Thus I was far from outraging and insulting you still more
grievously by composing a hateful work which I detest with my
whole heart, and which makes me shed tears of blood when I think
that people did not blush to attribute it to me.
"Believe in my respectful attachment, madame, no less than in
my cruel destiny, which renders me odious to those by whom I
would be loved. My enemies, a portion of whom are amongst yours,
certainly succeed each other with frightful eagerness to try my wind.
Now they have just published under my name some attacks on the
poor president Henault, whom I love with sincere affection. What
have they not attributed to me to inculpate me with my friends,
with my illustrious protectors, M. le marechal duc de Richelieu and
their majesties the king of Prussia and the czarina of Russia!
"I could excuse them for making war upon strangers in my name,
altho' that would be a pirate's method; but to attack, under my
banner, my master, my sovereign lord, this I can never pardon, and
I will raise against them even a dying voice; particularly when they
strike you with the same blows; you, who love literature; you, who
do me the honor to charge your memory with my feeble productions.
It is an infamy to pretend that I fire on my own troops.
"Under any circumstances, madame, I am before you in a very
delicate situation.
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