A similarity of opinion with the celebrated Buffon,, occasioned such an intimacy between Bailly and. that able naturalist, that when the office of secre tary to the Academy of Sciences became vacant in 1771, Bailly offered himself as a candidate, and was supported by all the influence of Buffon. The inte rest of D'Alembert, however, was powerfully exert ed in favour of Condorcet, and-Bailly lost his elec tion. He did not, however, long enjoy the friendship of Buffon. The opposition which he made to the admission of the Abbe Maury into the French Aca demy, irritated Buffon, and dissolved the friendship which they had mutually cherished. Besides those works which we have already mentioned, Bailly com posed in the years 1781 and 1782, a work on the Fables and religious creeds of antiquity, entitled, Essai sur les Fables et sur kur. Ilistoire, two vo lumes of which were published in 1799.
In the year 178•, Bailly was elected secretary of the French Academy, and, in 1785, he was cho sen a member of the Academy of Inscriptions and Belles Lettres ; the only case since the time of Fon in which the same person was at once a mem ber of the three learned academies which then flou rished in Paris. • The public attention having been attracted to the subject of Animal Magnetism, Bailly was appointed a member of the committee for examining the miracu lous effects which were said to be produced by this new art. The report which he drew up fur the Aca demy of Sciences was translated into English, and was universally admired for the elegance of its com position, and the sound philosophy which it display ed in developing the effects produced upon the body, by the influence of moral causes.
In the year 1786, a committee was appointed by the academy, to examine a plan for a new hotel-dieu by the architect Poyet. Bailly, who was one of the number, drew up a long report, of 250 pages, which did great credit to the genius and the humanity of its author.
It would have been fortunate for Bailly had his life now terminated, when worn out with the la bours of science, and loaded with the high rewards which are reserved for genius and learning. A fatal necessity, however, dragged him from the hallowed retreats of philosophy upon the stage of public life, and compelled him to act a conspicuous and a zealous part in that bloody struggle by which his countrymen sought for the blessings of a free government. Those who have witnessed the atrocities of this barbarous re volution, and have seen it terminating in a military go vernment, more oppressive than the despotism of the House of Bourbon, may well question the prudence of a people who throw themselves loose from the whole some restraints of the law, and seek for a reforma tion of their government from the assistance of an unbridled populace, and amid the selfish tumults of contending factions. But they are not entitled to sit
in severe judgment upon the conduct of those who listened to the groans of an oppressed people, and who lent the courage of their hearts, and the vigour of their minds, to impose a salutary check upon the licentiousness of arbitrary power, and to establish, without the waste of blood, the eternal and immuta ble principles of rational freedom. Bailly was one of those true patriots, who panted for the deliverance of his country, and proffered his most ardent ex ertions in her sacred cause. On the 26th of April 1789, he was chosen secretary by the electors of Paris ; and when the states-general assembled in the same year, he was elected deputy to the Tiers Etat, or Commons, and was afterwards appointed president of that magnanimous body. When the National Assembly was constituted, Bailly was appointed president for four days. The proclamation of the king to disperse this illegal combination, bound to gether by new tics the members of the National As sembly. They resolved to assert the rights of the people ; and Bailly dictated the famous oath to the members of the Tiers Etat, " that they would resist tyrants and tyranny, and would never separate till they had obtained a free constitution." On the 15th of July 1789, the day after the surrender of the Bas tille, M. Bailly was appointed, by general acclama tion, Mayor of Paris, an office which had long been dormant. The courage which lie displayed in ful filling the duties of this high trust, was uniformly tempered with moderation ; and while in the rigorous execution of the laws, he avoided the extreme of harshness and cruelty, he never forgot the imperious duty of forwarding the views of the popular party, and baffling the plans of the court faction, who re sisted every restraint, however rational, upon despo tic power. In testimony of the high esteem in which his public conduct was held, his bust was placed with great pomp in the municipality, and likewise in the academy of sciences, where those of Lying academi cians had never before been admitted.