We say therefore that an Insurrectionary France, loose of control from without, destitute of supreme order from within, will form one of the most tumultuous Activities ever seen on this Earth; such as no Girondin Formula can regulate.  An immeasurable force, made up of forces manifold, heterogeneous, compatible and incompatible.  In plainer words, this France must needs split into Parties; each of which seeking to make itself good, contradiction, exasperation will arise; and Parties on Parties find that they cannot work together, cannot exist together.

As for the number of Parties, there will, strictly counting, be as many Parties as there are Opinions.  According to which rule, in this National Convention itself, to say nothing of France generally, the number of Parties ought to be Seven Hundred and Forty-Nine; for every unit entertains his opinion.  But now as every unit has at once an individual nature, or necessity to follow his own road, and a gregarious nature or necessity to see himself travelling by the side of others,—­what can there be but dissolutions, precipitations, endless turbulence of attracting and repelling; till once the master-element get evolved, and this wild alchemy arrange itself again?

To the length of Seven Hundred and Forty-nine Parties, however, no Nation was ever yet seen to go.  Nor indeed much beyond the length of Two Parties; two at a time;—­so invincible is man’s tendency to unite, with all the invincible divisiveness he has!  Two Parties, we say, are the usual number at one time:  let these two fight it out, all minor shades of party rallying under the shade likest them; when the one has fought down the other, then it, in its turn, may divide, self-destructive; and so the process continue, as far as needful.  This is the way of Revolutions, which spring up as the French one has done; when the so-called Bonds of Society snap asunder; and all Laws that are not Laws of Nature become naught and Formulas merely.

But quitting these somewhat abstract considerations, let History note this concrete reality which the streets of Paris exhibit, on Monday the 25th of February 1793.  Long before daylight that morning, these streets are noisy and angry.  Petitioning enough there has been; a Convention often solicited.  It was but yesterday there came a Deputation of Washerwomen with Petition; complaining that not so much as soap could be had; to say nothing of bread, and condiments of bread.  The cry of women, round the Salle de Manege, was heard plaintive:  “Du pain et du savon, Bread and Soap.” (Moniteur &c.  Hist.  Parl. xxiv. 332-348.)