Be it so. But for casting a statue a little preparation is necessary. M. Le Moine employed nearly two years in casting that of Louis XV. "Oh! but this Jupiter Ammon was at most but three feet high. Go to any pewterer; will he not make you half a dozen plates in a day?" Sir, a statue of Jupiter is harder to make than pewter plates, and I even doubt whether your thieves had wherewith to make plates so quickly, clever as they might be at pilfering. It is not very likely that they had the necessary apparatus; they had more need to provide themselves with meal. I respect Lycophron much, but this profound Greek and his yet more profound commentators know so little of the arts--they are so learned in all that is useless, and so ignorant in all that concerns the necessaries and conveniences of life, professions, trades, and daily occupations that we will take this opportunity of informing them how a metal figure is cast. This is an operation which they will find neither in Lycophron, nor in Manetho, nor even in St. Thomas's dream. I omit many other preparations which the encyclopædists, especially M. Diderot, have explained much better than I could do, in the work which must immortalize their glory as well as all the arts. But to form a clear idea of the process of this art the artist must be seen at work. No one can ever learn in a book to weave stockings, nor to polish diamonds, nor to work tapestry. Arts and trades are learned only by example and practice. CATO. ON SUICIDE, AND THE ABBE ST. CYRAN's BOOK LEGITIMATING SUICIDE. The ingenious La Motte says of Cato, in one of his philosophical rather than poetical odes: _Caton, d'une âme plus égale,_ _Sous l'heureux vainqueur de Pharsale,_ _Eût souffert que Rome pliât;_ _Mais, incapable de se rendre,_ _Il n'eut pas la force d'attendre_ _Un pardon qui l'humiliât._ Stern Cato, with more equal soul, Had bowed to Cæsar's wide control-- With Rome had to the conqueror bowed-- But that his spirit, rough and proud, Had not the courage to await A pardoned foe's too humbling fate. It was, I believe, because Cato's soul was always equal, and retained to the last its love for his country and her laws that he chose rather to perish with her than to crouch to the tyrant. He died as he had lived. Incapable of surrendering! And to whom? To the enemy of Rome--to the man who had forcibly robbed the public treasury in order to make war upon his fellow-citizens and enslave them by means of their own money. A pardoned foe! It seems as if La Motte-Houdart were speaking of some revolted subject who might have obtained his majesty's pardon by letters in chancery. It seems rather absurd to say that Cato slew himself through weakness. None but a strong mind can thus surmount the most powerful instinct of nature. This strength is sometimes that of frenzy, but a frantic man is not weak.