Jean-Sifrein MAURY (1746-1817), prêtre, député aux Etats Généraux

Autograph manuscript of 22 pages, numbered in-8, bound with two pink cords, with erasures and annotations in the margins. Manuscript entitled "Reply of Father Maury, deputy of Picardy, to the motion of Mr. Thouret, on the ownership of clergy property, pronounced in the National Assembly, October 8, 1789". (the final vote on the motion was taken on November 2, 1789). Thus begins his speech: "Gentlemen, I come to summarize and (appreciate), a word that has been erased and replaced by (try to refute) today the objections that have been made to my principles in our last meetings, which we should make more direct and more frequent, this is the only way to shed light on the great questions that are submitted to your judgement ... I ask you, gentlemen, in advance, the favour of being heard once again, before your decision. Mr. Count de Mirabeau has been registered for several days to defend the motion of which he is the author. His plan and means of attack being unknown to me, I claim in the name of the clergy, as defendant, the right and honour to answer him. This is my first conclusion on which I beg the National Assembly to explain (from the moment), (in the margin) its intentions ...". Then explains at length the injustice of robbing the church of its property. Demonstrates that the owner of the ecclesiastical profits was not the order of the clergy, nor even the Catholic Church in general, but each parish, each diocese, each monastery, and that the owners of ecclesiastical lands are more profitable than those held by individual owners, and concludes "that commissioners of the assembly and of the clergy be appointed to consult together on the patriotic sacrifices which the clergy can make to the needs of the state ... offers four hundred million." Important, and rare manuscript eminently historical. Seal: A box with an engraved portrait of Maury dated 1789, deputy of the Baill, of Peronne at the National Assembly.