Editing Marquis de Condorcet (section)

==Civic duty==
For Condorcet's [[republicanism]] the nation needed enlightened citizens and education needed democracy to become truly public. Democracy implied free citizens, and ignorance was the source of servitude. Citizens had to be provided with the necessary knowledge to exercise their freedom and understand the rights and laws that guaranteed their enjoyment. Although education could not eliminate disparities in talent, all citizens, including women, had the right to free education. In opposition to those who relied on revolutionary enthusiasm to form the new citizens, Condorcet maintained that revolution was not made to last and that revolutionary institutions were not intended to prolong the revolutionary experience but to establish political rules and legal mechanisms that would insure future changes without revolution. In a democratic city there would be no Bastille to be seized. Public education would form free and responsible citizens, not revolutionaries.<ref>{{cite book|last=Baker|first=Keith Michael|title=Condorcet: From Natural Philosophy to Social Mathematics|publisher=[[University of Chicago Press]]|year=1975|isbn=0226035328|url-access=registration|url=https://archive.org/details/condorcetfromnat0000bake}}</ref>