If I did not publish this autobiography [Les Mots] sooner and in its most radical form, it is because I considered it exaggerated.
Drill and uniforms impose an architecture on the crowd. An army's beautiful. But that's not all; it panders to lower instincts than the aesthetic. The spectacle of human beings reduced to automatism satisfies the lust for power. Looking at mechanized slaves, one fancies oneself a master.