t my system, if it can be called a system, has
been to glide away unconcernedly on the stream of life, trusting to the
wind wherever it led. How many changes arise from such an independent
mode of life! My success and my misfortunes, the bright and the dark days
I have gone through, everything has proved to me that in this world,
either physical or moral, good comes out of evil just as well as evil
comes out of good. My errors will point to thinking men the various
roads, and will teach them the great art of treading on the brink of the
precipice without falling into it. It is only necessary to have courage,
for strength without self-confidence is useless. I have often met with
happiness after some imprudent step which ought to have brought ruin upon
me, and although passing a vote of censure upon myself I would thank God
for his mercy. But, by way of compensation, dire misfortune has befallen
me in consequence of actions prompted by the most cautious wisdom. This
would humble me; yet conscious that I had acted rightly I would easily
derive comfort from that conviction.

In spite of a good foundation of sound morals, the natural offspring of
the Divine principles which had been early rooted in my heart, I have
been throughout my life the victim of my senses; I have found delight in
losing the right path, I have constantly lived in the midst of error,
with no consolation but the consciousness of my being mistaken.
Therefore, dear reader, I trust that, far from attaching to my history
the character of impudent boasting, you will find in my Memoirs only the
characteristic proper to a general confession, and that my narratory
style will be the manner neither of a repenting sinner, nor of a man
ashamed to acknowledge his frolics. They are the follies inherent to
youth; I make sport of them, and, if you are kind, you will not yourself
refuse them a good-natured smile. You will be amused when you see that I
have more than once deceived without the slightest qualm of conscience,
both knaves and fools. As to the deceit perpetrated upon women, let it
pass, for, when love is in the way, men and women as a general rule dupe
each other. But on the score of fools it is a very different matter. I
always feel the greatest bliss when I recollect those I have caught in my
snares, for they generally are insolent, and so self-conceited that they
challenge wit. We avenge intellect when we dupe a fool, and it is a
victory not to be despised f