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ever in its mouth, and malice and vengeance in its heart, talks of honour, and practises perjury ;-of liberty, and exercifes the most intolerant tyranny :-that harangues on the rights of man, while it makes property a crime, robbery a virtue, and not only perpetrates, but justifies murder1. This execrable power, which alone

can

André Dumont inveighed, Dec. 7, 1794. againft the Jacobins, "who, he faid, with matchless impudence, were still talking of the rights of man, which in the most audacious manner they violated, by all kinds of cruelties and murders." See the reprefentation of their conduct as given in Fayette's Letter. Moore's Journal, vol. i. p. 114.

* The fecond or Legislative Affembly took the oath Oct. 4, 1791. to obferve the law. The National Affembly was perjured in respect to the oath of fidelity which they swore to the King, as well as in refpect to that which they fwore to their conftituents, &c. See the Manifefto of the Emperor of Germany, and King of Pruffia, Ann. Regifter, 1792, p. 291. Every country they have vifited bears witness to their fyftematic breach of the most folemn treaties, whenever it suits their convenience.

See the speech of Tallien in the Convention after the maffacre of the second of September. Moore's Journal, vol. i. p. 376. "The National Affembly of France was the only body of men that I ever heard of, who openly and fyftematically proposed to employ affaffination,

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can steel the hearts of its votaries against every feeling of nature, has dared to fanction treason, parricide, luftm, and mas

nation, and to inftitute a band of patriots, who should exercise this profeffion, either by fword, piftol, or poifon; and though the propofal was not carried into execution, it might be confidered as the fentiment of the meeting; for it was only delayed till it should be confidered how far it might not be imprudent, because they might expect reprifals." Robifon, p. 411.

"I fly far off from the cries of that execrable tribunal, which murders not only the victim, but which murders also the mercy of the people." The poet Klopftock to the National Convention, An. Reg. 1792, p. 128. Il faut du fang à ce peuple infortuné, dont on a detruit la morale, et corrompu l'inftinct; on se fert de tout, excepté la juftice, pour lui en donner." La Citoyenne Roland, tom. i. p. 195.

* Decree of fraternity and affistance by the National Convention, Nov. 19, 1792. and anfwer of the Prefident, Nov. 21. decreed to be tranflated into all languages as the manifefto of all nations against kings.Decree for extending the French fyftem to all countries occupied by their armies, Dec, 15, 1792.-Report from the diplomatic Committee, in which was founded the decree of the fifteenth of December, 1793.

'It was no uncommon thing for the Affembly to decree honourable mention to fons who had denounced their parents, wives their hufbands, and mothers their fons. Sept. 18, 1791. Philips of the Jacobin Club prefented to the Legislative Affembly the heads of his father and mother, whom his patriotifm had just facrificed.

facre

facre"; and to infufe into the breasts of his subject multitudes, a new paffion, which has funk them beneath the level of the brute creation-a paffion for the fight of their fellow creatures in the agonies of death, and a literal thirst for human blood.

This is the power that firft enthroning seven hundred tyrants in the place of one king (deliberately murdered only because he was a king), ruled twenty-four millions of flaves with the iron fceptre of terror, and for

By a decree of the Convention, June 6, 1794. it is declared that "there is nothing criminal in the promifcuous commerce of the sexes."

"See the Account of the maffacres of the firft, fecond, and third of September, 1792. and Danton's justification of those massacres in a letter to the municipalities of France immediately after. Annual Register, p. 115-119.

"If the defpotifm of a fingle individual is dangerous to liberty, how much more odious must be that of feven hundred men, many of whom are void of principles, without morals, and who have been able to reach that fupremacy by cabals or crimes alone." Gen. Dumourier to the French Nation. Annual Reg. 1793. p. 154.

"Ne vous y trompez pas (the tyrants of France in 1793.) c'est peut-être la deftruction de la Royauté,

des

for five years made France a slaughter-house, -That formed the web of its laws, of the most complex and intricate texture, and changed them at the fancy of the moment, or for the exprefs purpose of enfnaring the innocent; and, abfolute in all things elfe, difdained to preferve the prerogative of mercy.-That " calling evil good, and good evil, putting darknefs for light, and light for darkness," has "thought to change

des ordres privilégiés, qui irrite contre vous la plûpart des gouvernemens de l'Europe; mais ce qui fouleve les nations, c'eft la barbarie de la nature de votre gouvernement; vous la retrouvez dans la terreur, et là où. il exiftoit un trône, vous avez élévé un échafaud." Reflexions fur le Procés de la Reine, par une Femme.

See Hift. Epochs, and the lift of the moft confiderable fufferers at the end.

July 19, 1793. Not lefs than 6800 decrees had been paffed by the different Legiflatures. Hiftorical Epochs.

The Emigrant Laws in particular.

At the time when the moft fanguinary laws were paffed in France, laws which it was well known were executed with the most unfeeling feverity by the remorfelefs Robespierre; there did not exist a forgiving power in any part of the executive government. Perfons whofe names were inferted in lifts of profcription were condemned after a mock trial by jury; and every application for mercy was rejected with the declaration, that they had no power to pardon or to fave.

times

times and laws," for the exprefs purpose of destroying every veftige of true religion, and has deified Human Reason", after having degraded it to madness;-That has fettered its vaffals in the chains of requifition-a tyranny before unheard of,—that changed the artizans and peasants into a mafs of banditti, deluged the country with torrents of their blood, and marked the frontiers with the vast piles of their bodies *.—That, throwing away the sword of justice, made the guillotine keep pace with the flaughter of the field of battle, and crowded the prisons with numbers greater than the captives of wary-That, mingling priests

Paris, Nov. 12, 1793. "A grand feftival dedicated to Reafon and Truth was yesterday celebrated in the ci-devant cathedral of Paris. In the middle of this church was erected a mount, and on it a very plain temple, the façade of which bore the following inscription: A la Philofophie.-Before the gate of this temple were placed the bufts of the moft celebrated Philofophers, The torch of Truth was in the fummit of the mount upon the altar of Reafon, fpreading light. The Convention and all the conftituted authorities. affifted at the ceremony." Sun Paper. Robison, p. 252.

* See the account of the fucceffive flaughters made by the allies in Hift. Epochs, p. 78.

All the goals of Paris had been found infufficient for the increafed number of prifoners under the new

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