Moral Efficacy Of Capital Punishment.
Considered generally, and in its moral efficacy, capital
punishment, like all other punishments, has a double
effect--inspiring aversion to crime, and fear of chastisement.
The two ideas--crime and chastisement--are associated in the
mind of man. When crime is seen, punishment is expected; when
punishment is seen, crime is presumed. Founded upon this natural
fact, legislation proposes in punishing not only to terrify, but
also to maintain and fortify in all minds the conviction of the
perversity of the acts it punishes; and it is thus it would
dissuade the people from crime, and make that punishment an
example.
I even think that punishments are still more exemplary by the
moral impression they make, than by the terror they inspire. The
laws have more force in the consciences of men than in their
fears. The public reprobation and shame attached to certain acts
have more power in deterring, than the chastisement which may
follow. Those who are acquainted with human nature will agree
with me in this; and let those who doubt only suppose the moral
stigma removed from actions reckoned criminal by our code, and
then inquire whether all the skill of the police, and all the
rigour of power, could suffice for their prevention. Fear, no
doubt, has its part in the moral efficacy of punishments; but we
should not exaggerate the power of this agent, or forget the more
energetic one which works to the same result.
It has been said that the moral antipathy inspired by crime is
not increased by the severity of the punishment. It is true that
if the punishment appears excessive, if it revolts more than
conciliates the moral sentiments, if it changes the horror of the
crime into pity for the criminal, it loses its desired effect. It
is not true, however, that fear alone arises from severe
punishments, and that they do not move the conscience still more
strongly: all this varies according to the times, ideas, and
manners: the punishment which formerly spoke loudly against the
crime might now speak only in favour of the criminal. Moreover,
even in the midst of the mildest manners, pity never so
exclusively possesses the heart of man that, while beholding a
great punishment merited by a great crime, he suddenly forgets
the crime, to think only of the sufferings of the criminal. Pity
has its sentiment of justice; and when this justice is not
offended, the gravity of the punishment exercises its power alike
over the conscience and the fear. I do not dispute that capital
punishment has this double virtue.
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Neither do I believe that it now acts only by fear, or that it
is, besides, so contrary to our manners that it fails as entirely
in its end as would do the punishment of the wheel. I think even
that, become rarer, its effect upon the imagination may have
increased with the importance which a man's life takes in the
public mind. But even as simple capital punishment preserves its
moral efficacy, and as slow and cruel punishments have lost
theirs, in like manner are introduced or developed such
differences in crimes, that the same punishment does not possess
the same efficacy in all.
Why does capital punishment, when applied to private crimes, such
as murder, robbery, incendiarism, &c. never fail to produce this
chief effect, the end of all punishments, which consists in
increasing the aversion these crimes inspire? It is because it
finds this aversion in all hearts, or at least because there is
no dispute as to the natural criminality of the acts which it
punishes. Two facts are certain--that the action made criminal by
law has really taken place, and that it is really criminal. The
public, power, even the accused, agree upon this. There is no
question but to discover the author of an act of which no one
contests the reality or the wickedness. Thus the first condition
of the moral efficacy of punishment is in some sort fulfilled
beforehand; it is a proved fact, which calls for chastisement,
and the chastisement addresses itself to men who think in unison
with the law.
In political crimes, on the contrary, these two circumstances are
uncertain: it is not certain that the acts of the accused are
really these which the law incriminates, nor that the acts
incriminated by the law arc naturally and invariably criminal.
The first uncertainty is evident: no one in the present day is
ignorant that in the case of private offences it is the criminal
alone who is sought out, the offence being certain; while in a
political matter, such as conspiracies, offences of the press,
&c. it is almost always necessary to discover in a series of
actions more or less significant both the offence and the
offender. As to the second uncertainty, let it not be said that
in affirming that, it also exists, I wish to enervate the laws,
and leave public order without a safeguard. I affirm only that
the immorality of political crimes is neither so clear nor so
immutable as that of private crimes; it is constantly
metamorphosed or obscured by the vicissitudes of human affairs;
it varies according to times, events, and the rights and merits
of power; it totters every moment under the blows of a force
which pretends to fashion it according to its caprices or its
necessities. It would be difficult to find in the political world
a meritorious and innocent act which has not received, in some
corner of the world or of time, a legal incrimination. Who shall
say that all these laws were in the right? Who affirm that they
have always carried into the minds of the people the conviction
of their justice, and inspired, together with fear of the
punishment, horror of the crime?
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Who will now become the absolute defender of passive obedience,
and construe the rights of society as subordinate to the written
law, whatever be the character of power? Such an attempt would be
vain. In things so changeable and complicated, true morality does
not allow itself to be thus absolutely fixed and imprisoned for
ever in the text of the laws; and Providence, which so often
delivers up to force the destiny of men, does not permit it thus
to make and unmake crime and virtue at its pleasure. 'Do you not
know,' said the president of the revolutionary tribunal to M.
Engrand d'Alleray, 'the law which forbids the sending of money to
emigrants?' 'Yes,' replied the old man, 'but I know of an older
law which commands me to support my children.' This, which was
true in 1793, will be so always, in spite of all codes, and in
the face of all kinds of power. Doubtless there are real and
odious political crimes; but those that are made by the laws are
not always so, whatever the laws or times may be. Force exercises
an immense empire over the weak mind of man; but it is not given
to it to deprave it to this degree, that crimes of its own
fashioning excite the instinctive antipathy attached to crimes
declared as such by the true law. Tyranny apart, and even in
tolerably regular times, there frequently rests upon actions of
this kind a great moral uncertainty. When they raise in the
public a violent animosity, it is perhaps because the public is
passionate, and itself inclined to injustice; and when it is
always incredulous, and secretly given to excuse them, it is
because power displeases the public. Which is right, and which
wrong? Force may prevent people from knowing, or at least from
speaking, but in almost every case capital punishment in
political crimes fails to produce, either surely or generally,
the really moral impression which accompanies it in private
crimes.
An analogous difference exists between these two classes of
crimes as to the effect of the fear sought to be inspired by
capital punishment. The robber and the murderer are isolated in
society, or at least their friends, protectors, or accomplices
are only robbers or murderers like themselves. This they know;
and when punishment overtakes them, it is not power alone, but
the whole of society, which arms itself against them. With
society they were at war, and it has conquered. This victory
gives the idea of an immense force directed against individuals,
who can only oppose to it their courage or address. They will
never have better fortune; never will a portion of the public
embrace their cause; never will a day of triumph or vengeance
dawn for them. They live in the midst of society like wild beasts
in a country crowded by man, finding everywhere snares or
enemies; without support, without shelter, and without other
force than their personal strength, which every one attacks, and
living in a fear which every one increases; and every
condemnation, every execution of their brethren which takes
place, is to them a solemn proof of the weakness of their
position, and a warning of the fate which awaits them.
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But the enemies of a government, men inclined to conspire, or who
do actually conspire, are in a very different position: they do
not cease to belong to society, and they are attached to some
party, to whose assistance and protection they look. This party
may not wish what they wish, and may not believe what they
believe; but what of that? They merely exaggerate its power, and
misapprehend its intentions. In the meantime they live surrounded
by men whose desires assimilate with their own, and whose
illusions respond to their confidence. Who does not know what
prodigious blindness possesses political factions, and with what
mad certainty each reckons upon its strength and success? In each
passer-by, under each roof from which the smoke rises, the robber
sees an enemy; while the conspirator dreams everywhere of allies,
and is confident of obtaining everywhere at least a temporary
protection. And besides, if the latter is in danger, defenders
will not fail him; his offence will be considered doubtful, and
power unjust and violent; a thousand kind sentiments, a thousand
wise reasons, will lend their support to designs which are
disapproved of, and to conduct which is blamed, but which men
cannot, and will not, allow to be suppressed by iniquity.
Finally, if the man falls, it will not be in this isolation, in
the midst of this universal animadversion, which freezes the most
audacious courage. Perhaps in a future day he will be avenged;
and in this expectation his friends regard his ruin as a blow
from which the strength they possess, with the aid of a little
more good fortune or prudence, may henceforth preserve them.
It is not possible to intimidate a faction like a band of
robbers: in order to give in such cases the moral efficacy to
capital punishment which it derives from fear, and which in a
matter of private crime a single execution suffices to obtain, it
would be necessary to go almost so far as to render its efficacy
likewise physical; and we have seen that this has obstacles still
more formidable, and dangers still more serious. There is, then,
no analogy of this kind between private and political crimes,
which are separated by profound differences. The question is not
to examine the moral efficacy of capital punishment in general;
because, whether it addresses itself to the conscience or fear,
it will not produce the same effect in conspiracies as in
robberies. It is necessary to confine ourselves exclusively to
the former class of offences, in order to appreciate its
influence. There, as in other cases, it proposes for itself the
double end which every punishment aims at: it would prevent the
evil, in making the crime detestable and the chastisement
terrible.
{272}
I have just said that political crimes are of such a description
that their moral perversity is more doubtful, more variable, and
less generally recognised than that of private crimes; the
punishment, therefore, whatever it may be, has a work here to
perform which is spared it elsewhere. When some act of the kind
is proclaimed to be criminal, men are not found, as in the case
of murder or robbery, decided upon its character. Convictions
must be changed, and a struggle entered into not only against
passions, but against ideas; and as the question is to act upon
those very men who would be inclined to commit what is thus
proscribed, the difficulty becomes immense. In the present state
of manners, the destitute, the vagabond, or the depraved,
whatever be the unhappiness of their situation, or the vice of
their inclinations, never believe that they are morally permitted
to rob. Everything inculcates the interdict, and recalls it to
them when they forget it; and the law finds very rarely, even in
them, a belief directly opposed to right. Men carried to
political offences, on the contrary, are enemies alike to the
convictions and commands of the law; for the law affirms the
established order to be good, while they think it bad; its
continuance necessary, while they desire its fall; its existence
sacred, while they demand its overthrow. No point of contact
exists between these men and the law which addresses them; no
common principle unites them; and to obtain obedience otherwise
than through fear, the law must begin by making them believe it.
Before obtaining this chief and powerful efficacy, which consists
in fortifying the natural antipathy to crime, punishments are
here encountered by an unaccustomed obstacle. They have not, in
general, to do with beliefs; they are themselves a sanction to
public belief, acting upon men who have transgressed while
believing. How can the sanction of a principle produce its effect
in a case where the principle does not exist! It may prove the
strength of an enemy, but not the justice of its cause. Great
questions recur everywhere. If Providence had imposed on human
actions no other curb than fear of consequences--if men entirely
abandoned to the counsel of their interest or the voice of their
desires, were without those convictions which introduce order
into the tumult of passion, and light into the uncertainties of
life--chaos would soon invade the world, and the only means of
maintaining order would be the sudden abasement of our nature by
the absolute loss of its liberty. But man, by his moral
convictions, binds and adapts himself to the will of Providence:
he is in direct communication with it, comprehends the language
of its laws, admits its principles, and submits himself to them
freely; and notwithstanding the struggles which agitate him,
notwithstanding his constant errors, there is no need of force to
substitute slavery for obedience.
{273}
What man would be in his relations with Providence if his moral
principles were to fail him, men inclined to political offences
pretty nearly are in their relations with power. They do not
believe what it believes; they have no wish for what it wishes;
they contest with it even the legitimacy of its existence. How
must power act upon them? It has sense enough to understand that
force alone will not suffice, that it has never had enough of
this to exterminate or imprison any considerable portion of the
society it governs. It must change its dispositions, and
re-establish between it and them this community, if not of
intentions, at least of beliefs, which gives law its true empire,
arming it with the power to prevent a hundred crimes by punishing
a single one, and raising its administrators to the rank of
teachers of the people, whereas formerly they tried in vain to
remain their jailers.
Of all the means which power employs for attaining this end,
punishments assuredly are the least efficacious. Punishment
supposes crime, and if the supposition is not admitted, the moral
efficacy of the former disappears. When the man on whom the
punishment is inflicted, and those who think with him, judge that
he is unjustly smitten, in this case punishment has the effect of
injustice: it irritates, confirms the hostile opinion, widens the
breach between the law and its transgressors, and thus goes
directly against a part of its own purpose. But if, on the
contrary, the enemies of power admit that it is right in
punishing them, if they see that it employs its force against
them with reason, they can only have taken the part of
considering themselves in a state of war. From that moment every
social tie is broken; the question is no longer of laws or
chastisements; plots are ambuscades, and punishments defeats.
Government has lost its moral position: it has descended to an
equality of force; everything is equal between it and its
enemies: as it has the right of self-defence, they have the right
of attack: the claim of obedience on one side, and justice on the
other, are equally false. All this belongs to society, but
society is dissolved: there is nothing now but war, with the
liberty of its arms, the continuity of its dangers, and the
uncertainty of its results.
Of all punishments, capital punishment is that whose employment
precipitates parties and power most rapidly into this last
situation: it brings war to mind by rousing violent animosities,
and provoking vengeance. It is therefore the punishment which
possesses least of all the kind of efficacy we are now in quest
of. This efficacy, I repeat, has for its condition the reform of
certain ideas: it will not bear its fruit till the men it
addresses consent to consider those acts culpable from which it
would dissuade them; at least they must have conceived doubts on
the subject, and the notion of the legitimacy of power must have
entered their minds.
{274}
It has often been attempted to introduce moral convictions by
means of punishments, but when these have not succeeded in
exterminating, they have always failed. It is said that moral
convictions are not aimed at--that the struggle is only against
vicious desires, inordinate wants, and criminal interests. But
this is a mistake: for when the morality or immorality of an
action is not evident, when there is room for the least
uncertainty, then passions, interests, everything, hide
themselves under opinions, and all resolve or metamorphose
themselves into ideas. The most perverse and headstrong of men
are disinclined to dispense with reason, and content themselves
with brute force. They have ever a wish to legitimise in their
own eyes even the least disinterested conduct; they carefully
collect every motive, every pretext, and seize upon the slightest
pretence; and what is more easy, after an unexpected overthrow,
to form thus for themselves a creed which lends its support to
hostility against power? Was there ever a true faction that was
anything else than a union of banditti forced on by their own
base interests, and accessible only to fear? The weakest
government of our day might hold such a danger cheap; but
punishments are desired to act in a very different sphere: to
teach the citizens that it is culpable to conspire against
established order, and deliver their country to the terrible
chances of revolution. Be it known, however, that punishments
have no power to propagate such ideas; they must already exist in
the mind. It is weakness to suppose that they can be reaped when
other causes have not yet sown them: this is attributing to
punishments a power which they do not possess: they cannot make
things be detested as criminal which are regarded as meritorious,
nor can they demonstrate the moral legitimacy of power: they have
no effect upon the established convictions of the people; and
when these are hostile to authority, it is by other means than
punishments that government can succeed in changing them, and
when they will not change, punishments, instead of reforming,
only strengthen their empire. Let us talk no more, then, of
capital punishment preventing political crimes by inspiring a
hatred of them: this really moral efficacy, however powerful
against ordinary crimes, is here without reality; and the more
vigorous parties become, and the more the perils of power
increase, the less pretence can capital punishment make to such
salutary influence. It is, then, both for government and the
factious, only another step in antagonism, and for the public
only another blow of destiny, fatal to the vanquished to-day, and
perhaps to the conqueror to-morrow. Does it act more powerfully
through fear? I have already shown that in this point of view,
and by the sole difference of social position existing between
conspirators and robbers, political crimes offer to the laws much
less hold than private offences. But this is not the only cause
which renders the terror of punishment less efficacious in
political matters than is commonly supposed.
{275}
Men are influenced by different motives; and there must be an
agreement between them and the means used for control. Who does
not know that he cannot speak to a man whom interest governs in
the same manner as he would speak to him who is ruled by passion,
or to a man who is possessed by passion as to him who is directed
by an opinion or a duty? We study carefully, in the private
relations of life, those various dispositions of mankind, and
never think of addressing ourselves to feelings which have no
existence. The legislator who acts upon the masses cannot arrive
at this nice justice, this special fitness of things; but he need
not commit the profound absurdity of directing the same means
indifferently against dispositions the most different; and since
he can avoid this, it is imperative upon him to do so, not only
for the sake of justice, but for the sake of success.
Fear, for example, has more efficacy against interests than
passions, and against passions than ideas: it is easier to
prevent a poor man from stealing than an irritated man from
seeking vengeance; and the angry man, in his turn, is more easily
restrained than the fanatic who believes himself commanded to
assassinate. Generally, when a man's governing principle is of a
nature in some sort material, such as a purely personal interest,
fear has much power: it opposes interest to interest, and all
happens thus in the same sphere; for there is similitude and
fitness in the impelling and opposing motive. As we approach the
moral order, fear loses its virtue: it ceases to be in natural
and direct relation with the impulses it would repress; it
addresses them in a language not their own, gives them reasons
they cannot admit, and thus falls short of the mark it aims at.
But when we arrive at the purest and rarest of all motives, at
the full and dominating convictions of our moral nature, fear
remains without action upon the man thus placed above that world
to which its power is confined.
And this is not a theory: it is a series of facts, regulated by
Providence, which has willed that material and moral order shall
remain distinct and profoundly different even in their union.
To which category do these causes of action belong which
generally urge men to political offences? Here, also, the
diversity is great; for I am far from believing that everything
happens within the moral order, or even upon its confines. Among
the causes which excite hostility to power are ideas, passions,
and interests: here honourable sentiments or sincere beliefs,
there frenzied desires or the most brutal selfishness. All these
principles of action join, are confounded together, and form in
their admixture a heterogeneous force, whose different elements
cannot be combated by the same arms, nor be repressed by the same
means.
{276}
I do not say that the fear inspired by the spectacle, or the
chance of capital punishment, is without efficacy to prevent the
explosions of this confused force: but I do say that its efficacy
is not of a simple nature; and that even if it finds in the
adversary it combats points where it can strike with success,
there will be others which it cannot reach, and where its rebound
will produce a contrary effect to that contemplated by the penal
law.
When Charles II., urged on by the Catholics, and by his own taste
for absolute power, resorted to condemnations and punishments,
the opposition included, as always happens, the most
heterogeneous elements. The followers of the republic joined
those of Cromwell; and the fanaticism of the Puritans did not
refuse an alliance with men whose disgust of
frequently-ridiculous controversies had rendered them indifferent
to every religious belief. To men revolted by the license of the
court were joined others influenced by the love of disorder, the
melancholy fruit of revolutions; and the ambitious who sought
after popularity, for the sake of wealth or power, stood side by
side with sincere patriots, disinterested friends of their
country's liberty: thus Lord Shaftesbury voted with Lord Russell.
In the same party, in fine, met together the most noble
sentiments and the most culpable passions, the most sincere
beliefs and the most worldly interests, the highest virtue and
the most shameful desires.
What must have been, what really was, the effect of political
rigour upon a party thus composed? The court triumphed at first:
for those who had joined the party from interest withdrew from
it; the venal sold themselves; the timid sunk into silence; old
republicans, in thus losing their illusions, believed liberty
lost without retrieve; Monk corrupted or abandoned his former
companions; and Shaftesbury fled to Holland. Fear reigned in all
its glory. But at the same time that it struck the vulnerable
portion of the party, it deeply and irreconcilably offended
forces which it was not its business to attack. If cowards were
afraid, brave men became indignant; and if fear brought over to
the court some deserters from the popular party, it likewise
confirmed the people in their aversion; causing the former to
think themselves in error in having attacked power, and proving
to the latter their right to do so. The reformers were alienated
past return; the passions, kept in check perhaps among the great,
grew furious in the rabble; the public mistrust became incurable;
and all the friends of national liberty judged themselves in
peril. As to the more ambitious of the party, Lord Russell and
Sidney were the most unfortunate of the conspirators: they became
martyrs for the people; and time soon showed that if fear had
borne fruits favourable for power, it had likewise sowed some
that were very bitter.
{277}
Such is, in a political matter, the inevitable condition of the
indirect efficacy of punishment. It is not confined to the limits
in which it can be of service; it does not restrict its operation
to perils which it can combat with success; but in some cases
causes the desired effect, and in others one which would rather
have been avoided: its influence can neither be diverted nor even
foreseen. It is a weapon of unknown power, which, thrown at
random, may strike one required point, and at the same time in a
hundred others excite new enemies and new dangers.
The want of reflection in men explains everything: but that power
which, in order to destroy political factions, calls to its aid
the fear of death, commits a strange mistake; for in employing
this means, it knows not what it does. It should at least, before
having recourse to it, consider what is the nature of the danger
it fears, what the interior composition of the factions it
combats, and what will be the effects, so variable and
complicated, of the punishment of death. If the question was now
of such enemies as in the thirteenth century were those of
established governments; if political struggles carried physical
disorder suddenly into society, and the gatherings of
conspirators threatened always to turn into bands of robbers,
then fear would be the true weapon. If even, in our day, we dealt
with seditions engendered among the multitude, provoked by some
brutal passion or some physical interest--by the most pressing,
for instance, the most excusable of interests, famine--there,
again, I could conceive the employment of the punishment of
death. It might, indeed, be needlessly and odiously abused; but
it would at least be used with a knowledge of its effects against
an evil to which its fear might be properly applied. Parties now,
however, are very differently constituted: they unite men of all
conditions, rich and poor, idle and industrious, peaceable and
disorderly, bound together by numerous and systematic relations.
If conspiracies do not obtain entire success, and change the face
of empires, they seldom advance so far as they attempt. We live
in a society recently overturned, where legitimate and
illegitimate interests, honourable and blameable sentiments, just
and false ideas, are so mingled, that it is very difficult to
strike hard without striking wrong. We are an ancient people
entering into a new social order; the errors of inexperience are
seen amidst the security of civilisation; all is obscure and
confused, without being entirely disorderly or violent. In such a
state of men and things, to believe in the efficacy of capital
punishment against political danger, and to rely on the fear it
inspires as a great means of government, is to mistake both the
evil and the remedy, and to employ arms at once old and
poisonous, which are no longer of use, and cannot be handled
without danger.
{278}
I find everywhere the same mistake; and it is by confounding
times that means are misunderstood. In the former constitution of
society, the moral efficacy of capital punishment was powerfully
seconded by its direct and physical efficacy. When it fell upon
the chief of an eminent party, known to all its members, and
invested with immense power, his personal fall not only
dissipated a great danger, but struck terror into the whole
faction, and it was said on all hands--How has this man fallen?
What! were not all his riches, his credit, his numerous
followers, and his strong places, able to defend him? His
adversaries are then much to be dreaded! How is it possible to
escape their power? How strive against that which has destroyed
such a man? Beyond the circle of political conflicts the same
phenomenon is visible. The death of Cartouche or Mandrin will be
a much greater example, and act much more powerfully upon
robbers, than that of an obscure pickpocket. If you descend into
the rabble, you will find the same relation between the moral and
physical efficacy of punishments; for there the number of the
victims makes up for their want of celebrity. Is it surprising
that the population of a district should be paralysed with fear
when they see their ranks thinned by chastisements, and encounter
at every step the instruments or the ruins of this devastating
power? Sepulture itself is refused to their remains, and the dead
remain above ground to terrify the living.
At such a price is obtained that fear which in former times
derived its terrible influence from capital punishment. If you
try now to restore the vanished régime, you will not be able to
fulfil the conditions; you will not be able to multiply political
punishments so as to terrify by their number. A government aiming
at such effects would find danger moving against it at the same
pace as fear among the people. Society no longer furnishes those
victims whose illustrious fall spread terror everywhere. You must
act here and there against some obscure wretches, whose names are
unheard, and who are known only by their misfortune. And how can
you destroy such men? Not by the force of power: the conflict is
too unequal. By its justice? Have a care: when interest is
personal, and the superiority so immense, justice is very open to
suspicion: if doubt is possible, you may count upon its becoming
in many minds equivalent to a certainty. And what fear have you
then inspired? Not the fear of force, but of iniquity; and a
government, in my opinion, can gain nothing from the one without
the other.
That, however, is the error which possesses those who, in our
day, rely upon the punishment of death: they mistake the nature
of the fear they spread, and believe themselves to have proved
their strength when they have but made their justice or their
wisdom doubtful. Strength is not so easily proved, nor always in
the same manner.
{279}
Two governments have ruled France despotically--the Convention,
which reigned by political punishments; and Bonaparte, who made
little use of them, and even took pains to avoid them. Both, by
different means, were powerful, and dreaded. But was the scaffold
the only strength of the Convention? No rational man can believe
it: it played its part, just like conflagrations, or falling
houses, or ravaging banditti; but in all these the efforts are
greater than the energy, and the Convention, consuming itself
almost as quickly as its enemies, fell into the abyss from which
it issued; for in vain is power great--the crime by which it
triumphs destroys it in our day more rapidly than ever. Bonaparte
was strong in his turn; but it was not by punishments that he
proved his strength, and made it to be feared. He punished some
conspiracies, suppressed others, and passed over many more; he
even specially passed over those which proceeded from the party
opposed to the Revolution. Invested with power by the need of
order and justice, and in opposition to the anarchical tyranny of
the Jacobins, already worn out, he comprehended well that he must
invoke power from the same interests and sentiments which had
just procured him the Empire. The need of order within and of
victory without the Empire had made the 18th Brumaire, and
Bonaparte reigned as he had risen--by order and victory; and when
by his faults he had lost or compromised victory in Europe, and
security in France, he fell, still full of life, but having
ceased to be strong.
If I may use the figure, there is a star which bestows their
strength upon governments, and which they are not at liberty to
choose or renounce without danger. They are born and live with a
nature of their own, but in a situation they have not made, and
under conditions they cannot direct; and their skill consists in
becoming acquainted with these, and adapting themselves to them.
Thus are they powerful--one by war, another by peace; this by
severity, and that by gentleness--according as the different
means of government have affinity with the especial laws of their
destiny. And if they misunderstand these laws, and mistake the
means of the government which correspond with them; if they
imagine they can attempt indifferently any path they choose, and
set in motion such or such a spring according to their fancy; if
they consider power as an arsenal of all sorts of arms, equally
useful to all comers--then their star abandons them: they
hesitate, waver, try in vain a thousand resources, which fail
them successively, and feeling themselves growing weaker day by
day, are foolishly astonished that a course of conduct which has
succeeded so well with others does nothing but increase their
embarrassments and perils.
{280}
What was the star of the Restoration? Under what native laws was
the present government placed? Where were its elements of power,
and what means of action were fitted to its position and its
nature? I would know this, in order to discover if capital
punishment in political matters is really an arm for its use, and
which preserves in its hands, both as regards its own interest
and that of the people, a salutary efficacy. I cannot help the
question becoming so extensive. I shall endeavour to keep within
its bounds; but it is very necessary that I follow wherever it
conducts me.