ED 
Meeting of the Estates-General, 1789. 93 
courageously manifested itself; to the illustrious and respectable 
members of the clergy . . . who by their union with the national 
assembly, acquired a new claim to the homage of the present 
generation and to that of posterity; finally, to those noble citizens 
who were inclined to sink individual interest in the general 
welfare and to seek their happiness only in the happiness of all.” 
Particular emphasis was laid upon the satisfaction it gave the 
people to see the ‘‘first prince of the blood” in the ranks of the 
assembly. The address closed with a statement of the inability 
to depict in strong enough terms “the love of all the citizens 
for their king, their devotion to their country, and their con- 
fidence in their representatives.’’®? 
Bailly made a very judicious response to the address. He 
thanked the citizens of Paris for their interest, although it had 
not been conveyed through regular channels, but yet gave no 
undue attention to their act. He emphasized the fact of the 
unity of the assembly where the Paris delegates saw their worthy 
archbishop sitting. He urged them to inform the capital of the 
zeal of the assembly for the public welfare and to ask all the 
inhabitants of the city to do everything possible to quiet any 
popular agitation and to represent peace as the first condition 
requisite to the assembly’s labors for the regeneration of France.*° 
The deputation from the electors and that from the commune 
showed conclusively that the assembly had the public support 
of Paris, yet Bailly’s words clearly indicate that the deputies 
did not desire, and might even fear, any immoderate expression 
of popular sentiment. 
If the admission of those two deputations had caused the 
39 Procés-verbal, No. 8, 20-23. The full text of the address is given here: 
The Assemblée nationale (1, 244-46) also prints the address, with a few slight 
variations or omissions in wording as compared with the form in the Procés- 
verbal. Jallet (104, 105) says of the address: ‘“‘ Ils lurent, avant que d’entrer, 
leur discours 4 deux députés des communes, qui leur firent retrancher quel- 
ques paragraphes un peu trop forts.” 
40 Procés-verbal, No. 8, 24-25; Assemblée nationale, I, 246-47. The text is 
found in the second also. The Point du jour (I, 58) gives a reproduction of 
the last part of Bailly’s response; Duquesnoy (I, 134) and Procés-verbal des 
électeurs de Paris (1, 102) say that Bailly made a response, as does also Jallet 
(105); Boullé, Docs. inédits, Revue de la rév., XIII, 77; and Etats-généraux, 
Journal de Paris, I, 116. 
207 
