ough he hid his hopes, so
as to spare her the tortures of uncertainty. The man was firmly resolved
to make his way in the administration by bringing a strong light to bear
upon it. He intended to bring about one of those revolutions which send
a man to the head of either one party or another in society; but being
incapable of so doing in his own interests, he merely pondered useful
thoughts and dreamed of triumphs won for his country by noble means. His
ideas were both generous and ambitious; few officials have not
conceived the like; but among officials as among artists there are more
miscarriages than births; which is tantamount to Buffon's saying that
"Genius is patience."

Placed in a position where he could study French administration and
observe its mechanism, Rabourdin worked in the circle where his thought
revolved, which, we may remark parenthetically, is the secret of much
human accomplishment; and his labor culminated finally in the invention
of a new system for the Civil Service of government. Knowing the people
with whom he had to do, he maintained the machine as it then worked, so
it still works and will continue to work; for everybody fears to remodel
it, though no one, according to Rabourdin, ought to be unwilling to
simplify it. In his opinion, the problem to be resolved lay in a better
use of the same forces. His plan, in its simplest form, was to revise
taxation and lower it in a way that should not diminish the revenues of
the State, and to obtain, from a budget equal to the budgets which now
excite such rabid discussion, results that should be two-fold greater
than the present results. Long practical experience had taught Rabourdin
that perfection is brought about in all things by changes in the
direction of simplicity. To economize is to simplify. To simplify
means to suppress unnecessary machinery; removals naturally follow.
His system, therefore, depended on the weeding out of officials and the
establishment of a new order of administrative offices. No doubt the
hatred which all reformers incur takes its rise here. Removals required
by this perfecting process, always ill-understood, threaten the
well-being of those on whom a change in their condition is thus forced.
What rendered Rabourdin really great was that he was able to restrain
the enthusiasm that possesses all reformers, and to patiently seek out a
slow evolving medium for all changes so as to avoid shocks, leaving time
and experience to