Louis Blanc.
On the other hand, society is the human race. The human race, then, is
to receive its impulse from M. Louis Blanc.
It is at liberty to do so or not, it will be said. Of course the human
race is at liberty to take advice from anybody, whoever it may be. But
this is not the way in which M. Louis Blanc understands the thing. He
means that his project should be converted into _law_, and,
consequently, forcibly imposed by power.
"In our project, the State has only to give a legislation to
labour, by means of which the industrial movement may and ought to
be accomplished _in all liberty_. It (the State) merely places
society on an incline (_that is all_) that it may descend, when
once it is placed there, by the mere force of things, and by the
natural course of the _established mechanism_."
But what is this incline? One indicated by M. Louis Blanc. Does it not
lead to an abyss? No, it leads to happiness. Why, then, does not society
go there of itself? Because it does not know what it wants, and it
requires an impulse. What is to give it this impulse? Power. And who is
to give the impulse to power? The inventor of the machine, M. Louis
Blanc.
We shall never get out of this circle--mankind passive, and a great man
moving it by the intervention of the law.
Once on this incline, will society enjoy something like liberty? Without
a doubt.
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