Fox of France

　　　　 left the Academy of Sciences, Lavoisier did not go home, but took a carriage, out of Paris, to a manor of the Duke of Orleans. A few days ago, he borrowed a place from the Duke to use for new scientific experiments.

　　 Maybe it’s because for a long time, His Majesty the King always failed to give birth to a son. (Queen Marie Antoinette gave birth to her first son eleven years after marrying him.) Many great nobles in the country who have close relatives with the king have produced the possibility of extinction of the king, and the crown may fall on their heads. Thoughts. The Orleans family, as the king’s close relatives, may not have had similar ideas. A few years ago, after the king underwent an operation, he finally became pregnant and gave birth to two princes in succession. But once something like ambition is produced, it is difficult to naturally extinguish. It's like Macbeth, because of the witch's prediction, he has ambitions for the crown of Scotland. Although afterwards, the old king made it clear that his crown would be given to his son, not Macbeth, but Macbeth's ambition for the crown was not extinguished, on the contrary, it became more intense. And finally drove him to take the road of killing the king. Like Macbeth, some great nobles, including the Orleans family, did not lose their ambitions because of the birth of the prince. In addition, the king’s character is weak, and the queen, although her character is much tougher, as a woman, she has not received much political education, and she is quite politically naive. This makes the nobles feel that "he can replace it."

　　 In order to be able to "replace it", the great nobles, including the Orleans family, have worked hard to demolish the king overtly and secretly during these years, so that the king can do nothing well. At the same time, they deliberately created public opinion to discredit the royal family. Of course, they will not point the finger at the king directly-it is too direct and too easy to expose their ambitions. So they all pointed to Queen Mary. Queen Mary has a strong personality, but lacks political wisdom, coupled with her love of vanity, and no conception of money, so they easily get into the trap. On the one hand, they cheated on Queen Mary, tempted her to hold various dances, and cheated millions of francs of "gifts" from her every year; on the other hand, they slandered her "extravagance" in the society and even gave her back Got the nickname "Mrs. Deficit". The recent weird necklace incident has even discredited the queen. (A female liar, after directing such a big drama in which the queen is trapped, can still escape from the heavily guarded prison. If there is any problem in this, God knows.)

Of course, the nobles are still measured. Their propaganda has always insisted on that the king is a good man, but his ears are too soft and he is too afraid of his wife, so... The treacherous minister...No, he was just led by the nose by a woman."

　　 This kind of propaganda, on the surface, seems to justify the king, but in terms of its effect, it is actually better than directly attacking the king for greed and brutality. Because a greedy and cruel king is hateful, but also terrifying; but a kind and weak "good old man" controlled by his own wife will be despised.

　　 Machiavelli believes that the most vulnerable and most easily overthrown king is not a tyrant that everyone hates, but a king generally despised by his subjects. Through this kind of propaganda, the nobles channeled people's hatred to the queen, while leaving the most terrifying thing-contempt-to the king.

　　 If Louis XVI is a male lord, no, it doesn’t even need to be a male lord, but only a tyrant. He can also use storm-like means to quell these discussions fiercely, at least to make people's contempt for him become hatred and fear. Relatively speaking, the crown of a terrifying tyrant is more secure than the crown of a despised king.

　　 However, Louis XVI was a man of weak character. Looking forward and backward, he couldn't make the determination to cut the heads of the nobles. And his retreat made the nobles including the Orleans family feel more and more that the French crown should naturally be worn on their heads.

　　 Machiavelli also pointed out in the theory of kings that the king should also give people a little favor, so that the people are grateful and look forward to themselves. Therefore, while stumbling on the king, the nobles rushed to pretend to be "friends of the people", "enlightened gentlemen", and "pioneers of democracy." In the words of the great teacher later, it was: “In order to win over the people, the nobles used the proletariat’s begging bag as a banner to wave.” Of course, the end result of the great nobles must be “whenever the people follow them. At that time, they all found their buttocks with the old feudal coat of arms, so they laughed and broke up." But at least for now, these methods can still allow the people to go behind them.

　　 In order to pretend to be "friends of the people", "enlightened gentlemen", and "pioneers of democracy", the nobles all acted like they loved science, the motherland, and the people. The more support for academic research and academic freedom, the more these nobles compete to advertise. Supporting Lavoisier's research, which has become the pride of France, is naturally what a "friend of the people", "enlightened gentleman", and "pioneer of democracy" should do.

　　His Royal Highness Prince Phillips happened to be fine, so he was waiting for Lavoisier. He was also very interested in Lavoisier's experiment, so he asked Lavoisier about his experiment.

　　 "Master, you know, I don't mean anything else, just pure curiosity. Can you tell me what experiment you are going to do here?" Duke Phillips once asked when he lent this venue.

"Oh, Joseph wrote me a letter. The letter mentioned that he used concentrated nitric acid and concentrated sulfuric acid in a special method to carefully dispose of glycerin and obtained a very powerful liquid gunpowder. Well, maybe as Joseph said, it should not be called gunpowder, but dynamite. This liquid explosive has many problems, but Joseph is now busy with mathematical things, and he doesn’t count this kind of things. He was very proficient, so he told me about this under the condition of only conducting preliminary experiments. I tried it, and indeed, as he said, this thing is very powerful. The power is at least as good as brown gunpowder. Dozens of times to more than one hundred times."

　　 "So amazing?" Duke Phillips was taken aback.

"Isn't it?" Lavoisier said, "You know, Joseph said that the power of that thing is like Zeus's thunder. He suggested that when I experiment by myself, the amount of experiment should not exceed one gram at a time. Then I will I tried it for a gram, and it really exploded. And the power was far beyond my expectation. Well, Mr. Duke, this thing is quite dangerous. It must be impossible to conduct a full test in Paris. "

　　 "Such a thing, it seems that the military should study it?" Duke Phillips said.

"Ah, your Royal Highness, you may not know that although this thing is powerful, it is really not suitable for military use, at least not suitable for military use at present." Lavoisier looked at Duke Phillips and said, "You may not know, this thing Very unstable. A little bit of vibration, or light, or a little heating, this thing will explode. Your Majesty, if it is used for military purposes, this thing is in transit, as long as the wheel of the carriage is bumped in a small pit, it will be whole. The explosives of the carriage will explode with a bang, and the power is equivalent to the explosives of more than a hundred carriages."

　　 "My God!" Duke Phillips said, "How can this thing be used if it is so dangerous?"

"Military use is not good." Lavoisier said, "This thing is not easy to transport, and often needs to be prepared on site. For military use, how can it be prepared on the battlefield? It is for civilian use, for example, for mining~www. readwn.com~ We can prepare this thing directly at the mining site and use it immediately, so it is relatively safer. Lord Duke, this thing is actually very useful. For example, mining, such as the excavation of canals, etc. In many cases, it will even bring about revolutionary changes. Moreover, the cost of the raw materials used is not high. If the preparation problem can be solved, this thing should make a lot of money. Is your Royal Highness interested?"

　　 "If the problem of preparation can be solved? My master, then, there is still a problem with the preparation of this thing?" Duke Phillips asked.

"Yes, it can only be prepared in a laboratory at the moment, and the number of preparations at one time is quite limited. If it is to be applied on a large scale, the preparation method must be changed to a certain extent. And this thing is quite dangerous even when it is prepared. For large-scale preparation, the environment is different from the laboratory, so careful research is needed,” Lavoisier explained.

　　 "Then, Mr. Lavoisier, can I participate in this study?" Duke Phillips asked.

　　 "Of course, I welcome your participation. You can also name this product in the future. In addition, you can also sign your name on the position of the author of the future paper." Lavoisier said.

The Duke laughed: "Ah, this is not okay. People will say that I shamelessly pursue my own honor that is not my own. Therefore, the position of the author of the paper must not have my name. But if you can If the paper mentions that I have provided a little help for this research, then I will be very happy."

"This is not a problem." Lavoisier laughed, "In addition, this research is dangerous. So although your Royal Highness may participate, you are still requested to keep a safe distance when performing dangerous operations. "