them to a thief. It is nonsense to say that the Government officer will
spend these hundred sous to the great profit of _national labour_; the
thief would do the same; and so would James B., if he had not been
stopped on the road by the extra-legal parasite, nor by the lawful
sponger.

Let us accustom ourselves, then, to avoid judging of things by _what is
seen_ only, but to judge of them by _that which is not seen_.

Last year I was on the Committee of Finance, for under the constituency
the members of the Opposition were not systematically excluded from all
the Commissions: in that the constituency acted wisely. We have heard M.
Thiers say--"I have passed my life in opposing the legitimist party and
the priest party. Since the common danger has brought us together, now
that I associate with them and know them, and now that we speak face to
face, I have found out that they are not the monsters I used to imagine
them."

Yes, distrust is exaggerated, hatred is fostered among parties who never
mix; and if the majority would allow the minority to be present at the
Commissions, it would perhaps be discovered that the ideas of the
different sides are not so far removed from each other; and, above all,
that their intentions are not so perverse as is supposed. However, last
year I was on the Committee of Finance. Every time that one of our
colleagues spoke of fixing at a moderate figure the maintenance of the
President of the Republic, that of the ministers, and of the
ambassadors, it was answered:--

"For the good of the service, it is necessary to surround certain
offices with splendour and dignity, as a means of attracting men of