The next day the deputies of the Third Estate at the appointed hour repaired to the hall; but they found there none either of the clergy or of the nobles. These two parties, resolved to perpetuate the division of orders, had met in their respective halls and had organized as distinct bodies. The Third Estate, assuming the name of the Commons, abstained from any organic measures and waited to be joined by their colleagues. Thus matters continued for several days. Every effort was made on the part of the clergy and nobles to ensnare the Commons into some measure which would imply their organization as the Third Estate, but all was in vain. Assuming that they were a meeting of citizens assembled by legitimate authority to wait for other citizens that they might organize a political assembly, they merely chose a temporary chairman for the preservation of order, and _waited_.[103] Here, then, the vital question was to be decided whether the States-General should compose one body where the majority should rule, or three separate bodies where two could unite, a perpetual majority, against one. Upon this question the whole issue of reform was suspended. All equally understood the bearings of the question, and all equally saw that there was no room for compromise. It was a death-struggle. If united in one assembly the _people_ would have a majority, and could maintain popular rights. If there were three bodies the people would be in a hopeless minority, having two against them. The attention of all France was engrossed by the conflict, and the nation, with all its interests paralyzed, began to grow impatient of the delay. "The nobles," M. Bailly writes, "decreed that the deliberation by order, and the power of each order to put a veto on the proceedings of the other two, were part of the very constitution of the monarchy, and that they must maintain them as the defenders of the throne and freedom. What a strange decree! The representatives of about two hundred thousand individuals, or more, who are nobles take upon themselves to decide, and in their own favor, a question that concerns twenty-five millions of men. They assume for themselves the right of the veto; they declare the powers and the principles of the constitution; and who are they more than others who thus declare?"[104] During this protracted conflict the higher clergy cunningly devised the following plan to place the Commons in a false position: They sent an imposing delegation, headed by the Archbishop of Aix, with a pathetic allusion to the miseries of the people, and entreated the Commons to enter into a conference to assuage their sufferings. The snare was shrewdly contrived. If the Commons assented, it was the commencement of business with three chambers; if they refused, the clergy would apparently be those alone who regarded the starving population. For a moment there was much embarrassment.