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Updated: May 20, 2025
"This old and well-worn phrase is the saying of our Master," answered the Cardinal firmly, "And it is as true as the truth of the sunshine which, in its old and well-worn way, lights up this world gloriously every morning! I would stake my very life on the depth and the truth of Vergniaud's penitence!
At this name, Vergniaud's son Cyrillon stirred, and lifting his dark handsome head turned his flashing eyes full on the speaker. "Did you address me, Monsignor?" he queried, in a voice rich with the musical inflexions of Southern France, "I am Gys Grandit!" Had he fired another pistol shot in the quiet room as he had fired it in the church, it could hardly have created a more profound sensation.
Yet the hair of the Queen whitens, her spirit despairs. The Girondinist queen climbing the scaffold, not less a lover of love and of life than Marie Antoinette what nerves her? It is the star of the future and the memory of Vergniaud's phrase, "Posterity? What have we to do with posterity? Perish our memory, but let France be free!"
There it lay, the little gold watch of the great Girondin orator, choicest, most precious relic of the Revolution, historic memento unrivalled for interest and romantic associations! Vergniaud's watch! The very words take one's breath away, yet there it was, close under my eyes.
But " here leaning forward, he laid one hand gently on Vergniaud's arm, "My dear friend my dear brother you have told me of your sin; it is a great sin, but God forbid that I should presume to judge you harshly when our Lord Himself declared that 'He came not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance'. It may be that I can find a way to help you.
murmured Abbe Vergniaud, still listening, "It is like the cry of a lost soul!" "Or a strayed one," interposed the Cardinal gently, and rising, he took Vergniaud's arm, and leaned upon it with a kindly and familiar grace, an action which implied much more than the mere outward expression of confidence, "Nothing is utterly lost, my dear friend.
If you would like it, in a couple of days I can give you an exact inventory of all M. Vergniaud's property and possessions. I could guarantee that it will not vary twenty napoleons from the fact. We do everything so systematically here." "Thanks! I think it will hardly be necessary. I do not know that Helen likes him particularly."
And then, when the public confession of the Abbe Vergniaud came under discussion, the Pope had gathered together all the visible remains of physical force his attenuated frame could muster, and had hurled himself impotently against the wall of opposing fact with such frail fury as almost to suggest the celebrated simile of "a reed shaken with the wind". In vain had the Cardinal pleaded for Vergniaud's pardon; in vain had he urged that after all, the sinner had branded himself as such in the sight of all men; what further need to add the ban of the Church's excommunication against one who was known to be within touch of death?
In the fair, slight, girlish body of the child-soldier there lived a courage as daring as Danton's, a patriotism as pure as Vergniaud's, a soul as aspiring as Napoleon's.
Composition of the New Assembly. Rise of the Girondins. Their Corruption and Eventual Fate. Vergniaud's Motions against the King. Favorable Reception of the King at the Assembly, and at the Opera. Changes in the Ministry. The King's and Queen's Language to M. Bertrand de Moleville. The Count de Narbonne. Pétion is elected Mayor of Paris. Scarcity of Money, and Great Hardships of the Royal Family.
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