He preferred known, exhausted, opponents, men partly gained over, to new and ardent enemies who would surpass in exactions those they replaced.

To them there only remained his throne to overthrow,--to him there was left to yield but his life.
XX.
The principal names discussed in the public newspapers in Paris, were those of Condorcet, Brissot, Danton;--in the departments, those of Vergniaud, Guadet, Isnard, Louvet,--who were afterwards Girondists; and those of Thuriot, Merlin, Carnot, Couthon, Danton, Saint Just, who, subsequently united with Robespierre, were, by turns, his instruments or his victims.

Condorcet was a philosopher, as intrepid in his actions as bold in his speculations.

His political creed was a consequence of his philosophy.

He believed in the divinity of reason, and in the omnipotence of the human understanding, with liberty as its handmaid.
Heaven, the abode of all ideal perfections, and in which man places his most beautiful dreams, was limited by Condorcet to earth: his science was his virtue; the human mind his deity.