2 LIFE AND WRITINGS OP BECLARD. 



The central schools, which had been established in the de- 

 partments, and from the heart of which radiated the instruc- 

 tion destined to enlighten a regenerated nation, were then in 

 all their activity. Beclard had himself inscribed as one of the 

 pupils of that formed at Angers, and he was soon remarked 

 for his proficiency and rapid improvement. Here, for the first 

 time, he discovered the advantages of study; here he was im- 

 bued with the love of the sciences, and here he learned to 

 worship them. Notwithstanding the illusions with which he 

 already fed his ardent soul, his relations saw with sorrow such 

 dispositions developed in him, and in order to keep him in 

 the rank in which he was born, they from time to time, tried 

 to make of him a clerk of a store, then of a lottery office, and 

 at last secretary to the director of the stage-office. Beclard 

 but ill fulfilled those employments for which he had great re- 

 pugnance, and but little aptitude; and indeed, he was consi- 

 dered by his employers as unfit for the occupations of busi- 

 ness. The disgust that he experienced in this situation, very 

 unsuitable to his natural inclinations, from this moment tinged 

 with melancholy the character of Beclard, which afterwards 

 redounded to his advantage, by early preparing his mind for 

 that kind of meditation which the profound cultivation of 

 science always demands. 



There is an epoch in the life of man, when as yet undecided 

 on the profession he shall embrace, he studies, as it were, the 

 part he is to perform on the theatre of the world, and prepares 

 himself beforehand to fulfil it well. This period in the life of 

 Beclard, was marked with such indolence, as reduced his 

 family to despair; he is fit for nothing, said they, and neglect- 

 ful of the future: this was owing to their having misunder- 

 stood his secret intentions, and to the want of the aliment they 

 required; but as soon as his father was enlightened by good 

 advice, softened by the solicitations of his son, who only wish- 

 ed to become a surgeon in the army, and had permitted him 

 to follow the medical courses established in the hospital of the 

 same city, from that moment did the young student see open- 

 ed before him a profession in which he ardently desired to 



