He was swept up into the clouds.

"Diderot is a good and worthy man," wrote Madame Geoffrin to the King of Poland, "but he has such a bad head, and he is so curiously organised, that he neither sees nor hears what he does see and hear, as the thing really is; he is always like a man who is dreaming, and who thinks all that he has dreamed quite real."[261] _The Father of the Family_, written in 1758, and first acted in 1761, is very superior to _The Natural Son_; it even enjoyed a certain popularity.

In Germany it became an established favourite, and in Italy it was only less popular than a piece of Goldoni's.

The French were not quite so easy to please.

In 1761 its reception was undoubtedly favourable, and it ran for more than a week.