History of Civilization in England, Vol. 2 of 3

Locke, who was travelling in France in 1676 and 1677, writes in his journal, ‘The rent of land in France fallen one–half in these few years, by reason of the poverty of the people.’ King's Life of Locke, vol. i. p. 139. About the same time, Sir William Temple says (Works, vol. ii. p. 268), ‘The French peasantry are wholly dispirited by labour and want.’ In 1691, another observer, proceeding from Calais, writes, ‘From hence, travelling to Paris, there was opportunity enough to observe what a prodigious state of poverty the ambition and absoluteness of a tyrant can reduce an opulent and fertile country to. There were visible all the marks and signs of a growing misfortune; all the dismal indications of an overwhelming calamity. The fields were uncultivated, the villages unpeopled, the houses dropping to decay.’ Burton's Diary, note by Rutt, vol. iv. p. 79. In a tract published in 1689, the author says (Somers Tracts, vol. x. p. 264), ‘I have known in France poor people sell their beds, and lie upon straw; sell their pots, kettles, and all their necessary household goods, to content the unmerciful collectors of the king's taxes.’ Dr. Lister, who visited Paris in 1698, says, ‘Such is the vast multitude of poor wretches in all parts of this city, that whether a person is in a carriage or on foot, in the street, or even in a shop, he is alike unable to transact business, on account of the importunities of mendicants.’ Lister's Account of Paris, p. 46. Compare a Letter from Prior, in Ellis's Letters of Literary Men, p. 213. In 1708, Addison, who, from personal observation, was well acquainted with France, writes: ‘We think here as you do in the country, that France is on her last legs.’ Aikin's Life of Addison, vol. i. p. 233. Finally, in 1718 – that is, three years after the death of Louis – Lady Mary Montagu gives the following account of the result of his reign, in a letter to Lady Rich, dated Paris, 10th October, 1718: ‘I think nothing so terrible as objects of misery, except one had the god-like attribute of being able to redress them; and all the country villages of France show nothing else. While the post-horses are changed, the whole town comes out to beg, with such miserable starved faces, and thin, tattered clothes, they need no other eloquence to persuade one of the wretchedness of their condition.’ Works of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, vol. iii. p. 74, edit. 1803.

518

‘L'annonce de la mort du grand roi ne produisit chez le peuple français qu'une explosion de joie.’ Sismondi, Hist. des Français, vol. xxvii. p. 220. ‘Le jour des obsèques de Louis XIV, on établit des guinguettes sur le chemin de Saint-Denis. Voltaire, que la curiosité avoit mené aux funérailles du souverain, vit dans ces guinguettes le peuple ivre de vin et de joie de la mort de Louis XIV.’ Duvernet, Vie de Voltaire, p. 29: see also Condorcet, Vie de Voltaire, p. 118; De Tocqueville, Règne de Louis XV, vol. i. p. 18; Duclos, Mémoires, vol. i. p. 221; Lemontey, Etablissement de Louis XIV, pp. 311, 388.

519

‘Kaum hatte er aber die Augen geschlossen, als alles umschlug. Der reprimirte Geist warf sich in eine zügellose Bewegung.’ Ranke, die Päpste, vol. iii. p. 192.

520

The shock which these events gave to the delicacy of the French mind was very serious. The learned Saumaise declared that the English are ‘more savage than their own mastiffs.’ Carlyle's Cromwell, vol. i. p. 444. Another writer said that we were ‘barbares révoltés;’ and ‘les barbares sujets du roi.’ Mém. de Motteville, vol. ii. pp. 105, 362. Patin likened us to the Turks; and said, that having executed one king, we should probably hang the next. Lettres de Patin, vol. i. p. 261, vol. ii. p. 518, vol. iii. p. 148. Compare Mém. de Campion, p. 213. After we had sent away James II., the indignation of the French rose still higher, and even the amiable Madame Sévigné, having occasion to mention Mary the wife of William III., could find no better name for her than Tullia: ‘la joie est universelle de la déroute de ce prince, dont la femme est une Tullie.’ Lettres de Sévigné, vol. v. p. 179. Another influential French lady mentions ‘la férocité des anglais.’ Lettres inédites de Maintenon, vol. i. p. 303; and elsewhere (p. 109), ‘je hais les anglais comme le peuple… Véritablement je ne les puis souffrir.’

I will only give two more illustrations of the wide diffusion of such feelings. In 1679, an attempt was made to bring bark into discredit as a ‘remède anglais’ (Sprengel, Hist. de la Médecine, vol. v. p. 430): and at the end of the seventeenth century, one of the arguments in Paris against coffee was that the English liked it. Monteil, Divers Etats, vol. vii. p. 216.

521

‘Au temps de Boileau, personne en France n'apprenait l'anglais.’ Œuvres de Voltaire, vol. xxxviii. p. 337, and see vol. xix. p. 159. ‘Parmi nos grands écrivains du xviie siècle, il n'en est aucun, je crois, ou l'on puisse reconnaître un souvenir, une impression de l'esprit anglais.’ Villemain, Lit. au XVIIIe Siècle, vol. iii. p. 324. Compare Barante, XVIIIe Siècle, p. 47, and Grimm, Correspond. vol. v. p. 135, vol. xvii. p. 2.

The French, during the reign of Louis XIV., principally knew us from the accounts given by two of their countrymen, Monconys and Sorbière; both of whom published their travels in England, but neither of whom were acquainted with the English language. For proof of this, see Monconys, Voyages, vol. iii. pp. 34, 69, 70, 96; and Sorbière, Voyage, pp. 45, 70.

When Prior arrived at the court of Louis XIV. as plenipotentiary, no one in Paris was aware that he had written poetry (Lettres sur les Anglais, in Œuvres de Voltaire, vol. xxvi. p. 130); and when Addison, being in Paris, presented Boileau with a copy of the Musæ Anglicanæ, the Frenchman learnt for the first time that we had any good poets: ‘first conceived an opinion of the English genius for poetry.’ Tickell's statement, in Aikin's Life of Addison, vol. i. p. 65. Finally, it is said that Milton's Paradise Lost was not even by report in France until after the death of Louis XIV., though the poem was published in 1667, and the king died in 1715; ‘Nous n'avions jamais entendu parler de ce poëme en France, avant que l'auteur de la Henriade nous en eût donné une idée dans le neuvième chapitre de son Essai sur la poésie épique.’ Dict. Philos. article Epopée, in Œuvres de Voltaire, vol. xxxix. p. 175; see also vol. lxvi. p. 249.

522

‘Le vrai roi du xviiie siècle, c'est Voltaire; mais Voltaire à son tour est un écolier de l'Angleterre. Avant que Voltaire eût connu l'Angleterre, soit par ses voyages, soit part ses amitiés, il n'était pas Voltaire, et le xviiie siècle se cherchait encore.’ Cousin, Hist. de la Philos. Ire série, vol. iii. pp. 38, 39. Compare Damiron, Hist. de la Philos. en France, Paris, 1828, vol. i. p. 34.

523

‘J'avais été le premier qui eût osé développer à ma nation les découvertes de Newton, en langage intelligible.’ Œuvres de Voltaire, vol. i. p. 315; see also vol. xix. p. 87, vol. xxvi. p. 71; Whewell's Hist. of Induc. Sciences, vol. ii. p. 206; Weld's Hist. of the Royal Society, vol. i. p. 441. After this, the Cartesian physics lost ground every day; and in Grimm's Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 148, there is a letter, dated Paris, 1757, which says, ‘Il n'y a guère plus ici de partisans de Descartes que M. de Mairan.’ Compare Observations et Pensées, in Œuvres de Turgot, vol. iii. p. 298.

524

Which he was never weary of praising; so that, as M. Cousin says (Hist. de la Philos. II. série, vol. ii. pp. 311, 312), ‘Locke est le vrai maître de Voltaire.’ Locke was one of the authors he put into the hands of Madame du Châtelet. Condorcet, Vie de Voltaire, p. 296.

525

Morell's Hist. of Philos. 1846, vol. i. p. 134; Hamilton's Discuss. p. 3.

526

‘Rousseau tira des ouvrages de Locke une grande partie de ses idées sur la politique et l'éducation; Condillac toute sa philosophie.’ Villemain, Lit. au XVIIIe Siècle, vol. i. p. 83. See also, on the obligations of Rousseau to Locke, Grimm, Correspond. vol. v. p. 97; Musset Pathay, Vie de Rousseau, vol. i. p. 38, vol. ii. p. 394; Mém. de Morellet, vol. i. p. 113; Romilly's Memoirs, vol. i. pp. 211, 212.

527

In 1768, Voltaire (Œuvres, vol. lxvi. p. 249) writes to Horace Walpole, ‘Je suie le premier qui ait fait connaître Shakespeare aux français.’ See also his Lettres inédites, vol. ii. p. 500; Villemain, Lit. au XVIIIe Siècle, vol. iii. p. 325; and Grimm, Correspond. vol. xii. pp. 124, 125, 133.

528

There are extant many English letters written by Voltaire, which, though of course containing several errors, also contain abundant evidence of the spirit with which he seized our idiomatic expressions. In addition to his Lettres inédites, published at Paris in the present year (1856), see Chatham Correspond. vol. ii. pp. 131–133; and Phillimore's Mém. of Lyttelton, vol. i. pp. 323–325, vol. ii. pp. 555, 556, 558.

529

Grimm, Correspond. vol. i. p. 332; Voltaire, Lettres inédites, vol. ii. p. 258; and the account of Hudibras, with translations from it, in Œuvres, vol. xxvi. pp. 132–137; also a conversation between Voltaire and Townley, in Nichols's Illustrations of the Eighteenth Century, vol. iii. p. 722.

530

Compare Mackintosh's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 341, with Œuvres de Voltaire, vol. xxxix. p. 259, vol. xlvii. p. 85.

531

Œuvres de Voltaire, vol. xxxviii. pp. 216–218, vol. xlvi. p. 282, vol. xlvii. p. 439, vol. lvii. p. 178.

532

Ibid. vol. xxxvii. p. 353, vol. lvii. p. 66; Correspond. inédite de Dudeffand, vol. ii. p. 230.

533

Œuvres, vol. xxxiv. p. 294, vol. lvii. p. 121.

534

Ibid. vol. xxxvii. pp. 407, 441.

535

Ibid. vol. xxxvi. p. 46.

536

Ibid. vol. xxxiv. p. 288, vol. xli. pp. 212–217; Biog. Univ. vol. li. pp. 199, 200.

537

Lerminier, Philos. du Droit, vol. i. p. 221; Klimrath, Hist. du Droit, vol. ii. p. 502; Harris's Life of Hardwicke, vol. ii. p. 398, vol. iii. pp. 432–434; Mém. de Diderot, vol. ii. pp. 193, 194; Lacretelle, XVIIIe Siècle, vol. ii. p. 24.

538

Villemain, Lit. au XVIIIe Siècle, vol. ii. p. 182; Biog. Univ. vol. vi. p. 235; Le Blanc, Lettres, vol. i. p. 93, vol. ii. pp. 159, 160.

539

‘Admirateur passionné du romancier anglais.’ Biog. Univ. vol. xxxvii. p. 581. Compare Diderot, Corresp. vol. i. p. 352; vol. ii. pp. 44, 52, 53; Mercier sur Rousseau, vol. i. p. 44.

540

Villemain, Lit. vol. ii. p. 115; Schlosser's Eighteenth Century, vol. i. pp. 34, 42; Tennemann, Gesch. der Philos. vol. xi. p. 314; Biog. Univ. vol. xi. p. 314; Grimm, Correspond. vol. xv. p. 81. Stanyan's History of Greece was once famous, and even so late as 1804, I find Dr. Parr recommending it. Parr's Works, vol. viii. p. 422. Diderot told Sir Samuel Romilly that he had collected materials for a history of the trial of Charles I. Life of Romilly, vol. i. p. 46.

541

Diderot, Mém. vol. ii. p. 286; Cousin, Hist. de la Philos. IIe série, vol. ii. p. 331; Helvétius de l'Esprit, vol. i. pp. 31, 38, 46, 65, 114, 169, 193, 266, 268, vol. ii. pp. 144, 163, 165, 195, 212; Letters addressed to Hume, Edinb. 1849, pp. 9, 10.

542

This is the arrangement of our knowledge under the heads of Memory, Reason, and Imagination, which D'Alembert took from Bacon. Compare Whewell's Philos. of the Sciences, vol. ii. p. 306; Cuvier, Hist. des Sciences, part ii. p. 276; Georgel, Mém. vol. ii. p. 241; Bordas Demoulin, Cartésianisme, vol. i. p. 18.

543

Quérard, France Lit. ix. 193.

544

Mém. de Morellet, i. 236, 237.

545

Œuvres de Voltaire, lxv. 161, 190, 212; Biog. Univ. x. 158, 159.

546

Burton's Life of Hume, vol. i. pp. 365, 366, 406.

547

See the list, in Biog. Univ. vol. xx. pp. 463–466; and compare Mém. de Diderot, vol. iii. p. 49, from which it seems that Holbach was indebted to Toland, though Diderot speaks rather doubtingly. In Almon's Mem. of Wilkes 1805, vol. iv. pp. 176, 177, there is an English letter, tolerably well written, from Holbach to Wilkes.

548

Musset Pathay, Vie de Rousseau, ii. 10, 175; Œuvres de Voltaire, liv. 207.

549

Biog. Univ. x. 556.

550

Ibid. xii. 418.

551

Quérard, France Lit. iv. 34, 272.

552

Ibid. iv. 361.

553

Biog. Univ. xxiii. 226.

554

Montucla, Hist. des Mathém. ii. 170.

555

Montucla, ii. 120, iv. 662, 665, 670.

556

Biog. Univ. iii. 253, xxxiii. 564.

557

Quérard, France Lit. vii. 353.

558

Biog. Univ. xxxviii. 530.

559

Ibid. xxxviii. 411.

560

Ibid. iii. 450.

561

Bichat sur la Vie, 244.

562

Quérard, i. 416.

563

Biog. Univ. iii. 345.

564

Quérard, i. 260, 425, ii. 354.

565

Ibid. i. 476.

566

Biog. Univ. iv. 55, 56.

567

Notice sur Cabanis, p. viii. in his Physique et Moral.

568

Biog. Univ. xi. 65, 66.

569

Ibid. xii. 276.

570

Ibid. xv. 359.

571

Ibid. xviii. 187.

572

Quérard, iv. 641, vi. 9, 398.

573

Cuvier, Eloges, i. 354.

574

Quérard, vii. 95.

575

Cuvier, Eloges, iii. 382.

576

Biog. Univ. xxxix. 174.

577

Le Blanc, Lettres, i. 93.

578

Quérard, ix. 286.

579

Robin et Verdeil, Chim. Anat. ii. 416.

580

Biog. Univ. v. 530, 531.

581

Cuvier, Eloges, i. 196.

582

Biog. Univ. vi. 47.

583

Quérard, ii. 372.

584

Haüy, Minéralogie, ii. 247, 267, 295, 327, 529, 609, iii. 75, 293, 307, 447, 575, iv. 45, 280, 292, 362.

585

Quérard, iv. 598.

586

Ibid. viii. 22.

587

Swainson, Disc. on Nat. Hist. 52; Cuvier, Règne Animal, iii. 415.

588

De Lisle, Cristallographie, 1772, xviii. xx. xxiii. xxv. xxvii. 78, 206, 254.

589

Albemarle's Rockingham, ii. 156; Campbell's Chancellors, v. 365.

590

Biog. Univ. vi. 386.

591

Letters to Hume, Edin. 1849, 276, 278.

592

Biog. Univ. xv. 332.

593

Brewster's Life of Newton, ii. 302.

594

Palissot, Mém. ii. 56.

595

Biog. Univ. ix. 549.

596

Ibid. xxix. 51, 53.

597

Ibid. xliv. 534.

598

Ibid. xlviii. 93.

599

Volney, Syrie et Egypte, ii. 100, 157; Quérard, x. 271, 273.

600

Biog. Univ. i. 42.

601

Ibid. viii. 340, 341.

602

Mém. de Genlis, i. 276.

603

Palissot, Mém. i. 243.

604

Biog. Univ. xi. 281, xi. 172, 173.

605

Quérard, ii. 626, 627.

606

Ibid. iii. 141.

607

Quérard, iv. 342.

608

Ibid. v. 83.

609

Ibid. vi. 62.

610

Garrick Correspond. 4to, 1832, ii. 385, 395, 416.

611

Biog. Univ. xxxv. 314.

612

Quérard, vii. 399.

613

Biog. Univ. xxxix. 93.

614

Ibid. xxxix. 530.

615

Quérard, i. 209.

616

Biog. Univ. iii. 533.

617

Ibid. iii. 631.

618

Cuvier, Règne Animal, iii. 334.

619

Quérard, i. 284, vii. 287.

620

Mém. de Morellet, i. 237.

621

Biog. Univ. v. 264.

622

Dutens, Mém. iii. 32.

623

Biog. Univ. vi. 165.

624

Murray's Life of Bruce, 121; Biog. Univ. vi. 79.

625

Ibid. viii. 46.

626

Ibid. viii. 246.

627

Ibid. viii. 266.

628

Ibid. ix. 497.

629

Ibid. xlv. 394.

630

Lettres de Dudeffand à Walpole, iii. 184.

631

Œuvres de Voltaire. lvi. 527.

632

Biog. Univ. xi. 264.

633

Quérard, ii. 598.

634

Biog. Univ. xii. 313, 314.

635

Nichols's Lit. Anec. ii. 154; Palissot, Mém. ii. 311.

636

Biog. Univ. iv. 547, xii. 595.

637

Ibid. xiii. 399.

638

Quérard, iii. 79.

639

Biog. Univ. xv. 29.

640

Ibid. xv. 203.

641

Ibid. 218.

642

Quérard, i. 525.

643

Biog. Univ. xvi. 48.

644

Ibid. li. 508.

645

Smith's Tour on the Continent in 1786, i. 143.

646

Biog. Univ. xvi. 388.

647

Ibid. xvi. 502.

648

Sinclair's Correspond. i. 157.

649

Quérard, iii. 418.

650

Biog. Univ. xix. 13.

651

Quérard, i. 10, iii. 536.

652

Ibid. iii. 469.

653

Biog. Univ. xxi. 419.

654

Ibid. xxi. 200.

655

Œuvres de Voltaire, xxxviii. 244.

656

Palissot, Mém. i. 425.

657

Biog. Univ. xxiii. 34.

658

Ibid. xxiii. 56.

659

Ibid. xxiii. 111.

660

Quérard, iv. 503.

661

Biog. Univ. xxiii. 373.

662

Quérard, iv. 579.

663

Sinclair's Correspond. ii. 139.

664

Mem. and Correspond. of Sir. J. E. Smith, i. 163.

665

Biog. des Hommes Vivants, iv. 164.

666

Quérard, v. 177.

667

Nichols's Lit. Anec. iv. 583; Longchamp et Wagnière, Mém. i. 395.

668

Quérard, v. 316.

669

Biog. Univ. xxv. 87.

670

Ibid. xxv. 432.

671

Ibid. xxvi. 244.

672

Ibid. xxvi. 468.

673

Ibid. xxvii. 269.

674

Ibid. xxix. 208.

675

Lettres de Dudeffand à Walpole, i. 222.

676

Quérard, vi. 330.

677

Biog. Univ. xxx. 539.

678