Since then, what has French architecture become? Once having left tradition and national character, it wanders from imitation to imitation, and without comprehending the genius of antiquity, it unskilfully reproduces its forms. This bastard architecture, at once heavy and mannered, is, little by little, substituted for the beautiful architecture of the preceding century, and everywhere effaces the vestiges of the French spirit. Do you wish a striking example of it? In Paris, near the Luxembourg, the Condes had their _hotel_,[183] magnificent and severe, with a military aspect, as it was fitting for the dwelling-place of a family of warriors, and within of almost royal splendor. Beneath those lofty ceilings had been some time suspended the Spanish flags taken at Rocroy. In those vast saloons had been assembled the _elite_ of the grandest society that ever existed. In those beautiful gardens had been seen promenading Corneille and Madame de Sevigne, Moliere, Bossuet, Boileau, Racine, in the company of the great Conde. The oratory had been painted by the hand of Lesueur.[184] It had been easy to repair and preserve the noble habitation. At the end of the eighteenth century, a descendant of the Condes sold it to a dismal company to build that palace without character and taste which is called the Palais-Bourbon. Almost at the same epoch there was a movement made to construct a church to the patroness of Paris, to that Genevieve, whose legend is so touching and so popular. Was there ever a better chance for a national and Christian monument? It was possible to return to the Gothic style and even to the Byzantine style. Instead of that there was made for us an immense Roman basilica of the Decline. What a dwelling for the modest and holy virgin, so dear to the fields that bordered upon Lutece, whose name is still venerated by the poor people who inhabit these quarters! Behold the church which has been placed by the side of that of Saint-Etienne du Mont, as if to make felt all the differences between Christianity and Paganism! For here, in spite of a mixture of the most different styles, it is evident that the Pagan style predominates. Christian worship cannot be naturalized in this profane edifice, which has so many times changed its destination. It is in vain to call it anew Saint-Genevieve,--the revolutionary name of Pantheon will stick to it.[185] The eighteenth century treated the Madeleine no better than Saint-Genevieve. In vain the beautiful sinner wished to renounce the joys of the world and attach herself to the poverty of Jesus Christ. She has been brought back to the pomp and luxury that she repudiated; she has been put in a rich palace, all shining with gold, which might very well be a temple of Venus, for certainly it has not the severe grace of the Pantheon, of which it is the most vulgar copy. How far we are from the Invalides, from Val-de-Grace, and the Sorbonne, so