"SIRE—I have the honor to send your Majesty the copy of a letter to the National Assembly, in which you will find expressed the sentiments which have animated me all my life. The King knows with what ardour and perseverance I have at all times been devoted to the cause of liberty and to the principles of humanity, equality and justice. He knows, that I have always been the adversary of faction, the enemy of licentiousness, and that no power which I thought illegal has ever been acknowledged by me. He is acquainted with my devotion to his constitutional authority, and with my attachment to his person. Such, Sire, were the grounds of my letter to the National Assembly; such shall be those of my conduct to the nation and your Majesty, amidst the storms raised around to by hostile or by factious combinations.

"It does not belong to me, Sire, to give greater importance to my opinions and actions, than what is due to the individual conduct of a simple citizen. But the expression of my thoughts was always a right, and on this occasion becomes a duty; and though I should have performed it sooner, if, instead of being in a camp, I had remained in that retirement from which I was forced by the dangers of my country: yet I do not think that any public employment or private consideration exempts me from exercising this duty of a citizen, this right of a freeman.

"Persist, Sire, supported by the authority delegated to you by the national will, in the noble resolution of defending constitutional principles against all their enemies. Let this resolution, maintained by all the actions of your private life, as well as by a firm and complete exercise of the royal power; become the pledge of the harmony, which, particularly, at this critical juncture, cannot fail to be established between the elected representatives of the people and their hereditary representative. It is in this resolution, Sire, that glory and safety will be found for the country and for yourself. With this you will find the friends of liberty, all good Frenchmen ranged around your throne, to defend it against the plots of rebels and the enterprizes of the factious; and I, Sire, who in their honorable hatred have found the reward of my persevering opposition; I will always deserve it, by my zeal in the cause to which my whole life has been devoted, and by my fidelity to the oath I have taken to the nation, to the law and to the King. Such, Sire, are the unalterable sentiments I present to your Majesty, with my respect.

"LAFAYETTE"

Letter of Lafayette on leaving Paris to join his army, after having appeared at the bar of the National Assembly, and protested against their proceedings, the last of June.

"Gentlemen—In returning to the post where brave soldiers are ready to die for the constitution, but ought not and will not lavish their blood except for that, I go with great and deep regret in not being able to inform the army, that the National Assembly have yet deigned to come to any determination on my petition. [Alluding to the request in his letter to the assembly a short time before, to suppress the Jacobin clubs.] The voice of all the good citizens of the kingdom, which some factious clamours strive to stifle, daily call to the elected representatives of the people, that while there exists near them a sect who fetter all the authorities, and menace their independence; and who, after provoking war, are endeavoring, by changing the nature of our cause, to make it impossible to defend it; that while there is cause to blush at the impunity of an act of treason against the nation, which has raised just and great alarms in the minds of all the French, and universal indignation; our liberty, laws and honor are in danger. Truths like these, free and generous souls are not afraid of speaking. Hostile to the factious of every kind, indignant at cowards that can sink so low as to look for foreign interposition, and impressed with the principle, which I glory in being the first to declare to France, that all illegal power is oppression, against which resistance becomes a duty, we are anxious to make known our fears to the legislative body. We hope that the prudence of the representatives of the people will relieve our minds of them. As for me, gentlemen, who will never alter my principles, sentiments or language, I thought that the National Assembly, considering the urgency and danger of circumstances, would permit me to add my regrets and wishes to my profound respect."

Noble and generous sentiments, worthy of the disciple of our great Washington—'worthy of the philanthropic hero and firm friend of civil liberty'—worthy of the adopted citizen of free and independent America! Such were the opinions and sentiments of Washington and his friends, in 1794, when our republic was assailed by foreign emissaries, and convulsed by secret associations at home, who through ignorance or design were advocates for measures which would have thrown our country into a state of anarchy and misrule.

There was still a small majority in the National Assembly who were the friends of constitutional liberty, and advocates of Lafayette. But the Jacobins were every day increasing; and they felt confident of the popular favor. Enraged at his bold and independent conduct, and suspecting, perhaps that he was a secret supporter of all the wishes of the King, they denounced Lafayette as a traitor and an enemy to the republic. In this state of extreme ferment, while he was openly threatened and every attempt was making to render him odious to the populace, he had the courage (some might say, the rashness) to proceed to Paris, and present himself to the bar of the National Assembly. Few men, in such a situation, would have thus hazarded their lives; but he was strong in conscious rectitude. He appeared before his enemies with dignity and firmness. "He entreated the assembly to come forward and save the country from ruin, by dissolving the factious clubs and inflicting exemplary punishment on the authors of the late disgraceful riots." His friends were numerous in the Assembly, and probably the greater number condemned the violent transactions, against which he raised his voice in the legislative hall of the nation. The national guards in Paris, also, manifested their attachment to Lafayette. They assembled before the hotel in which he lodged; and planting a tree of liberty before the door, which they decorated with ensigns and ribbons, they greeted him with enthusiastic applause. But he was destined to suffer a reverse of fortune, and to be the subject of the most unjust and cruel persecution. The violent party prevailed: Lafayette and constitutional liberty, were proscribed; and the spirit of anarchy and misrule dictated the violent proceedings which deluged France in blood.

Lafayette, finding all his attempts to restore order and to maintain the constitution in vain, speedily returned to the army on the frontiers. This must have been a moment of great anxiety and suspense. Some suppose that, attached as most of the military were to him and supported by his friends of the moderate party, if he had marched his troops to Paris he might have defended the King from indignity, and restored the reign of law. But this is doubtful. The probability is, that with his love of justice and his correct principles, he could not persuade himself "that the end would justify the means;" and that he chose rather to submit to a cruel destiny, than to violate the constitution he had sworn to support, by resorting to physical force for the accomplishment of honorable purposes, and to be the occasion even indirectly of increasing the misery, in which his unhappy country was involved. He was, indeed, accused by his enemies of a design to march to Paris with his troops and to force the assembly into a compliance with his views. But this was a most unfounded calumny. When the minister for the home department wrote to him on the subject, in the name of the Assembly he replied—"If I were questioned respecting my principles, I should say, that as a constant proclaimer and defender of the rights of man, and the sovereignty of the people, I have every where and always resisted authorities which liberty disavowed and which the national will had not delegated; and that I have every where and always obeyed those, of which a free constitution had fixed the forms and the limits. But I am questioned respecting a fact—Did I propose to Marshal Luckner to march to Paris with our armies? To which I answer in four words—It is not true."

Under the pretence that General Lafayette was meditating some plan hostile to the cause of liberty, or designed to aid the King in another attempt to escape from France, three commissioners were sent to counteract his movements. But he was notified of their appointment, and ordered their arrest before they reached his army. He knew they were deputed by a faction, and hoped the assembly would return to more moderate and just views. He addressed the following letter to the troops under his command. "It is no longer time to conceal from you what is going forward. The constitution you swore to maintain is no more; a troop of factious men besieged the palace of the Tuilleries; the national and Swiss guards made a brave resistance, but they were obliged to surrender, and were inhumanly murdered. The King, Queen and all the royal family escaped to the National Assembly; the factious ran thither, holding a sword in one hand and fire in the other, and forced the legislative body to supersede the King, which was done for the sake of saving his life. Citizens, you are no longer represented; the National Assembly are in a state of slavery; Petion reigns; the savage Danton and his satellites are masters. Thus it is for you to determine whether you will support the hereditary representative of the throne, or submit to the disgrace of having a Petion for your king."