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The French Revolution
Book by Thompson, J M
544 pages, Paperback
First published August 1, 1985
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J.M. Thompson
36 books12 followersJames Matthew Thompson was a historian and theologian.
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February 2, 2021
If you are like me, the French Revolution is a period in history that can be difficult to understand, seeming to elude logic as the everyday student tries to grasp all the seemingly contradictory facts. For my whole life, whether as a student in my university history classes, or as an embittered middle-aged member of the American bourgeoisie, I have never found a teacher or a book that clears the confusion regarding the Revolution, despite this being such a supposedly important period in world history.
For me, the most glaring problem about how I was taught about this period was the fact that most texts on the subject couldn't even be bothered differentiating the Royal army from the rebels. To them, they were all "the French." So we have the French fighting Brunswick, and taking on Austria. Wait... wasn't Austria and Prussia supposed to be helping preserve the monarchy? Why would they be fighting the King's men? Oh! When they say the "French," they mean the rebels, as if they were the only "real" French, because they were all about democracy, and democracy is good--right?
But aside from this obvious confusion on who was fighting who, I had other numerous questions, and here are some examples. Why were such crucial figures of the Revolution, like Danton and Robespierre, later executed by the same movement? How on earth did the Crown, with all of its executive powers and access to the combined military of other sympathetic nations, succumb to municipal militias and the mob? What exactly did King Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette do so wrong that they could be arrested and executed? Were the Girondins friends of the Revolution or enemies, as they seemed to be passionate supporters for a new Republic and yet they were wiped out of Parliament and destroyed by the rebels? And if the Revolution was the decisive victory for democracy in the European west, effectively responsible for the installation of democratic elections in everything from all levels of government to the officers in your neighborhood homeowners association, why then does any discussion of this supposed victory for personal liberty and "rule by the people" leave such a notoriously bad taste, with a reputation for countless horrors and human rights violations?
So if you are like me, check out this book by Hilaire Belloc, because he wrote this for us. Here he attempts to clean up some of the mess.
The book is relatively short and can be digested in just a few days, because it is not a comprehensive primer on the Revolution. Instead, this is merely a clarification on some major points.
First, he talks about the founding principles of the Revolution, not just on the ideas of Rousseau, but on the centuries-old practice of giving a vote to the people on certain urgent matters of State which had already existed long before Rousseau and the Revolution.
Next, he delves a little into the individual personalities of the major players, and tries to separate the myth from the history. In this way, he reveals a little more of the truth as to things like why Robespierre went from the supposed architect of the Reign of Terror, which is myth, to an enemy of the new Republic worthy of being shot in the jaw and then beheaded.
Third, he breaks down the Revolution from its initial irritant, when the Third Estate of the Estates-General (The Commons as opposed to the Clergy of the First Estate and the Nobility of the Second) proclaimed themselves to be the true representatives of the people, which took on a life of its own, leading to mass hysteria fueled by gossip and misinformation especially about the Queen and her supposed improprieties. He highlights decisive turning points in escalations and their reasons, such as the storming of the Bastille, the ill-prepared Royal guard and failure to secure the Louvre during the attack on the palace in Paris, the delay of mobilizing the Prussian armies, the sham trial of the Royal family, the use of martial law to secure the power of the Committee of Public Safety, and the fall from grace of Danton and Robespierre.
He further analyzes in detail the important battles of the Revolution, shedding new light on how such a failure from a military standpoint could lead to a success for democracy. If you are a scholar of the art of war, you will certainly enjoy Belloc's detailed review, complete with maps of decisive campaigns.
He wraps it all up with an apology for the role of Catholicism through the whole affair. This is by far the lengthiest chapter as the very Catholic Belloc tries to reconcile the Church with the very anti-Catholic Revolution.
But Warren, you francophilic scholar and gentleman, I hear you ask, what was the big takeaway from all this? Well, unfortunately, it was a pretty pessimistic one.
I learned that the reason I found the Revolution so confusing is because in real politics and history there are no real distinct teams, no real good guys to cheer for, no real one noble cause. But the Revolution brought democracy to the West, our professors say. That's good, right? Well after reading this book, I wonder--did the Revolution really bring us the civil liberties of rule by the people?
The Revolution followed after the American War of Independence, whose fathers were also geniuses inspired by works like "The Social Contract," and though I as an American enjoy the privileges that come with our heritage, I am not naive enough to assume we live in a completely free society with a government absolutely accountable to the people. Nor is France today, or any of the other democratic nations. Belloc, originally a French native, as biased as he may have been toward the idea that the Revolution was such a crucial triumph of the noble cause of democracy, does not fail to repeatedly mention Rousseau's own dire warning. Democracy, Rousseau admits, is a practice for gods and angels, not the human animal. The idea behind a monarchy was that no one could bribe a king, while in a representative democracy, the will of the people becomes easily subverted by those with enough money and financial power to wield influence, thus transforming the democratic process into an untrustworthy facade for an actual oligarchy.
Many Americans and Europeans feel that this is exactly where we are today, and thus we have had the sudden explosion of populist candidates and ideas across the Western world, culminating in the 2016 election of the outsider figure of Donald Trump and the belief by many that there was no way the oligarchy was ever going to let that happen again.
Belloc does not provide us with any solid wisdom as to a less corruptible alternative means of governance. What his work on the Revolution clearly shows is that, no matter how noble the cause, when power is usurped, nature abhores a vacuum. In the case of the French Revolution, a large proportion of the French people, many of whom didn't know the difference between a constitutional republic vs. a monarchy and likely didn't care, were whipped into a frenzy by mentally ill people like Marat, convinced their King and Queen were the cause of all suffering in the world. They learned to spurn an institution that had been around since just before the Roman conquest and had served them through centuries of both disaster and prosperity. Hence, they felt justified to behave like animals, watching with relish as their Queen, head shaved and stripped to a white mourning gown, was carted for an hour through the streets being spit upon, to end her days with her head being triumphantly displayed to a bloodthirsty crowd as the symbol for all their hatred.
And their hatred still had not been satiated, so they started to eat their own. Hence, valuable minds and pawns for the democratic ideal became enemies of the new State. Friends of the revolution were slaughtered by the thousands. The Committee of Public Safety became the new Cesare to replace their newly overthrown one. No wonder the Revolution as taught to me and so many others is so confusing, because our teachers lacked the understanding or courage to ever say the real truth: "They always eat their own!"
And so I think about this after reading this book and look at the news. An American presidential inauguration with one of the greatest shows of force ever seen in the country. Another impeachment trial on a former president who should probably be just left to live out his few remaining years to Tweet on the toilet at Mar-a-Lago. An angry mob storming the Capitol like it was Tuileries. Talk from our leaders about dealing harshly with "domestic terrorists," rooting out the "bad think," canceling sources of what gigantic and powerful international corporations say is false information.
And I think, wow--this feels a lot like what I just read! History really does repeat itself! Will we ever learn?
And what Belloc and our tenured political science professors fail to remind us is that after all the years of bloodshed and civil war, this was not a rousing success for democracy. The monarchy WAS in fact restored. After the "democratic" revolution, we got Napoleon and the French Empire, where ironically the concepts of meritocracy, religious tolerance, equality under the law, and other progressive policies flourished. And to top it all off, when Napoleon fell, the Bourbon kingdom was restored, and again ironically, the time of the Bourbon restoration is considered by many to be a great time of prosperity and happiness for the French people. I am not pretending to be a Royalist here. What I'm saying is that my own indoctrinations and assumptions seem to be quite flawed. I feel like Doctor Who's granddaughter in "An Unearthly Child" cracking open her own copy of "The French Revolution" and crying, "That's not right!" I am quite speechless at how confusing this all is, and I wonder what it means for you and me and our brethren.
This is why we should read history, and I think Belloc's book on the French Revolution should be part of your studies of history as well. Even if we can't educate ourselves to the point where we can stop the madness, we can at least see what's coming in the next few years of our lives and possibly prepare. Or perhaps just read another book and forget.
For me, the most glaring problem about how I was taught about this period was the fact that most texts on the subject couldn't even be bothered differentiating the Royal army from the rebels. To them, they were all "the French." So we have the French fighting Brunswick, and taking on Austria. Wait... wasn't Austria and Prussia supposed to be helping preserve the monarchy? Why would they be fighting the King's men? Oh! When they say the "French," they mean the rebels, as if they were the only "real" French, because they were all about democracy, and democracy is good--right?
But aside from this obvious confusion on who was fighting who, I had other numerous questions, and here are some examples. Why were such crucial figures of the Revolution, like Danton and Robespierre, later executed by the same movement? How on earth did the Crown, with all of its executive powers and access to the combined military of other sympathetic nations, succumb to municipal militias and the mob? What exactly did King Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette do so wrong that they could be arrested and executed? Were the Girondins friends of the Revolution or enemies, as they seemed to be passionate supporters for a new Republic and yet they were wiped out of Parliament and destroyed by the rebels? And if the Revolution was the decisive victory for democracy in the European west, effectively responsible for the installation of democratic elections in everything from all levels of government to the officers in your neighborhood homeowners association, why then does any discussion of this supposed victory for personal liberty and "rule by the people" leave such a notoriously bad taste, with a reputation for countless horrors and human rights violations?
So if you are like me, check out this book by Hilaire Belloc, because he wrote this for us. Here he attempts to clean up some of the mess.
The book is relatively short and can be digested in just a few days, because it is not a comprehensive primer on the Revolution. Instead, this is merely a clarification on some major points.
First, he talks about the founding principles of the Revolution, not just on the ideas of Rousseau, but on the centuries-old practice of giving a vote to the people on certain urgent matters of State which had already existed long before Rousseau and the Revolution.
Next, he delves a little into the individual personalities of the major players, and tries to separate the myth from the history. In this way, he reveals a little more of the truth as to things like why Robespierre went from the supposed architect of the Reign of Terror, which is myth, to an enemy of the new Republic worthy of being shot in the jaw and then beheaded.
Third, he breaks down the Revolution from its initial irritant, when the Third Estate of the Estates-General (The Commons as opposed to the Clergy of the First Estate and the Nobility of the Second) proclaimed themselves to be the true representatives of the people, which took on a life of its own, leading to mass hysteria fueled by gossip and misinformation especially about the Queen and her supposed improprieties. He highlights decisive turning points in escalations and their reasons, such as the storming of the Bastille, the ill-prepared Royal guard and failure to secure the Louvre during the attack on the palace in Paris, the delay of mobilizing the Prussian armies, the sham trial of the Royal family, the use of martial law to secure the power of the Committee of Public Safety, and the fall from grace of Danton and Robespierre.
He further analyzes in detail the important battles of the Revolution, shedding new light on how such a failure from a military standpoint could lead to a success for democracy. If you are a scholar of the art of war, you will certainly enjoy Belloc's detailed review, complete with maps of decisive campaigns.
He wraps it all up with an apology for the role of Catholicism through the whole affair. This is by far the lengthiest chapter as the very Catholic Belloc tries to reconcile the Church with the very anti-Catholic Revolution.
But Warren, you francophilic scholar and gentleman, I hear you ask, what was the big takeaway from all this? Well, unfortunately, it was a pretty pessimistic one.
I learned that the reason I found the Revolution so confusing is because in real politics and history there are no real distinct teams, no real good guys to cheer for, no real one noble cause. But the Revolution brought democracy to the West, our professors say. That's good, right? Well after reading this book, I wonder--did the Revolution really bring us the civil liberties of rule by the people?
The Revolution followed after the American War of Independence, whose fathers were also geniuses inspired by works like "The Social Contract," and though I as an American enjoy the privileges that come with our heritage, I am not naive enough to assume we live in a completely free society with a government absolutely accountable to the people. Nor is France today, or any of the other democratic nations. Belloc, originally a French native, as biased as he may have been toward the idea that the Revolution was such a crucial triumph of the noble cause of democracy, does not fail to repeatedly mention Rousseau's own dire warning. Democracy, Rousseau admits, is a practice for gods and angels, not the human animal. The idea behind a monarchy was that no one could bribe a king, while in a representative democracy, the will of the people becomes easily subverted by those with enough money and financial power to wield influence, thus transforming the democratic process into an untrustworthy facade for an actual oligarchy.
Many Americans and Europeans feel that this is exactly where we are today, and thus we have had the sudden explosion of populist candidates and ideas across the Western world, culminating in the 2016 election of the outsider figure of Donald Trump and the belief by many that there was no way the oligarchy was ever going to let that happen again.
Belloc does not provide us with any solid wisdom as to a less corruptible alternative means of governance. What his work on the Revolution clearly shows is that, no matter how noble the cause, when power is usurped, nature abhores a vacuum. In the case of the French Revolution, a large proportion of the French people, many of whom didn't know the difference between a constitutional republic vs. a monarchy and likely didn't care, were whipped into a frenzy by mentally ill people like Marat, convinced their King and Queen were the cause of all suffering in the world. They learned to spurn an institution that had been around since just before the Roman conquest and had served them through centuries of both disaster and prosperity. Hence, they felt justified to behave like animals, watching with relish as their Queen, head shaved and stripped to a white mourning gown, was carted for an hour through the streets being spit upon, to end her days with her head being triumphantly displayed to a bloodthirsty crowd as the symbol for all their hatred.
And their hatred still had not been satiated, so they started to eat their own. Hence, valuable minds and pawns for the democratic ideal became enemies of the new State. Friends of the revolution were slaughtered by the thousands. The Committee of Public Safety became the new Cesare to replace their newly overthrown one. No wonder the Revolution as taught to me and so many others is so confusing, because our teachers lacked the understanding or courage to ever say the real truth: "They always eat their own!"
And so I think about this after reading this book and look at the news. An American presidential inauguration with one of the greatest shows of force ever seen in the country. Another impeachment trial on a former president who should probably be just left to live out his few remaining years to Tweet on the toilet at Mar-a-Lago. An angry mob storming the Capitol like it was Tuileries. Talk from our leaders about dealing harshly with "domestic terrorists," rooting out the "bad think," canceling sources of what gigantic and powerful international corporations say is false information.
And I think, wow--this feels a lot like what I just read! History really does repeat itself! Will we ever learn?
And what Belloc and our tenured political science professors fail to remind us is that after all the years of bloodshed and civil war, this was not a rousing success for democracy. The monarchy WAS in fact restored. After the "democratic" revolution, we got Napoleon and the French Empire, where ironically the concepts of meritocracy, religious tolerance, equality under the law, and other progressive policies flourished. And to top it all off, when Napoleon fell, the Bourbon kingdom was restored, and again ironically, the time of the Bourbon restoration is considered by many to be a great time of prosperity and happiness for the French people. I am not pretending to be a Royalist here. What I'm saying is that my own indoctrinations and assumptions seem to be quite flawed. I feel like Doctor Who's granddaughter in "An Unearthly Child" cracking open her own copy of "The French Revolution" and crying, "That's not right!" I am quite speechless at how confusing this all is, and I wonder what it means for you and me and our brethren.
This is why we should read history, and I think Belloc's book on the French Revolution should be part of your studies of history as well. Even if we can't educate ourselves to the point where we can stop the madness, we can at least see what's coming in the next few years of our lives and possibly prepare. Or perhaps just read another book and forget.
October 25, 2020
One should strive for a political philosophy more complex than one sentence. But as political mantras go “French Revolution = bad” is about the soundest one could hope for. The 1789 Revolution is the template for all later revolutions; in it can be found in utero all the evils of the present neoliberal regime. Modern conservativism, if such a thing exists, arises out of Burke’s eponymous reflections on it. The Catholic Church as she is now composed has defeated Protestantism, but withers under a council called the “1789 of the Church.” There is an endless amount to contemplate in the French Revolution, and anyone with any wisdom must take some time in trying to understand it. For good reason, the Revolution is the bete noir of all Rightists.
All Rightists except Hilaire Belloc and GK Chesterton. Maybe the two greatest English Catholic reactionary writers of the 20th Century, ChesterBelloc was (seemingly anachronistically) sympathetic to the French Revolution. Chesterton took evident delight in saying Edmund Burke was an atheist, while Robespierre was clearly a believer. And Belloc gave us this volume. This, along with distributism, was enough to keep the wonderful duo out of Russell Kirk’s good graces (early editions of The Conservative Mind saw the duo lambasted, while in the last edition Kirk seems about ready to fall in with the peculiar English cranks). It is also one of the marks held against the great literary pair by modern Rightists. Sympathy for the Revolution is anathema.
Still, Belloc is one of the greatest literary figures of the 20th Century, and as such is our teacher, not our subject. We owe him deference, not immediate disdain.
One seeking Belloc’s particular views on the Revolution can content himself with the first and fifth parts of this volume. The three middle sections and classic Belloc, full of his character sketches, a rough timeline of events, and a military history. As an independent volume, it is probably the military aspect of the work that is most novel; while the other sections were helpful, the section overflowing with Belloc’s love for military history (one I do not particularly share) was most enlightening for me, and the one that actually shed new light on events I was well acquainted with.
This said, the volume as a whole is disjointed. It is more a commentary on the Revolution than a history itself. It does not cohere the way Characters of the Reformation does, or even his biography of Napoleon, which is really just a bunch of battle sketches. It is a good overview for one already aware of the great events of the Revolution, but useless for someone unaware.
What about the first and last sections? The first is a summary of the political thought behind the Revolution, that is, Rousseau. The last is about the Revolution and the Catholic Church.
What of Rousseau? Belloc inspired me to read The Social Contract alongside his work. There is much to be appreciated there. Jean-Jacques is far from the trite hippie and scoundrel he is made out to be. As Belloc notes, Rousseau is one of the great critics of democracy; he says it can be practiced only by a nation of Gods. He deprecates the suffrage, going so far to say that when a man is given the vote (and he can’t resist prodding the English over this), he is no longer free.
Rousseau is the great proponent of popular sovereignty and the ultimate tyranny of the state. Stalin’s show trials could not have found a better advocate against “enemies of the people.” For when the people are the highest authority, and the state is the true avatar of the people’s will, then those who fall outside the good graces of the state are not enemies of one particular man, but the people itself. Rousseau speaks in ideal terms—embarrassingly. There is no good reason to believe Rousseau’s ideal state has ever been realized, and more than Karl Marx’s. But Rousseau, in his exuberancy, is not deterred by this.
How serious should we take him? The idea that the people are the true sovereign of any state—that prince, president, legislature, merely holds in trust the reins of state—is so prominent in the present day it is difficult to criticize it. No Christian can doubt that men have inherent rights; if God is the Logos, and man has inherent needs, then man has certain rights. The great divide we see between thinkers like St. Thomas, who of course recognized the natural law, and Rousseau is how man may avail himself of these rights. Thomas looked that the despot and saw that confounding him was sometimes necessary; overthrowing him was not. Rousseau’s work, of course, leads us to the opposite conclusion. Just and humane (if inept) leaders like George III and Louis XVI have found themselves victims of Rousseau. But Christians have found themselves victims of Nero and Stalin; what right do they have to wish such monsters overthrown?
This is where we, along with Belloc, must feel some sympathy with Rousseau if we are to keep any sense at all. It may be personally virtuous to suffer beneath the tyrant, but the mind rejects the notion that it is just. What is the right for the people to revolt? Belloc does not go far in defining it; he merely posits that it must exist. And with this established, you have the Revolution.
This is the political theory of the Revolution. Belloc applies it as clinically in relation to the Church. These pages are not drenched in blood and gore, and the passion of the French Church is relayed clinically. Whether or not this is appropriate, the reader can decide. Belloc notes that the Faith before the Revolution was at a low ebb. The actions of the revolutionaries in the initial days were not egregious, but rather the natural reaction of men interacting with a rich and ostensibly moribund institution. It was only after the initial overreach on the part of secular forces that an animosity was created, one made unbridgeable after the Terror. But this split was not immutable, says Belloc; the divide between the Church and Revolution was particular, not general, and there is no reason the Church could not have embraced democracy while retained her sovereignty.
It is here that Belloc does not provide us with enough meat. The reader is owed more in supporting this notion—a whole book, really. If insurrection can be supported as a principle, Belloc should bolster this claim, especially given the scriptural and historical precedents the principle must run up against. In the particular, Belloc’s case is even harder, because Louis XVI was not a tyrant or a despot. If modern Catholics look at 20th Century tyrants and imagine some right to insurrection must exist, they must run into the fact that those tyrants would not be possible without the evil precedent of 1789 having degraded political morality to the point where all modern states, more or less, are totalitarian and operate only on fear. And as Belloc notes, 700 thousand Frenchmen had died in military operations before Napoleon’s triumph at Marengo. Even if the Terror was merely an accompaniment to martial law, as Belloc posits, the reader is still entitled to ask, Was this tradeoff worth it?
In the end, the book is not all that enlightening with regards to Belloc’s political opinions. The oft-repeated claim in trad circles that Belloc’s opinion on the Revolution arose out of ancestorial bias on his part is not unfair, that is to say, he does not establish his political opinions so firmly that mere prejudice can be ruled out as a culprit. Belloc’s French Revolution is not a great political book, though it is still a good book, with plenty of supplementary insights for those who love studying the Revolution and Belloc’s writings as a whole.
All Rightists except Hilaire Belloc and GK Chesterton. Maybe the two greatest English Catholic reactionary writers of the 20th Century, ChesterBelloc was (seemingly anachronistically) sympathetic to the French Revolution. Chesterton took evident delight in saying Edmund Burke was an atheist, while Robespierre was clearly a believer. And Belloc gave us this volume. This, along with distributism, was enough to keep the wonderful duo out of Russell Kirk’s good graces (early editions of The Conservative Mind saw the duo lambasted, while in the last edition Kirk seems about ready to fall in with the peculiar English cranks). It is also one of the marks held against the great literary pair by modern Rightists. Sympathy for the Revolution is anathema.
Still, Belloc is one of the greatest literary figures of the 20th Century, and as such is our teacher, not our subject. We owe him deference, not immediate disdain.
One seeking Belloc’s particular views on the Revolution can content himself with the first and fifth parts of this volume. The three middle sections and classic Belloc, full of his character sketches, a rough timeline of events, and a military history. As an independent volume, it is probably the military aspect of the work that is most novel; while the other sections were helpful, the section overflowing with Belloc’s love for military history (one I do not particularly share) was most enlightening for me, and the one that actually shed new light on events I was well acquainted with.
This said, the volume as a whole is disjointed. It is more a commentary on the Revolution than a history itself. It does not cohere the way Characters of the Reformation does, or even his biography of Napoleon, which is really just a bunch of battle sketches. It is a good overview for one already aware of the great events of the Revolution, but useless for someone unaware.
What about the first and last sections? The first is a summary of the political thought behind the Revolution, that is, Rousseau. The last is about the Revolution and the Catholic Church.
What of Rousseau? Belloc inspired me to read The Social Contract alongside his work. There is much to be appreciated there. Jean-Jacques is far from the trite hippie and scoundrel he is made out to be. As Belloc notes, Rousseau is one of the great critics of democracy; he says it can be practiced only by a nation of Gods. He deprecates the suffrage, going so far to say that when a man is given the vote (and he can’t resist prodding the English over this), he is no longer free.
Rousseau is the great proponent of popular sovereignty and the ultimate tyranny of the state. Stalin’s show trials could not have found a better advocate against “enemies of the people.” For when the people are the highest authority, and the state is the true avatar of the people’s will, then those who fall outside the good graces of the state are not enemies of one particular man, but the people itself. Rousseau speaks in ideal terms—embarrassingly. There is no good reason to believe Rousseau’s ideal state has ever been realized, and more than Karl Marx’s. But Rousseau, in his exuberancy, is not deterred by this.
How serious should we take him? The idea that the people are the true sovereign of any state—that prince, president, legislature, merely holds in trust the reins of state—is so prominent in the present day it is difficult to criticize it. No Christian can doubt that men have inherent rights; if God is the Logos, and man has inherent needs, then man has certain rights. The great divide we see between thinkers like St. Thomas, who of course recognized the natural law, and Rousseau is how man may avail himself of these rights. Thomas looked that the despot and saw that confounding him was sometimes necessary; overthrowing him was not. Rousseau’s work, of course, leads us to the opposite conclusion. Just and humane (if inept) leaders like George III and Louis XVI have found themselves victims of Rousseau. But Christians have found themselves victims of Nero and Stalin; what right do they have to wish such monsters overthrown?
This is where we, along with Belloc, must feel some sympathy with Rousseau if we are to keep any sense at all. It may be personally virtuous to suffer beneath the tyrant, but the mind rejects the notion that it is just. What is the right for the people to revolt? Belloc does not go far in defining it; he merely posits that it must exist. And with this established, you have the Revolution.
This is the political theory of the Revolution. Belloc applies it as clinically in relation to the Church. These pages are not drenched in blood and gore, and the passion of the French Church is relayed clinically. Whether or not this is appropriate, the reader can decide. Belloc notes that the Faith before the Revolution was at a low ebb. The actions of the revolutionaries in the initial days were not egregious, but rather the natural reaction of men interacting with a rich and ostensibly moribund institution. It was only after the initial overreach on the part of secular forces that an animosity was created, one made unbridgeable after the Terror. But this split was not immutable, says Belloc; the divide between the Church and Revolution was particular, not general, and there is no reason the Church could not have embraced democracy while retained her sovereignty.
It is here that Belloc does not provide us with enough meat. The reader is owed more in supporting this notion—a whole book, really. If insurrection can be supported as a principle, Belloc should bolster this claim, especially given the scriptural and historical precedents the principle must run up against. In the particular, Belloc’s case is even harder, because Louis XVI was not a tyrant or a despot. If modern Catholics look at 20th Century tyrants and imagine some right to insurrection must exist, they must run into the fact that those tyrants would not be possible without the evil precedent of 1789 having degraded political morality to the point where all modern states, more or less, are totalitarian and operate only on fear. And as Belloc notes, 700 thousand Frenchmen had died in military operations before Napoleon’s triumph at Marengo. Even if the Terror was merely an accompaniment to martial law, as Belloc posits, the reader is still entitled to ask, Was this tradeoff worth it?
In the end, the book is not all that enlightening with regards to Belloc’s political opinions. The oft-repeated claim in trad circles that Belloc’s opinion on the Revolution arose out of ancestorial bias on his part is not unfair, that is to say, he does not establish his political opinions so firmly that mere prejudice can be ruled out as a culprit. Belloc’s French Revolution is not a great political book, though it is still a good book, with plenty of supplementary insights for those who love studying the Revolution and Belloc’s writings as a whole.
November 26, 2024
The complexity and contradictions of a movement toward democracy became a reign of horrors and violation of human rights.
Reflecting on my second encounter with Belloc’s text, I found myself more deeply impressed by his meticulous dissection of history. Unlike my initial experience with the audiobook, reading the text I appreciated the nuances of his arguments. Belloc’s ability to unravel the complexities of history, particularly the intricate web of French politics and military conflicts, is challenging. His careful examination offers a lens through which we can better understand the convoluted nature of historical events. Despite the inherent difficulties in grasping these complexities, Belloc’s work remains a testament to the importance of thorough historical analysis. It reminds us that history, much like the present, is a tapestry of conflicting narratives and intricate details that require careful consideration and reflection.
Reflecting on my second encounter with Belloc’s text, I found myself more deeply impressed by his meticulous dissection of history. Unlike my initial experience with the audiobook, reading the text I appreciated the nuances of his arguments. Belloc’s ability to unravel the complexities of history, particularly the intricate web of French politics and military conflicts, is challenging. His careful examination offers a lens through which we can better understand the convoluted nature of historical events. Despite the inherent difficulties in grasping these complexities, Belloc’s work remains a testament to the importance of thorough historical analysis. It reminds us that history, much like the present, is a tapestry of conflicting narratives and intricate details that require careful consideration and reflection.
March 1, 2015
An excellent and concise recounting of the events, persons and meaning of the French Revolution. Decidedly from a catholic perspective.
April 12, 2021
This is a somewhat short, but passionate treatment of the French Revolution.
You can't really read this without already having a background about the events, but I'm not going to hold that against the book. I just can't recommend it as an introduction.
The book starts with an examination of the political theories that led the revolution and Belloc is very sympathetic towards Rousseau, along with the concept of popular sovereignty, and he defends Rousseau as presenting these ideas in an extraordinarily well written manner.
I found it odd that the book basically dives right into character studies and then to a breakdown of the events, but arguably the former was the best part. Belloc writes with so much energy and familiarity. Belloc must've been an incredibly prolific researcher. It's like he knows these people personally, and I don't know enough to judge whether his examinations were accurate, but it made for very good literature.
He lost me in the military chapter which I skimmed through while images of charts and troop movements flashed in my head. If you're really familiar with the geography of the region it might be a better experience.
Of course the book is going to focus on Catholicism as well and Belloc tries to make the case that the revolution and Catholicism did not have to be necessarily opposed insofar as Catholicism and democracy were compatible, which I agree with of course. There is also an emphasis on the conditions of religion that led up to the revolution. The revolutionaries could not have simply uprooted the church by their own efforts, it had already been decaying for a long time and many people believed the Church was about to die out anyways. There were even atheists amongst the bishops yet the Church carries on. Noting that the revolution failed in wiping out the Church still around after all those years, was not a bad way to end the book.
You can't really read this without already having a background about the events, but I'm not going to hold that against the book. I just can't recommend it as an introduction.
The book starts with an examination of the political theories that led the revolution and Belloc is very sympathetic towards Rousseau, along with the concept of popular sovereignty, and he defends Rousseau as presenting these ideas in an extraordinarily well written manner.
I found it odd that the book basically dives right into character studies and then to a breakdown of the events, but arguably the former was the best part. Belloc writes with so much energy and familiarity. Belloc must've been an incredibly prolific researcher. It's like he knows these people personally, and I don't know enough to judge whether his examinations were accurate, but it made for very good literature.
He lost me in the military chapter which I skimmed through while images of charts and troop movements flashed in my head. If you're really familiar with the geography of the region it might be a better experience.
Of course the book is going to focus on Catholicism as well and Belloc tries to make the case that the revolution and Catholicism did not have to be necessarily opposed insofar as Catholicism and democracy were compatible, which I agree with of course. There is also an emphasis on the conditions of religion that led up to the revolution. The revolutionaries could not have simply uprooted the church by their own efforts, it had already been decaying for a long time and many people believed the Church was about to die out anyways. There were even atheists amongst the bishops yet the Church carries on. Noting that the revolution failed in wiping out the Church still around after all those years, was not a bad way to end the book.
June 15, 2021
Belloc strikes again. He is the best and most entertaining writer of history I have ever come across. With him, the beauty of human affairs comes to the fore and makes you realise that human history is a better story than anybody could possibly write themselves.
October 2, 2022
Thompson occupies a rather unique position in historiography of the French Revolution in that he does not neatly fall into any camp like most historians who came before and after him do. He is no Marxist, but is completely willing to recognize the contradictions of French society and the role of economic crisis and class struggle as the prime motivator of the Revolution. He is no Tocqueville, but his rhetoric on decentralization and centralization echoes much of what Tocqueville said. He assigns a role to ideas similar to the so-called “Revisionist” school, but does not condemn the Jacobins as much as he recognizes flaws inherent in an infantile bourgeois democracy threatened upon all sides by destruction. Thompson’s account of Danton’s conspiracy is one of the most detailed I have come across, made interesting by his contention that Danton intended to make use of Robespierre and Barere rather than making them victims of what would’ve been a sort of White Terror. His account of the mistakes of the Jacobin administration in ‘94 in dealing with the working-class is a stark reminder of the limits of even the progressive bourgeoisie in conceding to the demands of the people; his account of Saint Just’s Laws of the Ventose and the progressive aspects of “Robespierrism” paint a clear picture of the reason for the bucking of the Committee by the Thermidorians.
There are certain flaws with Thompson’s work. The reader must have at least some familiarity with the French Revolution and the monarchy before it—episodes that seem to have been well-known in his time are referred to without explanation (for example, the celebration of Louis XVI wedding in which many people seemed to have been stampeded is referred to casually without explanation, but I had never heard of this event). Whether Thompson will provide a translation of a phrase or quote from French seems to be a toss-up: should he begin a chapter with a French quote, there will certainly be no translation. In the style of a classical historian he uses no footnotes or citations outside of textual references, and only provides a bibliographic essay at the beginning of his work. His understanding of personalities is often fraught with personal condemnation of characters he deems unsavoury: false accusations against Marat, the “moral cowardice” of Desmoulins, the unhinged nature of Saint-Just, etc.
Thompson’s work is interesting in that it provides a sympathetic and somewhat progressive view of the French Revolution from a non-Marxist perspective that can be freely used to bolster the Marxist historiography of the French Revolution.
There are certain flaws with Thompson’s work. The reader must have at least some familiarity with the French Revolution and the monarchy before it—episodes that seem to have been well-known in his time are referred to without explanation (for example, the celebration of Louis XVI wedding in which many people seemed to have been stampeded is referred to casually without explanation, but I had never heard of this event). Whether Thompson will provide a translation of a phrase or quote from French seems to be a toss-up: should he begin a chapter with a French quote, there will certainly be no translation. In the style of a classical historian he uses no footnotes or citations outside of textual references, and only provides a bibliographic essay at the beginning of his work. His understanding of personalities is often fraught with personal condemnation of characters he deems unsavoury: false accusations against Marat, the “moral cowardice” of Desmoulins, the unhinged nature of Saint-Just, etc.
Thompson’s work is interesting in that it provides a sympathetic and somewhat progressive view of the French Revolution from a non-Marxist perspective that can be freely used to bolster the Marxist historiography of the French Revolution.
April 11, 2026
After having read a few books by Chesterton and Belloc I was a bit surprised by both of these men's partiality towards the French Revolution given that few other Conservatives, Christians, and especially Conservative Christians would seem to hold the same high opinions of a much-detested event. I assume here based on what I have read that Chesterton holds roughly the same opinions on the Revolution as Belloc, as I believe Chesterton once stated that he got all of his politics from Belloc (thus the “ChesterBelloc” merged into one cohesive socio-political view). This curiosity on their opinions led me to Belloc's The French Revolution, a six-chapter reflection on the French Revolution including its influences, proponents, historical phases, and its relationship with the Catholic Church. I have done little research into and have little knowledge of the French Revolution, but was still able to follow the book, though the book is really more of a compilation of Belloc's thoughts and what he found most interesting about the Revolution than a real full-fledged cover-to-cover history.
The first chapter lays some of the groundwork for Belloc’s arguments and describes some of the ideals of the Revolution, namely equality and representative government. The second chapter of the book deals with the political theory behind the Revolution, primarily Rousseau's The Social Contract, which Belloc shows was the blueprint of Revolution ideals. I cannot speak much more on this as I myself have not read Rousseau yet, though Belloc’s description of Rousseau’s most famous work certainly makes me want to. Belloc praises The Social Contract as the ultimate proposition for democratic forms of government, stating”
“Nevertheless, if it be closely read the Contrat Social will be discovered to say all that can be said of the moral basis of democracy. Our ignorance of the historical basis of the State is presumed in the very opening lines of it. The logical priority of the family to the State is the next statement. The ridiculous and shameful argument that strength is the basis of authority – which has never had standing save among the uninstructed or the superficial – is contemptuously dismissed…” (23).
The central importance of Rousseau carries through Belloc’s examination of the actual events of the Revolution with a look at the Revolution’s central character in the third chapter and then an overview of the historical phases of the Revolution in the fourth chapter. One of Belloc’s more memorable and unique arguments here is that the famous (or probably infamous to most) Robespierre was not actually significant to the Revolution in and of himself. “Robespierre was at this moment the chief figure in the eyes of the crowd, and was soon to be the chief revolutionary figure in the eyes of Europe… He was not, and was never destined to be, the chief force in the revolutionary Government” (82). Belloc argues that Robespierre merely wanted to be popular and so made himself the face of the Committee of Public Safety at home and abroad and that all of his actions were subsequently done because he thought they were popular. The actual driving ideas and actions of the Revolution, Belloc argues, did not originate in Robespierre himself. Robespierre’s folly of popularity perhaps led to his most critical mistake when he believed the Reign of Terror was popular and so supported it, ironically leading to the loss of his own head, an event only possible because he was not in fact the leader of the Committee.
Unlearned as I am, I do feel Belloc helped better shape some of my perceptions of the Revolution. The image of the Revolution I had previously held was that of a dozen or so chickens with their heads cut off running around Paris and cutting off the heads of other chickens; the image Belloc presents is very different. Belloc shows that the Revolution was not pure mob rule, but that there was in fact a dictator of France during the Revolution: the Committee of Public Safety. “Rousseau’s Dictator had appeared, the great mind which had given the Contrat Social to be the gospel of the Revolution had also foreseen one of the necessary organs of democracy in its hardest trial; his theory had been proved necessary and true in fact” (79). The Terror, Belloc shows, was not ruled only by base fanaticism, but was influenced by the imminent invasion of outside forces from Prussia and Austria, which led the Committee to increase its hold over French society and create not an Enlightenment orgy of a disorganized state but an authoritative military state.
The fifth chapter was a bit of a surprise for me as I had not realized the Belloc had such an interest in military history. Belloc details here some of the major military maneuvers of the Revolution and their importance to the Revolution’s outcome. Some of the topics covered here are the Battle of Valmy, the invasions of the Low Countries, the Battle of Hoondschoote, and the Battle of Tourcoring. I must confess that I remember the least about this chapter, not because I was not interested in military history, but simply because I have almost no grounding in the Revolution. With so little to work with, I found it more difficult to string together Belloc’s phases of the Revolution and the military strategy together into a cohesive narrative within what little else I know of French history. This chapter and the preceding chapter are perhaps best used as companions to French history and not as an introduction or recount of the Revolution in and of themselves. I am afraid Belloc set the bar too high for me here and I utterly failed to jump it. Readers more interested in Belloc’s social and political thought may find this chapter to be off-topic and more of a slog.
The final chapter on the relationship between the Catholic Church and the French Revolution is really what I suspect everyone who picks up the book is here for. This chapter, and indeed all of the chapters in the book, can really stand on its own, and if you want to know how Belloc reconciles the French Revolution with his Catholic faith, you can probably skip to this chapter. I had a lot of questions going into this book and I only got a few answers. The biggest problem is simply that the book needs to be longer, and this chapter in particular could have been expanded into its own book. Belloc argues that the ideals of the Revolution and the mission of the Catholic Church need not be in conflict and are seen to be compatible. “Historically and logically, theologically also, those who affirm a necessary antagonism between the Republic and the Church are in error” (136). Belloc’s claim here would seem to contradict almost everything else I have been told about the Revolution, which is not to say that I think he is wrong, but that I am left wondering who to trust. It is possible that Belloc’s love for the land of his father may have skewed him in favor of the Revolution in some ways, though I find it hard to believe that such an ardent pursuer of the truth would have such a glaring blind-spot that his greatest friend, who also happened to be one of the best popular Christian apologists of his generation, would also buy into.
Diving into the Core of Belloc’s argument, he states that the ideals of the Revolution were equality among men and the political theory of representative government. The former the Church affirms and the latter is not contradictory to her. The ideals and theories behind the Revolution thus cannot be said to be against the Church. He argues the strife between the Church and the Revolutionary government was more of an incidental strife. The conflict between the two was not caused by philosophy but was the unfortunate byproduct of the “eclipse of religion” in late 18th c. France that was the primary cause of antagonism between the Revolution and the Church. It was an ignorance of what the Church was and the belief that it was in fact a dead thing when in fact it was not that led to so much of the friction between the Revolution and the Church. “How, we ask, could men so learned, so enthusiastic, so laborious and so closely in touch with all the realities of their time, make a blunder of that magnitude?...The answer is to be discovered in what has just been laid down with so much insistence: the temporary eclipse of religion in France before the Revolution broke out” (146). To understand this, one must first understand the political development and the culture of the French state in the centuries preceding the Revolution. The Catholic Church had become internal to the government of France in the 18th c., necessitating the Revolution to address her in some way. By the end of the 18th c., the Church had also appeared to die; faith among all classes was at a low and the ranking clergy did not seem to even believe their own religion. The Assembly, thinking the Church dead, first attempted to maintain the political machinery of the Church while easing the religion onto its death bed with the Civil Constitution of the Clergy, but were startled to see the corpse finally wake up and begin to fight for its life before the coffin was nailed shut. In sum, it was bad politics and disastrous misunderstanding that would lead first to antagonism between the Church and the Revolution and then to the persecution of the Church by the Revolutionaries. Taking a wider view of the Revolution, Belloc says that, philosophically speaking, the ideals of the Church and the Revolution need not be mutually exclusive.
If I understand correctly, Belloc’s argument is not a condonement of all of the actions the Revolutionary government took, but separating the Terror and persecutions from the ideals of the Revolution, Belloc proposes a defense of the Revolution’s ideals in light of the political climate, national history, misunderstandings, and ignorance that led to the persecution of the Catholic Church during the Revolution, the key being that Christianity had reached such a nadir that it had become almost an incomprehensible thing to men of that period. Acting ignorantly in matters of faith, they were starting from square one in the realm of religion, and the actions they took become more understandable with this in mind.
Belloc would seem to be at odds with many other Catholic thinkers. Joseph Pearce, a biographer of Belloc, states that the ideals of the Revolution are contradictory to the Christian faith:
“As in England, the literature of nineteenth-century France was characterized by various degrees of disillusionment with the cankerous and cantankerous ideals that had led to revolution. These conflicting and confused efforts to find a new ideological synthesis are apparent in the novels of Victor Hugo, whose most famous novel, Les Miserables, conflates and confuses the self-sacrificial love of the Christian with the ideological idealism of the Revolution…Hugo, like many writers of his generation was guilty of what George Orwell would call ‘double-think,’ which might be defined as the holding of two mutually incompatible viewpoints simultaneously” (Joseph Pearce, Literature: What Every Catholic Should Know, 125).
Having recently finished Things Worth Dying For by Charles Chaput, Chaput also seems to directly contradict Belloc, citing Jesuit scholar John Courney Murray and arguing that the Revolution created and upheld a competing religion to Catholicism (Chaput, 118). So, was Belloc guilty of “double-think”? Did he suddenly become wayward when it came to the Revolution? I think that where Belloc disagrees with other conservatives is on what the French Revolution was about. Belloc maintains it was about equal, representative government while others maintain that it was more of a proto-Marxist revolution. I suppose this question would also be influenced by whether one chooses to separate the Terror from the Revolution, and whether the persecutions are an unfortunate incident or the object of the Revolution. On these interpretations, I am in no position to give any sort of informed verdict. I have briefly tried to find anything from Pearce on Belloc’s stance on the Revolution but have been fruitless in my efforts. Perhaps Pearce’s biography of Belloc addresses some of these questions. Belloc’s short biographies on the figures of French history may also shed some additional light on the topic. I would have to research both the Revolution and Belloc more to make a better decision and am eager for any input or suggestions on the topic. As it is, I am generally more partial to the American Revolution and would prefer to devote more of my energy to learning the ins and outs of that war. And that is how it should be, isn’t it? That is, I think, a part of the essence of Localsim (formerly Distributism): that a man from France ought to be concerned more with his fatherland and I ought to be more concerned with mine.
The first chapter lays some of the groundwork for Belloc’s arguments and describes some of the ideals of the Revolution, namely equality and representative government. The second chapter of the book deals with the political theory behind the Revolution, primarily Rousseau's The Social Contract, which Belloc shows was the blueprint of Revolution ideals. I cannot speak much more on this as I myself have not read Rousseau yet, though Belloc’s description of Rousseau’s most famous work certainly makes me want to. Belloc praises The Social Contract as the ultimate proposition for democratic forms of government, stating”
“Nevertheless, if it be closely read the Contrat Social will be discovered to say all that can be said of the moral basis of democracy. Our ignorance of the historical basis of the State is presumed in the very opening lines of it. The logical priority of the family to the State is the next statement. The ridiculous and shameful argument that strength is the basis of authority – which has never had standing save among the uninstructed or the superficial – is contemptuously dismissed…” (23).
The central importance of Rousseau carries through Belloc’s examination of the actual events of the Revolution with a look at the Revolution’s central character in the third chapter and then an overview of the historical phases of the Revolution in the fourth chapter. One of Belloc’s more memorable and unique arguments here is that the famous (or probably infamous to most) Robespierre was not actually significant to the Revolution in and of himself. “Robespierre was at this moment the chief figure in the eyes of the crowd, and was soon to be the chief revolutionary figure in the eyes of Europe… He was not, and was never destined to be, the chief force in the revolutionary Government” (82). Belloc argues that Robespierre merely wanted to be popular and so made himself the face of the Committee of Public Safety at home and abroad and that all of his actions were subsequently done because he thought they were popular. The actual driving ideas and actions of the Revolution, Belloc argues, did not originate in Robespierre himself. Robespierre’s folly of popularity perhaps led to his most critical mistake when he believed the Reign of Terror was popular and so supported it, ironically leading to the loss of his own head, an event only possible because he was not in fact the leader of the Committee.
Unlearned as I am, I do feel Belloc helped better shape some of my perceptions of the Revolution. The image of the Revolution I had previously held was that of a dozen or so chickens with their heads cut off running around Paris and cutting off the heads of other chickens; the image Belloc presents is very different. Belloc shows that the Revolution was not pure mob rule, but that there was in fact a dictator of France during the Revolution: the Committee of Public Safety. “Rousseau’s Dictator had appeared, the great mind which had given the Contrat Social to be the gospel of the Revolution had also foreseen one of the necessary organs of democracy in its hardest trial; his theory had been proved necessary and true in fact” (79). The Terror, Belloc shows, was not ruled only by base fanaticism, but was influenced by the imminent invasion of outside forces from Prussia and Austria, which led the Committee to increase its hold over French society and create not an Enlightenment orgy of a disorganized state but an authoritative military state.
The fifth chapter was a bit of a surprise for me as I had not realized the Belloc had such an interest in military history. Belloc details here some of the major military maneuvers of the Revolution and their importance to the Revolution’s outcome. Some of the topics covered here are the Battle of Valmy, the invasions of the Low Countries, the Battle of Hoondschoote, and the Battle of Tourcoring. I must confess that I remember the least about this chapter, not because I was not interested in military history, but simply because I have almost no grounding in the Revolution. With so little to work with, I found it more difficult to string together Belloc’s phases of the Revolution and the military strategy together into a cohesive narrative within what little else I know of French history. This chapter and the preceding chapter are perhaps best used as companions to French history and not as an introduction or recount of the Revolution in and of themselves. I am afraid Belloc set the bar too high for me here and I utterly failed to jump it. Readers more interested in Belloc’s social and political thought may find this chapter to be off-topic and more of a slog.
The final chapter on the relationship between the Catholic Church and the French Revolution is really what I suspect everyone who picks up the book is here for. This chapter, and indeed all of the chapters in the book, can really stand on its own, and if you want to know how Belloc reconciles the French Revolution with his Catholic faith, you can probably skip to this chapter. I had a lot of questions going into this book and I only got a few answers. The biggest problem is simply that the book needs to be longer, and this chapter in particular could have been expanded into its own book. Belloc argues that the ideals of the Revolution and the mission of the Catholic Church need not be in conflict and are seen to be compatible. “Historically and logically, theologically also, those who affirm a necessary antagonism between the Republic and the Church are in error” (136). Belloc’s claim here would seem to contradict almost everything else I have been told about the Revolution, which is not to say that I think he is wrong, but that I am left wondering who to trust. It is possible that Belloc’s love for the land of his father may have skewed him in favor of the Revolution in some ways, though I find it hard to believe that such an ardent pursuer of the truth would have such a glaring blind-spot that his greatest friend, who also happened to be one of the best popular Christian apologists of his generation, would also buy into.
Diving into the Core of Belloc’s argument, he states that the ideals of the Revolution were equality among men and the political theory of representative government. The former the Church affirms and the latter is not contradictory to her. The ideals and theories behind the Revolution thus cannot be said to be against the Church. He argues the strife between the Church and the Revolutionary government was more of an incidental strife. The conflict between the two was not caused by philosophy but was the unfortunate byproduct of the “eclipse of religion” in late 18th c. France that was the primary cause of antagonism between the Revolution and the Church. It was an ignorance of what the Church was and the belief that it was in fact a dead thing when in fact it was not that led to so much of the friction between the Revolution and the Church. “How, we ask, could men so learned, so enthusiastic, so laborious and so closely in touch with all the realities of their time, make a blunder of that magnitude?...The answer is to be discovered in what has just been laid down with so much insistence: the temporary eclipse of religion in France before the Revolution broke out” (146). To understand this, one must first understand the political development and the culture of the French state in the centuries preceding the Revolution. The Catholic Church had become internal to the government of France in the 18th c., necessitating the Revolution to address her in some way. By the end of the 18th c., the Church had also appeared to die; faith among all classes was at a low and the ranking clergy did not seem to even believe their own religion. The Assembly, thinking the Church dead, first attempted to maintain the political machinery of the Church while easing the religion onto its death bed with the Civil Constitution of the Clergy, but were startled to see the corpse finally wake up and begin to fight for its life before the coffin was nailed shut. In sum, it was bad politics and disastrous misunderstanding that would lead first to antagonism between the Church and the Revolution and then to the persecution of the Church by the Revolutionaries. Taking a wider view of the Revolution, Belloc says that, philosophically speaking, the ideals of the Church and the Revolution need not be mutually exclusive.
If I understand correctly, Belloc’s argument is not a condonement of all of the actions the Revolutionary government took, but separating the Terror and persecutions from the ideals of the Revolution, Belloc proposes a defense of the Revolution’s ideals in light of the political climate, national history, misunderstandings, and ignorance that led to the persecution of the Catholic Church during the Revolution, the key being that Christianity had reached such a nadir that it had become almost an incomprehensible thing to men of that period. Acting ignorantly in matters of faith, they were starting from square one in the realm of religion, and the actions they took become more understandable with this in mind.
Belloc would seem to be at odds with many other Catholic thinkers. Joseph Pearce, a biographer of Belloc, states that the ideals of the Revolution are contradictory to the Christian faith:
“As in England, the literature of nineteenth-century France was characterized by various degrees of disillusionment with the cankerous and cantankerous ideals that had led to revolution. These conflicting and confused efforts to find a new ideological synthesis are apparent in the novels of Victor Hugo, whose most famous novel, Les Miserables, conflates and confuses the self-sacrificial love of the Christian with the ideological idealism of the Revolution…Hugo, like many writers of his generation was guilty of what George Orwell would call ‘double-think,’ which might be defined as the holding of two mutually incompatible viewpoints simultaneously” (Joseph Pearce, Literature: What Every Catholic Should Know, 125).
Having recently finished Things Worth Dying For by Charles Chaput, Chaput also seems to directly contradict Belloc, citing Jesuit scholar John Courney Murray and arguing that the Revolution created and upheld a competing religion to Catholicism (Chaput, 118). So, was Belloc guilty of “double-think”? Did he suddenly become wayward when it came to the Revolution? I think that where Belloc disagrees with other conservatives is on what the French Revolution was about. Belloc maintains it was about equal, representative government while others maintain that it was more of a proto-Marxist revolution. I suppose this question would also be influenced by whether one chooses to separate the Terror from the Revolution, and whether the persecutions are an unfortunate incident or the object of the Revolution. On these interpretations, I am in no position to give any sort of informed verdict. I have briefly tried to find anything from Pearce on Belloc’s stance on the Revolution but have been fruitless in my efforts. Perhaps Pearce’s biography of Belloc addresses some of these questions. Belloc’s short biographies on the figures of French history may also shed some additional light on the topic. I would have to research both the Revolution and Belloc more to make a better decision and am eager for any input or suggestions on the topic. As it is, I am generally more partial to the American Revolution and would prefer to devote more of my energy to learning the ins and outs of that war. And that is how it should be, isn’t it? That is, I think, a part of the essence of Localsim (formerly Distributism): that a man from France ought to be concerned more with his fatherland and I ought to be more concerned with mine.
August 6, 2016
The French Revolution (1911), by Hilaire Belloc, is a comparatively short commentary on the great revolutionary experiment between the parliamentary quarrels of 1789 to the execution of Robespierre in 1794. Though the author does not attempt to present a full chronology of events, dwelling mainly on underlying ideas, the individual personalities of the main historical actor and the military aspect, he nonetheless convey a series of intriguing propositions that justify a read of this old treatise.
Belloc, being both a catholic and a republican, deals in-depth with the relationship between the political theory of democracy and of moral right, maintaining that though the former is true and legitimate in its actions, it cannot be confused with the latter, it being derived from God or what some may call “the moral sense.” It is perhaps best summarized by the expression that “if one community decides in one fashion, another, also sovereign, in the opposite fashion, both cannot be right” (page 17) – this not to be confused with genuine criticism of democratic theory itself. Still, it is interesting to see how the author ultimately (like so many of his contemporary early-20th century intellectuals) ends up praising democracy and the corporate will of the people, while simultaneously scorning the institution of representation and party politics.
Another point of interest is the – had it been publicized today – unorthodox rejection of Robespierre as the ruthless and supreme ruler of France; Belloc concluding that he was not in fact the leading influence in the Committee of Public Safety and that he was acting in accordance with a misinterpretation of public opinion, rather than radical personal convictions. This stance seems partly to be influenced by the historiography of the time, but this interpretation alone makes The French Revolution a worthwhile read.
Finally, the author dedicates a chapter to the conflict between the revolution and the Catholic Church, maintaining that this clash was not due to any inherent contradiction in the dogmas of the two ideals, but rather due to historical circumstances and the perceived unity of the Church and the State (l'Ancien Régime).
Overall, I found the book to be worth the time, though it must be read while keeping in mind the time it was written and the person who wrote it.
Belloc, being both a catholic and a republican, deals in-depth with the relationship between the political theory of democracy and of moral right, maintaining that though the former is true and legitimate in its actions, it cannot be confused with the latter, it being derived from God or what some may call “the moral sense.” It is perhaps best summarized by the expression that “if one community decides in one fashion, another, also sovereign, in the opposite fashion, both cannot be right” (page 17) – this not to be confused with genuine criticism of democratic theory itself. Still, it is interesting to see how the author ultimately (like so many of his contemporary early-20th century intellectuals) ends up praising democracy and the corporate will of the people, while simultaneously scorning the institution of representation and party politics.
Another point of interest is the – had it been publicized today – unorthodox rejection of Robespierre as the ruthless and supreme ruler of France; Belloc concluding that he was not in fact the leading influence in the Committee of Public Safety and that he was acting in accordance with a misinterpretation of public opinion, rather than radical personal convictions. This stance seems partly to be influenced by the historiography of the time, but this interpretation alone makes The French Revolution a worthwhile read.
Finally, the author dedicates a chapter to the conflict between the revolution and the Catholic Church, maintaining that this clash was not due to any inherent contradiction in the dogmas of the two ideals, but rather due to historical circumstances and the perceived unity of the Church and the State (l'Ancien Régime).
Overall, I found the book to be worth the time, though it must be read while keeping in mind the time it was written and the person who wrote it.
Read
April 18, 2020Un libro muy tecnico sobre estrategia bélica francesa. Describe los actores principales de la revolución francesa y describe las etapas de la misma. Un libro que nutre y ayuda a entender como un país con un extenso periodo de monarquia, pudo ser derrocado.
March 14, 2018
That is not the picture on my cover, so unsure if that is the exact book I read. I am a poor judge of this book as I really understood very little of it. It is due to me however. I have not had any prior exposure to this topic. I like the arrangement, how he has a small amount of information on each individual person (allows me to get a general intro to each of them to work on elaborating further on later) and how he separates out the military component (which I admit I skipped as I was having a hard enough time with the rest of the book), as well as speaking in the last chapter about the Catholic Church aspect.
April 25, 2016
This book is a concise overview of the French Revolution. Belloc lays some important foundation that helps one understand the mindset of the public at that time and why the French Revolution was able to take place. One of the interesting facts he brings out is the fact that the Church (read Catholic Church) at the time was going through a deep crisis with its clergy deeply involved in politics and greedy for wealth and living in moral decay ... for the most part. He maintains that during the 18th century, the majority of people in France looked at the Church as having no relevance to their lives and saw it as an institution based on superstition. Thus it had lost its right and its power to speak to the moral cruelties produced during the French Revolution. Belloc also maintains that the French Revolution's success was a success that laid the foundation for every other democracy in Europe. This was a very fascinating read for lovers of history.
September 13, 2025
The French Revolution by Hilaire Belloc
This book is not an ordinary history book that just gives you a detailed description of war, causes of war and its effects.
Hilaire Belloc has accepted that he is a true catholic that's why we see him bent towards catholicism. He is also a true supporter of Monarchism. That's why we can see in this book contempt against Revolution though it isn't In strong way.
He has divided revolution in many segments and then tried to learn history in an unprecedented way.
We can find many informative points in this book that will help us understand history much better.
By : Syed Muhammad Hamza
This book is not an ordinary history book that just gives you a detailed description of war, causes of war and its effects.
Hilaire Belloc has accepted that he is a true catholic that's why we see him bent towards catholicism. He is also a true supporter of Monarchism. That's why we can see in this book contempt against Revolution though it isn't In strong way.
He has divided revolution in many segments and then tried to learn history in an unprecedented way.
We can find many informative points in this book that will help us understand history much better.
By : Syed Muhammad Hamza
December 15, 2020
Explains the differing reasons behind the revolution and how church and state each played their roles. Can be difficult to follow at times and can often go down rabbit holes regarding a subject before jumping back to his original point.
February 6, 2018
Waivers between great and mediocre. Not recommended as an intro to the subject.
October 30, 2023
Not helpful to me. Too much theory and not enough names and dates, actions and consequences.
June 16, 2023
The least "Bellocian" Belloc book I have read, although it gets better as it goes along.
The very first part, about general principles, is muddled and abstract.
Next, Belloc does quick character sketches, which is something of a specialty of his.
Then, there is a long chapter about the military campaign of the European Allies against the Republican army, and why it went so contrary to expectations.
Finally, there is a chapter on the French Republic and the Catholic Church, which is the best part of the book.
The very first part, about general principles, is muddled and abstract.
Next, Belloc does quick character sketches, which is something of a specialty of his.
Then, there is a long chapter about the military campaign of the European Allies against the Republican army, and why it went so contrary to expectations.
Finally, there is a chapter on the French Republic and the Catholic Church, which is the best part of the book.
January 15, 2021
Written in 1911 by an Englishman, that being the renown historian Hilaire Belloc, it's prose at times was not the easiest. It was also rather jumpy in places and yet this was a great summary of the characters and events that took place before and during the bloody event. Although I took a class on the French Revolution in college, I'd forgotten the horrific actions of that darned Robespierre. What a jerk. The French Revolution....four stars.
January 3, 2026
Belloc hearts Robespierre too much
The book is informative enough but I find Belloc too complimentary of Robespierre and completely oblivious to the secular humanist underpinnings of the French Revolution, which could do nothing else than to put it in permanent conflict with believers in Divine Writ. I'm a bit disappointed in Belloc's credulity.
The book is informative enough but I find Belloc too complimentary of Robespierre and completely oblivious to the secular humanist underpinnings of the French Revolution, which could do nothing else than to put it in permanent conflict with believers in Divine Writ. I'm a bit disappointed in Belloc's credulity.
November 19, 2017
Good book, difficult to read.
This book presents a concise history of the French Revolution, but at times can be difficult to follow. It is a good start, but I feel like I need to read more books on the topic.
This book presents a concise history of the French Revolution, but at times can be difficult to follow. It is a good start, but I feel like I need to read more books on the topic.
March 20, 2021
This is very well written and informative. However, the author, for most of the book, goes into suffocating minute detail on the battles surrounding the French Revolution. I got so bogged down by his overwhelming detail on that particular area that I just couldn't force myself to go on.
But it is worth looking at and provides a different perspective on the French Revolution. It's very academic, though that is a plus, not a problem.
Strategists and battle buffs would appreciate it.
But it is worth looking at and provides a different perspective on the French Revolution. It's very academic, though that is a plus, not a problem.
Strategists and battle buffs would appreciate it.
April 28, 2019
Compared to a modern work is kind of disorganized and categorizes the book mostly by important people/civil politics , the military campaigns, and the catholic church. Kinda weird.
January 5, 2024
A wonderful read.
February 11, 2025
Eerie similarities to the secularization of American Culture here…
August 23, 2025
The misrepresentation of faith in politics defines the disaster of the French Revolution, wrought from imagined opposites and unsuitable alliances, foremost of which was Democracy and Catholicism.
May 18, 2019
A short pocket book summary of the lives and major events of the French Revolution, by a Fabian Society associate of H. G. Wells. Belloc was a prolific author and a leading politician in Edwardian Britain. In this often-neglected study, (complete with maps) the author makes it clear that some pre-reading of the subject is essential. He attempts to provide insights into the motives and personalities of the main protagonists and crowd-driven events. As such, the book reads like a series of notes and fragments.
The conflict that would lead so many to the guillotine began when the Commons, though divided in itself and in political minority, declared itself to be the ruling national representatives, in effect, snatching power from the weak King, Louis Seventeenth and his wife, Marie Antoinette. The Commoners secured public support from the outset by abolishing many forms of taxation, erasing thousands of debts.
Louis was slow to respond or realize the enormity of the conflict. He made plans that were never put into action, and eventually made a doomed effort to escape that would lead to execution and republicanism.
Belloc looks at the military aspects of the Revolution, touching barely on the role of Napoleon, and at the impact the secular revolt had on the persecuted Catholic Church (Belloc himself being an ardent Catholic).
There is a rather apologetic stance taken on Robespierre, the recognized arch-villain of the Reign Of Terror, arguing that he was a reluctant spokesman for the dreaded Committee Of Public Safety, rather than its outright controlling leader. Once it had turned on him and sent him to the guillotine, the Committee had lost its leader and collapsed for lack of anyone else able to take on the public role Robespierre had held.
Arthur Chappell
The conflict that would lead so many to the guillotine began when the Commons, though divided in itself and in political minority, declared itself to be the ruling national representatives, in effect, snatching power from the weak King, Louis Seventeenth and his wife, Marie Antoinette. The Commoners secured public support from the outset by abolishing many forms of taxation, erasing thousands of debts.
Louis was slow to respond or realize the enormity of the conflict. He made plans that were never put into action, and eventually made a doomed effort to escape that would lead to execution and republicanism.
Belloc looks at the military aspects of the Revolution, touching barely on the role of Napoleon, and at the impact the secular revolt had on the persecuted Catholic Church (Belloc himself being an ardent Catholic).
There is a rather apologetic stance taken on Robespierre, the recognized arch-villain of the Reign Of Terror, arguing that he was a reluctant spokesman for the dreaded Committee Of Public Safety, rather than its outright controlling leader. Once it had turned on him and sent him to the guillotine, the Committee had lost its leader and collapsed for lack of anyone else able to take on the public role Robespierre had held.
Arthur Chappell
October 20, 2021
This history of the French Revolution suffers the same problem that any history would have to face, that being that the French Revolution became more complicated as time went on. The author, Thompson, writes a great history until the death of Louis XVI and then seemingly gives up on explaining who the people are who replaced him were. This deficiency is understandable seeing as the French government went from having one person leading it to hundreds; however, the history's understandability suffers greatly.
A positive aspect of the history becomes its weakness at the end. It explains the governmental mechanics and some of the laws that the republican leaders did, which reveals just how educated and through thinking they were. That perception is important to understanding how and why the revolution went the way it did. But, in order to keep pace with the new laws and governmental mechanics the author skips out on explaining who the people are behind these machinations. For example, even big names like Desmoulins and Danton seem to come out of nowhere. The effect is a disorganized mess of an ending for the history.
I know that the book is already over 500 pages long, but a detailed history simply needs to be longer to explain so many different people and events.
A positive aspect of the history becomes its weakness at the end. It explains the governmental mechanics and some of the laws that the republican leaders did, which reveals just how educated and through thinking they were. That perception is important to understanding how and why the revolution went the way it did. But, in order to keep pace with the new laws and governmental mechanics the author skips out on explaining who the people are behind these machinations. For example, even big names like Desmoulins and Danton seem to come out of nowhere. The effect is a disorganized mess of an ending for the history.
I know that the book is already over 500 pages long, but a detailed history simply needs to be longer to explain so many different people and events.
April 19, 2012
For someone looking for a brief Birdseye view of the common French revolt beginning in 1789, The French Revolution by Hilaire Belloc could fit the bill. The book doesn’t go into much detail but lightly touches on all the essential points. The book begins with a sketch of the major personalities involved in this great historic event. Once the individuals are introduced the six phases of the revolution are explained. Then Belloc explains both the military situation and actions and then finally ending with the Catholic Church’s involvement in the monarchal regime (the old order) and the part it would and eventually did play in the post revolutionary society.
I prefer more details but this work could serve well as a preamble to someone that wants to eventually delve in the different facets more completely later. Its lack of “meat” leads me to give it only three stars (I can’t fill in 2 ½ stars). It isn’t a book for everyone.
I prefer more details but this work could serve well as a preamble to someone that wants to eventually delve in the different facets more completely later. Its lack of “meat” leads me to give it only three stars (I can’t fill in 2 ½ stars). It isn’t a book for everyone.
December 11, 2016
"That political structure—the French monarchy—seemed to be of granite and eternal. Had it indeed survived, the Church in Gaul would doubtless, in spite of its attachment to so mundane a thing as the crown, have still survived to enjoy one of those resurrections which have never failed it in the past, and would have returned, by some creative reaction, to its principle of life. But for the moment the consequence of this fixed political establishment was that scepticism, and all those other active forces of the mind which play upon religion in any Catholic State, had full opportunity. The Church was, so to speak, not concerned to defend itself but only its method of existence. It was as though a garrison, forgetting the main defences of a place, had concentrated all its efforts upon the security of one work which contained its supplies of food."- (pg. 226)
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