more precious homage when she wrote to him:  “We were united in our youth in every honorable way; let us be more than ever united now when ripe age, which diminishes the vivacity of impressions, augments the force of habit, and let us be more than ever necessary to one another when we live no longer save in the past and in the future, for, as regards myself, I, in anticipation, lay no store by the approbation of the circles which will surround us in our old age, and I desire nothing among posterity but a tomb to which I may precede M. Necker, and on which you will write the epitaph.  Such resting-place will be dearer to me than that among the poplars which cover the ashes of Rousseau.”

It was desirable to show what sort of society, cultivated and virtuous, lively and serious, all in one, the new minister whom Louis XVI. had just called to his side had managed to get about him.  Though friendly with the philosophers, he did not belong to them, and his wife’s piety frequently irked them.  “The conversation was a little constrained through the strictness of Madame Necker,” says Abbe Morellet; “many subjects could not be touched upon in her presence, and she was particularly hurt by freedom in religious opinions.”  Practical acquaintance with business had put M. Necker on his guard against the chimerical theories of the economists.  Rousseau had exercised more influence over his mind; the philosopher’s wrath against civilization seemed to have spread to the banker, when the latter wrote in his Traite sur le commerce des grains, “One would say that a small number of men, after dividing the land between them, had made laws of union and security against the multitude, just as they would have made for themselves shelters in the woods against the wild beasts.  What concern of ours are your laws of property? the most numerous class of citizens might say:  we possess nothing.  Your laws of right and wrong?  We have nothing to defend.  Your laws of liberty?  If we do not work to-morrow, we shall die.”

Public opinion was favorable to M. Necker, his promotion was well received; it presented, however, great difficulties:  he had been a banker, and hitherto the comptrollers-general had all belonged to the class of magistrates or superintendents; he was a Protestant, and, as such, could not hold any office.  The clergy were in commotion; they tried certain remonstrances.  “We will give him up to you,” said M. de Maurepas, “if you undertake to pay the debts of the state.”  The opposition of the church, however, closed to the new minister an important opening; at first director of the treasury, then director-general of finance, M. Necker never received the title of comptroller-general, and was not admitted to the council.  From the outset, with a disinterestedness not devoid of ostentation, he had declined the salary attached to his functions.  The courtiers looked at one another in astonishment.  It is easy to see that he is a foreigner, a republican, and a Protestant,” people said.  M. de Maurepas laughed.  “M.  Necker,” he declared, “is a maker of gold; he has introduced the philosopher’s stone into the kingdom.”