FRENCH MEMOIRS. PHILIP DE COMMINES. VOL. I. SIR WALTER SCOTT, who founded one of his best novels [Quentin Durward] upon the MEMOIRS OF PHILIP DE COMMINES, calls him “one of the most profound statesmen, and certainly the best historian of his age;” and quoting Ronsard, the poet, adds, “that he was the first to show the lustre which valour and noble blood derived from being united with learning.”—_See a Note to Quentin Durward._ “Above all men,” says Dryden, “in this kind of writing, may be accounted the plain, sincere, unaffected, and most instructive PHILIP DE COMMINES. I am sorry I cannot find in our own nation (though it has produced some commendable historians) any worthy to be ranked with him.” LONDON: A. and G. A. SPOTTISWOODE, New-street-Square. [Illustration: _Charles the Bold._ _Soutman._ _Hinchliff._] THE MEMOIRS OF PHILIP DE COMMINES, LORD OF ARGENTON: CONTAINING THE HISTORIES OF LOUIS XI. AND CHARLES VIII., KINGS OF FRANCE AND OF CHARLES THE BOLD, DUKE OF BURGUNDY. TO WHICH IS ADDED, THE SCANDALOUS CHRONICLE, OR SECRET HISTORY OF LOUIS XI., BY JEAN DE TROYES. EDITED WITH LIFE AND NOTES, BY ANDREW R. SCOBLE, ESQ. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON: HENRY G. BOHN, YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN. 1855. INTRODUCTION. Philip de Commines has been called the Father of Modern History. “His Memoirs,” says Mr. Hallam, “almost make an epoch in historical literature. He is the first modern writer who in any degree has displayed sagacity in reasoning on the characters of men and the consequences of their actions, or who has been able to generalise his observations by comparison and reflection.” This ability to discuss motives as well as events renders him far superior to Froissart, who, on the other hand, greatly exceeds him in picturesqueness of style and fertility of invention. Froissart merely described notable occurrences; Commines delineated great men. “The one,” says Sir James Stephen, “had contemplated the strife of kings and kingdoms as a spectator of the Isthmian Games may have gazed at that heart-stirring spectacle. The other had watched the schemes of statesmen and the conflict of nations, with some approach to that judicial serenity which we ascribe to a member of the Amphictyonic Council.” If Froissart may be termed the Livy of France, she had her Tacitus in Commines.