found themselves unsettled by the Revolution. The journal forms altogether 66 On the 7th instant I attended the sitting of the Academy of the Fine Arts. I always feel a little embarrassed in rendering an account of the lectures of our different academies; for, in my notices of books and subjects connected with literature, I have promised to give you my own opinions, and not those of others. But here I am speaking of myself, which I ought rather to leave you to do. The truth is, that since I read the notes and prefaces which M. de Chateaubriand has added to the new edition of his Works, I find myself unconsciously falling into egotism. But to resume: I went yesterday to the Academy of the Fine Arts, where a tall stout man, named Quatremère dé Quincy began to read, in a disagreeable nasal tone, one of the dullest of all the rhapsodies that have been heard at the Institute for the last twenty years. It was a pompous eulogium on an obscure architect named Heurtaud. M. Quatremère, in lavishing praises on this unknown individual, dealt out the severest censures on the present age, and, above all, on the youth of France, whose spirit of philosophy he strongly disapproves. He vented imprecations on this age of industry, in which commerce annihilates every noble feeling." On hearing this, some young men who were present, interrupted M. Quatremère's eloquent discourse by ironical plaudits. M. Quatremère, who is a censor and is powerfully protected by the police, insisted on the president ordering in the military to arrest the persons who were ridiculing him. At the sight of the soldiers the ladies became alarmed, and fled, leaving behind them their hats, shawls, &c. The men climbed up the benches of the gallery, into which the soldiers were entering. A terrible scene of disorder prevailed for about ten minutes, and at length the military withdrew without arresting any one. The sergeant who commanded the guard was very much embarrassed; for he could not possibly identify the individuals who had been guilty of applauding M. Quatremère. This gentleman, finding that his troops were forced to beat a retreat, exclaimed: "Well! we will give no more prizes to the students of sculpture!" The poor censor, not being aware that his office renders him generally obnoxious, thought he could only be attacked by the students of sculpture. The above is a brief account of an affair which for three months to come will be a subject of conversation in our literary circles. Such a scandal has never been witnessed since the establishment of academies in the reign of Louis XIV. D'Alembert was once hissed by some bigots, but he was avenged by the majority of the public; and, besides, he did not call in the aid of the military. The upper classes express much sympathy for M. Quatremère; not but that they find him sufficiently dull and stupid; but that which people of fashion most of all dislike is energy, under whatever form it may present itself. To ridicule publicly a man like M. Quatremère, however stupid he may be, is, in the higher classes of society, the most offensive way in which energy can be manifested. It will be well for rogues and fools if this system become general, for then they will always escape punishment. Whilst the Academy of the Fine Arts is assailed by misfortunes such as I have just described, and the "Academie Française," since the late nominations, is so degraded by intrigue that no candidate has appeared for the two vacant places, our Academic des Sciences" continues to advance with giant strides, under the direction of MM. Cuvier, Geoffroy St. Hilaire, Fourrier, and De la Place. Some time ago, a naturalist, whose name I will not mention for fear of injuring him, read a memoire on the phenomena exhibited in the life of certain insects. The subject, in itself highly interesting, was very cleverly treated. After the paper had been read, a murmur of approbation was heard, upon which M. Cauchy rose, and observed that the Academy must not bestow applause on this curious developement of insect life. "Allowing," said M. Cauchy, "that the things we have just heard described, were as true as I believe them to be false, such truths are not proper to be communicated to the public, in the fatal condition into which our unfortunate Revolution has thrown public opinion. Such statements may operate to the prejudice of our holy religion. They show too clearly the influence of physical causes, and tend to strengthen the mischievous doctrines of Cabanis." A general burst of laughter followed the address of M. Cauchy, who is the Quatremère of the Academie des Sciences. This worthy man, who is very anxious to push himself forward, and who seems to have no objection to become a martyr to contempt, requested, in the sitting of Monday last, that the Academy would dismiss from its library all books tainted with the spirit of philosophy. The Academy has been afraid to return any answer to M. Cauchy's request. Several men of science, whose subsistence depends entirely on the salaries arising from trifling posts, have been obliged to decline publishing some recent physiological discoveries, lest they should incur the accusation of tending to throw any new light on the relation between the physical and moral powers of man. Circumstances like that which I have just related are constantly occurring here to excite the sneers of a sarcastic people, always ready to ridicule power. This disposition on the part of the public sometimes induces literary people to examine the works published by the devout party, in which they often find some ridiculous fact which for a week affords a subject of entertainment in the saloons. The collected Works of Bossuet have just been reprinted. Bossuet, you know, caused the Court of Rome to condemn a book which Fenelon was weak enough to publish, on "Les douceurs de l'amour de Dieu," and "La pointe de l'ame extatique qu'il suffit de reserver à Dieu pendant l'anéantissement complet du pecheur en quietude." It is very extraordinary that a man of Fenelon's talent should have written this strange nonsense, and a great deal more of the same kind. And what added to the absurdity, at the time, was that Fenelon cherished this ecstatic and passionate love for the Deity conjointly with Madame Guyon, a beautiful young widow. Bossuet obtained lettres de cachet from Louis XIV. for exiling all persons suspected of quietism, the term used to express that tender and ardent love Fenelon innocently wished to inspire for the Deity. The Abbé Bossuet, the nephew of the celebrated Bishop of Meaux, and his agent at the Court of Rome, called Fenelon a monster and a bête feroce in one of the confidential letters which he addressed to his uncle. After the death of the Bishop of Meaux, the Abbé Bossuet found among his uncle's papers all his correspondence with one of his penitents. This little volume has suddenly acquired a sort of celebrity. Even ladies of rank evince an eagerness to read it. Bossuet's penitent was Madame Carnuau. She was a young and wealthy widow. A devotee, but yet witty and tender; no mere man of the world could have wished for a more agreeable mistress. What can be more amusing than to find laid open in full reality, and by the letters of the parties themselves, the relations which subsisted between such persons-a woman so interesting, and her spiritual director, the grand and sublime Bossuet! [Here we reluctantly break off our Correspondent's letter for the present :-the remainder shall follow next month.] SPECIMENS OF A DICTIONARY OF LOVE AND BEAUTY. NO. IV. ADDRESS AND ANIMAL SPIRITS.-Address is the art of behaving in the best and most seasonable manner on all occasions, particularly when the necessity for it is unlooked for. There are people whom we love and admire, and who make delightful companions, that have little or no address in the ordinary sense of the word. We relish them by degrees, or for some remarkable evidences of talent or goodness. On the other hand, there are men of address, in the worldly sense, whom we are unable, or speedily cease, to admire; nay, not only so, but whom we dislike the more for what would otherwise procure them the good-will of the discerning, as well as the foolish. These are people of no heart, whose address we learn to see through and resent, as an endeavour to take us in. But there is no question, that the more address a man has, in the highest sense of the term, the greater chance have his amiable qualities of winning and securing our love. We are less likely to mistake or be offended with him, jealousy apart. A friend is less likely to have his self-love unreasonably wounded by him. A mistress (we wish there were no such distinction in our language between a friend and a mistress) is more secure of his protection. She walks by his side with the greater certainty of proceeding smoothly in her path-of meeting with no obstacles, but what he will help her over in the best manner for herself. Nor is our preference of amiable qualities accompanied by address, over the same qualities without it, unfounded in reason, apart from a sense of our own convenience. It may seem hard that a man of intrinsic excellence should be at a disadvantage, however small, purely for the want of something which looks external, or of light importance; and it is often to be lamented that mere address carries it against him on very serious occasions, both to his own disquiet, and the ultimate regret of those with whom he has not succeeded. But this particular hardship, even in so small-looking a thing as the graces of artificial intercourse, is founded, no less than the greatest, in one of those laws of nature, which are good and wholesome in the general; laws, which are eternally informing us-if we would but listen to them-that a due harmony of the moral and physical in us, and the consequent tendency to please and be pleased with one another, are the first and greatest things in this our mortal state, and above all other systems of philosophy, whatever grand airs they may assume: they all end but in these, if they are worth any thing. Nature begins with them; and reminds us, with sundry pains and penalties, if we get out of the track. Animal spirits, whatever it be that creates them in the first instance, and continues or reflects them afterwards,-a -are the foundation of this evidence of a nature at ease with itself, called address. If all address is not accompanied with animal spirits, it imitates them, and most likely has once possessed them. Now animal spirits include either the possession of health, or a strong tendency to it in one part of our constitution. They are the result, at one time or another in our lives, of the experience of sprightly blood: sprightly blood is a part of natural health; and in that which is natural, whatsoever it be, are to be found the first principles of all which is happy, energetic, and desirable, above Nov.-VOL. XVII. NO. LXXI. 2 F every other consideration. A man's address, like his virtues and vices, commences before he is born. Give us two jog-trot or carking persons, who marry for money, and we will undertake to say, that their son will not be a man of address. Give us two sprightly, intelligent persons, or one sprightly and the other intelligent, or let both be natural, cheerful people,-healthy and of good confidence,-in short, let there be nature somewhere, and honest impulses, and it shall go hard but the offspring shall have a chance of beating his rival, when he comes to compare manners and shoulders with him. The first causes, even of the melancholy of the most virtuous, are to be found in something contradictory to health and a natural life, whether it begin with themselves or their ancestors. As to the reason why this is suffered by Providence, we have no more business to beg or discuss such a question, than the waggoner, whose team stuck in the mud, would have had to lie down and discuss the nature of the planetary system; all that we have to do is not to get into the mud, or to get out of it as fast as possible. Hypochondriacal wonder is a part of ill-health, and the greatest admonition we can have, to do our best to get well again. The stars in the heavens are brilliant and cheerful: we should acknowledge the happy intimation, and look up to them with pleasure and hope. But let us, at all events, cultivate the garden given us to live in, and not sophisticate ourselves out of our natural paradise. This is a mighty speculation to bring up out of a subject like the present it is like drawing a telescope out of an opera-glass. But no subject, interesting to humanity, is without its grand places, if traced up to its source. Let us return, like an aeronaut, to our crowd. The perfection of address is an exquisite distillation of the qualities of sincerity, good-nature, self-possession, intelligence, and animal spirits. This is oftener met with, perhaps, than sc formidable an array of good qualities would seem to imply. Garth, and his friend Codrington, Steele, and Vanbrugh, appear to have had them all, and, perhaps, Farquhar. The same may be thought of Congreve, if his friend's accounts of him are true; though we confess there are passages, both in his conduct and writings, which render it difficult to give them credit. We should guess Hoadly, the author of "The Suspicious Husband," to have been a man of address, of the cleverest and best-natured kind. Perhaps more characters of this sort are to be found among writers of the comic drama than any other set of men, their genius being that of sprightly intercourse. Addison, who, according to Chesterfield, was the awkwardest of mankind, and whom Steele confesses to have been one of the most bashful, wanted sincerity and animal spirits, perhaps good-nature. Prior was a man of address. Marvell was a man of admirable address: he had all the qualities requisite for it, moral and physical. Goldsmith, who had intelligence, good-nature, and sincerity, was deplorably wanting in self-possession. He was the son of a poor Irish clergyman, and bred up, most likely, in that mixture of learning and rusticity, which, of all educations, turns out the most awkward people. They know what address ought to be, only to be the more hampered with the want of it. If the consciousness of any bodily defect is added, the want of address is at its height. Swift, who was bred under Sir William Temple, was a complete gentleman, after the ordinary fashion, when he chose; but his imperious temper subjected A blunt him to mortification from those who repelled it as it deserved. Englishman, whom he thought to astonish and enslave after his usual fashion, saying, "You stupid English people do so and so," or some such thing, completely put him down, by replying in a similar strain, "But it's all along of you damned fools of Irish." A man of real address is too good-natured to commit himself in this manner. It might be thought that sincerity would hurt a man's address; that he would be too sincere to please us; tell us too much of our faults, and not speak kindly enough of our good qualities. But this is a mistake, provided the sincerity be mixed with good-nature, and wisely managed. There is no insincerity in managing our sincerity, if we may use a term which implies an instinctive rather than a conscious management; on the contrary, as all people have faults, so all people have virtues, or virtuous inclinations of some sort; and if a sincere, good-natured, and wise man tells us of our faults, or does not imply a denial of them, when forced upon his notice, his nature leads him, without any resort to artifice, to imply at the same time both a real consciousness of his having faults of his own, and as sincere an acknowledgment of our good qualities. It has been justly said, that advice is not generally disliked, because it is advice, but because so few people know how to give it. A good remark to the same purpose is, that advisers in ordinary do not put themselves into our situation, but insist on putting us in theirs; which, instead of being advice, is arrogance, and only substitutes their fault for our own. When a man of real humanity and intelligence advises us, the case is different. The plainest-spoken admonition we ever had in our lives was from a person whose memory we love and revere above that of all men, and whose hand we could have kissed while he gave it; but he was not less remarkable for the unequivocal sympathy of his nature, than for great talents. Candour and unreservedness are in themselves attractive, and only to be injured by qualities that do not really belong to them, which is the reason why so many persons are reserved. Men may flatter themselves, as they please, as to the nature or cause of their reserve; but the true reason is, that they have either not the sense to speak out, or real qualities enough to afford it. He who is always hiding, has a good deal to hide. It is not necessary, however, to have all the qualities here enumerated, in order to be a man of considerable address. Occasions for perfection of any sort do but rarely occur; and though there is a charm, on the most ordinary occasions, about the individual who is prepared for the greatest, yet the possession of any one of his qualities is accompanied by a share of his power. Waller, a poor-hearted man, was yet a person of very great address in the worldly sense, by the mere strength of his intellect and good breeding. His answer to Charles the Second, when asked why his panegyric upon him was not so good as the one upon Cromwell, that "poets succeed best in fiction," is deservedly admired: yet wanting sincerity, it is but a toy and a trifle, compared with a speech equally witty, and at the same time in earnest. In his old age, his want of good-nature was discoverable, among other evidences, in his reply to Lady Sunderland, his Sacharissa, who asked him when he would write such verses on her again. "When you are as young and handsome, Madam, as you were then." This was pure |