At first sight their success seems doubtful, for they are in a
minority, and a very small one. At Besançon, in November, 1791, the
revolutionaries of every shade of opinion and degree, whether Girondists
or Montagnards, consist of about 500 or 600 out of 3,000 electors, and,
in November, 1792, of not more than the same number out of 6,000 and
7,000.[1241] At Paris, in November, 1791, there are 6,700 out of more
than 81,000 on the rolls; in October, 1792, there are less than 14,000
out of 160,000.[1242] At Troyes, in 1792, there are found only 400 or
500 out of 7,000 electors, and at Strasbourg the same number out of
8,000 electors.[1243] Accordingly only about one-tenth of the electoral
population are revolutionaries, and if we leave out the Girondists and
the semi-conservatives, the number is reduced by one-half. Towards the
end of 1792, at Besançon, scarcely more than 300 pure Jacobins are found
in a population of from 25,000 to 30,000, while at Paris, out of 700,000
inhabitants only 5,000 are Jacobins. It is certain that in the capital,
where the most excitement prevails, and where more of them are found
than elsewhere, never, even in a crisis and when vagabonds are paid and
bandits recruited, are there more than 10,000.[1244] In a large town
like Toulouse a representative of the people on missionary service wins
over only about 400 persons.[1245] Counting fifty or so in each small
town, twenty in each large borough, and five or six in each village, we
find, on an average, but one Jacobin to fifteen electors and National
Guards, while, taking the whole of France, all the Jacobins put
together do not amount to 300,000.[1246]--This is a small number for the
enslavement of six millions of able-bodied men, and for installing in
a country of twenty-six millions inhabitants a more absolute despotism
than that of an Asiatic sovereign. Force, however, is not measured
by numbers; they form a band in the midst of a crowd and, in this
disorganized, inert crowd, a band that is determined to push its way
like an iron wedge splitting a log.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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