“Government is bound to give gratuitous instruction and education to all the citizens.”

It is bound to give “A general and appropriate professional education, as much as possible adapted to the wants, the callings, and the capacities of each citizen.”

It is bound “To teach every citizen his duty to God, to man, and to himself; to develop his sentiments, his tendencies, and his faculties; to teach him, in short, the scientific part of his labour; to make him understand his own interests, and to give him a knowledge of his rights.”

It is bound “To place within the reach of all, literature and the arts, the patrimony of thought, the treasures of the mind, and all those intellectual enjoyments which elevate and strengthen the soul.”

It is bound “To give compensation for every accident, from fire, inundation, &c., experienced by a citizen.” (The et caetera means more than it says.)

It is bound “To attend to the relations of capital with labour, and to become the regulator of credit.”

It is bound “To afford important encouragement and efficient protection to agriculture.”

It is bound “To purchase railroads, canals, and mines; and, doubtless, to transact affairs with that industrial capacity which characterises it.”

It is bound “To encourage useful experiments, to promote and assist them by every means likely to make them successful.  As a regulator of credit, it will exercise such extensive influence over industrial and agricultural associations, as shall ensure them success.”

Government is bound to do all this, in addition to the services to which it is already pledged; and further, it is always to maintain a menacing attitude towards foreigners; for, according to those who sign the programme, “Bound together by this holy union, and by the precedents of the French Republic, we carry our wishes and hopes beyond the boundaries which despotism has placed between nations.  The rights which we desire for ourselves, we desire for all those who are oppressed by the yoke of tyranny; we desire that our glorious army should still, if necessary, be the army of liberty.”

You see that the gentle hand of Government—­that good hand which gives and distributes, will be very busy under the government of the Montagnards.  You think, perhaps, that it will be the same with the rough hand—­that hand which dives into our pockets.  Do not deceive yourselves.  The aspirants after popularity would not know their trade, if they had not the art, when they show the gentle hand, to conceal the rough one.  Their reign will assuredly be the jubilee of the tax-payers.

“It is superfluities, not necessaries,” they say “which ought to be taxed.”

Truly, it will be a good time when the exchequer, for the sake of loading us with benefits, will content itself with curtailing our superfluities!

This is not all.  The Montagnards intend that “taxation shall lose its oppressive character, and be only an act of fraternity.”  Good heavens!  I know it is the fashion to thrust fraternity in everywhere, but I did not imagine it would ever be put into the hands of the tax-gatherer.