ON SAINT-JUST
473
army and wants to be so, this is not only because the army is indis–
pensable, but also because he sees in it a rough parallel to Spartan
society in which classes are of no importance (in the religious orders
there are no class conflicts ... ). It is difficult for us to imagine what
the revolutionary army was like after J emmapes, after the recapture
of Landau, the day after Fleurus. In this extraordinary, though often
despoiled, army, the Republic nevertheless found its first incarnation,
which had nothing to do with the politicians and their frauds. When
Saint-Just wrote in a rage to the Committee: "I have seen soldiers
starving to death holding on to their muskets," he was in his element.
And he knew what he was talking about. On his arrival at Strasbourg
the soldiers were selling their shoes. (He gave them other shoes, and
decreed that whoever bought military goods from them was to be
condemned to death. ) In his constitution, "an army which elects
its own commander is held to be rebellious." On the other hand he
wants the liberated villages of Alsace to be renamed for the soldiers
who distinguished themselves in the fighting, and wants every
wounded man, "to wear a gold star on his clothing over the spot
where he received wounds; if he was mutilated or suffered a face
wound, he will wear the star over his heart." His Republic is a
peasantry whose leadership is supplied by an army-a kind of
Jacobin Club in the service of the state-and an order of revolu–
tionary Templars (an idea perhaps suggested by his contact with
Freemasonry in his adolescence). For this officer's son, brought up
by priests, "the destiny of a people is shaped by those who strive for
glory and those who strive for riches." But he wanted those who
strive for riches to be ruled by those who strive for glory. Our cen–
tury has seen that such a goal is not utopian, provided that we identify
the latter with those who strive for power. Saint-Just's theories an–
ticipate neither communism nor fascism; he wants to follow in the
steps of Lycurgus, and regards industry as superfluous, except insofar
as it can create .arms. But he does anticipate
the
communists and
the
fascists, the single and all-powerful party. Passionately totalitarian,
he proclaimed that "It is in the nature of things that our economic
affairs will become more and more muddled, until such time as the
established republic encompasses all relations, all interests,
all
laws,
all duties, and gives a common direction to all parts of the state."
He does promise, in Thermidor, a coming period of clemency. But
