Marquis de Lafayette's letter to Jean-Paul Marat on the question of the
Royal Sanction and the present nature of the nation
Citoyen Marat,
My last letters of the 1st and 5th of September seem to be unacknowledged, as these letters
should have arrived at your residence as of the 10th and 14th respectively. I take this, the first
cordial and safe opportunity that having now delivered this letter to during our last concordat
upon which I enclose you my communication against further remonstrance against the recent
Royal Sanction. The extremities of the zeal with which you have opposed this decree, as some
have remarked, provides no directive or extent to which the revolutionary masses may not
undertake to absolve themselves of their financial burdens. Indeed, as an Enlightened man, one
can foresee that before the new government can be stabilized, assembled, reestablish its
financial system, get money into the Treasury, and mend relations with the rest of Europe,
considerable time will elapse. The proceedings of the current time, of which none of us thought
at the advent of this liberating revolution, in the omission of which, lurks the sentiments that I’m
afraid would take the heads of the former ancien regime. In England, it was a great point gained
during the revolution in which the commission of the Judges, previously dependent on the will of
the King that had proven the most oppressive of all tools, such that a change to a tenure of
good behavior; that question of good behavior left to the vote of a simple majority in the two
Houses of Parliament. I deem it not, as Monsieur Emmanual-Joseph Sieyes states in his recent
publication [What is the Third Estate? (1789)], that the third estate contributes a holistic
workforce to the nation, no, I deem that the managerial forbearance of our prior administration
ought to be treated with the same regard as of the people notwithstanding the abuses which,
having afflicted, ought to receive juridical attention. As with Plato’s metaphor of the State, what
shall we say then? That the state ought to be ruled by the indecisive, uninformed masses of no
civic forbearance? But I shall concede that careful consideration must be put in place regarding
monarchical powers which, as with our prior experience, has led to abuses of the people and
the general will of the nation.
Did not Montesquieu state in his [The Spirit of Law (1748)] that the spirit of moderation should
also be the spirit of the lawgiver? The moulding of a new republic, considering the important
events haven taken place in this nation, shall not induce an overriding sense of malice with
caution of judgement to the long-term consequences of our actions lest we pound the drums of
war. Our country’s task ahead requires an ostensibly patient, most invariable desire to the same
object; and such is now the necessity which constrains the Radical to expunge and their former
visions of the entire suspension of the state. Let facts be submitted to a candid world, for the
Jacobites have refused to assent to laws the most wholesome to the public good, warranted the
safety of Louis XVI questionable following the occurrences at the Palace of Tuileries, have
attempted to plunder and incited treasonable insurrections of our fellow citizens. But let us not
devolve into factional grievances for we are merely a young nation, and the principal object of
my association with the revolution has the deepest of ties and is sufficient to warrant the past
extremities of late as simply a forewarning by the late empirical calamities. I shall not wonder to
see the scenes of ancient Rome and Carthage renewed in our day; if not pursued upon the
same issue, our modern republic of modern powers will not permit the elimination of a single
member. I have the honor to be, with sentiments of highest esteem and respect, your humble
and fellow citizen.