Turgot had been in office only twenty months, but during that time he had prepared the way for a new era of extensive happiness and prosperity for his fellow-countrymen. A friend reproached him one day with being too precipitate. “How can you say so,” he replied, “you who know so well the pressing wants of the people, and are aware that none of my family survive the gout beyond the age of fifty.” His prediction was but too nearly fulfilled; he died of this hereditary disease a few years afterwards, March 20, 1781, in the fifty-fourth year of his age. During the interval between his retiring from office, and his death, Turgot devoted himself to literary and scientific pursuits. His works are contained in nine volumes octavo, 1808–11; they are composed principally of state papers connected with his administration, of some articles written for the Encyclopédie, and a few translations from classical and modern literature. Turgot was a great and a good man; endowed with depth and originality of thought, he discovered and acted upon sound principles of political economy, before the science had been even dignified with a name; and whilst his predecessors in office were ever seeking for temporary expedients to increase the revenue of the state by the oppression of the people, he first endeavoured to unite the interests of both. Mild and conciliating in his manners, just and benevolent in all his view’s, he was the firm and uncompromising opponent of every species of injustice. He was ambitious, but his ambition was of the highest order. He despised the tinsel grandeur of office, the smiles of courtiers, or even the applause of the multitude; but he courted the means of doing good to mankind, and his reward has been the esteem of discerning friends and the applause of a later and a more enlightened age. A disquisition on the life and opinions of Turgot, by Dupont de Nemours, is prefixed to the edition of his works which we have already mentioned. His life, written by Condorcet, is one of the best specimens of biography in any language. Lacretelle’s ‘Histoire du dix-huitième Siècle’ contains a short sketch of his ministry, well deserving attention: and several interesting details of his character are to be found in the Memoirs of the Abbé Morellet. [Illustration: _Engraved by W. Holl._ PETER THE GREAT. _From a Print by Smith after a Picture by Kneller._ Under the Superintendance of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge. _London, Published by Charles Knight, Pall Mall East._ ] [Illustration] PETER THE GREAT.