Already the children were clenching idle hands and drinking in a bitter cup the poisoned brewage of doubt.

Already things were drifting toward the abyss, when the jackals suddenly emerged from the earth.

A deathly and infected literature, which had no form but that of ugliness, began to sprinkle with fetid blood all the monsters of nature.
Who will dare to recount what was passing in the colleges?
Men doubted everything: the young men denied everything.

The poets sang of despair; the youth came from the schools with serene brow, their faces glowing with health, and blasphemy in their mouths.

Moreover, the French character, being by nature gay and open, readily assimilated English and German ideas; but hearts too light to struggle and to suffer withered like crushed flowers.