This book is entitled Tresors du temps. What are those "treasures of times"? They are all the treasures that the past has left us: great monuments, important ideas, memorable events (both happy and tragic), beautiful literature and poetry which survive intact the centuries. These treasures of the past form the background of our daily lives, and they are the fabric from which our present-day culture is made.

The blending of past and present is nowhere more vivid and important that in today’s France.