The only thing that was real was that an over-taxed, impoverished people was exasperated and--hungry.
Did the king need new supplies for his unimaginable luxuries, they were taxed.

Was it necessary to have new accessions to French "glory," in order to allay popular clamor or discontent, they must supply the men to fight the glorious battles, and the means with which to pay them.
Every burden fell at last upon this lowest stratum of the State; the nobility and clergy, while owning two-thirds of the land, being nearly exempt from taxation.
And yet the king and nobility of France, in love with Rousseau's theories, were airily discussing the "rights of man"-- wolves and foxes coming together to talk over the sacredness of the rights of property, or the occupants of murderers' row growing eloquent over the sanctity of human life! How incomprehensible that among those quick-witted Frenchmen there seems not one to have realized that the logical sequence of the formula, "Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity," must be, "Down with the Aristocrats!" And so the surface which Richelieu had converted into adamant grew thinner and thinner each day, until king and court danced upon a mere gilded crust, unconscious of the abysmal fires beneath.

Some of those powdered heads fell into the executioner's basket twenty-five years later.

Did they recall this time?
Did Madame du Barry think of it?
Did she exult at her triumph over de Pompadour, when she was dragged shrieking and struggling to the guillotine?
Five years before the close of this miserable reign an event occurred seemingly of small importance to Europe.

A child was born in an obscure Italian household.