Note 12 — LIFE OF NOSTRADAMUS.

Garencières, as we have shown, says Nostradamus dedicated the “Luminary Epistle” to Henri II. in 1557. M. le Pelletier holds (i. 10) that Henri II. never knew of the dedicatory epistle written to him by name, and that, as the events referred to do not concern the House of Valois, they could have had no interest for him had he known of the epistle. M. le Pelletier adds a most singular note to this remark, that the epistle is dedicated “A l’invictissime, très puissant, et très chrestien Henry Roy de France Second.” This epigraph he maintains not to be addressed to Henri II., for he remarks that he was no longer alive when it made its appearance. Now, this is not so; for the dedicatory letter was dated in print June 27, 1558, and the king’s death only took place in 1559, so that the document was even in print before his death. But, had it not been so, there is no reason whatever why Nostradamus should not have supplied the king with a copy of the letter and quatrains in manuscript long before either of them had been committed to type. Jean de Roux, Curé de Louvicamp, wrongly suggests that it was intended as a prophetical dedication to Louis le Grand or XIV. M. le Pelletier thinks it was not even dedicated to the great Henri Quatre, but to a “Henry, Roy de France Second”—second being the Latin secundus, or prosperous, i.e. some king not less illustrious than Henri Quatre, whose reign is to arise in the future. This it is which furnishes to the reader the secret purpose of Le Pelletier’s book, which is to set forth the claims of the Duc de Bordeaux, who would have ascended the French throne as Henri Cinq. Accordingly, in the body of the book, he has interpreted five quatrains and one sixain of the prophecies of Nostradamus as referring to this glorious King Henri Second, who has never arrived, and who, being now some years dead, never can. We have seen that the Curé de Louvicamp could even suppose that Louis XIV. could stand for “Henry, Roy de France Second.” M. F. Buget, in his “Étude sur Nostradamus,” has the same idea, that he does not address Henri II., because he was not of a character sufficiently great to merit the attribution of such spiritual authority to him by our prophet, as if the flattery of a dedication was to be interpreted au pied de la lettre. It could only be addressed, he thinks, to a really great man, a saint. M. Buget, in his book of 1862, evidently was another of those who made the fatal error of interpreting Nostradamus out of the future, instead of carefully following the enigmas thrown out by him to find their fulfilment in the past. These gentlemen, if they had assiduously read the Epistle itself, instead of consulting their imaginative faculties, would have perceived plainly enough that Nostradamus was writing to the only king he knew, before whom he had personally presented himself, and whom, as he says, he had highly reverenced from “iceluy jour que premierement devant icelle je me presentay.” The concluding words of the Dedication are equally plain, and show that he is addressing a king whom he has individually seen with his own eyes: “depuis que mes yeux furent si proches de vostre splendeur solaire.” All the rest is to be set down to the strain of courtly flattery that was customarily addressed to kings, then and down to a period full two hundred years later, especially on occasion of penning royal dedications. The purpose of this long note is to establish, once and for all, I trust, that “Henry, Roy de France Second,” stands, without any subtlety at all, simply for King Henri II., and nothing more. It is vain to endeavour to make millstones transparent that we may shoot unexpected rays of light through them. They will answer their purpose by being left in the dark, and will grind grain the better for it. Transparency will in such cases represent frangibility.