Paris; yet this was done by the English Government. It may perhaps be
said that it signifies nothing to a man what is done to him after he
is dead; but it signifies much to the living; it either tortures
their feelings or hardens their hearts, and in either case it
instructs them how to punish when power falls into their hands.

Lay then the axe to the root, and teach governments humanity. It is
their sanguinary punishments which corrupt mankind. In England the
punishment in certain cases is by hanging, drawing and quartering;
the heart of the sufferer is cut out and held up to the view of the
populace. In France, under the former Government, the punishments
were not less barbarous. Who does not remember the execution of
Damien, torn to pieces by horses? The effect of those cruel
spectacles exhibited to the populace is to destroy tenderness or
excite revenge; and by the base and false idea of governing men by
terror, instead of reason, they become precedents. It is over the
lowest class of mankind that government by terror is intended to
operate, and it is on them that it operates to the worst effect. They
have sense enough to feel they are the objects aimed at; and they
inflict in their turn the examples of terror they have been
instructed to practise.

There is in all European countries a large class of people of that
description, which in England is called the "mob." Of this class were
those who committed the burnings and devastations in London in 1780,
and of this class were those who carried the heads on iron spikes in
Paris. Foulon and Berthier were taken up in the country, and sent to
Paris, to undergo their examination at the Hotel de Ville; for the
National Assembly, immediately on the new ministry coming into
office, passed a decree, which they communicated to the King and