COLBERT. JEAN BAPTISTE, minister of finance to Louis XIV., was b. at Rheims in 1619, and served his apprenticeship in a woolen-draper's shop. He afterwards went to Paris, where his talents introduced him to Mazarin, who soon employed him in most important affairs of state. On his death-bed, Mazarin warmly recommended C. to the king, who, in 1661, appointed him comptroller-general of finances. C., who found the finances in a ruinous condition, immediately began his reforms. Fouquet, the superin tendent under Mazarin, was found guilty of impoverishing the state by his maladminis tration, and imprisoned for life. C. next instituted a council of finance and a chamber of justice, to call to account the farmers of the state-revenues, who were forced to yield up all the resources of the crown of which they had fraudulently possessed themselves. The debts of the state C. also reduced by arbitrary composition. So complete and thorough was the change which C. effected, that in 20 years the annual revenue had risen to 116 million livres, of which 23 were spent in collection and administration; whereas, when the management of the finances was intrusted to him, the revenue amounted only to 84 million livres, and 52 millions were absorbed in its collection. C. did not rest satisfied with being a monetary reformer, but in various ways developed the industrial activity of the nation by state support. Commerce was extended, roads and canals—including that of Languedoc--were made. He organized anew the colonies
in Canada, Martinique, and St. Domingo, and founded others at Cayenne and car. Made minister of marine in 1669, he found France with a few old rotten ships; three years later, she had a fleet of 60 ships of the' line, and 40 frigates. C. improved the civil code, introduced a marine code of laws, as well as the so-called Code _Arc* for the colonies; and statistical tables of the population were first made out by his orders. While attending to material interests, he did not neglect the arts and sciences; all men of learning and genius found in C. a generous patron. The academies of inscriptions, science, and architecture were founded by him. In short, C. was the patron of industry, commerce, art, science, and literature —the founder of a new epoch in France. Not withstanding the ingenuity of C., the unbounded extravagance of his master led him to raise money in ways objectionable to his reason, and to maintain war taxes in time of peace. He died 6th Sept., 1683, bitterly disappointed, because his great services were but ill appreciated by the king. The people, enraged at the oppressive taxes, would have torn C.'s dead body in pieces, but for the intervention of the military, and his burial by night. Because he had brains without birth, he was vexed and persecuted, both in private and public life, by those who, having birth, lacked brains.