History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814Mignet, M. (François-Auguste-Marie-Alexis)
History
History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814
Mignet, M. (François-Auguste-Marie-Alexis)
France -- History -- 1789-1815; France -- History -- Revolution, 1789-1799
usages of war. On the Rhine, Custine had taken Trèves, Spires, and
Mayence. In the Alps, general Montesquiou had invaded Savoy, and general
Anselme the territory of Nice. Our armies, victorious in all directions,
had everywhere assumed the offensive, and the revolution was saved.
If we were to present the picture of a state emerging from a great crisis,
and were to say: "There were in this state an absolute government whose
authority has been restricted; two privileged classes which have lost
their supremacy; a vast population, already freed by the effect of
civilization and intelligence, but without political rights, and who have
been obliged, by reason of repeated refusals, to gain these for
themselves"; if we were to add: "The government, after opposing this
revolution, submitted to it, but the privileged classes constantly opposed
it,"--the following would probably be concluded from these data:
"The government will be full of regret, the people will exhibit distrust,
and the privileged classes will attack the new order of things, each in
its own way. The nobility, unable to do so at home, from its weakness
there, will emigrate, in order to excite foreign powers, who will make
preparations for attack; the clergy, who would lose its means of action
abroad, will remain at home, where it will seek out foes to the
revolution. The people, threatened from without, in danger at home,
irritated against the emigrants who seek to arm foreign powers, against
foreign powers about to attack its independence, against the clergy, who
excite the country to insurrection, will treat as enemies clergy,
emigrants, and foreign powers. It will require first surveillance over,
then the banishment of the refractory priests; confiscation of the
property of the emigrants; war against allied Europe, in order to
forestall it. The first authors of the revolution will condemn such of
these measures as shall violate the law; the continuators of the
revolution will, on the contrary, regard them as the salvation of the
country; and discord will arise between those who prefer the constitution
to the state, and those who prefer the state to the constitution. The
monarch, induced by his interests as king, his affections and his
conscience, to reject such a course of policy, will pass for an accomplice
of the counter-revolution, because he will appear to protect it. The
revolutionists will then seek to gain over the king by intimidation, and
failing in this, will overthrow his authority."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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