Being a member of a wealthy family of the highest esteem, De la Gardie was predestined for an eminent career. He received a thorough education from his teacher Mattias Björnklou, and was in 1639 elected
rector illustris at
Uppsala University, thanks to his ancestry; this position put a student on a board that oversaw the university, in the hopes that he could influence the government on economic matters favor of university through his relatives and other high level contacts. The next year, he travelled abroad to complete his training. Much of this period was spent in
France and the
Netherlands. When the
Torstenson War between Sweden and Denmark broke out in 1643, De la Gardie returned to his native Sweden, and learned about warfare under the command of Field Marshal
Gustav Horn. The mission was a success for De la Gardie, who upon his return to Sweden received distinctions of an unparalleled amount. At the coronation in 1650, De la Gardie was entrusted with carrying the royal banner. A year later, in 1651, he ended his first term in Livonia and was appointed
Marshal of the Realm (
riksmarskalk). Also in 1652, De la Gardie was appointed
lawspeaker (
lagman) of
Västergötland and
Dalsland.
Falling out of favour In 1653, De la Gardie fell out of favour with the queen. He and his family had to leave the court and for the rest of Christina's reign, De la Gardie lived on his manors in some kind of an exile. However, Queen Christina abdicated soon thereafter and was replaced on the throne by Charles Gustav, the brother of De la Gardie's wife Maria Eufrosyne. In a Sweden with great financial problems, these subsidies was, in Count De la Gardie's thinking, a more attractive way to improve the state's finances than a reduction, which would mean that lands granted the nobility would be reclaimed by the Crown. In connection with King Charles's coronation the same year, De la Gardie was accused of
high treason, an accusation that soon was judged as unjustified. In principle, the entire Swedish elite of nobles was demolished. De la Gardie had tried to rally the members of the Privy Council to withstand the development leading to absolutism, but in vain. Prior to the Riksdag, De la Gardie had been removed from the Lord High Chancellor office and instead been made
Lord High Steward. Thus, De la Gardie lost influence in general and on the country's foreign policy in particular. Perhaps no other man was as negatively affected by the reduction as De la Gardie. He was judged owing the state a huge sum (352,159
daler silvermynt) and lost his whole fortune through the recoveries made by the Crown. For example, his Läckö estate was recovered in one and a half days. The only estates he could keep were
Venngarn and Höjentorp. In 1675 a special commission was appointed to inquire into the doings of De la Gardie and his high aristocratic colleagues, and on 27 May 1682 it decided that the regents and the senate were solely responsible for
dilapidations of the realm, the compensation due by them to the crown being assessed at 4,000,000
riksdaler. De la Gardie was treated with relative leniency, but he "received permission to retire to his estates for the rest of his life". Spending his final days on Venngarn, he could not understand what crimes he had committed. Desperately, he concluded that "what I have acquired during 38 years, and my father and ancestors during 40 years, is gone". Magnus Gabriel De la Gardie died at Venngarn on 26 April 1686. De la Gardie had been partly responsible for the treaty with France and had worked hard to increase the young King Charles's power. It might seem ironic that the treaty helped moving Sweden into a deep crisis financially, which, together with the level of power Charles had attained, in turn led to the reduction. Thus, De la Gardie contributions came to be a large factor behind his own fall from power and richness. . The picture is filled with symbolic details: Magnus Gabriel is standing lower than his wife because she is sister of the king; they holding hands is symbolizing fidelity, as is the dog; the bean in Maria Eufrosyne's hand is showing that she is pregnant. The painting is regarded as one of the finest from the early Swedish baroque era. ==Personal life==