Not only does he overlook all these characteristics, but he sets them aside; they are too numerous and too complex; they would interfere with and disturb his thoughts; however fitted for clear and comprehensive logic he is so much the less fitted for complex and comprehensive ideas; consequently, he avoids them and, through an innate operation of which he is unconscious, he involuntarily condenses, simplifies and curtails henceforth, his idea, partial and superficial as it is, seems to him adequate and complete; in his eyes the abstract quality of man takes precedence of and absorbs all others; not only has this a value, but the sole value.

One man, therefore, is as good as another and the law should treat all alike .-- Here, amour-propre (self-esteem, pride or arrogance), so keen in France, and so readily excited, comes in to interpret and apply the formula:[3303] "Since all men equal each other, I am as good as any man; if the law confers a right on people of this or that condition, fortune or birth, it must confer the same right on me.

Every door that is open to them must be open to me; every door that is closed to me must be closed to them.

Otherwise, I am treated as an inferior and wounded in my deepest feelings.

When the legislator places a ballot in their hands he is bound to place another just like it in my hands, even if they know how to use it and I do not, even if a limited suffrage is of use to the community and universal suffrage is not.