sive reason. The
reverse of this seems now to be the case in France: reason opens itself;
fancy and invention fade and decline.

I will send you a copy of this history by Lord Huntingdon, as I think it
very probable that it is not allowed to be published and sold at Paris.
Pray read it more than once, and with attention, particularly the second
volume, which contains short, but very clear accounts of many very
interesting things, which are talked of by everybody, though fairly.
understood by very few. There are two very puerile affectations which I
wish this book had been free from; the one is, the total subversion of
all the old established French orthography; the other is, the not making
use of any one capital letter throughout the whole book, except at the
beginning of a paragraph. It offends my eyes to see rome, paris, france,
Caesar, I henry the fourth, etc., begin with small letters; and I do not
conceive that there can be any reason for doing it, half so strong as the
reason of long usage is to the contrary. This is an affectation below
Voltaire; who, I am not ashamed to say, that I admire and delight in, as
an author, equally in prose and in verse.

I had a letter a few days ago from Monsieur du Boccage, in which he says,
'Monsieur Stanhope s'est jete dans la politique, et je crois qu'il y
reussira': You do very well, it is your destination; but remember that,
to succeed in great things, one must first learn to please in little
ones. Engaging manners and address must prepare the way for superior
knowledge and abilities to act with effect. The late Duke of
Marlborough's manners and address prevailed with the first king of
Prussia, to let his troops remain in the army of the Allies, when neither
their representations, nor his own share in the common cause could do it.
The Duke of Marlborough had no new matter to urge to him; but had a
manner, which he could not, nor did not, resist. Voltaire, among a
thousand little delicate strokes of that kind, says of the Duke de la
Feuillade, 'qu'il etoit l'homme le plus brillant et le plus aimable du
royaume; et quoique gendre du General et Ministre, il avoit pour lui la
faveur publique'. Various little circumstances of that sort will often
make a man of great real merit be hated, if he hath not address and
manners to make him be loved. Consider all your own circumstances
seriously; and you will find that, of all arts, the art of pleasing is
the most necessary for you to stu