He was
afterwards created Duc de la Rochequyon and Marquis
de Liancourt.
The fifth duke, banished from Court by Louis XV.,
became the friend of the philosopher Voltaire.
The sixth duke, the friend of Condorcet, was the
last of the long line of noble lords who bore that
distinguished name. In those terrible days of Sep-
tember, 1792, when the French people were proclaim-
ing universal humanity, the duke was seized as an
aristocrat by the mob at Gisors and put to death
behind his own carriage, in which sat his mother and
his wife, at the very place where, some six centuries
previously, his ancestor had been taken prisoner in
a fair fight. A modern writer has spoken of this
murder "as an admirable reprisal upon the grandson
for the writings and conduct of the grandfather."
But M. Sainte Beuve observes as to this, he can see
nothing admirable in the death of the duke, and if it
proves anything, it is only that the grandfather was
not so wrong in his judgment of men as is usually
supposed.
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