"Then they are a selfish pack. What great imbeciles!"
"I do not care to discuss what they are, for I do not know," said Balsamo, who was losing his patience. "I only know that they will all cry down the next ministry when this one is
destroyed."
"This new cabinet will have against it the philosophers and then the
Parliament. They will make such an uproar that the cabinet will persecute the philosophers and block the Parliament. Then in mind and matter will be organized a sullen league, a tenacious, stubborn, restless opposition, which will attack everything, undermining and shaking. Instead of Parliament they will try to rule with judges appointed by the king; they will do everything for their appointer. With reason they will be accused of venality, corruption and injustice. The people will rise, and at last royalty will have arrayed against it philosophy, which is intelligence, Parliament, which is the middle class, and the mob, which is the people; in other words, the lever with which Archimedes can raise the world."
"Well, when you have lifted it, you will have to let it fall again."
"Yes, but when it falls it will smash the royalty."
"To use your figurative language, when this wormeaten monarchy is broken, what will come out of the ruins?"
"Freedom."
"The French be free? Well, then, there will be thirty millions of freemen in France?"