“Believe me, a man must entertain a tolerably good opinion of his own discrimination, and have the organ of self-esteem developed in no mean degree, who could sit down coolly with a pretension of giving to the world a correct, nay, even a _lucid_ life of Prince Talleyrand. He has out-lived the greater portion of the comrades of his youth, of whom even then he lived so far in advance, that it was said of him, he had ‘comrades and colleagues, but no contemporaries.’ Long before middle age, he had learned that, in public life, the one thing needful is discretion; while he it was who first published to mankind the discovery he had made, that ‘speech was given to man to conceal his thoughts.’ Therefore, it is not probable that there exists a soul who could ever have penetrated sufficiently into the wily statesman’s confidence ever to gain enough knowledge of his aims and views, to _account_ for the different changes in his principles, with which he has been so taunted by all parties. There is not a single epoch of his life which is not, besides, so bound up with anecdotes and incidents of the ‘times in which he lived,’ that often the most simple recital of facts, as connected with any adventure in which he may have been engaged, might give deep offence in other quarters, and cause recrimination, and perhaps even, in some cases, litigation, on the part of other high personages, whose names would have to be brought forward. “No man was ever made the object of so much unjust vituperation as the Prince de Talleyrand, of calumnies which have been accepted by the credulous with as much good faith as proofs of holy writ; while not one single _proof_ of perfidy or baseness has ever been brought against him—nothing but supposition, for the most part ill-sustained, and sometimes even completely belied by his subsequent conduct. Notwithstanding the apparent freedom with which he admitted all his _entourage_ to his intimates, how little is really known of his private life! Notwithstanding the greediness with which the public have always sucked in any stray anecdote, any fugitive _bon mot_, or axiom of this great man’s, yet how strangely ignorant do they still remain of his real character—how blind to the real grandeur of soul, which he ever displayed amid the most trying circumstances—where any other than he would have clutched at the shadow, he let both the empty substance and the emptier shadow pass, while he calmly paused for that which was to follow. The truth is this—the _mind_ is made the judge of the public character; the _heart_ alone can understand the value of the private one.