Excerpt from Universal Classics Library
If ever satire had a distinct call to duty it was during the Regency in France. The ruling class was honeycombed with corruption. The country was groaning under its monarchical afflictions. There seemed to be no hope for the peoples salvation from disastrous fate. They were patient, long-suffering beasts of burden, content to be saddled, bridled, and ridden by a pestiferous breed of heartless incompetents, whose sole object in life was selfish pleasure at anyone's expense but their own. The cauldron was seething meanwhile, but did not boil over till near the century end.
This was a splendid opportunity for great souls with great courage, if any had existed. The old prophets of Israel would have made the hills echo with their ringing denunciations of wickedness in high places. Strong champions of human rights would have flashed the sword and fired the spirits of men worthy the name into triumphant vindication of the common right to fair play. But the patriotism of the period was a sorry substitute for the genuine thing. It whined and whispered when it should have shouted. It meekly accepted the role of the deaf and dumb Feneila, popping out here and there with mysterious gesticulations and enigmatical signalings, which conveyed meanings of momentous importance, or none, according as one chose to interpret them. The reformer spoke with a muzzle on his mouth, and sometimes it was a golden one.
The satirist is usually a reluctant martyr. He seeks to do good but prefers to do it by stealth and suggestion. Montesquieu was more, or less, than a satirist. A man of high education, versed in the theory and practice of law, an aristocrat of title and wealth, occupying a public position of great influence. He might have given bold utterance to his sentiments and defied officialdom.
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