LOUIS XVI. 



557 



rose en masse. No less attention was excited by the 

 work of Helvetius, De V Esprit. Even the ladies took 

 a very active part in the contest of philosophy. 

 Bureaux d'esprit were formed, and from the philoso- 

 phical circles at the houses of the baron of Holbach 

 and Helvetius, there proceeded several works in sup- 

 port of materialism and atheism, especially from 1 758 

 to 1770. The most famous of them is the Systeme de 

 la Nature, of which the baron of Holbach is regarded 

 as the author. Religion was shamelessly assailed by 

 La Mettrie, D'Argens, the abbe de Prades, who, 

 banished from France, sought refuge with Frederic 

 II., but whose opinions found reception in France. 

 Condemnation by the Sorbonne only excited opposi- 

 tion, and the boldness of the age loved to defend 

 rash and splendid errors, if they afforded opportunity 

 for the exhibition of acuteness. No work was more 

 destructive of public morals than Voltaire's Pucelle 

 a talented poem, which the licentious spirit of the 

 times of the regency alone could have inspired. But 

 better men, such as Turgot and Malesherbes, labour- 

 ed, not without the approbation of the better part of 

 the public, to counteract this pestilence, and saved 

 the honour of sound reason. Such a production is 

 Duclos's Considerations sur les Moeurs, of which 

 Louis XV. himself said, " It is the work of a man of 

 honour." Thomas Marmontel, and Laharpe remon- 

 strated loudly against atheism. Voltaire's wit was 

 particularly directed against the Christian religion, 

 after the duke de Choiseul, in order to have all the 

 voices against the Jesuits for himself, undertook the 

 protection of the philosophers and of the author of 

 the Dictionnaire Philosophique (Voltaire). Rousseau 

 roused the most violent anger of the antiphilosophers, 

 by his Emilie. Jesuits and Jansenists united against 

 him, and, notwithstanding the general admiration 

 which he received, he was obliged to leave France. 

 Such was the revolutionary spirit of the age of Louis 

 XV. The contempt for the court and royalty pro- 

 duced by his reign, the exhaustion of the state caused 

 by his extravagance, the rise of a critical and liberal 

 spirit, and the corruption of state and church, gave 

 birth to the revolution, and the debased state of the 

 public morals, poisoned by the example of the court, 

 stained it with hideous excesses. 



LOUIS XVI., who was destined to ascend the 

 throne of France on the eve of a great political con- 

 vulsion, and to atone with his life for the faults and 

 follies of his predecessors, was the grandson of Louis 

 XV., and the second son of the dauphin, by his 

 second wife, Maria Josephine, daughter of Frederic 

 Augustus, king of Poland and elector of Saxony. 

 Louis was born Aug. 22, 1754, and, in 1770, married 

 Marie Antoinette of Austria. The countess Marsan, 

 governess of the royal family, had a large share in 

 his education, and even after lie became king, Louis 

 listened to her representations, of which the abbe 

 Georgel relates a remarkable instance in his memoirs. 

 With the best intentions, but entirely inexperienced 

 in matters of government, this unfortunate prince 

 ascended the throne in 1774, at the age of hardly 

 twenty years. He modestly declined the title of le 

 Desire, given him by the nation, which he excused 

 from the tax usual on the occasion. After the death 

 of the Dauphin, in 1765, his grandfather had inten- 

 tionally kept him from acquiring the knowledge con- 

 nected with his destination ; and the countess Du 

 Barry sought to revenge herself for the contempt 

 exhibited towards her by the serious, strictly moral 

 prince, who dearly loved his wife, whom she hated, 

 by making him ridiculous in the eyes of the king. 

 The ministers, also, secretly spread the opinion that 

 the prince was severe, and far removed from *the in- 

 dulgent kindness of his grandfather. He was retir- 

 ing, silent, and reserved, and did not dare to express 



his benevolent feelings. His reserve passed for dis- 

 trust. He felt himself a stranger at a court where he 

 was surrounded by vice under a thousand glittering 

 forms. As he heeded not flattery, he was indifferent 

 to the courtiers. The duke Choiseul therefore said, 

 that, on the most desirable throne of the world, he 

 was the only king who not only had no flatterers, but 

 who never experienced the least justice from the 

 world. In his countenance, which was not destitute 

 of dignity, were delineated the prominent features of 

 his character integrity, indecision, and weakness. 

 He was injured, however, by a certain stiffness of 

 demeanour, repulsive to the communications of 

 friendship. His manners had nothing of the grace 

 possessed by almost all the princes of the blood. In 

 confidential intercourse alone, he frequently expressed 

 himself sensibly and ingeniously, but blushed if his 

 observations were repeated. Facility of comprehen- 

 sion, industry, and an extraordinary memory, made 

 him successful in his studies ; but, unhappily, they 

 had no immediate relation to the duties and know- 

 ledge of a prince. He employed himself too as- 

 siduously in unimportant particulars. Thus he print- 

 ed, when dauphin, in 1766, thirty-five copies of 

 Maximes morales et politiques, tirees de Telemague, 

 imprimees par Louis- Auguste, Dauphin. Versailles, 

 de I ' imprimerie de Monseigneur le Dauphin. He had 

 himself collected these maxims from Fenelon's work. 

 He was familiar with geographical and chronological 

 details ; but the practical lessons which kings should 

 derive from history, were unknown to him, although, 

 while dauphin, he had read several good historical 

 works. A translation, by him, of some parts of 

 Gibbon's History, appeared under the name of Le 

 Clerc de Sept Chenes, his reader. Upright, pious, 

 and indulgent, he was philanthropically disposed, 

 both towards his nation and towards individuals. 

 The virtues of his father, the quiet, domestic life of 

 his mother, had deeply impressed upon him a moral, 

 religious feeling. But his example was destined to 

 show how insufficient, on a throne, are the virtues of 

 a private man. He chose count Maurepas his minis- 

 ter of state, a man of talent and experience, but of 

 little solidity of character, and desirous of shin- 

 ing in epigrams. In the room of the infamous 

 abbe Terrai, he committed the financial department 

 to the enlightened, able, and upright Turgot, who 

 resolved to remedy the abuses of the state by 

 thorough reforms on strict philosophical, and, in some, 

 degree, physiocratical principles, and looked upon 

 the privileged orders as the sources of all evil. But 

 the friends of ancient abuses, the high nobility, the 

 court, and the clergy, immediately formed a combin- 

 ation against him. When the parliaments were re- 

 stored, by the influence of Maurepas, against the 

 judgment of Turgot, the contest of opinion, between 

 old and new views, more than ever embarrassed the 

 government. The count of Vergennes was at the 

 head of foreign affairs ; count Muy was minister of 

 war ; and Sartine, of the marine. The new theories, 

 which Turgot proposed in the council of state, had, 

 indeed, the approbation of the philosophers : even the 

 talented men and women, whom madame Helvetius, 

 madame Geoffrin, madamoiselle Espinasse, the prin- 

 cess of Beauveau, and the duchess D'Anville, col- 

 lected around them, took a lively interest in Turgot's 

 liberal plans, which were loudly praised by Joseph 

 II. and Leopold ; but his opponents found a support 

 for their resistance in the old parliaments. The most 

 oppressive feudal services, arbitrary exactions, slave- 

 ry in the mountains of Jura, ;ind the rack, were abol- 

 ished, and many useful regulations established ; but 

 Turgot could not overcome the king's dread of an 

 open struggle with the clergy, the nobility, and par- 

 liament. These bodies united against the minister, 



