Frances

“ Mixed Society.—Influence of the English Clergy and their Families.—Importance of their station in Society.
Though I am still of opinion that French society, properly so called,—that is to say, the society of the educated ladies and gentlemen of France,—is the most graceful, animated, and fascinating in the world; I think, nevertheless, that it is not as perfect as it might be, were a little more exclusiveness permitted in the formation of it. ”

“ No one who is familiar with that delightful portion of French literature contained in their letters and memoirs, which paint the manners and the minds of those they treat of with more truth of graphic effect than any other biography 98 in the world,—no one acquainted with the aspect of society as it is painted there, but must be aware that the character of Frenchmen has undergone a great and important change during the last century. ”

“ The position, the prospects, the prosperity of France are become a subject of the deepest interest to the English nation; and it is therefore that the observations of any one who has been a recent looker-on there may have some value, even though they are professedly drawn from the surface only. But when did ever the surface of human affairs present an aspect so full of interest? ”

“ But there is a polished grace, a finished elegance in the language of France, as registered in the writings of her Augustan age, which may well atone for the want of greater copiousness, with which it has been sometimes reproached. To 13 increase its strength, by giving it coarseness, would be like exchanging a high-mettled racer for a dray-horse. ”

“ Delicacy in France and in England.—Causes of the difference between them.
There is nothing perhaps which marks the national variety of manners between the French and the English more distinctly than the different estimate they form of what is delicate or indelicate, modest or immodest, decent or indecent: nor does it appear to me that all the intimacy of intercourse which for the last twenty years has subsisted between the two nations has greatly lessened this difference. ”

“ One gentleman, to whom I owe much gratitude for the active good-nature with which he seems willing to assist me in all my researches, has given me much curious information respecting the present state of literature and literary men in France. ”

“ Then again look at them under Napoleon, and look at them under Louis-Philippe. It is a great, a powerful, a magnificent people, let them put on what outward seeming they will; but I doubt if there be any nation in the world that would so completely throw out a theorist who wished to establish the doctrine of distinct races as the French. ”

“ This conversation only furnished one, among several instances, in which I have been astonished 128 to discover the many popular errors which are still current in France respecting England. Can we fairly doubt that, in many cases where we consider ourselves as perfectly well-informed, we may be quite as much in the dark respecting them? ”

“ I have seen so many delightful English persons here, that I die to see them at home, in the midst of all those singular customs, which they cannot bring with them, and which we only know by the imperfect accounts of travellers. ”

“ In a recent work on France, to which I have before alluded, a comparison is instituted between the conversational powers of the sex in England and in France; and such a picture is drawn of the frivolous inanity of the author's fair countrywomen, as, were the work considered as one of much authority in France, must leave the impression with our neighbours that the ladies of England are tant soit peu Agnès. ”

“ The French are almost too amiable to every one they chance to sit near. The lively smile, the kind empressement, the ready causerie, would be more flattering did we not know that it was all equally at the service of the whole world. ”

“ Would the gods but send a Sheridan to England and a Molière to France, we might yet live to see some of our worst misfortunes turned to jest, and, like the man choking in a quinsey, laugh ourselves into health again. ”

“ Everybody we see is preparing to be off in some direction or other,—some to the sea, some to philosophise under the shadow of their own vines, and some, happier than all the rest, to visit the enchanting watering-places of lovely Germany. ”

“ But at the humble restaurant of two francs, you have again a new page of Paris existence to study,—and one which, while it will probably increase your English relish for your English home, will show you no unprofitable picture of the amiable social qualities of France. I think that if we could find a people composed in equal proportions of the two natures, they would be as near to social perfection as it is possible to imagine. ”

“ Parisian Women.—Rousseau's failure in attempting to describe them.—Their great influence in Society.—Their grace in Conversation.—Difficulty of growing old.—Do the ladies of France or those of England manage it best?
There is perhaps no subject connected with Paris which might give occasion to such curious and inexhaustible observation as the character, position, and influence of its women. ”

“ I am persuaded, that if it were to become as much the fashion to imitate the French independence of mind in our style of living, as it now is to copy them in ragoûts, bonnets, moustaches, and or-molu, we should greatly increase our stock of real genuine enjoyment. ”

“ Foreigners—Frenchmen, for example—who live in the country seem always to do so 177under protest, and to wish to convey to the traveller that, like the patriarch, they are only strangers and sojourners in the rural districts, seeking a better country, even a Parisian. ”

“ Original minds, gifted with what the French call l’esprit primesautier, are perhaps, indeed, affected rather more than less than commonplace people by the emotions of those around them, because their larger natures are more open to the sympathetic shock. Like ships with all sails set, they are caught by every breeze. ”

“ Whatever the standers-by may wish or feel about future struggles and future changes, I think it is certain that no Frenchman who desires the prosperity of his country can at the present moment wish for anything but a continuance of the tranquillity she actually enjoys. ”

“ Here, stretched and lounging at our ease, we challenged each other to discover English colours among the multitude of conquered banners which hung suspended above our heads. It is hardly possible that some such should not be there ”

“ Into it flowed, from all parts of Germany, youths and men of mature years, alike through love of virtue and study, who, seeking the treasures of knowledge and philosophy, found them there in abundance. ”

“ Nous autres Anglaises generally understand how to do the first with a respectable degree of resignation; and the French, by means of some invaluable secret which they wisely keep to themselves, are enabled to approach very nearly to equal success in the other. ”

“ France and England both have so long a list of mighty names that may be quoted on either side to prove their claim to rank high as literary contributors to refinement, that the struggle as to which ranks highest can only be fairly settled by both parties agreeing that each country has a fair right to prefer what they have produced themselves. But, alas! at the present moment, neither can have great cause to boast. What is good, is overpowered and stifled by what is bad. ”

“ Every one, not personally interested in the possible result of another uproar, must rejoice at this improvement in discipline. The boys of France must now submit to give way before her men; and as long as this lasts, something like peace and prosperity may be hoped for. ”

“ French ideas of England.—Making love.—Precipitate retreat of a young Frenchman.—Different methods of arranging Marriages.—English Divorce.—English Restaurans.
It now and then happens, by a lucky chance, that one finds oneself full gallop in a conversation the most perfectly unreserved, without having had the slightest idea or intention, when it began, of either giving or receiving confidence. ”

“ Slang.—Les Jeunes Gens de Paris.—La Jeune France.—Rococo.—Décousu.
I suppose that, among all people and at all times, a certain portion of what we call slang will insinuate itself into familiar colloquial intercourse, and sometimes even dare to make its unsanctioned accents heard from the tribune and the stage. It appears to me, I confess, that France is at present taking considerable liberties with her mother-tongue. ”

“ Such is the brilliant Royal House of France, so called because it is the living personification of France, and because, having in the course of ages founded, with the nation's help, the unity of France, it now appears the last and only hope of Frenchmen, in the midst of their sorrows and their disasters. Let us bring it home to ourselves, although strangers only reading of the life of others; and may it go home to the mind of Frenchmen, that the safety of France is in the Monarchy, and that elsewhere people can find nought but ruin and calamity. ”

“ We know a great deal about old nobles who have laid down their titles and become men of the people, and about new nobles who have laid down their muskets to become men of the court,—of ministers, ambassadors, and princes who have dropped out of sight, and of parvenus of all sorts who have started into it ”

“ To look into the hearts of all who form either 133 a Parisian or a London lady's visiting list, in order to discover of what stuff each individual be made, would not perhaps be very wise, and is luckily quite impossible. ”

“ Five years in France!—France with its clear sun and lovely moon; its silver-grey cities, its lilac haze, its sweet, deep greenness, its atmosphere of living light!—France, the dwelling-place of God in all His myriad aspects—in all His protean forms! France, the sanctuary of Truth and all her ancient and her future liberties; France, blossoming domain of Love in Love’s million exquisite transfigurations, wherein only the eye of faith can recognise the winged god amid his camouflage! ”

“ God all powerful grant that he may issue forth from that sweet land which all must love, all France, where are good Christians, and may they be comforted, and may they be sustained; for the power of their adversary and his false art tempt them to withstand thy holy will. Have pity on Christendom, good lord God, on other lands as well as on France! It would be the worst of pities if so noble a kingdom as France were through much temptation to fall into perdition.... ”

“ France's colors wave again
High above this tented plain,
Stream and flaunt, and blaze and shine,
O'er the banner-painted brine,
Float and flow!
And the brazen trumpets blow
While upon her serried lines,
Full the light of Freedom shines
In a broad, effulgent glow.
And here this day I see
The fairest dream that ever yet
Was dreamt by History!
As in cadence, and in time,
To the martial throb and rhyme
Of her bugles and her drums
Forth a stately vision comes—
Comes majestically slow—
Comes a fair and stately vision of
One hundred years ago!
Welcome to France! ”

“ Society.—Morality.—False Impressions and False Reports.—Observations from a Frenchman on a recent publication.
Much as I love the sights of Paris,—including as we must under this term all that is great and enduring, as well as all that is for ever changing and for ever new,—I am more earnestly bent, as you will readily believe, upon availing myself of all my opportunities for listening to the conversation within the houses, than on contemplating all the marvels that may be seen without. ”

“ Men looked so much to the King of France, they looked so much on France as embodied in his person, that there was small room left in their thoughts for France herself, for France as embodied in her people. ”

“ For the representation of pieces bearing the general character which we have described, the French are certainly better fitted than any other people,—their native gaiety and sprightliness of disposition,—the polish which their manners so readily acquire,—their irrepressible confidence and self-conceit,—their love of shewing off, and attracting attention, give really a stage effect to many of their serious actions, and to almost all their trifling conversation and amusements. ”

“ A young Englishman of my acquaintance, who, though he had been a good deal in French society, was not initiated into the mysteries of female education, recounted to me the other day an adventure of his, which is german to the matter, though not having much to do with our last night's ball. ”

“ A finer subject could not offer itself to a Frenchman than the long reign in which France, seeming, at a bound, to emerge from a base condition of manners, of public morals, of government, and of policy, stood forth resplendent in letters, arts, arms, statecraft, and social refinement. ”

“ It was there, all of it, the courage, the resolution, the purity, the strength, the virility of the womanhood of France—all—all—it was all there—and they thought it wonderful, incomparable—only they prated of a secret model—nom de Dieu—when it was themselves, when it was France that was the model—and they had not grasped the apotheosis of their separate individualities in the sublime glory of the composite whole! ”

“ This quiet little girl, at once artless and disenchanted, pious and disillusioned, does not answer in the least to the conception that a young German artist forms of France. But we know better! The little governess personifies that France, known to few outside her boundaries, which is compact of sacrifice, of duty, of delicate conscientiousness, of rigid economy for self and generous outlay for some treasured ideal, child, or cause:—the France of Port-Royal, the France of ‘48. ”

“ It is true, that the noblesse who have visited England with proper recommendations, and have been introduced to the best society, do us justice: the men of letters also, who, from party motives, extol every thing English, have done us perhaps more than justice. But I speak of the French in general; not the lower classes only, but the gentry of the provinces, and even those who in other respects have pretensions to information. ”