"But do you not see," resumed Isnard; "that all counter-revolutionists are obstinate, and leave you no other part than that of vanquishing them? It is better to have to contend against them, whilst the citizens are still up and stirring, and well remember the perils they have encountered, than to allow patriotism to grow cold! Is it not true that already we are no longer what we were in the first year of liberty; (some of the chamber applaud, whilst others disapprove). If fanaticism had then raised its head, the law would have been subjected! Your policy should be to compel victory to declare itself; drive your enemies to extremities, and you Will have them return to you from fear, or you will subdue them by the sword. Under important circumstances, prudence is a weakness. It is especially with respect to rebels that you should be decisive and severe; they should be hewn down as they rise. If time be permitted to them to have meetings and earnest partisans, then they spread over the empire like an irresistible torrent. It is thus that despotism acts, and it was thus that one individual kept beneath his yoke a whole nation. If Louis XVI. had employed this great means whilst the Revolution was but yet in its cradle, we should not now be here! This rigour, the vice of a despot, is the virtue of a nation. Legislators, who shrink from such extreme means, are cowards--criminals: for when the public liberty is assailed, to pardon is to share the crime. (Great applause.)
"Such rigour might perchance cost an effusion of blood? I know it! But if you do not make use of it, will not more blood flow? Is not civil war a still greater misfortune? Cut off the gangrened member to save the whole frame.[10] Indulgence is the snare into which you are tempted. You will find yourselves abandoned by the nation for not having dared to sustain, nor known how to defend, it. Your enemies will hate you no less. Your friends will lose confidence in you. The law is my God: I have no other--the public good, that is my worship! You have already struck the emigrants--again a decree against the refractory priests, and you will have gained over ten millions of arms! My decree would be comprised in two words: compel every Frenchman, priest or not, to take the civil oath, and ordain that every man who will not sign shall be deprived of all salary or pension. Sound policy would decree that every one who does not sign the contract should leave the kingdom. What proofs against the priest do we require? If there be but a complaint lodged against the priest by the citizen with whom he lives, let him be at once expelled! As to those against whom the penal code shall pronounce punishment more severe than exile, there is but one sentence left: _Death!_!"