To all this I reply distinctly, that I do not depreciate the merit of those authors; but what follows?  Nothing, except that if they played well on an inferior instrument, how much better would they have done on a superior one.  Therefore, we may believe that Tartini would have played on the violin far better than he did, if his bow had been long as that of Baillot.

I do not belong to the neologues or even to the romanticists; the last are discoverers of hidden treasures, the former are like sailors who go about to search for provisions they need.

The people of the North, and especially the English, have in this respect an immense advantage over us.  Genius is never restricted by the want of expression, which is either made or created.  Thus it is that of all subjects which demand depth and energy, our translations make but pale and dull infusions.

Once I heard at the institute a pleasant discourse on the danger of neologism, and on the necessity of maintaining our language as it was when the authors of the great century wrote.

“Like a chemist, I sifted the argument and ascertained that it meant: 

“We have done so well, that we neither need nor can do better.”

Now; I have lived long enough to know that each generation has done as much, and that each one laughs at his grandfather.

Besides, words must change, when manners and ideas undergo perpetual modifications.  If we do things as the ancients did, we do not do them in the same manner.  There are whole pages in many French books, which cannot be translated into Latin or Greek.

All languages had their birth, their apogee and decline.  None of those which have been famous from the days of Sesostris to that of Philip Augustus, exist except as monuments.  The French will have the same fate, and in the year 2825 if read, will be read with a dictionary.

I once had a terrible argument on this matter with the famous M. Andrieux, at the Academie Francaise.

I made my assault in good array, I attacked him vigorously, and would have beaten him had he not made a prompt retreat, to which I opposed no obstacle, fortunately for him, as he was making one letter of the new lexicon.

I end by one important observation, for that reason I have kept it till the last.

When I write of me in the singular, I gossip with my reader, he may examine, discuss, doubt or laugh; but when I say we I am a professor, and all must bow to me.

 “I am, Sir Oracle,

 And when I ope my lips, let no dog bark.”

          Merchant of Venice.

PHYSIOLOGY OF TASTE.

Meditation first.

The senses.

The senses are the organs by which man places himself in connexion with exterior objects.

Number of the senses.