THE CAUSE OF THE BOURBONS. 181 



will even say a roughness, which in this age of conces 

 sions drew upon him numerous vexations. 



The purely speculative opinions of a studious man 

 concerning the political organization of society, must 

 generally be of too little interest to the public to render 

 their mention necessary ; but the influence which they 

 exercised on the career of Fresnel will not allow me to 

 be silent upon them. 



Fresnel, like so many good men, associated himself 

 deeply in 1814 with the hopes to which the return of 

 the Bourbon family gave rise. The charter of 1814, 

 executed without retrospective effect, appeared to him to 

 contain all the germs of a wise liberty. He saw in it 

 the aurora of a political regeneration which would, with 

 out a check, extend itself from France over all Europe. 

 His patriotic spirit was excited with the idea that our 

 beautiful country was about to exercise such a pacific 

 influence over the good of nations. If, during the Im 

 perial dynasty, the great events of Austerlitz, of Jena, of 

 Friedland, had not strongly excited his imagination, it 

 was solely because they appeared to him destined to per 

 petuate that despotism under which France at that time 

 bent. The disembarkment at Cannes, in 1815, appeared 

 to him an attack on civilization ; and thus, without being 

 hindered by the disordered state of his health, he was 

 anxious to go and join one of the detachments of the 

 royal army of the south. Fresnel flattered himself with 

 the hope of meeting only with men of his own disposi 

 tion, if I may judge from the painful impression which 

 he experienced at his first interview with the general 

 under whose orders he went to place himself. Touched 

 by the invalid appearance of the new soldier, the general 

 testified his surprise that in such a condition he should 



