CXXXIII
The most flattering thing that the most exalted imagination could find to say to the generation now arising among us to take possession of life, of public opinion and of power, happens to be a piece of truth plainer than the light of day. This generation has nothing to continue, it has everything to create. Napoleon's great merit is to have left the road clear.
CXXXIV
I should like to be able to say something on consolation. Enough is not done to console.
The main principle is that you try to form a kind of crystallisation as remote as possible from the source of present suffering.
In order to discover an unknown principle, we must bravely face a little anatomy.
If the reader will consult Chapter II of M. Villermé's work on prisons (Paris, 1820), he will see that the prisoners "si maritano fra di loro" (it is the expression in the prisoners' language). The women also "si maritano fra di loro," and in these unions, generally speaking, much fidelity is shown. That is an outcome of the principle of modesty, and is not observed among the men.
"At Saint-Lazare," says M. Villermé, page 96, "a woman, seeing a new-comer preferred to her, gave herself several wounds with a knife. (October, 1818.)
"Usually it is the younger woman who is more fond than the other."