rs of France, always recommended.
None of them propose to proclaim divine right and return to aristocratic
feudalism; each proposes to abrogate revolutionary right and destroy
Jacobin feudalism. The principle condemned by them is that which
sustains the theory of anarchy and despotism,

* the application of the Contrat Social,[5154]

* a dictatorship established by coups detat, carried on arbitrarily and
supported by terror,

* the systematic and dogmatic persistence of assaults on persons,
property and consciences,

* the usurpation of a vicious, fanatical minority which has devastated
France for five years and, under the pretext of everywhere setting up
the rights of man, purposely maintaining a war to propagate its system
abroad.

That which they are really averse to is the Directory and its clique,
Barras with his court of gorged contractors and kept women, Reubell
with his family of extortioners, stamp of a parvenu and ways of a tavern
keeper, La Revelliere-Lepaux with his hunchback vanity, philosophic
pretensions, sectarian intolerance and silly airs of a pedantic dupe.
What they demand in the tribune,[5155] is the purification of the
administration, the suppression of jobbery, an end to persecution and,
according as they are more or less excited or circumspect, they demand
legal sentences or simply the removal of Jacobins in office, the
immediate and entire suppression or partial and careful reform of
the laws against priests and worship, against emigres and the
nobles.[5156]--Nobody has any idea of innovation with respect to the
distribution of public powers, or to the way of appointing central or
local authorities. "I swear on my honor," writes Mathieu Dumas, "that
it has always been my intention to maintain the Republican Constitution,
persuaded as I am that, with a temperate and equitable administration,
it might give repose to France, make liberty known and cherished, and
repair in time the evils of the Revolution. I swear that no proposals,
direct or indirect, have ever been made to me to serve, either by my
actions, speech or silence, or cause to prevail in any near or
remote manner, any other interest than that of the Republic and the
Constitution."--"Among the deputies," says Camille Jordan, "several
might prefer royalty; but they did not conspire, regarding the
Constitution as a deposit entrusted to their honor.. They kept their
most cherished plans subordinate to the national will; they comprehen