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Taine, Hippolyte, 1828-1893

"The French Revolution - Volume 3"

- The Committee of Public
Safety. - Subordination of the Convention and ministry. - The use of
the Committee of General Security and the Revolutionary Tribunal. -
Administrative centralization. - Representatives on Mission, National
Agents and Revolutionary Committees. - Law of L?se-majesty. -
Restoration and Aggravation of the institutions of the old monarchy.
After the 2nd of August, on motion of Bazire, the Convention decrees
"that France is in revolution until its independence is recognized."
which means[111] that the period of hypocritical phrases has come to
an end, that the Constitution was merely a signboard for a fair, and
that the charlatans who had made use of it no longer need it, that it
is to be put away in the store containing other advertising material,
that individual, local and parliamentary liberties are abolished, that
the government is arbitrary and absolute, that no institution, law,
dogma, or precedent affords any guarantee for it against the rights of
the people, that property and lives are wholly at its mercy, that
there are no longer any rights of man. - Six weeks later, when,
through the protest of the forty-five and the arrest of the seventy-
three, obedience to the Convention is assured, all this is boldly and
officially announced in the tribune.


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