e
number of executions that saves empires," said M. Royer-Collard; "the
art of governing men is more difficult, and glory is acquired at a
loftier price. If we are prudent and skilful, we shall find that we have
punished enough; never, if we are not so." M. de Serre applied himself
chiefly to oppose the confiscations demanded under the title of
indemnities. "The revolutionists have acted thus," said he; "they would
do the same again if they could recover power. It is precisely for this
reason that you ought not to imitate their detestable example; and by a
distorted interpretation of an expression which is not open and sincere,
by an artifice scarcely worthy of the theatre.... Gentlemen, our
treasury may be low, but let it be pure." The categories and the
indemnities were definitively rejected. At the last moment, and in the
midst of almost universal silence, the banishment of the regicides was
alone inscribed upon the act. Under the advice of his ministers, the
King felt that he could not, in obedience to the will of Louis XVI.,
refuse his sanction to the amnesty, and leave this formidable question
in suspense. There are Divine judgments which human authority ought not
to forestall; neither is it called upon to reject them when they are
declared by the course of events.

To the differences on the questions of expediency, every day were added
the disagreements on the questions of principle. The Government itself
excited but few. A bill on elections, introduced by the Minister of the
Interior, M. de Vaublanc, was the only one which assumed this
character. The debate was long and animated. The leading men on the
opposite sides of the Chamber, MM. de Villele, de la Bourdonnaye,
de Bonald, Royer-Collard, Pasquier, de Serre, Beugnot, and Laine,
entered into it anxiously. But the ministerial plan was badly conceived,
based upon incompatible foundations, and giving to the elections more of
an administrative than of a political character. The principal orators
of the Centre rejected it, as well as a counter-project proposed by the
committee, in which the right-hand party prevailed, and which the
Cabinet also disapproved. The last proposal was ultimately carried, but
with important amendments, and vehemently opposed to the last. The
Chamber of Deputies passed it by a weak majority, and in the Chamber of
Peers it was thrown out. Although the different parties had clearly
indicated their impressions and desires on the electoral sy