In visiting a foreign country, and more especially its capital, the traveller, whose object is instruction, enters into the most minute details, in order to obtain a complete knowledge of the various classes of its inhabitants. As Seneca justly observes, in his epistles, what benefit can a person reap from his travels, who spends all his time in examining the beauty and magnificence of public buildings? Will the contemplation of them render him more wise, more temperate, more liberal in his ideas? Will it remove his prejudices and errors? It may amuse him for a time, as a child, by the novelty and variety of objects, which excite an unmeaning admiration. To act thus, adds the learned stoic, is not to travel, it is to wander, and lose both one's time and labour.
"Non est hoc peregrinari, sed erraie."
Wherefore Horace, in imitation of Homer, says, in praise of Ulysses,
"Qui mores hominum multorum vidit, et urbes."
I have, I hope, given you enough of sights and shows; let us then, my good friend, follow the wise example of the ancients, and take a view of men and manners.
Owing, in some measure, to the levity of French character, and the freedom which now prevails generally enough in all society here, this sort of study, sometimes so tedious, is greatly facilitated. In the Parisian assemblies of the present day, by an almost continual collision, self-love discovers the weak side of an individual whose whole merit consists in a little small-talk, and a rotation of those jolis petits riens, which, seconded by a well-favoured countenance and an agreeable carriage, have given him in the world the reputation of an amiable man; while, from another, we see a thousand essential qualities, concealed under a coarse exterior, force themselves into notice, and which his modesty, or more frequently his timidity, prevented him from displaying.
From the preceding preamble, you will naturally conclude that I purpose to appropriate this letter to a few remarks on the
PRESENT STATE OF SOCIETY IN PARIS.
In this city are three very distinct kinds of society. But the order I shall adopt in the description of each of them must not, in any way, lead you to prejudge my opinion respecting the rank which they hold among the French themselves. In this respect, I shall abstain from every sort of reflection, and, confining myself to the simple character of a faithful narrator, shall leave to your sagacity to decide the question.
I shall begin by the society, chiefly composed of the ci-devant noblesse, several of whom, never having quitted France, have preserved some of their property; and of emigrants, lately returned to their own country, and who have enough remaining to allow them to have a household establishment, but in a very modest style indeed, compared to that which their rank and fortune enabled them to support before the revolution.