only in the second rank. The principal offender is the author,
M. Flaubert; M. Flaubert who admonished by a note from the editor,
protested against the suppression which had been made in his work. After
him comes M. Laurent Pichat, from whom you will demand a reason, not
for the suppression which he has made, but of that which he should have
made; and finally comes the printer, who is a sentinel at the door of
scandal. M. Pillet, besides, is an honourable man against whom I have
nothing to say. We ask but one thing of you, which is to apply the law
to him. Printers should read; when they do not read or have read what
they print, it is at their own risk and peril. Printers are not
machines; they have a privilege, they take an oath, they are in a
special situation and they are responsible. Again, they are, if you
will permit the expression, like an advanced guard; if they allow a
misdemeanor to pass, it is like allowing the enemy to pass. Make the
penalty as mild as you will for Pillet, be as indulgent as you like with
the manager of the _Revue_; but as for Flaubert, the principal culprit,
it is for him you should reserve your severities!

My task is accomplished; we await the objections on the part of the
defense. The general objection will be: But after all the romance is
moral on the whole, for is not adultery punished?

To this objection there are two replies: I believe that in a
hypothetically moral work, a moral conclusion cannot be reached by the
presentation of the lascivious details we find here. And again I say:
that the work is not moral at the foundation.

I say, gentlemen, that lascivious details cannot be covered by a moral
conclusion, otherwise one could relate all the orgies imaginable,
describe all the turpitude of a public woman, making her die in a