ings
issuing their commands in this form: FOR SUCH IS OUR PLEASURE; it wished
to taste in its turn the pleasure of making laws. For fifty years it
has brought them forth by myriads; always, be it understood, through the
agency of representatives. The play is far from ended.

The definition of sovereignty was derived from the definition of the
law. The law, they said, is THE EXPRESSION OF THE WILL OF THE SOVEREIGN:
then, under a monarchy, the law is the expression of the will of the
king; in a republic, the law is the expression of the will of the
people. Aside from the difference in the number of wills, the two
systems are exactly identical: both share the same error, namely, that
the law is the expression of a will; it ought to be the expression of
a fact. Moreover they followed good leaders: they took the citizen of
Geneva for their prophet, and the contrat social for their Koran.

Bias and prejudice are apparent in all the phrases of the new
legislators. The nation had suffered from a multitude of exclusions and
privileges; its representatives issued the following declaration: ALL
MEN ARE EQUAL BY NATURE AND BEFORE THE LAW; an ambiguous and redundant
declaration. MEN ARE EQUAL BY NATURE: does that mean that they are equal
in size, beauty, talents, and virtue? No; they meant, then, political
and civil equality. Then it would have been sufficient to have said: ALL
MEN ARE EQUAL BEFORE THE LAW.

But what is equality before the law? Neither the constitution of 1790,
nor that of '93, nor the granted charter, nor the accepted charter, have
defined it accurately. All imply an inequality in fortune and station
incompatible with even a shadow of equality in rights. In this respect
it may be said that all our constitutions have been faithful expressions
of the popular will: I am going, to prove it.

Formerly the people were excluded from civil and military offices; it
was considered a wonder when the following high-sounding article
was inserted in the Declaration of Rights: "All citizens are equally
eligible to office; free nations know no qualifications in their choice
of officers save virtues and talents."

They certainly ought to have admired so beautiful an idea: they admired
a piece of nonsense. Why! the sovereign people, legislators, and
reformers, see in public offices, to speak plainly, only opportunities
for pecuniary advancement. And, because it regards them as a source of
profit, it decrees the eligibility of c