beats his neighbour, is adjudged to have the pre-eminence.

kitchens; it is not a long time since a foreigner at Naples made his coachman a duke. Custom, in these cases, has more power than royal authority. If you are but little known at Paris, you may there be a count or a marquis as long as you please; if you are connected with the law or finance, though the king should confer on you a real marquisate, you will not, therefore, be monsieur le marquis. The celebrated Samuel Bernard was, in truth, more a count than five hundred such as we often see not possessing four acres of land. The king had converted his estate of Coubert into a fine county; yet if on any occasion he had ordered

Philip II. was the first majesty in Spain; for the serenity of Charles V. was converted into majesty only on account of the empire. The children of Philip II. were the first highnesses; and afterwards they were royal highnesses. The Duke of Orleans, brother of Louis XIII. did not take up the title of royal highness till 1631: then the Prince of Condé claimed that of most serene highness, which the Dukes de Vendome did not venture to assume. The Duke of Savoy, at that time royal highness, afterwards substituted majesty, The grand Duke of Florence did the same, except-himself to be announced as Count Bering as to majesty: and, finally, the czar, nard, &c. he would have excited bursts who was known in Europe only as the of laughter. In England it is different; grand duke, declared himself emperor, if the king confers the title of earl or baand was recognised as such. ron on a merchant, all classes address Formerly, there were only two mar-him with the designation suitable to it, quises in Germany, two in France, and two in Italy. The Marquis of Brandenberg has become a king, and a great king. But, at present, our Italian and French marquises are of a somewhat different species.

without the slightest hesitation. By persons of the highest birth, by the king himself, he is called my lord. It is the same in Italy; there is a register kept there of monsignori. The pope himself addresses them under that title; his physician is monsignor, and no one objects.

If an Italian citizen has the honour of giving a dinner to the legate of his province, and the legate, when drinking, says to him, "monsieur le marquis, to your good health," he suddenly becomes a marquis, he and his heirs after him, for ever. If the inhabitant of any province Before the year 1635, bishops did not of France, whose whole estate consists of only not assume the title of monseigneur a quarter part of a little decayed castle-themselves, but they did not even give ward, goes to Paris, makes something of it to cardinals. These two customs were a fortune, or carries the air of having introduced by a bishop of Chartres, who, made one, he is stiled in the deeds and in full canonicals of lawn and purple, legal instruments in which he is con- went to call Cardinal Richelieu moncerned, "high and mighty seigneur, mar-seigneur ; on which occasion Louis XIII. quis and count;" and his son will be denominated, by his notary, "very high and very mighty seigneur," and, as this frivolous ambition is in no way injurious to government or civil society, it is permittéd to take its course. Some French lords boast of employing German barons in their stables: some German lords say they have French marquises in their

In France, the title of monseigneur, or my lord, is a very serious business. Before the time of Cardinal Richelieu, a bishop was only "a most reverend father } in God."

abserved, "That Chartrain would not mind saluting the cardinal au derriére.”

It is only since that period that bishops have mutually applied to each other the title of monseigneur.

The public made no objection to this application of it; but, as it was a rew title, not conferred on bishops by kirgs, they continued to be called sieurs, in

edicts, declarations, ordinances, and all official documents; and, when the council write to a bishop, they give him no higher title than monsieur.

grieve for posterity: they will find it extremely difficult to add to these very beautiful formulas. The Duke d'Epernon, the first of Gascons in pride, though far from being the first of statesmen, wrote, on his death-bed to Cardinal Richelieu, and ended his letter with"Your very humble and very obedient."

The dukes and peers have encountered more difficulty in acquiring possession of the title of monseigneur. The grand noblesse, and what is called the grand robe, decidedly refuse them that dis--Recollecting, however, that the carditinction. The highest gratification of nal had used only the phrase "very afhuman pride consists in a man's receiving fectionate," he dispatched an express to titles of honour from those who conceive bring back the letter (for it had been acthemselves his equals; but to attain this tually sent off) began it anew, signed is exceedingly difficult: pride always "very affectionate," and died in the bed finds pride to contend with.

of honour.

CERTAIN-CERTAINTY.

When the dukes insisted on receiving We have made many of these obthe title of monseigneur from the class of servations elsewhere. It is well, however, gentlemen, the presidents of the parlia- to repeat them, were it only to correct ments required the same from advocates some pompous peacocks, who would and proctors. A certain president actu- strut away their lives in contemptibly disally refused to be bled, because his sur-playing their plumes and their pride. geon asked-" In which arm will you be bled, monsieur?"-An old counsellor treated this matter somewhat more gaily. A pleader was saying to him-" monseigneur, monsieur, your secretary" He stopped him short:-"You have uttered three blunders," says he, "in many words. I am not monseigneur; my secretary is not monsieur; he is my clerk."

his dictionary.

I AM certain; I have friends; my fortune is secure; my relations will never abandon me; I shall have justice done me; my work is good, it will be well reasceived; what is owing to me will be paid me; my friend will be faithful, he has sworn it; the minister will advance mehe has, by the way, promised it ;-all To put an end to this grand conflict of these are words which a man who has vanity, it will eventually be found neces-lived a short time in the world erases from sary to give the title of monseigneur to every individual in the nation; as women, who were formerly content with mademoiselle, are now to be called madame. In Spain, when a mendicant meets a brother beggar, he thus accosts him:-"Has your conrtesy taken chocolate?"-This politeness of language elevates the mind, and keeps up the dignity of the species. Cæsar and Pompey were called in the senate, Cæsar and Pompey. Bu these men knew nothing of life. They ended their letters with vale-adieu. We, who possess more exalted notions, were, sixty years ago, "affectionate servants;" then, " very humble and very obedient;" and now, we" have the honour to be' so. I really

When the judges condemned L'Anglade, Le Brun, Calas, Sirven, Martin, Montbailli, and so many others, since acknowledged to have been innocent, they were certain, or they ought to have been certain, that all these unhappy men were guilty; yet they were deceived.

There are two ways of being deceived; by false judgment and self-blindnessthat of erring like a man of genius, and that of deciding like a fool.

The judges deceived themselves like men of genius in the affair of L'Anglade : they were blinded by dazzling appearances, and did not sufficiently examine the probabilities on the other side. Their wisdom made them believe it certain

bers exposed on the great road, when the assassin who had committed the murder and theft is put in prison for another crime, and confesses on the rack, to which he is condemned in his turn, that he only was guilty of the crime for which Martin had suffered torture and

that L'Anglade had committed a theft, is dispersed, his little property is confiswhich he certainly had not committed;cated, and scarcely are his broken memand on this miserable uncertain certainty of the human mind, a gentleman was put to the ordinary and extraordinary question; subsequently thrown, without succour, into a dungeon, and condemned to the gallies, where he died. His wife was shut up in another dungeon, with her daughter, aged seven years, who after-death. wards married a counsellor of the same parliament which had condemned her father to the gallies, and her mother to banishment.

It is clear that the judges would not have pronounced this sentence, had they been really certain. However, even at the time this sentence was passed, several persons knew that the theft had been committed by a priest named Gagnat, associated with a highwayman; and the innocence of L'Anglade was not recognised till after his death.

Montbailli, who slept with his wife, was accused with having, in concert with her, killed his mother, who had evidently died of apoplexy. The council of Arras condemned Montbailli to expire on the rack, and his wife to be burnt. Their innocence was discovered, but not until Montbailli had been tortured.

Let us cease advertence to these melancholy adventures, which make us groan at the human condition; but let us continue to lament the pretended certainty of judges, when they pass such sen

They were in the same manner certain.tences. when, by a sentence in the first instance, they condemned to the wheel the innocent Le Brun, who, by an arrêt pronounced on his appeal, was broken on the rack, and died under the torture.

There is no certainty, except when it is physically or morally impossible that the thing can be otherwise. What! is a strict demonstration necessary to enable us to assert, that the surface of a sphere is The examples of Calas and Sirven are equal to four times the area of its great well known: that of Martin is less so. circle ;—and is not one required to warHe was an honest agriculturist, near Barrant taking away the life of a citizen in Lorraine. A villain stole his dress, by a disgraceful punishment? and in this dress murdered a traveller whom he knew to have money, and whose route he had watched. Martin was accused; his dress deposed against him; the judges regarded this evidence as a certainty. Not the past conduct of the prisoner, a numerous family whom he had brought up virtuously, neither the little money found on him, nor the extreme probability of his innocence-nothing could save him. The subaltern judge made a merit of his rigour. He condemned the innocent victim to be broken on the wheel; and, by an unhappy fatality, the sentence was executed to the full extent. The senior Martin is broken alive, calling God to witness his innocence to his last breath: his family

If such is the misfortune of humanity that judges must be contented with extreme probabilities, they should at least consult the age, the rank, the conduct of the accused-the interest which he could have in committing the crime, and the interest of his enemies to destroy him. Every judge should say to himself,-Will not posterity, will not entire Europe condemn my sentence? Shall I sleep tranquilly with my hands tainted with innocent blood?

Let us pass from this horrible picture to other examples of a certainty, which leads directly to error.

Why art thou loaded with chains, fanatical and unhappy Santon? Why hast thou added a large iron ring on thy

miserable scourge? It is because I am certain of being one day placed in the first heaven, by the side of our great prophet. Alas, my friend, come with me to the neighbourhood of Mount Athos, and thou wilt see three thousand mendicants, who are as certain that thou wilt go to the gulf which is under the narrow bridge, as that they will all go to the first heaven!

Stop, miserable Malabar widow, believe not the fool who persuades thee that thou shalt be re-united to thy husband, in all the delights of another world, if thou burnest thyself on his funeral pile!-No, I persist in burning myself, because I am certain of living in felicity with my husband: my brahmin told me so.

Let us attend to less frightful certainties, and which have a little more appearance of truth.

{

{

This is a certainty very different from the others; they were only probabilities, and these probabilities when examined have turned out errors; but mathematical certainty is immutable and eternal.

I exist, I think, I feel grief-is all that as certain as a geometrical truth? Yes, sceptical as I am, I avow it. Why? It is that these truths are proved by the same principle that it is impossible for a thing to exist and not exist at the same What is the age of your friend Chris- time. I cannot at the same time feel and topher? Twenty-eight years. I have not feel. A triangle cannot at the same seen his marriage contract, and his bap-time contain a hundred and eighty detismal register: I knew him in his infan- grees, which are the sum of two right ancy; he is twenty-eight-I am certain of it. gles, and not contain them. Scarcely have I heard the answer of this man, so sure of what they said, and of twenty others who confirmed the same thing, when I learn that for secret reasons, and by a singular circumstance, the baptismal register of Christopher has been antedated. Those to whom I had spoken as yet know nothing of it, yet they have still the same certainty of that

which is not.

If you had asked the whole earth, before the time of Copernicus, Has the sun risen? has it set to-day? All men would have answered, We are quite certain of it. They were certain, and they were in

The physical certainty of my existence, of my identity, is of the same value as mathematical certainty, although it is of a different kid.

It is not the same with the certainty founded on appearances, or on the unanimous testimony of mankind.

But how, you will say to me-are you not certain that Pekin exists? Have you not merchandise from Pekin? People of different countries and different opinions have vehemently written against one ano{ther, while preaching the truth at Pekin; then are you not assured of the existence of this town? I answer, that it is extremely probable that there may be a Witchcraft, divinations, and posses-city of Pekin, but I would not wager sions, were for a long time the most cer- my life that such a town exists; and I tain things in the world, in the eyes of would at any time wager my life, that the society. What an innumerable crowd of three angles of a triangle are equal to people who have seen all these fine two right angles. things, and who have been certain of them! At present, this certainty is a little shaken.

error.

{

In the Dictionnaire Encylopédique a very pleasant thing appears. It is there maintained that a man ought to be as

certain that Marshal Saxe rose from the dead, if all Paris tells him so, as he is sure that Marshal Saxe gained the battle of Fontenoy, upon the same testimony.

species of plants and animals have been entirely destroyed-We have no murer— The Jews were forbidden to eat griffin and ixion: these two species, whatever Bochart may say, have probably disappeared from the earth. Where, then, is the chain?

Pray observe the beauty of this reasoning as I believe all Paris when it tells me a thing morally possible, I ought to believe all Paris when it tells me a Supposing that we had not lost some thing morally and physically impossible. species, it is evident that they may be Apparently, the author of this article { destroyed. Lions and rhinoceroses are has a disposition to be risible; as to our-becoming very scarce; and if the rest of selves, who have only undertaken this the nations had imitated the English, little dictionary to ask a few questions, we there would not now have been a wolf are very far from possessing this very ex- { left. tensive certainty.

It is probable that there have been races of men who are no longer to be CHAIN OF CREATED BEINGS. found. Why should they not have exTHE gradation of beings, rising from isted, as well as the whites, the blacks, the lowest to the Great Supreme-the the Caffres to whom nature has given an scale of infinity-is an idea that fills us apron of their own skin, hanging from the with admiration; but when steadily re-belly to the middle of the thigh; the garded, this phantom disappears, as ap- Samoyeds, whose women have nipples of paritions were wont to vanish at the a beautiful jet, &c. crowing of the cock.

Is there not a manifest void between the ape and man? Is it not easy to ima

thers, having intelligence, without our shape or the use of speech-one which we could tame, which would answer our signs, and serve us? And again, between this species and man, cannot we imagine others?

Beyond man, divine Plato, you place in heaven a string of celestial substances, in some of which we believe, because the faith so teaches us. But what reason

The imagination is pleased with the imperceptible transition from brute mat-gine a two-legged animal without feater to organized matter-from plants to zoophytes-from zoophytes to animals-from animals to men-from men to genii -from these genii clad in a light aerial body, to immaterial substances of a thousand different orders, rising from beauty to perfection, up to God himself. This hierarchy is very pleasing to young men, who look upon it as upon the pope and cardinals, followed by the archbishops and bishops, after whom are the vicars, had you to believe in them? It does not curates and priests, the deacons and sub-appear that you had spoken with the deacons, then come the monks, and the genius of Socrates; and though Heres, capuchins bring up the rear. good man, rose again on purpose to tell But there is, perhaps, a somewhatyou the secrets of the other world, he told greater distance between God and his you nothing of these substances. most perfect creatures, than between the Holy Father and the dean of the sacred college. The dean may become pope; but can the most perfect of the genii created by the Supreme Being become God Is there not infinity between them?

Nor does this chain, this pretended gradation, any more exist in vegetables and animais; the proof is, that some

In the sensible universe, the pretended chain is no less interrupted.

What gradation, I pray you, is there among the planets? The moon is forty times smaller than our globe. Travelling from the moon through space, you_find Venus, about as large as the earth. From thence you go to Mercury, which revolves in an ellipsis very different from