ABSTRACT
In a pre-scientific society the fundamental causes of debilitating poverty are to be looked for in the condition of agriculture. For most of Louis XIV’s subjects life was hazardous, for many a continuous struggle for the bare necessities of life. Louis XIV’s intendants and their subdelegues might then move to assume control of the village’s finance and oversee assemblies, using its leading men, who had most to lose and were most amenable to pressure. Louis XIV’s devot minister Pontchartrain spent large sums on hospitals, churches and schools, beside food and clothing for the destitute on the large estates from which he took his title. The general diffusion of capital obstructed growth while it gave stability to an economy, in which the supply of labour always exceeded demand, and to a political régime which did not make excessive demands.
