is
sketch contain a confession of his own weakness, but with an eloquent and
vigorous attack upon those who basely sacrifice the happiness of others
for the gratification of their own pleasures. "Homme riche, vous qui
voulez triompher de sa vertu par sa misere, de grace, pretez-moi votre
attention. Ce n'est point une exhortation pieuse, ce ne sont point des
sentiments devots que vous allez entendre; non, je vais seulement tacher
de vous tenir les discours d'un galant homme, sujet a ses sens aussi bien
que vous; faible, et, si vous voulez, vicieux; mais chez qui les vices et
les faiblesses ne sont point feroces, et ne subsistent qu'avec l'aveu
d'une humanite genereuse. Oui, vicieux encore une fois, mais en honnete
homme, dont le coeur est heureusement force, quand il le faut, de menager
les interets d'autrui dans les siens, et ne peut vouloir d'un plaisir qui
ferait la douleur d'un autre."[76]

Perhaps in no other writing has he attained the eloquence, sustained
throughout the description, that characterizes the letter[77] from a
father self-impoverished for his son's advancement and then abandoned by
that same son.

One is not accustomed to think of Marivaux as a moralist, yet this frilled
and powdered representative of the _beau monde_, this courtly gentleman,
this graceful writer, was one of the powers for good of his time.
Throughout his plays and novels, and particularly in his journals, may be
seen this nobler side of the man's nature. He was a practical moralist,
with little love for abstract theories, and a morality far from
asceticism, but, with profound unselfishness and pity for his fellow-man,
he strove to right the wrongs and correct the abuses of a cruelly
indifferent and light-hearted society. He once said of himself: "Je serais
peu flatte d'entendre dire que je suis un bel esprit; mais si on
m'apprenait que mes ecrits eussent corrige quelques vices, ou seulement
quelque vicieux, je serais vraiment sensible a cet eloge."[78] However, he
was tolerant, as one who knows the weaknesses that flesh is heir to, and,
whether his attack was aimed at the petty foibles or graver weaknesses of
the individual, coquetry, ambition, avarice, hypocrisy, vanity, and the
like, or at certain social evils, the reprimand was always given with a
tone of moderation.

Throughout his writings Marivaux showed himself heartily opposed to the
loose ideas then prevalent upon the marriage relation, and, as though to
emphasize his con