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From Blois he returned to Paris; and having now mastered the French language, found great pleasure in the society of French philosophers and poets. He gave an account, in a letter to Bishop Hough, of two highly interesting conversations, one with Malbranche, the other with Boileau. Malbranche expressed great partiality for the English, and extolled the genius of Newton, but shook his head when Hobbes was mentioned, and was indeed so unjust as to call the author of the Leviathan a poor silly creature. Addison's modesty restrained him from fully relating, in his letter, the circumstances of his introduction to Boileau. Boileau, having survived the friends and rivals of his youth, old, deaf, and melancholy, lived in retirement, seldom went either to Court or to the Academy, and was almost inaccessible to strangers. Of the English and of English literature he knew nothing. He had hardly heard the name of Dryden. Some of our countrymen, in the warmth of their patriotism, have asserted that this ignorance must have been affected. We own that we see no ground for such a supposition. English literature was to the French of the age of Louis the Fourteenth what German literature was to our own grandfathers. Very few, we suspect, of the accomplished men who, sixty or seventy years ago, used to dine in Leicester Square with Sir Joshua, or at Streatham with Mrs. Thrale, had the slightest notion that Wieland was one of the first wits and poets, and Lessing, beyond all dispute, the first critic in Europe. Boileau knew just as little about the Paradise Lost, and about Absalom and Achitophel; but he had read Addison's Latin poems, and admired them greatly. They had given him, he said, quite a new notion of the state of learning and taste among the English. Johnson will have it that these praises were insincere. "Nothing," says he, "is better known of Boileau than that he had an injudicious and peevish contempt of modern Latin; and therefore his profession of regard was probably the effect of his civility rather than approbation." Now, nothing is better known of Boileau than that he was singularly sparing of compliments. We do not remember that either friendship or fear ever induced him to bestow praise on any composition which he did not approve. On literary questions, his caustic, disdainful, and self-confident spirit rebelled against that authority to which everything else in France bowed down. He had the spirit to tell Louis the Fourteenth firmly, and even rudely, that his Majesty knew nothing about poetry, and admired verses which were detestable. What was there in Addison's position that could induce the satirist, whose stern and fastidious temper had been the dread of two generations, to turn sycophant for the first and last time? Nor was Boileau's contempt of modern Latin either injudicious or peevish. He thought, indeed, that no poem of the first order would ever be written in a dead language. And did he think amiss? Has not the experience of centuries confirmed his opinion? Boileau also thought it probable, that, in the best modern Latin, a writer of the Augustan age would have detected ludicrous improprieties. And who can think otherwise? What modern scholar can honestly declare that he sees the smallest impurity in the style of Livy? Yet is it not certain that, in the style of Livy, Pollio, whose taste had been formed on the banks of the Tiber, detected the inelegant idiom of the Po? Has any modern scholar understood Latin better than Frederic the Great understood French? Yet is it not notorious that Frederic the Great, after reading, speaking, writing French, and nothing but French, during more than half a century, after unlearning his mother tongue in order to learn French, after living familiarly during many years with French associates, could not, to the last, compose in French, without imminent risk of committing some mistake which would have moved a smile in the literary circles of Paris? Do we believe that Erasmus and Fracastorius wrote Latin as well as Dr. Robertson and Sir Walter Scott wrote English? And are there not in the Dissertation on India, the last of Dr. Robertson's works, in Waverley, in Marmion, Scotticisms at which a London apprentice would laugh? But does it follow, because we think thus, that we can find nothing to admire in the noble alcaics of Gray, or in the playful elegiacs of Vincent Bourne? Surely not. Nor was Boileau so ignorant or tasteless as to be incapable of appreciating good modern Latin. In the very letter to which Johnson alludes, Boileau says, "Ne croyez pas pourtant que je veuille par l
In the very letter to which Johnson alludes, Boileau says "Ne croyez pas pourtant que je veuille par la blamer les vers Latins que vous m'avez envoyes d'un de vos illustres academiciens. Je les ai trouves fort beaux, et dignes de Vida et de Sannazar, mais non pas d'Horace et de Virgile."
The queen, in the presence of Barkilphedro, lamented the event, finally exclaiming, with a sigh, "It is a pity that so many virtues should have been borne and served by so poor an intellect." "Dieu veuille avoir son âne!" whispered Barkilphedro, in a low voice, and in French. The queen smiled. Barkilphedro noted the smile. His conclusion was that biting pleased.
Avec toutes ces précautions, la conquête de la Grèce [Footnote: On a déja vu plus haut que par le mot Grèce l'auteur entend les états que les Turcs possédoient en Europe.] ne sera pas une entreprise extrêmement difficile, pourvu, je le répète, que l'armée fasse toujours corps, qu'elle ne se divise jamais, et ne veuille point envoyer de pelotons
Deja au mois de fevrier les arbustes poussaient des feuilles. Dieu veuille que cette douce chaleur de l'annee vous rende bientot a la sante et a la Normandie. As to France, I say nothing; for, after all, she has the chances of success, which will smooth away many apparent difficulties. But the peace of Europe depends on Germany and on England. Shall we succeed in maintaining it?
"Et tant s'en faut que je veuille que l'on croie toutes les choses que j'ecrirai, que meme je pretends en proposer ici quelques unes que je crois absolument etre fausses; a savoir, je ne doute point quo le monde n'ait ete cree au commencement avec autant de perfection qu'il eu a; en sorte que le soleil, la terre, la lune, et les etoiles ont ete des lors; et que la terre n'a pas eu seulement en soi les semences des plantes, mais que les plantes meme en ont couvert une partie; et qu' Adam et Eve n'ont pas ete crees enfans mais en age d'hommes parfaits.
"Il y a apparence que notre marine dont on s'occupe depuis longtemps va bientôt être en activité. Dieu veuille que tous ces mouvements n'amènent pas la guerre de terre." Marie Antoinette to Maria Teresa, March 18th, 1777, Arneth, iii., p. 174. "Jamais les Anglais n'ont eu tant de supériorité sur mer; mais ils en eurent sur les Français dans tous les temps." Siècle de Louis, ch xxxv.
The first of these is described at length by the knight Merri Dupuis "temoin oculaire" who sets down: "Je, Mary Dupuis gros et rude de sens et de entendement je veuille parler et desscrire au plus bref que je pourray et au plus pres de la verite selon que je pen voir a lueil."
"MONSIEUR, Je viens de lire avec le plus grand plaisir votre livre 'French and English. Il est si rare qu'un ecrivain anglais ose ou veuille, aller contre les prejuges de ses lecteurs anglais, et nous fasse justice, que j'en ai eprouve un vrai sentiment de reconnaissance.
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