of
heart, because he really loved the people, and sought their highest
good; a truly patriotic man, and as wise as he was enthusiastic. This
great orator and statesman was outraged and alarmed at the indecent
haste of the Assembly, and stigmatized its proceedings as "nocturnal
orgies." The Assembly on that memorable night swept away the whole
feudal edifice, and in less time than the English Parliament would take
to decide upon the first reading of any bill of importance.

The following day brought reflection and discontent. "That is just the
character of our Frenchmen," exclaimed Mirabeau; "they are three months
disputing about syllables, and in a single night they overturn the whole
venerable edifice of the monarchy." Sieyes was equally disgusted, and
made a speech of great force to show that to abolish tithes without an
indemnity was spoliating the clergy to enrich the land-owners. He
concluded, "You know how to be free; you do not know how to be just."
But he was regarded as an ecclesiastic, unable to forego his personal
interests. He gave vent to his irritated feelings in a conversation with
Mirabeau, when the latter said, "My dear Abbe, you have let loose the
bull, and you now complain that he gores you." It was this political
priest who had made the first assault on the constitution, when he urged
the Third Estate to decree itself the nation.

The National Assembly had destroyed feudal institutions; but it had not
yet made a constitution, or restored order. Violence and anarchy still
reigned. Then the clubs began to make themselves a power. "Come," said
the lawyer Danton to a friend, in the district of the Cordeliers, "come
and howl with us; you will earn much money, and you can still choose
your party afterwards." But it was in the garden of the Palais Royal,
and in the old church of the Jacobins that the most violent attacks were
made on all existing institutions. "A Fourth Estate (of able editors)
also springs up, increases, multiplies; irrepressible, incalculable."
Then from the lowest quarters of Paris surge up an insurrection of
women, who march to Versailles in disorder, penetrate the Assembly, and
invade the palace. On the 5th of October a mob joins them, of the lowest
rabble, and succeed in forcing their way into the precincts of the
palace. "The King to Paris!" was now the general cry, and Louis XVI.
appears upon the balcony and announces by gestures his subjection to
their will. A few hours after, th