Letter from Gustave Flaubert, Croisset, to Louise Colet, 1853 September 26 : autograph manuscript signed with initial.

Flaubert now has enough money to meet his daily needs, but speaks of what he would do if he were rich. He notes his pleasure at having received a letter from [Jacques] Babinet [physicist, mathematician, and astronomer] and mentions Leconte [de Lisle], who thinks like him and for whom he feels much affection. Flaubert holds a grudge against the critic Gustave Planche for an article he wrote criticizing Victor Hugo in 1837. He mentions Maxime du Camp and [Felicien de?] Saulcy as being responsible as well for its not being published in Athaeneum and La Revue de Paris and offers several reasons why, launching into a tirade against them and their ilk. Flaubert says that the younger generation has been impressed by the wicked/perverted characters of Balzac and are interested only in power. They have found in his novels a certain bourgeois immorality that they admire. They are social climbers who toot their own horn and want others to notice them, like Badinguet (a name used for Napoleon III). [Emile de] Girardin is the worst of all in Flaubert's eyes. If he sees one of them make only a million francs, he'll tip his hat to him. Flaubert is glad that Joseph Mery has had a fiasco and roundly criticizes his writing. Flaubert does not excuse failure in men of action, since success is the only measure of their merit. Flaubert has received a letter from Victor Hugo (from Jersey) and is going to respond to it. He disagrees with Hugo's admiration for "the people." Humanity, he says, has a heart, but not "the people." The idea of "the people," like that of "the nation/fatherland" is dead. The only true moral protest at the moment is in Turkey, crying out against the Russians. Flaubert concludes by mentioning [Louis Auguste] Blanqui's joy at the entry of American beef into France.