The writers whom I have just named are dead, at least I presume so, for I must not profess to have done more than touch their winding-sheets in the course of my private reading. But there are two moralists of the period who remain alive, and one of whom burns with an incomparable vivacity of life. If I am asked why Pascal and Nicole have not been chosen among my types, I can only answer that Pascal, unlike my select three, has been studied so abundantly in England that by nothing short of an exhaustive monograph can an English critic now hope to add much to public apprehension of his qualities. The case of Nicole is different. Excessively read in France, particularly during the eighteenth century, and active always in influencing the national conscience—since the actual circulation of the "Essais de Morale" is said to have far exceeded that of the "Pensées" of Pascal—Nicole has never, in the accepted phrase, "contrived to cross the Channel," and he is scarcely known in England. Books and their writers have these fates. Mme de Sévigné was so much in love with the works of Nicole, that she expressed a wish to make "a soup of them and swallow it"; but I leave her to the enjoyment of the dainty dish. As theologians, too, both Pascal and Nicole stand somewhat outside my circle.
The three whom I have chosen stand out among the other moralists of France by their adoption of the maxim as their mode of instruction. When La Bruyère, distracted with misgivings about his "Caractères," had made up his mind to get an introduction to Boileau, and to ask the advice of that mighty censor, Boileau wrote to Racine (May 19, 1687), "Maximilian has been out to Auteuil to see me and has read me parts of his Theophrastus." Nicknames were the order of the day, and the critic called his new friend "Maximilian," although his real name was Jean, because he wrote "Maximes." There is no other country than France where the maker of maxims has stamped a deep and permanent impression upon the conscience and the moral habits of the nation. But this has been done by La Rochefoucauld, La Bruyère, Vauvenargues, whom, did it not sound frivolous, we might style the three great Maximilians.
The three portraits were first exhibited as a course of lectures at the Royal Institution in February of this year. They have been revised and considerably enlarged. For the English of the passages translated or paraphrased I am in every case responsible. The chapter on "The Gallantry of France" appeared in the Edinburgh Review, and I thank the editor and publisher of that periodical for their courteous permission to include it here.
April 1918.
LA ROCHEFOUCAULD
One of the most gifted of the young officers who gave their lives for France at the beginning of the war, Quartermaster Paul Lintier, in the admirable notes which he wrote on his knee at intervals during the battle of the Meuse in August 1914, said—
"The imperative instinct for making the best you can of life, the sentiment of duty, and anxiety for the good opinion of others, in a word honour—these are the main educators of the soldier under fire. This is not a discovery, it is simply a personal statement."
Taken almost at random from the records of the war, this utterance may serve us as well as any other to distinguish the attitude of the Frenchman in the face of violent and critical action from the equally brave and effective attitude of other races. He has the habit, not common elsewhere, of analyzing conduct and of stripping off from the contemplation of it those voluntary illusions which drop a curtain between it and truth.
The result of this habit of ruthless criticism is to concentrate the Frenchman's attention, even to excess, on the motives of conduct, and to bring him more and more inevitably to regard self-love, self-preservation, personal vanity in its various forms, as the source of all our apparent virtues. Even when we appear to be most disinterested, even when we are most clearly actuated by unselfish devotion, by honour, we are really the prey, as Lintier saw it, of the wish to save our lives and to preserve the good opinion of others. Underneath the transports of patriotism, underneath the sincerity of religious fervour, the Frenchman digs down and finds amour-propre at the root of everything.
This attitude or habit of mind is particularly shocking to all those who live in a state of illusion, and there is probably no aspect of French character which is more difficult for the average Englishman to appreciate than this tendency towards sceptical dissection of the motives of conduct. Yet it is quite certain that it is widely disseminated among those of our neighbours who are most prompt and effective in action, and whose vigour is in no degree paralysed by the clairvoyance with which they seek for exact truth even in the most romantic and illusive spiritual circumstances. To throw light on this aspect of French character, I propose to call attention to a little book, which is probably well-known to my readers already, but which may be regarded from a point of view, as I venture to think, more instructive than that which is usually chosen.