ABSTRACT
The French Revolution initiated a new era in business management. The spirit of enterprise was much more developed; newly arrived men easily succeeded in contracting great financial operations. Many writers have noted the odd enterprises financiers undertook during the crisis of 1825. All the socialist literature before 1848 speaks continually of financial and industrial feudalism; this formula surprises contemporary writers who have up-to-date information on the history of institutions and who do not see a great analogy between the origins of feudalism and capitalism. The finance aristocracy created by the regime in many respects resembled the aristocratic nobility of the past: the routine, the stubbornness, the pride of nouveaux riches are no less than those of their predecessors. Many financiers are so aware of their incapacity that they are unable to decide whether to complete an agreement and prefer to buy when adventurers have already put it into practice.
