High Chancellor, desiring him to inform him of the Queen’s intentions, if he knew them; or to advise him whither he ought to go, to Osnabrug or elsewhere; and in fine, to send him a safe-conduct from the Ambassadors of the Emperor and the King of Spain, and even, if he could, from the Elector of Cologn.  Grotius was strongly persuaded that they would employ him elsewhere[418].  He demanded an audience of Queen Anne, whom he informed of his being recalled.  The Queen of Sweden wrote to the French Queen a letter highly to Grotius’s honour[419], in which she said that she would never forget his great services.  She wrote also to himself[420], signifying to him her satisfaction with his fidelity and prudence, and making him the fairest promises:  which confutes what we find in the Menagiana[421], that Queen Christina began her reign with recalling Grotius; since it is beyond doubt that it was Grotius himself who asked to be recalled.  But we must not expect great exactness in this kind of works, compiled for the most part by persons who relate ill what they heard, and are not always acquainted with the matters of which they write.

Before we consider Grotius returned to a private station, we shall observe that he always supported with great firmness the rights and honours belonging to the rank of Ambassador, not from vanity, but because he thought it his duty to prevent a dignity conferred on him from being depreciated.  He imagined[422], that the Dutch, from ill-will to him, had entered into a kind of conspiracy not to treat him as Ambassador, and to make him be considered as a simple Resident[423]; and afterwards to make a crime of his weakness in giving up any part of his right.  They denied him the title of Excellency when speaking to him of private business, under pretext that his embassy was not concerned:  but he shewed this to be a very bad reason, since the greatest Noblemen in Sweden treated him as Ambassador even in private letters:  he therefore burnt all those letters which did not give him the proper titles, without answering them; and even would not receive in his house such persons as denied him the honours due to the Ambassadors of crowned heads.

FOOTNOTES: 

[408] Ep. 716. p. 970.

[409] Puffendorf, l. 13. n. 77.

[410] Ep. 690. p. 284.

[411] Inter Vossianas Ep. 656.

[412] Ep. 1689, p. 731.

[413] Ep. 1477. p. 668.

[414] Ep. 572. p. 928.

[415] Ep. 620. p. 942.

[416] Ep. 83. p. 84.  Sarravii.

[417] Ep. 1743. p. 746.

[418] Ep. 1745. p. 746.

[419] Ep. 1757. p. 749.

[420] Ep. 1753. p. 748.

[421] Tom. 2. p. 298.

[422] Ep. 532. p. 912.

[423] Ep. 542. p. 918.