Written shortly after the revolutionary events of August 10, 1792 in which Marat became a member of the Revolutionary Communal Council and was put a candidate for the new National Convention, this campaign leaflet warns Parisians to quickly consolidate their victory or face annihilation.

‘The Friend of the People to the French Patriots’ (1792) by Jean Paul Marat Writings and Speeches. Voices of Revolt No. 2. International Publishers, New York. 1927.

Marat, who had been hunted for many years, who had to change his domicile from day to day, spending most of his time in a damp cellar, was finally elected to the Paris Communal Council. We print below a campaign document which he published early in August, 1792, at least earlier than August 10, the date of the storming of the Tuileries and the Proclamation of the Republic.

A MAN who has long lived in concealment in order to preserve himself to serve you, to-day leaves his subterranean asylum and makes the attempt to solidify the victory in your hands.

It is his desire to prove to you that he is not unworthy of your confidence, and to beg for your permission to remind you that already in the days when tyranny was in the saddle he revealed to you the vile machinations of our cruel enemies.

He predicted to you that your allies would be led to the slaughter by their treacherous generals, and the opening of the campaign was heralded by three shameful defeats; he predicted to you that the frontiers of your kingdom would be handed over to the enemy, and already the enemy has for the second time taken possession of the city of Bavay; he predicted to you that the contaminated majority of the National Assembly would continue forever to betray their country, and the treachery of their latest laws, which raised the indignation of the public to its pinnacle, was the provocation of the cruel–but, alas!–all too necessary events of this day.

He predicted to you that you would forever continue to be sold by your faithless trustees, the officials, so long as you were not able to make up your minds to cause the blood of your enemies to flow, in order to save your country.

My dear fellow-citizens, believe these words from the lips of a man who knows all the intrigues and plots, and who has not ceased for three years to watch over your safety.

The glorious day of August 10, 1792, may be a decisive one for the triumph of liberty, if you show intelligence in taking advantage of your gains. Many of the adherents of the despot have already bit the dust; your irreconcilable enemies seem thunderstruck, but they will soon have recovered from their terror and will again take the field, more formidable than ever. Think of the Chatelet trial, which was a result of the events of the night between October 5 and October 6. Tremble lest you lend an ear to the voice of a misguided compassion. After you have shed your blood in order to save your country from the abyss, tremble lest you become the victims of their secret dealings; tremble lest you be dragged from your beds by bloodthirsty soldiers in the dark of night and be cast into subterranean prisons where you will be left to your despair until they drag you to the scaffold.

I repeat, you must fear the reaction. Your enemies will not spare you when their time comes. Therefore, show no mercy now! You are lost forever if you do not hasten to strike down all the corrupt members of the city administration, of the Departments, all the unpatriotic Judges of the Peace, and the most contaminated members of the National Assembly. I say, of the National Assembly; why should any fatal prejudice, any ruinous excess of respect for them, spare the members of that body? They do not tire to tell you that, however bad the Assembly may be, it is necessary once more to obey the Assembly. This would be equivalent to asking you to assemble over the mine which lies concealed under your feet, and to entrust the safeguarding of your destiny to scoundrels who are determined to achieve your destruction. Do not forget that the National Assembly is your most dangerous enemy; once it again stands firm, it will exert every effort to destroy you; and so long as you have weapons in your hands, it will flatter you and seek to put you to sleep with false promises. It will inaugurate secret machinations in order to nullify your efforts; and if it ever is able to do so, it will hand you over to the mercies of hired camp soldiers. Do not forget the blood-bath on the Champs de Mars!

No one abhors bloodshed more than I. But, for the sake of escaping the necessity of shedding an ounce of blood, I warmly beseech you to shed a few drops of it, in order to reconcile the duties of humanity with your solicitude for the public welfare; I propose that you cause to be executed every tenth man among the counter-revolutionary members of the City Administration, the Judges of the Peace, of the Department, and of the National Assembly. If you recoil from this, then do not forget that the blood shed on this day will be a net loss and that nothing will have been achieved for liberty.

But, above all things, take the King, his wife, and his son as hostages, and let him be shown to the people four times a day until his final sentence shall have been spoken. And, since it rests with him to free us forever from our enemies, explain to him that if the Austrians and the Prussians do not retire within two weeks to a line twenty miles beyond the boundaries, never to return, his head will be sent rolling to his feet. Let him write out this frightful condemnation in his own hand and send it to his crowned accomplices; it will rest with him to free you from the necessity of executing it.

Also take possession of the persons of the former ministry and put them in irons. All the counterrevolutionary members of the Paris General Staff must be executed; all the unpatriotic officers must be banished from their battalions; disarm the infected battalions of Saint-Roche, of the Filles-Saint Thomas, of Notre-Dame, of Saint-Jean-en-Greve, of the Enfants Rouges. All patriotic citizens must be armed and supplied generously with ammunition.

Demand the convoking of a National Convention for the purpose of condemning the King and reforming the Constitution; above all, its members must not be elected by an independent body of electors, but by the direct vote of the people.

Cause the immediate sending back of all foreign and Swiss regiments to be decreed at once, for they have shown themselves to be enemies of the Revolution.

Tremble, tremble, lest you permit to pass unused a single one of the opportunities placed in your hands by the protecting genius of France, to escape from this abyss and to consolidate your liberty forever!

-From L’Ami du Peuple, August, 1792.

Writings and Speeches of Jean Paul Marat. Voices of Revolt No. 2. International Publishers, New York. 1927.

PDF of original book: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/parties/cpusa/voices-of-revolt/02-Jean-Paul-Marat-VOR-ocr.pdf