The Online Library of Liberty A Project Of Liberty Fund, Inc. Hippolyte Taine, The French Revolution, vol. 2 [1878] The Online Library Of Liberty This E-Book (PDF format) is published by Liberty Fund, Inc., a private, non-profit, educational foundation established in 1960 to encourage study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals. 2010 was the 50th anniversary year of the founding of Liberty Fund. It is part of the Online Library of Liberty web site http://oll.libertyfund.org, which was established in 2004 in order to further the educational goals of Liberty Fund, Inc. To find out more about the author or title, to use the site's powerful search engine, to see other titles in other formats (HTML, facsimile PDF), or to make use of the hundreds of essays, educational aids, and study guides, please visit the OLL web site. 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Author: Hippolyte Taine Translator: John Durand About This Title: Volume 2 of Taine’s 3 volume history of the French Revolution, written from a conservative perspective. PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011) 2 http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/880 Online Library of Liberty: The French Revolution, vol. 2 About Liberty Fund: Liberty Fund, Inc. is a private, educational foundation established to encourage the study of the ideal of a society of free and responsible individuals. Copyright Information: The copyright to this edition, in both print and electronic forms, is held by Liberty Fund, Inc. Fair Use Statement: This material is put online to further the educational goals of Liberty Fund, Inc. Unless otherwise stated in the Copyright Information section above, this material may be used freely for educational and academic purposes. It may not be used in any way for profit. PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011) 3 http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/880 Online Library of Liberty: The French Revolution, vol. 2 Table Of Contents Preface Book Fourth: the Jacobin Conquest Chapter I Chapter Ii Chapter Iii Chapter Iv Chapter V Chapter Vi Chapter Vii Chapter Viii Chapter Ix Chapter X Chapter Xi Chapter Xii PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011) 4 http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/880 Online Library of Liberty: The French Revolution, vol. 2 [Back to Table of Contents] PREFACE In this volume, as in those preceding it and in those to come, there will be found only the history of Public Powers. Other historians will write that of diplomacy, of war, of the finances, of the Church: my subject is a limited one. To my great regret, however, this new part fills an entire volume; and the last part, on the revolutionary government, will be as long. I have again to regret the dissatisfaction which I foresee this work will cause to many of my countrymen. My excuse is that almost all of them, more fortunate than myself, have political principles which serve them in forming their judgments of the past. I had none; if, indeed, I had any motive in undertaking this work, it was to seek for political principles. Thus far I have attained to scarcely more than one; and this is so simple that it will seem puerile, and that I hardly dare enunciate it. Nevertheless I have adhered to it, and in what the reader is about to peruse my judgments are all derived from that; its truth is the measure of theirs. It consists wholly in this observation: that human society, especially a modern society, is a vast and complicated thing. Hence the difficulty in knowing and comprehending it. For the same reason it is not easy to handle the subject well. It follows that a cultivated mind is much better able to do this than an uncultivated mind, and a man specially qualified than one who is not. From these two last truths flow many other consequences, which, if the reader deigns to reflect on them, he will have no trouble in defining. PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011) 5 http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/880 Online Library of Liberty: The French Revolution, vol. 2 [Back to Table of Contents] BOOK FOURTH The Jacobin Conquest CHAPTER I Rise of the new political organ—I.Principle of the revolutionary party—Its applications—II.Formation of the Jacobin—The common human elements of his character—Self-conceit and dogmatism are sensitive and rebellious in every community—How kept down in all well-founded societies—Their development in the new order of things—Effect of milieu on imaginations and ambitions—The stimulants of Utopianism, abuses of speech, and derangement of ideas—Changes in office; interests played upon and perverted feeling—III.Psychology of the Jacobin—His intellectual method—Tyranny of formulae and suppression of facts—Mental balance disturbed—Signs of this in the revolutionary language—Scope and expression of the Jacobin intellect—In what respect his method is mischievous—How it is successful—Illusions produced by it—IV.What the theory promises—How it flatters wounded self-esteem—The ruling passion of the Jacobin—Apparent both in style and conduct—He alone is virtuous in his own estimation, while his adversaries are vile—They must accordingly be put out of the way—Perfection of this character—Common sense and moral sense both perverted. In this society, in a state of dissolution, in which the passions of the people are the sole efficient force, that party rules which knows best how to flatter these and turn them to account. Alongside of a legal government, therefore, which can neither repress nor gratify these passions, arises an illegal government which sanctions, excites, and directs them. While the former totters and falls to pieces, the latter strengthens itself and completes its organization, until, becoming legal in its turn, it takes the other’s place. I We find a theory at the outset, in justification of these popular outbreaks and assaults, which is neither improvised, added to, nor superficial, but firmly fixed in the public mind, fed by long anterior philosophical discussion; a sort of enduring, long-lived root out of which the new constitutional tree has arisen, namely, the dogma of popular sovereignty. Literally interpreted, it means that the government is merely an inferior clerk or domestic.1 We, the people, have established the government; and ever since, as well as before its organization, we are its masters. Between us and it “no contract” that is undefined, or at least lasting—“none which cannot be done away with by mutual consent or through the unfaithfulness of one of the two parties.” Whatever it may be, or provide for, we are nowise bound by it; it depends wholly on us; we remain free to “modify, restrict, and resume as we please the power of which we have made it the depository.” By virtue of a primitive, inalienable right the commonwealth PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011) 6 http://oll.libertyfund.org/title/880 Online Library of Liberty: The French Revolution, vol. 2 belongs to us and to us only; if we put this into the hands of the government it is as when kings delegate authority for the time being to a minister, and which he is always tempted to abuse; it is our business to watch him, warn him, check him, curb him, and, if necessary, displace him. We must especially guard ourselves against the craft and manoeuvres by which, under the pretext of preserving public tranquillity, he would tie our hands. A law, superior to any he can make, forbids him to interfere with our sovereignty; and he does interfere with it when he undertakes to forestall, obstruct, or impede its exercise. The Assembly, even the Constituent, usurps when it treats the people like a royal drone (roi fainéant), when it subjects them to laws which they have not ratified, and when it deprives them of action except through their representatives. The people themselves must act directly, must assemble together and deliberate on public affairs; they must control and censure the acts of those they elect; they must influence these with their resolutions, correct their mistakes with their good sense, atone for their weakness by their energy, stand at the helm alongside of them, and even employ force and throw them overboard, so that the ship may be saved, which, in their hands, is drifting on a rock. Such, in fact, is the doctrine of the popular party. This doctrine is carried into effect July 14 and October 5 and 6, 1789. Loustalot, Camille Desmoulins, Fréron, Danton, Marat, Pétion, Robespierre proclaim it untiringly in the political clubs, in the newspapers, and in the Assembly. The government, according to them, whether local or central, encroaches everywhere. Why, after having overthrown one despotism, should we set up another? No longer subject to the privileged aristocracy, we are subject to “the aristocracy of our representatives.”2 Already at Paris “the body of