“If you don’t like me to hit her, give me your famous horse in exchange; that’s all I’ve got to say.”
“I cannot, because I’ve promised not to part with it.”
“Oh, you’ve made a promise, have you? What does that matter? Why, I make promises every evening, and break them every morning.”
“What do you say?” exclaimed Maurice.
“Why, of course, every evening mamma says to me, ‘My pretty Eusèbe, my little treasure, promise me now that you won’t put yourself into passions, nor disobey me any more; promise me that, dear, and here are some bonbons for you, and some chocolate à la crème.’ I promise of course, naturally. Afterwards, in the morning, when I want some more, she refuses, because, she says, I ought not to eat them before breakfast; but I put myself into such a terrible passion that she gives me them directly. That’s how it is, you see.”
“You are very wrong to behave in that way,” said Maurice: “but after all, your promises are not made quite seriously.”
“And what are yours, pray?”
“Mine are serious promises, and I keep them.”
“Now, that’s just because you’ve heard that men keep their promises,” replied Eusèbe, “and you want to be like a man. But the truth is, men are like me, I can tell you: they make promises to get what they want, and then they break them again to get what they want. It’s all very fine for them to say to us children—‘Don’t tell lies, be always just, keep your promises!’ Oh, I’m not to be taken in; I know all about it.”
Now, my little readers, I do not say to you that the world is peopled with only honest men: that would be deceiving you. But be assured that those who tell falsehoods are everywhere despised; and when anyone speaks of them, or writes about them, it is in order to show how much they ought to be hated.