Free The Physiology of Taste by Anthelme Jean Brillat-Savarin

of the trustworthiness of your heirs?
    AUTHOR —I haven’t any reason to believe that they will neglect one such duty, since for it I shall excuse them from a great many others!
    FRIEND —But will they, can they, give to your book that fatherly love, those paternal attentions without which a published work seems always a little awkward on its first appearance?
    AUTHOR —My manuscript will be corrected, neatly copied, polished in every way. There will be nothing more to do but print it.
    FRIEND —And the chances of fate? Alas, similar plans have caused the loss of plenty of priceless works! Among them, for instance, there was that of the famous Lecat, on the state of the soul during sleep … his life work …
    AUTHOR —That was, undoubtedly, a great loss. I am far from aspiring to any such regrets.
    FRIEND —Believe me, your heirs will have plenty to cope with, what with the church, the law courts, the doctors themselves! Even if they do not lack willingness, they’ll have little time for the various worries that precede, accompany, and follow the publication of a book, no matter how long or short it may be.
    AUTHOR —But my title! My subject! And my mocking friends!
    FRIEND —The single word
gastronomy
makes everyone prick up his ears. The subject is always fashionable. And mockers like to eat, as well as the rest. And there’s something else: can you ignore the fact that the most solemn personages have occasionally produced light works? There is President Montesquieu, for instance. *
    AUTHOR —By Jove, that’s so! He wrote THE TEMPLE OF GNIDUS … and one might do well to remember that there is more real point in meditating on what is at once necessary,pleasant, and a daily occupation, than in learning what was said and done more than two thousand years ago by a couple of little brats in the woods of Greece, one chasing, the other pretending to flee …
    FRIEND —Then you give up, finally?
    AUTHOR —Me? I should say not! I simply showed myself as an author for a minute. And that reminds me of a high-comedy scene from an English play, which really amused me. I think it’s in a thing called THE NATURAL DAUGHTER . See what you think of it. *
    The play is about Quakers. You know that members of this sect thee-and-thou everyone, dress very simply, frown on war, never preach sermons, act with deliberation, and above all never let themselves be angry.
    Well, the hero is a handsome young Quaker, who comes on the scene in a severe brown suit, a big flat-brimmed hat, uncurled hair … none of which facts prevents him from being normally amorous!
    A stupid lout, finding himself the Quaker’s rival in love, and emboldened by this ascetic exterior and the nature it apparently hides, teases and taunts and ridicules him, so that the young hero grows increasingly furious and finally gives the fool a good beating.
    Once having done it, though, he suddenly reassumes his Quakerish manners. He falls back, and cries out in his shame, “Alas! I believe that the flesh has triumphed over the spirit!”
    I feel the same way. After a reaction which is certainly pardonable, I go back to my first opinion.
    FRIEND —It simply can’t be done. You admit that you have shown yourself as an author for a second or two. I’ve got you now, and I’m taking you to the publisher’s. I’ll even tell you that more than one friend has already guessed your secret.
    AUTHOR —Don’t leave yourself open! I’ll talk about you in return … and who knows what I may say?
    FRIEND —What could you possibly say about me? Don’t get the idea you can scare me off!
    AUTHOR —What I shan’t say is that our native land * prides itself on having produced you; that at twenty-four you had already published a textbook which has since become a classic; that your deserved reputation inspires great confidence in you; that your general appearance reassures the sick; that your dexterity astounds them; that your sympathy comforts them. All this is common