XV. 1794. tors but of the actors; the worst deeds are committed by CHAP. men who delude themselves and others by the noblest expressions. Tyranny speaks with the voice of prudence, and points to the dangers of popular insurrection; ambition strikes on the chords of patriotism and loyalty, and leads men to ruin others in the belief that they are saving themselves; democratic fury appeals to the spirit of freedom, and massacres thousands in the name of insurgent humanity. In all these cases, men would shrink with horror from themselves if their conduct appeared in its true colours; they become steeped in crime while yet professing the intentions of virtue, and before they are well aware that they have transgressed its bounds. This line All these atrocities proceed from one source; criminality in them all begins when one line is passed. source is the principle of expedience; this line is the "To do evil that good may come of it," is of justice. perhaps the most prolific cause of wickedness. It is absolutely necessary, say the politicians of one age, to check the growing spirit of heresy; discord in this world, damnation in the next, follow in its steps; religion, the fountain of peace, is in danger of being polluted by its poison; the transient suffering of a few individuals will insure the eternal salvation of millions. Such is the language of religious intolerance, such the principles which lighted the fires of Smithfield. How cruel soever it may appear, say the statesmen of another age, to sacrifice life for property, it is indispensable in an age of commercial industry; the temptations to fraud are so great, the facilities of commission so extensive, that, but for the terror of death, property would be insecure, and industry, with all its blessings, nipped in the bud. Such is the language of commercial jealousy, and the origin of that sanguinary code which the humanity and extended wisdom of England has now perhaps too far relaxed. You would not hesitate, say the leaders of another period, to sacrifice a hundred thousand men in a single XV. CHAP. campaign, to preserve a province, or conquer a frontier town; but what are the wars of princes to the eternal 1794. contest between freedom and tyranny? and what the destruction of its present enemies, to the liberty of unborn millions of the human race? Such is the language of revolutionary cruelty; such are the maxims which, beginning with the enthusiasm of philanthropists, ended in the rule of Robespierre. The unexampled atrocities of the Reign of Terror arose from the influence yielded to a single principle; the greatest crimes which the world has ever known, were but an extension of the supposed expedience which hangs for forgery and burns for heresy. The error in all these cases is the same, and consists in supposing that what is unjust ever can be ultimately expedient, or that the Author of Nature would have implanted feelings in the human heart which the interests of society require to be continually violated. "A little knowledge," says Lord Bacon, "makes men irreligious, but extended wisdom brings them back to devotion." With equal truth it may be said, that "a little experience makes governments and people iniquitous, but extended information brings them back to the principles of justice." The real interests of society, it is at last perceived, can only be secured by those measures which command universal concurrence; and none can finally do this but such as are founded on the virtuous feelings of our nature. is by attending only to the first effect of unjust measures that men are ever deceived on this subject; when their ultimate consequences come to be appreciated, the expedience is found all to lie on the other side. But these ultimate effects often do not appear for a considerable period, and hence the immediate danger of revolutions, and the extreme difficulty of arresting their course. stoppage, however, is certain at last. When the feelings of the great body of mankind are outraged, or their interests menaced, by the measures of government, a reaction invariably, sooner or later, follows, and the temporary It The XV. 1794. advantages of injustice are more than counterbalanced by CHAP. the permanent dissatisfaction which it occasions. The surest guide, it is at length discovered, is to be found in the inward monitor which nature has implanted in every human heart; and statesmen are taught by experience, that true wisdom consists in following what their conscience tells them to be just, in preference to what their limited experience, or mistaken views, may apprehend to be expedient. 4. of drama Novelists and writers of the drama would do well to reflect on these observations. They generally represent Great error their depraved characters as admitting their wickedness, tists and but expressing their determination to adhere to it. This novelists in never occurs in real life. Men often admit the performance of, or profess an intention to perform, actions which the world calls wicked: but they never admit they are wicked. Invariably they speak of them as perfectly justifiable, or a commendable escape from absurd or iniquitous restraint. The libertine will avow all his deeds of perfidy, nay, he will glory in them; but he never allows they are wrong: on the contrary, he maintains they were no more than obedience to the dictates of nature, and that hypocritical cant alone can make them the subject of condemnation. The fraudulent bankrupt may not deny his deeds of deceit; but as long as he perseveres in his career, he represents them only as clever devices, indicating a superiority in the conduct of affairs over other men. The thief often admits his depredations, nay, he magnifies their number and dexterity; but while he remains a thief he never drops a hint as to their being criminal. The tyrant may, in a soliloquy, confess his cruel projects; but he never confesses they are cruel. State necessity, overruling destiny, are ever in his mouth; he is only watching over the safety of the commonwealth ; he is anticipating or warding off the strokes of the traitor. Milton represents Satan justifying his temptation of our First Parents even amidst the innocence of Paradise. CHAP. 1794. 5. of this. "Necessity, the tyrant's plea," was already in his mouth.* The works of many of the greatest dramatists and Examples romance-writers of modern times are characterised by this remarkable error-Racine and Molière, Alfieri and Scott, Lope de Vega and Bulwer, with all their profound knowledge of the human heart, have fallen into it.† Yet deeper observers of human nature have perceived the real character of man in this respect. Shakspeare draws, with a master's hand, the self-delusion of the human heart, and the struggle in the breast of the incipient criminal. Corneille represents his heroes justifying all their excesses on the grounds of state necessity; it was on this account that Napoleon said, if he had lived in his time, he would have made him his first councillor of state. Euripides and Sophocles exhibit the cruel deeds of their characters as overborne by irresistible destiny. Machiavel holds forth state policy as justifying deeds of wickedness to such an extent, that subsequent ages have been doubtful whether he did not intend to vindicate them altogether. It is no doubt very convenient for a dramatist, to represent his atrocious characters as laying bare their atrocity in conversation with confidants and in soliloquies; but no man ever met with this in real life. Those who look for it in the world will be constantly disappointed. Among the innumerable criminals whom the French Revolution warmed into life, there is not one who ever * "And should I at your harmless innocence By conquering this new world, compels me now The tyrant's plea, excused his devilish deeds." Paradise Lost, iv. 389. It is in an especial manner conspicuous in Alfieri. Madame de Stael was of the same opinion: "Il y a dans les pièces d'Alfieri une telle profusion d'énergie et de magnanimité, ou bien une telle exagération de violence et de crime, qu'il est impossible de reconnaître le véritable caractère des hommes. Ils ne sont jamais ni si méchans ni si généreux qu'il les peint."—Corinne, lib. vii. c. 2. He knew the approached even to an admission that he had done wrong CHAP. 1794. 6. of Robes vernment after the fall of Danton. The truth of these principles was strongly exemplified in the later stages of the French Revolution. During Principles the four months which elapsed between the death of pierre's goDanton and the fall of Robespierre, DEATH became the sole engine of government; systematic and daily executions took place in the capital; extermination, conducted by despotic agents, prevailed in the provinces-and yet nothing but the language of philanthropy was breathed in the Convention, nothing but the noblest sentiments were uttered by the Decemvirs. Each defeat of their rivals only rendered the ruling faction more sanguinary. The successive proscriptions of the Royalists, the Girondists, the Constitutionalists, the Anarchists, and the Moderates, were immediately followed by a more violent effusion of human blood, and a more vehement profession of the principles of humanity. The destinies of France, as of every other country which undergoes the crisis of a revolution, had fallen into the hands of men, who, born of the public convulsions, were sustained by them alone: they massacred in the name of their principles, they put to death in the name of the public welfare but terror of their rivals was the real spring of their actions. The most barbarous cruelty, the most ruthless violence, the most degrading despotism, were represented as emanating from the principles of freedom, and as imperiously called for by state necessity.11 Deux The noblest and most sacred motives which can influence 178, 192. Mig. ii. 316. the human breast-virtue, humanity, love for the public Th. vi. 223. good, the freedom of the world-were incessantly invoked * On the evening after the execution of that monarch, he walked round the corpse in Whitehall, muffled up in a long black cloak, repeating to himself the words, "Dreadful necessity !"-See Europ. Mag. xx. 106; and Anecdotes of Distinguished Persons, i. 254. Amis, xii. |