very large, swung above the heads of the passers-by, and the police
tried in vain to reduce their dimensions or to have them fixed against
the walls. Sometimes the government interfered in the municipal or
provincial elections without any opposition, and sometimes a diminution
of town councillors, or a promulgation of a stamp act for legal
documents, was violently resisted, and the rebellion had to be quenched
by an armed force, as, for example, in Guienne and Brittany from 1673
till 1675.
[489] Taxes are meant here.
[490] Adolphe de Belleforière, Chevalier de Soyecourt, a captain of the
gendarmes of the Dauphin, died two days after the battle of Fleurus
(July 1, 1690), of wounds received in this battle, in which his elder
brother, the Marquis de Soyecourt, was also killed. Both those young
men were the sons of Maximilien Antoine, Marquis de Soyecourt, _grand
veneur_, who died in 1679, and was the original of Dorante in Molièreʼs
comedy _Les Fâcheux_. The name of the Marquis is often mentioned in the
lampoons of the times for his reputation of valour in other fields than
those of Mars. La Bruyère was a friend of the family, whose name was
always pronounced Saucourt, and even sometimes written so.
[491] Dijon, the former capital of Burgundy, had been besieged in 1515
by thirty thousand men, who retired after the conclusion of a treaty
of peace which the king, Francis I., did not ratify. Corbie, a town
in Picardy, was taken when Burgundy and Picardy were invaded by the
Imperials in 1636.
[492] This refers to the League of Augsburg, a coalition of England,
Germany, Spain, Holland, Sweden, and Savoy against Louis XIV., with
whom they were at war when this paragraph was published in 1691.
[493] Olivier le Daim, first the barber of Louis XI. (1423-1483),
became his favourite, but was hanged in 1484, after that kingʼs death.
Jacques Cœur, a rich merchant, rendered great services to Charles
VII. (1403-1461), became his treasurer, and was accused of peculation;
thrown into prison, he escaped, and died in exile in 1461. The
characters of both these men were not very well known when La Bruyère
wrote.
[494] The Imperial cavalry had a well-deserved reputation for cruelty
and rapaciousness.
[495] Another allusion to the battle of Fleurus, won by the Marshal de
Luxembourg about a year before this paragraph was published (1691).
[496] This refers to Mons, besieged by Vauban, and taken on the 9th of
April 1691.
[497] In the month of July 1690, a rumour spread in Paris that William
III. was dead, upon which many people publicly rejoiced, until the news
came that the report was false. The “Keys” of the old English versions
name for the first and second prince “the Duke of Savoy and the king of
Spain.”
[498] The original has _halles et fauxbourgs_, “markets and suburbs.”
[499] The letters T. K. L. stand for Tækely, a Hungarian nobleman who
broke out in open rebellion against the Emperor of Austria, Leopold I.
(1640-1705), and gained a victory over the Imperial troops on the 21st
of August 1690.
[500] At that time the Sultan was Soliman II., who only reigned from
1687 until 1691.
[501] The Grand Vizier Kara-Mustapha laid siege to Vienna in 1683.
[502] A league formed in the Hague against France was called “The
Triple Alliance,” and was entered upon in 1668 between England,
Holland, and Sweden. Sometimes the treaty formed in 1717 between George
I., the Regent of France, and the United Provinces is also called
“Triple Alliance.”
[503] Cerberus, a dog with three heads, which keeps guard in the
infernal regions.
[504] According to the commentators, two insignificant newsmongers
are supposed to be portrayed in Demophilus and Basilides, an Abbé de
Sainte-Hélène and a certain du Moulinet, whom some think might have
been an abbé or a magistrate, because instead of clothes he speaks of
his _robe_ or gown.
[505] Proteus, in the mythology, is a sea-god residing in the
Carpathian Sea, who could change his form at will.
[506] This paragraph is the longest La Bruyère has written; it covers
between eight and nine pages in the original edition.
[507] An indirect homage to the assumed gravity of Louis XIV.
[508] Most probably this is a discreet allusion to Madame de Maintenon,
whom the king had married in 1684, and in whose room generally a
Council of State was held.
[509] _Bas de saye_, in the original, is a plaited petticoat worn in
Louis XIV.ʼs time by actors in classical tragedies; it owes its name to
the Latin _sagum_, a military cloak of the ancient Gauls. _Brodequins_
was the name given to the buskins of comic actors; the tragic actors
strutted in their _cothurnes_.
[510] This paragraph only appeared for the first time in the fourth
edition of the “Characters,” published in 1689, and disappeared, never
to be printed again, two years afterwards. It was probably suppressed
for fear of offending either Louis XIV., who had allowed his former
favourites, Bussy-Rabutin and Lauzun, to reappear at court (see page
18, note 5, and page 218, note 2), or of hurting the feelings of these
two noblemen, above all of Bussy-Rabutin, who, after being admitted to
the presence of the King, twice left a court where he felt he was not
wanted, and could not obtain any command in the army.
[511] This refers to Cardinal Georges dʼAmboise (1460-1510), Prime
Minister of Louis XII.
[512] Cardinal Richelieu (1585-1642) is meant.
[513] In politics, La Bruyère was in advance of his age, but not in
religious questions. He shared the idea of “the extirpation of heresy,”
not alone with almost all the prelates of his time, but with some of
the most eminent men in science, art, and literature, who all applauded
the revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685), and advocated the notion
of one religion for the whole State.
[514] This is an allusion to the reduction of the interest on the
French debt, and the calling in and recoining of certain monies, a
measure which was often taken by the French kings, and even by Louis
XIV., who, however, made no profit by it. See also page 152, note 2.
[515] Colbert has been wrongly accused of having made money by those
means; an accusation which was also brought against Mazarin, Fouquet,
and the _fermiers généraux_, on far better grounds.
[516] Our author had to conciliate Louis XIV. at a time when it was
supposed the publication of the “Characters” might make him many
enemies. Hence the direct and indirect flatteries he bestows on the
king, who prided himself on his complete mastery of details, for
which he was praised by some and blamed by others; and amongst these
latter must be reckoned Fénelon, who in his _Telemachus_ (Book xvi.)
criticises Louis XIV. in the character of Idomeneus. That the king
had a talent for mastering details cannot be doubted, and this is
even admitted by the late John Richard Green, in his “Short History
of the English People,” chap. ix. sect. vii., whose opinion of Louis
XIV. I transcribe here, as a corrective of the flatteries scattered
on this royal despot by La Bruyère: “Louis the Fourteenth, bigoted,
narrow-minded, commonplace as he was, without personal honour or
personal courage, without gratitude and without pity, insane in his
pride, insatiable in his selfishness, had still many of the qualities
of a great ruler; industry, patience, quickness of resolve, firmness of
purpose, a capacity for discerning greatness and using it, an immense
self-belief and self-confidence, and a temper utterly destitute indeed
of real greatness, but with a dramatic turn for seeming to be great.”
[517] An allusion to an operation for fistula performed on Louis XIV.
in 1686.
[518] Voltaire, in his _Siècle de Louis XIV._, says: “From 1663 until
1672 every year some new manufactory was established. The fine cloths
formerly imported from England and Holland were manufactured at
Abbeville.... The cloth manufactories of Sedan, which had almost gone
to wreck and ruin, were re-established.” See also page 48, note 3.
[519] Louis XII. was called by the States-General assembled at Tours
(1506) the “father of his people.”
[520] Such was, however, the opinion of Louis XIV. himself, who states
in his _Mémoires_: “Kings are absolute masters, and naturally dispose
fully and entirely of all the property possessed by the clergy and
laity.”
[521] This is another flattery intended for Louis XIV., who thought
that his ministers got their talents “by virtue of their office.” The
word _subalternes_, “subordinates,” seems also out of place applied to
such men as Colbert and Louvois.
[522] Louis XIV. was certainly not displeased when his presence awed
those who were presented to him.
[523] All those excellent qualities, which La Bruyère thinks are
necessary to a sovereign, were those generally attributed to Louis
XIV., and which Saint-Simon also ascribes to him in his _Mémoires_.
[524] Another hit at the revocation of the Edict of Nantes.
[525] A reference to the royal edicts against duelling.
[526] Louis XIV., from 1667 to 1685, promulgated several laws reforming
abuses in civil and criminal jurisprudence, and abolishing certain
restrictions on trade, commerce, etc.
[527] To say that Louis XIV. increased by his example the influence
of religion and virtue, can only apply to him after his marriage with
Madame de Maintenon. See page 258, note 3.
[528] An allusion to the declaration of the liberties of the Gallican
Church, published in 1682, and said to be written by Bossuet.
[529] The commentators of La Bruyère do not explain why the subsidies
to be granted to the king were lighter in the provinces. Can it be that
in certain provinces, called _pays dʼétat_, the subsidies voted by the
provincial states were smaller than those voted by the authorities
appointed by the king in those provinces not belonging to the _pays
dʼétat_, and called _pays dʼélections_?
[530] This allusion must greatly have pleased Louis XIV., who thought
himself great as a strategist and as a politician.
[531] Although this paragraph is only half the size of paragraph 12,
page 253, there is only one full stop in it in the original, and that
is at the end.
[532] The original has _avec_, which, in the seventeenth century, often
was used for “in spite of.”
[533] The author adds in a note: “This is not so much a portrait of one
individual, as a collection of anecdotes of absent-minded persons. If
they please, there cannot be too large a number of them, for as tastes
differ, my readers can pick and choose.” The chief traits of Menalcas
are based on stories related by the Count de Brancas, who died eleven
years before the above paragraph first saw the light (1691); others are
said to have happened to the Prince de la Roche-sur-Yon, afterwards
Prince de Conti (1664-1709), and to a certain Abbé de Mauroy, chaplain
to Mademoiselle de Montpensier. Eustace Budgell (1685-1736) depicts in
No. 77 of the “Spectator” “an absent man,” and also speaks of Monsieur
Bruyère, who “has given us the character of an absent man with a great
deal of humour;” and then prints “the heads” of Menalcasʼ portrait.
According to Wattʼs _Bibliotheca Britannica_, Budgell was the author of
a translation of La Bruyèreʼs “Characters,” published 1699 and 1702;
but in the edition of 1702 there is on the title-page, “made English by
several hands.”
[534] Many of the streets in Paris were so narrow when our author
wrote, that two people could hardly pass abreast; it was, therefore,
the fashion to “give the wall,” as it was called, to persons of a
superior rank.
[535] See page 243, note.
[536] The wigs were already worn very long, and completely concealed
the ears.
[537] See page 164, note 1.
[538] There was usually only one or two arm-chairs in a reception-room,
reserved for the master or mistress of the house, or for both.
[539] It was reported that Brancas, _chevalier dʼhonneur_ of the
queen-mother, Anne of Austria (1602-1666), behaved in almost a similar
manner to his royal mistress.
[540] Blotting-paper was not invented when our author wrote; even now
it is not unusual abroad to find the ink of letters dried with sand,
either plain or coloured.
[541] _Balais_ in French, a kind of pale-coloured ruby, so called,
according to Littréʼs _Dictionnaire_, from Balakschan or Balaschan, not
far from Samarcand.
[542] The king used to hunt at Fontainebleau almost every day in
October. See also page 174, note 4.
[543] There existed a great deal of coarseness at the court of Louis
XIV. underneath a semblance of extreme polish and refinement, and some
of the stories told by Saint-Simon of the habits and customs of the
king himself would not bear repeating at the present time, and even be
considered disgraceful by the lowest classes of society. As an example
of this general coarseness, it will, no doubt, have been observed that
it was the usual habit of decent people to expectorate on the floor
(see page 277, line 12), as well as to throw there the wine they did
not wish to drink; for Menalcas is only laughed at for his absence of
mind, and not for his bad habits. See also in the chapter “Of the Gifts
of Fortune,” § 83, the character of Phædo, page 161, and in the chapter
“Of Society, etc.,” the character of Troïlus, page 106, § 13.
[544] See page 65, note 1.
[545] In the Convent of the Carthusians, then near the Luxembourg, were
to be found the twenty-two celebrated pictures of Eustache Lesueur
(1616-1655), representing the history of Saint Bruno, founder of that
order, who died in 1101. The greater part of these pictures is now in
the Louvre.
[546] This picture represents the burial of an eloquent and learned
canon, who, whilst being carried to the tomb, rose in his coffin,
exclaimed that he was damned, and fell back again.
[547] See page 138, note 3.
[548] Tallemant des Réaux, in his _Historiettes_, tells a more probable
story of de Brancas, how one day, being on horseback and stopped by
footpads, he mistook them for footmen, and ordered them to let go his
horse, and how he did not find out his mistake till they clapt a pistol
to his breast.
[549] Compare what our author says in the above paragraph with the
remarks he makes in § 21, page 260, and § 34, page 266.
[550] One of these fathers appears to have been the Duke de Gesvres
(1620-1704), who spent all his money on purpose not to leave any to his
children.
[551] See the chapter “Of Society,” § 63.
[552] Epidaurus, a city of Peloponnesus, where Æsculapius, the god of
medicine and a son of Apollo, was worshipped.
[553] This paragraph appeared for the first time in the eighth edition
of the “Characters,” published in 1694, three years after the former
favourite of Louis XIV., Madame de Montespan, had left the court,
and about ten years after he had married Madame de Maintenon. Madame
de Montespan had then become an imaginary invalid, and made frequent
journeys to take the waters at different places, and chiefly to
Bourbon-lʼArchambaud, where, it is said, a doctor made her a similar
answer as recorded above. It is doubtful whether La Bruyère would have
spoken of her corpulency, failing sight, and her growing old if Madame
de Montespan had still remained a favourite; his former pupil, the Duke
de Bourbon, had married, in 1685, Mademoiselle de Nantes, one of her
daughters by Louis XIV.
[554] See page 68, note 3.
[555] This refers to the Prince de Conti (1661-1685), a cousin of
the Duke de Bourbon, the pupil of our author. When the Princeʼs
wife, formerly Mademoiselle de Blois, a daughter of Louis XIV. and
Mademoiselle de la Vallière, was attacked by the small-pox, he nursed
her so well that she recovered, but he died.
[556] According to the “Keys,” this paragraph alludes to Louvois. See
page 132, note, and page 242, note 2.
[557] The original has “aux âmes bien nées,” a very favourite
expression of the French authors of the seventeenth century; thus P.
Corneille, amongst others, says in the _Cid_:
“Pour des âmes bien nées,
La valeur nʼattend point le nombre des années.”
[558] Gambling was highly valued at court (see page 154, § 71); the
Marquis de Dangeau (see page 156, note 2) owed partly his position
to his successes at the gambling-table; and the mathematician
Sauveur, a member of the Academy of Sciences, used to give scientific
demonstrations before the king and the court of the various
combinations of the fashionable games.
[559] The Marshal de la Feuillade is supposed to be meant. Besides the
monument he erected to Louis XIV. (see page 227, note 2), there are
many other proofs of his eccentricity, as, for example, his going with
two hundred volunteers to wrest Candia from the Turks, and his voyage
to Spain to challenge a certain M. de Saint-Aunay, who was accused of
having calumniated Louis XIV.
[560] The commentators speak of a certain captain of the guard,
Boisselot, and of an Irish officer, Macarthy, one of the generals of
James II.; but there would have been nothing astonishing in their
“mixing with the people.” It may be that this paragraph points at the
Duke of Orléans, a brother-of Louis XIV., who had shown some valour at
the battle of Cassel in 1677, but who was never more employed, and was
not very “judicious.”
[561] All the “Keys” say the Archbishop of Paris, M. de Harlay, was
meant. See also page 238, note 4.
[562] The Cardinal de Bouillon (1644-1715) is supposed to be meant by
this remark; he was, however, according to Saint-Simon, always very
dissolute in his manners. See page 210, note 1.
[563] Some “Keys” name here wrongly Boutillier de Rancé, the founder of
the Trappists, whilst others speak of Le Camus, bishop of Grenoble (see
page 47, note 4). La Bruyèreʼs allusion is far more general.
[564] All the “Keys” say this refers to the _Dictionnaire de
lʼAcadémie_, but its first edition only appeared in 1694, and this
paragraph was published four years before. See page 9, note 2. It
alludes probably to those encyclopedias called _Traités sur toutes les
sciences, très abrégés à lʼusage de la noblesse_, or to some collection
of anecdotes, a kind of _omnium gatherum_, entitled _Bibliothèque des
gens de cour_; perhaps it might also apply to some verses then in
vogue, and called _vers abécédaires_, of which the first line began
with an “a,” the second with a “b,” and so on. Those “sports of wit,”
which our author calls by the name of _jeux dʼesprit_, witticisms, also
existed later in England, _e.g._, “The Foundling Hospital for Wit.”
[565] Several persons have been named whose duty it was to distribute
charity to the poor, but it has been rightly observed that the person
alluded to in this paragraph “makes a display of it,” and therefore it
cannot have been his duty.
[566] In French, _sœurs grises_, grey sisters, because the Sisters
of Charity wore grey dresses. Bands were then worn by every one, but
clergymenʼs bands were plain and called _petits collets_, the name our
author gives them.
[567] Holders of certain legal or financial offices had the right of
reversion or next nomination whilst they were alive, and not seldom
delayed exercising it until they were very old; but unless they did so
within forty days of their death, and had paid an annual tax called _le
droit de paulette_, so called after Charles Paulet, a minister of Henri
IV. who established it in 1604, and which tax varied from a sixtieth to
a fourth of the value of the office, the king had a right to make fresh
appointments. See also page 192, note 1.
[568] Jean François, Marquis dʼHautefort, who was, it is said, the
original of Harpagon in Molièreʼs _Avare_, seems to be partly portrayed
in this paragraph.
[569] Some of the commentators pretend that the “courtier of a ripe old
age” was the Marshal Nicolas de Villeroy, the former governor of Louis
XIV., who died in 1685, and whose son, the Duke, is mentioned on page
54, note 3, and on page 204, note 1.
[570] It is said that by Philip our author intended to portray the
Marquis de Sablé, a son of the finance minister Servien, who was the
proprietor of Meudon, sold it to Louvois (see the chapter “Of the
Court,” page 204, note 2), and seems to have been chiefly known by his
love for eating and drinking, his eccentricities and his debauchery.
[571] Louis Roger Danse, a canon of the _Sainte-Chapelle_, and a noted
_gourmand_, is supposed to have sat for Gnathon, as well as for the
stout Canon Evrard in Boileauʼs _Lutrin_.
[572] The Count dʼOlonne, a well-known lover of good cheer, who died in
1690, is said to have been limned as Clito; others think it was another
_gourmet_, M. de Bruslard, Count de Broussain, who lived until 1693.
[573] See page 179, note 1.
[574] The _potages_, in La Bruyèreʼs time, different from what is now
understood by them, seem to have been a sort of stew.
[575] These were either _entremets_ or side-dishes not larger than
could be contained in a plate or _assiette_.
[576] _Trivial_ in French. See page 136, note 1.
[577] See page 181, note 1.
[578] This asking for an injunction was called _sʼopposer au sceau_,
literally “to oppose oneʼs self to the seal.”
[579] See page 130, note, and page 192, note.
[580] _Committimus_, in the original.
[581] The chairman is the _syndic de direction_.
[582] _Vieil meuble de ruelle._ _Vieil_ was, in La Bruyèreʼs time,
often used instead of _vieux_, even before a consonant. For _ruelle_,
see page 65, note 1.
[583] The original speaks of the “Marais” (see page 172, note 1), and
of the “Grand Faubourg,” probably the “Faubourg Saint-Germain.”
[584] See page 72, note 2.
[585] The “Keys” name for Antagoras two eccentric noblemen of the time
now wholly unknown, a Count de Montluc and a Marquis de Fourille.
[586] In Louis XIV.ʼs time France was divided into thirty-three
provinces, and as communications were difficult, the inferior noblemen
were what our author describes them to be, and had no other amusements
but duelling, dining, and drinking.
[587] The original has _fourrures et mortiers_; the gowns of bachelors,
licentiates, and doctors of the various faculties were bordered and
even sometimes lined with fur. For _mortier_ see page 168, note 3.
[588] In French _les masses dʼun chancelier_, for the mace was always
carried before the Chancellor of France.
[589] La Bruyère adds in a note: “We can only mean that philosophy
which is depending on the Christian religion.”
[590] An allusion to the theory of Descartes (see page 151, note 2),
that beasts were only automatons without any consciousness of their
acts.
[591] In French “Alain,” the name of a rustic servant in Molièreʼs
_École des Femmes_.
[592] All the names given by our author have already been mentioned
before, except that of Claude de Lingendes (1595-1660), one of the
best preachers among the Jesuits, and whose reputation must have been
great to quote him with such illustrious dead; and whilst Bossuet,
Bourdaloue, and Fénelon were still alive.
[593] An allusion to the entertainments given by Louis XIV.
[594] Such places were, in our authorʼs time, Versailles,
Fontainebleau, Marly.
[595] This seems to hit at the courtiers of Louis XIV., who pretended
to become devout in order to please the monarch and Madame de Maintenon.
[596] La Bruyère is not in advance of his times in what regards
corporal punishment: Montaigne was.
[597] For “caps” and “gowns” the original has _mortier_ and _fourrures_
(see page 168, note 3, and page 318, note 2); for _fasces_ see page
139, note 5
[598] Some commentators think that the Marshal de Villeroy (see page
54, note 3) is meant by Timon, but this cannot be, as the Marshal was
rather ostentatious, and not at all a misanthrope. Perhaps our author
thought of giving another version of Molièreʼs _Alceste_, as later on
he gives another of _Tartuffe_, in his portrait of Onuphre, in the
chapter “Of Fashion,” page 395, § 24.
[599] The original has _entêtement_, “infatuation,” “obstinacy,”
which sometimes meant “enthusiasm,” as in Molièreʼs _Femmes
Savantes_, act iii. scene 2, “Jʼaime la poésie avec entêtement.”
[600] Our author adds in a note, “a pretended pious person.”
[601] The original has _pétitoire_ et _possessoire_, printed in italics.
[602] M. Terentius Varro (116-26 B.C.) was considered one of the most
learned among the Romans. His principal works are _De re rustica_ and
_De Lingua latina_.