noon
Misfortune had given a finer savour to the Marquis 's philosophy , and there was a kind of heroic grace in his undisturbed cultivation of the amenities . While the Marquis was struggling to preserve the conversational art , and Alfieri planning the savage revenge of the Misogallo , the course of affairs in France had gained a wilder impetus . The abolition of the nobility , the flight and capture of the King , his enforced declaration of war against Austria , the massacres of Avignon , the sack of the Tuileries -- such events seemed incredible enough till the next had crowded them out of mind . The new year rose in blood and mounted to a bloodier noon . All the old defences were falling . Religion , monarchy , law , were sucked down into the whirlpool of liberated passions . Across that sanguinary scene passed , like a mocking ghost , the philosophers ' vision of the perfectibility of man .