Acknowledgments
Introduction TO LIVE AND DIE BY NATURE’S LAWS
Natural Right and Republicanism in France
Natural Republicanism and the Golden Age
Enemies of the Human Race”: Transgressing the Laws of Nature
Natural Right and Terror Laws in the French Revolution
Restoring the Republic of Nature: The Jacobin Project
Prologue HOSTIS HUMANI GENERIS
Natural Man and Natural Right: New World Controversies
The “True Ancient Enemy of the Human Race”: Theology and the Devil
Killing No Murder: Tyranny and Natural Right
Pirates and the Law of the Land
The Law of Nations and the Law of Nature
Conclusion: Enlightenment and Hostility
PART I A SECRET HISTORY OF NATURAL REPUBLICANISM IN FRANCE (1699–1791)
Chapter 1 IMAGINARY REPUBLICS
The State of Nature and the Golden Age: From Montaigne to Fénelon
Troglodytes and Romans: Montesquieu’s Two Republicanisms
Classical Republicanism and Natural Right: Mably and Rousseau
Chapter 2 FINDING NATURE
Republican Orientalism (Voltaire)
Ethnography of the Golden Age: Diderot and Tahiti
Physiocracy: Conceiving the Natural Republic
The Politics of Sensibilité: Sylvain Maréchal, Natural Republican
The Coming of the French Republic
PART II THE REPUBLIC OF NATURE (1792–94)
Chapter 3 OFF WITH THEIR HEADS: DEATH AND THE TERROR
Power to the People? Popular Violence and State Manipulation
Terror by Committee: The Practice of Violence
The Revolutionary Dialectic: The Counterrevolution and Cycles of Violence
To Kill a King: Judging by Nature
Outlawing the Nation: Natural Right and Terror Laws
Only “Natural”: Becoming a Terrorist
Chapter 4 THE CASE OF THE MISSING CONSTITUTION: OF POWER AND POLICY
Chronicle of a Death Foretold: A Jacobin “Conspiracy”
The “Festival of Nature”: Performing Natural Authority
Conventions, Constitutions, and the Declaration of Rights
Republican by Nature: Saint-Just versus the Girondins
What’s Left of the General Will?
Chapter 5 THE DESPOTISM OF NATURE: JUSTICE AND THE REPUBLIC-TO-COME
Waiting for the Republic: The Revolutionary Government
“Let Justice Be the Order of the Day”: Ending “the Terror”
One Republic under the Supreme Being: The Metaphysical Panopticon
And Justice for All: The Law of 22 Prairial
“System of Terror” or Natural Republic?
Conclusion LEGACIES OF THE TERROR
From a Natural Republic to a World Revolution
Terror and Totalitarianism
Two Concepts of Exceptionality
Bibliography
Index