This was not the first time that the churchmen had presumed on their office, and abused the King’s goodness. A prelate had made him perform an ignominious act of penitence when sick at Metz.
I used fresh endeavours to relieve the King from this return of languor, and had in a great measure succeeded, when a family concern brought on a severe relapse.
The Dauphin was now in his twenty-second year, which, by the custom of France, intitled him to be intrusted with the affairs of the crown. This Prince had always shewn the most submissive deference to the King his father, but of late had put himself at the head of a party, most of whom were my enemies: they exposed me with all the venom of scurrility, and even brought in the King. Lewis XV. knew it, and this was what occasioned that inward conflict which gave him so much trouble. After communicating his situation to me, he said, And what would you do, Madam, in such a case? “Sire, answered I, I would admit his Royal Highness the Dauphin into every council, and allow him all the honours due to his rank and birth.” Well, said the King, I will follow your advice; and soon after the Dauphin saw himself sent for on every important deliberation.
M. de Machault, then at the head of the finances, left no stone unturned to put them in a good condition: he was urged on every side. M. Rouillé asked very large sums to form a navy; the payers of annuities were perpetually at his elbow, and his apartment was never clear of those who had advanced money in the late war. He one day said to the King, in my hearing, Sire, I know not how in the world, I shall answer your engagements; every body is making demands on me, and no body will give me any credit.
Marshal Belleisle, to whom that laborious minister often used to pour forth his lamentations, told him, “Sir, I see but one way for you, which is to make the state a bankrupt. When a machine is out of order, the only remedy is to stop its motion, and to set it to rights again.”
This advice, however, was not followed; and instead of stopping the machine of the finances, in order to set it to rights again, it remained in all its former disorder. I have somewhere, among my papers, a scheme for discharging the national debt, in which the author, who was accounted a very skilful economist, advanced, that, for the settlement of an invariable order in the finances, the state, every twenty-five years, should declare itself insolvent; and the creditors compound with the King, as with a private insolvent.
“France, said this paper, will not hear of making itself a bankrupt, but the way it takes to avoid it, is still more burthensome; for when the King’s debts grow troublesome, does he not lay very onerous imposts on the people for the payment of them? Now this is a remedy worse than the disease, because the collecting of a tax, it is known, falls little short of doubling it. He extorts from one to pay another; a bankruptcy would ruin only a part of his subjects, whereas the means of payment impoverishes every body.”
I am not sufficiently acquainted with finances, to determine whether a wise King, in order to make his people easy, should begin by forfeiting the confidence of the wealthy part of his subjects. There are always some exceptionable things in these kinds of memorials. A person of a great genius has often told me, “that should all the fine projects, for making France the most opulent state in Europe, be carried into execution, it would perhaps make it the very poorest in the universe.”
The particular favour with which Lewis XV. continued to honour me, drew great numbers to my apartment, so that I had every morning a full court: some persons of eminence appeared there purely to please the King; but the business of the multitude was interest. I had brought the latter to give me memorials, as otherwise, I could never have recollected so many different objects. It is impossible for those who live at a distance from court, to conceive the various classes of askers, and what a number of favours the throne has the pleasure of bestowing.
I have read, in an original paper, that Lewis XIV. allowed all his subjects, who had any demand to make at court, to apply directly to himself. Had such an indulgence been continued under the present reign, Lewis XV’s whole life would have been taken up only in giving audiences. These memorials I had read to me, and afterwards talked them over to the King.