7514. REVOLUTION (French), Imperial imbecility.—
The government has
published an Arret, suspending all reimbursements
of capital, and reducing the payments of
the principal mass of demands for interest to
twelve sous in the livre; the remaining eight
sous to be paid with certificates. * * *
The consternation is as yet too great to let us
judge of the issue. It will probably ripen the
public mind to the necessity of a change in
their constitution, and to the substituting the
collected wisdom of the whole in place of a
single will, by which they have been hitherto
governed. It is a remarkable proof of the total
incompetency of a single head to govern a nation
well, when, with a revenue of six hundred
millions, they are led to a declared bankruptcy,
and to stop the wheels of government, even in
its most essential movements, for want of
money.—
To John Jay. Washington ed. ii, 468.
(P.
Aug. 1788)
