Catherine, helpless between the party of Madame d'Etampes and the
party of the Senechale (such was Diane's title during the reign of
Francois I.), which divided the court and politics into factions for
these mortal enemies, endeavored to make herself the friend of both
Diane de Poitiers and Madame d'Etampes. She, who was destined to
become so great a queen, played the part of a servant. Thus she served
her apprenticeship in that double-faced policy which was ever the
secret motor of her life. Later, the /queen/ was to stand between
Catholics and Calvinists, just as the /woman/ had stood for ten years
between Madame d'Etampes and Madame de Poitiers. She studied the
contradictions of French politics; she saw Francois I. sustaining
Calvin and the Lutherans in order to embarrass Charles V., and then,
after secretly and patiently protecting the Reformation in Germany,
and tolerating the residence of Calvin at the court of Navarre, he
suddenly turned against it with excessive rigor. Catherine beheld on
the one hand the court, and the women of the court, playing with the
fire of heresy, and on the other, Diane at the head of the Catholic
party with the Guises, solely because the Duchesse d'Etampes supported
Calvin and the Protestants.

Such was the political education of this queen, who saw in the cabinet
of the king of France the same errors committed as in the house of the
Medici. The dauphin opposed his father in everything; he was a bad
son. He forgot the cruel but most vital maxim of royalty, namely, that
thrones need solidarity; and that a son who creates opposition during
the lifetime of his father must follow that father's policy when he
mounts the throne. Spinosa, who was as great a statesman as he was a
philosopher, said--in the case of one king succeeding another by
insurrection or crime,--