HÉRAULT. That is what everybody is doing nowadays, and the result is nothing to boast of.
CAMILLE. Poor Republic! What have they done to You? Oh, flowering fields, rejuvenated earth, clear air, and bright light of the heavens, clear-eyed Reason has sent packing the sorry superstitions and the ancient Gothic saints from fair France. Young men and women dancing in the meadows, heroic armies, fraternal feeling, impregnable wall against which the armies of Europe in vain break their lances; joy of beauty, noble Panathenaics, white-armed maidens, dressed in thin flowing draperies; liberty to live, pleasure that throbs from sheer joy of living. Fair Republic of Aspasia and the charming Alcibiades—what has become of you? What are you now? You wear a red cap, a dirty shirt; you have a hoarse voice, the fixed ideas of a maniac, the pedantic manner of a schoolmaster!
HÉRAULT. You are an Athenian among barbarians.—Ovid among the Scythians. You will never reform them.
CAMILLE. I shall at least try.
HÉRAULT. You are wasting your time—perhaps your life.
CAMILLE. What have I to fear?
HÉRAULT. Beware of Robespierre.
CAMILLE. I have known him since we were children: a friend may say anything.
HÉRAULT. A disagreeable truth is more easily forgiven by an enemy than a friend.
LUCILE. Stop! He must be a great man and save the Patrie. Whoever doesn't agree with me, will have none of my chocolate.