M. Chasles does not deny the right of artizans to employ the pen. Ignoble or noble--a serf or a lord--whether he is called Burns, or Chasles of Orleans--whether he is a porter, a laborer, or even a drunkard, from the moment that there is seen upon his brow the radiant sign of genius, he is known. To wonder that an artizan is a poet, is to think it marvellous that beauty should bloom upon the cheek of a village maid. The gift is natural, and not acquired; and the mechanic who writes either prose or poetry must be judged with as much severity as if he were a king. It is not astonishing, therefore, that the author of the _Etudes_ judges severely the blacksmith of Sheffield. But the latter seems to have anticipated the severity of the critic, when he says with an accent of the most mournful bitterness: "Do not read me, ye who love elegance and grace. Alight not, ye butterflies, among thorns--nor upon rocks burning in the sun and beaten by the rains--you may tarnish the gauze of your beautiful wings. But you who honor truth, follow me. I will bring you wild flowers, gathered from the precipice, amid howling tempests." While we inhale the perfume of the _flowers of the heath_, we can honor truth, without being _foolish flies_, and without renouncing the love of the _elegant and graceful_. Not less did M. Chasles write to the _Journal des Débats_, a little before the revolution, in those generous words which we are happy to see again in his book: "It is for you, politicians, to find a remedy for the evils of society. The interests of the masses are in your hands--those who have not enough to eat, and too much work. The verses of famished workmen, which we cannot sing, we weep over. The muse of Cooper, of Elliott, and of Crabbe, is not a muse, but a fury. You are reminded, that in accumulating wealth in one direction, you are increasing poverty in another; and that the poverty which complains at first avenges itself afterward."