L A Y L A V 351 old feudal city, with its ancient castle, and its irregularly built houses whose slate roofs and pointed gables peep from the groves of trees which clothe the hill. On the left bank the regularly built new town extends far into the plain. The river, here 80 yards broad, is crossed by the handsome railway viaduct, a beautiful stone bridge called "Pont Neuf," and the Mayenne bridge of three pointed arches, built in the 16th century. There is communication by steamer as far as to Angers. Laval may justly claim to be one of the loveliest of French towns. Its most curious and interesting monument is the sombre-looking old castle of the counts, now transformed into a prison. The new castle, dating from the Renaissance, is now the court house. Laval possesses several churches of different periods: in that of the Trinity, which serves as the cathedral, the transept is of the 12th century while the choir is of the 16th; the chapel of the Carmelites is an imitation of the Sainte Chapelle at Paris; Notre Dame des Cordeliers, which dates from the end of the 14th century or beginning of the 15th, has some fine marble altars. Half a mile below the Mayenne bridge is the beautiful 12th century church of Avenières, with an ornamental spire of 1534 and a handsome modern pulpit. The finest remaining relic of the ancient fortifications is the Beucheresse gate near the cathedral. There is a scientific museum, and a library containing 25,000 volumes. The town is embellished by fine promenades, at the entrance of one of which, facing the mairie, stands the statue of the celebrated surgeon Ambrose Paré. On the Place de Cheverus is a statue to the cardinal of that name, archbishop of Bordeaux. The principal industry of the town is the linen manufacture, introduced from Flanders in the 14th century. A large cloth hall (Halle-aux-toiles), built in last century is used now for industrial, artistic, and agricultural exhibitions. At present tickings are chiefly made. This industry occupies ten thousand workmen, who are not gathered together in great factories, but scattered all over the town. Cotton spinning is also carried on, and there are tanneries, flour-mills, foundries, paper-works, and dye-works. Here also the marbles of the neighbourhood are sawn, the greater part being converted into lime. Laval is the seat of a bishop, and has a lyceum. Population 27,000.
The history of Laval goes back only to the beginning of the 11th century, but from an early date in the feudal period the barons of Laval were distinguished by their valour and power, and by their alliances. One of them followed William the Conqueror into England. After having assumed the cross they allied themselves with the Montmorencys and Montforts, and their barony passed on later to the Colignys and the La Trémoilles. Laval was taken by Talbot in 1428. It changed hands several times during the wars of the League and the war of La Vendée in 1793.
LAVATER, Johann Kaspar (1741-1801), is a remarkable instance of a man who has obtained celebrity by following a bypath apart from the proper work of his life. As a preacher, theological writer, and spiritual director he occupied during his lifetime a position not very dissimilar to that held by Keble in our own day, but he survives for posterity chiefly as the author of a work on physiognomy. He was born at Zürich, November 15, 1741. Consistent with himself from the first, he manifested little application to study, but great depth of feeling, especially on religious themes, and a remarkable fluency of fervent and persuasive discourse. When barely one and twenty he greatly distinguished himself by denouncing, in conjunction with his friend the painter Fuseli, an iniquitous magistrate, who was compelled to make restitution of his ill-gotten gains. In 1769 Lavater took orders, and officiated till his death as deacon or pastor in various churches in his native city. The advantages of his manner and address, as well as his oratorical fervour and genuine depth of conviction, gave him great personal influence, especially with women; he was extensively consulted as a casuist, and was welcomed with demonstrative enthusiasm in his numerous journeys through Germany. His mystical writings were also widely popular. Scarcely a trace however, of this influence has remained, and Lavater's name would be forgotten but for his work on physiognomy, Physiognomische Fragmente zur Beforderung der Menschenkenntniss und Menschenliebe, Leipsic, 1775-78, republished in French with extensive additions by the author. The fame even of this universally known book rests to a great extent upon the handsome style of publication and the accompanying illustrations. It is not to be compared with the subsequent labours of Caius for scientific value, and leaves the study of physiognomy as desultory and unsystematic as it found it. The author's remarks, nevertheless, frequently display remarkable acuteness and insight into character, and the illustrations render it very valuable to artists. Next to his physiognomy, Lavater is perhaps chiefly remembered for his acquaintance with Goethe, and the lively portrait of him in Wahrheit und Dichtung. The impression he produced upon one so dissimilar to himself shows that the man was greater than his works. At a later period Goethe became estranged from him, somewhat abruptly accusing him of superstition and hypocrisy. Of the former charge he cannot be acquitted, seeing that he had manifested a tendency to run after Cagliostro; but he seems to have been no more open to the latter than every man whose ideal of creed and conduct is too exalted to be maintained with unvarying consistency. A more cogent reason for Lavater's discredit with Goethe was his intellectual intolerance. No man was more bigoted upon paper, while in truth his heart was open to all. He was continually propounding the alternative of his own form of Christianity or atheism; and it is indeed true that, if passages in his own writings are to be taken literally, he was himself incapable of conceiving a Deity apart from the person of the Redeemer. Much that he has written might be expressed in the language of Feuerbach with but slight alteration. He had a mystic's indifference to historical Christianity, and, although esteemed by himself and others a champion of orthodoxy, was in fact only an antagonist of rationalism. During the latter years of his life his influence waned, and he incurred ridicule by some exhibitions of vanity, pardonable in the recipient of so much incense. He redeemed himself by his patriotic conduct during the troubles occasioned by the French occupation of Switzerland, which brought about his tragical death. On the taking of Zürich by the French in 1799, Lavater, while endeavouring to appease the soldiery, was shot through the body by an infuriated grenadier, and died after long sufferings borne with great fortitude, on January 2, 1801. His life was written in the following year by his son-in-law Georg Gessner, with natural partiality and unavoidable reticences, but faithfully in the main. There are more recent biographies by Hegner and Bodemann, the latter entirely from the religious point of view.
LAVAUR, chief town of an arrondissement in the department of Tarn, France, 25 miles E.N.E. of Toulouse, stands at a height of 460 feet on the left bank of the Agout (a tributary of the Tarn), which is here crossed by a bold bridge of a single arch of 160 feet span. The most interesting monument of Lavaur is its cathedral, which dates from the 14th and 15th centuries. In front of it is an octagonal bell-tower, without a spire, 131 feet high; a second smaller square tower contains a jaquemart (a metal statue which strikes the hours with a hammer) of the 16th century. In the bishop's garden is the statue of Las Cases. The chief industry of Lavaur is sericulture, but wool-spinning and tanning occupy some of the people.
