Of the Old French Constitution – Digression on the King and on His Declaration to the French of the Month of July 17951
Three different theories about the old French constitution have been argued: some have claimed that the nation had no constitution; others have claimed the opposite; others have taken, as happens in all important questions, a moderate position: they have claimed that the French had a constitution, but that it was not observed.
The first view is untenable; the other two do not really contradict each other.
The error of those who have claimed that France had no constitution arises from the great error concerning human power, prior deliberation, and written laws.
If a man of good faith, having in himself only good sense and uprightness, should ask what the old French constitution was, we can answer him boldly: “It is what you felt when you were in France; it was that mixture of liberty and authority, of law and opinion, which made the foreigner, the subject of a monarchy traveling in France, believe that he was living under a government other than his own.”
But if we wish to consider the matter more thoroughly, we shall find in the corpus of French public law those characteristics and laws which elevate France above all known monarchies.
A peculiar characteristic of this monarchy is that it possesses a certain theocratic element which is particular to itself, and which has made it endure for fourteen hundred years: there is nothing so national as this element. The bishops, successors of the druids in this respect, have only perfected it.
I do not believe that any other European monarchy has employed, for the good of the state, a greater number of priests in the civil government. I think back from the peaceful Fleury to these Saint-Ouens, these Saint-Legers, and so many others so distinguished in political sense during their benighted times; true Orpheuses of France, who tamed tigers and led them in chains; I doubt whether a parallel series could be shown elsewhere.
But while the priesthood was one of the three pillars in France which supported the throne and played such an important role in the nation’s councils, courts, ministry, and embassies, its influence was, at best, little perceived in the civil administration; and even when a priest was Prime Minister, there was not a government of priests in France.
All the influences were well balanced, and everyone was in his place. From this point of view, it was England that most closely resembled France. If she ever banishes from her political vocabulary these words: Church and state,2 her government shall perish like that of her rival.
It was the fashion in France (because everything is fashionable in this country) to say that one was enslaved: but why then did one find in the French language the word of citoyen (even before the Revolution seized upon it much to its dishonour),3 a word that cannot be translated into other European languages? The younger Racine addressed this beautiful verse to the King of France, in the name of his city of Paris:
Under a citizen king, every citizen is king.
To praise the patriotism of a Frenchman, they said: C’est un grand citoyen. It would be hopeless to try to convey this expression in our other languages; Gross bürger in German,4 gran cittadino in Italian, etc., would not be tolerable.5 But we must go beyond generalities.
Several members of the old magistracy have brought together and developed the principles of the French monarchy in an interesting book which appears to deserve all the confidence of the French.6
These magistrates appropriately begin with the royal prerogative, and certainly there is nothing more magnificent.
“The constitution attributes to the King the legislative power; from him emanates all jurisdiction. He has the right to render justice, and to have it administered by his officers; to give pardon, to bestow privileges and rewards; to establish offices, to confer nobility; to convoke and to dissolve national assemblies whenever his wisdom so inclines him; to make peace and war, and to summon the army.” (p. 28)
No doubt, these are great prerogatives; but let us see what the French constitution has put on the other side of the balance.
“The King reigns only by the law and has no power to do anything at will.” (p. 364)
“There are laws that kings have confessed themselves (according to the famous expression) happily powerless to violate; they are the laws of the realm, as opposed to circumstantial or non-constitutional laws, called royal laws.” (pp. 29 and 30)
“Thus, for example, the succession to the crown is by male primogeniture, according to a rigid form.”
“Marriages of princes of the blood, made without the authority of the King, are null and void.” (p. 262)
“If the reigning dynasty is extinguished, it is the nation that gives itself a king.” (pp. 263 et seq.)
“Kings, as supreme legislators, have always spoken affirmatively in publishing their laws. Nevertheless, there is also a consent of the people, but this consent is only the expression of the will, the gratitude, and the acceptance of the nation.”7 (p. 271)
“Three orders, three chambers, three deliberations; this is how the nation is represented. The result of the deliberations, if it is unanimous, exhibits the will of the Estates-General.” (p. 332)
“The laws of the realm can only be made in general assembly of the whole realm, with the common consent of the people of the three estates. The prince may not derogate from these laws; and if he dares meddle with them, all he has done can be undone by his successor.” (pp. 292, 293)
“The necessity of the consent of the nation to the establishment of taxes is an incontestable truth, recognized by kings.” (p. 302)
“The will of two orders cannot bind the third, except with its consent.” (p. 302)
“The consent of the Estates-General is necessary for the validity of any perpetual alienation of the domain.” (p. 303) — “And the same supervision is recommended to them to prevent any partial dismemberment of the realm.” (p. 304)
“Justice is administered in the king’s name by magistrates who examine the laws to see if they are not contrary to the fundamental laws.” (p. 343) Part of their duty is to resist the misguided will of the sovereign. It was concerning this principle that the famous Chancellor l’Hôpital addressed the Parliament of Paris in 1561: The magistrates must not be intimidated by the transient wrath of sovereigns, nor by the fear of disgrace; but must always keep before them their oath to obey the ordinances, which are the true commandments of kings.” (p. 345)
We see Louis XI, arrested by the double refusal of his parliament, abandoning an unconstitutional alienation. (p. 343)
We see Louis XIV solemnly recognize this right of free verification (p. 347) and order his magistrates to disobey him on pain of disobedience if he should address to them commands contrary to law (p. 345). This order is not a play on words: the King forbids obedience to the man; he has no greater enemy.
Furthermore, this superb monarch ordered his magistrates to consider all letters-patent null which bear evocations or commissions for the judgment of civil and criminal cases, and even to punish the bearers of these letters. (p. 363)
The magistrates exclaim: Happy land, where servitude is unknown! (p. 361) And it is a priest distinguished by his piety and knowledge (Fleury) who writes, in expounding the public law of France: In France, all individuals are free: there is no bondage: there is freedom of domicile, travel, commerce, marriage, choice of profession, acquisitions, disposition of property, and succession. (p. 362)
“Military power must not interfere in the civil administration.” Provincial governors have nothing to do with the army; and they may only use it against the enemies of the state, and not against the citizen who is subject to the justice of the state. (p. 364)
“Magistrates are irremovable, and these important offices can only be vacated by the death of the holder, his voluntary resignation, or a legal forfeiture.”8 (p. 356)
“The King, in cases which concern him, pleads against his subjects in his tribunals. It has happened that he has been ordered to pay a tithe on the fruits of his gardens, etc.” (pp. 367 et seq.)
If the French examine themselves in good faith and with the passions quieted, they will feel that this is enough, and perhaps more than enough, for a nation too noble to be a slave, and too spirited to be free.
Shall we say that these beautiful laws were not observed? In this case, it was the fault of the French, and there is no more hope of liberty for them, for when a people does not know how to take advantage of its own fundamental laws, it is no use looking for others: it is a sign that it is not suited to liberty or that it is irredeemably corrupt.
But in rebutting these sinister ideas, I will cite, on the excellence of the French constitution, a testimony irrefutable from every point of view: that of a great politician and an ardent republican—that of Machiavelli.
“There have been,” he says, “many kings and very few of them good. I mean among the absolute sovereigns, among whom are not to be reckoned the kings of Egypt when that country, in the remotest ages, was governed by laws; nor those of Sparta; nor those of France in modern times, the government of this kingdom being, to our knowledge, the one most tempered by laws.”9
“The kingdom of France,” he says elsewhere, “is happy and tranquil because the King is subject to an infinitude of laws which guarantee the security of the people. The one who constituted this government10 wanted Kings to dispose of the army and treasury at their will; but in other cases, they were subjugated under the laws.”11
Who would not be struck to see from what point of view this powerful mind contemplated the fundamental laws of the French monarchy three centuries ago?
The French have been spoiled on this point by the English. They told them, without believing it, that France was a slave; as they told them that Shakespeare was better than Racine; and the French believed them. Even the honest judge Blackstone, towards the end of his Commentaries, with a smirk, placed on an equal footing France and Turkey: about which one must say, like Montaigne: the impudence of this coupling cannot be ridiculed too much.
But these English, when they made their revolution, such as it was, did they suppress kingship or the House of Lords to give themselves liberty? Not at all. Rather, they drew the declaration of their rights from their ancient constitution resurrected.
There is no Christian nation in Europe that is not by right free or free enough. There is none which does not have, in the purest examples of its legislation, all the elements of the constitution which suits it. But we must, above all, avoid the enormous mistake of believing that liberty is something absolute, not admitting of more or less. Remember the two jars of Jupiter; instead of good and evil, let us call them repose and freedom. Jupiter casts the lot of nations; more to one and less to the other: man counts for nothing in this distribution.
Another most catastrophic error is to attach oneself too rigidly to ancient monuments. They must undoubtedly be respected; but above all, we must consider what jurists call the last state. Every free constitution is by nature variable, and variable in proportion as it is free;12 to want to bring it back to its rudiments without losing something is a fool’s errand.
All this serves to establish that the French sought to surpass human power; that these disorderly efforts are leading them into slavery; that they only needed to know what they possessed, and that if they are suited to a greater degree of freedom than the one they enjoyed seven years ago (which is not at all clear), they have in their hands, in all the monuments of their history and their legislation, all that is necessary to make them the honour and the envy of Europe.13
But if the French are made for monarchy, and if it is only a question of establishing the monarchy on its true footings, what error, what fatality, what disastrous prejudice could estrange them from their legitimate King?
Hereditary succession is, in a monarchy, something so precious that every other consideration must yield before it. The greatest crime that a French royalist can commit is to see in Louis XVIII anything but his King, and to diminish the favour with which the King must be surrounded by discussing unfavourably the qualities or actions of the man. The Frenchman who would not blush to look back on the past in search of real or imagined wrongs would be very vile and guilty! The accession to the throne is a new birth: we count only from that moment.
If there is a commonplace in morality, it is that power and greatness corrupt man, and the best kings were those whom adversity has tested. Why, then, would the French deprive themselves of the advantage of being governed by a prince trained in the terrible school of misfortune? How many reflections the last six years must have provided him! how far he is from intoxication with power! how inclined he must be to reign gloriously by any means! by what holy ambition he must be penetrated! What prince in the world could have more motives, more desires, more means to bind the wounds of France!
Have the French not tested the blood of the Capets long enough? They know from eight centuries’ experience that this blood is good; why change? The chief of this great family showed himself in his declaration to be loyal, generous, deeply infused with religious truth; no one begrudges him his abundance of natural intelligence and knowledge. There was a time, perhaps, when it was well that the King be illiterate; but in this century, when we believe in books, a literate King is an advantage. What is more important is that he cannot be presumed to hold to any of those exaggerated ideas capable of alarming the French. Who could forget that Koblenz was displeased with him? This does him great honour. In his declaration, he pronounced the word liberty; and if anyone objects that this word was not more emphasized, it may be answered that a King must not speak the language of revolution. A solemn discourse addressed to his people must be distinguished by a certain sobriety of designs and expression that has nothing in common with the haste of a private individual. When the King of France has said that the French constitution subjects the laws to the forms it has consecrated, and the sovereign himself to observance of the laws in order to protect the legislator’s wisdom against seductive traps and to defend the subjects’ liberty against the abuses of authority, he has said everything, since he has promised liberty through the constitution. The King must not speak like a Parisian tribune. If he has discovered that it is wrong to speak of liberty as something absolute, that it is, on the contrary, something admitting of more and less; and that the art of the legislator is not to make the people free, but free enough, he has discovered a great truth, and he must be praised rather than blamed for his restraint. A famous Roman, at the moment when he restored liberty to a people most suited to it, and most anciently free, advised this people: libertate modice utendum [“to use their liberty with restraint”].14 What should he have said to the French? Surely the King, in speaking soberly of liberty, was thinking less of his own interests than of those of the French.
The constitution, the King continues, prescribes the conditions for the establishment of taxes, in order to assure the people that the taxes which they pay are necessary for the health of the state. The King, therefore, has no right to impose them arbitrarily, and this avowal alone excludes despotism.
It entrusts the highest body of the magistracy with the registration of laws, so that they may see to their execution and enlighten the monarch’s conviction if it should be deceived. Here is the registration of laws given into the hands of the higher magistrates; here is the right of remonstrance consecrated. Now, wherever a great body of hereditary—or at least irremovable—magistrates have the constitutional right to warn the monarch, to enlighten his conviction, and to complain of abuses, there is no despotism.
It places the fundamental laws under the safeguard of the King and the three orders in order to prevent revolution, the greatest calamity that can afflict peoples.
There is, therefore, a constitution, since the constitution is only the collection of fundamental laws, and the King cannot touch these laws; if he should try, the three orders would have the veto over him, as each of them has over the other two.
And one would surely be misguided in accusing the King of having spoken too vaguely, for this vagueness is precisely the proof of high wisdom. The King would have acted very imprudently if he had laid down limits preventing himself from advancing or retreating: he was inspired in reserving to himself a certain latitude of execution. The French will agree one day: they will admit that the King has promised all that he could.
Was Charles II better off for having adhered to the propositions of the Scots? He was told, as was Louis XVIII: “We must live in the present; we must be flexible”: it is a folly to sacrifice a crown to save the hierarchy. He believed it and acted very badly. The King of France is wiser: how are the French so obstinate as to refuse him justice?
If this prince had been foolish enough to propose a new constitution to the French, then one could have accused him of presenting a perfidious vagueness; for in so doing he would have said nothing: if he had proposed a work of his own, there would have been an outcry against him, and this outcry would have been well founded. By what right, in effect, could he have made himself to be obeyed once he abandoned the old laws? Is not arbitrariness a common domain to which everyone has an equal right? There is not a single young man in France who would not point out the defects of this new work and propose corrections. Let the matter be thoroughly examined, and it will be seen that as soon as the King had abandoned the old constitution, he would have had but one more thing to say: I will do whatever you wish. It is to this indecent and absurd phrase that the King’s most beautiful orations would have been reduced, once translated into clear language. Are we to be taken seriously when we blame the King for not having proposed to the French a new revolution? Since the insurrection began the dreadful misfortunes of his family, he has seen three constitutions accepted, sworn to, and solemnly consecrated. The first two lasted but a moment, and the third does not exist except in name. Should the King have proposed five or six to his subjects and let them take their pick? Certainly, the three attempts cost them dear enough, so that no sensible man should venture to propose another. But this new proposition, which would be folly on the part of an individual, would be, on the part of the King, a folly and a crime.
However he had conducted himself, the King could not please everyone. There would have been complaints in not publishing any declaration; there were complaints in publishing such as he did; there would have been complaints in any other case. Mired in doubt, he did well to stick to principles and to offend only passion and prejudice in saying that the French constitution would be for him the ark of the covenant. If the French examine this declaration with cool heads, I am much mistaken if they should not find there something for which to respect the King. In the terrible circumstances in which he found himself, nothing would have been more attractive than the temptation to compromise his principles to reconquer the throne. So many people have said and believed that the King lost in persisting in old ideas! It would have seemed so natural to listen to proposals for accommodation! Above all, it would have been so easy to accede to these proposals, preserving the ulterior motive to return to the old prerogative, without disloyalty, but relying solely on the force of things, to where it required much frankness, much nobility, and much courage to say to the French: “I cannot make you happy; I can, I must reign only through the constitution; I shall not touch the ark of the Lord; I am waiting for you to come to your senses; I await your apprehension of this truth so simple, so evident, and that you nevertheless persist in rejecting; that is to say, with the same constitution, I can give you a completely different regime.”
Oh! how wise was the King when he said to the French that their ancient and wise constitution was for him the holy ark, and that he was forbidden to touch it with a reckless hand. He adds, however, that he wishes to restore to it all purity which time had corrupted, and all vigour which time had weakened. Once again, these words are inspired; for here one clearly reads what is in man’s power as separate from what belongs only to God. There is not in this statement, too little contemplated, a single word which should not recommend the King to the French.
It is to be hoped that this impetuous nation, which knows to return to the truth only once it has exhausted error, should at last wish to see a very palpable truth; it is that it is the dupe and the victim of a small number of men who place themselves between it and its legitimate sovereign, from whom it can expect only good deeds. Let us put forth a worst-case scenario. The King will allow the sword of justice to fall on some parricides; he will punish by humiliation some nobles who have displeased him: so? what does it matter to you, a good labourer, an industrious artisan, a peaceful citizen, whoever you may be, to whom heaven has given obscurity and happiness? Recall, then, that you, with your fellows, form almost the whole nation; and that the whole people suffer all the evils of anarchy only because a handful of reprobates vilifies the King whom they themselves fear.
Never will a people have let slip a better chance if they continue to reject their King, since they expose themselves to being ruled by force, instead of crowning their legitimate sovereign themselves. What a gesture it would be to this prince! with what efforts of zeal and love would the King seek to reward his people’s fidelity! The national will would always be before his eyes to animate him in the great enterprises, in the dutiful work which the regeneration of France requires of its chief, and every moment of his life would be consecrated to the happiness of the French.
But if they persist in rejecting their King, do they know what their fate will be? The French today are sufficiently matured by misfortune to grasp a hard truth; amid the spasms of their fanatical freedom, the detached observer is often tempted to exclaim, like Tiberius: O homines ad servitutem natos [“O men born for slavery”]! There are, as we know, many kinds of courage, and surely the Frenchman does not possess them all. Intrepid before the enemy, but not before authority, even the most unjust. Nothing equals the patience of this people who call themselves free. In five years, it was made to accept three constitutions and the revolutionary government. Tyrants succeeded one another, and always the people obeyed. Never have we seen them succeed in any effort to escape from their impotence. Their masters have gone so far as to smite them with mockery. They told them: You think that you do not want this law, but rest assured, you want it. If you dare to refuse it, we will shoot you with grapeshot to punish you for not wanting what you want. — And so they did.
It is no matter that the French nation is no longer under the terrible yoke of Robespierre. Certainly, she may well congratulate herself, but cannot boast of having escaped this tyranny; and it is not clear whether the days of her servitude were more shameful for her than those of her enfranchisement.
The history of 9 Thermidor15 is brief: A few scoundrels killed a few scoundrels.
If not for this family feud, the French would still be groaning under the sceptre of the Committee of Public Safety.
And at this very moment, do a small number of seditious men not still speak of putting one of the Orléans family on the throne?
The French now lack only the reproach of putting the son of a tortured man on a pedestal instead of the brother of a martyr. And yet, nothing promises them that they will not suffer this humiliation if they do not hasten to return to their legitimate sovereign.
They have given such proof of patience that there is no kind of degradation that does not await them. The great lesson—I do not say for the French people, who more than any other people in the world will always accept and never choose their masters, but for the small number of good Frenchmen whom circumstances will render influential—is to neglect nothing in wresting the nation from these degrading fluctuations by delivering it into the arms of its King. He is a man, no doubt, but do they hope to be governed by an angel? He is a man, but today we are sure he knows this, and that counts for very much. If the wish of the French was to restore him to the throne of his fathers, he would be wedded to his nation, which would find everything in him: goodness, justice, love, gratitude, and incontestable talents matured in the unforgiving school of misfortune.16
The French have appeared to pay little attention to the words of peace which he has addressed to them. They did not praise his statement, they even criticized it, and have probably forgotten it; but one day they will do him justice: one day posterity will call this statement a model of wisdom, frankness, and royal style.
The duty of every good Frenchman at this moment is to work tirelessly to direct public opinion in favour of the King, and to present all his acts whatsoever in a favourable light. It is here that the royalists must examine themselves with the utmost severity and must harbour no illusions. I am not a Frenchman, I know nothing of their intrigues, I am not personally acquainted with them. But suppose that a French royalist told me: “I am ready to shed my blood for the King; however, without derogating from the loyalty I owe him, I cannot help but blame him, etc.” I should answer to this man what his conscience will doubtless tell him more authoritatively than I: You are lying to the world and to yourself; if you were capable of sacrificing your life for the King, you would sacrifice your prejudices for him. Besides, he does not need your life, but your prudence, your measured zeal, your passive devotion, even (to silence all conjectures) your very indulgence; keep your life, which he does not need at this moment, and render him the service he does need. Do you believe that the most heroic are those who thunder forth in the gazettes? The most obscure, on the contrary, can be the most effective and the most sublime. This is not a matter of your pride; please your conscience and Him who gave it to you.
Like those threads that a child at play could snap but nevertheless, when joined, form a cable that can support a great vessel’s anchor, so a host of insignificant critiques can muster a formidable army. How much service would we render to the King of France in combating those prejudices which have somehow developed, and linger on? Have men who profess the age of reason not reproached the King for his inaction? Have others not arrogantly compared him to Henry IV, observing that this great prince could find weapons other than intrigues and declamations to regain his throne? But since we are being witty, why not reproach the King for not having conquered Germany and Italy like Charlemagne and for not living nobly there while waiting for the French to listen to reason?
As for the more or less numerous party which utters great cries against the monarchy and the monarch, hate is not nearly the entirety of the feeling that animates it, and it seems that this mixed sentiment is worth analysing.
There is no man of intelligence in France who does not despise himself to some extent. National ignominy weighs on all hearts (for never was a people despised by more despicable masters); we need to console ourselves, and good citizens do this in their own way. But the vile and corrupt man, stranger to all elevated ideas, avenges himself for his past and present abjection by contemplating, with that ineffable pleasure that comes from baseness, the spectacle of humiliated greatness. To raise himself up in his own eyes, he looks down on the King of France, and he is pleased with his stature in comparing himself to this overturned colossus. Imperceptibly, by a feat of his own disordered imagination, he comes to look upon this great fall as his own work; he invests himself alone with all the power of the republic; he rebukes the King; he arrogantly calls him a pretended Louis XVIII; and, lashing out at the monarchy in his furious pamphlets, if he succeeds in frightening a few Chouans, he elevates himself to among La Fontaine’s heroes: I am thus a thunderbolt of war.
We must also take into account the fear that howls against the King, lest his return should bring another rifle shot.
People of France, let yourself not be seduced by the sophisms of private interest, vanity, or cowardice. Listen not to the reasoners any longer: there has been only too much reason in France, and reasoning has banished reason. Deliver yourself without fear and reservation to the infallible instinct of your conscience. Do you want to raise yourself up in your own eyes? Do you want to acquire the right to self-esteem? Do you want to perform a sovereign act? Recall your sovereign.
I am perfectly foreign to France, which I have never seen, and can expect nothing from its King, whom I will never know—if I make mistakes, the French can at least read them without anger, as altogether impartial errors.
But what are we, weak and blind human beings! and what is this quavering light that we call reason? When we have mustered all the probabilities, questioned history, satisfied all doubts and all interests, we may still embrace only a deceptive cloud instead of the truth. What decree has He pronounced, this great Being before whom nothing is great; what decrees has He pronounced on the King, his dynasty, his family, France, and Europe? Where and when will the shocks come to an end, and with how many misfortunes must we yet buy tranquillity? Is it to build17 that He has overthrown, or are his rigours without reprieve? Alas! a dark cloud covers the future, and no eye can pierce this darkness. However, all things announce that the established order of things in France cannot last, and that invincible nature must restore the monarchy. So, whether our wishes are fulfilled or inexorable Providence has decided otherwise, it is curious and even useful to examine, never losing sight of the history and nature of man, how these great changes work, and what role the multitude may play in an event whose date alone seems doubtful.
1 The Declaration of Verona by Louis XVIII made many concessions to the republican cause including religious tolerance, sweeping reform of abuses, the reconstitution of the Estates-General with expanded voting rights and the right of petition, but also demanded punishment for regicides and the re-establishment of hereditary monarchy and state religion. It was poorly received by republicans who saw it as insufficiently progressive.
2 [Maistre gives this phrase in English.]
3 [During the French Revolution, the term citoyen replaced that of monsieur, madame, or mademoiselle as an honorific.]
4 Bürger, verbum humile apud nos et ignobile [“a word lowly and ignoble to us”]. J. A. Ernesti, in Dedicat. Opp. Ciceronis, p. 79.
5 Rousseau made an absurd note on this word citoyen, in his Contrat social, book I, ch. VI. Unembarrassed, he accuses a very learned man [Bodin] of having made on this point an awkward blunder; whereas Jean-Jacques makes an awkward blunder in each line; he shows an ignorance as much of languages as he does of metaphysics and history.
6 Développement des principes fondamentaux de la monarchie française, 1795.
7 If one carefully examines this intervention of the nation, one will find less than a co-legislative power, and more than mere consent. This is an example of those things which must be left in a certain obscurity, and which cannot be subjected to human determination: it is the most divine part of the constitution, if it is permissible to say. It is often said: One has only to make a law to know where one stands. Not always; there are reserved cases.
8 Why bother declaiming so strongly against the venality of the offices of the magistracy? Venality should be considered only as a means to hereditary benefit, and thus the problem is reduced to knowing whether, in a country like France, or in one such as France has been for two or three centuries, justice could be administered better than by hereditary magistrates? The question is very difficult to resolve; the enumeration of inconveniences is a misleading argument. What is bad in a constitution, what must even destroy it, is, in fact, still as much a part of it as what is best in it. I am reminded of the passage in Cicero: Nimia potestas est tribunorum, quis negat, [“the power of the tribunes is excessive, who would deny it?”] etc. De Legibus, III. 10.
9 Discourses on Livy, book I, ch. LVIII.
10 I should like to know him.
11 Discourses on Livy, I, XVI.
12 “All human governements, particularly those of mixed frame, are in continual fluctuation.” Hume, History of England, Charles I, ch. L.
13 A man whose personality and opinions I respect equally (M. Mallet du Pan), and who does not share my opinion on the old French constitution, has taken the trouble of developing part of his ideas in an interesting letter, for which I am infinitely grateful. He objects, among other things, that the book of the French magistrates, quoted in this chapter, would have been burned under the reign of Louis XIV and Louis XV, as an attempt against the fundamental laws of the monarchy and against the rights of the monarch. — I believe it: just as M. Delolme’s book would have been burned in London (perhaps along with the author), under the reign of Henry VIII or his rude daughter.
When one has taken a position on great questions, with full knowledge of the cause, he rarely changes his opinion. Nevertheless, though I distrust my prejudices as much as I should; yet I am sure of my good faith. It will be noted that I have not cited any contemporary authority in this chapter, for fear that the most respectable might appear suspect. As for the magistrates who authored the Développement des principes fondamentaux, etc., if I have used their work, it is because I prefer not to do what has been done, and because these gentlemen have mentioned certain records, and this was exactly what I needed.
14 Livy, XXXIV, 49.
15 [The parliamentary revolt on 9 Thermidor, year II (July 27, 1794) against Robespierre, in response to his attacks against the Committee of Public Safety and Committee of General Security for the excesses of the Terror.]
16 I shall postpone until chapter X the interesting discussion on amnesty.
17 [Maistre’s original manuscript has détruire here, corrected subsequently to construire.]