finds a place there, and that is the desire to kill his enemies; and
these are also the State's enemies, however open or concealed, present
or future, probable or even possible. He carries this savagery and
bewilderment into politics, and hence the evil arising from his
government. Simply a brigand, he would have murdered only to rob, and
his murders would have been restricted. As representing the State,
he undertakes wholesale massacres, of which he has the means ready
at hand.--For he has not yet had time enough to take apart the old
administrative implements; at all events the minor wheels, gendarmes,
jailers, employees, book-keepers, and accountants, are always in their
places and under control. There can be no resistance on the part
of those arrested; accustomed to the protection of the laws and to
peaceable ways and times, they have never relied on defending themselves
nor ever could imagine that any one could be so summarily slain. As
to the mass, rendered incapable of any effort of its own by ancient
centralization, it remains inert and passive and lets things go their
own way.--Hence, during many long, successive days, without being
hurried or impeded, with official papers quite correct and accounts in
perfect order, a massacre can be carried out with the same impunity and
as methodically as cleaning the streets or clubbing stray dogs.[3104]
II.--The development of the ideas of killings in the mass of the party.
The morning after August 10.--The tribunal of August 17.
--The funereal fête of August 27.--The prison plot.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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