to designate phenomena is never called into question.”³ One can agree that language does not seem to be a problem for La Rochefoucauld, but only if one considers carefully the nature of definitions.

Many seventeenth century writers, and especially Pascal and the authors of the Logique de Port-Royal, dealt with this problem, and made several distinctions. Pascal refuses to question the legitimacy of what he calls “définitions de nom,” saying that they “portent la pensée vers le même objet,” but he admits that people have differing opinions about that object, that such definitions do not serve to “en montrer la nature.”⁴ La Rochefoucauld would seem to agree, using words in their common usage, but going on to present certain opinions about the nature of the object referred to by the word.

Arnauld and Nicole made further distinctions, though they acknowledge their debt to Pascal.⁵ In discussing Pascal's other type of definition, “définitions des choses,” they point out that the most exact definitions of this type are truly definitions, since they “explique [nt] la nature d'une chose par ses attributs essenciels,” (p. 164), while less exact definitions of this type are only descriptions, giving “quelque connoissance d'une chose par les accidens qui lui sont propres, and qui la déterminent assez pour en donner quelque idée qui la discerne des autres” (p. 165). This also seems to be in complete agreement with La Rochefoucauld, whose distinction between defining and describing, between the “détail” and the “gros,” is quite similar to that between understanding the “nature d'une chose” and “les accidens.”

Arnauld and Nicole also point out another important distinction between “définitions de nom” and “definitions de la chose.” In the latter, “on laisse au terme qu'on définit … son idée ordinaire, dans laquelle on prétend que sont contenues d'autres idées.” In “définitions de nom,” however, “on ne regarde que le son, et ensuite on détermine ce son à être signe d'une idée que l'on désigne par d'autres mots” (p. 86). The epigraph of the Maximes (“Nos vertus ne sont, le plus souvent, que des vices déguisés.”) seems to be of this type, suggesting that the reader see virtue only as a sound which designates an idea better represented by other words. This interpretation is reinforced by maxim 187: “Le nom de la vertu sert à l'intérêt aussi utilement que les vices.”

This is a radical use of definitions and of nominal style, however, and it is not found in other maxims in such pure form.⁶ It seems as if La Rochefoucauld wanted to call the whole notion of definition into question at the outset, but to base the maxims themselves on “définitions des choses” where he could point out other ideas contained (hidden) in the term which served as subject of the maxim. Even a maxim like 149 (“Le refus des louanges est un désir d'être loué deux fois.”) is more a case of a connotation (it is “refus des louanges,” not simply “refus” which is in question) which, according to Lewis, “emancipates ‘refus des louanges’ from a merely referential function, and relocates it in the perspective of the message” (pp. 176-7). The transparency of “refus” is not questioned, but there is a certain opacity in this particular combination of signs.

The Maximes suggest that it is in the users of these signs, in human relationships, that this opacity is created, and not in language itself. The “choses,” the “objets” which are the subject of the Maximes are people's actions, which are both the effect of a “dessein,” of a motive, and the producers of effects on others:

Quelque éclatante que soit une action, elle ne doit pas passer pour grande lorsqu'elle n'est pas l'effet d'un grand dessein.

(160)

Il doit y avoir une certaine proportion entre les actions et les desseins si on en veut tirer tous les effets qu'elles peuvent produire.

(161)

Virtues (and vices, passions, and other similar abstract nouns) can be reduced to “un assemblage de diverses actions et de divers intérêts” (1), i.e., they are effects produced on others by our motives and actions. Therefore, one should not judge an effect without carefully studying the action which produced it, and this action in turn must be seen in light of its underlying motive.

Establishing the motive behind an action is basically the same as giving it a true “définition des choses,” defining it in such a way as to explain its nature by its essential attributes. It is the explanation, the definition, which counts, and without it neither an action nor the word which represents it can be understood. This is the goal of so many of the maxims, to point out the motive behind the action, the reality behind the appearance, the deep meaning beneath the surface, the interior beneath the exterior, the essence beneath the disguise. However, in some of the most successful maxims, La Rochefoucauld's revisions show a conscious effort to suppress the words which express the motive, to leave out the explanation. Indeed, the explanation is not always clear at first glance, and some maxims were reduced to the point where, as Will Moore says of maxim 106 (quoted earlier), they seem “impenetrable.”⁷

This maxim is not that impenetrable, though the explanation of why our knowledge is superficial (because there is an infinite amount of detail to know) is much clearer with the additional explanations and examples given in the Holland edition. Many of the maxims which did undergo important revisions, however, are “impenetrable” until the reader supplies the missing explanation or motive, which is usually present in the earlier version.

For example, maxim 78 (“L'amour de la justice n'est en la plupart des hommes que la crainte de souffrir l'injustice.”) is all that remains of four maxims from the first edition. One of these, number 88 in that edition, gives a definition of justice (“La justice n'est qu'une vive appréhension qu'on ne nous ôte ce qui nous appartient”), and goes on to explain, based on that definition, our motive in respecting the interests of others, and what people would do if not restrained by fear. The definitive version not only leaves out the explanation, but it also avoids a fairly radical “définition de nom” of justice, leaving only the phrase “amour de la justice” to be defined (in a true “définition des choses”) in such a way as to point out other ideas contained in it, to point out (without explanation) the motive behind an apparently virtuous action.

In maxim 119 (“Nous sommes si accoutumés à nous déguiser aux autres qu'enfin nous nous déguisons à nous-mêmes.”), a brief but significant phrase was omitted, a phrase which reveals the motive behind our action (in this case our disguises)—“pour acquérir leur estime.” This motive not only explains the first part of the maxim, but also points out that we fool ourselves because we want our own self-esteem.

Maxim 50 (“Ceux qui croient avoir du mérite se font un honneur d'être malheureux, pour persuader aux autres et à eux-mêmes qu'ils sont dignes d'être en butte à la fortune.”) also has a brief but significant variant. The maxim presents a situation similar to that in 119, since both others and ourselves are being fooled, but here the explanation omitted from the later versions is more the motive behind the effect than behind the action—people like to be considered “au-dessus de leurs malheurs.” It is also, of course, the motive behind the action, but in a less direct way than in 119.

Maxim 65 (“Il n'y a point d'éloges qu'on ne donne à la prudence. Cependant, elle ne saurait nous assurer du moindre événement.”) seems to suggest the lack of foundation of an action, rather than a hidden motive. This lack of foundation is explained in the variants of the first four editions—man is so subject to change that even the most prudent person can not be sure of carrying out a project successfully. This is a lesson similar to that of maxim 106, where infinite detail has much the same effect as constant change.

The variant of the first edition (much longer than the others) goes farther, however, from why the praise of prudence is unfounded to why man insists on praising it. There is indeed a hidden motive (the ever present amour-propre) and this is what “il faut conclure” from the fact that man praises prudence. This motive is omitted, like so many others, after the first edition, but the second edition makes it much more clear this motive is the true thrust of the maxim—the numerous examples of what one says about prudence are left out, and the new opening sentence has éloge, not prudence, as its main noun. Finally, in the fifth edition, the explanation of why prudence is not worthy of praise is omitted, lest the reader think he need go no farther, and we are left with the simple statement of a foolish human action—the reader now asks himself why man does this, rather than why the action is foolish.

This tendency to condense certain maxims to the point of omitting explanations, motives, definitions, and examples does not indicate that these aspects are not important. On the contrary, it is part of an effort to arrive at as exact a “définition des choses” as possible, to point out the additional ideas (represented by terms) contained in the original term (subject of the maxim). To do this, La Rochefoucauld employed a form and a style based on nominalization, abstraction and an absence of strong connectives, since any clauses of explanation or definition would detract from the “collisions” of terms, especially in the briefer, carefully condensed, aphoristic maxims.

With all these terms, and the ideas they represent, present in a highly condensed form, it is up to the reader to make the connections, that is, to supply the explanations, the proper definitions for each term. This is the process which the author underwent in formulating the maxim in its longer form—searching out relationships between certain terms. In condensing a maxim, however, La Rochefoucauld can avoid sounding dogmatic, leave open the possibility that there may be more than one satisfactory explanation, and be sure that the reader finds his own explanation, rather than accepting a ready-made one.

It is important to remember that the actions represented by these terms, and their hidden motivations, often seem less important to La Rochefoucauld than their effects, especially since these effects are often the result of chance. While maxim 160 insists on the importance of a motive which is “grand,” maxim 161 subordinates both motive and action to the effect produced. The honnête homme, like Pascal's “vrai habile,” should be able to recognize true merit, to discern good motives from bad, but he should also learn to live in a society where appearances, i.e., effects, are often more important than merit (166). Recent criticism has shown that La Rochefoucauld was more than just a cynical old courtier, blaming everything on amour-propre. His way of writing the Maximes isolates our actions for what they are—often based on hidden motives, often producing deceptive effects, but always part of a complex system of social interaction; the reader can then discern motives, understand effects, and know when to take our (and his) actions at face value and when to go beyond them.

The reader can do this because these actions are much the same as the language La Rochefoucauld uses in the Maximes; indeed, one of the seventeenth century meanings of actions is discours. Our discourse, even when everyone knows to what we refer, often hides ulterior motives, often produces calculated effects. If one knows which words really characterize the object to which they refer, and which are only sounds or surface descriptions, then La Rochefoucauld's language, and that of his contemporaries, is, as Foucault and others insist, transparent. It is only transparent on the surface, however, as the actions it describes are only transparent on the surface. At a deeper level, these actions are quite opaque—one must take into account disguised or unknown motives, the complexity of man and of human relationships, and the various effects which words and/or actions can have. La Rochefoucauld devised, especially in carefully reworked maxims such as those discussed above, a true écriture which is able to characterize these actions perfectly—it seems clear and transparent, but actually conceals great complexity: coexisting levels of interpretation; problematic relationships between words; and especially, meanings which are constituted as a reader begins to understand a situation for himself.⁸ If the reader is willing to look beneath the surface of the maxim, to how it is constructed and to its deeper meanings, he will find the essence of human behavior beneath the surface of our actions and our words.

Notes

1. La Rochefoucauld, Maximes, ed. Jacques Truchet (Paris: Garnier, 1967), number 106. Subsequent references to the Maximes, in their definitive version of 1678 or in variants taken from earlier versions, will be to this edition; Pascal, in fragment 512 of the Lafuma arrangement of the Pensées, states the problem thus: “Dans l'esprit de finesse, … les principes sont si déliés et en si grand nombre, qu'il est presque impossible qu'il n'en échappe. Or l'omission d'un principe mène à l'erreur.”

2. See Philip Lewis's excellent discussion of nominal style in his La Rochefoucauld: The Art of Abstraction (Ithaca, New York and London: Cornell University Press, 1977), chapter 4, especially pp. 176-7.

3. “Paradox and the Language of Morals,” Modern Language Review, 68 (1973), p. 32. See also Lewis, pp. 144-5.

4. “De l'esprit géométrique,” in Oeuvres complètes, ed. Louis Lafuma (Paris: Seuil, 1963), p. 350B.

5. Antoine Arnauld and Pierre Nicole, La Logique ou l'art de penser, 5th ed., 1683; rpr., ed. Clair and Girbal (Paris: P.U.F., 1965), p. 21. The first edition is from 1662.

6. None of the maxims in the 1678 edition is truly a “définition de nom” in which a word is given a completely new definition. Definitions are usually attenuated by the use of the indefinite article or of descriptive (often superlative) phrases.

7. W. G. Moore, La Rochefoucauld: His Mind and Art (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969), p. 35.

8. This conception of écriture is very similar to that presented in Philippe Sollers's essay on Mallarmé, “Littérature et totalité,” in Logiques (Paris: Seuil, 1968). It is interesting to point out that the importance given by La Rochefoucauld to the effects of actions, and his tendency to leave out what would seem to be the most important part of some maxims, are strikingly similar to Mallarmé's desire to “peindre non la chose, mais l'effet produit” and to evoke absences rather than presences.