Proudhon - A Biography

THE PRISONER
This typically Gallic reluctance to leave his country was
reinforced by a continued belief that the Bonapartes maintained
an almost friendly attitude towards him. ‘I have every reason to
believe that in the Elysee I am looked on with a favourable eye/
he told Marc Dufraisse. But at the same time he added: ‘To
indulge in politics is to wash one’s hands in dung/ and this
Rabelaisian indication that he had no intention o f being directly
involved in the actions of the government was strengthened when
he indignantly rejected a suggestion from Antoine Gauthier that he
should obtain state employment; such a step, he held, would hinder
his efforts to push the authorities towards a revolutionary path.
Meanwhile, he began to face the problems o f his approaching
liberation. He realised, as he told Guillemin, that, unless some­
thing quite unforeseen happened, there would be nothing for
him in the field of politics. Besides, he had ‘had enough o f the
vile multitude/ and ‘in the midst of a people who can only bleat
Long Live the Emperor’ it would be absurd to cry Long Live the
Republic.’ He thought instead of a return to the business world,
and confided to Guillemin that several friends had approached
him to secure his participation in schemes for railways and canals.
‘I should not be displeased to prove at least once to the rabble
above and the rabble below that I am capable of something else
than carrying on a newspaper.’
It was in the same memorable letter to Guillemin that he out­
lined in stoic terms the mental attitude that had sustained him
through his years in prison. ‘The more I see people s minds
becoming confounded, the more I feel free and at ease. Yes, free,
for I am the slave o f nothing in the world but natural necessity;
I am enslaved neither to priest, nor magistrate, nor man of arms.
I am linked to no party, I obey no prejudices, I am above human
respect and even above popularity. I wanted to make others free
like myself; they concluded from this that I had too much liberty
and put me in prison. What have they gained from it? Nothing.
What have I lost? If I made the balance with exactitude, I would
again say, nothing. I know ten times more than I knew three
years ago, and I know it ten times better; I know positively what
I have gained, and truly I do not know what I have lost.’
It was in this mood that, on the morning of the 4th June, 1852,
he stepped out through the gate of Sainte-Pelagie, free to face a
life that would be changed more deeply than he imagined.