He took refuge in the trite
assertion that such views as Marcolina's were a menace, not only to
the ecclesiastical ordering of society, but to the very foundations of
social life. This enabled him to make a clever change of front, to pass
into the field of politics, where he hoped that his wide experience and
his knowledge of the world would render it possible for him to get the
better of his adversary. But although she lacked acquaintance with
the notable personalities of the age; although she was without inside
knowledge of courtly and diplomatic intrigues; although, therefore, she
had to renounce any attempt to answer Casanova in detail, even when
she felt there was good reason to distrust the accuracy of his
assertions--nevertheless, it was clear to him from the tenor of her
remarks, that she had little respect for the princes of the earth or
for the institutions of state; and she made no secret of her conviction
that, alike in small things and in great, the world was not so much a
world ruled by selfishness and lust for power, as a world in a condition
of hopeless confusion. Rarely had Casanova encountered such freedom of
thought in women; never had he met with anything of the kind in a girl
who was certainly not yet twenty years old.
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