Tea at Trianon

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Monday, September 3, 2007

My Agent

According to Google Analytics, "Tea at Trianon" has had over forty hits from a person or persons doing a search on the words "elena maria vidal agent." I assume this was precipitated by an offhand remark I made about "my agent" in one of the comboxes. I find this both hilarious and mystifying. If someone is so desperate to find out who my agent is, why don't they just email me and ask? Share

"The Golden Compass"

It sounds perfectly terrible. Kimberly Wasson has a write up about it, with a link to an article by Peter Hitchens about the author Philip Pullman. Apparently, the atheists want Mr. Pullman's work to supplant C.S. Lewis. They want God removed from all children's literature. Share

Ancient Egyptians in Ireland?

Carla Nayland, on her fascinating literary blog, has a review of a book which sounds very intriguing. Kingdom of the Ark by Lorraine Evans is a work of narrative non-fiction, putting forward the theory that refugees from Ancient Egypt settled in Britain and/or Ireland in the middle of the Bronze Age, under the leadership of Meritaten, eldest daughter of the ‘Heretic Pharaoh’ Akhenaten. To quote:

A necklace of amber, jet and faience beads was found with a secondary Bronze Age burial of a young man in a Neolithic burial mound at Tara in Ireland, excavated in 1955 and carbon-dated to 1350 BC. The faience beads were similar to those in the tomb of Tutankhamun, which dates to about the same period. (Note: faience is a ceramic, often characterised by a glossy blue glaze resembling precious stones such as turquoise or lapis lazuli). A second, similar, necklace was found in a Bronze Age burial mound in Devon in 1889. As the faience beads are similar to those found in Egypt at the same period, the author suggests that the burials may have been high-ranking Egyptians. Share

Sunday, September 2, 2007

Do not be afraid to dream

Pope Benedict said at Loreto, according to Zenit:

"Allow me to repeat this to you tonight: Each one of you, if you remain united with Christ, can accomplish great things.

"This is why, dear friends, you must not be afraid to dream -- with open eyes -- of great projects of good, and you must not let yourselves be discouraged by difficulties." Share

Here we go again....

Unbelievable. My mind cannot get around it. Share

Puccini's "Turandot"

There is nothing, not even a great film, that compares to grand opera. I read once in a biography of Giacomo Puccini that as a boy he felt moved to become a composer after watching a performance of Verdi's Aida, almost like a call from God. I think that God can inspire people through great works of art, even those that deal with secular subject matters.

Puccini did not receive much critical acclaim during his lifetime, although his operas met with popular success. Turandot was his last opera; he died before its completion, and the final scene had to be written by someone else. When I was in graduate school researching the fate of the last Romanovs, Turandot's grandeur and tragedy was one of the few pieces of music capable of capturing the full scope of the misery of the downfall and death of the Tsar and his family. I listened to it constantly in my grandmother's flat where I was staying, so that Grandma was concerned that the neighbors might be annoyed.

Many years later, when writing Madame Royale, Turandot played over and over again in the background, for the cold, deeply wounded, Chinese princess of the opera was not unlike Marie-Therese-Charlotte, haunted by the past and unable to move beyond it. Opera is a bit like the Latin Mass; you do not have to understand every single word in order to be swept up into it.

The Craig Debacle

Pat Buchanan offers some reflections on the fall from grace of a U.S. senator. Share

Martyrs of the September Massacres, 1792

They are remembered tomorrow. Thanks to The Western Confucian for the reminder. Here is an account, and here. To quote:

“In all, more than fourteen hundred were murdered during the diabolic orgy of violence that constituted the September massacres. All done, of course, under the flag of "liberty"; a point immortalized in a small attic above the church. On the wall, alongside a faded streak of blood, one reads the desperate cry of an ill-fated prisoner:

‘Liberty, Liberty, what have they done to thee, what horrors are committed in thy name….’

In the crypt of the Church of St-Joseph-des-Carmes, built by the Carmelites between 1613 and 1625 and now the church of the Institut Catholique, are the tomb of Ozanam and the remains of the 120 priests massacred in this church on 2 September 1792, after fifteen days of captivity. In this crypt, Lacordaire remained attached to a cross for three hours.

This group of beati consists of 191 individuals who were martyred during the French Revolution, including 120 who were massacred at the Carmelite church (Les Carmes) on the rue de Rennes, Paris. They were imprisoned by the Legislative Assembly for refusing to subscribe to the constitutional oath that had been condemned by the Holy See. They were massacred by a mob with the connivance of the assembly.

Among them were these prominent figures: Augustine Ambrose Chevreux, OSB, the last superior general of the French Benedictines of Saint Maur, was imprisoned at Les Carmes in Paris and killed in the general massacre; beatified in 1931. Charles de la Calmette, count of Valfons. Francis de la Rochefoucauld, bishop of Beauvais. John Mary du Lau, archbishop of Arles, was also imprisoned in Les Carmes and murdered by the mob. Louis Barreau de la Touche, OSB, nephew of Augustine of Chevreux and monk of Saint Maur. Louis de la Rochefoucauld, bishop of Saints and brother of Blessed Francis (Benedictines).

One dawn at the Discalced Carmelite chapel in Florence, a lovely, fair-haired girl of seventeen, in white veil and bridal dress, walked slowly down the aisle, candle in her hand. Anna Maria Redi, the beloved eldest child of a noble Tuscan family, offered herself as spouse to the King of Heaven. In doing so, she exchanged wealth and comforts for poverty and humiliations. Joyfully, she gave up her silk dress for the rough brown habit of Our Lady, and undertook to serve Our Lady by adoring her Eucharistic Son.

Re-named "Theresa Margaret," she strove to console the Heart of Christ by performing many penances. One day at Vespers, the words Deus Caritas Est (God is love) sank deep into her soul. She realized that love (not hairshirts) was what counted most. "You know, my God," wrote St. Theresa Margaret, "that my one desire is to be a victim of your Sacred Heart, wholly consumed as a holocaust in the fire of your holy love...dispose of me according to your good pleasure...." she struggled to give up her own will, to be humble and obedient, even when it meant performing duties that were unpleasant, such as caring for a nun who had gone insane.

On March 7, 1770, at age 24, she died after 18 hours of agony due to a mysterious intestinal infection. The incorrupt body of St. Theresa Margaret lies in a glass coffin in the monastery chapel where she once entered as a bride. Share