Precocity of Frenchmen.
Itis interesting to remark, that most of the more prominent leaders of the Jacobin or Mountain party, in the French revolution, were young men. It would hardly seem possible that many of them had lived long enough to have their feelings so indurated as to be able, deliberately, to perpetrate the atrocities of which they were guilty. This remark will appear more obviously just when we reflect that most of them had previously led an obscure provincial life, and may be supposed to have been little hardened by intercourse with the world. Perhaps, however, the greater part were actuated more by frantic enthusiasm than deliberate malevolence.
Robespierre, the master-spirit of the party, was guillotined at the age of thirty-five; Danton, his rival, he sent to the scaffold at the same early age. Camille des Moulins, when asked his age by the bloody revolutionary tribunal, gave the blasphemous reply, “My age is that of Jesus Christ when he suffered death,”—thirty-three years. Chaumette, another of the sanguinary tribe, suffered death at the age of thirty-one. Challer, who proposed to erect a guillotine at Lyons for the execution of nine thousand persons whom he had marked, was one of the oldest, being forty-six years old at the time he was beheaded. Fabre D’Eglantine, the author of the celebrated revolutionary calendar, was thirty-nine.
Carrier, the most infamous probably of the whole gang, who, when at Nantes, tied his victims together in couples, (one of each sex,) at the rate of twenty a day, and sunk them in the river, was only twenty-eight years of age, at his death. Robespierre, the younger, about the same age.
St.Just, whose talents, ferocity, and eloquence, rendered him second only to Robespierre, was about twenty-six. Chabot, the Capuchin friar, was thirty-five. Marat, who really appears to have been half madman, was, when assassinated, forty-nine. Babeuf, who, on the fall of Robespierre, was thought by his party to be most worthy to succeed the dictator, was twenty-seven when he joined the Revolutionists. The Duc D’Orleans, father of the present French king, was forty at the time he was guillotined. These were not the originators of the revolution; but they were the leaders of the Jacobin Clubs, or secret affiliated societies, over which Robespierre, as dictator, presided for two years. They were all beheaded except Marat. Besides these there were others, of inferior note, equally young. The present king of the French, then lieutenant-general Egalite, (Equality,) was about nineteen. A prettyequalityhe has made of it since.
Fouche (since duke of Otranto) was about thirty.
But it is likewise worthy of observation that the leading individuals of other parties who took part in the revolution, were generally young men, though not by birth, talent or wealth so generally obscure as those just mentioned. Of the Brissotins, (so named after their leader, Brissot de Warville, well known as the friend of Jefferson, and a traveller in this country, but otherwise called Girondists,) Brissot was thirty-nine. Bailly, the celebrated astronomer, and revolutionary mayor of Paris, was one of the oldest. He was beheaded, at the instigation of Robespierre, at the age of fifty-seven, dying with courage and dignity. Charlotte Corday, who, although a woman, was a Girondist, was but twenty-three when she assassinated Marat. The eloquent Barbaroux was about twenty-seven when beheaded. The just and magnanimous Barnave was executed at the age of thirty-two. Madame Roland, who died more as a man ought to die than all that were guillotined, was forty.Gensonne, the Brissotin, who was first to proclaim thatsuspicionwas sufficient cause for the infliction of death, was sent to the scaffold by Robespierre at the age of thirty-five. Mirabeau, whose eloquence covered his crimes all over with glory, was about forty years of age. Cabanus was thirty-six. Buzot, thirty-three. The most eloquent and accomplished Vergnaud perished at the age of thirty-five.
Those last mentioned were some of the principal Brissotins. Among the Royalists, D’Elbee, the principal Vendean chief, was about forty. Stofflet, another Vendean, was thirty-eight. The Duc D’Enghein, no more than twenty. Pichegru, in Robespierre’s time, not more than thirty-two.
Among the famous generals of the revolution, there were few who were not comparatively boys. Hoche, who was thought by many to be equal to Bonaparte, died at thirty. Honchard, when guillotined, was thirty-two. Kleber, one of the oldest and best, was forty. Dessaix, the knight, without fear and without reproach, was thirty when he received his death wound at Marengo. Other great captains who afterwards became renowned, Ney, Soult, Joubert, (only twenty-five,) M’Donald, Lannes, Duroc, Victor, Mortier, Oudinot, Murat, Eugene, (a mere boy,) &c. &c., were all young. But the giant is behind—Him!Bonaparte!the little corporal was but twenty-four.
Well did the Swedish chancellor, Oxenstrein, say to his son, when he sent him on his travels, “Go, son, and discover what little wisdom it takes to govern the world!”