220 CONDORCET: A BIOGRAPHY. 



divided into a great number of articles. An introduction of a hundred 

 and fifteen pages, written by Condorcet, gave in detail the motives 

 which had decided the commission. The "convention accorded to the 

 draught of our colleague the preference over all the others presented for 

 its consideration from other quarters, and concluded that it would with- 

 out delay be publicly discussed. Violent debates excited each day by 

 personal enmity, the bitterness of party spirit; the wearisome difficulties 

 of the circumstances, and the incessant usurpations of the commune of 

 Paris absorbed all the time of the sessions. Condorcet, caring only for 

 what he considered as directly promoting the triumph, the glory, and the 

 happiness of France, grieved to see the consideration of the constitu- 

 tion day by day deferred. In his impatience he demanded a limit 

 fixed for the delay, at the expiration of which a new convention should 

 be called. At Paris the proposed constitution received very little 

 attention; the departments, on the contrary, received it with favor. 

 It carried and promoted ideas which had become so powerful that it 

 was impolitic not to take them into account. Accordingly after the 

 events of the 31st of May and the 2d of June, the part of the conven-- 

 tion in the ascendency considered it opportune to gratify without 

 delay the wish of the people for the constitution so long promised the 

 country; but it refused to take up again the plan of Condorcet. Five 

 commissioners, appointed by the committee of the public safety, at 

 the head of which was H^rault de S^chelles, made a new plan which 

 the committee amended and accepted in a single session. The conven- 

 tion was not li-ss ex[)editious. The constitution presented on the 10th 

 of June, 179.'], was decreed on the 24th of the same month. The happy 

 shouts of the populace and the thunder of cannon announced in Paris 

 the great event. , 



The constitution, according to the terms of the decree, was to be sanc- 

 tio^ied or rejected by the i)rimary assemblies in the short space of three 

 days from the time of notification, and here occurred an act of Condorcet 

 in order to appreciate the bravery of which it-is necessary to go back 

 in thought to that terrible period in our annals which followed the 31st 

 of I\Iay. 



Sieves, in piivate confidence, called the work of H6rault de Seychelles 

 a bad index of subjects. What Sieyes said in se2ret Condorcet dared to 

 write to his constituents. lie did more: in a letter made public, the 

 celebrated savant openly proposed to the peo{)le not to sanction the new 

 constitution. His reasons were many and clearly expressed : 



"The integrity of the national rei)resentation," said Condorcet, "has 

 just been destroyed by the arrest of twenty-seven Girondiu members. 

 The discussion could no longer be free. Inquisitorial censure, the pillage 

 of printing offices, the violation of the secrets of letters, must be consid- 

 ered as having presented insurmountable obstacles to the manifestation 

 of the popular sentiment. The new constitution," added Condorcet, "as 

 it speaks of no compensation for the deputies, leads to the supposition 



