which he had observed the operation. Montesquieu errs, because he
has a fine thing to say, and is resolved to say it. If the
phaenomena which lie before him will not suit his purpose, all
history must be ransacked. If nothing established by authentic
testimony can be racked or chipped to suit his Procrustean
hypothesis, he puts up with some monstrous fable about Siam, or
Bantam, or Japan, told by writers compared with whom Lucian and
Gulliver were veracious, liars by a double right, as travellers
and as Jesuits.

Propriety of thought, and propriety of diction, are commonly
found together. Obscurity and affectation are the two greatest
faults of style. Obscurity of expression generally springs from
confusion of ideas; and the same wish to dazzle at any cost which
produces affectation in the manner of a writer, is likely to
produce sophistry in his reasonings. The judicious and candid
mind of Machiavelli shows itself in his luminous, manly, and
polished language. The style of Montesquieu, on the other hand,
indicates in every page a lively and ingenious, but an unsound
mind. Every trick of expression, from the mysterious conciseness
of an oracle to the flippancy of a Parisian coxcomb, is employed
to disguise the fallacy of some positions, and the triteness of
others. Absurdities are brightened into epigrams; truisms are
darkened into enigmas. It is with difficulty that the strongest
eye can sustain the glare with which some parts are illuminated,
or penetrate the shade in which others are concealed.

The political works of Machiavelli derive a peculiar interest
from the mournful earnestness which he manifests whenever he
touches on topics connected with the calamities of his native