BALZAC'S REMAINES, Or, his last LETTERS.  
WRITTEN To several Grand and Eminent Persons in FRANCE.  
Whereunto are annexed the Familiar Letters of Monsieur de Balzac to his Friend Monsieur CHAPELAIN.  
Never before in English.  
LONDON, Printed for Thomas Dring at the George in Fleetstreet near St. Dunstan's Church. 1658.   

 portrait of Monsieur de Balzac 
Mounseur de BALZAC:  R. Gaywo●d fecit.   

THE STATIONER TO THE READERS.  
GENTLEMEN,  
I Am not ignorant that the Book which now fills your hands, is uncapable to receive either Supplement or Ornament, from any Preface. And, it may be, in these wild times, there are few can be accused of such a degree of conceitedness, as 〈◊〉 imagine that Balzac may be Complemented. Let this letter than be reckoned as a Tax paid to Custom: being sadly sensible that the labours of greatest merit are like to suffer as abrupt, & rude, except the Reader be courted and invited in the Dedication: There is one grievance more, which I earnestly deprecate; You commonly date the worth of the book, from the Abilities you taste in the Epistle; and if this Humour prevail here, I am Undone. Besides, you destroy my harmless design, which was to try whether the Noble conceptions of the Monsieur, would admit of any Advantage, and appear more orient, as they are foiled by this trifle:  
If any shall dispute the Decency of the Title, and ask, How these letters came to be called choice, since none fell from the same incomparable pen, which did not challenge the same Denomination; I shall easily yield: but, must crave leave to affirm; that by persons of high discernment, these have been gathered as prime Stars from the other Sporades, and are here presented in one entire Constellation: There was nothing but Gold in the whole Mine; but here you will find such as has been tried and stamped and passed in all places, not only Currant, but Admired.  
He is much a stranger to the world, that does not know that the style of Monsieur Balzac was considered in France, as the Treasure and Test of Elegance: And he was esteemed the best proficient, in that which they call flos linguae, the Delicacy, fineness, and Idiom of language, who had attained the nearest Resemblance of this Author; Observe the vigour and flame of his fancy, the Cleanness and Roundness of his expression, the spirit and briskness of his Notions, the prudence and Insinuation of all his Addresses, and you will judge him a fit Parallel for any of his Predecessors, that Rome or Athens has most celebrated.  
The Comedian was handsomely, caressed by him that said, If Jupiter would speak Latin, He might find Apparel for his thoughts in Plautus his wardrobe; Possibly, if the same Jove had occasion to transmit his pleasure (those Gods wanting the mystical ways of Communication which we now ascribe to spirits) he had chosen no other Mercury, but this Frenchman:  
I am unwilling to be guilty of so much folly, as to define or distinguish Letters, and then list them under their several Colours, descanting upon those perfections, which render them peculiarly grateful to knowing men: lest any should suspect that this one Letter was not written by myself. Gentlemen, I shall not blush to acknowledge, that 'tis much my Interest this volume should be generally read: For I believe there is Charm enough in it to dissolve the most covetous Resolutions: And that such revenues of pleasure and improvement will arise from the perusal of this book, as may prevailingly tempt the greatest husbands to buy more.  
Your humble servant THOMAS DRING.   

Books Printed for Thomas Dring, and are to be sold at the George in Fleetstreet, near St. Dunstan's Church.  

Law-Books.  
THe Pleader, containing perfect Precedents and Forms of Declararions, Plead, Issues, Judgements, and Proceed, in all kinds of actions, both real and personal; by Mr. Brownlow, Mr. Moyle, Mr. Gulston, and Mr. Cony: published by J. Hern Gent. in Folio.  
The Law of Conveyances of all manner of assurances, with directions to sue out and prosecute all manner of Writs; by John Hern Gent. in Octavo.  
The Reports of that reverend and learned Judge, Sir Richard Hutton, in Folio.  
The twelfth Part of the Reports of Sir Edward Cook, in Folio.  
The Reports of that Learned Judge, Owen, in Folio.  
The Reading upon the Statute touching Bankrupts, by John Stone, in Octavo.  
An abridgement of the Common Law, with the Cases thereof, drawn out of the old and new Books of Law, for the benefit of all Practisers and Students; by W. H. of Graies-Inne, Esq; in Quarto.  
An abridgement of the Acts and Ordinances of Parliament, from 1640. to the year 1656. by W. H. Esq; in Quarto.  
The Reports of Serjeant Bridgman, in Fol.  
The grounds of the Laws of England, extracted out of the fountains of all Learning, and fitted for all Students and Practitioners, in large Octavo.  
A profitable Book of Mr. John Perkins, treating of the Laws of England, in Octavo.  
An exact Abridgement of that excellent Book, called, Doctor and Student, in Octavo.  
The Interpreter, or Book containing the signification of all the words of the Law, by john cowel, in Fol.  
The Maxims of Reason, or the Rule of the Common Law, by Edmond Wingate Esq; in Fol.  
An exact Abridgement of all the Statutes in force and use, upon the fourth of Jan. in the year 1641. 1643. faithfully extracted out of the said Statutes, from Magna Charta, to the said time, by Edmond Wingate, Esq;   

Romances.  
ARtamenes or the Grand Cyrus a Romance Complete in five volumes in Folio, by Monsieur de Scudery.  
Clelia an excellent Romance in three volumes in Folio, by Monsieur de Scudery.  
The Illustrious Bassa, a Complete Romance in Folio, by Monsieur de Scudery.  
Astrea, a new excellent and complete Romance in three volumes in Folio, Translated by a person of honour.  
The History of Polindor and Flaetella, a Romance in verse, by J. Harrington Esq;   

Histories.  
THe History and lives of the philosophers with their figures in two volumes, in Folio, by Thomas Stanley, Esq;  
The History of the wars betwixt Swedeland and Poland with all their policies; in Folio, by John Fowler.  
An Historical discourse of the City of London with the History of Westminster with the Courts of Justice, Antiquities, and new buildings thereunto belonging, by James Howell Esq; in Folio.  
The History of the Goths, Swedes, and Vandals by the Bishop of Vpsall, in Folio.  
The History of Masiniello, the second part, with a Continuation of that tumult, and the end of it, by J. H. Esq;  
The natural and experimental History of winds, written by the Lord Bacon, and translated into English by R. G.  
The life and death of Freeman Sands, Esq; by R. Bereman in quarto.   

Divinity.  
THings new and old, or a Storehouse of above two thousand Similes, Sentences, Allegories, Apophthegms, Adages, Apologues, divine and moral, Political and Historical, with their proper applications; A book that will furnish the Reader with Rarities for the adornment of his discourse upon any subject whatsoever;  
Anti-Socinianism, or a Confutation of Socinian heresy; with the description of the lives and deaths of the chief Authors of that sect, and w●●n it was brought into England: by N. Chewny M. A.  
Mr. Crag against Tombs, with a conviction of the Anabaptists, newly printed with Additions.  
A Sermon preached at the assizes at Huntingdon, by J. Gaul.  
Mr. Sands paraphrase upon the Psalms, in large Octavo.  
Good thoughts for every day in the month, by H. S.  
God's house, with the nature and use thereof, as it ought to be understood and respected by Christians under the Gospel: by Simon Gunton, M. A.  
Eight sermons of Mr. Cragge, with a treatise of the lawfulness of tithes, and the lawfulness of Marriage by the Minister.  
An exhortation for desperate sinners; written by the Right Honourable the Lord Grandison, prisoner in the Isle of Wight.  
Sapientia justificata, or an answer to D. tailor's, Deus justificatus; by J. Gaul.  
The Soloquys of St. Bonaventure; Containing his four mental exercises, and also his treatise called the Bundle of Myrrh, concerning the passion of our Saviour, with 13 spiritual exercises of the said Bonaventure.   

Books of the affairs of State, of Choice Letters, and of Poetry.  
A Catalogue of the Lords Knights and Gentlemen that have compounded for their estates, with the sums that paid their Compositions; in Octavo.  
A Panegyric of the Queen of Swedeland in Octavo.  
Letters of Affairs, Love, and Courtship, written to several persons of honour and quality, by the exquisite pen of Monsieur de Voiture a member of the famous French Academy, established at Paris by Cardinal Richlieu.  
A Trance, or Mercurius Acheronticus; by J. Howell Esq;  
Modern policy taken from Machiavelli and Borgia by an eye witness; a most incomparable piece.  
The Minister of State; wherein is shown, the true use of Modern policy: by Monsieur de Silhon; rendered into English, by Sir Henry Herbert Knight, in Folio.  
The Accomplished Courtier; consisting of institutions and examples, by which Courtiers and officers of estate may square their Transactions prudently, and in good order and Method, by H.W. Gent.  
An Apology for Paris, for rejecting of Juno and giving of Her Golden Ball to Venus; by R. B.  
Pocula Castalia or Castalian Cups; by R. Baron Gent.  
Mirza a Tragedy, really acted in Persia: by R. B. Gent.  
Choice Poems, being Amorous, Moral, Lucory, etc. by Edward Sherburne Esq;  
Five new Plays, by Richard Brome, in large Octavo.  
Select Poems, by william Hammond, in large Octavo.  
Choice Letters of Monsieur de Balzac, to several Grand and Noble Personages of France; with his Familiar Letters to Monsieur Chapelain.  
Wit Restored; being select Poems never before printed.    

THE TABLE Of the CHOICE LETTERS.  

TO Monsieur de St. Chartres, Counsellor to the King in the grand Council. 1  
To Monsieur de Bois Robert Metel, Abbot of Chastillon. 3  
To Monsieur du Pui, Counsellor and Library-Keeper to his Majesty. 4  
To Monsieur d'Argenson, Controller of the Revenue in Poictou, etc. 5  
To Monsieur the Abbot de Talan. 6  
To Monsieur de la Nauve, Ensign to the Queens Guard. 7  
To Monsieur de Gombervile. 8  
To Monsieur de Bellejoy. 9  
To Monsieur de Clairville 10  
To Monsieur de Bois Robert Metell, Abbot of Chastillon. 11 12  
To Monsieur de Bonair. 13 14  
To Monsieur Charlot, Farmer-Generall of the Taxes. Ib.  
To my Lord Bouthilier, Lord Treasurer. 15 16  
To Madam de Villesavin. 17 18  
To Madam de Bourdet. 19  
To Monsieur de Preizac, of the King's Privy Council 20  
To Monsieur de— 21  
To my Lord Bishop of Angoulesm, Almoner to the Queen of great Briton. 22  
To Monsieur de Lormu, Counsellor and Physician to the King. 23  
To Monsieur de Zuylichem, Counsellor and Secretary of State to his Highness the Prince of Orange. 24  
To Monsieur the Precedent de Pontac. 25 26  
To Monsieur the Mayor of Angoulesm. 27  
To Monsieur de Villemontée, of the King's Council, and Controller of the Revenue in Poictou, Saintonge, Annix, etc. 28  
To Monsieur de la Thibaudiere. 29  
To Monsieur de— 30  
To Monsieur L'Hillier, of the King's Council, etc. 32  
To Monsieur de Bayers. 35  
To Monsieur de Villemontée, of the King's Council, Controller of the Revenue in Poictou, Saintonge, Aunix, etc. 36  
To Monsieur de Lymerac de Mayat, Captain in the Regiment of Conty. 37  
To Monsieur de Priezac, of the King's Privy Council. 38  
To Monsieur de Covurelles. Ib.  
To Monsieur l'Huillier, of the King's Council, etc. 39  
To Madam des Leges. 40 41  
To Monsieur de Borstel. 42  
To Monsieur Menage. 43  
To Monsieur Fermin, Counsellor to the King, Controller of the King's Revenue in the Generality of Lymoges, etc. 45  
To Monsieur the Marquis of Montausier, Governor and Lieutenant General for the King in Alsatia, etc. 46  
To my Lord the Archbishop of Corinth, Coadjutour of the Archbishopric of Paris. 47  
To Monsieur the Precedent Maynard, Counsellor to the King. 48  
To Monsieur Menage. 49  
To my Lord, the Bishop of Lisieux. 50  
To Monsieur the Earl of la Motte Fenelon. 51  
To Monsieur de Plassac More. 52  
To Monsieur Conrart, Counsellor and Secretary to the King. 53  
To the reverend Father Hercules, Provincial of the Fathers of the Christian Doctrine. 54  
To Monsieur the Chevalier de Mere. 55  
To Monsieur de St. Chartres, of the King's high Council. 56  
To the reverend Father de Marin, a Divine of the Society of Jesus. 57  
To the reverend Father d'Estrades, a Divine of the Society of Jesus, Superior of the Cloister in Bourdeaux. 58  
To Madam, the marchioness of Ramboüillet. Ib.  
To Monsieur Cossar. 61 62  
To Monsieur Menage. 63  
To Monsieur de— 64  
To Monsieur Gombauld, a Chanter in the Church of Saints. 65  
To the reverend Father Dalmés, a Divine of the Society of Jesus, professor of Rhetoric. 66  
To the reverend Father, Du Creux, a Divine of the Society of Jesus, Rhetorick-professor. 67  
To the reverend Father, Stephen of Bourges, a Preaching Capuchin. 68  
To Monsieur de Meré, Knight. 69  
To Monsieur Colardeau, the King's Attorney in Fontenay. 70  
To the reverend Father Tesseron, of the Society of Jesus, professor of Rhetoric. Ib.  
To Monsieur Perrot, of Ablancourt. 71  
To the reverend Father, Adam, a Preacher of the Society, of Jesus. 72  
To my Lord, the Bishop of Grass. 73  
To Monsieur the Abbot Talon. 74  
To Monsieur the Abbot Bouchard. Ib.  
To the reverend Father, Josset, a Divine of the Society of Jesus, professor of Rhetoric. 75  
To Monsieur de Marca, Counsellor to the King. 76  
To Monsieur de Rampalle. 78  
To Monsieur de la Cambre, Counsellor and Physician to the King, and in ordinary to my Lord Chancellor, &c, Ib.  
To Monsieur Salmasius. 81  
To Monsieur de S●udery. Ib.  
To Monsieur Perrot, of Ablancourt. 85  
To the reverend Father, d'Estrades, a Divine of the society of Jesus, Superior of the Confessors Cloister in Bourdeaux. 86  
To Monsieur de Borstel. 87  
To Madam de Nesmond, Superior of the Ursulines in Angoulesm. Ib.  
To my Lord, the Bishop of Grass. 89 Ib.  
To Monsieur Maury, Dr. in Divinity. 90  
To Monsieur l'Huillier, Counsellor the King, etc. 91  
To Monsieur de Bellejoy. 92  
To Monsieur Colardeau, the King's Attorney in Fontenay. 94  
To Monsieur de la Thibaudier. Ib. 95 96  
To Monsieur Conrart, Counsellor and Secretary to the King. 97 Ib.  
To Monsieur the Precedent Mainard. 99  
To Monsieur Girard, Secretary to the late Lord Duke of Espernon. 100 101  
To Monsieur de Bellejoy. 102  
To Monsieur Zuilichem, Counsellor and Secretary to his Highness the Prince of Orange. 103  
To Monsieur de Campaignole, Lieutenant to the Regiment of the Kings Guard. 104  
To Monsieur Favereau, Counsellor to the King in the Court of Aids. 105 106  
To Monsieur de Lavaux St. James, rector of the University of Poictours. Ib.  
To the reverend Father Andrew, a Preacher of the Order of St. Dominick. 108  
To the reverend Father Hercules, Provincial of the Fathers of the Christian Doctrine. Ib.  
To my Lord, the Marquis of Montausier, Governor and Lieutenant General for the King in Saintonge, Angoumoise. 109  
To Monsieur de Burg, an Advocate in the Parliament. 110  
To Monsieur Conrart, Counsellor, and Secretary to the King. 111  
To Monsieur l'Huilliard, Councillor to the King, etc. 112  
To Monsieur the Count of Jonzac, the King's Lieutenant in Saintonge and Angoumois. Ib.  
To Monsieur Perrot d'Ablancourt. 113  
To the reverend Father Hercules, Provincial to the Fathers of the Christian Doctrine. 114  
To Monsieur de Menage. 115  
To Monsieur the Abbot Talon. 116  
To Monsieur de Montrevil, Captain in the Regiment de la Meilleraye. 117  
To my Lord, the Archbishop of Tholouse. 118  
To Monsieur the Marquis de la Case. 119  
To Monsieur d'Argenson, Counsellor to the King, controller of the Revenue in Poictou, Saintonge, etc. 121  
To Monsieur Esprit. 122  
To Monsieur de la Chetardie. Ib.  
To my Lord, the Marquis of Montausier, Governor and Lieutenant General to the King in Saintonge, Angoumois, etc. 123  
To Monsieur Conrart, Counsellor and Secretary to the King. 124  
To Monsieur Costar. 125  
To Madam the Countess of Brienne. 126  
To Madam the Masses. Ib.  
To Monsieur de Covurelles. 127  
To Monsieur de Borster 128  
To my Lord, the Bishop of Grass. 129  
To Monsieur de Bois-Robert Metel, Abbot of Chastillon. 128  
To Monsieur de Scudery. 129  
To Monsieur de Lorme, Counsellor and Physician in ordinary to his Majesty. 132  
To Monsieur Girard, Official and Prebend of Angoulesm. 133  
To Madam the Princess. 133  
To my Lord the Duke of— For Monsieur the Colonel de— 136  
To my Lord Seguier, Chancellor of France. 136 137 140 141  
To my Lord, the Archbishop of Tholouse. 141 Ib.  
To Monsieur le Grasse, Counsellor to the King, and Master of Requests in Ordinary of his household. 145  
To Monsieur Remy, professor of Rhetoric, and Poet Laureate. 151  
To Monsieur Daillé. 148  
To my Lord the Count d'Avaux, Sur intendant of the King's Revenue. 149  
To Madam the Duchess of— 146  
To the reverend Father, Vital Theron, a Divine of the Society of Jesus. 147  
To the reverend Father, de Marin, a Divine of the Society of Jesus. 152  
To the reverend Father, Vital Theron, a Divine of the Society of Jesus. Ib.  
To Monsieur de Souchotte. 158  
To Monsieur Perrot d'Ablancourt. Ib.  
To Monsieur de Bourdigal Candé. 159  
To Monsieur the Count de la Vauguion. 156  
To the reverend Father, Stephen de Brurges, a Capuchin Preacher. 157  
To my Lord, the Duke of Espernon, Governor and Lieutenant General for the King in Guienne, etc. 154  
To my Lord, the Duke de la Rochefoucaut, Peer of France. 155  
To Monsieur the Count of Clerimont, etc. 160 161  
To my Lord, the Duke of Grammont, Marshal of France. 162  
To my Lord, the Duke of Rohan. 163  
To Monsieur de Couppeau ville, Abbot of la Victoire. 164  
To Monsieur de Bourzeys, Abbot of Cores. 166  
To Monsieur the Abbot of Lavardin. Ib.  
To Monsieur Solomon, Attorney General to the grand Council. 168  
To Monsieur Ferret, Secretary to the late Duke of Weymar. 169  
To Monsieur de Blassac Meré. 170 171  
To Monsieur Menage. 173 174  
To my Lord, the Marquis of Montausier, Governor and Lieutenant General for the King in Saintonge, Angoumois, etc. 176 177  
To Monsieur de Puy, Counsellor to the King. 178  
To Monsieur the Precedent de Nesmond. 179 180 181  
To Monsieur de la Nauve, a Member of Parliament in the Court of Inquiries. 182  
To Monsieur de Morin, Counsellor to the King, in the Court of the Edict of Guienne. 183  
To Monsieur de Monrave, first Precedent of the Parliament of Tholouse. 184  
To Monsieur Huillier, Counsellor to the King, etc. 186  
To Monsieur de Gomberville. 187  
To Monsieur Arnould, Abbot of St. Nicholas. 188 Ib.  
To Monsieur Sarran, Counsellor to the King in his Court of Parliament. 190  
To Monsieurs the Precedent Maynard, Councillor to the King. 191 192  
To the Chloris of Monsieur Maynard. 194  
To Monsieur Costar. 195  
To Madam de Villesavin. 196  
To Madamoiselle de Scudery. 197  
To Monsieur de Villesavin. 198 Ib.  
To the reverend Father Pitard, Provincial of the Jesuits in Guienne. 199  
To Monsieur de Barreaux. 200  
To the reverend Father, d'Estrades, a Divine of the Society of Jesus, and Superior of the Confessors Cloister in Bourdeaux. 201  
To Monsieur de Voiture, Counsellor to the King, etc. 202  
To Monsieur de Lyonne Counsellor to the King, and Secretary to my Lord the Cardinal Mazarin. 203  
To Monsieur Colletet. 204  
To Monsieur Conrart, Counsellor and Secretary to the King. 205  
To Monsieur de Souchote. 206  
To Monsieur de Bois-Robert, Abbot of Chastillon. 207 208  
To Monsieur the Abbot of Beau-regard. 209  
To Madam de la Chetardue. 210  
To Monsieur Sené, a Divine of the Church of Saints. 211  
To Monsieur de Morin, Counsellor to the King in the Court of the Edict of Guienne. 212  
To Monsieur Salmasius. 216 217  
To Monsieur John Frederick Gronovius. 218  
To Monsieur Rigault, Counsellor, and Master of the Library to his Majesty. 219  
To Monsieur the Abbot of Guyet. 221  
To Monsieur Heinsius, the son of the Senior Heinsius. 222  
To Madam the Countess of Brienne. 223  
Monsieur Conrart, Counsellor and Secretary to the King. 221  
To Monsieur Corneille. 223  
To Monsieur Costar, 225 226  
To Monsieur Grandillaud, Precedent in the presidial Court of Angoulesme. 229  
To Monsieur d' Argenson, Counsellor to the King and Intendant of Justice in Saintonge. Ib.  
To Monsieur Colletet. 230 231  
To Monsieur le Prieur Packet. 233  
To my Lord Seguier, Chancellor of France Ib.  
To Monsieur Menage. 236  
To Monsieur de Balzac, from his father. 237  
To Monsieur Maury, Doctor of Divinity, 238  
To Monsieur de Flotte. 239  
To Monsieur de Silhon Secretary to my Lord the Cardinal Mazarin. 240 242  
To Monsieur John Frederic Gronovius. Ib  
To Monsieur de Belleveve Villotreis' Counsellor to the King. 244  
To Monsieur Ménage. 245  
To Monsieur du Herrier, Canon of the Church of Beaucarie. 246  
To Monsieur, Costar. 247  
To Monsieur Girard Commissary and Canon of Angoulesm. 248  
To my Lord the marquis of Montausieur, Governor and Lieutenant General for the King in Saintonge, Angoumois, etc. 249  
To Monsieur de Meré. 250  
To Monsieur Moricet, an Advocate in the Parliament. 251  
To Monsieur Girard Secretary to the late Duke of Espernon. 252  
To Monsieur Conrart Counsellor and Secretary to the King 253  
To Monsieur Girard Secretary to the late Duke of Espernon 254  
To Monsieur L' Huillier Counsellor to the King. 255  
To Monsieur de la Thibaudiere. 256 257  
To Monsieur de Bois-Robert Metel, Abbot of Castillon. 258 259  
To Monsieur Conrart, Counsellor and Secretary to the King. Ib.    

THE CHOICE LETTERS OF M. de BALZAC,  

THE FIRST BOOK.  

LETTER I. To Monsieur de St Chartres, Counsellor to the King in the grand Council.  
SIR,  
I Cannot apprehend upon what inducements you persist so resolutely to love me. My unsuitable deportment might have extinguished the ardour of your passion; and I know not any reason that could oblige you to court the amity of the most unsociable and useless person in the world. Certainly, 'tis a very strong and generous inclination, that moves you towards a subject so little attractive, and brings your Cares even as fare as this Desert, wherein they can neither meet the entertainment they deserve, nor be returned with due acknowledgements. I am not displeased with the contentment you testify of the Letter, whereof you make so favourable mention; but it would much provoke my Choler, if having been written as my last, the success should cross my design, and I should be again engaged by it into a Chaos of compliments, out of which I conceived I had for ever made an escape. You may reproach the rudeness and austerity of my humour as long as you please, whilst I continue a perfect hatred to the profession, that first raised me in the world's opinion. I have discarded all my Hyperboles and my Antitheses, with the rest of the paint of Rhetoric. Therefore, notwithstanding my devotion to the person you speak of, 'tis a greater violence than I can enforce upon myself, to undertake the Title and Office of a Wit; and writ letters to her, without either matter or occasion. Since my quiet is not unregarded by you, I beseech your dexterity to divert such kind of tempests, and that I may receive this courtesy from you in lieu of that you design in my favour from Monsieur the Commissary. Two years are past, since I was in the thoughts of his Lord the Treasurer: and if in that space, I had fed only upon returns from the Exchequer, you may imagine, my fare would have been extremely slender and Philosophical. I should, now be as meager and hollow as the Creatures that Pharaoh dreamt of, and the Patriarch joseph interpreted. There is an Epigram of Marshal's, we have sometime read together, which might have afforded me comparisons to my dryness: but that I was willing to give you notice, by the way, of my knowledge in the Hebrew, and that I could use the Dialect of some Rabbins of my acquaintance: the pleasantness of this raillery, will assure you, that I am not cast down with melancholy and discontent. But yet, to declare myself well satisfied, and to pretend to belong to the Court by my Letters, now I do not so by my Pension; would be such an absurdity, as might entertain the spleen●, of the Momus's, and I should have no reason to be offended at their mirth. If I am paid, I shall be obliged to the Paymaster, and yet not malign any person. Though I be not paid at all, I here find real consolations against afflictions a thousand times greater: And I should deserve very ill of Philosophy, if having received more valuable benefits from her, than fortune has denied me, I should in this condition repine at any thing whatsoever. 'Tis for your friendship, Sir, that I acknowledge an engagement to my stars, and I beseech you to believe that I am and shall ever-be-most passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. January. 18. 1639.   

LETTER II. To Monsieur de Bois-Robert Metel, Abbot of Chastillon.  
SIR,  
I Cannot approve your scrupulous and excessive modesty, nor esteem it other than an injury to my affection that you tell me, you are deficient in your husbandry and  of it as you ought. It is too well rooted to need such curious looking to, and is none of those tender plants that fade immediately, if they miss one days watering. Things of robust and vigorous natures, do not require such continual care and vigilancy; and their own firmness secures them enough, without the solicitous diligence of another. I will not put you to any trouble to preserve me, leave me to my own fidelity, and you shall never complain of my loss. It is sufficient that I know you love me, and I acknowledge I have received such infallible proofs of this truth, that it is not possible for me to doubt its reality. You may spare all further care than upon what is essential; words are no longer the marks of intentions. There is a traffic of smoke driven as well by Letters, as by voice: and the honestest man that I saw in Italy would not vouchsafe so much as to unseal those that were delivered to him on the Holidays of the Carnevall, (you understand the manner of that Country.) This was indeed to put the just value upon trifles, and to rate them agreeably to their worth. There could be no greater justice rendered to Compliments, than not to read them when they were received, in regard they were not intended when they were written. For my part, I do so little account of those affections in picture, that if the opinion I have of your generosity were capable of augmentation, it would have been raised to greater assurance, in that you treat me with less ceremony and talk. It is certainly very reproachful to have grown old in an absolute conjunction of fouls, and notwithstanding to be still at Protestations the first rudiments of Friendship. Let us leave them all to those people that are delighted with repetitions of the same things, or have to deal with distrustful and stubborn natures. This office is long since performed betwixt you and me; and since we have attained the end, to what purpose should we perplex ourselves about the means, and never let our Rhetoric be at quiet? Be pleased to believe me, and we shall do well enough. These common Principles must be laid once for all, never to be stirred but in case of necessity; The first whereof is, that your affairs require more than four and twenty hours to the day, and my idleness is yet desirous of a greater excess. The other, that you are and will be my friend in your heart, without troublesome ostentation of it by fruitless civilities; as I likewise am and will be with the same reality,  
SIR, Your, etc. 23. Aug. 1640.   

LETTER III. To Monsieur Du Pui, Counsellor and Library-Keeper to his Majesty.  
SIR,  
THe infinite value which I set upon your love, has made me receive the tokens of it with a sort of ecstasy and triumph: and although as to the essential part of friendship your generosity does sufficiently assure my possession, yet it is great contentment to me, that I have that in my Cabinet which unquestionably confirms my Title. I received together with those dear pledges, the advantageous testimony you were pleased to bestow upon my Book, which I intent shall serve me as a buckler against all the insolences of Censure and the injustice of those perverse judges you speak of. I do not covet the suffrages of all the world; even the Heroes have come short of universal approbation. The most just and clear fame has been brought into question and disputed. I have seen a Gallant, in Euripides Tragedies accuse Hercules for a pitiful and cowardly Lubber; the moral whereof is this, that there is always some body in the world that are of contrary opinions to the whole race of mankind, and whose extravagant singularity is not scrupulous to put the lie upon the affirmation of all men upon earth. Pro and Con are of equal antiquity in the world with Meum and Tuum; and Reason is not of longer duration than opposition and disputes. Sound opinions have never been at peace or free from the Alarms of Malice and Ignorance: and even at this day, how many Schisms, Sects, and Heresies make open war upon poor truth? That part of it which has the holiness of Religion and her Mysteries for its object, is of much greater importance, then that which is only interested in the contrivance of a Comedy, and the purity of language; and yet there were counted a hundred Atheists and Sectaries for one of a right persuasion. Every thing under Heaven is contradicted; yea, even what God himself hath spoken. We must look for unity of Tenets somewhere else; here we can find nothing but Diversity and Medley: for as long as there are heads and passions; there will be contentions and suits. I esteem myself Victor in all those that concern me, since you do me the honour to uphold the justness of my cause: and since it is at the house of Monsieur de Thou and not at that of Monsieur de— where the true and lawful Senate is held, whose right it is to judge our Book-affaires. Let the worst come, I do not so take things to heart as perhaps you imagine; since I writ less to please others than to divert myself, and have need to be roused up that way from my repose, lest it turn into a Lethargy: it suffices me that your goodness dispenses with my Papers as a Course prescribed by my Physician; and that you do me the favour to believe, It is not necessary to be perfectly eloquent to be perfectly what I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Octob. 20. 1644.   

LETTER iv To Monsieur d'Argenson Controller of the Revenue in Poictou, etc.  
SIR,  
I Begin to conceive my solitude less obscure since I received the Title of Illustrious from the hand of one of his Majesty's Officers, and to esteem myself a more considerable person, in that you have deigned from amids your high employments to cast an obliging aspect upon the valleys of my Hermitage. To represent to you my manner of living, is an enterprise on which I dare not presume; neither would the Relation be fit the Curiosity of him that understands the affairs of all Courts and States. Yet I must not dispute my obedience; and will tell you in a word either what I do or what I do not. My life, Sir, is a profound and drowsy pensiveness which yet is sometimes interrupted by not unpleasing visions. Hunting is the delight of my neighbours, but I affect it not: nor have I skill in matters of Husbandry, the divertisement of our Monsieur d'Andilly. Our woods do not afford me a Nymph to entertain the tedousnesse of the time with, as the good man Numa had, and our honest friend Des Yveteaux. I am no gamester at Hoc, Primero or Tick-tack. So that I am forced to busy myself sometimes upon my books to discuss the torpor and languishing of idleness. But 'tis fit you know, that my meditations are not seldom brought to a perfect birth; I employ paper and a Scribe, and am continually sending somewhat to my good Lords and friends, wherewith either to justify my laziness, or request pardon for it. Since you intent to be at Poitiers the Fifteenth of this month, I have designed a present of this nature to meet you there. And were not my Coach crippled by the loss of two of my horses, I should myself be the bearer of my offering, and assure you in person, that I am with as much ardour as ever,  
SIR, Your, etc. Aug. 1. 1645.   

LETTER V To Monsieur the Abbot de Talan.  
SIR,  
HAd not Monsieur de— given me assurance of your facility to pardon, I should not have presumed to appear before you after a negligence of so many ages. You may please to judge the proportion of my remorse by the large periods wherewith I compute the duration of my fault. I should have sinned above forgiveness, according to the punctual regularity of Compliment on the other side the Mountains, and the Courtship of Italy. But I persuade myself you will allow somewhat to the French liberty. You have heard, there was once in Italy an honest man that made a Hymn to the Goddess Sloth, and took it on him as a piece of honour to be her Priest, My ambition is not depraved yet to such extravagancy, and I shall not be competitor with him for his function. The cloudy fumes of my melancholy have not yet so overcast my reason as to make me in love with nothing but night and sleep. And though I am much affected with this Recess of mine, as prohibiting admission to all Letters and News, yet I cannot but confess that it is destructive to all civil society and commerce, and of near resemblance to that wild condition of mankind before their union into Government. I acknowledge my duty, although I wholly fail in the performance of it. It is true, I am sometimes enchanted for whole years together, and do no more correspond with my dearest friends, and next neighbours, then with our Enemies of Spain, or the People that are separated from us by the main Ocean. But it is also a truth, that in my profoundest drowsiness I delight to be awakened with the remembrance of such persons as I infinitely honour and esteem, in which number I am proud to reckon you. It is yet a greater truth, Sir, that I shall ever most constantly observe the essential part of friendship, and remain with much fervency, though with little blaze and show,  
SIR, Your, etc. July. 14th. 1640.   

LETTER VI To Monsieur de la Nauve, Ensign to the Queens Guard.  
SIR, My dear Cousin.  
I Conceive not your purpose in your so wasteful profusion of your Rhetoric, and heaping such elaborate compliments upon me. Certainly, you could not have employed more, to gain a coy Mistress, or impose upon a credulous Enemy. It's a clear evidence you have breathed the Air of Florence, and been scorched with the Sun of Rome; and that you are but lately arrived from the land of Eloquence. But though you come from that country, methinks you ought not to have used their style of Italy, when you are treating with an ancient Gaul. These caresses which would oblige another man, are in a manner injurious to me; and you wrong my affection in imagining it to stand in need of your fine language to feed and maintain its heat. I can profess of myself, without vanity; that I am an honest and good man; and on the other side without flattery, declare you for a person exceeding generous. And these being undisputable certainties, how can you apprehend any hazard of our friendship by our silence? does it depend only upon a dozen lines every month? or is it built upon a foundation of Paper, that is, upon one of the slightest and weakest things in nature? I am not of this belief; and though I might justly blame my own pertinacious slothfulness, and allege the multiplicity of your affairs for the discontinuance of our correspondence, yet I had rather refer it to the confidence of a perfect affection, which giving us an undoubted assurance each of other, may safely dispense with both; for the observance of those petty Laws which the world prescribes itself. If the Sluggard, be so happy as to be visited by the Active and Industrious, he will endeavour to infuse some of his Maxims into him with his treatment of Muscadine grapes, and the fare of the village; using that of Virgil in lieu of all compliments.  Aude, hospes, contemnere opes— 
In September, I expect the performance of your word, and am ever with all my soul,  
SIR, My dear Cousin. Your, etc. 4 June 1641.   

LETTER VII. To Monsieur de Gombervile.  
SIR,  
I Had not a less firm persuasion of the immutableness of your affection before, than I have now upon the receipt of your Letter. Men knew how to love and to be faithful too, before the art of writing was discovered: And since that invention they have lied, deceived, and betrayed one another with greater facility and cunning. Nay, the crafty malice of some has even practised poisoning by Letters; and revenge has been Ingenious to turn these marks of friendship into instruments of destruction. Yet I do not infer from hence, that we should therefore never trust to a way of communication which may in possibility prove so dangerous. I only say, we are not to be so precise about evidences of that dubiousness, and which serve oftentimes as well to disguise and corrupt truth as to declare it. 'Tis from our hearts that we receive sincere testimonies and assurances of our mutual passion, though our commerce has not been managed with the stir and heat of answers and replies, yet neither has our quiet been cold and lifeless; nor is silence the same thing with oblivion. Certainly if silence will not be allowed in the rank of Virtues, yet it contains innocence in it, and does nothing at all detract from the purity of engaged fidelity: But which is some thing more, it conserveses it in the memory, by locking and keeping it up in restraint. There is a certain Author, either ancient or modern, that in favour of this happy silence pronounces it, The nourishment of the soul and its conceptions. I presume therefore, that these ten years past, you have had my company with you in contemplation. My portrait, (but far better drawn and by a more masterly hand, then that which you have of Ferdinand's doing) has never been out of your sight; and undoubtedly you have meditated of me during all this long intermission of our converse. You see what justice I do your friendship; and will not you judge as candidly of mine? And unless I should now assure you that I resound your name, over all this Province; that I fill this part of the world with relations of the wonders of your generosity, and of the greatness of your accomplishments, and that when I would feast my fancy and entertain it magnificently, I betake myself to the Court of King Polexander, could you possibly doubt of the certainty of such manifest and historical truth? Since you know me so perfectly as you do, I conceive there is no necessity of unripping my breast to you every day: and being also fully persuaded of the affection I have for you, you cannot in reason doubt, that I am in all sincerity, or to speak in the style of those that come from Paris, that I am effectively,  
SIR, Your, etc. 13. Feb. 1646.   

LETTER VIII. To Monsieur de Bellejoy.  
SIR,  
HOwever you are of a contrary opinion, your friend has reason to curse his profession. The stipend of a Partisan is preferable to the reputation of a Poet, and 'tis better to lodge in gilded Palaces, then to chante of the Golden age and lie in an Hospital. The famed Torquato Tasso wore tattered breeches, and stood in need of charity. There is a Letter of his abroad in the world, wherein he implores the largesse of a crown. And yet there is a certain Ignorant that I could name, who counts his wealth by Millions, and pities the indigence of a senator of Venice. He dreams of purchasing Principalities and Kingdoms, if there were any to be sold; and his high raptures have scarce left him humility enough to judge himself deserving of less than Crowns and Sceptres. But, I beseech you, what means Monsieur the King's Advocate to engage himself into the trouble of writing books? This is such an unseasonable absurdity as admits of no excuse. Surely 'tis too much Vacation with him in his Law-Practice, and there is no great crowding in his apartment at the Palais. I cannot tell what he would have me say concerning the first race of our Kings, and his Latin observations upon the Salic Law. If he should send me the contract of Pharamund's marriage, and an extract of Meroiiée's last will and Testament; or, to go higher, if he should present me with the original of the Twelve Tables of the old Roman Laws; with the first draught of those of Solon, or the Manuscripts of those of Lycurgus, and Charondas; yet all these rarities would not have power enough to awaken my benumbed curiosity, or tempt me in the least to a desire of knowing more than I do already. My humour is become so fastidious of every thing that is Grave or Serious, that my appetite cannot possibly be restored, but by somewhat that is very delightful and Merry. In the mood wherein I am at present, I would give both the Goddesses of Equity and Justice, with all the skill in the Laws, the Ethics, and the politics; for one drinking-song. I am not able to continue the trade any longer. The expectation of golden Letters from me is too unreasonable for my stock to furnish. But even now, I was overwhelmed in a great crowd of compliments of divers languages; so that rather than go about to pay my debts, I am resolved to break, and make a solemn renunciation to all my Greek, Latin, and French. I would sooner choose to get myself naturalised in Base Bretagne and buy the place of a Tax-gatherer in the Town of Quinpercorentin. 'Tis more than four nights, since I closed my eyes to sleep. Have pity, Sir, I beseech you, both you and the king's Advocate, upon  
SIR, Your, etc. 19 March. 1640.   

LETTER IX. To Monsieur de Clairville.  
SIR,  
I Had very unquiet apprehensions of the Catarrh of Monsieur de—, and your Letter has not delivered me from them, How well complexioned soever he appears to your eye, I ever suspected the falseness of that scarlet in his cheeks from the first day I saw him. There are deceitful shows of a firm constitution, and roses of an ill omen. 'Tis not Art alone that is guilty of daubing and counterfeit; Nature does some times dissemble, and flatter us with a false Gloss. And hence it is, that I do not always pass my judgement in favour of florid faces and a good colour. Yet I would not have you add despair to a man who has already received the alarm. Only advise him thus from me, that he take care to settle his mind in peace, and that I forbidden him studying with as much caution as riot. Since you assure me he has a great belief in my counsels, I enjoin him to make no more Prefaces or Paraphrases; indeed, not to do any thing at all either in Prose or Verse, as an Author or Translarour. And this upon pain of incurring the displeasure of the dumb Muse I lately showed, him, which is added by a certain Greek to the other Nine. She was well satisfied, as she affirmed, with the secrecy of his thoughts, and a quiet possession of his Soul. O prudent Muse! transcendently more discreet than all her sisters. Of what incomparable excellency is silence, and how great the vanity of words and ceremony! We commit sins enough beside this, and there is nothing admits of a more easy reformation. But we had rather get rheums and catarrhs, distil our brains by drops, and become hectical and consumptive over our papers, then forbear to make Prefaces and Paraphrases. In expectance of better news of the health of Monsieur de—, I rest,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 10. 1638.   

LETTER X. To Monsieur de Bois Robert Metell, Abbot of Chastillon.  
SIR,  
With your permission I will begin my Letter as you end all yours, and tell you that I am overpressed as well as you, although it be not with so fair a burden. I profess myself a fugitive from the world and a desertour of civil society. I proclaim this as much as possibly I can. And yet this world and this society make semblance not to understand me. They take no notice of a vow, which I caused to be published in print, that every one might know it. My silence is molested every day by other men's Eloquence, and in penance for my sins I am forced to become the mark against which all the compliments of France are levelled. Is it impossible for me to be quit of this trade of a Letter-maker, which draws persecution upon me from every side? And is there no way to resign it into the hands of some of our Brethren of the Academy, who perhaps loves the employment and new acquaintances better than I do? Is it not extremely ridiculous to have no business, and yet to write as much as a dozen Bankers; to be idle in perpetual action, and notwithstanding always at leisure, not to have so much spare time as to pick straws on Holy days? I would feign keep myself for a few, and admit commerce only with some select persons. But what reason is there to expect a punctual answer from me to Questions that come from Roiergne and Givaudan? or that I should make an Elogium upon a book sent me from Castelnau d'Arry, and give my approbation to a piece of Barbary-Latine, or low Britain French? In which I must delude some with flattery, and incur the displeasure of others by my freedom? Pardon me, I beseech you, the untoward humour wherein I am: I did not think it would have transported me so fare. Three great packets have irritated it, and almost made me forget what I own to the civility of your friend. I intent to give him thanks more at large: But it cannot be till the return of the next Post. I need at least a weeks time to compose my brain, and reduce the acrimony of my Rhetoric. I am ever most passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. 7. April. 1641.   

LETTER XI. To the same.  
SIR,  
I Do but little trouble myself with the thought of Eloquence, and much less of Fortune. I am fallen into that extreme degree of languishment, that I have scarce strength enough to tell you of my deplorable condition, or courage to desire the health I want. You have done me singular favours, but I am destitute of taste even of the best things. I am at the same pass with that man of the Country of Epigrams, who desired thirst of him that offered him wine. 'Tis not Sir, that I am become so precisely devoted to sobriety, but because I have lost my appetite. Fortune which is able to fill the widest desires of ambition is not able to content the morosity of Melancholy. Even Joy herself would be hardly put to it, to cheer my dejected spirits; unless perhaps that Holy-Joy that resides in heaven, and very rarely descends to earth; where it lies hid in the breasts of the reverend Fathers, and glimmers upon the countenances of young novices.  
Laetitiam, quae Caelicolum per limina semper  
Discursat, raroque imas petit hospita terras,  
Curarumque expers, lachrymasque exosa virago  
Exultat, totoque abigit suspiria Caelo;  
Hanc soli hîc novére deo gens plena, sodales,  
Ignati et Francisce, tui, et quos carcere clausit  
Insontes Bruno, Bernardique optima proles,  
Innuptum aeternumque omnes genus.  
But I must here distinguissi between myself and my melancholy. I do not cease to acknowledge the civilities that are done me, although I am not sensible enough to apprehend them with pleasure; and in the Lethargy of my other faculties; my reason acts strongly enough to keep me from being ingrateful for the new obligations I have to you. Be pleased to do me the honour to believe it, and never doubt of my constant fidelity. I will die, as I have lived,  
SIR, Your, etc. 10. Aug. 1645.   

LETTER XII. To Monsieur de Bonair.  
SIR,  
YOu cannot conceive how much I am displeased with the negotiation of Monsieur de— This was not to solicit for his friend's Pension, but to make a purse and desire charity for a lazar. When I imagine the pathetical beseechings to which he was necessitated to descend for the obtaining of an ordinary answer, I blush for shame at ten leagues distance, and a month after the thing done. Pardon my weakness; I am the worst beggar in France, I cannot crave importunately, or be glad of a favour that is gotten so. Monsieur de— was too obliging to debase himself so much in my behalf and to esteem nothing unworthy of his quality, whereby he might do me a kindness. I shall desire much less from him another time. I had rather have only his good wishes naked and pure, than his good turns that come with so much violence, and are rather extorted than granted. And the case would be equally eligible to me for one to fling bread at my head, and that that bread were rather made of stone then flower. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Feb. 14. 1639.   

LETTER XIII. To the same.  
SIR,  
IT is not for want of any kind endeavours on your part, that I am not in a state of congratulating the propitiousness of fortune. Were she an enemy that could be possibly reconciled, you should be the mediator to accommode our feud. But without question she will never trust the business to you: and on the other side I should forward it so coldly, that it would be extremely difficult to bring your good intentions to effect. Notwithstanding all adventures, I am already deeply engaged to you; and search no further into the cause for which you are pleased to lay a new favour upon me. Yet I will not omit to tender my civilities, to the person you know of, and to testify my acknowledgements to him in the manner you enjoin me. But a convenient time must be regarded; and the compliment shall nevertheless be sooner at Paris, than the money can be brought to Angoulesme. In the mean time you may please to show her the Letter of the late Marshal d'Effiat, which she is so desirous to see, and you shall receive with this Packet. She will there observe that in former times men could be pleasant and obliging in those places where now they deride and destroy; and that the raillery wherewith favours and courtesies were clothed in those days, was more honest and becoming then this which outbraves modesty and want. I am with much passion,  
SIR, Your, etc. 4. Jan. 1640.   

To Monsieur Charlot, Farmer General of the Taxes.  
SIR,  
I Never, thought it would come to be necessary to recommend the Muse's interest to you, who make profession of generosity. Monsieur de Balzac whose merits have given him an universal esteem, complains that you refuse him that contentment which he promised himself from your favour: Although his rare qualities, besides the justness of his request, may seem to speak enough for him with a person so noble and intelligent, yet I was willing to write thus much to you, and assure you that I resent the denial you gave him as an injury done to me; as that on the contrary I shall also be partaker with him in the obligation, which your speedy satisfaction of his desires shall lay upon him. In confidence that you will not fail herein, I rest,  
SIR, Your most affectionate servant. d'Effiat. Paris 14 March. 1629.   

LETTER XIIII. To my Lord Bouthilier, Lord Treasurer.  
My Lord,  
YOu think you have done me but one favour, and I account I have received two. For in my Arithmetic 'tis a second benefit, that you did not expect till I requested for the first; and the favour you have done me is not of much greater value with me, than what your readiness to anticipate my desires has spared me. A man that petitions with trembling, and falls back upon the least refusal; who has all the necessary qualities that go to the making up of an ill Courtier is very much obliged to you for pardoning him so many fears and inquietudes as he should have undergone in his addresses to you; and for that you have not had less regard to his modesty then his wants. These goodnesses are not after the fashion of our Age, nor even of a better than ours. For Antiquity has complained before us of a certain art of Difficulty which great ones practice in the doing of good offices to enhance their price. They would have not only Petitions and solicitations from their supplicants, but if they durst, even be propitiated with Hymns and Sacrifices. You act, My Lord, by principles more humane, and yet withal more noble. The obligation I have received comes so immediately from yourself, that I did not so much as contribute my desires to it, but you were pleased to prevent them. What I conceive I am bound to assure you of, in testimony of my grateful resentments, is this, my Lord; that I receive the obligation with all its circumstances, and there is no part of it, to which I have not an especial regard. I am not ignorant, that in these day's Philosophers are but little useful to the State; or to learn what reason persons that are fare distant from the verge of the Court, have to hope for any influences from it. I see that favours are distributed with much frugality: And the Astrologers have informed me of a mortal constellation in the Heavens, that hangs over the most deserved pensions. These considerations made me resolve to have nothing, nor desire nothing: and I commended the good mannagement of him that did at first refuse me with scurvy Tickets. But, My Lord, you have corrected the Malignity of the Aspects, and qualified the Influence of the stars, in my favour. You were pleased, to exempt me, by the prudence of your Conduct, from being involved in the calamities of the times, and partaking in the common losses. What shall I add further? You have either recovered one from death, or raised that which was already dead. For in effect, I began to reckon my annual allowance in the number of things past, and to style it, My pension of happy memory. After my consideration and astonishment at these evenements, all that I can do is to proclaim the Miracle, to bless the hand that wrought it, and to protest to you with the zeal and devotion of a soul sensibly obliged, that I eternally am,  
My Lord, Your, etc. May. 12. 1639.   

LETTER XV. To the same.  
My Lord,  
YOur favours are conveyed with so graceful and obliging circumstances, and your manner of giving is so transcendent above the vulgar, that if I did not apprehend something in it beyond the advantages of the present, I might be deservedly esteemed of such gross ignorance, as not to be able to distinguish betwixt rarities, and ordinary occurrents. I own you new acknowledgements for a new favour; for which I should endeavour a retribution, if it were possible for my gratitude to be as ingenuous, as your goodness; and I had the gift to embellish fine language, as you have the art of adding value and richness to gold. It is precious in its own nature, but it receives a higher price, from the stamp of your civility and coming to me from your own hands, I confess I discern such attractions in it, as would have been unperceivable, if I had received it from the payment of an under-Officer. You made choice of this means to augment your gift, without enlarging the sum, and 'tis one of your delusions to multiply four thousand livres to me, even to infinity. For so I construe the course you were pleased to use in conferring an obligation upon me beyond the ordinary standard of courtesy. Since there is subtlety and contrivance in your benefits, they must not be received so negligently and grossly as if they proceeded from a blind faculty and acting without understanding. The form of it is worthy of as great esteem as the matter; and therefore I ought to be, not only in the quality of one obliged for a favour done me, but as rational and one curious of novelties,  
My Lord, Your, etc. 20 Sept. 1639.   

LETTER XVI. To Madam de Villesavin.  
Madam,  
IF you esteem things by their rarity, you ought to set a high rate upon my Letters. They come not oftener than Anniversary Festivals; and though you oblige me every day in the place where you are, yet there needs a whole twelve months' time to send you one bare thanks from hence. It is not that I begin to be a frugal husband of my words, after a squandring away of whole Volumes; and that I am grown Covetous of that only Estate I am thought to be rich in: But Madam, this estate being no more but the figure of sound, proceeding from the mouth, and the issue of a small emotion of the brain, I am ashamed that I am not able to present you with that which may properly be called Some thing; and it vexes me always to employ my zeal, only to let you know it is unprofitable. To what purpose do we truck with our protestations and drive a trade with our wishes? And to what end is it to expose to sale that which we want, and to enhance what we desire to gain? to put ourselves in the high strain only to get a reputation to our poverty, and to gild the front of a Cottage made of earth and stubble? It is certainly fare better to say nothing with silence, then to say nothing in long harangues and discourses. I am confident Madam, you have a better opinion of an insolent man in reality, that confesses himself so without pretences of sufficiency, than one that rakes up all the fleight false artifices and points of Rhetoric only to dress up an image of gratitude. I am not minded to undertake so unacceptable a service, and which I should manage with so ill success. This would be the way to increase my debt by endeavouring to get a discharge; and after I had kept a great bustle, I should still find myself in the same place. I will take a clean contrary course, if you please and present myself to you once a year, only to declare to you, that I will never pretend to acquit myself from my engagements, but eternally remain,  
Madam, Your, etc.   

LETTER XVII. To the same.  
Madam,  
NEither myself nor my affairs are worth the trouble you take upon you. When you have an opportunity to oblige me, you think nothing beneath you: And you who are the most moderate person in the world do herein commit exorbitances. You break the limits of decorum, even you who so religiously observe them in all things else. Who was ever so surprised as I, when I understood you had given a visit to Monsieur de— and that only in favour of my interests? I cannot comprehend, Madam, how this person could receive such an honour, without descending from his high terms, and seeking their pardon by giving me immediate satisfaction. But there are a sort of souls, whose hardness is proof against all soft persuasions: there is a Colony of Savages planted about Paris that understand nothing either Fair or Honest; neither History, Oratory, the Muses or Apollo. Compliments make no impression upon them, and they would resist even the power of Exorcisms. I conclude not from their barbarousness that you wanted authority, but I gather that virtue does not exercise her credit, saving in the Civilised World. You can do, Madame, all that you promise me, to get my business effected another way. Your goodness is ingenious, ready and powerful to oblige me, but I have already received the greatest obligation from you that possibly I can. For it is certain giving me money would have been much less, then contributing of your patience to my affairs, and receiving a denial in my behalf. I know not, whether in the like case my stomach would be as good as yours, or whether I could venture so fare in your service, though I am with all my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. 3 July. 1642.   

LETTER XVIII. To Madam de Bourdet.  
Madam,  
LEt the curiosity of people be as diligent and as laborious as they please, there can never be found odours that may be paralleled to those which you inspire into your sweet bags. The most subtle essences of Rome have a mixture of terra damnata and impurity, in comparison. The Spanish perfumes are sophisticate, and hurt more than they delight. These are all pure and innocent, quickening and recreating the heart after they have flattered the brain and revived the spirits. They may be called a Masterpiece of Delicacy and Physic united. I may say that by your favour there remains no sort of honest and ingenious pleasure undiscovered: and yet I may proceed further, that if you were Queen of Arabia the happy, or the fortunate Islands, you could not have presented me with any thing worthier of those two fair Kingdoms. It is true, Nature is the first which labours in the production of odours, but it is you who afterwards cultivate her fertility and put her estate to improvement. Though Amber, Jasmin, and Orange flowers be in themselves excellent, you raise them into a temper that advances the nobleness of their being. These exquisite things attain their perfection in your hands; you purge them from all the defects of their matter, and bestow something on them beyond what they receive from the Sun. So that though he should come nearer us by I know not how many degrees, and had the same power at Saints that he hath at Memphis, yet he would ever stand in need of your art. If you did not second him, ●e could not digest those rich and precious vapours, whose Oeconony and disposure is yours alone, into their just and requisite temper. But do not think, Madam, that I commend you for a vulgar Artist, and that thereupon I have a design to reduce your merits to your finger's ends. I kn●w your value is high, and it is certain your Province is owner of an ornament in you, that deserves the Envy of the Court: which shall some other time be discussed more largely and with effect. You will give me leave to tell you in the mean time, that it is no small matter to be Associate with the Sun, to guide his productions to their end, to understand the Art of making flowers durable, to build prisons for the most subtle and thin spirits that inhabit the air. You confine them after such a manner, and your structure is so admirable, that they still stream forth, and notwithstanding remain still locked up in their fountain. This half restraint hinders them only from being lost in a total liberty, and if they had been less barred up, it might happily have been, I should only have received the tidings of their flight, and your civility. Because my good kinswoman procured it for me, she thinks she hath received it as well as I, and desires to testify the thanks she owes you for it. Be pleased not to disallow that she comes in to my assistance, and charges herself with the conclusion of my compliment. I resign the hardest task to her as being the most eloquent, and leave her all the part of returning thanks, to assure you in a single expression that I am,  
Madam, Your, etc. Jul. 15. 1636.   

LETTER XIX. To Monsieur de Preizac, of the King's Privy Council.  
SIR,  
THe gentlewoman who presents this Letter to you assures me that I am your favourite, and promiseth herself great things from the power I have in you, upon my recommending of her cause unto you. For my part, I willingly believe what I extremely desire, and there is no need of much eloquence to persuade me you do me the honour to love me. If it be so, Sir, I beseech you, let this poor Oratrix experiense that your friendship is no unprofitable happiness, and that my recommendation, shall not disadvantage a good cause. She is persecuted by the most notorious Barreter of our Country, and I do not think there ever came a more formidable one out of Normandy. His very name makes the Widows tremble and Orphans run away; there is no parcel of meadow or vineyard within three leagues of him secure to the possessor. He thinks he is charitable to the children, when he vouchafes to be contented to take but an equal dividend of their father's estate. He dwells in desks, and other places, sacred to the exercise of discord; and if you think it fit for me to use the phrase of our honest Plautus He is oftener seen in the Court then the praetor. Shall I conclude his Eulogy in one word. He is Attila in Epitome, that is, the scourge of God to all his neighbourhood and the cruelest persecution that the world ever suffered or History relates. He is, possibly, proceeded from one of less tyrannical principles. You will do a meritorious work, or rather an action of Heroic charity, in contributing somewhat to the chastisement of this public enemy. You will in one single person oblige a thousand more that are concerned; But I shall not have a less engagement to you, then if you regarded only myself, who am your suppliant, and most passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Sep. 12. 1640.   

LETTER XX. To Monsieur de—  
SIR,  
IF I were as officious as I have been solicited to be, you had received from me within this fortnight, a hundred and fifty recommendations complete. Even at this very hour I have occasion for denials, and I should continue in the old posture of my  stubbornness against all sorts of requests: but it is impossible to stand out against the assaults of friendship, and I have strength enough to resist the importunate, and come off safe with my modesty clean; but I am not hardhearted enough to disoblige good men, or neglect the kind Offices of Civil life. Sometimes a man must suffer himself to be overcome, and not obstinately keep the same Guard. Although I am gone out of the world, I willing re-enter it, when either Honour or Virtue calls me thither. In such a case, a vow undertaken at the foot of the altars might be dispensed withal. My first design was not altogether so religious: at present it would be beyond superstition, and a scandal to all Morality, if it should deter me from doing that pleasure to Monsieur which he attends from me. This gentleman hath been my dear friend, ever since the reign of Henry the Great, and known to be such by all France that can but read. I beseech you, Sir, let me not be discouraged, that I should be unserviceable to him by my intercession, for being able only to wish him success, in a business where he expects greater effects from my interest in you; It is in your power to grant me his Quietus, either wholly or in part. One would please me much better than the other, and since there is scarce any tax but you mitigate without any man's entreaties. I promise myself the obliging and deciding stroke of your pen, that will expunge this for my sake, and leave nothing deficient in your benefit: the Graces are not lame or crippled; they are all lovely Goddesses and fair in perfection, and having seen them so in Seneca's books, you would not have mishapen, and out of my knowledge in the favour which I hope from you, who have all Seneca by heart. The way to interpret him admirably and understand him better than Liferius who hath commented on him, and Malherbe, who hath translated him, is to do what he advises you, and be as beneficent as you are good. I once more beseech your aid in this affair, and to believe that I am perfectly,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 3. 1646.   

LETTER XXI. To my Lord Bishop of Angoulesme, Almoner to the Queen of great Britain.  
My Lord,  
BE pleased to admit my second address either in the way of an acknowledgement or a further instance in the behalf of the Reverend Father— It were great pity that his eloquence should lie idle; and his zeal is so impatient of rest, that if he preaches not in your Church, he will have much ado to be kept within his Cell. I conceived you had formerly granted me this favour for him, and I did already assure him of it. But what I attend from your goodness may be Christened with what name you please. If you would not have it styled the confirmation of a benefit formerly received, let it be the conferring a new one: I am contented to owe it you as long as I live, and as if I received it every day; and will thank you for it as often as you please, for I think it not any trouble to return you my respects, and protestations that I am  
My Lord, Your, etc. ●ul. 25. 1643.   

LETTER XXII. To Monsieur de Lorme, Counsellor and Physician to the King.  
SIR,  
FOr an infinite number of good offices which I have received from Monsieur Drovet, I have promised to recompense him with your favour; so that you are he that must pay what I own him, and this is the only way I have to acquit my scores with him. I will believe, you will not be backward to supply me with your assistance herein; you have ever used so unlimited a goodness in my behalf, that I cannot apprehend any nigardise, or closeness from that very soul which I have found liberal even to profusion. Do by me Sir, as you are used to do; and persevere to oblige me in a second person. Love a man whom undoubtedly you will esteem. The desire he hath to but know you, proceeds from the skill he already hath of many rare things; but you are his last and highest Curiosity. He wishes this happiness, because he thinks to meet with every thing in you; and that you have enough to latiate his appetite of knowledge: yet I do not entreat an absolute abandoning of yourself; your leisure and our discretion must regulate the favours we expect from your goodness. I only tell you that my friend doth deserve very particular ones, and that if you do discover to him the mysteries of the Arabians (for in those of the Grecians he is perfect) he will not receive your instruction like a profane plebeian, or a mere novice. His name is in great Letters in the Archives of Milan, and he is newly come from under the tuition of the great Cremoninus, almost as great and learned as himself. Not that he is a blind Proselyte of his deceased Master, I can assure you, he is wedded only to his legitimate opinions, and never was any faithful person more strongly persuaded than he, that the God of Abraham and Isaac is the God of the living and not of the dead, etc. When you have seen him, you will finish his Character. I am passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 8. 1641.   

LETTER XXIII. To Monsieur de Zuylichem, Counsellor and Secretary of State to his Highness the Prince of Orange.  
SIR,  
I Have a favour to request of your Court, which your reputation, I conceive, may procure me. 'Tis a longer Licence for Monsieur de—. His merit being so well known to you, I will not make a rehearsal to you, how he hath been continually in the service above these ten years, and on his body bears honourable testimonies of his courage, I only assure you thus much, that he had ere this been on his way towards the Army if I had not detained him fast with all my strength and employed the utmost power that friendship gives me, to make him defer his journey. His affairs are so important, and of necessity require his presence, that it would be the utter loss of them to abandon them in the condition they now are in; Nevertheless this would not be enough to stay him, and being more sensible of the least interest of Honour then of the most considerable businesses he hath: were it not for this violence that I exercise upon him, he would break all other chains that bind him, to arrive at his Charge, yet before the fifteenth of March. So that if any prejudice befall him for this stay whereof I am the Author, you see clearly whom he hath reason to complain of, and how little I shall be satisfied with my counsel, if it be of the nature of those medicines that corrupt the Liver, when they comfort the stomach; and if I could not propound him the conservation of one thing without the ruin of another. Wherefore, Sir, it is as well for the honour of my own judgement, which is engaged in the advice I have given him, as for contenting a person whom I love no less than myself, that I importune you not only for your favour, and your good offices (which I know are very prevalent with his Highness the Prince of Orange) but your expedients, and contrivances, which I am confident, are most dextrous and effectual in all kind of affairs now. Besides that the rigour of the Law does in some cases admit mitigation, and justice does not exclude mercy, there is nothing impossible for a prompt and intelligent head (as yours is) that can profitably employ industry, when it is fitting to be sparing of Authority; and rescue that by some By-way, which would be otherwise lost at Common Law. Monsieur de— when he presents you this Letter, will confer with you more particularly upon this subject: and offer you his opinion what wheels are to be set on work, to make his friend's business feazible. I beseech you once more to undertake it for my sake, and if you conceive my name of any power in your mouth, or that it were known enough to be alleged to his Highness, I durst engage he should not have cause to repent of granting me a favour, which I should trumpet out so loud, and send so fare, that, it may be, Posterity would thank him for it. It is a great while since I have had a high Veneration, of that Prince as one of the demigods of my Cabinet. But if he desires I should bear a more tender and ardent passion towards him; if he would be the object of my love, as he is of my Estimation; how delightful would it be to me to term him my Benefactor, and receive something from a person, whom I should not cease to admire, though he should take away all I have. I wish him Laurels always green and fresh; and if the War must end, a long and peaceable enjoyment of the purest fame that ever was; and a Glory that even the Enemy shall acknowledge, with general accord by the very Histories of Spain. In expectation of some news from you, I rest,  
SIR, Your, etc. Feb. 1. 1640.   

LETTER XXIIII. To Monsieur the Precedent de Pontae.  
SIR,  
MY first design is altered by the arrival of Monsieur de—. I was about to have made a request to you, and he informed me that I owed you a thanks. I understood from him, that he had found you so disposed to oblige me, that all his Rhetoric lay on his hands. He told me too, that even Monsieur de Thou's great name was used to you unnecessarily. In fine, Sir, I knew, that I needed only to have employed myself, to do myself any good offices with you. I am very fortunate to be so much considered in a place, where I thought I was scarce known, and to find myself all at once in your good opinion where you ought not to have afforded me a room until after a long trial of my service. But I see clearly from whence all this proceeds. Rigorous justice is seldom coupled with perfect Generosity: this last, which is properly their own, is more impatient to produce her effects and less regular in observing formalities. She would not be, as now she is, the honour of your own Province, nor celebrated in all others, did she so scrupulously attend desert: she will oftentimes prevent it, and I am one of the examples of this happy unworthiness: you have rewarded my good intention, and answered my very thoughts, as Heaven answers the religious silence of people upon earth. You promised me that which I had not so much as asked for; but yet having promised it to me after so handsome a manner, you give me courage to request it of you more vigorously though my whole library should reproach me for it. I will not stick to say, that my Niece became obliged to you for the conservation of her just right, I shall also be obliged to you for that which was only wanting to the tranquillity of my life. Though Philosophy promised me it, yet she alone is not able to present me with it, nor appease my disquiets; but by stripping me of my dearest affections, that would be too high an act of cruelty. Lay hold therefore on this advantage which you have over her, that I may owe you my repose for protecting the affections she had deserted; and that my contentment proceed from your courtesy, and not from the strength of my imagination. I hope all good success by all the fair prefages you have given my friend; and if the destiny of a cause may be read in the eyes of a judge, he doth not any whit doubt the event of this he counsels me. Therefore to end, as he prescribed me to begin, and since I am already in your chains; since I am already fastened to you by this obligation, I will, for the future, only continue to style myself,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 6. 1641.   

LETTER XXV. To the same.  
SIR,  
YOur facility hath attracted a persecution on you, and you will be importuned afresh, since you have laid a bait for an importunate man. It is dangerous to give such person's admission, and not dispute their first approaches. There is another sort of people, Sir, who take civilities for Deeds sealed before a notary, and pretend they should be warranted even to the utmost of their wishes. I am not altogether one of those unjust pretenders, who exact favours as peremptorily as Creditors do their Debts. My solicitations too are somewhat less violent, than those resolute suppliants, who part with their modesty to gain their boon. But, in truth, not being able to doubt either of the solidity of what you say, or extent of what you are able to do, I cannot deny but I build upon the aid that you have promised us, and expect from your protection all the good fortune of our cause. Heretofore the Gods and Cato, were of a contrary opinion in the most important difference that ever was. I hope in this, that is not of so much concernment, they will agree together for my sake. I mean, Sir; A Cato, more mild and gentle then that Cato who railed at fortune, can wind her about to our side in this occasion, and bring good luck to the business he undertakes. Pardon me the liberty of this last word, for it is your easiness and goodness that suggested it to me; and I take heart besides that, from the violent passion, wherewith I am, and ever will be,  
SIR, Your, etc. Dec. 15. 1641.   

LETTER XXVI. To Monsieur the Mayor of Angoulesme.  
SIR,  
I Promise myself, you will condescend to the request this bearer will make to you from me: it concerns the publ●que as well as my particular interest; and I know you are so exact in the functions of your Charge, that to discover an enormity to you, is almost to redress it. At the entrance into the Suburb Loumeau, there is a way, not to be complained of in ordinary expressions: it is more intricate and perplexing then a Labyrinth, it would teach a man to swear that can say nothing but Verily, it would change all the meekness of a father of the Oratory into choler. It does not fortify Angoulesme, though it makes people dread to approach it on that side. I had like, the other day, to have been cast away there, and wracked in the mire. If it had been in the main Ocean, in a scurvy shallop, and by the impetuousness of a tempest, it had been but an ordinary adventure: but upon the continent, in a Coach, and the serenity of the fairest weather, nay and in your Mayoralty, it is a mischief cannot be comprehended; there is no comfort for it. Three words of an Order, which I entreat you for, will reduce things to a better pass, and oblige all the Country round. Join, then, the benedictions of them without the City, to those which you receive within it, and suffer not the face of your Corporation, in the embellishing whereof you are industrious in other places, to be disfigured by so foul a spot in this. But after you have considered the Public, would not you value me at something, and bestow a favour on a person who is known not to be ungrateful for the courtesies he receives? There are some in the world will tell you more, and assure you, you have an opportunity to extend your reputation beyond the limits of your own Province, and make the year of your Mayoralty last long. I shall know, at the return of this Bearer, whether those men speak truth or not, and whether you so highly esteem the thanks I shall pay you, after the request I have made to you: whereunto I have nothing further to add, but the assurance I give to be sincerely,  
SIR, Your, etc. Ju. 4. 1638.   

LETTER XXVII. To Monsieur de Villemontée, of the King's Council, and Controller of the Revenue, in Poitou, Saintonge, Aunix, etc.  
SIR,  
I Will not relate to you the adventures of that person who spoke to you, whose conditions are as deformed as his body. I will only tell you, that I do not conceive his testimony fit to be received then mine: and though I give it in an affair that concerns myself, you have so good an opinion of my honesty, and discretion, as to think I would not recommend to you any unjust interest, or make you any uncivil request. I beseech you, Sir, then be pleased to consider, that this place which hath so great a reputation, yields but a very small revenue. Vlysses's Ithaca was very renowned, and yet it was but a nest hung upon a rock; mine, as you may imagine, is somewhat less. It is, peradventure, a handsome desert, but not a rich Parish. The ways in it are very fair but the fields very barren, and so consequently this Country more agreeable for the secesse and meditation of a Philosopher, then fit to fill the stores of a Housekeeper. Hitherto the Soldiery have only looked on us, not meddled with us: now, I beg you for a protection from unarmed enemies. With their wands, and bits of paper they make themselves more formidable than the C●oates. Their way of writing hath no affinity to mine; and the language they speak, is unknown to me. But on the other side, they understand neither Humanity nor Reason; neither Schools nor the Morality taught in them. If you please, Sir, let them learn what distributive justice is from you, since they have not been at leisure to learn it from Aristotle; for I am confident you will reform all things according to reason. Besides proportioning the burden according to the feebleness of him who is to bear it, it will be a sensible obligation to me of the greatest adherents to your virtue; a man that extols you with all his power. and that is with all his soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. Aug. 20. 1642.   

LETTER XXVIII. To Monsieur de la Thibaudiere.  
SIR,  
I Just now heard tidings that you were within six leagues of this place; and you, it may be, will be so good as to let me hear from you by yourself; but in the mean time, if the Storm of your troops should approach our villages, and that of my residence be threatened, you know very well what I have title to exact of you on such an occasion. I entreat all that your favour with Monsieur d'Aumont can procure, and enjoin you to make my interest your own: friendship is imperious, and her terms are absolute. You have read the confident requests written by Cicero, Lucian, and other our honest friends of Ancient time. I pretend to be loved by you after that handsome manner, though it be not to be met withal any where but in History; and though I know, common fame is not in that particular favourable to your virtue. That accuses you for being little sensible of other men's griefs, and being cured of an infirmity, whereof it is seemly to be sick: but grant, it did not accuse you falsely, and that you were more Stoical than Chrysippus and Cleanthes, I am confident, I should give you back again the passions that Philosophy had bereft you of; and make the first breach in your heart. But public fahie is a liar, and Report calumniates you; that heart has long since been softened for me, and it is certain, I am no less your dear and well loved friend, then,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 15. 1642.    

THE SECOND BOOK. To Monsieur de—  

LETTER I  
SIR,  
YOur Letter of June was delivered me in the middle of August, and I answer it in a Condition more capable to move pity, then confer comfort. My old diseases have of late assailed me, increased by a Megrim which does so torment me, that it would be a wonder, if a grief so neighbouring to the brain should leave the faculties of it at liberty. I am confident your goodness will pardon my weakness, and I hope you will not take it ill that in this general dissipation of my most reasonable thoughts, I cannot make you equal returns, but am forced to send you dross for gold, and things of no esteem, for things most excellent. It is sufficient Sir that I am able highly to value (as I do) the most eloquent and handsome dress you are pleased to put on your sadness: Yet I must needs tell you, if it should still continue, though accompanied with all sorts of Arguments, and Colours of Rhetoric, I would take upon me not to allow your perseverance therein. I would know willingly what you mean by that magnificent aggravation of your misfortune, by that Art, and those Ornaments you make use of in the setting forth your loss? Instead of letting it wax old, and die with time, it seems you seek to renew it, and feast yourself with it every day; and whereas 'tis expected you should by little and little blot it out of your mind, you would preserve it fresh and ever new, that (if possible) by the most lively and lasting'st Colours it might be kept to eternity. But how can an eternity be look for from the frailty of a picture, since we cannot meet with it in the strength of marble? Years spoil and consume it, it glitters finely, and then moulders into dust, and returns to its first nothing. It is from hence Sir, I find my greatest advantage to assail you, and summon you to yield up to Reason. We have in our Friend lost a most worthy Senator, I confess it. But the Senate itself shall be destroyed, and one day there shall be no more Counselors of Paris, than Conscript fathers of Rome, or Areopagites of Athens. We have in the same friend been deprived of a Mathematician, an Orator, and a Poet: I confess this too; but do not you sufficiently know, man lives only among casualties and walks only upon ruins? How long is it, I beseech you, Since Mathematicians, Orators, Poets died? We should accustom ourselves to such like accidents as these; they are as ancient as the world, and yet we look on them as strange things, and novelties of to day. These are no Prodigies, they are very vulgar and ordinary; and he who said There was none but the first death, and none but the first night that deserved astonishment and sadness, spoke a truth whereon we ought to reflect more than we do. Every thing without exception is condemned to the same punishment; and not only Parliaments and Judges are things not immortal, but learning shall perish as well as the learned; and the height of Astrology shall be no more privileged, than the lowness of Grammar. God who will dissolve the Heavens to build more beautiful ones, will not protect Globes and Astrolabes in the destruction of their object. He will not leave us any notion of our small acquaintance here, in the happy future he prepares for us, because we shall have no leisure there to enjoy them: our felicity shall be altogether serious. He will abolish both Prose and Verse; he will put down Prayers and Hymns, and all other imperfect forms of speaking to him, and make way for a more noble and excellent manner of praising him. I cannot, then, think it strange, whatsoever your exclamations say, that Artists and their works have an end, since the Arts themselves as well as their instruments must find a period. But grant it were not so, yet me thinks Sir, this End is no such horrible thing. I am so little at Amity with the world that I do not much deplore any whomsoever, for being no more in it. These five and thirty years I have been tired with it, and every thing in it displeases me: so that I murmur and exclaim against it. My friends are the only objects in it, that are not distasteful to me; and I hope you take it not ill, that I put you in that Role, since with passion I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Aug. 19 1638.   

LETTER II. To Monsieur L' Huillier, of the king's Council, etc.  
SIR,  
I Am always concerned in some trifling employment or other, so that I have neither business nor leisure. My unhappy fate hath imposed this voluntary servitude upon me which most commonly takes me up in frivolous affairs, and prevents me in the discharge of my more necessary duties. This is the only thing in my opinion, that can justify my silence to you, and oblige you to pity, instead of Condemning me; I have owed you a Letter a great while, and the news of Monsieur de Peiresk's death would require something more of me, if I should take counsel of my first suggestions, and act according to the usual Custom. But all good offices are not to be done to all kind of persons. It would be an affront to Philosophy and a doubting the profession you make of it, to treat you like vulgar men. I remember Seneca sometimes comforted women and a servant, but I do not observe that any body undertook ever to comfort Seneca. I assent to you concerning whatsoever they speak most highly and magnificently of your friend? and if you will allow me to make use in French, of a sentence borrowed from Greece, I add that we have lost in that rare person, a piece of the wracks of Antiquity, and a relic of the Golden Age. All the virtues of Heroic times were retired into this lovely soul. The universal corruption had no power over the goodness of his Temper; and the evil that touched him, could not defile him. His generosity was not bounded by the sea, nor confined to this side the Alps. He sowed his favours and civilities on all sides; and had remerciments sent him from the remotest corners of Syria and the top of Mount Libanus. In an indifferent fortune he had the thoughts of a great Lord, and never ceased to be a Maecenas, although not supported by the amity of Augustus. So that in this regard I shall not scruple to aver that he maintained the primitive splendour of gallantry in France, and the good esteem that foreign nations do yet retain of her. I am of as certain belief as you Sir, that he will be lamented of what ever is great and illustrious, reasonable and intelligent, both within and without the Kingdom. I am confident Italy will celebrate his memory in all her learned assemblies, and that in the Ages of the Princes Barberini. Rome cannot be indifferent to the memory of one so dear to the Muses; and I make no question but the Holy Fa●●er who valued him so highly, cannot forbear to bewail him; for in the midst of that serenity, which, above us; environnes him, this cloud of sadness reaches his height. But concerning all these things which you writ to me, far more eloquently than I am able to repeat, your discretion without doubt can afford yourself greater Consolation than what you seem to desire from your friends. If your loss were not common to you with the noble Multitude, if both sovereigns and people were not interested in your grief, it might be thought almost insupportable; but since there's no body but bears his part with you, certainly there is a great deal of sweetness in an affliction that makes all the world on your side; nay should you esteem yourself unhappy in this respect, it could not but be with some kind of Contentation. There is, in earnest, I know not what that pleases in the very wounds of this nature: when Princes are equally concerned with private persons, and Paris joins with the Country in the same fellowship of sadness, why should we nitty or lament? It is a funeral, little less splendid than a Triumph the praises and acclamations abroad take away all the bitterness of domestic Complaints; and methinks, the possession of that Glory, which cannot be ascertained but by death is very well worth three or four scurvy years that might have been annexed to old age. To this glory if I could contribute any thing I should esteem myself happy, and towards this I offer you my hands and labour, though I cannot erect either Colossus'es' or Pyramids? yet, Sir, without offence to those who have a larger, and more sublime fancy, who would set whole Forests and Mountains on work. I have heard that some Artists have wrought in little, with much commendation; It is possible to be famous for one's Art, and not be prodigal of the Materials: a great deal of matter may be comprehended in a few words, which by a long discourse is enervated. There are bad Preachers and scurvy funeral Orations enough in the world already. I beseech you let not me increase the number, and be one of those officious enemies, who thus with a good intention injure the patience of the Living, and memory of the dead. I have too great an Ambition of pleasing you, to give myself the trouble or run the hazard of disturbing your quiet. And if you were indisposed, I do not set so high a rate on my medicines to make experiments on such a soul as yours. Take it not ill than I beseech you, that I obey you after another fashion than you commanded me; and that I go whither you desire me, but by a way that to myself seems most convenient. Procure Messieurs de P●i to approve of it too: for in my judgement they are no less inveterate enemies then myself to these ridiculous Alasses and tiresome lamentations: for, if I be not deceived, they prefer the shortest Eulogy in Livy, before the great volume of discourses printed after the death of the late King: though Legitimate Apoth●osies are not made any where but in their studies, and that from thence credit and esteem are dispensed, and men are declared Illustrious. I will not omit, since they will have it so, to do my devotions apart, nor will I scrupulously refuse room in my Works to a virtue, which they have already listed up to Heaven. The Contentment of my friends shall ever be dearer to me then my own reputation. The least beck from you shall have a greater power over me, than that Lethargy of Spirit, you so handsomely reproach me with. And therefore though I should spoil the business that you Imagine I shall give lustre to, doubt not but I am very glad to evince to you on this opportunity that I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Aug. 15. 1640.  
MEntion is made of this Letter, in the life of Monsieur de Peiresk, at the end of the sixth Book: and not to speak any thing concerning the excellency of it, let it suffice to know, it was desired in Rome before it was written in France; as appears by a Latin Epistle of the Abbot Bouchard printed at Venice, after the funeral Oration spoken in the Academy of Humorists, Here are subjoined the two places of the History, and the Epistle.  
Alias etiam praetereo, quibus amici eruditique, in quorum pectoribus Candor et Gratitudo inhabitat; ut dolorem testati sunt, sic consolationem mutuam adhibuerunt, Pervenêre ad me complures, sed principem locum eae tenent, quibus Jo. Ludovicus Guezius Balzacius, celebris ille scilicet, cui nemo non Gallice modò, sed Latine etiam scribentium, elegantiae palmam non facile cedat, singulariter parentavit, Lib. 6. de vita Peireskii per Petrum Gassendum  
Tu vero interea Nicolaï Claudii Fabricii Peirescii 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 memoriam, qua soles pietate, colere perge; et Petrum Gassendum etiam atque etiam urge, ut suos de ejus vitâ Commentarios, quàm maximé copiosoes ocyùs dimittat; sed in primis a Rigaltio et Balzacio, hominibus in literis quibus dediti sunt, summis atque perfectis, omni study contend, ut aeternis elegantissimorum scriptorum suorum monumentis, Heroem nostrum velint ad Inmortalitatem consecrare, vale. Romae Kalendis Januariis A. C. N.M.D CXXVIII Ex Epistola Johannis Jacobi Buccardi ad Franciscum Olearium, Regiarum Rationum Lutetiae Magistrum.   

LETTER III. To Monsieur de Bayers.  
SIR,  
IF I had known of your loss earlier, I should sooner have shown you what a part I bear in your grief. I just now understood the cause of it in the Gazette, and make no question, how strong and how fortified soever you be with Constancy, but that you are sensible of the blow your family hath received, and which will be felt all over our Province. Without injury to nature, reason cannot rank such like Accidents in the number of things Indifferent. Tenderness of heart is not incompatible with greatness of spirit; for those who have undauntedly seen their own blood trickle down, yet have with tears bewailed their kindred and friends in that Condition. Well, Sir, we must not think to make war, upon other terms: There was ever mourning and tears, even on the side of victory. Let us hope to recall him home who gives us occasion to speak so often of it, and let us not ambition the Empire of the World, at the rate of so dear a life as his. You must in this life a●me yourself with comfort against all sorts of death; and that great kinsman of yours should countervail all the former misfortunes of your life. It is a perpetual reason of Content and cause of satisfaction, that there is no colour why you should grieve for any one; or any lament you. Yet, I do it, Sir, in obedience to custom; knowing withal that that part of the soul, which suffers, is strucken sooner, than that which Reason hath warded off the blow. I thought it was necessary for me to enter into the same thoughts with you, but that it was as necessary too, to get out of them; and by a way which without doubt yourself had made choice of. I will hope that hereafter you will possess all your joys pure, and serene; and that Heaven, who loves you, reserves successes for you, wherein your Moderation shall be more requisite, than your Constancy: at least. I wish them you withal my heart, being without Compliment,  
SIR, Your, etc. June 5. 1642.   

LETTER iv To Monsieur de Villemontee of the King's Council, Controller of the Revenue in Poitou, Saintonge, Aunix, etc.  
SIR,  
YOu will say, it may be, my zeal renders me impatient; but though you could justly tax it of indiscretion, yet I must send this bea●er to you, to know at his return what I cannot be ignorant of without disquiet. When I parted from you, I left you in the best plight, the study of wisdom could settle a mind perfectly reasonable; and the Letter you did me the honour to write to me, informs me of nothing that should not continue you in this good temper. Nevertheless, I confess that sentence of sadness among the rest runs in my mind. And in truth it would trouble me if so drowsy and effeminate a passion as that is, should encroach upon your vigilance and fortitude. I remember the sage discourse you held me in, when your wound was yet green; sure you have not forgotten the great Precedent you then propounded, and what was so ready in your memory at the day of our separation. They who bequeathed us those high examples, concerning which we held so long a conference; were not happy or unlucky but in the good or bad fortune of the Commonwealth. They bore so great a love to their Country, that they left none for themselves. They knew no dysasters b●t wicked actions and the blame that attends on them; they dreaded faults, but despised every thing else. And unless you mightily dissembled, you are of the same mind: these are your principles as well as theirs; and consequently Sir, while you do the King service with courage and understanding, and your Gown saves him the expense of an army on this side the Loire: while you maintain yourself in repute at the Court, without losing the affection of the people, and while by your dexterity the bitterness of your medicines make not the Physician distasteful; I cannot think you have any need of consolation; nor that the Melancholy and clouds of an afflicted soul can retain their mists before the splendour and light of so unblemished a life. He whom I have sent to you will, without doubt, bring me the confirmation of all this, and the meaning of a sentence which I shall be very glad rightly to understand; my passion is wittily resolved to perplex me, but your goodness, me thinks is obliged, to draw me out of it: for I am not an ill interpreter of your words, but because it is with affection, (which is never without alarms), that I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jul. 1. 1641.   

LETTER V To Monsieur de Lymerac de Mayat, Captain in the Regiment of Conty.  
SIR,  
I Have no great inclinations to serve you in your request. I know not how to bewail a man who hath gotten so much honour as you. You are more fit for Brave men's envy, than Philosopher's compassion: and your laurels are much more delicate, than your chains: a stubborn Imprisonment is not so great an evil as you imagine it: it gives ill influences leisure to pass over you: it reserves a man to a happier season; and, it may be, we should have lost you, if our enemies had not preserved you. As concerning the Brimmers of Germany, of which you spoke to me with such grief, as if they were Turkish bastinadoes; methinks, your sobriety is there a thought too superstitious. You must (as they that talk proverbs say) when you are at Rome, do as they do at Rome, and not to allege to you great Commanders. Do not you know that wise Ambassadors have heretofore been fuddled for the good of the King's affairs, and sacrificed all their wisdom and gravity to the necessity of the times, and the custom of the countries in which they resided. I do not advise you to debauchery, that is prohibited: but I do not think there is any harm in drowning your cares, now and then, in Rhenish wine, and to make use of that pretty trick of contracting the time, which seems tediously long to prisoners. Your father all this while labours hard to procure your liberty, and you must think he doth not forget his cares and usual activeness in a business that is nearer his heart then all his other. For my part, being able to contribute only my good wishes, I can assure you, they are most ardent and passionate, for I am as much as it is possible to be,  
SIR, Your, etc. Dec. 15. 1645.   

LETTER VI To Monsieur de Prizac, of the King's Privy Council.  
SIR,  
IT is better to be sick in your company, than well in your absence. The delight I now take, comes not near the comfort you gave me; and your society is so good, that it makes even diseases pleasant. If it cannot be had at a lower price, than lameness, I renounce the use of my legs; and beg God to give me my infirmity again, on condition he send back my comforter. That is to say, I am not myself without you. Lately I held you in esteem only for your virtue, which I looked upon then as being unconcerned; and as on a good, I had no title to. Now I am in love with your person, which gives me a propriety in you, and a right to call you my own: This rouses and awakes me in the night: this makes me jealous of Monsieur d'Espesses, the Lord Abbot of Cerisy, our dear Monsieur de la Chambre, etc. I say nothing to you about your most learned and eloquent discourses, Monsieur Caplain will show you what I writ to him concerning them, in the ecstasy you left me; to which I can only annex this little label of my admiration. O how prevalent is truth when you dispense it! and how much have good causes, need of you, to be as strong as they are just! I am with all my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. Apr. 3. 1639.   

LETTER VII. To Monsieur de Covurelles.  
SIR,  
AFter I have told you that, honouring you perfectly as I do, I cannot be moderately touched with your loss, I have no mind to engage myself in the Common place of Consolations. I preach not steadfastness to a man who hath kept himself upright more than once in the public ruins, and hath afforded us examples. You are he that I would be; and Monsieur Huggens' Constanter (which he took for his Motto because his name was Constantine) belongs to you much more justly, then if you had only a title to it by virtue of an allusion to your name. Well, in earnest I am too much obliged to that honest Gallo-belgic for his remembrance of me; and that fine language he writ you to show me. But since he is afraid to trouble me with unnecessary Letters, me thinks, I ought to have as great a respect to his business, as he hath indulgence to my sloth; and then I shall do discreetly, by not putting myself to trouble nor him. About five or six months since, he sent me the Platform of a Palace that he hath builded, and write me word that he was providing me an apartment there. Since I am so unfortunate that I am not able to crawl so fare as to Saint Bris to tender my respects to you, sure, I shall hardly get over sea to take possession of the lodging prepared for me. But knowing, Sir, that you have an exquisite skill in the curiosity of Arts, and that you are taken with handsome figures, I thought it would not displease you to look upon this, and that a house so learned within and without, whose weathercocks are Spheres, would deserve to entertain a guest of as brave a spirit as yourself. I beseech you, then accept this picture, for you are a better judge of it then I: and take it kindly that in this present penury of my own village, I treat you with what is sent me out of a foreign Country. I am ever, with passion,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jul. 2. 1641.   

LETTER VIII. To Monsieur l'Huillier of the King Council, etc.  
SIR,  
I Believe more than you have written to me. I doubt not but the Mourning hath been general in the place where you are; that you have made the Parliament, the Garrison, and the people weep; your eloquence makes your grief contagious● and what ice, I mean not of Lorraine, but of Norway or Muscovia, would not thaw at the warmth of your lovely tears? what Barbarous man could forbear to become gentle, and share in your woes, hearing you lament in terms so pathetical, and which are so easily conveyed from one heart to another? For my part, I who believe I have lost a friend in Monsiour d'Aligre, as well as you; need neither example nor persuasion, to be excited to pay him my sad tribute; for before I received your Letters, — Crudeles Superos atque Astra vocabam.  
If you desire any thing more, and that I can contribute aught to the consecration of a memory already sacred to me, you know your desires are commands to me, and I promise you not to be sparing upon this occasion. I shall be very glad to do an act of obedience in an act of piety: and now immediately I invoke our Goddesses to dictate lines to me that may last, while the vanity of man carves out marble, that shall decay, etc. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 18. 1642.   

LETTER IX. To Madam des Loges.  
Madam,  
I Received your Letter upon the taking the anniversary journey of—. Since you are so good as to give him audience, whensoever he appears before you, I will only deliver you the matter in gross of which he shall give you a more particular account at Oradour. He will make you, Madam, a most lamentable relation; you will understand from him that my miseries are everlasting, and the comforts I had, begin to slack. My mind grows obstinate in Melancholy, and abandons itself to a faintness that makes it incapable of all the noble functions you speak of. The only sustenance that was not unpleasant to it, it now disrelishes like the rest, and my books are no more my comforters. How can cheerful thoughts be conversant with such fatal objects as environ us on the right, and left hand? or how can we quietly enjoy the Present which is not good, on the Eve of a Future, which must be worse; and which threatens all men with famine and poverty? I protest, I never attained to so high a pitch of Philosophy. Monsieur de— himself says, it would be such a grand equivocation as would make all Philosophers counted ridiculous. He says, nothing must be read but the lamentations of Jeremy, nor any thing written but Wills. I am reduced almost to such a condition, and am not valiant enough to resume the employment I have discontinued; did not, Madam, your commands interpose, and you imagine you had occasion of my language. I have sent you what you enjoined me, and it is drawn from the bottom of my heart. Possibly, it may want the graces and ornaments of a Rhetorician, but I conceive that for that reason it will not be of less valid evidence, that he who writ it, is perfectly,  
MADAM, Your, etc. May 12. 1640.   

LETTER X. To the same.  
Madam,  
I Understood from a friend of mine newly come out of Holland, of the loss you lately received before Breda, but judging of your grief according to my acquaintance with your disposition, and not doubting but it is much greater than ordinary, I dare not presume to apply any thing to it. These are maladies to which foreign medecines are not to be applied, since they commonly prove but ineffectual. It is possible a man may not weep with you; but it is impossible to condemn your tears. The austerest Philosophers do here suspend the severity of their Decrees: and Zeno would be worse than Phalaris, if amidst the tyranny he exercises over humane passions, he were not indulgent to natural piety. So that, Madam, none hath any title to comfort you but yourself: you alone are capable to do that good office to yourself, and manage that affliction which I look upon with amazement. I am confident, you will be successful in it: for knowing very well that there is as much fortitude as tenderness in your soul, I do not believe that, contrary to the course of things, you would have fortitude submit, and the weaker get the mastery of the stronger. Heretofore I have heard you value life so little, that by your own principles it were no great misfortune to do dead. And though you may have renounced this opinion, yet you will grant that the absence which separates those who live, from those who live no more, is too short a thing to merit any long bemoaning. The cause of obstinate griefs cannot be justified but by presupposing an eternity in this life, or a despair of that which is to come. But the very example of the persons we bewail confutes the first supposition, and the last is inconsistent with the promises of the son of God. So that, Madam, I should not only forget the common Fundamentals of our Faith, if I should comply with the persistance of your sadness: but on the other side should forget that I deal with a Lady, who is able to read excellent lectures of wisdom to Men; and with a Mother who gives not precedence in point of courage and Magnanimity to all the Matrons of Lacedaemon? I will only therefore represent to you, to banish vulgar thoughts out of your head, that it is not in vain, we call you Heroine, and besides to give satisfaction to truth and my affection, that it is impossible but I must be sick of all your griefs, being, as I am, withal my soul,  
MADAM, Your, etc. Dec. 16. 1638.   

LETTER XI. To Monsieur de Borstel.  
SIR,  
THere are words to bewail other afflictions, there is none to express this: for I confess I know not what are become of my wits, since the loss we received. I am as planet-strucken as if the Sun had tumbled out of the firmament; and instead of blending my tears with yours, or taking heart from your example, I abide here without motion and action, as stiff, as heavy, and insensible as one of the rocks of my Hermitage. A foul interdicted by grief cannot make any use of her reason. My Stoical resolutions are reversed: Zeno and Chrysippus hath given me the slip. Hîc me, & Philosophia, & eloquentia, & loquentia ipsa deficit. What shall I do? what shall I faith in the affrights of an Eclipse so mortal to all that profess virtue; in the mourning, in the desolation of our Parnassus? Every thing is blind, every thing is deaf, every thing is dumb amongst the Muses. I have nothing else to say, then, unless once again, that I have lost the use of my speech, except for those three or four words, which will assure you that such as I am, I will be all my life,  
SIR, Your, etc. Sep. 1. 1641.   

LETTER XII. To Monsieur Menage.  
SIR,  
SInce you have heard talk of Alcimedon, and have a mind to see him, your longing shall be satisfied. But I tell you, this is not a counterfeit Alcimedon, as you have been informed, nor do I by a Roman Gentleman personate a French Lord. No man is concealed under this picture. He is a native and true Roman: of the race of the Fabricii, the Fabii, or the Scipios, choose which you please. He died of a sickness at Rome the day before the City was taken by the duke of Bourbon, who commanded the Emperor Charle's army. It is true, History doth not mention this last of the Romans, but tradition hath discovered him to me, and you know I have had several conferences with marquis Pompeo. Frangipane, who was a treasury of the rarities of his Country. I am lately in a scurvy humour, withal that I do, and my most darling compositions do not like me a whole day together; yet I must needs tell you, this hath not yet distasted me, and I am still constant to Alcimedon. I shall know from you whether my inclination judges rightly, and if my Love be lawful.  
Rivalisque utinam noster dignum Alcimedonta  
Igne tuo credas, Licini; tunc se omnibus unum  
Romulidis, meliórque etiam quos protulit helas,  
Praeferat Alcimedon.  
I am, SIR, Your, etc. Sep. 15. 1643.   

LETTER XIII. To the same.  
SIR,  
A Whimsy hath come into my Doctour's crown to make a collection of funeral verses, and to add them to Alcimedon: it was not his fault that you had not Arguments to every one of them, nor that the margins of every Copy were not fringed with Annotations. I gave him thanks for his good will, and thought I had no occasion to use a Grammarian. Yet it will not be amiss to inform you what the subject was, which occasioned those Ridiculous tears which you will find in the end of the book. It was the death of an old university-post, famous for his ill favoured, looks, and ●atter'd breeches; a disciple of Jack Puddings, and near of kin to Amadis Jamin; a profound writer of Madrigals, Ballads, and Catches. These thirty years past, he hath come down but once from St Hillaryes, Mount over the bridges; he was a more religious observer of St. John Portelatins feast, then of that of Easter. He never called Jupiter any thing but the Thunder-thumper; nor Heaven by any other name but the Choice of the Universe. He made Chimney always rhyme to Polyhymne, he would not change th' ilke for the same, though the measure of the Verse would have allowed him; he stood up stiff for Whilom, Mickle, and howbeit, against all the adverbes, that were, as he said, younger and more effeminate. The first tidings of his death coming to me, by a Pedant his admirer, with this perpetual ingemination O what a thousand pities it is! made me at that instant laugh very hearty: but next morning, as you shall see, I droled like a Philosopher, and plunged myself deep in the Cosi va discorrendo. The Morality is somewhat long, yet possibly not tedious: and if you take notice of the latter part of it (it is called here the funeral Oration of Cardinal Perron) you will confess that your Amint●s is no ill imitator of your Lucretia if after all this time you do not know Urania, that Nymph whom I have so extolled, and for whom I now weep so bitterly, I inform you that it is my late good friend Madam des Loges who in her life time was, more than once, styled, by an Academic, the Celestial, the Divine, the tenth Muse, etc. and was esteemed both within and without the Kingdom by crowned heads, by the Demigods of our Age, by my Lord Duke of Orleans, the King of Sweden, the Duke of Weymar, etc. I am of an opinion that the verses which celebrate her memory (I mean eloquent Vrania's) are worth at least as much as those that one Antipater a Sidonian wrote on the death of the learned Sappho. You shall be the absolute and Sovereign judge of them and to this purpose, I send you the Greek Original of the Post of Sidon, with the Latin version of Doctor— concerning which you must also pronounce the unrepealable sentence. I am withal my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. Aug. 9 1644.   

LETTER XIIII. To Monsieur Fermin, Counsellor to the King, Controller of the King's revenue in the Generality of Lymoges, etc.  
SIR,  
YOur leaving this country hath left a sting in my heart, that continually goads me with a longing for your return. Our last conversation when I was your perpetual auditor, imprinted in my brain such lasting and acceptable Ideas, that I have since done nothing else but bless the hour wherein you gave them me, and envy my dear friends— who engross you to themselves whole days together: they are happy, if they can but be sensible of their good fortune; if they do but know that a Commissioners place, is the least gain they can make by you. I understand very well the advantages of such a neighbourhood: and though I love nothing like quiet; and all kind of noise be troublesome to me, yet I protest, the sound of your words, had, with much delight, weaned me f●om the love of silence and solitude. Since you do not despise the fruits that grow in this wildernosse, I send you by Monsieur— what i● hath brought forth in this season of drought. It may be, the novelty may please you; and because you love Tacitus, and do not hate my Lord Cardinal de la Vallette I thought it would not be distasteful to you to peruse a manuscript; that would put you in mind, both of the one and the other. My new way of consolation, and the Method I use to practise on the sick Grandees, to qualify grief by soothing it, hath been received at Paris with approbations. But although it had all the success I could wish; and passed for an original, after the making so many Consolations in the world, yet since Men are still mortal; and under the laws of Fortune, you may judge of it, if you please, Sir, without respect to any preceding sentence upon it. You shall moreover decree sovereignly in the contest I had in Holland some years since, the Plead whereof Monsieur— now brings you. My Scribe hath added to them, the Letter written on the Kid which is yet, in debate, and refers to that famous Cause that divided all the Court-Wits into faction. If the King's service remand you to Angoulesme, I would seek out some other recreations for you among my papers. But if you should chance to travel the road of St. John d'Angely, and be within fifty steps of Balzac, I will be confident you will not offer me a second affront, by refusing me a visit, where you may confer so great favour, on a Landlord that can give very diligent attention to you. It is impossible but you must feel some remorse for using me so hardly; and with out question, you will sometime or other take the pains to come down the hill into the Valley; and wade over a little rivulet for my sake, who would cross an Arm of the Sea: nay, would not be afraid of the main Ocean, to give you a testimony that I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. July. 15. 1636.   

LETTER XV. To Monsieur the marquis of Montausier, Governor and Lieutenant General for the King in Alsatia, etc.  
SIR,  
YOu will know by Monsieur Chaplain, with what respect I received the honour you did me, by retaining me in your remembrance. But you must understand from myself how great an obligation I resent in the handsome way, whereby you were pleased to express it. You comfort me Sir, and that most gloriously, for all the time and paper which hitherto I thought lost: For now though I have taken pains only for an ungrateful Court, and insensible Grande's, yet since you prise my pains at so high a rate, I look for nothing from any body: you have paid me what others did apparently owe me. Can it be, that I not only take up your spare hours, but cure your sadness; and that such trifles as were only the pastime of the idle, are become remedies for the afflicted? Since you find them so savoury, I had rather for your sake call th●m the nutriment of wise men; and if they were able to deserve that name, I would beg of God (but still for your sake) the fertility of that good Prelate, who hath strewed France with books, and who lately counted the seaventy-fifth of his volumes. It should be, that you might be supplied with whole convoys of them from time to time, and to quicken up those by my example who make the KING'S troops languish, that they might not suffer you to lack money and ammunition, as I could be careful to furnish you with Histories and discourses. The great consideration is this: Sir, you would afford the subject to these Histories and discourses, if they would but give you wherewithal to undertake and act, The share you had in that miraculous year of the Duke of Weymar, will not give you leave to suspect, but that as you were one of the Companions of his actions, you shall be one of the inheritors of his thoughts: they would be too big to be confined in breasts of an ordinary capacity, and would stifle common souls with their weight: But Sir, what opinion do you think we have of the elevation of yours? And what do you conceive Monsieur Chaplain and I promise ourselves from your destiny: things so high and extraordinary, that, not to say more, they daunt his verse and my prose, and drive me almost to the shift and of a bare protestation, which I make in this place, that I am  
SIR, Your, etc. Nou. 25. 1638.   

LETTER XVI. To my Lord the Archbishop of Corinth Coadintour of the Archbishopric of Paris.  
My Lord,  
IT was enough that you accepted the small present I sent you, too much to thank me for such inconsiderable trifle. I expected not this second favour, and believed the good fortune of my book had attained its higest at the courteous reception you gave it. But you have done more; you have with speeches of commendation consecrated a homage that was paid you before with thoughts of distrust and fear. Who could not seriously fear such subtle and penetrating eyes as yours, who pry out the most concealed defects, and are offended at the sleightest stains? who would not tremble, my Lord, in the behalf of compositions so deformed as mine; so unadorned with the Art of the Court; almost as irregular as the buildings in our Village? I do not doubt but they will become better improved had I but the honour to be near you, and one of those happy ones that hear you, when teaching how to live well, you exhibit a pattern of excellent speaking. I count the want of those wholesome and delightful lessons, those golden torrents that issue from your mouth, with which you every your people, amongst the least tolerable calamities of my exile. It cannot but be a tormenting misfortune to be none of the world in a season, when the world is so lovely a prospect: and it is no little act of moderation to be contented with the silence of an Hermitage, now when there is another Son of Thunder in the Church, now you handle all divine things, withal the vigour and dignity humane Eloquence is capable of. At least, my Lord, if I may not be permitted to enjoy it, I am not prohibited to love and long after it. I shall with delight behold the progress of your Renown in the Letters I expect from Monsieur Chaplain: I will devour the story of your Advent and Lent, that is the acclamations and applauses of Paris in the Relations I desire from Monsieur de Menage. It may be, he may have so much charity as to allow me a larger share of his happiness, and, to cheer up my solitude, send me some short notes of those good and lovely things his memory will lay up; so I shall not be altogether absent, or at least I shall not lose all that is gotten in my absence. With this thought I will endeavour to moderate the great discontent, in that I cannot be your most devout, and attentive auditor, as I am,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Dec. 1. 1644.   

LETTER XVII. To Monsieur the Precedent Maynard, Counsellor to the King.  
SIR,  
THe man so much spoken of to me is in this country, and we have already met three or four times. I have set upon him withal my might: I have laboured as much as is possible to blot out his unsound opinions, but I protest his resistance is greater than my strength, and you may tell our friends of Thoulouze that I have lost my pains and my argumentations. There is no way to make him approve of Lent, as well because of the preaching in it as the fasting. He judges all Preachers by two or three Hedge-Priests that he hath heard, and fancies that all sermons begin either with The valiant Captain Agesilaus, or The learned Philosopher Socrates, or, Pliny in his natural History, or Pausanias in Arcadicis: he urges to me continually the Buon per la Predica, and the Riservate questo per la Predica of the Cardinal Hippolytus of Este, when any merry fellow of his familiars spoke impertinently before him. He doth not forget the Mortalium ineptissimus, excepto uno Panigarolâ. He paraphrases and comments upon these precepts that an old Doctor gave a young Bachelor; Percute Cathedram fortiter; respice crucifixum torvis oculis, et nihil dic ad propositum, et bene praedicabis. I answer him, that it is not just to consider things in that corruption they were once plunged into, since now they are re-estated in their primitive purity: and reformation hath succeeded disorder. I lay before him when it comes to my turn, the merit of our Chrysostom's, and Basils: but he replies to me again, that according to my usual custom I am liberal even to Prodigality, and that I bestow great words and illustrious titles on every day in the year. He maintains that those good Fathers, are dead long since without issue. If he could, he would introduce the Greek custom into the Latin Church: he would have ancient Homilies read to the people, and a prohibition to make new ones for them. If he durst, he would do all his devotions in his Study, and be auditor to none but his books. What is to be done with this petulant morose fellow, this head strong opinative man, this ignorant pretender to reason? It comes in my head to show him that admirable Extract which you sent me, and I do not think it will be any hard matter to put that off to him for a translation of a Greek Father which was preached at St. John en Greve; yea for a Father of the first Classis in both Churches. There needs nothing for this but to put Antioch in stead of Paris: and translate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 into French. I see no other course to draw him into a better conceit of our Ecclesiastical Rhetoric. He must be cheated for his own good and without doubt he will admire that as a Homily, which he would not abide if he were told it were a Sermon—. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jun. 5. 1645.   

LETTER XVIII. To Monsieur Menage.  
SIR,  
I Am not afraid to lose brave Gomez savour for my Epigram of the hoarse Nightingale. He is not backward in taking offence, for he is only ambitious of military virtue, and remembers the taunt of Philip to Alexander, Art thou not ashamed to sing so well? If he doth not make exceeding good verses, not only Cicero and other Roman Consuls, but Dionysius, the tyrant, and some other tyrants too whom I will not nominate, had the same fate. You may tell him, if it please you, that as I have quoted him in an Epigram for a scurvy Poet, I will hold him forth for a great soldier, when I writ his Encomium in Pro●● and speak in good earnest. Especially, Sir, I will not forget his Prowess on the other side the Alps; and above all that famous combat at Mantua (I had the story from his own mouth) when he laid the dreadful Captain Brancaleon, sprawling on the ground. The Ladies who saw him fight, out at their windows (which I had from him too) called him a hundred times the honour of France, and hope of Italy: they cried out two hundred times Long live Gomes; after his victory, they fling him so many buckets of Jassamine and Orange flower water, with such a storm of perfumed eggs, that they had like to have smothered him. Is not here enough to comfort him abundantly against some trivial disgraces befallen him at the gate of Monsieur the Cardinal? But he finds elsewhere more solid consolations: are all the laurels of your Parnassus, and your Pindus' worth that he crownes himself with, when he gathers it from the Westphalia Hamme, and relates his adventures in a Tavern? If you see him, put him in hopes of the Elegy I am studying, and relish the Epigram I send you, as he should do. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Dec. 20. 1645.   

LETTER XIX. To my Lord, the Bishop of Lisieux.  
SIR,  
I Have done what you commanded me. You will receive by Monsieur your Secretary the papers of that gentleman, that writes so excellently, and yet cannot spell; that so happily makes use of the highest figures of Rhetoric, and yet never learned so much as the Elements of Grammar. He is ignorant of the use of commas and points, yet never fails to make most ceven and just periods. He familiarily puts a great Letter down where there should be a little one, and never knew the difference between Kit and Chit. If he writ to his mistress in the City concerning Hearts or Hairs, you would take him for a woodman; for you shall see nothing but Hearts and Hares. Had he gotten his learning at the University by the usual ways, he would be no greater a scholar then other men are: he might be sought for among the crowd of those Sir Dominies, whereof there are legions in every province of this Kingdom. But you will grant me that he is remarkable by his singularity, and that his defect of Latin, and scarcity of such like foreign goods do more illustrate the grandeur and riches of his birth: being the first of his kind, he deserves a crown, by Aristotle's rule. And for the present now the Palatinate is in controversy, and three or four dispute for it; a philosopher of my acquaintance is of opinion he should put in his claim too, by virtue of that excellent and commendable quality of Pa-latinity. I shall within a short time, know wh●ther you will give him your voice, and whether your opinion jump with either of the Philosophers. In the mean time, I rest  
My Lord, Your, etc. Sep. 13. 1640.   

LETTER XX. To Monsieur the Earl of la Motte Fenelon.  
SIR,  
SYlvia is a very pretty wench, I confess; she may make an honest woman, I confess that too. As her wit hath nothing of artifice, so her carriage hath nothing of fondness: She can answer, I and No reasonable well, and sometimes ventures further, with success too: when she is at a play, she does not entreat the company to instruct her when she should laugh; nor can she be said to be ugly of her age, since in the judgement of Madam the marchioness of— 's, the Devil was handsome when he was young. But here is a story would add calamity to the most dismal place on Earth, you make yourself pleasant with both Sylvia and Amyntas. She hath none but ordinary endowments, and he not any tolerable qualities: for there is a less esteem to be set upon his melancholy person, than all the tattered parcels of his groaning mansion: he is a petulant fellow, whose pensiveness sullyes the serenity of the most sun-shiny day, and disturbs the jollity of the most sacred holy-days. He sleeps ill a-nights, and then every morning falls foul upon the whole world; and curses nature in general. He is oftimes so retired into himself, that he would not go out to meet a Legate à Latere; and if Good fortune should come in person to visit him, she might light upon a day in the week, that the gate should be barred against her; although she should tell her name, to gain admittance. You must confess a man of this humour is to be beloved, but in the way of Christianity. That is the utmost of obedience which can be allowed to the Commandments of God, and the authority of Religion. I conclude then, Sir, that you commit an act of too grand a charity, to desire so ill company. For though it is possible I may deserve good men's pity, yet I cannot their curiosity. You are wealthy in the gifts of Heaven, and the true riches of mankind; how comes it to pass that being such a Magazine of wit and virtue, you look after any without yourself, especially where there is so little? why ●re you so persuaded with my apparent desert? why will you take a journey for the love of me, who cannot be sociable with you half an hour, though I resolve to be during my whole life,  
SIR, Your, etc. April. 12. 1638.   

LETTER XXI. To Monsieur de Plassac More.  
SIR,  
What would you do with me at Paris? Is it a design to show me at St. Germans Fair, like a beast come out of the Indies? or if this seem too ignoble a similitude, would you use me instead of a Jugle●, and tell me, what a Gallant man once said to me I have promised you to day to such a Monsieur, and to morrow to such a Lady? I am afraid I should often make you forfeit your promise. But grant that I were a man easy to be led; and that you brought me into Great Meetings: why even there both you and I should lose our reputation. The Miracles you had promised, would not have power enough to work upon the credulity of old wives; and if you were not called Mountebank in drown right terms, these expressions would come to you wrapped up in a little cleaner tiffany. You would be upbraided for putting your judgement to a venture, for misapplication of your eloquence, and making an Elogium of a Quartan Ague. I have nothing fit to please the nice world you tell me of, nothing to dazzle the eyes of curious people: and if in my early youth, I had in me something less cloudy, and dark, do you imagine so faint a lustre could so long contest against the rustiness of the Country, and the contagion of ill examples? This is now the tenth year of my exile: in a shorter time than this, an Athenian would have become a Barbarian, and the son of Roman parents would have lost all the rights and immunities of his birth. I am not then in the mind, with your favour, to display at Court the imperfections I have acquired in the Country. Give me leave not to carry thither the course evidences of a long absence, and not to say worse, a Forrainer's comportment which I have got, and should hardly be rid of. It will be sufficient, and it may be too much, if I hold any kind of correspondence with that Nation, and if from time to time some of my papers fly thither. But is it possible that excellent Lady hath set so high a value upon such an inconsiderable thing? That virgin who hath not yet met with any thing worthy of her, who hath rejected the sacrifices of Demigods, who does not so much as vouchsafe a look upon the Coronets of Dukes and Peers, when a lover prostrates them at her feet? how my joy swells with these excellent tidings, and how in this place am I at a stand for Rhetoric and exclamations! but they will be stronger and more persuasive from a personal delivery: therefore you shall disburse a compliment for me at the Lovure, and I promise to repay it when you shall have an occasion to use another in the university. I am passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 1. 1644.   

LETTER XXII. To Monsieur Conrart, Counsellor and Secretary to the King.  
SIR,  
IT appears than you endure my absence with grief, and out of your tender heart complain of my cruelty? You think I might find a Room for me at Paris, and wish for me as a piece wanting to the finishing up of that little world. Your handsome chide, and obliging wishes have great influence upon me: so that if a vow had confined me to the desert, and I were as zealous as I am humorous, I confess you have written things able to tempt my devotion. But all things well considered, Sir, it is better to conceal imperfections here; then expose them where you are, that is in the most public and remarkable place of the world, what should I get by carrying my disquiets, and my Fever so fare? the troublesome removal would encumber me, and afford no delight to you. I should bring along with me a face either to fright you, or move compassion in you; besides, since those productions which you esteem, are the most tolerable part of myself, me thinks you might take it well that I have chosen you, to send them to; and you are bound to commend the discretion of a sick man, that will converse with none but only you at his good hours. I shall believe them such, when they have accommodated you with any pleasing recreation, and shall never reckon myself totally unhappy if you ever do me the favour to love me well, and believe that I am perfectly,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jul. 24. 1645.   

LETTER XXIII. To the Reverend Father Hercules, Provincial of the fathers of the Christian Doctrine.  
Reverend Father,  
I Praise God that your race is finished & that you are come safe home into a place of rest. This good news found me in so ill a condition, that you see I have been necessitated these two months to defer my congratulations of it. I had Winter and all her Clouds in my head. I had neither a distinguishable voice, nor an articulate sound. I was only able to grumble and murmur—. Now, the inundation is abated, and I begin to descry some appearance and probability of Serenity.  Aut video, aut vidisse puto per nubila Solem. 
But on the other side the vapours of my melancholy make it always night in my soul, and the smallest ray of hope cannot shine into it. You perceive from what I would myself: but there is no way for me to effect that which, you say, is the pleasure of Heaven.  
If the power you have there, were great enough to change December into May, to strew all the way betwixt this and Paris with roses for me, I do not think I could remove out of this desert. After the season were changed, you must metamorphoseme too, and so consequently work a second Miracle: you must dissolve that charm that confines me to this little scantling of ground, Atque affigit humo divinae particulam aurae.  
Your eloquence is very forceable, and your considerations very prevalent to draw me to you, you have written me such words as would have persuaded Saint Anthony, and Saint Hilary the Hermit; and such as I cannot oppose with other words. I only say, that those good fathers were in the desert, and you are to reckon me among the immovables of that Walk you saw,  
 memora, ut colles, viridisque immora Carentae Prata mei. What will you say to the extravagancy of this Jargon? It is fare from the regularity and cevennesse of your style. Well, some other time my French may be less Latinized, and my prof less versifyed: but I am so weary with talking over-gravely of late, that I was forced to alter my custom, to try whether I could recover myself. You will see the marks of this forced and set gravity in some writings which my Nephew will deliver you. He hath especial Order from all the family you love, to assure you, you are perfectly honoured there: For my part, I so reverence your virtue, that if I might be permitted, I would willingly swear by Hercules; and say, Me Hercule as well as Cardinal Bembo, or Cardinal Sadolet: but my Hercules is not like theirs, a Son of Jupiter and Alcmene: nor is he; Hercules the furious.  
Ni furor ille, sacros agitat qui numine vates,  
Sit furor ille tuus.  
Accept of my devotion, I beseech you, and do me the honour to believe, that I am, even with all my soul,  
Reverend Father. Your, etc. Dec 15. 1643.   

LETTER XXIIII. To Monsieur the Chevalier de Mere.  
SIR,  
SOlitude is, in truth, a fine thing; but there would be a delight in it were there but sometimes a friend of your goodness, to whom it might be told so. Idleness, is called the food of the gods, and of men like them, but it is when Scipio and Laelius taste it together. If I were your neighbour, how deeply should we be engaged in matters of moment? What learned walks we should make! How rich should I be, possessing the Original of those good things you writ to me? I would not envy the Court for her Delicacies of wit, her sincerity of judgement the Graces and the Flourishing your Letter mentions: But if you do, not buy a House in Angoulmois, these are but wishes which vanish upon the paper; and considering the state I am in, Foitiers is as fare from me as Constantinople. You give me no hopes of this: I am afraid I am condemned to languish for ever in this little corner of the world. I shall be ever abandoned to my evil Angel, and my sad thoughts: there is neither remedy, mitigation, nor compassion taken on my miseries. Indeed, they are very great, I am an Hypocrite, whensoever I would be thought good company. However, such as I am, there is none more than I,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jun. 6. 1646.   

LETTER XXV. To Monsieur de St. Chartres, of the King's high Council.  
SIR,  
THe business of the Bishopric may succeed, and the means you propound are not very difficult: but your friend is resolved not to make use of the easiest. He too well understands his own unworthiness, to entertain that high conceit you would put in his head: and he hath read Saint Chrysostome's books of the Priesthood with too much attention, not to be afraid of a burden, formidable even to the strength of Angels: he dares not say to his shoulders, as Saint Bernard did. Yet it is a burden that even the weakest desire to carry: there is no Pedant but wishes to be laden hard with it. This is the drift of so many Preachers, and that which so many sermons aim at. But let them run, and let us be at rest. Let us not set the Gospel, nor Saint Paul on work to solicit our promotion: they are worthy of a better employment. Do not let us, instead of serving God, make use of Him. It is better to be a Catechumenist all one's life-time, and die at the Church door, then enter into the Sanctuary at a breach made by Ambition; How I like the Country and retirement! how I pity the distempers and the fevers of Competitors! Had I no other disease but that, I should be the soundest man in the world, and though your good will obliges me in this present offer, I beseech you, believe, that I am without hopes or interest,  
SIR, Your, etc. Aug. 4. 1639.   

LETTER XXVI. To the Reverend Father de Marin, a Divine of the Society of Jesus.  
Reverend father,  
YOu carried away my good days with you. Since your departure, I have not passed any one without grief or pain. Even the good intervalles of my disease have been appropriated to others, not myself: and the weakness of people on the mending hand, which is privileged every where else, hath not been able to get me dispensed with, for several labours which require a perfect health. At length, after all, I am at leisure, and have overtaken the April-sunne, who bestows strength on me as he receives it himself. Blessed be this Visible son of the invisible Father, you know it hath been called so heretofore. He hath already put me in possesson of my walks: he will shortly digest and purify the waters that are prescribed to you: he himself will make ready your baths, and cure you by luxurious medicines: when it is so, will you not be a man of your word, and come near our Desert? will you not come and contribute to my amendment, by the vicinity of your virtue, and the presence of your good examples? I only beg you one day in a week. But I speak in earnest, rather than not obtain this favour, I will set all my friends on work at Rome, to the great Mutio Vitelleschi. He would not deny you to the Savages if they had need of you: Shall I be less favourably dealt withal then the people of Canada? and do you run more hastily to an unknown harvest than a chosen one? You see whither my desire of not being fare from you, and of sometimes enjoying your holy and learned conversation, transports me. Limit your ambition for my sake. Be not jealous of the honour of your Companions: ruminate not on their famous conquests, nor propound to yourself the conversion of Kingdoms and Kings: fix yourself to this little corner of the world, and out of humility be an Apostle to your friend.  
Sic erit; et voti facies, Marine, potentem  
Balzacium, exanguemque dabis pinguescere terram;  
Cum propior largos Caelo demiseris imbres.  
I conjure you to this, from the bottom of my heart, and am passionately,  
Reverend father, Your, etc. Ap. 27. 1644.   

LETTER XXVII. To the Reverend father Destrades a Divine of the Society of Jesus, Superior of the Cloister in Bourdeaux.  
Reverend Father,  
When you do a good deed you think you receive one, and you are officious with such alacrity, that the way wherewith you oblige, is commonly a second obligation. But I leave the Chapter concerning the business in recommendation, to Madam Capaignol, to give you thanks in my own words for your perfumed-Rosary. I esteem it much higher for coming to me from you, then for coming from Peru to you: for I know your staple traffic is in heaven, from whence grace distils upon devotion. Questionless, it will be auspicious to me: it will do much more than you say: for it will impart zeal to me which I want, and make it acceptable after the conferring it upon me: So this sweet odour that makes the sacrifices agreeable, will not be wanting to that of my prayer, Et per te, mi optime & dulcissime pater, etiam in Christo deliciabor. In the mean time, I must tell you, here is strange talk of your passion against Spain; or, to speak more properly, against Castille. Are you certain Saint Ignatius and Saint Xavier will not take it ill at your hands that you declare so openly for the King of Portugal? do you know what their opinions are in so nice a business, and upon a Question so problematical? however, Reverend Father, you cannot be blamed for being a loyal Frenchman: there is no danger to be feared, nor hazard to be run in opinions of State: remember ever that verse in Homer that says, To serve one's Country is to protect her Temples and to do an act of Religion. Once more I thank you for my rosary: but I must acquaint you with all that I repose more confidence in your prayers, than my own; do not forget me then, if you please, when you recommend your well bebeloved to our Lord. and I am from the bottom of my soul,  
Reverend father, Your, etc. Mar. 12. 1641.   

LETTER XXVIII. To Madam, The marchioness of Rambovillet.  
Madam,  
I Have not yet received the present you were pleased to honour me withal; but the news of it being brought me by Monsieur Chaplain, I was not able any longer to suppress within mymind the acknowledgements I own you for it: and yet they are such Madam, that it is not easy to draw them out of the thought into the expression, without losing somewhat in the conveyance. To clothe them in ordinary words were too great an abasement of them: and in conscience I never had more need of that officious figure which aids our good intentions, which dischargeth the poor man's debts, and, not content to describe things to their just value, doth enhance them infinitely above themselves. You are acquainted with it, Madam, under the famous name of Hyperbole; and I must confess to you I have poorly abandoned it almost eighteen years ago, out of a cowardly fear which the reproaches and calumnies of my enemies created in me, without Question very much to my disadvantage: for I easily foresee, that wanting its succour to thank you magnificently, as I desired, I must be constrained to serve myself of the simplicity of my mother tongue, and only to tell you, as another mortal would, that I am highly obliged to you for your Present: yet I will add, Madam, but in the extremest rigour and severity of truth, That the only news of this Present, hath entirely changed the face of my fortune, and seems to have placed abundance where before was poverty. If you please, I shall take the Liberty to expound my meaning, and render you an account of the present estate of my affairs: 'Tis most certain, the wrath of Heaven is this year fallen upon our Country; and that for my own particular, I have not been more favourably treated then my neighbours. But though the unseasonable hail and frost in the month of May, have saved us the labour of gathering our Vintage in September, and left us nothing but the sad remainders of their prey; though the promising ears of corn have deceived our expectation, and yielded an inconsiderable harvest, (I demand your pardon Madam for these village expressions) though on the other side, all the Avenues of the Exchequer are most strictly guarded and justest gratifications escape not from it but with difficulty; yet for my own part I am nothing sensible of all these bad consequences; they are misfortunes that concern not me; and you, madam, are alone the cause that I complain not either of the inclemency of heavens, the barrenness of the earth, or the covetousness of the State. By means of you, never year was more plentiful, nor more happy to me then this: for having lost somewhat in ignoble and common things, may I not be more justly thought a gainer, since your hand makes me so bountiful a recompense, in things of rarity and value? in Essences of Jasmin, flower of Orange, musk and Amber grease. But Madam, what will the preciser sort of people say to this? and what answer shall I make to the generation of severe sages, who will think it strange that a man making profession of frugality should bring into his desert the delights and luxury of the Court? that a solitary person should have his boxes full of Frangipane gloves; he, I say, who in reason, should be content with a pair of mittens every winter? I shall not here endeavour to make his apology, or to justify that by reason which may be defended by authority, and by the example of one who had credit enough to found a Sect. It will not become me, Madam, to be better, or more wise than Aristippus, who knew so well the art of mixing pleasure and temperance together: he did not at all condemn the use of innocent pleasures; he could make a difference betwixt stinks and perfumes, and was nothing inclined to believe, that aromatical odours were infectious. One day above the rest he declared himself more openly upon this subject: an impertinent asker of questions, fell upon him in a great assembly, and having held some discourse with him, concerning the austerity to be observed in the lives of Philosophers, upon the sudden, thinking to put him to the blush, captiously inquired, who it was in the company that smelled so strong of perfumes, 'tis I, answered Aristippus, and another wretch more unhappy than myself, known by the name of the King of Persia. Shall I take the boldness, Madam, to rank myself as the third sinner of that order, and dare to intrude into so noble a society? Yes Madam, for once I shall renture to march by the side of this King and Philosopher who perfumed themselves; and have some reason to believe, I possess advantages above them both, because in their time, they had neither a Madam, nor a Madamoyselle de Ramboüillet, to select, and present them with those perfumes. The Latin Poesy makes its vaunt of certain Essences which Venus and the loves her children made present of to a Roman Lady; but those Essences, Madam, which I expect, are sent me by a nobler hand, then of that Common Venus and her Cupid's; 'tis the true Venus Urania, and her adorable daughter; 'tis virtue itself embodied, and become visible to the eyes of mortals; 'tis perfection descended from its heavenly habitation, which does me this day the honour to regale me. I make my public boast of it: I look upon all the riches and possessions of the earth as things below me, but as there is no glory in the world which equals mine, I must also beg your belief there are no acknowledgements can vie with mine; though yet the greatest part of them remain within my heart, and cannot make any outward appearance but imperfectly in the protestation which I make, to be always with respect and veneration,  
MADAM, Your, etc.   

LETTER XXIX. To Monsieur Costar.  
SIR,  
I Have received your pastils, your Powder, and your Cushionets of Odours. But what do you expect I should say of them? They are no mortal things, nor are they to be commended in humane terms. Flora, the spring, the sun, and Marshal never produced so fair a fruit of their united labours, or made any thing so excellent as these perfumes. Our Doctor swears they are better than those of Venus when she appeared to her son Aeneas upon the bank of a River in Lybia. Yet Virgil who is not so prodigal of Divinity as the Poets his successors, gives them the appellation of divine.  
Ambrosiaeque comae divinum vertice odorem  
Spirauêre—.  
For your Table books I look on them, and consider, but dare not adventure to use them. I make a conscience of touching so fair things, with such course hands as mine. The plates, guilding, and lively colours have been bestowed on them without parsimony. They would have been fit Registers for the private Cabinet of Caesar and Cleopatra. I do not think, when the Conquering God read a lecture to the Muses his scholars, they had such handsome Note-books as these, wherein they diligently writ after him.  
Bacchum in remotis carmina rupibus  
Vidi docentem, Nymphasque discentes, etc.  
You know the rest in Latin, but not in Italian, for I just now received these verses from Florence, where they were made the last month.  
Jo vidi (il giuro, et se mia lingua ment  
Con furia procellosa  
Schiantin le viti mie grandini ac●rbe)  
Vidi i'll Padre Lieo steso fran l'erbe,  
su cetra armonioso  
Trattar d'avorio d'or plettro lucente  
Vidi le Ninfe intent  
S●arfene all canto & à le voci argute  
I satiri chinar l'orecchie argute.  
You see here I put the change upon you, and deviate as much from my subject as I can. The reason is because I do not intent to slubber over a thanks to you for exquisite presents. I must prepare myself a whole month for it. I think of consulting all my Muses and to look over all my common places: nay I have a mind to take a potion for that purpose, and be let blood; that my spirits may be clearer and all my faculties more free and active. I most humbly kiss your hands and am with passion,  
SIR, Your, etc. Sept. and 1644.   

LETTER XXX. To the same.  
SIR,  
I Know not how I dare undertake to write to you: for in the condition I am, I can with truth assure you, that I do not see my Letter.  
In me tota ruens Hiems  
Arcton deseruit  
If ruens Hiems grate your ear, it does more mischief to my Eyes. But then I have an other way to express myself, 
Me nebulâ turpi, multo me Jupiter imbre  
Atque omni premit Aeolio. Da mitior almâ  
Luce frui, Pater, et formosum redde serenum.   
I do not beg Jupiter for the drying up my Rheum, and use of my Nose; but merely that I may be in a condition to enjoy your kindness, or, if you will have any more in the language of the immortal Gods, 
 saltem Ambrosio Florae immortalis odour  
Muneribusque tuis fruar, o vel Regibus aequis  
Par Arabum, Costarde, animo.   
In earnest, Sir, your perfumes are admirable, they are even better than those of the last year; and if my Rhetoric about this subject were not quite exhausted, they should be attended with as ample thanks as the divine Artenice— I am without reserve,  
SIR, Your, etc.    

THE THIRD BOOK.  

LETTER I. To Monsieur Menage.  
SIR,  
TO obey you, I have read the Spanish Philosopher's Book a second time. The title always pleased me exceedingly; but I cannot say any more of the rest, than what I told a Gentleman of my familiarity, who first mentioned it to me. I could not find what I sought in it, and in my opinion the Art of the Will required all the sufficiencies of our Gassendus to be displayed answerably to its merit. The Spaniard is in many places enervate and feeble, in others too subtle and abstractive; and repeats the same matter so often, that his six Books might be reduced to less than the half of that number without any injury to his subject. A modern Orator termed this kind of Tautology, The dancing the Canaries in a Bushel. And a Poet of antiquity said it was, Vnum ponere ferculis tot assem.  
Which may be expressed in ordinary speech, The serving up of one joint in a dozen or two of dishes. But I beseech you Sir, what sinister advice, what vision or extravagance moved this John Eusebius to cite almost perpetually, such authors as have no authority; and were scarce ever heard of? This is giving people for sureties, for whose credit certificates and pledges, yea pawns and engagements of bodies, might be required in their particular affairs. I cannot tell what rank a Bernardus Sylvester, a Barlaamus Giracensis, or an Odo Cluniacensis, should hold among the genuine and legitimate Fathers of the Church. His treatise bears the Character of the same judgement throughout. All the way he strains his wits in quest of ridiculous novelties both in things and words, that he may seem to renounce the dialect of the Schools, and to speak like a man of another Country, he compounds such a gibberish of his own as fare exceeds the obscurity and canting of the Doctors, and is likewise no less savage and remote from the Roman purity. He himself is the Planter of his barbarism and raises a new rebellion of his own head against Cicero. And this with how much endeavour and violence? His care and pains are perspicuous in the defects of his style. He designs to fall, where other men slip unwittingly. He does not utter his Galamaufry unawares, but 'tis his aim to plunge himself into it. In a word, intending to speak elegantly, he speaks absurdly with curiosity, and makes choice of all his bad expressions. Can it possibly be, that this man had the liking of Messieurs Du-Puy. I do not believe he is of any great credit with the Jesuits; I mean, the Jesuits of Paris, who have a better  than those of Madrid. I am confident, that in this particular at lest the dreadful Petavius is of the same opinion with the redoubtable Salmasius. Instead of him I read the life of your Mamurra without weariness. It seems to me more lovely and new, at the tenth reading then at the first. How hearty it would have provoked the laughter of the Cardinal of Perron? How will it please the Cardinal Bentivoglio, and with what esteem will the father Strada regard the salt and delicate sauces in it. He who sometimes smiles after a Roman manner, and is as exquisite at ingenious raillery as yourself: But if you would see the Elogium of his Life all at length, you may please to see what I have written of it to the father Socrates, and ask of him, if I commend the other Latin Satyrs he sent me with the same Language.  
Hae, licet ingentis Pansae, Hirtiadaeque superbi,  
Nomina clara ferant.  
I am ever affectionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Nou. 4. 1643.   

LETTER II. To Monsieur de—.  
SIR,  
I Have lately received news that gives me very sensible apprehensions of discontent. Monsieur Costar was an Eye-witness of my trouble: and it is most certain, that if a Spanish Philosopher made me lose your favour, I should not easily be reconciled with Spain, not even after the pacification of Munster. When I writ you my opinion, I did not imagine it would have been injurious to your judgement, for I conceived Sir, you had told me, that some men cried up this Modern Doctor, but not that you had any affection for him yourself. Had I thought the least of any such thing, I am not so bad a Courtier, a● to have willingly contradicted you, in a business of so little importance, and my particular conceits shall always be less dear to me then the contentation of my friends. Therefore be pleased to impute the mistake that is fallen out, either to the dulness of my hearing at the time you spoke to me of the Treatise, or to the defect of my understanding when I ●ead it. And do me the favour to believe that though I am not a professed cider with Johannes Eusebius Nierenbergius é societate Jesus, yet I am not less really,  
SIR, Your, etc. July. 5. 1644.   

LETTER III. To Monsieur Gombauld, a Chanter in the Church of Saints.  
SIR,  
THe Dialogue you did me the favour to send me was taken away from me the same day I received it, and since that time has passed through so many hands, that I co●ld never be master of it till this day. I have newly read it with such a liking and relish as I shall retain a long while in my fancy, and I confess that such kind of Dialogues if we had any in our Language, would bring me out of Love with those of Plato. This little tract, since you would know my opinion of it, is a Library in Epitome, a magazine in a packet, and a Daedalus-shop where all the utensils move of themselves, and all the materials are alive. It deserves this last attribute upon a particular account, being not only the juice and quintessence of the ancient Sages, but more, the Life and Soul of their wisdom: he is so dextrous in reduceing speculation to use, and study unto action. But this He, Sir, is it not Monsieur de la Hoguette? and what are his intentions of his closeness and concealment? If he will not own a Child so worthy of him, though it want a father, it shall not be destitute of protection. Heroes were never exposed to the mercy of their fates, but Heaven took care of them; and dubious births have almost ever been the entrance to illustrious lives. I send you the present which Monsieur Chaplain bestows upon you, and being not able to thank you sufficiently for that I lately received from you, I must be contented to assure you that I am with much gratitude,  
SIR, Your, etc.   

LETTER X. To the Reverend Father Dalmés, a Divine of the society of Jesus, Professor of Rhetoric.  
Reverend father,  
EIther it was my fault to express myself ill, or your friend's to miss-appprehend my intention. However it be, I am very sensible of the trouble he has drawn upon you. It is unquestionably a great crime to abuse that happy fruitfulness, which Heaven hath conferred upon your Muse. She must not be harassed out every day, but deserves to be kept for grand Holy days; and you yourself are an ill Husband, to make so many excellent Verses at a venture, and proceed so fare to leave your mark behind you: One thing that pleases me in this thankless labour that you have taken, is, that it hath given you an occasion to write me a Letter sincerely Latin, and worthy of the purity of Antiquity. I read it often with delight; and had it not been for my vexatious business, and my want of health you should immediately have seen in the same language how highly I value your exquisite knowledge in it. All that I can say, being oppressed with business, and drowned in Rheum, is, that I was much comforted to behold this Ray of the Age of Eloquence, at a time when one would think the Goths were newly risen again to sack Aquitaine, and replant their gibberish: but I concluded, when I read your Latin, that they were not yet Masters of the place where you were, since you held out still for old Rome, and their savage style had not gained you to be an abettor of it. Continue, I beseech you, this laudable design: oppose yourself, stoutly against the vicious imitation of some young Doctors, who labour with might and main for the re-establishment of Barbarism. Their phrases are either foreign or poetical; and their Periods, Rhimes and Antitheses. If scurvy books afford any word, either rotten with age, or monstrous by the newness of it; a bolder metaphor then usual; or an insolent and rash expression; they rake up this dung with care, and bedeck themselves with it with much curiosity. They believe themselves much more handsome, after taking in those ornaments, than they were before. This is a strange malady, and a filthy love? I cannot tell what their brains are made of, to contemn the force, the vigour, and the lustre of Rome, to become enamoured only on her diseases and her carcase; on her sepulchre, and her ashes. Or if there be any excess in the last words; what do they think they do, when they prefer before Senators and Consuls of the Commonwealth, all magnificent and glittering in their purple, such poor tattered slaves, the remainders of war and persecution, who after the ruin of the same Republic are come to beg, and wear their rags in the Provinces? You easily discern that in these two different Parties, on our side we have our Livy, our Sallust, our Cicero: and on the other side they have their Cassiodore their Symmachus, and their Apuleius, coeteráque id genus, ut meus ait Damon, dehonestamenta Latinitatis. I wish them better and sounder fancies: and would very feign see an end of their rebellion against the true and lawful Nephews of Remus. I beg of you, reverend father, the good examples you can bestow upon us: but especially I entreat your good opinion, and beseech you to believe me, as truly I am,  
Reverend father, Your, etc. Ap. 3. 1643.   

LETTER V To the reverend Father, du Creux, a Divine of the society of Jesus, Rhetorick-Professour.  
Reverend father,  
I Had a sight of five or six leaves, the other day, which I admired; and without question you saw them before me, since they came from your father Sirmond: he is an admirable father, I have told you often; but he is admirable in divers respects, and is not to be looked on only one way, he is provided to instruct the learned, and to delight meaner capacities, he hath both the solid and the subtle part of learning: and not to speak of the riches of a choice knowledge managed by a Magisteriall judgement, the dispenser, and regulatour of it, I observe yet in his fourscore, all the fire, all the brave blood, all the gallantry of Spirit, that can be discovered in the very youth of the Demigods. If your Christian severity will not, cannot digest that word, let me say at least in the youth of such men as are more happily born then the rest. I beseech you, contrive it so that your young people set before them this man, who is an honour both to his Age and Country, as a copy how to write by; and not some raw Latinists who would breed Schisms and Heresies in Eloquence: who are crueler enemies of ancient Rome, then ever Hannibal, jugurtha, Mithridates, etc. They writ iron and stones, as they confess themselves, if not mud and smoke, as some upbraid them for.  
Quis furor ille novus postponere casta profanis,  
Impurasque sequi neglecto fonte lacunas,  
Et tenebras sordesque tuo praeferre nitori?  
Quis Romam violare luto, quod Barbara vexit  
Tempestas olim in Latium, nisi natus iniquo  
Sydere, nunc velit, & Romani nominis hostis?  
You see, an enthusiasm ever possesses me when I discourse with you. I sigh after next Thursday's conversation, and rest,  
Reverend father, Your, etc. Aug. 30. 1640.   

LETTER VI To the Reverend father, Stephen of Bourges, a Preaching Capuchin.  
Reverend father,  
I Send you back the Manifesto and expect the Exhortations, you did me the favour to promise me. It is not so much curiosity to look on them as fine things, as an intention to be benefited by them as saving things that obliges me once more to desire them of you: and you well remember the old Roman saying, Medecines do no good, unless they stay by it: Which words cannot, for they pass by without any stopping, since your Latin-Country-friend will be our Nymph's Poet, advise him to lay down the Character of Virgil in his Eclogues for his Idea. I meet not with any Venice-glass more polished or clear then that. Ovid's sweetness, and facility, likes me exceedingly, under favour of the Critic Victorius, and the Hypercritick—. As for Lucan, Statius, and Claudian, they rant too high, and make too loud a noise in a sick man's chamber. They are Bells, Drums, and Timbrels which we admit not into our Music. I writ this to you in a huddle, and have but this moment, to tell you, I am,  
Reverend father, Your, etc. Ap. 3. 1645.   

LETTER VII. To Monsieur de Meré, Knight.  
SIR,  
YOur judgement is true; the productions of these fine wits are neither free nor natural. A straining and forcednesse is discernible every where: and aiming to become admirable, they happen to be prodigious. They do not consider that Monsters are produced by excess, as well as deficiency, and that Giants no more than dwarves can be said to be of a handsome stature. But shall we put those you speak of, in the Catalogue, who talked so highly to you of the Roman Majesty; and the nobleness of their style? have a care, Sir, how you condemn them; I beg their pardon of you, for a more considerable interest than their own. For, in earnest, if they are culpable; Virgil cannot be innocent: if in their Poems Caesar forgets his modesty, what I beseech you doth the Head of Caesar's race in the Aeneids do, when being asked his name, he answers.  Sum pius Aeneas, famâ super aethera notus. 
When he proposes himself as a pattern and Idea of true virtue, Disce puer virtutem ex me, etc.  
When he styles himself the great Aeneas, and believes a man doth not repine to die, because 'twas he that killed him.  
Hoc tamen infelix miseram solabere mortem  
Aeneae magni dextrâ cadis, & c?  
We will examine these three passages at our first interview, though you do not give me hopes of any such thing, nor your Letter promise me your company. I am with all my soul.  
SIR, Your, etc. Oct. 4. 1646.   

LETTER VIII To Monsieur Colardeau, the King's Attorney in Fontenay.  
SIR,  
I Applaud the design you do me the favour to impart to me, and it will be approved all the world over, if you please to produce as fine things as you are able to express them elegantly. The ancient Latinism bears a high price amidst the barbarism of these latter ages; but where it is quite dried up (as in some places in which it is maintained merely by the dint of talking) it is to write only for two or three in a kingdom, whose palates are capable of gusting any thing of sound and sincere antiquity. The curiosity of the major part must be contented with something notorious and remarkable, that may stick in the memory, and not be blown away with the sound of the words. And herein the Italian writer of Characters, is much more divertising and instructive, than he of France, though he is inferior to him in Latin and politeness. For example; is there not a great deal of delight in understanding the true manner of Politian's death, which Cardinal Bembo hath so disguised in the Epitaph he made upon him? the whimsy of Naugerius, in making an annual sacrifice of marshal's Epigrams to the muse of Catullus; and the proud morosities of another Poet of the same times? etc. I advise you to excite the Readers attentiveness by such like particularities in the lives of your worthies. Use your utmost to interweave the curiosity of History with the purity of language, and do not forget to sprinkle Paulus Jovius salt, in the same feasts where you use St. Martha's sugar. If you do thus, you will compose a work that shall live; and will not deserve meanly of your own Age, by obliging Posterity. I send you what Madam Des Loges lately sent to me, and beseech you to own me for what I am with passion,  
SIR, Your, etc. Sep. 21. 1646.   

LETTER IX. To the Reverend father Tesseron, of the society of Jesus, Professor of Rhetoric.  
Reverend father,  
I Do a little understand the language of Heaven, but cannot judge of the merits of them who speak it: for the Peerage of Poets ought to be exempted from the Jurisdiction of Grammarians. It is sufficient for me then, to bestow these commendations on your fine verses, and thank you for the delight they gave me. For to engage myself into that strict examination you seem to desire of me, would be not only to introduce an inquisition into a free Country, and violate the enfranchisments of Parnassus, but an acception of your words too literally, and the grounding a Prerogative upon a Compliment. I intent not any such thing, nor will so abuse the arbitrement you commit to me. I must not take advantage on the civilities of a man that teaches Rhetoric, and consequently does not make profession of rigid truth. Whatsoever you do, you cannot debase yourself into a vulgar person, or humble yourself so low by your modesty, as you are elevated in your Genius and conceptions. Reverend Father, Sevine will tell you in what terms I expressed myself to him concerning the subject of those frequent towrings, and what I said of your Muses daring flight; you know he is an eager and pathetical Orator: But I have no need either of his vehemence or his figures, I only desire his bare testimony to persuade you that I am,  
Reverend Father, Your, etc. Apr. 25. 1645.   

LETTER X. To Monsieur Perrot of Ablancourt.  
SIR,  
YOu will receive by this bearer the discourses I promised you yesterday, they will not teach you any new thing, (for what is it you are now to learn?) but they will call to memory your excellent knowledge and revive your fading Ideas. The last time I saw him that made them, I left him in a design to fall on studying French, as if he had been a Germane: you see here how it hath succeeded; and you yourself, Sir, you who were born on the banks of Seine, cannot choose but confess to me that our deserts begin to be civilised, and the savages to grow tame; at least, they purge their tongues by little and l●ttle from the faults of their Country, and speak more like men then formerly: from swaggerers & lawless in matter of Eloquence they are reclaimed to discreet Lovers, and become persons of Reason: this gentleman sticks but too close to the method and precepts of Art. He is so fearful of failing or being misapprehended that sometimes he writes rather like a Grammarian then an Orator: and because he leaps from licentiousness to scruple, in his style; it may be, that so exquisite strictness of his, will not seem very natural to you. You remember him that was taken for a foreigner for being too Attic, for he discovered himself by his disguise. The Provincial Oratour's way of speaking is remarkable for the same care, and shows something pumped and strained for. For the matters he treats of, though often times they slide into Common-places, yet they are pretty lucky falls; and me thinks, his Preaching is not tiresome: but I will not comment in a Tickquet, nor forestall the sentence I ought to wait for. I shall receive it from your sovereign Criticism, the next time I have the Honour to see you. I most humbly kiss your Hands, and am ever with passion,  
SIR, Your, etc. Paris: Mar 7. 1635.   

LETTER XI. To the Reverend Father Adam, a Preacher of the society of Jesus.  
Reverend Father,  
YOu have extremely obliged me in not failing of your word and sending me your fifteen Sermons: they might deserve of the Ears of the Court: they are high proof against all my little craft in the way of words; and they have little less power on paper, then when you animated them with the eloquence of your delivery, & left in our minds so many agitations and emotions, behind them. Proceed to advance your fame yet higher in this noble race, wherein you have already acquired a great stock of reputation: your beginnings were very glorious and splendid, your continuation yet more; and I make no doubt but if you fortify your sacred School learning by the serious study of the fathers, and the solid knowledge of the ecclesiastical History, you will not be left behind those that run most vigorously after honour: and this you will do without forfiture of your humility too. Hitherto I answer you with delight, but what mean you, I beseech you, after the sending fifteen Sermons? what do those taunts of a Rhetorician, those ambiguous and figurative terms, those subtle and delicate complaints in your Letter signify? you are mistaken, Reverend Father, if you imagine your interests are not dear to me, or that I have been cold in an occasion where I ought to show my Ardour. Certainly, you are missinformed in the particulars and circumstances of the thing, and to use the terms of the Founder of the French Academy, some Petulant Aggravatour hath enlarged this business of nothing, to disturb the quiet of your mind. The Reverend Father Gombauld knows how much I am concerned in any thing that relates to you, and at what price I rate your virtue. He shall justify my proceed to you, and I will only assure you at the present, that I am most faithfully,  
Reverend Father, Your, etc. Jan. 15. 1643.   

LETTER XII. To my Lord, the Bishop of Grass.  
My Lord,  
IF you resolve, as you say you do, to write without any Ornament, it is a design will puzzle you hard, and you will scarce be able to bring it about: besides, your not following Saint Basil's counsel herein, you deviate from the example of him and the whole Church of his time, who made no scruple to speak handsomely. I beseech you shake off this untoward humour, do not be incensed against the Graces, those good and innocent. Damsels, who have already won you so many Adherents, and so many Readers of your works; bear some respect to the advantages of nature, I mean the gifts of God; and if you are not an Enemy to the harmless delights of our Country, do not do, like that extravagant Chaste one, who mangled his face, because his beauty pleased those Eyes too well that looked upon it. Eloquence hath nothing to be dreaded in it, when she is in the service of Piety. A Grecian is not to turn Barbarian, when he is converted Christian. They who are afraid the riches of Language should corrupt the simplicity of Christianity, would have driven the wise men from Jesus Christ's stable where they came to offer Gold. There cannot be too much curiosity either on the Altars, or in your works; and you ought not to apprehend that the name of chrysostom should make you lose that of Saint—. I am,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Ap. 12. 1639.   

LETTER XIII. To Monsieur the Abbot Talon.  
SIR,  
SInce you relish well the last things I writ, and your  so exceedingly accurate and discerning; I cannot count them utterly ill: it is no small matter to have pleased you, and Monsieur the Attorney General Talon, for who dares, in point of Eloquence, contradict a mouth that hath so long while, swayed the ablest and justest Council in the world. I willingly submit my dead words, dropped upon my paper, to that lively and animated virtue residing on his lips, that produces decrees in the breasts of the judges. I should be contented not to be wholly slighted; but I should be very proud, if it were true, that he had any esteem for me, and that in that Sun he fights in, he cast pleased aspects upon that shade wherein I am obscured. I cannot choose but apprehend much delight, that my retirement is approved by the most active and best-acting person in the world. Oblige me to tell him this on my part, and to believe me passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 4. 1645.   

LETTER XIIII. To Monsieur the Abbot Bouchard.  
SIR,  
I Make no question of Monsieur Holstenius, his great riches; I only complain of his thriftiness. Of what use is abundance without liberality, unless to change the nature of Good, and lock up that which would be communicated? He should either possess less, or impart more: for though I know he hoards up for Posterity, and will enrich our grandchildren, yet me thinks, he should not in the mean time disinherit us, nor reserve the best part of his fame for a Future that he shall never see. Be our solicitor, then, to his learned worship, and tell him in the name of all the Grecians and Latins of this kingdom, that we lay claim to his papers, and that he is more obliged to instruct his own Age then another. He is none of those barren ones that continually sit in Libraries, but never hatch any thing. It is expected he should bring forth something Eminent from his long conversation with the Vatican. I received what you did me the favour to send me from him. I confess, it is purple, and cloth of Tissue: but it is only a pattern, and there is scarce enough to make a suit for a baby. I would have enough to hang a room with, and I beg whole Pieces, etc. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Mar. 14. 1640.   

LETTER XV. To the Reverend father Josset, a Divine of the society of Jesus, Professor of Rhetoric.  
Reverend father,  
I Think, I need not spend much time in justification of my silence, I may rather commend my tears to you, and tell you that common report having killed you, I have with true grief bewailed your imagined death. I must confess, you confuted this falsity after an excellent fashion; for as you were deceased in my thoughts, so you are newly risen again to my eyes, more gloriously; for so I call the pomp wherein you appeared to me; and that lustre in the work you did me the favour to send me. Never was so bright a diffusion seen. The fertility of things rare, is only in you; and though there are mothers that people the world with cripples and crook'd-backs, your abundance cannot be said to resemble that unfortunate fecundity. You get only perfect children, Omnes Coelicolas, omnes supera alta tenentes.  
May I dare to hazard a fancy, just now fallen into my head? You so highly sing the triumphs of the Church, and Holy days of the State, the death of Martyrs and the birth of Princes, that your verses seem to accumulate glory to that of Heaven, and ornaments to those of the Lovure: the Saints seem to receive a new happiness from you, and Monsieur the Dolphin a second nobility. But you are not only a great Poet, you are a j●lly man also; for I confess, that what you say there, concerning the war with Spain, and the Queens lying in, made me laugh in the height of my Melancholy. According to your opinion, the good fortune of the King was so busily employed at Saint Germans that she could not be at Fontaraby. So Diana suffered her temple at Ephesus to be burnt, that night in which Alexander was brought into the world, while she served as a Midwife to his Mother Olimpias. Plutarch derides this saying of Timeus the Historian, and Cicero admires it in his books of the nature of the Gods. Which of these two are in the right, and to whom shall we judge the prize? or if neither of them must be condemned, what way of accommodation shall we contrive to reconcile them? we will determine this business of consequence at our next interview. In the mean time, I have a thing that more concerns me to speak to you, since you ever love me, Be always mindful of me in your sacrifices of Love, and Charity: allow me some little share in those excesses and inundations of virtue I have been told of: at least let those overflowings water my barrenness: I want only the sight of you to grow better. Come reverend father, come and with your presence manure the stones and sands of our desert. I conjure you to it from the bottom of my heart, and am passionately,  
Dec. 5. 1638. Your, etc.   

LETTER XVI. To Monsieur de Marca, Counsellor to the King.  
SIR,  
AFter I have told you, I was very sensible of the honour you did me, I must now add, that I have a share in that honour you have done to our Age; and that I should have been unwilling to die without seeing your labours in their utmost perfection. This work, Sir, will be no vain show of Science nor mere Ornament of Libraries: this will be a piece necessary to the order of things, for want of which the Glory of France was defective: it will at once both beautify the public, and strengthen the State. Our Kings shall reckon it among their Demeanes, or put it into the number of their Treasures: and if with your profound Learning you had not a large portion of humility you would give me leave to prefer it before Bucklers fallen from Heaven, Images esteemed fatal, and other sacred Gauges of the Grandeur and Duration of Empires; but you would not have men fly so high, for your sake; and you do not affect to show yourself in so much pomp. The Title you have given to your excellent Book is less proud and figurative: it doth not menace the world with an insolent Metaphor, though its modesty (notwithstanding) promise that which none but a perfect understanding can perform. You undertake, Sir, the difficultest accommodation that ever was heard spoken of, since there were any quarrels on Earth: and though Priesthood and Royalty are two powers naturally friends, nay two daughters of the same Father, yet they are ofttimes so embroiled against one another by the interest of their relatives, that it will be hard for Equity herself to succeed in the reconciliation of them. To this is required a moderation the  French are not very inclinable to, and the haughty Roman, less: here must be neither the spirit of a Slave, nor an Enemy: here must be a soul full of light, and emty of passion; the King's power must be acknowledged, and the Pope's authority bowed to: but truth, who is Superior both to Pope and King, and is the strongest thing in the world must be absolutely depended on. What a Renown will it be to you, when it is believed, that your design was merely to oblige her; and it shall be said you defended her rights, as if you had received pay from her, or were by her commanded to write books! What a brave thing it will one day be, to be styled the Champion of truth? I do not see any thing in your writings that may prejudice your hopes, or so noble a pretention. If you had any such when you writ it, there is nothing of the degenerate or rebel in it, and though as yet I have only considered the outside of the building, and three or four pieces of the Portal, I omit not to comprehend the merit of the whole pile together. I saw at the first glance that your knowledge is wise, your Liberty discreet, and your zeal not blind: the most part of books are notorious by such imperfections, and the greatest part of Readers will easily be cured of them, if they meet with no more books to foment them: for my part, I seek after nothing else, since my grey Hairs admonished me to look after what is solid and serious: but especially, Sir, I highly esteem that learned wisdom, without which I should not value all Baronius Latin though he had mountains of it, nor all Casaubon's Greek, though he were more Attic then Athens itself; nor all Scaliger's Hebrew and Arabic, though he understood it better than the Rabbins, and the Mufty. With this bait of sound sense and reason, you take my mind, after you had conquered my heart by another charm, and I am not in this particular less your abettor, than elsewhere I am obliged to be,  
SIR, Your, etc. Aug. 6. 1641.   

LETTER XVII. To Monsieur de Rampalle.  
SIR,  
I Prized you, before I knew you loved me; and though such good tidings should have been concealed from me for ever, yet should I have spoke of your verses with passion, because indeed they put me into one: there is fire in them, that creeps into my veins; for I confess to my shame, my age was a little warmed again with them. I cannot dissemble it, they tickled my heart, and I appeared less severe that day I received them, than I was the day before: you touch the soul so to the quick, that he must have none, who feels not those smart-stroakes: your Art is a second Nature, and your picture's rather the perfection of things than the representation. It is true, the Stories you set down, are such as lead to error, and forfeited Bishopprickeses in the rigour of the Primitive Church, for who can tell but your Metamorphosis may beget others, nay may make more than one— in Diana's retinue, may change chaste Ladies into amorous ones, and the pleasure of reading into a temptation of sinning? but I have neither virtue, nor authority suffificient to prescribe you spiritual counsel: it is enough for me to commit destiny holy matters to you; and to tell you concerning the subject of those that are not so, and that are such dangerous weapons in your hands, what an old woman in Rome said when she was reading the tales of Bocace, Would to God this were saying one's prayers! You see by the carelessness of this Letter that I have put off my trade of Declaimer; I have absolutely renounced the Genus demonstrarivum, and deal no more in Eloquence: but I have great do with truth, and you may believe me when I protest I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. May. 21. 1640.   

LETTER XVIII. To Monsieur de la Chambre, Counsellor and Physician to the King, and in ordinary to my Lord Chancellor, etc.  
SIR,  
YOur humility does you injustice and me a favour: It exalts me, by undervalewing you; but yet I cannot therefore esteem myself taller, or reckon you lesser. I understand the style of the place where you are: such submissions are part of your mirth, and at Court you play with those words, which we use in earnest in the Country. It must necessarily be so; else is it possible that you who are ignorant of nothing should not know what yourself were worth? Would you have excepted yourself out of the universal knowledge you have acquired, and at once both obeyed and disobeyed the Oracle of Apollo? In earnest, after I had considered, examined, and studied your book a whole fortnight, I concluded that never any knew the worth of a man so perfectly as yourself. Never was the God of Delphos more nobly, more punctually obeyed: No, not by him of whose absolute wisdom he gave testimony, nor him that was heretofore called The understanding: nor that other who to this day is called The Genius of nature. This Genius, it is true, hath peeped into the soul, but he stopped at the door. He hath only made the way open to you; and if I were bold enough, I would say, he is but of the outer Court, you of the cabinet-councel. There is no recess nor cranny of the humane soul, but you have penetrated; there is nothing how nimble, swift or secret soever, that passes through it, can escape the perspicacity of your sight, and of which you cannot give a most faithful and certain account. Our greatest Philosophers are only Pupils and Grammar Scholars of Aristotle, as Eustathius was of Homer, and Servius of Virgil. Our best modern books are only repetitions and transcriptions of ancient ones, or at most, but Glosses and Paraphrases on them. I should wrong yours, if I should say the same of it. I should injure the highest and sovereign Reason, which is interessed in this work, if I should attribute it to the lessons you had learned, or the common places you had collected. You are nothing less than Commentatour or transcriber; and to put you in among the number of wits of the second rank would be to degrade you. It may be said then, and that without extravagancy, that you are Philosopher in chief: that your writings are Originals that you have made a great progress into Truth; that you have there discovered unknown regions, which must bear your name, and the straight of Magellan not more famous, then certain places you have passed through. There is no question but you are the first that traveled them, and therefore the glory of discovery is due to you. There are things in your book, for the invention of which a Grecian would have thanked his Gods with a Hecatomb. And not to particularise so many, (and those so rare) things; That single discourse of the knowledge of Animals is a novelty would have given birth to a Sect at Athens, and have ranked you among the Founders of Philosophical Orders. If Aristotle himself were returned to the world, so excellent a Novelty would stir up Jealousy in his breast; it would vex him as much as it would inform him; for being so ambitious as he was, he would have been inconsolable for not being the author of it. But in what unknown quarter of the World have you found that loveliness and light (which are wanting in his works) which invite, solicit, and arrest all eyes to yours. Beauty is there inseparably united with goodness. By your pains it is become broad day in Philosophy, after a night of many Ages; and your words are so clear and pure, so powerful and efficacious, that fare from obscuring things from quickest sighted, me thinks they might even illuminate the blind; as they display the objects, they strengthen and cherish the sight, They delight both the severe and the sad: and the pleasure of them is such that I make no Question but an expression so flourishing and attractive even in the Thorniest and Roughest matters, would quickly discredit Rome and make France loath Comedies and Entertainments, and such other kind of allurements as voluptuous spirits are taken with. This being so, if I am not the most deceiveed man in the world, and having written nothing but what proceeds from my very heart, and a full persuasion, I may yet come in earnest to answer either, the Drollery or civilities of your Letter. In conclusion I say this, if you have lost any thing by my absence (as you pretend in compliment) they are innumerable applauses, loud and frequent acclamations, sometimes interrupted with a silent pause of admiration: they are postures and gestures of a man transported, and such kind of things as Posts and Messengers are not laden with all: these, it may be, you have lost; and in truth, I believe if I had been at Paris when your book came forth, the representation of the Characters you are to treat of in your Chapter of Ecstasy might all have been seen acted by me, though I have not the gift to express them, as you have in paper: in which let it suffice to assure you, that I am passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Sep. 15. 1645.   

LETTER XIX. To Monsieur Salmasius.  
SIR,  
IT is enough, that I hear you have done me the honour to take cognisance of my cause. After this, I do not expect till you have pronounced judgement, to give you thanks for the justice you have done me. Favourable or contrary, I call it good because, being yours it cannot be bad. And if I were afraid of the extremest rigour, as I hope something more mild, yet I am too well persuaded of the integrity and sufficiency of my judge, not to approve my condemnation, if coming out of his mouth. In such affairs, I will never appeal from you to any other. Neither the People, nor Posterity, are names great enough to be set in the scale against Salmasius; and if I should say that in the Commonwealth of Letters he holds the same dignity that formerly Queen Zenobias Confident did, who was acknowledged the Oracle of his own Age, and the Treasure of past Centuries, I should speak nothing but what all the sound part of that Republic would aver after me. Do you then Sovereignly decide, Sir, all the matters in contest? Your opinion ought to be the absolute Rule of our differences. Against so legitimate an authority, there is no protection among the Rabbins; no Sanctuary in the East, nor Recruit in the Country of the Hellenists: and how small an inclination soever my Adversary shows to an arbitrement like mine, yet we are each of us obliged to tell you, Tibi summum rerum judicium Dii dedêre, nobis obsequii gloria relicta est. I shall conserve this glory with respect, and continue passionately, whilst I live,  
SIR, Your, etc.   

LETTER XX. To Monsieur de Scudery.  
SIR,  
YOu have not followed the advice of the Secretary of Florence, in the distribution of your favours. He would have counselled you to distil them drop by drop, to the end they might hold out the longer. But that Grandeur of courage of which you make profession is above those frugal Maxims it confers its graces with a full and open hand; and you are of opinion you have given nothing, where you have not enriched. I have found in the same packet, your Letter, your Request, your Tragedy, and your Observations upon the Kid. What an Ocean of favours pour d out at once! which had they been well husbanded, had returned you the income of four several acknowledgements. But I question not; you were very willing to be quit of three bad Compliments, and will receive this only in your own defence. And yet, Sir, I dare not pretend by it to be discharged of my debt: it shall serve to bear witness against me how much I own you, and let you know the desert hath not yet rendered me so savage, but that I have some sense left me of those rarities which are brought me from the civilised world. 'Tis in that number I place the presents you have made me, and you know well I do not now begin to prise your works. I was one amongst the first who ado●'d your infant Muses, and clapped my hands at the recital of your first Essay: since that time my esteem hath grown proportionably with your forces; and having given its applauds to your fair hopes and expectations cannot now refuse its voice to your more ripe and vigorous productions. Few, if any, are ignorant of the merit of your verse; and your prose hath ravished some who were not acquainted withal your perfections, which as it may boast an infinity of graces besides those of novelty, so it hath found in the world a vast number of partisans, and adorers, amongst whom I am not the least passionate. Yet it will nothing become me to take cognisance of the difference betwixt you and Monsieur Corneille, since for my own particular I am oftener a starter of doubts then a resolver of questions. However I must needs say, you seem to me to have attacked him with address and force; and that, for the most part, your objections are lined with strong sense, with subtlety and gallantry itself. For all this you may please Sir, to consider that all France is entered into the cause with him; and that there is not one of those judges whom it is reported you have assembled, who hath not praised that, you desi●e he should condemn; insomuch that should your Arguments prove invincible and your adversary himself acknowledge them for such, he had yet wherewithal gloriously to be comforted for the loss of his caus●, and might avouch boldly that to have pleased an whole k●ngdome, imports somewhat more of excellent and grand, then to have composed a piece exactly regular. There is not an Architect in Italy, who hath not some fault to find, in the structure of Fontaine bleau, who doth not call it a Monster of stone, and yet this Monster is the fair habitation of our kings, and the Court is there commodiously lodged. There are many perfect beauties eclipsed, by others whose features carry in them less of perfection but more of attract and charm. And since acquired parts are not so noble as the natural, nor the industry of men to be equally esteemed with the gifts of heaven, I may further add that to understand the art of pleasing is not so much to be valued as to understand how without Art to please. Aristotle blames the Flower of Agathon, yet confesses it agreeable, and his Oedipus was not perhaps agreeable, though Aristotle approved it. If it then be true, that the satisfaction of the spectators is the end which the Theatre proposeth to its self; and that the Professors of that art have sometimes appealed from Caesar to the people; the Kid of the French Poet having pleased as well as the Flower of the Grecian, it must be granted he hath obtained the scope of his representation, and that he hath already reached the goal, though he made not to it by the way of Aristotle, nor by the addresses of his Poesy. But you will say, he hath cast a Mist before the eyes of the world, and will accuse him of Magic and enchantment. I know many people that would have the vanity to be proud of such an accusation; and you yourself will confess to me that Magic were an excellent thing, if a thing that were lawful. Would it not be admirable (think you) to be the Author of innocent Prodigies? to make the sun appear at midnight, to prepare a feast without meat or Caterers; to change oak leaves into Gold, and glass into Diamonds? This is that with which you reproach the Author of the Kid, who acknowledging himself to have violated the rules of art doth oblige you at the same time to avow he hath a secret which hath thriven better with him then the Art itself; and not denying but he hath deceived all the Court and all the People, leaves you nothing to conclude but that he is more subtle than all the Court and all the People, and that a finesse put upon so great a number of Persons is more a conquest then a fraud. This being so, Sir, I doubt not but the Messieurs of the Academy will find themselves in the briers about the deciding of your cause; and that on the one side, your Arguments will shake them; as on the other the public approbation will confirm them. Were I of their number, I should have been in the like pain, had I not by good fortune lighted on your sentence in the Register of Antiquity. It was pronounced fifteen hundred years ago by a Philosopher of the Stoic Tribe, but such a Philosopher who had a soul not insensible of pleasures. The Satyrs and Tragedies fallen from whose hand, we have yet amongst us; one who flourished in the reign of an Emperor that was both a Poet and Comedian, in the Age of Verses and of Music. See here the express terms of this authentic judgement which I leave you to interpret to your Ladies, for whose sake you have undertaken a longer and more difficult translation.  
Illud mulium est primo aspectu oculos  
Occupâsse, etiamsi contemplatio diligens  
Inventura est quod arguat: si me interrogas,  
Major ille est qui judicium abstulit,  
Quàm qui meruit.  
Your adversary gains his ends in the favourable word of Major est; and you also have compassed all you can desire, not coveting any more (as I conceive) then to prove that judicium abstulit. So that you will carry it in the Cabinet, as he hath already done upon the stage. If the Kid be guilty, 'tis of a crime for which he hath been honoured: if he must needs be punished, it will yet be, after he hath triumphed. If Plato banish him his Commonwealth, he will first Crown him with flowers and not treat him worse than he formerly treated Homer. If Aristotle find aught wanting in the conduct and management of his plot, he will yet suffer him quietly to enjoy his good fortune and not altogether condemn a design which its success hath justified. You have too m●ch goodness to wish more, you know there is an allay found out for the Law itself in many cases, and that a Court of Equity conserveses that which the strictness of Justice would have ruined. Do not then insist upon that rigorous Letter of the Law: nor bind up yourself in so severe chains to the dictates of sovereign reason. He who designs to satisfy that wholly, and to follow it exactly through all its niceties, would be obliged to contrive a fairer fabric of a World, then that we live in; he must invent a new nature of things, and search for Ideas above the Heavens. I speak for my own interest; if you are of that belief, you will find nothing to be loved, and by consequence I shall run the hazard of losing your favour, though it be extremely dear to me, and that I am passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Aug. 27. 1637.   

LETTER XXI. To Monsieur Perrot, of Ablancourt.  
SIR,  
THis little note threatens you with a large pair of Manuscripts, and I am now making ready for I know not what long harangve upon the subject of Tiberius and his honest successors. Yet it troubles me to forego Liberty for Tyranny, and my Livy for your Tacitus. But Tacitus being become yours, my ill humour against him cannot last. I cannot hate a person whom you love; and to tell you the truth, methinks he is grown more gentle and less thorny, since he passed through your hands. The reason is, you contract no soil from the impurity of the matters which you handle; and amidst the corruptions of Policy your morality is preserved pure and unconcerned. A Stoical Philosopher of this latter Age, as you will grant Justus Lipsius to be, had the same passion as yourself: A great Commander, as questionless was the marquis Spinola, hath translated the same thing, into his own language; though it never was yet published; and I reveal this secret to you from the mouth of one of his greatest Confidents. So that you are neither singularly gentleman, or the only wise man that hath pleased to make observation upon ill times, and carefully studied the History of a corrupted Empire, with a soul worthy the Repubique in her perfect Glory. You cannot think how I prise your work; the beauty and the chastity of your style; both that which nature bestowed largely upon you, and your own acquisitions. But this is a subject for another pair of manuscripts, I conclude with a sincere protestation to continue with all my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jun. 4. 1643.   

LETTER XXII. To the Reverend Father d'Estrades, a Divine of the Society of Jesus, Superior of the confessors Cloister in Bourdeaux.  
Reverend father,  
At last my New-year's gift are come.  
I Have received the controverted discourses you did me the favour to send me, and you were just to call them the Weapons. I add fatal and invincible, and I think, I speak yet too modestly of them; For, in earnest, who can esteem those Weapons high enough which Monsieur the Grand Prior forged, and you have polished; on which he bestowed the temper and the strength; you the fashion and ornaments? Your Minister is too happy, for dying so fair a death. Certainly Duke Moulin and Mestrezat will envy him for it. But for our particular, what should we do: It becomes us to joy as in our Muse's behalf at the honour done them by a man of so high quality, who hath had so great and so illustrious employments, is at present Governor of a Province, and one day may be sovereign to a Nation made up all of Gentlemen. I confess freely to you, my profession gins not to dislike me so much as it did, I begin to love it a little more, since as well as I, that Gallant Knight is of the same, and we are both Authors in one Language. But I beseech you Reverend father repent not of that good Office you lately did him, and do not conceive that action, though it seem inferior, is unworthy of you. There is more Glory in Copying out Oracles, then dictating ones own inventions. The Sibyls and Prophets did nothing but repeat as well as you. They were but interpreters and messengers; or, not to run so fare back, Posterity shall not be less beholding to you for preserving a piece of Divinity of Monsieur the Grand Prior, than we are now obliged to Arrian for saving us the relics of Epictetu●'s Philosophy. Doubt not then, to proceed in the Noble Collection of the reasons and arguments of an other: Nevertheless, since in point of Learning you are not less rich by birth, than fortune and industry hath rendered you; send us something immediately from your own hand, to let your Minister know, you are able to beat him with your unborrowed forces: this will effectually dispatch him; and not leave him, in the distress you have put him, so much as this small sentence of comfort with which he may possibly flatter his despair, Is it possible not to yield to the Uncle of a man who hath command of Legions? I shall expect this second present for my next new year's gift, and in the mean time remain withal my soul,  
Reverend father, Your, etc. Jan. 15. 1640.   

LETTER XXIII. To Monsieur de Borstel.  
SIR,  
THe gentleman who delivered me your Letter, brings you the Sermons you would needs have me read, and of which you desired my opinion. I have read them with a great deal of delight, and I may say with much edification: for, in earnest, they do not deviate, methinks, from the Orthodox Doctrine; and were it not for two or three little marks, which denote them of the contrary party, and some slight offers at our Outside, which we do not much care to defend, they might be preached with applause in our Lady's Church at Paris. I met with beauty in most places, and vigour almost in all; especially in that of our dear Monsieur Daille. He is none of those Orators, Seneca's Apes, whose perpetual Antithesies only touch upon the superficies of the soul. As he uses better weapons than they, so he strikes deeper wounds. He leaves true compunction in the heart, and not false alarms in the ear. He hath seen the Idea of that Sovereign Rhetoric, whose portrait I drew lately, and Monsieur Costar calls, Queen of the Free States: He hath studied her among the ablest masters; and though by a certain scrupulosity entailed on his profession, he dare not display her in her full extent; though he conceals more than he discloses; yet it is easily visible, he doth possess what he doth not make show of; and that he is rich and powerful, though he be modest and thirsty— etc. In a word, I am with passion,  
SIR, Your, etc. Feb. 4. 1639.   

LETTER XXIIII. To Madam de Nesmond, Superior of the Ursulines in Angoulesme.  
Madam, my Dear Cousin,  
IT is now wednesday morning, and you may keep Monsieur Godeau's book till Friday Evening: but I declare to you, I cannot resolve to endure a longer absence. Do you know how much I do in this for your sake? I separate myself from a friend at all hours of the day; I deprive myself of a companion that makes my solitude happy; I let go a guest that pays me in Rubies and Diamonds. It is true, he will return speedily: but in the mean time, what a Patience must I practise to be without him to day, to morrow, and the next day? When you have surveyed the wonders I speak of, you will accuse my words of undervalewing and poorness: you will deride the meanness of my Metaphors, though I draw them from the most precious things Magnificence can be employed in, and make them of Rubies and Diamonds. You will tell me, that in this inferior world, and amongst all the glories of nature that are visible, no comparison is to be found worthy of my friend: that he is an Angel in a Poet's disguise; that he is descended to Earth to teach men the language and Music of Heaven: at least let us say, and that with a perfect consent and wonder, that before him our Muses were Courtesans, and debauched wenches, and he hath reclaimed them from that scandalous life, to make them Saints and Religious, like you: let us say, he hath reduced Verse to its primitive and Legitimate use: that he hath cleansed Parnassus, when it was filled with all the defilements of humane wit, with the mud and the corruption of all ages. But what should not I say in a Preface of my making, before the book I send you, since I have made a Ticket speak so much already? One word more in answer to your Letter. Pardon me, Madam my dearest Colen, if I cannot do what you entreat me. I do not think I shall quit St. John chrysostom, nor St. Leo the Pope, who are the Chaplains of my Desert, for your Preacher, to whose Sermons you invite me. And unless yourself were to preach in your own Chapel, it would be a very difficult task to entice me out of my Hermitage as long as this fair season lasts. Do not think I am in jest when I speak of your Preaching: you want nothing to do it but a privilege, which by misfortune hath not been granted to your sex: and you would have eloquence to spare, if the Church would suffer you to make use of it. I wish you a good day, and am with all my soul,  
Madam, my Dear Cousin, Your, etc. May. 7. 1634.   

LETTER XXV. To My Lord, the Bishop of Grass.  
My Lord,  
I Received your Paraphrase on the Canonical Epistes: But you are more liberal than you conceive you are, or else you give more than you speak of. The Letter you did me the honour to write me, promises me only four Apostles, and I find five in the book I received from your favour. Was it for want of memory that you made no mention of the fifth, or an excess of humility that you reckoned it for none? This itself is one of the marks of Apostleship; and the same God who exalts those of your order in the same rank with Angels, by the power he hath given them, inclines them to debase themselves beneath men, by the example he hath left them. But I am not obliged ever to assent to your Humility, and believe a perfect man that preaches his imperfection. For not to put any dissension between the Saints that triumph above, and those who fight below, I believe I may say, the same spirit that animates you, is no other but that which inspired them, and that you speak with as much vigour as our Fathers did when the blood of our Saviour boiled yet in the Church's veins. I observe in your works the language of those Heroic times, and the courage of those Heroes. Though I am all ice, I kindle at the reading of them; and I should find no difference between the Epistle you have made, and those you have expounded, but that you call them Gentlemen whom the Apostles style Brethren. But it is not through affectation of certain terms out of use, that we are to imitate the primitive Christians. There is no great harm in complying with the age we are of, in things of so small consequence; and without letting slack the ancient austerity, some little toleration may be yielded to custom. I am,  
My Lord, Your, etc. April. 12. 1639.   

LETTER XXVI. To the same.  
My Lord,  
SEek some other than me that may do what you order. You require a thing of me that is not in my power; and your works being my Mistresses, how can I possibly look on them with the eyes of an enemy? To do this, I must be as Barbarous as the ancient Goths who made war on all excellent things; or of as ill a nature as that modern Italian, who commented on Aristotle only to find fault with him. I am neither a Goth, nor Castelvetro. I am your constant and perpetual Admirer; your Verses, your Prose, your inventions, your imitations, your lutes, your flutes, and your trumpets please me absolutely, and without any condition. Every thing that comes from you does so charm me, that there is no means to make me censure uprightly of it; unless passion and ecstasy are competent judges. You shall have nothing else from me, besides that true protestation. But what would you more? what can I say of your last compositions, unless that the multitude of The beauteous and The good takes away my free election of any one; and that, 
As one, who to some flowery garden walks  
Designed in wreaths t' unite the severed stalks,  
Nature's enamel there the more he spies  
The more the choice distracts his wondering eyes.   
I am without reserve,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Jan. 22. 1644.   

LETTER XXVII. To Monsieur Maury, Dr. in Divinity.  
SIR,  
YOur papers have taught me an infinity of good things, both serious and delightful, strong and subtle, Attic and Roman in an equal degree: but this shall be our Sundays conversation, and I will not dilate myself on it till I am with you in attending that desired day. I must tell you news, that Monsieur de— who was so much your friend, is become your accuser: In earnest, he impeached you yesterday for a Magician, and he still avers that there is something supernatural in your more then Ovidian smoothness. He swears that that of the Prophets and other inspired persons, nay that of Apollo himself their inspirer, was never comparable. For my part, I dare not go so high: I only say, that when you speak in Prose, you are more puzzled to avoid measures, and number, than we are to find them when we writ Verses. I believe it would be no hard task for you to turn all into rhyme, that ever was written in the world, and set all the Sciences in music: that hereafter, Philosophy and Divinity, yea the Law, and Physic too, might be all sung of your composing. There is no Author so constant and stiff in his way, but altars in your hands; none so serious and sad but you make him dance as often as you please. There is no mortal in Print, but you in an instant teach him the Language of the Gods, by an extemporary Paraphrase. You have already written a Rhetoric in Verse; but that is nothing, you will make Cicero a Poet when you please; his Orations and Epistles shall be transformed into Woods and Epigrams, if you resolve it.  
O latices numerorum! O verba fluentia cursu  
Aeterno! Talis Rhodanus, vesterque Garumna,  
Hybernis fluit auctus aquis. Nec verba, sed illas  
Res, O Maure, illas, sed vastum ac fine carentem  
Miramur rerum Oceanum, quas fundis ab ore;  
Formosam que is Burdigalam ditare benignus,  
Pictonicumque solum voluisti, & littora laté,  
Santonica, insignemque suis sine moenibus urbem.  
Que is nostras, mi Maure, beâsti sepius aures.  
I most humbly kiss your hands, and am with all my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. Aug. 30. 1640.   

LETTER XXVIII. To Monsieur L'Huillier, Counsellor to the KING etc.  
SIR,  
I Felicitate you for having Monsieur De Roncieres for your Governor, Monsieur Rigault for your Colleague, and Madamoiselle Calista for your Mistress or your disciple. If the word felicitate is not yet a French Denizen, it shall be next year, and Monsieur de Vaugelas hath promised not to oppose it. I congratulate your good fortune in Lorraine, and confess you have cause to slight the three Cities you speak of; though Venice be Queen of the Sea, Rome Metropolis of the earth, and Madrid be accused of aspiring to the Universal Monarchy. If the man of Bilbilis said formerly to a Calista of less merit than yours, Romam tu mihi sola facis, what would he not have said, if besides his mistress he had enjoyed two such friends as you do? what contempt had he not put on the fathers-Conscript, and the Order of Knights on the Palace, and the Palatine Militia; every thing is to be found in three persons differently excellent. A little World so complete would please me much better than the great one so spoilt. In reality, I count you happier for the converse of that venerable Old Man, then if you were in ordinary with Jupiter, then if that Father of the Gods and King of men should carry you with him to his banquets in the Ocean, though Nectar be poured out there in buckets, and the Muses say Grace to him. Your Letter promises me his Minutius which I have not yet seen (I mean the Minutiuses of Monsieur your Landlord): but to tell you truth, I had rather see some of his own natural productions than all the works of other men he hath new dressed up: especially, Sir, I long for the Character of the ancient Christian, which he put me in some hopes of, the last time I had the honour to entertain him. How filtly would such a work come out at the beginning of a civil War, kindled between the Orthodox Churchmen; and how the representation of the spirit and mildness of our forefathers, would be effectual to persuade their quarrelsome Children to peace; both Jesuits and Jansenists!  
Exoriare liber priscae virtutis Imago,  
Et dubiae tandem properé succurrito Romae.  
Love me ever, I beseech you, since your friendship is one of the sweetest consolations of my melancholy Life, and since I am more than any person in the world,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 18. 1642.   

LETTER XXIX. To Monsieur de Bellejoy.  
SIR,  
Why do you take it so ill that the late King of Sweden, and the Duke of Weymar are named in a drinking Song? I am not so great a Scholar as you, I want above half of it: yet I know that long since Harmodius and Aristogiton were sung, in the most memorable debauches; and hath not your own Athaeneus taught you a Song concerning Harmodius, that gins thus, Most dear Harmodius, thou art not yet dead; the report is that thou yet livest in the fortunate Islands, with active Achilles and brave Diomedes. Upon this song of Harmodius the Loyalist who would have converted you, when you were both in my Chamber, hath brought me a passage out of Aristophanes, and another of one of his commentatours which confirm that of Atheneus: here they are both, 
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉,  
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉.  Aristophanes' Achernensibus: Ad quem locum Scholiastes.  
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉  
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉,  
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉.  
You are admirable in searching out all kind of drinking Songs for me, which you call Bacchanal Odes. Certainly, it is because I writ to you last year, that I had need of an appetite, that I was nauseated with serious matters, and that I never hear more talk of Morality nor Politics. I am not always in that scurvy humour. We dispute, we discourse, and sometimes declaim in our village, the affairs of the Roman Commonwealth are there treated on; Caesar and Pompey are both arraigned there, you may find controverses and Suasories, with counsels given to Consuls and Dictatours, and if you please to have me tell you after a more Noble manner.  
Hic soceri causa, & generi, censente Catone,  
Et longa imperia, et nimii damnantur honores.  
Hic bona Libertas, tranquilla obscuraque vita,  
Praefertur regno Italiae, ac victricibus armis;  
Consiliumque damus Syllae, privatus ut altùm  
Dormiat, & numeret salsos in littore fluctus,  
Aequoreasque legat conchas.  
This good counsel that is given to Sylla to sleep sound, puts me in mind it is time to go to bed, and take leave of your learned Lordship. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Apr. 20. 1641.   

LETTER XXX. To Monsieur Colardeau, the King's Attorney in Fontenay.  
SIR,  
I Maintain it openly that your Verse has no whit advantage of your Prose: or if you would not have me speak like the People, I tell all that will hear me, you are not less valiant on foot, then on Horseback. The Panegyricke to our Monsieur d'Argenson, and the vote for our Monsieur de Villemonte are worthy your Art, and their Virtue. I equally esteem the materials and the workmanship, the richness of the stuff and rarity of the embroidery. In how agreeable a dress you have embellished the objects of my love! you represent them to me, if it be possible, more amiable than they seemed before. It is true, there is a neighbouring Vicar, to whom I shown both the Pieces, and he produced me the story of the two Parrots that were taught to speak at Rome during the War at Actium; one of which the Juggler had instructed to cry AVE VICTOR CAESAR, and the other AVE VICTOR ANTONI: But I stoutly defended the honour of your Muses against his allegation: I answered him, that here was no War, no Enemy; and that to commend the Predecessor and the Successor was one and the same thing? it is only to praise the King's Creature, the Queen's choice, and their council's judgement. Let not therefore an assault that I have repelled already for you, give you any disquiet; and enjoy peaceably the glory you have deserved by labouring to celebrate that of others; I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Aug. 10. 1646.   

LETTER XXXI. To Monsieur de la Thibaudier.  
SIR,  
I Had sent to morrow into Poictou, if I had not this day heard you were at Paris. Your Steward amazed me with the news, and hath taken me off the hopes I had to feast you here within four or five days. The Learned Peyrarede is to be here within that time, if he be a man of his word. He brings along with him his observations upon Plautus and Martial, to mingle with our Melons, and our Mushrooms: with all which, and a great deal of salt and pepper, we shall make no contemptible olives. But what shall we do in the mean time for your incomparable way of discourse; your facetious Eloquence, your constant and perpetual mirth? where will that picture of a young Pope be, in whose company no melancholy is able to keep countenance? his mere Idea infuses delighting conceits into me, in the midst of my sadness: On a day too, wherein I take Physic, when I do not so much as write to Titus Pomponius Atticus, you provide me this happy instant, to offer myself to you both in Latin and French against Monsieur the Prior and Monsieur the judge. They have either of them made a match to assault you in his own Language as soon as ever you come into the Country. But what honour do I foresee for you! how bright a day will this be, and what new rays it will add to your splendour! I am now making ready to clap my hands and cry out Vivat and Sophos, to the great Monsieur de la Thibaudier. If your steward is to be believed, you are already so great that you can beget nothing that is little: He hath told us miracles of that little Gallant of your own mould, that is not yet five years and a half old. Is it true, that he had rather go out at the windows then at the doors; that he runs upon the brink of precipices; that he goes to go to snatch the thing he loves, out of the middle of the fire? These are the rudiments of a Hero, whose History shall one day be written by some Gomberville. I speak in earnest; Aeneas did not do more for his father, than your son has already done for roasted apples. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Oct. 16. 1643.   

LETTER XXXII. To the same.  
SIR,  
I Know you do not care much to be put to charges, but I know besides you will not let good customs be antiquated. I therefore thought fit (out of my natural liberality) to send you you Lenten provision for this year. Among other things you will receive a Satin ●hesis dedicated to me by the Philosophers of Angoulesme, of which you may make that learned Mask, you once shown me the plot of. It is true, Crasset is no longer of this world, and Monmor is a little too far from Chisay: but what do you take Monsieur— for, who is within a spit and a stride of you, and who of late is become all Form, all Matter, all Genus, all Species, all category, and Predicament? Your mummery could not be carried to a better house than his. He hath at least two thousand ready Syllogisms in stock lying by him, and not one but is over-weight, as I am told by a Gentleman of his acquaintance that cannot read. I would very feign make one at so merry a meeting, but I must wait from Paris for my convoy to la Thibaudier, Tantae molis erat, lecticam condere nostram!  
I am, Sir, but in earnest, and out of the terms of our figure,  
SIR, Your, etc. Nou. 3. 1642.   

LETTER XXXIII. To the same.  
SIR,  
FOr an answer to all your eloquent Letters, I give you notice that I am resolved to make a collection of them and present them to the Public with a Preface of my own. I ought to be doubtful that the success of this design might prove disadvantageous to me: but my affection is uncapable of jealousy. It surpasses all considerations of self-love, and private interest: With a ready heart I resign to you the Crown, Monsieur de Bois-Robert bestowed on me, when he inaugurated me king of the Wits, and am content to lose the esteem I held of a Doctor at the Letter-style, provided you succeed me in the chair. Questionless, you would be voted to it, if you had never writ any thing besides the last Letter I received from you, for I protest the lustre of your writings is so bright and strong, that I am yet dazzeled with them. Isocrates his Helena shows deformed to me incomparison of that Lady whose portrait you drew to me. All that is left us of the wracks of Antiquity, and the hands of the most eminent Masters comes not near this exquisite picture. Even he that infused a soul and life intocolours, should be but one of your apprentices: we should find he hath but slubbered over the Goddess of beauty, if his work-manship were set against your—. I am withal my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. Dec. 28. 1643.   

LETTER XXXIIII. To Monsieur Conrart, Counsellor and Secretary to the King.  
SIR,  
IT is necessary that I be very firmly persuaded that your goodness is infinite: for if I could suppose it had any limits, with what forehead durst I appear before you? Yet I do it, and that with a strange confidence: not only to ask you pardon for doing amiss, but also to beg leave to continue in my fault. Never was such a boldness heard of: never did offender less dissemble his inclination to evil, nor treated more familiarly with his judge. All that can be said in my justification, is, that I sin out of infirmity, and that my offences are neither malicious nor voluntary. I languish here at the end of the world without action or motion. I am a burden to myself, and of no use to any body else. I am, if you would have me speak in a higher strain, a paralytic limb of Common society; I have only left, Sir, some principle of life, which I reserve for you, and my hea●t is still sound enough to honour you as I ought. That As I aught is as unlimited as your goodness: and though you were not an extraordinary person, and one of the things of the world which I admire (who am no very great Admirer) yet you have obliged me to be more than any man in the world,  
SIR, Your, etc. Oct. 24. 1639.   

LETTER XXXV. To the same.  
SIR,  
YOur Doctor is not Orthodox; at least he hath been ill informed, for I have not so much as dreamt (as he told you) of putting any thing to the press. I am so nauseated with all things that are called books, that in the mind I now am, I would more willingly blot out all that ever I writ then resolve to write them fair. Be pleased then to assure the intelligencer, that he received a false alarm. I do with all my heart forgive the memory of Don Roderigo, and bury all my injuries and my resentments of them in his grave: I am not addicted to disturb the quiet of Churchyards, to fence with my pen against Ghosts, to violate the Franchises and sanctuary of death. It is true, Sir, my dear Menander hath in his hands two Apologies of mine, which I made long since, and he may dispose of, as he pleases. But it is as true withal, that I defend myself there without encountering with any person in it: and my equity, my modesty, and my civilities are such, that my friends of Quercy and Perigored have styled them abjectness and Cowardice. I left a copy of these two Apologies at Paris, which N. N. hath a command to present to you from me, with some other compositions Moral and Political. You may please to send me your opinion of them at your leisure, and do me always the favour to believe that none can be more passionately than I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Apr. 7. 1639.    

THE FOURTH BOOK.  

LETTER I. To Monsieur the Precedent Mainard.  
SIR,  
We are now in the beginning of October, and your last Letter promised me your Company here in August, if you were alive. I pray Heaven you be rather false then dead, and that you break your word, yet for many years to come. I know that, in Poetry, Jupiter laughs at the perjuries of Lovers, But remember your promise was made in prose, and that it is allowed you to be always fabulous. Yet if there be no means to drive you from your fictions, nor reduce your style to the simplicity of truth, it shall not hinder me from enjoying my desires by another way. I have decreed to see you, though I enforce my way through all the Mountains that separate us, and vanquish all the Barbary betwixt you and me. For this effect, I have in my fancy designed myself a litter, becoming the Equipage of a Spanish Ambassador; and I am now sending to the most noted fairs of Poitou to provide a couple of Mules, as black and sleek as those your Predecessors assigned to draw the Coach of the Moon. When this is done, I set forth for the upper Auvergne, and bring you with the ice● and infirmities of my age, the most lively and ardent passion that a heart of five and twenty can be sensible of, 
Nec segnis mihi flamma placet. Malé novit amare,  
Qui patience, qui lentus amat.   
SIR, Your &c. Octo. 5. 1641.   

LETTER II. To Monsieur Girard, Secretary to the late Lord Duke of Espernon.  
SIR,  
YOu must needs be a person of much resolution that have undertaken a journey to Paris with the Posse of Bourdeaux. I am jealous of the success of your temerity: for unless you be defended with a Parasol as broad as Aiaxe's buckler, I fear you will have cause to complain of the too great brightness of the month of July.  
Vos Aurae, Aoniis placidae de Montibus Aurae,  
Aestum illi lenite, gravem lenite laborem.  
A more tender wish cannot be made for a Mistress. But to summon the cool gales so fare, and to make them come from Graece into France, I cannot tell how it should be effected without one of Apollo's miracles, who does not always grant me the supplications I address to him. However, accept the good intention of your friend, and do not take it ill that I wish you at the head of the River Loire, and on the plains of Beausse; the same gentle air I suck in on an Evening on the bank of our Charante. I say the Evening; for after that, there is no gentleness for me, I lie ever on Thorns; and have continually unquiet nights. Yet since I have begun to be pleasant with you, I am resolved to go through so. It is better to make you a sharer in my comforts, then tire you with my Lamentations. I am he, in effect, that daily wake Aurora; that am a constant waiter on the hours, when they open their Portals of Heaven; that ever gather that first flower of the day, the Poets speak such fine things of. Nay, I may credibly say, that this very morning, I saw the Rocks that surround the prospect of my Chamber, turned into Porphyry, and that I am a perpetual witness of the Sun's actions, 
When a more mild not full expanded ray;  
Upon our Hills gins to kindle day.   
— The Magis of Persia, and the Indian Gymnosophist could not say more. Thus we talk magnificently of our miseries. Such diseases must be gently palliated as admit of no cure, to try whether Quacking may have better success than Physic. Since I cannot be happy by a slumber, I endeavour to take all the delight my watch will allow me, 
Sic vigilo Comes Astrorum, falloque dolores  
Ipse meos, mihi sic noster dat ludere Phoebus.   
At least he furnishes me to write you a Letter without matter. For if I had been so minded, I could have made an end of it at the beginning, as well as that Grand Personage heretofore began at the end. I could have told you immediately and have forgot nothing I had to say, that I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jul. 30. 1642.   

LETTER III. To the same.  
SIR,  
YOu are a notorious deluder, or a deluder notorious. I speak both ways to satisfy two Grammarians of my acquaintance, who are at variance about the precedence of the adjective. But, to treat you more fairly, I say you have not performed all you promised me; and I have expected, to no purpose, almost four months. Yet I do not deny to admit your justifications, and believe it is only the necessity of your business that hath made you forfeit your word. I beseech you therefore dispatch that business speedily, and come triumph at Balzac for the victories you go to obtain at Paris. The throats of all these Law suits must be cut, and of all that looks like them. The brood must be stifled in the Cradle. For my part I have such a Natural enmity against them, that I am so fare from becoming a solicitor either of the Council, the Parliament, or the Exchequer, etc. that I cannot so much as request any thing from the Sovereign of all these Sovereign Courts, Nec tanti sunt res humanae, ut Balzacius (why not he as well as Scaliger?) vel ulli Monarchae suplex fit. I am confident you will not return unedified from the conferences you will have with that Sage person to whose acquaintance I recommend you: and you will confess to me that his virtue, though high and Sovereign, hath nothing in it strange or Stoical, Quod pace Zenonis, Chrysippi, Cleanthis, & nostri— dictum sit. Is enim, si nescis, purum putum Stoicismum, etiam cum ad Silviam aut ad Phillidem scribit, multâ cum gravitate profitetur, etc. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. May. 12. 1643.   

LETTER FOUR To Monsieur de Bellejoy.  
Sir,  
I Would not have been so lazy, had I believed you so diligent. I conceived that you having never been at Paris would have taken some time to learn the Map of that little world. So that according to my computation, after you had worn out one month in recovering yourself of your journey, you would have spent another in finding out the Climate where Monsieur Chaplain lives. I have just now given him that testimony I promised you, in the most advantageous language I could devise. He will inform you of it at your first conference, and shall justify my affection, in case you accuse it. He is a person of an eminent virtue, all Understanding and all Reason; of whom it may be said, as well as of that other That he dips his pen in sense. If you are a man that will take counsel, his are more infallible than the oracles of Pythia; but you must attend him with docility and submission: you must know, The greatest Clerks, are not the wisest men.  
Instead of the Panegyric you intent, I would advise you to undertake the translation of a Greek piece of some Christian Author. There are excellent in that kind, as you know, of St. chrysostom, St. Gregory Nazianzen, Theodoret, etc. You may make choice of such as best please you, and teach them to speak good French, now you are perfectly Vn-Gasconated. A preface of your making would be fare better than those Paranymphes, and Panegyrics which you have under your hands,—. When the translation is finished we shall consult upon the subject of the preface, if you come back hither this Autumn, where I attend you with more questions than Tiberius made to a Grammarian newlanded in his Isle of Capri. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Apri. 4. 1639.   

LETTER V To Monsieur Zuilichem, Counsellor and Secretary to his Highness the Prince of Orange.  
SIR,  
I Received your Letter as if it had dropped down from Heaven, and brought me back my good fortune. I speak thus, in regard I thought you were not willing I should be happy any longer, and because I grow distrustful of all the good things of this world. The obstinacy of your silence made me fear something worse than the discontinuation of our correspondence. When I had a mind to flatter myself, I fancied you had forgot me without hating me, and that your friendship had expired of a natural death. I have cried aloud but my voice was not heard: I writ Letters and had no answer. For it is most true; I could retort all the complaints you urge upon me. I could call you cruel, or at least disdainful, but that I had rather find out some extrinsecall cause of this default and lay the blame upon the Posts, or the Seasons; Fortune, and Destiny, and any thing else, than you. At last I understood, there was a packet for me at Paris, and the virtuous Madam— sent me the happy tidings of it. But, would you believe, Sir, that this packet has grown old at the Poste-house, and that after its arrival at Paris, I was constrained to expect its coming hither above four months? Certainly there must be some Damon envious of my happiness whose only employment is to put barricadoes between you and me, and way-layes all the presents that come to me out of Holland. Sometimes he intercepts your Letters; sometimes he is contented to retard them, and not being able to make me lose your affection, he crosses me all he is able, in the enjoyment of your favours. Nevertheless, in despite of this evil Spirit and all his malice, your presents are here put into the port, after a voyage of six months; and with your elegant Letter, I have received the platform of your fair House. To judge of the excellency of such a complete piece, requires more skilful eyes than mine and such as are better purged of earthly vapours, and the Barbarism of the Country. A man must be of Rome to do it, and not of this village, where nature indeed, hath some graces and allurements; but art is violated on all sides, and hath received infinite outrages by Artificers. Instead of your Ideas of perfection, and your Masterpieces of Wit and Hand, you can see nothing here but confused rubbish; but Monsters and Prodigies of stone that will trouble you to behold them. There is not one part in its right place, not one place but hath an incongruity in Architecture, and offends the Eyes of such as look upon it knowingly. So that if you would do me the same honour you desire I should receive at your house, I should be forced (out of fear of bringing you into a Chaos of disorder and irregularity) to pitch a Tent on the bank of my River, having first found o●t a charm to make my house invisible. The painting of yours, doth not please me a whit less than the two descriptions which the younger Pliny have left of his. You cannot choose but be extremely satisfied with it, and I confess you cannot speak too highly of it. But when it shall be attended with the Distertation you make me hope for; then indeed, you may say, you have built for Eternity, and more justly sing then the Poets our dear friends Jamque opus exegi, quod nec Jovis ira, nec ignes, etc.  
I am very impatient for the sight of this second work, the pure work of your mind. But when shall I be able to go take possession of the Apartment you offer me in so obliging terms, and assure you, not by figures and paper, but by my own self, and by the mouth of the true Balzac, that I am perfectly,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 25. 1640.   

LETTER VI To Monsieur de Campaignole, Lieutenant to the Regiment of the Kings Guard.  
Sir, My Dear Nephew,  
I Wish sickness be none of the causes of your silence! Be as slothful as sloth itself, rather than indisposed in the least measure. It is an interessed person that speaks to you; and I beseech you, preserve your health for my sake. All that can be called disease in your person, would so suddenly communicate itself to mine, and distract me in such a strange manner, that I should become the mansion of pain, and you only the thorough fare. But it is too much to call to mind the fright you put me in, last year, and your fits of five and thirty hours' continuance; Let us leave this subject: And if my last Letter be lost, this shall let you know, that I am extremely satisfied with your negotiation; I admire that capacity in one and twenty, and such dexterity without experience: It deserves a better employment than I have given it, and you wrong yourself with the term of my Little Agent, who may one day be a great Ambassador, and convey words from King to King: You want nothing but favour to do it, for in the School you are, you will quickly acquire the civil virtues, as you were borne with the military, etc.— We are merry together according to our wont, yet one may jest and speak truth to, and do not conceive that I esteem you a less brave man then that other Gallant of your name, who is called in the History of Flanders, Il Signior di Campagnola, Soldato di stima grande. I am with love, and tenderness,  
SIR, My dear Nephew, Your, etc. Aug. 10. 1644.   

LETTER VII. To Monsieur Favereau, Counsellor to the King in the Court of Aids.  
SIR,  
BE pleased to admit from me the same excuses which you make to me, and do not judge of my affection by my compliments. I am sometimes so backwards in writing that a journey of fifty leagues would not put me to so much trouble as a Letter of five and twenty lines, and as weak and feeble as I am, I had rather take Post to go visit my friends then take my Pen in hand to send them news of me. It is no small matter, to talk and have nothing to say; to want matter and fill up a sheet of paper with words. In truth, I am ashamed to fall so often into repetitions of the same thing, and to be always reduced to—. You may please therefore only to understand, that you have made Mademoiselle Campaignole the proudest of Virgins, but this pride of hers is but reasonable: the tokens of your remembrance which she hath received are so agreeable that there is no confessor so severe but will indulge her the vanity she takes in them; for my part I have a concernment in them; for, me thinks, after so glorious an approbation, it is more honour to be her Uncle then before—. I am ever with passion,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jul. 20. 1638.   

LETTER VIII. To the same.  
SIR,  
I Am, for this day, secretary to that Novice at Tic-tacke whom you taught last year, and who expects, as she says, to learn the perfection of that game from you. She is not so uncomely that she will be a dishonour to her Master, and there will be no cause to repent you of the pains you take with a person whom the Gods have not neglected. I feel your Muses coming upon me and making me speak already in the language of a Poet: I remember you sometimes told me, that you saw Love hover about her, and flutter with his wings. This word Love is enough to make her angry. But your vision must be cautiously interpreted, and she must be persuaded you did not mean that wanton Love, Son of the terrestial Venus, but the wise Love, Son of Venus Urania. I go beyond my commission, and yet have not performed it: for I have express command from the Scholar who would receive your instructions to assure you, she honours you perfectly. As for me, you are not ignorant that I am the most in the World,  
SIR, Your, etc. Sep. 3. 1639.   

LETTER IX. To Monsieur de Lavaux Saint James, rector of the University of Poitiers.  
SIR,  
I Have owed you a thanks a great while: but you have so much chariry as not to exact the forfeiture of your debr; and more forward to commiserate my infirmities, then to blame my neglects. Sometimes I attend six months for one good hour: and all my Learned neighbours have had opportunity to read your excellent Manuscripts before my turn came to receive that contentment. At length I have surveyed your agreeable work. How enammelled and florid is your style, and yet withal how strong and vigorous! you have persuaded me in your paper, as powerfully as you could have done in the Pulpit: your Orations in the silent and quiet manner of reading do yet warm me, even after the heat and motion of your action has left them. You strike fire out of every line of them—. You perceive by this I am none of those who think the bride too handsome, or accuse the Gascons for being too valiant; in this kind, I like too much better than too little. I know magnificence borders nearer upon prodigality then its other extreme of thrift; and magnanimity has more affinity with rash hardness then with fear: therefore if you exceed the ordinary bounds whether in the adornments of your style, or height of your fancy, my Civility must ever conclude, in favour of your Rhetoric, that the Prodigal is better than Niggard, and excess more commendable than defect. It may so fall out that the disciples of the Bemboes' and Manucioes' will not assent to this conclusion. Possibly, they will say, you are less Latin then their Ancestors, and you are not of the Sect of Cicero: But were there no honest men of the party of Mark Anthony's? Is there but one way to go to Rome—? Provided you do not straggle, I do not advise you to go out of your track. Where there is good and good; use the liberty of election. Fly up to Heaven, since your wings are strong; and do not fetter so Noble a Genius as yours. It is better to resemble the Ancients in their courage and wit, than their Physiognomy, or garb of . The Ancients themselves have said that speaking well, does not proceed from the mouth so much as the breast. Sweetness, and purity, deserves to be commended: But strength and Grandeur are above all praises; and if we delight to behold the gliding of Rivulets, we look upon Tempests at Sea with admiration and astonishment—. The Reverend Father Adam, when he delivers you this Letter will give you a further testimony of the esteem I have of your merit, and the passion with which I will continue as long as I live,  
SIR, Your, etc. March. 15. 1646.   

LETTER X. To the Reverend Father Andrew, a Preacher of the Order of St. Dominick.  
Reverend Father,  
I Am not a subject worthy to be preached by you, and yet what do you not say of me in the two Letters you did me the honour to write? I perceive by them you cannot fly but high, and that you abuse good Language, when you do not employ it lawfully. Reduce it I beseech you, to its primitive and legitimate use. Lay out your Rhetoric only towards our salvation, and return to delight us by instructing us. Since my Morality and Politics have neither made me a better nor happier man. I expect that from the Gospel and from you, which Plato and Aristotle, could not give me. As there is an efficacy of Error of which the Apostle speeks, so there is a power of truth that animates the Spirits of Apostolical men; and makes itself visible in their discourses. This sacred violence is not wanting in you, and I am deceived or I have more than once seen it issue out of your mouth with Thunder and Lightning to work upon the souls of your Auditors. Mine may be yielded without resistance: She will gain by suffering herself to be conquered. But besides my interest, civility obliges me to it: I must needs owe you the reformation of my Life, that our friendship may not be dishonourable to your virtue, and that I may not be less one of your creatures in our Lord, than I am,  
Reverend Father, Your, etc. Feb. 18. 1646.   

LETTER XI. To the Reverend Father Hercules, Provincial of the fathers of the Christian Doctrine.  
Reverend Father,  
YOu have discovered a Saint to me whose Holy day I promise you to keep: and from this time forward I declare I have not more devotion for our Saint Martha of Poictou then for your Saint Genies of Provence. But let us leave this tropical language, lest we plunge ourselves into Canting or Gibberish, to which it is so near a neighbour: Let us say in the vulgar tongue, in clear and intelligible terms, that the Euterpe you have sent me, is one of the finest things that has arrived amongst us from the Country Latin, a long time. The greatest part of the Moderns, sing, and mean nothing; and they who can speak to the purpose, are so unfortunate they cannot sing at all. Your friend is a Poet in all respects. Besides his Art and Rhetoric, which is neither strained nor obsolete, he hath wit and courage; which is ordinarily wanting to the most exact versifying, and the purest style of Latin. These are no trifles in music, no words empty and void of things; as his Horace calls them: He happily expresses what he thinks, and thinks nothing but what is excellent. He does imitate in such a manner that he himself is even an Original. He is one of the Children, not one of the Apes of Antiquity; and had I seen nothing of his but his Articles of Treaty with the Muses, I should have concluded, he must necessarily be no less a gallant man then a great Scholar; no less of the Court of Augustus, then of the Age of Virgil. I find this Capitulation so pleasant, that I am vexed it was not mine. Me thinks none but I should have been the author of it, and I protest, that this very part of the Poem would have bred envy in me; if the Hendecasyllables before, had not given me an Antidote of Love. He doth me too much honour to—. My dear Cousin Madam de Nesmond is the confident of my heart; and to all the relations she shall make from me, I entreat you, give credit as to myself, who am most of all men living,  
Reverend father, Your, &. Jul. 14. 1646.   

LETTER XII. To my Lord the marquis of Montausier, Governor and Lieutenant General for the King in Saintonge, Angoumoise.  
My Lord,  
IF not to be thankful enough be ingratitude, I have reason to complain of your generosity; which drives me into that involuntary crime, by reducing me to an invincible disability. This is the third time your excesses make me apprehensive, and sensible of my poverty. When you do me favours, you deprive me of the means, to thank you for them; and the Language you use is so lively, so sprightly, and full of fire, that I find mine, no more but ice in comparison of it. You leave me nothing to say, so that I must for my own honour entrench my self within my thoughts; and being destitute of Language to maintain my credit, in some proportion with you, I can only produce an interior act to justify me to my conscience; and comfort me with this, that I cannot do what I would. But what is it My Lord I would not do, for your service; and your glory? could you see the bottom of my soul, what desires, what resentments would you not behold there? Never had any soul more passionate desires, or an higher adoration; for though Wealth should shower upon your house, and Crowns upon your head; (this shower of Crowns is one of Cardinal Perron's wishes), though Fortune should every day bribe you; and fame do nothing else but commend you, I say (though but a part of what I think) that they would do but justice to your virtue. You enjoy already more than all this, for he that possesses Julia with the allowance and consent of Artenice; ought not to consider the Grandeurs of the world, but as accessories to his happiness. I am too much obliged to those two divine persons for their goodness in remembering me, for I cannot discern any thing in myself worthy that honour; unless it be that I am your Adorer. Be pleased to conceive, I use those latter words in the full extent of their signification; it being impossible for any to be more than I am,  
My Lord, Your, &c Feb. 15. 1645.   

LETTER XIII. To Monsieur de Burg, an Advocate in the Parliament.  
SIR,  
TO what end do you waste your labour and your colours, to delude a man that knows himself? The excellency of your Art doth not correct the defects of my person; you may disguise me, but can never give me a new shape. I should be worth infinitely more than I am, were I but like the original you have drawn. What should not I be, were I but the man your Letter speaks of? But since you design to make me a Hero, you make your Letter a Romance. I find myself a feigned person in all the things you tell of me. I am only the unformed matter of a work whose whole beauty is derived from you; and after I have considered it with delight, I cannot look upon myself without discontent. The actions you commend me for, reproach me that I have hitherto employed myself merely about words. You make me remember with remorse the vain occasions of my life past. Or, it may be, you subtly intimate, that it is time for me to think on something better and more solid. The attribute of Wise, that you in courtesy bestow on me, is doubtless a wish which you make for me; but you should offer it after a more noble and obliging manner. I must labour to acquire the good I want to make your wish effectual, that I may become worthy of your praises and our friend's testimony. Yet his evidence is to be suspected: I am his error and his disease; And though he be Cato in all other causes, he is in mine the most passionate and corrupt of all judges; do not expect any truth, therefore from him when he is Commenting on the Chapter of my virtue: Believe him only when he assures you what a high rate I set upon your merit, and of the serious profession I make, to be as much as any man in the world,  
SIR, Your, etc. Feb. 3. 1641.   

LETTER XIIII. To Monsieur Conrart, Counsellor and Secretary to the King.  
SIR,  
YOu have writ me a Letter perfectly eloquent, whose Rhetoric lifts me up to Heaven. At least it raises me much above my own condition, and I should heretofore have termed it the Theatre of my glory: the mischief is, that all this is but representation and picture. Now I have read out your discourse, and my part is played, I cease to be Achilles or Agamemnon. This borrowed greatness deserts me, and my old poverty remains upon me. I lately saw at another man's house the compleatest person of all mankind, and I find myself at home the infirmest of all Creatures. If you love me better for dressing me in your own garb, and if I please you more in the ornaments you have bestowed on me, I can safely protest to you, that you are one of those I most desire to please and of whose esteem I make highest account. But yet towards the consolation of my sad life, your esteem is nothing comparable with your friendship. There are some years since, I have not been sensible but in that part, and I now scarce ever resent any thing of my commendations, or else I sleep when I do read them. One loving word from you does me more good than a whole pile of superlatives and great words of which the wits are so prodigal, and whole Gardens of flowers, with which adulterating Rhetoric crowns base ambition. So I call the common places of the Declamers we know; who adore, who consecrate, and deify every thing; as well the gourd of Claudius, as the head of Augustus. The rest at another time. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Feb. 24. 1645.   

LETTER XV. To Monsieur l'Huilliard, Counsellor to the KING, etc.  
SIR,  
I Advertise you that you are a great fomenter of Quarrels, and that you have stirred up abundance of trouble and jealousy among my papers. That discourse of the Comical style cannot endure you should lay it a side to take up that of Grand Eloquence. The Roman takes it ill that you side with the Hollander to his disadvantage: Maecenas the Glory, the Antiquity, of Religion, and all the rest, find fault with the pre-eminence adjudged to some; in a word, there being none of them but thinks itself as much worth as his Companion, they are every one discontented with your choice. It is a difficult matter to appease such a seditious people as these are, who have all the pride and ambition of Old Rome in their heads. It may be, Monsieur Chaplain would be a fit instrument to manage so nice a Treaty: for my part, I will not meddle with it; besides, I am more partial to your opinions, than I am passionate for the Roman or Maecenas, and shall be all my Life time on your side against all whomsoever, yea, against my own off spring, being, without reserve,  
SIR, Your, etc. Nou. 30. 1644.   

LETTER XVI. To Monsieur the Count of Jonzac, the King's Lieutetenant in Saintonge and Angoumois.  
SIR,  
I Wish our Grapes were worthy of their great reputation, and the excellent language of your Letter. It is true, they are originally of Languedoc, and Languedoc is the Italy of France. But I cannot tell whether the climate of Balzac hath not altered their natural goodness, or my name have not made them unfortunate. However it be, Sir, you have all kind of power in this little place; and I have commission from the Master of the house, where I am but a guest, to tell you, he expects the month of March with impatience to satisfy your desire. He pretends he will not keep any in his Nursery, but what you please to leave him, although he esteems them incomparably much more than he did, since you gave them the precedence, when the Grape of Coignac was in place, which is universally esteemed. For my part Sir, I find myself so obliged to your eloquent civilities, that there is no Galernian nor Formian race in books (for these are the only places where I think I possess any thing) but I would myself carry into your Quarter, if there were any way to make a present of it to you. But this can be no more than a wish, and that a Poetical one too: and for the least I can offer you in the name of the Muses, after the honour you have done them in my person. I shall ever receive your favours with the acknowledgements they deserve, and continue all my life, with due respect,  
SIR, Your, &c: Jan. 22. 1645.   

LETTER. XVII. To Monsieur Perrot d'Ablancourt.  
SIR,  
THe news you send me hath not much surprised me. I know the person who is Relater, is an Enemy to Heresy: but withal, I know he loves virtue in what place soever he finds it, were it in Luther's or calvin's. Your name does not fright little Children, as theirs do. It is none of those names that are odious to the Catholic Church: and on the otherside, I do not think but the strongest Romanisme would suffer its self to be mollified by so honest a Hugenot as you are. His Holiness himself, did he but hear you, would have much difficulty to condemn you in your process; he would at least, allow you an Interim: He would awhile hold his hand, and not discharge an Anathema but upon extremity: But should you be so lig●ed to your opinions, as not to accept his grace, and he not able to exempt you out of the Bull In Coenà Domini; I conceive when he darted his thunder upon your head, it would not be with all his force, 
Mollius & dubia jaculari fulmina dextra,  
Tarpeia de rupe, Jovem, te propter, etc.   
As your Reporter hath done you justice, you do it to the Jesuit my friend: His verses are worthy of your applause, and in my opinion he might have deserved no less from Buchanan, and possibly too from Virgil, 
Laudalusque foret Romae, vel judice Tarpâ,  
Vitalis meus, & nostro censente Marone.   
But you must know that this terse and lofty Poet is the oldest of that profession in France. Threescore and sixteen Winters that have snowed upon his head, cannot extinguish his fire. No nor so much as diminish it, as you will perceive by the collection of his other Poems, which I send you. When you have compared them together, you may please to give me your judgement of them. I am, even to the Altars,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jun. 26. 1640.   

LETTER XVIII. To the Reverend father Hercules, Provincial to the Fathers of the Christian Doctrine.  
Reverend Father,  
IF I am esteemed at Rome, it is upon your account; and if Father Strada love me, it is because you have infected him with your passion. I will suppose too, you have not forgot to assure him of mine, and to do me those civil offices to him, which I may justly expect from your goodness. Questionless, you have magnified the zeal of an Ultramontane, one enamoured of his virtue, and almost an Idolator of those of his Ancestors, qui et pridem comiter observat Maiestatem Populi Romani, & in Provinciâ Gallia, Romana quandoque verba non infeliciter conatur. You cannot believe what an advantage I reap by the friendship of so excellent a pe●son, and the longing I had to be one of his familiars as well as your. Since Cardinal Bentivoglio is no more in Italy, and consequently my affection there is free, it goes all directly and i● gross to that great Jesuit; and you will oblige me by presenting him this Compliment from me, in the vulgar Language of the Country-Muses of his Country.  
Non per veder il successor di Piero  
Regger col cenno il Mondo in Vaticano,  
Ne le reliquie del superbo impero,  
Vetrei veloce all dolce aer Romano:  
Ma sol por honorar voi spirto altero,  
D' ogni basso pensier schivo e lontano.  
Since you will needs show him some of my verses, I send you some that speak of Rome and him, atque utinam ex utriusque dignitate— You remember you promised me something— it is a thing I value above all the most reverend and most Illustrious Titles and Lordships, than all the Green and Purple, I had almost said, than all the Scarlet in the place where you are. How desirous am I of being good, and how much do I need your help towards it! Be mindful therefore of the work you have undertaken, and begin with a Mass which I beg of you at Santa Maria Major; In illo loco quem Deus optimus Maximus tam manifestus ac praesens, quàm Coelum ac fidera insedit. What will the severe Litterals say concerning this entreaty, and the gentle wits to this Gibberish? The first will judge me to have the fancy and conceits of an old woman; and the others will say, I have the Genius and style of Mamurra: They, will reproach my weakness; and these, my barbarism. Let them call me by what name they please, and think of me what they list. But it suffices me that you know I glory to be your Penitent and Votay, as I am withal my soul,  
Reverend father, Your, etc. Jul. 3. 1645.   

LETTER XIX. To Monsieur de Menage.  
Sir,  
I Writ to your friend what opinion I had of your excellent Verses; and now I tell you, I have learned them by heart and sing them. Your Gondiades is termed nothing else in our village, but.  
Francigenûm sublime decus, spes magna Senatûs  
Purpurei.  
But when shall we see the accomplishment of our hopes, that the sacred Senate may be a full House; and not want one of the noblest members of it? Almost thirty years are fled since the decease of Cardinal Perron, me thinks it is high time to fill up his room; which is yet vacant after so many numerous promotions. There needs no more words to one of so quick an apprehension as you are. Let us come to the person you have celebrated in your Hendecasyllables, whom I love and honour with all my soul. Now he is in the Centre of debauchery, or to speak more favourably in the Country of good-fellowship; oblige him by your persuasions, sometimes to defend himself against temptations; especially at the fatal hour of supper, 
Nec juvenes imitetur, eum nec Gallicus ardour  
In medias coenarum acies, in Bacchica ducat  
Praelia, longaevo nimium metuenda Poetae.   
Put him in mind that our Plato reckons good cheer twice a day in the number of Prodigies, and that against Birkes and Ragousts, caeteraque id genus ingeniosa gulae irritamenta non satis cauta mortalitas est. I give this counsel to myself as well as to him, for though I am not at Paris; yet we find ourselves here often in hot service. They are Expeditions, (take this from me, you that know all things) wherein a Constable and a Marshal of France ended their days: Illos siquidem ut Medici asseverârunt, gula occidit non gladius. Here is a strange kind of Gibberish and Medley, that would fright our brethren of the Academy. Yet Cicero made use of such a jargon-intermixture of several Languages in his commerce with M. Pomponio Attico, who, as you know, was none of the least honest fellows of those times. I bid you good night, and sleep at the period of this line,  
SIR, Your, etc. Sep. 4. 1646.   

LETTER XX. To Monsieur the Abbot Talon.  
SIR,  
YOu command me no hard task, nor impose any thing that weighs me down; when you desire new marks of my love, to a memory that is exceeding dear to me. It will be easy for me to obey you, since it is to follow my own inclination; and yield myself to the propensity of my affections. There is so much sweetness in the remembrance of our good Cardinal, that I may say; he takes rests upon this subject, that is tired with any other. The Genus Demonstrativum was almost grown obsolete in the world, but you have restored it to a new youth and strength. But let us have a right understanding betwixt us, if you please; for f you desire verses from me, I know not whether I shall be able to content that desire. I have but a small Talon of Poetry and my vein distils very weakly, drop by drop; it will scarce supply above a Stanza of four in four days. An Epigram drains it quite dry. 'Tis Monsieur the Bishop of Grass, Monsieur Guyet and Monsieur Voiture who are capable of high and long inspirations of true and just Poems: They are the men of whom you must require Lapidaries, Hymns, and apotheosis: and I persuade myself they have not kept silence till now, but only to speak with more preparation. It shall be my glory that I opened the Lists for them, and promised such excellent Combatants to the people who expect them. But my comfort is this, that I have already discharged my duty, and by the same means given content to a person whom I perfectly esteem. It is not necessary to explain to you who that person is, and you do not doubt the absolute reality of my being  
SIR, Your, etc. Sep. 25. 1644.   

LETTER XXI. To Monsieur de Montrevil, Captain in the Regiment de la Meilleraye.  
SIR,  
THe relation you have given me of the first successes of your Army, and the Protection you obtained from Monsieur the Grand Master for my sister's house, are tokens of remembrance that have something more essential in them then ordinary civilities. I knew well enough that you were exceeding good and obliging, but that you were so exact and punctual, was, to tell you truth, more than I expected from a afriend of two and twenty; who having every where lawful occasion of distraction, does much more than he is bound to do, when he is a good solliciter. My sister conceives herself deeply obliged to your goodness, and hath entreated me to testify her acknowledgements; to which, if you please, I will annex my own; and tell you besides, that valuing you at the rate I do, I was glad to be confirmed in my opinion by your Letter, and to see there how intelligently you can speak of the affairs of war. I wish it may be as successful, Sir, to you, as it is probable it will be glorious to Monsieur your General, unless Fortune forsake his side and join with the Enemy, and so he fail to accomplish those designs he hath so well attempted. You will have a share, I am confident in those great exploits; and there will be honour for you to be attained. But, if it be possible, I pray let that honour be pure and without the expense of your blood; and bring back your Laurels to your winter-Quarters. You deserve to live a pleasant life, and appear at banquets, after you have showed yourself so often in battles. I say the same to our dearest Monsieur the la Guette, and am to both of you passionately,  
A most humble, etc. Aug. 3. 1639.   

LETTER XXII. To my Lord, the Archbishop of Tholouse.  
My Lord,  
THe Letter you did me the honour to write, revives my grief, but withal brings me a lenitive. I cannot read the name of that friend we have lost, but I in some sort seem to lose him again. But on the otherside, since God preserves you for the consolation of our losses, and the glory of our age, I cannot welcome such good tidings with a displeased countenance and this very thought sweetens all the bitternesses of my soul. It is no small content to me to understand, your return had somewhat of triumph in it, and that you manage the affairs of your Charge amidst the acclamations of your people. The passion I have for you, gives me an interest of all these happy successes and making me look upon them at first as my own, and yours in the second place. I could have wished myself a witness of them, and have come to reverence you in a Chair, which you render more illustrious than Thrones publishing from thence the mysteries of the Son of God, which are far better & more saving than Arrests and Edicts. But I am not fortunate enough for this; and I assure myself, you will be so merciful in the pursuance of your Rights, and indulgent to my weakness, that you will dispense with a vow for me which I am not able to perform. Instead of the journey to Tholouse which I promised you, I beseech you admit of that to Saint Amant, which I will begin the next day after your arrival thither.— I expect that time with impatience, and am after my Old manner preparing many Questions for you to decide, and difficulties to resolve: in the mean time, since you desire to know the success of the enterprise of honest Monsieur Lirieux (who was resolved to have made me a great Lord) I will tell you, that for my own particular, I am very well satisfied with it. It is true, he did not bring me what he sought after, but my Lord— sent me so civil and handsome a refusal, that I esteem it much more than that which was requested of him in my favour. He would without Question have granted the thing, if he had not had a design to oblige me higher by not doing it. The manner with which he shifted off his liberality was so magnificent, and he took such especial care to enrich it with many fine words and fair hopes, that I ought to reckon it one of the greatest favours that possibly I could receive from his goodness. He that can ruin us with a word, obliges us infinitely, when he bestows two dozen of lines to delude us. I am,  
My Lord, Your, etc. May. 25. 1636.   

LETTER XXIII. To Monsieur the marquis de la Case.  
SIR,  
SInce my diseases have forced me to a divorce from my muses, and a renunciation, for three entire months, of all things printed and written, my silence hath a much more lawful excuse than I could wish it, and I do not conceive but instead of reproaching with my laziness, you will take compassion on my hard fortune. It was in earnest, a very dysastrous hap to have a treasure so long in ones custody, and not dare touch it; to have the possession of one of the finest things in the world without the possible power of enjoyment. This fine thing, Sir, is the Genealogy you were pleased to communicate to me; and if I tell you, the multitude of those illustrious names dazelled me, and that confluence of stars which makes the milky way in heaven, does not cast such a splendour, nor enclose so many Demigods, I shall possibly speak like a Poet, yet offer no violence to the purity of truth. You have that which Kings cannot confer upon their favourits; that which was wanting to Augustus' Son in Law to the brave and magnanimous Agrippa. And who knows not that his obscure extraction and the blemishes of his family could not be cleansed with many consulships and the supreme command of the Roman Armies: There was ever some bold spirit or other that, upbraided him of the newness of his Grandeur; and the defect of those riches, wherewith you abound. If it were possible to drive a trade with such a stock so much desired, you would have a surplusage, after you had supplied a number of great Commanders, who are unprovided of it. john de Wert would be one of your Merchant's General; Beck would give you a competent portion of what he hath pillaged in the wars for three or four of your illustrious names. There would be thronging to the door of your Cabinet, and such Sons of Earth and Night, would come thither to seek Parents and Lustre. But the great consideration is, that the present doth not degenerate from the glory of the past, and that your Virtue is worthy its Original. In the conversation of an afternoon which I had once the honour to spend with you, you manifested such a pure and natural generosity, that should your Heroes return to see the world again, I make no doubt but th●y would own you by that very mark, and immediately say This is our true blood. For the excellency of your soul, either I know not what capacity is, or yours is the clearest and most delicate in the discerning and choice of things. I have admired the rare productions of it, and should I go no further than your mysterious Grotto, yet you would be one of my best Authors, Sir, and whom I would most readily allege. Is it true, that among an infinite generation of ravenous Birds that unroof houses, suck humane blood, depopulate Cities and Countries, you have caused one to be drawn beyond comparison bigger than the rest, that tears the Globe of the world with his pounces, and pulls in Pieces what God had so well composed. And is it possible this Caprichio is originally Saintonge? comes it not from Rome or Florence? or at least from Paris? If the glory of the invention be due to you, I congratulate you for the giving birth to so handsome a Fable; although I am sorry that I knew it not, nor received your Pedigree, in those days when I could have written gay letters. I should not then have contented myself with such slight dress and ornaments, as this appears in, nor the naked protestation I now make you, not being able to embellish it with my ancient colours, of being with all my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. Feb. 7. 1646.   

LETTER XXIIII. To Monsieur d'Argenson, Counsellor to the King, controller of the Revenue in Poitou, Saintonge, etc.  
SIR,  
I Just now received the Letter you did me the honour to write me. It is indeed properly a commentary on my discourse of Glory, but such a one as corrects and reforms the Text, and instructs and Catechises the Author. I yield up my opinions, to your, and you have absolutely convinced me; so that if I knew myself as capable of the employment you design me, as I acknowledge it is better than that which hitherto hath taken up my care, you should in a short time have a Treatise of Christian Humility of my making, to cause you to lose the unsavoury relish which that of worldly Glory hath left behind it. I made it formerly on an occasion that obliged me to it; and my design in it was rather to condemn Avarice then plead for Vanity. But Sir, I must now let you see, that Secular Authors are not always profane ones, and we sometimes confine upon matters of piety. Here is something concerning Apostolical and Religious Rome, that you may not think I am inseparably addicted to consular and triumphing Rome. The work is Christian, and composed in the Language of the Church; and Monsieur the Cardinal Bentivoglio hath approved it—. Yet I beseech you expect nothing regular or dogmatic in it. I have not argued in mode and figure: nor sliced out my matter into Sections and Paragraphs. I have chosen the style of the ancient Prophets, rather than that of the modern Doctors; and though I am not so good a Divine as Becanus, I would very feign be as good as Orpheus, if it be too much to say, as David. I shall know your opinion of my Divinity, and my verses, when I have the honour to see you. This cannot be so soon as I wish it, for I am impatient to be with you, and protest to you by word of mouth, that none is more truly than myself,  
SIR, Your, etc. Oct. 8. 1645.   

LETTER XXV. To Monsieur Esprit.  
SIR,  
HEre lately passed a Nymph this way, whose elegancy and promptness of tongue is admirable. She informed me of an infinite number of things that I was ignorant of before. And though she has not so many mouths, as that other lying Nymph who presides over Panegyrickes and funeral Orations; yet she hath one extremely eloquent, which does not mar good subjects, as it embellishes only such as are true; I perceive I exercise your patience, and you expect the name of this Nymph. Not to make you Languish any longer; She is called in the Language of men, Madamoiselle de Newfoic. But it concerns you to know, she is your votary, though herself adored by me and others. You may please to know, that she sings you in what place soever she can find Auditors or Echoes. She hath strewed our Hillocks, our Plains, and Valleys with your praises—. Among other things, she affirms, you better perform the duties of Amity than the illustrious friends mentioned in Lucian's Toxaris. She is, in a word, a very magnificent and generous publisher of all your merits. But, to tell you the truth, this last hath made most impression on me, and is the reason why I writ this Letter to you, with as little ceremony as if, these six year's silence, I had written to you by every post. Nor is this all, I intent something more than a Letter, and I recommend a Suit and a solicitor to you: I entreat your credit and care for him to obtain what he desires, and beseech you to oblige me effectually in his person, with your interest in our common Lord—. I promise myself this good office from your friendship, and rest with passion,  
SIR, Your, etc. Oct. 15. 1643.   

LETTER XXVI. To Monsieur de la Chetardie.  
Sir, My dear Cousin,  
I Secure myself to the utmost of my power from the persecution of compliments; and for that purpose I have sought out a desert, more out of the way and less known than my own. At present I inhabit an enchanted Island, where few guests are admitted, and all sort of Letters are not read. Yours indeed deserve a privilege, not one of them arrives here, is fraughted but with some good tidings or other, or attended with some excellent rarity, and presents me sometimes with temporal goods, sometimes with spiritual, not seldom with both. These last have feasted me with double magnificence, and are so fare from disturbing my repose, that I assure you they make a part of my pleasures. Who can be so much his own enemy, or an inhabitant of the Earth in despite of Heaven, as to complain of his happiness, I mean the favours of Madam de la Chetardio, and the civilities of Monsieur the Count of Crem●il? Who can possibly be so distempered (or it is too little to call him delicate) as to taste such exquisite meats, without making exclamations as he tastes them? without lifting up his eyes? without crying out, upon the first morsel, that the Nectar and Ambrosia which Jove receives from the hand of Ganymede are neither sweet nor divine incomparison.  
But Madam my Cousin will some little time dispense with the thanks which is due to her, since all the gratitude I have at present, and all my words this day must be for Monsieur our Count; and you will not take it ill, that I go to finish those Commentations I have begun, in satisfaction on his questions. I beg the continuance of your good offices to the excellent Chevalier, and beseech you to believe, that I am ever passionately,  
Sir, my Dear Cousin, Your, etc. Mar. 6. 1645.   

LETTER XXVII. To my Lord the marquis of Montausier, Governor and Lieutenant General to the King in Saintonge, Angoumois, etc.  
My Lord,  
HAnnibal laughed at a Scholar that discoursed of war before him: This example has been an impediment in the design I had to write to you in favour of Monsieur des Ardillers; And in truth, I know not what you will conceive of me, or what you will take me for, if I venture to give an officer of your Troops a Certificate, there being so little affinity betwxit his profession and mine. If it be possible, I will not do any thing that shall be ridiculous; I will restrain my judgement within the confines of my art, I do not meddle with setting prices upon things which I do not understand. I only conceive, my Lord, you will not disapprove a passion I bear to a person, whose discourse to me is nothing but your History, and who comforts himself for many miseries he has suffered, with the honour only he had to serve under you. These ten months we have been upon this subject, and I find in him so intelligent an admiration of your virtue, so much ardour and zeal to your glory, that though he be not run through and through, and cannot show his wounds in Germany, nor his hurts in Catalonia, I cannot have a mean esteem of him since he has so perfect an understanding of your worth. This is at least the testimony I own him, and the acknowledgement he hath deserved from me, for the pleasant hours he hath made me in the rehearsal of your brave actions. I wish I could be as serviceable to him as he was acceptable to me. But I have no power in the world, and can only make vows in the desert. Yet I am sure of one thing; never man, my Lord, knew better than I, how to own the courtesies done to my friends. This gentleman hath no great reason to be contented with his fortune; and for my part, since I am able only to wish him a better, if you judge him worthy of any of your favours, I shall willingly bear a part in the obligation, and not be less, then if I received them myself,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Jan. 21. 1647.   

LETTER XXVIII. To Monsieur Conrart, Counsellor and Secretary to the King.  
SIR,  
MY indisposedness having hitherto retarded my good designs, I could not possibly perform this duty to you sooner, nor give you notice since May, that I received Monsieur Dailles Sermons, and Monsieur des Cartes discourses. Both of them have written me so many obliging caresses, and commended me with such excess, that there is nothing in their excellent Letters which belongs to me, besides my name. I know myself in it only by that; and without doubt, the high opinion these two great persons have conceived of me, will one day be reproached to them by their adversaries it will be one of the errors of your excellent Heretic, and one of the oversights of my admirable maker of Spectacles. I have no mind, whatsoever you please to enjoin me, to give you my judgement of the last man for I know he sees nothing but Heaven above his reason, and Sovereignty hath no judge. Since he tells me, that if I desired it, he would make a Ghost for me in four and twenty hours only by the operation of his innocent Science, and without employing any evil spirits: from that time forwards I took his soul not to be of the same order with mine, and that he was a Hero, because I knew he was not a Mountebank. But shall we bestow that scurvy name on our—? I dare not pronounce any thing concerning him neither. Only I fear, he hath less authority than zeal, and that the parties do attribute too much to him to empower him with the Arbitrement of their good wills, and without entreaty of any person. I am without reserve,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 14. 1640.   

LETTER XXIX. To Monsieur Costar.  
SIR,  
I Have employed Seneca and Boetius, father Adam the Jesuit and father Stephen the Capuchin to comfort me for your absence; but I have s●t them on work to no end. It is yourself that must put me into a condition of enduring to be some time without you; and find me out a remedy for the affliction you put me into, by leaving me. You have lately done me that good office in an admirable manner. For after I had received your elegant Letter, I was so fare from being miserable, that I could not contain my joy from becoming insolent, it is an extreme infelicity to be separated from you, but it is a Sovereign blessing to have so great an interest in your soul and affection; and these glorious tidings do so ravish me that I do not less need moderation now, than I did constancy three days ago. If Monsieur de la Thihaudiere were not the bearer of these truths, I would stretch them out longer, and dress them up with more Ornament. But he will do me that service, and I have more confidence in his Rhetoric than my own. I believe neither of them is necessary to persuade you that I am perfectly,  
SIR, Your, etc. Octo. 1. 1643.   

LETTER XXX. To Madam, the Countess of Brienne.  
Madam,  
There is no place so remote whither the reputation of your virtue hath not extended; the public voice has entertained me with it in the desert, and all France is in this the Echo of Paris: the whole World calls you the good and generous Lady of the Court, and you are not less known by these amiable names, than the illustrious Title you bear. This is that which deters me, Madam, from using any Art, or endeavouring by a long train of words, to beg of you what you cannot refuse me. Your protection is sure, not only to desert, but to any thing that is like it; and you have confessed to monsieur the Abbot of Saint Nicolas that there is something that either pleases you, or deludes you in my writings. Those which my friend will present you from me, have already been in the place where you are, but so diseased and tattered that I am told it would move pity in me to see them in that condition. I fear they have offended the eyes of Madam the Princess, if they have appeared before her with those defects and deformities; and I am desirous she might see them in a better and more decent equipage. You may please to do me this good office by communicating to her the Copy I send you. I most humbly beseech you, do me this favour, and believe me,  
Madam, Your, etc. Dec. 14. 1644.   

LETTER XXXI. To Madam de Masses.  
Madam,  
I Perceive you will not be in debt; the present I sent you was paid for above its value by the thanks I received for it, and it is not you that are obliged; it is I, that am become insolvent. In earnest, what can I repay you for all the goodnesses in your Letter: for such a deal of rarity, excellency, and perfection as you bestow upon me? If I had spoken Pearls, (as we may say among us,) you had over-bought them by praising my words with such excess. It will not be your fault, if rusticity and plaineness of my works be not preferred before the polite and courtly style of others: The compositions of a Provincial, shall be set upon the shelves of Kings, and kept up among their treasures, if your opinion be asked. If you may be credited, I shall be annexed to Plutarch's Lives. I am illustrious enough, Madam, by your estimation of me; my works are too happy in being lodged in your Closet, and be sometimes taken into your hands. Would to God, it could divert you to your content! but what wishes would I not make to serve you in some occasions of importance, and evidence to you by my respects and obedience, that I am,  
Madam, Your, etc. Aug. 17. 1644.   

LETTER XXXII. To Monsieur de Covurelles.  
SIR,  
To live in your remembrance is an eminent vindication from being as a dead person to all the world; it is to live gloriously to be commended in Madam Desloges Closet by you and M. Borstel. There is no virtue so ambitious that dares desire more, or that would choose for its Coronation day, any other place or persons. I perceive manifestly I was treated with a great deal more grace than justice; and I find my recompense so fare above the meanness of my merit, that I confess, I own you all that you think you have given me. Yet it is not this, for which I am most obliged to you. What honour soever I have received from so eloquent a mouth as yours, your words delight me much more when they cure, than when they commend; and I thank you more hearty for the recovery of our excellent sick Lady, then for my Paneygrick. Since I am so throughly conscious of your power, I cannot in the least doubt the truth of the miracle, and I know long ago by experience that you are able to accomplish things beyond the ordinary reach. I was almost harassed to death in the way to Poitiers, when you fortunately appeared to my succour: & me thinks, it was not less to unweary me in an instant, and to afford me delicacies in a scurvy Inn, then driving away a settled fever, and giving consolation to an afflicted Lady. After this, why do you talk of the strength of my style and the virtue of my writings, you who act with so much efficacy in your most familiar conversation, and each of whose words is a remedy? Is it possible you can relish such Latin, as is produced amidst the barbarism of our village, eight day's journey from Monsieur de Thou's gallery, and eighteen ages after Cicero's death? I know not whether I am a Goth or a Roman, or whether it be gibberish, or language that I send abroad: But I am sure you are perfectly obliging, and you prise even the good meaning of such as do ill. I have nothing to say of this particular, but only that you shall never applaud an ill Actor that honours you more than I, nor that can be with more passion than I am,  
Sir, Your, etc. Aug. 10. 1638.   

LETTER XXXIII. To Monsieur de Borstell.  
Sir,  
MY two years' silence hath been the effect of several unlucky causes: melancholy and grief have done their parts and there has been a little concurrence of debauchery with a great deal of laziness and some business. Any person besides you, would think strange that I put business into the number of evils, but since you fly from it to the further end of the world, and the leisure of the desert seems more agreeable to you then the most eminent employments at Court I may not fear to disclose my inclination to you which your example has justified. You have obliged me, Sir, by the care you have taken to let me understand the truth of that which I knew only by hear-say. Let Rouliers Son be of as mean extraction as he can, he is an illustrious Rascal, and I look upon him as the Ventidius of our age. That Ventidius that beat the Parthians in several battles, and revenged the affronts the Romans had received, climbed up from slavery to command, by the same steps, that this man has done, and this Libel was sung of him all about Rome, 
Concurrite omnes augurs, Haruspices,  
Portentum inusitatum conflatum est recens;  
Nam mulos qui fricabat, consul factus est.   
I must confess you dive very deep into the truth of things: I admire the relations you have sent me. And who would have thought ten years since, that Limosin would become as polite and as politic as Tuscany, O fertile Deserts, etc.  
Continue to make me partaker of the fruits that grow in those dry sands you have so well manured. Think on my poverty among your riches; but never doubt I beseech you, that I always am with many acknowledgements,  
SIR, Your, etc. Dec. 28. 1639.   

LETTER XXXIV. To my Lord the Bishop of Grass.  
My Lord,  
I Am no longer in the number of profane Poets. The Christian Collection is perfected, and, it may be, you will not be displeased to see yourself there under the name of Gratius; If you had rather it should be Daphnis, there is nothing easier than to alter it, for it will not be any prejudice to the measure, Nulla hûc Syllaba contumax repugnat.  
My verses are not otherwise interressed in any thing. And when I commend you, it is not out of a traffic that I drive with Compliments. I do not barter with praises for others: nor is it act of gratitude I pay after the favours I have received. These favours in truth do sensibly oblige me, and the thought you had to travel a hundred leagues, on a visit to me, fills all my desert with Glory. But though you had condemned the Author, of whose Paneygrick you have made an Eulogy and should chase me from your approaches with Thunder instead of giving me a visit; yet I am so convinced of your virtue, that I should ever perfectly esteem it; for otherwise, I must do violence to my own inclination, and commit a greater outrage upon myself then any mischief you could do me, not to be during life, withal my soul,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Apr. 12. 1639.   

LETTER XXXV. To Monsieur de Bois-Robert Metel, Abbot of Chastillon.  
SIR,  
ALl things die, and are subject to corruption; it is an universal Law. But you have affections that are privileged: They know no declination; they hold out against old age: having never been more vigorous and ardent. It was an infinite pleasure to me to understand this truth in the Letter you did me the honour to write me, and to behold in it that I am still your favourite, after I have held the place five and twenty years. Questionless, we shall one day be proposed for examples, and added to the Fables and Histories. But how fine a thing it would be, Sir, could the other parts of ourselves be preserved in the same vigour that our friendship is, and the snow that appears upon our heads did not signify, there is ice in our veins? See how dear two virtues cost us, which we could very well spare, Experience and Gravity. In this world we must lose when we get: we cannot be respected, till we come to be pitied: and the Epithet Venerable is most perpetually attended with that of Infirm. For my part, I am sensible of this infirmity as often as ●ver I have any need of my strength; I do not mean, for running or combatting in the lists, but for walking softly, and taking a few turns in our Garden. All my fire is retreated to the centre of my soul, where, it may be, I can tell you, it is yet quick enough to kindle some thoughts of mirth, and make me a Poet in my old days. You speak concerning my Prose much more advantageously than it deserves: but you take no notice of the new discovery I have made in my own brain. The father Bourbon, and the Ambassadors of Sweden liked it well, and encouraged me to travel further into the Country. You shall shortly have your share of such rarities as grow there, which I have brought over from thence lately: but your whole part shall not be huddled with that of the publicks, I promise you yet more than that. There shall be no parcel of my Latin, but Metellus shall gather his custom from, and you shall find him at Balzac in as large Characters as in Horace, where you have read more than once.  Motum ex Metello Consul Civicum. 
The Prelate is very well worth the Consul: and is there any thing which I own not to an affection so constant and pure as yours? I am,  
SIR, Your, &. Dec. 26. 1644.   

LETTER XXXVI. To Monsieur de Scudery.  
SIR,  
EVery thing that comes out of your hands, every thing that bears your name, is precious. Your remembrance is very obliging in all manners. In a little note, written to another in the simplicity of a sudden thought, raised only by chance, it had been exceeding dear to me. I leave you to imagine with what joy I received it, being embellished, with infinite riches and ornaments, and accompanied with an eloquent Preface, which I found followed by an excellent Poem. If this Poem be the last present you intent to the Theatre, as you put us in fear; you cannot take your leave of the people, with an Adieu more remarkable than that, or that will make your departure more regretted. I subscribe in general to what is said of it in the Preface, and further add this, Sir; That Arminius is not only your Masterpiece, but the Masterpiece of the Art; that he will bring honour to our Muses, and put a jealousy into those of our neighbours. I proceed still, that it is a child which speaks the place of his extraction, and the courage of his father. Mere imitation and the borrowed greatness of matter, fly not so high: There is something here natural and your own; and it was not enough to be a learned and ingenious person but Magnanimity and Gallantry were required to make Germanicus and Arminius speak so nobly. An author who lived in their time hath given this testimony of the latter. Juvenis genere nobilis, manu fortis, sensu cele●, ultra barbarum promptus ingenio, nomine Arminius, Segemiri Principis gentis ejus filius, ardorem animi vultu oculisque praeferens, assiduus militiae nostrae prioris comes, et jam Civitatis Romanae jus equestremque consecutus gradum, segnitia Ducis in occasionem sceleris usus est, haud imprudenter speculatus neminem celerius opprimi quàm qui nihil timeret, et frequentissimum initium esse calamitatis securitatem. In this passage, Arminius is the son of Segemirus; and if it be so, might not some scrupulous Grammarian demand how you come to make the father of Arminius to be his sister in law? but besides the community of names to either sex as Hippolyta, Anne, etc. You have without question some historical ground to oppose against this slight objection. It was made to me by one who nevertheless values you perfectly and I send it you without any examination. I will ever be of your opinion, and withal my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. Apr. 16. 1643.   

LETTER XXXVII. To Monsieur de Lorme Counsellor and Physician in ordinary to his Majesty.  
SIR,  
I Am extremely taken with the silver Medal, in which you revive Hippolytus with these three words Diis geniti potuere: but I maintain besides, that the name of Demigod cannot be disputed against you, but only by such as are ignorant of your father's merit and the nobleness of your profession. The good Lord, you speak of, does not know that besides Apollo and Aesculapius, his son, there was in Greece one Hercules a Physician, Peter Mommor calls him in French of Alexica, and he is yet to be seen in the Tapestry of Clement Alexandrinus, but that honest Lord uses no Hang but of Flanders or those of the Fairies, and knows no other Hercules but he that carries a Club and a Lion's skin. This Demigod Physician we treat of, had an infallible receipt to cure pale complexions and yellowness in less than four and twenty hours. He was not contented only to bestow health and good plight upon the Ladies, but he inspired youth and beauty into them. It was he that cured the Queen Alceste of a disease which the faculty of Montpellier had judged incurable; and I mention to you particularly what he did for women, because I know you are readiest to give succour to that sex which is most delicate and infirm as well as he. But Hercules hath made me forget Hippolytus and I have filled that fragment of paper in which I intended to have thanked you, with a comment upon your Medal. I have no more room left, Sir, but as much as to assure you that I am ever perfectly,  
SIR, Your, etc. Aug. 12. 1639.   

LETTER XXXVIII. To Monsieur Girard, Official and Prebend of Angoulesme.  
SIR,  
IT must be acknowledged that Madamoiselle de Schurman is an admirable Virgin, and her verses are not the least of her wonders. I do not think that the Sulpitia, whom Marshal hath so highly extolled, ever made better, or more elegant in her native Latin: But what modesty and virtue there is among the Graces, and beauties of her Verses! how the goodness of her soul is agreeably interwoven with the productions of her wit! I am very much obliged to you for the knowledge of this admirable Lady, and for sending me with her Epigrams the eloquent Letter of Monsieur Naudé. I return you them all again by my Servant, who should have set forth yesterday had it not been for an accident that befell me, to restore more than I had received. In the midst of this Epistle a new book was brought me, and casting my Eye upon the preface, I found these lines.  
Habemus in urbe, unius diei itinere hinc dissitâ, virginem nobilem, haud minus quâm Hippian, numerosa arte multisciam, & tanto magis eo nomine mirandam, quòd in hunc sexum rarò cadit tanta ingenii foecunditas, tanta artium copia, cum omnes calleat; tot virtutum conjunctio, cum nullâ careat. Quaecunque manu confici ●t ment concipi possunt, tenet una; sic pingit ut nemo melius, sculpit, fingit ex aere, ex cera, ex ligno, fimiliter in Phrygionica arte, & in omnibus quae muliebrium sunt curarum et operum: omnes antiquas et hodiernas provocat ac vincit mulieres: tot vero doctrinarum dotibus instructa est, ut nescias in qua magis antestet: tot linguarum donis ornata est, ut non contenta Europaeis, in orientem usque, study & industria pervolârit, comparatura ibi Hebraícas, & Arbaicas, Syriacasque, quas adjungeret jam quaesitis. Latinè ita scribit, ut virorum qui totâ vitâ hanc elegantiam affectaverunt, nemo politiús. Gallicas' Epistolas tales concinnat, ut vix meliores Balzacius. Cateris in Europa usitatis linguis aequè bene utitur ac illi quibus sunt vernacula. Cum Iudaeis Hebraice, cum Saracenis Arabice potest commercium habere: literarum etiam viris arduas & spinosas sententias ita tractat, Philosophiam nempe Scholasticam et Theolog●am, ut omnes flupeant: quia prodigio similis res est, nemo aemuletur, quia nemo potest imitari; nullus etiam invideat, quia supra invidiam ipsa est.  
If Monsieur Salmasius be author of this book and the preface, as I am written word, when he puts out a second Edition I shall entreat him instead of Gallicas' Epistolas tales concinnat, ut vix meliores Balzacius, thus he will please to change it; multo minus bon●s & minus Gallicas' Balzacius. I shall think myself yet too much honoured by this allay and moderation to my honour. There is no glory in being near so excellent a person, in what manner soever it be, and in such a similitude, disadvantage itself is obliging. I attend by my servant the inscriptions of Gruterus, and the chrysostom of the Father Fronton. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. May. 15. 1646.     

THE SECOND PART  

THE FIRST BOOK.  

LETTER I. To Madam the Princess.  
Madam,  
IT is not for glory to approach the obscurity of a defart, nor was its splendour ordained for Recesses and Solitude. Your Highness has bestowed that on me which I am not capable of receiving, and I acknowledge in the midst of a great amazement that I cannot in conscience esteem myself deserving the least word of that favourable Message, which my Nephew delivered me. Nevertheless I can safely protest an infinite zeal to the Service of your Highness; and this most assured truth gives me encouragement to believe that I do not merit to be wholly unregarded, I know not whether it was not first fitting to learn that my devotion is not displeasing to you, to the end I might with greater confidence perform my duty at certain altars I have raised to this effect, and whose design was not unpleasing to me in the conception. Without this evidence of your goodness, Madam, I had never dared any further than to erect Altars, and offer Sacrifices in my breast. I could not have presumed more than to have made a part of the people, on the festivals of France, and joined my voice to the public acclamations, which at this day are the music of the Hostel of Conde, and so agreeably disturb the quiet of the most contented of all mothers. This Title belongs to your Highness; who by the birth of one Prince have obliged the whole World. 'Tis to your happy fruitfulness that our Age owes all its ornament honour and lustre: and you the person that have astonished all Nations with the late miracles they have seen. If the King's Sovereignty has grown beyond the extent of his own Kingdom; If his Kingdom have no frontiers after so many conquests and triumphs, these are in truth, the achievements of a Prince's hands who has not reckoned above two and twenty years in the world. But they proceed, Madam, from that flower and perfection of the blood of Bourbon and Montmorency which is derived from you. Is there any of the French nation who is not an Enemy to his Country, that restrains his vows for the perpetuity of your contentment? And ought we not to wish your Highness, a long and peaceable possession of a good in which we are rich as well as you? For my part, I beseech Heaven, Madam, that he may never be ravished from you; not even by the violent passion of some foreign Nation enamoured with his heroic virtue, or by the Ambassadors of some elective Crown, who may once more come to desire a King from France. These misfortunes, Madam, are those that attend of a too great felicity. They threaten the heads of few Princes, and all Princesses are not in a condition to fear them. But I may confidently presage that never more any Calamity or dysaster shall betid your Family, if my prayers be successful, and I be as propitiously heard by Heaven as I am passionately,  
Madam, Your Highness' most humble, etc. Feb. 1. 1645.   

LETTER II. To my Lord the Duke of—. For Monsieur the Colonel de—.  
My Lord,  
THE Letter which your Highness has honoured me with writing, hath calmed the disquiet of my mind. I perceive manifestly, My LORD, that I was but alarmed, and some were pleased to make an experiment of my passion. But the ill opinion I have conceived against the World made me not unapt to believe ill news. Since I know there is no Saint in Heaven but has been traduced on Earth, I did not imagine that the fate of naked and common innocent could scape better than that of triumphant and sovereign virtue. Yet this world is not so universally corrupted, but that there is some found part of it: There is some place of safety from the persecution of the wicked, and honest men find sanctuary in your Lordship's protection. All your inclinations tend to Greatness, not any deflects to Tyranny, so that he that is not preserved in your Highness' love must needs have a design to lose himself there. God keep me, my Lord, from so dangerous a thought. Since Calumny can prevail nothing in your Court, I cannot fear any injury in this Country; and my conscience bears me witness of the passion wherewith I have ever been, and desire to be eternally,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Aug. 15. 1632.   

LETTER III. To my Lord Seguier Chancellor of France.  
My Lord,  
I Do not stay for your favours to testify my gratitude. The only intention you had to favour me hath already extremely obliged me. Though it should still remain in your thoughts without producing its effect, yet it would at least be a very fair Idea; it would draw a man out of oblivion of whom the world hath no longer Remembrance: it would do me no injury in representing me in the chief dispenser of justice, better and more deserving than I am. It would be, My Lord, an interior action of Liberty and Choice, which not being conveyed to any second subject, would terminate in itself, and without appearance, retain its merit in its own reality. The vulgar call nothing benefits but what they handle, and falls under their sense. They measure them only by success, which is within the jurisdiction of Fortune. Speculative men ascend higher: They meet courtesies in the Rudiments of the imagination, as pure acts and separate from matter: and defer not their gratitude until the event, which would in that case be involved in chance and hazard. That which is not now, possibly may never be, and the most faithful promises are exposed to all the uncertainty of the future and the changes of humane things; yet they cease not to be esteemed faithful. Thus My Lord, I have received from you the favour which may properly be called yours, though I am yet in expectance of the benefit of it, from the king. And I maintain against all those who are not of my opinion; that you have given it me in your promise. It may possibly fall out that I shall receive nothing of it, by reason of the ill fortune that attends me: but it is beyond the reach of Fate to destroy the obligation, I have to your Lordship, according to the maxims I have learned. Your goodwill having satisfied my ambition, my necessity doth not press me so hard; as to I account it in the first place. Esteem is somewhat more noble than payment, and the Honest shall ever comfort me for the loss of the Profitable. But in the mean time, that I may not seem to deliberate upon the reality of my obligation to you, after the assurances I received in the Letters of Monsieur de Bois-Robert. I will not defer till to morrow the protestation which I make, to be perfectly,  
My Lord, Your most humble, most obedient, and most obliged servant. Balzac. Feb. 20. 1638.   

LETTER FOUR To the same.  
My Lord,  
YOur favours justify my solitude, and the benefit I have received upon your recommendation makes me eminent in the world, though I am no longer of it. It declares to such as throng and run, that there is an idleness which the Commonwealth rewards, and a rest that you esteem. All the hands that serve the State, are not employed in kill men, nor removing Engines: some there are which are lifted up to Heaven to second those that fight, and pray to God for the victory: Some of them make dispatches and Commissions: Some draw Redoubts and Battaglias; and score out on paper, what is to be executed in the field: and some without noise labour for the glory of their Prince, and the edification of his subjects. I will not say, My Lord, that mine have been so nobly employed, nor pretend to that glory which was bestowed on Phidias; of having made the image of a God which added much devotion to what was paid him before: I only say, that if to be an honest man and a good Citizen is the first part of the definition of a good Orator, the half of that excellent quality cannot in reason be disputed with me; that in the greatest severity the superaboundance of passion deserves pardon for the defects of Art. But I am well assured of the extent of your indulgence, and there is not so slender a mediocrity in the profession of good Letters; but you take delight to exalt it by your Patronage. You love honest conversations because you have discovered their most secret, and peculiar beauties: and carefully oppose the return of ignorance, because you very well understand that if the French should relapse to Barbarism, your virtue would be but coorsely commended by Barbarian Orators and Poets. So that your protection upon the interest of your virtue will cherish and encourage the Literati of our age; yea even polish and civilize our rudness and villages. It will cause a lovely spring of new Excellencies on every side, and make all France learned. They are your benefits, my Lord, which shall restore to honour such degraded persons as were once termed holy, though in these days are accounted unprofitable pieces of the State. But notwithstanding your Lordship has obliged me with a new favour, advantage and get are not the principal importances that have rendered me your suppliant. A few things content a soul, that hath been initiated in the study of Wisdom; and being not in distress for necessaries, I can desire nothing of another's, but such as I can well be without, and which in the strictness of Philosophy is esteemed superfluous. I speak of Fortune's favours and bounties; for, as to your Lordship's affection, and esteem, they are happinesses which I do not rank in this Catalogue. They are essential parts of that bliss I seek in this world. I have absolute need of them for the content of my life; and it is certain I should not be my own friend if I were not your Lordship's favourite; being with all my soul,  
My Lord, Your most humble, etc. Sep. 6. 1636.   

LETTER V To my Lord Seguier, Chancellor of France.  
My Lord,  
YOur goodness is the sole inducement I have to hope in it: and in my addresses to you, I support myself on this Title, which I conceive you will not implead of falsity. I do not represent any returns of my services, but favours received and many ancient courresies, as arguments to obtain a new. I would willingly, My Lord, compile the history of your good deeds, to put you in remembrance of the place whither they were accustomed to flow, and of the pleasure you took to send Manna to the desert. But particular stories must not be drawn into example, nor the gifts of Heaven abused. I do not always beseech your mighty miracles, though I perpetually expect your ordinary protection: Be pleased therefore to permit me, with all the respect which I own you, and all the acknowledgements I am capable of, to obtain it at this time in favour of a person who is very near to me by the straight tye of blood, but his interests much more precious to me, by the sacred knot of friendship. Himself will declare to you the merits of his cause, if you please to do him the honour of your attention. If his own deserts may receive any advantage from my testimony, I can assure you that he is an Officer who hath grown old in his Command with a reputation of Understanding and Honesty, and this no more than might be confirmed by the public voice of our Province. I dare promise myself, My Lord, you will regard my words with some belief that I shall be neither an unprofitable witness or intercessor with you. And though when I have intentions of approaching your person, the Majesty of state that environs it with all its rays, might amaze and blind me, who am not accustomed to so much light, yet your goodness, which is the temper and allay of your power, and upon which I immediately cast my eyes, does yet encourage me to such an hazardous enterprise. I will believe that on this present occasion, I have successfully addressed my requests to you, since their favours have heretofore been more forward than my desires; and that it is by your own pure and free choice that I am,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Sept. 4. 1641.  
I conceived my Lord, the sight of my last compositions would not be unpleasing to you, and to this purpose I have sent Monsieur the Precedent de Marca, a Christian Poem, sufficiently longwinded, and two Epigrams upon the occasion of some late occurrences: Futura tibi, Illustrissime virorum, Monumenta qualiacunque, meae in Deum & in Rempublicam pietatis.   

LETTER VI To the same.  
My Lord,  
IF the King's affairs will allow you any interval of relaxation for the walks of Chaillot, Monsieur de— will present you half an hour's divertisement; and you will find in one of my Muse's Prophecies, the sound advice they gave to him, who hath made so bad use of it. You will observe, My Lord, how they forewarned this poor Mortal of his approaching ruin, when he was so rash as to lose the reverence he owed to the Gods—. Laws have heretofore been delivered in Rythmne, or at least in measure. Anacharsis and Solon made verses, and we have a whole volume left us by Monsieur the Chancellor de l'hospital. It is not to be doubted, but if the burden of the State, which weighs heavier now than ever it did, would at this day permit you to breathe so sweetly, you would give us Master-peices of our Art in the fruits of your leisure. You understand it in perfection as you do all other things that are worthy knowing: and this complete knowledge, My Lord, makes you here as else where, our last and sovereign judge. The Academies as well as the Parliaments esteem it an honour to have you for their. Head. All sorts of Tribunals are subalternate to yours. If Athens were not now Barbarian, and Rome were still Latin, they would acknowledge your Authority. And what insolent Poet of the Low-Countries is he, that would scruple submission to so intelligent a Supremacy? & laying aside his doubts, and suspicions refuse to acquiesce in Oracles of such certainty & which comes so immediately from Heaven—? We do not look upon you only as our Protector, but also as our example; and for this double reason, our Verse, our Prose, our Prayers, and our Homages are due to you. But in expectance to address mine with more solemnity, be pleased to do me the honour to remember, that there is a Hermit in the desert, who is your Courtier in his heart: who blesses you incessantly, although he writes to you but seldom; and who, should he perform that duty every day, would not cease to be all his life, more in truth then show, and with greater zeal than interest,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Aug. 18. 1642.   

LETTER VII. To the same.  
My Lord,  
YOu may lay new engagements upon my liberty at your pleasure, it is not in my power to be more perfectly yours then I have been long since. You may always have more favours to bestow on me, but I had only one heart to give you, the propriety of which I offered to you eighteen years ago, and you had gained it sometime before. It is true, the present was but trivial: I am ashamed to put you in mind now, that great hearts are so necessary in great erterprises, and unless you reckon a great deal of passion and zeal for something, I should not in time of War have mentioned a toy of so little use as that. Yet my Lord, is there no place for a violent passion, in your service? Cannot a zealous spirit produce some thoughts courageous enough to venture beyond the prospect of our present age, and more Noble then to injure the glory of your great Name? There are some persons over-credulons in my favour, as to imagine so, and I were very happy, if their persuasions were not upon bad grounds. As it is the most ambitious of all my designs, so it is also the most ardent of all my desires. But herein I must confess, I can but little satisfy myself: For, what ever indulgent friends say, I have little encouragement to believe from the view of my sufficiencies. I discover neither a Mine nor a Bank in my brain to suffice for the recompense of supreme virtue, for requital of heroic actions, and for the price of that which is inestimable. On the other side, I want that other faculty, which descends from above, and is called Enthusiasm. The muses do not answer me at all times when I call them, and I have often times begun Poems that ended at the Invocation. It is possible I shall be better inspired for the future; The excellencies of invention may at length be infused into me from Heaven, and I may have my part of those illuminations it sends down to our brethren of the Academy. I attend this happy hour of inspiration with impatience, that I may employ it well: and I cannot live contented, till I have testified by some eminent act of gratitude (pardon that eminent upon this occasion) that I am as I ought to be,  
My LORD. Your, etc. Feb. 25. 1645.   

LETTER VIII. To my Lord the Archbishop of Thoulose.  
My Lord,  
THE successes, of which I received information from your Letter, redouned so much to your glory, that Honouring you perfectly as I do, I could not receive them with a moderate joy. You have had justice at length of the Senate, but it was the same Senate that did it you. You do not only receive the just Honours that are due to you, but even with the consent of them who disputed them with you; & by one and the same victory you have gained both your cause and your adversaries affection. So though the conquest be , but the peace far better, nothing should be wanting to your satisfaction who have obtained at once both the Good and the Better. It remains now, my Lord, that you enjoy this fair calm, and these days of Serenity you have made such: that is, employ them all in that harvest that respects you, and in the conduct of that flock which Jesus CHRIST hath entrusted to your care. If you would, you might have climbed to Glory by other steps; But all things being considered, this is the surest and shortest for him that aims at nothing but Heaven. Can you exceed Cardinal Baronio in the solidity of your learning, yet it is better to follow Cardinal Borromeo, in the Sanctity of your Life, and be the subject of others writings, than the Historian of their actions. How happy do I esteem the meanest labourers that you use in your great work! and I cannot express how it troubles me to be perpetually desirous of being with you, and yet to stick fast here, and to be able to profess to you only with wishes and idle passions, I know not when, that I am more than any person in the World,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Jul. 25. 1633.   

LETTER IX. To the same.  
My Lord,  
I Perceive there is no possibility, for me to execute my grand enterprise, or to effect what I have had in design these ten years. My journey to Languedoc, is likely to become the exercise of a man that stirs not, or the dream of one awake. If Heaven will have it so, I shall at least have this happiness, nothing can hinder me the enjoying in my mind, the contentment which I fancy. My imagination, that hath power to bring me near to places where I desire to be, walks me continually round about this distant happiness, and puts me into possession of one of the apartments of your Palace, and soon after lodges me even in your Library. O how I contemn the Jasper and guildings of the Escurial, when I am in that Cabinet? This indeed is to inhabit a more Noble and stately Court, to be the guest of an infinite number of rare souls, and blessed intelligences; where after a repast of Tanzies and Melons, the entertainment might be with light and truth. I do not seek out high words to abuse them, I employ them in their proper and natural signification: for what is there, My Lord, which the desire of knowledge and ambition of learning can imagine exquisite and rare, but is to be found either in your books, or conversation? those three or four hours I had the honour to pass with you, presented to me the riches of ages, and antiquity! you taught me things which not only the commonalty of the learned are ignorant of, but such as, it may be, the Princes of the Schools understand not. The several manuscripts your goodness deigned to show me, left so fair an impression of Christianity upon my soul, that immediately I divorced myself from my old Loves, and bad adieu to all the muses that are not holy. Since that time I speak nothing but of the Primitive Church and the Ecumenical Counsels: and you have so alienated me from Pagan-Rome, that in those places of History where I meet with Aquilae, I am sometimes ready to change it into Labarum. A communication of such advantage deserves to be sought, though it were at the end of the World; and a thousand leagues are nothing to be traveled for it. To confess freely: the voyages of the Grecian Philosophers into Egypt, do very much reproach my immobility. It is necessary that I rouse up this Lethargy, or to speak more humanely, that I prop up this weakness and provide redress to this infirmity: and since it is impossible it should endure a Coach, unless in a Down or a Meadow, I am at this instant going to purchase a Litter, to make it more capable of the journey, and transport me without disturbance, to the feet of a greater Master than Gamaliel. The ambition of a spirit cured of the Court, may well be terminated there, where I shall receive your answers to my Questions, after I have rendered you my respects and sworn to you in the presence of Eusebius Theodoret and such like kind of witnesses, that I am ever perfectly,  
My Lord, Your, etc. March. 4. 1641.   

LETTER X. To Monsieur le Grass, Counsellor to the King, and Master of Requests in Ordinary of his Household.  
SIR,  
MY passion is not satisfied with what I have already done, it still requires more from me and having employed the language of the Gods to extol your great honesty, your profound judgement, sense, and excellent knowledge, I am l●ft to tell you in the terms of mortals, that I more esteem the friend then the judge, and the Generous than the Intelligent. You have so heart●ly desired for me what you could not give me, that I conceive I own it you though I have not received it. The intention is something more obliging, and more ours then the success: and since you have had that entire, to establish me in the enjoyment of the courtesy that was granted to me, there is no part of your favour lost, though fortune came short in the accomplishment of the rest. This rest, Sir, which the people calls the whole, is but the gross material part of the obligation; and this fortune who takes delight in sporting with events, and destroying hopes, cannot reach the principle of well doing which resides in the mind. You have therefore been beneficent in despite of her, and I will be grateful in the same manner: For, whatever misfortune she has blown upon the King's gift so that it could not pass the Seal, yet she could not hinder me from finding a great treasure in the loss of a business of 3 thousand livres: I mean Sir, the assurance you have in your actions, with which I dare not call myself unhappy, and am at least satisfied with the negotiation of my friend. He has upon this occasion, writ me truths so welcome to my belief, and so much to my advantage, that I cannot doubt being rich by the gain I have made, though it be not in my pu●●e, and though I thank you for nothing but what was denied for me. The reason is, for that I understand how to separate the spiritual from the terrestrial. I can esteem, where others tell out: and being contented with the thing, without the perplexity of an account, I am, Sir, in the most pure and noble manner,  
Your, etc. Jun. 4. 1645.   

LETTER XI. To Madam the Duchess of—.  
Madam,  
TEn years are fled since you heard tidings of me, & yet I have received a Letter from you this day exceeding civil, obliging, and very worthy of your perfect generosity. I consider this honour, as a Favour from Heaven, arrived to a man that never says his prayers. He offers up neither vows nor sacrifices, and yet his indevotion fails not to be happy; and receives the rewards of Piety. You are stored with these goodnesses of Heaven, amidst the wickednesses of the Earth; and you seek after those savadges, Madam, that endeavour to avoid you—. Yet it is not requisite for me to take this pains to bring myself into a bad reputation, or decry myself with so much diligence and care. Questionless, Madam, you more regard the inside of things than the surface and outward appearance. You have the gift to behold the actings of immaterial souls, and so consequently you perceive there, that the private motions of my heart clear me of all the ill conjectures that might condemn me. That is a place I always reserve for you, though I never give you an account of it: All there is full of zeal, and reverence to your virtue, and if external acts were not of the essence of true worship, I would challenge the most diligent of your Courtiers, for the glory of being more yours, than he conceives himself to be. This being granted, Madam, I beseech you, not to conceive it possible for me to deliberate on any proposition that regards your service or contentment: or that I need quickening and excitation to endeavour the advancing my interests into your affections. I could wish they were less just than they are, that my obedience might be purer, than it will be, and that you might see I can perform your will without examining your commands. The Gentleman that delivered me your Letter, will confirm what I say, and make his report of the things he hath seen already. I had begun them, before I understood your desire. The end shall soon follow the beginning: and if you do me the honour to cast your eye upon my pains, I assure myself you will accept my devotion. Which hath not ceased to be, though it did to appear; and I have constantly been as I shall continue my whole life with all my soul,  
Madam, Your, etc. Mar. 14. 1643.   

LETTER XII. To the Reverend father Vital Theron, a Divine of the society of Jesus.  
Reverend father,  
IS it possible that I am the person of whom you have sung such excellent things? it is almost beyond my belief, and though my friend assures me of it, and I read my name in your verses, I am in doubt whether there be not another Balzac, more worthy of that Honour. Perhaps I am not the true one, and I own my good fortune to an Equivocal name. Yet I remember, I have heard it reported for one of Jupiter's pastimes, to enrich poverty, and exalt meanness. In which regard I am not longer in wonder, that the Muses should be of their Father's humour, and that they love the same divertisement with him. You have therefore with your pen ennobled a vision which appeared to you for my advantage; you have lifted me from Earth to Heaven: you have celebrated the Apotheôsis of a man yet alive: of a man that hath no Legions, who is not clad in purple, nor hath founded you a College: yet you have brought more pomp and more ornaments to this uninteressed Canonization, then is to be found in that which is left us by Antiquity, and Herodian hath so magnificently described. It is too superlative an excess, Reverend father, and though I had the virtue of moderation and equanimity yet my happiness is extravagant, and irregular; so that I justly apprehend the jealousy of that Goddess, whom the Language of your verse calls The terrible Nemesis, she punishes the prosperous as well as the proud, and does not willingly let festivals pass without troubling their serenity with some dysaster But is it not possible to get her, in lieu of her interest, and for the tempering of my great fortune, to be satisfied with a dozen fits of a fever, and five and thirty ounces of blood, which are already drawn from my veins by sentence of the Physician? If I could escape on these terms I should take my disease for a remedy, and believe I had made a good purchase of your praises. Is it a good that can be bought too dear, to be commended by father Theron? Should it not be the ambition of Kings, and the desire of them that possess all things? The fabric of Glory that is raised by their hands, hath nothing of frail or mortal. That which you have bestowed on me, shall not perish with my name, which yet may be contagious. It will preserve both itself and that too, by your excellent industry. Posterity shall receive it as pure and undecayed, as I did out of your packet; and Marble shall be dust, when your works shall be yet entire—. For a Future so glorious, for so many Ages of fair Reputation, and for the Eternity you have made me sure of, it is very reasonable that I be perfectly all my life,  
Reverend father, Your, etc. Mar. 20. 1643.   

LETTER XIII. To Monsieur Daillé.  
SIR,  
THough I am ordinarily but little satisfied with myself, yet I dare not question the merit of a piece which your approbation has made good. Your praises give a second lustre to my writings which will last longer than that of the impression, and makes me esteem them more beauteous and pleasing than they were. It is very difficult to contain within the limits of modesty after so favourable a sentence from so authentic place. I am resolved, at least not to be so compliant with those which do not treat me equitably. So that though I abandon my own interests, I am obliged to maintain your opinions, and defend myself for your sake. Whoever, then, shall contradict you, let him not think to persuade me; I except neither the Courtiers, nor Scholars. If the Court itself fancy some taint in my French of the Provinces on this side Loire; or the University disrellish my Latin, since you have declared for both, I will say the Court is troubled with Rheum, and the Universitie's palate is out of taste. I acknowledge you, Sir, a Legal judge of both the times: I mean venerable Antiquity, and our fine Barbarism; of the Language of the Sovereign and victorious people, and of the change introduced in the declination of the Empire, by the conquered nations. You have extracted from good books the splendour and Majesty of the dead Tongue, and from good use the politeness and excellency of the living. You are rich both by birth and acquisition, and have Title to keep the same rank in old Rome that you hold among the Eloquent of Paris. What an advantage is it to be able to say, I have that person on my side! There is no pretender but would pass upon so considerable an attestation; no Litigious person, but dreads so intelligent a justice; nor any enemy, that dares assail a place which you defend. One would think it sufficient that you did defend it, but you embellish it with so much care of ornament, that I who made it, can scarce know it, Whatsoever you are pleased to say, they are your flowers and not mine that make the avenues so pleasant: and that your Letter at the beginning of my book, would look no further for the Spring or Chaplets which you promise. I keep this Letter as one of the most precious jewels in my treasury: and will produce it in time and place against the oppositions of Grammarians and Sophisters. I am not the child of so perverse a Mother; but she will give me the liberty to do it, and allow me to esteem a stranger, whom she would be very glad to adopt, and make her own. It is with her consent, doubt not, and without deviating from her Maxims, that I profess to honour you, and am perfectly,  
SIR, Your, etc. Dec. 24. 1649.   

LETTER XIIII. To my Lord the Count d'Avaux, Sur intendant of the King's Revenue.  
SIR,  
YOur favours are ●o novelties to me, and the civility you have lately done me, is an action of which you attained the habit long since. In the greatest heat of the war kindled against me, you sheltered my innocence: You were stronger than Calumny; and if the Senators and Cardinals are now partisans for me, it is because you were my Protector at Venice and at Rome, you did after the same manner endear me in Germany, and in Courts the most distant from our world. Your judgement hath regulated that of Potentates: and the Letters I receive, dated from the shores of the Baltic sea, are effects of the curiosity you have infused into the nations of the North, of knowing a person which you love. But shall I conceal the bravest part of my Adventures? Is it not to you I own that illustrious sentence that the king of Denmark pronounced in my favour? and did he not take you for his assistant, nay for his whole Council, when the Lutheran Bishop that contested with me lost his cause in an Audience composed of Princes and Princesses? Since you remembered me at Capenhagen, there was no fear you should forget me at Paris; and that which I have understood of the new obligations I have to you did so little surprise me, that though I am sensibly affected with them, yet there being no novelty to amaze me, I could not testify any great ecstasy or emotion. I apprehended much joy at the constancy of your goodness but this joy hath not excited any extraordinary agitation in my heart: it did not discover itself outwardly by the discomposing of my countenance: nor transport me to undecent exclamation. My acknowledgement was ever pure and without disturbance, and be pleased to excuse at present the nakedness and simplicity of its address. At least suffer a Grammarian to speak properly, and do no longer prohibit me, to call you My Lord, you are certainly such by so many Titles, that I neither pretend to, nor will ever accept of dispensation and liberty. If a person whom you have gained, whom you have preserved, and conferred honour on, and procured favours to, should not call himself yours, I do not know with all my Grammars and Dictionaries, what name to find out for such a man. But there are yet some further concernments, and I have received advantages of another nature. Were I not the subject you have painted and beautified, yet you are Master of that Art that furnishes us with colours, and ornaments: I have nothing for my part but what you have distributed to me; and how often have I protested in full and glorious Academy that I had less profited by Quintilians precepts then by your examples; and that I had more enriched myself with what I had received from your mouth, than what I had romaged from the Treasuries of Antiquity. It is that eloquent mouth that hath oftentimes been more serviceable to a good cause, than both the wings of an army: It is by that, the King speaks so high, and so effectually to foreigners, that he makes himself so many friends and servants; I mean Sovereign and independent servants. If it were lawful for me, I would say, you have gained me with the same power, and you possess me by the same title, that I am one of your first conquered, and your first subjects, that I yielded myself upon your approach, and that I met my felicity in my surrender. Upon these considerations shall I not be benefited to call you MY LORD? Shall not you be my Patron in Italian, and one of my Heroes in all languages whatsoever? Shall your modesty arrest my gratitude on my Lips, or desire it out of my writings? Such a violence is not in your power. You may dispense with me as long as you please, for what I own to the Quality you hold in the world, but you cannot hinder me from acknowledging the superiority which virtue exercises in the Rational Word. You cannot give away her interest with your own. Extraordinary persons must be treated with respects beyond the vulgar addresses. And seeing you are so elevated above humane things by the sublimity of your soul, I am afraid I should make too long a conclusion, and not express in telling you only that I am with a kind of Religion,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Jul. 2. 1643.   

LETTER XV. To Monsieur Remy, Professor of Rhetoric, and Poet Laureate.  
SIR,  
THis is not the first day of my knowledge, and esteem of Muses: it is fifteen years complete since I was first obliged to them; when they undertook my protection against Don Roderigo. In all this interval, it hath been my design to testify my gratitude to you, and from thence forward my Pros● ever did homage to your Verse in presence of our friend of the Tournelle. I brought him to confess that curious arguments were not spoilt by my hand, that I had good fortune in composing the Characters of illustrious men. If this poor deceased should rise again, he would confirm this to you in five or six languages, (for he spoke so many) and would assure you in Poetical expressions, but those affirmative ones (for he would also swear sometimes,) that I honoured you three complete Olympiads, and had not the courage to tell you so had this backwardness continued longer, it might have been called Cowardice, if not by a worse name. There is no means to contain so much estimation and passion in my breast: they will force their way out by some short and authentic declaration, and give you to know that that ancient Client of your Muses, that Orator who heretofore made your Paneygrick in the Cabinet of Monsieur Favereau, that Hermit whom you have newly banqueted with your excellent verses, hath read them more than once with admiration, and concluded the Metamorphosis is worthy of antiquity, and the other pieces of the Metamorphosis. I beg the continuation of your favour and am with passion,  
Sir, Your, etc. Jan. 4. 1643.   

LETTER XVI. To the Reverend Father de Marin, a Divine of the Society of Jesus.  
Reverend Father,  
MOnsieur de Marin hath broke his Word with us, and hath passed over at St. Cybardeau without coming to Balzac. I entreat you reprove him for it, when you see him, and tell him from me, that the affairs of Catalonia might very well have permitted him to turn a League out of his way, and bestow half a day on me. Shall we never walk all three together in the plain that he thought not unpleasant, at the bottom of the green mountain, upon the banks of the silver River, near the baths of Diana, and over against her Miroir? I expect you there, and him too, to make him relate his own History, and offer him that Historian of whom you have so high an opinion. The Father Marin prefers him before Sallust and Livy: but it may be, some less obliging father will place him beneath Ammonius the Monk, and Paul the Deacon—. I am,  
Reverend father, Your, etc. May. 12. 1639.   

LETTER XVII. To the Reverend Father Vital Theron, a Divine of the Society of Jesus.  
Reverend Father,  
YOu make complaints against your old age, and I am resolved to write the Elogium of it. I will extol it publicly and in genere Demonstrativo; that age which is privileged and cherished by Heaven, free and exempted from all the oppressive tribute, that other men pay nature, and purposes as an example by our goddesses, to excite ambition and courage in our young men. The winters of Naples, me thinks, have some resemblance with it, those clear and serene Winters that are gilded with light, and crowned with roses; that of Masinissa was less green and vigorous, and the child which he begot at fourscore was a production not comparable to your Poem at threescore and fifteen. The reason is, that the fire which descends from Heaven by way of inspiration, is not extinguished by the diminution of natural heat: and if Art have found out the invention of unextinguishable lamps, the Master of Art may very well preserve in its full force the igneous part of our mind, and make the ardour and vivacity of its operations durable. Are there not some sensible representations of this happy duration? who knows not that gold is refined by waxing old, and that the Sun its father, is as bright in one thousand six hundred and forty two, as he was the very day of his creation? I must therefore disclaim that erroneous sentence which I have formerly so much cried up as a proposition of eternal truth, That there was never seen a handsome old woman. Pardon me that rash expression, I was not then acquainted with your Muse, which gives my proposition the lie, and decryes a Proverb, to which I thought to have given eternity. Her age does not cause the declining of her beauty, but is the confirmation of it by the very suffrage of Time, by approbation of the Present, as well as the Past: it is not a mark of the victory of years over her, but a trophy of her resistance and strength against time. I speak as I am really persuaded; but were I as courageous as the Authors of your Country, I should express much more: I should say at least of this admirable old Lady, that at the age of Hecuba she had as many Lovers, as Helena in the flower of her youth. I could allege an infinite numbers as well of those that burn at Paris, as that sigh on this side the Loire: But it suffices me to speak for myself, who am the most passionate of them all, and as much as any person in the world,  
Reverend father, Your, etc. Marh. 4. 1642.   

LETTER XVIII. To my Lord the Duke of Espernon, Governor and Lieutenant General for the King in Guienne, etc.  
My Lord,  
THe obligations I have to you, affect me in such a sensible manner, that I am much unsatisfied with myself, that I am able only to testify to you vulgar resentments and acknowledgements for them. Perhaps it were a safer crime to present you with none at all. The silence of meditation is somewhat more devout than the Music of Hymns and Songs. There is no Sermon so eloquent as an Ecstasy, and study may have flattery and dissembling, when the distraction of the soul discovers the bottom and secrets. 'Tis with confusion of my thought, My Lord, and a discomposed spirit, that I thank you for your favours. It was with transport, and the loss of speech, that I received them lately: and I should yet continue in the same condition; were I not afraid to breed ill example among those that receive favours. My trance must not ever continue so drowsy as to hinder me from turning my eyes sometimes towards that side from whence my good fortune shines. If I be dumb with admiration, I will at least make signs, that I am not ungrateful on purpose: and when I shall taste those pleasant days at Plassac which you invite me to seek, I will say, at least in my heart, that you and the Sun bestow them on me, or make use of a verse in Virgil, It is a God that does indulge this leisure.  
The gods, my Lord, (I speak in the Language of Virgil) can not make a richer present to mankind: nay, they have not reserved a better for themselves: for it was affirmed by one that leisure was their business, and by another that it was their proper possession. I hide myself in the village for the better pursuance of this business of Heaven, and to enjoy a happy idleness: to satiety but my fruition hath been disturbed, and I could not escape discovery. Though this little corner of the world be unknown both to the ancient and modern Geography, and Mercator speaks no more of it then Ptolemy, my ill fate has pleased to bring it into reputation since my coming to it; and it is now deprived of that sweet and peaceable obscurity, wherein things unknown do rest. All the Prose and Verse in Christendom have learned the way thither: Paraphrases and Comments, Orations and Panegyrics, flock to it from all parts: but especially Letters, which claim a right to be admitted from the farthest Countries of the earth, and do verily believe they come to their own home, because I have written volumes of them. They do me much honour; I confess it: This persecution is too glorious for me: But yet it is still a persecution to a spirit overcharged, and that is no longer able—. I fret and repine here in vain against this glory: there is no way to acquit me from it but by escaping into some place of freedom; where there is not only a porter to tell them, I am not within, but a Captain to speak it with authority, and repel curiosity from searching after me. You do me the favour, my Lord, to offer me this place of refuge, wherein I may hope to be in security: and I know well enough that without need either of Captain or Soldiers, you have no house but your Name alone fortifies. It is the safeguard of other men's, and War respects it, even upon the door of a cottage. How can I fear my quiet then, when so powerful an authority assures it to me, and your goodness vouchsafes to own me, of whom I am and will ever be passionately all my life,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Janua. 5. 1645.   

LETTER XIX. To my Lord the Duke, de la Rochefoucaut, Peer of France.  
My Lord,  
IT is a great reproach to me to be so near a neighbour to you and make so little improvement of that advantage. But it would be a kind of lesser treason to live in your territories, and repose myself under your protection without expressing one thought of gratitude for it. It troubles me I am not able to say an action of it, and I hearty wish it were possible for me to venture so far. But my repose being grown to an incapacity of motion, I am constrained, my Lord, to render you my duty in my mind, and be of the Court of Vertevill in the same manner, I am of the Academy of Paris, that is, without stirring from hence to either. My indisposition sows thorns for me every where: it meets with precipices in the eevenest ways, and the infirmities of age do already so over-press me, that if they increase never so little more, I shall not dare to go out of my Chamber till I have made my will. In this piteous estate, you preceive clearly, my Lord, my faults are rather from necessity then choice, and that I am not guilty of my unhappiness. I lose so much in the want of your commerce, & your person hath so many Qualities to render it , abstracted from those of your condition, that were I naturally an Enemy of greatness, I should not be so much my own foe, as to keep at distance from my good when it were in my power to approach it. There needs not more for this, but common sense, and self-love, and as in some men's judgement, I have some of this love to spare, so in my own opinion, I do not altogether fail in the rational part. You may please to permit me, this little act of vain glory upon this occasion. I will receive it as a favour from you: But on the otherside, you will do me justice in this honourable belief of me, that there is no person more truly in his heart then myself,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Apr. 12. 1639.   

LETTER XX. To Monsieur the Count de la Vauguion.  
SIR,  
THe day you had the goodness to come and visit me, my spirits were so enfeebled with a restless night, and I was so incapable of all reasonable Society, that if you went not away with a very low opinion of me, you did an act of very high charity. Since that time the disgrace of that unlucky half hour hath lain upon my heart, and I have often fancied what you might conceive of the testimonies and approbation of the public. Questionless, Sir, you accused the people either of simplicity or imposture: you judged that they had suffered themselves to be deluded by a very unable man, or else they would deceive others for his sake; had I but an indifferent esteem of you, I should comfort myself up against all you could speak thereupon: but I knowing your valour great as your value, I must confess, Sir, I have doubtful apprehensions of my reputation, for I am afraid I have either utterly lost it with you, or extremely endangered it. To piece myself up again some way or other, and try to show myself to you at a more advantageous light than you saw me, I have just now resolved to send you the discourse I was obliged to make Of the conversation of the Romans. You will find there what you sought in mine: at least you cannot be ill entertained in a place where Consuls and Dictatours make up the honour of the house. I shall think my labour happy if it please you better than I have done: but I should esteem myself much happier than my labour, and believe I had repaired my detriment with advantage, could I but evidence to you with what respect, I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Mar. 28. 1640.   

LETTER XXI. To the Reverend Father Stephen de Bourges, a Capuchin Preacher.  
Reverend Father,  
YOu ought to commiserate me, instead of complaining of me. You know well on whom the unhappiness of your separation falls, or at lest who loses most by it, since you will be so good as to take a share in the mishap. For my justification, be pleased to consider only the present estate of things. You are the distributer of the favours of heaven at the distance of a league and half from hence: The treasures of the Church flow in torrents from your Lips: You deal out your largesses every morning; while I am tormented that these good things are done in my absence, and am so out of favour that no one drop of these inundations reaches me. The people receive the benefits, and I only hear the news of them. I who presumed myself your confident, who would and am not able to be near you. This is to tell you, Reverend father, that there is a superior force against which we are too feeble, and inevitable mischiefs, which meet us when we would fly them. Your divinity shall pardon me this error if you please. I now acknowledge, that fatal necessity in my own person too, I feel the violences and chains of destiny, which captive the most arbitrary and independent—. The world is so importunate, it does not allow a man leisure to say his prayers, and its importunity proceeds so far, & sometimes to that curiosity that it is troublesome even in the bosom of the desert. It seeks out men in a place, where it is written over the door, that there is no body within; that it is the Mansion of silence, the Sanctuary of sloth. At our first meeting I shall expound this last article, and lay open my moans to you to receive your comforts. I am with passion,  
Reverend father, Your, etc. Mar. 4. 1646.   

LETTER XXII. To Monsieur de Souchotte.  
SIR,  
Whatsoever opinion you have of the Barbarism of our climate, we are not so contemptible at Rome, but her largesses arrive to us; nor so little curious of rarity, as not to obtain a Jubilee as well as you. Your Letter having found me in this good mind, had no great difficulty to persuade me to that good work you request of me. I shall be very glad to please you, in my obedience to the Church, and do an act of Religion that may either acquire or recover me a friend to the merits of Monsieur de Saint . It is not possible for me to hate him, being as I am a member of the body of the Faithful: and if I had not esteemed him, I should not be in the Catalogue of the reasonable. Oblige me therefore by assuring him of my affection and respects, after you have told him that I have sent you my injuries and my resentments to be laid upon the altar whereon he makes his vows and sacrifices; that is, the Altar of Peace and Love, he must offer on it both for himself and me, all our froward passions, and all the sourness and bitterness of our spirits. I am resolved not to contribute to the continuance of disorder, or nourish myself with the quintessence of gall, nor grow old in a bad constancy. You may add as many civilities as you please to this Christian protestation. I make this universal profession to you, that I am without reserve,  
SIR, Your, etc. Ap. 25. 1645.   

LETTER XXIII. To Monsieur Perrot d'Ablancourt.  
SIR,  
YOu will perceive by the Copy of what you requested of me, in what manner I determine our compliance to the present state of affairs, and what has ever been my opinion del tempo & della signoria. The Letter is of an ancient date, as you know already; it was written to a man who had need of the like advice, but made very ill use of what I gave him: for some few years afterwards, being engaged in the revolt of Rochel, he died in a Sea-fight, wherein he commanded a vessel against the King. It might be said of him that he Renowned himself in his destruction, and that he showed miracles of courage, had he not done them in a bad cause, and had not his valour been his crime.  
Ah quantâ Virtute scelus defends, Amice!  
Quam fortis reus, atque invito qualia Marte  
Neptuno mirante geris?  
But when shall we peruse your History, in the condition you will suffer it to be seen? I expect it impatiently, that we may have a French Alexander, as stout, as brave, and as courageous in his words, as the Macedonian was in his actions. You know what was said of the portraiture of this, that of the two Alexanders, the son of Philip was invincible, and that of Apelles inimitable. You may make the application yourself to your excellent work: For my part, I shall not less esteem Alexander the book, than Alexander the Captain, and be all my life with passion,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jun. 5. 1645.   

LETTER XXIIII. To Monsieur de Bourdigal Candé.  
SIR,  
IS not a defluxion of these six week's continuance, which hath made a fountain of my head; and a Colic that succeeded it, to rend my entrails, with a thousand troublesome businesses besides, that have overburdened me at the same time, sufficient in your opinion to excuse my silence? Less than all this could not have made me break my word; and had I been capable of society, you should have known at the beginning of October, not only that I admire the Eloquence of your Letters, but I have communicated my admiration to all the wits within ten Leagues of me. I am not able to say more to you of it, and I beseech you Sir, do not take it ill that I send you not my Comments on the Relation of your friend, I am in a house where Policy medles not with any other affairs but those of Camillus, Fabricius and Scipio: By the orders of our Landlord, it is confined within the decades of Livy: nay the neighbouring History of Augustus is prohibited, it is not lawful to descend so low as the quarrels of Sylla and Marius, or of Pompey and Caesar. The Trium-virate must not so much as be glanced upon, so great a fear there is of approaching nearer, and becoming curious in comparing Ages, and Countries. I confess this is a very nice restraint and in a manner turning of us into another world, but you must also confess that your friend is very inquisitive after great secrets, and sick of Intrigues and news. What account would he have me give him of that which is done above me, of the hurly burly and tempests of humane affairs? I look upon the troubled Air and raging Sea, without murmuring at Juno, and execrations against Thetis: I am a witness, and not a judge of the life of Princes: and though I did not approve their conduct, which is distasted where you are, I would at least stick fast to that old oracle, Bona tempora voto expetere, qualiacunque tolerare; and to that more modern, but not less true, though translated by Apollo into Kitchen Latin, Bene loqui de superiore, Facere officium suum taliter qualiter, & sinere ire res quomodo vadunt: had I any hours free from pain, I would hold you longer, but I have only moments of relaxation, and I must make use of this, to assure you that I am ever really,  
SIR, Your, etc. Oct. 30. 1617.   

LETTER XXV. To Monsieur the Count of Clerimont, etc.  
SIR,  
I Have received an infinite number of favours from your goodness, and I have an infinite gratitude for them. But the mischief is, there is none that knows it besides myself. I have been so fare from ostentation of my good fortune, that I have enjoyed it as a thing gotten by theft, and it seems have taken a course to possess it without witnesses, that I might keep it without envy. You may call it either covetousness, or modesty, seeking security, or avoiding Spectators: I am sure, Sir, I have kept silence with as much Religion as if you had Confessed to me all the civilities you have written: and I cannot deny, that unless you have the gift of reading thoughts, you must needs be very dissatisfied with the care you have taken to oblige a man that does not speak. Yet I must, at length, justify myself, and help you to divine the true cause of this silence. It is most certain, my resentments had not been imprisoned thus long in my breast, but because I knew not whither to address them to you: for you have so many Houses, in so many several Provinces, that nothing was more easy then to miss you when you are aimed at, and mistake the Earldom for the Marquisate. Now you are fixed, Sir, and are to be found in the Castle which the Fairies built for your Ancestors on the banks of the Dordoigne, I beseech you, gently admit these lines to present my respects to you, and assure you of a fidelity as pure and sincere—. I could with I had myself been the bearer of these assurances, to have passed with you the happy days which my affection promised me there. But this cannot be accomplished only with desires and passions, though Monsieur Desportes formerly called them the feet of the soul. I must move more materially, and with more strength: if God do not take compassion of my weakeness, I am afraid I shall take no more journeys, but in the Map. I expect, therefore, by Monsieur— a faithful relation of the pleasures which I should have tasted, had I been capable to receive them. I will comfort myself by his assistance, with that harvest of Orange flowers and Jassamine, which is gathered in my absence. I will read the Diary of that war, we should have both been at in a Coach, and I shall know the number of the slain, whose Epitaphs we should have made after dinner: I mean your Hearts, your wild Boars, and your Salmon, which are taken in such abundance, as I am told, that there is no day in the year but you might feast Mark Anthony, and his Mistress—. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Sep. 2. 1639.   

LETTER XXVI. To the same.  
SIR,  
IS it possible that our friend hath lost his liberty? and can that countenance of Fabritius that represents to our age the severity of the ancient Republic, demit itself sometimes, to delight the eyes of some young Phillis? I have much ado to believe so strange a story. What probability is there, that having joined to the behaviour of old Rome, the Chaplets and Medals of the new, and that having treated face to face with Pope Vrban and drawn blessings from their source, he should return not confirmed in grace by those Apostolical Conferences, and refuse to drink at that Fountain of Holiness? There is no appearance he would lose so fair an opportunity of advance to greater perfection, and you do very well to colour your accusation with all that may make it look like truth: for by the same reason I proclaim you to be an Eloquent Detractor, I maintain my friend an honest man calumniated. Though I had seen him enter into those houses that are afraid of Beadles and Constables, I should not conceive a worse opinion of him then of that Holy Marchioness who resorts the same places to gain souls to our Lord; and I should cry out to any one that judged rashly, Do not mistake him, he is a Physician visiting his patients. When he comes hither, we will see if for matter of chastity, your actions may receive any such favourable interpretations, and if there be no means of revenge for the ill same you have aspersed him with; yet be confident, Sir, all this shall be done with the respect which is due to you: and, if it be not possible to make an Elogium of your countenance, without writing a Romanza more fabulous than the Rules of Poetry will permit, I promise you Panegyrics from me, and Odes from him, in commendation of your other virtues that are not controverted, and of which I am no less a believer then truly,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jun. 25. 1640.   

LETTER XXVII. To My Lord the Duke of Grammont, Martial of France.  
My Lord,  
YOur goodness to my Nephew, is a peculiar obligation to myself; and I resent it with all the apprehensions of gratitude that can enter into the soul of an honest man: but to return you the thanks you merit, is that which I dare not undertake: and I should have need of better words then my own, to do it as I would. In time past, those trifling words have been happy enough not to displease you, and you have done me the honour to declare, they sometimes spent your spare hours with delight: But, my Lord, as that was a good fortune I was little worthy of, and so I have little title to promise myself the continuance of it. You are not obliged for my sake, to employ the acuteness of your wit always sparingly, and use your strength by halves. Courtesies are not to be exacted like debts, and if you did me a favour when you made any account of me, you now do but justice, if you do so no longer. An obscured man, as I am, of no use in the world, should not aspire to the highest ambition of those that appear and act in it, I mean to your esteem, my Lord, and having only prayers to offer up, for the happy success of your great erterprises, it ought to suffice me, if you but pity my feeble passion, and suffer me to style myself as long as I live, withal kind of respect,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Jan. 14. 1645.   

LETTER XXVIII. To my Lord the Duke of Rohan.  
My Lord,  
YOu could not send your Decree to a person better persuaded of your cause then myself, nor more passionate to your service. I was much rejoiced at the report that ran of it: but you were pleased to give me a more peculiar relation of it that my second joy might have something in it more sensible and noble than my first. In doing me the honour hereby of separating me from the people, you desire I should see that though I am not one of your judges, I am one of those of whose voice you account, and whose opinion you do not contemn. At first, my Lord, and without deliberation my vote was for you. I judged you worthy of your good fortune before it befell you, and seeming a very just man from the first time I observed you, I did not think it any miracle that you should become fortunate, or that the choice of a goddess hath crowned the Graces of Heaven. All that has been attempted to trouble the success of this envied election, hath done nothing but bred occasion for you to triumph over envy; and you draw this advantage from your pains, and contests, that in a possession, which was too peaceable for so desired a good, there is now near as much splendour as sweetness, and something that resembles conquest, after your victory in Parliament. It was such a one, my Lord, that it will seem to some, that the envy which assailed you, held correspondence with you; since she only made the onset that she might yield, and set up an Incognito in competition with you, to give you occasion to interess in your cause, and discover in your Race and Alliances, more Heroes and great Lords, than came out of the Trojan Horse. When I consider that brave throng of Illustrious names, that Triumph rather than that Audience, that day of your glory after those of your good fortune, so much Grandeur and lustre at an hundred leagues distance from me; I confess I am somewhat ashamed of my solitude and obscurity. But I must tell you further, and Monsieur Gautier shall pardon me, if he please, that I have a little season of jealousy against him and his Eloquence, and I wish if it had been possible for me, to have been your advocate that day, being to that degree as I am,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Apr. 17. 1646.   

LETTER XXIX. To Monsieur de Couppeau ville, Abbot of La Victoire.  
SIR,  
THat you may know your reputation hath no limits, and that you are esteemed both within and without the World; I advertise you, that Monsieur de la— is to come to preach you in our desert, and that in a week's conversation we have had together, he hath told me more things of you then a dozen mistresses that he left at Paris. The charms of your tongue are sufficiently known, and you have made great experiments of them: but be assured they never wrought more powerfully ●hen on the spirit of this Gentleman, you never spoke with more success than when he heard you, and never dismissed an auditor better edified. Sallust was his first beloved. Quintilian ●ath since taken Salusts place, and you have succeeded Quintilian. I saw the beginning of a book he is writing of your ●pophthegms; he hath learned you by heart, and understands you throughly: so that if by any mischance you should be lost, you might be retrieved in his ●emory. I leave you Sir, to imagine, the pleasure he did me, to concur so exactly with my resentments, and choose my inclinations for the subject of his discourse. It lies upon him to give you a further account, when he sees you, and inform you of the first motions your name excited in a languishing soul, and the continuance of my joy in the sequel of his relations. He told me nothing concerning you, but I desired him to repeat it; and mentioned nothing of vows but what deserved this compliment of the Academy Italian, Di gratia Signor un altra Volta: But particularly the description of the feast, you made Monsieur Chavigny, was acted over more than once at my most humble supplication. I found in it I know not what of learned Antiquity. But on your conscience, Sir, was that Terence which was served in for one of your sweetmeats, so stuck with perfumes and covered with flowers, absolutely of your own invention? Is it not an Original of Maecenos, or at least that gallant man of the following Century, qui deliciarum arbiter, & cujus eruditus luxus à nostro Cornelio celebratur? How ever it be, we never heard of such cates before, and you wanted nothing that day, but Dionysius Lambinus for cook, and Adrian Turnebus for Steward. The piece is throughly ingenious, and much more humane and rational than the desire of that Barbarous Grecian, who at Alexander's table wished for a Satrapa's head in a dish. This was a resemblance of the haughtiness of Turkey, before there were any Turks in the world: and it is an example only fit for machiavel's imitation, if he had invited Caesar Borgia to dinner. But you are to deal with a man, who hath the  of Roman Consuls, and not Asian Princes: and you have accordingly treated him after the Roman fashion; for it must be confessed, that the appetite of his mind could not be better represented, by an emblem more spiritual, nor more gallant than that you had devised. When if you make him a second Entertainment I have entreated our friends to give you a present from me, and deliver you some Latin verses, of the last inspiration of my Muses; they are neither the Ragousts of Scipio, nor the delicacies of Maecenas: yet they are fruits transplanted from the nursery of those happy Ages; and I have inserted my grafts upon their Stocks. You may please to judge of them when you have tasted them: and continue ever to love me a little, since I will never cease to be infinitely,  
SIR, Your, etc. Sep. 3. 1642.   

LETTER XXX. To Monsieur de Bourzeys, Abbot of Cores.  
SIR,  
IF I did not know that Generosity takes delight in speaking improperly, and thinks it owes that which it gives, I should not understand the intentions of Monsieur your brother. His conversation hath dispelled the clouds of my melancholy: his quittance hath melted the stubbornness of my soul: he hath been my intercessor to the Commissary; he hath showed me one of your Sermons: and after all this, he thanks me for all the good turns he has done me, and will not make me happy without being obliged to me for it. And yet more, Sir, he would have this conceit of obligation extend even to you, and disturb you in the middle of your conflicts, that I might receive a compliment from that hand which strikes dead Heresy. Here is enough to satisfy the most ambitious spirit in the world. One grain of your incense is worth a mass of another's, and nothing is so sweet, even in the sense of wise Antiquity, as the praises that come from a person that is universally commended. They that contemn the acclamations of the people, should yet be sensible of these; which cannot be indifferent to any, but such as honour their sullen humour with the Title of Stoic Philosophy. For my part, Sir, I declare myself to be none of that sect, every kind of allurement would not be apt to tempt me: but how is it possible to abstain from a meat which you have dressed, or resist a passion, that works its effect by your Language? So that I must needs tell you freely, I never received more joy than when I received your Letter. Monsieur de la Thibaudiere was a witness of my trance: Monsieur Chaplain had notice of my good news: if it were possible I would have divulged it to all the Earth, and have printed it in all Languages, that all such as can read might know, I am most passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Mar. 3. 1639.   

LETTER XXXI. To Monsieur the Abbot of Lavardin.  
SIR,  
SHall I dare to tell you that I writ these lines to you, overtired with watch and melancholy? that I draw them from a brain yet unsettled from yesterday tempest; that I now expect a fift Fit? It would be injurious to the worth of the excellentest Letter in the world, and to intimate to you, that it hath not absolutely cured me, or that it leaves any work behind for Physic or time: it would be too ungrateful a treating me of your favours, so rare and exquisite, and which have so sensibly obliged me, yet I must allege the disturbance of my head, to justify the little premeditation I am capable of, and the negligence of this scroll. It will assure you, Sir, that there is no body so possessed with the Devil of a Tertian ague; but the sound of your words bring him some ease: there are no eyes so greedy of sleep, but love your Letters better than their rest. I never saw so much beauty, so many ornaments, and so much riches in one place: and yet in the middle of this fair abundance, you complain of being poor. Ask God pardon for that sinful word. It cannot proceed from any thing but either an extreme ambition or an insatiable avarice: and you put me in mind of him who reckoned the treasuries of Darius' nothing, who slighted the tributes of the Indies and Asia, who did not think he had enough when he had all. You ought not Sir, to bewail your poverty: you should reform your excess and profuseness. For my particular you give me so much, that I have not room enough to receive your benefits: and they are so unfit for me that I dare not touch them with profane hands. I make a conscience of appropriating things so high and disproportionable to my meanness. I have no right to receive them, unless you have power to force me to it, unless you compel my humility as the Pope did that of father Lugo, who would not have accepted the Purple but only to avoid excommunication. What ever it be, Sir, and whatsoever accident menaces good fortunes, I hope to preserve the Principle of mine, I mean your favour. And for this, I shall be deficient neither in passion nor respect; and if Time undeceive you in that counterfeit Grandee whom you esteem so highly in my person, you shall find at least, an honest man in the place of him, whom time can never change, and whom doubtless, you will ever love, since he will eternally be with all his soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. Oct. 8. 1644.   

LETTER XXXII. To Monsieur Solomon, Attorney General to the Grand Council.  
SIR,  
YOu will not be offended, that I value the accessary higher than the principal, and your Letter then your present. You have sent me a book I do not much admite, but you have written I know not what that charms me. Pardon the curiosity of a man, on whom you have made trial of your enchantments; I desire of you seriously, Where is this innocent and handsome Magic taught? or, if you please, that subtle and new kind of Rhetoric. In that Country, from whence the Genus Demonstrativum comes to us, and in the shapes of Cardinal Bentivoglic, and the father Strada: there is not any mystery taught to attract the soul more gently, and by more delicate engines. Your civilities are perfumed with an incense so exquisite and precious, that that which is retailed at Court, is but a sophisticate Gum in respect of it. In a word, Sir, to express myself literally, without making use of the figures and Rhetoric I have learned from you; you employ so much of your own Eloquence in praising mine, that you seem rather to defy that, then make a compliment to me. I have no mind, either to contest in this, or any thing else with you: I bear too much reverence both to the King's servant, and his Tongue, and am too sensible of the advantage he hath over me; who the last year persuaded what he would, and whom I harkened to with delight, when he gave his answers upon two hundred questions that were proposed him. I am resolved to hear and applaud as long as I live, to give place and yield to you as much as you please: for it were better, I should pass for one of your Paradoxes, than, with words so unequal to yours, attempt to confute you to my own confusion. Why should I perplex myself to resist a strength which is nothing but gentleness, and can do nothing but good? I must patiently endure my happiness. In Egypt they do not cast up banks against that beneficial violence, which breaks in to enrich the Country that receives it: Be pleas d therefore to continue your pleasing excesses, and over-presse me with an infinity of favours. I shall be glorious in those precious ruins: writ excellent things to me still whilst I only return an answer to them in the bare protestation, which I shall make you, to be ever passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Apr. 18. 1645.   

LETTER XXXIII. To Monsieur Ferret, Secretary to the late Duke of Weymar.  
SIR,  
I Have been slow in answering your eloquent Letter, but the reason is because I have ruminated and meditated upon its Eloquence a long time. There are enchanted papers as well as Castles, and if I have forgot myself amongst your excellent things, do not esteem it sloth, but rather an ecstasy and ravishment. That which you have written to me, does honour to the memory of your Prince, and extols his judgement after his death. I perceive by that, he understood how to choose heads and distinguish of men: that he was as knowing in pens as swords; that his Secretaries did not second him less gallantly in his Closet, than his Colonels in the field. But do not think you shall be rid of me so, in showing me you were worthy to be the Duke of Weymar's Secretary: you promised me more, that you would be his Historiographer for my sake, and I expect the Memoires I requested of you. In the mean time, Sir, I thank you for the Sermons you have taken the pains to send me, and beseech you to assure the honest Heretic that preached them, that I always extremely honour and esteem him. There is more than one Right Reverend, and one Regent Master amongst us, that I should be very glad our Church could truck for so deserving an enemy. Not that we want famous persons, but I could wish there were none famous in the world but who were ours; and it troubles me, I am forced to commend a valour that makes war upon us. It is most certain, I cannot withhold from praising that Monsieur Daillé, yea in the presence of the Jesuits my spiritual fathers, and the Capuchins my dear friends. I every day envy him your Party, and sometimes I tell him, though he can hardly hear me where he is, Cum talis fis, utinam noster esses? Will you be so faithful as to carry him this amorous sigh from me? it makes its addresses also to you who very well merit our desires; and I beseech you, receive it with my protestation to be always in sincerity,  
SIR, Your, etc. Aug. 8. 1644.   

LETTER XXXIV. To Monsieur de Blassac Merè.  
SIR,  
YOu are too good in pitying my solitude, and awaking me out of my drowsiness by a name so dear to me as yours. I was ravished to find it at the end of those curious lines that preceded it: curious, indeed, if ever I read any; for without any design to irritate the goddess of flowers, or the god of light, I maintain there can be nothing more gloriously enameled nor more radiant than what you writ. But from whence do you gather all these riches? You make but few journeys into the Latin Country, and very rarely in to Greece? Without doubt you take all these rich materials of the Universal Idea of things: your soul is naturally instructed and disciplined, and you become learned in the same manner as the first Inventours of Arts and Sciences. I am confident, that excellent man you tell me of, is of my opinion, and that night's conversation you two had togerher in the walls of Saint Germans, showed him, that common understanding well-managed can outstrip Philosophy, and that there was just occasion for a Dialogue, where it may be, he had provided a Lecture. I exceedingly approve the eloquent homages you do him in your Letter to him? I admire the high things, you speak concerning the superiority of his wit: and that silver Coller which you promise to wear as the badge of your servitude, is a rare piece in my conceit. I very much esteem, Sir, the good Counsels you have given to our Monsieut de la— if he resolve to follow them, no heart can escape him, and we shall see as many Chlorises and Phillises as he can catch in his nets. O the gallant Inamorato, and youthful Doctor of Love? When shall I make up the third in your society? It cannot be till you both come hither; for in the consideration I am, good fortune must come seek me, and cast herself into my arms. In the mean time, I beseech you continue your hearty love to me, if you will have me live with any comfortably in expectation of you, and believe me ever, I beseech you,  
SIR, Your, etc. Oct. 1. 1643.   

LETTER XXXV. To the same.  
SIR,  
YOu did not allow me time to expect the good which I desired. Almost at the same instant that I wished for manna from Sedan, I saw it rain in my desert: and the cloud broke upon the banks of Charante, when I thought the vapour began but to exhale from the streams of . Yet so rare a present is not the principal part of the benefit I have received: the spirit with which you animated it, is something, more exquisite than the gift: I do less value your none-such then your eloquence: and contrary to the ordinary course, words are here of more worth than things. Give me leave therefore Sir, to renew my old Questions to you and to demand, What God hath inspired you with these eloquent words; who hath revealed Rhetoric to you? on what hill have you slept, and what laurel have you eaten? Or have you lighted upon the thoughts of those Philosophers, and Orators, whose books you never read? Certainly your souls have seen and discoursed with one another in the other world, before yours came into this. You must have conferred together in the Closet, from whence celestial originals, and the first forms of things do issue, for your acquaintance with them must come from a farther place than mine. If it be so, me thinks you have lately put yourself to a superfluous expense. What will you do with that perpetual whistler, that chatters out Porphyries five Predicables, and that Hackney Grammarian, who betrays Cicero every time he goes about to translate him to him? Retrench your retinue of those two unprofitable mouths, and continue to search narrowly within yourself, where I promise you, you will find excellent things. It is betetr to be rich by birth, then cease to be a beggar by labour: and I esteem an admirable ignorant as you are, before an ordinary Doctor, such as I know store. But the matter in Question, hath been too long and too often handled. Let us therefore conclude it with that fair picture, which you have drawn in your Letter: and do you fancy that young Lady who dispenses good and ill days at her pleasure, and who without stirring from her mother's house, scatters fire over all France: fancy her, I say, either coming out of her bed, or from bathing, without a co●●●, without a nightgown, without lawn, nay without her smock, if you be but valiant enough to endure such an apparition, and see her as naked as when she came into the world. On the other side, imagine to yourself that Lady who has the prodigious memory, who is the inventory of several Kingdoms, who groans under the burden of fashions and gugewes, who hath all Medaeaes' receipts for pastes, oils, and essences. To which of these two, think you, would the inclination of a soul that knew how to choose, run first? before which would a man of a sound judgement, and good eyes most willingly prostrate himself? There would be no great scruple in the choice, Sir, and by the same sentence, your divine cousin and yourself have carried your cause: but I am not of opinion to venture myself any further, though you would lead me. I am extremely apprehensive of ridiculous designs and adventures; and my grey hairs drive me from that banquet your good nature invites me to. I leave you then, the Phoenix, the eighth wonder of the World, the utmost achievement of nature, and all the rest of the hardwords, of which you would have had me make an Oration, contenting myself to end this Letter in the simplicity of familiar language, and telling you  to my custom, that I am perfectly.  
SIR, Your, etc. Dec. 3. 1642.    

THE SECOND BOOK.  

LETTER I. To Monsieur Menage.  
SIR,  
IF your passion be as true as it is eloquent, and kindle as great a flame in your own breast as it casts lustre in your words, with the favour of Socrates, I am the most happy Lover that ever courted beauteous souls. Within a little space, I have found a thousand rays of that first, and sovereign Fair, which all the ancient Philosophy sought after: and you can so well represent what you happily conceive, that had you given me no more than this picture, I should have already received too much. But it is not your intention I should only be happy in figure: you do not design to bedeck me with a new nothing nor make a largess of false money. Your Colours are solid and your appearances essential: and without Question you have professed to me the fervency of your love in the Ornaments of your language, to no other end but that I may see truth is not always plain and poorly clad, but that she hath her festivals, and actions of Ceremony. Can any thing be imagined more gallant and yet more passionate than this devotion of yours, and those vows which you continually pay, in the Church where we first saw one another? The secrecy and the solitude which you fought out to enjoy, apart from witnesses, the paper which Monsieur Chaplain lent you, obliges me to cry out Hony soit qui mal y pense, and advertise the profane people, that virtue wears sometimes the countenance of vice, and our Muses cease not to be chaste, though they are voluptuous. But what shall I say to your shutting the door, and fortifying yourself in your chamber that no body might disturb you in the possession of a dozen of lines? The long, and greedy kisses, you bestowed on the paper that wore my name, and the other almost sensual pleasures, to which your spirit, yielded itself, when you read my testimony of your merit are fare from the actions of a dissembler, and can never possibly seem such to me though I saw them only written, and in the Relation I received. The fabulous Pylades and Orestes cannot be so lively acted, nor the two Pythagoreans in the story. For my part, I having some familiarity with Hermogenes, and a little acquaintance with forms and Ideas, do maintain there is no Rhetoric but the Amorous, that can speak in that style: and that is the true, and natural strain of noble affection. Mine being more strong than handsome, I do not venture to wrap it up in a delicate style. I know not how to answer a Relation which I can only admire, and you shall be contented, if you please with vulgar expressions: but such as I do warrant every syllable of them in their most Rigorous signification, protesting to you that I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Nou. 5. 1639.   

LETTER II. To the same.  
SIR,  
YOu are not contented only to bestow your own affection on me, and place me in your heart: you labour for me elsewhere, and cease not either to acquire or preserve me illustrious friends Is it true which you writ of Monsieur the Ambassador of Sweden, and am I happy enough to be esteemed by him? I speak this to you as religiously as if I touched the altars whereon we swore our friendship: My ambition was dead, but you have restored it to life again, and I should have the same ecstasies as you, were but my blood as subtle and spiritful in my veins. Who would not think himself glorious by his esteem, of whose birth our Age has cause to be proud? He is a Living one, whom the Precedent Jannin opposed to all the dead Grandees of Antiquity, and had Holland brought forth no more than this learned head, our dear friend is to blame: she had deserved alone all the laurels he would dispoil the rest of. For Messieurs du Puy you cannot believe what good you have done me, in telling me they always love me, and that my sloth hath not forfeited their favour: For though Monsieur L' Huillier has engaged for me, and undertaken to preserve me in their remembrance, yet I should not have left all to him, and been deficient in a duty, which is paid them in all Languages, and from all places of the Earth. Nevertheless if you please to associate with that admirable Monsieur l'Huillier, and act jointly in my name, who makes any question but they had rather hear you, then read me, and that my Agents would be valued more than either I or my Letters? Oblige me therefore to let them know, Sir, but this from your eloquent mouth, that they have not cherished a savage, and that he who received their favours is a Denizen of the civilised world, capable of gratitude, and who both knows and is sensible of a benefit bestowed on him. If it were not almost as hard to bring me to Paris, as to bring Paris hither to me, I would willingly ease you of this Commission, and be myself the bearer of my compliment. In truth, though Paris have many allurements to make it be desirable, and though the Majesty of the State be not only contracted there in the person of the Prince, but diffused into as many parts as there are Courts of Justice; yet all this greatness, and all this Majesty cannot tempt me to return thither again. It is not the Lovure that attractes me thither, it is the Closet of those excellent brothers: and the fortune I seek, hath nothing in it but pure, spiritual, and learned: I am neither Courtier, Lawyer, nor Usurer. I am ignorant in all knowledge of these professions: but out of all that ignorance, there is found a certain animal, extremely free and indifferently reasonable, who hath not been disliked by Monsieur the Ambassador of Sweden, who hath formerly been acceptable to Messieurs du Puy, and whom you may now prise to them, at what rate you please. I do not implore you to enrich the definition of me, to value me at more than I am worth: I only beseech you not to forget what really I am master of, and to persuade even yourself, (for with you I have most need of your good offices) that I can love without interest: that my tenderness is firm and constant, that I am a Violent that lasts, that is, that I shall be all my life, with passion,  
SIR, Your, etc. Sep. 30. 1639.   

LETTER III. To my Lord the marquis of Montausier, Governor and Lieutenant General for the King in Saintonge, Angoumois, etc.  
My Lord,  
SInce it is infinitely beyond my power to return a suitable answer to the favourable Relations I received from Monsieur Chapelain, what can I do but despair as to my acknowledgements of so many solid effects and sensible obligations as I have received from your goodness? You take too much care to preserve that which you cannot lose: my passion is the most unprofitable thing you are Master of; it is withal the most assured. The mischief is, that having reserved nothing of myself when first I made you the gift, I have nothing now left to offer you; and I very well perceive that at the same time you intent to show your own power and my disability. I was immediately drained of my compliments, but your favours are inexhaustible: and whosoever shall understand that your imprisonment in Germany did not bereave you of the means to oblige me there, will not wonder that your Government of Angoumois affords you occasions to do it. During your confinement you entertained your solitude with me in your thoughts: In a time of melancholy you conceived me capable to divert you, yea my only name and image have served to do it: and as remote as I was from you, I made such rays of joy stream into your soul as caused an admirable and glorious spring in it. I preserve my Lord, the bundle of those excellent flowers it brought forth with much care: I bedeck myself and flatter my vanity with them. I look upon them as the fairest token of remembrance that Polybius could have wished from his Scipio, and Paulus Jovius from his marquis of Pescara. It is not without some design of Heaven, or some good presage that this marquis is come into my mind. Since you are not less brave than he, it is just you be not less happy. The Victoria Colonna of our age must complete your felicity, since virtue hath begun it. There are no wishes to be made for you, after these. And though the present I have received from you be something more obliging then the grant of Exemptions and Protections, or then the Majoralty of Angoulesme and that of Saints which you have conferred at my instance; yet I think myself sufficiently grateful, if I prognosticate with success the possession of a good which you esteem infinitely higher than all others. It hath hitherto been in vain desired: God hath refused it to the prayers and devotion of men: But without doubt, you are elected in the secret of Providence to be the happy possessor of it. Believe me, my Lord: I have been inspired more than once, and I tell you in the name of Heaven, and in the language of my Oracles, Tua tua erit, et sua te propter esse desinet. Tu certè dignus es quem ipsa Minerva praeferat & virginitati & sibi. I dare not add any thing to these high words, and cannot better conclude my Letter then with a Prophecy. I am ever passionately,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Apr. 25. 1645.   

LETTER iv To the same.  
My Lord,  
YOur remembrance is not a bare token of your civility: You remember me in terms that persuade me although they come from a suspected place, and that I know, at Court words are not much used but to disguise intentions. You use them with greater integrity, and more faithful to the intent of nature. They are the fair interpreters of your soul; and in your Letters, the representation of the thing is no other than the thing itself. You love, my Lord, where ever you have said it; and your word gives me firmer assurance of my good then my possession of it. I repose confidence in that, who have reason to distrust the decrees of Jupiter, and in whom so many Oracles have proved liars. I am not a little proud to find room in a memory, which usually is stored with Orders from the King, and determinate resolutions of the Council. But I am much more glorious in being beloved by a man that looks on all Employments, and charges, beneath him who makes serious profession of Probity and honour, whom the Court hath not been able to effeminate, nor War to exasperate. I think I have said all in this. For is it not a little miracle to escape without flying, from the contagion of a corrupted Age; to have more true strength, than custom hath violence; to know how to manage fury, and mix the Man with the Lion; to be virtuous, rational, wise, amidst the tumult of unchained passions? And in this place you must, if it please you, pardon me the liberty I am about to take, and permit me to demand of you, whether you always intent to employ Reason to a use that seems so contrary to her? Will you ever exercise an Art so mortal to the quiet of the World? Shall the wise, my Lord, and virtuous be any longer injurious to the ruin of mankind? It may be, a milder season will succeed this, and heaven may be reconciled to earth; possibly the future reserves some good days for us, and all our festivals are not extinct: In case it should be so, you will have leisure to let us see you in your government; and that is at least one fruit of the peace which I hope to gather on the bank of our fair Charante. I do not tell you in her behalf and as her Poet, that the Rhine and Danow make her jealous: I speak of my own head, that I impatiently expect the honour of kissing your hands, and am more than any person in the World,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Jan. 7. 1646.   

LETTER V To Monsieur de Puy, Counsellor to the King.  
SIR,  
SInce your books are your mistresses, and I am the cause of an eighteen months' absence (having detained them here so long) I believe you have put up many unprofitable vows for their return, and they will come to your hands at the instant you are making imprecations against me; so long a stay from their own home, and the opinion which they have at Paris, that all on this side the Loire is Gascon, may have rendered my fidelity suspected to you, and given you some reason to fear that the Romans had much difficulty to themselves from the Barbarians. Yet here they are, Sir, as sound and entire as I received them from Monsieur Girard: and I pr●test I have borne such respect to them, that, had it been possible, I would not have touched them but with satin fingers. Every thing that comes to me from you, and that wears the Livery of Monsieur de Thou, satisfies me immediately of its price and merit: and if I did but see that mark on an Almanac, or on the works of the Count Vi Ma, I should restrain myself from terming them pitiful papers. You may judge by this in what consideration I held your Hubertus Fobietta, and his excellent company? Since the bastards of Vandals and Goths, if owned by you, should be treated honourably by me; you may believe, Sir, that the same warrant did not permit me to  the true and magnanimous Nephews of Remus. Monsieur Menage who knows my resentments in this particular, and the perfect value I set upon your virtue and your brothers, will tell you in more Courtly manner, what I only writ you in the style of the village. He will choose out words, which shall not extenuate as mine do, the greatness of my passion and gratitude. If there be any necessity of it, he shall bind himself by oath to you; he is good, and my friend enough to do it, that I am not less than he,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jul. 15. 1642.   

LETTER VI To Monsieur the Precedent de Nesmond.  
Sir, my dear Cousin,  
I Am so good a husband of that portion I conceive I have in your favour, that I would not willingly ever touch it; and had rather pass for a bad friend, then make a custom of recommending suits to you. But discretion must not be so scrupulous as to violate Society, and one may suspend the rigour of his principles without forfeiting the reputation of constancy. I thought I was obliged to offer that to Monsieur Covurelles which I had refused to an infinite number of Suitors, and I have entreated him to deliver you this Letter from me, to the end an action not usual with me, might be a token to you of his extraordinary virtue. He is a Gentleman, whose noble extraction hath been improved with excellent education, he understands his own profession, and that of other men too. And although Politeness and Purity do seldom meet together, yet he hath both the knowledge of the Court with the innocence of the Country. I have heard him commended by the greatest persons of this Kingdom, and I make no Question but you will be one of his illustrious approvers: after you have had an hours entertainment of his discourse. I most humbly beseech you, Sir, to do him this favour; and dismiss him back to us as soon as you can, with the satisfaction he promises himself from your justice. He is one of those that civilize our Barbarism and represent us your great world: so that consequently conceiving myself interessed in my own particular in the supplication I have made to you, I redouble it in this place with a little fervency, and protest to you with much truth, that no man can be more than I myself,  
Sir, Your, etc. May. 10. 1638.   

LETTER VII. To the Same.  
SIR,  
Whatever infirmity it is that confines me here, it is only Madam Desloges power that withholds me from causing myself to be conveyed to Paris, to be her solicitor there to you: But she will not employ all the right she hath over me, and whereas she may command me a journey, she is contented to desire a Letter from me. I have granted it to her, as a favour which she does me, or I rather which I do myself: and I writ it to you with as much concernment, as if my own good fortune depended on the success she promises herself from your justice. So the thing hath changed its nature: it is not her business I recommend to you: but my own interests which I put into your hands, and prosecute in another's name. I account it superfluous, Sir, to tell you at this time, of a virtue the most acknowledged and celebrated in the World. It would not only be a stifling of a great subject in too close a Room, and bringing the Genus Demonstrativum to a straight, but it would look as if had a design to mix some thing of ascititious in a cause which I esteem wholly my own, and as it I had a mind to be little beholding to you, when I make many importune instances and allegations. I have not any such cunning design I should be very loath to diminish the worth of your benefit by the reflection on any other merit. But on the contrary I declare to you, that of the many obligations I have to you both of new and ancient date, this will be the most considerable beyond compare; Whereof I shall be more sensible and for which, principally you shall be entitled My Benefactor, as I all my life time will profess myself,  
Sir, my dear Cousin, Your, etc. Aug. 15. 1639.   

LETTER VIII. To the same  
Sir, my dear Cousin,  
YOu have obliged me with so much goodness in the affairs of others, that I cannot doubt your assistance in my dearest and most sensible interests. It is true, I am ashamed that I never come before you but with the countenance of a suppliant, and that I never write any thing but b●gging Letters. I would at least once in my life, offer you my devoirs more nobly, and without blemish to the purity of my passion by this troublesome mixture of business that accompanies it. But on the other side, me thinks, it would have something of Pride in it, to be unwilling to owe you much; & your protection is so gentle that I am not troubled to be more yours every day, by some new title which you acquire over me. Whom should we invoke in our calamities but him that effectually hearkens to us? and to whom shall we address our prayers, but to a power that is beneficent to all? but to the tutelar Saint of our Province, and our peculiar Protector? Preserve us therefore Sir, from the dreadful harrasses of Barratry that menace us. Which after it hath defrauded us of what our lawful right was not strong enough to maintain, would now snatch that from us which the remorse of our judges hath left us. I do not accuse their integrity, though I cannot commend their judgement, I only say, to clear them, that oftentimes falsehood has a better appearance than truth. I see very evidently the fictions of Lawyers are more dangerous than those of Poets, and the Sophisms of Normandy harder to resolve then those of the Latin Country. If you pleased but to discourse upon this matter with any of our Commissioners, I make no question but being inspired by your words he would receive a new spirit for the good of our business, and the effect of his inspiration be immediately infused on all his Associates. The reverence of your virtue, would make them consider more exactly the goodness of our cause, you—, and will be the chief Author of the consolation we expect. I conjure you, to do us this favour, and believe me always,  
Sir, my dear Cousin, Your, etc. Nou. 20. 1640.   

LETTER IX. To Monsieur de la Nauve, a member of Parliament in the Court of Inquiries.  
SIR,  
HItherto I have solicited you in favour of my friends, and never for myself: At this time I must do it for one that is nearer to me then myself, and I recommend something more than my own cause, since it is that of Monsieur Chapelain. I draw so much advantage from his friendship, and so much profit from his example, that if I have any comfort in solitude, or any goodness in a wicked age, I own him both. He made me a Philosopher, and he detains me from being a savage. I cannot be indebted to him higher than that, nor tell you more of him after I have said, he alone is my Socrates, Aristides, and my Photion. I beg justice of you in the name of those three, concentred together in this one: In the name of virtue injured in his person: in the name of all civil men interested in his cause for the sake of an honesty so pure and exact, nay so rigid and scrupulous, that we may with advantage parallel it with those of the first times. These are high words, I confess: yet they are not sufficient for my purpose, and my thoughts outgo them, though my expression be forced to stop here. That expression which did not dislike the King of Sweden, and made the Duke of Weymar desire that I should speak of him, doth afford me nothing that contents me, when I should speak of my friend. I find it weak in the testimony I now give of him, and think I render him this office but imperfectly, though it be with the utmost of my affection, and with as much fervency and zeal as I am,  
Sir, my dear Cousin, Your, etc. Sep. 10. 1640.  
Pardon my precipitation: I had in my Letter forgot a fourth Grecian, in whose favour I am bound to solicit you: with their permission I will add, Homer to Socrates, Aristides, and Photion. You will perceive more in the verses I have caused to be copied for you, and which I sent lately to Colummiers, whither Monsieur the Duke of Longueville had carried Monsieur Chapelain to spend some few days with him.   

LETTER X. To Monsieur de Morin, Counsellor to the King in the Court of the Edict of Guyenne.  
SIR,  
THere is a certain Spirit of Barratry and a she devil of Lawsuits which fills the world with disorders. The Poets were overseen in not reckoning her among their Harpuys and Furies: they ought to have made her one of their mischievous deities, and should have given her terrible Talons, and armed her with Torches and Serpents. You know, Sir, this enemy of humane quiet, hath tormented our friend a long time: but, it may be, you do not know that she will torment him eternally, unless you compassionate his miseries, and become his absolute Redeemer. I can neither doubt of your affection to your friends, nor your influence over the minds of the judges: I have had too particular experiences of them, and Suitors have formerly given me thanks for carrying the causes I have recommended to you. That which troubles me a little, is an apprehension lest my Letter should not find you at Bourdeaux, and that we should by your absence lose the advantages your goodness makes me hope. Yet on the other side, this apprehension cannot make any deep impression for there is some probability that at least in the middle of February, or the Latter end of winter, your Campagne may be ended. It hath lasted longer than those of any of our Generals: and unless you mean to pass in the Hall for one that has left the Bar, there is no question but you will be by that time returned to resume your long robe. If it be so, our cause will be better by half: for though we have many contrivances and Engines, yet what use are they of, without an engineer that understands how to manage them? I conjure you to be the spirit to animate and infuse heat to the rest, and do me the favour to believe that you shall never oblige a Suppliant more of readier gratitude, nor more truly than myself,  
SIR, Your, etc. Feb. 14 1641.   

LETTER XI. To Monsieur de Monrave, first Precedent of the Parliament of Tholouse.  
SIR,  
DId not friendship justify whatsoever is her own action, I should this day be guilty of a strange error, and it would seem a sort of riddle; that one that was recommended to you by Monsieur Maynard should now recommend Monsieur Maynard to you: for his first compliment it would be (if taken literally) a very peremptory piece of extravagance, the History of Tholoze would record my address to the Prince of the Senate, but not much to my commendation, and those which treat of the doctrine of Manners would quote it in the Chapter of Good-Carriage as a prodigy newly happened in the rational world. This would be the consequence, Sir, were my action measured by the rules of common Morality: But according to the privileges which are granted to us by a more sublime Philosophy, conceiving myself dispensed with from the rigour of formalities, and licenced to fall immediately upon the point, I do not see any more remarkable, nor that concerns me more than this we now treated of: And since I find my own interest involved with that of my friend, I most humbly beseech your allowance in this particular, that being moved by a natural principle, and without further deliberation, I may pay what I own myself. I will not prejudice your time of public audiences with my addresses. You shall be suffered to act the God on Earth, losing myself in the crowd of affairs which ascend with you into the Tribunal. I shall patiently await your descent: and not engage myself in the throng of Suppliants, or expose my weakeness to those popular tides and tempests which I so much dread. A man accustomed to serenity who is troubled at the least view of any commotion, will solicit you, if you please somewhat more conveniently. I will choose some propitious and favourable hour: and could I upon some day of rest slip into your gardens under the robes of Monsieur the Bishop of Utica, I do not think you would be strong enough, though you have all the fortitude of Cato and Photion, to resist what I would procure him to tell you in favour of our cause. This worthy Prelate was formerly my sword and buckler in the Kingdom of Scotus and Albertus Magnus: and if my name is yet remaining in the nature of things after so many conspiracies against it, and so many designs framed to surpress it, a great part of the obligation is due to him. From whence I conclude that he seldom speaks but he persuades: for if he have for my sake, tamed the most savage Doctors of Christendom, the Phalarisses and Dionysiusses of the Schools, it is probable he will not have much difficulty to recommend a person effectually to you who already is in some favour with you, and an intercessor from the Muses to their Apollo. When I call you by that name; I conceive I speak most appositely: you inherit it from Father to Son, and it is not a new title, that you have brought into your house. Oracles have ever been delivered from thence by two different Divinities, and I do not look upon it only as a Vein of Purple, but also as a Nursery of Laurels. Upon my conscience, Sir, and if I have any skill in Laurels, those which I saw by Monsieur Maynards' means are the most lively and verdant, and goodliest to wove into Chaplets, that have this long time been gathered on the Latin hills. But is it possible that Monsieur your Father, that is a Frenchman of this latter Century writ things so pure and Roman? Can it come to pass that a Poet of our Age should be so powerfully possessed with the Genius of Antiquity? Were I not assured that Virgil was not acquainted with Saint Sernin, and Saint Papoul, I should attribute that excellent Poem to him, in which there is no Hemistick but bears the Character of his style; and if he could possibly have lived till this time till some enchanted Castle of an unknown Island, I should believe he had been baptised in the year, one thousand six hundred and ten: and affirm that Virgil being lately converted to the Christian Religion, had made Hymns to the Images of Tholouse. But we must not ascribe that glory on a Spectre which is due to a blessed soul, and such as in the place where he now is may preside over all compositions and studies. We may take him for one of our Patroness both in prose & verse, and for one of the tutelar Saints of our Art: if he continue (as it is credible) to love those exercises in the other world, which were dear to him in this; He will Questionly take part with the Orators and Poets that are now all in confusion; he will side with the interests of our public society, that implores either your justice or favour. To this most powerful recommendation, and request made immediately from Heaven, shall I dare to annex my poor and frivolous labours? they are two discourses, not disapproved at Court, and which you will read perhaps with some delight though such as I entreat you to look upon only as written at the instance of a friend. He will present them to you from me with a comment of his own, and beside relate you the occurrences of the desert where he has been, since your curiosity doth not contemn what passes in it: and when you have seen in what manner you are celebrated there, and in what veneration I hold your virtue, he will not fail to give you his testimony of my zeal and respects, and assure you that I am, and will ever be perfectly all my life,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 7. 1643.   

LETTER XII. To Monsieur Huillier, Counsellor to the KING, etc.  
SIR,  
I Will take some other opportunity to commend your eloquence; but what you writ me of the fourteenth of March, is so affectionate and obliging that at this time I can only praise your goodness. You draw glory from an adventure which is much more glorious for me than you. The Lady that treated you as my favourite in the walks of Luxembourge has done me an honour in which you have so small a share, that it was humility in you not to have rejected her Compliment. I receive it of her, as a favour addressed directly unto me, and which so pleasingly tickles my vanity, that if I were at Paris, I would entreat you to carry me to her to thank her for it. I cannot be known to the world by a definition that delights me more than this, This is he that is so great a Lover and admirer of Monsieur l' Huillier. What a goodly property is this to distinguish me from an infinite number of writers of scurvy prose, and bad verse, as well as I! Do not mistrust the verity of my words; for were I of worth enough, to recommend men by the passion I have for them, or if I durst give attestations of their virtue as Justus Lipsius used to do; after I had treated you with many magnificent superlatives, I would inform all present and all to come, that you are one of my dearest and most violent inclinations; that I am the rival, but a very zealous one, of those blessed Chaplains, Menages, etc. who possess you in my absence. That last word enforces a sigh from me. Why should we grow old in a friendship altogether abstracted and separated from matter? Without any sensible society, & animated by word of mouth? without hope to see one another again until the resurrection? ever remote above ten day's journey? For less cause than this, the honestest among the Poets have made imprecations against Fate, and railed at destiny: But we must not add blasphemy to our bad fortune. I will comfort myself with your Letter, for the happiness I am deprived of in the loss of your conversation, and will wish you more such adventures as those in Luxembourge, that from time to time some fair tongue may advertise you that I am more than any person in the World,  
SIR, Your, etc. Apr. 3. 1644.   

LETTER XIII. To Monsieur de Gomberville.  
SIR,  
THe Holy Scripture calls Death the Kingdom of Silence, and the Land of Oblivion. Let us evidence that we are not yet of that Region. Let us make use of our faculty of speaking, and the convenience of a post, at least, once in ten years. Let there appear some sign of Life in our friendship: either by a little motion of the heart, or by half a word of remembrance in an old Formula, to ease the pains of Rhetoric; or by that ancient and famous Si vales bene est, ego quidem valeo. The only advantage I have of you, is, that I have given you the onset, for I am sure you wish me well: and God forbidden I should ever reckon your good will, or indeed any thing of yours in the number of things corruptible. Length of time hath no rust that can waste the affection of Philosophers: those people go straight to eternity and perfection; and particularly you, Sir, who continually dive into the chiefest and profoundest Ideas; and purge things from all the impurities and defects that attend them. Since you can make finer worlds, and better than that we behold, without doubt you have in yourself the principle of that perfection, which you communicate to your matter. There is no probability, that the father of Demigods is subject to humane infirmities, or that you want generosity after you have bestowed so much on Polexander, Phelismond, and many more absolutely believe the truth of this Article, that I made no scruple to promise your favour to the Cavalier that delivers you this Letter, upon the assurance I have, that it is a gage which he will find where I left it, and which you have kept securely for me after so many years. Thus they lived in the golden Age, and I beseech you to believe, that with all the frankness and sincerity of that Age, I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Sep. 4. 1643.   

LETTER XIV. To Monsieur Arnould Abbot of Saint Nicholas.  
SIR,  
FAther Narni is not now at Paris, and you have continual respondence at Rome: I believe therefore, I may without presumption accept the book which you offer me with so much civility. Our friend has writ the express terms, and way you took to do it: which I find so generous and obliging, that though the present be very rich in itself, yet I do not esteem it more than them. I look upon them as a liberality more your own then the first. They make me remember with delight the first charms you used to win my heart: and amidst the lightning and thunder of the Apostolical Preacher, me thinks, I behold again the sweetness and serenity of your countenance. Yet this is but a faint representation of the things which I have lost: I am deprived of an infinity of happinesses by my remoteness from your presence: but withal I very well understand the wretchedness of my condition, and the greatness of my losses. Nothing is able to comfort me for them but the honour I have of your love, and the favour you will do me, if you please, to believe me with all my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. May. 13. 1639.   

LETTER XV. To the same.  
SIR,  
YOU are always either doing or procuring me good: you intercede for me, when you do not give; and my riches flow from your goodness, either as from their fountain or in their channel: I call those things riches which you sent me from Rome, because I now know no other. My soul being cured of ambition, and having never so much as been sick of avarice, neither the employments nor dignities of your world can tempt me in the desert: I am no way pregnable but by the spirit, and covetous only or goods purely spiritual. So that I judge I have received more grace from Monsieur the Cardinal Bentivoglio in the clause of a Letter, than he could have done me by a load of Bulls, though the ring of the Fisher had been the Seal of them. How dextrous is this Prince in winning men! how learned in the art of obliging! what delight there is in presenting him! It is a way to see him do miracles, to make him change the smallest and vilest things that are offered him, into great and precious. Upon reading the words he hath written to you concerning me, me thinks, Sir, I am no more myself. I believe I am one of Augustus' Court, and my verses are as vigorous as those of Virgil; I imagine I have been crowned in the Capitol, I know not how many Ages before Petrarch received that honour. In the ecstasy I am transported to, by so high a Generosity, and which hath made so low a descent, it is impossible to grow higher without running into extravagance. And that is done already, unless you please to style that Enthusiasm, which they who speak properly would call Frenzy. But supposing there be a reasonable fury, yet the motions of it not being in their right place, when in a Letter, I intent to reserve them for my Latin compositions, and a Hymn to the God which hath inspired me. In the mean time, be pleased to be my intercessor to him, and besides, my security in another place that the person to whom I confess I own much, may not doubt upon your word, but that I am very grateful. But you ever do more than I entreat you: Indeed, you love too nobly; your cares are too punctual, and your good offices too passionate. How shall I behave myself in this confusion, into which your generous friendship has cast me? I can only assure you, Sir, that of all those you love, there is none who reuerences your virtue at that height as I do, nor who is more perfectly than myself,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jul. 20. 1642.   

LETTER XVI. To Monsieur Sarran, Counsellor to the King in his Court of Parliament.  
SIR,  
I Conceive myself injured by your excess of modesty, and I look upon your humility as bad usage of me. Indeed you treat me too much after the fashion of the Country, in demanding the causes of our new acquaintance with so much reasoning and curiosity. Though I am a villager, I am not so scarce of intelligence, but I know some thing from time to time, and have a little commerce with the world. At least I can be instructed by common fame; she flies hither sometimes and brings us the names of the Gallant, Wise, and Learned which the world esteems. You are, Sir, one of those illustrious ones, whom I know, by report of the public voice, and by a testimony that never flatters. And although Monsieur de Morin were nothing to you, and you were not the great confident of the great Salmasius, yet you have parts essentially your own, for which you very well deserve to be regarded. Your virtue entirely pure, and separated from all adherences shall ever be a most worthy object of my passion and respects. You alone can furnish me with commendations then, for more than one Senator, and to make above one Elogium; and do you think it strange yet I should account highly of you? To be Priest to severe Themis, and yet not omit sacrificing to the Graces, who are less rigid; to receive equal benedictions from the Catholic people, and the Hugue not nation: not to be less Grecian or Roman then French, and to be able to deliver your opinion both among the Areopagites and the father's Conscript, with the same facility as in the Court of the Edict; Is all this, Sir, but a trifle in the barbarism of these latter ages? Are not these qualities that ought to oblige me to se●k your friendship, and to offer you a little present, to gain myself the possession of a very great happiness? It is not necessary to speak disadvantagiously to you of my present estate. I will not by undeceiving you, rob myself of the fruit I gather by your error. I will only tell you, as to that amity which I sought, that it was long ago in my wishes, and I shall be no unjust possessor of it, if it be sufficient to be as I am with all my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. Oct. 20. 1644.   

LETTER XVII. To Monsieur the Precedent Maynard, Counsellor to the King.  
SIR,  
Menelaus' was contented with the declaration of Greece in his favour; But our friend of Quercey, looks for more. He conceives all the Earth be concerned in the accusation which he charges on his wife; certainly, he is much mistaken, and is not throughly acquainted with mankind. Men jest at misfortunes of this nature, in the person of Socrates and Cato, I mean such men as otherwise love Socrates and Cato very perfectly. They are violences if they be not Tragedies, for they compel people to laugh, unless some capital crime be involved in the trick of youth, or there be poison mingled with the love. In such cases, indeed the business is beyond raillery. The delight of laughter is changed into detestation and abhorrence; and these two things, as Aristotle hath noted, afford no room for good language. Out of these cases the public doth not take the injuries of particulars to heart, one half of the world serves for pastime to the other; what Titius calls violating the sanctity of the Laws, and defiling the purity of Marriage, Seia calls it sport and recreation. Yea she is so confident of the merit of her action that she says it was but justice to prefer an honest fellow before a Sot. When women delude their husbands upon the stage, is there any spectator so severe but applauds it, and g●ves his approbation to that which passes? all the people favour the Malefactresse: there is no body but would save her from the danger she hath fallen into. Yea, even the Father's Conscript, and Roman Matrons are not of his side that suffers the injury. I can lead you to honest Quintilian, where you shall find in the Chapter De Risu one of these sage Romans, seated on the Tribunal. Ask him what he thinks of a man that is surprised with his neighbour's wife: he will give you no other answer but this, that the injured person was deficient in point of diligence and labour. You may see by this, that our frined of Quercy's complaints are such as do not move pity, they are evils no more bemoaned than the Megrime or toothache. Let him therefore conceal that which he can discover only to a jeering and unpitying world; and how just soever his cause be, yet restrain him from getting such a victory, of which the Garland would dishonour him. I wish him the patience of Marcus Aurelius, since he hath not the good fortune of Brutus. You are acquainted with Portia and Faustina, and know, Philosophy is a remedy, that cures all kind of sick persons. I recommend to your care the dispatch to Tholose, the Letter to Monsieur the Count of Clermont, the copy of the Poem which Monsieur de—. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Sep. 10. 1630.   

LETTER XVIII. To the same.  
SIR,  
I Have watched these five and twenty years; or to speak more Historically, have slept ill these five and twenty years. I have sought all remedies imaginable, but have been diligent to no effect. Since Physic hath failed me, I am fallen into superstition. I pray to him whom our Predecessors admitted into the List of Deities, and who yet hath Altars in the works of some of our modern Poets. I address to him in the language of Tibullus, 
Huc ades, o bone Somne, veni dulcissime Semne,  
Et mea furtiuâ lumina claude manu.  
Somne veni, en volucres tibi dulcia carmina dicunt,  
Invitat placito te vaga lympha sono;  
Te violae, te lilia pulchra, tuumque papaver,  
Teque vocant plenis Rhetica vina cadis;  
Nec tamen ipse venis: quidnam mitissime rerum,  
Tam surdum precibus te facit esse meis?  
Non Divos violavi ullos scelerisve nefandi  
Conscia perpetuus mens mihi tortor adest.  
Ille ego sum Phoebi, si nescis, Somne, sacerdos;  
Nutriit in tenero me pia Musa sinu;  
Et Citharam dedit; Et dulces tibi condere versus  
Jam meditor properè jam modo, Somne, veni.  
Ni properas lethi sopor ingruit, et mea saevus  
Lumina perpetuâ claudere nocte parat.  
Ergo, age, Somne, gradum celera, ne fama vagetur  
Immeritum culpâ me periisse tuâ,  
Nam si nulla meae tangit te cura salutis,  
At parcas famae, si sapis, ipse tuae.  
And after that, in the language of Petrarch,  
O Sonno, o de la quieta; humida, ombrosa,  
Notte placido figlio, o de mortali  
Egri conforto oblio dolce de mali  
Si gravi, on d'è la vita aspra è noiosa,  
Succori all core homar, che langue, e posa  
Non lave, e quest membra stanche e frali  
Solleva: à me t' invola, o Sonno, è l'ali  
Tue brune soura me distendi e posa  
Ou e'l silentio, che'l di fugge, e ' l lume?  
E lievi sogni, che con non secure  
Vestigia di seguirti han per costume?  
Lasso, i noan ti chiamo, e quest obscure  
E gelide ombre inean lusingo: o piume  
D' asprezza colme, o notti acerbe e dure,   
In English thus, 
Sweet Sleep, thou pleasing Son of quiet night,  
The sick man's ease, the joyless man's delight,  
Afford my wearied heart thy timely aid,  
And supple limbs thy want hath useless made:  
Come with thy powerful Rod, come touch my head,  
And thy soft wings o'er all my body spread.  
Where is sweet silence fled that shuns the day,  
And gentle dreams which thy commands obey?  
O cruel nights! Deaf sleep, in vain, in vain  
I sing, and flatter thee to charm my pain!   
You see by the conclusion of this Sonnet, that I invoke, but am not heard: that he who hath been called the gentlest of all the gods, is ever cruel to me, and that he perpetually rejects my prayers and my devotion. He will not be persuaded by my words, nor yet by better than mine: He derides both the Latin and Tuscan I had borrowed from two such rich persons, to endeavour to mollify him. At all adventures let us make one prayer more to him. Let us try whether Malherbe's language will succeed better with us then that of Tibulius and Petrarch. But I must pray, Sir, in your name, for mine is too odious to him. Oblige the god Somnus, either by an Ode, or a paite of Sonnets, or three Epigrams to relent of his cruelty, and deal more favourably than he is wont with your poor friend. Get him to allow some good hours in the night, for it would be too much to demand whole nights. Let him pour upon my eyelids at evenings, one little drop of that precious liquor, in which he plunges my Laquay overhead and ears. If he will do nothing, and continue peremptory in his rigour, than you have liberty to alter your style; and to pass from invocation to blaspheming him. You shall threaten him to degrade him of his Divinity, to beat down his images, and set fire on his temples; to take away the Wife Homer gave him, and to grub up the Wood which Statius planted for him; to deprive him of all the pretty names, all the Epithet-Titles, and in general of all the honours he hath received from the Poetical Nation, since the reign of Orpheus, to that of Monsieur de Grasse. I beg this comfort of you, that I may be revenged, if I cannot otherwise be satisfied: I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Dec. 81. 1645.   

LETTER XIX. To the Chloris of Monsieur Maynard.  
Madam,  
We are indebted to you for the rarest things in the world. Monsieur Maynard sings them, but it is by means of your inspiration: and it must be acknowledged that you have either infused new spirits into him, or awakened a faculty that lay dormant in him. Since he is your Knight, he is become our Master, and his strength has increased by half, in the last Stanza's that he writ. He is raised above the view of France, in the sublimity and lostiness of his strain: He leaves Italy behind him, I mean the witty and eloquent Italy, even in the judgement of the eloquent Cardinal Bentivoglio: and it would be the greatest infelicity, that ever happened, if he should not win you, with such a— as has vanquished a nation victorious over all the rest. Believe my counsel, Madam, I know assuredly that your reputation hath raised jealousy in the Closets, and divers Calistaes' and Clorindaes' are envious of the praises of Chloris. I lately saw a dispatch from Court which speaks of a Widow in this Country that gives out, she is Chloris, and swears the amorous stanzas belong to her. Give the world, Madam, the satisfaction of a truth which is so important to you, & silence the tongue of a presumptuous counterfeit. Secure your glory and praises with speed; and, in a word, take possession of the name of Cloris by a Solemn act which neither Cloris nor Menander can undo again, if they would. I wish each of you a long and perfect happiness on condition, that pleasant life be ever fertile of good Verses, and that the Prophet do not grow so drowsy in the arms of the Nymph, that he forget to prophesy. He must utter Oracles according to his custom, and chant his enjoyments as well as his hopes. But to this he must have your yes, so that I want only your consent to have your Epithalamium; & in the behalf of all France, I beg a Poem of you, that cannot be made without you, and profess myself,  
MADAM, Your, etc. Aug. 20. 1643.   

LETTER XX. To Monsieur Costar.  
SIR,  
It is not to do a favour to a virtue not common, to esteem it extraordinarily as I do. When I praise Madamoiselle de Dampierre, I am just, but not liberal. The Law of Nations would exact the like duty from me, to the person of a Spanish Lady in the heat of a proclaimed War. So that you must not take her upon my testimony: that is too much beneath her merit. But my suffrage must be added to the other commendations that are due to her, and confess that she is endowed with modesty and all the other qualities that beget pride in her sex. She made you a strange request, in desiring you to persuade me to forget that I had ever seen her Letters in the hands of a Lady that feasted me with them two hours together. Your way, Sir, to effect this must be by the help of Sorcery: you cannot make me forget two so happy hours, and so dear, to my remembrance with less than making me lose my memory. Have you learned either Magic, or Physic enough to reduce me to that condition? Have you as much as will send me a disease like that of the ancient Orator, who having known all things forgot them all to his own name? You see what is the demand of Madamoiselle de Dampierre. I am confident neither you nor I, are able to do any thing in it. I shall ever be the same I was, ever steadfast in my judgement and affections, ever an admirer of Madamoiselle de Dampierre, and the excellent things she writes, and ever passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Apr. 25. 1640.   

LETTER XXI. To Madam de Villesavin.  
Madam,  
When I tender you my duty, I have no other design then to tender it in intelligible language, and not to pass for a man of the other World before a person of this. Yet you are so good, you would persuade me that I writ you Letters, and that I am eloquent without any intention of mine to be so. You profess to admire, Madam, what I believe you could not endure, but out of grace and indulgence. If so favourable words were not accompanied with more obliging effects, I should conceive some suspicion they proceeded from the spirit of the Court, and that in that part of the Kingdom it was their manner of mockery. But the craftiest way of derision not being the style of truth, and consequently not yours, I beseech yo●, do not confound me any more by commendations that amaze me. I might be vain enough not to reject them in things I did ever pretend to; but what Colour can there be, to admit them in this, where they are no less beyond my ambition, than out of their proper place? No, Madam, my soul discovers herself to you in the simplicity of her first thoughts, and you may easily perceive she is not naturally a Rhetorician. They are my very thoughts that speak to you, and the Art of fine Lang●age has nothing to do with the passages of my heart. We do not study our passions. I have not learned to love either by Greek or Latin, from Aristotle or Cicero: and though I could not write with any kind of Ornament, yet I should not cease to protest with a great deal of truth, that I am,  
Madam, Your, etc. Jan. 4. 1641.   

LETTER XXII. To Madamoiselle de Scudery.  
Madam,  
COuld I have obtained one moment's dispensation from my indisposition, I had told you long since that I have neither humility enough to reject the praises you bestow on me, nor presumption to assent to them. To believe them with an Historical faith requires a very strong Imagination; and yet to be offended at so obliging a Fable would speak an ill nature. The mean herein which I intent to choose shall not be to your disadvantage. I will consider your excellent language as purely yours, and not with any reference to myself. Thus they shall still have their true effect, and I shall ever be convinced by them; that is, Madam, of the beauties and perfections of your soul; of the Eloquence that gives those praises, not that to which they are directed. Pardon my distrustful humour, I cannot believe you are of the same opinion with your Letter, nor that my Relation to Menander is of that strength you speak of. Possibly it may move you because you are compassionate of other men's misfortunes, and your goodness interesses you in all the adventures of innocence. In this respect, indeed, I may deserve your favour, and your worthy brother too might justly take me for one of those objects that need his assistance. He can defend with as much valour as assault, and his bucklers are no less impenetrable, than his other arms are piercing. The piece of his which you sent me, me thinks, retains that fatal solidity. The greatest enemies of shows and Wit-feasts, will not hereafter be able to violate them, under such a protection. Pleasure shall by his means acquire a good repute, and by h●s favour we shall be merry without scruple, in spite of the Sad and the Severe. I could say more to you, if you were desirous to examine me concerning your book, or take an account of my studies. But this is no place for Comment, or Preamble: and the noble assemblies which are not ungrateful will on all sides proclaim so loud the glory of their defender, that it is probable a voice so weak and remote as mine, would not be observed in the great shout of so many acclamations. It shall suffice me, therefore, to tell you without any dress of words, that I am not void of gratitude for so complete an obligation: and that it being impossible the present I received should be richer, Monsieur de Scudery has found out an expedient to make it more acceptable, by entrusting you to send it. With his permission, I thank you with all my heart, and will ever be, if you please to suffer me,  
Madam, Your, etc. Jul. 25. 1639.   

LETTER XXIII. To Monsieur de Villesavin.  
SIR,  
AS I am not importunate, so I will not be ungrateful. The study of wisdom which teaches to beg nothing, teaches how we ought to owe; and though it has taken away my desire of getting, it has not extinguished my acknowledgement for benefits when I receive them. You are one of those generous persons, who take pleasure in obliging: But how grateful soever I am in my heart, I might appear somewhat too reserved did I any longer conceal how I am engaged to you: I must at length, Madam, fall to an open publishing of your goodness and that of your memory. The first expected not my entreaties to recommend my interests, to Monsieur the Sur-intendant, and the other minded you amongst the great crowd of the world, that there was a certain Somebody in the desert, not unworthy your protection. This I know not who hath yet some motions of a rational life left, enough to distinguish his repose from laziness. He is by some chance or other illuminated still with a bright ray of light, and his retirement is not altogether his burial.— Vouchsafe me the honour to believe it, and that I am ever passionately,  
Madam, Your, etc. Dec. 12. 1639.   

LETTER XXIIII. To the same.  
Madam,  
I Do not strain for fine words to compile you a handsome Letter. hypocrisy hath so adulterated all that kind of Merchandise, that I am conscientious of charging myself with it, and had rather proclaim my good fortune aloud, then seem to doubt of it by servile compliments. Instead of thanking you after a pitiful fashion, or beseeching you timorously, I tell you, Madam, you cannot be indifferently generous; you are resolved to take care of a contemplative person that has none of himself: and you intercede for a bashful man, that cannot beg; you can persuade paymasters to expedition and change their lying To Morrow's into true To days. I have said much of you, Madam, in a few words: but what can I say of myself, but this? that instead of all the virtues of the time present which I could not compass, it shall suffice me with you that I have one of the time past which I brought into the world at my birth, and to be, as I am, with all fidelity,  
Madam, Your, etc. Feb. 4. 1639.   

LETTER XXV. To the Reverend father Pitard, Provincial of the Jesuits in Guyenne.  
Reverend father,  
YOu have done me a great civility in granting the request that was addressed to you in my name. But because one favour draws on another, I am willing to believe you will add this second I now beg, to the first which I have already received, having left the Reverend father du Creux at Angoulesme; for my sake be pleased to suffer me to enjoy the advantages of his neighbourhood and permit him at convenient times to make a little journey hither. It will be an action becoming your charity to take some care of so barren and dry a solitude as mine, and to send your Angels into the desert to comfort such as are weary of themselves there. I beseech this favour once more of you, out of my mere necessity of rational commerce, or to say better, of Philosophical conversation, lest perhaps the first word give offence to the Coridon's of my Parish. Such Equivocal words have heretofore pulled great quarrels on my head, but I think one may speak securely to you, especially in matters so innocent as these. I am resolved never to meddle any more with such as are dangerous. Do not fear I will discourse to you of the Intrigues of Prince's Court, or the war betwixt the Barberini, against the Farnesis. I will only tell you news from Parnassus, (for my diurnal takes notice of none elsewhere) that the Tragedy of Mauritius has merited the esteem and applause of all the learned in this province. There is not one of them but says, it is pity so handsome a Composition should die within the walls of your College; The Author is persecuted by an infinite number of people to extort Copies from him, and, as ill luck would have it, you have allowed him no Secretary to transcribe his Originals: so that the Publication of it, is begged of you by the general voice; and herein I am but the delegate of the learned nation to your Reverence, etc. I am,  
Reverend father. Your, etc. Octo. 20. 1642.   

LETTER XXVI. To Monsieur de Barreaux.  
SIR,  
HEre is no discourse since your departure but of you. My father, whom you elevated into Patriarch Laban, and whom you so elegantly thanked for the present he bestowed on the world in begetting me, is in continual admiration of your Eloquence. He protests, those hours he passed with you, are the best part of that age he is now drawing to a period of. Your adopted mother values her fruitfulness at a lower rate than her fortune, and does so often mention her son at Court, that she gins to raise jealousy in him of the Country; for the widow, that holds up so stoutly against Time, and whom you thought not over-wrinckled, she does with much contentation remember the pleasant rapture you delivered your service in. It is true, she did not accept it, but yet she dares not deny, that in the very minute she gave you audience, there came into her mind a thought much less severe than she usually harbours, and what ever she says, Si non pertasum thalami, tedaeque fuisset, etc.  
I know, these kind of widows do not relish very pleasantly with your palate, and you are no great approover of fidelity to the dead. But yet what say you of your virtuous Cousin, according to whose example my sister conforms herself, and of whom I speak in the Characters of Renowned Ladies?  
Et cineres lachrymis rigat, atque accendit amore,  
Et tota in mortem fertur, nec jam ampliùs ullum  
Esse diem, vitaeque putat caelestia dona.  
Viva tamen superest, ut sanctam diligat umbram  
Jgne pio, nudúmque colat post funera nomen,  
Aut conjux aterna viro, aut aeterna sacerdos.  
I say nothing of the Evening Walk, the remembrance of which you are obliged by oath to consecrate in your verses: Nor do I mention Diana, nor her Companions; nor the Satyrs that stole them away, nor the green mountain, nor the Baths of the Gods, nor the Miroir of the Stars, nor the other pieces of our walk. You are to write me intelligence from your Muses, and acquit yourself of your Word: yet to make you remember it the better, I am in the mind to send you some verses, that entreat the performance of it from you. They were made in the same place of the Meadow, where you promised yours at the setting Sun, and the god of CHARANTE. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Oct. 12. 1641.   

LETTER XXVII. To the Reverend Father d'Estrades, a Divine of the Society of Jesus, and Superior of the Confessors Cloister in Bourdeaux.  
Reverend Father,  
Were I happy enough to be near you, our friendship would be one of the goodliest things in the World. You would render me worthy of it by making me better than I am. I should reap all the advantages, and you would bear all the charge; for a little docilenesse and good disposition which I might possibly contribute to it, you would lay in common a perfect virtue, which is now your own propriety: For this is it I mean when I call you my perfect friend. And speaking of friend, pardon the repetition of what I have formerly expressed, I do not mean a Companion for Commerce or good-fellowship, nor a perpetual admirer, nor one that punctually pays visits the next morning after he has received them, nor yet one that can write three answers to a single Letter. I mean a witness to the conscience, a Physician of secret griefs, a governor in prosperity, a comforter in declining fortunes. You are all these and something more: but the misery is, Reverend Father, you being at so great a distance from me deprives me both of the more and the less: it debars me the practice of all the good you have done me. I may perhaps think, when I set forth from hence, to meet you perhaps at Rochel, when some holy necessity has removed you a hundred leagues from thence. If I travel those hundred leagues to see you, you, it may be, will give me the slip the same day I arrive there; and Monsieur the Archbishop of Bourdeaux may come to take you from thence with his Navy: And yet more, you will go to sanctify the War in AFRICA or ASIA, if either the Churches good or the KING'S service require it of you. So that this courageous piety and magnanimous zeal, which you profess, oppose all my good designs and are the cause that I have no probability to hope for you, but by the Treaty of—, that is, the restitution of all, that War has usurped from us. My impatience is to no purpose, we cannot enjoy you sooner: for you, and peace are two gifts of God, which he will send us together. But when you are sent, I beseech you, let us be they that shall receive you, and not the Gascons, nor the Rochellers. After so many journeys, and expeditions it is fit the Crown be the centre of your rest, and that its extent circumscribe the Plus Vltra of your ambition. You cannot choose out a retire of a more lucky Omen, that will afford you greater serenity and glorious days, or less interrupted silence to your devout meditations. When this comes to pass, you may easily believe, so glorious a neighbourhood will give me much occasion of pride, and that I will endeavour my utmost to improve a friendship so beneficial as yours. The fresh assurances you are pleased to give me of it by words that speak the zeal of ancient Christianity, are new chains that bind me yet closer to you, and force me, Reverend Father, but with the delight of those that receive liberty, to be, if possible, yet more than I was,  
Octo. 8. 1639. Your, &c,   

LETTER XXVIII. To Monsieur de Voiture, Counsellor to the KING, etc.  
SIR,  
I Am not minded to write you a Letter? I am too religious an observer of our old wont, and fear to put your civility to too much trouble; For that, per adventure, might oblige you to another. This scroll requires no more of you but your mark without writing or an impression of your Seal, 
 nescio quae agrestis Musa tutò adeat nostrum illum  
Illustrissimum,  
Qui Regum solet adversos componere motus.  
Qui Gallum, atque Aquilam conciliare potest,  
Et Marti dare vincla, & terris pellere diras,  
Et Sanctum optatae condere Pacis opus.   
If you are nor very confident I love you, honour you, and esteem you infinitely, you are very ill informed of what passes in my heart, and your familiar spirit does not give you a faithful account of the things that are done a hundred leagues from you.  
Esto mihi tu Sol testis; tu, Dia Carenta;  
Vos Nymphae, Num me Veneres laudare pudicas  
Victuri, urbanosque sales, artemque placendi,  
Audistis, solidumque altis in rebus acumen,  
Et bona vera animi, cum, me dicente, vel ips●  
Costardus siluit, facundior ille nepote  
Atlantis licet, et Victuri maxima cura  
Costardus, etc.   

LETTER XXIX. To Monsieur de Lyonne, Counsellor to the KING, and Scretary to my Lord the Cardinal Mazarin.  
SIR,  
I Am affected by you, without having the honour of being known to be so. I had no designs of requesting any favour from you, and you have taken pleasure to oblige me. I but now understand how much I am bound to you, and you forbidden me to testify my acknowledgements. This is not, Sir, the manner of common goodness, and I confess the rarity of it, has surprised me. I Questioned at first whether this action were done at Paris or in the fortunate Islands; the corruption, of the year one thousand six hundred forty four, or the purity of the Golden Age. However it be, I must not permit you so much advantage over me. The prohibition you make me is noble and honest, but my obedience to it will not be so. It seems you would be so highly generous as to make me appear ungrateful, or as if you had a design to purchase glory with the loss of my reputation. This is indeed, too much, and your generosity must be measured by charity and moderation. Accustom yourself to magnanimous actions as much as you please; profess a sublime and difficult virtue; but leave me at least the easiest and ordinary duties; the last and meanest member of that society wherein you have thought me fit to be enroled; I mean, Sir, that of receiving and oweing thankfully, that which binds the poor as well as the rich, and whereof I conceive myself able to discharge myself, since the heart is sufficient to do it. I have one yet good enough to be capable of such a rational resentment: and if I cannot by my merits warrant the testimony you have given of me to his Eminence; yet I hope by my passion and respects, to maintain the happiness I enjoy in your favour, resolving to be perfectly as long as I live,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 7. 1644.   

LETTER XXX. To Monsieur Colletet.  
SIR,  
I Will neither violate my oath by writing Letters, nor injure our friendship by returning you no answer. Therefore, if you please receive this in the Quality of a Ticket, and so I shall acquit myself of what I own you, without prejudice to an other obligation. What can I say to that excellent present which you have sent me? Your Muses have always some new favours for me, and your Poems are the daily recreations of my mind. But you overvalew the testimony I have given of them, which expresses my intention as imperfectly, as it does their merit. Believe it, were I the Apollo of the Poets, and were to distribute their Chaplets, you should not receive one of the faintest verdure, or made with the least care. For the Collection you speak of, notwithstanding all the pains I took, I cannot easily give you satisfaction in it. Since our Scevolaes' died, our Abel's have been almost ever sick: and if there can be any other who can purge the Municipal Orators and Poets of their old and scurvy signification (as I know one that can) who is so grave and serious, that he would hardly be brought to let his mind stoop so low as matters of joy; your Collection may then me made without us, or to use the phrase of your Letter, your body may rove up and down the Country freely, there is none to oppose you. But I beseech you, do not complain of the smallness of it; the biggest are usually the worst and we have lately seen that a whole Army of Banditti were not worth one Company of a Low-Country Regiment. I proceed further; I shall fall unawares into the inconvenience which I counsel you to avoid; at least, this Billet would be a Giant amongst others of that name, and might hazard to be reckoned in the number of Letters. That must be carefully declined, and therefore to take away all likeness and resemblance, I shall choose not to end with Sir, and your most humble servant, though there are not many gentlemen whom I esteem more than you, nor any person more your servant than myself,  
Jul. 20. 1639.   

LETTER XXXI. To Monsieur Conrart, Counsellor, and Secretary to the King.  
SIR,  
THe loveliest solitudes are those about Paris, and you have the happiness to be a Courtier in the morning and a Hermit after dinner. This is the way not to be tired with either kind of life, and prevent nauseating by change: for my part, I am here confined to one of the futhermost corners of the earth, eight long days journeys distant from your polite world, and so consequently reduced to gather a simple satisfaction with myself, which I can almost never do; or if at any time it is only by conversation with the dead, who yet do but repeat me over the same things. The condition of Madam Desloges is little better than mine, and unless it be in her own Closet or her family, she sees nothing that can please her. But she is more to be commiserated now then any of the years past. Besides the melancholiness of Limosin she apprehends all the dangers of Breda, and according to her account it is on her alone the Spaniards make all their sallies, and shoot into the trenches of the Hollanders. I lately left her in a fit of these fits of discontent that made her tremble at the opening of every Letter she received, for fear she should find a son or a nephew dead in it. Yet in this deplorable estate, she remembered you with comfort, and you were the subject of one of our longest conferences. You were read over and over a dozen times. I shown her the description of your retreat; and she requited me with the sight of other fine things of your making; and this was our result for you, that there is good sense in Paris as well as at Athens and Rome, and that it is possible to invent happily and express those fancies with success, without the help of Greek or Latin. If I use both of them more than ordinary, I do not think this foreign abundance any great credit to me; but rather a reproach of my own sterility. It is, in effect, because I am forced to borrow from others, having exhausted what was my own; and wanting strength, I have need to lean on something to support me. However it be, it is no small matter to please you, whether as an Original or a Copy; and since you assure me that my writings are your most pleasing divertisements, I fully resolve to be a Scribe still, though there were no other Reader in the world but yourself. So that I intent to fall to work again this winter, and keep & maintain the authentic Privilege you have obtained for me, who am always most perfectly,  
SIR, Your, etc. Sep. 18. 1637.   

LETTER XXXII. To Monsieur de Souchote.  
SIR,  
THough I had lost the use of my hands, and had not wherewithal to maintain a Scribe; and though I had made a second oath, with intention to observe it better than the first, yet I should not cease to love those persons to whom I did not write. Your goodness has made you one of that number, and to justify this you may please but to consult your own memory. Do you remember the day when I made over my affection to you by a solemn act? it was in the presence of the God of the Seine, and the Sun of the meadows aux Cleres was witness to it: you assured me you were contented with that form of gift, and that you would not desire I should send you any new titles to it by the Carrier or the Post. This is the reason of my long and obstinate silence, you may term it laziness as long as you please, but you will injure me if you give it any worse name; you would derogate from my friendship, if you imagine that it is enclosed in my Letters, and you mistake one thing for another, if you lay inconstancy to the charge of a man that is steadfast even to obstinacy. I love and esteem you, do not question it; and had I as much good fortune as good wishes you should see I am as zealous in essentials, as I am cold in ceremonies. For the two Lists you speak of, your absent friend is author of both one and the other, and consequently, the complaint you make to him upon occasion of them is more gallant than reasonable. I had no hand in the distribution of the Copies; and I believe Monsieur de Campaignole, who was the chief manager of that little affair, did not think of all my friends. But, I beseech you, what matters it, that an Almanac out of date, and some scribbled sheets of paper were not presented to you? The author himself in body and soul, his whole Library, all his Learning, Eloquence and Hyperboles are yours, that is, I am absolutely,  
SIR, Your, etc. Nou. 15. 1644.   

LETTER XXXIII. To Monsieur de Bois-Robert Abbot of Chastillon.  
SIR,  
YOu are very well informed of what happened here as my Lady Duchess of— traveled through this province. What ever judgement may be given of it in the place where you are, and whatsoever interpretation they may lay on a casual action, I can assure you on my knowledge, that in all that business there was nothing less than interest of State. It is a pure Hypothesis of that Chapter of Aristotle's Rhetorics where the generosity of the young people is opposed to the circumspection of the old, and honour to reason. Cavaliers will ever be obsequious to the beauteous sex, and not deliberate of safety or danger when the question is of serving them. They talk so frequently of the Empire and Sovereignty of Ladies, and have their heads so full of Romanzaes' and strange adventures that they believe they can achieve whatsoever was done in the reign of Amadis: they think they are obliged to follow the mode of Gallantry though contrary to all the reasons of policy, and that they may at least tell a suppliant Princess.  
Etenim ipsi Dii negare cui nil potuerunt  
Hominem me denegare quis posset pati?  
You will do me a pleasure to send me word of the consequences of this business, and believe me ever, I beseech you,  
SIR, Your, etc. Sep. 15. 1640.   

LETTER XXXIIII. To the same.  
SIR,  
I Know very well, you are cured of that sickness which you have walked through so many provinces, and which has bred me so many disquiets. But my friendship is not satisfied with that; I would understand that you are confirmed in health, and that you have recovered your pristine strength. For this purpose I have entreated Monsieur de— to survey you curiously when he delivers you this Letter, and send me word whether your eyes are clear, or your face well complexioned; But especially, I have desired him not to require any answer from you, for I would not my curiosity should prejudice you nor have you discerned any secret interest in my passion: reserve all your fine words for discourse at the fine Court, that takes delight to give you audience Quaeque te imprimis habet inter instrumenta honestae et eruditae voluptatis. But now concerning Learning, my sister just now sends me word that you have a Kinswoman writes books, and that she has received one of her making. According to this rate, every one of your race is learned as well the females as the males: So that I must no more value you severally: Nor yet arrest my esteem upon your dear brother that heroic Madcappe, that Citizen of I know not how many Kingdoms and Commonwealths, that Quartermaster General to Alexander, Caesar, and the rest of the Conquerors, as honest Monsieur de Malherbe used to call him; 
Et merito; namque ipse Deus qui ferre per auras  
Jussa Jovis suevit, minus orbem novit utrumque,  
Nec Sol plura videt Nerei spacia alta, suisque  
Terrarum quicquid Nereus complectitur ulnis,  
Ille tuus capit et frater, Populòsque, Ducèsque,  
Totamque augusto rerum sub pectore molem,  
Invidiâ vel teste, atque aequo gestat Ibero.   
These last words are a granted truth: for a Spaniard speaking to me concerning him, told me he was so well acquainted in Persia that he could tell the sign of every Inn in it, and that he knew every bush in the Country of the great Mogul. I have repeated them often since, and am never weary of speaking of you, and of what—. But I was induced to be pleasant a little, in the description of that Illustrious Debauched that you might partake of my mirth. You see I represent him in the style of Marus Varro who mingled prose and verse, and Greek and Latin together in this manner. He was one of the joviallest fellows of his time, however our friend— accuse him for the greatest Pedant that ever lived. But our friend is too delicate that he cannot endure the miscellany of Idioms; no not in the Kyrie & Christ eleeson: though otherwise he be a very good Catholic. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Nou. 1. 1640.   

LETTER XXXV. To Monsieur the Abbot of Beau-regard.  
SIR,  
I Am glad you are so happily deceived, and that the defluxion into your eyes hath not done you so much mischief as it threatened. You were afraid of an eternal night, and it has been but an Eclipse of four and twenty hours; You had bid adieu for ever to that light which was next day to return to you though Homer heretofore was blind, and Cupid be so still, yet it is not necessary you should resemble them in this, for without loss of your goodly Eyes you can make goodly verses, and strike love into either sex. I am one of those, I protest, whom you have wounded deepest, and you set me in a fire from the very first minute of our conversation. The World is full of false Friends. Towns, and Commonwealths are made up of these honest kind of Cheaters, and into what place soever your Geography can lead me, I am sure I shall not find what you have brought me hither; I mean affection without interest, a fidelity without stain, with all the goodness and freedom of the Golden Age. And, to represent me a more lively picture of that happy Age, instead of Rivers of milk and honey whereof your Ancestors talked, you have taken a course to send me mountains of Sugar, and Sweetmeats, and to feed me with Viands which I value little less than Ambrosia. Indeed I am something fearful of the carriage of them, by reason of their delicacy, and the rough hands of the Carrier's servant who never heard any one speak of the Golden Age, nor its delicacies. But were they all spoilt by the way, I am already extremely obliged to you for your liberal intention. To remember me before you came to Orleans, and in a place where you had so agreeable occasions of distraction, was to have placed me in your soul among the choicest objects of your thoughts, and given me timely notice that I am unworthy and ungrateful, if I am not all my life,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jun. 10. 1642.   

LETTER XXXVI. To Madam de la Chetardue.  
Madam, my dear Cousin,  
I Will not eat your favours without a testimony of my gratitude. You have feasted me these four days, and either there are no pleasures in taste, or I find them in your Cheeses, They are not only Cream, well-Housewifed, but a quintessence hitherto unknown: they are some I know not what miraculous things that with a tartness which bites the tongue, afford a sweetness that fills the mouth. It must needs be that God loves you who has bestowed such a Land on you as flows with Milk and Honey. He did not heretofore treat the Jews his favourites better, and these were the Riches of the Golden Age. But in places where such Riches are to be had, good Cheer should be confined to them, without seeking after any other kind of abundance. You ought long since to have put down hunting, and purified your Kitchen; For what a shame is it to live with Murder and Cruelty, amidst such innocent sustenance? I cannot set too high a rate on them, nor too much thank you for your Presents and what ever you please to say, I cannot think they were the labour of any of your Country Mopses. Such counterfeit hands know not how to labour in things of that delicacy. Questionless the Nymphs of Vienna had a hand in them, and it is an invention of theirs: which you have sent me for a rarity. If this conceit seem Poetical to you, so is the subject of it too: It might make a piece of a very good Eclogue, or be drawn into a corner of a Pastoral. But I have never learned to rhyme. It is fit for me to quit this language of Fables, to assure you in true and serious Prose, I honour your virtue so highly, that though you had given me nothing, I should have thought myself nevertheless indebted to you much: And were you not my benefactress, I should not be less, than I am,  
Dear Cousin, Your, etc. Sep. 14. 1639.   

LETTER XXXVII. To Monsieur Senné, a Divine of the Church of Saintes.  
SIR,  
I Had need only of two earthen basons, and I have received a whole Closet of rarities. I desired but enough to supply necessity and simplicity, and you have added Ornament and superfluity. This profusion is not to be allowed in a man that every day preaches against luxury: They are exorbitances which would deserve reformation in any Commonwealth more severe than ours. I speak this without any manner of aggravation, for you know I have utterly renounced Hyperbolyes. Neither the Buckler of ACHILLES described by HOMER, nor the other rich descriptions of the rest of the great Poets, neither the Thesis which the Father D'orleans formerly dedicated to Monsieur the Cardinal de la Vallette, not all that ever I saw of greatest variety and History in the world, is so much as what you have done me the favour to send me. And yet you are pleased to say notwithstanding, to extenuate the merit of your present, It is but clay. You who know Tertullian calls clay Sororem nobis materiam, and that Kings and Emperors are moulded out of it: It is not only in Vessels of the like stuff, as you writ to my Niece, that Antiquity offered incense to their gods; but the gods themselves were made of it, and you remember that verse which says, Fictilibus creuêre deis haec aurea Templa.  
I could, if I please, allege Prometheus in Lucian's Dialogues to you, and Agathocles in Ansonius' Epigrams. I have also two passages in Pliny on the same subject, and three in Pausanias: But let this text of scripture suffice, if you please, and I will only tell you that by your favour, Thesauros habemus in vasis fictilibus. Is it not true Sir, that I have altered my custom strangely, and am not I become a terrible Rapsodist? It is a disease our dear friend the great Doctor of the short robe has infected me with. He is the cause that for these six months I have not spoken in the vulgar tongue, and he hath beaten so this gibberish into my brain, that I do not think Petrus Valens is more of the University than I. The importance is, the ancient innocence is preserved there still, and the dissimulation of the Court has no admittance. Do not doubt therefore, I beseech you, but that I am in earnest when I have a better conceit of myself for your liberality, and when I profess myself,  
SIR, Your, etc. Aug. 10. 1638.   

LETTER XXXVIII. To Monsieur de Morin, Counsellor to the KING in the Court of the Edict of Guyenne.  
SIR,  
AS I would not be accounted ungrateful, so neither would I proclaim my debauchery? What shall I do therefore in this strait? I dare not openly name the present that I have received from you, and let any one know, I have a Load of Muscadine in my house without hazarding the good reputation of my former life: I cannot commend your liberality, but I must at the same time accuse my own intemperance. Some expedient either of Rhetoric or Poetry, which you please, must be found out to free me of this intricacy. Without mentioning that scandalous name of Muscadin, I will say with your leave, it is a present fit for the Duke of Saxony; it is the Sovereign Remedy of sadness and ill thoughts; the true Nepenthe Homer sung of; an admirable wash for pale complexions, a device to make a man valiant in an instant, utter Oracles immediately, speak unknown languages even to Monsieur Salmasius: In a Word, Sir, I will say it is a load of Enthusiasm and inspiration which you did me the favour to send me. But on the otherside, what will our severe and peevish friend say, if he discover my excesses through these high and magnificent words? What opinion will your brave and learned ones have of me when they hear I draw up bottles in Battalia, and they are told my Library is stored with them? It will be to much purpose, to allege the honest Passerat for doing the same thing: his authority is not owned out of the College, nor indeed in it by the debauched Students. It is better for me, after my ancient wont, to have recourse to my old Rome, that never failed me at a pinch: and I confess I should be ruined in my honour were it not for the example of old Cato, whom I oppose against all our sober Moderns. You know how dry and stiff his virtue was, yet he sometimes moistened that drought, and soaked that stiffness. Nay, who knows whether that iron virtue were not pregnable by so gentle a force? I would not swear it, for peradventure had Caesar during his abode in Gallia Narbonensis thought of sending him as good Frontiniack as this which I have received, this surly honest man might have been sweetened by that excellent wicked one. But to change our subject; I have at length found out the three pieces I promised you on Ale; which were strayed among my papers. Do not you think this desertion of my subject pretty sport? I do, in earnest, intent to be the founder of a new Proverb: and if I may be believed it shall be said Ale for Frontiniacke, as well as Copper for Gold. The pieces you see are short, and consequently I have much more time to drink than you to read. Quem vero nostrum tuo judicio beatiorem credat Ilotta? Vtrumque, praestantissime Morine, nam et Philosophari, sed paucis, ut Neoptolemus apud Ennium, et multum bibere amat, ut olim Pater Eunius.  

Francisci Gujeti In Cerevisiam.  
Triticei latices, mensis Berealibus apta  
Munera, sed Cellis tetra venena meis,  
Quae vos sacra tulit tellus, quae numinis irae  
Aemula lethaeis pocula finxit aqvis?  
Qui vos odit, amat musas, Bacchumque Cyprinque;  
Et superos odit, si quis amare potest.  
Vos vitiata Ceres temeratis devovet undis,  
Nais, et adversis Cynthius horret equis.  
Cui sapitis, nihil ille sapit, dignusque suillo  
Jure sit, et socios glandis habere sues,  
Qui bibit, irato tentabit Apolline carmen,  
Arcadicosque dabit rusticus ore sonos.  
Hinc Batavi, fumis Cerealibus ebria turba,  
Carmina tot Musis inficianda vomunt;  
Et miseri placuêre sibi, gaudentque prosanas  
Frondibus aeternis implicuisse comas.  
At deus è Pindo crassae deliria gentis  
Ridet, et has poenas impietatis habet;  
Ducite damnatos, gens Barbara, ducite succos,  
Nectareus nobis proluet ora liquor.   

Hugonis Gratii pro Cerevisia.  
Humor dulcis aquae, sed igne coctae,  
Quam succo Ceres imbuit salubri,  
Qui corpus vegetas nec impotente  
Commotam furias vapore mentem,  
Quo potu fruitur Batava tellus,  
Neptuni domus horreumque mundi,  
Et quotquot populos mares ab alto  
Caeli culmine conspicatur Arctos,  
Ipsae te sitiunt novem Sorores,  
Nec Permesside proluuntur undâ,  
Ex quo Graecia Barbaro sub hoste est,  
Nec Bacchi cyathos amant puellae,  
Sed Rheni vahalisque temperatos  
Almis pastibus hauriunt liquores.  
Durae mentis, iners, merumque rus est,  
Si quem Basia non movent Secundi,  
Et quos Dousa canit parente major  
Coelo sidereos rotante cursus,  
Et quae spicula Baudio vibrante  
Non unum sibi destinant Lycamben,  
Et quos dat numeros nihil vetustis  
Cedens vatibus Heinsii Thalia.  
At me (senti●) larga cum sequatur  
Vini copia, frigidique fontes,  
Heu Mufae fugiunt, Venite quo●dam  
Dilecti latices: Nec esse crudum,  
Nec contrà decet, ebrium Poetam.   

Erycii Puteani De Cerevisia.  
Defaecata nunc, quam expectas, Cerevisia est, atque itinerispatiens. Faxo igitur instructam hac hebdomade cellam habeas. Bina vasa sunt: alterum ejecit florem, ut fieri solet; alterum sordes tantum, ut non solet. Hoc enim peculiari nos modo agimus, ut subsidente pinguiori materiâ, vires liquor diutius servet, & alatur velut à faece. Scire aves? Testam, poculi instar, sed aperto et collo et fundo (ejusmodi ferè vascula sunt, quibus urbani passerculi nidos suos & pullos credunt) Testam, inquam, gutture in os dolii immisso, tanquam infundibulum, statuimus, in quam se foeces bulliendo attollunt nec ejiciuntur. Cogitur enim è testa in dolium redire spuma, unde surrexerat, & posito velut fervore densatur ac mitescit, limi instar, humore supernatante. Testa demum aufertur, vas clauditur, & Cererem velut Bacchum stringit. Non enim Dea hic Deo cedit, aut in sexu vilior natura est. Isidoru● sic quidem Cerevisiam quasi Cereris vim olim definivit ipsumque adeo Germanorum potum Tacitus, hordei liquorem, in similitudinem vini corruptum. Sed an corruptum? Quod igni coquitur, corrumpi certè non potest. Deinde bibitur, sapit, nutrit; imo ut scias vim vini inesse, vincit virum ac deponit. Obiter haec indicare volui, ut non ingenium tantum utriusque Cerevisiae distingueres, quam mittemus, sed & usum. Aetatem illa melius feret, quae flori suo incumbit, & substrata fomenta habet: Altera ante senium magis allubescat. Fruere utrâque, nos ama, & vale.     

THE THIRD BOOK.  

LETTER I. To Monsieur Salmasius.  
SIR,  
MY admiration is not within your jurisdiction, give me leave to speak of an extraordinary merit in terms that are not common, and allow as much confidence to truth as to flattery. Having seen such a multitude of your excellent works, so many goodly and choice things, I must needs say there is nothing so vast, and boundless as your learning. I except neither the extent of the Ocean, nor the depth of the Abyss. I will maintain, that your soul is of another kind than ours, and you know more than can be comprehended by a humane capacity. They that think it sufficient to call you a Genius, do not express you in your full latitude: They omit some thing that is essential, and forget two words that should attend the first. You are indeed, a gentle and amiable Genius: one of that charitable order that love and help men; and have as much goodness as knowledge. You possess the virtues of urbanity in the same degree of perfection as you do the advantages of wit, whereof I have an eminent instance in my hands; and I perceive Sir, by the Letter so extremely modest, civil and obliging which you have favoured me with, that the French gentleness and courtesy has retired with you to the neighbourhood of the North, into the Country and among the Sons of Neptune. You are in all regards the grand enemy of Barbarism, and always the absolute favourite of those Goddesses, called Mansuetiores, even to the excluding the graces and Venus; yet I must confess your sweetness has a pungency in it, and your honey is not without a sting. The inclination that moves you to do good to all, is nevertheless fatal to some; you sometimes wage war; and if necessity require it, you do it to the extremity with all the forces of reason and all the Artillery of Authority. Woe be to counterfeit Learning, and Error puff up with presumption when they dare make head against you▪ As you protect the weak, so you chastise the Tyrants: and it must be acknowledged that unless you had come in to our assistance, there would in a short time have been no liberty in a State that has been hitherto esteemed Aristocratical and—. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jun. 15. 1643.   

LETTER II. To the same.  
SIR,  
ALI things will be at the best pass in the world, provided you be well, and that the defluxion your Letter tells me of, be not obstinate in tormenting you. It would be a strange irregularity, indeed a notorious injustice, if it mistake the Abstemious for the drinker, and that you with your water and diet-drink should suffer the punishment which one of my acquaintance has escaped with all his Sack and Frontiniacke. I beseech God render every one according to his works! at least that he do not deal with Temperance more severely then with Excess, and that your designs be no longer interrupted by the surprises of this vexatious disease, which sometimes opposes the resolutions of the Prince of Orange. May you give light and ornament to the world for many periods of the Sun's motion. Be not weary in doing good to mankind, and enriching our Age with the treasures of your wit, instructing them that are now alive, with them that are yet unborn. You will without question find equity and gratitude, both in this and future Ages. Rational Learned men, who invoke you in the difficult tracts of Antiquity, and in the Quicksands and Rocks of History, will not refuse you their oblations after they have propitiated you with their prayers. For my part, I own you more than all the rest, I shall promise you as religious an acknowledgement as any, but I dare not say any thing that favours of the profane medley which I have blamed. I will not speak any more of Infinite, Genius, divine, etc. (they are the words that fell from me in my last Letter, and your modesty disapproves.) It shall suffice me to tell you in the plain Language of men, that I am more than any person in the world,  
SIR, Your, etc. Apr. 25. 1644.   

LETTER III. To Monsieur John Frederick Gronovius.  
SIR,  
I Was transported with joy at the opening of your Letter, but upon observation of the date and that it was written from Paris, I was reduced to a more calm and serene gladness. This little Abridgement of your Odysseus composed in a place of security, restored my mind to its former tranquillity, and appeased my inquietude. For indeed I began to have doubtful apprehensions of you, I was at the same time afraid of Heaven, Earth, and Sea; that is, of sickness, imprisonment, and Shipwreck. But now the cloud is dispelled, and if I were one that committed the faults which I have reproved, or mingled two Religions together, I should pay my vows to Fortune; I should offer a victim to Mercury: and give thanks to the other Gods that preside over travelling abroad and returning, for the conservation of a Head that is so infinitely dear to me. But we must not withhold our acknowledgements from the author of the mercy. Let us be grateful to your good Angel, or rather to him that put you in his custody; and confess, that if you had been minded to pass through Hungary and make a voyage out of the Christian world, he would have tamed the Barbarians for your sake, 
Posuissentque effera Turcae Corda,  
Jubente Deo.   
But you have done better, not to hazard yourself upon such an occasion, and to be contented with the view of the frontitiers of a Country, wherein you would not have found many Libraries. I am of opinion, there are but very few Turks Rhetoricians or Philosophers: you would hardly have met with any solution of your doubts amongst a people that hold forth ignorance the fundamental Article of their Religion. They take the most vulgar operations of the Mathematics, for Magic, and believe Printing, and Clocks, inventions of the Devil. So that I extremely approve your stay in Italy, and the desire you had to understand and observe the deportment of the most rational People of the world. But why do not you speak of Rome as well as Venice? Do you only esteem the Nephews of Antenor, and make no account of the sons of Aeneas? I should think father Strada might merit as much your curiosity, as father Fulgentio; and you ought not to have slighted the Legitimate heir, or rather the very soul of Tacitus, to run after the shadow and relics of father Paul. You make no mention of the Court of the Princes Barbarini, though it is most certain that all manner of virtue is welcome to that Court, though it come from Hamborough or beyond the Elbe. The Muses are lodged in that Palace, and he whom you Gallants call Jupiter Capitolinus may justly add to his titles of Most good and Most great, those of Most learned and Most generous. He speaks the Language of Oracles even when he does not speak ex Tripod, and makes himself familiar with men. And it is possible, had you written that Elegy ad Romam, which you have written ad Venetias, the good Pope that understand, the making of verses might have returned you an answer which is beyond the skill of the Duke—. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Oct. 1. 1640.   

LETTER FOUR To Monsieur Rigault Counsellor and Master of the Library to his Majesty.  
SIR,  
I Confess my sin but do not repent of it: I am the most vain of all men Living; but how is it possible to be humble with all the glory that you give me. After such rich tokens of your amity and esteem? commendations bestowed by you, are in effect, something more glorious than Statues erected by a public decree and carved by Phidias. When I consider with myself, it is the dear and last confident of the great Precedent de Thou, who is also my intimate and perfect friend, you can not believe what advantage I draw from the mere imagination of so illustrious a society. As often as I think that it is a Patriot of old Rome, and a Christian of the Primitive Church which whom I converse, I fancy myself immediately transported back into former ages, and am sometimes become companion to the Sulpitii or Scevolaes', and at other times to the Tertullias and Cyprians. That which you have sent me to confirm my opinion of one of those good fathers, is most worthy both of you and him. And should he return from the other world himself to give an account of his thoughts, he could not justify them better. But because they may seem somewhat harsh and strange, (at least to the nicety of women and ignorance of children) and appearing in French cast a general fright on all unlatined people, I could wish you had taken the pains to transfuse them out of the vulgar tongue into the learned, and add this new benefit to all the old favours which Tertullian has received from you. I could desire too, Sir, (but in the same manner as Brutus did) that you would give me the Christian which you once promised me. I mean that Christian of the Heroic times of Christianity, one of those gluttons of Fasts and Martyrdoms, as your African would have called them. I should be infinitely obliged to you, if you would please to dispatch this present to me, and if at the opening of a packet from Monsieur l'Huillier, I found but three leaves written with your hand, in the style and vigour of your Prefaces, with this inscription on the front, Rigaltii Christianus ad Balzacium. Permit that admirable Monsieur l'Huillier to importune you for it in my absence, and me to burden him with the solicitation of a business, that lies nearer my heart than you can imagine. Besides his own strength and power in persuasion, he shall be assisted, if it be necessary with the last part of my Apologies, to Menander, a volume of my Discourses, two volumes of Letters ad Atticum, and some other such Records (that is the only word of Barratry I am Master of) that shall all combine to demand the like debt from you. When you have paid it, we will talk more civilly. It shall then be a benefit or a favour, and I shall be glad to be yet more firmly than I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Nou. 27. 1644.   

LETTER V To Monsieur the Abbot of Guyet.  
SIR,  
YOu entreat me a great benefit to myself when you desire my company. I understand what advantage a man that has but good ears may gain by it, and I should have a soul too stubborn and flinty, if it would not be mollified by the remonstrances you use to me. Though I am one of the most rigid Anchorites that live in the Desert, I must confess, you have shaken the firmness of my vow, and the society of one of your merit is a violent temptation to incline me to Apostasy. A solitary life has indeed its charms and delights: But who can choose but grow lean, when he is brought to that pass as he has no aliment but his own juice? And how commendable soever the commerce with books be, yet every thing considered, is it not an unburying of the dead, and oftentimes a descending into their Sepulchers by deep and melancholy meditation? A man had almost as good work in the mines. He runs the same fortune, and hazard, and brings back no better a countenance, nor eyes less sunk in his head. They are living books that illuminate the mind, without prejudice to the sight, and you are Sir, one of those excellent and agreeable books. What delight then is in such volumes as can answer and reply! they save the labour of scrutiny and choice, by presenting things pure and simple: they have something of more power and life then reading can possibly be capable of. And though your three great favourites, Terence, Horace, and Virgil, be my ancient inclinations too, yet I confess I never accounted them such honest fellows as when I heard them speak out of your mouth. But what shall I say of the incomparable things I have heard from yourself? What Oracles have you delivered in my presence: or to speak more plainly, what admirable verses have I seen you make and recite? By your favour I once had them among my papers, and should have kept them still, if some curious hand had not pilladged my Cabinet. Be pleased to make me a second present of them, if you desire to have me believe my own not displeasing to you. Let Monsieur Menage prevail with you; and I shall know you esteem me in earnest if you send me your Gold for my Copper. After so many famous Wits, once in my life I ma●e use of the fable of Glaucus and Diomedes; but besides this, I do not offer you any thing fabulous. My protestations are not Poetical, and I profess a sincere truth, when I assure you, that I am passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Oct. 28. 1644.   

LETTER VI To Monsieur Heinsius the Son of the Sr. Heinsius.  
SIR,  
YOUR Excellent Verses are seducing Spirits that come to tempt Anchorites they had like to have destroyed the merit of many years' solitude in a moment, and I confess I had an inclination to review the world that produces such admirable things. But the temptation was not long; according to the usual manner, second thoughts were wiser than the first. The consideration of my honour retained me, and I bethought myself it would be dangerous to administer you an occasion of undeceiving yourself, and supposed it was not the best of my prudence to give you a nearer Prospect of that, which owes all its beauty to distance of place, and the passion of Monsieur Menage. It is more advantageous to me to preserve the good opinion you have of me by my absence then to do myself an ill office with you by my presence. There is no Question but you would still seek me after you had found me; and perceiving nothing in my person either worthy of my name, or your curiosity, you would call Fame to an account for her testimony of me, and Monsieur Menage for his love. Possibly I might in former times have had something in me that would not have displeased; But heretofore is not now. Age that never comes alone, does oppress me with so many diseases, that lesser ruins than I feel would serve to crush far greater Ornaments than I was ever capable to receive from some little Art, and weak Naturals. Time effects strange Metamorphoses. The Monsters of this world were the miracles of the past: and such a She as has been placed amongst Temples and Altars, and shown for miraculous, has now no other place but a Chimney corner, and hides herself to avoid frighting of people. That Famous Wrestler that fling all men in the Lists of Exercises is now the poor bedridden Paralytic whom all the World commiserates. I am not yet reduced to so deplorable an extremity: it threatens me, and I am drawing near it. I want strength and the quickness of my apprehension fails me: I have begun to die in my memory; and I lose my soul by little and little. Though the Siren of France (for so you are pleased to call me) is not altogether dumb, yet she is become for the most part hoarse, and Rheumatic and at her best has so scurvy a little pipe that she has not voice enough to lull asleep the drowsiest mariner in your Country. You, Sir, are in the flower of age and in the condition to charm not only Ulysses' companions, but himself: I mean, you can equally please the People, and the Wise; bestow pleasure on the ear, and give satisfaction to the mind. At four and twenty you have atcheived whatever an exquisite education can add to an happy birth: and that flourishing youth is attended by so great a number of other gifts from Heaven, that I unless I armed my heart with more than a triple plate of brass, I could not hinder so many Venuses and Graces from making impression upon it. Those which I found in the Hendecasyllables I received, would have tickled a soul that were the most enemy to Verse and Music in the world, and would have tamed the most savage beast in the desert. You do me the favour to believe me more humane and reasonable; and consequently you cannot doubt the esteem I have of a present which I cannot rate high enough. I will only say this little to you, and deliver you my opinion of them. They are so soft, so amorous, and charming, that I believe they would hinder me from feeling the stroke of the hardest, most virulent, and cruel iambics, that Monsieur your father could discharge against me, if I had provoked his indignation. Do not repent, I beseech you, that you have made me happy: prolong my good fortune by the continuation of your favour. Which I beseech of you from my heart, and will be, while I live passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 15. 1646.   

LETTER VII. To Madam the Countess of Brienne.  
Madam,  
YOu do injustice to your Academic, to submit his book to my censure. I adore the mysteries in it, though I cannot comprehend them, and have no mind to use the liberty which you have given me. I should render you but a slender account of a Science wherein I am but at the Accidence. I scarce understand visible objects, and the outside of nature: and for what is above it, I dare not attempt to climb up so high. My curiosity is not so presumptuous and I wholly refer myself to the Sorbonists concerning superior things; Expect not here, therefore, from me a precise judgement of what I cannot reach. I have not discovered the depth of the book: It is true, Madam, the outside and surface is very beautiful and is precious. I am ravished with the sound of the harmony which is made by matters I cannot comprehend: this way of writing would have amazed the Philosophers whom it had not convinced. And had Gregory of Nazianza, shown such a piece of work to his friend Themistius, questionless it had wrought upon him He would have admired the appearance and outside of Christianity though he could not have beheld the secret and interior part of it. They are not words printed and read on the paper, they are felt, & penetrate even to the very heart. They live and have motion; and I perceive something of the vigour of the Primitive Christians and the style of that Heroic age wherein the same virtue animated speeches and actions; conveyed itself into the Wit and Courage, and bred Doctors and Martyrs. Will you please Madam, to tell me the sincere truth? Has not he that appears in the front of these Chapters, been at the Oracle of our Lady's Cloister? Has he not been inspired by our excellent Abbot? In earnest, I conceived I had known his style. I observed traces and impressions of his wit in several passages and exclaimed with Virgil, These are his eyes, his hands, his Countenance.  
Your Doctor ought not to be offended at my suspicion: I do not injure him in saying he has the vein of an extraordinary person. So noble a resemblance is an infinite advantage to a mediocrity and there is nothing low in imitation of the highest Idea that can be aimed at. If my conjectures be well grounded, solicit that Grand Artist to sit close to his work, and follow it openly, and let the Oracle speak itself without an interpreter. Besides your high merit herein, Madam, from the Church, you will have more encouragements to maintain that understanding piety nobly, which the Oracle himselse told me was in you. You will have something more to lock up in that rich cabinet wherewith you dazzeled my eyes the other day; and whose workmanship I valued not at a less rate than the matter. I do not question you care in the choice of what you admit into it; for a Poet says that a prison of Gold and Emeralds should retain none but Gods, or Demigods, etc. I am,  
Madam, Your, etc. May. 5. 1645.   

LETTER VIII. To Monsieur Conrart, Counsellor and Secretary to the King.  
SIR,  
IT is true, I affect silence better than noise, but who ever told you I loved it above music? Who informed you, I preferred my lumpish, and stupid indolence before your lively and subtle pleasures? As many persons would do me a pleasure to leave me to my rest, so you oblige me in disturbing it. There is no slumber so sweet, but is infinitely recompensed by so welcome a voice as yours. Besides, what is written at Paris and related at Court, may very justly awaken the attention of a contemplative dreamer, although he meditated upon the banks of Seine. So that you need not question, but I shall readily forgo a calm much more serene than mine, and a River that glides much more gently than ours, to regard that uniform rapidity, and orderly torrent which rushed from the mouth of Ulysses. The style and work of your friend present me with a certain Resemblance of it, and I confess I have not often seen a thing so Impetuous, and yet withal so Regular. But Rules are best learned by Time, and Study gives Art to the least fortunate natures. There is that secret force in him which animates his words and comes immediately from Heaven, and that with grandeur and Majesty.  
This person has Received a very ample portion; and if these be Eulogies which he dispenses in this manner, they seem to be uttered in the same tone as if he were making Laws or pronouncing judgements. He adores indeed, but 'tis with Confidence and familiarity; whereof one is the companion of a good conscience, and the other proceeds from love. Such as are not of his opinion may term him idolater and inamorato, as long as they please, without moving his passion; but they cannot with justice accuse him either of hypocrisy or flattery. He speaks his belief; and delivers nothing slight and low, because all his conceptions are above mediocrity. Although I am become an implacable enemy to every thing that has the resemblance of a Paneygrick, yet I am pleased with this for that very reason. His mind being wholly possessed with his subject, is not so taken up in contrivance of a Harangue, and scanning over common places, as to make himself intelligible, and represent his Ideas. Every thing seems natural and his own; even the ornaments which he borrows; and there is no part in it but is free, yea servitude itself triumphs. That servitude, I say, which cannot but provoke envy, and seem glorious and noble in the eyes of all. How is it possible to hold out against such a violent manner of writing, which has a compulsive power disguised in the Art of persuading? And do not you seem to desire my approbation, in the same fashion, that one of young Caesar's Captains demanded the consulship for his Master? This, said he, laying his hand on his sword, This shall do it, if you will not. There is therefore no room for deliberation▪ I must needs grant you what you have already forced from me, and I cannot enhance the worth of my esteem by the difficulty of obtaining it, since it is no longer in my power to refuse. This is of the kind of those armed requests that are attended with a strong party of reasons and Rhetoric; and such a courageous eloquence as leaves neither indifferency to the will, nor liberty to the judgement. If I understand any thing, there would need no other to preach up the Crusade effectually, whereof it speaks; and I doubt not, but if the people could apprehend it, it would save the Princes a considerable part of the charges of the War. There is too much humility in him that owns it, to submit it to my censure; and it would be too great a presumption in your most humble servant to accept an office so full of envy. Besides the offence the Cou●t would take, which has already explauded it, I remember the Original cause of the miseries of Troy, and the example is too dangerous to admit a Country swain the second time to be judge of supreme beauty. It is enough for me to let you know, that I am one of those that easily receive her wounds, and that I sometimes pursue even her shadow and resemblance—. 'tis not the course of a strong affection to p●y into little defects, and examine the sli●ht imperfections of the thing it loves. If there be any in this I am not in a condition to observe them; and you may please to inform your Doctor Candido, that he hath made me an interessed disciple. I beseech your endeavours to continue me in his favour. And for this, Sir, which I am so neglectful of, & I find so faithfully preserved by you, yourself are the cause that I do not much fear its loss. You give continually, and yet never remember that there is any indebted to you. It is pleasure to you to bear all the burden and charges of friendship; and your affection is far more active, than my sloth is torpid and languishing, Yet I can not in conscience acquit myself of shame for it; and I must confess it a great miscarriage, that you should never be weary in conferring obligations and favours upon me, both in my own person, and the concernments of others and I so backward in the testification of my acknowledgements, that without somewhat of divination, and a great deal of Faith, you cannot be assured that I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Dec. 9 1640.   

LETTER IX. To Monsieur Corneille.  
SIR,  
I Found a strange alteration of ease and recovery upon the receit of your Packet, and I cannot contain from proclaiming the miracle in the beginning of my Letter. Your Cinna restores health to the sick: He causes the Paralytic to clap his hands, and giveth speech to the Dumb, much more to a Rheumatic. I had indeed lost my speech with my voice, and being repossessed of both, by the virtue of what you sent me, it is just that I employ them to your glory, and publishing the sovereignty of the remedy. Yet you fear you are one of those, that are over charged with the Majesty of the subjects, whereof they treat, and you are not satisfied that you have brought strength enough for the support of the Roman Grandeur. This modesty does more please then persuade me, and I am bound to oppose it on the behalf of truth. You are too nice an examiner of a composition that has been called excellent by the public voice; and though it were true, that you had discovered a little disparity of weakness in some part of it, yet this aught to be a secret between your Muses and yourself, since I am confident it would be for ever imperceptible by any other. The weakness should be rather charged on our expression and the incapacity of our language, than your conceit, and the defect imputed to the inconcinnity of the instruments, not to want of skill in the Artist. You have shown us as much of Rome as is possible to be seen at Paris without any prejudice by the removal. It is not a Rome of Cassiodorus, forlorn and— as it was in the age of the Theodorus. 'Tis a Rome of Titus Livius, and as magnificent and pompous as it was in the time of the first Caesar's. You have even found that which she had lost in the ruins of the Commonwealth, her noble and magnanimous fierceness. We meet with some tolerable translators of her language and expressions, but you are the true and faithful Interpreter of her spirit and courage. I proceed yet higher, Sir, and tell you, that I know you are many times her Tutor, and admonish her of decorum when she has forgotten it. You are the reformer of Antiquity, where it wants either Ornament or support. In those places where Rome was but of brick, you rebuild her with Marble; wherever you find a void interstice, you fill it up with a Masterpiece; and I have observed that what you supply to the History, of your own, is ever transcendent to that which you borrow from it. The wife of Horatius and the Mistress of Cinna, which are two daughters of yours and purely creatures of your brain, what are they less than the principal Ornaments of your two Poems? Is there any thing of the production of good antiquity in the weaker sex, that is comparably vigorous and strong to these late Heroesses, which you have brought into the World; to these Roman Dames of your begetting? After a fornights' time, I am not satisfied with surveying the perfections of her that came hither last. I have astonished all the Wits of our Province with the sight of her. Our Orators and our Poets speak wonders of her. But a Doctor of my Neighbourhood, who is ordinarily upon the high strain, speaks of her indeed after a strange manner. The first day he was contented to say that your Aemilia was the Rival of Cat● and Brutus in their zeal of Liberty, But now he goes far higher. Sometimes he swears she is possessed with the Genius of the Commonwealth, and at other times calls her the fair, reasonable, holy, and adorable Fury. These are strange words indeed, concerning your Roman Virago, but yet they are not destitute of reason, and foundation. She does in effect inspire the whole Conspiracy, and diffuses heat to the party by the Fire which she raises in the breast of their General. She endeavours to interest all the World in her revenge? and would make a sacrifice to her Father, which were too great for Jupiter himself. She is in my opinion a person so excellent, that I think I speak not too much to her advantage, when I say that you are more happy in your issue then Pompey was in his, and that your daughter Aemilia, is without comparison of greater worth than his Grandchild Cinna. If he had more virtue than Seneca could imagine, it is because he fell into your hands and had the benefit of your care. He is obliged to You for his merit, as to Augustus for his dignity. The Emperor made him Consul and you have rendered him an honest man. This you have effected by the Rules of an Art that adorns and refines truth; that allows favour in imitation, and that sometimes proposes to itself the apparent and sometimes the true good. I shall say too much if I add any more. I will not begin a Dissertation but end a Letter, and conclude with the usual protestations but most sincere and true, that I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 17. 1643.   

LETTER X. To Monsieur Costar.  
SIR,  
YOu writ me strange news concerning the Doctor that is fallen into disgrace for having spoken too liberally of Grace. Certainly your Theologues are men of no ordinary temper, since they speak of the affairs of heaven as if they were Counsellors of state in that Kingdom, and declare the secrets of Jesus Christ as freely, as if they were his Confidents.  
They conceive their news as certain, and deliver it as affirmatively, as if they had not only slept in his bosom with St. JOHN. But even as if they had watched in his heart and soul, and there were none of his intentions hid from their knowledges. Do you not think there is laughing enough at their brawls and contests; and that the Church Triumphant is offended at them. For my part, I conceive the modesty and discretion of our ignorance would be more pleasing to God than the presumption and insolence of our Doctrine; and that he better approves of a peaceable silence, and contentedness, then of a war of bitter words in which it is very difficult to save our charity. You remember that Ode of Ronsard, which Galandius once esteemed worth the Duchy of Milan, the beginning of which is, 
Errand par les Champs de la Grace  
Qui penit mes Vers de ses Couleurs.   
A person, which you know, tells me, that unless Monsieur the Coadjutour redouble his prohibitions, it is to be feared there will be store of these Errants, and that Grace will make Bedlams of more than one of these subtle disputers, who examine the question with too much curiosity. I approve your not declaring yourself on either part, and the Neutrality which you resolve to hold to, notwithstanding, the person you know, cries as fare as he can see you, that media via nulla via est, quae neque amicos parit neque inimicos tollit. But yet I must tell you, that this Neutrality which I consent to, must not be altogether dumb, and that I consent not to it, saving upon condition, that you give an account of it to the Public, and justify it by a large and eloquent Manifesto. The Cavalier, which your Letter mentions thought to have been the bearer of mine, and to have had time enough, to keep his Court with you at Paris before the beginning of the Campagne. But here arrived a Messenger to tell him that his Brigade was commanded to— and so he is necessitated to departed hence directly thither. He would have been glad to have entertained you with some news of me, and not unwilling to have seen the fair St. Germane. Nevertheless in this last unhappiness, his comfort is that he goes to serve under a Prince, that performs things of greater admiration and excellency, etc.— I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. March. 2. 1645.   

LETTER XI. To the same.  
SIR,  
THe book which you have sent me from Monsieur Scarron, is a present very acceptable to me, and which I have reason to prise at no mean rate. At the first perusal it served me for Physic and relieved me from a fit of the spleen, which had quite overcome me, if that had not come timely to my succour. I hope it will effect much more upon frequent application. Possibly it may cure me of my serious pensiveness and my melancholy Philosophy; and I shall learn to turn Chancery Bills and Processes into rhyme, and become buxom by contagion. He is indeed an admirable Infirm. He enjoys something that is better than health, I mean dull and material health, for you know the Arabians describe joy to be the flower and spirit of a quick and active health. Since you are desirous to know the several thoughts which I have had of this infirm, and require a particular Chapter of them, I tell you, Sir, that he is a man either the g eatest dissembler, or most patiented and constant in the world. I look upon him as one that bears witness against the tenderness of mankind, or else pain treats him with more courtesy than she does other mortals: It may seem the Tormentor has conspired to flatter the patiented. When I see him laugh in the middle of his pains and tortures, I cannot but think the disease does rather tickle then pierce and pinch him. In a word, I affirm, that the Prometheus, the Hercules, and the Philoctetes of Poetry, not to mention the Job of Truth, did utter high expressions in the violence of their torments, but never jocund and pleasant. And that in several places of Antiquity I have met with constant, modest, yea and wise griefs too, but never any that were merry and blithe but this; nor was there ever before heard of a soul that could dance the Saraband and the Matachines' in a Paralytical body. Such an eminent prodigy deserves the consideration of inquisitive Philosophers. History must not forget it, and if I had a fancy to be an Historian, as I am an Historiographer, I would record it for none of the least miracles of our times, which have not been unfruitful in the production of great ones. 'Tis not my design to diminish the glory of the dead, with whom I have had some friendship too. But there are different degrees of glory; and though the quality of Apostle be a Title not a little considerable in a Christian family, yet it must be acknowledged, that the Martyrdom of the Son has somewhat more rare in it then the Apostleship of the father. What thoughts would your Seneca have had concerning him, who sometimes took so much pleasure in treating of the like subjects, and so often sought occasions to do it. Is it not true, that that rough and haughty virtue, which he has so much commended, & which vaunted it could be at ease in the Bull of Phalaris, and say all was well, was, but the bare shadow of this virtue, so sweet and humble, that can put in practice the Paradoxes of the other, and yet boast of nothing at all. Let us conclude therefore in honour of the Queen's infirm that there is either Ecstasy or Possession in his Malady, and that the soul does her affairs apart, without being concerned in the matter. Or else that he has an extraordinary courage and vigour, and that the soul wrestles with the body with all the advantages the greatest strength can have over the greatest debility.  
Aut caleste aliquid, Costarde, Astrísque propinquum  
Morbus hic est, superóque trahit de lumine lucem;  
Aut servant immota suum Bona vera serenum,  
Státque super varias virtus iliaesa ruinas.  
Post tot saecla igitur tandem, gens Stoica, Regem  
Cerne tuum: Fasces tenero submittite vati  
Sublimes tragicíque Sophi, Zenonia proles;  
Nec pudeat decreta humili postponere socco  
Grandia, & ampullas verborum, & nomen Honesti  
Magnificum, ac veras audire in carmine voces.  
Scarro aeger, Scarro infando data praeda dolori,  
Non Fatum crudele, Jovem non clamat iniquum;  
Jratis parcit superis, sortique malignae,  
Et patitur saevos invictâ ment labores,  
Jucundúmque effert dira inter spicula vultum.  
Nec simulata gerit, personam indutus honestam,  
Vel mistâ ridet, veluti Mezentius, irâ;  
Sed purum, & sine fraud & laxis ridet habenis.  
Dicam iterum, neque sat semel est dixisse triumphos,  
Qui laeta, ingeniosa, aegro de pectore promit;  
Qui ludit Caeum, Enceladum, vastumque Typhoea,  
Terrigenásque alios, festivo carmine fratres:  
Qui sedeat licét aeternùm, mirabile dictu,  
Perpetuas agitat Pindi per amaena choreas;  
Proximus ille Polo, Fortunâque altior omni,  
Scarro meus, mihi namque tuum, Costarde, dedisti,  
Magnus erit Rex ille sui, quem prisca coronet  
Porticus, & rigidi vox imperiosa Cleanthae,  
Ni seclo invideat nostro rigidúsque Cleanthes,  
Priscaque Dijs Diuûmque Patri se porticus aequans.  
I know not whether the miscellany of this Chapter will Please you. But I will take care at least, that it do not offend you with its length. Therefore I give you the Good-night, and rest unfeignedly,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 1. 1645.   

LETTER XII. To Monsieur Grandillaud, Precedent in the presidial Court of Angoulesme.  
Sir, My dear Cousin,  
EIther I have no judgement in handsome things, or those which you shown me are such in perfection. But the bare sight of beauty is not satisfactory; I must obtain the enjoyment. Therefore be pleased to remember your engagement and give me the possession at my ease and with a true and full pleasure of that, which in passing before my eyes hath only inflamed my desires and disturbed my quiet. It is great pity, and I am infinitely sensible of the loss, that an Eloquence I dare term sovereign and which would do honour to Paris, should be bounded in the precincts of an inferior Court, and have no larger Sphere than a little corner of this great Kingdom. One of the Ancients would have termed this the putting of a Pilot into a Cock boat; and another would have said, it was to show a treasure in a place where it could not be seen. As for me, I only confirm what I have already said, and remain in expectance of the effect of your promise,  
Sir, My dear Cousin. Your, etc. Jan. 3. 1645.   

LETTER XIIII. To Monsieur d'Argenson, Counsellor to the King and Intendant of Justice in Saintonge.  
SIR,  
I Am determined to forbear my importunate caresses, and will no more offend you with stroking and embraces. Since your virtue is so delicate as not to endure the perfumes and flowers which it merits, it is necessary to comply with the strangeness of your humour, and you must be obeyed though it be with injustice. So that you shall neither receive incense or Chaplets from my hand; notwithstanding I cannot pass it, without protesting against the violence which you do me. I will complain of the loss of my liberty, and inform the world, that 'tis no fault of mine that I am not just. I am perfectly so, Sir, as fare as the will and endeavours. Your jurisdiction does not extend to the secrets of my heart, and you cannot hinder the devotion of my soul, although you do with so much severity prohibit me the ceremonies and outward worship. I question not but you will find my expressions very high, when you are the subject, which yet do not seem such to me. My words, I conceive, may be drawn from holy things without offending Religion; and your verses being related to it, I look on it as a piece of divine service to read them. Since the Muses which supply you with such excellent inventions are not false Deities, the honour which is given them goes directly to Heaven; and we adore the inspirer of Prophets and Sibyls, when we admire a Poet so chaste and pure as you. Be pleased to admit this truth, which is compatible with their modesty, and represents you some shadow of my intention. If you would allow me to display it, what should I not say of the early achievements which I have seen, and of that prudent and grave youth, which reproaches my grey hairs? But the orders which I have received from you are of too strict a tenor, and you will be so punctually obeyed, that I cannot so much as publish your Elogium in Epitome. All I can do in a person so commendable, and that is offended with the effects of his virtue, is, to esteem him perfectly in my heart, and to be, as I am with all my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 5. 1646.   

LETTER XIIII. To Monsieur Colletet.  
SIR,  
I Am at a loss, what language I should use to please you in commendation of yourself and your works. Great titles have been profaned by being conferred on undeserving persons, which they have obtained and still wear out of a frolic of fortune. Excellent, Admirable, and Incomparable, are terms of every day; and if I should treat you with the Epithet of Divine, I should only give you the relics of Rossett● and Mailles, who have been saluted in that manner by poorer Poets than themselves. I have determined at length to seek out no new terms at all to express you my ancient passion, and the esteem I have ever had of your person and productions. I will content myself to read them so often, as to be able to give you account of every verse; and to tell you, that this tickled me with delight, and the acuteness of that touched me to the quick, I was wholly transported by another, and such a whole scene charmed me. You may perceive I have no need of Bellerose to inflame me, and they receive applauses at a hundred leagues distance from the Theatre. Yet I do not deny but the voice and good action have life in them. You know what the rival of Demosthenes said in that particular, and if I had been present at the representation of the piece which I have read, there is no question, but I should have made myself hoarse with the violence of exclaiming, Euge, Bellé, etc. My admiration is more calm upon my paper, though not less true; and I am as really, Sir, though without much noise of compliments,  
Your, etc. Jan. 5. 1641.   

LETTER XV.  
SIR,  
I Have a great design of making you a magnificent acknowlegdment; and such as might be answerable to the civilities of your Letter, and according to the degree you have placed me in amongst the Latin Poets, with that too favourable, 
— Tibi carmine ab omni  
Cedetur jurique tuo Natura relinquet  
Quis vatum esse velis.   
But what hopes is there in contesting with you in point of generosity and gallantry who are then at Roan, when you are no longer at Paris, that is, who change one Court for another, and never go out of the great world? So that I shall only tell you, that without pretensions to the glory of which your Letter has pretended me, I receive very much honour from the four terms of war which you bestow on me; and from the first as well as the other three. Although the style of Statius be not that, to which I would frame mine, yet his strain is none of those whose imitation I account vicious. I am not so delicate as those Gallants on the other side the mountains, and I have always blamed the Capricio of that Venetian Gentleman, who to ingratiate with Virgil, burned the woods which he had composed in his youth, because they were sprung from the Nursery of Statius. He would not have Posterity ignorant of his bad humour, and has therefore preserved the memory of it, in an Epigram which gins thus, 
Has, vulcane, dicat Sylvas tibi villicus Aymon  
Tu sacris illas ignibus ure, Pater.  
Crescebant ducta è Statî propagine Sylvis,  
Jamque erat ipsa bonis frugibus umbra nocens.   
Perhaps that which was an effect of cruelty in this Gentleman of Venice would be in me an act of justice, if I condemned my verses to the fame fate that he did his. And indeed I am so doubtful of their goodness, that unless our Master, Monsieur Menage swear to me that my apprehension is ill grounded, and after that confirm his Oath by the testimony of our other Masters, Monsieur Bourbon, Monsieur the Ambassador of Sweden, I shall have a belief that you and he do only abuse me with your applauses. I shall imagine that you have a design to make yourself sport with the gibberish of a Country versifier.  
Qui linguam violare Remi temerarius audet,  
Somniat & Thuscum Tiberim & Saturnia Regna,  
Accola Santonici Oceani; viridisque Carentae  
Potator, procul à doctis, vetus exul, amicis.  
However it be, there is no sort of pastime but may be allowed in the Commonwealth of good Letters, to two persons which have deserved so well of it, as you and Monsieur Menage. And as to matter of raillery, it is no great hurt to suffer somewhat from the Historian of Mamurra and the father of the stage. I would signify by this last word, that you may be Aristophanes when you please, as you are already Sophocles, but I should never be offended with your mirth. The war which you make upon me, instead of hurting me shall afford me divertisement. You cannot be otherwise to me then a gentle and agreeable Persecutor; nor myself, though ill treated by you, any other then,  
SIR, Your, &c,   

LETTER XVI. To Monsieur le Prieur Packet.  
SIR,  
YOu have given life to me, as well by the great care you have taken of Monsieur Costar, as the good news you have signified to me of his recovery. I beseech God it may have a long and fair continuance and that the loss, which we were in fear of, do not happen but to our Nephews.  
May I ne'er know Thyrsis has ceased to be:  
Heaven keep that day for our Posterity!  
But you must contribute your part to the favour of the Stars. Preserve us I entreat you our treasure, and be not weary of a service which I envy you. It is so noble and so glorious that the Muses and the Graces themselves would not disdain your office. Without question they would always write, if Monsieur Costar would always dictate to them. I recommend him to you once more and remain,  
SIR, Your, etc. Feb. 1. 1642.   

LETTER XVII. To my Lord Sequier, Chancellor of France.  
My Lord,  
I Have heard you would not permit the publication of a book, newly made against me, though the harm I had thence received had been small. My obligements to you for the favour cannot but be great; it being a very particular care you have for the quiet of my life, not to suffer the least noise to disturb it. I know not, my Lord, whether you may not seem to have treated with too much delicacy, one who makes profession of Philosophy. It is enough the public authority shelters me from the tempest without defending me from the wind and dust; and that it protects my hermitage from the violence of savage beasts without beating off the flies, and other importunate Infects from me. But, my Lord, the goodness you have for me goes beyond the limits of ordinary justice: you would not only I should enjoy a calm repose, amidst the agitations of all Europe, but were farther willing the world should have some respect for my retiredness, and that being eloigned from the society of men I should be placed without the reach of detraction. And yet it pursued St. Jerome even to the Grott● of Bethelem, and to the foot of our Saviour's cradle, it even there found him out, though, as himself tells us, he endeavoured to lie hid; if that insolent had no consideration for so admirable a sanctity, nor for a place guarded by Angels, no wonder a vulgar innocence, retired into a village ill fortified, should not find a very favourable entertainment. But to pass from the purity of manners to the high qualities and endowments of the soul, if from time to time there have been bold revolts against the heads of Arts and disciplines, and if within the memory of our fathers, it hath publicly been said at Paris, that Aristotle was a bad Sophister, I think myself civilly used in that place that they content themselves to call me a bad writer, that grand Blasphemer of the name of Aristotle, as well by his pen as by his tongue, was (as you know) Peter Ramus, who though of our Religion, passed for an Hugue not in the Massacre, and died the death of the Rebels and the Factious: in effect some have thought, God permitted it by a just judgement and that the tutelary Angel of Learning took the colour of the cause of faith to revenge the injury by him done to reason. There is this day living in Germany a tyrant Grammarian, an enemy of universal truths, an accuser of Cicero, who not long since hath printed his Animadversions, wherein he is so impudent as to arraign his judge, and to dispute the praecedence of the Prince of Latin Antiquity: insomuch, My Lord, that the consent of all Mankind, confirmed by a possession of eighteen ages, is not Title sound enough to secure the reputation of that Roman against the Pedantry of this Barbarian. If then it avails not virtue that she hath been consecrated by time, and crowned by the people to preserve her inviolate from the attempts of particular persons there is no show of likelihood, I should move their compassion, amongst so many injured Hero's, or that I should have respect shown me, when Aristotle and Cicero are not in safety. An ordinary man ought not in justice to complain, if he undergoeth the same destiny with extraordinary persons, neither would it be handsome in me to petition, you would reform the world for my only interest. I know not, My Lord, but that this petty disorder may be of some use to the Common wealth; and it were to be wished that malice would always amuse itself in things of so small concern, to the end it might never intermeddle with affairs of greater moment. Those who have employed their talon, in perverting the sense of my words, and falsifying my works, had otherwise perhaps been busied in forging wills, and coining money. And he who now only desires an Imprimatur from you for his book, had I not been, might have sued to you for a Reprieve, or Act of grace. 'Tis much better, injustice should spert itself with my books, then that it should have aught to do in civil society; 'tis much the lesser inconvenience, that injurious persons should transpose words, and alter periods, then that they should remove the Landmarks, and ruinated the houses of their Neighbours, it is, to say the truth, the most innocent employment vice can have; and I do not think the Commonwealth a little beholden to me, that I have for these ten years set awork a number of reckless idle fellows who apparently would have proved dangerous Citizens, if they had not chosen to be ridiculous Censurers: 'tis very well if the heat of their souls exhales this way; if their intemperance finds this vent; and that, to avoid their rage, their folly may be licenced, leave them then (my Lord) this exercise; they know not what to do with their time, and will employ it worse if you will not permit them to use it thus: suffer their turbulent youth to spend its fury upon an insensible subject, and to combat dead words which are neither capable of grief nor joy, so long as they present themselves before you in no other quality then as Gladiators of the Pen, be not sparing of the King's grace, and remit somewhat of your severity. If the thing were new to me, 'tis likely I should not find myself aggrieved that the first Pamphlet that libelled me should be stopped in the press, but now that there is already a fair Library of them got together, I am well content they should increase and multiply and take pleasure to behold a goodly heap of stones which envy hath thrown without hurting me. The reproach of some persons is not resented by me as shameful, because I esteem not their praise for honest. I do not trouble myself to go begging of voices or making Cabals, that I may be approved by all sorts of people. I have what I desire (my Lord) if I have your approbation; as that which proceeds from an un-erring principle, & an understanding perfectly clear. God had endued you with a sovereign judgement before the King had bequeathed his sovereign justice into your hands, and you were all po●●rfull in reason before you were so in authority. I will have no recourse to this latter, because I know the former is not altogether my enemy, and am more proud to have pleased you, than I should be satisfied should you have prescribed all my adversaries the advantageous discourses you have held with me upon divers occasions, your Picture which you were pleased to give me last year as the gage of your affection, those rich works of yours which you have formerly made me partaker of, I mean those writings animated with the soul of State and full of the grandeur of your Master, which appeared to me so transcendently above the force of the present age, and so worthy the Roman Majesty; in a word (my Lord) every moment of that happy afternoon I had the honour to pass with you in your Cabinet, are Privileges for which I have dearer considerations, then for what you have denied to the Ape or Fantasme of Philarchus. I dare not mention what other obligements I have to you: in that particular you have enjoined me silence, with a belief your favours would go less, and receive alloy in their purity, should my acknowledgements wait upon them; 'tis not fit however, you should oblige me from having the intentions of an honest man, nor deprive me the liberty of grateful thoughts. You have forbid the publication of my thanks, but have not impeached me from acquitting myself in the secret part of my devoir, or, at least from being in my soul always,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Oct. 30. 1636.   

LETTER XVIII. To Monsieur Menage.  
SIR,  
I Have at length retrieved the Letter, which was lost in the confusion of my Papers. I entreat you do me the favour to show it to our father Bourbon, and tell him it was written by a Father much more ancient than he. Tell him moreover that this Father understood neither Greek nor Latin; but the late King Henry the Great had a good esteem of his French, his capacity and honesty. He even desired to have him near him, and had he not been tied by affection to the service of a meaner Master, whom he would not quit for a greater, it is possible your friend might have been son to a Secretary of State.  
Diis aliter visum, atque illi meliora dedêre,  
Silvesque irriguosque hortos camposque patentes  
Atque Aulae contemptum & nullis otia jussis  
You see that my Verses do confirm, what you told me in Prose of the tranquillity of my life and the beauties of my habitation. But although I could add all the delights of the Golden Age to this quiet of the village; though I should dote, or, to speak more nobly, though I should meditate in an enchanted palace, which Ariosto had built with his own hands; in a word Sir, though my desert were as fair as your Language, it were not possible for me to be happy, if I were there without you. There is no felicity for me in the absence of two or three persons, whom I see no more; and I mark those days with black, which would otherwise be most pleasing and agreeable, were not my heart in another place. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. 12 May 1644.   

To Monsieur de Balzac, from his father.  
Dear Son,  
SInce I first began to solicit you, to present the public with the fruits of your industry, twelve years are insensibly slid away, and my own as much augmented, being already entered into the 89th year of my age; and though it be now time for me to employ all my thoughts upon well-dying, rather than any other subject; yet, as it is entailed upon humane weakness to desire a farther reprieve, and prolongation of our days, I must confess myself in that, not to differ from other people, nor to be yet weary of my life. But withal it is most true, I desire particularly to live that I may enjoy the content in my extreme old age, to see, before I leave the world, those fair works of yours published, which I have already viewed in writing. It seems to we (Dear Son) that you cannot reasonably deny me this last satisfaction I demand from you, and that, should you farther harden yourself in your denial of my request, your Excuses would savour more of Melancholy than Modesty. If the desire of being praised by men cannot tempt you, at least that of pleasing me aught to make some impression upon your soul, and I am willing to believe that in this occasion, you will have some consideration of my person, who despoil myself of my paternal authority to transact with you by Entreaties and Remonstrances. I know well, you are abundantly rich in things of rarity and value; but to keep them close prisoners in your Cabinet, is to be covetous: and I desire you with as much affection as is due to the goodness of your nature, which never yet refused me obedience, not to let me continue longer in a languishing suspense: content the impatience of an urgent suitor, who is in haste to accomplish that remains for him to do on earth. And in the first place (Dear Son) send to the press with what convenient speed you can, the two books of your Apology; which in my judgement are admirable, and which I have read, and reviewed many times, and always with a new pleasure. You own this not only to the glory of the public and your own reputation, but also to the honour of our family, and to my particular interest; to the end you may disabuse certain people who were induced to believe, upon the credit of a false witness, that you have not always had an high esteem for me, nay more that you were unwilling to allow me a place amongst reasonable creatures. Thus was it foolishly concluded by the ridiculous subtlety of the Doctor, who designed to set us at variance, but that is beyond the power of School-niceties and distinctions to compass, and there is no piece of Sophistry whatsoever can induce me to think ill of you to the prejudice of a multitude of good offices, my old age hath received, and daily doth receive from your assistance: for which I beg of the Almighty always to preserve you in his favour. I am your assectionate Father,  
To serve you, Guez.   

LETTER XIX. To Monsieur Maury, Doctor of Divinity.  
SIR,  
YOu might possibly in the sheets which you published, have obliged a person of greater dignity and eminence, but none more acknowledging of your favours, or passionately adoring of your virtue then myself. I have such a particular esteem of that unspotted virtue, that although your Verses are extremely handsome, and your Prose no less, yet I prefer the solid before the glorious; and confess to you that it is neither the Orator nor the Poet, but the Honestman that is the object of my passion. I am not a little sorry, that I cannot with truth give that Title entire to him that you lament in the Printed Leaves, and that I have cause to complain of his dissimulation and improbity, not to say of his treachery and perfidiousness. It is a History which I shall recount to you in person. I think Heaven ordained the occasion of it some years since, to the end I should not die with sorrow at present. I should have been utterly incapable of all consolation, if I had lost Monsieur de— in the year sixteen hundred thirty seven. At least, I should have spared no pains and cost in the search of Gold and Marble in all places to render honour to his memory. But the violation of his faith dispenses with me for that care; and having been injured in such a degree, all that I can do is to give him room in my charity, and to pray God for a poor Deceased, who were it not for that action, would now have been one of the Demigods of my Closet. The freedom whereof I make profession will not permit me to play the dissembler with you, and I have discharged that into your bosom, which lay so heavy upon my heart. I had hitherto complained only to the Trees and Rocks of my Desert, and my grief should have been still secret, did it not concern me to justify my silence to you, and to assure you, that it is not without reason that I bear not a part in the consort of your Funeral Elegies.— I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Feb. 20. 1643.   

LETTER XX. To Monsieur de Flotte.  
SIR,  
I have been almost drowned in an inundation of Rheum, and I am not yet dry from my shipwreck. I have great dread of the return of the tempest and that the clouds are not dispelled in good earnest. Notwithstanding, without further expectation of a more assured calm, I will make use of this tolerable moment, to rejoice for it with you, yea and to give you my thanks for it too. I have it in effect, by your gift, and you have restored me the use of my eyes and my soul. 'Tis by the reading of your Letter, and Monsieur le Fevre's book, that I renew the commerce, which I had intermitted with all handsome Letters and good Books. The receit of that you sent me, has done me more good than you imagine. They are not scare-crows but Arms which you have furnished me withal. Your Volume is my Arsenal; and I do not doubt, but when I have finished the Lecture which I am entered upon, I shall be not only more polite and stored with fine Notions, to make myself regarded amongst my neighbourhood, but also much stronger and fortified with examples and reasons to defend the Rights of my Country. In the mean time be pleas d to suffer me to remind you of some less serious Subjects which I have long expected of your-enriching and embroidery. I desire of you in the first place the History of that exemplary death which happened in the Palace of Guise in the year sixteen hundred and eighteen. The Dialogue of Austin, when he was dying with Monsieur the Almoner (who exhorted him to die like a Christian, and blunted all his Divinity against the hardness of his Turkish soul) will be none of the worst passages of the piece. But for the little that you will excite your mi●th in tickling your spleen, you will make wonders o● his Testament, and his taking leave of all the Pots and K●ttles one after another. Policy, which is my Mistress, and the speculative Sciences my dear friends, must pardon me, if they please, that, I love this sort of Relations better than ●hose of Botero and Antonio Perez. Amidst the Hostility of the two parties, these should be the Gazettes inviolable to both; and if they had leisure to laugh in Germany, there is no Question but they would afford equal pleasure to our enemy Picolomini, and Torstenson our Ally. Let my request prevail with you to exercise yourself in these excellent ways of writing, and do not suffer the graces of your discourse to expire with the sound of your voice. Preserve us the memory of your feasts after the example of Plutarch and Athenaeus: And to the end your good cheer may last after the Table is taken away, and all the Compositum may taste it, I mean the whole man, prepare us a volume of novels, which may deserve to be termed even by the sober Monsieur Chaplain, the Ragousts and delicates of the Wit. Provided they contain no forbidden ingredient as there is in some of those of Boccace. I promise you a public remerciment for the pleasure you shall give me, whereof I have so great need. I beseech you consider of it, and be pleased to believe me always,  
SIR, Your &c. 28 Decemb. 1641.   

LETTER XXI. To Monsieur de Silhon Secretary to my Lord the Cardinal Mazarin.  
SIR,  
MOnsieur Chaplain has informed me of your zealous goodness, and the heat which you testified in my little affairs. They are obl●gations of which I am infinitely sensible, and I consider them much more than all they can produce of profitable and advantageous to me. I have need of my pensione but I cannot l●ve without your friendship; and having assured me of the continuation of it in your last Letter, you have given me much more than I shall receive from the Exchequer. Yet I shall not make you a studied thanks for it, nor put myself to the trouble of providing Rhetoric to send th●ther whence it comes to us. You perceive the very bottom of my soul; and know that I preserve you in it with what is most precious and dear to me; with my Heroes and my Heroesses; my Masters and Mistresses, (if I have any.) It is a clear fountain, you need not doubt it, and is not at all soiled with particular interest. Therefore, Sir, you may draw out the acknowledgement that is due to you: But withal, expect something from it wh●ch you have newly inspired me with, and I own to the reading of your last work. The fair Ideas of our excellent reasonings which remain still in my soul, have left a se●d and principle of beauty in it which hath already germinated some thing, that possibly w●ll not be displeasing to his Eminence. I do not design to pass with him for a maker of Pan gyricks: But I can make it appear to him in time and place, and in matters of historical certainty that an honest man, of a good persuasion, can relate truth with no bad grace. And of this yourself are an undeniable instance, 
Tu, Silo, sacro Sophie quem Nectare pavit,  
Qui pleno rerum pectore verba facis;  
Qui cautas Regnandi arts, dubia omnia ●octus,  
Terrarum dominos optima sola doces:  
Nec falsum nec inane sonas, velut Aulica turba,  
turba etiam ducibus plaudere sueta malis.  
Hic quanquam haud aequo tua per vestigia passu,  
Scilicet V●be procul, sort nec arte parem,  
Me tamen & Rectum & Veri secreta latentis,  
Secura invidiae quaerere ment juvat.  
Veri diva potens sophy, mihi Numinis instar,  
Tu, Silo, auctores, vos sequor, este mei.   
I did not think to conclude with Verses, but the first begat the rest, as chance made the first. I will not complain of that chance, but rather call it my good fortune, if it has given me the means of expressing my meaning to you better, and represented me in a more noble manner, as I am perfectly,  
SIR, Your, etc. 19 Feb. 1644.   

LETTER XXII. To the same.  
SIR,  
I Shall perhaps one day have the courage to attempt to speak something of his Eminence. But for the present you must know that my Muses have been more daring and active than I myself. Their Verses have got the start, and left my Prose behind: If you do not approve that I separate and make a distinction betwixt me and my Muses, I must take another course to express myself You will perceive by THE ORACLE OF THE GREAT JULIUS that I performed my devotion more than a year since, without vaunting of it to any one, or recording it with the Booksellers. You will also see by consequence that I am a better Frenchman then a Courtier; and that in the actions of my duty, I oftentimes content myself with the testimony of my conscience. After the Oracle, there f●llowes an Epigram, which has already appeared in the place, where you are, but in a Copy that depraves my sense in divers place, and transposes my words almost throughout. That which I now send you is the most uncorrupted, and you may give it what Title you please. I would have made one that might have served for an Argument to the Epigram, not forgetting the sickness at Fontain-bleau, Et cum post gravissimum illum morbum melius se haberet Eminentissimus Princeps, etc. but that you are no friend to Asiaticall Titles: for are not we bound to know all that happens to a person that presides at this day over the affairs of Europe? who is so necessary to the general good of the world? who, etc. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc.   

LETTER XXIII. To Monsieur John Frederic Gronovius.  
SIR,  
BEing in the Low Countries you are in the suburbs of Paris, at least you are nearer than I to the true France. I believed you upon the confines of the furthest Almany, neighbour to the King of Denmark and in suit, or upon terms of accord with him. So that I shot a hundred and fifty leagues beyond the mark, and perceive that he that caused me to write last year to Monsieur Gronovius Cannon of Hamburg was pleased to make himself sport with my pen and your name. He imposed upon me with a fable to draw a Letter from me, upon which I think he will neither find credit at the Bank nor Courtesy among the Croates, if he should fall into their hands. But I am sorry I have cause to complain of a man of your country, and am constrained to ask, What is become of the Germane candour and sincerity? I beseech you let not this word scandalize you, for at the same moment I answer myself, that it is retired into your breast. And though War should have wasted all; though it should suffer neither Virtue nor Civility upon the face of the Earth, yet I am assured you would not cease to be good in the general ruin of good manners. You can love and oblige your friends with tokens of so ardent and passionate a remembrance, that I should be more cold and flinty than the rocks of desert, if I did not kindle at your fire, and feel the points of your words. I wish to God, Sir, I were nearer to you to make a greater benefit of my fortune and draw more profit from so advantageous a neighbourhood. You have made a book de Sestortiis; but I should then begin to reckon by Talents, I should flow in abundance on all hands, and beside the natural riches of your wit, you would entertain me with the Treasures of Antiquity. I expect the promised Titus Livius, and in the mean time I send you one of his children I mean my Roman, attended with some other Treatises of the like nature. They will demonstrate to you whether my soul be full of Titus Livius, and if by his assistance I have framed a sufficiently high Idea of the ancient Commonwealth. I have written to Paris to cause another discourse to be sent you, in which I conceive I have pleaded the cause of the people, with all the respect that is due to the Majesty of Sovereigns. I have principally in it endeavoured to avoid the style of a Declamation; for I can neither endure that Orators should be Parasites, or Eloquence the slave of Greatness. Malè sit illi per quam malè audiunt nostrae deae, & quam nos quoque laudavimus. But I ask pardon of God for it, in all the prayers I make to him: And I think my repentance is effectual, since my choler is stirred even at the most just and lawful praises. It would proceed so fare as to suppress Nazarius, Mamertinus, Latinus Pacatus, and many more. If the Adages of the Doctor of Rotterdam happen to be printed again at Leyden, I entreat you to cause this to be inserted for my sake, As very a liar as a Panegyric or a funeral Oration. I should continue this discourse to you were not I thronged with a crowed of troublesome businesses that beset me on all sides, and enforce me to defer the rest to another time. I am with all my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. 7. March. 1644.   

LETTER XXIIII. To Monsieur de Belleveve Villotreis' Counsellor to the King.  
Sir, My Cousin,  
IF I did not know you to be no less true than eloquent, that excellent Letter which you writ me, would make me suspect the cruelty of your gout, not to be so extreme as you represent it. It is difficult to preserve the freedom of the mind amidst the pains that besiege it, and assault all its Organs. And to effect this, the soul must be absolute mistress of the body, and very much unloosed from the matter. But that liberty is not attained without help and by the sol● strength of nature. You are obliged to Philosophy for it, although you give her so little thanks for the good offices she has done you, and te●l wonders of her unprofitableness in your Letter; notwithstanding, 'tis she, that bears up in your heart, and does not permit you to suffer as vulgar souls do. Instead of the child should cries and womanish complaints of others, she inspires you with strong and masculine expressions: she is the cause that rage is reasonable with you and gave you that serene moment in which you have renounced her so elegantly. I could accuse you of ingratitude in her name and undertake her cause against Romances, to which you are reconciled only to despite her. But that which you do is accompanied with so good a grace and in such a persuasive manner, that it is not possible to be of any other side but yours. You can never employ a bad reason, not even when you plead against Reason, and conclude that Ari●sto is an honester man than Aristotle. I do not wonder at the favour you do the Poet, to the prejudice of the Philosopher: You are interessed in the cause of good Poets, and in truth there is nothing more excellent than the Eclogue you have done me the favour to send me. For the deceitful Nymph, or the Nymph of Madrid which I had put into your hands, I confess she is no longer to be known, since she has been under your care. I am astonished at the beauty you have given her, and cannot be satisfied with considering her dress and ornaments. From whence I observe, that an excellent education is able to correct the defects of a less happy birth, etc. I am passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. 25 Feb. 1645.   

LETTER XXV. To Monsieur Ménage.  
SIR,  
I Am devoted to your glory, that it does not trouble me to be poor, provided you have wherewith to exercise your liberality. Monsieur Chaplain gives me notice of half a shop that you are sending to me, and that there is need of a waggon for the conveyance. Certainly it will be enough to make me a great Doctor, if I be not wanting in capacity. I hope to make some profit of the long communication, that I shall have by your favour with Monsieur the Ambassador of Sweden, Quem mea non totum Bibliotheca capit.  
I am much taken with his Hendecasyllables; wherein I have found the just strain that I sought for in that kind of Verse, which is they must be somewhat inferior to the strength of the Heroic, and yet have nothing of effeminate, as some judge they ought, who enervate their sweetness even to softness. But, to tell you the free truth, the Elegiacks of our friend are quite another thing, and carry him from—. Otherwise, he is not the first that disliked the taste of Ale, and bestowed Poetical maledictions upon it. This false Bacchus has been cursed long since, and disowned for the true son of Jupiter. Do not you remember the Epigram of Julian the Emperor.  
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉.  
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉,  
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉.  
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉  
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉.  
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉,  
〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉.  
You see, the poison of our Celtes was the beverage of them of those times, but 'tis because the Celtes afterwards came to the knowledge of planting Vines, and learned to husband their vintage. And thus the two passages may be reconciled: it is true the Greek is contented to testify his aversion against Ale, without railing on the Bards or the Druids. The Latin might have done so too, and I am sorry he has offended so many honest men of our friends. But because it would be too great pity to maim a body so well shaped, let us persuade him to put Hinc Morini in the place of Hinc Batavi, and abandon those remotest of men to him, according to the testimony of Virgil. If he be not content with those, let us give him in prey all the Spanish part of Flanders, upon which he may make war without violating the sanctity of our Alliances in hurting our Confederates— I am with all my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. 1 Octob. 1639.   

LETTER XXVI. To Monsieur du Herrier, Canon of the Church of Beaucaire.  
Sir,  
I Have many great obligations to my father besides those of my birth; but I think I own him very much for giving me your friendship. It is a present so rich and rare, that I know not whether it was possible for him to have made me another of equal value. There is a sterility of those things in all parts of the earth. There are scarce found two men, but I see interest and traffic on both sides, and in a great nation it is very difficult for me to discover affection and persons that love. You are one of those extraordinary goodnesses, whose love is pure and generous, and without an eye to advantage. No body has business in the desert, or drives a trade with Hermit's: Nor can I repay your civilities with any thing but my good intentions, and return you only a weak and fruitless passion, for that efficacious friendship of yours which has been so ingenious to oblige me. You may speak of it with as much modesty as you please: But as for me, I put it in the number of goods that are not subject to the infelicity of the times nor to the outrages of fortune. Being possessed of a true friend in your Province, I account myself more wealthy than if I were owner of those three parishes, which the Countess Alix, gave to the great Grandfather of my Grandfather's Grandfather. So that I comfort myself for my poverty in Angoumois, in that by your favour I am not so in Languedoc; and I cannot have lost any thing in this Country that is equivalent to what you preserve me there. If my health permit me to make the journey I design, I shall declare my resentments more particularly, and swear to you, if it be necessary upon the Tombs of our fathers, and by the Genius of our common Country, that I am and will be passionately, while I live,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 30. 1640.   

LETTER XXVII. To Monsieur Costar.  
SIR,  
IF it were in my power to make verses as often as I would, those which I have now in hand, should bear the Title of Soteria and begin with 
Estis Io Superi, nec inexorabile Clotho,  
Volvit opus—.   
But you know well that inspiration is not in the will of the Prophet. That spirit from on high is sometimes long a coming; and the good wind does not blow at all hours; but oftentimes there is a necessity of a fortnight's attendance only to pass from Calis to Dover—. I cannot obtain from myself either so much faith or patience; and therefore I shall without further trouble, tell you in the language of poor mortals that I bewailed you verissimis et calidissimis lachrymis. Notwithstanding I could also tell you, if I pleased, in the language of the gods of Olympus, that made a thousand exclamations for your loss against them, 
Et Socii immeriti mortem indignatus acerbam,  
Crudeles Divos, Fatum crudele vocavi.   
Monsieur de— was the first that arrested the torrent of my blasphemies and qualified the violence of my grief. He enjoined me to hope well: But Monsieur de— came after him and did much more, by bringing joy to my hope. At present, since I see by your Letter to Monsieur le Goust, that you are not contented with health but pretend to strength, and represent yourself rather as a Champion that is ready for a combat at barriers, than one that is only well and sound, I know not if—. This shall be the subject of one of our conversations, when you will do me the honour to come hither, where I expect you in April, Cum Zephyro, primisque rosis, & hirundine primâ.  
I am eternally with all my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 2. 1642.   

LETTER XXVIII. To Monsieur Gira●d Commissary and Canon of Angoulesme.  
SIR,  
YOu have extremely obliged me by letting me understand some news of yourself and our friends, Monsieur de— is always the best and most obscure of men. He speaks continually in the Language of the Druids and leaves Pharamont and Meroüe fare behind him, etc. In earnest he hath not sent me a Letter but a Riddle, and if I should return him an answer, I might perhaps do it to his meaning, which I know is very good, but not to his words, which I cannot understand. Notwithstanding the murmur of your presumptuous Poet, I cannot repent of that expression, from the reign of Orpheus to that of Monsieur de Grasse. No body can dispute the Crown of Parnasse to that excellent Prelate. For besides that he makes admirable verses and his Bishopric rhymes to his kingdom; that kingdom being a holy state as well as the state Ecclesiastical, no secular aught to take it ill, that they are Prophets or Divines which command in that Country, etc. As for the news of this village, the Gazette of it advertises you that—. I might be a very honest man if I should endeavour to get a compliment, to end my Letter with; but you would not be so, Sir, if after 36 years of amity and confidence, I had need of compliments to persuade you that I am, more than any person in the world,  
SIR, Your, etc. Nou. 20. 1646.   

LETTER XXIX. To my Lord the marquis of Montausieur, Governor and Lieutenant General for the KING in Saintonge, Angoumois, etc.  
My Lord,  
I Have been a languishing patient these six months, and at present I cannot say that I live, but only because I am not quite deprived of sense. Yet Heaven has taken care of me in this condition: Some angel that does not hate me hath inspired me with the charitable thought, which you had of honouring me with a Letter. The receipt of which has awakened me out of my languishment to a fuller enjoyment of life, and mitigated those pains which were worse than death: It has restored my strength by giving me courage and confidence. For, how is it possible I should think myself ill, as long as I am well within your favour or dare to complain, with your friendship, in your esteem, and which is yet more, your admiration. You see here, how I follow the Language of your Letter, although I confess this last word is not suitable to me among the rest. But I am not to doubt how it came there, since the haste of your departure for the Siege of Dunkirk was the cause that you were not curious of proper words, but served yourself of such as came next to hand. There is nothing besides the Sun, the Ocean and such great works of nature that are worthy the admiration of wise men, and yet you are pleased to profess that you have that passion for mine, which are so small and inconsiderable in all regards. You give my Verse the name that is due only to those of Prophets; Wherein my Lord, the honour of your judgement cannot be saved but by the interpretation of your words; and you cannot admire any otherwise then as people do Dancers on the Ropes and such as make dangerous leaps. I hazard myself as they do, and raise myself from the ground into the air, and in other places precipitate myself again, and generally practise an Art which I do not understand. This is my work when I make verses. I abandon my wit to fortune, and leave it to be dealt with at her pleasure, and lead it whither it cannot go alone. So that there is but little commendation due either to the Artist or his design. Fortune and casualty must be thanked for the success. That good goddess must have all the merit of an action, to which I contribute only the temerity of venturing and the boldness of beginning without knowing what will become of it afterwards. However, since you approve my lucky attempts, I am minded to deliver them from ruin; and resolve to present you with them in full daylight with the advantage of Impression, as soon as I am able to dress them up for it. But if I durst, they should avoid all other eyes, since I seek no Theatre out of your Cabinet. I am,  
My Lord, Your, etc. Oct. 25. 1646.   

LETTER XXX. To Monsieur de Meré.  
SIR,  
IF I should tell you that your Laquay found me sick and your Letter cured me, I should be neither guilty of poetical invention, nor oratoriall exaggeration, I should be a faithful Historian, and render you a true account of what passed in my Chamber: You are not ignorant of the great opinion I have of the accomplishments and perfections of your soul; but perhaps you are to be informed that though you had no merit at all to compel me, yet I could not possibly forbear to love you. This affection of mine without question comes from above and the stars have some influence on it. I am sensible of a secret violence that constrains me, and it is most true that I never see or think of you, but I feel a kind of soft delight that tickles my soul. So that the favour you do me in rendering me happy is but justice, to my strong and constant affection. Since I find there is a necessity of loving, I am glad of my good fortune that I have a correlative in the knot which is a happiness I have sometimes wanted. I shall say no more concerning myself, who am proud of being your favourite, and come to speak somewhat of my papers, which receive no less glory from your esteem than I do from your goodness. It is no small matter to have pleased a person, who having none but sound passions, can relish no other but true pleasures. The Testimony of one that is clear sighted aught to be preferred above the guesses and hear-sayes of the whole people of Blind men. Since you have wit and judgement in perfection there is none that can justly dispute the title of a Judge to you in the works of the mind, and that far before such Doctors as are remarkably defective in both, who employ knowledge against Reason, and accuse Aristotle of all their bad opinions. Yet your sentences are much to my advantage, and you are very liberal in your praises of my papers. And what boldness would it be to contradict a Gallant and a Philosopher together; it would certainly be rather rashness than modesty, and therefore I am with docility and respect,  
SIR, Your, &c Aug. 24. 1646.  
But, be pleased to remember, Sir, that there is another consideration, never to be violated, and that you have promised me to oppose the combination of the Grammarians against the Poets. Since I am an admirer of Monsieur Chaplain, I think Monsieur— would do well to be so too, and yet do himself no prejudice; and he will always find more safety in believing us, you and me, then in relying on his own sense.   

LETTER XXXI. To Monsieur Moricet, an Advocate in the Parliament.  
SIR,  
YOu are guilty of a great injury against yourself in distasting the fruits of your labour, of which you ought in justice to be extremely satisfied. They are rare and exquisite, and if you continue to feast me with them, I know not whether I shall not envy you the benefit you do me, and I be your friend enough, not to become jealous.  
Non tamen invideo, miror magis, & tibi pulchram,  
Haud aliena mihi est cum sit tua, gratulor artem,  
Qua Seium Seiamque & me tuearis, Amice,  
Si quis adhuc surgat Philarki ex ossibus hostis.  
The Post of Friday brought me news of our Monsieur de Peirarede, whose name is become so great that it has filled all Paris, and the Celtes begin to admire the Aquitanes. Or if you please to have it in another fashion, and in the phrase of a Poet, the God of the Seine is astonished to hear the singing of the Muses of Dordonne. For my part, I am wholly ravished with their last composition; and if blessed souls could be recalled with the charms of excellent verse, I do not question but that of the Duke of Brezê would descend from Heaven at the hearing of these, 
Tu Nube serena  
Stellato fulgens apice, & radianto coronâ,  
Ad tua Sacra veni, quae multo Regia luctu  
Concelebrat, sacríque Chori, sanctúsque Senatus, etc.  
Aspice ut ipsa gemens, ingenti adfixa feretro,  
Horridaque & laceris luget victoria pennis,  
Quae quondam tua castra, tuas comitata triremes,  
Hesperio toties mutas dum sanguine Pontum,  
Deseruit tua signa semel: Nunc caedis acerbae  
Invidiam lenire velit, fatisque malignis  
Imputat, infandaeque excusat crimina cladis, etc.   
Have you ever seen any thing more noble and more pathetic than this poor victory afflicted with the death of that brave Duke? What a sight it is to behold her with her robes torn, and her wings broken, doing penance for the fault whereof she conceives herself guilty; to see her hanging and as it were nailed to that great Hearse, which she baths with her tears! she cannot be comforted for the misfortune arrived at Orbitello, and would readily lay the blame upon bad destiny, she, etc. But I contain myself, and you shall not know the rest unless you come to learn it here. I expect you some day of the following week, and am passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Dec. 4. 1646.   

LETTER XXXII. To Monsieur Girard Secretary to the late Duke of Espernon.  
SIR,  
I Send you the Stanza which shamed my memory in our last conversation, and whereof I could repeat no more than the four first verses.  
Che giova posseder cittadi & regni,  
Et palagis habitar d'alto lavoro,  
Et servi-intorno haver d'imperio degni,  
Et l'archi gravi di molto tesoro;  
Esser cantate da sublimi ingegni,  
Di porpora vestir, mangiar in oro,  
Et di bellezza pareigiar il sole,  
Giacendo poi nel letto tutto fredde & sole?  
Monsieur de Frangipane recited this handsome stanze admirably, and was wont to call it Divine: but as there is no Divinity, which does not meet with impious and sacrilegious persons; so I have seen a Grammarian, that would not approve that the Poet should give robes of Scarlet to Queens and Princesses, like Cardinals and Counselors of Parliament. He judged the verse of the full Coffers of less dignity than the rest, and that the two words fredde and sole which end the last are transposed, because it is being alone that causes cold, and therefore it ought to precede. My servant will deliver you the new book of Monsieur de Priezac, and the judgement of Cardinal Bentivoglio. You see from hence, that the most sufficient are also the most just, and that Italy gins to esteem the Barbarians. Let us take part in the glory of our excellent friend, and—. To persuade the Cardinal Bentivoglio, is to gain at once and in one person the Senate and order of Cavaliers, the Learned of the university and the honest people of the Court; Rome, Florence, Paris, and all the rest. So that we have a friend, that is universally approved, and France an Author, that deserves the praises of him that receives those of all the world. I am passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Jan. 3. 1640.   

LETTER XXXIII. To Monsieur Conrart Counsellor and Secretary to the King.  
SIR,  
I Have with delight surveyed the beauties of the printed pieces which you did me the favour to send me. But is there nothing else for me to read? and is it not possible for me with your assistance to obtain the sight of some secret stanzas whereof I have heard wonders? They are of Monsieur de Serisay's making, and you know he once loved me a little, as I had always a perfect esteem for him. Yet I dare not address to him in this occasion; being I cannot think myself in a condidition to receive of his favours, in that he has not accounted me deserving of the least token of his remembrance. You may please to know that he came lately into this province without making so much enquiry as whether I were in it or no. The neglect is great, and would be a very sensible injury to a person less accustomed to suffer then I. But I have gained a habit of patience, so fare as sometimes to believe that my friends have reason on their side, when they do me wrong. I had rather acknowledge my unworthiness, then complain of their injustice, and suppress my resentments then publish my disgraces. Nevertheless, be not you weary of doing good to the undeserving and obliging those that are out of favour—. Since he is at present as devout as he has been always virtuous, you may tell him (for the obtaining those desired stanzas) that 'tis from Paul the Hermit or St. Hilarion; that they were requested of you. I conceive he has not an opinion good enough of the modern Anchorites: and possibly his coldness for me proceeds from that of my zeal, and the little progress he hath seen me make in piety—. Yet I have had commerce with great Saints both on this and the other side the Mountains and Monsieur de Lorme will test fie to him, that Monsieur the Abbot of—. I am with all my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. March. 12. 1645.   

LETTER XXXIII. To Monsieur Girard Secretary to the late Duke of Espernon.  
SIR,  
YOu must not think the promotion of Monsieur the Precedent Seguier causes only a particular festival at Cadillac; but will be public and universal within these four days. The king has done a good deed to all his Realm, and the year must not be esteemed happy so much for the purity of the air or the fruitfulness of the Earth as for the election of excellent Magistrates. I rejoice at this news as a subject of the Kings, which is the principal regard wherein I consider it; but I have besides a second right to be glad, and that is, out of the interest I have in the raising of a modesty, that is known to me, and the happiness I apprehend to me in the prosperity of a person, of whose probity I am perfectly assured. I know he has preservatives against all the poisons of the Court, and a reason not to be corrupted by all the presents of fortune. There is nothing of so high a value for which he would forsake his virtue. He would have been as resolute a Martyr under Nero as he will be a profitable Minister under a just Prince. The preservation of a life of a few days is not sufficient to induce him to slain that which must remain in the memory of many ages; and the least blot upon his honour would be less supportable to him then the effusion of all his blood. He understands that in the administration of justice, he is not to make laws but only to pronounce th●m; that he is the dispenser not the Master of power; and that soveraingty is in the Law and not in him. And these are the reasons, that in every cause he takes cognisance of, he considers his own, which must one day be heard before a greater Tribunal. He judges, as if Posterity were to review his decrees hereafter, and the time present were subordinate to that to come. Having seriously meditated on the condition of humane affairs, he esteems them at their just value, and adds nothing to their worth by opinion. He hates neither riches nor authority (which was the sullen humour of the Cynics to hate every thing that was lovely.) He but serves himself of them according the doctrine of the Academy and the Licaeum, who did not account them impediments of the Sovereign good, but helps and conveniences to virtue. I have heard him reason in this manner, and so drawn these conclusions from his principles. In a conference I had with him some years since, he seemed to me yet better than I represent him. So that I could not suffer you to rejoice alone, nor read his Elegy in your Letter without testifying to you that I was of that belief before I read it, and there was nothing new amongst the excellent things you told me. The Doctor that is a defier of all Beauty, may, if you please, see the answer I send to the objections which he made against it, etc. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. March. 1. 1633.   

LETTER XXXIIII. To Monsieur L'Huillier Counsellor to the King.  
SIR,  
I Burn with the fire, I have met with in your Letters, and I have got a Fever with reading them. But is it possible that change of air has not been able to cure you, and that you continually bear that heat and amorous inquietude in your breast. Is it true, that having been your beloved in France, I am still one of your idols in Lorraine? Must I believe, that you divide yourself equally between L' Calista and Amintas, and that the Mistress has no advantage over the Favourite? if I were happy enough for this, I would not change my fortune for that of those whom the Court adores. But I cannot doubt of my felicity since I have your word for my assurance, so that the Court has nothing to raise envy in me; and in the possession of a thing so pure and firm as your friendship, I have nothing to do with their smoky and sophisticate incense, but scoff at their frail and ruinous altars. Many times a whole people is not of so much value as one man, I mean a person so perfect as you, who might deserve to be a Magistrate (for it is too little to say, a Citizen) in the Commonwealth of Plato. He that chants me in the Closer, and preaches me up in assemblies, he that is the cause that the good and learned Monsieur Rigault, places me by the side of his Greeks and Romans; prefers me sometimes above them, and revolts against holy and venerable Antiquity infavour of a modern Author. Yet I beseech you, Sir, that the other Monsieur who is learned but not good, know nothing at all of this. He would not endure my good fortune, and your favours would draw his persecution upon me. It would be very difficult for you to protect him, whom you have lately crowned from being beaten down; and it is better for me to retake my place amongst the people, and renounce a crown so full of envy. But if you will not permit me to do this act of humility, yet at the least, let me have your consent to an expedient which I have just now considered of. I will either keep the Crown in my Treasury, or only wear it in secret, to avoid offending the eyes of the Public I will be any thing you would have me in your Letters and your apprehension, but I will not pretend to any other glory before the world, but to be passionately affected by you, and as I am, with all my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. June 14. 1645.   

LETTER XXXV. To Monsieur de la Thibaudiere.  
SIR,  
IF I had had wherewithal to write to you, when your laquay arrived here, I had dispatched him fifteen hours sooner than I have done. But ill fortune would have it so, that Totila, who keeps my hands, had carried them abroad to the Town. So that I was constrained to expect their return to give arms to my choler, and let you know my resentments. Do not conceive that I dissemble and play the part of a Furioso. I am offended, and more sensible of offences than you believe, since your References are not ended I disclaim to have any thing to do with your Eulogies; and since the points of Law hinder me from enjoying you, I do not only curse the fury of Barratry but even blaspheme the Goddess Themis. I also fall foul on another Goddess, which you would never suspect and call Ceres the maker of noise because Virgil called her the maker of Laws. This Epithet has incensed me against her for your sake, and the perplexed confusion of suits makes me hate the Legislators. Three weeks are passed since, I began to break all rule and regiment of diet, that I dine always in alarm, and imagine every moment when you should arrive. The Ladies are come hither on purpose to attend your coming, and to assist me to discharge the honour of the house. But in the mean time in great contempt of the Ladies and them, you render Oracles at home to Sempronia and Maevia, and give audience to Titius and Seius, etc. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. May. 12. 1638.   

LETTER XXXVI. To the same.  
SIR,  
I Proclaim your probity every where, and always allege you, when the discourse is of a faithful man. Yet the month of July is passed, and I have your hand and seal here which accuses you of being not yet come. You promised me to bring plenty with you, and to surround me at the same time with temporal goods, and spiritual riches. I will believe, to speak your language, that the inward man is clear of all this, but the exterior is not at all acquitted. I have seen neither the Cheeses nor the Gennets; neither Verse nor Prose; neither the Chancellor Bacon, nor the Precedent d'Espagnet. I know not what to conceive of it seeing the exact and punctual regularity whereof you make profession, and I will dispatch a man on purpose to know the truth. I would cause him to go with this Ticket, being bound by Oath to write no more Letters: But he protested he would not present himself before you with empty hands. He told me moreover, out of his familiarity with me, that he would allow me to make a sermon or an Oration, if I were so conscientious as not to dictate a Letter to him; and he has thought himself to draw two pieces out of his Register, presuming you will take delight to read them, because he does so to copy them. If Monsieur— I should be glad, he may be partaker with you: you know I have a most particular esteem of his judgement, and that a young Cato is worth a whole senate of Graybeards. That which makes me not to hope ill of my French, is, that he did not judge my Latin barbarous, and that the inartificial simplicity of my verse found favour in his eyes. Having fallen casually from the mouth of him that made them, they ought to have died in the secrecy of him that received them: But their good fortune has been greater than their merit; and since that time they have almost persuaded me to think myself a Poet. Being approved by a person, that is not less of the Court of Augustus, then of that of Lewis the thirteenth, his approbation has encouraged me to a new heat; and the honour which he has done to five or six stragglers is the cause that has induced me to form a Body of sixty and more: which I beseech you to present him, with the two pieces of the Register, etc. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Aug. 4. 1638.   

LLTTER XXXVII. To Monsieur de Bois-Robert Metel, Abbot of Chastillon.  
SIR,  
YOur Letter of the sixth of the past month, gives me no new knowledge; it confirms me only in my old opinions. You are always the father of courtesies, and the common good of the whole world. But you are principally necessary to the learned world, and the Common wealth of good Letters. Were it not for you, the Orators would be perpetually exclaiming in their Orations, against the Times and Manners; and the Poets would do nothing in their Verses, but curse Apollo and the Muses. The good offices which you do them with his Eminence, temper their bad humour, and give them thoughts less violent. So that, to consider things from their Original, there is no Ode nor Panegyric at this day, whereof you are not the first Author; and Posterity will be obliged to you for all the Latin and French of our Age. But beside the Panegyric and Ode—; etc. I beseech you in the mean time to secure the affair; and since you know that times consumes things as it ripens them, continue me your care and diligence both for the one and for the other assignation. I am passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc.   

LETTER XXXVIII. To the same.  
SIR,  
I Am astonished at the design of Madam de Motteville concerning me. I did not imagine my name was known to so excellent a Person, and there was so muth goodness at Court as would oblige without importunity. As it is a favour above the common Standard; so my resentments must not be in an ordinary measure. But do not you counsel to depute that office to your most reverend Lordship? Since you know better how to set it off then I, and that she has been excited to a good action only by the inducement of her virtue, she will not refuse to continue that goodness at your entreaties, which are attended with the force of so much eloquence. Your last Verses seemed to me very excellent and natural; but I have known long ago, that you are none of those violents that take our Goddesses by force, quique in Parnassum irrumpunt diis hominibusque invitis. Were it not for you, the comparison of Cleopatra would be no longer in the world; which now cannot perish, being she finds her preservation in your memory. The care you have taken of her is an evidence of her predestination, or if you would have me speak less Theologically, there is no appearance, that I should neglect that which is now more yours than mine, and which you judged worthy to be kept a long time in the Cabinet of excellent things, so I call your memory, Sir, etc. I am always perfectly,  
Decem. 26. 1644. Your, etc.   

LETTER XXXIX. To Monsieur Conrart, Counsellor and Secretary to the King.  
SIR,  
MY melancholy corrupts the greatest pleasures of my life. I am unsatisfied with the sweetness of light, and nothing in the world would content me, if I had not two or three persons in it, that are to me instead of all. You are a part of this little world, which I esteem so dear; I have chosen you with the refusal of the Sun and the Court; and in the most gloomy and sad nights, only your Idea framed in my imagination gives me sensible comforts. Therefore what will not your Letters do, which are so sincere and amorous; and infinitely more your presence, which your Letters promise me? But there is no longer a Madam Desloges to invite you to the Village; and to hope such a visit but from the like attractive, is beyond the belief I have of my desert. Nevertheless, it is perhaps a design of your goodness, and you have resolved to make me happy. If there needs no more but the good interval you speak of to bring me that felicity, I shall presently betake myself to my vows to the goddess of Health for it. I will compose her a Hymn, to obtain a months release from your Gout. And to speak my conscience, she will not more oblige me in restoring me the vigour of my first years, in giving me a second youth, yea in giving herself to me, then in granting me those thirty days of so dear a society. They would be days of which I should make benefit every moment, and would requite me for all the time I have lost amongst pretenders and false friends. My spirit which is corrupted by the neighbourhood of bad examples would be restored to purity by your excellent communication. You would purge me from all the errors of the people, and the defects of the Country. You would make me live in earnest. The life of the fortunate Islands or that of the Elysian fields; those which the Poets spin of Gold and Silk would be but low resemblances of it—. But I must repress my course. Poor men are never more sensible of, and more afflicted with their poverty, then when they have dreamt of riches. I am to the utmost of my power, and without reserve,  
SIR, Your, &c, Apr. 25. 1647.    
FINIS.   

FAMILIAR LETTERS, OF M. de BALZAC, To M. CHAPELAIN.  

The First Book.  

LETTER I.  
SIR,  
IT is out of doubt, nothing of Alarm hath yet been apprehended by us from Paris. Nevertheless it is true, that a Gentleman of quality informed my father, of the Prince's indignation, and the complaints of the Queen his mother: But the Queen is of too great goodness, to have given that rigorous command, which is reported to us; and there is not much likelihood, that the Prince should say at brussels, he would set my house on fire, if he came with his Army into Guienne. This burning would indeed somewhat more displease me, then that which my Book suffered, by the courageous marquis d'Ayt●na, Houses, as you know, are not printed; nor can there be more copies of them made at the same time. But I am very averse from believing, that those words fell from the lips, of the son of Henry the Great; an action of that kind, would not be the fairest part of his History: It is not the manner of Eagles to stoop at Flies. We are too inconsiderable objects, for his high and redoubtable displeasure. And what presumption would it be in a man, that is not appointed with a hundred Arms, nor of strength enough, to pile Mountains one upon another, to esteem himself worthy of the vengeance of Jupiter, or at least, of one of his sons? I expect some of your news by the Post on Friday, and remain,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac. 1 June 1636.   

LETTER II.  
SIR,  
IT must needs be, that either I did not deliver myself well, in the Conference I had with your friend, or he ill understood my intention. For I desire nothing from Doctor B. but the honour of his good opinion, which he hath solemnly promised me; nor from the Sorbonne, but the enjoyment of the peace they accorded me, in the most ample form that I could request. It would be very strange, if I should be enforced to the further trouble of Negotiation and Ambassadors, to treat that old Peace anew. I believed that affair to be as well dead at Paris, as it was buried in oblivion at Balzac. The homage which the Faculty required of me, I have already rendered them; and was assured, that the Gentlemen were therewith satisfied. Hereafter let us visit them as our Friends, and cease to solicit them as Judges. I conceive Doctor B. reputes himself, of having treated me too civilly; perhaps he expected, I should have taken an attire of mourning, and suffered my hair and beard to grow down to my girdle, to the end I might have presented myself before him, in the fashion of an accused person, and an humble suppliant. His Doctoral severity must not proceed so far. And I entreat you, tell your friend, that it is not reasonable to oppress people with formalities, which are to no purpose, and never have an end. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 15 June 1636.   

LETTER III.  
SIR,  
YOu are not ignorant, that in the affair of the Sorbonne, I comported myself with the docility and flexiblenesse of a Novice: And although I had as much reason to maintain my opinions, as they to oppose them, yet I forbore to make use of my right, or defend myself against my fathers. My submission will possibly one day be proposed for Imitation; and I would fain believe, that for the future I shall be left to my undisturbed quiet. In former years, I was of the number of those thirsters after honour, to whom, both days and nights were rendered restless, by the desire of conquest. At present, I am altogether another person; I love rather to sleep in the silence and calm of peace, then to be wakened from my repose, by all the Trumpets of Victory. Let us keep close to the Pater noster, and determine ourselves, with the other pieces of that nature: There is none but God, that can speak fitly of God, because there is none but God that knows God; All that men of themselves speak concerning him, is no other but stammering, incongruity, and soloecism, in the language and science of Heaven. And you are not to learn, that, De divinis, etiam vera dicere periculosum. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 June 1636.   

LETTER IU.  
SIR,  
I Am not much troubled to be dead at Paris, provided that I live at Balzac; the Letter I writ you about eight days since, hath given you assurance of this truth, whereof a flying report had caused you to doubt. Though I be not of much value, I perceive, you would have had a sensible regret of my loss; and I am greatly satisfied of your affe n. The only resentment I have, is, that your judgement doth not appear so favourable to me, as your inclination, and that you refuse me that agreeable fruit, which I aim at in all my actions; I mean, the contentment of having pleased you. You make scruple to pronounce upon the Letter, which I writ to an Achilles of the cause, because a Thorsites of the same cause hath told you, that it displeased him to whom it was sent. I have learned the contrary from himself. And besides the civilities of his Answer, he hath caused a thousand compliments to be made me in person, by a famous Hugenot of this Province. The comparison between him and Hannibal, both of them sworn enemies of Rome, did him honour, and, I know, was not displeasing to him. The word Finesse could not any ways disgust him; in the place where it is, it signifies only address, knowledge, and subtlety. The fineness of a language, and the fineness of an art, are terms of no bad sense. And if I had said, that such a Captain, by some certain means, had finely concealed the weakness of his Town, it must needs be, that this Captain were more rude than a Gascone, and that his bravery extended to a dislike of good reason and prudence, if he took it ill, that I spoke of his fineness. As for Hannibal, I am most confident, he was of no such humour, he did not account himself affronted, by the recital sometimes of his stratagems and sleights; for it was no more, then to intimate to him, that he not only knew how to overcome his enemies; but that he could also overcome them by mockery and sport. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 30 June 1636.   

LETTER V.  
SIR,  
THe objections of Paris are insupportable, and the interpreters of the Fauxbourgh of St. German, take all my words to a contrary sense. I perceive, that to avoid being contradicted, it is necessary that I give over speaking. If I am so unhappy as to injure my friends, when I caresse them, reason requires, that for the good of civil society, I change my solitude into a prison, and chain up myself for the safety of my friends. Will the world be always thus unjust and impertinent? and will there never be any other, to judge of the productions of the soul, but lumps of flesh and matter? I think I cannot call them beasts by a more civil expression. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 8 July 1636.   

LETTER VI.  
SIR,  
I Received two of your Letters by the same Post, which gave me knowledge of some news, whereof I was before ignorant, and confirmed the relations of others. I am always of your opinion, and particularly, concerning the King of Sweden- I wish only, that he had not so much of the Germane in his countenance, and that in this great country of faces (as Queen Margaret sometimes called it) he had more brown, and less yellow; more of shadow, and fewer rays. And this, to the end that he might nearer resemble in his outside, Caesar and Alexander. His portrait would please me much better; for as to his actions, they are all Greek, and all Roman: And I see nothing amongst them, that might not become the days of the Hero's. The Panegyric which was made him, seems to be obscure and entangled, & in eâ deprehendas vitia degenerantis Latinitatis. The style of this man was more commendable twenty years ago, he hath learned to write ill by writing continually, and is grown a Jade in his Carrier. They that have a greater stock of judgement then of imagination, are not subject to these inconveniences; Their eloquence becomes ripe without corruption of their speech; And I am well assured that the good wine you tell me of will never lose its strength by age. A thousand salutes to our dear friends. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 15 July 1636.   

LETTER VII.  
SIR,  
I Do not conceive that my exile must be eternal, but hope to see Paris once again unless you forsake it, and Rome also if it be thither that your destiny calls you. But, I beseech you expound me the riddles of your last Letters, and do not constrain me any more to divine. I have no fancy to those reservations of prudence, which give me much trouble, and do you no service. Our commerce is most innocent; and being no dispersers of dangerous news, let us defy all informers, and commissaries, if fortune be resolved to try you, I wish it may be by something that may deserve your yeeldance to the temptation, With all my soul, I pardon that cruel Goddess, all the injuries she hath done me, on condition she will treat you favourably, and have consideration of your merit, I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 july 1636.   

LETTER VIII.  
SIR,  
I Am not forward to dislike the freedom you are pleased to use with me. But I beseech you, to allow something to my melancholy, and to bear with the irregularities of an indisposed spirit. I am proud of the esteem you make of my discourse, notwithstanding I am unsatisfied, whether that esteem be real, or only a means you take, to appeafe the humour you conceive you have provoked. Should you offer your wisdom to me crude and undressed? perhaps I might find some difficulty to relish it. But being, as it is, accompanied with so great goodness, there is no Rhubarb can have a bad taste, with such a mixture. I presage some news, that troubles me already, but I believe it advantageous to your benefit. The Secretariship of an Embassy to Rome, was the first step to the fortunes of Cardinal d'Ossat. Yet if Fate have so decreed it, you must bid adieu to the Maid of Orleans, and the Epic Poem. I dare not mention my own concernments. It is certain, this voyage will be destructive to many fair proposals, that I have made you. I was in full expectation to have seen you here, where I should have constrained you, to have passed the remainder of the Summer with me. But I am too unfortunate, ever to enjoy you; and fortune will detain you at Rome, though but on purpose to despite me. Let me know, if you please, whether your departure from Paris will be suddenly; and, before you leave it, take special order for the security of our commerce. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 1 August 1636.   

LETTER IX.  
SIR,  
THe kinsman of Vercingentorix knows not his own desires, nor discerns his advantages: He is very culpable to contest with you, concerning a charge, which he ought to re-establish, in favour of a person of your merit, although it had been, as he pretends, suppressed. I am very glad to hear the change of you remote employment, for one nearer us, which gives me hope to find you at Paris, when I take a journey thither a purpose for a visit. Which when I have form, I shall account you in my debt for another, and think it not impossible, to draw you hither to eat of our Muscates, and meditate upon the banks of our river. The excellent Provincial, of whom you send me news, hath you continually both in his heart and mouth. The acquisition you have made of this man is most firm, and you need not doubt it. It will not stand you in much care, travel, or industry, to preserve him. The amity of those people whereof you tell me, is of another nature. It is of little value, and very much trouble. What great pity it is there should be Asses, which should require as much guard and observance, as Lions. I esteem myself happy to be sixscore leagues distant from that sort of men. And which is more, I account their absence into part of the revenue of my House. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 8. August 1636.   

LETTER X.  
SIR,  
IT is rare that I am mistaken above once, for I give but little credit to the esteem of great Persons, nor to the Testimony of the People; so that I am not dazzled with the name and dignity of two men whose strength and weakness I have been acquainted with, these ten years. The first, is all memory and fancy; for judgement, that must be sought otherwhere: for in fifty Conferences that we have had together, I could never discover one small glimpse of it: A great personage in Greek, Hebrew, and Arabic! but no body in the vulgar tongue; the sport of Cavaliers and Ladies, and a mere Doctor Gratian to you and me, as often as we desire the divertisement of a Comedy. The other is less tolerable, for he will not be flouted so familiarly, nor licence the company to leave him, when they desire; for other matters, you may take my word that he is but a pitiful Orator, as I took that of Monsieur Malherbe for his Poetry. Heretofore he endangered my life with three great Manuscripts, or rather three great Engines in folio, whereof One was called Overtures made at St. Martin's after Easter etc. Another, at the Entry of Prince's Governors, etc. And the third, an Argument or Plea for the King, etc. Monsieur can bear witness of my patience and the persecution of this man. He hath many times come into my Chamber at break of day and never departed till he carried night with him. You may imagine, if during that time, I could be possibly at my ease, and if I had not had a better market with a fit of a  of four and twenty hours then with so much Pedantry and Fustian Galimatias, as I was enforced to hear, and must needs make semblance to approve. Nevertheless he continues in the repute of a man of sufficiency, acquits his charge well, and is employed in Negotiations and Treaties which he brings to effect: he hath a happy memory, a lively imagination, and the gift of impudence, even in a degree more eminent than hath Monsieur De. ****. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 15. August 1636.   

LETTER XI.  
SIR,  
DO not cause me to languish in the expectation of a good, whereof your last Letter gave me a promise; and send me that Ode which must accomplish the felicity of a happy man, and add a Crown to his other Crowns, to speak in the phrase of our Monsieur De la Thibaudiere. The stanza's of Monsieur **** are not in my opinion, of the excellentest sort of his productions. There are some verses which I cannot relish; but it may be the fault lies in my palate. Is it not strange that this framer of stanzas should exhort me to adore that deity, who hath so long time derided both my vows and my incense? I am not so pertinacious a Courtier, and I resign all my hopes and my pretensions to him. If he receives good words at present, I have heretofore had solemn offers of love and friendship. And if he is told, you shall have this; oaths have been passed to me that I should have that and more; yet nothing ever fell into my hands. He that promises these wonders, is very rich and very powerful, I do not question it; but I also know, that he understands not either to judge of verse, or acquits himself of his promises: insomuch, that unless he cut his purse, he runs the adventure of being but ill paid; and if he be not advertised of the good things that are in his verses, he will never take the pains to observe them. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 August 1636.   

LETTER XII.  
SIR,  
THe discourse of this Country hath been no other for this month, but of the spiritual works of Monsieur Godeau. I can scarce believe that he has wholly forgotten me, and I think that fai●e present will at length be sent me. However it be, he hath too great an opinion of my patience, and will not treat me in manner of a person of a keen appetite. I am much more forward and diligent than he; for I send you this morning, that which I understood but last midnight you desired to see. You may know by Monsieur de la Hoguette that this Madam d'Anguitar is no ordinary person. She is extremely admired by those that see her; and though she be but seldom visible, and allows the greater part of her hours to none but herself; yet her rare merit justifies her from any one's exceptions at her solitary humour. She is a light that shuns the eyes of men and seeks obscurity. People speak not of her but by conjecture and divination. She meditates, she studies, and enjoys herself in her Cabinet; yet she cannot always so well shut her door, but fame finds an entry, and reports us the tidings. That rambling goddess repeats to us continually some pleasant things which she hath gathered from the mouth of this Sedentary divinity. Whereupon we make our benefit; and Monsieur De la Thibaudiere keeps the register. In a short time you shall see the Collection with his Commentaries. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 30 August 1636.   

LETTER XIII.  
SIR,  
YOur Letters are my sweetest consolations, and I receive none, from which I do not find good, eight days after. In your paquet I met with one of our banished friends, it had been unripped and sealed again before it came to your hands. It seems if it had carried any matter of danger, and which smelled of the bad air of brussels from whence it came, they would not have been contented, to have only opened and reclosed it. These curiosities are not at all commendable. But I desire no further light in this business, and you would disoblige me if my complaint come to any other ears. My proceed have been misreported to you, nor have I stripped me to my shirt, according to your information. Indeed I have changed the nature of that fortune that fell to me in partage, and received money in lieu of land; but my revenue is not at all straightened thereby. The house which my father built, and would pass for magnificent at Paris, deserves to be retained; my brother is more capable of the care that it requires, than I; so he shall have the propriety, and I will partake of the accommodation with him. I am ravished with the esteem you make of the Letter, to Madam d'Anguitar, she hath caused copies of it to fly throughout all Guienne; and I am not able to make it any longer a secret. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 8 Septemb. 1636.   

LETTER XIV.  
SIR,  
Will you never cease to be thus credulous to my prejudice? this is the second time that your easiness has done me injury: I am wholly a stranger to that great and intimate friend you tell me of, and my memory does not afford me any representation or shadow of him; if I have ever seen him, I took no regard of him, it was either in a dream, or in a crowd; or perhaps it was one day, that my sight was not well cleared, and I brought no attention to the objects that passed before me. So it is, that whether I have forgotten this great and intimate friend, or never knew him, that his name never came into my memory, or immediately vanished thence, I utterly renounce his friendship. You may please to know once for all, that the passion I have for you, is in no common measure, nor such as will permit me to be in neutrality. I am none of those sages, that love with so much reservedness and circumspection. I approve sometimes of breaches, open declarations, and Ligues offensive and defensive. And if this person were not an incognito, but my own brother, that had attempted your mischief, I should never be induced to pardon him, unless it were only at your intercession. I am,  
SIR Your, etc. Balzac, 15 Septemb. 1636.   

LETTER XV.  
SIR,  
YOu must indulge my humour, that I cannot at present be serious with you. The pleasant news of your Letter hath transported me into such an excess of jollity, that it is not in my power to refrain smiling. You tell me, you are received by favour, into the Academy of good wits, and I would fain understand, who received the good wits, that received you? upon what grnund is their authority established, and whence have they the approbation to be currant? What are those great personages, that have done this especial grace to Monsieur Chapelain? from what new discovered Countries, are these extraordinary men arrived? who, that they may confer honour on Monsieur Chapelain, must needs be of somewhat more worth, than Monsieur the Cardinal of Perron, and than Monsieur the Precedent de Thou? Tell me yet further, I beseech you, what is that you call, Director? and that which ******? What ever wonders you may relate me thereof, you will scarce persuade me, and I shall find a great deal of reluctancy, to adore the rising Sun you speak of. Some have given me intelligence of it, as of a fatal Comet, that threatens us, and a terrible thing, and of more dread, than the holy Inquisition. They writ, that it is a tyranny, which must be established over all wits, and to which it is required, that all makers of Books should yield a blind obedience. If it be so, I am both a Rebel and a Heretic, and intent to list myself on the side of the Barbarians. This is a great word, but most true. You are the only person I can allow, to be sovereign of my liberty. And if there be no means to live independent in the world, I entreat you, let me not be enforced to acknowledge, either in Verse or Prose, any other jurisdiction but yours. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 22 Septemb. 1636.   

LETTER XVI.  
SIR,  
I Crave your pardon, for my over great credulity; forgive me, I beseech you, my fears and my alarms. I am in dread of all sort of yokes, and Tyranny casts me into fear, even in the histories of Athens and Syracuse. I was ill informed of the nature of your Academy; without question, the picture that was sent me of it, was not drawn after the life. You have done me the kindness to undeceive me; and I well see, this new Society will be none of the least glories of the Kingdom of France; it will raise jealousy, and perhaps envy, in Italy. And if I have any skill in drawing a Horoscope, it will in a short space become the Oracle, of all civilised Europe. I am glad that Monsieur the Keeper of the Seals, and Monsieur Servien, are admitted of it. But I should be also contented, that some others, which have been named to me, were not; or, at least, that they had no deliberative voice. It would be well, if they satisfied themselves with placing the chairs, and to open and shut the door. They might be of the Academy, but in the quality of Beadles or lay-Fryers: It were necessary, that they made up a part of your body, as the Ushers are part of the Parliament. But it may be, I am mistaken in my latter news, and they which were mentioned to me, have not received the honour that is reported; it is probable, you know better how to choose. By all means I desire, that there may be two Orders of Academicians, and that you remember at your first sitting, to separate the Patricians from the People. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 30 Septemb. 1636.   

LETTER XVII.  
SIR,  
I Have received your Letter of the twentieth of this Month, and bestowed the same caresles on it, that I used to the former; I kissed it, as I read it, which is not a ceremony without example; the Cardinal Barronius performed that reverence to all those he received from the Cardinal of Perron. Having perused it, and done my devotions to it, I treasured it up in my Cabinet. Concerning that other, which I ●rit to that poor Gentleman that is slain, 'tis glory to me, that the Prince does not dislike it. But all the glory in the world has not charms enough, to cause me to forget the loss I suffer of that person so dear unto me. When he forsook Paris to run unto Death, which awaited him before Mastricht; he came to take his horse at my lodging, where we parted with tears and sorrow: Between us there was a sworn friendship, of the heroical ages; and we intended to outdo Orestes and Pylades. That which I have written of him, and you so highly prize, must be no more, than the preface of our History. What would you then have said, of entire Volumes, and I know not how many Decades I had designed him, if his courage, which was his ruin, had allowed me leisure to compose them? Thus we propose mighty enterprises upon Earth, and are great undertakers: 

Mais dans le Ciel on se moque de nous,  
Preschoit, un jour, reverend Pere Arnoux.   

But, as of old the reverend Arnauld taught,  
Heaven scorns our plots, and brings our hopes to naught.    
I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 6 Octob. 1636.   

LETTER XVIII.  
SIR,  
I Am extremely satisfied with your Letter, and as much astonished at the request which was made me, by our friend of Languedoc; not but that I do very readily accord it to him, but for that I am of the opinion of that honest man of old, who said, He had rather have an outrage done him, than an injury offered to his reason. I never heard of so pleasant a scruple; and if I did believe him the Author of it, I should suffer myself to abate somewhat, of the esteem I have of him. But I understand, by what head these pretty difficulties are brought forth, and therefore shall discover no further to you. Though the word of illustrious Stripling, or of illustrious young man, or illustrious youth, may afford matter of raillery; you know, 'tis a condition of mirth, not to be apprehended as offensive; as for instance: The appellation of Salapusium disertum, did not put the Orator Calvus into choler; and lepidissimus homuncio, was not displeasing to the Poet Horace: So that if our friend is jealous, lest the name of illustrious Youth should stick upon him, he fears what he should rather desire, and which a Roman would have received as a great piece of honour. Perhaps he never heard of those grandes praetextati, the Scholars of Cicero: They were of greater age than he, they commanded Armies, and were Consuls at the same time; and after all this, did not account it an affront, to be treated as young men. But what will he say, when he shall see in the divine Jerusalem, that Rinaldo is in divers places called Youth, and even without the additions of brave, valiant, or illustrious. Such men as are illustrious, own a great part of their glory to time; but illustrious youths are indebted, for near all theirs. By consequence, those two sorts of glories, are much different, and one is fairer than the other; The glory of youth is a light, as it were, proper and natural to it, and which it seems rather to produce, then receive; the glory of riper age, is a light fetched from abroad, either gotten or borrowed, which arises more out of exploits and actions, then from the person; and hath greater advantage by the length of life, than the nobleness of the subject. But without further Philosophising glory, it is necessary to comply with the fancies of Languedoc, and to deal with the world according to its humour. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 14 Octob, 1636.   

LETTER XIX.  
SIR,  
MY words are not so dear to me, but that I freely bestow them on you, to deal with them as you please; and my Stationer is not so ignorant of my affection, but that he might have obeyed you, without expecting my answer; you have therefore used your power over me, with too much moderation. There was no necessity, to cause the dispatch of an Order six score leagues, for an affair, which you might have determined upon the place, and whereto I should have readily yielded my allowance. Since you have not done it, but spared to exercise your right, I now send you my consent, together with a declaration to you, that my will shall ever be conformable to yours, although it may happen, there may be some contrariety in our opinions. Nevertheless, I cannot persuade myself, that the scruple you propound me, is your own, or Monsieur Chapelain's, since you are both wise with sobriety, according to the precept of the Apostle. It must needs be issued from some head of those Refiners, whose faculty lies in the destruction of things, already finished, and are good only to raise difficulties, after resolutions are concluded. If it were otherwise, and you the author of this subtlety, I believe, I should have known your intention two months since, and you received satisfaction. But there is no ground of likelihood for this, nor to accuse you, as the enemy of your Spring, and its Roses. I do not imagine, that you pretend to old age, and that your actions being infinitely fair, you would defalk the moiety of their beauty, and your glory, which has appeared to great advantage, for that you performed them in the earliness of your youth. The number of illustrious men is far greater, then that of illustrious youths; and Caesar wept, because he was not illustrious till his manhood. Valerius Corvinus was called Adolescens, after he had been Consul; and Scipio and Pompey, after they had triumphed. Yet none of them misliked the raillery of the people of Rome, or complained, of being treated as young men. Virgil did not think he should offend the victorious Augustus, when he termed him, as I you: 
Hunc saltem everso Juvenem succurrere sêclo,  
Nè prohibete—  Cicero speaks often of Brutus in the same manner, and his princeps juventutis signifies no more, than the illustrious youth of our discourse. He calls Hircius and Pansa, who were created Consuls the year that Caesar was slain, duos grandes praetextaios, which is a title without comparison, more liable to raillery than mine. Notwithstanding we never heard, that they were scandalised at it, or that any person demanded reparation on their part. On the contrary, Seneca the father, thought it so good, that he chose rather to design them by this word, then by their proper names. In illo atriolo, in quo duos grandes praetextatos ait secum declamare solitos, potui illud ingenium cognoscere, quod solum populus Romanus par imperio suo habuit. You, that know all this, and much more, are not, without doubt, but the interpreter of some friend a little too nice, and you relate me his conceit, and not your own. One of these days, perhaps, he will advise Don Garsias, and the Duke of Infantada, to change their names, because they contain something of Garcon, and Infant. Prudence hath both its bounds, and its excels. This perpetual circumspection, is a troublesome virtue; and it were better to be a little heavy and blockish, then to take so much pains to be wise. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 14 Octob. 1636.   

LETTER XX.  
SIR,  
THe Ode of the Poet of nineteen years old is no despicable beginning. But though you had not sent me the name of his Master, I should easily have conjectured him, by the green coat which his Scholar bestows on the goddess Flora. Such are the erroneous raillaries of our dear friends the followers of Caporalli. Those people are neither acquainted with the nature of our Language, nor the genius of our Poetry. They account it a fine fancy to make the fatal sisters laugh, and to place the Patten of Venus upon Minerva's face. We dare not allow ourselves that licence, and should look upon such entravagancies as unsufferable in a novice. It may be the Poet will reform himself with the increase of years, and some charitable friend will direct him to the better way. If he be apprehensive, and propound Monsieur Chapelain for his example, whose style is so chaste and orderly, 'tis possible he may become a very gallant man. But if he adhere to the advices of his Master, he is lost beyond recovery. Let him therefore choose according to his capacity, the good or the evil th●t is set before him: for if he continue in that manner he has undertaken, I must give him this answer, that he is likely to become one of the most ridiculous Poets of our age. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 Octob, 1636.   

LETTER XXI.  
SIR,  
THe Letter which I lately received from Monsieur de Colommiers hath comforted me in a great measure; and the signification of the happy news of your return, hath given me assurance of a good, whereof I began to despair. So that I promise myself the felicity of embracing you, before I leave Paris and the enjoyment of that  afternoon, of which your engagement hath raised an ardent expectation. The benefit of it will be, that I shall return into Barbary with your benediction, which cannot but carry happiness with it. But you will do yet somewhat more; you will enable me to resist the badness of the air for a long time; you will fortify me with preservatives and receipts against the Contagion of Galimatias, Gibberish, and Solecisms of Gascony, and other like popular evils which seize upon our great Lords, after four months' continuance in the Country; I humbly thank you before hand, for the good you will do me, and am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Paris, 15. May.   

LETTER XXII.  
SIR,  
TO satisfy your goodness, and give you the account of my adventures, I shall tell you, that I am happily arrived at my own house, and that I met with neither War nor Enemies betwixt Paris and Angoulesme; the news of the coming of Monsieur the Count de Brassac, had before cleared the ways of all bad company; he is, undeniably, that Vir quis, in the first of the Aeneids, whose appearance is able to appease a popular sedition: And you must grant me, that in his countenance he carries some kind of resemblance of Neptune, when he grows in choler against the winds. I beseech Heaven, that the cure of our other distempers, be of no greater difficulty than this; and that the Croates put us to no more trouble than the Croquans. They have done too much for good subjects, and too little for Rebels. This is also an effect of the King's fortune. Under his Reign, even wickedness itself is innocent, and fury is discreet and respectful. We will treat of this another time more at large: I have need of rest, and you are not concerned with Politics; I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac,   

LET. XXIII.  
SIR,  
HAnnibal is then at the Gates, since the Enemy hath gotten passage over the River of Soame. Your Letter has made me partake of your inconveniences, and knowing you to be in trouble, I cannot relish my own repose. If the condition of affairs grow worse, I do not question but you have choice of sanctuaries. The place that shall receive your flying Muses, will be ever glorious by that honour, and shall in future ages be renowned for the retreat of those illustrious Guests. But you must remember, that in that case, you cannot oblige any other than myself, without doing me injury; and if there be one glance of Peace on this side the River Loire, you will find it more serene in our Village, then amongst our Neighbours. I conjure you therefore in all affection, to grant me this favour which I demand of you, and come take full possession of a small signory. The Pucelle shall enjoy her entire liberty, and be absolute Mistress of the House. I am ready to meet you as fare as Tours, unless you had rather I should send the Seigneur Totila with my Caroche, for the more convenience of your journey. I expect your answer, and remain,  
SIR, Yours, etc. Balzac, July 1636.   

LET. XXIV.  
SIR,  
I must know myself better. I have not so well deserved of fortune, as to hope the happiness of seeing you here; and I confess it no small presumption, to have flattered myself with such a thought, but you know that great passions are sometimes inconsiderate, and always credulous. They that have forward desires, fall into dreams, although they do not sleep. Pardon me therefore what I have transgressed, and live still at Paris with more quiet and sweetness, than the state of the times, and the face of affairs seem to promise you a month longer. For the Marotte or trifle you speak of (so you are pleased to term the design of your Poem) I have a greater esteem of it, then of any Sceptre whatsoever. I am fare from advising you to abandon that enterprise which you have attempted with the vows and applause of all France. Nor will I be so cruel an enemy to Posterity, as to stifle Heroes and Heroesses in their Cradle. Seek another Counsellor of your Parricides, and do not believe that I approve what hath been inspired you by your evil Angel; I am.  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 30. Aug. 1636.   

LET. XXV.  
SIR,  
Two days since, I received the Book of Monsieur Hensius, which was Printed by the Elzevirs. It is bigger by a third part then the Manuscript that was shown you. Notwithstanding, it contains nothing in all that bulk to our purpose, nothing which I could not defeat with advantage, if I were a person inclinable to quarrel, and did not prefer my repose above my reputation. But I do not resent matters so deeply, and have less thirst after glory than some have imagined. It is not my design to assemble the people, and make pastime to the spectators. And though I may pass for a Craven in the Country of Latin, I shall not be accounted a less honest man at the House of Ramboüillet. You have goodness enough to conserve that happiness you gained for me there, I mean the esteem of the two divine Persons. And remember them upon opportunity, that in the quality of one sick and afflicted, I do at least deserve so much friendship, as to be pitied. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 4 Novemb. 1636.   

LETTER XXVI.  
SIR,  
I Had not so great apprehensions of fear for my Paquet, as for you. It was a long time before I heard any tidings of it, and I began to be jealous of your welfare. We drink your health here solemnly with the Marquis of Montaufier. And there wanted nothing either in our Cups, or our Wishes, that might make you as sound and flourishing, as Marc Anthony, and Dolabella. It must be acknowledged that this Marquis is a Cavalier of great worth, and very deserving of your affection and esteem. As for me, I expect extraordinary performances from him, and that which was told me a while since of the late Monsieur his Brother, seems of good conceit. That Madam his Mother did not begin her teeming but with a Hero, that she might at length content herself with bringing forth a Man. But I adjoin thereto, That she hath been very happy to succeed twice in so high and difficult an enterprise. I have lost the Sonnet that consecrates the memory of the deceased, and which you bestowed on me at Paris. Be pleased to oblige me with a Copy, and make me partaker of some of your other rarities. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Angoulesme, 18 Novemb. 1636.   

LETTER XXVII.  
SIR,  
SInce you will have it so, that I must be indebted to the honest Camusat, for the Present you sent me, you must do me the favour to return him many thanks. It is fitting that good man be admitted of our Society, and become our Flantin; for it would be somewhat too much, to term him Manucio. That Plantin so famous for his understanding in his Profession, and the impression of the great Bible, was otherwise wholly ignorant of the Latin Tongue. He did, indeed, make semblance of skill in it, and his friend Justus Lipsius, concealed that secret very faithfully till his death. He writ him Letters in Latin, but in the same Paquet he sent him the interpretation in Dutch. Martial makes frequent mention of a Bookseller Triphon, and Quintilian entreats his care in the Edition of his Book, by an express for that purpose. Perhaps ours is not inferior to theirs, and your testimony is sufficient to persuade me to all good opinions of him. Be pleased to send me the name, that Cavalier Marin bestowed on him; for I am so unhappy as to have forgot it, and, as I remember, it afforded no small pleasure to my fancy. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 29 Novemb. 1636.   

LET. XXVIII.  
SIR,  
THe Princess Julia is doubly admirable, both in her person, and in your Verse. But I am much afraid she should induce you to prove, inconstant to the Virgin of Orleans, and that the living will cause the dead to be forgotten. You must take heed of drawing the reproach of so great infidelity upon you, and remember that there lies a vow upon your design, and by consequence his Holiness himself, according to the opinion of most Divines, is not able to discharge you from it. As for myself, I spend my leisure after my ordinary custom, I meditate all day, and would believe not without success, because you are satisfied therewith. If Heaven would bless me with that great benefit of health, I should endeavour to content you after another manner, and my spirit being at liberty, its elevations would be fare more strong and vigorous, notwithstanding you bestow the term of Sublimity upon the last composition of mine you received. But in conclusion, behold a passage not unpleasant. You request my permission to dispose of a sheet of Paper in your hands, and will not touch my Trifles without solemn licence, you, that have sovereign power to dispose of my life and fortunes. Either you are ignorant of that power, or dissemble it; in plain terms, you are too ceremonious, and too great a formalist, for a man on this side the Mountains. A Florentine bred up in the Court of Rome, could have done no more. Without question, saying to me, con lic●nza, you would have the echo answer, con authorita. To finish my Letter in the language of the Country of Compliments, Vo signoria è Padrone; although I am in all the rigour of truth,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 1 Decemb. 1636.   

LETTER XXIX.  
SIR,  
THe urgency of business has drawn me by force out of my repose. I have been in my travel, almost these five weeks; at present I am in the Province of Limosni, where I received your Letter of the six and twentieth of the last month, and that excellent Poem you did me the favour to send in company with it. It was opened in the enchanted Closet, and by Madam Desloges. I was made choice of to read it, and I can assure you without flattery, there was no Stanza that wanted acclamation, and most of them had their applause redoubled. That which we read of Monsieur de Grasse, is also highly esteemed. Do me the favour as to assure him of the fidelity and constancy of my passion. I believe him of goodness enough to compassionate my afflictions, and not to require of one encumbered with the multitude of affairs, all the civilities that a man of leisure can render him. Without answering to the Postscript of your Letter, I would have you understand, I have no more remembrance of my objections, and am well satisfied with your answers. It is time to go on seriously with the great Work; You must dispute the place with Virgil, unless it be that you honour Antiquity, and bear respect to your Predecessor; in which, though your worth may give you the priority, your modesty will induce you to follow. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Lambertie, 10. Decemb. 1636.   

LET. XXX.  
SIR,  
I Infinitely value the the person of our friend, and I should desire his alliance with passion; but it will be difficult to accommode matters to effect it. The young lady's head is full of her great lineage. She hath been shown the name she wears amongst those Illustrious Names, in the History of the Cardinal Bentivoglio, and that of the Precedent de Thou. And from hence arises that haughtiness of speaking Italian in French Company, and contempt of all kinds of Burgessship and Professions, though clothed in Purple, and placed upon cloth of Flowers de Lys. Her Mother had thoughts less high, and more favourable to the long Robe. Nevertheless, I can tell you, she is solicited every day by divers persons of quality, and in the humour I left her yesterday, a Counsellor of the Grand Council would not serve for her Daughter, as twenty thousand Crowns would be too narrow a fortune for such a person. At Paris, men are poor with ten thousand Livres of Rent, but in Poitou and Xaintonge, a fare less estate is Riches. A moderate Revenue is plenty in this Country, and we commit excess upon that which would only suffice to entertain your sobriety. You may read an Epigram of martials to this purpose, in which, what ever he speaks of Rome, is clearly applicable to your City of Paris. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Angoulesme, 20 Decemb. 1636.   

LET. XXXI.  
SIR,  
THe Letter I sent you in favour of Roscius, is not composed of a style suitable to the gust of our severe friend. But I considered in what manner Cicero used to deal with the Roscius of his time. I remember, I have seen this treated by Monsieur the Cardinal de la Valette, and other great Lords of the Court, as a person of honour. Can it be desired, that Philosophy should be more stately, and disdainful than Greatness? One action of civility which draws not to a consequence, is different from a prostitution every day, to which I am not inclined to abandon myself. Only for the future, it is requisite that my Compliments be somewhat more rare. The greatest part of my correspondents writ me Letters to no other purpose, but to show the answers; and so I am made the Martyr of their vanity, and that troublesome reputation which you and my other good friends have bestowed upon me. Let us seek out a remedy for this evil, and take leave of the World once for all. At least let us make a Truce withal the Wits for twenty years, and repose ourselves during that space. O happy rest! in what part of the world dwellest thou? and when shall I find thee? I desire not but this only thing, though I have need of very many other. I wish neither applause, nor praise, nor glory, nor fortunes, nor dignities. Quid concupiscam quaeris ergo? Dormire. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 29 Decemb. 1636.   
The End of the First Book.   

FAMILIAR LETTERS, OF M. de BALZAC, To M. CHAPELAIN. The Second Book.  

LETTER. I.  
SIR,  
AOu are not weary of obliging me; all my Letters give you some trouble, and all yours afford me benefit. The last of the twelfth of this month, is a continuance of that commerce wherein I always gain advantage, and you become the loser. For, upon the reckoning, your hours might be more profitably employed, and on greater concernments. My small interests cannot deserve the care you take of them. But what means is there to restrain the generosity of your mind? This active wisdom that adjoins good deeds to good Counsels, transcends all the discourses of speculative Philosophers, who have treated of the duties of friendship, You practise much more than they ever knew in precept. They drew the Idea of perfect friends, and you accomplish the design. I am happy to be the subject you were pleased to make choice of to that effect, and to gather the fruit of your glory: wh●ch I do with all acknowledgements of gratitude, and there shall never be any person more than myself,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 4 Januar. 1637.   

LETTER II.  
SIR,  
YOur scruple touching the affairs of England, is not without sufficient grounds. As for the term of Divine, in the place where it is, it cannot give offence to any. 'Tis true, of later times it hath been so debased, that I made conscience to bestow it on Artemie, otherwise Madam the Marchioness de Ramboüillet. Nevertheless she may please to consider, that as there are false Divinities, so there are also true, and she is of this latter so●t. If they of the Court commit Idolatry, we are religious in the Village; and she is one of the principal objects of the devotion of our Province. But, to clear this matter in another respect; Are there not some Heavens higher than others? Are there not different degrees of Glory, and Crowns of greater value? yet somewhat further of the justice and injustice of Epithets. There is the divine Aretine, whose divinity is beyond my comprehension: But there is also the divine Plato, whose wit ravishes the prudent Guidricione w●th admiration, and whom St. Augustine, preferred above all the gods Antiquity adored. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 15 Januar. 1637.   

LETTER III.  
SIR,  
YOur discretion makes you as happy, as the want of it renders me otherwise. The greatest of my disadvantages are hence occasioned, and in earnest I stand as much in need of your prudence to deport myself handsomely, as I do of health▪ Such a depth of melancholy has possessed me for this fortnight, that I am scarce sensible of breath and motion. There is nothing presents itself to my view, but is extremely offensive. Pardon me, I should have excepted your last Letters, which afforded me so much cheerfulness, as served in some measure to dispel the clouds of my disturbed fancy. I received them together with those Advisoes with which you are pleased to favour me, with all the reverence due to every thing that comes from you to me. You will find in a little Note by itself, what answer I return to some Objections which were sent me from another hand. My judgement submits itself to reason, but yet understands how to defend itself against sophistry. I am.  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 25 Janu. 1637.   

LETTER IU.  
SIR,  
IN this miserable world, I account petty Mischiefs in the rank of Goods, and am therefore less solicitous to bemoan your indisposition. There wants but little to cause me rather to congratulate with you, since it allows you ability enough to manage all your affairs both of great and less importance, and is no impediment to your composition of Rondeaux, in continuation of your Heroic Poem. This is an excellent languishment, and the best qualified distemper I ever yet heard of; mine are of a fare different nature. The greatest part of the time I am equally uncapable both of action and repose, either to pleasure others, or satisfy myself. I have been harassed with the cruelty of this malady above a month, without so much intermission as to read the Treatise of Monsieur de ***. For the Philosophical discourse, it was taken out of my hands the same day I received it; and Monsieur de Brassac, who had possession of it since, hath not yet suffered me to see any more than the Privilege, and the prefatory Epistle. If he should condemn me to stop there, it would be no great injury to my patience. For to tell you freely, I have more longing for the sight of your Verses, then for the Prose of those Gentlemen. But that is a happiness out of the way of my Fate, since you have not confidence enough in me, to send me one small fragment of that admirable Masterpiece. I beseech you, let not the importunity of my entreaties give you cause of distaste. My love shall not cease to continue in the same fervour, although I have no hope of succeeding. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 6. Febru. 1637.   

LETTER V.  
SIR,  
HAving not yet received any News from you, I remain unresolved whether the Latin work be Latin: Notwithstanding it be the production of an Author, that esteems not himself a stranger to the Country of Cicero, and makes choice of no bad examples for his imitation. It is therefore injurious to accuse the Counsellor you know of, for the father of it. For in my judgement, his writings are of another nature. His Verses have some sound, and the confidence of the age of Statius and Juvenal. But every part of this is empty, shallow, and tumid, stuck thick with high words of no significance; and this harmonious obscurity is oftentimes the cause, that the Readers suspect a Mystery, where there is nothing but Bombast. The other piece is of more solidity, and better contexture. This, if you please, may serve for a universal Answer to all the perpetual impertinencies, which shall be spoken or written against me, to the end of the world. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 16 Feb. 1637.   

LET. VI  
SIR,  
IT is not possible, for the clouds of my melancholy to become so impenetrably thick and gloomy, but that your Letters clear a passage to let in some glimmerings of day, and brightness. They bring with them such small rays of joy, as prisoners receive at the opening of their grates. The Epicure Colothes, with his great Mittain, wherewith he armed himself against Winter, enforced me to laughter in the bitterness of my pains; and I think an entire discourse of that strain, would afford wonderful cheerfulness to poor calamitous persons. I acquiesce in the greatest part of those advices wherewith you are pleased to favour me. But with your permission, I shall offer my most humble Remonstrances upon some of them, yet with no intention of being opinative against you. You know I do not believe my own opinions for good, but when I have persuaded you to allowance, nor have an assurance of any truth, till you confirm it to be such. As to the rest of the Copy, instead of sending me the places to be reviewed, it were better to sprinkle them with a parcel of fair Asterisms, without other ceremonies. There will be great pleasure to see the Grammarians exercise their wits upon those vacuities, and take much pains to fill them. At the worst, the Reader will be drawn to a belief, that they are passages the Corrector wanted skill to uncypher. 'Tis the easiest of all remedies, and will spare no small labour to yourself and me. I believe the Council of Flanders would have been half wild to have encountered the like difficulty, because they should be obliged to await at brussels, the resolutions of Madrid. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 26 Feb. 1637.   

LETTER VII.  
SIR,  
ALl the glory of this Province is departed with the Marquis of Montaufier. He had begun to civilize our Barbary, and to bring Angoulesme into repute. But it is not for us to expect that happiness, which the Court cannot enjoy, but by the way, when his honour calls him otherwhere abroad. Being born, as he is, for military action, he has no inclination to be detained in Closets, when his service is necessary in the Campagne. He is, in truth, a  whom I esteem infinitely; yet if by mishap, I have not sufficiently persuaded him of the height of that esteem; I beseech you to confirm the truth of it by the power of your eloquence, and give him better information than I could imagine. There came lately to my hand, a Letter from our friend, who was heretofore only an Abbot by his name. He certifies me, that, at length, the event hath succeeded the Prognostic, and he is become as real and essential an Abbot, as the Abbot of St. Denys, or as he of St. Gall, of whom the Gazettes make so frequent mention. It is sit we express to him our joy of that news by the next convenience. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac. 7 March, 1637.   

LET. VIII.  
SIR,  
IF some affairs had not diverted me, you should, eight days ago, have received, what this Courtier delivers you. There are about five and twenty Letters in all, whereof the ten last please me better, than the other; not, for that they have any pre-eminence of goodness, but because the matter more nearly touches my heart; and I have great impatiency, that the world should know, in what degree I esteem your friendship, and reverence your virtue. You have absolute power over the whole collection, and may at your discretion, retrench entire Lines and Periods. But, I reserve, with your favour, this small parcel to myself, which if your modesty should induce you to diminish in the least, I immediately forbidden the impression, and declare to honest Camusat, that I have nothing to do with him. Sans plus is an Italian idiotism, without question; but it is also French, and very frequently used by the Cardinal of Perron. Besides, having no harshness to offend delicate ears, I may think I have name enough, to introduce the usage of it myself. Trop plus, and Trop mieux, which are often in the same Cardinal's writings, are terms which I leave to himself, without ever being liquorish after them, they seem to be of so bad a relish. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 17 March, 1637.   

LET. IX.  
SIR,  
I Cannot but admire the industry, you are pleased to bestow on a work, that deserves it so little. This piece is nothing, but the Van-currier, to the Gross of my other compositions. And I am in fear, this paper of Satin, and the Characters, dropped down from Heaven, will not be suitably employed to their worth. 'Tis yet to engage you to a further obligation. But howsoever, though I performed nothing more, then to give the world a promise, of your Maid of Orleans, and that my Book served only, to give the world notice of your Poem; I think, it would find no bad entertainment; and the good tidings it brought, would render it agreeable to the curiosity of the ingenious. I am loath to tell you, what you must of necessity know, that having turned over a huge mountain of Papers, and made exact search in all my Magazines, it is impossible to find that Piece I promised you: Without dispute, it has either been pillaged from me, by some curious hand, or s●me despiteful devil conceals it. I cannot make you sensible, how much I apprehend the loss of that thing I intended should be yours. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 25 May, 1637.   

LET. X.  
SIR,  
I Perceive idleness is a better Catholic then diligence. I solemnise holy Festivals with more devotion than you; and you are not likely to receive Letters from me, dared upon Whitsunday, as I have one of yours. I acknowledge, modesty is the most amiable thing in the world; and because it is peculiarly the virtue of Virgins, you will not suffer the defect of it in yours of Orleans. Yet there is a magnanimous pride, of which Philosophy does not disapprove, and Aristotle relates wonders in his Ethics. If I have promised high matters of you, your performance will yet transcend my engagements. I do not fear being questioned by the Public, and reproached for false information. To be surety for Croesus is not less hazardous, then to be responsible for Monsieur Chapelain. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 6 April, 1637.   

LET. XI.  
SIR,  
IT is rrue, that being at Paris, I sent a copy of my last Book to Sedan: And this, without other design, then in pursuance of a customary civility, and to avoid the complaints of a person, that perhaps expected it. He returned me for it the compliment, that I shown you, whereunto I thought myself obliged to answer. But I fear, our friend has made him too particular a discovery, and contrary to my intention: For, though I had seen the last year, that passage of his Latin Libel, for which I am not extremely beholding to him; yet I dissembled my knowledge, and forbore to vaunt of my disgrace; I would not let him understand my resentments of it, lest I should put him to the pains of giving me satisfaction. I am not ignorant, that satisfactions are ofttimes the seeds of second quarrels; and that a vain man, yea one of much modesty, is not easily induced to unsay, what he hath spoken, but with reluctancy. But what would you say of Monsieur **** who hath written me a tedious long Letter, accompanied with a Sermon, that would hold a whole Lent?  Hostibus eveniant talia dona meis. 
I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 15 April 1637.   

LETTER XII.  
SIR,  
I Am glad you are well pleased with the Treatise of Monsieur des Cartes, and shall no longer question the solidity of his doctrine, since it has received your approbation. I send you with this, his judgement on my first Letters, stylo, ut aiebat, Petroniano. My Latin will suddenly follow, all glorious, with the Eulogies bestowed on it at Paris; with which appointments, it will not fear to appear before the Manutii, having been so highly valued by the Bourbons. You are extolled there, according to your merit; and you may believe, that if I understood as many Languages, as one of our friends professes knowledge of, and they report Scaliger had skill in, I should not content myself to commend you in Latin and French. The accuser of Cicero, since you desire to know him, is the redoubtable Schioppius. He hath caused a Book to be printed at Milan, wherein he accuses Cicero of incongruity and barbarism. There is but one copy in all France, and the Sieurs Dupens did me the favour to lend it me, when I was at Paris. This injustice offered to Cicero, would be a comfort to Scaliger, if he should return into the world in these days. But I expect the same Schioppius should shortly write another Volume, and therein undertake to prove, that Cato was a wicked man, and Julius Cesar a craven soldier. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 22 April 1637.   

LETTER XIII.  
SIR,  
I Did not understand the extraordinary merit of Monsieur the Counsellor de— and you are the first that rated him to me at so high a value. The late Monsieur de Malherbe, was one of his particular friends, and made sometimes mention of him, but only as a person extremely curious, much affecting relations and stories, a great searcher of Medals and Manuscripts, a great professor of knowledge in strange Countries, a great admirer of all the Doctors of the University of Leyden, etc. All this in my opinion is too little, to make up a grand personage. I do not question, but he was also respectful and faithful to his friend. But there is a difference between the heroical virtues, and those of the meaner sort; betwixt glory, and a good repute; and by consequence, between Monsieur the Precedent de Thou, and Monsieur the Counsellor de— Your Letter concludes in the style of an Oracle, and sets my wit upon the rack. These are your affronts of old, and you take pleasure in provoking the impatiency of them, that love you. And why, I beseech you, so many guises, so many veils and folds, to hid a little secret from me? You might at first have discovered the truth in its native clearness. But you design to make me languish, and had rather I should a long time attend the revelation of the mystery by the post, or seek it out at adventure, by suspicions and conjectures. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 1 May 1637.   

LETTER XIV.  
SIR,  
YOu know well how to exercise men's patience, or, to speak more properly, to enrage it. I have had time and leisure sufficient, to study out your Riddle; five Posts are returned, since the first proposal you made me of it, and none of them afforded me any light to it, not so much as one word of your news, or concerning the honest Camusat. This gins to put me in disquiet, and to beget some of those vain fears in my mind, whereof true friendships are not unfertile. Your indisposition of Rheum, is it become of more forwardness and diligence, then ordinary, and has it mistaken July for December? Can there any other accident betid you? Has Monsieur the Duke of Longueville obliged you to follow him into Germany?  Dii meliora piis— 
I know Philosophy is valiant, and that your predecessor Socrates, was eminent in the achievements of War. Yet I would not have your fancy incline you, to that way of getting honour, for I account all the Spaniards, both of this and the New world, scarce worth the trouble, of putting you only into a bad humour. I expect your resolutions of peace, and entreat you of all love, to avoid the garb of Buff. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 8 july 1637.   

LETTER XV.  
SIR,  
YOur Letter of the twenty sixth of the last Month, has restored my spirit to its former repose, by the explication of your mystery; although I had divined it before, as Monsieur the Commissary can bear me witness. I would not be understood, as to usurp upon you, who are immediately inspired by the god Apollo; or to endeavour to gain the repute of a Prophet, for fear, lest that new quality should draw with it upon me, a new persecution. I cannot have admiration enough, at their depraved gust, that dislike my speaking of myself, in an affair that concerned no body else, and where I could not mention any other, without digressing from my subject. Would they have me talk of the grand Signior, or the King of Persia? or dilate myself upon the pedigree of Messieurs de—? I am not fit to commend these great Lords, in so mean a manner, and Monsieur de— would discharge that office better. But I must acknowledge, that all the obloquys of the inconsiderable rout, do not so much move me, as that word which was whispered in your ear, by Monsieur the Keeper of the Library. From whence I gather, that to please, and displease, in this honest age, are the mere effects of fortune and hazard; wisdom and sufficiency have no share therein. And according as the physic of my Lord— hath had good or bad operation, and that he slept well, or otherwise, he passes a favourable or hard censure, upon whatever is presented him. This breeds in me sometimes a resolution, to hate all mankind. And if you were not the only good and just person, amidst this universal degeneracy, I should make a second vow, yet more solemn and religious, than the first. In my own opinion, I never writ any thing more modest or commendable, than the Piece now in question; and yet because it is no, declamation of the Palace, or preachment to the Vulgar, it is slightly esteemed: Those that afford it praise, do it with a great deal of indifferency and reserve, because they know not how to blame it, without rendering themselves ridiculous: Yet I suspect some ill offices from the Antichamber, and forbear yet to condemn them of the Cabinet. Nevertheless. He will-believe, for the honour of the Master, that, that undeserved speech never fell from his mouth. For if it were so, after all the respect I have given him, I should have reason in the same place, where I speak excessively of myself, t'write him though never so great and powerful, Barbaro, discortese, etc. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 16 July 1637.   

LETTER XVI.  
SIR,  
THe friendship of the Court is never without an allay of envy; and if it be true as you tell me, that I have taught the greatest part of our acquaintance the faculty of writing, and the use of that knowledge; it is likewise a certainty, that, the Scholars have wanted gratitude to acknowledge their Master; and I have made as many unthankful persons, as my instruction rendered composers of Books. These Gentlemen never return me any good office, wherein there is not a seasoning of concealed poison. I have no inclination to that manner of carriage, and my sincerity is fare different from such proceed. I often commend them for those qualities to which they are strangers, and thank them for favours they never did me; And there comes not so mean Rhymes, or dry Prose, out of their Paquet, b●t I assure them that the Verses are Oracles of Poetry, and the Prose a Masterpiece of Eloquence. The result is, my goodness finds too bad requital, and knowing to love with so much integrity, I merited greater happiness in friendship. I have ever made it my endeavour to oblige and please, but yet failed to meet with suitable retaliation. And taking my History a little higher, during the violence of the most unjust persecution that ever malice raised against an Innocent, since the memory of man; my disgraces afforded pleasure to some, others made semblance of compassion, but none offered the least assistance or succour. I always except him from that number whom duty binds me, and my reproaches do not extend thither, where I shall never address any thing, but returns of thanks and acknowledgement. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 22 July, 1637.   

LETTER XVII.  
SIR,  
IF the Collection of Camusat had been published, the declaration of my vow exhibited there in great Characters, had privileged me from the task of this day. But it is necessary that I suffer by the negligence of Printers, and be constrained to write to Rome, since it is not yet known in this Country, that I canno● write any longer with a safe conscience. I am fully determined to set myself at liberty, and not to answer our Holy Father the Pope, although I should receive a brief subscribed Ciampoli; you will therefore oblige me (if the publication of my vow be not sufficient) to assure some, that I am sick of the fiftieth disease that hath surprised me. Others, that I am at the baths of the Pyrenean Mountains; and the more intelligent, that the Importunate drive me out of the world, and compel me to discontinue the commerce I held with honest persons. I must likewise give you further advertisement, That the Seigneur Totila is near his Marriage, and this is another reason that ratifies the resolution I have taken: for, being destitute of hands, it ought not to appear strange that I gave over writing. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 30 July, 1637.   

LETTER XVIII.  
SIR,  
I Crave your remembrance, that I am already departed for the Baths of the Pyrenees, where I shall continue the entire space of two years, although during that time, I will not cease to write to you after my custom, from Balzac But, under pardon, I cannot but esteem you rather severe, then equitable, to give the appellation of sloth to that necessary resolution, which I was enforced to take up, that I might at length begin to live, after forty years being in the world. Were it not a misery to be the perpetual Butt of all the idle Compliments of France, and to hold up against all the makers of flourishing Letters? A truce must of necessity be made with honest men, to avoid the complaints of them that are not such: And I am constrained to discontinue the commerce that was both pleasing and advantageous to me, since I cannot use it, without often falling into the hands of Pirates, and encountering a thousand mischiefs. You are the only person with whom I shall admit correspondence, and because you desire it, I will communicate to you my remarks on Seneca. By your order, I have again run him over these last three weeks, and that both as a Grammarian, and a Philosopher. As he takes Epicurus for his Text, I shall take him for mine, and my Commentary shall be neither too naked, nor with overmuch ornament. Philosophy may be decently dressed without prejudice to her gravity. Liniments and fucus do not become her countenance; but yet there is a necessity of preserving her genuine colour and cleanliness. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 6 August 1637.   

LETTER XIX.  
SIR,  
I Attend the beginning of my repose, from the finishing the impression of our Collection. When that is done, the Decree must be inviolably maintained, and that troublesome correspondence extinguished, which deprives me of all my time and contentment. It is not only Paris that persecutes me, Bordeaux, Th●louse, Aix, etc. do it without mercy, without accounting the virtuosos abroad, which are also of the party. But when they perceive my resolutions in Print, they will either leave me in quiet, or at least I shall have good right to remain so. I am sensibly touched with the news of Madam d'Andilly's death, and partake in all the good and bad success of a family that ought to be so dear to France, and which was born for the glory of the French name. But I have an especial pity for our friend, whose passion being unreclaimed, he accounts he hath lost in his wife, all his Mistresses, and all the contentments of this world. He is, notwithstanding, so knowing in the doctrine of Christianity, and hath so many holy persons of his blood about him, that he is in no great want of Philosophy of the Stoics, or any other foreign succour to defend him against the assaults of fortune. Every one discourses, preaches, and persuades in that House, and one Arnold is of more value, than a dozen of Epictetus. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 14 August, 1637.   

LET. XX.  
SIR,  
THe Animadversions I made upon the Tragedy of Herodes infanticida, cannot come under the appellation of a censure. And there is great difference betwixt proposing of doubts, and making positive resolutions. If the good man Heinsius has apprehended the matter to a contrary intention, I am not to blame, 'tis his own error. And I am well assured, that Justus Lipsius, that read Tacitus heretofore out of the same Chair, would have answered me as an honest man, and not like a signior Dottor. In some places he is pleased to term me vir disertissimus & maximum ingenium; but he has more unkind thoughts in his breast, and has made an ill construction of my good meaning. It was no design of mine to take advantage upon him, but rather to find him exercise, to stir up his acuteness, & furnish him with the matter of an excellent discourse. For, to tell you a truth, though I have cause to complain of his roughness and intractable humour, he is in my opinion, one of the great men of these latter ages. A Poet, Orator, Philosopher, Critic; in a word, the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of the Greeks. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 22 August, 1637.   

LET. XXI.  
SIR,  
ALthough I am well acquainted with your dexterity, in ridding yourself from the trouble of importunate requests. Yet I have great confidence you will not reject the suit I now make you. I desire twenty or thirty of the Verses that please you best in your Poem, to the end that I may learn them by heart, & rehearse them to the Echoes of Balzac, and the Nymphs of Charante. For I know you will not allow them to be carried to the Town, and sung in the ears of profane Mortals. The answer will be unsatisfactory, that they are all equally your issue, and that you have no particular affection to any. Virgil had his darlings, and so Lucan and Torqua●o Tasso theirs. They loved some place of their Works above the rest: They had their Benjamins and their favourites. I expect the grant of my entreaties, and cannot receive any excuses, although the Pucelle should come to make them in person. You know I am both dumb and paralytical, and dwell with the Antipodes, in respect to all writers of polite Letters. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 30 August 1637.   

LETTER XXII.  
SIR,  
I Must not tell you, that I bear a part of your grief, I should speak improperly; I have such resentments of the whole weight of your sorrow, as can possibly be produced in a tender spirit, by the perfection of friendship. Your troubles do as deeply affect me, as my own; and I cannot be in capacity to afford you consolation, having less strength of reason, and as great a share in the affliction. Losses and disgraces, are part of the ingredients to every man's cup. Prosperities are not pure to the greatest favourites of fortune, and even mourning and tears are to be seen on the side of victory. Calamities must, if possible, be rendered insensible, and objects provided to divert them, in want of such as might g●ve them cure. I wish it were in my power, to supply you with r●dresses of that nature. Were my Letters of sufficient virtue, I should be reconciled to that employment, on which I have bestowed so many maledictions; and should not say any more, what I have often wished, utinam nescirem litteras. My affection observes no interval of Holy days, it is ever active in its duty; it makes its appearance on the days of mourning, and consignes prosperity to the desires of other friends; it abounds in heat, though it be but of small light. You may perhaps be treated with more compliments, but never loved with greater fidelity. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 6 Septemb. 1637.   

LET. XXIII.  
SIR,  
HItherto your tears have been just and allowable; but if they continue any longer, they may so injure you, as to dis-serve those persons, which have a respect for you. I beseech you therefore, have a care, lest your melancholy become habitual; it is the heaviest and most stupid, or to speak more favourably of it, the softest and most effeminate, of all the passions. And if ever any man had need of life and vigour, it is you, who have undertaken a design, I believe, the greatest that has been this hundred years. But if you should chance to fail in your purpose, it will not be construed either inability or unfaithfulness, but want of convenience and leisure. I am afraid, that Paris, with its compliments, will do the Maid more hurt, than ever England did, by all her force of Arms. I am told, that something has passed unhandsome, betwixt the Marshal de— and our friend, who has been menaced, although the sacredness of his person preserves him secure. We are here in a place, where we catch cold, whilst the Country you reside in burns with excessive heat. May you enjoy a felicity pure and unmixed, and pass such days, as are woven with the finest gold and silk, that ever the three Sisters wrought, calm and undisturbed. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 30. Septemb. 1637.   

LET. XXIV.  
SIR,  
I See now, you are a faithful promiser, and that a man may safely rely upon your word. The fragments you are pleased to communicate to me, is come to my hands. But to tell you the truth, this drop does but increase my thirst: I burn with impatiency, to have the sight of that entire body, from which so rare a piece was taken: But while I am in preparation to court you to that suit, is it not true, that a hundred Verses had been of no greater charge to you, than thirty. If you would have obliged me nobley, I assure you, they should be kept here in great secrecy, neither will I communicate them to more than one person, who shall also oblige herself by Oath, never to remember any thing, of that I shall recite to her. Those distates you mention, would some thing trouble me, but that you sufficiently understand the brutishness of this age, whose judgement concerning good things is yet worse, then that of the precedent. I j●st now came from reading in Monsieur de Thou, the complaints made to him, by the good man Victorius, when he went to visit him, being at Florence; Querebatur is tum bonas litteras in Italiâ vilescere, habere se multa quae publico libenter daret, sed ea plerisque non tanti aestimari, quanti conveniret, etc. I am of his mind, that the pains we take are very ill bestowed, and that we ought not to trouble ourselves so much, in making-pastime, for impertinent and ingrateful persons. If some ignorant fellow take exception at the learned World, in the discourse, you may allege those verses to him: 
— Meritò cui doctior Orbis  
Submissis defert fascihus imperium.  I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20. Septemb. 1637.   

LET. XXV.  
SIR,  
I Presume you understand the design of our Semicapro, to put me into the Prelacy, which he imagines to accomplish, by the credit and recommendation of certain people, whose names and existence I never yet heard of. I send you the two wonderful Letters they writ me, to that effect, which I think you can scarce read with a sober countenance; you will there see the management of all bad policy, and the whole Machiavelli of the Village, to draw two Letters from me, in their own commendation. But I am determined, and that I assure myself, with your allowance, to equal their artifice wtth cruelty, and to suffer their vanity to expire, for want of succour. If these Gentlemen were not comprised in my general vow, I should make a particular one for their sakes. They have as little knowledge of me, as I have sufficient of them: And their attempt is contrived upon me by such means, as I am hardest to be taken. It is not in my skill, either to canvasse for voices, or beg any man's approbation. I have forsaken those that were able to give and enrich, and shall not now begin to court such, as can only promise and abuse. You know, Sir, I have no ambition to raise a fortune; if I had, I should endeavour it all other ways before. The kindness that our good Semicapro has for me, and his readiness to ingratiate me with my Lord— perhaps as sincerely as many others, have restrained him from discovering such a number of subtle devices, as you may observe in the Letters I speak of. For these friendly advices, and all the propositions of advancement, have in reality no other aim, but two answers. But I here solemnly protest, they shall never be Masters of their design. And if it be requisite, I will add to my former Oath, all those Execrations of the Ancients, which you have read in Aulus Gellius. You see the bad construction I make of other men's goodwill. But I have told you a thousand times, that I am infinitely apprehensive of all injuries, that abuse my reason. I most humbly kiss your hands, and remain.  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 28 Septemb. 1637.   

LETTER XXVI.  
SIR,  
YOur Letter represents the little Father, as so jolly a person, that my displeasure would be more vehement, if he had been an experter Mountebank, and endeavoured to beguile me with greater subtlety. 'Tis your happiness, to apprehend things always on the right side; and to proceed directly to truth. This is no groundless asseveration. We have friends of less exact judgement, and you know, the Writer of Politic Books, is liable to be overmatcht by the little Father, as well as he that prints them. I am redevable to this latter, for his goodwill; yet I would wish him, to acquiesce absolutely in your advice. He must not permit the mediocrity of his reason, to strain forwards, having learned from you or me, the compass it should move in. I do not doubt but you are surprised, even at the title of the little Father's Letter, and that Balzac l'Orateur does not extremely please you. Although he cannot confer that quality on me, without displacing Monsieur de Colomby, who is Orator to the King, and usurping upon the Jacobins and Cordeliers, who are your most humble Orators. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 6 Octob. 1637.   

LETTER XXVII.  
SIR,  
THough I have no very commendable eyes, yet I perceive, the workmanship of Mellan is far gallanter, and of better conceit, then that of the other engraver. The good Camusa● adds much honour to my writings, by the ornament of so fair and ingenuous figures. What do you conceive in particular, of that pensive and melancholy Pallas? May she not seem to be placed at the entry of the Book with her wand, only on purpose to defend it from the fingers of the Sophister Gorgias and Palemon the Grammatian. That which I have sent you, is of the style which the Romans termed Attic, and has not yet fallen into the observation of our people. Nevertheless it was of great renown, during the times that Eloquence and Orators flourished in the world, and maintained its credit against Cicero, even in his own days. If I were minded, I could send you somewhat more considerable, for which I am confident of your thanks; But that must be entreated for. I do not intent to pour out all my favours at once, having, besides, great reason to complain of your parsimony. You have no commiseration of the indigence of my solitude, or the barrenness of this Desert. For how many ages are fled, since I received any thing immediately from you? I know no more of the affairs of your Muses, then if I were the most profane of all the Barbarians, Yet this great neglect cannot overcome my patience, or shake that unalterable resolution I have to honour you with passion. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 15 Octob. 1637.   

LETTER XXVIII.  
SIR,  
I Am resolved to free myself from the dominion of all troublesome passions, as well for the safety of my soul, as for the quiet of my life, and interest of my health. I have been long since of opinion, that it is better to suffer injustice, then to commit it; and of late have made particular reflection upon that passage, Qui dixerit patri suo, Raca, etc. Upon which consideration, I will for the future repay evil for good, and begin to practise with Monsieur Bourbon, to whom I make the first overture, without holding me to the point of honour, or remembering forepast actions. I had entreated a Lady of our friends, to relate him this message, before I knew of the Academies interceding in the matter, or had learned by your Letter what forward progression he had made, both of his own inclination, and by order of the Company; As to myself, I yet once more assure you, That what I do, is with no other aim then the satisfaction of my conscience, and submission to the commands of God. I seek neither Orator nor Poet; 'Tis my Neighbour, with whom I would renew my charity, and Petrus Valens might have found the same readiness to reconcliation, if there had been the like allowableness in the cause of our discord. I am.  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 21 Octob. 1637.   

LETTER XXIX.  
SIR,  
THe humility of your language, is not suitable to the most glorious Heroess the world ever knew; your expressions are too excessively low for so high a merit. You seem to treat her in the manner of a young Girl, and will not permit her to discover so much as her face at the door or window. I cannot tell if such restraint will please her, or she will be contented with all you relate concerning her. Modesty is indeed the virtue of Virgins; but shamefacedness does not agree with the carriage of Amazons, and you know that she that came to visit Al●xander, spoke in no mean style of herself. The Car of our friend is a very pleasant piece, and it must be acknowledged, he has a genius of excellent and taking raillery. Only, I could wish he would use some diligence to purify his phrase. In his writings, the construction is many times intricate, and neither things nor words are put always in their due place. For the Acrostic Sonnet, I am much deceived, if it be not after the nature of those of a certain fool of the University, named *** whom I have sometimes seen with the Author of Car, and who made that famous Epitaph, wherein this Verse is written in great Characters.  Auae manes bien-heareux de l'antique Voiture. I am, 
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 28 Octob. 1637.   

LETTER XXX.  
SIR,  
What judgement, I beseech you, do you make of the Election of our new Brother, with whom I am lately reconciled? Do you believe he will perform great services to the Academy, and that he is a proper instrument to be employed with our other Gentlemen, in refining the French language? I have heretofore showed you of his French Letters which are written in the style of the Bards or Druids. And if you do not account that, S'eximer des apices de droit, l'officine d'un artisan, & l'imperitie de son art, with other like spoils of the old Romans, are very precious in France; he has enough to fill the Lovure, the Arsenal, and the Bastile, After this choice, I am of opinion that our dear Monsieur de Racan, be designed to correct the Dictionary of Robert Stevens. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 6 Novemb. 1637.   

LETTER XXXI.  
SIR,  
YOu are so exact, to acquaint me with the last circumstances of things, that I perceive well, you value my contentment, and would not have me a loser by my absence. My desires to requite you, are rendered ineffectual through want of matter, and every thing is so dry and barren in this Desert, that I should become totally mute, unless you supplied me wherewith to entertain the commerce. Muscardins is allowed for current by custom, although Muscadins be more grateful to the ear, But Usuage must have the prerogative in this as in other things. The word is originally of Italy, and I know not what right we can pretend, to remove a letter from the middle of it, it being not of our jurisdiction. Although this Letter be somewhat harsh, is called the Dog-letter, and in Muscardins, does but ill become the little mouth of Monsieur de— yet it still preserves its rank in the Alphabet. It has murmured, grumbled, and snarled, securely for so many ages, and is entered into divers words, wherein it is not less rough and unpleasant then in Muscardins, without any man's accusation or process. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 17 Novemb. 1637.   

LET. XXXII.  
SIR,  
I Received much contentment from the esteem you make of Monsignor della Casa. He is one of my old intimates, and the late Monsieur de Roccellai, his great Nephew brought him first to my knowledge. I have lately read with diligence all his Writings in the vulgar tongue, and am proud that it was my chance to pass of him the same judgement, which you out of an assured knowledge allow him. I concur in your opinion of the Latin, of the same Author. The life of Cardinal Bembo is a very handsome piece, judicious, and Elegant. That of Cardinal Contareni, is longer, but not so complete, and Victorius himself, confessed it stood in need of being reviewed to attain its ultimate perfection. The Italian-Manuscript, which I intent to print, is nothing inferior in its nature to the Oration made to the Emperor upon the restoring of Placentia: At least it is so conceived by many honest persons beyond the Mountains; and some think it was so offensive to the Spaniards, that they endeavoured to be revenged on him by the poisoned morsel that was given him. He that your Letter speaks of, is one of them, whose persons I esteem more than their Books; and when I would represent his worth and attractions to myself, I leave this quality out of his Picture. Is it possible that a man wholly unskilful in the Art of writing, and whom the King had not commanded to make Books upon pain of his life, should quit the rank of an honest man he held in the world, out of design to gain that of impertinent and ridiculous amongst the Doctors and Scholars. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 23 Novemb. 1637.   

LET. XXXIII.  
SIR,  
I Am afraid the dispatch of last month has mistaken its way and must be retrieved in the Registers of Totila. Not that these sort of writings is worth the pains of being preserved, or that it is necessary my idleness should be as exact and punctual as an Embassy: But because there is no reason to refuse employments to those that are importunate for them, or to spare such hands as are never weary. The Seigneur Totila is desirous of business, and cares not of what nature, so it be of my provision and service. It is great pity he is not retained at a salary by the Academy, that he might stand behind the Gentlemen, Cum stylo & pugil aribus, by the side of our honest Camusat. If you would do him this honour, I dare engage not a syllable of your learned conferences should perish: And I can promise yet more, that he is able to gather such things, whereon there is no hold to be taken. As particularly he might give you relation of the Choler of Monsieur—, the melancholy of Monsieur—, the sour aspect of Monsieur— the gravity of Monsieur—, and the shake of the head, and disdainful smiles of Monsieur—. A man of all this performance, is well able to recover a stray Letter, and if his Archives should fail us, I expect a miracle from his memory. To be cleared of my error, I stood in need of the last clause of your Letter. Your advices have perpetually this preeminence, either to confirm or redress mine. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 10 Decemb. 1637.   

LET. XXXIV.  
SIR,  
YOu may happily as much wonder, as myself, at that Libel, which passes under my name in the Netherlands. It is well known, I am reconciled with the House of Austria, and in peace with all the Sovereigns of the opposite party. I had so little thanks for my first Combats, that I am not forward to undertake new, and have long since renounced the Philippics, and all matters of quarrel. You may therefore confidently refute the news of Holland, and aver that I am not the Father of that Brat that is laid to my charge in the Low-Countries. But without this express Declaration that I make you, there can be no greater argument to assure you of my innocence, then that the purpose of it never arrived to your knowledge. This is not the first counterfeit that ever was in the world: And since there has been Pseudo-philips', false Agrippa's, and false Baldwin's, there may well be a false Balzac, probably some idle speech-maker, that forges Libels in the Provinces of Low-Germany. The best is, there is a true Balzac upon his legs to scourge all his Apes, and chase away his Ghosts. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 Decemb. 1637.   
The End of the Second Book.   

FAMILIAR LETTERS, OF M. de BALZAC, To M. CHAPELAIN. The Third Book.  

LETTER I.  
SIR,  
I Find no remedy so sovereign to my melancholy, as your Letters. That which I received of the fourth of this Month, hath performed the usual effect; and methinks even your heart speaks each of those lines to me, I read from your hands. A friend of your merit is a happiness beyond value; and I cannot comprehend the riches of my possession. The only defect is, that I am always remote from my treasure. I enjoy nothing of it but in conceit, and by the strength of imagination, which is indeed sustained and kept alive from one Post to another, by your most prudent, pleasing, and most obliging Letters. The last is as absolute in these three qualities as the rest, and according to your custom, declares in behalf of the good Party. You have pleaded the cause of Virgil to admiration, and I believe, that, after this, no Lucanist will be confident enough to show his head, but every one is ready to disown his Jargon, his Rodomentadoes, and his misshapen portrait upon his paper. For, in earnest, it seems to me, that in their Verses, I behold the deformed wreathe of their countenance they use in composing them, and the pains they put themselves to, to swerve from their own genius. The greatest part of the people of Leyden, are of the sect of Lucanists, or at least their Allies and Confederates. If they do not imitate all the bad, or perhaps dangerous examples; yet they ordinarily leave the Reader to divine what they would express; and notwithstanding all my industry and search, I could never yet attain to understand them perfectly. Possibly it may be my fault, but it may also be sometimes theirs; and since Lucretius and Horace, and other honest men of Antiquity, have not excluded me their confidence; certainly these might communicate to me their secret, without injury to themselves. They believe that clearness of expression, is the language of the multitude; and, that to separate themselves from the profane vulgar, it is requisite to speak like Prophets, and not to be intelligible to poor Mortals, but by the mediation of Grammarians. I cannot induce myself to that belief, and I am sure father Bourbon is of my opinion; although, to tell you freely, he more than once deviates into that bad tract, whereof he gave us caution, and has quitted his own Virgil for the Lucan, and Claudian of others. But this I would have taken under the Seal of civil confession. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 2 Janu. 1638.   

LETTER II.  
SIR,  
MY curiosity is satisfied, and you have done me a great civility, by giving me so exact information of the affair of the Prisoners. I think it was feared, the Abbot had intentions of raising a sect, and that he might be probably the leader of a Heresy. I do not mean carnal and dissolute Heresies, like those of Luther and Calvin; but spiritual and severe, as those Origen and Montanus were Authors of. I could dilate much or this subject, if our Letters could be turned into discourse, and you were either here, or myself at Paris; Yet I will offer something to this purpose. This Man is indeed an extraordinary person, a great Divine, a great Philosopher, and as full of high speculations as I ever knew any. He oftentimes speaks things that seem inspired to him, and to come immediately from heaven. Amongst others, he assured me one day, that he saw the mysteries of the other life more evidently, than I did the affairs of this. It is true, the demonstration he brought did not convince me, but I believe, rather through my incapacity then his fault. If this man be deceived, I acknowledge the same error, and it is great pity for the rest of us poor mortals, who ought to humble ourselves continually before the Throne of God. I can never be persuaded that he pretends to the quality of Head of the Party, or that it was any of his design to broach Opinions. For no person in the world could appear more respectful to the Holy See, or better satisfied of the Omnipotence of Rome. He is otherwise a great admirer of the Writings of the late Monsieur, the Cardinal de Berulle, and I cannot imagine what induced h●m to esteem so meanly of those of Father Seguenot, the companion of his fortune. As to myself, I confess his style ravishes me, and I leave h s Doctrine to their censure, to whom the judgement of it belongs. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 22. Janu. 1638.   

LET. III.  
SIR,  
OUr new friend is of too nice a palate, and that which disgusts him, is neither harsh nor unsavoury. I cannot conceive his reasons to think it strange, that I said, If I were born a Swiss, I should approve no other Government but that of my own Country; since the supposition I make, is to the advantage of the Government of that Country wherein I was born. Besides, Liberty and Master are two words almost every where opposed, Non facilè libertas & domini miscentur; and in another place, Res olim dissociabiles miscuit, libertatem & principatum. Whereas I affirm, the change even of bad things, to be dangerous; if he consider the preceding words, they cannot be understood of Religion. My intention is of things, purely civil and politic. And is it not true, that in States, there are some pieccs so ticklish and delicate, that they cannot be touched without overturning? Tender constitutions cannot bear medicines, and are incapable of curing; they must be left in the condition they are found, for fear of bruising when they are stirred. A sleight touch and motion, even without violence, or the passage from one bed to another, is sometimes mortal, to such weak bodies; yet they are able to endure a long time, if they be not molested, but left to the care and conduct of Nature: Quiet preserves them, though in a state of decay, and amongst their familiar and accustomed maladies. Should they be wakened, or turned only from one side to the other, their life being included in their insensible drowsiness, that wakening and change would prove fatal to them. Such are the dangerous consequences of some alterations. When our young friend has seen as many Winters as we, he will have no better opinion than we, of those that go about to reform the world. Let him survey the Histories of all Ages, and he will perceive, that this zeal of reformation, has given birth to new disorders, instead of rooting out, and abolishing the old. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 Jan. 1638.   

LETTER IU.  
SIR,  
THe wit and judgement of Monsieur de— are without question excellent, and his compositions have not that Pedantry, which is so rank in the greatest part of our Writers. But it must also be confessed, that in some places, his expressions want vigour; and what he oftentimes presents in a plain dress, might be rendered far more glorious, by a Pen that had skill in ornament, I rather pardon him this weakness, then that which makes him distrust fidelity itself, and fills his head with suspicions. Yet, I think, you ought not to suffer his disfidence and jealousy, to outlive their infancy, and to gain strength by time. As the more discreet, you are obliged to begin first, and ●pen the passage to his illumination. Since he is sick, it is most requisite, you become his Physician, and perform a cure on such a person, as deserves to recover. I have here had, for three or four days, the company of Doctor— whom I invited, for the benefit of his assistance in my studies. In this manner I increase my train, being a Philosopher of a quick appetite, that cannot be contented with three Dates and four Olives, for his Ordinary. I always bear a spirit above my fortune, and sometimes act the Lord, although there are Lords, whose servants are beyond comparison, more wealthy than I; as for instance, the little Hog of— who has a revenue of above ten thousand Crowns, to find him a years provision of Acorns and Husks. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 10. Feb. 1638.   

LET. V.  
SIR,  
IN obedience to your order, I have writ a letter to Monsieur the Abbot of St. Nicholas; but I much fear, it will seem after the nature of the Orations of Gascoigne, short and bad. There is no question, the third Part of the History of Flanders, he did me the favour to send me, is of less excellence than the two first. But to discover my thoughts to you, I begin to have a a greater aversion from war. A History, that relates only of Sieges, Camps, and Battles, cannot always please a man, that has but little fancy to the military virtues. 'Tis pity, that rare Wit did not choose France for his Theatre, rather than the Low-Countries, where the frequent alteration of the Scene, would have rendered his work more various and delightful. He m●ght sometimes have retired from the Field, to the Cabinet, and we should have seen the Foxes of the Court, amongst the Lions of Armies. This perpetual roaring of Lions, is a Music, with which, I confess, I am not much ravished; Apes, Reynards, and other Animals, of more subtlety than fierceness, would yield me better pastime, with their frisks and gambols. Puppets have their use in the Commonwealth, you know it well; but likewise you are not ignorant, that while the Ape dances on the Rope, that time is taken to cut the purses, of the more attentive spectators. Be pleased to sound out this Riddle, since you have employed me, in the explication of so many of yours. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 Feb. 1638.   

LET. VI  
SIR,  
I Desire you to understand, that such a Gentleman is distasted with me, or rather I with him. I invited him hither upon the word of my Stationer; but by ill fortune, he appeared not so well purified, as the Letter of recommendation endeavoured to persuade me. There are certain vapours, which proceed from the ruins of his nose, of that noisomeness, that they are insupportable, to the most civil and yielding conversation. Besides, to tell you freely, he is the most savage of all Mortals, and less capable of discipline, than Bats and Swallows; which, if Plini's History may be credited, can never be reclaimed: Yet, I did not fail to treat him courteously at parting, and to retrench something from my poverty, to advantage his; but with a solemn promise to our Ladies, never to bring to their sight again, an Animal of so unpleasing an aspect, or a Pedant of that humour and smell. Such people, in proper speech, are the plagues of the Commonwealth. Catiline, Cethegus, and others, though termed so by Cicero, were not plagues, but in figure and metaphor. Miserable are they that come near them, without being fortified with antidotes and preservatives. Their infirmity is dreadful, and they have this advantage from their defects, that though they be not guilty at all of valour, yet they cause all the world to fly from them. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Angoulesm, 16. March, 1638.   

LET. VII.  
SIR,  
IF prudence herself should write Letters, they could not be more absolute and judicious than yours. The last I received, is to my infinite contentment, of this number; and I have read it above a dozen times without tediousness. You might have been an admirable author of politic discourses, and 'tis a great loss, that your subject has so much of fiction. Our entire History would not have cost you more pains, than this small parcel of it, which you endeavour to adorn with falsities. And you might have instructed posterity, instead of being uncertain, whether you shall happily have time to divert them. I will hope for satisfaction to my desires, both the one and the other, from your Pen. And I require of you at least, some conspiracy of Catiline, some Jugurthine war, or any other considerable member, if it be impossible to obtain the whole body. The Packet fo● Rome is not yet dispatched. Perhaps a fecond Abbot de Rets, will appear, to do us the like favour. I beseech you to attend it with patience, and not to believe in the mean time, that my affection makes me sick. You understand my intention in this. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 16 March, 1638.   

LET. VIII.  
SIR,  
THe Doctor that acted Hercules furens, in your presence, and the pipe you advised him to moderate his violence with, in the dispute, are very fine devices, and which I have a desire to rob you of, for one of the Chapters of my Bourbon. But is it possible, that the dear **** should become an impeacher of crimes, and a preyer upon confiscations, and that he will live by the death of others. Certainly, after this, Honey must lose its sweetness, for the taste of Gall; Sheep must turn Woolus, and the whole frame of Nature be everted. His only justification will be, to allege that, 
— Quid non mortalia pect●ra cogis,  
Dira fames, durisque urgens in rebus egestas?   
I cannot approve those foul and unhandsome courses, to sustain life; this is not to want Philosophy, as you say, 'tis to have no humanity. But there is no redress for habitual and confirmed maladies. Such wretches have made a solemn vow to baseness, at the Court, and are not any longer capable of virtue, honour, or liberty. Therefore I entreat you, let the dear *** know, that I have no appetite to serve him in this affair, and that I received the proposition with honour, which Monsieur the Commissary made me in his behalf. It were better to betake himself to eat Cheese and Chestnuts, in the Mountains of Avergne, then to enterprise such practices, to subsist at Court. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 29 May, 1637.   

LETTER IX.  
SIR,  
THe Letter of Seigneur Jean Jaques, has afforded me extraordinary pleasure, and I am obliged to your goodness for furnishing me with such agreeable divertis●ments. His manner of begging often brings to memory that of Paulus Jovius, who yet used to demand with more confidence and carelessness than he. I have read certain Letters of his, of that nature, indeed admirable in their kind. In some of them he protests, that, if the Cardinal of Lorraine do not cause his pension to be pa●d him, he will affirm, that he is not of the race of Godfrey, who bestowed the Arch bishopwrick of Tire upon a Schoolmaster. In others, he desires two Horses of the Marquis of Pescara, and for that effect, prays him to strike the earth with a little more force than Neptune did. In another, to a Lady his friend, he beseeches her to send him some Preserves of Naples, for that he began to be cl●y'd with his daily food of new laid Eggs, etc. Although our friend have not the gift of begging with so much variety, yet it must be granted, he will receive a sufficient Dole, if he to whom he writes procure him a Canonship of Verdun. But I beseech you, make me understand the reason of Most Illustrious, which he gives him. Is it because he has a suit to him; and the Italian Policy has taught him in such cases, trattalo di mester Domine Dio, etc. The Poet Martial, who was at least as poor as the Orator Jean-Jacques, terms a Roman Lady his Queen, because she gave him good New-year's gifts once a year, and almost every day a Dinner. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 10 April, 1638.   

LETTER X.  
SIR,  
I was surprised at the discourse of the French Gentlemen, and I assure you, I could not own it, till I had with much study recalled the memory of things long since past. If I had commited sacrilege, or a greater crime, if such can be, I should not conceal it from you, and therefore am not at all scrupulous to confess that, which is more pardonable, and of less consequence. It is true, I am the Author of that discourse, which does not enough fear the Thunders of Rome, and treats the holy Inquisition with too little respect. But it is likewise true, that I composed it in Holland, without design of coming to the eyes of the public by printing, and in an age that might be excused for greater failings. Therefore having passed the space of five and twenty years, it may well claim prescription against all sorts of accusers. Since that time, the whole face of Christendom has been often changed, and all the Earth renewed. The world than was not the world it is at this day: And in truth, the great Heinsius cannot hope for much glory▪ in fleshing himself so unmercifully upon Balzac in his Infancy, and triumphing with his grey hairs over a youth of seventeen years old; and who, as then, had no beard. His cruelty has been decried by both parties; and though that continuation of Antitheses, I lately observed in the discourse of the French Gentlemen, may be tolerable in the composition of such a scholar as I was at that time, and the babies I then played withal, ought not to disparage the Arms I have since managed; yet I will not put myself to that trouble, as to defend the cause of my Childhood. I committed a folly when I was young, and the good man H●insius has told the world five and twenty years after that I did it. Let that judge which of us two is more culpable. I endeavoured to extinguish and suppress the fault, and he would renew it, and make it perpetual if possible. O violator of the sepulchre of an Infant half born, or at least unperfect for the birth! O unworthy, that dis●nters the dead! I am  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 15. Octob. 1638.   

LETTER XI.  
SIR,  
LEt us never mention the— 'tis the shame and ignominy of the French name. 'Tis a day the Romans would have termed Scelerata, & we must call it cursed. It is fit Posterity detest it, or rather never hear of it, and that we raze it, if it be possible from amongst the rest, of the year one thousand— 
By Jove's command, out of old Time's Record,  
Let the three Sisters raze it, nor afford  
Its name a place amongst things past and done.  There are some people, only instruments of ill luck, in whose hands the most advantageous opportunities are spoiled and perish. When the design is to raise sieges, or lose Armies, there needs no more than to employ them. At the same moment, all Fortresses become Acro Corinth's; and all the enemies, alexander's. We may conclude, that in every Country, and upon all occasions, 'tis more profitable to be happy then wise, and better to win, though ignorant of the game, then to have the commendation of playing well, and lose. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 8 May, 1638.   

LET. XII.  
SIR,  
FAther Retavius hath sent me his Genethliacal Oration, and I have likewise received another gratulatory upon the same subject, which was pronounced at Charenton. It resembles neither the style of Monsieur le Faucheur, nor that of Monsieur Daille; and hath nothing good besides the terms of Scripture, which are woven into it from the beginning to the end. I do not question, but Monsieur de Grasse is framing some admirable Sonnet under the shadow of his Orange-trees, and if there remains one drop of good blood in the veins of the Father Bourbon, he will employ it to the honour of my Lord the Dolphin. It is not fit he should suffer the Jesuits to have advantage in this, before the Fathers of the Oratory; or that the Society be esteemed more really French, than the Congregation its Rival. I have been long since acquainted with the dowtinesse of the Abbot you tell me of. I know how violently he is transported in heat of dispute, and since he threatened the Bastinado to a Precedent of the Grand Chamber, that came in company with him to visit me, I have always extremely dreaded him. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 19 Octob. 1638.   

LETTER XIII.  
SIR,  
Since the King does not approve, that men should say, Monsieur the Dolphin is a Child of Wonder; can he, in your judgement allow, that our friend, speaking to the Queen, should term her, his Queen? And is not this familiarity sufficient to give him apprehensions of jealousy? It is verily admirable, what he says of Tagus and Rhine, that their Channels would have been dried up, unless they had received supplies from our tears; as likewise where he beseeches Monsieur the Dolphin, to come and visit Monsieur the Chancellor. I do not question, that if Monsieur the Surintendant, or even Monsieur Cornuel, had given him the sum of two hundred Crowns but he also had been one, whom Monsieur the Dolphin should have been desired to visit. This is you see, a man very acknowledging of favours which he receives, and spares not the visits of new born Princes, where there is opportunity to thank his benefactors. But when the Spaniards devoured France in their imagination, what induces him to name Quercy amongst the principal objects of their appetite, which is no more than a member of the Government of Guyenne? Certainly it was to fit a Rhyme to Nancy; and this last syllable was the cause that the Spaniards slighted Burgundy and Picardy, etc. to gain a little corner of Gascony. In another place, it seems he had forgot that there were Rivers of Wine in the golden Age, as well as Rivers of milk; and that Jupiter who succeeded Saturn, passim rivis currentia vina repressit. But, pethaps, he presumed to alter the Fable, for the better conclusion of his Period, which you know is no more sufferable in Poets, than the falsification of holy Scripture in Divines. He is otherwise a very gallant man, and makes excellent Verses here and there. To tell you freely, nothing I have yet seen upon this great subject, transcends mediocrity. And though at the first view, I took the Poem of Monsieur de— for the Tables of the Law, and thought the finger of Heaven had not written in greater Characters, yet I must confess to you, it did not possess me with devotion, and after I had read it, I found myself the same man I was before. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 1 Novemb. 1638.   

LET. XIV.  
SIR,  
I Delivered my opinion upon some Verses, but you have passed your sentence upon the Poet together. Your judgements are always the effects of supreme understanding, and you know men as throughly, as if you had made them. If Monsieur de Saint Blancat write our History, I could wish you would lend him your skill, so exact, subtle, and piercing, for the making such Eulogies with truth, as are usually placed in the conclusion of every Book. This Historian-Poet is not unknown to me, I have seen long ago, both of his Prose and Verse, wherein he imitates two examples, extremely dangerous; I mean, Tacitus and Statius. I believe your testimony concerning his Leucate. But if I will believe myself, for the beginning of a History of our times, I conceive it necessary, that he change a●d reform his style, before he can resemble Titus Livius. I have the same esteem of his Poem with you, 'tis written in a high strain, saving that it is sometimes overshort, and falls into the vicious extreme. As for instance, in these two Verses, which struck me with amazement at the first reading, and made me smile the second: 
Ille ore horrendum lituis respondet aperto,  
Obscuratque tubas vagitu, & tympana terret.   
Good God what a representation is this, of Monsieur the Dolphin, in his cradle! Methinks I rather see Pantagruel there, or Garagantua, frighting his poor Nurse, Heavens! what a voice, that drowns the noise of Drums, and renders the sound of Trumpets imperceptible! This is indeed a fair beginning, to speak, one day, with the mouth of Canons, Quod solum orationis genus Principi concedit beatissimae memoriae Theophilus. I remember I have read something of near likeness to this, in Silius Italicus, where he speaks of Hannibal, than an Infant, and puts these words into his father's mouth; He cries with some sort of gravity, & I see in his countenance the portrait of my hatred and choler, which are reproduced in him, and shall increase with his years.  Vagitumque gravem, atque irarum elementa mearum. 
Silius Italicus is very high in his expressions, but Monsieur de Saint Blancat is many degrees above him. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 Decemb. 1638.   

LETTER XV.  
SIR,  
I Much approve the Idea you have drawn, of your austere and rigid History, being not so great a lover of ornaments and dressing, as that I would have them enervate virility. But yet you must confess, that it is an Idea purely spiritual, which appeared only to you in your Closet, and is not to be found in the nature of things. Your accomplished reading cannot produce me one example of it, in all Roman Antiquity. For I do not consider, Quicquid Graecia mendax Audet in Historiâ. I have a most confident assurance, you cannot do it. Just now, I ended the entire History of Titus Livius, who seems to me more eloquent, if it be possible, than Cicero. As for Sallust, he manifestly transgresses your maxims, and is not contented to use good language, but he lends it out to Marius, that is, to a Jean de Wert, and employs all his Rhetoric in the Oration of an ignorant. The Commentaries of Caesa●, and the lives of Suetonius, might be brought in your justification; but they have not the name of Histories, nor, with your favour, must, what I say, be termed Controversy. For I am in effect of your opinion, and would write an History in the manner you design it, though I have great contentment, in reading that of the draught of Livy. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 4 July, 1638.   

LETTER XVI.  
SIR,  
MY intention was certainly misconstrued, concerning the Gasconian Poem; I never had any design of aspersing it, much less Statius and Tacitus; for although I am of the contrary party to them, yet I esteem them brave & generous enemies; I know those noble personages have conceits high and magnanimous, that above half the world is for them, and that being only culpable of the vice of their age, they are culpable of a vice, that has a near resemblance to virtue. It is true, Naugerius made a sacrifice to the god Vulcan, of the Woods he had planted, in imitation of Statius. But I cannot approve of his cruelty, nor will I counsel Monsieur de Saint Blancat to dispose so of his, which I have seen of the Impression of Tholouse. Besides their worth, wh●ch is not ordinary, I have a kind of interest in them, since I am styled there magni Balzacius oris, if, at least, his meaning is, that I have the eloquence of Cicero, and hot the throat of Garagantua. I am for the child of a thousand vows. All France has apprehended the matter so; 'Tis a word framed by the universal voice; and without an express Edict to that purpose, it will be no small difficulty to make us change our language. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 6 Janu. 1639.   

LETTER XVII.  
SIR,  
I Return you the Comedy of Annibal Caro, which I have just now read over; it seems to me judicious and plausible, yet, I conceive, I have seen better: The moral part has more of my approbation, than the pleasant; and his Fool has not given me so agreeable divertisement, as I could have wished. Touching the Comedies of Ariosto, you tell me of, I read them in my voyage to Rome, and do readily subscribe to the favourable judgement you make of them. The person that lent them me, did not value them at so high a rate, as your friend of Paris. Certainly, if that friend be married, he will not suffer his wife out of his sight, but accompany her himself to repay visits. A man of that unmeasurable jealousy, deserves a strumpet for his consort, and that his servant should set his Library on fire, to teach him a more moderate esteem, of what he calls himself Master. I cannot believe, I have any friends of this humour; if they were, I should soon repent me of their knowledge, and so have given them such testimonies, as I prise above all their Books. I speak only of Ink, Paper, and Covers, without reference to the merit of the Authors, who are not concerned in this sort of commerce. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 19 May, 1638.   

LET. XVIII.  
SIR,  
I Am not so well skilled in the Greek of Florence, as to understand distinctly the Atticism of Annibal Caro; yet I have some doubt of it, and my confused suspicions, are at no great distance from your perfect knowledge. There is something of morality in the Comedy, that gave me much contentment, though: have at present lost the remembrance of it. For the rest, I refer myself to you; only I conceive, the Cavalier Marini must be allowed the preeminence of fancy, and I never knew so great a difference between two Wits, as his and this; one of them is all imagination, and the other all judgement. In the Verses of Annibal Caro, methinks I behold the modest grandeur, and decent management of a Commonwealth; and those of Cavalier Marini represent me, the luxury and profusion of Nero. As to Victorius, he is a person I extremely value, although he be no great friend to Ovid, and seems not wholly satisfied with the Latin of Virgil. We will examine this matter at better leisure, and consider the weight of those reasons, that have induced him to such opinions. In the mean time, you may please to understand, that I expect the volume in Folio, and have nothing but thoughts of acknowledgement, for the civilities of Messieurs du Puy. Your jealous friend might do well, to consult some Soothsayer, concerning the voyage of his Book: I think he would be in as forlorn a condition, as the desolate Alcyone, if he should dream of some unhappy adventure, that had befallen it. I beseech you pardon my freedom, in treating such people; the greatest honour I can afford them, is, to reckon them in the number of those, that are sick of the disease of Tulips, or of that of Hens and Pigeons. Although these last are sometimes more profitable, and I have had the flowers of the one in my hand, and the young of the other in my dish. For my own part, I should take great contentment, in losing my Books in that manner; and I can say without vanity, that those wherewith I have pleasured my friends, since I came into the world, would be sufficient to make no small Library. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 29 May, 1638.   

LETTER XIX.  
SIR,  
MY indisposition renders all my nights restless, and yours permits you but small repose. I cannot draw comfort from the resemblance of your sufferings. But I must further advertise you, that my days are also painful and irksome, and I only enjoy a few passable moments. A life of this kind, is a great misery, and I know nothing in it, can countervail the trouble, of sustaining a body so ruinous as mine. Long waking is sometimes without anguish but when a man's pains never sleep, this is indeed the state of Regulus, in the hands of the Carthagenians. 'Tis to endure all the racks and tortures of the Tyrants, your Letter mentions; 'tis to live as I do. I am sorry, that in all this relation, there is not so much as one word of Rhetoric, and could wish, my complaints were less Historical; they proceed from a cause so sensible and importunate, that I am not able to continue them, but must of necessity, for this time, reduce all my matter to these few lines, which will assure you, that I am eternally with all my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 12 June 1638.   

LETTER XX.  
SIR,  
HAving deprived the imaginative Poet of judgement, I have left him nothing now, b●t an instrument to commit faults with. You know, when the Cyclops was blind, his great strength encumbered him, and served only, to advance the danger of his fall. Our opinions therefore appear to be the same, though they differed in the expression; and I conceive, that the fancy alone, in what degree of perfection it can possibly be, is uncapable of being a Parent of any thing, but Monster●, or of treading in the right way, but by accident and fortune. Victorius is not so debonnair and agreeable, as some persons I could name; but he has a certain Roman simplicity in his carriage, that pleases me infinitely; and even his negligence has something in it, of grace and comeliness. He is otherwise a man of good blood, and has ennobled Pedantry He has employed his whole life, in the instruction of youth, and read publicly every day in the Schools of Florence; some volumes of his observations upon Aristotle, Cicero, Demetrius, Phalerius, etc. are come forth into the world, with commendation of his judgement. Monsieur della Cas●, acknowledged him for his Master; Annibal Caro consulted him, as the Oracle of his Country; and on this side the Mountains, the proud Scaliger styles him frequently, Clarissimus Senex, and, Doctissimus Victorius. To conclude, he received visits from the Princes de Medici's, and Hen●y the third writ him a Letter, to desire his friendship. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 29 June 1638.   

LETTER XXI.  
SIR,  
Whatsoever information the enemy of Car may have given you, I entreat you to believe my affections are most constant and immutable. I have always had a particular esteem for Victorius, although I am constrained to confess to you, I do not greatly admire the Letters and Orations I lately read. They resemble those Wines which are not indeed corrupted, yet their worth exceeds not the rate of eight pence a Gallon, to use the comparison of the late Monsieur Malherbe. He commits no solecisms, he is no Barbarian, but a native Citizen of Rome, though a very mean Plebeian, and has nothing to render him considerable, but the place of his birth. You cannot imagine what resolution is necessary, to proceed sometimes from one page to another. To read the whole Book is no less toil, then to travail over all the plains of Bourdeaux afoot, and without company. I do not wonder therefore, that it is so scarce, but rather should have counted it prodigious, if there had been two Editions. Some of his prefaces created in me a desire to read his Letters, which nauseated me so much, that I should fear being sick, unless yours do restore my appetite. As I do not approve of Salt and Pepper by handfuls, so notwithstanding my infirmity and squeamishness, I am not so superstitious as to dislike all manner of sauces, and always to observe the rules of a sick man's diet. 'Tis a health more grievous than diseases, which obliges us to abstain from those things which we most affect. Cicero in divers places of his Works, derides the softlinesse of such Orators, as have neither strength nor vigour, and are equally undeserving both of punishment and reward: We may rank this person in that number; you would think he expired at the close of every period, and had no more life than one just a dying. In a word, he no ways plays the Orator in his Orations. But from hence it must not be concluded, but he may be otherwise learned and judicious. And even in this, although I am weary and harrssed with so tedious a Lecture; yet I prefer his meanness and slow pace, beyond the loftiness and impetuosity of Ciampoli, Malvezzi, and many other highflown wits on the other side the Mountains. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 6 July, 1638.   

LETTER XXII.  
SIR,  
IT was your pleasure, that the sacredness of Hospitality should prevail above all other considerations, and I esteemed obedience my duty. No civility was wanting on my part in Monsieur Costar's entertainment. I had his company here a fortnight, and during that time, you were both the most frequent and agreeable subject of our discourses. Truth obliges me to this testimony, that, I never knew any man have a more resolute persuasion of your worth than he. Your friendship is the highest aim of his ambition, and unless you reject his, I dare offer myself his surety, and to be responsible for the contract. Upon diligent scrutiny, and sounding all the recesses of his heart, I find that in former passages, there was not so much malice as bravery, and more of accident than design. But I can assure you, he hath an extreme regret for what is past, and acknowledges that even Innocence itself must be esteemed culpable, if it should offend a virtue like yours. He hath given me so full satisfaction therein, that I have made him a promise of your love, and judged it of no necessity to require of him such Remonstrances, as himself, by a Letter to you intended. Your goodness makes me confident it will not be unpleasing to you, to have gained a friend, and lost an enemy. He is, in reality, a person of great merit, and has eminent accomplishments both of Nature and Education. But I must not pass so soon from an Apology to a Panegyric, since I cannot hearty commend him, till he be in good opinion with you. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 12 August, 1638.   

LET. XXIII.  
SIR,  
THough nothing is able to astonish me, yet the sudden retirement of Monsieur the Precedent is a very strange and surprising adventure. I make you no questions thereupon, nor will I examine whether he were immediately inspired by the Holy Ghost. Second causes have no influence in this alteration, as unhappy success in love, discountenance of Superiors, or some defeature of that kind, which you may perhaps conjecture. His piety is not occasioned by discontent, or lassitude of spirit: Neither is it the issue of a faint courage and despondency. Nauscounesse  usually of those things that have glutted and overthrown the appetite, and we become weary of such profession, which our affections at first carried us with most violence to embrace. Our strength, if unthriftily husbanded, grows enervate and languid, and with that, our spirit. But this case affords no ground for such conceits, The continuance of so troublesome an employment, might perhaps seem insupportably burdensome to some other man's shoulders, though strong and laborious. But this person, had a clear and unquestionable reputation, beyond that which his eloquence and admirable plead had gained him at the Bar. His resolution will possibly be variously interpreted, though to myself, I shall make no other judgement of it, but civil and favourable. I would believe that he was not able to withstand the power of Grace that drew him from the world, and that God was vanquisher in the combat betwixt him and man. But what moves him to speak so much of his faults and infidelities, in the Letter which he writ to Monsieur the Chancellor? I know that was the style of St. Francis; but yet it ought not therefore to be drawn into example, both you and myself, can sufficiently testify, that, he never committed any excess except that of studying, and has no debaucheries, but such as are honest and virtuous. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 1 Septemb. 1638.   

LET. XXIV.  
SIR,  
THe days whereon I receive your Letters, are remarkable to my small family, by the serenity of my countenance. I am not cheerful but when it pleases you, nor have I any contentment but that which the Currier brings me with your Packet. You evidence an excessive goodness and charity, in satisfying my importunate curiosities so punctually, and taking such particular care, of a person altogether unprofitable unto you. Yet you conceive what you do, short and deficient, and complain of the tenderness of my conscience, that I forbear to dispatch you, after your overthrow; for to require of you the news of Rambouïllet Hostell, as you apprehend I did, were it not to oblige you to be the greatest Historian of this Age, and to send me the relations of an infinite number of excellent things that are discoursed every day in that fair part of the World. You know, that Dies unus expraeceptis sapientiae traductus, peccanti immortalitati anteponendus est. That is, in the vulgar Tongue, that one day in the Hostell of Ramboüillet, is more valuable than many Ages otherwhere; and by consequence, the Acts of one week in that Country, considering the importance and worth of things would comprehend more matter, than there is in several decade of other Histories. I understand such matter as deserves to be known, and affords both instruction and divertisement. In which respect, I am not minded to charge you with the most precious, but yet the most weighty burden that I know in the world. I desire but one sentence, one half of a period, or one small word, of Madam the marchioness de Ramboüillet, in repeating of which, it would be very difficult to determine, whether the Mother of the Gracchis, were more absolutely Roman then she, in regard of spirit and virtue. The Eloquence of that ancient Cornelia, was suitably extolled by them of her times. And we must also confess, to the glory of ours, that her words are framed with no greater proportion of solid reason and judgement, than they are of modesty and honour. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 18 Feb. 1638.   

LET. XXV.  
SIR,  
THe feminine Senate, that assembles every Wednesday at the house of Madam— is, in my opinion, an odd conceit. But Cato would have termed it a disease of the Commonwealth, which ought necessarily to be redressed; and on such an occasion the old Romans would have sent to consult the Oracle of Delphos, what so great a Prodigy might portend. If the Lady that is Precedent of the Assembly, has, as I am told, made a certain person, called— a Denizen of Rome; there remains nothing for her to do, in my opinion, then to espouse the Emperor of the little Houses. I have long since declared myself against the Pedantry of the other Sex, and professed that I could more willingly tolerate a woman with a beard, than one that pretends to learning. It is fit the eloquent Laday de— be at least attorney-general of this Sovereign Court; and next her, Madam—. In earnest, had I authority in the Civil Government, I would condemn all those women perpetually to the distaff, that undertake to write books, that transform their souls by a masculine disguise, and break the rank they hold in the world. There are some that pass their censure as confidently on our Verse and Prose, as on their Italian Dresses and Needle-works. They scruple to say, an Heroic Poem, but always call it Epic; and there is never any mention of the Kid, but they presently fall to discourse of the singleness of the subject, and the rule of twenty four hours. No more at present, but that I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 21 Sep. 1638.   

LETTER XXVI.  
SIR,  
IN requital of the news, of the great World you sent me, I impart to you those of our Village. Never did Nature  our fields with more beauty, and delightful verdure; nor were the trees and corn more florid and promising. The Sun does not employ all those beams, he did in April the year past, when he burnt up the herbs in the tenderness of their birth; his hair is mild, innocent, and supportable to the weakest heads. The coolness and dews of the nights succeed in their course, and yield refreshment, to what would languish upon the earth, without their succour. But having rather laid the dust, than made it dirty, it must be granted, they contribute no small share, to the pleasure of those rare mornings we enjoy. I am very solicitous of losing the least moment of them, and precisely begin them, at half an hour after four, and so continue them without intermission till noon, during that space, I walk abroad without weariness, and in such places, where I may conveniently sit at my pleasure. I read Books, that do not oblige me to meditate, and my study is with indifferent attention; for at the same time, I do not cease to listen to an infinite number of Nightingales, wherewith our thickets are inspired. I pass my judgement of their merit, as you do of that of Poets, in the place where you are; and indeed, if you are ignorant of it, I assure you, there is as much difference between Nightingale and Nightingale, as between Poet and Poet. There are some of the first, and some of the inferior Classis. We have enough of Maillets, and— and also some Chapelains and Malherbes. The rest another time. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 12 May, 1638.   

LETTER XXVII.  
SIR,  
THe father Narni is an Orator, whom I admired in the Chair, but do not so upon the Paper; in the little that I have read of his book, I have observed very many poetical expressions, and cold allusions, together with certain fables intermixed; which, as they do not please me in any place, so I absolutely condemn them in Christian eloquence. Besides all which, I know not who can allow him, to allege before the Pope, and the sacred College of Cardinals, Alexander ab Alexandro, Caelius Rhodiginus, Pierius Valerianus, and other like Authors, so little deserving of the honour he doth them, and so remote from his argument; in a word, who have nothing to do with the grandeur of Jesus Christ, and the Majesty of the holy Gospel. I perceive hence, that the father Narni was well born, but badly enough instructed; and that his defects proceeded from his Masters and his Books, but that he owes his eloquence almost wholly to himself; he speaks sometimes in a high and noble strain, and even in the Book, in which there are so many cold allusions, and poetical expressions, and where Pierius Valerianus is quoted, there are some incomparable passages. I must have a copy of it, at what rate soever; and I will not want one, tho●gh I be enforced to request it of Pope Vrban, who heretofore did me the honour to caresse me. It ought not to seem strange, that I have such inclination, for an Orator of my acquaintance. But there is yet something more particular, that justifies my passion: and who would now conclude, but there were some domestical interests between us? Nevertheless, it is a real truth, that I am going to tell you; this good man does so nearly resemble my father, that the first time I saw him, I believed my father had disguised himself, in the habit of a Capuchin. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 Octob. 1638.   

LET. XXVIII.  
SIR,  
I Earnestly beseech you, to have so much pity of me, as to deliver me from the torment of this importunate person; he assaults me with Paraphrases and Sermons, and will not suffer me to enjoy the benefit, of being a hundred leagues distant from him. If you have no skill in Exorcism, to chase him from haunting me, I will turn shameless, and give him some remarkable disgust. At least, his qualities of Preacher and Paraphrast, or even those of Psalmist and Prophet, shall not hinder me, from signifying to him in plain terms, that I much value his friendship, but yet have greater love to my own repose. As for Monsieur the Count, I am not so unjust, as to honour him in a less degree than I did, because I have no reason to commend Monsieur his brother: They are two persons, not only distinct and separate, but even opposite and contrary in all things: One of them is the most courteous and civil, of all men living; and the other has not his equal, in crossness and morosity; so that if the virtue of their mother were not indubitable, no man would ever believe them brothers. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 30. Octob. 1638.   

LET. XXIX.  
SIR,  
I Am redevable unto you, for the exact justice you have rendered, in your last Letter, to our friends of antiquity; I have drawn particular instruction from it, as from all the precedent; and my expectation was not greater than my satisfaction. But, I cannot deny, The demand you make me, concerning Monsieur de— has something surprised me; he understands more of my affairs, than myself; and it is fit he be both most-great, and most-good, since he beatifies me in my life-time, and by his own private authority. I am all matter, earth, and body, and yet they sell me about at Paris, for a man made up of quintessence. 'Tis a favour done me by my News-Merchant, and a virtue he is pleased to endue me with: Nevertheless I believe, he does not report, that I let my beard grow at length, or curtail the collar of my jerkin. I have ever so much disapproved singularity of this nature, that although I reverence the younger Cato, yet the uncleanlinesse of his hands, with his torn and dirty Gown, and his locks horrid and incompt, are very far from commending him to my esteem. The action of Monsieur the Precedent, is an heroical exploit, which must not be drawn into example, and infinitely transcends my capacity and endeavours. I have not wing enough for so high a flight; nor know I how to take aim at things, beyond my view and comprehension. But as I am short of those perfect ones, who have no other object of their thoughts, but the felicities of Heaven, so I beseech you to believe, that I am more remote from the number of those hypocrites, who drive a trade upon earth with dejectedness and sour faces; I have not falsehood enough for such carriage. I never affected to appear better than I am, because I always loved my reputation less than truth. Had I been capable of the cheat of devotion, I had certainly found fortune more favourable, than she has been, and the Seigneur Jean Jaques should have treated me at this day, with the title of my Lord. But in reality, I prefer liberty before command, and prize my quiet, more than the dignities of others. You should see a clear proof of what I say, if they at Court would take me into consideration, and confer on my silence, what the Doctor's canvasse for every day, by their Sermons; the world should then know, that I am no vaunter of Philosophy, & you receive the pleasure of having a friend, that did in earnest refuse Bishoprics. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 10 Novemb. 1638.   

LET. XXX.  
SIR,  
I Will not undertake to cure you, it is enough that I assure you, I suffer with you, and have as quick a sense of your sorrows, as of my own. The person for whom you lament, died like a Hero, and with the glorious consolation of that ancient Verse; 
He conquering fell, and ere of life bereaved,  
Paid back his foe the death himself received.   
But this is that, which, in my opinion, obliges you to a double grief; that which augments the glory he obtained, renders more deplorable the loss which you undergo; and a meaner valour had given you a less measure of affliction. Yet in this case, as in others, attention must be given to the counsels of reason; and it ought to be remembered, that in the ruin of the world, which is dissolved piece by piece, it is not requisite to bewail a small portion, that has happened to perish a little sooner than the rest. Coloredo was ever speeding on to the end of his days, without the furtherance of Monsieur de la Trousse; and also Monsieur de la Trousse, although he had never met Coloredo. Death is a necessary consequence of birth, and 'tis our beginning should be lamented, as being the first step to our end and dissolution. But what presumption is this, to preach before the father Narni? Nevertheless, the father Narni preached before the Pope; that is, before him that has all the Canon Law and Divinity in his breast. I could curse those Poltrons, that forsook their Principal at his fall, and methinks there aught to have been four French Cavaliers to have covered him, with the bodies of four Cavaliers of Germany. The brown Nymph, in my opinion, does not render him good justice, nor sing his high valour in a suitable strain. I am troubled for our Monsieur de Chaudebonne, whom you call the sick-Sage. But wisdom is no more privileged than valour; it is necessary that even the Saints die, before they be Canonised. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 1 Decemb. 1638.   
The End of the Third Book.   

FAMILIAR LETTERS, OF M. de BALZAC, To M. CHAPELAIN. The Fourth Book.  

LETTER I.  
SIR,  
I Do not begin to count my obligations to you from this day. All that I possess of Hannibal Caro, I hold of your bounty, and the same hand has made me a New years present of his Translation of Aristotle, that formerly bestowed on me the Volume of his Letters. So that we only continue our custom, you give, and I receive. May prosperity attend my benefactor, or my bere-factor, since Monsieur Vaugelas will have it so; and that it is not meet to interrupt an old friendship for so inconsiderable a difference. The Italian Aeneide shall return to you as complete and sound, as it left your Closet. Such guests, when they sojourn under my roof, never suffer any bad treatment. Of the two Epitaphs you were pleased to send me, I conceive one is less  than the other; but there is neither of them good, and this is not called writing in Latin. You understood this truth before me, but would not declare it so freely. 'Tis no new observation to you, that as there are confident and furious fools in the ga●be of wisemen, so there are also sententious absurdities, that carry the appearance of Aphorisms. The World is most frequently imposed upon by such false lightning; and I cannot affirm, if to avoid being of the deceived World, it suffices to be one of the Academy, I am infinitely pleased with the new acquisition it has made of the Philosopher—; He is, in truth, a gallant person, and is not deficient of conceit and invention, though he serves himself most commonly of that of others. I say nothing of the other reception, which was made on the same day, lest I should seem to disparage the judgement of my Superiors, and to give too much liberty to my own. There are some Books, and some wits, which he cannot endure. He would suppress two thirds of all Libraries, and the moiety of Universities. A person of such savage melancholy, should never dream of coming abroad out of his retirement, and the pleasure which he takes in despising all things, aught to restrain his desires of being any thing in the world. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 4 Janu. 1639.   

LETTER II.  
SIR,  
THe ambitious thoughts of Monsieur— in my behalf, and the glorious offers he many times proposes to you, cannot but give you strange apprehensions of him. You must excuse the heat of his zeal, and make yourself pleasant with all his splendid promises. Without question, it is only an old Parchment, which they call a Breviate, that was tendered me some ten years since; and the subscription of several Let●ers, some whereof are from very ordinary hands, that have carried him to these extravagant motions. He imagined, I might with justice expect the like favour that was granted to an Advocate of Picardy, who is not capable of returning any considerable services. But herein I descent from my friend; having learned a long time since, that there is no Robe so becoming a Philosopher as his virtue. Wherefore, Sir, after acknowledgements to you for the good will you have testified towards me in this occurrence, and the solicitation you have already begun; my request to you is, that you would surcease the continuance of it, and inform Monsieur the Abbot— that my appetite is not suitable to the desires of my friends. I find myself so feeble, and overburdened with divers evils, that even an other name annexed to mine, would weigh me down, and a naked title, though without charge or employment, can afford me only trouble and inconvenience. I would willingly have written to Monsieur—, but I am wholly unprovided of matter to do it, Neither my Rhetoric, nor my Muses, yield me any thing upon those sorts of arguments, If I knew a maker of Compliments, and Marriage-Sonnets, I would purchase some of his Merchandise at a Pistol a line, though Pistols also are not made in my Village. This is to tell you, Sir, I am no longer able to do it; and you may moreover excuse me, that there was no great appearance, I should perform civilities upon a subject of marriage, since I failed in the duties of humanity, and afforded nothing to my ancient affections, upon occasion of the death of Monsieur de— It is necessary therefore, for my honour, that my Letters be kept secret, to avoid offending such persons as I respect; and it is of much importance, that every one be assured of my indisposition, to the end, no body may complain of my silence. To morrow, I will send Monsieur the Commissary, the Letter which you writ to him; I have opened it, and find it very judicious and discreet. But discretion is the universal character of all your writings, and you are very circumspect in the least actions of your life. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 27 Jan. 1639.   

LET. III.  
SIR,  
I Perceive, Monsieur de la Brosse had not intentions, only to oblige me, but to do it gracefully, and after a noble fashion; this is to make two favours of one, and to understand the Art that Seneca teaches. But he is better skilled in other matters, and I know not, if I told you when I was at Paris, that as often as I had the honour to entertain him, I was dazzled with the rays and lustre, that proceeded from his wit. At that time, I spoke without interest. It is requisite now, that I adjoin my acknowledgements to my esteem, and beseech you, to give him assurance of both. I am now falling to work in good earnest, for our incomparable marchioness; and you may tell him before hand, that I hope to relate some wonders, of his Rome, and his Romans. There shall be perhaps a little Book, divided into several Chapters, for the better consideration of the parts; and when that is finished, I must bethink myself of another design; for I have a work in my head, which I intent to entitle Entertainments, and shall be of a more concise, and less oratoriall style; but yet such, as shall not be less graceful and pleasing. To authorize the title, I have the example of two Authors, that have passed before me, namely, Monsieur the Bishop of Geneva, and our dear Monsieur Bardin. who imposed this name upon some of their works. It will suit exactly with my book, it being in effect, the abridgement and extract, of all the conversations, I have had with yourself, and other choice persons. I shall therein discourse, either with my friends, or concerning them, and I think, that disinterressed commerce ought to be more approved by them, than Letters of compliment, which almost ever signify the same thing. I renew my former resolution, and renounce them this last time more solemnly than ever. Therefore, dear Sir, oblige me, by forbearing to press me further thereunto; and remember, that for all others, except you, I am at Jerusalem, but passionately at Balzac.  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 8 Feb.. 1639.   

LETTER IU.  
SIR,  
I Am not at all dismayed at the digression, which you are pleased to call terrible. The Tickets of other men seem tedious unto me, but should you write me whole Volumes, I should account them short. And I have no reason to complain, that you dispense your favours so liberally, and by handfuls. All that you writ is considerable, and over-payes the Reader's patience. The greatest part of posthumous pieces, are either spurious, or very unworthy of the name of their fathers, to whom those injurious offices are ordinarily performed, if not against their order, at least, besides their intention. Yet this does not excuse the feebleness and flagging style of Victorius; for his Orations, which were not written without meditation, are more weak and dead, if possible, than his Letters, on which it is evident, he employed no study or diligence at all. The funeral Oration of Cosmo, deserved the height and excellence of Oratory. But I cannot judge it tolerable, and without doubt, he has done injury to the reputation of that great Prince, not to say, that he has scandalised his memory. In truth, he did deserve to have been told, at his descending from the Chair, O indignum fatum principis tui, bis mortuus est; semel per morbum, iterum per te. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 15 Feb. 1639.   

LET. V.  
SIR,  
YOu writ me the most pleasant things in the world, concerning the greater and lesser deities; and the array as Varro places them in St. Augustine, is nothing comparable to yours; I esteem it, but without any benefit or advantage. And since all the calamities those little gods can send us, are only metaphorical, I continue in the terms of my last Letter, and am resolved to be irreligious, rather than adore all sorts of Divinities. There is, Sir, in my opinion, a mean between impiety and devotion; and a man may abstain from blasphemies, though he do not undertake to compose hymns. Besides, silence is sometimes interpreted, an owning of Religion; and they used to cry of old, Favete linguis, in the middle of their sacrifices. I have chosen this piece of false religion, and desire to hold my self to it; most of all, for the commerce with the Academy, and that I have with you, which I should have kept secret, lest the— should think to measure themselves, by the value I make of Monsieur Chapelain. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 Feb. 1639.   

LETTER VI.  
SIR,  
TO judge exactly, and like a Master, of the Comedy which you have done me the favour to send me, it is not necessary to be deeply learned, or to have more knowledge, than I have of Aristotle's secrets and yours. I call that new doctrine so, which you disclose to your favourits, and whereof our Poets understand no more, than it pleases you to teach them. Nevertheless I shall not forbear to declare my opinion, in expectance of your determination, and to tell you, that the Supposez, as I conceive, are far from doing prejudice to the reputation of Orlando, their elder brother. If I can judge any thing, there cannot be a more ingenuous, handsome, or better contrived story, than this; and France never yet saw any piece of this nature, that deserved to be compared with it. It is almost impossible, to bend the gravity of our Verse, and suit it to the familiarness of ordinary conversation. Neither do I much approve of Prose upon the Theatre; and Verse without rhyme, in the opinion of our friend de la Tournelle, have little of life or pleasure. Unless you oblige the Stage with a Comedy, We are like to have no Ariosto amongst us. But I confess, I never perused this, but in the bulk, and without design of strict examination. You may please to resolve me, if my first view has deceived me, and whether my judgement be not erroneous. However it be, the concernment is not so great to me, as to require my care: Good or bad, true or false, 'tis almost the same thing now adays, and all the world undertakes to judge, though in truth, there is nothing so rare and hard to be found, as solid and unbiass'd judgement. Perhaps we spend a whole day, in the elaborating of one Period, and when we have distilled our brains, in the framing of a discourse, which may possible be a Masterpiece of Art, they will believe they highly favour us, in saying, there are truly some pretty things in it, & the language is not bad. A man had better devote himself to sleep, than to tyre himself in such unprofitable elucubrations. And I freely pardon that brave person, the resentment which he testified against the Muses, upon the like occasion: 
Ite leves nugae sterilesque valete Camaenae,  
Ite, sat est, primos vobiscum assumpsimus annos.  I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 15 March, 1639.   

LET. VII.  
SIR,  
THis paper serves only, to accuse the slow pace of your Letter, of the eighth of this month, and to assure you, that I subscribe universally to all that you writ. I look upon myself as much honoured, by the late conference which you had with the marquis de Montausier; he casts too many obligations upon me, and the fresh proofs of his goodness, seem too disproportionate to my merit. One day, perhaps, I may have opportunity to signify unto him, how gratefully I resent his civilities, and I hope he will have no cause to repent, of having honoured a person with his friendship, who has so reverend esteem of his virtue. I must further add to this Ticket, the report which one lately acquainted me withal, that there passes a Libel at Paris, whereof some conjecture me the Author; if it arrive at your ears, you may confidently swear, without fear of perjury, that I intermeddle not with things of so foul a nature: You know how well I love my quiet, and how generally backward I am from all manner of writing; I am so far from supererogating, that I oftentimes fall short of my duty. I use not to lend my words, or my choler, in the behalf of any man. And he that passes over injuries done to himself, is not like to revenge those of another. The relation which I have made you of it, is, I think, to little purpose, but ad majorem cautelam, and I thought myself obliged to give it you. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 17 Novemb. 1639.   

LETTER VIII.  
SIR,  
THe affair of Ariosto is, it seems, in the mouth of all people, and has occasioned factions and parties. For my particular, I have gone in that way my reason suggested for the best, without imagining that I concurred with you, and I merit not your thanks, for following my own opinion. I had no other object but truth, which, it was said of old, aught to be chosen, with the desertion of Socrates and Plato, and in whose cause we should not scruple, to oppose, not only the apprehensions of our friends, but even our own inclinations. Upon this consideration, I have some hopes of the conversion of our dear, Monsieur de Voiture, who knows, that Saint Augustine hath written his retractations, and that there are some Laws that are abrogated by others; as also that none hath the gift of infallibility, besides our holy father the Pope, when he speaks ex cathedrâ. It is fit to ascribe glory to God, who alone has the possession of truth, and is not capable either of errors or repentance. Since the Stars and Cedars fall, who is he that can assure himself of his stability? And is there any person so perfect, that he has not sometimes a sense of human weakness? This ingenuous confession is almost as honourable as the victory. In all regards, an accommodation is better than a duel; and I had rather be reconciled with Ariosto, then be engaged in a combat against his Knight. This Astolpho is a dangerous man, and woe be to them that incur his displeasure. As to myself, I account his friendship as a piece of good fortune, and am very proud of the new testimony he has rendered me of it. But that sister of his, that writes so elegantly, and such good sense, is verily worthy of that relation, and, in my fancy, a most accomplished and excellent person. Do me the favour, Sir, to lend me a dozen of your words, to make her the compliment I am obliged to offer; and assure her further, if you please, that if I were the lawful disposer of that immortality, whereof you speak, she should not fail to have a portion. At present, my desire is, that she, and Monsieur her brother, may have the sight of the first part of my discourse, upon Menander. It will not likewise be unfitting, to communicate it to the learned, Monsieur de la Motte, to the intent I may know of him, whether all our French eloquence be any thing more, than the disposition of words, and harmony of periods. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 15 April, 1639.   

LETTER IX.  
SIR,  
YOur difference with Monsieur de Voiture, might be the argument of no unpleasant discourse; & we would entitle it, with your permission, The Trial of Ariosto. Our friend's Letter of defiance, would be inserted in it, which is a piece of no ordinary invention; but then, you must be entreated to do me the necessary favour, of keeping mine in your hands, & denying every body both the sight and copy of it. You are indeed unmeasurable in your diligence, and your goodness overpresses me with civilities and obligations. What prodigious inclination is this, to receive a Letter at nine a clock at night, and to answer it at the same time, with so much discretion and exactness! I confess you have all sorts of advantages over me, and I am not capable of so great performances. I will suddenly return you your admirable Italian, and only in the mean time assure you, that I am ravished with his Translation of the Aeneids. I conceive, we may judge principally from it, of the wit of Hannibal Caro, and of the excellence of his Tongue. When I consider it, in this Book, I cannot but pity ours, and have very low esteem of it, Nisi, quod ei deest de ingenio, ut ille ait, adderemus. I have very many things to say upon this subject, but it will be better to reserve them for a Chapter of our Entertainments: And besides, I am not in a condition to be pleasant, being weary and shattered with one of the most cruel nights that I have passed a long time. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 29 April, 1639.   

LETTER X.  
SIR,  
IF I happen to see that gallant person again, of whom your Letter makes mention, and who is so dexterous in swallowing Benefices of five hundred Crowns revenue, I shall contain myself from esteeming him either Photion or Aristides. The judgement of Monsieur de— pace tanti viri dixerim, is sometimes right, and not always so. The understanding of Monsieur de— has very narrow limits, and as the first does ordinarily attribute too much to himself, so does the second set too high a value on the first; whether it be, that he own him some small sum, for which he pays him consideration in this manner, or any other less material interest that induces him to such conceits. They are both of them strangers in that Country, whereof I esteem myself a Denizen, and the little acquaintance they have with the Ancients, is the cause that they deal with so much equivocation and ambiguity in matters which concern the Moderns. If they had only taken the pains to read the Apology of Apuleius, or that of Saint Jerome against Rufinus, they would have learned, that all subjects are not capable of the same strength or ornament; and have observed other manner of inequalities there, then in my Discourse. I will speak nothing of those knowing Ladies, which they have drawn to their opinion, but only this, that I conceive myself subtle enough, to be able to deceive them at the first reading at least, as well as some bad Poets of the stage have done. I confess, it never entered into my thoughts to choose them for my Judges, and hence it is that they pronounced so speedy a sentence upon a man that did not yet begin to plead. 'Tis you, Sir, who are the rule of Truth, and it is not possible for me to doubt the certainty of your resolutions, so long as I have your voice in my favour; I shall not be solicitous, to repair a business wherein the curious ignorance of some— does rather make then find defects. This person does me a kindness beyond my desires; and I could not believe, that there was so much freedom in the Country of dissimulation. I also wonder how the most observant of all Mortals, came to quit his obsequiousness for my concernment, and did not rather in compliance with his friend, pronounce the second moiety of equal merit with the first. However it be, I shall not much lay this unhappiness to heart. The world is become so delicate, and I may say, fastidious too, that it often disrelishes more commendable things than mine, I cannot dilate further upon this subject, by reason of Totila's absence, whom some affairs have taken from me. I am so infirm and helpless, that wanting his hands, my own will only serve me to assure you, that, I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 12 May, 1639.   

LET. XI.  
SIR,  
YOu may most assuredly believe, that my mind is in equal sufferance with yours; and that I swallow a part of that dust whereof you speak. But besides this, I am not without my peculiar unhappinesses, though I have likewise some good news to impart to you. In requital of the story of your breaking up house, you shall receive that of the death of three of my Horses, and the sickness of the fourth. It must needs be, that either the Goddess Hippona is strangely incensed against me, or some other pernicious Daemon is grown envious of my Promenades, and has designed to force me to go a foot, and so deprive me of the only remaining pleasure of my life. This inconvenience is more grievous to me then my last, which though it would be perhaps not inconsiderable to a man that had both a grand and little Escuyrie; yet I resent no more of it, than the present disturbance, and the trouble I shall have to move, till my poor equipage be repaired. The want of a Caroche is a misery insupportable, to the condition wherein I am; and though Philosophy may place it in the number of things superfluous, yet my infirmity makes me account it amongst the necessary. Having affirmed thus much, I will presume to tell you further, that I apprehend more contentment, in being extolled in that manner, then by all the Eulogies of the Academy. And of those two desires of Virgil, 
— quâ me quoque possim  
Tollere humo, victorque virûm volitare per ora.  I expound the fi●st, concerning a Caroche, which you see he places before a great reputation. Nevertheless, Sir, I would not be misconceived, as offended thereat; and that my disgust of the last weeks actions, draws these speeches from me. Whatsoever I have written to you, I beseech you to believe, that I know with what submission and docility, I ought to receive every thing, that is tendered me by my friends. Only I think, the freedom of friendship should not exclude discretion; and that faithful counsel is not used to be given in public. Therefore Monsieur— might have forborn raising himself, to be Monsieur the Judge; and rather thought, he had been less attentive in reading the second part, then said of it, that it was of less strength than the first, which is only a civil accusation of its weakness. He has received the displeasure of being contradicted by you, and Monsieur de Conrart, who have observed no inequality in it; and therefore by necessary consequence, it can have none. But although we should agree in the acknowledgement of his objection, yet being, as I am, continually afflicted and in misery, I desire rather consolation than counsel. Provided there be neither heresy nor incongruity in my writings, I esteem all the rest, as undeserving the trouble of reformation. I prefer indeed a business accomplished, before that which is to be done, and is yet only in design.  
Praetulerimque parùm fortis doctusque videri,  
Dum mea delectant mala me, vel denique fallent,  
Quàm sapere & ringi—  
I have seen the days, wherein I had different inclinations; but age and infirmities have wrought this, amongst other alterations in me. I perceive myself become obstinate and hardened, against the greatest and most provoking injuries, which may possibly be rather an effect of them, than of Philosophy. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 24 May, 1639.   

LET. XII.  
SIR,  
IT is not unquestionable, but Scaliger may have failed in the quadrature of the Circle. Yet Casaubon has written excellent observations in his Exercitations, against the Cardinal Baronius. Heinsius also will perhaps afford us some remarkable discoveries, upon the New Testament, although he be no Doctor of the Sorbonne. Good judgement, with understanding of Languages, and skill in Antiquities, are the only necessary provision for his enterprise; and if he employ them with integrity, and faithfully, our side will draw more advantage from them, than his own. The handling of the Mathematical Sciences, is a far different business, in my opinion, since they have no community with the precepts of Morality; and their mystery depends not, either of the Greek or Hebrew: They require a very abstracted speculation, and must be attended with that subtlety of apprehension, that I conceive it not difficult to mistake the way, in a path so obscure and narrow. Yet I think, a knowing and judicious person, that has read all the ancient Fathers, and is skilled in all the tongues of the East, may, with success, publish what he has gone so far to seek, and taken up at several Ports and Countries. As to the ridiculous— he has something too much toleration; it is not fit he be suffered to rule so absolutely, but must be frequently put in mind of la Berne, and perhaps that may make him for the future more wise. Monsieur— would do well, to extend his charity so far, and try, if the fear of punishment may happily divert the effect. But what prodigy is that you tell me? Is it possible, that a person, that is endued with one grain of common sense, can prefer the Spanish Poets, above those of Italy, and conceive the visions of one Lopez de Vega, to be rational compositions. This is it that persuades me, there are sometimes false judgements made, in the cabinets of the wisest, and that there is hazard in the issues of the brain, as well as in the affairs of the world. I appeal from this injustice to our excellent Marquis, who will never mistake apparences for truth. But can it be true, that this brave Marquis should not be treated answerably to his worth, and that he was designed to encounter, with all the fury and hardships of the North, without allowance of necessary support. I am fearful of the success of th●s great courage, if he fail of the assistance of men and money. He apprehends the enemy, to be the least considerable danger he can meet with. Famine, and want of provisions, are far more dreadful, and such as no valour is able to resist. I would to God, all the Spaniards were at the Indies, and all the Imperialists with the Antipodes: our friends indeed would hereby have less matter for triumph and glory; but we should be freed from those fears, we apprehend for their safety. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 8 June, 1639   

LETTER XIII.  
SIR,  
I Repent me, that I made you any discovery of my losses, since you resent them so deeply. But I receive great contentment, from those evident testimonies you give me of your affection; and that my interests could make any impression upon your soul, which is all Adamant in your own. Such tenderness is not unbecoming the strength of Hero's; and, if they have sometimes lamented the loss of a Dog they loved, you may certainly be allowed to condole with a friend, for the death of four Horses, that were of necessary use unto him. In those days, they would have deserved four Epitaphs; but they are now too well treated, in that they are sorrowed for by you; and the unfeigned tears you speak of, are more glorious to them, than a Bucephalia, and all the Grecian vanity could invent, to consecrate dead things to perpetual remembrance. I hope, in a short time, to fill their places with others, because I cannot live, and be without them; and that my weakness is of more reality than your tears. When I relate you my afflictions, I borrow no Rhetoric, to represent them in a larger proportion; I am an Historian, and make you a faithful narration. I cannot consent to you, that the use of the Caroche is but a shadow of exercise; there is not indeed such violent agitation, as in other sorts, yet there is a continual motion, that contributes enough to the advancement of digestion. Besides, I receceive the air on all sides, and my eyes a●e refreshed with the beauties of the field, as often as I discharge them from the employment of reading. My infirmity makes me wish some other carriage, of more gentleness and ease; and the Gestatio of the old Romans, is exactly such, as I stand in need of. Were it not to provoke the tongues of people, I would provide me a Pulpit, and cause myself to be carried by men, instead of being drawn by horses. The person of whom I told you, and whose character you have so suitably delineated, is departed from this Province, with the curses of the whole world. If the Tax be continued, all this Country will be turned into an Hospital. For my own concernment, I have great reason to commend his civility, for that he had a more merciful regard, to all such as I recommended to him. But I fear, in a little while, it will be necessary to recommend myself, and that Orators and Poets will not be esteemed as privileged persons. You well remember the field that was taken away from poor Virgil, and the complaints that he makes thereupon in his Eclogues. If one that I know, had foreseen this imposition six years ago, his Letters should have been dated from beyond sea, and he would have provided for the security of his Peculium. However things go, I exhort all the world to patience; but I find every man in the depth of despair, and cannot imagine any remedy, to our present sufferings, unless Heaven appear by miracles for our succour, to accomplish the good intentions of the King. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 June, 1639.   

LET. XIV.  
SIR,  
I Am not minded to enter the Lists, in the quarrel of the Rabbins, especially when I must encounter with you for my adversary. They are people, with whom I have no acquaintance, and such as, if you please, I shall believe more fools, than your Letters represent them. But, Sir, if I remember, it was not upon this empty and trifling reading, that I chief grounded the learning of Monsieur Heinsius. Besides the Oriental Languages, which they report him skilled in, he is of great natural endowments, and has exact knowledge in solid Antiquity, and the Philosophies of old; and yet further, such sagacity in matters of Criticism, that his conjectures seem sometimes to approach near divination: Notwithstanding, it is possible he may decline in his old days. And 'tis a common word amongst his orientals, that Vinegar is the son of Wine, and that Time gins to pray upon things, as soon as it has brought them to their perfection. But let us relinquish those Gentlemen, the Rabbins, and give me leave to desire some knowledge, of the affairs of our friends. Be pleased to make me understand, how Monsieur d'Ablancourt is at this present employed, and if he intent not a Panegyric, in honour of his eminency, having caused others to display all their eloquence upon that subject. He is a person of sufficiency, for whatever he will undertake, on whom I have bestowed my heart, and my esteem, and who must not be forgotten in my Entertainments. Let me also know, if Monsieur— has finished his Treatise, of Counsels for War, whereof you gave me notice. There being at this day a Prince of Orange, and a Duke of Weymar in the world, does he not fear the misadventure of that Doctor, that discoursed of the same matter in the presence of Hannibal, and employed all his Rhetoric, to make himself ridiculous? These Princes are indeed more polite, than that Barbarian was, and our friend more expert than the Sophister; and therefore I consent to the continuation of his work. I most humbly kiss your hands, and am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 6 July, 1639.   

LETTER XV.  
SIR,  
IT is infinite pleasure unto me, to see you Philosophise upon the argument of friendship; all your subtleties are not less solid, then delicate and agreeable. You have discovered the most secret recesses of your soul, and it must necessarily be, that you have throughly studied your inclinations, since you are so perfect in the knowledge of yourself. Certainly you know an excellent person. And what unhappiness have I, to be separated from you by so many Towns and Champions: Is it the will of Destiny, to keep us always apart?  Nec d●bitur veras audire & reddere voces? 
These violent desires do frequently transport me, and I should undoubtedly content them, if it were possible to see Paris without approaching the Court. But I acknowledge my weakness the obstacle. The great light blinds me, and I lose my breath in the crowd of the World. I forbear to describe you the desolation of our Village, which has lately been almost devoured by the Regiment of the Lord—. Monsieur the Abbot of Bois-Robert, will perhaps give you some relation of it. I shall only tell you that this injury committed against the Muses, might well deserve an Eclogue in the strain of our friend Colletet. If you please to offer him the subject, I do not question but he will manage it answerably, and readily lend me his resentments. He has obliged me in many other matters, and I conceive there is nothing which I may not expect from his friendship. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 4 August, 1639.   

LETTER XVI.  
SIR,  
SInce the return of the last Post, I have received that which you were pleased to deliver to the Messenger, and shall account it to the number of my former engagements. I cannot sufficiently admire your Jesuit, his daring wit, and the magnificence of his expression; What Enthusiasm has possessed him? Without dispute, he is one of your great friends, or at least one that has propounded you for his pattern; and I am confident, your Ode for Monsieur the Cardinal, was his first inspiration. I shall say nothing where I have met with most strength or weakness in his Poem, but forbear at this time to exercise my skill in Censure. Only I assure you, I never yet saw a more happy imitation; and yet further (which I would have pass for Oraculous) that if Monsieur Chapelain be the instructor of the Father le Moine, the Father le Moine will prove one of the great Personages of these later Ages. I mentioned to you, a few days since, the Letter which I writ to Monsieur the Abbot of Bois-Robert, concerning Monsieur de— I send you a Copy of it enclosed, because I deem it expedient, that you should know the whole History of Balzac, wherein I do not doubt, but your affection has made you somewhat concerned. I am, likewise, more perfectly than any person in the world,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 18 August, 1639.  
In closing of my Letter, I am told, that Monsieur— did prohibit his Troops to quarter at Balzac. But either his commands had not Authority enough, or his Captains were unmindful of his orders. For our Village was wholly sacked before ever the Party approached it. But this injury must be forgotten as well as many more, and we must rest satisfied with the little subsistence they have left us to be so.   

LETTER XVII.  
SIR,  
I Have read with very great consolation, the two Letters of our dear and incomparable friends. I should have said, with very great joy, if in the condition wherein I am, I could be sensible of that delightful motion of the soul. But I find such drooping and languour upon my spirit, and my body so enfeebled with the restless nights I have lately passed, that there is no news of goodness enough to awaken and divert my melancholy. You may well perceive, that if this were not the obstacle, I should dispense with my vow for this time, and not borrow your words, though more eloquent than mine, to testify to those worthy friends, that I esteem their Amity amongst the dearest blessings of my life. The prudence and matter of that of Monsieur Hobier, is admirable, as well as his style pure and uniform. I think, Sir, the definition of vir bonus, dicendi peritus, was made expressly for him, and that all his words are marked with the character of virtue. I have proceeded no further yet, than his Preface, which deserves an attentive perusal; and, wherein I have stayed with pleasure. We will speak therefore another time of the life of Agricola, and at present, to pass from a part of Tacitus, to Tacitus entire; be pleased to let Monsieur d'Ablancourt know, that I have so high an opinion of his French Version, that I am ready to maintain against the Doctor Heinsius, and the Jesuit Strada, that it fare excels the Latin, whereof they have so closely affected the imitation. Had I a Neighbour of his sufficiency, we should surely accomplish considerable designs, and in our learned walks employ our Criticism to great advantage. But it is not meet for a poor Anchoret to conceive such high thoughts, and my maladies raise fear in all the world. They are indeed excessively violent, and I assure you, you are imposed upon by all such as give you any information of my health. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 30 Aug. 1639.   

LETTER XVIII.  
SIR,  
YOu reproach my pusillanimity with a very good grace, and your French seems to tell me thus in Latin.  
Sydera quis mundumque velit spectare cadentem,  
Expers ipse metûs? Quis cum ruat arduus aether,  
Terra labet misto cöeuntis pondere caeli,  
Complosas tenuisse manus? solusne remotus,  
Otia s●●as ages?—  
To which I answer, that knowing myself one of the most impotent and unprofitable members of the Commonwealth, I cannot yet discern wherein I may be serviceable to the present necessity. And nevertheless, If I heard that you were in danger at the end of the world, I should immediately fly thither, either to your assistance, or at least to be your companion in the common ruin. Therefore, if my advice be of weight with you, you shall accept the command of a company of Cavalry, unless you rather affect the charge of Lieutenant Colonel, in the Regiment of our excellent Marquis, I am ready to to list under your Ensign; and if you forbidden me, I will play the valiant in the same Tongue wherewith you upbraided my cowardice, and tell you, 
Vtrumne justi persequemur otium, Horat. Epod. 1.  
Non dulce, ni tecum simul?  
An hunc laborem ment laturi, decet,  
Quadratus far non molles viros.  
Feremus? & te vel per Alpium juga,  
Inhospitalem & Caucasum,  
Vel occidentis usque ad ultimum sinum,  
Forti sequemur pectore?  
Rogues tuum labore quid juvem meo,  
Imbellis ac firmus parùm?  
Comes minore sum futurus in metu,  
Qui major absentes habet.  You observe, how I borrow the Enthusiasm of an other, and make myself a Poet with Verses that belong not to me. The cause is, for that they better explain my intention, than I can do myself, and represent my thoughts to you in their nakedness and sincerity. I have nothing more to adjoin to this, but only that you are pleased to make yourself merry with saying, that you have drawn much Constancy from my Writings; you that have more in your breast, than Seneca, Boetius, Lipsius, or the Keeper of the Seals, du Vaire, have published in all their Volumes. A friend of such worth, is able to uphold me with comfort against all the injuries of bad times. I have added this Epithet to time but of late, and if Monsieur— had not taken assay of me, I might have still been entire, and able to have told you, 
D'ogni oltraggio e scorno,  
La mia famiglia, e la mia greggia il●ese.  
Semper qui fur, ne strepito di mart  
Anchor turbò questa rémota parte.   
But I am now enforced to change my ditty; and were my resentments as quick and delicate, as formerly, (though some, as I have told you, would persuade me they are) I should endeavour to repay the rudeness with such a revenge, as should acquit my courage, and afford our Province some mirth, in the midst of their distresses. But we must comfort ourself with the multitude of sufferers, in the same cause, and admire the Heroes of other Ages, who took care of men of learning, and protected them in the general desolation. Possibly another time, there will be found some, that will judge us worthy of this honour, and make us objects of their heroical generosity. You see what course I take to palliate our miseries, and so, Dum careo veris, gaudia falsa juvant. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 29 April, 1639.   

LETTER XIX.  
SIR,  
I Have this day received a Letter of Monsieur de— whereof I send you a copy; I could have wished less commendations from his Rhetoric, and more favour from his Captains: But since his commands were ineffectual, and Monsieur the ●uke de la Rochefaucaut, was partaker in the common saccage, it is meet our Province should abate their vanity; and I forbear to trouble you any further, with the lamentable story of our grievances. Having already given you so exact narration of my misfortunes, it is but equitable to inform you, of the good requital I received by this last Post; 'tis a Letter from Monsieur Conrart, which makes me the proudest man upon earth; and if there be remaining any shadow of humility in me, yet I triumph at least within doors, and keep holiday in my Closet. To tell you the truth sincerely, I never yet saw a Letter, more ingenuous, rich, and noble: and for that you speak of it, as if it had never been in your hands, I thought myself obliged to send you a copy of it, to the end it may become the common subject of our admiration and applause. Does not this Gentleman make you recall to memory, the first Nephews of Remus, who were wealthy, without having pillaged the Gold of Asia; and learned, before they understood the Language of the Greeks: They were, I say, rich, with their own possessions, and learned with such knowledge, as was peculiarly their own, and unborrowed. It must not be suffered, that posterity be ignorant of this wonder of our age. And if my writings have that strength of constitution, to survive the ashes of their parent, (as he is pleased to imagine in my favour) he may be assured, it shall never be, without making them bear some eminent testimonies, of the esteem I have of his great worth, and the friendship wherewith he has done me honour. The father Palavicino gives me no satisfaction, concerning the Comedies of Ariosto; and the grande Positivo, whereunto he requires our belief, is more than one degree above my apprehension. I cannot discover more excellency in the great Poem, considered in its kind, than the Comedies have in theirs; and as to the point of regularity, you know there is no comparison. It may be therefore, that Palavicino is a great Scholar, but this part of learning lies out of his road. To be a native of Italy, is not a sufficient qualification, to create a man Dictator in the Commonwealth of Literature; witness the Poet of Luca, for whom Camusat lately printed a volume of Verses, which, in my opinion, are far short in value, of the paper of the Impression. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 24 Septemb. 1639.   

LET. XX. From Monsieur Conrart, to Monsieur de Balzac.  
SIR,  
I Advertise you beforehand, that I intent no excuses in this, for my not writing to you; it is rather a protestation to assure you, that I shall give you no further trouble in that kind, but leave you in repose, to employ your only care, in advancing the immortality of your own glory, and that of your friends. Nevertheless I have imagined, that after a silence of above a years durance, I might happily oblige you to the reading of a few lines, provided I did at the same time oblige you, to return me no answer. This is now a favour which I request of you, with as much passion, as I used heretofore to obtain your Letters; the esteem I bear them, is in as high a degree as ever; but I content my desires with those, which you writ to Monsieur Chapelain, as well as if they were addressed to myself, and I have found the device to imagine them such, and that I make you all the answers, which you receive from him. So that, without loss of time to you, in regard of me, or of my prayers and importunities, we enjoy a mutual commerce, which puts you to no trouble, and affords me a great measure of delight and contentment. I have had a sight of the remarkable judgement you passed, upon the Supposez of Ariosto, wherein I am much taken, both with your equity, and your address, and have equal admiration of the profoundness of your capacity, and the politeness of your wit. Never was seen a Judge so well accomplished, and so little prepossessed; nor a sentence more just and better grounded. There needs no rigid and severe decrees, to constrain it to execution, every one acquiesces in it without resistance; and even those that accounted it their glory, to have never yielded, have thought themselves obliged to a ready approbation, of what you ordain. I have read, with no less contentment, that handsome Apology, which is in the keeping of Monsieur Chapelain; it has been the subject of divers Academical conferences; and all that saw it, after they had surveyed all the perfections of it with wonder, could find no other fault in it, but its brevity. I assure you, there was scarce one lecture of it, but drew these expressions from the Auditory. When will it be our happiness, to see complete Volumes of such excellency, as this Discourse? And why cannot we prolong the life of this incomparable person, the Author of it, with the like facility, as he renders all those immortal, whose names deserve a place in his Writings? I had intended to finish my Letter here, but this last word induces me, to make a request to you, for a speedy sight of your rich Miscellanies, wherein we shall unquestionably behold, all the beauties of Art and Nature, in the height of their glory and lustre, and the pomp of ornament, so delightfully accommodated, with the genuine and simple comeliness, that the contexture, though of nothing but natural and supernatural, will appear most graceful, without either disorder or contradiction. Eloquence will have there, so dextrously contrived all its force and artifice, yet without making show of any, it will notwithstanding animate the whole body, with such motion and action, as will ravish all the world. Suffer us not to languish any longer, in expectation of our happiness; and be pleased to believe, that amongst all those that desire the accomplishment of it, there is not any more perfectly than myself.  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 10 Sep. 1639.   

LET. XXI.  
SIR,  
YOu shall be no better obeyed, than Virgil was of old, when he sentenced his Aeneids to the fire. I cannot be won to burn your Letter, although you should ordain me to do it, by an especial clause of your Testament. Notwithstanding, your desire may prevail with me, for secrecy, and the wise person be suffered in the guilt of his folly, without knowing our opinions of the action. Your perspicatious reason, has discovered the true cause of his prodigious inequality, and the article which you writ me concerning it, deserves to be inserted in a convenient place. This may be effected without difficulty, Suppresso authorum & paraphrastarum nomine; and you may intrust Monsieur— upon my interest. I will not descend from a Thesis to an Hypothesis. I knew, long since, that man is an Animal, composed of contrarieties, and that such a person is reasonable to day, who has no assurance of being so to morrow. Some man may have great dexterity and conduct, in his affairs, as for instance, the Marshal— and yet be void of all sense in his writings; and another, as the Lord Madelenet, may compose Odes in Latin, in competition with those of Horace, and French Verse, after the rate of Du Monin. Your— affords an authentic demonstration of this truth, and as far as I can judge, there is a greater difference between him and himself, than there is between him and another person; I speak only of his Poetry, having yet seen but one sort of his Prose, concerning which, I must tell you, that if he choose me for his example, I am as unhappy as he, of whom it was said, Multas fecerat simias, nullos filios. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 4 Octob. 1639.   

LET. XXII.  
SIR,  
I Have very tender resentments of your loss, although your gain could not have promoted the conclusion of the War. Since Brisac has wrought no advantage to it, I am no longer of belief, that peace is in the power of men; Heaven must of necessity become engaged in the affair, and it must be the work of God, and not ours. Yet let us not, in the mean time, abandon ourselves to grief, nor despair of the Commonwealth, although after a Battle of Cannae. At the worst, we may save ourselves in the Sanctuary, that Philosophy has built for us, against the misfortunes of the world; I mean, the Philosophy of Plato, for I know you affect not that of Chrysippus; and I accord with you, in dislike of that stepdame of the passions; (as one terms it) which in order to the design, of making a true wise man, that is, living and sprightly, represents him no other, than a dead and insensible image. This kind of Statues are more suitable, for the ornament of the Porch, then for the uses of life; and, as I conceive, there is between hardness and softness a middle temperament, which is called Firmness. The Piece that this Post will deliver you, contains something perhaps not impertinent to this argument. I have some weak apprehensions of its beauty, by the persuasion of some here that think it fair; but Monsieur Chapelain having not yet pronounced upon it, I am wholly unresolved in what quality to esteem it. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 Octob. 1639.   

LET. XXIII.  
SIR,  
LEt us leave the dead, to the company of those in the same condition, and suffer me to congratulate with you, for your new acquaintance. I never yet saw the face, of Monsieur the Ambassador of Sueden, though I have long since had a particular esteem of his endowments; and had not he turned the Institutes into Verse, and published some other pieces of the like nature, I should have yet had a greater veneration of his worth. As for his humour, of affecting the behaviour of a stranger, I am not much displeased with it; we are all Barbarians to one another, and there is a sort of civility at Paris, which I more disgust than all the rudeness of the North. The Poet of Luca, of whom you have no knowledge, is a— that has made an infinite company of Verses, at the rate of a hundred for a penny, as your Marin used to speak; and all de communi, in the term of the University. I have not discovered one grain of salt in two or three great Poems, which I had the patience to read. Whereupon I have bidden him Adieu for e-ever. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 4 Novemb. 1639.   

LET. XXIV.  
SIR,  
SHould I credit your Relation, I must use much virtue to restrain me from vainglory. My Writings deserve not the commendations, they have received at Ramboüillet Hostel, and the honour bestowed on me, seems more properly the due of my Lord the Cardinal de la Valette. But, in the mean time, where was the dear Monsieur— that constant and perpetual admirer of F. N. C. whose disposition is so sweet, that honey and sugar are bitter in comparison? ********** The gravity of our other friend, is also rare and admirable; and I believe, the Areopagus never saw any thing more sober and composed. Be pleased, Sir, for my sake, to call my Consolation a Discourse; for, besides the properness of the Title, and that it is Oratio ad Cardinalem, (there being some much shorter in the Books of the Ancients, especially in those of the old Greeks) you know, I detest the name of Letter, cane pejus & angue. Yet it is necessary the Muse of the Fens have a Copy, since you ordain it so, and I have no power to disobey you. But this must not be drawn to an example, and you must bear with me another time, if la signora Principina, ò lafoy signora— writ to me, and I return them no answer. What misery is this to be obliged, to make Eulogiums upon all Books that are published? 'Tis certainly to be in a worse condition in Prose, than the Auratus poeta regius was, who did with a good will, what I do by force, and as condemned to. I have with sorrow understood the death of poor Monsieur Arnaud: He was indeed a person of great worth, and I lament the case of the Gentlemen his Brothers, who are very deserving, and for whom I have ever had a most sincere affection, but full of respect and reverence. Shall we never see a happier time than this? nor furious Mars once secured in chains? Quem das finem, Rex magne, laborum? I speak of the Catholic King, for as for the most-Christian, we know he desires peace even in the midst of Victory. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 8 Novemb. 1639.   

LET. XXV.  
SIR,  
I Never pass judgement on any thing, but I sometimes declare my opinion. Your Sonnet seems to me of perfect excellence, and the Edict of fame, which is executed by a hundred people at the same hour, is proclaimed, is without question an Inspiration, for which you are beholding to your Muses. I would have this understood, without prejudice to what we shall say of it at another time. But what means Seigneur Jean-Jacques, with his dreadful Title of Panglossie. If he account himself Master of forty Languages, he exceeds Scaliger by three and twenty; and the soul of Parnassus must be commended in the Tongue of Biscay, and base Bretagnie. This is to make wild Music in Apollo's Hill, and to bring Barbarians into the Holy place, with no less crime, then theirs that opened the passages of Italy, to the Predecessors of the King of Sweden. Do me the favour to know of Monsieur Conrart, if Monsieur du Moulin has lately printed any of his Sermons, for I should be glad to see his manner of writing upon all occasions. I ever had a great passion for the merit of the excellent Monsieur Conrart, and desire the continuance of his favour, as absolutely necessary and essential to the conservation of my life. Give me leave, Sir, at least once a year, to request of you some news concerning Monsieur, de St. Cyran, Monsieur le Maistre, and the unfortunate—. I extremely resent the loss of our poor Camusat; and 'tis an Article that I had forgotten in my former. He had a great portion both of honour and virtue, and had he grown old in his Profession, he would have restored it to its primitive glory. But Books must also one day perish, as well as those that print them: Debemus morti nos nostraque. I most humbly kiss your hands, and am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 22 Novemb. 1639.   

LETTER XXVI.  
SIR,  
ALthough at present, I want the assistance of Totila, I shall not forbear to write to you in as good a fashion as a weak hand and a bad pen will suffer me; and to let you see my intentions in the least disorder I am able to represent them. Be pleased then, Sir, That I thank you with my uncomely writing, for the fair present you have conferred upon me. I mean the Robe of a Consolatour, wherewith your favour has invested me, and raised me as it were a statue between those of Seneca and Plutarch. These dignities are indeed very dear unto me, because they assure me the esteem of such a person, who possesses reason in a sovereign degree, and so is consequently free from error in his judgements. But is it possible, that you have discovered a Vittoria Colonna at Paris, and that that marchioness of whom we never heard before, is equal in merit to her of Rome? It is no longer questionable, after you have affirmed it, and we must reverence her excellent qualities for the future, and acknowledge the justice and favour she has done us in the affair of Phylarque. To confirm her in her opinion, I desire she may have my Apology, in the form as I lately revised it. But, Sir, my principal ambition is to satisfy you alone, whose least scruples give me more trouble, than all the declared hostilities of all the Doctors and Academies of the world can do. You may judge from hence, if I esteem and allow the curiosity of Monsieur de Scudery, who intends to rank you amongst his Illustrious persons. I only desire that he would be careful of placing you with suitable companions. For besides the great Poet, which I acknowledge you to be, I account you also an eminent Counsellor of State, Secretary, and Ambassador; in a word, a person most accomplished in all things: And I never give any other Character of you, to those that demand of me, who that perfect friend is I have at Court, and of whom I make all my glory. Et haec non animo adulatorio & ad aulicas artes composito dicta sint. Jure tuo habes testem, qui si sciens fallat, etc. The rest another time, for at present I am able to proceed no further, but remain,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 1 Decemb. 1639.   

LETTER XXVII.  
SIR,  
I Am but ill affected with the deportment of the Italian Parricide; and the Muse's Balzacides do no less distaste it, than the Putean's. The pious offices which he renders to the memory of his friend, gave me infinite contentment, and I have testified as much. But I cannot endure that he should drive a Trade with them. It must needs be, that he has little knowledge of our Court, since he addresses himself to Scholars to be his Solicitors, and to gain him kindness from a man they never see. He is yet more strangely mistaken in the choice of his subject. For you may believe, that if he escape being derided for his Panglossie, he will at least receive but little thanks for this. Monsieur the Cardinal may willingly bear with his Panegyrics, and pay him for some of them; but he is not concerned in a Funeral Oration, for people that he never heard of. It seems, the famous T●pler is come back to drink at Paris, and that he could not be long absent from the centre of his Luxury, I beseech you, Sir, let me know from him, where Monsieur Maynard is, for whom my curiosity is uncessant. If you also happen into the company of Monsieur de la Pigeonnier, you will infinitely oblige me by desiring of him, the Manuscript Works of the late du Vivier, which are in his hands. I think he will not refuse you; and if you will do me the pleasure to send them hither, I shall return them with speed, and before he can imagine they are gone so long a journey. This du Vivier had a pretty way of raillery, and because it may be thought I had some share in his death, I believe myself obliged to perform some duty to his memory. He writ me word by the Messenger from Blois to Paris, that he had lost his Father, and that himself should infallibly follow, unless I comforted him for that affliction. I was negligent, after my custom, and rendered him not the office he required at the time appointed. As for him, he made good his word, and the following Messenger, by whom I intended my answer, told me the person to whom I addressed it, was no longer of this World. Behold a fatal slothfulness, and which may give warning to all people that writ to me in that manner, for I know at length I shall become incorrigible. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 15. Decemb. 1639.   

LETTER XXIX.  
SIR,  
YOu may be assured by my former Letters, that I have received yours, and that the Elogium of your marchioness is not lost; if it were she, that sent you so many Notes, they might be tolerated with patience. But the persecution of the other is insupportable, and I swear unto you, I would never have said a good word of her, if I had known she did so perpetually assassinate you with her Writings. I should have begun long since to deplore your fortune. The— would needs heretofore play with me at that sport, but I was more valiant than you, and acquitted myself of her courageously. She made a thousand false thrusts, and I received a whole Bushel of Tickets, but without losing one jot of my dumb gravity. This is the way to treat Ladies of that kind, whether they be Muses or Fairies; or, which you love better, Sibyls. You see my old practice, I am ready to do worse in case of necessity: 'Tis not because I am full of employment, but for that I am so discontented, and weary with the continued torture of my maladies, that I know not on which side to turn myself. I am in great fear for Piedmont, that is, for you, and a little Nephew I have there, who may possibly be trodden down in the crowd. Our friends are of great worth, but the Princes of Savoy must not be neglected; and there being brave spirits on both sides, I apprehend a terrible slaughter, unless Heaven avert it. I am proud of the good opinion that Monsieur Spanheim has of me; for he is a person whom I infinitely esteem. If there be any thing of his abroad, besides the two Books which I have already seen, I beseech you inform my Stationer of it, and let him send them. Otherwise, I never make any uncivil request, nor desire to see that which is kept secret. Hence it is, that I mortify my curiosity with my discretion, and am contented to know, that Monsieur le Maistre can make nothing but what is rare and excellent. You are wholly silent concerning my affections, I mean, Monsieur Conrart, and Monsieur Menage. Be pleased to let t●em know, I have still the same passion for them, and be confidently assured, that I am more perfectly than any other in the world, I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 Decemb. 1639.   
The End of the Fourth Book.   

FAMILIAR LETTERS, OF M. de BALZAC, To M. CHAPELAIN. The Fifth Book.  

LETTER I.  
SIR,  
I Saw yesterday the Duke of Rochefoucaut, who told me many things, and amongst the rest, that your Signora Vittoria takes the little man we know, for a little fool: It is the more likely to be true, because the number of that Order is very great; and yet it may not be so, because the Court oftentimes condemns a man, for a wry mouth, or one simple look. I understand from the same Author, that Moses saved, was the delight and passion of Monsieur and Madam of Liancourt. Besides, I have received the book of Holstenius, and the Tyrannique Love of Monsieur de Scudery; by the reading of which, I must confess to you, I am still warmed and agitated. 'Tis true, there are some few things in that piece, which I could wish he would alter, and himself may take notice of them; but the rest are in my opinion incomparable, which move the passions after a strange manner, which make me shed tears in despite of me, and are the cause, that the Kid and Scipio are no longer my favourits; perhaps it is, because we ordinarily judge, in favour of things and persons that are present, and forget what is past. However it be, I shall not be displeased, that Monsieur de Scudery understand, he hath done what he would with me, and hath taken me down from my altitude of Philosophy, to range me amongst the common crowd. But I beseech you, Who is that gallant person, whom you call Monsieur Sarrasin, and who calls himself, Monsieur d'Arbois? The name pleases me, as well as the remembrances, and I yet honour the memory of that precious liquor, which I sometimes preferred before that of Spain or the Canaries. Setting aside raillery, Monsieur Sarrasin is an excellent Doctor, and distributes many things after a most agreeable sort. I will be beholding to you for the rest, if you please, and understand from you, Qui genus, unde domo, quibus aut mihi venit ab oris. I could heartily wish he had the same sentiments for me, I have for him; there wants but little, that I do not this very hour demand his friendship; I, who otherwise am far enough from searching out acquaintance. But this will one day happen, my mind so gives me, and I shall willingly lay hold of an occasion, to let him know, what esteem I have of h s deserts. But would you think it possible, that Monsieur the Duke de Rochefoucaut had never heard speak of our Monsieur de Peiresk? and that many other, not ignorant or barbarous people, know him no more than he? You see by this, his reputation was good, but that it was the Italian Signieur, who enterprised to make it great; and that his Panglossie was rather an effect of his own solicitations, than a voluntary devoyer, made known to the people. I would the Duke of Weymar could find as good a friend, and who would take as great a care of his memory. It was he who ought to have been celebrated, in those forty tongues, and who merits the name of Hero, which we have given so good cheap, and which title many people unworthily hold of our grace. I speak not here of his first marvails, nor intent to compile his History. But I demand of you, if the History of Alexander himself, is embellished with a fairer year than that, in the circle of which he gained three Battles, took three Towns, and made prisoners three Generals? Yet my muse hath revealed to me, he wronged himself, by performing so much in so short a time; for he put a fallacy upon death, who believed him older than he was, taking the last fifteen months of his life for an entire age, because in stead of counting the Time, death reckoned the Victories. You see, I have a little elevated my style, in the end of this Letter, and have somewhat forgotten that plain familiar way, we have obliged each other to keep in our privacies; but you are much more faulty in that then I, and inform me by all the Courriers, of things which seem extremely studied; if they have fallen negligently from your quill, at least they have been collected with much care, and the art of your expressing them, is nothing inferior to the sense. Suffer this protestation which I make betwixt us, and know, there is not any person in the world I esteem so much as you, or any who is so perfectly as myself,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 8 Jan. 1640.   

LETTER II.  
SIR,  
DO not give yourself the trouble hereafter, of answering my questions, and resolving my doubts; I should be very sorry, the profit and honour I receive, should incommode you. Writ me, if you please, but a single monosyllable, and treat me as briefly, as the Lacedæmonians did Philip, I shall be satisfied; provided you sign that syllable, and it contain news from you. Your last, of the 21 of the past month, brought me abundance, for which I return you my acknowledgements, and desire you to believe, that if a little favour is capable of obliging me, I must needs have a perfect recognizance, of that fair profusion you are pleased to enrich me with. The Tomb of the Duke de Weymar, is worthy of himself and you; and of the three verbs you have noted, I am of your opinion for the last, against the two competitors. Je tracay seems to me more warlike, then j' ebaucheray, and is less historical than je fonday; that holds forth enough, and the other, it may be, would too much. The invention, as to the rest, is incomparable, to say, that the last victory of the great Gustavus, was carried by the Duke of Weymar, and that he died in pursuit of an Empire, is in four words to consecrate his memory, and to endow him with the most compendious and highest praise, he could receive. Since you are of opinion, that the reading of the Apology, would not be altogether disagreeable to your excellent marchioness, I shall cause a new copy of it to be written out, and will send it you so soon as it is perfected. Make me understand, I beseech you, what that ridiculous mode means, of certain people, that at midday, and when no cloud obscures the Sun, cause themselves to be served with Torches. And tell me, if you please, which pleases you best of the la point du jour, or du point du jour; and whether you approve the pronounciation of Paris, which cuts in two the Monosyllable, ëu j'ay ëu ila eü, and which renders Rome and Lionne as they are writ, when all France besides pronounce them Rheum and Lioune. As for the other affairs, do not at all marvel, at the judgement I made of the piece, which made so much noise in the world; I only read it once over, and in haste; but I must confess to you, it touched me sensibly. Therefore I yet persist in my opinion, that Monsieur— is a great Poet, and— a most important Grammarian. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 Jan. 1640.   

LETTER III.  
SIR,  
HOw great are your goodness, and your justice! and how signal a pleasure have you done me, in not signing the condemnation of the man of Champagne? What you have writ me upon that subject, is drawn out of the most subtle reason, et ex ipsius visceribus veritatis, as the Gentlemen our Masters say. It is most certain, our Courtiers take too much licence, and stretch their jurisdiction a little farther than they ought; If they cannot bear with our young Doctor, who hath sacrificed to the Graces, in what fashion would they treat the rude Heinsius, if it should please him to enter into the Cabinets? with what hisses would they persecute the base Crassot, and the unpurified Demsterus? Who would be able to save from the lash, poor Frederic Morel, and Theodore Mareile, those too famous Anti-Courtiers, who at every turn, fall from the clouds into the mire, and speak a language so far from being common and intelligible, that it is scarcely human or articulate: Those two were unpolished and rude, and yet had the value set upon them, of an unfashioned Diamond; the rough hardness of their shell, concealed many good things, whilst the fair outside of our refined Writers, covers nothing but froth and wind. Speak your conscience to me, have you a greater esteem for the remaining ruins of Queen Margaret's Court, and the Princess of Conty's, or that which is issued out from the School of Scaliger or Lipsius? For my own part, I love the Pedants in Greek, better than the Pedants in French; and the knowing youth of this Gentleman ought to be preferred, before the aged sufficiency of—. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc.   

LETTER IU.  
SIR,  
YOu have made a happy alteration, in the Tomb of the Duke de Weymar, 'tis worth an Egyptian Pyramid, and the Eagle ready to fall under his blows, is not a change of small importance. I have sent me the Translation of the Parasite, which is barricadoed with such a company of bad Verses, that I was in a mind to have arrested my curiosity there, without passing farther. He is certainly a rare fellow, to elect and pick out himself, for the Guardian of the French Honour, and the abaser of the pride of Italy.  En Cor Zenodoti! en jecur Cratetis! 
I am sufficiently persuaded of the merit of Monsieur de Petrese; but I spoke to you of his reputation, and you know well, that there is a certain donum famae, that all learned men do not possess, and which renders those who enjoy it, not only considerable to the Nobility and Gentry, but to the common People and Artisans. I have not reviewed the book you sent me, but neither do I think the first judgement I made of it, was precipitated; at the least, I have a kindness for the Author, and conceive he is not enough regarded; he hath, I know not what, of grave and noble in him, which extremely pleases me; I speak of his person, and not of his first writings, in which, I acknowledge, he hath too much played the Captain: But who is he that hath not his failings, and his tricks of youth? There is not that thing in the world we can praise, without exception, and all men generally have need of grace. Shall I see nothing of our dear Monsieur de Silhors, to quicken my appetite? and shall I never hear the good news, that fortune at length hath some remorse, for ill treating his virtue? I expect the relation of this with some impatience, as I shall the occasions of letting you know, I am passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 16 Feb. 1640.   

LET. V.  
SIR,  
I Interest myself very much, in the praises Germany bestows upon you, and congratulate the good success of your Sonnet; I am resolved to quote it every syllable, in a Chapter I am now studying. And that you may know, your friend is a Weymarian, as well as you; I must let you understand, that that Hero, a little before his death, made an enquiry after me and my studies, with such care, as well testified, he attended somewhat from them: Monsieur Feret his Secretary, a person of much worth, writ this in a Letter to Monsieur Borstel, from whom I heard it. I never saw in Italian the conspiracy of Giovan in Ludovico Count of Triesque; but assure you, the French Translation of it is a piece, I do not much admire, and the Epistle is but course. I am now far entered into the quarrel of Annibal Caro, but have nothing changed my first sentiment, and I still esteem him an honester man, than his Antagonist, though perhaps the other may be the greater Clerk. No Grammarian I ever yet saw, hath that address and force of this Modenois, either in this, or in the Commentaries he made, upon Aristotle's Poetiques; yet it must be acknowledged, he sometimes sins through his too much subtlety, and that he is an enemy of mankind, who cannot bear the merit or reputation of another. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 1 March, 1640.   

LET. VI  
SIR,  
Whatever inclination the party you know of, hath to slandering, I cannot choose but think him a brave boy, nay, a gallant man, since he is now enriched with a beard; if I love him not with that sacred friendship I have for you, at the least I can afford him such a passion, as shall nothing incommode me, and yet extremely satisfy him. I will put him in the number of Mountebanks, of Perfumers, Viollists, makers of Ragousts, and all those Artificers of pleasure, which are virtuosos in Italy, and who, as you know, Delectant Copetane, non amantur. That generation of people were banished from Sparta, but were esteemed amongst the Sybarites; and for my particular, I regard them, because I have need of mirth, and am not displeased. I have no obligement to love them, because I desire to love few. They are the cure of my distempers, and the cause I suffer not out of myself; at the least, they spare me those alarms, which ordinarily torture true friendship. For Monsieur de Voiture, he is always himself, that is, always a most excellent person; and if at any time it hath been said, Nature was never greater than in little things, let us convert that to the advantage of his Tickets, and prefer them before Volumes of Asiatic Authors. I desire from you the continuation of his favours, and entreat you to assure him of my service. There are few persons in the world I esteem so much as him; but amongst those few, you are always to be excepted. The Metamorphosis was lately sent me, which I read without much attention; but in that tumultuary view I had of it, I remarked many gallant things, and perhaps the obscurity of certain passages in it, proceeded only from my carelessness in the perusal. I say nothing to you of the invention of the fables, but for the manner of expressing them, it seems a little too far strained, and puts me in mind of that ancient Orator, who could not give the good-morrow without a figure. But what will you say of the other party, who enjoins me to read a much larger piece, but of a far lesser merit; he may as soon persuade me to dig in a Mine, as oblige me to it; you know the rest, and I remain,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac. 15 March, 1640.   

LETTER VIII.  
SIR,  
IN earnest, your Sonnet is one of those noble pieces which command attention, and which are esteemed more the renth time, than the first. I was never acquainted with all its excellencies till this day. I am very fare from the comparison of the coal, with which you are pleased to smut it, and much fear I shall want words rich enough to ennammel it; yet I shall not fail to enterprise that, though I have only Led to set it in. And be pleased to know, (without pretending to thanks for it) there is no work of mine in which you shall not be seen on the right hand, and on the left; The Copy you did me the favour to send me, is most exquisite, and that way of writing pleases me much more than the way of some other Ladies, famous for their Letters: they preach and declaim a great part of the time, and their Letters in folio are no other than gross bodies ill animated; in lieu of which, all in this piece is full of spirit, and which smells not of the lamp. By what I understand, our Gentleman of Rome means to change his name into as many shapes as ever Tabarin changed his Hat; and by consequence he will always be idem & alter? he might with as much decency run naked through the City, as commit such a piece of folly; and if he had any charitable friend by him, he would catch him by the throat, rather than let him go out into the streets so bedawbed with Names and Lordships. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 25 March, 1640.   

LETTER VIII.  
SIR,  
I Agree with you, that Castelvetro is a Grammatical Philosopher, who seeks after truth with address, and employs reason to the best advantage. Nevertheless, he sometimes drives it on too fare, and I could reprehend him more justly in certain things, than he has done my friend. 'Tis the Seigneur Hannibal whom I term so, and I conjure you to employ your Agents of the street of St. Jaques, to procure for me his Aeneids in quarto, together with his Dialogues of Speron Sperone, because I want them all. Monsieur the Duke de la Rochefaucaut, told me of some new Work of Monsieur Des-Cartes. I am much troubled concerning him, having heard nothing of him a long time, and the father Mersennus, is to blame for his silence. The late Monsieur the Marshal de Schomberg, showed me sometimes the Letters of Madam de Liancourt, which he bedewed with his tears in the reading. I did not remember to request a Copy of them. He would have been ravished in making me the present, and we should now have been comparing them with those of Vittoria. In the design I have to treat of our language, Prose and Verse, and our honest men, and witty women, I should have been glad to allege some word or line of hers; and this perhaps would be the only fit manner of making her worth known unto the world hereafter. Apage enim Authores Faeminas, ipsa quamvis diuûm Regina ita de se loquatur apud divinum Poetam, Author ego, etc. I expect your resolution, whether the Duke of Weymar's Verses were Dutch, French, or Latin, and remain,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 10 April, 1640.   

LETTER IX.  
SIR,  
THe incomparable Monsieur de la Thihaudier, has now left me to my former solitude, after the enjoyment of a weeks happiness, during which time, I received your Letter of the twenty sixth of the last month, for which I beseech you to lay aside all jealousy; for he neither saw the superscription on the outside, nor understood the least syllable within it. I am not one of those that make a secret of every thing, and much less of those that divulge Mysteries. Though my freedom be directly opposite to the servitude of Courtiers, yet I desire it should be discreet, and not injurious to my friend or myself. This advertisement, may, if you please, serve for all, and you may sleep in assurance as to this particular. If for the future you do not look upon me as a Confessor of the short Robe, your diffidence of my taciturnity, will accuse you of doubting the power of Philosophy over the minds of men. But, Sir, you have sent me so lively a Portraiture, that I could easily bear the want of the Original, if he should save himself the trouble of coming hither. He is at present a quarter of a league from Niort, with Monsieur the Abbot of Lawardin. Monsieur de la Thibaudier tells me, he has mountains of Collections, and that he reads no Author, either ancient or modern, without making Observations upon him. Being judicious and pol●e, I doubt not but he will one day impart you some of the rarest things in the world. The Metamorphoses of the Crown Imperial, and the Celestial Lionness, have sufficient grounds and resemblance, and the first cannot be made for any other than the King of Sweden; nor the second, but for Madamoiselle Paulet. But the invention which is in hand, is not so exact as might be imagined. The Sun may be Rival to all Shepherds, as well as to Daphnis; and a Lover of all Shepheardesies, the same manner he is of Phillis. I do but half explain myself, because I want leisure to say more. Yet I believe you understand me well enough, and our opinions will be nothing different. I am without reserve,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 25 April, 1640.   

LETTER X.  
SIR,  
THe favours of Monsieur the Count de Fiesque, are no new things to me. It is long ago that he took pleasure to oblige me; and he was one of the first Protectors of my writings Even at Rome itself, where the Monkish faction exercises its Tyranny, and threatens the Inquisition to those that are not of their judgement, he declared himself openly for oppressed truth against triumphant calumny. He is therefore interessed in my Cause; and as one of our friends of times past, said, Me pariter servat, judiciumque suum. I am extremely obliged to him for this noble constancy, and beseech you, Sir, to testify my acknowledgements unto him; to which you may add, if you please, that I have a perfect esteem of his valour. I take valour here, in the most large and comprehensive signification, and include in this one word, an infinity of excellent qualities, natural and acquired, civil and military. But this is not a place to make his Elog e in; we shall one day find one more public and eminent to declare our gratitude. I am also much obliged to Monsieur L'Huillier, in cujus sanctissimâ memoriâ exul aut etiam damnatus ad bestias, libenter acquiescerem. I do in a manner comfort myself of all my misfortunes, when I consider the goodness which this dear friend has for me. He affords me the honour of his love, and he may be assured, he has not a more faithful and passionate servant in the world, than myself. Monsieur the Abbot de la Rochefoucaut, has one of the Messieurs d'Esprit with him, who does me the favour to give me a visit sometimes of three or four days. I have found report mistaken in the worth of this person, and he is so knowing and judicious, that his abilities have but few equals. He is otherwise a great admirer of virtue, and speaks of you as is fitting to be heard favourably of me, although he should not otherwise tell me the finest things in the World. I know no person more worthy to be the elder Brother of him that is with Monsieur the Chancellor, whose merit is likewise generally approved of all the Court. Madam, the Marchioness de Ramboüillet, is more liberal of her favours to me then I deserve. I remember well my engagements to her, but I desire a little respite, being otherwise encumbered and overcharged. I shall ever bewail the death of Monsieur de la Valette, and Philosophy wants remedies to comfort me. Time itself is not able to do it, because he goes about the work too slowly; and so I shall pass the remainder of my life in sorrow and regret. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 1 May, 1640.   

LET. XI.  
SIR,  
I Think the modesty of Madam de Liancourt, which you praise so much, was not greater than your humility. You speak almost in the strain of young novices. This would be good in a general Confession, at the feet of a Father of the Oratory; but to write to me, that you have no merit, and that 'tis I that set a value upon you, cannot be received without an incivility to the public, in flattering a particular person. I pray God pardon you, my dear Sir; yet a superfluity in your Compliment may be suffered for this time, although in the judgement of Monsieur de—, it be not any where allowable but at Table, where I agree with him, that Entertainments are of the essence of good cheer, I confess the conversation of this Gentleman pleases me wondrously, being mixed of the world and books. He brings in such a proportion of serious and jest, as serves exactly to keep the mind, betwixt looseness and study, in the agreeable mean that partakes of both. If I had known, his Letter would have been troublesome to you, I should have hindered him from writing; but I conceived, that twelve lines of your style every day, would not put you to much pains. Besides, to tell you true, the sending of Spanish gloves to Monsieur de Voiture, pleased me so well, that I was desirous to see a Ticket more of the same air. Monsieur de Thou has sent Monsieur Girard the relation, of the death of Monsieur the Cardinal de la Valette; he desired to be interred at Tholouse, in a Church, where the bodies of three Apostles, and many Saints, are reposed. I observe in it also divers other evidences, of a true piety; and this I confess it is, wherein I find some consolation. At least it is the only comfort I will admit of, in so great a loss. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc.   

LET. XII.  
SIR,  
THe last Post made me rich, and you have been liberal, as well of your own presents, as of those of another. The Letter of Monsieur Silhon, to Monsieur the Cardinal Bentivoglio, is very full of admirable conceits; it afforded me not only divertisement, but instruction, and his judicious reflections, upon the most eminent places of the Italian Book, are Master pieces of an absolute workman. You would proceed from liberality to magnificence, if you could often make me the like presents; and they should be better received here, than the platform of the building of Monsieur de—. What a strange sight is this, and what is the meaning of this republican, to raise his vanity from the structure of his house, knowing it was a crime in one of old, to have built his a story higher, then that of his neighbours? Madam Desloges had informed me before, of this important news, and told me more, that this Builder was of great note in his Country, and very powerful with his Master. We shall see what he desires of me, for there must needs be a Letter with the Packet; and he protests to Madam Desloges, that he has writ me divers others, which notwithstanding never came to my hands. You surprise me strangely, in telling me, that the old Doctor, whom we have always so much loved, is but a refined cheat; he preaches nothing else, but fidelity, freedom, and sincerity; I know, that oftentimes deceits are practised that way, and some people commend truth, to the end they may lie with less suspicion. I know there will be always Pharisees in the world, always Salusts and Seneca's, who will hid corrupt manners under fair speeches.  O vita fallax, abditos sensus geris! 
Or if you will, with Cicero, Frons, & oculi persaepe mentiuntur, oratio verò saepissime. We must observe the carriage of this gallant man for the future; and beware, that his finesses take not advantage of our simplicity. Be pleased to send me your opinion of an Italian Author, called Davila, who has writ the History of the Civil Wars of France: Is he comparable to the Ancients, as I have been told? is his language pure, and his mind dissinteressed? are his Politics solid and judicious, & c? All this, Sir, in the familiarity of your ordinary style, and without any meditation. I have received news of our good Monsieur Maynard, who will be here in few days, if he be a man of his word. In the mean time, oblige me with the delivery of a Letter to him, from Monsieur the Commissary. Of many Verses wherewith he has feasted us, I send you ten, which are not indeed of the lofty strain, but such, whose style seems to me very sweet and natural.  

To Phillis afflicted.  
THink not (fair mourner) I can e'er be tired,  
To see that sorrow which so sweet appears.  
What Artemisia could be more admired,  
Or wash a Tomb with such becoming tears?  
May curses that Philosophy pursue,  
Which with tame precepts shall your grief subdue.  
All your regrets and sighs so graceful are,  
And force my heart by their victorious charms.  
Those clouds of sorrow are both bright and fair,  
And love from them takes more triumphant arms.   
I most humbly kiss your hands, and am with all my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 15 May, 1640.   

LETTER XIII.  
SIR,  
THe Post has faithfully acquit himself, of all that you entrusted him with in my favour, for which I confess a new engagement to you; but more eminently, for the two most prudent, most exact, and, according to your custom, most obliging Letters. The gift of Urbanity, which you congratulate to Monsieur de la Thebaudier, will be undoubtedly pleasing to him. I have sent him your Letter, but I had near forgotten to thank you for it on my own part: And surely, Sir, it is fit I do, since I am as much interessed in it, as he; and you therein amplify my small merit, with your accustomed exaggerations. I am very sensible of these testimonies of esteem, because they are also evidences of love, and the heat where with your words are animated, is too natural to come other whence, then from your heart. But, Sir, what are the intentions of our dear Monsieur Esprit? his civilities fill me with confusion; he either mocks me, or is good and generous even to excess, as well as Monsieur his elder brother, who is not contented to excuse the poverty of the Village, but also misimployes his good language, in commendations of the bad cheer, wherewith he was received. I treated him only in the fashion, of the good man in the Georgics: Qui dapibus mensas onerabat inemptis. and made him no other compliment, then that in the same Author; Aude hospes contemnere opes & te quoque dignum, etc. Notwithstanding, he would have the whole family charged with all these favours, which are so empty and leight, and whereunto only his acknowledgement gives a a body. How easy is it to oblige persons, that act by noble principles! 'Tis I, Sir, that am infinitely accountable to them, for their generous affection; and since I am destitute of all means to declare my gratitude, by my actions. I conjure you to assure the two brothers, which are at Paris, that I love, esteem, and honour them all three perfectly. I return you the catalogue of Italian books, wherein I see not any thing of value. Is this the rich Library of the curious book-merchant? I much pity the hard hap of his widow, if she be such as she is represented to me; and if I were one of those Grandees, that loved the husband so well, I would not suffer her to perish for want of relief. But they are of that sort of people, who think, they give all, when they give shadows and appearances; and had rather go to the obsequies of the dead, then assist, to the upholding of his ruinous family. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 22 May, 1640.   

LET. XIV.  
SIR,  
I Have a perfect esteem of the merit of Monsieur— but I confess, his book less pleased me at the second, than it did at the first reading. You shall know the reasons of my sentence, if we happen to meet once more in our lives; and it shall be on the side of that fair bed, wrought with Tulips, where we will treat of this matter, and several others, if Heaven hear my prayers.  
Et me fata unum patiantur degere mensem,  
Anspiciis, Capelane, tuis.  
I am confident, the Bulls you speak of, will not be the cause of this voyage, although he that makes the Briefs at this day, has said these twenty years, that I was not unworthy of the favours of the King, sed haec fuere; and he obliges me too much, to leave me to my repose and liberty, which I prefer above all, that greatness is able to give me. I find that true every day, which you writ me of Davila, and the frequent concurrence of my judgement with yours, gives me great cause of glory. I only adjoin to it, that it is a great shame to our Nation, to be instructed of their own affairs from a stranger, and that France has not yet been the mother of a French Historian. I have seen a second Lapidary on the Duke of Weymar, which I cannot commend, though it be ascribed to a person whom we love. That which you tell me of the other is most true, his eloquence is wholly founded upon common places, and has nothing at all of Cicero. I am,  
SIR, Yours, etc. Balzac, 1 June, 1640.   

LET. XV.  
SIR,  
I Should not think myself in my wits, if I did not extraordinarily esteem those Messieurs that bear that name by way of excellency. But further also, considering my obligations to them, if I loved them not, (permit me to tell you in Latin) Mihi robur & aes triplex, circa pectus esset. The strength that Philosophy confers on us, being not contrary to the tenderness into which humanity softens us, I make it my glory to be one of those tender and sensible ones, that have always their hearts wounded, and their souls captived to incomparable virtue. When I have discovered it in any place, no ceremony or compliment is able to restrain me, The possessors of it cannot quit themselves of me at their pleasure, and there is a necessity of loving, that joins me inseparably to the thing, that I account amiable. Our Monsieur Esprit de Verseüil, and yours of Paris, shall not doubt of this truth, and they shall one day see, that I do not content myself with a secret resentment, but make profession of my gratitude. It seems you have shown all our friends the Letter of Monsieur de— He would be very much mistaken, if he thought, I would raise me a Trophy of the praises that he gives me, and be still greedy of those Viands, whereof I surfeited long ago. You need not fear lest his profusion make me slight my vow, and bring me new desires to write Letters. It was with much Religion, that I said vae literis, and pronounced a curse upon my ancient Trade. And in case you doubt of it, I confirm all the maledictions in this place, that I have so often and solemnly bequeathed unto it. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 10 June, 1640.   

LETTER XVI  
SIR,  
ALl that I received of yours, and the Roman Frenchman's, has satisfied me above measure. Although his mind be famished with Benefices, and sick of Ambition; yet he has otherwise amiable and deserving qualities. Let us not exact more of poor mortals, than the proportion of their fortunes will allow. It is not a crime to be no Philosopher: All of that profession have not equally abandoned matters of interest. There have been some that have made as importunate supplications as this, that have received denials and affronts, and insinuated into the favour of the Pages of the Syracusan Tyrants. I took delight in all the Papers which he sent me, and should have taken much more, it they had not obliged me to the return of answers. We have to do with an urgent man, and who understands not what it is to give. He lends only upon usury, and trafficks in Prose and Verse, in the one and the other Tongue. He is so rigorous in the observation of punctualities, that he will never be wooed to pardon my omistions. Yet I must beseech a little expectation from him, and some of his mercy in consideration of my infirmities. He that told you the other day, that he had not aes triplex circa pectus, may notwithstanding have it circa frontem. For, indeed I see no other remedy to defend myself from these favours that are done me, which I esteem cruel, and should be happier in the neglect and oblivion of all the world. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc.   

LETTER XVII.  
SIR,  
YOur last Letter has taught me nothing new, it only confirmed me in the high opinion I had of the strong constitution of your soul. Nevertheless I discover through it a very excellent and commendable infirmity; I mean that tenderness whereof you tell me, which renders you sensible only of the losses which you suffer of your friends. These are such, Sir, as in these days are accounted none; and how many people are there on every side of you, that had rather have lost eight hundred friends, than eight hundred crowns; they value them no more, than they do men in Turkey, that are to be sold; and I know some, that would easily forego their most dear and faithful intimates, at fifty crowns apiece.  O curvae in terris animae & coelestium inanes! 
In stead of requiring consolation, you ought rather to rejoice in the possession of the virtue, which is contrary to that ignoble vice, and congratulate your health in the time of a Pestilence. I am fully satisfied, that the ruins, upon which the ancient Sages held themselves immovable, would not be more dreadful to you, then them, and that you could behold with a countenance, no less serene and unfrighted, all the Shipwrecks and burn, and other hostilities, wherewith fortune enterprises upon Philosophy. I would gladly continue this Discourse, and acquit myself of what I promised you by the last Post; but my attendance on a great company with me, will not afford me leisure. I am confident, you will allow the excellent wit and language of Monsieur the Duke de la Rochefoucaut, as also that of Monsieur the Prince of Marsillac his son, to be sufficient and lawful causes, of referring you to another time. Yet I must not end here, without telling you, that I received about three hours since, a rich present from Monsieur de la Menardiere. All that I could do since that time, was, to read the discourse at the entry of the book, wherein I confess, betwixt the strength of his reasoning, and the solidity of his doctrine, I perceived so quick and glorious appearances, and in so great number, that I yet remain dazzled with them. Did I yet practise the writing of Letters, I would not fail to testify to him, the resentments I have of so dear a favour. But it is possible, I shall one day render him some more considerable act of my gratitude; and I hope, that after I have studied his book, it will furnish me wherewith to allege it. Par verò mumus ne à nobis unquam expectes, praestantissime Capellane, sed si per egestatem nostram referre gratiam non licet, ingenui saltem animi erit profiteri per quem profecerimus. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 22 June, 1640.   

LET. XVIII.  
SIR,  
I Have solemnly renounced Hyperbole; 'tis a rock, which I look 〈◊〉 upon without trembling, and fear more than Scylla and Ch●●●dis. Yet you think, I take pleasure to fall upon it, and that I am more than ever the hyperbolical Doctor. I perceive well, Sir, where the occasion lies. I shall be in combat all my life, with your perpetual humility, and there is need of a process to make you receive your due; I will not cease to tender it to you, in the best coin I am able, and shall not scruple to perform that justice, to the most faithful of my friends, which I rendered to my most enraged adversaries. Monsieur Costard will without doubt be transported with joy, for the receipt of the excellent present you sent him, and you shall not fail of his thanks; which notwithstanding I shall know sooner from you, then from him, because there is no commerce from hence to Niort, and the fifteen leagues that separate us, are less favourable to our entertainments, than the distance of a hundred 'twixt Angoulesm and Paris. All your fears give me not less disquiet, than they do you. But I hope, the God of Hosts will be on our side, to the end of this Campagne. It may be, the excellent Hymns will prevail with him, and then I doubt not, but the Prince of Monsieur Chapelain will obtain greater favours from him, than he of Monsieur Faret. Battles are not always fought at the times of appointment, and I have observed in the Histories of all ages, that the great events which determine the fate of great affairs, do happen less frequently, according to design, then by accident and occasion. Our enterprises here below, are derided from above; and we are but the engines and actors of pieces, that are composed in heaven; Homo histrio, Deus verò poeta est: He is, Sir, a sovereign Poet, and you cannot refuse the part, which he appoints you to bear in the Scene. It is meet we comply to his orders concerning us, and submit ourselves to the direction of his providence. Nevertheless I dare promise you this time, that you shall have no need of your supreme virtues; and my genius prompts me, that your Muses shall yet a long time sing the triumphs of Monsieur de Longueville: These are the vows which are made for him and you, by,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 1 July, 1640.   

LET. XIX.  
SIR,  
YOu are the last of the good and magnanimous, and if there be yet any generosity upon earth, we ma● say boldly, it is lodged in your breast, and discovers it se●●●n your words. Those which you have written to Monsieur Costard, in answer to his Letter, have so wholly satisfied me on every side, that I know not which most to esteem, either the prudence and freedom that have dictated them, or the wit and courage that breathe in them. They would even reclaim Tigers to civility, and to inchant Dragons. Quid fiet de homine, ut Romani loquebantur, humanissimo, cui est consuetudo cum mansuetioribus musis?  Non obtusa adeò Costardus pectora gestat. 
I doubt not, but for the future, he will be one of your great admirers, and knowing you, as he does, bestow his heart upon you, which is one of the most noble and constant, that I know. I account myself happy, in having contributed something to this incomparable friendship. Being both of you of such eminent worth, it was requisite to the glory of either, that you should be no longer indifferent. I have yet seen no more, than the Epistle of our friend, wherein I was ravished, to see the Verses which he citys from you. This is termed, 
Praesenti tibi maturos largitur honores,  
Ornandasque tuum per nomen suscipit arts.  Do me the reason of a most humble acknowledgement, for the other, wherewith he gins his discourse, with that excess of gratitude, pro ingratissimâ mihi olim gratiâ. If one had given him the Consulship, what would he not have said? For one Panegyric that Ausonius made, he would have made a dozen; and if Domitian had offered him the honour of a dinner, he would have flouted the feasts of Jupiter; he would have said, He scorned his Nectar, and had no need of his Ambrosia. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 10 July, 1640.   

LET. XX.  
SIR,  
SInce the Letters which you writ me, are benefits which I receive, and those I return you, are the acknowledgements which I render; you may well perceive, that it concerns me not to leave you one only moment in doubt, of the gratitude of my soul. The happiness is, you are neither a hard friend, nor a proud benefactor. Although I should fail, your indulgence would seek reasons, to justify my offence, and you would accuse, not only the Post, Totila, and Rocolet, but also fortune, the stars, and destiny, rather than believe me culpable. You need not doubt, but I am much interessed in the great news of Germany, and intent to make a bonfire for my own particular, as soon as your Prince shall have deserved those of the public; I pray Heaven he may become the Liberatour of Christendom, and that I be his Prophet, and you his Historian. But indeed, if a man may be a Prophet and a Poet, at the price you speak of, they are charges of a very cheap rate, and the places of the Sages did not cost more, in the time of Cleobulus and Bias, when there needed no more to have one, then to have said, 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, or some such like quodlibet. If Monsieur Menage does me the honour of a visit, I will receive him with open arms, and my hermitage shall be ever esteemed glorious, for the receipt of such a guest. I have no knowledge of the Abbot of Aubignac, nor ever heard of his Question of a dozen hours long, neither can I tell who are those Candidati tam infeliciter ambitiosi; you will oblige me, by giving me a little light herein. If any one have done you injustice, I will declare it to just posterity; and the Judges that shall condemn my friend, shall not be less execrable, than those which acquitted the enemies of Cicero; Cum nempe violatae Religionis reus, Religioni & Legibus illusit. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 10 June, 1640.   

LET. XXI.  
SIR,  
What is the design of your Rheum, to set upon you in the month of July, and not to be contented to make war against you, in the midst of winter, which is the true time of its Campagne, ut optimè & ingeniosissimè scribis? You may with reason reckon it, with the other prodigies, which we have lately seen, and those that are still in being. And since your phlegm has such an extraordinary inundation, you may be suffered to accuse the stars, and complain of the dispensations of Nature. As for me, let Rivers forsake their Channels, and overswel their banks as long as they please; let the Dog-star die with cold, if he will, and let it freeze and snow upon our harvest; I know, the worst evil is already past, and the succeeding disorders will ever be more supportable to me, than the first. But, Sir, you are good company for a sick person, and it must be confessed, that the clouds of your rheum, do nothing at all disturb the serenity of your mind. Can any man speak better of the affairs of Germany, and the peregrinations of your Theseus? or with more humanity accuse the miscarriage of our new brother of the Academy? Is it possible for earnest and jest, to be more agreeably tempered upon the farewell of Monsieur de Colomby to them, or upon the curses that he bestows on the present age, and the small understanding there was, between him and Tacitus, even at the time of their greatest familiarity? You become what person soever you please to act, and there is an equal mixtu e of prudence in all your performances. I have seen within a few days, a man whom you much prized to me, in two very different postures: And at the conclusion of his Poetry, which pleased me extremely, I fell by misfortune upon these Verses, which made me sick at heart, and wherewith I am somewhat conscientious to sully white paper.  
Cum spueret vestrum alteruter gravis exquecrearet,  
Plurimus & raucâ conspergeret omnia tussi;  
Nulla horrescentis vultu asper signa dedissem,  
Cuncta ferens, vos aetatis namque ante tulistis  
Plura immunda meae, cum cultûs nescius infans,  
Foedarem toties in canis humida strata.  
As I would not have a Poet bear too much upon the wing, and be always soaring above the clouds, so neither would I have him suffer himself to fall into the dirt, and much less into some other matter more unclean. Fracastori●s descends and abases his course, when he pleases; but this man creeps and wallows in these six verses, as if he took pleasure in ordure. I do not know Monsieur Hedelin any more, than I knew Monsieur the Abbot of Auhignac; but I shall be forward to begin our acquaintance, by the way which you have marked me out. You must therefore do me the favour, to send me the pro and con, and believe me always,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 1 August, 1640.   

LET. XXII.  
SIR,  
I am happy in being beloved of you, and I would not change this good fortune, for that of all the favourites in the world. This is indeed a magnificent speech, but the loftiness of my words is neither without reason nor example. Your Horace goes beyond them, when instead of the favour of Kings, he appropriates even Royalty to himself, and says, he is more happy than the King of Persia, by a less enjoyment than mine. With how great goodness have you received the trouble which I put upon you? How many souls receive light from your fire? And what is it that you do not for a man, that can only requite you with vows and wishes? You cover me, Sir, with shame and confusion, and I know not how to answer your last Letter, but with bowing my head, and laying my hand upon my mouth. This religious posture must serve me instead of the thanks I own you, and of those I should tender you for the savour of those excellent persons which you have engaged to undertake our affairs. I am not more yours than I was before, quid enim perfecto addi potest? But I am, as I conceive, more than any person in the world.  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 12 Aug. 1640.   

LETTER XXIII.  
SIR,  
I Send you here with the Letter of a gallant man of my acquaintance, which he desired might be communicated to you; and I must tell you, he is persuaded upon my words, that he is a Master Artist at writing of Letters. It is therefore a just judgement of God, that I am now persecuted with the impertinences which I formerly commended, and that my flattery reaps the thorns which itself had sown. He seeks occasions to write to me, and when he cannot devise any, he purveys for them abroad in all the world. He also enjoins me to return him an answer, upon I know not what penalty; and requires, besides all this, gratiam celeritatis, as if it were a business of expedition. He shall have neither one nor other, neither answer nor diligence. I will preserve the liberty whereof he would bereave me; and if he proceed to molest me, make another oath more solemn than the first. What an imprudence is it, to exact golden Letters of his friends, to demand of me Rhetorical flourishes, and cosi va discorrendo, to the intent he may read me in assemblies, and make a Proclamation of our secrets? You can testify for me, that I am fare from engaging in the Trade of a Declamer, which I shall ever studiously avoid. I beseech you let me know, who that person is which takes himself for Scipio Africanus, and treats his friend with the name of Laelius. His presumption certainly deserves severe punishment, and I doubt not but one of these days, the fancy will be in his head to profane the names of Agrippa, Maecenas, and Hephestion, in bestowing them upon some miserable scoundrel, to whom himself will be Augustus and Alexander. That Vida, whom we esteem so much, and in whose favour Scaliger the Son hath written, Qui de Hieronymo Vida aliter sentit quàm de summo ac perfectissimo Poeta nugas agit. This Vida, I say, is the true Author of the villainy you have seen. It is in the Poem which he addresses, Gelelmi Vidae & Leonae Oscasalae Manibus. But we must leave all other matters, & give you a recital of the Heroical enterprise of a gallant man, which passed through this Country, and is going in quest of Truth, and good Wine, by Sea and Land. To this effect, he designs a Pilgrimage to Monsieur Des Cartes, in imitation of that of Apollonius to Hiarchas: Nevertheless he will put off truth, and Monsieur des Cartes to the next year, and not pass the Sea this Campagne. But his other design deserves the knowledge of the whole world. He departed from Paris on purpose to come and see the Sun rise and set at Balzac, and so forwards, to eat all the Melons and Figs of Gasconie; and from thence to take the way of Languedoc, and keep the Vintage of Frotignac. Alexander had never so rare a thought: The Conquest of the Indies is nothing in comparison to this expedition, and you must be more sparing hereafter in relating to me the voyages of your Theseus. You must further know, that his first speech to me, was concerning you, in such manner as I would have all the world speak; and this introduction has so well pleased me, that although he had drawn after him, Maenades, Sileni, Asses and Panthers, I could not have shut my Gate upon this extraordinary train. As I had finished my Letter, he that is the subject of it, came hither upon the Gallop, and gave me a second visit, matutinam, siccam & sobriam. But yet I must tell you, that this sobriety is not without some consideration of interest; and that he did not forbear his breakfast, but for fear it might be prejudicial to a great dinner which attended him at Angoulesme. So that even his abstinence has intemperance for its object, and is nothing at all agreeable to that of the ancient Fathers in the Desert. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 14 Aug. 1640.   

LETTER XXIV.  
SIR,  
THe great importance is to know, that I am your Favourite; for it is most certain you are a King; and if you will not believe me, hear the Oracle that tells you.  
Rex est qui posuit metus,  
Et airi mala pectoris;  
Quem non ambitio impotens,  
Et nunquam stabilis favour  
Vulgi praecipitis, movet;  
Qui tuto positus loco,  
Infra se videt omnia.  
If you desire any more, behold, Sir, a second Oracle, or the confirmation of the first.  
Mens regnum bona possidet  
Nil ullis opus est equis,  
Nil armis & inertibus  
Telis quae procul ingerit  
Parthus, cum simulat fugas:  
Rex est qui metuit nihil.  
There is nothing herein which is not proper to you, and you are the Sovereign next Monsieur de Longueville. But it is true, this Noble affection gives you some disquiets, and you fear all the blows for so dear a person, which you would contemn if they were directed against yourself. The Sonnet of the Italian Precedent, and the Letter of the Cavalier of twenty years old, are very agreeable to my palate, and you have obliged me with a feast of two so rare presents. But how many lustres are gone? I had almost said, Ages, wherein we have seen nothing of your Muses. I know well, that Carmina proveniunt animo deducta sereno. And there is scarce any thing but Vows made in a Tempest. But yet you might have put those vows in rhyme, and told us in Music, that singing could not be expected from you in your present estate. As for me, nothing disturbs me from my Trade. Neither pain of body, nor affliction of mind, hinder me, from sending you almost by every Post, something of my workmanship. My Enthusiasm being past, and my last Latine-Letter sent, some have assured me, that it was an incomparable piece. Behold, a great word for a Courtier, not very familiar with your Apollo, and a Doctor in the vulgar tongue. I have not so much faith, as to believe myself presently a Roman Citizen, because a Provincial told me so; 'tis you, Sir, who must clear me up this truth, and if you please to associate Monsieur the Abbot of St. Nicholas, in the judgement of this important affair; I send you a new copy to be delivered to him. He is, without doubt, rerum nostrarum acerrimus & integerrimus judex, possidetque in supremo gradu, ut Magistri loquuntur, facultatem judicatricem. Do me the favour, to observe and mark all the faults, to the end I may correct them; for it is a dangerous thing to speak a dead language. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 4 Septemb. 1640.   

LET. XXV.  
SIR,  
I Have much exclaimed against the delays of messengers, and truly not without cause, since they deprived me of an extraordinary contentment, and hindered me from the enjoyment of Monsieur Menage; his Book would have made Justus Lipsius' jealous, and put Lambin in despair. It astonishes me, and I am confident, satisfies you, though you express nothing thereon, to leave me the entire liberty of my judgement. It is true, I have a great inclination for this grandis praetxtatus. But if I were his professed enemy, I should confess, that his subtleties are very solid, and his doctrines exquisite; he draws out of fountains, remote from the common roads, and which the people have not yet soiled. But who would think, that in critical questions, and those upon the Heautontimorumenos of Terence, there were any room for courtesy and offices of friendship? and that I should see myself amongst so many Authors and Scholiasts? It seems he did not reprehend me in t●e beginning, but with a foresight of rendering his commendations of me less suspected in the conclusion, nor correct me, for taking the conception of Hercules for his birth, but to the end he might say, that the faults which I commitate common to me, with the infallible Heinsius. You are too good, Sir, and know the way of gratitude too well, to leave me in areer in this particular, and there are no words but yours, that can sufficiently express my resentments. Be pleased to grant me them, in this occasion, and preserve me that precious friend, in the same manner as you bestowed him on me. But must I not hear, that you are returned into the way of the Hostel, of Monsieur the Ambassador of Sueden, and that you are a better Courtier in Summer, then in Winter? Visit that excellent person, and become his Confident. You may possibly see that incomparable History, which he keeps prisoner so many years, for there are near thirty past, since the Author of Infanticida writ to him, in these remarkable words: Ita munus molestissimum sustinuisti hactenus, ut quaecunque in Republicâ jam restant, aliud agendo sustinere possis; & quod fidem superat, tanquam in otio absolutam patriae Historiam occupatissimus scripsisti. Quam qui olim legent, obstupescent, salvo Taciti splendore & augustâ Majestate dici aliquid floridius potuisse. I have read his Book, de jure Belli & Pacis, which is of very great learning; and a long time since his Mare Liberum, and lately two Tragedies, and some other sacred Poems; but I have lost the volume of his Verses, printed at Leyden, which I would gladly regain: He has also composed divers other pieces, whereof I beseech you to give my Stationer a catalogue, to the end, I may want none of the works of this great personage: I have a particular esteem of all that comes from him, and besides the solidity of his learning, the strength of his reasoning, and the graces of language, I observe therein a certain character of honesty, which persuades me, that excepting our Religion, from which he is unhappily a stranger, he may be confided in, for all other things. You do very much honour to my extravagance, in calling it Enthusiasm, and I did not take myself to be of so jolly an humour. 'Tis only in your presence, that my melancholy leaves me in repose; and had not I been to write to Monsieur Chapelain, I should not have so much as remembered the voyage of the new Bacchus. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 Septemb. 1640.   

LETTER XXVI.  
SIR,  
I Pardon our friend his pedantry, if he be assured of the Prelacy, and has City-security for it. He, near whom he would be placed, has sometimes the outside and appearance of an honest man, but the bottom of him is a certain cheat. 'Tis a folly to depend upon any thing from him, though after protestations, both by word and writing. My indefagitable Scribe has laboured for you this week, and will by all means have you see my last Latin, because it seems to him well writ. I do not oppose his will, since it costs me nothing but consent, nor complain of the pains he puts himself to. Let him kill you therefore with this so often recocted cram, provided you do not cease to be otherwise in health, and that it cause not the return of your rheum. Never did any business find more protection, then that which I recommended to you, and we are principally indebted to you for the good success. You have obliged Monsieur de Voiture, to contract his gravity in my favour, that Monsieur de Voiture, that never speaks without persuading. You may perhaps think, that I am providing him an accurate compliment hereupon; I had indeed once resolved it, but I lately read in my Stoic Philosophy, that a wise man ought to have a friend, to the end, he may not want one to sacrifice his life for, if need be. So that upon this ground, it is apparent, that neither you nor he are yet fully discharged towards me. You have not yet been solicited to Martyrdom, and since you own me your life and your blood, can you account to me a visit in a coach, and a dozen words? I presume, you did not expect this anti-complement, and will confess, that I do not take things after the common bias. This it is to be one of Zeno's disciples, and to have commerce with those lofty souls of Antiquity, whose very extravagances are noble. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 30. Septemb. 1640.   

LETTER XXVII.  
SIR,  
I Cannot tell, if I should at present admire the Oration of my Lord della Casa; but it is true, that I did formerly admire it, and had a design of publishing it with Notes of my own making. This desire is not yet passed, and I beseech you to procure a very correct Copy of it, to the end, that when I send you mine, you may, by comparing them, judge which of the Manuscripts is the better. In my opinion, this Florentine was perfectly judicious. He had seen the Idea of the highest Eloquence: and I cannot agree to the sentence of Monsieur Guyet, who wholly condemns his Latin. Only I think, the advantage is on the side of the Tuscan, which is more free and natural. I have reviewed my second Apology, and shall send you them both to be presented from me, to Madam the Marchioness de Sable. I think it will be convenient, to make the Dedication of them to her: And though there are many points of Learning treated therein, above the ordinary capacities of Women; yet my address cannot be reproved, being made to one that transcends the generality of that sex. Besides, I have a great example to justify the action; and you may possibly have observed, that Diogenes Laertius, directs his speech to a Lady of his time, in the Lives which he has written of the Philosopher's. Notwithstanding, he speaks not only of their actions, and manners, but also of their sects and opinions. Our other incomparable Marchioness shall likewise find a ready obedience from me. I will publish the virtue and achievements of her Fathers, and her brave Romans; and I hope she will be satisfied with something more than my forward compliance to her commands. If I were capable of joy, I should have received it very sensibly from your last approbation. You are in effect almost the only man whom I desire to please, and I am ready to say, that omnes cogitationes meae ad te referuntur, & in te consumuntur. Therefore I conjure you to love me, if you would have my sad life sustained yet longer by any comfort, and believe not that I labour either for Fortune or Glory. You are the only end of all my pains. But there is yet one thing which I would obtain of you, that when I send you either my Latin or my French, you would not advertise me of my faults. Not for that I think myself infallible, or you incapable to c●rrect me. But because I am not solicitous about my errors, and do not take things so much to heart as I have done formerly. If a solecism escape f●om me, I think I should now let it run as fare as it pleases, without putting myself to the trouble of overtaking it. 'Tis a favour therefore of chance, if I make any thing considerable at t●e first attempt. I am.  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac 8 Octob. 1640.   

LET. XXVIII.  
SIR,  
I Have obtained at length, what I desired so passionately, I mean an authentical Declaration of my favour with you. I possessed the thing formerly, but I wanted the Title. Now I am provided of a necessary Piece to justify my possession, and let any one hereafter adventure to dispute it with me. But do not think, Sir, that I account it in the number of Goods honest and unprofitable. I find in your friendship, pensions, benefices, offices, dignities, and generally all the advantages that favour can expect from Royalty; since I find in it wherewith to slight all those graces, and having made me a present of yourself, what did ever Hephestion receive from the King his Master, that was comparable to what you have bestowed on me? You must either confess that you know not yourself, or agree with me in this truth, and that there is no rationally ambitious man, that is not of my opinion. But since we are upon the Chapter of excellent friendship, is that of Monsieur Silhon, in as high a degree of heat towards me, as I left it at Paris. If it be so, as I cannot doubt it, I am doubly happy, and I beseech you to assure him, that he has not a more faithful servant than myself. As for you, dear Sir, I have no more to say to you, only do me the honour to believe, that in receiving you, I give myself to you, and could wish I were of some value, that you might not be wholly a loser in the change. I am,  
SIR, Your &c. Balzac, 19 Octob. 1640.   

LETTER XXIX.  
SIR,  
I Have received so great contentment from the Letter which your friend writ you, as was incapable of addition by a second compliment. I did formerly apprehend the inconvenience of this excess, like that of two dinners on a day; and you know, that there is satiety even of the best things. He is indeed a very gallant person, and agrees with your description. Oftentimes what he speaks, deserves to be alleged. But is there no means of obtaining of the Ingenious answers which he recited to you? it is indifferent to me, whether they come from deliberation, or are delivered upon the place; whether they be born in the company, or brought from home, provided they be ingenious. It is not of true jests, that the Poet said, 
Turpe est difficiles habere nugas,  
Et stultus labor est ineptiarum.  'Tis of those Equivocations you know of, and other studied fooleries, which bad Buffoons fetch as fare as the end of the World. I am an enemy to sour faces, and affected gravity; and therefore I leave you to consider, if my thoughts agree with yours concerning the Ambassador. Fruatur, per me, superbiâ Titulorum.  Ad populum phaleras; ego te intus, & in cute, novi. 
What are his intentions, with his Arminian Divinity, and Schism upon Schism? I could wish he were cured of this malady, quem sacrum jure nomines; and that some good Angel would reduce him into the right way. The Chancellor of Sueden, who does not trouble himself with controversy, aught to perform this good office, and enjoin him upon penalty, of being ill paid by his States, to discover the Treasure which he hides; I mean the History which he keeps secret. Be pleased, Sir, to know of him, what is his judgement concerning that of Father Strada, and let me know yours, upon all the Spanish Comedies; for those which I have seen, have much displeased me. I render you a thousand thanks for your excellent Verses, which are besides, prudent; and speak you not only a Poet, but a Politician. You have found out the delicacy of a Sonnet and this is a perfect body, whose parts are all admirable. I envy you that meditation de l'Empire, and facin de regner. Had not you regard to the sacra fames auri of Virgil, and an other passage in Aristotle, which he alleges of one Jason, Qui nisi regnaret, sibi esurir● videbatur. I never yet saw any thing of so happy conceit, nor so happily expressed; I congratulate with you for it, and am more than ever,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 1 Novemb. 1640.   

LET. XXX.  
SIR,  
I Am very ill satisfied with the proceed of the shee-Pedant, as our friend Thibaud terms her; if she did not give order to her Gentleman to lie, he has lied of his own head. I have been long since distasted with the husband and the wife, and think, I should lose the words which I should spend upon them; therefore I am glad of the right I have, to blot them out, and imitate the revenge of Virgil, who punished those of Nola in this manner, and put Ora jugo where there was Nola jugo. Sed de his hactenus, Masculo & Faeminâ, marito & conjuge, paedagogis. You are very injurious, to desire Monsieur— to write to me; he would do me no pleasure, in being persuaded by you: For though his Letters are admirable, yet it will be necessary, that I give answers to his admirable Letters. Monsieur— has shown me four long sheets of his. If she should treat me in that manner, would you condemn me to do the like? Truly, you are a strange person! I bestowed myself upon you, and my soul is joined to yours; and would not you have me keep my fidelity, and do not you consider, that all other communication would be reproached to me? Beasti me with your judgement, upon my Lord della Casa, and the approbation wherewith you authorize my design. I will undertake the work with all speed, and will not forget what I own to the incomparable Marchionesses. If you see Monsieur Menage, I entreat you tell him, that the Germane Gentleman, recens Papinii Commentator, passed by this way yesterday, to see me; and spoke of him and his works so advantageously, that it is beyond the power of my rhetoric, to add any thing to his Elegy. I am,  
SIR, Yours, etc. Balzac, 15 Novemb. 1640.   

LET. XXXI.  
SIR,  
I Remain your favourite, during your good pleasure, and I hope, I shall never do any thing to forfeit that title. But, if you please, do not take me for a follower of Chrysippus, for if you do, you will have cause one of these days, to accuse me of lightness, and to brand him with apostasy, whom you once termed novice. You will see in my second apology, how I have quitted the Cassock I had taken, and in what manner I had been rebellious against the old Stoical fathers. Yet I conceive, if I remember well the words of my Letter, I spoke plainly of that proud Philosophy, without much declaration for any side. I am indeed of a Sect more gentle, or, to speak truer, I am of all Sects, & nequid tibi dissimulem, sine lare & familiâ in Philosophiâ vagamur, & cum nostro Flacco, 
Nulliùs addictus jurare in verba Magistri,  
Quo me cunque rapit tempestas, deferor hospes.  Our friend's Latin seems to me very handsome, but his flattery is insupportable; and as that honest man of antiquity, exclaimed against Homer's Jupiter, because he favoured the Barbarians, so this new Author displeases me, because he soothes up such people, as are not worth his pains. The Letter I writ to Monsieur Heinsius, was neither long nor short, and therefore there must be something more in that, that was told you. For the German whom I mentioned to you the other day, called Joannes Fredericus Gronovius, had the like discourse with me; and I know not, if some officious unknown person, has been disposed to make himself pleasant with him and me. Mascardi is dead, and we shall all die as well as he. But was he so eloquent as you speak of? I have seen nothing of his making, except some Academical Orations, which were shown me some fourteen or fifteen years since, and I confess, that I found his Italian Prose as poetical, as that of Ciampoli. A thousand services to Monsieur de Voiture, and all our other friends. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 24 Novemb. 1640.   

LETTER XXXII.  
SIR,  
I Should be more sick than you, if informing me of bad news, you did not likewise give me hopes of better for the future: But you are in the mean time in your bed, and the Physicians give your rheum the appellation of a Rhumatism. For the love of God, dear Sir, have a care of your health, whereof I have more need for my life, then of my own, and consider me in your person. Would not that superstitious course of diet do prejudice, to the nobleness and gallantry of nature? and do you think, the humours would not revolt against an abstinence, that endeavours to bring them into absolute subjection? I do not approve such rules of living, except for such decayed bodies as mine, which are incapable of all action, and overwhelmed with the least burden. Since you are not in the like condition, you ought to take an honest liberty, and indulge yourself sometimes a more genial fare; I conceive, your blood would by that means become more pure and clear, and that all the seditions in the Microcosm, would be appeased and tempered thereby. But, Sir, you speak very pleasingly of your malady, your rheumatism is eloquent, and every thing flourishes in your hands. This gallantry which is mingled with your pains, is an infallible sign to me, of your approaching recovery, although you had not otherwise given me assurance of it; and it cannot be said, there are any sick people of so jolly an humour. Monsieur the Duke of Rochefoucaut, did me lately the honour of a visit, and intermitted for some hours the great fishing he had, in our fair Rivers, that washes five or six of his Teritorries, which contain twelve large leagues of our Country. You were mentioned in our conference, with all the eulogies and admiration, due to a supreme virtue. He brought with him a Lady of his kindred, whom I had a little before complemented, for a present which she sent me. I imagined, you wo●ld not be unwilling to see the Letter which I writ to her, and that the soft and delicate style, will not be less pleasing to you, than the sublime. But the main is, to know, if a Rustic is able to distinguish of delicateness, and without mistaking one for another: It is your part to clear this doubt: In the mean time, I expect with impatience the news of your health, and am with all my soul,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 10 Decemb. 1640.   

LET. XXXIII.  
SIR,  
I Have been ravished with joy, at the evidences of your recovery; but you ought not to have attempted so much already, and should have managed better this first favour of Nature. Four lines would have been enough, to have quieted my mind, and given me the information I desired. But you know not how to keep measure, when there is occasion to oblige; and you account your favours defective, unless they exceed. How few friends are there like yours! and yet fewer Philosophers, that are able to retain contentment of mind, in the afflictions of the body, and loss of estate! I know such a Monsieur— that would have murmured against St.— for less than a rhumatism; and the damage of eight hundred crowns, upon the calling in of money, hath rather inconvenienced, then troubled you, which would have put Seneca into a fret, though inconsiderable to his fortune. You may inquire concerning this of Dion, and he will assure you, that there is a great difference between the flourishes of Theory, and the decretory weapons of Experience; between a Sage upon the paper, and a Sage upon occasions. But yet, Sir, I conceive, this ought not to render you disaffected towards others, nor your force hinder you, from having pity on the feeble and infirm. You must suffer men to hope, and desire still at this day, as they have hoped and desired ever since the beginning of the world. And though covetousness be not of so great antiquity, yet you must remember, that you live not in the heroical times, but in the dregs of the year, sixteen hundred and forty; and that heretofore, one of your predecessors was commended, for showing that favour to the world, which he would not allow to himself. Monsieur— pretends to the Prelacy: What is there you find so strange and criminal, in his pretensions? are they not the same, with those of the greatest part of the Preachers at Paris, who do not much attend to the Greek Ecclesiastical History; nor the example of St. Isidore of Pelusium. The worst I see in it, is, that he has discovered himself to a mocker, and declared his design with more freedom, than the hypocrisy of the Court permits. But is he not in the bottom of such stuff, as Patriarches and high Priests are made of? and do not you remember, that in the place where he is, there is not so poor a Surplice-wearer, but has an eye upon the Papacy, and p●ayes to God for the triple Crown. Has he not at least as handsome a name, as the Signieur de Simeonibus, whereof he makes mention in his Letter, and which I dannot remember without laughter? Does not he well deserve a title, in partibus infidelium, since he is so desirous of a Diocese, that any would be welcome to him? This ambition does not prejudice civil society, and may be suffered in a mean virtue. He may have it, without hating his Prince, without violating friendship, and without being either a bad Frenchman, or a bad Roman. And therefore, Sir, though you handsomely reproach my indulgence, I shall crave the liberty to continue it, I know not how to declaim against so many imperfections, purely human, seeing such a world of monstrous and gross crimes I should have to combat, if I would undertake to be a Reformer. Quod ad Eminentissimum Bentivolum attinet. You have all the reason in the world to blame me, and I confess, I am the most rustic Provincial betwixt this and Paris. Nevertheless, since you have already performed the compliment, to which I was obliged, I shall rest there. I am not able to add any thing to the perfection of what you do, and will only tell you, that they are happy faults whereof you are the amender. I wish to heaven, you would as liberally acquit me of the rest of my debts, It would be a charity worthy of your riches; and I leave you to imagine, if my creditors would have cause to complain of their payment. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 Decemb. 1640.   

LETTER XXXIV.  
SIR,  
ALl was very agreeable in your Letter, till the conclusion; but that bad tail has stung me, and I have much fear of that news, which would afflict you to the utmost, if true; be it the will of heaven it prove false, and that your friend be rather victorious, or at least that he be living. Life is a recruit, whereby Marius regained the power which he had lost, and our admiral the Armies which were defeated. Having that left, there is something remaining to requite all losses; the unfortunate of this year, may be the happy men of the next: Et durare ac semet rebus servare secundis, is the most sure maxim, and greatest policy I know, in the instability of human affairs. You see how I preach at a venture, and answer to what you have not told me, or at least in such manner, as to understand it; I must expect the explication by the next Post. You might as well have specified the misfortune which you apprehend, since there are many sorts of them; but in stead of making me partaker of your fear, you have put me into all fears imaginable. Eight days will either cure or confirm my trouble. In the mean time, it is fit we enjoy our good fortunes, as well as we can possibly, and get some Poet, to make a Soterion of thanks to Heaven, for the recovery of your health. You cannot doubt, but it is very dear to me, and that I vehemently desire the preservation of a life, by which my own is principally supported. If I had lost you, I should not have known what to do longer in the world, I should have been in worse estate, than widows and orphans, and gone to eat my heart in the deserts of the Thebaïs'.  Ipse meum cor edens, hominum vestigia vitans. 
But let us leave these bad presages, and meddle wi●h nothing that is grievous, though in detestation of it, upon such a holy day as this. We are now in the declining of a year, during which, your virtue has been exercised with a thousand assaults of fortune, and yet remained impregnable. May it please God to make the succeeding more favourable to you, and that I have fewer occasions to admire the greatness of your courage. Be you absolutely happy in yourself, and I shall be so by reflection; for I never separate my interests from yours. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc.   
The End of the Fifth Book.   

FAMILIAR LETTERS, OF M. de BALZAC, To M. CHAPELAIN. The Sixth Book.  

LETTER I.  
SIR,  
I Suffer with the tenderness of women, and your actions speak the strength of Philosophy. I acknowledge my weakness in extremity; but I thought you had known it long since, & that this vicious virtue of my soul could not be hid from him, that aught to have seen the bottom of it. Nevertheless you improve it admirably, and make excellent discourses upon the divinity of your late sickness. I pray Heaven, Sir, that you be no more a Prophet at that rate, and that the inspirations from above, may possess you by ways more sweet and easy. The agitation that torments the Sybille of Virgil, and the pains she takes to deliver herself from the violence of the spirit that seizes her, gives me very unquiet thoughts; & it were better to remain in a state less raised & lofty, that were also more gentle and serene. The person that you know better than I, gave himself the trouble to come bid me adieu, before he left Paris, and made me solemn protestations of his friendship. I have observed in him by experience, whatsoever you had written of him to me before, and find in him a deep judgement, and a great appearance of virtue; so that I am throughly persuaded of his worth and honesty, and that he received injustice in the character that was formerly given of him. It is possible you may have changed him, and that he was converted by your good example. I know you have made many metamorphoses of the like nature, & quos probos non inveneras, probos fecisti. I cannot tell, if the dispatches you have done me the favour to send over the Mountains, will have a happy voyage: If they have not, I am already comforted, and the disorders that appear on all sides, will cause greater mischiefs than this. I dare not speak any more to you of the continuance of my maladies, and the emptiness of my purse, though I still grapple with my pains.  
God grant that the first month of the year, be the beginning of a better age. But I fear I shall never again see health or good times; and did not your incomparable friendship, give me some comfort in this world, I would rather go out of it this day, then to morrow, if it were the will of Him, to whom all creatures own submission. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Angoulesm, 4 Jan. 1641.   

LETTER II.  
SIR,  
I Am ashamed to tell you, that my indisposition hindered me from writing to you by the last Post, for methinks I scarce ever speak of any thing else. There being only this cause that could make me fail in my duty? you must allow me to use it in my justification. I should be sick at this present for any other cause, but I am bound to free you from those inquietudes, my silence would raise in you, if the Post should make two returns, without bringing you any news of me. You may therefore be pleased to understand, that I have received your dispatch, with the Letter of Monsieur Conrart, which could not but be welcome to me in the afflicted condition wherein I languish. There came also a third in company, whereof I knew almost all the contents before, and yet did not conceive my knowledge very great. Sed nihil hoc ad Andromachen, and our friend has not understood me. I did not desire any news of those Antipodes in manners, as Seneca calls them, that turn day into night, and night into day, as was the custom of Queen Margaret in our times. I would only have learned something of certain stranger Princes, who, as I am told, made use of Torches as well by day as night, out of an humorous and mysterious ceremony. The fire that was carried before the Roman Emperors, as a mark of Sovereignty, whereof as I remember, there are extant but three Testimonies in all Antiquity, namely two in the History of Herodian, and the third in the Poem of Corippus, has a near resemblance with this of my present enquiry. But likeness and identity are different things; and it is disputable, whether it were a Torch, or a chaffer of coals, or a lamp, that was so carried in state. If there be any such proud fools, that would be treated as Gods or Idols, let us leave them to burn daylight as long as they please, and make no further search into the repertories of Paris, which afford us nothing new. Our Monsieur Conrart is always an admirable person, I know not if it be possible, to find so many excellencies any other where, as I see in every thing of his. Since he is pleased to serve me in my Compliment to Holland, I accept his offer, and promise him, that I will not often abuse his courtesy upon the like occasions, you can testify for me, that semper invitissimus scribo. I am  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 Jan. 1641.   

LET. III.  
SIR,  
LEt us suspend our judgements for a time, and not condemn the Parricide upon the disposition of a Pedant. Possibly this man may have visions, and has not read what he believes he did. Nor is it improbable, that he has ill understood his Brother's meaning, or put the innocent words upon the rack, to make them signify what he pleases. 'Tis the ordinary vice of Grammarians, such as he is, quorum proprium est malè interpretari, & à ment Auctorum saepius aberrare. As for myself, Sir, who have known long since, and think I have expressed as much somewhere, that there is no Saint in Heaven, but has been asperssed with unjust calumny upon earth; I do not receive all sorts of testimonies indifferently; and before I can believe the evil that is cast upon a person I love, I must see it clearly, and search it with my fingers. Yet I am not ignorant of the corruption of mankind, nor do I desire to answer, for the honesty of all the Doctors. But to imagine that all our Societies are full of— and— is beyond my skill; and I could not do it, though I should be accused of more than rustic simplicity, and called the ignorant amongst the great wits of the Academy. Your Jesuit of Thoulouse, is a person of rare merit, and I esteem his dozen of Verses you have favoured me with, above all that I have seen of— this ten years. Here is strength, wit, and clearness; 'Tis an absolute Poem, and has all the requisites of Art and Rule. He delivers all that could be expressed in vulgar Prose, but in such a manner, that the Muses themselves could not have spoken better, if they had made use of the mouth of Horace and Virgil. You have much obliged me in copying out that passage in the Life of Monsieur de Peiresk, that concerns yourself and me. The Historian has done me right, in regard of my affection, to place me near you. This is to make two favours of one. I could wish he had touched one word of our friendship, & erat huic locus, and that in the succession of Malherbe, he had not forgotten your Lyric Poetry. I know he understands the mystery of writing, and his Latin is of the best age, so that he will do great honour to the memory of his friend. I beseech God comfort you with some good news from Germany. I tremble at the only reading of what you writ me thence, and unless fata viam invenient, I cannot tell how your Hero can save himself. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 30 Jan. 1641.   

LET. IU.  
SIR,  
YOur discourses are according to your custom, prudent and Philosophical; and there is scarce a small word escapes from me in writing to you, but returns me many periods of excellent instruction. You treat the stupid and obdurate sect of Stoics, as they deserve, and yet do not bend the tenderness of other more mild Philosophy, so low, as to lament the death of Lampreys, Hens, and Parrots, ut olim Crassus, Honorius, aliique non pauci ridiculae memoriae mortales. We do not say with Virgil, Nec doluit miserans— Refute him by himself, and say, Sunt lachrymae rerum, & mentem mortalia tangunt. I am not exempt from such apprehensions as afflict you, concerning the uncertain condition of the affairs of War. Be pleased therefore to let me know what news you have received, and suffer me not to be consumed in my own fears. Oblige me also, by recommending me to Monsieur the Bishop of Grass, and assure him, he has not a more faithful servant then me, nor better persuaded of his incomparable worth. If there be any of his new Poetry abroad, I beseech your goodness to intercede for it in my favour, who am most passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 6 Feb. 1641.   

LETTER V.  
SIR,  
THough the Greeks have a proverb, that offends the sons of the gods, yet I do not believe, that the Counts of Dunois of former times, were more honourable persons, than the Duke of Longueville, of the present. The last miracle, whereof your Letter gives me relation, made me tremble in the reading; my imagination is still unsettled, and I fear for them that are escaped, as if I saw them yet in hazard, and amidst the difficulties of the passage. Without question, Sir, Heaven has some extraordinary design for your Prince. Men are not less frequently deceived in their fears, then in their hopes; and I have observed in the Histories of all Ages, that great forces have almost ever performed but little, and such as were inconsiderable, very much.  
Nil desperandum Teucro duce & auspice Teucro,  
— Cràs ingens iterabimus aequor.  
But you must remember, that Teucer made this Oration amongst his cups; and likewise observe, that 'tis from the banks of Bacchara, (which the Latinists of Germany derive by Etymology from Bacchi ara) that the Nectar Rhenanum is gathered, which may perhaps have filled your Army with Enthusiasm. But, Sir, you return me the title of Philosopher, with too great humility, I cannot accept an honour, whereof I am so undeserving, nor suffer you to call me your Book, who are to me both a Library and an University. If you provoke me further, I will term you my Tripod and my Oracle, and treat you as Apollo, or at least as a Prophet, and a man inspired by some deity. But, out of raillery, you know the high esteem I have of your great capacity, and the reverence I bear to all that you pronounce, ex cathedra; I use this word, because you many times send me the advices of others, for your own. And though I very much prise the wit and eloquence of our acquaintance, yet I do not acknowledge them for Judges and Sovereigns. Since you are curious to know, who the father Teron is, whom I believed, you had known better than myself, I shall tell you, that he is a Poet of seventy five years old: Soon after the birth of the King, he composed two Poems of little Verses, which they call Glyconiques; and the late King, upon the favourable applause that was given them, commanded Molin to translate them; they are entitled, Les Couronnes, and Les Dauphins, and were printed at Paris, the Latin on one side, and the French è regione. These two works are indeed very commendable, and I am assured they will find your approbation. I have seen other things of his, wherein I observed an excellent genius; but I know, that he is otherwise inclined to idleness, and a workman, that of all the world, loves his own trade least. I had good store of other news to requite you with, and but for this diversion, you had not been discharged at so cheap a rate. Monsieur de Thou, who turned out of his way, to do me the honour of a visit, had the patience to relate them four and twenty hours together, which were so pleasing and agreeable, that they seemed to me scarce four and twenty minutes. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 25 Feb. 1641.   

LETTER VI.  
SIR,  
YOur diligence depends not upon that of the Post, nor upon considerations of the season. Whatever his speed be, and the Sun approach or be more remote from you, I always find my reckoning, and receive tidings from you at the end of the week; for which, Sir, I return you a thousand remerciments, and for an infinite number of other goodnesses, whereof I perceive manifest testimonies in all your Letters. You had formerly declared your resentments of my losses; but indeed they were such, as were not much apprehended by me; and unless you had recalled them to my remembrance, by ma●ing yourself a sufferer in them, they had been utterly defaced out of my memory. I have, I thank God, but little temptations to covetousness; and 'tis almost without trouble or study, that I contemn that, which the greatest part of men adore. So that my virtue has nothing of merit, and being not engaged in combat, cannot in reason expect the reward of Crowns and triumphs. I bestow a thousand curses every day, upon that person, that molests you, and extremely bemoan your poor Muses, that are scared and inquieted, with litigious wranglings atd chicanry. Sunt hae quidem litterae, sed litterae illitteratissimae, as our Pliny terms them. I understand so little in those matters, that I could never recommend a process, without committing a thousand incongruities, and mistaking one thing for another. As for you, Sir, you will not be in hazard of such inconveniences, whose skill and capacity is universal. But I wish you a more honest employment, and more worthy of the nobleness of your wit. I know not, if the discourse that I send you, will be happy enough for that purpose; but I hope, you will neither disapprove the sense, nor the words and contrivance, and that you will not take it ill, that I endeavour to oblige a man, that relates wonders of you in all places where he comes; he may peradventure be one of those, that we shall make good by our kindness and benefits. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 24 Feb. 1641.   

LETTER VII.  
SIR,  
I Know not what it is in my writings, that deserves your applause and esteem; but I know, that all that I writ pleases you, and that you read my words with eyes, capable of all the illusions of friendship. She is the fair and innocent enchantress, that gives me this power over you; 'tis her Magic, that renders me the only person in the world, that can overrule your judgement. And hence it is, that that person, that is able to observe blackness in the Milky way, and imparity even in the body of light, will take no notice of my spots and blemishes. Since it is your pleasure to make me happy, it is not fitting I be too curious, in examining the causes of my good fortune, or seek to enlarge the meanness of my worth, which would upbraid you, with the bad foundation of your love. Rationem faelicitatis nemo reddit. But what appearance is there, that without any design or intention, I should have uttered a line, which were worthy of your Hero. He deserves such commendations, as are carefully chosen, and not to be spoken of without study. You must be as solicitous of his glory, as well as of that of his fathers; and your Trumpet would better befit him, than our Reeds. Absit itaque ut tam illustrem materiam familiari dicendi genere & extemporaneitate nostrâ violemus. The danger you tell me, our perfect friend has been in, makes me tremble, and my imagination is hurt with all the instruments of Chirurgery, and the cruel remedies you speak of, I wish him an absolute recovery; and the Senate and people of Parnassus, who have so great obligations to him, must wean for him, as well as for Princes, the lives of gold and silk, whereof I have heard so frequent mention, and pray, as for their true benefactor; De nostris annis tibi Jupiter augeat annos. I should be glad to see the six verses of the Poet, Perewiged with Icicles; and the Duel of the Horatij and Curiatij, or any thing else that passes through your Territories. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 1 March, 1641.   

LET. VIII.  
SIR,  
YOur process continues too long, and your Muses are injuried, with the delays of the Palais. Such a suit would have made me hate the world; and though I am a man of peace, yet I should not dread a military expedition so much, as the trouble of your cause. Nevertheless, your Philosophy will secure you; and having both to combat with your interior resentments, and defend yourself against a visible adversary. Zeno will crown your moderation at the same time, and Justinian adjudge you the victory. The Verses of the Poet with the rattling beard, are such as you judge them, and accord with your opinion. The conclusion of the Ode, to Monsieur de Bullion, is better than the beginning, but the Amphitrite is quite contrary, and falling from its first height, is only supported upon two bad legs; for it would be too severe to call it monstruous, and to say of it, as of other divinities of the Sea, that, definite in piscem mulier formosa supernè. The Wood is handsome, but not of perfect beauty, in my judgement; and I see something beyond, whether the strength of the Poet did not reach. The communicating of all these rarities, would deserve a formal acknowledgement; but you have long ago commanded me, to say no more of your favours, then that I received them. The first discourse that I sent you of eloquence, shall be suddenly followed with a second, wherein I speak of the critic Longinus, and of his Treatise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, whereof the several parts deserve consideration. 'Tis a subject wherewith I am much affected, and have great inclination to it in my fancy, though I dare not pretend to the enjoyment of that high Queen of souls.  Hanc qualem neque● monstrare, & sentio tantum. 
Concerning the word, whereof I desired your opinion; 'tis to deride me, to refer me to myself. Pronounce upon it, I beseech you; for 'tis the Court that must give Law to the Village. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 12 March, 1641.   

LET. IX.  
SIR,  
YOu cannot imagine the indignation I have, against your persecutors, and the pity I bear for poor virtue, when fraud draws her before the Tribunal of judges. There aught to be nothing for you, but Crowns and rewards, and so eminent probity as yours, might even deserve to be respected by malice; but if malice should do that it ought, it would be no longer such; the Woolves will never be really reconciled with the Shepherd's flock. And 'tis the order, or rather the confusion of the things of this world, that there be Tyrants of all degrees, grand, mean, and little; some to afflict the public, and others for the torment and scourge of particular persons. I just now writ to Monsieur de la Nawe, not as I ought, but as I was able, in the midst of my distempers. I conjure him both by alliance and friendship, to take charge of your interests as of my life; and I assure myself, you will find him not indifferent in the business. But how am I mistaken, in imagining, that any body will consider me, when the proposal is touching your service? Your name is cherished and respected of all the earth, and Monsieur de la Nawe, who is a man perfectly honest, will look only upon you, in the good justice he will do you. I have endured a fit of more than thirty hours, and all the respite that I can obtain from my anguishes, is only enough to entreat you to believe, that I am, as of old,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 22 March, 1641.   

LET. X.  
SIR,  
I Perceive I must contest no longer with you, about the worth of my words; they shall be rated at what value you put upon them, and be accounted handsome, since they please you. I would only desire, they were as strong, as by your favour they are graceful, and that I had the faculty of healing with my words, as well as, in your belief, I have that of praising; I would not deny so easy remedies at this time, but prepare them with all the skill, whereof I am capable, to the end they might operate more effectually, against the  of your friend. It should also be permitted, to make experience in my own person, and the Physician undertake the cure of himself: But there is no medicine, for such old and obstinate maladies as mine; 'tis here, that the rhetoric of Demosthenes, yea and the magic of Zoroaster, would manifest the weakness and impotency of their Art. There will certainly come better times than these, and we shall be well one day, at least at the day of the Resurrection, cum mortale hoc nostrum induet immortalitatem, & in gloriâ resurgemus, by the grace and mercy of our Lord. I think I sent you my opinion, of the Verses of the Lyric Madelenet; for the others of raillery, whereof you speak, I have no curiosity to see them. The raillery of this man, always seemed to me so cold and flat, that it was not possible for me to laugh at it; and if I were in the place where you are, and a necessity laid upon me to commend them, 'tis so hard for me to go against my knowledge, that I should rather die at that instant. I am astonished at what I hear, of Doctor Palemon; I believed that he lived only in spirit, and that he was so persuaded of the immortality of the soul, whereof he speaks so much, that he held no longer commerce with his senses: But I perceive, he is one of those hypocritical Philosophers, who contented themselves with discoursing of virtue, and never took further pains to follow it. It may please God to give him better thoughts one day, and possibly he has permitted the publication of the secret of this brave man, to the end he may hereafter make him a great Saint. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 4 April, 1641.   

LETTER XI.  
SIR,  
TO lose nothing in this bad age, 'tis the only security to possess nothing, If you have suffered great losses, 'tis because you had great riches; Magnae opes, amicissime Capellane, magnae jacturae locum faciunt. Quid verò inter opes majus & praestantius veris & bonae fidei amicis? I will believe the person you lament, worthy of your tears; and although his merit be sufficiently problematical in the judgement of the people: Yet I know the people is but a bad esteemer of worth, and their aversion is many times, as unjust as their love. But however it be, the King of Sweden is dead, and so is the Duke of Weymar? and if a man outlive War and Combats, he comes at last to die in Feasts and Triumphs. Let us look upon all men as lost, or ready to be so, and account every hour of our life for Climacterical. Let us expect bad news by each Post, and conclude, that the only means to avoid being afflicted, is to be none of this world. In effect, Sir, we must either see others perish, or perish ourselves; and therefore, what unreasonable delicateness is it, to be in love with life, and not to be able to endure the appendances that accompany it? and what profit is it to bewail an evil, whereunto all the world cannot afford a remedy? I have long since left the Stoics their insensibility; yet am not in the contrary extreme. I remember a Rhyme rhat gins thus, Thy tender pity makes me pity thee, etc. and flouts the good nature of one of our friends. As I do not approve the heart of steel of Zeno, and his eyes of Pumice; so neither can I commend those that were turned into fountains, in the Regions of Metamorphoses, or at least became blear-eyed all the rest of their lives. This softness cannot befoll a soul of that firm constitution as yours; so that you will not fail to maintain your place between the two extremes, where there is honest and assured contentment. Your Predecessor, Monsieur de Malherbe, will tell you, that King Priam, King Francis, and himself, were comforted; and that it is permitted to every one to do the like. 'Tis very true as you tell me, that the Princes do at length become weary of the War, and that the Caducei of my Lords the Nuntios, will have the virtue to separate the Combatants, who are so exasperated and cruelly animated against one another. If his Holiness be the Author of this great good, he will receive as many benedictions as he bestows, and the Orator Jean: Jaques, shall be commissioned to make him an ample Remerciment in the name of all Christendom. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 April, 1641.   

LET. XII.  
SIR,  
ACcording to your custom, you set a value upon all that I writ, and find a perfection in things that scarce reach a mediocrity. 'Tis friendship that disguises objects to you, and makes you mistake appeearances for truth. I was indisposed when I writ to Monsieur de la Nawe; and if there were any thing in my Letter that deserves your esteem, it ought to be rather ascribed to fortune, then to me, who contributed no more than a good intention. This, indeed is so pure, that I will not deny but it merits your allowance; and you must, at least, consider it as an honest and generous inability, which having nothing but desires to give, will never be accused of sparing them. As for the praises which are burdensome to your modesty, I besceech you to believe, that they are neither amplifications, nor common places. I am so throughly persuaded of your virtue, that when I render the like testimony of it, I imagine that I am holding up my hand, and swearing before a Judge. If the Daemon of Socrates did report you, all that passed in your absence, you would know, that I never speak of you, but I am transported, and that in this I imitate the Sibyls, who delivered their predictions with fury. Concerning the other part of your Letter, I declare unto you, that I will not undertake to plead the cause of the accused; and that I neither justify nor condemn at the first sight. Yet I know, that all the witnesses against him are not so faithful as I, and that the greatest part of advices, are like Heroic Poets, who upon a small foundation of truth, build a prodigious structure of Lies. How many wicked minds, are there, that wish an eternity of the War, that are only fit to break friendships, to hinder reconcilements, and to cherish and improve the seeds of hatred. But the business must be further cleared, and our judgements suspended till then. I know not what to say concerning Monsieur Conrart, but only that old word, which I have repeated so often, I shall live and die in my ingratitude. He is excessiuly obliging, and unless I have your assistance, to acquit me from so many engagements, I confess I am insolent; and I yield him up my words, which are the only goods of a poor Rhetorician. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 1 May, 1641.   

LET. XIII.  
SIR,  
YOu remember what the Crow said of old upon the Capitol, Est bene non potuit dicere, dixit erit. She is in the same note at this day; and therefore let us hope well for the future. Let us judge favourably of our affairs in Germany, and not imagine, that the fortune of our Army is dead, with its first General; at least, let us content ourselves with present losses, and the miseries that arrive every hour. Calamities come fast enough, without being anticipated by our fears; as it also continues to long, although we take no pains to preserve it in our memories. I expect the book of Monsieur de la Chambre, with much zeal and devotion, since we are now entered upon the holy week; without doubt, he has made some new discoveries touching the Passions, for he long since designed them an argument for his pen, and told me, he would treat of them, as a Physician, and in another way than that of Aristotle. He has a wit piercing and confident, and a style not unpleasing. When I was at Paris, he gave me a view of a great store of his exeellent Merchandises. So that to do well, he needs understand no more, then to make a good choice, wherein the goodness of his judgement will secure him from error. But, I beseech you, who is the Author of the French Verities, that did me the favour to send me his books? The same day I received them, they were taken from me by a friend; so that having not yet read them, I cannot tell you my opinion of their worth. In the mean time, be pleased to let him know, that I am obliged to him for his present, and give him all the thanks I am able. I am more troubled for the health of our dear Monsieur, the Abbot of Bois-Robert, then for my pension. If by your credit and his, it happen to be paid, this little succour will come conveniently, to repair some breaches of the last year: But I ought to thank none but you and him for it, since you will procure me a thing, which was not so much in my thoughts as to ask it. I was formerly yours by abundance of titles, but I shall moreover be now so, by that of your most humble Pensioner. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 12 May, 1641.   

LET. XIV.  
SIR,  
SInce I every day receive new testimonies of your affection, I am obliged to express my acknowledgements as often. Did I not readily embrace them, I should be an enemy of mine own happiness. Your tender inclinations are the fountains, from whence I continually draw comfort to my miseries. But the condition of Monsieur de Feuguiere, renders him incapable of receiving any. I did not write you such words, as that I consented with the people, in that which concerns his reputation; for I could never favour the injustice that has been done him, by some person's misinformed; yet I am glad, that I have given occasion for an apology of a dozen lines. You defend his life more vigorously, than I related you his death; and having most judiciously alleged the examples of many illustrious unfortunate persons, 'tis infinite pleasure to see, how roughly you deal with the Beast of many heads, and interest almost all persons of honesty on your side, against her. Every drop of blood that remains in the veins of the old Jesuit, is clear and sprightly, and even his declining is full of lustre and glory. But is it not strange, that the name you know of, should be as essential in Verses, as those of the Saints in the Testaments, and that it must be thrust into all compositions, whether good or bad, and to the purpose or otherwise? I am confident, he will be the first, that will deride these extravagances; and as he deserves infinite commendations, so he desires, that the praises bestowed on him be not ridiculous and impertinent. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc.   

LETTER XV.  
SIR,  
I Have read your Letter of the two and twentieth of the last month, not only with joy but profit, and have already provided those prospectives of your invention, which I intent to use upon opportunity of time and place. It is indeed sometimes good, to be a creature less reasonable; and too curious providence gives us trouble, by adding the evils of our imagination, to those which really afflict us. But, under your pardon, Sir, I do not believe you one of those, that use to be sick by anticipation; and to what end were your philosophical reason, which corrects common apprehension, unless it enabled you to contemn all that, which others fear, hope, admire, etc. I have at last received the excellent Book of Monsieur de la Chambre, and am now about the middle of it; I could wish it were as great a volume, as Calepin, to give me a more durable contentment. I protest to you, I never read any thing with greater pleasure, or that affected me more sensibly. Some others have heretofore furnished us with pieces of brokage, and disguised translations; but he presents us with a true and perfect Original. And if all the parts of Philosophy were made French in this manner, non esset cur Graeciae suos Platones, Xenophontes, & Theophrastos invideremus. I know not how I came to omit Aristotle here; whose acuteness I also observe in it, and his methodical style, so necessary to the inquiry and clearing of truth. In my opinion, the Latin of Celsus is not more graceful, than his French; Imò verò tersam & elegantem dictionem, ipsae gratiae videntur mihi iis manibus formâsse quibus, ut vos vos Poetae vultis. Dominae veneri ministrant. As for myself, I would willingly say something to our Heroesse, upon the subject of the Bruti, Scaevolae, Camilli, Fabritii, Scipiones, Catones, Caesares, & Mecaenates; but this requires more cheerfulness, than I am owner of. And unless you entreat your God of spirit and light, to dispel those clouds and sadnesses that oppress my soul, all that's there will languish with more night and darkness, then is imaginable in caves and dungeons. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 15 June, 1641.   

LETTER XVI.  
SIR,  
IT seems, the great discourse has been displayed at Rambovillet Hostel, and you had courage enough to read it, as well as Monsieur de Voiture patience to attend it. This is indeed too much already, and I dare not believe the rest, nor imagine, that I merited those acclamations you speak of. Those Ladies are for the sublimity of eloquence, and cannot relish the meanness of mine; Demosthenes is a more agreeable Author to them, than I, and they have rather applauded the Text than the Preacher. I have considered what you writ me of the ironical Doctor, and I shall one of these days know, An fit deploratae salutis, aut ad meliorem frugem redire possit. In the mean time, I will communicate to you, what I lately read of Florent Chrestien, who was almost of our man's humour; Adeò ut adoloscentiae annos nondum egressus, Ronsardum ipsum jam tum insigni laude florentem, mordaci & amarulento Poemate lacesseret; quam aetatis intemperantiam summus ille vir, quâ erat animi magnitudine, non modo contempsit, verum etiam doctissimi adolescentis ingenium exosculatus, in amicitiam illum avidissimè recepit. The difference between them is, that this has passed his fiftieth year, and his obloquy is a disease, and not youth; nevertheless, it is possible he may be converted, and perhaps will translate some of our pieces, or make us honourable amends in some other fashion; we shall see the event. I heard a report, that the Lord Paul Fiesque is at Court, and that he undertakes the affair of the Peace; If so, I shall hope good success, for he is an Angel in negotiations, and not a man; and I believe, all the world cannot afford another person so pliable, dextrous, and intelligent, as he. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 14 June, 1641.   

LETTER XVII.  
SIR,  
I Am of late become deaf to the bruit of applause, and insensible of all the allurements of glory. Yet I have very quick resentments of friendship, and it is that which makes somethings precious to me, which otherwise in themselves I should look upon as indifferent. Therefore the praises of strangers do no longer please me as formerly. I call them of strangers, with distinction from yours, whereof I am never glutted, tam gratum est à te laudari. All the relish that I find in the eulogies of others, proceeds from the seasoning that you give them. 'Tis not Monsieur de Thou that describes Florent Chrestien so graphically, but one of his friends. Scevola nempe Sammarthanus in aureolo Elogiorum libello, digno, me judice, omnium Bemborum & sadoletorum invidiâ. But are you serious, when you speak of Ronsard, and give him the title of Grand? or is it only out of modesty, and to oppose his greatness to your tenuity? As for me, I esteem him not great, except in the sense of the old proverb, Magnus liber, magnum malum; and I have declared as much in one of my latin Letters, which you suffered to pass, without making any opposition. Since the thing is done, there is no place left for denial; and Monsieur de Malberbe, Monsieur de Grasse, and yourself, must come into the number of small Poets, if he be allowed to pass for great. I dare not presume to give so much trouble to Monsieur the Abbot of Bois Robert, who could not bear it, without notable prejudice to his health. Oblige me therefore to tell him, when you see him, that provided he recover, and God preserve me so dear a friend, I will no more lament my particular unhappinesses, or those of the times. If he should hereupon offer to make me a compliment of two lines, I conjure you to restrain him from it by violence, and do not suffer, that I become the occasion of a second malady, which would add nothing to the assurance I have already of his affection. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 1 July, 1641.   

LETTER XVIII.  
SIR,  
SO long as you preach in this manner, I shall take great pleasure to be of your parish; and you need not fear I will ever complain, that Monsieur Curate is too tedious. All that you say is extremely handsome, and the little Astyanax smiles, not only on his father Hector, when he is going to die by the hand of Achilles, but also upon Ulysses his executioner, as he casts him headlong from the Tower. Nor does the Swine make good cheer only in the tempest, whilst men are at their prayers and vows; but at the same time the knife is put to his throat, he knows not whether he be tickled or hurt. O free and natural Philosophy! much less artificial and dissembled, then that of the Philosopher Polemon! We profess one sort, as you say excellently, that was discovered for the ruin of all others. Let us follow its maxims, and the doctrine of the Gospel, and we shall have compassion of all Sects and Sectaries. I read with joy that article of your Letter, wherein you speak of Monsieur the Abbot de la Victoire, and am infinitely pleased with the renovation of that society. Nobile certè par, sed utinam per Balzacium impar. Besides the affection I bear him, there is scarce a Prelate in all our Hierarchy, of whom I set a higher value. His ordinary communication is, in my opinion, beyond the meditated speeches of most of our Gentlemen. Live happy, and pity the condition of your friend, who am destitute of the enjoyment of either of you here, and cry uncessantly to the Trees and Rocks, as heretofore, Frustrà revocabere votis.  
I am with all manner of respect,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac. 12 July, 1641.   

LET. XIX.  
SIR,  
I Have told you a thousand times, and tell you this once more, that you always discover reason in whatever place it is hidden. I know not what opinion Cicero had of glory, in the books that he made; but I am confident, Praise is worth neither more nor less, then as you rate it; you have set it at a just price, and not only the rigour of Philosophy, but even Christian humility, might deign to taste it of your preparation. I think, he on whom people cast their eyes, for instructor to the Prince, is the same whom they desire to employ, in the negotiation of the Peace. These thoughts do him no injury, and the destination, that judges him worthy of so high and important affairs, ought not to displease him, though he have no design to undertake them. My judgement herein shall always conform to his. And be it, that he go to Collen, or lodge in the Palace-Royall, or keep himself in his Closet, I will believe, he could not possibly do better than he will choose to do. Monsieur de la Mothe ie Vayer, has taught me many things, whereof I was ignorant, and confirmed me in some that I knew before. There cannot be a work more rich and absolute than his, and he has infinitely obliged me with his present. I beseech you to assure him, of my acknowledgements for this favour, and preserve me in his good opinion. You see, Sir, it is by you, that I entertain commerce with honest men; and I am prized by them, only according to the esteem you make of me. But there can nothing be added to my gratitude, for your goodness, and I am more perfectly than any person in the world,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 25 July, 1641.   

LETTER XX.  
SIR,  
YOu may write to me in haste, as long as you please, and bestow what appellation you will upon the things, you do me the honour to send me. Divina responsa, propositiones aeternae veritatis; and if there were any terms more noble, I should employ them upon this occasion. It is certain, that a genius and judgement, are the two essential parts of a Poet; and I rest satisfied, with all that you have told me thereupon. But having submitted myself entirely to your authority, you would have me a little content my reason. Permit me therefore to read Ronsard again over, for upon the last reading, I thought him rather the matter and beginning of a Poet, than one accomplished; and in the fire wherewith his imagination was heated, there was much less of flame, than smoke and foot. You know the fancy of the late Monsieur de Malherbe, that blotted out a whole Volume with his own hand, and did not pardon one syllable; I do not approve his rigour so universal. But if all the Sonnets, all the Franciade, and all the Odes were lost, I think, I should not need much comfort against my sorrow. I have written in Latin to Monsieur Silhon, what I conceived both of the one and the other; I mean, of the Martyr and the Tyrant, Ronsard and Malherbe. Be pleased for my sake, to read that part over again, and send me your opinion of it, to the end I may know if mine be right, and I may hold me to it. I am ravished with the second article of your Letter, and cannot sufficiently commend the judgement, prudence, and magnanimity, which you manifest in the Treaty, whereof I made the overture. I hope the success will be happy, and that you will have no cause, either to reproach my credulity, or repent the confidence you have put in me. God forbidden, I should have a design to deceive you; I have all the moral assurances that can be had, of the faith of another. And if I were not certain, that I bestow a tried friend upon you, I should not be so forward, to be the instrument of the new friendship, which I propose you; if any evil ever come of it, Dii in me convertant. I am passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 August, 1641.   

LET. XXI.  
SIR,  
I Am not very healthful, and yet you must know, that amidst my grief, I have been guilty of an infidelity, (agnosce verba tua amicissime & elegantissime Capellane) for I have burnt with another fire then yours; you will discover it in the Letter I writ to Monsieur Menage, which is full of passion. Be pleased to tell him, that I have answered him in the vulgar language, for the same reason that Statius, being to speak of Lucan, durst not venture to do it in heroic Verse: Ego, saith he, non potui majorem tanti authoris habere reverentiam, quàm quod laudes ejus dicturus Hexametros meos timui. I feared as much for my Latin, and did not think it worthy to be opposed, to that of his excellent Letter; although in the Apostill, I forgot myself more than once, and delivered both Prose and Verse in that Mistress of Tongues; but according to my custom, more out of caprichio, than design. Since he is as earnestly desirous, to see his name in my Letters, as Cicero was to see his, in the Histories of Luceius, and borrows his words, Ardeo cupiditate incredibili nomen meum etc. to signify his intention; I beseech you to tell him, that I love him so well, that though I abhor every thing that is called a Letter, I will for his sake print a Volume; Et quidem brevi, ut primo quo que tempore compos fiat voti non ambitiosissimi. You have no cause to wonder, that I am a sworn confederate, of the excellent persons you speak of. Were it your pleasure, I would side with my enemies, if I have any yet remaining. And how can it be, that I should not esteem goddesses upon your recommendation, who am ready at your instance, to compose Hymns upon the Harpuys. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 22 Aug. 1641.   

LETTER XXII.  
SIR,  
YOu ever make the two hardest parts of the argument, and leave me only the pains to draw out the consequence. Let this glorious liberty flourish, and let us dethrone all Tyranny in the affairs of Philosophy. You speak admirably, that our reason ought to yield obedience to nothing but reason, and that Authority is a yoke, which Religion only has right to impose upon the judgements of men. Upon these considerations, I shall take the freedom, to descent sometimes from the Paradoxes of Zeno, to debate the opinions of Aristotle, and to question the maxims of Aristippus, especially when he speaks Latin, to a man that understands it not. For the Letter of Monsieur— which I send you, I had much ado to arrive at the end of it, it seemed longer to me then the Ecclesiastes, the Proverbs, and the book of Wisdom; yea, than that stupendious volume, wherein he treated of the Universe, and the properties of all Plants. Is it possible, that a man should write Letters of supererogation, to another man that he knows not? and that the same man should have an imagination, strong enough to persuade himself, that he knows that man, and that he received Letters from him, and the History of the Cardinal Bentivoglio, and communicated his own with him. Without question, this is one of my Antipodes, and of a contrary nature to the negligent person, that never writes Letters when civility requires it, or his affairs urge it, or even necessity seems to enforce it; I had almost slipped a great word, nor when Monsieur Chapelain appoints it, which is more powerful with me, than necessity itself. But you say nothing of Monsieur l'Huilier, who is an ancient Roman disguised, and makes Eulogies, of near resemblance with those of Ovid; I would gladly see them at the end of the life of his friend, Monsieur du Peiresk, with all the pomp and gallantry of the Impression. I had delivered your three Italian Books to Monsieur Girard, if he had taken my house in his passage, according to his promise: But I hear, he was necessitated by his occasions, to go another way. He will not be backward, to enjoy the honour of your company, and verify all that I have said or written of him, at several times. I have added five or six Verses to the last Latin Letter, which I writ to Monsieur Maynard, wherein you will perceive, that I spend all my gall against the old Court of Rome, to the end I may take away all ambiguity and equivocation. Scis enim iis temporibus Poëtae objectum esse, quod Agamemnoni maledixisset. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac 25. Aug. 1641.   

LET. XXIII.  
SIR,  
THe pains which I endure, make my complaints perpetual; there is nothing of the Comedian in the relation I make you of them; and there passes not a day, but I have cause to exclaim against Physic, which affords me no redress. You may judge from hence, if those that send me kind Letters, have reason to require answers from me in the same strain; and if the compliment which I sent you, for the great— is not more than he ought to expect, considering his quality, and my distempers. But if he be distasted at it, the repose and silence I shall enjoy, will comfort me, for the loss of a talkative and ambitious friendship. Nevertheless, I will not yet condemn him; and its possible, he may become one of your converts, for there is scarce any that approaches you, but is made an honester man by it. I am obliged to Monsieur the Counsellor of Tholouze, for his Latin traduction. You may be assured by that, of the richness of your Verse, since he returns you nothing but gold for them, and four words for one. I never heard before of that learned Dutch Lady, and I confess, I am surprised with her Epigram: There is in it both sense and Latin, and the Roman Sulpitia could not have made a better, upon the equivocal translation of Astrea. As for her Hebrew, I humbly kiss her hands. But is it also true, that Madam— undertakes to play the Rabbin, and that she studies the Talmud, instead of saying her Orisons? Truly this is excellent, and she will triumph over the Italian and Spanish of other Ladies. The History of Monsieur Grotius will be handsome unquestionably, and his Politics cannot be bad. I have seen a book of his composing, de Antiquitate Reip. Batavicae, after which I held him capable of all things. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 30 Aug. 1641.   

LETTER XXIV.  
SIR,  
YOu receive this from the Monsieur Girard, whom I so often promised you, and who came on purpose to Balzac to have his passport, being not willing, as he said, to present himself before you, without one of my Letters. I will not here repeat his, because I do not distrust your memory; nor tell you any thing new of him, having left him in perfect health, the last time I saw him. I will only tell you, that he seems to me deserving of your friendship, and that in this transaction, I give you not much less than I demand of you. Good men are so rare, that sometimes it is difficult to find half a one in a whole Nation. I see a great deal of complacency and politeness on every side, but I can scarce discover any strength or solidity. Notwithstanding, this person is no rough Diamond, he has been cut with so much art, and by the hands of so great a Master, who looks upon him, as one of his principal pieces of workmanship, that you cannot but acknowledge, the fashion well worthy of the matter. If you had not believed me upon my word, I could have produced you several great witnesses, and alleged St. Augustine, Aristotle, and the Count Balthasar; that is, in the vulgar tongue, Monsieur de Lysieux, Monsieur Silhon, and Monsieur de Voiture. After all this, your approbation is necessary, without which, the deposition of a Father of the Church, the sovereign reason of the Lycoeum, and the extreme delicacy of the Court, are not sufficient confirmations of an honest man. His dear brother is my daily comforter, and I cannot express to you the advantage that I receive, from his ingenious amity. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 6 Septemb. 1641.   

LET. XXV.  
SIR,  
MAy I believe, that my melancholy is prophetical, and that my Grace speaks Greek; that my praises made the iron face of the Epicure Colotes blush, and that my Letters received the applauses of a company, that assembles twice a day, to hisse at all the rest of France? Since you have solemnly affirmed it, there is no room for incredulity; and I dare not suspect the least part of untruth, where your credit is concerned. But these fine things please me no further, than you approve them. It is certain, they had their birth in pain and sorrow, amongst complaints and sad faces. In that miserable condition, from which I am but seldom free, I do not fail of comfort, as often as I contemplate your Idea, and think of your affection, and that of Monsieur de Voiture. Be pleased to assure him, Sir, of the vehemency and constancy of my passion, and that I esteem him in all Languages that he speaks, and that my note-books are full of the excellent things, which he has told me. I must acknowledge, that the thanks you intent to render in person, to Monsieur Menage, is a favour suitable to your goodness, which is so industrious, in seeking new ways and manners to oblige me. I shall make good my engagement, you need not scruple it. But I must crave your assistance, to render the volume more uniform, and the return of some of my Letters in your hands, which may be communicated to the public, without profaning our mysteries. As I apprehend, you ought to content the passion of Monsieur the Ambassador, who desires your Pucelle, too violently to be refused; she will not be in danger of her honour, with so virtuous a person; and what means have you to resist that, furtim, clàm, precariò, dummodo potiar. I am eternally,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 16 Septemb. 1641.   

LETTER XXVI.  
SIR,  
I Am much obliged to you for those things, for which, according to your custom, you make excuses. After an entertainment, that might befit Anthony and Cleopatra, you are ashamed of your good cheer. As for me, it gave infinite contentment; and could I do it honestly, and without incivility, I would conjure you, to persecute and annoy me always in that manner. The royalty of reason could not be more stoutly maintained, against the usurpation of authority. And notwithstanding your endeavour, to hid and repress the power and vigour of your eloquence, yet there breaks from you such rays and evidences of it, as did of courage and manhood from Achilles, when disguised in the habit of a virgin. Thus we repay the censures, which the vulgar pass upon us; and neither the respect of number, nor the continued series of Ages, nor the good fortune of Sects and Schools, are able to misguide us in our sentence. That which you say of the sovereignty of Reason, and the seat of her Empire, of her dresses and attendants, and the Grotto whither she retires, etc. What is all this, Sir, but to proclaim a truth magnificently, and to attire your Queen with purple and cloth of gold. But to pass from the Throne of this Queen, to her Chariot of Triumph; that is, from your Prose to your Verse, wherein your Virgin transcends the splendour and glory, of all conquerors of the other sex, and is no less beholding to your Pen, than her own Sword. In requital of your French, I have sent you some Latin numbers, which your Letter told me you desired; but instead of six Verses, which I formerly mentioned, you may perceive them multiplied to thirty. Perhaps they will please such as know the Court of Rome, as you do, and have seen the ambitious poverty of its Courtiers, where there is choice of Cavaliers of five or six sorts for attendants, at the rate of a Julio a piece by the day; with which miserable pittance, they quiet their eager appetites. But, as I conjecture, that which will least displease you, is my Bacchus Laborans, who does no longer remember that he was once a conqueror, and the three goddesses that accompany him. One, half-learned, and that never heard but of Priapus, or at most of Vertumnus, will haply wonder to see Venus in the place, that he thinks belongs to them; but not you, Sir, who have shown me, Hortos olim tutelae Veneris assignatos, Plauto & Plinio testibus: & meministi etiam illud Naevii.  Coquus edit Neptunum & Venerem & Cererem. 
Pisces nempe, olera, & panem. I forbear to speak any thing of Neptune, because we are more than twenty leagues distant from the Sea. The tongue of du Moustier has already discharged all its venom against me, and he has nothing now to do, but to enjoy the fruits of his old malice. But you remember, Sir, the place that designs him; for methinks I speak innocently, that the portrait of Phylarque was drawn, by the Painter of Heroes and Heroesses, since he styles himself amongst other titles, the Painter of the King and Queen. If these words are injurious, I have no understanding in quarrels or injuries. And I would ask of Socrates himself, what is calmesse and moderation, if this be not wholly such. He that termed him heretofore an Artificer, and his Closet a Shop, used him more rudely. But as he made himself pleasant in appearance, with his resentments of that reproach, so shall I do really with his despair. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 Octob. 1641.   

LETTER XXVII.  
SIR,  
YOu see, I do not promise true Diamonds, with design of putting falls upon you; and that I need not fear the threats of that sentence, so often thundered out by Petrus Valens, in the Chair of Boncour; 
Qualem commendes etiam atque etiam aspice, ne mox  
Incutiant aliena tibi peccata pudorem.   
Nevertheless, Sir, I must assure you, that the glory of my judgement is not so dear to me, as that of my friend; and that I affect Monsieur Girard more than you believe, upon his own peculiar merit, rather than the recommendation of others. He is a person of extraordinary value, and you will understand him further, in the progress of your commerce. But I am glad of the happy meeting of Monsieur l'Huilier, in that first conference, whose name rejoices me, in what place soever of your Letters I meet it. As for the fat person, I will believe, that he spoke to you in earnest, and without fiction; and therefore you may please to tell him, that he shall be more than once in the Volume, that I am purposely composing for Monsieur Menage; He shall likewise have a room in my Latin, and in my Discourses: And if he loves me only for putting him in print, I think this will be enough to satisfy his vanity, and by consequence to redouble his affection. I could wish also, that you would do me the favour to certify Messieurs de Maire, with the help of some kind of Trunk, (for I dare not request this trouble so frequently) that I honour and esteem them infinitely. They are persons that have given me high testimonies of their friendship, and from whom I have received a thousand civilities. And you know, that the Muses, are the daughters of Jupiter, etc. and that, 
A brave and generous virtue makes them hate,  
Above all other faults, to be ingrate.   
He, of the two brothers that is styled the Cavalier, is a Poet, and understands Latin, in the subtlety and delicacy of it. I remember the ingenious observations he made, upon many passages in the Poets, which I had never considered. I importune you, Sir, to love, not a little, as mild natures do, but violently, and with all your power,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 20 Octob. 1641.   

LET. XXVIII.  
SIR,  
BY the last Post, I received the discourse and the Verses, you were pleased to send me; I have a great obligation to you for them, but yet a greater, for four lines I read in your Letter, then for all besides in the Packet. You were scrupulous, of letting it come into my hands, and there was a great combat hereupon, between your inclination, and your engagement. These words, Sir, are infinitely obliging, although they should not be true; but being most certainly so, they affect me very sensibly, and I declare unto you, that I am sufficiently comforted for all my afflictions, by the preference that you give me above all the world, in the honour of your friendship. That which the famous Drinker told you, hath freed me from my jealousy and unquiet; for as affection is ingenious to presage ill, and ever concludes to the worst, I did already apprehend something more fatal, than a rheum. I was in fear, that our friend was gone a longer voyage than he promised; or, if you please, that I speak less vulgarly, I misdoubted, that Menander, the maker of Epigrams, was gone to find Menander the writer of Comedies; I mean only of his death, for God forbidden that I should assign him the same place of residence in the other life. The ninteenth of this month is past, and four day would have brought him from his own house to Balzac This is a cause of new trouble, unless he come speedily, or make me understand the reason of his delay. The inclemency of the season is an excuse too allowable to detain him. And though I passionately desire to see him, yet I know not, if I ought to wish a person so dear to me, exposed unto all the injuries of an intemperate air, and that at the age of near sixty years: he should slight the menaces of the god Perewiged with Icicles, & Winter with his rattling beard, which another Poet calls, The god of old age. My Stationer lately sent me a Treatise of Monsieur de Priesac, wherein I have observed a great number of rarities. Whatever he delivers of his own invention, is always good; and he appropriates so handsomely, that which he borrows from antiquity, that it is hard to distinguish the foreign from the native. His style is otherwise noble, and he has nothing of the barbarity of our Provinces. But besides all this, it must be confessed, that he improves his art to admiration, and that as often as he has occasion to use the Civil Law, he does it in such manner, that the most dry and thorny pieces, become flourishing and glorious in his hands, and that even they read him with delight; qui voluptatis tantum causâ legunt, and have gust for nothing but Romances. As soon as you meet him, I beseech you assure him of my humble service; and moreover, if you please, that my esteem and my affection are two separate things; and 'tis not for love of him, that I commend the Book of his that was sent me. I should be glad to see the oratoriall Prose, of Monsieur de St. Blancet; he has both wit and confidence, and si peccat, imitatione tantum peccat. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 29 Novemb. 1641.   

LETTER XXIX.  
SIR,  
YOu never make any excursions, but you perform the most graceful & exact courses in the world; or, to speak better in your own figure, you never preach, without the extreme edification of your auditors. Non apta tantum ad persuadendum dicis, verum omnino persuades, neque usquam à te nisi melior & doctior, etc. If Totila were here, I would proceed further, and after my fashion, examine your reason, and all the anti-reasons that sergeant and act it. But with fortune for you and your reason, I employ my own bad hand, which is soon weary of my service. You are, Sir, to me, not only in the place of Augustus and Maecenas, but also of Agrippa, Asinius Pollio, Messala Corvinus, and all the rest of that gallant and learned Court. Therefore if you approve my compositions, that approbation alone does Crown me; and I shall say to you, as to one of those great ones, Quod fi me Latiis vatibus inseres, Sublimi feriam sydera vertice. Quam verò, ut de Latiis taceam, inepti sunt populares nostri? And how groundless are the suspicions of— when he is jealous of your enterprises, and imagines himself worthy of your envy. I have no remembrance of the Letter, out of which he takes occasion of such regret. But this is an affair of great importance, both in respect of himself, and his Antagonist. There are more opinionated fools, in the little houses, besides these discoverers of plots and designs. Nevertheless, since we are obliged to give every one as much satisfaction, as we are able; if, I say, the people talk so, or the report runs, instead of speaking affirmatively, you may believe it a sufficient qualifying, to satisfy the suspicious. For, as you know, the greatest part of reports are not free from falsehood, and many things are told me every day, that are not true. I am,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 24 Novemb. 1641.   

LETTER XXX.  
SIR,  
MY friendship is ever inconsiderable, and although it were not troublesome, yet it is so barren and unprofitable, that it cannot be esteemed of any value, but by one that is wholly disinteressed from it. But as for yours, how infinitely precious is it! I dare not engage myself into a matter, so vast and spacious; and it suffices me to tell you; as I am wont, that it is the only joy of my life, and all the delight of my soul. So that although I move not out of my own jurisdiction, and am forced to deliberate concerning the journey of a league, I shall become man enough, to creep as far as Paris, for the only desire I have to see you; where I will appear on a sudden in your chamber; and break out of the cloud with these words, Coram quem diligis adsum, with a design too of continuing some time with you; but absolutely incognito, and without discovering myself to any other whatsoever. Then it shall be, that we will survey all the graces and beauties of the Virgin, to our wish; and I will give him cause that shall write your life, to inform posterity, that a poor Paralytic went from the River of Charenta, on purpose to hear the melody of the Swan of Seine. Is it not true, Sir, that the History of the Man of Calis, is not very excellent? And do not you believe, that I have more esteem and passion for you, than he had for Livy. He that I termed the virtuous man, appeared such to me, the day that I gave him that title; but another time, I shall possibly call him by another name, because he may appear in another shape, or I look upon him with other eyes. So it is, that I will not warrant my courtesies, or undertake to make good any thing, except what I say of you. Non enim hic prolixus laudator, sed juratus testis Balzacius est. The divers employments that Monsieur Girard has for his Master, are without doubt nothing, but the jealous and treacherous persons, of whom you complain, and who have detained him from giving you a second visit. His brother, to whom, with your consent, I show all your Letters, has not failed to represent him your discontentments, and the diffidence which you have taken as unjustly against yourself, as you express it agreeably and with applause. The rigour of the weather hinders me from saying more to you at this time; for this winter kills me, and I am ready to choose my habitation in the fire. I call it not only rough and troublesome, but cruel, unmerciful, Scythian, Swedish, and Norwegian: If it continues thus, I shall be constrained to take my leave of you, till the mid spring of the next year. I am passionately,  
SIR, Your, etc. Balzac, 28 Decemb. 1641.   
The End of the Sixth Book.   
FINIS.