“I utter this deadly truth with regret, but Louis must die, because the homeland has to live. Among a peaceable, free people, respected at home and abroad, you might listen to the advice being given you to be generous; but a people whose liberty is still being disputed after so many sacrifices and battles, a people in whose country the laws are still only inexorable towards the unfortunate, a people in whose country the crimes of tyranny are still subjects of dispute, such a people must want to be avenged; and the generosity for which you are being praised would resemble too much that of a society of bandits sharing out spoils.”

Speech on the Trial of Louis XVI (Dec. 3, 1792)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

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Maximilien Robespierre 78
French revolutionary lawyer and politician 1758–1794

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