And you know that at this day your friends are under great apprehension if they see you in the streets without arms.  Do you count it a slight thing to put an end to all these miseries?  And will you neglect the only opportunity Providence puts a into your hands to obtain the honour of it?  Take your clergy with you to Compiegne, thank the King for removing Mazarin, and beg his Majesty to return to Paris.  Keep up a good correspondence with those bodies who have no other design but the common good, who are already almost all your particular friends, and who look upon you as their head by reason of your dignity.  And if the King actually returns to the city, the people of Paris will be obliged to you for it; if you meet with a refusal, you will have still their acknowledgments for your good intention.  If you can get the Duc d’Orleans to join with you, you will save the realm; for I am persuaded that if he knew how to act his part in this juncture it would be in his power to bring the King back to Paris and to prevent Mazarin ever returning again.  You are a cardinal; you are Archbishop of Paris; you have the good-will of the public, and are but thirty-seven years old:  Save the city, save the kingdom.”

In short, the Duc d’Orleans approved of my scheme, and ordered me to convene a general assembly of the ecclesiastical communities, and to get deputies chosen out of them all, and go with them to Court, there to present the deputation, which should request the King to give peace to his people and return to his good city of Paris.  I was also to endeavour by the aid of my friends to induce the other corporate bodies of the city to do likewise.  I was to tell the Queen that she could not but be sensible that the Duke was in good earnest for peace, which the public engagements he was under to oppose Mazarin had not suffered him to conclude, or even to propose, while the Cardinal continued at Court; that he renounced all private views and interests with relation to himself or friends; that he desired nothing but the security of the public; and that after he had the satisfaction of seeing the King at the Louvre he would then with joy retire to Blois, fully resolved to live in peace and prepare for eternity.

I set out immediately with the deputies of all the ecclesiastical bodies of Paris, nearly two hundred gentlemen, accompanied by fifty men of the Duke’s Guards.  The number of my attendants gave such umbrage at Court, where it was ridiculously exaggerated, that the Queen sent me word I should only have accommodation for eighty horses, whereas I had no less than one hundred and twelve for the coaches alone.  If I had known as much when I went as I heard after I returned, I should have hesitated about going, for I was told that some moved for arresting me, and others for killing me.  However, the Queen received me very well; the King gave me the cardinal’s hat and a public audience.