It was Pierre Leroux who initiated George Sand into the new, fermenting social ideas which with feminine impulsiveness she at once adopted. In his capacity of social reformer, Pierre Leroux, a metaphysician with a noble heart and a confused brain, who thought in triads in the manner of Schelling, championed equality and progress. To him progress meant approach towards equality. He was instigated to his attempts at reform by his indignation with the existing condition of society, with the equality as regarded the law, which permitted the rich man to escape the hardship of military service and the punishment due to his crime, with the liberty which consisted in the right of free competition, that is to say, the legal right of the rich to oppress the poor. Society as reorganised by Leroux was to be based on the triple nature of man. Man is constituted of perception, intuition, and cognition. To these three elements were to correspond three classes, the artisan or industrial, the artist, and the scientist class; but these three classes were not, as in Saint-Simon's imaginary society, to be castes, but were to act in unison. Three individuals or units, one from each class, were to constitute a society individual or unit; and these same three, working together, would constitute an "atelier." The "ateliers" also were to be divided into three classes, according to the activity which predominated in them, &c. When we think of all these Utopias, we cannot but admire the sane and wise attitude maintained towards them by the authors who allowed themselves to be carried away by some of the ideas inspiring the different systems. They held aloof from everything, or almost everything, that was artificial, fantastic, or absurd. They contented themselves with kindling their poetic torches at the altar fire kept alight by the pure-hearted enthusiasts; they drew inspiration from the philanthropy of these men, from their ardent championship of the poor and the oppressed, from their fervent faith in the people and in progress.