cal importance of the
_doctrinarians_.

Other men of other parties have possessed the same qualities; and
between the relative pretensions of these rivals in understanding,
eloquence, and sincerity, public opinion will decide. The peculiar
characteristic of the doctrinarians, and the real source of their
importance in spite of their limited number, was that they maintained,
against revolutionary principles and ideas, ideas and principles
contrary to those of the old enemies of the Revolution, and with which
they opposed it, not to destroy but to reform and purify it in the name
of justice and truth. The great feature, dearly purchased, of the French
revolution was, that it was a work of the human mind, its conceptions
and pretensions, and at the same time a struggle between social
interests. Philosophy had boasted that it would regulate political
economy, and that institutions, laws, and public authorities should only
exist as the creatures and servants of instructed reason,--- an insane
pride, but a startling homage to all that is most elevated in man, to
his intellectual and moral attributes! Reverses and errors were not slow
in impressing on the Revolution their rough lessons; but even up to 1815
it had encountered, as commentators on its ill-fortune, none but
implacable enemies or undeceived accomplices,--the first thirsting for
vengeance, the last eager for rest, and neither capable of opposing to
revolutionary principles anything beyond a retrograde movement on the
one side, and the scepticism of weariness on the other. "There was
nothing in the Revolution but error and crime," said the first; "the
supporters of the old system were in the right."--"The Revolution erred
only in excess," exclaimed the second; "its principles were sound, but
carried too far; it has abused its rights." The doctrinarians denied
both these conclusions; they refused to acknowledge the maxims of the
old system, or, even in a mere speculative sense, to adhere to the
principles of the Revolution. While frankly adopting the new state of
French society, such as our entire history, and not alone the year 1789,
had made it, they undertook to establish a government on rational
foundations, but totally opposed to the theories in the name of which
the old system had been overthrown, or the incoherent principles which
some endeavoured to conjure up for its reconstruction. Alternately
called on to combat and defend the Revolution, they boldly assume