It was England's good fortune to have but one Parliament of politicians, instead of ten Parliaments of magistrates, the latter more fit for the theory than the practice of public affairs; and the Reformation had, beforehand, accustomed its people to discussion as well as to liberty.

Its great lords and its gentlemen placed themselves from the first at the head of the national movement, demanding nothing and expecting nothing for themselves from the advantages they claimed for their country.

The remnant of the feudal system had succumbed with the Duke of Montmorency under Richelieu; France knew not the way to profit by the elements of courage, disinterestedness, and patriotism offered her by her magistracy; she had the misfortune to be delivered over to noisy factions of princes and great lords, ambitious or envious, greedy of honors and riches, as ready to fight the court as to be on terms with it, and thinking far more of their own personal interests than of the public service.

Without any unity of action or aim, and by turns excited and dismayed by the examples that came to them from England, the Frondeurs had to guide them no Hampden or Cromwell; they had at their backs neither people nor army; the English had been able to accomplish a revolution; the Fronde failed before the dexterous prudence of Mazarin and the queen's fidelity to her minister.

In vain did the coadjutor aspire to take his place; Anne of Austria had not forgotten the Earl of Strafford .-- Cardinal de Retz learned before long the hollowness of his hopes.