Charles Mackay (1814-1889), from Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions And The Madness Of Crowds
This remarkable pretender to the secret of the
philosopher's stone, was contemporary with the
last mentioned. He was a great personage at the court of
Charles VII, and in the events of his reign played a prominent part. From a very humble origin he rose to the highest honours of the state, and amassed enormous wealth, by peculation and the plunder of the country which he should have served. It was to hide his delinquencies in this respect, and to divert attention from the real source of his riches, that he boasted of having discovered the art of
transmuting the inferior metals into
gold and
silver.
His father was a
goldsmith in the city of
Bourges; but so reduced in circumstances towards the latter years of his life, that he was unable to pay the necessary fees to procure his son's admission into the
guild. Young Jacques became, however, a workman in the Royal Mint of Bourges, in
1428, and behaved himself so well, and showed so much knowledge of
metallurgy, that he attained rapid promotion in that establishment. He had also the good fortune to make the acquaintance of the fair
Agnes Sorel, by whom he was patronized and much esteemed. Jacques had now three things in his favour - ability, perseverance, and the countenance of the King's mistress. Many a man succeeds with but one of these to help him forward: and it would have been strange indeed, if Jacques Cœur, who had them all, should have languished in obscurity. While still a young man he was made Master of the Mint, in which he had been a
journeyman, and installed at the same time into the vacant office of Grand Treasurer of the royal household.
He possessed an extensive knowledge of finance, and turned it wonderfully to his own advantage as soon as he became intrusted with extensive funds. He speculated in articles of the first necessity, and made himself very unpopular by buying up grain, honey, wines, and other produce, till there was a scarcity, when he sold it again at enormous profit. Strong in the royal favour, he did not hesitate to oppress the poor by continual acts of forestalling and
monopoly. As there is no enemy so bitter as the estranged friend, so of all the tyrants and tramplers upon the poor, there is none so fierce and reckless as the upstart that sprang from their ranks. The offensive pride of Jacques Cœur to his inferiors was the theme of indignant reproach in his own city, and his cringing humility to those above him was as much an object of contempt to the aristocrats into whose society he thrust himself. But Jacques did not care for the former, and to the latter he was blind. He continued his career till he became the richest man in France, and so useful to the King that no important enterprise was set on foot until he had been consulted. He was sent in
1446 on an embassy to
Genoa, and in the following year to
Pope Nicholas V. In both these missions he acquitted himself to the satisfaction of his sovereign, and was rewarded with a lucrative appointment, in addition to those which he already held.
In the year
1449, the
English in
Normandy, deprived of their great general, the
Duke of
Bedford, broke the truce with the
French King, and took possession of a small town belonging to the Duke of
Brittany. This was the signal for the recommencement of a war, in which the French regained possession of nearly the whole province. The money for this war was advanced, for the most part, by Jacques Cœur. When
Rouen yielded to the French, and Charles made his triumphal entry into that city, accompanied by
Dunois and his most famous generals, Jacques was among the most brilliant of his
cortége. His chariot and horses vied with those of the King in the magnificence of their trappings; and his enemies said of him that he publicly boasted that he alone had driven out the English, and that the valour of the troops would have been nothing without his gold.
Dunois appears, also, to have been partly of the same opinion. Without disparaging the courage of the army, he acknowledged the utility of the able financier, by whose means they had been fed and paid, and constantly afforded him his powerful protection.
When peace returned, Jacques again devoted himself to commerce, and fitted up several galleys to trade with the
Genoese. He also bought large estates in various parts of France; the chief of which were the
baronies of
St. Fargeau,
Meneton,
Salone,
Maubranche,
Meaune,
St. Gerant de Vaux, and
St. Aon de Boissy; the
earldoms or counties of
La Palisse,
Champignelle,
Beaumont, and
Villeneuve la Genet, and the
marquisate of
Toucy. He also procured for his son,
Jean Cœur, who had chosen the Church for his profession, a post no less distinguished than that of
Archbishop of
Bourges.
Everybody said that so much wealth could not have been honestly acquired; and both rich and poor longed for the day that should humble the pride of the man, whom the one class regarded as an upstart and the other as an oppressor. Jacques was somewhat alarmed at the rumours that were afloat respecting him, and of dark hints that he had debased the coin of the realm and forged the King's seal to an important document, by which he had defrauded the state of very considerable sums. To silence these rumours, he invited many alchymists from foreign countries to reside with him, and circulated a counter-rumour, that he had discovered the secret of the philosopher's stone. He also built a magnificent house in his native city, over the entrance of which he caused to be sculptured the emblems of that science. Some time afterwards, he built another, no less splendid, at
Montpellier, which he inscribed in a similar manner. He also wrote a treatise upon the
hermetic philosophy, in which he pretended that he knew the secret of transmuting metals.
But all these attempts to disguise his numerous acts of
peculation proved unavailing; and he was arrested in
1452, and brought to trial on several charges. Upon one only, which the malice of his enemies invented to ruin him, was he acquitted; which was, that he had been accessory to the death, by poison, of his kind patroness, Agnes Sorel. Upon the others, he was found guilty; and sentenced to be banished the kingdom, and to pay the enormous fine of four hundred thousand crowns. It was proved that he had forged the King's seal; that, in his capacity of Master of the Mint of Bourges, he had debased, to a very great extent, the gold and silver coin of the realm; and that he had not hesitated to supply the
Turks with arms and money to enable them to carry on war against their
Christian neighbours, for which service he had received the most munificent recompences. Charles VII. was deeply grieved at his condemnation, and believed to the last that he was innocent. By his means the fine was reduced within a sum which Jacques Cœur could pay. After remaining for some time in prison, he was liberated, and left France with a large sum of money, part of which, it was alleged, was secretly paid him by Charles out of the produce of his confiscated estates. He retired to
Cyprus, where he died about
1460, the richest and most conspicuous personage of the island.
The writers upon alchymy all claim Jacques Cœur as a member of their fraternity, and treat as false and libellous the more rational explanation of his wealth which the records of his trial afford.
Pierre Borel, in his "
Antiquites Gauloises," maintains the opinion that Jacques was an honest man, and that he made his gold out of
lead and
copper by means of the philosopher's stone. The alchymic adepts in general were of the same opinion; but they found it difficult to persuade even his contemporaries of the fact. Posterity is still less likely to believe it.
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