of continental Europe. In 1847 he delivered his cele- brated speech on the affairs of Switzerland, in which he distinctly foretold the revolution which broke out among the continental nations in the year following ; and his brilliant Discours sur les affaires de Rome, de- livered shortly after the popular outbreak, was re- ceived with a triple salvo of applause by an audience which sympathized but coldly with his views. After the revolution of February, 1848, the department of Doubs, in which he held property, elected him its rep- resentative to the National Assembh', from which he passed into the Legislative Assembh', where he uni- formly acted true to his professions as the exponent of the views and interests of the Roman Catholic Church. He worked hard as a member of the commission which, under manj' difficulties and compromises, prepared the new law of education known as the " Loi Falloux" (and which he might be excused from thinking ought to have been the "Loi Montalembert") ; but his influ- ence was even at this time due in the main to his pow- ers as an orator. Like many other men of the orator- ical temperament, he was not fitted for parliamentary diplomacy and intrigue, or the many acts behind the scenes by which political power is often acquired and maintained. It is thus that the estrangement of the extreme section of the clerical party from him after the passage of the educational law is to be accounted for. He called this settlement of the question the " Concordat d'Enseignement," and believed himself a
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last time hofore the world in the attitude which above all he would liave prohahly mcst desired — of an advo- cate for the freedom of the press.
The remainder of this nohle man's life was entirely devoted to literary lalwrs. He had for twenty years earnestly inquired into the medi«val institutions and characters, and in 18G0 l)rou<;;ht out the first two vol- umes of Les Moines d'Occidtnt chpnis Saint Beno'it jusqii a Saint Bernard (transl. into English hy IMrs. Oliphant, Edinb. 18G1 and sq.). The whole Western world, Protestant as well as Konian Catholic, was at- tracted, and everybody who claimed a place for cult- ure read what were a decade's studies — the mature conclusions of this brilliant Frenchman. Especial- ly in England, where Montalcmbert had always been well known and much admired, the work was univer- sally spoken of and freely commented upon bj' the press. (See Blackwood's .^fagazine, ,Iune, 1801.) The British and Foreign Kmngdical Review^ in July, 1868, reviewing the first five volumes, observes, " Howev- er mistaken we may think this gifted son and ser- vant of the Church of Rome as to the importance of the object to which he has consecrated so large a portion of his life, it is impossible to withhold our ad- miration, either from the earnestness of spirit which prompted him to make the sacrifice, or from the fine con- ception and vigorous execution displayed in his attempt to teach the world what it owes to the monks, what it has gained b}' their existence, what it has lost by their overthrow. . . . He would disclaim — indeed, he does expressly disclaim — the work of the paneg3-rist; he even admits and deplores the errors and follies and abuses which the system has developed in the course of ages" (p. 450, 454, 47G; compare British Qurtrterly Review, July, 1868, p. 202, 203). See Monasticis:m. Montalcmbert lived to bring out three more volumes of this work, making five in all, but did not complete it. Though, as we have seen, Protestants cannot in every particular endorse it, they have yet gladly as- signed it a most important place in ecclesiastical lit- erature. Of course Roman Catholics regard it as a chef-d'oeuvre in all respects, and greatly lament that the author did not live to complete it. " This great monument of history, this great work interrupted by death," says M.Coclin," is gigantic as an uncompleted cathedral." It is certainly a vast conception, a dura- ble, if unfinished, monument of energy, zeal, litera- ry skill, research, learning, eloquence, and (we must add) credulity. The most remarkable result of Mon- talembert's labors in this direction he reaped in his own household. "One day," says Mr. Coclin, "his charming and beloved child entered that library which all his friends know so well, and said to him, 'I am fond of everything around me. I love pleasure, wit, society and its amusements ; I love mj' faniilj', my studies, my companions, my youth, my country, but I love (iod better than all, and I desire to give'myself to him.' And when he said to her, ' My child, is there something that grieves you?' she wciit to the book- j shelves and sought out one of the volumes in which he | had narrated the history of the monks of the West. \ ' It is you,' she answered, 'who have taught me that ' withered hearts and weary souls are not the things which we ought to offer to God.' " After descril)ing the agony inflicted on botli mother and father by this I event, jMontaleml)ert exclaims, "How many others ! have undergone this agony, and gazed with a look of distraction on the last worldly appearance of a dearly i beloved daughter or sister." Yet it never once oc- curred to til is warm-hearted, noble-minded man that a system whicli inflicts such agony on so many innocent suflVrers, which condemns to the chill gloom of a clois- t<-r what is meant for love and light — which runs counter to tlic whole course of nature — may be wrong.