Tea at Trianon: Madame Elisabeth and the Revolution

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Thursday, April 26, 2012

Madame Elisabeth and the Revolution

Madame Elisabeth of France provides milk for poor children at her estate at Montreuil

From Nobility:

The correspondence is full of pious and exalted thoughts. One might say that the sister of Louis XVI already foresaw the approaching tempests, and was asking Heaven for strength to face them, with alarm. In many of the letters there is a sort of anticipation of her heroic endurance. It is easy to see that this young girl was no ordinary person; that deep in her heart lay hidden treasures of resignation, piety, and courage. Touching reflections, wise counsels, Christian meditations, abound especially in her letters to Madame Marie de Causans….

February 9, 1786, she wrote to Madame Marie de Causans: “Let us turn simply to God. May faith be given us to see that he never abandons his children! If we feel too weak for his service, if we are discouraged, let us not rely on ourselves alone; let us say to him: ‘Thou, O God, seest all my heart; it is wholly Thine. I do not know whether Thou acceptest all the sacrifices which I make and intend; but Thy Son died in atonement for my faults. Look upon Him, O God, and even on the Cross, where our cruelty and sins fastened Him; hear Him who intercedes for us, who consoled the penitent thief. I would imitate him, O God, and recognize Thy sovereign power, and believe that, whatever may befall me, Thou wilt not desert me.” Madame Elisabeth ascended the scaffold; but as she climbed the steps, the God of mercy did not desert her, and death was rather an entrance into glory than a punishment….(Read entire post.)

lara77 said...: When one thinks of the foreign princes who would have wanted Princess Elizabeth as their wife; yet she stayed close to her brother and sister in law. It is as if God decided she would be the guardian angel for the King and Queen throughout the travail of the revolution. What an amazing woman; such strength of faith and character. I bet in all the many republics that followed the French Monarchy not one ever produced the class or breeding of a Princess Elizabeth. In her was the longevity and breeding that spoke to the world that the Royal Family of France was France. They would never shirk their responsibility to God and people.; April 30, 2012 at 10:11:00 AM EDT