--Le moi humain n'existoit plus;
chaque individu n'etait qu'une machine, allant, venant, pensant ou
ne pensant pas, felon que la tyrannie le pressait ou l'animait."_
Discours de Bailleul, 19 March 1795.
"The minds of all were subdued by terror, and every heart was
compressed beneath its influence.--In this consisted the strength of
the government; and that government was such, that the immense
population of a vast territory, seemed to have lost all the
qualities which distinguish man from the animals attached to him.--
They appeared to exhibit no signs of life but such as their rulers
condescended to permit--the very sense of existence seemed doubtful
or extinct, and each individual was reduced to a mere machine, going
or coming, thinking or not thinking, according as the impulse of
tyranny gave him force or animation."
Speech of Bailleul, 19 March 1795.
On the twenty-second of Prairial, (June 10,) a law, consisting of a
variety of articles for the regulation of the Revolutionary Tribunal, was
introduced to the convention by Couthon, a member of the government; and,
as usual adopted with very little previous discussion.--Though there was
no clause of this act but ought to have given the alarm to humanity,
"knocked at the heart, and bid it not be quiet;" yet the whole appeared
perfectly unexceptionable to the Assembly in general: till, on farther
examination, they found it contained an implied repeal of the law
hitherto observed, according to which, no representative could be
arrested without a preliminary decree for that purpose.
Pages:
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133