Popular Government

Essay I: The Prospects of Popular Government

PopulrGov_001-050.indd 27 12/16/11 12:54 PM ESSAY I THE PROSPECTS OF POPULAR GOVERNMENT PopulrGov_001-050.indd 28 12/16/11 12:54 PM PopulrGov_001-050.indd 29 12/16/11 12:54 PM The blindness of the privileged classes in France to the Revolution which was about to overwhelm them furnishes some of the best-worn commonplaces of modern history. There was no doubt much in it to surprise us. What King, Noble, and Priest could not see, had been easily visible to the foreign observer. "In short," runs the famous passage in Chesterfield's letter of December 25, 1753, "all the symptoms which I ever met with in history previous to great changes and revolutions in government now exist and daily increase in France." A large number of writers of our day, manifesting the wisdom which comes after the event, have pointed out that the signs of a terrible time ought not to have been mistaken. The Court, the Aristocracy, and the Clergy should have understood that, in face of the irreligion which was daily becoming more fashionable, the belief in privilege conferred by birth could not be long maintained. They should have noted the portents of imminent political dis- PopulrGov_001-050.indd 30 12/16/11 12:54 PM 30 Popular Government turbance in the intense jealousy of classes. They should have been prepared for a tremendous social upheaval by the squalor and misery of the peasants. They should have observed the immediate causes of revolution in the disorder of the finances and in the gross inequality of taxation. They should have been wise enough to know that the entire structure, of which the keystone was a stately and scandalous Court, was undermined on all sides. "Beautiful Armida Palace, where the inmates live enchanted lives; lapped in soft music of adulation; waited on by the splendours of the world; which nevertheless hangs wondrously as by a single hair."1 But although Chesterfield appeals to history, the careful modern student of history will perhaps think the blindness of the French nobility and clergy eminently pardonable. The Monarchy, under whose broad shelter all privilege grew and seemed to thrive, appeared to have its roots deeper in the past than any existing European institution. The countries which now made up France had enjoyed no experience of popular government since the rude Gaulish freedom. From this, they had passed into the condition of a strictly administered, strongly governed , highly taxed, Roman province. The investigations of the young and learned school of historians rising in France leave it questionable whether the Germans, who are sometimes supposed to have redeemed their own barbarism by reviving liberty, brought anything like freedom to Gaul. There was little more than a succession of German to Roman privileged classes. German captains 1 Carlyle, French Revoluhon, i. 4· PopulrGov_001-050.indd 31 12/16/11 12:54 PM The Prospects of Popular Government 31 shared the great estates, and assumed the rank, of the half-official, half-hereditary nobility, who abounded in the province. A German King, who was in reality only a Roman general bearing a barbarous title, reigned over much of Gaul and much of Central Europe. When his race was supplanted by another in its kingship, the new power got itself decorated with the old Roman Imperial style; and when at length a third dynasty arose, the monarchy associated with it gradually developed more vigour and vitality than any other political institution in Europe. From the accession of Hugh Capet to the French Revolution , there had been as nearly as possible Boo years. During all this time, the French Royal House had steadily gained in power. It had wearied out and beaten back the victorious armies of England. It had emerged stronger than ever from the wars of religion which humbled English kingship in the dust, dealing it a blow from which it never thoroughly recovered. It had grown in strength, authority, and splendour, till it dazzled all eyes. It had become the model for all princes. Nor had its government and its relation to its subjects struck all men as they seem to have struck Chesterfield. Eleven years before Chesterfield wrote, David Hume, a careful observer of France, had thus written in 1742, "Though all kinds of government be improved in modern times, yet monarchical government seems to have made the greatest advance to perfection . It may now be...