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Chapter 12
Page: 142-165
CHAPTER XII
Apathy of the powers of Europe regarding the state of France; human rights; their criticism; reflection on equality and freedom.
What did Europe as a whole make of all this during this alarming succession of horror and disorder? Pitt, with his burning desire for revenge, continued on with his disruptive plan while the other cabinets, led by ministers who were unfit or irresolute and little educated as to the causes of the revolution, and unaware of either the force of the torrent nor the limits where it would stop, contemplated with a certain sardonic glee the French empire as it made ready to erase itself from the political landscape. But soon, after seeing fanaticism being propagated and a kingdom that was tossing its debris around like in an asylum, they saw the danger and their hatred and jealousy gave way to belated pity.
Finally, torn between joy and fear,
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they began to take precautions, at least to isolate themselves from such a disastrous contagion.
Shortly before the king was transported to Paris, a very un-political cleric, but full of pride, studied Grotius, Condillac, and Rousseau regarding the American code which dwelled largely on humans right based on the false bases of equality and freedom.
Clear-thinking people said to him, “Monsieur abbot, please choke this political monster. If you let it live, it will produce vandalism, insubordination and disorder.” – “But my masterpiece is finished and it’s sublime. I don’t want to have worked on it so long for nothing!” - “Alright, go ahead and present your declaration, your masterpiece to the courts to enlighten the judges, but do not publish them. Do you want to work for the people and make things better? Then establish their duties in a precise way so that they will match perfectly with human rights. To proclaim to the people that ‘Nobody is above me, I am free’ would be to misguide public morals and destroy all the harmony which links people together. If ‘Nobody is above me’ then I am responsible to nobody.
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And if ’I am free’, then all the restraints which oppose my will are suspended.
Here is, Monsieur abbot, the root of all the insults which the people are now hurling at those whom they have always respected. Here is, Monsieur abbot, the cause of the crimes which have been delivered with such audacity. But, let us examine for a moment your alleged ‘masterpiece’ which is framed everywhere as if it were the Jewish Books of the Law.
Let’s start with the preamble:
"Representatives of the French people constituted in a national assembly, mindful that ignorance, or forgetful and contemptuous of humans rights which are the only causes of public misfortune and the corruption of governments, etc…"
First of all, it is false to state that ignorance is the only cause of public misfortune; in fact it is just the opposite. For instance, if an instigator in a village preaches disobedience, he is always one who has had some formal education; but let’s continue:
"are resolved to express in a solemn declaration, the natural, inalienable and crowned rights of man. So that acts,
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legislative power, and that of the executive, powers are to be at every moment compared with the goal of all political institutions and respected."
But this faculty ‘to compare’ will pose continual obstacles for the authorities. Each individual will believe himself to be a competent judge of contradictions. If there is a contradiction, he will give birth to it, and, if not, who will judge between the law and the one who doesn’t want some act to be carried out? This principle is very dangerous and was the basis for all the seditious movements. The Jacobins, Cordeliers, Feuillans and clubs in general, prove this to be true.
"Men are born and remain free and are equal in rights; social distinctions are founded on common utility"
All rights hark back to convention, and it is generally agreed that the son of a cobbler does not have the same rights as the son of a prince. This results from the fact that men in society are not born with the same rights but have the rights attached to their nature. Thus the most despotic tyrant cannot say to his slave, “I defend your right to feel the evil that I have made for you, or I defend your right to digest your food.” Furthermore, even if men were born equal in rights, this doesn’t
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mean that they would remain equal. For example, the criminal has lost his right to freedom. So if one wanted to say that men are born with the right to have unequal rights, then that wouldn’t be worth the trouble to write down. This distinction must be made otherwise you induce the people to error by making them believe in the benefits of equality and sovereignty without reservation or restraint.
"the goal of any political association is the conservation of natural rights - the conservation of the natural and inalienable rights of man; these rights are freedom, property, safety, and resistance to oppression "
Freedom, yes; and property, yes, but ‘safety’ is not a right, it is a political convention. Regarding resistance to oppression, it too is not a human right. For example, a savage cannot be viewed as being oppressed, and war is not an oppression. If a robber attacks me, I will resist him, so that is my right; I use it because society is not there to defend me. But if every person in society believes he has the right to be defended when oppressed, then even the robber believes he is being oppressed. Thus any contrary opinion will be viewed as an oppression and if both are defended, then the law will have
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no effect. Thus this alleged ‘right’ carries within it the seed for revolt.
"the principle of any sovereignty lies primarily in the nation; no body or individual can exert authority which it isn’t expressly given"
Since sovereignty is not properly defined, each club, group, executioner, killer, pillager, and guillotine operator claims to act under the umbrella of national sovereignty. If the principle of sovereignty is badly explained, it becomes destructive of the national order.
"Law should prohibit only the harmful activities in society."
But the harmful actions in one canton may be very useful in another. There are two sides to every coin. One legislator will look at something as beneficial and worth supporting while another looks at the same thing as harmful and worth opposing. In the first case the legislator will make a law which will not harm his canton; in the second, the law will be considered bad, and the right to resist oppression will destroy this initiative of the government.
"the law is the expression of a popular consensus.”
Good!
“All citizens have the right
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to contribute personally to its formation.”
This principle is very dangerous. The participation of all citizens in lawmaking is impossible. The differences between regions, their differing needs and spirit, will often preclude any kind of general assent. Thus, any man with whom a law will seem unfavourable will be able to ignore it, and petitions, for and against, will appear. So, what then is the popular will? To either withhold or to pass laws have their disadvantages: one shows weakness while the other stifles freedom. For a law to be good, people must rule people without favoritism.
Consider the social contract where it says, "The law should only establish punishments that are strictly necessary.”
This vague reasoning will establish an eternal controversy between the legislator and the delinquent, the law and the critic. The law is not a person; it is made by men who are prone to error.
"The free communication of thoughts and opinions is the most invaluable right of man. Any citizen can thus speak, write, print freely, except in response to the abuse
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of this freedom, in cases determined by law. "
Every abuse must produce some evil and to avoid it, it is necessary to define what the abuse spoken about consists of. This must be published otherwise one opens the way for arbitrary pronouncements regarding exceptions to the law expressed.
"All citizens have the right to note, by themselves, the need for public participation"
Never will a peasant note the need for participation, unless he happens to be excluded.
"to agree to it voluntarily".
He will comply only if forced to.
"to comply with it".
He will see uselessness in it everywhere
"to determine the quantity of it".
’All for those closest to him.’ Nothing is more passionate, more selfish, more unjust than the peasant when it comes to his own self-interest.
"Any society in which the guarantee of rights is not assured, and neither has a fixed separation of powers, does not have a constitution"
And here precisely is why France doesn’t have a constitution.
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I invite my readers to read the analysis of the constitution of 1789, 1790 and 1791, by Mr. de Clermont-Tonnerre. They will see there that each article carries within it the downfall of its principles. One thus misleads the people when these rights are presented as a solid base on which all laws should rest.
This declaration was to be a series of clear maxims so precise that the legislator himself could not deviate from them. Here each article has its exception and to derive constant legislation from it, all sides must be taken into consideration. But if one claims the principle, and the other the exception, then who decides?
Louis XVI had greater foresight than all the philosophers of the constituent assembly when he sensed the dangers of human rights and was loathe to sanction them.
Equality presupposes general public virtue, but there is no such thing unless, as in Sparta, it didn’t spring from general virtue. Equality is a vain proposition and ever will France smell it only to misuse it. Furthermore, the sovereignty of the people
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and equality are incompatible because equality is the principle of despotism. This is what Tarquin wanted to say when he cut down the heads of poppies higher than the others. He, being a despot, wanted all men equal so, obviously, the sovereignty of the people never existed but in the infancy of the policy. All legislators put a line of demarcation between the people and sovereignty because obedience can be ordered only by one who happens to be above those who obey. [Or, as George Orwell put it regarding socialism: “A system whereby all men are equal, except some men are more equal than others.”]
"Equality (said Burlamaquy) excludes any subordination, since it is the equality of two weights that keeps them in balance. It is necessary, therefore, in nature as well as with one who wishes to subordinate another that different qualities exist by which one can base the relation of the superior to the inferior." If mankind everywhere found an assured subsistence, then no man would ever be in a position to control another. Thus in the absence of needs, equality could exist. But doesn't one need forty workmen to labor under a Master, otherwise who would cultivate the ground? It takes manpower to make the earth productive, thus any system of equality is a system that tends toward famine.
The Ephésiens had their ‘sans-culottes’.
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Cicéro, whom our legislators regarded well, bequeathed us a travesty when he said by exiling Hernodore: That nobody among us believes himself higher than another, and if somebody is in this case, that he be driven out. Meanwhile the aristocrat Héraclite claimed that whoever dared to speak thus, deserved death.
But, let us suppose for a moment the undeniability of equality. Then Sieyès, the legislator, must have felt that truth isn’t always the rule in politics or that the laws which govern men should not be known by all.
The fact is, if you create a society of equal people, it will have neither a head, laws, or power. The factions of Rome did not take on a ferocious character until all civil distinctions ceased to exist. Then one saw bloody heads in the forum and all the dishonored patricians threw in with the lower class people in order to hang on to something and find support.
Readers, compare these historical facts with what you saw. I believe that, if, instead of saying, ‘All men are equal’ one had said, ‘All men are aristocrats’, one would have approached the truth well and comprehended it better.
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What is an aristocrat in the sense of the revolution? It is one who is not in favour of equality. Fine! But doesn’t everybody have a natural desire to rise above mediocrity?
The child from the cradle onward shows his spirit. First he demands more food while suckling; then he is with his tutor; then he is in college with his comrades – all to develop some superiority. Any man who works to better himself is an aristocrat simply because he doesn’t want to remain forever at the same common level.
It is incredible what spontaneous effects arose from human rights and the doctrine of equality. Let us briefly consider some of these:
1° Forgetting all about respect
Here is a letter, dating back to Blois, written to the king before his departure for Varennes:
"The friends of the constitution can only speak its language; (the language of the constitution!) the tone of pride never leaves it; [Is it possible to be more stupid! The characteristic of a constitution is precisely not to be proud.] we will not pay you any more respect because liberty does not teach us the art of
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servitude; [under equality] the municipal body made an address to you regarding a convention that we find unconstitutional: henceforth we do not recognize you as our sovereign since we are the subjects of the law, and not yours. In delegating to you the premier function and secondary powers, this is not at all the dispossession of sovereignty."
What logic! Oh, well! This silly thing came from some irate craftsmen and found some admirers. It is a frog which is now seen swelling with pride.
2° A general trend was felt which reversed the natural order of things [ie reverse discrimination]. The servant became insolant, inflamed by cheap passions, and didn’t see any more the degrees of distinction between himself and his Master. Thus, following the impulses of his pride and greed, he became a denouncer of his Master.
3° the most inept people and the most impudently passionate, were carried by the populace into positions of great importance.
I saw a violin player in an orchestra elevated to the rank of war commissioner.
I saw a shoe-maker leave his shop to be proclaimed a general.
I saw the taking of sundials and arabesques as signs of feudalism (1).
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One may well argue that one is right to believe that a man of merit has the right to claim all having risen to the top of his profession because genius is a noble gift given by nature. But when a chancellor instructed me to regard all occupations as honourable, I presume he didn’t mean equally capable, otherwise a cobbler would be as capable of doing the chancellor’s job as the chancellor himself. Perhaps it would have been truer to say: "Virtue can be found in every capacity, therefore every honourable vocation and those who engage in it are worthy of respect."
(1) Here is a declaration taken from me while I was in prison. I beg the reader to consider this quotation which I write having it under my eyes.
"Seen the request of the citizen...... The council will grant to the guy known as citizen, for the day that he will be asked by the one known as citizen of course that means the citizen will not escape..... and the committee will send a gendarme to him on the day that he will be asked.
Members of the committee, etc.
Such was the calibre of those governing us! What would have been said of these same people if they had put in their shops staff who did not know how to shave or to put bottoms on old breeches?
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As for Freedom, it too is something which the people know nothing about. Say to one that it means doing whatever one wants provided that no harm is inflicted upon another, and he will say, “No, it isn’t that. To be free means to be controlled by no law. It is the right to seize properties which are appropriate; to insult whoever one wants whenever one is stronger; to violate one’s obligations without being afraid of the police; to plunder, start fires, or kill without fear of being hung.” Do you want proof of that? Since we had these legislators at the head of the government, all this was done without restraint.
Thus ‘freedom’ as conceived by the French people is nothing more than anarchy. It appears, furthermore, that the word ‘people’ doesn’t have a well-defined meaning either. For example, if one complains about ill treatment, he responds with, “It is necessary to have patience and suffer because the people should not be opposed.”
Consequently the sovereignty of the ‘people’ is only the sovereignty of the craftsman who arbitrarily uses the term... Ah! I am mistaken! True craftsmen work and are decent people. I refer only to the turbulent malcontents
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of a ferocious nature whose notion of freedom is similar to that employed by wolves, foxes, and savages.
Let us examine for one moment the effects of this kind of ‘freedom’ which is so much proclaimed, so much sung about, and which appears on so many banners.
Here is a scenario concerning a businessman: As a businessman my affairs are always under scrutiny. I am unable to make the smallest voyage without being stopped, examined and questioned. And if perchance I happened to mislay my passport, I am a suspect even though I am well-known. I am then incarcerated and my wife, absent from these proceedings, writes saying, “Stay calm, everything will be alright.” Her letter is opened by police chiefs who interpret the message as conspiratorial so that officers come to take to me away to prison. I do not know what I’m charged with but am questioned about conspiracy. My astonishment gives me the appearance of being guilty. When one shows me the ‘evidence’ of my crime, I prove that my trip is simply a matter of business and trade. My chains are then removed but with an injunction to be more circumspect in the future.
Then I am tormented with taxes and tariffs, but if the State happens to owe me money and I present myself for payment, then I’m asked for documents that are impossible to obtain and certificates that officials refuse to issue me. [Note: Something like this actually happened to Isaac as seen in this excerpt from his ‘Memoirs’ when he had to defend various art treasures in his custody from confiscation.] – But I don’t ask for certificates
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when you owe me money, so why not forget about what I owe you, and cease your pursuits. – No! You must pay. – Well, then, I won’t pay you unless you pay me what you owe since the amounts are equal. All the same, my furniture is seized.
Then if some rascal denounces me to be an emigrant, my goods are seized even if I can prove by my infirmities that I never left home. But I have been lame and only lately have been able to walk. A thousand witnesses will testify to that fact. – No matter, you are an émigré which we can prove because the proof is here on this list!
Here are some family scenarios: I am the head of a family faced with a fearsome food shortage. So I buy corn, rice and provisions for a few months which causes an enemy to denounce me as a monopolizer. On this pretext a horde of brigands enters my home, plunders me, and ransacks my house. My crime, thus, was to have been a good father who was prudent. I know who the robbers are, but my complaint isn’t accepted and their actions are approved.
At home I have some weapons to protect me from brigands. Then someone comes to take them away from me. – “But my house is isolated; you are putting me in jeopardy of assassins!” – All to no avail, they won’t listen to me.
I have a horse which is essential for my well-being and health. No, that doesn’t matter. - But
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the horse is mine! – No, it belongs to the State. – But I paid for it! - So much the better; now nothing more has to be paid for it. - You are stealing it from me! – You will be reimbursed, but don’t bother making an accounting because it is I who will do that!
I have a little money saved up to live in my old age. I am obliged to make a full declaration of what money I have. This is needed so that I can be stripped of it.
Or, if I do not have any money, but am suspected of having some, then my home is searched as though what belongs to me had been stolen.
If I am quiet, cause no trouble, do not slander anybody or meddle in the affairs of the state, then I am denounced as being indifferent, and under this charge I am exposed to persecution.
During one incident that happened at Noyon, there was a ceremony in which a ‘Tree of Freedom’ was being raised. I did not attend this majestic ceremony because I was ill. Soldiers then came looking for me and forced me to go and kiss the grass. When I bent down to do this, my head was pushed against the ground breaking my nose and teeth – all as punishment for being sick.
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We have examples of nations that wanted to be free, but never did they establish the principles of freedom vaguely, and never did they presume the people to have virtue which they didn’t have. And never did they subject their empire to random political experiment. These nations established their freedom on a system of Morality and printed a sacred caricature to his honor.
Never, since the world has been in existence, has any people established a government based on the principle of equality. Would it be, perchance, that this concept of government is unworkable? No, certainly it isn’t workable.
In Lacédémone there were the Ilotes (slaves).
In Athens, slaves were the greatest in number.
In Rome there was a marked distinction between the patricians and the plebeians.
Then in France the notion of the ‘sovereignty of the people’ was created which is an absurd idea because a sovereign cannot be sovereign over himself. So, when men are chosen to govern, they are effectively told, “You will be governing your Masters.” And when their representatives turn out to be scoundrels, one can say to the people, “It is you who are causing the ruin!”
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And when they exert a despotic tyranny, one can say to the people, “It is you who you are doing all the tyrannizing!” What credulity! But the people are a child who can be made to accept whatever one wants.
It is an undeniable fact that each individual must know his place in society. If you overlook merit, fortune, status and talent, then jealousy will burst forth and you will soon see war and disorder. This happened in France: the poor plundered the rich and imbeciles overpowered those who had merit.
It appears, finally, to be a scheme of works based on three basic principles. The first is territory; the second, population; the third, taxation. In order to avoid building an aristocracy based on wealth, it was necessary to disregard the contribution that one man makes to another. Thus the concept of equality vs. the fact of unequal contributions could not be reconciled. Consequently, the execution of a system based on equality is bound to fail but, unfortunately, nobody’s eyes were open to that fact!
There were costly taxes, certainly, and the people only asked for relief, but what became of them? To better serve the people, all taxes were declared to be oppressive, but however it was expressed
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these same oppressive obligations would continue to be paid.
One expected a revolt but after having declared a thing oppressive, it didn’t take long to decide who the new oppressed would be. Nobody wanted to pay, and by this ill-considered action all the operations and programs of the Treasury came to a halt. So a tax of one-quarter of one’s income was created, and some had the temerity to keep for themselves revenues taken from those who one had just been stripped of all that they had. This tendency to persecute, during a time of turmoil which offered so many resources, is quite a strange thing.
When legislators in former times composed their governments, before undertaking any program they believed themselves obliged to study society and to weigh the effects that their civil actions would have on the people. From such studies and observations were born these distinctions in education, professions, talents, ages, etc, etc; and from these distinctions a class structure emerged quite naturally.
Also Montesquieu remarked concerning class distinctions,
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“Citizens are the masterpiece of legislators.”
Zaleucus, Lieurgue, Solon and Numa certainly were political scientists, wise men and virtuous citizens. All felt the relative need and all established a moral scale among men. All were convinced that the happiness of the people must form a cohesive unit which required different combinations of rules and laws. Therefore Solon didn’t imitate Lieurgue.
For instance, Lacédémoniens were passionate about freedom, but they were warlike, sober and austere. Furthermore, they wanted freedom only for themselves so they had Ilotes (slaves). They were egoists and very aristocratic. Athenians, on the other hand, liked pleasure, art and luxury. Consequently it wasn’t a priority for them to have laws that trained up soldiers. Instead they became soldiers only when necessary.
The national assembly had other views than those of the great men whom I have just mentioned. Never was a body more idolatrous of its prejudices and conceptions. Its genius was employed only in concocting slogans that strengthened itself in error.
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The national assembly did not sense the danger of delivering a vast empire over to the particular prejudices of some angry speakers, or to the influence of cabals, the well-springs of discord. It did not appreciate that classes form a barrier to despotism and are the means for getting things done in a republic. Neither did it consider the enormous area of the kingdom of France with its varied distinctive characters of people who live north, midway, and in its center. The national assembly did not sense that massive direct taxation is more onerous than indirect taxes. Nor did it consider that, by toppling the head of a vast empire, it thus tore off the capstone and prepared the building for collapse.
Never was there an insanity more dogmatic, more determined, more full of guile, and finally, more impudent. Here is a typical example of lunacy. Surely it would have to be insane people who had escaped from an asylum that the people of Paris had named as their legislators.
On June 19, 1790 someone came to announce to the national assembly
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that a delegation of ambassadors consisting of Chaldéens, Arabs, Prussians, Poles, Swiss, Germans, English, Dutch, Swedes, Italians, Spaniards, Negroes, Syrians, Indians, Brabançons, Inhabitants of Liège and Avignon, Sardes, Grisons, and Sicilians, all in costume, had joined together on the same day to pay their compliments to the wise legislators.
This delegation, worthy of Sancho in her island, was permitted to enter. They were obviously clothed in costumes from the opera and the stamp of opera companies could be seen on the epaulets of some ambassadors. The object of this burlesque was to prove to the good Parisiens that the wisdom of the legislators was respected around the world.
Really, how much stupidity can the people take? What could have possessed the representatives of a nation, reduced to formulating such a farce, to actually carry out such a stunt? Later it was proved that the ‘ambassadors’ were a bunch of rascals, selected by Bicêtre, hired to play their role and to whom a ballet master had given lessons.
That was enough for sensible people to shrug their shoulders
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but the common people who later ran in the streets believed in this ‘Embassy of the Universe’ as ardently as the good woman who believed that snakes would emerge from the mouth of an aristocrat.
This reminds me of the words of an English conspirator to whom it was observed that the people would never believe the absurdities that he proposed to say to them. "We are lost,” he replied, “if they will not believe things that are ten times more incredible".
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