PSYCHOLOGY OF THE LEADERS OF THE REVOLUTION1.Mentality of the Men of the Revolution.The respective Influence of Violent and Feeble Characters.
Men judge with their intelligence, and are guided by their characters.To understand a man fully one must separate these two elements.
During the great periods of activity--and the revolutionary movements naturally belong to such periods--character always takes the first rank.
Having in several chapters described the various mentalities which predominate in times of disturbance, we need not return to the subject now.They constitute general types which are naturally modified by each man's inherited and acquired personality.
We have seen what an important part was played by the mystic element in the Jacobin mentality, and the ferocious fanaticism to which it led the sectaries of the new faith.
We have also seen that all the members of the Assemblies were not fanatics.These latter were even in the minority, since in the most sanguinary of the revolutionary assemblies the great majority was composed of timid and moderate men of neutral character.Before Thermidor the members of this group voted from fear with the violent and after Thermidor with the moderate deputies.
In time of revolution, as at other times, these neutral characters, obeying the most contrary impulses, are always the most numerous.They are also as dangerous in reality as the violent characters.The force of the latter is supported by the weakness of the former.
In all revolutions, and in particularly in the French Revolution, we observe a small minority of narrow but decided minds which imperiously dominate an immense majority of men who are often very intelligent but are lacking in characterBesides the fanatical apostles and the feeble characters, a revolution always produces individuals who merely think how to profit thereby.These were numerous during the French Revolution.Their aim was simply to utilise circumstances so as to enrich themselves.Such were Barras, Tallien, Fouche, Barrere, and many more.Their politics consisted simply in serving the strong against the weak.
From the outset of the Revolution these ``arrivists,'' as one would call them to-day, were numerous.Camille Desmoulins wrote in 1792: ``Our Revolution has its roots only in the egotism and self-love of each individual, of the combination of which the general interest is composed.''
If we add to these indications the observations contained in another chapter concerning the various forms of mentality to be observed in times of political upheaval, we shall obtain a general idea of the character of the men of the Revolution.We shall now apply the principles already expounded to the most remarkable personages of the revolutionary period.
2.Psychology of the Commissaries or Representatives ``on Mission.''
In Paris the conduct of the members of the Convention was always directed, restrained, or excited by the action of their colleagues, and that of their environment.
To judge them properly we should observe them when left to themselves and uncontrolled, when they possessed full liberty.
Such were the representatives who were sent ``on mission'' into the departments by the Convention.
The power of these delegates was absolute.No censure embarrassed them.Functionaries and magistrates had perforce to obey them.
A representative ``on mission'' ``requisitions,'' sequestrates, or confiscates as seems good to him; taxes, imprisons, deports, or decapitates as he thinks fit, and in his own district he is a ''pasha.''
Regarding themselves as ``pashas,'' they displayed themselves ``drawn in carriages with six horses, surrounded by guards;sitting at sumptuous tables with thirty covers, eating to the sound of music, with a following of players, courtezans, and mercenaries....'' At Lyons ``the solemn appearance of Collot d'Herbois is like that of the Grand Turk.No one can come into his presence without three repeated requests; a string of apartments precedes his reception-room, and no one approaches nearer than fifteen paces.''
One can picture the immense vanity of these dictators as they solemnly entered the towns, surrounded by guards, men whose gesture was enough to cause heads to fall.
Petty lawyers without clients, doctors without patients, unfrocked clergymen, obscure attorneys, who had formerly known the most colourless of lives, were suddenly made the equals of the most powerful tyrants of history.Guillotining, drowning, shooting without mercy, at the hazard of their fancy, they were raised from their former humble condition to the level of the most celebrated potentates.
Never did Nero or Heliogabalus surpass in tyranny the representatives of the Convention.Laws and customs always restrained the former to a certain extent.Nothing restrained the commissaries.
``Fouche,'' writes Taine, ``lorgnette in hand, watched the butchery of 210 inhabitants of Lyons from his window.Collot, Laporte, and Fouche feasted on days of execution (fusillades), and at the sound of each discharge sprang up with cries of joy, waving their hats.''
Among the representatives ``on mission'' who exhibit this murderous mentality we may cite as a type the ex-cure Lebon, who, having become possessed of supreme power, ravaged Arras and Cambrai.His example, with that of Carrier, contributes to show what man can become when he escapes from the yoke of law and tradition.The cruelty of the ferocious commissary was complicated by Sadism; the scaffold was raised under his windows, so that he, his wife, and his helpers could rejoice in the carnage.At the foot of the guillotine a drinking-booth was established where the sans-culottes could come to drink.
To amuse them the executioner would group on the pavement, in ridiculous attitudes, the naked bodies of the decapitated.
