science and philosophy to the friends who were eager as ever for the
last gleanings of his prolific intellect. In the last conversation that
his daughter heard him carry on, his last words were the pregnant
aphorism that _the first step towards philosophy is incredulity_.

On the evening of the 30th of July 1784 he sat down to table, and at the
end of the meal took an apricot. His wife, with kindly solicitude,
remonstrated. _Mais quel diable de mal veux-tu que cela me fasse?_ he
said, and ate the apricot. Then he rested his elbow on the table,
trifling with some sweetmeats. His wife asked him a question; on
receiving no answer, she looked up and saw that he was dead. He had died
as the Greek poet says that men died in the golden age--[Greek: thneskon
d' hos hypno dedmemenoi], _they passed away as if mastered by sleep_. It
had always been his opinion that an examination of the organs after
death is a useful practice, and his wish that the operation should take
place in his own case was respected. Nothing interesting or remarkable
was revealed, and his remains were laid in the vaults of the church of
Saint Roche.

So the curtain fell upon this strange tragi-comedy of a man of letters.
There is no better epilogue than words of his own:--"We fix our gaze on
the ruins of a triumphal arch, of a portico, a pyramid, a temple, a
palace, and we return upon ourselves. All is annihilated, perishes,
passes away. It is only the world that remains; only time that endures.
I walk between two eternities. To whatever side I turn my eyes, the
objects that surround me tell of an end, and teach me resignation to my
own end. What is my ephemeral existence in comparison with that of the
crumbling rock and the decaying forest? I see the marble of the tomb
falling to dust, and yet I cannot bear to die! Am I to grudge a feeble
tissue of fibres and flesh to a general law, that executes itself
inexorably even on very bronze!"

CHAPTER IX.

CONCLUSION.

A few more pages must be given to one or two of Diderot's writings which
have not hitherto been mentioned. An exhaustive survey of his works is
out of the question, nor would any one be repaid for the labour of
criticism. A mere list of the topics that he handled would fill a long
chapter. A redaction of a long treatise on harmony, a vast sheaf of
notes on the elements of physiology, a collection of miscellanea on the
drama, a still more copious collection of miscellanea on a hundred