ho discovered the
extent of his abilities, and esteemed them as they deserved. He on his
part seemed satisfied with me, and, whilst shut up in my chamber in the
Rue Jean Saint Denis, near the opera-house, I composed my act of Hesiod,
he sometimes came to dine with me tete-a-tete. We sent for our dinner,
and paid share and share alike. He was at that time employed on his
Essay on the Origin of Human Knowledge, which was his first work. When
this was finished, the difficulty was to find a bookseller who would take
it. The booksellers of Paris are shy of every author at his beginning,
and metaphysics, not much then in vogue, were no very inviting subject.
I spoke to Diderot of Condillac and his work, and I afterwards brought
them acquainted with each other. They were worthy of each other's
esteem, and were presently on the most friendly terms. Diderot persuaded
the bookseller, Durand, to take the manuscript from the abbe, and this
great metaphysician received for his first work, and almost as a favor,
a hundred crowns, which perhaps he would not have obtained without my
assistance. As we lived in a quarter of the town very distant from each
other, we all assembled once a week at the Palais Royal, and went to dine
at the Hotel du Panier Fleuri. These little weekly dinners must have
been extremely pleasing to Diderot; for he who failed in almost all his
appointments never missed one of these. At our little meeting I formed
the plan of a periodical paper, entitled 'le Persifleur'--[The Jeerer]
--which Diderot and I were alternately to write. I sketched out the first
sheet, and this brought me acquainted with D'Alembert, to whom Diderot
had mentioned it. Unforeseen events frustrated our intention, and the
project was carried no further.

These two authors had just undertaken the 'Dictionnaire Encyclopedique',
which at first was intended to be nothing more than a kind of translation
of Chambers, something like that of the Medical Dictionary of James,
which Diderot had just finished. Diderot was desirous I should do
something in this second undertaking, and proposed to me the musical
part, which I accepted. This I executed in great haste, and consequently
very ill, in the three months he had given me, as well as all the authors
who were engaged in the work. But I was the only person in readiness at
the time prescribed. I gave him my manuscript, which I had copied by a
laquais, belonging to M. de Francueil of the n