No More Learning

Nothing ought to be more weighed
than the nature of books recommended by public authority. So recommended, they soon form the character of the age. Uncertain indeed is the efficacy, limited indeed is the extent, of a virtuous institution.
But if education takes in vice as any part of its system, there is no doubt but that it will operate with
abundant energy, and to an extent indefinite. The
magistrate, who in favor of freedom thinks himself
obliged to suffer all sorts of publications, is under a
stricter duty than any other well to consider what
sort of writers he shall authorize, and shall recommend by the strongest of all sanctions, that is, by public honors and rewards. He ought to be cautious how he recommends authors of mixed or ambiguous
morality. He ought to be fearful of putting into the
hands of youth writers indulgent to the peculiarities
of their own complexion, lest they should teach the
humors of the professor, rather than the principles of
the science. He ought, above all, to be cautious in
recommending any writer who has carried marks of a
deranged understanding: for where there is no sound
reason, there can be no real virtue; and madness is
ever vicious and malignant.
? ? ? ? OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY. 25
The Assembly proceeds on maxims the very reverse
of these. The Assembly recommends to its youth a
study of the bold experimenters in morality. Everybody knows that there is a great dispute amongst their leaders, which of them is the best resemblance
of Rousseau. In truth, they all resemble him. His
blood they transfuse into their minds and into their
manners. Him they study; him they meditate; him
they turn over in all the time they can spare from the
laborious mischief of the day or the debauches of the
night. Rousseau is their canon of holy writ; in his
life he is their canon of Polycletus; he is their standard
figure of perfection. To this man and this writer, as
a pattern to authors and to Frenchmen, the foundries
of Paris are now running for statues, with the kettles
of their poor and the bells of their churches. If an
author had written like a great genius on geometry,
though his practical and speculative morals were vicious in the extreme, it might appear that in voting the statue they honored only the geometrician. But
Rousseau is a moralist or he is nothing. It is impossible, therefore, putting the circumstances together, to mistake their design in choosing the author with
whom they have begun to recommend a course of
studies.
Their great problem is, to -find a substitute for all
the principles which hitherto have been employed
to regulate the human will and action. They find
dispositions in the mind of such force and quality
as may fit men, far better than the old morality, for
the purposes of such a state as theirs, and may go
much further in supporting their power and destroying their enemies. They have therefore chosen a selfish, flattering, seductive, ostentatious vice, in the
? ? ? ? 26 LETTER TO A MEMBER
place of plain duty. True humility, the basis of
the Christian system, is the low, but deep and firm
foundation of all real virtue. But this, as very painful in the practice, and little imposing in the appearance, they have totally discarded. Their object is to merge all natural and all social sentiment in inordinate vanity. In a small degree, and conversant in
little things, vanity is of little moment. When fullgrown, it is the worst of vices, and the occasional
mimic of them all. It makes the whole man false.
It leaves nothing sincere or trustworthy about him.
His best qualities are poisoned and perverted by it,
and operate exactly as the worst. When your lords
had many writers as immoral as the object of their
statue (such as Voltaire and others) they chose
Rousseau, because in him that peculiar vice which
they wished to erect into ruling virtue was by far
the most conspicuous.
We have had the great professor and founder of
the philosophy of vanity in England. As I had good
opportunities of knowing his proceedings almost from
day to day, he left no doubt on my mind that he entertained no principle, either to influence his heart
or to guide his understanding, but vanity. With this
vice he was possessed to a degree little short of madness. It is from the same deranged, eccentric vanity,
that this, the insane Socrates of the National Assembly, was impelled to publish a mad confession of his
mad faults, and to attempt a new sort of glory from
bringing hardily to light the obscure and vulgar vices
which we know may sometimes be blended with eminent talents. He has not observed on the nature of
vanity who does not know that it is omnivorous,that it has no choice in its food,- that it is fond to
? ? ? ? OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY. 27
talk even of its own faults and vices, as what will excite surprise and draw attention, and what will pass at worst for openness and candor.
It was this abuse and perversion, which vanity
makes even of hypocrisy, which has driven Rousseau
to record a life not so much as checkered or spotted
here and there with virtues, or even distinguished by
a single good action. It is such a life he chooses to
offer to the attention of mankind. It is such a life
that, with a wild defiance, he flings in the face of his
Creator, whom he acknowledges only to brave. Your
Assembly, knowing how much more powerful example is found than precept, has chosen this man (by his own account without a single virtue) for a model.
To him they erect their first statue. From him they
comlmence their series of honors and distinctions.
It is that new-invented virtue which your masters
canonize that led their moral hero constantly to
exhaust the stores of his powerful rhetoric in the
expression of universal benevolence, whilst his heart
was incapable of harboring one spark of common parental affection. Benevolence to the whole species, and want of feeling for every individual with whom
the professors come in contact, form the character of
the new philosophy. Setting up for an unsocial independence, this their hero of vanity refuses the just prioe of common labor, as well as the tribute which
opulence owes to genius, and which, when paid, honors the giver and the receiver; and then he pleads his beggary as an excuse for his crimes. He melts
with tenderness for those only who touch him by the
remotest relation, and then, without one natural pang,
casts away, as a sort of offal and excrement, the
spawn of his disgustful amours, and sends his chil
? ? ? ? 28 LETTER TO A MEMBER
dren to the hospital of foundlings. The bear loves,
licks, and forms her young: but bears are not philosophers. Vanity, however, finds its account in reversing the train of our natural feelings. Thousands admire the sentimental writer; the affectionate father is hardly known in his parish.
Under this philosophic instructor in the ethics of
vanity, they have attempted in France a regeneration
of the moral constitution of man. Statesmen like
your present rulers exist by everything which is spurious, fictitious, and false, --by everything which takes
the man from his house, and sets him on a stage, --
which makes him up an artificial creature, with
painted, theatric sentiments, fit to be seen by the
glare of candle-light, and formed to be contemplated
at a due distance. Vanity is too apt to prevail in all
of us, and in all countries. To the improvement of
Frenchmen, it seems not absolutely necessary that it
should be taught upon system. But it is plain that
the present rebellion was its legitimate offspring, and
it is piously fed by that rebellion with a daily dole.
If the system of institution recommended by the
Assembly is false and theatric, it is because their
system of government is of the same character. To
that, and to that alone, it is strictly conformable. To
understand either, we must connect the morals with
the politics of the legislators. Your practical philosophers, systematic in everything, have wisely began
at the source. As the relation between parents and
children is the first among the elements of vulgar, natural morality,* they erect statues to a wild,
* "Filiola tua te delectari lketor, et probari tibi VO-LK)v esse -jr,
rpov 7Ta TEKva: etenim, si hbec non est, nulla potest homini esse ad
hominem naturae adjunctio: qua sublata, vitao societas tollitur. Va
? ? ? ? OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY. 29
ferocious, low-minded, hard-hearted father, of fine general feelings,- a lover of his kind, but a hater of his kindred. Your masters reject the duties of this
vulgar relation, as contrary to liberty, as not founded
in the social compact, and not binding according to
the rights of men; because the relation is not, of
course, the result of free election, -never so on the
side of the children, not always on the part of the
parents.
The next relation which they regenerate by their
statues to Rousseau is that which is next in sanctity
to that of a father. They differ from those old-fashioned thinkers who considered pedagogues as sober and venerable characters, and allied to the parental.
The moralists of the dark times prceceptorem sancti
voluere parentis esse loco. In this age of light they
teach the people that preceptors ought to be in the
place of gallants. They systematically corrupt a very
corruptible race, (for some time a growing nuisance
amongst you,)- a set of pert, petulant literators, to
whom, instead of their proper, but severe, unostentatious duties, they assign the brilliant part of men of wit and pleasure, of gay, young, military sparks, and
danglers at toilets. They call on the rising generation in France to take a sympathy in the adventures and fortunes, and they endeavor to engage their
sensibility on the side, of pedagogues who betray the
most awful family trusts and vitiate their female
pupils. They teach the people that the debauchers
of virgins, almost in the arms of their parents, may
be safe inmates in their house, and even fit guardians of the honor of those husbands who succeed lete, Patron [Rousseau] et tui condiscipuli [L'Assemblde Nationalel! "- Cic. Ep. ad Atticum.
? ? ? ? 30 LETTER TO A MEMBER
legally to the office which the young literators had
preoccupied without asking leave of law or conscience.
Thus they dispose of all the family relations of parents and children, husbands and wives. Through this same instructor, by whom they corrupt the morals, they corrupt the taste. Taste and elegance, though they are reckoned only among the smaller
and secondary morals, yet are of no mean importance
in the regulation of life. A moral taste is not of
force to turn vice into virtue; but it recommends
virtue with something like the blandishments of
pleasure, and it infinitely abates the evils of vice.
Rousseau, a writer of great force and vivacity, is
totally destitute of taste in ally sense of the word.
Your masters, who are his scholars, conceive that all
refinement has an aristocratic character. The last
age had exhausted all its powers in giving a grace
and nobleness to our natural appetites, and in raising them into a higher class and order than seemed justly to belong to them. Through Rousseau, your
masters are resolved to destroy these aristocratic
prejudices. The passion called love has so general
and powerful an influence, it makes so much of the
entertainment, and indeed so much the occupation, of
that part of life which decides the character forever,
that the mode and the principles on which it engages
the sympathy and strikes the imagination become of
the utmost importance to the morals and manners
of every society. Your rulers were well aware of
this; and in their system of changing your manners
to accommodate them to their politics, they found
nothing so convenient as Rousseau. Through him
they teach men to love after the fashion of philoso
? ? ? ? OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY. 31
phers: that is, they teach to men, to Frenchmen, a
love without gallantry,- a love without anything of
that fine flower of youthfulness and gentility which
places it, if not among the virtues, among the ornaments of life. Instead of this passion, naturally
allied to grace and manners, they infuse into their
youth an unfashioned, indelicate, sour, gloomy, ferocious medley of pedantry and lewdness, - of metaphysical speculations blended with the coarsest sensuality. Such is the general morality of the passions to be found in their famous philosopher, in his famous work of philosophic gallantry, the Nouvelle Eloise.
When the fence from the gallantry of preceptors
is broken down, and your families are no longer
protected by decent pride and salutary domestic
prejudice, there is but one step to a frightful corruption. The rulers in the National Assembly are
in good hopes that the females of the first families
in France may become an easy prey to dancing-masters, fiddlers, pattern-drawers, friseurs, and valets-dechambre, and other active citizens of that description,
who, having the entry into your houses, and being
half domesticated by their situation, may be blended
with you by regular and irregular relations. By a
law they have made these people their equals. By
adopting the sentiments of Rousseau they have made
them your rivals. In this manner these great legislators complete their plan of levelling, and establish
their rights of men on a sure foundation.
I am certain that the writings of Rousseau lead
directly to this kind of shameful evil. ' I have often
wondered how he comes to be so much more admired
and followed on the Continent than he is here. Per
? ? ? ? 32 LETTER TO A MEMBER
haps a secret charm in the language may have its
share in this extraordinary difference. We certainly
perceive, and to a degree we feel, in this writer, a
style glowing, animated, enthusiastic, at the same
time that we find it lax, diffuse, and not in the best
taste of composition, -- all the members of the piece
being pretty equally labored and expanded, without
any due selection or subordination of parts. He is
generally too much on the stretch, and his manner
has little variety. We cannot rest upon any of his
works, though they contain observations which occasionally discover a considerable insight into human nature. But his doctrines, on the whole, are so inapplicable to real life and manners, that we never dream of drawing from them any rule for laws or conduct,
or for fortifying or illustrating anything by a reference to his opinions. They have with us the fate of
older paradoxes -
CuTn ventum ad verum est, senses moresque repugnant,
Atque ipsa utilitas, justi prope mater et mequi.
Perhaps bold speculations are more acceptable because more new to you than to us, who have been long since satiated with them. We continue, as in
the two last ages, to read, more generally than I believe is now done on the Continent, the authors of sound antiquity. These occupy our minds; they
give us another taste and turn; and will not suffer
us to be more than transiently amused with paradoxical morality. It is not that I consider this writer as wholly destitute of just notions. Amongst his irregularities, it must be reckoned that he is sometimes moral, and moral in a very sublime strain. But the
general spirit and tendency of his works is mischievous,- and the more mischievous for this mixture:
? ? ? ? OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY. 33
for perfect depravity of sentiment is not reconcilable
with eloquence; and the mind (though corruptible,
not complexionally vicious) would reject and throw
off with disgust a lesson of pure and unmixed evil.
These writers make even virtue a pander to vice.
However, I less consider the author than the system of the Assembly in perverting morality through
his means. This I confess makes me nearly despair
of any attempt upon the minds of their followers,
through reason, honor, or conscience. The great object of your tyrants is to destroy the gentlemen of
France; and for that purpose they destroy, to the best
of their power, all the effect of those relations which.
may render considerable'men powerful or even safe.
To destroy that order, they vitiate the whole com-munity. That no means may exist of confederating
against their tyranny, by the false sympathies of this
Nouvelle Eloise they endeavor to subvert those principles of domestic trust and fidelity which form the
discipline of social life. They propagate principles
by which every servant may think it, if not his duty,
at least his privilege, to betray his master. By these
principles, every considerable father of a family loses
the sanctuary of his house. Debet sua cuique domus
esse peyfugium tutissimum, says the law, which your
legislators have taken so much pains first to decry,
then to repeal. They destroy all the tranquillity and
security of domestic life: turning the asylum of the
house into a gloomy prison, where the father of the
family must drag out a miserable existence, endangered in proportion to the apparent means of his safety, --where he is worse than solitary in a crowd of domestics, and more apprehensive from his servants
and inmates than from the hired, bloodthirsty mob.
VOL. IV. 3
? ? ? ? 34 LETTER TO A MEMBER
without doors who are ready to pull him to the lanterne.
It is thus, and for the same end, that they endeavor to destroy that tribunal of conscience which exists independently of edicts and decrees. Your despots
govern by terror. They know that he who fears God
fears nothing else; and therefore they eradicate from
the mind, through their Voltaire, their Helvetius, and
the rest of that infamous gang, that only sort of fear
which generates true courage. Their object is, that
their fellow-citizens may be under the dominion of no
awe but that of their Committee of Research and of
their lanterne.
Having found the advantage of assassination in the
formation of their tyranny, it is the grand resource
in which they trust for the support of it. Whoever
opposes any of their proceedings, or is suspected of a
design to oppose them, is to answer it with his life,
or the lives of his wife and children. This infamous,
cruel, and cowardly practice of assassination they
have the impudence to call merciful. They boast that
they operated their usurpation rather by terror than
by force, and that a few seasonable murders have
prevented the bloodshed of many battles. There is
no doubt they will extend these acts of mercy when~ever they see an occasion. Dreadful, however, will be the consequences of their attempt to avoid the
evils of war by the merciful policy of murder. If, by
effectual punishment of the guilty, they do not wholly
disavow that practice, and the threat of it too, as any
part of their policy, if ever a foreign prince enters
into France, he must enter it as into a country of
assassins. The mode of civilized war will not be
practised: nor are the French who act on the present
? ? ? ? OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY. 35
system entitled to expect it. They whose known policy it is to assassinate every citizen whom they suspect to be discontented by their tyranny, and to corrupt the soldiery of every open enemy, must look for no modified hostility. All war, which is not battle,
will be military execution. This will beget acts of
retaliation from you; and every retaliation will beget
a new revenge. The hell-hounds of war, on all sides,
will be uncoupled and unmuzzled. The new school
of murder and barbarism set up in Paris, having destroyed (so far as in it lies) all the other manners
and principles which have hitherto civilized Europe,
will destroy also the mode of civilized war, which,
more than anything else, has distinguished the Christian world. Such is the approaching golden age
which the Virgil * of your Assembly has sung to his
Pollios!
In such a situation of your political, your civil,
and your social morals and manners, how can you be
hurt by the freedom of any discussion? Caution is
for those who have something to lose. What I have
said, to justify myself in not apprehending any ill
consequence from a free discussion of the absurd consequences which flow from the relation of the lawful
king to the usurped Constitution, will apply to my
vindication with regard to the exposure I have made
of the state of the army under the same sophistic
usurpation. The present tyrants want no arguments
to prove, what they must daily feel, that no good
army can exist on their principles. They are in no
want of a monitor to suggest to them the policy of
getting rid of the army, as well as of the king, whenever they are in a condition to effect that measure.
* Mirabeau's speech concerning universal peace.
? ? ? ? 36 LETTER TO A MEMBER
What hopes may be entertained of your army for the
restoration of your liberties I know not. At present,
yielding obedience to the pretended orders of a king
who, they are perfectly apprised,-has no will, and
who never can issue a mandate which is not intended, in the first operation, or in its certain consequences, for his own destruction, your army seems to make one of the principal links in the chain of that
servitude of anarchy by which a cruel usurpation
holds an undone people at once in bondage and confusion.
You ask me what I think of the conduct of General Monk. How this affects your case I cannot tell.
I doubt whether you possess in France any persons
of a capacity to serve the French monarchy in the
same manner in which Monk served the monarchy of
England. The army which Monk commanded had
been formed by Cromwell to a perfection of discipline
which perhaps has' never been exceeded. That army
was besides of an excellent composition. The soldiers
were men of extraordinary piety after their mode; of
the greatest regularity, and even severity of manners;
brave in the field, but modest, quiet, and orderly in
their quarters; men who abhorred the idea of assassinating their officers or any other persons, and who
(they at least who served in this island) were firmly
attached to those generals by whom they were well
treated and ably commanded. Such an army, once
gained, might be depended on. I doubt much, if
you could now find a MIonk, whether a Monk could
find in France such an army.
I certainly agree with you, that in all probability
we owe our whole Constitution to the restoration of
the English monarchy. The state of things from
? ? ? ? OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY. 37
which Monk relieved England was, however, by no
means, at that time, so deplorable, in any sense, as
yours is now, and under the present sway is likely to
continue. Cromwell had delivered England from anarchy. His government, though military and despotic, had been regular and orderly. Under the iron, and under the yoke, the soil yielded its produce.
After his death the evils of anarchy were rather
dreaded than felt. Every man was yet safe in his
house and in his property. But it must be admitted
that Monk freed this nation from great and just apprehensions both of future anarchy and of probable
tyranny in some form or other. The king whom he
gave us was, indeed, the very reverse of your benignant sovereign, who, in reward for his attempt to
bestow liberty on his subjects, languishes himself in
prison. The person given to us by Monk was a man
without any sense of his duty as a prince, without
any regard to the dignity of his crown, without any
love to his people, - dissolute, false, venal, and destitute of any positive good quality whatsoever, except
a pleasant temper, and the manners of a gentleman.
Yet the restoration of our monarchy, even in the person of such a prince, was everything to us; for without monarchy in England, most certainly we never can enjoy either peace or liberty. It was under this
conviction that the very first regular step which we
took, on the Revolution of 1688, was to fill the throne
with a real king; and even before it could be done
in due form, the chiefs of the nation did not attempt
themselves to exercise authority so much as by interim. They instantly requested the Prince of Orange
to take the government on himself. The throne was
not effectively vacant for an hour.
? ? ? ? I88 LETTER TO A MEMBER
Your fundamental laws, as well as ours, suppose a
monarchy. Your zeal, Sir, in standing so firmly for
it as you have done, shows not only a sacred respect
for your honor and fidelity, but a well-informed attachment to the real welfare and true liberties of
your country. I have expressed myself ill, if I have
given you cause to imagine that I prefer the conduct
of those who have retired from this warfare to your
behavior, who, with a courage and constancy almost
supernatural, have struggled against tyranny, and
kept the field to the last. You see I have corrected
the exceptionable part in the edition which I now
send you. Indeed, in such terrible extremities as
yours, it is not easy to say, in a political view, what
line of conduct is the most advisable. In that state
of things, I cannot bring myself severely to condemn
persons who are wholly unable to bear so much as
the sight of those men in the throne of legislation
who are only fit to be the objects of criminal justice.
If fatigue, if disgust, if unsurmountable nausea drive
them away from such spectacles, ubi miseriarum pars
non minima erat videre et aspici, I cannot blame them.
He must have an heart of adamant who could hear a
set of traitors puffed up with unexpected and undeserved power, obtained by an ignoble, unmanly, and perfidious rebellion, treating their honest fellow-citizens as rebels, because they refused to bind them selves through their conscience, against the dictates
of conscience itself, and had declined to swear an
active compliance with their own ruin. How could
a man of common flesh and blood endure that those
who but the other day had skulked unobserved in
their antechambers, scornfully insulting men illustrious in their rank, sacred in their function, and ven
? ? ? ? OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY. 39
erable in their character, now in decline of life, and
swimming on the wrecks of their fortunes, - that
those miscreants should tell such men scornfully and
outrageously, after they had robbed them of all their
property, that it is more than enough, if they are
allowed what will keep them from absolute famine,
and that, for the rest, they must let their gray hairs
fall over the plough, to make out a scanty subsistence
with the labor of their hands? Last, and worst, who
could endure to hear this unnatural, insolent, and
savage despotism called liberty? If, at this distance,
sitting quietly by my fire, I cannot read their decrees
and speeches without indignation, shall I condemn
those who have fled from the actual sight and hearing of all these horrors? No, no! mankind has no title to demand that we should be slaves to their
guilt and insolence, or that we should serve them in
spite of themselves. Minds sore with the poignant
sense of insulted virtue, filled with high disdain
against the pride of triumphant baseness, often have
it not in their choice to stand their ground. Their
complexion (which might defy the rack) cannot go
through such a trial. Something very high must
fortify men to that proof; But when I am driven to
comparison, surely I cannot hesitate for a moment
to prefer to such men as are common those heroes
who in the midst of despair perform all the tasks of
hope, - who subdue their feelings to their duties, -
who, in the cause of humanity, liberty, and honor,
abandon all the satisfactions of life, and every day
incur a fresh risk of life itself. Do me the justice to
believe that I never can prefer any fastidious virtue
(virtue still) to the unconquered perseverance, to the
affectionate patience, of those who watch day and
? ? ? ? 40 LETTER TO A MEMIBER
night by the bedside of their delirious country,who, for their love to that dear and venerable name,
bear all the disgusts and all the buffets they receive
from their frantic mother. Sir, I do look on you as
true martyrs; I regard you as soldiers who act far
more in the spirit of our Commander-in-Chief and
the Captain of our Salvation than those who have left
you: though I must first bolt myself very thoroughly, and know that I could do better, before I can censure them. I assure you, Sir, that, when I consider your unconquerable fidelity to your sovereign and to
your country, - the courage, fortitude, magnanimity, and long-suffering of yourself, and the Abb6
Maury, and of M. Cazalds, and of many worthy persons of all orders in your Assembly, --I forget, in
the lustre of these, great qualities, that on your side
has been displayed an eloquence so rational, manly,
and convincing, that no time or country, perhaps,
has ever excelled. But your talents disappear in
my admiration of your virtues.
As to M. Mounier and M. Lally, I have always
wished to do justice to their parts, and their eloquence, and the general purity of their motives.
Indeed, I saw very well, from the beginning, the
mischiefs which, with all these talents and good
intentions, they would do their country, through
their confidence in systems. But their distemper
was an epidemic malady. They were young and
inexperienced; and when will young and inexperienced men learn caution and distrust of themselves?
And when will men, young or old, if suddenly raised
to far higher power than that which absolute kings
and emperors comlmonly enjoy, learn anything like
moderation? Monarchs, in general, respect some
? ? ? ? OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY. 41
settled ol der of things, which they find it difficult to
move from its basis, and to which they are obliged to
conform, even when there are no positive limitations
to their power. These gentlemen conceived that
they were chosen to new-model the state, and even
the whole order of civil society itself. No wonder
that they entertained dangerous visions, when the
king's ministers, trustees for the sacred deposit of
the monarchy, were so infected with the contagion of
project add system (I. can hardly think it black premeditated treachery) that they publicly advertised
for plans and schemes of government, as if they were
to provide for the rebuilding of an hospital that had
been burned down. What was this, but to unchain
the fury of rash speculation amongst a people of itself but too apt to be guided by a heated imagination and a wild spirit of adventure? The fault of M. Mounier and M. Lally was very
great; but it was very general. If those gentlemen
stopped, when they came to the brink of the gulf of
guilt and public misery that yawned before them in
the abyss of these dark and bottomless speculations,
I forgive their first error: in that they were involved
with many. Their repentance was their own.
They who consider Mounier and Lally as deserters
must regard themselves as murderers and as traitors:
for from what else than murder and treason did they
desert? For my part, I honor them for not having
carried mistake into crime. If, indeed, I thought
that they were not cured by experience, that they
were not made sensible that those who would reform
a state ought to assume some actual constitution of
government which is to be reformed, -if they are not
at length satisfied that it is become a necessary pre
? ? ? ? 42 LETTER TO A MEMBER
liminary to liberty in France, to commence by the reestablishment of order and property of every kind, and, through the reestablishment of their monarchy, of
every one of the old habitual distinctions and classes
of the state, - if they do not see that these classes are
not to be confounded in order to be afterwards revived and separated,- if they are not convinced that
the scheme of parochial and club governments takes
up the state at the wrong end, and is a low and sellseless contrivance, (as making the sole constitution of
a supreme power,) -I should then allow that their
early rashness ought to be remembered to the last
moment of their lives.
You gently reprehend me, because, ill holding out
the picture of your disastrous situation, I suggest no
plan for a remedy. Alas! Sir, the proposition of
plans, without an attention to circumstances, is the
very cause of all your misfortunes; and never shall
you find me aggravating, by the infusion of any speculations of mine, the evils which have arisen from the speculations of others. Your malady, in this respect,
is a disorder of repletion. You seem to think that my
keeping back my poor ideas may arise from an indifference to the welfare of a foreign and sometimes an hostile nation. No, Sir, I faithfully assure you, my
reserve is owing to no such causes. Is this letter,
swelled to a second book, a mark of national antipathy, or even of national indifference? I should act altogether in the spirit of the same caution, in a
similar state of our own domestic affairs. If I were
to venture any advice, in any case, it would be my
best. The sacred duty of an adviser (one of the most
inviolable that exists) would lead me, towards a real
enemy, to act as if my best friend were the party con
? ? ? ? OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY. 43
cerned. But I dare not risk a speculation with no
better view of your affairs than at present I can command; my caution is not from disregard, but from solicitude for your welfare. It is suggested solely
from my dread of becoming the author of inconsiderate counsel.
It is not, that, as this strange series of actions has
passed before my eyes, I have not indulged my mind
in a great variety of political speculations concerning
them; but, compelled by no such positive duty as does
not permit me to evade an opinion, called upon by no
ruling power, without authority as I am, and without
confidence, I should ill answer my own ideas of what
would become myself, or what would be serviceable
to others, if I were, as a volunteer, to obtrude any
project of mine upon a nation to whose circumstances I could not be sure it might be applicable. Permit me to say, that, if I were as confident as
I ought to be diffident in my own loose, general
ideas, I never should venture to broach them, if but
at twenty leagues' distance from the centre of your
affairs. I must see with my own eyes, I must, in a
manner, touch with my own hands, not only the fixed,
but the momentary circumstances, before I could venture to suggest any political project whatsoever. I must know the power and disposition to accept, to
execute, to persevere. I must see all the aids and
all the obstacles. I must see the means of correcting
the plan, where correctives would be wanted. I must
see the things; I must see the men. Without a concurrence and adaptation of these to the design, the very best speculative projects might become not only
useless, but mischievous. Plans must be made for
men. We cannot think of making men, and binding
? ? ? ? 44 LETTER TO A MEMBER
Nature to our designs. People at a distance must
judge ill of men. They do not always answer to their
reputation, when you approach them. Nay, the perspective varies, and shows them quite otherwise than you thought them. At a distance, if we judge uncertainly of men, we must judge worse of opportunities, which continually vary their shapes and colors, and
pass away like clouds. The Eastern politicians never
do anything without the opinion of the astrologers
on the fortunate moment. They are in the right, if
they can do no better; for the opinion of fortune is
something towards commanding it. Statesmen of a
more judicious prescience look for the fortunate moment too; but they seek it, not in the conjunctions
and oppositions of planets, but in the conjunctions
and oppositions of men and things. These form their
almanac.
To illustrate the mischief of a wise plan, without
any attention to means and circumstances, it is not
necessary to go farther than to your recent history.
In the condition in which France was found three
years ago, what better system could be proposed,
what less even savoring of wild theory, what fitter to
provide for all the exigencies whilst it reformed all
the abuses of government, than the convention of the
States-General? I think nothing better could be imagined. But I have censured, and do still presume
to censure, your Parliament of Paris for not having
suggested to the king that this proper measure was
of all measures the most critical and arduous, one
in which the utmost circumspection and the greatest
number of precautions were the most absolutely necessary. The very confession that a government wants either amendment in its conformation or relief to
? ? ? ? OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY. 45
great distress causes it to lose half its reputation,
and as great a proportion of its strength as depends
upon that reputation. It was therefore necessary
first to put government out of danger, whilst at its
own desire it suffered such an operation as a general
reform at the hands of those who were much more
filled with a sense of the disease than provided with
rational means of a cure.
It may be said that this care and these precautions were more naturally the duty of the king's ministers than that of the Parliament. They were so:
but every man must answer in his estimation for the
advice he gives, when he puts the conduct of his
measure into hands who he does not know will execute his plans according to his ideas. Three or four
ministers were not to be trusted with the being of the
French monarchy, of all the orders, and of all the
distinctions, and all the property of the kingdom.
What must be the prudence of those who could
think, in the then known temper of the people of
Paris, of assembling the States at a place situated as
Versailles?
The Parliament of Paris did worse than to inspire
this blind confidence into the king. For, as if names
were things, they took no notice of (indeed, they rather countenanced) the deviations, which were manifest
in the execution, from the true ancient principles of
the plan which they recommended. These deviations (as guardians of the ancient laws, usages, and
Constitution of the kingdom) the Parliament of Paris
ought not to have suffered, without the strongest remonstrances to the throne. It ought to have sounded the alarm to the whole nation, as it had often done on things of infinitely less importance. Under pre
? ? ? ? 46 LETTER TO A MEMBER
tence of resuscitating the ancient Constitution, the
Parliament saw one of the strongest acts of innovation, and the most leading -i-n. its consequences, carried into effect before their eyes, - and an innovation through the medium of despotism: that is, they suffered the king's ministers to new-model the whole
representation of the Tiers Etat, and, in a great measure, that of the clergy too, and to destroy the ancient
proportions of the orders. These changes, unquestionably, the king had no right to make; and here
the Parliaments failed in their duty, and, along with
their country, have perished by this failure.
What a number of faults have led to this multitude
of misfortunes, and almost all from this one source,
-that of considering certain general maxims, without attending to circumstances, to times, to places,
to conjunctures, and to actors! If we do not attend
scrupulously to all these, the medicine of to-day becomes the poison of to-morrow. If any measure was
in the abstract better than another, it was to call the
States: ea visa salus morientibus una. Certainly it
had the appearance. But see the consequences of
not attending to critical moments, of not regarding
the symptoms which discriminate diseases, and which
distinguish constitutions, complexions, and humors.
Mox erat hoc ipsum exitio; furiisque refecti
Ardebant; ipsique suos, jam morte sub megra,
Discissos nudis laniabant dentibus artus.
Thus the potion which was given to strengthen the
Constitution, to heal divisions, and to compose the
minds of men, became the source of debility, frenzy,
discord, and utter dissolution.
In this, perhaps, I have answered, I think, another
of your questions,- Whether the British Constitu
? ? ? ? OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY. 47
tion is adapted to your circumstances? When I
praised the British Constitution, and wished it to be
well studied, I did not mean that its exterior form
and positive arrangement should become a model for
you or for any people servilely to copy. I meant to
recommend the principles from which it has grown,
and the policy on which it has been progressively improved out of elements common to you and to us. I
am sure it is no visionary theory of mine. It is not
an advice that subjects you to the hazard of any experiment. I believed the ancient principles to be
wise in all cases of a large empire that would be free.
I thought you possessed our principles in your old
forms in as great a perfection as we did originally.
If your States agreed (as I think they did) with your
circumstances, they were best for you. As you had
a Constitution formed upon principles similar to ours,
my idea was, that you might have improved them as
we have done, conforming them to the state and exigencies of the times, and the condition of property in
your country, - having the conservation of that property, and the substantial basis of your monarchy, as
principal objects in all your reforms.
I do not advise an House of Lords to you. Your
ancient course by representatives of the noblesse (in
your circumstances) appears to me rather a better
institution. I know, that, with you, a set of men of
rank have betrayed their constituents, their honor,
their trust, their king, and their country, and levelled themselves with their footmen, that through
this degradation they might afterwards put themselves above their natural equals. Some of these persons have entertained a project, that, in reward of this their black perfidy and corruption, they may be
? ? ? ? 48 LETTER TO A MEMBER
chosen to give rise to a new order, and to establish
themselves into an House of Lords. Do you think,
that, under the name of a British Constitution, I
mean to recommend to you such Lords, made of such
kind of stuff? I do not, however, include in this description all of those who are fond of this scheme.
If you were now to form such an House of Peers;
it would bear, in my opinion, but little resemblance to
ours, in its origin, character, or the purposes which it
might answer, at the same time that it would destroy
your true natural nobility. But if you are not in a
condition to frame a House of Lords, still less are
you capable, in my opinion, of framing anything
which virtually and substantially could be answerable (for the purposes of a stable, regular government) to our House of Commons. That House is, within itself, a much more subtle and artificial combination of parts and powers than people are generally aware of. What knits it to the other members of the Constitution, what fits it to be at once the
great support and the great control of government,
what makes it of such admirable service to that monarchy which, if it limits, it secures and strengthens,
would require a long discourse, belonging to the leisure of a contemplative man, not to one whose duty
it is to join in communicating practically to the people the blessings of such a Constitution.
Your Tiers ltat was not in effect and substance an
House of Commons. You stood in absolute need of
something else to supply the manifest defects in such
a body as your Tiers Etat. On a sober and dispassionate view of your old Constitution, as connected with
all the present circumstances, I was fully persuaded
that the crown, standing as things have stood, (and
? ? ? ? OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY. 49
are likely to stand, if you are to have any monarchy
at all,) was and is incapable, alone and by itself, of
holding a just balance between the two orders, and at
the same time of effecting the interior and exterior
purposes of a protecting government. I, whose leading principle it is, in a reformation of the state, to make use of existing materials, am of opinion that
the representation of the clergy, as a separate order,
was an institution which touched all the orders more
nearly than any of them touched the other; that it
was well fitted to connect them, and to hold a place
in any wise monarchical commonwealth. If I refer
you to your original Constitution, and think it, as I
do, substantially a good one, I do not amuse you in
this, more than in other things, with any inventions of
mine. A certain intemperance of intellect is the disease of the time, and the source of all its other dis -- eases. I will keep myself as untainted by it as I can.
Your architects build without a foundation.