ABSTRACT
Casanova never denies having been an adventurer. On the contrary, he is proud of having been the flat-catcher rather than the flat, the shearer rather than the shorn, in a world where, as the old adage says, people want to be fooled. Having had a talent for acting handed down to him by his father and his mother, he made the whole world into his stage, of which Europe was the centre. Beyond question he was a man of splendid and most varied gifts. Conscientiously applied in any direction, whether to science, art, diplomacy, or business, they would have sufficed to achieve wonders. Casanova deliberately frittered away his talents upon the purposes of the fleeting moment; and he, who might have been anything, preferred to be nothing - but free. Casanova would never be the slave of anything or anyone except chance, which does indeed handle him rudely at times, but is surprisingly good to him as a rule.
