Vindiciae Gallicae and Other Writings on the French Revolution

Appendix to “On the State of France in 1815”

274 Appendix to “On the State of France in 1815” We have no time to say much at present on the remaining division of this great subject. Wise administration, in the situation of Louis XVIII, was so extremely arduous a task, that the consideration of his misfortunes is not necessary to repress all propensity to severe censure. The restoration of the French Monarchy was impossible. Its elements were destroyed. No proprietary nobility, no opulent church, no judiciary bodies, no army.Twenty- five years had destroyed and produced more than several centuries usually do. A Bourbon Prince was placed at the head of revolutionized France. It was not merely a loose stoneintheedifice, itwasacaseof repulsionbetween the Government and all the Elements of the Society. It is difficult to determine whether any prudence could have averted the catastrophe. In justice it ought to be allowed, that more civil liberty was enjoyed during these ten months,thanduringanyperiodof Frenchhistory. There were no arbitrary imprisonments; not above one or two feeble attempts to exile obnoxious men to their country houses. Once, or perhaps twice, during the Revolution, there had been more political liberty, more freedom of the press, more real debate in the Legislative assemblies. But, in those tumultuous times there was no tranquillity, no security of person and property. The King and the Court could not indeed love liberty; few Courts do; and they had much more excuse than most others for hating it. It was obvious that his policy consisted in connecting himself with the purest part of the Revolutionists, in seeing only in the Revolution the abuses which it had destroyed, in keeping out of sight those claims which conveyed too obvious a condemnation of it, in conquering his most natural and justi- fiable repugnance to individuals, when the display of such a repugnance produced or confirmed the alienation of numerous classes and powerful appendix 275 interests, and, lastly, the hardest but most necessary part of the whole, in the suppression of gratitude, and the delay of justice itself, to those whose suffering and fidelity deserved his affection, but who inspired the majority of Frenchmen with angry recollections and dangerous fears. It is needless to say that so arduous a scheme of policy, which would have required a considerable time for a fair experiment, and which, in the hands of an unmilitary Prince, was likely enough, after all, to fail, was scarcely tried by this respectable and unfortunate Monarch. The silly attack made by his ministers on the press, rendered the Government odious, without preventing the publication, or limiting the perusal of one libel. It answered no purpose, but that of giving some undeserved credit for its suppression to Buonaparte, who has other means of controuling the press than those which are supplied by laws and tribunals. Macdonald, who spoke against it with most rigour and spirit in the House of Peers, was one of the last Marshals who quitted the King (if he has quitted him); and Constant,who wrote against it with such extraordinary talent and eloquence, was the last French writer of celebrity who threw himself into the breach, and defied the vengeance of the Conqueror. The policy of some of the restored Governments in other countries of Europe, was extremely injurious to the Bourbon administration. Spain, governed by a Bourbon Prince, threw discredit, or rather disgrace, upon all ancient Governments. The conduct of Ferdinand at Valencay was notorious in France. It was well known that he had importuned Napoleon for a Princess of the Imperial Family, and that he wrote constant letters of congratulation to Joseph on his victories over the Spanish armies, whom Ferdinand called the rebel subjects of Joseph. It was known, that, besides all those imbecilities of superstition which disgraced his return, besides the re-establishment of the Inquisition, besides the exile, on various grounds or pretexts, of several thousand families, he had thrown into prison more than five thousand persons, for no other crime than that of administering or seconding a Government which all Europe had recognized, which had resisted all the offers of Buonaparte, and under whom resistance was made to which he owed his Crown. Many cases of oppression were familiarly known in France, which are hitherto little spoken of in this country. Among them, that of M. Antillon deserves to be mentioned. That gentle- 276 on the state of france man, a pre-eminent Professor in...