Chapter 1476: Your Holiness, You Must Trust the Sun King!

One gold louis was worth three of the Ming dynasty's one-tael silver coins, so five million gold louis came to fifteen million taels. That was a colossal sum!

Moreover, the Roman Curia was no longer as flush as it had been in its prosperous days. Because of the Thirty Years' War, the Spanish kingdom's repeated bankruptcies, and the New Spanish kingdom going its own way under the regent Don Juan José, among other reasons, the Curia's tithes had fallen sharply.

The Curia, which had once simply lain back and collected money, had in recent years begun spending more than it took in. Fortunately, the Curia had been rich for centuries and had deep reserves, and over its history it had produced several popes skilled at investment. So the Curia still had considerable capital, enough not only to sustain its various expenses but also to provide support to Poland and the Holy Roman Empire in their fight against the Ottoman Empire. But to hand over five million gold louis at one go was still a bit too much for the Curia's present finances.

And on top of that, the Curia was now preparing to allocate a large sum to support the Poles in fighting the Ottomans!

"Your Excellency, Foreign Minister!" The old pope grew agitated, abandoned French, and switched to rapid, urgent Latin, saying to Hugo Leonardo, "The Curia simply cannot produce five million gold louis, and I do not consider the defense of the Americas a matter of urgency. The Church's urgent task is the defense of Poland. The Regional Commander of the Polish army, Jan Sobieski, has already issued a declaration expressing firm opposition to the Treaty of Buchach. All Poland has now mobilized, the Holy Roman Empire is preparing to give Poland support, and the Roman Curia will also provide Poland with funds! As long as aid from all quarters arrives, the Poles will surely defeat the Ottoman Empire!"

The old pope was somewhat agitated. He rose and paced a few steps across the hall, then turned and said, "If we sit by and watch Jan Sobieski fail, the Ottoman host will soon be hurling itself at Vienna! When that time comes, all Europe will tremble before the armies of the Ottoman Empire. If Vienna cannot hold, then Paris and Rome may both become the Ottomans' next targets! If Paris falls, do you French intend to abandon the French homeland and go live in the New World?"

Hugo Leonardo looked at the pope, whose face was flushed bright red and whose white beard was quivering, and began praying inwardly — he must not let the pope die of rage!

To anger a pope to death must surely be a grave sin, perhaps enough to send one to hell.

"Your Holiness," Hugo Leonardo hastily spoke up to soothe the pope, who was nearly exploding with fury, "your worries are unnecessary. The Ottomans simply do not have the strength to break through Vienna, and the Polish question can be satisfactorily resolved without war. As long as Your Holiness supports France's enterprise in the New World, King Louis can step in to mediate. The Ottoman armies are nothing before our French army, and Ahmed Köprülü will be willing to revise the Treaty of Buchach."

His words were not entirely nonsense. The Ottoman Empire's armies already found it somewhat difficult to bully the Holy Roman Empire and Poland. Had the Poles themselves not been so disorganized, refusing to pay taxes to Jan Sobieski so that he could raise a sufficiently large army, the fortress of Kamianets would never have fallen to the Ottoman forces.

If Louis XIV were willing to send troops, the Ottoman Empire would be no match at all — a French intervention would not mean France fighting the Ottoman Empire alone, but France plus the Netherlands plus the Holy Roman Empire plus Greater Poland, and perhaps Russia as well, oh, and Spain and Portugal, and the half-dead Papal States, Venice, Genoa — the whole lot.

Essentially, the Ottoman Empire would be mobbed by all of Europe!

Hearing Hugo Leonardo speak this way, the Roman pope finally calmed down a little, but he still did not quite trust the Sun King of France.

"But France's relations with the Ottoman Empire have always been very close!" the pope pointed out. "Is King Louis truly willing to give up this infidel friend?"

Of course Louis XIV would abandon the Ottoman Empire! Leonardo thought to himself: the moment the Ottomans had thoroughly beaten the Habsburg family into the ground, he would surely be willing to become Holy Roman Emperor — Louis XIV had once sought that position, only he had not succeeded in obtaining it.

"Your Holiness!" Leonardo said. "King Louis is a principled Catholic... and we French are also a people who love God with all their hearts. The reason we maintain a certain friendship with the Ottoman Empire is that doing so is the most advantageous course for safeguarding the interests of Catholicism."

What? Friendship with the Ottomans was most advantageous to Catholicism? The pope was not yet senile, so he looked at Leonardo with a face full of doubt.

Leonardo solemnly pointed out: "The facts prove that the Kingdom of France is the most beneficial supporter of the Roman Curia and the most important defender of Catholicism.

Therefore the development and strengthening of the Kingdom of France accords with the fundamental interests of Catholicism! And maintaining a certain degree of friendship with the Ottoman Empire can promote the prosperity of France.

Therefore this is something that accords with the interests of Catholicism!"

So it could be explained that way!

The pope was left speechless.

Leonardo went on spinning his yarn: "Your Holiness, our Kingdom of France will not permit the Ottoman Empire to expand excessively on the European continent, because we need the support of a stable, united, and powerful Catholic Europe. Only in this way can we contend for supremacy in the Americas, in the Indian Ocean, in Central Asia, and elsewhere against the most powerful world empire of the East!

Especially in the Americas — vast and rich, and enormously attractive to the Great Ming Empire with its population of more than two hundred million. They have too many people; they have reached the point where their homeland cannot feed them. So these Easterners who believe in the Heavenly Principle are flooding toward the American continent like a tide. Only sixteen or seventeen years ago, there was perhaps not a single Chinese person on the American continent. And now there are a full one million Chinese there! And the number is still growing at high speed!

Consider this: once the Great Ming Empire possesses all of the Americas, to what extent will their population grow? Three hundred million? Four hundred million? Five hundred million? Or a billion? How many people does all of Europe have? How many people do all the Catholics in the world combined amount to? Forty million? Fifty million? If a billion people in the world believe in the Heavenly Principle, then in whose hands does the truth truly lie?"

The Roman pope began to tremble, and his face turned ashen. Religion, after all, was a matter of numbers — a truth believed by a billion people was indeed truer than a truth believed by fifty million! Why could the Roman Church call itself the "Catholic" and "Universal Church"? Was it not precisely because so many people believed in it?

If the believers in the Heavenly Principle grew to a billion...

The pope had been persuaded by Hugo Leonardo: "The Catholic Church can fund King Louis's enterprise. It can give five million gold louis, but I have two conditions.

First, King Louis must support Jan Sobieski in becoming the next King of Poland, and must sign a treaty of alliance with the Polish Republic to guarantee the territory and sovereignty of the Polish Republic. If the Ottoman Empire refuses to withdraw its troops from Polish territory, France must enter the war!

Second, the City of God that King Louis establishes in New France must be governed by a cardinal appointed by the Catholic Church!"

"Fine! No problem!" Hugo Leonardo breathed a great sigh of relief inwardly, and felt somewhat admiring of his own diplomatic skill — he had actually managed to bamboozle that old fool of a pope. It had been a close call just now; if he really had angered the pope to death, things would have become troublesome.

The pope had been bamboozled, but he was not about to "transfer the money" to France right away. He needed more assurances. And besides, he still had to rescue Poland, that loyal Catholic country, from under the iron hooves of the Ottomans!

"Foreign Minister," the pope said, "I hope to meet with the King of France in Rome as soon as possible, and the Regional Commander of the Polish army, Jan Sobieski, will also attend. If the Franco-Polish treaty of alliance can be signed in Rome, I can pay one million gold louis. If the Ottoman army withdraws from Polish territory, I will pay another one and a half million gold louis. As for the remaining two and a half million gold louis, they will be used by the Catholic Church for the construction of the New Rome on the American continent!"

(End of Chapter)