Two very instructive facts may be mentioned in connection with the suppression of the _corvees_ in the Limousin. The first is that the central government assented to the changes proposed by the young Intendant, as promptly as if it had been a committee of the Convention, instead of being the nominee of an absolute king. The other is that the people in the country, when Turgot had his plans laid before them in their parish meetings held after mass on Sundays, listened with the keenest distrust and suspicion to what they insisted on regarding as a sinister design for exacting more money from them. Well might Condorcet say that very often it needs little courage to do men harm, for they constantly suffer harm tranquilly enough; but when you take it into your head to do them some service, then they revolt and accuse you of being an innovator. It is fair, however, to remember how many good grounds the French countryman had for distrusting the professions of any agent of the government. For even in the case of this very reform, though Turgot was able to make an addition to the _taille_ in commutation of the work on the roads, he was not able to force a contribution, either to the _taille_ or any other impost, from the privileged classes, the very persons who were best able to pay. This is only an illustration of what is now a well-known fact, that revolution was made necessary less by despotism than by privilege on the one side, and by intense political distrust on the other side.