PROGRESS DURING XVIITH CENTURY.

II.

65

their market value rises or falls in different countries. LECTURE It was then believed that you could sell your own commodities to foreign nations without purchasing any of their goods; it is now understood that every nation must discharge its debts with the produce of its own soil and labour: it was then believed that the excess of the value of exports over imports was the best evidence of a prosperous commerce with other nations; it is now understood that a profitable trade with foreign countries is shown by the superior value of the goods brought home as compared with the commodities sent abroad it was then believed that gold and silver were the most profitable articles of importation; it is now understood, that it is immaterial what kinds of commodities are imported, provided they are of equal value: it was then believed that the gain of one nation was the loss of another; it is now understood that "an exchange of equivalents is the foundation of all commerce, from the simple barter of the untutored Indian to the most complicated and extensive operations of the London merchant."

F

66

DISORDERS IN FRANCE.

LECTURE III.

LECTURE THE antagonism and rivalry of the Chartered TradIII. ing Companies, established during the reign of Eliza

Disorders

in France

after death

beth, had materially contributed to the great progress towards sounder opinions, which England had made during the seventeenth century, and which was alluded to in the previous Lecture; whilst the termination of the struggle between the House of Stuart and the Commons House of Parliament, in favour of the latter body, led at once to the removal of many practical obstacles in the way of further advancement. In France, on the other hand, after the death of Henri IV., and the retirement of Sully from public affairs, the ancient elements of disorder, which the firm hand of that minister had restrained, resumed of Henri IV. their disastrous influence, and the good effects of his wise administration were obliterated within a brief interval, in the struggle which soon ensued between the crown and the great nobles. The Wars of the Roses had fortunately released England from the trammels of feudalism; the Wars of the League, however, had not accomplished this desirable result for France, inasmuch as the accession of Henri IV. had effected a compromise, rather than a conclusion of the conflict, and with the death of that sovereign it recommenced. It was on this, the last occasion, indeed, with the exception of the more memorable one of the year 1789, that the Crown of France called in the aid of the third estate (tiers état) of the kingdom, and in 1614, a meeting of the States General was convoked. The constitution, however, of this body was very different from that of the English Parlia

ACCESSION OF LOUIS XIV.

III.

67

ment, and the two privileged chambers of the nobles, LECTURE and the clergy respectively, could hardly be expected to assent to the reforms which were suggested by the third estate, upon which, almost exclusively, the public burdens pressed; and the third estate in France could not venture to speak with the same boldness, as it had not the same privileges, with the Commons in England. Nothing, therefore, was accomplished on this occasion, and the successive administrations of Richelieu and Mazarin were too anxiously occupied with foreign and domestic warfare, to admit of their attention being directed to the interests of peace. With the termination of the quarrels of the Fronde, the struggle for supremacy between the Crown and the Nobles may be considered to have concluded, and with the death of Mazarin in 1661, the monarchy in France once more resumed, in the person of Louis XIV., Accession of its long abandoned duty of governing the country.

Louis XIV.

tion.

A new era now dawned upon French industry. Mazarin's last act had been to recommend to the confidence of Louis XIV. a man, whose name has since been identified with a system, and whose spirit has apparently never ceased to influence the councils of his country. Colbert, the intendant of the late minis- Colbert's ter, brought with him into the king's service the administrahabits of a laborious and plodding man of business, to use Adam Smith's own words, combined with great integrity and great clearness of intellect. But the very ability which fitted him so well for the task of introducing order into the collection and expenditure of the public revenue, was likely to engender a spirit of system, and a disposition to apply its rules to other subjects than those of finance. Sismondi, in his Histoire des Français, c. xxviii. says, that in the great encouragement which Colbert gave to manufactures and commerce, he merely executed the measures which his predecessor, Fouquet, had designed. It is

68

III.

COLBERT'S ADMINISTRATION.

LECTURE immaterial whether the whole credit be due to Colbert or not, as most assuredly the execution of a great political measure has always been deemed a more trying test of statesmanship than the conception of it.

lection for

tures and commerce.

After having re-established order in the public finances, Colbert directed his attention to the sources of revenue. His views, in regard to the best mode of developing the national resources, were diametrically His predi- opposed to the previous system of Sully. As the manufac- grandson of a wool-merchant at Rheims, Colbert might be expected to have a bias in favour of the pursuits of his ancestor, and accordingly we find his ruling idea to have been, that the promotion of agriculture might justly be made subordinate to the encouragement of manufactures and commerce: that the manufacturer and merchant were more efficient pioneers of national wealth than the cultivator of the soil; and that the welfare of the two former classes would entail, as a necessary consequence, the prosperity of the latter, by increasing the demand, in the home market, for agricultural produce. Having, therefore, relieved the cultivator of the soil from a portion of the oppressive burden of direct taxes, which since Sully's time had been once more reckExportation lessly heaped upon him, Colbert did not hesitate to hibited. prohibit the exportation of corn. In this respect his discernment of the connexion between cause and effect was not so clear as that which Sully had shown. The latter had fully appreciated the principle, that if we would encourage production, we must open outlets for produce. Colbert, on the other hand, seems not to have formed a correct estimate of the extent to which, from the nature of the relations between supply and demand, production would be discouraged by closing up the existing outlets for produce, and to have overlooked the fact, that the cost of production would be increased with every diminution in the quantity of the produce.

of corn pro

EXPORTATION OF CORN PROHIBITED.

III.

69

We learn from Forbonnais, that since Sully's admi- LECTURE nistration, the price of wheat in France had now more than doubled; but at the same time the burdens upon the cultivator had been more than doubled. In addition, the troubled state of the country, during the administration of the two cardinals, must have interfered with the pursuits of agriculture; so that we should not be surprised to find that the supply of the home market occasionally fell short of the demand. Instead, however, of attributing the rise in the price of corn to the circumstances just alluded to, which seem quite sufficient to account for it, since most assuredly had there not been some such ob-stacles in the way, the agriculturists would have readily met the growing demand with increased supplies, where the price was apparently highly remunerative; the consumers at once referred the occasional dearths of corn to the incautious policy of Sully in according freedom to commerce in grain, and raised their voice against allowing any longer the exportation of corn. Colbert had thus the popular feeling in favour of his regulations, and he may probably have conceived that the reduction which he had made in the direct burdens upon agriculture was altogether a boon to the producers, and would enable agricultural industry to maintain its ground against a temporary depression of prices. In the mean time, the diminished cost of maintenance would encourage the growth of a manufacturing population, and its increasing consumption of agricultural produce would in time replace the extinguished demand of the foreign consumer.

The pursuits in which Colbert had been trained, disposed him to overlook the operation of disturbing causes, for which a statesman, no less than an engineer, must make allowances. Accustomed to superintend the department of a public office, and to see his own