All the powers of the Middle Ages which were still in existence seemed to be affected by the same disease; all showed symptoms of the same languor and decay.

Wherever the provincial assemblies had maintained their ancient constitution unchanged, they checked instead of furthering the progress of civilisation.

Royalty no longer had anything in common with the royalty of the Middle Ages; it enjoyed other prerogatives, occupied a different place, was imbued with a different spirit, and inspired different sentiments; the administration of the state spread in all directions upon the ruin of local authorities; the organised array of public officers superseded more and more the government of the nobles.

This view of the state of things, which prevailed throughout Europe as well as within the boundaries of France, is essential to the comprehension of what is about to follow, for no one who has seen and studied France only can ever, I affirm, understand anything of the French Revolution.

What was the real object of the revolution?  What was its peculiar character?  For what precise reason was it made, and what did it effect?  The revolution was not made, as some have supposed, in order to destroy the authority of religious belief.  In spite of appearances, it was essentially a social and political revolution; and within the circle of social and political institutions it did not tend to perpetuate and give stability to disorder, or—­as one of its chief adversaries has said—­to methodise anarchy.

However radical the revolution may have been, its innovations were, in fact, much less than have been commonly supposed, as I shall show hereafter.  What may truly be said is that it entirely destroyed, or is still destroying—­for it is not at an end—­every part of the ancient state of society that owed its origin to aristocratic and feudal institutions.

But why, we may ask, did this revolution, which was imminent throughout Europe, break out in France rather than elsewhere?  And why did it display certain characteristics which have appeared nowhere else, or, at least, have appeared only in part?

One circumstance excites at first sight surprise.  The revolution, whose peculiar object it was, as we have seen, everywhere to abolish the remnant of the institutions of the Middle Ages, did not break out in the countries in which these institutions, still in better preservation, caused the people most to feel their constraint and their rigour, but, on the contrary, in the countries where their effects were least felt; so that the burden seemed most intolerable where it was in reality least heavy.

In no part of Germany, for instance, at the close of the eighteenth century, was serfdom as yet completely abolished.  Nothing of the kind had existed in France for a long period of time.  The peasant came, and went, and bought and sold, and dealt and laboured as he pleased.  The last traces of serfdom could only be detected in one or two of the eastern provinces annexed to France by conquest; everywhere else the institution had disappeared.  The French peasant had not only ceased to be a serf; he had become an owner of land.