are never more admired and applauded than at those moments of
inspiration when, borne upon the wings of science, you ascend to those
lofty truths which cause plebeian hearts to beat with enthusiasm, and
which chill with horror men whose intentions are evil. How many times,
from the place where I eagerly drank in your eloquent words, have I
inwardly thanked Heaven for exempting you from the judgment passed by
St. Paul upon the philosophers of his time,--"They have known the truth,
and have not made it known"! How many times have I rejoiced at finding
my own justification in each of your discourses! No, no; I neither wish
nor ask for any thing which you do not teach yourself. I appeal to your
numerous audience; let it belie me if, in commenting upon you, I pervert
your meaning.

A disciple of Say, what in your eyes is more anti-social than the
custom-houses; or, as you correctly call them, the barriers erected by
monopoly between nations? What is more annoying, more unjust, or more
absurd, than this prohibitory system which compels us to pay forty
sous in France for that which in England or Belgium would bring us but
fifteen? It is the custom-house, you once said, [45] which arrests
the development of civilization by preventing the specialization of
industries; it is the custom-house which enriches a hundred monopolists
by impoverishing millions of citizens; it is the custom-house which
produces famine in the midst of abundance, which makes labor sterile by
prohibiting exchange, and which stifles production in a mortal embrace.
It is the custom-house which renders nations jealous of, and hostile to,
each other; four-fifths of the wars of all ages were caused originally
by the custom-house. And then, at the highest pitch of your enthusiasm,
you shouted: "Yes, if to put an end to this hateful system, it should
become necessary for me to shed the last drop of my blood, I would
joyfully spring into the gap, asking only time enough to give thanks to
God for having judged me worthy of martyrdom!"

And, at that solemn moment, I said to myself: "Place in every department
of France such a professor as that, and the revolution is avoided."

But, sir, by this magnificent theory of liberty of commerce you render
military glory impossible,--you leave nothing for diplomacy to do;
you even take away the desire for conquest, while abolishing profit
altogether. What matters it, indeed, who restores Constantinople,
Alexandria, and Sai