An experiment on a grand
scale is about to be made on human society; owing to the slackening
of the regular restraints which have maintained it, it is now
possible to measure the force of the permanent instincts which
attack it. They are always there even in ordinary times; we do not
notice them because they are kept in check; but they are not the
less energetic and effective, and, moreover, indestructible. The
moment their repression ceases, their power of mischief becomes
evident; just as that of the water which floats a ship, but which,
at the first leak enters into it and sinks it.
I.
Old Religious Grudges - Montauban and N?mes in 1790.
Religious passions, to begin with, are not to be kept down by
federations, embraces, and effusions of fraternity. In the south,
where the Protestants have been persecuted for more than a century,
hatreds exist more than a century old.[1] In vain have the odious
edicts which oppressed them fallen into desuetude for the past
twenty years; in vain have civil rights been restored to them since
1787: The past still lives in transmitted recollections; and two
groups are confronting each other, one Protestant and the other
Catholic, each defiant, hostile, ready to act on the defensive, and
interpreting the preparations of its adversary as a plan of attack.
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