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Title: The Explosion Author: Jean-François Varlet Date: 1794 Language: en Topics: French revolution, Direct Democracy, libertarian socialism, democracy Source: https://libcom.org/library/anarchism-documentary-history-libertarian-ideas-volume-1-2
There is contempt, a violation of human rights, when an inhabitant of
the city is plunged into dungeons for having defended the principles of
the people's sovereignty.
There is mourning for the country, when the tyrants who oppress it
triumph; and when the good citizens who defend it groan.
There is oppressed patriotism, when a victim of Lafayette, of the
commission of the twelve, of the revolutionary inquisition, is left in
the clutches of the ambitious.
Republicans, will you suffer this? Forget the individuals, but think of
the principles of which they were the propagators, and especially when
in their disinterested zeal they did good for good's sake.
Do not doubt it, these are the raw truths, said at the tribune of the
electoral club that earned me my new retirement at Plessis [prison]. If
from the depths of the dungeon my thought can still reach the people, I
rejoice; the tyrants will have in vain persecuted me; they will have
only increased my zeal, far from rendering it powerless.
Snitches, bailiffs, rulers guarantee, fast on feet: I pass the ball to
the ambitious. My candor can offer a vast range of denouncements. Your
testimonies will be doubtless. You will have in hand written proofs...
Vile creatures! I have not obeyed the unjust order of which you were the
bearer, I have only allowed you to violate my homes in the hope of being
treated as equal with the tyrants, your masters, before the tribunal of
the people.
I stand accused of counter-revolution. Let me anticipate my appearance
before the magistrates; the charge is a valid one... I consider myself
convicted, if by counter-revolutionary is meant opposition to
revolutionary government. I temporarily obey this tyranny, without
forgetting my portion of sovereignty, by the censorship we are all
entitled to exercise over the decrees rendered. I will use an unofficial
advocate; I will plead against a national government for the declaration
of human rights; I will be myself accusing a handful of ambitious men,
strong enough perhaps to brave the truth. I will say it.
I immerse myself in the happiness of my country; where there is danger,
there is dedication.
The Friend of the people [nicknamed Marat] did not interfere; he named
the masked: imitate him.
The most shameless of the agents of the people, Monsieur Billaud de
Varennes, places a center of conspiracy in the electoral club, sitting
in the above-mentioned bishopric; he speaks with Barere de Vieuzac, with
Baron de Montaut, with whom he makes common cause. Yes, Monsieur Billaud
de Varennes is right; he must see conspirators in the real insurgents of
31st of May. But if, as at that time, they conspire with the people, the
audacity of their new enemies will not guarantee their success. Disgrace
and ignominy await them. A remnant of terror prolongs their power for a
moment. Engulfed by the power that intoxicates them, they see it
eternally in their hands, and proceed with their blindness to the point
of forgetting that all the plans of oppression have failed with their
authors, against the strength of the people. There are no happy wretches
in a people who want to be free, and who will be in spite of everything
the movement that Barrere, Billaud, Vadier, Collot, Amar, Voulland,
Bourdon of the Oise, Duhem, Ducos, Montaut, Carrier, etc. give
themselves. And to reach the traitors with a single trick, all the
members of the committees of public safety, general security, the
revolutionary tribunal, are guilty of complicity or cowardice under the
reign of Robespierre, imperator & pontifex.
Republicans, let us not look elsewhere than the revolutionary government
for the source of the oppression under which the Republic has groaned
since the unforgettable events of 31st of May, 1st of June and 2nd of
June. Your confidence at that time nominated me to the insurrection
committee; and as it might be concluded from this that I have served the
most odious of tyrannies, I owe a frank explanation to the people and to
myself.
Among the citizens elected to rescue the motherland in the revolution of
31st of May, there were unleashed patriots chosen by the people,
patriots who had risen with it in defence of principle and to establish
a republican constitution. There were also schemers, the most
destructive emissaries of factionalism. That band of Caligulas looked
upon the downfall of the Brissotins [followers of Brissot, a Girondin
leader] simply as opening a wider vista to their own ambitions. The
insurrection committee contained the seeds of revolutionary government,
devised in secrecy beforehand. Unknown to me, the sham insurgents
replaced Brissot with Robespierre; and federalism with a disgusting
dictatorship dressed up with the title of Public Safety. As for myself,
I was too unassuming to be an initiate; I was by-passed.
I was an insurgent, and nothing more. When I saw deputies accosted in
the public thoroughfares and clapped in irons, I backed off; I resigned
from every post and retreated back into the ranks of the people and
completely shunned the revolutionary government, except that from time
to time I did my duty by fighting it. The government thought me
incapable of fulfilling its views; no power was offered to me. My
distancing of myself from the committees and from the revolutionary
tribunal, my utter insignificance and my time served in Les
Madelonnettes [another prison] after 31st of May are evidence enough, I
reckon, to show that I wanted to be a revolutionary, pure and simple. O
my fellow citizens! Do not accuse me of having been the architect of
your misfortunes; I did nothing to deserve such a harsh reproach.
Robespierre's ghastly dictatorship is scarcely a justification of
Brissot's dictatorship; deep down inside me, I find no remorse, I'm at
peace with myself... It's something, I think?
I have just defended myself as an accused. Have I forgotten that I am
accusing myself!
Republicans; the enemy of the Brissotins abhors and exonerates the
Robespierrins. Their leader is no longer: We conspire to attack... whom?
Pitt? Coburg? Foreigners? Pitt, Cobourg and foreigners are good for
something; but behind them I perceive ambitious deputies disputing over
the ruins of factions, the possession of the throne. Despotism has
passed from the palace of the kings to the precincts of the committees.
It is neither the royal robes, nor the crown, nor the scepter that have
made kings hated; but rather ambition and tyranny. In my homeland there
has merely been a change in costume. Frivolous, fickle nation! How much
longer will you remain in thrall to names instead of things? I believe
that I see clearly: I will not extend the respect owed to the National
Convention to disloyal delegates if, at their instigation, a lawfully
constituted authority hands down decrees that subvert all social
harmony. Am I to touch a slavish forelock to a revolutionary code,
palladium or tyranny? Am I to yield to hastening fear? Am I to give
obedience to this despotic order? Silence or deatl1? I will not be so
craven. The principles enshrined in the declaration of our rights
over-ride all decrees; they scream to me that above all else we must be
free, to make our stand between the respect due to the bulk of the
people's delegates and the respect that is even more legitimately due
its sovereignty.
Before my eyes I keep this motto:
"Long live the rights of the sovereign people! Respect to the National
Convention! Down with the usurpers! Perish revolutionary government
rather than a principle!"
And I continue, striking out at the rulers.
What a social monstrosity, what a masterpiece of Machiavellianism is
this revolutionary government! To any rational being, government and
revolution are incompatible, unless the people wishes to set its
constituted authority in insurrection against itself, which would be
absurd.
Slaves subjected to the law of might; old courtiers bound to the chariot
of all tyranny; two-legged species of the egotistical and apathetic;
hack writers for whose daily poison the people pay dearly; fanatics,
idolaters of error; bigots who see crime where there is difference of
opinion, you are the advocates or dupes of revolutionary government. Its
authors require some pretext on which they can legitimize dictatorship.
In the name of public safety, they conjure an infinity of subsidiary
dictatorships answering to the Committee of Public Safety.
In the darkness of night, in silence, in secret, without further ado,
caprice and personal rancour clap citizens by the thousands in their
Bastilles. The revolutionary kings can reign only if they corrupt: they
must make money; the sword of Themis becomes a dagger; the laws of blood
are enforced retrospectively; those with the greatest title, charged
with phoney conspiracies, are hauled before a murderous tribunal, the
pitiless prosecution, deaf to all defence stratagems; the criminal
consciences of the panel-members are easily swayed; their ears hear a
single cry: Death! Death! The palace of justice becomes the lair of
cannibals, and these ogres prattle about humanity.
We have plumbed the depths of degradation of the rights of the people.
In the state we see the oppressive and terrifying authority of a few
ambitious men, overruling the legitimate authority of the National
Convention. We see citizens stripped of their rights, wretched, quaking
and mute before their tyrants; and at this sight we wonder whether
France is populated by subjects or republicans.
Citizens, eager to know the laws by which you are governed, do not ask
its supporters for a precise description of revolutionary government;
licentious without being free, ferocious without vigour; that is how
they describe that fine invention.
"Two thirds of citizens are mischievous enemies of freedom: they must be
stamped out. Terror is the supreme law; the instrument of torture an
object of veneration. If destruction is not constantly on the agenda, if
the sword should cease to slaughter; if the executioners are no longer
the fathers of the nation, freedom is in jeopardy. Terror aims to rule
over heaps of corpses and wade through the blood of its enemies..."
Sensitive men! O my friends! Do not reply. The traveler ranks to make
way for the torrent; give reason to the furious, for in the exasperated
movements of their hatred, they would victimize you. One must say to
oneself:
"Is this to exterminate scoundrels, or to persuade and convince deceived
men? Are the thousand and one conspiracies certain? Is it not rather the
imaginations that conspire? Can the executor of high works regenerate
the nation, or should this care be entrusted to the proper organization
of primary schools? Will the revolutionary government bring a solution
in public affairs? Does it tend to exterminate factionalism, or is it
not the social contract to lead us to an order of lasting things?"
These reflections I indulge in are sweet and consoling. The
revolutionaries will cry for moderation. I really like moderantism that
makes me humane, tolerant, thoughtful. Well! Then I am a moderate; I
deserve the hatred of the great patriots of the day, and in this I
gather according to my vow; for if they esteemed me, I would hold myself
to be less.
Patriots, stand firm in your attachment to principle and support the
true citizen against money, usurpation and the abuse of power; he trusts
and surrenders himself to the justice of your cause. But such placidity!
Such stupor! Such lethargy! Silence and oblivion hang over you.
Republicans, you sleep! And the counter-revolution sleeps not. Only the
tyrant has been banished from Robespierre's tyranny; his ghastly system
has survived him; ever since the monstrous decree that outlawed the
innocent and the guilty alike, in order to draw a veil over the most
deep-seated conspiracy, the delegates who carry on the tyrant's work,
these brazen conspirators, despised and feared, letting their masks
fall, stand exposed as counter-revolutionaries. You sleep! And, though
the ambitious may seem to deal severely with the priests, with the
nobles, the priests and nobles hold in their hands the security of a
state that they have sworn to overthrow. You sleep! And there was no
dagger of Brutus to drive Bourdon-de-I'Oise from the rostrum after he
announced in the middle of the Senate that 'What is required is not a
dictator, but a dictatorship'. And the dagger of an assassin refutes the
opinion of Tallien on the indefinite liberty of the press. You sleep!
And seven agents charged with facts of public notoriety, as evident as
the enunciative act of the offenses of Capet and Brissot, defend
themselves as culprits; some of their colleagues serve as unofficial
defenders: if, they say, the seven accused members are guilty, the
entire convention has conspired. This is how the respect of the people
is abused for the center of legitimate authority, the only rallying
point for Republicans! The mantle of inviolability envelops the
conspirators. Lecointre, an energetic accuser, is called a slanderer, a
madman; we speak of union, of peace, and the order of the day is
adopted; the seven accused members do not wash the infamous spot that
covers them; strong is the law rendered against slanderers, it is
cowardice not to transfer Lecointre to the revolutionary tribunal. You
sleep! Prisons open to slaves, and are closed to free men: Fouquier de
Tinvillle, executor of the tyrant's legal massacres, is left alone. You
sleep! And misery stabs you in the back and you make no effort to
discover which demon has rendered sterile a soil rich in nature's gifts.
You sleep! And the aristocracy sees with a secret joy, the temple, to
conceal in Paris the stone of waiting for royalism; & Meudon, a strong
castle mysteriously forging the conjuring thunders. The popular deputy,
who dares to conceive of some doubt, is a Pitt, a Coburg. You sleep! And
in all the walls of Paris, the ambitious already have their beams, their
lictors, their praetorian guard. You sleep! And this Barrere de Vieuzac,
noble and conspirator born, lulls you with feigned victories. I believe
in republican worth: I do not believe in Barrere. This deceiver, who for
ten months has been shouting fanfare at the tribune of the National
Convention, that he is giving the nation countless amounts of gunpowder,
manufactured and gone on the frontiers, at the moment when Condé and
Valenciennes are caught almost without a blow. To fight; let him say
whether a single rifle has entered the bosom of the people, in spite of
this million devoted to arming the interior; let him say where these
arms go, which are forged daily by many factories. If, as Barere has
announced so many times, we have arsenals, magazines, camps for the
enemy; if many vessels taken from the English, have returned to our
ports laden with food, the armies must have fed on booty from without,
the consumption of the interior being less. The people of the artisans,
on whom the public misery weighs, did not feel these happy effects. He
asks Barere a general state of the catches made; he wants him to
indicate the deposits that contain them. Barere! O Barere! you are no
longer so victorious. Republicans, you sleep! And the murderous Vendee
rises from the ruins, more formidable than before; that corner of the
earth, soaked in the purest blood, still threatens to engulf new
defenders. You sleep! And the sovereign voice of the people is
supplanted by lying speeches, tissues of vile sycophancy, all of them
ending with these words: War, terror, revolutionary government, stand by
your posts. You sleep! And the society of Jacobins, perverted by the
ringleaders, is at the mercy of the ambitious who, from there, rule the
entire populace. There, they are tribunes; the ruled rulers. This
society serves as a mainstay of the conspiratorial government, feeding
factionalism and acting as a stepping-stone for intriguers. Its inherent
vice is having two peoples in its assembly: the people who pay, speaking
inside the hall; and the people that do not pay, the real people, the
public, is silent in the tribunals. A no less fundamental vice is the
admission of deputies into this society. The people are no longer left
to its own devices; the predominant delegates come to the Jacobins to be
made party leaders; they go there to plot yet another 9th of Thermidor
against the National Convention. Republicans, you sleep! And the eighty
five departments, overrun by revolutionary tyranny reaching into every
nook and cranny, are unaware of what is going on here and do not report
to you the oppression beneath which they groan.
You sleep! The Republic is in irons... Citizens! Citizens! Shake off
your slumbers! Wake up! Our tearful motherland looks to you patriots who
have escaped the flames of the revolutionary tribunal to TAKE ENERGETIC
ACTION for the love of liberty and in self-defence. The aristocracy
back-stabs and a price is put upon your heads. Shoulder arms! Take up
your pens! Close ranks! Audacity against audacity! This is where we must
attack, harry and bring severe pressure to bear on the enemy, giving him
no respite. Let us hold tyranny up to ridicule and publicize its
misdeeds; let us thwart its sinister designs and not wait until it
launches a surprise attack on us.. LET US DARE! ...And the danger is no
more; forgetting about ourselves can save the motherland; dangers and
obstacles scatter in the face of courage, devotion eludes them. Tremble!
Tyrants in your masks of popularity, for thought is coming into its own
after lengthy suppression, it will hit you like saltpetre packed into a
pipe. The free man unleashes his hatred of oppressors and the press
fires its guns... And where are the ringleaders of the conspiracy? ..
Ashen-faced and undone, they lie in the dust, breathing their last...
And are no more.
The French nation breathes again as its many battalions rally around her
freely elected authority, forming an impregnable bulwark outside the
National Convention: the sordid remnants of its would-be assassins are
dispatched. Spirits are lifted and at ease. Joy and enthusiasm are
universal; on the ramparts of the temple of the law, waves the tricolour
flag, bearing this legend, that ten thousand free men chant in unison to
the breeze:
"Long live the rights of the sovereign people! Respect the National
Convention! Down with the usurpers! BETTER THAT THE REVOLUTIONARY
GOVERNMENT SHOULD PERISH THAN A PRINCIPLE."