al period, both practised the art
of extreme brevity with astonishing success. The DUC DE LA ROCHEFOUCAULD
was the first French writer to understand completely the wonderful
capacities for epigrammatic statement which his language possessed; and
in the dexterous precision of pointed phrase no succeeding author has
ever surpassed him. His little book of _Maxims_ consists of about five
hundred detached sentences, polished like jewels, and, like jewels,
sparkling with an inner brilliance on which it seems impossible that one
can gaze too long. The book was the work of years, and it contains in
its small compass the observations of a lifetime. Though the reflections
are not formally connected, a common spirit runs through them all.
'Vanity of vanities! All is vanity!' such is the perpetual burden of La
Rochefoucauld's doctrine: but it is vanity, not in the generalized sense
of the Preacher, but in the ordinary personal sense of empty egotism and
petty self-love which, in the eyes of this bitter moralist, is the
ultimate essence of the human spirit and the secret spring of the world.
The case is overstated, no doubt; but the strength of La Rochefoucauld's
position can only be appreciated when one has felt for oneself the keen
arrows of his wit. As one turns over his pages, the sentences strike
into one with a deadly force of personal application; sometimes one
almost blushes; one realizes that these things are cruel, that they are
humiliating, and that they are true. 'Nous avons tous assez de force
pour supporter les maux d'autrui.'--'Quelque bien qu'on nous dise de
nous, on ne nous apprend rien de nouveau.'--'On croit quelquefois hair
la flatterie, mais on ne hait que le maniere de flatter.'--'Le refus de
la louange est un desir d'etre loue deux fois.'--'Les passions les plus
violentes nous laissent quelquefois du relache, mais la vanite nous
agite toujours.' No more powerful dissolvent for the self-complacency of
humanity was ever composed.

Unlike the majority of the writers of his age, La Rochefoucauld was an
aristocrat; and this fact gives a peculiar tone to his work. In spite of
the great labour which he spent upon perfecting it, he has managed, in
some subtle way, to preserve all through it an air of slight disdain.
'Yes, these sentences are all perfect,' he seems to be saying; 'but
then, what else would you have? Unless one writes perfect sentences, why
should one trouble to write?' In his opinion, 'le vrai honnete ho