Note 89 — Front matter (continued 3)

"The prelates and dignified clergy felt the utmost disquietude at the number of curés and ecclesiastics of inferior rank who attended them as members of the States-General. It was evident, from their conversation, habits, and manners, that they participated in the feelings of the Tiers Etat, with whom they lived in constant communication; and that the unjust exclusion of the middling ranks from the dignities and emoluments of the Church had excited as much dissatisfaction in the ecclesiastical classes as the invidious privileges of the noblesse had awakened in the laity."—Alison's History of Europe, vol. i., p. 68.