I* 



LOUIS XVI. 



LOUIS XVL 



14 



the oorvces and other feudal exaction*, equalising the direct taxes 

 all over the kingdom, granting liberty of conscience and recalling the 

 Protestants, reforming the criuiinal code, compiling a uniform civil 

 code, giving freedom of trade, rendering the civil power independent 

 of all eccltiaUcl jurisdiction, suppressing the greater part of the 

 convents, and establishing a new system of public instruction. These 

 were the real wants of France ; if they could have been satisfied, the 

 revolution would have become unnecessary. But the clergy and the 

 nobility strongly opposed these project*, the parliament! themselves 

 were averse to changes which would reduce their own importance, and 

 the old Count de Maurepas, who was also one of the cabinet, dissuaded 

 the young king from them. Turgot was dismissed. Louis however, 

 following hU own natural disposition, effected much partial good ; he 

 abolished the oorvdes and the practice of torture, granted liberty of 

 trade in corn in the interior of the kingdom between one province and 

 another, made many reforms in the administration, established a 

 system of economy and order, and gave the first example of it himself 

 in his own household. He also granted toleration to the Protestants. 

 But all these were little more than palliatives, and did not strike at 

 the root of existing evils. 



The deficiency in the treasury, and the debt of four thousand 

 millions of livres left by Louis XV., were the great stumbling-block of 

 Louis's administration. He however went on for some years, during 

 which he engaged in a war against England, which was very popular 

 with the French, humbled as they had been in the preceding struggle 

 with that power. The object of this war was a singular one for an 

 absolute monarchy to embark in : it was in support of the revolted 

 colonies of North America, which had declared their independence of 

 Great Britain, and it has been since generally regarded as a great 

 political blunder on the part of the French monarch. On the 6th of 

 February 1778 a treaty of commerce and alliance was signed at Paris 

 between the French cabinet and Franklin and Silas Deane on behalf 

 of the United States, by which the latter were acknowledged by France 

 as an independent community. In the following May a French fleet 

 nnder Count d'Eataing sailed for America, in June the first hostilities 

 took place at sea, and on the 10th of July France declared war against 

 England, and 40,000 men were assembled in Normandy for the invasion 

 of England. This plan however was not carried into effect, because 

 the French and Spanish fleets, which were to protect the landing, were 

 dispersed by contrary winds. In America the French auxiliary troops, 

 joined to the Americans, were successful against the English. 

 [LAFAYETTE.] At sea many engagements took place between the 

 French and English, both in the Atlantic and the Indian seas, without 

 any very decisive advantage on either aide ; but on the 12th of April 

 1782 the French Admiral De Grasse was completely defeated by 

 Admiral Rodney off the island of Dominica, with the loss of five ships 

 of the line, aud was taken prisoner. In September of the same year 

 the attack of the French and Spaniards upon Gibraltar failed. [.Vitro N ; 

 ELIOTT, GEORGE AUGUSTUS.] In September 1783 peace was concluded 

 at Versailles ; England acknowledged the independence of the United 

 States, and gave up to France Tobago and the coast of Senegal. 



Meantime the financial embarrassment of the French government 

 went on increasing. Necker, a Genevese banker [NECKEB], wealthy 

 and retired from business, having become minister of finance in 1776, 

 made many reforms, effected a new and more equitable assessment of 

 the direct taxes, established provincial assemblies of notables, who 

 apportioned the taxes, and put an end to the enormous gains of the 

 Fenuiers Ge"ne"raux. After five years of war his 'compte rendu ' 

 showed a surplus of ten millions of livres; he had borrowed 530 

 millions at a less interest than had ever been known in times of war ; 

 the discount on exchequer-bills, which had been 16 per cent., was 

 reduced to 8, and all this without any addition to the burdens of the 

 people. In November 1783, by a court cabal, Necker was dismissed, 

 and Calonne, a more pliant and courtly person, was substituted. He 

 managed to go on a little longer, involved himself in a dispute with 

 the parliament of Paris, and at last, being unable to proceed any 

 further, he proposed to the king to call together an assembly of the 

 notables selected by the king from the various provinces, to consult 

 upon the means of supplying the deficiency in the revenue, which 

 Calonne stated to amount to 110 millions of livres. This assembly 

 met at Versailles in February 1787, rejected Calonne's proposal of 

 laying additional taxes upon property (the notables themselves were 

 all landed proprietors), and proposed instead several measures, among 

 others a loan on life annuities, and the formation of a council of 

 finance. The king adopted their measures, and then dissolved the 

 assembly. A paper war now took place between Necker aud Calonne 

 on the respective merits of their administrations, and Calonne, being 

 detected by the king in a falsehood, was dismissed. Several successive 

 ministers followed for short periods, but they could do nothing to 

 retrieve the ruinous state of affairs, and at last Necker was recalled. 

 He stated to the king that the only resource left was to call together 

 the states-general of the kingdom, which had not been assembled since 

 1614. The king convoked them at Versailles in May 1789. These 

 states hail always consisted of the three orders clergy, nobility, and 

 the third estate, or commons. Every order formed a separate houso, 

 in which it discussed the measures proposed by the government, and 

 decided by a majority of votes. By this means any project of law 

 displeasing to the two privileged orders was sure not to pass tho'e 



two houses, and was therefore lost. Necker, to obviate this difficulty, 

 proposed to give to the third estate a double vote, BO as to balance the 

 votes of the other two houses. The king, after some hesitation, gave 

 this double vote to the third mtate, and this was in fact the beginning 

 of the revolution. It is remarkable that Monsieur, the king's brother, 

 afterwards Louis XV111.. was one of those who supported this 

 organic change. 



On the 5th of May, the three estates having assembled in the 

 common-hall, the king opened the session by a temperate speech, 

 which was much applauded, after which the clergy and nobility 

 withdrew to their separate rooms to deliberate among themselves. 

 The third estate remained in the common-hall, and in the following 

 sittings proposed that the three orders should assemble and del: 

 together, which the other two refused. On the 10th the third estate 

 elected Bailly for their president; and on the following day they were 

 joined by several deputies of the clergy. On the 17th, on the motion 

 of the Abbe Sieyes, the third estate, joined by many of the clergy, 

 constituted themselves as a national assembly, and resolved that as 

 soon as that assembly should be prorogued or dissolved all taxes not 

 sanctioned by it should cease to be legal. The court was alarmed at 

 these innovations, and the king announced that he was going to hold 

 a royal sitting. Meantime the doors of the hall of the assembly were 

 closed, and a guard placed there to prevent the deputies from entering. 

 Bailly led them, on the 20th to the ' Jeu de paume,' where they sworo 

 not to separate until they had framed and enforced a new constitution 

 for the kingdom, and the redress of existing grievances. On the 23rd 

 the king convoked the three estates in the common-hall, aud atVr 

 qualifying the resolutions of the 17th preceding as illegal, ordered the 

 estates to leave the hall, aud withdraw each to their appropriate 

 chamber, to deliberate there upon certain subjects which he laid before 

 them. After the king's departure, the third estate, joined by part of 

 the clergy, refused to leave the hall, and when the grand-master of the 

 ceremonies came to enforce the king's order, Mirabeau answered him, 

 that they were there to fulfil their duty towards their constituents, 

 and that force alone should disperse them. On the 25th, part of the 

 deputies of the nobility joined tho third estate, and the name of 

 National Assembly was publicly recognised. 



The events that followed rapidly are too numerous and too generally 

 known to be inserted in this article. Tha National Assembly, by the 

 constitution it formed, changed tho old French monarchy into a 

 representative republic, with a single chamber and an hereditary 

 magistrate with the name of king, whose power however was rendered 

 insignificant and nugatory. They suppressed not only the feudal 

 jurisdictions, but also the manorial dues and fees, the titles of nobility, 

 the tithes, convents, and the corporations of trades ; they confiscated 

 the property of the Church ; they abolished the old division of the 

 kingdom by provinces, and ordered a now one by departments ; they 

 changed entirely the social relations of the country, so that even 

 Mirabeau was startled at the rapidity with which they were legislating, 

 and began to express ominous doubts of the result, (Dumont, 'Souve- 

 nirs de Mirabeau.') " It is easy to destroy, " ho said, ' but we want 

 men able to reconstruct." Paiue's pamphlet on the supposed ' lights 

 of Man' was gravely assumed by that assembly as the basis of thrir 

 political theory. Meantime insurrections broke out in Paris and in 

 the provinces ; not only the abominable Bastille was taken and 

 destroyed (July 1789), but the chateaux, or manorial residences of 

 the nobility, all about the country, were attacked and burnt, with 

 many acts of atrocity. On the 6th of October the palace of Versailles 

 was entered by a mob from Paris, the body-guards were murdered, 

 the royal family were in great danger, and at last the king consented 

 to remove to Paris, whither he was escorted by the armed popul ic". 

 On the same day the famous club of the Jacobins began its meetings 

 at Paris. The emigration of the nobles had already begun : - 

 members of the royal family repaired to Germany aud Italy. Tho 

 year 1790 wao passed amidst alarms and insurrections in the interior, 

 and rumours of foreign war, amidst which the assembly continued its 

 labours for the new organisation of France. It passed a law requiring 

 of all the clergy the oath of fidelity to the new constitution : the pope 

 forbade the oath as schismatic, aud many of the French clergy refused 

 to take it, but they were dismissed from their functions and replaced 

 by others more docile, who however had not the confidence of the 

 more religious among their flocks : thus religious schism was added to 

 civil feuds. The king himself was obliged to send away his chaplains. 

 He had by this time become weary of being a mere puppet in the 

 hands of tho assembly, which had despoiled him of almost every 

 royal prerogative, even of the right of pardoning ; the ' veto," or 

 power of suspending for a time the passing of an obnoxious law, had 

 also become illusory, for whenever he attempted to exercise it an 

 insurrection broke out, which, by frightening the court, obliged the 

 king to submit. 



In June 1791, Louis, with his consort, his sister, an 1 his children, 

 endeavoured to escape from Franco, but was stopped at Varenue.*, and 

 brought back to Paris. In the following September the assembly, 

 having completed the new constitution for France, presented it to 

 Louis, who, after making some remarks on what he conceived to be 

 its deficiences, swore to observe it. This act acquired him a few 

 moments' popularity : and tho assembly, having stated that the 

 object for which it had met was completed, closed its sittings on tho 



