Transcriber’s Note
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JOHN LAW OF LAURISTON
JOHN LAW OF LAURISTON.
From a portrait in the National Portrait Gallery, London.
John Law of Lauriston
Financier and Statesman
FOUNDER OF THE BANK OF FRANCE, ORIGINATOR OF THE
MISSISSIPPI SCHEME, ETC.
By A. W. WISTON-GLYNN, M.A.
EDINBURGH
E. SAUNDERS & Co., 52 NORTH BRIDGE STREET
Also at London and Dublin
Inscribed
to
My Wife.
vii
PREFACE
The career of John Law is one of the most strikingand romantic in a period teeming with greatand historic personages, and provides in the annalsof the early part of the 18th century a chapterdealing with a series of exciting events which, intheir character, their intensity, and their influenceupon the French people, were almost revolutionary.As a financial genius he was incomparablythe greatest man of his age. His schemes,original in their conception, and vast in theiroperation, captivated by their brilliance a nationalready on the brink of ruin, and eager to embraceany possible means by which it might rehabilitateits shattered fortunes. His gigantic joint-stockundertakings, his sweeping financial proposalsculminating in the discharge of the whole NationalDebt of France, his gradual increase of powerand influence, and latterly his virtual control ofthe government of France, made him a man ofinternational importance—a man to be respected,flattered, and feared.
It is, accordingly, a somewhat striking circumstancethat, with the exception of the short accountof Law’s career by John Philip Wood issued solong ago as 1824, no adequate biography of thegreat financier has yet appeared in this country.While essays, and critical articles have, no doubt,appeared in abundance in numerous publications,viiiand while his phenomenal career has even beenpressed into the service of fictional literature, ithas only been possible to obtain a comprehensiveimpression of the man and his work by referenceto the numerous treatises dealing with his systempublished in France during the 18th century, to thevoluminous memoirs of the time, and last but notleast to the state and official documents in whichhis various schemes are considered. In preparingthe following pages, therefore, it has been necessaryto deal with a considerable mass of unsiftedmaterial, no small portion of which seems to havebeen neglected by previous writers, althoughvaluable and requisite for forming a just and impartialestimate.
Amongst the authorities to which I have beenmost indebted for guidanc