Alpha Book

Turenne,
the best general, had been killed late in the contest, and Conde, on
account of ill health, was obliged to withdraw from active service.
Yet at the darker side of the picture, the Grand Monarch refused to
look. He was puffed up with pride by his successes in war and
diplomacy. Like many another vain, ambitious ruler, he felt that what
economic grievances or social discontent might exist within his country
could readily be forgotten or obscured in a blaze of foreign glory--in
the splendor of ambassadors, the glint and din of arms, the grim
shedding of human blood. Having picked the sanguinary path, and at
first found pleasure therein, the Grand Monarch pursued it to an end
bitter for his family and tragic for his people.
[Sidenote: The "Chambers of Reunion" and Further French Annexations]
No sooner was the Dutch War concluded than Louis XIV set out by a
policy of trickery and diplomacy further to augment the French
territories. The cessions, which the treaties of Westphalia and
Nijmwegen guaranteed to France, had been made "with their
dependencies.


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