“Let not ambition take possession of you; love the friends of the people, but reserve blind submission for the law, and enthusiasm for liberty. Pardon this advice, gentlemen; you have given me the glorious right to offer it, when, by loading me with every species of favor which one of your brothers could receive from you, my heart, amidst its delightful emotions, cannot repress a feeling of fear.” That the confederates fully appreciated the noble motives which actuated his decision in this matter is revealed by their farewell words to him:— “The deputies of the National Guard of France retire with the regret of not being able to nominate you their chief. They respect the constitutional law, though it checks, at this moment, the impulse of their hearts. A circumstance which must cover you with immortal glory is, that you, yourself, promoted the law; that you, yourself, prescribed bounds to our gratitude.” Paris and Louis were too vacillating and unstable to allow any permanent peace, or permit France to enjoy any prolonged prosperity. Before the 1st of August the solemn oath which had been taken on the Champ de Mars was forgotten by both king and people. The same contentions were again fanning the flames of a still more ominous conflagration. On the 26th of August, 1790, La Fayette thus writes to General Washington:— “We are disturbed with revolts among the regiments; and, as I am constantly attacked on both sides by the aristocratic and the factious parties, I do not know to which of the two we owe these insurrections. Our safeguard against them is the National Guard. There are more than a million of armed citizens, among them patriotic legions, and my influence with them is as great as if I had accepted the chief command. I have lately lost some of my favor with the mob, and displeased the frantic lovers of licentiousness, as I am bent on establishing a legal subordination. But the nation at large is very thankful to me for it. It is not out of the heads of aristocrats to make a counter-revolution. Nay, they do what they can with all the crowned heads of Europe, who hate us. But I think their plans will either be abandoned or unsuccessful. I am rather more concerned at a division that rages in the popular party. The club of the Jacobins and that of ’89, as it is called, have divided the friends of liberty, who accuse each other; the Jacobins being taxed with a disorderly extravagance, and ’89 with a tincture of ministerialism and ambition. I am endeavoring to bring about a reconciliation.”