small electoral qualification, it carried out its principle to the
end, the principle of Rousseau. It deliberately refused to consider
man as he really was under its own eyes, and persisted in seeing
nothing in him but the abstract being created in books.
Consequently, with the blindness and obstinacy characteristic of a
speculative surgeon, it destroyed, in the society submitted to its
scalpel and its theories, not only the tumors, the enlargements, and
the inflamed parts of the organs, but also the organs themselves,
and even the vital governing centers around which cells arrange
themselves to recompose an injured organ. That is, the Assembly
destroyed on the one hand the time-honored, spontaneous, and lasting
societies formed by geographical position, history, common
occupations and interests, and on the other, those natural chiefs
whose name, repute, education, independence, and earnestness
designated them as the best qualified to occupy high positions. In
one direction it despoils and permits the ruin and proscription of
the superior class, the nobles, the members of Parliament, and the
upper middle class. In another it dispossesses and breaks up all
historic or natural corporations, religious congregations, clerical
bodies, provinces, parliaments, societies of art and of all other
professions and pursuits. This done, every tie or bond which holds
men together is found to be severed; all subordination and every
graduated scale of rank have disappeared. There is no longer rank
and file, or commander-in-chief. Nothing remains but individual
particles, 26 millions of equal and disconnected atoms. Never was
so much disintegrated matter, less capable of resistance, offered to
hands undertaking to mold it. Harshness and violence will be
sufficient to ensure success. These brutal hands are ready for the
work, and the Assembly which has reduced the material to powder has
likewise provided the mortar and pestle. As awkward in destruction