m it what it held with disquietude, and saw in
every direction plots which it anticipated by crimes. The sudden burst
of liberty, for which it was not prepared, agitated without
strengthening it: it evinced all the vices of enfranchised men without
having got the virtues of the free man. The whole of France was but one
vast sedition: anarchy swayed the state, and in order that it might be,
as it were, self-governed, it had created its government in as many
clubs as there were large municipalities in the kingdom. The dominant
club was that of the Jacobins: this club was the centralisation of
anarchy. So soon as a powerful and high passioned will moves a nation,
their common impulse brings men together; individuality ceases, and the
legal or illegal association organises the public prejudice. Popular
societies thus have birth. At the first menaces of the court against the
States General, certain Breton deputies had a meeting at Versailles, and
formed a society to detect the plots of the court and assure the
triumphs of liberty: its founders were Sieyes, Chapelier, Barnave, and
Lameth. After the 5th and 6th of October, the Breton Club, transported
to Paris in the train of the National Assembly, had there assumed the
more forcible name of "Society of the Friends of the Constitution." It
held its sittings in the old convent of the Jacobins Saint Honore, not
far from the Manege, where the National Assembly sat. The deputies, who
had founded it at the beginning for themselves, now opened their doors
to journalists, revolutionary writers, and finally to all citizens. The
presentation by two of its members, and an open scrutiny as to the moral
character of the person proposed, were the sole conditions of admission:
the public was admitted to the sittings by inspectors, who examined the
admission card. A set of rules, an office, a president, a corresponding
committee, secretaries, an order of the day, a tribune, and orators,
gave to these meetings all the forms of deliberative assemblies: they
were assemblies of the people only without elections and responsibility;
feeling alone gave them authority: instead of framing laws they formed
opinion.

The sittings took place in the evening, so that the people should not be
prevented from attending in consequence of their daily labour: the acts
of the National Assembly, the events of the moment, the examination of
social questions, frequently accusations against the king, ministers,
the