present himself before me; I discharge him this very minute!” The
servant makes his appearance, and he asks him, in a contemptuous tone,
where he comes from; the man replies he has been where he was sent
to, and gives a faithful account of his errand. You would often take
Menalcas for what he is not, for an idiot; for he does not listen,
and speaks still less; for a madman, because he talks to himself, and
indulges in certain grimaces and involuntary motions of the head;
for proud and discourteous, because when you bow to him, he may pass
without looking at you, or look at you and not return your bow; for a
man without any feeling, for he talks of bankruptcy in a family where
there is such a blot; of executions and the scaffold before a person
whose father has been beheaded; of plebeians before plebeians who
have become rich and pretend to be of noble birth. He even intends
to bring up his illegitimate son in his house, and pretends he is a
servant; and though he would have his wife and children know nothing
about the matter, he cannot forbear calling him his son every hour of
the day. He resolves to let his son marry the daughter of some man of
business, yet he now and then boasts of his birth and ancestors, and
that no Menalcas has ever made a misalliance. In short, he seems to be
absent minded, and to pay no attention to the conversation going on; he
thinks and speaks at the same time, but what he says is seldom about
what he thinks; so that there is hardly any coherence and sequence in
his talk; he often says “yes” when he should say “no,” and when he
says “no,” you must suppose he would say “yes.” When he answers you so
pertinently, his eyes are fixed on your countenance, but it does not
follow that he sees you; he looks neither at you nor at any one, nor at
anything in the world. All that you can draw from him, even when he is
most sociable and most attentive, are some such words as these: “Yes,
indeed; it is true; very well; really; indeed; I believe so; certainly;
O Heaven!” and some other monosyllables, even not always used on
the right occasions. He never is with those with whom he appears to
be; he calls his footman very seriously “Sir,” and his friend “La
Verdure;”[547] says “Your Reverence” to a prince of the royal blood,
and “Your Highness” to a Jesuit. When he is at mass, and the priest
sneezes, he cries out aloud, “God bless you!” He is in the company
of a magistrate of serious disposition, and venerable by his age and
dignity, who asks him whether a certain event happened in such and such
a way, and Menalcas replies, “Yes, miss.” As he came one day from the
country, his footmen plotted to rob him and succeeded; they jumped down
from behind his coach, presented the end of a torch to his breast, and
demanded his purse, which he gave up.[548] When he came home he told
his friends what had happened, and when they asked for details he said
they had better inquire of his servants, who also were present.
(8.) Impoliteness is not a vice of the mind, but the consequence of
several vices; of foolish vanity, of ignorance of oneʼs duties, of
idleness, of stupidity, of absence of mind, of contempt for others, and
of jealousy. Though it only shows itself outwardly, it is not the less
odious, because it is a fault which is always visible and manifest;
however, it gives more or less offence, according as the motives for
displaying it are more or less offensive.
(9.) If we say of an angry, captious, quarrelsome, melancholy, formal,
capricious person, that it is all owing to his temper, it is not to
find an excuse for him, whatever people may think, but an involuntary
acknowledgment that such great faults admit of no remedy.
What we call good temper is a thing too much neglected among men; they
ought to understand that they should not alone be good, but also appear
to be so, at least if they are inclined to be sociable and disposed to
friendly intercourse; in other words, if they would be men. We do not
require wicked men to be gentle and urbane; in these qualities they
are never wanting, for they employ them to ensnare the simple, and to
find a larger field for their operations; but we wish kind-hearted men
always to be tractable, accessible, and courteous; so that there should
no longer be any reason for saying that wicked men do harm and that
good men make others uncomfortable.
(10.) The generality of men proceed from anger to insults; others act
differently, for they first give offence and then grow angry; our
surprise at such behaviour always supersedes resentment.
(11.) Men do not sufficiently take advantage of every opportunity for
pleasing other people. When a person accepts a certain post, it seems
that he intends to acquire the power of obliging others without using
it; nothing is quicker and more readily given than a refusal, whilst
nothing is ever granted until after mature reflection.
(12.) Know exactly what you are to expect from men in general, and
from each of them in particular, and then mix with the people around
you.
(13.) If poverty is the mother of all crimes, lack of intelligence is
their father.
(14.) A knave can hardly be a very intelligent man; a clear and
far-seeing mind leads to regularity, honesty, and virtue; it is want
of sense and penetration which begets obstinacy in wickedness as well
as in duplicity; in vain we endeavour to correct such a man by satire;
it may describe him to others, but he himself will not know his own
picture; it is like scolding a deaf man. It would be well, please
gentlemen of sense and culture, and avenge everybody, if a rogue were
not so constituted as to be without any feeling whatever.
(15.) There are some vices for which we are indebted to none but
ourselves, which are innate in us, and are strengthened by habit; there
are others we contract which are foreign to us. Sometimes men are
naturally inclined to yield without much difficulty, to be urbane, and
to desire to please; but by the treatment they meet from those whom
they frequent and on whom they depend, they soon lose all moderation,
and even change their disposition; they grow melancholy and peevish to
a degree ere this unknown to them; their temper is completely changed,
and they are themselves astonished at their being rude and tetchy.
(16.) Some people ask why the whole bulk of mankind does not
constitute one nation, and does not like to speak the same language,
obey the same laws, and agree among themselves to adopt the same
customs and the same worship? For my part, observing how greatly
minds, tastes, and sentiments differ, I am astonished to see seven or
eight persons, living under the same roof and within the same walls,
constitute one family.[549]
(17.) There are some extraordinary fathers, who seem, during the whole
course of their lives, to be preparing reasons for their children for
being consoled at their deaths.[550]
(18.) Everything is strange in the dispositions, morals, and
manners of men: one person who during his whole lifetime has been
melancholy, passionate, avaricious, fawning, submissive, laborious,
and egotistical, was born lively, peaceable, indolent, ostentatious,
and with lofty feelings, abhorring anything base; want, circumstances,
and dire necessity have compelled him and caused such a great change.
Such a manʼs inmost feelings can really not be described, for too many
external things have altered, changed, and upset him, so that he is not
exactly what he thinks he is himself or what he appears to be.
(19.) Life is short and tedious, and is wholly spent in wishing; we
trust to find rest and enjoyment at some future time, often at an age
when our best blessings, youth and health, have already left us. When
at last that time has arrived, it surprises us in the midst of fresh
desires; we have got no farther when we are attacked by a fever which
kills us; if we had been cured, it would only have been to give us more
time for other desires.
(20.) A man requesting a favour from another, surrenders himself at
discretion to the personage from whom he expects it, but when he is
quite sure it will be granted, he temporises, parleys, and capitulates.
(21.) It is so usual for men not to be happy, and so essential for
every blessing to be acquired with infinite trouble, that what is
obtained easily is looked upon with suspicion. We can hardly understand
how anything which costs us so little can be greatly to our advantage,
or how by strictly honest means we can so easily obtain what we want;
we may think we deserve our success, but we ought very seldom to depend
on it.
(22.) A man who says he is not born happy may at least become so by the
happiness his friends and relatives enjoy, but envy deprives him even
of this last resource.
(23.) Whatever I may somewhere have said,[551] it is, perhaps, wrong to
be dejected. Men seem born to misfortune, pain, and poverty, and as few
escape this, and as every kind of calamity seems to befall them, they
ought to be prepared for every misfortune.
(24.) Men find it so very difficult to make business arrangements, they
are so very touchy where their smallest interests are concerned, they
are so bristling over with difficulties, so willing to deceive and so
unwilling to be deceived, they place so high a value on what belongs to
themselves, and are so apt to undervalue what belongs to others, that
I admit I cannot understand how and in what way marriages, contracts,
acquisitions, conventions, truces, treaties, and alliances are brought
about.
(25.) Among some people arrogance supplies the place of grandeur,
inhumanity of decision, and roguery of intelligence.
Knaves easily believe others as bad as themselves; there is no
deceiving them, neither do they long deceive.
I would rather at any time be considered a fool than a rogue.
We never deceive people to benefit them, for knavery is a compound of
wickedness and falsehood.
(26.) If there were not so many dupes in this world there would be
fewer of those men called shrewd or sharp, who are honoured for having
been artful enough in deceiving others during the whole course of their
lives, and are proud of having done so. Why should you expect Erophilus
not to presume on himself and his shrewdness, whose breach of faith,
bad actions, and roguery, instead of doing him any harm, have procured
him favours and rewards, even from those whom he has either never
served or to whom he has done an ill turn?
(27.) We hear nothing in the squares and in the streets of great
cities, and out of the mouths of the passers-by, but such words as
“writs, executions, interrogatories, bonds, and pleadings.” Is there
not the smallest equity more left in this world? Or is it, on the
contrary, full of people who coolly ask for what is not due to them, or
who distinctly refuse to pay what they owe?
The invention of legal documents to remind men of what they promised,
and to convince them that they did so, is a shame to humanity.
If you suppress passion, interest, and injustice, how quiet would
the greatest cities be! The necessities of life, and the means of
satisfying them, are the cause of nearly half the difficulties.
(28.) Nothing is of greater assistance to a man for bearing quietly the
wrongs done to him by relatives and friends than his reflections on
the vices of humanity; on the difficulty men have in being constant,
generous, and faithful, or on their loving anything better than their
own interests. He knows the extent of their power, and does not require
them to penetrate solid bodies, to fly in the air, or to give every
one his due; he may dislike mankind in general for having no greater
respect for virtue; but he finds excuses for individuals, and even
loves them from higher motives, whilst he does his best to require
himself as little indulgence as possible.
(29.) There are certain things which we most passionately desire,
and of which the mere thought carries us away and throws us into an
ecstasy: if we happen to obtain them, we are less sensible of them than
we thought we should be, and we enjoy them the less because we aspire
to get some of greater importance.
(30.) There exist some evils so terrible and some misfortunes so
horrible that we dare not think of them, whilst their very aspect
makes us shudder; but if they happen to fall on us, we find ourselves
stronger than we imagined; we grapple with our ill luck, and behave
better than we expected we should.
(31.) Sometimes a pretty house which we inherit, or a fine horse, or
a handsome dog which is given to us, or some hangings, or a clock
presented to us, will alleviate a great grief, and make us feel less
acutely a great loss.
(32.) Suppose men were to live for ever in this world, I do not think I
could discover what more they could do than they do at present.
(33.) If life be wretched, it is hard to bear it; if it be happy, it is
horrible to lose it; both come to the same thing.
(34.) There is nothing men are so anxious to keep, and yet are so
careless about, as life.
(35.) Irene is at great cost conveyed to Epidaurus;[552] she visits
Æsculapius in his temple, and consults him about all her ailings. She
complains first that she is weary and excessively fatigued, and the
god replies that the long journey she just made is the cause of this;
she says that she is not inclined to eat any supper, and the oracle
orders her to eat less dinner; she adds she cannot sleep at night, and
he prescribes her to lie a-bed by day; she complains of her corpulency,
and asks how it can be prevented; the oracle replies she should get up
before noon and now and then use her legs to walk; she declares that
wine disagrees with her, the oracle bids her drink water; she suffers
from indigestion, and he tells her she must diet herself. “My sight
begins to fail me,” says Irene. “Use spectacles,” says Æsculapius. “I
grow weak,” continues she; “I am not half so strong nor so healthy as
I was.” “You grow old,” says the god. “But how,” asks she, “can I get
rid of this disease?” “The shortest way to cure it, Irene, is to die,
as your mother and grandmother have done.” “Son of Apollo!” exclaimed
Irene, “is this all the advice you give me? Is this the skill praised
by all, and for which every one reveres you? What rare and secret
things did you tell me, and what remedies have you prescribed for me,
which I did not know before?” “Why did you not take these, then,” the
god replied, “without coming such a long distance to consult me, and
shortening your days by such a tedious journey?”[553]
(36.) Death happens but once, yet we feel it every moment of our
lives; it is worse to dread it than to suffer it.
(37.) Restlessness, fear, and dejection cannot delay death, but, on the
contrary, hasten it; I only question whether man, who is mortal, should
indulge in much laughing.
(38.) Whatever is certain in death is slightly alleviated by what is
not so infallible; the time when it shall happen is undefined, but it
is more or less connected with the infinite, and what we call eternity.
(39.) When we are sighing for the loss of our past blooming youth,
which will return no more, let us think that decrepitude will come,
when we shall regret the mature age we have reached and do not
sufficiently value.
(40.) The fear of old age disturbs us, yet we are not certain of
becoming old.
(41.) We hope to grow old, and yet we dread old age; or, in other
words, we are willing to live, and afraid to die.
(42.) A man had better yield to nature and fear death, than be engaged
in continual conflicts, provide himself with arguments and reflections,
and be always combating his own feelings in order not to fear it.
(43.) If some persons died, and others did not die, death would indeed
be a terrible affliction.
(44.) A long disease seems to be a halting-place between life and
death, that death itself may be a comfort to those who die and to those
who are left behind.
(45.) Humanly speaking, there is something good in death, namely, that
it puts an end to old age. That death which prevents decrepitude comes
more seasonably than that which ends it.
(46.) Men regret their life has been ill-spent, but this does not
always induce them to make a better use of the time they have yet to
live.
(47.) Life is a kind of sleep; old men have slept longer than others,
and only begin to wake again when they are to die. If, then, they
take a retrospect of the whole course of their lives, they frequently
discover neither virtues nor commendable actions to distinguish one
year from another; they confound one time of their life with another
time, and see nothing of sufficient note by which to measure how long
they have lived. They have dreamt in a confused, indistinct, and
incoherent way; but, nevertheless, they are aware, as all people who
wake up, that they have slept for a long while.
(48.) There are but three events which concern man: birth, life, and
death. They are unconscious of their birth, they suffer when they die,
and they neglect to live.
(49.) There is a time preceding the power of reasoning, when, like
animals, we live by instinct alone, and of which memory retains no
vestiges. There is a second period, when reason is developed, formed,
and might act, if it were not obscured and partly extinguished by vices
of the constitution, and a sequence of passions following one another
till the third and last age; reason then, being in its full strength,
should produce something; but it is chilled and impaired by years,
disease, and sorrow, and rendered useless by the machinery getting old
and out of gear; yet these three periods constitute the whole life of
man.
(50.) Children are overbearing, supercilious, passionate, envious,
inquisitive, egotistical, idle, fickle, timid, intemperate, liars, and
dissemblers; they laugh and weep easily, are excessive in their joys
and sorrows, and that about the most trifling objects; they bear no
pain, but like to inflict it on others; already they are men.
(51.) Children are neither for the past nor the future, but enjoy the
present, which we rarely do.
(52.) There seems to be but one character in childhood; at that age
morals and manners are nearly all the same, and it is only by paying
great attention that we can perceive any difference, which, however,
increases in the same proportion as reason does, whilst the passions
and vices gather strength as well; these alone make men so unlike each
other and so at variance with themselves.
(53.) Children already possess those faculties which are extinct in
old men, namely, imagination and memory, and which are very useful to
them in their little sports and amusements; by the help of these they
repeat what they have heard, imitate what they see done, exercise all
trades, either in busying themselves with many small labours or in
copying the movements and gestures of various workmen; are guests at
a sumptuous feast and entertained most luxuriously; are transported
to enchanted palaces and places; have splendid carriages and a large
retinue, though they are by themselves; are at the head of armies, give
battle, and enjoy the delights of obtaining a victory; converse with
kings and with the greatest princes; are themselves monarchs, have
subjects, possess treasures which they make of leaves or sand; and know
then, what they will ignore in afterlife, to be satisfied with their
fortune and to be masters of their own happiness.
(54.) There are no outward vices, nor bodily defects, which children do
not perceive; they observe them at once, and know how to describe them
in suitable terms, for more exact definitions could not be invented;
but when they become men, they, in their turn, contract the same
imperfections which they ridiculed.
The only anxiety children have is to find out the weaknesses of their
masters, and of the persons they have to obey; as soon as they have
taken once advantage of these, they get the upper hand, and obtain an
influence over these people which they never part with: for what once
deprived these persons of their superiority will always prevent them
recovering it.
(55.) Idleness, indolence, and laziness, vices so natural to children,
disappear as soon as they begin to play; they are then lively,
attentive, exact observers of rule and order, never pardon the least
slip, and several times begin again one and the same thing, in which
they failed; these are sure forebodings that they may, hereafter,
neglect their duties, but will forget nothing that can promote their
pleasures.
(56.) To children everything seems great; courtyards, gardens,
houses, furniture, men, and animals; to men the things of the world
appear so, and, I dare say, for the same reason, because they are
little.
(57.) Children begin among themselves with a democracy, where every
one is master; and what is very natural, it does not suit them for
any length of time, and then they adopt a monarchy. One of them
distinguishes himself from among the rest, either by greater vivacity,
strength, and comeliness, or by a more exact knowledge of their various
sports and of the little laws which regulate them; all the others
submit to him, and then an absolute government is established, but only
in matters of pleasure.
(58.) Who can doubt but that children conceive, judge, and reason
consistently? If only in small things consider they are children, and
without much experience; if they make use of an indifferent phraseology
it is less their fault than their parentsʼ and mastersʼ.
(59.) It destroys all confidence in the minds of children, and
alienates them as well, to punish them for faults they have not
committed, or even to be severe with them for trifling offences; they
know exactly, and better than any one, what they deserve, and seldom
deserve more than they dread; when they are chastised, they know if it
is justly or unjustly, whilst unjust punishments do them more harm than
not to be punished at all.
(60.) Man does not live long enough to be benefited by his faults; he
is committing them during the whole course of his life, and it is as
much as he can do, if, after many errors, he dies at last improved.
Nothing revives more a man than the knowledge that he has avoided doing
some foolish action.
(61.) Men are loath to particularise their faults; they conceal them
or blame some other person for them, and this gives the “spiritual
director”[554] an advantage over the father-confessor.
(62.) The faults of blockheads are sometimes so great and so difficult
to foresee, that wise men are puzzled by them; they are only of use to
those who commit them.
(63.) A party spirit betrays the greatest men to act as meanly as the
vulgar herd.
(64.) Vanity and propriety lead us to act in the same way and in the
same manner as we should do through inclination or a feeling of duty; a
man died lately in Paris of a fever which he got by sitting up at night
with his wife, for whom he did not care.[555]
(65.) All men in their hearts covet esteem, but are loath any one
should discover their anxiety to be esteemed; for men wish to be
considered virtuous; and men would no longer be thought virtuous, but
fond of esteem and praises, and vain, were they to derive any other
advantages from virtue than virtue itself. Men are very vain, and of
all things hate to be thought so.
(66.) A vain man finds it to his advantage to speak well or ill of
himself; a modest man never talks of himself.
We cannot better understand how ridiculous vanity is, and what a
disgraceful vice it is, than by observing how careful it is not to be
seen, and how often it hides itself underneath a semblance of modesty.
False modesty is the highest affectation of vanity; it never shows
a vain man in his true colours, but, on the contrary, enhances his
reputation, through the very virtue which is the opposite of the vice
constituting his real character; it is a falsehood. False glory is the
rock on which vanity splits; it induces a desire in men to be esteemed
for things they indeed possess, but which are frivolous and unworthy of
being noticed; it is an error.
(67.) Men speak of themselves in such a manner, that though they admit
they are guilty of some trifling faults, these very faults imply
noble talents or great qualities. Thus they complain of a bad memory,
though quite satisfied with the large amount of common sense and
sound judgment they possess; submit to being reproached for absence
of mind and musing, imagining them the concomitants of intelligence;
acknowledge being awkward and not able to do anything with their hands,
and comfort themselves for being without these small qualities by the
knowledge of possessing those of the understanding or those innate
feelings which every one allows them. In owning their indolence they
always intimate they are disinterested and entirely cured of ambition;
they are not ashamed of being slovenly, which shows they merely are
careless of little things, and seems to imply that they solely occupy
themselves with solid and important matters. A military man affects
to say that it was rashness or curiosity which carried him into the
trenches on a certain day, or in a dangerous spot, without being on
duty or ordered to do so; and he adds that the general reprimanded him
for it. Thus a man possessing brains or a solid genius and an innate
circumspection which other men endeavour in vain to acquire; a man who
has strengthened his mind by a long experience; to whom the number,
weight, variety, difficulty, and importance of affairs merely procure
some occupation without embarrassing him; who, by his extensive
knowledge and penetration masters all events; who does not consult all
the remarks ever written on the art of governments and politics, but
is, perhaps, one of those sublime minds created to sway others, and
from whose example those rules were first made; who is diverted, by
the great things he does, from those pleasant and agreeable things he
might read, and who, on the contrary, loses nothing by recapitulating
and turning over, as it were, his own life and actions: a man, so
constituted, may easily, and without compromising himself, admit that
he knows nothing of books and never reads.[556]
(68.) Men intend sometimes to conceal their imperfections, or attenuate
the opinion of others about them, by frankly acknowledging them. “I am
very ignorant,” says some man who knows nothing; “I am getting old,”
says a second above threescore; “I am far from rich,” says a third who
is wretchedly poor.
(69.) There is either no such thing as modesty, or it is mistaken for
something quite different, if we think it to be an inward sentiment,
debasing man in his own eyes, and which is a supernatural virtue we
call humility. Man naturally thinks of himself with pride and conceit,
and thinks thus of no one but himself; modesty only aims at modifying
this disposition so that no one shall suffer by it; it is an external
virtue, which commands our looks, gait, words, tone of voice, and
obliges a man ostensibly to act with others as if in reality he did not
despise them.
(70.) There are many people in this world who inwardly and habitually
draw a comparison between themselves and others, always give a
decision in favour of their own merits, and behave accordingly.