SOURCE: Furber, Donald. “The Myth of amour-propre in La Rochefoucauld.” The French Review 43, no. 2 (December 1969): 227-39.

[In this essay, Furber analyzes La Rochefoucauld's concept of self-love, which the critic argues is at once a principle of unity and disunity in the human personality and a mysterious aspect of human nature.]

It is difficult not to accept the critical position which emphasizes the futility of searching for a system in the writings of La Rochefoucauld.¹ Contradictory in their affirmations, ambiguous in their moral point of view, paradoxical in their composition, the seventeenth-century Maximes and Réflexions diverses continue to pose an intricate problem of synthesis and comprehension. Having rejected the traditional viewpoints which saw in these writings a rigid, superficial thesis on human behavior, recent critics tend to agree with Will G. Moore who has stated flatly: “La Rochefoucauld n'est pas un auteur facile à comprendre.”² There is still, however, no consensus of opinion as to what exactly constitutes the difficulty in these works: the profundity of the notions with which La Rochefoucauld is dealing, the complexity of his expression, or even the possible incoherence and confusion in his thinking and beliefs. And yet most critics have accepted Pascal's opinion: “Tout auteur a un sens auquel tous les passages contraires s'accordent ou il n'a point de sens du tout” (257).³ Consequently, there have been attempts to integrate La Rochefoucauld into the history of the philosophy of the ego, to equate him with the conclusions of modern psychoanalysis, or to expose a unifying poetic structure in the Maximes.⁴

The crux of the problem, nevertheless, resides in the interpretation given to La Rochefoucauld's pivotal term of amour-propre. After all the texts have been considered, it really does not seem to be a synonym for self-interest, self-esteem, or self-importance. It cannot be contained within a definition of vanity, pride, or egoism. Neither can it accurately be explained as a substantial force, a passion, nor an energy. As described by La Rochefoucauld, amour-propre is a vast complex of emotions and forces, both positive and negative, and constitutes a strange and mysterious being in the very being of man himself. In his writings, La Rochefoucauld has dealt with this term as an anthropomorphic creature, has endowed it with a soul and a mind, and has attributed to it boundless and spectacular powers and activities. In essence, amour-propre is not only a component of human nature for La Rochefoucauld. It is a creature that dwells within our being from the moment of birth, destroying man's ability of achieving harmony and consonance with the self, and dispelling man's possibility of reaching his ultimate goal of tranquillity and self-realization. It is presented in the form of a mythological monster that must satisfy its appetites and the requirements of its own nature, and whose behavior is contrary to nature's laws of harmony.

In this paper, the mythological character of amour-propre will be examined. It will be shown that amour-propre is simultaneously a principle of both unity and disunity in the personality. This discussion will stress, throughout La Rochefoucauld's writings, the major factors that underlie this complicated internal dialectic, factors which range from paradoxes within the ideas of freedom and nature to a seemingly unreconcilable clash between ideals and reality. Finally, it will be proposed that, refusing to accept these enigmas, La Rochefoucauld has resolved them into a heuristic and directional idea of man's nature, with the ontological, anthropomorphic, and inevitably mysterious characteristics of a myth.

It is true, of course, that seventeenth-century readers did not need La Rochefoucauld in order to become conscious of the term amour-propre, or of some of its connotations. The term was in Christian tradition, was used by the libertins, and was also in common currency with the meaning of an exaggerated sense of self-importance.⁵ But La Rochefoucauld's use of this term is not merely a subtle variation on Augustinian personalism represented above all in the writings of Nicole.⁶ Neither is it synonymous with Bossuet's concupiscence.⁷ Finally, it does not have the same meaning as the amour-propre of common usage that one finds, for example, in Corneille's preface to Oedipe, published in 1659.

La Rochefoucauld's principal description of amour-propre is not in the body of the Maximes themselves, but rather in the celebrated suppressed maxim 563.⁸ The first sentence of this long baroque passage makes it clear that, for La Rochefoucauld, amour-propre is perfectly synonymous with amour de soi, or self-love, and might best be compared to Pascal's use of this term: it is the factor which causes man to deify himself and to tyrannize others.⁹ But whereas Pascal clearly differentiates among various orders of love, La Rochefoucauld gives every evidence that all love is of one order: “Il n'y a que d'une sorte d'amour, mais il y en a mille différentes copies” (74). La Rochefoucauld apparently separates himself from the Christian tradition and originates an interpretation of love in general: that love of others not only implies the love of self, but must be defined as merely a form of self-love, to the extent that “love of others is only love of ourselves.”¹⁰ La Rochefoucauld's definition of love in general, considered in the light of the body of his thought, is seemingly an ironic definition of love of self: “Il est difficile de définir l'amour: ce qu'on en peut dire est que, dans l'âme, c'est une passion de régner; dans les esprits, c'est une sympathie; et dans le corps, ce n'est qu'une envie cachée et délicate de posséder ce que l'on aime après beaucoup de mystères” (68). Like all its copies, love of self is a commerce that constantly seeks to gain and conserve, never to give or to lose.¹¹ In La Rochefoucauld, therefore, it would be wrong to interpret the true goal of amour-propre as the possession of others. Self-love is the quest for the self by the self, and the moralist asserts “que c'est après lui-même qu'il court, et qu'il suit son gré lorsqu'il suit les choses qui sont à son gré” (563). To rule oneself, to correlate with oneself, to possess oneself are, therefore, the inexplicable but nevertheless principal necessities in the notion of self-love. Every act of self-love is motivated by a desire for self-possession; each act is the fulfillment of an opportunity for self-realization, or an attempt to avert a threat to this desire. But man cannot possess himself as he would like to. The behavior of amour-propre is erratic, determined, and mysterious, never mastered and consonant. Because of amour-propre, “dont toute la vie n'est qu'une grande et longue agitation” (563), man is not free to love, and therefore possess himself, as he feels he must.

If freedom is defined as the power to organize life according to will and reason, the Maximes offer persuasive evidence that the belief in such a power is merely an illusion. Rigorously determined by natural laws, manipulated by the capricious play of circumstances, mysteriously shaped by forces that escape understanding, the man who recognizes his image in these writings will be left with a sense of the utter impossibility of exercising a natural freedom that will enable him to choose his fate or to solve the enigma of the self. Man must remain a prisoner of his essential nature. And of all the things in nature that enslave mankind, nothing is more powerful than the compelling force of self-love. It is nevertheless true that, by another definition of freedom, from the viewpoint of a Montaigne, a Gide, or an existentialist, La Rochefoucauld is not in any sense describing a factor that limits our possibilities; on the contrary, his description of self-love suggests the entire range of natural freedom itself. Amour-propre is wondrously flexible and “ses souplesses ne se peuvent représenter …” Its possibilities are infinite: “il vit partout et il vit de tout, il vit de rien” (563). In short, the Maximes clearly depict man's dilemma: the infinite range of natural freedom does not satisfy his idea of willful freedom.

It would be, therefore, an absolute error to read La Rochefoucauld's long description of self-love as a paean to the mercurial freedom of the personality, to the infinite variety of human nature. Absolute disponibilité, and the natural ability to free ourselves from a static form of existence are not the desiderata of the Maximes. It is true, of course, that self-love is not systematically denounced by La Rochefoucauld. At times, “c'est un prix que nous nous donnons imperceptiblement à nousmêmes” (398). It is not always reprehensible in its effects: “Il est aussi honnête d'être glorieux avec soi-même qu'il est ridicule de l'être avec les autres” (307). Amour-propre is denounced because it cannot be controlled, because we cannot calculate its effects: “Ce n'est pas assez d'avoir de grandes qualités; il en faut avoir l'économie” (159). Man is not the master of his own freedom.

It is, however, not only the idea of willful freedom which is confounded by a belief in the existence of amour-propre. Beneath all the apparent contradictions in La Rochefoucauld's writings, there are several notions which never vary. The moralist believes in a system of absolute truths which are universally and eternally valid. He maintains a belief in universal harmony, and in the necessity for proportion and consonance in the attainment of a souverein bien. Systematically, no one of these beliefs can be logically reconciled with a belief in the existence of an uncontrollable amour-propre.

There can be no doubt that La Rochefoucauld believes in the fundamental harmony of nature. Our moods follow “un cours ordinaire et réglé” (297). Nature has assigned limits to our virtues and vices (189). There is always compensation for the evils brought about by bad fortune (52), and no one vice can assume supremacy in our lives, since all vices tend to temper and to neutralize each other (195). It follows, therefore, that a free consent to natural laws, a willing submission to passion, “un art de la nature dont les règles sont infaillibles” (8), is not at all the ideal for mankind. On the level of ordinary, daily living, nature's laws may indeed suffice to avoid any great catastrophe and disproportion. On this level, an epicurean philosophy is, if not infallible, at least a reasonable and frequently efficacious adjustment to life's problems.¹² If this philosophy is considered fundamental in the Maximes, it may be concluded that La Rochefoucauld, like La Fontaine, is an epicurean who “voudra utiliser toutes les ressources humaines et individuelles pour en tirer quelque bien.”¹³ But the parallel between the ideals of the two friends should not be extended too far. There is no Hymne à la volupté in the writings of La Rochefoucauld. His epicureanism is at best limited to the useful and the necessary in life, but does not suffice for satisfaction and happiness. Nothing, in fact, is more systematically denounced by the author of the Maximes than a life of mediocrity and superficial pleasures.¹⁴ The goal of life is not pleasure, but self-possession.

To attain this goal, all must be suitable, harmonious and proportioned. Our “airs and manners” must be in accord with natural qualities (“De l'air et des manières,” p. 507). Conversation must be adjusted to the group in which it is spoken (“De la conversation,” p. 510). Only perfect balance and harmony lead to a true appraisal of things, and false judgment occurs because, in estimating things, “on ne les fait point rapporter à nous en la manière qui leur convient, et qui convient à notre état et à nos qualités” (“Du faux,” p. 520). A great mind judges accurately because it “agit toujours également et avec la même activité” (“De la différence des esprits,” p. 527). For these reasons, the wonder provoked by famous events of the century is caused by evidence of a disproportion between potentialities and improbable, illogical consequences in the lives of great figures of the day. Marie de Médicis, after a life of splendor and grandeur, “est morte de misère, et presque de faim, à Cologne, après une persécution de dix années” (“Des événements de ce siècle,” p. 530). The inability to apply the verb convenir in these instances baffles human logic.

It is perfectly true, of course, that the notion of what is “suitable” is far more a question of aesthetics, or even morals, than one of metaphysics, although Platonism does unite the several domains. La Rochefoucauld's ideas on suitability were echoed in the nineteenth century by Flaubert, for example, who describes Emma Bovary's beauty as “une harmonie entre le tempérament et les circonstances.”¹⁵ In the seventeenth-century maxims, aesthetics and metaphysics are certainly allied.¹⁶ “Rien ne doit tant diminuer la satisfaction que nous avons de nous-mêmes que de voir que nous désapprouvons dans un temps ce que nous approuvons dans un autre” (51), writes La Rochefoucauld. Dissatisfaction that results from a change in taste can be explained only by a belief in a standard of absolute values that are universal and eternal. Inconsistency in taste is thus a deviation from truth itself. And what applies to taste applies also to all human values. In a universe of essentialism, man alone is in constant relativity. An absurd relationship exists between the inevitable fluctuation of man's modalities, and the static, fixed nature of essential ideas. For this reason alone, man's nature would be absurd. “On est quelquefois aussi différent de soi-même que des autres” (135), and this difference is not on the level of superficial incongruities, observable contradictions, even radical antinomies which could in some way be resolved into a unified solidarity, as is the case with the doctor Desplein of Balzac's La Messe de l'athée, or explained by La Rochefoucauld's own belief in the existence of hidden reasons behind incomprehensible behavior (163). In La Rochefoucauld, these incongruities represent seemingly ontological differences that cannot be comprehended or explained in any way. The realizations of our wildest dreams of metamorphosis and diversification of character are, therefore, never the ideal. La Rochefoucauld systematically posits an ideal of self-consistency, rather than the Romantic fantasy of a dream come true whereby, naturally and even inevitably, a single man could play the entire cast of the human comedy without benefit of beards and putty. The freedom offered by nature itself might lead to such a goal, but this is not the idea of freedom conceived by the seventeenth-century moralist. Reality and ideals are in radical contradiction.

Nowhere in La Rochefoucauld's writings is this contradiction between ideals and reality more apparent than in the maxims and reflections dealing with heroic values. La Rochefoucauld has been considered, with the Jansenists, as one of the contributors to the “démolition du héros” in the seventeenth century.¹⁷ But it is not the absolute heroic ideal of the aristocracy that he is denouncing, rather the false heroism of his own post-Fronde era. He is denouncing not “le boeuf,” but rather “la grenouille.” His only real criticism of this ideal bears on the inconsistency between the goals of the généreux and their true motives, or on the fact that the effects of a seeming act of générosité have been accidental rather than the result of a sure and conscious design. Although amour-propre renders suspect or obscure all designs and motives, La Rochefoucauld still believes, nevertheless, in the reality, or at least the possibility, of a generous action founded on unquestionably generous motives. The distinction between authentic and suspect examples of this consonance between motive and action must be, however, more intellectual than empirical; the reality of the heroic ideal cannot be confirmed by experience.

Throughout his reflections on great heroes, La Rochefoucauld insists on one central idea: a perfect harmony between chance and nature. Fortune is acting “de concert” with nature; qualities and their manifestations have “proportions qui conviennent à leur dessein” (“Des modèles de la nature et de la fortune,” p. 522). Arrangement, consistency, unity, conformity, composition, and suitability: these are the distinctive features in the lives of heroes. For Pascal, such men were not suspended in the air, but had “les pieds aussi bas que les nôtres” (770). For La Rochefoucauld also, true heroism is not merely an abstraction; neither is it illustrated only in distant history. True heroism is observable in the very persons of Turenne and Condé. But the long parallel in which he discusses these two soldiers completely omits the psychological penetration and the investigation of motives which are the characteristics of the Maximes, and concentrates only on the paraître (“Des modèles …,” pp. 524-525). Turenne and Condé emerge from this parallel as idealized figures, models of superhuman indefectibility, who could not be encountered in reality. Whether he is treating the lives of heroes, or the truths of life itself, La Rochefoucauld can neither forsake his ideals, nor close his eyes to the experiences which belie them. When necessary, therefore, reality must be transformed in some way to retain both the truth of the experience and the permanence of the ideals. Just as the myth of heroism is found in the description of Turenne and Condé, the myth of human nature itself is found in the description of amour-propre, which resolves, in all aspects of man's existence, the contradiction between an ideal of harmony and equilibrium, and the reality of disharmony and strife.

It is true, on one hand, that amour-propre works to maintain equilibrium in nature, as the character Mengo, for example, points out in the first act of Lope de Vega's Fuenteovejuna. In the suppressed maxim 563, La Rochefoucauld also clearly indicates that self-love “dans le même temps qu'il se ruine en un endroit, il se rétablit en un autre.” Amour-propre seeks constantly to persevere in its being, “enfin il ne se soucie que d'être.” But the character in the Spanish play and the French moralist do not arrive at the same conclusions. In Fuenteovejuna, self-love works only to achieve pleasure. In La Rochefoucauld, self-love destroys peace of mind, repose, and stability. The existence of self-love, therefore, thwarts man's quest for true happiness. By hindering a subjective preference for peace and tranquillity, self-love is apparently contradicting nature's own laws of harmony. Amour-propre, indeed, introduces discord and strife into a universe that seemed everywhere ruled by the equative laws of universal harmony. Self-love is a stranger to the laws of the universe, and yet it must be a fundamental component of nature. This essential paradox does not, however, remain unresolved in La Rochefoucauld. The moralist's observations and insights lead him to discover self-love as an agent of strife in nature. But his belief in universal harmony reaffirms itself in all his writings. Solicited by two beliefs that are equally strong and equally valid, La Rochefoucauld could have accepted the antinomy as an inevitable paradox of life. On the contrary, it will be proposed that, instead of acquiescing to this enigma, the moralist has found a resolution by treating amour-propre not as a psychic or metaphysical reality, but indeed by treating it as a myth.

Amour-propre in La Rochefoucauld is, evidently, an illustration of the classical tendency to present psychic complexity as a mechanism. It is, moreover, an example of the materialistic manner of conceiving the idea of synthesis. Presented as an anthropomorphic creature, it is typical of one of the salient features of French classical literature, found above all in the writings of préciosité. From the very first appearance of the term amour-propre, this feature is obvious in the Maximes. Self-love is first personified: “L'amour-propre est le plus grand de tous les flatteurs” (2). Next it is situated in space: “Quelque découverte qu'on ait faite dans le pays de l'amour-propre, il y reste encore bien des terres inconnues” (3). On this level, self-love has only as much, but no more reality than the abstractions of the Carte du Tendre. But, in maxim 563, amour-propre is compared to a phenomenon from the real physical world, the flux and reflux of the sea, which gives a “fidèle expression” of its actions. Self-love is, in fact, systematically characterized by physical actions and has been placed in the world of matter. Dormant or active, virtual or manifest, self-love perseveres in its being as if it were a material object, a substantial form of reality. Individually, of course, each manifestation of self-love is a phase of psychic reality, whether the act be a thought, a feeling, an instinct, or an appetite: “il voit, il sent, il entend, il imagine, il soupçonne, il pénètre, il devine tout” (563). But neither separately, nor collectively can these acts in truth constitute a thing-in-itself, an appreciable object, above all an object which is autonomous and self-sufficient.

La Rochefoucauld is dealing, then, with the essentially dynamic unity of the human complex, which he characterizes by eternal motions and exemplifies by the constant agitation of the sea. Because what he is describing is its own raison d'être, because it is “en lui-même son commencement et sa fin” (563), it is a reality in itself and by itself, like truth, infinity, or even God. It is incontrovertibly a metaphysical reality. But, at the same time, because it summarizes man's psychology, it is indeed a psychic reality. The use of one term, however, to summarize such a wide range of psychic behavior can be justified only by evident relationships between all the acts taken as a whole. The individual acts of self-love, however, differ widely in form and structure: “ses transformations passent celles des métamorphoses, et ses raffinements ceux de la chimie” (563). To propose a link between seemingly unrelated acts is to posit the existence of a mysterious being which persists, invisibly, under the ebb and flow of psychic behavior. Self-love is, then, not really a dynamic force or energy, but rather an invariable, static being whose essential nature remains constant, although its form changes infinitely. As Sartre has characterized the image in Bergson, only “la forme qu'il se donne se défait et se refait sans cesse.”¹⁸Amour-propre obviously cannot be seen, nor felt, nor observed. It is not simply a fact of life, adduced from empirical observation or psychological analysis. Most of its actions cannot even be perceived in or by the self: “là il est souvent invisible à lui-même” (563). Above all, there is no possibility of experiencing these actions in a totality which would unquestionably lead to an inevitable synthesis. Specifically, the very composition of maxim 563 does not convey the apprehension of a single reality. In sum, the maxim is an analytical construction, additive and accumulative. It can, however, be broken down into a series of individual subjects which do not, however, appear tightly arranged in any particular pattern. From sentence to sentence, and from clause to clause, there is everywhere separation, discontinuity, and particularization.¹⁹ Taken as a whole, therefore, it is in no way directly applicable to a unity in nature. As the term amour-propre is used throughout the Maximes, it appears at times to be synonymous with other terms which, by definition, are only parts of the whole, such as self-interest (34), pride (35), or vanity (443), but which could reasonably form an integrated complex. But amour-propre is also satisfaction, austerity, and self-destruction. The external relationships between all the isolated examples of self-love are not, therefore, completely evident; the internal relationships are not convincingly provable.

Self-love, in the Maximes, encompasses wide poles, and goes from the heights of glory to the depths of self-abasement. It would be impossible to experience these modalities in an essential state where they would be substantially unified. On the contrary, experience reveals these moments in the life of self-love as distinct, separable, even mutually exclusive, and no primary evidence can be offered to substantiate La Rochefoucauld's description of self-love. As a concept, amour-propre does not designate any empirical experience that will allow it to be accepted unquestionably as ontologically significant.

It is true, however, that self-evidence is not the only test for reality. A concept that proves its resistance to doubt can also be affirmed.²⁰ In fact, primary evidence is seldom the criterion for truth in La Rochefoucauld, but rather analogy and comparison between immutable truths in nature and any other phenomenon. Truth is always equal to itself, and “le vrai, dans quelque sujet qu'il se trouve, ne peut être effacé par aucune comparison d'autre vrai” (“Du vrai,” p. 503). All truths have, therefore, normative values in nature, which has been defined as a vast system of coherence and consonance. But La Rochefoucauld's observation of the human condition led him to the conclusion that man's nature is multiple and disparate, not coherent and consonant. His idea of the consistent cadence of nature's own rhythm and the chaotic tempo of man's behavior were, therefore, in profound contradiction. His definition of amour-propre is, in a sense, a reconciliation between the evident and the incomprehensible, a means of retaining at the same time a belief in the fundamental unity of nature, and the observable truth of its multiplicity.²¹ This definition may be described as an endeavor to form a synthesis based on elements, discernible or relational, which appear to have been furnished by a contingent observation of natural phenomena and man's behavior. The observation itself, however, is aprioristic, based on a definition of love as possession, of possession as consonance, and ultimately, of consonance as the fundamental law of nature. Amour-propre exists, since to affirm its existence is to resist any doubt about the laws of nature. But once its existence has been established, its continuing actions once again render suspect the fundamental truths of life, into which it really cannot be integrated.

Having delved into the darkness of human motives, and having refused to lose sight of the universal harmony in which he steadfastly believes, La Rochefoucauld has brought back to light a term, amour-propre, which paradoxically restores man's unity by the very description of his multiplicity. By subsequent analogies and comparisons, he has made this term encompass a full range of psychic phenomena, to encompass human nature itself. But instead of conveying the presence of a single reality, amour-propre appears more as an absence, a figure for what it hides—the lack of harmony between man's motives and his behavior. La Rochefoucauld has tried, positively, to convey the active presence of self-love by comparing it to the discernible, physical movement of the sea. But amour-propre affirms its existence negatively; it serves to explain the impossibility of mastering and controlling motives and their effects. Behind the mask of “la sagesse païenne” is not man's true face, but rather the figure of self-love whose presence only intensifies the absence of natural means for arriving at truth and harmony.

It should be said at this point, however, that the achievement of personal harmony is not an impossibility in La Rochefoucauld. The absence of natural means towards this goal can be supplanted by art, by the voluntary adoption of a mask which imposes on the individual a control and an equilibrium which nature itself does not seem able to provide, the mask of honnêteté. The Maximes have indeed been seen primarily as a “manuel d'honnêteté,”²² which proposes, as a plan for living, “un ‘plaquage’ voluntaire du faux sur le vrai.”²³ But if this recommendation were followed with consistency, we would exist only as a mask throughout every moment of our social living: “C'est être veritablement honnête homme que de vouloir être toujours exposé à la vue des honnêtes gens” (206). If, however, true honnêteté is a calculated, but perfected coordination between being and behavior, it seems inevitable that this constant pose would destroy forever the possibility of ascertaining the truth about the self which would allow us to distinguish accurately between nature and art, the actual countenance and the mask: “Nous sommes si accoutumés à nous déguiser aux autres qu'enfin nous nous déguisons à nous-mêmes” (119). For ourselves, as for others, at this point the true self would cease its conscious existence. Living in a state of deception about our own nature, the application of the mask of the honnête homme would constitute one lie compounded by another. The code of honnêteté does not permit, therefore, a willful adjustment between what we are and what we appear to be.

Masks and poses are, moreover, an impediment, rather than an accommodation to coordinated behavior: “Rien n'empêche d'être naturel que l'envie de la paraître” (413). The honnête homme will, above all, never attain La Rochefoucauld's highest goal, the “grandeur tout intérieure”²⁴ which remains at the summit of aristocratic codes. Such goals can only be achieved in a solipsistic state, as can true humility, “la véritable preuve des vertus chrétiennes” (358), the highest virtue that La Rochefoucauld recognizes. Man should not nullify himself before others: “C'est une grande folie de vouloir être sage tout seul” (231). But the ideal moral goals require the absence of witnesses, whether one is a soldier: “La parfaite valeur est de faire sans témoins ce qu'on serait capable de faire devant tout le monde” (216), or a martyr: “Les véritables mortifications sont celles qui ne sont point connues; la vanité rend les autres faciles” (536). Even if the self is the only witness to its own actions, all virtues can be suspect: “Il est aussi facile de se tromper soi-même sans s'en apercevoir qu'il est difficile de tromper les autres sans qu'ils s'en aperçoivent” (115). The eternal movement of amour-propre continues in solitude and can even contaminate an act of profound abnegation. To become, therefore, the honnête homme, constantly on parade, never conscious of the hidden self which lurks in the shadows, to arrive at a state of perfect honnêteté that no longer requires thought or reflection is, in a sense, to forget the hidden self, to render it absent. The mask of honnêteté, in this way, would become a figure for the absence of the self, rather than its manifestation. In this way, the Maximes lead toward a reduction of the self, rather than a development. Our whole conscious existence would be finally, as Pascal has stated, that of “l'homme qui se succombe à lui-même” (795). In the state of ideal honnêteté, the monster of amour-propre could finally be stifled.

In La Rochefoucauld, then, the description of amour-propre translates the apparent need for material signs of coherence in the human personality, and the driving desire to restore some kind of order to human contradictions. The movements of self-love are self-compensatory, and the movements of the conscious self are radically disharmonious. Self-love safeguards, consequently, a belief in rhythmic movement as the fundamental reality of nature, and at the same time it assures the continuity of the self. But far more than being the expression of an ordering process for the disparate modalities of the personality, the mysterious creature of amour-propre translates man's consciousness of an alienation from the self. It reveals, therefore, an approach to the reality of nature, but at the same time a breach between our idea of nature and our idea of the self. Far more than designating the reality of something within human nature, it communicates a metaphysical experience: the awareness of the presence of urges for self-possession, and the absence of the power for self-realization. It encompasses, positively, what the beggar in Bernanos' L'Imposture called “mon sacré polichinelle,”²⁵ and negatively, what Henri Peyre has seen in the Maximes as “the strange inability to tell the truth.”²⁶ Because it resolves these widely disparate experiences, the description of amour-propre “comble une lacune dans l'explication que l'homme se donne de la vie.”²⁷ Because his description fills this breach, signifying at the same time a presence and an absence, an urge and the experience that it is impossible to fulfill this urge, amour-propre in La Rochefoucauld is a wondrous and enduring myth.

Notes

1. See Edith Mora, La Rochefoucauld (Paris: Seghers, 1965), p. 71.

2. W.-G. Moore, “La Rochefoucauld: une nouvelle anthropologie,” RSH, LXXII (Oct.-Dec., 1953), p. 302. See also Morris Bishop, The Life and Adventures of La Rochefoucauld (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell Univ. Press, 1951), p. 256.

3. The numbers of Pascal's fragments are those assigned by Louis Lafuma in: Blaise Pascal, Pensées (Paris: Editions du Seuil, 1962). All other quotations of Pascal are taken from this edition.

4. See Corrado Rosso, “La Rochefoucauld e la morale delle ‘Massime’,” Filosofia, XIII (1962), 408-452; Will G. Moore, French Classical Literature (London: Oxford Univ. Press, 1961), p. 125; Roland Barthes ed., Maximes et Réflexions by La Rochefoucauld (Paris: Club français du livre, 1961), 10-11.

5. See A. J. Krailsheimer, Studies in Self-Interest from Descartes to La Bruyère (London: Oxford Univ. Press, 1962).

6. Cf. Pierre Nicole, Pensées de Nicole (Paris: Fortin, Masson et C^ie, 1840), pp. 53, 76, 116-118. For Nicole, amour-propre is a sort of ego-image, the source of vanity and self-deception.

7. Cf. Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet, Œuvres complètes (Paris: Vivès, 1862-1866), VII (“Traité de la concupiscence”), pp. 437-438. See also IX, 428; XXVII, 531. For Bossuet, amour-propre is a source of both self-satisfaction and self-disgust, caused by ignorance and destructive passions.

8. The maxims of La Rochefoucauld are numbered according to the edition of 1678. All other specific quotations are from La Rochefoucauld, Œuvres complètes (Paris: Gallimard, 1964).

9. Cf. Pensées 617 and 978.

10. Lester G. Crocker, An Age of Crisis (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1959), p. 257. Crocker's statement applies directly to the ideas of J. Abbadie, frequently and strongly influenced by La Rochefoucauld.

11. See maxims 28, 33, 68, 81, 85, 254, 259, 262, 457, and 504.

12. See maxims 123, 392, 453, and 482.

13. Louis Hippeau, “La Rochefoucauld et les jansénistes,” TR, CLXI (June 1961), p. 73.

14. See maxims 18, 19, 122, 156, 175, 191, 237, 273, 293, and 308.

15. Gustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary (Paris: Editions de Cluny, 1947), p. 204.

16. See E. B. O. Borgerhoff, The Freedom of French Classicism (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Univ. Press, 1950), p. 107.

17. See Paul Bénichou, Morales du grand siècle (Paris: Gallimard, 1948), p. 97.

18. Jean-Paul Sartre, L'Imagination, 6th ed. (Paris: PUF, 1965), p. 65.

19. See Will G. Moore, “La Rochefoucauld's Masterpiece,” Linguistic and Literary Studies in honor of Helmut A. Hatzfeld (Washington, D.C.: The CU of A Press, 1964), 263-268.

20. Cf. the discussion of amour-propre attributed to Jean Nabert in: Paul Naulin, L'Itinéraire de la conscience (Paris: Editions Montaigne, 1963), 429-464, esp. 458, and 506.

21. Cf. Jean Starobinski, “Complexité de La Rochefoucauld,” Preuves, CXXXV (1962), p. 35.

22. Pierre-Henri Simon, Le Domaine héroique des lettres françaises (Paris: Armand Colin, 1963), p. 181.

23. Edith Mora, La Rochefoucauld, p. 78.

24. Antoine Adam, Histoire de la littérature française au XVII^e siècle, IV (Paris: Domat, 1954), p. 101.

25. Georges Bernanos, L'Imposture (Paris: Plon, 1927), p. 205.

26. Henri Peyre, Literature and Sincerity (New Haven and London: Yale Univ. Press, 1963), p. 59.

27. Henri Morier, Dictionnaire de poétique et de rhétorique (Paris: PUF, 1961), p. 265.