The Struggle of Parties and the Ascendency of Robespierre.
It was in November, 1793, and under the influence of the Commune of Paris, that the Revolution reached its climax. The party of the Commune was undoubtedly strong. It had behind it the elaborate organisation of the Parisian municipality. It had many supporters in the Jacobin Club. It had complete possession of the Cordeliers, once the scene of Danton's triumphs. It had friends on the Committee of General Security. It was countenanced by Pache, the Mayor, and by Bouchotte, the Minister of War. On the Committee of Public Safety it had a powerful champion in the person of Collot d'Herbois, and in Carrier, Fouché, and other proconsuls of the Terror it had agents on whom it could rely. Hébert, its most ambitious leader, enjoyed, as the editor of Père Duchesne, a commanding influence in the Press. Chaumette, a worthier disciple, held an important post in the Commune. Vincent, another of its representatives, held an important post in the Ministry of War. Ronsin, the commander of the Revolutionary Army, lent it the assistance of an effective force. Other politicians of less note, Clootz and Momoro, Desfieux and Proli, Maillard, Chabot and Bazire, were sometimes associated with it, and contributed to it their strange enthusiasm, their doubtful services, and their discreditable intrigues. Before long the objects of the Commune appeared without disguise—to destroy the power of the Convention, to usurp the place of the Government, and to make its own views and heroes the chief authority in the State.
The proclamation of the worship of Reason marked the ascendency of this party, and from that moment its decline began. The orgies which accompanied its triumph, the tyranny which it had established in Paris, and the license and brutality which distinguished its representatives in the departments caused grave dissatisfaction in the Jacobin ranks. The majority of the Convention submitted, but they submitted with indignation and disgust, and though they had not the courage to rebel, they were prepared to welcome anyone who would give voice to the resentment which they felt. Under these circumstances a second party raised its head among the forces of the time. Philippeaux and Fabre d'Églantine, two well-known deputies of the Mountain believed to be on terms of intimacy with Danton, came forward to attack the proceedings of the Hébertists. Others, like Westermann and Bourdon de l'Oise, Legendre, Lecointre, Lacroix and many others, joined in the attack with more or less reserve. On the same side Camille Desmoulins threw himself into the battle with all his impetuous eloquence and ardour; and behind the attacking forces there rose, impressive and conspicuous as ever, the figure of the man whom all regarded as a leader, and whom the rising opposition hoped to make the spokesman of their protest against the Commune and the Terror alike.
Danton, like so many of his contemporaries, had soon wearied of the system of the Terror. He watched with repugnance the ruin which it spread. He had no liking for political intrigue. He felt strongly the need of stability and order, if there were ever again to be a settled government in France. It is true that in the earlier days Danton had taken a chief part in securing the Jacobin triumph. In the heat of the revolutionary struggle, in the moment of national danger, no one had been readier to act. He had encouraged and organised the insurrection of the 10th August. He had grasped the helm of State during the perilous days which followed. Many of the characteristic Jacobin measures—the wholesale arrest of the suspected in September, the foundation of the Committee of Public Safety, the establishment of the Revolutionary Tribunal, of the Maximum and of the tax on the rich, the formation of the Revolutionary Army, the proclamation of the Terror, the conscription and the defence of France—had been largely due to his initiative or support. In common with the rest of his party, Danton had opposed the declaration of war, but as soon as the invaders appeared upon the frontier, he had thrown himself into the battle heart and soul. He cared little for party jangles; but he cared intensely for the honour and greatness of his country. Free alike from narrow theories, from absorbing jealousies and from morbid ambition, Danton had always viewed events with a statesman's eye. He had seen Dumouriez' failings, but he had seen also his conspicuous ability, and he had supported him staunchly to the end. He had seen, as Mirabeau had seen before him, that the government of the country could never prosper until a strong Executive were formed, and accordingly, like Mirabeau, he had endeavoured to induce the Convention to give the Ministers seats in the House. Only when that scheme had failed, had he fallen back on the device of a powerful committee. He had realised much sooner than his colleagues the folly of the reckless decree by which, in November, 1792, the Convention had declared war on all the kings of Europe, and four months later he had secured its repeal. He had discerned the uses of diplomacy, had negotiated the withdrawal of Brunswick, had tried to detach Prussia from the coalition, had secured an alliance with Sweden, and had steadily laboured, in spite of the wild talk of his colleagues, to bring France back into the comity of nations. From the time of the king's death, Danton had done all that eloquent persuasion could do to heal divisions and to unite parties in the work of defending the Republic. He would gladly have worked with the Girondists, had they not driven him by their intemperate charges into the opposing camp. 'If we must shed blood,' he once pleaded nobly, 'let us shed the blood of the enemies of our country.'
But when the danger of invasion passed away, Danton's energies passed with it. When the Jacobins had conquered and the State was saved, he felt that he had no employment left. He had little sympathy with the Government of the Terror. He wearied of the long tale of violence and outrage. Unscrupulous and hardened as he was, he turned disgusted from the methods of Carrier and Hébert. After his second marriage, in June, 1793, his young wife and the delights of home called him away to purer things than politics. He knew the limits of his own capacity, and that he could not bring to the work of political manœuvring the irresistible vigour and conviction by which he had roused the country and had swept his colleagues into power. Even to the last, when Philippeaux and Desmoulins forced him to the front, and made him the unwilling leader round whom the party of reaction gathered, he was inclined to urge them to put up their weapons, and to fall back on his old plea for unity. He hated personal animosities and was not made to be a faction chief. But he was too conspicuous and too honest to remain altogether in the background, when his comrades were risking their lives in a cause which he knew to be the cause of mercy, and believed to be the cause of France.
Between Hébert and his adherents in the Commune, and the party which gradually ranged itself behind Danton in opposition to the whole system of the Terror, there stood, as a third party, the Government of the day. The Government, that is the Committee of Public Safety, was not, it is true, entirely united. Some of its members, like Collot d'Herbois and in a lesser degree Billaud-Varennes, approved of the methods of the Commune, and were closely leagued with its chiefs. On the other hand, Robespierre detested the brutal license of many of the Communist party, and his feelings were shared by Couthon and St. Just. Others, again, like Carnot, had little liking for either Robespierre or Hébert. Hérault de Séchelles was a friend of Danton and sympathised with his ideas. But, divided as they were, most of the members of the Committee felt that things were going too far. They were responsible for the government of the country, and they could not, therefore, view with unconcern the anarchy and public plunder which marked the course of the agents of the Commune. They were for the moment kings of France, and they had no intention of surrendering their throne to the ambitious municipality of Paris, or of permitting any reaction in the Convention which would deprive them of the power which it had suffered them to usurp.
Accordingly, in the month of November, when Collot d'Herbois was absent in Lyons, a decided movement against the Commune appeared. Robespierre, with his strong sense of decorum and his reverence for the sentimental theology of Rousseau, was shocked by the excesses of the materialist party, and encouraged by the signs of opposition in the Convention, he began to make his opinions felt. As usual, he proceeded with great caution, but by significant hints and phrases he showed his resentment at the conduct of Hébert. On the 17th November, in a long report upon the foreign policy of France, he took occasion to denounce both the 'cruel moderantism and the systematic exaggeration of false patriots.' Four days later, at the Jacobin Club, in answer to a challenge from Hébert, he delivered a singular speech on the religious question, and ended by proposing the purging of the Club. The grounds on which Robespierre attacked his enemies were characteristically circuitous and astute. 'Atheism,' he argued, 'is aristocratic. The idea of a Supreme Being, who watches over oppressed innocence and punishes triumphant crime, is essentially the idea of the people.'
Cautious as Robespierre's action was, the majority quickly rallied round him. Danton returned to Paris and ranged himself at Robespierre's side. 'We did not destroy superstition,' he cried, 'in order to establish the rule of the atheist.' In the Convention he pleaded for milder measures, and urged that the sword of the Terror should be pointed only at those convicted of crime. As the scrutiny at the Jacobins proceeded, the victory of the opponents of the Commune became more distinct. The attacks made upon Danton and Desmoulins collapsed. Robespierre defended them with spirit and enthusiasm, and asked to be judged by Danton's side. On the 4th December, a new law was adopted by the Convention, consolidating the power of the Committee of Public Safety, bringing all constituted authorities more directly under its control, suppressing the revolutionary armies and the agents of the Commune in the departments, forbidding the raising of taxes except by decree of the Assembly, and extending the Government's supervision over the committees in the Sections of Paris. The effect of this decisive measure was largely to increase the authority of the Committee, and to diminish the influence of the Commune both in the provinces and in the capital itself.