In vain the authorities attempted to restrain it, and threatened its editor with prosecution and punishment. In vain Lafayette exerted his influence to crush the dauntless advocate of the needy, the dauntless minister of sedition and spite. Persecution only made Marat more bitter in his warnings, and endeared him more to those who half believed his warnings to be true. But while the democratic Press claimed the largest indulgence for itself, the people who accepted its teaching would permit no indulgence to their opponents. From the reactionary Press they had not much to fear. Three newspapers of some importance were subsidised by the Court, the _Actes des Apôtres_, the _Ami du Roi_, and the _Journal général de la Cour et de la Ville_, popularly known as _Petit Gautier_. But none of these productions showed any real literary or political merit, and for the most part the contributors to them, of whom the Vicomte de Mirabeau is a not unfair type, contented themselves with ridicule and obscenity, with witty personalities or vulgar abuse. Only one journal of the first rank, the _Mercure_, continued to brave unpopularity by a steady defence of liberty and order, and under the guidance of Mallet du Pan, supported with eloquence and staunch moderation the views which Malouet vainly endeavoured to recommend to the Assembly. But again and again self-constituted critics, deputations from the Palais Royal, representatives of the mob, and even the agents of the local authorities, denounced, remonstrated and interfered with the writer, and plainly threatened with violence and death any one who dared to use the freedom of the Press to defend unpopular, though liberal, opinions. Under such conditions, and having regard to the disorganisation and unwisdom of the royalists, and to the energy and enthusiasm which pervaded the popular party, it is not surprising that the power of the Press came to be enlisted almost entirely upon the democratic side, and helped to render irresistible the victorious advocates of the Revolution.