It has been said that Necker did not entirely rest his claims to office on the strength or public opinion which backed him, but employed the intervention of the Mar quis de Pezay, by means of whom he maintained a concealed correspondence with the young king, and transmitted him memorials, insisting on the resources of the state, and painting, in blight colours, the immense improvement which might result from properly using them. Prompted by those glen) ing representations, or impelled by the national voice, Louis at last conserit cd to admit Necker into his finance department. It was at first attempted to make the new Comptroller-general divide his powers and his duties with the old ; but eight months of experiment showed clearly enough that the two could not act in concert ; and Taboreau king dis missed, Necker obtained the sole management of his post, on the 10th July, 1777. His conduct in it gave general satisfaction. He retrenched and borrowed ; and by many judicious arrangements matelially bettered the condition or the treasury. The middle ranks, who felt the practical benefit of this procedure, approved his character, and extolled the disinterestedness (which his enemies called the ostentation) of serving without a salary. Excepting Turgot, whom his doctrines on the corn trade had alienated, the literary class regarded him with favour, and exulted at the triumph of liberal opinions in this first instance, since the edict or Nantes was repealed, of a Protestant being advanced to any im portant situation in the government. INith the court party lic was less successful ; his measures thwarted their prejudices and their interests : but the rectitude and calmness of his demeanour, and the puwerful sup port he receiveE: from without, v:ere sufficient to impress them with respect, and to frustrate their cabals.
Necker was now in the place he desired: his admi nistration or it was applauded ; and the five subr.,equent years, though always lull of toil, and seldom free from anxiety', were perhaps among the happiest of his life. He was fortunate in the possession or an amiable and highly-gifted wife,* whose attentive management relieved him from domestic cares, while her affection ancl accom plishments made his home at all times a scene of com fort ancl peace. lie was employed in labouring for the welfare or a great nation. Buffon, Marmontel, Thomas, and all the most celebrated men of the age, embellished his leisure ; and he might flatter himself as being the architect of his own fortune, and think, with more than usual plausibility, that his own powers and his own merit had earned him all this exaltrition.
So splendid a condition was not, however, destined to be permanent. Necker, it is true, continued to enjoy the unabated, or even increasing confidence of the pub lic ; the Compte Rendu (1781,) in which he developed his plans of finance, was circulated to an unparallelled extent ; and among the '200 000 copies of it that were sold, few were perused with other feelings than appro bation. But his enemies at court were still active. The expedients he recommended for all:viating the na tional burdens, or allaying the popular discontent, were viewed with suspicion and rcpug,nance ; and a claim which he put forward, soon after the publication or his Comptc Rendu, to a right of being received into the Council, and which he s.upportecl with more spirit than prudence, was eagerly seized on ; and being dex• trously improved, it led to discussions svhich forced him to give up his appointment. He resigned on the 28th of May, and withdrew to Copet, a chateau which he had purchased lately on the banks of the lake of Geneva.
It was natural to feel keenly the immense change in his circumstances ; and to a mind so active and as piring., particularly when it had already drunk so deeply of the sweets of power, this change must have been more than usually galling. But Necker had not aban doned the hope of resuming his station ; and the warm reception bestowed on his treatise De l'ildministration des Finances, published during his retirement, was well calculated to strengthen such anticipations. Courtiers might stigmatize him as a demagogue, whom his posi tion in society rendered a natural enemy of the privi leged orders, and whose ideas of a representative go vernment, like that of England, were fraught with dan ger ; but the ineptness and prodigality of Calonne, his successor ; the increasing agitation of the kingdom ; the increasing embarassments of the ministry, all point ed to a thorough alteration of system, and to Necker as the man for effecting it. Animated by those pros
pects, he returned to Paris in 1787 ; and as Calonne had accused him, before the Notables (then assembled to provide against the growing dangers,) of malversa tion in his office, and unfairness in his accounts, Necker instantly prepared a memorial to rebut this charge, of which it was easy to demonstrate the falsehood. He submitted his defence to the king, but refused, at his request, to suppress it ; and was in consequence order ed to retire to St. Ouen, a country seat many miles dis tant from the capital. This banishment, however, was not of long continuance. Calonne's dismissal, which the publication in question contributed to hasten, and Biennc's appointment to succeed him, were found inade quate to the emergency ; the financial difficulties, the popular discontent, went on increasing ; and Necker was recalled, in the month of August, 1788.
Such a reinstatement might well be gratif}ing to his vanity ; but the task tie had to perform was appaling. On onc hand were a dilapidated treasury, and a ruinous, though insufficient taxation : on the other was an itnpo verished and tumultuous people, from whose scanty re sources he behoved to make good this clefficiency, while he felt that in their favour consistcd his only security against the intrigues of a court which viewed himself and his principles at once wit)) fear and aversion. His first step, after devising means to relieve the pressing scarcity of corn, was to insist on the removal of Mann pas, the prime minister ; and having now the chief di rection of affairs in his own hand, he urged the King to fulfil his former promise of assembling the States Gene ral,—as the cnly means of calming the popular ferment, and effectually remedying the grievances of the nation. The States General were convoked accordingly ; they met on the 5th of May, 1789 ; but their meeting pro duced none of the enticipated effects. To Necker, far ftom realizing his favourite project of a limited mo narchy, it afforded nothing but a series of disappoint ments and vexations,—plaeing him in a situation where it Was in)possible to reconcile the wishes of his master (or his master's advisers) with the wishes of the people, and thus forcing him to vacillate between co-operation and resistance with regard to both. In his dread of the noblesse he had settled, that the deputies of the tiers eta: should be equal in number to the two remaining orders united; an arrangement which soon brought about the junction of all into one National Assembly, where the democratic influence decidedly ptevailed : and the plan of a constitution, by which he still hoped to quiet the rising demands of that party, was so altered and curtail ed by the King, that Necker refused to be present when it Ivas read. Vehement contentions ensued, in which the voice of moderation could no more be heard ; violent, yet feeble efforts on the part of Government, but served to irritate the deputies ; and as Necker refused, not withstanding their intemperance, to concur in the at tempt to overawe them by a military force, and was be sides regarded as a lukewarrn friend, if not a concealed enemy to the royal interest, he received a secret order, on the afternoon of the Ilth July, 1789, to leave 'Ver sailles privately within twenty-tour hours. Ile com plied without hesitation, and instantly set out for Brus sels. But his departure produced a result very dif ferent from the proposed one, Coupled with the gra dual approach of a great army to Paris and Versailles, it inspired the populace with vague terrors, and enabled designing men to exasperate them into frenzy. On the memorable 14th of July, the mob rose and levelled the Bastile to the ground, massacred every obnoxious per son, and delivered themselves up to all manner of ex cesses. To appease them, Louis was glad to despatch a courier in pursuit of Necker, requesting his immediate return. He returned accordingly; and his journey from Basle, where the messenger found him, to the capital, resembled a long triumphal procession.