M. Bailly, who made himself the
popular mayor on the rebellion of the Bastile, and is a principal actor
in the revolt, before the change possessed a pension or office under the
crown of six hundred pound English a year,--for that country, no
contemptible provision; and this he obtained solely as a man of letters,
and on no other title. As to the moneyed men, whilst the monarchy
continued, there is no doubt, that, merely as such, they did not enjoy
the _privileges_ of nobility; but nobility was of so easy an
acquisition, that it was the fault or neglect of all of that description
who did not obtain its privileges, for their lives at least, in virtue
of office. It attached under the royal government to an innumerable
multitude of places, real and nominal, that were vendible; and such
nobility were as capable of everything as their degree of influence or
interest could make them,--that is, as nobility of no considerable rank
or consequence. M. Necker, so far from being a French gentleman, was not
so much as a Frenchman born, and yet we all know the rank in which he
stood on the day of the meeting of the States.
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