fixed the ideas of his fon, refpecting defpotifm; and it may be here neceffary to obferve, that the wander. ings of an impetuous genius fpring out of the means employed to reprefs them; conftraint adds to the energy of great characters, and an iron fceptre calls forth all the powers of a ftrong mind into inftant rebellion.

On his liberation from prifon, Mirabeau obtained the favour of being fent to Corfica in quality of a volunteer in a regiment of cavalry. There he diftinguished himfelf, acquired the efteem of feveral of his fuperior officers, and procured the brevet of captain of dragoons at the end of the campaign. He wished to obtain a company; and the refusal of his father to this propofition made him relinquifh the profeffion of arms, a profeffion to which he was greatly at tached, and for which, in his own opinion, he was admirably adapted, there not being a fingle book on the art of war, in any language, dead or living, which he bad not read." During the war in Corfica, Mirabeau began to canvafs the principles on which it had been undertaken; this inquiry induced him to bluth at his own fuccefs, and he accordingly feemed defirous to make an expiation by animadverting on the exceffes of the Genoefe aristocracy, in a memoir tranf, mitted to, and deftroyed by his father. Soon after this, the patriarch of the Economists propofed a courfe of agriculture to the young warriour. Mirabeau accordingly exchanged the fword for the plough, and employed himself, out of mere complaifance, in rural experiments. To the difguft attendant on this, was added that of a law fuit. Thefe proving a load too hard to be borne, he quitted the Li moufin, and repaired to Provence.

The firft fymptoms of a refiftance on the part of the parliament to the

*

commands of abfolute power, began now to manifeft themfelves.

The friend of man becomes the friend of authority; his fon, on the contrary, was one of the most formidable adverfaries of the court party and the new magiftrates.

In June, 1772, he received at Aix the hand of Mademoiselle de Marignane, a lady, young, amiable, of an illuftrious family on this occafion he was preferred to five different ri ́vals, after feven months affiduous homage.

Six thoufand livres a- -year in estate, burdened with a jointure to his mother-in-law, feveral entails, the profpect of a confiderable inheritance, and 160,000 livres of debts, compofed the fortune of Mirabeau at this period.

Certain family arrangements might have eafily extinguished or diminifhed his incumbrances; but they became the germ of all the misfortunes of his future life. Harfh, captious, inflexible, violent-his father, taking advantage of this circumftance, procured an interdict at the Chatelet of Paris, and obtained leave to fix his refidence first at the castle of Mirabeau, and afterwards in the town of Mano que.

His wife accompanied him thither, and they lived in the greatest happinefs together, until the month of May 1774, when Mirabeau intercepted a fecret and criminal correfpond-ence; it did not become him to be fevere; he therefore brought back his wife to her duty, and pardoned her..

He now forgot his exile, and went to Graffe. An unexpected dispute divulged his difobedience. A certain baron de Villeneuve Mohans infulted Madame de Cabris, the fifter of Mirabeau, The latter challenges. him. The baron refufing to fight, receives the chaftifement ufually inflicted on cowards, and avenges himfelf

des Hommes.

felf after the manner of M. de Pourceaugnac. He accordingly brings an action, and obtains from a fubaltern tribunal, and an inferior judge, who proved to be his own vaffal, a decree for arrefting Mirabeau. The noife this occafioned, having discoverd the infraction of the arders enjoining his exile, a new lettre de cachet was invoked, and Mirabeau was fhut up in the caftle of if, on the 23d of December 1774. M. d'Allégre, the governor, tellified his good behaviour, and demanded bis liberty: a young and handfome woman, who was cruelly beaten by a brutal fellow of a jailor her husband, contributed to cheer the gloom of a prifoner, twenty-four years old, and at laft abfconded with him. This circumftance aggravated the bondage of Mirabeau.

As he was reproached with idle. nefs, he replied to this charge by publishing his firft work, which was begun when he was only twenty-one years old the Effay on Defpotifm. This epigrammatick anfwer, irritathis father: the narrow and cowardly ideas of a courtier were offended....... A young man to accuse his masters, and that too from a dungeon!

Yielding at length to powerful folicitations, his father confented to his removal from the caftle of If, to Joux, near Pontarlier, in April 1775- It was there he firft faw his Sophia. Madame de Mirabeau was at a diftance-she had even refused to vifit him during his bondage. Madame Lemaunier married to a phantom of a hufband feventy-nine years old, being on the other hand, both tender and affectionate, fupplied her place, and his paffion for her foon became violent in the extreme.

St Maurice the commandant of the fort, unfortunately proved his rival, and as both he and his father feemed to pursue him with the most implacable revenge, he determined to efcape out of their clutches. He accordingly retreated to the papital of

B

Burgundy, whither his miftrefs had alfo retired, but being denounced by her mother, he was feized and fhut up in the caftle of Dijon.

In the mean time the commiffioners nominated by M. de Malefherbes, in order to examine into the disputes between the father and fon, inclined to the liberation of the latter, on which the inflexible parent furprised a new lettre de cachet, which condemned Mirabeau to forget his love in the caftle of Dourlens. M. de Malefherbes, on quitting the miniftry, caufed it to be intimated to Mirabeau, that the laft fervice he could render him, was to advise him to fly into fome foreign country. He ac cordingly followed his counfel.

"

While abroad he received a letter from Sophia, who had been threatened with being fhut up in a convent, ftating that M. Lemounier had folicited a lettre de cachet; it ended with thefe words: either flight or death!" Could he abandon a woman rendered miferable by and for him: A fugitive himfelf, could he prohibit her from flight? P. Manuel has well obferved, on this occafion, that marriage ought to ceafe to be a duty, the moment that divorce is not confidered as a right. This fentiment includes the juftification of Sophia; that of Mirabeau, existed in his affection.

The incenfed and injured husband immediately applied to the lawyers, and an inferior tribunal, confidering this in the fame light as a rape, paffed fentence of death on the offender, who was accordingly decapitated in effigy!

This infamousjudgement was, however, in the end annulled, and the accufer would have been multed in large damages, had not his adversary generously forgiven him, on condition, that he would no longer trouble the repofe of a wife who abhorred him!

In the mean time, Mirabeau con2 cealed

cealed himself in Holland, where he paffed under the name of Saint Mathieu; he lived in great obfcuriry, fpending all his time with his Sophia, his books, and a few learned men. During part of the years 1776 and 1777, his fubfiftence, and that of his female friend, depended folely on his literary labours. The book feller Changuyon, gave him plenty of employment. The indefatigable count, found no art or science a ftranger to him; his largeft work at this period, was the translation of a Hiftory of England.

He had at firft formed the defign of repairing to America; and it is to be regretted that he did not execute this project, which would have accomplished part of his political deftiny. He was, however, very well pleafed with his prefent obfcure, but tranquil fituation, and he gives an enchanting description of it in his letters, where he often laments that happy mediocrity, for which he was not formed by nature. It was from his afylum in Holland, that he fent abroad his memorials against his father; an inexpiable errour, which he acknowledged, by the difavowal of them, and effaced with his tears!

The patriarch of the economists ftill panted after revenge, and had unfortunately fufficient intereft to caufe the rights of nations to be violated, in order to punish his eldest fon. Accordingly, an exempt of the police, provided with a lettre de cachet, figned Amelot and Vergennes, went to fearch for his prey, in the bofom of a free country. Mirabeau receives intimation of his intentions, and prepares to fly; but it is neceffary to provide alfo for the safety of his Sophia. A few moments loft on this occafion, bereaved them both of liberty, for they were arrefted on the 17th of May, at the house of Le

quefne in the Clavestand. This vioà lation of national independence, was tolerated by a people who, on a fimilar occafion, cut off the head of one of the emiffaries of Louis XIV. but the Batavian nation was at this moment fubjected to the yoke of a Stadtholder.

On their arrival at Paris, the dungeon of Vincennes received Mirabeau; Sophia, who was with child, was confined under the fuperintendence of the police, and was delivered of a daughter, after which she was removed to the convent of St Claire, at Gien, on the 18th of June, 1778. To this detention, which lafted nearly three years, we are indebted for the celebrated book, entitled, “ Lettres á Sophie," a work of the paffions, compofed in folitude, and breathing fenfibility, delirium, and affection.

Obliged, at this period, to enter the lifts once more with the marquis, he displayed wonderful address in fupporting the rights, without wounding the duties of his fon. The memoir he wrote on this occafion, is a mafter-piece of reafon, art, eloquence, and logick. No one can be. hold fo much genius enchained within the walls of a dungeon, without exclaiming with Sophia: "You have proved to demonftration, that you ought to renounce the idea of becoming a great man in your native country.'

While deprived of every comfort, and overwhelmed with bodily calamities, Mirabeau compofed his Erotica Biblion, a work, keen, poignant, and original: the commentaries of Dom Calmet, on the Bible, furnished him with the materials. About the fame time he drew up for his Sophia, a grammar, and a little treatife on mythology; he alfo translated Joannes Secundus, and marked out the boundaries of arbitrary power,

in

in his vigorous and mafculine work on Lettres de Cachet..

At length a period feemed to be put to his literary pursuits-he is refufed paper! He found means however, to fupply this want, by tearing off the first and last leaves of the books he was ftill permitted to have accefs to. His writings at the fame time, at least those we have seen, affumed a clofer and fiercer ftyle. He concealed the leaves on which he wrote, in the folds of his clothes, and actually left his prifon, with the manufcript of his Lettres de Cachet, fewed up in this manner!

His long and expiatory captivity had now blunted the fury of perfecution, for the agents of authority began to blush at becoming the inftruments of vengeance to a father, whofe own conduct gave occafion to the feverest reproaches, he himself being the flave of Madame de Pailly, his miftrefs, who tyrannifed over his domefticks, and exiled his family.

The bondage of Mirabeau, was at length diffolved on the 17th of December 1780, and it appears that he became reconciled to his father, for at this epoch, he spent fixteen months along with him. Indeed, he only quitted the paternal manfion, in order to procure a revocation of the fentence pronounced at Pontarlier, which was finally accomplished on the 14th of Auguft 1782. Sophia at the same time, recovered her marriage portion and her liberty.

After this, Mirabeau returned to Provence, whence he wrote the following billet to his wife: dated, November 6, 1782:

Eight years are added to my life fince we have lived separate from each other; it will be with great difficulty I fhall be brought to believe, that these eight years devoted to misfortune a title always facred with a good heart, can have entirely banished me from yours."

Prayers, aloquence, addrefs, and

the mediation of common friends, having proved ineffectual, owing to the obftinacy of her relations; Mirabeau applied in his turn to the laws, and a procefs fcandalous to all parties took place. His advocate happened to be Duport Dutertre: that of Madame Mirabeau was Delacroix, fince profeffor of public law at the Lyceum, and author of a work in five vols. 8vo. entitled, "Conflitutions des principaux Etats de l'Europe, des Etats-Unis d'Amerique."

not

After lofing this fuit, Mirabeau fet out for London, and it is evident from his letters, that two or three good inftitutions excepted, he did think very favourably of England. It was at this period he became a man of letters, and a publicift by profeffion as well as by genius. He, indeed, had no longer any other profeffion; but is not this the firft of all? The hiftory of his works and his life, is henceforth the fame.

America having obtained its liberty, the generals and officers of the conquering army, meditated the recompofition of a military and heredit ary ariftocracy, under the title of The Order of Cincinnatus. A citizen of South Carolina, pointed out the danger of this new corporation in 1783. It was on the plan of that pamphlet, which

was but little

known, that Mirabeau, in the courfe of the next year, publifhed a work in London, entitled, Confidérations fur l'ordre de Cincinnatus, in which, treating the fubject as a politician and a legiflator, he fixed the opinion of mankind on this dangerous innovation, and contributed to fave America from the chains which had been forged for her.

An ambitious innovator, tormented with the mania of conqueits abroad, and reforms at home, Jofeph II. in league with Ruffia, and participating in her dreams of maritime commerce, pretended to revive the navigation of the Scheldt, to make

Oftend

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After having fhewn himself to be a politician, he appeared in the character of a ftatefman. His writings on the "Caffe d' Efcomptes" the Banque de St. Charles," "Aions des eaux," on all the branches of publick credit, and all the fources of ftock-jobbing fucceeded each other, like fo many rays of light. On these occafions, to the method of Smith, he joined the eloquence of Demofthenes.

The helm of the finances was at this moment directed by Calonne, a minister who poffeffed great talents without a fingle grain of publick virtue. Calonne did juftice to the genius of Mirabeau, but he dreaded his fuccefs; it was on this account that he caufed him to be fent into exile in Pruffia, by means of an obscure misfion, which furrounded him with danger, without the poffibility of glory. It was there, that Mirabeau prepared his useful and learned work, "De la Monarchie Pruffienne;" it was there he collected the details of that internal mifery, on which a dazzling grandeur was founded; it was there he discovered those rude but fecble cords employed in moving the decorations that furprife and attonith mankind.

The genius of the great Frederick appreciated that of Mirabeau. William replaced, or rather fucceeded Frederick, and foon after his elevation, fent an order to Mirabeau, to depart immediately from his dominions.

The latter having with great difficulty procured fufficient money for

his journey, leaves the capital of Pruffia, and topping at Nancy to fee the reprefentation of Dido, becomes enamoured with the actrefs, loses a night, and his purfe at her lodgings; borrows that of his fecretary; nearly empties it; a wheel breaks at Bourget; on this he leaves his fecretary, his carriage, and his papers behind him, and enters Paris on foot, and without a fingle fou.

On his arrival in France, he inftantly perceived the ftorm that was approaching. His firft work after his return was a continuation of his Dénonciation de l'Agiotage. In attacking this privileged fcourge, he appeared like Hercules ftifling Cacus; the return he received from government, was a lettre de cachet, which he found means to avoid: his destiny now commenced, and tyranny trembled.

After attacking the reputation of Necker, and beholding liberty germinating in France, and expiring in Holland, he published his "Avis aux Bataves." His work entitled "l'Hiftoire fecrette de la cour de Berlin," produced new reputation and new perfecutions.

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CHARACTER