Congregation of the Mission

The Congregation of the Mission, or Lazarists, is the religious order that Aramis resolves to enter after the siege. Although the organization is named only briefly, it carries decisive narrative weight: Aramis’s projected admission signifies his rejection of further military service and contrasts with d'Artagnan’s continuing advancement in the profession of arms.

Identity and Appearance

The Congregation of the Mission is introduced as the house of the Lazarists, a religious community associated with Aramis’s planned postwar vocation. The evidence does not describe its internal organization, rules, membership, or activities. Its significance therefore comes less from institutional detail than from the choice it represents for one of the principal companions: a movement away from campaigns, duels, and royal service toward a religious life.

Aramis’s Decision

After the expedition to Bethune and the adventures surrounding it, Aramis tells d'Artagnan that military life has disgusted him. Kneeling before a prie-dieu with an open prayer book, he presents his decision as final and says that after the siege he will enter the house of the Lazarists. The setting and posture make the decision visibly religious, while the language of irrevocable determination distinguishes it from a passing fatigue or temporary retreat.

Aramis’s refusal is also a response to the burdens accumulated through the companions’ recent career. He has been valued for his intelligence and counsels, and d'Artagnan believes that Aramis has earned the lieutenancy more than any of them. Yet Aramis declines the offered commission, maintaining that the profession of arms suits d'Artagnan and predicting that d'Artagnan will become a brave and adventurous captain. The Congregation of the Mission thus becomes the destination of a deliberate renunciation, not a failure to qualify for advancement.

Contrast with Military Institutions

The order’s appearance is set against a world structured by armed rivalry. In the reign of Louis XIII, citizens readily take up weapons amid conflicts involving nobles, the king, the cardinal, Spain, robbers, and Huguenots. Louis XIII appoints M. de Treville captain of the King's Musketeers, while Cardinal Richelieu establishes his own Cardinal's Guards; the two political powers even compete over the courage and reputation of their fighting men.

That military culture is governed by a tension between formal prohibition and practical indulgence. The king insists that an edict forbids fighting, even while privately arranging to receive the King's Musketeers after their clash with five of the cardinal's Guardsmen. Elsewhere, judicial authority is invoked when the king orders a case sent to the judges, but political persecution remains a recognized danger. Against this environment of armed service, secret conflict, arrest, and competing commands, the Lazarists offer Aramis an alternative mode of allegiance.

Relation to the Siege and the Ending

Aramis’s decision follows a campaign whose larger setting is the siege of La Rochelle. The siege is presented as a major political and military undertaking by Cardinal Richelieu, aimed at destroying the last important Huguenot stronghold and closing its port to English intervention. The conflict is sustained not only by soldiers but by material conditions: English troops suffer from salt meat, bad biscuit, invalids, and storm damage to their vessels, while the dyke blocks ships from reaching the besieged city.

The siege also exposes the human cost of prolonged warfare. La Rochelle’s inhabitants face starvation, and a captured letter warns that without relief from Buckingham within fifteen days, the population will be dead from hunger. The English expedition is eventually repulsed and forced to re-embark, leaving two thousand men on the field, including senior officers, together with cannon and flags. Aramis’s withdrawal into the Congregation of the Mission therefore comes after a campaign defined by political ambition, logistical attrition, hunger, and death.

Narrative Significance

The Congregation of the Mission gives the ending a pattern of separation without erasing the companions’ shared history. Porthos refuses the lieutenancy because he plans to marry a wealthy widow after the death of her husband, while Aramis refuses it because he intends to enter the Lazarists. Athos likewise does not immediately accept the commission. D'Artagnan alone remains oriented toward military advancement, eventually becoming the companion whose career continues along the path Aramis abandons.

Aramis’s projected entrance into the order thus completes a central contrast between friendship and destiny. The four men have acted together within the violent machinery of the French court and army, but the conclusion reveals that their common adventures do not require identical futures. For Aramis, the Congregation of the Mission represents withdrawal, religious vocation, and a hoped-for release from the profession of arms; for d'Artagnan, the same ending confirms that military courage and adventure remain his defining path.