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Untitled Article
© f the court—on the superstition of a bigot , the freaks of a fool , or the cruelty of a tyrant—the lives and properties of the millions ^ ho were permitted to exist in that first of continental countries might absolutely depend . Nor was this all 5 courtiers , favourites , mistresses , could immure in dungeons , and secretly send into
hopeless captivity and even solitary confinement those who displeased them ; and the petty , but galling and sometimes tragical , tyrannies of the feudal lords spread their heart-withering influences everywhere . As late as in the seventeenth century , Urban Grandeur was burned at Loudon , on the borders of Touraine , at the instigation of the Cardinal Richelieu , seignior thereof , who
suspected him of being the author of a libel on his eminence , but Of which there being no proof , the arch-priest had him indicted for practising magic , and the depositions of the devils Ashtaroth , Asmodaeus , and others , as well as those of the order of seraphims , thrones , and principalities , were actually received in evidence against this unfortunate victim of clerical wrath * ! During the
whole reign of Louis XV . lettres de cachet were sold , with blanks to be filled up at the pleasure of the purchaser ; who was thus enabled , in the gratification of private revenge , to tear a man from the bosom of his family , and bury him in a dungeon , where he might live forgotten and die unknown . Arthur Young , in his Travels in France , relates that Lord Albemarle , when ambassador in that
country , about the year 1753 , calling one day on the minister for foreign affairs , was introduced into his cabinet , while the minister finished a short conversation in the room in which he usually received persons on business . As his lordship walked backward and forward in a very small room he could not help seeing a paper
lying on the table , written in a large legible hand , and containing a list of the prisoners in the Bastile , the first name of which was Gordon . When the minister entered , Lord Albemarle apologized for his involuntarily remarking the paper ; the other replied , that it was of no consequence , for they made no secret of the names . lord Albemarle then said that he had seen the name of Gordon
first on the list , and begged to know , as in all probability he was a British subject , on what account he had been put into the Bastile . The minister told him , that he knew nothing of the matter , but would make the proper inquiries . The next time he saw Ivord Albemarle , he told him that , on inquiry into the case of
Gordon , he could find no person who could give him the least information , on which he had had Gordon himself interrogated , who solemnly affirmed that he had not the ' smallest suspicion of the cause of his imprisonment , but that he had been confined thirty years . * However , ' added the minister coolly , 'I ordered him to be immediately released , and he is now at large I * This * L'Histoire de Touraine , p . 284 ( where further particulars of this atrocious murder are detailed ) . dulmei'u Histoirs Chrotiologique , &c *
Untitled Article
Notices of France * . 15
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Jan. 2, 1833, page 15, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2606/page/15/
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