" Once he has rattled his
revolutionary pedantry off, he no longer knows what to say. - As to
financial matters and military art, he knows nothing and risks
nothing, except to underrate or calumniate Carnot and Cambon who did
know and who took risks.[84] - In relation to a foreign policy his
speech on the state of Europe is the amplification of a schoolboy; on
exposing the plans of the English minister he reaches the pinnacle of
chimerical nonsense;[85] eliminate the rhetorical passages, and it is
not the head of a government who speaks, but the porter of the Jacobin
club. On contemporary France, as it actually exists, he has not one
sound or specific idea: instead of men, he sees only twenty-six
millions simple robots, who, when duly led and organized, will work
together in peace and harmony. Basically they are good,[86] and will,
after a little necessary purification, become good again.
Accordingly, their collective will is "the voice of reason and public
interest," hence, on meeting together, they are wise. "The people's
assembly of delegates should deliberate, if possible, in the presence
of the whole body of the people;" the Legislative body, at least,
should hold its sittings "in a vast, majestic edifice open to twenty
thousand spectators.
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