The ardour with which he prosecuted his favourite study of character seemed insatiable, and even cruel.

"The eager anatomist," says Sainte-Beuve, "was not more ready to plunge the scalpel into the still-palpitating bosom in search of the disease that had baffled him." La Bruyere possessed the same gift of accurate and penetrating observation of character.

He watched and studied everybody about him.
He sought to read their secrets; and, retiring to his chamber, he deliberately painted their portraits, returning to them from time to time to correct some prominent feature--hanging over them as fondly as an artist over some favourite study--adding trait to trait, and touch to touch, until at length the picture was complete and the likeness perfect.
It may be said that much of the interest of biography, especially of the more familiar sort, is of the nature of gossip; as that of the MEMOIRES POUR SERVIR is of the nature of scandal, which is no doubt true.

But both gossip and scandal illustrate the strength of the interest which men and women take in each other's personality; and which, exhibited in the form of biography, is capable of communicating the highest pleasure, and yielding the best instruction.

Indeed biography, because it is instinct of humanity, is the branch of literature which--whether in the form of fiction, of anecdotal recollection, or of personal narrative--is the one that invariably commends itself to by far the largest class of readers.
There is no room for doubt that the surpassing interest which fiction, whether in poetry or prose, possesses for most minds, arises mainly from the biographic element which it contains.