Religion and European Interstate Relations in the Age of Louis XIV
Confessional strife as a reason for conflict in interstate relations did not cease with the peace of
Westphalia. Assertions such as those, for instance, by Michael Sheehan in his The Balance of
Power History & Theory need to be reevaluated and corrected. He claimed that “the Treaty of
Westphalia (...) can be seen as a crucial watershed in the long process by which the balance of
power became the central guiding principle of European international relations in the eighteenth and
nineteenth centuries. In order to work effectively, a complex balance of power requires the
existence of a functioning international system in which the sovereign independence of states is the
central goal of national policy and in which there is comparative moderation in foreign policy
objectives and an absence of ideologically based interstate bitterness. The Peace of Westphalia can
be said to have formalised these conditions in Europe and thereby provided the foundation for the
acceptance of balance of power logic as a determinant of foreign policy behaviour. It brought an
end to the century-long Christian wars of religion in Europe [and] it formally recognised the
concept of state sovereignty“.1 Although the settlement of the Westphalian treaties had indeed to a
remarkable degree established a new modus vivendi among the European states, assertions such as
Sheenan's seem too easily to forget that the confessional antagonism between the Christian creeds
continued to influence the forging of alliances along confessional lines on the one hand and, on the
other, continued to disrupt the settling of conflicts because of its divisive power.2 In order to avoid
such anachronistic and too simplified views of a world which is alien to us, the historian of ideas
needs to engage with the important task to accurately situate the contemporary debates and their
underlying ideas to allow for an appropriate understanding of their intellectual currency.3 This
essay will look at some of the arguments and polemics in the age of Louis XIV and thus endeavour
to assess the role religion still played in the conflicts and the theories arguing about them during this
period.
In particular I will focus on the decade after the peace of Nimwegen in 1678. These ten years mark
the so called armed peace or reunions (1679-1684)4, which saw the violent seizure of the Imperial
city of Strasbourg by French troops in 1681 and the revocation of the edict of Nantes in 1685.5 Both
1 M. Sheehan, The Balance of Power. History & Theory (London/New York: Routledge, 1996), 37f.
2 For the Holy Roman Empire see notably R.-P. Fuchs, Ein “Medium zum Frieden”. Die Normaljahrsregel und die
Beendigung des Dreißigjährigen Krieges (München: Oldenbourg Verlag, 2010) and J. Luh, Unheiliges Römisches
Reich. Der konfessionelle Gegensatz 1648 bis 1806 (Potsdam: Verlag für Berlin-Brandenburg, 1995). For France
see E. Labrousse, „Une foi, une loi, un roi?“ La Révocation de l'édit de Nantes (Genève: Labor et Fides, 1985).
Generally see H. Schilling, “Konfessionalisierung und Formierung eines internationalen Systems während der
Frühen Neuzeit” Die Reformation in Deutschland und Europa: Interpretationen und Debatten, ed. H.
Guiggisberg/G. Krodel (Heidelberg: Gütersloher Verlags-Haus, 1993), 591-613.
3 With further references see the collection of essays in D. Castiglione/I. Hampsher-Monk (eds.), The History of
Political Thought in National Context (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001).
4 See L. Bély, La France moderne 1498-1789 (Paris: Presse Universitaires de France, 2003), 405-17.
5 See J. Garrisson, L’Édit de Nantes et sa révocation. Histoire d'une intolérance (Paris: Seuil, 1985). For Strasbourg
events caused considerable irritation and concern among Protestant princes and political thinkers
alike. With the accession to the English throne in 1688 by William III of Orange the tables turned
again and war ensued anew. How dramatic this change in 1688/89 really was, can also be seen in
the fact that France, one of the guarantors of the peace of Westphalia, was declared an enemy of the
Holy Empire in April 1689.6 A lot of research has been done regarding the Huguenot's writings
during the ten years preceding these crucial events in 1688/89, but political thought in Germany
during this period has not been as well studied as might be expected. This essay will in particular
concentrate on the still somewhat neglected political writings of the German protestant Gottfried
Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716) and his reaction to the increasingly aggressive French policies and
propaganda. In contrast to Leibniz, the importance of Samuel Pufendorf (1632-1694) as a political
thinker has firmly been established.7 In many ways he complemented Leibniz's position and I will
to some extend engage with his work to show how both thinkers shared concern about the defense
of the Holy Roman Empire and Protestantism against the French quest for religious and political
hegemony in Europe. By way of some concluding remarks, I will situate Leibniz's writings in the
wider context of the Protestant-Catholic polemics and in particular the defence of French
catholicism and Louis XIV's rule by the French bishop Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet (1627-1704) on
the one hand, and Pierre Bayle's (1647-1706) reaction to the aggressive religious politics of the
French crown on the other.
see A. Schilling, Höfe und Allianzen Deutschland 1648-1763 (Berlin: Siedler Verlag, 1989), 236-40, C. Boutant,
L'Europe au grand tournant des années 1680. La succession palatine (Paris: SEDES, 1985) and Histoire de
Strasbourg des Origines à nos Jours. Tome III: Strasbourg de la Guerre de Trente ans a Napoleon 1618-1815, ed.
G. Livet/F. Rapp (Strasbourg: Editions de Dernieres Nouvelles, 1981).
6 J. J. Pachner von Eggenstorf, Vollständige Sammlung aller von Anfang des noch fürwährenden Teutschen ReichsTags de anno 1663 biss andero abgefassten Reichsschlüsse (Regensburg: 1740-76): 2, 673-76.
7 A good overview of the existing research with further references can now be found in: Naturrecht und Staatstheorie
bei Samuel Pufendorf, ed. D. Hüning (Baden-Baden, Nomos Verlag, 2009). For Pufendorf's arguments on religion
see S. Zurbuchen, “Samuel Pufendorf's Concept of Toleration”, Difference and Dissent: Theories of Toleration in
Medieval and Early Modern Europe, C. J. Nedermann/C. Laursen (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 1996), 163-84.