reply, dated September 18, is drawn up with unusual
ability. He adopted the argument of Sieyes on the
suppression of tithe. He said that a large income would
be granted to the land, and that the rich, who ought
to contribute most, would, on the contrary, receive most.
Small holders would profit little, while those who possessed
no land at all would now be mulcted for payment of the
clergy. Instead of relieving the nation, it would relieve
one class at the expense of another, and the rich at the
expense of the poor.
The Assembly insisted that the abolition of feudalism was part of the Constitution, and ought to receive an unconditional sanction. But they promised to give most respectful attention to the remarks of the king, whenever the decrees came to be completed by legislation. The royal sanction was accordingly given on the following day. Thereupon the Assembly made a considerable concession. They resolved, on September 21, that the suspensive veto should extend over two legislatures. The numbers were 728 to 224.
The new Committee, appointed on the 1 5th, took a fortnight to complete their scheme, on the adopted principles that there should be one Chamber, no dissolution, and a power of retarding legislation without preventing it. On the 29th it was laid before the Assembly by their reporter, Thouret. The voice was the voice of Thouret, but the hand was the hand of Sieyes. At that juncture he augured ill of the Revolution, and repented of his share in it. His Declaration of Rights had been passed over. His proposal to restore the national credit by the surrender of tithe had been rejected. His partition of the Assembly, together with partial renewal, which is favourable to the executive, by never allowing the new parliament to rise, like a giant refreshed, from a general election, had encountered no support It remained that he should compose the working machinery for his essential doctrine, that the law is the will of him that obeys, not of him that commands. To do this, the Abbé Sieyès abolished the historic Provinces, and divided France into departments. There were to be eighty,
