SOURCE: Lewis, Philip E. “A Problematic Work.” In La Rochefoucauld and the Art of Abstraction, pp. 15-54. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1977.

In this excerpt, Lewis offers an introduction to the problematical aspects of reading La Rochefoucauld, focusing on the difficult and ambiguous nature of the maxim.

Just as reading La Rochefoucauld has almost always meant reading the Maximes, reading the Maximes has almost automatically entailed reflecting on the nature of the maxim, on its status as a genre or type of statement. The apparently simple question—what is a maxim?—leads into a tangle of complex problems in La Rochefoucauld's work. To each answer, to each notion or definition of the maxim, corresponds a particular image or interpretation of La Rochefoucauld. Examining divergent perceptions of the Maximes and various accounts of the maxim proposed by La Rochefoucauld's readers will provide a convenient introduction to the problematics...