This quotation and the notes that follow on the same page are inspired by the 2016 film that bears Saint-Just’s comment as its impossibly long title. Saint-Just, known as the Angel of Death, during the Terror following the French Revolution, spearheaded the calls for the execution of Louis XIV. As a member of the Committee for Public Safety and President of the Convention his fanaticism led to 26 executions per day at the height of the Terror. Saint-Just’s own execution, on 28 July 1794, along with that of Robespierre, is often taken to be the end of the Terror.
