to_, quae vitia _religionis ac
sanctimoniae simulatione obtegere conabatur_." Prosperi Santacrucii de
Civilibus Galliae dissensionibus commentariorum libri tres (Martene et
Durand Amplissima Collectio), v. 1438. After these delineations of his
character by not unfriendly pens, it is scarcely surprising that a
caustic contemporary pamphlet--_Le livre des marchands_ (1565)--should
describe him as "ce cardinal si avare, et si ambitieux de nature, que
l'avarice et l'ambition mise dedans des balances, elles demeureroyent
egalles entre deux fers." (Ed. Pantheon, p. 423.)]

[Footnote 547: "Non credo fosse in quel regno desiderata alcuna cosa piu
che la sua morte." Relaz. di Gio. Michiel, Tommaseo, i. 440. I have
united the accounts of two ambassadors, Soranzo and Michiel, the first
belonging to 1558, the other to 1561. Both are contained in Tommaseo's
edit. of the Relations Venitiens.]

[Footnote 548: Werke, viii. 141.]

[Footnote 549: Brantome, Oeuvres (Ed. of Fr. Hist. Soc.), iv. 275,
etc.]

[Footnote 550: "Et seroit a desirer que ceste femme et le cardinal
n'eussent jamais este; car ces deux seuls out este les flamesches de nos
malheurs." De l'Aubespine, iii. 286. The reader will, after this, make
little account of the extravagant panegyric by the Father Alby (inserted
by Migne in his Dict. des Card., s. v. Lorraine); yet he may be amused
at the precise contradiction between the estimate of the cardinal's
political services made by this ecclesiastic and that of the practical
statesman given above. He seems to the priest born for the good of
others: "ayant pour cela merite de la posterite toutes les louanges d'un
homme ne pour le bien des autres, et le titre meme de cardinal de
France, qui lui fut donne par quelques ecrivains de son temps." This
blundering eulogist makes him to have been assigned by Francis I. as
counsellor of his son.]

[Footnote 551: Brantome, Hommes illustres (Oeuvres, viii. 63).]

[Footnote 552: Mem. de Vieilleville, i. 179.]

[Footnote 553: La Planche, 205.]

[Footnote 554: Mem. de Vieilleville, i. 186-189.]

[Footnote 555: "Pour du tout s'asseurer, ils se jetterent du
commencement au party de ceste femme; et specialement le cardinal, _qui
estoit des plus parfaicts en l'art de courtiser_. Comme tel _il se
gehenna_ tellement par l'espace de pres de deux ans, que ne tenant point
de table pour sa personne, _il disnoit a la table de Madame_; ainsi
estoit-elle appellee par la Royne mesme." L'Aubes