.. In general, they are insensible
to the continental victories. All classes of citizens are much more
sensitive to the levies of the conscription than to the successes which
come from them."]

[Footnote 6268: There is here, 100 years later, a message for us about
the enormous force which, under the name of politically correct, is
haunting our media, our universities and our political life. (SR.)]

CHAPTER III. EVOLUTION BETWEEN 1814 AND 1890.

I. Evolution of the Napoleonic machine.

History of the Napoleonic machine.--The first of its two
arms, operating on adults, is dislocated and breaks.--The
second, which operates on youth, works intact until 1850.
--Why it remains intact.--Motives of governors.--Motives of
the governed.

After him, the springs of his machine relax; and so do, naturally, the
two groups controlled by the machine. The first, that of adult men,
frees itself the most and the soonest: during the following half
century, we see the preventive or repressive censorship of books,
journals and theatres, every special instrument that gags free speech,
relaxing its hold, breaking down bit by bit and at last tumbling to the
ground. Even when again set up and persistently and brutally applied,
old legal muzzles are never to become as serviceable as before. No
government will undertake, like that of Napoleon, to stop at once all
outlets of written thought; some will always remain more or less open.
Even during the rigorous years of the Restoration and of the second
Empire the stifling process is to diminish; mouths open and there is
some way of public expression, at least in books and likewise through
the press, provided one speaks discreetly and moderately in cool and
general terms and in a low, even tone of voice. Here, the imperial
machine, too aggressive, soon broke down; immediately, the iron arm by
which it held adults seemed insupportable to them and they were able
more and more to bend, push it away or break it. Today, in 1890, nothing
remains of it but its fragments; for twenty years it has ceased to work
and its parts, even, are utterly useless.

But, to the contrary, in the other direction, in the second group, on
children, on boys, on young men, the second arm, intact down to 1850,
then shortened but soon strengthened, more energetic and more effective
than ever, maintained its hold almost entirely.

Undoubtedly, after 1814, its mechanism is less rigid, its