d without any member of
the clergy upon it, the Commons raised a cry that they should be
introduced in their proportion. They, in a fraternal spirit, refused.
And the second Committee, the one that actually drew up the scheme,
was composed of three churchmen to five laymen. The nobles were not
reconciled, and refused to unite with men of English views in a Tory
party. To them, the separation of orders was a fundamental maxim of
security, which they had inherited, which they were bound to hand
down. They looked on debate in common as provisional, as an exception,
to be rectified as soon as might be. They kept up the practice of also
meeting separately. On July 3 there were one hundred and thirty-eight
present; and on the 11th there still were eighty. They refused to vote
in the divisions of the joint Assembly, because their instructions
forbade. The scruple was sincere, and was shared by Lafayette; but
others meant it as a protest that the Assembly was not lawfully
constituted. Therefore, July 7, Talleyrand moved to annul the
instructions. They could not be allowed to control the Assembly; they
ought not to influence individuals. The constituencies contribute to a
decision; they cannot resist it. Whatever the original wish of the
electors, the final act belonged to the legislature. The king himself,
on June 27, had declared the imperative mandates unconstitutional.
But the deputies, in declaring themselves permanent, had cut
themselves adrift from their constituents. The instructions had become
the sole security that the Constitution would remain within the limits
laid down by the nation, the sole assurance against indefinite change.
They alone determined the line of advance, and gave protection to
monarchy, property, religion, against the headlong rush of opinion,
and the exigencies of popular feeling.

Sieyes, who expected no good from the co-operation of the orders which
he condemned, and who thought a nobleman or prelate who did not vote
better than one who voted wrong, urged that the question did not
affect the Assembly, but the constituencies, and might be left to
them. He carried his amendment by seven hundred to twenty-eight.

Meantime the party that had prevailed on June 23 and had succumbed on
the 27th was at work to recover the lost position. Lewis had retained
the services of Necker, without dismissing the colleagues who baffled
him. He told him that he would not accept his resignation now, but
would choose