Did not the Duc de Brissac perform the operation himself for a moral and dignified sentiment, instead of letting himself be shaved by his valet-de-chambre? Often was he heard to say unto himself in grave soliloquy, while holding the razor open, and adjusting the blade to the proper angle, in readiness for the first stroke “Timoleon de Cossé, God hath made thee a Gentleman, and the King hath made thee a Duke. It is nevertheless right and fit that thou shouldst have something to do; therefore thou shalt shave thyself!”—In this spirit of humility did that great Peer “mundify his muzzel.”
De sçavoir les raisons pourquoy son pere luy donna ce nom de Timoleon, encore que ce ne fut nom Chretien, mais payen, il ne se peut dire; toutesfois, à l'imitation des Italiens et des Grecs, qui ont emprunté la plus part des noms payens, et n'en sont corrigez pour cela, et n'en font aucun scruple,—il avoit cette opinion, que son pere luy avoit donné ce nom par humeur, et venant à lire la vie de Timoleon elle luy pleut, et pour ce en imposa le nom à son fils, présageant qu'un jour il luy seroit semblable. Et certes pour si peu qu'il a vesçu, il luy a ressemblé quelque peu; mais, s'il eust vesçu il ne l'eust resemblé quelque peu en sa retraite si longue, et en son temporisement si tardif qu'il fit, et si longue abstinence de guerre; ainsi que luy-mesme le disoit souvent, qu'il ne demeureroit pour tous les biens du monde retiré si longuement que fit ce Timoleon.1 This in a parenthesis: I return to our philosopher's discourse.
1 BRANTOME.
And what lectures, I have heard the Doctor say, does the looking-glass, at such times, read to those men who look in it at such times only! The glass is no flatterer, the person in no disposition to flatter himself, the plight in which he presents himself, assuredly no flattering one. It would be superfluous to have γνωθι σεαυτον inscribed upon the frame of the mirror; he cannot fail to know himself, who contemplates his own face there, long and steadily, every day. Nor can he as he waxes old need a death's head for a memento in his closet or his chamber; for day by day he traces the defeatures which the hand of Time is making,—that hand which never suspends its work.
Thus his good melancholy oft began
On the catastrophe and heel of pastime.2
2 SHAKESPEARE.
“When I was a round-faced, red-faced, smooth-faced boy,” said he to me one day, following the vein upon which he had thus fallen, “I used to smile if people said they thought me like my father, or my mother, or my uncle. I now discern the resemblance to each and all of them myself, as age brings out the primary and natural character of the countenance, and wears away all that accidental circumstances had superinduced upon it. The recognitions,—the glimpses which at such times I get of the departed, carry my thoughts into the past;—and bitter,—bitter indeed would those thoughts be, if my anticipations— (wishes I might almost call them, were it lawful as wishes to indulge in them)—did not also lead me into the future, when I shall be gathered to my fathers in spirit, though these mortal exuviæ should not be laid to moulder with them under the same turf.”
There were very few to whom he talked thus. If he had not entirely loved me, he would never have spoken to me in this strain.