By the side of the
General is a certain Viscount, who has lived in a savage island
since the wreck of La Perouse, and who, more royalist than the
King, finds himself among strangers and is utterly dumfounded on
beholding the new France. Let us cite some fragments of this piece
in which there is more acuteness, more observation, more truth,
than in many of the studies called psychologic or historic:--
"THE GENERAL. Ah, do not confuse Liberty with the excesses
committed in her name. Liberty, as we understand her, is the
friend of order and duty; she protects all rights. She wishes
laws, institutions, not scaffolds.
THE MARQUIS. Alas! of what service to you are your courage and
your wise opinions? You are denounced, reduced as I am, to hiding,
after shedding your blood for them.
THE GENERAL. Not for them but for France. The honor of our country
took refuge in the armies, and I followed it there. I have done a
little good; I have hindered much evil, and if the choice were
still mine, I should follow the same route.
A VOICE (in the street). A great conspiracy discovered by the
Committee of Public Safety.
THE GENERAL. Still new victims.
THE MARQUIS. They who did not respect the virtues of Malesherbes,
the talents of Lavoisier, the youth of Barnave, will they recoil
from one crime more?
THE GENERAL. Decent people will get weary of having courage only
to die.
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