Men thus disposed cannot fail to draw near each other, to understand each other, and combine together; for, in the principle of popular sovereignty, they have a common dogma, and, in the conquest of political supremacy, a common aim. Through a common aim they form a faction, and through a common dogma they constitute a sect, the league between them being more easily effected because they are a faction and sect at the same time.
At first their association is not distinguishable in the multitude of other associations. Political societies spring up on all sides after the taking of the Bastille. Some kind of organization had to be substituted for the deposed or tottering government, in order to provide for urgent public needs, to secure protection against ruffians, to obtain supplies of provisions, and to guard against the probably machinations of the court. Committees installed themselves in the town halls, while volunteers formed bodies of militia: hundreds of local governments, almost independent, arose in the place of the central government, almost destroyed.1205 For six months everybody attended to matters of common interest, each individual getting to be a public personage and bearing his quota of the government load: a heavy load at all times, but heavier in times of anarchy; this, at least, is the opinion of the majority but not of all of them. Consequently, a division arises amongst those who had assumed this load, and two groups are formed, one huge, inert and disintegrating, and the other small, compact and energetic, each taking one of two ways which diverge from each other, and which keep on diverging more and more.
On one hand are the ordinary, sensible people, those who are busy, and who are, to some extent, not over-conscientious, and not over-conceited. The power is in their hands because they find it prostrate, lying abandoned in the street; they hold it provisionally only, for they knew beforehand, or soon discover, that they are not qualified for the post, it being one of those which, to be properly filled, needs some preparation and fitness for it. A man does not become legislator or administrator in one day, any more than he suddenly becomes a physician or surgeon. If an accident obliges me to act in the latter capacity, I yield, but against my will, and I do no more than is necessary to save my patients from hurting themselves, My fear of their dying under the operation is very great, and, as soon as some other person can be found to take my place, I go home.1206—I should be glad, like everybody else, to have my vote in the selection of this person, and, among the candidates. I should designate, to the best of my ability, one who seemed to me the ablest and most conscientious. Once selected, however, and installed, I should not attempt to dictate to him; his cabinet is private, and I have no right to run there constantly and cross-question him, as if he were a child or under suspicion. It does not become me to tell him what to do; he probably knows more about the case than I do; in any event, to keep a steady hand, he must not be threatened, and, to keep a clear head, he must not be disturbed. Nor must I be disturbed; my office and books, my shop, my customers must be attended to as well. Everybody has to mind his own business, and whoever would attend to his own and another's too, spoils both.—This way of thinking prevails with most healthy minds towards the beginning of the year 1790, all whose heads are not turned by insane ambition and the mania for theorizing, especially after six months of practical experience and knowing the dangers, miscalculation, and vexations to which one is exposed in trying to lead an eager, over-excited population.—Just at this time, December 1789, municipal law becomes established throughout the country; all the mayors and municipal officers are elected almost immediately, and in the following months, all administrators of districts and departments. The interregnum has a length come to an end. Legal authorities now exist, with legitimate and clearly-determined functions. Reasonable, honest people gladly turn power over to those to whom it belongs, and certainly do not dream of resuming it. All associations for temporary purposes are at once disbanded for lack of an object, and if others are formed, it is for the purpose of defending established institutions. This is the object of the Federation, and, for six months, people embrace each other and exchange oaths of fidelity.—After this, July 14, 1790, they retire into private life, and I have no doubt that, from this date, the political ambition of a large plurality of the French people is satisfied, for, although Rousseau's denunciation of the social hierarchy are still cited by them, they, at bottom, desire but little more than the suppression of administrative brutality and state favoritism.1207 All this is obtained, and plenty of other things besides; the august title of sovereign, the respect of the public authorities, honors to all who wield a pen or make a speech, and, better still, actual sovereignty in the appointment to office of all local land national administrators; not only do the people elect their deputies, but every species of functionary of every degree, those of commune, district, and department, officers in the national guard, civil and criminal magistrates, bishops and priests. Again, to ensure the responsibility of the elected to their electors, the term of office fixed by law is a short one,1208 the electoral machine which summons the sovereign to exercise his sovereignty being set agoing about every four months.—This was a good deal, and too much, as the sovereign himself soon discovers. Voting so frequently becomes unendurable; so many prerogatives end in getting to be drudgery. Early in 1790, and after this date, the majority forego the privilege of voting and the number of absentees becomes enormous. At Chartres, in May, 1790,1209 1,447 out of 1,551 voters do not attend preliminary meetings. At Besançon, in January, 1790, on the election of mayor and municipal officers, 2,141 out of 3,200 registered electors are recorded as absent from the polls, and 2,900 in the following month of November.1210 At Grenoble, in August and November of this year, out of 2,500 registered voters, more than 2,000 are noted as absent.1211 At Limoges, out of about the same number, there are only 150 voters. At Paris, out of 81,400 electors, in August, 1790, 67,200 do not vote, and, three months later, the number of absentees is 71,408.1212
Thus for every elector that votes, there are four, six, eight, ten, and even sixteen that abstain from voting.—In the election of deputies, the case is the same. At the primary meetings of 1791, in Paris, out of 81,200 registered names more than 74,000 fail to respond. In the Doubs, three out of four voters stay away. In one of the cantons of the Côte d'Or, at the close of the polls, only one-eighth of the electors remain at the counting of the votes, while in the secondary meetings the desertion is not less. At Paris, out of 946 electors chosen only 200 are found to give their suffrage; at Rouen, out of 700 there are but 160, and on the last day of the ballot, only 60. In short, "in all departments," says an orator in the tribune, "scarcely one out of five electors of the second degree discharges his duty."
In this manner the majority hands in its resignation. Through inertia, want of forethought, lassitude, aversion to the electoral hubbub, lack of political preferences, or dislike of all the political candidates, it shirks the task which the constitution imposes on it. Most certainly is has no taste for the painstaking burden of being involved in a league (of human rights). Men who cannot find time once in three months to drop a ballot in the box, will not come three times a week to attend the meetings of a club. Far from meddling with the government, they abdicate, and as they refuse to elect it, they cannot undertake to control it.
It is, on the other hand, just the opposite with the upstarts and dogmatists who regard their royal privileges seriously. They not only vote at the elections, but they mean to keep the authority they delegate in their own hands. In their eyes every official is one of their creatures, and remains accountable to them, for, in point of law, the people may not part with their sovereignty, while, in fact, power has proved so sweet that they are not disposed to part with it.1213 During six months preceding the regular elections, they have come to know, comprehend, and test each other; they have held secret meetings; a mutual understanding is arrived at, and henceforth, as other associations disappear like fleeting bloom, theirs1214 rise vigorously on the abandoned soil. A club is established at Marseilles before the end of 1789; each large town has one within the first six months of 1790, Aix in February, Montpellier in March, Nîmes in April, Lyons in May, and Bordeaux in June.1215 But their greatest increase takes place after the Federation festival. Just when local gatherings merge into that of the whole country, the sectarian Jacobins keep aloof, and form leagues of their own. At Rouen, July 14, 1790, two surgeons, a printer, a chaplain at the prison, a widowed Jewess, and four women or children living in the house,—eight persons in all, pure and not to be confounded with the mass,1216 bind themselves together, and form a distinct association. Their patriotism is of superior quality, and they take a special view of the social compact;1217 in swearing fealty to the constitution they reserve to themselves the Rights of Man, and they mean to maintain not only the reforms already effected, but to complete the Revolution just begun.—During the Federation they have welcomed and indoctrinated their fellows who, on quitting the capital or large cities, become bearers of instructions to the small towns and hamlets; they are told what the object of a club is, and how to form one, and, everywhere, popular associations arise on the same plan, for the same purpose, and bearing the same name. A month later, sixty of these associations are in operation; three months later, one hundred; in March, 1791, two hundred and twenty-nine, and in August, 1791, nearly four hundred.1218 After this date a sudden increase takes place, owing to two simultaneous impulses, which scatter their seeds over the entire territory.—On the one hand, at then end of July, 1791, all moderate men, the friends of law and order, who still hold the clubs in check, all constitutionalists, or Feuillants, withdraw from them and leave them to exaggeration or the triviality of proposing motions; the political tone immediately falls to that of the tavern and guard-house, so that wherever one or the other is found, there is a political club. On the other hand, a convocation of the electoral body is held at the same date for the election of a new National Assembly, and for the renewal of local governments; the prey being in sight, hunting-parties are everywhere formed to capture it. In two months,1219 six hundred new clubs spring up; by the end of September they amount to one thousand, and in June, 1792, to twelve hundred—as many as there are towns and walled boroughs. On the fall of the throne, and at the panic caused by the Prussian invasion, during a period of anarchy which equaled that of July, 1789, there were, according to Roederer, almost as many clubs as there were communes, 26,000, one for every village containing five or six hot-headed, boisterous fellows, or roughs, (tape-durs), with a clerk able to pen a petition.
After November, 1790,1220 "every street in every town and hamlet," says a Journal of large circulation, "must have a club of its own. Let some honest craftsman invite his neighbors to his house, where, with using a shared candle, he may read aloud the decrees of the National Assembly, on which he and his neighbors may comment. Before the meeting closes, in order to enliven the company, which may feel a little disturbed on account of Marat's articles, let him read the patriotic oaths in 'Pêre Duchesne.'"1221—The advice is followed. At the meetings in the club are read aloud pamphlets, newspapers, and catechisms dispatched from Paris, the "Gazette Villageoise," the "Journal du Soir," the "Journal de la Montagne," "Pêre Duchesne," the "Révolutions de Paris," and "Laclos' Gazette." Revolutionary songs are sung, and, if a good speaker happens to be present, a former monk (oratorien), lawyer, or school-master, he pours out his stock of phrases, speaking of the Greeks and Romans, proclaiming the regeneration of the human species. One of them, appealing to the women, wants to see
"the declaration of the Rights of Man suspended on the walls of their bedrooms as their principal ornament, and, should war break out, these virtuous supporters, marching at the head of our armies like new bacchantes with flowing hair, the wand of Bacchus in their hand."
Shouts of applause greet this sentiment. The minds of the listeners, swept away by this gale of declamation, become overheated and ignite through mutual contact; like half-consumed embers that would die out if let alone, they kindle into a blaze when gathered together in a heap.—Their convictions, at the same time, gain strength. There is nothing like a coterie to make these take root. In politics, as in religion, faith generating the church, the latter, in its turn, nourishes faith. In the club, as in the private religious meeting, each derives authority from the common unanimity, every word and action of the whole tending to prove each in the right. And all the more because a dogma which remains uncontested, ends in seeming incontestable; as the Jacobin lives in a narrow circle, carefully guarded, no contrary opinions find their way to him. The public, in his eyes, seems two hundred persons; their opinion weighs on him without any counterpoise, and, outside of their belief, which is his also, every other belief is absurd and even culpable. Moreover, he discovers through this constant system of preaching, which is nothing but flattery, that he is patriotic, intelligent, virtuous, of which he can have no doubt, because, before being admitted into the club, his civic virtues have been verified and he carries a printed certificate of them in his pocket.—Accordingly, he is one of an élite corps, a corps which, enjoying a monopoly of patriotism, holds itself aloof, talks loud, and is distinguished from ordinary citizens by its tone and way of conducting things. The club of Pontarlier,1222 from the first, prohibits its members from using the common forms of politeness.
"Members are to abstain from saluting their fellow-citizens by removing the hat, and are to avoid the phrase, 'I have the honor to be,' and others of like import, in addressing persons."
A proper idea of one's importance is indispensable.
"Does not the famous tribune of the Jacobins in Paris inspire traitors and impostors with fear? And do not anti-Revolutionaries return to dust on beholding it?"
All this is true, in the provinces as well as at the capital, for, scarcely is a club organized before it sets to work on the population. In may of the large cities, in Paris, Lyons, Aix and Bordeaux, there are two clubs in partnership,1223 one, more or less respectable and parliamentary, "composed partly of the members of the different branches of the administration and specially devoted to purposes of general utility," and the other, practical and active, made up of bar-room politicians and club-haranguers, who indoctrinate workmen, market-gardeners and the rest of the lower bourgeois class. The latter is a branch of the former, and, in urgent cases, supplies it with rioters.
"We are placed amongst the people," says one of these subaltern clubs, "we read to them the decrees, and, through lectures and counsel, we warn them against the publications and intrigues of the aristocrats. We ferret out and track plotters and their machinations. We welcome and advise all complainants; we enforce their demands, when just; finally, we, in some way, attend to all details."
Thanks to these vulgar auxiliaries, but whose lungs and arms are strong, the party soon becomes dominant; it has force and uses it, and, denying that its adversaries have any rights, it re-establishes all the privileges for its own advantage.1224
Let us consider its mode of procedure in one instance and upon a limited field, the freedom of the press.1225 In December, 1790, M. Etienne, an engineer, whom Marat and Fréron had denounced as a spy in their periodicals, brought a suit against them in the police court. The numbers containing the libel were seized, the printers summoned to appear, and M. Etienne claimed a public retraction or 25,000 francs damages with costs. At this the two journalists, considering themselves infallible as well as exempt from arrest, are indignant.
"It is of the utmost importance," writes Marat, "that the informer should not be liable to prosecution as he is accountable only to the public for what he says and does for the public good."
M. Etienne (surnamed Languedoc), therefore, is a traitor: "Monsieur Languedoc, I advise you to keep your mouth shut; if I can have you hung I will." M. Etienne, nevertheless, persists and obtains a first decision in his favor. Fire and flame are at once belched forth by Marat and Fréon:
"Master Thorillon," exclaims Fréron to the commissary of police, "you shall be punished and held up to the people as an example; this infamous decision must be canceled."—"Citizens," writes Marat, "go in a body to the Hôtel-de-Ville and do not allow one of the guards to enter the court-room. "—On the day of the trial, and in the most condescending spirit, but two grenadiers are let in. Even these, however, are too many and shouts from the Jacobin crowd arise "Turn 'em out! We rule here," upon which the two grenadiers withdraw. On the other hand, says Fréron triumphantly, that there were in the court-room "sixty of the victors at the Bastille led by the brave Santerre, who intended to interfere in the trial."—They intervene, indeed, and first against the plaintiff. M. Etienne is attacked at the entrance of the court-room and nearly knocked down He is so maltreated that he is obliged to seek shelter in the guard-room. He is spit upon, and they "move to cut off his ears." His friends receive "hundreds of kicks," while he runs away, and the case is postponed.—It is called up again several times, so no the judges have to be restrained. A certain Mandart in the audience, author of a pamphlet on "Popular Sovereignty," springs to his feet and, addressing Bailly, mayor of Paris, and president of the tribunal, challenges the court. As usual Bailly yields, attempting to cover up his weakness with an honorable pretext: "Although a judge can be challenged only by the parties to a suit, the appeal of one citizen is sufficient for me and I leave the bench." The other judges, who are likewise insulted and menaced, yield also, and, through a sophism which admirably illustrates the times, they discover in the oppression to which the plaintiff is subject a legal device by which they can give a fair color to their denial of justice. M. Etienne having signified to them that neither he nor his counsel could attend in court, because their lives were in danger, the court decides that M. Etienne, "failing to appear in person, or by counsel, is non-suited."—Victorious shouts at once proceed from the two journalists, while their articles on the case disseminated throughout France set a precedence contained in the ruling. Any Jacobin may after this with impunity denounce, insult, and calumniate whomsoever he pleases, sheltered as he is from the action of courts, and held superior to the law.
Let us see, on the other hand, what liberty they allow their adversaries. A fortnight before this, Mallet du Pan, a writer of great ability, who, in the best periodical of the day, discusses questions week after week free of all personalities, the most independent, straight-forward, and honorable of men, the most eloquent and judicious advocate of public order and true liberty, is waited upon by a deputation from the Palais-Royal,1226 consisting of about a dozen well-dressed individuals, civil enough and not too ill-disposed, but quite satisfied that they have a right to interfere. The conversation which ensues shows to what extent the current political creed had turned peoples' heads.
"One of the party, addressing me, informed me that he and his associates were deputies of the Palais-Royal clubs, and that they had called to notify me that I would do well to change my principles and stop attacking the constitution, otherwise extreme violence would be brought to bear on me. I replied that I recognized no authority but the law and that of the courts; the law is your master and mine, and no respect is shown to the constitution by assailing the freedom of the press."
"The constitution is the common will, resumed the spokesman. The law, is the authority of the strongest. You are subject to the strongest and you ought to submit. We notify you of the will of the nation and that is the law.'"
Mallet du Pan stated to them that he was not in favor of the ancient régime, but that he did approve of royal authority.
"Oh!" exclaimed all together, "we should be sorry not to have a king. We respect the King and maintain his authority. But you are forbidden to oppose the dominant opinion and the liberty which is decreed by the National Assembly."
Mallet du Pan, apparently, knows more about this than they do, for he is a Swiss by birth, and has lived under a republic for twenty years. But this does not concern them. They persist all the same, five or six talking at once, misconstruing the sense the words they use, and each contradicting the other in point of detail, but all agreeing to impose silence on him:
"You should not run counter to the popular will, for in doing this you preach civil war, bring the assembly's decrees into contempt, and irritate the nation."
Evidently, for them, they constitute the nation, or, more or less, they represent it. Through this self-investiture they are at once magistrates, censors, and police, while the scolded journalist is only too glad, in his case, to have them stop at injunctions.—Three days before this he is advised that a body of rioters in his neighborhood "threatened to treat his house like that of M. de Castries," in which everything had been smashed and thrown out the windows. At another time, apropos of the suspensive or absolute veto; "four savage fellows came to his domicile to warn him, showing him their pistols, that if he dared write in behalf of M. Mounier he should answer for it with his life." Thus, from the outset,
"just as the nation begins to enjoy the inestimable right of free thought and free speech, factional tyrants lose no time in depriving citizens of these, proclaiming to all that would maintain the integrity of their consciences: Tremble, die, or believe as we do!"
After this, to impose silence on those who express what is offensive, the crowd, the club, the section, decree and execute, each on its own authority,1227 searches, arrests, assaults, and, at length, assassinations. During the month of June, 1792, "three decrees of arrest and fifteen denunciations, two acts of affixing seals, four civic invasions of his premises, and the confiscation of whatever belonged to him in France" is the experience of Mallet du Pan. He passes four years "without knowing with any certainty on going to bed whether he should get out of it in the morning alive and free." Later on, if he escapes the guillotine and the lantern, it is owing to exile. On the 10th of August, Suleau, a conservative journalist, is massacred in the street.—This shows how the party regards the freedom of the press. Other liberties may be judged of by its encroachments on this domain. Law, in its eyes, is null when it proves an obstacle, and when it affords protection to adversaries; consequently there is no excess which it does not sanction for itself; and no right which it does not refuse to others.
There is no escape from the tyranny of the clubs. "That of Marseilles has forced the city officials to resign;1228 it has summoned the municipal body to appear before it; it has ignored the authority of the department, and has insulted the administrators of the law. Members of the Orleans club have kept the national Supreme Court under supervision, and taken part in its proceedings. Those of the Caen club have insulted the magistrates, and seized and burnt the records of the proceedings commenced against the destroyers of the statue of Louis XIV. At Alby they have forcibly abstracted from the record-office the papers relating to an assassin's trial, and burnt them." The club at Coutance gives the deputies of its district to understand that "no reflections must be cast on the laws of the people." That of Lyons stops an artillery train, under the pretext that the ministry in office does not enjoy the nation's confidence.—Thus does the club everywhere govern, or prepare to govern. On the one hand, at the elections, it sets aside or supports candidates; it alone votes, or, at least, controls the voting. In short, the club is the elective power, and practically, if not legally, enjoys the privileges of a political aristocracy. On the other hand, it assumes to be a spontaneous police-board; it prepares and circulates the lists which designate the ill-disposed, suspected, and lukewarm; it lodges information against nobles whose sons have emigrated; against unsworn priests who still reside in their former parishes, and against nuns, "whose conduct is unconstitutional". It prompts, directs, and rebukes local authorities; it is itself a supplemental, superior, and usurping authority.—All at once, sensible men realize its character, and protest against it.
"A body thus organized," says a petition,1229 "exists solely for arming one citizen against another.... Discussions take place there, and denunciations are made under the seal of inviolable secrecy..... Honest citizens, surrendered to the most atrocious calumny, are destroyed without an opportunity of defending themselves. It is a veritable Inquisition. It is the center of seditious publications, a school of cabals and intrigue. If the citizens have to blush at the selection of unworthy candidates, they are all due to this class of associations... Composed of the excited and the incendiary, of those who aim to rule the State," the club everywhere tends
"to a mastery of the popular opinion, to thwarting the municipalities, to an intrusion of itself between these and the people," to an usurpation of legal forms and to become a "colossus of despotism."
Vain complaints! The National Assembly, ever in alarm on its own account, shields the popular club and accords it its favor or indulgence. A journal of the party had recommended "the people to form themselves into small platoons." These platoons, one by one, are growing. Each borough now has a local oligarchy, an enlisted and governing band. To create an army out of these scattered bands, simply requires a staff and a central rallying-point. The central point and the staff have both for a long time been ready in Paris, it is the association of the "Friends of the Constitution."
No association in France, indeed, dates farther back, and has an equal prestige. It was born before the Revolution, April 30, 1789.1230 At the assembly of the States-General in Brittany, the deputies from Quimper, Hennebon, and Pontivy saw how important it was to vote in concert, and they had scarcely reached Versailles when, in common with others, they hired a hall, and, along with Mounier, secretary of the States-General of Dauphiny, and other deputies from the provinces, at once organized a union which was destined to last. Up to the 6th of October, none but deputies were comprised in it; after that date, on removing to Paris, in the library of the Jacobins, a convent in the Rue St. Honoré, many well-known eminent men were admitted, such as Condorcet, and then Laharpe, Chénier, Champfort, David, and Talma, among the most prominent, with other authors and artists, the whole amounting to about a thousand notable personages.—No assemblage could be more imposing—two or three hundred deputies are on its benches, while its rules and by-laws seem specially designed to gather a superior body of men. Candidates for admission were proposed by ten members and afterwards voted on by ballot. To be present at one of its meetings required a card of admission. On one occasion, a member of the committee of two, appointed to verify these cards, happens to be the young Duke of Chartres. There is a committee on administration and a president. Discussions took place with parliamentary formalities, and, according to its status, the questions considered there were those under debate in the National Assembly.1231 In the lower hall, at certain hours, workmen received instruction and the constitution was explained to them. Seen from afar, no society seems worthier of directing public opinion; near by, the case is different. In the departments, however, where distance lends enchantment, and where old customs prevail implanted by centralization, it is accepted as a guide because its seat is at the capital. Its statutes, its regulations, its spirit, are all imitated; it becomes the alma mater of other associations and they its adopted daughters. It publishes, accordingly, a list of all clubs conspicuously in its journal, together with their denunciations; it insists on their demands; henceforth, every Jacobin in the remotest borough feels the support and endorsement, not only of his local, club, but again of the great club whose numerous offshoots reached the entire territory and which extends its all-powerful protection to the least of its adherents. In return for this protection, each associated club obeys the word of command given at Paris, and to and from, from the center to the extremities, a constant correspondence maintains the established harmony. A vast political machine is thus set agoing, a machine with thousands of arms, all working at once under one impulsion, and the lever which the motions is in the hands of a few master spirits in the Rue St. Honoré.
No machine could be more effective; never was one seen so well contrived for manufacturing artificial, violent public opinion, for making this appear to be national, spontaneous sentiment, for conferring the rights of the silent majority on a vociferous minority, for forcing the surrender of the government.
"Our tactics were very simple," says Grégoire1232. "It was understood that one of us should take advantage of the first favorable opportunity to propose some measure in the National Assembly that was sure to be applauded by a small minority and cried down by the majority. But that made no difference. The proposer demanded, which was granted, that the measure should be referred to a committee in which its opponents hoped to see it buried. Then the Paris Jacobins took hold of it. A circular was issued, after which an article on the measure was printed in their journal and discussed in three or four hundred clubs that were leagued together. Three weeks after this the Assembly was flooded with petitions from every quarter, demanding a decree of which the first proposal had been rejected, and which is now passed by a great majority because a discussion of it had ripened public opinion."
In other words, the Assembly must go ahead or it will be driven along, in which process the worst expedients are the best. Those who conduct the club, whether fanatics or intriguers, are fully agreed on this point.
At the head of the former class is Duport, once a counselor in the parliament, who, after 1788, knew how to turn riots to account. The first revolutionary consultations were held in his house. He wants to plough deep, and his devices for burying the ploughshare are such that Sieyès, a radical, if there ever was one, dubbed it a "cavernous policy."1233 Duport, on the 28th of July, 1789, is the organizer of the Committee on Searches, by which all favorably disposed informers or spies form in his hands a supervisory police, which fast becomes a police of provocation. He finds recruits in the lower hall of the Jacobin club, where workmen come to be catechized every morning, while his two lieutenants, the brothers Laurette, have only to draw on the same source for a zealous staff in a choice selection of their instruments. "Ten reliable men receive orders there daily;1234 each of these in turn gives his orders to ten more, belonging to different battalions in Paris. In this way each battalion and section receives the same insurrectionary orders, the same denunciations of the constituted authorities, of the mayor of Paris, of the president of the department, and of the commander of the National Guard," everything taking place secretly. These are dark deeds: the leaders themselves call it 'the Sabbath' and, along with fanatics they enlist ruffians. "They spread the rumor that, on a certain day, there will be a great commotion with assassinations and pillage, preceded by the payment of money distributed from hand to hand by subaltern officers among those that can be relied on, and that these bands are to assemble, as advertised, within a radius of thirty or forty leagues."1235—One day, to provoke a riot, "half a dozen men, who have arranged the thing, form a small group, in which one of them holds forth vehemently; at once a crowd of about sixty others gathers around them. Then the six men move on from place to place, to form fresh groups making their apparent excitement pass for popular irritation.—Another day, "about forty fanatics, with powerful lungs, and four or five hundred paid men," scatter themselves around the Tuileries, "yelling furiously," and, gathering under the windows of the Assembly, "move resolutions to assassinate."—"Our ushers," says a deputy to the Assembly, "whom you ordered to suppress this tumult, heard reiterated threats of bringing you the heads of those the crowd wished to proscribe. That very evening, in the Palais-Royal, "I heard a subordinate leader of this factious band boast of having charged your ushers to take this answer back, adding that there was time enough yet for all good citizens to follow his advice."—The watchword of these agitators is, are you true and the response is, a true man. Their pay is twelve francs a day, and when in action they make engagements on the spot at that rate. "From several depositions taken by officers of the National Guard and at the mayoralty," it is ascertained that twelve francs a day were tendered to "honest people to join in with those you may have heard shouting, and some of them actually had the twelve francs put into their hands."—The money comes from the coffers of the Duke of Orleans, and they are freely drawn upon; at his death, with a property amounting to 114,000,000 francs, his debts amount to 74,000,000.1236 Being one of the faction, he contributes to its expenses, and, being the richest man in the kingdom, he contributes proportionately to his wealth. Not because he is a party leader, for he is too effeminate, too nervous; but "his petty council,"1237 and especially one of his private secretaries, Laclos, cherishes great designs for him, their object being to make him lieutenant-general of the kingdom, afterwards regent, and even king,1238 so that they may rule in his name and "share the profits."——In the mean time they turn his whims to the best account, particularly Laclos, who is a kind of subordinate Macchiavelli, capable of anything, profound, depraved, and long indulging his fondness for monstrous combinations; nobody ever so coolly delighted in indescribable compounds of human wickedness and debauchery. In politics, as in romance, his department is "Les Liaisons Dangereuses." Formerly he maneuvered as an amateur with prostitutes and ruffians in the fashionable world; now he maneuvers in earnest with the prostitutes and ruffians of the sidewalks. On the 5th of October 1789, he is seen, "dressed in a brown coat,"1239 foremost among the women starting for Versailles, while his hand1240 is visible "in the Réveillon affair, also in the burning of barriers and Châteaux," and in the widespread panic which aroused all France against imaginary bandits. His operations, says Malouet, "were all paid for by the Duke of Orleans"; he entered into them "for his own account, and the Jacobins for theirs."—At this time their alliance is plain to everybody. On the 21st of November, 1790, Laclos becomes secretary of the club, chief of the department of correspondence, titular editor of its journal, and the invisible, active, and permanent director of all its enterprises. Whether actual demagogues or prompted by ambition, whether paid agents or earnest revolutionaries, each group works on its own account, both in concert, both in the same direction, and both devoted to the same undertaking, which is the conquest of power by every possible means.
At first sight their success seems doubtful, for they are in a minority, and a very small one. At Besançon, in November, 1791, the revolutionaries of every shade of opinion and degree, whether Girondists or Montagnards, consist of about 500 or 600 out of 3,000 electors, and, in November, 1792, of not more than the same number out of 6,000 and 7,000.1241 At Paris, in November, 1791, there are 6,700 out of more than 81,000 on the rolls; in October, 1792, there are less than 14,000 out of 160,000.1242 At Troyes, in 1792, there are found only 400 or 500 out of 7,000 electors, and at Strasbourg the same number out of 8,000 electors.1243 Accordingly only about one-tenth of the electoral population are revolutionaries, and if we leave out the Girondists and the semi-conservatives, the number is reduced by one-half. Towards the end of 1792, at Besançon, scarcely more than 300 pure Jacobins are found in a population of from 25,000 to 30,000, while at Paris, out of 700,000 inhabitants only 5,000 are Jacobins. It is certain that in the capital, where the most excitement prevails, and where more of them are found than elsewhere, never, even in a crisis and when vagabonds are paid and bandits recruited, are there more than 10,000.1244 In a large town like Toulouse a representative of the people on missionary service wins over only about 400 persons.1245 Counting fifty or so in each small town, twenty in each large borough, and five or six in each village, we find, on an average, but one Jacobin to fifteen electors and National Guards, while, taking the whole of France, all the Jacobins put together do not amount to 300,000.1246—This is a small number for the enslavement of six millions of able-bodied men, and for installing in a country of twenty-six millions inhabitants a more absolute despotism than that of an Asiatic sovereign. Force, however, is not measured by numbers; they form a band in the midst of a crowd and, in this disorganized, inert crowd, a band that is determined to push its way like an iron wedge splitting a log.
And against sedition from within as well as conquest from without a nation may only defend itself through the activities of its government, which provides the indispensable instruments of common action. Let it fail or falter and the great majority, undecided about what to do, lukewarm and busy elsewhere, ceases to be a corps and disintegrates into dust. Of the two governments around which the nation might have rallied, the first one, after July 14, 1789, lies prostrate on the ground where it slowly crumbles away. Now its ghost, which returns, is still more odious because it brings with it the same senseless abuses and intolerable burdens, and, in addition to these, a yelping pack of claimants and recriminators. After 1790 it appears on the frontier more arbitrary than ever at the head of a coming invasion of angry émigrés and grasping foreigners.—The other government, that just constructed by the Constituent Assembly, is so badly put together that the majority cannot use it. It is not adapted to its hand; no political instrument at once so ponderous and so helpless was ever seen. An enormous effort is needed to set it in motion; every citizen is obliged to give it about two days labor per week.1247 Thus laboriously started but half in motion, it poorly meets the various tasks imposed upon it—the collection of taxes, public order in the streets, the circulation of supplies, and security for consciences, lives and property. Toppled over by its own action, another rises out of it, illegal and serviceable, which takes its place and stands.—In a great centralized state whoever possesses the head possesses the body. By virtue of being led, the French have contracted the habit of letting themselves be led.1248 People in the provinces involuntarily turn their eyes to the capital, and, on a crisis occurring, run out to stop the mailman to know what government happens to have fallen, the majority accepts or submits to it.—Because, in the first place, most of the isolated groups which would like to overthrow it dare not engage in the struggle: it seems too strong; through inveterate routine they imagine behind it that great, distant France which, under its impulsion, will crush them with its mass.1249 In the second place, should a few isolated groups undertake to overthrow it, they are not in a condition to keep up the struggle: it is too strong. They are, indeed, not yet organized while it is fully so, owing to the docile set of officials inherited from the government overthrown. Under monarchy or republic the government clerk comes to his office regularly every morning to dispatch the orders transmitted to him.1250 Under monarchy or republic the policeman daily makes his round to arrest those against who he has a warrant. So long as instructions come from above in the hierarchical order of things, they are obeyed. From one end of the territory to the other, therefore, the machine, with its hundred thousand arms, works efficiently in the hands of those who have seized the lever at the central point. Resolution, audacity, rude energy, are all that are needed to make the lever act, and none of these are wanting in the Jacobin. 1251
First, he has faith, and faith at all times "moves mountains.1252 "Take any ordinary party recruit, an attorney, a second-rate lawyer, a shopkeeper, an artisan, and conceive, if you can, the extraordinary effect of this doctrine on a mind so poorly prepared for it, so narrow, so out of proportion with the gigantic conception which has mastered it. Formed for the routine and the limited views of one in his position, he is suddenly carried away by a complete system of philosophy, a theory of nature and of man, a theory of society and of religion, a theory of universal history,1253 conclusions about the past, the present, and the future of humanity, axioms of absolute right, a system of perfect and final truth, the whole concentrated in a few rigid formulae as, for example:
"Religion is superstition, monarchy is usurpation, priests are impostors, aristocrats are vampires, and kings are so many tyrants and monsters."
These ideas flood a mind of his stamp like a vast torrent precipitating itself into a narrow gorge; they upset it, and, no longer under self-direction, they sweep it away. The man is beside himself. A plain bourgeois, a common laborer is not transformed with impunity into an apostle or liberator of the human species.—For, it is not his country that he would save, but the entire race. Roland, just before the 10th of August, exclaims "with tears in his eyes, should liberty die in France, she is lost the rest of the world forever! The hopes of philosophers will perish! The whole earth will succumb to the cruelest tyranny!"1254—Grégoire, on the meeting of the Convention, obtained a decree abolishing royalty, and seemed overcome with the thought of the immense benefit he had conferred on the human race.
"I must confess," said he, "that for days I could neither eat nor sleep for excess of joy!"
One day a Jacobin in the tribune declared: "We shall be a nation of gods!"—Fancies like these bring on lunacy, or, at all events, they create disease. "Some men are in a fever all day long," said a companion of St. Just; "I had it for twelve years..."1255 Later on, "when advanced in life and trying to analyze their experiences, they cannot comprehend it."1256 Another tells that, in his case, on a "crisis occurring, there was only a hair's breadth between reason and madness."—"When St. Just and myself," says Baudot, "discharged the batteries at Wissenbourg, we were most liberally thanked for it. Well, there was no merit in that; we knew perfectly well that the shot could not do us any harm."—Man, in this exalted state, is unconscious of obstacles, and, according to circumstances, rise above or falls below himself, freely spilling his own blood as well as the blood of others, heroic as a soldier and atrocious as a civilian; he is not to be resisted in either direction for his strength increases a hundredfold through his fury, and, on his tearing wildly through the streets, people get out of his way as on the approach of a mad bull.
If they do not jump aside of their own accord, he will run at them, for he is unscrupulous as well as furious.—In every political struggle certain kinds of actions are prohibited; at all events, if the majority is sensible and wishes to act fairly, it repudiates them for itself. It will not violate any particular law, for, if one law is broken, this tends to the breaking of others. It is opposed to overthrowing an established government because every interregnum is a return to barbarism. It is opposed to the element of popular insurrection because, in such a resort, public power is surrendered to the irrationality of brutal passion. It is opposed to a conversion of the government into a machine for confiscation and murder because it deems the natural function of government to be the protection of life and property.—The majority, accordingly, in confronting the Jacobin, who allows himself all this,1257 is like a unarmed man facing one who is fully armed.1258 The Jacobin, on principle, holds the law in contempt, for the only law, which he accepts is arbitrary mob rule. He has no hesitation in proceeding against the government because, in his eyes, the government is a clerk which the people always has the right to remove. He welcomes insurrection because, through it, the people recover their sovereignty with no limitations.—Moreover, as with casuists, "the end justifies the means."1259 "Let the colonies perish," exclaims a Jacobin in the Constituent Assembly, "rather than sacrifice a principle." "Should the day come," says St. Just, "when I become convinced that it is impossible to endow the French with mild, vigorous, and rational ways, inflexible against tyranny and injustice, that day I will stab myself." Meanwhile he guillotines the others. "We will make France a graveyard," exclaimed Carrier, "rather than not regenerating it our own way!"1260 They are ready to risk the ship in order to seize the helm. From the first, they organize street riots and jacqueries in the rural districts, they let loose on society prostitutes and ruffians, vile and savage beasts. Throughout the struggle they take advantage of the coarsest and most destructive passions, of the blindness, credulity, and rage of an infatuated crowd, of dearth, of fear of bandits, of rumors of conspiracy, and of threats of invasion. At last, having seized power through a general upheaval, they hold on to it through terror and executions.—Straining will to the utmost, with no curb to check it, steadfastly believing in its own right and with utter contempt for the rights of others, with fanatical energy and the expedients of scoundrels, a minority may, in employing such forces, easily master and subdue a majority. So true is that, with faction itself, that victory is always on the side of the group with the strongest faith and the least scruples. Four times between 1789 and 1794, political gamblers take their seats at a table where the stake is supreme power, and four times in succession the "Impartiaux," the "Feuillants," the "Girondins," and the "Dantonists," form the majority and lose the game. Four times in succession the majority has no desire to break customary rules, or, at the very least, to infringe on any rule universally accepted, to wholly disregard the teachings of experience, the letter of the law, the precepts of humanity, or the suggestions of pity.—The minority, on the contrary, is determined beforehand to win at any price; its views and opinion are correct, and if rules are opposed to that, so much the worse for the rules. At the decisive moment, it claps a pistol to its adversary's head, overturns the table, and collects the stakes.
1201 (return)
[ See the figures
further on.]
1202 (return)
[ Mallet du Pan, II.
491. Danton, in 1793, said one day to one of his former brethren an
advocate to the Council.: "The old régime made a great mistake. It brought
me up on a scholarship in Plessis College. I was brought up with nobles,
who were my comrades, and with whom I lived on familiar terms. On
completing my studies, I had nothing; I was poor and tried to get a place.
The Paris bar was very expensive, and it required extensive efforts to be
accepted. I could not get into the army, having neither rank nor
patronage. There was no opening for me in the Church. I could purchase no
employment, for I hadn't a cent. My old companions turned their backs on
me. I remained without a situation, and only after many long years did I
succeed in buying the post of advocate in the Royal Council. The
Revolution came, when I, and all like me, threw themselves into it. The
ancient régime forced us to do so, by providing a good education for us,
without providing an opening for our talents." This applies to
Robespierre, C. Desmoulins, Brissot, Vergniaud, and others.]
1203 (return)
[ Religious order
founded in Rome in 1654 by saint Philippe Neri and who dedicated their
efforts to preaching and the education of children. (SR)]
1204 (return)
[ Dauban, "La Demagogie
à Paris en 1793," and "Paris in 1794." Read General Henriot's orders of
the day in these two works. Comparton, "Histoire du Tribunal
Révolutionaire de Paris," a letter by Trinchard, I. 306 (which is here
given in the original, on account of the ortography): "Si tu nest pas
toute seulle et que le compagnion soit a travailler tu peus ma chaire amie
ventir voir juger 24 mesieurs tous si devent président ou conselier au
parlement de Paris et de Toulouse. Je t'ainvite a prendre quelque chose
aven de venir parcheque nous naurons pas fini de 3 hurres. Je t'embrase ma
chaire amie et épouge."-Ibid. II. 350, examination of André Chenier.—Wallon,
"Hist. Du Trib. Rév.", I, 316. Letter by Simon. "Je te coitte le bonjour
mois est mon est pousse."]
1205 (return)
[ Cf. "The Revolution,"
page 60.]
1206 (return)
[ Cf. On this point the
admissions of the honest Bailly ("Mémoires," passim)]
1207 (return)
[ Rétif de la Bretonne:
"Nuits de Paris," 11éme nuit, p. 36. "I lived in Paris twenty-five years
as free as air. All could enjoy as much freedom as myself in two ways—by
living uprightly, and by not writing pamphlets against the ministry. All
else was permitted, my freedom never being interfered with. It is only
since the Revolution that a scoundrel could succeed in having me arrested
twice."]
1208 (return)
[ Cf. "The Revolution,"
vol. I. p.264.]
1209 (return)
[ Moniteur, IV. 495.
(Letter from Chartres, May 27, 1790.)]
1210 (return)
[ Sauzay, I.147, 195
218, 711.]
1211 (return)
[ Mercure de France,
numbers of August 7, 14, 26, and Dec. 18, 1790.]
1212 (return)
[ Ibid. number of
November 26, 1790. Pétion is elected mayor of Paris by 6,728 out of 10,632
voters. "Only 7,000 voters are found at the election of the electors who
elect deputies to the legislature. Primary and municipal meetings are
deserted in the same proportion."—-Moniteur, X. 529 (Number of Dec.
4, 1791). Manuel is elected Attorney of the Commune by 3,770 out of 5,311
voters.—Ibid. XI. 378. At the election of municipal officers for
Paris, Feb.10 and 11, 1792, only 3,787 voters present themselves;
Dussault, who obtains the most votes, has 2,588; Sergent receives 1,648.—Buchez
et Roux, XI. 238 (session of Aug.12, 1791). Speech by Chapelier; "Archives
Nationales," F.6 (carton), 21. Primary meeting of June 13, 1791, canton of
Bèze (Cote d'Or). Out of 460 active citizens, 157 are present, and, on the
final ballot, 58.—Ibid., F7, 3235, (January, 1792). Lozerre: "1,000
citizens, at most, out of 25,000, voted in the primary meetings. At.
Saint-Chèly, capital of the district, a few armed ruffians succeed in
forming the primary meeting and in substituting their own election for
that of eight parishes, whose frightened citizens who withdrew from it...
At Langogne, chief town of the canton and district, out of more than 400
active citizens, 22 or 23 at most—just what one would suppose them
to be when their presence drove away the rest—alone formed the
meeting."]
1213 (return)
[ This power, with its
gratifications, is thus shown, Beugnot, I. 140, 147. "On the publication
of the decrees of August 4, the committee of surveillance of Montigny,
reinforced by all the patriots of the country, came down like a torrent on
the barony of Choiseul, and exterminated all the hares and partridges...
They fished out the ponds. At Mandres we find, in the best room of the
inn, a dozen peasants gathered around a table decked with tumblers and
bottles, amongst which we noticed an inkstand, pens, and something
resembling a register.—'I don't know what they are about,' said the
landlady, 'but there they are, from morning till night, drinking,
swearing, and storming away at everybody, and they say that they are a
committee.'"]
1214 (return)
[ Albert Babeau, I.
206, 242.—The first meeting of the revolutionary committee of Troyes
in the cemetery of St. Jules, August, 1789. This committee becomes the
only authority in the town, after the assassination of the mayor, M. Huez
(Sept 10, 1790).]
1215 (return)
[ "The French
Revolution," Vol.I. pp. 235, 242, 251.—Buchez et Roux, VI, 179.—Guillon
de Montléon, "Histoire de la Ville de Lyon pendant la Revolution," I. 87.—Guadet,
"Les Girondins."]
1216 (return)
[ Michelet, "Histoire
de la Révolution," II.47.]
1217 (return)
[ The rules of the
Paris club state that members must "labor to establish and strengthen the
Constitution, according to the spirit of the club."]
1218 (return)
[ Mercure de France,
Aug.11, 1790.—"Journal de la Société des Amis la Constitution,"
Nov.21, 1790.—Ibid., March, 1791.—Ibid., March, 1791.—Ibid.,
Aug.14, 1791 (speech by Roederer)—Buchez et Roux, XI. 481.]
1219 (return)
[ Michelet, II. 407.—Moniteur,
XII 347 (May 11, 1792), article by Marie-Joseph Chénier, according to whom
800 Jacobin clubs exist at this date.—Ibid., XII. 753 (speech by M.
Delfaux session of June 25, 1792).—Roederer, preface to his
translation of Hobbes.]
1220 (return)
[ "Les Révolutions de
Paris," by Prudhomme, number 173.]
1221 (return)
[ Constant, "Histoire
d'un Club Jacobin en province, "passim (Fontainbleau Club, founded May 5,
1791).—Albert Babeau, I.434 and following pages (foundation of the
Troyes Club, Oct 1790).—Sauzay, I 206 and following pages
(foundation of the Besançon Club Aug. 28, 1790).—Ibid., 214
(foundation of the Pontarlier Club, March, 1791)]
1222 (return)
[ Sauzay, I. 214 (April
2, 1791)]
1223 (return)
[ "Journal des Amis de
la Constitution," I. 534 (Letter of the "Café National" Club of Bordeaux,
Jan.29, 1791). Guillon de Monthléon, I. 88.-"The French Revolution," vol.
I. 128, 242.]
1224 (return)
[ Here we have a
complete system of propaganda and organizational tactics identical to
those used by the NAZIS, the Marxist-Leninists and other 'children' of the
original communist-Jacobins. (SR.)]
1225 (return)
[ Eugène Hatin,
"Histoire politique et littéraire de la presse," IV. 210 (with Marat's
text in "L'Ami L'Ami du peuple," and Fréron's in "l'Orateur du peuple").]
1226 (return)
[ Mercure de France,
Nov. 27, 1790.]
1227 (return)
[ Mercure de France,
Sept. 3, 1791 (article by Mallet du Pan). "On the strength of a
denunciation, the authors of which I knew, the Luxembourg section on the
21st of June, the day of the king's departure, sent commissaries and a
military detachment to my domicile. There was no judicial verdict, no
legal order, either of police-court, or justice of the peace, no
examination whatever preceding this mission... The employees of the
section overhauled my papers, books and letters, transcribing some of the
latter, and carried away copies and the originals, putting seals on the
rest, which were left in charge of two fusiliers."]