ts ancient masters, and subjugated anew to a feudal
domination.

"A constitutional law has been imposed on France, as easy to be eluded
as revoked; and in the form of royal ordinances simply, without
consulting the nation, without even hearing those bodies, become
illegal, the phantoms of national representation.

"The violation of this charter has been checked only by the timidity
of the government; the extent of the abuses of its authority has been
limited only by its weakness.

"The disjointing of the army, the dispersion of its officers, the
exile of several, the debasement of the soldiers, the suppression of
their endowments, the privation of their pay or pensions; the
reduction of the pay of the legionaries, the despoiling them of their
honours, the pre-eminence given to the decorations of the feudal
monarchy, the contempt of the citizens, designated anew under the name
of _tiers-etat_ (third estate); the spoliation of the purchasers of
national property, prepared and already begun, the actual diminution
of value of such as was obliged to be sold; the return of the feudal
system in its titles, privileges, and useful rights, the
re-establishment of tramontane principles, the abolition of the
liberties of the Gallican church, the annihilation of the Concordat,
the re-establishment of tithes, the reviving intolerance of an
exclusive form of worship; the domination of a handful of nobles over
a people accustomed to equality: are what the ministers of the
Bourbons have done, or wished to do, for the people of France.

"It was under such circumstances, that the Emperor Napoleon quitted
the island of Elba: such were the motives of the resolution he took,
and not the consideration of his own personal interests, so trivial in
his opinion compared with the interests of the nation, to which he has
devoted his existence.

"He has not brought war into the bosom of France: on the contrary, he
has extinguished the war, which the possessors of national property,
constituting four fifths of the landholders throughout France, would
have been compelled to make upon their despoilers; the war, which the
citizens, oppressed, degraded, humiliated by the nobles, would have
been forced to declare against their oppressors; the war, which the
Protestants, the Jews, and the people of different sects, would have
been obliged to maintain against their persecutors.

"He came to deliver France; and as a deliverer he has been received.