beau said of Robespierre: "Whatever that man has
said, he believes in it.--Robespierre, Duplay's guest, dined every day
with Duplay, a juryman in the revolutionary tribunal and co-operator for
the guillotine, at eighteen francs a day. The talk at the table probably
turned on the current abstractions; but there must have been frequent
allusions to the condemnations of the day, and, even when not mentioned,
they were in their minds. Only Robert Browning, at the present day,
could imagine and revive what was spoken and thought in those evening
conversations before the mother and daughters."]

[Footnote 31162: Today, more than 100 years later, where are we? Is it
possible that man can thus lie to himself and hence to others? Robert
Wright, in his book "The Moral Animal", describing "The New Science of
Evolutionary Psychology", writes (page 280): "The proposition here is
that the human brain is, in large part, a machine for winning arguments,
a machine for convincing others that its owner is in the right--and thus
a machine for convincing its owner of the same thing. The brain is like
a good lawyer: given any set of interests to defend, its sets about
convincing the world of their moral and logical worth, regardless of
whether they in fact have any of either. Like a lawyer, it is sometimes
more admirable for skill than for virtue." (SR).]

[Footnote 31163: Buchez et Roux, XXXIII., 151.--Cf.. Dauban, "Paris
en 1794," p.386 (engraving) and 392, "Fete de l'Etre Supreme a Sceaux,"
according to the programme drawn up by the patriot Palloy. "All citizens
are requested to be at their windows or doors, even those occupying the
rear part of the main buildings."--Ibid., 399. "Youthful citizens will
strew flowers at each station, fathers will embrace their children and
mothers turn their eyes upward to heaven."--Moniteur, XXX., 653. "Plan
of the fete in honor of the Supreme Being, drawn up by David, and
decreed by the National Convention."]

[Footnote 31164: Buchez et Roux, XXXIII., 176. (Narrative by Valate.)]

[Footnote 31165: Hamel, III., 541.]

[Footnote 31166: Buchez et Roux, XXVIII., 178, 180.]

[Footnote 31167: Ibid., 177 (Narrative by Vilate.) Ibid., 170, Notes by
Robespierre on Bourdon (de l'Oise) 417. Passages erased by Robespierre
in the manuscript of his speech of Thermidor 8.--249. Analogous passages
in his speech as delivered,--all these indications enable us to trace
the depths of his resentment.]

[Footnote 31168