The first steps taken were successful. On the very night of his return, Robespierre was perorating at the Jacobins against atheism and on the great idea of God, but within twelve hours, on the morrow, Danton’s voice gave the new note. It was in the discussion upon the pension to be paid to the priests whom the last decree had thrust out of their regular office and of its salary. Danton spoke with the greatest decision on this plain matter, and the Convention heard with delight the fresh phrases to which it had so long been a stranger. He says virtually, “If you do not pay this sum you are persecutors.” There are in this speech such sentences as these: “You must appreciate this, that politics can only achieve when they are accompanied by some reason.... I insist upon your sparing the blood of men; and I beg the Convention to be, above all, just to all men except those who are the declared and open enemies of the Republic.” Four days later he went a little further, and the Convention still followed him. On the question which he had most at heart he spoke plainly. Richard complained of Tours. He said that the municipality of that town were arresting “suspects” right and left, and had even attacked himself. Danton said in a speech of ten lines: “It is high time the Convention should learn the art of government. Send these complaints to the Committee. It is chosen, or at least supposed to be chosen, from the élite of the Convention.” Later in the same day he spoke on a ridiculous procession such as the violence of the time had made fashionable. It was a deputation of Hébertists bringing from a Parisian church the ornaments of the altar. Already, it will be remembered, the Commune had ordered the churches in Paris to be closed, and the attempt to enforce such scenes were being copied in all the large towns of France. He said: “Let there be no more of these mascarades in the Convention.... If people here and there wish to prove their abjuration of Catholicism, we are not here to prevent them ... neither are we here to defend them.... The Terror is still necessary, the Revolutionary Government is still necessary, but the people does not demand this indiscriminate action. We have no business save with the conspirators and with those who are treating with the enemy.” There was a protest from Fayan, who cried, “You have talked of clemency!” for all the world as though such talk was blasphemy. But Danton was getting back his old position and was leading the Convention. His success seemed certain. On the 3rd of December (14th Frimaire) he was violently attacked at the Jacobins, but he managed to hold his own. Robespierre defended him in a speech which has been interpreted as a piece of able treachery, but which may with equal justice be regarded as an attempt to hold himself between the opposing parties; and within a fortnight after his return Danton, who had in him a directness of purpose and a rapidity of action that prefigured Napoleon, had gained every