Maximillien Robespierre

Robespierre 1791
On the King s Flight
It s not to me that the flight of the first public functionary should appear to be
a disastrous event. This day could have been the most beautiful of the revoluti
on; it could still become so, and the gain of 40 million in support that the roy
al individual cost would be the least of the benefits of this day.
But for this other measures must be taken than those adopted by the National Ass
embly, and I seize a moment where they are not in session to speak to you of the
measures it seems should have been taken and that I wasn t permitted to propose.
The king chose the moment to desert his post when the opening of the primary ass
emblies was going to awaken all ambitions, all hopes, and all parties, and arm h
alf the nation against the other by the application of the decree of the marc d'
argent, as well as through the ridiculous distinctions established between full
citizens, half citizens and quarter citizens.
He chose the moment when the first legislature, at the end of its labors, sees a
pproaching it
with the eye one uses to look on an heir the legislature that is g
oing to chase it and exercise the national veto in reversing some of its acts. H
e chose the moment when treacherous priests have, by orders and bulls, stirred u
p fanaticism, and provoked against the constitution all that philosophy has left
behind of idiots in the eighty-three departments.
He waited for the moment when the emperor and the king of Sweden would have arri
ved at Brussels to receive him, and when France would be covered with harvests s
o that a small band of brigands, torch in hand, could have starved the nation.
But these aren t the circumstances that frighten me: let all of Europe league agai
nst us and Europe will be defeated.
What frightens me, Messieurs, is the very thing that seems to reassure everyone.
And here I need to be listened to until the end. Once again, what frightens me
is the very thing that seems to reassure everyone else: it s that since this morni
ng, all of our enemies speak the same language as us.
Everyone is united; everyone has the same face, and nevertheless it s clear that a
king who had a pension of 40 million, who still disposed of all places, who sti
ll had the most beautiful and the most secure crown on his head, could not have
renounced so many advantages without being sure of recovering them.
So he couldn t have based his hopes on the support of Leopold and the King of Swed
en and on the army from beyond the Rhine: let all the brigands of Europe league
together and they will again be defeated. It is, then, in our midst, it s in this
capital, that the fugitive king left those supports upon which he counts for his
triumphal re-entry. Otherwise his flight would be too foolish.
You know that 3 million men armed for freedom would be invincible; he thus has a
powerful party of great intelligence in our midst. But look around you and shar
e my fear in considering that everyone wears the same mask of patriotism
These are not conjectures that I am making; these are facts of which I am certai
n. I am going to reveal all to you, and I defy those who will speak after me to
respond to me.

You know the memorandum that Louis XVI left on departing; you noted how he marks
in the constitution those things that wound him and those that have the happine
ss of pleasing him. Read that protest by the king and you will grasp the entire
plot.
The king is going to reappear on the frontiers, assisted by Leopold, by the King
of Sweden, by d'Artois, by Cond, by all the fugitives and all the brigands whose
ranks the common cause of kings would have swollen. In their eyes the ranks wil
l be even more swelled.
A paternal manifesto will appear, like that of the emperor when he re-conquered
Brabant. The king will say in it: My people can always count on my love. The sweet
ness of peace and even that of liberty will be vaunted in it.
A transaction will be proposed with the migrs: eternal peace, amnesty, fraternity.
At the same time the chiefs in the capital and in the departments, with whom th
is project is coordinated, on their side will paint the horrors of civil war. Wh
y kill each other in a war between brothers who all want to be free? For Bender
and Cond will speak of themselves as more patriotic than us. If, when you had no
more harvests to preserve from arson, nor enemy armies on your frontiers, the Co
nstitutional Committee had you tolerate so many nation-icide decrees, would you
hesitate to cede to the insinuations of your chiefs when you are only asked to m
ake slight sacrifices in order to bring about a general reconciliation?
I know well the character of the nation. Will the chiefs who had you give votes
of thanks to Bouill for the St Bartholomew s massacre of patriots in Nancy have any
difficulty in the short term in bringing to a transaction a worn out people, on
e with whom great pains have been taken to wean them of the beauties of freedom,
while it was effected to weigh upon them all the charges, and to make them feel
all the privations, their preservation impose?
And see how everything works together to execute this plan, and how the National
Assembly itself marches to this goal in concert.
Louis XVI wrote to the Assembly in his own hand; he signs that he is fleeing and
the Assembly in a lie that is: cowardly, since it could call things by their na
me in the middle of 3 million bayonets; crude, since the king had the impudence
to write: I am not being abducted, I leave so that I can return to subjugate you
; perfidious, since this lie tended to preserve to the king his quality and the
right to dictate to us, arms in hand, the decrees that would please him. The Nat
ional Assembly, I say, has today in twenty decrees called the king s flight an abd
uction. We can guess for what reason.
Do you want any other proofs that the National Assembly betrays the interests of
the nation? What measures did it take this morning? Here are the principal ones
:
The Minister of War will continue in office, under the oversight of the Diplomat
ic Committee, and the same for the other ministers.
And what is the Minister of War? It s a man who I have never ceased denouncing to
you, who has constantly followed in the steps of his predecessors, persecuting t
he patriotic soldiers, and naming aristocratic officers. What is the Military Co
mmittee that is charged with watching over him? It s a committee entirely made up
of disguised aristocratic colonels and our most dangerous enemies. I need only t
heir works to unmask them. The decrees most fatal for liberty have come from the
Military Committee.
What is the Minister of Foreign Affairs? It s a Montmorin who, a month ago, two we
eks ago, answered you saying that the king adored the constitution. It s to this t

raitor that you abandon foreign relations! Under whose oversight? Of the Diploma
tic Committee, of this committee where reigns an Andr, and where one of whose mem
bers told me that a man of good will, a man who wasn t a traitor to his country, c
ould not put his feet. I won t continue this review. Lessart no more has my confid
ence than does Necker, who left him his coat.
Citizens, have I demonstrated enough the depths of the abyss that is going to sw
allow up our freedom?
Do you see clearly enough the coalition of ministers of the king, some of whom,
if not all, I will never believe did not know of his flight? Do you see clearly
enough the coalition of your civil and military chiefs? It is such that I can t no
t believe that it didn t favor that escape, which they confess to have known about
. Do you see that coalition with your committees, with the National Assembly?
And as if this coalition wasn t strong enough, I know that soon a reunion with you
r best known enemies is going to be proposed to you; in a moment all 89, the may
or, the judge, the general, the ministers, it is said, are going to arrive here!
How can we escape? Antony commands the legions that are going to avenge Caesar!
And it s Octavian who commands the legions of the republic.
They talk bout unity, of the need to gather around the same men. Bur when Antony
camped around Lepidus and also spoke of unity there was soon nothing but the ca
mp of Antony, and there was nothing left for Brutus and Cassius but to kill them
selves.
I swear that all I have just said is the exact truth. You well know you would ne
ver hear it in the National Assembly. And here, among you, I feel that these tru
ths will not save the nation without a miracle of Providence, which deigns to be
tter look after freedom than your chiefs.
But I wanted to at least depose in your transcript a monument of all that is goi
ng to happen. At least I would have predicted everything to you; I will have tra
ced the march of your enemies, and I cannot be reproached for anything.
I know that by a denunciation
dangerous for me to make but not dangerous for the
public thing; I know that in thus accusing almost all of my colleagues, almost
all the members of the Assembly of being counter-revolutionary, some from ignora
nce, others from terror, others from resentment, others by wounded pride, others
from a blind confidence, many because they are corrupt, I raise up against me a
ll the prideful; I sharpen a thousand daggers, I offer myself to all the hatred.
I know the lot that is reserved for me. But if in the beginnings of the revoluti
on, and when I was barely glimpsed in the National Assembly, if when only my con
science was seen I sacrificed my life to the truth, to freedom, to the fatherlan
d, then today, when the suffrage of my fellow citizens, when universal benevolen
ce, when too much indulgence, recognition and attachment have paid me well for m
y sacrifice, I would receive death almost as a benefit that would prevent me fro
m witnessing the evils that I see to be inevitable.
I have just put the National Assembly on trial. I dare it to do the same to me.

On the Death Penalty

The news having been brought to Athens that citizens had been condemned to death
in the city of Argos, people ran to the temples, where the gods were called upo
n to turn Athenians away from such cruel and dire thoughts. I come to ask, not t
he gods, but legislators who should be the organs and the interpreters of the et

ernal laws that the divinity dictated to men

to erase from the code of the Frenc
h the blood laws that command judicial murders, and that their morals and their
new constitution reject. I want to prove to them: 1- that the death penalty is e
ssentially unjust and, 2- that it isn t the most repressive of penalties and that
it multiplies crimes more than it prevents them.
Outside of civil society, if a bitter enemy makes an attempt on my life or, push
ed away twenty times, he returns again to ravage the field that I cultivated wit
h my own hands; since I have only my individual strength to oppose to his I must
either perish or kill him, and the law of natural defense justifies and approve
s me. But in society, when the force of all is armed against only one, what prin
ciple of justice could authorize it to kill him? What necessity can absolve it?
A victor who kills his captive enemies is called a barbarian! A grown man who ki
lls a child that he could disarm and punish seems to us a monster! An accused ma
n condemned by society is nothing else for it but a defeated and powerless enemy
. Before it, he is weaker than a child before a grown man.
Thus, in the eyes of truth and justice these scenes of death that it orders with
so much ceremony, are nothing but cowardly assassinations, nothing but solemn c
rimes committed not by individuals but by entire nations using legal forms. Howe
ver cruel, however extravagant the laws, do not be surprised: they are the work
of a few tyrants, they are the chains with which they weigh down the human race,
they are the arms with which they subjugate it, they were written in blood. It
isn t permitted to put to death a Roman citizen; this was the law the people passe
d. But Scylla was victorious and said: All those who bore arms against me are wo
rthy of death. Octavian and his companions in crime confirmed this law.
It was a crime worthy of death under Tiberius to praise Brutus. Caligula condemn
ed to death those who were so sacrilegious as to undress before the image of the
emperor. Once tyranny invented the crime of lse-majest
which were actions either
indifferent or heroic who could have dared to think that it merited a penalty mo
re gentle than death without rendering himself guilty of lse-majest?
When fanaticism, born of the monstrous union of ignorance and despotism, invente
d in its turn the crime of divine lse-majest, when it conceived in its delirium th
e project of avenging god himself, was it not necessary that it offer him blood,
and that they bring him down to the level of the monsters who said they were hi
s image?
The death penalty is necessary, say the partisans of ancient and barbarous routi
ne. Without it there is no brake strong enough for crime. Who told you this? Hav
e you calculated all the gears by which penal laws can act on human sensibility?
Alas, before death how much physical and moral pain can man endure?
The desire to live cedes before pride, the most imperious of all the passions th
at master the heart of man. The most terrible of all punishments for social man
is opprobrium, is the overwhelming sight of public execration. When the legislat
or can strike the citizen in so many sensitive places and in so many ways, why w
ould he reduce himself to employing the death penalty? Punishments aren t imposed
to torment the guilty, but in order to prevent crime by the fear of incurring th
em.
The legislator who prefers death and atrocious penalties to the gentler means in
his power outrages public feeling and weakens the moral sentiment among the peo
ple he governs; like a clumsy preceptor who, by the frequent use of cruel punish
ments, stupefies and degrades the soul of his student; he wears out and weakens
the springs of government by wanting to wind them up too strongly.
The legislator who establishes this penalty renounces the salutary principle tha
t the must effective way to repress crimes is to adapt the punishment to the cha

racter of the different passions that produce it, and to punish them, so to say,
by themselves. It confounds all ideas, it troubles all relations, and openly co
ntradicts the goal of penal laws.
The death penalty is necessary, you say. If this is true, then why have several
peoples done without it? By what fatality were these people the wisest, the happ
iest and the freest? If the death penalty is the most apt to prevent great crime
s, then they should then have been most rare among the peoples who adopted and u
sed it. But the facts are precisely the contrary. Witness Japan: the death penal
ty and tortures are nowhere more widely used, and nowhere are crimes so frequent
and so atrocious. One might almost say that the Japanese want to dispute in fer
ocity the barbaric laws that outrage and irritate them. Did the Greek republics,
where penalties were moderate and where the death penalty was either infinitely
rare or absolutely unknown, offer more crime and less virtue than the countries
governed by blood laws? Do you think that Rome was soiled with more crimes when
in the days of its glory, the Porcian Laws wiped out the severe laws carried ou
t by kings and decimvirs, than it was under Scylla, who revived them, and under
the emperors, who carried their rigor to a point of excess worthy of their infam
ous tyranny. Has Russia been in turmoil since the despot who governs it entirely
suppressed the death penalty, as if by this act of humanity and philosophy he w
anted to expiate the crime of holding millions of men in the yoke of absolute po
wer?
Listen to the voice of justice and reason. It cries out to you that human judgem
ents are never certain enough to justify a society of men subject to error deali
ng death to another man. Even if you could imagine the most perfect judicial ord
er, even if you had found the most upright and enlightened judges, there would s
till remain some room for error or caution. Why forbid yourselves the means of r
epairing them? Why condemn yourselves to the inability to lend a helping hand to
oppressed innocence? What do sterile regrets, illusory reparations matter to a
vain shadow, to insensible ash? They are the sad testimony of the barbaric temer
ity of your penal laws. Take from a man the possibility to expiate his crime by
repentance or acts of virtue; pitilessly close off to him any return to virtue,
self-esteem, rush his descent, so to speak, into the tomb still covered by the r
ecent stain of his crime is, in my eyes, the most horrible refinement in cruelty
.
The first obligation of a legislator is to form and preserve public morals, the
source of all freedom, source of all social happiness. When in running to a part
icular goal he turns away from this general and essential goal he commits the mo
st vulgar and dire of errors. The king must thus present to the people the pures
t model of justice and reason. If in place of this powerful, calm and moderate s
everity that should characterize it they place anger and vengeance; if they spil
l human blood that they could spare and that they have no right to spread; if th
ey spread out before the people cruel scenes and cadavers wounded by torture, it
then alters in the hearts of citizens the ideas of the just and the unjust; the
y plant the seed in the midst of society of ferocious prejudices that will produ
ce others in their turn. Man is no longer for man so sacred an object: we have a
less grand idea of his dignity when public authority puts his life at risk. The
idea of murder inspires less fear when the law itself gives the example and the
spectacle. The horror of crime is diminished when it is punished by another cri
me. Do not confuse the effectiveness of a penalty with the excess of severity: t
he one is absolutely opposed to the other. Everything seconds moderate laws; eve
rything conspires against cruel laws.
It has been observed that in free countries crime was more rare and penal laws m
ore gentle. All ideas hold together. Free countries are those where the rights o
f man are respected and where, consequently, the laws are just. Where they offen
d humanity by an excess of rigor this is a proof that the dignity of man is not
known there, that that of the citizen doesn t exist. It is a proof that the legisl

ator is nothing but a master who commands slaves and who pitilessly punishes the
m according to his whim. I thus conclude that the death penalty should be abroga
ted.

On Subsistence Goods
To speak to the representatives of the people of the means of providing for its
subsistence is not only to speak to them about the most sacred of their obligati
ons, but of the most precious of their interests, for without a doubt they are m
ixed in with it. It is not the cause of the indigent alone that I want to plead,
but that of landowners and merchants themselves.
I will restrict myself to recalling some obvious principles that seem to have be
en forgotten. I will only indicate simple measures that have already been propos
ed, for it is a matter less of creating brilliant theories than of returning to
first notions of good sense.
In every country where nature furnishes man s needs with prodigality, shortages ca
n only be imputed to the vices of administrations or laws themselves. Bad laws a
nd bad administration have their source in false principles and bad morals.
It is a fact generally recognized that the soil of France produces much beyond w
hat is necessary to feed its inhabitants, and that the current shortages are man
-made shortages. The consequence of this fact and of the principle I proposed co
uld be troubling, but this isn t the moment to flatter ourselves. Citizens, it is
to you that the glory to make true principles triumph is reserved, and to give j
ust laws to the world. You are not made to drag yourselves in a servile fashion
in the ruts of tyrannical prejudices traced by those who came before you; rather
you are beginning a new career, one where no one has preceded you. You should a
t least submit to a severe examination all laws made under aristocratic despotis
m, be it noble, ecclesiastic or bourgeois, and up till now you have had no other
. The most imposing authority cited is that of a minister of Louis XVI, combated
by another minister of the same tyrant. I saw the birth of the legislation of t
he Constituent Assembly on the commerce in grains; it was nothing but that of th
e time that had preceded it; it hasn t changed up to this moment, since the intere
sts and prejudices that were the basis have not changed. At the time of this sam
e Assembly I saw the same events that are being renewed in this era; I saw arist
ocracy accuse the people, I saw hypocritical intriguers impute their own crimes
to the defenders of freedom, who they called agitators and anarchists. I saw an
impudent minister whose virtue was allowed to be suspected, demand adorations of
France while ruining it, from the midst of these criminal intrigues I saw tyran
ny emerge armed with martial law in order to legally bathe in the blood of starv
ing citizens. Millions for the minister, from whom it was forbidden to ask for a
n accounting; bonuses for the profit of the blood-suckers of the people; the unl
imited freedom of commerce; and bayonets to calm fear or to oppress hunger: this
was the policy vaunted by our first legislators.
The bonuses can be discussed; the freedom of commerce is necessary up to the poi
nt where homicidal cupidity becomes an abuse; the use of bayonets is an atrocity
. The system is essentially incomplete because it doesn t bear upon the true princ
iple.
The errors we have fallen into in this regard seem to come from two principal ca
uses;
The authors of the theory have only considered the goods necessary for life as a
form of ordinary merchandise, and haven t made any differentiation between the co

mmerce in wheat, for example, and that of indigo; they have spoken more on the c
ommerce in grains than on the people s subsistence. And for having failed to allow
this fact to enter into their calculations they have made a false application o
f principles evident in general. It is this mixture of true and false which has
loaned something specious to an erroneous system.
They have even less adapted it to the stormy circumstances brought about by revo
lutions, and if their vague theory were good in ordinary times it would find no
application in the rapid measures that moments of crisis demand of us. They have
counted for much the profits of merchants and landowners, and for almost nothin
g the lives of men. And why? It was the great, the ministers, the rich who wrote
, who governed. If it had been the people it s probable that the system would have
received a few modifications!
For example, good sense indicates this truth: that the commodities that are not
essential can be abandoned to the most unlimited speculations of the merchant. T
he momentary shortage that might be felt is always a bearable inconvenience, and
it is enough that in general the unlimited freedom of the market works to the g
reater profit of and state and individuals. But the lives of men cannot be subje
ct to the same chance. It isn t necessary that I be able to buy brilliant material
, but I do have to be rich enough to buy bread for myself and my children. The m
erchant can very well keep in his storehouse the merchandise that vanity and lux
ury desire up till the moment when he can sell them at the highest possible pric
e, but no man has the right to pile up stacks of wheat while next to him his lik
e dies of hunger.
What is the first object of society? It is to maintain the inviolable rights of
man. What is the first of these rights? The right to exist.
The first social law is thus that which guarantees to all society s members the me
ans of existence; all others are subordinated to it. Property was only institute
d or guaranteed to cement it. It is in order to live that we have property in th
e first case. It is not true that property can ever be in opposition with men s su
bsistence.
The aliments necessary to man are as sacred as life itself. Everything that is i
ndispensable for its preservation is a property common to all of society. Only t
he surplus is private property and is abandoned to the industry of merchants. An
y mercantile speculation that I make at the cost of the life of my like is not a
traffic, but brigandage and fratricide.
In accordance with this principle, what is the problem to be resolved in the mat
ter of legislation on subsistence? It is this: to assure to all members of socie
ty the enjoyment of the portion of the fruits of the earth that is necessary to
their existence: The price of their industry for landowners and cultivators, and
the delivery of the excess to the freedom of commerce.
I defy the most scrupulous defender of property to contest these principles, unl
ess they openly declare that they understand by this word the right to despoil a
nd assassinate their like. How then could it have been claimed that any kind of
hindrance or rather, any kind of rule, about the sale of wheat was an attack on
property and how could this barbarous system be disguised under the specious nam
e of freedom of commerce? Don t the authors of this system see that they are neces
sarily contradicting themselves?
Why are you forced to approve the prohibition of the exportation of grains to th
e exterior every time abundance isn t assured for the interior? You yourselves fix
the price of bread; do you fix that of spices, or of the brilliant products of
India? What is the cause of all these exceptions if it isn t the very obviousness
of the principles I have just expounded upon? What am I saying? The government s
ometimes subjects the very commerce of luxury items to the modifications that he
althy policy calls for. Why would that which deals with the subsistence of the p

eople be necessarily freed of this?

Doubtless if all men were just and virtuous, if cupidity was never tempted to de
vour the people s substance, if the rich, docile to the voice of reason and nature
, looked upon themselves as the economists of society, or as the brothers of the
poor it would be possible to recognize no other law than that of the most unlim
ited liberty. But if it s true that avarice can speculate on poverty, and tyranny
itself on the despair of the people; if it s true that all the passions declare wa
r on suffering humanity, why would the laws not repress these abuses? Why wouldn t
it stop the homicidal hand of the monopolizer, as it does that of the ordinary
assassin? Why wouldn t it occupy itself with the existence of the people after hav
ing occupied itself for such a long time of the enjoyments of the great and the
power of despots?
What then are the means of repressing these abuses? It s claimed that they are imp
ractical; I say that they are as simple as they are infallible. It is claimed th
at they offer an insoluble problem, even for those of genius; I say that they pr
esent no difficulty to good sense and good faith. I say that they don t harm neith
er the interests of commerce nor the rights of property.
Let circulation throughout the entire extent of the republic be protected, but l
et the necessary precautions be taken so that circulation take place. It s precise
ly the lack of circulation that I complain of. For the plague of the people, the
sources of shortages, are the obstacles put before circulation under the pretex
t of rendering it unlimited. Does public subsistence circulate when greedy specu
lators keep it piled up in their granaries? Does it circulate when it is accumul
ated in the hands of a small number of millionaires who remove it from commerce
in order to render it more precious and rare, who coldly calculate how many fami
lies must perish before the merchandise has reached the time fixed by their atro
cious avarice? Does it circulate when it only crosses the regions that produced
it, before the eyes of indigent citizens who suffer the torture of Tantalus befo
re filling the unknown abyss of some entrepreneur of public starvation? Does it
circulate when, next to the most abundant harvests, the needy citizen languishes
for not being able to give a piece of gold or a piece of paper precious enough
to obtain a parcel?
Circulation is that which puts products of premier necessity within the reach of
all men and brings abundance and life to the hearthside. Does blood circulate w
hen it is engorged in the brain or the breast? It circulates when it freely flow
s through the body. Subsistence is the blood of the people, and its free circula
tion is no less necessary to the health of the social body than that of blood to
the life of the human body. Favor then the free circulation of grain by prevent
ing all harmful engorgements. What is the means of fulfilling this object? Remov
e from greed the interest and the ability to carry it out. Three causes favor th
is: secrecy, freedom without restraint, and the certainty of impunity.
Secrecy: when each can hide the quantity of public subsistence which he deprives
all of society of. When he can fraudulently make it disappear and transport it
either to foreign countries or to storehouses in the interior. Simple methods, t
hen, are proposed: the first is to take the necessary precaution of learning the
amount of grain produced by each region and the amount harvested by each landow
ner or cultivator. The second consists in forcing grain merchants to sell them i
n the market and to forbid any transporting of purchases during the night. Neith
er the possibility nor the utility of these precautions needs to be proven, for
neither is contested. Is it their legitimacy? But how could we look upon rules o
f general policy, commanded by society s interests as attacks on property? Who the
n is the good citizen who could complain of being obliged to act with loyalty in
broad daylight? Who are the shadows necessary for if not monopolists and rascal
s? In any event, haven t I proved to you that society has the right to demand that
portion that is necessary for the subsistence of citizens? What am I saying? It

is the most sacred of obligations. How then could the laws necessary to assure
its exercise be unjust?
I said that the other causes of the disastrous operations of monopoly were unres
tricted freedom and impunity. What more certain way to encourage cupidity and to
free it from any hindrance than to pose as a principle that the law doesn t even
have the right to oversight in order to impose the slightest constraint? That th
e only rule prescribed for it is the power to dare to do anything with impunity?
What am I saying? Such is the degree of perfection to which this theory has bee
n taken that it has almost been established that those who corner markets are im
peccable, that monopolists are humanity s benefactors, that in the quarrels that a
rise between them and the people it is the people who are always wrong. Either t
he crime of monopoly is impossible, or it is real. If it s a chimera how is it tha
t this chimera has always been believed in? Why have we felt the ravages since t
he first moments of the revolution? Why do credible reports and incontestable fa
cts denounce these guilty maneuvers to us? If it is real, by what strange privil
ege does it alone obtain the right to be protected? What limits would the pitile
ss vampires who speculate on public misery put on their attacks if bayonets and
the absolute order to believe in the purity and beneficence of the monopolists w
ere opposed to any demand? Unlimited freedom is nothing but the excuse, the safe
guard and the cause of this abuse. How could it be the remedy? What is complaine
d of? Precisely those ills that the current system has produced, or at least the
ills it could not prevent. And what remedy is proposed? The current system. I d
enounce to you the assassins of the people and you respond: let them be. In this
system everything is against society, everything is in favor of the grain merch
ants.
It is here, legislators, that all your wisdom and circumspection are necessary.
Such a subject is always delicate to deal with. It is dangerous to redouble the
fears of the people and to even seem to authorize its discontent. It is even mor
e dangerous to be silent about the truth and to hide principles. But if you foll
ow them all inconveniences disappear: principles alone can dry up the sources of
evil.
I well know that when we examine the circumstances of this or that particular ri
ot, excited by either the real or man-made shortages of wheat, the influence of
a foreign cause can sometimes be recognized. Ambition and intrigue feel the need
to stir up troubles. Sometimes it is the same men who excite the people in orde
r to find the pretext to slaughter them and to render freedom itself terrible in
the eyes of week and selfish men. But it is nonetheless true that the people ar
e naturally upright and peaceful; they are always guided by pure intentions: tho
se with evil intentions can not move them unless they present a motive both powe
rful and legitimate in its eyes. They profit from discontent more than cause it,
and when they bring the people to ill-considered actions, using subsistence goo
ds as the pretext, it s only because they are predisposed to receive these impress
ions by oppression and poverty. A happy people has never been a turbulent people
. Whoever knows men, whoever especially knows the French people, knows that it i
s not in the power of a fool or a bad citizen to rise the people up without any
reason against the laws they love; even less against its elected representatives
and the freedom it has conquered. It is up to the representatives themselves to
bear witness to the confidence given them and to disconcert aristocratic evil b
y taking care of the people s needs and calming their fears.
The very fears of the people must be respected. How can they be calmed if you re
main inactive? The very measures proposed, even if they weren t as necessary as we
think; it is enough that the people desire them, it s enough that they prove in t
heir eyes your attachment to their interests in order to determine you to adopt
them. I have already indicated the nature and the spirit of these laws; I will c
ontent myself here with demanding priority for the projected decree that propose
s precautionary measures against monopoly, reserving to myself the right to prop

ose modifications if it is adopted. I have already proved that these measures, a

nd the principles upon which they are founded, were necessary to the people. I a
m going to prove that they are useful to the rich and all landowners.
I don t take from them any honest profit, any legitimate property. I only take fro
m them the right to attack that of others. I don t at all destroy commerce, rather
the brigandage of the monopolist. I only condemn them to the penalty of letting
their like live. Nothing then could be more advantageous to them: the greatest
service that a legislator can render men is to force them to be honest men. Man s
greatest interest is not to amass treasure, and the sweetest property is not to
devour the subsistence of a hundred unfortunate families. The pleasure of reliev
ing his like and the glory of serving the fatherland are easily worth this deplo
rable advantage. What use could the unlimited freedom of their odious traffic be
to the greediest of speculators? To be either oppressed or oppressors. This lat
ter destiny is atrocious. Rich men, egoists: know how to prevent and prevent in
advance the terrible results of the struggle of pride and cowardly passions carr
y out against justice and humanity. Let the example of nobles and kings teach yo
u. Learn to appreciate the charms of equality and the pleasures of virtue. Or at
least content yourselves with the advantages fortune gives you and leave the pe
ople bread, labor and morality. It is in vain that the enemies of freedom act to
tear at their fatherland s breast. They can no more stop the course of human reas
on than that of the sun. Cowardice will not triumph over courage. The genius of
intrigue must flee before the genius of freedom. And you, legislators, remember
that you are not representatives of a privileged caste, but that of the French p
eople; don t forget that justice is the source of order; that the surest guarantee
of public tranquility is the happiness of citizens, and that the long convulsio
ns that tear states apart are nothing but the combat of prejudices against princ
iples, of egoism against general interest, of the pride and passions of powerful
men against the rights and needs of the weak.

Prospectus for Le Dfenseur de la Constitution

Reason and the public interest began the revolution; intrigue and ambition have
halted it. The vices of tyrants and slaves have changed it into a painful state
of trouble and crisis.
The majority of the nation wants to rest under the auspices of the new Constitut
ion, on the breast of freedom and peace. What causes have deprived it of this do
uble advantage up till now? Ignorance and division. The majority desires the goo
d, but it neither knows the means to reach this goal nor the obstacles that dist
ance them from it. Even the best intentioned of men differ on the questions most
strictly related to the general happiness. All the enemies of the Constitution
borrow the name and language of patriotism to spread error, discord and false pr
inciples. Writers prostitute their venal pens in this odious enterprise. It is t
hus that public opinion is excited and becomes disorganized; the general will be
comes powerless and invalid and patriotism, without a system, without a plan, an
d without a determined objective, acts slowly and fruitlessly, or sometimes seco
nds, through blind impetuosity, the evil projects of the enemies of our freedom.
In this situation one means alone is left to us to save the public thing, and th
at s the enlightenment of the zeal of good citizens in order to lead them towards
a common goal. To rally all of them to the principles of the Constitution and th
e general interest; to bring into broad daylight the true causes of our ills and
to indicate the remedies; to develop in the eyes of the Nation the reasons, the
general view, and the consequences of the political operations that have an inf
luence over the fate of the State and its liberty; to analyze the public conduct
of the personalities who play the principle roles in the theatre of the revolut

ion; to cite before the tribunal of opinion and truth those who with ease escape
d from the tribunal of the laws and who can decide the destiny of France and the
Universe. This is without a doubt the greatest service a Citizen can render the
public cause.
A periodical that would fulfill this project seemed to me to be the occupation m
ost worthy of friends of the Fatherland and humanity. I dare to undertake this.
The spirit that guides it is announced by its title: The Defender of the Constitu
tion.
Placed since the beginning of our revolution at the center of political events,
I saw from up close the tortuous march of tyranny. I saw that the most dangerous
of our enemies are not those who openly declared themselves such, and I will wo
rk to see that this knowledge be made useful for the salvation of my country.
I need not say that only the love of justice and truth will guide my pen: it s on
this condition alone that, having descended from the tribune of the French Senat
e one can still climb to that of the universe and speak, not to the assembly whi
ch can be agitated by the shock of diverse interests but to humankind, whose int
erest is that of reason and general happiness. Perhaps when once one has left th
e theatre to sit among the spectators one can better judge the stage and the act
ors. At the very least it seems that once having escaped the maelstrom of affair
s one breathes in an atmosphere more peaceful and pure, and one has a more certa
in judgment on men and things, much like he who flees the tumult of the city to
climb to the summit of the mountain feels the calm of nature penetrate his soul,
and his ideas expand with the horizon.
I have seen well-known members of the legislature, who bring together two functi
ons of almost equal importance, recount and appraise in their writings the next
day the operations in which they participated the day before in the National Ass
embly.
Though this last occupation sufficed in keeping me completely occupied when it w
as confided to me, I nevertheless applauded those legislators who rendered that
striking homage to the necessity for and the dignity of
the ministry of philosop
hical and political writers. I even believe that they have a double right to the
esteem of their fellows if they fulfill both tasks with the same integrity. He
who declares himself the censor of vice, the apostle of reason and truth must be
neither less pure nor less courageous than the legislator himself. The errors o
f the latter leave a great resource to public spirit and opinion. But when opini
on is degraded, when public spirit is twisted, the last hope of freedom is annih
ilated. The writer who prostitutes his pen to hatred, to despotism or corruption
betraying the cause of patriotism and humanity
is more vile than the prevaricat
ing magistrate, more criminal than even the representative who sells out the rig
hts of the people.
Such is my profession of faith; such will be the spirit and objective of the wor
k that I consecrate to the freedom of my country.
This work will appear every Thursday; each issue will be three or four pages lon
g.

Notice to Subscribers
Current circumstances and the approach of the National Convention seem to warn u
s that the title of Defender of the Constitution is no longer appropriate for this
work, even though we declared from the beginning that it wasn t its defects we wa
nted to defend but its principles. Though our wish was never to defend it agains

t the wishes of the people who could and should perfect it, but against the cour
t and against all the enemies of freedom who wanted to destroy it or have it det
eriorate. We will henceforth continue this work under a title more analogous to
the conjuncture in which we find ourselves.
Since pressing circumstances have caused a certain delay in the issuing of issue
s, we will repair this as soon as possible.

Robespierre 1793
For the Defense of the Committee of Public Safety
If my quality as member of the Committee of Public Safety must prevent me from e
xplaining myself with entire independence on what has happened, then I must abdi
cate it this instant. And after having separated myself from my colleagues, who
I esteem and honor (and it s well-known that I am not prodigal in the sentiment) I
will tell my country the necessary truths. The truth is the only weapon that re
mains in the hands of the intrepid defenders of freedom in order to bring down t
he perfidious agents of aristocracy. He who seeks to debase, to divide, to paral
yze the Convention is an enemy of the fatherland, whether he sits in this hall o
r is a foreigner (applause). Whether he acts by stupidity or perversity he is of
the party of the tyrants who make war upon us. But this project of debasement e
xists in the very places where patriotism should reign, in the clubs that claim
to be more than patriotic. War is made on the Convention in the persons of all t
he defenders of freedom. And what is most deplorable is that this cowardly syste
m has partisans here.
For a long time the Committee of Public Safety has put up with a war made on it
by several members who are more envious than just. While it is busy day and nigh
t with the great interests of the Fatherland, written denunciations, presented w
ith guile, are brought here. Can it then be that the Citizens you have charged w
ith the most difficult functions have lost the title of imperturbable defenders
of freedom because they've accepted this burden? Are those who attack them more
patriotic because they haven t received this mark of confidence? Do you claim that
those who defended freedom here at the risk of their lives, in the midst of dag
gers, should be treated like vile protectors of aristocracy? We will brave calum
nies and intrigues. But the Convention is attached to the Committee of Public Sa
fety; your glory is tied to the success of those who you have garbed in national
confidence.
We are accused of doing nothing, but has our position been thought on? Eleven ar
mies to direct, the weight of all of Europe to bear; everywhere there are traito
rs to unmask, emissaries bribed by the gold of foreign powers to foil, unfaithfu
l administrators to watch over, to pursue; everywhere we must level the obstacle
s and hindrances to the execution of the wisest measures; all the tyrants to com
bat, all the conspirators to intimidate, those who can almost always be found in
a caste once so powerful because of its riches, and even more by its intrigues,
these are our functions. Do you believe that without unity in action, without s
ecrecy in its operations, without the certainty of finding support within the Co
nvention that the government could triumph over so many obstacles and so many en
emies? No. Only the most extreme ignorance, only the most profound perversity co
uld claim that in such circumstances those who play the cruel game of vilifying
those who are at the helm of affairs, of hindering their operations, of slanderi
ng their conduct are not enemies of the fatherland. It is not with impunity that
you will leave aside the necessary force of opinion. No other proof is necessar
y than the discussions that have just taken place.

The Committee of Public Safety sees treason in the midst of a victory. It dismis
ses a general still garbed in the splendor of an apparent victory, and his very
courage is called a crime! It expels traitors and casts its gaze on the officers
who showed the most civisme. It chooses them after having consulted the represe
ntatives of the people who had particular knowledge of the characters of each of
them. This operation required secrecy in order to be completely successful, the
safety of the fatherland demanded it. We took all the necessary measures so tha
t secrecy should be guarded, even if it was only in relation to other armies. An
d now, at the moment in which we are impatient to know the result of these measu
res, we are denounced at the National Convention, our work is criticized without
knowledge our motives, they want us to divulge the Republic s secrets, that we gi
ve traitors the time to escape; it is hoped to strike with disfavor the new choi
ces, doubtless in order to prevent the reestablishment of confidence.
The nobles are ceaselessly declaimed against; it is said that they must be dismi
ssed and, by a strange coincidence, when we execute this great revolutionary mea
sure, and we bring to it all possible consideration, we are denounced. We have j
ust dismissed two nobles, that is, one of the men of this proscribed caste, thos
e must suspect by their former relations with the court, and another known for h
is ties and his zeal with foreign nobles, the one and the other pronouncedly ari
stocratic. So we're accused of disorganizing everything. We're told that we want
ed to see only true sans-culottes at the head of the armies. We chose those whos
e new exploits in the affairs at Bergues and Dunkirk designated them for nationa
l recognition, who won despite Houchard, who deployed the greatest talent, for t
he attack of Hondschoote should have wiped out the French army. It s principally t
o Jourdan that the amazing success that honored that army is due, which forced t
he raising of the siege of Dunkirk. It is that officer who, at the moment when t
he army didn t expect to find 18,000 well-entrenched men, and where it was surpris
ed by the discharge of a frightening artillery, it is Jourdan who at the head of
a battalion took off into the enemy camp, which made his courage pass to the re
st of the army, and the taking of Hondschoote was the effect of his able disposi
tions and the ardor he knew how to inspire.
The head of headquarters being justly suspect, we replaced him by a man whose ta
lents and patriotism were attested to by all the commissioners; a man known by e
xploits that signaled him at the very time when the most odious treasons sacrifi
ced that army. His name is Ernould. He distinguished himself in the last affair
and was even wounded. And we are denounced!
We have made the same changes in the armies of the Moselle and the Rhine. All of
our choices were made for men of the character of he I just depicted to you. An
d we are still accused!
If there are some moral presumptions that can guide the government and serve as
rules for legislators, it is certainly those which we have followed in these ope
rations.
What is then the cause for this denunciation?
I dare say that that day was worth three victories for Pitt. What success can he
claim if it is not the annihilation of the national Government established by t
he Convention, dividing us, and making us tear ourselves apart with our own hand
s? And if in Europe we pass for imbeciles or traitors, do you think that they wi
ll have more respect for the Convention that chose us, that they will even be di
sposed to respect the authorities that you will afterwards establish?
It is thus important that the government be consistent, and that you replace a c
ommittee that has successfully been denounced in your midst (No! No! the assembl
y cries out with unanimity).

It s not a question here of individuals; it s a question of the fatherland and of pr

inciples. I declare this: in the current state of affairs, it is impossible for
the Committee to save the public thing. And if I am contested on this I will rem
ind everyone how perfidious, how widespread is the system to vilify and dissolve
us; how many paid agents foreigners and internal enemies have to this effect; I
will recall that the faction is not dead, that it conspires in the depths of it
s cells, that the serpents of the Marais have not yet all been crushed (applause
.)
The men who perpetually declaim, whether here or elsewhere, against those men wh
o are at the head of the government have themselves given proof of lack of civis
me and baseness. Why then do they want to debase us? Which of our acts have dese
rved this ignominy?
I know that we cannot flatter ourselves that we have attained perfection. But wh
en one must support a republic surrounded by enemies, arm reason in favor of fre
edom, destroy prejudices, render void individual efforts against the public inte
rest, moral and physical forces are necessary that nature has perhaps refused bo
th to those who denounce us and those we combat.
The Committee has earned the hatred of kings and rascals; if you don t believe in
its zeal, in the services it has rendered to the public thing, smash this instru
ment. But before doing so, examine the circumstances in which you find yourselve
s. Those who denounce us have themselves been denounced to the committee. From t
he accusers they are today, they are going to become the accused (applause). But
who are these men who rise up against the conduct of the Committee, who in this
session have worsened your reverses in order to worsen their accusations?
The first declared himself the partisan of Custine and Lamorlire. He was the pers
ecutor of patriots in an important fortress, and lately he dared to advise the a
bandonment of a territory united with the republic, whose inhabitants, denounced
by him, defend themselves with energy against the fanatics and the English.
The second has not yet repaired the shame with which he covered himself in retur
ning from a place whose defense was confided in him after having surrendered it
to the Austrians. Without a doubt, if such men manage to prove that the Committe
e isn t composed of good men, then liberty is lost, for it will doubtless not be t
o them that enlightened opinion will give its confidence and hand over the reins
of government! And don t think that it is my intention to render imputation for i
mputation. Jep commits to never dividing the patriots, but I don t include among t
he patriots those who only wear the mask, and I will unmask the conduct of two o
r three traitors who have here been the artisans of discord and dissension (appl
ause).
I thus think that the fatherland is lost if the Committee doesn t enjoy unlimited
confidence, and if it isn t composed of men who deserve it. I demand that that the
Committee of Public Safety be renewed (No! No! is cried out throughout the asse
mbly)
Interventions by Briez, Jeanbon Saint-Andr and Billaud Varenne. The order of the
day is demanded.
To pass to the order of the day is to open the door to all the misfortunes that
I just exposed. The Convention cannot be silent on that which tends to paralyze
the government. The explanations that have been given are insufficient. The only
result is that the members of the Committee of Public Safety who have spoken se
emed to be defending their cause, and you haven t pronounced. It means giving the
advantage to those men who slandered it, not always here, but secretly, in a way
all the more perfidious for having seemed to applaud it before you when it made
its reports. For I say to you that the most painful sentiment I felt was having

seen Barre applauded by the very men who have never ceased indiscriminately slan
dering all the members of the Committee, by those very men who would perhaps lik
e to see us with a dagger in the breast (applause).
A member has said that everyone should be able to give his opinion on the operat
ions of the Committee of Public safety; I don t disagree. The functions of the Com
mittee of Public Safety are arduous, and it is because of this that it cannot sa
ve the fatherland without the Convention. In order to save the fatherland one mu
st have a great deal of character, great virtues. Men are needed who have the co
urage to propose strong measures, who even dare to attack the pride of individua
ls (applause). Without a doubt everyone is free to express his opinion about the
Committee. But this freedom should not go so far that a deputy recalled from th
e depths of the departments because he has been judged to have ceased serving th
e people well should go on the attack and accuse the Committee (applause).
Citizens, I promised you the whole truth and I'm going to tell it; in this discu
ssion the Convention has not shown all the energy it should have; a report was d
elivered to you about Valenciennes, the apparent goal of which was to instruct y
ou on all the circumstances surrounding the surrender of that place, but the rea
l object of which was to indict the Committee of Public Safety. As price for his
vague accusation, the author of this report is an assistant on the Committee he
denounces. Well I say to you, he who was at Valenciennes when the enemy entered
there is not fit to be member of the Committee of Public Safety (lively applaus
e). This member will never respond to this question:
Are you dead? (applause repeated several times). If I had been in Valenciennes u
nder those circumstances I would never have been in a position to deliver a repo
rt on the events of the siege. I would have wanted to share the fate of the brav
e defenders who preferred an honorable death to a shameful capitulation (applaus
e). And since one must be republican, since one must have energy, I say to you t
hat I wouldn t be member of a committee in which such a man could participate.
This might seem harsh, but what is harsher still for a patriot is that for two y
ears, 100,000 men have been killed by treason or weakness; it is weakness before
traitors that harms us. We are tender towards the most criminal men, towards th
ose who deliver the fatherland to the enemy s steel. I only know how to be moved b
y the fate of a generous people who are slaughtered with so much villainy (appla
use).
I add a word on our accusers: it cannot be that, on pretext of the freedom of op
inion, a committee that serves the fatherland well should be slandered with impu
nity by those who, being able to crush one of the hydra heads of federalism, did
not do so due to an excess of weakness, nor any of those who, at this tribune,
coldly proposed the abandonment of Mont-Blanc to the Piedmontese. (applause.)
As for the proposal of Billaud-Varenne, I attach no importance to it, and I don t
find this impolitic. If the 50 million put at the disposal of the Committee coul
d fix the attention of the Convention one instant it wouldn t be worthy of working
for the salvation of the fatherland. I say that it is not necessary to believe
in probity in order to suspect the Committee of Public Safety (applause). That t
he tyrants who hate us, their salaried slanderers, the journalists who serve the
m so well spread those falsehoods to vilify us, this I can conceive. But it s not
up to us to ward off such charges and respond to them. It s enough that I feel in
my heart the strength to defend unto death the cause of the people, which is gre
at and sublime. It s enough for me to hold in contempt all the tyrants and the ras
cals who second them (applause).
I summarize and I say that all the explanations that have been given are insuffi
cient. We can hold the slanderers in contempt, but the agents of the tyrants who
surround us observe us and gather all they can to vilify the defenders of the p

eople. It s for them, it s to ward off their impostures, that the National Conventio
n must proclaim that it maintains its confidence in the Committee of Public Safe
ty.

Robespierre February 1794

On the Principles of Political Morality
Citizens, Representatives of the People:
Some time since we laid before you the principles of our exterior political syst
em, we now come to develop the principles of political morality which are to gov
ern the interior. After having long pursued the path which chance pointed out, c
arried away in a manner by the efforts of contending factions, the Representativ
es of the People at length acquired a character and produced a form of governmen
t. A sudden change in the success of the nation announced to Europe the regenera
tion which was operated in the national representation. But to this point of tim
e, even now that I address you, it must be allowed that we have been impelled th
ro' the tempest of a revolution, rather by a love of right and a feeling of the
wants of our country, than by an exact theory, and precise rules of conduct, whi
ch we had not even leisure to sketch.
It is time to designate clearly the purposes of the revolution and the point whi
ch we wish to attain: It is time we should examine ourselves the obstacles which
yet are between us and our wishes, and the means most proper to realize them: A
consideration simple and important which appears not yet to have been contempla
ted. Indeed, how could a base and corrupt government have dared to view themselv
es in the mirror of political rectitude? A king, a proud senate, a Caesar, a Cro
mwell; of these the first care was to cover their dark designs under the cloak o
f religion, to covenant with every vice, caress every party, destroy men of prob
ity, oppress and deceive the people in order to attain the end of their perfidio
us ambition. If we had not had a task of the first magnitude to accomplish; if a
ll our concern had been to raise a party or create a new aristocracy, we might h
ave believed, as certain writers more ignorant than wicked asserted, that the pl
an of the French revolution was to be found written in the works of Tacitus and
of Machiavel; we might have sought the duties of the representatives of the peop
le in the history of Augustus, of Tiberius, or of Vespasian, or even in that of
certain French legislators; for tyrants are substantially alike and only differ
by trifling shades of perfidy and cruelty.
For our part we now come to make the whole world partake in your political secre
ts, in order that all friends of their country may rally at the voice of reason
and public interest, and that the French nation and her representatives be respe
cted in all countries which may attain a knowledge of their true principles; and
that intriguers who always seek to supplant other intriguers may be judged by p
ublic opinion upon settled and plain principles.
Every precaution must early be used to place the interests of freedom in the han
ds of truth, which is eternal, rather than in those of men who change; so that i
f the government forgets the interests of the people or falls into the hands of
men corrupted, according to the natural course of things, the light of acknowled
ged principles should unmask their treasons, and that every new faction may read
its death in the very thought of a crime.
Happy the people that attains this end; for, whatever new machinations are plott

ed against their liberty, what resources does not public reason present when gua
ranteeing freedom!
What is the end of our revolution? The tranquil enjoyment of liberty and equalit
y; the reign of that eternal justice, the laws of which are graven, not on marbl
e or stone, but in the hearts of men, even in the heart of the slave who has for
gotten them, and in that of the tyrant who disowns them.
We wish that order of things where all the low and cruel passions are enchained,
all the beneficent and generous passions awakened by the laws; where ambition s
ubsists in a desire to deserve glory and serve the country: where distinctions g
row out of the system of equality, where the citizen submits to the authority of
the magistrate, the magistrate obeys that of the people, and the people are gov
erned by a love of justice; where the country secures the comfort of each indivi
dual, and where each individual prides himself on the prosperity and glory of hi
s country; where every soul expands by a free communication of republican sentim
ents, and by the necessity of deserving the esteem of a great people: where the
arts serve to embellish that liberty which gives them value and support, and com
merce is a source of public wealth and not merely of immense riches to a few ind
ividuals.
We wish in our country that morality may be substituted for egotism, probity for
false honour, principles for usages, duties for good manners, the empire of rea
son for the tyranny of fashion, a contempt of vice for a contempt of misfortune,
pride for insolence, magnanimity for vanity, the love of glory for the love of
money, good people for good company, merit for intrigue, genius for wit, truth f
or tinsel show, the attractions of happiness for the ennui of sensuality, the gr
andeur of man for the littleness of the great, a people magnanimous, powerful, h
appy, for a people amiable, frivolous and miserable; in a word, all the virtues
and miracles of a Republic instead of all the vices and absurdities of a Monarch
y.
We wish, in a word, to fulfill the intentions of nature and the destiny of man,
realize the promises of philosophy, and acquit providence of a long reign of cri
me and tyranny. That France, once illustrious among enslaved nations, may, by ec
lipsing the glory of all free countries that ever existed, become a model to nat
ions, a terror to oppressors, a consolation to the oppressed, an ornament of the
universe and that, by sealing the work with our blood, we may at least witness
the dawn of the bright day of universal happiness. This is our ambition, - this
is the end of our efforts....
Since virtue and equality are the soul of the republic, and that your aim is to
found, to consolidate the republic, it follows, that the first rule of your poli
tical conduct should be, to let all your measures tend to maintain equality and
encourage virtue, for the first care of the legislator should be to strengthen t
he principles on which the government rests. Hence all that tends to excite a lo
ve of country, to purify manners, to exalt the mind, to direct the passions of t
he human heart towards the public good, you should adopt and establish. All that
tends to concenter and debase them into selfish egotism, to awaken an infatuati
on for littlenesses, and a disregard for greatness, you should reject or repress
. In the system of the French revolution that which is immoral is impolitic, and
what tends to corrupt is counter-revolutionary. Weaknesses, vices, prejudices a
re the road to monarchy. Carried away, too often perhaps, by the force of ancien
t habits, as well as by the innate imperfection of human nature, to false ideas
and pusillanimous sentiments, we have more to fear from the excesses of weakness
, than from excesses of energy. The warmth of zeal is not perhaps the most dange
rous rock that we have to avoid; but rather that languour which ease produces an
d a distrust of our own courage. Therefore continually wind up the sacred spring
of republican government, instead of letting it run down. I need not say that I
am not here justifying any excess. Principles the most sacred may be abused: th

e wisdom of government should guide its operations according to circumstances, i

t should time its measures, choose its means; for the manner of bringing about g
reat things is an essential part of the talent of producing them, just as wisdom
is an essential attribute of virtue....
It is not necessary to detail the natural consequences of the principle of democ
racy, it is the principle itself, simple yet copious, which deserves to be devel
oped.
Republican virtue may be considered as it respects the people and as it respects
the government. It is necessary in both. When however, the government alone wan
t it, there exists a resource in that of the people; but when the people themsel
ves are corrupted liberty is already lost.
Happily virtue is natural in the people, [despite] aristocratical prejudices. A
nation is truly corrupt, when, after having, by degrees lost its character and l
iberty, it slides from democracy into aristocracy or monarchy; this is the death
of the political body by decrepitude....
But, when, by prodigious effects of courage and of reason, a whole people break
asunder the fetters of despotism to make of the fragments trophies to liberty; w
hen, by their innate vigor, they rise in a manner from the arms of death, to res
ume all the strength of youth when, in turns forgiving and inexorable, intrepid
and docile, they can neither be checked by impregnable ramparts, nor by innumera
ble armies of tyrants leagued against them, and yet of themselves stop at the vo
ice of the law; if then they do not reach the heights of their destiny it can on
ly be the fault of those who govern.
Again, it may be said, that to love justice and equality the people need no grea
t effort of virtue; it is sufficient that they love themselves....
If virtue be the spring of a popular government in times of peace, the spring of
that government during a revolution is virtue combined with terror: virtue, wit
hout which terror is destructive; terror, without which virtue is impotent. Terr
or is only justice prompt, severe and inflexible; it is then an emanation of vir
tue; it is less a distinct principle than a natural consequence of the general p
rinciple of democracy, applied to the most pressing wants of the country.
It has been said that terror is the spring of despotic government. Does yours th
en resemble despotism? Yes, as the steel that glistens in the hands of the heroe
s of liberty resembles the sword with which the satellites of tyranny are armed.
Let the despot govern by terror his debased subjects; he is right as a despot:
conquer by terror the enemies of liberty and you will be right as founders of th
e republic. The government in a revolution is the despotism of liberty against t
yranny. Is force only intended to protect crime? Is not the lightning of heaven
made to blast vice exalted?
The law of self-preservation, with every being whether physical or moral, is the
first law of nature. Crime butchers innocence to secure a throne, and innocence
struggles with all its might against the attempts of crime. If tyranny reigned
one single day not a patriot would survive it. How long yet will the madness of
despots be called justice, and the justice of the people barbarity or rebellion?
- How tenderly oppressors and how severely the oppressed are treated! Nothing m
ore natural: whoever does not abhor crime cannot love virtue. Yet one or the oth
er must be crushed. Let mercy be shown the royalists exclaim some men. Pardon th
e villains! No: be merciful to innocence, pardon the unfortunate, show compassio
n for human weakness.
The protection of government is only due to peaceable citizens; and all citizens
in the republic are republicans. The royalists, the conspirators, are strangers

, or rather enemies. Is not this dreadful contest, which liberty maintains again
st tyranny, indivisible? Are not the internal enemies the allies of those in the
exterior? The assassins who lay waste the interior; the intriguers who purchase
the consciences of the delegates of the people: the traitors who sell them; the
mercenary libellists paid to dishonor the cause of the people, to smother publi
c virtue, to fan the flame of civil discord, and bring about a political counter
revolution by means of a moral one; all these men, are they less culpable or le
ss dangerous than the tyrants whom they serve? ...
To punish the oppressors of humanity is clemency; to forgive them is cruelty. Th
e severity of tyrants has barbarity for its principle; that of a republican gove
rnment is founded on beneficence. Therefore let him beware who should dare to in
fluence the people by that terror which is made only for their enemies! Let him
beware, who, regarding the inevitable errors of civism in the same light, with t
he premeditated crimes of perfidiousness, or the attempts of conspirators, suffe
rs the dangerous intriguer to escape and pursues the peaceable citizen! Death to
the villain who dares abuse the sacred name of liberty or the powerful arms int
ended for her defence, to carry mourning or death to the patriotic heart. ...

Robespierre February 1794

Justification of the Use of Terror
Maximilien Robespierre (1758-1794) was the leader of the twelve-man Committee of
Public Safety elected by the National Convention, and which effectively governe
d France at the height of the radical phase of the revolution.
The committee was among the most creative executive bodies ever seen - and rapid
ly put into effect policies which stabilized the French economy and began the fo
rmation of the very successful French army. It also directed it energies against
counter-revolutionary uprisings, especially in the south and west of France. In
doing so it unleashed the reign of terror. Here Robespierre, in his speech of F
ebruary 5, 1794, from which excerpts are given here, discussed this issue. The f
igures behind this speech indicate that in the five months from September, 1793,
to February 5, 1794, the revolutionary tribunal in Paris convicted and executed
238 men and 31 women and acquitted 190 persons, and that on February 5 there we
re 5,434 individuals in the prisons in Paris awaiting trial.
But, to found and consolidate democracy, to achieve the peaceable reign of the c
onstitutional laws, we must end the war of liberty against tyranny and pass safe
ly across the storms of the revolution: such is the aim of the revolutionary sys
tem that you have enacted. Your conduct, then, ought also to be regulated by the
stormy circumstances in which the republic is placed; and the plan of your admi
nistration must result from the spirit of the revolutionary government combined
with the general principles of democracy.
Now, what is the fundamental principle of the democratic or popular government-t
hat is, the essential spring which makes it move? It is virtue; I am speaking of
the public virtue which effected so many prodigies in Greece and Rome and which
ought to produce much more surprising ones in republican France; of that virtue
which is nothing other than the love of country and of its laws.
But as the essence of the republic or of democracy is equality, it follows that
the love of country necessarily includes the love of equality.
It is also true that this sublime sentiment assumes a preference for the public
interest over every particular interest; hence the love of country presupposes o
r produces all the virtues: for what are they other than that spiritual strength

which renders one capable of those sacrifices? And how could the slave of avari
ce or ambition, for example, sacrifice his idol to his country?
Not only is virtue the soul of democracy; it can exist only in that government.
...
* * *
Republican virtue can be considered in relation to the people and in relation to
the government; it is necessary in both. When only the govemment lacks virtue,
there remains a resource in the people's virtue; but when the people itself is c
orrupted, liberty is already lost.
Fortunately virtue is natural to the people, notwithstanding aristocratic prejud
ices. A nation is truly corrupted when, having by degrees lost its character and
its liberty, it passes from democracy to aristocracy or to monarchy; that is th
e decrepitude and death of the body politic. ...
But when, by prodigious efforts of courage and reason, a people breaks the chain
s of despotism to make them into trophies of liberty; when by the force of its m
oral temperament it comes, as it were, out of the arms of the death, to recaptur
e all the vigor of youth; when by tums it is sensitive and proud, intrepid and d
ocile, and can be stopped neither by impregnable ramparts nor by the innumerable
ammies of the tyrants armed against it, but stops of itself upon confronting th
e law's image; then if it does not climb rapidly to the summit of its destinies,
this can only be the fault of those who govern it.
* * *
From all this let us deduce a great truth: the characteristic of popular governm
ent is confidence in the people and severity towards itself.
The whole development of our theory would end here if you had only to pilot the
vessel of the Republic through calm waters; but the tempest roars, and the revol
ution imposes on you another task.
This great purity of the French revolution's basis, the very sublimity of its ob
jective, is precisely what causes both our strength and our weakness. Our streng
th, because it gives to us truth's ascendancy over imposture, and the rights of
the public interest over private interests; our weakness, because it rallies all
vicious men against us, all those who in their hearts contemplated despoiling t
he people and all those who intend to let it be despoiled with impunity, both th
ose who have rejected freedom as a personal calamity and those who have embraced
the revolution as a career and the Republic as prey. Hence the defection of so
many ambitious or greedy men who since the point of departure have abandoned us
along the way because they did not begin the journey with the same destination i
n view. The two opposing spirits that have been represented in a struggle to rul
e nature might be said to be fighting in this great period of human history to f
ix irrevocably the world's destinies, and France is the scene of this fearful co
mbat. Without, all the tyrants encircle you; within, all tyranny's friends consp
ire; they will conspire until hope is wrested from crime. We must smother the in
ternal and external enemies of the Republic or perish with it; now in this situa
tion, the first maxim of your policy ought to be to lead the people by reason an
d the people's enemies by terror.
If the spring of popular government in time of peace is virtue, the springs of p
opular government in revolution are at once virtue and terror: virtue, without w
hich terror is fatal; terror, without which virtue is powerless. Terror is nothi
ng other than justice, prompt, severe, inflexible; it is therefore an emanation
of virtue; it is not so much a special principle as it is a consequence of the g

eneral principle of democracy applied to our country's most urgent needs.

It has been said that terror is the principle of despotic government. Does your
government therefore resemble despotism? Yes, as the sword that gleams in the ha
nds of the heroes of liberty resembles that with which the henchmen of tyranny a
re armed. Let the despot govern by terror his brutalized subjects; he is right,
as a despot. Subdue by terror the enemies of liberty, and you will be right, as
founders of the Republic. The government of the revolution is liberty's despotis
m against tyranny. Is force made only to protect crime? And is the thunderbolt n
ot destined to strike the heads of the proud?
* * *
. . . Indulgence for the royalists, cry certain men, mercy for the villains! No!
mercy for the innocent, mercy for the weak, mercy for the unfortunate, mercy fo
r humanity.
Society owes protection only to peaceable citizens; the only citizens in the Rep
ublic are the republicans. For it, the royalists, the conspirators are only stra
ngers or, rather, enemies. This terrible war waged by liberty against tyranny- i
s it not indivisible? Are the enemies within not the allies of the enemies witho
ut? The assassins who tear our country apart, the intriguers who buy the conscie
nces that hold the people's mandate; the traitors who sell them; the mercenary p
amphleteers hired to dishonor the people's cause, to kill public virtue, to stir
up the fire of civil discord, and to prepare political counterrevolution by mor
al counterrevolution-are all those men less guilty or less dangerous than the ty
rants whom they serve?

Robespierre 1794
On the Enemies of the Nation
Citizens:
It would be a beautiful subject for conversation for posterity; it s already a spe
ctacle worthy of heaven and Earth to see the Assembly of the people s representati
ves placed upon the inexhaustible volcano of conspiracies bring to the feet of t
he Eternal Author of all things the homage of a great people with one hand, and,
with the other, with the lives and the wrath of tyrants gathered against it, fo
und the first republic in the world and recall exiled freedom, justice and natur
e among mortals.
They will perish, all of the tyrants armed against the French people! They will
perish, all the factions that rely upon their power in order to destroy our free
dom. You will not make peace, but you will give it to the world, taking it from
the hands of crime.
This approaching prospect offered itself to the sight of the frightened tyrants,
and they decided with their accomplices that the time had come to assassinate u
s; we, that is, the National Convention, for if they attack you now en masse and
now individually you still recognize the same plan and the same enemies. Withou
t a doubt they are not foolish enough to believe that the death of a few represe
ntatives can assure their triumph.
If they believed, in fact, that in order to destroy your energy, or to change yo
ur principles, it was enough to assassinate those to whom you have especially co
nfided the care of overseeing the salvation of the republic; if they believed th

at in throwing us into the tomb the spirits of Brissot, Hebert and Danton would
emerge triumphant to deliver you a second time to discord, to the empire of fact
ions and to the mercy of traitors, they were wrong.
When we will have fallen under their blows, you would either complete your subli
me enterprise or share our fate. Or rather, there is not one Frenchmen who would
not want to stand over our bloody corpses to swear to exterminate the last of t
he enemies of the people.
Nevertheless, their impious delirium attests both to their hope and their despai
r.
They once hoped to succeed in starving the French people; the French people stil
l lives and will survive all its enemies. Subsistence was assured, and nature, f
aithful to Liberty, already presents it abundance. What resource then remains to
them? Assassination.
They hoped to exterminate the national representation by bribed revolt, and they
so counted on the success of this attack that they didn t blush to announce it in
advance to the wrath of Europe and to confess it in the English parliament. Thi
s project failed. What remains to them? Assassination.
They thought they could overwhelm us by the efforts of their sacrilegious league
, and especially by treason. The traitors tremble or perish, their artillery fal
ls into our power, their satellites flee before us, but assassination remains to
them.
They sought to dissolve the National Convention by degradation and corruption. T
he Convention punished their accomplices and rose triumphant on the ruins of fac
tions and under the aegis of the French people. But assassination remains to the
m.
They attempted to deprave public morality and to extinguish the generous sentime
nts of which the love of freedom and of the fatherland are composed by banishing
from the republic good sense, virtue and divinity. We proclaimed the divinity a
nd the immortality of the soul; we commanded virtue in the name of the republic.
Assassination remains to them.
Finally, slander, treason, arson, poisoning, atheism, corruption, famine, assass
inations. They were lavish with these crimes: assassination and yet more assassi
nation still remain to them.
Let us then rejoice and give thanks to heaven since we have so well served our c
ountry as to have been judged worthy of the daggers of tyranny.
We thus have glorious dangers to run! The city offers as many such dangers as th
e battlefield. We have nothing to envy our brave brothers in arms; we pay, in mo
re than one way, our debt to the fatherland.
Oh kings and valets of kings! It is not we who will complain of the kind of war
you make, and we recognize that it is worthy of your august prudence.
In fact, it is easier to take our lives than to triumph over our principles and
our armies. England, Italy, Germany, and France itself will furnish you soldiers
to execute these noble exploits. When the powers of the earth league together t
o kill a feeble individual he must not insist on living; it is thus that living
a long time doesn t enter into our calculations. It s not in order to live that we d
eclare war on all tyrants and, what is even more dangerous, on all crimes.
What man on earth has ever defended the rights of humanity with impunity?

A few months ago I said to my colleagues on the Committee of Public Safety: If th

e armies of the Republic are victorious, if we unmask the traitors, if we put do
wn factions, they will assassinate us. And I was not in the least astonished to s
ee my prophecy realized. I myself find that the situation in which the enemies o
f the republic have placed me is not without its advantages, for the more uncert
ain and precarious are the lives of the defenders of the fatherland, the more in
dependent they are of men s evil.
Surrounded by assassins I have already put myself in the new order of things whe
re they want to send me. I only hold to fleeting life by the love of the fatherl
and and the thirst for justice and, separated more than ever from any personal c
onsiderations, I find myself better disposed to attack with energy the villains
who conspire against us and humankind.
The more they hurry to terminate my career down here, the more I hasten to fulfi
ll those actions useful to the happiness of my like.
At least I will leave a testament whose reading will make tyrants and their acco
mplices tremble. I will perhaps reveal redoubtable secrets that a pusillanimous
prudence would have pushed me to hide.
I will tell what the salvation of my fatherland and the triumph of freedom depen
d upon. If the same perfidious ones who guide the rage of the assassins aren t yet
visible to all eyes, I will leave to time the task of lifting the veil that cov
ers them, and I will restrict myself to recalling those truths that alone can sa
ve this Republic.
Yes, no matter what lack of seriousness with its lack of foresight might think,
whatever perfidious counter-revolutionaries might say! The destiny of the republ
ic is not yet fixed, and the vigilance of the people s representatives is more tha
n ever necessary.
It is not the pomp of denominations, not victory, nor riches nor fleeting enthus
iasm that constitute the republic; it is the wisdom of laws and especially the g
oodness of mores; it is the purity and the stability of the maxims of government
.
The laws are to be made, the maxims of government to be assured, and the mores t
o be regenerated. If one of these things is missing there is in a state naught b
ut errors, pride, passions, factions, ambitions and cupidity. Far from repressin
g vices the republic would then only allow them freer expansion, and vice necess
arily returns us to tyranny.
Whoever is not master of himself is made to be the slave of others. This a truth
that applies to peoples as well as individuals. Do you want to know who are the
ambitious?
Examine who they are who protect the rogues who encourage counter-revolutionarie
s, who execute attacks, who hold virtue in contempt, who corrupt public morals:
it was the march of the conspirators who fell under the mailed fist of the law.
To make war on crime is the path to the tomb and to immortality; to favor crime
is the path to the throne and the scaffold.
Perverse beings managed to throw the Republic and human reason into chaos. It s a
matter now of pulling them from this in order to create the harmony of the moral
and political worlds. The French people have two guarantors of the possibility
of executing this heroic enterprise: the current principles of representation an
d its own virtues.

The moment in which we find ourselves is favorable, but it is perhaps unique. In

the state of equilibrium in which things are it is easy to consolidate liberty,
and it is easy to lose it. If France were to be governed for a few months by a
corrupted legislature, freedom would be lost. Victory would fall to the factions
and immorality.
Your concert and you energy have astonished and defeated Europe. If you come to
know this as well as your enemies you will easily triumph. I spoke of the virtue
of the people. Attested to by the entire revolution, this virtue would not alon
e suffice to reassure us against the factions who attempt without cease to corru
pt and tear apart the republic.
What is the reason for this? It s that there are two peoples in France.
The one is the mass of citizens, pure, simple thirsting for justice and friends
of liberty. It is this virtuous people that spills all its blood to found the re
public that is imposing to internal enemies and shakes the thrones of tyrants.
The other is a mass of the ambitious and intriguers, it s the chatting, charlatan,
artificial people who show themselves everywhere, who persecute patriotism, who
grab onto the tribunes and often the public functions; who abuse the learning t
hat the advantages of the ancien regime gave them in order to fool public opinio
n. It s this people of rogues, of foreigners, of hypocritical counter-revolutionar
ies who place themselves between the people and their representatives in order t
o fool the one and slander the other; to block their operations, to turn against
the public good the most useful laws and the most salutary truths.
As long as this impure race exists the Republic will be unhappy and precarious.
It s up to you to deliver it by an imposing energy and an unalterable concert.
Those who seek to divide us, those who stop the march of the government, those w
ho slander it every day among you by perfidious insinuations, those who seek to
form against it a dangerous coalition of all the evil passions, of irascible pri
de, of all the interests opposed to the public interest are your enemies and tho
se of the fatherland. They are foreign agents.
They are the successors of Brissot, of Hebert, of Danton. If they were to reign
one day the Fatherland would be lost.
In saying these things I sharpen daggers against myself, and it is precisely for
this that I say them.
You will persevere in your principles and in your triumphal march. You will put
down crime and you will save the fatherland...
I have lived long enough... I saw the French people rise up from degradation and
servitude to the heights of Glory and Freedom. I saw the chains broken and the
guilty thrones that weigh upon the earth near to being overthrown by triumphant
hands.
I saw a yet more astonishing marvel, a marvel that monarchical corruption and th
e experience of the first period of our Revolution barely allowed to be seen as
possible: an assembly invested with the strength of the French nation, marching
with a rapid and firm step towards public happiness, devoted to the cause of the
people and to the triumph of equality, worthy of giving to the world the signal
of Liberty and the example of all the virtues.
Accomplish, Citizens, accomplish your sublime destiny. You have placed us in the
vanguard to bear up under the first efforts of the enemies of Liberty; we will

be worthy of this honor, and with our blood we will trace the route of immortali
ty.
May you constantly deploy that unquenchable energy which you need to put down th
e monsters of the universe that conspire against you, and to then enjoy in peace
the benedictions of the people and of the fruits of your virtues.

Maximilien Robespierre 1793

The Festival of the Supreme Being
First Speech
Of Maximilien Robespierre, president of the national convention, to the people g
athered for the festival of the Supreme Being, Dcadi 20 Prairial, the year 2 of t
he French Republic, one and indivisible.
It has finally arrived, the forever fortunate day that the French people consecr
ate to the Supreme Being. The world that he created has never offered a spectacl
e so worthy of his regard. He has seen tyranny , crime and imposture reign on ea
rth: at this moment he sees an entire nation that is combating all the oppressor
s of humankind suspend the course of its heroic labors in order to raise its tho
ughts and its vows towards the great being who gave it the mission to undertake
and the strength to execute it.
Is it not he whose immortal hand, by engraving in the heart of man the code of j
ustice and equality, traced there the death sentence of tyrants? Is it not he wh
o, from the beginning of time, decreed the republic and placed on the order of t
he day, for all centuries and all peoples, liberty, good faith, and justice?
He did not create kings to devour humankind, he didn t create priests to harness u
s like vile animals to the chariot of kings and to give an example of baseness,
selfish pride, perfidy, avarice, debauch, and falsehood. He created the universe
to make known his might. He created men to mutually assist and love each other,
and to arrive at happiness by the path of virtue.
It is he who placed remorse and fear in the breast of the triumphant oppressor,
and calm and pride in the heart of the innocent oppressed. It is he who forces t
he just man to hate the wicked, and the wicked to respect the just man. It is he
who adorned the face of beauty with modesty, so as to make it even more beautif
ul. It is he who makes maternal entrails palpitate with tenderness and joy. It i
s he who bathes with delicious tears the eyes of a son pressed against his mothe
r s breast. It is he who silences the most imperious and tender passions before th
e sublime love of the fatherland. It is he who covered nature with charms, riche
s and majesty. All that is good is his work, or is him. Evil belongs to the depr
aved man who oppresses or allows his like to be oppressed.
The author of nature ties together all mortals in an immense chain of love and f
elicity.
May the tyrants who dared break it perish!
Republican Frenchmen, it is up to you to purify the land they have soiled and to
recall the justice they have banished. Liberty and virtue sprang together from
the breast of the divinity, and one cannot remain among men without the other.
Generous people, do you want to triumph over your enemies? Practice justice and

render the divinity the only cult worthy of it. People, today let us give oursel
ves over, under its auspices, to the just transports of a pure happiness, Tomorr
ow we will again combat vices and tyrants; we will give the world the example of
republican virtues. And in doing this we honor it again.
Second Speech
Of the president of the National Convention, at the moment when atheism, consume
d in flames, has disappeared, and Wisdom appears in its place to be gazed upon b
y the People.
It has vanished into nothingness, this monster that the genius of kings vomited
onto France. May all the crimes and misfortunes of the world disappear along wit
h it. Armed either with the daggers of fanaticism or the poisons of atheism, kin
gs always conspire to assassinate humanity. If they can no longer disfigure the
divinity by superstition so as to associate it to their misdeeds, they strive to
banish him from earth in order to reign their alone with crime.
People, fear no more their sacrilegious plots. They can no more tear the world f
rom the breast of its author than the remorse from their own hearts. Unfortunate
s, raise up your beaten down heads; you can still raise your eyes to heaven with
impunity. Heroes of the fatherland, your generous devotion is not a brilliant f
olly. If the henchmen of tyranny can assassinate you it is not in their power to
entirely obliterate you. Man, whoever you might be, you can yet conceive high t
houghts on your own; you can attach your fleeting life to God Himself and immort
ality. Late nature take on again its entire clat and wisdom all its empire. The S
upreme Being is not obliterated.
It is above all wisdom that our enemies wanted to chase from the republic. It is
up to wisdom alone to solidify the prosperity of empires; it is for it to guara
ntee us the fruits of our courage. We must associate it then to all our enterpri
ses. Let us be serious and discreet in all our deliberations, like men who are s
tipulating the interests of the world. Let us be ardent and tenacious in our ang
er against leagued tyranny, imperturbable in the midst of danger, patient in lab
or, terrible in reverses, modest and vigilant in success. Let us be generous tow
ards the good, compassionate towards the unfortunate, inexorable towards the wic
ked, just towards all. We must not count on an unalloyed prosperity or triumphs
without obstacles, or on whatever depends on the fortune or perversity of others
. We should only rest upon our steadfastness and our virtue. Sole, but infallibl
e guarantors of our independence, let us crush the unholy league of kings more t
hrough the grandeur of our character than by the force of our arms.
Frenchmen, you are fighting kings, and so you are worthy of honoring the divinit
y. Being of beings, author of nature, the stupefied slave, the vile henchman of
despotism, the perfidious and cruel aristocrat insults you by invoking you. But
the defenders of liberty can abandon themselves with confidence within your pate
rnal breast. Being of beings, we don t have to address you unjust prayers. You kno
w the creatures who have come from your hands; their needs no more escape your g
aze than do their most secret thoughts. The hatred of bad faith and tyranny burn
s in our hearts along with the love of justice and the fatherland. Our blood flo
ws for the cause of humanity. This is our prayer, these are our sacrifices. This
is the cult we offer you.