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Title: The
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[Redactor’s
Note:]
[Redactor’s
Note: Reprinted from the “The Writings of Thomas Paine Volume I” (1894 -
1896). The author’s notes are preceded by a “*”. A Table of Contents has
been added for each part for the convenience of the reader which is not
included in the printed edition. Notes are at the end of Part II. ]
·
Editor’s
Introduction
·
Dedication to
George Washington
·
Preface to the
English Edition
·
Preface to the
French Edition
·
Rights of Man
·
Miscellaneous
Chapter
·
Conclusion
XIV
The Rights of Man
·
French Translator’s
Preface
·
Dedication to M.
de la Fayette
·
Preface
·
Introduction
·
Chapter I
Of Society and Civilisation
·
Chapter II
Of the Origin of the Present Old Governments
·
Chapter III Of the
Old and New Systems of Government
·
Chapter IV
Of Constitutions
·
Chapter V
Ways and Means of Improving the Condition of Europe, Interspersed with
Miscellaneous Observations
·
Appendix
·
Notes
VOLUME
II.
1779
- 1792
RIGHTS
OF MAN.
EDITOR’S
INTRODUCTION.
WHEN
Thomas Paine sailed from America for France, in April, 1787, he was perhaps as
happy a man as any in the world. His most intimate friend, Jefferson, was
Minister at Paris, and his friend Lafayette was the idol of France. His fame
had preceded him, and he at once became, in Paris, the centre of the same
circle of savants and philosophers that had surrounded Franklin. His main
reason for proceeding at once to Paris was that he might submit to the Academy
of Sciences his invention of an iron bridge, and with its favorable verdict he
came to England, in September. He at once went to his aged mother at Thetford,
leaving with a publisher (Ridgway), his “ Prospects on the Rubicon.” He
next made arrangements to patent his bridge, and to construct at Rotherham the
large model of it exhibited on Paddington Green, London. He was welcomed in
England by leading statesmen, such as Lansdowne and Fox, and above all by
Edmund Burke, who for some time had him as a guest at Beaconsfield, and drove
him about in various parts of the country. He had not the slightest
revolutionary purpose, either as regarded England or France. Towards Louis
XVI. he felt only gratitude for the services he had rendered America, and
towards George III. he felt no animosity whatever. His four months’ sojourn
in Paris had convinced him that there was approaching a reform of that country
after the American model, except that the Crown would be preserved, a
compromise he approved, provided the throne should not be hereditary. Events
in France travelled more swiftly than he had anticipated, and Paine was
summoned by Lafayette, Condorcet, and others, as an adviser in the formation
of a new constitution.
Such
was the situation immediately preceding the political and literary duel
between Paine and Burke, which in the event turned out a tremendous war
between Royalism and Republicanism in Europe. Paine was, both in France and in
England, the inspirer of moderate counsels. Samuel Rogers relates that in
early life he dined at a friend’s house in London with Thomas Paine, when
one of the toasts given was the “ memory of Joshua,”-in allusion to the
Hebrew leader’s conquest of the kings of Canaan, and execution of them.
Paine observed that he would not treat kings like Joshua. “ I ‘m of the
Scotch parson’s opinion,” he said, “when he prayed against Louis XIV.-‘Lord,
shake him over the mouth of hell, but don’t let him drop!
‘ “ Paine then gave as his toast, “ The Republic of the World,”-which
Samuel Rogers, aged twenty-nine, noted as a sublime idea. This was Paine’s
faith and hope, and with it he confronted the revolutionary storms which
presently burst over France and England.
Until
Burke’s arraignment of France in his parliamentary speech (February 9,
1790), Paine had no doubt whatever that he would sympathize with the movement
in France, and wrote to him from that country as if conveying glad tidings.
Burke’s “ Reflections on the Revolution in France “ appeared November 1,
1790, and Paine at once set himself to answer it. He was then staying at the
Angel Inn, Islington. The inn has been twice rebuilt since that time, and from
its contents there is preserved only a small image, which perhaps was meant to
represent “ Liberty,”-possibly brought from Paris by Paine as an ornament
for his study. From the Angel he removed to a house in Harding Street, Fetter
Lane. Rickman says Part First of “ Rights of Man “ was finished at
Versailles, but probably this has reference to the preface only, as I cannot
find Paine in France that year until April 8. The book had been printed by
Johnson, in time for the opening of Parliament, in February ; but this
publisher became frightened after a few copies were out (there is one in the
British Museum), and the work was transferred to J. S. Jordan, 166 Fleet
Street, with a preface sent from Paris (not contained in Johnson’s edition,
nor in the American editions). The pamphlet, though sold at the same price as
Burke’s, three shillings, had a vast circulation, and Paine gave the
proceeds to the Constitutional Societies which sprang up under his teachings
in various parts of the country.
Soon
after appeared Burke’s “ Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs.” In this
Burke quoted a good deal from “ Rights of Man,” but replied to it only
with exclamation points, saying that the only answer such ideas merited was
“criminal justice.” Paine’s Part Second followed, published February 17,
1792. In Part First Paine had mentioned a rumor that Burke was a masked
pensioner (a charge that will be noticed in connection with its detailed
statement in a further publication); and as Burke had been formerly arraigned
in Parliament, while Paymaster, for a very questionable proceeding, this
charge no doubt hurt a good deal. Although the government did not follow Burke’s
suggestion of a prosecution at that time, there is little doubt that it was he
who induced the prosecution of Part Second.
Before the trial came on, December 18, 1792, Paine was occupying his
seat in the French Convention, and could only be outlawed.
Burke
humorously remarked to a friend of Paine and himself, “ We hunt in pairs.”
The severally representative character and influence of these two men in the
revolutionary era, in France and England, deserve more adequate study than
they have received. While Paine maintained freedom of discussion, Burke first
proposed criminal prosecution for sentiments by no means libellous (such as
Paine’s Part First). While Paine was endeavoring to make the movement in
France peaceful, Burke fomented the league of monarchs against France which
maddened its people, and brought on the Reign of Terror. While Paine was
endeavoring to preserve the French throne (“phantom” though he believed
it), to prevent bloodshed, Burke was secretly writing to the Queen of France,
entreating her not to compromise, and to “ trust to the support of foreign
armies “ (“ Histoire de France depuis 1789.” Henri Martin, i., 151).
While Burke thus helped to bring the King and Queen to the guillotine, Paine
pleaded for their lives to the last moment. While Paine maintained the right
of mankind to improve their condition, Burke held that “ the awful Author of
our being is the author of our place in the order of existence; and that,
having disposed and marshalled us by a divine tactick, not according to our
will, but according to his, he has, in and by that disposition, virtually
subjected us to act the part which belongs to the place assigned us.” Paine
was a religious believer in eternal principles; Burke held that “ political
problems do not primarily concern truth or falsehood. They relate to good or
evil. What in the result is likely to produce evil is politically false, that
which is productive of good politically is true.” Assuming thus the
visionary’s right to decide before the result what was “ likely to produce
evil,” Burke vigorously sought to kindle war against the French Republic
which might have developed itself peacefully, while Paine was striving for an
international Congress in Europe in the interest of peace. Paine had faith in
the people, and believed that, if allowed to choose representatives, they
would select their best and wisest men; and that while reforming government
the people would remain orderly, as they had generally remained in America
during the transition from British rule to selfgovernment. Burke maintained
that if the existing political order were broken up there would be no longer a
people, but “ a number of vague, loose individuals, and nothing more.” “
Alas! “ he exclaims, “ they little know how many a weary step is to be
taken before they can form themselves into a mass, which has a true
personality.” For the sake of peace Paine wished the revolution to be
peaceful as the advance of summer; he used every endeavor to reconcile English
radicals to some modus vivendi with the existing order, as he was willing to
retain Louis XVI. as head of the executive in France: Burke resisted every
tendency of English statesmanship to reform at home, or to negotiate with the
French Republic, and was mainly responsible for the King’s death and the war
that followed between England and France in February, 1793. Burke became a
royal favorite, Paine was outlawed by a prosecution originally proposed by
Burke. While Paine was demanding religious liberty, Burke was opposing the
removal of penal statutes from Unitarians, on the ground that but for those
statutes Paine might some day set up a church in England. When Burke was
retiring on a large royal pension, Paine was in prison, through the devices of
Burke’s confederate, the American Minister in Paris. So the two men, as
Burke said, “ hunted in pairs.”
So
far as Burke attempts to affirm any principle he is fairly quoted in Paine’s
work, and nowhere misrepresented. As for Paine’s own ideas, the reader
should remember that “Rights of Man” was the earliest complete statement
of republican principles. They were pronounced to be the fundamental
principles of the American Republic by Jefferson, Madison, and Jackson,-the
three Presidents who above all others represented the republican idea which
Paine first allied with American Independence. Those who suppose that Paine
did but reproduce the principles of Rousseau and Locke will find by careful
study of his well-weighed language that such is not the case. Paine’s
political principles were evolved out of his early Quakerism. He was potential
in George Fox. The belief that every human soul was the child of God, and
capable of direct inspiration from the Father of all, without mediator or
priestly intervention, or sacramental instrumentality, was fatal to all
privilege and rank. The universal Fatherhood implied universal Brotherhood, or
human equality. But the fate of the Quakers proved the necessity of protecting
the individual spirit from oppression by the majority as well as by privileged
classes. For this purpose Paine insisted on surrounding the individual right
with the security of the Declaration of Rights, not to be invaded by any
government; and would reduce government to an association limited in its
operations to the defence of those rights which the individual is unable,
alone, to maintain.
From
the preceding chapter it will be seen that Part Second of “ Rights of Man
“ was begun by Paine in the spring of 1791. At the close of that year, or
early in 1792, he took up his abode with his friend Thomas” Clio “
Rickman, at No. 7 Upper Marylebone Street.
Rickman was a radical publisher; the house remains still a book-binding
establishment, and seems little changed since Paine therein revised the proofs
of Part Second on a table which Rickman marked with a plate, and which is now
in possession of Mr. Edward Truelove. As the plate states, Paine wrote on the
same table other works which appeared in England in 1792.
In
1795 D. I. Eaton published an edition of “ Rights of Man,” with a preface
purporting to have been written by Paine while in Luxembourg prison. It is
manifestly spurious. The genuine English and French prefaces are given.
AUTHOR
OF THE WORKS ENTITLED “COMMON SENSE’ AND ‘A LETTER TO ABBÉ
RAYNAL”
George
Washington
President
Of The United States Of America
Sir,
I
present you a small treatise in defence of those principles of freedom which
your exemplary virtue hath so eminently contributed to establish. That the
Rights of Man may become as universal as your benevolence can wish, and that
you may enjoy the happiness of seeing the New World regenerate the Old, is the
prayer of Sir,
Your
much obliged, and
Obedient
humble Servant,
Thomas
Paine
PAINE’S
PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH EDITION
From
the part Mr. Burke took in the American Revolution, it was natural that I
should consider him a friend to mankind; and as our acquaintance commenced on
that ground, it would have been more agreeable to me to have had cause to
continue in that opinion than to change it.
At
the time Mr. Burke made his violent speech last winter in the English
Parliament against the French Revolution and the National Assembly, I was in
Paris, and had written to him but a short time before to inform him how
prosperously matters were going on. Soon after this I saw his advertisement of
the Pamphlet he intended to publish: As the attack was to be made in a
language but little studied, and less understood in France, and as everything
suffers by translation, I promised some of the friends of the Revolution in
that country that whenever Mr. Burke’s Pamphlet came forth, I would answer
it. This appeared to me the more necessary to be done, when I saw the flagrant
misrepresentations which Mr. Burke’s Pamphlet contains; and that while it is
an outrageous abuse on the French Revolution, and the principles of Liberty,
it is an imposition on the rest of the world.
I
am the more astonished and disappointed at this conduct in Mr.
Burke, as (from the circumstances I am going to mention) I had formed
other expectations.
I
had seen enough of the miseries of war, to wish it might never more have
existence in the world, and that some other mode might be found out to settle
the differences that should occasionally arise in the neighbourhood of
nations. This certainly might be done if Courts were disposed to set honesty
about it, or if countries were enlightened enough not to be made the dupes of
Courts. The people of America had been bred up in the same prejudices against
France, which at that time characterised the people of England; but experience
and an acquaintance with the French Nation have most effectually shown to the
Americans the falsehood of those prejudices; and I do not believe that a more
cordial and confidential intercourse exists between any two countries than
between America and France.
When
I came to France, in the spring of 1787, the Archbishop of Thoulouse was then
Minister, and at that time highly esteemed. I became much acquainted with the
private Secretary of that Minister, a man of an enlarged benevolent heart; and
found that his sentiments and my own perfectly agreed with respect to the
madness of war, and the wretched impolicy of two nations, like England and
France, continually worrying each other, to no other end than that of a mutual
increase of burdens and taxes. That I might be assured I had not misunderstood
him, nor he me, I put the substance of our opinions into writing and sent it
to him; subjoining a request, that if I should see among the people of
England, any disposition to cultivate a better understanding between the two
nations than had hitherto prevailed, how far I might be authorised to say that
the same disposition prevailed on the part of France? He answered me by letter
in the most unreserved manner, and that not for himself only, but for the
Minister, with whose knowledge the letter was declared to be written.
I
put this letter into the, hands of Mr. Burke almost three years ago, and left
it with him, where it still remains; hoping, and at the same time naturally
expecting, from the opinion I had conceived of him, that he would find some
opportunity of making good use of it, for the purpose of removing those errors
and prejudices which two neighbouring nations, from the want of knowing each
other, had entertained, to the injury of both.
When
the French Revolution broke out, it certainly afforded to Mr.
Burke an opportunity of doing some good, had he been disposed to it;
instead of which, no sooner did he see the old prejudices wearing away, than
he immediately began sowing the seeds of a new inveteracy, as if he were
afraid that England and France would cease to be enemies. That there are men
in all countries who get their living by war, and by keeping up the quarrels
of Nations, is as shocking as it is true; but when those who are concerned in
the government of a country, make it their study to sow discord and cultivate
prejudices between Nations, it becomes the more unpardonable.
With
respect to a paragraph in this work alluding to Mr. Burke’s having a
pension, the report has been some time in circulation, at least two months;
and as a person is often the last to hear what concerns him the most to know,
I have mentioned it, that Mr. Burke may have an opportunity of contradicting
the rumour, if he thinks proper.
Thomas
Paine
PAINE’S
PREFACE TO THE FRENCH EDITION
The
astonishment which the French Revolution has caused throughout Europe should
be considered from two different points of view: first as it affects foreign
peoples, secondly as it affects their governments.
The
cause of the French people is that of all Europe, or rather of the whole
world; but the governments of all those countries are by no means favorable to
it. It is important that we should never lose sight of this distinction. We
must not confuse the peoples with their governments; especially not the
English people with its government.
The
government of England is no friend of the revolution of France.
Of this we have sufficient proofs in the thanks given by that weak and
witless person, the Elector of Hanover, sometimes called the King of England,
to Mr. Burke for the insults heaped on it in his book, and in the malevolent
comments of the English Minister, Pitt, in his speeches in Parliament.
In
spite of the professions of sincerest friendship found in the official
correspondence of the English government with that of France, its conduct
gives the lie to all its declarations, and shows us clearly that it is not a
court to be trusted, but an insane court, plunging in all the quarrels and
intrigues of Europe, in quest of a war to satisfy its folly and countenance
its extravagance.
The
English nation, on the contrary, is very favorably disposed towards the French
Revolution, and to the progress of liberty in the whole world; and this
feeling will become more general in England as the intrigues and artifices of
its government are better known, and the principles of the revolution better
understood. The French should know that most English newspapers are directly
in the pay of government, or, if indirectly connected with it, always under
its orders; and that those papers constantly distort and attack the revolution
in France in order to deceive the nation. But, as it is impossible long to
prevent the prevalence of truth, the daily falsehoods of those papers no
longer have the desired effect.
To
be convinced that the voice of truth has been stifled in England, the world
needs only to be told that the government regards and prosecutes as a libel
that which it should protect.*[1] This outrage on morality is called law, and
judges are found wicked enough to inflict penalties on truth.
The
English government presents, just now, a curious phenomenon.
Seeing that the French and English nations are getting rid of the
prejudices and false notions formerly entertained against each other, and
which have cost them so much money, that government seems to be placarding its
need of a foe; for unless it finds one somewhere, no pretext exists for the
enormous revenue and taxation now deemed necessary.
Therefore
it seeks in Russia the enemy it has lost in France, and appears to say to the
universe, or to say to itself. “If nobody will be so kind as to become my
foe, I shall need no more fleets nor armies, and shall be forced to reduce my
taxes. The American war enabled me to double the taxes; the Dutch business to
add more; the Nootka humbug gave me a pretext for raising three millions
sterling more; but unless I can make an enemy of Russia the harvest from wars
will end. I was the first to incite Turk against Russian, and now I hope to
reap a fresh crop of taxes.”
If
the miseries of war, and the flood of evils it spreads over a country, did not
check all inclination to mirth, and turn laughter into grief, the frantic
conduct of the government of England would only excite ridicule. But it is
impossible to banish from one’s mind the images of suffering which the
contemplation of such vicious policy presents. To reason with governments, as
they have existed for ages, is to argue with brutes. It is only from the
nations themselves that reforms can be expected. There ought not now to exist
any doubt that the peoples of France, England, and America, enlightened and
enlightening each other, shall henceforth be able, not merely to give the
world an example of good government, but by their united influence enforce its
practice.
(Translated
from the French)
RIGHTS
OF MAN
Among
the incivilities by which nations or individuals provoke and irritate each
other, Mr. Burke’s pamphlet on the French Revolution is an extraordinary
instance. Neither the People of France, nor the National Assembly, were
troubling themselves about the affairs of England, or the English Parliament;
and that Mr. Burke should commence an unprovoked attack upon them, both in
Parliament and in public, is a conduct that cannot be pardoned on the score of
manners, nor justified on that of policy.
There
is scarcely an epithet of abuse to be found in the English language, with
which Mr. Burke has not loaded the French Nation and the National Assembly.
Everything which rancour, prejudice, ignorance or knowledge could suggest, is
poured forth in the copious fury of near four hundred pages. In the strain and
on the plan Mr. Burke was writing, he might have written on to as many
thousands. When the tongue or the pen is let loose in a frenzy of passion, it
is the man, and not the subject, that becomes exhausted.
Hitherto
Mr. Burke has been mistaken and disappointed in the opinions he had formed of
the affairs of France; but such is the ingenuity of his hope, or the
malignancy of his despair, that it furnishes him with new pretences to go on.
There was a time when it was impossible to make Mr. Burke believe there would
be any Revolution in France. His
opinion then was, that the French had neither spirit to undertake it nor
fortitude to support it; and now that there is one, he seeks an escape by
condemning it.
Not
sufficiently content with abusing the National Assembly, a great part of his
work is taken up with abusing Dr. Price (one of the best-hearted men that
lives) and the two societies in England known by the name of the Revolution
Society and the Society for Constitutional Information.
Dr.
Price had preached a sermon on the 4th of November, 1789, being the
anniversary of what is called in England the Revolution, which took place
1688. Mr. Burke, speaking of this sermon, says: “The political Divine
proceeds dogmatically to assert, that by the principles of the Revolution, the
people of England have acquired three fundamental rights:
1.
To choose our own governors.
2.
To cashier them for misconduct.
3.
To frame a government for ourselves.”
Dr.
Price does not say that the right to do these things exists in this or in that
person, or in this or in that description of persons, but that it exists in
the whole; that it is a right resident in the nation. Mr. Burke, on the
contrary, denies that such a right exists in the nation, either in whole or in
part, or that it exists anywhere; and, what is still more strange and
marvellous, he says:
“that
the people of England utterly disclaim such a right, and that they will resist
the practical assertion of it with their lives and fortunes.” That men
should take up arms and spend their lives and fortunes, not to maintain their
rights, but to maintain they have not rights, is an entirely new species of
discovery, and suited to the paradoxical genius of Mr. Burke.
The
method which Mr. Burke takes to prove that the people of England have no such
rights, and that such rights do not now exist in the nation, either in whole
or in part, or anywhere at all, is of the same marvellous and monstrous kind
with what he has already said; for his arguments are that the persons, or the
generation of persons, in whom they did exist, are dead, and with them the
right is dead also. To prove
this, he quotes a declaration made by Parliament about a hundred years ago, to
William and Mary, in these words: “The Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and
Commons, do, in the name of the people aforesaid” (meaning the people of
England then living) “most humbly and faithfully submit themselves, their
heirs and posterities, for Ever.” He quotes a clause of another Act of
Parliament made in the same reign, the terms of which he says, “bind us”
(meaning the people of their day), “our heirs and our posterity, to them,
their heirs and posterity, to the end of time.”
Mr.
Burke conceives his point sufficiently established by producing those clauses,
which he enforces by saying that they exclude the right of the nation for
ever. And not yet content with making such declarations, repeated over and
over again, he farther says, “that if the people of England possessed such a
right before the Revolution” (which he acknowledges to have been the case,
not only in England, but throughout Europe, at an early period), “yet that
the English Nation did, at the time of the Revolution, most solemnly renounce
and abdicate it, for themselves, and for all their posterity, for ever.”
As
Mr. Burke occasionally applies the poison drawn from his horrid principles,
not only to the English nation, but to the French Revolution and the National
Assembly, and charges that august, illuminated and illuminating body of men
with the epithet of usurpers, I shall, sans ceremonie, place another system of
principles in opposition to his.
The
English Parliament of 1688 did a certain thing, which, for themselves and
their constituents, they had a right to do, and which it appeared right should
be done. But, in addition to this right, which they possessed by delegation,
they set up another right by assumption, that of binding and controlling
posterity to the end of time. The case, therefore, divides itself into two
parts; the right which they possessed by delegation, and the right which they
set up by assumption. The first is admitted; but with respect to the second, I
reply: There never did, there never will, and there never can, exist a
Parliament, or any description of men, or any generation of men, in any
country, possessed of the right or the power of binding and controlling
posterity to the “end of time,” or of commanding for ever how the world
shall be governed, or who shall govern it; and therefore all such clauses,
acts or declarations by which the makers of them attempt to do what they have
neither the right nor the power to do, nor the power to execute, are in
themselves null and void. Every
age and generation must be as free to act for itself in all cases as the age
and generations which preceded it. The vanity and presumption of governing
beyond the grave is the most ridiculous and insolent of all tyrannies. Man has
no property in man; neither has any generation a property in the generations
which are to follow. The Parliament or the people of 1688, or of any other
period, had no more right to dispose of the people of the present day, or to
bind or to control them in any shape whatever, than the parliament or the
people of the present day have to dispose of, bind or control those who are to
live a hundred or a thousand years hence. Every generation is, and must be,
competent to all the purposes which its occasions require.
It is the living, and not the dead, that are to be accommodated. When
man ceases to be, his power and his wants cease with him; and having no longer
any participation in the concerns of this world, he has no longer any
authority in directing who shall be its governors, or how its government shall
be organised, or how administered.
I
am not contending for nor against any form of government, nor for nor against
any party, here or elsewhere. That which a whole nation chooses to do it has a
right to do. Mr. Burke says, No. Where, then, does the right exist? I am
contending for the rights of the living, and against their being willed away
and controlled and contracted for by the manuscript assumed authority of the
dead, and Mr. Burke is contending for the authority of the dead over the
rights and freedom of the living. There was a time when kings disposed of
their crowns by will upon their death-beds, and consigned the people, like
beasts of the field, to whatever successor they appointed. This is now so
exploded as scarcely to be remembered, and so monstrous as hardly to be
believed. But the Parliamentary clauses upon which Mr. Burke builds his
political church are of the same nature.
The
laws of every country must be analogous to some common principle.
In England no parent or master, nor all the authority of Parliament,
omnipotent as it has called itself, can bind or control the personal freedom
even of an individual beyond the age of twenty-one years. On what ground of
right, then, could the Parliament of 1688, or any other Parliament, bind all
posterity for ever?
Those
who have quitted the world, and those who have not yet arrived at it, are as
remote from each other as the utmost stretch of mortal imagination can
conceive. What possible obligation, then, can exist between them- what rule or
principle can be laid down that of two nonentities, the one out of existence
and the other not in, and who never can meet in this world, the one should
control the other to the end of time?
In
England it is said that money cannot be taken out of the pockets of the people
without their consent. But who authorised, or who could authorise, the
Parliament of 1688 to control and take away the freedom of posterity (who were
not in existence to give or to withhold their consent) and limit and confine
their right of acting in certain cases for ever?
A
greater absurdity cannot present itself to the understanding of man than what
Mr. Burke offers to his readers. He tells them, and he tells the world to
come, that a certain body of men who existed a hundred years ago made a law,
and that there does not exist in the nation, nor ever will, nor ever can, a
power to alter it. Under how many subtilties or absurdities has the divine
right to govern been imposed on the credulity of mankind? Mr. Burke has
discovered a new one, and he has shortened his journey to Rome by appealing to
the power of this infallible Parliament of former days, and he produces what
it has done as of divine authority, for that power must certainly be more than
human which no human power to the end of time can alter.
But
Mr. Burke has done some service- not to his cause, but to his
country-
by bringing those clauses into public view. They serve to
demonstrate
how necessary it is at all times to watch against the
attempted
encroachment of power, and to prevent its running to
excess.
It is somewhat extraordinary that the offence for which James
II.
was expelled, that of setting up power by assumption, should be
re-acted,
under another shape and form, by the Parliament that
expelled
him. It shows that the Rights of Man were but imperfectly understood at the
Revolution, for certain it is that the right which that Parliament set up by
assumption (for by the delegation it had not, and could not have it, because
none could give it) over the persons and freedom of posterity for ever was of
the same tyrannical unfounded kind which James attempted to set up over the
Parliament and the nation, and for which he was expelled. The only difference
is (for in principle they differ not) that the one was an usurper over living,
and the other over the unborn; and as the one has no better authority to stand
upon than the other, both of them must be equally null and void, and of no
effect.
From
what, or from whence, does Mr. Burke prove the right of any human power to
bind posterity for ever? He has produced his clauses, but he must produce also
his proofs that such a right existed, and show how it existed. If it ever
existed it must now exist, for whatever appertains to the nature of man cannot
be annihilated by man. It is the nature of man to die, and he will continue to
die as long as he continues to be born. But Mr. Burke has set up a sort of
political Adam, in whom all posterity are bound for ever. He must, therefore,
prove that his Adam possessed such a power, or such a right.
The
weaker any cord is, the less will it bear to be stretched, and the worse is
the policy to stretch it, unless it is intended to break it. Had anyone
proposed the overthrow of Mr. Burke’s positions, he would have proceeded as
Mr. Burke has done. He would have magnified the authorities, on purpose to
have called the right of them into question; and the instant the question of
right was started, the authorities must have been given up.
It
requires but a very small glance of thought to perceive that although laws
made in one generation often continue in force through succeeding generations,
yet they continue to derive their force from the consent of the living. A law
not repealed continues in force, not because it cannot be repealed, but
because it is not repealed; and the non-repealing passes for consent.
But
Mr. Burke’s clauses have not even this qualification in their favour. They
become null, by attempting to become immortal. The nature of them precludes
consent. They destroy the right which they might have, by grounding it on a
right which they cannot have. Immortal
power is not a human right, and therefore cannot be a right of Parliament. The
Parliament of 1688 might as well have passed an act to have authorised
themselves to live for ever, as to make their authority live for ever. All,
therefore, that can be said of those clauses is that they are a formality of
words, of as much import as if those who used them had addressed a
congratulation to themselves, and in the oriental style of antiquity had said:
O Parliament, live for ever!
The
circumstances of the world are continually changing, and the opinions of men
change also; and as government is for the living, and not for the dead, it is
the living only that has any right in it.
That which may be thought right and found convenient in one age may be
thought wrong and found inconvenient in another. In such cases, who is to
decide, the living or the dead?
As
almost one hundred pages of Mr. Burke’s book are employed upon these
clauses, it will consequently follow that if the clauses themselves, so far as
they set up an assumed usurped dominion over posterity for ever, are
unauthoritative, and in their nature null and void; that all his voluminous
inferences, and declamation drawn therefrom, or founded thereon, are null and
void also; and on this ground I rest the matter.
We
now come more particularly to the affairs of France. Mr. Burke’s book has
the appearance of being written as instruction to the French nation; but if I
may permit myself the use of an extravagant metaphor, suited to the
extravagance of the case, it is darkness attempting to illuminate light.
While
I am writing this there are accidentally before me some proposals for a
declaration of rights by the Marquis de la Fayette (I ask his pardon for using
his former address, and do it only for distinction’s sake) to the National
Assembly, on the 11th of July, 1789, three days before the taking
of the Bastille, and I cannot but remark with astonishment how opposite the
sources are from which that gentleman and Mr. Burke draw their principles.
Instead of referring to musty records and mouldy parchments to prove that the
rights of the living are lost, “renounced and abdicated for ever,” by
those who are now no more, as Mr. Burke has done, M. de la Fayette applies to
the living world, and emphatically says: “Call to mind the sentiments which
nature has engraved on the heart of every citizen, and which take a new force
when they are solemnly recognised by all:- For a nation to love liberty, it is
sufficient that she knows it; and to be free, it is sufficient that she wills
it.” How dry, barren, and obscure is the source from which Mr. Burke labors!
and how ineffectual, though gay with flowers, are all his declamation and his
arguments compared with these clear, concise, and soul-animating sentiments!
Few and short as they are, they lead on to a vast field of generous and manly
thinking, and do not finish, like Mr. Burke’s periods, with music in the
ear, and nothing in the heart.
As
I have introduced M. de la Fayette, I will take the liberty of adding an
anecdote respecting his farewell address to the Congress of America in 1783,
and which occurred fresh to my mind, when I saw Mr.
Burke’s thundering attack on the French Revolution. M. de la Fayette
went to America at the early period of the war, and continued a volunteer in
her service to the end. His conduct through the whole of that enterprise is
one of the most extraordinary that is to be found in the history of a young
man, scarcely twenty years of age. Situated in a country that was like the lap
of sensual pleasure, and with the means of enjoying it, how few are there to
be found who would exchange such a scene for the woods and wildernesses of
America, and pass the flowery years of youth in unprofitable danger and
hardship! but such is the fact.
When the war ended, and he was on the point of taking his final departure, he
presented himself to Congress, and contemplating in his affectionate farewell
the Revolution he had seen, expressed himself in these words: “May this
great monument raised to liberty serve as a lesson to the oppressor, and an
example to the oppressed!” When this address came to the hands of Dr.
Franklin, who was then in France, he applied to Count Vergennes to have
it inserted in the French Gazette, but never could obtain his consent. The
fact was that Count Vergennes was an aristocratical despot at home, and
dreaded the example of the American Revolution in France, as certain other
persons now dread the example of the French Revolution in England, and Mr.
Burke’s tribute of fear (for in this light his book must be considered) runs
parallel with Count Vergennes’ refusal. But to return more particularly to
his work.
“We
have seen,” says Mr. Burke, “the French rebel against a mild and lawful
monarch, with more fury, outrage, and insult, than any people has been known
to rise against the most illegal usurper, or the most sanguinary tyrant.”
This is one among a thousand other instances, in which Mr. Burke shows that he
is ignorant of the springs and principles of the French Revolution.
It
was not against Louis XVI. but against the despotic principles of the
Government, that the nation revolted. These principles had not their origin in
him, but in the original establishment, many centuries back: and they were
become too deeply rooted to be removed, and the Augean stables of parasites
and plunderers too abominably filthy to be cleansed by anything short of a
complete and universal Revolution. When it becomes necessary to do anything,
the whole heart and soul should go into the measure, or not attempt it. That
crisis was then arrived, and there remained no choice but to act with
determined vigor, or not to act at all. The king was known to be the friend of
the nation, and this circumstance was favorable to the enterprise. Perhaps no
man bred up in the style of an absolute king, ever possessed a heart so little
disposed to the exercise of that species of power as the present King of
France. But the principles of the Government itself still remained the same.
The Monarch and the Monarchy were distinct and separate things; and it was
against the established despotism of the latter, and not against the person or
principles of the former, that the revolt commenced, and the Revolution has
been carried.
Mr.
Burke does not attend to the distinction between men and principles, and,
therefore, he does not see that a revolt may take place against the despotism
of the latter, while there lies no charge of despotism against the former.
The
natural moderation of Louis XVI. contributed nothing to alter the hereditary
despotism of the monarchy. All the tyrannies of former reigns, acted under
that hereditary despotism, were still liable to be revived in the hands of a
successor. It was not the respite of a reign that would satisfy France,
enlightened as she was then become. A
casual discontinuance of the practice of despotism, is not a discontinuance of
its principles: the former depends on the virtue of the individual who is in
immediate possession of the power; the latter, on the virtue and fortitude of
the nation. In the case of Charles I. and James II. of England, the revolt was
against the personal despotism of the men; whereas in France, it was against
the hereditary despotism of the established Government. But men who can
consign over the rights of posterity for ever on the authority of a mouldy
parchment, like Mr. Burke, are not qualified to judge of this Revolution. It
takes in a field too vast for their views to explore, and proceeds with a
mightiness of reason they cannot keep pace with.
But
there are many points of view in which this Revolution may be considered. When
despotism has established itself for ages in a country, as in France, it is
not in the person of the king only that it resides. It has the appearance of
being so in show, and in nominal authority; but it is not so in practice and
in fact. It has its standard everywhere. Every office and department has its
despotism, founded upon custom and usage. Every place has its Bastille, and
every Bastille its despot. The original hereditary despotism resident in the
person of the king, divides and sub-divides itself into a thousand shapes and
forms, till at last the whole of it is acted by deputation. This was the case
in France; and against this species of despotism, proceeding on through an
endless labyrinth of office till the source of it is scarcely perceptible,
there is no mode of redress. It strengthens itself by assuming the appearance
of duty, and tyrannies under the pretence of obeying.
When
a man reflects on the condition which France was in from the nature of her
government, he will see other causes for revolt than those which immediately
connect themselves with the person or character of Louis XVI. There were, if I
may so express it, a thousand despotisms to be reformed in France, which had
grown up under the hereditary despotism of the monarchy, and became so rooted
as to be in a great measure independent of it. Between the Monarchy, the
Parliament, and the Church there was a rivalship of despotism; besides the
feudal despotism operating locally, and the ministerial despotism operating
everywhere. But Mr. Burke, by considering the king as the only possible object
of a revolt, speaks as if France was a village, in which everything that
passed must be known to its commanding officer, and no oppression could be
acted but what he could immediately control. Mr. Burke might have been in the
Bastille his whole life, as well under Louis XVI. as Louis XIV., and neither
the one nor the other have known that such a man as Burke existed. The despotic principles of the government were the same in
both reigns, though the dispositions of the men were as remote as tyranny and
benevolence.
What
Mr. Burke considers as a reproach to the French Revolution (that of bringing
it forward under a reign more mild than the preceding ones) is one of its
highest honors. The Revolutions that have taken place in other European
countries, have been excited by personal hatred. The rage was against the man,
and he became the victim. But, in the instance of France we see a Revolution
generated in the rational contemplation of the Rights of Man, and
distinguishing from the beginning between persons and principles.
But
Mr. Burke appears to have no idea of principles when he is contemplating
Governments. “Ten years ago,” says he, “I could have felicitated France
on her having a Government, without inquiring what the nature of that
Government was, or how it was administered.” Is this the language of a
rational man? Is it the language of a heart feeling as it ought to feel for
the rights and happiness of the human race? On this ground, Mr. Burke must
compliment all the Governments in the world, while the victims who suffer
under them, whether sold into slavery, or tortured out of existence, are
wholly forgotten. It is power, and not principles, that Mr. Burke venerates;
and under this abominable depravity he is disqualified to judge between them.
Thus much for his opinion as to the occasions of the French Revolution.
I now proceed to other considerations.
I
know a place in America called Point-no-Point, because as you proceed along
the shore, gay and flowery as Mr. Burke’s language, it continually recedes
and presents itself at a distance before you; but when you have got as far as
you can go, there is no point at all. Just
thus it is with Mr. Burke’s three hundred and sixty-six pages.
It is therefore difficult to reply to him. But as the points he wishes
to establish may be inferred from what he abuses, it is in his paradoxes that
we must look for his arguments.
As
to the tragic paintings by which Mr. Burke has outraged his own imagination,
and seeks to work upon that of his readers, they are very well calculated for
theatrical representation, where facts are manufactured for the sake of show,
and accommodated to produce, through the weakness of sympathy, a weeping
effect. But Mr. Burke should recollect that he is writing history, and not
plays, and that his readers will expect truth, and not the spouting rant of
high-toned exclamation.
When
we see a man dramatically lamenting in a publication intended to be believed
that “The age of chivalry is gone! that The glory of Europe is extinguished
for ever! that The unbought grace of life (if anyone knows what it is), the
cheap defence of nations, the nurse of manly sentiment and heroic enterprise
is gone!” and all this because the Quixot age of chivalry nonsense is gone,
what opinion can we form of his judgment, or what regard can we pay to his
facts? In the rhapsody of his imagination he has discovered a world of wind
mills, and his sorrows are that there are no Quixots to attack them. But if
the age of aristocracy, like that of chivalry, should fall (and they had
originally some connection) Mr. Burke, the trumpeter of the Order, may
continue his parody to the end, and finish with exclaiming: “Othello’s
occupation’s gone!”
Notwithstanding
Mr. Burke’s horrid paintings, when the French Revolution is compared with
the Revolutions of other countries, the astonishment will be that it is marked
with so few sacrifices; but this astonishment will cease when we reflect that
principles, and not persons, were the meditated objects of destruction. The
mind of the nation was acted upon by a higher stimulus than what the
consideration of persons could inspire, and sought a higher conquest than
could be produced by the downfall of an enemy. Among the few who fell there do
not appear to be any that were intentionally singled out. They all of them had
their fate in the circumstances of the moment, and were not pursued with that
long, cold-blooded unabated revenge which pursued the unfortunate Scotch in
the affair of 1745.
Through
the whole of Mr. Burke’s book I do not observe that the Bastille is
mentioned more than once, and that with a kind of implication as if he were
sorry it was pulled down, and wished it were built up again. “We have
rebuilt Newgate,” says he, “and tenanted the mansion; and we have prisons
almost as strong as the Bastille for those who dare to libel the queens of
France.”*[2] As to what a madman like the person called Lord George Gordon
might say, and to whom Newgate is rather a bedlam than a prison, it is
unworthy a rational consideration. It was a madman that libelled, and that is
sufficient apology; and it afforded an opportunity for confining him, which
was the thing that was wished for. But certain it is that Mr.
Burke, who does not call himself a madman (whatever other people may
do), has libelled in the most unprovoked manner, and in the grossest style of
the most vulgar abuse, the whole representative authority of France, and yet
Mr. Burke takes his seat in the British House of Commons! From his violence
and his grief, his silence on some points and his excess on others, it is
difficult not to believe that Mr. Burke
is sorry, extremely sorry, that arbitrary power, the power of the Pope and the
Bastille, are pulled down.
Not
one glance of compassion, not one commiserating reflection that I can find
throughout his book, has he bestowed on those who lingered out the most
wretched of lives, a life without hope in the most miserable of prisons. It is
painful to behold a man employing his talents to corrupt himself. Nature has
been kinder to Mr. Burke than he is to her. He is not affected by the reality
of distress touching his heart, but by the showy resemblance of it striking
his imagination. He pities the plumage, but forgets the dying bird.
Accustomed to kiss the aristocratical hand that hath purloined him from
himself, he degenerates into a composition of art, and the genuine soul of
nature forsakes him. His hero or his heroine must be a tragedy-victim expiring
in show, and not the real prisoner of misery, sliding into death in the
silence of a dungeon.
As
Mr. Burke has passed over the whole transaction of the Bastille (and his
silence is nothing in his favour), and has entertained his readers with
refections on supposed facts distorted into real falsehoods, I will give,
since he has not, some account of the circumstances which preceded that
transaction. They will serve to show that less mischief could scarcely have
accompanied such an event when considered with the treacherous and hostile
aggravations of the enemies of the Revolution.
The
mind can hardly picture to itself a more tremendous scene than what the city
of Paris exhibited at the time of taking the Bastille, and for two days before
and after, nor perceive the possibility of its quieting so soon. At a distance
this transaction has appeared only as an act of heroism standing on itself,
and the close political connection it had with the Revolution is lost in the
brilliancy of the achievement. But we are to consider it as the strength of
the parties brought man to man, and contending for the issue. The Bastille was
to be either the prize or the prison of the assailants.
The downfall of it included the idea of the downfall of despotism, and
this compounded image was become as figuratively united as Bunyan’s Doubting
Castle and Giant Despair.
The
National Assembly, before and at the time of taking the Bastille, was sitting
at Versailles, twelve miles distant from Paris. About a week before the rising
of the Partisans, and their taking the Bastille, it was discovered that a plot
was forming, at the head of which was the Count D’Artois, the king’s
youngest brother, for demolishing the National Assembly, seizing its members,
and thereby crushing, by a coup de main, all hopes and prospects of forming a
free government. For the sake of humanity, as well as freedom, it is well this
plan did not succeed. Examples are not wanting to show how dreadfully
vindictive and cruel are all old governments, when they are successful against
what they call a revolt.
This
plan must have been some time in contemplation; because, in order to carry it
into execution, it was necessary to collect a large military force round
Paris, and cut off the communication between that city and the National
Assembly at Versailles. The troops destined for this service were chiefly the
foreign troops in the pay of France, and who, for this particular purpose,
were drawn from the distant provinces where they were then stationed. When
they were collected to the amount of between twenty-five and thirty thousand,
it was judged time to put the plan into execution. The ministry who were then
in office, and who were friendly to the Revolution, were instantly dismissed
and a new ministry formed of those who had concerted the project, among whom
was Count de Broglio, and to his share was given the command of those troops.
The character of this man as described to me in a letter which I communicated
to Mr. Burke before he began to write his book, and from an authority which
Mr. Burke well knows was good, was that of “a high-flying
aristocrat, cool, and capable of every mischief.”
While
these matters were agitating, the National Assembly stood in the most perilous
and critical situation that a body of men can be supposed to act in. They were
the devoted victims, and they knew it. They
had the hearts and wishes of their country on their side, but military
authority they had none. The guards of Broglio surrounded the hall where the
Assembly sat, ready, at the word of command, to seize their persons, as had
been done the year before to the Parliament of Paris. Had the National
Assembly deserted their trust, or had they exhibited signs of weakness or
fear, their enemies had been encouraged and their country depressed. When the
situation they stood in, the cause they were engaged in, and the crisis then
ready to burst, which should determine their personal and political fate and
that of their country, and probably of Europe, are taken into one view, none
but a heart callous with prejudice or corrupted by dependence can avoid
interesting itself in their success.
The
Archbishop of Vienne was at this time President of the National Assembly- a
person too old to undergo the scene that a few days or a few hours might bring
forth. A man of more activity and bolder fortitude was necessary, and the
National Assembly chose (under the form of a Vice-President, for the
Presidency still resided in the Archbishop) M. de la Fayette; and this is the
only instance of a Vice-President being chosen. It was at the moment that this
storm was pending (July 11th) that a declaration of rights was
brought forward by M. de la Fayette, and is the same which is alluded to
earlier. It was hastily drawn up, and makes only a part of the more extensive
declaration of rights agreed upon and adopted afterwards by the National
Assembly. The particular reason for bringing it forward at this moment (M. de
la Fayette has since informed me) was that, if the National Assembly should
fall in the threatened destruction that then surrounded it, some trace of its
principles might have the chance of surviving the wreck.
Everything
now was drawing to a crisis. The event was freedom or slavery. On one side, an
army of nearly thirty thousand men; on the other, an unarmed body of citizens-
for the citizens of Paris, on whom the National Assembly must then immediately
depend, were as unarmed and as undisciplined as the citizens of London are
now. The French guards had given strong symptoms of their being attached to
the national cause; but their numbers were small, not a tenth part of the
force that Broglio commanded, and their officers were in the interest of
Broglio.
Matters
being now ripe for execution, the new ministry made their appearance in
office. The reader will carry in his mind that the Bastille was taken the 14th
July; the point of time I am now speaking of is the 12th.
Immediately on the news of the change of ministry reaching Paris, in the
afternoon, all the playhouses and places of entertainment, shops and houses,
were shut up. The change of ministry was considered as the prelude of
hostilities, and the opinion was rightly founded.
The
foreign troops began to advance towards the city. The Prince de Lambesc, who
commanded a body of German cavalry, approached by the Place of Louis Xv.,
which connects itself with some of the streets.
In his march, he insulted and struck an old man with a sword. The
French are remarkable for their respect to old age; and the insolence with
which it appeared to be done, uniting with the general fermentation they were
in, produced a powerful effect, and a cry of “To arms! to arms!” spread
itself in a moment over the city.
Arms
they had none, nor scarcely anyone who knew the use of them; but desperate
resolution, when every hope is at stake, supplies, for a while, the want of
arms. Near where the Prince de Lambesc was drawn up, were large piles of
stones collected for building the new bridge, and with these the people
attacked the cavalry. A party of French guards upon hearing the firing, rushed
from their quarters and joined the people; and night coming on, the cavalry
retreated.
The
streets of Paris, being narrow, are favourable for defence, and the loftiness
of the houses, consisting of many stories, from which great annoyance might be
given, secured them against nocturnal enterprises; and the night was spent in
providing themselves with every sort of weapon they could make or procure:
guns, swords, blacksmiths’ hammers, carpenters’ axes, iron crows, pikes,
halberts, pitchforks, spits, clubs, etc., etc. The incredible numbers in which
they assembled the next morning, and the still more incredible resolution they
exhibited, embarrassed and astonished their enemies. Little did the new ministry expect such a salute. Accustomed
to slavery themselves, they had no idea that liberty was capable of such
inspiration, or that a body of unarmed citizens would dare to face the
military force of thirty thousand men. Every moment of this day was employed
in collecting arms, concerting plans, and arranging themselves into the best
order which such an instantaneous movement could afford. Broglio continued
lying round the city, but made no further advances this day, and the
succeeding night passed with as much tranquility as such a scene could
possibly produce.
But
defence only was not the object of the citizens. They had a cause at stake, on
which depended their freedom or their slavery. They every moment expected an
attack, or to hear of one made on the National Assembly; and in such a
situation, the most prompt measures are sometimes the best. The object that
now presented itself was the Bastille; and the eclat of carrying such a
fortress in the face of such an army, could not fail to strike terror into the
new ministry, who had scarcely yet had time to meet. By some intercepted
correspondence this morning, it was discovered that the Mayor of Paris, M.
Defflesselles, who appeared to be in the interest of the citizens, was
betraying them; and from this discovery, there remained no doubt that Broglio
would reinforce the Bastille the ensuing evening. It was therefore necessary
to attack it that day; but before this could be done, it was first necessary
to procure a better supply of arms than they were then possessed of.
There
was, adjoining to the city a large magazine of arms deposited at the Hospital
of the Invalids, which the citizens summoned to surrender; and as the place
was neither defensible, nor attempted much defence, they soon succeeded. Thus
supplied, they marched to attack the Bastille; a vast mixed multitude of all
ages, and of all degrees, armed with all sorts of weapons. Imagination would
fail in describing to itself the appearance of such a procession, and of the
anxiety of the events which a few hours or a few minutes might produce. What
plans the ministry were forming, were as unknown to the people within the
city, as what the citizens were doing was unknown to the ministry; and what
movements Broglio might make for the support or relief of the place, were to
the citizens equally as unknown. All was mystery and hazard.
That
the Bastille was attacked with an enthusiasm of heroism, such only as the
highest animation of liberty could inspire, and carried in the space of a few
hours, is an event which the world is fully possessed of. I am not undertaking
the detail of the attack, but bringing into view the conspiracy against the
nation which provoked it, and which fell with the Bastille. The prison to
which the new ministry were dooming the National Assembly, in addition to its
being the high altar and castle of despotism, became the proper object to
begin with. This enterprise broke up the new ministry, who began now to fly
from the ruin they had prepared for others. The troops of Broglio dispersed,
and himself fled also.
Mr. Burke has spoken a great deal about plots, but he has never once spoken of this plot against the National Assembly, and the liberties of the nation; and that he might not, he has passe