Malesherbes, CHRÉTIEN GUILLAUME DE LAMOIGNON DE, a distinguished French statesman, was born at Paris, December 6, 1721. Educated at the Jesuits' College, at twenty-four he became counsellor to the parliament of Paris, and in 1750 succeeded his father as president of the Cour des Aides, where he showed clear judgment, strict integrity, and humanity. A quiet but determined opponent of government rapacity and tyranny, he watched the ministry with a jealous eye, and was indefatigable in his efforts to prevent the people from being plundered. Besides his more proper judicial duties he was entrusted also with the censorship of the press, and so tolerant was he that French authors pronounce the period of his censorship 'the golden age of letters.' To his large mind we may ascribe the publication of the famous Encyclopédie. In 1771 his bold remonstrances against the abuses of law which Louis XV. was perpetrating led to his banishment to his country-seat of St Lucie, but here he solaced himself with botany, ever a favourite study. At the accession of Louis XVI. (1774) he was recalled, and took office under the crown, but retired on the dismissal of Turgot, and from this time to the Revolution spent his time in travel, or in the improvement of his estates, with one brief interval of office in 1787. The first storms passed him by; but when he heard that the unhappy king was about to be tried by the Convention he magnanimously left his retreat, and came to Paris to undertake his defence. 'I was twice called to the council of him who was my master, when all the world coveted that honour; and I owe him the same service now when it has become one which many reckon dangerous,' said the gray-haired hero. From that day Malesherbes himself was doomed. He was arrested in the beginning of December 1793, and guillotined, April 22, 1794, along with his daughter and her husband, brother of the famous Chateaubriand. Malesherbes was one of the noblest figures of his time, and his fearless, high-minded devotion to duty as an advocate was fittingly commemorated in 1826 by a statue in the hall of justice at Paris, and in the name of a well-known boulevard in the city. He was a member of the Academy, and brought an able pen to the discussion of agriculture and botany as well as political and financial questions.
His Œuvres Choisies (1809) contains his most interesting writings. For his Life, see the books by Dubois (3d ed. 1806), Gaillard (1805), Boissy d'Anglas (1818), Rozet (1831), Dupin (1841), and Vignaux (1874).