efined and delicate
pleasures. Nay more, a kind of indolence of mind and heart, which they
frequently contract in the midst of this long and peaceful enjoyment
of so much welfare, leads them to put aside, even from their pleasures,
whatever might be too startling or too acute. They had rather be amused
than intensely excited; they wish to be interested, but not to be
carried away.

Now let us fancy a great number of literary performances executed by the
men, or for the men, whom I have just described, and we shall readily
conceive a style of literature in which everything will be regular and
prearranged. The slightest work will be carefully touched in its least
details; art and labor will be conspicuous in everything; each kind of
writing will have rules of its own, from which it will not be allowed to
swerve, and which distinguish it from all others. Style will be thought
of almost as much importance as thought; and the form will be no less
considered than the matter: the diction will be polished, measured,
and uniform. The tone of the mind will be always dignified, seldom very
animated; and writers will care more to perfect what they produce than
to multiply their productions. It will sometimes happen that the members
of the literary class, always living amongst themselves and writing for
themselves alone, will lose sight of the rest of the world, which will
infect them with a false and labored style; they will lay down minute
literary rules for their exclusive use, which will insensibly lead them
to deviate from common-sense, and finally to transgress the bounds of
nature. By dint of striving after a mode of parlance different from
the vulgar, they will arrive at a sort of aristocratic jargon, which is
hardly less remote from pure language than is the coarse dialect of the
people. Such are the natural perils of literature amongst aristocracies.
Every aristocracy which keeps itself entirely aloof from the people
becomes impotent--a fact which is as true in literature as it is in
politics. *a

[Footnote a: All this is especially true of the aristocratic countries
which have been long and peacefully subject to a monarchical government.
When liberty prevails in an aristocracy, the higher ranks are constantly
obliged to make use of the lower classes; and when they use, they
approach them. This frequently introduces something of a democratic
spirit into an aristocratic community. There springs up, moreover, in a
privileg