REVOLUTION. 



Locke (Gov. p. 2. c. 19.) ; which would have reduced the 

 locietv almoft to a itate of nature ; would have levelled all 

 distinctions of honour, rank, officer, and property ; would 

 have annihilated the fovereign power, and in confequence 

 have repealed all pofitive laws ; and would have left the 

 people at liberty to have erected a new fyitem of itate upon 

 a new foundation of polity. They therefore very prudently 

 voted it to amount to no more than an abdication of the 

 government, and a confequent vacancy ot the throne ; by 

 which the government was allowed to fublilt, though the 

 executive magiilrate was gone, and the kingly office to re- 

 main, though king James was no longer king. Thus the 

 constitution was kept entire ; which, upon every found prin- 

 ciple of government, mull otherwife have fallen to pieces, if 

 fo principal and conitituent a part as the royal authority 

 had been abolilhed, or even fuipended. Blackll. Comin. 

 book i, Sec. book iv. Hume's Hilt. vol. viii. 



Revolution, French, in its moil popular fenfe, was for 

 feveral years, after 1789, understood in England to confiit 

 of thofe events which at the outlet deltroyed the ufual order 

 of things, "viz.. the Parisians' revolt, the capture and deitruc- 

 tion of the Baftile, and the fubmiffion of the monarch. But 

 thefe events, Angular and important as they were, could not 

 conllitute a political revolution : this mull have required a 

 change in the government. It is capable, lays Mr. (now fir 

 James) Mackintosh, of three fenfes. The king's recogni- 

 tion of the rights of the itates-general to a (hare in the le- 

 giflation, was a change in the actual government of France, 

 where the whole legillative and executive power had, with- 

 out the ihadow of interruption, for nearly two centuries, 

 been enjoyed by the crown ; in that fenfe, the meeting of the 

 Itates-general was the revolution, and the 5th of May 1789 

 was its epoch. The union of the three orders in one af- 

 fembly was a moil important change in the forms and fpint 

 of the legillature. This, too, may be called the revolution : 

 and the 23d of June of the fame year will be its epoch. This 

 body, thus united, formed the new conftitution, which may 

 be called a revolution ; becaufe, of all the early political 

 changes, it was the moil important, and its epoch was deter- 

 mined by the conclufion of the labours of the National Af- 

 fembly, on the 30th of September 1791, when the king, 

 Louis XVI., came to the aiTembly, and having addrefled 

 the members, the preiident proclaimed in his own name, and 

 in the name of the whole body, that " the conitituent af- 

 fembly declares that its power is at an end, and that it will 

 fit no longer." In whatever fenfe the phrafe be taken, the 

 effects have been fo momentous, as to claim the attention, 

 and excite the awe of the whole civilized world. In a work 

 of this kind it is impoffible to enter into the detail of the 

 various events connected with the French revolution : thefe 

 mufl require the pen of the hiltorian, who can devote years 

 to the inveiligation of facts, and to the developement of the 

 motives by which the great actors have been impelled to en- 

 gage in the feveral parts connected with their namss, The 

 hiitory of the French revolution will afford ample fcope and 

 abundant materials ior the molt interesting narrative of mo- 

 dern times. The New Cyclopaedia, embracing every topic 

 connected with human knowledge, cannot devote much fpace 

 to the hiitory of any country, and Mill lefs to a single event 

 connected with an individual itate. In the articles France 

 and Lewis XVI. we have given a pretty full account of the 

 caufes which led to the French revolution, and of the 

 changes which took place previoufly to the deftruction of 

 the Baltile : of the confederacy of the crowned heads againit 

 the popular governments, which were eftabhihed, one after 

 another, on the ruins of the old conititution : of the pro- 

 fcriptions and maflacres which were perpetrated in Paris ; 



and finally, of the decapitation oi the king, queen, and the 

 king's filter. We have then traced the progrels of Bona- 

 parte, from his confullhip to the high dignity of emperor, 

 and noticed the valt ind unprecedented power to which he 

 attained over almoft the whole continent of Europe, men- 

 tioning the kings that had been created by his iiat, and the 

 ilates that had been fubject to his controul, or that itood 

 in awe of his power. This mighty conqueror we followed, 

 in the article France, to his divorcement of Jofephine, and 

 marriage with the daughter of the emperor of Germany. 



In addition to the above-named articles, to which the 

 reader is referred, we have now to trace the iteps of this 

 man from the year 18 10, to his expuliion from the throne 

 and empire of France, and (hew by what means his oblti- 

 nacy and ambition caufed him to fall from the highest digni- 

 ties, to which perhaps mortal man ever arrived, to a itate 

 of mortification and almoll infigniiicance as the exile to 

 Elba, which may be regarded as the end of the revolution. 



For fome time the very nature of commerce mult have 

 operated as much to the prejudice of his own merchants, as 

 they could do to the prejudice of the merchants of this 

 country ; he ftruck more directly and fatally at the liberty 

 of his fubjedts by his decrees refpecting priions, domeitie 

 fervants, and the prefs. 



In the decree refpecting prifons, to which we referred 

 in the article France, it was explicitly declared, that then 

 were many perfons, in that country, accufed of crimes 

 againit the itate, whom it was neither fafe to liberate nor to 

 bring to trial : for the purpofe ot keeping thefe prifoncrs in 

 fafe cuftody, a number of itrong prifons were reared in the 

 heart of the country, in which it was determined they 

 fhould be confined. There might have been fome plea for 

 this mode of conduct during the convulsions of the revolu- 

 tion : — then it might not have been fafe nor prudent cither 

 to have brought to trial, or to have liberated men whole po- 

 pular character, or caufe, probably would, in the one cafe, 

 have excited frefh disturbances ; and in the other have ai- 

 fured their acquittal, however ilrong and full the proofs of 

 their guilt might have been. But under the exiiting order 

 of things it was impofiible for the emperor of France to pro- 

 nounce a itronger libel on his own government, than could 

 be inferred from fuch a decree. At this time, indeed, he 

 reigned with the molt defpotic fway over the French, and 

 he feemed refolved to eltabhih, in the heart of Europe, 

 and over a people enlightened by icience, a defpotifm 

 unknown even to the ignorant and enflaved nations ct 

 the Ealt. By his decree refpecting fervants it was evi- 

 dent, that its object was not to be confined to perfons in 

 that conditkm of life, but that it was meant, by putting 

 them under fuch itrict and harih regulations, to have always 

 at command fpies in every family, and thus to eftabliih a 

 more regular and perfect fyitem of efpionage. To their 

 acts he iifued his mandate, which went to deilroy every ad- 

 vantage which attaches to a free prefs.: this, indeed, was 

 not calculated to excite altoiiiihment, for in all defpotic 

 countries the liberty of the prefs has been the object of the 

 tyrant's fear and hatred. At no period did France ever 

 enjoy a free prefs ; but Bonaparte, who feems to have ex- 

 amined and compared all the tyrannical proceedings and 

 meafures of defpotic governments, both ancient and modern, 

 with a view to improve upon them, and from them to 

 eftabliih a perfect fyitem in France, which (hould cruih the 

 powers of the human mind, had gone beyond all former 

 precedent. By his decrees in the year 1810, of which we 

 are fpeaking, only a certain number of printers were al- 

 lowed to carry on their bufinefs within the French terri- 

 tories, and thefe were to be under the molt itrict and watch- 

 ful 



