LETTERS OF Mounsieur de BALZAC . 1.2.3 . and 4th parts .

Translated out of French into English .

BY Sr RICHARD BAKER Knight , and others .

Now collected into one Volume , with a methodicall table of all the letters .

LONDON , Printed for John Williams , and Francis Eaglesfield . At the Crown , and Marigold in S. Pauls Churchyard . 1654.

I Here present you Mounsieur Balzac's Letters , which may well be termed new ones , even after the eighth Edition ; for though they have long since been in possession of publick favour , yet I may justly say , this is the first time their Authour hath avouched them . The advantagious Judgement you have delivered of him , and the ardor wherewith all France hath followed your approbation , well deserveth his best endeavours toward the perfectionating so excellent things : I have been solicitous to draw him to this labour , to the end the world might know , that if I be not worthy the share I have in his respects , yet that I have at least been wise enough to make right use of my good fortune , and to cause it to become serviceable to the glory of my Countrey . But truly , were he master of his body , or did his maladies afford him liberty of spirit , he would not suffer any but himself to speak in this cause ; and his pen performing no slight acts , would have consecrated his own labours , and the wonders they have produced . But since evils have no prefixed time of durance , and in that all the good interims which hereafter may befall him , are wholly to be , imployed in his Book , The Prince ; I esteemed it to small purpose to attend his health in this businesse , and that it was now no longer any time to deferre the purging of these curious Letters from such blemishes as ill impressions had left upon them . They shall therefore non appear in the parity wherein they were conceived , and with all their naturall ornaments : Besides , I have added divers letters of his , not as yet come to light , which may serve as a subject of greater satisfaction to all men , and be as a recompense of the honour wherewith he hath collected the former . And truly ( my Lord ) had it been possible to place in the Frontispiece of this Book , a more illustrous name then yours , or should Mounsieur de Balzac's inclination and mine have been farre from any such intention , yet would not the order of things , or the law of decency have permitted any other reflection , then what I now make : I speak not at this present , of that dazeling greatnesse whereunto you are elevated , nor of that so rare and necessary vertue , which rightly to recognize , the greatest King on earth hath esteemed himself not to be over able . I will only say , I had reason to submit an eloquence produced in the shade , and formed in solitarinesse , to this other eloquence quickned both with voice and action , causing you to reign in sovereignity at all assemblies . Certainly , my Lord , you are more powerfull by this incomparable quality , then by the authority wherein the King hath placed you : The only accent of your voice hath a hidden property , to charm all such as hearken unto you ; none can be possessed with any so wilfull passions , who will not be appeased by the reasons you propound ; and after you have spoken , you will at all times remain master of that part of man , no way subject to the worlds order , and which hath not any dependency upon lawfull power , or tyrannicall usurpation . This is a truth , my Lord , as well known as your name , and which you so solidly confirmed at the last assembly of the Notables ; as that in the great diversity of humours and judgements , whereof it was composed , there was peradventure this only point well resolved on , That you are the most eloquent man living . This being true , I can no way doubt , but the perusall of this Book I offer unto you , will extraordinarily content you , and that you will be pleased to retire thither , sometimes to recreate your spirits after agitation , and to suspend those great thoughts , who have for their object the good of all Europe . It is a book , my Lord , wherein you shall find no common thing but the Title ; ( where entertaining some particular person ) Mounsieur de Balzac reades Lessons to all men ; and where amidst the beauty of Complements and dexterity of Jeasting , he often teacheth of the most sublime point of Philosophy : I mean not that wrangling part thereof which rejecteth necessary verities , to seek after unprofitable ones , which cannot exercise the understanding without provoking passions , nor speak of moderation without distemper , and putting the soul into disorder : But of that , whereby Pericles heretofore made himself master of Athens , and wherewith Epaminondas raised himself to the prime place of Greece : which tempereth the manners of particulars , regulateth the obligation of Princes , and necessarily bringeth with it the felicity of all States where they command . This book will make it apparent even to your enemies , that your life hath been at all times equally admirable , though not alwayes alike glorious : How you have conserved the opinion of your vertue , even in the time of your hardest fortunes , and how in the greatest fury of the tempest , and in the most extreme violence of your affairs , the integrity of your actions hath never been reduced to the only testimony of your conscience . To conclude , It is in this Book , my Lord , where I suppose you will be pleased to read the presages of your present greatnesse , and what hath been foretold ; not by Astrologicall Rules , or the aspect of some Constellation , but by a true discourse founded upon the maximes of Reason , and experience of things past ; causing him to presume , that God hath not conferred such extraordinary endowments upon you , to be for ever encloistered within your self : And that he hath loved France better , then to deprive her of the good you ought to procure her . But all these verities shall one day be comprised in that work the King , by your mouth , my Lord , hath commanded Mounsieur de Balzac to undertake , and which one year of leisure will effect . There shall it be , where he will cause all men to confesse , that to have the pourtract of a perfect Prince , the reign of so great a Monarch as ours , is to be attended ; that the Divine Providence never shewed it self more apparantly , then in the conduct of his designes , and in the event of his enterprises ; and how Heaven hath so farre declared it self in his favour , that were his state assaulted on all sides , and all ordinary meanes of defence should fail him ; he hath vertue sufficient to save himself , and perform miracles . Now as you are the prime intelligence of his Councell , and your cogitations the first causes of the good resolutions therein taken , you are not to doubt , my Lord , but you likewise possesse the principall place therein , after his Majesty ; and that you participate more then any other of his triumphs . There shall you be revenged of all those wretched writings you have formerly sleighted : There the spirits of all men shall be satisfied in the justice of your deportments , and calumny it self will there be so powerfully convinced , that to cry down so legall a government as yours , ill affected French-men , and those strangers enemies to this Crown , will find no further pretext in affairs , nor credulity among men . And truly , when I ( on the one side ) consider how fatall it is to those who govern , to be exposed to the envy of great ones , and complaints of meaner persons , and how Publick affairs have this fatality , as how pure soever the administration of the rest be , they still afford sufficient colour to calumny , to disguise them and cause them to appear unjust . And on the otherside : when I consider that to guide this State is no lesse then to manage a body having no one sound part ; and how there is no sick person who doth not sometimes murmure against his Physician ; I dare be confident ( my Lord ) that such a man as Monsieur de Balzac will not prove unusefull unto you , and that the luster of your actions , and glory of your life shall receive no diminution in his hands . I would say more , did I not fear to disoblige him in commending him , or if I believed him to be so great a self admirer as his enemies figure him unto us . But I who have sufficiently studied him to know him , and who am acquainted with his most secret Inclinations , and the most particular conceptions he hath in his soul , and of a far different opinion to theirs . I will therefore rest there ( my Lord ) and not to cause you to loose more time , and to the end you may the sooner enjoy the entertainment , this excellent Book prepareth for you : I will satisfie my self in letting you know , that I esteem not my self so unfortunate as formerly I did , since I have happened upon so fair an occasion , to let you know that I am ,

I Doubt not but amongst those who shall see these Works some there are who will esteem them worthy a more advantagious Title then that of Letters , as well in regard of the greatnesse of those things therein frequently handled , as in respect of the exactnesse wherewith they seem to have been composed : But as I willingly excuse those , who with unapt complements imagine they have composed a good Letter ; nor do any more blame such as therein never digresse from their particular affairs ; so must I likewise acknowledge , that such writings as these , having not been made with any intention to be put in Print , the World might well have passed without them : And that it is onely allowed to the Germanes to give account to the age they live in , and to posterity forsooth , concerning the affairs and fortunes of their particular families , and of the silly acts of their Colleagues Truly it is an errour to believe , that grave and solemn subjects are to be banished out of all Letters , or that even eloquence ought but slackly therein to appear ; and that the Majesty of both these is onely reserved for Pulpits and Panegyrick Orations ; as though valour never appeared save only in pitch'd Battels ; and that in single Combates it were lawfull to run away , or that virtue therein were utterly unusefull , because it hath fewer witnesses , neither is so fully regarded : But besides that , we are no longer in those times wherein the State government was publickly questioned , where the Oratours forced the Lieutenants generall of armies to render account of their severall charges ; and that consequently , there is no more any means remaining to become eloquent in that kind : Yet are there reasons , whereby we may understand the merit of Letters to be of no lesse regard then that of Orations . Howbeit , if there be any necessity to find some difference between these ; this at least can neither be in regard of the dignity of the Subjects the force of Reasons , the gracefulness of Discourses , nor in the sublimity of Conceits . To speak truth , when I consider the Orations yet remaining among the ruines of former ages , some whereof were publickly pronounced , others onely penned ; I am so farre from admiring any advantage they have over those Letters now extant among us both of the same Authours and Ages , as I do not so much as wonder at all , how the first having been armed with discourse and voice , together with the gesture and motion of the body , have produced such prodigious effects as we all know and have so often , as it were by main force , extorted the consents of all hearers ; yet the second , though they had not the like armes and allurements have notwithstanding not been any way deficient . Those smooth Exordiums whereby they prepare , and put themselves by easie accesses , as it were into possession of the Readers , those straites and passages whereby they conduct the spirits of men from pleasant to painfull , and from grievous , to gracious objects , to the end that having in a manner shaken and cast them out of their former stations , they may afterwards force them to fall on what side they please . Surely all these advantages are so peculiar to Orations , as I ingeniously confesse , Letters do not so much as know what they mean . In these , we enter at the first dash upon the matter , nor do we scarce at any time , quit the same ; the reasons go altogether alone without assistance , and all the ornament allowed them , is onely freedome of conceptions , the fecundity of language , and that they passe not promiscuously . But as concerning the Subjects , they are common to both kinds of writings , and it is an errour to imagine , there are some particular to the one , that the other cannot touch upon the same without injury thereunto . Upon the matter , Panegyrick discourses , Apologies , Consultations , Judgements upon Morall actions , whether good or bad opinions and censures upon occurrents of those which please , and those we ought to detest , yea even indifferent accidents ; briefly whatsoever may fall into discourse , and under reason , are the objects of Letters : So we see , the greatest and most important mysteries of our religion have been left unto us in Letters . All the wisdome of the Pagans is contained in those of Seneca , and we owe to those Cicero wrote to his friends , the knowledge of the secrets , and certain inducements which caused the greatest revolutions the world hath ever known , to wit the shaking and subversion of the Roman Reipublicke , we are therefore to confesse Oratorical Treatises to have no other subject then Letters : and that if there be any difference , it is none other then what is observed between our ancient Seas , and those not discovered unto us till in our fathers times . The latter are no lesse deep then the other ; they are capable of the like shipping ; their ebbes , and floods are neither more just , nor lesse uncertain ; and all the difference discovered between them is onely this , that the winds tosse not those in like sort as it doth ours , and in that they are seldome or never subject either to stormes , or tempests . In like manner it being within the power and capacity of Letters to treat of the same things , how much more eminent and excellent soever one may conceive them to be then any other kind of writings , yet do they not indeed receive those extraordinary motions which appear in Orations , since neither the like height of excesse , nor the same Enthusiasmes or raptures are herein found ; In a word , it is a more middle beauty , and a more calm eloquence . And surely , if the subject we make use of be as illustrious as the person before whom we are to handle it , were it not as much as to abuse both the one and the other , to come short in our expressions : Since the action ought neither to be publick , nor generall , if you intend to performe it negligently , and not to allow it all the ornaments whereof it is capable . And who can doubt that Cicero being to make an Oration before Cesar , after the change of the Common-wealth , had not a greater apprehension , and prepared not himself with more studious care , then if he had onely spoken to that beast with an hundred heads , he had so often led after his own Phantasie , and whereof he was in so full possession so long before , as to cause them to take the part best pleasing unto him . In these last occasions , and in the presence of this man alone , he knew with whom he had to do : Now had he been timerous , or fearfull to fail before his Master , yet impute not this apprehension of his to proceed either out of consideration he had of his greatnesse , nor from the reflections upon those things he came to accomplish : But it was in that he considered him as a man no lesse versed in the art of well-speaking then himself , and who had heretofore contributed to the study of this science , so many rare gifts of spirit , and so many faire endowments of nature , that had he not afterward esteemed it more noble to conquer men by armes , then to convince them by arguments , and if of the two most excellent exercises this of his life , fortune , and the famousnesse of his courage , had not caused him to make choise of the former , he might easily have disputed for the glory of the latter with him . Or were it so that this excellent Oratour might at this day return into the world , and were personally , or by his Pen to discourse with those two great Cardinalls to whom the most part of these Letters are addrest , it is not probable , coming to know them as we do , that he would imploy , and contribute a more exact study and solicitude , then when he was onely to please a multitude of ignorant Plebeians , and to speak to all that rabble of ancient Rome , we shall yet again be amazed at the perfection of these Letters , some whereof are written to the King , and appointed to be read ( as in truth they were ) with admiration in full counsell , and a great part of the rest addressed to the most eminent persons of our age . To speak truth we may justly say , this is the first time any thing of perfection hath appeared in our language ; so that if of all our ancient eloquence there be ought worthy of esteem in any equality with this , it may be that with much labour you shall produce some one Letter : For of all such who have hitherto written , we may affirme , that the most fortunate among them , when they made choise of subjects able to subsist of themselves , have not been absolutely condemnable , and that amidst their writings , the solidity of learning , and the savagenesse of language ( to wit ) the good and evill did equally appear . But when at any time they fell upon subjects where eloquence onely swayed the Scepter , there truly it was where fortune forsook them , and where the feeblenesse of their proper forces was manifestly perceived , if they were not some way assisted by strange tongues . Some of them ( to say the truth ) have doubted what way they were to take , and have striven to shew it to others , though themselves were not in it . In a word , the greatest glory those gained who have written with most perfection and purity , is onely that which nature hath reserved for women , to which sex eminent actions being denied , it seemeth they perform sufficient if they abstain from evil doing . But to say that any hath joyned Art to abundance , and mingled mildnesse with Majesty , or hath raised his stile without either loosing himself , or straying from his subject , that is it which in truth we could not see till this present . And questionlesse these brave and generous formes of discourse , and those great and strange conceptions wherewith these Letters were so curiously limed , and so plentifully graced , have been very slenderly known in proceeding ages : This very order , and this number , whereof every tongue is not capable , and wherein ours owes nothing to the Latine , and which appeares in all his words , though diversly , and as their gender requires , do right haply appear in this place , though the most part of writers before him have esteemed these perfections of small importance ; yet notwithstanding , without the helpe of these two great secrets , nether ornaments of Art , nor graces of Nature , can be but in part pleasing ; nor can all the reasons the World can alledge perswad a Very woman resoluing to resist : And to speake seriously , they are no lesse necessary among excellent discourses , and conceits , then discipline amongst Souldiers , without which , courage is of no effect , and valour most commonly proveth unprofitable . As for me who have known the Authour from both our infancies , and who better then all others , can depose in what fashion he effecteth his labours ; besides , knowing the great advantage he hath over all those who write at this day : I haue ever thought that if any were able to raise our Language to the merit and reputation of such Eloquence , werewith the Ancients were adorned ▪ it should be to him alone to whom our age oweth this glory . Nor do I doubt , but the comparison coming in question at this present , between these his writings , and those of others ; the difference will be easily discovered , assuring my self , that all spirits will dispose themselves to be ranged herein to mine opinion and voluntarily to give way thereunto . As for my self , who read the Ancients with all respect due unto them , and the Moderns without any prejudicate opinion , do notwithstanding confesse , that all I can conceive in others is so far short of the merit of these Letters , that abstracting from the passion I am possessed with , both for them , and their Authour , hardly could I dispose my self to frame this Preface for them . And who is there will make any difficulty to give them their due ? Since he whose very faults have been esteemed so fair , that they caused a Sect during his life , which yet continues after his death ; having ( at Meats ) seen certain discourses this Authour composed in those miserable times , and which stood in need of another age to be gratefully regarded , was astonished at his beginnings , confessing it was with unwillingnesse , that the onely thing he supposed to possesse by the generall consent of all , was ravished from him by one who as yet had lived but twenty yeares . But surely , it was in this strain of writing which in that it is not restrained within so strict limits as that of Letters , is capable of all the motions , and ornaments of Art ; and of the same sort as was the other discourse he addresseth to the Pope who now is , upon the like subject , as that of Saint Bernards to Eugenius : And as God never chose among men any so accomplished with all perfections , as this person to command all others , so can I not conceive any thing either more great , or extraordinary , then what appeareth in this work , nor more sutable to the excellency of the subject , and to the Majesty of him to whom he dedicated his discourse : But if ( to return to the particulars of these letters ) it were necessary for the delivering an unpartiall judgement , to consider those of the Antients , I should seem more respectfull then were requisite , if ( puting them all together ) I should undertake to make them so much as enter into comparison with these ; excepting onely those of Seneca , yea even in those ( which in truth come not near these ) there is so infinite abundance of matter , as can hardly be imagined , and since all things therein appear so confusedly , that it seems they were therein couched without choice , and to say truth , as it were at adventure , some who will yet further tax his stile will happily say , they are rather matters then Works . But for my part , if there be any defects therein , I hold they ought well to be borne with , in regard of so many rarities therein concurring ; and when we have said all , what appearance is there to undervalue any thing we receive from a man who was worth seven Millions of Gold ? and who once in his life had the heart and ambition to aspire to the Empire of the whole world ? Let us therefore esteem all we receive from him , and from those times , yet suffer us to commend our own , wherein this science which meddleth with the commanding of spirits , and which was but formerly in it's infancy , is now found to be in his full maturity , and as it were of ripe years . If therefore you acknowledge any obligation due ( as in truth there is ) to these excellent Letters , you shall in short time see so solid , and just a judgement proceed from this Authour , that the Parliament it self produced not any more able ; and his solitarinesse will be so satisfactory unto you , that you will make no more difference then I do , to prefer the same before the magnificence of Princely Courts , and the Pomp of most stateliest Cities .