There was no longer a flag, there was no longer law, there was no longer humanity, there was no longer a country, there was no longer France; they began to assassinate.
The Schinderhannes division, the brigades of Mandrin, Cartouche, Poulailler, Trestaillon, and Tropmann appeared in the gloom, shooting down and massacring.
No; we do not attribute to the French army what took place during this mournful eclipse of honor.
There have been massacres in history, abominable ones assuredly, but they have possessed some show of reason; Saint Bartholomew and the Dragonnades are explained by religion, the Sicilian Vespers and the butcheries of September are explained by patriotism; they crush the enemy or annihilate the foreigner; these are crimes for a good cause; but the carnage of the Boulevard Montmartre is a crime without an ostensible reason.
The reason exists, however. It is hideous.
Let us give it.
Two things stand erect in a State, the Law and the People.
A man murders the Law. He feels the punishment approaching, there only remains one thing for him to do, to murder the People. He murders the People.
The Second of December was the Risk, the Fourth was the Certainty.
Against the indignation which arose they opposed the Terror.