to fly to the defence of their country, they demand arms for themfelves, and profeffedly for the fame purpose.

The memoir concerning the Drufes' will be read, we think, with pleasure. We have perufed with admiration those pages of their history, in which we are told of the noble ftand that they have very frequently made against the power and defpotifm of the Turk, who has never been able to deprive them of the liberty they have long enjoyed, and which they feem determined to maintain and defend.

A fhort account is also given by our Author of the Mutualis, a people who inhabit a mountainous but fertile country, extending from the river of Sidon to the territory of Acra. But for this, and any farther information refpe&ting the Drufes themfelves, we must refer our Readers to the work at large.

ART. XXII.

The Life of M. Turgot, Comptroller General of the Finances of France in the years 1774, 1775, and 1776. By the Marquis de Condorcet, of the Academy of Sciences. Tranflated from the French; with an Appendix. Svo. 6s. Boards. Johnfon. 1787.

HE life of M. Turgot conftitutes but a small part of this

THE work. M. de Condorcet's univerfal knowledge and great

abilities would not fuffer him to be the mere relater of actions; he must neceffarily enquire into the original fources and firit causes of the events which he records; we are confequently here prefented with many curious political fpeculations and opinions on government, and the art of finance.

We fhall make a fhort abftract of the life of this illuftrious man; recommending, at the fame time, as worthy the attention. of our Readers, the Marquis's thoughts on different fubjects relative to ftate affairs.

Anne Robert James Turgot was born at Paris, May 10, 1727, of a very ancient Norman family. His father was, for a long time, provoft of the corporation of merchants. During this period, he was the object of general admiration; and the regularity and economy of his adminiftration procured him the particular refpect of the citizens. M. Turgot was the youngest of three brothers. The eldeft was intended for the rank of magiftracy,' which had been the ftation of his family for feveral generations; the fecond was deftined for the army; and Robert for the church. He had fcarcely attained the age at which reflexion commences, when he was refolved to facrifice all temporal advantages to liberty and confcience, and to purfue his ecclefiaftical studies, without declaring his repugnance to their propofed object. At the age of twenty-three years, he took his degree, and was elected prior of the Sorbonne. In coníequence of this fituation, he was obliged to pronounce two Latin

Uu3

orations.

orations. These compofitions are, in the biographer's opinion, monuments which mark not fo particularly the extent of his knowledge, as a philofophy and comprehenfion peculiar to himfelf. The first oration has for its fubject, the benefits which the human fpecies have derived from the Chriftian religion; the fecond gives the hiftory, and traces the progrefs, of the human understanding.

The time when it was neceffary for him to declare that he would not be an ecclefiaftic, was now arrived. He announced this refolution to his father by letter, fhewing the motives which induced him to decline the clerical order. His father confented, and he was appointed Mafter of Requefts. M. Turgot prepared himself for this office, by particular application to thofe parts of fcience which are moft connected with its functions and duties, viz. the ftudy of natural philofophy, as far as it relates to agriculture and manufactures, to the fubjects of merchandise, and the execution of public works, together with fuch parts of mathematical knowledge as lead to a practical application of natural philofophy, and facilitate the calculations that are frequently neceffary in politics, commerce, and law.

About this period he wrote fome articles for the Encyclopédie, of which the most capital were, Etymology, Exiftence, Expanfibility, Fair, and Foundation. He had prepared feveral others, but thete five only were inierted; the perfecution fet on foot against the Encyclopédie hindered him from continuing to write in it, being unwilling that his opinions fhould be published in a work which was received with difapprobation by fome of the moft diftinguished people of that time.

In 1761, M. Turgot was appointed Intendant + of Limoges. In this office he did much good. He gave activity to the fo

ciety

A Mafter of Requests in France,' fays the Author, is the fervant of the executive power, where the activity of that power embraces every thing: he is the inftrument of government in operations of commerce and finance, in which, of all others, the public profperity is moft interested; and he is called, more frequently than the member of any other order, to take on himself the first offices of adminiftration. A Mafter of Requests is rarely without a confiderable fhare of influence refpecting fome one of the provinces, or the whole flate; fo that it feldom happens that his liberality or his prejudices, his virtues or his vices, do not, in the course of his life, produce great good or great mifchief."

The immediate authority of an Intendant lies within narrow bounds. Directions in detail for carrying into execution the general orders of adminiftration; the power of making provifional decifions in certain cafes, and of adjudging others which refpect commerce and finance fubject to an appeal to the council; fuch are nearly the

functions

ciety of agriculture eftablished at Limoges, by directing their efforts to important obje&s: he opened a mode of public inftruction for female profeffors of midwifery: he procured for the people, the attendance of able phyficians during the raging of epidemic difeafes: he established houfes of induftry, fupported by charity (the only fpecies of alms giving which does not encourage idleness): he introduced the cultivation of potatoes into his province, &c. &c. While M. Turgot proceeded with unremitting activity and zeal, in promoting the good of the people over whom he was placed, he meditated projects of a more extenfive nature, fuch as an equal diftribution of the taxes, the conftruction of the roads, the regulation of the militia, the prevention of a fcarcity of provifion, and the protection of commerce.

We should exceed our bounds, were we to give the particulars of the many great actions which are here recorded, during the thirteen years in which he held this office: fuffice it to fay, that we do not remember to have often read of a man in power, whofe fole and great object was the happiness and welfare of the people.

At the death of Louis XV. the public voice called M. Turgot to the first offices of government, as a man who united the experience refulting from habits of bufinefs, to all the improvement which study can procure. After being at the head of the marine department only a fhort time, he was, August 24, 1774, appointed Comptroller General of the Finances. During his difcharge of this important office, the operations he carried on are aftonishing-He fuppreffed twenty-three kinds of duties on neceffary occupations, ufeful contracts, or merited compenfations-He abolished the corvée for the highways, faving the nation thirty millions of livres annually-He fet afide another kind of corvée, which refpected the carriage of military ftores

functions of his office. But he is the officer of government, and poffeffes its confidence. Government fees but with his eyes, and acts but by his hands. It is on the information he collects, on the memorials which he difpatches, and on the accounts he renders in, that minifters decide on every thing, and that in a country where every political power centers in adminiftration, and where a legiflation, imperfect in all its parts, compels it to unintermitted activity, and to reflection on every fubject.'

* The word corvée feems to be derived from cura viæ, i. e. the care of the roads. It fignifies the call made on individuals to furnish labour and materials in kind for the conftruction and repair of roads. The fame exifts to this day in England, under the name of ftatute duty. It is indeed with us under proper reftrictions, but in France, where there are no turnpikes, all the roads, which are very good, are made and repaired by the corvée alone; whence it becomes an intolerable burden to the labourers.

and baggage-He abated the rigour in the adminiftration of indirect impofitions, to the great profit of the contributors, the king, and the financiers-He foftened the mode of collecting the territorial impofts-He stopped the progrefs of a plague among cattle-He fuppreffed a fedition conducted with artHe provided for the equal diftribution of fubfiftence-He gave the utmost encouragement to the cultivation of the three chief productions of France, viz. wheat, cattle, and wine, and to the commerce thence refulting-He reformed a number of abuses, fome of which yielded a profit to the place he filled-He abolifhed, as much as he could, the fale of offices-He formed many useful establishments-He paid the penfions of the poorer fervants of the ftate, who were four years in arrear-He fupplied the expences of a coronation, the marriage of a princess, and the birth of a prince-He facilitated payments as far as India-He fettled a part of the colony debts, and put the reft in order-He found the public borrowing at five and a half per cent. and reduced the rate to four-He leffened the public engagements eighty-four millions-He found the revenue nineteen millions deficient, and left a furplus of three millions and a half.All these he accomplished within the fpace of twenty months, during feven of which, fevere fits of the gout totally incapacitated him from bufinefs. Such had been the operations, the labours, and the conduct of M. Turgot, when the king demanded his refignation. The courtiers were convinced that they had nothing to expect from the minifter. They forefaw that if ever he obtained the power of extending his ceconomical reform to the expences of the court, that many of their places would be annihilated. The financiers knew, that under an enlightened minifter, folely intent on fimplifying the receipt of taxes, the fources of their enormous wealth would foon be dried up. The money.dealers felt how useless they should become under a minifter who was the friend of order, and of the liberty of commerce. People of all conditions, who had contracted the habit of living at the expence of the public, without ferving it; all these men, alarmed and terrified, formed a league, powerful by its numbers, which removed this great man from an office, in the difcharge of which, the happiness of the people and the good of his country were his ultimate objects.

Reduced to a private fituation, M. Turgot did not experience. that frightful void which is the juft but dreadful punishment of ambitious men when deferted by fortune. The sciences and the belles lettres, which he had cultivated in his youth, afforded him confolation, while an active fphere of lite was denied him. Natural philofophy and chymiftry were his favourite purfuits; yet he frequently entertained himself with poetry, especially with tranflating Virgil into French verfe. We know,' fays

his biographer, but of one Latin verfe compofed by M. Turgot, and which was intended for a picture of Dr. Franklin.

Erripuit cælo fulmen, mox fceptra tyrannis.'

The attacks of the gout, under which he had long laboured, becoming more frequent and exceffive, forewarned him of the approaching moment, when in conformity to the laws of nature, he was going to fill, in a higher order of beings, the rank which thefe laws deftined for him. He died March 20, 1781.

Not having the original before us, we cannot fpeak as to the fidelity of the tranflation. The language is in general good, if we except a few Gallicifms, but as these rarely occur, they are pardonable in fo large a work. The word perfectibility, which is used more than once, is, we think, no way preferable to perfection; but as it is printed in Italics, we fuppofe the original French word to have been peculiar.

We fhall conclude, with recommending this curious and learned performance to the attention of our Readers; we are perfuaded that the liberality of the Marquis de Condorcet's fentiments, and the juftness of his remarks, cannot fail of being admired by every perfon whofe foul is not contracted by the narrow principles which defpotifm and bigotry muft neceffarily inculcate, for their own prefervation.

ART. XXIII.

The Hiftory of Mexico. Collected from Spanish and Mexican Hiftorians, from Manufcripts and ancient Paintings of the Indians. Illuftrated with Charts and Plates. By Abbé D. Francefco Saverio Clavigero. Tranflated from the original Italian, by Charles Cullen, Efq. 4to. 2 Vols. 21. 2s. Boards. Robinfons. 1787.

T

HE difcovery of America may be juftly efteemed one of the most remarkable eras of the world. The history of that difcovery is interefting and curious. The Europeans, aftonifhed at the extent and riches of the new world, were more furprised to find a rich and flourishing empire; a king on the throne of Mexico, governing, according to the moft refined principles of equity, a polifhed nation; the ufeful arts of architecture and agriculture nearly in a ftate of perfection: the fine arts of fculpture and painting made fubfervient to hiftory; feminaries of learning for each fex, properly inftituted for promoting morality as well as knowledge; in a word, an enlightened people, furnished not only with the neceffaries and the conveniences but even enjoying the luxuries of life.

The Abbé Clavigero, as we learn from the Tranflator's preface, is a native of Vera Cruz; he refided near forty years in the provinces of New Spain; acquired the language of the Mexicans, and other nations; gathered many of their traditions,

and