icero,--that is an uprising; Paris against the Bastille,--that is
insurrection. The soldiers against Alexander, the sailors against
Christopher Columbus,--this is the same revolt; impious revolt;
why? Because Alexander is doing for Asia with the sword that which
Christopher Columbus is doing for America with the compass; Alexander
like Columbus, is finding a world. These gifts of a world to
civilization are such augmentations of light, that all resistance in
that case is culpable. Sometimes the populace counterfeits fidelity to
itself. The masses are traitors to the people. Is there, for example,
anything stranger than that long and bloody protest of dealers in
contraband salt, a legitimate chronic revolt, which, at the decisive
moment, on the day of salvation, at the very hour of popular victory,
espouses the throne, turns into chouannerie, and, from having been an
insurrection against, becomes an uprising for, sombre masterpieces of
ignorance! The contraband salt dealer escapes the royal gibbets, and
with a rope's end round his neck, mounts the white cockade. "Death to
the salt duties," brings forth, "Long live the King!" The assassins of
Saint-Barthelemy, the cut-throats of September, the manslaughterers of
Avignon, the assassins of Coligny, the assassins of Madam Lamballe, the
assassins of Brune, Miquelets, Verdets, Cadenettes, the companions of
Jehu, the chevaliers of Brassard,--behold an uprising. La Vendee is
a grand, catholic uprising. The sound of right in movement is
recognizable, it does not always proceed from the trembling of excited
masses; there are mad rages, there are cracked bells, all tocsins do not
give out the sound of bronze. The brawl of passions and ignorances
is quite another thing from the shock of progress. Show me in what
direction you are going. Rise, if you will, but let it be that you may
grow great. There is no insurrection except in a forward direction. Any
other sort of rising is bad; every violent step towards the rear is a
revolt; to retreat is to commit a deed of violence against the human
race. Insurrection is a fit of rage on the part of truth; the pavements
which the uprising disturbs give forth the spark of right. These
pavements bequeath to the uprising only their mud. Danton against Louis
XIV. is insurrection; Hebert against Danton is revolt.

Hence it results that if insurrection in given cases may be, as
Lafayette says, the most holy of duties, an uprising may be the most
fat