“The harlots enter into the kingdom of heaven before you.”
—_Gospel according to St. Matthew._
If we recall the causes which force women into the sewer of
prostitution,—if we remember the humiliations of registered and
non-registered girls,—we shall not be at all astonished that common
prostitutes often feel all the horror of their lot, and we shall
understand the talent of observation presented by certain types rendered
familiar by literature.
Apart from romance and the drama, the authors who have, at Paris,
studied this subject with such scrupulous accuracy, declare to us in
like manner, that a great number of these “unfortunates” are conscious
of their degradation, and hasten to quit their infamous means of living
when they find normal means of livelihood. Unhappily this recovery is
but an exceptional fact; the brothel-keeper, who collects the proceeds
of their sale, makes them giddy by intoxication to dissemble from them
the horror of their degradation. Their mirthfulness is often but a mere
external display, provoked by the impure jokes of those who support
them. Among those confined in the St. Lazare, too, are found instincts
of shame, united to the sentiments of motherly love. Most of them impose
heavy sacrifices upon themselves to bring up their child, the only
creature, say they, who will _not at all despise them_.
A few words of sympathy astonish them. A young female foundling, whom
want had caused to take to bad ways, was admitted into the “Bon Pasteur”
institution: the fulness of her joy made her shed tears abundantly,
because it was the first time, she said, that any one had spoken kindly
to her. The horror of this condition has many a time been the cause of
mental aberration and suicide.[12] The consciousness of their degraded
condition has been apparent even in the queens of fashion who have
become famous in backstairs society. Théroigne de Méricourt one day
recognised, in Paris, the gentleman who had deceived her; she darted so
vindictive a look at him that he perceived how dangerous his position
was becoming, at a time when the lower orders were exercising such an
implacable justice against crimes unpunished till then, and he dared to
ask forgiveness of her. “My forgiveness!” she replied, “and with what
price could you pay for it? My innocence betrayed, my honour lost, that
of my family sullied, my brothers and sisters pursued in their native
place by the sarcasms of their neighbours; my father’s curse; my exile
from my native land; my enrolment in the infamous caste of courtesans;
the blood with which I stain and shall stain my hands; my memory
execrated among men; that immortality of virtue which you have taught me
to doubt—this is what you wish to redeem! Let us see: do you know a
price on earth able to pay me for all that?”[13] Théroigne not believing
that the guilty man’s blood was too precious or too pure to wipe out her
shame, allowed, or caused, him to perish in the September massacres.[14]
At periods of religious revival especially, the courtesan has a
consciousness of her debasement. Under the influence of gospel
enlightenment the most abandoned women were reformed to the length of
hastening to martyrdom, in order to wipe out the stains of their life
in this baptism of blood. When the age of persecution was past, the
church tried to reinstate fallen women; councils granted a
dispensation from canonical penance to those who gave up their evil
ways, and granted forgiveness of their sins to the men who should
marry them.[15] Different societies were formed with the design of
raising a dower for them. The middle age opened numerous asylums to
them: St. Louis had a large refuge built for them, and gave them the
name of “Filles-Dieu.”—“And caused,” says Joinville, “a great number
of women to be put in a refuge, who from poverty were made to sin by
the luxurious, and gave them 400 livres annually to live upon.” This
dotation (endowment), enormous for the age, was higher than that of
the “Quinze-Vingts,” which received only 300 livres.[16][17] Louis IX.
also helped them with his advice, or founded with his money several
similar institutions, as places affiliated to the “Filles-Dieu.” “The
King,” says Joinville further, “caused houses of nuns to be instituted
in several places of his kingdom, and gave them incomes to live upon,
and recommended that they should be admitted into them who were
willing to resolve (_fere contenance_) to live in chastity.”
The Duke of Orleans, afterwards Louis XII., collected in a part of his
“hotel” two hundred penitent girls, whom destitution and licentiousness
had perverted during war; but France was then so ruined, and existence
was so rough for modest women, that several of them became prostitutes
with the design of getting admission. The Corporation of Paris also
supplied penitent women with money-aids, which are found entered thus in
a bill of the 16th century:—“To poor penitent girls, six _livres
parisis_ for charity and alms, to get bread, of which they stand in
great need.”
Louis XIV. founded the Madeleine asylum; he granted his patronage to
that of the Bon Pasteur, which a widow founded, and to Sainte Pélagie,
the work of Madame de Miramion. Paris built, in the 18th century, four
more establishments of this kind, under the titles of the Saviour, St.
Valerius, St. Theodore, and St. Michael. These refuges, so richly
endowed by royal or private munificence, had numerous subsidiary
institutions in the provinces; the letters-patent of our Kings, even the
bulls of the Popes, gave authority for making them permanent.
Other societies reinstated fallen women by affiancing them to Christ.
After the revolution had destroyed these rich and numerous places of
refuge, the Consulate re-established the house of St. Michael; the City
of Paris and the Ministry for charitable institutions also founded that
of the Bon Pasteur in 1821; but the inadequacy of the sums placed at
their disposal did not admit of these institutions fulfilling their
original purpose. There was the same poverty of resources in all France.
This state of things seemed deplorable, whether it be regarded in
reference to the wealth of the spoliated refuges, or be compared with
the stability and the opulence of those other social institutions that
are called toleration-houses, and to the sums absorbed in the interest
of profligacy upon the pretext of public health and security. An effect
of our moral impoverishment, and of certain economical doctrines which
have gone to the extent of making the refuges guilty of the progress of
prostitution, may be seen in that. Without doubt, there is immorality in
the efforts made to _take away from vice the consequences which nature
has attached to it_; but this consideration can only be applied to
individuals who choose it voluntarily. In going back to the causes of
the downfall of the greater number of women, we can but bless the hand
which tries to raise them up, though tardily. Every measure which
relates to them is, however, but a powerless palliative of an evil which
must be attacked in its causes, by putting down the profligacy of the
man.