"To any who told me so," I replied, "I would say, that the division they complained of, arose not so much from any change in the French character, as from the false position in which many were unhappily placed at the present moment. Men's hearts are divided because they are diversely drawn aside from a common centre." "And you would say truly," said he; "but others will tell you, that regenerated France will soon dictate laws to the whole earth; that her flag will become the flag of all people--her government their government; and that their tottering monarchies will soon crumble into dust, to become part and parcel of her glorious republic." "And to these I should say, that they appeared to be in a very heavy slumber, and that the sooner they could wake out of it and shake off their feverish dreams, the better it would be for them." "But what would your inference be as to the state of the country from such reports as these?" "I should think that, as usual, truth lay between. I should neither believe that France was so united as to constitute a single-minded giant, nor so divided as to have become a mass of unconnected atoms, or a race of pigmies." "You know," he continued, "that the fashionable phrase for describing our condition at present is, that we are in _a state of transition_,--from butterflies to grubs, or from grubs to butterflies, I know not which; but to me it seems that the transition is over,--and it is high time that it should be so. The country has known neither rest nor peace for nearly half a century; and powerful as she has been and still is, she must at last fall a prey to whoever may think it worth their while to despoil her, unless she stops short while it is yet time, and strengthens herself by a little seasonable repose." "But how is this repose to be obtained?" said I. "Some of you wish to have one king, some another, and some to have no king at all. This is not a condition in which a country is very likely to find repose." "Not if each faction be of equal power, or sufficiently so to persevere in struggling for the mastery. Our only hope lies in the belief that there is no such equality. Let him who has seized the helm keep it: if he be an able helmsman, he will keep us in smooth water;--and it is no longer time for us to ask how he got his commission; let us be thankful that he happens to be of the same lineage as those to whose charge we have for so many ages committed the safety of our bark." I believe my countenance expressed my astonishment; for the old gentleman smiled and said, "Do I frighten you with my revolutionary principles?" "Indeed, you surprise me a little," I replied: "I should have thought that the rights of a legitimate monarch would have been in your opinion indefeasible."