The life of Napoleon Buonaparte, emperor of the French. By Sir Walter Scott.

I LIFE OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 137
against liberty, or in favour of royalty, or affecting personal strength, beauty, or stature. Divide the
the rights and liberty of man, or in any way, more whole property of a country equally among its inorless, tending to counteract the progress of the habitants, and a week will bring back the inequaRevolution. In short, it was the business of this lity which you have endeavoured to remove; nay,
court to execute the laws, or inflict the sentence a much shorter space will find the industrious and
rather, upon such as had been arrested as suspected saving richer than the idle and prodigal. But in
persons; and they generally saw room to punish in France, at the period under discussion, this equamost of the instances where the arresting function- lity, in itself so unattainable, had completely superaries had seen ground for imprisonment. seded even the principle of liberty, as a watchword
This frightful court consisted of six judges, a for exciting the people. It was to sin against this
public accuser, and two assistants. There were leading principle to be possessed of, and more estwelve jurymen; but the appointment of these was pecially to enjoy ostentatiously, anything which was
a mere mockery. They were official persons, who awanting to your neighbour. To be richer, more
held permanent appointments; had a salary from the accomplished, better bred, or better taught, subjectstate; and were in no manner liable to the choice or ed you to the law of suspicion, and you were conchallenge of the party tried. It may be sure the ducted instantly before a revolutionary committee,
jurors and judges were selected for their republican where you were probably convicted of incivisin; not
zeal and steady qualities, and were capable of forinterfering with the liberty and property of others,
seeing no obstacle either of law or humanity in the but for making what use you pleased of your
path of their duty. This tribunal had the pow.er own.
of deciding without proof,-or cutting short evi- The whole of the terrible mystery is included in
dence when in the progress of being adduced,-or two regulations, communicated by the Jacobin Club
stopping the defence of the prisoners at pleasure; of Paris to the Committee of Public Safety. —. That
privileges which tended greatly to shorten the when, by the machinations of opulent persons, seforms of court, and aid the dispatch of business. ditions should arise in any district, it should be deThe Revolutionary Tribunal was in a short time clared in a state of rebellion.-2. That the Convenso overwhelmed with work, that it became necessary tion shall avail themselves of such opportunity to
to divide it into four sections, all armed with similar excite the poor to make war on the rich, and to
powers. The quantity of blood which it caused to restore order at any price whatsoever.-This was so
be shed was something unheard of even during the much understood, that one of the persons tried by
proscriptions of the Roman empire; and there were the Revolutionary Tribunal, when asked what he
involved in its sentences crimes the. most different, had to say in his defence, answered,-" I am wealthy
personages the most opposed, and opinions the most -what avails it to me to offer any exculpation when
dissimilar. When Henry VIII. roused the fires of such is my offence?"
Smithfield both against protestant and papist, burn- The Committees of Government distributed large
ing at the same stake one wretch for denying the sums of money to the Jacobin Club and its affiliated
king's supremacy, and another for disbelieving the societies, as being necessary to the propagation of
divine presence in the Eucharist, the association sound political principles. The clubs themselves
was consistency itself compared to the scenes pre- took upon them in every village the exercise of the
sented at the Revolutionary Tribunal, in which powers of government; and while they sat swearing,
royalist, constitutionalist, girondist, churchman, drinking, and smoking, examined passports, impritheophilanthropist, noble and roturier, prince and soned citizens, and enforced to their full extent the
peasant, both sexes and all ages, were involved in benefits of liberty and equality. "Death or Fraterone general massacre, and sent to execution by scores nity" was usually inscribed over their place of as$ogether, and on the same sledge. sembly, which some one translated,-" Become my
Supporting by their numerous associations the brother, or I will kill thee."
government as exercised by the revolutionary com- These clubs were composed of members drawn
mittees, came the mass of jacobins, who, divided from the lees of the people, that they might not, in
into a thousand clubs, emanating from that which their own persons, give an example contradicting
had its meetings at Paris, formed the strength of the equality which it was their business to enforce.
the party to which they gave the name. They were filled with men without resources or
The sole principle of the jacobinical institutions talents, but towards whom the confidence of the
was to excite against all persons who had anything deceived people was directed, from the conviction
to lose, the passions of those who possessed no pro- that, because taken from among themselves, they
perty, and were, by l;irth and circumstances, bru- would have the interest of the lower orders contally ignorant, and envious of the advantages en- stantly in view. Their secretaries, however, were
joyed by the higher classes. All other governments generally selected with some attention to alertness
have made individual property the object of coun- of capacity; fobr on them depended the terrible comtenance and protection; but in this strangely-invert- bination which extended from the mother society of
ed state of things, it seemed the object of constant jacobins in Paris, down into the most remote villages
suspicion and persecution, and exposed the owner of the most distant provinces, in which the same tyto perpetual danger. We have elsewhere said that ranny was maintained by the influence of similar
equality (unless in the no less intelligible than sacred means. Thus rumours could be either circulated or
sense of equal submission to the law) is a mere collected with a speed and uniformity, which enchimera, which can no more exist with respect to abled a whisper from Robespierre to regulate the
property, than in regard to mental qualifications, or sentiments of the jacobins at the most distant part
VOL. vI.' I
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