Can you really get more pompous than this?

I promised to leave Hugo a moment, and I meant to, but I just read a passage that is a perfect example of my complaint:

The gamin is the expression of Paris, and Paris is the expression of the world. For Paris is a sum total. Paris is the ceiling of the human race.

(from the chapter, Ecce Paris, Ecce Homo)

Believe it or not, this puts me in a good mood; reading the novel should be downhill from here on out. His writing can't possibly get much worse than this.

I hope.