The Works

VIEW

OF THE

CAUSES AND PROGRESS

OF THE

FRENCH REVOLUTION.

CHAPTER I.

The Resources of France-Henry IV—Lewis XIV-The Love of our Country Loyalty The Regent-Lewis XV.

THE present revolution in France is one of the most awful events of which history affords any record.

The crimes with which it has been accompanied will remain a stain on the national character, which all the perseverance and intrepidity with which France has repelled external attack cannot efface.

The misery which the revolution has already produced, is of a nature so extensive and so acute, as no rational hope of future prosperity can compensate.

The only way we have to judge of the probability of what is to happen, is by reflecting on what has happened; and the surest means of avoiding evil of any kind is by discovering the causes which lead to it.

To enumerate some of the circumstances which tended to hasten, and are reckoned among the remote causes of the French revolution, may be useful.

Many imagine, that it will be a very long time before the finances of France can recover the extraordinary

drains they have of late undergone; it must be remem bered, however, that her resources are prodigious, of which nothing can afford more convincing proofs than the rapidity with which, on former occasions, she acquired riches and prosperity, after being exhausted by civil dissensions or foreign wars.

She revived from all the disasters of the bloody civil war of the league, with wonderful quickness, and acquired new dignity and unprecedented prosperity under Henry

IV.

very

short time after the civil dissensions and war of the Fronde, her greatness and wealth excited the jealousy, and resisted the force, of several powerful states which combined against her.

The sudden recovery from the disastrous condition to which France was reduced at the two epochs above mentioned, was partly owing to the talents of the two princes who reigned immediately after them.

The first, being blessed with benevolence and genius, had at once the inclination to raise his country from the calamitous state in which she was, and the power to execute it he was in reality a great king.

The second has been called the best actor of a great king that ever lived.

The fine person, dignified deportment, and imposing manners of Lewis XIV commanded the admiration, and even the awe, of his generals, ministers, and courtiers; and towards the end of his reign, when he was at once assailed by domestic and public misfortunes, the attachment of his subjects seemed to make them feel the sorrows of their king as their own, and submit with alacrity to heavier exactions than were ever wrung by tyranny from men.

Mankind are governed by force and by opinion. Lewis made use of both these agents in a supreme degree. Besides the immense army which he kept up, in peace as well as war, he also kept in action all those springs which have been found friendly to the maintenance of implicit

obedience in the subject, and arbitrary power in the mo narch. By various means he kept his nobility entirely dependent on his favour. Jealous of allowing the princes of the blood occasions of acquiring military fame, he seldom gave them the command of armies, and never for a long time. He commanded in person only when conquest was secure; and without being exposed to hardship or danger, he claimed the merit of having reduced every fortress, which was either bought by his money, or subdued by the skill of his engineers: even in his cabinet at Versailles he affected to direct the operations of his generals in the field, and vainly expected that, their victories being imputed to his military skill, the greater share of the glory would remain with himself.

He was taught that he had a right to controul the consciences and seize the money of his subjects; and, as he was at once superstitious and haughty, he revived the spirit of persecution, partly from zeal for the religion which he himself professed, and partly to punish the arrogance of those who dared to entertain opinions different from his.

Compensating the difference in quantity by that of quality, he seems to have thought himself and family, including his illegitimate children, of more value than all his subjects together.

Other monarchs have rated themselves and subjects in the same manner; but Lewis XIV is perhaps the only king who ever brought his subjects to the same way of thinking. He and his glory occupied their thoughts more than their own welfare, or that of their country. Those endearing ideas, which are connected with the expression our country, roused his jealousy at least, pains were taken, in his time, to root them out of their native soil, and transplant them around the word King: the expression la Patrie fell out of use during his reign, and continued so for a long time afterwards;-le Roi supplied its place.

That men should reverence the chief magistrate of a

constitution, where power is limited and prerogative as. certained, is highly rational and becoming; that subjects should admire a great king, and love a benevolent one, is natural and just. The heart owns, and the understanding approves, those sentiments. There is nothing in them, however, to fire the imagination, or greatly to captivate the affections. But the expression native country presents itself to the mind, decorated with many ideas from the wardrobe of imagination. To tell men they have disgraced their country, is the most bitter of all reproaches; to say that they have done it honour, is the most soothing of all praises. The officer on the day of battle is sensible of this; and that he may inspire those under his command with additional courage, and rouse. them to the utmost efforts, he reminds them that they are fighting for their country. That simple sentence contains all the magic of eloquence. Conjuring up the ideas of protecting our property, our homes, the abodes of our forefathers, the beloved scenes of our earliest pleasures and first affections, it implies defending from outrage our constitution, our religion, all that is valuable and endearing, our friends, parents, wives, and children. The love of our country is mentioned with the love of fame by the Roman poet, as the feeling of a noble mind.

• Vincit amor patriæ, laudumque immensa cupido.'

It not only excites to virtuous exertions during life, but a soothing recollection in death.

The Romans, fond of fighting as they were, would not have unsheathed a sword for the greatest man their country ever produced, if he had insinuated that they were to fight for his glory, and not for their country.

But the French, in Lewis XIV's time, seem to have thought of nothing but the monarch. When a battle was lost, their greatest concern was the affliction it would occasion to him-they rejoiced in victory, because it would afford him pleasure, and increase his glory. The great empire of France, and all which it inherit, seemed to have

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The Works: With Memoirs of His Life and Writings by Robert Anderson, Том 4