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MIRABEAU, HONORS GABRIEL RIQUETI, COM...

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Originally appearing in Volume V18, Page 570 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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MIRABEAU, HONORS See also:GABRIEL RIQUETI, See also:COMTE DE (1749-1791) , See also:French statesman, was See also:born at See also:Bignon, near See also:Nemours, on the 9th of See also:March 1749. The See also:family of Riquet, or Riqueti, originally of the little See also:town of See also:Digne, won See also:wealth as merchants at See also:Marseilles, and in 1570 See also:Jean Riqueti bought the See also:chateau and seigniory of Mirabeau, which had belonged to the See also:great Provencal family of See also:Barras. In 1685 Honore Riqueti obtained the See also:title of See also:marquis de Mirabeau. His son Jean See also:Antoine served with distinction through all the later See also:campaigns of the reign of See also:Louis XIV., and especially distinguished himself in 1705 at the See also:battle of See also:Cassano, where he was so severely wounded in the See also:neck that he had ever after to See also:wear a See also:silver stock; yet he never See also:rose above the See also:rank of See also:colonel, owing to an See also:eccentric See also:habit of speaking unpleasant truths to his superiors. On retiring from the service he married Francoise de Castellane, and See also:left at his See also:death, in 1737, three sons—See also:Victor marquis de Mirabeau, Jean Antoine, bailli de Mirabeau, and Comte Louis See also:Alexandre de Mirabeau. The great Mirabeau was the eldest surviving son of the See also:marquess. When but three years old he had a virulent attack of small-pox which left his See also:face disfigured, and contributed to his See also:father's dislike of him. Being destined for the See also:army, he was entered at a See also:pension militaire at See also:Paris. Of this school, which had See also:Lagrange for its See also:professor of See also:mathematics, we have an amusing See also:account in the See also:life of See also:Gilbert Elliot, 1st See also:earl of See also:Minto, who with his See also:brother See also:Hugh, afterwards See also:British See also:minister at See also:Berlin, there made the acquaintance of Mirabeau. On leaving this school in 1767 he received a See also:commission in a See also:cavalry See also:regiment which his grandfather had commanded years before. He at once began love-making, and in spite of his ugliness succeeded in winning the See also:heart of the See also:lady to whom his colonel was attached; this led to such See also:scandal that his father obtained a lettre de cachet, and the See also:young scapegrace was imprisoned in the isle of Re. The love affairs of Mirabeau See also:form a well-known See also:history, owing to the celebrity of the letters to Sophie.

Yet it may be asserted that until the more durable and more reputable connexion with Mme de Nehra these love episodes were the most disgraceful blemishes in a life otherwise of a far higher moral See also:

character than has been commonly supposed. As to the marquess, his use of lettres de cachet is perfectly defensible on the theory of lettres de cachet, and Mirabeau, if any son, surely deserved such correction. Further, they had the effect of sobering the See also:culprit, and the more creditable See also:part of his life did not begin till he left See also:Vincennes. Mirabeau did not develop his great qualities of mind and character until his youthful excesses were over, and it was not till 1781 that these began to appear. On being released, the young See also:count obtained leave to accompany as a volunteer the French expedition to See also:Corsica. After his return, he tried to keep.on See also:good terms with hig father, and in 1772 he married a See also:rich heiress, See also:Marie Emilie, daughter of the marquess de Marignane, an See also:alliance procured for him by his father. His See also:wild extravagance, however, forced his father to forestall his creditors by securing his detention in semi-See also:exile in the See also:country, where he wrote his earliest extant See also:work, the Essai sur le despotisme. His violent disposition now led him to See also:quarrel with a country See also:gentleman who had insulted his See also:sister, and his semi-exile was changed by lettre de cachet into imprisonment in the Chateau d'If. In 1775 he was removed to the See also:castle of Joux, to which, however, he was not very closely confined, having full leave to visit in the town of See also:Pontarlier. Here he met Marie Therese de See also:Monnier, his Sophie as he called her. Of his behaviour nothing too strong can be said: he was introduced into the See also:house as a friend, and betrayed his See also:trust by inducing Mme de Monnier to fall in love with him. The affair ended by his escaping to See also:Switzerland, where Sophie joined him; they then went to See also:Holland, where he lived by hack-work for the booksellers; meanwhile Mirabeau had been condemned to death at Pontarlier for rapt et vol, and in May 1777 he was seized by the French See also:police, and imprisoned by a lettre de cachet in the castle of Vincennes.

During his imprisonment he seems to have learnt to See also:

control his passions from their very exhaustion, for the See also:early part of his confinement is marked by the indecent letters to Sophie (first published in 1793), and the obscene Erotica biblion and Ma See also:conversion, while to the later months belongs his See also:political work of any value, the Lettres de cachet, published after his liberation (1782). It exhibits an accurate knowledge of French constitutional history skilfully applied in an See also:attempt to show that an existing actual grievance was not only philosophically unjust but constitutionally illegal. It shows, though in rather a diffuse and declamatory form, that application of wide See also:historical knowledge, keen philosophical See also:perception, and genuine eloquence to a See also:practical purpose which was the great characteristic of Mirabeau, both as a political thinker and as a statesman. With his See also:release from Vincennes (See also:August 1782) begins thesecond See also:period of Mirabeau's life. He found that his Sophie was an idealized version of a rather See also:common and See also:ill-educated woman, and she consoled herself with the See also:affection of a young officer, after whose death she committed See also:suicide. Mirabeau first set to work to get the See also:sentence of death still See also:hanging over him reversed, and by his eloquence not only succeeded in this but got M. de Monnier condemned in the See also:costs of the whole See also:law proceedings. From Pontarlier he went to See also:Aix, where he claimed the See also:court's See also:order that his wife should return to him. She naturally objected, but his eloquence would have won his See also:case, even against Jean See also:Etienne Marie See also:Portalis, the See also:leader of the Aix See also:Bar, had he not in his excitement accused his wife of infidelity, on which the court pronounced a See also:decree of separation. He then intervened in the suit pending between his father and See also:mother before the See also:parlement of Paris, and attacked the ruling See also:powers so violently that he had to leave See also:France and again go to Holland, and try to live by See also:literary work. About this See also:time began his connexion with Mme de Nehra, the daughter of Zwier See also:van Haren, a Dutch statesman and political writer, and a woman of a far higher type than Sophie, more educated, more refined, and more capable of appreciating Mirabeau's good points. His life was strengthened by the love of his petite See also:horde, Mme de Nehra, his adopted son, See also:Lucas de Montigny, and his little See also:dog Chico. After a period of work in Holland he betook himself to See also:England, where his See also:treatise on lettres de cachet had been much admired, being translated into See also:English in 1787, and where he was soon admitted into the best Whig literary and political society of See also:London, through his old schoolfellow Gilbert Elliot, who had now inherited his father's baronetcy and estates, and become a leading Whig member of See also:parliament.

Of all his English See also:

friends none seem to have been so intimate with him as the 1st marquess of See also:Lansdowne, better known as See also:Lord Shelburne, and Mr, afterwards See also:Sir See also:Samuel, See also:Romilly. The latter became particularly attached to him, and really understood his character; and it is See also:strange that his remarks upon Mirabeau in the fragment of autobiography which he left, and Mirabeau's letters to him, should have been neglected by French writers. Romilly was introduced to Mirabeau by Sir See also:Francis D'Ivernois (1757-1842), and readily undertook to translate into English the Considerations sur l'ordre de See also:Cincinnatus, which Mirabeau had written in 1785. Romilly writes thus of him in his autobiography: "The count was difficult enough to please; he was sufficiently impressed with the beauties of the See also:original. He went over every part of the See also:translation with me, observed on every passage in which See also:justice was not done to the thought or the force of the expression lost, and made many useful criticisms. During this occupation we had occasion to see one another often, and became very intimate; and, as he had read much, had seen a great See also:deal of the See also:world, was acquainted with all the most distinguished persons who at that time adorned either the royal court or the See also:republic of letters in France; had a great knowledge of French and See also:Italian literature, and possessed very good See also:taste, his conversation was extremely interesting and not a little instructive. I had such frequent opportunities of seeing him at this time, and afterwards at a much more important period of his life, that I think his character was well known to me. I doubt whether it has been so well known to the world, and I am convinced that great injustice has been done him. This, indeed, is not surprising, when one considers that, from the first moment of his entering upon the career of an author, he had been altogether indifferent how numerous or how powerful might be the enemies he should provoke. His vanity was certainly excessive; but I have no doubt that, in his public conduct as well as in his writings, he was desirous of doing good, that his ambition was of the noblest See also:kind, and that he proposed to himself the noblest ends. He was, however, like many of his countrymen, who were active in the calamitous Revolution which afterwards took See also:place, not sufficiently scrupulous about the means by which those ends were to be accomplished. He indeed to some degree professed this; and more than once I have heard him say that there were occasions upon which ` la petite morale etait ennemie de la grande.' It is not surprising that with such See also:maxims as these in his mouth, unguarded in his expressions and careless of his reputation, he should have afforded See also:room for the circulation of many stories to his disadvantage." This luminous See also:judgment, it must be noted, was written by a See also:man of acknowledged purity of life, who admired Mirabeau in early life not when he was a statesman, but when he was only a struggling literary \Ilan= The Considerations See also:sue l'ordre de Cincinnatus which Romilly translated was the only important work Mirabeau wrote in the See also:year 1785, and it is a good specimen of his method.

He had read a pamphlet published in See also:

America attacking the proposed order, which was to form a See also:bond of association between the See also:officers who had fought in the See also:American See also:War of See also:Independence against England; the arguments struck him as true and valuable, so he re-arranged them in his own See also:fashion, and rewrote them in his own oratorical See also:style. He soon found such work not sufficiently remunerative to keep his petite horde in comfort, and then turned his thoughts to employment from the French See also:foreign See also:office, either in See also:writing or in See also:diplomacy. He first sent Mme de Nehra to Paris to make See also:peace with the authorities, and then returned himself, hoping to get employment through an old literary collaborateur of his, Durival, who was at this time director of the finances of the See also:department of foreign affairs. One of the functions of this See also:official was to subsidize political pamphleteers, and Mirabeau had hoped to be so employed, but he ruined his chances by a See also:series of writings on See also:financial questions. On his return to Paris he had become acquainted with Etienne Claviere, the Genevese exile, and a banker named Panchaud. From them he heard plenty of abuse of stock-jobbing, and seizing their ideas he began to regard stock-jobbing, or agiotage, as the source of all evil, and to attack in his usual vehement style the Banque de St See also:Charles and the Compagnie See also:des Eaux. This last pamphlet brought him into a controversy with Caron de See also:Beaumarchais, who certainly did not get the best of it, but it lost him any See also:chance of literary employment from the See also:government. However, his ability was too great to be neglected by a great minister such as Charles Gravier, Comte de See also:Vergennes undoubtedly was, and after a preliminary tour to Berlin at the beginning of 1786 he was des-patched in See also:July 1786 on a See also:secret See also:mission to the court of See also:Prussia, from which he returned in See also:January 1787, and of which he gave a full account in his Histoire secrete de la tour de Berlin (1789). The months he spent at Berlin were important in the history of Prussia, for while he was there See also:Frederick the Great died. The letters just mentioned show clearly what Mirabeau did and what he saw, and equally clearly how unfit he was to be a diplomatist. He certainly failed to conciliate the new See also:king Frederick See also:William; and thus ended Mirabeau's one attempt at diplomacy. During his See also:journey he had made the acquaintance of See also:Jakob Mauvillon (1743-1794), whom he found possessed of a great number of facts and See also:statistics with regard to Prussia; these he made use of in a great work on Prussia published in 1788.

But, though his De la monarchic prussienne sous See also:

Frederic le See also:Grand (London, 1788) gave him a See also:general reputation for historical learning, he had in the same year lost a chance of political employment. He had offered himself as a See also:candidate for the office of secretary to the See also:Assembly of Notables which the king had just convened, and to bring his name before the public published another financial work, the Denonciation de l'agiotage, which abounded in such violent diatribes that he not only lost his See also:election, but was obliged to retire to Tongres; and he further injured his prospects by See also:publishing the reports he had sent in during his secret mission at Berlin. But 1789 was at See also:hand; the states-general was summoned; Mirabeau's period of See also:probation was over. On See also:hearing of the king's determination to summon the states-general, Mirabeau started for See also:Provence, and offered to assist at the preliminary See also:conference of the noblesse of his See also:district. They rejected him; he appealed to the tiers etat, and was returned both for Aix and for Marseilles. He elected to sit for the former See also:city, and was See also:present at the opening of the states-general on the 4th of May 1789. From this time the See also:record of Mirabeau's life forms the best history of the first two years of the Constituent Assembly, for at every important crisis his See also:voice is to be heard, though his See also:advice was not always followed. He possessed at the same time great logical acuteness and the most passionate See also:enthusiasm. From the beginning he recognized that government exists in order that the bulk of the See also:population may pursue their daily work in peace and quiet, and that for a government to be successful it must be strong. At the same time he thoroughlycomprehended that for a government to be strong it must be in See also:harmony with the wishes of the See also:majority of the See also:people. He had carefully studied the English constitution in England, and he hoped to establish in France a See also:system similar in principle but without any slavish See also:imitation of the details of the English constitution. In the first See also:stage of the history of the states-general Mirabeau's part was very great He was soon recognized as a leader, to the chagrin of Jean See also:Joseph See also:Mounier, because he always knew his own mind, and was prompt in emergencies.

To him is to be attributed the successful consolidation of the See also:

National Assembly. When the taking of the See also:Bastille had assured the success of the Revolution, he warned the Assembly of the futility of passing See also:fine-See also:sounding decrees and urged the See also:necessity for acting. He declared that the famous See also:night of the 4th of August was but an See also:orgy, giving the people an immense theoretical See also:liberty while not assisting them to practical freedom, and overthrowing the old regime before a new one could be constituted. His failure to control the theorizers showed Mirabeau, after the removal of the king and the Assembly to Paris, that his eloquence would not enable him to See also:guide the Assembly by himself, and that he must therefore try to get some support. He wished to establish a strong See also:ministry, which should be responsible like an English ministry, but to an assembly chosen to represent the people of France better than the English House of See also:Commons at that time represented England. He first thought of becoming a minister at a very early date, if we may believe a See also:story contained in the Memoires of the duchesse d'See also:Abrantes, to the effect that in May 1789 the See also:queen tried to bribe him, but that he refused this and expressed his wish to be a minister. The indignation with which the queen repelled the See also:idea may have made him think of the See also:duke of See also:Orleans as a possible constitutional king, because his title would of necessity be See also:parliamentary. But the weakness, of Orleans was too palpable, and in a famous remark Mirabeau expressed his utter contempt for him. He also attempted to form an alliance with See also:Lafayette, but the general was as vain and as obstinate as Mirabeau himself, and had his own theories about a new French constitution. Mirabeau tried for a time, too, to See also:act with See also:Necker, and obtained the See also:sanction of the Assembly to Necker's financial See also:scheme, not because it was good, but because, as he said, " no other See also:plan was before them, and some-thing must be done." Hitherto See also:weight has been laid on the practical See also:side of Mirabeau's political See also:genius; his ideas with regard to the Revolution after the 5th' and 6th of See also:October must now be examined, and this can be done at length, thanks to the publication of Mirabeau's See also:correspondence with the Comte de la Marck, a study of which is indispensable for any correct knowledge of the history of the Revolution between 1789 and 1791. Auguste Marie See also:Raymond, See also:prince d'Arenberg, known as the Comte de la Marck, was a Flemish nobleman who had been proprietary colonel of a See also:German regiment in the service of France; he was a See also:close friend of the queen, and had been elected a member of the states-general. His acquaintance with Mirabeau, begun in 1788, ripened during the following year into a friendship, which La Marck hoped to turn to the See also:advantage of the court.

After the events of the 5th and 6th of October he consulted Mirabeau as to what See also:

measures the king ought to take, and Mirabeau, delighted at the opportunity, See also:drew up an admirable See also:state See also:paper, which, was presented to the king by See also:Monsieur, afterwards Louis XVIII. The whole of this Memoire should be read to get an adequate idea of Mirabeau's genius for politics; here it must be summarized. The See also:main position is that the king is not See also:free in Paris; he must therefore leave Paris and See also:appeal to France. " Paris n'en veut que I'argent; See also:les provinces demandent des lois." But where must the king go? " Se retirer a See also:Metz ou sur toute autre frontiere serait declarer la guerre A la nation et abdiquer le trone. Un roi qui est la seule sauvegarde de son peuple ne fuit point devant son peuple; i1 le prend pour See also:juge de sa conduite et de ses principes." He must then go towards the interior of France to a provincial See also:capital, best of all to See also:Rouen, and there he must appeal to the people and summon a great See also:convention. It would be ruin to appeal to the noblesse, as the queen advised: " un See also:corps de noblesse n'est point une armee, qui puisse combattre." When this great convention met the king must show himself ready to recognize that great changes have taken place, that See also:feudalism and See also:absolutism have for ever disappeared, and that a new relation between king and people has arisen, which must be loyally observed on both sides for the future. " Il est certain, d'ailleurs, qu'il faut une grande revolution pour sauver le royaume, que la nation a des droits, qu'elle est en chemin de les recouvrer tous, et qu'il faut non seulement les retablir, mais les consolider." To establish this new constitutional position between king and people would not be difficult, because " 1'indivisibilite du monarque et du peuple est dans le cceur de tous les See also:Francais; it faut qu'elle existe dans See also:faction et le pouvoir." Such was Mirabeau's See also:programme, from which he never diverged, but which was far too statesmanlike to be understood by the poor king, and far too See also:positive regarding the altered See also:condition of the See also:monarchy to be palatable to the queen. Mira-beau followed up his Memoire by a scheme of a great ministry to contain all men of See also:mark—Necker as See also:prime minister, " to render him as powerless as he is incapable, and yet preserve his popularity for the king," the duc de Liancourt, the duc de la Rochefoucauld, La Marck, Talleyrand, See also:bishop of See also:Autun, at the finances, Mirabeau without See also:portfolio, G. J. B. See also:Target, See also:mayor of Paris, Lafayette generalissimo to reform the army, Louis Philippe, comte de See also:Segur (foreign affairs), Mounier and I.

R. G. le Chapelier. This scheme got noised abroad, and was ruined by a decree of the Assembly of the 7th of See also:

November 1789, that no member of the Assembly could become a minister; this decree destroyed any chance of that necessary harmony between the ministry and the majority of the representatives of the nation which existed in England, and so at once overthrew Mirabeau's hopes. The queen utterly refused to take Mirabeau's counsel, and La Marck left Paris. However, in See also:April 1790 he was suddenly recalled by the comte de See also:Mercy-Argenteau, the See also:Austrian See also:ambassador at Paris, and the queen's most trusted political adviser, and from this time to Mirabeau's death he became the See also:medium of almost daily communications between the latter and the queen. Mirabeau at first attempted again to make an alliance with Lafayette, but it was useless, for Lafayette was not a strong man himself and did not appreciate "la force" in others. From the See also:month of May 1790 to his death in April 1791 Mirabeau remained in close and suspected, but not actually proved, connexion with the court, and drew up many admirable state papers for it. In return the court paid his debts; but it ought never to be said that he was bribed, for the See also:gold of the court never made him swerve from his political principles—never, for instance, made him a royalist. He regarded himself as a minister, though an unavowed one, and believed himself worthy of his hire. Before Mirabeau's See also:influence on foreign policy is discussed, his behaviour on several important points must be noticed. On the great question of the See also:veto he took a practical view, and seeing that the royal See also:power was already sufficiently weakened, declared for the king's See also:absolute veto and against the See also:compromise of the suspensive veto. He knew from his English experiences that such a veto would be hardly ever used unless the king See also:felt the people were on his side, and that if it were used unjustifiably the power of the See also:purse possessed by the representatives of the. people would, as in England in 1688, bring about a bloodless revolution.

He saw also that much of the inefficiency of the Assembly arose from the in-experience of the members and their incurable verbosity; so, to establish some system of rules, he got his friend Romilly to draw up a detailed account of the rules and customs of the English House of Commons, which he translated into French, but which the Assembly, puffed up by a belief in its own merits, refused to use. On the great subject of peace and war he supported the king's authority, and with some success. Again Mirabeau almost alone of the Assembly held that the soldier ceased to be a See also:

citizen when he became a soldier; he must submit to be deprived of his liberty to think and act, and must recognize that a soldier's first See also:duty is obedience. With such sentiments, it is no wonder that he approved of the vigorous conduct of See also:Francois See also:Claude Amour, marquis de See also:Bouille, at See also:Nancy, which was the more to his See also:credit as Bouille was the one See also:hope of the court influences opposed to him. Lastly,in matters of See also:finance he showed his See also:wisdom: he attacked Necker's " caisse d'escompte," which was to have the whole control of the taxes, as absorbing the Assembly's power of the purse; and he heartily approved of the system of See also:assignats, but with the See also:reservation that they should not be issued to the extent of more than one-See also:half the value of the lands to be sold. Of Mirabeau's attitude with regard to foreign affairs it is necessary to speak in more detail. He held it to be just that the French people should conduct their Revolution as they would, and that no foreign nation had any right to interfere with them while they kept themselves strictly to their own affairs. But he knew also that neighbouring nations looked with unquiet eyes on the progress of affairs in France, that they feared the influence of the Revolution on their own peoples, and that foreign monarchs were being prayed by the French emigres to interfere on behalf of the French monarchy. To prevent this interference, or rather to give no pretext for it, was his guiding thought as to foreign policy. He had been elected a member of the comite diplomatique of the Assembly in July 1790, and became its reporter at once, and in this capacity he was able to prevent the Assembly from doing much harm in regard to foreign affairs. He had See also:long known Armand Marc, comte de Montmorin, the foreign secretary, and, as matters became more strained from the complications with the princes and See also:counts of the See also:empire, he entered into daily communication with the minister, advised him on every point, and, while dictating his policy, defended it in the Assembly. Mirabeau's exertions in this respect are not his smallest title to the name of statesman; and how great a work he did is best proved by the confusion which ensued in this department after his death.

For indeed in the beginning of 1791 his death was very near; and he knew it to be so. The wild excesses of his youth and their terrible See also:

punishment had weakened his strong constitution, and his parliamentary labours completed the work. So surely did he feel its approach that some time before the end he sent all his papers over to Sir Gilbert Elliot, who kept them under See also:seal until claimed by Mirabeau's executors. In March his illness was evidently gaining on him, to his great grief, because he knew that he alone could yet See also:save France from the distrust of her monarch and the present reforms, and from the foreign interference, which would assuredly bring about catastrophes unparalleled in the history of the world. Every care that See also:science could afford was given by his friend and physician, See also:Cabanis, to whose brochure on his last illness and death the reader may refer. The people kept the See also:street in which he See also:lay quiet; but medical care, the loving solicitude of friends, and the respect of all the people could not save his life. When he could speak no more he wrote with a feeble hand the one word " dormir," and on the znd of April 1791 he died. No man ever so thoroughly used other men's work, and yet made it all seem his own. ` Je prends mon bien ou je le trouve " is as true of him as of See also:Moliere. His first literary work, except the bombastic but eloquent Essai sur le despotisme (Neufchatel, 1775), was a translation of See also:Robert See also:Watson's See also:Philip II., done in Holland with the help of Durival; his Considerations sur l'ordre de Cincinnatus (London, 1788) was based on a pamphlet by Aedanus See also:Burke (1743-18oz), of See also:South Carolina, who opposed the aristocratic tendencies of the Society of the See also:Cincinnati, and the notes to it were by Target; his financial writings were suggested by the Genevese exile, Claviere. During the Revolution he received yet more help; men were proud to labour for him, and did not murmur because he absorbed all the credit and fame. Etienne See also:Dumont, Claviere, Antoine Adrien Lamourette and Etienne Salomon Reybaz were but a few of the most distinguished of his collaborators.

Dumont was a Genevese exile, and an old friend of Romilly's, who willingly prepared for him those famous addresses which Mirabeau used to make the Assembly pass by sudden bursts of eloquent declamation; Claviere helped him in finance, and not only worked out his figures, but even wrote his financial discourses; Lamourette wrote the speeches on the See also:

civil constitution of the See also:clergy; Reybaz not only wrote for him his famous speeches on the assignats, the organization of the national guard, and others, which Mirabeau read word for word at the See also:tribune, but even the See also:posthumous speech on See also:succession to the estates of intestates, which Talleyrand read in the Assembly as the last work of his dead friend. Yet neither the gold of the court nor another man's conviction would make Mirabeau say what he did not himself believe, or do what he did not himself think right. He took other men's labour as his due, and impressed their words, of which he had suggested the underlying ideas, with the See also:stamp of his own individuality; his collaborators themselves did not complain—they were but too glad to be of help in the great work of controlling and forwarding the French Revolution through its greatest thinker and orator. As an orator his eloquence has been likened to that of both See also:Bossuet and See also:Vergniaud, but it had neither the See also:polish of the old 17th See also:century bishop nor the flashes of genius of the young Girondin. It was rather parliamentary See also:oratory in which he excelled, and his true compeers are rather Burke and See also:Fox than any French speakers. Personally he had that which is the truest mark of See also:nobility of mind, a power of attracting love and winning faithful friends. (H. M.

End of Article: MIRABEAU, HONORS GABRIEL RIQUETI, COMTE DE (1749-1791)

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