In the cells of Valdemosa, an old and deserted Carthusian monastery, situated in a wild and noble landscape, George Sand found poetic surroundings and associations that were so congenial that she says: "Had I written there that part of _Lélia_ which has a monastery for its scene, I should have produced a finer and more real picture." The occupation of rooms in this lonely old retreat was perhaps the only pleasurable feature of the stay in Majorca. It was here that _Spiridion_ was finished: a tale of a young monk who is filled with the fervor of divine love, but who later strays from his simple faith as the result of the agitations and doubts which philosophic teachings impart. This book probably reflects the experience of the author, more particularly that of her exaltation at the convent, and it also portrays her own spiritual conflicts and the calm of a sincere, broad faith that rises above dogma and rests secure in the divine love. After a short stay at Marseilles and a trip to Italy, George Sand returned to her home at Nohant. We have now approached a period when Madame Sand's literary work was to show a change from the subjective lyricism of her previous works, which are the voice of her long-repressed early emotions, to a series of works in which she drew her inspiration largely from the religious, philosophic, and socialistic doctrines that her impressionable mind had espoused as expounding the true principles by which society and the individual should govern themselves. But, in yielding her art to the services of the reformers, George Sand had little thought for aught but the goodness of the principles, as they appeared to her, or, at any rate, had not taken measure of the practical difficulties within the circle of the reformers and those which passive resistance on the part of the great masses offered. Before, however, the first of her books of the quasi-philosophical style appeared, our author made an essay as a playwright, and _Cosima_, a drama in five acts, was produced at the Théâtre Français. It was received with hisses and hooting.--George Sand writes of it, on May 1, 1840: "The whole audience condemned the play as being immoral, and I am not sure that the Government will not prohibit it.... It was played through, being much attacked by some, and equally defended by others, ... and I will not alter a single word for the subsequent representations." The scene was laid in Florence, and the period was the Middle Ages, both time and place being unsuited to the wholly French sentiment of the play.