+ f historical chronicle. 
disgusts, of the consequences of which he was not aware. Mr Necker, a 
good man, anda greet arithmetician, but in regard to knowledge of the 
grand springs of political actions, perhaps one of the weakest of men» 
felt that great obstructions arose to his views of augmenting the prosperity 
of the people, from certain local stipwhations that had been made with 
the inhabitants of particular proyinces, when they were annexed to the 
crown. ‘These privileges had been always respected by the prince, and 
could not with safety be infringed ; but they had given rise to many political 
abuses, which he saw no pofsible way of removing. Artful men, who knew 
his weak side, sugested the idea of calling a meeting of the strates. That 
minister, believing that the beneficence of the proposals he fould make 
would be so universally recognised, and the utility of his plans so obvious, as | 
easily to induce the deputies of the people when afsembled in the sTATEs to 
acquiesce in them, he approved the proposal, and advised the king to adopt 
it. 
No sooner was this determination known, than all the active spirits 
in the mation were set at work, to contrive plans each for their 
own agerandizement ; for the effecting of which they trusted to their in- 
fluence in the great popular afsembly about to be opened, These, as in e- 
very case of this sort, were by each man kept secret; and many of them 
can never be so much as guefsed at, being concealed under various disguised 
veils. Many good and well meaning men not foreseeing the secret influ- 
ence of these sinister views, seriously rejoiced, in the prospect of thus getting 
many evils, that were obvious, removed. But soon did the minister see that ~ 
all his fine theories were swept away as obwebs before the rising breeze; 
and the others when too late have been fatally convinced of their error. 
No sooner did the national afsembly feelits power, than it went far beyond 
the bounds he had prescribed to it. The most artful persons among them, 
aware of the power of the nobility, and fearing to attack it directly, while 
the regal authority was unimpeached, began with attacking, by means of a 
popular insurrection, the 4a stile, knowing that in this attempt the nobility 
would secretly concur with the people. This being once done, and the ar- 
my bribed ‘rom its allegiance, the regal power received a decisive blow it 
never could recover; and the grandees in vain then attempted to restore © 
what they themselves had inadvertantly contributed to pull down. They 
could then be safely attacked; their privileges were at first curtailed; and 
soon after, their whole order was annihilated. 
Here once more, a number of good men like the worthy but fhort sighted © 
minister, saw that they had contributed to let loose an innundation whose 
eee 
extent could not be foreseen, and whose progrefs could not be upposed ; and 
numbers repented when too late. .The innundatign went forward. In vain 
did they opp°s¢ toit an Utopean constitution which pretended to stop the pros 
s ” TAY 
