24 FEBRUARY 1849, Page 15

LEWES'S LIFE OF ROBESPIERRE. * EXCEPT among a certain class of

people who echo opinions but never examine them, Robespierre has for some time ceased to be looked upon as a mere blood-stained monster, akin to the raw-head-and-bloody-bones that frighten children of a smaller growth ; though the real source of his power, still more the objects he proposed to himseLc and above all the true nature of his character, are yet unsettled. To solvethis problem, and to furnish others with the means of testing the truth of the attempted solution, is the purpose of Mr. Lewes's Life of Maximilien Robespierre. When we consider the celebrity the apostle of "Liberty and Equality" attained, the memoir-writing people among whom he lived, and the numbers whom he inspired with a disinterested attach- ment, it is remarkable how little is known of his private and especially of his early life. All that is known Mr. Lewes has collected, and presented in a manner which not only brings out the biographical character of the facts, but helps the reader to a biographical conclusion, from the picture it suggests of France at the time. He has added to this a complete account of Robespierre's public career from the period whea he emerged from obscurity, and combined with it a succinct view of the Revolution ; but on matters in which his hero was not engaged he only touches so far as was necessary to understand the influence of public The Life of Marlmihen Robespierre ; with Extracts from his Unpublished Corse epondence. By G. H. Lewes, Author of "Ranthorpe," "The Biographical History of Philosophy," &c. Published by Chapman and Hall.

events on Robespierre, or Robespierre's influence on them. Intermixed with the narrative are specimens of Robespierre's poetry, when he was a member of the literary societies at Arras; some extracts from his corre- spondence ; and a sufficient selection from his speeches, or rather from his composed addresses, (for Robespierre had little or no oratorical readi- ness,) to enable the reader to form an idea of his political and philoso- phical schemes for renovating society.

And those schemes, impracticable as they may appear to the experienced minister or man of the world, had at that time a charm even for men of education and thought in many countries, as they still have for suffering poverty and the young enthusiasm of wilder natures. The master of Robes- pierre was, as he always acknowledged, Rousseau. His scheme was founded on the natural equality of man, and the superior virtue of the people, from their want of means to be profligate, and their want of opportunity to practise the sordid tricks of the trader or the polished deceptions of the courtier. Standing on this great principle of equality, he demanded for the people a self-government more absolute than that of the United States of America ; and refused to modify his demand on any grounds of expediency, because the people were the most virtuous part of the community, and less exposed to sinister influences than the classes above them, while those classes if in power will oppress them, as all history shows. With the furious fanatical infidelity of his associates Robespierre had no sympathy. He was tolerant in principle and practice; the injury he did himself by his opposition to the bulk of the Mountain in the decree affirming the existence of a God, and in the festival to the Supreme Being, shows that be was deeply touched by the religious sentiment : phy- sical courage, or an inclination to risk danger that he could by possibility avoid, formed no part of his nature ; but he throughout avowed belief in a Supreme Being when he was prudently silent on politics. Education for the people, and support for those unable to support themselves, formed a part of his theory ; the means to be raised by a graduated taxation of the rich. A species of Communism perhaps might be logically deduced from his principles ; but he personally disclaimed any such idea, though rather, it would seem, as a sentiment than a conclusion.

" propose,' said he, on one of the many occasions when he expounded his theories, certain articles necessary to complete your theory of property. Let the word alarm no one. Degraded wretches ! (Imes de bone !) who only prize gold, I do not wish to touch your treasures, however impure their source may be. You ought to know that the agrarian law, of which you have spoken so much, is but a phantom created by scoundrels to frighten idiots. There was no need of a revolution to teach the universe that the extreme disproportion of fortune is the source of many evils and of many crimes; but we are also not the less convinced that community of goods is a chimera. As for me, I think it still less necessary to private happiness than to public felicity. We had better render poverty ho- nourable than proscribe wealth. The cottage of Fabricius need not envy the palace of Crassus. For my part, I would sooner be the son of Aristides, brought up at the expense of the Republic, than the presumptive heir of Xerxes, born in the corruption of courts, to occupy a throne adorned from the degradation of the people, glittering with public misery.' "He then defined property to be the right which every citizen has of enjoying and disposing of that portion of goods which is guaranteed him by the law. The right of property is limited, as are all other rights, by the obligation of respect- ing the rights of other people. It should neither be prejudicial to the safety, nor to the liberty, nor to the existence, nor to the property of our fellow men. All property which violates this principle is illicit and immoral.' "With respect to taxes, he proposed that all citizens whose revenue did not exceed that which was necessary to their subsistence should be dispensed from contributing to public expenses; the others should pay progressively in proportion to their fortune."

It was an undeviating logical consistency in these flattering visions of human perfectibility, combined with perfect disinterestedness, and a greater power of exposition and enforcement than, we think, has yet been conceded to him, that gave Robespierre the influence he eventually attained, and the disciples he still possesses. More experienced men might halt in satisfaction, or from a sense of expediency or difficulty, at a certain stage of the Revolution ; men more politically timorous, from a sense of fear; the corrupt, of whom there was no small number, might look to their interests, and the slaves to established prejudices might shrink from this or that on account of names ; the bulk of the Moun- tain, fanatical, bloody, cruel, unscrupulous as they were, could only de- stroy, without being able to present an attractive scheme of social reno- vation. Robespierre steadily and sternly, and Mr. Lewes thinks con- scientiously, pressed forward through all obstacles to the realization of his idea—a remarkable example of the influence of conviction and per- tinacious will. During many stages of the Revolution, Robespierre was unstained by crime ; his struggle with the Girondins, was one of life or death, and nearly so with others. But when all obstacles were removed —when power virtually was placed within his grasp—when criticism or attack was over, action and establishment to begin—Robespierre found his incapacity to renovate society. He was like what O'Connell would have been had "Repeal" been given him with the task of governing and feeding Ireland. He was even worse off; for Robespierre had less ex- perience of the world, the guillotine had already begun its work on those who faltered, and the Republic was engaged in war.

"Paris had now not only to contend against Europe and against faction; it had also to contend against the terrible pressure of famine. A maximum had been decreed, an arbitrary price, above which no bread, meat, fish, wine, coals, &c. could be sold. There was likewise fixed a maximum of weights. The effect of this was only to cramp commerce and increase the famine. Crowds of workmen, of beggars, and of women, collected round the Hotel de Ville shrieking for bread. Hebert and Chaumette encouraged these assemblies. Lamartine says that Robes- pierre one while appeared indignant at the success of anarchy, at another feigned to comprehend its necessity, to pardon it—to instigate, that he might rule it. I doubt- this. Whatever discrepancy may be observed in his views, is owing, I think, to the vacillation of his mind as he stood face to face with the awful mob, which he bad so powerfully aided in evoking, and which now as a Minister be had the awful problem of ruling. Remember that his was no longer the office of mstagating and exciting the masses to rebellion. He was no longer in opposition. The Republic, if ever, was now to be formed; and he had the terrible task of forming it. But republics and other forms of government, which act so smoothly upon paper, become very different things when we attempt to realize them, having as our instruments ferocious and ignorant masses of hungry men. Certain it is, that he essayed many tunes to restrain these petitioners; essayed in vain. His popularity, great as it was, scarcely survived this resistance to the popular will and he often entered his dwelling alone, forsaken, and despondent. • • "The fifth act of this long and dismal tragedy now opens • and the moral of the story begins to glimmer through its horrible events. Robespierre has gained his ambitious object: what use will he make of it? We have traced him step by step along his troubled path; we have seen him an obscure honest reformer, wish. Mg to have abuses removed, but never contemplating the abolition of a Constitu- tional Monarchy. From that early stage, we have seen him gradually pass on. wards to Republicanism. We have seen him borne upon the tide of popularity, in- stigating insurrection, approving massacres, exasperating the minds of a furions people by fierce declamations and rabble-rousing words, denouncing every man whose power seemed an obstacle to the realization of his ideas—doing all this evil that good might come of it; that good being nothing less than a pure Republic. He has now nearly attained the culminating point of power; he is almost a dic- tator. Now commences the fearful task of realizing ideas—of passing from the easy office of criticism to the perilous office of action. He who so fiercely u braided the acts of others has now to act himself; he who was pitiless thwar those who fell short of his ideal, taking no heed of obstacles, giving no credit for intentions, is now to be himself the butt of that opposition which he has hitherto directed against others. Patriotism, vague declamations about love of one's coun- try and-Republican virtue, will avail him no longer; powerful in opposition, these phrases are powerless in Ace. His business is to act, not to declaim. He has to govern a nation—and what a nation! Phrases will not govern it. It can only be governed by institutions, and those must be based upon ideas. What social ideas has Robespierre? None: he has nothing but aspirations. He desires a republic; but he has not thought out even the most elementary plans of institu- tions necessary for a republic. Face to face with the great problem of social misery—face to face with the terrible problem of government for an anarchical nation—he is powerless to solve it, powerless to shape that chaos into order.

"There is something to my mind infinitely tragic in such a situation."

Mr. Lewes's interpretation of the problem of Robespierre's conduct during the reign of Terror is founded upon this view of his position, and the cold, selfish, and timorous cast of his character. He could not realize his promises, or his ideas ; so he did nothing : he diapproved of much of the bloodshed, but he wanted courage to stop it ; so he allowed it to go on under the sanction of his name, but without his expressed approval, or, except for a short period, any overt act. When at last his repugnance overcame his fears, and he resolved to crush the Committee of Public Safety and their abettors, his incapacity for action, his want of courage and decision, his half philosophical half vain reliance on "moral force and on his influence in the Convention, caused his downfall. This view of the case Mr. Lewes works out at length; exhibiting the facts by which he supports it, narrating the grotesquely horrible circumstances that accompanied the end of the Dictator, and delineating his charac- ter, with a justice more severe than might perhaps have been looked for from the author's theory. Mr. Lewes disclaims all attempt at novelty ; but he has brought together, and sometimes from out-of-the-way sources, all that is known upon the subject : he takes a distinct and rational view of Robespierre's conduct and character, which preserves the lineaments of the man without sinking those of the criminal; and though there is frequently too much of apparent effort in the composition, it answers the object of exciting attention, and is not ill adapted to the strange, startling, phantasmagoric subjects it exhibits.