her fubjugation and her ruin are not objects of atrocious joy, or infamous fpeculation.

Such, gentlemen, are the reprefentations and thep titions fubmitted to the national aflembly, as they are to the king, by a citizen, whofe love of liberty will never be honeftly queftioned; whom the different factions would hate lefs, if he had not raised himself above them by his difintereftedness; whom filence would have better become, if, like fo many others, he had been indifferent to the glory of the national affembly, and the confidence with which it is of importance that it fhould be furrounded; and who cannot better teftify his own confidence, than by laying before it the truth without difguife.

Gentlemen, I have obeyed the dictates of my confcience, and the obligation of my caths. I owed it to my country, to you, to the king, and above all to myself, whom the chances of war do not allow to poftpone obfervations that I think ufeful, and who with to believe that the affembly will find in this a new homage of my devotion to its conftitutional authority, of my perfonal gratitude, and of my refpect.

majefty will find the expreffion of fentiments that have animated my whole life. The king knows with what ardour and conftancy I have been at all times devoted to the caufe of liberty, to the facred principles of humanity, equality, and juftice. He knows that I was always the adverfary of tactions, the enemy of licentiouínefs, and that no power, which I thought unlaw. ful, was ever acknowledged by me. He knows my devotion to his conftitutional authority, and my attachment to his perfon. Such, fire, are the fentiments which dictated my letter to the national affembly; fuch will be those of my conduct toward my country and your majefty, amid the ftorms which fo many combinations, hoftile or factious, ftrive to draw upon us.

It belongs not to me, fire, to give to my opinions or my measures a higher degree of importance than the unconnected acts of a fimple citizen ought to poffefs; but the expreffion of my thoughts was always a right, and, on this occafion, becomes a duty; and, although I might have fulfilled this duty fooner, if, inftead of being to be heard from the midft of a camp, my voice had been to iffue from the retreat from

Which I was drawn by the dangers of my country, I do not think that any public function, any perfonal confideration, releafes me from exercifing this duty of a citizen, this right of a freeman.

Perfift, fire, ftrong in the authority which the national will has deleated to you, in the generous refolution of defending the principles of the conftitution against all their enemies. Let this refolution, fup. ported by all the acts of your private life, as by a firm and full exercife of the royal power, become the pledge of harmony, which, above

all,

all, in the moments of crifis, cannot fail to be eftablished between the reprefentatives elected by the people, and their hereditary reprefentative. It is in this refolution, fire, that for your country and for yourself are glory and fafety. There you will find the friends of liberty, all good Frenchmen, ranged around your throne, to defend it againft the machinations of the rebellious, and the enterprifes of the factious. And I, fire, who, in their honourable hatred, have found the recompence of my perfevering oppofition, will always merit it by my zeal to ferve the caufe to which my whole life is devoted, and by my fidelity to the oath which I have taken to the nation, the law, and the king. Such, fire, are the unalterable fentiments of which I fubjoin the homage and that of my refpect. (Signed)

LA FAYETTE.

Letter from M. Roland, late Minifter of the Home Department, to the King.

SIRE,

The prefent ftate of affairs in France cannot be of long duration. It is a crifis at its highest degree of violence, and muft terminate in a fhock that interests your majefty as much as it does the whole empire. Honoured with your confidence, and placed in a fituation in which it behoves me to fpeak the truth to you, I venture to do it without difguife: it is an obligation under which your majefty's felf has laid me. The French have formed a conftitution, and it has produced malecontents and rebels. The majority of the nation approve it, and have fworn to maintain it at the expence of their lives. They have confidered the war with fatisfaction,

as the grand expedient for establishing the conftitution; yet, buoyed up by hopes, the minority have exerted their united efforts against it. Hence arifes that inteftine conflict with the laws, that anarchy which all good citizens lament, and of which ill-difpofed people have not failed to take the advantage, in order to countenance their afperfions against the new government. Hence thofe opinions which are every where fpread abroad, and every where fomented; for in no part is indifference of opinion to be found. Either the triumph or the change of the conftitution is the cry of all; they labour either to maintain or new-model it. I fhall only touch, upon what the prefent circumftances of things require and, with the utmoft impartiality, fhall fuggett an idea of what turn affairs may be expected to take, and what measures would be prudent to adopt.

The

gatives, and which, indeed, your You enjoyed, fire, great preromajefty conceived to be inherent in royalty. Bred up under the idea of preferving thefe prerogatives, you could not fee yourfelf deprived of them with fatisfaction. defire of recovering them was as natural as the regret you felt at their diffolution. Thefe fentiments, which are natural to the human heart, have had their proper influence on the minds of the antirevolutionifts.

They have, therefore, depended upon being fecretly favoured by your majefty, until circumstances permitted an open declaration, in their behalf. This pofture of things could not but be evident to the whole nation; and it was fufficient to put men upon their guard. Your majefty has then been ever under the neceffity of either yielding to

the

the force of habit, and to particular inclination, or to make facrifices dictated by philofophy, and called for by neceflity.

Every thing has its term of duration, and that of uncertainty has at length arrived. Can your majefty openly ally yourself with the pretended reformers of the conftitution? or is it incumbent upon you generously to devote yourfelf entirely to promote its triumph? Such is the true statement of a queftion, the folution of which the prefent ftate of things renders of inevitable neceflity.

As to the metaphyfical queftion, Whether the French are ripe for liberty it is foreign from the fubject before us; for it is not our bufinefs to confider what we should become in a century hence, but to fee what the prefent generation are capable of.

In the midst of the fermentations of the four laft years, what has taken place? Privileges burdenfome to the lower order of the community have been abolished; the ideas of juftice and equality have been univerfally fpread. The acknowledgment of the rights of the people, which has been folemnly allowed, is become a facred doctrine in politics. The hatred againft the nobles has been long fince infpired by the nature of the feudal fyftem: it is now increased by their maniteft oppofition to the conftitution. The people confidered these nobles in an odious light on account of the oppreffive privileges they enjoyed; but they would have forgot their hatred on the abolition of thefe privileges, if the conduct of the nobility, fince that period, had not given every reafon for men to confider their rank with diftruft, and to oppofe it as an ir

reconcileable enemy to their welfaré.

The public attachment to the conftitution increafed in like proportion. The people not only derived effential advantages from it, but were perfuaded that still greater benefits were preparing for them, fince those who were accustomed to opprefs them were endeavouring with fuch earneftnefs to destroy or to modify it. The declaration of rights is become a political gospel, and the French conftitution a religion; in the defence of which, the people are ready to perish. Thus their zeal fometimes went fo far as to fupply the place of law; and when its influence was not fufficient to restrain the disturbers of the public peace, the citizens took upon themselves the task of punishing them. Hence the poffeffions of the emigrants have been expofed to the ravages incited by vengeance. Hence fo many departments were under the neceffity of feverely treating the clergy whom the public opinion had profcribed, and of whom fome would have been victims to its refentment. In the collifion of interefts, every fentiment affumed the tone of paffion. Our country is not a mere word, created by warmth of imagination; it is a being to which we offer facrifice, to which we are the more attached by the very folicitude it brings upon us, that which we love on account of the benefits we hope ta derive from it; and every injury offered to our country proves the means of increafing our enthufiafm.

To what a height did this enthufiafm rife, when the machinations. of foreign enemies were added to thofe of the domeftic foe, in order to perpetrate all that could be con

ceived

ceived wicked and fatal? The fermentation is extreme in the various parts of the empire; it will burst upon us with a dreadful explofion, unless it be calmed by a wellfounded confidence in your majefty s intentions. But this confidence will not be established by mere promifes and proteftations; it can rest upon facts only. The French nation know their conftitution can fuftain itself; that government will have all neceffary aid, whenever your majefty, withing well to the conftitution, fhall fupport the legislative body, by caufing their decrees to be executed, and remove every pretext for popular diffatisfaction, and every hope of the malecontents.

For inftance, two important decrees have been iffued; both effentially concern public tranquillity and the welfare of the empire: their not being fanctioned gives birth to miftruft; if it be poftponed, it will create malecontents; and it is my duty to fay, that in the prefent ef fervefcence of the people's minds, difcontent may lead to any thing. It is no longer time to recede: it is no longer time to temporize. The revolution is established in the public mind; it will be completed by the effufion of blood, if wifdom do not guard against evils which can yet be prevented.

If force were recurred to in order to restrain the national affem

bly; if terror were spread through Paris, difunion and confternation in its vicinity, all France would rife with indignation; and, diftracted by the horrors of a civil war, fhe would difplay that gloomy energy, the parent of virtues and crimes, ever fatal to thofe who provoke it. Public fafety, and your majesty's individual happinefs, are clafely

linked; no power can divide them;, diftreffes and certain misfortune will gather round your throne, if it do not reft, through yourself, on the bafis of the conftitution, and be established on peace, which the maintenance of that conftitution would at laft produce in our fa vour. Thus the state of the pub lic mind, the circumftances, political reafons, your majefty's own intereft, render it indifpenfable for you to join the legislative body, and to concur in the nation's will. The nation confiders as a neceffity what principles point out as a duty; but the natural fenfibility of this affectionate people holds out another motive. You were cruelly deceived, fire, when wicked men endeavoured to excite uneasiness and miftruft in your breaft, injurious to this kind people, this people fo easily affected.

By being perpetually taught not to confide in the nation, your own conduct alarmed them. Let the people fee that you are willing the conftitution fhould take its course, the conftitution to which they have united their happinefs, and you will foon become the object of thanks.

The conduct of the clergy in many parts of the kingdom, the pretext they furnish for commotions, occafioned a wife law to be enacted against thofe difturbers of the peace. Let your majesty's fanction be given to it. The public tranquillity and the fafety of the clergy folicit it. If this law be not put in force, the departments will be obliged to fubftitute fevere meafures, as they have univerfally done, and the people will fupply its place by violence.

The attempts of our enemies, the fermentations in the capital,

the

the extreme difquietude arifing from the conduct of your guard, and which the teftimonies of fatisfaction given to that body contained in your proclamation (a meafure truly impolitic under fuch circumstances) it keep up the fituation of Paris; its proximity to the frontiers, all contribute to fhew the neceflity of a camp in its neighbourhood. This meafure, the wifdom and urgency of which are allowed by thinking men, waits only for the fanction of your majefty. Why fhould delay create an appearance of regret on the part of your majefty, when difpatch would deferve gratitude on ours? Already have the machinations of the staff of the Parifian national guards against this meafure caufed men to fufpect that they act under fuperior influence: already the clamours of certain outrageous demagogues raife fufpicion; already the public opinion expofes the intentions of your majefty.

A little more delay, and the afficted people will imagine they perceive in their king the friend and the accomplice of confpirators. Good heaven! are the powers of the earth ftricken with blindnefs, and will they never attend to any councils but fuch as lead them on to ruin? I am aware that the language of truth is feldom well received in courts: I am likewife fenfible, that, as her voice is hardly ever heard there, revolutions become neceffary. Above all, I know to fpeak the truth to your majefty, not only as a citizen fubject to the laws, but as a minifter honoured with your confidence, or invefted with functions that imply it; nor do I know what can prevent me from fulfilling a duty which I feel to be incumbent on me! With the fame intentions, I fhall

repeat my obfervations to your majefty on the utility and neceflity of executing the law, which prefcribes that there fhould be a fecretary of council. The law fpeaks fo powerfully, that the execution of it fhould immediately follow.

It is neceffary, for the fake of refponfible minifters, to ufe means to establish fedatenefs, wifdom, and caution, in the deliberations of council.

Letter from the King to the National Aembly, June 21.

The national affembly is already apprifed of the events of yesterday. No doubt Paris is full of confternation. I leave to the prudence of the affembly the management of the conftitution, and alfo the individual liberty of the hereditary reprefentative of the people. France will learn what has happened with grief. As for me, nothing fhall hinder me from fteadily pursuing, without the leaft diftruft, the views which are directed by the conftitution, which I have fworn to maintain, and to obtain thofe ends which it prefcribes.