RUPTURE WITH BUFFON. 125 
But what is much less so, is forgetting that a vote is a 
decision, and that in this sense the academician, like the 
magistrate, may say to the suitor, whether an academician 
or not, “I give decrees, and not services.” 
Unfortunately, considerations of this sort, notwithstand- 
ing their justice, would make but little impression on the 
haughty and positive mind of Buffon. That great natu- 
ralist wished to have the Abbé Maury nominated ; his 
associate Bailly thought he ought to vote for Sedaine. 
Let us place ourselves in the ordinary course of things, 
and it will appear difficult to see in this discordancy a 
sufficient cause for a rupture between two superior men. 
The Unforeseen Wager and The Unconscious Philosopher, 
considerably balanced the, then very light, weight of 
Maury. The comic poet had already reached his sixty- 
sixth year; the Abbé was young. The high character, 
the irreproachable conduct of Sedaine, might, without 
disparagement, be put in comparison with what the pub- 
lic knew of the character of the official and the private 
life of the future cardinal. Whence then had the illus- 
trious naturalist derived such a great affection for Maury, 
such violent antipathies against Sedaine? It may be 
surmised that they arose from aristocratic prejudices of 
rank. Nor is it impossible but that M. le Comte de 
Buffon instinctively foresaw, with some repugnance, his 
approaching confraternity with a man formerly a lapi- 
dary; but was not Maury the son of a shoemaker? 
This very small incident of our literary history seemed 
doomed to remain in obscurity; chance has, I believe, 
given me the key to it. 
You remember, Gentlemen, that aphorism continually 
quoted by Buffon, and of which he seemed very proud,— 
“ Style makes the man.’’ 
