a note, the text of which I give below:--


"A member calls the attention of the Academy to a pamphlet,
published last June by the titulary of the Suard pension,
entitled, "What is property?" and dedicated by the author to the
Academy. He is of the opinion that the society owes it to
justice, to example, and to its own dignity, to publicly disavow
all responsibility for the anti-social doctrines contained in
this publication. In consequence he demands:

"1. That the Academy disavow and condemn, in the most formal
manner, the work of the Suard pensioner, as having been published
without its assent, and as attributing to it opinions
diametrically opposed to the principles of each of its members;


"2. That the pensioner be charged, in case he should publish a
second edition of his book, to omit the dedication;

"3. That this judgment of the Academy be placed upon the
records.

"These three propositions, put to vote, are adopted."


After this ludicrous decree, which its authors thought to render
powerful by giving it the form of a contradiction, I can only beg
the reader not to measure the intelligence of my compatriots by
that of our Academy.