Alpha Book

Within
the _bourgeoisie_ was the seed of revolution: they would one day in
their own interests overturn monarchy, nobility, the Church, the whole
social fabric. That was to be the death-knell of the old regime--the
annunciation of the nineteenth century.


CHAPTER VI
THE GROWTH OF ABSOLUTISM IN FRANCE AND THE STRUGGLE BETWEEN BOURBONS
AND HABSBURGS, 1589-1661

GROWTH OF ABSOLUTISM IN FRANCE: HENRY IV, RICHELIEU, AND MAZARIN
For the first time in many years France in 1598 was at peace. The Edict
of Nantes, which in that year accorded qualified religious toleration
to the Huguenots, removed the most serious danger to internal order,
and the treaty of Vervins, concluded in the same year with the king of
Spain, put an end to a long and exhausting foreign war. Henry IV was
now free to undertake the internal reformation of his country.
Sorry, indeed, was the plight of France at the close of the sixteenth
century. Protracted civil and foreign wars had produced their
inevitable consequences.


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