During the debate on the new Education Bill, introduced by M. de Falloux in January, 1850, Victor Hugo adversely criticized the measure as placing too much power in the hands of the clergy. He announced that he should oppose any scheme which entrusted the education of youth to the clerical party, who were always seeking to fetter the human mind. Church and State must pursue independent courses. 'Your law,' he exclaimed, directly addressing the Minister, 'is a law with a mask. It says one thing, it does another. It may bear the aspect of liberty, but it means thraldom. It is practically confiscation under the name of a deed of gift. But it is all one with your usual policy. Every time that you forge a new chain you cry, "See, here is freedom!"' During the same session Hugo appealed for mercy for the political criminals, and condemned the law of transportation, by which they were not only banished but liable to be shut up in citadels. His speech on this occasion created such a profound impression that it was afterwards printed and distributed throughout the country, and a medal was struck in honour of the orator. Troublous times were again looming over France. The protestations of Louis Napoleon that he desired to rank as a patriot only, and not as a Bonaparte, had been accepted by Victor Hugo, Louis Blanc, and others, in good faith. In his prison at Ham, he had been visited by several staunch Republicans, who believed his asseverations that he had no other end in view than the welfare of France and the consolidation of her liberties. Indeed, when the exile returned to Paris he sought out Victor Hugo, and in the most frank and unambiguous language said to him, 'What would it be for me to be Napoleon over again? Why, it would not simply be an ambition, it would be a crime. Why should you suppose me a fool? I am not a great man, and when the Republic is made I shall never follow the steps of Napoleon. As for me, I am honest; and I shall follow in the way of Washington.' It never struck the poet that his visitor protested too much. Upright and sincere himself, he liked to believe in the integrity of others, and he little dreamt that Louis Napoleon, who had sworn fidelity to the Constitution, and again and again declared himself bound by his oath, would in a short time strangle the Republic with his own hands.