ary 1716 during a visit, which my mother made to her parents. I was soon afterward carried to Aubagne, where I passed my infancy.

At the age of four years I lost my mother, who died very young. Those, to whom she was known, described her to me as a woman, possessed of sense and talents. I had not the happiness to profit by her example; but I had more than once the consolation of weeping for her. My father

was inconsolable, and took me by the hand every morning and evening during a stay, which we made in the country, and led me to a solitary spot; there he made me sit down, burst into tears, and exhorted me to weep for the most tender of mothers. I wept, and alleviated his grief. These affecting scenes, long renewed, made upon my heart a profound impression, which has never been effaced.

My mother left two sons and two daughters, No family was ever more united, and more attached to their duties. My father had so strongly obtained the esteem of his fellowcitizens, that the day of his death was a day of mourning for the whole town. That of my brother produced afterward the same effect; and when I saw that inheritance of virtue pass to his children, I had not the vanity of birth, but I had the pride; and I have often said to myself, that I would not have chosen another family, had that choice been in my

power.

At the age of twelve years my father placed me in the college of the Oratory at Marseilles, where I entered in the fourth class. I passed through the classes under the direction of Father Raynaud, who has since been celebrated at Paris in the pulpit. He had been previously distinguished by rewards both for poetry and prose from the academy of Marseilles and the French academy. He had a great deal of taste, and took pleasure in exercising ours. His care redoubled in rhetoric; he often detained seven or eight of us after the rest of the class. He read to us our best writers; made us remark their beauties; increased our interest by asking our opinions; and sometimes he gave us a subject for composition.

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One day he demanded of us a description of a storm in French verse. Each of us brought his own. The next day they were read to a small number; he appeared contented with mine. A month afterwards he gave a literary exercise in a great hall of the college. I was too timid to take any part; I placed myself in the corner of the room, in which was soon assembled the best society of Marseilles, both men and women. Suddenly I saw every body rise up; it was at the arrival of M. de la Visclède, perpetual secretary of the academy of Marseilles, established some years before. He was highly esteemed. Father Raynaud received him, and seated him in the best place. I was then fifteen. In the numerous company were to be found the handsomest women of Marseilles in full dress; but I only saw M. de la Visclède, and my heart palpitated in seeing him.

A moment after, he rose up as well, as Father Raynaud, who, after looking on all sides, espied me in my corner, and made me a sign to approach. I lowered my head, and crouched down, and wanted to conceal myself behind some of my comrades, who betrayed me. At length, Father Raynaud having called me in a loud voice, I felt, as if I heard my sentence of death. All eyes were turned towards me. I was obliged to traverse the whole length of the hall upon narrow benches close together, falling at every step, on the right, on the left, before and behind, catching hold of gowns, cloaks, headdresses, &c. After a long and disastrous course I arrived near M. de la Visclède, who, taking me by the hand, presented me to the assembly, and told them of the description of a tempest, which I had given to Father Raynaud, and then made a most pompous eulogium on my pretended talents. I was the more disconcerted, as I had taken the description almost entirely from the Iliad of La Motte. At last M. de la Visclède was silent ; and my situation may be conceived by my answer, which I pronounced in a trembling voice. Sir,... Sir,... I have the honor “to be .... your very humble and very obedient servant, Barthelemy." I retired ashamed and in despair at having so much genius.

M. de la Visclède, whom I had an opportunity of knowing afterwards, zealous for the progress of letters, took a lively interest in young men, who discovered any inclination for literature; but he was so good and so easy, that he only inspired them with presumption.

I had destined myself for the ecclesiastical profession; but as Bebrunce, the Bishop of Marseilles, refused to admit those, who studied at the Oratory, I went through a course of philosophy under the Jesuits. In the first course the professor, wishing to give us an idea of a cube, after tormenting himself without success, took his three cornered cap, and said here is a cube. In the second the professor of the morning during three entire years and for two hours every day foamed and gesticulated, like one possessed, to prove to us, that the five propositions were in Jansenius.

I had happily formed a plan of study, which rendered me indifferent to the follies and extravagance of my new regents. Previous to leaving the Oratory I had desired one of my companions to communicate to me the sheets of philosophy, as they were dictated. It was the system of Des Cartes, which strongly displeased the Jesuits. I transcribed and studied in secret these papers. I applied myself at the same time to the ancient languages, and above all to the Greek, to facilitate the study of the Hebrew, the roots of which I disposed in technical verses, still worse, than those of the Greek roots of the Portroyal. I afterwards compared the Hebrew text with the Samaritan, and also with the Chaldean and Syrian. I occupied myself with the history of the Church, and particularly with that of the first ages.

These labors attracted the attention of the professor, charged with giving us every afternoon lessons upon the Bible, the councils, and the fathers. He was a man of merit; his favorable opinion flattered me, and to justify it I conceived the project of a thesis, which I intended to sustain during his presidency, and which was to embrace the principal questions upon the books of the holy scriptures upon the history and discipline of the Church. They were very nu

merous; cach article was to be the result of a crowd of discussions, and demanded a profound examination. Ten vigorous Benedictines would not have dared to undertake this immense enterprise; but I was young, ignorant, and insatiable of labor. My professor without doubt feared to discourage me in warning me, that the plan was too vast. I precipitated myself into the chaos; and I plunged so deep, that I fell dangerously sick. In the state of languor, in which I long remained, I desired only the return of my powers to abuse them again.

As soon, as they were restored to me, I entered the seminary of Marseilles, directed by the Lazarists, where I found a professor of theology, who was reasonable enough, and a meditation every morning, which was not always so; it was taken from a work, composed by Beuvelet. The day af ter my entering, the chapter, in which Beuvelet compares the Church to a vessel, was read to us slowly and by detached phrases. The Pope is the captain, the Bishops are the lieutenants, and then came the priests, deacons, &c. It was necessary to reflect seriously during half an hour on this paralle!; without waiting for the end of the chapter I found, that in this mysterious vessel I could be only a cabin boy. said so to my neighbor, who told it to his; and then suddenly the silence was interrupted by a general laugh, of which the superior insisted to know the cause. He had also the good sense to laugh.

Having a good deal of leisure at this seminary, I studied Arabic, and collected all the roots in the immense dictionary of Golius; and I composed detestable, technical verses, which gave me much trouble to retain, and which I forgot soon after. To unite the practice with the theory, I made an acquaintance with a young Maronite, brought up at Rome in the college of the Propaganda, and placed at Marseilles with one of his uncles, who was engaged in the commerce of the Levant. He came to me every day, and we talked Arabic. He told me one day, that I should render a great service to a number of Maronites, Armenians, and other A

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rabian catholics, who did not understand French, if I would announce to them the word of God in their own tongue, He had some sermons of a Jesuit preacher of the Propagan da. We selected the least absurd, and I learned it by heart, My hearers to the number of forty were assembled in a hall of the seminary; and, though they remarked in my pronunciation a foreign accent, they were in other respects so much gratified, that they earnestly asked from me a second sermon. I consented, and the next day some of them came and begged me to hear them confess; but I told them, I did not understand the language of Arabian sins.

This was only a farce; but what follows may serve, as a lesson against the quackery of erudition. My master had composed for my use a number of Arabian dialogues, which contained in questions and answers various compliments and other subjects of conversation, as for instance, Good day, Sir, how do you do? Very well at your service. It is a long time since I have seen you. I have been in the country, &c.

One day I was told, that some persons were inquiring for me at the doors of the seminary. I went down, and found myself surrounded by ten or twelve of the principal merchants of Marseilles. They brought with them a sort of beggar, who had come to them upon the exchange. He had told them, that he was a Jew by birth; that he had been raised to the dignity of a Rabbi; but, penetrated with the truths of the gospel, he had become a christian; that he was well acquainted with the oriental languages, and that to be convinced of it they might confront him with any learned man. These gentlemen added with politeness, that they did not hesitate to bring him before me. I was so much frightened, that I was in a cold sweat. I was trying to persuade them, that these languages were not learned for the sake of talking, when suddenly the fellow began the attack with an intrepidity, that at first confounded me. But I fortunately perceived, that he recited in Hebrew the first of the psalms, which I knew by heart. I waited till he had repeat