a man, and each man representing a philosophy.
Not that each man was the contriver of a system, but the effervescence
of one. As true as Robespierre was the advocate of Rousseau, as Marat
was the Wilkes of Paris, as Danton was the Paine, and Mirabeau the
expediency-politician of reflex England, so true is it that Condorcet
was the type of the philosophic Girondists, the offspring of Voltaire.

The two great schools of metaphysics fought out the battle on
the theatre of the Constituent Assembly, in a spirit as bitterly
uncompromising as when under different phraseological terms, they met in
the arguments of the School-men, or further in the womb of history, on
the forum of Athens. It is a fact no less true than singular, that after
each mental excitement amongst the _savons_, whether in ancient or in
modern times, after the literary shock has passed away, the people are
innoculated with the strife, and, destitute of the moderation of their
leaders, fight for that doctrine which they conceive oppresses their
rights. The French Revolution was one of those struggles. It gave rise
to epoch-men. Not men who originated a doctrine, but those who attempted
to carry it out. Condorcet was one of those men. He was the successor
of Voltaire in the Encyclopaedic warfare. The philosopher amongst the
orators. Destitute of the amazing versatility of the sage of Ferney, he
imbibed the prophet's antipathy to superstition, and after a brilliant
career, fell in the wild onslaught of passion. The Revolution was the
arena on which was fought the battle involving the question whether
Europe was to be ruled for a century by Christianity or Infidelity. The
irresolution of Robespierre lost to us the victory of the first passage
of arms, equally as decisive as Lafayette in 1830, and Lamartine in
1848, being Liberals, lost in each case the social Republic by
their vacillating policy. The true Freethinkers of that age were the
Girondists. With their heroic death, the last barrier to despotism
disappeared; the Consulate became the only logical path for gilded
chains and empire. With the ostracism of the Republicans by Napoleon the
Little, a Parallel is completed between the two eras of French history.

The family name of Condorcet was Caritat. His father was a scion of an
aristocratic family, and an officer in the army. The son who gave honor
to the family, was born in the year 1743, at Ribemont, in Picardy. His
father dying early, left his son to b