Here is the gist of the interview as Véri had it from Turgot’s own lips. ‘All that I have told you is a little confused, said Turgot, because I am still not at my ease.—I know that you are nervous, but I know also that you are constant and honest and that I could not have made a better choice ; I called you to the Marine for a little while to have the opportunity of knowing you.—It is necessary, Sire, that you should give me permission to put in writing my general opinions and, I may venture to add, my conditions, concerning the manner in which you ought to support me in this administration, for, I assure you, the superficial knowledge that I have of affairs causes in me some misgivings.—Yes, yes, said the King, just as you wish ; but I give you my word of honour in advance, he added, taking Turgot’s hands, to follow all your ideas and to uphold you always in the courageous course that you have taken.’
Véri’s account has not come down to us in its entirety. But Mlle de Lespinasse, who was in close touch with Turgot and his friends, no doubt completes the story when she writes to her lover, Guibert, as follows : ‘. . . He had some difficulty in accepting the Finances for which M. de Maurepas proposed him. When he went to thank the King, Louis said to him, “ You do not wish, then, to become Comptroller-General ? ” “ Sire,” answered M. Turgot, “ I assure Your Majesty that I would have preferred the Marine because the office is less precarious and I am sure that I should do more good there ; but at this moment it is not to the King I give myself : it is to an honest man.” The King took Turgot’s hands and said to him, “ You will never be deceived.” M. Turgot added : “ Sire, I ought to mention to Your Majesty the necessity of economies, of which you must give the first example. All this, no doubt, the Abbé Terray has already told Your Majesty.” “Yes,” replied the King, “he has told me, but not as you have.” ’
That same day Turgot put in writing—in his famous letter of 24 August—the general outline of his programme. It is a long letter, and it probably took him the remainder of the day to write ; it is one mass of erasures and interpolations. When reading it—and this applies to all the letters that he wrote to Louis—one must remember the extreme youth of the King. Turgot was endeavouring to descend to his level, and his words have the ring of a kindly pedagogue. The language of reason is translated into sentiment, for no other appeal to Louis could have been effective. Yet it was not without some misgiving that he availed himself of the Abbé de Vermond’s strategy. In later days he told the Abbé de Véri that, afraid of abusing the confidence of so young a monarch, he decided to confine innovation to a barest minimum, being content to wait until Louis could be convinced in a rational way of the necessity for radical reform. And it was therefore with great difficulty that he wrote a letter which would appeal to Louis’s conscience and yet satisfy his own.
Having just left Your Majesty's room, still full of the anxiety produced by the immensity of the burden you place upon me, overcome be the touching kindness with which you have deigned to encourage me, I hasten to convey to you my respectful gratitude and the absolute devotion of my whole life .
Your Majesty has been good enough to authorize me to put in writing the promise you have made to uphold me in the execution of those plans for economy that are at all times, and to-day more than ever, of an absolute necessity . ... At this moment, Sire, I confine myself to recalling to you these three phrases :
No bankruptcy ;
No increase of imposition ;
No borrowing .
No bankruptcy either avowed or disguised by arbitrary reduction (of interest on public stock).
No increase of impositions ; the reason for this lies in the plight of your subjects, and still more in Your Majesty's heart .
No borrowing ; because every loan always diminishes the unanticipated revenue and necessitates, in the long run, either bankruptcy or an increase in taxes . In time of peace it is perhaps permissible to borrow, but only in order to liquidate old debts, or to redeem other loans contracted on less advantageous terms .
There is only one way of fulfilling these three aims : that of reducing expenditure below receipts, and sufficiently below to ensure each year a saving of twenty millions (livres) with a view to the redemption of long-standing debts . Failing this, the first gunshot will drive the State to bankruptcy .
It will be asked, “On what can we retrench ?” and all officials, speaking for their own departments, will maintain that every particular item of expenditure is indispensable . They will be able to put forward very good reasons ; but since the impossible cannot be achieved, all these must yield to the absolute necessity of economy .
It is, then, highly essential for Your Majesty to insist that the heads of all departments should act in concert with the Minister of Finance . It is imperative that he should discuss with them in the presence of Your Majesty the urgency of proposed expenses . Above all it is essential, Sire, that, as soon as you have decided what amount is strictly requisite for each department, you should forbid the officials concerned to order any new expenditure without first arranging with the Treasury the means of providing for it . Without this regulation each department will load itself with debts, which will always become Your Majesty's debts, and your Minister of Finances will be unable to answer for the discrepancy between income and expenditure .
Your Majesty is aware that one of the greatest obstacles to economy is the multiplicity of demands by which you are constantly besieged, and which have unfortunately been sanctioned too indulgently by your predecessors .
It is necessary, Sire, to arm yourself against your kindness by a greater kind-heartedness, by considering whence comes this money which you are able to distribute to your courtiers, and by comparing the wretchedness of those from whom it is extracted (sometimes by the most rigorous methods) with the condition of those people who have the greatest call upon your liberality .
There are certain favours which, it is thought, you can readily grant, because they do not immediately bear upon the Royal Treasury .
Of this kind are profit-sharing in revenue collections (intérêts and croupes) and privileges ; they are the most dangerous and the most open to abuse . Every profit made on imposition which is not strictly necessary for their collection should be devoted to the relief of the taxpayer and the needs of the State .
Besides, these participations in the rewards of the tax-farmers are a source of corruption for the nobility and of vexation to the people, since they afford all such abuses secret and powerful protectors .
It may be hoped that, following an improvement in husbandry and also the suppression of irregularities in the collection of taxation, and as a result of more equitable assessments, a substantial relief for the people may be obtained without diminishing greatly the public revenue ; but unless economy is the first step, no reform is possible, because every readjustment entails the risk of interrupting the collection of taxation, and because increasing difficulties, caused by the manoeuvres and protests of those interested in perpetuating abuses, are only to be expected, there being no abuse upon which someone does not thrive .
So long as the finances are continually subject to the old expedients in order to provide for State services, Your Majesty will be at the mercy of the Financiers, who will always be able by their stratagems to frustrate reforms . No relief will be possible either by way of lightening the burden of the taxpayer or through legislation and changes in administration . The Government can never feel at ease, because it cannot ever win affection, and because the discontent and impatience of the masses are always the means utilized by intriguers and disaffected persons to excite disturbances . It is, then, upon economy that, above all, the prosperity of your reign depends ; upon it, too, hangs the tranquillity of your kingdom, its reputation among foreign Powers, the happiness of the nation and your own .
I must impress upon Your Majesty that I take office at a serious time when disquietude is widely prevalent respecting the sustenance of the people—a disquietude aggravated in the public mind for several years by the want of uniformity in the principles of administrators, by a number of imprudent operations on their part, and above all, by a harvest below average . On this matter, as upon other, I do not ask Your Majesty to adopt my principles without first having them thoroughly examined and discussed, as well by yourself as by your counsellors in your presence . But should you recognize the justice and the necessity of these principles, I implore you to maintain with firmness their application, showing no fear for the clamours which are absolutely certain to arise, no matter what system you adopt or policy you pursue .
These are the matters that I have been permitted to recall to Your Majesty . You will not forget that in accepting the office of Comptroller-General, I have felt to the full the value of the confidence with which you favour me ; I have felt that you entrust to me the happiness of your people, and, if I may be permitted to say so, the mission of promoting among your people the love of your person and of your authority . But at the same time I am aware of all the dangers to which I expose myself . I foresee that I shall be alone in fighting against abuses of every kind, against those who profit by them, against the many prejudiced persons who, opposed to all reforms, are such powerful instruments in the hands of vested interests intent on perpetuating the existing disorder . I shall have to battle even against the natural goodness and generosity of Your Majesty and of persons who are most dear to you . I shall be feared, hated even, by nearly all at Court, by all who solicit favours ; they will attribute refusals to me ; they will call me a hard man because I advise Your Majesty not to enrich even those you love at the loss of your people's sustenance . And these very subjects, for whom I shall sacrifice myself, are so easily deceived that perhaps I shall arouse their hatred of the very measures I take to save them from exactions . Appearances being against me, I shall be subject to calumny, the aim being to deprive me of Your Majesty's confidence . I shall never regret losing an office which I never expected . I am ready to resign it to Your Majesty as soon as I can no longer hope to be useful in it ; but the esteem, the reputation for integrity, the desire to promote the common good, all of which have led you to favour me, are more dear to me than life, and I run the risk of losing my reputation even though meriting in my own eyes no reproach .
Your Majesty will remember that it is my faith in your promises which leads me to shoulder a burden perhaps beyond my strength, and that it is to you personally, to an honest, just, and good man rather than to the King, that I give myself .
I venture to repeat here what you have already been kind enough to hear and approve . The affecting kindness with which you condescended to press my hands within your own, as if accepting my devotion, will never be effaced from my memory . It will sustain my courage . It has for all time welded my personal happiness with the interests, the glory, and the welfare of Your Majesty .
Such was Turgot’s plan. It contained the promise of the barest minimum of reform ; it nowhere departed from the principles of sound business and common sense ; and yet, as he himself was well aware, his was a colossal undertaking, in view of the difficulties that he would encounter—the bewilderment and timidity of his master, the sinister influences of those around him, the ease with which vested interests could turn popular disaffection against the Crown, making even a moderate reform the most hazardous of ventures.
Yet Turgot’s following were more elated than ever and the kingdom at large hoped for better times. Mlle de Lespinasse wrote to Guibert, ‘ Every one was intoxicated with joy, my friend . . . I repeat to you : you missed a great deal here.’ Paris and the provinces celebrated vociferously the disgrace of Maupeou and the Abbé Terray, and the fishwives of Compiègne, under cover of a time-old custom of the day of Saint-Louis, congratulated the King upon his good ‘bag’. ‘ Men of all ranks ’, declares Stormont, ‘ vie with each other in demonstrations of joy.’ Bonfires were lighted, the streets were decorated, and the fallen Ministers were burned in effigy. Terray was fortunate not to be personally assaulted. The crowd at the ferry at Choisyle-Roi were for throwing him into the river, and only by bribing the watermen, who pulled him quickly from the bank, did he manage to escape from the grasp of his ferocious pursuers.
Far away at Limoges a touching and most appropriate ceremony was organized. The municipal assembly sent to Turgot a letter of congratulations, and on 8 September held a public fête which ended with a firework display, the final effect being the lighting of a Catherine-wheel upon which were the words, Vive Turgot.
At the Court Turgot’s appointment caused very little stir. Opinion had not changed much during the short period that he had been at the Marine, and it was still the dévots who denounced him because of his former associations with the encyclopaedists. But, as the King had overlooked the indiscretions of his early years, they must grudgingly forgive him also. They must be thankful that he was not a Choiseuliste. On the other hand, the Choiseulistes must console themselves that he was not a dévot. Neither party was then fully aware that as a result of their struggles they had advanced a common enemy. Disappointed though the various factions were, they must remember that things might have been much worse. The Queen’s interest was most sanguine. Was not Turgot the Abbé de Vermond’s friend ? Might he not use his influence to promote the Queen’s favourite, Sartine, to the Royal Household ? Might he not improve the Queen’s financial position ? Such were the arguments that Mercy unfolded to the Empress ; and Marie-Antoinette wrote once again to tell her mother that Turgot was a very honest man.
No less satisfactory was Turgot’s reception from the magistracy. There was, of course, a vague uneasiness among them, and Nicolai, who received him at the Chambre des comptes on 31 August, while lavishing praise and fine words upon him, hinted that systems were dangerous and implored him to ‘ avail himself of simple and facile methods in his financial administration’. But this was hardly the time to voice open discontent. Turgot and Miromesnil were to be preferred to Terray and Maupeou. Indeed, the Ministerial changes promised well for the magistracy, for it was known that Turgot favoured the reversal of Maupeou’s coup d’état. It mattered little for the moment that he also held other ideas which the magistracy held in abhorrence. For the time being he must be welcomed : old scores could wait for another occasion.