social co-operation mostly went to the wall. Now it is the turn of the social instincts, and we must expect them to work themselves out to the utmost. We have to see to it that the truth to which Diderot and the rest fought their way is not meanwhile lost. The general will is itself to-day in danger of becoming a benevolent despotism, and perhaps the time will never arrive when such warnings as these will be quite out of date. When it is a question of the oppression of our fellows, we cannot always afford to wait until the offender listens to the voice of persuasion; him, at least, we must bring within “the region of police:” beyond that lies danger. “Et si j’ai quelque volonté, C’est que chacun fasse la sienne.” So Diderot wrote in some impromptu verses at a convivial gathering over which he once presided; it was a summary of his views on many matters. “I am convinced,” he wrote, “that there can be no true happiness for the human race except in a social state in which there is neither king nor magistrate, nor priest nor laws, nor _meum_ nor _tuum_, nor property in goods or land, nor vices nor virtues.” This is the anarchism that stands at the end of all social progress, but as an attainable social state it is still certainly, as Diderot adds, “diablement idéal.” He had no faith in moralization by Act of Parliament. “There will then be prostitutes?--Assuredly.--Mistresses?--Why not?--Girls seduced?--I expect there will.--Husbands and wives not always faithful?--I fear so. But at least,” he adds, “I shall be spared all those vices which misery, luxury, and poverty produce. The rest may be as it will be.”