n to be curious as to the
characters of two famous men. It was in 1759, when D'Alembert was tired
of the Encyclopaedia, and was for making hard terms as the condition of
his return to it. "If," said Diderot to him, "six months ago, when we
met to deliberate on the continuation of the work, you had then proposed
these terms, the booksellers would have closed with them on the spot,
but now, when they have the strongest reasons to be out of humour with
you, that is another thing."

"And pray, what reasons?"

"Can you ask me?"

"Certainly."

"Then I will tell you. You have a bargain with the booksellers; the
terms are stipulated; you have nothing to ask beyond them. If you worked
harder than you were bound to do, that was out of your interest in the
book, out of friendship to me, out of respect for yourself; people do
not pay in money for such motives as these. Still they sent you twenty
louis a volume: that makes a hundred and forty louis that you had beyond
what was due to you. You plan a journey to Wesel [in 1752, to meet
Frederick of Prussia] at a time when you were wanted by them here; they
do not detain you; on the contrary, you are short of money, and they
supply you. You accept a couple of hundred louis; this debt you forget
for two or three years. At the end of that rather long term you bethink
you of paying. What do they do? They hand you back your note of hand
torn up, with all the air of being very glad to have served you. Then,
after all, you turn your back on an undertaking in which they have
embarked their whole fortunes: an affair of a couple of millions is a
trifle unworthy of the attention of a philosopher like you.... But that
is not all. You have a fancy for collecting together different pieces
scattered through the Encyclopaedia; nothing can be more opposed to
their interests; they put this to you, you insist, the edition is
produced, they advance the cost, you share the profits. It seemed that,
after having thus twice paid you for their work, they had a right to
look upon it as theirs. Yet you go in search of a bookseller in some
quite different direction, and sell him in a mass what does not belong
to you."

"They gave me a thousand grounds for dissatisfaction."

"_Quelle defaite!_ There are no small things between friends. Everything
weighs, because friendship is a commerce of purity and delicacy; but are
the booksellers your friends? Then your behaviour to them is horrible.
If not, then you