Moderate's Fear of the Left

'Moderate opposition of the 1840s..were much more worried by the danger from their left than by the old regimes. From the moment the barricades went up in Paris, all moderate liberals(and, as Cavour observed, a fair proportion of radicals) were potential conservatives'

Eric Hobsbawm, p. 17

Fear of democracy, revolution and the labouring poor

 'If the social order were to be genuinely menaced, if the great principles on which rests were to be at serious risk, then many of the most determined oppositionists, the most enthusiastic republicans would be, we are convinced, the first to join the ranks of the conservative party'

- Count Cavour of Piedmont(1846), practically anticipating the universal failure of 1848 revolutions in Europe.

Anti-revolutionary peasants

 'Poland..its Russian and Austrian rulers succeeded in mobilizing the peasantry against the revolutionary gentry' 

- Hobsbawm, p. 11

'Harmless' democracy

 'By this time(1848) rules of the advanced states of Erope were beginning to recognize not only that democracy was inevitable, but also that it would probably be a nuisance but politically harmless. This discovery hd long since been made by the rules of the United States'

- Eric Hobsbawm, 'The Age of Capital; 1848-1875', p. 3

The Economist's stupid assertion

'The final crime, the Treaty of Versailles, whose harsh terms would ensure a second war'

As Margaret MacMillan said, if it was harsh Germany couldn't have started that war in the first place lol. They had no intention of following it in the first place, especially on military matters, and the term was actually too lenient compared to what they imposed on France in 1871.

Nietzsche on Paris and France

'As an artist, a man has no home in Europe save in Paris..
I believe only in French culture, and regard everything else in Europe which calls 'culture' as a misunderstanding'

from Ecce Homo

3rd Republic and Labor

Rereading Shirer's 'The Collapse of the 3rd Republic'

Bourgeois of the 3rd Republic was no different than the ancien regime in escaping taxation. Plus, the regime was deeply anti Labor, in fact one of the most reactionary among developed nations. Naturally no attempt on social security legislation implemented by the likes of..Bismarck!

Hence the appeal of Sorel and the General Strike by the working class, and their lack of incentive to fight for the country; which ultimately led to 1940.

P.S. Aristide Briand put down a general strike in 1910 by arresting union leaders and calling the strikers to army reserves. He has begun his career as a labor lawyer, claiming the necessity of the gneral strike!

Immanuel Kant on the public & enlightenment

'..the public can only slowly attain enlightenment. Perhaps a fall of personal despotism or of avaricious or tyrannical oppression may be accomplished by revolution, but never a true reform in ways of thinking.'

- Immanuel Kant, 'What is Enlightenment(1784)?'