His Majesty with the power of removing out of this kingdom all
foreigners suspected of revolutionary principles. Is it contended that
he was, then, less liable to the provisions of that Act than any other
individual foreigner, whose conduct afforded to Government just ground
of objection or suspicion? Did his conduct and connexions here afford
no such ground? or will it be pretended that the bare act of refusing
to receive fresh credentials from an infant republic, not then
acknowledged by any one Power of Europe, and in the very act of
heaping upon us injuries and insults, was of itself the cause of war?
So far from it, that even the very nations of Europe, whose wisdom and
moderation have been repeatedly extolled for maintaining neutrality,
and preserving friendship, with the French Republic, remained for
years subsequent to this period without receiving from it any
accredited Minister, or doing any one act to acknowledge its political
existence. In answer to a representation from the belligerent Powers,
in December, 1793, Count Bernstorff, the Minister of Denmark,
officially declared that 'It was well known that the National
Convention had appointed M. Grouville Minister-Plenipotentiary at
Denmark, but that it was also well known that he had neither been
received nor acknowledged in that quality'. And as late as February,
1796, when the same Minister was at length, for the first time,
received in his official capacity, Count Bernstorff, in a public note,
assigned this reason for that change of conduct--'So long as no other
than a revolutionary Government existed in France, His Majesty could
not acknowledge the Minister of that Government; but now that the
French Constitution is completely organized, and a regular Government
established in France, His Majesty's obligation ceases in that
respect, and M. Grouville will therefore be acknowledged in the usual
form.' How far the Court of Denmark was justified in the opinion that
a revolutionary Government then no longer existed in France, it is not