THE FIRST SUPPLEMENT
[The following reflections are extracted from the first two
editions of La Rochefoucauld, having been suppressed
by the author in succeeding issues.]
I.--Self-love is the love OF self, and of all things
FOR self. It makes men self-worshippers, and if for-
tune permits them, causes them to tyrannize over
others; it is never quiet when out of itself, and only
rests upon other subjects as a bee upon flowers, to
extract from them its proper food. Nothing is so
headstrong as its desires, nothing so well concealed as
its designs, nothing so skilful as its management; its
suppleness is beyond description; its changes surpass
those of the metamorphoses, its refinements those of
chemistry. We can neither plumb the depths nor
pierce the shades of its recesses. Therein it is hidden
from the most far-seeing eyes, therein it takes a thou-
sand imperceptible folds. There it is often to itself
invisible; it there conceives, there nourishes and rears,
without being aware of it, numberless loves and
hatreds, some so monstrous that when they are brought
to light it disowns them, and cannot resolve to avow
them.
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