cultivated mind is much better able to do this than an uncultivated
mind, and a man specially qualified than one who is not. From these
two last truths flow many other consequences, which, if the reader
deigns to reflect on them, he will have no trouble in defining.

Paris 1881.



Notes:


[1] Page XLVI of the Introduction to the Edition by Robert Lafont
in 1986 by "Les Origines de la France Contemporaine".

[2] From "HISTORIES", BOOK VI. 3. 3-4. 1 FROM LOEB'S CLASSICAL
LIBRARY, HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS.


THE ANCIENT REGIME

PREFACE BY THE AUTHOR:

ON POLITICAL IGNORANCE AND WISDOM.

In 1849, being twenty-one years of age, and an elector, I was very
much puzzled, for I had to nominate fifteen or twenty deputies, and,
moreover, according to French custom, I had not only to determine what
candidate I would vote for, but what theory I should adopt. I had to
choose between a royalist or a republican, a democrat or a