It is amusing enough to remark how these advocates for expediency contrive each of them to find reasons why things had better remain as they are, while all these reasons are strongly tinted by their various opinions.
"Charles Dix," says a legitimate in principle, but a juste-milieu man in practice,—"Charles Dix has abdicated the throne, which otherwise must unquestionably be his by indefeasible right. His heir-apparent has followed the example. The country was in no state to be governed by a child; and what then was left for us, but to take a king from the same race which so for many ages has possessed the throne of France. Louis-Philippe est roi, parcequ'il est Bourbon."
"Pardonnez-moi," replies another, who, if he could manage it without disturbing the tranquillity about him, would take care to have it understood that nothing more legitimate than an elective monarchy could be ever permitted in France,—"Pardonnez-moi, mon ami; Louis-Philippe est roi, quoiqu'il est Bourbon."
These two parties of the Parceques and the Quoiques, in fact, form the great bulwarks of King Philippe's throne; for they both consist of experienced, practical, substantial citizens, who having felt the horrors of anarchy, willingly keep their particular opinions in abeyance rather than hazard a recurrence of it. They, in truth, form between them the genuine juste-milieu on which the present government is balanced.
That there is more of the practical wisdom of expediency than of the dignity of unbending principle in this party, can hardly be denied. They are "wiser in their generation than the children of light;" but it is difficult, "seeing what we have seen, seeing what we see," to express any heavy sentence of reprobation upon a line of conduct which ensures, for the time at least, the lives and prosperity of millions. They tell me that my friend the Vicomte has sapped my legitimate principles; but I deny the charge, though I cannot deliberately wish that confusion should take the place of order, or that the desolation of a civil war should come to deface the aspect of prosperity that it is so delightful to contemplate.
This discrepancy between what is right and what is convenient—this wavering of principle and of action, is the inevitable consequence of repeated political convulsions. When the times become out of joint, the human mind can with difficulty remain firm and steadfast. The inconceivable variety of wild and ever-changing speculations which have long overborne the voice of established belief and received authority in this country, has brought the principles of the people into a state greatly resembling that of a wheel radiated with every colour of the rainbow, but which by rapid movement is left apparently without any colour at all.
Our last soirée was at the house of a lady who takes much interest in showing me "le Paris d'aujourd'hui," as she calls it. "Chère dame!" she exclaimed as I entered, "I have collected une société délicieuse for you this evening."
She had met me in the ante-room, and, taking my arm within hers, led me into the salon. It was already filled with company, the majority of which were gentlemen. Having found room for us on a sofa, and seated herself next to me, she said—
"I will present whomsoever you choose to know; but before I bring anybody up, I must explain who they all are."
I expressed my gratitude, and she began:—"That tall gentleman is a great republican, and one of the most respectable that we have left of the clique. The party is very nearly worn out among the gens comme il faut. His father, however, is of the same party, and still more violent, I believe, than himself. Heaven knows what they would be at!... But they are both deputies, and if they died to-morrow, would have, either father or son, a very considerable mob to follow them to Père Lachaise; not to mention the absolute necessity which I am sure there would be to have troops out: c'est toujours quelque chose, n'est-ce pas? I know that you hate them all—and, to say truth, so do I too;—mais, chère amie! qu'est-ce que cela fait? I thought you would like to see them: they really begin to get very scarce in salons."