Part 25

The reputation of generosity is to be purchased pretty cheap; it does not depend so much upon a man’s general expense, as it does upon his giving handsomely where it is proper to give at all. A man, for instance, who should give a servant four shillings would pass for covetous, while he who gave him a crown would be reckoned generous; so that the difference of those two opposite characters turns upon one shilling. A man’s character, in that particular, depends a great deal upon the report of his own servants; a mere trifle above common wages makes their report favorable.

Take care always to form your establishment so much within your income as to leave a sufficient fund for unexpected contingencies and a prudent liberality. There is hardly a year, in any man’s life, in which a small sum of ready money may not be employed to great advantage.

POLITICAL MAXIMS FROM CARDINAL DE RETZ.

It is often madness to engage in a conspiracy; but nothing is so effectual to bring people afterward to their senses, at least for a time. As in such undertakings, the danger subsists, even after the business is over; this obliges to be prudent and circumspect in the succeeding moments.

2. A middling understanding, being susceptible of unjust suspicions, is consequently, of all characters, the least fit to head a faction; as the most indispensable qualification in such a chief is to suppress, in many occasions, and to conceal in all, even the best grounded suspicions.

3. Nothing animates and gives strength to a commotion so much as the ridicule of him against whom it is raised.

4. Among people used to affairs of moment, secrecy is much less uncommon than is generally believed.

5. Descending to the little is the surest way of attaining to an equality with the great.

6. Fashion, though powerful in all things, is not more so in any, than in being well or ill at court. There are times when disgrace is a kind of fire, that purifies all bad qualities, and illuminates every good one. There are others, in which the being out of favor is unbecoming a man of character.

7. Sufferings, in people of the first rank, supply the want of virtue.

8. There is a confused kind of jumble, which practice sometimes teaches; but it is never to be understood by speculation.

9. The greatest powers cannot injure a man’s character, whose reputation is unblemished among his party.

10. We are as often duped by diffidence, as by confidence.

11. The greatest evils are not arrived at their utmost period until those who are in power have lost all sense of shame. At such a time those who should obey shake off all respect and subordination. Then is lethargic indolence roused; but roused by convulsions.

12. A veil ought always to be drawn over whatever may be said or thought concerning the rights of the people, or of kings; which agree best when least mentioned.

13. There are, at times, situations so very unfortunate, that whatever is undertaken must be wrong. Chance, alone, never throws people into such dilemmas; and they happen only to those who bring them upon themselves.

14. It is more unbecoming a minister to say, than to do, silly things.

15. The advice given to a minister, by an obnoxious person, is always thought bad.

16. It is as dangerous, and almost as criminal, with princes, to have the power of doing good, as the will of doing evil.

17. Timorous minds are much more inclined to deliberate than to resolve.

18. It appears ridiculous to assert, but it is not the less true, that at Paris, during the popular commotions, the most violent will not quit their homes past a stated hour.

19. Flexibility is the most requisite qualification for the management of great affairs.

20. It is more difficult for the member of a faction to live with those of his own party, than to act against those who oppose it.

21. The greatest dangers have their allurements, if the want of success is likely to be attended with a degree of glory. Middling dangers are horrid, when the loss of reputation is the inevitable consequence of ill success.

22. Violent measures are always dangerous, but when necessary, may then be looked upon as wise. They have, however, the advantage of never being matter of indifferency; and, when well concerted, must be decisive.

23. There may be circumstances, in which even prudence directs us to trust entirely to chance.

24. Everything in this world has its critical moment, and the height of good conduct consists in knowing and seizing it.

25. Profligacy, joined to ridicule, forms the most abominable and most dangerous of all characters.