3184 ([return])
[ Archives nationales, cartons 3144 and 3145, No. 1004, missions of the councilors of state, year IX.—(Report by Fourcroy.) "The keeping of Sunday and the attendance on the churches, which is seen everywhere, shows that the mass of Frenchmen desire a return to ancient usages, and that the time has gone by for resisting this national tendency... The mass of mankind require a religion, a system of worship and a priesthood. It is an error of certain modern philosophers, into which I have myself been led, to believe in the possibility of any instruction sufficiently widespread to destroy religious prejudices; they are a source of consolation for the vast number of the unfortunate.... Priests, altars and worship must accordingly be left to the mass of the people.">[
3185 ([return])
[ Peuchet, "Statistique élémentaire de la France" (published in 1805), p.228. According to statements furnished by prefects in the years IX and X, the population is 33,111,962 persons; the annexation of the island of Elbe and of Piedmont adds 1,864,350 Total, 34,976,313.—Pelet de la Lozère, P.203. (Speech by Napoleon to the council of state, February 4, 1804, on the Protestant seminaries of Geneva and Strasbourg, and on the number of Protestants in his states.) "Their population numbers only 3 millions.">[
3186 ([return])
[ Roederer, III., 330 (July 1800): "The First Consul spoke to me about the steps necessary to be taken to prevent the (emigrés) who had been struck off from getting back their possessions, in view of maintaining the interest in the revolution of about 1,200,000 purchasers of national domains. "—Rocquain, "État de la France au 18 Brumaire." (Report by Barbé-Marbois on Morbihan, Finisterre, Ile-et-Vilaine, and Côtes-du-Nord, year IX.) "In every place I have just passed through the proprietors recognize that their existence is attached to that of the First Consul.">[
3187 ([return])
[ Constitution of Frimaire 22, year VIII, art. 94.—Article 93, moreover, declares that "the possessions of the émigrés are irrevocably acquired by the republic.">[
3188 ([return])
[ Law of Floréal 29, year X, title I, article 8. The member also swears "to combat with all the means which justice, reason and the law authorize, every enterprise tending to restore the feudal régime," and, consequently, feudal rights and tithes]