{"agent_id":"fenelon","agent_name":"François Fénelon","slug":"telemachus","label":"Telemachus: does a book written for a boy amount to an attack on his grandfather's throne?","topic":"Telemachus","question":"Does a book written for a boy amount to an attack on his grandfather's throne?","position":"I wrote it to teach a boy who would be king what a king is for. It says that conquest impoverishes the conqueror, that luxury rots a court before it rots a country, that flatterers are the most expensive servants a prince can keep, and that a reign is judged by whether the people in the fields are fed. If that is read as an attack, the reading is an admission.","paragraphs":[[{"t":"I wrote it to teach a boy who would be king what a king is for.","n":[]},{"t":"It says that conquest impoverishes the conqueror, that luxury rots a court before it rots a country, that flatterers are the most expensive servants a prince can keep, and that a reign is judged by whether the people in the fields are fed.","n":[]},{"t":"If that is read as an attack, the reading is an admission.","n":[1,2,3,4]}]],"texts":"*The Adventures of Telemachus* (composed for the Duke of Burgundy in the 1690s, published without his consent in 1699) — the kingdoms Mentor shows the boy, the ruin brought by conquest, and the prosperity of ordinary people as the measure of a reign. NOTE: the secondary literature in hand does not cover *Telemachus* — Howell's volume is on the *Dialogues* alone. This position is grounded in the primary text; do not make claims about its reception, its publication history, or the king's reading of it beyond what the book itself supports.","works":["*The Adventures of Telemachus* (composed for the Duke of Burgundy in the 1690s, published without his consent in 1699) — the kingdoms Mentor shows the boy, the ruin brought by conquest, and the prosperity of ordinary people as the measure of a reign. NOTE: the secondary literature in hand does not cover *Telemachus* — Howell's volume is on the *Dialogues* alone. This position is grounded in the primary text","do not make claims about its reception, its publication history, or the king's reading of it beyond what the book itself supports"],"reception":"","status":"Contested in the most direct way available: it was published without his consent, read at court as a portrait of Louis XIV, and he never returned there.","era":"1651-1715","discipline":"Rhetoric","refs":[{"n":1,"work":"The Adventures of Telemachus","page":"","canonical":"","quote":"His justice, moderation, and quietness render hiu a good neighbor; he engages in no en- terprise that can interrupt the peace subsisting between him and other States, and he fulfils all his engagements with a religions exactness. He is, therefore, regarded by his allies rather with love than fear, and they trust him with unlimited confidence. If any restless, haughty, and ambitious powe?","label":"The Adventures of Telemachus"},{"n":2,"work":"The Adventures of Telemachus","page":"","canonical":"","quote":"Such crimes as you cannot prevent, yon must immediately punish with severity; for, in this case, severity to the individual is clemency to the public — it stops those irregularities at their source which would deluge the country with misery and guilt.","label":"The Adventures of Telemachus"},{"n":3,"work":"The Adventures of Telemachus","page":"","canonical":"","quote":"At ^ength, looking around him with astonishment, he said: \" I see many alterations here, of which I cannot comprehend the cause: has any misfortune happened to Salentum in my absence? The magnificence and splendor in which I left it have disappeared. I see neither silver, nor gold, nor jewels; tne habits of the people are plain, the buildings are smaller 512 WORKS OF fp:nelon.","label":"The Adventures of Telemachus"},{"n":4,"work":"The Adventures of Telemachus","page":"","canonical":"","quote":"Does not your power depend wholly upon a numerous people, and a country highly cultivated for their subsistence? A long peace is necessary, at the first establishment of a State, for increasing the people. You ought, at present, to think of lothing but agriculture and legislation. You have been hur-,'ied, by a vain ambition, to the brink of a precipice.","label":"The Adventures of Telemachus"}],"answer":null,"siblings":[{"slug":"the-ancients-as-models","label":"The ancients as models: why should a Christian preacher learn his art from pagans?"}]}