was heard, 'Off to the lamp post with the bishops!'"]

[Footnote 1445: De Montlosier, I. 303.--Moniteur, sessions of the 8th,
9th, and 10th of October.--Malouet, II. 9, 10, 20.--Mounier, Recherches
sur les Causes, etc., and "Addresse aux Dauphinois."]

[Footnote 1446: De Ferrieres, I. 346. (On the 9th of October, 300
members have already taken their passports.) Mercure de France, No. of
the 17th October. Correspondence of Mirabeau and M. de la Marck, I. 116,
126, 364.]

[Footnote 1447: Correspondence of Mirabeau and M. de la Marck, I.175.
(The words of Monsieur to M. de la Marck.)]

BOOK SECOND. THE CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY, AND THE RESULT OF ITS LABORS.

CHAPTER I.--CONDITIONS REQUIRED FOR THE FRAMING OF GOOD LAWS.

Among the most difficult undertakings in this world is the formulation
of a national constitution, especially if this is to be a complete and
comprehensive work. To replace the old structures inside which a great
people has lived by a new, different, appropriate and durable set of
laws, to apply a mold of one hundred thousand compartments on to the
life of twenty-six million people, to construct it so harmoniously,
adapt it so well, so closely, with such an exact appreciation of their
needs and their faculties, that they enter it of themselves and move
about it without collisions, and that their spontaneous activity
should at once find the ease of familiar routine,--is an extraordinary
undertaking and probably beyond the powers of the human mind. In any
event, the mind requires all its powers to carry the undertaking out,
and it cannot protect itself carefully enough against all sources of
disturbance and error. An Assembly, especially a Constituent Assembly,
requires, outwardly, security and independence, inwardly, silence
and order, and generally, calmness, good sense, practical ability and
discipline under competent and recognized leaders. Do we find anything
of all this in the Constituent Assembly?

I.--These conditions absent in the Assembly

Causes of disorder and irrationality--The place of meeting
--The large number of deputies--Interference of the galleries
--Rules of procedure wanting, defective, or disregarded.--The
parliamentary leaders--Susceptibility and over-excitement of
the Assembly--Its paroxysms of enthusiasm.--Its tendency to
emotion.--It encourages theatrical display--Changes which
these displays introduce in its good intentions