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Leader (1850-1860), 6th March 1852, Edition Town of 2, Page 219, Untitled Article

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      the chairs of philosophy will be silehced ^ in xOl the coli ^ es and educational establishments , and replaced by a Sond year of rhetoric and a course of logic . I forbear to sav more , for to write calmly is impossible . How fare the negotiations with the Comte de Chamliord to obtain of him Jus abdication in favour W the Comte de Paris , is not yet known . One thing , however I do know—that the fusion of the two branches is now more than ever , a I ' ordredujour . The majority

      of the most eminent leaders of the Legitimists and of the Orleanists are agreed upon the necessity of this fusion . It is reported that the two most eminent leaders , one of the liberal party , the other of the tiers parti , and an ex-president of the council of state , have come to an understanding , and are ready to declare and to publish that there is no safety for France but in the restoration of the traditional monarchy . There three men are MM . Odilon Barrot , Thiers , and Cormenin .

      Legitimist songs are already in circulation in Paris . There is one in particular in which the Comte de Chambord is called " Henri Quatre second " The French government has just sent an ultimatum to Switzerland on the subject of the refugees . In this ultimatum , Louis Bonaparte energetically maintains all his imperious demands relative to the designation of refugees for expulsion from the Swiss territory , and strongly recommends the Federal government to " reflect on the consequences their resistance might entail . " In other words , to resist the pretensions of M . Louis Bonaparte is to declare wae . S .

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      CONTINENTAL NOTES . OuB Continental Notes of this week may be summarily dismissed in a few brief sentences . We do not suspect our readers of taking any interest in the squabbles of North and South Germany , Prussia , and Austria , large and small states , seaboard and inland Germany , about the possession , the dismantling , the sale , or the maintenance of that rather mythical creation , the German fleet ! Nor do we imagine that tbfe reported

      movements of the King , the Emperor , or some minor prince or other , are very valuable as news . We are told that in Weimar , that pleasant and artistic duchy , " in consequence of the adoption of the new electoral law by the Diet , all the members of the Opposition have resigned . " Indeed ! pur readers will say . But it is interesting to many to learn , that the meeting of the Austrian congress at Berlin , has been definitively fixed

      for March 29 . Beneath the struggle for commercial supremacy between Austria and Prussia , the struggle for political preponderance , which in ' 48 was so insanely led off in the ftountebank-mystic style by our bibulous friend , the descendant of Frederick the Great , and in ' 49 had almost brought the empire and the kingdom to a shock of arms , is easily recognised . Politically and commercially , the contest is of great moment to England .

      Another fact , distressing in itself , perplexing to our Protectionists , grateful to farmers , and serviceable as " capital" to our Free-traders , is , that the Prussian Minister of Finance has announced that the duties of entry on importation of corn , flour , and vegetables , are suspended for all the States of the Zollverein till the 31 st of August , on account of the extreme dearth . The probable dissolution of the Wurtemburg Chambers ( the sole liberal parliament now extant in Germany ) , for having again assorted tho " fundamental ri ghts" suppressed by the Diet , is but another evidence of tho now all-embracing reaction .

      From Turin wo learn that on the 25 th xilt . tho Senate adopted the new law on the press , modifying tho law of tho 26 th March , 1848 , and withdrawing from tho cognizance of juries offoncea against Foreign governments , by 49 to 3 ; and by 46 to 2 , tho bill authorising the Government to adopt certain movements of public fiafbty . Wo four that on this lusfcnainca ^ measure , bearing the ominous title of « f public safet y / ' Homething more than tho " preservation of tho public liberties from excess" is intended . The situation of Piedmont , wo have often sajd , and are always read y to conccdo , is quite exceptional ; but it is not her interest , still Icsb is it tho interest of her King , to ^ "Htnanizo . All these indications go to establish tho incompatibilit y of continental monarchy with popular "I'orfcy , however wiselregulated

      y . . Kjjmo there haa been a polico-discovery of explore shollH , and numerous arrests of innocent persons in consequence . ' From ono end of tho Continent to the other English TOellors arc treated with great suspicion ; us , in fact , congenital revolutionist * t 1 ii ? ff tUrn t (> Fmnco ' httV 0 a fiw * to record about mi ? l 1 1 Jnndflo l > whom wo inontionod in our lait now v ° > m an <« - *« PW 5 Bcntntivo of tho pooplo , w- working m a . journeyman shoemaker in London . In \ i ? i ptwa 8 ll r ° proBontativo of tho Bns lthin . um a ° PWtnaeut thoro aro now two journals ; ono

      Bonapartist , the other Democratic . The latter published the forged appeal to the President for pardon , * with bitter comments , as the act of a deserter . When the official notification appeared in the Moniteur from M . Bandsept himself , the democratic . journal of the Bas Rhin was naturally eager to publish the denial as it had published the ibrgery j but ,- no ! the- elections were nigh at hand ; Louis Bonaparte wanted political capital for the occasion . This generous pardon to a democratic representative , and a working man , was just the bait to catch the electors . True , it was proved and confessed , even by the Moniteur ; to be a forgery , but what of that ? it was wanted .

      M . Sauvaire Barthelemy , the Legitimist , a devoted catholic , presented himself as a candidate in the department of the Bouches du Rhone . To his extreme surprise , he found himself opposed \> y the clergy , who prefer Louis Bonaparte to a mere " good Catholic . " It is true that M . Barthelemy was an independent candidate ; and he makes no secret of his detestation of what he calls the most detestable oppression ever inflicted upon a country .

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      LOUIS BLANC AND MAZZINI . WHAT FRENCH SOCIALISM IS , AND IS NOT * . ( To the JSditor of the Leader ^ Letter III . The Doctrine of the French Socialists has nothing IN COMMON WITH WHAT M . MAZZINI , IN his Address to the Society of the Friends of italy , cams " the absitrd , savage , and immoral dream of communism . " First of all , it is important to come to an understanding about terms . What is Communism , such as it has been understood hi France by some of those whom M . Mazzini designates by the name of " system-makers and sectarians ?"

      There are , in -the vocabulary of party passions , certain unlucky words which seem to have been created for no other purpose than to serve as-A resume to all forms of calumny ^ Before the Revolution of February , J 848 > the word employed "by the people ' s enemies as a weapon for the moral assassination of their defenders , was the word Republican . To be a republican in the reign of Louis Philippe was to dream of nothing but disorder and destruction ; it was to be a heartless , bloodthirsty wretch ; it was to desire for France , dragged back to the sombre regime of the Terror , a permanent scaffold Bet up in the public square , and the equality of citizens beneath the axe of tho executioner . Yet , what occurred ?

      It came to pass that no sooner were they masters of events , than these very republicans , who had been represented as so fierce , anxiously , hastened to moderate the triumph even before the combat had ceased ; granted a noble amnesty to the conquered ; refrained from proscription as the crime of cowards ; abolished the punishment of death ; and , in the name of civilization , disavowed for evermore the guillotine . The long and abominable calumny that had lasted now fifty years must needs be renounced . The word Republican found itself suddenly tolerated again . Tolerated , do I say ? The provisional government had no sooner proclaimed the Republic , than every man held out his hand to it . Innumerable and glowing were the assurances of devotion to the new idea . , From

      M . Odilon Barrot even , up to M . de Montalembert , from M . do La Roche Jacquelin down even to M . Louis Bonaparte , all rushed to tho defence , leaving behind them the baggage of their royalist opinions or of their royalist pretensions . Tho generals , tho magistracy , tho high public functionaries , tho Cour de Cassation , tho Conr des Comptes , hastened to perform a solemn act of republicanism at tho Hotel doVillo ; and it was tho very writer of theso present lines who at that moment received , in tho name of the Provisional government , tho adhesions of the constituted bodies .

      Finally , on tho first day of meeting of tho Assembly Hprung from universal suffrage , on tho 4 th of May , 1818 , the cry of Vive la RepuUique 1 was raised as many as twenty times in a single sitting , by tho royalists of yesterday ! f It was thus that tho word Republican escaped calumny . Calumny looked about for another , and found Communist . Tho Communists wore ono of tho schools which tho aggregato body w « ia designated » by tho generic term ( winco become so famous ) of Socialism . Tho sum of their peculiar doctrines may bo thus stated :

      Tho Communists rccogninod and proclaimed tho inequality of utun in strength , in faculties , in wants ; but thoy maintained that all aro equal in rights ; that all havo thoir destiny to accomplish ; and that ,

      consequently , all have an equal right to the free development of their different faculties , and to the satisfaction of their unequal wants . To natural inequalities , the Communists were indisposed to add social inequalities , and to graft the one upon the other * They refused to believe that those who . had been most generously enr dowed by nature werer entitled to be still more prodigally endowed by society . In their eyes , the difference of capacities , and the inequalities of natural endowment , emphatically signified diversity of aptitudes , and the speciality of vocations ; they were meant to determine the employment , the function , the graduated rank

      of each functionary , but without conferring any particular privilege in the distribution of the means of moral or natural enjoyment . The Communists , then , sanctioned the principle of graduated ranks , but they rested it upon the recognised diversity of aptitudes , and not on the accident of birth . Regarding all functions as equally honourable , so long as they are useful , and accepting the admirable maxim of the Gospel , they demanded that all functionaries , from the first to the last , should be hailed as members of the great human family , and should live like true brethren , conformably to the law of Christ .

      To work according to our strength , our faculties , our natural aptitudes ; such was , according to the Communists , Duty . To enjoy , according to our wants and tastes , within the limit of the resources of the community—such was Right . The Communists thought that the rights of all would be fully guaranteed , if each accomplished his duty : that is to say , acknowledged and respected the rights of others as he would that his own rights should be acknowledged and respected . Repudiating any idea of constraint , or the employment of coercive measures , they trusted for the regular development and maintenance of a social order so

      constituted , to tlte interest of each , rightly understood , when true notions of the social science should be sufficiently disseminated , and to the power of attractive work when , instead of being bent down by misery under the yoke of labour , not voluntarily undertaken , often foreign to the ^ natural dispositions of the man condemned to pursue it , every man should be -called to fulfil his vocation , to exercise the function of his choice—to occupy , in a word , that post in society for which God himself , when he created him with

      certain peculiar qualities , and with certain predominating tastes , had in some sort designed him . Distribution being no longer subservient to the grade of the workman , the Communists concluded that in this social order of their creation , mediocrity would have no further interest in soliciting high offices , in caballing to obtain some special function or other : they were convinced that tho most able and the most worthy would bo naturally , and by an elective process , called to the supftme direction , and that they would be so much the more beloved and honoured that their superior rank

      would confer no privilege . It is scarcely necessary to add , that , by universal and gratuitous education , the Communists invited all children , without exception , to come and take their place at tho grand sources of human knowledge ; just as by their system of distribution they tended to assure to all men , without exception , their place at tho banquet of life . * To thoso who were disposed to accuse them of encouraging an idle dream , of abandoning themselves , to tho deceptive charms of an impracticable Utopia , the Communists replied , that such had over been tho fate of a new idea , to bo reputed impossible , till it had received application ; that tho earliest inventor of the

      steam-engine , the precursor of Watt , was thrown into a Lunatic Asylum , l > y way of recognition of his sublime discovery ; that Galileo was forced to demand pardon on his knees for having professed tho impious error of tho earth ' s rotation ; that in tho history of knowledge , every now truth has been at its birth Utopian ; that , moreovor , tho Communists were far from asserting that their system was capable of off-hand application ; that thoy were perfectly awake to obstacles ; that they contented themselves , in consequence , with pointing from afar to tho end to bo attained , without in any way pretending to destroy tho road which would progressively conduct thither , without removing , tho

      intorinediato stations . In any caso , tho Communists would have had no right to complain if thoir speculations had boon simply neglected , and thouiHolvoH treated as dreamers . What oino could they have fairly expected P But what did tho enemies of tho people P No longer having at thoir disposal tho word Republican , with which they had ho long aurpriHod tho good faith of simple houIh , abused iguorunco , and lniwlcd opinion , they caught up , as tho

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      Mapch 6 , 1852 . ] THE LEADER . 219

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      * Boo Z # arf « r , 'No . 100 . t Soo all tho journals in which a report of that momorablo Bitting appoarod , and notably , tlio official Monifantr

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      * Tins oxposition of tho Communist doctrines in not my own . It ia tho fnilhiul rosumd of tho dootsino as it has boon developed in tho treaties of tho most enlightened of tho Socialist writors , M . Francois Vidal " On tho distribution of wealth , and of distributive justice in Social Economy . "

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), March 6, 1852, page 219, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1925/page/7/