The Letters of Phillip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

608 Pages·1932·19.82 MB·English

by  Bonamy Dobrée

THE LETTERS
OF LORD
CHESTERFIELD
VOL. FOUR

4
4
*
THE LETTERS OF
PHILIP DORMER STANHOPE
4_th EARL OF
CHESTERFIELD
EDITED, WITH AN INTRODUCTION, BY
BONAMY DOBRLE
★
IN SIX VOLUMES
Volume Four
letters: 1748-1751
193
AMS PRESS • NEW YORK
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Reprinted with the permission of Eyre & Spottiswoode
From the edition of 1932, London & New York
First AMS EDITION published 1968
Manufactured in the United States of America
Reprinted from a copy in the collections of the
Elarvard College Library.
Library of Congress Catalogue Card Number: 68-59007
AMS PRESS, INC.
New York, N.Y. 10003
THE LETTERS OF
PHILIP DORMER STANHOPE
FOURTH EARL OF
CHESTERFIELD
Nos. 1580-1797
22nd August, 1748-15th November, 1751
IV. A
1748
(continued)
No. 1580
A
Madame la Marquise de Monconseil
A Londres, ce 22 d’aout, 1748
Ayez la bonte, je vous en conjure, Madame, de dire
pour moi a Monsieur le Prince de Conti1 tout ce qu’en ma
place vous diriez vous-meme; alors, avec l’esprit qu’il a il
croira que j’en ai aussi beaucoup, car je pretends que vous
lui souteniez, en meme temps, que je vous l’ai ecrit mot a
mot. Je ne pense pas que vous soyez assez ladre pour me
refuser ce petit present, dont vous ne sentirez pas le besoin,
et que je ne demande que de votre surabondance. Au reste,
ajoutez, s’il vous plait, que je me flatte de pouvoir en quelque
temps d’ici lui envoyer des recrues de cette sort de chiens:
on en avait neglige la race, depuis qu’il n’y avait plus de
loups en Irlande, mais j’ai ecrit a quelques-uns des mes ami
de m’en faire faire.
Vos guerriers auront, du moins pour quelque temps,
loisir de chasser, quoique pourtant il me semble que ce
traite definitif ne finit point. Je ne sais a qui en est la faute,
puisqu’il a paru assez clairement que vous voulez la paix, et
qu’il est tres sur que nous la voulons aussi; et il me semble
que des que nous sommes d’accord, il faut bien que nos
allies respectifs marchent.
Sauriez-vous, Madame, qui Ton destine chez vous pour
Ambassadeur ici? Nous supposons ici qu’il y a deux concur¬
rents pour cette commission, Monsieur de Mirepoix, et
Monsieur le Marechal de Belleisle; pour moi je demande
seulement qu’il soit de vos amis, et que par consequent il
pense comme moi sur votre sujet.
Je tacherai de procurer pour Monsieur votre beau-frere
les papiers qu’il souhaite, mais a present tous ceux qui
■•Louis Frangois, Prince de Conti, bom in 1717; a man of cultivated mind and
literary taste.—M.
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seraient en etat de me les fournir sont encore en Flandres;
et d’ailleurs, pour vous dire la verite, je doute beaucoup de
l’exactitude de nos militaires dans ces matieres-la. Ils se
battent bien, il en faut convenir; mais ils n’ont pas cette
attention, et ce gout pour leur metier, qu’ont les votres.
Je vois bien que vous ne convenez pas de mes raisons au
sujet de votre futur eleve: cela n’est pas extraordinaire; mais
ce qui Test, c’est que je ne me rende point aux votres. II
faut en tout des gradations, et les petites villes le prepareront
peu a peu pour les grandes. Paris fourmille actuellement
d’Anglais, que je ne lui donnerais pas volontiers, ou pour
modeles ou pour connaissances, mais qui seraient infaillible-
ment Fun et l’autre s’il y allait presentement; au lieu que
Turin achevera de le depayser, apres quoi, n’etant plus
d’aucun pays, il adoptera surement le votre. Adieu, Madame;
je vous fais grace d’une page entiere, recompensez-moi en
en ajoutant une a celle dont vous m’honorerez.
No. 1581
To his Son
(Stanhope CLIX)
London, 23 August O.S. 1748
Dear Boy,
Your friend Mr. Eliot1 has dined with me twice since I
returned hither; and I can say with truth, that, while I had
the Seals, I never examined or sifted a state-prisoner with so
much care and curiosity as I did him. Nay, I did more; for,
contrary to the laws of this country, I gave him, in some
manner, the question ordinary and extraordinary; and I
have infinite pleasure in telling you that the rack which I
put him to did not extort from him one single word that
was not such as I wished to hear of you. I heartily con¬
gratulate you upon such an advantageous testimony from
1Edward Eliot (1727-1804), for some years M.P. for St. Germans; created Lord
Eliot in 1784.
IIC)6
IJ48
so creditable a witness. Laudari a laudato viro is one of the
greatest pleasures and honours a rational being can have;
may you long continue to deserve it! Your aversion to
drinking and your dislike to gaming, which Mr. Eliot
assures me are both very strong, give me the greatest joy
imaginable for your sake; as the former would ruin both
your constitution and understanding, and the latter your
fortune and character. Mr. Harte wrote me word some time
ago, and Mr. Eliot confirms it now, that you employ your
pin-money in a very different manner from that in which
pin-money is commonly lavished; not in gewgaws and
baubles, but in buying good and useful books. This is an
excellent symptom, and gives me very good hopes. Go on
thus, my dear boy, but for these two next years, and I ask
no more. You must then make such a figure and such a
fortune in the world as I wish you, and as I have taken all
these pains to enable you to do. After that time, I allow you
to be as idle as ever you please; because I am sure that you
will not then please to be so at all. The ignorant and the
weak only are idle; but those who have once acquired a good
stock of knowledge always desire to increase it. Knowledge
is like power in this respect, that those who have the most are
most desirous of having more. It does not cloy by possession,
but increases desire, which is the case of very few pleasures.
Upon receiving this congratulatory letter, and reading your
own praises, I am sure that it must naturally occur to you
how great a share of them you owe to Mr. Harte’s care and
attention; and, consequently, that your regard and affection
for him must increase, if there be room for it, in proportion
as you reap, which you do daily, the fruits of his labours.
I must not, however, conceal from you that there was
one article in which your own witness, Mr. Eliot, faltered;
for, upon my questioning him home as to your manner of
speaking, he could not say that your utterance was either
distinct or graceful. I have already said so much to you upon
this point that I can add nothing. I will therefore only repeat
1197
1748 45^45^
this truth, which is, That if you will not speak distinctly
and gracefully, nobody will desire to hear you.
I am glad to learn that Abbe Mably’s Droit Public de
VEurope makes a part of your evening amusements. It is a
very useful book, and gives a clear deduction of the affairs
of Europe, from the Treaty of Munster to this time. Pray
read it with attention, and with the proper maps, always
recurring to them for the several countries or towns yielded,
taken, or restored. Pere Bougeant’s third volume will give
you the best idea of the Treaty of Munster, and open to you
the several views of the belligerent and contracting parties;
and there never were greater than at that time. The House of
Austria, in the war immediately preceding that treaty, in¬
tended to make itself absolute in the Empire, and to over¬
throw the rights of the respective states of it. The view of
France was, to weaken and dismember the House of Austria
to such a degree, as that it should no longer be a counter¬
balance to that of Bourbon. Sweden wanted possessions
upon the continent of Germany, not only to supply the
necessities of its own poor and barren country, but likewise
to hold the balance in the empire between the House of
Austria and the States. The House of Brandenburg wanted
to aggrandize itself by pilfering in the fire; changed sides
occasionally, and made a good bargain at last, for I think it
got, at the peace, nine or ten Bishops secularized. So that
we may date from the Treaty of Munster the decline of the
House of Austria, the great power of the House of Bourbon,
and the aggrandizement of that of Brandenburg; and I am
much mistaken if it stops where it is now.
Make my compliments to Lord Pulteney, to whom I
would have you be not only attentive but useful, by setting
him (in case he wants it) a good example of application and
temperance. I begin to believe that, as I shall be proud of
you, others will be proud too of imitating you. Those ex¬
pectations of mine seem so well grounded, that my dis¬
appointment, and consequently my anger, will be so much
1198
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the greater if they fail; but, as things stand now, I am most
affectionately and tenderly
Yours.
No. 1582
To his Son
(Stanhope CLX)
,
London 30 August O.S. 1748
Dear Boy,
Your reflections upon the conduct of France, from the
Treaty of Munster to this time, are very just; and I am very
glad to find by them that you not only read, but that you
think and reflect upon what you read. Many great readers
load their memories without exercising their judgments, and
make lumber-rooms of their heads, instead of furnishing
them usefully: facts are heaped upon facts without order or
distinction, and may justly be said to compose that
-Rudis indigestaque moles,
Quam dixere chaos.1
Go on, then, in the way of reading that you are in; take
nothing for granted upon the bare authority of the author,
but weigh and consider in your own mind the probability
of the facts and the justness of the reflections. Consult dif¬
ferent authors upon the same facts, and form your opinion
upon the greater or lesser degree of probability arising from
the whole, which, in my mind, is the utmost stretch of
historical faith: certainty (I fear) not being to be found.
When an historian pretends to give you the causes and
motives of the events, compare those causes and motives
with the characters and interests of the parties concerned,
and judge for yourself whether they correspond or not.
Consider whether you cannot assign others more pro-
1Adapted from Ovid, Metam. I. 7.
H99