ing rashly, and in knowing how to doubt many
things. What can be more intolerable and humiliating than to see our
pretended great men boast themselves of believing nothing, and of
calling those people simple and credulous who have not perhaps examined
the first proofs of religion?" The condition of things was no better in
the reign of Louis XV., nor indeed at any time during the eighteenth
century. It could not be expected that Rousseau would overpaint the
picture; yet in his _La Nouvelle Heloise_ we find this language: "No
disputing is here heard--that is, in the literary coteries--no epigrams
are made; they reason, but not in the stiff professional tone; you find
fine jokes without puns, wit with reason, principles with freaks, sharp
satire and delicate flattery with serious rules of morality. They speak
of everything in order that every one may have to say something, but
they never exhaust the questions raised; from the dread of getting
tedious they bring them forth only occasionally, shorten them hastily,
and never allow a dispute to arise. Every one informs himself, enjoys
himself, and departs from the others pleased. But what is it that is
learned from these interesting conversations? _One learns to defend with
spirit the cause of untruth, to shake with philosophy all the principles
of virtue, to gloss over with fine syllogisms one's passions and
prejudices in order to give a modern shape to error._ When any one
speaks, it is to a certain extent his dress, not himself, that has an
opinion; and the speaker will change it as often as he will change his
profession. Give him a tie-wig to-day, to-morrow a uniform, and the day
after a mitre, and you will have him defend, in succession, the laws,
despotism, and the Inquisition. There is one kind of reason for the
lawyer, another for the financier, and a third for the soldier. Thus, no
one ever says what he thinks, but what, on account of his interest, he
would make others believe; and his zeal for truth is only a mask for
selfishness."

This was the basis upon which Voltaire and Rousseau built in France.
What wonder that the one with his pungent sarcasm, popular style and
display of philosophy, and the other with his morbid sentimentalism,
should become the real monarchs not only of their own land, but of
cultivated circles throughout the Continent? There was not the slightest
sympathy between these two men, for they hated each other cordially, and
each was jealous of th