Volume 183601

Paris and the Parisians in 1835.

  • Frances Trollope
Date:
1836
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Paris and the Parisians in 1835. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    presume, that we must account for the present afduence of a talent which some few years ago could hardly be said to exist in France, and might perhaps have been altogether denied to it, had not the pages both of Fenelon and his elo- quent antagonist, Bossuet, rendered such an injustice impos- sible. ) It was, I think, about a dozen years ago that I took some trouble to discover if any traces of this glorious eloquence re- mained at Paris. I heard sermons at Notre Dame—at St. Roch —at St. Eustache; but never was a search after talent attend- ed with worse success. The preachers were nought; they had the air, too, of being vulgar and uneducated men, which I believe was, and indeed still is, very frequently the ease. The churches were nearly empty; and the few persons scattered up and down their splendid aisles appeared, generally speaking, to be of the very lowest order of old women. How great is now the contrast! Nowhere are we so cer- tain of seeing a crowd of elegantly-dressed and distinguished persons as in the principal churches of Paris. Nor is it a crowd that mocks the eye with any tinsel pretensions toa rank they do not possess. Inquire who it is that so meekly and devoutly kneels on one side of you—that so sedulously turns the pages of her prayer-book on the other, and you will he answered by the announcement of the noblest names remaining in France. Though the eloquence of the pulpit has always been an ob- ject of attention and interest to me in all countries, I hardly ventured on my first arrival here to inquire again if anything of the kind existed, lest I should once more be sent to listen to an inaudible mumbling preacher, and to look at the deaf and dozing old women who formed his congregation. Butit has needed no inquiry to make us speedily acquainted with
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