XVI. It is certain, that courts are the great public schools of true
Urbanity; but they have mixed so much false in those schools in the
practice of it, that some have been led to think, it has nearly
obscured the true, of which, there seems to be scarce any thing left
but the mere appearance. I believe, that without disparagement to
any other courts we ever heard of, those of antient Rome, and modern
Paris, may be esteemed the most cultivated and polite that have been
known in the world. After mentioning this, let us hear what two authors
say who were well versed in the practice of them both. The first is
Juvenal, who clearly gives us to understand, that he who could not lie
and flatter should withdraw from court, as there were no hopes of his
getting any thing by his attendance there--
_Quid Romæ faciam? Mentiri nescio; librum_
_Si malus est, nequeo laudare, &c._
XVII. The second is the abbot Boileau, a famous preacher at Paris in
the reign of Louis the Fourteenth. This eminent man, in a treatise
he published, entitled _Choice Thoughts or Reflexions_, drew such a
picture of the court of Versailles, as shews the Urbanity exercised
there, had degenerated not only into dissimulation, but even into
treachery, although he admits, this was not the practice of every one
who attended it. These are his words:
XVIII. “What are the manners and behaviour of a courtier? Why they
consist in flattering his enemies while he is afraid of their power;
and in endeavouring to destroy them whenever he finds an opportunity
for doing it; in being civil to, and making use of his friends when he
stands in need of their assistance, and in turning his back upon them
when they can be of no further service to him; in seeking out powerful
protectors, whom he fawns on, and idolizes exteriorly, and frequently
despises in secret.
XIX. “Courtly Urbanity, consists in converting dissimulation and
deceit, into the law or rule of a man’s actions; and representing all
sorts of people in such colours, as your interest dictates to you that
you should paint them; in bearing slights and disappointments with a
forced reserve, and in awaiting with a strained appearance of modesty
and composure, the favours of Fortune.
XX. “In a court, for the most part there is no sincerity, but almost
every thing you see there, is compounded of hypocrisy, deceit, and
malevolence; for example, in peoples doing underhand ill offices
to each other; in contriving and laying snares that nobody can be
aware of; in bearing painful and mortifying disgusts with a smiling
countenance; and in hiding under an apparent shew of modesty, the
pride of Lucifer. It is very common in a court, for a man not to be
permitted to love whom he likes, to do what he should, nor to speak
what he thinks. It is necessary to keep silence, in order to conceal
your sentiments, and it is also necessary, to acquire a facility at
changing them. You must applaud, abuse, love, abhor, speak, and live,
not according to your own liking or inclination, but in conformity to
the arbitrary will and caprice of other people.
XXI. “In what do the other manners and mode of a man’s conducting
himself consist in a courtier? Why in dissembling injuries, and in
revenging them; in flattering his enemies, and in destroying them; in
promising every thing for the sake of obtaining a dignity or promotion,
and in performing none of these promises after he has got it; in
repaying favours with words, services with plausible assurances, and
debts with threatenings. At court, they in the same breath implore and
execrate Fortune, applaud and despise merit; and they also disguise the
truth, under an ostentatious appearance of frankness.”
XXII. I believe there is a great deal of this sort of dissimulation
all over the world; but it is natural to suppose, there is more of
it practised in courts than in other places, for the incitements to
the exercise of the before-mentioned vices, are generally stronger
there, than they are found to be out of those circles. There is not a
passion nor an appetite, which there a man does not seem within reach
of indulging, and the objects which stimulate his desires, shine
forth there also in their greatest splendor. The ambitious man fancies
himself on the point of grasping honours, and the covetous one riches.
The pretenders are vying with each other, the emulous contending with
the emulous, and the envious with the envied. There the success of the
unworthy man, is staring the neglected deserving one in the face, and
there the hands of the unskilful artist fully employed, is exhibiting
a disgusting spectacle, to the able one who has nothing to do. And
although a modest man who only views this at a great distance, or who
only hears it from report, may reason upon it, and contain himself like
a philosopher, still, when the mortifying prospect is so near him, he
can scarce speak of the thing with temper, nor look upon it without
falling into a passion. Thus it is almost morally impossible, that
the hearts of the neglected men should not be in a continual state of
fermentation, and their feelings in a tumultuous agitation, which is
attended, not so much with the corruption of the men themselves, as
with that of their manners.
XXIII. But notwithstanding all that has been alledged, we ought to
conclude, that the two before-named authors exaggerated the evils they
meant to reprehend. There is a great deal of bad in courts, but there
is also some good to be found in them. The complaints that merit is
neglected, are frequently nothing more than sighs, which express the
grief and disappointments of the heart from whence they proceed. The
same man who laments political mismanagement, while he is not permitted
to go beyond the porch of the favourite’s house, when he has once
gained admittance into it, begins to applaud his conduct, as he ascends
the steps leading to his levee-room; which is a proof that what he
meant by mismanagement and a bad conducted government, was such a one
as he got nothing under, and that what he understands by a good one,
is such a one as is advantageous to him. I have at all times heard the
administration ill spoken of, but if we come to enquire by whom, we
shall find it is chiefly done, by importunate candidates for places
and employments, who are unable to attain what they never deserved,
and by litigious suitors, who were justly disappointed of success in
their vexatious attempts, and who have been condemned to pay costs, for
commencing unjust prosecutions; by delinquents who have been legally
mulcted for their misdeeds; by ignorant people who have passed for men
of understanding, and who without having studied in any other school,
than that of a coffee-house or a club-room, have presumed to give
positive opinions, upon the most important and difficult political and
military questions; and finally, by weak people, who fancy that a good
government can effect impossibilities, and that they are able to make
all the subjects of a state, happy and contented.
XXIV. Neither my genius, nor my destiny have allowed me to have much
intercourse with ministers in high stations; but I have heard sincere
judicious men, who have known many of them well, speak of them, in
terms very different from those they have been spoken of by the vulgar;
and who have expressed a different opinion, both of their abilities and
their intentions, from that which has been commonly propagated. Nor
indeed is it credible, that princes, who generally know men’s political
characters better than private people, should make choice of men for
their ministers, who are either incapable, or wickedly disposed.
If in case that they should have been mistaken in the opinion they
entertained of them, and they find upon trying them, that they are not
equal to conduct the business they have confided to their management,
they may easily remove them. Thus it is utterly improbable to me, that
a man destitute of all merit, should for any length of time, occupy a
post of great importance, or have the ear of his sovereign.
XXV. With respect to inferior ministers, such for example, as the
principal people and magistrates in the provinces, I have had a great
deal of experience, and protest, that for the most part, I have found
them to be the best sort of men to be met with in the country. I say
for the most part, for it cannot be denied, that among this class,
there are men to be found that are not very upright, and more than a
little addicted to avarice. And by what I find the principal directors,
lawyers, and magistrates in the country to be, I judge of those about
the court; and it seems natural to me, that the higher the sphere of
life is in which people move, they are the more stimulated by motives
of honour, and less likely to descend to, or be guilty of mean actions.