The deed of the 4th of December is the most colossal dagger-thrust that

a brigand let loose upon civilization has ever effected, we will not say

upon a people, but upon the entire human race. The stroke was most

monstrous, and struck Paris to the ground. Paris on the ground is

Conscience, is Reason, is all human liberty on the ground; it is the

progress of centuries lying on the pavement; it is the torch of Justice,

of Truth, and of Life reversed and extinguished. This is what Louis

Bonaparte effected the day when he effected this.

The success of the wretch was complete. The 2d of December was lost;

the 4th of December saved the 2d of December. It was something like

Erostratus saving Judas. Paris understood that all had not yet been told

as regards deeds of horror, and that beneath the oppressor there was the

garbage-picker. It was the case of a swindler stealing César's mantle.

This man was little, it is true, but terrifying. Paris consented to this

terror, renounced the right to have the last word, went to bed and

simulated death. Suffocation had its share in the matter. This crime

resembled, too, no previous achievements. Even after centuries have

passed, and though he should be an Aeschylus or a Tacitus, any one

raising the cover would smell the stench. Paris resigned herself, Paris

abdicated, Paris surrendered; the novelty of the treason proved its

chief strength; Paris almost ceased to be Paris; on the next day the

chattering of this terrified Titan's teeth could be heard in the

shadows.

Let us lay a stress upon this, for we must verify the laws of morality.

Louis Bonaparte remained, even after the 4th of December, Napoleon the

Little. This enormity still left him a dwarf. The size of the crime does

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The History of a Crime