HISTORY OF EUROPE. 



169 



tyranny were known, and who had 

 manifested it by iheir zeal and ac- 

 tivity, in aiding, at the risk of their 

 lives, in l:s destructien. In order 

 to obviate at the same time the ill 

 consequences resulting from a long 

 retention o*" power, the Convention 

 deere;^ ihac one fourth, of their 

 numoer should go out every month 

 by rotation, and that their places 

 should be regularly supplied by a 

 new appointment. 



In the mean time, the great re- 

 volution that had taken place at 

 Paris was notified to all the depart- 

 ments in France, and received every- 

 where with the loudest acclama- 

 tions. As the submission to the late 

 government was in every respect 

 compelled, and the persons in pow- 

 er equally feared and detested, the 

 new acts and measures of the Con- 

 vention met with a ready and un- 

 feigned acquiescence. The differ- 

 ent armies of the republic concur- 

 red unanimously in following the 

 example of their fellow-citizens. 

 The decree by which they were 

 enjoined to give no quarter to the 

 English, had universally indisposed 

 all military men against its authors : 

 besides its atrocity and violation of 

 the laws of war, established among 

 civilized nations, it exposed the 

 French troops to retaliation when- 

 ever the events of War should be 

 adverse to them. In this view they 

 considered the decree as emanating 

 from men who sported with the 

 lives of their fellow-citizens, in or- 

 der to gratify a base thirst of re- 

 venge. So pleased, in short, was 

 every class of society with the 

 changee that' had happened, that 

 congratulations upon them were 

 presented to the Convention from 

 every part of France, and every 

 branch of the service by land and 

 «<a. ^Moderation, to use the phrase 



of the times, became the order of 

 the day, to the great jay of tfie 

 people at large ; bwt particularly 

 the more respectable classes, who 

 now began to breathe from the fa^* 

 tiguing anxiety with which they 

 had been continually agitated. In 

 compliance with the public opinion 

 and wishes, the revolutionary tri- 

 bunal, that engine of blood and bar- 

 barity, was pursuant to a decree of 

 the legislature, though not altoge- 

 ther abolished, new modelled, and 

 placed on a footing of equity and 

 justice that quieted the fears of all 

 the friends to the revolution, at 

 the same lime that it held out no 

 further terrors to those who peace- 

 ably submitted to the existing go» 

 vernment. 



The prisons too, conformably to 

 the spirit of lenity that now pre- 

 vailed, were no longer suffered to 

 retain indiscriminately the innocent 

 and the guilty. Strict enquiries 

 were made into every prisoner's 

 case ; and where no legal motive 

 for detention appeared, they were 

 immediately discharged. The rem- 

 nants of the terrorists, as they were 

 justly denominated, from the cruel 

 and impolitic maxim of keeping the 

 people in implicit subjection by a 

 merciless severity, did not behold 

 this great alteration in the system 

 of government without heavy com- 

 plaints and representations of the 

 pernicious consequences of indul- 

 gence to men who were incorri- 

 gibly attached to principles inimi- 

 cal to liberty, and obstinately de- 

 termined to destroy the republic, 

 should events put it in their power, 

 TKty were answered by reasonings, 

 founded on the impropriety of 

 punishing criminal intentions until 

 they had been openly manifested 

 by deeds ; and that it was much 

 more cjnsistenr wjth good policy 



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