latter, by their nature, transcend the narrow limits of nationality and race, and appeal to all who have ears to hear. The propagation of Republican principles in 1789, and for some years afterwards, resembled much more the propagation of a faith than the institution of a polity. The rights of man were preached by the Jacobins as Salvation by Faith alone was preached by the Calvinists, with a further tendency to enforce conviction at the sword's point, reminding one of Islam. "Be my brother or I kill you," is a compact and not unfair summary of Jacobinical sentiment. To be suspected of aristocratic leanings is to be suspected of the worst heresy. A fellow-countryman who is not also a co-religionist is the most odious of enemies. The Republic is as intolerant as the Inquisition, and Torquemada differs only superficially from Robespierre. This fanaticism has long been sobered in practical politics by the stern teachings of experience. French Republicanism now ostentatiously proclaims that it only wishes to mind its own business, and without any ill-will to the rights of man, shrewdly determines to give its chief attention to the rights of Frenchmen. But this advance in practical politics has hardly been matched by a similar advance in theoretic politics. The principles of '89 are still the centre of hot contention, of eulogy or abuse, and a man, or Frenchman at least, needs to be wary how he meddles with them, either to praise or blame. At all times the most popular and effective form of religious polemics has been that of 1 Par Henri Taine. Hachette, Paris, 1878.

historical narrative, in which adversaries are carefully painted in the gloomiest blacks and browns, and friends are arrayed in the brightest colours the artist can command. The abundant literature which issues from the French press on the French Revolution is still far from being purged of the fanatical leaven which is happily disappearing from French politics: and this literature is largely of the historical kind. Each prominent father or heresiarch of the Republican church has his voluntary and devoted historian, who sets forth the exclusive rights of his hero to public recognition and worship. The hagiology used to begin with Mirabeau, but since the publication of the La Marck Correspondence, which revealed his corrupt relations with the court, few are willing to say a good word for him. With this exception the Acta Sanctorum present an edifying series of portraits in which perfect faith casteth out criticism, and removes any mountain of fact that may threaten to discompose pious minds. Each party has its sacred bard. The Girondins have Lamartine; the Dantonists, Michelet; the Robespierrists, Louis Blanc. Even the Hébertists with Chaumette and Anacharsis are now worthily sung by M. Avenel. Such zeal naturally produces heat and sharp temper. Plain speaking and angry contradiction mark the collisions of the hostile sects. The shades of difference are often faint, and not easily visible to profane eyes. But this is a common note of religious disputes, and could hardly be wanting here.

While the polemics are battling within the fold with insufficient regard to the impression they may create outside it, signs are not wanting that another order of persons is approaching the scene of strife with the inten

tion of saying an important word. These are the critics, whose revolutionary faith is cold or nearly wanting. It is obvious that for them to be listened to at all, they must not be zealots of any other hostile church, and that partisans of Pope or King, of divine right, or infallibility, have no claim to attention. Such are ex-officio hostile to the Revolution, and what they will say against it is known before they open their mouths. The true critic is the man who wishes to get to the facts of the case regardless of which side they may seem to favour. An offensive character therefore to all parties, who much prefer a rash and hot opponent, since he frequently damages himself more than his adversaries. M. Taine is by far the most conspicuous writer who has taken up the task of criticising the Revolution, and some evidence that he has discharged his task only imperfectly may perhaps be found in the fact that, while he has mortally offended one set of partisans, he has filled another set with delight. The Republicans in France have regarded his book as nothing short of a scandal, but their Conservative opponents have found it so much to their liking that they have forgiven on the spot a long literary career, which up to this time they have condemned loudly. At the same time M. Taine may justly plead that if he has not offended both parties at the same time, he has offended them alternately, and so far has experienced the usual fate of the critic. ~ His recent work on the Ancien Régime was as distasteful to the Conservatives as the present one on the Revolution is to the Liberals. He in the first unsparingly criticised the old Monarchy: in this he unsparingly criticises the Revolution. Neither work is marked by lofty impartiality and sobriety of tone, and each resembles the vehement impeachment of an advocate rather than the calm equity of a judge. Still, as it is difficult to depreciate the old Monarchy without, in a measure, excusing or justifying the Revolution which abol

ished it; or to depreciate the Revolution without seeming to say a good word for the Monarchy, a sort of balance is established, and a sort of justice is meted out to both, though not in the worthiest form such a great subject deserved. Two blacks do not make one white, and two opposite invectives do not make a thoughtful political work.

However, taking M. Taine as he is, and not as one might wish him to be, let us see what he has to tell us. His object is the destruction of the socalled republican legend, a dissipation of the sentimental and idyllic fictions which have gradually become current, in relation to the real character of the Great Revolution. France has recently witnessed the destruction of a legend nearly, if not quite, as popular and accredited as that which is now attacked.

The present generation has seen the Napoleonic legend disappear, chiefly, but not entirely, through the able work of the lamented M. Lanfrey. But M. Lanfrey was much assisted by circumstances, and but for the scandals and disasters of the Second Empire, we may be pretty certain that his vigorous exposure of the vulgarity and meanness of the first Napoleon would have met with a very different reception from what it received. M. Taine is nothing like so fortunate. He appears with his indictment of the Revolution at a moment when its lineal descendants — however unlike these may be to their ancestors—are triumphant in French politics. Second Empire discredited the first. The last Republic, by its humanity and moderation, not very logically, but very certainly, has cast a certain prestige on its most unsimilar predecessor. Even the crimes and follies of the Commune have not prevented this result, because the Commune itself was suppressed and punished by a Republican government, with a severity no Monarchy or Empire could surpass, and the will and the power to defeat anarchy and radicalism can no longer be claimed as a monopoly by Conserva

The

tives. So far from being discredited, Republican principles have got a hold in France such as they never had before. M. Taine, therefore, will certainly not carry his point as M. Lanfrey did. He appeals to a jury whose convictions are hardened against him, and the very support he receives in certain quarters confirms the hostile prejudice with which his pages are read.

But an Englishman is not bound by French party ties, and it may be possible to be just to M. Taine without failing in allegiance to truth. With out any great novelty of research, or depth of thought, or charm of style, M. Taine must be admitted to have very seriously damaged the popular views of the Revolution which have been propagated by eminent Republican writers, and obtained general credence. It requires but a small acquaintance with the works of the latter to perceive that their mode of treatment is not historical in the true sense of the term. They are passionate advocates, pleading for a cause with eloquence, with profound conviction, but critical historians not at all. They would disdain any such coldblooded office, as something unfeeling and well-nigh infamous. Michelet prays God to protect him from Mr. Carlyle's hardness of heart. "O glorious day," he bursts forth, in reference to the burning of the châteaux, "how long have you been coming! How long our fathers expected and dreamed of you in vain ... and what has enabled me, their companion labouring beside them in the furrow of history, and drinking their bitter cup, to revive the suffering middle ages, and yet not die of grief Was it not you, O glorious day, first day of liberty? I have lived in order to relate your history." When a man is in this frame of mind, he is not fit to approach the historic muse, who is an austere divinity, and demands a calm and serene mood in her worshippers. The atmosphere of excited feeling in which the Revolution has

been viewed both by friends and foes, is a refracting medium, so capricious and misleading, that the most obvious facts are distorted or obscured by it, the plainest inferences overlooked or perverted. M. Louis Blanc, for instance, a most laborious inquirer, and with a regard for historic truth far above the average, is nevertheless coerced by the despotism of strong feeling to make the following series of extraordinary statements—the more singular as he himself in other parts. of his work adduces facts which suffice for his own confutation :

"Readers, if you would be just, compare the Festival of the Federation just related with that which is about to follow. When, further on, you shall see hatreds waxing ferocious, anger becoming ungovernable, the prisons full, the scaffold set up, do not forget

"That the Revolution was at the commencement magnanimity itself, and that its mercy knew no bounds.

"That it allowed to its enemies, through respect for liberty, free license to curse it and conspire against it.

"That it destroyed with infinite tenderness privileges which were nevertheless very odious.

"That if it disturbed the scandalous luxury of a few prelates, it was in the interest of a crowd of poor curés, who were dying of hunger.

"That if it stripped the nobles of titles by which their pride had impoverished human dignity, it was in order to give them the first places in politics, in the administration, in the national militia.

"That it was in the first instance slow to shed blood, to a degree unequalled since great commotions have appeared in the world.

"That it never ceased to open its arms to its adversaries, imploring of them one favour-to be just.

"That on a certain day, worthy of eternal remembrance, it called all the children of France to union, to conciliation, to embrace and love each other round the patriotic altar."

This is certainly a very remarkable instance of the power of preconceived opinion, to absolutely shut the eyes of the mind to unwelcome facts. For, although M. Louis Blanc says that the Revolution was "slow to shed blood in the first instance," he not only knows the contrary, but honestly tells us so in other places. It is true that he minimises the early atrocities of the Revolution to the utmost of his power, passing over them with haste, and asserting, with real disregard to historic accuracy, that such instances were very rare. But he does mention them, which Michelet does not. Still, the general effect of the two pictures is not very different, as was to be expected. No effort of will on the part of an historian to be fair can make his representation fair, unless the whole temper of his mind and feelings is in a state of balanced equipoise, spontaneously equitable to the just and the unjust, to the men and the cause he approves, as well as to those he dislikes and condemns.

It is in reference to this question of the mercy, magnanimity, and slowness to shed blood of the early Revolution, that M. Taine has executed a piece of thoroughly good work, which we may hope will not require doing over again. He proves by accumulated instances of cruelty, outrage, and murder, that the Revolution was from the very first what all unprejudiced persons knew it to be, a fierce uprising of vindictive revenge, and that the pretence that it was made cruel and sanguinary only through the conduct of its natural enemies, the nobles and priests, is one of the most unfounded ever maintained. The pretension is as untrue, as much against the evidence, as the pretension of Roman Catholic divines that the Church has never persecuted, never shed blood, never been cruel and unjust. The evidence which M. Taine adduces to prove his point is by its nature difficult to set forth in a review of this kind. Long extracts from MS. authorities, instructive but somewhat

wearisome repetitions of monotonous crimes, of disgusting brutality and violence, fill some hundreds of pages of his volume. One can understand how, writing for the public he addresses, the exhibition in extenso of the evidence which supports his case was a wise proceeding. wise proceeding. Those who would refute him must prove that his authorities are untrustworthy, or incorrectly cited. As most of them seem to be taken from official records, the task is not likely to be an easy one. In any case it is the business of native critics to control his excerpts from the Archives Nationales. That he will be tripped up here and there is highly probable. But that the bulk of his indictment, will be rebutted is extremely unlikely.

After all, no reader of Arthur Young's travels will be surprised at the conclusion which M. Taine is at such pains to establish. As early as July, 1789, Young tells us from personal knowledge of the facts, that the nobles were hunted like wild beasts, their wives and daughters carried off, and their houses pillaged or burned. “ There is here in this hotel," he says, "a noble, to his misfortune, with his wife, relations, three servants, and a child barely a few months old, who escaped, half naked, from their château in flames.” Arthur Young himself frequently had narrow escapes of being lynched during his last tour, and was told that if he were a noble, as he once hinted he might be by way of a joke, he deserved to be hanged; and if he had not promptly declared himself an Englishman, and made an amusing speech, in which he showed he sympathised with the people, he probably would have been. Taine proves that even before the meeting of the States - General the lives and fortunes of priests and nobles were at the mercy of any mob which thought fit to attack them. In April the Bishop of Sisteron was nearly killed, and only escaped through his horses running away under a shower of stones aimed at their owner.

M.

At

September, because three cart loads of flour had proved to be bad, the people rose in tumult. Huez was knocked

instance :

"The mayor's substitute, M. Cureau, told the peasants that the report of brigands was false; he recommended that the tocsin should not be sounded, and that the best thing was to keep quiet. It is inferred at once that he is in league with the brigands, that he has forestalled corn and bought crops standing. The people carry him off, with M. Montesson, his son-in-law, to the neighbouring village, where there are judges. During the transit the two prisoners were dragged on the ground, pitched about from hand to hand, trampled under foot, spat in the face, befouled with ordure. M. Montesson was shot, M. Cureau was massacred slowly. A carpenter with his tools cut off the two heads, and children carried them about to the music of violins and drums" (p. 97).

"On the 31st of July, Lally-Tollendal mounted the tribune in the Assembly with his hands full of despairing letters, a list of thirty-six châteaux burned, demolished, or pillaged in one province alone, and an account of still worse outrages against persons. In Languedoc, M. de Barras was cut in pieces before his wife's eyes, who was near her accouchement, and died from the shock. In Normandy, a gentleman who was paralysed was left on a bonfire, and only withdrawn after his hands had been burned. . . . The Baron de Montjustin, a popular noble, was suspended for an hour in a well, and heard a discussion as to whether he should be dropped to the bottom or be killed in some other way" (p. 134.)

But the climax of atrocity was reached in two murders-the one of Huez, the mayor of Troyes; the other of Major Belsunce, an officer at Caen. The former, an "upright and venerable magistrate," was distinguished by his charity to the poor. Only the day before his death he sent one hundred crowns to the poor-box. On the 9th

struck on the head with a wooden shoe, pitched down a large staircase; a rope was put round his neck, and the people began to drag him along the ground. A priest, who begged permission to at least save his soul, was repelled and beaten. A woman rushed upon the prostrate old man, stamped upon his face, and drove her scissors several times into his eyes. One of the murderers declared that he had been despatched too quickly, and that the design had been to make him suffer longer. M. Taine ought to have added that this abominable crime at least was avenged by the law, and that the murderers were executed in November following.

The murder of Major Belsunce was, if possible, more revolting. M. Louis Blanc has some singular remarks to make in reference to this crime. Major Belsunce, he says, expiated by a terrible death the "violence of his disdain." "He was abhorred by the people because he pursued the Revolution with insulting defiance; because, mounted on horseback, and armed to the teeth, in the company of a man with a sinister countenance, he affected to smile with contempt at the fêtes which celebrated the recall of Necker." For these and similar high crimes and misdemeanours the unfortunate major was killed and cut to pieces, and his heart was torn out by a woman, who is said to have eaten it. With regard to the murderers of M. Huez, the mayor of Troyes, M. Louis Blanc does not plead the extenuating circumstances which he could in the case of Major Belsunce the riding on horseback, the evil-looking companion, and contemptuous smiles at Republican festivities. He prefers to suggest that M. Huez came by his death at the hands of hired assassins, and that the people had nothing to do with it. This is exactly in the spirit of De Maistre, who shrugs his