XIV. just before his death drew up an edict appointing a council of regency during the minority of his great-grandson, the young king. The Parliament of Paris, however, declared the will null, and appointed the Duke of Orleans, who was considered favorable to the nobles, regent! For eight years, from 1715 to 1723, the regent, by shameless profligacy and extravagance, was but filling up the measure of wrath which had been accumulating for ages. Nothing was done to promote the welfare of the people, and, notwithstanding the misery which was actually depopulating the provinces, the gorgeous palaces of France exhibited scenes of voluptuousness which the wealth of the Orient had never paralleled.
Louis XIV. had expended upon the single palace of Versailles more than two hundred millions of dollars. The roofs of that vast pile would cover a surface of twenty-five French acres. Thirty thousand laborers were frequently employed simultaneously in embellishing the magnificent park sixty miles in circuit.16 Marly, with its fountains, its parks, and gardens, had also been constructed with equal extravagance. Both of these palaces exhibited scenes of measureless profligacy gilded by the highest fascinations of external refinement and elegance. Louis XIV. left the nation in debt eight hundred and fifty millions of dollars. For several years the expenditure had exceeded the income by nearly thirty millions of dollars a year. The regent during the seven years of his profligate administration had added to this debt a hundred and fifty millions of dollars.
There was now fearful embarrassment in the finances. All the measures for extorting money seemed to be exhausted, and it was found impossible to raise the sums necessary to meet the expenses of the court and to pay the interest upon the debt. Taxation had gone to its last extremity; and no more money could be borrowed. The Duke of St. Simon proposed that the treasury should declare itself bankrupt.
"The loss," said he, "will fall upon the commercial and moneyed classes, whom no one fears or pities. The measure," he continued, "will also be a salutary rebuke to the ignoble classes, teaching them to beware how they lend money to the king which will enable him to gain the supremacy over the nobles."
The Duke of Orleans, who was regent only, not king, could sympathize in these views. The general discontent, however, was such, that he did not dare to resort to so violent a measure. The end was accomplished in a more circuitous way. A commission of courtiers was appointed to examine the accounts of the public creditors. Three hundred and fifty millions of francs ($76,000,000) were peremptorily struck from their claims. There was no appeal. This mode of paying debts seemed so successful that the commission established itself as an inquisitorial chamber, and summoned before it all those who had been guilty of lending money to the king. Most of these were thrown into prison, and threatened with death unless they purchased pardon for the crime with large sums of money. The regent and the nobles made themselves merry with the woes of these low-born men of wealth, and filled their purses by selling their protection.
A wealthy financier was perishing in one of the dungeons of the Bastille. A count visited him and offered to procure his release for sixty thousand dollars. "I thank you, Monsieur le Comte," was the reply, "but Madame, your countess, has just been here, and has promised me my liberty for half that sum."
The reign of the regent Duke of Orleans was the reign of the nobles, and they fell eagerly upon the people, whom Louis XIV. had sheltered from their avarice that more plunder might be left for him. The currency was called in and recoined, one fifth being cut from the value of each piece. By this expedient the court gained nearly fifteen millions of dollars.
Soon this money was all gone. The horizon was darkening and the approaching storm gathering blackness. Among the nobles there were some who abhorred these outrages. A party was organized in Paris opposed to the regent. They sent in a petition that the States-General might be assembled to deliberate upon the affairs of the realm. All who signed this petition were sent to the Bastille. There had been no meeting of the States-General called for more than one hundred years. The last had been held in 1614. It consisted of 104 deputies of the clergy, 132 of the nobles, and 192 of the people. The three estates had met separately and chosen their representatives. But the representatives of the people in this assembly displayed so much spirit that the convention was abruptly dismissed by the king, and neither king nor nobles were willing to give them a hearing again.
A bank was now established with a nominal capital of six millions of francs ($1,200,000). The shares were taken up by paying half in money and half in valueless government bills. Thus the real capital of the bank was $600,000. Upon this capital bills were issued to the amount of three thousand millions of francs ($600,000,000). Money was of course for a time plenty enough. The bubble soon burst. This operation vastly increased the financial ruin in which the nation was involved. Five hundred thousand citizens were plunged into bankruptcy.17 The Parliament of Paris, though composed of the privileged class, made a little show of resistance to such outrages and was banished summarily to Pontoise.
Dubois, one of the most infamous men who ever disgraced even a court, a tool of the regent, and yet thoroughly despised by him, had the audacity one morning to ask for the vacant archbishopric of Cambray. Dubois was not even a priest, and the demand seemed so ridiculous as well as impudent that the regent burst into a laugh, exclaiming,
"Should I bestow the archbishopric on such a knave as thou art, where should I find a prelate scoundrel enough to consecrate thee?"
"I have one here," said Dubois, pointing to a Jesuit prelate who was ready to perform the sacrilegious deed. Dubois had promised Rohan that if he would consecrate him he would bring back the favor of the court to the Jesuit party. One of the mistresses of the regent had been won over by Dubois, and the bloated debauchee was consecrated as Archbishop of Cambray. Dubois was now in the line of preferment. He soon laid aside his mitre for a cardinal's hat, and in 1722 was appointed prime minister. The darkness of the Middle Ages had passed away, and these scandals were perpetrated in the full light of the 18th century. The people looked on with murmurs of contempt and indignation. It was too much to ask, to demand reverence for such a church.18
The infamous Jesuit, Lavergne de Tressan, Bishop of Nantes, who consecrated Dubois, revived from their slumber the most severe ordinances of Louis XIV. Louis XV. was then fourteen years of age. Royal edicts were issued, sentencing to the galleys for life any man and to imprisonment for life any woman who should attend other worship than the Catholic. Preachers of Protestantism were doomed to death; and any person who harbored such a preacher, or who should neglect to denounce him, was consigned to the galleys or the dungeon. All children were to be baptized within twenty-four hours of their birth by the curate of the parish, and were to be placed under Catholic instructors until the age of fourteen. Certificates of Catholicity were essential for all offices, all academical degrees, all admissions into corporations of trade. This horrible outrage upon human rights was received by the clergy with transport. When we contemplate the seed which the king and the court thus planted, we can not wonder at the revolutionary harvest which was reaped.
The Catholic Church thus became utterly loathsome even to the most devout Christians. They preferred the philosophy of Montesquieu, the atheism of Diderot, the unbelief of Voltaire, the sentimentalism of Rousseau, to this merciless and bloody demon, assuming the name of the Catholic Church, and swaying a sceptre of despotism which was deluging France in blood and woe. The sword of persecution which had for a time been reposing in its scabbard was again drawn and bathed in blood. Many Protestant ministers were broken upon the wheel and then beheaded. Persecution assumed every form of insult and cruelty. Thousands fled from the realm. Religious assemblies were surrounded by dragoons, and fired upon with the ferocity of savages, killing and maiming indiscriminately men, women, and children. Enormous sums of money were, by the lash, torture, the dungeon, and confiscation, extorted from the Protestants. Noblemen, lawyers, physicians, and rich merchants were most eagerly sought.
The seizure of Protestant children was attended
