trouble. I
am informed Madam d'Epinay is going to Geneva, and do not hear you are to
accompany her. My friend, you are satisfied with Madam d'Epinay, you
must go, with her; if dissatisfied you ought still less to hesitate. Do
you find the weight of the obligations you are under to her uneasy to
you? This is an opportunity of discharging a part of them, and relieving
your mind. Do you ever expect another opportunity like the present one,
of giving her proofs of your gratitude? She is going to a country where
she will be quite a stranger. She is ill, and will stand in need of
amusement and dissipation. The winter season too! Consider, my friend.
Your ill state of health may be a much greater objection than I think it
is; but are you now more indisposed than you were a month ago, or than
you will be at the beginning of spring? Will you three months hence be
in a situation to perform the journey more at your ease than at present?
For my part I cannot but observe to you that were I unable to bear the
shaking of the carriage I would take my staff and follow her. Have you
no fears lest your conduct should be misinterpreted? You will be
suspected of ingratitude or of a secret motive. I well know, that let
you do as you will you will have in your favor the testimony of your
conscience, but will this alone be sufficient, and is it permitted to
neglect to a certain degree that which is necessary to acquire the
approbation of others? What I now write, my good friend, is to acquit
myself of what I think I owe to us both. Should my letter displease you,
throw it into the fire and let it be forgotten. I salute, love and
embrace you."

Although trembling and almost blind with rage whilst I read this epistle,
I remarked the address with which Diderot affected a milder and more
polite language than he had done in his former ones, wherein he never
went further than "My dear," without ever deigning to add the name of
friend. I easily discovered the secondhand means by which the letter was
conveyed to me; the subscription, manner and form awkwardly betrayed the
manoeuvre; for we commonly wrote to each other by post, or the messenger
of Montmorency, and this was the first and only time he sent me his
letter by any other conveyance.

As soon as the first transports of my indignation permitted me to write,
I, with great precipitation, wrote him the following answer, which I
immediately carried from the Hermitage, where I then