Some one has said that talent should be judged at its best and character at its worst; but this is a phrase which does not help us to form a true estimate of Frontenac.  He touched no heights of genius and he sank to no depths of crime.  In essential respects his qualities lie upon the surface, depicted by his acts and illustrated by his own words or those of men who knew him well.  Were we seeking to set his good traits against his bad, we should style him, in one column, brave, steadfast, daring, ambitious of greatness, far-sighted in policy; and in the other, prodigal, boastful, haughty, unfair in argument, ruthless in war.  This method of portraiture, however, is not very helpful.  We can form a much better idea of Frontenac’s nature by discussing his acts than by throwing adjectives at him.

As an administrator he appears to least advantage during his first term of office, when, in the absence of war, his energies were directed against adversaries within the colony.  Had he not been sent to Canada a second time, his feud with Laval, Duchesneau, and the Jesuits would fill a much larger space in the canvas than it occupies at present.  For in the absence of great deeds to his credit obstinacy and truculence might have been thought the essentials rather than the accidents of his character.  M. Lorin, who writes in great detail, finds much to say on behalf of Frontenac’s motives, if not of his conduct, in these controversies.  But viewing his career broadly it must be held that, at best, he lost a chance for useful co-operation by hugging prejudices and prepossessions which sprang in part from his own love of power and in part from antipathy towards the Jesuits in France.  He might not like the Jesuits, but they were a great force in Canada and had done things which should have provoked his admiration.  In any case, it was his duty to work with them on some basis and not dislocate the whole administration by brawling.  As to Duchesneau, Frontenac was the broader man of the two, and may be excused some of the petulance which the intendant’s pin-pricks called forth.

Frontenac’s enemies were fond of saying that he used his position to make illicit profits from the fur trade.  Beyond question he traded to some extent, but it would be harsh to accuse him of venality or peculation on the strength of such evidence as exists.  There is a strong probability that the king appointed him in the expectation that he would augment his income from sources which lay outside his salary.  Public opinion varies from age to age regarding the latitude which may be allowed a public servant in such matters.  Under a democratic regime the standard is very different from that which has existed, for the most part, under autocracies in past ages.  Frontenac was a man of distinction who accepted an important post at a small salary.  We may infer that the king was willing to allow him something from perquisites.  If so, his profits from the fur trade become a matter of degree.  So long as he kept within the bounds of reason and decency, the government raised no objection.  Frontenac certainly was not a governor who pillaged the colony to feather his own nest.  If he took profits, they were not thought excessive by any one except Duchesneau.  The king recalled him not because he was venal, but because he was quarrelsome.