Convinced that all was conspiring against it,--king, queen, court, ministers, authorities, foreign powers,--it threw itself headlong into the arms of its defenders.

The most eloquent in its eyes was he who inspired it with most dread--it had a parching thirst for denunciations, and they were lavished on it with prodigal hand.

It was thus that Barnave, the Lameths, then Danton, Marat, Brissot, Camille Desmoulins, Petion, Robespierre, had acquired their authority over the people.

These names had increased in reputation as the anger of the people grew hotter; they cherished their wrath in order to retain their greatness.

The nightly sittings of the Jacobins and the Cordeliers frequently stifled the echo of the sittings of the National Assembly: the minority, beaten at the Manege, came to protest, accuse, threaten at the Jacobins.
Mirabeau himself, accused by Lameth on the subject of the law of emigration, came a few days before his death to listen face to face to the invectives of his denouncer, and had not disdained to justify himself.