Dismissal the nobles began a separate verification of their powers. But many of the clergy and nobles, including the archbishop of Paris a few of the nobles and a great many of the clergy voted against and the duke of Orleans, joined the Assembly. Louis tamely this procedure. On the 7th the Tiers Etat sent deputations to accepted his defeat. He recalled Necker, who had resigned exhort the other estates to union, while the clergy sent a deputa-after the Séance Royale. On the 27th he wrote to those clerical tion to it with the proposal that each estate should name com- and noble deputies who still held out, urging submission. By missioners to discuss the best method of verifying powers. the 2nd of July the joint verification of powers was completed. The Tiers État accepted the proposal and conferences were held, The last trace of the historic States-General disappeared and the but without result. It then made another appeal to the clergy | National Assembly was perfect. On the same day it claimed an which was almost successful. The king interposed with a com- absolute discretion by a decree that the mandates of the electors mand for the renewal of the conferences. They were resumed were not binding on its members. under the presidency of Barentin, but again to no purpose. On the 10th of June Sieyès moved that the Tiers État should for the last time invite the First and Second Estates to join in the verification of powers and announce that, whether they did or not, the work of verifying would begin forthwith. The motion was carried by an immense majority. As there was no response, the Tiers État on the 12th named Bailly provisional president and commenced verification. Next day three curés of Poitou came to have their powers verified. Other clergymen followed later. When the work of verification was over, a title had to be found for the body thus created, which would no longer accept the style of the Tiers État. On the 15th Sieyès proposed that they should entitle themselves the Assembly of the known and verified representatives of the French nation. Mirabeau, Mounier and others proposed various appellations. But success was reserved for Legrand, an obscure deputy who proposed the simple name of National Assembly. Withdrawing his own motion, Sieyes adopted Legrand's suggestion, which was carried by 491 votes to 90. The Assembly went on to declare that it placed the debts of the crown under the safeguard of the national honour and that all existing taxes, although illegal as having been imposed without the consent of the people, should continue to be paid until the day of dissolution. By these proceedings the Tiers État and a few of the clergy declared themselves the national legislature. Then and thereafter the National Assembly assumed full sovereign The and constituent powers. Nobles and clergy might National come in if they pleased, but it could do without them. Assembly. The king's assent to its measures would be convenient, but not necessary. This boldness was rewarded, for on the 19th the clergy decided by a majority of one in favour of joint verification. On the same day the nobles voted an address to the king condemning the action of the Tiers État. Left to himself, Louis might have been too inert for resistance. But the queen and his brother, the count of Artois, with some of the ministers and courtiers, urged him to make a stand. A Séance Royale was notified for the 22nd and workmen were sent to prepare the Salle des Menus Plaisirs for the ceremony. On the 20th Bailly and the deputies proceeded to the hall and found it barred against their entrance. Thereupon they adjourned to a neighbouring tennis court, where Mounier proposed that they should swear Oath of not to separate until they had established the constituCristion. With a solitary exception they swore and the Oath of the Tennis Court became an era in French history. As the ministers could not agree on the policy which the king should announce in the Séance Royale, it was postponed to the 23rd. The Assembly found shelter in the church of St Louis, where it was joined by the main body of the clergy and by the first of the nobles. At the Séance Royale Louis made known his will that the Estates should deliberate apart, and declared that if they should refuse to help him he would do by his sole authority what was necessary for the happiness of his people. When he quitted the hall, some of the clergy and most of the nobles retired to their separate chambers. But the rest, together with the Tiers État, remained, and Mirabeau declared that, as they had come by the will of the nation, force only should make them withdraw. "Gentlemen," said Sieyes, " you are to-day what you were yesterday." With one voice the Assembly proclaimed its adhesion to its former decrees and the inviolability of its members. In Versailles and in Paris popular feeling was clamorous for the Assembly and against the court. During the next few days Having failed in their first attempt on the Assembly, the Court party resolved to try what force could do. A large number of troops, chiefly foreign regiments in the service of France, were concentrated near Paris under the command of the of Necker. marshal de Broglie. On Mirabeau's motion the Assembly voted an address to the king asking for their withdrawal. The king replied that the troops were not meant to act against the Assembly, but intimated his purpose of transferring the session to some provincial town. On the same day he dismissed Necker and ordered him to quit Versailles. These acts led to the first insurrection of Paris. The capital had long been in a dangerous condition, Bread was dear and employment was scarce. The measures taken to relieve distress had allured a multitude of needy and desperate men from the surrounding country. Among the middle class there already existed a party, consisting of men like Danton or Camille Desmoulins, which was prepared to go much further than any of the leaders of the Assembly. The rich citizens were generally fund-holders, who regarded the Assembly as the one bulwark against a public bankruptcy. The duke of Orleans, a weak and dissolute but ambitious man, had conceived the hope of supplanting his cousin on the throne. He strained his wealth and influence to recruit followers and to make mischief. The gardens of his residence, the Palais Royal, became the centre of political agitation. Ever since the elections virtual freedom of the press and freedom of speech had prevailed in Paris. Clubs were multiplied and pamphlets came forth every hour. The municipal officers who were named by the Crown had little influence with the citizens. The police were a mere handful. Of the two line regiments quartered in the capital, one was Swiss and therefore trusty; but the other, the Gardes Françaises, shared all the feelings of the populace. On the 12th of July Camille Desmoulins announced the dismissal of Necker to the crowd in the Palais Royal. Warmed by his eloquence, they sallied into the street. Part of Rioting Broglie's troops occupied the Champs Elysées and the in Paris. Place Louis Quinze. After one or two petty encounters with the mob they were withdrawn, either because their temper was uncertain or because their commanders shunned responsibility. Paris was thus left to the rioters, who seized arms wherever they could find them, broke open the jails, burnt the octroi barriers and soon had every man's life and goods at their discretion. Citizens with anything to lose were driven to act for themselves. For the purpose of choosing its representatives in the states-general the Third Estate of Paris had named 300 electors. Their function once discharged, these men had no public character, but they resolved that they would hold together in order to watch over the interests of the city. After the Séance Royale the municipal authority, conscious of its own weakness, allowed them to meet at the Hôtel de Ville, where they proceeded to consider the formation of a civic guard. On the 13th, when all was anarchy in Paris, they were joined by Flesselles, Provost of the Merchants, and other municipal officers. The project of a civic guard was then adopted. The insurrection, however, ran its course unchecked. Crowds of deserters from the regular troops swelled the ranks of the insurgents. They attacked the Hôtel des Invalides and carried off all the arms Fall of the which were stored there. With the same object they Bastille, assailed the Bastille. The garrison was small and July 14, disheartened, provisions were short, and after some hours' fighting De Launay the governor surrendered on promise of quarter. He and several of his men were, notwithstanding, butchered by the mob before they could be brought to 1789. the Hôtel de Ville. As all Paris was in the hands of the insurgents, the king saw the necessity of submission. On the morning of the 15th he entered the hall of the Assembly to announce that the troops would be withdrawn. Immediately afterwards be dismissed his new ministers and recalled Necker. Thereupon the princes and courtiers most hostile to the National Assembly, the count of Artois, the prince of Condé, the duke of Bourbon and many others, feeling themselves no longer safe, quitted France. Their departure is known as the first emigration. New muni National Guard. The capture of the Bastille was hailed throughout Europe as symbolizing the fall of absolute monarchy, and the victory of the insurgents had momentous consequences. Recognizing the 300 electors as a temporary municipal government, cipality of the Assembly sent a deputation to confer with them at Paris and the Hôtel de Ville, and on a sudden impulse one of these deputies, Bailly, lately president of the Assembly, was chosen to be mayor of Paris. The marquis Lafayette, doubly popular as a veteran of the American War and as one of the nobles who heartily upheld the cause of the Assembly, was chosen commandant of the new civic force, thenceforwards known as the National Guard. On the 17th Louis himself visited Paris and gave his sanction to the new authorities. In the course of the following weeks the example of Paris was copied throughout France. All the cities and towns set up new elective authorities and organized a National Guard. At the same time the revolution spread to the country districts. In most of the proRevolution vinces the peasants rose and stormed and burnt the provinces, houses of the seigneurs, taking peculiar care to destroy their title-deeds. Some of the seigneurs were murdered and the rest were driven into the towns or across the frontier. Amid the universal confusion the old administrative system vanished. The intendants and sub-delegates quitted or were driven from their posts. The old courts of justice, whether royal or feudal, ceased to act. In many districts there was no more police, public works were suspended and the collection of taxes became almost impossible. The insurrection of July really ended the ancien régime. in the Disorder in the provinces led directly to the proceedings on the famous night of the 4th of August. While the Assembly was considering a declaration which might calm revolt, the The 4th of vicomte de Noailles and the duc d'Aiguillon moved August. that it should proclaim equality of taxation and the suppression of feudal burdens. Other deputies rose to demand the repeal of the game laws, the enfranchisement of such serfs as were still to be found in France, and the abolition of tithes and of feudal courts and to renounce all privileges, whether of classes, of cities, or of provinces. Amid indescribable enthusiasm the Assembly passed resolution after resolution embodying these changes. The resolutions were followed by decrees sometimes hastily and unskilfully drawn. In vain Sieyès remarked that in extinguishing tithes the Assembly was making a present to every landed proprietor. In vain the king, while approving most of the decrees, tendered some cautious criticisms of the rest. The majority did not, indeed, design to confiscate property wholesale. They drew a distinction between feudal claims which did and did not carry a moral claim to compensation. But they were embarrassed by the wording of their own decrees and forestalled by the violence of the people. The proceedings of the 4th of August issued in a wholesale transfer of property from one class to another without any indemnity for the losers. Parties In the The work of drafting a constitution for France had already been begun. Parties in the Assembly were numerous and illdefined. The Extreme Right, who desired to keep the government as it stood, were a mere handful. Assembly, The Right who wanted to revive, as they said, the ancient constitution, in other words, to limit the king's power by periodic States-General of the old-fashioned sort, were more numerous and had able chiefs in Cazalès and Maury, but strove in vain against the spirit of the time. The Right Centre, sometimes called the Monarchiens, were a large body and included several men of talent, notably Mounier and Malouet, as well as many men of rank and wealth. They desired a constitution like that of England which should reserve a large executive power to the king, while entrusting the taxing and legislative powers to a modern parliament. The Left or Constitutionals, known afterwards as the Feuillants, among whom Barnave and Charles and Alexander Lameth were conspicuous, also wished to preserve monarchy but disdained English precedent. They were possessed with feelings then widespread, weariness of arbitrary government, hatred of ministers and courtiers, and distrust not so much of Louis as of those who surrounded him and influenced his judgment. Republicans without knowing it, they grudged every remnant of power to the Crown. The Extreme Left, still more republican in spirit, of whom Robespierre was the most noteworthy, were few and had little power. Mirabeau's independence of judgment forbids us to place him in any party. The first Constitutional Committee, elected on the 14th of July, had Mounier for its reporter. It was instructed to begin with drafting a Declaration of the Rights of Man. Six Declaraweeks were spent by the Assembly in discussing this tion of the document. The Committee then presented a report Rights of which embodied the principle of two Chambers. This Man, principle contradicted the extreme democratic theories so much in fashion. It also offended the self-love of most of the nobles and the clergy who were loath that a few of their number should be erected into a House of Lords. The Assembly rejected the principle of two Chambers by nearly 10 to 1. The question whether the king should have a veto on legislation was next raised. Mounier contended that he should have an The royal absolute veto, and was supported by Mirabeau, who had already described the unlimited power of a single Chamber as worse than the tyranny of Constantinople. The Left maintained that the king, as depositary of the executive, should be wholly excluded from the legislative power. Lafayette, who imagined himself to be copying the American constitution, proposed that the king should have a suspensive veto. Thinking that it would be politic to claim no more, Necker persuaded the king to intimate that he was satisfied with Lafayette's proposal. The suspensive veto was therefore adopted. As the king had no power of dissolution, it was an idle form. Mounier and his friends having resigned their places in the Constitutional Committee, it came to an end and the Assembly elected a new Committee which represented the opinions of the Left. veto. Soon afterwards a fresh revolt in Paris caused the king and the Assembly to migrate thither. The old causes of disorder were still working in that city. The scarcity of bread was set down to conspirators against the Revolution. Riots were frequent and persons supposed hostile to the Assembly and the nation were murdered with impunity. The king still had counsellors who wished for his departure as a means to regaining freedom of action. At the end of September the Flanders regiment came to Versailles to reinforce the Gardes du Corps. The officers of the Gardes du Corps entertained the officers of the Flanders regiment and of the Versailles National Guard at dinner in the palace. The king, queen and dauphin visited the company. There followed a vehement outbreak of loyalty. Rumour enlarged the incident into a military plot against freedom. Those who wanted a more thorough revolution wrought up the crowd and even respectable citizens wished to have the Removal king among them and amenable to their opinion. On of the the 5th of October a mob which had gathered to royal assault the Hôtel de Ville was diverted into a march on Versailles. Lafayette was slow to follow it and, when he arrived, took insufficient precautions. At daybreak on the 6th some of the rioters made their way into the palace and stormed the apartment of the queen who escaped with difficulty. At length the National Guards arrived and the mob was quieted by the announcement that the king had resolved to go to Paris. The Assembly declared itself inseparable from the king's person. Louis and his family reached Paris on the same evening and took up their abode in the Tuileries. A little later the Assembly established itself in the riding school of the palace. Thenceforward the king and queen were to all intents prisoners. The Assembly itself was subject to constant family and Assembly to Paris. intimidation. Many members of the Right gave up the struggle and emigrated, or at least withdrew from attendance, so that the Left became supreme. and the court. Mirabeau had already taken alarm at the growing violence of the Revolution. In September he had foretold that it would not stop short of the death of both king and queen. Mirabeau After the insurrection of October he sought to communicate with them through his friend the comte de la Marck. In a remarkable correspondence he sketched a policy for the king. The abolition of privilege and the establishment of a parliamentary system were, he wrote, unalterable facts which it would be madness to dispute. But a strong executive authority was essential, and a king who frankly adopted the Revolution might still be powerful. In order to rally the sound part of the nation Louis should leave Paris, and, if necessary, he should prepare for a civil war; but he should never appeal to foreign powers. Neither the king nor the queen could grasp the wisdom of this advice. They distrusted Mirabeau as an unscrupulous adventurer, and were confirmed in this feeling by his demands for money. His correspondence with the court, although secret, was suspected. The politicians who envied his talents and believed him a rascal raised the cry of treason. In the Assembly Mirabeau, though sometimes successful on particular questions, never had a chance of giving effect to his policy as a whole. Whether even he could have controlled the Revolution is highly doubtful; but his letters and minutes drawn up for the king form the most striking monument of his genius (see MIRABEAU and MONTMORIN DE SAINT-HÉREM). The and the royal power. Early in the year 1790 a dispute with England concerning the frontier in North America induced the Spanish government to claim the help of France under the Family Compact. Assembly This demand led the Assembly to consider in what hands the power of concluding alliances and of making peace and war should be placed. Mirabeau tried to keep the initiative for the king, subject to confirmation by the Chamber. On Barnave's motion the Assembly decreed that the legislature should have the power of war and peace and the king a merely advisory power. Mirabeau was defeated on another point of the highest consequence, the inclusion of ministers in the National Assembly. His colleagues generally adhered to the principle that the legislative and executive powers should be totally separate. The Left assumed that, if deputies could hold office, the king would have the means of corrupting the ablest and most influential. It was decreed that no deputy should be minister while sitting in the House or for two years after. Ministers excluded from the House being necessarily objects of suspicion, the Assembly was careful to allow them the least possible power. The old provinces were abolished, and France was divided anew into eighty departments. Each department was subdivided into districts, cantons and communes. Reorgan The main business of administration, even the levying ization of France. of taxes, was entrusted to the elective local authorities. The judicature was likewise made elective. The army and the navy were so organized as to leave the king but a small share in appointing officers and to leave the officers but scanty means of maintaining discipline. Even the cases in which the sovereign might be deposed were foreseen and expressly stated. Monarchy was retained, but the monarch was regarded as a possible traitor and every precaution was taken to render him harmless even at the cost of having no effective national government. The distrust which the Assembly felt for the actual ministers led it to undertake the business of government as well as the business of reform. There were committees for all commit- the chief departments of state, a committee for the army, a committee for the navy, another for diplomacy, Assembly. another for finance. These committees sometimes asked the ministers for information, but rarely took their advice. Even Necker found the Assembly heedless of his counsels. The condition of the treasury became worse day by day. The yield of the indirect taxes fell off through the interruption of business, and the direct taxes were in large measure withheld, for want of an authority to enforce payment. With some trouble Necker Executive tees of the church induced the Assembly to sanction first a loan of 30,000,000 livres and then a loan of 80,000,000 livres. The public having shown no eagerness to subscribe, Necker proposed that every man should be invited to make a patriotic contribution of onefourth of his income. This expedient also failed. On the 10th of October 1789 Talleyrand, bishop of Autun, proposed Confisca that the Assembly should take possession of the lands tion of of the church. In November the Assembly enacted that they should be at the disposal of the nation, which property. would provide for the maintenance of the clergy. Since the church lands were supposed to occupy one-fifth of France, the Assembly thought that it had found an inexhaustible source of public wealth. On the security of the church lands it based a paper currency (the famous assignats). In December it ordered an issue to the amount of 400,000,000 livres. As the revenue still declined and the reforms enacted by the Assembly involved a heavy outlay, it recurred again and again to this expedient. Before its dissolution the Assembly had authorized The the creation of 1,800,000,000 livres of assignats and assignats. the depreciation of its paper had begun. Finding that he had lost all credit with the Assembly, Necker resigned office and left France in September 1790. Power of clubs. Even the committees of the Assembly had far less power than the new municipal authorities throughout France. They really governed so far as there was any government. Often full of public spirit, they lacked experience and the muni in a time of peculiar difficulty had no guide save their cipalities own discretion. They opened letters, arrested suspects, and controlled the trade in corn, and sent their National popular Guards on such errands as they thought proper. The political clubs which sprang up all over the country often presumed to act as though they were public authorities (see JACOBINS). The revolutionary journalists, Desmoulins in his Révolutions de France et de Brabant, Loustallot in his Révolutions de Paris, Marat in his Ami du peuple, continued to feed the fire of discord. Amid this anarchy it became a practice for the National Guards of different districts to form federations, that is, to meet and swear loyalty to each other and obedience to the laws made by the National Assembly. At the suggestion of the municipality of Paris the Assembly decreed a general federation of all France, to be held on the anniversary of the fall of the Bastille. The ceremony took place in the Champ de Mars (July 14, 1790) in presence of the king, the queen, the Assembly, and an enormous concourse of spectators. It was attended by deputations from the National Guards in every part of the kingdom, from the regular regiments, and from the crews of the fleet. Talleyrand celebrated Mass, and Lafayette was the first to swear fidelity to the Assembly and the nation. In this gathering the provincial deputations caught the revolutionary fever of Paris. Still graver was the effect upon the regular army. It had been disaffected since the outbreak of the Revolution. The rank and file complained of their food, their lodging and their pay. The non-commissioned officers, often intelligent and hard-working, were embittered by the refusal of promotion. The officers, almost all nobles, rarely showed much concern for their men, and were often mere courtiers and triflers. After the festival of the federation the soldiers were drawn into the political clubs, and named regimental committees to defend their interests. Not content with asking for redress of grievances, they sometimes seized the regimental chest or imprisoned their officers. In August a formidable outbreak at Nancy was only quelled with much loss of life. Desertion became more frequent than ever, and the officers, finding their position unbearable, began to emigrate. Similar causes produced an even worse effect upon the navy. Disaffection in the army. Civil con By its rough handling of the church the Assembly brought fresh trouble upon France. The suppression of tithe and the confiscation of church lands had reduced the clergy to live on whatever stipend the legislature might think fit to give them. A law of February 1790 suppressed the religious orders not engaged in education or in works of charity, and forbade the introduction of new ones. Monastic vows stitution of the clergy. were deprived of legal force and a pension was granted to the religious who were cast upon the world. These measures aroused no serious discontent; but the so-called civil constitution of the clergy went much further. Old ecclesiastical divisions were set aside. Henceforth the diocese was to be conterminous with the department, and the parish with the commune. The electors of the commune were to choose the curé, the electors of the department the bishop. Every curé was to receive at least 1200 livres (about £50) a year. Relatively modest stipends were assigned to bishops and archbishops. French citizens were forbidden to acknowledge any ecclesiastical jurisdiction outside the kingdom. The Assembly not only adopted this constitution but decreed that all beneficed ecclesiastics should swear to its observance: As the constitution implicitly abrogated the papal authority and entrusted the choice of bishops and curés to electors who often were not Catholics, most of the clergy declined to swear and lost their preferments. Their places were filled by election. Thenceforwards the clergy were divided into hostile factions, the Constitutionals and the Nonjurors, As the generality of Frenchmen at that time were orthodox although not zealous Catholics, the Nonjurors carried with them a large part of the laity. The Assembly was misled by its Jansenist, Protestant and Freethinking members, natural enemies of an established church which had persecuted them to the best of its power. The As sembly, the colonies, In colonial affairs the Assembly acted with the same imprudence. Eager to set an example of suppressing slavery, it took measures which prepared a terrible negro insurrection in St Domingo. With regard to foreign relations the Assembly showed itself well-meaning but indiscreet. and It protested in good faith that it desired no conquests foreiga and aimed only at peace. Yet it laid down maxims powers. which involved the utmost danger of war. It held that no treaty could be binding without the national consent. As this consent had not been given to any existing treaty, they were all liable to be revised by the French government without consulting the other parties. Thus the Assembly treated the Family Compact as null and void. Similarly, when it abolished feudal tenures in France, it ignored the fact that the rights of certain German princes over lands in Alsace were guaranteed by the treaties of Westphalia. It offered them compensation in money, and when this was declined, took no heed of their protests. Again, in the papal territory of Avignon a large number of the inhabitants declared for union with France. The Assembly could hardly be restrained by Mirabeau from acting upon their vote and annexing Avignon. Some time after his death it was annexed. The other states of Europe did not admit the doctrines of the Assembly, but peace was not broken. Foreign statesmen who flattered themselves that France was sinking into anarchy and therefore into decay were content to follow their respective ambitions without the dread of French interference. to escape from Paris. Deprived of authority and in fact a prisoner, Louis had for many months acquiesced in the decrees of the Assembly however distasteful. But the civil constitution of the clergy Attempt of Louis XVI. wounded him in his conscience as well as in his pride. From the autumn of 1790 onwards he began to scheme for his liberation. Himself incapable of strenuous effort, he was spurred on by Marie Antoinette, who keenly felt her own degradation and the curtailment of that royal prerogative which her son would one day inherit. The king and queen failed to measure the forces which had caused the Revolution. They ascribed all their misfortunes to the work of a malignant faction, and believed that, if they could escape from Paris, a display of force by friendly powers would enable them to restore the supremacy of the crown. But no foreign ruler, not even the emperor Leopold II., gave the king or queen any encouragement. Whatever secrecy they might observe, the adherents of the Revolution divined their wish to escape. When Louis tried to leave the Tuileries for St Cloud at Easter 1791, in order to enjoy the ministrations of a nonjuring priest, the National Guards of Paris would not let him budge. Mirabeau, who had always dissuaded the king from secking foreign help, died on the 2nd of April. Finally the king and queen resolved to fly to the army of the East, which the marquis de Bouillé had in some measure kept under discipline. Sheltered by him they could await foreign succour or a reaction at home. On the evening of the 20th of June they escaped from the Tuileries. Louis left behind him a declaration complaining of the treatment which he had received and revoking his assent to all measures which had been laid before him while under restraint. On the following day the royal party was captured at Varennes and sent back to Paris. The king's eldest brother, the count of Provence, who had laid his plans much better, made his escape to Brussels and joined the émigrés. It was no longer possible to pretend that the Revolution had been made with the free consent of the king. Some Republicans called for his deposition. Afraid to take a course which involved danger both at home and abroad, the Assembly decreed that Louis should be suspended from his office. The club of the Cordeliers (q.v.), led by Danton, demanded not only his deposition but his trial. A petition to that effect having been exposed for signature on the altar in the Champ de Mars, a disturbance ensued and the National Guard fired on the crowd, killing a few and wounding many. This incident afterwards became known as the massacre of the Champ de Mars. On the other hand, the leaders of the Left, Barnave and the Lameths, felt that they had weakened the executive power too much. They would gladly have come to an understanding with the king and revised the constitution so as to strengthen his prerogative. They failed in both objects. Louis and still more Marie Antoinette regarded them with incurable distrust. The Constitutional Act without any material change was voted on the 3rd of September. On the 14th Louis swore to the Constitution, thus regaining his nominal sovereignty. The National Assembly was dissolved on the 30th. Upon Robespierre's motion it had decreed that none of its members should be capable of sitting in the next legislature. Assembly. If we view the work of the National Assembly as a whole, we are struck by the immense demolition which it effected. No other legislature has ever destroyed so much in the Review of same time. The old form of government, the old the work territorial divisions, the old fiscal system, the old of the judicature, the old army and navy, the old relations National of Church and State, the old law relating to property in land, all were shattered. Such a destruction could not have been effected without the support of popular opinion. Most of what the Assembly did had been suggested in the cahiers, and many of its decrees were anticipated by actual revolt. In its constructive work many sound maxims were embodied. It asserted the principles of civil equality and freedom of conscience, it reformed the criminal law, and laid down a just scheme of taxation. Not intelligence and public spirit but political wisdom was lacking to the National Assembly. Its members did not suspect how limited is the usefulness of general propositions in practical life. Nor did they perceive that new ideas can be applied only by degrees in an old world. The Constitution of 1791 was impracticable and did not last a year. The civil constitution of the clergy was wholly mischievous. In the attempt to govern, the Assembly failed altogether. It left behind an empty treasury, an undisciplined army and navy, a people debauched by safe and successful riot. At the elections of 1791 the party which desired to carry the Revolution further had a success out of all keeping with its numbers. This was due partly to a weariness of politics The which had come over the majority of French citizens, Legislative partly to downright intimidation exercised by the Assembly. Jacobin Club and by its affiliated societies throughout the kingdom. The Legislative Assembly met on the 1st of October. It consisted of 745 members. Few were nobles, very few were clergymen, and the great body was drawn from the middle class. The members were generally young, and, since none had sat in the previous Assembly, they were wholly without experience. The Right consisted of the Feuillants (q.v.). They numbered about 160, and among them were some able men, such as Matthieu Dumas and Bigot de Préamenau, but they were guided chiefly by persons outside the House, because incapable | the most intelligent. He had skilfully extricated himself from of re-election, Barnave, Duport and the Lameths. The Left con- the embarrassments at home and abroad left by his predecessor sisted of the Jacobins, a term which still included the party Joseph. He was bound by family ties to Louis, and he was afterwards known as the Girondins or Girondists (q.v.)-so obliged, as chief of the Holy Roman Empire, to protect the border termed because several of their leaders came from the region of princes. On the other hand, he understood the weakness of the the Gironde in southern France. They numbered about 330. Habsburg monarchy. He knew that the Austrian Netherlands, Among the extreme Left sat Cambon, Couthon, Merlin de where he had with difficulty restored his authority, were full of Thionville. The Girondins could claim the most brilliant orators, friends of the Revolution and that a French army would be welVergniaud, Guadet, Isnard. Inferior to these men in talent, comed by many Belgians. He despised the weakness and the Brissot de Warville, a restless pamphleteer, exerted more influence folly of the émigrés and excluded them from his councils. He over the party which has sometimes gone by his name. The Left earnestly desired to avoid a war which might endanger his sister as a whole was republican, although it did not care to say so. or her husband. In August 1791 he had met Frederick William Strong in numbers, it was reinforced by the disorderly elements II. of Prussia at Pillnitz near Dresden, and the two in Paris and throughout France. The remainder of the House, monarchs had joined in a declaration that they conabout 250 deputies, scarcely belonged to any definite party, sidered the restoration of order and of monarchy in but voted oftenest with the Left, as the Left was the most France an object of interest to all sovereigns. They powerful. further declared that they would be ready to act for this purpose in concert with the other powers. This declaration appears to have been drawn from Leopold by pressure of circumstances. He well knew that concerted action of the powers was impossible, as the English government had firmly resolved not to meddle with French affairs. After Louis had accepted the constitution, Leopold virtually withdrew his declaration. Nevertheless it was a grave error of judgment and contributed to the approaching war. The Left had three objects of enmity: first, the king, the queen and the royal family; secondly, the émigrés; and thirdly, the clergy. The king could not like the new constitution, The court although, if left to himself, indolence and good nature and the emigrés. might have rendered him passive. The queen throughout had only one thought, to shake off the impotence and humiliation of the crown; and for this end she still clung to the hope of foreign succour and corresponded with Vienna. Those émigrés who had assembled in arms on the territories of the electors of Mainz and Treves (Trier) and in the Austrian Netherlands had put themselves in the position of public enemies. Their chiefs were the king's brothers, who affected to consider Louis as a captive and his acts as therefore invalid. The count of Provence gave himself the airs of a regent and surrounded himself with a ministry. The émigrés were not, however, dangerous. They were only a few thousand strong; they had no competent leader and no money; they were unwelcome to the rulers whose hospitality they abused. The nonjuring clergy, although harassed by the local authorities, kept the respect and confidence of most Catholics. No acts of disloyalty were proved against them, and commissioners of the National Assembly reported to its successor that their flocks only desired to be let alone. But the anti-clerical bias of the Legislative Assembly was too strong for such a policy. The king's ministers, named by him and excluded from the Assembly, were mostly persons of little mark. Montmorin gave up the portfolio of foreign affairs on the 31st of October and was succeeded by De Lessart. Cahier de Gerville was minister of the interior; Tarbé, minister of finance; and Bertrand de Molleville, minister of marine. But the only minister who influenced the course of affairs was the comte de Narbonne, minister of war. On the 9th of November the Assembly decreed that the émigrés assembled on the frontiers should be liable to the penalties of and the death and confiscation unless they returned to France The king by the 1st of January following. Louis did not love Bonjurors. his brothers, and he detested their policy, which without rendering him any service made his liberty and even his life precarious; yet, loath to condemn them to death, he vetoed the decree. On the 29th of November the Assembly decreed that every nonjuring clergyman must take within eight days the civic oath, substantially the same as the oath previously administered, on pain of losing his pension and, if any troubles broke out, of being deported. This decree Louis vetoed as a matter of conscience. In either case his resistance only served to give a weapon to his enemies in the Assembly. But foreign affairs were at this time the most critical. The armed bodies of émigrés on the territory of the Empire afforded matter of complaint to France. The persistence of the French in refusing more than a money compensation to the German princes who had claims in Alsace afforded matter of complaint to the Empire. Foreign statesmen noticed with alarm the effect of the French Revolution upon opinion in their own countries, and they resented the endeavours of French revolutionists to make converts there. Of these statesmen, the emperor Leopold was Declaration of Pillaitz. In France many persons desired war for various reasor.s. Narbonne trusted to find in it the means of restoring a certain authority to the crown and limiting the Revolution. He contemplated a war with Austria only. The Girondins desired war in the hope that it would enable them to abolish monarchy altogether. They desired a general war because they believed that it would carry the Revolution into other countries and make it secure in France by making it universal. The extreme Left had the same objects, but it held that a war for those objects could not safely be entrusted to the king and his ministers. Victory would revive the power of the crown; defeat would be the undoing of the Revolution. Hence Robespierre and those who thought with him desired peace. The French nation generally had never approved of the Austrian alliance, and regarded the Habsburgs as traditional enemies. The king and queen, however, who looked for help from abroad and especially from Leopold, dreaded a war with Austria and had no faith in the schemes of Narbonne. Nor was France in a condition to wage a serious war. The constitution was unworkable and the governing authorities were mutually hostile. The finances remained in disorder, and assignats of the face value of 900,000,000 livres were issued by the Legislative Assembly in less than a year. The army had been thinned by desertion and was enervated by long indiscipline. The fortresses were in bad condition and short of supplies. In October Leopold ordered the dispersion of the émigrés who had mustered in arms in the Austrian Netherlands. His example was followed by the electors of Treves and Mainz. At the same time they implored the emperor's protection, and the Austrian chancellor Kaunitz informed Noailles the French ambassador that this protection would be given if necessary. Narbonne demanded a credit of 20,000,000 livres, which the Assembly granted. He made a tour of inspection in the north of France and reported untruly to the Assembly that all was in readiness for war. On the 14th of January 1792 the diplomatic committee reported to the Assembly that the emperor should be required to give satisfactory assurances before the 10th of February. The Assembly put off the term to the 1st of March. In February Leopold concluded a defensive treaty with Frederick William. But there was no mutual confidence between the sovereigns, who were at that very time pursuing opposite policies with regard to Poland. Leopold still hesitated and still hoped to avoid war. He died on the 1st of March, and the imperial dignity became vacant. The hereditary dominions of Austria passed to his son Francis, afterwards the emperor Francis II., a youth of small abilities and no experience. The real conduct of affairs fell, therefore, to the aged Kaunitz. In France Narbonne failed to carry the king or his colleagues along with him. The king took courage to dismiss |