CHAP. XIII. 1793. 129. ence in the disposal of situations, while the slumber of pacific life affords a prospect of the incapacity of the persons promoted not being discovered, or not becoming productive of public disaster. During the latter years of a long peace, influential imbecility is daily, in the army and navy, mounting more exclusively to the head of affairs; and when hostilities break out, a large proportion of the officers in high command are generally found to be wholly unfit for the duties devolving on them. Thus, while democratic clamour starves down the establishment to a ruinously low standard in point of amount, aristocratic cupidity paralyses the direction, and nullifies the exertions of that part which is allowed to exist. The disasters at the commencement of the war of 1739, during the first three years of that of 1756, during the whole of the American contest, during the first four years of the Revolutionary strife, and in the dreadful campaign of Affghanistaun in 1840, may all be traced to the combined operation of these causes. Nor is the English system of education and governDefects of ment without an important, and what often proves a disEnglish education in astrous influence on the national fortunes in the com the same respect. mencement, and sometimes through the whole course, of hostilities. No provision is made, in schools or colleges, in general instruction, either for teaching our future statesmen any thing connected with their department in the direction of war, or qualifying our future generals to understand the principles or practice of their profession. Young men too often enter the houses of Lords and Commons perfectly initiated in the loves of Dido and Æneas, of Mars and Venus; able to construe Eschylus and write hexameter verses; perhaps skilled in forensic debate, and happy in parliamentary allusions; but as ignorant of the means by which success is to be attained or disaster averted in war, as the child unborn. Youths are moved from school into the army, able indeed to ride and shoot, and they are soon taught the simple details of XIII. 1793. military discipline; but for any thing like knowledge of CHAP. the art of war, you must, in general, ascend to the higher officers in the service, to whom it has been taught by experience. Statesmen are raised to the supreme direction of affairs often from talent in speaking, or readiness in reply, rather than from any practical knowledge they possess, either of the civil or military duties with the direction of which they are intrusted. Power in debate is the one thing needful; and in that art the British statesmen are unrivalled in modern times. But power in debate is not statesmanlike wisdom. It is often acquired by habits little conducive to it; and it differs as much from the able direction of an expedition or a campaign, as the skill in a tournament of Amadis de Gaul or Palmerin of England does, from the consummate genius of Wellington or Napoleon. Hence the numerous opportunities of bringing the war to a successful termination which were lost in 1793, from want of military talent and combination in the British government. And to those who reflect on these circumstances, and their illustration in the woful mismanagement which that campaign exhibits, even when the mighty genius of Pitt was in the direction of affairs, and on the constant examples of similar ignorance of the first principles of warlike combination in government, which every period of our history has exhibitedit will probably occur as the most decisive proof of the virtue and energy which free institutions develop in a community, when duly regulated by aristocratic power, that, despite such obstacles, the British empire has unceasingly advanced, and has now attained an eminence unrivalled since the time when the Roman legions, directed by wisdom and led by valour, conquered the world. CHAPTER XIV. XIV. 1793. REIGN OF TERROR: FROM THE FALL OF THE GIRONDISTS TO THE DEATH OF danton.—June 2, 1793—MARCH 31, 1794. "THE rule of a mob," says Aristotle, "is the worst of CHAP. tyrannies ;" and so experience has proved it, from the caprice of the Athenian democracy to the proscriptions of the French Revolution. The reason is one which always General holds, and must remain unaltered while society remains. sanguinary In contests for power, a monarch has, in general, to dread democracy. only the efforts of a rival for the throne; an aristocracy, 1. character of the ascendancy of a faction in the nobility; the populace, the vengeance of all the superior classes in the state. Hence, the safety of the first is usually secured by the destruction of a single rival and his immediate adherents; the jealousy of the second extinguished by the proscription or exile of a limited number of families; but the terrors of the last require the destruction of whole ranks in society. They constantly feel that, if they do not destroy the superior classes in the state, they will, in the long run, fall again under their influence, and their leaders in consequence be subjected to punishment. Hence the envenomed and relentless animosity by which they are actuated towards them. Similar feelings are not experienced in nearly the same degree by the holders of property on the resumption of power, because they are not felt to be necessary for the securing of their authority. Measures dictated by the dread of individuals become * “Τούτων των τυραννίδων τελευταια ἡ δημοκρατια.”ARIST. De Politica. XIV. unnecessary when they have perished; those levelled CHAP. against the influence of classes require to be pursued till the class itself is destroyed. 1793. 2. peculiarity. It was not a mere thirst for blood which made Marat and Robespierre declare and act upon the principle, that Cause of this there could be no security for the Republic till two hundred and sixty thousand heads had fallen. Hardly any men are cruel for cruelty's sake; the leaders of the Jacobins were not more so than the reckless and ambitious of any other country would be, if exposed to the influence of similar passions. Ambition is the origin of desperate measures, because it renders men sensible only of the dictates of an insatiable passion: terror is the most common source of cruelty. Men esteem the lives of others lightly when their own are at stake. The revolutionary innovations being directed against the whole aristocratic and influential classes, their vengeance was felt to be implacable, and no security could be expected to the democratic leaders, till their whole opponents were destroyed. Thence the incessant, and often ridiculous, dread of a counter revolutionary movement, which was evinced by the democratic party, and which so often impelled them into the most sanguinary measures, when there was in reality no danger to be apprehended.* In the strife of contending classes, the sphere of individual vengeance was fearfully augmented. Not one, but fifty leaders had terrors to allay, rivals to extinguish, hatred to gratify. Amidst the contests for influence, and the * So true are the words of Metastasio -"E in qual funesta entrai Ciro, Act ii. scene 3. XIV. 1793. CHAP. dread of revenge, every man sacrificed his individual to his political connexions: private friendship, public character, yielded to the force of personal apprehension, or the vehemence of individual ambition. A forced coalition, between the most dissimilar characters, took place from the pressure of similar danger; friends gave up friends to the vengeance of political adversaries; individual security, private revenge, were purchased by the sacrifice of ancient attachment. 3. of a new government bins. France experienced the truth of these principles with Formation unmitigated severity during the later stages of the RevoBut it was not immediately that the leaders of by the Jaco- the victorious faction ventured upon the practical application of their principles. The first feeling with the multitude, on the overthrow of the Girondists, was exultation at the victory they had gained, and unbounded anticipations of felicity from the assumption of power by the most popular and vehement of their demagogues. The most extravagant joy prevailed among the Jacobins at their decisive triumph. "The people," said Robespierre, "have by their conduct confounded all their opponents. Eighty thousand men have been under arms nearly a week, and not one shop has been pillaged, not one drop of blood shed. They have proved by that whether the accusation was well founded, that they wished to profit by the disorders to commit murder and pillage. Their insurrection was spontaneous; the result of an universal moral conviction; and the Mountain, itself feeble and irresolute, showed that it had no hand in producing it. The insurrection was a great moral and popular effort, worthy of the enlightened people among whom it arose. The people of Paris have afforded an example which may well make all the monarchs of the earth tremble, and silence the calumnies they pour forth against All we have to do now is to complete our triumph, and destroy the Royalists.1 We must gain possession of the committees, and spend our nights in framing good 1 Journal des Jacobins, 7th June 1791, No. 428. us. |