--The
extreme despotism of the government seems to have confounded every
principle of right and wrong, every distinction of honour and dishonour
and the individual, of whatever class, alive only to the sense of
personal danger, embraces without reluctance meanness or disgrace, if it
insure his safety.--A tailor or shoemaker, whose reputation perhaps is
too bad to gain him a livelihood by any trade but that of a patriot,
shall be besieged by the flatteries of people of rank, and have levees as
numerous as Choiseul or Calonne in their meridian of power.
When a Deputy of the Convention is sent to a town on mission, sadness
takes possession of every heart, and gaiety of every countenance. He is
beset with adulatory petitions, and propitiating gifts; the Noblesse who
have escaped confinement form a sort of court about his person; and
thrice happy is the owner of that habitation at which he condescends to
reside.--*
* When a Deputy arrives, the gentry of the town contend with jealous
rivalship for the honour of lodging him; and the most eloquent
eulogist of republican simplicity in the Convention does not fail to
prefer a large house and a good table, even though the unhallowed
property of an aristocrat.--It is to be observed, that these
Missionaries travel in a very patriarchal style, accompanied by
their wives, children, and a numerous train of followers, who are
not delicate in availing themselves of this hospitality, and are
sometimes accused of carrying off the linen, or any thing else
portable--even the most decent behave on these occasions as though
they were at an inn.
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