Resolved questions
What is the meaning of this sentence? (From "A Tale of Two Cities" by Charles Dickens)

It means France was interested in material possession (money), and was printing and spending more money than England. England is described here as being the shield and trident and the sister of France. Also Dickens is drawing an allusion to the biblical phrase "Ye cannot serve God and mammon" by implying that France has put great service towards the production and utilization of paper money the inevitable expense would be a lack of spirituality (according to that quote). If one were to follow the logic of that quote, then one would assume if one were more interested in money, than they cannot be as spiritual. Dickens's (I don't know if Dickens would be an ancient name, or modern, I went with modern 's) audience would have been familiar with that quote, especially the King James edition, which is where he probably got it from. This is also written in a very embellished and fancy style. It's great keep reading, but once in a while, he lies to play with language, and you have to read between the lines to understand his meaning. Also he implies an undertone of economic catastrophe, by implying they are going to have a economic bust, because they cannot maintain this rate of manufacturing and spending money, eventually if one is to slow down, problems are on the horizon. So he is foreshadowing and he is using a biblical allusion. This requires extreme fluency in English, but great job at tackling a difficult challenge.