The fall of Empires and the transmission of dominions astonish us and remain incomprehensible to us, because we have not discovered the imperceptible point, or touched the secret spring which when put in movement has destroyed and overthrown everything.

The author of this great history knows better than anyone else his faults and his weaknesses, but he can do himself this justice--that he has always kept the moderation, the seriousness, the austerity, which an account of affairs of State demands, and that he has never departed from the gravity which is suitable to a recital of human actions.
VII.

THE FIRST CONSEQUENCES When Eveline confided to Paul Visire that she had never experienced anything similar, he did not believe her.

He had had a good deal to do with women and knew that they readily say these things to men in order to make them more in love with them.

Thus his experience, as sometimes happens, made him disregard the truth.