(1.)THE most honourable thing we can say of a man is, that he does not understand the court; there is scarcely a virtue which we do not imply when saying this. (2.) A perfect courtier can command his gestures, his eyes, and his countenance; he is profound and impenetrable; he seems to overlook every injury; he smiles on (3.) A court is like certain changeable colours; which vary according to the different lights they are exposed in. He who can define these colours can define the court. (4.) A man who leaves the court for a single moment renounces it for ever; the courtier who was there in the morning must be there at night, and know it again next day, in order that he himself may be known there. (5.) A man must appear small at court, and let him be never so vain, it is impossible to prevent it; but it is the common lot, and the highest nobles themselves are there of no consequence. (6.) People who live in the provinces consider the court admirable; but if they visit it, its beauties diminish, like those of a fine drawing of perspective viewed too closely. (7.) It is difficult to get accustomed to the spending of our lives in ante-chambers, courtyards, or on staircases. (8.) The court does not satisfy a man, but it prevents him from being satisfied with anything else. (9.) A cultured gentleman should have some experience of the court; as soon as he enters it he will discover a new world, as it were, wholly unknown to him, where vice and politeness have equal sway, and where good and evil alike may be of use to him. (10.) The court is like a marble structure, for the courtiers are very polished and very hard. (11.) Sometimes people go to court only to come back again, so that, on their return, they may be taken notice of by the nobility of their county or by the bishops of their diocese. (12.) There would be no use for embroiderers and confectioners, and they would open their shops in vain, if all the people were modest and temperate; courts would be deserts and kings almost left alone, if every one was void of vanity and self-interest. Men are willing to be slaves in one place if they can only lord it in another. It seems that at court a proud, imperious, and commanding mien is delivered wholesale to the great for them to retail in the country; they do exactly what is done unto them, and are the true apes of royalty. (13.) Nothing disparages some courtiers so much as the presence of a prince; their faces are scarcely to be recognised; their features are altered and their looks debased; the more proud and haughty they are, the greater is the change in them, because they have suffered a greater loss; whilst a gentlemanly and modest man bears it much better, as there is nothing in him to alter. (14.) Courtly manners are contagious; they are caught at Versailles, (15.) N ..., (16.) Courts are haunted by certain bold adventurers, of free-and-easy manners, who introduce themselves, pretend to possess greater abilities than others in their profession, and are believed on their sole assertion. (17.) Some men, on entering a room, make but a slight bow, stretch their shoulders and thrust out their chests like women; they ask you a question, look another way, and speak in a loud tone, to show that they think themselves above every one present; they stop, and everybody gathers around them; they do all the talking, and seem to take the lead. This ridiculous and simulated haughtiness continues until some really great person makes his appearance, when they shrink away at once, and are reduced to their natural level, for which they are all the better. (18.) Courts cannot exist without a class of courtiers who can flatter, are complaisant, insinuating, devoted to the ladies, whose pleasures they direct, whose weaknesses they study, and whose passions they flatter; they whisper some naughty words to them, speak of their husbands and lovers in a proper manner, conjecture when they are sad, ill, or expect a baby; they head the fashions, refine on luxury and extravagance, and teach the fair to spend in a short time large sums on clothes, furniture, and carriages; they wear nothing themselves but what shows good taste and riches, and will not live in an old palace till it be repaired and embellished; they eat delicately and thoughtfully; there is no pleasure they have not tried and of which they cannot tell you something; they owe their position to themselves, and they keep it with the same ability they made it. Disdainful and proud, they no longer accost their former equals, (19.) Would any person not think that to Cimon and Clitandre alone are intrusted all the details of the State, and that they alone are answerable for them? The one manages at least everything concerning agriculture and land, and the other is at the head of the navy. Whoever will give a sketch of them must express bustle, restlessness, curiosity, activity, and paint Hurry itself. We never see them sitting, standing, or stopping; no (20.) A courtier who has not a pretty name ought to hide it under a better; (21.) It shows a simple mind to acknowledge at court the smallest alloy of common blood, and not to set up for a nobleman. (22.) At court people go to bed and rise only with a view to self; it is what they revolve in their own minds morning and evening, night and day; it is for this they think, speak, are silent or act; it is with this disposition that they converse with some and neglect others, that they ascend or descend; by this rule they measure all their assiduity, complaisance, esteem, indifference, or contempt. Whatever progress any of them seems to make towards moderation and wisdom, they are carried away by the first motive of ambition along with the most covetous, the most violent in their desires, and the most ambitious. Can they stand still when everything is in motion, when everything is stirring, and forbear running whither every one runs? Such people even think they only owe their success in life to themselves; and a man who has not made it at court is supposed not to have deserved it; and this judgment is without appeal. However, is it advisable for a man to leave the court without having obtained any advantage by his stay, or should he remain there without favour or reward? This question is so intricate, so delicate, and so difficult to decide, that a very large number of courtiers have grown old without coming to any affirmative or negative conclusion, and died, at last, without having arrived at any final resolution. (23.) There is nothing at court so worthless and so contemptible as a man who cannot assist us in the least to better our position; I am amazed such a person dares appear there. (24.) A man who sees himself raised far above his contemporaries, whose rank was formerly the same as his own, and who made their first appearance at court at the same time as he did, fancies it is a sure proof of his superior merit, and thinks himself better than those other people who could not keep up with him; but he forgets what he thought of himself before he became a favourite, and what he thought of those who had outstripped him. (25.) It proves a good deal for a friend, after he has become a great favourite at court, still to keep up an acquaintance with us. (26.) If a man who is in favour dares to take advantage of it before it is all over; if he makes use of a propitious gale to get on; if he keeps his eye on any vacancies, posts, or abbeys, asks for them, obtains them, and is stocked with pensions, grants, and reversions, We blame those persons who make use of their opportunities for bettering their positions, because we are in a very inferior situation, and, therefore, despair of being ever in such circumstances that will expose us to a similar reproach. But if we were likely to succeed them, we should begin to think they were not so much in the wrong as we imagined, and would be more cautious in censuring them, for fear of condemning ourselves beforehand. (27.) We should not exaggerate things, nor blame the court for evils which do not exist there. Courtiers never endeavour to harm real merit, but they leave it sometimes without reward; they do not always despise it when they have once discerned it, but they forget all about it; for a court is a place where people most perfectly understand doing nothing, or very little, for those whom they greatly esteem. (28.) It would be very wonderful indeed, if among all the instruments I employ for building up my fortune, some of them were not to miscarry. A friend of mine who promised to speak for me does not say a single word; another speaks without any spirit; a third speaks by accident against my interests, though it was not his intention to do so. One lacks the will, another sagacity and prudence; and none of them would be sufficiently delighted in seeing me happy, and do everything in their power for making me so. Every one remembers well enough what pains he took in establishing his own position, and what assistance he got in clearing his way to obtain it. We should not be averse to acknowledge the services which certain people have rendered us, by rendering to others some service on similar occasions, (29.) Courtiers never employ whatever intelligence, skill, or perspicacity they may possess to find out means of obliging those of their friends who implore their assistance, but they only invent evasive answers, plausible excuses, or what they call impossibilities for moving in the matter; and then they think they have satisfied all the duties which friendship and gratitude require. No courtier cares to take the initiative in anything, but he will offer to second him who does, because, judging of others by himself, he thinks that no one will make a beginning, and that therefore he shall not be obliged to second any one. This is a gentle and polite way of refusing to employ his influence, good offices, and mediation in favour of those who stand in need of them. (30.) How many men almost stifle you with their demonstrations of friendship, and pretend to love and esteem you in private, who are embarrassed when they meet you in public, and at the king's levÉe, or at mass at Versailles, look another way, and do all they can to avoid you. There are few courtiers who have sufficient greatness of soul or confidence in themselves to dare to honour in public a man of merit but who does not occupy a grand post. (31.) I see a man surrounded and followed by a crowd, but he is in office. I see another to whom every one says a few words, but he is a court favourite; a third is embraced and caressed even by persons of high rank, but he is wealthy; a fourth is stared at by all, and pointed at, but he is learned and eloquent. I perceive one whom nobody omits bowing to, but he is (32.) When a man is appointed to a new post he is inundated with praises, which flood the courtyards, the chapel, overflow the grand staircase, the vestibules, the galleries, and all the rooms of the palace; (33.) It may be justly said that it is easier to get appointed to an eminent and difficult post than to keep it. (34.) We see men fallen from a high estate for those very faults for which they were appointed to it. (35.) At court there are two ways of dismissing or discharging servants and dependants; to be angry with them, or to make them so angry with us that they leave us of their own accord. (36.) Courtiers speak well of a man for two reasons: firstly, that he may know they have commended him; and secondly, that he may say the same of them. (37.) It is as dangerous at court to make any advances as it is embarrassing not to make them. (38.) There are some people who, if they do not know the name or the face of a man, make this a pretence for laughing at him. They ask who that man is; it is not Rousseau, Fabry, or La Couture, (39.) I am told so many bad things of this man, and see so few in him, that I begin to suspect he has some merit which is so vexatious that it eclipses the merit of others. (40.) You are an honest man, (41.) None are impudent by choice; but they are so constitutionally, and though it is quite wrong, yet it is natural; a man who is not born so is modest and cannot easily pass from one extreme to another. It would be useless to advise such a man to be impudent in order to be successful; a bad imitation will not do him any good, and would ensure his failure. Without real and ingenious effrontery there is not doing anything at court. (42.) We seek, we hurry, we intrigue, we worry ourselves, we ask and are refused; we ask again and get what we ask for; but we pretend we obtained it without ever having asked for it, or so much as thought about it, and even when we had quite another thing in view. This is an obsolete style, a silly falsehood, which deceives nobody. (43.) A man intrigues to obtain an eminent post, lays all his plans beforehand, takes all the right measures, and is on the point of being as successful as he wishes; some people are to initiate the business in hand, others are to second it; the bait is already laid, and the mine ready to be sprung; and then the candidate absents himself from the court. Who would dare suspect that Artemon ever aimed at so fine a post when he is ordered to leave his seat or his government to fill it? (44.) Men do not like us to pry into their prospects of bettering their position, or to find out what post they are anxious to occupy, because, if they are not successful, they fancy their failure brings some discredit upon them; and if they succeed, they persuade themselves it redounds more to their credit that the giver thought them worthy of it than that they thought themselves worthy of it, and, therefore, intrigued and plotted; they appear decked in their stateliness as well as in their modesty. Which is the greater shame, to be refused the post which we deserve, or to be put into one we do not deserve? Difficult as it is to obtain a place at court, it is yet harder and more difficult to be worthy of filling one. A man had better be asked by what means he obtained a certain post than why he did not obtain it. People become candidates for any municipal office, or try to get a seat in the French Academy, (45.) I never yet have seen a courtier whom a prince has appointed governor of a wealthy province, given a first-rate place, or a large pension, who does not protest, either through vanity, or to show himself disinterested, that he is less pleased with the gift than with the manner in which it was given. What is certain and cannot be doubted is that he says so. To give awkwardly denotes the churl; the most difficult and unpleasant part is to give; then, why not add a smile? There are, however, some men who refuse with more politeness to grant you what you ask than others know how to give; (46.) There are some men at court so covetous that they catch hold of any rank or condition to reap its benefits; governments of provinces, offices, benefices, nothing comes amiss to them; they are so situated that, by virtue of their official position, they can accept any kind of favour; they are amphibious, live by the church and the sword, and one day or other will discover the secret of including the law also. (47.) A thousand people at court wear out their very existence by embracing, caressing, and congratulating all persons who have received favours, and die without having any bestowed on themselves. (48.) Menophilus (49.) There is a highroad or a beaten road, as it is called, which leads to grand offices, and there is a cross or bye-way which is much the shortest. (50.) We run to get a look at some wretched criminals, we line one side of the street, and we stand at the windows to observe the features and the bearing of a man who is doomed and knows he is going to die, impelled by a senseless, malignant, inhuman curiosity. If men were wise, they would avoid public executions, and then it would even be considered infamous to be present at such spectacles. (51.) When a man has once got into office, he neither makes use of his reason nor of his intelligence to regulate his behaviour and manners towards others, but shapes them according to his office and his position; this is the cause of his forgetfulness, pride, arrogance, harshness, and ingratitude. (52.) Theonas having been an abbÉ (53.) There must be knaves at court (54.) An ancient author, whose very words I shall take the liberty to quote, (55.) The youth of a prince is the making of many courtiers. (56.) Timantes, (57.) How many friends, how many relatives of a new Minister, spring up in a single night! Some men pride themselves on their former acquaintance, on their (58.) What supports me and comforts me when sometimes men of high rank or my equals slight me, is the feeling that perhaps those very men only despise my position; and they are quite right, for it is a very humble one; but they would doubtless worship me if I were a Minister. Am I suddenly to obtain some post, and do people know it, or foresee it, because they forestall me and bow to me first? (59.) A man who tells us he has dined the day before at Tibur, or is going to have supper there tonight, and repeats it often, who brings in the name of Plancus' (60.) I think it must be a pretty sight for a man of merit to observe at a meeting, or at a public entertainment, that the very seat which has been refused him is given up before his face to a man who has neither eyes to see nor ears to hear, (61.) Theodotus (62.) Never more expect candour, frankness, justice, good offices, services, kindness, generosity, steadiness from a man who for some time has spent all his days at court, and secretly wishes to better his fortunes. Do you know him by his face or conversation? He no longer calls things by their proper names; for him there exist no longer any knaves, rogues, fools, or im (63.) There is a country (64.) Court life is a serious, sad game, requiring application; a man must arrange his pieces and his plans, have a design, pursue it, thwart his adversaries, now and then venture something, and play capriciously; yet after all those fancies and contrivances he may be kept in check, and not seldom be checkmated; whilst often with well-handled men he may queen it and win (65.) The wheels, the springs, the movements of a watch are hidden, and only the hands can be seen gradually going round and finishing their course. This is a true image of a courtier, who goes over a great deal of ground, but often returns to the very same point whence he started. (66.) “Two-thirds of my life are already gone; why, then, should I perplex myself so much about the remainder? The most brilliant career neither deserves the anxiety I suffer, nor the meannesses I accidentally commit, nor the humiliations and mortifications I have to bear. In thirty years those giants of power whom we can hardly perceive without raising our heads will be destroyed; I, who am so small, and those to whom I looked up with so much anxiety and from whom I expected all my greatness, will have disappeared. The best of all good things, if such there be in this world, is repose, retirement, and a place you can call your own.” N ... was of this opinion when he was in disgrace, but he forgot it in his prosperity. (67.) A nobleman who resides in his own province, lives free, but without patronage; if he lives at court he will be patronised, but is a slave; so one thing compensates for another. (68.) Xantippus, (69.) Nobody is a greater slave than an assiduous courtier, unless it be a courtier who is more assiduous. (70.) A slave has but one master; an ambitious man has as many masters as there are people who may be useful in bettering his position. (71.) A thousand men scarcely known appear every day in crowds at the levÉe, (72.) Of all those persons who dangle after men of rank, and pay their respects to them, a few honour them in their hearts, a great number follow them out of ambition or interest, but the motive of the largest number is a ridiculous vanity or a silly impatience to be noticed. (73.) There are certain families who, according to the ways of the world, and what we call decency, ought never to be reconciled to one another; however, now they are good friends, for those whom religion could not induce to lay aside their feuds, interest, without much trouble, has linked together. (74.) People say there exists a certain country where (75.) Whoever will consider that a king's presence constitutes the entire happiness of courtiers, that their sole occupation and satisfaction during the whole course of their lives is to see and be seen by him, (76.) Great noblemen show their respect for their prince; this concerns them, as they have also their dependants. Courtiers of inferior rank are more relaxed in those duties, assume a kind of familiarity, and live like men whose examples none will follow. (77.) What is there wanting in the youth of the present time? They can do and they know everything; or at least if they do not know as much as it is possible to know, they are as positive as if they did. (78.) How weak are men! A great lord says of He says also that Iphicrates is a coward; and you have seen him perform an act of bravery. But do not be uneasy. I do not insist you should relate it, but, after what you have heard this lord say, still remember that you saw him perform it. (79.) To know how to speak to a king is perhaps the sole art of a prudent and pliant courtier. One word escapes him, which the prince hears, recollects, and sometimes lodges in his heart; there is no recalling it; all the care and skill that can be used to explain or soften it, serves only to impress it the more and to bite it in deeper. If the courtier has only spoken against himself, though this misfortune is very unusual, the remedy is at hand; he must take warning by his fault, and bear the punishment of his levity; but if another be the victim, he ought to feel dejected and contrite. Is there a better rule in such a dangerous conjuncture than to talk to our sovereign of others, of their persons, works, actions, manners, or conduct, at least with the same reserve, precaution, and care with which we talk of ourselves? (80.) I would say that a man who tries to be witty must have a most wretched character, if it had not been said before. (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; (84.) There are some men on whom favour lights as it were accidentally; they are the first it surprises and (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 depend (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 (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. (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 (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 (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. THE GREAT
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