“Our position is this:  We are now on the point of having the Constitution brought to us for acceptance.  It is in itself so monstrous that it is impossible that it should be long maintained.  But, in the position in which we are, can we risk refusing it?  No; and I will prove it to you.  I am not speaking of the personal dangers which we should run.  We have fully shown by the journey which we undertook two months ago that we do not take our own safety into account when the public welfare is at stake.  But this Constitution is so intrinsically bad that it can only acquire consistence from any resistance which we might oppose to it.  Our business, therefore, is to take a middle course, which may save our honor, and may put us in such a position that the people may come back to us when once their eyes are opened, and they have become weary of the existing state of affairs.  I think also that it is necessary that, when they have presented the act to the king, he should keep it by him a few days; for he is not supposed to know what it is till it has been presented to him in all legal form; and that then he should summon the Commissioners before him, not to make any comments, not to demand any alterations, which perhaps might not be admitted, and which would be interpreted as an admission that he approved of the basis, but to declare that his opinions are not changed; that, in his declaration of the 20th of June,[9] he proved the absolute impossibility of governing under the new system, and that he is still of the same mind; but that, for the sake of the tranquillity of his country, he sacrifices himself; and that, as his people and the nation stake their happiness on his accepting it, he does not hesitate to signify that acceptance; and that the sight of their happiness will speedily make him forget the cruel and bitter griefs which they have inflicted on him and on his family.

“But if we take this line we must adhere to it; and, above all things, we must avoid any step which can create distrust, and we must move on, so to say, always with the law in our hand.  I promise you that this is the best way to give them an early disgust at the Constitution.  The mischief is, that for this we shall want an able and a trustworthy ministry....  Several people urge us to reject the act, and the king’s brothers press upon him every day that it is indispensable to do so, and affirm that we shall be supported.  By whom?” And she proceeds to examine the situation and policy of Spain, of the empire of England, and of Prussia, to prove that from none of them is there any hope of active aid, while to trust to the emigrants would be the worst expedient of all, because “we should then fall into a new slavery worse than the first, since, while we should appear to be in some degree indebted to them, we should not be able to extricate ourselves from their toils.  They already prove this when they refuse to listen to the persons who are in our confidence, on the pretext that they do not trust them, while they seek to force us to give ourselves up to M. de Calonne, who, I fear, in all that he does is guided by nothing but his own ambition, his private enmities, and his habitual levity, thinking every thing he wishes not only possible, but already done.