"St. Just refused to give way before the storm that then broke out. He stood at the tribune, says Barras, 'motionless, impassive, unconquerable, coolly defying the whole House,' until the uproar ended in his impeachment and arrest.
He showed the same demeanour during the final scenes in the Town Hall, and at the scaffold, holding his head stiffly and disdainfully to the end. He would illustrate his own portrait of the perfect revolutionist, penned a few weeks before. He would show these false patriots how to die. 'The perfect revolutionist,' he had written, 'is inflexible, but temperate and sensible. He lives simply, without affecting the luxury of false modesty. He is the irreconcilable enemy of every lie, indulgence, and affectation. Since his aim is to see the triumph of the Revolution, he never finds fault with it, but condemns its enemies without involving it in their disgrace. He educates it without ever forcing his views upon it. Jealous for its reputation, he speaks of it carefully and with respect. The equality he claims is not that of legal privilege, but that which he shares with all men, particularly the unfortunate. A revolutionist is the soul of honour. He keeps the law of his own free will, not from lack of enterprise; and because he has peace in his heart. Coarseness he regards as a sign of deceit and remorse, or as hypocrisy masked by violence. Aristocrats may speak and deal with tyrants: the revolutionist has no truck with bad men. But he is not a fool. He is so jealous for the good name of liberty and of his country that he never acts without consideration. He is eager for battle; he pursues the guilt and defends the innocent; he speaks the truth to instruct, not to compel; he knows that if the Revolution is to triumph he must be as good now as once he was bad: and his morality is not a clever pose, but something heart-felt and fundamental.'"
