In presence of so general and so novel an opposition, the Government showed signs at first of surprise and of annoyance rather than of defeat. It employed all its old weapons--proclamations, _lettres de cachet_, exile--but it employed them in vain. Force was resorted to, enough to irritate, not enough to terrify; moreover, a whole people cannot be terrified. An attempt was made to excite the passions of the multitude against the rich, the citizens against the aristocracy, the lower magistrates against the courts of justice. It was the old game; but this too was played in vain. New judges were appointed, but most of the new magistrates refused to sit. Favours, money were proffered; venality itself had given way to passion. An effort was made to divert the public attention; but it remained concentrated. Unable to stop or even to check the liberty of writing, the Government sought to use it by opposing one press to another press. A number of little pamphlets were published on its side, at no small cost.[123] Nobody read the defence, but the myriad pamphlets that attacked it were devoured. All these pamphlets were evolved from the abstract principles of Rousseau’s _Contrat Social_. The Sovereign was to be a citizen king; every infraction of the law was treason _against the nation_. Nothing in the whole fabric of society was sound; the Court was a hateful den in which famished courtiers devoured the spoils of the people. At length an incident occurred which hurried on the crisis. The Parliament of Dauphiny had resisted like all the other Parliaments, and had been smitten like them all. But nowhere did the cause which it defended find a more general sympathy or more resolute champions. Mutual class grievances were there perhaps more intense than in any other place; but the prevailing excitement lulled for a time all private passions; and, whereas in most of the other provinces each class carried on its warfare against the Government separately and without combination, in Dauphiny they regularly constituted themselves into a political body and prepared for resistance. Dauphiny had enjoyed for ages its own States, which had been suspended in 1618, but not abolished. A few nobles, a few priests, and a few citizens having met of their own accord in Grenoble, dared to call upon the nobility, the clergy, and the commons to meet as provincial Estates in a country-house near Grenoble, named Vizille. This building was an old feudal castle, formerly the residence of the Dukes of Lesdiguières, but recently purchased by a new family, that of Périer, to whom it belongs to this day. No sooner had they met in this place, than the three Orders constituted themselves, and an air of regularity was thrown over their irregular proceedings. Forty-nine members of the clergy were present, two hundred and thirty-three members of the nobility, three hundred and ninety-one of the commons. The members of the whole