country affairs; they can scarcely distinguish flax from hemp, wheat
from rye, and neither of them from meslin; they are satisfied with
eating, drinking, and dressing. Do not mention to a large number of
townsfolk such words as fallowland, staddles, layers, or after-grass,
if you wish to be understood, for they will not think it is their
mother-tongue. Speak to some of them of measures, tariffs, taxes,[379]
and to others of appeals, petitions, decrees, and injunctions; for they
know the world, and above all, what is ugly and vulgar in it; but they
do not know Nature, its beginning, growth, gifts, and bounteousness.
Their ignorance often is voluntary, and based on the conceit they have
of their own callings and talents. There is not a low pettifogger
in his dark and grimy room, his brain teeming with the most wicked
legal quibbles, who does not prefer himself to a husbandman, who,
blest of Heaven, cultivates the land, sows when it is needed, and
gathers a rich harvest; and if at any time the former hears mention
made of the first men or the patriarchs, their rural lives and their
husbandry, he wonders how people could have been living in those days
without lawyers, commissioners, presidents, or solicitors, and cannot
understand how they could ever have done without rolls-offices, courts
of judicature, and refreshment-rooms.
(22.) When the Roman emperors were making their triumphal entries,
they never protected themselves in a more effeminate, easy, and
efficacious manner against the wind, the rain, the dust, and the sun,
than the citizens of Paris do when they are driven from one end of
the town to another. What a difference between their habits and the
mules on which their forefathers rode! The latter did not know how to
deprive themselves of the necessaries of life to get superfluities,
nor to prefer show to substance; their houses were never illuminated
with wax-candles, and they never warmed themselves by a little fire,
for in their time such candles were only used at the altar and in the
Louvre;[380] they never ate a bad dinner in order to keep a carriage;
they were convinced that men had legs given them to walk, and they
did walk. In dry weather they kept themselves clean; in wet they did
not mind to dirty their shoes and stockings, and to cross a street
or passage with the same alacrity as a sportsman rides over ploughed
fields, or a soldier gets wet in the trenches. They had not then
invented the harnessing of two men to carry them in a Sedan chair; then
several magistrates walked to the two courts,[381] and with as good
a grace as Augustus formerly went on foot to the Capitol. Pewter in
those days shone on the tables and the sideboards, brass and iron in
the chimneys, whilst silver and gold lay safe in coffers. Women were
then waited on by women, and there were even women in the kitchen.
Such fine names as “governor” and “governess” were not unknown to our
forefathers, for they knew to whom the children of kings and of great
princes were intrusted;[382] but their children had the same servants
they had, and they themselves were satisfied to superintend their
education. Everything they did was calculated; their expenses were
in proportion to their means; their liveries, their carriages, their
furniture, their household expenses, their town and country houses
were all in accordance with their incomes and their station in life.
Outward distinctions existed, however, amongst them, so that it was
impossible to mistake the wife of an attorney for the wife of a judge,
and a commoner or a mere servant for a nobleman. Less desirous to
spend or enlarge their patrimony than to keep it, they left it entire
to their heirs, led a tranquil life, and died a peaceful death; then,
there was no complaint of hard times, of excessive misery, of scarcity
of money; they had less than we have, and yet they had enough, richer
through their economy and their moderation than through their incomes
or estates. To conclude, in former days people observed this maxim,
that what is splendour, pomp, and magnificence in nobles of high rank,
is extravagance, folly, and stupidity in private gentlemen.[383]
[Illustration]
VIII.
OF THE COURT.
(1.) The most honourable thing we can say of a man is, that he does not
understand the court; there is scarcely a virtue which we do not imply
when saying this.[384]
(2.) A perfect courtier can command his gestures, his eyes, and his
countenance; he is profound and impenetrable; he seems to overlook
every injury; he smiles on his enemies, controls his temper, disguises
his passions, belies his inclinations, and both speaks and acts
against his opinions. Such a quintessence of refinement is usually
called “falsehood,” and is, after all, sometimes of no more use to a
courtierʼs success than frankness, sincerity, and virtue.
(3.) A court is like certain changeable colours; which vary according
to the different lights they are exposed in. He who can define these
colours can define the court.
(4.) A man who leaves the court for a single moment renounces it for
ever; the courtier who was there in the morning must be there at night,
and know it again next day, in order that he himself may be known there.
(5.) A man must appear small at court, and let him be never so vain, it
is impossible to prevent it; but it is the common lot, and the highest
nobles themselves are there of no consequence.
(6.) People who live in the provinces consider the court admirable; but
if they visit it, its beauties diminish, like those of a fine drawing
of perspective viewed too closely.
(7.) It is difficult to get accustomed to the spending of our lives in
ante-chambers, courtyards, or on staircases.
(8.) The court does not satisfy a man, but it prevents him from being
satisfied with anything else.
(9.) A cultured gentleman should have some experience of the court; as
soon as he enters it he will discover a new world, as it were, wholly
unknown to him, where vice and politeness have equal sway, and where
good and evil alike may be of use to him.
(10.) The court is like a marble structure, for the courtiers are very
polished and very hard.
(11.) Sometimes people go to court only to come back again, so that,
on their return, they may be taken notice of by the nobility of their
county or by the bishops of their diocese.
(12.) There would be no use for embroiderers and confectioners, and
they would open their shops in vain, if all the people were modest and
temperate; courts would be deserts and kings almost left alone, if
every one was void of vanity and self-interest. Men are willing to be
slaves in one place if they can only lord it in another. It seems that
at court a proud, imperious, and commanding mien is delivered wholesale
to the great for them to retail in the country; they do exactly what is
done unto them, and are the true apes of royalty.
(13.) Nothing disparages some courtiers so much as the presence of a
prince; their faces are scarcely to be recognised; their features are
altered and their looks debased; the more proud and haughty they are,
the greater is the change in them, because they have suffered a greater
loss; whilst a gentlemanly and modest man bears it much better, as
there is nothing in him to alter.
(14.) Courtly manners are contagious; they are caught at
Versailles,[385] as the Norman accent is at Rouen and Falaise;
we partly find them amongst quartermasters, superintendents, and
confectioners;[386] a man with no very great intellect may become
proficient in them; one with a lofty genius and of solid worth
does not sufficiently value such accomplishments to make it his
principal business[387] to study and acquire them; he contracts them
imperceptibly, and does not trouble himself to get rid of them.
(15.) N ...,[388] in a great flutter, comes up to the kingʼs chamber,
turns everybody aside, and clears the way; he scratches at the door,
nay, almost raps; he gives his name, and the people around him recover
now their breath; after some time he is admitted, but it is with the
crowd.[389]
(16.) Courts are haunted by certain bold adventurers, of free-and-easy
manners, who introduce themselves, pretend to possess greater abilities
than others in their profession, and are believed on their sole
assertion.[390] In the meanwhile they take advantage of this general
belief, or of the fondness of some men for novelty; they make their
way through the crowd, and reach the ear of the prince, with whom the
courtier sees them talking, whilst he thinks himself happy if he only
obtains a glance. It is not difficult for great people to get rid of
them, for as they are only admitted on sufferance, and are of no
consequence, their dismissal is of no importance: then they disappear,
at once rich and out of favour; and the very men who so lately were
deceived by them are ready to be deceived by others.
(17.) Some men, on entering a room, make but a slight bow, stretch
their shoulders and thrust out their chests like women; they ask you
a question, look another way, and speak in a loud tone, to show that
they think themselves above every one present; they stop, and everybody
gathers around them; they do all the talking, and seem to take the
lead. This ridiculous and simulated haughtiness continues until some
really great person makes his appearance, when they shrink away at
once, and are reduced to their natural level, for which they are all
the better.
(18.) Courts cannot exist without a class of courtiers who can flatter,
are complaisant, insinuating, devoted to the ladies, whose pleasures
they direct, whose weaknesses they study, and whose passions they
flatter; they whisper some naughty words to them, speak of their
husbands and lovers in a proper manner, conjecture when they are sad,
ill, or expect a baby; they head the fashions, refine on luxury and
extravagance, and teach the fair to spend in a short time large sums
on clothes, furniture, and carriages; they wear nothing themselves
but what shows good taste and riches, and will not live in an old
palace till it be repaired and embellished; they eat delicately and
thoughtfully; there is no pleasure they have not tried and of which
they cannot tell you something; they owe their position to themselves,
and they keep it with the same ability they made it. Disdainful and
proud, they no longer accost their former equals, and scarcely bow
to them; they speak when every one else is silent; enter, and at
inconvenient hours thrust themselves into places where men of the
highest rank dare not intrude; and when such men, after long services,
their bodies covered with wounds, filling great posts or occupying high
official positions, do not look so confident, and seem embarrassed.
Princes listen to what these courtiers have to say, who share all their
pleasures and entertainments, and never stir out of the Louvre or the
Castle,[391] where they behave themselves as if quite at home and in
their own house; they seem to be in a thousand different places at
one and the same time; their countenances are sure always to attract
the notice of any novice at court; they embrace and are embraced,
they laugh, talk loud, are funny, tell stories, and are of an easy
disposition; they are agreeable, rich, lend money, but, after all, are
of no importance.[392]
(19.) Would any person not think that to Cimon and Clitandre alone
are intrusted all the details of the State, and that they alone are
answerable for them? The one manages at least everything concerning
agriculture and land, and the other is at the head of the navy.
Whoever will give a sketch of them must express bustle, restlessness,
curiosity, activity, and paint Hurry itself. We never see them sitting,
standing, or stopping; no one has ever seen them walk; for they are
always running, and they speak whilst running, and do not wait for
an answer; they never come from any place, or go anywhere, but are
always passing to and fro. Stop them not in their hurried course,
for you would break their machinery; do not ask them any questions,
or, if you do, give them at least time to breathe and to remember
that they have nothing to do, can stay with you long, and follow you
wherever you are pleased to lead them. They do not, like Jupiterʼs
satellites,[393] crowd round and encompass their prince, but precede
him and give notice of his coming: they rush with impetuosity through
the crowd of courtiers, and all who stand in their way are in danger.
Their profession is to be seen again and again, and they never go
to bed without having acquitted themselves of such an important
duty, so beneficial to the commonwealth. They know, besides, all the
circumstances of every petty accident, and are acquainted with anything
at court people wish to ignore; they possess all the qualifications
necessary for a small post. Nevertheless they are eager and watchful
about anything they think will suit them as well as slightly
enterprising, thoughtless, and precipitate. In a word, they both carry
their heads very high, and are harnessed to the chariot of Fortune, but
are never likely to sit in it.
(20.) A courtier who has not a pretty name ought to hide it under a
better;[394] but if it is one that he dares own,[395] he should then
insinuate that his name is the most illustrious of all names, and his
house the most ancient of all others; he ought to be descended from the
princes of Lorraine, the Rohans, the Châtillons, the Montmorencys,[396]
and, if possible, from princes of the blood; he ought to talk of
nothing but dukes, cardinals, and ministers; to introduce his
paternal and maternal ancestors in all conversations, as well as the
_Oriflamme_[397] and the Crusades; to have his apartments adorned with
genealogical trees, escutcheons with sixteen quarters, and portraits
of his ancestors and of the relatives of his ancestors; to value
himself on his having an old castle with turrets, battlements, and
portcullises; to be always speaking of his race, his branch, his name,
and his arms; to say of a man that he is not a man of rank, of a woman
that she is not of noble extraction;[398] or to ask whether Hyacinthus
is a nobleman when they tell him he has drawn a great prize in the
lottery.[399] If some persons laugh at such absurd remarks, he lets
them laugh on; if others make erroneous comments, they are welcome; he
will always assert that he takes his place after the royal family, and,
by constantly repeating it, he will finally be believed.
(21.) It shows a simple mind to acknowledge at court the smallest alloy
of common blood, and not to set up for a nobleman.
(22.) At court people go to bed and rise only with a view to self; it
is what they revolve in their own minds morning and evening, night and
day; it is for this they think, speak, are silent or act; it is with
this disposition that they converse with some and neglect others, that
they ascend or descend; by this rule they measure all their assiduity,
complaisance, esteem, indifference, or contempt. Whatever progress any
of them seems to make towards moderation and wisdom, they are carried
away by the first motive of ambition along with the most covetous, the
most violent in their desires, and the most ambitious. Can they stand
still when everything is in motion, when everything is stirring, and
forbear running whither every one runs? Such people even think they
only owe their success in life to themselves; and a man who has not
made it at court is supposed not to have deserved it; and this judgment
is without appeal. However, is it advisable for a man to leave the
court without having obtained any advantage by his stay, or should he
remain there without favour or reward? This question is so intricate,
so delicate, and so difficult to decide, that a very large number of
courtiers have grown old without coming to any affirmative or negative
conclusion, and died, at last, without having arrived at any final
resolution.
(23.) There is nothing at court so worthless and so contemptible as
a man who cannot assist us in the least to better our position; I am
amazed such a person dares appear there.
(24.) A man who sees himself raised far above his contemporaries,
whose rank was formerly the same as his own, and who made their first
appearance at court at the same time as he did, fancies it is a sure
proof of his superior merit, and thinks himself better than those other
people who could not keep up with him; but he forgets what he thought
of himself before he became a favourite, and what he thought of those
who had outstripped him.
(25.) It proves a good deal for a friend, after he has become a great
favourite at court, still to keep up an acquaintance with us.
(26.) If a man who is in favour dares to take advantage of it
before it is all over; if he makes use of a propitious gale to
get on; if he keeps his eye on any vacancies, posts, or abbeys,
asks for them, obtains them, and is stocked with pensions, grants,
and reversions,[400] people will blame him for being covetous and
ambitious, and will say that everything tempts him and is secured by
him, his friends and his creatures; and that through the numberless and
various favours bestowed on him, he, in his own person, has monopolised
several fortunes. But what should he have done? I judge not so much
by what people say, as by what they would have done themselves under
similar circumstances, and that is precisely what he has done.
We blame those persons who make use of their opportunities for
bettering their positions, because we are in a very inferior situation,
and, therefore, despair of being ever in such circumstances that will
expose us to a similar reproach. But if we were likely to succeed
them, we should begin to think they were not so much in the wrong as
we imagined, and would be more cautious in censuring them, for fear of
condemning ourselves beforehand.
(27.) We should not exaggerate things, nor blame the court for evils
which do not exist there. Courtiers never endeavour to harm real merit,
but they leave it sometimes without reward; they do not always despise
it when they have once discerned it, but they forget all about it;
for a court is a place where people most perfectly understand doing
nothing, or very little, for those whom they greatly esteem.
(28.) It would be very wonderful indeed, if among all the instruments I
employ for building up my fortune, some of them were not to miscarry. A
friend of mine who promised to speak for me does not say a single word;
another speaks without any spirit; a third speaks by accident against
my interests, though it was not his intention to do so. One lacks
the will, another sagacity and prudence; and none of them would be
sufficiently delighted in seeing me happy, and do everything in their
power for making me so. Every one remembers well enough what pains he
took in establishing his own position, and what assistance he got in
clearing his way to obtain it. We should not be averse to acknowledge
the services which certain people have rendered us, by rendering to
others some service on similar occasions, if our chief and only care
were not to think of ourselves when we have made our fortune.
(29.) Courtiers never employ whatever intelligence, skill, or
perspicacity they may possess to find out means of obliging those
of their friends who implore their assistance, but they only invent
evasive answers, plausible excuses, or what they call impossibilities
for moving in the matter; and then they think they have satisfied all
the duties which friendship and gratitude require.
No courtier cares to take the initiative in anything, but he will offer
to second him who does, because, judging of others by himself, he
thinks that no one will make a beginning, and that therefore he shall
not be obliged to second any one. This is a gentle and polite way of
refusing to employ his influence, good offices, and mediation in favour
of those who stand in need of them.
(30.) How many men almost stifle you with their demonstrations of
friendship, and pretend to love and esteem you in private, who are
embarrassed when they meet you in public, and at the kingʼs levée, or
at mass at Versailles, look another way, and do all they can to avoid
you. There are few courtiers who have sufficient greatness of soul or
confidence in themselves to dare to honour in public a man of merit but
who does not occupy a grand post.
(31.) I see a man surrounded and followed by a crowd, but he is in
office. I see another to whom every one says a few words, but he is a
court favourite; a third is embraced and caressed even by persons of
high rank, but he is wealthy; a fourth is stared at by all, and pointed
at, but he is learned and eloquent. I perceive one whom nobody omits
bowing to, but he is a bad man. I should like to see a man courted who
is merely good and nothing else.
(32.) When a man is appointed to a new post he is inundated with
praises, which flood the courtyards, the chapel, overflow the grand
staircase, the vestibules, the galleries, and all the rooms of the
palace;[401] he has quite enough of them, and can no longer bear it.
There are not two different opinions about him; those of envy and
jealousy are the same as those of adulation; every one is carried away
by the raging torrent which forces a person to say what he thinks of
such a man, or what he does not think of him, and often to commend a
man of whom he has no knowledge. If such a man has any intelligence,
merit, or valour, he becomes in one moment a genius of the first
order, a hero, a demi-god; he is so extravagantly flattered in all
the portraits painted of him that he appears disagreeably ugly when
compared with any of them; it is impossible for him ever to reach the
point to which servility and adulation would have him rise; he blushes
at his own reputation. But let him not be so firmly established in
the post in which he has been placed as people thought he was, and
the world will without difficulty entertain another opinion. If his
downfall be complete, then the very men who were instrumental in
raising him so high by their applause and praise are quite ready to
overwhelm him with the greatest contempt; I mean, there are none who
will despise him more, blame him with greater acrimony, or deny him
with more contumely than those very men who were most impassioned in
speaking well of him.[402]
(33.) It may be justly said that it is easier to get appointed to an
eminent and difficult post than to keep it.
(34.) We see men fallen from a high estate for those very faults for
which they were appointed to it.
(35.) At court there are two ways of dismissing or discharging servants
and dependants; to be angry with them, or to make them so angry with us
that they leave us of their own accord.
(36.) Courtiers speak well of a man for two reasons: firstly, that he
may know they have commended him; and secondly, that he may say the
same of them.
(37.) It is as dangerous at court to make any advances as it is
embarrassing not to make them.
(38.) There are some people who, if they do not know the name or the
face of a man, make this a pretence for laughing at him. They ask who
that man is; it is not Rousseau, Fabry, or La Couture,[403] for then
they would know him.
(39.) I am told so many bad things of this man, and see so few in him,
that I begin to suspect he has some merit which is so vexatious that it
eclipses the merit of others.
(40.) You are an honest man,[404] and do not make it your business
either to please or displease the favourites. You are merely attached
to your master and to your duty; you are a lost man.
(41.) None are impudent by choice; but they are so constitutionally,
and though it is quite wrong, yet it is natural; a man who is not born
so is modest and cannot easily pass from one extreme to another. It
would be useless to advise such a man to be impudent in order to be
successful; a bad imitation will not do him any good, and would ensure
his failure. Without real and ingenious effrontery there is not doing
anything at court.
(42.) We seek, we hurry, we intrigue, we worry ourselves, we ask and
are refused; we ask again and get what we ask for; but we pretend we
obtained it without ever having asked for it, or so much as thought
about it, and even when we had quite another thing in view. This is an
obsolete style, a silly falsehood, which deceives nobody.