Page 1770 - les-miserables

of Brune, Miquelets, Verdets, Cadenettes, the companions
of Jehu, the chevaliers of Brassard,— behold an uprising. La
Vendee is a grand, catholic uprising. The sound of right in
movement is recognizable, it does not always proceed from
the trembling of excited masses; there are mad rages, there
are cracked bells, all tocsins do not give out the sound of
bronze. The brawl of passions and ignorances is quite an-
other thing from the shock of progress. Show me in what
direction you are going. Rise, if you will, but let it be that
you may grow great. There is no insurrection except in a
forward direction. Any other sort of rising is bad; every vio-
lent step towards the rear is a revolt; to retreat is to commit
a deed of violence against the human race. Insurrection is
a fit of rage on the part of truth; the pavements which the
uprising disturbs give forth the spark of right. These pave-
ments bequeath to the uprising only their mud. Danton
against Louis XIV. is insurrection; Hebert against Danton
is revolt.
Hence it results that if insurrection in given cases may
be, as Lafayette says, the most holy of duties, an uprising
may be the most fatal of crimes.
There is also a difference in the intensity of heat; insur-
rection is often a volcano, revolt is often only a fire of straw.
Revolt, as we have said, is sometimes found among those
in power. Polignac is a rioter; Camille Desmoulins is one of
the governing powers.
Insurrection is sometimes resurrection.
The solution of everything by universal suffrage being
an absolutely modern fact, and all history anterior to this

1770 Les Miserables