VIII. 1792. CHAP. what so slow in vengeance? Is it before the prince that we must justify our proceedings, and is that prince to be inviolable? The system of the King was apparent gentleness and goodness: everywhere he identified himself with his country, and sought to fix on himself the affections which should be centred on her. He sapped the laws by the refinement of his conduct by the interest which unfortunate virtue inspires. Louis was truly a tyrant, and a perfidious and deceitful one. He convoked the States general; but it was only to humble the noblesse, and reign absolute through their divisions. On the 14th July, and the 5th October, he had secretly provided the means of resistance; but when the national energy had shattered them in pieces, he made a virtue of necessity, and testified a hypocritical joy for the victory of the people. Since that time, being no longer able to employ force, he has never ceased to strive to corrupt the friends of the people; he employed the most perfidious dissimulation before the 10th August, and now assumes a feigned gentleness to disarm your resentment. He then filled the palace with soldiers and assassins, and came to the Assembly with peace and conciliation on his lips. It is in vain to talk of an appeal to the people: it would be an appeal only to anarchy. The Revolution does not in reality commence till the tyrant is no more. The French long loved the King who was preparing their slavery; he 1 Hist. Parl. has since slain those who held him foremost in their affec xxii. 82, 83. 218. Th. Lac. x. 215, tions. The people will no more revolt if the King is just, than the sea will rise if it is not agitated by the winds."1 iii. 356. 88. Robes pierre. Robespierre said—“There are sacred forms, unknown Speech of to the bar; there are indestructible principles, superior to the common maxims, concentrated by habit, or confirmed by prejudice. The true condemnation of a sovereign is to be found in the spontaneous insurrection of a people driven to desperation by his oppression; it is the most sure and the most equitable of all judgments. Louis VIII. 1792. was condemned long before the decree which called him CHAP. to your bar. The last and greatest proof which freemen can give of their love to their country, is to sacrifice to it the first movements of returning sensibility. The humanity which trembles in presence of the accused, the clemency which compounds with tyranny, is the worst kind of oppression. What motive can there be for delay? The defence of the accused has terminated-why should we not give judgment? Do you doubt of his guilt? If so, you doubt of the sacred right of insurrection: you throw an imputation on the whole Revolution: you transfer the accusation of the King into an indictment against the whole French nation. It is a mere pretext to talk of an appeal to the people. Have the people heard the evidence ? Are they qualified to give judgment? The people have energy, they have courage; but they are often the dupe of scoundrels: they strike down tyrants; but they often yield to hypocrites. The majority of the nation!-Why, virtue has ever been in a minority on the earth. But for that, would it have been peopled by tyrants and slaves? Hampden and Sidney were in the minority, for they expired on the scaffold Cato was in the minority, for he tore out his entrails: Socrates was in the minority, for he swallowed poison. The motion to submit the question to an appeal to the people, is nothing Hist. Parl. but an effort to arrest the cause of justice, and instead of 105. Monithe solemn judgment of the national representatives, 29, 1792. induce the distractions and horrors of a civil war." Vergniaud replied in a strain of impassioned eloquence. 66 We are xxii. 104, teur, Dec. 89. A profound silence prevailed when he arose; the members Vergniaud's listened with breathless anxiety to the first orator of reply. France, pleading the cause of its first subject. accused of provoking a civil war; the accusation is false. But what do they desire, who incessantly preach up assassination against the partisans of tyranny, and apply that name to all those who thwart their ambitious projects; who invoke poniards against the representatives of VIII. 1792. CHAP. the people; who are never satisfied, unless the minority of the legislature rules the majority, and enforces its arguments by the aid of insurrections? They are the real promoters of civil war, who thunder forth these principles in all the public places, and pervert the people, by stigmatising justice with the name of pusillanimity, humanity with that of conspiracy. Who has not heard in the streets the exclamations of the rabble, who ascribe every calamity to the influence of the sovereign? If bread is dear, the cause is in the Temple; if money is scarce, if the armies are ill-paid, the cause is in the Temple; if we are daily obliged to witness misery in the streets, the cause is in the Temple. Who will assure me, that those men who are so ready in exciting such complaints, will not hereafter direct them against the Convention? and those who assert that the tyranny of the legislature had succeeded to that of the throne, and that a new 10th of August is necessary to extinguish it; that a defender is required for the Republic, and that one chief alone can save it-who will assure me that these same men will not exclaim, after the death of Louis, with still greater violence than before, If bread is dear, the cause is in the Convention; if money is scarce, if our armies are ill-provisioned, the cause is in the Convention; if the machine of government is overcharged, the cause is in the Convention; if the calamities of war have been increased by the accession of England and Spain to the league of our enemies, the cause is in the Convention, which provoked their hostility by the condemnation of Louis? Who will assure me, that among the assassins xxii. 137, of September 2d, there will not be found what you now 154. Moni- call a defender, but who, in reality, will prove a dictator, Lac. 1. 231, yet reeking with the blood of his victims; and if so, to 232. Th. what unheard-of calamities will Paris be subjected? Who Mig. i. 238. will inhabit a city tenanted only by desolation and death? 1 Hist. Parl. teur, Dec. 31, 1792. iii. 369, 373. Toul. iii. 178. And when the industrious citizens shall be reduced to beggary, who will then relieve their wants? who will succour VIII. 1793. their famishing children? I foresee the thrilling reply which CHAP. will meet them - Go to the quarries, and snatch from the earth the bleeding remains of the victims we have murdered. You have asked for blood in the days of your power here are blood and corpses; we have no other food now to offer you.' You shudder at the thought: oh! then unite your efforts with mine to avert so deplorable a catastrophe." At the conclusion of the debate, the Assembly unanimously pronounced that Louis was guilty.* The appeal to the people was rejected by a majority of 423 to 281. "Falsa è l'accusa; ognun lo sa; ma ognuno 90. condemned, Louis is contrary to opinion of the great majority of the Assembly. the secret 1793. The question remained, what punishment should be Jan. 15, inflicted on the accused? The vote lasted forty hours. During its continuance, Paris was in the last degree of agitation; the club of the Jacobins re-echoed with cries for his death; the avenues of the Convention were choked with a furious multitude, menacing alike his supporters and the neutral party. Deputations innumerable from the sections, from the national guard, from the municipality, from the citizens, succeeded each other at the bar of the Assembly. The sittings of the Jacobin Club were permanent; night and day menacing speeches were poured forth in that awful den of guilt. Every effort that vehemence, faction, revenge, and terror combined could make, was incessantly put in practice to secure his condemnation. As the termination of the vote drew near, the tumult increased; a dense crowd in every direction surrounded the hall of the Convention; the most breath * Eight members were absent from bad health; thirty-seven declared Louis guilty, but voted only for precautionary measures; 683 declared him guilty. Not one Frenchman deemed it safe to assert the truth, that the illustrious accused was entirely innocent.-See THIERS, iii. 377. "The accusation is false: all know it; but all, ALFIERI, Fillipo. VIII. 1793. 66 CHAP. less anxiety pervaded the Assembly; and at length the President, Vergniaud, announced the result in these words: Citizens, I announce the result of the vote: when justice has spoken, humanity should resume its place: there are 721 votes; a majority of twenty-six have voted for death. In the name of the Convention, I declare that the punishment of Louis Capet is Death.” He was the first of the Girondists who was called on to vote and it was well known they would all follow his 1 Mig. i. 238, example. Indescribable, in consequence, was the sensa380, 385. tion in the Assembly and capital when he voted for Lac. x. 233, death. Every one felt that the baseness of this party had brought their sovereign to the scaffold. Now, Moniteur, boast of your orators," whispered Danton to Brissot, Lam. Hist. when the vote was given: "sublime words, dastardly deeds. What can you make of such men? speak no more of them; their party is gone."1 239. Th. iii. 240. Hist. Parl. xx. 206, 207. Jan. 18. des Gir. v. 69. 91. The defee- tion of the was the cause of this. 66 But for the defection of the Girondists the King's life would have been saved. Forty-six of their party, besides Vergniaud, voted conditionally or unconditionally for his death. They were anxious to save the King; but the democratic fury of the times rendered no mode of doing so practicable in their opinion but by the appeal to the people. Vergniaud spent the whole night after the fatal result in tears. Almost all of them subsequently perished on the scaffold they had prepared for their sovereign. The Duke of Orleans, when called on to give his vote, walked with a faltering step, and a face paler than death itself, to the appointed place, and there read these words:" Exclusively governed by my duty, and Moll. x. 1,9. convinced that all those who have resisted the sovede la Conv. reignity of the people deserve death-my vote is for death." Important as the accession of the first prince of the blood was to the bloodthirsty faction, his conduct 2 Bert, de Pref. Hist. ii. 48. Lac. x. 241. * It is now generally admitted that this statement of the number was incorrect; and that the real majority which condemned Louis to death was only five. |