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have lost the point of support which could alone have CHAP. made success probable.

Apr.

"The present war will probably end in the abso- 1776. lute independence of the colonies, and that event will certainly be the epoch of the greatest revolution in the commerce and politics not of England only but of all Europe. From the prudent conduct, the courage, and intelligence of the Americans, we may augur that they will take care, above all things, to give a solid form to their government, and as a consequence they will love peace and seek to preserve it.

"The rising republic will have no need of conquests to find a market for its products; it will have only to open its harbors to all nations. Sooner or later, with good will or from necessity, all European nations who have colonies will be obliged to leave them an entire liberty of trade, to regard them no more as subject provinces, but as friendly states, distinct and separate, even if protected. This the independence of the English colonies will inevitably hasten. Then the illusion which has lulled our politicians for two centuries, will be dispelled; it will be seen that power founded on monopoly is precarious and frail, and that the restrictive system was useless and chimerical at the very time when it dazzled the

most.

"When the English themselves shall recognise the independence of their colonies, every mother country will be forced in like manner to exchange its dominion over its colonies for bonds of friendship and fraternity. If this is an evil, there is no way of preventing it, and no course to be taken but resignation to the absolute necessity. The powers which

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CHAP. shall obstinately resist, will none the less see their colonies escape from them, to become their enemies 1776. instead of their allies.

Apr.

"The yearly cost of colonies in peace, the enormous expenditures for their defence in war, lead to the conclusion that it is more advantageous for us to grant them entire independence, without waiting for the moment when events will compel us to give them up. This view would not long since have been scorned as a paradox and rejected with indignation. At present we may be the less revolted at it, and perhaps it may not be without utility to prepare consolation for inevitable events. Wise and happy will be that nation which shall first know how to bend to the new circumstances, and consent to see in its colonies allies and not subjects. When the total separation of America shall have healed the European nations of the jealousy of commerce, there will exist among men one great cause of war the less, and it is very difficult not to desire an event which is to accomplish this good for the human race. In our colonies we shall save many millions, and if we acquire the liberty of commerce and navigation with all the northern continent, we shall be amply compensated.

"The position of Spain with regard to its American possessions will be more embarrassing. Unhappily she has less facility than any other power to quit the route that she has followed for two centuries, and conform to a new order of things. Thus far she has directed her policy to maintaining the multiplied prohibitions with which she has embarrassed her commerce. She has made no preparations to substitute for empire over her American provinces a fra

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Apr.

ternal connection founded on the identity of origin, CHAP. language, and manners, without the opposition of interests; to offer them liberty as a gift instead of 1776. yielding it to force. Nothing is more worthy of the wisdom of the king of Spain and his council than from this present time to fix their attention on the possibility of this forced separation, and on the measures to be taken to prepare for it.

"It is a very delicate question to know, if we can underhand help the Americans to ammunition or money. There is no difficulty in shutting our eyes on their purchases in our ports; our merchants are free to sell to any who will buy of them; we do not distinguish the colonists from the English themselves; but to aid the Americans with money would excite in the English just complaints.

"The idea of sending troops and squadrons into our colonies for their security against invasion, must be rejected as ruinous, insufficient, and dangerous. We ought to limit ourselves to measures of caution, less expensive, and less approaching to a state of hostility; to precipitate nothing unless the conduct of England shall give us reason to believe that she really thinks of attacking us.

"In combining all circumstances, it may certainly be believed that the English ministry does not desire war, and our preparations ought to tend only to the maintenance of peace. Peace is the choice of the king of France and the king of Spain. Every plan of aggression ought to be rejected, first of all from moral reasons. To these are to be added the reasons of interest, drawn from the situation of the two powers. Spain has not in its magazines the requirements

CHAP. for arming ships of war, and cannot in time of need LXI. assemble a due number of sailors, nor count on the 1776. ability and experience of its naval officers. Her Apr. finances are not involved, but they could not suffice for years of extraordinary efforts.

"As for us, the king knows the situation of his finances; he knows that in spite of economies and ameliorations already made since the beginning of his reign, the expenditure exceeds the receipts by twenty millions; the deficit can be made good only by an increase of taxes, a partial bankruptcy, or frugality. The king from the first has rejected the method of bankruptcy, and that of an increase of taxes in time of peace; but frugality is possible, and requires nothing but a firm will. While the king found his finances involved, he found his army and navy in a state of weakness that was scarcely to have been imagined, For a necessary war resources could be found; but war ought to be shunned as the greatest of misfortunes, since it would render impossible, perhaps for ever, a reform, absolutely necessary to the prosperity of the state and the solace of the people."

Turgot had been one of the first to foretell and to desire the independence of the colonies, as the means of regenerating the world; his virtues made him worthy to have been the fellow laborer of Washington; but as a minister of France, with the superior sagacity of integrity in its combination with genius, he looked at passing events through the clear light, free from refraction or distortion.

The public mind in France applied itself to im proving the condition of the common people; Chastellux, in his work on public felicity, which was just

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then circulating in Paris, with the motto NEVER CHAP. DESPAIR, represented as "the unique end of all gov ernment and the universal aim of all philosophy, the 1776. greatest happiness of the greatest number;" Turgot, by his earnest purpose to restrain profligate expenditure and lighten the grievous burdens of the laboring classes, seemed called forth by Providence to prop the falling throne and hold back the nobility from the fathomless chaos towards which they were drifting. Yet he could look nowhere for support but to the king, who was unenlightened, with no fixed principle. and, therefore, naturally inclined to distrust. Malesherbes, in despair, resolved to retire. Maurepas, who professed, like Turgot, a preference for peace, could not conceive the greatness of his soul, and beheld in him a dangerous rival, whose activity and vigor exposed his own insignificance to public shame. The keeper of the seals, a worthless man, given up to intemperance, greedy of the public money, which, without a change in the head of the treasury, he could not get either by gift or by embezzlement, nursed this jealousy; and setting himself up as the champion of the aristocracy, he prompted Maurepas to say to the king that Turgot was an enemy to religion and the royal authority, disposed to annihilate the privileges of the nobility and to overturn the state.

Sartine had always supported the American policy of Vergennes, and had repeatedly laid before the king his views on the importance and utility of the French colonies, and on the condition of India. "If the navy of France," said he, "were at this moment able to act, France never had a fairer opportunity to avenge the unceasing insults of the English. I beseech your ma