The De Maistre, a Russian-Savoyan Family
де Местр: русско-Савойская семья
I De Maistre: una famiglia russo-savoiarda
Les De Maistre: une famille russo-savoisienne
Die De Maistre: eine russisch-savoische Familie
One of the most impressing achievements of Russia’s successes in Napoleon’s war was the fact that St. Petersburg had become one of the most important intellectual centers of Europe, also because it became the target of different groups, most of them thinkers, as well as Freemasons, of aristocrats fleeing from the Revolution’s and Napoleon persecutions.
A family, which well symbolizes this “Golden Age” of St. Petersburg, is the De Maistre Family, whose statues are in front of the Castle of Chambéry, in France,the former capital city of the Duchy of Savoy and the native city of the two brothers.
Joseph et Xavier De Maistre were the sons of the higher magistrate of the Duchy of Savoy, the original cradle of the Dynasty, which, at the time of the French Revolution, was governed by local magistrates on behalf of the King of Sardinia, residing in Torino.
Savoy was, already at that time, a country of French culture, in the same way as other territories of the Kingdom of Sardinia, such as the County of Nice and the Duchy of Aosta.
As many other European aristocrats, Joseph de Maistre had embraced Freemasonry, which, according to him, would have offered a purer way of understanding religion, as well as a way for fighting against the moral degeneration of the ruling classes, which characterized the last period of the Ancien Régime (as testified by famous masterpieces, like “Les Liaisons Dangéreuses” of Choderlos de Laclos). In fact, it results that one of the main objectives of famous revolutionaries, such as Robespierre, was, precisely, as it had been for Puritans, the one of hinging back Religion to its originary purity, as well as to fight public immorality.
However, the path followed by Joseph de Maistre was different from the one followed by French revolutionaries. Similar to what happened to most of the “Enlightened Monarchs”, such as Catherine 2nd and Joseph 2nd, and to Goethe, when the French Revolution came up, he gave up his belonging in Freemasonry and in Enlightenment, and fled, from the native Savoy, into the core of Sardinia’s Kingdom.
He also moved his core interests, from the urgency of a purification of religion and customs, into a reflection on French Revolution, which, according to him, fulfilled, to a certain extent, his wishes of purification, in the sense that it constituted the long-due punishment of France, of its Kingdom and of its aristocracy for their guilts. Notwithstanding the above positive impact, the Revolution lacked, for De Maistre, a constructive character. According to him, the deep-rooted nature of humankind is well expressed by the Catholic idea of original sin. No social revolution may change this fact, so that a sound society may be grounded only upon a realistic and pessimistic notion of mankind, on the necessity of the alliance Throne and Altar as a discipline needed for minimizing Evil. In conclusion, the French Revolution has been a purification of the past sins, imposed by the Divine Providence. It will allow the Church and the Kingdom to stand up stronger than before. For this reason, no use withstanding Revolution using its own methods: and, this, not only because, according to De Maistre, traditional institutions must show themselves morally superior to the ones of Revolution, but also because Revolution, having been decided by God, is, to a certain extent, irreversible. t can just be overcome, not destroyed. Finally, the end of Ancien Régime has also another positive aspect, the elimination of the pretention by the Monarchs, to achieve a “sovereign” power, whilst, according to him, the only real “sovereign” power belongs to the Pope. So, at the end of the day, De Maistre is not a reactionary, but, on the contrary, the forebear of conservatives like Tocqueville.I
Following to the important role of Marshal Suvorov in fight against Napoleon in Piedmont, Joseph de Maistre establishes a link with Russia, which, according to him, might fulfill, after France, a providential task within Europe’s history: the one to save Europe from himself (i.e., from the corruption of the Ancien Régime and the fanatism of Revolution). An idea which will be shared by many authors, the most famous being Dostojevskij. In the meantime, an opposite, but parallel, attitude was rising in liberal and progressive circles. For instance, Heinrich Heine expressed the hope that the Revolution, defeated in the West, could take place in Russia (an idea which, it goes without saying, would have received a large support).
So, Joseph de Maistre transferred his family (including his brother Xavier) at its own change, to St. Petersburg, where it represented, on a voluntary basis, the Kingdom of Sardinia, which, at that time, had been reduced, by Napoleon’s conquests, to the sole island of Sardinia, and that, therefore, could not afford the expenses of a full-fledged Embassy in Russia.
The long years of stay in St. Petersburg were very fruitful, from a cultural point of view, for both De Maistre brothers. Joseph entered into the very complex and sophisticated political and cultural environment of the Emperor, dominated by Cazrtoryski, Novosiltzev and Baroness von Krüdener. However, his policy was conflictual with the one of the Tsar, especially because he tried to push the Tsar and the Russian aristocracy to embrace on his own positions, including a tentative to convert the Tsar himself, or, at least, many important aristocrats, to the Catholic Church. This tentative was in line, but also in competition, with peaceful efforts undertaken by German protestant sects, and, in particular, by Baroness von Krüdener.
The Tsar did not appreciate this very personal and very passionated way to interpret his ambassador’s role, and asked the King of Sardinia to call back De Maistre to Sardinia’s capital, Torino. Indeed, De Maistre was very critical of the Tsar’s position, affirming that: «Russia could have done very much for Europe, but it does not do anything».
De Maistre criticized especially the trend towards Protestantism, which, according to him, had found its expression in the Manifesto of the Holy Alliance, which was, in practice, an alliance between Orthodox and Protestant powers; according to De Maistre, Russia, having refused to reunite with Catholicism, was preparing a new revolution. From his point of view, De Maistre was undoubtedly right, since the cultural basis of the Holy Alliance were the philosophy of Saint Martin (to which De Maistre adhered during his “Masonic” period), the Baroness von Krüdener (a protestant mystic, living at Alexander’s Court), Franz von Baader and Jung-Stilling (seeVon Baader’s “Über das durch die Französische Revolution herbeigeführte Bedürfniss einer neueren und innigen Verbindung der Religion mit der Politik“, which Von Baader composed in 1814 and sent to the King of Prussia and to the Emperors of Austria and Russia).
According to Jung-Stilling, the French Revolution precedes immediately the Advent of Antichrist. Whilst the Antichrist proceeded from East to West, true believers should have proceeded the opposite way, towards Russia. Under the influence of von Krüdener and Jung-Stilling, thousands of “awakened” flocked to Crimea.
In the meantime, De Maistre had written “Les Soirée de St. Petersbourg”, one of the masterpieces of philosophical literature in French, which, whilst expressing in a classical form his philosophical and theological points of view, constitutes also a vibrant celebration of St. Petersburg as a crucial cultural center of Europe during the first half of the XIX Century, and an act of personal nostalgy for the City.
Eventually, De Maistre was also, for a short period, Prime Minister of the Sardinian Kingdom, and Governor of the Island of Sardinia, implementing, in these roles, the theories he had worked out, about the needlessness, for Counter-revolution, to follow the violent and intolerant paths typical for revolutions. In fact, he opposed to persecuting the many Piemontese aristocrats which, under the Napoleonian occupation, had collaborated with the French, so betraying Sardinia. Moreover, De Maistre, contrary to what could be imagined, was a forebear of the theories of the Piemontese Historical Right, that catholic-liberal élite which imposed to the country Italian unification under a constitutional monarchy.
De Maistre’s work is described, in the manuals of history, together with the ones of Bonald and of Burke, as the basis for the counter-revolutionary thought of Restauration. This is truly the case. However, the main interest for such works today does not reside in their aspect of critics towards liberalism, but, on the contrary, especially in the one that, by trying to overcome the culture of the Revolution, these authors anticipated philosophies and ideas of later thinkers, which, at their turn, have deeply influenced today’s society. So, whilst Burke anticipated Dirk Russel’s ideas about the opposition between the American and the French Revolutions, and Bonald the ones of socialist utopic revolutionaries, De Maistre’s stress on a supposed pre-existing harmony of Ancien Régime, axed on the character of the Pope, anticipated St. Simon’s and Comte’s ideas of an “organic society”, whereby such society would have been governed, no more, by Throne and Altar, but by Science and Management.
Le Soirées de Saint Petersbourg was published in Paris before De Maistre’s death.
Joseph’s brother, Xavier, was also an intellectual deeply involved in the anti-Napoleonic struggle. His main profession was to be an officer. He served in the Sardinian Army as long as Sardinia resisted Napoleon. Afterward, he entered the Russian Army and fought in the Caucasus against Cechens. The military adventures of Xavier de Maistre allowed him to realize some of the most famous works of French Romanticism, such as “L’histoire du Lépreux de la Ville d’Aoste”, which he wrote during the retreat of the Sardinian Army, defeated by Napoleon, from Savoy to the Aosta Valley, as well as “Voyage autour de ma chambre”, and “Le prisonnier du Caucase”, devoted to Chechnya, which anticipates several works of Russian authors, including Tolstoj, on the same subject.
The history of the De Maistre brothers, Savoyan, Piedmontese and Sardinian officials, politicians and intellectuals in Russia, shows how deeply Western Europe and Russia have been interconnected in that period of their history.
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