Chapter XXIII: Commotion in Paris

The Remains of Voltaire removed to the Pantheon.--Decision of
the Assembly on the Flight of the King.--Thomas Paine.--Views
of the Constitutional Monarchists.--Message from La Fayette
to the King of Austria.--The Jacobins summon the Populace to
the Field of Mars.--Mandate of the Jacobins.--The Crowd on the
Field of Mars dispersed by the Military.--Completion of the
Constitution.--Remarkable Conversation of Napoleon.--The King
formally accepts the Constitution.--Great, but transient, Popularity
of the Royal Family.

In the midst of these stormy scenes the Assembly voted to remove the remains of Voltaire, which had slumbered for thirteen years in the obscure abbey of Scellieres in Champagne, to the Pantheon in Paris. On the 11th of July his coffin was received with great pomp at the barriers, and conducted to a pedestal on the ancient site of the Bastille, constructed from one of the foundation-stones of the fortress. Voltaire had once been imprisoned in that gloomy citadel. Upon the pedestal which supported the coffin were engraved the words,

"Receive on this spot, where despotism once fettered thee, the honors decreed thee by thy country."

The next day a brilliant sun invited the whole population of Paris to the fete. The car which bore the coffin to the Pantheon was drawn by twelve white horses, harnessed four abreast. They were very richly caparisoned, and led by postillions in antique attire. An immense body of cavalry headed the procession. The wail of requiems and the roar of muffled drums blended with the booming of minute guns from the adjacent heights. The sarcophagus was preceded, surrounded, and followed by the National Assembly, the municipal authorities of the city, and by deputations from all the illustrious and dignified bodies of France. Scholars, laborers, artists, and, conspicuously, all the actors and actresses of Paris, took part in the pageant. Arches, with garlands of leaves and wreaths of roses, spanned the streets. Groups of beautiful girls, dressed in white, carpeted the path with flowers. At intervals, bands of music were placed, saluting the car as it approached with bursts of melody. Before each of the principal theatres the procession stopped, and a hymn was sung in commemoration of the achievements of the great dramatist. It was ten o'clock at night before the immense procession reached the Pantheon. The coffin was deposited between those of Descartes and Mirabeau.

It was the pen of Voltaire which overthrew despotism in France. It was also the pen of Voltaire which banished for so long from human hearts thoughts of God and of future responsibility. Thus then sprung up, in the place of the despotism he had overthrown, another despotism a thousand fold more terrible. With consummate genius and utter destitution of all moral principle, he was the demon of destruction, sweeping the good and the bad alike into indiscriminate ruin. He could fawn upon the infamous Frederic, and palliate his vices. He was ever ready to bow the knee to the paramours of Louis XV. There was no prostitution of genius which could cause him to blush. The venomous spirit with which he pursued the religion of Christ is fully expressed by his motto, "_Crush the wretch_." The genius of Voltaire induced France to attempt to establish liberty without religion. The terrific result will probably dissuade from any future repetition of that experiment.

The club of the Jacobins was greatly roused by the moderation of the Assembly, and began to clamor for the entire overthrow of the monarchy and the establishment of a republic. On the evening of the 15th of July a meeting of the club was held at which four thousand persons were present. It was a scene of wild enthusiasm. La Fayette, Barnave, and others who were in favor of a constitutional monarchy were denounced as traitors. Robespierre and Danton were the orators of the evening, and they were greeted with thunders of applause. A petition was sent to the Assembly, which assumed the tone of an order, demanding that the king should be deposed as a perfidious traitor to his oaths. It was a meeting of the mob virtually repudiating the Assembly, and assuming for itself both legislative and executive power. The tumultuous gathering was not dispersed until after midnight. Here originated that spirit of lawless violence which subsequently transformed Paris into a field of blood.

On the 16th the commissioners made their report to the Assembly on the flight of the king. Both the commissioners and the Assembly were disposed to be lenient. They were already very anxious in view of popular tumult and menacing anarchy. They had still no wish to overthrow the monarchy and establish a republic. Such a measure would be full of danger to France in its distracted state, and would exasperate a thousand fold the surrounding monarchies. There was no one for whom they wished to exchange their present king. He was the legitimate monarch, which gave him vast power over all the aristocracy of Europe. He had sworn to defend the Constitution, and it was so manifestly for his interest now to consent to be a constitutional monarch that it was hoped that he would sincerely accept that popular cause which would secure for him popular support. Though no one doubted that it had been the intention of the vacillating monarch to throw himself into the midst of foreign armies, and by the aid of their artillery and swords to force the Old Regime again upon France, a very generous report, exculpating the king from blame, was presented and adopted.

Influenced by these views, it was argued that the king had committed no crime. He surely had a right, if he wished, to take a journey to Montmedy. There was no proof that he intended any thing more, he had violated no law. The Assembly therefore decreed that "in the journey there was nothing culpable."[288]

The Jacobin press now became very bold. "No more king," exclaimed Brissot in the _Patriot_; "let us be Republicans. Such is the cry at the Palais Royal, and it does not gain ground fast enough."

"No king! no protector! no regent!" shouted Fauchet in the _Bouche de Fer_ (the Mouth of Iron).

An address was read to the Jacobin Club openly demanding the annihilation of royalty; and though this address was received at first with murmurs--for the majority, even of the Jacobins, were not then prepared for such a step--the new doctrine with marvelous rapidity spread through the lower orders of Paris, and very speedily gained the ascendency in the club. Danton mounted the tribune of the Jacobin Club on the 23d of June, and demanded the forfeiture of the throne. "Your king," said he, "is either a knave or an idiot. If we must have one of the two, who would not prefer the latter?"

The Jacobin Club had now become very formidable. It already numbered eighteen hundred members in Paris alone, each of whom was admitted to its meetings by a ticket. Two hundred and fifty affiliated clubs were scattered throughout the principal cities. It occupied the large chapel of the Convent, and had its president, its secretaries, its tribune, its regular order of business, and its journal, in which its debates and resolutions were published. Many of the ablest members of the Assembly were members of the club, and their most powerful efforts of eloquence were addressed to the club, regarding its voice as beginning to be more potent than that of the Assembly. The Jacobin Club was rapidly becoming the great power of the kingdom, with an excitable mob ever at its disposal as its military arm.

The Journal of the Jacobins, edited by Laclos, a confidant of the Duke of Orleans, overwhelmed the monarch with a torrent of insults and objurgations. Thomas Paine, the notorious reviler of Christianity, was then in Paris, and one of the most violent of the Jacobin Club. He wrote an inflammatory address, which was posted on all the walls of Paris, urging the peremptory dethronement of the king.

The views entertained by La Fayette and the Constitutional Monarchists can not be better conveyed than in the eloquent language of Barnave, in a speech addressed to the Assembly on this occasion.

"I will not dilate," said he, "on the advantages of monarchical government. You have proved your conviction by establishing it in your country. Some men, whose motives I shall not impugn, seeking for examples to adduce, have found in America a people occupying a vast territory with a scanty population, nowhere surrounded by very powerful neighbors, having forests for their boundaries, and having for customs the feelings of a new race, and who are wholly ignorant of those factitious passions and impulses which effect revolutions of government. They have seen a republican government established in that land, and have thence drawn the conclusion that a similar government was suitable for us.

"But if it be true that in our territory there is a vast population; that we have a multitude of men exclusively devoted to those intellectual speculations which excite ambition and the love of fame; that powerful neighbors compel us to form one compact body in order to resist them--if these circumstances are wholly independent of ourselves, then it is undeniable that the sole existing remedy lies in a monarchical government.

"When a country is populous and extensive, there are but two modes of assuring to it a solid and permanent existence. Either you must organize those parts separately, placing in each section of the empire a portion of the government, thus maintaining security at the expense of unity, strength, and all the advantages which result from a great and homogeneous association, or else you will be forced to centralize an unchangeable power, which, never renewed by the law, presenting incessant obstacles to ambition, resists with advantage the shocks, rivalries, and rapid vibrations of an immense population, agitated by all the passions engendered by long-established society.

"These facts decide our position. We can only be strong through a _federative government_, which no one here has the madness to propose, or by a _monarchical government_ such as you have established. You have intrusted to an _inviolable_ king the exclusive function of naming the agents of his power, but you have made those agents responsible.

"Immense damage is done us when that revolutionary impetus, which has destroyed every thing there was to destroy, and which has urged us to the point where we must at last pause, is perpetuated. The Revolution can not advance one step farther without danger. In the line of _liberty_ the first act which follows is the annihilation of royalty. In the line of _equality_ the first act which must follow is an attempt on all property. It is time to end the Revolution. It ought to stop when the nation is free, and all men have equal rights. If it continue in trouble it is dishonored, and we with it. Yes! all the world ought to agree that the common interest is involved in now closing the Revolution.

"Those who have lost ought to perceive that it is impossible to make the Revolution retrograde. Those who fashioned the Revolution should see that it has attained its consummation. Kings themselves--if from time to time profound truths can penetrate the councils of kings, if occasionally the prejudices which surround them will permit the sound views of a great and philosophical policy to reach them--kings themselves must learn that there is for them a wide difference between the example of a great reform in government and that of the abolition of royalty; that if we pause here, where we are, they are still kings! But, be their conduct what it may, let the fault come from them and not from us. Regenerators of the empire, follow straightly your undeviating line. You have been courageous and potent--be to-day wise and moderate. In this will consist the glorious termination of your efforts. Then again returning to your domestic hearths you will obtain, if not blessings, at least the silence of calumny."

Though these views of moderation were opposed alike by the aristocrats and the Jacobins, they were accepted with applause by the great majority of the Assembly. Aristocrats and Jacobins now combined to disturb in every possible way the action of the Assembly. They both hoped through tumult and anarchy to march into power. Mobs began to reassemble in the streets of Paris, and cries of treason were uttered against La Fayette and his fellow-constitutionalists. Already in the market-place, at the Palais Royal, and in the hall of the Jacobins, individuals denounced that Constitution as tyrannical which the nation had so recently, with unutterable enthusiasm, sworn to support.[289]

La Fayette, Barnave, the Lameths, Talleyrand, and other illustrious friends of a constitutional monarchy, sent a confidential note to the Emperor of Austria, assuring him that the Constitution conferred as much power upon the king as it was possible now to obtain from the French nation; that any invasion of France by the allies would only exasperate the people, bring the Jacobins into power, endanger the life of the king, and that it could not be successful in restoring the Old Regime. The king was consulted upon this measure, and gave it his approval.[290]

Notwithstanding these warnings, the monarchs of Europe, who were trembling lest the spirit of liberty, rising in France, should undermine their despotic thrones, resolved to crush the patriots beneath the tramp of their dragoons. Leopold of Austria, Frederick William of Prussia, and Count d'Artois, with Bouille and other of the emigrants, met at Pilnitz, and on the 27th of August signed an agreement that the French Revolution was an "open revolt," "a scandalous usurpation of power," and that all the governments of Europe were bound to unite to abate the nuisance.[291]

The Jacobin Club, it will be remembered, in a stormy midnight debate, had drawn up a petition to the Assembly demanding the deposition of the king as a perjured traitor. They wished, by a demonstration of popular enthusiasm, to terrify the Assembly into obedience to their mandate. Accordingly, the whole populace of Paris were summoned to meet on the Field of Mars, to sign, with much parade, the petition on the Altar of Federation, which had not yet been taken down.

At an early hour on the morning of the 17th of July the multitude began to congregate. It was the Sabbath-day. Every scene in the drama of the Revolution seems to have been arranged on the sublimest scale. Soon from fifty to one hundred thousand, including the lowest of the population of Paris, were thronging the field, and clambering over the gigantic altar.[292] Two men were seized, under the absurd accusation that they were intending to blow up the altar and all upon it by means of a barrel of gunpowder. The cry of "Aristocrats!" which passed like a tornado through the crowd, precluded any trial, and settled their doom. The two unhappy men were literally torn to pieces, and their heads were borne about on pikes by brutal wretches who were now beginning to emerge from dens of obscurity into confidence and power.

The rumor of these murders and of the threatening attitude of the mob spread through the city and reached the ears of the Assembly. The principal ringleaders of the Jacobins were nowhere to be found, and it was asserted and generally believed that they were in a secret place, that they might escape responsibility, while, through their agents, they were rousing the mob to a demonstration which should overawe the Assembly. In the midst of the wildest imaginable scene of tumult and uproar, the _mandate_ of the Jacobins--for it could with no propriety be called a _petition_--was placed upon the altar upon many separate sheets of paper, and speedily received six thousand signatures. This was a new order, drawn up at the moment, for the original document could not be found. It read as follows:

"Representatives of the people! your labors are nearly ended. A great crime has been committed. Louis has fled, abandoning his post. The country is on the verge of ruin. The king has been arrested, brought back to Paris, and the people demand that he be tried. You declare that he shall be king. The people do not wish it, and therefore annul your decree. The king has been carried off by the two hundred and ninety-two _aristocrats_ who have themselves declared that they have no longer a voice in the National Assembly. Your decree is annulled, because it is in opposition to the voice of the people, your sovereign. Repeal it. The king has abdicated by crime. Receive his abdication."

Nothing could be more execrable than this usurpation of authority by the mob. The Assembly was composed of the representatives of twenty-five millions of people, acting under the calm deliberation which the forms of law exacted. And here six thousand men, women, and boys, belched forth perhaps from the dens of infamy in Paris, and arming themselves with a mob of fifty thousand of the most degraded of the populace of a great city, assumed to be _the nation_--the law makers and the law executors of the kingdom of France.[293]

The municipality ordered La Fayette, with a detachment of the National Guard, to proceed to the scene of tumult and disperse the rioters. The moment the soldiers appeared they were received with hisses, shouts, and a shower of stones from the populace. Several of the stones struck La Fayette, and he narrowly escaped death from a pistol-shot fired at him. The attitude of the mob was so threatening that La Fayette retired for a stronger force. He soon returned, accompanied by Bailly, the mayor of the city, and all the municipal authorities, and followed by ten thousand of the National Guard. The red flag, which proclaimed that the city was placed under martial law, was now floating from the Hotel de Ville. The tramp of ten thousand men,[294] with the rolling of artillery and the beating of four hundred drums, arrested the attention of the throng. The troops, debouching by three openings which intersected the glacis, were, as by magic, drawn up facing the throng. M. Bailly, upon horseback, displayed the red flag, in accordance with the Riot Act law, and ordered the mob to disperse.[295]

The response was a shout from fifty thousand men, women, and boys of "Down with the red flag! Down with Bailly! Death to La Fayette!" The clamor became hideous, and a shower of mud and stones fell upon La Fayette and the mayor, and several pistol-shots from a distance were discharged at them. The crowd, accustomed to lawlessness, did not believe that the municipal government would dare to order the soldiers to fire.

La Fayette, with mistaken humanity, ordered the advance guard to fire into the air. The harmless volley was followed by shouts of derision and defiance. It now became necessary to give the fatal order. One volley swept the field. The crash was followed by a shriek, as four hundred dead or wounded fell upon the plain, and as the smoke passed away the whole tumultuous mass was seen flying in terror over the embankments and through the avenues. The artillerymen, with the coolness of trained soldiers, were just upon the point of opening their fire of grapeshot upon the panic-stricken fugitives, when La Fayette, unable to make his voice heard through the uproar, heroically threw himself before the cannon, and thus saved the lives of thousands. The National Guard, saddened by the performance of a duty as painful as it was imperious, returned in the evening through the dark streets of Paris and dispersed to their homes.[296]

The next day M. Bailly appeared before the Assembly, and, in terms of dignity and manly sorrow, reported the triumph of the law. Both the National Assembly and the municipality of Paris voted their cordial approval of the conduct of Bailly and La Fayette. The Jacobin press, however, gave utterance to the fiercest invectives. Bailly and La Fayette were denounced as murderers, and every effort was made to exasperate the passions of the populace.

Amid such scenes of agitation and violence the Assembly concluded its task of forming a constitution. The important document, which was but partially finished at the great celebration on the 14th of July, 1790, was now completed. None were, however, fully satisfied with the Constitution. The aristocratic party abhorred the democratic spirit with which it was pervaded, and yet wished to make it still more obnoxiously democratic, that monarchical Europe might be more thoroughly exasperated. The Jacobins held it up to derision and execration because it was not democratic enough. The moderate party, represented by such men as La Fayette and Barnave, wished to invest the king with more power, but dared not attempt any revision of the Constitution, with the aristocrats and the Jacobins both ready to combine against them.

Napoleon was at this time a young officer in the army, twenty-three years of age. His brother Joseph was studying law in Italy. The whole family had warmly espoused the popular cause. From the beginning Napoleon was the ardent advocate of equal rights, and the determined foe of mob violence. At this early period of the Revolution, he expressed the views to which he adhered through the whole of his career.

There was about this time a large party given by M. Necker. All the illustrious men and women of Paris were present. The youthful Napoleon, then quite a boy in appearance, and almost a stranger in Paris, was introduced to this brilliant assembly by his friend the Abbe Raynal. The genius of Napoleon, and his commanding conversational eloquence, soon drew around him quite a group.

"Who is that young man," inquired the proud Alfieri, "who has collected such a group around him?"

"He is," replied the abbe, "a protege of mine, and a young man of extraordinary talent. He is very industrious, well read, and has made remarkable attainments in history, mathematics, and all military science."

The Bishop of Autun commended the soldiers for having refused to obey their officers, who had ordered them, on a certain occasion, by a discharge of musketry, to disperse a mob.

"Excuse me, my lord," said Napoleon, in tones of earnestness which arrested general attention, "if I venture to interrupt you, but, as I am an officer, I must claim the privilege of expressing my sentiments. It is true that I am young, and it may appear presumptuous in me to address so many distinguished men. But during the past three years I have paid intense attention to our political troubles. I see with sorrow the state of our country, and I will incur censure rather than pass unnoticed principles which are not only unsound, but which are subversive of all government.

"As much as any I desire to see all abuses, antiquated privileges, and usurped rights annulled. Nay, as I am at the commencement of my career, it will be my best policy, as well as my duty, to support the progress of popular institutions, and to promote reform in every branch of the public administration. But as, in the last twelve months, I have witnessed repeated alarming popular disturbances, and have seen our best men divided into factions which threaten to be irreconcilable, I sincerely believe that now, _more than ever_, a strict discipline in the army is absolutely necessary for the safety of our constitutional government and for the maintenance of order.

"Nay, if our troops are not compelled unhesitatingly to obey the commands of the executive, we shall be exposed to the blind fury of democratic passions which will render France the most miserable country on the globe. The ministry may be assured that, if the daily-increasing arrogance of the Parisian mob is not repressed by a strong arm and social order rightly maintained, we shall see not only this capital but every other city in France thrown into a state of indescribable anarchy, while the real friends of liberty, the enlightened patriots now working for the best good of our country, will sink beneath a set of demagogues who, with louder cries for freedom on their tongues, will be in reality but a horde of savages, worse than the Neros of old."[297]

The whole future career of Napoleon was in consistency with the spirit of these remarks. "I frankly declare," said Napoleon, subsequently, "that if I were compelled to choose between the old monarchy and Jacobin misrule, I should infinitely prefer the former."

On the 3d of September the Constitution was presented to the king for his acceptance with imposing ceremonies.[298] At nine o'clock in the evening a deputation left the chamber of the Assembly, and, escorted by a numerous and brilliant guard of honor, entered the Chateau of the Tuileries. The multitudes who thronged the way applauded loudly. The king, surrounded by his ministers and other high officers of the kingdom, received the deputation in his council-chamber. M. Thouret, president of the commission, presented the Constitution to the king, saying,

"Sire! the representatives of the nation come to present to your majesty the constitutional act which consecrates the indefeasible rights of the French people, which gives to the throne its true dignity, and regenerates the government of the empire."

The king, with a countenance expressive of satisfaction, received the document, and replied that he would examine it, and, after the shortest possible delay, communicate his decision to the Assembly. On the 13th he sent a message to the Assembly, which Barnave had assisted him in drawing up, and which contained the following conciliatory and noble sentiments:

"I have examined the Constitution. I accept it and will carry it into execution. The will of the people is no longer doubtful to me, and therefore I accept the Constitution. I freely renounce the co-operation I had claimed in this work, and I declare that when I have renounced it no other but myself has any right to claim it. Let the absent who are restrained by the fear of persecutions return to their country in safety. Let us consent to a mutual forgiveness of the past and obliterate all accusations arising from the events of the Revolution in a general reconciliation. I do not refer to those which have been caused by an attachment to me. Can you see any guilt in them? I will present myself to-morrow at noon to the National Assembly, and take oath to the Constitution in the very place where it has been drawn up."

This frank and cordial assent was unanticipated. It created a burst of extraordinary joy. La Fayette, in response to the suggestion of the king, immediately proposed a general amnesty for all acts connected with the Revolution. The motion was carried by acclaim. For a moment all parties seemed again to be united, prisons were thrown open, captives liberated, and shouts of fraternity and happiness resounded through Paris.

The next day the king went to the Assembly and took his seat by the side of the president. He was received by all the members standing, and they remained standing while he addressed them. With the most earnest expression of sincerity and satisfaction, the king said,

"I come to consecrate solemnly here the acceptance I have given to the Constitutional Act. I swear to be faithful to the nation and the law, and to employ all the powers delegated to me for maintaining the Constitution and carrying its decrees into effect. May this great and memorable epoch be that of the re-establishment of peace, and become the gage of the happiness of the people and the prosperity of the empire."

As the king withdrew the whole Assembly enthusiastically escorted him to his palace. But it was a bitter trial for the once absolute monarch to lay aside his unlimited power and become a constitutional king. The monarch, though feeling humiliated, was still enabled to maintain his aspect of smiles and composure until he reached the privacy of his own apartment. He then threw himself into a chair, and, losing all control, burst into tears.[299] A weeping king excites universal sympathy. The heroic struggles of twenty millions of people to gain their liberties also secure the sympathy and the admiration of every noble heart.

On the 18th of November the Constitution was proclaimed in the streets of Paris. Every thing was done which art could devise to invest the scene with splendor.

Paris was again in a delirium of joy. The bells rang, salvos of artillery were fired, and the acclamations of hundreds of thousands, blending with peals of music from martial bands, filled the air with a confusion of all the sounds of exultation. The people were never weary of calling the king, the queen, the children, to the windows of the palace, and whenever they appeared they were greeted with outbursts of love and joy.[300]

On the 18th there was another magnificent festival on the Field of Mars. The Constitution was read to the people. It was accepted by them with the simultaneous shout from three hundred thousand voices of "_Vive la Nation! Vive le Roi!_" No discordant cry was heard. "After the tempest, those who have been beaten by it, as well as those who have not suffered, enjoy in common the serenity of the sky." In the evening Paris and all France blazed with illuminations and resounded with the shout of enfranchised millions. Balloons rose, from which copies of the Constitution were scattered as snow-flakes upon the multitude. The Elysian Fields, from the Arc de l'Etoile to the Tuileries, was brilliant with garlands and stars and pyramids of flame. Every tree blazed with quivering tongues of fire. Majestic orchestras pealed forth the notes of national triumph, and a multitude which no man could number filled that most magnificent avenue of Europe with plays, dances, shouts, and songs of exultation.

La Fayette, on his well-known white charger, rode at the head of his staff through the almost impenetrable throng, accompanied by the king, the queen, and their children. Enthusiasm now reached its culminating point. Hats were thrown into the air, and from the whole mighty mass, as by electric sympathy, rose the cry "_Vive le Roi! Vive la Reine! Vive le Dauphin!_"

The king and queen were overjoyed in view of the happiness of the people, and of the love thus spontaneously and enthusiastically manifested for the royal family. The queen was bewildered by so marvelous a change. But four weeks before the royal family were conducted as captives through that same avenue, surrounded by the same countless throng, and not a voice bade them welcome. They could then read in every eye the expression of hatred and defiance. The contrast led the queen to exclaim, "They are no longer the same people." Even her proud heart was touched, and she, for the first time, began to feel some respect for popular rights. Returning to the palace, of her own accord she stepped out upon the balcony, and presented her children to the crowd who thronged the terrace. They received such greeting as can only come from hearts glowing with sincerity and joy. These days of rejoicing were terminated by an offering of thanksgiving to God, as the sublime chant of the _Te Deum_ was sung in the cathedral of Notre Dame.

The Constituent Assembly, having now completed its task, prepared to dissolve. As a conclusive reply to all who had accused it of ambitious designs to perpetuate its powers, and as a magnanimous display of patriotic disinterestedness, it decreed that none of its members should be re-eligible to the next Legislature.

At three o'clock in the afternoon of the 30th of September, the king, surrounded by his ministers, entered the Assembly. He was no longer the hostage of the nation, but its recognized sovereign; the guard which the law assigned him being now placed under his own command. Upon his entrance the applause was so enthusiastic and prolonged that for some time he was unable to commence speaking. He then said,

"Gentlemen, after the completion of the Constitution, you have resolved on to-day for the termination of your labors. I will exercise all the power confided to me in assuring to the Constitution the respect and obedience which is its due. For you, gentlemen, who, during a long and painful career, have evinced an indefatigable zeal in your labors, there remains a last duty to fulfill, when you are scattered over the face of the empire. It is to enlighten your fellow-citizens as to the spirit of the laws you have made; to purify and unite opinions by the example you will give to the love of order and submission to the laws. Be, on your return to your homes, the interpreters of my sentiments to your fellow-citizens. Tell them that the king will always be their first and most faithful friend; that he desires to be loved by them, and can only be happy with them and by them."

The king left the hall amid the loudest acclamations. They were the last with which he was greeted. Thouret, the president of the Assembly, as soon as the king had retired, said in a loud voice, "The Constituent Assembly pronounces its mission accomplished, and that its sittings now terminate." Thus closed the truly patriotic Assembly. It had accomplished the greatest and the most glorious revolution ever achieved in so short a time, and with so little violence. Repressing alike the despotism of aristocracy and the lawlessness of the mob, it established a constitution containing the essential elements of liberty protected by law. Under this constitution France might have advanced in prosperity. But the aristocrat and the Jacobin combined in its overthrow. They were fatally successful in their efforts.

It is interesting to observe how differently the same events were regarded by different minds. Bertrand de Moleville, a warm partisan of the aristocracy, says,

"Thus terminated this guilty Assembly, whose vanity, ambition, cupidity, ingratitude, ignorance, and audacity have overturned the most ancient and the noblest monarchy of Europe, and rendered France the theatre of every crime, of every calamity, and of the most horrible catastrophe. Can these treacherous representatives ever justify themselves in the eyes of the nation for having so unworthily abused their confidence and their powers?"

On the other hand, the democratic historians, the "Two Friends of Liberty," while regretting that the Constitution was not more thoroughly democratic, say,

"The Constitution of 1791, with all its faults, forever deserves the gratitude of the French people, because it has destroyed, never to return, every trace of feudalism, imposts the most fatal to agriculture, the privileges of particular persons, the usurpations of the priesthood over the civil power, and the proud pretensions of ancient corporations; because it has realized what philosophy for ages has in vain wished, and what monarchs the most absolute have never dared to undertake; and because it has established that uniformity which no one could have ever hoped for in an empire formed by gradual accretions from time to time, and with which, under a good government, there is no prosperity which France may not realize."

But whatever may be the estimate which political partisans may place upon the labors of the Assembly, no intelligent man will now deny that the great majority of that body were true patriots, sincerely desiring the welfare of their country. It will be admitted by all that they abolished judicial torture, placed all men upon the basis of equality in the eye of the law, annulled obnoxious privileges, introduced vast reform into commercial jurisprudence, established liberty of worship and of conscience, suppressed monastic vows, abolished the execrable system of _lettres de cachet_, rendered personal liberty sacred, introduced equality of taxation, and swept away those provincial jealousies and that interior line of custom-houses which had for ages seriously embarrassed the internal trade of the kingdom. All feudal rights were abrogated, industry encouraged, and the citizens of the kingdom were enrolled into a National Guard, for the preservation of domestic peace and to resist aggression.

This most noble reform combined Europe assailed with all its marshaled bayonets. The crime deluged the Continent in woe. After nearly a quarter of a century of conflagration and carnage, French liberty was trampled into the bloody mire of Waterloo, and the Old Regime was reinstated.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 287: "Je connais vos moyens de defense; ils sont nul. Et votre chatiment servira d'exemple aux autres peuples. Voila ce que voit vous dire un homme qui n'a pour vous et votre peuple qu'indignation et horreur. Je connais les chemins; je guiderais les armees etrangeres qui vous attaqueront. Si l'on ote un seul cheven de la tete de mon roi, il ne restera pas pierre sur pierre a Paris. Adieu, messieurs."--_Histoire de la Revolution Francaise, par Villaume_, p. 160.]

[Footnote 288: The Assembly, while exonerating the king, condemned Bouille and three _Guards du Corps_ who accompanied the king in his flight. It is impossible to refute the _logic_ with which Robespierre opposed this decision. "The measures you propose," he said, "can not but dishonor you. If you adopt them, I demand to declare myself the advocate of _all_ the accused. I will be the defender of the three _Guards du Corps_, the governess, even of Monsieur de Bouille. By the principles of your committee, _no crime has been committed_. Where there is no crime _there can be no accomplices_. Gentlemen, to visit the weaker culprit when the greater one escapes is cowardice. You must condemn all or acquit all." To this no reply was made. The Assembly voted.]

[Footnote 289: "The Republican party now began to appear. The struggle, which lay at first between the Assembly and the court, then between the Constitutionalists and the aristocrats, was now about to commence between the Constitutionalists and the Republicans."--_Mignet_, p. 104.]

[Footnote 290: Villiaume, p. 112; Desodoards, p. 42.]

[Footnote 291: Hist. de la Rev. Fr., par Villiaume, p. 112. "The Emperor of Austria, the King of Prussia, and the Count d'Artois met at Pilnitz, where they made the famous declaration of the 27th of August, which, far from improving the condition of the king, would have imperiled him, had not the Assembly, in its wisdom, continued to follow out its new designs, regardless at once of the clamors of the multitude at home and of the foreign powers."--_Mignet_, p. 107.]

[Footnote 292: Histoire des Montagnards, par Alphonse Esquiros, p. 49.]

[Footnote 293: "It is easy to discern how many a hasty and tremulous hand has traced the witness of its fury or ignorance upon this document. Many were even unable to write. A circle of ink with a cross in the centre marks their anonymous adhesion to the petition. Some female names are to be seen, and numerous names of children are discernible from the inaccuracy of their hand, guided by another."--_History of the Girondists, Lamartine_, vol. i., p. 125.

This document is still preserved in the archives of the municipality of Paris. On it may be read the names of Chaumette, Maillard, Hebert, Hauriot, Santerre, and others who subsequently became most conspicuous in deeds of cruelty and infamy.]

[Footnote 294: History of the Girondists, Lamartine, vol. i., p. 126.]

[Footnote 295: The Riot Act established by the Constitution was a great improvement upon the Riot Act of England. It declared that the municipal officers, if the public peace is endangered, shall declare that military force must be produced; and the signal of this declaration shall be a red flag upon the Hotel de Ville, and then carrying before them a red flag through the streets, wherever they, with their armed force, go. On the appearance of the red flag, all crowds refusing instantly to disperse shall be held criminal, and shall be liable to be dispersed by force. In a crowd a _voice_ can not always be heard, but a _red flag_ can always be seen. The crowd, though thus dispersed, were authorized to depute six persons to state their grievance to the government.]

[Footnote 296: There are many conflicting partisan accounts of this event. The most careful and thorough investigation has led me to the statement given above. When the Jacobins came into power they sent Bailly to the guillotine for this noble deed. La Fayette would have perished with him had he not been sheltered in the dungeons of Olmutz. Bailly, in his narrative of this affair, says that there were but twelve killed and about as many wounded.]

[Footnote 297: The narrative of this interview is given in full in Chambers' Edinburgh Journal. It was communicated to that journal by an Italian gentleman, a pupil of Condorcet, who was present on the occasion.]

[Footnote 298: The Constitution was commenced the 17th of June, 1789, and completed the 3d of September, 1791.]

[Footnote 299: Madame Campan's Memoirs, vol. ii., p. 157.]

[Footnote 300: All contemporary history unites in testifying to the enthusiasm displayed on this occasion.]