No More Learning

substance be ours. But all is upon that false principle of distrust, which, not confiding in strength, can
never have the full use of it. They that pay, and
feed, and equip, must direct. But I must speak
plain upon this subject. The French islands, if
they were all our own, ought not to be all kept.
A fair partition only ought to be made of those territories. This is a subject of policy very serious,
which has many relations and aspects. Just here
I only hint at it as answering an objection, whilst
I state the mischievous consequences which suffer
us to be surprised into a virtual breach of faith by
confounding our ally with our enemy, because they
both belong to the same geographical territory.
My clear opinion is, that Toulon ought to be made,
what we set out with, a royal French city. By the
necessity of the case, it must be under the influence,
civil and military, of the allies. But the only way
of keeping that jealous and discordant mass fiom
tearing its component parts to pieces, and hazarding
the loss of the whole, is, to put the place into the
nominal government of the regent, his officers being
approved by us. This, I say, is absolutely necessary
for a poise amongst ourselves. Otherwise is it to
be believed that the Spaniards, who hold that place
with us in a sort of partnership, contrary to our mutual interest, will see us absolute masters of the Mediterranean, with Gibraltar on one side and Toulon on the other, with a quiet and composed mind, whilst
we do little less than declare that we are to take the
whole West Indies into our hands, leaving the vast,
unwieldy, and feeble body of the Spanish dominions
in that part of the world absolutely at our mercy,
without any power to balance us in the smallest de
? ? ? ? ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES. 447
gree? Nothing is so fatal to a nation as an extreme
of self-partiality, and the total want of consideration
of what others will naturally hope or fear. Spain
must think she sees that we are taking advantage
of the confusions which reign in France to disable
that country, and of course every country, from affording her protection, and in the end to turn the
Spanish monarchy into a province. If she saw things
in a proper point of light, to be sure, she would not
consider any other plan of politics as of the least
moment in comparison of the extinction of Jacobinism. But her ministers (to say the best of them) are
vulgar politicians. It is no wonder that they should
postpone this great point, or balance it by considerations of the common politics, that is, the questions
of power between state and state. If we manifestly
endeavor to destroy the balance, especially the maritime and commercial balance, both in Europe and
the West Indies, (the latter their sore and vulnerable
part,) from fear of what France may do for Spain
hereafter, is it to be wondered that Spain, infinitely
weaker than we are, (weaker, indeed, than such a
mass of empire ever was,) should feel the same fears
from our uncontrolled power that we give way to
ourselves from a supposed resurrection of the ancient power of France under a monarchy? It signifies nothing whether we are wrong or right in the abstract; but in respect to our relation to Spain, with
such principles followed up in practice, it is absolutely impossible that any cordial alliance can subsist between the two nations. If Spain goes, Naples will speedily follow. Prussia is quite certain, and
thinks of nothing but making a market of the present
confusions. Italy is broken and divided. Switzer
? ? ? ? 448 ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES.
land is Jacobinized, I am afraid, completely. I have
long seen with pain the progress of French principles
in that country. Things cannot go on upon the present bottom. The possession of Toulon, which, well
managed, might be of the greatest advantage, will be
the greatest misfortune that ever happened to this
nation. The more we multiply troops there, the
more we shall multiply causes and means of quarrel
amongst ourselves. I know but one way of avoiding it, which is, to give a greater degree of simplicity
to our politics. Our situation does necessarily render them a good deal involved. And to this evil,
instead of increasing it, we ought to apply all the
remedies in our power.
See what is in that place the consequence (to say
nothing of every other) of this complexity. Toulon
has, as it were, two gates, - an English and a Spanish.
The English gate is by our policy fast barred against
the entrance of any Royalists. The Spaniards open
theirs, I fear, upon no fixed principle, and with very
little judgment. By means, however, of this foolish,
mean, and jealous policy on our side, all the Royalists
whom the English might select as most practicable,
and most subservient to honest views, are totally excluded. Of those admitted the Spaniards are mlasters. As to the inhabitants, they are a nest of Jacobins, which is delivered into our hands, not from
principle, but from fear. The inhabitants of Toulon
may be described in a few words. It is differturn
nautis, cauponibus atque malignis. The rest of the
seaports are of the same description.
Another thing which I cannot account for is, the
sending for the Bishop of Toulon and afterwards forbidding his entrance. This is as directly contrary to
? ? ? ? ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES. 449
the declaration as it is to the practice of the allied
powers. The king of Prussia did better. When he
took Verdun, he actually reinstated the bishop and
his chapter. When he thought he should be the
master of Chalons, he called the bishop from Flanders, to put him into possession. The Austrians
have restored the clergy wherever they obtained possession. We have proposed to restore religion as well as monarchy; and in Toulon we have restored
neither the one nor the other. It is very likely that
the Jacobin sans-culottes, or some of them, objected
to this measure, who rather choose to have the atheistic buffoons of clergy they have got to sport with, till they are ready to come forward, with the restof their worthy brethren, in Paris and other places,,
to declare that they are a set of impostors, that tlheynever believed in God, and never will preach any sort of religion. If we give way to our Jacobins in
this point, it is fully and fairly putting the government, civil and ecclesiastical, not in the king of
France, to whom, as the protector and governor, and
in substance the head of the Gallican Church, the
nomination to the bishoprics belonged, and who made
the Bishop of Toulon, - it does not leave it with him,
or even ill the hands of the king of England, or the
king of Spain, - but in the basest Jacobins of a low
seaport, to exercise, pro tempore, the sovereignty.
If this point of religion is thus given up, the grand
instrument for reclaiming France is abandoned. We
cannot, if we would, delude ourselves about the true
state of this dreadful contest. It is a religious war.
It includes in its object, undoubtedly, every other
interest of society as well as this; but this is the
principal and leading feature. It is through this
VOL. IV. 29
? ? ? ? 450 ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES.
destruction of religion that our enemies propose the
accomplishment of all their other views. The French
Revolution, impious at once and fanatical, had no
other plan for domestic power and foreign empire.
Look at all the proceedings of the National Assembly,
from the first day of declaring itself such, in the year
1789, to this very hour, and you will find full half of
their business to be directly on this subject. In fact,
it is the spirit of the whole. The religious system,
called the Constitutional Church, was, on the face
of the whole proceeding, set up only as a mere temporary amusement to the people, and so constantly stated in all their conversations, till the time should
come when they might with safety cast off the very
appearance of all religion whatsoever, and persecute
Christianity throughout Europe with fire and sword.
The Constitutional clergy are not the ministers of any
religion: they are the agents and instruments of this
horrible conspiracy against all morals. It was from
a sense of this, that, in the English addition to the
articles proposed at St. Domingo, tolerating all religions, we very wisely refused to suffer that kind of traitors and buffoons.
This religious war is not a controversy between
sect and sect, as formerly, but a war against all sects
and all religions. The question is not, whether you
are to overturn the Catholic, to set up the Protestant.
Such an idea, in the present state of the world, is too
contemptible. Our business is, to leave to the schools
the discussion of the controverted points, abating as
much as we can the acrimony of disputants on all
sides. It is for Christian statesmen, as the world is
now circumstanced, to secure their common basis,
and not to risk the subversion of the whole fabric
? ? ? ? ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES. 451
by pursuing these distinctions with an ill-timed zeal.
We have in the present grand alliance all modes of
government, as well as all modes of religion. In
government, we mean to restore that which, notwithstanding our diversity of forms, we are all agreed
in as fundamental in government. The same principle ought to guide us in the religious part: conforming the mode, not to our particular ideas, (for in that point we have no ideas in common,) but to
what will best promote the great, general ends of
the alliance. As statesmen, we are to see which of
those modes best suits with the interests of such a
commonwealth as we wish to secure and promote.
There can be no doubt but that the Catholic religion, which is fundamentally the religion of France,
must go with the monarchy of France. We know
that the monarchy did not survive the hierarchy, no,
not even in appearance, for many months, --in substance, not for a single hour. As little can it exist in
future, if that pillar is taken away, or even shattered
and impaired.
If it should please God to give to the allies the
means of restoring peace and order in that focus of
war and confusion, I would, as I said in the beginning of this memorial, first replace the whole of the
old clergy; because we have proof more than sufficient, that, whether they err or not in the scholastic
disputes with us, they are not tainted with atheism,
the great political evil of the time. I hope I need
not apologize for this phrase, as if I thought religion
nothing but policy- it is far from my thoughts, and
I hope it is not to be inferred from my expressions.
But in the light of policy alone I am here considering the question. I speak of policy, too, in a large
? ? ? ? 452 ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES.
light; in which'large light, policy, too, is a sacred
thing.
There are many, perhlaps half a million or more,
calling themselves Protestants, in the South of France,
and in other of the provinces. Some raise them to a
much greater number; but I think this nearer to the
mark. I am sorry to say that they have behaved
shockingly since the very beginning of this rebellion,
anld have been uniformly concerned in its worst and
most atrocious acts. Their clergy are just the same
atheists with those of the Constitutional Catholics,
but still more wicked and daring. Three of their
number have met from their republican associates
the reward of their crimes.
As the ancient Catholic religion is to be restored
for the body of France, the ancient Calvinistic religion ought to be restored for the Protestants, with every kind of protection and privilege. But not one
minister concerned in this rebellion ought to be suffered amongst them. If they have not clergy of their own, men well recommended, as untainted with
Jacobinisml, by the synods of those places where Calvinism prevails and French is spoken, ought to be sought. Many such there are. The Presbyterian
discipline ought, in my opinion, to be established in
its vigor, and the people professing it ought to be
bound to its maintenance. No man, under the false
and hypocritical pretence of liberty of conscience,
ought to be suffered to have no conscience at all.
The king's commissioner ought also to sit in their
synods, as before the revocation' of the Edict of
Nantes. I am conscious that this discipline disposes
men to republicanism: but it is still a discipline, and
it is a cure (such as it is) for the perverse and undis
? ? ? ? ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES. 453
ciplined habits which for some tim6 have prevailed.
Republicanism repressed may have its use in the composition,of a state. Inspection may be practicable,
and responsibility in the teachers and elders may be
established, in such an hierarchy as the Presbyterian.
For a time like ours, it is a great point gained, that
people should be taught to meet, to combine, and to
be classed and arrayed in some other way than in
clubs of Jacobins. If it be not the best mode of
Protestantism under a monarchy, it is still an orderly Christian church, orthodox in the fundamentals, and, what is to our point, capable enough of rendering men useful citizens. It was the impolitic
abolition of their discipline, which exposed them to
the wild opinions and conduct that have prevailed
amongst the Huguenots. The toleration in 1787 was
owing to the good disposition of the late king; but
it was modified by the profligate folly of his atheistic
minister, the Cardinal de Lom4nie. This mischievous minister did not follow, in the edict of toleration,
the wisdom of the Edict of Nantes. But his toleration
was granted' to non-Catholics, - a dangerous word,
which might signify anything, and was but too expressive of a fatal indifference with regard to all
piety. I speak for myself: I do not wish any man to
be converted from his sect. The distinctions which
we have reformed from animosity to emulation may
be even useful to the cause of religion. By some
moderate contention they keep alive zeal. Whereas
people who change, except under strong conviction,
(a thing now rather rare,) the religion of their early prejudices, especially if the conversion is brought
about by any political machine, are very apt to degenerate into indifference, laxity, and often downright
atheism.
? ? ? ? 454 ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES.
Another political question arises about the mode of
government which ought to be established. I think
the proclamation (which I read before I had proceeded far in this memorial) puts it on the best footing, by postponing that arrangement to a time of peace.
When our politics lead us to enterprise a great
and almost total political revolution in Europe, we
ought to look seriously into the consequences of what
we are about to do. Some eminent persons discover
an apprehension that the monarchy, if restored in
France, may be restored in too great strength for the
liberty and happiness of the natives, and for the tranquillity of other states. They are therefore of opinion that terms ought to be made for the modification of that monarchy. They are persons too considerable, from the powers of their mind, and from their
situation, as well as from the real respect I have for
them, who seem to entertain these apprehensions, to
let me pass them by unnoticed.
As to the power of France as a state, and in its
exterior relations, I confess my fears are on the part
of its extreme reduction. There is undoubtedly
something in the vicinity of France, which makes it
naturally and properly an object of our watchfulness
and jealousy, whatever form its government may take.
But the difference is great between a plan for our
own security and a scheme for the utter destruction
of France. If there were no other countries in the
political map but these two, I admit that policy might
justify a wish to lower our neighbor to a standard
which would even render her in some measure, if not
wholly, our dependant. But the system of Europe is
extensive and extremely complex. However formi
? ? ? ? ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES. 455
dable to us, as taken in this one relation, France is
not equally dreadful to all other states. On the contrary, my clear opinion is, that the liberties of Europe cannot possibly be preserved but by her remaining a
very great and preponderating power. The design at
present evidently pursued by the combined potentates,
or of the two who lead, is totally to destroy her as
such a power. For Great Britain resolves that she
shall have no colonies, no commerce, and no marine.
Austria means to take away the whole frontier, from
the borders of Switzerland to Dunkirk. It is their
plan also to render the interior government lax and
feeble, by prescribing, by force of the arms of rival
and jealous nations, and without consulting the natural interests of the kingdom, such arrangements as, in the actual state of Jacobinism in France, and the
unsettled state in which property must remain for
a long time, will inevitably produce such distraction
and debility in government as to reduce it to nothing, or to throw it back into its old confusion. One cannot conceive so frightful a state of a nation. A
maritime country without a marine and without commerce; a continental country without a frontier, and for a thousand miles surrounded with powerful, warlike, and ambitious neighbors! It is possible that she might submit to lose her commerce and her colonies:
her security she never can abandon. If, contrary to
all expectations, under such a disgraced and impotent government, any energy should remain in that country, she will make every effort to recover her security, which will involve Europe for a century in war and blood. What has it cost to France to make
that frontier? What will it cost to recover it? Austria thinks that without a frontier she cannot secure
? ? ? ? 456 ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES.
the Netherlands. But without her frontier France cannot secure herself. Austria has been, however, secure for an hundred years in those very Netherlands, and has never been dispossessed of them by the chance
of war without a moral certainty of receiving them
again on the restoration of peace. Her late dangers
have arisen not from the power or ambition of the
king of France. They arose from her own ill policy,
which dismantled all her towns, and discontented all
her subjects by Jacobinical innovations. She dismantles her own towns, and then says, " Give me the
frontier of France! " But let us depend upon it, whatever tends, under the name of security, to aggrandize
Austria, will discontent and alarm Prussia. Such
a length of frontier on the side of France, separated
from itself, and separated from the mass of the Austrian country, will be weak, unless connected at the
expense of the Elector of Bavaria (the Elector Palatine) and other lesser princes, or by such exchanges
as will again convulse the Empire.
Take it the other way, and let us suppose that France
so broken in spirit as to be content to remain naked
and defenceless by sea and by land. Is such a country
no prey? Have other nations no views? Is Poland
the only country of which it is worth while to make
a partition? We cannot be so childish as to imagine
that ambition is local, and that no others can be infected with it but those who rule within certain parallels of latitude and longitude. In this way I hold
war equally certain. But I can conceive that both
these principles may operate: ambition on the part
of Austria to cut more and more from France; and
French impatience under her degraded and unsafe
condition. In such a contest will the other powers
? ? ? ? ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES. 457
stand by? Will not Prussia call for indemnity, as
well as Austria and England?
Is she satisfied with
her gains in Poland? By no means. Germany must
pay; or we shall infallibly see Prussia leagued with
France and Spain, and possibly with other powers, for
the reduction of Austria; and such may be the situation of things, that it will not be so easy to decide
what part England may take in such a contest.
I am well aware how invidious a task it is to oppose anything which tends to the apparent aggrandizement of our own country. But I think no country can be aggrandized whilst France is Jacobinized. This post removed, it will be a serious question how
far her further reduction will contribute to the general safety, which I always consider as included.
Among precautions against ambition, it may not be
amiss to take one precaution against our own. I
must fairly say, I dread our own power and our own
ambition; I dread our being too much dreaded. It
is ridiculous to say we are not men, and that, as
men, we shall never wish to aggrandize ourselves in
some way or other. Can we say that even at this
very hour we are alot invidiously aggrandized? We
are already in possession of almost all the commerce
of the world. Our empire in India is an awful thing.
If we should come to be in a condition not only to
have all this ascendant in commerce, but to be absolutely able, without the least control, to hold the
commerce of all other nations totally dependent upon
our good pleasure, we may say that we shall not abuse
this astonishing and hitherto unheard-of power. But
every other nation will think we shall abuse it. It is
impossible but that, sooner or later, this state of
things must produce a combination against us which
mav end in our ruin.
? ? ? ? 458 ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES.
As to France, I must observe that for a long time
she has been stationary. She has, during this whole
century, obtained far less by conquest or negotiation
than any of the three great Continental powers. Some
part of Lorraine excepted, I recollect nothing she has
gained, --no, not a village. In truth, this Lorraine
acquisition does little more than secure her barrier.
In effect and substance it was her own before.
However that may be, I consider these things at
present chiefly in one point of view, as obstructions
to the war on Jacobinism, which must stand as long
as the powers think its extirpation but a secondary object, and think of taking advantage, under the name
of indemnity and security, to make war upon the whole
nation of France, royal and Jacobin, for the aggrandizement of the allies, on the ordinary principles of
interest, as if no Jacobinism existed in the world.
So far is France from being formidable to its neighbors for its domestic strength, that I conceive it will
be as much as all its neighbors can do, by a steady
guaranty, to keep that monarchy at all upon its basis. It will be their business to nurse France, not to
exhaust it. France, such as it is, is indeed highly
formidable: not formidable, however, as a great republic; but as the most dreadful gang of robbers and
murderers that ever was embodied. But this distempered strength of France will be the cause of proportionable weakness on its recovery. Never was a country so completely ruined; and they who calculate the resurrection of her power by former examples have not sufficiently considered what is the present state of things. Without detailing the inventory of what organs of government have been
destroyed, together with the very materials of which
? ? ? ? ON THE POLIC(Y OF THE ALLIES. 459
alone they can be recomposed, I wish it to be considered what an operose affair the whole system of taxation is in the old states of Europe. It is such as never could be made but in a long course of years.
In France all taxes are abolished. The present powers resort to the capital, and to the capital in kind.
But a savage, undisciplined people suffer a robbery
with more patience than an impost. The former is in
their habits and their dispositions. They consider it
as transient, and as what, in their turn, they may exercise. But the terrors of the present power are such
as no regular government can possibly employ. They
who enter into France do not succeed to their resources. They have not a system to reform, but a
system to begin. The whole estate of government is
to be reacquired.
What difficulties this will meet with in a country
exhausted by the taking of the capital, and among a
people in a manner new-principled, trained, and actually disciplined to anarchy, rebellion, disorder, and
impiety, may be conceived by those who know what
Jacobin France is, and who may have occupied themselves by revolving in their thoughts what they were
to do, if it fell to their lot to reestablish the affairs of
France. What support or what limitations the restored monarchy must have may be a doubt, or how
it will pitch and settle at last. But one thing I conceive to be far beyond a doubt: that the settlement
cannot be immediate; but that it must be preceded
by some sort of power, equal at least in vigor,
vigilance, promptitude, and decision, to a military
government. For such a preparatory government,
no slow-paced, methodical, formal, lawyer-like system, still less that of a showy, superficial, trifling,
? ? ? ? 460 ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES.
intriguing court, guided by cabals of ladies, or of
men like ladies, least of all a philosophic, theoretic,
disputatious school of sophistry, -none of these ever
will or ever can lay the foundations of an order that
can last. Whoever claims a right by birth to govern
there must find in his breast, or must conjure up in
it, an energy not to be expected, perhaps not always
to be wished for, in well-ordered states. The lawful
prince must have, in everything but crime, the character of an usurper. He is gone, if he imagines
himself the quiet possessor of a throne. He is to
contend for it as much after an apparent conquest
as before. His task is, to win it: he must leave posterity to enjoy and to adorn it. No velvet cushions
for him. He is to be always (I speak nearly to the
letter) on horseback. This opinion is the result of
much patient thinking on the subject, which I conceive no event is likely to alter.
A. valuable friend of mine,. who I hope will conduct these affairs, so far as they fall to his share,
with great ability, asked me what I thought of acts
of general indemnity and-oblivion, as a means of settling France, and reconciling it to monarchy. Before I venture upon any opinion of my own in this matter, I totally disclaim the interference of foreign
powers in a business that properly belongs to the government which we have declared legal. That government is likely to be the best judge of what is to be done towards the security of that kingdom, which it
is their duty and their interest to provide for by such
measures of justice or of lenity as at the time they
should find best. But if we weaken it not only by
arbitrary limitations of our own, but preserve such
persons in it as are disposed to disturb its future
? ? ? ? ON THE POLICY "If THE ALLIES. 461
peace, as they have its past, I do not know how a
more direct declaration can be made of a disposition
to perpetual hostility against a government. The
persons saved from the justice of the native magistrate by foreign authority will owe nothing to his
clemency. He will, and must, look to those to
whom he is indebted for the power he has of dispensing it. A Jacobin faction, constantly fostered
with the nourishment of foreign protection, will be
kept alive.
This desire of securing the safety of the actors in
the present scene is owing to more laudable motives.
Ministers have been made to consider the brothers
of the late merciful king, and the nobility of France
who have been faithful to their honor and duty, as a
set of inexorable and remorseless tyrants. How this
notion has been infused into them I cannot be quite
certain. I am sure it is not justified by anything
they have done. Never were the two princes guilty,
in the day of their power, of a single hard or ill-natured act. No one instance of cruelty on the part of
the gentlemen ever came to my ears. It is true that
the English Jacobins, (the natives have not thought
of it,) as an excuse for their infernal system of murder, have so represented them. It is on this principle that the massacres in the month of September, 1792, were justified by a writer in the Morning
Chronicle. He says, indeed, that " the whole French
nation is to be given up to the hands of an irritated and revengeful noblesse "; - and, judging of
others by himself and his brethren, he says, " Whoever succeeds in a civil war will be cruel. But
here the emigrants, flying to revenge in the cars
of military victory, will almost insatiably call for
? ? ? ? 462 ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES.
their victims and their booty; and a body of emigrant traitors were attending the King of Prussia
and the D uke of Brunswick, to suggest the most
sanguinary counsels. " So says this wicked Jacobin;
but so cannot say the King of Prussia nor the Duke
of Brunswick, who never did receive any sanguinary
counsel; nor did the king's brothers, or that great
body of gentlemen who attended those princes, commit one single cruel action, or hurt the person or
property of one individual. It would be right to
quote the instance. It is like the military luxury
attributed to these unfortunate sufferers in our common cause.
If these princes had shown a tyrannic disposition,
it would be much to be lamented. We hlave no others to govern France. If we screened the body of
murderers from their justice, we should only leave
the innocent in future to the mercy of men of fierce
and sanguinary dispositions, of which, in spite of all
our intermeddling in their Constitution, we could not
prevent the effects. But as we have much more reason to fear their feeble lenity than any blamable rigor, we ought, in my opinion, to leave the matter to themselves.
If, however, I were asked to give an advice merely
as such, here are my ideas. I am not for a total
indemnity, nor a general punishment. And first, the
body and mass of the people never ought to be treated as criminal. They may become an object of more
or less constant watchfulness and suspicion, as their
preservation may best require, but they can never become an object of punishment. This is one of the few
fundamental and unalterable principles of politics.
To punish them capitally would be to make massa
? ? ? ? ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES. 463
cres. Massacres only increase the ferocity of men,
and teach them to regard their own lives and those
of others as of little value; whereas the great policy
of government is, to teach the people to think both of
great importance in the eyes of God and the state,
and never to be sacrificed or even hazarded to gratify their passions, or for anything but the duties prescribed by the rules of morality, and under the direction of public law and public authority. To punish them with lesser penalties would be to debilitate the
commonwealth, and make the nation miserable, which
it is the business of government to render happy and
flourishing.
As to crimes, too, I would draw a strong line of
limitation. For no one offence, politically an offence
of rebellion, by council, contrivance, persuasion, or
compulsion, for none properly a military offence of
rebellion, or anything done by open hostility in the
field, should any man at all be called in question;
because such seems to be the proper and natural
death of civil dissensions. The offences of war are
obliterated by peace.
Another class will of course be included in the
indemnity, - namely, all those who by their activity
in restoring lawful government shall obliterate their
offences. The offence previously known, the acceptance of service is a pardon for crimes. I fear that
this class of men will not be very numerous.
So far as to indemnity. But where are the objects
of'justicc, and of example, and of future security to
the public peace? They are naturally pointed out,
not by their having outraged political and civil laws,
nor their having rebelled against the state as a state,
but by their having rebelled against the law of Na
? ? ? ? 464 ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES.
ture and outraged man as man. In this list, all the
regicides in general, all those who laid sacrilegious
hands on the king, who, without anything in their
own rebellious mission to the Convention to justify
them, brought him to his trial and unanimously
voted him guilty, - all those who had a share in the
cruel murder of the queen, and the detestable proceedings with regard to the young king and the
unhappy princesses, - all those who committed coldblooded murder anywhere, and particularly in their revolutionary tribunals, where every idea of natural
justice and of their own declared rights of man have
been trod under foot with the most insolent mockery,
- all men concerned in the burning and demolition
of houses or churches, with audacious and marked
acts of sacrilege and scorn offered to religion, -in
general, all the leaders of Jacobin clubs, - not one of
these should escape a punishment suitable to the nature, quality, and degree of their offence, by a steady, but a measured justice.
In the first place, no man ought to be subject to
any penalty, from the highest to the lowest, but by a
trial according to the course of law, carried on with
all that caution and deliberation which has been used
in the best times and precedents of the French jurisprudence, the criminal law of which country, faulty
to be sure in some particulars, was highly laudable
and tender of the lives of men. In restoring order
and justice, everything like retaliation ought to be
religiously avoided; and an example ought to be set
of a total alienation from the Jacobin proceedings in
their accursed revolutionary tribunals. Everything
like lumping men in masses, and of forming tables
of proscription, ought to be avoided.
? ? ? ? ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES. 465
In all these punishments, anything which can be
alleged in. mitigation of the offence should be fully
considered. Mercy is not a thing opposed to justice.
It is an essential part of it,-as necessary in criminal
cases as in civil affairs equity is to law. It is only
for the Jacobins never to pardon. They have not
done it in a single instance. A council of mercy
ought therefore to be appointed, with powers to report on each case, to soften the penalty, or entirely
to remit it, according to circumstances.
With these precautions, the very first foundation
of settlement must be to call to a strict account those
bloody and merciless offenders. Without it, govern --
ment cannot stand a year. People little considerthe utter impossibility of getting those who, having
emerged from very low, some from the lowest classes
of society, have exercised a power so high, and with
such unrelenting and bloody a rage, quietly to fall
back into their old ranks, and become humble, peaceable, laborious, and useful members of society. It
never can be. On the other hand, is it to be believed that any worthy and virtuous subject, restored to the ruins of his house, will with patience see the cold-blooded murderer of his father, mother,
wife, or children, or perhaps all of these relations,
(such things have been,) nose him in his own village,
and insult him with the riches acquired from the
plunder of his goods, ready again to head a Jacobin
faction to attack his life? He is unworthy of the
name of man who would suffer it. It is unworthy
of the name of a government, which, taking justice
out of the private hand, will not exercise it for the
injured by the public arm.
I know it sounds plausible, and is readily adopted
VOL. IV. 80
? ? ? ? 466 ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES.
by those who have little sympathy with the sufferings
of others, to wish to jumble the innocent and guilty
into one mass by a general indemnity. This cruel
indifference dignifies itself with the name of humanity.
It is extraordinary, that, as the wicked arts of this
regicide and tyrannous faction increase in number,
variety, and atrocity, the desire of punishing them
becomes more and more faint, and the talk of an
indemnity towards them every day stronger and
stronger. Our ideas of justice appear to be fairly
conquered and overpowered by guilt, when it is
grown gigantic. It is not the point of view in which
we are in the habit of viewing guilt. The crimes we
every day punish are really below the penalties we
inflict. The criminals are obscure and feeble. This
is the view in which we see ordinary crimes and criminals. But when guilt is seen, though but for a time,
to be furnished with the arms and to be invested with
the robes of power, it seems to assume another nature, and to get, as it were, out of our jurisdiction.
This I fear is the case with many. But there is another cause full as powerful towards this security to
enormous guilt, --the desire which possesses people
who have once obtained power to enjoy it at their
ease. It is not humanity, but laziness and inertness
of mnind, which produces the desire of this kind of indemnities. This description of men love general and
short methods. If they punish, they make a promiscuous massacre; if they spare, they make a general
act of oblivion. This is a want of disposition to proceed laboriously according to the cases, and according to the rules and principles of justice on each case: a want of disposition to assort criminals, to discrimi
? ? ? ? ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES. 467
nate tile degrees and modes of guilt, to separate accomplices from principals, leaders from followers, seducers from the seduced, and then, by following
the same principles in the same detail, to class punishments, and to fit them to the nature and kind of the delinquency. If that were once attempted, we
should soon see that the task was neither infinite
nor the execution cruel. There would be deaths,
but, for the number of criminals and the extent of
France, not many. There would be cases of transportation, cases of labor to restore what has been wickedly destroyed, cases of imprisonment, and cases
of mere exile. But be this as it may, I am sure, that,
if justice is not done there, there can be neither peace
nor justice there, nor in any part of Europe.
History is resorted to for other acts of indemnity
in other times. The princes are desired to look back
to Henry the Fourth. We are desired to look to the
restoration of King Charles. These things, in my
opinion, have no resemblance whatsoever. They
were cases of a civil war, - in France more ferocious,
in England more moderate than common. In neither
country were the orders of society subverted, religion and morality destroyed on principle, or property totally annihilated. In England, the government of
Cromwell was, to be sure, somewhat rigid, but, for a
new power, no savage tyranny. The country was
nearly as well in his hands as in those of Charles the
Second, and in some points much better. The laws
in general had their course, and were admirably administered. The king did not in reality grant an act of indemnity; the prevailing power, then in a manner the nation, in effect granted an indemnity to him. The idea of a preceding rebellion was not at all ad
? ? ? ? 468 ON THE POLICY OF THE ALLIES.
mitted in that convention and that Parliament. The
regicides were a common enemy, and as such given
up.
Among the ornaments of their place which eminently distinguish them, few people are better acquainted with the history of their own country than the illustrious princes now in exile; but I caution
them not to be led into error by that which has been
supposed to be the guide of life. I would give the
same caution to all princes. Not that I derogate from
the use of history.