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 144 MARAT corps et du corps sur Vame (3 vols., Amsterdam, 177")). IK- appeared as an opponent of Voltaire, and a literary controversy ensued between tin-in. He removed to Paris, and from 1779 bo 17^ published a series of writings, in which he attempted to revolutionize natural philoso- phy, and to refute the Newtonian theory. ^ His success being far inferior to his pretensions, !i ivlin[uished the field of literature and en- d -avorud to establish himself as a physician; but after many disappointments he was ob- IL'ed to accept a position as veterinary surgeon to the count of Artois, afterward Charles X. The outbreak of the revolution gave him the opportunity to play the part of a demagogue. Although physically not prepossessing, being hardly five feet high, with a strange mixture of the ludicrous and terrible in his countenance, he soon obtained a vast influence over the low- er classes by his energy and resolution. On Sept. 12, 1789, he published the first number of the PuUiciste Parisien, the title of which was afterward changed into Ami du Peuple. As early as August of that year he had publicly proclaimed that 800 members of the national as- sembly ought to be hanged, Mirabeau the fore- most among them. In the same spirit every page of the Ami du Peuple was written. This journal, under the successive titles Le Journal de la Republique Franfaise and Le Publiciste de la Republique Fran$aise, was continued with- out interruption till July 14, 1793. At the same time he also published several revolution- ary pamphlets, and 13 numbers of a political journal entitled Le Junius Fran$ais. Having been introduced by Danton into the club of the Cordeliers, he created there disturbances so violent that the municipality ordered his arrest in January, 1790. He evaded it by se- creting himself in the cellars of the Cordeliers, whence he continued to issue his periodical. After the king's unsuccessful attempt at flight, Marat again ventured into publicity, and di- rected his attacks against the Girondists. Hav- ing been prosecuted in consequence, he re- turned to his former underground haunts, from which he again emerged in the riots of Au- gust, 1792. lie now became the right-hand man of Danton, then minister of justice, intro- duced himself into the vigilance committee es- tablished by the municipality of Paris, and was one of the chief instigators of the massacres of September. To reward him for the part he had taken in these atrocities, the people of Paris elected him to the national convention. Here his speeches were received by the party of the majority with a feeling of abhorrence mingled with contempt They moved a vote of censure against him for having advocated the establishment of a dictatorial power. When, after anirry diBCTttdons, the motion was at last Withdrawn, Marat produced a pistol from his .liming that, if the motion had he would have blown his brains out in the presence of the convention. Emboldened by impunity, he grew more fanatical every day MARATHON 1 and his paper denounced the French generals and armies as incapable, and asked for the heads of 270,000 " traitors," and the massacre of three fourths of the members of the conven- tion. In vain the Girondists endeavored to break down his influence. Under the pressure of popular excitement, created by foreign in- tervention, the ultra-revolutionary party had gradually obtained the ascendancy, and the most sanguinary proceedings being considered unavoidable in order to prevent a cooperation of the anti-revolutionary elements with the foreign foe, Marat, who excelled all others in this respect, was almost adored by the Parisians as the saviour of the country. Thus, in April, 1793, he succeeded in obtaining the passage of a "law for the arrest of suspicious persons," by the operations of which no fewer than 400,- 000 individuals were imprisoned throughout France. Having, as chairman of the Jacobin club, signed an address to the people, in which the assassination of the Girondists was openly called for, he was prosecuted before the revo- lutionary tribunal. But his trial became a tri- umph. The public prosecutor, the jurors, and the audience did him homage, and he was car- ried in triumph to the national convention t where Danton delivered an eloquent eulogy in his honor. He now rapidly rose to the cul- minating point of his career. Having made the municipality subservient to his plans, he instigated the mob of May 31, 1793, by which the Girondist party was completely destroyed. With Robespierre and Danton he formed a triumvirate, which for the time determined the destinies of France. Confined by disease in his garret, Marat was restlessly active in stirring up, by letters and denunciations, the passions of the people and of the national con- vention. He was finally assassinated by Char- lotte Corday, while preparing a list of Giron- dists to be sacrificed to the common weal, only a few days before his life would probably lu<u ended from natural causes. (See COEDAY.) Robespierre used his death as a pretext for carrying the reign of terror to its utmost ex- tent. Hundreds of victims were sacrificed to the "manes of the martyr." The entire na- tional convention attended his funeral. His body was transferred, Nov. 4, 1793, to the Pantheon, and his portrait, executed by Da- vid, adorned the hall of the convention. A pension for life was voted by the "grateful nation " to his concubine. Two years later, when the revolutionary passions had cooled down, the remains of Marat were removed from their resting place and his portrait taken down. Though vain and egotistic, Marat was doubtless sincere in his sanguinary ravings, and was so disinterested that, even in" the height of his power, he lived in the most abject poverty. MARATHON, a town of Greece, near the E. coast of Attica, about 18 m. N. E. of Athens, near which the Persians under Datis and Ar- taphernes were defeated, in 490 B. C. (Sept. 28 or 29, according to somewhat uncertain compu-