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1654.]
Temporary retirement
of the chancellor. CHRISTINA’S ADMINISTRATION. Causes of the decline
of his influence. 33c
should answer it to him one day, if
they met iu the
body. Some weeks afterwards lie was able to in-
form the queen, that the blame of procrastination
was so little chargeable on him, that the French
ministers themselves deferred the treaty ^. It was
so in truth; and now Salvius received orders to
direct himself herein by them. " Ye do well to
assist the French in their postulates," Christina
writes to him, July 6, 1647.
" Ye must embrace
this occasion to bring us in good grace with
France ^."
That which had occurred gave occasion to an
intei’view between Christina and Oxenstierna, me-
diated by Torstenson, in which the queen at last
declared, that she had not written the letter above-
mentioned with an ill-meaning against his son, and
a seeming reconciliation followed *. The French
ministry also flattered the old chancellor ^; but he
withdrew for some time from court. " I have now
been residing about five weeks at home on myestates,
to attend to my private affairs,"
—he writes to his son
John from Tidoen,
—" for I have ever hitherto, as is
known to thee, bestowed my whole time on public
business, troubling myself little about my private
concerns. For the rest, all stands well here with
us in the country, and a noble harvest is before our
eyes; God be praised! I depart iu two days for
Fiholm, to survey the house and my new clear-
ings. There I have had this year a set of Dale-
men, who have already cleared a large tract, so
that T hope to have Fiholm provided with spacious
meadows. The worst with me is, that I cannot go
to inspect it; a fortnight ago I had the misfortune to
fall with my horse into a marsh, where I bruised
my leg against a fence, which has weakened me so
much, that since then I have been unable to mount
a horse ^." Age and sickness began to exhaust his
vita! forces.
" Your mother has been obliged
mostly to keep her bed," he writes the following
year to John,
" but age so plays too with me ’."
2 " I perceive by your letter just arrived, that Traut-
mannsdorf, instigated by the Spanish ambassador, has de-
parted ; that the treaty is put off; that you and your col-
league have stayed hitherto in Munster ; and that the French,
who formerly blamed you for postponement, now themselves
obstruct its progress. Herein nothing occurs of which I
would say,
’
Non putarara ;
’
and I refer all to God, to dis-
pose of it as is pleasing to Him. But it disgusts me that
we ourselves should judge so childishly, and still more that
we should proceed so. I am of old not so accustomed, but
use, as you know, to have my mind made up for any event.
Sed hcec dies aliam vitam, alios mores postulat. Yet, my
son, I hope that God and time will disclose who means well
and rightly. Be not too deeply moved. Keep thy course as
becomes thee, and seek to further the service and reputation
of her majesty our queen, and the realm ; and if in any
thing there should be backwardness, look that thou bear no
great part therein. The rest commend to God. Thy par-
ticular difficulty I see well, and what inconvenience may
grow to thee from this delay ;
but look upon it as a neces-
sary evil, and bear it with patience." The high-chancel’or
to his son John, Tidoen, Aug. 4, 1647. " You will learn by
her majesty’s own letter, her intention that you should con-
tinue there, and execute the commission with Salvius,
hereafter as hitherto. Dear son, if you have so long vexed
yourself, and drunk so much bitterness, stand out yet, and
be not misled by impatience." To the same, Stockholm,
Dec. 12, 1647. "
Thy colleague enjoys his accustomed con-
fidence ; yet here we are not sure of peace as before ; although
thy colleague can write of little else in his private letters,
and discourses with a heap of ratiuncles, as if he were read-
ing Terence and Plautus for school-boys, to show his great
He resumed the discharge of his official functions.
Such a man could hardly remain without influence;
and after the disgrace of De la Gardie, towards the
end of the year 1653, we see the affairs of govern-
ment for some time again in the liands of the
chancellor and his son Eric. But he no longer
retained the same importance as formerly ; and
of this the cause was not the caprice of a young
woman on the throne, but the altered position of the
minister to the throne and kingdom. A states-
man’s activity should find its springs only in the
central point of the commonwealth, regulated by a
strict regard to the interests of the whole *. His
strength lies not in favour and personal connexion,
but m that general dispensation of justice, secu-
rity, and order, for which he lives, and which he
is called upon to watch over. The great European
war, in which Sweden bore so honourable a part,
had profoundly disturbed the internal balance of
the state. To restore this upon new foundations
was a problem perhaps not too difficult for the
creative spirit of Gustavus Adolphus, had not the
thread of his life been so early cut off’. What was
eff’ected after him, even though with magnanimity,
was left a half-finished work. To ground the ad-
ministrative system for a term of peace on those
relations, which the war had called forth, was un-
doubtedly a great mistake; and of this mistake we
cannot acquit Axel Oxenstierna. For that reason
his political life terminated with the peace. It was
the beginning of a new order of things, which iu its
operation set him aside; in this, more than in the
weakness of age, lay the secret of his powerless-
ness. Without him, and against him, Sweden’s
futui’e was to be detei-mined ;
in this, the principal
figure was Christina herself. With all the re-
proaches which have been cast upon and deserved
by her, we yet cannot deny her either intellect or
courage; and for the stedfastness with which she
knowledge. But, my son, let that stand aside, and hold to
what is real, averting as much as thou canst all public jea-
lousy." To the same, Stockholm, March 4, 1648.
3
Arckenholtz, i. 129.
• ’ The letter which has been written to thee has troubled
me not a little, and I had a conversation with her majesty
upon that subject on the 25th of this month. It causes me
sorrow, and I believe that, if it had not been written, it
would perhaps be withheld. They seek to excuse it, and
pretend that it is only a warning. But the words are clear
as light. However it be, the matter stands aboil. For
what concerns myself, I shall not, by God’s help, be found
without resolution." The chancellor to his son John, Stock-
holm, May 29, IG47.
5 " What the cardinal Mazarini has written to me in a
letter, received two days ago through Chanut, filled with big
French compliments, thou mayst perceive by the copy here-
with following." The chancellor to the same, March 11,
1648. •
6
Tidcen, July 19 and August 4, 1647. The letter to his
younger son Eric (a youth of distinguished endowments),
in which he advises marriage, in consequence of a suspicion
expressed by the queen herself, that Eric Oxenstierna che-
rished hopes of her hand, is also of this year, Stockholm,
June 29, 1647.
’
Stockholm, February 5, 1648. His wife was named Anna
Bat.
8 The chancellor himself has admirably expressed this :
" When a government does not assume the spirit of a sove-
reign, and speak for the commonwealth, but, instead, acts
as a private person, and speaks for the behoof of a class,
then can its rule no longer subsist." Protocol in the Senate,
July 20, 1636.
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