BOOKS.

TAINE'S ANCIENT REGIME.* M. TAME somewhat disappoints us. He is the victim, not of his method, but of his genius. He tells us that his plan is to scrutinise and to catalogue historical products precisely as the natural historian does the specimens in his museum, and this volume is a sufficing proof either that his method is inadequate, or that he is unfaithful to it. Any such record as he professes to give us must be greatly vitiated, if it is proved to be guilty of salient omissions within the sphere with which it professedly deals. " A historian may be allowed to act as a naturalist," he says, re- urging what has been a common-place with him since the issue of his Philosophic de r Art ; and he adds, " I have confronted my subject as I would the metamorphosis of an insect." Now, M. Take has certainly not complicated matters by propounding any new or formidable thesis,—he merely wishes to furnish us with historical proofs that in France, in the latter stage of the Bourbon reigns, the Revolution was made inevitable, because the forms of institutions remained when the spirit had fled. There were classes with rights and privileges, but no duties ; classes, again with, duties but no rights ; and the frame-work of society was shattered, because the two sections stood opposed to each other, with no mediating influence. He himself perceives that such a hard-and-fast dogma needs qualification, inasmuch as some of the classes were divided within themselves, the lower clergy—the curds of the rural dis- tricts, for example—against the higher clergy ; but these are not the points on which we propose to lay stress. M. Doudan, in his shrewd, incisive way, in one of his Letters, said of M. Taine's writing in the Revue des Deux Mondes, " It is like a colour-dealer's shop. What a noise of colours ?—red, blue, green, orange, black, nacre, opal, iris, purple !"—and it does seem to us as though his passion for brilliancy had done something to spoil him as a naturalistic historian. We do not deny that this volume shows more trace of effort to overcome this tendency than some of his former works ; but a kaleidoscopic scattering of bright colours, a grouping and readjusting, and shlyking-apart again, as suits his circumstances and his desires, is really more the characteristic mark, than a scientific exactitude and care to find only what exists, • The Ancient Rergime. By H. A. Thine, D.O.L., Oxon. London: Daldy, 'oldster and Co. and to make no more out of it than the documents will justify. M. Take has certainly been assiduous ; he has left no stone un- turned to get at a fact, a trait, or an anecdote, and his pages are burdened with foot-note references ; but he is too fond of imme- diate effect, and is always ready to sacrifice a little for the sake of vividness. His facts run into separate and isolated groups, which stand apart from each other, the business of calmly tracing out wider and subtler relations being more troublesome to him than picturesque arrangement. France is, in fact, regarded by bin,- from first to last as something isolated, standing byitself, because it suits his style so to view it, and this both in respect to what it derived from other nations, and what it imparted to them. But the naturalistic study of conditions, if one is bold enough to be historical, and to deal with national development, must needs be liberally comparative ; and the isolation of a people is as unjusti- fiable as would be the professor in the museum were he to make no reference to the difference between the climate of India, which produced the palm, and that of Switzerland, which reared the pine. M. Take makes several references to England in the course of the work, but they are nearly all incidental, and to aid special points of contrast ; and though he makes it clear enough that the revo- lutionary idea was first distinctively preached in England, he is very inadequate and superficial in the reasons he gives why it did not take root there. The seed was sown, but the harvest was reaped elsewhere.

Let us give two salient instances of M. Taine's failure in width of view. In tracing out the Revolutionary idea, and assigning the doctrine to its sources, he dwells on the rise of the scientific spirit, which had substituted for religion the faith in discovery and analysis ; and the claisic spirit, which had set aside practical laws and allied itself with mathematical formulas, promoting the exigeant temper that would carry a theory to its extreme. But M. Take, though he notices the fact that already the revolutionary doctrines had been proclaimed elsewhere, makes no reference to America, which France, out of dislike to England, had encouraged in the application of the democratic idea, and which had some- thing of moral and social significance to return to France for her countenance. Then, again, though M. Take makes profesSion to treat with the utmost minuteness the condition of the indus- trial population of France, spending a large space in exhibiting the condition of the peasantry—starved, ground down by taxes, and so unequal to maintain their footing that a third of the whole land of the country lay waste—he fails to deal at all adequately with the town populations, or to' hint at, far less to trace out faithfully, the effect on France of the gradual draining-away of the flower of the urban industrial population by the religious persecutions which were so long maintained by Court, and nobles, and clergy. The Huguenots, who were driven to England and other countries, were the flower of France's middle-class, who more than any other section could have tempered between the social extremes, and certainly a student is justified in looking in a work like this for some attempt to estimate the effect of such per- sistent withdrawals of industrial population. But this is not even glanced at by M. Taine, notwithstanding that he is so much more concerned with social phenomena than with political principles, at which he does look with the air of a man who has completely de- tached himself, and will regard them only in the dry light of facts. Very good and characteristic is his confession on this head in the preface, showing how completely a French historian can rise above party spirit. He was in 1849 an elector, and very much perplexed ; he had not only to select men, but to discriminate theories :— " Motives valid for others were not so for me ; I could not under- stand how, in politics one could make up his mind according to his predilection. My positive friends constructed a constitution as if it were a house, according to the most attractive, the newest and simplest plan ; and there is no lack of models,—the mansion of the marquis, the domi- cile of the bourgeois, the working-man's lodging, barracks for soldiers, the commonest philanstery, and even the gipey's encampment. Each one asserted of his model,—' This is the true abode of man, the only one a man of sense could dwell in?' In my opinion, the argument was weak ; personal fancies did not strike one as authorities. It seemed to me that a house should not be built for the architect, not for itself, bat for the

owner and occupant A people on being consulted may tell the form of government they like, but not the form they need ; this is only possible through experience ; time is required to ascer- tain if the political dwelling is convenient, durable, proof

against inclemenciee As proof of this, we have never been content with our own ; within eighty years we have pulled it down thirteen times in order to rebuild it, and this we have done in vain, not having yet found one that snits us. If other people have been more fortunate, if, in other countries, many political institutions are durable and last indefinitely, it is because they have been organised in a peculiar manner, around a primitive and massive nucleus, supported on some old central edifice, many times repaired, but always preserved,

adapted and modified according to the wants of the inhabitants. None of them were built at one stroke, on a new pattern and according to the pro- visions of reason alone. I promised myself that, for my part, if I should some day undertake to form a political opinion, it would only be after having studied France."

It is somewhat flattering to English feeling, that amidst this delicate Parisian irony, which should not be without its own effect on men of the "Extremes," one can detect that M. Taine indulges in a side-glance at English institutions, makes full use of his studies in English history and the fruit of his visits to this country. But the truth is that, in spite of his claims, we should fall into an error

if we looked in M. Taine's Ancient Regime for a severely scientific or a philosophical work, such as he affects to give us,—a work

like that of M. De Tocqueville, who is intent on interpreting great principles. M. Taine's book is a series of brilliant social pictures, professedly rather than essentially connected by a per- vading idea, and may be taken in a certain way to supplement and to illustrate De Tocqueville.

Accepted thus, there is nothing to say but that the book is ingenious, interesting, even amusing. M. Taine can paint with wonderful ease and dexterity the foibles, the frivolities, the excess of empty politeness, the dainty fastidiousness which masked the idleness and immorality of the Court, the upper classes, and the clergy of Louis XVI.'s time. Once the King had been the State, a warrior intent on maintaining order, and with a dim idea of general

good lying behind his exercises of arbitrary power, and shedding a halo around his person and acts. His nobles were his knights,—

warriors too, giving protection to those under them, and adminis- tering a kind of rude law ; while the clergy brought the various orders

into true relationship, and asserted a higher unity of interest in the very fact of the honest discharge of their duties. But now the King was " a do-nothing," given up to the delights of the chase,

stupid, incompetent to check bad administration, and in fact, without any interest in government, while yet he remained an autocrat ; the nobles had become mere courtiers, intent on squeezing everything that the law allowed out of the poorer orders, that they, the worst kind of absentees, might live a life of pleasure in the capital, in drawing-rooms, theatres, and the in- dulgence of all delicacies ; while the chief clergy had fallen even a stage lower, and were content to be Court buffoons, hangers-on, confidants and friends of the King's mistresses. All this is told with the most thrilling and picturesque effect by Taine, no less than the rise of the doctrines of Rousseau and Raynal, and their gradual dissemination through society, till they reached the lower orders. Very happily has Taine hit off the peculiar way in

which the habitues of the Salons played with the new ideas, finding in them something that seemed to justify the false and prurient naturalism with which the Court had become affected, with its retreats, and its Trianons, and so forth. And then the perfect good-breeding which shone through it all :— " Imagine, if it is possible, the degree of elegance and perfection to which they attained through good-breeding. I sAtect vne at random,—a duel between two Princes of the Blood, the Cowte d'Artois and the Duo de Bourbon. The latter being' the offended party, the former, his superior, had to offer him a meeting. As soon as the Comte d'Artois saw him, he leaped to the ground, and walking directly up to him said to him smiling, ' Monsieur, the public pretends that we are seeking each other.' rhe Due de Bourbon, removing his bat, replied, Monsieur, I am here to receive your orders:—. To execute your own,' returned the Comte d'Artois; 'hut you must allow me to return to my carriage.' He comes back with a sword, and the duel begins. After a certain time

they aro separated, the seconds deciding that honour is satisfied. It is not for me to express an opinion,' says the Comte d'Artois.—• Monsieur, the Dec de Bourbon is to express his wishes ; I am here only to receive his orders.'—' Monsieur,' responds the Dec de Bourbon, addressing the Comte d'Artois, meanwhile lowering the point of his sword, I am over- come with gratitude for your kindness, and shall never be insensible to the houctur you have done me.' Could there be a greater and more delicate sentiment of rank. position, circumstance, and could a duel be surrounded with more graces? There is no situation, however thorny, which is not saved by politeness. Through habit and suitable expression, even in the fall of the King, they conciliate resistance and respect."

The following gives a suggestive glimpse of the way in which the young generation were reared, under the one idea of perfecting them in this enervating politeness, so that in the Revolution the noblesse passively submitted to seizure and to insult from the mob, as deeming any appearance of violence beneath the dignity of their rank :- " Even in the last years of the ancient regime little boys have their hair powdered, a pomatnmed chignon (bourse), ringlets. and curls ;' they wear the sword, the chapeau under the arm, a frill, and a coat with gilded cuffs ; they kiss young ladies' hands with the air of little dandies. A lass of six years is bound up in a whalebone waist, her large hoop-petticoat supports a skirt covered with wreaths ; she wears on her head a skilful combination of false curls, puffs, and knots, fas- tened with pins, and crowned with plumes, and so high that frequently 'the chin is half-way down to her feet;' sometimes they put rouge on her face. She is a miniature lady, and she knows it ; she is fully up

in her part, without effort or inconvenience, by force of habit ; the unique the perpetual instruction she gets is that on deportment ; it may be said with truth that the fulcrum of education in this country is the dancing-master. They could got along with him without any others ;-

without him the others were of no use Along with graces of attitude and gesture, they already have those of the mind and ex- pression. Scarcely is their tongue loosened when they speak the polished language of their parents. The latter amuse themselves with them and use them as pretty dolls ; the preaching of Rousseau, which, during the last third of the last century, brought children into fashion, produces no other effect. They are made to recite lessons in public, to perform in proverbs, to take parts in pastorals. Their sallies are encouraged. They know how to turn a compliment, to invent a clever or affecting repartee, to be gallant, sensitive, and even spirituelle. The little Due d'Angouleme, holding a book in his hand, receives Suffren, whom he addresses thus I was reading Plutarch and his illustrious men. You could not have entered more a propos.' The children of M. de Sabran, a boy and girl, one eight and the other nine, having taken lessons from the comedians Sainval and Larive, came to Versailles to play before the King and Queen in Voltaire's Oreste, and on the little fellow being in- terrogated about the classic authors, he replies to a lady, the mother of three charming girls, Madame, Anacreon is the only poet I can think of here !' Another of the same age replies to a question of Prince Henry of Prussia with an agreeable impromptu in verse. To cause witticisms and mediocre verse to germinate in a brain eight years old, what a triumph for the culture of the day I It is the last characteristic of the teginte which, after having stolen man away from public affairs, from his own affairs, from marriage, from the family, hands him over, with all his sentiments and all his faculties, to social worldliness, him and all that belong to him."

The following has a touch of almost Carlyle-like irony, though accompanied with a subdued delicacy of colouring which Carlyle does not affect :—

"Ideas in the first-floor of the house, in handsome gilded rooms, serve only as an evening illumination, as drawing-room explosives and pleasing Bengal lights, with which people amass themselves, and then laughingly throw from the windows into the streets. Collected together in the storey below and on the ground-floor, transported to shops, te warehouses, and into business-rooms, they find combustible material, piles of wood a long time accumulated, and the flames kindle. The conflagration seems to have begun already, for the chimneys roar and a ruddy light gleams through the windows ; but 'No,' say the people above; 'those below would take care not to set their house on fire, for they live in it as we do. It is only a straw bonfire or a burning chimney, and a little water will put it eat ; and besides, those little accidents clear the chimney and burn out the soot.'- Take _care I Under

the vast deep arches supporting it, in the cellars of the honse,ireiThe _ magazine of powder."

In the circumstances, the inevitable result was that everybody began to talk of political economy ; the aristocrats became humanitarians, the privileged attacked their own privileges in the abstract; but, though in exceptional individuals there was the will, there was no power in any section to act for reform with judgment, though changes were on every side demanded, till, finally, " the sparks thrown from the upper storey of the house into the street" caught the lumber and took fire. The whole book, dealing with the Court and with drawing-room life, is con- ceived in this spirit, and pervaded by a sense of the same subtle irony, arising from the ever-present contrast which the writer manages to convey to the reader of the sufferings—the starvation and disease—that run their own fateful course outside.

M. Taine—who presents this as a mere section of Les Origines de la France Contenzporaine—may be able, in the next volume which he promises, and which we shall anxiously look for, to supply some of the omissions we have noted and hinted at ; and we have no doubt that the excesses and the brutalities of the " citizens " will be treated with as much brilliancy and power as he has shown in his pictures of the Ancient Regime. Of the trans- lation, it is only needful to say that it is free and readable, dis- figured now and then, however, by Americanisms, and occasionally too much lacking in the subtlety and grace which belong to epithets and phrases in the original.