《旧制度与大革命·卷二·第二十章·革命自然从既有事实中产生》第5节
At the period immediately preceding the Revolution of 1789, these two passions were equally sincere and appeared to be equally intense. At the outbreak of the Revolution they met and combined; for a moment they were intimately mingled, they inflamed each other by mutual contact, and kindled at once the whole heart of France. Such was 1789, a time of inexperience no doubt, but a time of generosity, of enthusiasm, of virility, and of greatness--a time of immortal memory, towards which the eyes of mankind will turn with admiration and respect long after those who witnessed it and we ourselves shall have disappeared. Then, indeed, the French were sufficiently proud of their cause and of themselves to believe that they might be equal in freedom. Amidst their democratic institutions they therefore everywhere placed free institutions. Not only did they crush to the dust all that effete legislation which divided men into castes, corporations, and classes, and which rendered their rights even more unequal than their conditions, but they shattered by a single blow those other laws, more recently imposed by the authority of the Crown, which had deprived the French nation of the free enjoyment of its own powers, and had placed by the side of every Frenchman the Government, as his preceptor, his guardian, and, if need be, his oppressor. Centralisation fell with absolute government. But when that vigorous generation, which had commenced the Revolution was destroyed or enervated, as commonly happens to any generation which engages in such enterprises--when, following the natural course of events of this nature, the love of freedom had been damped and discouraged by anarchy and popular tyranny, and the bewildered nation began to grope after a master--absolute government found prodigious facilities for recovering and consolidating its authority, and these were easily discovered by the genius of the man who was to continue the Revolution and to destroy it.
注释摘要
托克维尔在此处提出了一个极其精微的区分：法国人在旧制度末期实际上怀有两种表面相似、本质迥异的激情。其一是对不平等的刻骨仇恨，这种激情源远流长、根深蒂固；其二是对自由的向往，这种激情出现较晚、根基较浅。1789年的独特之处，在于这两种激情恰好相遇并短暂融合。他把这一年赋予了几乎不带保留的赞美，称为慷慨、热情、充满阳刚之气与伟大情怀的时刻，这恰恰是因为只有在那…