dure was in my opinion a high misdemeanor in those who acted thus in England, if they were not so very low and so very base, that no acts of theirs can be called high, even as a description of criminality; and the Assembly, in accepting, proclaiming, and publishing this forged alliance, has been guilty of a plain aggression, which would justify our court in demanding a direct disavowal, if our policy should not lead us to wink at it. Whilst I look over this paper to have it copied, I see a manifesto of the Assembly, as a preliminary to a declaration of war against the German princes on the Rhine. This manifesto contains the whole substance of the French politicks with regard to foreign states. They have ordered it to be circulated amongst the people in every country of Europe-even previously to its acceptance by the king, and his new privy council, the club of the Feuillans. Therefore, as a summary of their policy avowed by themselves, let us consider some of the circumstances attending that piece, as well as the spirit and temper of the piece itself. against the It was preceded by a speech from Brissot, full of Declaration unexampled insolence towards all the sovereign Emperour. states of Germany, if not of Europe. The Assembly, to express their satisfaction in the sentiments which it contained, ordered it to be printed. This Brissot had been in the lowest and basest employ under the deposed monarchy: a sort of thief taker, taker, or spy of police; in which character he acted after the manner of persons in that description. He had been employed by his master, the lieutenant de police, for a considerable time in London, in the same or some such honourable occupation. The Revolution, which has brought forward all merit of that kind, raised him, with others of a similar class and disposition, to fame and eminence. On the Revolution he became a publisher of an infamous newspaper, which he still continues. He is charged, and I believe justly, as the first mover of the troubles in Hispaniola. There is no wickedness, if I am rightly informed, in which he is not versed, and of which he is not perfectly capable. His quality of news writer, now an employment of the first dignity in France, and his practices and principles, procured his election into the Assembly, where he is one of the leading members. M. Condorcet produced on the same day a draft of a declaration to the king, which the Assembly published before it was presented. Condorcet, (though no marquis, as he styled himself before the Revolution) is a man of another sort of birth, fashion, and occupation from Brissot; but in every principle, and every disposition to the lowest as well as the highest and most determined villanies, fully his equal. He seconds Brissot in the Assembly, and is at once his coadjutor and his rival in a newspaper, which, in his own own name and as successor to M. Garat, a member also of the Assembly, he has just set up in that empire of Gazettes. Condorcet was chosen to draw the first declaration presented by the Assembly to the king, as a threat to the elector of Treves, and the other provinces on the Rhine. In that piece, in which both Feuillans and Jacobins concurred, they declared publickly, and most proudly and insolently, the principle on which they mean to proceed in their future disputes with, any of the sovereigns of Europe; for they say, "that it is not with fire and sword they mean to "attack their territories, but by what will be "more dreadful to them, the introduction of "liberty."I have not the paper by me to give the exact words-but I believe they are nearly as I state them. Dreadful indeed will be their hostility, if they should be able to carry it on according to the example of their modes of introducing liberty. They have shewn a perfect model of their whole design, very complete, though in little. This gang of murderers and savages have wholly laid waste and utterly ruined the beautiful and happy country of the Comtat Venaiffin and the city of Avignon. This cruel and treacherous outrage the sovereigns of Europe, in my opinion, with a great mistake of their honour and interest, have permitted, even without a remonstrance, to be carried to the desired point, on the principles on which they are now themselves threatened in their State of the their own states; and this, because, according to the poor and narrow spirit now in fashion, their brother sovereign, whose subjects have been thus traitorously and inhumanly treated in violation of the law of nature and of nations, has a name somewhat different from theirs, and instead of being styled king, or duke, or landgrave, is usually called pope. The electors of Treves and Mentz were frightened with the menace of a similar mode of war. The Assembly, however, not thinking that the electors of Treves and Mentz had done enough under their first terrour, have again brought forward Condorcet, preceded by Brissot, as I have just stated. The declaration, which they have ordered now to be circulated in all countries, is in substance the same as the first, but still more insolent, because more full of detail. There they have the impudence to state that they aim at no conquest; insinuating that all the old, lawful powers of the world had each made a constant, open profession of a design of subduing his neighbours. They add, that if they are provoked, their war will be directed only against those who assume to be masters. But to the people they will bring peace, law, liberty, &c. &c. There is not the least hint. that they consider those whom they call persons assuming to be masters," to be the lawful government of their country, or persons to be treated with the least management or respect. They regard them as usurpers and enslavers of the people. If I do not mistake they are described by the name of tyrants in Condorcet's first draft. I am sure they are so in Brissot's speech, ordered by the Assembly to be printed at the same time and for the same purposes. The whole is in the same strain, full of false philosophy and false rhetorick, both however calculated to captivate and influence the vulgar mind, and to excite sedition in the countries in which it is ordered to be circulated. Indeed it is such, that if any of the lawful, acknowledged sovereigns of Europe had publickly ordered such a manifesto to be circulated in the dominions of another, the ambassador of that power would instantly be ordered to quit every court without an audience. fear on the Powers. The powers of Europe have a pretext for con- Effect of cealing their fears, by saying that this language Sovereign is not used by the king; though they well know that there is in effect no such person, that the Assembly is in reality, and by that king is acknowledged to be, the master; that what he does is but matter of formality, and that he can neither cause nor hinder, accelerate nor retard, any measure whatsoever, nor add to nor soften the manifesto which the Assembly has directed to be published, with the declared purpose of exciting mutiny and rebellion in the several countries governed by these powers. G VOL. VII. By |