the tonic of strong emotions, and was happiest when
devoting himself heart and soul to some person or cause, whether a
Napoleon, a mistress, or a question of philosophy. His great
preoccupation was the analysis of the human mind, an employment which in
later years became a positive detriment. He was often led to attribute
ulterior motives to his friends, a course which only served to render
him morbid and unjust; while his equally pitiless dissection of his own
sensations often robbed them of half their charm. Even love and war, his
favorite emotions, left him disillusioned, asking "Is that all it
amounts to?" He always had a profound respect for force of character,
regarding even lawlessness as preferable to apathy; but he was
implacable towards baseness or vulgarity. Herein lies, perhaps, the
chief reason for Stendhal's ill success in life; he would never stoop to
obsequiousness or flattery, and in avoiding even the semblance of
self-interest, allowed his fairest chances to pass him by. "I have
little regret for my lost opportunities," he wrote in 1835. "In place of
ten thousand, I might be getting twenty; in place of Chevalier, I might
be Officer of the Legion of Honor: but I should have had to think three
or four hours a day of those platitudes of ambition which are dignified
by the name of politics; I should have had to commit many base acts:" a
brief but admirable epitome of Stendhal's whole life and character.

Aside from his works of fiction, Stendhal's works may be conveniently
grouped under biographies,--'Vie de Haydn, de Mozart, et de Metastase,'
'Vie de Napoleon,' 'Vie de Rossini'; literary and artistic
criticism,--'Histoire de la Peinture en Italie,' 'Racine et
Shakespeare,' 'Melanges d'Art et de Litterature'; travels,--'Rome,
Naples, et Florence,' 'Promenades dans Rome,' 'Memoires d'un Touriste';
and one volume of sentimental psychology, his 'Essai sur l'Amour,' to
which Bourget owes the suggestion of his 'Physiologie de l'Amour
Moderne.' Many of these works merit greater popularity, being written in
an easy, fluent style, and relieved by his inexhaustible fund of
anecdote and personal reminiscence. His books of travel, especially, are
charming _causeries_, full of a sympathetic spontaneity which more than
atones for their lack of method; his 'Walks in Rome' is more readable
than two-thirds of the books since written on that subject.

Stendhal's present vogue, however, is due primarily to his novels, to
w