Such was the principle under the ancient regime, in spite of grave abuses, and under forced exactions.

When the ecclesiastical commission suppressed an ecclesiastical order, it was not for the purpose of making its possessions over to the public treasury, but to apply these to seminaries, schools, and hospitals.

In 1789, the revenues of Saint-Denis supported Saint-Cyr; those of Saint Germain went to the Economats, and the Government, although absolute and needy, was sufficiently honest to adjust that confiscation was robbery.

The greater our power, the greater the obligation to be just, and honesty always proves in the end to be the best policy .-- It is, therefore, both just and useful that the Church, as in England and in America, that superior education, as in England and in Germany, that special instruction, as in America, and that diverse endowments for public assistance and utility, should be unreservedly secured in the maintenance of their heritage.

The State, as testamentary executor of this inheritance, strangely abuses its mandate when it pockets the bequest in order to choke the deficit of its own treasury, risking it in bad speculations, and swallowing it up in its own bankruptcy, until of this vast treasure, which has been heaped up for generations for the benefit of children, the infirm, the sick and the poor, not enough is left to pay the salary of a school-mistress, the wages of a parish nurse, or for a bowl of broth in a hospital.[2248] The Assembly remains deaf to all these arguments, and that which makes its refuse to listen is not financial distress .-- The Archbishop of Aix, M.de Boisjelin, offered, in the name of the clergy, to liquidate at once the debt of three hundred millions, which was urgent, by a mortgage-loan of four hundred millions on the ecclesiastical property, which was a very good expedient; for at this time the credit of the clergy is the only substantial one.