MAISTRE, JOSEPH DE, Count (1754 1821 I. A French philosopher and political writ er, and statesman in the service of Sardinia, horn in ChambC••y of a noble French family that had settled in Savoy when it belonged to the Sardin ian Kingdom. Driven from his native country by the invasion of the French (1792) , De Maistre, who was a member of the Senate, escaped to Turin, and when, in 1798. the King was com pelled to abandon his Continental possessions, De Maistre accompanied the Court to the island of Sardinia. From 1803 to 1817 he represented his impoverished King at Saint Petersburg, and upon his return was appointed Minister of State and Regent of the Grand Chancery. De Maistre was an ardent advocate of legitimacy, and in his later career became one of the most eminent writers of the new (or liberal) conservative school in polities and religion, of which Chateaubriand may be regarded as the head. His first work of note was Considerations .sur la France (1700), in which he combated the revolutionary doctrines then in vogue. His later works include: Essai le principe generateur des constitutions poll tiques (1810), advocating an absolute monarchy: Du pope (1819), probably the best modern de fence of the spiritual and temporal power of the Pope; and De lYglise gallivant- (1821-22). Ilis
Les soirees de Saint Ntershourg (1821). Examen. de la philosophic de Baron (1830), Lettres et opaseules inedits du (-wilt(' Jos(ph de Maistre (1851), and Ileinoires politiques et rorrespon dance diplomatique appeared posthumously. ()mi tre rhapitrrs inedits .su• la Rossi(' par If rotate Joseph de Maistrr (1859) was published by his son Rodolphe. There are also editions of his (Eurres completes (18041 and (Fumes posthumes (1804). Consult : Margerie. Lr conite .loseph de Maistre (Paris, 18901: Lescure, Le comtr Jo seph (le Maistre rt xi) famille (Paris. 1893): Descostes, Joseph de 1/aisto- aront la rerolrition (Paris, 1893) : id., Joseph de llaistre pendant in rerolution (Paris. 1895) : and Mandmil. Maistrc et in politique de in maison de Saroir (Paris, 1900).