Talleyrand Sentence Examples

Dumont was a Genevese exile, and an old friend of Romilly's, who willingly prepared for him those famous addresses which Mirabeau used to make the Assembly pass by sudden bursts'of eloquent declamation; Claviere helped him in finance, and not only worked out his figures, but even wrote his financial discourses; Lamourette wrote the speeches on the civil constitution of the clergy; Reybaz not only wrote for him his famous speeches on the assignats, the organization of the national guard, and others, which Mirabeau read word for word at the tribune, but even the posthumous speech on succession to the estates of intestates, which Talleyrand read in the Assembly as the last work of his dead friend.

If my country needs me, if there are additions to the number of those who share the opinion of Talleyrand, Sieyes and Roederer, that war will break out again and that it will be unsuccessful for France, I will return, more sure of the feeling of the nation."

Talleyrand, Roederer, Cambaceres and Real were among his special confidants, his brothers Joseph and Lucien also giving useful advice.

They were Talleyrand, Foreign Affairs; Berthier, War; Abrial, Justice; Lucien Bonaparte, Interior; Gaudin, Finance; Forfait, Navy and Colonies.

Despite the urgent efforts of Joseph Bonaparte and Talleyrand to bend the First Consul, he refused to listen to these proposals.

Next came dignities of a slightly lower rank, such as those of grand almoner (Fesch), grand marshal of the palace (Duroc), grand chamberlain (Talleyrand), grand master of the horse (Caulaincourt), grand huntsman (Berthier), grand master of ceremonies (Segur).

A little later the emperor bestowed the two papal enclaves of Benevento and Ponte-Corvo on Talleyrand and Bernadotte respectively, an act which emphasized the hostility which had been growing between Napoleon and the papacy.

On returning from Tilsit to Paris he relieved Talleyrand of the ministry of foreign affairs, softening the fall by creating him a grand dignitary of the empire.

These facts, and not, as has often been assumed, the treachery of Talleyrand, decided Alexander to assume at Erfurt an attitude of jealous reserve.

His anxiety was increased by news of sinister import respecting frequent interviews between those former rivals, Talleyrand and Fouche, in which Murat was said to be concerned.

Convoked by Talleyrand on the 1st of April, it pronounced the word abdication on the morrow.

Clearly it was time to safeguard what remained; and that could best be done under Talleyrand's shield of legitimacy.

Talleyrand (Prince de Benevento), Lettres inedites a Napoleon, 1800-1809 (Paris, 1889).

The insults of Talleyrand, and his shameless attempts to extort bribes from the American commissioners, roused the deep anger of the people against France.

In 1805 a difference of opinion with Talleyrand on the question of the Austrian alliance, which Hauterive favoured, led to his withdrawal from the political side of the ministry of foreign affairs, and he was appointed keeper of the archives of the same department.

The probability of a French invasion in August was increased by the renewal of the war in May, Emmet's brother Thomas being then in Paris in communication with Talleyrand and Bonaparte.

In 1793, however, she made a visit of some length to England, and established herself at Mickleham in Surrey as the centre of the Moderate Liberal emigrants - Talleyrand, Narbonne, Jaucourt and others.

His governor, Marshal D'Ornano, was arrested by Richelieu's orders, and then his confidant, Henri de Talleyrand, marquis de Chalais and Vendome, the natural sons of Henry IV.

He had from the first been on intimate terms with Talleyrand, and retired from the public service when the latter fell out of the emperor's favour.

In 1814 he was a member of the provisional government by whom the Bourbons were recalled, and he attended the congress of Vienna, with Talleyrand, as minister plenipotentiary.

He notes that at the congress of Vienna he received 22,000 florins through Talleyrand from Louis XVIII., while Castlereagh gave him £600, accompanied by les plus folks and his diary is full of such entries.

At last, through Fouche and Talleyrand, he got the appointment of consul at Alicante, and remained there until he lost the sight of one eye from yellow fever.

When a French adventurer calling himself Guillet de la Gevrilliere, whom Fox at first "did the honour to take for a spy," came to him with a scheme for the murder of Napoleon, he sent a warning on the 10th of February to Talleyrand.

He accompanied Talleyrand on his mission to England, returning to France after the execution of Louis XVI.

This programme was adopted by the clergy of his diocese as their cahier, or book of instructions to their representative at the States General, namely Talleyrand himself.

The course of events harmonized with the anticlerical views of Talleyrand, and he gradually loosened the ties that bound him to the church.

When the Assembly sought to impose on its members an oath of obedience to the new decree, Talleyrand and three other bishops complied out of the thirty who had seats in the Assembly.

The others, followed by the greater number of the clergy throughout France, refused, and thenceforth looked on Talleyrand as a schismatic. He did not long continue to officiate, as many of the so-called "constitutional" clergy did; for, on the 21st of January 1791, he resigned the see of Autun, and in the month of March was placed under the ban of the church by the pope.

Talleyrand's reputation for immorality, however, was as marked as that of Mirabeau.

In the closing days of the first or Constituent Assembly, Talleyrand set forth (loth of September 1791) his ideas on national education.

Debarred from election to the second National Assembly (known as the Legislative) by the self-denying ordinance passed by the "constituents," Talleyrand, at the close of 1791, sought to enter the sphere of diplomacy for which his mental qualities and his clerical training furnished him with an admirable equipment.

For that purpose Delessart sent Talleyrand, well known for his Anglophil tendencies, to London, but in the unofficial or semiofficial capacity which was rendered necessary by the decree of the Constituent Assembly referred to above.

Talleyrand arrived in London on the 24th of January 1792, and found public opinion so far friendly that he wrote off to Paris, "Believe me, a rapprochement with England is no chimera."

After some delay the British government decided to return no definite answer to this proposal, a result due, as Talleyrand thought, to the Gallophobe views of King George and of the ministers Camden and Thurlow.

Talleyrand, however, was convinced that Great Britain would not intervene against France unless the latter attacked the Dutch Netherlands.

The exMarquis Chauvelin was appointed, with Talleyrand as adviser.

After Talleyrand's return to Paris early in July (probably in order to sound the situation there) matters went from bad to worse.

The overthrow of the monarchy on the 10th of August and the September massacres rendered hopeless all attempts at an entente cordiale between the two peoples; and the provocative actions of Chauvelin, undertaken in order to curry favour with the extremists now in power at Paris, undid all the good accomplished by the tact and moderation of Talleyrand.

Talleyrand was expelled from British soil and made his way to the United States.

The practical statesmanship contained in these papers raised Talleyrand in public estimation; and, thanks to the efforts above named, he gained the post of foreign minister, entering on his duties in July 1797.

Talleyrand, despite the weakness of his own position (he was as yet little more than the chief clerk of his department), soon came to a good understanding with the general, and secretly expressed to him his satisfaction at the terms which the latter dictated at Campo Formio (17th of October 1797).

The coup d'etat of Fructidor (September 1797) had perpetuated the Directory and led to the exclusion of the two "moderate" members, Carnot and Barthelemy; but Talleyrand saw that power belonged really to the general who had brought about the coup d'etat in favour of the Jacobinical Directors headed by Barras.

The investigations of the most recent of Talleyrand's biographers tend to show that the charges made against him of trafficking with the envoys have been overdrawn; but all his apologists admit that irregularities occurred.

Talleyrand refused to clear himself of the charges made against him as his friends (especially Madame de Stael) urged him to do; and the incident probably told against his chances of admission into the Directory, which were discussed in the summer of 1798.

Talleyrand's share in the actual events of the 18th, 19th Brumaire (9th, 10th of November) 1799 was limited to certain dealings with Barras on the former of those days.

With the more critical and exciting events of the 19th of Brumaire at St Cloud Talleyrand had no direct connexion; but he had made all his preparations for flight in case the blow failed.

In the great work of reconstruction of France now begun by the First Consul, Talleyrand played no unimportant part.

He had a hand in the pacific overtures which Bonaparte, early in the year 1800, sent to the court of London; and, whatever may have been the motives of the First Consul in sending them, it is certain that Talleyrand regretted their failure.

After the battle of Marengo an Austrian envoy had come to Paris in response to a proposal of Bonaparte, and Talleyrand persuaded him to sign terms of peace.

As regards French affairs, Talleyrand used his influence to help on the repeal of the vexatious laws against emigres, nonjuring priests, and the royalists of the west.

At the end of June 1802 the pope removed Talleyrand from the ban of excommunication and allowed him to revert to the secular state.

During the meeting of Italian notables at Lyons early in 1802 Talleyrand was serviceable in manipulating affairs in the way desired by Bonaparte, and it is known that the foreign minister suggested to them the desirability of appointing Bonaparte president of the Cisalpine Republic, which was thenceforth to be called the Italian Republic. In the negotiations for peace with England which went on at Amiens during the winter of 1801-2 Talleyrand had no direct share, these (like those at Luneville) being transacted by Napoleon's eldest brother, Joseph Bonaparte (q.v.).

This unscrupulous proceeding, known as the Secularizations (February 1803), was carried out largely on lines laid down by Bonaparte and Talleyrand; and the latter is known to have made large sums of money by trafficking with the claimants of church lands.

While helping to establish French supremacy in neighbouring states and assisting Bonaparte in securing the title of First Consul for life, Talleyrand sought all means of securing the permanent welfare of France.

This is especially so in the case of the execution of the duc d'Enghien (March 1804), which Talleyrand disapproved.

On the assumption of the imperial title by Napoleon in May 1804, Talleyrand became grand chamberlain of the empire, and received close on 500,000 francs a year.

In the bargainings which accompanied this last event Talleyrand is believed to have reaped a rich harvest from the German princes most nearly concerned.

In the negotiations with England which went on in the summer of 1806 Talleyrand had not a free hand; they came to nought, as did those with Russia which had led up to the signature of a Franco-Russian treaty at Paris by d'Oubril which was at once disavowed by the tsar.

Talleyrand had a hand only in the later developments of these negotiations; and it has been shown that he cannot have been the means of revealing to the British government the secret arrangements made at Tilsit between France and Russia, though his private enemies, among them Fouche, have charged him with acting as traitor in this affair.

Talleyrand had long been weary of serving a master whose policy he more and more disapproved, and after the return from Tilsit to Paris he resigned office.

There Talleyrand secretly advised that potentate not to join Napoleon in putting pressure on Austria in the way desired by the French emperor; but it is well known that Alexander was of that opinion before Talleyrand tendered the advice.

Talleyrand disapproved of the Spanish policy of Napoleon which culminated at Bayonne in May 1808; and the stories to the contrary may in all probability be dismissed as idle rumours.

It is also hard to believe the statement in the Talleyrand Memoirs that the ex-foreign minister urged Napoleon to occupy Catalonia until a maritime peace could be arranged with England.

On Talleyrand now fell the disagreeable task of entertaining at his new mansion at Valencay, in Touraine, the Spanish princes virtually kidnapped at Bayonne by the emperor.

At the close of 1808, while Napoleon was in Spain, Talleyrand entered into certain relations with his former rival Fouche (q.v.), which aroused the solicitude of the emperor and hastened his return to Paris.

He subjected Talleyrand to violent reproaches, which the ex-minister bore with his usual ironical calm.

After the Danubian campaign of 1809 and the divorce of Josephine, Talleyrand used the influence which he still possessed in the imperial council on behalf of the choice of an Austrian consort for his master, for, like Metternich (who is said first to have mooted the proposal), he saw that this would safeguard the interests of the Habsburgs, whose influence he felt to be essential to the welfare of Europe.

Talleyrand listened unmoved, but afterwards sent in his resignation of his seat on the council.

These arguments, reinforced by those of the royalist agent de Vitrolles, convinced the tsar; and Talleyrand, on the 1st of April, convened the French senate (only 64 members out of 1 4 0 attended), and that body pronounced that Napoleon had forfeited the crown.

The next effort of Talleyrand was to screen France under the principle of legitimacy and to prevent the scheme of partition on which several of the German statesmen were bent.

At the congress of Vienna (1814-15) for the settlement of European affairs, Talleyrand, as the representative of the restored house of Bourbon in France, managed adroitly to break up the league of the Powers (framed at Chaumont in February 1814) and assisted in forming a secret alliance between England, Austria and France in order to prevent the complete absorption of Poland by Russia and of Saxony by Prussia.

Everything was brought into a state of uncertainty once more by the escape of Napoleon from Elba; but the events of the Hundred Days, in which Talleyrand had no share - he remained at Vienna until the Toth of June - brought in the Bourbons once more; and Talleyrand's plea for a magnanimous treatment of France under Louis XVIII.

The new sovereign offered him the portfolio for foreign affairs; but Talleyrand signified his preference for the embassy in London.

Under all the inconsistencies of Talleyrand's career there lies an aim as steadily consistent as that which inspired his contemporary, Lafayette.

Talleyrand believed that he served those causes best by remaining in office whenever possible, and by guiding or moderating the actions of his chiefs.

The latter revised them with care, and added to them other pieces emanating from Talleyrand.

They were not to be published until after the lapse of thirty years from the time of Talleyrand's death.

The Talleyrand Memoires were edited by the duc de Broglie in 5 vols.

Pallain, Talleyrand et Louis XVIII.

France sent Prince Talleyrand to conduct her difficult affairs.

This was the situation which Talleyrand had to face when he arrived on the 24th of September.

Talleyrand had, however, already shaken the position of the allies.

It was Talleyrand's opportunity.

Talleyrand had constantly defended the rights of France's old ally Saxony in the name of the principle which his master Louis XVIII.

The reluctant consent of the British cabinet was obtained and Talleyrand was approached as an equal.

Talleyrand had rescued France from its humiliating position, and set it as an equal by the side of the allies.

It must be admitted that, in pursuance of his "system," Gertz displayed a genius for diplomacy which would have done honour to a Metternich or a Talleyrand.

He acquired his knowledge of the men and intrigues of the Napoleonic epoch from Talleyrand.

Kensington Square, however, lying south of High Street in the vicinity of St Mary Abbots church, still preserves some of its picturesque houses, nearly all of which were formerly inhabited by those attached to the court; it numbered among its residents Addison, Talleyrand, John Stuart Mill, and Green the historian.

In the course of his intellectual development, he came successively under the influence of Kant, Schelling and Hegel, and on account of the different phases through which he passed he was called the Talleyrand of German thought.

In 1797, however, the attention of Talleyrand, then minister of foreign affairs, was called to his exceptional abilities by General Huet, and he was attached to the diplomatic service.

Gerry, although despairing of any good results, remained in Paris for some time in the vain hope that Talleyrand might offer to a known friend of France terms that had been refused to envoys whose anti-French views were more than suspected.

The real direction of foreign affairs, however, lay less in his hands than in those of Talleyrand, who had gone to London as the ambassador of the new king.

Charles de Flahaut was generally recognized to be the offspring of his mother's liaison with Talleyrand, with whom he was closely connected throughout his life.

He was saved from exile by Talleyrand's influence, but was placed under police surveillance.

He remained intimately associated with Talleyrand's policy, and was, for a short time in 1831, ambassador at Berlin.

Talleyrand introduced him to Napoleon, who arranged for him to establish in Paris an English tri-weekly, the Argus, which was to review English affairs from the French point of view.

On the appointment of a successor to Count Tolstoy he retired to St Petersburg, but returned to Paris early in 1810 charged with a commission from Speranski to Talleyrand and the marquis de Caulaincourt, formerly ambassador in St Petersburg, both of whom were hostile to Napoleon's policy of aggression.

His former relations with Talleyrand facilitated negotiations in Paris, and his great influence with the emperor was used in favour of the restoration of the Bourbons, and, after Waterloo, against the imposition of a ruinous war indemnity on France.

The direction of affairs having passed into the hands of Talleyrand and his associates, Daunou turned once more to literature, but in 1 798 he was sent to Rome to organize the republic there, and again, almost against his will, he lent his aid to Napoleon in the preparation of the constitution of the year VIII.

On the 10th of October 1789 Talleyrand, bishop of Autun, proposed Con fisca- that the Assembly should take possession of the lands tion of of the church.

Talleyrand celebrated Mass, and Lafayette was the first to swear fidelity to the Assembly and the nation.

As this would awaken English jealousy, he sent Talleyrand to London with assurances that, if victorious, the French would annex no territory.

Those of Talleyrand are singularly barren, the result, no doubt, of deliberate suppression.

Wolfe Tone, who a few months before had patronizingly described him to Talleyrand as "a respectable old man whose patriotism has been known for thirty years," was now disgusted by the lying braggadocio with which Tandy persuaded the French authorities that he was a personage of great wealth and influence in Ireland, at whose appearance 30,000 men would rise in arms. Tandy was not, however, lacking in courage.

The defection of the military and civil aristocracy, which brought about Napoleons abdication, the refusal of a regency, and the failure of Bernadotte, who wished to resuscitate the Consulate, enabled Talleyrand, vicepresident of the senate and desirous of power, to persuade the Allies to accept the Bourbon solution of the difficulty.

He chose Paris, and in spite of the difficulties which he had to encounter before he could enter into possession, was consecrated on the 27th of March 1791 by eight bishops, including Talleyrand.

In March 1814 the Allies entered Paris, and thanks to Talleyrand's negotiations the restoration of the Bourbons was effected, Louis XVIII.

He was forced to retain Talleyrand and Fouche in his first ministry, but took the first opportunity of ridding himself of them when the elections of 1815 assured him of a strong royalist majority in the chamber (the chambre introuvable, a name given it by Louis himself).

Talleyrand, personally impressed when in America with Hamilton's brilliant qualities, declared that he had the power of divining without reasoning, and compared him to Fox and Napoleon because he had " devine l'Europe."

The deputies having been dazzled by I tes anc reviews, Talleyrand and Marescalchi, ministers of foreign affain at Paris and Milan, plied them with hints as to the course to th followed by the consulta; and, despite the rage of the mon democratic of their number, everything corresponded to thi wishes of the First Consul.

He took no heed of the warnings uttered by those sage counsellors, Cambaceres and Talleyrand, against an invasion of Russia, while "the Spanish ulcer" was sapping the strength of the empire at the other extremity.

For a brilliantly satirical but not wholly fair reference to the part then played by Talleyrand, the reader should consult Carlyle's French Revolution, vol.

Owing to certain indiscretions of Chauvelin and the growing unpopularity of the French in England (especially after the disgraceful day of the 10th of June at the Tuileries), the mission was a failure; but Talleyrand had had some share in confirming Pitt in his policy of neutrality, even despite Prussia's overtures for an alliance against France.

The occupation of Rome and of Switzerland by the French troops and the events of Bonaparte's Egyptian expedition (see Napoleon I.) brought about a renewal of war on the continent, but with these new developments Talleyrand had little or no connexion.

The general and the diplomatist soon came to an understanding, and Talleyrand tactfully brought about the alliance between Bonaparte and Sieyes (q.v.) (then the most influential of the five Directors) which paved the way for the coup d'etat of Brumaire (see French Revolution and Napoleon I.).

By what means Talleyrand brought him to do so, whether by persuasion, threats or bribes, is not known; but on that afternoon Barras left Paris under an escort of soldiers.

Talleyrand had rarely succeeded in bending the will of the First Consul.

He refused, indeed, Talleyrand's offer of a place in his ministry, pleading his long absence from France and ignorance of its conditions; but after Talleyrand's retirement he consented to follow him as prime minister, though - as he himself said - he did not know the face of one of his colleagues.

The discourteous and underhanded treatment of this embassy by Talleyrand and his agents., who attempted to obtain their ends by bribery, threats and duplicity, resulted in the speedy retirement of Marshall and Pinckney.

But the universal historian Gervinus, refuting this opinion of the specialist historian, tries to prove that the campaign of 1813 and the restoration of the Bourbons were due to other things beside Alexander's will--such as the activity of Stein, Metternich, Madame de Stael, Talleyrand, Fichte, Chateaubriand, and others.

He let it be known that he strongly disapproved of their proposal to elect Count Melzi, the Italian statesman most suitable for the post; and a hint given by Talleyrand showed the reason for his disapproval.

By direction of Talleyrand, then minister for foreign affairs, the French commissary repaired in state to the old man's residence in Turin, to congratulate him on the merits of his son, whom they declared "to have done honour to mankind by his genius, and whom Piedmont was proud to have produced, and France to possess."