that came within the bounds of possibility to have been proved against her," a generous government would have been disposed to have softened, instead of aggravating, the punishment due to them, when they considered the heap of calamities which she had already endured, when they saw her beauty destroyed and her hair turned gray with grief. But mercy was a virtue unknown to the present rulers of France. They were not aware that whilst they gratified their malice to the utmost, they conferred on the queen the greatest boon that she could receive in her present forlorn state-that of recommending herself to the respect of posterity by the magnanimity with which she bore her complicated afflictions, and the fortitude with which she submitted to the stroke of death. Lest compassion should steal upon the hearts of men while they were thus executing their vengeance, the decemvirs, as Roberspierre and his colleagues were now denominated, endeavoured to render them insensible to all the tender feelings of human nature by alarming them continually with a representation of the dangers that surrounded them, to which the culprits were said to have contributed; and, that they might not be embarrassed in the prosecution of their designs by any principle that might be a restraint to the votaries, they resolved, if possible, to eradicate from their minds all sense of religion.-Reflecting, at the same time, how prone the multitude are to fanaticism, they consecrated reason as an object of worship; they celebrated a festival in honour of her in the cathedral at Paris, where she was personated by a woman; || combining artifice with enthusiasm, they endeavoured to confirm their influence over the minds of the populace by making them fanatics in their devotion to this new created deity.' To conciliate the attachment of a different description of partisans, whilst they were erasing the impressions of religion, they employed men of science to make a new arrangement of the calendar. By this, each month was divided into three decades, and the day of rest was fixed on the tenth instead of the seventh; thus to supersede, by a political institution, the worship and ceremonies attached to the religion which they wished to abolish. The doctrine of atheism was now publicly preached: and, effectually 1793 1793 tually to destroy the idea of a future state of rewards and punishments, men were taught to believe that death was an eternal sleep." These measures relative to religion afford us an opportunity of observing another feature in the character of Roberspierre. On the publication of a decree for completing their project by shutting up the churches, he saw that the people were shocked at their impiety, and that the destruction of all religious sentiments in the human mind was an enterprise which exceeded their strength. Therefore, with an hypocrisy well adapted to finish the character of a villain, he became an advocate for those institutions, which, as a decemvir, he had sanctioned the destruction of, and made a timely sacrifice to popularity by recommending a repeal of the decree.' 1799 SPAIN. a THE Spanish monarch, whom we have seen prudently observing a neutrality respecting the affairs of France, when informed that Lewis the Sixteenth was brought to his trial before the convention, could not refrain from interposing his kind offices to avert his awful doom. The earnest solicitations of his ambassador being contemptuously rejected, don Ferdinand discovered a disposition to join the coalition, and shared with its other members, the indignation of the French government in the declaration of war by that state. †-His majesty then prepared for war, and dispatched a messenger to a congress held by the confederate powers at Antwerp, to deliberate on the plan of carrying it on.-In pursuance of the warlike councils adopted by the court of Madrid, don Ferdinand ordered don Ricordos, who commanded in Catalonia, to invade the French frontier in Roussillon. And that general, in pursuance of his sovereign's orders, made himself master of the fort of Andaya, the town of Goret, and the fortress of Bellegarde; and afterwards defeated a body of French troops near PORTUGAL. -NAPLES.-ECCLESIASTICAL STATE. Truillas. -Don Langara, in the mean-time, was dispatched, with a fleet and a body of land forces on board, to co-operate with the English in the measures planned for assisting the malecontents in the south of France. 373 1793 PORTUGAL. THE Portuguese government, influenced by prudence or a consciousness of its weakness, adheres to pacific councils during the present war in Europe. NAPLES. THE king now became a confederate against the French republic, and dispatched an ambassador to the congress at Antwerp;' a rash measure, of which we shall find that he soon had cause to repent. 1793 1793 ECCLESIASTICAL STATE. THE enmity between his holiness and the French republic, grew daily more inflamed.-Pius, as head of the Romish church, could not but be moved with grief and indignation at the contempt as well as animosity which the convention had studiously expressed towards the christian faith; and as a man, he could not but feel resentment of the scurrilous language in which he had been vilified in an anonymous letter, addressed to him about this time, and the disrespect shewn him by the executive council, in addressing him by the style of "the prince bishop of Rome." "-An incident which happened this year served to exasperate the minds of the Romans towards the French 1798 1793 French republicans, and to furnish the convention with a plea for its persecution of the pontiff.-Basseville, a secretary of legation sent to Rome by the French minister at Naples, as if with an intention to provoke aggression from the citizens, had appeared publicly with the tri-coloured cockade, the badge of the revolutionists in France: he was, moreover, deliberating with some other Frenchmen then resident at Rome upon the subject of replacing the armorial insignia, with which the palace of the French academy was ornamented, with the arms of the republic. But whilst this was under contemplation, Basseville was attacked by the populace in his coach, on the corso at Rome, and was killed in a fray that ensued. Pius gave the French government occasion of offence by not prosecuting the perpetrators of this outrage with sufficient rigour. And whilst he continued to profess neutrality, and to make provision only for defence, he indicated a disposition to forward, to the utmost of his abilities, the cause of the confederates against France by his negotiations at the Italian courts. -With more zeal than discretion, he, at the same time, expressed his acrimony towards the partisans of the French republic. In a proclamation, exhorting his people to defensive measures in case of an invasion, "let "them endeavour," said he, "to destroy, by every practicable mean a "lawless and merciless enemy."-However applicable these terms were, they must be considered as ill-judged at a time when the French government was seeking an occasion to quarrel with the court of Rome, that it might have a plea for further acts of injustice and tyranny. The success of the allies at Toulon, and the presence of the British fleet in the Mediterranean, appear to have had a material influence on the councils of his holiness and other Italian powers at this period.—We have already had an opportunity of observing the line of conduct pursued by the king of Sardinia. The success of his troops in defeating an attempt made by the French to dislodge his advanced posts at Raus and Auchion in the county of Nice concurred with the subsidies of Great Britain to fix him in the allied interests.+-Genoa would willingly have declared for France, but was intimidated by the English fleet, and was forced to maintain its neutrality. And the duke of Tuscany, under protection of the British flag, + In July. C b Life. 2. 253. Idem. 256. d Annual Register. 286. flag, was emboldened to order the French minister and his adherents to quit his dominions. 1793 SWITZERLAND. THE Swiss cantons had escaped from the direful grasp of the French republic, by standing aloof during the contest with that state. But their situation was still perilous.-An invasion of the country was projected by Clavieres and some fugitive Swiss: and their impending doom is said to have been averted at this time by a forcible representation to the French government of the advantages which it would derive from the neutrality of the Swiss, at a period when France was surrounded by enemies and distressed by internal revolt. The refusal of the cantons to accept the invitation now given them by the emperor and king of Sardinia, to join the confederacy against France, may be considered as a compensation for this forbearance; at the same time that it evinced their persuasion of the good policy of adhering to a neutrality in a contest between their powerful neighbours.-This conduct, no doubt, was intended to merit the friendship of the French government. But we shall find in the sequel how small a weight it had when put in competition with the interests of that ambitious republic. 1793 GERMANY AND PRUSSIA. His Prussian majesty, disappointed of the glory and advantage that he promised himself from his invasion of France, and disgusted with the emigrants who had deceived him by their misrepresentations respecting the state of that country, began now to grow cool towards the confederacy.— He perceived, moreover, that he had been the dupe of the empress Catharine's policy; who had artfully encouraged the German powers to embark in 1793 e Annual Register. 286. a Planta. 2. 384. |