MODERN FRANCE, AND HER REVOLUTIONS. 
Ill 
FEANCE AND HER REVOLUTIONS. 
ABSTRACT OF MR. J. D. LEWIs's PAPER. 
(Read November 3rd, 1870.) 
In the revolutions of France they had a subject of present as 
well as historic interest. France had changed her government 
many times within the past eighty years ; and Talleyrand stated of 
a constitution that it was the thirteenth he had sworn to. These 
changes of government were not detached events, but indications 
of a chronic state of things. The first revolution, that of 1789, 
was the key to all that followed. It was said that the bulk of the 
French people were the most down-trodden in the world. The 
king was well meaning, but weak. Against this state of things 
the people rose and rested some portion of liberty. But the kings 
of Europe, in terror lest the feeling and influence should spread, 
formed a cordon around the country. Then followed the republic, 
with a captive king. He coquetted with the enemies of the 
country, and the law in its equality took his life. Then those of 
the kings of Europe who had hitherto stood aloof meddled in a 
matter that was not their own, and the Reign of Terror crushing 
the enemies of the republic at home, the forces of the country 
were consolidated, and launched upon the enemies abroad. Thus 
the revolution destroyed the feudal system in France, and was 
alike a blessing to France and to the whole of Europe. Such 
opinions as these would be generally accepted, but he believed 
they were utterly false. The French peasantry were better off 
than those of most other countries : many of them were landed 
proprietors; their parishes were governed by local functionaries, 
not by the nobility ; and on the whole the feudal system was per- 
haps weaker in France than anywhere else. The first phase of the 
revolution was legitimate, and the demands then made were 
granted, for the constitution of 1791 was as free as that of 
England. That constitution marked the limit to which respect- 
ability wished to go. At length the mob got the upper hand, 
and the Reign of Terror followed ; want, caused by the winter of 
1788-9, which had ushered in the revolution, had increased within; 
and the only chance of safety for France from foes without was 
arming the whole nation. A hungry people with arms in its 
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