The period in which aristocracies fall is that in which nations regenerate.

The sap of the people is there.

In this was born Jean Jacques Rousseau, the virile type of Madame Roland.

A portrait of her when a child represents a young girl in her father's workshop, holding in one hand a book, and in the other an engraving tool.

This picture is the symbolic definition of the social condition in which Madame Roland was born, and the precise moment between the labour of her hands and her mind.
Her father, Gratien Phlippon, was an engraver and painter in enamel.