We hear a vast deal in these ages of what are called "Idées
Napoléoniennes," the wisdom of Napoleon, and so forth. Some of this is
invented by the writers, and ascribed to Napoleon; some of it is no
wisdom at all; and some is what may be called second-hand wisdom, an old
familiar face with a new dress. Of the latter sort is the famous saying:
"From the sublime to the ridiculous there is but a step."
For this remark Napoleon has obtained considerable notice: but the truth
is, he borrowed it from Tom Paine; Tom Paine borrowed it from Hugh
Blair, and Hugh Blair from Longinus. Napoleon's words are:--
"Du sublime au ridicule il n'y a qu'un pas."
The passage in Tom Paine, whose writings were translated into French as
early as 1791, stands thus:--
"The sublime and the ridiculous are often so nearly related, that
it is difficult to class them separately; one step above the
sublime makes the ridiculous, and one step above the ridiculous
makes the sublime again."
Blair has a remark akin to this:
"It is indeed extremely difficult to hit the precise point where
true wit ends and buffoonery begins."
But the passage in Blair, from which Tom Paine adopted his notion of the
sublime and the ridiculous, is that in which Blair, commenting on
Lucan's style, remarks:--
"It frequently happens that where the second line is sublime, the
third, in which he meant to rise still higher, is perfectly
bombast."
Lastly, this saying was borrowed by Blair from his brother rhetorician,
Longinus, who, in his _Treatise on the Sublime_, has the following
sentence at the beginning of section iii.:--
"Τεθόλωται γὰρ τῇ φράσει, καὶ τεθορύβηται ταῖς φαντασίαις μᾶλλον,
ἢ δεδείνωται, κἂν ἕκαστον αὐτῶν πρὸς αὐγὰς ἀνασκοπῇς, ἐκ τοῦ
φοβεροῦ κατ' ὀλίγον ὑπονοστεῖ πρὸς τὸ εὐκαταφρόνητον."
This is referred to by Warton in his comments on Pope's translation of
the _Thebais of Statius_; and Dr. Croly, apparently unacquainted with
the passages in Paine and Blair, describes it, in his edition of Pope,
as the anticipation of Napoleon's celebrated remark. It will be seen
that the original saying, in its various peregrinations, has undergone a
slight modification, Longinus making the translation a gradual one,
"κατ' ὀλίγον," while Blair, Paine, and Napoleon make it but "a
step." Yet, notwithstanding this disguise, the marks of its paternity
are sufficiently traceable.
So much for this celebrated "mot." And, after all, there is very little
wit or wisdom in it, that is not expressed or suggested by La
Rochefoucauld's _Maxims_:--
"La plus subtile folie se fait de la plus subtile sagesse."
"Plus on aime une maîtresse, plus on est près de la haïr;"
or by Rousseau's remark--
"Tout état qui brille est sur son déclin;"
or by Beaumarchais' exclamation--
"Que les gens d'esprit sont bêtes!"
or by the old French proverb--
"Les extrêmes se touchent;"
or by the English adage--
"The darkest hour is nearest the dawn;"
or, lastly, by any of the following passages in our own poets:--
----"Evils that take leave,
On their departure most of all show evil."
_Shakspeare._
"Wit, like tierce claret, when't begins to pall,
Neglected lies, and's of no use at all;
But in its full perfection of decay
Turns vinegar, and comes again in play."
_Rochester._
"Great wits are sure to madness near allied,
And thin partitions do their bounds divide."
_Dryden._
"There's but the twinkling of a star
Between a man of peace and war."
_Butler._
"For men as resolute appear
With too much as too little fear."
_Butler._
"Th' extremes of glory and of shame,
Like east and west become the same:
No Indian prince has to his palace
More followers, than a thief to the gallows."
_Butler._
"For as extremes are short of ill or good,
And tides at highest mark regorge the flood;
So fate, that could no more improve their joy,
Took a malicious pleasure to destroy."
_Dryden._
"Extremes in nature equal ends produce,
And oft so mix, the difference is too nice
Where ends the virtue or begins the vice."
_Pope._
I might adduce other instances, but these are sufficient to show that
the sentiment owes nothing to Napoleon but the sanction of his great
name, and the pithy sentence in which he has embodied it.