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Letter from Monsieur de Cros / (who was an embassador at the Treaty of Nimeguen and a resident at England in K. Charles the Second's reign) to the Lord –; being an answer to Sir Wm. Temple's memoirs concerning what passed from the year 1672 until the year 1679
A LETTER from Mons. de Cros, &c
My Lord,
I have been informed of the Calumnies that Sir W. T. hath caused to be Printed against me. I know very well that Sir W. is of great Worth, and deserves well; and that he hath been a long time employed, and that too upon important occasions; but I am as certain, that he had but a small share in the Secrecy of the late King Charles's Designs in the greatest part of the Affairs, for which he was employed, from 72, till 79, which is the main Subject of his Work.
This Consideration alone might not perhaps have given me the curiosity, or at least, any great earnestness to read his Memoirs; and I might have very well judged that I could draw from them no sufficient light and insight for the discovery of so many Intrigues.
Nay besides, I might have doubted whether or no these Memoirs might not have been his own Panegyrick upon himself, and the diminution and undervaluing of the real Worth and Glory of several Persons of Quality, and distinguished by their Merit; whose Fortune and Reputation Sir W. T. hath so much envied: for I am particularly acquainted with Sir W's Pride. He looks upon himself to have the greatest Reach, to be the wisest and ablest Politician of his Time; and a man may perceive abundance of Satyrical Reflexions scattered here and there in his Work against most illustrious Persons, and that he hath stuffed his Memoirs with his own Praise, and the fond over-weening Opinion he hath of himself.
Without doubt this is quite different from that Sincerity and Modesty which reigns throughout the Memoirs of Villeroy, in the Negotiations and Transactions of Jeanin, in the Letters of Card. Dossat, those mighty and truly eminent Persons, esteemed as such by the greatest Princes of their Age; and even still are to this day, by the ablest Politicians, with much more Justice and Glory than Sir W's Book-Seller stiles him, One of the Greatest Men of this Age. It had been Sir W's duty to have regulated himself according to their most excellent Pattern.
I shall at present only quote one Passage, which I accidentally light on at the first opening his Book, whereby one may easily guess at the greatness of his presumption; in a short time, My Lord, I shall give you occasion to observe many others. The Negotiations, saith he, that I managed and transacted at the Hague, at Brussels, at Aix la Chapelle, which saved Flanders from the French Churches, in 68. made People believe I had some Credit and Reputation amongst the Spaniards, as well as in Holland.
'Twas a Piece of strange Ingratitude of the Hollanders and Spaniards, as well as of his own dear Country-men, so much concern'd for the preservation of Flanders, not to rear him a Statue, which, he saith, some-where else, Mr. Godolphin had promised him. Could Sir. W. T. have done any thing to deserve it more; or was there any thing more worthy of Triumph than to have preserved Flanders, a Country so important to the Spaniard, and the only Bulwark of Holland and England? But Sir W. was apt to believe he could not find any one who was better able to hammer out his own Glory than himself; and he flattered himself with the Opinion that he should erect himself as many Statues, as there are places in his Memoirs, crouded with intolerable and ridiculous Vain-glory.
It was not the Negotiations, my Lord, that Sir W. tells us he managed at the Hague, Brussels, and at Aix la Chappelle, which saved Flanders from the hands of the French, in 1668. The French published that they were beholding to the most Christian Kings Moderation for that Peace; who was willing to put a stop to the progress and course of his victorious Arms. But the truth of it is, they most justly ascribed all the Merit, and all the Glory of the Peace, and of the Triple League, to the generous resolution and stedfastness of the States-General. They made use, upon this occasion, of a Minister of State far beyond Sir W. in Prudence, Experience, and Capacity, one, who was in the Opinion even of his Enemies, the most able Manager of Affairs of his Age.
I shall not undertake, my Lord, in this place, strictly to examine Sir W. Temple's Memoirs: I will do it shortly if God spare me with Life; nay, and I promise you a Volume of Remarks, at least, as large as his Book.
If, like him, I had the Vanity to procure the printing of Memoirs, during my life-time, I could now have a fair pretence so to do, and without all question I should publish more just and solid ones than his are. Not, that I have the presumption to judge my self more capable to do it; but, in several places he relates some things falsly, whereof I am much better informed. The only Hero of my piece shall be Truth, without Complaisance or Flattery; without Passion, no not so much as against him: So that I shall do him the satisfaction and kindness to instruct him better, even touching divers Matters, which he performed and executed, without knowing so much as the reason why he was made to act so.
It is not likewise, because I have been one of the Council of the King his Master; yet I have had the Happiness, during some Years, to partake in the Confidence of a Minister of State, who was in several important, weighty Occasions, as it were the Primum Mobile of that Conduct and Management that surprized all the World. You know, my Lord, what Credit he had, and of what nature his Intelligences were. Sir W. may well imagine that I did not ill improve this able Ministers Confidence, when Sir W. tells us, That I had wholly devoted my self to him.
Men are not ignorant likewise, that oftentimes I have had some access to the King's Ministers of State, and even near to the King himself,; it did more especially appear, in the business for which I took my Journey to Nimeguen; and it would be a great shame that a Man more cunning and subtil than them all, according to the King's own testimony, as Sir W. relates it, should not have had (considering so much freedom of access and easiness) the address and cunning to dive into the most hidden Springs of Deliberations and Resolutions, wherein the Swede and my Master had so great an Interest.
Be therefore assured, my Lord, that after my Death, nay perhaps, whilst I am alive, if need require, and if I be obliged thereto, there will appear some Memoirs, which will divulge some Matters the truth whereof is still so carefully concealed, Sir W. doth ingeniously confess that hitherto he was ignorant of them; He, who hath so much quickness of Penetration, and seems to make us believe that he was the King his Master's Confident.
You your self, my Lord, have often urged me to acquaint you with such important Secrets, and of such great Consequence; and altho' I could not possibly refuse, upon the account of that honour you do me to afford me any share in your Favours, to let you have a glympse of one part of what pass'd in one of the most important Negotiations of that time; yet you had so much Generosity as not to take the advantage of it you might have done, to the infallible ruine, as was believed, of a Minister whom you take for one of your greatest Enemies; yet on this occasion one could not well lay any thing to his charge, besides his blind obedience to the Will of his Master.
The Truth of it is, I am not obliged to have the same Considerations that with held me at that time, but yet I preserve a profound respect for the Memory of the late King, and also a great respect for some Persons, who are even at this time of the day so much concerned, that I should hold my tongue, if it were not for that reason, it would be a very easie matter for me, to make appear without any more adoe, how basely Sir W. is mistaken in what he delivers concerning divers Negotiations of England; and especially concerning my Journey to Nimeguen.
My Design is not at all, my Lord, to write you a Letter full of Invectives against Sir W. I shall not descend to the Particulars of his Behaviour, and shall tell you no more of them at present, than what is needful to let your self and every body else judge that I have means in my hand to be revenged for the Injury he hath done me.
