texte qu'on a oublie d'inserer dans le livre des loix | name--which was not told her till some time le mode de le juger ?"—xii. p. 324. And all this truckling and twisting was in vain. They had but sharpened the knife for their own throats. The framing of the new constitution, the proper business and express object of the Convention, could be no longer deferred-and on this the parties were finally forced to join issue-Condorcet again being prominent, for he was one of the committee named for drawing the programme by the Girondins, and among the various schemes suggested within that committee his was the one adopted by the party. The Jacobins produced their still more extravagant plan and the tumult at the gates and in the galleries having driven away many voters and overawed others, the majority was, for the first time, on the side of the Jacobins as directly against the Gironde. The victory was followed up forthwith by the proscription of Brissot and a long list of Girondins who had been forward in the debate. Their subsequent history is well known. Condorcet, not having spoken, was in the first instance spared. But soon afterward a letter of his to his constituents of the Aisne was intercepted in the hands of the post-officeon the 8th July, 1793, the apostate Capuchin Chabot read it in the Assembly-pointed out some passages in which the writer asserted the notorious fact that the late decision had been come to under the influence of terror-expatiated on his insolence passim as daring to criticise the Constitution!--and, loudly denouncing all aristocrats, moved the arrest (among others) of "Caritat ci-devant Marquis de Condorcet"--which was carried by acclamation. Some of his friends received intelligence in the morning of Chabot's intentions for the evening, and, foreseeing all the consequences, they instantly went in search of a retreat for him. The house they fixed upon was No. 24 in the Rue Servandoni, near the Luxembourg-a lodging-house chiefly for students, where one of themselves had occupied a chamber not long before-kept by a Madame Vernet, the widow of an architect nearly related to the celebrated painters. The widow had married again, but privately, and retained Vernet's name. Her new husband was a cousin of her own, Sarret, who passed merely for one of her lodgers. When she was asked if she would give shelter to un proscrit, she asked, "Is he a man of virtue ?-is he an honnete homme?" and being satisfied with her friend's assurances, declined to hear the afterward by Condorcet himself. He was conveyed to her house during the evening sitting of the Assembly, and in such hurry that he had with him no money whatever. It would have been imprudent for his friends to venture on any subsequent communication with him-so he remained for weeks utterly ignorant as to what had become of his wife. Her noble family were, like most of the class, in suspicion and difficulty. Her attached brother, the young Marquis de Grouchy, had been expelled from the army, in which he ultimately attained the highest rank, and was wandering in anxious obscurity. She herself was reduced to extreme difficulty; but she was a woman of gallant spirit, and by and by found means to provide for herself and her child. She took a lodging in a village near town, and began practice as a miniature-painter, the chief employment of her pencil being, according to the Biographie des Contemporains, among the political victims with whom the prisons were crammed. "The relations of these unfortunates were eager for parting memorials, and her skill in catching a likeness was very remarkable." We only wonder by what influence she got access to the prisoners. When she had collected some money she set up a small haberdashery shop, and the back shop was her studio. She also employed her pen in leisure hours on a series of Notes to Adam Smith's "Theory of Moral Sentiments," which were subsequently appended to the translation of that work by Roucher.* Meanwhile Madame Vernet, on finding who her guest was, exerted all the influence which her most generous kindness gave her in persuading him to undertake some work of literature which would divert his thoughts A miniature of this M. Roucher, executed within the walls of the Conciergerie by Leroy, was sent to the family of the sitter with these touching lines in his handwriting : Ne vous étonnez pas, objets chéris et doux, Roucher had some reputation as a poet. He had been an exalted Jacobin, and celebrated in verse the 10th of August-which, however, proved as fatal to him as to M. de la Rochefoucauld, or, we may add, to M. de Condorcet. He was included in the last but one of Robespierre's batches. Madame de Condorcet lived till 1822. Her last publication, we believe, was a pamphlet in defence of Maréchal Grouchy's conduct in the campaign of Waterloo. from painful reflection. He began accordingly the Esquisse d'un Tablean Historique des Progres de l'Esprit Humain, and when he had finished that-an essay of considerable length-proceeded to the Tableau itself, which he seems to have carried to its conclusion, though the MS., as recovered, has many and large gaps. Working as he did without books, that these last of Condorcet's productions should be very open to criticism as to dates and details was inevitable; but certainly, all things considered, they are an extraordinary monument of his mental activity, elasticity, and accumulated knowledge. He adheres to his old dogmas, that there is no God, and that the admirable organization of the first of earthly animals is, in all its compartments, intellectual, moral, and physical, susceptible of improvement, not, indeed, to an extent which can in strict mathematical language be called infinite, but so immeasurably beyond what has ever been dreamt of, that it may be pronounced indefinite (vi. p. 274). When we bear in mind, (says he), that out of every fifty whose peculiar organization fitted them for attaining eminence in science, literature, or art, at least forty-nine, on the lowest calculation, have hitherto received such felicity of material structure to no purpose, because its properties were undeveloped by education, it is an easy task of arithmetic to arrive at the sum total of geometricians, economists, poets, sculptors, &c., &c., who will have adorned the world, within the first, the second, the third century--and so on-after a just system of education shall have been applied to the whole mass of these indefinitely perfectible machines (ib. 254). The calculation as to the increased product of illustrious physicians, anatomists, chemists, and botanists, is pregnant with assurance that disease will, within a limited allowance of centuries, have disappeared; so that, while it would be absurd to anticipate immortality, death shall only be occasioned by accident, or--at a gradually but prodigiously extending distance of time-by exhaustion or evaporation of the essential gas or vital principle (ib. 273). It does not escape the author that some may anticipate inconvenience from the reprolongation of human life to the averages of the antediluvian epoch-and first as it respects nutriment. To this he answers that agricultural improvement will keep pace with that in other departments--we shall have fifty high-farmers in every generation for one that we have now, and there is no assignable limit to the development of agricultural chemistry: but furthermore, you are forgetting the contemporary advancement in the intellect generally. You are not allowing for the universal practical philosophy of the new æra. Supposing it possible that under universal liberty and universal equality of education-and when just laws shall have abolished every restriction upon the commercial intercourse of the human species-there should still occur, from any unforeseen circumstance or accident, a risk in any quarter of population getting beyond the means of subsistence, the organization in its then state of progress will at once apply a remedy. The rate at which the calculating machine usually multiplies will be spontaneously altered:- "Les hommes sauront alors que s'ils ont des obligations à l'égard des etres qui ne sont pas encore, elles ne consistent pas à leur donner l'exis tence, mais le bonheur; elles ont pour objet le bien-etre général de l'espèce, et non la puérile idée de charger la terre des etres inutiles ou malheureux."—(ib. 258.) In the same style he overthrows all suggestions as to the hazard of political ambitions multiplied in a ratio analogous to that of the breed. Universal education implies universal self-denial and self-devotion. It is not to be questioned that some organizations will still show a certain superiority over others as respects the qualities for government and administration; but, while these varieties will be very willing to perform the functions for which they may be peculiarly adapted, the others will have too clear a perception of this their adaptation not to wish to see it exercised;-the cause of the superiority being recognized as physical or fatal, there will be nothing of that envy and grudg ing wherewith men now contemplate a superiority ascribed by them to the injustice of social and educational arrangements fairly within the control of human reason. Woman is a delicate topic. From various peculiarities in her physique, and functions therewith connected, she may be said to be more or less a malade until she has passed the middle stage of existence. It is probable that even when female life reaches to some hundreds of years, the effect of these arrangements may still be discernible; but even so, that weaker division will have partaken in the general march-and there can be no doubt woman will be indefinitely better qualified for the highest intellectual, moral, and political exertions than man as we now see him is.* Among other prophecies of the Esquisse is one of a universal language-not oral, but graphical, and "easy as algebra" (ib. 270). We need not go farther into detail. Soon after Condorcet's death, the MS. containing all this mass of atheism and insanity was submitted by the Convention to their Committee of Public Instruction--and the printing and diffusion thereof were, at the recommendation of that conclave, unani-him mously decreed. This philosophy has still its advocates. Even while we are writing we receive a volume from the London press of 1850, entitled "The Purpose of Existence popularly considered," and which announces very much the same views as the results of fifty years' studious meditation and observation. There is, indeed, one important difference. This English writer, agreeing with Condorcet that "spirit" is merely an "exquisitely refined development of matter," does not agree with in deciding that when the visible machine human at last ceases to play, its gas or soul has been worked out, and is done forever. He, on the contrary, holds that, all matter being absolutely indestructible, the gas escapes only to be purified and refined in some new combination-and the repetition of such processes constitutes his chain of perfectibility. Any prolongation of consciousness in the gas is not supposed at each change the extinguisher of Lethe is no doubt applied-but still the gas goes on improving;-and this must be more than enough to console us for non-adhesion courageous-they are prudent-that is to say, pol- (apparently) to Condorcet's prophecy of This chapter reminds us of a lively conversation between Diderot and the celebrated Abbé Galiani (the great friend of Madame d'Epinay), which is recorded in the rambling and gossiping work called Mémoires de Condorcet, and professing to be in part compiled from his Notebooks (1824):-Diderot. How do you define woman? 66 "Galiani. An animal naturally feeble and sick. Did. Feeble Has not she as much courage as man? "Gal. Do you know what courage is? It is the effect of terror. You let your leg be cut off because you are afraid of dying. Wise people are never troons. "Did. Why call you woman naturally sick? "Gal. Like all animals, she is sick until she attains her perfect growth. Then she has a peculiar symptom which takes up the fifth part of her time. Then come breeding and nursing-two long and troublesome complaints. In short, they have only intervals of health until they turn a certain corner, and then elles ne sont plus des malades peut-etre elles ne sont que des vieilles. Did. Observe her at a ball-no vigor then, M. l'Abbé? "Gal. Stop the fiddles--put out the lights-she will scarcely crawl to her coach. 66 Did. See her in love. "Gal. Not so much as in instinct. A woman is habitually ill. She is affectionate, engaging, irritable, capricious, easily offended, easily appeased-a trifle amuses her. The imagination is always in play. Fear, hope, joy, despair, desire, disgust, follow each other more rapidly, are manifested more strongly, effaced more quickly than with us. They like a plentiful repose-at intervals company-anything for excitement. Ask the doctor if it is not the same with his patients. But ask yourself-don't we all treat them as we do sick people-lavish attention, soothe, flatter, caress-and get tired of them?"-(Mem. i. 150.) Condorcet, shortly after this conversation (the Abbé must have been a pleasant clerk,) writes a letter on the same grave controversy, in which (it is printed by Arago)-reluctantly confessing that there was a good deal in what the Abbé had said, he concludes thus:-"I see I must put some limit to my anticipations. I do not insist upon it as prob able that woman will ever be Euler or Voltaire; but I am satisfied that she may one day be Paschal or Rousseau"-a deep question in equations. Methuselamic extension for the light in its present candlestick. As to the practical department of the treatise, it is very nearly in accordance with the Esquisse of the Rue Servandoni. We observe, however, a few prudent condescensions to the still prevalent prejudices of this country. For example, the author would not cancel the regal officeat least not for some time to come. Neither would he at once abolish the peerage-he would be satisfied with limiting the crown in the issuing of writs for the Second Chamber, or Senate, to a selection from a list of eminent teachers drawn up by a committee of the House of Representatives. As to ecclesiastical matters, utterly and scornfully denying the inspiration of the Bible, he regards "Jesus of Nazareth" as a virtuous and intelligent individual, to be broadly distinguished from his ignorant and corrupt followers, called Apostles and Evangelists, and he is for entrusting the whole education, and very much of the practical administration of the country, to a body of teachers (already alluded to) who shall inculcate, inter alia, those few and simple maxims that can be rationally identified with the teaching of "Jesus of Nazareth" himself-to the utter exclusion of all the figments of churches and sects. These teachers are to hold schools for young people on week-days, and on Sunday mornings are to preach in every parish the lessons of sound morality, science, porteress, had a part. Madame Vernet knew how to impregnate with her virtue all who surrounded her. From that day forth he made no movement without being observed. And here I must not ligence of Madame Vernet, her profound knowpass an incident which will show the high intelledge of the human heart. One day, in ascending the stairs to his chamber, Condorcet rubbed shoulders with Citizen Marcos, a deputy for the [newly created] department of Mont Blanc, and who belonged to the section of the Mountain; he had been for some days one of Madame's lodgers. been recognized; but was it possible to count on Under the disguise he wore Condorcet had not a continuance of the same luck? The illustrious proscribed imparted his uneasiness to his hostess. Stop,' said she, 'I will soon arrange thisaffair.' She mounts to Marcos's room, and without any preamble says to him, Citizen, Condorcet is lodged under the same roof with you-should he him-if he perishes, it will be you that have be arrested, it will be you that have denounced caused his head to fall. You are a man of honor and polity. They are to hold any religious Condorcet appears to have also given some of his solitary days to a work of a different class-a New Method of Accompting-and to this resumption of his earliest studies he may probably have been prompted by Sarret, who was himself the author or compiler of various Elementary Manuals for Youth, among the rest one on Arithmetic. The recluse seemed for some weeks to be so absorbed in his literary industry as to have almost forgotten his actual situation; but when the newspapers announced the execution of several friends who had been proscribed at the same time with himself, and, further, that the Convention had declared the penalty of death against all who harbored one included in such a vote, his reflections on the risks to which his hostess exposed herself were cruel. He next morning had a communication with her, which, says M. Arago, "I must, under pain of sacrilege, reproduce without the change of a single word: "Vos bontés, Madame, sont gravées dans mon cœur en traits ineffaçables. Plus j'admire votre courage, plus mon devoir d'honnete homme m'impose de ne point en abuser. La loi est positive: si on me découvrait dans votre demeure, vous auriez la meme triste fin que moi je suis hors la loi-je ne puis plus rester." "La Convention, Monsieur, a le droit de mettre hors la loi elle n'a pas le pouvoir de mettre hors de l'humanité. Vous resterez !" "This admirable answer," continues Arago, "was immediately followed by the organization of a system of surveillance in which most of the inmates of the house, and particularly the humble 6 need say no more.' This noble confidence was not betrayed. Marcos even entered, at the peril of his life, into personal relations with Condorcet. It was he who supplied him with novels, of which our colleague devoured a vast quantity." Madame Vernet. It seems that another proWe may here mention another trait of scribed Conventionalist besides Condorcet was at this time sheltered by her, and that, unlike Condorcet, he remained there until the fall of Robespierre. When Madame Madame Vernet the name of this gentleman, O'Connor, many years afterward, asked she answered with proud calmness, "I have never seen nor heard of him since the 9th Thermidor. Do you expect that I should now recall his name?" It appears that among her numberless consolations, Madame Vernet from time tɔ time inscribed to Condorcet copies of verses, and that the philosopher responded, as in duty bound. Of his prison rhymes, however, we shall content ourselves with one sample, which all students of June and August, 1792, and of January and February, 1793, will allow to merit preservation. This couplet occurs in an epistle to his wife :— "Ils m'ont dit: Choisis, d'etre oppresseur ou victime! J'embrassai le malheur et leur laissai le crime." After copious comments on the severer labors of his hero's closet, M. Arago says: "When he at last paused, and the feverish excitement of authorship was at an end, our colleague rested all his thoughts anew on the danger incurred by Madame Vernet. He resolved then (I employ his own words) to quit the retreat which the boundless devotion of his tutelary angel had transformed into a paradise. He so little deceived himself as to the probable consequences of the step he meditated-the chances of safety after his evasion appeared to him so feeble-that before he put his plan into execution he made his last dispositions. In the pages then written, I behold every where the lively reflection of an elevated mind, a feeling heart, and a beautiful soul. I will venture to say that there exists in no language anything better thought, more tender, more touching, more sweetly expressed, than the Avis d'un Proscrit à sa Fille. Those lines, so limpid, so full of unaffected delicacy, were written on the very day when he was about to encounter voluntarily an immense danger. The presentiment of a violent end almost inevitable, did not disturb him-his hand traced those terrible words, Ma mort, ma mort prochaine! with a firmness which the stoics of antiquity might have envied. Sensibility, on the contrary, obtained the mastery when the illustrious proscribed was drawn into the anticipation that Madame de Condorcet also might possibly be involved in the bloody catastrophe that threatened him. Should my daughter be destined to lose all--this is the most explicit lusion that the husband can insert in his last writing." 66 from D'Alembert, and whatever the Bishop of Lisieux had to leave-having been (to say nothing of the early pensions stated by one authority) in receipt of one salary ever since 1764, and of another during most, if not all, the years from 1774-and having been certainly a most industrious and popular author and journalist,-it might have been expected that he should refer to considerable funds as confiscated under the vote of the Convention. It may be surmised therefore that, notwithstanding his usual gravity of demeanor and regularity of personal habits, he had been the reverse of a prudent man in respect of pecuniary affairs. He had, probably, got rid of 'his fiefs" before he renounced his title. The Conseils à sa Fille occupy thirteen printed pages; and we agree with M. Arago tender affection so elegantly expressed. Many in admiring their language, as well as the sentences, when we consider the writer's position and antecedents, are eminently curious. Throughout this document-peral-haps it is needless to mention it-there is no allusion whatever to religion-not the slightest hint to warrant us in hoping that Condorcet, in the immediate contemplation of death, had been shaken in his old conclusions that there is no God, and no future life for man. Whether what we have quoted may or may not indicate any touch of misgiving as to the most painful passages in his political conduct-our readers will form their own opinion. The testament is short. It was written on the fly-leaf of a History of Spain. In it Condorcet directs that his daughter, in case of his wife's death, shall be brought up by Madame Vernet, whom she is to call her second mother, and who is to see her so educated as to have means of independent support either from painting or engraving. Should it be necessary for my child to quit France, she may count on protection in England from mylord Stanhope and mylord Daer. In America, reliance may be placed on Jefferson and Bache, the grandson of Franklin." She is, therefore, to make the English language her first study. He in timates that she may expect pecuniary assistance by and bye from the Grouchy family, and that "perhaps, when the day of justice returns, she may also derive benefit from her father's writings." From these words we must infer that there was no other property of which he could contemplate the restoration-and this is a circumstance of some importance, though, as usual, the biographers take no notice of it. Having inherited (apparently) a considerable fortune M. Arago constantly writes Dear. This friend of Condorcet's, Basil Douglas, Lord Daer, elder brother of the late Earl of Selkirk, was endowed with extraordinary talents, but died young in October of this very year, 1794. He is lamented both in the verse and the prose of Robert Burns. At last These papers were both, it seems certain, written on the morning of 5th of April, 1794, At 10 o'clock he left his chamber in an artisan's jacket and large woolen cap, his usual disguise, came down to Madame's little parlor on the ground floor, and entered into conversation with her husband. He chose a subject in which Madame could take no interest, but seemed as if he meant to say a vast deal upon it, and plied Sarret with Latin quotations-but Madame, like a good sentinel, stuck to her post de pied fermetill he was on the point of despair. the good-natured woman, observing that he missed his snuff-box, forgot her caution and ran up stairs to fetch it. He seized the moment and rushed into the street. It was unusually crowded. At the first turning Sarret was at his elbow-"Your disguise is incomplete-you don't know your way-you will never escape the numberless agents of the Commune. I will not quit you till you reach your point, wherever it may be.” They "all but miraculously" escaped the police at the Barrière du Maine, and pro |