Vergniaud’s speech was, as usual, prepared and closely reasoned. He began by asking the meaning of what seemed to be a counter-revolution. The movements of the Army had been changed at the critical moment, the Ministry had been dismissed, the National Assembly itself had been torn by division. Then he spoke of internal troubles, and assigned two causes—the nobility and the priesthood. The first, he said, could be kept in order by a close police surveillance, but the second were under the King’s protection. It was not possible to believe, without accusing the King of being the enemy of his people, that he wished to encourage the intrigues of sacerdotalism, therefore they must conclude that he thought himself sufficiently strong to impose peace. At the same time, if failure were the result, it would be the fault of no one but the King. The speaker held the whole Assembly by his words. At his first insinuations against the King there had been a slight murmur of disapproval from the extreme Right, and from one of the galleries, but it had been promptly suppressed, and as Vergniaud continued he became bolder in his questioning of the King’s motive. At last it seemed as if he would dare to pass from insinuation to direct attack. “It is in the name of the King,” he said, “that the French princes have tried to raise all the courts of Europe against France; it is to vindicate the dignity of the King that the treaty of Pillnitz was signed and the monstrous alliance made between the courts of Vienna and Berlin; it is to defend the King that the former companies of the body-guard have hurried to Germany to serve beneath the standards of rebellion; it is to come to the help of the King that the _émigrés_ ask for and obtain employment in the Austrian armies, and prepare to tear the bosom of their native land; it is to join these gallant defenders of the royal prerogative that other gallants of the most scrupulous honour are abandoning their posts in presence of the enemy and are labouring to corrupt their soldiers; it is in the name of the King that liberty is being attacked. In short, it is the name of the King alone which is the pretext and the cause of all the evils which are being heaped upon our heads, and of all which we have to dread.” The speaker paused, amid a thunder of applause. As it died unwillingly away he resumed.