only on the refusal of the first, that he appealed from it to a power
whose intervention and support he dreaded. He preferred private
assemblies, which, being isolated, necessarily remained secondary, to a
general assembly, which representing all interests, must combine all
powers. Up to this great epoch every year saw the wants of the government
increasing, and resistance becoming more extensive. Opposition passed from
parliaments to the nobility, from the nobility to the clergy, and from
them all to the people. In proportion as each participated in power it
began its opposition, until all these private oppositions were fused in or
gave way before the national opposition. The states-general only decreed a
revolution which was already formed.




CHAPTER I

FROM THE 5TH OF MAY, 1789, TO THE NIGHT OF THE 4TH OF AUGUST

The 5th of May, 1789, was fixed for the opening of the states-general. A
religious ceremony on the previous day prefaced their installation. The
king, his family, his ministers, the deputies of the three orders, went in
procession from the church of Notre-Dame to that of Saint Louis, to hear
the opening mass. Men did not without enthusiasm see the return of a
national ceremony of which France had for so long a period been deprived.
It had all the appearance of a festival. An enormous multitude flocked
from all parts to Versailles; the weather was splendid; they had been
lavish of the pomp of decoration. The excitement of the music, the kind
and satisfied expression of the king, the beauty and demeanour of the
queen, and, as much as anything, the general hope, exalted every one. But