AS PREFACE S regards the origin of this little book I may say that for more than thirty years I have been a constant reader of French, passing, in so reading, as Boileau puts it, "Du grave au doux, du plaisant au sévère." Almost always I have had a notebook beside me, pillaging," as Montaigne says of himself, "the flowers, here, there, and everywhere," and jotting down for future reference the passages which took my fancy. A writer in the Athenæum recently remarked: "The French are easily the best makers of epigram,” and indeed a taste for concise and witty forms of thought leads one inevitably to study their literature. Naturally in so many years my notebooks have grown almost to be a library, and it seems to me now, in passing their contents in review, that I may venture to offer a selection from them to the public. I may add that these citations have been gleaned not merely from the well-known classical authors of Maximes and Pensées such as Pascal, La Rochefoucauld, La Bruyère, Chamfort, Joseph Joubert, etc., but from a great variety of writers from the fifteenth to the twentieth centuries. They in clude passages from Sainte-Beuve, Gustave Vapereau, Admiral Réveillère, Alfred Capus, Henry Becque, René Doumic, and many others of modern times, the extracts from whose writings will, I think, be fresh to English readers. I have grouped all the citations on the same topic together under headings arranged alphabetically, so that any subject can be easily found, and what has been written on it by various authors compared. In conclusion, I will quote a few words from Diderot in praise of the book that helps us to think, which I can only hope some of my readers may find applicable to this little volume. "Que le livre, bien choisi, soit pour nous un compagnon, un ami, un adversaire; conversons, raisonnons, disputons avec lui: la lecture ne peut profiter qu'à cette condition.” Les Affaires. Il est une lenteur en affaires qui les mûrit, et une lenteur qui les pourrit.-L'Abbé J. Roux. En précipitant trop les choses on se précipite avec elles.-Beaumarchais. Trop et trop peu de secret sur nos affaires témoignent également une âme faible. Vauvenargues. Il y a des gens habiles dans tout ce qui ne les regarde pas, et très mal-habiles dans tout ce qui les regarde; et il y en a d'autres, au contraire, qui ont une habileté bornée à ce qui les touche, et qui savent trouver leur avantage en toutes choses.-La Rochefoucauld. Il y a de certaines gens qui veulent si ardemment et si déterminément une certaine chose, que de peur de la manquer, ils n'oublient rien de ce qu'il faut faire pour la manquer.-La Bruyère. Le commerce est la mutualité des services, chacun ayant intérêt à servir son voisin le mieux possible.-L'Amiral Réveillère. |