Sovereign, and they rejoiced
in that of Brissot and his confederates.--These men, then, only found the
just retribution of their own guilt; and though it may be politic to
forget that their survivors were also their accomplices, they are not
objects of esteem--and the contemporary popularity, which a long
seclusion has obtained for them, will vanish, if their future conduct
should be directed by their original principles.*
* Louvet's pamphlet had not at this time appeared, and the
subsequent events proved, that the interest taken in these Deputies
was founded on a supposition they had changed their principles; for
before the close of the Convention they were as much objects of
hatred and contempt as their colleagues.
Some of these Deputies were the hirelings of the Duke of Orleans, and
most of them are individuals of no better reputation than the rest of the
Assembly. Lanjuinais has the merit of having acted with great courage in
defence of himself and his party on the thirty-first of May 1792; but the
following anecdote, recited by Gregoire* in the Convention a few days ago
will sufficiently explain both his character and Gregoire's, who are now,
however, looked up to as royalists, and as men comparatively honest.
* Gregoire is one of the constitutional Clergy, and, from the habit
of comparing bad with worse, is more esteemed than many of his
colleagues; yet, in his report on the progress of Vandalism, he
expresses himself with sanguinary indecency--"They have torn (says
he) the prints which represented the execution of Charles the first,
because there were coats of arms on them. Ah, would to god we could
behold, engraved in the same manner, the heads of all Kings, done
from nature! We might then reconcile ourselves to seeing a
ridiculous embellishment of heraldry accompany them."
--"When I first arrived at Versailles, (says Gregoire,) as member of the
Constituent Assembly, (in 1789,) I met with Lanjuinais, and we took an
oath in concert to dethrone the King and abolish Nobility." Now, this
was before the alledged provocations of the King and Nobility--before the
constitution was framed--before the flight of the royal family to
Varennes--and before the war. But almost daily confessions of this sort
escape, which at once justify the King, and establish the infamy of the
revolutionists.
These are circumstances not to be forgotten, did no
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