The things we do!

[21]
But, through the principle, the drawing up and the omissions of its
law, it condemns both to a common destruction; the fire on which it
has thrown the chaff necessarily burns up the wheat. -- Both are
in fact bound up together in the same sheaf. If the noble formerly
brought men under subjection by the sword, it is also by the sword
that he formerly acquired possession of the soil. If the subjection
of persons is invalid on account of the original stain of violence,
the usurpation of the soil is invalid for the same reason. And if
the sanction and guarantee of the State could not justify the first
act of brigandage, they could not justify the second; and, since the
rights which are derived from unjust sovereignty are abolished
without indemnity, the rights which are derived from unjust
proprietorship should be likewise abolished without compensation. -
- The Assembly, with remarkable imprudence, had declared in the
preamble to its law that "it abolished the feudal system entirely,"
and, whatever its ulterior reservations might be, the fiat has gone
forth.


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