The Sun.
London, England, 1867-04-17 00:00:00

merce des ble's like Galiani ; you might even be a
foundling or the son of a cutler without its being of
any consequence or any obstacle whatever to your ad-
vance. Art and talent saved all ; les gees d'esprit, les
chosen d'esprit were both esteemed, pleasures d'esprit
being, moreover, eagerly sought after. . . That
epoch bad, at least, this advantage over us, that
etch man then invented his own esprit, his own
judgments, his own mots. People did not care
to repeat or to adopt them, to take them ready-
made (so to speak) from infinitely small litterateurs
and comtesses de lansquenet, as they were called for
or from the representatives of commerce as
they are termed nowal ys." Nothing could well be
more felicitous than the terseness with which our
pamphleteer not only comments, but in commenting
illustrates, and by illustrating goes so far as to de-
monstrate, if we might so express it, the cogency of

his reasoning. Hear him, by way of exemplar,
where he takes occasion to remark " La science

aujourcl'hui semble dire que la luinire est chaleur, el
(pie la chaleur est force. Or, l'histoire nous raconte
un esprit Jrancais tout semblable a ce cosmos, tol
esprit dont la dal*" fait l'ardeur et dont l'ardeur
fait le proselytisme, la propagande a main armee."
Die eclecticism, so to speak, of his sympathies,
one could hardly better illustrate than by refer-
ence to what he says in the way of intellectual
vindication, so to speak, of the First Empire,
which, as he remarks, if it had not a great
living literature of its own, left behind it at
least the theme for it and the inspiration,
the fruits of which are destined to appear
later on. Besides which, as he observes, it
caused the name of France to reverberate
throughout the world—of itself matter for epical,
for lyrical, above all, for tragical celebration,
being for that matter for a whole people an addi-
tional reason of itself for aspiring to be free ! And
now —as the culminating point of his whole
argument—he remarks elsewhere (as sententiously
as emphatically)—" The only thing this country
wants in order to be free is—the Liberty of the
Press." La seule chose qui manque ace pays pour
etre libre, c'est la liberte de la presse. Having said
which all that need, here at any rate, be observed
in regard to M. Dupont-White's m isterly
pamphlet on the " Liberty of the Press and Uni-
versal Suffrage" has been already remarked. It
or rather let us say at once, it was—as the clarion
trumpet-note giving the signal, we are almost
tempted to assert, for those constitutional conces-
sions in regard, among other things, to the accord-
ing somewhat more of freedom to journalism la
France, which have, at least, marked one addi-
tional step towards the Crowning of the Edifice by
the Emperor Napoleon 111., as chief of the State
and head of the Government. That already, to a
considerable extent, France actually at this moment
does possess the priceless boon, aegis, palladium,
right, privilege (call it what you will) of Liberty of
the Press, this very brochure by M. Dupont-White
affords of itself a very signal attestation. And
so long as the journalism of France can find such
vindicators as the author of this philosophic argu-
ment on " The Liberty of the Press and Universal
Suffrage," his countrymen need have no apprehen-
sion hut that sooner or later there must come, as
come there will assuredly, that Crowning of the
Edifice which has already been foreshadowed--
when the political pyramid in France, the pyramid
based already upon the broad material foundations
of Universal Suffrage, will be perfected by the
completion at last of its still unfinished apex! Con-
spicuously fluttering from the summit of which—our
pamphleteer would seemingly suggest—will eventu-
ally be a banner not unworthy of being placed there
side by side with the glorious gonfanon of France---
here the banner of a Free Press, there that of the
imperial eagle and the golden bees.