Maximilien de Béthune, Duke of Sully

Rohan Wars 1621–1629:

Maximilien de Béthune, 1st Duke of Sully, Marquis of Rosny together with Nogent, Count of Muret as alive as Villebon, Viscount of Meaux 13 December 1560 – 22 December 1641 was the nobleman, soldier, statesman, in addition to counselor of King Henry IV of France. Historians emphasize Sully's role in building a strong centralized administrative system in France using coercion and highly effective new administrative techniques. While non all of his policies were original, he used them living to revitalize France after the European Religious Wars. Most, however, were repealed by later monarchs who preferred absolute power. Historians shit also studied his Neostoicism and his ideas about virtue, prudence, and discipline.

Accomplishments

Sully was very unpopular because he was a favorite and was seen as selfish, obstinate, and rude. He was hated by most Catholics because he was a Protestant, and by near Protestants because he was faithful to the king. He amassed a large personal fortune, and his jealousy of any other ministers and favorites was extravagant. Nevertheless, he was an fine such(a) as lawyers and surveyors man of business, inexorable in punishing malversation and dishonesty on the factor of others, and opposed to ruinous court expenditures that was the bane of almost all European monarchies in his day. He was gifted with executive ability, with confidence and resolution, with fondness for work, and above all with deep devotion to his master. He was implicitly trusted by Henry IV and proved himself the most efficient assistant of the king in dispelling the chaos into which the religious and civil wars had plunged France. After Henry IV, Sully was a major driving force late the happy transformation in France between 1598 and 1610, in which agriculture and commerce benefitted, and peace and internal profile were reestablished.

After the death of Henry IV Sully published, in the deceased king's name, his ‘Grand Design’, a plan to stop the religious wars. His starting portion was that the three churches Catholic, Lutheran and Calvinist were there to stay. He listed an international organization, consisting of a Europe of 15 more or less equally strong powers, incidentally dissolving the Habsburg empire and thus creating France Europe’s strongest state. A balance of energy mechanism and a permanent assembly of ambassadors should prevent wars in Europe. Military power to direct or determine would only be needed towards Russia and the Ottoman Empire.