had but little chance of receiving a wholesome education, even if there
was not a settled design to enfeeble his mind by neglect.

His father had been a man of a character very different from that of the
king. By a sort of natural reaction or silent protest against the infamies
which he saw around him, he had cherished a serious and devout
disposition, and had observed a conduct of the most rigorous virtue. He
was even suspected of regarding the Jesuits with especial favor, and was
believed to have formed plans for the reformation of morals, and perhaps
of the State. It was not strange that, on the first news of the illness
which proved fatal to him, the people flocked to the churches with prayers
for his recovery, and that his death was regarded by all the right-
thinking portion of the community as a national calamity. But the
courtiers, who had regarded his approaching reign with not unnatural
alarm, hailed his removal with joy, and were, above all things, anxious to
prevent his son, who had now become the heir to the crown, from following
such a path as the father had marked out for himself. The negligence of
some, thus combining with the deliberate malice of others, and aided by
peculiarities in the constitution and disposition of the young prince
himself, which became more and more marked as he grew up, exercised a
pernicious influence on his boyhood. Not only was his education in the
ordinary branches of youthful knowledge neglected, but no care was even
taken to cultivate his taste or to polish his manners, though a certain
delicacy of taste and refinement of manners were regarded by the
courtiers, and by Louis XV. himself, as the pre-eminent distinction of his
reign. He was kept studiously in the background, discountenanced and
depressed, till he contracted an awkward timidity and reserve which
throughout his life he could never shake off; while a still more
unfortunate defect, which was another result of this system, was an
inability to think or decide for himself, or even to act steadily on the