wretched character, if it had not been said before.[443] Those persons
who injure the reputation or position of others for the sake of a
witticism deserve to be punished with ignominy; this has not been said
before, and I dare say it.
(81.) There are a certain number of ready-made phrases which we store
and use when we wish to congratulate one another. Though we often utter
them without really feeling what we say, and are received without
gratitude, yet we must not omit them, because, at least, they represent
the very best thing in this world, namely, friendship; and since men
cannot depend on one another in reality, they seem to have agreed to be
satisfied with appearances.
(82.) With five or six terms of art, and nothing else, we set up for
connoisseurs in music, painting, architecture, and gastronomy; we fancy
we have more pleasure than others in hearing, seeing, or eating; we
impose on our fellow-creatures and deceive ourselves.
(83.) At court there are always a certain number of people to whom
a knowledge of the world, politeness, or fortune supply the want of
merit;[444] they know how to enter and to leave a room; they are never
embarrassed in their conversation, because they never engage in one;
they please by their very taciturnity, and make themselves appear of
importance by their prolonged silence, or by uttering, at most, a few
monosyllables; they answer you by a glance, an intonation, a gesture,
and a smile; their understanding, if I may venture on the expression,
is only two inches deep, and if you fathom it, you will soon come to
the bottom.
(84.) There are some men on whom favour lights as it were accidentally;
they are the first it surprises and even alarms; they recollect
themselves at last, and think they are worthy of their good fortune;
and, as if stupidity and fortune were two things incompatible, or as if
it were impossible to be lucky and foolish at one and the same time,
they fancy they are intelligent, and venture, or I should rather say,
are conceited enough, to speak on all occasions, on every possible
subject, and without any regard for their audience. I might add that at
last they become terrible, and disgust every one by their fatuity and
nonsense. This is at least certain; they infallibly discredit those who
assisted them in their promotion.[445]
(85.) What shall we call those who are only shrewd in the opinion of
fools? I know this, that able men rank them with the people they impose
upon.
A man must be very shrewd to make other people believe that he is not
so sharp after all.
Shrewdness is neither too good nor too bad a quality, but is something
between a virtue and a vice; there is scarcely any circumstance in
which prudence cannot supply its place, and, perhaps, in which it ought
not to do so.
Shrewdness is a near neighbour of rascality; there is but a step from
the one to the other, and that a slippery one; falsehood only makes the
difference, for add shrewdness to it, and the result is rascality.
Amongst those people who, out of shrewdness, hear everything and talk
little, be sure to talk less; or, if you must talk much, say little.
(86.) You have a just and important business depending on the
consent of two persons; and one of them says to you that he will favour
it provided the other will agree to it, which the latter does, though
he wishes to know what the first intends doing. Meanwhile nothing comes
of it; and months and years roll on to no purpose. You say you are
bewildered, that it is a complete mystery to you, and that all that was
necessary for your success was for these two persons to meet together
and to converse about it. I tell you I see through it all, and it is no
mystery to me; they have met and conversed about your business.
(87.) Methinks a man who solicits for others shows the confidence of a
person asking for justice, whilst he who speaks or acts for himself is
as embarrassed and bashful as if he were asking a favour.
(88.) If a courtier be not continually upon his guard against the
snares laid for him to make him ridiculous, he will, with all
his sagacity, be amazed to find himself duped by people far less
intelligent than he is.
(89.) In life some circumstances may happen when truth and simplicity
prove the best policy.
(90.) If you are in favour, whatever you do is well done; you commit no
faults, and every step you take leads you to the goal; but if you are
not in favour, everything you do is faulty and useless, and whatever
path you take leads you out of the way.
(91.) A man who has schemed for some time can no longer do without it;
all other ways of living are to him dull and insipid.
(92.) Intelligence is requisite to be a schemer; yet a man may have a
sufficient amount of it to be above scheming and plotting, and above
subjecting himself to such things; in such a case he takes other means
for bettering his fortune, or for acquiring a brilliant reputation.
(93.) Fear not, O Aristides, with your sublime intellect, your
universal learning, your well-tried honesty, and your highly
accomplished merits, to fall into disgrace at court, or to lose the
favour of men of high rank so long as they need you.[446]
(94.) Let a favourite watch his actions very narrowly; for if I have to
wait in his anteroom not so long as usual; if his countenance be more
open, his forehead less clouded; if he listens to me more patiently,
and sees me to the door a little farther than he used to do, I shall
think he is tottering, and shall not be mistaken.
Man has but very little strength of mind, for disgrace or
mortifications are needed to make him more humane, pliable, less rude,
and more of a gentleman.
(95.) If we observe certain people at court, their discourses and their
whole conduct show that they think neither of their grandfathers nor
grandchildren; they only care for the present, and that they do not
enjoy, but abuse.
(96.) Straton[447] is born under two planets, equally fortunate and
unfortunate; his life is a romance, but with even less probability.
Adventures he had none, but good and bad dreams in abundance, or, if I
may say so, no dreams come up to his life. Fate has been to none more
kind than to him; he is acquainted with the mean and the extremes of
life; he has made a figure, been in distress, led an ordinary life,
and gone through all vicissitudes. He has made himself valued for
those virtues which he seriously asserted he possessed; he has said of
himself, “I have intelligence and courage,” and every one said after
him, “He has intelligence and courage.” In his good and bad fortune he
has experienced the disposition of courtiers, who said of him perhaps
more good and more ill than ever he deserved. When people praised him
they called him pretty, amiable, rare, wonderful, and heroic; and words
quite the contrary have also been employed to vilify him. His character
is heterogeneous, mixed and confused; his life has been an enigma,
which is not yet wholly solved.
(97.) Favour raises a man above his equals, and disgrace throws him
below them.
(98.) He who one day or other deliberately abandons a great name, a
great authority, or a large fortune, frees himself at once from many
troubles, many restless nights, and sometimes from many crimes.
(99.) The world will be the same a hundred years hence as it is now;
there will be the same stage and the same decorations, though not the
same actors. All who were glad to receive favours, as well as those who
were grieved and in despair for boons that were refused, shall have
disappeared from the boards; others have already made their entrances
who will act the same parts in the same plays, and in their turn make
their exits, whilst those who have not yet appeared one day will also
be gone, and fresh actors will take their places. What reliance is
there to be placed on any actor?
(100.) Whoever has seen the court has seen the most handsome, the
best-looking, and the most decked-out part of the world. He who
despises the court after having seen it, despises the world.
(101.) The city makes a man take a dislike to the country; the country
undeceives him as to the city and cares of the court.
A healthy mind acquires at court a liking for solitude and
retirement.[448]
[Illustration]
IX.
OF THE GREAT.
(1.) The common people are so blindly prepossessed in favour of the
great, and so enthusiastic about their bearing, looks, tone of voice,
and manners, that if the latter would take it into their heads to be
good, this prepossession would become idolatry.
(2.) If you are intrinsically vicious, O Theagenes[449] I pity you;
if you have become so out of weakness for those men who have an
interest in your being debauched, who have conspired to corrupt you,
and boast already of their success, you will excuse me if I despise
you. But if you are wise, temperate, modest, polite, generous,
grateful, industrious, and besides of a birth and rank which ought to
set examples rather than copy those others give, and to make rules
rather than to receive them, agree with such a class of men, and be
complaisant enough to imitate their disorders, vices, and follies,
after the respect they owe you has obliged them to imitate your
virtues. This is a bitter but useful ironical remark, very suitable
for securing your morals, for ruining all their projects, and for
compelling them to remain as they are, and leave you as you are.
(3.) In one thing great men have an immense advantage over others; they
may enjoy their sumptuous banquets, their costly furniture, their dogs,
horses, monkeys, dwarfs, fools, and flatterers; but I envy them the
happiness of having in their service their equals, and sometimes even
their superiors, in feelings and intelligence.
(4.) Great lords delight in opening glades in forests, in raising
terraces on long and solid foundations, in gilding their ceilings, in
bringing a good deal of water where there was none before, in growing
oranges in hothouses; but they are not anxious to restore peace to
the distracted, to make joyful the afflicted, and to forestall urgent
necessities, or to relieve them.
(5.) The question arises, whether, in comparing the different
conditions of men, their troubles and advantages, we cannot observe
such a mixture or balance of good and evil as seems to place them on
an equality, or at least as makes one scarcely more desirable than
another. Those men who are powerful, rich, and who want nothing may put
the question, but the decision must be left to the indigent.
There is, however, a kind of charm belonging to each of those different
conditions, and which lasts till misery removes it. The great please
themselves in excess, their inferiors in moderation: these delight in
lording and commanding; those are pleased, and even proud, to serve and
to obey: the great are surrounded, complimented, and respected; the
little surround, compliment, and cringe; and both are satisfied.
(6.) Good words cost the great so little, and their rank gives them
such a dispensation for not keeping what they have most solemnly
promised, that they really are moderate in being so sparing of those
promises.
(7.) “Such a person,” says some great man, “has grown old and feeble,
and has worn himself out in my service. What can I do for him?” A
younger competitor steps in, and obtains the post which had been
refused to this unfortunate man for no other reason but that he too
well deserved it.
(8.) “I do not know how it happens,” you exclaim with a cold and
disdainful air, “that Philanthes, though he possesses merit,
intelligence, is agreeable, exact in fulfilling his duties, faithful
and fond of his master, is not greatly valued by him, cannot please,
and is not at all liked.”—“Explain yourself; do you blame Philanthes or
the great man whom he serves?”
(9.) It is often more advantageous to quit the service of great men
than to complain of them.
(10.) Who can explain to me why some men get a prize in a lottery and
others find favour with the great?
(11.) The great are so happily situated that in the whole course of
their lives they never feel the loss of their best servants, or of
persons eminent in their various capacities, and from whom they have
obtained all the pleasure and profit they could. As soon as those
unique persons, so difficult to replace, are dead, a host of flatterers
are ready to expose their supposed weaknesses, from which, according to
them, their successors are entirely free; they are convinced that these
successors, whilst possessing all the skill and knowledge of their
predecessors, will have none of their faults; and this is the language
which consoles princes for the loss of worthy and excellent servants,
and makes them satisfied with indifferent ones.[450]
(12.) The great feel a contempt for intelligent men, who have nothing
but intelligence; men of intelligence despise the great, who possess
nothing but greatness; a good man pities them both, if their greatness
or intelligence is not allied with virtue.
(13.) When, on the one hand, I see some brisk, busy, intriguing,
bold, dangerous, and obnoxious persons at the table of the great, and
sometimes intimate with them, and, on the other hand, consider what
difficulty a man of merit has to obtain an interview with them, I am
not always inclined to believe that the wicked are tolerated out of
interest, or that good men and true are looked upon as useless; but I
am rather confirmed in my opinion that rank and sound judgment do not
always go together, and that a liking for virtue and virtuous people is
a distinct quality.
(14.) Lucilius chooses to spend his life rather in being admitted on
sufferance by a few of the great than in being reduced to his living
familiarly with his equals.
The custom of associating with people who are our superiors in rank
ought to have some restrictions; it often requires extraordinary
talents to put it into practice.[451]
(15.) Theophilusʼ disease seems to be incurable; he has suffered
from it these thirty years, and now he is past recovery. He was, is,
and will always be desirous of governing the great; death alone can
extinguish with his life this craving for swaying and ruling other
minds. Is it in him zeal for his neighbourʼs weal, or is he accustomed
to it, or is it an excessive good opinion he has of himself? He
insinuates himself into every palace, and does not stop in the middle
of an apartment, but goes on to a window-niche or a closet; other
people wait to be seen or to have an audience till he has finished
his speech, which lasts generally a goodly time, during which he
gesticulates much. He penetrates the secrets of many families, has
a share in their good or bad fortunes; forestalls many an occasion,
offers his services, and forces himself upon people so discreetly[452]
that he must be admitted. The care of ten thousand souls, for which he
is accountable to Providence as much as for his own, is not sufficient
to employ his time or satisfy his ambition; there are others of a
higher rank, and of more consideration, for whom he is not responsible,
but of whom he officiously takes charge. He listens and watches for
anything that may gratify his spirit of intrigue, meddling and
muddling. A great man has scarcely set foot on shore, but he gets hold
of him, and pounces upon him; and we hear that Theophilus is his guide
and director before we could even suspect he had so much as thought of
it.[453]
(16.) A coldness or incivility from our superiors in rank makes us hate
them; but a bow or a smile soon reconciles us.
(17.) There are some proud men whom the success of their rivals humbles
and mortifies; it is a disgrace which even sometimes makes them return
your bow; but time, which alleviates all things, restores them at last
to their natural disposition.
(18.) The contempt the great feel for the common people renders them so
indifferent to their flattery or praises, that it does not feed their
vanity. In like manner, princes praised continually and unreservedly by
the great and the courtiers, would be more elated if they had a better
opinion of those who praise them.
(19.) The great believe themselves the only persons who are the pink
of perfection, and will hardly allow any sound judgment, ability,
or refined feelings in any of a meaner rank; but they arrogate to
themselves those qualities by virtue of their birth. However, they are
greatly in error in entertaining such absurd prejudices, for the best
thoughts, the best discourses, the best writings, and perhaps the most
refined behaviour, have not always been found among them. They have
large estates and a long train of ancestors, and there is no arguing
about those facts.[454]
(20.) Have you any intelligence, grandeur of mind, capacity, taste,
sound judgment? Can I believe prejudice and flattery which so boldly
proclaim your merit? No! I suspect and reject them. I will not be
dazzled by that look of capacity and grandeur which makes it appear
as if you could act, speak, and write better than any one else; which
makes you so niggardly of bestowing praise, and renders it impossible
to obtain the smallest approbation from you. Hence I naturally infer
that you are a favourite, have influence, and are very wealthy. How
shall we describe you, Telephon?[455] We can only approach you as we do
fire, namely, from a certain distance; and to form an opinion of you
in a sensible and rational manner, we ought to strip you, handle you,
and confront you with your equals. Your confidant, your most intimate
friend, who gives you advice, for whom you give up the society of
Socrates and Aristides, with whom you laugh, and who laughs louder than
yourself, Davus,[456] in short, I know thoroughly; and this is enough
for me to make you out.
(21.) There are some persons who, if they did know their inferiors and
themselves, would be ashamed to be above them.
(22.) If there are but few excellent orators, are there many who
can understand them? If good writers are scarce, are there many who
can read? Thus we are always complaining of the paucity of persons
qualified to counsel kings, and assist them in the administration
of affairs; but if such able and intelligent personages make their
appearance, and act according to their ideas and knowledge, are they
beloved and esteemed as much as they deserve? Are they commended for
what they plan and do for their country? They exist, that is all; they
are censured if they fail, and envied if they succeed. Let us then
blame the people for whom it would be ridiculous to find an excuse. The
great and those in power look on their dissatisfaction and jealousy as
inevitable; and, for this reason, they have been gradually induced not
to take into account and to neglect their opinions in whatever they
undertake, and even to consider this a rule in politics.
The common people hate one another for the injuries they reciprocally
do each other; the great are execrated by them for all the harm they
do, and for all the good they do not, whilst they are also blamed for
their obscurity, poverty, and misfortunes.
(23.) The great think it too much condescension to have the same
religion and the same God as the common people, for how can they be
called Peter, John, or James, as any tradesman or labourer? Let us
avoid, they say, to have anything in common with the multitude; let
us affect, on the contrary, a distinction which may separate us from
them; the people are welcome to the twelve apostles, their disciples,
and the first martyrs, fit patrons for such folks; let them every
year rejoice on some saintʼs day, which each celebrates as if it were
his birthday;[457] but for us great people, let us have recourse to
profane names, and be baptized by such patronymics as Hannibal, Cæsar,
and Pompey, for they were indeed great men; by that of Lucretia, for
she was an illustrious Roman lady; or by those of Rinaldo, Rogero,
Oliviero, and Tancredo,[458] who were paladins and among the most
marvellous heroes of romance; by those of Hector, Achilles, or
Hercules, all demi-gods: even by those of Phœbus and Diana; and who
shall prevent us from calling ourselves Jupiter, Mercury, Venus, or
Adonis?[459]
(24.) While the great neglect to become acquainted not only with the
interests of their princes and with public affairs, but with their
own, while they ignore how to govern a household or a family, boast of
this very ignorance, and are impoverished and ruled by their agents,
while they are satisfied with being dainty in eating and drinking,[460]
with visiting Thais and Phryne,[461] talking of various packs of
hounds, telling how many stages there are between Paris and Besançon or
Philipsburg,[462] some citizens instruct themselves in what is going
on within and without the kingdom, study the art of government, become
shrewd politicians, are acquainted with the strength and weakness of an
entire state, think of bettering their position, obtain a place, rise,
become powerful, and relieve their prince of a portion of the cares
of state. The great, who disdained them, now respect them, and think
themselves fortunate in being accepted as their sons-in-law.[463]
(25.) If I compare the two most opposite conditions of men, I mean
the great and the common people, the latter appear satisfied if they
only have the necessities of life, and the former fretful and poor
amidst superfluities. A man of the people can do no harm; a great man
will do no good, and is capable of doing great mischief; the first
only plans and practises useful things, the second adds to them what
is hurtful. Here rusticity and frankness show themselves ingenuously;
there a malignant and corrupt disposition lies hidden under a veneer
of politeness. If the common people have scarcely any culture, the
great have no soul; the first have a good foundation and no outward
appearances; the latter are all outward appearance and but a mere
superstratum. Were I to choose between the two, I should select,
without hesitation, being a plebeian.
(26.) However able the great at court may be, and whatever skill they
may possess in appearing what they are not, and in not appearing what
they are, they cannot conceal their malice and their inclination to
make fun of other people, and often to render a person ridiculous who
is not really so. These fine talents are discovered in them at the
first glance, and are admirable without doubt to ensnare a dupe or
make a fool of a man who already was one, but are still better suited
to deprive them of the pleasure they might receive from a person of
intelligence, who knows how to vary and adapt his conversation in a
thousand agreeable and pleasant ways, and would do so, if the dangerous
inclination of a courtier to ridicule any one did not induce him to be
very reserved; he, therefore, assumes a grave air, and so effectively
entrenches himself behind it, that the jokers, ill disposed as they
are, cannot find an opportunity of making fun of him.
(27.) Ease, affluence, and a smooth and prosperous career are the cause
why princes can take some delight in laughing at a dwarf, a monkey, an
imbecile, or a wretched story; men less fortunate never laugh but when
they ought to.
(28.) A great man loves champagne and hates wine from La Brie; he gets
intoxicated with better wine than a man of the people; and this is the
only difference between orgies in the two most opposite conditions of
life, that of a lord and of a footman.
(29.) It would seem, at the first glance, that the pleasures of princes
always are a little seasoned with the pleasure of inconveniencing other
people. But this is not so; princes are like other men; they only
think of themselves, and follow their own inclinations, passions, and
convenience, which is quite natural.
(30.) One would think that the first rule of companies, of people in
office and in power, is to provide those who depend on them in their
business with as many obstructions as they dread those dependants might
place in their way.