But on this preliminary
question the parties are so irreconcilable, that it is impossible to
foresee what issue it will have. The _Tiers-Etat_, as constituting the
nation, may propose to do the business of the nation, either with or
without the minorities in the Houses of Clergy and Nobles, which side
with them. In that case, if the King should agree to it, the majorities
in those two Houses would secede, and might resist the tax-gatherers.
This would bring on a civil war. On the other hand, the privileged
orders, offering to submit to equal taxation, may propose to the King
to continue the government in its former train, resuming to himself
the power of taxation. Here, the tax-gatherers might be resisted by
the people. In fine, it is but too possible, that between parties so
animated, the King may incline the balance as he pleases. Happy that he
is an honest, unambitious man, who desires neither money nor power for
himself; and that his most operative minister, though he has appeared to
trim a little, is still, in the main, a friend to public liberty.
I mentioned to you in a former letter, the construction which
our bankers at Amsterdam had put on the resolution of Congress,
appropriating the last Dutch loan, by which the money for our captives
would not be furnished till the end of the year 1790.
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