But the Jacobins demanded wages; he proffered them in war.

Danton, as violent but more politic than Marat, did not cease to repeat that the revolutionists and the despots were irreconcileable, and that France had no safety to expect except from its audacity and despair.

War, according to Danton, was the baptism or the martyrdom which liberty was to undergo, like a new religion.

It was necessary to replunge France into the fire, in order to purify it from the stains and shame of its past.
Dumouriez, agreeing with La Fayette and the Feuillants, was also anxious for war; but it was as a soldier, to acquire glory, and thus crush faction.

From the first day of his ministry he negotiated so as to obtain from Austria a decisive answer.