The word people has, by the French, been long applied to the lowest order only; it was considered by many members of the first National Assembly as lowering the Deputies to denominate them “Representans du Peuple Francais.” Mirabeau, in one of his discourses, made the following energetic observation:--“I give no weight to the signification of words, according to the absurd language of prejudice. I here speak the language of liberty, and am supported by the example of the English and of the Americans, who have always respected the name of the “People,” and have always adopted it in their declarations, in their laws, and in their politics. When Chatham compressed the charter of nations in a single expression, and pronounced the “Majesty of the People”; when the Americana opposed the natural rights of the “People,” to all the trash published against them; they showed that they understood the true signification and full energy of an expression, to which freedom gives so great a value.” (Christian Weekly.)
