Lot n° 140
Estimation :
700 - 800
EUR
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Result
: 1 200EUR
MALET Jean-Roland (vers 1675-1736) économiste, administrateu - Lot 140
MALET Jean-Roland (vers 1675-1736) économiste, administrateur et poète [AF 1714, 40e f].
autograph manuscript, [1721]; 9 pages and a half small in-fol.
drafts of a draft speech to the Académie française on the occasion of the death of academician Marc-René d'Argenson and the reception of his successor at the Académie, Mgr Jean-Joseph Languet de Gergy.
[Marc-René d'ARGENSON (1652-1721), lieutenant general of police, then keeper of the seals, had died on May 8, 1721; Jean-Joseph LANGUET DE GERGY (1677-1753), then bishop of Soissons, was elected, not without difficulty, to his chair on July 14; his reception took place on August 18, 1721, and it was Jean-Roland Malet who received him.
These are successive versions, abundantly erased and corrected, very different from each other, and also very different from the printed text of the speech, where the eulogy of the Marquis d'Argenson occupies only two paragraphs; it will be seen that Malet had first prepared his speech to receive Louis RACINE, whose candidacy had been rejected by the Cardinal de Fleury].
The first draft, on 4 pages of a bi-fold, begins as follows: "You succeed, sir, to a man illustrious by his birth, by his jobs, his dignities, his talents, and even more so by his zeal and his devotion to the public good. We can say that he lived less for himself and for his family than for his country of which he was the ornament and the support" Malet retraces at length the career and the character of M. d'ARGENSON, to conclude: "He esteemed he loved this Company he made it an honor and a pleasure to see his name mixed with that of so many great men who make up the Academy, lover of beautiful letters he made it his delight in his most important jobs and his consolation in solitude". Then comes the part devoted to Louis RACINE : " By choosing you sir we return in a way to the son the glory that we received from the father. It has been in our days a rare and marvelous spectacle to see two poets whose common voice is equal to the two most famous poets of antiquity compete with each other for the glory of the theatre". Malet then develops a beautiful parallel of CORNEILLE and RACINE After three brief paragraphs on d'Argenson, Malet begins his answer to LANGUET DE GERGY : "You come from a family where merit and virtue are communicated with the blood. We see 4 brothers who in different posts and jobs all animated by the same spirit and the same ardor for the fatherland render equally useful and important services to the King, the Church and the State.
The second draft, also on a bifeuillet, bears at the top: "Corrigé et finy". It begins as follows: "Hardly have we wiped our tears on the loss of three famous academics that the death of Mr. DARGENSON obliges us to spread new ones could we refuse our regrets and our praises to a man so distinguished by his birth, by his jobs his dignities, his talents and more still by his zeal and his devotion for the public good. This was his dominant passion and we can say that he was its victim since the languor and exhaustion which have wasted his days had no other cause than his tireless application to prevent the misfortunes which threatened or which desolated the country" Etc. After the eulogy of d'ARGENSON comes that of Mgr LANGUET DE GERGY which ends thus: "If the indispensable duties of the episcopate exempt you and prevent you from following the inclination that you would have to frequent our assemblies [...] You can by your advice, your protection and your examples serve him as father, protector and model and maintain the noble emulation that one of your predecessors has given birth to ".
Finally, a simple leaflet is attached to the writings of the bishop : " Your mature and vigorous writings carry the character of the venerable antiquity one sees there shining of all part the punctuality the piety the knowledge the force " Etc.
Very rare (Raoul Bonnet had not been able to count anything of Malet).
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