Page:Lectures on the French Revolution of John Acton.djvu/107

Rh to look after his man. Representation was new; and to every reader of Rousseau, of Turgot, or of Mably, it was an object of profound distrust. The desire to uphold the supremacy of the deputing power over the deputed, of the constituent over his member, was distinctly part of the great literary inheritance common to them all. As the mandate was originally imperative, the giver of the mandate claimed the right of seeing to its execution. The exercise of powers that were defined and limited, that were temporary and revocable, called for scrutiny and direct control. The Bureaux did not last, and their disappearance was a disaster. Party, as the term is used in the constitutional vocabulary, was not yet developed; and no organisation possessed the alternate power of presenting ministers to the Crown. The main lines that divided opinion came to light in the debates of September, and the Assembly fell into factions that were managed by their clubs. The President held office for a fortnight, and each new election indicated the movement of opinion, the position of parties, the rise of reputations. The united Assembly did honour to the acceding orders. The first presidents were prelates and men of rank. Out of six elections only one fell to a commoner, until the end of September, when the leader of the Liberal Conservatives, Mounier, was chosen, at what proved a moment of danger. In the same way, the thirty chairmen of the Bureaux were, with scarcely an exception, always taken from the clergy or the nobles.

As Mounier, with his friends, had dominated in the constitutional committee of thirty, and was now paramount in the new committee of eight, there was some prospect of a coalition, by which, in return for their aid in carrying the English model, the nobles would obtain easy terms in the liquidation of privilege. That is the parliamentary situation. That is the starting-point of the transactions that we have now to follow.

During the days spent in making terms between the king, the Assembly, and the capital, the provinces were depending on Paris for news, for opinions, and direction.