"For the average person, all problems date to World War II; for the more informed, to World War I; for the genuine historian, to the French Revolution."
-Erik Maria Ritter von Kuehnelt-Leddihn
By way of antidote to any of the pro-Jacobin festivities you may have witnessed today, I present you some excerpts from the prologue and first chapter of Nesta Webster's The French Revolution: A Study in Democracy (1919). A good quality PDF of the entire book can be found here. It is superbly researched and from a perspective you're not likely to find in more recent works; I can't recommend it highly enough. The excerpts below were taken from a corrupted text containing many errors, and I'm sure I missed some, so I hope it's readable enough. I'm posting it in pieces because of its length.
Enjoy
THE PEOPLE BEFORE THE REVOLUTION
Before attempting to describe the outbreaks of the Revolution, it is necessary to indicate as briefly as possible the ills from which the people were suffering, the reforms that they demanded, and, on the other hand, the influences at work amongst them which diverted the movement for reform into the channel of revolution.
Nearly every author in embarking on the story of the Revolution has considered it de rigueur to enlarge on the progress of philosophy that heralded the movement. The oppressions that had prevailed during the reigns of Louis XIV and Louis XV had, we are told, been endured in a spirit of dumb resignation until the teaching of Rousseau, Diderot, and other social reformers proclaimed to the nation that they need be endured no longer.
If we regard the Revolution from the point of view of the people, this time-honoured preamble may, however, be dispensed with.
Doubtless the philosophers played an important part in preparing the Revolution, but their direct influence was confined to the aristocracy and the educated bourgeoisie ; to the peasant tillng the soil, the Encyclopedic and the Contrat Social were of less pressing interest than the condition of his crop and the profit of his labour. How the abuses of the Old Regime affected him in this tangible respect we can read in Arthur Young's Travels, in Albert Babeau's Le Village sous I'Ancien Regime, or in the works of Taine, where all the injustices of tallies, capitaineries, corvees, gabelles, etc., are set forth categorically, and are too well known to be enumerated here. Suffice it to say, these oppressions were many and grievous, but they sprang less from intentional tyranny than from an obsolete system that demanded readjustment.
Thus certain customs that originated in benevolence had, through the progress of civilization, become oppressive—the liberty to grind at the seigneur's mill had become the obligation to grind at the seigneur's mill, whilst many feudal exactions and personal services were merely relics of the days when rent was paid in kind or in labour. It is evident, moreover, that many of these feudal oppressions that look so terrible on paper had fallen into disuse ; thus, although the parchments enumerating the seigneurial rights were still in existence, “the power of the seigneurs over the persons of their vassals only existed in romances at the time of the Revolution.” In every ancient civilization strange archaic laws might be discovered—does not our own legal code enact that a man may beat his wife with any weapon no thicker than his thumb ? but so far the women of England have not found it necessary to rise in revolt against this extraordinary stipulation.
For the peasant of France the most real grievances were undoubtedly the inequality of taxation and the “ capitaineries “ or game-laws, monstrous injustices that crippled his energies and often made his labour vain. Yet were the peasants of old France the wretched, down-trodden beings that certain historians have described them ? The strange thing is that no contemporary evidence corroborates this theory ; in none of the letters or memoirs written before the Revolution, even by such advanced thinkers as Rousseau and Madame Roland, do we encounter the starving scarecrows of the villages or the ragged spectres of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine portrayed by Dickens ; on the contrary, gaiety seems to have been the distinguishing characteristic of the people. The dancing peasants of Watteau and Lancret were no figments of an artist's brain, but very charming realities described by every traveller. Arthur Young, who has been persistently represented as the great opponent of the Ancien Regime, records few actual instances of misery or oppression, and, as we shall see.
Young was later on led to reconstruct his views on the old government of France in a pamphlet which has been carefully ignored by writers who quote his earlier work in support of their theories.
But the most remarkable evidence on peasant life before the Revolution is to be found in the letters of Dr. Rigby, who travelled in France during the summer of 1789. This curious book, published for the first time in 1880, aroused less attention in England than in France, where it was regarded as an important contribution to the history of the period. The accounts it contains are so subversive of the accepted theories on peasant misery current in this country, and have been so little quoted, that a few extracts must be given here.
Between Calais and Lille “ the most striking character of the country “ through which Dr. Rigby passed was its extraordinary fertility : “ We went through an extent of seventy miles, and I will venture to say there was not a single acre but what was in a state of the highest cultivation. The crops are beyond any conception I could have had of them—thousands and ten thousands of acres of wheat superior to any which can be produced in England. . . .
“The general appearance of the people is different to what I expected ; they are strong and well-made. We saw many agreeable scenes as we passed along in the evening before we came to Lisle : little parties sitting at their doors, some of the men smoking, some playing at cards in the open air, and others spinning cotton. Everything we see bears the marks of industry, and all the people look happy. We have indeed seen few signs of opulence in individuals, for we do not see so many gentlemen's seats as in England, but then we have seen few of the lower classes in rags, idleness, and misery. What strange prejudices we are apt to take regarding foreigners ! . . .
“ What strikes me most in what I have seen is the wonderful difference between this country and England . . . the difference seems to be in favour of the former ; if they are not happy, they look at least very like it. . . .” Throughout the whole course of his journey across France Dr. Rigby continues in the same strain of admiration—an admiration that we might attribute to lack of discernment were it not that it ceases abruptly on his entry into Germany. Here he finds “ a country to which Nature has been equally kind as to France, for it has a fertile soil, but as yet the inhabitants live under an oppressive government.” At Cologne he finds that “ tyranny and oppression have taken up their abode. . . . There was a gloom and an appearance of disease in almost every man's face we saw ; their persons also look filthy.
The state of wretchedness in which they live seems to deprive them of every power of exertion . . . the whole country is divided between the Archbishop and the King of Prussia . . . the land is uncultivated and depopulated. How every country and every people we have seen since we left France sink in comparison with that animated country f “ It is evident that, however rose-coloured was Dr. Rigby's view of France, the French people had certainly not reached that pitch of “ exasperation “ that according to certain historians would account for the excesses of the Revolution.
Lady Eastlake, Dr. Rigby's daughter, who edited these letters from France, fearing apparently that her father will be accredited with telling travellers' tales, attempts in the preface to explain his remarks by quoting the observation of De Tocqueville: 'One must not be deceived by the gaiety the Frenchman displays in his greatest troubles, it only proves that, believing his unhappy fate to be inevitable, he tries to distract himself by not thinking about it—it is not that he does not feel it.” This might possibly describe the attitude of the French people towards their government during the centuries that preceded the Revolution, when, convinced of their impotence to revolt, they resigned themselves to oppression ; but at the period Dr. Rigby describes the work of reform had long since begun and they had therefore no cause for hopelessness or despair. Louis XVI. Had not waited for the gathering of the revolutionary storm in order to redress the evils from which the people suffered ; in the very first year of his reign he had embarked on the work of reform with the co-operation of Turgot and Malesherbes. In 1775 he had attempted to introduce the free circulation of grain—thereby enraging the monopolizers who in revenge stirred up the “ Guerre de Farines “ ; in 1776 he had proposed the suppression of the corvee which the opposition of the Parlements prevented; in 1779 he had abolished all forms of servitude in his domains, inviting “ all seigneurs of fiefs and communities to follow his example “; in 1780 he had abolished torture ; in 1784 he had accorded liberty of conscience to the Protestants ; in 1787 he had proposed the equality of territorial taxation, the suppression of the gabelle or salt tax, and again urged the abolition of the corvee and the free circulation of grain ; in 1787 and 1788 he had proposed reforms in the administration of justice, the equal admission of citizens of every rank to all forms of employment, the abolition of lettres de cachet, and greater liberty of the press. Meanwhile he had continued to reduce the expenses of his household and had reformed the prisons and hospitals.
The Parlements, which played an active part in the revolutionary movement, had proved continually obstructive to the King's schemes of reform, and it was they, as well as the monopolizers, who had opposed the free circulation of grain. “ It must appear strange,” wrote Arthur Young, “ in a government so despotic in some respects as that of France, to see the parliaments in every part of the kingdom making laws without the King's consent, and even in defiance of his authority “ {Travels in France, p. 321).
Finally on August 8, 1788, he had announced the assembling of the States-General, at which he accorded double representation to the Tiers Etats.
In this spring of 1789 the French people had therefore every reason to feel hopeful of the future and to believe that now at last all their wrongs would be redressed. Had not the King sent out a proclamation to the whole nation saying, “ His Majesty has desired that in the extremities of his kingdom and in the obscurest dwellings every man shall rest assured that his wishes and requests shall be heard “?
“ All over the country,” says Taine, “ the people are to meet together to discuss abuses. . . . These confabulations are authorized, provoked from above. In the early days of 1788 the provincial assemblies demand from the syndicate and from the inhabitants of each parish that a local enquiry shall be held ; they wish to know the details of their grievances, what part of the revenue each tax removes, what the cultivator pays and suffers. . . . All these figures are printed . . . artisans and countrymen discuss them on Sunday after mass or in the evening in the great room at the inn. ...”
The King has been bitterly reproached by Royalists for thus taking the people into his confidence over schemes of reform; such changes in the government as were needed, they remark, should have been effected by the royal authority unaided by popular opinion. But the King doubtless argued that no one knows better than the wearer where the shoe pinches ; and since his great desire was to alleviate the sufferings of his people, it seemed to his simple mind that the best way to do this was to ask them for a list of their grievances before attempting to redress them. Behevers in despotism may deplore the error in judgement, but the people of France did not mistake the good intentions of the King, for in the cahiers de doleances or lists of grievances that arrived from all parts of the country in response to this appeal the people were unanimous in their respect and loyalty to Louis XVI.
What, then, did the cahiers demand ? What were the true desires of the people in the matter of government ? This all important point has been too often overlooked in histories of the Revolution ; yet it must be clearly understood if we would realize how far the Revolution as it took place was the result of the people's will. Now the summarizing of the cahiers by the National Assembly revealed that the following principles of government were laid down by the nation :
I. The French government is monarchic.
II. The person of the King is inviolable and sacred.
III. His crown is hereditary from male to male.
On these three points the cahiers were unanimous, and the great majority were agreed on the following :
IV. The King is the depositary of the executive power.
V. The agents of authority are responsible.
VI. The royal sanction is necessary for the promulgation of the laws.
VII. The nation makes the laws with the royal sanction. '
VIII. The consent of the nation is necessary for loans and taxes.
IX. Taxes can only be imposed from one meeting of the States- General to another.
X. Property is sacred.
XL Individual liberty is sacred.
In the matter of reforms the cahiers asked first and foremost for the equality of taxation, for the abolition of that monstrous privilege by which the wealthier classes of the community were enabled to avoid contributing their rightful share towards the expenses of the State ; they asked for the free admission of citizens of all ranks to civil and military employment, for revision of the civil and criminal code, for the substitution of money payments in the place of feudal and seigneurial dues, for the abolition of gabelles, corvees, franc-fief, and arbitrary imprisonment.
In all these demands we shall find no element of sedition or of disaffection towards the monarchy, but the response of a loyal and spirited people to the King's proposals for reform. Such animosity as they displayed was directed against the “ privileged orders,” and, as we shall see, this sentiment was not wholly spontaneous. Lua, a member of the Legislative Assembly, has well described the attitude of the people in pages that may be summarized thus :
The Ancien Regime had very real abuses, there was every reason to attack it. The clergy and noblesse had lost their power and their raison d'etre ; they were obliged to let the Third Estate come into its own by giving up their privileges. Nothing could have stopped this or ought to have stopped it. “It has been said that the Revolution was made in public opinion before it was realized by events ; this is true, but one must add that it was not the Revolution such as we saw it . . . it was not by the people that the Revolution was made in France.” And in confirmation of this statement, with which, as I shall show, contemporaries of all parties agree, Lua points out that “ the voice of the nation cried out for reform, for changes in the government, but all proclaimed respect for religion, loyalty to the King, and desire for law and order.” I
What, then, was needed to kindle the flame of revolution ? To understand this we must examine the intrigues at work amongst the people ; these and these alone explain the gigantic misunderstanding that arose between the King and his subjects, and that plunged the country on the brink of regeneration into the black abyss of anarchy.
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