JUDGE. Danton, your language is an insult to justice. The low expressions you use indicate the baseness of your soul. Moderation is the badge of innocence, and audacity that of crime. DANTON. If audacity is a crime, I speak for crime. I kiss it, and leave virtue to you, Judge: the lean kine of Pharaoh have no attraction for me. I love audacity, and I am proud of it: the audacity of a good hug. I love the huge breasts where heroes suck. The Revolution is the daughter of audacity. Audacity is what laid low the Bastille; through me, audacity urged the people of Paris against royalty; audacity it was that urged me to pick the severed head of Louis by its fat ears, and cast it in the teeth of tyrants and their God! [_The People, in great excitement, show their approval of_ DANTON.] JUDGE. All this violence proves nothing. I have made specific accusations against you, and I ask you to make specific replies, adhering to the facts. DANTON. Do you expect a revolutionary like me to make a dignified answer? My soul is like bronze in a forge. The statue of Liberty is being molded in my breast. Do you want to put me into a squirrel's cage? Do you insist on putting me through a cross-examination? Catechize me? Why, I would tear the net you want to put around me to tatters; my belly would burst the shirt! I am accused, you say! Where are my accusers? Let them show themselves, and I will cover them with the opprobrium they so richly deserve! JUDGE. Again, Danton, you are lacking in respect toward the representatives of the nation, toward the court and the sovereign people who have a right to demand an account of your actions. Marat was accused as you are accused. He did not become violent. He did not answer facts with athletic exhibitions and florid rhetoric. He tried to justify himself, and he succeeded. I can offer you no more brilliant example.