THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. 577 CHAPTER V. THE FRENCH REVOLUTION (1789-1799). "I. CAUSES OF THE REVOLUTION : THE STATES-GENERAL OF 1789. Introductory. The French Revolution is in political what the German Reformation is in ecclesiastical history. It was the revolt of the French people against royal despotism and class privilege. "Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity," was the motto of the Revolution. In the name of these principles the most atrocious crimes were indeed committed; but these excesses of the Revolution are not to be confounded with its true spirit and aims. The French people in 1789 contended for those same principles that the English Puritans defended in 1640, and that our fathers maintained in 1776. It is only as we view them in this light, that we can feel a sympathetic interest in the men and events of this tumultuous period of French history. Causes of the Revolution. -Chief among the causes of the French Revolution were the abuses and extravagances of the Bourbon monarchy; the unjust privileges enjoyed by the nobility and clergy; the wretched condition of the great mass of the people; and the revolutionary character and spirit of French philosophy and literature: To these must be added, as a proximate cause, the influence of the American Revolution. We will speak briefly of these several matters. Even the hastiest examination of the condition of France during the century preceding the tremendous social upheaval, will enable us to understand how an English statesman,' writing just before 1 Lord Chesterfield, writing in 1753. the bursting of the storm, could say, "All the symptoms which I have ever met with in history, previous to great changes and revolutions in government, now exist and daily increase in France." The Bourbon Monarchy. We simply repeat what we have already learned, when we say that the authority of the French crown under the Bourbons had become unbearably despotic and oppressive. The life of every person in the realm was at the arbitrary disposal of the king. Persons were thrown into prison without even knowing the offense for which they were arrested. The royal decrees were laws. The taxes imposed by the king were simply robberies and confiscations. The public money, thus gathered, was squandered in maintaining a court the scandalous extravagances and debaucheries of which would shame a Turkish Sultan. Meanwhile all public works and all national interests, after the reign of Louis XIV., were utterly neglected. Louis XV., it is asserted, "probably spent more money on his harem than on any department of State." Louis XVI. was sincerely desirous of reform, but unfortunately he did not possess the qualities essential in a reformer. Besides, it was too late. Matters had gone too far. France was already caught in the rapids that sweep down to the abyss of Revolution. The Nobility.The French nobility, in the time of the Bourbons, numbered about 80,000 families — that is, between 200,000 and 300,000 persons. The order was simply the rubbish of the once powerful but now broken-down feudal aristocracy of the Middle Ages. Its members were chiefly the pensioners of the king, the ornaments of his court, living in riotous luxury at Paris or Versailles. Stripped of their ancient power, they still retained all the old pride and arrogance of their order, and clung tenaciously to all their feudal privileges. Although holding one fifth of the lands of France, they paid scarcely any taxes. The rents of their estates, with which they supplemented the bounty of the king, were wrung from their wretched tenants with pitiless severity. That heartless absentee landlordism which is constantly driving the peasantry of Ireland to the point of revolution feebly illustrates the relation of the French nobles to their tenants at the time of which we are speaking. The Clergy. The clergy formed a decayed feudal hierarchy. They possessed enormous wealth, the gift of piety through many centuries. Over one third of the lands of the country was in their hands, and yet this immense property was almost wholly exempt from taxation. The bishops and abbots were usually drawn from the families of the nobles, being attracted to the service of the Church rather by its princely revenues and the social distinction conferred by its offices, than by the inducements of piety. These "patrician prelates" were characterized by the same odious pride and insolence that marked the lay nobles. They were hated alike by the humble clergy and the people. Though there were many noble exceptions, the great mass of the clergy, including both the superior and inferior members of the order, were ignorant, arrogant, avaricious, and so generally immoral in their lives, that they had lost all credit and authority with the people whose shepherds they ostensibly were. The Commons. Below the two privileged orders of the state stood the commons, who constituted the great bulk of the nation, and numbered, at the commencement of the Revolution, probably 25,000,000. These were divided into two classes, the Bourgeoisie, or Middle Class, composed of the wealthy and well-to-do merchants, traders, lawyers, and other professional men; and the People, embracing of course the great mass of the commons, and being made up of the peasants and the poorer inhabitants of the towns. The Middle Class were despised by the privileged orders and hated by the People; yet they constituted the most intelligent portion of the French nation, and the conservatism of the body was often a great check upon the fury of the masses at different stages of the Revolution. But it is with the condition of the lower classes, the People, that we are now particularly concerned. It is quite impossible to |