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THE EVE OF THE FRENCH REVOLUTION
BY
EDWARD J. LOWELL
TO MY WIFE
PREFACE
There are two ways in which the French Revolution may be considered. We
may look at the great events which astonished and horrified Europe and
America: the storming of the Bastille, the march on Versailles, the
massacres of September, the Terror, and the restoration of order by
Napoleon. The study of these events must always be both interesting and
profitable, and we cannot wonder that historians, scenting the
approaching battle, have sometimes hurried over the comparatively
peaceful country that separated them from it. They have accepted easy
and ready-made solutions for the cause of the trouble. Old France has
been lurid in their eyes, in the light of her burning country-houses.
The Frenchmen of the eighteenth century, they think, must have been
wretches, or they could not so have suffered. The social fabric, they
are sure, was rotten indeed, or it would never have gone to pieces so
suddenly.
There is, however, another way of looking at that great revolution of
which we habitually set the beginning in 1789. That date is, indeed,
momentous; more so than any other in modern history. It marks the
outbreak in legislation and politics of ideas which had already been
working for a century, and which have changed the face of the civilized
world. These ideas are not all true nor all noble. They have in them a
large admixture of speculative error and of spiritual baseness. They
require to-day to be modified and readjusted. But they represent sides
of truth which in 1789, and still more in 1689, were too much overlooked
and neglected. They suited the stage of civilization which the world had
reached, and men needed to emphasize them. Their very exaggeration was
perhaps necessary to enable them to fight, and in a measure to supplant,
the older doctrines which were in possession of the human mind.
Induction, as the sole method of reasoning, sensation as the sole origin
of ideas, may not be the final and only truth; but they were very much
needed in the world in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and
they found philosophers to elaborate them, and enthusiasts to preach
them. They made their way chiefly on French soil in the decades
preceding 1789.
The history of French society at that time has of late years attracted
much attention in France. Diligent scholars have studied it from many
sides. I have used their work freely, and acknowledgment will be found
in the foot-notes; but I cannot resist the pleasure of mentioning in
this preface a few of those to whom I am most indebted; and first M.
Albert Babeau, without whose careful researches several chapters of this
book could hardly have been written. His studies in archives, as well as
in printed memoirs and travels, have brought much of the daily life of
old France into the clearest light. He has in an eminent degree the
great and thoroughly French quality of telling us what we want to know.
His impartiality rivals his lucidity, while his thoroughness is such
that it is hard gleaning the old fields after him.
Hardly less is my indebtedness to the late M. Aimé Chérest, whose
unfinished work, "La Chute de l'ancien régime," gives the most
interesting and philosophical narrative of the later political events
preceding the meeting of the Estates General. To the great names of de
Tocqueville and of Taine I can but render a passing homage. The former
may be said to have opened the modern mind to the proper method of
studying the eighteenth century in France, the latter is, perhaps, the
most brilliant of writers on the subject; and no one has recently
written, or will soon write, about the time when the Revolution was
approaching without using the books of both of them. And I must not
forget the works of the Vicomte de Broc, of M. Boiteau, and of M.
Rambaud, to which I have sometimes turned for suggestion or
confirmation.
Passing to another branch of the subject, I gladly acknowledge my debt
to the Right Honorable John Morley. Differing from him in opinion almost
wherever it is possible to have an opinion, I have yet found him
thoroughly fair and accurate in matters of fact. His books on Voltaire,
Rousseau, and the Encyclopaedists, taken together, form the most
satisfactory history of French philosophy in the eighteenth century with
which I am acquainted.
Of the writers of monographs, and of the biographers, I will not speak
here in detail, although some of their books have been of very great
service to me. Such are those of M. Bailly, M. de Lavergne, M. Horn, M.
Stourm, and M. Charles Gomel, on the financial history of France; M. de
Poncins and M. Desjardins, on the cahiers; M. Rocquain on the
revolutionary spirit before the revolution, the Comte de Luçay and M. de
Lavergne, on the ministerial power and on the provincial assemblies and
estates; M. Desnoiresterres, on Voltaire; M. Scherer, on Diderot; M. de
Loménie, on Beaumarchais; and many others; and if, after all, it is the
old writers, the contemporaries, on whom I have most relied, without the
assistance of these modern writers I certainly could not have found them
all.
In treating of the Philosophers and other writers of the eighteenth
century I have not endeavored to give an abridgment of their books, but
to explain such of their doctrines as seemed to me most important and
influential. This I have done, where it was possible, in their own
language. I have quoted where I could; and in many cases where quotation
marks will not be found, the only changes from the actual expression of
the author, beyond those inevitable in translation, have been the
transference from direct to oblique speech, or some other trifling
alterations rendered necessary in my judgment by the exigencies of
grammar. On the other hand, I have tried to translate ideas and phrases
rather than words.
EDWARD J. LOWELL.
June 24, 1892.
CONTENTS.
INTRODUCTION
I. THE KING AND THE ADMINISTRATION
II. LOUIS XVI. AND HIS COURT
III. THE CLERGY
IV. THE CHURCH AND HER ADVERSARIES
V. THE CHURCH AND VOLTAIRE
VI. THE NOBILITY
VII. THE ARMY
VIII. THE COURTS OF LAW
IX. EQUALITY AND LIBERTY
X. MONTESQUIEU
XI. PARIS
XII. THE PROVINCIAL TOWNS
XIII. THE COUNTRY
XIV. TAXATION
XV. FINANCE
XVI. "THE ENCYCLOPAEDIA"
XVII. HELVETIUS, HOLBACH, AND CHASTELLUX
XVIII. ROUSSEAU'S POLITICAL WRITINGS
XIX. "LA NOUVELLE HÉLOÏSE" AND "ÉMILE"
XX. THE PAMPHLETS
XXI. THE CAHIERS
XXII. SOCIAL AND ECONOMICAL MATTERS IN THE CAHIERS
XXIII CONCLUSION
INDEX OF EDITIONS CITED
THE EVE OF THE FRENCH REVOLUTION.
INTRODUCTION.
It is characteristic of the European family of nations, as distinguished
from the other great divisions of mankind, that among them different
ideals of government and of life arise from time to time, and that
before the whole of a community has entirely adopted one set of
principles, the more advanced thinkers are already passing on to
another. Throughout the western part of continental Europe, from the
sixteenth to the eighteenth century, absolute monarchy was superseding
feudalism; and in France the victory of the newer over the older system
was especially thorough. Then, suddenly, although not quite without
warning, a third system was brought face to face with the two others.
Democracy was born full-grown and defiant. It appealed at once to two
sides of men's minds, to pure reason and to humanity. Why should a few
men be allowed to rule a great multitude as deserving as themselves? Why
should the mass of mankind lead lives full of labor and sorrow? These
questions are difficult to answer. The Philosophers of the eighteenth
century pronounced them unanswerable. They did not in all cases advise
the establishment of democratic government as a cure for the wrongs
which they saw in the world. But they attacked the things that were,
proposing other things, more or less practicable, in their places. It
seemed to these men no very difficult task to reconstitute society and
civilization, if only the faulty arrangements of the past could be done
away. They believed that men and things might be governed by a few
simple laws, obvious and uniform. These natural laws they did not make
any great effort to discover; they rather took them for granted; and
while they disagreed in their statement of principles, they still
believed their principles to be axiomatic. They therefore undertook to
demolish simultaneously all established things which to their minds did
not rest on absolute logical right. They bent themselves to their task
with ardent faith and hope.
The larger number of people, who had been living quietly in the existing
order, were amused and interested. The attacks of the Philosophers
seemed to them just in many cases, the reasoning conclusive. But in
their hearts they could not believe in the reality and importance of the
assault. Some of those most interested in keeping the world as it was,
honestly or frivolously joined in the cry for reform and for
destruction.
At last an attempt was made to put the new theories into practice. The
social edifice, slowly constructed through centuries, to meet the
various needs of different generations, began to tumble about the
astonished ears of its occupants. Then all who recognized that they had
something at stake in civilization as it existed were startled and
alarmed. Believers in the old religion, in old forms of government, in
old manners and morals, men in fear for their heads and men in fear for
their estates, were driven together. Absolutism and aristocracy,
although entirely opposed to each other in principle, were forced into
an unnatural alliance. From that day to this, the history of the world
has been largely made up of the contests of the supporters of the new
ideas, resting on natural law and on logic, with those of the older
forms of thought and customs of life, having their sanctions in
experience. It was in France that the long struggle began and took its
form. It is therefore interesting to consider the government of that
country, and its material and moral condition, at the time when the new
ideas first became prominent and forced their way toward fulfillment.
It is seldom in the time of the generation in which they are propounded
that new theories of life and its relations bear their full fruit. Only
those doctrines which a man learns in his early youth seem to him so
completely certain as to deserve to be pushed nearly to their last
conclusions. The Frenchman of the reign of Louis XV. listened eagerly to
Voltaire, Montesquieu and Rousseau. Their descendants, in the time of
his grandson, first attempted to apply the ideas of those teachers.
While I shall endeavor in this book to deal with social and political
conditions existing in the reign of Louis XVI., I shall be obliged to
turn to that of his predecessor for the origin of French thoughts which
acted only in the last quarter of the century.
CHAPTER I.
THE KING AND THE ADMINISTRATION.
When Louis XVI. came to the throne in the year 1774, he inherited a
power nearly absolute in theory over all the temporal affairs of his
kingdom. In certain parts of the country the old assemblies or
Provincial Estates still met at fixed times, but their functions were
very closely limited. The _Parliaments_, or high courts of justice,
which had claimed the right to impose some check on legislation, had
been browbeaten by Louis XIV., and the principal one, that of Paris, had
been dissolved by his successor. The young king appeared, therefore, to
be left face to face with a nation over which he was to exercise direct
and despotic power. It was a recognized maxim that the royal was law.
[Footnote: Si veut le roi, si veut la loi.] Moreover, for more than two
centuries, the tendency of continental governments had been toward
absolutism. Among the great desires of men in those ages had been
organization and strong government. A despotism was considered more
favorable to these things than an aristocracy. Democracy existed as yet
only in the dreams of philosophers, the history of antiquity, and the
example of a few inconsiderable countries, like the Swiss cantons. It
was soon to be brought into greater prominence by the American
Revolution. As yet, however, the French nation looked hopefully to the
king for government, and for such measures of reform as were deemed
necessary. A king of France who had reigned justly and strongly would
have received the moral support of the most respectable part of his
subjects. These longed for a fair distribution of public burdens and for
freedom from unnecessary restraint, rather than for a share in the
government. The admiration for the English constitution, which was
commonly expressed, was as yet rather theoretic than practical, and was
not of a nature to detract from the loyalty undoubtedly felt for the
French crown.
Every monarch, however despotic in theory, is in fact surrounded by many
barriers which it takes a strong man to overleap. And so it was with the
king of France. Although he was the fountain of justice, his judicial
powers were exercised through magistrates many of whom had bought their
places, and could therefore not be dispossessed without measures that
were felt to be unjust and almost revolutionary. The breaking up of the
Parliament of Paris, in the latter years of the preceding reign, had
thrown the whole body of judges and lawyers into a state of discontent
bordering on revolt. The new court of justice which had superseded the
old one, the Parlement Maupeou as it was called, after the name of the
chancellor who had advised its formation, was neither liked nor
respected. It was one of the first acts of the government of Louis XVI.
to restore the ancient Parliament of Paris, whose rights over
legislation will be considered later, but which exercised at least a
certain moral restraint on the royal authority.
But it was in the administrative part of the government, where the king
seemed most free, that he was in fact most hampered. A vast system of
public offices had been gradually formed, with regulations, traditions,
and a professional spirit. This it was which had displaced the old
feudal order, substituting centralization for vigorous local life.
The king's councils, which had become the central governing power of the
state, were five in number. They were, however, closely connected
together. The king himself was supposed to sit in all of them, and
appears to have attended three with tolerable regularity. When there was
a prime minister, he also sat in the three that were most important. The
controller of the finances was a member of four of the councils, and the
chancellor of three at least. As these were the most important men in
the government, their presence in the several councils secured unity of
action. The boards, moreover, were small, not exceeding nine members in
the case of the first four in dignity and power: the Councils of State,
of Despatches, of Finance, and of Commerce. The fifth, the Privy
Council, or Council of Parties, was larger, and served in a measure as a
training-school for the others. It comprised, beside all the members of
the superior councils, thirty councilors of state, several intendants of
finance, and eighty lawyers known as _maîtres des requêtes_.
[Footnote: De Lucay, _Les Secrétaires d'État, 418, 419, 424, 442, 448,
449.]
The functions of the various councils were not clearly defined and
distinguished. Many questions would be submitted to one or another of
them as chance or influence might direct. Under each there were a number
of public offices, called bureaux, where business was prepared, and
where the smaller matters were practically settled. By the royal
councils and their subordinate public offices, France was governed to an
extent and with a minuteness hardly comprehensible to any one not
accustomed to centralized government.
The councils did nothing in their own name. The king it was who
nominally settled everything with their advice. The final decision of
every question was supposed to rest with the monarch himself. Every
important matter was in fact submitted to him. Thus in the government of
the country, the king could at any moment take as much of the burden
upon his own shoulders as they were strong enough to bear.
The legislative power was exercised by the councils. It was a question
not entirely settled whether their edicts possessed full force of law
without the assent of the high courts or parliaments. But with the
councils rested, at least, all the initiative of legislation. The
process of lawmaking began with them, and by them the laws were shaped
and drafted.
They also possessed no small part of the judiciary power. The custom of
removing private causes from the regular courts, and trying them before
one or another of the royal councils, was a great and, I think, a
growing one. This appellate jurisdiction was due in theory partly to the
doctrine that the king was the origin of justice; and partly to the idea
that political matters could not safely be left to ordinary tribunals.
The notion that the king owes justice to all his subjects and that it is
an act of grace, perhaps even a duty on his part, to administer it in
person when it is possible to do so, is as old as monarchy itself.
Solomon in his palace, Saint Louis under his oak, when they decided
between suitors before them, were exercising the inherent rights of
sovereignty, as understood in their day. The late descendants of the
royal saint did not decide causes themselves except on rare occasions,
but in questions between parties followed the decision of the majority
of the council that heard the case. Thus the ancient custom of seeking
justice from a royal judge merely served to transfer jurisdiction to an
irregular tribunal.[Footnote: De Lucay, _Les Secrétaires d'État_,
465.]
The executive power was both nominally and actually in the hands of the
councils. Great questions of foreign and domestic policy could be
settled only in the Council of State.[Footnote: Sometimes called
Conseil d'en haut, or Upper Council.] But the whole administration
tended more and more in the same direction. Questions of detail were
submitted from all parts of France. Hardly a bridge was built or a
steeple repaired in Burgundy or Provence without a permission signed by
the king in council and countersigned by a secretary of state. The
Council of Despatches exercised disciplinary jurisdiction over authors,
printers, and booksellers. It governed schools, and revised their rules
and regulations. It laid out roads, dredged rivers, and built canals. It
dealt with the clergy, decided differences between bishops and their
chapters, authorized dioceses and parishes to borrow money. It took
general charge of towns and municipal organization. The Council of
Finance and the Council of Commerce had equally minute questions to
decide in their own departments.[Footnote: De Lucay, _Les Secrétaires
d'État_, 418. For this excessive centralization, see, also, De
Tocqueville, _L'ancien Régime et la Révolution_, passim.]
Evidently the king and his ministers could not give their personal
attention to all these matters. Minor questions were in fact settled by
the bureaux and the secretaries of state, and the king did little more
than sign the necessary license. Thus matters of local interest were
practically decided by subordinate officers in Paris or Versailles,
instead of being arranged in the places where they were really
understood. If a village in Languedoc wanted a new parsonage, neither
the inhabitants of the place, nor any one who had ever been within a
hundred miles of it, was allowed to decide on the plan and to regulate
the expense, but the whole matter was reported to an office in the
capital and there settled by a clerk. This barbarous system, which is by
no means obsolete in Europe, is known in modern times by the barbarous
name of bureaucracy.
The royal councils and their subordinate bureaux had their agents in the
country. These were the intendants, men who deserve attention, for by
them a very large part of the actual government was carried on. They
were thirty-two in number, and governed each a territory, called a
généralité. The Intendants were not great lords, nor the owners of
offices that had become assimilated to property; they were hard-working
men, delegated by the council, under the great seal, and liable to be
promoted or recalled at the royal pleasure. They were chosen from the
class of _maîtres des requêtes_, and were therefore all lawyers and
members of the Privy Council. Thus the unity of the administration in
Versailles and the provinces was constantly maintained.
It had originally been the function of the intendants to act as legal
inspectors, making the circuit of the provincial towns for the purpose
of securing uniformity and the proper administration of justice in the
various local courts.[Footnote: Du Boys, i. 517.] They retained to the
end of the monarchy the privilege of sitting in all the courts of law
within their districts.[Footnote: De Lucay, _Les Assemblées
provinciales_, 31.] But their duties and powers had grown to be far
greater than those of any officer merely judicial. The intendant had
charge of the interests of the Catholic religion and worship, and the
care of buildings devoted to religious purposes. He also controlled the
Protestants, and all their affairs. He encouraged and regulated
agriculture and commerce. He settled many questions concerning military
matters and garrisons. The militia was entirely managed by him. He
cooperated with the courts of justice in the control of the police. He
had charge of post-roads and post-offices, stage coaches, books and
printing, royal or privileged lotteries, and the suppression of illegal
gambling. He was, in fact, the direct representative of the royal power,
and was in constant correspondence with the king's minister of state.
And as the power of the crown had constantly grown for two centuries, so
the power of the intendant had constantly grown with it, tending to the
centralization and unity of France and to the destruction of local
liberties.
As the intendants were educated as lawyers rather than as
administrators, and as they were often transferred from one province
to another after a short term of service, they did not acquire full
knowledge of their business. Moreover, they did not reside regularly
in the part of the country which they governed, but made only flying
visits to it, and spent most of their time near the centre of
influence, in Paris or Versailles. Yet their opportunities for doing
good or harm were almost unlimited. Their executive command was nearly
uncontrolled; for where there were no provincial estates, the
inhabitants could not send a petition to the king except through the
hands of the intendant, and any complaint against that officer was
referred to himself for an answer.[Footnote: For the intendants, see
Necker, _De l'administration_, ii. 469, iii. 379. Ibid., _Mémoire au
roi sur l'établissement des administrations provinciales_, passim. De
Lucay, _Les Assemblées provinciales_, 29. Mercier, _Tableau de Paris_,
ix. 85. The official title of the intendant was _commissaire
départi_.]
The intendants were represented in their provinces by subordinate
officers called sub-delegates, each one of whom ruled his petty district
or _élection_. These men were generally local lawyers or
magistrates. Their pay was small, they had no hope of advancement, and
they were under great temptation to use their extensive powers in a
corrupt and oppressive manner.[Footnote: De Lucay, _Les Assemblées
provinciales_, 42, etc.]
Beside the intendant, we find in every province a royal governor. The
powers of this official had gradually waned before those of his rival.
He was always a great lord, drawing a great salary and maintaining great
state, but doing little service, and really of far less importance to
the province than the new man. He was a survival of the old feudal
government, superseded by the centralized monarchy of which the
intendant was the representative.[Footnote: The _generalité_
governed by the intendant, and the _province_ to which the royal
governor was appointed, were not always coterminous.]