You, M. le ministre, sent orders that Théophile Gautier's lines were not to be read on the stage of the Théâtre-Français!
But perhaps this order came from higher authority still? Perhaps it came from the President of the Republic?
If it came from the President of the Republic, it is another matter ... and it is with the President of the Republic that I must settle my grievance.
I shall not take long in dealing with the President of the Republic.
"Ah! M. le président de la République," I shall say to him, "you who have forgotten so many things in the overwhelming rush of state affairs, have you, by any chance, forgotten what Monsieur your uncle said of the author of the Cid, 'If Corneille had lived in my time, I would have made him a prince.'"
Now that I have said to the President of the Republic, to M. le Ministre de l'Intérieur, and to M. le Chef de Division Chargé du Département des Beaux-Arts, what I had it in my mind to say, let us return to the year 1823, which also possessed its Censorship, but one that was much less severe than that of 1851.