Part I, 3

The mind can hardly imagine a more tremendous scene than Paris presented at the taking of the Bastille, and during the two days before and after it; nor can it easily conceive how the city grew quiet again so quickly. Seen from a distance, the event looks like an isolated act of heroism; its close political connection with the Revolution is lost in the brilliance of the achievement. But we must see it as the opposing forces brought face to face, contending for the outcome. The Bastille would be either the attackers' prize or their prison. Its fall meant the fall of despotism, and the two images had become as closely united in the imagination as Bunyan's Doubting Castle and Giant Despair.

Before and during the taking of the Bastille, the National Assembly sat at Versailles, twelve miles from Paris. About a week before the supporters of the Revolution rose and took the Bastille, a plot was discovered. Headed by the Count D'Artois, the king's youngest brother, it aimed to destroy the National Assembly, seize its members, and so crush, in one sudden stroke, every hope and prospect of forming a free government. For humanity's sake as well as liberty's, it is fortunate that the plan failed. History offers plenty of examples of how savagely vindictive and cruel old governments become when they prevail over what they call a revolt.

The plan must have been under consideration for some time: carrying it out required gathering a large military force around Paris and severing communication between the city and the National Assembly at Versailles. The troops designated for this operation were chiefly foreign troops in French pay, drawn for this purpose from the distant provinces where they had been stationed. When between twenty-five and thirty thousand had gathered, the conspirators judged it time to act. The ministers then in office, who favored the Revolution, were immediately dismissed, and a new ministry formed from those who had devised the project. Among them was Count de Broglio, who was given command of the troops. A letter I shared with Mr. Burke before he began his book, from a source he well knows to be reliable, described this man as "a high-flying aristocrat, cool, and capable of every mischief."

While these events unfolded, the National Assembly stood in as dangerous and critical a position as any body of men can face. They were the intended victims, and they knew it. Their country gave them its hearts and hopes, but they had no military authority. Broglio's guards surrounded the hall where the Assembly sat, ready at a command to seize its members, as had happened to the Parliament of Paris the previous year. Had the National Assembly abandoned its trust or shown weakness or fear, its enemies would have been emboldened and its country disheartened. Consider together their position, the cause they served, and the approaching crisis that would decide their personal and political fate, their country's, and perhaps Europe's: no one whose heart has not been hardened by prejudice or corrupted by dependence can fail to care whether they succeeded.

At this time the Archbishop of Vienne was President of the National Assembly—too old a man for the ordeal that might come within days or hours. Someone more active and resolute was needed. The National Assembly chose M. de la Fayette, giving him the title of Vice-President since the Archbishop remained President; this was the only occasion on which a Vice-President was chosen. With the storm about to break (July 11th), M. de la Fayette presented the declaration of rights mentioned earlier. It was drawn up quickly and forms only part of the fuller declaration of rights the National Assembly later agreed upon and adopted. M. de la Fayette has since told me the particular reason for presenting it then: if the National Assembly perished in the destruction threatening it, some trace of its principles might survive the wreck.

Everything was approaching a crisis. The outcome would be freedom or slavery. On one side stood an army of nearly thirty thousand men; on the other, unarmed citizens. The citizens of Paris, on whom the National Assembly now had to depend, were as unarmed and untrained as the citizens of London are today. The French guards had shown strong signs of loyalty to the national cause, but they were few—less than a tenth of Broglio's force—and their officers supported Broglio.

With preparations now complete, the new ministers took office. Let the reader remember that the Bastille was taken the 14th July; the day I now describe is the 12th. When news of the change of ministry reached Paris that afternoon, all theaters and other places of entertainment, shops, and houses were closed. The change was taken as a prelude to hostilities, and rightly so.

The foreign troops began advancing toward the city. The Prince de Lambesc, commanding a force of German cavalry, came by way of the Place of Louis XV., which opens onto several streets. As he advanced, he insulted an old man and struck him with a sword. The French are notably respectful of old age. The apparent insolence of the act, added to the general agitation, had a powerful effect: the cry "To arms! To arms!" swept through the city at once.

They had no arms, and hardly anyone knew how to use them. But desperate resolve, when all hope hangs in the balance, can make up for a lack of arms for a time. Near where the Prince de Lambesc had stationed his men lay great heaps of stones collected for the construction of a new bridge; with these the people attacked the cavalry. A detachment of French guards heard the gunfire, rushed from its quarters, and joined the people. Night fell, and the cavalry withdrew.

Paris's narrow streets were favorable to defense. Its tall, many-storied houses, from which attackers could be badly harried, secured it against an assault at night. The citizens spent that night equipping themselves with every kind of weapon they could make or obtain: guns, swords, blacksmiths' hammers, carpenters' axes, iron crowbars, pikes, halberds, pitchforks, spits, clubs, etc., etc. Their incredible numbers the next morning, and their still more incredible determination, baffled and astonished their enemies. The new ministers had hardly expected such a greeting. Accustomed themselves to servitude, they could not imagine that liberty could inspire such courage, or that unarmed citizens would dare confront a military force of thirty thousand men. Every moment of the day went to gathering arms, making plans, and organizing themselves as well as such a sudden uprising allowed. Broglio remained around the city but advanced no farther that day; the following night passed as peacefully as was possible in such circumstances.

But the citizens did not aim merely to defend themselves. Their cause, on which their freedom or slavery depended, was at stake. At every moment they expected an attack on themselves, or news of one against the National Assembly. In such circumstances, the swiftest measures are sometimes the best. The Bastille now presented itself as a target; the brilliance of taking such a fortress in the face of such an army was bound to terrify the new ministers, who had barely had time to meet. Correspondence intercepted that morning revealed that the Mayor of Paris, M. Defflesselles, who appeared to support the citizens, was betraying them. After this discovery there was no doubt that Broglio would reinforce the Bastille the next evening. They had to attack that day; but first they needed a better supply of arms than they had.

A large store of weapons was kept at the Hospital of the Invalids beside the city. The citizens demanded its surrender, and since the place could not be defended and little defense was attempted, they soon succeeded. Thus supplied, they marched to attack the Bastille: a vast, mixed multitude of every age and rank, armed with every kind of weapon. Imagination can scarcely picture that procession or the suspense of the events that the next few hours or even minutes might bring. The people inside the city knew as little of the ministers' plans as the ministers knew of what the citizens were doing. Broglio's possible movements to support or relieve the fortress were equally unknown to the citizens. Everything was mystery and hazard.

The world knows well that the Bastille was attacked with a heroic ardor that only the fullest inspiration of liberty could produce, and taken within a few hours. I do not intend to recount the attack itself. I mean to bring into view the conspiracy against the nation that provoked the attack and fell with the Bastille. The prison to which the new ministry intended to send the National Assembly, being also the high altar and fortress of despotism, was the fitting place to begin. This action broke up the new ministry, whose members now began to flee the ruin they had prepared for others. Broglio's troops scattered, and he too fled.

Mr. Burke has much to say about plots but never once mentions this plot against the National Assembly and the nation's liberties. To avoid mentioning it, he passes over all the circumstances that might lead him to it. The exiles who have fled France, whose plight so concerns him and from whom he has learned his story, fled because this plot failed. Nobody had plotted against them; they plotted against others. Those who died met, not unjustly, the punishment they had prepared to inflict. But will Mr. Burke claim that, had this plot, devised with the cunning of an ambush, succeeded, the victors would have restrained their anger so soon? Let the history of every government answer.

Whom has the National Assembly sent to the scaffold? No one. They themselves were the intended victims of the plot, yet have not retaliated; why accuse them of a revenge they have not taken? When an entire people of every rank, disposition, and character erupts and, by an extraordinary exertion, delivers itself from the destruction planned for it, can we expect nothing at all to happen? When people are raw with a sense of past oppression and threatened with more to come, should we expect the composure of philosophers or the numbness of people who feel nothing? Mr. Burke cries out against outrage, yet the greatest outrage is his own. His book is a whole volume of it, excused by no passing impulse but cultivated over ten months; and Mr. Burke had suffered no provocation—neither his life nor his interests were at stake.

More citizens than opponents died in this struggle; but four or five people were seized by the crowd and immediately killed: the Governor of the Bastille and the Mayor of Paris, caught betraying the citizens; and afterward Foulon, one of the new ministers, and Berthier, his son-in-law, who had accepted the post of intendant of Paris. Their heads were put on spikes and carried around the city. Mr. Burke builds much of his tragic scene on this method of punishment. Let us examine, then, where people learned to punish in this way.

They learn it from the governments under which they live and repay the punishments they have grown accustomed to seeing. The heads displayed for years on spikes at Temple Bar made a spectacle no less horrifying than the heads carried on spikes in Paris; yet that was the work of the English Government. Perhaps it will be said that what is done to a man after his death matters nothing to him. But it matters greatly to the living: it either tortures their feelings or hardens their hearts, and in either case teaches them how to punish when power comes into their hands.

Lay the axe, then, to the root, and teach governments humanity. It is their bloody punishments that corrupt humankind. In England the penalty in certain cases is hanging, drawing, and quartering; the sufferer's heart is cut out and held up before the people. Under the former Government in France, punishments were no less barbarous. Who does not remember the execution of Damien, torn apart by horses? Such cruel spectacles shown to the people destroy tenderness or arouse revenge; and through the base, false notion that people should be governed by terror rather than reason, they become precedents. Government by terror is aimed at the lowest class of society and has its worst effect upon them. They have sense enough to know that they are its targets, and in turn inflict the forms of terror they have been taught to practice.

It is hard to imagine a more frightening scene than Paris during the taking of the Bastille and the two days before and after it. It is just as hard to imagine how the city settled down so quickly. From a distance, the taking of the Bastille looks like a heroic act standing alone. Its close political connection with the Revolution gets lost in the brilliance of the achievement. But we must see it as the moment when the opposing sides met face-to-face and fought to decide the outcome. The Bastille would either be a prize for its attackers or a prison for them. Its fall also meant the fall of despotism. The two images had become as closely joined as Doubting Castle and Giant Despair in Bunyan's story.

Before and during the taking of the Bastille, the National Assembly was meeting at Versailles, twelve miles from Paris. About a week before its supporters rose and took the Bastille, people discovered a plot led by the king's youngest brother, the Count D'Artois. The plotters intended to destroy the National Assembly and seize its members. With one sudden attack they would crush every hope of creating a free government. It was good for both humanity and freedom that this plan failed. History offers plenty of examples of how cruel and vengeful old governments are when they defeat what they call a revolt.

The plot must have been under consideration for some time. Carrying it out required a large military force around Paris and a break in communications between the city and the National Assembly at Versailles. Most of the troops selected were foreign soldiers paid by France. They were brought in especially for this purpose from the distant provinces where they were stationed. When between twenty-five and thirty thousand had gathered, the plotters decided it was time to act. The ministers then in office, who supported the Revolution, were immediately dismissed. A new ministry was formed from the men who planned the attack. Count de Broglio was among them, and he was given command of the troops. Before Mr. Burke started his book, I showed him a letter describing Broglio. It came from a source he knows was trustworthy and called Broglio "an extreme aristocrat, calm, and capable of any wrongdoing."

While all this was going on, the National Assembly faced an extremely dangerous and critical situation. Its members knew they were the intended victims. Their country supported them in feeling and in wishes, but they had no military authority. Broglio's guards surrounded their meeting hall, ready to arrest them on command, as the Parliament of Paris had been arrested the year before. If the Assembly had abandoned its duty or shown weakness or fear, its enemies would have gained confidence and the country would have lost heart. Consider their situation, their cause, and the crisis about to break. It would decide their personal and political fate, their country's fate, and probably Europe's. Only a person numbed by prejudice or corrupted by dependence could fail to care whether they succeeded.

The Archbishop of Vienne was then President of the National Assembly. He was too old to face what the next few days or even hours might bring. The Assembly needed someone more active and courageous. It chose M. de la Fayette as Vice-President, while the Archbishop remained President. This was the only time a Vice-President was chosen. On July 11th, as the crisis approached, M. de la Fayette proposed a declaration of rights. It is the same proposal I mentioned earlier. Drafted quickly, it formed only part of the fuller declaration of rights the National Assembly later agreed on and adopted. M. de la Fayette has since told me why he presented it then. If the Assembly was destroyed as threatened, he wanted at least some record of its principles to have a chance of surviving.

Everything was nearing a decisive moment. The outcome would be freedom or slavery. On one side stood an army of nearly thirty thousand men. On the other stood unarmed citizens. The citizens of Paris, on whom the National Assembly now had to rely, were as unarmed and untrained as the citizens of London are now. The French guards showed strong signs that they supported the national cause. But there were few of them, less than a tenth of Broglio's force, and their officers supported him.

With preparations complete, the new ministers took office. Remember that the Bastille was taken on the 14th July; the moment I am describing is the 12th. News of the ministerial change reached Paris that afternoon. Immediately the theaters, other places of entertainment, shops, and houses all closed. People saw the change as the start of hostilities, and they were right.

Foreign troops began moving toward the city. The Prince de Lambesc commanded a group of German cavalry and approached through the Place of Louis Xv., which connects to several streets. Along the way he insulted an old man and struck him with his sword. The French are known for respecting the elderly. This arrogant act, together with the public's already intense feelings, had a powerful effect. A cry of "To arms! To arms!" instantly spread across the city.

The citizens had no weapons, and hardly any of them knew how to use weapons. But when everything is at stake, desperate determination can make up for that lack for a while. Large piles of stones for building the new bridge lay near where the Prince de Lambesc had stationed his men. People attacked the cavalry with the stones. Some French guards heard the gunfire, rushed out of their quarters, and joined the people. As night fell, the cavalry withdrew.

Paris's narrow streets were easy to defend. Its tall houses had many floors from which defenders could attack, making a night assault difficult. The people spent the night gathering every kind of weapon they could make or find: guns, swords, blacksmiths' hammers, carpenters' axes, iron crowbars, pikes, halberds, pitchforks, roasting spits, clubs, etc., etc. The enormous crowd that gathered the next morning, and its even more astonishing determination, confused and stunned its enemies. The new ministers had hardly expected such a greeting. Used to slavery themselves, they had no idea that freedom could inspire people like this. They never thought unarmed citizens would dare face a force of thirty thousand soldiers. The citizens spent every moment of the day collecting weapons, making plans, and organizing themselves as well as they could in so sudden a movement. Broglio stayed around the city but did not advance any farther that day. The following night passed as quietly as such circumstances allowed.

But the citizens wanted more than defense. Their freedom or slavery depended on the outcome. They expected an attack at any moment, either against themselves or against the National Assembly. In such a situation, acting quickly is sometimes best. The Bastille now became their target. Taking such a fortress with an army standing nearby would make a powerful impression and frighten the new ministers, who had barely had time to meet. Intercepted correspondence that morning showed that the Mayor of Paris, M. Defflesselles, was betraying the citizens, though he appeared to support them. This discovery left no doubt that Broglio would send reinforcements to the Bastille the next evening. It was necessary to attack that very day, but first the citizens needed more weapons than they had.

Next to the city, the Hospital of the Invalids held a large store of weapons. The citizens demanded its surrender. It could not be defended effectively, and hardly anyone tried, so they soon succeeded. Now armed, they marched on the Bastille: a huge mixed crowd of all ages and social positions, carrying every sort of weapon. It is hard to imagine the sight of that procession or its anxiety about what might happen within hours or minutes. The people inside the city did not know what the ministers were planning. The ministers did not know what the citizens were doing. The citizens also did not know what Broglio might do to support or relieve the fortress. Everything was uncertain and dangerous.

The world already knows that the Bastille was attacked with extraordinary courage inspired by love of liberty and taken within a few hours. I do not intend to describe the attack itself. I want to show the plot against the nation that provoked it and collapsed with the Bastille. The new ministers intended to imprison the National Assembly there. That made it a natural first target, as well as the chief symbol and stronghold of despotism. The attack broke up the new ministry. Its members began fleeing the disaster they had planned for others. Broglio's troops dispersed, and he fled too.

Mr. Burke talks a great deal about plots but never mentions this plot against the National Assembly and the nation's liberty. He skips every circumstance that might have forced him to mention it. He cares deeply about the people exiled from France, from whom he has learned his account. They fled because this plot failed. No one plotted against them; they plotted against others. Those who died received a punishment they had themselves been preparing to inflict, and not an unjust one. If this carefully concealed plot had succeeded, does Mr. Burke think its victors would have stopped their vengeance so quickly? The history of governments answers that question.

Whom has the National Assembly sent to the executioner's platform? No one. Its own members were the plot's intended victims, but they have not taken revenge. Why accuse them of a revenge they never carried out? A whole people rose in a tremendous outburst, with people of every class, temperament, and character mixed together. Through an almost miraculous effort they escaped the destruction planned for them. Could anyone expect nothing at all to go wrong? When people feel the pain of past oppression and face the threat of more, should we expect the calm of philosophers or the numbness of people without feeling? Mr. Burke condemns outrage. Yet he himself has committed the greatest outrage. His book is full of it. He did not write it in a moment of anger but cultivated it for ten months. Mr. Burke had not even been provoked: neither his life nor his interests were at risk.

More citizens died in this struggle than their opponents. But four or five people were seized by the crowd and killed at once. They included the Governor of the Bastille and the Mayor of Paris, who was caught betraying the people. Later the crowd killed Foulon, one of the new ministers, and Berthier, his son-in-law, who had accepted the office of intendant of Paris. Their heads were placed on spikes and carried through the city. Mr. Burke bases much of his tragic picture on this method of punishment. We should therefore ask where people got the idea to punish others this way.

They learned it from the governments they lived under and repeated the punishments they were used to seeing. Heads remained on spikes at Temple Bar for years. That sight was just as horrifying as heads carried on spikes through Paris, and the English Government was responsible for it. Someone may say that what happens to people after death does not matter to them. But it matters greatly to the living. It either hurts their feelings or makes their hearts harder. Either way, it teaches them how to punish when they gain power.

So strike at the root of the problem and teach governments to be humane. Their bloody punishments corrupt humanity. In England, some offenses are punished by hanging, drawing, and quartering. The victim's heart is cut out and displayed to the crowd. Punishments under France's former Government were no less brutal. Who has forgotten Damien's execution, when horses tore him apart? Showing the public such cruelty destroys compassion or stirs a desire for revenge. Based on the low and false belief that people should be ruled by fear instead of reason, these spectacles become examples to follow. Rule by terror is meant to affect the lowest social class, and it affects them most terribly. They understand well enough that they are its targets. When their turn comes, they use the very examples of terror that they were taught to practice.