The Old Regime in Canada by Francis Parkman

First published: 1874

Type of work: History

Time of work: 1604-1763

Locale: Canada

Principal Personages:

• Charles Saint-Etienne de la Tour, the holder of land grants in Acadia
• Charles de Menou D’Aunay Charnisay, his political rival
• Father Poncet, a Jesuit missionary
• Francois Xavier de Laval-Montmorency, Bishop of Quebec
• Abbe de Queylus, Vicar-general of Canada, Bishop Laval’s rival
• Bishop Saint-Valliers, Bishop Laval’s successor
• The Vicomte D’Argenson, Governor of Quebec, Bishop Laval’s rival
• Baron Dubois D’Avaugour, Argenson’s successor
• Father Simon Le Moyne, a missionary priest
• Chomedey de Maisonneuve, Governor of Montreal
• Jean Baptiste Talon, Intendant of Quebec
• The Marquis Prouville de Tracy, Lieutenant-general of America, 1663-1665

Analysis

Francis Parkman, along with William Hickling Prescott and John Lothrop Motley, is one of the great American historians of the nineteenth century and indeed of the twentieth also. Parkman differs from the other two in that he had a controlled style not subject to useless rhetorical flights, and he was more able to give to his writings a sense of immediacy.

His great accomplishment as historian derives from at least three firm beliefs about the art of this craft. He believed that the historian should pay close attention to research, going to primary documents wherever possible, and he made numerous trips, several across the Atlantic, to examine primary sources. He believed the historian should pay strict attention to developing his work dramatically and should closely observe the proportions of the various sections. He believed, finally, that the proper style of historical writing should be vigorous, without studied prettiness or “tricks of rhetoric.” As a consequence of these basic tenets, Parkman’s works remain readable and lively today.

THE OLD REGIME IN CANADA is the fourth of a series of works known collectively as FRANCE AND ENGLAND IN NORTH AMERICA, published in eleven volumes from 1851 to 1892. It reveals his biases and prejudices typically. He disdained commerce, cared little for democracy but hated tyranny, loved the good old days when men were men, was a political reactionary. As Parkman says in his book, “My political faith lies between two vicious extremes, democracy and absolute authority, each of which I detest, the more because it tends to react into the other.” Although he did not “object to a good constitutional monarchy, he preferred a conservative republic.” Further, he obviously respected Englishmen more than he did Frenchmen, and he had greater regard for Protestantism than for Catholicism.

THE OLD REGIME IN CANADA begins with a Preface that sets the tone, a quotation from the nineteenth century French critic of America, Alexis de Tocqueville: “The physiognomy of a government can best be judged in its colonies, for there its characteristic traits usually appear larger and more distinct. When I wish to judge of the spirit and the faults of the administration of Louis XIV, I must go to Canada. Its deformity is there seen as through a microscope.” Parkman’s volume is an attempt to show by what methods the monarchy of France “strove to make good its hold (on North America), why it achieved a certain kind of success, and why it failed at last.”

The first edition of this work begins in 1653, with the Jesuits at Onandaga, not, as in the revised edition, with material drawn from the papers of La Tour and D’Aunay, the rival claimants to Acadia. Immediately the strength of Parkman’s method is apparent. No detail is too small for his consideration and inclusion. He believes, for example, that “the key” to the history of early New France is “incessant supernaturalism.” He demonstrates with numerous examples. For one he quotes Father Poncet’s insistence that the “holy angels” revealed their intervention in the affairs of men by their use of the number nine, “which,” Father Poncet said, “is specially dedicated to them.” Another “prodigy” he records is that of a French priest’s head, severed from the body, speaking to the Iroquois in their own language. Another example of Parkman’s use of detail and the emergence of bias against his will can be seen in his account telling how a group of French Algonquins captured a “Wolf” or Mohegan Indian who had been naturalized among the Iroquois. The Algonquins brought him to Quebec and burned him. The Jesuits made no effort to prevent this atrocity although they obviously could have done so with the slightest protest. Parkman insists that the Jesuits allowed this monstrous behavior not only because of unwillingness to curb the savagery of their Indian allies but also, perhaps more importantly, because of religious motives. To them torture was spiritually therapeutic. Parkman quotes, with heavy irony, one of the Jesuits: “Is it not a marvel to see a wolf changed at one stroke into a lamb, and enter into the fold of Christ, which he came to ravage?”

He chronicles with thoroughness all the various aspects of Canadian life, development, and conflict. Because he felt that Roman Catholicism was stronger than any other single power in shaping the character and destiny of Canada, he develops this theme in detail and discusses at great length the conflict between Argenson, the Governor of Canada, and the fiery Jesuit Laval, and the triumph of the Church. Again and again, as Parkman shows, Bishop Laval, the “modest Levite,” prevailed, until he became the greatest power in Canada and thought himself beyond human law.

Parkman develops beautifully the resolution of Louis XIV not to abandon New France to mere trade. In his effort to make Canada an extension of old France, Louis poured soldiers, settlers, equipment and women for wives into the country. About the last there grew up among hostile critics many accusations against their virtue; Parkman demonstrates, however, that these women were in general quite moral, were hard working, and made themselves good wives and helpmates.

The success or failure of French rule in Canada rested to a large extent on the government, closely modeled after that of the French province which in the old country was something of an anachronism, the past vying with the present. The Canadian government moved into absolutism, cramping and crushing life. Further, the government was frustrated and thwarted by the zealous activity of the Jesuits. Added to these weaknesses were the vitiating activities of various Indian tribes, the selfishly independent activities of the coureurs de bois trading in beaver furs and other commodities with the Indians. The consequence, inevitably, was failure.

Parkman explicitly points out what to him were the reasons for the failure of French Canada, and in doing so he contrasts Canada with the British Colonies, revealing his own biases and points of view. The nature of education in Canada, essentially held under the heel of despotism, was doomed to failure. The Church and state exercised too much control; their error lay not in exercising power, for the people were not trained to be their own rulers, but in failing to train the people for eventual self-control. The English were superior because they had been trained in “reflection, forecast, industry, and self-reliance.” To Parkman, “Freedom is for those who are fit for it.” Though critical of most characteristics of Canadian government and people, Parkman does praise the military efficiency there. The absolute government utilized the skillful woodsman to the fullest advantage. The most conspicuous characteristic of Canadian life was the power of the Roman Catholic Church, which was more powerful and lasting than the provincial government.

The “grand crisis” in Canadian history, as Parkman says, was the conquest by the English and the peace of 1763. With this conquest came Protestantism and a consequent purification of the Church, material growth, patriotism, and a “rational and ordered liberty.”

According to Parkman’s final sentence in the volume, “A happier calamity never befell a people than the conquest of Canada by the British arms.”