Journal in France in 1845 and 1848 with Letters from Italy in 1847. Allies Thomas William
the opposite side of the street, through a private door, we entered into a most beautiful little chapel just erected in the style of the thirteenth century. It belongs to some religious garde-malades, connected with the sisters of charity, who were saying their office as we came in. The architecture is exceedingly rich: all the windows of painted glass. I have never seen anything so exquisite as this chapel. The apse was richly painted and decorated. Afterwards we set off for S. Denis, but gave it up. Looked into S. Eustache, an imposing church of the renaissance, very lofty and spacious. Also S. Germain l'Auxerrois, which is interesting. It has been restored since the riots, and is being filled with painted glass.
Saturday, July 5. – Set off for S. Denis: the abbey has been wonderfully restored since I was there, and is now exceedingly imposing and interesting. The aisles round the choir have been most richly painted and decorated, the central roof not yet. All the windows are of stained glass, forming a complete sketch of French history, wherein Dagobert and S. Louis, Napoleon, Louis XVIII. and Louis Philippe, strangely figure. The tombs of François I. and Louis XII. are very beautiful. The western front resembles Mantes in character; very beautiful; pinnacles of the spire curious and most pleasing. We went to drink tea with Miss Young, her mother, a French lady, and an Irish priest, M. Macarthy, who assists at S. Sulpice. He said the seats there were let to a woman for 35,500 francs per annum. The chief duty of a Catholic is not to go to mass, but to confess and receive absolution. Before marriage every one is compelled to confess, but they do not necessarily receive absolution. This priest's conversation gave one a notion that to common minds the confessional would often be as it were wiping off an old debt, and beginning a new score. "He said there were about 14,000 or 15,000 communicants at Easter in that parish out of a population of 50,000. He seemed to think many might be people who would fall back again into grievous faults, but nearly all at the time had good intentions. I rather thought he made too little a matter of the probability of many falling back: but I may have been mistaken. He said, however, that S. Sulpice was not a measure of Paris, being the most pious parish in the city. He said also, that there was very little temptation to hypocrisy, religion being rather at a discount in public opinion. I should hope from this and other accounts, that there was a very considerable leaven of true piety in this place, bad as it is." – M.
Sunday, July 6. – The heat excessive. We went to Bishop Luscombe's chapel: many staid to the Holy Communion. "There was a discontented French priest there, who, I fear, is going to set up for himself. I had a little talk with the Bishop between services. He has, if I am not mistaken, a totally false view of the position of the French Church. He thinks it is falling to pieces, as a man might think Oriel was coming down, if he did not know there was a live Provost and Fellows inside to repair it when necessary. The discontented go to him and tell him their tale, as the college weapons might fall on the head of any one in quad; and of course they do their best to make him think that all is as rotten as they are. The Roman Catholic clergy, I believe, do not know much of him, or he of them, and he is shut out from the sight of what is best among them." – M.
At five dined with M. Bonnetty. We found there two priests, one of whom, M. D'Alzon, was going to preach at Notre Dame des Victoires that evening for the archiconfrèrie du sacré Cœur de Marie. He seemed an able man, was vicaire general of Nismes, a person of property, who was bent on taking orders. He could not understand how we could preach with a book before us; said no one would listen in France. The other priest, M. Jacquemet, was a very pleasing modest person. We adjourned to the garden of the missions étrangères; met there M. Drach, who had been chief rabbin. He has written a book on the harmony of the Synagogue and the Church; seemed to think he could settle the difficulty concerning the day of the Passover by Jewish traditions.
M. Bonnetty took us to Mrs. Ryon's in the Place belle Chasse. The heat excessive.
Monday, July 7. – We called on M. Defresne; much struck by his conversation. He said all that was best in religion was at Paris: out of a million of inhabitants there were 300,000 going to mass, and 50,000 practising Christians; this was the kernel of religion in the country, the pure gold. He justified the shops being left open by the government on Sunday, for the people generally being without belief, it would be an act of sheer tyranny to shut them. Louis Philippe was now employing against the Jesuits the same arbitrary power he had used to expel l'Abbé Châtel. On religious matters he did not seem to understand how an instructed person could remain with good faith out of the Roman Church. The Puseyites, he seemed to think, did not belong to the Establishment. M. Defresne speaks with remarkable energy; we both wished to have another talk with him. Thence we went to the Pères Lazaristes; M. Aladel received us, gave us the rules of the sisters of charity. Their chief work being the relief of the sick, &c. they have no office, properly so called, and their hours are subject to variation. They rise, winter and summer, at 4 to 4½; 4½ to 5½ meditation, prayer, a subject for meditation given the evening before; 5½ hear mass – this is the ordinary time, but it varies: for instance, they would attend the church in their immediate neighbourhood at whatever hour it might be. Every day spiritual reading, – the Chaplet: it lasts a long half hour; has many special prayers added by their founder, which cannot be seen. In the evening a second meditation for half an hour, always before six o'clock. Vocal prayers before bed time, at half-past eight. Subject of meditation given. These exercises of piety are never given up, as in cases of extreme sickness the sister attending waits till the others have done, and is then relieved by them. They do not go out after nightfall. Dinner at half-past eleven. Supper at six. Their duties are, 1. visiting the sick; 2. attending hospitals; 3. dressing the sick at their own house; 4. keeping schools at their own house. Each school belongs to a sister, who is generally the same; one takes care of the linen, another of the kitchen, and so on. M. Aladel then attacked us on matters of controversy; could not conceive persons of intelligence and good faith remaining out of the pale of the Roman Church. Indeed, this is universally the first thing with them – to be in communion with Rome. Without unity they can conceive no holiness, nor self-devotion, nor even sincerity. We said we admitted the primacy of Rome, but not an absolute power; and referred back to the times of the early Patriarchs, as St. Athanasius. His reply was, that the Pope allowed them to institute their own Bishops, and where this permission was not openly expressed it was implied; a mode of assumption which soon puts an end to all difficulties. The Greeks and Russians were schismatics, but far nearer than we. To him, as to every other Roman Catholic with whom we conversed, the English Church is simply a mass of heresy and schism. We regretted the controversial language of this conversation. Called on M. Labbé, and had a friendly talk with him. He describes the actual state of the Colleges of the University as horrible in point of morality. He is now, at forty-five, sitting down to the study of Greek, to pass his degree of M.A. at the University, in order that he may be privileged to teach under it. At Lady Elgin's in the evening, whither M. Bonnetty conducted us, we found a lively party in the garden. The chief conversation was on magnetising, there being a young man of great powers that way present, but he declined giving us any specimen of his power: he said it took too much out of him, and sometimes bestowed on him the maladies he relieved others from. Thus, he succeeded in transferring a lady's headache to himself. The heat very great to-day.
Tuesday, July 8. – We called on M. Théodore Ratisbonne, a man of about forty-two, with striking Jewish physiognomy, gentle and pleasing in manner. I was very much struck with his conversation. We said we came to learn as much as we could of Catholic institutions. 'As for Protestantism,' said he, 'I believe it has produced good fathers of families, good morals, kindly social feelings, and so on; but as for perfect devotion of the heart to God, it seems to me quite barren. But the soul should not walk, she should fly.' On the worship of the Blessed Virgin, so called, he said, 'Place yourself in the presence of Jesus Christ, for He is ever present, He is always the same. You would see beside Him the Blessed Virgin and the Apostles. You would throw yourself at his feet; but having done so, would you have no thought for His mother? Would you turn your back upon her? Would that be a way of gaining His favour? Or, place yourself at the foot of the Cross, remember His last words, and how can any Christian have other than filial feelings towards her? But there is not a child of the poorest Catholic peasant who would for an instant confound the reverence paid to the mother of his Lord with the worship due only to God. C'est une horreur. Elle est une simple créature, une fille d'Adam, notre sœur; mais elle a réçu la grace d'être mère de Dieu. Moi, je baise un tableau de ma mère, de