He was a man admirably well adapted to the
reigning system: that is to say, having a very general acquaintance
with facts, coupled with a total absence of principles in matters of
government; calling every fixed rule mere abstraction, and placing
his conscience in devotion to the reigning power. The first time I
saw him, he told me that talents like mine were made to celebrate
the emperor, who was a subject well worthy of the kind of enthusiasm
which I had shown in Corinna. I gave him for answer, that persecuted
as I was by the emperor, any thing like praise of him coming from
me, would have the air of a petition, and that I was persuaded that
the emperor himself would find my eulogiums very ridiculous under
such circumstances. He combatted this opinion very strongly: he
returned to my house several times to beg me, in the name of my own
interest, as he styled it, to write something in favor of the
emperor, were it but a sheet of four pages; that would be
sufficient, he assured me, to put an end to all the disagreeables I
suffered. He repeated what he told me to every person of my
acquaintance. Finally, one day he came to propose to me to celebrate
in verse the birth of the king of Rome; I told him, laughing, that I
had not a single idea on the subject, and that I should confine
myself to wishes for his having a good nurse. This joke put an end
to the prefect's negociations with me, upon the necessity of my
writing in favor of the present government.
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