《旧制度与大革命·卷二·第十二章·何以十八世纪法国农民处境反不如十三世纪》第11节
It was more especially in times of scarcity that the relaxation or total interruption of the ties of patronage and dependence, which formerly connected the great rural proprietors and the peasantry, was manifest. At such critical times the Central Government, alarmed by its own isolation and weakness, sought to revive for the nonce the personal influences or the political associations which the Government itself had destroyed; they were summoned to its aid, but they were summoned in vain, and the State was astonished to find that those persons were defunct whom it had itself deprived of life. In this extremity some of the Intendants--Turgot, for instance--in the poorest provinces, issued illegal ordinances to compel the rich landowners to feed their tenants till the next harvest. I have found, under the date of 1770, letters from several parish priests, who propose to the Intendants to tax the great landowners, both clerical and lay, ‘who possess vast estates which they do not inhabit, and from which they draw large revenues to be spent elsewhere.’ At all times the villages were infested with beggars; for, as Letronne observes, the poor were relieved in the towns, but in the country, during the winter, mendicity was their only resource. Occasionally these poor wretches were treated with great violence. In 1767 the Duc de Choiseul, then Minister, resolved suddenly to suppress mendicity in France. The correspondence of the Intendants still shows with what rigour his measures were taken. The patrol was ordered at once to take up all the beggars found in the kingdom; it is said that more than 50,000 of them were seized. Able-bodied vagabonds were to be sent to the galleys; as for the rest, more than forty workhouses were opened to receive them. It would have been more to the purpose to have opened the hearts of the rich. This Government of the ancient French monarchy, which was, as I have said, so mild, and sometimes so timid, so full of formalities, of delays, and of scruples, when it had to do with those who were placed above the common people, was always harsh and always prompt in proceeding against the lower orders, especially against the peasantry. Amongst the records which I have examined, I have not seen one relating to the arrest of a man of the middle class by order of the Intendant; but the peasants were arrested continually, some for forced labour, some for begging, some for the militia, some by the police or for a hundred other causes. The former class enjoyed independent courts of justice, long trials, and a public procedure; the latter fell under the control of the provost-marshal, summarily and without appeal.
注释摘要
托克维尔在这一段里抛出了一个极具讽刺意味的结构性矛盾。旧制度下中央集权持续推进，王室通过总督和行政官僚一点一点抽空了地方领主对乡村的实际治理权，原来那种由领主承担义务、提供保护和救助的主从纽带早已名存实亡。可是一旦发生饥荒，社会骤然面临生存危机，中央政府才发现自己虽然手握着庞大的行政机器，却根本无法独自兜底那些散落在广袤农村里的饥饿人口。这时王室急急忙忙想…