glory is but a name, virtue all a mistake, and law
nothing else than a phantom." The "Introduction" is all written in
this spirit; it is a passionate appeal to the French nation to leave
mean and trivial pursuits, and to live for pure and passionate ideals,
for glory gained by merit, and as the reward of solid and strenuous
effort.

Vauvenargues' attitude to the English moralists has not been
sufficiently examined. So far as is known he never visited this
country, although he desired to do so. In one of his letters he speaks
of intending to consult a famous oculist in London, but this project
was not carried out; his poverty doubtless prevented it. Whether he
knew English is not certain, but he appears to have read Temple and
Locke, possibly in the original, and a reference to a remarkable
English contemporary appears to have hitherto escaped observation. In
the "Introduction a la connaissance de l'esprit humain," he speaks of
a writer who has argued that private vices are public benefits, and he
attempts to show that this is a fallacy. He returns, less definitely,
to the same line of thought in the "Discours sur la gloire," where he
denies that vice has any part in stimulating social action. It is
strange that no one, so far as I know, has observed this proof that
Vauvenargues was acquainted with the celebrated paradox of Bernard
Mandeville, whose "Fable of the Bees" was in 1747 continuing to cause
so scandalous a sensation, and was still so completely misunderstood.
There seems, occasionally, a trace of the idealism of Shaftesbury in
the colour of Vauvenargues' phrase, but on this it would be dangerous
to insist.

His own views, however, were more emphatically defined, and more
directly urged, in the other contribution to literature published by
Vauvenargues in his lifetime, the "Reflexions sur divers sujets." Here
he abandons the attempt at forming a philosophical system, and admits
that his sole object is "to form the hearts and the manners" of his
readers. Perhaps the most penetrating of all his sentences is that in
which he says: "If you possess any passion which you feel to be noble
and generous, be sure you foster it." This was diametrically opposed
to all the teaching of the seventeenth-century moralists who had
preceded him, and also had taught us that we should mistrust our
passions and disdain our enthusiasms. To see how completely
Vauvenargues rejected the Christian doctrine of the utter decrepitude
and