French & English

FRENCH & ENGLISH
A Comparison
PHILIP GILBERT HAMERTON
AUTHOR OF ‘THE INTELLECTUAL LIFE,’ ETC.
London MACMILLAN AND CO. AND NEW YORK 1889
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ADVERTISEMENT
In the years 1886 and 1887 the author contributed a series of seven articles to the Atlantic Monthly , which bore the title of the present volume, and are in great part absorbed in it. The book, however, is essentially new, as it contains much more matter than the articles, and the chapters are either hitherto unpublished or rewritten in a less desultory order.
This work is not intended to be historical. It only professes to compare the French and English of the second half of the nineteenth century.
It may be taken as typical of the author’s intentions that he has felt uncertain which of the two nationalities he would put first in the title, and that the question has been decided by a mere consideration of euphony. If the reader cares to try the experiment of saying “English and French,” and “French and English” afterwards, he will find that the latter glides the more glibly from the tongue. There is a tonic accent at the beginning of the word “English” and a dying away at the end of it which are very convenient in the last word of a title. “French,” on the other hand, comes to a dead stop, in a manner too abrupt to be agreeable.
The supercilious critic will say that I am making overmuch of a small matter, but he may allow me to explain why I put the Frenchmen first, lest I be accused of a lack of patriotism. This book has not, however, been written from a patriotic point of view; it is not simply an exposition of the follies and sins of another nation for the comparative glorification of my own, neither is it an example of what Herbert Spencer has aptly called “anti-patriotism,” which is the systematic setting down of one’s own countrymen by a comparison with the superior qualities of the foreigner.
I should like to write with complete impartiality, if it were possible. I have at least written with the most sincere desire to be impartial, and that perhaps at the cost of some popularity in England, for certain English critics have told me that impartiality is not patriotic, and others have informed me of what I did not know before, namely, that I prefer the French to my own countrymen.