The nation is to be regenerated, a phrase found in all writings and in every mouth. At Nangis, Arthur Young finds this the sub-stance of political conversation[4350]. The chaplain of a regiment, a curate in the vicinity, keeps fast hold of it; as to knowing what it means that is another matter. It is impossible to find anything out through explanations of it otherwise than "a theoretic perfection of government, questionable in its origin, hazardous in its progress, and visionary in its end." On the Englishman proposing to them the British constitution as a model they "hold it cheap in respect of liberty" and greet it with a smile; it is, especially, not in conformity with "the principles." And observe that we are at the residence of a grand seignior, in a circle of enlightened men. At Riom, at the election assemblies,[4351] Malouet finds "persons of an ordinary stamp, practitioners, petty lawyers, with no experience of public business, quoting the 'Contrat Social,' vehemently declaiming against tyranny, and each proposing his own constitution." Most of them are without any knowledge whatever, mere traffickers in chicane; the best instructed entertain mere schoolboy ideas of politics. In the colleges of the University no history is taught[4352]. "The name of Henry IV., says Lavalette, was not once uttered during my eight years of study, and, at seventeen years of age, I was still ignorant of the epoch and the mode of the establishment of the Bourbons on the throne." The stock they carry away with them consists wholly, as with Camille Desmoulins, of scraps of Latin, entering the world with brains stuffed with "republican maxims," excited by souvenirs of Rome and Sparta, and "penetrated with profound contempt for monarchical governments." Subsequently, at the law school, they learn something about legal abstractions, or else learn nothing. In the lecture-courses at Paris there are no students; the professor delivers his lecture to copyists who sell their copy-books. If a pupil should attend himself and take notes he would be regarded with suspicion; he would be charged with trying to deprive the copyists of the means of earning their living. A diploma, consequently, is worthless. At Bourges one is obtainable in six months; if the young man succeeds in comprehending the law it is through later practice and familiarity with it.--Of foreign laws and institutions there is not the least knowledge, scarcely even a vague or false notion of them. Malouet himself entertains a meager idea of the English Parliament, while many, with respect to ceremonial, imagine it a copy of the Parliament of France.--The mechanism of free constitutions, or the conditions of effective liberty, that is too complicated a question. Montesquieu, save in the great magisterial families, is antiquated for twenty years past. Of what avail are studies of ancient France? "What is the result of so much and such profound research? Laborious conjecture and reasons for