* It is remarkable, that the persecution of religion was never more
     violent than at the time when the Convention were anathematizing
     Hebert and his party for athiesm.

—­Brissot and his companions died singing a paraphrase of my quotation: 

               "Plutot la mort que l’esclavage,
               “C’est la devise des Francois."
     ["Death before slavery, is the Frenchman’s motto.”]

—­Let those who reflect on what France has submitted to under them and their successors decide, whether the original be not more apposite.

I hope the act of accusation against Chabot has been published in England, for the benefit of your English patriots:  I do not mean by way of warning, but example.  It appears, that the said Chabot, and four or five of his colleagues in the Convention, had been bribed to serve a stock-jobbing business at a stipulated sum,* and that the money was to be divided amongst them.

* Chabot, Fabre d’Eglantine, (author of “l’Intrigue Epistolaire,” and several other admired dramatic pieces,) Delaunay d’Angers, Julien de Toulouse, and Bazire, were bribed to procure the passing certain decrees, tending to enrich particular people, by defrauding the East India Company.—­Delaunay and Julien (both re-elected into the present Assembly) escaped by flight, the rest were guillotined.  —­It is probable, that these little peculations might have passed unnoticed in patriots of such note, but that the intrigues and popular character of Chabot made it necessary to dispose of him, and his accomplices suffered to give a countenance to the measure.

—­Chabot, with great reason, insisted on his claim to an extra share, on account, as he expressed it, of having the reputation of one of the first patriots in Europe.  Now this I look upon to be a very useful hint, as it tends to establish a tariff of reputations, rather than of talents.  In England, you distinguish too much in favour of the latter; and, in a question of purchase, a Minister often prefers a “commodity” of rhetoricians, to one of “good names.”—­I confess, I am of Chabot’s opinion; and think a vote from a member who has some reputation for honesty, ought to be better paid for than the eloquence which, weakened by the vices of the orator, ceases to persuade.  How it is that the patriotic harangues at St. Stephen’s serve only to amuse the auditors, who identify the sentiments they express as little with the speaker, as they would those of Cato’s soliloquy with the actor who personates the character for the night?  I fear the people reason like Chabot, and are “fools to fame.”  Perhaps it is fortunate for England, that those whose talents and principles would make them most dangerous, are become least so, because both are counteracted by the public contempt.  Ought it not to humble the pride, and correct the errors, which too often accompany great genius, that the meanest capacity can distinguish between talents and virtue; and that even in the moment our wonder is excited by the one, a sort of intrinsic preference is given to the other?—­Yours, &c.