be impossible to do that without establishing the forbidden principle that every one has a right to his own views. PART VIII SUCCESS CHAPTER I PERSONAL SUCCESS [Sidenote: Success difficult for a French Gentleman.] The estimate of what constitutes personal success varies so much in the two countries, and in the different classes of each, that it is very difficult to arrive at any common standard. There is hardly any kind of success that a French gentleman desires and which is at the same time possible for him. He cannot desire success in trade, or even in any lucrative profession, because all the trades and professions are beneath him; his former possibilities of success lay in Court favour, but now there is no Court. It is _bon ton_ to despise official posts under the Republic. The gentry do not enter the Church, except occasionally the regular orders, and therefore cannot look for bishoprics. The fine arts and professional work in literature are of course infinitely beneath them. Nothing remains but the army and navy, with the drawback that both of these are already crowded with plebeian ability. [Sidenote: Success in the Middle Classes.] A class that has nothing to look forward to in life, nothing to aim at, but only to live from day to day in dignity, often on very narrow means, is deprived of the possibilities of success, and cannot really know the delightful meaning of the word. The middle classes know it,--the shopkeepers, manufacturers, professional men. Even the peasant knows it when he has fought his way to the purchase of a little farm. [Sidenote: Middle-class Frenchwomen.] [Sidenote: Madame Boucicaut.] [Sidenote: An untitled Queen.] [Sidenote: A true Success.] The women in the French middle classes, as is well known, often understand business quite as well as the men, and show quite as much energy, and govern great commercial houses with quite as much capacity both for large affairs and for details. Madame Boucicaut, of the _Bon Marché_ in Paris, will probably remain the typical Frenchwoman of business of this century. She attained undeniable greatness, not merely as the possessor of I know not how many millions, but as an untitled queen actually reigning over a great number of human beings and constantly applying a most powerful intellect to answer one question satisfactorily, “How can I do most good to all these people who work for me?” A lower nature would have tried to get above the shopkeeping sphere; her ambition was satisfied with remaining where she was and being a great worker and a great philanthropist.[85] Her life was indeed a success, not only in the exercise of power, but in the development of character. It has sometimes appeared possible that studious philanthropy may have its origin in a kind of remorse. In the case of Madame Boucicaut it may have been at first suggested by regret for the injury done to thousands of petty tradesmen by a colossal cheap establishment like hers.