The social body, like our own, has its periods of adolescence and senility, its maladies and critical periods, while the axiom that nations have the government they deserve is attested by the fact that governments correspond to the national pathology. The individuals too who dominate in turbulent times are like straws on an impetuous stream. They merely serve to show the direction of the current and its force. Danton and Robespierre did not make the Revolution. It made them. A popular fallacy exists that the Revolution ended with the fall of Robespierre, or at any rate when Napoleon planted his artillery before the doors of the National Assembly. It is not over yet, and the men in power to-day are but straws on the surface. The French Revolution was an avatar of the revolution of the sixteenth century, or rather one of the periodical renaissances or revolts of Paganism against Christianity. No doubt many economical causes were at work in 1789 and there was an urgent need for readjustment. The _corvéable_, or what we call to-day the taxpayer, then as now, groaned and repined against the excessive burdens laid upon him. Proportion guarded, it is even true to say to-day that all tradesmen, agriculturists, and shopkeepers, all _except_ the _vendors of alcohol_, are as much crushed by taxes now as the _corvéables_ were in 1789. The moving spirit, the genius and soul of the Revolution were the Jacobin Clubs. There were organized the Civil Constitution of the Clergy, theo-philanthropy, the worship of the prostitute as Goddess of Reason, the _noyades_ and the _fusillades_ which made France a vast charnel-house. To-day the Jacobin Clubs have changed their signboards, they are now Lodges of the Grand Orient. But the spirit is unchanged. The ideal is always the same--the destruction of all revealed religion, and with it the noblest fruit of Christianity, Liberty.