The latest edition of this work was nearing completion when certain completely trustworthy Frenchmen assured me that the book Développement des principes fondamentaux, etc., which I cite in Chapter 8, contains maxims that the king does not approve.

‘The authors of the book in question’, they tell me, ‘are magistrates who reduce the right of the Estates-General to that of presenting grievances and attribute to the parlements the executive power of verifying all laws, even those which are the result of a request from the Estates, which is to say they elevate the magistracy above the nation.’

I avow that I had not perceived this monstrous error in their book (and which I do not share); this error even appeared to me to be excluded by certain of its texts, quoted on pages 64 and 65 of my work, and it can be seen by my note on page 68 that the book in question can give rise to objections of quite another sort.

If, as I am assured, the authors have deviated from true principles in reference to the legitimate rights of the French nation, I am not surprised that their work, otherwise full of excellent things, has alarmed the king, for even those persons who have never had the honour of meeting him know by a great many unimpeachable witnesses that these sacred rights have no more loyal protector than himself and that nothing would offend him more than the preaching of contrary systems.