He was in the vein of
bitter frankness. He had not dined the preceding day. He seized me by
the arm, and, dragging me out of the circulating-library, said to me, in
a voice as abrupt as a feverish pulsation,--
"Don't listen to that old hag! All the books she offers you are
miserable stuff, fit at best for the pastry-cooks. Oh! you don't know
how success is won nowadays. I'll tell you. There is an assurance
society between the book, the piece, and the judge. Praise me, and I'll
praise you. If you will praise us, we will praise you. The public buys."
Then he went on with his bitter voice to utter a furious philippic
against our celebrated literary men. He attacked them all, with scarcely
an exception. This one sold his pen to the highest bidder; that one
levied contributions of all sorts on the vanity of authors and artists;
another was a mere actor; a fourth was nothing but a mountebank; a fifth
was a mere babbler; and so on he went through the whole catalogue of
authors. The illustrious literary democrats were Liberals and Spartans
only for the public eye. They cared as much about liberty as about old
moons: this one speculated on a title; that one on a vice; a third, to
possess a carriage and dine at Vefour's, had become the thrall of a
wealthy stockjobber who paid his virtues by the month and his opinions
by the line.
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