ABSTRACT
G e n e s is o f B u rk e 's Reflections 463 the events of October 5 and 6 when the mob marched to Versailles and forced the royal family to return with them to Paris. The memory of this outrage later prompted Burke in the R e fle c tio n s to write his famous effusion of feeling about Marie Antoinette. “ It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France; . . . surely never lighted on this orb . . . a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon . . . glittering like the morning star. . . . Oh! what a revolution! and what an heart must I have, to con template without emotion that elevation and that fall! . . . Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fallen upon her in a nation of gallant men! . . . I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards to avenge even a look that threat ened her with insult. ” 3
This passage was not written in the heat of immediate anger. Indeed, Burke was to keep his own sword in the scabbard for a full three months after Marie Antoinette suffered her humiliation at the hands of the Paris mob. What prompted him to draw it was the publication of Richard Price’s D is c o u r s e on th e L o v e o f O u r C ou n try . The D isc o u rse had first been delivered as an address to a meeting of the Revolution Society in November 1789. The purpose of the society was to commemorate the Revolution of 1688. The meeting of November turned into a celebration of the French Revo lution, instead. Congratulatory motions were voted and sent to the National Assembly in Paris. Price’s address closed with a passionate exultation over the fall of tyranny in France. “ What an eventful period is this! I am thankful that I have lived to see it; and I could almost say, Lord now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace for mine eyes have seen thy salvation. . . . I have lived to see Thirty millions of people, indignant and resolute, spurning at slavery, and demanding liberty with an irresistable voice; their king led in triumph, and an arbitrary monarch surrendering himself to his sub jec ts .” 4 The address was published and came into Burke’s hands in January 1790. Immediately upon reading it, he sat down and started to write preliminary notes for a public pam phlet.5
