Delivered at the Royal Institution, these three lectures examine France before the Revolution: the caste system that walled the nobility off from the people, the centralised bureaucracy that ruled by force, and the explosive ideas and grievances that blew it apart. Kingsley contrasts it throughout with England, arguing that English liberty made revolution there unnecessary.
A short, opinionated Victorian reading of the old order, by the author of The Water-Babies. Download the free EPUB.