arts were still unknown to Athens, when scarcely a thatched hut stood on what was afterwards the site of Rome, this contemned people had their fenced cities and cedar palaces, their splendid Temple, their fleets of merchant ships, their schools of sacred learning, their great statesmen and soldiers, their natural philosophers, their historians and their poets. What nation ever contended more manfully against overwhelming odds for its independence and religion? What nation ever, in its last agonies, gave such signal proofs of what may be accomplished by a brave despair? And if, in the course of many centuries, the oppressed descendants of warriors and sages have degenerated from the qualities of their fathers, if, while excluded from the blessings of law, and bowed down under the yoke of slavery, they have contracted some of the vices of outlaws and of slaves, shall we consider this as matter of reproach to them? Shall we not rather consider it as matter of shame and remorse to ourselves? Let us do justice to them. Let us open to them the door of the House of Commons. Let us open to them every career in which ability and energy can be displayed. Till we have done this, let us not presume to say that there is no genius among the countrymen of Isaiah, no heroism among the descendants of the Maccabees.

Sir, in supporting the motion of my honourable friend, I am, I firmly believe, supporting the honour and the interests of the Christian religion. I should think that I insulted that religion if I said that it cannot stand unaided by intolerant laws. Without such laws it was established, and without such laws it may be maintained. It triumphed over the superstitions of

the most refined and of the most savage nations, over the graceful mythology of Greece and the bloody idolatry of the northern forests. It prevailed over the power and policy of the Roman empire. It tamed the barbarians by whom that empire was overthrown. But all these victories were gained not by the help of intolerance, but in spite of the opposition of intolerance. The whole history of Christianity proves that she has little indeed to fear from persecution as a foe, but much to fear from persecution as an ally. May she long continue to bless our country with her benignant influence, strong in her sublime philosophy, strong in her spotless morality, strong in those internal and external evidences to which the most powerful and comprehensive of human intellects have yielded assent, the last solace of those who have outlived every earthly hope, the last restraint of those who are raised above every earthly fear! But let not us, mistaking her character and her interests, fight the battle of truth with the weapons of error, and endeavour to support by oppression that religion which first taught the human race the great lesson of universal charity.

FOR

OR nearly eleven months I have been away from France. During eleven months have I imposed upon myself the most complete exile, the most obscure retreat, the most absolute silence. I was like one voluntarily dead, lying in the secret grave, in expectation of truth and justice. And to-day, truth having conquered, justice reigning at last, I am re-born, I return, and once more take my place upon French soil. To-day is it not a shining evidence that our lengthy campaign, to my advisers, to my friends and to myself, has been nothing but a disinterested struggle to cause to flow from facts the greatest possible amount of light? If we have wished to gain time, if we have opposed proceeding to proceeding, it is because we had charge of the truth as we have charge of a soul; it is because we did not wish to see the feeble glimmer extinguished within our hands, when it was growing day by day. It was like a small, sacred lamp, which was being carried through the tempest, and which had to be defended against the fury of the crowd, maddened by lying. We had but one tacticto remain masters of our affair, to prolong it so long as possible that it might provoke events to happen, to draw from it, in one word, what we had promised ourselves of decisive truths. And we have never given a thought to ourselves, we have never acted but for the triumph of right, ready to pay with our liberty and life.

Let the situation be remembered which was created for me, in Versailles last July. It was a strangling without words. And I did not want to be thus strangled; it did not suit me to be thus executed dur

ing the absence of Parliament, amidst the passions of the street. It was our will to reach October, with the hope that truth would have still advanced, that justice would then have to be done. Besides, it must not be forgotten what underhand work was being carried on all this time. All we could expect from the examinations opened against Commander Esterhazy and against Colonel Picquart One and the other were in prison, we were not ignorant of the fact that shining lights must perforce flow from these inquests, if they were held loyally; and, without, nevertheless, foreseeing the confession, then the suicide of Colonel Henry, we were reckoning upon the inevitable events which one day or another would enlighten the whole monstrous affair in its true and sinister aspect. Therefore is not our desire to gain time explained? Were we not justified in using every legal means of choosing our hour in the best interests of Justice? Was it not to conquer, to temporize, in the most painful and most holy of struggles? And these reasons were so powerful that I departed, resigned, announcing my return in October, with the certitude to thereby be a good worker for the cause and to assure its triumph.

But what I am not saying to-day, what I shall tell of some day, is the anguish of heart, the bitterness of this sacrifice. It must not be forgotten that I am neither a polemist, nor a politician, seeking benefits from disturbances. I am a free writer who has had but one passion in his life, that of truth. During nearly forty years I have served my country by means of my pen, with all my courage, with all I possessed of strength to work, and good faith. And I swear to you, there is a fearful sorrow, to go away alone, one dark night, to

see afar the lights of France growing dim, when one has simply wished for her honour, her grandeur in matters of justice among nations. And those who think that I went away to escape prison, and perhaps to live abroad in luxury with Jewish gold, are sorry people who inspire me with a little disgust and a great deal of contempt. I was to have returned in October. We had resolved to temporize until the reopening of the Houses, while reckoning upon the unforeseen event which was for us, in the course of things, the certain event. And did not that unforeseen event not even await October, but burst forth already at the end of August, with the confession and the suicide of Colonel Henry?

For me,

On the very next day I desired to return. the revision was imposing itself, Dreyfus's innocence had immediately to be recognized. I had besides

never asked for anything but the revision; my rôle must perforce end, so soon as the Cour de Cassation should convene, and I was ready to withdraw. As to my trial, it was no longer anything, in my sight, than a pure formality, since the document produced by the Generals de Pellieux, Gonse and Boisdeffre, and upon which the jury had convicted me, was a forgery from which its author had just taken refuge in death.

And

I was therefore preparing to return, when my friends from Paris, my counsel, all those who had remained in the battle, wrote me letters full of anxiety. The situation remained serious. Far from being assured, the revision remained uncertain. M. Brisson, the head of the cabinet, was meeting with ever-increasing obstacles, betrayed by every one, not being able to dispose of a simple police official. So that my return,