Chapter 1.6.V.

The Fourth Estate.

Pamphleteering opens its abysmal throat wider and wider: never to close
more. Our Philosophes, indeed, rather withdraw; after the manner of
Marmontel, 'retiring in disgust the first day.' Abbe Raynal, grown gray
and quiet in his Marseilles domicile, is little content with this work;
the last literary act of the man will again be an act of rebellion: an
indignant Letter to the Constituent Assembly; answered by 'the order
of the day.' Thus also Philosophe Morellet puckers discontented brows;
being indeed threatened in his benefices by that Fourth of August: it
is clearly going too far. How astonishing that those 'haggard figures
in woollen jupes' would not rest as satisfied with Speculation, and
victorious Analysis, as we!

Alas, yes: Speculation, Philosophism, once the ornament and wealth of
the saloon, will now coin itself into mere Practical Propositions, and
circulate on street and highway, universally; with results! A Fourth
Estate, of Able Editors, springs up; increases and multiplies;
irrepressible, incalculable. New Printers, new Journals, and ever new
(so prurient is the world), let our Three Hundred curb and consolidate
as they can! Loustalot, under the wing of Prudhomme dull-blustering
Printer, edits weekly his Revolutions de Paris; in an acrid, emphatic
manner. Acrid, corrosive, as the spirit of sloes and copperas, is Marat,
Friend of the People; struck already with the fact that the National
Assembly, so full of Aristocrats, 'can do nothing,' except dissolve
itself, and make way for a better; that the Townhall Representatives are