You recently published this curious piece of workmanship.’ It 
consists of two very distinct parts: political measures and _ social 
measures. Now the political measures are, one and all, taken from the 
Constitution of 1791,'”° with almost no alteration; that is, they are the 
return to the demands of the middle classes in the beginning of the 
revolution. At that time the whole of the middle classes, including 
even the smaller tradesmen, were invested with political power, while 
at present the participation in it is restrained to the large capitalists. 
What, then, is the meaning of the political measures proposed by M. 
de Lamartine? To give the government into the hands of the inferior 
bourgeoisie, but under the semblance of giving it to the whole people 
(this, and nothing else, is the meaning of his universal suffrage, with 
his double system of elections). And his social measures? Why, they 
are either things which presuppose that a successful revolution has 
already given the political power to the people—such as gratuitous 
education for all; or measures of pure charity, that is, measures to 
soften down the revolutionary energies of the proletarians; or mere 
high-sounding words without any practical meaning, such as 
extinction of mendicity by order in council, abolition of public 
distress by law, a ministry of the people’s life, etc. They are, 
therefore, either totally useless to the people, or calculated to benefit 
them in such a degree only as will assure some sort of public 
tranquillity, or they are mere empty promises, which no man can 
keep—and in these two last cases they are worse than useless. In 
short, M. de Lamartine proves himself, both under a social and a 
political point of view, the faithful representative of the small 
tradesman, the inferior bourgeoisie, and [one] who shares in the 
illusion particular to this class: that he represents the working 

people. And, in the end he is foolish enough to address himself to 
the government with the demand of their support for his measures. 
Why, the present government of the great capitalists will do anything 
but that. The Réforme, therefore, is perfectly right in attacking, 
though with a deal of good will, and recognising his good intentions, 
the practicability both of his measures, and his mode of setting about 
having them carried.” 

” 

“Certainly,” says the Réforme, “these are high words, revealing a mighty heart, a 
spirit sympathising with the cause of right. The fraternal feeling is panting visibly 
under the cloak of words, and our poets and philosophers will be excited by them into 
enthusiasm similar to that produced upon Periclean Greece by the sentence of Plato. 
But we have not now anything to do with Pericles, we live under the reign of Messrs 
Rothschild, Fulchiron and Duchatel, that is under the triple incarnation of Money, 
blockheaded Fear, and Police; we have for a government, profits, privilege, and the 
municipal guard. Now, hopes M. de Lamartine that the league of consolidated 
interests, that the Sonderbund? of dollars, place and monopoly, will surrender and lay 
down arms at his appeal to national sovereignty and social fraternity? Why, for good 
as for evil, all things in this world are connected—one keeps up the other, nothing is 
isolated—and that is the reason why the most generous programme of the deputy for 
Macon¢ will pass like perfumed zephyrs of summer, will die like empty trumpet 
sounds, as long as they shall bear the motherstain of all monopoly—feudal] violation of 
Right and of Equality. And this league of the privileged classes is particularly closely 
united at this very moment, when the governmental system 1s the prey of convulsive 
fear. 

‘As to the institutions he proposes, the official country and its leaders call such 
things the sweet meats of philosophy: Messrs Duchatel and Guizot will laugh at them, 
and if the deputy for Macon does not look out elsewhere for arms and soldiers to 
defend his ideas, he will pass all his life at making fine words and no progress! And if 
he addresses himself to the millon instead of the government, we tell him that he 
follows a false route, and never will win over to his system of graduated election, poor 
rate, and philanthropic charity, neither the Revolution, nor thinking men, nor the 
people. The principles, indeed, of social and political regeneration have been found 
fifty years ago. Universal suffrage, direct election, paid representation—these are the 
essential conditions of political sovereignty. Equality, liberty, fraternity—these are the 
principles which ought to rule all social institutions. Now, the poor rate is far from 
being based upon fraternity, whilst at the same time it is an insolent and very impotent 
denial of equality. What we want is not English middle-class expediency, but quite a 
new system of social economy, to realise the right and satisfy the wants of all.” 

A few days after appeared the second manifesto of M. de 
Lamartine upon the foreign policy of France. In this he maintains 
that the peace system followed by the French government after 1830, 
was the only convenient mode of action. He covers by pompous 

sentences the infamous manner in which the French government 
first excited Italy and other countries to rebellion, and afterwards 
abandoned them to their fate. Here is the forcible reply of the 
Réforme* to this buttermilk manifesto: 

““M. de Lamartine sacrifices the legitimate and only instrument of freeing us—the 
holy war of principle—to a theory of peace which will be a mere weakness, a lie, and 
even an act of treason, as long as the relations from people to people are based upon 
the policy of diplomatists, and the egotism of governments. No doubt, peace is the 
ultimate necessity of civilisation; but what is peace with Nicholas of Russia? The 
disemboweller of whole nations, the hangman who nails infants to the gallows, who 
carries on a deadly war against even hope and recollection, who drowns in her tears 
and her blood a great, a glorious country! For mankind, for civilisation, for France 
herself, peace with this madman of a Jack Ketch is cowardice; for justice, for right, for 
the revolution, it is a crime! What is peace with Metternich, who hires hosts of 
assassins, who confiscates for the benefit of crowned epilepsy,» the liberties of nations? 
What is peace with all those little Caesars of Europe, ruined debauchees, or villainous 
bigots who reign, to-day for the Jesuits, to-morrow for the courtezan? What is peace 
with the aristocratic and money-mongering English government, which tyrannises the 
seas, which kills liberty in Portugal, which squeezes money even out of the rags of its 
people? Peace with these Jews, these poison-mongers, we repeat it, is, for a country in 
revolution, cowardice, shame, crime, moral] desertion, bankruptcy not only of interest, 
but of right and honour.” 

The other Paris papers have equally expressed their dissent from 
M. de Lamartine’s programme in different respects.'”! He continues, 
however, illustrating its principles in his paper, the Bien Public of 
Macon. We shall in a few months be enabled to judge what effect his 
new move will make upon the Chamber of Deputies. 

No. 525, November 13, 1847