to make himselfe obscure there needs no more but to stay upon the first notions wee have of truth which are never eyther wholly pure or purely mingled and which falling from the imagination upon paper leave upon it such a confusion that it resembles rather an informed abortion than a perfect production Besides in the composition of a Historie especially where the Politiques have to doe an Authour is carried and borne out by his matter and the things being all made to his hand which case him of the paines of invention as the order of the time caseth him of the care of disposing he hath little to doe for his part but onely to contribute words which is by some made so small a matter that when Menander was pressed by some friends to publish a worke of his that he had promised He made answere it shall presently come forth for it is in a manner all finished and ready there wants nothing but to make the words But in the perswasive kinde of writing besides that there must be a better choice made and a stricter order used in placing the words than in simple Narrations which for all their lustre and riches of expression require no more but plainnesse and fit termes they which desire to attaine perfection or indeed to doe any thing at all of worth endeavour all they can to put in use and reduce to action the most subtle Idaea's of all Rhetoricke to rayse up their understanding to the highest poynt of things to search out in every matter the verities lesse exposed to view and to make them so familiar that they who perceived them not before may by their relation come as it were to touch them Their designe is to joyne pleasure to profit to mingle daintinesse and plentie together and to fight with Armes not onely firme and strong but also fayre and glittering They endeavour to civilize Learning drawing it from the Colledge and freeing it from the hands of Pedants who marre and sully it in handling and to say the truth adulterate and corrupt it abusing this excellent and delicate thing in the sight of all the world They seeke not to avoyde Rockes by turning aside from them but rather by slyding gently over them and rather to escape places of danger than to shunne them And to make it appeare that nothing is so sowre or bitter but that it may be sweetned and allayed by Discourse Finally they suffer themselves sometimes to be transported with that reasonable fury which Rhetoricians have well knowne though it goe beyond their Rules and Precepts which thrust an Oratour into such strange and uncouth motions that they seeme rather inspired than to be naturall and with which Demosthenes and Cicero were so possessed that the one of them sweares by those that dyed at Marathon and of his owne authoritie makes them Gods the other askes questions of the Hilles and Forrests of Alba as if they had eares and were able to heare him But if I were one that did come any thing neere so noble an end which I neither will nor dare beleeve and that I were able to make strangers see that all things in France are changed for the better since the happie Reigne of our King who no lesse augmenteth our spirits than he encreaseth our courage yet it is not I that should merit the glory of this but I must wholly attribute it to the happinesse of my time and to the force of my object Howsoever my Lord if I cannot be taken into the List of learned and able men at least I cannot be denyed a place amongst honest men and loyall servants and if my abilities be worthy of no consideration with you at least my zeale and affection are better worth than to be rejected With which meditation I am sometimes so ravished that I doubt not but my resentments must needs content you and that it is no unpleasing recreation to you to cast your eye upon a Philosopher in choler And though true love content it selfe with the testimony of its owne Conscience and that I give you many proofes of my most humble service which I assure my selfe will never come to your knowledge yet for your satisfaction I desire you might heare me sometimes in the place where you are and might see with what advantage I maintaine the publike cause in what manner I controll false Newes that runs about and how I stop their mouthes that will be talking in disparagement of our affayres It is certaine that it is not possible our State should be more flourishing than it is or that the successe of the Kings Armes should be more glorious than it is or that the Peace of the People should be more assured than it is or that your Government should be more judicious than it is and yet wee meete with certaine spirits that are troubled with their owne quietnesse are impatient of their owne felicitie cannot be held in any good beliefe but by prosperities that are supernaturall and longer than they see miracles give no credit to any thing If present affayres be in good termes then they cast out feares of those to come and when they see the events prove happie then they fall affrighting us with Presages They take an Oath to esteeme of no persons but forreyners of no things but farre fet They admire Spinola because he is an Italian and their enemie they cannot abide to prayse the King because he is a Frenchman and their Master They will hardly be drawne to confesse that the King hath overcome though they see before their eyes an infinite number of Townes taken of Factions ruinated eternall Monuments of his Victories and more easily the King hath gotten the applause of all Europe than these mens approbation They would perswade us if they could that he had raysed his Siege before Rochell That he had made a shamefull Peace with the Protestants and that the Spaniards had made him run away They doe all they can to exterminate his History and to extinguish the greatest light that shall ever shine to posteritie I doubt not but they cast a malicious eye upon my Booke for presenting an image of those things which offend them so much And they who beleeve Fables and Romances and are in passion for an Hercules or an Achilles who perhaps never were They who reade with extasie of joy the actions of Rowland and of Reinold which were never done but upon Paper These men will finde no rellish in a true History because it gives testimonie to the vertue of their naturall King They can like well enough that against the credit of all Antiquitie Xenophon being a Graecian and no Persian should frame Cyrus a life after his owne fancie and make him die in his bed and amongst his Friends when yet hee dyed in the warres and overcome by a woman and they can like well enough that Plinie should tell a lye in open Senate and prayse Trajan for temperance and chastitie who
so pure a Grace with proscriptions and punishments I make you a faithfull promise to doe that which you desire me to doe to employ all my cunning and all my engines to erect a statue to the memory of his Name You touch the right string of my inclination when you pray me to praise and to magnifie that Prince If all the Crownes that are wrought upon his Scarfe should be changed into so many Kingdomes they could never in my opinion sufficiently recompence so rare a vertue nor be able to fill so vaste a Spirit as his is As I expect nothing but great from his valour so from his honesty I hope for nothing but good and although in Spaine it be currant that he is certainely Antichrist yet I am â—…either so devout to beleeve such a fable nor â—…o fearefull to be afraide of such a deame I onâ—…y answer some scrupulous persons who queâ—…tion me about this Prince that our King hath â—…n him a second to stand by him and such a one â—…s a fitter could never be found to strike an amasement into the house of Austria and to â—…ivert it from the care it takes of our affaires But I will stay my selfe here for this time and â—…ot enter upon a subject which I reserve for the â—…earest houres of my leasure it is better to make 〈◊〉 stand at the porch of holy places then to enter â—…nto them without preparation Besides my disâ—…ourse may seeme already long if not too long â—…or a beginning of acquaintance pardon I beâ—…eech you the contentment I take to be this way with you which makes me forget both â—…our employments and my owne custome It â—…s not any desire I have to be troublesome to â—…ny much lesse to make Sermons to my friends â—…ut your selfe gave me the Text I have handâ—…ed and I cannot doubt but that having openâ—…d unto you the bottome of my heart without â—…issimulation you will give my liberty the credit of your beliefe and with this I solemnely â—…ssure you that I truely am Sir Your c. To Mounsieur the Abbot of Baume LETTER IV. SIR I am true if not liberall and I send you that I promised though I cannot send you what I would This is neither a mooveable for the use of your house nor an ornament to beautifie your closet it is matter of discourse onely for two or three dayes at your table and a Novelty that will quickly grow stale But if your selfe have any better opinion of it and that you account it of any value I am contented that you leave my stile to the mercy of any that will arrest it so you please to justifie my intentions to men that are reasonable and not suffer in the Country where you are that an honest man should bee oppressed with the hatred against his side If I were a revoulted Spaniard and that the words I write did come from the mouth of a Fugitive they might with good reason bee taken in ill part and we finde that a Graecian at Athens was once punished for serving the Persians to bee their Interpreter but I desire you to consider that the cause I maintaine is the cause of my Prince and Country which I could not maintaine coldly without a kinde of treason We punish Prevaricatours and Traytors but true and lawfull enemies wee prayse and I cannot thinke that M. the Cardinall of Cueva will thinke the worse of my passion for the publike liberty who hath shewed himselfe the like passion for one particular mans Regency I am not afraid that a good action should make me lose his favour or that being himselfe extreamely just hee should not more esteeme of my zeale which is naturall and honest than the choller of Doctor Boucher a mercenary man and a Pentioner to a stranger It will be no Novelty to say that of Spaine which hath beene alwayes said of great Empires and that rapine and cruelty is a reproach even to Eagles and Lyons To be a Tyrant and an Vsurper is it not in other termes to be a Grandee and a Conqueror And are not violence and severity vices that exceed the reach of vertue and which makes our morality ridiculous I blame sometimes the counsailes of Kings but I never lay hands upon their royalty and if I seeke to cut off superfluities and excesses it cannot therfore be justly sayd I teare that off which I seeke to prune Crownes are to me sacred even upon Idolaters heads and I adore the marke of God in the person of the great Cham and of the great Mogoll Having now made this declaration which yet is more expressly delivered in my booke I hope there will be no place left for calumnie and I promise to my selfe that for my sake you will whip the Spaniards in point of generousnesse and shew them that she hath shewed her selfe principally to doe a favour to enemies and to mingle things which seeme hard to bee mingled courtesie and warre together I demand not these good offices from you I expect them from your friendship and I doubt not but you will continue it to me in spight of all the spightfulnesse and bitternesse of the opposites seeing I know you are free from those petty passions of vulgar spirits and that you know I am Sir Your c. To Mounsieur Bouthillier Counsellor of the King in his Counsailes and Secretary of his commands LETTER V. SIR I vow I am one of the worst Courtiers of France and to justifie Fortune for having little favoured me I will accuse my selfe for having little courted her yet for the love of you I have used an extraordinary endeavour My affection hath gone beyond my action and I have put my selfe to the venture to goe as farre as Gascogny to seeke you out If you had gone by Cadillac as I was told you would you had found me at the waters side at your disimbarking and I should have put hard with the best of the Country to have had the honour to offer you my service first of any but God did not thinke me worthy of my desires It was his pleasure I should make a journey of fifty leagues not to see you and I conceive my happinesse to be such that if I should goe to Paris with the like intention God would presently inspire the Kings heart to send you away in some Embassage Be pleased therefore Sir to spare me this travaile I dare undertake no second voyage for feare least such a thought onely should remoove you from the station where all the good of life is seated and out of which a man can have no contentment but what he can get by the force of Reason and Philosophie It sufficeth me that I have this one way left me to present you my Complements and that from time to time I can make you reade that your Idaea is the deare company of my solitude your reputation the comfortable trouble of my repose In the estate I now am in this
gives sanctuary of pardon to Delinquents I have heard speake of the sweet nature and signing of the Dove but never of her cruelty nor of her roaring and to give her clawes and teach her to love blood would be no lesse then to make her a Monster this would bee Sir to make love it selfe turne wilde and metamorphise it into hate This would bee to imitate the antient Pagans who attributed to their gods all the passions and infirmities of men no man I hope shall be able to lay such prophanation to our charge wee will be no corrupters of the most excellent puritie no handlers of holy things with polluted hands no stretchers of our defects to the highest point of perfection They which doe so in what part of the world soever they be are Anathemaes in your Bookes accursed in your Sermons condemned by the rules of your doctrine and by the examples of your life These false Saints doe not serve Christ but serve themselves of Christ they sollicite their owne affaires in his name and recommend it as his cause when it is their owne suite Periwasion that they doe well makes them more hardy in doing ill they call their choller zeale and when they kill they thinke they sacrifice Thankes be to God no part in the whole body of our Clergie is so unsound it is returned to its oyle and to its balme in whose place the civill warres had substituted deadly Aconite and bitter Wormewood The League is dead and Spaine heartsicke our Oracles are no longer inspired by forreigne Deities the spirit of love and charity animates all our Congregations and no doubt he that ought to be the mouth of the assembly will consider that Bishops are Ministers of mercy and not of justice and that to them our Lord said I leave peace with you but said not I leave vengeance with you the wisedome of M. the Cardinall will strip off all the thorny prickles of passions and sweeten all the bitternesse of figures before they arrive to come neare the King This divine spirit is farre surmounting all orations all deliberations and all humane affaires and in this he will easily finde a temper both to preserve the honour of the Church and yet not oppresse the humilitie of him that submits both to give full satisfaction to the first order and yet not withdraw regard from the merit of the second both to make us see heads bowed and knees bended before the Altars and yet no houses demolished nor governments destroyed whereof the Altars should receive no benefit I am in hope you will doe me the favour to informe me of the occurrents of the whole history whereof I doubt not but you are your selfe one of the principall parties and I expect by your letters a true relation of all the newes that runnes about In the meane time Sir I trust you will not take it ill that I speake unto you of this great affaire as a man that sees it a farre off and whom you appoint sometimes to deliver his advise upon matters of which he hath but small understanding At your returne we will renue the Commerce we have discontinued and since you will have it so I will once againe play the Oratour and the Politician before you yet I feare me much you will scarce bee suffered to keepe your promise with me I see you are more borne to action then to rest and that our rurall pleasures are not worthy so much as to amuse so great a spirit as yours is I therefore wish you such as are worthy of you that is the solidest and the perfectest and such as glorious Atchievements and glorious actions leave behind them and I love not my selfe so much that I am not much more Sir Your c. At Balzac 25. January 1630. To Mounsieur Arnaut Abbot of St. Nicholas LETTER III. SIR the small service you desired of me is not worth considering but onely for the great thankes I have received for it I had altogether forgot it when I received your Letter which makes mee yet forget it more in making mâ—…â—…o remember it You have words that change things and in your Language aâ—… impuissant willingnesse iâ—…â—…n immortall obligation If you make so great account of good desires I merveile what price you set upon good deeds and if you thus bestow your compliments without necessitie I feare you will want them when you have neede you should goe more reserveldy to worke and retaine more providence for the future A man may be a good husband and yet not bee covetous and seeing limits and bounds are fit in all cases they cannot bee unfit in the case of courtesie Thinke not therefore Sir that herein you have done an act of acknowledgement you have gone farre beyond the bounds of this vertue If there be a vice opposite to ungratefulnes your too great officiousnesse hath made you fall into it and by the excesse you have avoided the defect The interests of M. the Cardinall Bentivoglio have no neede of recommending but amongst people that are not yet Civilized that which concernes his honour is no matter of indifferencie to them that know his vertue and they that know it not are no better then Barbarians If to doe him service I had not run whither you prayed me to goe and if I had not required an absolute suppression of that discourse whereof you required onely but a sweetning I had performed my duty but very weakely and had deserved blame in that for which you praise me Though his name were not resplendent in history nor his dignitie in the Church yet he should have Iâ—…stre enough in his very stile and writings and though he were not a grandchild of Kings and a Senatour of the whole earth yet I finde something in him more worth then all that I consider him without his Purple and devested of all externall ornaments regarding onely those that are naturall to him and which would make him most illustrious though hee had but a blacke cap on his head and most eminent though he were but a private man These are advantages hee hath over other men and which hee communicates to this age of the world goods that hee possesseth and I enjoy For I vow unto you that in this sad place whither my owne humour hath miss-led me and where there is no talke but of Suits and quarrells I should not know in the world how to passe my time if I had not brought his booke along with me This hath beene the companion of my voyage and is now the comforter of my Exile and after I am dulled with a deale of troublesome discourse and have my eares filled with idle chat I goe and purifie my selfe in his delicate relations and gather my spirits together which the noyse and clatter had before dispersed I never saw in so sober and chast a stile so much fulnesse and delight if nature herselfe would speake shee could never make choyse of more proper termes
make that hatefull to her which is not in it selfe lovely to confirme her in the principles which you have taught her and to draw her out some rules from her own actions she is I know naturally good but the best natures have need of some method to guide them and direction doth never any hurt to vertue she is able to keepe herselfe in termes extreamly obliging without ever falling into the basenesse of flatterie She is able to please without colloguing and though shee call not every thingby the right name nor bee so very curious to speake in proper termes yet her stile shall not for that bee the lesse liked nor her companie the lesse desired She may call them wise that want the reputation of beeing valiant and women that are sad she may say they are serious If a man bee not of a quicke spirit she may say he is of a good judgement and if one bee unfortunate in his actions she may say he hath a good meaning in his counsails But yet in this there is a measure to bee held and a choyce must bee made in laying her colours that shee seeke not to disguise all sorts of subjects for there are some indeed that are not capable of disguising Those that are pale she may praise for their whitenesse but those that have a dropsie she must not praise for their fatnesse shee may say that scruple is a bud of pietie But shee must not say that prophanenesse is an effect of Philosophie Shee may make a favourable construction of things doubtfull and sweeten the rigour of particular judgements but shee must not contend against common sence nor bee opposite to verities that are publicke and manifest Shee must make a difference betweene errours and crimes betweene a docible simplicitie and a presumptuous stupiditie betweene sots that are honest and those that are wicked And if shee happen to bee in companie where some weake spirit is oppressed as the world is full of such that will triumph over the weake and take no pittie of any shee must then by all meanes bee a protectresse of such a one and make herselfe a Sanctuarie for all those whom stronger adversaries would otherwise ruine This onely is to bee observed that shee so undertake the maintaining of weake causes that it may appeare by the tune of her voyce that it proceedes from excesse of goodnesse and not from want of knowledge and that shee compassionates humane infirmities by an act of charitie makes not herselfe a partie by false perswasion I am now at the end of my paper and should have beene a good while since at the end of my letter but I alwayes forget my selfe when I am with you and never thinke howres shorter than those I bestow upon your memorie And so my deare sister I bid you farewell not without great longing to see you and if you and all your company come not hither the next week I proclaime it to you that I am no longer Your c. At Balzac 10. Iuly 1634. THE SECOND PART of the third Volume of the Letters of Monsieur DE BALZAC To my Lord the Cardinall Duke of Richelieu LETTER I. MY Lord being stayed here by some occasions I suffer this hard necessitie with a great deale of paine and account my selfe banished from my Countrey being so long a time deprived of your presence I deny not but the victorious and triumphant Newes that comes continually from the Armie gives me some resentment of joy and that the brute of your Name in all quarters toucheth me very sensibly but it is no perfect satisfaction to me to learne that by others relating which I ought to know as an eye-witnesse and I conceive so great a pleasure to consist in the sight of your glory that there is not a common Souldier under your Command whose happinesse and good fortune I doe not envie But my Lord though I cannot serve you with my bodily actions yet I revere you day and night with the thoughts of my minde and in this so worthy an imployment I never thinke the noblest part of my selfe can doe service enough Your Lordship next to the King is the eternall object of my spirit I never turne my eyes from the course of your life and if perhaps you have Courtiers more officious than my selfe and such as doe their duties with greater oftentation and shew yet I am most sure you have no servant that is more faithfull and whose affection comes more truely from his heart and is fuller of life and vigour But to the end my words may not be thought vaine and without ground I send you now a proofe of that I say by which you shall perceive that a man that is himselfe perswaded hath a great disposition to perswade others and that a Discourse founded upon the things themselves and â—…ated with the truth both stirres mens spirits with greater force and also begets a firmer beliefe than that which is but feigned and comes but in the nature of Declayming This my Lord is a part drawne out from the whole bodie and a piece which I have taken most paines to polysh which I freely vow unto you that all the houres of a calmer leisure than mine and all the powers of a more elevated spirit than ordinary would have found worke enough to bring to perfection In it there is handled Of the vertue and victories of the King Of the Justice of his Armes Of Royaltie and Tyrannie Of usurpers and lawfull Princes Of Rebellion chastened and libertie mainteined but because the Prince I speake of is a stirrer and makes no stay any where and that in following him I should imbarque my selfe in a world of severall subjects I have therefore prescribed to my selfe certaine bounds which in his actions I should never have met with and after the example of Homer who finished his Ilias with the death of Hector though that were not the end of the warre I have thought fit not to goe further than the taking of Suze though this were but the beginning of the wonders wee have seene of his You know my Lord that this kinde of writing which I propose to my selfe is without comparison the most painfull of all other and that it is a hard matter to continue long in an action that must be violent and to be violent in an action that must continue long This prayse belongs properly to Oratours I meane such as know how to perswade how to please in profiting and can make the people capable of the secrets of Governning a Common-wealth For as for Philosophers that have written of this argument their discourse is commonly so drie and meager that it appeares their intention was rather to instruct than to reconcile and besides their style is so thornie and cumbersome that it seemes they meant to teach none but the learned And in this there is no more difficultie than there is in healing of men that be in health And for a man
any of mine be worthy the name must looke for nothing but defacing a very hard suiteit would be but to get their pardon and I follow not vertue onely without reward but I follow her with danger You thinke not withstanding that I take a pleasure in this ungratefull occupation and that I have a greater forwardnesse to it than I finde resistance You thinke my spirit should never shrinke for ill successes and that of its owne fertiltie without either one beame of the Sunne or one droppe of dew and at the mercy of all windes it is able to budde and bring forth some thing You judge too favourably of a vigor that is halfe extinguished and consider not that melancholy indeede is ingenious and pregnant when it comes from the temper which Aristotle commendeth but that it is drie and stupid when it proceedes from the continuall outrages of adverse fortune And therefore Sir my deare Cousin expect nothing from me to answer your expectation and to merit the veneration you speake of in your letter I cannot endure such a great word in your mouth are you not afraid to come under my office of a Grammarian One such improper terme is unexcusable unlesse it be you had relation to that old Verse Res est sacra miser or to that brave fellow in the controversies of Seneca who in the life time of the Oratour Cestius but upon the wane of his spirit affirmed that he reverenced his very Cynders and would use to sweare by his shadow and by his memory It shall suffice me that you handle me in this manner that Mounsieur your President and your selfe would sometimes say in lamenting me he had beene further off than now he is if he had met with fewer ambushes in his way I require your recommendation of my service to that rare personage whom I dare not call the last of the French I remember what was laid to Cremutius Cordus his charge but how ever I account him worthy of the antient France and of the Senate which we have not seene that had the honour to be Arbitrator betweene the Emperour and the Pope a mediator betweene the King and his People I require from you but onely the like favour and I acquit you of your veneration provided that you keepe for me your good will which I cannot lose if you be just since I am Sir My deare Cosin Your c. From Balzac 16. Februa 1634. To Mounsieur Conrade LETTER XX. SIR the account I make of you is farre from being a scorne One should doe you wrong to take you for any other than your selfe and it would be a hard matter to finde a man for whom you could be changed without losse I see therefore your drift you would not thinke the number of your Vertues compleate if you added not humility and you would make me see that there are Capuchine Huguenots Indeede a fine noveltie but it belongs not to you to be so modest nor to take upon you Perfection who have not yet attained Conversion To speake uprightly your respects and your submissions are not sufferable men used to speake otherwise in the golden age and to say nothing more hardly of you you are too unjust a valuer of your selfe Doe what you can you are never any more able to weaken the Testimony which Madam de Loges and Mounsieur Chapelain have given of you then you can deny me your friendship which I crave of you in their name You see how contagious an ill example is and how I imitate you in condemning you I can play the Reserved as well as you and seeke for mediators and favour to obtaine that favour you have granted me already These are the subtilties of my passion to the end I may taste a second joy I will make you tell me twice one thing I will have you once again lay forth your letter to our former view thereby to husband the better for so long time the pleasure I take to heare you assure me that you love me Such assurances should perswade me but little in the mouth of many men but for you I know with what Religion you make your promises of what holinesse your word is I know you approve of no lies but those of the Muses and that fictions in Poetry you can beare withall but banish them from your conversation I am glad therefore I have found one face among so many vyzards and that I can lay hold of something I can feele and that hath truth in it It is nothing but the freedome of my minde that gives mee the boldnesse to approach other vertues with all which I am at defiance if I finde not this freedome in their companie By this Sir you have woâ—…e me and I must vow unto you that this syncerity whereof you make profession hath been a wonderfull allurement to a man that is no longer taken with the bravery or galantnes of spirit These flashes have so often abused me that I am now growne to be afraid of any thing lookes râ—…d de least it should be fire and burne me I suspect these Barkes that are so painted and guilded over I have often made shipwracke in such I desire those that are sound and safe and enter them as Vessells to sayle in and not as Galleries to walke in When I speake of a friend I meane not a companion in trade or in disorder nor one that can returne visites the next day aftet hee hath received them and is not failing in the least duties of a civile life but I meane a witnesse of the conscience a Physitian of secret griefes a moderatour in prospe ritie and a guide in adversitie I have some few left me of this sort but have had many losses and very lately one which but for you would be irreparable you whom God hath sent to comfort me and whom I substitute in the place of one of the honestest men that was in France Our contract if you please shall be short and plaine I will propose no matter of lustre to engage you in it onely I assure you my heart and a sinceritie answerable to yours It is now of proofe from the most dangerous Ayre of Christendome I have brought it from Rome I have preserved it at Paris It is not therefore likely that to deceive you I am come to lose it in a Village and that I have any designe to falsifie my faith seeing I assure you I will ever be Sir Your c. From Balzac 5. of February 1633. To LETTER XXI SIR since you will have me to write that in a letter which I spake unto you by word of mouth this Letter shall be a second testimony of the account I make of and of the feeling I have of the courtesies received from him During the time wee had his company I considered him with much attention but in my conscience observed nothing in the motions of his spirit but great inclinations to great designes and to
see him doe wonders in the world you neede wish him no more but matter of imployment Hee hath all the Intendments of an honest man all the Characters of a great Lord by these he gaines mens eyes in present and their hearts in expectation and afterwards brings more goodnesse forth than ever he promised and exceedes expectation with performance And in truth if this Heroick countenance had no wares to vent but vulgar qualities this had beene a tricke put upon us by Nature to deceive us by hanging out a false signe The charge hee exerciseth in the Church is no burden to him hee hath in such sort accōmodated his humour to it that in the most painefull functions of so high a duty there lies nothing upon his shoulders but ease and delight He embraceth generally all that hee beleeves to be of the decencie of his profession and is neither tainted with the heate which accompanies the age wherein he is nor with the varietie which such a birth as his doth commonly bring with it In a word the way he takes goes directly to Rome Hee is in good grace with both the Courts and the Pope would be as willing to receive the Kings commendation of him as the King would be to give it He hath brought from thence a singular approbation and hath left behind him in all the holy Colledge a most sweete odour and that without making faces or making way to reputation by singularitie For in effect what heate soever there be in his zeale hee never suffers it to blaze beyond custome his piety hath nothing either weake or simple it is serious all and manly and he protesteth it is much better to imitate S. Charles than to counterfeit him Concerning his passion of horses which he calls his malady since hee is not extreme in it never counsell him to cure it it is not so bad as either the Sciatica or the ◅out and if he have no other disease but that hee hath not much to doe for a Physitian One may love Horses innocently as well as Flowers and Pictures and it is not the love of such things but the intemperate love that is the vice Of all beasts that have any commerce with men there are none more noble nor better conditioned and of them a great Lord may honestly and without disparagement be curious Hee indeede might well be said to be sicke of them who can sed mangers of Ivory to be made for them and gave them full measures of peeces of gold this was to be sicke of them to bestow the greatest part of his estate upon beautifying his Stable and to make a mocke what men said or thought of chusing a Consull by his horses neighing You shall give me leave to tell you another story to this purpose not unpleasant It is of Theophylact Patriarch of Constantinople who kept ordinarily two thousand horses and fedde them so daintily that in stead of Barley and Oates which to our horses are a feast hee gave them Almonds Dates and Pistache nuts and more than this as Cedrenus reports he watered them long time before in excellent wine and prepared them with all sorts of precious odours One day as hee was solemnizing his Office in the Church of Saint Sophia one came and told him in his eare that his Mare Phorbante had foaled a Colt with which hee was so ravished that instantly without having the patience to finish his Service or to put off his Pontificall Robes hee left the mysteries in the midst and ranne to his Stable to see the good newes hee had heard and after much joy expressed for so happy a birth he at last returned to the Altar and remembred himselfe of his dutie which the heate of his passion had made him to forget See Sir what it is to dote upon horses but to take a pleasure in them and to take a care of them this no doubt may make a man bee said to love them and neverthelesse not the lesse the wiser man Even Saints themselves have their pleasures and their pastimes all their whole life is not one continued miracle they were not every day foure and twentie houres in extasie amidst their Gifts their Illuminations their Raptures their Visions they had alwayes some breathing time of humane delight during all which time they were but like us and the Ecclesiasticall Story tells us that the great Saint Iohn who hath delivered Divinitie in so high a straine yet tooke a pleasure and made it his pastime to play with a Partridge which he had made tame and familiar to him I did not thinke to have gone so farre it is the subject that hath carried me away and this happens very often to mee when I fall into discourse with you My complements are very short and with men that are indifferent to mee I am in a manner dumbe but with those that are deare unto mee I neither observe Rule nor Measure and I hope you doubt not but that I am in the highest degree Sir Your c. At Balzac 5. of Ianuary 1633. To Mounsieur Godeau LETTER XXII SIR there is no more any merit in being devout Devotion is a thing so pleasing in your Booke that even prophane persons find a rellish in it and you have found out a way how to save mens soules with pleasure I never found it so much as within this weeke that you have fedde mee with the dainties of the antient Church and feasted me with the Agapes of your Saint Paul This man was not altogether unknowne to me before but I vow unto you I knew him not before but onely by sight though I had sometimes beene neare unto him yet I could never marke any more of him than his countenance and his outside your Paraphrase hath made me of his counsell and given me a part in his secrets and where I was before but one of the Hall I am now one of the Closet and see clearely and distinctly what I saw before but in cloudes and under shadowes You are to say true an admirable Decipherer of Letters in some passages to interpret your subtilty is a kinde of Devotion thoroughout the manner of your expressing is a very charme I am too proud to flatter you but I am just enough to be a witnesse of the truth and I vow unto you it never perswades me more that when it borrowes your style There reflects from it a certaine flash which pleaseth instantly as beauty doth and makes things to be lovely before one knowes they are to be loved Your words are no way unworthy of your Authour they neither weaken his conceits by stretching them out at length nor scatter the sence by spreading it out in breadth But contrariwise the powerfull spirit which was streightened within the bounds of a concise stile seemes to breath at ease in this new libertie and to encrease it selfe as much as it spreads it selfe hee seemes to passe from his fetters into triumph and to goe