690 
*« They immediately answered him in 
the words of Vaudeville: " 
‘ Faut pas étre grand sorcier pour ca!” 
“* Be it so (added he). but perhaps it 
might be a little necessary for what re- 
mains to be tuld. Do you know what 
will arise out of that Revolution, what 
will occur to you yourselves, who are 
here assembled, and what will be the im- 
mediate effect and consequence of it? 
“Ah! let us see (savs Condorcet with 
his simpleton air, and saturnine smile), a 
philosopher is not sorry to meet with a 
prophet.’ 
“You M. de Condorcet*, you will ex- 
Conciergerie, where he was transferred, and 
attended upon him until the moment of his 
execution, in consequence’ of a sentence of 
the Revolutionary Tribunal. ; 
* Marie-jean- Antoine Nicholas Caritat, 
Marquis de Condorcet, was descended from a 
noble family, originally from che Comtat Ve- 
naissin. He was born at St. Quintin, on the 
i7th of September 1745, and having addicted 
himsel' ircm his youth to study, great hopes 
were entertained that he wovld distinguish 
himsel in the career of the sciences, to which 
he particularly directed his attention. 
He eccordingly became the scholar of 
D’Alembert, and in 1767, published jis first . 
work, ‘¢ Essaind’Analyse,” which procured 
for him a brilliant reputation, so that during 
the administ ation of M. de Turgot, he was 
selected to assist that minister in ail the ope- 
rations which required an extensive know- 
ledge of mathematics. 
Condercet was about this period admitted a 
member of the French Academy ; and when 
the Revolution occurred, his reputation ad- 
ded dignity and credit to° the popular cause. 
After acting a distinguished part, he was in- 
«cluded by Rotespierre in the proscription of 
nearly all the great and able men who re- 
Mained in France, and was obliged to seek an 
acylum in the house of a ‘emale Parisian, who 
had compassionated his misiortunes. 
In 1794, he was obliged to quit the place 
of his concealment, in consequence of the do- 
miciliary visits that then tok place, and hay- 
ang escaped from the capital in the disguise of 
a woman, he re-assumed his male attire, and 
endeavoured tu shelter himself in the house 
of a friend, supposed to have been Garat, 
who had actually kept him for a few days 
locked up in one of the public offices, for he 
was at that time a ministerof state. Having 
been disappointed, in consequence of the ab- 
sence of the owner, he was forced by hunger 
to enter the town of Chalmars, and being 
discovered devouring rather than cating some 
food he had purchased, he was seized and in- 
terrogated. 
On this occasion he passed by the name of 
Simon, and said he was an old servant out of 
employment; but on rifling his pockets, a 
Horuce was discovered, with marginal notes 
Retrospect of Freneh Literature—Miscellancous. 
pire, stretched out on the floor of a duns 
geon; you will die of the poison whicks 
you are to swallow, with a view of pre- 
serving yourself from the executioner; the 
poison, whicn the happiness of those times 
will force you to carry constantly about 
you.’ ; 
“ Great astonishment ensued; but it 
was recollected, that the good Cazotte had 
been accustomed’ to dream awake, and 
the langh increased. 
“ NM. de Cazotte (says one), the story 
you have just told us, 1s not half so amu- 
sing as that of your Diable Amoureur. But 
what devil has stuffed your head with 
this dungeon, poison, and executioner? 
What has all this to do with philosophy, 
and the reign of Reason ? 
‘¢ Tis is precisely what I now tell you: 
it is in the name of philosophy, of huma- 
njty, and liberty; and under the reign of 
that very Reason, that all this is to oc- 
cur; and it will in reality prove the reign 
of Reason, tor theu she will have her tem- 
ples, and morgover there will be no longer 
any other temples throughout the whole 
of France, at the period to which I now 
allude, than those erected to Reason.” 
“ On my word (says Chamfort, with 
a sarcastic grin), you will not be one of 
the priests of those days!’ 
“ I hope not (replies the other); but 
you M. de Chamfrt*, who are very wor- 
written in Jatin. Being suspected as an aris« 
tocrat, who had formerly servants of his own, 
he was confined ina cellar, where he was for- 
gotten during twenty-four hours, and is said 
by some to have died of hunger, and by others _ 
to have ended his days by means of poisony 
furnished by his friend Garat. During his 
concealment, he composed a work on arith- 
metic, which was published alter his death. 
* Sebastian-Roch Nicholas Chamfort was 
born in 1741, in a little village near Cler- 
mont en Auvergne. He is supposed to have been 
the fruit of illicit love: certain it is, that he 
never knew the name of his own father; but 
~he was greatly attached to his mother, and 
during the perplexitics and embarrassments of 
his youth, he took care that she should never 
be destitute, for he even deprived himself at 
times of the necessaries of life, in order to 
support her. - 
Having been admitted when a boy under 
the name o° Nicholas, into thecollege of Gras- 
sins, in quality of a Boursier, or pensioner 
he remained there, without distinguishin 
himself by any excellence whatsoever, until 
his third year. Being then in what is called 
the Rhetorical class, he obtained the four first 
prizes; he failed however, at his attempt at 
Latin verses; but at the next exhibition he 
gained the whole five, archly observing, 
‘¢ that on the former occasion he had lost by 
imitating Virgil, while on that he had proved 
successful, 
