or of these corporations. However, to be subject to the pleasure of that assembly, is not to be subject to law, either for protection or for constraint.
Has more wisdom been displayed in the con|stitution of your army than what is discoverable in your plan of judicature? The able arrangement of this part is the more difficult, and requires the greater skill and attention, not only as a great con|cern in itself, but as it is the third cementing prin|ciple in the new body of republicks, which you call the French nation. Truly it is not easy to divine what that army may become at last. You have voted a very large one, and on good appointments, at least fully equal to your apparent means of pay|ment. But what is the principle of its discipline? or whom is it to obey? You have got the wolf by the ears, and I wish you joy of the happy position in which you have chosen to place yourselves, and in which you are well circumstanced for a free delibe|ration, relatively to that army, or to any thing else.
The minister and secretary of state for the war department, is M. de la Tour du Pin. This gen|tleman, like his colleagues in administration, is a most zealous assertor of the revolution, and a san|guine admirer of the new constitution, which ori|ginated in that event. His statement of facts, re|lative to the military of France, is important, not only from his official and personal authority, but because it displays very clearly the actual condi|tion of the army in France, and because it throws light on the principles upon which the assembly proceeds in the administration of this critical
