For she was entirely impressed with the idea that no person or body could have any right to call in question the king's disposal of the national revenue; and that there was no prerogative of the crown of which the exercise was more becoming to the royal dignity than that of granting pensions or creating sinecures with no limitations but such as might be imposed by his own will or discretion.

And on this point her husband fully shared her feelings.
"What," said he, on one occasion to Turgot, who was urging him to refuse an utterly unwarrantable application for a pension.

"What are a thousand crowns a year ?" "Sire," replied the minister, "they are the taxation of a village." The king acquiesced for the moment, but probably not without some secret wincing at the control to which he seemed to be subjected; and we may, perhaps, suppose that even the queen's disapproval of the minister would have been less effectual had it not been re-enforced by the king's own feelings.
In fact, that the part which she took against the great minister was the fruit of mere inconsiderateness and ignorance of the feelings and necessities of the nation, and that, if she had known the depth of the people's distress, and the degree in which it was caused by the viciousness of the whole existing system of government, she would gladly have promoted every measure which could tend to their relief, we may find abundant proof in a letter which she had written to her mother, a few weeks earlier.

Maria Teresa had spoken with some harshness of the French fickleness.

Marie Antoinette replies:[7] "You are quite right in all you say about French levity, but I am truly grieved that on that account you should conceive an aversion for the nation.