verted the order of creation: you have destroyed a being.

You, who, with a grain of corn, can make a god, tell me, was it not also a god that you held just now in that credulous and docile soul? what have you done with that interior god of man, that we call liberty? You have put yourself in its place; in the place of that power, by which man is man, I see nonentity.

Well! that nonentity shall be your torment. You will probe it in vain; however low you penetrate, you will find but a void, nothing, neither will nor power. There every thing that could have loved has perished.

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PART III.

FAMILIES.

CHAPTER I.

SCHISM IN FAMILIES. THE DAUGHTER; -BY WHOM EDU

VANTAGE OF THE FIRST INSTRUCTOR. INFLUENCE OF PRIESTS UPON MARRIAGE, WHICH THEY OFTEN RETAIN AFTER THAT CEREMONY.

THE drama which I have endeavoured to sketch does not always, thanks be to God, go so far as the annihilation of the will and personality. One cannot well discern where it stops, owing to the dark cloak of reserve, discretion, and hypocrisy, with which this black community is enveloped. Besides, the clergy have been doubly guarded in their conduct during the present contentions.* It is out of the church, in houses, and family circles, that we must seek for what will throw the principal light upon what the Church conceals. Look well; there you see a reflec

*This circumspection would bear carrying a little farther, if we are to judge of it by the public adventures of the Abbés C. and N., who, by-the-by, will not prosper the less on this account, as two others, of high rank, and known to every body, have already shown.

tion, unfortunately too clear, of what is passing else where.

We have already said, if you enter a house in the evening, and sit down at the family table, one thing will almost always strike you; the mother and daughters are together, of one and the same opinion, on one side; whilst the father is on the other, and alone.

What does this mean? It means that there is some one more at this table, whom you do not see, to contradict and give the lie to whatever the father may utter. He returns fatigued with the cares of the day, and full of those which are to come; but he finds at home, instead of repose and comfort for the mind, only the struggle with the past.

We must not be surprised at it. By whom are our daughters and wives brought up? We must repeat the expression, by our enemies, the enemies of the Revolution, and of the future.

Do not cry out here, nor quote me this or that sermon you have preached.

What do I care for the democratical parade which you make in the pulpit, if every thing beneath us, and behind us, all your little pamphlets which issue by thousands and millions, your ill-disguised system of instruction, your confessional, the spirit of which now transpires, show us altogether what you are, the enemies of liberty? You, subjects of a

foreign prince; you, who deny the French church, how dare you speak of France?

Six hundred and twenty thousand* girls are brought up by nuns under the direction of the priests. These girls will soon be women and mothers, who, in their turn, will hand over to the priests, as far as they are able, both their sons and their daughters.

The mother has already succeeded as far as concerns the daughter; by her persevering importunity, she has, at length, overcome the father's repugnance. A man who, every evening, after the troubles of business, and the warfare of the world, finds strife also at home, may certainly resist for a time, but he must necessarily give in at last; or he will be allowed neither truce, cessation, rest, nor refuge. His own house becomes uninhabitable. His wife having nothing to expect at the confessional, but harsh treatment, as long as she does not succeed, will wage against him every day and every hour the war they make against her; a more gentle one, perhaps; politely bitter, implacable, and obstinate.

She grumbles at the fire-side, is low-spirited at table, and never opens her mouth either to speak or eat; then at bed-time, the inevitable repetition of the lesson she has learned, even on the pillow. The

* Mr. Louandre gives the figure six hundred and twentytwo thousand girls, in his conscientious statistics. Revue des Deux-Mondes, 1844.

ever; who

same sound of the same bell, for ever and could withstand it? what is to be done? Give in, or become mad!

If the husband were firm, obstinate, and persevering enough to stand this trial, the wife, perhaps, would not resist. "How can I see her so unhappy, pining, uneasy, and ill? She is evidently growing thinner. I had much rather save my wife." Such is the language of the husband. If he be not subdued by his wife, he is by his own heart. The next day, the son leaves his school for the Christian school, or the college for the little seminary. The daughter is led triumphantly by her mother to the excellent boarding-school close by, where the good abbé confesses and directs. In less than a year, the boardingschool is found to be not quite good enough, being still too worldly; the little girl is then given over to the nuns, whose superior our abbé happens to be, in some convent of his, that is, under his protection, and his lock and key.

Good-humoured parent, lie easy, and sleep sound. Your daughter is in good hands; you shall be contradicted till your death. Your daughter is really a girl of good sense; and on every subject, having been carefully armed against you, will take, whatever you may say, the opposite side of the question.

What is very singular, the father, generally, is aware that they are bringing up his child against him. Man, you surprise me; what do you expect