Page:A Tour Through the Batavian Republic.djvu/394

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
382
APPENDIX

the power to alter or modify the form of their government.

Gillet,
Bellegarde,
J. B. Lacoste,
Joubert,
Portiez de L'Oise.




B.

Speech of P. Paulus, President of the Assembly of the Provisional Representatives of the free People of Holland, at the Opening of its Sittings, Jan. 27th, 1795.


BEHOLD, citizens, at length the grand basis of your liberty founded, and the aristocratic edifice of your ancient government overthrown. Doubtless this basis will prove durable, having been fixed by the express will, and under the supreme direction, of the Almighty, whose all-powerful hand has been so manifest in the events which have lately happened to us. During one of the most glorious campaigns of which the annals of the world speak, the French army had already approached our frontier, when the natural force of our country, its rivers, its