Saint-Just, therefore, postulates that every king is a rebel or a usurper. He is a rebel against the people whose absolute sovereignty he usurps. Monarchy is not a king, “it is crime.” Not a crime, but crime itself, says Saint-Just; in other words, absolute profanation. That is the precise, and at the same time ultimate, meaning of Saint-Just’s remark, the import of which has been stretched too far:8 “No one can rule innocently.” Every king is guilty, because any man who wants to be king is automatically on the side of death.
