In the revolution of France two sorts of men were principally
concerned in giving a character and determination to its pursuits: the
philosophers and the politicians. They took different ways, but they met
in the same end. The philosophers had one predominant object, which
they pursued with a fanatical fury; that is, the utter extirpation of
religion. To that every question of empire was subordinate. They had
rather domineer in a parish of atheists than rule over a Christian
world. Their temporal ambition was wholly subservient to their
proselytizing spirit, in which they were not exceeded by Mahomet
himself. They who have made but superficial studies in the natural
history of the human mind, have been taught to look on religious
opinions as the only cause of enthusiastic zeal and sectarian
propagation. But there is no doctrine whatever, on which men can warm,
that is not capable of the very same effect. The social nature of man
impels him to propagate his principles, as much as physical impulses
urge him to propagate his kind. The passions give zeal and vehemence.
The understanding bestows design and system. The whole man moves under
the discipline of his opinions. Religion is among the most powerful
causes of enthusiasm. When anything concerning it becomes an object of
much meditation, it cannot be indifferent to the mind. They who do not
love religion, hate it. The rebels to God perfectly abhor the author of
their being. They hate him "with all their heart, with all their mind,
with all their soul, and with all their strength." He never presents
himself to their thoughts, but to menace and alarm them. They cannot
strike the sun out of heaven, but they are able to raise a smouldering
smoke that obscures him from their own eyes. Not being able to revenge
themselves on God, they have a delight in vicariously defacing,
degrading, torturing, and tearing in pieces his image in man. Let no
one judge of them by what he has conceived of them, when they were
not incorporated, and had no lead. They were then only passengers in a
common vehicle. They were then carried along with the general motion of
religion in the community, and, without being aware of it, partook of
its influence. In that situation, at worst, their nature was left free
to counter-work their principles. They despaired of giving any very
general currency to their opinions. They considered them as a reserved
privilege for the chosen few. But when the possibility of dominion,
lead, and propagation, presented itself, and that the ambition, which
before had so often made them hypocrites, might rather gain than lose
by a daring avowal of their sentiments, then the nature of this infernal
spirit, which has "evil for its good," appeared in its full perfection.
Nothing indeed but the possession of some power can with any certainty
discover what at the bottom is the true character of any man. Without
reading the speeches of Vergniaud, Francian of Nantes, Isnard, and
some others of that sort, it would not be easy to conceive the passion,
rancour, and malice of their tongues and hearts. They worked themselves
up to a perfect frenzy against religion and all its professors.
They tore the reputation of the clergy to pieces by their infuriated
declamations and invectives, before they lacerated their bodies by
their massacres. This fanatical atheism left out, we omit the principal
feature in the French revolution, and a principal consideration with
regard to the effects to be expected from a peace with it.
The other sort of men were the politicians. To them, who had little or
not at all reflected on the subject, religion was in itself no object
of love or hatred. They disbelieved it, and that was all. Neutral with
regard to that object, they took the side which in the present state of
things might best answer their purposes. They soon found that they could
not do without the philosophers; and the philosophers soon made them
sensible that the destruction of religion was to supply them with means
of conquest, first at home, and then abroad. The philosophers were the
active internal agitators, and supplied the spirit and principles: the
second gave the practical direction. Sometimes the one predominated in
the composition, sometimes the other. The only difference between them
was in the necessity of concealing the general design for a time, and in
their dealing with foreign nations; the fanatics going straightforward
and openly, the politicians by the surer mode of zigzag. In the
course of events, this, among other causes, produced fierce and bloody
contentions between them. But at the bottom they thoroughly agreed in
all the objects of ambition and irreligion, and substantially in all the
means of promoting these ends.