To His Royal Highness, Monseigneur le
Duc d'Orléans, Regent of the Kingdom.
Monseigneur,—This work, which I have the honour to present to your. Royal Highness, has for its aim: to give an idea of the personal qualities and general knowledge necessary in all good negotiators; to indicate to them the paths which they should follow and the rocks which they should avoid; and to exhort those who destine themselves to the foreign service of their country, to render themselves capable of discharging worthily that high, important, and difficult office before entering upon it.
The honour which the late King did me in charging me with his commands and his full powers for foreign negotiation, and particularly for those which led to the Treaty of Ryswick, has redoubled the attention which I have ever paid since my youngest years to my own instruction in the power, the rights, and the ambitions of each of the principal monarchies and states of Europe, in their divergent interests and the forms of their government, in the causes of their understandings and misunder-
