"[2615] La Source proposes to "punish with death," not alone the minister who is not prompt in ordering the execution of a decree, but, again, the clerks who do not fulfill the minister's instructions.

Always death on every occasion, and for every one who is not of the sect.

Under this constant terror, the ministers resign in a body, and the King is required at once to appoint others; meanwhile, to increase the danger of their position, the Assembly decrees that hereafter they shall "be answerable for each other." It is evident that they are aiming at the King over his minister's shoulders, while the Girondists leave nothing unturned to render government to him impossible.

The King, again, signs this new decree; he declines to protest; to the persecution he is forced to undergo he opposes nothing but silence, sometimes a simple, frank, good-hearted expression,[2616] some kindly, touching complaining, which seems like a suppressed moan.[2617] But dogmatic obstinacy and impatient ambition are willfully deaf to the most sorrowful strains! His sincerity passes for a new false-hood.

Vergniaud, Brissot, Torne, Condorcet, in the tribune, charge him with treachery, demand from the Assembly the right of suspending him,[2618] and give the signal to their Jacobin auxiliaries .-- At the invitation of the parent club, the provincial branches bestir themselves, while all other instruments of agitation belonging to the revolutionary machine are likewise put in motion,--gatherings on the public squares, homicidal announcements on the walls, incendiary resolutions in the clubs, shouting in the tribunes, insulting addresses and seditious deputations at the bar of the National Assembly.[2619] After the working of this system for a month, the Girondists regard the King as subdued, and, on the 26th of July, Guadet, and then Brissot, in the tribune, make their last advances to him, and issue the final summons.[2620] A profound delusion! He refuses, the same as on the 20th of June: "Girondist ministers, Never!" Since he bars one of the two doors, they will pass out at the other, and, if the Girondists cannot rule through him, they will rule without him.