170] 
fore the administration of Rober- 
spierre. The appeals were made 
to the direétory, which appointed 
commissioners to examine and de- 
cide of their validity: but these 
abused the powers committed to 
them inso glaring and scandalous a 
manner, and the direétory appeared 
so remiss in calling them to account 
for their criminal behaviour, that 
the legislature thought itself bound 
to take the cognizance of these 
matters from the executive power, 
which, either through want of time 
or of inclination, did not pay them 
sufficient attention, and to appoint, 
for their investigation, a committee 
of its own members, 
The public were not dissatisfied 
atthe scrupulous vigilance of the 
councils ever the direétory, and at 
the spirit with which they animad- 
verted upon their conduct, and re- 
strained their powers when it was 
necessary for the safety of individu- 
als) The number of which the 
directory consisted, though seeming- 
ly calculated to keep the aétive 
rulers of the statesufficiently divided 
among themselves, to prevent any 
one of them from engrossing the su- 
preme authority, bad not, however, 
in the opinion of many, provided 
against the combination of the mem-: 
bers colleétively, to grasp at so- 
vereign power, and to overrule, 
through the weight and dignity at- 
tached to their office, the proceed. 
ings of the other departments of the 
state, It was therefore no less in- 
cumbent on these to repress the first 
attempts of that body, to exceed 
the limits of their constitutional 
powers, than upon the parliaments 
of Great Britain to keep a vigilant 
eye on the conduct of the monarch 
and his ministers, and on the states- 
general of Holland, to watch the 
stéps of an aspiring stadtholder. 
ANNUAL REGISTER, 1796. 
Such were the opinions of the 
discerning part of the public; nor 
did many scruple to avow their ap- 
prehensions, that, in consequence 
of the numerous appointments to 
places of trust and profit, confided 
to the direétory, it would soon or 
late arrive at so great a power, as to 
form a party strong enough to con- 
tro] the legislature itself. 
Whether this were  effeéted 
through influence, or through force, 
the result would be the same: and 
the nation would be obliged to sub- 
mit toabsolute sway, like others that 
are governed despotically, by the 
crown and its agents, through the 
purchased and servile acquiescence 
of its representatives. 
These surmises were not without 
foundation. The stateliness assumed 
by the direétory, in its intercourse 
with foreign states, sufficiently indi- 
cated the lofty ideas they enter- 
tained of their importance, and how 
readily they would raise themselves 
to the summit of personal grandeur | 
and uncontrolled power, in the 
management of all public affairs, 
unless their ambition were obviated 
by timely checks, which could not be 
too expeditiously employed against 
men who exhibited so early a dispo- 
sition to aspire at an undue exten- 
sion of their authority. 
This loftiness of the direétory had 
suffered no small degree of humilia- 
tion from the spirited conduct of 
the government of the united states 
of America. Full of the idea, that 
these owed their independence to 
France, the French bore with im- 
patience and indignation that so 
great a benefit should be overlooked, 
and that, in this struggle for liberty 
with so many powers combined 
against them from every quarter in 
Europe, they should be forsaken by 
that people, in whose cause they 
3 2) hed 
