Ibid., 15. "Indifference seems to have retired from the summits of
the nation only to descend to the lower strata. . . . In France, the
priest is the more liked the less he is seen; to efface himself, to
disappear is what is first and most often demanded of him. The clergy
and the nation live together side by side, scarcely in contact,
through certain actions in life, and never intermingling."




CHAPTER III

I. The regular clergy.

The regular clergy. - Difference in the condition of the two clergies.
- The three vows. - Rules. - Life in common. - Object of the system. -
Violent suppression of the institution and its abuses in 1790. -
Spontaneous revival of the institution free of its abuses after 1800.
- Democratic and republican character of monastic constitutions. -
Vegetation of the old stock and multiplication of new plants, - Number
of monks and nuns. - Proportion of these numbers to the total
population in 1789 and 1878. - Predominance of the organizations for
labor and charity. - How formed and extended. - Social instinct and
contact with the mystic world.

HOWEVER correct the life of a secular priest may be, he stills belongs
to his century. Like a layman, he has his own domicile and fireside,
his parsonage in the country with a garden, or an apartment in town -
in any event, his own home and household, a servant or housekeeper,
who is often either his mother or a sister; in short, a suitable