GATHERING CLOUDS
The great storm of the French Revolution was now to appear on the
horizon, climb to its height, and break in terror over France. During
these years, from 1784 to 1792, Lafayette was for most of the time in
Paris where he took part in events of great importance and in such a
way as to command respect from those who sympathized with his liberal
ideas and to win detraction from devotees of monarchial systems.
At first, however, no one dreamed what the future held for France.
Lafayette busied himself in doing what he could to further the affairs
of the United States, turning his attention to commercial questions
such as he had never supposed would interest him. Whale-oil, for
instance, became a favorite subject with him; his services on behalf
of that American industry were acknowledged by the seagoing people of
Nantucket who sent him a gigantic, five-hundred-pound cheese, the
product of scores of farms, as a testimonial of their appreciation.
A cause that interested him intensely was slavery. His views on this
subject he summed up in 1786 in a letter to John Adams:
"In the cause of my black brethren I feel myself warmly interested, and
most decidedly side, so far as respects them, against the white part of
mankind. Whatever be the complexion of the enslaved, it does not, in my
opinion, alter the complexion of the crime which the enslaver commits, a
crime much blacker than any African face. It is to me a matter of great
anxiety and concern, to find that this trade is sometimes carried on
under the flag of liberty, our dear and noble stripes, to which virtue
and glory have been constant standard-bearers."
Lafayette not only had a lofty sentiment about the condition of the
slaves, but he put his theory into practice by buying at great expense
an estate in Cayenne, or French Guiana, with a large number of slaves
whom he put under a system of education, with the intention of making
them free as soon as they were fitted for economic independence.
Madame de Lafayette interested herself in the management of this
estate; she provided pastors and teachers to go to Cayenne as
missionaries and educators.
The experiment was going on well when the Revolution broke over
France. Then it was doomed. While Lafayette was languishing in the
dungeon at Olmütz, one of his great anxieties was for his Cayenne
charge. He would have been even more unhappy if he had known that when
the revolutionists took possession of his property, they caused that
estate to be sold, together with all the slaves, who thus went back
into slavery--a great inconsistency in those same revolutionists who
imagined they were working for liberty and enfranchisement!
During this time Lafayette had two great interests: one, a public life
marked by increasing premonitions of national danger; the other, at
Chaviniac where his family stayed and where he was instituting all
sorts of reforms on his own estate and in the village of Chaviniac,
and working steadily for the welfare of the people who were dependent
upon him. He founded an annual fair and a weekly market day. He built
roads at his own expense. In the village he established a resident
physician whose services the poor could have at any time without cost
to themselves. He founded a weaving business and a school to teach the
art. The agricultural advancement of America had interested him, so he
brought a man from England to teach new methods to his farmers. New
implements were imported and new breeds of cattle were introduced. In
every way he brought enlightenment and betterment.
Meantime a spirit was rising that was soon to sweep not only over
Paris but through all the provinces of France. Lafayette saw this
storm coming. One day, in 1789, he was walking in the grand gallery of
the Château de Chaviniac with a gentleman of the neighborhood. They
spoke together of what the emancipation of the peasant would mean to
the people of the Auvergne region. At that moment a group of peasants
from his estate came in to offer Lafayette some nosegays and cheeses.
They presented these gifts on bended knees, in an attitude of deep
submission and respect.
"There," said the neighbor, "see how little disposed these peasants
are to receive your boasted emancipation; depend upon it, they think
very little on the matter."
"Well, well," replied Lafayette, "a few years hence we shall see who
was right."
They did! The time was not far distant when the peasants of Auvergne,
as well as the rabble of Paris, went singing:
Ah! ça ira, ça ira, ça ira!
Celui qui s'élève, on l'abaissera,
Et qui s'abaisse, on l'élèvera.
Significant events followed, and on every important occasion Lafayette
bore a part. He was a member of the Assembly of Notables, and he led a
minority of the nobility who demanded the calling of the States General,
a representative assembly. He presented his famous composition, the
Declaration of Rights, modeled on Jefferson's Declaration of Independence.
He was made by acclamation Colonel General of the new National Guard
and gave them the white cockade. He represented the people on the great
day of the oath of loyalty to the new constitution. For a time he was
riding on the top wave of popularity.
Lafayette believed in freedom for all people and to every man his
rights. But he thought that France was not yet ready for the form of
government that was succeeding in America. For France he believed the
constitutional monarchy to be the best. He thought--and every one now
thinks--that Louis XVI was a man of good intentions, and he believed
these good intentions would show that monarch what was for the welfare
and happiness of the people. Therefore he defended the king and the
royal family as a part of the form of government that was the best
for France. The newly adopted constitution appeared to him to be the
just expression of royal authority.
In his blind optimism Lafayette could not believe but that his ideas
would in the end have their proper weight. He stood with the nobility,
resting proudly on their good intentions, and facing a brute force
newly awakened by the tocsin of liberty. To this unreasoning instinct,
liberty meant nothing but license. The result of putting this license
into power meant anarchy.
Now came Lafayette's time of difficulty. He was accused of conniving
at the attempt of the king and queen to escape. Afterwards the queen
in her trial testified that Lafayette had known nothing whatever of
the project. Lafayette was also blamed for the death of Foulon, a
minister who was hanged, beheaded, and dragged through the streets by
the mob. The fact was that he did all in his power to control the mob
that caused Foulon's death. They accused him of firing on the mob.
That he did, in defense of the life of the king--first standing before
the cannon to give his life if need be. He was accused of being too
liberal and of being too aristocratic. He was burned between the two
fires. The people seemed determined not to understand him. They said
that if Lafayette truly loved the people it was but another evidence
that his soul was plebeian--his simplicity of manner and unstudied
grace of speech were but further proofs thereof. Brutality and
lawlessness, veiled under the name of patriotism, could hardly do less
than hate an incorruptible man like Lafayette who was outspoken in his
beliefs.
A coalition of European powers stood ready to invade France and place
the monarchy again on a secure basis. Lafayette was at the head of one
of three armies sent to withstand the forces of the coalition, but his
own soldiers were secretly in sympathy with the revolutionary frenzy.
The end came when Lafayette defied the Jacobin party, and they in turn
declared him a traitor and put a price on his head. But even at that
late day, if there had been in France any number of men who possessed
Lafayette's calmness, self-control, and generous spirit, the state
might still have been saved from tumult and degradation. As it was,
France turned its face away from its best light and hope, and
Lafayette was, as Carlyle picturesquely said, "hooted forth over the
borders into Cimmerian night." He put his army into the best order
possible, and with a company of devoted officers and followers started
for a neutral country.
Meantime in Paris the feet of the people were at the threshold of the
Terror.