Lawrence. New France was, in reality, widely separated in spirit
from old France, before the new master in Canada made the
division permanent. The imagination of the Canadian peasant did
not wander across the ocean to France. He knew only the scenes
about his own hearth and in them alone were his thought and
affections centered.
The one wider interest which the habitant treasured was love for
the Catholic Church of his fathers and of his own spiritual
hopes. It thus happened that when France in revolution assailed
and for a time overthrew the Church within her borders, the heart
of French Canada was not with France but with the persecuted
Church; she hated the spirit of revolutionary France. Te Deums
were sung at Quebec in thanksgiving for the defeats of Napoleon.
In language and what literary culture they possessed, in
traditions and tastes, the conquered people remained French, but
they had no allegiance divided between Canada and France. To this
day they are proud to be simply Canadians, rooted in the soil of
Canada, with no debt of patriotic gratitude to the France from
which they sprang or to the Britain which obtained political
dominance over their ancestors after a long agony of war.
Pages:
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257