In his public life, d'Argenson is distinguished rather for what he might have done than for anything he did. In 1745 he was, as it has been necessary to show, in no sense responsible for the policy of France; while throughout the year 1746 his position was being undermined in all directions. There was, however, at least one transaction for which his responsibility is clear and undivided. His conduct of the Negotiation of Turin displays in brief the character of the man, and the peculiar qualities of his statesmanship. It reveals one capital defect, the defect of one who has been long accustomed to look upon the world through his own eyes. He made a fatal mistake in attributing his own motives to the Sardinian Government, and in imagining that it would consent for a national ideal to hazard its present and material interests. He did not see that in offering the King of Sardinia the hegemony of the Italian states, he was inviting him to accept the desperate part which had been played by Frederick in Silesia; and that, though the reward would indeed be brilliant, it was far too distant and uncertain to be readily sought by the Government of Turin. The defect, grave as it was, proceeded chiefly from lack of the experience, which a man like d'Argenson can only gain through the terrible bitterness of a first disappointment. We have only to consider the incident further to see that no man ever compassed disaster with so many of the qualities which make for success. The scheme was distinguished by grandeur of conception, and in pursuing it the author gave proof of decision and intrepidity. Incidentally he achieved one triumph of which any statesman might be proud. His dealings with Spain were a monument of reasoned daring and determination; and the acceptance of the Treaty of Turin by Elisabeth Farnese is the most striking tribute that could have been paid to d'Argenson's political capacity. It is true that he was carried away by an enthusiasm which a longer experience would certainly have chastened; and that he courted disaster by endeavouring to accomplish in three weeks the work of thirty, or a hundred and thirty, years. Yet his callow temerity was not ignoble; and French diplomacy can boast of few more honourable failures. France owes to d'Argenson one lasting debt. He strove, as gallantly as ever man could, to arrest the disintegration of French policy. His determination to adhere to the anti-Austrian tradition embroiled him with his colleagues in the Ministry, and became the occasion of his fall; while it has been made the principal ground of impeachment by certain writers of his own country. He is charged with having sacrificed the substantial interests of France to his blind prejudice in favour of Prussia; and with having refused to recognise the new problems created by the decline of the Austrian House. Such criticism must not pass unchallenged.