December 29, 2017 Friday
Bedtime Story
The Revolution was Building Up
In France of 1700s, any peasant who lost
his wife would not hesitate to pick up a woman as his second wife and there
would be plenty available who would be willing to become a step mother to his
brood of children.
Such were the conditions and plight of most
French apes then unless they happened to be born to monarchies or royalties.
With the loosing wars that the monarchy was
indulging in not only within the continent but even across the Atlantic,
conditions were ripening up for a massive social upheaval.
In social upheavals on such massive scale
as in the French Revolution, mob rioting is far and widespread.
The mob comprehends no reason and during
revolutions worst of the human instincts are unleashed en masse in a manner so
perverse that the perpetrators of evil actually consider themselves to be
virtuous.
The financial crisis that France landed up
in prior to the revolution was itself caused by its costly and cataclysmic
involvement in the Seven Years’ War (It was a World War that essentially rested
on the imperialistic conflict between Great Britain and France)) and later the
American War of Independence.
As an aside, it must also be told that
Britain too landed up in financial crisis as a result of its massive losses in
the American War of Independence.
The Thirteen Colonies that declared
themselves as the United States of America at their very inception brought down
two major world powers to their knees.
After the bloody French Revolution ended
with the abolition of monarchy and establishment of French Republic, the newly
formed republic was run by a powerful Committee of Public Safety.
Just see how one of its famous member
Maximilien Robespierre justifies the mass beheadings that the Committee carries
out during the Reign of Terror in 1793-94:
“If the basis of popular government in
peacetime is virtue, the basis of popular government during a revolution is
both virtue and terror; virtue, without with terror is baneful; terror, without
which virtue is powerless.
Terror is nothing more than speedy, severe
and inflexible justice; it is thus an emanation of virtue; it is less a
principle in itself, than a consequence of the general principle of democracy,
applied to the most pressing needs of the patrie.”
Patrie is the French for fatherland or
homeland.
The Committee of the Public Safety that was
the de facto executive government in France during the Reign of Terror
(1793-94) and could hardly be said to have provided any kind of safety or
security to the public.
It headed the period of maximum executions
following the Revolution.
This committee was then thrown over and
replaced by yet another one in 1795 that went by the name of Directory.
Stay tuned to the voice of an average story storytelling
chimpanzee or login at http://panarrans.blogspot.com
Good night mon ami and my fellow cousin ape.
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Another great educator and a teacher that I am aware of is
Professor Subhashish Chattopadhyay in Bangalore, India.
While I narrate stories, Professor Subhashish an electronic
engineer and a former professor at BARC, does and teaches real mathematics and
physics.
He started the participation of Indian students at the
International Physics Olympiad.
Do visit him here:
All his books can be downloaded for free through this link:
For edutainment and English education of your children, I
recommend this large collection of Halloween Songs for Kids:
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