heard of in the salon of Madame Helvetius, and in that of M. Trudaine, the enlightened Intendant des Finances. He was introduced to Madame du Deffand, and made acquaintance with Turgot and with Morellet.[1] The time indeed of his visit could not have been better chosen, for a very different state of things existed in Paris from that which the previous century had seen.
On the death of Louis XIV. it was in English institutions and English literature that the illustrious Frenchmen, who were bent on restoring their country to the high position it once had occupied, sought the long lost-fountain of freedom of speech and intellectual independence. Then took place that junction of French and English intellects which has justly been pronounced by far the most important fact in the history of the eighteenth century.[2] The most eminent Frenchmen visited England, and while in the time of Boileau hardly any one knew the English language, all the leading French authors of the eighteenth century were intimately acquainted with it. The effect was instantaneous. English ideas penetrated into France with the English language.[3] The freedom of speech with which every subject was canvassed in London, made itself heard in Paris, and in the mouths of a sceptical and witty nation went far beyond the limits observed in the country where it had originated.
A variety of causes, of which the great prestige of the court and nobility on the one hand, and the comparative weakness of the dissolute and venal clergy on the other, were the chief, turned the destroying current of criticism
- ↑ Mémoires de Morellet, i. ch. vi. ix. Rutt, Life of Priestley, i. 156.
- ↑ Buckle, History of Civilisation, ii. ch. v.
- ↑ Voltaire, Collected Works, xxxviii. 337. Buckle, ii. ch. v.
porte de quel pays, ni chez quelle nation; cela ne lui paroît qu'un exil affreux, etc. etc. Et puis elle nous dit que, dans le temps où elle aimoit le mieux l'Angleterre, elle n'auroit consenti à s'y fixer, qu'à la condition qu'elle y auroit amené avec elle vingt-quatre ou vingt-cinq de ses amis intimes, et soixante à quatre-vingts autres personnes qui lui étoient absolument nécessaires; et c'étoit avec beaucoup de sérieux et surtout beaucoup de sensibilité qu'elle nous apprenoit le besoin de son âme. Ce que j'aurois voulu que vous vissiez c'est l'étonnement qu'elle causoit à milord Shelburne. Il et simple, naturel; il a de l'âme, de la force: il n'a de goût et d'attrait que pour ce qui lui ressemble, au moins par le naturel. Je le trouve bien heureux d'être né Anglais; je l'ai beaucoup vu, je l'ai écouté, celui-là: il a de l'esprit, de la chaleur, de l'élévation. Il me rappeloit un peu les deux hommes du monde que j'ai aimés, et pour qui je voudrois vivre ou mourir."—Lettres de Madame de l'Espinasse, i. ch. lxiii.
