VI. 1737-1755. The "Considérations"—The Plan of 1737—The Plan of 1755.

"Il faut être autant en garde contre la réforme que contre les abus."—"Considérations" (1784).

It was not to be imagined that the man who watched so anxiously the progress of the malady, and marked with such sensitive precision the quickening of the pulse, could do so from a mere cold interest in social pathology. D'Argenson felt the distemper as if it had been his own. He was devotedly, even extravagantly patriotic; and his political criticism might have been less pungent had the subjects of invective been less personal to himself. He could have neither patience nor charity for men who could fiddle while Rome was burning. Powerless as he was, he was at least above that reproach.

Seven years after d'Argenson's death there appeared a very remarkable book. It was called

"Considérations sur le Gouvernement de la France," or "Jusqu' où la Démocratie peut être admise dans le Gouvernement Monarchique."

It was written by him in 1737, the year of Chauvelin's disgrace. It is upon this work or upon notices of it that d'Argenson's reputation as a political thinker is principally based. It is necessary to examine it carefully, and in the light of the circumstances under which it was composed. The author would turn in his grave could he hear the verdict which has generally been passed upon it; for if there was one imputation which d'Argenson abhorred and strove to avoid, it was that of being a visionary possessed by chimeras.

The consideration of this book is not so easy as it at first appears. It is less known than it certainly deserves to be, and we are dependent for our knowledge of it upon a couple of old editions, published in 1764[415] and 1784. The work consists of a number of dissertations on the past history and present condition of the French Government, which serve as the setting for its central feature, a Plan or project of reform. In the preface to the edition of 1784, which was issued by the d'Argenson family, the previous publication is noticed, and we are told that it is grossly imperfect, and that unwarrantable liberties have been taken with the author's text. Upon consulting the earlier edition, the discrepancies are at once apparent, and nowhere so noticeably as in the very Plan which is the most important section of the work. To begin with, the Plan which, in 1784, is given in the form of a royal proclamation in thirty-four articles, appears in the issue of 1764 as an informal draft consisting of fifty-two. And the difference is not of form alone; for on comparing the two Plans we find that they are as far apart as are the poles asunder, and that the second might represent, at the ordinary rate at which history proceeds, a century's advance in breadth of thought. In some bewilderment we turn to the four manuscripts preserved in the Library of the Arsenal;[416] and confusion is further confounded by the discovery that it is with the very Plan of this maligned edition of 1764 that that of the manuscripts coincides. The manuscripts themselves are clearly authentic: for they bear annotations in d'Argenson's handwriting. A question at once arises as to the authenticity of the scheme of 1784. A comparison of the texts establishes the fact that in spite of the impeachment of one editor and the apologies of another, both editions are equally genuine, and represent different stages of the work. Moreover it is evident that that of 1784 is mainly a revised and enlarged version of the original, and was probably executed about the year 1750; and further, that in it the editor, without a word of explanation, has incorporated a Plan, a Chapter and a Conclusion, of much later date and with a very different purpose.

The "Considérations," as written in 1737, is founded upon two principles. D'Argenson felt that for the rapid and decisive action which a great nation should be able to employ, a strong and united government was necessary: and that in the Monarchy France possessed such a government. He saw at the same time that that government had charged itself with a multitude of minute concerns which it could not possibly understand or supervise, and that consequently the rural districts were neglected, and local administration throughout the country was in a shameful state of nullity or disorder. He proposed therefore to disband the great army of subaltern officials who worked or shirked in the pay of the Sub-delegates, and with an emancipation of thought which is truly astonishing, to hand over their duties to popular control. With that object he devised the following scheme.

Henceforth the business of each city, borough or village (ville, bourg et village), should be managed by a committee of the inhabitants, to the number of five or more. Persons eligible for service in that capacity should be nominated in an annual meeting of the inhabitants; and the officers should be appointed from among the nominees by, and at the discretion of, the Sub-delegate. The latter, while ceasing to interfere directly in parochial concerns, should maintain a general control and supervision, and should have a discretionary power to displace the local officers for dereliction of duty or other misconduct. In matters affecting more than one district the local authorities might confer together, after specifying the subjects of the conference, and obtaining from the Sub-delegate a formal warrant. The national taxes should henceforth be raised in the form of a communal grant, equal in amount to the sum hitherto obtained from the taille; it was to be assessed upon the inhabitants of the district by the local authority, and paid in by them to the Financial Receivers, who should be, in addition to the Intendants and Sub-delegates, the only royal officers. The reform should be introduced gradually, and might be submitted to experiment in certain districts in the neighbourhood of Paris, and in the wards of Paris itself. In any attempt to introduce it, the authority of the Crown must be scrupulously maintained.[417]

Such are the principal, and from a constitutional point of view, the only essential features of the project of 1737. It is with this scheme that M. Martin deals in his notice of d'Argenson. He concludes a summary of it with a critical remark which is characteristic of the tone not infrequently held with regard to d'Argenson and his proposals. He says:—

"Monarchy without nobility, without a judicial aristocracy, and without a bureaucracy, royalty suspended without supports at an enormous height above a democratic society—there is d'Argenson's dream: illusion of a noble heart!" etc.

"Un ministre stipule pour le Roi, mais il travaille et craint pour lui-même."—"Considérations" (1764).

In this judgment M. Martin displays somewhat less than his usual acumen. Certain abusive privileges might have been touched: but not a rank in the social hierarchy connecting the Crown with the tiny democratic communities, would have been menaced by d'Argenson's scheme.[418] Moreover to speak of "Royalty" and "democratic society" in connection with it, is to employ large words to describe what is after all a very little thing; by using these wide and general terms the idea is dilated and swollen till it becomes grotesque. What d'Argenson proposed was simply to dismiss the score or so of clerks, tax-collectors and hangers-on who managed parochial affairs under the direction of the Sub-delegate without sympathy or regard for the wishes of the people: and to transfer these affairs to a little parish council, consisting, for example, of the neighbouring squire, the village curé, a couple of farmers, and an erudite cobbler or so, who would look after the roads, assist the poor, assess and collect the parochial taxes, and attend to all matters which were not beyond the capacity of half-a-dozen intelligent countrymen, guided and supervised by the Sub-delegate. The two poles upon which the system revolved were not "royalty" and "a democratic society,"[419] but in plain prose, the bureau of the Controller-General at Versailles, and the parish room or the inn parlour of the village of Argenson in the "généralité" of Touraine. In fact we have an almost exact parallel in the by no means fantastic relations which exist in nearly every parish in England between the local School Board and the Education Department at Whitehall.

It cannot be supposed, as M. Martin would appear to imply, that the Crown and the Vestry could neither co-operate nor co-exist. D'Argenson, in drafting his proposal, presumed upon both sides at least the average amount of sense which is ordinarily devoted to matters of government. So far as he could see, there was no reason why the parish councils should ever dream of giving trouble; and he could not conceive any Government perverse enough to provoke them to a national combination for resistance. He imagined, on the other hand, that local affairs would be managed better, and could not be managed worse, than they were; and that in any case life would be awakened in the provincial districts, and that they would be rescued from the torpor of death into which they were rapidly subsiding. Surely this was something more than the illusion of a noble heart.

It is entirely in accordance with the fitness of things that the best criticism of d'Argenson's plan is that of one of his own contemporaries, who was better able than any one now can be to understand the difficulty which pressed for solution. Voltaire, as we have seen, received the manuscript about eighteen months after its completion; and his quick intelligence was in no danger of mistaking

"Le temps de l'Aristocratie est passé quand le Despotisme s'est établi sans son secours."—"Considérations" (1784).

the meaning of his friend's proposal. He wrote to him:—[420]

"It seems to me that you have elucidated in a consecutive system the vague ideas and the heartfelt wishes of every good citizen.

"Is not England a standing witness to the truth of your ideas? The King with his Parliament is legislator, as in France with his Council. The rest of the nation is governed according to municipal laws, as sacred as those of Parliament itself. The love of law has become a passion among this people, because every one is interested in the maintenance of the law. All the highroads are kept in order, hospitals founded and maintained, commerce flourishing, without the necessity of a decree of Council. This idea is the more admirable in that you are yourself a member of this Council, and that in you the love of your own authority yields to the love of the public good."[421]

There was only one point on which Voltaire was at variance with his friend; and its consideration will lead us to that other proposal for which, nearly twenty years later, the present was abandoned by its author. Before leaving this scheme of 1737 a few concluding reflections have to be made.

To us in England at the present day this Plan seems a very modest one; but we may readily forget the breadth of thought, the marvellous political instinct, which could have conceived it in the France of 1737. To realise the depth of d'Argenson's discernment, we have only to compare the "Considérations" with the famous book by which it was evoked,[422] "L'Histoire de l'ancien Gouvernement de la France." M. de Boulainvilliers and d'Argenson had been struck by the same evils; but the former attributed them to the iniquitous usurpation by which the people had been withdrawn from the protection of their feudal lords, and subjected to oppression by the irresponsible minions of the royal authority. His remedy was a reversion to the society of the thirteenth century. D'Argenson's proposal was a very different one. He saw very clearly that as a great political instrument the French noblesse existed no longer; and that if local government was to be reformed, the reform must come from the people themselves. If these shopkeepers, peasants and the rest, had no political tradition or knowledge, they were primarily concerned in acquiring it; and he enunciates, perhaps for the first time, the great principle of all democratic development, the principle that in matters of government interest is more valuable than intelligence. Astonishing as it may seem, he had perfect confidence in the men to whom he proposed to entrust a modest share of influence and power: and he expressed it in a few golden words which suggest the spirit of his scheme:—

"Insensiblement ces magistrats, quoique paysans, se ressentiront de leur caractère, et en prendront le véritable esprit, qui éloigne également de la basse soumission et de l'insolence."[423]

Even to Rousseau, the tramp of genius, who had eaten black bread and slept in cabins, the democratic faith came gradually and as an inspiration; but what are we to think of the French nobleman who had conceived it twenty-five years before as he talked with the labourers round his château?

One of the most striking features of this Plan of 1737 is the care which is taken to safeguard the royal authority. The local officers are placed under the absolute control of the Sub-delegates, and the unit of popular action is nothing more formidable than the parish or the ward. "Divide et impera" was the legislator's device. To us who have daily experience of the harmonious working of local and central institutions, this solicitude may appear a little singular. To d'Argenson however it was not so. His devotion to the Crown was hereditary; and he shared the belief in the sovereign virtues of monarchical government which was held unanimously in 1737. Any project which would tend in the slightest degree to impair the authority of the Crown, could neither be proposed by him nor listened to by others. It was this point which drew from Voltaire his only suggestion of dissent. The poet had been travelling in England and Holland; and his natural reverence for the Monarchy had been qualified by an acquaintance with republican societies. He had very little faith in Louis XV., and he expresses the real weakness of his friend's proposals in a single trenchant line. D'Argenson had averred[424] that when the King has nothing to think of but governing, he will always govern well.

"Well then," exclaims Voltaire, "for God's sake let the King think of governing!"[425]

At that date, with the history of Louis Quatorze behind him, and before him his hopes of Louis Quinze, d'Argenson could have no uneasiness upon that score. It took twenty years of experience of the Monarchy at close quarters, of further knowledge of the actual principles by which it was conducted, to show him how far and fatally the reality fell short of the ideal design. In the few years that elapsed between his disgrace and death, he came to understand that excellent as absolutism may be in theory, it has certain disadvantages in fact: and that for one monarch who is found to satisfy the standard of sovereign virtue, there are twenty who fall immeasurably beneath it. At the cost of the convictions of a lifetime he accepted the truth that the only warrant of the people against anarchy or oppression lay in their own power of self-defence; and he felt that if strength and virtue were to be restored to the Government, the people must be placed in a position where they would at once be able to assist it to do good, and have absolute power to prevent it doing harm. What the country needed was no longer a great administrative reform, but nothing less than a national constitution.

That constitution d'Argenson endeavoured to work out; and the fruit of his reflections was the scheme published in 1784. It cannot be discussed in the light of experience; for it never was, nor had a chance of being, submitted to the test of practice. It was not until twenty-eight years after the author's death that it first saw the light; and by that time popular demands had become loud and instant, while a constitutional ideal of a wholly different type had taken possession of the mind of France. Still there is a certain sense developed by acquaintance with history and politics which enables us to estimate with approximate justice the worth of any particular project in relation to a given set of circumstances; and upon that sense it is necessary to rely. There is reason to suggest that if examined in the light of such knowledge as we have of the state of the Government and of popular feeling about the year 1755, the constitution d'Argenson conceived at that time is by no means least among the many proofs of his extraordinary political wisdom.

As few documents of so much importance are so inaccessible or so little known,[426] a brief abstract of this remarkable scheme may not be without use. In presenting it, the form of the original, that of a royal proclamation, is, so far as possible, preserved; while some striking passages, which illustrate the prevailing tone and spirit, are given in

"Les Rois n'aiment point à être Tyrans; mais la plupart le sont sans le savoir."—"Considérations" (1784).

d'Argenson's own words. In considering it, it is necessary to remember two things. In the first place, though popular criticism is irascible and alert, it has yet made but little way; the people, though beginning to despise the monarch, are still devoted to the monarchical tradition. Further it has to be borne in mind that when the Government did endeavour to act with vigour and to prosecute measures of constructive reform, it was hampered and clogged at every turn by the influence of the privileged orders: while there was no great popular organisation upon which it could lean for support.

The Constitution is set forth in thirty-four articles, the substance of which is as follows:—

PLAN FOR THE GOVERNMENT OF FRANCE. (Ed. 1784.)

Louis, &c. Whereas our royal authority, however acquired, has been given us for the happiness of our people, we desire that this our people should co-operate with us in our efforts to attain so desirable an end. Our will is set forth in the articles here following.

I.

The ancient divisions of our Realm into Provinces shall continue, though all feudal relation connected therewith shall hereby cease.

The internal administration of the provinces shall be uniform; and "they shall have more freedom than any among them has hitherto enjoyed."

No landed property shall be exempt from the common burdens:

"Et que la noblesse, quelque ancienne qu'elle soit, ni aucun emploi, charge ni dignité, soit un titre pour dispenser nos sujets de payer les impositions réelles et personnelles."

II.

The subsisting divisions of the Provinces into districts "of greater or less extent" shall remain very much as before. They shall retain their ancient usages, but notwithstanding shall be mutually independent in respect of administration.

III.

Each District shall be further subdivided into cities, boroughs, and parishes (or divisions composed of several villages); and each of these subdivisions shall have its own officers charged with matters of finance and police. These officers shall be chosen from among the persons living, and holding property, in the place itself. The election shall take place in an annual meeting (assemblée) convened for the purpose.

IV.

Immediate steps shall be taken to prepare a Schedule, or statement of property and income, to cover each District and to serve as the basis of assessment.

V.

In each District there shall be holden an annual Assembly, which shall last fifteen days, and which shall consist of:

(a) The officers of the principal city of the District.

(b)One deputy from each of the boroughs.

(c) A certain number of the officers of the Parishes and smaller divisions (arrondissements) to be returned in rotation.

The holders of large landed properties may also attend.

In this Assembly the financial and other affairs of the District shall be transacted, and deputies shall be chosen to represent the District in the Provincial Estates.

"La liberté est l'appui du Trône: l'ordre rend légitime la liberté."—"Considérations" (1764).

VI.

In each of the Provinces of our Realm there shall be holden Provincial Estates, which shall consist of deputies chosen in the District Assemblies.

The Estates shall also include certain great landholders (Propriétaires), to whom the perpetual right to be present at the Estates will be granted in consideration of the dignity and extent of their possessions in the Province, of which they shall be regarded as the Peers.

VII.

Such members of the nobility as have a right to attend the Estates shall have certain privileges of ceremony and none other.

It is our pleasure that the nobility do not constitute a separate body in the said Estates; and that no person of birth, however noble, shall be present, who is not either a deputy from some District, or who does not hold property which connects his interests intimately with those of the Province.

Such Peers of the Province may be present by proxy.

"Nous aurons nous-mêmes pour les terres dont nous conserverons la domaine utile, des Représentans (qui seront tout à fait distincts de nos Commissaires), dont les fonctions se borneront à opiner comme membres des États, et dont la voix ne sera comptée dans les délibérations générales que comme celle des autres Propriétaires: nous fondant sur ce principe incontestable, que l'autorité de nos Provinces reste toute entière entre nos mains: que nous confions aux États que la seule administration, c'est-à-dire l'exécution de nos ordres, la répartition juste et exacte des charges que nous croyons utiles et nécessaires d'imposer, le droit de nous éclairer sur les besoins de chaque Province et sur les mesures à prendre pour en augmenter la population et le commerce, et la liberté de nous représenter les abus que pourraient faire de nos ordres ceux qui les reçoivent immédiatement de nous."[427]

VIII.

To each of the Provincial Estates there shall be attached a Syndic-General (or president), a Secretary-General, and a Treasurer-General.

"Celui-ci touchera de chaque Receveur particulier[428] le montant des impositions de son District, fera passer au Trésor Royal la partie des impositions qui devra y être versée pour contribuer aux dépenses générales du Royaume: conservera entre ses mains la portion destinée à subvenir aux besoins de la Province et à procurer des avantages à ses habitants: l'emploiera conformément aux ordres des commissaires des États: sera comptables à nos ministres des finances de la recette et de la dépense du premier genre, et aux États et à ses commissaires de celle du second genre."

To each District Assembly shall likewise be attached a Syndic, a Secretary, and a Receiver.

IX.

The Provincial Estates shall be opened by four Royal Commissioners, who shall explain the amount of the contribution assessed upon the Province.

"Quand ces impositions seront plus considérables qu'elles ne l'étaient les années précédentes, ils en expliqueront les motifs, afin que nos peuples soient parfaitement instruits des raisons qui nous déterminent à imposer de nouvelles charges; mais d'ailleurs, il ne sera pas à l'option des États d'accorder ou de refuser, de restreindre ou de modifier, les charges qui leur seront imposées."

Notwithstanding the Estates, after making due arrangements for the execution of our orders, shall be privileged to present representations in regard to them.

"Nous les recevrons toujours avec bonté, et nous nous ferons un devoir d'y répondre article par article."

The Royal Commissioners shall likewise present to the Estates the different Regulations with regard to police, commerce, and civil and military administration. They shall in all cases be accepted by the Estates, who shall then have power to make representations in regard to them.

"Nous proscrivons à jamais le mot et l'idée de don gratuit."

X.

After arranging for the execution of our will, the Estates may give their attention to any measures affecting the Province which they may desire to propose to us (solliciter auprès de nous); their petitions shall be presented by deputies. Matters not requiring our sanction shall be disposed of finally by the Estates, and the officers of the Crown shall second them in the prosecution of their arrangements.

XI.

The Estates shall meet at the end of every November, and shall dissolve at the beginning of the following January. Before dissolving they shall elect an executive commission, consisting of one of the deputies from each District and the three principal officers of the Estates. The Commission shall hold office until the meeting of the Assembly next ensuing.

Four deputies shall also be elected to reside at Court as the representatives of the Estates.

The District Assemblies shall likewise elect a small executive commission.

XII.

The four Royal Commissioners shall appoint subordinates to control the troops, to execute orders committed to them by their superiors, and to report to them events as they occur. These officers shall have no power to give any orders in their own name, or to employ force against the inhabitants except in cases of the last emergency; they shall at once report such cases to their superiors, at whose will they may be deprived of their posts.

Our Commissioners shall hold office during our royal pleasure. Their salaries and those of their subordinates shall be charged upon the general expenses of the Kingdom; and no officer in the direct service of the Crown shall touch one penny of the Provincial revenue.

On the other hand, the maintenance of the Provincial executive shall fall entirely upon the Province.

XIII.

The Revenue of the Crown shall be collected by, and at the expense of, the Provincial Estates, "whose business it will be to make this collection as inexpensively as possible, and by the method

"Fixer des lois à un abus, c'est l'autoriser et le rendre durable."—Considérations" (1764-1784).

the least disagreeable to the people." It shall be paid entire into the Royal Treasury.

In the same manner, the Provincial Revenue shall be collected by, and shall remain at the absolute disposition of, the Estates.

XIV.

The Provincial Treasurers shall be accountable to our Council of Finance and our Chamber of Accounts at Paris, for the revenues of the Crown: and to the Provincial Estates for those of the Province.

XV.

These measures will involve the disappearance of the Receivers-general, the Receivers of the Taille, the Receivers-general of Domains and Woods, all the officers of Waters and Forests, the Treasurers of Roads and Bridges, and all persons employed in the construction of high roads and public buildings: their duties devolving upon the administration of the Provinces and Districts. All expenses in connection with the "Aides, Gabelles, Traites et autres droits des Fermes" will lapse, the dues in question being collected by the officials of the Province in conjunction with the rest of the taxes. There shall also be suppressed the Treasurerships of France, the Provincial Chambers of Accounts, the Courts of Aides, and the "Élections." Persons subjected to forfeiture will receive compensation.

XVI.

The offices of the Governors, Lieut.-Governors and Lieutenants of the Provinces, and also those of the "Baillis d'épée," shall be suppressed.

XVII.

Questions in dispute between different local authorities shall be decided, if possible, by the superior authority, or, in default, by our Council.

XVIII.

The dispensation of justice shall remain the prerogative of the Crown.

The administration of justice shall be rendered uniform, and the high seigneurial jurisdictions shall be suppressed.

XIX.

(Provides certain rules of judicial procedure.)

XX.

The laws of the nation, local customs and corporate charters shall be revised; but shall only be abrogated in so far as they may be found contrary to natural equity, morality, and public order,

"Persuadés qu'il ne faut pas faire perdre, sans une véritable nécessité, les habitudes anciennement contractées, et qui sont compatibles avec le maintien de la tranquillité des familles et de la bonne police."

XXI.

(Prescribes method of revision.)

XXII.

The administrative arrangements already existing shall remain in force until the promulgation of the reforms designed to supersede them. It is our intention to suppress "la vénalité des charges de judicature"; persons subjected to forfeiture will receive compensation.

XXIII.

To certain posts in the department of Finance alone shall a pecuniary interest be attached, as a guarantee for the integrity of the holders.

The system of official reversions (survivances) shall be wholly suppressed.

Steps will be taken to provide for the efficiency of the service of the Crown, both administrative and judicial.

XXIV.

The payment of the Royal officers shall be arranged in the interests of the people; Il faut savoir économiser les graces les plus justes comme les supplices les plus sévères."—"Considérations" (1784).

"Nous voulons leur épargner par ce moyen des faux frais qui leur seraient infiniment plus coûteux. D'un autre côté, nous ferons en sorte que nos officiers supérieurs et subalternes trouvent dans la prompte expédition des affaires autant d'avantages qu'ils en trouveraient en les faisant traîner."

XXV.

No person in holy orders (clerc) shall henceforth be admitted to any share in the civil administration, "the constant work" demanded by the latter being inconsistent with the performance of his duties as an ecclesiastic.

XXVI., XXVII., XXVIII.

There shall be no evocation of provincial causes for judgment in the capital (XXVI.). Appeals (requêtes en cassation) shall be done away with so far as possible (XXVII.). The constitution of our "Conseil des Parties" shall be reformed (XXVIII.).

XXIX.

"Quant aux ordres qui s'expédient en notre nom, et qui tendent à priver quelques-uns de nos sujets de leur liberté et à les éloigner de leur état ou de leur domicile ordinaire, nous ne voulons point qu'il en soit donné sans une approbation précise de notre main, que nous n'accorderons jamais que sur le rapport au moins d'un de nos ministres, secrétaires ou conseillers d'État, qui nous en garantira la justice et la nécessité, et signera sur la feuille qui nous sera présentée."

XXX.

"La gloire et la grandeur de la noblesse de notre Royaume qui nous est si cher à tant de titres, consistant bien plus dans le souvenir des services que nous ont rendus ses ancêtres et dans le mérite de ceux qu'elle nous rende elle-même que dans le vain honneur de jouir de certaines exemptions qui n'empêchent pas les nobles de partager avec le reste de nos sujets le poids des impositions: et qui, si elles avaient plus d'effet, seraient injustes, puisque la partie la plus pauvre et la plus laborieuse de notre nation ne pourrait pas supporter seule le fardeau pesant mais nécessaire des impôts: nous jugeons à propos d'abolir les distinctions établies entre les nobles et les roturiers, qui assujetissent ceux-ci à payer la taille et en exemptent les autres, d'autant plus que notre intention est de rendre la taille réelle par toute l'étendue de notre Royaume, et d'abolir la taille personelle. "Enfin nous réduisons tous les priviléges de notre noblesse à des droits purement honorifiques, et à la considération résultante d'une naissance ancienne et illustre, sans que ce genre de gloire puisse jamais autoriser aucun acte de tyrannie, ni rien qui tende à la surcharge de nos peuples."

XXXI.

It shall no longer be possible to buy a patent of nobility.

XXXII.

In no charge, office, or post in connection with the judicial or administrative bodies shall any proof of nobility be required. Notwithstanding the Noblesse are encouraged to serve in these posts.

"Nous ne prétendons pas même que les emplois les plus subalternes ou le commerce en détail entraînent pour les anciens gentilhommes d'autre dérogeance qu'une suspension passagère de leurs titres honorables,"

which their descendants may at any time resume.

XXXIII.

(Provides for the constitution of a heraldic Court.)

XXXIV.

The Catholic Establishment shall be maintained as

"la base de la morale, dont le maintien est essentiel à la tranquillité et au bonheur public. Ceux que auraient le malheur de n'être pas convaincus des vérités qu'elle nous enseigne"

will be ineligible for public office; but no step shall be taken in the direction of persecution or proscription.

Complete toleration shall be maintained in so far as it is compatible with public order.

Such was the constitution projected by d'Argenson during the few years before his death. Its real meaning is clear and unmistakable: yet it has not escaped the evil fortune which has pursued so many of its author's plans. It is true that to concede to thirty-two provincial assemblies a virtually absolute power, while providing that the authority of the Crown shall be in no way diminished, may appear at first sight as strange an inconsequence as M. de Broglie[429] and others have found it. Yet a patient reading of d'Argenson's scheme is sufficient to show that with all its elaborate reservations, it involved nothing more nor less than the provisional surrender of the Sovereignty of France into the hands of the French people.

It is to be remembered that in the years which succeeded the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, d'Argenson had been watching with growing alarm the disaffection which was beginning to ferment:[430] and at the same time his old belief in the sovereign virtues of absolutism had been profoundly modified by a more lengthened experience.[431] We have only to bear in mind this change of opinion in considering his project of reform, to be alive to the numerous hints which it contains and to detect the real significance of its provisions. What d'Argenson proposed was virtually this: the whole administration of the interior was to be ceded to the people of France, organised in their parishes, districts, and provinces; the royal bureaucracy, the entire system of intendancies and sub-delegacies was to be swept away; and the Crown was to be represented in each Province by four Royal Commissioners, who should open the Estates at the end of November and explain to the deputies the wishes of the King, while leaving the execution of them to the Provincial government. These Royal Commissioners had power to appoint a flying squadron of subordinates, who were attached to no particular place nor any defined duty, whose principal business was to report to their superiors, and who were strictly forbidden to act upon their own authority, or, except in cases of the last emergency, to employ force against the people. Within the province not only the whole administration, but the assessment, collection and payment of the taxes, was entirely in the hands of the Estates.

"La guerre se faisait alors en nature, et actuellement elle se fait, pour ainsi dire, en argent."—"Considérations" (1784).

We cannot mistake the possible significance of these proposals, however implicitly it be conveyed. The provision that the King alone should make laws and impose taxes might be really little more than a constitutional fiction, which, so long as the laws were prudently made and the taxes equitably imposed, might pass as undisputed fact. The proposition that the royal ordinances must always be accepted might prove to be a fiction of the same kind. Indeed, in certain eventualities the whole scheme might be one continued fiction in so far as it relates to the Crown. The Provincial Estates shall not legislate, but they shall have power to present bills for the royal ratification. What will happen if their petitions are rejected is a question for time and circumstance, and not for legislation, to decide. In the same way the Estates must accept the contribution assessed upon them: but they may present representations in regard to it. If those representations are neglected the Estates will proceed as their power and wisdom may dictate. In a word, the absolute power of the Crown in legislation was conditioned only by the proper use of it.

D'Argenson had arrived at the conviction that the causes of the evil from which the country was suffering were the practical nullity of the Crown and the political nullity of the people; and he felt that the remedy was to be found in the admission of the people to a share of power. He knew not less than any of his critics, that where power is divided differences will arise; but he saw no reason to doubt that if King and people were guided by a common patriotism and mutual respect, such differences need never issue in violent collision. At the same time he knew that when the interests of the King were obstinately opposed to those of the people, such collisions would occur; they were calamitous, but they were the lesser of two calamities. He declares that in the case of "a King who is worthy of the name," such divergence of interest need never be feared. Should there be a King who was not worthy of the name, he might be left to the discretion of an indignant people, and of the most daring and determined man who happened at the moment to possess their confidence. It was none of d'Argenson's concern.

It is true that we do not find him stating, in this uncompromising way, the revolutionary aspect of his programme; he would have shrunk from formulating it clearly even to himself. At the same time we know that it was by no means distant from his mind. Notwithstanding, he cannot have regarded it as of any immediate or direct importance; for he could not but think that only by an access of inconceivable folly on the part of the people or of inconceivable madness on the part of the Crown, could such a revolutionary ferment be occasioned.

We cannot better appreciate the spirit and scope of d'Argenson's proposal than by comparing it with the universally admired design broached, about twenty years later, by the great minister Turgot. The principle of the two policies was practically the same. Turgot proposed, like d'Argenson, to entrust to the people and popular organisations the whole administration of the interior, while retaining the entire legislative authority in the hands of the Crown.[432] The people, as in d'Argenson's scheme, had merely the power of suggesting legislation, though the actual law must proceed from the King. Between the two plans, however, there was one great difference of detail. D'Argenson had surrounded the authority of the Crown with a sacred barrier; behind that barrier the people might exercise all the effective powers of popular control: beyond it they were forbidden to pass. In the proposal of Turgot that barrier was destroyed. Above the circle of Provincial Estates he desired to constitute a Municipality of the Whole Realm; by doing so he would have brought the sphere of popular action into direct juxtaposition with that of the Crown, and have surrounded the very palace gates with the acclamations or with the clamour of the people.

Perhaps both policies, at their several periods, had equally little prospect of realisation; but if it were necessary to choose between them with regard to the state of feeling existing and likely to exist in France, the preference might be given to the earlier plan. For a time of disturbance and strain, it can claim one signal excellence, in attempting to provide for the maximum of exasperation with the minimum of indecency and danger. It is the great vice of central, but not sovereign assemblies that they can never come into collision with the Crown without inflicting a grievous blow upon the prestige and authority of the Crown. The veil which shroud it from the vulgar gaze, which surrounds it with an air of sacramental mystery, is torn into a thousand disreputable pieces, and the solemn difference between King and citizen is seen to fade guiltily away. D'Argenson feared, and had always feared, that blighting closeness of contact; and he endeavoured to preserve the influence of the Crown while placing the people in a position from which, in cases of the last emergency, they would be able to control the Crown. It is easy to see how the King at Versailles and a number of Estates in the provincial cities might have quarrelled to the verge of revolution, and yet how the King, by timely concession, might have retained his authority unimpaired.

Nor is it hard to answer the question which some have found it necessary to ask, and to sketch the progress of a revolution proceeding from the basis of d'Argenson's scheme. Had the Government become utterly despicable and bad, and had the King shown himself unable or unwilling to undertake reform, the Provincial Estates might have waited in patience until popular feeling was at fever height, and then they might have offered the King his choice between a national insurrection

"Les jalousies réciproques des Princes Chrétiens sont peut-être aujourd'hui son appui le plus solide."—"Considérations" (1784). [Of the Turkish Empire.]

and the acceptance of a certain demand. That demand would have been that the hundred and twenty-eight deputies who represented the several Estates at the Court,[433] should be combined in a single assembly in order to concert measures for the future of the Kingdom. If the King had yielded, the deputies would have met, and have offered him the choice between a national insurrection and the acceptance of their advice. If he chose the latter alternative and endeavoured loyally to fulfil it, the assembly would disperse, matters would revert to their normal condition, and a politic effort would be made by all parties to forget the past. If, on the other hand, he remained contumacious, the people would resort to that last of political resources employed by England with such signal success a century and a half before. Such a state of things was never for a moment likely to arise. In 1755 the tradition of the French Monarchy remained unshaken.[434] A popular constitution would have been accepted as an act of grace; and the people would have been engaged too busily in remedying abuses to spend their strength in factious opposition. Only by suicidal folly on the part of the Crown could any danger have arisen. A moderate endowment of public spirit and common sense would have sufficed to protect the Government; and a monarch with one-half of the ability even of Louis XVI., or one tithe of the devotion maintained for generations in the House of Hohenzollern, would have been able to maintain his position with ease.

As a general constitutional proposition d'Argenson's plan is admirable enough; but when considered in relation to the paramount need of France at that particular moment it becomes a very master-work of statesmanship and sagacity. He alone could diagnose the conditions of the disease and discern the only remedy it was possible to apply. It is scarcely half the truth to say that the French Revolution was induced by bad government; there were times when the Government had been infinitely worse. The cause lay deeper. It lay in a social revolution which was already complete, and which the Crown refused to recognise.

By the middle of the eighteenth century the institutions of France had drifted into a condition of which history perhaps can afford no parallel. The aristocratic corporations of the Church, the law, and the land, whose influence the Crown for its own purposes had so often used and abused, were losing every particle of vital force; and the Monarchy found itself burdened and overborne by the weight of the great classes upon whom in times past it had leaned for support. The history of its last forty years is the history of a series of spasmodic efforts to rise to the grandeur of its great position: and the continual frustration of those efforts through the stolid egotism of the privileged orders.

Why was it, it may be asked, that what had once been an inexhaustible source of strength had become a fatal element of weakness? The cause is to be found in a social revolution which had been silently proceeding for nearly a century. Ever since the time of Colbert, the middle classes, the class of tax-farmers, merchants and manufacturers, had been increasing rapidly in wealth and importance. It was not the mere growth of a bourgeoisie; it was the rise of a new society, whose leaders were ready to sow their wealth in the garden of art and letters. So it was that while lordly ineptitude upon the field of battle made the French Government a byword in Europe, the name of France was rendered illustrious by bourgeois triumphs in literature and the arts.

Coincident with the rise of the middle class was the declining influence of the Church and the Nobility. For fifty years the Church had been engaged in one of the most despicable party fights which history records; its most successful men were witty libertines, who officiated at the unhallowed sacrament of the "petit souper," and whose only belief in heaven or earth was in the redeeming virtues of a cardinal's hat. The nobles were despised by the best among them. They were hopelessly sunk in debt; and those whose magnificence paid no interest were subsisting on pensions dispensed by favourites and wrung from wretches who fed on grass and had no stomach for resistance. The nobles were outshone by the farmers-general; the Church had ceded her empire to the "Philosophes"; while financier and "philosophe" were the social and intellectual leaders of a great society whose growth was transforming the aspect of France.

Had Fortune dealt as kindly with the Bourbon House as she had lately done with the failing Hapsburgs: could she have given to France in Louis XV. the latest and greatest of her kings, the Revolution might have been undreamed of, and the Bourbons absolute to this day. Such a man would have discerned the tendency of events: he would have thrown himself into line with it.[435] He would have sent his nobles beyond the Rhine, with a mission to die or to justify their existence; he would have crushed with an iron hand the pretensions of the Church; and turning Versailles into a national museum, he would have transferred his Court to the Louvre or the Tuileries, nor would he have allowed it to be surpassed in brilliance by the salons of the farmers-general.

By putting himself at the head of the new France, he might have renewed the tradition of the French Monarchy. Such might have been the work of a great King; but the Great King reviewed his squadrons on the plain of Potsdam, and devoted to France but a passing jest; and she was left to the guidance of one of the most pitiable and mean of men, who could do no more than watch

"C'est la déportation qui constitue principalement l'esclavage; nul n'est facilement esclave dans son pays."—"Considérations" (1784).

the clouds and predict the bursting of "Le Déluge."

Effort to avert it there was none. Versailles displayed perhaps as strange a combination of pomp and vanity as was ever known in the history of the world. It retained the profusion, without the dignity, of the Grand Age; and public affairs went as they could while incapable nobles and dissolute Churchmen exchanged the shuttle of an endless intrigue. In tradition and spirit it was utterly alien from the new society. But one representative of the rising classes won her way into the charmed circle; she entered the Court as Madame d'Etioles; but before long the wife of the farmer-general was lost in Madame la Marquise de Pompadour. In public affairs the blindness was equally insensate. The King consented to trail his ermine in the slush of ecclesiastical quarrels; and such men as Tencin were the rulers of France, while Voltaire was reduced to crave the favour of some obscure lieutenant of police. When at last a man arises who will not take Madame's gifts, but will consent to copy her music, and who will not accept a hundred louis for work worth a dozen francs, he is spoken of as some strange kind of wild animal, "un original d'une nouvelle espèce," in Madame's own words.[436] And meanwhile the silver-tongued "bourreau" went on correcting his proofs—of the "Contrat Social"—and inditing the charter of those great classes which the French Monarchy continued to ignore.

No man had cherished more fondly than d'Argenson his hopes of Louis XV., and none had been more cruelly disappointed. He acknowledged at last that the Monarchy could not save itself; he would have tried to save it in spite of itself. His method was the only possible one. Flinging aside, like a damaged tool, the decrepit organisation of the privileged orders, he would have called in the assistance of that great people who held the future in the hollow of their hand. He would have given them power by their own efforts to redeem the vices of the Government, and to free that Government from the vesture of privilege and tradition which clung to it like the shirt of Nessus. For the two-fold evil from which France was suffering, his scheme provided a double remedy. The people had no power to demand good government; the Crown, burdened as it was by the privileged orders, had scarcely the power to afford it. D'Argenson would have given the people the necessary power: he would have given the Crown the necessary freedom: and he would have left it to the patriotism of the nation and the good sense of the King to restore prosperity to their common country.

D'Argenson's constitution died with him, and he who will may call it a dream.

It is a pity that such dreams are not more frequent.

END OF THE ESSAY.

For the portrait at the beginning of the book the author is obliged to the present Marquis d'Argenson. He is pleased to have this opportunity of thanking Mr. H. L. Samuel, of Balliol College, and also Mr. T. A. Vans Best and Mr. F. S. P. Swann, of Magdalen, for invaluable advice and help.