of "mastery on the part of the
workingmen over the other classes of society?"

All that I have to say in my pamphlet bearing on this head is that it
is the destiny of the historical epoch beginning with February, 1848,
to install the ethical principle of the working classes as the
dominant principle of society, to make it the guiding principle of the
State; the nature of this principle is expounded in my pamphlet, and I
have already restated it in outline in the introductory part of my
speech.

I repeatedly and explicitly express myself to the same effect. So I
say (page 31) that, as in 1789 the revolution was a revolution of the
third estate, so in this later case it was a revolution of the fourth
estate, "which now seeks to erect its principle into the dominant
principle of society and to permeate all institutions with it." Or
again

(page 32): "Whoever, therefore, appeals to the principle of the
working class as the dominant principle of society;" and, further, on
the same page: "We have now to examine, in three several hearings,
this principle of the working class as the dominant principle of
society." And (page 33): "Perhaps the idea of making the principle of
the lowest class of society the dominant principle of the State and of
society may seem to be a dangerous idea." I, then, proceed to develop,
from page 39 onward, the difference between the ethical and political
principle of the bourgeoisie and the ethical and political principle
of the working class, and conclude on page 42 with the words: "This,
then, is it, Gentlemen, that is to be characterized as the political
principle of the working class," etc.

And because I present an exalted ethical principle, the noblest
ethical principle which my intelligence is capable of grasping, the
noblest ethical principle yet achieved by political philosophy,
because I proclaim this as destined to become the guiding principle of
the present period of history; because of this and because I bring
evidence to show that this principle, as being the expression of the
natural instinct due to the economic situation of the working classes,
is properly to be designated as the principle of the working
classes,--this is what the public prosecutor has construed into an
atrocious crime, and has accused me of urging the working classes to
aim at making their own class the masters of the other classes of
society.

The public prosecutor appears to believe that I aspire to see the