to remind these grave retailers of Bayle's sly and ironical sophistry, that every argument for Christianity, drawn from its internal evidence, tacitly recognises the authority of human reason; and assumes, as the ultimate criteria of truth and of falsehood, of right and of wrong, certain fundamental articles of belief, discoverable by the light of Nature ? * Charron is well known as the chosen friend of Montaigne's latter years, and as the confidential depositary of his philosophical sentiments. Endowed with talents far inferior in force and originality to those of his master, he possessed, nevertheless, a much sounder and more regulated judgment; and as his reputation, notwithstanding the liberality of some of his peculiar tenets, was high among the most respectable and conscientious divines of his own church, it is far from improbable, that Montaigne committed to him the guardianship of his posthumous fame, from motives similar to those which influenced Pope, in selecting Warburton as his literary executor. The discharge of this trust, however, seems to have done less good to Montaigne than harm to Charron; for, while the unlimited scepticism, and the indecent levities of the former, were viewed by the zealots of those days with a smile of tenderness and indulgence, the slighter heresies of the latter were marked with a severity the more rigorous and unrelenting, that, in points of essential impor "I once asked Adrian Turnebus," says Montaigne, "what he thought of Sebonde's treatise? The answer he made to me was, That he believed it to be some extract from Thomas Aquinas, for that none but a genius like his was capable of such ideas." I must not, however, omit to mention, that a very learned Protestant, Hugo Grotius, has expressed himself to his friend Bignon not unfavorably of Sebonde's intentions, although the terms in which he speaks of him are somewhat equivocal, and imply but little satisfaction with the execution of his design. "Non ignoras quantum excoluerint istam materiam (argumentum scil. pro Religione Christiana) philosophica subtilitate Raimundus Sebundus, dialogorum varietate Ludovicus Vives, maximâ autem tum eruditione tum facundiâ vestras Philippus Mornæus." The authors of the Nouveau Dictionnaire Historique (Lyons, 1804,) have entered much more completely into the spirit and drift of Sebonde's reasoning, when they observe, "Ce livre offre des singularités hardies, qui plurent dans le temps aux philosophes de ce siècle, et qui ne déplairoient pas à ceux du nôtre.” It is proper to add, that I am acquainted with Sebonde only through the medium of Montaigne's version, which does not lay claim to the merit of strict fidelity; the translator himself having acknowledged, that he had given to the Spanish philosopher" un accoutrement à la Françoise, et qu'il l'a dévêtu de son port farouche et maintien barbaresque, de manière qu'il a mes-hui assez de façon pour se présenter en toute bonne compagnie.', tance, they deviated so very little from the standard of the Catholic faith. It is not easy to guess the motives of this inconsistency; but such we find from the fact to have been the temper of religious bigotry, or, to speak more correctly, of political religionism, in all ages of the world.* As an example of Charron's solicitude to provide an antidote against the more pernicious errors of his friend, I shall only mention his ingenious and philosophical attempt to reconcile, with the moral constitution of human nature, the apparent discordancy in the judgments of different nations concerning right and wrong. His argument on this point is in substance the very same with that so well urged by Beattie, in opposition to Locke's reasonings against the existence of innate practical principles. It is difficult to say, whether, in this instance, the coincidence between Montaigne and Locke, or that between Charron and Beattie, be the more remarkable.† Although Charron has affected to give to his work a systematical form, by dividing and subdividing it into books and chapters, it is in reality little more than an unconnected series of essays on various topics, more or less distantly related to the science of Ethics. On the powers of the understanding he has touched but slightly; nor has he imitated Montaigne, in anatomizing, for the edification of the world, the peculiarities of his own moral character. It has probably been owing to the desultory and popular style of composition common to both, that 10 "Montaigne, cet auteur charmant, Voltaire, Epitre au Président Hénault. See Beattie's Essay on Fable and Romance; and Charron de la Sagesse, Liv. ii. c. 8. It may amuse the curious reader also to compare the theoretical reasonings of Charron with a memoir in the Phil. Trans. for 1773 (by Sir Roger Curtis,) containing some particulars with respect to the country of Labradore. so little attention has been paid to either by those who have treated of the history of French philosophy. To Montaigne's merits, indeed, as a lively and amusing essayist, ample justice has been done; but his influence on the subsequent habits of thinking among his countrymen remains still to be illustrated. He has done more, perhaps, than any other author (I am inclined to think with the most honest intentions,) to introduce into men's houses (if I may borrow an expression of Cicero) what is now called the new philosophy,—a philosophy certainly very different from that of Socrates. In the fashionable world, he has, for more than two centuries, maintained his place as the first of moralists; a circumstance easily accounted for, when we attend to the singular combination, exhibited in his writings, of a semblance of erudition, with what Malebranche happily calls his air du monde, and air cavalier.* As for the graver and less attractive Charron, his name would probably before now have sunk into oblivion, had it not been so closely associated, by the accidental events of his life, with the more celebrated name of Montaigne.† The preceding remarks lead me, by a natural connexion of ideas (to which I am here much more inclined to attend than to the order of dates,) to another writer of the seventeenth century, whose influence over the literary and philosophical taste of France has been far greater than seems to be commonly imagined. I allude to the Duke of La Rochefoucauld, author of the Maxims and Moral Reflections. "Ah l'aimable homme, qu'il est de bonne compagnie ! C'est mon ancien ami; mais à force d'être ancien, il m'est nouveau.' Madame de Sévigné. Montaigne himself seems, from the general strain of his writings, to have had but little expectation of the posthumous fame which he has so long continued to enjoy. One of his reflections on this head is so characteristical of the author as a man; and, at the same time, affords so fine a specimen of the graphical powers of his now antiquated style, that I am tempted to transcribe it in his own words: "J'écris mon livre à peu d'hommes et à peu d'années; s'il c'eût été une matière de durée, il l'eût fallu commettre à un language plus ferme. Selon la variation continuelle qui a suivi le nôtre jusqu'à cette heure, qui peut espérer que sa forme présente soit en usage d'ici à cinquante ans il écoule tous les jours de nos mains, et depuis que je vis, s'est altéré de moitié. Nous disons qu'il est à cette heure parfait: Autant en dit du sien chaque siècle. C'est aux bons et utiles écrits de le clouer à eux, et ira sa fortune selon le crédit de notre état." How completely have both the predictions in the last sentence been verified by the subsequent history of the French language! Voltaire, was, I believe, the first who ventured to assign to La Rochefoucauld the preeminent rank which belongs to him among the French classics. "One of the works," says he, "which contributed most to form the taste of the nation to a justness and precision of thought and expression, was the small collection of maxims by Francis Duke of La Rochefoucauld. Although there be little more than one idea in the book, that self-love is the spring of all our actions, yet this idea is presented in so great a variety of forms, as to be always amusing. When it first appeared, it was read with avidity; and it contributed, more than any other performance since the revival of letters, to improve the vivacity, correctness, and delicacy of French composition." Another very eminent judge of literary merit (the late Dr. Johnson) was accustomed to say of La Rochefoucauld's Maxims, that it was almost the only book written by a man of fashion, of which professed authors had reason to be jealous. Nor is this wonderful, when we consider the unwearied industry of the very accomplished writer, in giving to every part of it the highest and most finished polish which his exquisite taste could bestow. When he had committed a maxim to paper, he was in use to circulate it among his friends, that he might avail himself of their critical animadversions; and, if we may credit Ségrais, altered some of them no less than thirty times, before venturing to submit them to the public eye. That the tendency of these maxims is, upon the whole, unfavorable to morality, and that they always leave a disagreeable impression on the mind, must, I think, be granted. At the same time, it may be fairly questioned, if the motives of the author have in general been well understood, either by his admirers or his opponents. In affirming that self-love is the spring of all our actions, there is no good reason for supposing that he meant to deny the reality of moral distinctions as a philosophical truth;-a supposition quite inconsistent with his own fine and deep remark, that hypocrisy is itself an homage which vice renders to virtue. He states it merely as a fact, which, in the course of his experience as a man of the world, he had found very generally verified in the higher classes of soci ety; and which he was induced to announce without any qualification or restriction, in order to give more force and poignancy to his satire. In adopting this mode of writing, he has unconsciously conformed himself, like many other French authors, who have since followed his example, to a suggestion which Aristotle has stated with admirable depth and acuteness in his Rhetoric. "Sentences or apothegms lend much aid to eloquence. One reason of this is, that they flatter the pride of the hearers, who are delighted when the speaker, making use of general language, touches upon opinions which they had before known to be true in part. Thus, a person who had the misfortune to live in a bad neighbourhood, or to have worthless children, would easily assent to the speaker who should affirm that nothing is more vexatious than to have any neighbours; nothing more irrational than to bring children into the world."* This observation of Aristotle, while it goes far to account for the imposing and dazzling effect of these rhetorical exaggerations, ought to guard us against the common and popular error of mistaking them for the serious and profound generalizations of science. As for La Rochefoucauld, we know, from the best authorities, that, in private life, he was a conspicuous example of all those moral qualities of which he seemed to deny the existence; and that he exhibited, in this respect, a striking contrast to the Cardinal de Retz, who has presumed to censure him for his want of faith in the reality of virtue. In reading La Rochefoucauld, it should never be forgotten, that it was within the vortex of a court he enjoyed his chief opportunities of studying the world; and that the narrow and exclusive circle in which he moved was not likely to afford him the most favorable specimens of human nature in general. Of the Court of Louis the Fourteenth, in particular, we are told by a very nice and * Εχουσι δὲ (γνῶμαι) εἰς τοὺς λόγους βοήθειαν μεγάλην, μίαν μὲν δὴ διὰ φορτικότητα τῶν ἀκροατῶν· χαίρουσι γὰρ, ἐάν τις καθόλου λέγων, ἐπιτύχῃ τῶν δοξῶν, ὡς ἐκεῖοι κατὰ μέρος ἔχουσιν.—Η μὲν γὰρ γνώμη, ὥσπερ εἴρηται, ἀπόφανσίς εστι· χαίρουσι δὲ καθόλου λεγομένου, ὃ κατὰ μέρος προϋπολαμβάνοντες τυγχάνουσιν· οἷον εἴτις γείτοσι τύχη κεχρημένος, ἢ, ὅτι οὐδὲν ἠλιθιώτερον τεκνοποιΐας. Arist. Knet. Lib. ii. c. 21. The whole chapter is interesting and instructive, and shows how profoundly Aristotle had meditated the principles of the rhetorical art. |