coxcomb superiority to all other human beings, that pert supremacy, that
grotesque and yet irritating caricature, which makes the _Moi, je suis
Français_, a demand for universal adoration, the concentrated essence of
absurdity, the poison-drop of scorn.

"When will this great consummation arrive?"

"When the tyranny can be endured no longer; when the people find that
they must depend upon themselves for its redress; when a just Providence
finds the vindication of its laws required by the necessities of man."

"From what quarter will the grand effort first come?"

"From the nation most aggrieved."

"What will be its result?"

To this moment I remember the sudden light which flashed into his cold
grey eye, the gasping lip, and the elevation which even his stooped form
assumed; as he answered with a tone and gesture which might have been
imagined for one of the prophets of the Sistine Chapel--

"The result," said he, "will be the fall of the French empire, for it is
a house built on the sand;--the extinction of Napoleon, for it is his
creation, and the one cannot survive the other;--the liberation of
Europe, for its united strength can be chained no longer;--perhaps the
liberty of man, for the next step for nations which have crushed foreign
dominion is to extinguish domestic despotism. Europe once free, what is
to come? A new era, a new shape of society, a new discovery of the
mighty faculties of nations, of the wonders of mind, of matter, and of