‘Do not believe I am insane, because reports to that effect have reached Paris. I can assure you that my acts, in my supposed state of madness, would be acts of wisdom on the part of certain ambassadors. I am, and shall continue to be, the faithful servant of the King, but I am not, nor do I wish to be, the sordid servant of certain nobles, his worthless varlets. To those who tell you that your son is a wild animal reared in the forests of Burgundy or of Champagne (M. de Guerchy has already said this to me), reply as I and my friend Jean Jacques do, that nature treats all animals abandoned to her care with a certain predilection that seems to show how jealous she is of this right. The horse, the cat, the bull, and even the ass, should they become ambassadors, are usually taller, of a more robust constitution, more vigorous, stronger, and more courageous in forest-land than when living amongst us; they lose half these advantages in becoming domesticated; and it might be said that all our concern in well treating and feeding those animals, only tends to degenerate them. It is the same with man; in becoming social and the slave of the great, or of those who ape to be so, he becomes weak, timid, servile, and his inactive and effeminate style of living suffices to unnerve his strength and courage.... As to my huge brother-in-law, Mr. Gorman,[157] let him attend to his own affairs in Paris, I do not need his advice or that of any other person.... Let everybody mind his own business. I know my own affairs, not a soul in the world shall poke his nose into them, or I will singe his moustache.... Since you cannot voler as birds do, as great ladies and great gentlemen do, I will turn over to you, with great pleasure, my pension of 2,000 livres on the privy purse, which, in addition to what you possess, will enable you to live comfortably in some convent near Paris.... If you wish to do what is best, remain quietly in your charming retreat at Tonnerre, and do not return to Paris unless the Court pays your travelling expenses in some surer way than it has mine, and remember, that whether men praise or blame you, you are none the better or the worse. _The glory of the righteous is in their conscience, and not in the praise of man._ I embrace you tenderly.... If you continue to weep, I shall have to supply you with some of the English East India Company’s pocket-handkerchiefs, and you will no longer be my mother if you are not the virtuous woman spoken of by Solomon, and which I have not as yet been able to find anywhere.... Be at ease—these enemies are harmless as sheep; they are mischievous rather than dangerous.’[158]