Robbespierre Virtue
It is a direction of intention; it therefore requires of the citizens an integrity of purpose, which is to say a critical spirit, patriotism in the proper sense of the word, respect for the rights of others, reasoned devotion to the national community, "virtue" in the language of Montesquieu, Rousseau and Robbespierre. "The soul of the Republic," wrote Robbespierre in 1792, "is virtue, love of country, the generous devotion that fuses all interests into the general interest" (pp. 219 220).
Perhaps the reader in the late 20th century --- some fifty years after Lefebvre wrote his book --- is too weary from the horrors of that half-century to take the author's romantic notions about the French Revolution as seriously as they should be taken.
Perhaps the reader in the late 20th century --- some fifty years after Lefebvre wrote his book --- is too weary from the horrors of that half-century to take the author's romantic notions about the French Revolution as seriously as they should be taken.