Solve the two problems, encourage the rich and protect the poor,
suppress misery, put an end to the unjust exhaustion of the weak by
the strong, bridle the iniquitous jealousy which the man still on
the road feels for him who has reached the journey's end, adjust
mathematically and paternally the wage to the labor, blend gratuitous
and enforced education with the growth of childhood and render science
the basis of manhood, develop intelligence while occupying the arms,
be at once a powerful people and a family of happy men, democratize
property, not by abolishing but by universalizing it, so that every
citizen without exception may be a land-owner,--an easier task than
it may be supposed,--in two words, know how to produce wealth and to
distribute it, and you will possess at once material greatness and
moral greatness, and be worthy to call yourself France. Such was what
socialism, above and beyond a few mistaken sects, said; this is what it
sought in facts and stirred up in minds: they were admirable efforts
and sacred attempts!
These doctrines, theories, and resistances; the unexpected necessity
for the statesman of settling with the philosophers; glimpses caught
of confused evidences; a new policy to create, agreeing with the old
world, while not disagreeing too greatly from the revolutionary ideal,
a situation in which Lafayette must be used to defend Polignac, the
intuition of progress apparent behind the riots, the chambers, and the
street; the king's faith in the revolution; rivalries to be balanced
around him, possibly some eventual resignation sprung from the vague
acceptance of a definite and superior right; his wish to remain here,
his race, his family affections, his sincere respect for the people,
and his own honesty,--all these painfully affected Louis Philippe, and
at times, though he was so strong and courageous, crushed him beneath
the difficulty of being a king. He felt beneath his feet a formidable
disintegration, which, however, was not a crumbling to dust, as France
was more France than ever. Dark storm-clouds were collected on the
horizon; a strange, gradually increasing shadow was extended over men,
things, and ideas; it was a shadow that sprang from anger and systems.
Everything that had been hastily suppressed stirred and fermented,
and at times the conscience of the honest man held its breath, as
there was such an uneasy feeling produced by this atmosphere, in which
sophisms were mixed with truths. Minds trembled in the social anxiety,
like leaves on the approach of a storm, and the electric tension was
such that at some moments the first-comer, a stranger, would produce a
flash, but then the twilight obscurity fell over the whole scene again.
At intervals, deep and muttered rolling allowed an opinion to be formed
of the amount of lightning which the cloud must contain.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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