THE END OF LITTLE PICPUS.
Toward the beginning of the Restoration, Little Picpus began to pine away; it shared in the general death of the order, which after the eighteenth century began to decay, like all religious orders. Contemplation, like prayer, is a want of humanity; but, like all that the revolution has touched, it will be transformed, and will become favorable to human progress, instead of being hostile to it. The house of Little Picpus became rapidly depopulated. In 1840 the little convent and the school had disappeared; there were no old women or young girls left; the former were dead, the latter had fled away. Volaverunt.
The rule of the Perpetual Adoration is so strict that it horrifies; novices hold back, and the order is not recruited. In 1845 a few lay sisters were still found here and there, but no professed nuns. Forty years ago there were nearly one hundred nuns; fifteen years ago there were only twenty-eight; how many are there now? In 1847 the prioress was young, a sign that the choice was becoming restricted. She was not forty years old. In proportion as the number diminishes the fatigue is augmented; the service of each becomes more painful; and the moment may be seen approaching at which there will be only a dozen sore and bent shoulders to bear the heavy rule of St. Benedict. The burden is implacable, and remains the same for the few as for the many; it used to press, but now it crushes. Hence they die out. At the time when the author of this book still resided in Paris two died,—one twenty-five, the other twenty-three years of age. The latter can say, like Julia Alpinula: Hic jaceo. Vixi annos viginti et tres. It is owing to this decadence that the convent has given up the education of girls.
We were unable to pass by this extraordinary, unknown, and obscure house without entering it, and taking with us those who are reading—we trust with some advantage to themselves—the melancholy story of Jean Valjean. We have penetrated into this community so full of those old practices which seem so novel at the present day. It is a closed garden. Hortus conclusus. We have spoken of this singular spot in detail, but with respect, so far, at least, as respect and detail are compatible. We do not understand everything, but we insult nothing. We keep at an equal distance from the hosanna of Joseph de Maistre, who ended by consecrating the hangman, and the sneers of Voltaire, who even jeered at the crucifix.
There is a lack of logic in Voltaire's attitude, be it said in passing; for Voltaire ought to have defended Jesus as he defended Calas; and even for those who deny the Divine incarnation, what does the crucifix stand for? The good man murdered. In the nineteenth century the religious idea is undergoing a crisis. We unlearn some things, and we do well, provided that in unlearning one thing, we learn another. There must be no vacuum in the heart of man. Some demolitions are made, and it is well that they should be made, but only on condition that they shall be followed by reconstructions.
In the meanwhile let us study the things which are past. It is necessary to know them were it only to avoid them. The counterfeits of the past take on false names, and try to pass themselves off for the future. This ghost, the past, may falsify his passport. We must learn to unmask the trick. We must be on our guard against it. The past has a face, superstition; and a mask, hypocrisy. We must identify the face, and tear off the mask.
As for the convents, they offer a complex question,—a question of civilization which condemns them, a question of liberty which protects them.
BOOK VII
A PARENTHESIS.
CHAPTER I.
THE CONVENT AS AN ABSTRACT IDEA.
This book is a drama in which the hero is the Infinite. The second character is Man.
Under these circumstances, as a convent happens to lie on our road, we ought to enter it. Why? Because the convent, which belongs as much to the East as to the West, to antiquity as to modern times, to Paganism, to Buddhism, to Mahometanism, as to Christianity, is one of the lenses which man brings to bear on the Infinite.
This is no place to develop unrestrictedly certain ideas; still, while we maintain absolutely our reservations, our restrictions, and even our indignation, we ought to acknowledge, that whenever we find in man the sense of the Infinite, well or ill conceived, we are seized with a feeling of respect. In the synagogue, in the mosque, in the pagoda, in the wigwam, there is a repulsive side which we detest, and a sublime side which we reverence. What a subject for meditation for the spirit, and what a boundless revery is the reverberation of God on the human wall!