antes, when each new outbreak of fighting was
threatening to connect the flaming frontier with the conflagration in
the Catholic countries.[1180]--With a jet of cold water aptly directed,
the "Mountain" could extinguish the fires it had kindled in the great
republican towns; otherwise, nothing remained but to let them increase
at the risk of consuming the whole country, with no other hope than
that they might at last die out under a mass of ruins, and with no other
object but to rule over captives and the dead.

But this is precisely the Jacobin aim; for, he is not satisfied with
less than absolute submission; he must rule at any cost, just as he
pleases, by fair means or foul, no matter over what ruins. A despot by
instinct and installation, his dogma has consecrated him King; he is
King by natural and divine right, in the name of eternal verity, the
same as Philip II., enthroned by his religious system and blessed by
his Holy Office. Hence he can abandon no jot or title of his authority
without a sacrifice of principle, nor treat with rebels, unless they
surrender at discretion; simply for having risen against legitimate
authority, they are traitors and villains. And who are greater rascals
the renegades who, after three years of patient effort, just as the sect
finally reaches its goal, oppose its accession to power![1181] At Nimes,
Toulouse, Bordeaux, Toulon, and Lyons, not only have they interfered
with or arrested the blow which Paris struck, but they have put down the
aggressors, closed the club, disarmed the fanatical and imprisoned the
leading Maratists; and worse still, at Lyons and at Toulon, five or
six massacreurs, or promoters of massacre, Chalier and Riard, Jassaud,
Sylvestre and Lemaille, brought before the courts, have been condemned
and executed after a trial in which all the forms were strictly adhered
to.--That is the inexpiable crime; for, in this trial, the "Mountain"
is involved; the principles of Sylvestre and Chalier are its principles;
what is accomplished in Paris, they have attempted in the provinces; if
they are guilty, it is also guilty; it cannot tolerate their punishment
without assenting to its own punishment. Accordingly,

* it must proclaim them heroes and martyrs,

* it must canonize their memory,[1182]

* it must avenge their tortures,

* it must resume and complete their assaults,

* it must restore their accomplices to their places,

* it must render them omnipotent,

* it