fice to illustrate the discrepancies between sincerity and veracity often occurring in these Mémoires.

Marie was engaged to a physician named Gardanne; but the engagement was speedily broken,-and whether by Marie or by Gardanne is the question. According to the Mémoires, Gardanne having become. angered by the action of her father, Marie seized eagerly upon the occasion to break the engagement, and "was very glad to escape a union which they were in such haste to bring about"; but her letters of the time to Sophie Cannet give a very different view of the matter. According to these, after Gardanne's suit had been accepted, he made one visit and then, to the great mortification of Marie, who from day to day awaited anxiously news of him, did not appear again but, only after the lapse of nearly two weeks, sent a note dryly announcing that unfortunately, through respect for his father's wishes, he must decline the proposed union.

Another instance is that of the wooing of Marie by a young nobleman, La Blancherie. In the Mémoires this is presented as a transitory and insignificant episode: she ridicules the young man's personality, and the ending of the affair is by a few minutes' interview and his dismissal with contempt. The letters show, on the other hand, that the wooing was a matter of some years, that Marie saw La Blancherie often, had a deep regard for him, took a lively interest in his literary work, and regarded his financial status as the sole obstacle to their marriage. She writes: "I am constantly finding new points of contact in our way of looking at things; his soul, it appears, is the expression of my own. . . . La Blancherie knows that he interests me, he sees that I love him; I myself have

The brief final interview and haughty dismissal described by the Mémoires are shown by the letters to have been an earnest four hours' talk, La Blancherie departing undramatically as a relative of Marie's unexpectedly entered the room. The scene as described in the Mémoires is evidently fiction. Similarly, we derive a very different impression from the Mémoires and the letters as to Marie's early attitude toward M. Roland, her husband.

Madame Roland, although exceedingly intelligent and heroic, was proud and vain, and her Mémoires are filled with self-laudation; and so we may readily believe that, when memory lapsed, self-esteem stepped in to make good the deficiency. It is probable that humiliating recollections were often unconsciously repressed because displeasing, or sanctioned in consciousness only after distortion into a form acceptable to her self-love. Where, in an autobiography, the writer's memory fails, there he tends to fill in with romance, and this intercalation is not only false in fact but is also falsely colored by the circumstances of life at the time of writing; and of this breech in veracity there may be no consciousness whatever.

The autobiography is essentially a product of selflove; and this ever-active spirit contrives that admiration shall be due at every stage of the unfolding story. The autobiography is shot through and through with deceit, and for this, as we read, we must make continual allowance. It is only a presentation in permanent form of what, for the most part unconsciously, we all have been doing through the greater part of our lives, in response to the universal need,-talking and

doing to gain the approval and admiration of our fellow-men. "It is astonishing to read the letters of murderers, anarchists, and 'Apaches.' All show the need to write memoirs, to give their fame to posterity. All are childish and vain."

Influence of a Book and Its Merit.-The influence of a book is often greatly at variance with its merit. Books are constantly appearing which exert upon the public a wide and deep effect, although the hardy conclusions which disquiet or astound the reader may have small sanction in logic and the material of the premises upon which the conclusions supposedly rest may be in great part untrue. We are so readily the prey of suggestion. The acceptance of ideas depends so largely upon the time and place of their presentation, the language in which they are clothed, the personality of the mind through which they are offered. As, in conversation, the assurance and pompous manner of the speaker, his excellent choice of words, even a certain charm about his clothing, may carry all before him and convince us against our reason, so the fine words of a book, supported perhaps by a powerful prestige, may induce our enthusiastic acceptance of ideas which are commonplace or erroneous.

A great admirer of Nietzsche, Gustave Naumann, reduced the high-flown harangues of the famous Zarathustra to ordinary words, with the result that "One is often startled to perceive how empty and trite a large part of it is." We tend to think the water deep which is only muddy. The Proverbial Philosophy of Martin Tupper, a long series of didactic moralizings in blank verse (1838-1867), was extraordinarily popular for twenty-five years or more, many persons believing

that Tupper had "eclipsed Solomon." Then the work received appraisal at its proper worth. The blank verse was found to be merely prose cut into suitable lengths, and the philosophy to be egregiously commonplace. The work continued long to be a favorite butt of the critics.

Judgment is so difficult that our best authorities often, and in a measure always, mislead us. As the hero is said to be seldom such to his valet, so the "authority" cannot completely conceal his weaknesses and limitations from his associates and discerning pupils: they may revere his character and venerate his abilities, but they penetrate many of his disabilities and errors. A tilt between authorities may be a sad spectacle but it is always instructive. Let us take an instance of what one authority may feel impelled to say of the work of another.

Max Müller.-About thirty years ago, there appeared a new and revised edition of the well-known work on the Science of Language, by Prof. F. Max Müller, at the time "still the principal and most authoritative textbook of that study, as regards both methods and results." Prof. Müller had become an authority of the highest grade, one "who has established so tyrannical a sway in British public opinion, that even those most opposed to him hardly dare to raise a voice in public against him." His work a very eminent American philologist' has felt it a duty to criticize, in such destructive terms as follow.

He shows that "its facts are untrustworthy and its reasonings wrong, its influence is in a high degree

· Max Müller and the Science of Language: A Criticism. By Prof. William Dwight Whitney. New York, 1892. D. Appleton & Co.

damaging to the study of language and of everything concerned with language. . . . It is, in fact, no scientific work, and the name of 'science' should not appear in connection with it; it ought to be called by some such name as 'Facts and fancies in regard to language and other related subjects."" The "author must not be taken seriously by one who would learn from him; the incitement he brings must be an incitement to challenge his facts, compare and correct his reasonings, and question and refute his conclusions. The more the work is handled as a student in logic handles a collection of fallacies gathered for him to correct, the more profit will it yield." Certainly, such an arraignment by so competent and highly esteemed a critic is a revelation,-which sternly warns us not to put too much trust in the princes of learning.

Very Erratic or Insane Authors. -Very influential books are occasionally produced by authors who, at the time of writing, were highly erratic or even insane. A recognition of their condition, so destructive of trustworthiness, may yet be slow to destroy trust, for with the mental taint goes often an ease of argument and a peculiar dash which make a charm almost irresistible; and thereby the erroneous and pernicious elements of such works may prolong indefinitely their hurtful influence.

Weininger. -Thus, in 1903, there appeared a remarkable book, Geschlecht und Charakter, by Otto Weininger, at the age of twenty-three. It awakened much attention, was translated into English and other languages, and found many enthusiastic admirers, although, likewise, much adverse criticism. A Swedish