A French Vicar of Bray in Grasse

Maximin Isnard seems to have been a real-life (and, obviously, French!) Vicar of Bray. If you're not familiar with the Vicar, I've put the lyrics to the song about him at the bottom of this post. Suffice to say that whatever the political changes which happened in the seventeenth and eighteenth century England, he was going to keep his job!

To see where the story of his French equivalent starts, just go to the Place des Aires in the middle of the old town and you'll see the Isnard House at the eastern end:

Isnard Mansion, Place aux Aires

There's an identifying plaque on it which indicates that the house is significant, but it doesn't tell the full story.

Display plaque, Isnard Mansion

In September 1791, at the age of 35, Maximin was elected to the Legislative Assembly, which was the second parliamentary body of the revolutionary period, as a member for the newly-formed department of the Var, which included Grasse. He sat on the extreme left, which was rabidly anti-clerical, wanted to spread the revolution to other countries and was highly suspicious of Louis XVI, who was still nominally king of France.

In September 1792, following the coup of August in which the royal family was imprisoned in the Temple, he was elected to the Legislative Assembly’s successor body, the National Convention, of which he became president in May 1793. He was instrumental in the creation of the notorious Committee of Public Safety in January 1793 and voted for the death of the king.

But by then, the extreme left had split between the original Jacobins, known as the 'Montagnards' and dominated by Parisians who wanted complete central control of the country, and the more rightist 'Girondins', who were in favour of more decentralised government. Maximin was prominent in the latter faction and is famous for saying in response to Jacobin demands, "Si par ces insurrections toujours renaissantes il arrivait qu'on portât atteinte à la représentation nationale, je vous le déclare, au nom de la France entière, Paris serait anéanti... ". (“if by these continual insurrections, it should happen that the principle of national representation should suffer, I declare to you in the name of France that Paris will annihilated").

Isnard during the Revolution (Archives of the Var)

When Maximilien Robespierre and his Montagnards triumphed and the Reign of Terror began in September 1793, Maximin fled for his life, only returning to the Convention in December 1794, well after the execution of Robespierre. By now, he was regarded as of the right in revolutionary terms. In October 1795, he was elected again from the Var to the Council of Five Hundred ('Conseil des Cinq-Cents’), which was the next legislative body spawned by the Revolution.

But by 1797 he had become associated with Jean-Charles Pichegru, the effective leader of the rightist and monarchist wing of the Council. Following yet another coup from the left in September, this one supported powerfully by Napoleon Bonaparte, he avoided retribution from the triumphant republicans by returning home, never to return to national French politics. He was well out of the way when Napoleon took absolute power in 1799.

Here he is in 1804 surrounded by his family in the Musée d'Art et d'Histoire de Provence:

Isnard family painting, Musée d'Art & d'Histoire de Provence, Grasse

His opinions seem to have continued to change with the times. In 1802, he published a pamphlet titled ‘De l'immortalité de l'âme’ (‘Of the immortality of the soul’), in praise of Catholicism. In 1804, another of his pamphlets enthusiastically endorsed Napoleon’s new empire. His by now fully adjusted loyalty was rewarded by being made a hereditary Baron of the Empire in 1811.

Yet in 1816, after the restoration of the monarchy when a law was passed proscribing those who had voted for the execution of Louis XVI, he somehow escaped again, professing to have been a royalist all the time!

Possible profile of Maximin Isnard, V illa Musée Jean-Honoré Fragonard

He died in his bed in 1825. In Grasse, it's possibly his image which appears on the wall of the hall and stairway of the Villa Musée Jean-Honoré Fragonard as one of the symbols of the Revolution. My thanks to guide Gilles Burois (whose hand here holds up an image of Maximin next to the illustration on the wall) for a very interesting description of the iconography of these decorations, in a kind of graffiti style, which may have been produced by Fragonard himself.

The family Isnard appears throughout the history of Grasse. Flowers are still grown and developed for perfume at the Bastide Isnard in the St Christophe quartier (see www.isnardgrasse.com), while Isnard Group, located on the Plan de Grasse, specialises in the distribution, storage and commissioning of perfume.

Lyrics to the 'Vicar of Bray':

1. In good King Charles' golden time, when loyalty no harm meant,

A zealous high churchman was I, and so I gained preferment.

To teach my flock, I never missed: Kings are by God appointed

And damned are those who dare resist or touch the Lord's anointed.

(Chorus):

And this be law, that I'll maintain until my dying day, sir

That whatsoever king may reign, Still I'll be the Vicar of Bray, sir.

2. When royal James possessed the crown, and popery came in fashion,

The penal laws I hooted down, and read the Declaration.

The Church of Rome, I found, did fit full well my constitution

And I had been a Jesuit, but for the Revolution.

3. When William was our King declared, to ease the nation's grievance,

With this new wind about I steered, and swore to him allegiance.

Old principles I did revoke; Set conscience at a distance,

Passive obedience was a joke, a jest was non-resistance.

4. When Royal Anne became our queen, the Church of England's glory,

Another face of things was seen, and I became a Tory.

Occasional conformists base; I blamed their moderation;

And thought the Church in danger was from such prevarication.

5. When George in pudding time came o'er, and moderate men looked big, sir

My principles I changed once more, and I became a Whig, sir.

And thus preferment I procured From our new Faith's Defender,

And almost every day abjured the Pope and the Pretender.

6. The illustrious house of Hanover and Protestant succession

To these I do allegiance swear -- while they can hold possession.

For in my faith and loyalty I never more will falter,

And George my lawful king shall be -- until the times do alter.