2. Dissolution of the Ancien Régime. The
assembling of the States General.
Before they are realised in action, revolutions are sketched
out in men's thoughts. Prepared by the causes already studied,
the French Revolution commenced in reality with the reign of
Louis XVI. More discontented and censorious every day, the
middle classes added claim to claim. Everybody was calling for
reform.
Louis XVI. thoroughly understood the utility of reform,
but he was too weak to impose it on the clergy and the nobility.
He could not even retain his reforming ministers, Malesherbes and
Turgot. What with famines and increased taxation, the poverty of
all classes increased, and the huge pensions drawn by the Court
formed a shocking contrast to the general distress.
The notables convoked to attempt to remedy the financial
situation refused a system of equal taxation, and granted only
insignificant reforms which the Parliament did not even consent
to register. It had to be dissolved. The provincial Parliaments
made common cause with that of Paris, and were also dissolved.
But they led
opinion, and in all parts of France promoted the demand for a
meeting of the States General, which had not been convoked for
nearly two hundred years.
The decision was taken: 5,000,000 Frenchmen, of whom
100,000 were ecclesiastics and 150,000 nobles, sent their
representatives. There were in all 1,200 deputies, of whom 578
were of the Third Estate, consisting chiefly of magistrates,
advocates, and physicians. Of the 300 deputies of the clergy,
200, of plebeian origin, threw in their lot with the Third Estate
against the nobility and clergy.
From the first sessions a psychological conflict broke out
between the deputies of different social conditions and
(therefore) different mentalities. The magnificent costumes of
the privileged deputies contrasted in a humiliating fashion with
the sombre fashions of the Third Estate.
At the first session the members of the nobility and the
clergy were covered, according to the prerogatives of their
class, before the king. Those of the Third Estate wished to
imitate them, but the privileged members protested. On the
following day more protests of wounded self-love were heard. The
deputies of the Third Estate invited those of the nobility and
the clergy who were sitting in separate halls to join them for
the verification of their powers. The nobles refused. The
negotiations lasted more than a month. Finally, the deputies of
the Third Estate, on the proposition of the Abbé
Siéyès, considering that they represented 95 per
cent. of the nation, declared themselves constituted as a
National Assembly. From that moment the Revolution pursued its
course.
