“Il est des noeuds secrets, il est des sympathies,
     Dont par les doux rapports les ames assorties
     S’attachent l’une a l’autre.”

[12]

     “Croire tout decouvert est un erreur profonde: 
     C’est prendre l’horizon pour les bornes du monde.”

ELECTION OF BAILLY INTO THE ACADEMY OF INSCRIPTIONS.

In speaking of the pretended identity of the Atlantis, or of the kingdom of Ophir under Solomon with America, Bailly says, in his fourteenth letter to Voltaire:  “Those ideas belonged to the age of learned men, but not to the philosophic age.”  And elsewhere (in the twenty-first letter) we read these words:  “Do not fear that I shall fatigue you by heavy erudition.”  To have supposed that erudition could be heavy and be deficient in philosophy, was for certain people of a secondary order an unpardonable crime.  And thus we saw men, excited by a sentiment of hate, arm themselves with a critical microscope, and painfully seek out imperfections in the innumerable quotations with which Bailly had strengthened himself.  The harvest was not abundant; yet, these eager ferrets succeeded in discovering some weak points, some interpretations that might be contested.  Their joy then knew no bounds.  Bailly was treated with haughty disdain:  “His literary erudition was very superficial; he had not the key of the sanctuary of antiquity; he was everywhere deficient in languages.”

That it might not be supposed that these reproaches had any reference to Oriental literature, Bailly’s adversaries added:  “that he had not the least tincture of the ancient languages; that he did not know Latin.”

He did not know Latin?  And do you not see, you stupid enemies of the great Astronomer, that if it had been possible to compose such learned works as The History of Astronomy, and The Letters on the Atlantis, without referring to the original texts, by using translations only, you would no longer have preserved any importance in the literary world.  How is it that you did not remark, that by despoiling Bailly (and very arbitrarily) of the knowledge of Latin, you showed the inutility of studying that language to become both one of your best writers, and one of the most illustrious philosophers of the age?

The Academy of Inscriptions and Belles Lettres, far from participating in these puerile rancours, in the blind prejudices of some lost children of erudition, called Bailly to its bosom in 1785.  Till then, Fontenelle alone had had the honour of belonging to the three great Academies of France.  Bailly always showed himself very proud of a distinction which associated his name in an unusual manner with that of the illustrious writer, whose eulogies contributed so powerfully to make science and scientific men known and respected.