The things we do!

The forty thousand sovereign municipalities to which the
text of the decree is read pay attention only to the first article,
and the village attorney, imbued with the rights of man, easily
proves to these assemblies of debtors that they owe nothing to their
creditors. There must be no exceptions nor distinctions: no more
annual rents, field-rents, dues on produce, nor contingent rents,
nor lord's dues and fines, or fifths.[22] If these have been
maintained by the Assembly, it is owing to misunderstanding,
timidity, inconsistency, and on all sides, in the rural districts,
the grumbling of disappointed greed or of unsatisfied necessities is
heard:[23]
"You thought that you were destroying feudalism, while your
redemption laws have done just the contrary. . . . Are you not
aware that what was called a Seigneur was simply an unpunished
usurper? . . That detestable decree of 1790 is the ruin of lease-
holders. It has thrown the villages into a state of consternation.
The nobles reap all the advantage of it.


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