The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1875-07-08
LEDR0IT ETLAL0I
EXTRACTS FROM VICTOR HO|
COS LATEST WORKS.

| NlCUOT I1uBO LdD Pupi'S~ Pr
called "Le Droit ct la Loi," an introduc'
ton to his political memories, when
will shortly appear in three Volumes un,
der the separate titles of"Avant pExll,
"Pendant pExiI," and "Apres PExiL'
We extract the following passages from
the work;
This society of the future will be su,,
perb, and Tranquil discoveries wiilsucceeu
battles nations will conquer, no more
They will raise themselves and enhghteh
one another. People will no longer be
warriors, they win be workers. Ihey
will find, construct, and invent. 10 ex-
terminate will no longer be glory IL
will be the replacing of murder by crea-
ton. Civilization which was all action,
will be composed fthe study OF the true
and ofthe production of the beautiful
CheS. dG,,vre will be incidents: People
will be more moved by an lliad than by
an Austerlitz. Frontiers will be etfaced
under the light Of mind Greece was was
very small. Our peninsula OF flhlsterre ne
laid over Greece would coverlt Ureece
was nevertheless immensly honored by
Homer, by Eschylus, by Phidias ana oy
Socrates. These four men are iour
worlds. Greece possessed them, hence
her greatness The spread Of people Is
measured by the radiancy. Siberia, that
giant is dwarf. Colossal Africa scarcely
exists. One town, Rome, was the equal
of the universe. Whoever spoke to her
smoke to all the earth--ur6te et orbl. Ihls
greatness France has and will have
France is in the admirablewtnat she is
destined to die, but to die ike the gous
by TRANSFORMATION. Certain nations nm
ish by sublimation like Hercules, or by
ascension like Jesus Christ. 1t might, be
said that at given moment people be-
comes constellation: the other nations,
stars of second order, group themselves
around it, and thus it is that Athens,
Rome and Paris are Pleiades. Greece
was transfigured and has become the
heather world; Rome was transfigured
and has become the Christian world;
France will be transfgured and become.
the human world. The revolution OF
France will be called the revolution OF
nations, Why? Because France ue-
serves it, because she is wanting IN sell
fishness because she is not working Tor
herself alone. because she is the creator
of universal hopes, because she repre-
sents all human good, because Where
other nations are only sisters she ls
mother. This maternity OF generous
France breaks out in all the social pheno-
mena of the age. Others peoples cause
her ills, she makes their ideas. Her
revolution is not local, it is general; 1t ls
not limited, it is indefinite and infinite
France restores in everything the prlml'
tive notion, the true idea. lnphilosophy
she re-establishes logic; in art she re-es-
tablishes nature; in the law she re-estab-
fishes nature, in the law she re-establishes
right.
Right and law, such are the two forces.
From their agreement springs order,
from their antagonism Catastrophes.
Right speaks and commands from the
summit of truths; law answers from the
depths of realities. Right cries aloud
from the just, law from the possible;righit
is divine, law is terrestrial. Hence lib
erty is right, society is law, Thence two
tribunes-one where are the nen OF
ideas: the other where are the men OF
facts,the one which isabsolute, the other
| il relative. Of these two tribunes the first
| is necessary, the second is useful. From
one to the other the huOtuation of conse-
ouence, Harmony is not yet made be-
tween these two powers-the one immov-
able, the other variable, the one serene,
the other impassioned. Law flows from
right, but as riverlhows from the source
accepting all the contortions, all the i'm
purities of the banks. Often practice
contradicts the rule, often the corollary
contradicts the rule, often the corollary
betrays the principle, often the effect
disobeys the cause; such is the fatal hui
man condition. Right and law struggle
without cease, and from their dispute
issued sometimes darkness, sometimes
light. The scaffold, the sword, and the
sceptre, war, every sort of yoke, from
marriage without divorce in the family
to the state of seige in the city is the
law. Right, to come, go, buy, send ex-
change. Law, Custom m-House, octroi.
Right, gratuitous and obligatory. In
struction without encroachment on the
conscience of the man in embryo in the
child. that is to say, lay instruction-law;
the ignorantins right, free belief-law.
State religions. Universal suffrage, uni
versal Jury, that is right. Restrained
suffrage, picked jury, that is law. The
thing It Judged is law. Justice is right.
Measure the space between. Law has
the hardness, the mobility, the encroach-
ment, and the anarchy of water often
troubled, but the right cannot be sub
merged. In the order for everything to
be saved, it is sufficient for right to float
nnnermost in a conscience. One does
not swallow up God. The persistenCy Of
right against the obstinacy of law, all So
ci9l agitation comes thence. Chance
willed (but does chance exist?) that the
first political words uttered in an official
way by him who writes these lines sho'd
have been first at the institute for right
and next in the Chamber of Peers, against
the law. On June II, lS4l, in taking his
place in the French Academy, he glorif-
ed resistance to the empire. On June IL
l84l, he demanded in the Chamber of
Peers the return of the banished Bona
parte family. Therefore, in the first
case he was pleading for liberty-that is,
for right; and in the second case he was
liftingup his voice against prescription
that is law. From this period one of
the formulas of his public life has been
pro lure contra legenl. His conscience i'm
posed upon him in his duties of legislator
a permanent and perpetual confronting
ofthe law which men make against the
right which makes men obey. His con-
science is a rule with him-a rule which
admits of no exceptions. Fidelity to this
rule is what he asserts will be found in
these three volumes, "Avant pExil,
"Pendant pExil," ""Depuis pExil,"
Victor Hugo then concludes with a
short discourse on liberty, and gives the
| explanation of the Republican legend,
''Liberte, Egalite, Eaternite"-"Liberty,
Equality, Fraternity" He says there is
nothing to add, nothing to retrench-
they are three steps of the supreme lad