=Source.=--_Reflections on the Revolution in France._ Edmund Burke.
Vol. ii. of his Collected Works. LONDON: G. Bell and Sons. 1910.
Perhaps persons unacquainted with the state of France, on hearing the
clergy and the noblesse were privileged in point of taxation, may
be led to imagine, that, previous to the Revolution, these bodies
had contributed nothing to the state. This is a great mistake. They
certainly did not contribute equally with each other, nor either of
them equally with the commons. They both, however, contributed largely.
Neither nobility nor clergy enjoyed any exemption from the excise on
consumable commodities, from duties of custom, or from any of the other
numerous _indirect_ impositions, which in France, as well as here, make
so very large a proportion of all payments to the public. The noblesse
paid the capitation. They paid also a land-tax, called the twentieth
penny, to the height sometimes of three, sometimes of four, shillings
in the pound; both of them _direct_ impositions of no light nature, and
no trivial produce. The clergy of the provinces annexed by conquest to
France, (which in extent make about an eighth part of the whole, but
in wealth a much larger proportion,) paid likewise to the capitation
and the twentieth penny, at the rate paid by the nobility. The clergy
in the old provinces did not pay the capitation; but they had redeemed
themselves at the expense of about 24 millions, or a little more than a
million sterling. They were exempted from the twentieths: but then they
made free gifts; they contracted debts for the state; and they were
subject to some other charges, the whole computed at about a thirteenth
part of their clear income. They ought to have paid annually about
forty thousand pounds more, to put them on a par with the contribution
of the nobility.
When the terrors of this tremendous proscription hung over the clergy,
they made an offer of a contribution, through the archbishop of Aix,
which, for its extravagance, ought not to have been accepted. But it
was evidently and obviously more advantageous to the public creditor,
than anything which could rationally be promised by the confiscation.
Why was it not accepted? The reason is plain--There was no desire
that the church should be brought to serve the state. The service of
the state was made a pretext to destroy the church. In their way to
the destruction of the church they would not scruple to destroy their
country: and they have destroyed it. One great end in the project would
have been defeated, if the plan of extortion had been adopted in lieu
of the scheme of confiscation. The new landed interest connected with
the new republic, and connected with it for its very being, could not
have been created. This was among the reasons why that extravagant
ransom was not accepted.
The madness of the project of confiscation, on the plan that was first
pretended, soon became apparent. To bring this unwieldy mass of landed
property, enlarged by the confiscation of all the vast landed domain
of the crown, at once into market, was obviously to defeat the profits
proposed by the confiscation, by depreciating the value of those
lands, and indeed of all the landed estates throughout France. Such
a sudden diversion of all its circulating money from trade to land,
must be an additional mischief. What step was taken? Did the Assembly,
on becoming sensible of the inevitable ill effects of their projected
sale, revert to the offers of the clergy? No distress could oblige them
to travel in a course which was disgraced by any appearance of justice.
Giving over all hopes from a general immediate sale, another project
seems to have succeeded. They proposed to take stock in exchange
for the church lands. In that project great difficulties arose in
equalizing the objects to be exchanged. Other obstacles also presented
themselves, which threw them back again upon some project of sale. The
municipalities had taken an alarm. They would not hear of transferring
the whole plunder of the kingdom to the stock-holders in Paris. Many
of those municipalities had been (upon system) reduced to the most
deplorable indigence. Money was nowhere to be seen. They were therefore
led to the point that was so ardently desired. They panted for a
currency of any kind which might revive their perishing industry. The
municipalities were then to be admitted to a share in the spoil, which
evidently rendered the first scheme (if ever it had been seriously
entertained) altogether impracticable. Public exigencies pressed upon
all sides. The minister of finance reiterated his call for supply with
a most urgent, anxious, and boding voice. Thus pressed on all sides,
instead of the first plan of converting their bankers into bishops and
abbots, instead of paying the old debt, they contracted a new debt,
at 3 per cent., creating a new paper currency, founded on an eventual
sale of the church lands. They issued this paper currency to satisfy in
the first instance chiefly the demands made upon them by the _bank of
discount_, the great machine, or paper-mill, of their fictitious wealth.
The spoil of the church was now become the only resource of all their
operations in finance, the vital principle of all their politics, the
sole security for the existence of their power. It was necessary by
all, even the most violent means, to put every individual on the same
bottom, and to bind the nation in one guilty interest to uphold this
act, and the authority of those by whom it was done. In order to force
the most reluctant into a participation of their pillage, they rendered
their paper circulation compulsory in all payments. Those who consider
the general tendency of their schemes to this one object as a centre,
and a centre from which afterwards all their measures radiate, will not
think that I dwell too long upon this part of the proceedings of the
National Assembly.
To cut off all appearance of connexion between the crown and public
justice, and to bring the whole under implicit obedience to the
dictators in Paris, the old independent judicature of the parliaments,
with all its merits, and all its faults, was wholly abolished. Whilst
the parliaments existed, it was evident that the people might some
time or other come to resort to them, and rally under the standard
of their ancient laws. It became, however, a matter of consideration
that the magistrates and officers, in the courts now abolished, _had
purchased their places_ at a very high rate, for which, as well as
for the duty they performed, they received but a very low return of
interest. Simple confiscation is a boon only for the clergy;--to the
lawyers some appearances of equity are to be observed; and they are to
receive compensation to an immense amount. Their compensation becomes
part of the national debt, for the liquidation of which there is the
one exhaustless fund. The lawyers are to obtain their compensation
in the new church paper, which is to march with the new principles
of judicature and legislature. The dismissed magistrates are to take
their share of martyrdom with the ecclesiastics, or to receive their
own property from such a fund, and in such a manner, as all those, who
have been seasoned with the ancient principles of jurisprudence, and
had been the sworn guardians of property, must look upon with horror.
Even the clergy are to receive their miserable allowance out of the
depreciated paper, which is stamped with the indelible character of
sacrilege, and with the symbols of their own ruin, or they must starve.
So violent an outrage upon credit, property, and liberty, as this
compulsory paper currency, has seldom been exhibited by the alliance of
bankruptcy and tyranny, at any time, or in any nation.
In the course of all these operations, at length comes out the grand
_arcanum_;--that in reality, and in a fair sense, the lands of
the church (so far as anything certain can be gathered from their
proceedings) are not to be sold at all. By the late resolutions of
the National Assembly, they are indeed to be delivered to the highest
bidder. But it is to be observed, that _a certain portion only of
the purchase money is to be laid down_. A period of twelve years is
to be given for the payment of the rest. The philosophic purchasers
are therefore, on payment of a sort of fine, to be put instantly into
possession of the estate. It becomes in some respects a sort of gift to
them; to be held on the feudal tenure of zeal to the new establishment.
This project is evidently to let in a body of purchasers without money.
The consequence will be, that these purchasers, or rather grantees,
will pay, not only from the rents as they accrue, which might as
well be received by the state, but from the spoil of the materials
of buildings, from waste in woods, and from whatever money, by hands
habituated to the gripings of usury, they can wring from the miserable
peasant. He is to be delivered over to the mercenary and arbitrary
discretion of men, who will be stimulated to every species of extortion
by the growing demands on the growing profits of an estate held under
the precarious settlement of a new political system.