that the antagonism of the three
orders prevented any progress in the public business for which they were
convened, the king summoned a general meeting of all the deputies, and
after an address, in which he expressed his royal pleasure that the
three orders should form separate chambers, he commanded the assembly to
disperse, that they might meet under the ordinances his prerogative had
prescribed. The clergy, the nobles obey; the commons remain uncertain,
hesitating, and almost in consternation. The royal command is again
communicated to them, with the intimation, that having heard the king's
intentions they had now only to obey. The crisis of the royal
prerogative, obedience, hung but on the turn of a feather: the repulsed
Mirabeau arose, and turned it against the king. "We _have_," said he, in
a voice of thunder, "we _have_ heard the intentions _attributed_ to the
king; and you, sir, who have no place, nor voice, nor right of speech
here, are not competent to remind us of them. Go tell your master that
we are here by the will of the people, and that we are not to be
expelled but by the power of bayonets!"

Cheered and supported by the now reassured _Tiers-Etat_, he next, in
imitation of the English parliament, carried, that the persons of the
deputies were inviolate, that any one infringing that right should be
pursued as an enemy of the country, and that the payment of taxes, till
further legislation, should be obligatory only during the existence of
the legislative corps.

Added to the bold title of "National Assembly," newly adopted, these
votes were the assumption of a kingship by the _Tiers-Etat_; and as
public opinion enthusiastically backed the innovation, the divided peers
and ecclesiastics were compelled at length to join, and be submerged in
the mass of popular deputies.

A civil war could alone stand between royal power and its destruction.
For some weeks the court prepared for even such an eventuality.
"Ministers play high stakes," writes Mirabeau, on the 5th of July; "they
are compromising the king, for in menacing Paris and the Assembly they
are menacing France. All reaction is equal to action: the more the
pressure now, the more terrible do I foresee will be the reaction. Paris
will not suffer itself to be muzzled by a bevy of nobles thrown into
despair by their own stupidity; but they shall pay the penalty of the
attempt.... The storm must soon break out. It is arranged that I ask the
withdrawal o