《旧制度与大革命·卷二·第十三章·十八世纪中叶文人何以成为首要政客》第9节
The writers of the time not only imparted their ideas to the people who effected the Revolution, but they gave them also their peculiar temperament and disposition. The whole nation ended, after being so long schooled by them, in the absence of all other leaders and in profound ignorance of practical affairs, by catching up the instincts, the turn of mind, the tastes, and even the humours of those who wrote; so that, when the time for action came, it transported into the arena of politics all the habits of literature. A study of the history of the French Revolution will show that it was carried on precisely in that same spirit which has caused so many abstract books to be written on government. There was the same attraction towards general theories, complete systems of legislation, and exact symmetry in the laws--the same contempt of existing facts--the same reliance upon theory--the same love of the original, the ingenious, and the novel in institutions--the same desire to reconstruct, all at once, the entire constitution by the rules of logic, and upon a single plan, rather than seek to amend it in its parts. The spectacle was an alarming one; for that which is a merit in a writer is often a fault in a statesman: and the same things which have often caused great books to be written, may lead to great revolutions. Even the political language of the time caught something of the tone in which the authors spoke: it was full of general expressions, abstract terms, pompous words, and literary turns. This style, aided by the political passions which it expressed, penetrated through all classes, and descended with singular facility even to the lowest. Considerably before the Revolution, the edicts of Louis XVI. frequently spoke of the law of nature and the rights of man; and I have found instances of peasants who, in their memorials called their neighbours ‘fellow-citizens,’ their Intendant ‘a respectable magistrate,’ their parish-priest ‘the minister of the altar,’ and God ‘the Supreme Being,’ and who wanted nothing but spelling to become very indifferent authors. These new qualities became so completely incorporated with the old stock of the French character, that habits resulting only from this singular education have frequently been attributed to the natural disposition of the French. It has been asserted that the taste, or rather the passion, which the French have displayed during the last sixty years for general ideas and big words in political discussion, arose from some characteristic peculiar to the French race, which has been somewhat pedantically called ‘the genius of France,’ as if this pretended characteristic could suddenly have displayed itself at the end of the last century, after having remained concealed during the whole history of the country.
注释摘要
托克维尔在这一段里做了一个极具穿透力的诊断：文人不但把思想种子播给了革命群众，更把一整套文人的性情、本能和思维习惯移植到了政治行动里。这是他整个第十三章的结论性段落，前面反复铺陈的是，十八世纪中叶法国文人如何在毫无实际政治经验的隔绝中，靠着抽象理性构建了一个又一个完美社会的蓝图，而这些蓝图最终俘获了全民族的想象。但直到这里，他才指出那个更隐蔽也更致命的后果…