your fellow-citizens, that the happinefs of the French ever has been, and ever will be, the object of my wifhes; that I neither have, nor can have, any intereft but the general intereft; that my profperity confifts only in the public profperity; that I fhall exert all the powers entrusted to me to give efficacy to the new fyftem; that I fhall communicate it to foreign courts; and fhall, in every thing, prove that I can be happy only in the happiness of the people of France.

Tell them alfo, that the revolu tion has reached its period, and that the firmeft fupport of the conftitution is now the re-establishment of order. You, gentlemen, in your feveral departments, will undoubtedly fecond my vigilance and care with all your power; you will give the first example of fubmiffion to the laws which you have framed; in the capacity of private citizens you will difplay the fame character as in the capacity of public men; and the people, feeing their legiflators exercife, in private life, thofe virtues which they have proclaimed in the national affembly, will imitate them, difcharge with pleasure the obligations which the public intereft impofes on them, and cheerfully pay the taxes decreed by their reprefentatives. It is by this happy union of fentiments, of wifhes, and exertions, that the conftitution will be confirmed, and that the nation will enjoy all the advantages which it guarantees.

The PRESIDENT'S ANSWER.

Sire,

THE adherence of the nation ratifies the conftitution decreed by the aflembly of the reprefentatives of the nation. Your majefty has accepted it, and the public joy is a fufficient

teftimony of the general affent. It promifes that your majefty will no longer defire in vain the happiness of the French. On this memorable day, the national affembly has nothing more to wifh; and the nation, by its tranquil confidence, is ready to co-operate for the prompt fuccefs of its internal government.

His Majesty's Proclamation, Sept. 30.

LOUIS,

By the grace of God, and by the conftitutional law of the ftate, king of the French. To all citizens-greeting:

I HAVE accepted the conftitution: I will ufe all my endeavours to maintain it, and cause it to be executed.

The revolution is completed. It is time that the re-establishment of order should give to the conftitution the fupport which is ftill most neceflary; it is time to fix the opinion of Europe on the destiny of France, and to fhew that the French are worthy to be free.

But my vigilance and my cares ought still to be seconded by the concurrence of all the friends of their country, and of liberty. It is by fubmiffion to the laws; it is by ab. juring the fpirit of party, and all the paffions which accompany it; it is by a happy union of fentiments, of withes, and of endeavours, that the conftitution will be confirmed, and that the nation will enjoy all the advantages which it fecures.

Let every idea of intolerance then be abandoned for ever; let the rafh defire of independence no longer be confounded with the love of liberty; let thofe pernicious terms of reproach, with which it has been attempted to inflame the people, be irrevocably.banifhed; let religious opi

nions no longer be a fource of perfecution and animofity; let all who obferve the laws be at liberty to adopt that form of worship to which they are attached; and let no party give offence to thofe who may follow opinions different from their own from motives of confcience. But it is not fufficient to fhun those exceffes to which you might be carried by a fpirit of violence; you muft likewife fulfil the obligations which are impofed by the public intereft. One of the firft, one of the most effential, is the payment of the contributions established by your reprefentatives. It is for the obfervance of engagements, which national honour has rendered facred, for the internal tranquillity of the state, for its external fecurity; it is for the ftabili. ty of the conftitution itself that I remind you of this indifpenfable duty. Citizens, armed for the maintenance of the law; national guards, never forget that it is to protect the fafety of perfons and of property, the collection of public contributions, the circulation of grain and provifions, that the arms which you bear have been delivered into your hands. It belongs to you to feel that justice and mutual utility demand, that, between the inhabitants of the fame empire, abundance fhould be applied to the aid of indigence; and that it is the duty of public force to promote the advancement of com. merce, as the means of remedying the intemperance of feafons, correcting the inequality of harveft, uniting together all the parts of the kingdom, and establishing a community of the various productions of their foil and induftry.

And you, whom the people have chofen to watch over their interests: you also, on whom they have conferred the formidable power of deter

mining on the property, the honour, and the life of citizens; you too whom they have instituted to adjust their differences, members of the different administrative bodies, judges of tribunals, juftices of peace, I recommend to you to be impressed with the importance and dignity of your functions. Fulfil them with zeal, with courage, with impartiality. Labour with me to reftore peace, and the government of laws; and, by thus fecuring the happiness of the nation, prepare for the return of those whofe abfence has only proceeded from the fear of disorder and violence.

And all you, who from different motives have quitted your country, your king invites you to return to your fellow-citizens; he invites you to yield to the public wish and the national intereft. Return with confidence under the fecurity of law; and this honourable return, at the moment when the conftitution is definitively fettled, will render more eafy, and more expeditious, the reestablishment of order and of tranquillity.

And you, French people, a nation. illuftrious for fo many ages, show yourfelves magnanimous and generous at the moment when your liberty is confirmed; refume your happy character; let your moderation and wifdom revive among you the fecurity which the difturbances of the revolution had banished; and let your king henceforth enjoy without inquietude, and without moles tation, thofe teftimonies of attachment and fidelity which can alone fecure his happiness.

Done at Paris the 28th Sept. 1791. (Signed) LOUIS. (and underneath) DE LESSART.

His

His Majesty Speech to the New National fembly, Oct. 7.

Gentlemen,

ASSEMBLED by virtue of the conftitution to exercise the powers which it delegates to you, you will undoubtedly confider as among your firft duties, to facilitate the operations of government; to confirm public credit; to add, if poffible, to the fecurity of the engagements of the nation; to fhew that liberty and peace are compatible; and, finally, to attach the people to their new laws, by convincing them that those laws are for their good.

Your experience of the effects of the new order of things, in the feveral departments from which you come, will enable you to judge of what may be yet wanting to bring it to perfection and make it easy for you to devife the most proper means of giving the neceffary force and activity to the administration.

For my own part, called by the constitution to examine, as first reprefentative of the people, and for their intereft, the laws prefented for my fanction, and charged with caufing them to be executed, it is alfo my duty to propofe to you fuch objects as I think ought to be taken into confideration in the course of your feffion.

You will fee the propriety of fix ing your immediate attention on the ftate of the finances, and you will feel the importance of eftablishing an equilibrium between the receipt and the expenditure, of accelerating the affefment and the collection of taxes, of introducing an invariable order into all parts of this vaft adminiftration, and thus providing at once for the fupport of the ftate, and the relief of the people.

The civil laws will alfo demand your care, which you will have to

render conformable to the principles of the conftitution. You will also have to fimplify the mode of proceeding in the courts of law, and render the attainment of juftice more eafy and more prompt.

You will perceive the neceffity of establishing a fyftem of national education, and of giving a folid bafis to public fpirit. You will encourage commerce and industry, the progress of which has fo great an influence on the agriculture and the wealth of the kingdom; and you will endeavour to make permanent difpofi tions for affording work and relief to the indigent.

I shall make known my firm defire for the re-establishment of order and difcipline in the army; and I fhall neglect no means that may contribute to reftore confidence among all who compofe it, and to put it into a condition to fecure the defence of the realm. If the laws in this refpect are infufficient, I fhall make known to you the measures that frem to me to be proper, and you will decide upon them.

I fhall in the fame manner communicate my fentiments respecting the navy, that important part of the public force, deftined to protect trade and the colonies.

We fhall not, I hope, be troubled with any attack from abroad. I have taken from the moment that I accepted the constitution, and I ftill continue to take, the fteps that ap. pear to me the moft proper to fix the opinion of foreign powers in our favour, and to maintain with them the good intelligence and harmony that ought to fecure to us the continuance of peace. I expect the beft effects from them; but this expectation does not prevent me from purfuing, with activity, thofe meafures of precaution, which prudence ought to dictate,

Gen

conquefts; that we offer them the good neighbourhood, the inviolable amity of a free and powerful people; that we will refpect their laws, their cuftoms, and their conftitutions; but that we infift upon our own being refpected. Tell them, that if the German princes continue to favour preparations directed against the French, we will carry among them not fire and fword, but liberty. It is for them to calculate what may be the confequences of the alarm of nations.

For two years that French patriots have been perfecuted on the frontiers, and that rebels have there found fuccour, what ambaffador has fpoken in your name as he ought? 'Not one.

If the French who were driven

from the country by the revocation

of the edict of Nantes had affembled

in arms on the frontiers, if they had been protected by the princes of Germany, Sire, we appeal to you, what would have been the conduct

anfwer fhall be received. Let your declaration be fupported by movements of the forces entrusted to you, and let the nation know who are its friends and its enemies. In this fplendid measure we shall recognize the defender of the constitution.

You will thus affure the tranquil. lity of the empire, infeparable from your own; and you will haften thofe days of national profperity, in which peace fhall reffore order and the reign of the laws, in which your happiness fhall be united with that of all the French.

ANSWER.

I Will take the meffage of the national affembly into the most serious confideration. You know

fecure the public tranquillity at that I have omitted nothing to and to make it refpected abroad. home, to maintain the conftitution,

Affembly, Decem, 14.

Gentlemen,

Sire, your intereft, your dignity, the infulted greatnefs of the nation, all dictate a language very different from that of your ambaffadors. The nation expects from your energetic declarations to the circles of the Upper and the Lower Rhine, the electors of Treves and Mentz, and the bishop of Spire.

Let them be fuch as that the hordes of the emigrants may be inftantly difperfed. Prefcribe an early period beyond which no dilatory

I HAVE taken your meffage of the 29th of laft month into deep confideration. In a cafe that involves the honour of the French people, and the fafety of the empire, I thought in my duty to be myself the bearer of my anfwer. The nation cannot but applaud thefe communications between its elected and its hereditary reprefentative.

You have invited me to take decifive measures to effect a ceffation of those external affemblages which keep up a hateful difquiet and fermentation in the bofom of France, render neceffary an oppreffive augmentation of expence, and expofe liberty to greater danger than an

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