bishop who deplored it lately in an episcopal charge--is a valuable commentary on that devotion to the Church which the French aristocracy still professes so long as it entails no greater inconvenience than a perfunctory attendance at mass. There is, consequently, a _social severance_ between the clergy and the aristocracy, though there may be a _political alliance_. The priest may have patrons in the château, he may have real friends there, but his relations and his equals are generally in the farm-houses.[72] The reason lies no deeper than the obvious fact that the duties of a parish priest are irksome and his life is austere. He is confined to one place, without amusements, and with society limited to peasants and to the few gentry who happen to be there for a part of the year only; his work is a continual servitude, and it is never done. He is allowed by law to marry, but not by the rules of his Church or the opinion of society, and his conduct is watched with the most jealous and unceasing scrutiny. To devote oneself to such an existence requires not merely the pretence to religious belief but its reality. That, and that alone, can make a human being happy in a life which is deprived of all worldly pleasures, and has no earthly rewards. [Sidenote: Bishops.] The difference between the parish priest and the bishop, though great in England, is much greater in France. In England it is the difference between a gentleman and a peer, in France it is that between a common soldier and his colonel. Since royalty is dead, and the great nobles politically paralysed by universal suffrage, the bishop seems all the greater as the sole survivor of the splendid personages of the middle ages. The grandeur of the Church is represented by the bishops, both in their social position, which, in the absence of royalty, is much higher than any other, and also in externals, such as the stately residence, the violet and gold of the costume, and the customary carriage and pair. It must be remembered, too, that the “Church” in Catholic language means the bishops, who are alone summoned to Œcumenical Councils, and not the inferior clergy, who have no vote, direct or indirect, the bishops not being elected by them. [Sidenote: French Officers.] [Sidenote: Position of Officers in England.]