He had already suffered on this score from his earliest youth, and his wounds being still fresh made him only the more sensitive .-- Born in Arras in 1758, orphaned and poor, protege of his bishop, a bursar through favor at the college Louis-le-Grand, later a clerk with Brissot under the revolutionary system of law-practice, and at length settled down in his gloomy rue des Rapporteurs as a pettifogger.

Living with a bad-tempered sister, he has adopts Rousseau, whom he had once seen and whom he ardently studies, for his master in philosophy, politics and style.

Fancying, probably, like other young men of his age and condition, that he could play a similar part and thus emerge from his blind alley, he published law pleadings for effect, contended for Academy prizes, and read papers before his Arras colleagues.

His success was moderate: one of his harangues obtained a notice in the Artois Almanac; the Academy of Metz awarded him only a second prize; that of Amiens gave him no prize, while the critic of the "Mercure" spoke of his style as smacking of the provinces .-- In the National Assembly, eclipsed by men of great and spontaneous ability, he remains a long time in the shade, and, more than once, through obstination or lack of tact, makes himself ridiculous.

With his sharp, thin, attorney's visage, "dull, monotonous, coarse voice and wearisome delivery,"-- "an artesian accent" and constrained air,[31102] his constantly putting himself forward, his elaboration of commonplaces, his evident determination to impose on cultivated people, still a body of intelligent listeners, and the intolerable boredom he caused them--all this is not calculated to render the Assembly indulgent to errors of sense and taste.[31103] One day, referring to certain acts of the "Conseil:" "It is necessary that a noble and simple formula should announce national rights and carry respect for law into the hearts of the people.