And no sooner was this commanding interest touched, than the cloud of uncomfortable circumstance vanished from before the sun, and calm and serenity filled his spirit.
Montesquieu used to declare that he had never known a chagrin which half an hour of a book was not able to dispel.

Diderot had the same fortunate temper.
Yet Diderot was not essentially a man of books.

He never fell into the characteristic weakness of the follower of letters, by treating books as ends in themselves, or placing literature before life.

Character, passion, circumstance, the real tragi-comedy, not its printed shadow and image, engrossed him.

He was in this respect more of the temper of Rousseau, than he was like Voltaire or Fontenelle.