Chapter I: Psychology of the Jacobin Leaders (3)

[Footnote 3191: During this century all important Jacobin leaders, Hitler, Mussolini, Lenin, Stalin, Castro etc. have in their turn followed robespierre's example and bored their captive audiences with their interminable speeches. (SR).]

[Footnote 3192: Buchez et Roux, XXXIII., 406. (Speech delivered Thermidor 8th.) The printed copy of the manuscript with corrections and erasures.]

[Footnote 3193: Ibid., 420, 422, 427.]

[Footnote 3194: Ibid., 428, 435, 436. "O day forever blessed! What a sight to behold, the entire French people assembled together and rendering to the author of nature the only homage worthy of him! How affecting each object that enchants the eye and touches the heart of man! O honored old age! O generous ardor of the young of our country! O the innocent, pure joy of youthful citizens! O the exquisite tears of tender mothers! O the divine charms of innocence and beauty! What majesty in a great people happy in its strength, power and virtue!"--"No, Charmette, No, death is not the sleep of eternity!"--"Remember, O, People, that in a republic, etc."--"If such truths must be dissembled then bring me the hemlock!"]

[Footnote 3195: Speech, May 7, 1794. (On moral and religious ideas in relation to republican principles.)]

[Footnote 3196: Personifications. From Greek to make persons. (SR).]

[Footnote 3197: Buchez et Roux, XXXIII., 436. "The verres and Catilines of our country." (Speech of Thermidor 8th.)--Note especially the speech delivered March 7, 1794, crammed full of classical reminiscences.]

[Footnote 3198: Ibid., XXXIII., 421. "Truth has touching and terrible accents which reverberate powerfully in pure hearts as in guilty consciences, and which falsehood can no more counterfeit than Salome can counterfeit the thunders of heaven."--437: "Why do those who yesterday predicted such frightful tempests now gaze only on the fleeciest clouds? Why do those who but lately exclaimed 'I affirm that we are treading on a volcano' now behold themselves sleeping on a bed of roses?"]

[Footnote 3199: Ibid., XXXII., 360, 361. (Portraits of the encyclopaedists and Hébertists.)]

[Footnote 31100: Ibid., XXXIII., 408. "Here, I have to open my heart."--XXXII., 475-478, the concluding part.]

[Footnote 31101: Hamel: "Histoire de Robespierre," I., 34-76. An attorney at 23, a member of the Rosati club at Arras at 24, a member of the Arras Academy at 25. The Royal Society of Metz awarded him a second prize for his discourse against the prejudice which regards the relatives of condemned criminals as infamous. His eulogy of Gresset is not crowned by the Amiens Academy. He reads before the Academy of Arras a discourse against the civil incapacities of illegitimate children, and then another on reforms in criminal jurisprudence. In 1789, he is president of the Arras Academy, and publishes an eulogy of Dupaty and an address to the people from Artois on the qualities necessary for future deputies.]

[Footnote 31102: See his eulogy of Rousseau in the speech of May 7, 1794. (Buchez et Roux, XXXII., 369.--Garat, 85. "I hoped that his selection of Rousseau for a model of style and the constant reading of his works would exert some good influence on his character."]

[Footnote 31103: Fievée, "correspondance" (introduction). Fievée, who heard him at the Jacobin Club, said that he resembled a "tailor of the ancient regime." La Réeveillère-Lepeaux, ´"Memoires."--Buchez et Roux, XXXIV., 94.--Malouet, "Mémoires," II., 135. (Session of May 31, 1791, after the delivery of Abbé Raynal's address.) "This is the first and only time I found Robespierre clear and even eloquent.... He spun out his opening phrases as usual, which contained the spirit of his discourse, and which, in spite of his accustomed rigmarole, produced the effect he intended."]

[Footnote 31104: Courrier de Provence, III., No. 52, (Oct. 7 and 8, 1789).--Buchez et Roux, VI., 372. (Session of July 10, 1790.) Another similar blunder was committed by him on the occasion of an American deputation. The president had made his response, which was "unanimously applauded." Robespierre wanted to have his say notwithstanding the objections of the Assembly, impatient at his verbiage, and which finally put him down. Amidst the laughter, "M. l'Abbé Maury demands ironically the printing of M. Robespierre's discourse."]

[Footnote 31105: L. Villiers, 2.]

[Footnote 31106: Cf. his principal speeches in the constituent Assembly;--against martial law; against the veto, even suspensive; against the qualification of the silver marc and in favor of universal suffrage; in favor of admitting into the National Guard non-acting citizens; of the marriage of priests; of the abolition of the death penalty; of granting political rights to colored men; of interdicting the father from favoring any one of his children; of declaring the "Constituants" ineligible to the Legislative Assembly, etc. On royalty: "The King is not the representative but the clerk of the nation." On the danger of allowing political rights to colored men: "Let the colonies perish if they cost you your honor, your glory, your liberty!"]

[Footnote 31107: Hamel, I., 76.77, (March, 1789). "My heart is an honest one and I stand firm; I have never bowed beneath the yoke of baseness and corruption." He enumerates the virtues that a representative of the Third Estate should possess (26, 83). He already shows his blubbering capacity and his disposition to regard himself as a victim: "They undertake making martyrs of the people's defenders. Had they the power to deprive me of the advantages they envy, could they snatch from me my soul and the consciousness of the benefits I desire to confer on them."]

[Footnote 31108: Buchez et Roux, XXXIII. "Who am I that am thus accused? The slave of freedom, a living martyr to the Republic, at once the victim and the enemy of crime!" See this speech in full.]

[Footnote 31109: Especially in his address to the French people, (Aug., 1791), which, in a justificatory form, is his apotheosis.--Cf. Hamel, II., 212; Speech in the Jacobin club, (April 27, 1792).]

[Footnote 31110: Hamel, I., 517, 532, 559; II., 5.]

[Footnote 31111: Laréveillère-Lepeaux," Mémoires."--Barbaroux, "Mémoires," 358. (Both, after a visit to him.)]

[Footnote 31112: Robespierre's devotees constantly attend at the Jacobin club and in the convention to hear him speak and applaud him, and are called, from their condition and dress, "the fat petticoats."]

[Footnote 31113: Buchez et Roux, XX., 197. (Meeting of Nov. I, 1792.)--"Chronique de Paris," Nov. 9, 1792, article by Condorcet. With the keen insight of the man of the world, he saw clearly into Robespierre's character. "Robespierre preaches, Robespierre censures; he is animated, grave, melancholy, deliberately enthusiastic and systematic in his ideas, and conduct. He thunders against the rich and the great; he lives on nothing and has no physical necessities. His sole mission is to talk, and this he does almost constantly... His characteristics are not those of a religious reformer, but of the chief of a sect. He has won a reputation for austerity approaching sanctity. He jumps up on a bench and talks about God and Providence. He styles himself the friend of the poor; he attracts around him a crowd of women and 'the poor in spirit, and gravely accepts their homage and worship.... Robespierre is a priest and never will be anything else." Among Robespierre's devotees Madame de Chalabre must be mentioned, (Hamel, I., 525), a young widow (Hamel, III., 524), who offers him her hand with an income of forty thousand francs. "Thou art my supreme deity," she writes to him, "and I know no other on this earth! I regard thee as my guardian angel, and would live only under thy laws."]

[Footnote 31114: Fievée, "Correspondance," (introduction).]

[Footnote 31115: Report of Courtois on the papers found in Robespierre's domicile. Justificatory documents No.20, letter of the Secretary of the Committee of Surveillance of Saint Calais, Nivôse 15, year II.]

[Footnote 31116: Ibid., No. 18. Letter of V--, former inspector of "droits reservés," Feb. 5, 1792.]

[Footnote 31117: Ibid., No.8. Letter of P. Brincourt, Sedan, Aug.29, 1793.]

[Footnote 31118: Ibid., No. I. Letter of Besson, with an address of the popular club of Menosque, Prairial 23, year II]

[Footnote 31119: Ibid., No.14. Letter of D--, member of the Cordeliers Club, and former mercer, Jan.31, 1792]

[Footnote 31120: Ibid., No.12. Letter by C--, Chateau Thierry, Prairial 30, year II.]

[Footnote 31121: Hamel, III., 682. (Copied from Billaud-Varennes' manuscripts, in the Archives Nationales).]

[Footnote 31122: Moniteur, XXII., '75. (Session of Vendémiaire i8, year III. Speech by Laignelot.) "Robespierre had all the popular clubs under his thumb."]

[Footnote 31123: Garat, 85. "The most conspicuous sentiment with Robespierre, and one, indeed, of which he made no mystery, was that the defender of the people could never see amiss."--(Bailleul, quoted in Carnot's Memoirs, I. 516.) "He regarded himself as a privileged being, destined to become the people's regenerator and instructor."]

[Footnote 31124: Speech of May 16, 1794, and of Thermidor 8, year II.]

[Footnote 31125: Buchez et Roux, X., 295, 296. (Session June 22, 1791, of the Jacobin Club.)--Ibid., 294.--Marat spoke in the same vein: "I have made myself a curse for all good people in France." He writes, the same date: "Writers in behalf of the people will be dragged to dungeons. 'The friend of the people,' whose last sigh is given for his country, and whose faithful voice still summons you to freedom, is to find his grave in a fiery furnace." The last expression shows the difference in their imaginations.]

[Footnote 31126: Hamel, II., 122. (Meeting of the Jacobin Club, Feb.10, 1792.) "To obtain death at the hands of tyrants is not enough--one must deserve death. If it be true that the earliest defenders of liberty became its martyrs they should not suffer death without bearing tyranny along with them into the grave."--Cf., ibid., II., 215. (Meeting of April 27, 1792.)]

[Footnote 31127: Hamel, II., 513. (Speech in the Convention, Prairial 7, year II.)]

[Footnote 31128: Buchez et Roux, XXXIII., 422, 445, 447, 457. (Speech in the Convention, Thermidor 8, year II.)]

[Footnote 31129: Buchez et Roux, XX., 11, 18. (Meeting of the Jacobin Club, Oct.29, 1792.) Speech on Lafayette, the Feuillants and Girondists. XXXI., 360, 363. (Meeting of the Convention, May 7, 1794.) On Lafayette, the Girondists, Dantonists and Hébertists.--XXXIII., 427. (Speech of Thermidor 8, year II.)]

[Footnote 31130: Garat, "Mémoires," 87, 88.]

[Footnote 31131: Buchez et Roux, XXI., 107. (Speech of Pétion on the charges made against him by Robespierre.) Petion justly objects that "Brunswick would be the first to cut off Brissot's head, and Brissot is not fool enough to doubt it."]

[Footnote 31132: Garat, 94. (After the King's death and a little before the 10th of March, 1793.)]

[Footnote 31133: Ibid., 97. In 1789 Robespierre assured Garat that Necker was plundering the Treasury, and that people had seen mules loaded with the gold and silver he was sending off by millions to Geneva.--Carnot, "Mémoires," I. 512. "Robespierre," say Carnot and Prieur, "paid very little attention to public business, but a good deal to public officers; he made himself intolerable with his perpetual mistrust of these, never seeing any but traitors and conspirators."]

[Footnote 31134: Buchez et Roux, XXXIII., 417. (Speech of Thermidor 8, year II.)]

[Footnote 31135: Ibid., XXXII., 361, (Speech May 7, '794,) and 359. "Immorality is the basis of despotism, as virtue is the essence of the Republic."]

[Footnote 31136: Ibid., 371.]

[Footnote 31137: Buchez et Roux, XXXIII., 195. (Report of Couthon and decree in conformity therewith, Prairial 22, year II.) "The revolutionary tribunal is organised for the punishment of the people's enemies.. .. The penalty for all offences within its jurisdiction is death. Those are held to be enemies of the people who shall have misled the people, or the representatives of the people, into measures opposed to the interests of liberty; those who shall have sought to create discouragement by favoring the undertakings of tyrants leagued against the Republic; those who shall have spread false reports to divide or disturb the people; those who shall have sought to misdirect opinion and impede popular instruction, produce depravity and corrupt the public conscience, diminish the energy and purity of revolutionary and republican principles, or stay their progress Those who, charged with public functions, abuse them to serve the enemies of the Revolution, vex patriots, oppress the people, etc."]

[Footnote 31138: Buchez et Roux, XXXV., 290. (" Institutions," by Saint-Just.) "The Revolution is chilled. Principles have lost their vigor. Nothing remains but red-caps worn by intrigue."--Report by Courtois, "Pièces justificatives" No.20. (Letter of Pays and Rompillon, president and secretary of the committee of Surveillance of Saint-Calais, to Robespierre, Nivôse 15, year II.) "The Mountain here is composed of only a dozen or fifteen men on whom you can rely as on yourself; the rest are either deceived, seduced, corrupted or enticed away. Public opinion is debauched by the gold and intrigues of honest folks."]

[Footnote 31139: Report by Courtois, N. 43.--Cf. Hamel, III., 43, 71.--(The following important document is on file in the Archives Nationales, F 7, 4446, and consists of two notes written by Robespierre in June and July, 1793): "Who are our enemies? The vicious and the rich.... How may the civil war be stopped? Punish traitors and conspirators, especially guilty deputies and administrators.... make terrible examples.... proscribe perfidious writers and anti-revolutionaries.... Internal danger comes from the bourgeois; to overcome the bourgeois, rally the people. The present insurrection must be kept up.... The insurrection should gradually continue to spread out... The sans-culottes should be paid and remain in the towns. They ought to be armed, worked up, taught."]

[Footnote 31140: The committee of Public Safety, and Robespierre especially, knew of and commanded the drownings of Nantes, as well as the principal massacres by Carrier, Turreau, etc. (De Martel, "Etude sur Fouché," 257-265.)--Ibid., ("Types revolutionnaires," 41-49.)--Buchez et Roux, XXXIII., 101 (May 26, 1794.) Report by Barère and decree of the convention ordering that "No English prisoners should be taken." Robespierre afterwards speaks in the same sense. Ibid., 458. After the capture of Newport, where they took five thousand English prisoners, the French soldiers were unwilling to execute the convention's decree, on which Robespierre (speech of Thermidor 8) said: "I warn you that your decree against the English has constantly been violated; England, so ill-treated in our speeches, is spared by our arms."]

[Footnote 31141: On the Girondists, Cf. "The Revolution," II., 216.]

[Footnote 31142: Buchez et Roux, XXX., 157. Sketch of a speech on the Fabre d'Eglantine factim.--Ibid., 336, Speech at the Jacobin Club against Clootz.--XXXII., abstract of a report on the Chabot affair, 18.-Ibid., 69, Speech on maintaining Danton's arrest.]

[Footnote 31143: Ibid., XXX., 378. (Dec.10, 1793.) With respect to the women who crowd the Convention in order to secure the liberty of their husbands: "Should the republican women forget their virtues as citizens whenever they remembering that they are wives?"]

[Footnote 31144: Hamel, III., 196.--Michelet, V., 394, abstract of the judicial debates on the disposition of the Girondists: "The minutes of this decree are found in Robespierre's handwriting."]

[Footnote 31145: De Martel, "Types revolutionnaires," 44. The instructions sent to the Revolutionary Tribunal at Orange are in Robespierre's handwriting.--(Archives Nationales, F7 4439.)]

[Footnote 31146: Merlin de Thionville.]

[Footnote 31147: Buchez et Roux, XXXII., 71. (On Danton.) "Before the day is over we shall see whether the convention will shatter an idol a long time rotten.... In what respect is Danton superior to his fellow-citizens?.... I say that the man who now hesitates is guilty..... The debate, just begun, is a danger to the country."--Also the speech in full, against Clootz.]

[Footnote 31148: Ibid., XXX., 338. "Alas, suffering patriots, what can we do, surrounded by enemies fighting in our own ranks!... Let us watch, for the fall of our country is not far off," etc.--These cantatas, with the accompaniments of the celestial harp, are terrible if we consider the circumstances. For instance, on the 3rd of September, 1792, in the electoral assembly while the massacres are going on: "M. Robespierre climbs up on the tribune and declares that he will calmly face the steel of the enemies of public good, and carry with him to his grave the satisfaction of having served his country, the certainty of France having preserved its liberty".--(Archives Nationales, C. II., 58-76.)]

[Footnote 31149: Buchez et Roux, XXXII., 360, 371. (Speech of May 7, 1794.) "Danton! the most dangerous, if he had not been the most cowardly, of the enemies of his country.... Danton, the coldest, the most indifferent, during his country's greatest peril."]

[Footnote 31150: Ibid., XXXIV.,--Cf. the description of him by Fievée, who saw him in the tribune at the Jacobin Club.]

[Footnote 31151: Merlin de Thionville "A vague, painful anxiety, due to his temperament, was the sole source of his activity."]

[Footnote 31152: Barère, "Mémoires." "He wanted to rule France influentially rather than directly."--Buchez et Roux, XIV., 188. (Article by Marat.) During the early sessions of the Legislative Assembly, Marat saw Robespierre on one occasion, and explained to him his plans for exciting popular outbreaks, and for his purifying massacres. "Robespierre listened to me with dismay, turned pale and kept silent for some moments. This interview confirmed me in the idea I always had of him, that he combined the enlightenment of a wise senator with the uprightness of a genuine good man and the zeal of a true patriot, but that he equally lacked the views and boldness of a statesman."--Thibaudeau, "Mémoires," 58.--He was the only member of the committee of Public Safety who did not join the department missions.]

[Footnote 31153: Someone is "grandisonian" when he is like the novelist Richardson's hero, Sir Walter Grandison, beneficient, polite and chivalrous. (SR).]

[Footnote 31154: Buchez et Roux XX., 198. (Speech of Robespierre in the Convention, November 5, 1792.)]

[Footnote 31155: All these statements by Robespierre are opposed to the truth.--("Procés-verbaux des Séances de la Commune de Paris.") Sep. 1, 1792, Robespierre speaks twice at the evening session.--The testimony of two persons, both agreeing, indicate, moreover, that he spoke at the morning session, the names of the speakers not being given. "The question," says Pétion (Buchez et Roux, XXI., 103), "was the decree opening the barriers." This decree is under discussion at the Commune at the morning session of September 1: "Robespierre, on this question, spoke in the most animated manner, wandering off in sombre flights of imagination; he saw precipices at his feet and plots of liberticides; he designated the pretended conspirators."--Louvet (ibid., 130), assigns the same date, (except that he takes the evening for the morning session), for Robespierre's first denunciation of the Girondists: "Nobody, then," says Robespierre, "dare name the traitors? Very well, I denounce them. I denounce them for the security of the people. I denounce the liberticide Brissot, the Girondist faction, the villainous committee of twenty-one in the National Assembly. I denounce them for having sold France to Brunswick and for having received pay in advance for their baseness."--Sep. 2, ("Procès verbaux de la Commune," evening session), "MM. Billaud-Varennes and Robespierre, in developing their civic sentiments,.. denounce to the Conseil-Général the conspirators in favor of the Duke of Brunswick, whom a powerful party want to put on the throne of France."--September 3, at 6 o'clock in the morning, (Buchez et Roux, 16, 132, letter of Louvet), commissioners of the Commune present themselves at Brissot's house with an order to inspect his papers; one of them says to Brissot that he has eight similar orders against the Gironde deputies and that he is to begin with Guadet. (Letter of Brissot complaining of this visit, Monitur, Sep. 7, 1792.) This same day, Sep. 31 Robespierre presides at the Commune. (Granier de Cassagnac, "Les Girondins" II., 63.) It is here that a deputation of the Mauconseil section comes to find him, and he is charged by the "Conseil" with a commission at the Temple.--Sept. 4 (Buchez et Roux, XXI., 106, Speech of Petion), the Commune issues a warrant of arrest against Roland; Danton comes to the Mayoralty with Robespierre and has the warrant revoked; Robespierre ends by telling Petion: "I believe that Brissot belongs to Brunswick."--Ibid., 506. "Robespierre (before Sept. 2), took the lead in the Conseil"--Ibid., 107. "Robespierre," I said, "you are making a good deal of mischief. Your denunciations, your fears, hatreds and suspicions, excite the people."]

[Footnote 31156: Garat, 86.-Cf. Hamel, I., 264. (Speech, June 9, 1791.)]

[Footnote 31157: "The Revolution," II., 338, 339. (Speech. Aug. 3, 1792.)]

[Footnote 31158: Buchez et Roux, XXXIII., 420. (Speech, Thermidor 8.)]

[Footnote 31159: Ibid., XXXII., 71. (Speech against Danton.) "What have you done that you have not done freely?"]

[Footnote 31160: Ibid., XXXIII., 199 and 221. (Speech on the law of Prairial 22.)]

[Footnote 31161: Mirabeau said of Robespierre: "Whatever that man has said, he believes in it.--Robespierre, Duplay's guest, dined every day with Duplay, a juryman in the revolutionary tribunal and co-operator for the guillotine, at eighteen francs a day. The talk at the table probably turned on the current abstractions; but there must have been frequent allusions to the condemnations of the day, and, even when not mentioned, they were in their minds. Only Robert Browning, at the present day, could imagine and revive what was spoken and thought in those evening conversations before the mother and daughters."]

[Footnote 31162: Today, more than 100 years later, where are we? Is it possible that man can thus lie to himself and hence to others? Robert Wright, in his book "The Moral Animal", describing "The New Science of Evolutionary Psychology", writes (page 280): "The proposition here is that the human brain is, in large part, a machine for winning arguments, a machine for convincing others that its owner is in the right--and thus a machine for convincing its owner of the same thing. The brain is like a good lawyer: given any set of interests to defend, its sets about convincing the world of their moral and logical worth, regardless of whether they in fact have any of either. Like a lawyer, it is sometimes more admirable for skill than for virtue." (SR).]

[Footnote 31163: Buchez et Roux, XXXIII., 151.--Cf.. Dauban, "Paris en 1794," p.386 (engraving) and 392, "Fête de l'Être Suprême à Sceaux," according to the programme drawn up by the patriot Palloy. "All citizens are requested to be at their windows or doors, even those occupying the rear part of the main buildings."--Ibid., 399. "Youthful citizens will strew flowers at each station, fathers will embrace their children and mothers turn their eyes upward to heaven."--Moniteur, XXX., 653. "Plan of the fête in honor of the Supreme Being, drawn up by David, and decreed by the National Convention."]

[Footnote 31164: Buchez et Roux, XXXIII., 176. (Narrative by Valate.)]

[Footnote 31165: Hamel, III., 541.]

[Footnote 31166: Buchez et Roux, XXVIII., 178, 180.]

[Footnote 31167: Ibid., 177 (Narrative by Vilate.) Ibid., 170, Notes by Robespierre on Bourdon (de l'Oise) 417. Passages erased by Robespierre in the manuscript of his speech of Thermidor 8.--249. Analogous passages in his speech as delivered,--all these indications enable us to trace the depths of his resentment.]

[Footnote 31168: Ibid., 183. Memoirs of Billaud-Varennes, Collot d'Herbois, Vadier and Barère. "The next day after Prairial 22, at the morning session (of the committee of Public Safety).... I now see, says Robespierre, that I stand alone, with nobody to support me, and, getting violently excited, he launched out against the members of the committee who had conspired against him. He shouted so loud as to collect together a number of citizens on the Tuileries terrace." Finally, "he pushed hypocrisy so far as to shed tears." The nervous machine, I imagine, broke down.--Another member of the committee, Prieur, (Carnot, "Mémoires," II., 525), relates that, in the month of Floréal, after another equally long and violent session, "Robespierre, exhausted, became ill."]

[Footnote 31169: Carnot, "Mémoires," II. 526. "As his bureau was in a separate place, where none of us set foot, he could retire to it without coming in contact with any of us, as in effect, he did. He even made a pretence of passing through the committee rooms, after the session was over, and he signed some papers; but he really neglected nothing, except our common discussions. He held frequent conferences in his house with the presidents of the revolutionary tribunals, over which his influence was greater than ever."]

[Footnote 31170: Dauban, "Paris en 1794," 563.--Archives Nationales, AF.II., 58. The signature of Robespierre, in his own handwriting, is found affixed to many of the resolutions of the Committee of Public Safety, passed Thermidor 5 and 7, and those of St. Just and Couthon after this, up to Thermidor 3, 6 and 7. On the register of the minutes of the Committee of Public Safety, Robespierre is always recorded as present at all meetings between Messidor 1 and Thermidor 8, inclusive.]

[Footnote 31171: Archives Nationales, F.7, 4438. Report to the Committee of Public Safety by Herman, Commissioner of the civil and Police administrations and of the Courts, Messidor 3, year II. "The committee charged with a general supervision of the prisons, and obliged to recognize that all the rascals mostly concerned with liberticide plots are.... still in the prisons, forming a band apart, and rendering surveillance very troublesome; they are a constant source of disorder, always getting up attempts to escape, being a daily assemblage of persons devoting themselves wholly to imprecations against liberty and its defenders.... It would be easy to point out in each prison, those who have served, and are to serve, the diverse factions, the diverse conspiracies.... It may be necessary, perhaps, to purge the prisons at once and free the soil of liberty of their filth, the refuse of humanity." The Committee of Public Safety consequently "charges the commission to ascertain in the prisons of Paris... who have been more specially concerned in the diverse factions and conspiracies that the National convention has destroyed." The word "approved" appears at the foot of the resolution in Robespierre's handwriting, then the signature of Robespierre, and lower down, those of Billaud and Barère. A similar resolution providing for the 7th of Messidor, signed by the same parties and five others, is dispatched the same day. (M. de Martel came across and made use of this conclusive document before I did, most of it being quoted in "Les Types Revolutionnaires.")]

[Footnote 31172: Buchez et Roux, XXXIII., 434.]