Chapter XII: Part 12

I was surprized at meeting among our fellow-prisoners a number of Dutch officers. I find they had been some time in the town on their parole, and were sent here by Dumont, for refusing to permit their men to work on the fortifications.--The French government and its agents despise the laws of war hitherto observed; they consider them as a sort of aristocratie militaire, and they pretend, on the same principle, to be enfranchised from the law of nations.--An orator of the convention lately boasted, that he felt himself infinitely superior to the prejudices of Grotius, Puffendorff, and Vatel, which he calls "l'aristocratie diplomatique."--Such sublime spirits think, because they differ from the rest of mankind, that they surpass them. Like Icarus, they attempt to fly, and are perpetually struggling in the mire.--Plain common sense has long pointed out a rule of action, from which all deviation is fatal, both to nations and individuals. England, as well as France, has furnished its examples; and the annals of genius in all countries are replete with the miseries of eccentricity.--Whoever has followed the course of the French revolution, will, I believe, be convinced, that the greatest evils attending on it have been occasioned by an affected contempt for received maxims. A common banditti, acting only from the desire of plunder, or men, erring only through ignorance, could not have subjugated an whole people, had they not been assisted by narrow-minded philosophers, who were eager to sacrifice their country to the vanity of making experiments, and were little solicitous whether their systems were good or bad, provided they were celebrated as the authors of them. Yet, where are they now? Wandering, proscribed, and trembling at the fate of their followers and accomplices.--The Brissotins, sacrificed by a party even worse than themselves, have died without exciting either pity or admiration. Their fall was considered as the natural consequence of their exaltation, and the courage with which they met death obtained no tribute but a cold and simple comment, undistinguished from the news of the day, and ending with it.

December.

Last night, after we had been asleep about an hour, (for habit, that "lulls the wet sea-boy on the high and giddy mast," has reconciled us to sleep even here,) we were alarmed by the trampling of feet, and sudden unlocking of our door. Our apprehensions gave us no time for conjecture --in a moment an ill-looking fellow entered the room with a lantern, two soldiers holding drawn swords, and a large dog! The whole company walked as it were processionally to the end of the apartment, and, after observing in silence the beds on each side, left us. It would not be easy to describe what we suffered at this moment: for my own part, I thought only of the massacres of September, and the frequent proposals at the Jacobins and the Convention for dispatching the _"gens suspect,"_ and really concluded I was going to terminate my existence _"revolutionnairement."_ I do not now know the purport of these visits, but I find they are not unusual, and most probably intended to alarm the prisoners.

After many enquiries and messages, I have had the mortification of hearing that Mr. and Mrs. D____ were taken to Arras, and were there even before I left it. The letters sent to and from the different prisons are read by so many people, and pass through so many hands, that it is not surprizing we have not heard from each other. As far as I can learn, they had obtained leave, after their first arrest, to remove to a house in the vicinity of Dourlens for a few days, on account of Mrs. D____'s health, which had suffered by passing the summer in the town, and that at the taking of Toulon they were again arrested while on a visit, and conveyed to a _Maison d'Arret_ at Arras. I am the more anxious for them, as it seems they were unprepared for such an event; and as the seals were put upon their effects, I fear they must be in want of every thing. I might, perhaps, have succeeded in getting them removed here, but Fleury's Arras friend, it seems, did not think, when the Convention had abolished every other part of Christianity, that they intended still to exact a partial observance of the eighth article of the decalogue; and having, in the sense of Antient Pistol, "conveyed" a little too notoriously, Le Bon has, by way of securing him from notice or pursuit, sent him to the frontiers in the capacity of Commissary.

The prison, considering how many French inhabitants it contains, is tolerably quiet--to say the truth, we are not very sociable, and still less gay. Common interest establishes a sort of intimacy between those of the same apartment; but the rest of the house pass each other, without farther intercourse than silent though significant civility. Sometimes you see a pair of unfortunate aristocrates talking politics at the end of a passage, or on a landing-place; and here and there a bevy of females, en deshabille, recounting altogether the subject of their arrest. One's ear occasionally catches a few half-suppressed notes of a proscribed aire, but the unhallowed sounds of the Carmagnole and Marseillois are never heard, and would be thought more dissonant here than the war-whoop. In fact, the only appearance of gaiety is among the ideots and lunatics. --_"Je m'ennuye furieusement,"_ is the general exclamation.--An Englishman confined at the Bicetre would express himself more forcibly, but, it is certain, the want of knowing how to employ themselves does not form a small part of the distresses of our fellow-prisoners; and when they tell us they are _"ennuyes,"_ they say, perhaps, nearly as much as they feel-- for, as far as I can observe, the loss of liberty has not the same effect on a Frenchman as an Englishman. Whether this arises from political causes, or the natural indifference of the French character, I am not qualified to determine; probably from both: yet when I observe this facility of mind general, and by no means peculiar to the higher classes, I cannot myself but be of opinion, that it is more an effect of their original disposition than of their form of government; for though in England we were accustomed from our childhood to consider every man in France as liable to wake and find himself in the Bastille, or at Mont St. Michel, this formidable despotism existed more in theory than in practice; and if courtiers and men of letters were intimidated by it, the mass of the people troubled themselves very little about Lettres de Cachet. The revenge or suspicion of Ministers might sometimes pursue those who aimed at their power, or assailed their reputation; but the lesser gentry, the merchants, or the shopkeepers, were very seldom victims of arbitrary imprisonment--and I believe, amongst the evils which it was the object of the revolution to redress, this (except on the principle) was far from being of the first magnitude. I am not likely, under my present circumstances, to be an advocate for the despotism of any form of government; and I only give it as a matter of opinion, that the civil liberty of the French was not so often and generally violated,* as to influence their character in such a degree as to render them insensible of its loss. At any rate, we must rank it among the _bizarreries_ [Unaccountable whimsical events.] of this world, that the French should have been prepared, by the theory of oppression under their old system, for enduring the practice of it under the new one; and that what during the monarchy was only possible to a few, is, under the republic, almost certain to all.

* I remember in 1789, after the destruction of the Bastille, our
compassionate countrymen were taught to believe that this tremendous
prison was peopled with victims, and that even the dungeons were
inhabited; yet the truth is, though it would not have told so
pathetically, or have produced so much theatrical effect, there were
only seven persons confined in the whole building, and certainly not
one in the dungeons.

Amiens, Providence, Dec. 10, 1793.

We have again, as you will perceive, changed our abode, and that too without expecting, and almost without desiring it. In my moments of sullenness and despondency, I was not very solicitous about the modifications of our confinement, and little disposed to be better satisfied with one prison than another: but, heroics apart, external comforts are of some importance, and we have, in many respects, gained by our removal.

Our present habitation is a spacious building, lately a convent, and though now crouded with more prisoners by two or three hundred than it will hold conveniently, yet we are better lodged than at the Bicetre, and we have also a large garden, good water, and, what above all is desirable, the liberty of delivering our letters or messages ourselves (in presence of the guard) to any one who will venture to approach us. Mad. de ____ and myself have a small cell, where we have just room to place our beds, but we have no fire-place, and the maids are obliged to sleep in an adjoining passage.

A few evenings ago, while we were at the Bicetre, we were suddenly informed by the keeper that Dumont had sent some soldiers with an order to convey us that night to the Providence. We were at first rather surprized than pleased, and reluctantly gathered our baggage together with as much expedition as we could, while the men who were to escort us were exclaiming "a la Francaise" at the trifling delay this occasioned. When we had passed the gate, we found Fleury, with some porters, ready to receive our beds, and overjoyed at having procured us a more decent prison, for, it seems, he could by no means reconcile himself to the name of Bicetre. We had about half a mile to walk, and on the road he contrived to acquaint us with the means by which he had solicited this favour of Dumont. After advising with all Mad. de ____'s friends who were yet at liberty, and finding no one willing to make an effort in her behalf, for fear of involving themselves, he discovered an old acquaintance in the "femme de chambre" of one of Fleury's mistresses.-- This, for one of Fleury's sagacity, was a spring to have set the whole Convention in a ferment; and in a few days he profited so well by this female patronage, as to obtain an order for transferring us hither. On our arrival, we were informed, as usual, that the house was already full, and that there was no possibility of admitting us. We however, set up all night in the keeper's room with some other people newly arrived like ourselves, and in the morning, after a little disputing and a pretty general derangement of the more ancient inhabitants, we were "nichees," as I have described to you.

We have not yet quitted our room much, but I observe that every one appears more chearful, and more studied in their toilette, than at the Bicetre, and I am willing to infer from thence that confinement here is less insupportable.--I have been employed two days in enlarging the notes I had made in our last prison, and in making them more legible, for I ventured no farther than just to scribble with a pencil in a kind of short-hand of my own invention, and not even that without a variety of precautions. I shall be here less liable either to surprize or observation, and as soon as I have secured what I have already noted, (which I intend to do to-night,) I shall continue my remarks in the usual form. You will find even more than my customary incorrectness and want of method since we left Peronne; but I shall not allow your competency as a critic, until you have been a prisoner in the hands of French republicans.

It will not be improper to notice to you a very ingenious decree of Gaston, (a member of the Convention,) who lately proposed to embark all the English now in France at Brest, and then to sink the ships.--Perhaps the Committee of Public Welfare are now in a sort of benevolent indecision, whether this, or Collot d'Herbois' gunpowder scheme, shall have the preference. Legendre's iron cage and simple hanging will, doubtless, be rejected, as too slow and formal. The mode of the day is "les grandes mesures." If I be not seriously alarmed at these propositions, it is not that life is indifferent to me, or that I think the government too humane to adopt them. My tranquillity arises from reflecting that such measures would be of no political use, and that we shall most likely be soon forgotten in the multitude of more important concerns. Those, however, whom I endeavour to console by this reasoning, tell me it is nothing less than infallible, that the inutility of a crime is here no security against its perpetration, and that any project which tends to evil will sooner be remembered than one of humanity or justice.

[End of Vol. I. The Printed Books]

[Beginning of Volume II. Of The Printed Books]

Providence, Dec. 20, 1793.

"All places that are visited by the eye of Heaven, are to the wise man happy havens." If Shakspeare's philosophy be orthodox, the French have, it must be confessed, many claims to the reputation of a wise people; and though you know I always disputed their pretensions to general gaiety, yet I acknowledge that misfortune does not deprive them of the share they possess, and, if one may judge by appearances, they have at least the habit, more than any other nation, of finding content under situations with which it should seem incompatible. We are here between six and seven hundred, of all ages and of all ranks, taken from our homes, and from all that usually makes the comfort of life, and crowded together under many of the inflictions that constitute its misery; yet, in the midst of all this, we fiddle, dress, rhyme, and visit as ceremoniously as though we had nothing to disturb us. Our beaux, after being correctly frizz'd and powdered behind some door, compliment the belle just escaped from a toilet, performed amidst the apparatus of the kitchen; three or four beds are piled one upon another to make room for as many card-tables; and the wits of the prison, who are all the morning employed in writing doleful placets to obtain their liberty, in the evening celebrate the loss of it in bout-rimees and acrostics.

I saw an ass at the _Corps de Garde_ this morning laden with violins and music, and a female prisoner seldom arrives without her complement of bandboxes.--Embarrassed, stifled as we are by our numbers, it does not prevent a daily importation of lap-dogs, who form as consequential a part of the community in a prison, as in the most superb hotel. The faithful valet, who has followed the fortunes of his master, does not so much share his distresses as contribute to his pleasure by adorning his person, or, rather, his head, for, excepting the article of hair-dressing, the beaux here are not elaborate. In short, there is an indifference, a frivolity, in the French character, which, in circumstances like the present, appears unaccountable. But man is not always consistent with himself, and there are occasions in which the French are nothing less than philosophers. Under all these externals of levity, they are a very prudent people, and though they seem to bear with infinite fortitude many of the evils of life, there are some in which their sensibility is not to be questioned. At the death of a relation, or the loss of liberty, I have observed that a few hours suffice, _pour prendre son parti;_ [To make up his mind.] but on any occasion where his fortune has suffered, the liveliest Frenchman is _au desespoir_ for whole days. Whenever any thing is to be lost or gained, all his characteristic indifference vanishes, and his attention becomes mentally concentrated, without dissipating the habitual smile of his countenance. He may sometimes be deceived through deficiency of judgment, but I believe not often by unguardedness; and, in a matter of interest, a _petit maitre_ of five-and-twenty might _tout en badinage_ [All in the way of pleasantry.] maintain his ground against a whole synagogue.--This disposition is not remarkable only in affairs that may be supposed to require it, but extends to the minutest objects; and the same oeconomy which watches over the mass of a Frenchman's estate, guards with equal solicitude the menu property of a log of wood, or a hen's nest.

There is at this moment a general scarcity of provisions, and we who are confined are, of course, particularly inconvenienced by it; we do not even get bread that is eatable, and it is curious to observe with what circumspection every one talks of his resources. The possessor of a few eggs takes care not to expose them to the eye of his neighbour; and a slice of white bread is a donation of so much consequence, that those who procure any for themselves do not often put their friends to the pain either of accepting or refusing it.

Mad. de ____ has been unwell for some days, and I could not help giving a hint to a relation of her's whom we found here, and who has frequent supplies of bread from the country, that the bread we eat was peculiarly inimical to her; but I gained only a look of repulsive apprehension, and a cold remark that it was very difficult to get good bread--_"et que c'etoit bien malheureux."_ [And that it certainly was very unfortunate.] I own this kind of selfishness is increased by a situation where our wants are numerous, and our enjoyments few; and the great distinctions of meum and tuum, which at all times have occasioned so much bad fellowship in the world, are here perhaps more rigidly observed than any where else; yet, in my opinion, a close-hearted consideration has always formed an essential and a predominant quality in the French character.

People here do not ruin themselves, as with us, by hospitality; and examples of that thoughtless profusion which we censure and regret, without being able entirely to condemn, are very rare indeed. In France it is not uncommon to see a man apparently dissipated in his conduct, and licentious in his morals, yet regular, even to parsimony, in his pecuniary concerns.--He oeconomizes with his vices, and indulges in all the excesses of fashionable life, with the same system of order that accumulates the fortune of a Dutch miser. Lord Chesterfield was doubtless satisfied, that while his son remained in France, his precepts would have all the benefit of living illustration; yet it is not certain that this cautious and reflecting licentiousness has any merit over the more imprudent irregularity of an English spendthrift: the one is, however, likely to be more durable than the other; and, in fact, the character of an old libertine is more frequent in France than in England.

If oeconomy preside even over the vices of the rich and fashionable, you may conclude that the habits of the middling ranks of people of small fortunes are still more scrupulously subjected to its influence. A French _menage_ [Household.] is a practical treatise on the art of saving--a spirit of oeconomy pervades and directs every part of it, and that so uniformly, so generally, and so consistently, as not to make the same impression on a stranger as would a single instance where the whole was not conducted on the same principle. A traveller is not so forcibly stricken by this part of the French character, because it is more real than apparent, and does not seem the effect of reasoning or effort, which is never consequential, but rather that of inclination and the natural course of things.

A degree of parsimony, which an Englishman, who does not affect the reputation of a Codrus, could not acquire without many self-combats, appears in a Frenchman a matter of preference and convenience, and till one has lived long and familiarly in the country, one is apt to mistake principles for customs, and character for manners, and to attribute many things to local which have their real source in moral causes.--The traveller who sees nothing but gay furniture, and gay clothes, and partakes on invitation of splendid repasts, returns to England the enamoured panegyrist of French hospitality.--On a longer residence and more domestic intercourse, all this is discoverable to be merely the sacrifice of parsimony to vanity--the solid comforts of life are unknown, and hospitality seldom extends beyond an occasional and ostentatious reception. The gilding, painting, glasses, and silk hangings of a French apartment, are only a gay disguise; and a house, which to the eye may be attractive even to splendour, often has not one room that an Englishman would find tolerably convenient. Every thing intended for use rather than shew is scanty and sordid--all is _beau, magnifique, gentil,_ or _superb,_ [Fine magnificent, genteel, or superb.] and nothing comfortable. The French have not the word, or its synonime, in their language.

In France, clothes are almost as durable as furniture, and the gaiety which twenty or thirty years ago we were complaisant enough to admire is far from being expensive. People are not more than five or six hours a day in their gala habits, and the whole of this period is judiciously chosen between the hours of repast, so that no risk in incurred by accidents at table. Then the caprices of fashion, which in England are so various and despotic, have here a more limited influence: the form of a dress changes as long as the material is convertible, and when it has outlasted the possibility of adaptation to a reigning mode, it is not on that account rejected, but is generally worn in some way or other till banished by the more rational motive of its decay. All the expences of tea-visits, breakfast-loungings, and chance-dinners, are avoided--an evening visit is passed entirely at cards, a breakfast in form even for the family is unusual, and there are very few houses where you could dine without being previously engaged. I am, indeed, certain, that (unless in large establishments) the calculation for diurnal supply is so exact, that the intrusion of a stranger would be felt by the whole family. I must, however, do them the justice to say, that on such occasions, and where they find the thing to be inevitable, they put the best face possible on it, and the guest is entertained, if not plentifully, and with a very sincere welcome, at least with smiles and compliments. The French, indeed, allow, that they live less hospitably than the English: but then they say they are not so rich; and it is true, property is not so general, nor so much diffused, as with us. This is, however, only relative, and you will not suspect me of being so uncandid as to make comparisons without allowing for every difference which is the effect of necessity. All my remarks of this kind are made after an unprejudiced comparison of the people of the same rank or fortune in the two countries;--yet even the most liberal examination must end by concluding, that the oeconomy of the French too nearly approaches to meanness, and that their civility is ostentatious, perhaps often either interested, or even verbal.

You already exclaim, why, in the year 1793, you are characterizing a nation in the style of Salmon! and implying a panegyric on the moral of the School for Scandal! I plead to the first part of the charge, and shall hereafter defend my opinion against the more polished writers who have succeeded Salmon. For the moral of the School for Scandal, I have always considered it as the seal of humanity on a comedy which would otherwise be perfection.

It is not the oeconomy of the French that I am censuring, but their vanity, which, engrossing all their means of expence, prefers show to accommodation, and the parade of a sumptuous repast three or four times a year to a plainer but more frequent hospitality.--I am far from being the advocate of extravagance, or the enemy of domestic order; and the liberality which is circumscribed only by prudence shall not find in me a censurer.

My ideas on the French character and manner of living may not be unuseful to such of my countrymen as come to France with the project of retrieving their affairs; for it is very necessary they should be informed, that it is not so much the difference in the price of things, which makes a residence here oeconomical, as a conformity to the habits of the country; and if they were not deterred by a false shame from a temporary adoption of the same system in England, their object might often be obtained without leaving it. For this reason it may be remarked, that the English who bring English servants, and persist in their English mode of living, do not often derive very solid advantages from their exile, and their abode in France is rather a retreat from their creditors than the means of paying their debts.

Adieu.--You will not be sorry that I have been able for a moment to forget our personal sufferings, and the miserable politics of the country. The details of the former are not pleasant, and the latter grow every day more inexplicable.

1794

A RESIDENCE IN FRANCE

January 6, 1794.

If I had undertaken to follow the French revolution through all its absurdities and iniquities, my indolence would long since have taken the alarm, and I should have relinquished a task become too difficult and too laborious. Events are now too numerous and too complicated to be described by occasional remarks; and a narrator of no more pretensions than myself may be allowed to shrink from an abundance of matter which will hereafter perplex the choice and excite the wonder of the historian.--Removed from the great scene of intrigues, we are little acquainted with them--we begin to suffer almost before we begin to conjecture, and our solicitude to examine causes is lost in the rapidity with which we feel their effects.

Amidst the more mischievous changes of a philosophic revolution, you will have learned from the newspapers, that the French have adopted a new aera and a new calendar, the one dating from the foundation of their republic, and other descriptive of the climate of Paris, and the productions of the French territory. I doubt, however, if these new almanack-makers will create so much confusion as might be supposed, or as they may desire, for I do not find as yet that their system has made its way beyond the public offices, and the country people are particularly refractory, for they persist in holding their fairs, markets, &c. as usual, without any regard to the hallowed decade of their legislators. As it is to be presumed that the French do not wish to relinquish all commercial intercourse with other nations, they mean possibly to tack the republican calendar to the rights of man, and send their armies to propagate them together; otherwise the correspondence of a Frenchman will be as difficult to interpret with mercantile exactness as the characters of the Chinese.

The vanity of these philosophers would, doubtless, be gratified by forcing the rest of Europe and the civilized world to adopt their useless and chimerical innovations, and they might think it a triumph to see the inhabitant of the Hebrides date _"Vendemiaire,"_ [Alluding to the vintage.] or the parched West-Indian _"Nivose;"_ but vanity is not on this, as it is on many other occasions, the leading principle.--It was hoped that a new arrangement of the year, and a different nomenclature of the months, so as to banish all the commemorations of Christianity, might prepare the way for abolishing religion itself, and, if it were possible to impose the use of the new calendar so far as to exclude the old one, this might certainly assist their more serious atheistical operations; but as the success of such an introduction might depend on the will of the people, and is not within the competence of the bayonet, the old year will maintain its ground, and these pedantic triflers find that they have laboured to no more extensive a purpose, than to furnish a date to the newspapers, or to their own decrees, which no one will take the pains to understand.

Mankind are in general more attached to customs than principles. The useful despotism of Peter, which subdued so many of the prejudices of his countrymen, could not achieve the curtailment of their beards; and you must not imagine that, with all the endurance of the French, these continual attempts at innovation pass without murmurs: partial revolts happen very frequently; but, as they are the spontaneous effect of personal suffering, not of political manoeuvre, they are without concert or union, of course easily quelled, and only serve to strengthen the government.--The people of Amiens have lately, in one of these sudden effusions of discontent, burnt the tree of liberty, and even the representative, Dumont, has been menaced; but these are only the blows of a coward who is alarmed at his own temerity, and dreads the chastisement of it.*

* The whole town of Bedouin, in the south of France, was burnt
pursuant to a decree of the convention, to expiate the imprudence of
some of its inhabitants in having cut down a dead tree of liberty.
Above sixty people were guillotined as accomplices, and their bodies
thrown into pits, dug by order of the representative, Magnet, (then
on mission,) before their death. These executions were succeeded by
a conflagration of all the houses, and the imprisonment or
dispersion of their possessors. It is likewise worthy of remark,
that many of these last were obliged, by express order of Maignet,
to be spectators of the murder of their friends and relations.

This crime in the revolutionary code is of a very serious nature; and however trifling it may appear to you, it depends only on the will of Dumont to sacrifice many lives on the occasion. But Dumont, though erected by circumstances into a tyrant, is not sanguinary--he is by nature and education passionate and gross, and in other times might only have been a good natured Polisson. Hitherto he has contented himself with alarming, and making people tired of their lives, but I do not believe he has been the direct or intentional cause of anyone's death. He has so often been the hero of my adventures, that I mention him familiarly to you, without reflecting, that though the delegate of more than monarchical power here, he is too insignificant of himself to be known in England. But the history of Dumont is that of two-thirds of the Convention. He was originally clerk to an attorney at Abbeville, and afterwards set up for himself in a neighbouring village. His youth having been marked by some digressions from the "'haviour of reputation," his profession was far from affording him a subsistence; and the revolution, which seems to have called forth all that was turbulent, unprincipled, or necessitous in the country, naturally found a partizan in an attorney without practice.--At the election of 1792, when the King's fall and the domination of the Jacobins had spread so general a terror that no man of character could be prevailed upon to be a candidate for a public situation, Dumont availed himself of this timidity and supineness in those who ought to have become the representatives of the people; and, by a talent for intrigue, and a coarse facility of phrase-making, (for he has no pretensions to eloquence,) prevailed on the mob to elect him. His local knowledge, active disposition, and subservient industry, render him an useful kind of drudge to any prevailing party, and, since the overthrow of the Brissotines, he has been entrusted with the government of this and some of the neighbouring departments. He professes himself a zealous republican, and an apostle of the doctrine of universal equality, yet unites in his person all the attributes of despotism, and lives with more luxury and expence than most of the _ci-devant_ gentry. His former habitation at Oisemont is not much better than a good barn; but patriotism is more profitable here than in England, and he has lately purchased a large mansion belonging to an emigrant.

* "Britain no longer pays her patriots with her spoils:" and perhaps
it is matter of congratulation to a country, when the profession of
patriotism is not lucrative. Many agreeable inferences may be made
from it--the sentiment may have become too general for reward,
Ministers too virtuous to fear, or even the people too enlightened
to be deceived.

--His mode of travelling, which used at best to be in the _coche d'eau_ [Passage-boat.] or the diligence, is now in a coach and four, very frequently accompanied by a led horse, and a party of dragoons. I fear some of your patriots behold this with envy, and it is not to be wondered at that they should wish to see a similar revolution in England. What a seducing prospect for the assertors of liberty, to have the power of imprisoning and guillotining all their countrymen! What halcyon days, when the aristocratic palaces* shall be purified by solacing the fatigues of republican virtue, and the levellers of all distinction travel with four horses and a military escort!--But, as Robespierre observes, you are two centuries behind the French in patriotism and information; and I doubt if English republicanism will ever go beyond a dinner, and toasting the manes of Hampden and Sydney. I would, therefore, seriously advise any of my compatriots who may be enamoured of a government founded on the rights of man, to quit an ungrateful country which seems so little disposed to reward their labours, and enjoy the supreme delight of men a systeme, that of seeing their theories in action.

* Many of the emigrants' houses were bought by members of the
Convention, or people in office. At Paris, crouds of inferior
clerks, who could not purchase, found means to get lodged in the
most superb national edifices: Monceaux was the villa of
Robespierre--St. Just occasionally amused himself at Raincy--Couthon
succeed the Comte d'Artois at Bagatelle-and Vliatte, a juryman of
the Revolutionary Tribunal, was lodged at the pavillion of Flora, in
the Tuilleries, which he seems to have occupied as a sort of Maitre
d'Hotel to the Comite de Salut Public.

_A propos_--a decree of the Convention has lately passed to secure the person of Mr. Thomas Paine, and place seals on his papers. I hope, however, as he has been installed in all the rights of a French citizen, in addition to his representative inviolability, that nothing more than a temporary retreat is intended for him. Perhaps even his personal sufferings may prove a benefit to mankind. He may, like Raleigh, "in his prison hours enrich the world," and add new proselytes to the cause of freedom. Besides, human evils are often only blessings in a questionable form--Mr. Paine's persecutions in England made him a legislator in France. Who knows but his persecutions in France may lead to some new advancement, or at least add another line to the already crouded title-pages that announce his literary and political distinctions!

--Yours.

January, 1794.

The total suppression of all religious worship in this country is an event of too singular and important a nature not to have been commented upon largely by the English papers; but, though I have little new to add on the subject, my own reflections have been too much occupied in consequence for me to pass it over in silence.

I am yet in the first emotions of wonder: the vast edifice which had been raised by the blended efforts of religion and superstition, which had been consecrated by time, endeared by national taste, and become necessary by habit, has now disappeared, and scarcely left a vestige of its ruins. To those who revert only to the genius of the Catholic religion, and to former periods of the history of France, this event must seem incredible; and nothing but constant opportunities of marking its gradual approach can reconcile it to probability. The pious christian and the insidious philosopher have equally contributed to the general effect, though with very different intentions: the one, consulting only his reason, wished to establish a pure and simple mode of worship, which, divested of the allurements of splendid processions and imposing ceremonies, should teach the people their duty, without captivating their senses; the other, better acquainted with French character, knew how little these views were compatible with it, and hoped, under the specious pretext of banishing the too numerous ornaments of the Catholic practice, to shake the foundations of Christianity itself. Thus united in their efforts, though dissimilar in their motives, all parties were eager at the beginning of the revolution for a reform in the Church: the wealth of the Clergy, the monastic establishments, the supernumerary saints, were devoted and attacked without pity, and without regret; and, in the zeal and hurry of innovation, the decisive measure, which reduced ecclesiastics to small pensions dependent on the state, was carried, before those who really meant well were aware of its consequences. The next step was, to make the receiving these pensions subject to an oath, which the selfish philosopher, who can coldly calculate on, and triumph in, the weakness of human nature, foresaw would be a brand of discord, certain to destroy the sole force which the Clergy yet possessed--their union, and the public opinion.

Unfortunately, these views were not disappointed: conviction, interest, or fear, prevailed on many to take the oath; while doubt, worldly improvidence, or a scrupulous piety, deterred others. A schism took place between the jurors and nonjurors--the people became equally divided, and adhered either to the one or the other, as their habits or prepossessions directed them. Neither party, as it may be imagined, could see themselves deprived of any portion of the public esteem, without concern, perhaps without rancour; and their mutual animosity, far from gaining proselytes to either, contributed only to the immediate degradation and future ruin of both. Those, however, who had not taken the prescribed oath, were in general more popular than what were called the constitutionalists, and the influence they were supposed to exert in alienating the minds of their followers from the new form of government, supplied the republican party with a pretext for proposing their banishment.*

*The King's exertion of the power vested in him by the constitution,
by putting a temporary negative on this decree, it is well known,
was one of the pretexts for dethroning him.

At the King's deposition this decree took place, and such of the nonjuring priests as were not massacred in the prisons, or escaped the search, were to be embarked for Guiana. The wiser and better part of those whose compliances entitled them to remain, were, I believe, far from considering this persecution of their opponents as a triumph--to those who did, it was of short duration. The Convention, which had hitherto attempted to disguise its hatred of the profession by censure and abuse of a part of its members, began now to ridicule the profession itself: some represented it as useless--others as pernicious and irreconcileable with political freedom; and a discourse* was printed, under the sanction of the Assembly, to prove, that the only feasible republic must be supported by pure atheism.

* Extracts from the Report of Anacharsis Cloots, member of the
Committee of Public Instruction, printed by order of the National
Convention:

"Our _Sans-culottes_ want no other sermon but the rights of man, no
other doctrine but the constitutional precepts and practice, nor any
other church than where the section or the club hold their meetings,
&c.

"The propagation of the rights of man ought to be presented to the
astonished world pure and without stain. It is not by offering
strange gods to our neighbours that we shall operate their
conversion. We can never raise them from their abject state by
erecting one altar in opposition to another. A trifling heresy is
infinitely more revolting than having no religion at all. Nature,
like the sun, diffuses her light without the assistance of priests
and vestals. While we were constitutional heretics, we maintained
an army of an hundred thousand priests, who waged war equally with
the Pope and the disciples of Calvin. We crushed the old priesthood
by means of the new, and while we compelled every sect to contribute
to the payment of a pretended national religion, we became at once
the abhorrence of all the Catholics and Protestants in Europe. The
repulsion of our religious belief counteracted the attraction of our
political principles.--But truth is at length triumphant, and all
the ill-intentioned shall no more be able to detach our neighbours
from the dominion of the rights of man, under pretext of a religious
dominion which no longer exists.--The purpose of religion is no how
so well answered as by presenting carte blanche to the abused world.
Every one will then be at liberty to form his spiritual regimen to
his own taste, till in the end the invincible ascendant of reason
shall teach him that the Supreme Being, the Eternal Being, is no
other than Nature uncreated and uncreatable; and that the only
Providence is the association of mankind in freedom and equality!--
This sovereign providence affords comfort to the afflicted, rewards
the good, and punishes the wicked. It exercises no unjust
partialities, like the providence of knaves and fools. Man, when
free, wants no other divinity than himself. This god will not cost
us a single farthing, not a single tear, nor a drop of blood. From
the summit of our mountain he hath promulgated his laws, traced in
evident characters on the tables of nature. From the East to the
West they will be understood without the aid of interpreters,
comments, or miracles. Every other ritual will be torn in pieces at
the appearance of that of reason. Reason dethrones both the Kings
of the earth, and the Kings of heaven.--No monarch above, if we wish
to preserve our republic below.

"Volumes have been written to determine whether or no a republic of
Atheists could exist. I maintain that every other republic is a
chimera. If you once admit the existence of a heavenly Sovereign,
you introduce the wooden horse within your walls!--What you adore by
day will be your destruction at night.

"A people of theists necessarily become revelationists, that is to
say, slaves of priests, who are but religious go-betweens, and
physicians of damned souls.

"If I were a scoundrel, I should make a point of exclaiming against
atheism, for a religious mask is very convenient to a traitor.

"The intolerance of truth will one day proscribe the very name of
temple 'fanum,' the etymology of fanaticism.

"We shall instantly see the monarchy of heaven condemned in its turn
by the revolutionary tribunal of victorious Reason; for Truth,
exalted on the throne of Nature, is sovereignly intolerant.

"The republic of the rights of man is, properly speaking, neither
theistical nor atheistical--it is nihilistical."

Many of the most eminent conforming Prelates and Clergy were arrested, and even individuals, who had the reputation of being particularly devout, were marked as objects of persecution. A new calendar was devised, which excluded the ancient festivals, and limited public worship to the decade, or tenth day, and all observance of the Sabbath was interdicted. The prisons were crouded with sufferers in the cause of religion, and all who had not the zeal or the courage of martyrs, abstained from manifesting any attachment to the Christian faith.

While this consternation was yet recent, the Deputies on mission in the departments shut up the churches entirely: the refuse of low clubs were paid and encouraged to break the windows and destroy the monuments; and these outrages, which, it was previously concerted, should at first assume the appearance of popular tumult, were soon regulated and directed by the mandates of the Convention themselves. The churches were again opened, an atheistic ritual, and licentious homilies,* were substituted for the proscribed service--and an absurd and ludicrous imitation of the Greek mythology was exhibited, under the title of the Religion of Reason.--

* I have read a discourse pronounced in a church at Paris, on the
decade, so indecent and profane, that the most humble audience of a
country-puppet show in England would not have tolerated it.

On the principal church of every town was inscribed, "The Temple of Reason;" and a tutelary goddess was installed with a ceremony equally pedantic, ridiculous, and profane.*

* At Havre, the goddess of Reason was drawn on a car by four
cart-horses, and as it was judged necessary, to prevent accidents,
that the horses should be conducted by those they were accustomed
to, the carters were likewise put in requisition and furnished with
cuirasses a l'antique from the theatre. The men, it seems, being
neither martial nor learned, were not au fait at this equipment,
and concluding it was only a waistcoat of ceremony, invested
themselves with the front behind, and the back part laced before,
to the great amusement of the few who were sensible of the mistake.

Yet the philosophers did not on this occasion disdain those adventitious aids, the use of which they had so much declaimed against while they were the auxiliaries of Christianity.*

* Mr. Gibbon reproaches the Christians with their adoption of the
allurements of the Greek mythology.--The Catholics have been more
hostilely despoiled by their modern persecutors, and may retort that
the religion of reason is a more gross appeal to the senses than the
darkest ages of superstition would have ventured on.

Music, processions, and decorations, which had been banished from the ancient worship, were introduced in the new one, and the philosophical reformer, even in the very attempt to establish a religion purely metaphysical, found himself obliged to inculcate it by a gross and material idolatry.*--

* The French do not yet annex any other idea to the religion of
reason than that of the female who performs the part of the goddess.

Thus, by submitting his abstractions to the genius of the people, and the imperfections of our nature, perhaps the best apology was offered for the errors of that worship which had been proscribed, persecuted, and ridiculed.

Previous to the tenth day, on which a celebration of this kind was to take place, a Deputy arrived, accompanied by the female goddess:* that is, (if the town itself did not produce one for the purpose,) a Roman dress of white satin was hired from the theatre, with which she was invested--her head covered with a red cap, ornamented with oak leaves-- one arm was reclined on a plough, the other grasped a spear--and her feet were supported by a globe, and environed by mutilated emblems of seodality. [It is not possible to explain this costume as appropriate.]

* The females who personated the new divinity were usually selected
from amongst those who "might make sectaries of whom they bid but
follow," but who were more conspicuous for beauty than any other
celestial attribute.--The itinerant goddess of the principal towns
in the department de la Somme was the mistress of one Taillefer, a
republican General, brother to the Deputy of the same name.--I know
not, in this military government, whether the General's services on
the occasion were included in his other appointments. At Amiens, he
not only provided the deity, but commanded the detachment that
secured her a submissive adoration.

Thus equipped, the divinity and her appendages were borne on the shoulders of Jacobins "en bonnet rouge," and escorted by the National Guard, Mayor, Judges, and all the constituted authorities, who, whether diverted or indignant, were obliged to preserve a respectful gravity of exterior. When the whole cavalcade arrived at the place appointed, the goddess was placed on an altar erected for the occasion, from whence she harangued the people, who, in return, proffered their adoration, and sung the Carmagnole, and other republican hymns of the same kind. They then proceeded in the same order to the principal church, in the choir of which the same ceremonies were renewed: a priest was procured to abjure his faith and avow the whole of Christianity an imposture;* and the festival concluded with the burning of prayer-books, saints, confessionals, and every thing appropriated to the use of public worship.**--

*It must be observed, in justice to the French Clergy, that it was
seldom possible to procure any who would consent to this infamy. In
such cases, the part was exhibited by a man hired and dressed for
the purpose.--The end of degrading the profession in the eyes of the
people was equally answered.

** In many places, valuable paintings and statues were burnt or
disfigured. The communion cups, and other church plate, were, after
being exorcised in Jacobin revels, sent to the Convention, and the
gold and silver, (as the author of the Decline and Fall of the Roman
Empire invidiously expresses himself,) the pearls and jewels, were
wickedly converted to the service of mankind; as if any thing whose
value is merely fictitious, could render more service to mankind
than when dedicated to an use which is equally the solace of the
rich and the poor--which gratifies the eye without exciting
cupidity, soothes the bed of sickness, and heals the wounds of
conscience. Yet I am no advocate for the profuse decorations of
Catholic churches; and if I seem to plead in their behalf, it is
that I recollect no instance where the depredators of them have
appropriated the spoil to more laudable purposes.

The greater part of the attendants looked on in silent terror and astonishment; whilst others, intoxicated, or probably paid to act this scandalous farce, danced round the flames with an appearance of frantic and savage mirth.--It is not to be forgotten, that representatives of the people often presided as the high priests of these rites; and their official dispatches to the convention, in which these ceremonies were minutely described, were always heard with bursts of applause, and sanctioned by decrees of insertion in the bulletin.*

* A kind of official newspaper distributed periodically at the
expence of Government in large towns, and pasted up in public
places--it contained such news as the convention chose to impart,
which was given with the exact measure of truth or falsehood that
suited the purpose of the day.

I have now conducted you to the period in which I am contemplating France in possession of all the advantages which a total dereliction of religious establishments can bestow--at that consummation to which the labours of modern philosophers have so long tended.

Ye Shaftesburys, Bolingbrokes, Voltaires, and must I add the name of Gibbon,* behold yourselves inscribed on the registers of fame with a Laplanche, a Chenier, an Andre Dumont, or a Fouche!**--

* The elegant satirist of Christianity will smile at the presumption
of so humble a censurer.--It is certain, the misapplication only of
such splendid talents could embolden me to mention the name of the
possessor with diminished respect.

** These are names too contemptible for notice, but for the mischief
to which they were instrumental--they were among the first and most
remarkable persecutors of religion.

Do not blush at the association; your views have been the same; and the subtle underminer of man's best comfort in the principles of his religion, is even more criminal than him who prohibits the external exercise of it. Ridicule of the sacred writings is more dangerous than burning them, and a sneer at the miracles of the gospel more mischievous than disfiguring the statues of the evangelists; and it must be confessed that these Anti-christian Iconoclasts themselves might probably have been content to "believe and say their prayers," had not the intolerance of philosophy made them atheists and persecutors.--The coarse legend of "death is the sleep of eternity,"* is only a compendium of the fine-drawn theories of the more elaborate materialist, and the depositaries of the dead will not corrupt more by the exhibition of this desolating standard, than the libraries of the living by the volumes which hold out the same oblivion to vice, and discouragement to virtue.--

* Posts, bearing the inscription "la mort est un sommeil eternel,"
were erected in many public burying-grounds.--No other ceremony is
observed with the dead than enclosing the body in some rough boards,
and sending it off by a couple of porters, (in their usual garb,)
attended by a municipal officer. The latter inscribes on a register
the name of the deceased, who is thrown into a grave generally
prepared for half a score, and the whole business is finished.

The great experiment of governing a civilized people without religion will now be made; and should the morals, the manners, or happiness of the French, be improved by it, the sectaries of modern philosophy may triumph. Should it happen otherwise, the Christian will have an additional motive for cherishing his faith: but even the afflictions of humanity will not, I fear, produce either regret or conviction in his adversary; for the prejudices of philosophers and systemists are incorrigible.*