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have been, and what you have done. You, General Berthief, and you, Citizen Monge, will receive in particular the teftimonies of esteem which are due to you. I felicitate myself infinitely upon being the organ of them. The choice which the hero of Italy has made of the two perfons charged to announce peace to us, is a trait characteristic of him. The one is in fact one of thofe generals who, by their talents, their activity, and their courage, have allied themfelves to all his triumphs; the other is a member of that learned committee which, in the eyes of all Italy, made the French republic refpected by the virtues of thofe who compofe it, and their ardent and animated love of liberty, as well as by the vaft extent of their knowledge and the purity of their tafte. Happy alliance of ftrength and wisdom, mayft thou, for the happiness of France, never be destroyed! It is thou who affureft to nations the two moft defirable benefits-liberty and peace. Receive, citizens, in the name of all those who have ably ferved the republic, no matter in what capacity, our fraternal embraces; they are the affured prefages of that union which theuld ever reign among all Frenchmen. Vive la paix! Vive la republique !

Report by Roffee, Deputy from the Department of the Upper Rhine, on the Treaty of Peace between the Emperor of Germany and the French Republic.

Citizens Representatives,

SIX years have paffed away, during which the moft undaunted

minds could not avoid feeling fomé anxiety at feeing all Eutope rife in a mafs againft France, while fhe was diftracted by powerful parties, and more terribly agitated than the waves that dah again her coaft. For fix years France was armed, without auxiliaries, and without a government; but fhe fill poffeffed a fertile foil, the courage of the men who inhabit it, and that creative genius which alone knew how to call forth, even in a ftate of financial diftrefs, thofe means and that energy which were capable of refifting the league of kings. Our enemies believed that liberty would annihilate our refources, and it increased them a hundred fold. The republic, all in arms, rufhed forth into the invaded plains of Champagne; while the monarchy, difmayed by the project of the enemy, would have abjectly inoked the clemency of the conqueror. Political order has fucceeded to the revolution which our ancient inftitutions experienced. A new world prefents itself, and is expofed to the view contemporaries: astonished to behold-us now the arbiters of the univerfe, and the regulators of the deftinies of Europe, the efforts of thought follow flowly the events of our revolution, VOL. VII. F

of our

while

while admiration of the prodigies performed by our heroes excited, in all enlightened minds, only one with, that of being free and republican. The bold inhabitants of the mountains of Switzer, land, the induftrious Batavians, and the obftinate Americans, broke the yokes which were impofed upon them. More fortunate, we have fpread the bleffings of independence over the nations which furround us. After fix years of war, which feemed to prefage that glorious fall which a people prepare for themselves who prefer difperfion and death to fhame and fervitude, we have not bargained with our enemies, we have not treated for our difputed independence, nor facrificed our dignity to our preservation; but, in extending the bounds of our territory, and enlarging the limits of a nation which we have created, we difplay in our treaties the generofity of a powerful and magnanimous ally, and the pretenfions of a state which poffeffes acknowledged and venerated rights. The French republic does not, in her negotiations, affume the tone or the attitude of a ftate which has juft appeared on the theatre of the world; it exhibits at once the maturity of age and the vigour of youth; it refembles thofe celeftial bodies, which, though only discovered yesterday, claim an antiquity equal to the planets, which man has, from time immemorial, been accuftomed to behold in the firmament. Let us commence by investigating the general confequences which must refult from this treaty of peace with the Emperor, before we proceed to examine in detail its particular advantages. Permit me, citizens colleagues, to bring to your recollection the last remarkable event in the annals of the world, and which ftill has a fubfidiary influence in regulating the affairs of Europe. You will have forefeen that I allude to the famous treaty of Weftphalia. Religion, lending its illufions and its fanaticifm to the people of Germany, afforded to the priests and the princes the means of ambition. The multitude, intoxicated by the filtres which the church and the throne prepared for them, became the eafy inftruments of both; a long and cruel war, the pretext of which excited the prejudices of the people, and favoured the views of thofe who deceived them, extinguished itfelf in the blood of man, changed the centre of political gravity, and the balance of the power of Europe. The interests of princes affumed a religious afpect; the Proteftant intereft and the Catholic intereft became diplomatic expreffions, which a change of territorial limits rendered diftinct; and real humanity had then no profpect of fuccefs. The yoke remained fixed on the bended head of man. Fanaticifm, in lofing its power, left to its companion Ambition all the fplendour of pre-eminence. Religion returned to the, obfcurity of the cloifters, and the interefts of princes were difplayed alone on the throne. France was engaged in the war which preceded this treaty; fhe acquired the

fovereignty of Metz, Toul, Verdun, and the two Alfaces. Such were the fruits of a war of thirty years. If we compare these indemnifications with those we have already obtained, and those which are now offered to us, and, in making this comparison, eftimate the time which has elapfed during the war of freedom, you will be convinced, citizens colleagues, that under the ancient regimen we should have had to continue the war for two ages, to procure what the campaigns of liberty have conquered in fix years. But we ought not to lofe fight of the object which I have propofed to fubmit to your confideration. The result of this thirty years war was another combination of powers, ftruggling unceasingly to obtain an equilibrium which continually filed from the grafp of the ambitious potentates of Europe. After the peace all things remained in that fituation, fo diftreffing for humanity, in which they stood before the commencement of the war. Pretenfions which had changed into new hands, and which were brought forward under new names, were not the lefs haughty. The Proteftant party, as well as the Catholic party, was defirous of making conquefts; blood was ftill destined to flow for the aggrandizement of fome families; and if an accident altered the topography of a state, the monarch changed with it his denomination and his party. The peace which fucceeds to the exploits of our armies-that general pacification which Europe is at laft about to enjoy, will imprint upon its population two diftinct and ineffaceable characters:-the republican interest on the one hand, and the monarchical intereft on the other, fpring at once from the terrible shock which this quarter of the globe has experienced. Each has two objects-its preservation and its preponderance. In watching anxiously over the maintenance of their power, and the duration, of their existence, both muft feel the imminent danger of neighbourhood and rivalry. The men whom these interests divide are linked to them by the fame ftrong affection that urges the individual to the prefervation of his life. Thus, before either republics or monarchies can think of their aggrandizement, they must have nothing to fear for their independence. Our revolution is extended over both hemifpheres; it fubmits cabinets to new combinations; and kings, who for fome time must be occupied with the care of defending their thrones, will undertake with lefs levity wars; the termination of which must neceffarily fhorten the period of their political existence. We may live in good neighbourhood with kings, but we can expect fidelity in our political connexions only from nations which are free. The peace of the 6th year must, therefore, have a most powerful influence on the deftiny of Europe; it totally fubverts its ancient policy, and changes the nature of all its former relations. Let us now examine what addition the treaty with the Emperor-King makes to our territorial, military,

F 2

and

and commercial refources. In the first place, we unite, by pofitive agreement, to our ancient territory, the Auftrian Low Countries, with all their dependencies. The extent, the fertility, and population of this conceffion, are too well known to require my expatiating on the importance of that addition of territory, force, and commercial productions. Our line of defence on the fide of the German empire is reduced to one half; and a triple. row of fortified places, without mentioning their natural defence, would add to our fecurity, if the courage of our fellow-citizens were not fuperior to the advantages of art and of nature. This line of defence, reduced, as I have juft faid, to one half its former extent, is flanked at the one extremity by the Swifs, our conftant and pacific allies; and on the other by the Batavian republic, which the intereft of its inhabitants attaches to our political existence. We fhall acquire citizens whom nature has attached to every fpecies of industry by the attraction of profit, the near prospect of which would put the moft indolent in motion, and which are now become ftill more attractive by the free / navigation of the Scheldt. The port of Oftend extends the line of countervallation that the perfidy of the English government forces us to trace oppofite to its territory. In Italy, the chain of islands which border the coafts of Lower Albania, of the Livadia and the Morea, offer to our navy nurseries of seamen, and to our manufactures a market and articles of exchange. These precious colonies promise to us the free navigation of the Mediterranean and the Adriatic fea, the entrance to which we already poffefs. They affure to us the Levant trade, and will act, in refpect to our commerce in general, as an exact balance-maker, who will eftablifh the equilibrium of competition that English cupidity has deftroyed. But when I prefent to you the picture of our new acquifitions on the coafts of that Greece, to which, the immortal names of thofe heroes for whom the was indebted to the Genius of Liberty even at this day give lustre, it is neceffary that I.fhould fhow you the map of that new republic which its fate has attached to that of the French republic, and the ftate of the Emperor's new poffeffions on the borders of the Gulf of Venice. The Cifalpine republic comprelends what was formerly called Auftrian Lombardy, the ter ritories of Bergamo and Cremona, the town and fortrefs of Mantua, with its territory, Pefchiara, part of the ci-devant Venetian states, the territory of Modena, the principality of Malla and Carrara, and the three legations of Bologna, of Ferrara, and Romagna. The line of demarkation which feparates this republic from the Emperor's dominions, appears to have been traced in the front of the camp of an army preparing to march against the enemy. The frontier of the Cifalpines is a true parallel. On the file of the Adriatic fea, nearly thirty leagues

of '

of coaft furnish the navy of this new ftate with fich means of defence as will be fufficient for this ally of France, against the only enemy by which it can be attacked. If we confider, in a geometrical point of view, the new poffeffions of the Emperor, we might perhaps be led to imagine, that, after an uninterrupted feries of defeats, this monarch has reafon to be fatisfied; but, citizens colleagues, an extent of territory, without cultivation, without inhabitants, or at least very thinly peopled, and without manufactures, ought not to be put in comparifon with even a far inferior furface, where fertility of foil, population, industry, and military ftrength, are found united. The acquifition of population, in a moral and political point of view, equally engages our attention. If the Emperor be in poffeffion of the inhabitants of Iftria and Dalmatia; if he can drag them trembling to battle; the French republic, more happy, can oppofe to him republicans who were formerly his fubjects. The geographical pofition of the Cifalpine republic, and its invariable interefts, leave it no choice as to its allies and its enemies. It appeared, then, neceffary to give the Emperor a few foldiers, when we placed on his frontiers a brave and restlefs rival. The naval establishment of the house of Auftria in the Gulf of Venice ought not to alarm the friends of our commerce; for if these maritime poffeffions enable the court of Vienna to elevate itself to the rank of thofe powers who divide the empire of the feas, it will foon become the enemy of those who revolt all by the most infolent ambition. But ought we to dread her as a rival? Facts reply to the queftion. England, producing lefs raw materials, with an inferior number of hands, paying higher wages than workmen receive in France, has acquired a fuperiority over us which liberty alone can destroy. If England, with all her difadvantages, furpaffed us when we wore the yoke, fhall we fear, now we are free, the rivalry of the fubjects of kings? Commerce cannot flourish without liberty. Human induftry always droops under the head of defpotifm. Our imaginary rivals, ftill without colonies, weighed down by the existence of the fifcal government of a master, can never, then, enter into a struggle with us. Perfectly at eafe with refpect to any injury to be received by the progrefs of Austrian industry, and the rapid and menacing creation of a military marine, we conceive that the compenfations accorded to the Emperor and King cannot in any degree affect, I will not fay the tranquillity of the French republic and its allies, but the unfolding of thofe refources, of that force, and of that industry, to which the Genius of Liberty will give birth. Citizens colleagues, we have prefented to you the principal provisions of the treaty which is fubmitted to your approbation. You will be of opinion, no doubt, with your committee, that independently of the circumftances and of the wifhes of our confti

tuents,

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