The Shadow of Great Britain

Chapter 935: Chapter 33: Welcome Contributions

What kind of person is Guizot?

Arthur initially thought Hugo would angrily criticize this historically criticized gentleman with a passionate attitude, but to his surprise, Hugo’s portrayal of Guizot seemed completely different from what the books described.

As a leader of French Romanticist literature, Hugo’s impression of Guizot was not only positive but rather favorable.

At least in Hugo’s view of 1833, Guizot was a downright gentleman.

Guizot’s maternal grandfather was a member of the Mountain Party during the Great Revolution period and had served as the head of Gaul Province, while his paternal grandfather had been an underground Priest of Calvinism. Both paternal and maternal relatives were highly intellectual.

But this didn’t mean Guizot’s childhood was pleasant; during the Great Revolution period, even these upper-class families were often in turmoil.

Guizot’s father was arrested by the Jacobin Party due to accusations of being a Girondist.

Guizot’s maternal grandfather, either for self-preservation or party prejudice, refused to intervene to save his son-in-law despite his daughter’s desperate pleas, instead, watching as he was sent to the Guillotine within his jurisdiction.

To escape these painful memories, Guizot’s mother then took him and his brother to live in Geneva, Switzerland. Here, Guizot not only learned many skills but also mastered multiple languages, including Latin, Greek, German, English, and Italian.

His misfortunate childhood and learning experience in Geneva ultimately shaped Guizot’s current political stance.

Compared to those extreme conservative Royalists, Guizot was a liberal.

And compared to those republican parties closer to the Jacobin Party, Guizot was a conservative.

Using the British perspective to examine Guizot, his stance should be somewhere between the Duke of Wellington and Sir Peel, as he was a Tory Party advocate of Monarchy.

For a French person, the most unfortunate stance was like Guizot’s.

He could only survive in the gap between republicans and Royalists, neither side would consider him as one of their own completely. Worse still, Guizot also did not advocate violent revolution, but rather preferred mild gradual reforms.

To France, such a country prone to pushing Cannons onto the streets, Guizot’s approach was akin to handing the noose around his neck to the republicans and Royalists.

But such a stance was not without any benefits. Since he returned to France in 1805, the 18-year-old Guizot quickly distinguished himself in the Parisian literary circle with his extensive knowledge, a book titled ”History of the Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire” made him a renowned historian throughout France.

Fang Dan, the principal of Sorbonne University in Paris, even personally invited Guizot to teach modern history at Sorbonne University, and at that time, Guizot was only a young man of just 25 years old.

If there was anything dissatisfying for Guizot who was thriving at age 25, it was that he loathed the Emperor Napoleon of the French Empire at that time. He never engaged in specific political activities, consistently maintaining the identity of a liberal, spending money to exempt himself from military service, avoiding the then fanatical military atmosphere, and refusing to sing praises for the Emperor.

And after Napoleon abdicated, Louis XVIII of the Bourbon Dynasty was crowned King in Paris, to win over the liberal literati at home at that time, Louis XVIII wisely promoted the groundless Guizot to the position of secretary of state, and subsequently appointed him as Home Secretary.

At this time, Guizot was still less than 30 years old when he entered the Cabinet.

Louis XVIII’s ideas were similar to Guizot’s; this king who cultivated liberal and enlightened tendencies from a young age was also a centrist.

He witnessed his brother Louis XVI being executed, his nephew Louis XVII dying in prison, and his niece Mary Therese’s tragic fate. The turbulent events during the Great Revolution period made Louis XVIII deeply convinced that France could not return to the old path of an Absolute Monarch.

During Guizot’s tenure in the Cabinet, he effectively executed the shared ideas between him and the King; on one hand, he affirmed many essential principles of the Great Revolution, such as equality before the law, freedom of religious belief, and freedom of the press and publication. He resolutely did not allow the revived aristocratic forces to counterattack the republicans. On the other hand, He opposed the radical liberals’ uncompromising stance toward Old Nobles.

But as mentioned before, even with Louis XVIII’s support, neither Louis XVIII himself could control the balance between the Royalists and republicans.

On February 13, 1820, Crown prince Duke of Berry was assassinated, and the balance was finally broken.

The Extreme Royalists took this opportunity to blame the liberals for the case, forcing Prime Minister Elie Decazes to resign, and replaced him with the extreme faction representative Earl Villerel to form a new Cabinet.

They promulgated laws favorable to the Nobility, strengthened control of public opinion, and the Church regained control of educational and cultural rights, black terror descended once again over the French skies.

Seeing he was unable to remedy the situation, Guizot took the initiative to resign and returned to the professorship at Sorbonne University in Paris.

Louis XVIII also could not intervene in the current situation; in his anger, this rare enlightened king of the Bourbon Dynasty finally fell terminally ill.

He watched as his brother Charles X became the new Crown prince, only able to curse in resentment before his death: ”Hmph! My brother might have difficulty dying on this bed.”