Editing François Quesnay (section)

== Life ==
Quesnay was born at [[Méré, Yvelines|Méré]] near [[Versailles (commune)|Versailles]], the son of an advocate and small landed proprietor. [[Apprenticeship|Apprenticed]] at the age of sixteen to a surgeon, he soon went to Paris, studied medicine and surgery there, and, having qualified as a master-surgeon, settled down to practice at [[Mantes]]. In 1737 he was appointed perpetual secretary of the academy of surgery founded by [[François Gigot de la Peyronie]], and became surgeon in ordinary to [[Louis XV of France|King Louis XV]]. In 1744 he graduated as a doctor of medicine; he became the physician in ordinary to the king, and afterwards his first consulting physician, and was installed in the [[Palace of Versailles]]. His apartments were on the ''entresol'', whence the Réunions de l'entresol{{Clarify|date=September 2010}} received their name. Louis XV esteemed Quesnay highly, and used to call him his thinker. When he ennobled him he gave him for arms three flowers of the [[pansy#Name origin and significance|pansy]]<ref name=EB1911 /> (derived from ''pensée'', in French meaning ''thought''), with the [[Latin]] [[motto]] ''Propter cogitationem mentis''.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.taieb.net/auteurs/Quesnay/albon.html |title=Nouvelles Ephemerides, Économiques, Seconde Partie, Analyses, Et Critiques Raisonnées. N° Premier. Éloge Historique De M. Quesnay, Contenant L'Analyse De Ses Ouvrages, Par M. Le Cte D'A*** |publisher=Taieb.net |access-date=16 August 2012}}</ref>

He now devoted himself principally to [[economics|economic studies]], taking no part in the court intrigues which were perpetually going on around him. Around 1750 he became acquainted with [[Jacques Claude Marie Vincent de Gournay|Jacques C. M. V. de Gournay]] (1712–1759), who was also an earnest inquirer in the economic field; and round these two distinguished men was gradually formed the philosophic sect of the Économistes, or, as for distinction's sake they were afterwards called, the Physiocrates. The most remarkable men in this group of disciples were the elder [[Victor de Riqueti, marquis de Mirabeau|Mirabeau]] (author of ''L'Ami des hommes'', 1756–60, and ''Philosophie rurale'', 1763), [[Nicolas Baudeau]] (''Introduction a la philosophie économique'', 1771), [[Guillaume-François Le Trosne]] (''De l'ordre social'', 1777), [[André Morellet]] (best known by his controversy with [[Ferdinando Galiani|Galiani]] on the freedom of the [[grain trade]] during the [[Flour War]]), [[Pierre-Paul Lemercier de La Rivière de Saint-Médard|Lemercier de La Rivière]], and [[Pierre Samuel du Pont de Nemours|du Pont de Nemours]]. [[Adam Smith]], during his stay on the continent with the young [[Henry Scott, 3rd Duke of Buccleuch|Duke of Buccleuch]] in 1764–1766, spent some time in Paris, where he made the acquaintance of Quesnay and some of his followers; he paid a high tribute to their scientific services in his ''Wealth of Nations''.<ref name=Smith>Smith, Adam, 1937, The Wealth of Nations, N. Y.: Random House, p. 643; first published 1776.</ref><ref name=EB1911 />

In 1717, Quesnay married Jeanne-Cathérine Dauphin,<ref>{{Cite book |last=Murphy |first=Antoin E. |title=The Genesis of Macroeconomics: New Ideas from Sir William Petty to Henry Thornton |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2009 |isbn=9780199543229 |pages=120}}</ref> and had a son and a daughter; his grandson by the former was a member of the first Legislative Assembly. He died on 16 December 1774, having lived long enough to see his great pupil, [[Anne Robert Jacques Turgot, Baron de Laune]], in office as minister of finance.<ref name=EB1911 />