But this is to reason with people able only to listen to their own interest.
Better, rather, to present them with a more immediate consideration.
Is it still right for the nobility to keep to the language and attitude that it
used in a gothic age? Is it still right, at the end of the 18th century, for the
Third Estate to keep to the abject and cowardly manners of ancient servility?
If the Third Estate knew how to prize and respect itself, the other
orders would undoubtedly respect it too! Remember that the old relationship
between the orders has changed on both sides. The Third Estate,
once reduced to nothing, has re-acquired, by means of its industry, a part
of what was stolen from it by injurious force. But instead of retaking its
rights, it has agreed to pay for them. They have not been restored;