Volume 5 (of 6) 31/52 I.25n.) Speech by the Chancellor Seguier, 1775: "Our kings have themselves declared that they are fortunately powerless to attack property."] [Footnote 2317: Rousseau's text in the "Contrat Social."-- On the meaning and effect of this principle cf "The Revolution," I., 217 and following pages, and III., book VI., ch. 47 to 74).] [Footnote 2318: The opinion, or rather the resignation which confers omnipotence on the central power, goes back to the second half of the fifteenth century, after the Hundred Years' war, and is due to that war; the omnipotence of the king was then the only refuge against the English invaders, and the ravages of the Ecorcheurs .-- Cf. |