pot transported me in idea to the end of
the world. It had striking beauties which are but seldom found near
cities, and never, if suddenly transported thither, could any person have
imagined himself within four leagues of Paris.

After abandoning myself for a few days to this rural delirium, I began to
arrange my papers, and regulate my occupations. I set apart, as I had
always done, my mornings to copying, and my afternoons to walking,
provided with my little paper book and a pencil, for never having been
able to write and think at my ease except 'sub dio', I had no inclination
to depart from this method, and I was persuaded the forest of
Montmorency, which was almost at my door, would in future be my closet
and study. I had several works begun; these I cast my eye over. My mind
was indeed fertile in great projects, but in the noise of the city the
execution of them had gone on but slowly. I proposed to myself to use
more diligence when I should be less interrupted. I am of opinion I have
sufficiently fulfilled this intention; and for a man frequently ill,
often at La Chevrette, at Epinay, at Raubonne, at the castle of
Montmorency, at other times interrupted by the indolent and curious, and
always employed half the day in copying, if what I produced during the
six years I passed at the Hermitage and at Montmorency be considered, I
am persuaded it will appear that if, in this interval, I lost my time, it
was not in idleness.

Of the different works I had upon the stocks, that I had longest resolved
in my mind which was most to my taste; to which I destined a certain
portion of my life, and which, in my opinion, was to confirm the
reputation I had acquired, was my 'Institutions Politiques. I had,
fourteen years before, when at Venice, where I had an opportunity of
remarking the defects of that government so much boasted of, conceived
the first idea of them. Since that time my views had become much more
extended by the historical study of morality. I had perceived everything
to be radically connected with politics, and that, upon whatever
principles these were founded, a people would never be more than that
which the nature of the government made them; therefore the great
question of the best government possible appeared to me to be reduced to
this: What is the nature of a government the most proper to form the most
virtuous and enlightened, the wisest and best people, taking the last
epithet in its most extens