River Falls journal. [volume] (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1872-2019, 1877-01-11
Marie Antoinette.


Such was Marie Antoinette in the
flower of her youth, while she basked
in the Summer sun of life before the
tempest gathered in darkness around
her. She had some amiable and good
qualities her intellect, had it been
properly trained, was above the ordln-
airy level of her sex; she was not in
capable of firm resolves, and we dis
credit what a thousand slanderous
tongues have said of her good name
and her conjugal faith. But she was,
not the less that unpleasing contrast,
fair woman with little discretion;
and, while with a disposition almost
untutored, she was impetuous and
light in thought and act, nature had
made her some what imperious and
hard, fond of self-indulgence and
eager for power, Sent, as she was,
from Vienna while still child, placed
in the perilous sphere of Versailles,
and with the associations that sur
rounded her life, it is not surprising
that, with such character she should
have committed many and grieyous
errors that she should readily have
listened to Austrian counselS f; should
have launched giddily into wild extav-
agance, should have scorned old ways.
and become the centre of circle of
favorites and bad fatterers should
have fashioned to her will feeble
husband should have raShly meddled
with affairs of state. and have acted
recklessly in this position.
To Judge Marie AntoiOnette fairly,
even at this period of her career, we
must consider not only her essential
qualities, but the peculiarities of her
situation in France it is because they
have not done this that so many French
writers have been unjust to her and
when the examination has been right
ly made, we find in her, indeed, much
that is flawed and imperfect, many
blemishes that offend the sight, yet
much too, that is really pleasant and
attractive. Yet it is not strange that
this Inflated princess -should have
seemed almost prodigy of evil to the
thousands among the generation of
Frenchmen who had grown up to man.
hood in 1889. 1t was the singular mis-
fortune of Marie Ant0inette that she
made numerous and unrelenting ene-
opinion was formed and the reports
against her which spread from Yer
sailles, especially as her own conduct
gave color to them, were eagerly
caught up in the obSeTvant capital.and
thence penetrated far into the nation.
What must have been the feeling of
the better class of Frenchmen when
they heard that light and designing
woman was making France mere tool
of Austria, was keeping the King in a
state of bondage, had blighted the
hopes of the realm by dismissing Tur-
got! What must Marie Antoinette
have seemed in the eyes of those who,
week after week, read that her lovers
rioted on TIE public wealth, and that
her life was round of gilded sin, and
who could note how this fine lady made
herself superior, as it were, to royalty,
trailed its state through the mire with
gay inSolence, exposed its weaknesses
to the prying multitude
What must have been the thoughts
of the starving crowds which gathered
in the streets and ways of Paris, when
they were told that what would relieve
their misery was wasted by a crowned
harlot at Versailles; when they beheld
the Queen parading her state, indiffer-
ent apparently to their life of suffer-
ing +? We cannot wonder, therefore,
that Marie Antoinette should have
been a name of evil in France, even
before I790-93 and it is less strange,
perhaps, that ever since she has found
numerous censors in French opinion.
To those who have no part in the for
tunes of France, to whom her annals
are merely strange drama, the hero
ism of the woman in the hour of trial,
and her constancy in enduring afillc-
tion, may seem to efface her many
faults, and in their eyes a tragic and
cruel death may transform her into a
suffering martyr. But the French peo-
pie can not lightly forget the part
played by Marie Antoinette in what
was for them a crisis of fate; they
have rightly judged that she passionate
ly opposed the Revolution, even in its
Just changes they know that the very
virtues of which she gave proof made
her but more dangerous and power
full enemy. What, too, we will add,
would have been the verdict of history
on her had the Queen won the terrible
game she most certainly played-had
Holy Alliance of armed despots re-
stored the old monarchy by mere bru-
tai force; had Brunswick handed her
back Il crown amid the ruins and blood
of sacked capital!