His great merit as a minister consisted in developing the
industrial resources of France and providing the King with money.

Colbert was the father of French commerce, and the creator of the French
navy. He saw that Flanders was enriched by industry, and England and
Holland made powerful by a navy, while Spain and Portugal languished and
declined with all their mines of gold and silver. So he built ships of
war, and made harbors for them, gave charters to East and West India
Companies, planted colonies in India and America, decreed tariffs to
protect infant manufactures, gave bounties to all kinds of artisans,
encouraged manufacturing industry, and declared war on the whole brood
of aristocratic peculators that absorbed the revenues of the kingdom. He
established a better system of accounts, compelled all officers to
reside at their posts, and reduced the percentage of the collection of
the public money. In thirteen years he increased the navy from thirty
ships to two hundred and seventy-three, one hundred of which were ships
of the line. He prepared a new code of maritime law for the government
of the navy, which called out universal admiration. He dug the canal of
Languedoc, which united the Mediterranean with the Atlantic Ocean. He
instituted the Academies of Sciences, of Inscriptions, of Belles
Lettres, of Painting, of Sculpture, of Architecture; and founded the
School of Oriental languages, the Observatory, and the School of Law. He
gave pensions to Corneille, Racine, Moliere, and other men of genius. He
rewarded artists and invited scholars to France; he repaired roads,
built bridges, and directed the attention of the middle classes to the
accumulation of capital. "He recognized the connection of works of
industry with the development of genius. He saw the influence of science
in the production of riches; of taste on industry; and the fine arts on
manual labor." For all these enlightened measures the King had the
credit and the glory; and it certainly redounds to his sagacity that he
accepted such wise suggestions, although he mistook them for his own. So
to the eyes of Europe Louis at once loomed up as an enlightened monarch;
and it would be difficult to rob him of this glory. He indorsed the
economical reforms of his great minister, and rewarded merit in all
departments, which he was not slow to see. The world extolled this
enlightened and fortunate young prince, and saw in him a second Solomon,
both for wisdom a