Chesnel's prolonged scrutiny of consciences, given in
a condensed form, will perhaps serve as a picture of the judicial
world in a country town.
Magistrates and officials generally are obliged to begin their career
in the provinces; judicial ambition there ferments. At the outset
every man looks towards Paris; they all aspire to shine in the vast
theatre where great political causes come before the courts, and the
higher branches of the legal profession are closely connected with the
palpitating interests of society. But few are called to that paradise
of the man of law, and nine-tenths of the profession are bound sooner
or later to regard themselves as shelved for good in the provinces.
Wherefore, every Tribunal of First Instance and every Court-Royal is
sharply divided in two. The first section has given up hope, and is
either torpid or content; content with the excessive respect paid to
office in a country town, or torpid with tranquillity. The second
section is made up of the younger sort, in whom the desire of success
is untempered as yet by disappointment, and of the really clever men
urged on continually by ambition as with a goad; and these two are
possessed with a sort of fanatical belief in their order.
At this time the younger men were full of Royalist zeal against the
enemies of the Bourbons.
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