attacks, we have a right to demand to be amongst those whom it hears. To begin with, we must clearly establish the fact, that if the word evolution is willingly accepted by the very persons who look upon revolutionists with horror, it is because they do not fully realise what the term. implies, for they would not have the thing at any price. They speak well of progress in general, but they resent progress in any particular direction. They consider that existing society, bad as it is, an<l as they themselves acknowledge it to be, is worth preserving; it is enough for them that it realises their own ideal of wealth, power, or comfort. As there are rich and poor, rulers and subjects, masters and servants, Cresars to command the combat, and gladiators to go forth and die, prudent men have only to place themselves on the side :,f the rich and powerful, and to pay court to Cresar. Our beautiful society affords them bread, money, place, and honour; what have they to complain of? They persuade themselves without any difficulty that every one is as well satisfied as they. In the eyes of a man who has just dined all the world is well fed. Toying with his tooth-pick, he contemplates placidly the miseries of the " vile multitude" of slaves. All is well; perdition to the starveling whose moan disturbs his digestion ! If society has from his cradle provided for the wants and whims of the egotist, he can at all events hope to win a place there by intrigue and flattery, by hard work, or the favour of destiny. What does moral evolution matter to him? To evolve a fortune is his one ambition ! But if the word evolution serves but to conceal a lie in the mouths of those who most willingly pronounce it, it is a reality for revolutionists; it is they who are the true evolutionists. Escaping from all formulas, which for them nave lost their meaning, they seek for truth outside the teaching of the schools ; they criticise all that rulers call order, all that teachers call morality ; they grow, they develop, th;!y live, and seek to communicate their life. What they have learned they proclaim ; what they know they desire to practise. 7he existing state of things seems to them iniquitous, and they wish to modify it in accordance with a new ideal of juf!ti'ce. It does not suffice them to have freed their own 1:iind&, they wish to emancipate those of others also, to Bibi oteca G no B Bnco
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