As a literary curiosity, and as a supplemental anecdote to the article
of PREFACES,[173] I cannot pass over the suppressed preface to the
"Acajou et Zirphile" of Du Clos, which of itself is almost a singular
instance of hardy ingenuity, in an address to the public.
This single volume is one of the most whimsical of fairy tales, and an
amusing satire originating in an odd circumstance. Count Tessin, the
Swedish Ambassador at the Court of France, had a number of grotesque
designs made by Boucher, the king's painter, and engraved by the first
artists. The last plate had just been finished when the Count was
recalled, and appointed Prime Minister and Governor to the Crown Prince,
a place he filled with great honour; and in emulation of Fenelon,
composed letters on the education of a Prince, which have been
translated. He left behind him in France all the plates in the hands of
Boucher, who, having shown them to Du Clos for their singular invention,
regretted that he had bestowed so much fancy on a fairy tale, which was
not to be had; Du Clos, to relieve his regrets, offered to invent a
tale to correspond with these grotesque subjects. This seemed not a
little difficult. In the first plate, the author appears in his
morning-gown, writing in his study, surrounded by apes, rats,
butterflies, and smoke. In another, a Prince is drest in the French
costume of 1740, strolling full of thought "in the shady walk of ideas."
In a third plate, the Prince is conversing with a fairy who rises out of
a gooseberry which he has plucked: two dwarfs, discovered in another
gooseberry, give a sharp fillip to the Prince, who seems much
embarrassed by their tiny maliciousness. In another walk he eats an
apricot, which opens with the most beautiful of faces, a little
melancholy, and leaning on one side. In another print, he finds the body
of his lovely face and the hands, and he adroitly joins them together.
Such was the set of these incomprehensible and capricious inventions,
which the lighter fancy and ingenuity of Du Clos converted into a fairy
story, full of pleasantry and satire.[174]
Among the novelties of this small volume, not the least remarkable is
the dedication of this fairy romance to the public, which excited great
attention, and charmed and provoked our author's fickle patron. Du Clos
here openly ridicules, and dares his protector and his judge. This
hazardous attack was successful, and the author soon acquired the
reputation which he afterwards maintained, of being a writer who little
respected the common prejudices of the world. Freron replied by a long
criticism, entitled "Réponse du Public à l'Auteur d'Acajou;" but its
severity was not discovered in its length; so that the public, who had
been so keenly ridiculed, and so hardily braved in the light and
sparkling page of the haughty Du Clos, preferred the caustic truths and
the pleasant insult.
In this "Epistle to the Public," the author informs us that, "excited by
example, and encouraged by the success he had often witnessed, he
designed to write a piece of nonsense. He was only embarrassed by the
choice of subject. Politics, Morals, and Literature, were equally the
same to me: but I found, strange to say, all these matters pre-occupied
by persons who seem to have laboured with the same view. I found silly
things in all kinds, and I saw myself under the necessity of adopting
the reasonable ones to become singular; so that I do not yet despair
that we may one day discover truth, when we shall have exhausted all
our errors.
"I first proposed to write down all erudition, to show the freedom and
independence of genius, whose fertility is such as not to require
borrowing anything from foreign sources; but I observed that this had
sunk into a mere commonplace, trite and trivial, invented by indolence,
adopted by ignorance, and which adds nothing to genius,
"Mathematics, which has succeeded to erudition, begins to be
unfashionable; we know at present indeed that one may be as great a
dizzard in resolving a problem as in restoring a reading. Everything is
compatible with genius, but nothing can give it.
"For the _bel esprit_, so much envied, so much sought after, it is
almost as ridiculous to pretend to it, as it is difficult to attain.
Thus the scholar is contemned, the mathematician tires, the man of wit
and genius is hissed. What is to be done?"
Having told the whimsical origin of this tale, Du Clos continues: "I do
not know, my dear Public, if you will approve of my design; however, it
appears to me ridiculous enough to deserve your favour; for, to speak to
you like a friend, you appear to unite all the stages of human life,
only to experience all their cross-accidents. You are a child to run
after trifles; a youth when driven by your passions; and, in mature age,
you conclude you are wise, because your follies are of a more solemn
nature, for you grow old only to dote; to talk at random, to act without
design, and to believe you judge, because you pronounce sentence.
"I respect you greatly; I esteem you but little; you are not worthy of
being loved. These are my sentiments respecting you; if you insist on
others from me, in that case,
"I am,
"Your most humble and obedient servant."
The caustic pleasantry of this "Epistle Dedicatory" was considered by
some mawkish critics so offensive, that when the editor of the "Cabinet
de Fées," a vast collection of fairy tales, republished this little
playful satire and whimsical fancy-piece, he thought proper to cancel
the "Epistle:" concluding that it was entirely wanting in that respect
with which the public ought to be addressed! This editor, of course, was
a Frenchman: we view him in the ridiculous attitude of making his
profound bow, and expressing all this "high consideration" for this same
"Public," while, with his opera-hat in his hand, he is sweeping away the
most poignant and delectable page of Acajou and Zirphile.