CHAPTER VII.

MY OPPOSITION.

1820-1829.

MY RETIREMENT AT THE MAISONNETTE.--I PUBLISH FOUR INCIDENTAL ESSAYS

ON POLITICAL AFFAIRS: 1. OF THE GOVERNMENT OF FRANCE SINCE THE

RESTORATION, AND OF THE MINISTRY IN OFFICE (1820); 2. OF

CONSPIRACIES AND POLITICAL JUSTICE (1821); 3. OF THE RESOURCES OF

THE GOVERNMENT AND THE OPPOSITION IN THE ACTUAL STATE OF FRANCE

(1821); 4. OF CAPITAL PUNISHMENT FOR POLITICAL OFFENCES

(1822).--CHARACTER AND EFFECT OF THESE PUBLICATIONS.--LIMITS OF MY

OPPOSITION.--THE CARBONARI.--VISIT OF M. MANUEL.--I COMMENCE MY

COURSE OF LECTURES ON THE HISTORY OF THE ORIGIN OF REPRESENTATIVE

GOVERNMENT.--ITS DOUBLE OBJECT.--THE ABBE FRAYSSINOUS ORDERS ITS

SUSPENSION.--MY HISTORICAL LABOURS.--ON THE HISTORY OF ENGLAND; ON

THE HISTORY OF FRANCE; ON THE RELATIONS AND MUTUAL INFLUENCE OF

FRANCE AND ENGLAND; ON THE PHILOSOPHIC AND LITERARY TENDENCIES OF

THAT EPOCH.--THE FRENCH REVIEW.--THE GLOBE.--THE ELECTIONS OF

1827.--MY CONNECTIONS WITH THE SOCIETY, 'HELP THYSELF AND HEAVEN

WILL HELP THEE.'--MY RELATIONS WITH THE ADMINISTRATION OF M. DE

MARTIGNAC; HE AUTHORIZES THE REOPENING OF MY COURSE OF LECTURES,

AND RESTORES MY TITLE AS A STATE-COUNCILLOR.--MY LECTURES

(1828-1830) ON THE HISTORY OF CIVILIZATION IN EUROPE AND IN

FRANCE.--THEIR EFFECT.--I AM ELECTED DEPUTY FOR LISIEUX (DECEMBER,

1829).

When I was struck from the list of State-Councillors, with

MM. Royer-Collard, Camille Jordan, and Barante, I received from all

quarters testimonies of ardent sympathy. Disgrace voluntarily

encountered, and which imposes some sacrifices, flatters political

friends and interests indifferent spectators. I determined to resume, in

the Faculty of Letters, my course of modern history. We were then at the

end of July. Madame de Condorcet offered to lend me for several months a

country-house, ten leagues from Paris, near Meulan. My acquaintance with

her had never been intimate; her political sentiments differed

materially from mine; she belonged thoroughly and enthusiastically to

the eighteenth century and the Revolution: but she possessed an elevated

character, a strong mind, and a generous heart, capable of warm

affection; a favour offered by her sincerely, and for the sole pleasure

of conferring it, might be received without embarrassment. I accepted

that which she tendered me, and with the beginning of August I

established myself at the Maisonnette, and there recommenced my literary

labours.

At that time I was strongly attached, and have ever since remained so,

to public life. Nevertheless I have never quitted it without

experiencing a feeling of satisfaction mixed with my regret, as that of

a man who throws off a burden which he willingly sustained, or who

passes from a warm and exciting atmosphere into a light and refreshing

temperature. From the first moment, my residence at the Maisonnette

pleased me. Situated halfway up a hill, immediately before it was the

little town of Meulan, with its two churches, one lately restored for

worship, the other partly in ruins and converted into a magazine; on the

right of the town the eye fell upon L'Ile Belle, entirely parcelled out

into green meadows and surrounded by tall poplar-trees; in front was

the old bridge of Meulan, and beyond it the extensive and fertile

valley of the Seine. The house, not too small, was commodious and neatly

arranged; on either side, as you left the dining-hall, were large trees

and groves of shrubs; behind and above the mansion was a garden of

moderate extent, but intersected by walks winding up the side of the

hill and bordered by flowers. At the top of the garden was a small

pavilion well suited for reading alone, or for conversation with a

single companion. Beyond the enclosure, and still ascending, were woods,

fields, other country-houses and gardens scattered on different

elevations. I lived there with my wife and my son Francis, who had just

reached his fifth year. My friends often came to visit me. In all that

surrounded me, there was nothing either rare or beautiful. It was nature

with her simplest ornaments, and family life in the most unpretending

tranquillity. But nothing was wanting. I had space, verdure, affection,

conversation, liberty, and employment,--the necessity of occupation,

that spur and bridle which human indolence and mutability so often

require. I was perfectly content. When the soul is calm, the heart full,

and the mind active, situations the most opposite to those we have been

accustomed to possess their charms, which speedily become happiness.

I sometimes went to Paris on affairs of business. I find, in a letter

which I wrote to Madame Guizot during one of these journeys, the

impressions I experienced. "At the first moment I feel pleasure at

mixing again and conversing with the world, but soon grow weary of

unprofitable words. There is no repetition more tiresome than that

which bears upon popular matters. We are eternally listening to what we

know already; we are perpetually telling others what they are as well

acquainted with as we are: this is, at the same time, insipid and

agitating. In my inaction, I prefer talking to the trees, the flowers,

the sun, and the wind. Man is infinitely superior to nature; but nature

is always equal, and inexhaustible in her monotony; we know that she

remains and must remain what she is; we never feel in her presence that

necessity of moving in advance, which makes us impatient or weary of the

society of men when they fail to satisfy this imperative demand. Who has

ever fancied that the trees ought to be red instead of green, or found

fault with the sun of today for resembling the sun of yesterday? We

demand of nature neither progress nor novelty; and this is why nature

draws us from the weariness of the world, while she brings repose from

its excitement. It is her attribute to please for ever without changing;

but immovable man becomes tiresome, and he is not strong enough to be

perpetually in motion."

In the bosom of this calm and satisfying life, public affairs, the part

I had begun to take in them, the ties of mutual opinion and friendship I

had formed, the hopes I had entertained for my country and myself,

continued nevertheless to occupy much of my attention. I became anxious

to declare aloud my thoughts on the new system under which France was

governed; on what that system had become since 1814, and what it ought

to be to keep its word and accomplish its object. Still a stranger to

the Chambers, it was there alone that I could enter personally into the

field of politics, and assume my fitting place. I was perfectly

unfettered, and at an age when disinterested confidence in the empire of

truth blends with the honest aspirations of ambition; I pursued the

success of my cause, while I hoped for personal distinction. After

residing for two months at the Maisonnette, I published, under this

title, 'On the Government of France since the Restoration, and the

Ministry now in Office,' my first oppositional treatise against the

policy which had been followed since the Duke de Richelieu, by allying

himself with the right-hand party to change the electoral law, had also

changed the seat and tendency of power.

I took up the question, or, to speak more truly, I entered into the

contest, on the ground on which the Hundred Days and the Chamber of 1815

had unfortunately placed it:--Who are to exercise, in the government of

France, the preponderating influence? the victors or the vanquished of

1789? the middle classes, elevated to their rights, or the privileged

orders of earlier times? Is the Charter the conquest of the newly

constituted society, or the triumph of the old system, the legitimate

and rational accomplishment, or the merited penalty of the revolution?

I borrow from a preface which I added last year to a new edition of my

'Course of Lectures on the History of Civilization in France,' some

lines which today, after more than forty years of experience and

reflection, convey the faithful impress of my thoughts.

"It is the blind rivalry of the high social classes, which has

occasioned the miscarriage of our efforts to establish a free

government. Instead of uniting either in defence against despotism, or

to establish practical liberty, the nobility and the citizens have

remained separate, intent on mutually excluding or supplanting each

other, and both refusing to admit equality or superiority. Pretensions

unjust in principal, and vain in fact! The somewhat frivolous pride of

the nobility has not prevented the citizens of France from rising, and

taking their place on a level with the highest in the State. Neither

have the rather puerile jealousies of the citizens hindered the nobility

from preserving the advantages of family celebrity and the long tenure

of situation. In every arranged society which lives and increases there

is an internal movement of ascent and acquisition. In all systems that

are destined to endure, a certain hierarchy of conditions and ranks

establishes and perpetuates itself. Justice, common sense, public

advantage, and private interest, when properly understood, all require a

reciprocal acknowledgment of these natural facts of social order. The

different classes in France have not known how to adopt this skilful

equity. Thus they have endured, and have also inflicted on their

country, the penalty of their irrational egotism. For the vulgar

gratification of remaining, on the one side insolent, on the other

envious, nobles and citizens have continued much less free, less

important, less secure in their social privileges, than they might have

been with a little more justice, foresight, and submission to the divine

laws of human associations. They have been unable to act in concert, so

as to become free and powerful together; and consequently they have

given up France and themselves to successive revolutions."

In 1820, we were far from this free and impartial appreciation of our

political history and the causes of our disasters. Re-engaged for five

years in the track of the old rivalries of classes and the recent

struggles of revolution, we were entirely occupied with the troubles and

dangers of the moment, and anxious to conquer, without bestowing much

thought on the price or future embarrassments of victory. I upheld with

enthusiasm the cause of the new society, such as the Revolution had made

it, holding equality in the eye of the law as the first principle, and

the middle classes as the fundamental element. I elevated this cause,

already so great, by carrying it back to the past, and by discovering

its interests and vicissitudes in the entire series of our history. I

have no desire to palliate my thoughts or words. "For more than thirteen

centuries," I said, "France has comprised two races, the victors and the

vanquished. For more than thirteen centuries, the beaten race has

struggled to throw off the yoke of its conquerors. Our history is the

history of this contest. In our own days, a decisive battle has been

fought. That battle is called the Revolution.... The result was not

doubtful. Victory declared for those who had been so long subdued. In

turn they conquered France, and in 1814 were in possession beyond

dispute. The Charter acknowledged this fact, proclaimed that it was

founded on right, and guaranteed that right by the pledge of

representative government. The King, by this single act, established

himself as the chief of the new conquerors. He placed himself in their

ranks and at their head, engaging himself to defend with them, and for

them, the conquests of the Revolution, which were theirs. The Charter

implied such an engagement, beyond all question; for war was on the

point of recommencing. It was easy to foresee that the vanquished party

would not tamely submit to their defeat. Not that it reduced them to the

condition to which they had formerly humiliated their adversaries; they

found rights, if they lost privileges, and, while falling from high

supremacy, might repose on equality; but great masses of men will not

thus abdicate human weakness, and their reason ever remains far in the

rear of their necessity. All that preserved or restored to the ancient

possessors of privilege a gleam of hope, urged and tempted them to grasp

it. The Restoration could not fail to produce this effect. The fall of

privilege had entrained the subversion of the throne; it might be hoped

that the throne would restore privilege with its own re-establishment.

How was it possible not to cherish this hope? Revolutionary France held

it in dread. But even if the events of 1814 had not effected the

Restoration, if the Charter had been given to us from another source and

by a different dynasty, the mere establishment of the representative

system, the simple return to liberty, would have sufficed to inflame and

rouse up once more to combat the old race, the privileged orders. They

exist amongst us; they live, speak, circulate, act, and influence from

one end of France to the other. Decimated and scattered by the

Convention, seduced and kept under by Napoleon, as soon as terror and

despotism cease (and neither are durable) they re-appear, resume

position, and labour to recover all that they have lost.... We have

conquered the old system, we shall always conquer it; but for a long

time still we shall have to combat with it. Whoever wishes to see

constitutional order established in France, free elections, independent

Chambers, a tribune, liberty of the press, and all other public

liberties, must abandon the idea that, in this perpetual and animated

manifestation of all society, the counter-revolution can remain mute and

inactive."

At the very moment when I recapitulated, in terms so positive and

forcible, the situation in which the Revolution, the Restoration, and

the Charter had placed France, I foresaw that my words and ideas might

be perverted to the advantage of revolutionary passions; and to confine

them within their just interpretation, I hastened to add, "In saying

that, since the origin of our monarchy, the struggle between two races

has agitated France, and that the Revolution has been merely the triumph

of new conquerors over the ancient possessors of power and territory, I

have not sought to establish any historical filiation, or to maintain

that the double fact of conquest and servitude was perpetual, constant,

and identical through all ages. Such an assertion would be evidently

falsified by realities. During this long progression of time, the

victors and the vanquished, the possessors and the possessions--the two

races, in fact--have become connected, displaced, and confounded; in

their existence and relations they have undergone innumerable

vicissitudes. Justice, the total absence of which would speedily

annihilate all society, has introduced itself into the effects of power.

It has protected the weak, restrained the strong, regulated their

intercourse, and has progressively substituted order for violence, and

equality for oppression. It has rendered France, in fact, such as the

world has seen her, with her immeasurable glory and her intervals of

repose. But it is not the less true that throughout thirteen centuries,

by the result of conquest and feudalism, France has always retained two

positions, two social classes, profoundly distinct and unequal, which

have never become amalgamated or placed in a condition of mutual

understanding and harmony; which have never ceased to combat, the one to

conquer right, the other to retain privilege. In this our history is

comprised; and in this sense I have spoken of two races, victors and

vanquished, friends and enemies; and of the war, sometimes open and

sanguinary, at others internal and purely political, which these two

conflicting interests have mutually waged against each other."

On reading over these pages at the present day, and my entire work of

1820, I retain the impression, which I still desire to establish. On

examining things closely and by themselves, as an historian and

philosopher, I scarcely find any passage to alter. I continue to think

that the general ideas therein expressed are just, the great social

facts properly estimated, the political personages well understood and

drawn with fidelity. As an incidental polemic, the work is too positive

and harsh; I do not sufficiently consider difficulties and clouds; I

condemn situations and parties too strongly; I require too much from

men; I have too little temperance, foresight, and patience. At that time

I was too exclusively possessed by the spirit of opposition.

Even then I suspected this myself; and perhaps the success I obtained

inspired the doubt. I am not naturally disposed to opposition; and the

more I have advanced in life, the more I have become convinced that it

is a part too easy and too dangerous. Success demands but little merit,

while considerable virtue is requisite to resist the external and innate

attractions. In 1820, I had as yet only filled an indirect and secondary

position under the Government; nevertheless I fully understood the

difficulty of governing, and felt a degree of repugnance in adding to it

by attacking those to whom power was delegated. Another conviction began

also from that time to impress itself upon me. In modern society, when

liberty is displayed, the strife becomes too unequal between the party

that governs and those who criticize Government. With the one rests all

the burden and unlimited responsibility; nothing is looked over or

forgiven: with the others there is perfect liberty and no

responsibility; everything that they say or do is accepted and

tolerated. Such is the public disposition, at least in France as soon as

we become free. At a later period, and when in office, I endured the

weight of this myself; but I may acknowledge without any personal

reluctance, that while in Opposition I first perceived the unjust and

injurious tendency of this feeling.

By instinct, rather than from any reflective or calculated intention, I

conceived the desire, as soon as I had committed an act of declared

hostility, of demonstrating what spirit of government was not foreign to

my own views. Many sensible men inclined to think that from the

representative system, in France at least, and in the state in which

the Revolution had left us, no sound plan could emanate, and that our

ardent longings for free institutions were only calculated to enervate

power and promote anarchy. The Revolutionary and Imperial eras had

naturally bequeathed this idea; France had only become acquainted with

political liberty by revolutions, and with order by despotism; harmony

between them appeared to be a chimera. I undertook to prove, not only

that this chimera of great minds might become a reality, but that the

realization depended upon ourselves; for the system founded by the

Charter alone contained, for us, the essential means of regular

government and of effective opposition, which the sincere friends of

power and liberty could desire. My work, entitled, 'On the Means of

Government and Opposition in the Actual State of France,' was entirely

dedicated to this object.

In that treatise I entered into no general or theoretic exposition of

policy, the idea of which I expressly repudiated. "Perhaps," I said, in

my preface, "I may on some future occasion discuss more general

questions of predominant interest in regard to the nature and principles

of constitutional government, although their solution has nothing to do

with existing politics, with the events and actors of the moment. I wish

now to speak only of power as it is, and of the best method of governing

our great and beautiful country." Entirely a novice and doctrinarian as

I then was, I forgot that the same maxims and arts of government must be

equally good everywhere, and that all nations and ages are, at the same

moment, cast in a similar mould. I confined myself sedulously to my own

time and country, endeavouring to show what effective means of

government were included in the true principles and regular exercise of

the institutions which France held from the Charter, and how they might

be successfully put in practice for the legitimate advantage and

strengthening of power. With respect to the means of opposition, I

followed the same line of argument, convinced myself, and anxious to

persuade the adversaries of the then dominant policy, that authority

might be controlled without destroying it, and that the rights of

liberty might be exercised without shaking the foundations of

established order. It was my strong desire and prepossession to elevate

the political arena above the revolutionary track, and to imbue the

heart of the constitutional system with ideas of strong and legal

conservatism.

Thirty-six years have since rolled on. During this long interval I

participated, for eighteen of those years, in the efforts of my

generation for the establishment of a free government. For some time I

sustained the weight of this labour. That government has been

overthrown. Thus I have myself experienced the immense difficulty, and

endured the painful failure, of this great enterprise. Nevertheless, and

I say it without sceptical hesitation or affected modesty, I read over

again today what I wrote in 1821, upon the means of government and

opposition in the actual state of France, with almost unmingled

satisfaction. I required much from power, but nothing, I believe, that

was not both capable and necessary of accomplishment. And

notwithstanding my young confidence, I remembered, even then, that other

conditions were essential to success. "I have no intention," I wrote,

"to impute everything to, and demand everything from, power itself. I

shall not say to it, as has often been said, 'Be just, wise, firm, and

fear nothing;' power is not free to exercise this inherent and

individual excellence. It does not make society, it finds it; and if

society is impotent to second power, if the spirit of anarchy prevails,

if the causes of dissolution exist in its own bosom, power will operate

in vain; it is not given to human wisdom to rescue a people who refuse

to co-operate in their own safety."

When I published these two attacks upon the attitude and tendencies of

the Cabinet, conspiracies and political prosecutions burst forth from

day to day, and entailed their tragical consequences. I have already

said what I thought on the plots of that epoch, and why I considered

them as ill based, as badly conducted, without legitimate motives or

effectual means. But while I condemned them, I respected the sincere and

courageous devotion of so many men, the greater part of whom were very

young, and who, though mistaken, lavished the treasures of their minds

and lives upon a cause which they believed to be just. Amongst the

trials of our time, I scarcely recognize any more painful than that of

these conflicting feelings, these perplexities between esteem and

censure, condemnation and sympathy, which I have so often been compelled

to bestow on the acts of so many of my contemporaries. I love harmony

and light in the human soul as well as in human associations; and we

live in an epoch of confusion and obscurity, moral as well as social.

How many men have I known, who, gifted with noble qualities, would in

other times have led just and simple lives, but who, in our days,

confounded in the problems and shadows of their own thoughts, have

become ambitious, turbulent, and fanatical, not knowing either how to

attain their object or how to continue in repose!

In 1820, although still young myself, I lamented this agitation of minds

and destinies, almost as sad to contemplate as fatal to be engaged in;

but while deploring it, I was divided between severe judgment and

lenient emotion, and, without seeking to disarm power in its legitimate

defence, I felt a deep anxiety to inspire it with generous and prudent

equity towards such adversaries.

A true sentiment does not readily believe itself impotent. The two works

which I published in 1821 and 1822, entitled, the first, 'On

Conspiracies and Political Justice,' and the second, 'On Capital

Punishment for Political Offences,' were not, on my part, acts of

opposition; I endeavoured to divest them of this character. To mark

distinctly their meaning and object, it will suffice for me to repeat

their respective epigraphs. On the title-page of the first I inscribed

this passage from the prophet Isaiah: "Say ye not, _a confederacy_, to

all them to whom this people shall say, _a confederacy_;" and on that of

the second, the words of St. Paul: "O death, where is thy sting? O

grave, where is thy victory?" What I chiefly desired was to convince

power itself that sound policy and true justice called for very rare

examples of trial and execution in political cases; and that in

exercising against all offenders the utmost severity of the laws, it

created more perils than it subdued. Public opinion was in accordance

with mine; sensible and independent men, taking no part in the passions

of the parties engaged in this struggle, found, as I did, that there was

excess in the action of the police with reference to these plots, excess

in the number and severity of the prosecutions, excess in the

application of legal penalties. I carefully endeavoured to restrain

these complaints within their just limits, to avoid all injurious

comparisons, all attempts at sudden reforms, and to concede to power its

necessary weapons. While discussing these questions, which had sprung up

in the bosom of the most violent storms, I sought to transfer them to an

elevated and temperate region, convinced that by that course alone my

ideas and words would acquire any permanent efficacy. They obtained the

sanction of a much more potent ally than myself. The Court of Peers,

which at that time had assumed the place assigned to it by the Charter,

in judgment on political prosecutions, immediately began to exercise

sound policy and true discrimination. It was a rare and imposing sight,

to behold a great assembly, essentially political in origin and

composition,--a faithful supporter of authority; and at the same time

sedulously watchful, not only to elevate justice above the passions of

the moment, and to administer it with perfect independence, but also to

apply, in the appreciation and punishment of political offences, that

intelligent equity which alone could satisfy the reason of the

philosopher and the charity of the Christian. A part of the honour due

to this grand exhibition belongs to the authorities the time, who not

only made no attempt to interfere with the unshackled impartiality of

the Court of Peers, but refrained even from objection or complaint.

Next to the merit of being themselves, and through their own

convictions, just and wise, it is a real act of wisdom on the part of

the great ones of the earth, when they adopt without murmur or

hesitation the good which has not originated with themselves.

I have lived in an age of political plots and outrages, directed

alternately against the authorities to whom I was in opposition and

those I supported with ardour. I have seen conspiracies occasionally

unpunished, and at other times visited by the utmost rigour of the law.

I feel thoroughly convinced that in the existing state of feelings,

minds, and manners, the punishment of death in such cases is an

injurious weapon which heavily wounds the power that uses it for safety.

It is not that this penalty is without denunciatory and preventive

efficacy; it terrifies and holds back from conspiracies many who would

otherwise be tempted to engage in them. But by the side of this salutary

consequence, it engenders others which are most injurious. Drawing no

line of distinction between the motives and dispositions which have

incited men to the acts it punishes, it stifles in the same manner the

reprobate and the dreamer, the criminal and the enthusiast, the wildly

ambitious and the devotedly fanatical. By this gross indifference, it

offends more than it satisfies moral feeling, irritates more than it

restrains, moves indifferent spectators to pity, and appears to those

who are interested an act of war falsely invested with the forms of a

decree of justice. The intimidation which it conveys at first,

diminishes from day to day; while the hatred and thirst of vengeance it

inspires become hourly more intense and expansive; and at last the time

arrives when the power which fancies itself saved is exposed to the

attacks of enemies infinitely more numerous and formidable than those

who have been previously disposed of.

A day will also come, I confidently feel, when, for offences exclusively

political, the penalties of banishment and transportation, carefully

graduated and applied, will be substituted in justice as well as in fact

for the punishment of death. Meanwhile I reckon, amongst the most

agreeable reminiscences of my life, the fact of my having strenuously

directed true justice and good policy to this subject, at a moment when

both were seriously compromised by party passions and the dangers to

which power was exposed.

These four works, published successively within the space of two years,

attracted a considerable share of public attention. The leading members

of Opposition in the two Chambers thanked me as for a service rendered

to the cause of France and free institutions. "You win battles for us

without our help," said General Foy to me. M. Royer-Collard, in pointing

out some objections to the first of these Essays ('On the Government of

France since the Restoration'), added, "Your book is full of truths; we

collect them with a shovel." I repeat without hesitation these

testimonies of real approbation. When we seriously undertake to advocate

political measures, either in speeches or publications, it becomes most

essential to attain our object. Praise is doubly valuable when it

conveys the certainty of success. This certainty once established, I

care little for mere compliments, from which a certain degree of

puerility and ridicule is inseparable; sympathy without affected words

has alone a true and desirable charm. I had a right to set some value on

that which the Opposition evinced towards me; for I had done nothing to

gratify the passions or conciliate the prejudices and after-thoughts

which fermented in the extreme ranks of the party.

I had as frankly supported royalty, as I had opposed the Cabinet; and it

was evident that I had no desire to consign either the House of Bourbon

or the Charter to their respective enemies.

Two opportunities soon presented themselves of explaining myself on this

point in a more personal and precise manner. In 1821, a short time after

the publication of my 'Essay on Conspiracies and Political Justice,' one

of the leaders of the conspiring faction, a man of talent and honour,

but deeply implicated in secret societies, that inheritance of

tyrannical times which becomes the poison of freedom, came to see me,

and expressed with much warmth his grateful acknowledgments. The boldest

conspirators feel gratified, when danger threatens, by shielding

themselves under the principles of justice and moderation professed by

men who take no part in their plots. We conversed freely on all topics.

As he was about to leave me, my visitor, grasping me by the arm,

exclaimed, "Become one of ours!"--"Who do you call yours?"--"Enter with

us into the _Charbonnerie_; it is the only association capable of

overthrowing the Government by which we are humiliated and

oppressed."--I replied, "You deceive yourself, as far as I am concerned;

I do not feel humiliation or oppression either for myself or my

country."--"What can you hope from the people now in power?"--"It is not

a question of hope; I wish to preserve what we possess; we have all we

require to establish a free government for ourselves. Actual power

constantly calls for resistance. In my opinion it does so at this

moment, but not to the extent of being subverted. It is very far from

having done anything to give us either the right or the means of

proceeding to that extremity. We have legal and public arms in abundance

to produce reform by opposition. I neither desire your object nor your

method of attaining it; you will bring much mischief on all, yourselves

included, without success; and if you should succeed, matters would be

still worse."

He went away without anger, for he felt a friendship for me; but I had

not in the slightest degree shaken his passion for plots and secret

societies. It is a fever which admits of no cure, when the soul is once

given up to it, and a yoke not to be thrown off when it has been long

endured.

A little later, in 1822, when the publications I have spoken of had

produced their effect, I received one day a visit from M. Manuel. We had

occasionally met at the houses of mutual friends, and lived on terms of

good understanding without positive intimacy. He evidently came to

propose closer acquaintanceship, with an openness in which perhaps the

somewhat restricted character of his mind was as much displayed as the

firmness of his temperament; he passed at once from compliments to

confidence, and, after congratulating me on my opposition, opened to me

the full bearing of his own. He neither believed in the Restoration nor

the Charter, held the House of Bourbon to be incompatible with the

France of the Revolution, and looked upon a change of dynasty as a

necessary consequence of the total alteration in the social system. He

introduced, in the course of our interview, the recent death of the

Emperor Napoleon, the security which thence resulted to the peace of

Europe, and the name of Napoleon II. as a possible and perhaps the best

solution of the problems involved in our future. All this was expressed

in guarded but sufficiently definite terms, equally without passion or

circumlocution, and with a marked intention of ascertaining to what

extent I should admit or reject the prospects on which he enlarged. I

was unprepared, both for the visit and the conversation; but I stood on

no reserve, not expecting to convert M. Manuel to my own views, and with

no desire to conceal mine from him. "Far from thinking," I said in

reply, "that a change of dynasty is necessary for France, I should look

upon it as a great misfortune and a formidable peril. I consider the

Revolution of 1789 to be satisfied as well as finished. In the Charter

it possesses all the guarantees that its interests and legitimate

objects require. I have no fear of a counter-revolution. We hold against

it the power of right as well as of fact; and if people were ever mad

enough to attempt it, we should always find sufficient strength to

arrest their progress. What France requires at present is to expel the

revolutionary spirit which still torments her, and to exercise the free

system of which she is in full possession. The House of Bourbon is

extremely well suited to this double exigence of the country. Its

government is anti-revolutionary by nature, and liberal through

necessity. I should much dread a power which, while maintaining order,

would either in fact or appearance be sufficiently revolutionary to

dispense with being liberal. I should be apprehensive that the country

would too easily lend itself to such a rule. We require to be a little

uneasy as regards our interests, that we may learn how to maintain our

rights. The Restoration satisfies while it keeps us on our guard. It

acts at the same time as a spur and a bridle. Both are good for us. I

know not what would happen if we were without either." M. Manuel pressed

me no longer; he had too much sense to waste time in useless words. We

continued to discourse without further argument, and parted thinking

well, I believe, of each other, but both thoroughly satisfied that we

should never act in concert.

While engaged in the publication of these different treatises, I was

also preparing my course of lectures on Modern History, which I

commenced on the 7th of December, 1820. Determined to make use of the

two influential organs with which public instruction and the press

supplied me, I used them nevertheless in a very different manner. In my

lectures, I excluded all reference to the circumstances, system, or acts

of the Government; I checked every inclination to attack or even to

criticize, and banished all remembrance of the affairs or contests of

the moment. I scrupulously restrained myself within the sphere of

general ideas and by-gone facts. Intellectual independence is the

natural privilege of science, which would be lost if converted into an

instrument of political opposition. For the effective display of

different liberties, it is necessary that each should be confined within

its own domain; their strength and security depend on this prudent

restraint.

While imposing on myself this line of conduct, I did not evade the

difficulty. I selected for the subject of my course the history of the

old political institutions of Christian Europe, and of the origin of

representative government, in the different forms in which it had been

formerly attempted, with or without success. I touched very closely, in

such a subject, on the flagrant embarrassments of that contemporaneous

policy to which I was determined to make no allusion. But I also found

an obvious opportunity of carrying out, through scientific paths alone,

the double object I had in view. I was anxious to combat revolutionary

theories, and to attach interest and respect to the past history of

France. We had scarcely emerged from the most furious struggle against

that old French society, our secular cradle; our hearts, if not still

overflowing with anger, were indifferent towards it, and our minds were

confusedly imbued with the ideas, true or false, under which it had

fallen. The time had come for clearing out that arena covered with

ruins, and for substituting, in thought as in fact, equity for

hostility, and the principles of liberty for the arms of the Revolution.

An edifice is not built with machines of war; neither can a free system

be founded on ignorant prejudices and inveterate antipathies. I

encountered, at every step throughout my course, the great problems of

social organization, under the name of which parties and classes

exchanged such heavy blows,--the sovereignty of the people and the

right divine of kings, monarchy and republicanism, aristocracy and

democracy, the unity or division of power, the various systems of

election, constitution, and action of the assemblies called to

co-operate in government. I entered upon all these questions with a firm

determination to sift thoroughly the ideas of our own time, and to

separate revolutionary excitement and fantasies from the advances of

justice and liberty, reconcilable with the eternal laws of social order.

By the side of this philosophic undertaking, I pursued another,

exclusively historical; I endeavoured to demonstrate the intermitting

but always recurring efforts of French society to emerge from the

violent chaos in which it had been originally formed, sometimes produced

by the conflict, and at others by the accordance of its different

elements--royalty, nobility, clergy, citizens, and people,--throughout

the different phases of that harsh destiny, and the glorious although

incomplete development of French civilization, such as the Revolution

had compiled it after so many combats and vicissitudes. I particularly

wished to associate old France with the remembrance and intelligence of

new generations; for there was as little sense as justice in decrying or

despising our fathers, at the very moment when, equally misled in our

time, we were taking an immense step in the same path which they had

followed for so many ages.

I expounded these ideas before an audience little disposed to adopt or

even to take any interest in them. The public who at that time attended

my lectures were much less numerous and varied than they became some

years later. They consisted chiefly of young men, pupils of the

different scientific schools, and of a few curious amateurs of great

historical disquisitions. The one class were not prepared for the

questions I proposed, and wanted the preparatory knowledge which would

have rendered them acceptable. With many of the rest, preconceived ideas

of the eighteenth century and the Revolution, in matters of historical

and political philosophy, had already acquired that strength, derived

from inveterate habit, which rejects discussion, and listens coldly and

distrustfully to all that differs from their own opinions. Others again,

and amongst these were the most active and accessible dispositions, were

more or less engaged in the secret societies, hostile intrigues and

plots. With these, my opposition was considered extremely supine. I had

thus many obstacles to surmount, and many conversions to effect, before

I could bring over to my own views the small circle that listened to my

arguments.

But there is always, in a French audience, whatever may be their

prejudices, an intellectual elasticity, a relish for efforts of the mind

and new ideas boldly set forward, and a certain liberal equity, which

disposes them to sympathize, even though they may hesitate to admit

conviction. I was at the same time liberal and anti-revolutionary,

devoted to the fundamental principles of the new French social system,

and animated by an affectionate respect for our ancient reminiscences. I

was opposed to the ideas which constituted the political faith of the

greater portion of my auditors. I propounded others which appeared

suspicious to them, even while they seemed just; they considered me as

made up of obscurities, contradictions, and prospective views, which

astonished and made them hesitate to follow me. At the same time they

felt that I was serious and sincere; they became gradually convinced

that my historic impartiality was not indifference, nor my political

creed a leaning towards the old system, nor my opposition to every kind

of subversive plot a truckling complaisance for power. I gained ground

in the estimation of my listeners: some amongst the most distinguished

came decidedly over to my views; others began to entertain doubts on the

soundness of their theories and the utility of their conspiring

practices; nearly all agreed with my just appreciation of the past, and

my recommendation of patient and legal opposition to the mistakes of the

present. The revolutionary spirit in this young and ardent section of

the public was visibly on the decline, not from scepticism and apathy,

but because other ideas and sentiments occupied its place in their

hearts, and drove it out to make room for their own admission.

The Cabinet of 1822 thought differently. It looked upon my lectures as

dangerous; and on the 12th of October in that year, the Abbe

Frayssinous, who a few months before had been appointed by M. de Villele

Head Master of the University, commanded me to suspend them. I made no

complaint at the time, and I am not now astonished at the measure. My

opposition to the Ministry was unconcealed, and although not in the

slightest degree mixed up with my course of public instruction, many

persons were unable to separate as distinctly as I did, in their

impressions, my lectures on the history of past ages from my writings

against the policy of the day. I am equally convinced that the

Government, by sanctioning this proceeding, deceived itself to its own

detriment. In the struggle which it maintained with the spirit of

revolution, the ideas I propagated in my teaching were more salutary

than the opposition I carried on through the press was injurious; they

added more strength to the monarchy, than my criticisms on incidental

questions and situations could abstract from the Cabinet. But my free

language disturbed the blind partisans of absolute power in the Church

and State, and the Abbe Frayssinous, short-witted and weak though

honest, obeyed with inquietude rather than reluctance the influences

whose extreme violence he dreaded without condemning their exercise.

In the division of the monarchical parties, that which I had opposed

plunged more and more into exclusive and extreme measures. My lectures

being interdicted, all immediate political influence became impossible

to me. To struggle, beyond the circle of the Chambers, against the

existing system, it was necessary either to conspire, or to descend to a

blind, perverse, and futile opposition. Neither of these courses were

agreeable; I therefore completely renounced all party contentions, even

philosophical and abstracted, to seek elsewhere the means of still

mentally serving my cause with reference to the future.

There is nothing more difficult and at the same time more important in

public life, than to know how at certain moments to resign ourselves to

inaction without renouncing final success, and to wait patiently without

yielding to despair.

It was at this epoch that I applied myself seriously to the study of

England, her institutions, and the long contests on which they were

founded. Enthusiastically devoted to the political future of my own

country, I wished to learn accurately through what realities and

mistakes, by what persevering efforts and prudent acts, a great nation

had succeeded in establishing and preserving a free government. When we

compare attentively the history and social development of France and

England, we find it difficult to decide by which we ought to be most

impressed,--the differences or the resemblances. Never have two

countries, with origin and position so totally distinct, been more

deeply associated in their respective destinies, or exercised upon each

other, by the alternate relations of peace and war, such continued

influence. A province of France conquered England; England for a long

time held possession of several provinces of France; and on the

conclusion of this national strife, already the institutions and

political wisdom of the English were, with the most political spirits of

the French, with Louis XI. and Philip de Comines, for example, subjects

of admiration. In the bosom of Christianity the two nations have served

under different religious standards; but this very distinction has

become between them a new cause of contact and intermixture. In England

the French Protestants, and in France the persecuted English Catholics,

have sought and found an asylum. And when kings have been proscribed in

their turn, in France the monarch of England, and in England the

sovereign of France, was received and protected. From these respective

havens of safety, Charles II., in the seventeenth century, and Louis

XVIII. in the nineteenth, departed to resume their dominions. The two

nations, or, to speak more correctly, the high classes of the two

nations, have mutually adopted ideas, manners, and fashions from each

other. In the seventeenth century, the court of Louis XIV. gave the tone

to the English aristocracy. In the eighteenth, Paris went to London in

search of models. And when we ascend above these historical incidents to

consider the great phases of civilization in the two countries, we find

that, after considerable intervals in the course of ages, they have

followed nearly the same career; and that similar attempts and

alternations of order and revolution, of absolute power and liberty,

have occurred in both, with singular coincidences and equally remarkable

distinctions.

It is, therefore, on a very superficial and erroneous survey that some

persons look upon French and English society as so essentially

different, that the one could not draw political examples from the other

except by factitious and barren imitations. Nothing is more completely

falsified by true history, and more opposed to the natural bias of the

two countries. Their very rivalries have never broken the ties, apparent

or concealed, that exist between them; and, whether they know or are

ignorant of it, whether they acknowledge or deny the fact, they cannot

avoid being powerfully acted upon, by each other; their ideas, their

manners, and their institutions intermingle and modify mutually, as if

by an amicable necessity.

Let me at the same time admit, without hesitation, that we have

sometimes borrowed from England too completely and precipitately. We

have not sufficiently calculated the true character and social condition

of French society. France has increased and prospered under the

influence of royalty seconding the ascending movement of the middle

classes; England, by the action of the landed aristocracy, taking under

its charge the liberties of the people. These distinctions are too

marked to disappear, even under the controlling uniformity of modern

civilization. We have too thoroughly forgotten them. It is the rock and

impediment in the way of innovations accomplished under the name of

general ideas and great examples, that they do not assume their

legitimate part in real and national facts. But how could we have

escaped this rock? In the course of her long existence, ancient France

has made, at several regular intervals, great efforts to obtain free

government. The most powerful influences have either resisted, or failed

in the attempt; her best institutions have not co-operated with the

necessary changes, or have remained politically ineffective;

nevertheless, by a just sentiment of her honour as of her interest,

France has never ceased to aspire to a true and permanent system of

political guarantees and liberties. She demanded and desired this system

in 1789. Through what channels was it sought? From what institution was

it expected? So often deceived in her hopes and attempts within, she

looked beyond home for lessons and models,--a great additional obstacle

to a work already so difficult, but an inevitable one imposed by

necessity.

In 1823, I was far from estimating the obstacles which beset us in our

labour of constitutional organization as correctly as I do now. I was

impressed with the idea that our predecessors of 1789 had held old

France, her social traditions and her habits, in too much contempt; and

that to bring back harmony with liberty into our country, we ought to

lay more stress on our glorious past. At the same moment, therefore,

when I placed before the eyes of the French public the history and

original monuments of the institutions and revolutions of England, I

entered with ardour into the study and exposition of the early state of

French society, its origin, laws, and different gradations of

development. I was equally desirous to give to my readers information on

a great foreign history, and to revive amongst them a taste and

inclination for the study of our own.

My labours were certainly in accord with the instincts and requirements

of the time; for they were received and seconded by the general movement

which then manifested itself in the public mind, and with reference to

the Government so much a subject of dispute. It is the happy tendency of

the French temperament to change the direction of its course without

slackening speed. It is singularly flexible, elastic, and prolific. An

obstacle impedes it, it opens another path; if burdened by fetters, it

still walks on while bearing them; if restrained on a given point, it

leaves it, and rebounds elsewhere. The Government of the right-hand

party restrained political life and action within a narrow circle, and

rendered them more difficult; the generation which was then beginning to

stir in the world, sought, not entirely independent of, but side by side

with politics, the employment of its strength and the gratification of

its desires: literature, philosophy, history, policy, and criticism

assumed a new and powerful flight. While a natural and unfortunate

reaction brought back into the field of combat the eighteenth century

with its old weapons, the nineteenth displayed itself with its original

ideas, tendencies, and features.

I do not quote particular names; those which deserve to be remembered

require no repetition; it is the general character of the intellectual

movement of the period that I wish to bring into light. This movement

was neither exclusively nor directly applied to politics, yet it was

from politics that it emanated; it was both literary and philosophic:

the human mind, disengaging itself from the interests and disputes of

the day, pressed forward through every path that presented itself, in

the search and enjoyment of the true and beautiful; but the first

impulse came from political liberty, and the hope of contributing to the

establishment of a free system was plainly perceptible in the most

abstract labours as in the most poetic flights. My friends and I, while

originating in 1827 one of the leading periodicals of the age, the

'Revue Francaise,' selected for its motto this verse of Ovid,--

"Et quod nunc ratio est, impetus ante fuit:"--

"What is now reason, was at first an impulse of passion."

We thus truly conveyed the prevailing spirit around us, and our own

personal conviction. The 'Revue Francaise' was devoted to philosophy,

history, literary criticism, and moral and scientific lucubrations; at

the same time it was impregnated with the grand political inspirations

which for forty years had agitated France. We declared ourselves

distinct from our precursors of 1789, strangers to their passions, and

not enslaved to their ideas, but inheritors and continuators of their

work. We undertook to bring back the new French society to purer

principles, to more elevated and equitable sentiments, and to firmer

foundations; to that great subject of interest, to the accomplishment of

its legitimate hopes and the assurance of its liberties, our efforts and

desires were incessantly directed.

Another miscellany, commenced in 1824, and more popular than the

'Revue'--the 'Globe'--bore the same features in a polemic of greater

animation and variety. Some young doctrinarians, associated with other

writers of the same class, and animated by the same spirit, although

with primary ideas and ultimate tendencies of a very different

character, were the ordinary editors. Their distinguishing symbols were,

in philosophy, spiritualism; in history, intelligent inquiry, impartial

and even sympathetic as regarded ancient times and the progressive

conditions of human society; in literature, a taste for novelty,

variety, liberty, and truth, even under the strangest forms and the most

incongruous associations. They defended, or rather advanced their banner

with the ardour and pride of youth; enjoying, in their attempts at

philosophical, historical, poetical, and critical reform, the

satisfaction, at once personal and disinterested, which forms the

sweetest reward of intellectual activity; and promising themselves, as

always happens, a too extensive and too easy success. Two faults were

mingled with these generous aspirations: the ideas developed in the

'Globe' were deficient in a fixed basis and a defined limit; their form

was more decided than their foundation; they exhibited minds animated by

a noble impulse, but not directed to any single or certain end; and open

to an easy, unrestricted course, which excited apprehension that they

might themselves drift towards the rocks they cautioned others to avoid.

At the same time the spirit of partisanship, inclining men to be wrapped

up and isolated in the narrow circle of their immediate associates,

without remembering the general public for whom they labour and to whom

they speak, exercised too much influence in the pages of the 'Globe.'

Turgot intended to write several articles for the 'Encyclopaedia.'

D'Alembert came one day to ask him for them. Turgot declined: "You

incessantly say _we_," he replied; "the public will soon say _you_; I do

not wish to be so enrolled and classed." But these faults of the

'Globe,' apparent today, were concealed, thirty years ago, by the merit

of its opposition; for political opposition was at the bottom of this

miscellany, and obtained favour for it with many in the party opposed to

the Restoration, to whom its philosophical and literary opinions were

far from acceptable. In February, 1830, under the ministry of

M. de Polignac, the 'Globe,' yielding to its inclination, became

decidedly a great political journal; and from his retirement at

Carquerannes, near Hyeres, where he had gone to reconcile his labour

with his health, M. Augustine Thierry wrote to me as follows:--"What

think you of the 'Globe' since it has changed its character? I know not

why I am vexed to find in it all those trifling points of news and daily

discussion. Formerly we concentrated our thoughts to read it, but now

that is no longer possible; the attention is distracted and divided.

There are still the same spirit and the same articles, but it is

disagreeable to encounter by their side these commonplace and every-day

matters." M. Augustine Thierry was right. The 'Globe' sank materially by

becoming a political journal, like so many others; but it had not been

the less essentially political from its commencement, in tendency and

inspiration. Such was the general spirit of the time; and, far from

avoiding this, the 'Globe' was deeply impregnated with it.

Even under the controlling influence of the right-hand party, the

Restoration made no attempt to stifle this actual but indirect

opposition, which they felt to be troublesome though not openly hostile:

justice requires that we should remember this to the credit of that

epoch. In the midst of the constant alarms excited by political liberty

and the efforts of power to restrain it, intellectual freedom maintained

itself and commanded respect. This freedom does not supply all the rest;

but it prepares them, and, while their accomplishment is suspended,

preserves the honour of nations who have not yet learned to conquer or

preserve their rights.

While this movement of the mind developed itself and gained strength

from day to day, the Government of M. de Villele pursued its course,

more and more perplexed by the pretensions and quarrels of the party

which its leader vainly endeavoured to restrain. One of my friends,

endowed with penetrating and impartial judgment, thus wrote to me in

December, 1826, from the interior of his department:--"Men who are at

the head of a faction are really destined to tremble before their own

shadow. I cannot recollect any time when this nullity of the ruling

party was more complete. They do not propound a single doctrine or

conviction, or a hope for the future. Even declamation itself seems to

be exhausted and futile. Surely M. de Villele must be allowed the merit

of being well acquainted with their helplessness; his success springs

from that cause; but this I look upon as an instinctive knowledge: he

represents without correctly estimating these people. Otherwise he would

discover that he might refuse them everything except places and

appointments; provided also that he lends himself to no connection with

opposite opinions." When the party, proceeding from exigence to

exigence, and the Cabinet from weakness to weakness, found themselves

unable to act longer together,--when M. de Villele, in November 1827,

appealed to an election for defence against his rivals in the Chamber

and at Court,--we resolutely encountered our share in the contest. Every

opposition combined. Under the motto, _Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera_,

"Help thyself, and Heaven will help thee," a public association was

formed, in which was comprised men of very different general ideas and

definitive intentions, who acted in concert with the sole design of

bringing about, by legal measures, a change of the majority in the

Chamber of Deputies, and the fall of the Cabinet. I as readily joined

them, with my friends, as in 1815 I had repaired alone to Ghent to

convey to the King, Louis XVIII., the wishes of the constitutional

Royalists. Long revolutions engender two opposite vices, rashness and

pusillanimity; men learn from them either to plunge blindly into mad

enterprises, or to abstain timidly from the most legitimate and

necessary actions. We had openly opposed the policy of the Cabinet; it

now challenged us to the electoral field to decide the quarrel: we

entered it with the same frankness, resolved to look for nothing beyond

fair elections, and to accept the difficulties and chances, at first of

the combat, and afterwards of the success, if success should attend our

efforts.

In the 'Biography' which Beranger has written of himself, I find this

paragraph:--"At all times I have relied too much on the people, to

approve of secret associations, in reality permanent conspiracies, which

uselessly compromise many persons, create a host of inferior rival

ambitions, and render questions of principle subordinate to private

passions. They rapidly produce suspicion, an infallible cause of

defection and even of treachery, and end, when the labouring classes are

called in to co-operate, by corrupting instead of enlightening them....

The society, _Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera_, which acted openly, has alone

rendered true service to our cause." The cause of M. Beranger and ours

were totally distinct. Which of the two would profit most by the

electoral services derived from the society of _Aide-toi, le Ciel

t'aidera_? The question was to be speedily solved by the King, Charles

X.

The results of the election of 1827 were enormous; they greatly exceeded

the fears of the Cabinet and the hopes of the Opposition. I was still in

the country when these events became known. One of my friends wrote to

me from Paris, "The consternation of the Ministers, the nervous attack

of M. de Villele, who sent for his physician at three o'clock in the

morning, the agony of M. de Corbieres,[18] the retreat of M. de Polignac

to the country, from whence he has no intention to return, although he

may be vehemently requested to do so, the terror at the palace, the ever

brilliant shooting-parties of the King, the elections so completely

unexpected, surprising, and astounding,--here are more than subjects

enough to call for prophecies, and to give rise to false predictions on

every consequence that may be anticipated." The Duke de Broglie, absent,

like myself, from Paris, looked towards the future with more confident

moderation. "It will be difficult," he wrote to me, "for the general

sound sense which has presided at these elections not to react, to a

certain extent, on the parties elected. The Ministry which will be

formed during the first conflict, will be poor enough; but we must

support it, and endeavour to suppress all alarm. It has already reached

me here, that the elections have produced great apprehensions; if I am

not deceived, this terror is nothing more than a danger of the moment.

If, after the fall of the present Ministry, we are able to get through

the year quietly, we shall have won the victory."

When the Ministry of M. de Villele fell, and the Cabinet of

M. de Martignac was installed, a new attempt at a Government of the

Centre commenced, but with much less force, and inferior chances of

success, than that which in 1816 and 1821, under the combined and

separate directions of the Duke de Richelieu and M. Decazes, had

defended France and the crown against the supremacy of the right and

left-hand parties. The party of the centre, formed at that time under a

pressing danger of the country, had drawn much strength from that very

circumstance, and either from the right or the left had encountered

nothing but animated opposition, but still raw and badly organized, and

such as in public estimation was incapable of government. In 1828, on

the contrary, the right hand-party, only just ejected from power, after

having held it for six years, believed that they were as near recovering

as they were capable of exercising office, and attacked with exuberant

hope the suddenly created successors who had stepped into their places.

In other quarters, the left and the left centre, brought into contact

and almost confounded by six years of common opposition, reciprocated

mutual understanding in their relations with a Cabinet which they were

called on to support, although not emanating from their ranks. As it

happens in similar cases, the violent and extravagant members of the

party, paralyzed or committed the more moderate and rational to a much

greater extent than the latter were able to restrain and guide their

troublesome associates. Thus assailed in the Chambers by ambitious and

influential rivals, the rising power found there only lukewarm or

restrained allies. While from 1816 to 1821 the King, Louis XVIII., gave

his sincere and active co-operation to the Government of the Centre, in

1828 the King, Charles X., looked upon the Cabinet which replaced

immediately round him the leaders of the right-hand party as an

unpleasant trial he was doomed to undergo; but to which he submitted

with uneasy reluctance, not believing in its success, and fully

determined to endure it no longer than strict necessity compelled.

In this weak position, two individuals, M. de Martignac, as actual head

of the Cabinet, without being president, and M. Royer-Collard, as

president of the Chamber of Deputies, alone contributed a small degree

of strength and reputation to the new Ministry; but they were far from

being equal to its difficulties or dangers.

M. de Martignac has left on the minds of all who were acquainted with

him, either in public or private life, whether friends or adversaries, a

strong impression of esteem and goodwill. His disposition was easy,

amiable, and generous; his mind just, quick, and refined, at once calm

and liberal; he was endowed with natural, persuasive, clear, and

graceful eloquence; he pleased even those from whom he differed. I have

heard M. Dupont de l'Eure whisper gently from his place, while listening

to him, "Be silent, Siren!" In ordinary times, and under a well-settled

constitutional system, he would have been an effective and popular

minister; but either in word or act he had more seduction than

authority, more charm than power. Faithful to his cause and his friends,

he was unable to carry either into government or political debate that

simple, fervent, and persevering energy, that insatiable desire and

determination to succeed, which rises before obstacles and under

defeats, and often controls wills without absolutely converting

opinions. On his own account, more honest and epicurean than ambitious,

he held more to duty and pleasure than to power. Thus, although well

received by the King and the Chambers, he neither exercised at the

Tuileries nor at the Palais Bourbon the authority, nor even the

influence, which his sound mind and extraordinary talent ought to have

given to him.

M. Royer-Collard, on the contrary, had reached and occupied the chair of

the Chamber of Deputies through the importance derived from twelve years

of parliamentary contest, recently confirmed by seven simultaneous

elections, and by the distinguished mark of esteem which the Chamber and

the King had conferred on him. But this importance, real in moral

consideration, was politically of little weight. Since the failure of

the system of government he had supported, and his own dismissal from

the State Council by M. de Serre in 1820, M. Royer-Collard had, I will

not say fallen, but entered into a state of profound despondency. Some

sentences in letters written to me from his estate at Chateau-vieux,

where he had passed the summer, will more readily explain the condition

of his mind at that time. I select the shortest:--

"_Aug. 1, 1823._--There is no trace of man here, and I am ignorant of

what can be found in the papers; but I do not believe there is anything

more to hear. At all events, I am careless on the subject. I have no

longer any curiosity, and I well know the reason. I have lost my cause,

and I much fear you will lose yours also; for you assuredly will as soon

as it becomes a bad one. In these sad reflections the heart closes

itself up, but without resignation."

"_Aug. 27, 1826._--There cannot be a more perfect or innocent solitude

than that in which I have lived until this last week, which has brought

M. de Talleyrand to Valencay. It is only through your letter and his

conversation, that I am again connected with the world. I have never

before so thoroughly enjoyed this kind of life,--some hours devoted to

study, the meditations they occasion, a family walk, and the care of a

small, domestic administration. Nevertheless, in the midst of this

profound tranquillity, on observing what passes, and what we have to

expect, the fatigue of a long life entirely wasted in wishes

unaccomplished and hopes deceived, makes itself sensibly felt. I hope I

shall not give way under it; in the place of illusions, there are still

duties which assert their claims."

"_Oct. 22, 1826._--After having thoroughly enjoyed this year of the

country and of solitude, I shall return with pleasure to the society of

living minds. At this moment that society is extremely calm; but without

firing cannon, it gains ground, and insensibly establishes its power. I

have formed no idea of the coming session. I believe it to be merely

through habit and remembrance, that any attention is yet paid to the

Chamber of Deputies. It belongs to another world; our time is still

distant, fortune has thrown you into the only course of life which has

now either dignity or utility. It has done well for you and for us."

M. Royer-Collard was too ambitious and too speedily cast down. Human

affairs do not permit so many expectations, and supply greater

resources. We should expect less, and not so soon give way to despair.

The elections of 1827, the advent of the Martignac Ministry, and his

own situation in the chair of the Chamber of Deputies, drew

M. Royer-Collard a little from his despondency, but without much

restoring his confidence. Satisfied with his personal position, he

supported and seconded the Cabinet in the Chamber, but without warmly

adopting its policy; preserving carefully the attitude of a gracious

ally who wishes to avoid responsibility. In his intercourse with the

King he held the same reserve, speaking the truth, and offering sage

advice, but without in the slightest degree conveying the idea that he

was ready to put in practice the energetic and consistent policy he

recommended. Charles X. listened to him with courtesy and surprise,

confiding in his loyalty, but scarcely understanding his words, and

regarding him as an honest man tainted with inapplicable or even

dangerous ideas. Sincerely devoted to the King, and friendly to the

Cabinet, M. Royer-Collard served them advantageously in their daily

affairs and perils, but held himself always apart from their destiny as

from their acts, and without bringing to them, through his co-operation,

the strength which ought to have attached to the superiority of his mind

and the influence of his name.

I did not at that time return to public office. The Cabinet made no such

proposition to me, and I refrained from suggesting it; on either side we

were right. M. de Martignac came from the ranks of M. de Villele's

party, and was obliged to keep measures with them; it would not have

been consistent in him to hold intimate relations with their

adversaries. For my own part, even though I should consider it

necessary, I am badly adapted to serve a floating system of policy,

which resorts to uncertain measures and expedients instead of acting on

fixed and declared ideas. At a distance, I was both able and willing to

support the new Ministry. In a close position I should have compromised

them. I had, however, my share in the triumph. Without calling me back

to exercise the functions of State-Councillor, the title was restored to

me; and the Minister of Public Instruction, M. de Vatimesnil, authorized

the reopening of my course.

I retain a deep impression of the Sorbonne which I then entered, and of

the lectures I delivered there during two years. This was an important

epoch in my life, and perhaps I may be permitted to add, a moment of

influence on my country. With more care even than in 1821, I kept my

lectures free of politics. Not only did I abstain from opposition to the

Martignac Ministry, but I scrupulously avoided embarrassing them in the

slightest degree. In other respects, I proposed an object to myself

sufficiently important, as I thought, to occupy my entire attention. I

was anxious to study and describe, in their parallel development and

reciprocal action, the various elements of our French society, the Roman

world, the Barbarians, the Christian Church, the Feudal System, the

Papacy, Chivalry, Monarchy, the Commonalty, the Third Estate, and

Reform. I desired not only to satisfy the scientific or philosophic

curiosity of the public, but to accomplish a double end, real and

practical. I proposed to demonstrate that the efforts of our time to

establish a system of equal and legal justice in society, and also of

political guarantees and liberties in the State, were neither new nor

extraordinary,--that in the course of her history, more or less

obscurely or unfortunately, France had at several intervals embraced

this design, and that the generation of 1789, grasping it with

enthusiasm, had committed both good and evil,--good, in resuming the

glorious attempt of their ancestors,--evil in attributing to themselves

the invention and the honour, and in believing that they were called

upon to create, through their own ideas and wishes, a world entirely

new. Thus, while promoting the interests of existing society, I was

desirous of bringing back amongst us a sentiment of justice and sympathy

for our early recollections and ancient customs; for that old French

social system which had lived actively and gloriously for fifteen

centuries, to accumulate the inheritance of civilization which we have

gathered. It is a lamentable mistake, and a great indication of

weakness, in a nation, to forget and despise the past. It may in a

revolutionary crisis rise up against old and defective institutions; but

when this work of destruction is accomplished, if it still continues to

treat its history with contempt, if it persuades itself that it has

completely broken with the secular elements of its civilization, it is

not a new state of society which it can then form, it is the disorder of

revolution that it perpetuates. When the generation who possess their

country for a moment, indulge in the absurd arrogance of believing that

it belongs to them, and them alone; and that the past, in face of the

present, is death opposed to life; when they reject thus the sovereignty

of tradition and the ties which mutually connect successive races, they

deny the distinction and pre-eminent characteristic of human nature, its

honour and elevated destiny; and the people who resign themselves to

this flagrant error, also fall speedily into anarchy and decline; for

God does not permit that nature and the laws of His works should be

forgotten and outraged to such an extent with impunity.

During my course of lectures from 1828 to 1830, it was my prevailing

idea to contend against this injurious tendency of the public mind, to

bring it back to an intelligent and impartial appreciation of our old

social system, to inspire an affectionate respect for the early history

of France; and thus to contribute, as far as I could, to establish

between the different elements of our ancient and modern society,

whether monarchical, aristocratic, or popular, that mutual esteem and

harmony which an attack of revolutionary fever may suspend, but which

soon becomes once more indispensable to the liberty as well as to the

prosperity of the citizens, to the strength and tranquillity of the

State.

I had some reason to think that I succeeded to a great extent in my

design. My audience, numerous and diversified, youths and experienced

men, natives and foreigners, appeared to take a lively interest in the

ideas I expounded. These notions assimilated with the general

impressions of their minds, without demanding complete subservience, so

as to combine the charms of sympathy and novelty. My listeners found

themselves, not thrown back into retrograding systems, but urged forward

in the path of just and liberal reflection. By the side of my historical

lessons, but without concert, and in spite of wide differences of

opinion between us, literary and philosophic instruction received from

my two friends, MM. Villemain and Cousin, a corresponding character and

impulse. Opposite breezes produced the same movement; we bestowed no

thought on the events and questions of the day, and we felt no desire to

bring them to the attention of the public by whom we were surrounded. We

were openly and freely devoted to great general interests, great

recollections, and great hopes for man and human associations; caring

only to propagate our ideas, not indifferent as to their possible

results, but not impatient to attain them; gratified by the intellectual

advance in the midst of which we lived, and confident in the ultimate

ascendency of the truth which we flattered ourselves we should possess

and in the liberty we hoped to enjoy.

It would certainly have been profitable for us, and as I also believe

for the country, if this intention could have been prolonged, and if our

minds could have fortified themselves in their calm meditations before

being once more engaged in the passions and trials of active life. But,

as it happens almost invariably, the errors of men stepped in to

interrupt the progress of ideas by precipitating the course of events.

The Martignac Ministry adopted a moderate and constitutional policy. Two

bills, honestly intended and ably discussed, had given effectual

guarantees, the one, to the independence of elections, and the other, to

the liberty of the press. A third, introduced at the opening of the

session of 1829, secured to the elective principle a share in the

administration of the departments and townships, and imposed on the

central Government new rules and limitations for local affairs. These

concessions might be considered too extensive or too narrow; but in

either case they were real, and the advocates of public liberty could do

nothing better than accept and establish them. But in the Liberal party

who had hitherto supported the Cabinet, two feelings, little politic in

their character, the spirit of impatience and the love of system, the

desire for popularity and the severity of reason, were indisposed to be

satisfied with those slow and imperfect conquests. The right-hand party,

by refusing to vote, left the Ministry in contest with the wants of

their allies. Despite the efforts of M. de Martignac, an amendment, more

formidable in appearance than in reality, attacked in some measure the

plan of the bill upon departmental administration. With the King, and

also with the Chambers, the Ministry had reached the term of its credit;

unable to obtain from the King what would give confidence to the

Chambers, or from the Chambers what would satisfy the King, it

voluntarily declared its impotence by hastily withdrawing the two bills,

and still remained standing, although struck by a mortal wound.

How could it be replaced? The question remained in suspense for three

months. Three men alone, M. Royer-Collard, M. de Villele, and

M. de Chateaubriand seemed capable of forming a new Cabinet that might

last, although compounded of very different shades. The two first were

entirely out of the question. Neither the King nor the Chambers

contemplated the idea of making a Prime Minister of M. Royer-Collard. He

perhaps had thought of it himself, more than once, for nothing was too

bold to cross his mind in his solitary reveries; but these were merely

inward lucubrations, not actually ambitious designs; if power had been

offered to him he would assuredly have refused it; he had too little

confidence in the future, and too much personal pride, to encounter

such a risk of failure.

M. de Villele, still suffering from the accusations first whispered

against him in 1828, and which had remained in abeyance in the Chamber

of Deputies, had formally refused to attend the session of 1829, and

held himself in retirement at his estate near Toulouse; it was evident

that he could not return to power, and act with the Chamber that had

thrown him out. Neither the King nor himself would have consented, as I

think, to encounter at that time the hazard of a new dissolution.

M. de Chateaubriand was at Rome. On the formation of the Cabinet of

M. de Martignac he had accepted that embassy, and from thence, with a

mixture of ambition and contempt he watched the uncertain policy and

wavering position of the Ministers at Paris. When he learned that they

were beaten, and would in all probability be compelled to retire, he

immediately commenced an active agitation. "You estimate correctly my

surprise," he wrote to Madame Recamier, "at the news of the _withdrawal_

of the two bills. Wounded self-love makes men children, and gives them

very bad advice. What will be the end of all this? Will the Ministers

endeavour to hold place? Will they retire partially or all together? Who

will succeed them? How is a Cabinet to be composed? I assure you that,

were it not for the pain of losing your society, I should rejoice at

being here, out of the way, and at not being mixed up in all these

enmities and follies, for I find that all are equally in the wrong....

Attend well to this; here is something more explicit: if by chance the

portfolio of Foreign Affairs should be offered to me (and I have no

reason to expect it), I should not refuse. I should come to Paris, I

should speak to the King, I should arrange a Ministry without being

included in it; for myself, I should propose, to attach me to my own

work, a suitable position. I think, as you know, that it belongs to my

ministerial reputation, as well as to revenge me for the injury I

sustained from Villele, that the portfolio of Foreign Affairs should be

given to me for the moment. This is the only honourable mode in which I

could rejoin the Administration. But that done, I should immediately

retire, to the great satisfaction of all new aspirants, and pass the

remainder of my life near you in perfect repose."[19]

M. de Chateaubriand was not called to enjoy this haughty vengeance, or

to exhibit such a demonstration of generosity. While he still dreamed of

it in the Pyrenees, whither he had repaired to rest from the labours of

the Conclave which gave Pius VIII. as successor to Leo X., the

Prince de Polignac, brought over from London by the King, arrived in

Paris on the 27th of July; and on the 9th of August, eight days after

the closing of the session, his Cabinet was officially announced in the

'Moniteur.' What course would he propose to himself? What measures would

he adopt? No one could tell; not even M. de Polignac and the King

themselves any more than the public. But Charles X. had hoisted upon the

Tuileries the flag of the Counter-Revolution.

Politics soon became the absorbing consideration of every mind. From all

quarters a fierce struggle was foreseen in the approaching session; all

parties hastened to congregate beforehand round the scene of action,

seeking to draw some anticipation as to what would occur, and how to

secure a place. On the 19th of October, 1829, the death of the learned

chemist, M. Vauquelin, left open a seat in the Chamber of Deputies, in

which he had represented the division of Lisieux and Pont-l'Eveque,

which formed the fourth electoral district in the department of

Calvados. Several influential persons of the country proposed to

substitute me in his place. I had never inhabited or even visited that

province. I had no property there of any kind. But since 1820, my

political writings and lectures had given popularity to my name. The

young portions of the community were everywhere favourably disposed

towards me. The Moderates and active Liberals mutually looked to me to

defend them, and their cause, should occasion arrive. As soon as the

proposition became known at Lisieux and Pont-l'Eveque, it was cordially

received. All the different shades of the Opposition, M. de La Fayette

and M. de Chateaubriand, M. Dupont de l'Eure and the Duke de Broglie,

M. Odillon Barrot and M. Bertin de Veaux, seconded my candidateship.

Absent, but supported by a strong display of opinion in the district, I

was elected on the 23rd of February, 1830, by a large majority.

At the same moment M. Berryer, whose age, as in my own case, had until

then excluded him from the Chamber of Deputies, was elected by the

department of the Higher Loire, where a seat had also become vacant.

On the day following that on which my election was known in Paris, I

had to deliver my lecture at the Sorbonne. As I entered the hall, the

entire audience rose and received me with a burst of applause. I

immediately checked them, and said: "I thank you for your kind

reception, by which I am sensibly affected. I request two favours of

you; the first is to preserve always the same feelings towards me; the

second is, never to evince them again in this manner. Nothing that

passes without should resound within these walls. We come here to treat

of pure, unmingled science, which is essentially impartial,

disinterested, and estranged from all external occurrences, important or

insignificant. Let us always maintain for learning this exclusive

character. I hope that your sympathy will accompany me in the new career

to which I am called; I will even presume to say that I reckon upon it.

Your silent attention here is the most convincing proof I can receive."

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 18: He was, in fact, extremely ill at the moment of this

crisis.]

[Footnote 19: February 23rd, and April 20th, 1829.]