Far from any increase of revenue in their hands, I find, by a report of
M. Vernier, from the Committee of Finances, of the second of August
last, that the amount of the national revenue, as compared with its
produce before the Revolution, was diminished by the sum of two hundred
millions, or _eight millions sterling_, of the annual
income,--considerably more than one third of the whole.
If this be the result of great ability, never surely was ability
displayed in a more distinguished manner or with so powerful an effect.
No common folly, no vulgar incapacity, no ordinary official negligence,
even no official crime, no corruption, no peculation, hardly any direct
hostility, which we have seen in the modern world, could in so short a
time have made so complete an overthrow of the finances, and, with them,
of the strength of a great kingdom.--_Cedo qui vestram rempublicam
tantam amisistis tam cito?_
The sophisters and declaimers, as soon as the Assembly met, began with
decrying the ancient constitution of the revenue in many of its most
essential branches, such as the public monopoly of salt. They charged
it, as truly as unwisely, with being ill-contrived, oppressive, and
partial. This representation they were not satisfied to make use of in
speeches preliminary to some plan of reform; they declared it in a
solemn resolution or public sentence, as it were judicially passed upon
it; and this they dispersed throughout the nation.
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