Chapter 320 20 The dead are right, the living are innocent

The death throes of the barricades are about to begin. Everything lends tragic grandeur to the supreme last moment: the myriad mystical explosions in the air, the sound of armed masses moving in invisible streets, the staccato gallop of cavalry, the advancing artillery. The heavy vibrations from the troops, the sound of salvos of gunfire and cannons circled over the labyrinthine Paris, the golden clouds of war rose from the roofs, and an indescribable and somewhat frightening cry came from a distance. Here comes the terrible fire, the bells of St. Miri now whimpering, the mild season, the bright blue sky flecked with sun and clouds, the splendor of time, and the horror of dead houses.

Because since last night, the two rows of houses on Machang Street have become two walls, two walls that no one can approach, the doors and windows are tightly closed, and the shutters are also closed. In those days, very different from ours, when the common people thought that the charter or legislative regime bestowed by the king had lasted too long and demanded an end, when the general indignation was in the air, when the city allowed its Paving stones, when the insurgent whispers to the townspeople, tells the password in private, and the listener smiles, the inhabitants at this time can be said to be full of riotous emotions, they become the assistants of the fighters, and the houses and those who depend on them The temporary fortress becomes one with love.When the situation is premature, when the uprising is clearly not supported by the people, when the masses deny the movement, there is no hope for the fighters.All around the insurgents, the city turned into a desert, the hearts of the people were indifferent, places of refuge were blocked, and the streets became shelters to assist the army in capturing the barricades.

We cannot suddenly ask ordinary people to speed up against their will.Whoever wants to force the common people is out of luck!The common people will never listen to others.They will abandon the rebels, leave them alone, and then the rebels will be ignored.A house is a cliff, a door is a rejection, the front of a building is a wall.The wall can see and hear, but won't hear you.It can come ajar to your rescue.No.The wall is a judge, it looks at you and condemns you.How gloomy are the rooms with closed doors, which seem to be dead, but are alive inside.The life inside seems to have stopped temporarily, but it is there.No one had come out for twenty-four hours, but no one was missing.In this grotto, people come and go, sleep and get up, and the whole family gathers to eat and drink; people are afraid, and this fear is a terrible thing!Fear excuses this terrible indifference, and panic is all the more justifiable when mingled with fear.Sometimes, too, fear turns into passion, horror into madness, as prudence into rage, and hence the profound words: "The poise of madness." The flames of extreme fear can produce a ray Gloomy smoke, that is anger. "What are these people up to? They're never enough. They're going to mess with peaceful people, as if there weren't enough revolutions! What are they doing here? Let them get away with it! It's their fault, it's their fault, it's none of our business .Our wretched street is being shot at. This is a bunch of rascals. Don't open the door." So the houses are like graves.The rebels are dying at the door, they see the shot and the sword coming, and if they shout, they know someone will hear, but no one will come out, there are walls to protect them, someone to rescue them, and these walls have ears made of meat, But these people are hard-hearted.

Who is to blame? No one is to blame!Blame everyone. Strange lives in an imperfect age. Utopia turns into an insurgent, from philosophical resistance to armed resistance, from Minerva to Pallas, always risky, Utopia rushes into riots, knowing what will happen to itself, often because of haste, so Had to submit, to accept disaster rather than victory with equanimity.It serves and even excuses those who deny it without rancor, its nobility consists in enduring desertion, it is indomitable in the face of obstacles, it is gentle with the ungrateful. Is it ungrateful? From a human point of view, yes.

Personally, no. Progress is a way of life for man.The normal state of human life is called progress; the consistent steps of human beings are called progress.Progress advances; it marches through heaven and earth, to reach the divine state of ingenuity; it sometimes pauses, waiting to join those who are behind; It has long nights in which it sleeps; and it is this which makes the thinker grieve, that shadows are cast upon the human spirit, and that man gropes in the dark, unable to revive the progress that sleeps. "God may be dead," Gérard de Nerval said to the author of this book one day.He confuses progress with God, equating the temporary cessation of movement with the death of God.

Despair is wrong, and progress is bound to wake up.In short, it can be said that it is also advancing while asleep, because people find that it has grown.When it stood up again, it was noticed that it was a little taller.Progress is like a river, which cannot be calm forever; don't build dikes, don't throw stones; obstacles can make the river foam and make people boil, and there will be chaos; but after the chaos, we know that we have made progress.Before order, that is, the establishment of global peace, before harmony and unity spread across the land, progress always takes revolution as a post.

What is progress?We have just said that it is the eternal life of the people. Yet sometimes the present life of the individual resists the permanent life of the human being. Let us admit without grievance that each has his different interests, which he seeks and defends without overstepping his power; that a certain degree of selfishness is permitted for present purposes; Constantly sacrifice yourself for the future.The current generation has the right to cross the earth, and they cannot be forced to shorten their journey for the sake of future generations, who are equal to them, and it will be their turn to cross the road in the future. "I exist." Someone said softly.This person is everyone. "I'm young, I'm in love, I'm old, I need rest, I have children, I work, I make money, I have a prosperous career, I have a house to rent, I have money to invest in government enterprises, I'm happy, I have Wife and children, I love it all, I want to live, don't disturb me." These reasons make these people sometimes extremely indifferent to the great vanguard of mankind.

Besides, Utopia, we have to admit, leaves its radiant domain as soon as it goes to war.It is the truth of tomorrow, and it employs the means of war, the means used yesterday.It is the future, but it acts like the past.It was a pure thought, but it became a violent act.It has mixed violence with its heroism, for which it is responsible; it is violence of expediency, and violation of principle must be punished.A rebellious utopia fights with old military regulations in hand; it shoots spies and executes traitors, it annihilates the living and casts them into nameless darkness.It uses death, which is a serious matter.It seems that Utopia has lost faith in the light, which is its invincible and indestructible force.It strikes with a sharp sword, but no sword is single-edged, every sword has two edges, and when one wounds a man, the other wounds itself.

Having made this reservation, and a serious reservation, we cannot fail to pay tribute—whether they succeed or not—to these glorious warriors, priests of Utopia, who fought for the future.Even if they fail, they are still respectable, and perhaps because of their failure, they are all the more majestic.A progressive victory deserves the applause of the people; but a heroic defeat deserves the sympathy of the people.One is grand and the other is sublime.We value the victims more than the winners, we think John Brown is greater than Washington, and Pisa Conner is greater than Garibaldo. Someone has to support the defeated.

People don't do justice to these great people who worked hard for the future and failed. The revolutionaries were accused of spreading terror, and every barricade seemed to be committing murder.People accuse their theories, doubt their purpose, fear they have ulterior motives, and condemn their consciousness.They are blamed for resisting the existing social order, for erecting, erecting, and causing mass poverty, misery, crime, dissatisfaction, and despair, for digging up dark stones from the ground, and erecting battlements for struggle.People cry out to them, "You have pulled down the paving-stones of hell!" They can answer, "That shows that our motives for building barricades are pure."

The best solution is of course a peaceful solution.In short, we have to admit that when we see paving stones, we think of the bear, and society is worried about this kindness.But society should save itself; and we appeal to its goodwill, that it is our admonition to society to study the affliction, find out the disease, and then cure it by friendly negotiation, without the need for drastic potions. In any case, these men, from all corners of the world, had their eyes on France and fought for a great cause with the firm logic of their ideals.Even when they fall, especially when they fall, they are awesome.They gave their lives gratuitously for progress, they fulfilled the will of heaven, they performed religious acts.At a certain moment, like an actor when it is time to take his lines, go to the grave selflessly and according to the arrangement of the plot of heaven.This hopeless battle, and this poised disappearance, they all accepted in order to develop to its splendor and glory the irresistible movement of man which began on July 14, 1789. Until the supreme world ending.These soldiers were missionaries, and the French Revolution was an act of God. Moreover, to the distinction already indicated in another chapter, the following distinction should be added: There are uprisings which are accepted, which are called revolutions, and revolutions which are denied, which are called insurrections.The outbreak of an uprising is an idea put to the test in front of the people. If the people throw a black ball, the idea becomes a withered fruit, and the uprising becomes a rash act. Whenever fantasy is willing to become reality, war will be waged immediately at that time, but this is not the style of ordinary people. These nations do not always have the temperament of heroes and martyrs. They are practical.They have an aversion to uprisings from the very beginning, first, because their results are often catastrophic, and second, because their starting points are often abstract. For it is noble that the faithful always and only die for their ideals.An uprising is an expression of fanaticism.A fanatical mind can rage, so it takes up arms.But any uprising against a government or regime goes much deeper.Let us emphasize, for example, that the leaders of the uprising of 1832, especially the radical youth of the Rue de las Mills, were not entirely against Louis-Philippe.Most people, in frank conversation, could do justice to the merits of this king who stood between monarchy and revolution, and no one hated him.In Louis-Philippe they attacked the offspring of the hereditary theocratic throne, just as in Charles X the direct line.We have already explained that they overthrew the French monarchy, mainly to overthrow the usurpation of man by man and the usurpation of human rights by privileges all over the world.If there is no king in Paris, the consequence is that there will be no tyrants in the world.They are thus deduced, their goals must be distant, they may be vague, they recoil before difficulties, but they are great. This is the case.One sacrifices to these phantoms; and to the consecrators they are almost always dreams, in short, dreams that confuse the firm beliefs of man.The rebels gilded and poetized the uprising.People plunged headlong into the tragic event, intoxicated by the cause they were about to engage in.Who knows!Maybe it will work.They are small in number and have to fight an entire army, but in order to defend human rights and natural law, to defend everyone's inalienable sovereignty, to defend justice and truth, they can die like the three hundred Spartans when necessary.They don't think of Don Quixote, but of Leonidas, they go forward bravely, they don't retreat when they have entered the battle, they rush forward with their heads bowed, hoping for an unprecedented victory, a more complete revolution, and a restoration. The progress of freedom, the hope that mankind will be greater and the world will be saved, the worst is nothing but Thermopylae. These contests for progress are often defeated, for reasons which we have just explained.The masses do not want to be driven by the warrior.These sluggish masses are weak because they are dull, they fear risky actions, and ideals are risky. Besides, we must not forget that there is a matter of interests here, not very compatible with ideals and feelings, and sometimes the stomach paralyzes the heart. The greatness and beauty of France is that it does not have a protruding belly like other nations, it can tie a rope around its waist more flexibly, it is the first to wake up, and the last to fall asleep.It advances, it explores. This is precisely because it is an artist. The ideal is nothing but the pinnacle of logic, and so beauty is the pinnacle of truth.A nation of art is at the same time a nation of roots.To love beauty is to ask for light.Thus the torch of Europe, the torch of civilization, was carried first by Greece, then to Italy, and then to France.Holy national vanguard!They are passing the lamp of life. It is wonderful that the poetry of a people is the element of its progress.The weight of culture is measured by the weight of imagination.But a nation that spreads culture should be strong.Like Collins, yes!Like Sybaris, no.Whoever loves cowardice will decline.Don't be an amateur, and don't be a famous performer, be an artist.As for culture, it should not be refined but purified.On this condition we can bestow upon human beings an ideal model. The modern ideal is typified by art and by science as means.By following the science, we can realize the poet's grand fantasy - the beauty of society.We will rebuild the paradise with A+B.Culture has developed to such a degree that precision is an essential ingredient of grandeur, and scientific means not only assist but enrich the sensibility of art.Dreams must be planned.This is the art of conquerors, and it should be based on science, which is its driving force.The sturdiness of the mount is important, and modern wisdom is the Greek genius who used the Indian genius as his vehicle, Alexander on an elephant. A nation ossified by dogma or corrupted by profit is not suitable for leadership culture.Worshiping idols or money will atrophy the muscles that govern walking and atrophy of the upward will.Immersion in religious traditions or in commercial transactions degrades a nation, lowers its level, narrows its horizons, and deprives it of the human and divine wisdom for world purposes that is This people can be made evangelists.Babylon had no ideals, and neither did Carthage.Athens and Rome had, and maintained, a cultural aura through centuries of darkness. France has the same national quality as Greece and Italy, it has the beauty of the Athenians and the greatness of the Romans.Plus, it's kind.It is generous in its devotion, it is more loyal and sacrificed than other peoples, but this temperament comes and goes, which is very dangerous for those who want to go when France wants to go, or they want to go when France wants to stop. of.France, too, has been guilty of materialism many times, and sometimes the mind that shuts up the supernatural mind recalls nothing of great France, but only Missouri or South Carolina.what to do?Giants pretend to be dwarfs, and vast France sometimes suddenly likes smallness.That's all. Nothing to say about the situation.The people, like the stars, have the right to disappear temporarily.All is well, as long as the light returns, as long as the temporary oblivion does not degenerate into night.Dawn and resurrection are synonymous, and the recurrence of light is the same as the continuation of "I". Let us look at these things with equanimity.Death on the barricades or exile was acceptable to the loyal as a last resort.The true meaning of loyalty is selflessness.Forsaken let them be abandoned, exiles exiled, we only beseech great peoples not to retreat too far; not to slip too far on the downhill under the pretense of regaining sanity. Matter exists, time exists, benefits exist, and the stomach exists; but the stomach should not be the only wisdom.The present life has a right to be valued, we admit it, but the permanent life has its right too.well!It is a pity that this kind of thing is often seen in history.There is a nation that was great for a time, that was ideal, and then that it was mired and satisfied.If someone asked it why it abandoned Socrates for Falstaff, its answer was: "Because I love politicians." A few more words before returning to this melee. A war of which we are speaking at this moment is nothing but a convulsion towards the ideal.Progress that hits a roadblock is pathological, it has these tragic epilepsies.The sickness of progress is civil war, and we must meet it on our itinerary.It is an unavoidable stage, both an act and an intermission, of a play whose central character is a socially afflicted man, whose real name is "Progress." progress! This is the voice that is often issued on behalf of our thoughts. Our play has developed to the present, and the thoughts contained in it have to undergo more than one test. Maybe we can lift the curtain and at least let its light be clearly revealed. The book which the reader now has before him, with whatever discontinuities, exceptions, or imperfections there may be, from beginning to end, from whole to detail, is a passage from evil to good, from injustice to justice, from falsehood to truth, from night to dawn , from desire to conscience, from corruption to life, from bestiality to duty, from hell to heaven, from nothingness to God.It begins with matter and ends with mind; it begins with hydra and ends with angels.