But alas! there was not the least shadow of justice in this operation; because long before the visa was established, most of the grounds of those debts had circulated from hand to hand, under the greatest discredit: so that the real sufferers were then beyond the reach of the indemnity offered; and the usurers and brokers who had bought them up, were those who made fortunes by them. The Cardinal’s plan of paying at the selling price, would have proved, in this particular case, more rational, and more according to equity, than any other: so greatly do circumstances influence our decisions in all political matters!
By the visa, the 600 millions were reduced to 250 millions, and put at 4 per cent. like all the other debts. No plan was proposed at first for paying off the capitals; but a sum was appropriated, though very ill paid, for discharging the interest. We have discussed sufficiently the famous operations of the Missisippi; by which an attempt was made to throw the whole national debt on the company of the Indies; and we have seen how it succeeded.
The distance, therefore, of Richlieu’s time, from Davenant’s, occasions very little deception in comparing the principles of French and English credit: and when we come to examine the present state of that question, I am afraid we shall find, in France, enough of the old system still remaining, to verify my observation, that the French have the advantage in paying their debts; the English, in contracting them. Where the balance of advantage may lie, will be the subject of more speculation.
The first essential difference I find between the credit of France and that of England, in the two periods we are considering, relates to the coin. In the first, the value of it had been very well preserved: no considerable alteration had been made upon it, from 1602 to 1636, that the Cardinal raised the denomination of the marc of fine silver, from 22 livres to 27 livres 10 sols, as has been said. Whereas from the revolution, until the establishment of the bank in 1695, the coin had suffered in England a debasement, from clipping, of near 50 per cent. This circumstance, more than any other, affected the credit of England, and increased the expence of King William’s war. In Richlieu’s time, circulation and trade had made more progress in France than in England at the time Davenant lived. The revenue left by Henry the Fourth was double to that of England at the revolution: and, in general, the income of the Kings of France had far exceeded that of the Kings of England, for many reigns before that of the great Henry. Borrowing also, upon a fixed and permanent interest, had been known in France so far back as Francis the First.
That Prince was the first, I find, who contracted a regular debt, at perpetual interest, upon the town-house of Paris, at about 8 per cent. when the legal interest in England, under his contemporary Henry the Eighth, was 10 per cent.
The predecessor of Francis, Louis XII. had of gross revenue, charged with his debts, which eat up near one half, above 2,500,000l. sterling. Dutot, Reflex. Pol. Vol. I. p. 204. Francis I. left to his successor in 1546, a gross revenue of 2,685,314l. sterling, and of nett income 2,287,998l. according to Dutot and M. de Sulli.
Under Henry II. and Francis II. the gross revenue stood at about 2,618,000l. sterling.
Under Charles the IXth, I have not been able to discover any thing which can be relied upon: but his successor Henry III. according to Sulli, had, in 1581, a revenue of 3,250,000l. sterling, and left only about 16 millions of livres of debt, which was no great sum.
To this Henry IV. succeeded; and by the capacity and unwearied application of his great minister M. de Sulli, it was raised to above six millions sterling, at the beginning of the reign of Louis XIII. This revenue, by his wars and expences, was left greatly incumbered; but still the taxes were established which brought it in; and so early in the reign of his successor Louis XIV. as the year 1683, his revenue extended to no less than 9,182,914l. sterling, according to Dutot. Reflex. Pol. Vol. II. p. 256[[22]].
[22]. These sums are all converted into sterling, according to the value of the French livre at the different periods here mentioned.