POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS. 145 



Louis XVI., the Consulate, and the thirty-two years of 

 constitutional monarchy. 



The regenerative movement began to be felt after the 

 peace of 1763, through the preaching of economists in 

 favour of free trade in grain. Quesnay's articles in the 

 Encydop6die point out both the wide extent of the evil 

 and the remedy for it. All the after-progress of national 

 agriculture was anticipated in these two articles. It 

 required some time before the new doctrine spread and 

 took root. Meanwhile old notions disappeared. On 

 the accession of Louis XVL, hopes of a better state of 

 things began to dawn. Turgot was the first to extend 

 a helping hand to the tottering fabric. Considerable re- 

 forms had already been made previously to 1789 ; free 

 scope had been given to labour, and free trade in corn 

 proclaimed. The Constituent Assembly, in its first 

 deliberations, finished what had been so well begun. The 

 nation breathed at last. If France of 1789 had known 

 where to stop, as England did in 1688, its general pros- 

 perity from that time would no doubt have prodigiously 

 increased. 



The lamentable bouleversement which followed those 

 days of hope repressed the growing progress. After an 

 ordeal of ten years, the Consulate afforded some respite to 

 the country, and the movement, suspended during the 

 revolutionary storms, again broke forth with a power not 

 to be repressed. The happy days of the peace of Vervins 

 returned. But a fresh evil unfortunately arose again to 

 retard this advance : the fatal wars of the Empire be- 

 gan, capital again became dispersed, population was once 

 more decimated upon fields of battle ; it seemed as if the 

 great principles sown under Louis XVL were never to 

 arrive at maturity. France had only got a sight of peace 

 and liberty to see them vanish. It is really only since 



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