Вальтер Скотт
Life of Napoleon Bonaparte. Volume I
Summoned, one by one, to take the oath, or refuse it under the consequences menaced, the Assembly, fearful of the effect of their firmness, would scarce hear these sufferers speak a syllable, save Yes or No. Their tumult on the occasion resembled the beating of drums to drown the last words of a martyr. Few, indeed, were the priests who accepted the constitutional oath. There were in the number only three bishops. One had been a person of note – it was that Archbishop of Sens – that very cardinal, whose maladministration of fifteen months had led to this mighty change. Another of the three Constitutional prelates was destined to be much more remarkable – it was the celebrated Talleyrand, whose talents as a statesman have been so distinguished.
The National Assembly failed totally in their attempts to found a national Church. The priests who took the oaths received neither reverence nor affection, and were only treated with decency by such as considered religion in the light of a useful political institution. They were alike despised by the sincere Catholic, and the declared infidel. All of real religious feeling or devotion that was left in France turned towards their ancient pastors, and though the impulse was not strong enough to counteract the revolutionary movement, it served, on many occasions, to retard and embarrass it.134 The experiment which had thus signally miscarried, was indeed as impolitic as it was unnecessary. It can only be imputed, on the one hand, to the fanaticism of the modern philosophers,135 who expected, by this indirect course, to have degraded the Christian religion; and, on the other, to the preconcerted determination of the Revolutionists, that no consideration should interfere with the plan of new-modelling the nation through all its institutions, as well of Church as of State.
Victorious at once over altar and throne, mitre and coronet, King, Nobles, and Clergy, the National Assembly seemed, in fact, to possess, and to exert, that omnipotence, which has been imputed to the British Parliament. Never had any legislature made such extensive and sweeping changes, and never were such changes so easily accomplished. The nation was altered in all its relations; its flag and its emblems were changed – every thing of a public character was destroyed and replaced, down to the very title of the sovereign, who, no longer termed King of France and Navarre, was now called King of the French. The names and divisions of the provinces, which had existed for many years, were at once obliterated, and were supplied by a geographical partition of the territory into eighty-three departments, subdivided into six hundred districts, and these again portioned out into forty-eight thousand communities or municipalities. By thus recasting, as it were, the whole geographical relations of the separate territories of which France consisted, the Abbé Siêyes designed to obliterate former recollections and distinctions, and to bring every thing down to the general level of liberty and equality. But it had an effect beyond what was proposed. While the provinces existed they had their separate capitals, their separate privileges; and those capitals, though in a subordinate rank, being yet the seats of provincial parliaments, had a separate consequence, inferior to, but yet distinct from, that of Paris. But when France became one single province, the importance of its sole capital, Paris, was increased to a most formidable degree; and during the whole Revolution, and through all its changes, whatever party held the metropolis was sure speedily to acquire the supreme power through the whole departments; and woe to those who made the fruitless attempt to set the sense or feelings of the nation in opposition to those of the capital! Republican or royalist was equally sure to perish in the rash attempt.
TRIAL BY JURY.
The Parliaments of France, long the strongholds of liberty, now perished unnoticed, as men pull down old houses to clear the ground for modern edifices. The sale of offices of justice was formally abolished; the power of nominating the judges was taken from the crown; the trial by jury, with inquests of accusation and conviction, corresponding to the grand and petty juries of England, were sanctioned and established. In thus clearing the channels of public justice, dreadfully clogged as they had become during the decay of the monarchy, the National Assembly rendered the greatest possible services to France, the good effects of which will long be felt. Other alterations were of a more doubtful character. There might be immediate policy, but there was certainly much harshness, in wresting from the crown the power of granting pardons. If this was for fear lest grace should be extended to those condemned for the new crime of leeze-nation, or treason against the Constitution, the legislators might have remembered how seldom the King dares to exercise this right of mercy in favour of an unpopular criminal. It requires no small courage to come betwixt the dragon and his wrath, the people and their victim. Charles I. dared not save Strafford.
The National Assembly also recognised the freedom of the press; and, in doing so, conferred on the nation a gift fraught with much good and some evil, capable of stimulating the worst passions, and circulating the most atrocious calumnies, and occasioning frequently the most enormous deeds of cruelty and injustice; but ever bearing along with it the means of curing the very evils caused by its abuses, and of transmitting to futurity the sentiments of the good and the wise, so invaluable when the passions are silenced, and the calm slow voice of reason and reflection comes to obtain a hearing. The press stimulated massacres and proscriptions during the frightful period which we are approaching; but the press has also held up to horror the memory of the perpetrators, and exposed the artifices by which the actors were instigated. It is a rock on which a vessel may be indeed, and is often wrecked; but that same rock affords the foundation of the brightest and noblest beacon.
We might add to the weight of benefits which France unquestionably owes to the Constituent Assembly, that they restored liberty of conscience by establishing universal toleration. But against this benefit must be set the violent imposition of the constitutional oath upon the Catholic clergy, which led afterwards to such horrible massacres of innocent and reverend victims, murdered in defiance of those rules of toleration, which, rather in scorn of religion of any kind than regard to men's consciences, the Assembly had previously adopted.
Faithful to their plan of forming not a popular monarchy, but a species of royal republic, and stimulated by the real Republicans, whose party was daily gaining ground among their ranks, as well as by the howls and threats of those violent and outrageous demagogues, who, from the seats they had adopted in the Assembly, were now known by the name of the "Mountain,"136 the framers of the Constitution had rendered it democratical in every point, and abridged the royal authority, till its powers became so dim and obscure as to merit Burke's happy illustration, when he exclaimed, speaking of the new-modelled French government, —
" – What seem'd its head,
The likeness of a kingly crown had on."
The crown was deprived of all appointments to civil offices, which were filled up by popular elections, the Constitutionalists being, in this respect, faithful to their own principles, which made the will of the people the source of all power. Never was such an immense patronage vested in the body of any nation at large, and the arrangement was politic in the immediate sense, as well as in conformity with the principles of those who adopted it; for it attached to the new Constitution the mass of the people, who felt themselves elevated from villanage into the exercise of sovereign power. Each member of the elective assembly of a municipality, through whose collective votes bishops, administrators, judges, and other official persons received their appointments, felt for the moment, the importance which his privilege bestowed, and recognised in his own person, with corresponding self-complacency, a fraction, however small, of the immense community, now governed by those whom they themselves elected into office. The charm of power is great at all times, but exquisite to intoxication to those to whom it is a novelty.
Called to the execution of these high duties, which hitherto they had never dreamed of, the people at large became enamoured of their own privileges, carried them into every department of society, and were legislators and debaters, in season and out of season. The exercise even of the extensive privilege committed to them, seemed too limited to these active citizens. The Revolution appeared to have turned the heads of the whole lower classes, and those who had hitherto thought least of political rights, were now seized with the fury of deliberating, debating, and legislating, in all possible times and places. The soldiers on guard debated at the Oratoire – the journeymen tailors held a popular assembly at the Colonnade – the peruke-makers met at the Champs-Elysées. In spite of the opposition of the national guard, three thousand shoemakers deliberated on the price of shoes in the Place Louis Quinze; every house of call was converted into the canvassing hall of a political body; and France for a time presented the singular picture of a country, where every one was so much involved in public business, that he had little leisure to attend to his own.
There was, besides, a general disposition to assume and practise the military profession; for the right of insurrection having been declared sacred, each citizen was to be prepared to discharge effectually so holy a duty. The citizens procured muskets to defend their property – the rabble obtained pikes to invade that of others – the people of every class every where possessed themselves of arms, and the most peaceful burgesses were desirous of the honours of the epaulet. The children, with mimicry proper to their age, formed battalions on the streets, and the spirit in which they were formed was intimated by the heads of cats borne upon pikes in front of the juvenile revolutionists.137
FEVER OF LEGISLATION.
In the departments, the fever of legislation was the same. Each district had its permanent committee, its committee of police, its military committee, civil committee, and committee of subsistence. Each committee had its president, its vice-president, and its secretaries. Each district was desirous of exercising legislative authority, each committee of usurping the executive power.138 Amid these subordinate conclaves, every theme of eulogy and enthusiasm referred to the Revolution which had made way for the power they enjoyed, every subject of epidemic alarm to the most distant return towards the ancient system which had left the people in insignificance. Rumour found a ready audience for every one of her thousand tongues; Discord a prompt hand, in which she might place each of her thousand snakes.
The Affiliation, as it was called, or close correspondence of the Jacobin Clubs in all their ramifications, tended to influence this political fever, and to direct its fury against the last remains of royalty. Exaggerated and unfounded reports of counter-revolutionary plots and aristocratical conspiracies, not a little increased by the rash conversation and impotent efforts of the nobility in some districts, were circulated with the utmost care; and the falsehood, which had been confuted at Paris, received new currency in the departments; as that which was of departmental growth was again circulated with eagerness in the metropolis. Thus, the minds of the people were perpetually kept in a state of excitation, which is not without its pleasures. They are of a nature peculiarly incompatible with soundness in judgment and moderation in action, but favourable, in the same degree, to audacity of thought, and determination in execution.
CROWN PRIVILEGES.
The royal prerogative of the King, so closely watched, was in appearance formidable enough to be the object of jealousy and suspicion, but in reality a mere pageant which possessed no means either of attack or resistance. The King was said to be the organ of the executive power, yet he had named but a small proportion of the officers in the army and navy, and those who received their appointments from a source so obnoxious, possessed little credit amongst those whom they commanded. He was the nominal head of six ministers, who were perpetually liable to be questioned by the Assembly, in which they might be called to defend themselves as criminals, but had no seat or vote to enable them to mingle in its debates. This was, perhaps, one of the greatest errors of the constitution; for the relation which the ministers bore to the legislative body, was of such a limited and dependent nature, as excluded all ideas of confidence and cordiality. The King's person was said to be inviolable, but the frowning brows of a large proportion of his subjects, their public exclamations, and the pamphlets circulated against him, intimated very different doctrine. He might propose to the Assembly the question of peace or war, but it remained with them to decide upon it. Lastly, the King had the much-grudged privilege of putting a veto on any decree of the legislative body, which was to have the effect of suspending the passing of the law until the proposition had been renewed in two successive Assemblies; after which the royal sanction was held as granted. This mode of arresting the progress of any favourite law was likely to be as dangerous to the sovereign in its exercise, as the attempt to stop a carriage by catching hold of the wheel. In fact, whenever the King attempted to use this sole relic of monarchical power, he risked his life, and it was by doing so that he at length forfeited it. Among these mutilated features of sovereignty, it is scarcely worth while to mention, that the King's effigy was still struck upon the public coin, and his name prefixed to public edicts.
Small as was the share of public power which the new Constitution of France afforded to the crown, Louis, in outward semblance at least, appeared satisfied. He made it a rule to adopt the advice of the Assembly on all occasions, and to sanction every decree which was presented to him. He accepted even that which totally changed the constitution of the Gallican Church. He considered himself, doubtless, as under forcible restraint, ever since he had been dragged in triumph from Versailles to Paris, and therefore complied with what was proposed to him, under the tacit protest that his acquiescence was dictated by force and fear. His palace was guarded by eight hundred men, with two pieces of cannon; and although this display of force was doubtless intended by La Fayette to assure Louis's personal safety, yet it was no less certain that it was designed also to prevent his escape from the metropolis. The King had, therefore, good cause to conceive himself possessed of the melancholy privilege of a prisoner, who cannot incur any legal obligation by acts which do not flow from free-will, and therefore finds a resource against oppression in the incapacities which attend it. It was, however, carrying this privilege to the verge of dissimulation, nay, beyond it, when the King went, [Feb. 4,] apparently freely and voluntarily, down to the National Assembly, and, in a dignified and touching speech, (could it have been thought a sincere one,) accepted the Constitution, made common cause with the regenerated nation, and declared himself the head of the Revolution.139 Constrained as he was by circumstances, anxious for his own safety, and that of his family, the conduct of Louis must not be too severely criticised; but this step was unkingly as well as impolitic, and the unfortunate monarch gained nothing by abasing himself to the deceit which he practised at the urgency of his ministers, excepting the degradation attending a deception by which none are deceived. No one, when the heat of the first enthusiasm was over, gave the King credit for sincerity in his acceptance of the Constitution: the Royalists were revolted, and the Revolutionists could only regard the speech and accession as the acts of royal hypocrisy. Louis was openly spoken of as a prisoner; and the public voice, in a thousand different forms, announced that his life would be the penalty of any attempt to his deliverance.
LOUIS'S NEGOTIATIONS.
Meanwhile, the King endeavoured to work out his escape from Paris and the Revolution at once, by the means of two separate agents in whom alone he confided.
The first was no other than Mirabeau – that very Mirabeau who had contributed so much to the Revolution, but who, an aristocrat at heart, and won over to the royal party by high promises of wealth and advancement, at length laboured seriously to undo his own work.140 His plan was, to use the Assembly itself, in which his talents, eloquence, and audacity, gave him so much influence, as the means of re-establishing the royal authority. He proposed, as the final measure, that the King should retire from Paris to Compiegne, then under the government of the Marquis de Bouillé, and he conceived his own influence in the Assembly to be such, that he could have drawn thither, upon some reasonable terms of accommodation, a great majority of the members. It is certain he had the highest ascendency which any individual orator exercised over that body, and was the only one who dared to retort threats and defiance to the formidable Jacobins. "I have resisted military and ministerial despotism," said he, when opposing a proposed law against the emigrants; "can it be supposed I will yield to that of a club?" – "By what right?" exclaimed Goupil, "does Mirabeau act as a dictator in the Assembly?" – "Goupil," replied Mirabeau, "is as much mistaken when he calls me a dictator, as formerly when he termed me a Cataline." – The indignant roar of the Jacobins bellowing from their boasted mountain, in vain endeavoured to interrupt him. – "Silence these thirty voices," said Mirabeau, at the full pitch of his thundering voice; and the volcano was silent at his bidding.141 Yet, possessed as he was of this mighty power, Mirabeau did not, perhaps, reflect how much less it would have availed him on the royal side, than when he sailed with all the wind and tide which the spirit of a great and general revolution could lend him. He was a man, too, as remarkable for his profligacy as his wonderful talents, and the chance which the King must have risked in embarking with him, was like that of the prince in the tale, who escaped from a desert island by embarking on board a skiff drifting among dangerous eddies, and rowed by a figure half human and half tiger.142 The experiment was prevented by the sudden and violent illness and death of Mirabeau, who fell a victim to his debaucheries.143 His death [April 2, 1791] was greatly lamented, though it is probable that, had the Apostle of the Revolution lived much longer, he would either have averted its progress, or his dissevered limbs would have ornamented the pikes of those multitudes, who, as it was, followed him to the grave with weapons trailed, and howling and lamentation.144
The King's other confidant was the Marquis de Bouillé, a person entirely different from Mirabeau. He was a French soldier of the old stamp, a Royalist by birth and disposition; had gained considerable fame during the American war, and at the time of the Revolution was governor of Metz and Alsace. Bouillé was endowed with a rare force of character, and proved able without having recourse to disguise of any kind, to keep the garrison of Metz in tolerable discipline during the general dissolution of the army. The state of military insubordination was so great, that La Fayette, and his party in the Assembly, not only hesitated to dismiss a general who was feared and obeyed by the regiments under his command, but, Royalist as he was, they found themselves obliged to employ the Marquis de Bouillé and his troops in subduing the formidable revolt of three regiments quartered at Nancy, which he accomplished with complete success, and such slaughter among the insurgents, as was likely to recommend subordination in future. The Republican party of course gave this act of authority the name of a massacre of the people, and even the Assembly at large, though Bouillé acted in consequence of their authority, saw with anxiety the increased importance of an avowed Royalist. La Fayette, who was Bouillé's relation, spared no pains to gain him to the Constitutional side, while Bouillé avowed publicly that he only retained his command in obedience to the King, and in the hope of serving him.145
With this general, who had as yet preserved an authority that was possessed by no other Royalist in France, the King entered into a close though secret correspondence in cipher, which turned chiefly on the best mode of facilitating the escape of the royal family from Paris, where late incidents had rendered his abode doubly odious, and doubly dangerous.
La Fayette's strength consisted in his popularity with the middle classes of the Parisians, who, in the character of national guards, looked up to him as their commandant, and in general obeyed his orders in dispersing those tumultuous assemblies of the lower orders, which threatened danger to persons and property. But La Fayette, though fixed in his principle to preserve monarchy as a part of the constitution, seems to have been always on cold and distrustful terms with the monarch personally. He was perpetually trying his own feelings, and those whom he influenced, by the thermometer, and became alarmed if his own loyalty or theirs arose above the most tepid degree.
Two marked incidents served to show that the civic guard were even less warm than their commandant in zeal for the royal person.
PROJECTED ATTACK ON VINCENNES.
The national guard, headed by La Fayette, together with the edict respecting martial law, had, as we have observed, greatly contributed to the restoration of order in Paris, by checking, and dispersing, upon various occasions, those disorderly assemblies of rioters, whose violence and cruelty had dishonoured the commencement of the Revolution. But the spirit which raised these commotions was unabated, and was carefully nourished by the Jacobins and all their subordinate agents, whose popularity lay among the rabble, as that of the Constitutionalists did with the citizens. Among the current falsehoods of the day, arose a report that the old castle of Vincennes, situated about three miles from Paris, was to be used as a state prison in place of the Bastile. A large mob marched from the suburb called Saint Antoine, the residence of a great number of labourers of the lowest order, already distinguished by its zeal for the revolutionary doctrines. [Feb. 20.] They were about to commence the destruction of the ancient castle, when the vigilant commandant of Paris arrived, and dispersed them, not without bloodshed. In the meantime, the few Royalists whom Paris still contained, became alarmed lest this tumult, though beginning in another quarter, might be turned against the person of the King. For his protection about three hundred gentlemen repaired to the Tuileries, armed with sword canes, short swords, pistols, and such other weapons as could be best concealed about their persons, as they went through the streets. Their services and zeal were graciously acknowledged by the unfortunate Louis, little accustomed of late to such marks of devotion. But when La Fayette returned to the palace, at the head of his grenadiers of the national guard, he seems not to have been ill pleased that the intrusion of these gentlemen gave him an opportunity of showing, that if he had dispersed the revolutionary mob of the Fauxbourgs, it was without any undue degree of affection to the royal cause. He felt, or affected, extreme jealousy of the armed aristocrats whom he found in the Tuileries, and treated them as men who had indecently thrust themselves into the palace, to usurp the duty of defending the King's person, by law consigned to the national guard. To appease the jealousy of the civic soldiers, the King issued his commands upon the Royalists to lay down their arms. He was no sooner obeyed by those, to whom alone out of so many millions he could still issue his commands, than a most scandalous scene ensued. The soldiers, falling upon the unfortunate gentlemen, expelled them from the palace with blows and insult, applying to them the name of "Knights of the Poniard," afterwards often repeated in revolutionary objurgation. The vexation and sorrow of the captive prince had a severe effect on his health, and was followed by indisposition.
The second incident we have alluded to intimated even more directly the personal restraint in which he was now held. Early in spring [April 18,] Louis had expressed his purpose of going to Saint Cloud, under the pretext of seeking a change of air, but in reality, it may be supposed, for the purpose of ascertaining what degree of liberty he would be permitted to exercise. The royal carriages were drawn out, and the King and Queen had already mounted theirs, when the cries of the spectators, echoed by those of the national guards who were upon duty, declared that the King should not be permitted to leave the Tuileries. La Fayette arrived – commanded, implored, threatened the refractory guards, but was answered by their unanimous refusal to obey his orders. After the scene of tumult had lasted more than an hour, and it had been clearly proved that La Fayette's authority was unable to accomplish his purpose, the royal persons returned to the palace, now their absolute and avowed prison.146
La Fayette was so much moved by this affront, that he laid down his commission as commandant of the national guard; and although he resumed it, upon the general remonstrances and excuses of the corps, it was not without severely reproaching them for their want of discipline, and intimating justly, that the respect they showed ought to be for his rank and office, not for his person.
Meantime, the natural inferences from these cruel lessons, drove the King and Queen nearly desperate. The events of the 28th of February had shown that they were not to be permitted to introduce their friends or defenders within the fatal walls which inclosed them; those of the 18th April proved, that they were not allowed to leave their precincts. To fly from Paris, to gather around him such faithful subjects as might remain, seemed, though a desperate resource, the only one which remained to the unhappy monarch, and the preparations were already made for the fatal experiment.
The Marquis de Bouillé had, under various pretences, formed a camp at Montmedy, and had drawn thither some of the troops he could best depend upon; but such was the universal indisposition, both of the soldiery and the people of every description, that the general seems to have entertained almost no hope of any favourable result for the royal cause.147 The King's life might have been saved by his escaping into foreign parts, but there was hardly any prospect of restoring the monarchy.
The history of the unhappy Journey to Varennes is well known. On the night between the 20th and 21st of June, Louis and his Queen, with their two children, attended by the Princess Elizabeth and Madame de Tourzel, and escorted by three gentlemen of the gardes du corps, set out in disguise from Paris. The King left behind him a long manifesto, inculpating the Assembly for various political errors, and solemnly protesting against the acts of government to which he had been compelled, as he stated, to give his assent, during what he termed his captivity, which he seemed to have dated from his compulsory residence in the Tuileries.148
ESCAPE OF THE KING.
The very first person whom the Queen encountered in the streets was La Fayette himself, as he crossed the Place du Carousel.149 A hundred other dangers attended the route of the unfortunate fugitives, and the hair-breadth escapes by which they profited, seemed to intimate the favour of fortune, while they only proved her mutability. An escort placed for them at the Pont de Sommeville, had been withdrawn, after their remaining at that place for a time had excited popular suspicion. At Saint Menehould they met a small detachment of dragoons, stationed there by Bouillé, also for their escort. But while they halted to change horses, the King, whose features were remarkable, was recognised by Drouet, a son of the postmaster. The young man was a keen revolutionist, and resolving to prevent the escape of the sovereign, he mounted a horse, and pushed forwards to Varennes to prepare the municipality for the arrival of the King.
Two remarkable chances seemed to show that the good angel of Louis still strove in his favour. Drouet was pursued by a resolute Royalist, a quartermaster of dragoons, who suspected his purpose, and followed him with the design of preventing it, at all hazards. But Drouet, better acquainted with the road, escaped a pursuit which might have been fatal to him. The other incident was, that Drouet for a time pursued the road to Verdun, instead of that to Varennes, concluding the King had taken the former direction, and was only undeceived by an accident.
He reached Varennes, and found a ready disposition to stop the flight of the unhappy prince. The King was stopped at Varennes and arrested; the national guards were called out – the dragoons refused to fight in the King's defence – an escort of hussars, who might have cut a passage, arrived too late, acted with reluctance, and finally deserted the town. Still there remained one last throw for their freedom. If the time could have been protracted but for an hour and a half, Bouillé would have been before Varennes at the head of such a body of faithful and disciplined troops as might easily have dispersed the national militia. He had even opened a correspondence with the royal prisoners through a faithful emissary who ventured into Varennes, and obtained speech of the King; but could obtain no answer more decided than that, being a prisoner, Louis declined giving any orders. Finally, almost all the troops of the Marquis de Bouillé declared against the King and in favour of the nation, tending to show the little chance which existed of a favourable issue to the King's attempt to create a Royalist force. The Marquis himself made his escape with difficulty into the Austrian territories.150