Note 368 — Front matter (continued 9)

M. Chabot, a patriotic orator, who had been a Franciscan friar, spoke in the Society of Jacobins as follows of Marat: "Marat is reproached with being of a sanguinary disposition; that he contributed to the late massacres in the prisons. But in so doing he acted in the true spirit of the Revolution, for it was not to be expected that while our bravest patriots were on the frontiers we should remain here exposed to the rage of the prisoners, who were promised arms and the opportunity of assassinating us. It is well known that the plan of the aristocrats has always been, and still is, to make a general carnage of the common people. Now, as the number of the latter is to that of the former in the proportion of ninety-nine to one, it is evident that he who proposes to kill one to prevent the killing of ninety-nine is not a blood-thirsty man."