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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from The Psychology of Revolution by Gustave le Bon: name, the right of surveillance over a portion of the capital--a
right implying the power to send to the Revolutionary Tribunal,
and therefore to the guillotine, all those whom he suspected.
Certain streets were thus almost depopulated by him.
The Convention struggled feebly against the Commune at the
outset, but did not prolong its resistance. The culminating
point of the conflict occurred when the Convention wished to
arrest Hebert, the friend of the Commune, and the latter sent
armed bands who threatened the Assembly and demanded the
expulsion of the Girondists who had provoked the measure. Upon
the Convention refusing the Commune besieged it on June 2, 1798,
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