528

MIRABEAU APPEALS TO THE JACOBINS.

is admirable in this matter, being never cool or indifferent: one day he terms him an adored mistress; on the next a harlot.

Mirabeau had fallen in public opinion by his proposing a vote of thanks to Bouillé ; but he had recovered his lost ground by a terrible speech against those who had dared to insult the tricolour,-one of those ever-memorable orations, which render it impossible for this man, even though he were still more culpable, and in spite of whatever may be said, to be ever erased from the memory of France. And then he had lost ground again, by proposing to postpone the annexation of Avignon, and show still some deference to the pope; but he had recovered once more, by merely showing himself at the theatre, when Brutus was reproduced for the first time: the very sight of him caused all to be forgotten, and rekindled love and enthusiasm, "veteris vestigia flammæ;" he captivated the general attention; and numerous allusions were addressed to him. It was a signal triumph, but his last.

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This happened on the 19th of November. On the 21st, Mirabeau, presiding at the Jacobins, listened impatiently to Robespierre's speech on the National Guard being restricted to active citizens; and he undertook to silence him under the pretext that he was speaking against previous decrees. This was a serious and dangerous proceeding, before an impassioned Assembly entirely in favour of Robespierre. Continue, continue," was shouted from all sides of the hall. The tumult became excessive: it was impossible to hear anything, either the president or his bell. Mirabeau, instead of putting on his hat, as president, took a very bold step, which would either give him the advantage, or make his defeat the more conspicuous. He mounted upon his arm-chair; and, as though the decree attacked was in his own person, and the question was to defend and save it, he exclaimed: " Help, colleagues! Let all my friends surround me!" This perilous demonstration rendered Mirabeau's solitude bitterly evident. Some thirty deputies obeyed his call; but the whole of the Assembly remained with Robespierre. Desmoulins, an old college companion of the latter, and who loses no opportunity of exalting his character, says, on this occasion: "Mirabeau surely did not know that if idolatry be permitted among a free people, it is only for virtue.'

POSITION OF THE LAMETHS.

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This was also a great revelation of the serious change which the Jacobin club had already undergone. Although founded by the deputies and for themselves, it contained now but a very few, who, moreover, had but little weight. Easy admission had replenished the club with earnest and impatient men; the Assembly was doubtless in it; but it was the future Assembly, to which alone Robespierre addressed himself.

Charles de Lameth now arrived, with his arm in a sling; and everybody became silent; for they were convinced that he was for Robespierre; yet he spoke for Mirabeau! But Viscount de Noailles declared that the committee had understood the decree differently from Mirabeau and Lameth, and in the same light as Robespierre. The latter then resumed his speech, with the whole Assembly on his side, and the president then reduced to silence-Mirabeau reduced to silence!

The Lameths are now in a very critical position. These founders of the Jacobins see them escaping from their hands. Their popularity dated especially from the day when they opposed Mirabeau on the right of making peace and war; and now they find themselves compromised and associated with Mirabeau in the distrust of the people; they must sink and be drowned, if they do not find means to separate themselves violently from this man, to throw him overboard; and if, on the other hand, their warfare against the clergy did not restore them in public opinion.

It is quite fair to say that the priests were doing all that was necessary to merit persecution. They had been skilful enough to leave in the dark the question on ecclesiastical estates, and to bring the question of the oath prominently forward in the light of day. This oath, which interfered in no way with religion or the sacerdotal character, was unknown to the people, who naturally believed that the Assembly was imposing on the priests a kind of abjuration. The bishops declared that they would have no communication with the ecclesiastics who might take the oath. The most moderate said that the pope had not yet replied; that they would wait; that is to say, that the judgment of a foreign sovereign was to decide whether they might obey their native land.

The pope did not answer. Why? On account of the vacation. The congregation of the cardinals, it was said, did

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THE CHURCH IN AGITATION.

not assemble at that period of the year. Meanwhile, by means of curates, and of preachers of every rank and denomination, they strove to agitate the people, make the peasantry furious, and reduce the women to despair. From Marseilles to Flanders, there arose one immense and admirable chorus against the Assembly; and incendiary pamphlets were hawked about from village to village by the curates of Provence. At Rouen and Condé, they preach against the paper-money, as an invention of the devil; at Chartres and Peronne, they forbid, from the pulpit, the paying of taxes; and the curate bravely proposes to go, at the head of the people, and massacre the tax-gatherers! The sovereign chapter of Saint-Waast despatches missionaries to preach with all their might against the Assembly; whilst, in Flanders, curates lay down the law, in strong set terms, that the purchasers of the national estates were infallibly damned, both they themselves, their children, and posterity: "Even though we wished to give them absolution," said those furious fanatics, "could we do so? No, nobody could, neither curates, bishops, cardinals, nor the popes! Damned they are, and damned they will remain, for ever!"

A considerable portion of these facts were brought to light and diffused among the public by the correspondence of the Jacobins, and by Laclos' newspaper; and they were collected and arranged in a report which Voidel, the Jacobin, made to the Assembly. Mirabeau supported the report by a long and magnificent speech, in which, under cover of violent language, he inclined towards gentle means, restricting the oath to the priests who were confessors; and he wanted the Assembly to trust to time and extinction to weaken the power of the clergy. But the Assembly was more bitter; it wanted to chastise them; so it required that the oath should be taken, and immediately. One thing surprises us in this Assembly, composed, for the most part, of Voltairian lawyers; which is its simple faith in the holiness and efficacity of human speech. After all the sophistry of the eighteenth century, there must still have remained a vast fund of ingenuous childish simplicity in the hearts of men.

They imagine that the very moment the priest has sworn, the very day the king has sanctioned their decrees, everything is concluded and saved.

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DECREE OF NOVEMBER 27.

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But the king, on the contrary,-an honest man of the old system,-goes on lying all day long. The word of honour which they had believed to be so great a difficulty, an insurmountable obstacle, a binding agreement for the man, by no means embarrasses the king. For fear he should not be sufficiently believed, he goes beyond all bounds; speaks over and over again of the confidence he deserves, saying that he expresses himself openly and frankly, and is surprised that any doubts should arise on the well-known uprightness of his character . . . (Dec. 23rd and 26th, 1790).

...

The Jansenists-the most simple of all-do not remain satisfied with this; they want something real and positive,—breath and noise.

Therefore, the 27th of November witnesses a terrible decree : The Assembly desires earnestly that the bishops, curates, and vicars, should take the oath to the constitution, within a week ; otherwise they will be considered to have renounced their office. The mayor is bound to denounce, eight days afterwards, such as fail to take the oath. Those who, after taking the oath, should break it, are to be summoned to the tribunal of the district ; and such as, having refused, should continue any part of their former functions, will be prosecuted as disturbers of the peace.'

Decreed, not sanctioned !-This is a new cause of alarm for the Jansenists, who have entered so far. They want some result; therefore, on the 23rd of December, Camus votes "that force should interpose," force in the form of a prayer; that the Assembly prays the king to reply to it in a regular manner about the decree. Now, force was the very thing that the king was waiting for. He immediately replies that he has sanctioned the decree: for thus he can tell all Europe that he is forced to act, and a captive.

He said to M. de Fersen, "I would rather be the king of Metz... But all this will soon be ended."

What is worthy of remark, is, that neither Robespierre,

*However, it is not exact to say, as Hardenberg does (in his Mémoires d'un Homme d'Etat) that it was after this forced sanction that the king applied to the foreign powers. He had done so from the 6th of October to the 3rd of December. On the latter day he writes to Prussia, that he has already applied to all the sovereigns; whereas he did not give the sanction till the 26th of December.

Marat, nor Desmoulins, would have required the oath from the clergy. The intolerant Marat, who demands that the presses of his enemies should be broken, desires that the priests should be gently treated. "It is," says he, "the only occasion on which regard should be shown; for it is a matter of conscience." Desmoulins desires no other severe measure than to take away the money of the state from those who will not swear obedience to the state. "If they hold fast to their pulpit, let us not expose ourselves even to tear their linen gowns in dragging them from it... That species of demons called Pharisees, calotins, or princes of the clergy, is to be driven away only by fasting: non ejicitur nisi per jejunium."

The severe, impolitic, and unreasonable measure of demanding the oath of the ecclesiastical deputies in the Assembly itself, was a sad blunder committed by the predominant party. It gave the refractory a grand, glorious, and solemn opportunity of bearing testimony before the people for the faith that they did not possess. The Archbishop of Narbonne said, later, during the empire, "We behaved like true noblemen; for it cannot be said of the greater number of us that we did so from motives of religion.

It was easy to foresee that these prelates, reduced to the extremity of yielding to numbers, and of solemnly denying their official opinion, would reply like noblemen. The most feeble character, when thus beset, would show some spirit; for whether noblemen or not, they were at least Frenchmen. The curates the most favourable to the Revolution could not resolve to abandon their bishops at the critical moment. The constraint shocked them; the danger was captivating; the solemn grandeur of such a scene exalted their imagination, and they refused.

On the first day of the debate, when the Bishop of Clermont alone was questioned, the Assembly was able to judge of the effect. On the following day, (January 4th), Grégoire and Mirabeau attempted to appease the storm. Grégoire said that the Assembly by no means meant to meddle with spiritual affairs; that it even did not require the inward assent, and would not force their conscience. Mirabeau went so far as to say that the Assembly did not require precisely the oath ; but merely that it declared a refusal incompatible with such