I
defended that great potentate for associating in a grand alliance for
the preservation of the old governments of Europe; but he puts me to
silence by delivering up all those governments (his own virtually
included) to the new system of France. If he is accused before the
Parisian tribunal (constituted for the trial of kings) for having
polluted the soil of liberty by the tracks of his disciplined slaves, he
clears himself by surrendering the finest parts of Germany (with a
handsome cut of his own territories) to the offended majesty of the
regicides of France. Can I resist this? Am I responsible for it, if,
with a torch in his hand, and a rope about his neck, he makes _amende
honorable_ to the _sans-culotterie_ of the Republic one and indivisible?
In that humiliating attitude, in spite of my protests, he may supplicate
pardon for his menacing proclamations, and, as an expiation to those
whom he failed to terrify with his threats, he may abandon those whom he
had seduced by his promises. He may sacrifice the royalists of France,
whom he had called to his standard, as a salutary example to those who
shall adhere to their native sovereign, or shall confide in any other
who undertakes the cause of oppressed kings and of loyal subjects.
How can I help it, if this high-minded prince will subscribe to the
invectives which the regicides have made against all kings, and
particularly against himself? How can I help it, if this royal
propagandist will preach the doctrine of the Rights of Men? Is it my
fault, if his professors of literature read lectures on that code in all
his academies, and if all the pensioned managers of the newspapers in
his dominions diffuse it throughout Europe in an hundred journals? Can
it be attributed to me, if he will initiate all his grenadiers and all
his hussars in these high mysteries? Am I responsible, if he will make
_Le Droit de l'Homme_, or _La Souverainte du Peuple_ the favorite parole
of his military orders? Now that his troops are to act with the brave
legions of freedom, no doubt he will fit them for their fraternity.
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