Marat once said of him: "Il n'est pas dangereux." The phrase had been taken up.

Within the precincts of the National Convention, Marat was still looked upon as the great protagonist of Liberty, a martyr to his own convictions carried to the extreme, to squalor and dirt, to the downward levelling of man to what is the lowest type in humanity.

And his sayings were still treasured up: even the Girondins did not dare to attack his memory.

Dead Marat was more powerful than his living presentment had been.
And he had said that Deroulede was not dangerous.

Not dangerous to Republicanism, to liberty, to that downward, levelling process, the tearing down of old traditions, and the annihilation of past pretensions.
Deroulede had once been very rich.