forgive him for having preferred Raspail to Ledru-Rollin, the
candidate of the Mountain, attacked him on the day after the
election with a violence which overstepped all bounds. At first,
Proudhon had the wisdom to refrain from answering him. At
length, driven to an extremity, he became aggressive himself, and
Delescluze sent him his seconds. This time, Proudhon positively
refused to fight; he would not have fought with Felix Pyat, had
not his courage been called in question.

On the 25th of January, 1849, Proudhon, rising from a sick bed,
saw that the existence of the Constituent Assembly was endangered
by the coalition of the monarchical parties with Louis Bonaparte,
who was already planning his coup d'Etat. He did not hesitate
to openly attack the man who had just received five millions of
votes. He wanted to break the idol; he succeeded only in getting
prosecuted and condemned himself. The prosecution demanded
against him was authorized by a majority of the Constituent
Assembly, in spite of the speech which he delivered on that
occasion. Declared guilty by the jury, he was sentenced, in
March, 1849, to three years' imprisonment and the payment of a
fine of ten thousand francs.

Proudhon had not abandoned for a single moment his project of a
Bank of Exchange, which was to operate without capital with a
sufficient number of merchants and manufacturers for
adherents. This bank, which he then called the Bank of the
People, and around which he wished to gather the numerous
working-people's associations which had been formed since the
24th of February, 1848, had already obtained a certain number of
subscribers and adherents, the latter to the number of thirty-