Appointed to govern, an aristocracy frees itself from the land when it no longer rules.
It ceases to rule the moment when, through increasing and constant encroachments, almost the entire justiciary, the entire administration, the entire police, each detail of the local or general government, the power of initiating, of collaboration, of control regarding taxation, elections, roads, public works and charities, passes over into the hands of the intendant or of the sub-delegate, under the supreme direction of the comptroller-general or of the king's council.[1329] Civil servants, men "of the robe and the quill," colorless commoners, perform the administrative work; there is no way to prevent it.

Even with the king's delegates, a provincial governor, were he hereditary, a prince of the blood, like the Condes in Burgundy, must efface himself before the intendant; he holds no effective office; his public duties consist of showing off and providing entertainment.

Besides he would badly perform any others.

The administrative machine, with its thousands of hard, creaking and dirty wheels, as Richelieu and Louis XIV, fashioned it, can work only in the hands of workmen who may be dismissed at any time therefore unscrupulous and prompt to give way to the judgment of the State.

It is impossible to allow oneself to get mixed up with rogues of that description.