The revolutions of society are almost as sure if not as regular as
those of the planets. The inventions of a generation weary after
a while, but they are very likely to be revived if they have once
ministered successfully to pleasure or ambition. The famous coteries
in which learning was inter-blended with fashion in the golden age
of French intelligence, are being revived under the new Republic,
and women are again quietly playing with institutions and liberties,
perhaps as dangerously as when Mesdames de Tencin, Pompadour,
Geoffrin, Deffant, Poplinière and L'Espinasse assembled the destinies
nightly in their drawing rooms.
The tendency to such associations is displayed also in most of our
own cities. The Town and Country Club of Boston, the Wistar Parties
in Philadelphia, the Literary Club in Charleston, the recent
_converzaziones_ at the houses of President Charles King of Columbia
College, and others, and the well-known Saturday Evenings at Miss
Lynch's, where literature and art and general speculation have for
some seasons had a common center, all illustrate the disposition of an
active and cultivated society, not engrossed by special or spasmodic
excitements, to cluster by rules of feeling and capacity: and clusters
of passion and mind are rarely for a long period inert. When they
become common they are apt to assume the direction of private custom
and public opinion and affairs.
In view of these things, we are sure that the readers of the
_International_ will be interested in the following translation of
Professor Schlosser's brilliant survey of those _bureaux d'esprit_
which so much distinguished society and influenced its history
in Europe, from the beginning to the middle of the last century.
Schlosser is a Privy Councillor and Professor of History in the
University of Heidelberg. He is chiefly known in continental Europe
by his great work, the History of the Eighteenth Century, and of
the Nineteenth till the overthrow of the French Empire, a work which
derives its value not merely from the profound and minute acquaintance
of the author with the subject, from the new views which are presented
and the hitherto unexamined sources from which much has been derived,
but from his well-known independence of character--from the general
conclusions which he draws from the comparative views of the
resources, conduct, manners, institutions and literature of the great
European nations, during a period unparalleled in the history of
the world for the development of the physical and mental powers of
mankind, for the greatness of the events which occurred, for the
progress of knowledge, for the cultivation of the arts and sciences,
for all that contributes to the greatness and prosperity of nations.
* * * * *
If we venture to bring the Parisian evening, dinner and supper parties
into connection with the general history of Europe, and the ladies
also at whose houses these parties took place, we can neither be
blamed for scrupulous severity, nor for paradoxical frivolity. It
belongs to the character of the eighteenth century, that the historian
who wishes to bring the true springs of conduct and sources of action
to light, must condescend even so far. It must also be borne in mind,
when the clever women and societies of Paris are spoken of, that
the demands of the age and progressive improvement and culture were
altogether unattended to at the court of Louis XV., as well before as
after the death of Cardinal Fleury, and that all which was neglected
at Versailles was cultivated in Paris. The court and the city had been
hitherto united in their wants and in their judgment; the court ruled
education, fashion and the general tone, as it ruled the state; now,
however, they completely separated. Afterward the voice of the city
was raised in opposition, and the voice of this opposition became the
organ of the age and of the country; but it was felt and recognized
in Versailles only when it was too late. How easy it would have
been then, as Marmontel had shown very clearly in his memoirs, to
fetter Voltaire, who was offensive to the people, and how important
this would have been for the state, will appear in the following
paragraphs, in which we shall show that even the Parisian theatre,
whose boards were regarded as a model by all Europe, freed itself
from the influence of the court, became dependent on the tone-giving
circles of Paris, and assumed a decidedly democratic direction.
As early as the time of Louis XIV., the court had separated itself
from the learned men of the age; and at the end of the seventeenth
century the houses and societies could be historically pointed out,
in which judgments were pronounced upon questions of literature in
the same manner as the pit became the tribunal to which plays and
play-actors must appeal; we shall not, however, go back so far, but
keep the later times always in our view. In those associations in
which the Abbé de Chaulieu and other friends of Vendome and Conti led
the conversation, literature was brought wholly under the dominion of
audacious pretension and immorality, in the time of the Regency and
during the minority of Louis XV. In reference to the leaders there
needs no proof. What could a Philip of Orleans or his Dubois take
under his protection, except what corresponded with his ideas and mode
of life?
The time of the minority of Louis XV. and that of the administration
of Cardinal Fleury was for several reasons highly favorable to the
formation of private societies, which entertained themselves with
wit and satire, and carried on a quiet but continual contest with the
persons and systems which were protected by the government and the
clergy. Fleury regarded everything as sinful which had the appearance
of worldly knowledge, or partook of the character of jests, novels,
or plays; Louis, as he grew up, showed himself quite indifferent to
everything which had no connection with religious ceremonies, hunting,
or handsome women. Fleury spoke and wrote in that ecclesiastical
phraseology which was laughed at in the world: he favored the clergy,
school learning, the tone of the times of Louis XIV.; but the spirit
of the age demanded something different from this. All that was
regarded with disfavor by Fleury assembled around those celebrated
men, who held their reunions in Paris, and this court soon became more
important to the vain than the royal one itself, and it was proved by
experience that reputation and glory might be gained without the
aid or protection of the court at Versailles. This no one could have
previously believed, but the public soon learnt to do homage to the
tone-giving scholars, to the ladies and gentlemen who fostered them,
as it had formerly paid its homage to the ministers of the court.
This gave to the ladies, who collected around them the celebrated men
of the time (for reputation was much more the question than merit,)
and who protected and entertained them, a degree of weight in the
political and literary world, which made them as important in
the eighteenth century as Richelieu and Colbert had been in the
seventeenth.
The queen, on her part, might have been able to exercise a beneficial
influence, however little power she had in other respects, when
compared with the mistresses of the king; but the daughter of
Stanislaus Leckzinski was a gentle, admirable woman, although somewhat
narrow-minded, and wholly given up to irrational devotional exercises
and bigotry. Like her father, she was altogether in the hands of the
Jesuits, blindly and unconditionally their servant; such an attachment
to a religious order, and such blind devotedness as hers would be
quite incredible, if we did not possess her own and her father's
autograph letters, as proofs of the fact. We shall present our readers
with some extracts from these letters, which are preserved in the
archives of the French empire, when we come to speak of the abolition
of the order of Jesuits.
As to the enlightened mistresses who had much more power and influence
than the queen, Pompadour seemed, as we learn from Marmontel, desirous
of participating in the literature of the age and of doing something
for its promotion, when she saw how important writers and the
influence of the press had become; but partly because both she and
the king were altogether destitute of any sense for the beautiful
in literature or art, and partly because the better portion of the
learned men at the time neither could nor would be pleased with what
a Bernis, Düclos and Marmontel were disposed to be, who undoubtedly
received some marks of favor from her. Voltaire is therefore quite
right when he lays upon the court the blame of allowing the influence
which literature then exercised upon the people, to be withdrawn
altogether from king and his ministers, and to be transferred to the
hands of the Parisian ladies and farmers-general, &c. Voltaire, in his
well-known verses,[1] admits, with great openness and simplicity, that
he attached much importance to the applause of a court, although it
neither possessed judgment nor feeling for the merits of a writer,
nor for poetical beauties; and he complains at the same time that this
court had neither duly estimated his tragedies nor his epic poems. It
is characteristic both of the court and of Voltaire that he eagerly
pressed himself forward for admission to its favor, and sought to
attract attention by a work which be himself called a piece of trash,
and that the court extended its approbation and applause to this
miserable and altogether inappropriate piece, ('La Princesse de
Navarre,') which he composed on the occasion of the Dauphin's
marriage with the Infanta of Spain, whilst it entirely neglected his
masterpieces.
The Paris societies had got full possession of the field of
literature, and erected their tribunals before the middle of the
century, whilst at Versailles nothing was spoken or thought of except
amusements and hunting, Jesuits and processions, and the grossest
sensuality prevailed. The members of the Parisian societies were not a
whit more moral or decent in their behavior than those about the court
at Versailles, but they carried on open war against hypocrisy, and all
that was praised and approved of by the court.
We shall now proceed to mention three or four of the most
distinguished of those societies, which have obtained an historical
importance, not merely for the French literature and mental and moral
culture of the eighteenth century, but for Europe in general, without
however restraining ourselves precisely within the limits of the half
century. The minute accounts which Grimm has given, for the most part
affect only the later periods; we turn our attention therefore the
rather to what the weak, vain, talkative Marmontel has related to us
on the subject in his 'Autobiography,' because Rousseau was by far
too one-sided in his notices, and drew public attention to the most
demoralized and degraded members of the circle only.
The first lady who must be mentioned, is Madame de Tencin. She
belonged to the period within which we must confine ourselves, and she
gained for herself such a name, not only in Paris, but in all Europe,
that she was almost regarded as the creator of that new literature
which stood in direct and bold opposition to the prevailing taste,
inasmuch as she received at her house, entertained and cherished,
those who were really its originators and supporters. This lady could
not boast of the morality of her early years, nor of her respect even
for common propriety. She is not only notorious for having exposed,
when a child, the celebrated D'Alembert, who was her natural son, and
for regarding with indifference his being brought up by the wife of a
common glazier as her own son; but stories still worse than even these
are told of her. She enriched herself, as many others did, in the time
of Law's scheme, by no very creditable means; and fell under such a
serious suspicion of having been privy to the death of one of those
who had carried on an intrigue with her, that she was imprisoned
and involved in a criminal prosecution, from which she escaped, not
through her own innocence, but by means of the powerful influence of
her distinguished relations and friends.
All this did not prevent Pope Benedict XIV., who, as Cardinal
Lambertini, had been often at her house, as a member of the society of
men of talents who met there, from carrying on a continual intercourse
with her by letter; he also sent her his picture as a testimony of
kind remembrance. This lady succeeded in procuring for her brother the
dignity of a cardinal, and through him had great weight with Fleury,
with the court, and with the city in general; she is also known as
an authoress. As we are not writing a history of literature properly
speaking, we pass by her novels in silence, with this remark only,
that people are accustomed to place the 'Comte de Comminges,' written
by Madame de Tencin, on the same footing with the 'Princess de Clêve,'
by Madame de Lafayette.
The society in the house of Madame de Tencin consisted of well-known
men of learning, and some younger men of distinguished name and
family; she united, in later years, a certain amiability with her
care for the entertainment and recreation of those whom she had once
received into her house. This society, after the death of De Tencin,
assembled in the house of Geoffrin. It appears, however, that Madame
de Tencin, as well as the whole fashionable world to which she
belonged, could never altogether disavow their contempt for science,
if indeed it be true, that she was accustomed to call her society
by the indecent by-name of her ménagerie. Fontenelle, Montesquieu,
Mairan, Helvetius who was then quite young and present rather as a
hearer than a speaker, Marivaux and Astruc, formed the nucleus of this
clever society and led the conversation. Marmontel, who was not well
suited to this society, in which more real knowledge and a deeper
train of thought was called for than he possessed, informs us what
the tone of this society was, and speaks of their hunting after lively
conceits and brilliant flashes of wit, in a somewhat contemptuous
manner. Marmontel, however, himself admits, that he was only once in
the society, and that in order to read his 'Aristomenes,' and that
greater simplicity and good humor prevailed there than in the house of
Madame Geoffrin, in which he was properly at home.
Madame de Tencin's influence upon the new literature of the opposition
party, or rather upon the spirit of the age, may be best judged of
from the fact, that she largely contributed to the first preparation
and favorable reception of Montesquieu's "Spirit of Laws." It is
certain, at least, that she bought a large number of copies and
distributed them amongst her friends. Madame Geoffrin went further;
the society which had previously met at Madame de Tencin's, no sooner
held their reunions in her house, than she drew together the whole
literary and the fashionable world, foreign ministers, noblemen and
princes who were on their travels, etc. Marmontel also says, that the
aged Madame de Tencin had guessed quite correctly the intentions of
Madame Geoffrin, when she said, that she merely came to her house so
often in order to see what part of her inventory she could afterward
make useful.
Madame Geoffrin became celebrated all over Europe, merely by devoting
a portion of her income and of her time to the reception of clever
society. She had neither the knowledge, the mind, nor the humility of
Madame de Tencin, which the latter at least affected toward the close
of her life; she was cold, egotistical, calculating, and brought
into her circle nothing more than order, tact and female delicacy.
Geoffrin also assumed the tone of high life, which always treats men
of learning, poets and artists, as if they were mantua-makers or
hair-dressers; and which must ever value social tact and the tone
which is only to be acquired in good society, higher than all studies
and arts upon which any one possessed of these properties is in a
condition to pass judgment without having spent any time in their
investigation. Marmontel is therefore honest enough to admit that he
and his friends, as well as Madame Geoffrin herself, were accustomed
to make a full parade when foreign princes, ministers, and celebrated
men or women dined at the house. On such occasions especially, Madame
Geoffrin displayed all the charms of her mind, and called to us, "now
let us be agreeable."
Geoffrin's house was the first school of _bon ton_ in Europe:
Stanislaus Poniatowsky, even after he became King of Poland, addressed
her by the tender name of mother, invited her to Warsaw, and received
her as a personage of high distinction. All the German courts
which followed the fashion, paid correspondents in order to be made
acquainted with the trifles which occupied that circle. Catherine II.
had no sooner mounted the throne than she began to pay a commissioner
at this literary court, and even Maria Theresa distinguished Madame
Geoffrin in a remarkable manner, on her return from Poland. Besides,
we are made acquainted by Marmontel, who ranked his hostess among the
gods of this earth, with the anxiety and cautiousness of this lady of
the world, who afterward broke altogether with the chiefs of the new
literature, and most humbly did homage to the old faith, because she
had never wholly forsaken her old prejudices.
The able writers of the time were used by Geoffrin only as means to
promote her objects, to gain a reputation for splendor, and to glorify
France. The King of Prussia sought her society, in order to refresh
and cheer his mind when he was worn out with the cares and toils of
government.
Madame Geoffrin opened her house regularly on Mondays for artists,
and on Wednesdays for men of learning; but as she neither understood
the arts nor sciences, she took part in the conversation only so far
as she could do so without exposing her weak side. She understood
admirably how to attract the great men to her house, to whose houses
she herself very seldom went; and as long as the appearance of
fashionable infidelity and of scoffing, which was then the mode in the
higher circles, was necessary to this object, she carefully concealed
her real religious opinions.
The weak Marmontel, who, according to his own description, was
only fitted for superficial conversation and writing, boasts of the
prudence, foresight and skill of his protectress, and shows how she
understood the way to gain the confidence of others without ever
yielding her own. This distinguished art made the house of Madame
Geoffrin invaluable to the great world, and to those learned men
who wished to shine in this kind of society, and to cultivate and
avail themselves of it, for such people must learn above all things
neither to say too much nor too little. This society, indeed, was not
calculated for any length of time for a Rousseau or a Diderot. Even
the great admirers of Geoffrin admit that _savoir vivre_ was her
highest knowledge, she had very few ideas with respect to anything
besides; but in the knowledge of all that pertained to the manners and
usage of good society, in the knowledge of men, and particularly of
women, she was deeply learned, and was able to give some very useful
instructions.
It would lead us too far into the history of the following period, to
enumerate and characterize the members of these regular societies.
It may suffice to mention, that in addition to all the guests who
frequented Madame de Tencin's, all the friends of Voltaire's school,
and at first also Rousseau, made a part of the society at the house of
Madame Geoffrin. We have already remarked that no prince, minister, or
distinguished man of all Europe came to Paris who did not visit Madame
Geoffrin, and think it an honor to be invited to her house, because he
there found united all that was exclusively called talent in Europe.
Kaunitz also, who was then only a courtier in Versailles, came
to Madame Geoffrin's parties. He was a man who combined in a most
surprising manner true philosophy and a deep knowledge of political
economy, with the outward appearance of a fop and a trifler. Among the
other distinguished men who lived in Paris, Marmontel names with high
praise the Abbé Galliani, Caraccioli, who was afterward Neapolitan
ambassador, and the Swedish ambassador, Count Creutz.
Marmontel was so much delighted with this society, even at a very
advanced age, that he gives us also accounts of their evening parties:
"As I was in the habit of dining with the learned and with the artists
at Madame Geoffrin's, so was I also of supping with her in her more
limited and select circle. At these _petits soupers_ there was no
carousing or luxuries,--a fowl, spinach and pancakes constituted the
usual fare. The society was not numerous: there met together only five
or six of her particular friends, or even persons of the highest rank,
who were suited to each other, and therefore enjoyed themselves." It
appears distinctly from the passage already quoted from Marmontel,
how the high nobility on these occasions treated the learned, and
how the learned demeaned themselves toward the nobility. It appears,
therefore, that Rousseau was not in error when he alleged that
emptiness and wantonness only were cherished in these societies, and
that the literature which was then current was only a slow poison.
Madame du Deffant appeared on the stage of the great world
contemporaneously with Geoffrin, and attained so high a degree of
celebrity, that the Emperor Joseph paid her a visit in her advanced
period of life, and thus afforded her the opportunity of paying him
that celebrated compliment which is found related in every history
of France. With respect to Deffant, however, we must not listen to
Marmontel; she stood above his rhymes, his love tales, his sentimental
wanton stories, and besides, he knew her only when she had become
old. What we Germans name feminine and good morals formed no part of
the distinction of Deffant, but talents only. Like Tencin, she was
ill-reputed in her youth on account of her amours, and reckoned the
Regent among her fortunate wooers; at a later period she turned her
attention to literature.
Deffant brought together at her house all those persons whom Voltaire
visited when he was in Paris; among these the President Hénault,
and, at a later period of which we now speak, D'Alembert attracted
to this circle distinguished foreigners and Frenchmen, who made
any pretensions to culture and education. Deffant assumed quite a
different tone among the learned from that of Geoffrin. She set up
for a judge in questions of philosophy and taste, and carried on a
constant correspondence with Voltaire. Among celebrated foreigners,
the Englishman Horace Walpole played the same character in this house
which the Swede Creutz had assumed in that of Geoffrin. Deffant and
her Walpole became celebrated throughout Europe by their printed
correspondence, which, on account of its smoothness and emptiness,
like all books written for the great world, found very numerous
readers.
Deffant, moreover, like Geoffrin. was faithless to her friends; she
wished indeed to enjoy the most perfect freedom in their society, but
she was unwilling that they should publish abroad this freedom. And
she strongly disapproved of the vehemence with which her friends
assailed the existing order of things.
When she afterward lost a considerable part of her property, and
became blind, she occupied a small dwelling in an ecclesiastical
foundation in Paris, but continued to receive philosophers, poets
and artists in her house; and in order to give a little more life to
the conversation, she invited a young lady whose circumstances were
straitened to be her companion. This was Mademoiselle l'Espinasse.
L'Espinasse was not beautiful, but she was young, amiable, lively, and
more susceptible than we in Germany are accustomed either to allow or
to pardon. Deffant, on the other hand, was witty and intelligent, but
old, bitter, and withal egotistically insensible. The boldest scoffers
assembled around L'Espinasse, and there was afterward formed around
her a circle of her own. Deffant turned day into night, and night into
day. She and the Duchess of Luxembourg, who was inseparable from her,
received learned distinguished personages and foreigners, from six
o'clock in the evening during the greater part of the night.
The importance in which such ladies and such societies were held, not
merely in France but in all Europe, may be judged of from the fact,
that the breach between Deffant and her young companion was treated
in some measure as a public European event. The French minister and
foreign ambassadors took part in it, and the whole literary world felt
its effect. After this breach there were two tone-giving tribunals for
the guidance of public opinion in matters of literature and taste,
and their decisions were circulated by letter over all Europe. Horace
Walpole, Hénault, Montesquieu. Voltaire, whose correspondence with
Deffant has been published in the present century, remained true to
her cause. D'Alembert, whose correspondence with Deffant, as well as
that of the Duchess of Maine, have also been published in our century,
went over to L'Espinasse. This academician, whose name and influence
was next in importance to that of Voltaire, formed the nucleus of a
new society in the house of L'Espinasse, and was grievously tormented
by his _inamorata_, who pursued one plan of conquest after another
when she saw one scheme of marriage after another fail of success. It
appears from the whole of the transactions and consequences connected
with this breach, however surprising it may be, that this formation
of a new circle in Paris for evening entertainment may be with truth
compared to the institution of a new academy for the promotion of
European culture and refinement. The Duchess of Luxembourg, who
continued to be a firm friend of Deffant, took upon herself to provide
suitable apartments for the society, whilst the minister of the day
(the Duc de Choiseul) prevailed upon the king to grant a pension of no
inconsiderable amount to L'Espinasse.
This new circle was the point of union for all the philosophical
reformers. Here D'Alembert and Diderot led the conversation; and the
renowned head of the political economists, Türgot, who was afterward
minister of state, was a member of this bolder circle of men who
became celebrated and ill-renowned under the name of Encyclopædists.
We shall enter upon a fuller consideration of the tone and taste which
reigned in this assembly, as well as in the society which met in
the house of Holbach, and of the history of the Encyclopædia, in the
following period, and shall only now mention at the conclusion of the
present, and that very slightly, some of the other clever societies
of Parisians who were all in their day celebrated in Europe. It is
scarcely possible for us to judge of the charm which these societies
possessed in the great world. This may be best learned from their
own writings and conversation, a specimen of which may be found
in Marmontel's 'Memoirs,' and formed the subject of a conversation
between him and the Duke of Brunswick (who fell at Jena in 1806) and
his duchess.
The society of _beaux esprits_ which met at the house of Madame de
Poplinière, in the time of Madame de Tencin, was only short-lived,
like the good fortune of the lady herself. In her house there
assembled members of the great world who were addicted to carousing
and debauchery, and learned men who sought to obtain their favor
and approbation. The same sort of society was afterward kept up in
the house of Holbach. A smaller society, which frequented the house
of the farmer-general Pelletier, consisted of unmarried people,
who were known as persons who indulged in malicious and licentious
conversation. Collé, the younger Crébillon and Bernard, who,
notwithstanding his helplessness, was called _le gentil_, played the
chief characters in this reunion, and the Gascon nature of Marmontel,
which was always forward and intrusive, helped him into this society
also. Baron Holbach, who was a native of the Palatinate, and the
able Helvetius who was wanton merely from vanity, brought together
expressly and intentionally at a later period, around their
well-spread table, all those who declared open war against religion
and morality. We must, however, return to these men in the following
period.
Holbach for a whole quarter of a century had regular dinner-parties
on Sundays, which are celebrated in the history of atheism. All those
were invited, who were too bold and too out-spoken for Geoffrin; and
even D'Alembert also at a later period withdrew from their society.
Grimm, whose copious correspondence has also been published in the
nineteenth century, gives minutes and notices of all the memorable
sayings and doings that served to entertain and occupy the
polite world in Europe. Grimm also entertained and feasted these
distinguished gentlemen. He was not at that time consul for Gotha, or
employed and paid by that court or the Empress Catherine to collect
Parisian anecdotes, neither had he then been made a baron, but was
merely civil secretary of Count von Friese. Both J.J. Rousseau and
Buffon belonged at first to these societies; but the former, in great
alarm, broke off all intercourse with the people who then played the
first parts in Paris, and the other quietly retired.
[Footnote 1:
Mon Henri quatre et ma Zaïre,
Et mon Americaine Alzire,
Ne m'ont valu jamais un seul regard du roi;
J'eus beaucoup d'ennemis avec très-peu de gloire.
Les honneurs et les biens pleuvent enfin sur moi
Pour une farce de la foire.--_La Princesse de Navarro_.]
* * * * *