the little arts and devices
of popularity. They facilitate the carrying of many points of moment;
they keep the people together; they refresh the mind in its exertions;
and they diffuse occasional gayety over the severe brow of moral
freedom. Every politician ought to sacrifice to the Graces, and to join
compliance with reason. But in such an undertaking as that in France all
these subsidiary sentiments and artifices are of little avail. To make a
government requires no great prudence. Settle the seat of power, teach
obedience, and the work is done. To give freedom is still more easy. It
is not necessary to guide; it only requires to let go the rein. But to
form a _free government_, that is, to temper together these opposite
elements of liberty and restraint in one consistent work, requires much
thought, deep reflection, a sagacious, powerful, and combining mind.
This I do not find in those who take the lead in the National Assembly.
Perhaps they are not so miserably deficient as they appear. I rather
believe it. It would put them below the common level of human
understanding. But when the leaders choose to make themselves bidders at
an auction of popularity, their talents, in the construction of the
state, will be of no service. They will become flatterers instead of
legislators,--the instruments, not the guides of the people. If any of
them should happen to propose a scheme of liberty soberly limited, and
defined with proper qualifications, he will be immediately outbid by his
competitors, who will produce something more splendidly popular.
Suspicions will be raised of his fidelity to his cause. Moderation will
be stigmatized as the virtue of cowards, and compromise as the prudence
of traitors,--until, in hopes of preserving the credit which may enable
him to temper and moderate on some occasions, the popular leader is
obliged to become active in propagating doctrines and establishing
powers that will afterwards defeat any sober purpose at which he
ultimately might have aimed.

* * * * *

But am I so unreasonable as to see nothing at all that deserves
commendation in the indefatigable labors of this Assembly? I do not
deny, that, among an infinite number of acts of violence and folly, some
good may have been done. They who destroy everything certainly will
remove some grievance. They who make everything new have a chance that
they may establish something beneficial. To give them credit