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Scandinavian Journal of History

ISSN: 0346-8755 (Print) 1502-7716 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/shis20

THE SWEDISH AND THE FRENCH ENLIGHTENMENT CIRCA 1740–1780

Charlotta Wolff

To cite this article: Charlotta Wolff (2005) THE SWEDISH ARISTOCRACY AND THE FRENCH ENLIGHTENMENT CIRCA 1740–1780, Scandinavian Journal of History, 30:3-4, 259-270, DOI: 10.1080/03468750500279632 To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/03468750500279632

Published online: 08 Aug 2006.

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Full Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at https://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?journalCode=shis20 Charlotta Wolff1

THE SWEDISH ARISTOCRACY AND THE FRENCH ENLIGHTENMENT CIRCA 1740–1780

During the second half of the 18th century, had important political and cultural contacts with France. The aristocracy, which had a central role in Swedish during the Age of Liberty, showed an active interest in the French Enlightenment. This article examines the meaning of radical philosophy in the context of court society. It focuses on the Swedish diplomats in Paris as an example of a learned for which philosophy was not so much a way to transform society as an alternative form of satisfaction.

During the period known in Swedish history as the Age of Liberty 1719–1772, the had a prominent position in the Swedish political system. The first estate of the was dominated by an old court aristocracy progressively renewed by the rise of ambitious servants of the . Within this renewed aristocracy, the councillors of state, also called senators by their contemporaries, and their friends and clients formed a political elite. Designed by the diet and governing together with the , whose power had been reduced to a formality by the of 1720, they dominated state politics and held the most important offices, such as the diplomatic representations in London or Paris. Political life was characterized by the struggle between the two parties known as the ‘‘Hats’’ and the ‘‘Caps’’, reflecting French and British competition for influence in the Baltic region. The French encouraged the ‘‘Hat’’ party at the Swedish diet and particularly favoured the influential aristocracy, trying to attach it to French interests. When its party began to lose power, France advocated the reinforcement of the during the first years of the reign of Gustavus III. The alliance with France was central in the political system built up by the ‘‘Hat’’ party. The primary interest of the relation between the and France is, however, no longer in its bilateral, diplomatic aspects, thoroughly studied since the 19th century.2 In a larger context, it can be seen as an example of the intellectual and political cosmopolitism of a European elite that took advantage of political circumstances and of its own cultural resources. The contact with France was not only a matter of money and political influence; it also brought new ideas, books and philosophies that are said to comprise the ‘‘French Enlightenment’’.3 The Swedish aristocracy of the 18th century was an educated elite, familiar with foreign politics, literature and art. Like other European , it maintained a strong tradition of cultural mobility. During journeys on the continent, young

Scandinavian Journal of History Vol. 30, No. 3/4. September 2005, pp. 259–270 ISSN 0346-8755 print/ISSN 1502-7716 online ß 2005 Taylor & Francis http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals DOI: 10.1080/03468750500279632 260 SCANDINAVIAN JOURNAL OF HISTORY

aristocrats perfected their education and were introduced in court society. Swedish diplomats, politicians, military officers taking up assignments in the French army, and gentlemen on tour used personal relations to obtain favours and economic benefits from the French court. Birth and name, personal relations and aristocratic courtesy were ways to surpass practical difficulties and make one’s way abroad. This cosmopolitan and polite sociability of the European transmitted and generated common values and cultural practices. It also permitted the exchange of different ideas, news and fashions. Its language and forms of expression were not far from those of the of Letters; French language, politeness and the importance of correspondence and personal credibility were common to both of them. Neither was the Swedish political aristocracy unfamiliar with the intellectual aspects of European elite cosmopolitism. Some of its members were members of influential circles in Paris, participated in intellectual debates there and acted as important cultural intermediaries.4 It is this cultural cosmopolitism and the contact with French literary sociability and intellectual life that interests us here. The Swedish aristocracy of the Age of Liberty, jealous of its privileges, and later the Gustavian councillors, represented or wished to represent the political summit, like the French Parlementaires, i.e., the members of the sovereign courts of justice, which pretended to exercise not only jurisdictional, but also political power.5 That could go hand in hand with a strong interest in philosophy and contemporary critical debate. The interaction and interpenetration between the political and the intellectual spheres, philosophy and political power, is perceptible both in the elaboration of new political theories and in the literary sociability that contributed to the development of public opinion, particularly in France.6 Particularly the Swedish diplomats, future senators or councillors, showed an active interest in cultural and political debates and developed important networks of sociability and correspondence during their missions to France. This article will focus on their attitudes towards French philosophy, and intellectual debate during the period c. 1740–1780. What was the cultural outcome of their stays in France? Which circles did they frequent, what kind of intellectual sociability and which philosophical or ideological tendencies did they represent? What was the significance of philosophical engagement for an aristocratic political elite? In this article, I argue that the Swedish aristocracy came in contact with French intellectual culture and, eventually, radical Enlightenment philosophy. The meaning of this radicalism for the aristocratic elite, however, remains ambiguous. It is evident that it left traces in libraries, vocabulary and statements, but the fact that the Swedish aristocracy was aware of an intellectual movement does not imply that all its members agreed with it. In court society, acceptable forms and aesthetics often tended to be more important and safer than open approval of nonconformist thought and behaviour.

Diplomats, politics and enlightenment From 1739 onwards, after their party had risen to power at the Swedish diet, the ‘‘Hats’’ took control of diplomatic representation in Paris. The office of minister at THE SWEDISH ARISTOCRACY AND THE FRENCH ENLIGHTENMENT c. 1740–1780 261 the French court was given to the party leader Carl Gustaf Tessin. It then passed on successively to his prote´ge´ Count Clas Ekeblad, their friends Carl Fredrik Scheffer and his brother Ulric Scheffer, then to Ekeblad’s prote´ge´ Count Gustav Philip Creutz and finally, in 1783, during the Gustavian era, to Creutz’s former attache´ Erik Magnus Stael von Holstein. These Swedish diplomats in France were connected to each other by kinship and political friendship. There are numerous examples of how they promoted their friends and used their personal relations in the run for favours and graces at the French court, such as appointments in the French army, pensions and other honours.7 Among an almost constant number of some 20 European ministers in Paris during the 18th century, the Swedish diplomats held an honourable position. French police reports as well as the private correspondence and other archives of the Swedish diplomats confirm that they had contacts and personal acquaintances in the highest circles of the French court and aristocracy. In the 1770s, after the royal revolution in Sweden, ambassador Creutz was always one of the first to be mentioned in the hierarchical list of foreign ambassadors and ministers in France, together with the ambassadors of Spain and Naples, before the ministers of Russia or of minor German courts.8 Speaking and writing French as a second language, the Swedish diplomats had no difficulties in adopting French manners, which made it easy for them to win the favour of the French court and highest aristocracy.9 Thanks to their continuous contacts with both the French court and the aristocratic opposition that sympathized with the Parlement of Paris, they were well placed to participate in the continuous and frenetic exchange of ideas and news in salons and circles that contributed to both public debate and more secret political choices. They obtained entrance to exclusive societies and salons; they were learned, skilful and socially trained.10 Their position as political agents made them well suited to observe and participate not only in formal court ceremonies and negotiations, but also in more substantial political and philosophical debates in informal surroundings or private settings where they could contribute to the forming of public opinion. This observation of all kinds of political activity was part of their professional duties. Moreover, the diplomats had broad relations of friendship and kinship, networks over which they could pass on their knowledge and contacts to their successors, personal friends or prote´ge´s. Last but not least, when they returned from their missions, it was to take up important political and administrative assignments that allowed them to rise to high positions in their own country.11 French police records over foreigners, systematically kept by the administration because of the fear of espionage and conspiracies, give detailed accounts of diplomatic daily life and social activities. They make it possible to retrace the intellectual contacts and sympathies of the foreign diplomats. The records from 1772–1774 onwards are particularly important; but earlier documents of the same office do not seem to have been preserved to the same extent or have not been systematically archived. For this reason, we have a wealth of information about the second half of Creutz’s time in Paris 1766–1783. While the mornings were reserved for ciphering the correspon- dence, for meetings and negotiations, the diplomats spent their afternoons visiting salons, theatres, the opera and other places of public debate such as the Parisian Parlement or other tribunals where they listened to the pleas.12 262 SCANDINAVIAN JOURNAL OF HISTORY

Theatre and opera were not merely fashionable entertainment, but also a place at which to meet and be seen, to discuss important or secret matters informally in neutral surroundings. In the beginning of the 1740s, Count Ekeblad and his friend baron Carl Fredrik Scheffer systematically visited the opera. As an example of how the diplomatic duty to follow up all kind of news mixed with personal interests and even might have provoked them, they were particularly interested in the works of Jean- Philippe Rameau, who renewed French operatic music and represented the musical avant-garde of his time.13 Like the artistic, literary or philosophical , the theatre and the tribunals were also the kitchens of public opinion, in which politics and society could be debated metaphorically or openly.14 On 23 February 1775 ambassador Creutz visited the first night of Beaumarchais’ politically daring Barbier de Se´ville together with Countess Stroganov, the wife of the famous Russian collector and industrialist, who belonged to the same inner circle in Parisian high society as Creutz.15 Creutz was also a regular visitor at all the most famous and important salons such as those of the Marquise du Deffand, Madame Geoffrin, Madame de Boufflers and Madame Necker. Madame Necker, the wife of the Genevan banker Jacques Necker, who became French minister of finances, was perhaps the most important of these ladies for Creutz. He visited her literary salon almost every week.16 Swedish diplomats themselves actively supported culture and letters. Count Tessin is known as one of the greatest collectors and protectors of fine arts in 18th- century Sweden. Boucher, Oudry and Nattier, among other painters, were his friends and prote´ge´s, and during his mission to France in 1739–1742 he commissioned numerous works of art for himself and for the Swedish court.17 Baron Ulric Scheffer helped the young Swedish portraitist Alexander Roslin to acquire a position and a place in the French Academy for fine arts.18 of arts and letters was also very important for Creutz, who protected the young composer Andre´ Modeste Gre´try and the painter Philippe Jacques de Loutherbourg, as well as young Swedish artists in Paris.19 To support culture and make oneself a name as a protector of writers and artists was a way to acquire consideration and influence in both politics and public opinion, and the Swedish diplomats in Paris were well aware of this.20 Some of the Swedish diplomats and their younger prote´ge´s frequented the circles associated with the philosophes and the high Enlightenment, circles that contributed to or even stood in the centre of public debate. Count Ekeblad cultivated the friendship of the Jaucourts, a noble family with Protestant traditions, to which belonged the chevalier de Jaucourt, one of the authors of the Encyclope´die. He also befriended the very intellectual Lamoignon-Malesherbes family and other members of the Parlement, fortress of the aristocratic opposition against royal absolutism.21 Carl Fredrik Scheffer’s contacts are most remarkable, since they correspond to the whole panoply of contemporary French critical thought and its development over three intellectual generations. During his first stays in Paris, in the early 1740s and from 1744 onwards, he associated with members of the former Club de l’Entresol,an aristocratic and intellectual society to which among others and the Marquise du Deffand had belonged. Put together by Abbe´ Alary in the late 1720s, it had been closed by the police in 1730 on the order of Louis XV’s minister Cardinal Fleury, who with good reason considered it to be a nest of aristocratic opposition, with connections to the Parlement, to Jansenists and Freemasons.22 Immediately after returning from Paris in 1752, Scheffer corresponded with liberal circles close to Denis THE SWEDISH ARISTOCRACY AND THE FRENCH ENLIGHTENMENT c. 1740–1780 263

Diderot’s and Jean d’Alembert’s Encyclope´die. In the 1770s, after his last visit to Paris in the company of Prince Gustaf, his correspondence network enlarged to include physiocrats and other representatives of the extremist third generation of the French Enlightenment.23 Count Creutz was acquainted with such philosophers and writers as Diderot and his friends Friedrich Melchio Grimm, Abbe´ Guillaume Thomas Raynal, the Baron Paul Henri d’Holbach and Jean-Franc¸ois Marmontel. During his 17 years in Paris, he developed an impressive network of contacts covering almost every important coterie of the town and court, from the encyclopaedists at Madame Geoffrin’s and the radical materialists at Madame Necker’s to Madame de La Ferte´-Imbault’s aristocratic circle and d’Holbach’s republican gentlemen’s society; the latter were both very critical – but for different reasons – towards the regime in power.24 Every week, Creutz visited at least one or two salons. Creutz himself had his own masculine of diplomats that met every Monday to play cards, eat and drink, and probably discuss politics, arts and society – many of them, although not Creutz himself, belonged to the distinguished liberal Freemason lodge Les Neuf Sœurs.25 These modern learned libertines also visited the trials in the Parlement together and seem to have been among the first to use the new fashionable waistcoat le frac and to take healthy morning promenades, thus distinguishing themselves as arbiters of taste.26

Aristocratic sociability and philosophy The forms of sociability in which Swedish diplomats and aristocrats took part during their stays in Paris could, to a large extent, be described as the expression of aristocratic refinement and polity. The meetings with artists and generally followed the rules of polite society too, since they frequently took place at dinner parties at the diplomats’ residences or in the famous salons of French ladies of high and wealth. There was a time when these salons were not considered as important for the radical Enlightenment because they practised self-censorship and searched for consensus instead of constructive dispute.27 However, this sociability, both intellectual and fashionable, is not to be interpreted as a mirror of court society only. Continuing a tradition of aristocratic opposition and a quest for independence, it had its own importance in what we could call the social history of the Enlightenment and in the birth of all sorts of rumours, social judgements and beliefs that made up much of public opinion. It was also an expression of the particular forms of organization and communication that formed the context of the elite culture of French Enlightenment.28 Still, it is not always easy to interpret the relations between foreign aristocrats and the French philosophes. The contact was sometimes deceptive because of fundamental differences in aesthetic conceptions of sociability and literary politeness. The Swedish queen Lovisa Ulrika showed interest in the French intellectual movements, corresponded with and ordered the Encyclope´die. She had her eldest son read modern French philosophy as a part of his royal education.29 Like the young aristocrats of his court, Prince Gustaf visited Paris in 1770–1771 with Carl Fredrik Scheffer and met several of the philosophes at Creutz’s residence. He wrote to his mother that they were ‘‘more agreeable to read than to meet’’, that they flattered 264 SCANDINAVIAN JOURNAL OF HISTORY

themselves far more than was suitable and that Creutz’s best friend, the academician and encyclopaedist Marmontel was the most republican hysteric to be found.30 Count Hessenstein, son of the late king Fredrik I, wrote sarcastically about Diderot’s social clumsiness and the French intellectuals’ ignorance and internal disputes.31 Count Axel von Fersen the younger, son of a former ‘‘Hat’’ party politician leading the aristocratic opposition against Gustavus III in the late 1770s, stated that Voltaire’s old friend Madame Du Deffand was ‘‘still blind’’ and that one was ‘‘bored to death’’ at her salon.32 One thing was to belong to the ‘enlightened’ part of mankind and to read the works of the radical philosophers, but it was still quite another to approve of their political views, several of which questioned the rationality of monarchy or of estate society as a whole. It was also a question of socially acceptable behaviour. In court circles, philosophy and intellectual games could have an entertaining or distinctive function. In literature and letters, the tyranny of taste could be as severe as in fashion or manners of speech. The Swedish court appreciated Voltaire for his sarcasm and use of critical reason, but also for his relative moderation and stylistic decency.33 This conception of taste was guided by an aesthetic consensus about politeness and decency not to be surpassed, in subject and in . For readers for whom erudition was a distinction, the philosophical ambitions of an author could be less important than the formal qualities of his text. This is one aspect of vitterhet, the Swedish concept for academism and classicist taste. Another point of view would be that for the erudite , philosophy was just a part of a stable aristocratic ethos, the art of behaving with dignity and self-control.34 This kind of global interpretation, however, would make it difficult or even irrelevant to estimate the meaning and broader impact of particular elements, such as the contact with radical philosophy or less polite, nonconformist sociability. Many members of the social elite still did show a genuine interest in philosophy, society and its good government or more practical ‘‘Enlightenment’’ matters such as philanthropy, popular education or charity. Some of the Swedish diplomats in Paris also went farther than what was appropriate by the standards of court taste. Scheffer not only mingled with the learned, the academicians and the old aristocratic opposition of the Parlements, but also with progressive freemasons, encyclopaedists, and from 1771 onwards corresponded with physiocrats, economists and radical political thinkers who supported the idea of – challenging the sense of freedom and openness with which the sociability and philosophy of the Enlightenment has most often been associated. The cynical Abbe´ d’Expilly’s statement that a people is made happy with bread, entertainment and gallows is one example of this radical extreme.35 Ambassador Creutz in his turn became acquainted with the radical materialist and atheist circles of Claude Adrien Helve´tius and d’Holbach, and sent Marmontel’s forbidden Be´lisaire as well as volumes of the Encyclope´die to Prince Gustaf, warning him to let the Swedish know about it. Between balls, parties, extravagant gambling throughout the nights and very hard work, he willingly abandoned himself to metaphysics in debates with writers and philosophers. His liaisons with republican circles on one hand and his visits to the Marquise de La Ferte´-Imbault and her oppositional society on the other, as well as his probable participation in discussions about representative assemblies amidst the foreign diplomats in Paris in the autumn of 1774 give us reason to believe that he was far from uninterested in political philosophy.36 THE SWEDISH ARISTOCRACY AND THE FRENCH ENLIGHTENMENT c. 1740–1780 265

Another characteristic of the intellectual elite culture of the 18th century is that although these ‘‘alternative’’ or nonconformist, cosmopolitan forms of sociability – freemasonry, or the radical republic of letters – transgressed or challenged established social, juridical or political borders or canons of taste, they had their own hierarchies and their own elitist system of limiting the access to knowledge or membership. They simultaneously defied and generated and exclusivity.37

The meaning of radicalism An elite amidst the elite, the Swedish diplomats participated in the intellectual sociability in Paris. They certainly could have a genuine interest in Enlightenment matters, but the impact of this intellectual engagement had its own limits. How should this interest in radical philosophy be understood? Even fervent monarchists like Creutz or Carl Fredrik Scheffer, devoted to their ‘enlightened’ sovereign Gustavus III, who denied the estates (and thus the nobility) their political power, could show a critical, curious attitude towards ‘arbitrary’ absolutist politics in general. They did so particularly if it did not endanger, but rather confirmed their conceptions of the excellence of Swedish and principles of government.38 Sweden in the Age of Liberty had been a classically republican, anti-absolutist aristocratic regime where monarchy was reduced to a formality. From 1772 onwards, Gustavus III re- established royal absolutism and legitimated it through the concept of freedom, recycling in his propaganda many keywords of the Enlightenment as well as of Swedish republican rhetorics.39 Radical Enlightenment and philosophy should not be opposed to absolutism, neither in ideas nor in practices. In this late, sceptical and radical Enlightenment, there was a strong temptation to try different extreme solutions, such as or centralized government. Political physiocratism, promoting legal despotism, was one of these tendencies. A former party politician and a representative of the republican aristocracy of the Age of Liberty, Carl Fredrik Scheffer, despite his old contacts in anti- absolutist French spheres, inclined more and more towards the reinforcement of royal authority in Sweden. From 1756–1765, he was the governor of the heir of the throne, responsible for his education, which he personally supervised. At an early stage, he introduced the writings of such French physiocrats as Mirabeau the older and Lemercier de La Rivie`re, author of L’Ordre naturel, to his royal pupil. Later on, in the 1770s and 1780s, his correspondence with French physiocrats provided an ideological support for the king’s justification of re-established absolutism.40 As an individual putting his intellectual networks and philosophical contacts directly at the service of state ideology, Scheffer was quite exceptional in Sweden. Many others were equally interested in radical foreign political thought, but kept their interests in private, spreading books and other readings through their personal correspondence networks or borrowing from friends at dinner parties, like the Lamoignon, Jaucourt and Besenval ladies whom Ekeblad knew in Paris.41 In absolutist regimes or societies with no freedom of speech and limited printing freedom, it was in the nature of the intellectual sociability of the aristocracy to keep philosophical matters in discretion and only share them with friends or correspondents. Another sense of erudite vitterhet was that most ideas were not applied, but studied as such, as 266 SCANDINAVIAN JOURNAL OF HISTORY

study gave pleasure and satisfied intellectual needs that could be stronger than political or personal literary ambitions.42 Absolutism did not exclude radical political thought, and it would be quite naı¨ve to see ‘aristocracy’ and ‘philosophy’ as some kind of opposites. Private radicalism, secret societies or more informal societies that shared intellectual pleasures were an alternative to the conformism of court sociability. The philosophy that this sociability transmitted could still be quite daring. In the libraries of late 18th-century statesmen and courtiers, we can find books by French materialists and atheists sharing space with neo-humanism and classical republican thought. Creutz, who had returned from Paris to become chancellor (kanslipresident) of Gustavus III, owned the Traite´ des trois imposteurs, anti-clerical writings, vitalist philosophy and Seneca, but his contacts with Diderot, the Baron d’Holbach and Julien Offray de La Mettrie seem to have been less visible in his library.43 An important function of intellectual cosmopolitism and philosophical sociability in the identity of an elite losing its political power to the king was to maintain a certain aristocratic independence towards royal authority. However, this political elite did not necessarily contribute to the propagation of ideas and impulses that they received from participating in cosmopolitan literary sociability. Their contact with French intellectual sociability of the Enlightenment might have had a limited political impact. Still, it contributed to maintaining the Swedish nobility as an active participant in European elite cosmopolitism. Intellectual life in 18th-century Sweden was not only concentrated to universities and academies, but it was also an aspect of noble court culture. Members of the aristocracy, and particularly the diplomats, were in touch with the French Enlightenment, and it would be wrong to describe these contacts as passive reception only, since they developed a form of intellectual sociability and an intellectual curiosity which preceded the rise of the opinions during the last years of the Age of Liberty, when Sweden’s first radical press appeared.44

Conclusions The Swedish political elite, represented by its diplomats in Paris, certainly came in touch with French Enlightenment ideas. Particularly Carl Fredrik Scheffer and Gustav Creutz were deeply engaged in French philosophical and intellectual matters. Also Count Ekeblad was acquainted with the opposition in a way that denotes a critical and open attitude towards society, politics and letters. Observing the oppositional circles and the intellectual movements was part of the diplomatic profession, but for some of the diplomats it also seems to have become a personal engagement. During their stays in Paris, the Swedish diplomats participated in the European, cosmopolitan, intellectual sociability. The meaning of a certain radicalism that could be found in circles and salons such as those of Madame Necker or d’Holbach is more difficult to estimate. For visiting aristocrats, the salons and the intellectual disputes could be an amusing fancy or sometimes an annoying, compulsory part of the Grand Tour and of the admired French culture. So far as the diplomats, learned amateurs and politicians were concerned, the contact with French philosophers and writers was obviously more serious. In Carl Fredrik Scheffer’s case, it probably became a stimulus to later intellectual activities. Above all, it can be seen as a form of sociability that THE SWEDISH ARISTOCRACY AND THE FRENCH ENLIGHTENMENT c. 1740–1780 267 confirmed the gentleman’s privilege to political thought, as an alternative to court culture. The impact of the French Enlightenment in Sweden should not be underestimated just because it was present in aristocratic or court culture rather than in academic and scholarly intellectual circles. This does not, however, justify an over-estimation of an intellectual court culture more concerned with forms and politeness than with philosophy itself. The intellectual and artistic contacts of the diplomats abroad were very important to the court and the social elite. They may have influenced the kind of philosophical references present in late 18th-century political , and this can be important if we consider that Swedish political culture and intellectual life during almost the whole Age of Liberty were dominated by censorship of printed texts and by the relatively strong position of the Lutheran church that strived to control the minds and morals of the population. But at least in appearance, for the social and political elite, French radicalism still had little to do with Swedish society or politics.

Notes

1 This article has been written with the support of the project ‘‘Enlightened Loyalties. The Conceptual Construction of National, Cultural and Political Identities and Loyalties in North-Western Europe, 1750–1800’’ funded by the Academy of Finland. 2 See for instance C. G. Malmstro¨m, Sveriges politiska historia fra˚n K. Carl XII:s do¨d till statshva¨lfningen 1772 (Stockholm, 1855–1877); H. Danielson, Sverige och Frankrike 1727–1735. Ett bidrag till belysning av Arvid Horns utrikespolitik (Lund, 1920); H. Danielson, Sverige och Frankrike 1736–1739. Till belysning av Arvid Horns politik och fall (Lund, 1956); L. Trulsson, Ulrik Scheffer som hattpolitiker. Studier i hattregimens politiska och diplomatiska historia (Lund, 1947). 3 About Swedish diplomats, culture and the French Enlightenment see also G. Castre´n, Gustav Philip Creutz (Helsingfors, 1917); G. von Proschwitz, ed., Tableaux de Paris et de la Cour de France. Lettres ine´dites de Carl Gustaf, comte de Tessin (Go¨teborg & Paris, 1983); J. Heidner, ed., Carl Fredrik Scheffer. Lettres particulie`res a` Carl Gustaf Tessin 1744–1752 (Stockholm, 1982); M. Molander, Le Comte de Creutz. Lettres ine´dites de Paris 1766–1770 (Go¨teborg & Paris, 1987). See also E. Hammar, ‘‘La Franc¸aise’’. Mille et une fac¸ons d’apprendre le franc¸ais en Sue`de avant 1802 (Uppsala, 1991). On cultural brokerage and diplomatic agents, cf B. Noldus, ‘‘Dealing in Politics and Art: Agents between Amsterdam, Stockholm and Copenhagen’’, Scandinavian Journal of History, vol. 28 (2004), pp. 215–225. 4 For a broader analysis of the Swedish aristocracy’s relations with France during the 18th century, see my doctoral dissertation Va¨nskap och makt. Den svenska politiska eliten och upplysningstidens Frankrike (University of Helsinki, 2004), now available in a commercial version: C. Wolff, Va¨nskap och makt. Den svenska politiska eliten och upplysningstidens Frankrike (Helsingfors, 2005). This study consists of four parts: a presentation of the cosmopolitan and Francophile culture of the aristocracy; an analysis of how the members of the ‘‘Hat’’ party took personal advantage of the diplomatic relations with France; a study of the intellectual sociability of the Swedish diplomats and courtiers in Paris, and finally, an analysis of how the images 268 SCANDINAVIAN JOURNAL OF HISTORY

of self and the conceptions of the fatherland were articulated through the relation with a foreign country. 5 The Parlements were courts of appeal (courts of first instance for the nobility), and their members were generally highly educated judges and lawyers, very often belonging to the nobility and forming a learned, urban aristocracy. Comparing itself to the English Parliament, the Parlement of Paris pretended to exercise political, legislative power by its right to refuse the registration of royal laws and edicts. It formed a strong opposition towards the king and his ministers, particularly during these years of war, when France sided with Prussia in the war of Austrian succession without any greater military success. The conflict between the monarchy and the Parlement also had a more dangerous political and ideological aspect, since the Parlement sympathized with the Jansenists and rejected the papal bull Unigenitus. 6 On sociability, see e.g. A. Lilti, Le monde des salons. La sociabilite´ mondaine a` Paris dans la seconde moitie´ du XVIIIe sie`cle (diss., Universite´ Paris I, 2003); D. Gordon, Citizens without Sovereignty. Equality and Sociability in French Thought (Princeton, 1994). 7 See the correspondence between the Swedish diplomats and the French minister of war in RA, Diplomatica Gallica, vol. 340–341, 355, 463, and C. Wolff, Va¨nskap och makt. Den svenska politiska eliten och upplysningstidens Frankrike, op. cit. 8 Bibliothe`que de l’Arsenal, Mss Bastille 10 283–10 293; Ministe`re des Affaires E´trange`res (MAE), Controˆle des e´trangers, vol. 2–82; G. von Proschwitz, ed., op. cit.; Clas Ekeblad’s letters and diary, Riksarkivet (RA), Ekebladska samlingen, vol. 15, 17; ‘‘Liste de mes connoissances a` Paris et des personnes que j’y frequentois’’, RA Ericsbergsarkivet, Fredrik Sparres samling, vol. 1; see also C. Wolff, ‘‘Carl Gustaf Tessin, a Swedish cosmopolitan in French Europe’’, Comparare (Comparative European History Review), vol. 2 (2002), pp. 35–48. 9 Bernard Hours, Louis XV et sa Cour. Le roi, l’e´tiquette et le courtisan (Paris, 2002), pp. 62–65. 10 RA Ekebladska samlingen, vol. 17; G. von Proschwitz, ed., op. cit.; MAE Controˆle des e´trangers, vol. 2–82. 11 C. Wolff, ‘‘Sveriges representation i Paris. Sa¨ndebuden och beskickningen under frihetstiden och den gustavianska tiden’’, Historisk Tidskrift fo¨r Finland, vol. 86 (2001:2), pp. 169–184; G. Castre´n, op. cit.; W. Holst, Carl Gustaf Tesssin under rese-, riksdagsmanna- och de tidigare beskickningsa˚ren. Ett bidrag till hans ungdomshistoria och politiska biografi (Lund, 1931); G. von Proschwitz, ed., op. cit. 12 MAE Controˆle des e´trangers, vol. 2–82. 13 Ekeblad’s diary, RA Ekebladska samlingen, vol. 17. 14 R. Darnton, ‘‘An Early Information Society: News and the Media in Eighteenth- Century Paris’’, American Historical Review, vol. 2001:1, pp. 1–35; T. C. W. Blanning, The Culture of Power and the Power of Culture. Old Regime Europe 1660–1789 (Oxford, 2002). 15 ‘‘Ministres Etrangers’’, 23.2–3.3.1775, MAE Controˆle des e´trangers, vol. 4. 16 MAE Controˆle des e´trangers, vol. 2–49; G. Castre´n, op. cit.; A. Hultin, Gustaf Filip Creutz. Hans levnad och vittra skrifter (Helsingfors, 1913), pp. 181–217, 280– 320. The Marquise du Deffand was an old friend and contemporary of Voltaire and a former member of the forbidden Club de l’Entresol. Her rival, the burgher’s wife Madame Geoffrin, protected the encyclopaedists around d’Alembert and Diderot. Together with Madame de Boufflers, the mistress of the prince of Conti, they were THE SWEDISH ARISTOCRACY AND THE FRENCH ENLIGHTENMENT c. 1740–1780 269

the ladies that the Swedish travellers went to see in Paris. Madame Necker’s literary salon was less aristocratic and more academic than the others, and the meetings did not take place in Paris aristocratic quarters, but in Saint-Ouen, in the countryside outside the town. See C. Wolff, ‘‘Kabal och ka¨rlek. Va¨nskapen som alternativ sociabilitet i 1700-talets hovsamha¨llen’’, Historisk Tidskrift fo¨r Finland, vol. 89 (2004:2), pp. 92–93. 17 P. Bjurstro¨m, ed., Carl Gustaf Tessin och konsten (Stockholm, 1970); G. von Proschwitz, ed., op. cit., passim. 18 P. Bjurstro¨m, Roslin (Ho¨gana¨s, 1993), p. 15; L. Trulsson, op. cit., p. 101. 19 See G. Castre´n, op. cit., pp. 359–380. 20 Cf Creutz letter to Gustavus III, 28 April 1776, quoted in G. Castre´n, op. cit., p. 324. 21 Cf correspondence in RA Ekebladska samlingen, vol. 10. Guillaume de Lamoignon became chancellor in 1750, and his son, Guillaume Chre´tien de Lamoignon- Malesherbes, royal censor and director of the press. Outside his office Malesherbes protected the Encyclope´die and befriended Rousseau. He was the advocate of Louis XVI in the prosecution against the king in 1793. 22 The Parlement had strong sympathies with Jansenism, a movement of Catholic laymen who believed in predestination and recommended inner spiritual renewal by the conversion of the heart. Mystic, elitist, Gallican, anti-Jesuit and anti- absolutistic, it was particularly appreciated by the learned aristocracy. During the 18th century, however, it became a channel for general political dissatisfaction, recruiting not only in the nobility but on all levels of society. See Monique Cottreˆt, Janse´nismes et Lumie`res. Pour un autre XVIIIe sie`cle (Paris, 1998). 23 C. Wolff, ‘‘Carl Fredrik Scheffers brevva¨xling med franska fysiokrater’’, Historisk Tidskrift fo¨r Finland, vol. 88 (2003:2), pp. 185–201. 24 A. Hultin, op. cit., pp. 181–217, 280–320; G. Castre´n, op. cit., pp. 319–380; MAE Controˆle des e´trangers, vol. 2–49; D. Masseau, Les ennemis des philosophes. L’antiphilosophie au temps des Lumie`res (Paris, 2000); C. A. Kors, D’Holbachs Coterie. An Enlightenment in Paris (Princeton, 1976), p. 105. Madame de La Ferte´-Imbault was the daughter of the famous Madame Geoffrin, who protected the encyclopaedists, but contrary to her mother, she rejected modern philosophy as well as any attempts to diminish the privileges of the aristocracy. She formed an exclusive, aristocratic circle that opposed the reform politics of Louis XV’s chancellor Maupeou, whose aim was to reduce the power of the Parlement. Her circle was anti-philosophic, but it was also anti-absolutist. 25 MAE Controˆle des e´trangers, vol. 2–49; L. Amiable, Une loge mac¸onnique d’avant 1789. La loge des Neuf Sœurs (Paris, 1897). Concerning Creutz’s attitude towards freemasonry, see A. Hultin, op. cit., pp. 33–36 and G. Castre´n, op. cit., pp. 62– 63 for opposite views. Voltaire and Benjamin Franklin were members of the lodge, which held its meetings at Helve´tius’ widow’s house. 26 MAE Controˆle des e´trangers, vol. 2–49. 27 See among others, D. Goodman, The Republic of Letters. A Cultural History of the French Enlightenment (Ithaca & London, 1994); D. Roche, ‘‘Salons, Lumie`res, engagement politique : la coterie d’Holbach de´voile´’’, Les Re´publicains des lettres (Paris, 1988), pp. 247–248; C. A. Kors, op. cit. 28 Cf D. Gordon, op. cit.; R. Chartier, Les origines culturelles de la Re´volution franc¸aise (Paris, 2000); R. Darnton, op. cit. 270 SCANDINAVIAN JOURNAL OF HISTORY

29 S. A˚. Nilsson, ed., Drottning Lovisa Ulrika och Vitterhetsakademien (Stockholm, 2003); about Prince Gustaf’s upbringing, see M. C. Skuncke, Gustaf III – Det offentliga barnet (Stockholm, 1993). 30 ‘‘Ils sont plus agre´ables a` lire qu’a` voir.’’ G. von Proschwitz, ed., Gustave III par ses lettres (Stockholm, 1986), p. 107. 31 Ibid., pp. 71–72. 32 ‘‘Mad Dudefant est toujours aveugle et on sy ennuye a` mort.’’ Fersen’s diary in RA, Stafsundsarkivet, Hans Axel von Fersens samling, vol. 4. 33 G. von Proschwitz, ‘‘Tessin och Voltaire’’, Carl Gustaf Tessin. Kulturpersonen och privatmannen 1695–1770 (Stockholm, 1995), pp. 1–19. 34 Cf e.g. E. Bury, Litte´rature et politesse. L’invention de l’honneˆte homme 1580–1750 (Paris, 1996). 35 He was quoting a minister of Both Sicilies. See C. Wolff, ‘‘Carl Fredrik Scheffers brevva¨xling med franska fysiokrater’’, op. cit., p. 200. 36 MAE Controˆle des e´trangers, vol. 2–49; G. von Proschwitz, ed., Gustave III par ses lettres, op. cit., pp. 50–53. 37 M. Marraud, op. cit., pp. 476; D. Gordon, op. cit., pp. 24–42. 38 C. Wolff, ‘‘Carl Fredrik Scheffers brevva¨xling med franska fysiokrater’’, op. cit., pp. 185–201; G. Castre´n, op. cit.; M. Molander, op. cit. 39 See P. Ihalainen, ‘‘Lutherska drag i den svenska politiska kulturen i slutet av frihetstiden. En begreppsanalytisk underso¨kning av fyra riksdagspredikningar’’, , kaffehus och predikstol. Frihetstidens politiska kultur 1766–1772, ed. M.-C. Skucke & H. Tandefelt (Stockholm & Helsingfors, 2003), pp. 73–93; M. Alm, Kungsord i elfte timmen. Spra˚k & sja¨lvbild i det gustavianska enva¨ldets legitimitetskamp 1772–1809 (Stockholm, 2002); P. Hallberg, Ages of Liberty. Social Upheaval, History Writing, and the New Public Sphere in Sweden, 1740–1792 (Stockholm, 2003). 40 C. Wolff, ‘‘Carl Fredrik Scheffers brevva¨xling med franska fysiokrater’’, op. cit., pp. 185–201. 41 RA Ekebladska samlingen, vol. 10, 17. 42 Cf T. Kaitaro, ‘‘Klandestin filosofisk litteratur. Upplysande allusioner och na¨tverk’’, Historisk Tidskrift fo¨r Finland, vol. 88 (2003:2), pp. 216–224; D. Gordon, op. cit.; M. Marraud, op. cit., pp. 401–476; see also S. A˚. Nilsson, ed., op. cit. 43 E. Ha¨kli, ‘‘Gustav Philip Creutz och hans bibliotek’’, Opusculum, vol. 4 (2001:1), pp. 11–32. 44 See J. Christensson, Lyckoriket. Studier i svensk upplysning (Stockholm, 1996); S. Lindroth, Svensk la¨rdomshistoria, vol. IV (Stockholm, 1981); M-C. Skuncke & H. Tandefelt, ed., Riksdag, kaffehus och predikstol. Frihetstidens politiska kultur 1766–1772 (Stockholm & Helsingfors, 2003).

Charlotta Wolff, PhD, born 1976, works as a researcher at the University of Helsinki in the project ‘‘Enlightened Loyalties. The Conceptual Construction of National, Cultural and Political Identities and Loyalties in North-Western Europe, 1750–1800’’ financed by the Academy of Finland. Her doctoral dissertation Va¨nskap och makt. Den svenska politiska eliten och upplysningstidens Frankrike (Helsingfors, 2004) dealt with the political and cultural relations between the Swedish aristocracy and France in the 18th century. Address: Department of History, PO Box 59, FIN-00014 University of Helsinki, Finland. [email [email protected]]