COMMITTEE OF PUBLIC SAFETY. 35 
law, under pain of being null, must be furnished with a 
certain number of signatures. These prescriptions had 
the greatest of all faults, that of being completely im- 
practicable. Man has discovered in our days the secret 
of going ten times as fast when he travels, of using less 
force when he acts, and of casting his searching gaze 
into the regions of infinity ; but he has not yet discovered 
the means of reading a page of manuscript in less time 
than it formerly occupied. We must allow that in that 
respect, the most humble merchant’s clerk would advance 
equally with Cesar or Cicero, Descrates or Bossuet. The 
innumerable dispatches which the Committee of Public 
Safety received daily, from all points of the frontiers 
menaced or invaded, from all the towns and villages of 
the interior where the promoters of a new political or- 
ganization were in violent conflict with the prejudices 
and interests of the privileged classes, could not be ma- 
turely examined. Zeal, activity, and devotion were not 
sufficient to expedite so many weighty affairs; a reform 
was indispensable; it concerned the safety of France. 
Two different ways presented themselves: they could 
demand the reorganization of the Committee, or divide 
the work amongst its various members. The reor- 
ganization of the Committee, in presence of a powerful 
enemy, and in the midst of unheard-of difficulties (such 
as no period of the history of nations had given an ex- 
ample of), would have excited in the Convention new 
ferments of disorder, enervated its magic power, and 
compromised the defence of the territory. The division 
of labour should prevail, and it did prevail. Carnot 
was charged with the organization of the armies and 
with their operations; Prieur (of the Cote-d’Or) with 
arming them; Robert Lindet-with provisioning them ; 
