In George Sand’s piece, Moliere was at work with his servant, Laforet, who could not read, but without whom, it appears, he could not have written a line.  He has not finished his play, the actors have not learnt their parts, and the king is impatient at being kept waiting.  Moliere is perplexed, and, not knowing what to do, he decides to go to sleep.  The Muse appears to him, styles him “the light of the people,” and brings to him all the ghosts of the great poets before him.  AEschylus, Sophocles, Euripides and Shakespeare all declare to him that, in their time, they had all worked towards preparing the Revolution of 1848.  Moliere then wakes up, and goes on to the stage to pay his respects to the king.  The king has been changed, though.  “I see a king,” says Moliere, “but his name is not Louis XIV.  It is the people, the sovereign people.  That is a word I did not know, a word as great as eternity.”

We recognize the democrat in all this. Le Roi attend may be considered as an authentic curiosity of revolutionary art.  The newspaper announced to its readers that subscriptions could be paid in the Rue Richelieu.  Subscribers were probably not forthcoming, as the paper died a natural death after the third number.

George Sand did much more than this, though.(44) We must not forget that she was an official publicist in 1848.  She had volunteered her services to Ledru-Rollin, and he had accepted them.  “I am as busy as a statesman,” she wrote at this time.  “I have already written two Government circulars."(45)

     (44) With regard to George Sand’s role, see La Revolution
     de 1848, by Daniel Stern (Madame d’Agoult).

     (45) Correspondance: To Maurice Sand, March 24, 1848.

With George Sand’s collaboration, the Bulletin de la Republique became unexpectedly interesting.  This paper was published every other day, by order of Ledru-Rollin, and was intended to establish a constant interchange of ideas and sentiments between the Government and the people.  “It was specially addressed to the people of rural districts, and was in the form of a poster that the mayor of the place could have put up on the walls, and also distribute to the postmen to be given away.  The Bulletins were anonymous, but several of them were certainly written by George Sand.  The seventh is one of these, and also the twelfth.  The latter was written with a view to drawing the attention of the public to the wretched lot of the women and girls of the lower classes, who were reduced to prostitution by the lowness of their wages.  Their virginity is an object of traffic,” we are told, “quoted on the exchange of infamy.”  The sixteenth Bulletin was simply an appeal for revolt.  George Sand was looking ahead to what ought to take place, in case the elections did not lead to the triumph of social truth.  “The people,” she hoped, “would know their duty.  There would, in that case, be only one way of salvation