Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

last illusion of love, than what she had viewed as her death-stroke becomes a new life to her. In the atmosphere of virtue and of the recovered affection of her father, and in the esteem of her husband, she feels that she is rising from her degraded state, and that she has been born into a new existence. Henceforth the life of Julia is like a clear stream emerged for ever from its muddy source. A virtuous wife, she confesses to her husband the fault of her youth, and gains his entire confidence without diminishing his affection; she is a sensible and enlightened mother, an affectionate daughter, and a woman fond of domestic life. Full of religion she lives without a shade of error, and dies a victim to her maternal piety; and her very death cures at length her husband of his false philosophy; he is vanquished by such a life and such a death which can be those of a Christian only.

Is it necessary to say anything more to prove the moral tendency of such a picture? Unquestionably a woman always virtuous would be a more perfect model. The beau-ideal of woman is a life pure and transparent in both her conditions of maiden and wife. No spot should be perceptible on that crystal, in order that virtue, like a golden sunray, might irradiate the whole of its many coloured surface. Such perfection alone constitutes that most beautiful of nature's types which bears the name of woman. But descending from this absolute idea to the melancholy exceptions in corrupt society, it must be conceived that it was a good thought of the philosopher to exhibit a picture of suffering in crime, and of peace by a return to virtue. The utmost extent of palliation that we offer for Rousseau's tale is, that it was the work of a dark moral period, and that he painted a woman rather better than women then were, and certainly better than the monstrous school now. The structure of such a story in England would necessarily involve its exclusion, since a higher morality precludes his Julia from interest, and his own depravities would assuredly at present banish the author from the pale of civilization-depravities of the most heartless character, though of course countenanced by that frightful school into which Rousseau had entered unaware of its exact tendency: under their instruction, for example, his children were systematically placed one after the other in the Enfans Trouvés. And though La Nouvelle Heloise possess their sickly sentimentality, yet" The Confessions" contain scenes of the most revolting debauchery of the school of Candide openly expressed; and to them may be traced in a degree the naif modern school, who say any thing and speak of doing any thing without disguise. No doubt the sentimental Rousseau would have shuddered at the depravity of his literary as well as physical offspring, but it does not rid him of their

parentage, any more than Sin's deformity precludes her relation to Satan.

The principal objection usually made to the Nouvelle Heloise is, that the first part of it may do more harm than the second can do good. If it be so, this is not the author's fault. If in the first part he has shown passion and its follies in the most favourable form, he has also painted in yet more attractive colours virtue and happiness, derived from the strict fulfilment of duties and the charms of a retired and respectable life. With perfect good faith he has imparted the richness of his talent to both sides of his picture. The question therefore seems to be, is it good for young people to read novels at all? and this question has been long since answered in the negative. A work of passion, composed with a purely moral view, does not suit youthful minds yet untried by experience. Besides the unfavourable influence which all novels may be suspected of exercising over the soft minds of the young, is it fair to overcast with gloom their light hearts and to convulse them with storms unsuited to their age? No one knew better the mischief of this than Rousseau, who said too that "La fille chaste n'a jamais lu des romans ;" and the very title of his novel, and his preface to it, are proof sufficient that he never intended it for a work on education for the young. But when the question is no longer, whether it be proper to read novels, but whether all novels without exception shall be read, it is then desirable to distinguish between the monstrous compositions of the present day and this of Rousseau, which being run through rather than read, or read by young people, may give cause for scandal; but which being read by persons of matured judgment will stand the test for morality, and rank with the works described by Julia herself. "I know not," says she," of any other mode of appreciating the books I read, than of observing the state of mind into which they bring me; and I cannot imagine what kind of merit a work can possess if it does not inspire its readers with the love of what is good."

Now having once more awakened the eloquent voice of Rousseau, it may be well to point out the difference between the reform of which he dreamed, and of that preached by the French writers of the present day. A bold Utopist of the eighteenth century, he saw corruption of morals only in the capital amongst the higher classes and the philosophers. He wished therefore to limit it to these cankered members of society, and to preserve to the classes not yet deprived of moral worth and of faith the possession of their treasure: to teach them not to aspire to the follies and dazzling misery of those placed in higher stations: to make them acquainted with their own dignity and happiness. This was what

VOL. XXVII. NO. LIII.

K

he sought to express by his exaggerated phrase of returning to the state of nature. Between the position he assumed and that of the present reformers, there lies an impassable gulf. The Jacobins soon found out this, and the remains of Rousseau, placed in the Pantheon by the revolutionists, were cast out from it as those of an aristocrat. The evil, however, went on increasing; and the wrecks of morals, upon which he built his Utopia, are now exposed to the battering engine of the Littérature Extravagante. As he made use of a novel as a popular means by which to recommend the worth of social duties and conjugal fidelity, so the moralists and philosophers of the present day have also chosen the same form to bring the same objects into universal contempt, as irrational and incompatible with the liberty of man. This is the beginning and the end-the fundamental idea of the so justly called Littérature Extravagante, or Mad Literature. In fact, Rousseau with his sermons on social duties and conjugal virtue, which he considered as the pillars of human society, would be now regarded as a Rococo of the first order, the appellation given to whatever does not chime in with the present fashionable notions; which last, in their turn, have received the apt name of décousu." Will it be admitted for a moment that any society can possibly endure of which the members do not acknowledge any kind of duty? Or by what ingenuity will it be proved that society can be benefited by the banishment of those high principles by which man's actions are subjected to the immutable laws of morality, by which alone deep wounds may be healed and reconciliation be effected between those who have injured each other during the

course of life?

[ocr errors]

One beautiful episode in the Nouvelle Heloise is that of the intimate friendly intercourse in the castle of Clarens between the lover of Julia and the old baron, her father. St. Preux has not forgotten that it was the baron who deprived him of his beloved Julia, and who gave her to Wolmar. Nevertheless his first grief being subdued, he lives friendly with him, has indulgence for his prejudices, and respect for his years. Let us now suppose the same subject treated by a modern French novelist. What a vast field would have been open to him for showing that hatred and revenge are exalted virtues-the imperative duties of every man who knows how to respect himself. With what contempt would the age of the old man be assailed! What declamation should we hear against aristocracy! We should behold the mad St. Preux with the rage of a lion, of a tiger, of a hyena, rail against the father of Julia, plunge a poniard in his heart, and trample him under his feet. Or he might probably restrain himself for a time, feign oblivion, and then we should hear of

his sleepless nights spent in holding councils with himself by what means he might most effectually wound the old man's heart. Perhaps he would take a fancy to punish him in his paternal affection by murdering before his eyes his daughter, and his own once beloved one. After all, this would be nothing extraordinary, for in the Littérature Extravagante we have met with yet more ingenious contrivances. According to the doctrines of this

school it would seem that all the sacred duties of man must be reduced to the two extremes of love and hatred.

The subject of modern novels is not, as with Rousseau, the weakness of a young inexperienced girl, for this would not excite any interest. Their writers look for something more at war with morality and decency. Madame Sophie Gay's novel "Un Mariage de l'Empire," for instance, is generally considered quite an innocent book, yet the following are its incidents. A rich young heiress is compelled by Napoleon, in pursuance of his "système de fusion," to marry an officer in the army, the scion of a noble family. Owing to the French custom, which dispenses with the necessity of young ladies, educated in convents or in a public institution, becoming previously acquainted with their destined husbands, who are chosen by the parents (in the present case by the emperor), there is nothing new in the couple in question knowing nothing of each other before their marriage; but that which is new, and entirely the invention of Madame Gay, is, that they remain strangers even after it. Nevertheless they love each other, though owing to some odd circumstances, they cannot come to a mutual understanding. They quarrel in consequence without any apparent cause, and the young wife carries her ill humour (la bouderie et le dépit) so far that she allows herself to have a child by the friend of her husband. Strange to say, this remarkable couple are soon after reconciled, and the child of the friend is adopted by the injured husband. Some slight reminiscences however disturb the heroine, but fortunately the child dies, and thus nothing remains (in the opinion of the authoress) to prevent her from being considered as a pattern wife and a most virtuous woman.*

But the task of advocating the absolute emancipation of woman from all moral and social obligations, and the destruction of the marriage tie, has devolved upon Madame Dudevant, the well known George Sand. The heroines of her novels, Indiana,

* It would seem at first that this novel is but another edition of La Nouvelle Heloise. They differ, however, widely. Heloise half-mad, passion "begone," failed before marriage, and repented for it during the remainder of her life; whilst the other heroine sins from ill-humour, and feels quite easy about it, being in addition a married

woman.

Rose and Blanche, are yet but poor samples of this theme in comparison with her Lelia. The two leading characters of this novel are, Lelia herself, a woman placed on the lowest degree of the social hierarchy, and Trenmor, a gambler by profession, who having been convicted of fraud and condemned to the gallies, is again at large after having undergone the punishment. It is impossible to read without supreme disgust their disquisitions upon social questions of the highest importance. Two of the most degraded members of society, and outcasts from it, they successively attack every one of its laws, all of which they have themselves violated. An openly avowed hostility to marriage, borne out by a divorce from her husband, the adoption of male attire, a cigar in her mouth, a whip in her hand, and her conversation with young men carried on in the familiar terms of tu and George, have invested the talent of Madame Dudevant with a kind of apodectical authority, and given to her works a moral political cast. According to her system some violent passion usually seizes upon married women, very frequently mothers of a family. When her first youth has passed away, and her children are growing up, the superannuated heroine begins to perceive that maternal affection is not sufficient for her. She therefore sets about looking for the ideal of her soul, and has usually little trouble in finding it. Then begins a struggle, but not with a sense of duty, not with attachment to husband and children, not in the least!- but a struggle with society, because a Mariette has happened to marry a respectable man, and not a proletaire or an adventurer, who alone knows how to love. From Madame Dudevant's writings it would appear that if the institution of marriage be permitted to exist at all, society should contrive a kind of noviciate from which it would be permitted to withdraw,-several probatory degrees of marriage. Other authors, as Bibliophile in his novel, Vertu et Temperament, try to prove that a chaste woman is naturally bad, but that a dissolute one must necessarily possess a tender heart and the most exalted şentiments. Bibliophile however has accidentally committed a strange inconsistency. The lover of one of these tender-hearted personages cannot bear her noble actions and blows out his brains in consequence; but it is only fair to state on the other hand, that the author represents the young man as not a genuine jeune France, but as a man behind his age (stationaire), in short a rococo.

The playwright Scribe labours to prove that in order to enjoy peace and happiness at home, a man must have an unfaithful wife, otherwise quarrels and ill humour will embitter every hour. But the most frightfully important part of all this is, that these cynic jests and obscene pictures are so many conclusions derived from

« AnteriorContinuar »