nineteenth century?--for really I cannot call you
revolutionists. What do you think?--what do you believe?--what do you
want? Be guarded in your reply. I have read faithfully your favorite
journals, your most esteemed authors. I find everywhere only vain and
puerile _entites_; nowhere do I discover an idea.

I will explain the meaning of this word _entite_,--new, without doubt,
to most of you.

By _entite_ is generally understood a substance which the imagination
grasps, but which is incognizable by the senses and the reason. Thus the
SOPORIFIC POWER of opium, of which Sganarelle speaks, and the PECCANT
HUMORS of ancient medicine, are _entites_. The _entite_ is the
support of those who do not wish to confess their ignorance. It
is incomprehensible; or, as St. Paul says, the _argumentum non
apparentium_. In philosophy, the _entite_ is often only a repetition of
words which add nothing to the thought.

For example, when M. Pierre Leroux--who says so many excellent things,
but who is too fond, in my opinion, of his Platonic formulas--assures us
that the evils of humanity are due to our IGNORANCE OF LIFE, M. Pierre
Leroux utters an _entite;_ for it is evident that if we are evil it is
because we do not know how to live; but the knowledge of this fact is of
no value to us.

When M. Edgar Quinet declares that France suffers and declines because
there is an ANTAGONISM of men and of interests, he declares an _entite;_
for the problem is to discover the cause of this antagonism.

When M. Lamennais, in thunder tones, preaches self-sacrifice and love,
he proclaims two _entites_; for we need to know on what conditions
self-sacrifice and love can spring up and exist.

So also, proletaires, when you talk of LIBERTY, PROGRESS, and THE
SOVEREIGNTY OF THE PEOPLE, you make of these naturally intelligible
things so many _entites_ in space: for, on the one hand, we need a new
definition of liberty, since that of '89 no longer suffices; and, on the
other, we must know in what direction society should proceed in order to
be in progress. As for the sovereignty of the people, that is a
grosser _entite_ than the sovereignty of reason; it is the _entite_
of _entites_. In fact, since sovereignty can no more be conceived
of outside of the people than outside of reason, it remains to be
ascertained who, among the people, shall exercise the sovereignty; and,
among so many minds, which shall be the sovereigns. To say that the
people should el