vehemently questioned, began his defence by recalling, on the one
hand, the treatment which he had received from the dismissed
minister; and, on the other, the impartial conduct displayed
towards him in 1840 by M. Vivien, the new minister. He then
attacked the Mountain by telling its delegates that it sought
only a pretext, and that really, in spite of its professions of
Socialism in private conversation, whether with him or with the
organizers of the banquet, it had not the courage to publicly
declare itself Socialist.

On the following day, in his Toast to the Revolution, a toast
which was filled with allusions to the exciting scene of the
night before, Proudhon commenced his struggle against the
Mountain. His duel with Felix Pyat was one of the episodes of
this struggle, which became less bitter on Proudhon's side after
the Mountain finally decided to publicly proclaim the Democratic
and Social Republic. The campaign for the election of a
President of the Republic had just begun. Proudhon made a very
sharp attack on the candidacy of Louis Bonaparte in a pamphlet
which is regarded as one of his literary chefs-d'oeuvre: the
"Pamphlet on the Presidency." An opponent of this institution,
against which he had voted in the Constituent Assembly, he at
first decided to take no part in the campaign. But soon seeing
that he was thus increasing the chances of Louis Bonaparte, and
that if, as was not at all probable, the latter should not
obtain an absolute majority of the votes, the Assembly would not
fail to elect General Cavaignac, he espoused, for the sake of
form, the candidacy of Raspail, who was supported by his friends
in the Socialist Committee. Charles Delescluze, the editor-in-
chief of "La Revolution Democratique et Sociale," who could not