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Mauprat by George Sand
page 294 of 411 (71%)
The poor abbe did not know that there was so much truth in his words.




XIX

After thoroughly reflecting on the Trappist's probable intentions, I
decided that I ought to grant him the interview he had requested. In any
case, John Mauprat could not hope to impose upon me, and I wished to do
all in my power to prevent him from pestering my great-uncle's last days
with his intrigues. Accordingly, the very next day I betook myself
to the town, where I arrived towards the end of Vespers. I rang, not
without emotion, at the door of the Carmelites.

The retreat chosen by the Trappist was of those innumerable mendicant
societies which France supported at that time. Though its rules
were ostensibly most austere, this monastery was rich and devoted to
pleasure. In that age of scepticism the small number of the monks was
entirely out of proportion to the wealth of the establishment which
had been founded for them; and the friars who roamed about the vast
monasteries in the most remote parts of the provinces led the easiest
and idlest lives they had ever known, in the lap of luxury, and entirely
freed from the control of opinion, which always loses its power when man
isolates himself. But this isolation, the mother of the "amiable vices,"
as they used to phrase it, was dear only to the more ignorant. The
leaders were a prey to the painful dreams of an ambition which had been
nurtured in obscurity and embittered by inaction. To do something, even
in the most limited sphere and with the help of the feeblest machinery;
to do something at all costs--such was the one fixed idea of the priors
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