always awake
to compassion; and indolence or avarice may yield a too ready obedience
to prohibitions which favour both. The poor are certainly no gainers by
the substitution of philosophy for religion; and many of those who are
forbidden to celebrate Christmas or Easter by a mass, will forget to do
it by a donation. For my own part, I think it an advantage that any
period of the year is more particularly signalized by charity; and I
rejoice when I hear of the annual gifts of meat or firing of such, or
such a great personage--and I never enquire whether they might still
continue their munificence if Christianity were abolished.--Adieu.

1795

Amiens, Jan. 23, 1795.

Nothing proves more that the French republican government was originally
founded on principles of despotism and injustice, than the weakness and
anarchy which seem to accompany every deviation from these principles.
It is strong to destroy and weak to protect: because, deriving its
support from the power of the bad and the submission of the timid, it is
deserted or opposed by the former when it ceases to plunder or oppress--
while the fears and habits of the latter still prevail, and render them
as unwilling to defend a better system as they have been to resist the
worst possible.

The reforms that have taken place since the death of Robespierre, though
not sufficient for the demands of justice, are yet enough to relax the
strength of the government; and the Jacobins, though excluded from
authority, yet influence by the turbulence of their chiefs in the
Convention, and the recollection of their past tyranny--against the
return of which the fluctuating politics of the Assembly offer no
security. The Committees of Public Welfare and General Safety (whose
members were intended, according to the original institution, to be
removed monthly) were, under Robespierre, perpetual; and the union they
preserved in certain points, however unfavourable to liberty, gave a
vigour to the government, of which from its conformation it should appear
to have been incapable. It is now discovered, that an undefined power,
not subject to the restriction of fixed laws, cannot remain long in the
same hands without producing tyranny. A fourth part of the Members of
these Committees are, therefore, now changed every month; but this
regulation, more advantageous to the Convention than the people, keeps
alive animosities, stimulates ambition, and retains the country