If a personal point may be noted, the fact that the writer of these pages is himself a Catholic and in political sympathy strongly attached to the political theory of the Revolution, should not be hidden from the reader. Such personal conditions have perhaps enabled him to treat the matter more thoroughly than it might have been treated by one who rejected either Republicanism upon the one hand, or Catholicism upon the other; but he believes that no personal and therefore exaggerated note has been allowed to intrude upon his description of what is a definite piece of objective history lying in the field of record rather than in that of opinion. Some years ago the paramount importance of the quarrel between the Church and the Revolution might still have been questioned by men who had no personal experience of the struggle, and of its vast results. To-day the increasing consequences and the contemporary violence of that quarrel make its presentation an essential part of any study of the period. The scheme thus outlined will show why I have given this sketch the divisions in which it lies. H. BELLOC. _King’s Land, January 1911._ CONTENTS PAGE PREFACE v I THE POLITICAL THEORY OF THE REVOLUTION 13 II ROUSSEAU 29 III THE CHARACTERS OF THE REVOLUTION: King Louis XVI 37 The Queen 45 Mirabeau 53 La Fayette 61 Dumouriez 65 Danton 67 Carnot 72 Marat 74 Robespierre 77 IV THE PHASES OF THE REVOLUTION: i. From May 1789 to 17th of July 1789 83 ii. From the 17th of July 1789 to the 6th of October 1789 98 iii. From October 1789 to June 1791 102 iv. From June 1791 to September 1792 108 v. From the Invasion of September 1792 to the Establishment of the Committee of Public Safety, April 1793 118 vi. From April 1793 to July 1794 126