_Jacobins determine upon the Execution of Louis--Progress and
Reasons of the King's Unpopularity--Girondists taken by
surprise, by a proposal for the Abolition of Royalty made by the
Jacobins--Proposal carried--Thoughts on the New System of
Government--Compared with that of Rome, Greece, America, and
other Republican States--Enthusiasm throughout France at the
Change--Follies it gave birth to--And Crimes--Monuments of Art
destroyed--Madame Roland interposes to save the Life of the
King--Barrère--Girondists move for a Departmental
Legion--Carried--Revoked--and Girondists defeated--The Authority
of the Community of Paris paramount even over the
Convention--Documents of the Iron-Chest--Parallel betwixt
Charles I. and Louis XVI.--Motion by Pétion, that the King
should be Tried before the Convention._
It is generally to be remarked, that Crime, as well as Religion, has her
sacramental associations, fitted for the purposes to which she desires
to pledge her votaries. When Cataline imposed an oath on his
fellow-conspirators, a slave was murdered, and his blood mingled with
the beverage in which they pledged each other to their treason against
the republic. The most desperate mutineers and pirates too have
believed, that by engaging their associates in some crime of a deep and
atrocious nature, so contrary to the ordinary feelings of humanity as to
strike with horror all who should hear of it, they made their allegiance
more completely their own; and, as remorse is useless where retreat is
impossible, that they thus rendered them in future the desperate and
unscrupulous tools, necessary for the designs of their leaders.
In like manner, the Jacobins--who had now full possession of the
passions and confidence of the lower orders in France, as well as of all
those spirits among the higher classes, who, whether desirous of
promotion by exertions in the revolutionary path, or whether enthusiasts
whose imagination had become heated with the extravagant doctrines that
had been current during these feverish times,--the Jacobins resolved to
engage their adherents, and all whom they influenced, in proceeding to
the death of the unfortunate Louis. They had no reason to doubt that
they might excite the populace to desire and demand that final
sacrifice, and to consider the moment of its being offered as a time of
jubilee. Nor were the better classes likely to take a warm or decisive
interest in the fate of their unhappy prince, so long the object of
unpopularity.
[Sidenote: UNPOPULARITY OF LOUIS XVI.]
From the beginning of the Revolution, down to the total overthrow of the
throne, first the power of the King, and afterwards his person and the
measures to which he resorted, were the constant subject of attack by
the parties who successively forced themselves into his administration.
Each faction accused the other, during the time of their brief sway, of
attempts to extend the power and the privileges of the crown; which was
thus under a perpetual siege, though carried on by distinct and opposite
factions, one of whom regularly occupied the lines of attack, to
dislodge the others, as fast as they obtained successively possession of
the ministry. Thus the Third Estate overcame the two privileged classes,
in behalf of the people and against the crown; La Fayette and the
Constitutionalists triumphed over the Moderates, who desired to afford
the King the shelter and bulwark of an intermediate senate; and then,
after creating a constitution as democratical as it could be, leaving a
name and semblance of royalty, they sunk under the Girondists, who were
disposed altogether to dispense with that symbol. In this way it
appeared to the people, that the King was their natural enemy, and that
the royal interest was directly opposed to a revolution which had
brought them sundry advantages, besides giving them the feelings and
consequence of freemen. In this manner, one of the mildest and best
disposed monarchs that ever swayed a sceptre, became exposed to general
suspicion and misconstruction in his measures, and (as is sure speedily
to follow) to personal contempt, and even hatred. Whatever the King did
in compliance with the current tide of revolution was accounted as
fraudful complaisance, designed to blind the nation. Whatever
opposition he made to that powerful impulse, was accounted an act of
open treason against the sovereignty of the people.
His position, with regard to the invading powers, was enough of itself
to load him with obloquy and suspicion. It is true, that he was called,
and professed himself, the willing king of a popular, or democratic
monarchy; but in the proclamations of his allies, he was described as a
monarch imprisoned, degraded, and almost dethroned. To achieve his
liberty (as they affirmed,) and to re-establish his rights, the Emperor,
his brother-in-law, the King of Prussia, his ally, and above all, his
brothers, the princes of the blood of France, were in arms, and had sent
numerous armies to the frontiers.[303] It was scarcely possible, in the
utmost extent of candour, that the French people should give Louis
credit for desiring the success of the revolutionary cause, by which not
only his power had been circumscribed, but his person had been placed
under virtual restraint, against forces armed avowedly for his safety
and liberty, as well as the restoration of his power. We can allow as
much to the disinterestedness of Louis, as to any whose feelings and
rights were immediately concerned with the point at issue; and we admit
that all concessions which he made to the popular cause, before the
National Assembly had asserted a paramount authority over his, were
willingly and freely granted. But, after the march from Versailles, he
must have been an enthusiast for public liberty of a very uncommon
character, if we could suppose him seriously wishing the defeat of his
brothers and allies, and the victory of those who had deprived him first
of authority, and then of freedom.
A single glance at his situation must have convinced the people of
France, that Louis could scarcely be sincere in desiring the continuance
of the system to which he had given his adhesion as sovereign; and the
consciousness that they could not expect confidence where they
themselves had made ungenerous use of their power, added force to their
suspicions, and acrimony to the deep resentments which arose out of
them. The people had identified themselves and their dearest interests
(right or wrong, it signifies little to the result) with the Revolution,
and with the increasing freedom which it bestowed, or rather promised to
bestow, in every succeeding change. The King, who had been the regular
opponent of every one of these innovations, was in consequence regarded
as the natural enemy of the country, who, if he continued to remain at
the helm of the executive government, did so with the sole view of
running the vessel upon the rocks.
If there had been any men in France generous enough to give the King
credit for complete good faith with the Constitutionalists, his flight
from Paris, and the manifestoes which he left behind him, protesting
against the measures in which he had acquiesced, as extorted from him
by constraint, gave open proof of Louis's real feelings. It is true, the
King denied any purpose of leaving the kingdom, or throwing himself into
the hands of the foreign powers; but it could escape no one, that such a
step, however little it was calculated upon in the commencement of his
flight, might very easily have become inevitable before its completion.
It does not appear from the behaviour of the escorts of dragoons and
hussars, that there was any attachment among the troops to the King's
person; and had the mutiny of Bouillé's forces against that general's
authority taken place after the King reached the camp, the only safety
of Louis must have been in a retreat into the Austrian territory. This
chance was so evident, that Bouillé himself had provided for it, by
requesting that the Austrian forces might be so disposed as to afford
the King protection should the emergency occur.[304] Whatever,
therefore, might be the King's first experiment, the point to which he
directed his flight bore out those, who supposed and asserted that it
must have ultimately terminated in his re-union with his brothers; and
that such a conclusion must have repeatedly occurred to the King's
thoughts.
But if the King was doubted and suspected before he gave this decisive
proof of his disinclination to the constitution, there had surely
happened nothing in the course of his being seized at Varennes, or the
circumstances of his reception at Paris, tending to reconcile him to the
constitutional crown, which was a second time proffered him, and which
he again, with all its duties and acts of self-denial, solemnly
accepted.
We have before hinted, that the King's assuming of new the frail and
barren sceptre, proffered to him under the most humiliating
circumstances, was a piece of indifferent policy. There occurred almost
no course of conduct by which, subjected as he was to general suspicion,
he could show himself once more to his people in a clear and impartial
point of view--each of his measures was sure to be the theme of the most
malignant commentary. If his conduct assumed a popular aspect, it was
accounted an act of princely hypocrisy; if it was like his opposition to
the departmental army, it would have been held as intended to weaken the
defence of the country; if it resembled his rejection of the decrees
against the emigrants and refractory priests, then it might be urged as
inferring a direct intention of bringing back the old despotic system.
In short, all confidence was lost between the sovereign and the people,
from a concurrence of unhappy circumstances, in which it would certainly
be unjust to cast the blame exclusively on either party, since there
existed so many grounds for distrust and misunderstanding on both sides.
The noble and generous confidence which Frenchmen had been wont to
repose in the personal character of their monarch--a confidence, which
the probity of no man could deserve more than that of Louis--was
withered, root and branch; or those in whose breasts it still flourished
were banished men, and had carried the Oriflamme, and the ancient spirit
of French chivalry, into a camp not her own. The rest of the nation, a
scattered and intimidated remnant of Royalists excepted, were
Constitutionalists, who, friends rather to the crown than to the King as
an individual, wished to preserve the form of government, but without
either zeal or attachment to Louis; or Girondists, who detested his
office as Republicans; or Jacobins, who hated his person. Every one,
therefore, assailed Louis; and it was held enrolling himself amongst
aristocrats, the most avowed and hated enemies of the new order of
things, if any one lifted a voice in his defence, or even apology.
To this the influence of the revolutionary clubs, amounting to so many
thousands, and of the daily press, almost the only kind of literature
which France had left, added the full tribute of calumny and
inculpation. The Jacobins attacked the person of the King from the very
commencement of the Revolution; for they desired that Louis should be
destroyed, even when some amongst them were leagued for placing Orleans
in his room. The Girondists, on the contrary, would have been well
contented to spare the person of Louis; but they urged argument after
argument, in the journal which they directed, against the royal office.
But upon the whole, the King, whether in his royal or personal
character, had been so long and uniformly calumniated and
misinterpreted, that through most parts of France he was esteemed the
enemy whom the people had most to dread, and whom they were most
interested to get rid of. In evidence of which it may be added, that
during all successive changes of parties, for the next year or two, the
charge of a disposition towards royalty was always made an aggravation
of the accusations which the parties brought against each other, and was
considered as so necessary an ingredient, that it was not omitted even
when circumstances rendered it impossible.
[Sidenote: ABOLITION OF ROYALTY.]
Both parties in the Convention were thus prepared to acquire popularity,
by gratifying the almost universal prejudices against monarchy, and
against the King. The Girondists, constant to the Republican principles
they entertained, had resolved to abolish the throne; but their
audacious rivals were prepared to go a step beyond them, by gratifying
the popular spirit of vengeance which their own calumnies had increased
to such a pitch, by taking the life of the dethroned monarch. This was
the great national crime which was to serve France for a republican
baptism, and which, once committed, was to be regarded as an act of
definitive and deadly adhesion to the cause of the Revolution. But not
contented with taking measures for the death of the monarch, this
desperate but active faction resolved to anticipate their rivals in the
proposal for the abolition of royalty.
The Girondists, who counted much on the popularity which they were to
attain by this favourite measure, were so far from fearing the
anticipation of the Jacobins, that, under the idea of Orleans having
some interest remaining with Danton and others, they rather expected
some opposition on their part. But what was their surprise and
mortification when, on the 21st September, Manuel[305] arose, and
demanded that one of the first proposals submitted to the Convention
should be the abolition of royalty! Ere the Girondists could recover
from their surprise, Collot d'Herbois, a sorry comedian, who had been
hissed from the stage, desired the motion to be instantly put to the
vote. The Girondists, anticipated in their scheme, had no resource left
but to be clamorous in applauding the motion, lest their hesitation
should bring their republican zeal into question. Thus all they could do
was but to save their credit with the popular party, at a time when they
had expected to increase it to such a height. Their antagonists had been
so alert as to steal the game out of their hands.[306]
The violence with which the various orators expressed themselves against
monarchy of every complexion, and kings in general, was such as to show,
either that they were in no state of mind composed enough to decide on a
great national measure, or that the horrors of the massacres, scarce ten
days remote, impressed on them the danger of being lukewarm in the cause
of the sovereign people, who were not only judges without resort, but
the prompt executioners of their own decrees.
The Abbé Grégoire declared, that the dynasties of kings were a race of
devouring animals, who fed on the blood of the people; and that kings
were in the moral order of things what monsters are in the
physical--that courts were the arsenals of crimes, and the centre of
corruption--and that the history of princes was the martyrology of the
people. Finally, that all the members of the Convention being fully
sensible of these self-evident truths, it was needless to delay, even
for a moment, the vote of abolition, reserving it to more leisure to put
their declaration into better form. Ducos[307] exclaimed, that the
crimes of Louis alone formed a sufficient reason for the abolition of
monarchy. The motion was received and passed unanimously; and each side
of the hall, anxious to manifest their share in this great measure,
echoed back to the other the new war-cry of "Vive la Republique!"[308]
Thus fell, at the voice of a wretched player and cut-throat, backed by
that of a renegade priest, the most ancient and most distinguished
monarchy of Europe. A few remarks may be permitted upon the new
government, the adoption of which had been welcomed with so much
gratulation.
[Sidenote: NEW SYSTEM OF GOVERNMENT.]
It has been said, that the government which is best administered is
best. This maxim is true for the time, but for the time only; as good
administration depends often on the life of individuals, or other
circumstances in themselves mutable. One would rather incline to say,
that the government is best calculated to produce the happiness of a
nation, which is best adapted to the existing state of the country which
it governs, and possesses, at the same time, such internal means of
regeneration as may enable it to keep pace with the changes of
circumstances, and accommodate itself to the unavoidable alterations
which must occur in a progressive state of society. In this point of
view, and even in the patriarchal circle, the most natural forms of
government, in the early periods of society, are Monarchy, or a
Republic. The father is head of his own family; the assembled council of
the fathers governs the Republic; or the _patria potestas_ of the whole
state is bestowed upon some successful warrior or eminent legislator,
who becomes king of the tribe. But a republic, in the literal
acceptation, which supposes all the individuals subject to its
government to be consulted in council upon all affairs of the public,
cannot survive the most early period of existence. It is only to be
found around the council-fire of a North American tribe of Indians; and
even there, the old men, forming a sort of senate, have already
established a species of aristocracy. As society advances, and the
little state extends itself, ordinary matters of government are confided
to delegates, or exclusively grasped by some of the higher orders of the
community. Rome, when she dismissed the Tarquins, the period to which
the Girondists were fond of assimilating that of the French Revolution,
had already a privileged body of patricians, the senate, from which were
exclusively chosen the consuls; until at a later period, and at the
expense of many feuds with the patricians, the plebeians succeeded in
obtaining for their order many advantages. But the state of Rome was not
more republican, in the proper sense, than before these concessions. The
corporate citizens of Rome were indeed admitted into some of the
privileges of the nobles; but the quantity of territory and of
population over which these citizens extended their dominion, was so
great, that the rural and unrepresented part of the inhabitants quite
outnumbered that of the citizens who voted in the Comitia, and
constituted the source of authority. There was the whole body of slaves,
who neither were nor could be represented, being considered by the law
as no farther capable of political or legal rights, than a herd of so
many cattle; and there were the numerous and extensive dominions, over
which, under the name of auxiliaries, Rome exercised a right of absolute
sovereignty. In fact, the so called democracy was rather an oligarchy,
dispersed more widely than usual, and vesting the government of an
immense empire in a certain limited number of the inhabitants of Rome
called citizens, bearing a very small proportion in bulk to the gross
number of the inhabitants. These privileged persons in some degree lived
upon their votes;--the ambitious caressed them, fed them, caught their
eyes with magnificent exhibitions, and their ears with extravagant
eloquence, and by corrupting their principles, at last united the small
class of privileged citizens themselves, under the very bondage in which
they had long kept their extensive empire. There is no one period of the
Roman republic, in which it can be said, considering the number of the
persons governed relatively to those who had as citizens a share of that
government by vote, or capacity of bearing office, that the people, as a
whole, were fairly and fully represented.
All other republics of which we have any distinct account, including the
celebrated states of Greece, were of so small a size, that it was by no
means difficult to consult the citizens to a considerable extent in the
affairs of the state. Still this right of being consulted was retained
among the _free_ citizens of Greece. Slaves, who amounted to a very
large proportion of the inhabitants, were never permitted any
interference there, more than in Rome. Now, as it was by slaves that the
coarser, more debasing, and more sordid parts of the labour of the
community were performed, there were thus excluded from the privilege of
citizens almost all those, who, by constant toil, and by the sordid
character of the employments to which their fate condemned them, might
be supposed incapable of exercising political rights with due feelings
of reflection and of independence. It is not too much to say, in
conclusion, that, excepting in the earliest stage of human society,
there never existed a community in which was to be found that liberty
and equality, which the French claimed for each individual in the whole
extent of their empire.
Not only the difficulty or impossibility of assigning to every person in
France an equal portion of political power, was one against which
antiquity had never attempted to struggle, but the wealth and size of
the late French empire were circumstances which experience induced wise
statesmen to conclude against the favourable issue of the experiment.
Those memorable republics, which Montesquieu eulogizes[309] as being
formed upon _virtue_, as the leading principle, inhabited the modest and
sequestered habitations where virtue is most often found. In mountainous
countries like those of the Swiss, where the inhabitants are nearly of
the same rank, and not very much disproportioned in substance, and
where they inhabit a small district or territory, a republic seems the
most natural form of government. Nature has, to a certain extent,
established an equality among the fathers of such a society, and there
is no reason why policy should supplant it. In their public meetings,
they come together upon the same general footing, and possess nearly the
same opportunity of forming a judgment; and the affairs of such a state
are too little complicated to require frequent or prolonged discussions.
The same applies to small states, like Genoa, and some of the Dutch
provinces, where the inequality of wealth, if it exists in some
instances, is qualified by the consideration, that it is gained in the
same honourable pursuit of mercantile traffic, where all fortunes are
founded on the same commercial system, and where the chance that has
made one man rich yesterday, may to-morrow depress him and raise
another. Under such favourable circumstances, republics may exist long
and happy, providing they can prevent luxury from working the secret
dissolution of their moral principles, or the exterior force of more
powerful neighbours from swallowing up their little community in the
rage of conquest.
America must certainly be accounted a successful attempt to establish a
republic on a much larger scale than those we have mentioned. But that
great and flourishing empire consists, it must be remembered, of a
federative union of many states, which, though extensive in territory,
are comparatively thin in occupants. There do not exist in America, in
the same degree, those circumstances of a dense and degraded population,
which occasion in the old nations of Europe such an infinite difference
of knowledge and ignorance, of wealth the most exuberant, and indigence
the most horrible. No man in America need be poor, if he has a hatchet
and arms to use it. The wilderness is to him the same retreat which the
world afforded to our first parents. His family, if he has one, is
wealth; if he is unencumbered with wife or children, he is the more
easily provided for. A man who wishes to make a large fortune, may be
disappointed in America; but he who seeks, with a moderate degree of
industry, only the wants which nature demands, is certain to find them.
An immense proportion of the population of the United States consists of
agriculturists, who live upon their own property, which is generally of
moderate extent, and cultivate it by their own labour. Such a situation
is peculiarly favourable to republican habits. The man who feels himself
really independent,--and so must each American who can use a spade or an
axe,--will please himself with the mere exertion of his freewill, and
form a strong contrast to the hollowing, bawling, blustering rabble of a
city, where a dram of liquor, or the money to buy a meal, is sure to
purchase the acclamation of thousands, whose situation in the scale of
society is too low to permit their thinking of their political right as
a thing more valuable than to be bartered against the degree of
advantage they may procure, or of a license which they may exercise, by
placing it at the disposal of one candidate or another.
Above all, before considering the case of America as parallel with that
of France, the statesmen of the latter country should have observed one
grand and radical difference. In America, after the great change in
their system had been effected by shaking off the sovereignty of the
mother country, the states arranged their new government so as to make
the least possible alteration in the habits of their people. They left
to a future and more convenient opportunity, what farther innovation
this great change might render necessary; being more desirous to fix the
general outlines of a firm and orderly government, although containing
some anomalies, than to cast all existing authorities loose, in order
that they might produce a constitution more regular in theory, but far
less likely to be put into effectual execution, than those old forms
under which the people had grown up, and to which they were accustomed
to render regular obedience. They abolished no nobility, for they had
none in the colonies to abolish; but in fixing the basis of their
constitution, they balanced the force and impulse of the representative
body of the states by a Senate, designed to serve the purposes answered
by the House of Lords in the British Constitution. The governors of the
different states also, in whose power the executive administration of
each was reposed, continued to exercise the same duties as before,
without much other change, than that they were named by their
fellow-citizens, instead of being appointed by the sovereign of the
mother country. The Congress exercised the rights which success had
given them over the loyalists, with as much temperance as could be
expected after the rage of a civil war. Above all, the mass of the
American population was in a sound healthy state, and well fitted to
bear their share in the exercise of political rights. They were
independent, as we have noticed, and had comparatively few instances
amongst them of great wealth, contrasted with the most degrading
indigence. They were deeply imbued with a sense of religion, and the
morality which is its fruit. They had been brought up under a free
government, and in the exercise of the rights of freemen; and their
fancies were not liable to be excited, or their understandings made
giddy, with a sudden elevation to privileges, the nature of which was
unknown to them. The republic of America, moreover, did not consist of
one huge and populous country, with an overgrown capital, where the
legislative body, cooped up in its precincts like prisoners, were liable
to be acted upon by the applauses or threats of a desperate rabble. Each
state of America carries on its own immediate government, and enjoys
unmolested the privilege of adopting such plans as are best suited to
their own peculiar situation, without embarrassing themselves with that
ideal uniformity, that universal equality of rights, which it was the
vain object of the French Constituent Assembly to establish. The
Americans know that the advantage of a constitution, like that of a
garment, consists, neither in the peculiarity of the fashion, nor in the
fineness of the texture, but in its being well adapted to the person who
receives protection from it. In short, the sagacity of Washington was
not more apparent in his military exploits, than in the manly and wise
pause which he made in the march of revolution, so soon as peace gave an
opportunity to interrupt its impulse. To replace law and social order
upon an established basis was as much the object of this great general,
as it seems to have been that of the statesmen of Paris, civilians as
they were, to protract a period of insurrection, murder, and
revolutionary tyranny.
[Sidenote: FRANCE, A REPUBLIC.]
To such peculiarities and advantages as those we have above stated,
France opposed a direct contrast. Not only was the exorbitant influence
of such a capital as Paris a bar to the existence of that republican
virtue which is the essence of a popular form of government, but there
was nothing like fixed or settled principles in the minds of the people
of France at large. Every thing had, within the last few years, been
studiously and industriously altered, from the most solemn rites of the
Church of Rome, to the most trifling article of dress; from the
sacrament of the mass to the fashion of a shoe-tie. Religion was
entirely out of the question, and the very slightest vestiges of an
established church were about to be demolished. Republican virtue (with
the exception of that of the soldiers, whose valour did honour to the
name) consisted in wearing a coarse dress and foul linen, swearing the
most vulgar oaths, obeying without scruple the most villanous mandates
of the Jacobin Club, and assuming the title, manner, and sentiments of a
real sans-culotte. The country was besides divided into an infinite
variety of factions, and threatened with the plague of civil war. The
streets of the metropolis had been lately the scene of a desperate
conflict, and yet more recently of a horrible massacre. On the
frontiers, the country was pressed by armies of invaders. It was a
crisis in which the Romans, with all their love of freedom, would have
called in the assistance of a dictator; yet it was then, when, without
regarding either the real wants of the country, or the temper of its
inhabitants, France was erected into a Republic, a species of government
the most inconsistent with energetic, secret, and successful councils.
These considerations could not have escaped the Girondists. Neither
could they be blind to the fact, that each republic, whatever its
pretensions to freedom, has committed to some high officer of the state,
under the name of doge, stadtholder, president, or other title, the
custody of the executive power; from the obvious and undeniable
principle, that, with safety to freedom, it cannot be lodged in the
hands of the legislative body. But, knowing this to be the case, they
dared not even hint that such a separation of powers was indispensable,
aware that their fierce enemies, the Jacobins, while they would have
seized on the office without scruple, would, with the other hand, sign
an accusation of leze-nation against them for proposing it. Thus crude,
raw, and ill considered, did one of the most important changes that
could be wrought upon a country, pass as hastily through this
legislative body as the change of a decoration in the theatre.
The alteration was, notwithstanding, hailed by the community at large,
as the consummation of the high fortunes to which France was called.
True, half Europe was in arms at her gates--but the nation who opposed
their swords to them were become Republicans. True, the most frightful
disorder had stalked abroad, in the shape of armed slaughter--it was but
the effervescence and delirium of a republican consciousness of freedom.
Peculation had crept into the finance, and theft had fingered the
diamonds of the state[310]--but the name of a republic was of itself
sufficient to restore to the blackest Jacobin of the gang, the moral
virtues of a Cincinnatus. The mere word _Republic_ was now the universal
medicine for all evils which France could complain of, and its
regenerating operations were looked for with as much faith and
confidence, as if the salutary effects of the convocation of the estates
of the kingdom, once worshipped as a panacea with similar expectations,
had not deceived the hopes of the country.
Meantime, the actors in the new drama began to play the part of Romans
with the most ludicrous solemnity. The name of _citizen_ was now the
universal salutation to all classes; even when a deputy spoke to a
shoe-black, that fond symbol of equality was regularly exchanged betwixt
them; and, in the ordinary intercourse of society, there was the most
ludicrous affectation of republican brevity and simplicity. "When thou
conquerest Brussels," said Collot d'Herbois, the actor, to General
Dumouriez, "my wife, who is in that city, has my permission to reward
thee with a kiss." Three weeks afterwards the general took Brussels, but
he was ungallant enough not to profit by this flattering
permission.[311] His quick wit caught the ridicule of such an
ejaculation as that which Camus addressed to him: "Citizen-general,"
said the deputy, "thou dost meditate the part of Cæsar; but remember I
will be Brutus, and plunge a poniard in thy bosom."--"My dear Camus,"
said the lively soldier, who had been in worse dangers than were
involved in this classical threat, "I am no more like Cæsar than you are
like Brutus; and an assurance that I should live till you kill me, would
be equal to a brevet of immortality."
With a similar assumption of republican dignity, men graced their
children, baptized or unbaptized, with the formidable names of Roman
heroes, and the folly of Anacharsis Clootz seemed to become general
throughout the nation.
Republican virtues were of course adopted or affected. The duty of
mothers nursing their own children, so eloquently insisted on by
Rousseau,[312] and nevertheless so difficult to practise under the forms
of modern life, was generally adopted in Paris; and as the ladies had no
idea that this process of parental attention was to interfere with the
usual round of entertainment, mothers, with their infants dressed in the
most approved Roman costume, were to be seen at the theatre, with the
little disastrous victims of republican affectation, whose wailings, as
well as other embarrassments occasioned by their presence, formed
sometimes disagreeable interruptions to the amusements of the evening,
and placed the inexperienced matrons in an awkward situation.
These were follies to be laughed at. But when men read Livy, for the
sake of discovering what degree of private crime might be committed
under the mask of public virtue, the affair became more serious. The
deed of the younger Brutus served any man as an apology to betray to
ruin and to death a friend, or a patron, whose patriotism might not be
of the pitch which suited the time. Under the example of the elder
Brutus, the nearest ties of blood were repeatedly made to give way
before the ferocity of party zeal--a zeal too often assumed for the most
infamous and selfish purposes. As some fanatics of yore studied the Old
Testament for the purpose of finding examples of bad actions to
vindicate those which themselves were tempted to commit, so the
Republicans of France, we mean the desperate and outrageous bigots of
the Revolution, read history, to justify, by classical instances, their
public and private crimes. Informers, those scourges of a state, were
encouraged to a degree scarce known in ancient Rome in the time of the
emperors, though Tacitus has hurled his thunders against them, as the
poison and pest of his time. The duty of lodging such informations was
unblushingly urged as indispensable. The safety of the republic being
the supreme charge of every citizen, he was on no account to hesitate in
_denouncing_, as it was termed, any one whomever, or however connected
with him,--the friend of his counsels, or the wife of his
bosom,--providing he had reason to suspect the devoted individual of the
crime of _incivism_,--a crime the more mysteriously dreadful, that no
one knew exactly its nature.
The virtue, even of comparatively good men, gave way under the
temptations held out by these fearful innovations on the state of
morals. The Girondists themselves did not scruple to avail themselves of
the villany of others, when what they called the cause of the country,
in reality that of their own faction, could be essentially served by it;
but it was reserved for the Jacobins to carry to the most hideous
extremity the principle which made an exclusive idol of patriotism, and
demanded that every other virtue, as well as the most tender and
honourable dictates of feeling and conscience, should be offered up at
the shrine of the Republic, as children were of old made to pass through
the fire to Moloch.
[Sidenote: SACRILEGE OF SAINT DENIS.]
Another eruption of republican zeal was directed against the
antiquities, and fine arts of France. The name of king being pronounced
detestable, all the remembrances of royalty were, on the motion of
Barrère, ordered to be destroyed. This task was committed to the rabble;
and although a work dishonourable to their employers, and highly
detrimental both to history and the fine arts, it was nevertheless
infinitely more harmless than those in which the same agents had been
lately employed. The royal sepulchres at Saint Denis, near Paris, the
ancient cemetery of the Bourbons, the Valois, and all the long line of
French monarchs, were not only defaced on the outside, but utterly
broken down, the bodies exposed, the bones dispersed, and the poor
remains, even of Henry IV. of Navarre, so long the idol of the French
nation, exposed to the rude gaze, and irreverent grasp, of the banditti
who committed the sacrilege.[313]
Le Noire, an artist, had the courage to interpose for preventing the
total dispersion of the materials of those monuments, so valuable to
history and to literature. He procured, with difficulty, permission to
preserve and collect them in a house and garden in the _Rue des Petits
Augustins_, where their mutilated remains continued in safety till after
the restoration of the Bourbons. The enterprise was accomplished at much
personal risk; for if the people he had to deal with had suspected that
the zeal which he testified for the preservation of the monuments, was
rather that of a royalist than of an antiquary, his idolatry would have
been punished by instant death.
But the demolition of those ancient and sacred monuments, was
comparatively a trivial mode of showing hatred to royalty. The vengeance
of the Republicans was directed against the emigrants, who, armed or
unarmed, or from whatever cause they were absent from France, were now
to be at once confounded in a general set of decrees. 1. All emigrants
taken in arms were to suffer death within twenty-four hours. 2.
Foreigners who had quitted the service of France since the 14th July,
1789, were, contrary to the law of nations, subjected to the same
penalty. 3. All Frenchmen who had sought refuge in foreign parts, were
banished for ever from their native country, without any distinction, or
inquiry into the cause of their absence. The effects of these
unfortunate exiles were already under sequestration, and by the
assignats which were issued on the strength of this spoliation, Cambon,
who managed the finances, carried on the war, and supplied the expenses
of government.
The emigrants who had fled abroad, were not more severely treated than
those supposed to share their sentiments who had remained at home.
Persons suspected, from whatever cause, or denounced by private malice
as disinclined to the new system, were piled anew into the prisons,
which had been emptied on the 2d and 3d of September, and where the
blood of their predecessors in misfortune was yet visible on the walls.
The refractory priests were particularly the objects of this species of
oppression, and at length a summary decree was made for transporting
them in the mass from the land of France to the unhealthy colony of
Guiana, in South America. Many of these unfortunate men came to a more
speedy fate.
But the most august victims destined to be sacrificed at the altar of
republican virtue, were the royal family in the Temple, whose continuing
in existence seemed, doubtless, to the leaders, a daily reproach to
their procrastination, and an object to which, when the present spirit
should abate, the affections of the bewildered people might return with
a sort of reaction. The Jacobins resolved that Louis should die, were it
only that the world might see they were not ashamed to attest, with a
bloody seal, the truth of the accusations they had brought against him.
On the other hand, there was every reason to hope that the Girondists
would exert, in protection of the unhappy prince, whatever vigour they
derived from their predominating influence in the Convention. They were,
most of them, men, whose philosophy, though it had driven them on wild
political speculations, had not destroyed the sense of moral right and
wrong, especially now that the struggle was ended betwixt monarchy and
democracy, and the only question remaining concerned the use to be made
of their victory. Although they had aided the attack on the Tuileries,
on the 10th of August, which they considered as a combat, their hands
were unstained with the massacres of September, which, as we shall
presently see, they urged as an atrocious crime against their rivals,
the Jacobins. Besides, they had gained the prize, and were in possession
of the government; and, like the Constitutionalists before them, the
Girondists now desired that here, at length, the revolutionary career
should terminate, and that the ordinary forms of law and justice should
resume their usual channels through France; yielding to the people
protection for life, personal liberty, and private property, and
affording themselves, who held the reins of government, the means of
guiding these honourably safely, and with advantage to the community.
The philosophical statesmen, upon whom these considerations were not
lost, felt nevertheless great embarrassment in the mode of interposing
their protection in the King's favour. Their republicanism was the
feature on which they most prided themselves. They delighted to claim
the share in the downfall of Louis, which was due to their colleague
Barbaroux, and the Federates of Marseilles and Brest. It was upon their
accession to this deed that the Girondists rested their claims to
popularity; and with what front could they now step forward the
defenders, at the least the apologists, of the King whom they had aided
to dethrone; or what advantages would not the Jacobins obtain over them,
when they represented them to the people as lukewarm in their zeal, and
as falling off from the popular cause, in order to preserve the life of
the dethroned tyrant? The Girondist ministers felt these embarrassments,
and suffered themselves to be intimidated by them from making any open,
manly, and direct interference in the King's cause.
[Sidenote: MADAME ROLAND.]
A woman, and, although a woman, not the least distinguished among the
Girondist party, had the courage to urge a decisive and vigorous defence
of the unhappy prince, without having recourse to the veil of a selfish
and insidious policy. This was the wife of Roland, one of the most
remarkable women of her time. A worthless, at least a careless father,
and the doating folly of her mother, had left her when young to pick out
such an education as she could, among the indecencies and impieties of
French philosophy. Yet, though her Memoirs afford revolting specimens of
indelicacy, and exaggerated sentiments in politics, it cannot be denied
that the tenor of her life was innocent and virtuous in practice, and
her sentiments unperverted, when left to their natural course.[314] She
saw the great question in its true and real position; she saw, that it
was only by interposing themselves betwixt the legislative body of
France and the commission of a great crime, that the Girondists could
either remain firm in the government, attract the confidence of honest
men of any description, or have the least chance of putting a period to
the anarchy which was devouring their country. "Save the life of Louis,"
she said;[315] "save him by an open and avowed defence. It is the only
measure that can assure your safety--the only course which can fix the
stamp of public virtue on your government." Those whom she addressed
listened with admiration; but, like one who has rashly climbed to a
height where his brain grows giddy, they felt their own situation too
tottering to permit their reaching a willing hand to support another,
who was in still more imminent peril.
Their condition was indeed precarious. A large party in the Convention
avowedly supported them; and in "_the Plain_," as it was called, a
position held by deputies affecting independence, both of the Girondists
and the Jacobins, and therefore occupying the neutral ground betwixt
them, sate a large number, who, from the timidity of temper which makes
sheep and other weak animals herd together in numbers, had formed
themselves into a faction, which could at any time cast decision into
either scale which they favoured. But they exercised this power of
inclining the balance, less with a view to carrying any political point,
than with that of securing their own safety. In ordinary debates, they
usually gave their votes to the ministers, both because they were
ministers, and also because the milder sentiments of the Girondists were
more congenial to the feelings of men, who would gladly have seen peace
and order restored. But then these timid members of the Plain also
assiduously courted the Jacobins, avoided joining in any measure which
should give them mortal offence, and purchased a sort of immunity from
their revenge, by showing plainly that they deserved only contempt. In
this neutral party the gleanings of the defeated factions of Moderates
and of Constitutionalists were chiefly to be found; resigning themselves
to the circumstances of the moment, consulting their own safety, as they
gave their votes, and waiting, perhaps, till less disorderly days might
restore to them the privilege of expressing their actual sentiments. The
chief of these trucklers to fortune was Barrère, a man of wit and
eloquence, prompt invention, supple opinions, and convenient
conscience.[316] His terror of the Jacobins was great, and his mode of
disarming their resentment, so far as he and the neutral party were
concerned, was often very ingenious. When by argument or by eloquence
the Girondists had obtained some triumph in the Assembly, which seemed
to reduce their adversaries to despair, it was then Barrère, and the
members of _the Plain_, threw themselves between the victors and
vanquished, and, by some proposal of an insidious and neutralizing
nature, prevented the completion of the conquest, and afforded a safe
retreat to the defeated.
The majorities, therefore, which the Girondists obtained in the
Assembly, being partly eked out by this heartless and fluctuating band
of auxiliaries, could never be supposed to arm them with solid or
effective authority. It was absolutely necessary that they should
exhibit such a power of protecting themselves and those who should join
them, as might plainly show that the force was on their side. This point
once established, they might reckon Barrère and his party as faithful
adherents. But while the Jacobins retained the power of surrounding the
Convention at their pleasure with an insurrection of the suburbs,
without the deputies possessing other means of defence than arose out of
their inviolability, the adherence of those whose chief object in voting
was to secure their personal safety, was neither to be hoped nor
expected. The Girondists, therefore, looked anxiously round, to secure,
if it were possible, the possession of such a force, to protect
themselves and their timorous allies.
[Sidenote: DANTON--ROBESPIERRE--MARAT.]
It has been thought, that a more active, more artful body of ministers,
and who were better acquainted with the mode of carrying on
revolutionary movements, might at this period have secured an important
auxiliary, by detaching the formidable Danton from the ranks of the
enemy, and receiving him into their own. It must be observed, that the
camp of the Jacobins contained three separate parties, led each by one
of the triumvirs whom we have already described, and acting in concert,
for the common purpose of propelling the Revolution by the same violent
means which had begun it--of unsheathing the sword of terror, and making
it pass for that of justice--and, in the name of liberty, of letting
murder and spoil, under the protection of armed ruffians of the basest
condition, continue to waste and ravage the departments of France. But,
although agreed in this main object, the triumvirs were extremely
suspicious of each other, and jealous of the rights each might claim in
the spoil which they contemplated. Danton despised Robespierre for his
cowardice, Robespierre feared the ferocious audacity of Danton; and with
him to fear was to hate--and to hate was--when the hour arrived--to
destroy. They differed in their ideas also of the mode of exercising
their terrible system of government. Danton had often in his mouth the
sentence of Machiavel, that when it becomes necessary to shed blood, a
single great massacre has a more dreadful effect than a series of
successive executions. Robespierre, on the contrary, preferred the
latter process as the best way of sustaining the Reign of Terror. The
appetite of Marat could not be satiated, but by combining both modes of
murder. Both Danton and Robespierre kept aloof from the sanguinary
Marat. This position of the chiefs of the Jacobins towards each other
seemed to indicate, that one of the three at least might be detached
from the rest, and might bring his ruffians in opposition to those of
his late comrades, in case of any attempt on the Assembly; and policy
recommended Danton, not averse, it is said, to the alliance, as the most
useful auxiliary.
[Sidenote: MARAT.]
Among the three monsters mentioned, Danton had that energy which the
Girondists wanted, and was well acquainted with the secret movements of
those insurrections to which they possessed no key. His vices of wrath,
luxury, love of spoil, dreadful as they were, are attributes of mortal
men;--the envy of Robespierre, and the instinctive blood-thirstiness of
Marat, were the properties of fiends. Danton, like the huge serpent
called the boa, might be approached with a degree of safety when gorged
with prey--but the appetite of Marat for blood was like the horse-leech,
which says, "Not enough"--and the slaughterous envy of Robespierre was
like the gnawing worm that dieth not, and yields no interval of repose.
In glutting Danton with spoil, and furnishing the means of indulging his
luxury, the Girondists might have purchased his support; but nothing
under the supreme rule in France would have gratified Robespierre; and
an unlimited torrent of the blood of that unhappy country could alone
have satiated Marat. If a colleague was to be chosen out of that
detestable triumvirate, unquestionably Danton was to be considered as
the most eligible.
On the other hand, men like Brissot, Vergniaud, and others, whose
attachment to republicanism was mixed with a spirit of virtue and
honour, might be well adverse to the idea of contaminating their party
with such an auxiliary, intensely stained as Danton was by his share in
the massacres of September. They might well doubt, whether any physical
force which his revolutionary skill, and the arms it could put in
motion, might bring to their standard, would compensate for the moral
horror with which the presence of such a grisly proselyte must strike
all who had any sense of honour or justice. They, therefore, discouraged
the advances of Danton, and resolved to comprise him with Marat and
Robespierre in the impeachment against the Jacobin chiefs, which they
designed to bring forward in the Assembly.
The most obvious means by which the Girondists could ascertain their
safety and the freedom of debate, was by levying a force from the
several departments, each contributing its quota, to be called a
Departmental Legion, which was to be armed and paid to act as a guard
upon the National Convention. The subject was introduced by Roland,
[Sept. 24,] in a report to the Assembly, and renewed on the next day by
Kersaint, a spirited Girondist, who candidly declared the purpose of his
motion: "It was time," he said, "that assassins and their prompters
should see that the law had scaffolds."
The Girondists obtained, that a committee of six members should be
named, to report on the state of the capital, on the encouragement
afforded to massacre, and on the mode of forming a departmental force
for the defence of the metropolis. The decree was carried for a moment;
but, on the next day, the Jacobins demanded that it should be revoked,
denying that there was any occasion for such a defence to the
Convention, and accusing the ministers of an intention to surround
themselves with a force of armed satellites, in order to overawe the
good city of Paris, and carry into effect their sacrilegious plan of
dismembering France.[317] Rebecqui and Barbaroux replied to this charge
by impeaching Robespierre, on their own testimony, of aspiring to the
post of dictator. The debate became more tempestuous the more that the
tribunes or galleries of the hall were filled with the violent followers
of the Jacobin party, who shouted, cursed, and yelled, to back the
exclamations and threats of their leaders in the Assembly. While the
Girondists were exhausting themselves to find out terms of reproach for
Marat, that prodigy stepped forth, and raised the disorder to the
highest, by avowing himself the author and advocate for a dictatorship.
The anger of the Convention seemed thoroughly awakened, and Vergniaud
read to the deputies an extract from Marat's journal, in which, after
demanding two hundred and sixty thousand heads, which was his usual
stint, he abused the Convention in the grossest terms, and exhorted the
people to ACT[318]--words, of which the import was by this time
perfectly understood.
This passage excited general horror, and the victory for a moment seemed
in the hands of the Girondists; but they did not pursue it with
sufficient vigour. The meeting passed to the order of the day; and
Marat, in ostentatious triumph, produced a pistol, with which he said he
would have blown out his brains, had a decree of accusation been passed
against him. The Girondists not only lost the advantage of discomfiting
their enemies by the prosecution of one of their most noted leaders, but
were compelled for the present to abandon their plan of a departmental
guard, and resign themselves to the guardianship of the faithful
citizens of Paris.[319]
This city of Paris was at the time under the power of the intrusive
community, or Common Council, many of whom had forced themselves into
office on the 10th of August. It was the first act of their
administration to procure the assassination of Mandat, the commandant of
the national guard; and their accompts, still extant, bear testimony,
that it was by their instrumentality that the murderers of September
were levied and paid. Trained Jacobins and pitiless ruffians themselves,
this civic body had raised to be their agents and assistants an unusual
number of municipal officers, who were at once their guards, their
informers, their spies, their jailors, and their executioners. They had,
besides, obtained a majority of the inhabitants in most of the
sections, whose votes placed them and their agents in command of the
national guard; and the pikemen of the suburbs were always ready to
second their excellent community, even against the Convention itself,
which, in point of freedom of action, or effective power, made a figure
scarcely more respectable than that of the King after his return from
Varennes.
Roland almost every day carried to the Convention his vain complaints,
that the course of the law for which he was responsible, was daily
crossed, thwarted, and impeded, by the proceedings of this usurping
body. The considerable funds of the city itself, with those of its
hospitals and other public establishments of every kind, were
dilapidated by these revolutionary intruders, and applied to their own
purposes. The minister at length, in a formal report to the Convention,
inculpated the Commune in these and such like offences. In another part
of the report, he intimated a plot of the Jacobins to assassinate the
Girondists, possess themselves of the government by arms, and choose
Robespierre dictator. Louvet denounced Robespierre as a traitor, and
Barbaroux proposed a series of decrees; the first declaring the
Convention free to leave any city, where they should be exposed to
constraint and violence; the second resolving to form a conventional
guard; the third declaring, that the Convention should form itself into
a court of justice, for trial of state crimes; the fourth announcing,
that in respect the sections of Paris had declared their sittings
permanent, that resolution should be abrogated.
Instead of adopting the energetic measures proposed by Barbaroux, the
Convention allowed Robespierre eight days for his defence against
Louvet's accusation, and ordered to the bar, [Nov. 5,] ten members of
the Community, from whom they were contented to accept such slight
apologies, and evasive excuses, for their unauthorised interference with
the power of the Convention, as these insolent demagogues condescended
to offer.
The accusation of Robespierre though boldly urged by Louvet and
Barbaroux, was also eluded, by passing to the order of the day; and thus
the Convention showed plainly, that however courageous they had been
against their monarch, they dared not protect the liberty which they
boasted of, against the encroachment of fiercer demagogues than
themselves.[320]
Barbaroux endeavoured to embolden the Assembly, by bringing once more
from his native city a body of those fiery Marseillois, who had formed
the vanguard of the mob on the 10th of August. He succeeded so far in
his scheme, that a few scores of those Federates again appeared in
Paris, where their altered demeanour excited surprise. Their songs were
again chanted, their wild Moresco dances and gestures again surprised
the Parisians; and the more, as in their choruses they imprecated
vengeance on the Jacobins, called out for mercy to the "poor tyrant," so
they termed the King, and shouted in the cause of peace, order, and the
Convention.[321]
The citizens of Paris, who could not reconcile the songs and
exclamations of the Marseillois with their appearance and character,
concluded that a snare was laid for them, and abstained from uniting
themselves with men, whose sincerity was so suspicious. The Marseillois
themselves, discouraged with their cold reception, or not liking their
new trade of maintaining order so well as their old one of oversetting
it, melted away by degrees, and were soon no more seen nor heard of.
Some of the Breton Federates, kept in the interest of the Girondists, by
their countrymen the deputies Kersaint and Kervclagan, remained still
attached to the Convention, though their numbers were too few to afford
them protection in any general danger.
If the Memoirs of Dumouriez are to be relied on, that active and
intriguing general presented to the Girondists another resource, not
free certainly from hazard or difficulty to the republican government,
which was the idol of these theoretical statesmen, but affording, if his
means had proved adequate to the execution of his plans, a certain
bulwark against the encroachments of the hideous anarchy threatened by
the Jacobin ascendency.
[Sidenote: DUMOURIEZ'S PROPOSAL.]
General Dumouriez was sufficiently hated by the Jacobins,
notwithstanding the successes which he had gained on the part of France
over foreign enemies, to induce him to feel the utmost desire of putting
down their usurped power; but he was under the necessity of acting with
great caution. The bad success of La Fayette, deserted by his army as
soon as he attempted to lead them against Paris, was in itself
discouraging; but Dumouriez was besides conscious that the Jacobin
clubs, together with the commissioners of the Convention, with Danton at
their head, had been actively engaged in disorganizing his army, and
diminishing his influence over them. Thus circumstanced, he naturally
resolved to avoid hazarding any violent measure without the support of
the Convention, in case of being deserted by his army. But he affirms,
that he repeatedly informed the Girondists, then predominant in the
Assembly, that if they could obtain a decree, but of four lines,
authorising such a measure, he was ready to march to Paris at the head
of a chosen body of troops, who would have been willing to obey such a
summons; and that he would by this means have placed the Convention in a
situation, when they might have set the Jacobins and their
insurrectionary forces at absolute defiance.[322]
Perhaps the Girondists entertained the fear, first, that Dumouriez's
influence with his troops might prove as inefficient as that of La
Fayette, and leave them to atone with their heads for such a measure
attempted and unexecuted. Or, secondly, that if the manœuvre proved
successful, they would be freed from fear of the Jacobins, only to be
placed under the restraint of a military chief, whose mind was well
understood to be in favour of monarchy of one kind or other. So that,
conceiving they saw equal risk in the alternative, they preferred the
hazard of seeing their fair and favourite vision of a republic
overthrown by the pikes of the Jacobins, rather than by the bayonets of
Dumouriez's army. They turned, therefore, a cold ear to the proposal,
which afterwards they would gladly have accepted, when the general had
no longer the power to carry it into execution.
Thus the factions, so intimately united for the destruction of royalty,
could not, when that step was gained, combine for any other purpose save
the great crime of murdering their deposed sovereign. Nay, while the
Jacobins and Girondists seemed moving hand in hand to the ultimate
completion of that joint undertaking, the union was only in outward
appearance; for the Girondists, though apparently acting in concert with
their stern rivals, were in fact dragged after them by compulsion, and
played the part less of actors than subdued captives in this final
triumph of democracy. They were fully persuaded of the King's innocence
as a man, of his inviolability and exemption from criminal process as a
constitutional authority. They were aware that the deed meditated would
render France odious to all the other nations of Europe; and that the
Jacobins, to whom war and confusion were natural elements, were desirous
for that very reason to bring Louis to the scaffold. All this was plain
to them, and yet their pride as philosophers made them ashamed to be
thought capable of interesting themselves in the fate of a tyrant; and
their desire of getting the French nation under their own exclusive
government, induced them to consent to any thing rather than protect the
obnoxious though innocent sovereign, at the hazard of losing their
popularity, and forfeiting their dearly won character of being true
Republicans.
A committee of twenty-four persons had been appointed early in the
session of the Convention, to inquire into, and report upon, the grounds
for accusing Louis. Their report was brought up on the 1st of November,
1792, and a more loathsome tissue of confusion and falsehood never was
laid upon the table of such an assembly. All acts that had been done by
the Ministers in every department, which could be twisted into such a
shape as the times called criminal, were charged as deeds, for which the
sovereign was himself responsible; and the burden of the whole was to
accuse the King, when he had scarcely a single regiment of guards even
at his nominal disposal, of nourishing the intention of massacring the
Convention, defended by thirty thousand national guards, besides the
federates, and the militia of the suburbs.[323]
[Sidenote: DOCUMENTS OF THE IRON CHEST.]
The Convention were rather ashamed of this report, and would scarce
permit it to be printed. So soon as it appeared, two or three persons,
who were therein mentioned as accomplices of particular acts charged
against the King, contradicted the report upon their oath.[324] An
additional charge was brought under the following mysterious
circumstances:--Gamin, a locksmith of Versailles, communicated to
Roland, about the latter end of December, that, in the beginning of May,
1792, he had been employed by the King to secrete an iron chest, or
cabinet, in the wall of a certain apartment in the Tuileries, which he
disclosed to the ministers of justice. He added a circumstance which
throws discredit on his whole story, namely, that the King gave him with
his own hand a glass of wine, after taking which he was seized with a
cholic, followed by a kind of paralysis, which deprived him for
_fourteen_ months of the use of his limbs, and the power of working for
his bread. The inference of the wretch was, that the King had attempted
to poison him; which those may believe who can number fourteen months
betwixt the beginning of May and the end of December in the same year.
This gross falsehood utterly destroys Gamin's evidence; and as the King
always denied his knowledge of the existence of such a chest with such
papers, we are reduced to suppose, either that Gamin had been employed
by one of the royal ministers, and had brought the King personally into
the tale for the greater grace of his story, or that the papers found in
some other place of safety had been selected, and put into the chest by
the Jacobin commissioners, then employed in surveying and searching the
palace, with the purpose of trumping up evidence against the King.
Roland acted very imprudently in examining the contents of the chest
alone, and without witness, instead of calling in the commissioners
aforesaid, who were in the palace at the time. This was perhaps done
with the object of putting aside such papers as might, in that hour of
fear and uncertainty, have brought into danger some of his own party or
friends. One of importance, however, was found, which the Jacobins
turned into an implement against the Girondists. It was an overture from
that party addressed to Louis XVI., shortly before the 10th of August,
engaging to oppose the motion for his forfeiture, providing Louis would
recall to his councils the three discarded ministers of their faction.
The contents of the chest were of a very miscellaneous nature. The
documents consisted of letters, memorials, and plans, from different
persons, and at different dates, offering advice, or tendering support
to the King, and proposing plans for the freedom of his person. The
Royalist project of Mirabeau, in his latter days, was found amongst the
rest; in consequence of which his body was dragged out of the Pantheon,
formerly the Church of Saint Genevieve, now destined to receive the
bodies of the great men of the Revolution, but whose lodgings shifted as
often as if they had been taken by the month.
The documents, as we have said, consisted chiefly of projects for the
King's service, which he certainly never acted on, probably never
approved of, and perhaps never saw. The utmost to which he could be
liable, was such penalty as may be due to one who retains possession of
plans submitted to his consideration, but which have in no shape
obtained his assent. It was sufficiently hard to account Louis
responsible for such advice of his ministers as he really adopted; but
it was a dreadful extension of his responsibility to make him answerable
for such as he had virtually rejected. Besides which, the story of Gamin
was so self-contradictory in one circumstance, and so doubtful in
others, as to carry no available proof that the papers had been in the
King's possession; so that this new charge was as groundless as those
brought up by the first committee; and, arguing upon the known law of
any civilized country, the accusations against him ought to have been
dismissed, as founded on the most notorious injustice.[325]
[Sidenote: CHARLES I. AND LOUIS XVI.]
There was one circumstance which probably urged those into whose hands
Louis had fallen, to proceed against his person to the uttermost. They
knew that, in English history, a king had been condemned to death by his
subjects, and were resolved that France should not remain behind England
in the exhibition of a spectacle so interesting and edifying to a people
newly regenerated. This parallel case would not perhaps have been
thought a worthy precedent in other countries; but in France there is a
spirit of wild enthusiasm, a desire of following out an example even to
the most exaggerated point, and of outdoing, if possible, what other
nations have done before them. This had doubtless its influence in
causing Louis to be brought to the bar in 1792, like Charles of England
in 1648.
The French statesmen did not pause to reflect, that the violent death of
Charles only paved the way for a series of years spent in servitude
under military despotism, and then to restoration of the legitimate
sovereign. Had they regarded the precedent on this side, they would have
obtained a glimpse into futurity, and might have presaged what were to
be the consequences of the death of Louis. Neither did the French
consider, that by a great part of the English nation the execution of
Charles Stuart is regarded as a national crime, and the anniversary
still observed as a day of fasting and penitence; that others who
condemn the King's conduct in and preceding the Civil War, do, like the
Whig Churchill, still consider his death as an unconstitutional
action;[326] that the number is small indeed who think it justifiable
even on the precarious grounds of state necessity; and that it is barely
possible a small portion of enthusiasts may still exist, who glory in
the deed as an act of popular vengeance.
But even among this last description of persons, the French regicides
would find themselves entirely at a loss to vindicate the execution of
Louis by the similar fate of Charles; and it would be by courtesy only,
if at all, that they could be admitted to the honours of a sitting at a
Calves-Head Club.[327]
The comparison between these unhappy monarchs fails in almost every
point, excepting in the closing scene; and no parallel can, with justice
to either, be drawn betwixt them. The most zealous Cavalier will, in
these enlightened days, admit, that the early government of Charles was
marked by many efforts to extend the prerogative beyond its legal
bounds; that there were instances of oppressive fines, cruel punishment
by mutilation, long and severe imprisonments in distant forts and
castles; exertions of authority which no one seeks to justify, and which
those who are the King's apologists can only endeavour to mitigate, by
alleging the precedents of arbitrary times, or the interpretation of the
laws by courtly ministers, and time-serving lawyers. The conduct of
Louis XVI., from the hour he assumed the throne, was, on the contrary,
an example of virtue and moderation.[328] Instead of levying ship-money
and benevolences, Louis lightened the feudal services of the vassals,
and the _corvée_ among the peasantry. Where Charles endeavoured to
enforce conformity to the Church of England by pillory and ear-slitting,
Louis allowed the Protestants the free use of their religion, and
discharged the use of torture in all cases whatever. Where Charles
visited his Parliament to violate their freedom by arresting five of
their members, Louis may be said to have surrendered himself an
unresisting prisoner to the representatives of the people, whom he had
voluntarily summoned around him. But above all, Charles, in person, or
by his generals, waged a long and bloody war with his subjects, fought
battles in every county of England, and was only overcome and made
prisoner, after a lengthened and deadly contest, in which many thousands
fell on both sides. The conduct of Louis was in every respect different.
He never offered one blow in actual resistance, even when he had the
means in his power. He ordered up, indeed, the forces under Maréchal
Broglio; but he gave them command to retire, so soon as it was evident
that they must either do so, or act offensively against the people. In
the most perilous situations of his life, he showed the utmost
reluctance to shed the blood of his subjects. He would not trust his
attendants with pistols, during the flight to Varennes; he would not
give the officer of hussars orders to clear the passage, when his
carriage was stopped upon the bridge. When he saw that the martial array
of the Guards did not check the audacity of the assailants on the 10th
of August, he surrendered himself to the Legislative Assembly, a
prisoner at discretion, rather than mount his horse and place himself at
the head of his faithful troops and subjects. The blood that was shed
that day was without command of his. He could have no reason for
encouraging such a strife, which, far from defending his person, then in
the custody of the Assembly, was likely to place it in the most imminent
danger. And in the very last stage, when he received private notice that
there were individuals determined to save his life at peril of their
own, he forbade the enterprise. "Let not a drop of blood be shed on my
account," he said; "I would not consent to it for the safety of my
crown: I never will purchase mere life at such a rate." These were
sentiments perhaps fitter for the pious sectaries of the community of
Friends, than for the King of a great nation; but such as they were,
Louis felt and conscientiously acted on them. And yet his subjects could
compare his character, and his pretended guilt, with the bold and
haughty Stuart, who, in the course of the Civil War, bore arms in
person, and charged at the head of his own regiment of guards!
Viewed in his kingly duty, the conduct of Louis is equally void of
blame; unless it be that blame which attaches to a prince, too yielding
and mild to defend the just rights of his crown. He yielded, with feeble
struggling, to every demand in succession which was made upon him, and
gave way to every inroad on the existing state of France. Instead of
placing himself as a barrier between his people and his nobility, and
bringing both to some fair terms of composition, he suffered the latter
to be driven from his side, and by the ravaging their estates, and the
burning of their houses, to be hurried into emigration. He adopted one
popular improvement after another, each innovating on the royal
authority, or derogatory to the royal dignity. Far from having deserved
the charge of opposing the nation's claim of freedom, it would have
been well for themselves and him, had he known how to limit his grant to
that quantity of freedom which they were qualified to make a legitimate
use of; leaving it for future princes to slacken the reins of
government, in proportion as the public mind in France should become
formed to the habitual exercise of political rights.
[Sidenote: PREPARATIONS FOR THE KING'S TRIAL.]
The King's perfect innocence was therefore notorious to the whole world,
but especially to those who now usurped the title of arraigning him; and
men could hardly persuade themselves, that his life was seriously in
danger. An ingenious contrivance of the Jacobins seems to have been
intended to drive the wavering Girondists into the snare of voting for
the King's trial. Saint Just, one of their number, made a furious speech
against any formality being observed, save a decree of death, on the
urgency of the occasion. "What availed," said the supporters of this
brief and sure measure, "the ceremonies of grand and petty jury? The
cannon which made a breach in the Tuileries, the unanimous shout of the
people on the 10th of August, had come in place of all other
solemnities. The Convention had no farther power to inquire; its sole
duty was to pronounce, or rather confirm and execute, the doom of the
sovereign people."
This summary proposal was highly applauded, not only by the furious
crowds by whom the galleries were always occupied, but by all the
exaggerations of the more violent democrats. They exclaimed that every
citizen had the same right over the life of Louis which Brutus possessed
over that of Cæsar. Others cried out, that the very fact of having
reigned, was in itself a crime notorious enough to dispense with further
investigation, and authorise instant punishment.[329]
Stunned by these clamours, the Girondists and neutral party, like all
feeble-minded men, chose a middle course, and instead of maintaining the
King's innocence, adopted measures, calculated to save him indeed from
immediate slaughter, but which ended by consigning him to a tribunal too
timid to hear his cause justly. They resolved to urge the right of the
National Convention to judge in the case of Louis.
There were none in the Convention who dared to avow facts to which their
conscience bore witness, but the consequences of admitting which, were
ingeniously urged by the sophist Robespierre, as a condemnation of their
own conduct. "One party," said the wily logician, "must be clearly
guilty; either the King, or the Convention, who have ratified the
actions of the insurgent people. If you have dethroned an innocent and
legal monarch, what are you but traitors? and why sit you here--why not
hasten to the Temple, set Louis at liberty, install him again in the
Tuileries, and beg on your knees for a pardon you have not merited? But
if you have, in the great popular act which you have ratified, only
approved of the deposition of a tyrant, summon him to the bar, and
demand a reckoning for his crimes." This dilemma pressed on the mind of
many members, who could not but see their own condemnation the necessary
consequence of the King's acquittal. And while some felt the force of
this argument, all were aware of the obvious danger to be encountered
from the wrath of the Jacobins and their satellites, should they dare to
dissent from the vote which these demagogues demanded from the Assembly.
When Robespierre had ended, Pétion arose and moved that the King should
be tried before the Convention. It is said, the Mayor of Paris took the
lead in this cruel persecution, because Louis had spoken to him sharply
about the tumultuary inroad of the Jacobin rabble into the Tuileries on
the 20th of June; and when Pétion attempted to reply, had pointed to the
broken grating through which the entrance had been forced, and sternly
commanded him to be silent. If this was true, it was a bitter revenge
for so slight an offence, and the subsequent fate of Pétion is the less
deserving of pity.
The motion was carried [Dec. 3] without opposition,[330] and the next
chapter affords us the melancholy results.
FOOTNOTES:
[303] Annual Register, vol xxxiv., pp. 230, 236.
[304] Bouillé's Memoirs, p. 250.
[305] Manuel was born at Montargis in 1751. On the trial of the King he
voted for imprisonment and banishment in the event of peace. When the
Queen's trial came on, he was summoned as a witness against her; but
only expressed admiration of her fortitude, and regret for her
misfortunes. In November, 1793, he was condemned to death by the
Revolutionary Tribunal, and executed. Among other works, Manuel
published "Coup d'œil Philosophique sur le Règne de St. Louis,"
"Voyages de l'Opinion dans les Quatres Parties du Monde," and "Lettres
sur la Révolution."
[306] Lacretelle, tom. x., p. 12; Mignet, tom. iii., p. 150.
[307] Born at Bourdeaux in 1765. He voted for the death of the King--and
was guillotined, Oct., 1793.
[308] Lacretelle, tom. x., p. 16.
[309] Esprit des Lois, liv. iii., c. 9.
[310] "One night the jewel-office, in the Tuileries, was pillaged, and
all the splendid ornaments of the crown disappeared. The seals affixed
on the locks were removed, but no marks of violence appeared on them,
which showed that the abstraction was by order of the authorities, and
not by popular violence."--THIERS, tom. iii., p. 103.
[311] Dumouriez, vol. iii., p. 262; Journal des Jacobins, 14th Oct.,
1792.
[312] Emile, liv. i.
[313] "The first vault opened was that of Turenne. The body was found
dry like a mummy, the features perfectly resembling the portrait of this
distinguished general. Relics were sought after with eagerness, and
Camille Desmoullins cut off one of the little fingers. The body, at the
intercession of M. Desfontaines, was removed to the Jardin des Plantes.
The features of Henry the Fourth were also perfect. A soldier cut off a
lock of the beard with his sabre, and putting it upon his upper lip,
exclaimed, 'Et moi aussi, je suis soldat Français! désormais je n'aurai
pas d'autre moustache!' The body was placed upright upon a stone for the
rabble to divert themselves with it; and a woman, reproaching the dead
Henry with the crime of having been a king, knocked down the corpse, by
giving it a blow in the face. Two large pits had been dug in front of
the north entrance of the church, and quick lime laid in them; into
those pits the bodies were thrown promiscuously; the leaden coffins were
then carried to a furnace, which had been erected in the cemetery, and
cast into balls, destined to punish the enemies of the republic."--See
Promenade aux Sépultures Royales de Saint Denis, par M. P. St. A. G.,
and LACRETELLE, tom. xi., p. 264.
[314] "To a very beautiful person, Madame Roland united great powers of
intellect; her reputation stood very high, and her friends never spoke
of her but with the most profound respect. In character she was a
Cornelia; and had she been blessed with sons, would have educated them
like the Gracchi. The simplicity of her dress did not detract from her
natural grace and elegance, and though her pursuits were more adapted to
the other sex, she adorned them with all the charms of her own. Her
personal memoirs are admirable. They are an imitation of Rousseau's
Confessions, and often not unworthy of the original."--DUMONT, p. 326.
[315] At the bar of the National Convention, Dec. 7, 1792.
[316] "I used to meet Barrère at a table d'hòte. I considered him of a
mild and amiable temper. He was very well-bred, and seemed to love the
Revolution from a sentiment of benevolence. His association with
Robespierre, and the court which he paid to the different parties he
successively joined and afterwards deserted, were less the effect of an
evil disposition, than of a timid and versatile character, and a
conceit, which made it incumbent upon him to appear as a public man. His
talents as an orator were by no means of the first order. He was
afterwards surnamed the Anacreon of the guillotine; but when I knew him
he was only the Anacreon of the Revolution, upon which, in his 'Point du
Jour,' he wrote some very amorous strains."--DUMONT, p. 199.
[317] Lacretelle, tom. x., p. 41.
[318] "O! peuple babillard, si tu savais agir!"
[319] Thiers, tom. iii., p. 170; Lacretelle, tom. x., p. 23.
[320] Mignet, tom. i., p. 224; Thiers, tom. iii., p. 213; Lacretelle,
tom. x., p. 54.
[321] "Point de procès au roi! épargnons le pauvre tyran!"--LACRETELLE,
tom. x., p. 47.
[322] Dumouriez, vol. iii., p. 273.
[323] Mignet, tom. i., p. 228.
[324] M. de Septueil, in particular, quoted as being the agent by whom
Louis XVI. was said to have transmitted money to his brothers when in
exile, positively denied the fact, and made affidavit accordingly.--S.
[325] Mignet, tom. i., p. 229; Montgaillard, tom. iii., p. 265; Thiers,
tom. iii., p. 259; Lacretelle, tom. x., p. 164; Madame Campan, vol. ii.,
p. 222.
[326]
"Unhappy Stuart! harshly though that name
Grates on my ear, I should have died with shame,
To see my King before his subjects stand,
And at their bar hold up his royal hand;
At their command to hear the monarch plead,
By their decrees to see that monarch bleed.
What though thy faults were many, and were great--
What though they shook the fabric of the state?
In royalty secure thy person stood,
And sacred was the fountain of thy blood.
Vile ministers, who dared abuse their trust,
Who dared seduce a king to be unjust,
Vengeance, with justice leagued, with power made strong,
Had nobly crush'd--The King can do no wrong."
_Gotham._--S.
[327] This club used to meet on the 30th January, at a tavern near
Charing Cross, to celebrate the anniversary of the death of Charles I.
Their toasts were, "The glorious year, 1648." "D----n to the race of the
Stuarts." "The pious memory of Oliver Cromwell," &c.--See _Gent.'s
Mag._, vol. v., p. 105; and "_History of the Calves-Head Club_."
[328] "No one act of tyranny can be laid to Louis's charge: and, far
from restraining the liberty of the press, it was the Archbishop of
Sens, the King's prime minister, who, in the name of his Majesty,
invited all writers to make known their opinions upon the form and
manner of assembling the States-General."--DE STAËL, vol. ii., p. 94.
[329] Lacretelle, tom. x., p. 145.
[330] Thiers, tom. iii., p. 257.