ley that the Duke of Tuscany had
become jealous of the attention he was receiving from foreigners, as they
usually went to visit MAGLIABECHI before the Grand Duke.

A confession by MONTESQUIEU states, with open candour, a fact in his life
which confirms this jealousy of the great with the literary character. "On
my entering into life I was spoken of as a man of talents, and people of
condition gave me a favourable reception; but when the success of my
Persian Letters proved perhaps that I was not unworthy of my reputation,
and the public began to esteem me, _my reception with the great was
discouraging, and I experienced innumerable mortifications."_ Montesquieu
subjoins a reflection sufficiently humiliating for the mere nobleman: "The
great, inwardly wounded with the glory of a celebrated name, seek to
humble it. In general he only can patiently endure the fame of others, who
deserves fame himself." This sort of jealousy unquestionably prevailed in
the late Lord ORFORD, a wit, a man of the world, and a man of rank; but
while he considered literature as a mere amusement, he was mortified at
not obtaining literary celebrity; he felt his authorial always beneath his
personal character. It fell to my lot to develope his real feelings
respecting himself and the literary men of his age.[A]

[Footnote A: "Calamities of Authors." I printed, in 1812, extracts from
Walpole's correspondence with Cole. Some have considered that there was a
severity of delineation in my character of Horace Walpole. I was the
_first_, in my impartial view of his literary character, to proclaim to
the world what it has now fully sanctioned, that "His most pleasing, if
not his great talent, lay in _letter-writing;_ here he was without a
rival. His correspondence abounded with literature, criticism, and wit of
the most original and brilliant composition." This was published several
years before the recent collection of his letters.]

Who was the dignified character, Lord Chesterfield or Samuel Johnson, when
the great author, proud of his protracted and vast labour, rejected his
lordship's tardy and trivial patronage?[A] "I value myself," says Swift,
"upon making the ministry desire to be acquainted with PARNELL, and not
Parnell with the ministry." PIRON would not suffer the literary character
to be lowered in his presence. Entering the apartment of a nobleman, who
was conducting another peer to the stairs-head, the latter stopped to make
way for Piron