There is, of course, no great difference between “writing down” Rousseau’s doctrine for children, and making miniature versions of Richardson and La Bruyère; but Berquin’s humour should have saved him from _Le Petit Grandison_,[83] and Madame de Genlis might have reflected on the undramatic qualities of _Le Petit La Bruyère_.[84] Berquin’s Lilliputian hero reveals himself in letters to his mother as a perfect miniature of Sir Charles Grandison, not less insufferable for his youth; and the little _La Bruyère_ is made up of conventional homilies: “Of Reading, Study and Application”; “Of Personal Merit”; “Of the Heart” (introduced by a quotation from Marmontel); “Of Insipidity” (perhaps evoked by the other platitudes).