Louis XIV by Josephine Wilkinson

Author:Josephine Wilkinson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pegasus Books
Published: 2018-12-24T00:00:00+00:00

Indeed, as La Fare wrote, “We had never dreamt of taking Holland, but to chastise her: a bad idea, for we impressed fear and hatred in the hearts of men who, in their own interests, were our natural allies.” Moreover, France had caused the Dutch to throw themselves under the influence of a leader who had made them warlike and a republic, transforming a state that could never have been a danger to them into one of their most potent enemies, “without whom all the others would not be capable of resisting us.”64

The ink on the treaty of Nijmegen was barely dry when Orange graphically demonstrated his scorn for it. He attacked the maréchal de Luxembourg, who had broken off the siege of Mons the moment he heard of the peace. A long and bloody battle ensued, “which cost the lives of two thousand French and as many of the enemy.” Louis was now

at the height of his greatness. Victorious since he had begun to reign, having besieged no place which he had not taken, superior in every way to his united enemies, for six years the terror of Europe and at last her arbiter and peacemaker, he now added Franche-Comté, Dunkirk, and one-half of Flanders to his possessions; moreover, and he might well count this the greatest of his advantages, he was the king of a nation happy in itself and the model of all others.65

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