Manual of the History of French Literature (2024)

From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia

Jump to: navigation, search

"Nevertheless, the Précieuses rendered us great principles; and that if they had lacked the formula for these principles it would have been supplied them by Lessius in his de Providentia, and by Garasse, Doctrine curieuse des Beaux Esprits."--Manual of the History of French Literature (1898) by Ferdinand Brunetière

{{Template}}Manuel de l’histoire de la littérature française (1898) by Ferdinand Brunetière translated as Manual of the History of French Literature.


PRELIMINARY NOTICE(6In writing this " MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCHLITERATURE, " which is at the same time, I do notventure to say the promise, but at least theแ programme " of a more exhaustive and detailedHistory, " I have given attention in particularto certain points, which will be noted I hope; butas there is a chance of their being overlooked—ifI have been unsuccessful in making them clearthe reader will excuse my insisting upon them inthis short preliminary notice.In the first place, to the customary divisioninto Centuries, and in each century into Branches-poetry set apart from prose; comedy in onesection, the novel in a second, " eloquence " ina third I have substituted the division intoLiterary Periods. For since the periods of physicsor those of chemistry are not dated from thetransition from one century to another, nor evenfrom the beginning of the reign of a sovereign,what grounds are there to date in this way those194535vi PRELIMINARY NOTICEof the history of a literature? Did writers reflectin the course of the year 1800 that they wereabout to belong to the nineteenth century; andare we to believe that they were at pains to differfrom themselves in view of the advent of January1 , 1801? At the same time, the division intobranches is in nowise less artificial or lessarbitrary, supposing these branches to becomedifferentiated, after the manner of species in thenatural world, solely by the struggle, against oneanother, to which they are perpetually exposed .What, for instance, is tragi-comedy, if not thehesitation of the drama between the novel andthe tragedy? And how shall we perceive this,if we separate the study of the novel from thatof tragedy? The truth is , Literary Periods oughtto be dated only from what are called literaryevents the appearance of the Lettres provinciales, or the publication of the Génie du Christianisme; —and this is not only in accordance withreality, but is also the only mode there is ofgiving the history of a literature that continuityof movement and life without which, in myopinion, there is no such thing as history.In the second place-and with a view to makingthis continuity still clearer-I have not omittedI I would remark, however, that of the other divisions in use themost natural would yet be the division into reigns or political periods;and in this very book, for example, I have sketched some of theliterary characteristics common to all the regencies in French historyPRELIMINARY NOTICE viito note those other influences on which it isthe habit to lay weight, the influence of race orthe influence of environment; however, as I holdthat of all the influences which make themselvesfelt in the history of a literature, the principalis that of works on works, I have made it myspecial concern to trace this influence and to followits continuous action . We wish to be differentfrom those who have preceded us in history: thisdesign is the origin and determining cause ofchanges in taste as of literary revolutions; thereis nothing metaphysical about it. The Pleiad ofthe sixteenth century wished to do " somethingdifferent " from the school of Clément Marot.Racine in his Andromaque wished to do " something different " from Corneille in his Pertharite;and Diderot in his Père de Famille wished to do"something different " from Molière in his Tartuffe.The romanticists of our own time wished to do"something different " from the classicists. It isfor this reason that I have not concerned myselfwith the other influences, except in so far as thesuccession of periods is not sufficiently explainedby the influence of works on works. The uselessmultiplication of causes is to be avoided, and underthe pretext that literature is the expression ofThere have also been writers who have wished to do "the samething " as their predecessors. I am well aware of the fact! But inthe history of literature and of art, they are precisely the writerswho do not count.viii PRELIMINARY NOTICEsociety, the history of literature must not beconfounded with that of manners. They are quitedistinct.Finally-and for the reason that neither originality nor even genius consists in being withoutancestors or forerunners, but most often in beingsuccessful where many others have failed-I havegiven more attention to the Periods of Transitionthan is usually accorded them. Is it necessaryto point out in this connection, that in spite ofall that can be urged, " periods of transition "exist? And since it is usual to describe them innatural history or physiology, why should theynot be described in the history of literature? Notonly do not all periods offer the same characteristics , but there are periods whose peculiar featureis to be lacking in characteristics. Able to showfew lasting works, they are often prolific in writersof every class and particularly in ideas. Is it alaw of the human mind that it often does notperceive at the outset the whole import of itsdiscoveries or of its inventions? In any case,scarcely anything is seen to give definite results.in literature or art that has not been frequentlyattempted, and in vain. Herein, precisely, liesthe interest of the periods of transition . Theyexplain the other periods because they pave theway for them, and they are quite unexplained bythe other periods; and in this way they transformPRELIMINARY NOTICE ixinto a genealogical link the connecting link ofhistory, which would otherwise be chronologicalor solely logical .Such are the two or three points I haveendeavoured to keep in view in the kind ofDiscourse, which forms something like a halfof this Manual. I now come to the points towhich I devote attention in the continuous Noteswhich constitute its other half; they should servethe former half as illustrations or proofs.I have made a selection among the writers, andhave only retained for notice those of whom itseemed to me it could truly be said that something would be wanting in the " sequence " ofFrench literature, were they not to be mentioned. There are very great writers-not many,but there are two: Saint- Simon and Mme deSévigné-of whom I have not spoken, because thefirst Lettres de Mme de Sévigné having only seenthe light in 1725 or perhaps in 1734, and theMémoires de Saint- Simon in 1824, their influenceis not sensible in history. A method is a disciplinewhich must be rigorously observed if it is torender all the services of which, it is capable.On the other hand, to other writers to HonoréI note here, as an indication of my method, that in a moreexhaustive history, I should place towards 1734 what I should haveto say of the Lettres de Mme de Sévigné; and I should connect withthem that ambition to figure as letter writers, which a great numberof clever women are seen to display about the date in question.X PRELIMINARY NOTICEd'Urfé for example, I have given more space than isusually accorded them. Finally, there are writersof the stamp of Rollin or d'Aguesseau of whomI have thought it right to " disencumber " history.It is necessary to adopt this course when we beginto fear that the attention may be growing wearied,and especially that in consequence of this passingunder review in triumphal succession of so manyauthors, the notion of the distinctions and distancesthat separate them may end by being abolished.Again, this book being a Manual-I wouldalmost say an Aid to the Memory-I have socontrived these Notes, that each of them in itskind, and in its rather narrow but also most clearlydefined scope, should be the outline or " summary"of a complete study, and naturally I have proportioned the dimensions of this study, as mathematically as I have been able, to the true importanceof the writer who is its subject. I say " mathematically, " because in such a matter there shouldbe no intrusion of one's personal tastes; one doesnot write a History of French Literature for thepurpose of giving expression in it to his ownopinions, but, very much as he draws up the mapof a large country, with a view to giving in ita correct idea of the relief, relations and proportions of the constituent parts .-Further always in order that the book 'mightbe more useful and a more efficacious and constantPRELIMINARY NOTICE xiItaid—I have given very special attention to theBibliography of the subject. Qui scit ubi scientiasit, ille est proximus habenti: this old proverbis never more apposite than in connection withliterary history. In consequence, at the end ofeach of these notices will be found an almostcomplete enumeration of the works, and of thebest editions, with their dates , of the works of eachwriter; while the notices begin with an enumeration of the principal sources of information towhich reference can be made if it be desired.is even incumbent on the student to refer tothese sources: first, because he cannot neglectthem without exposing himself to making discoveries that are not discoveries at all; and inthe next place, because the very judgments formedupon the works of our writers by their contemporaries and by those who have come after themhave become, as it were, incorporated with theidea we form of them ourselves. The criticismof Boileau, for instance, and that of Voltaire areinseparable from the notion of the tragedy ofRacine. I have also endeavoured to classify thesesources, and to arrange them in a manner thatin itself constitutes their criticism; but this classification is still all too imperfect- and for thisreason I do not insist upon it.It only remains for me to apologise for theerrors that it will be only too easy to point out


xii PRELIMINARY NOTICEin this book. I have spared no pains to preventthere being too many of them of a serious or ofa too serious nature, for in a certain sense everyerror of fact or in a date is serious in a Manual,based, one flattered oneself, upon an exact chronology as its firm foundation. But how is itpossible to verify thousands of dates and to assureoneself of the exactitude of hundreds of factswithout the memory wearying and even theeyesight being at a loss? I shall thereforethankfully accept all rectifications or correctionsthat may kindly be brought to my notice. Abook of this nature only becomes what it issusceptible of becoming by the lapse of timeand owing mainly to the indulgence and collaboration of the public.1897.dPREFACE TO THE ENGLISH EDITION·Ir would doubtless be impossible for me to finda better or surer means of inviting the indulgenceof English readers for the present Manual, thanto offer it them for what it is: an application ofthe doctrine of Evolution to the history of a greatliterature. In this way the work is placed, as itwere,. under the auspices of the great name ofCharles Darwin, and while it is not for me todecide whether the illustrious author of the"Origin of Species " ranks, as has been maintained, but little below or perhaps on a level withSir Isaac Newton in the history of modernEuropean ideas, it is certain that for some fortyyears past his influence is everywhere to be traced.I shall be happy if English readers see it to be atwork in the present volume.It is not, indeed, that I wholly accept thedoctrine in question, and still less the consequences that have been deduced from it inトziii


xiv PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH EDITIONEngland itself, in Germany or in France. So faras I am in a position to judge, and I am not aman of science, Evolution is only an hypothesis;the variability of natural species , however probableit may be, is not what is called proven; andadmitting selection to be one of its modes ofoperation or factors, there are assuredly manyothers. Still, as I myself have more than onceremarked, the very serious objections that may beurged, it is said, against the hypothesis in thedomain of natural history, lose much of theirweight when the doctrine is applied to the historyof literature or art, where it is a method as well asa doctrine. Even supposing that species do notvary, it would be an advantage to natural historyto study them as if they did; and of all theclassifications that have been suggested with aview to bringing home to us, I do not say thespectacle merely, but the movement of nature, thegenealogical classification is by far the most con- .venient, the most probable, and above all the mostin conformity with the greatest number of facts.It is from the genealogical standpoint, then,that I have endeavoured to study in the historyof French literature the perpetually changingsuccession of ideas, authors and works; and ifthere be any novelty in this Manual it is constituted by this attitude.I am aware that serious objection is taken toPREFACE TO THE SH EDITION XVthe employment of this method in history. Toreply to many of the objections made woulddoubtless be beyond the scope of this shortPreface, but among them is one graver, orapparently graver, than the others, and I mustnot pass it over entirely. What, it is said, is mostinteresting, or solely interesting perhaps, in thehistory of literature or art is the individual,Shakespeare or Molière, Milton or Bossuet, Popeor Boileau, Swift or Voltaire, Burke or Mirabeau,Tennyson or Lamartine, George Eliot or Honoréde Balzac; and I wholly share this opinion.Whether we study these writers in their works,or whether in their works it be they themselvesthat excite our preference, what interests us inthem is what distinguishes them from all otherwriters, or what in them is irreducible and incommensurable. In their own line they resemblethemselves alone, a characteristic that is the causeof their glory or renown. But is not this precisely the characteristic that no method is capableof dealing with? and if we treat the writers whopossess it in conformity with the laws of theevolutionary hypothesis, is it not at the expenseof the very originality that is their pre-eminentquality? Do we not rob them of their individuality by resolving it into its elements, andmake away with their singularity when wedecompose it? At first sight it seems that such


xvi PREFACE TO ENGLISH EDITIONis the case, but Darwin had answered thisobjection in advance, while inasmuch as it canscarcely be said that he had the exigencies of thehistory of literature or art in view when framinghis reply, we have the more right to regard it asconvincing.What, according to Darwin, is Natural Selection, and what are the conditions under which itoperates? He has told us explicitly, and indeedit is the definition of this power that his disciples,in spite of his express declarations, have so oftentaken to be a psychological Entity. In a givenspecies, among all of whose representatives theobserver had hitherto detected none but almostinsignificant differances, it is inevitable that thereshould at length appear a specimen better endowedthan its fellows-a bull, for instance, with exceptional horns, or a horse of exceptional swiftness.Until this better endowed individual has appearedthere is no variation, and in consequence noground or adequate reason for the action of naturalselection. Neither " need " as Lamarck believed,nor "environment " as Geoffroy Saint- Hilairesupposed, is sufficient. Something more is indispensable, and this something, for which Darwinexpressly states he cannot account, is the apparition of the profitable or useful variety; and it isprecisely the fixation or consolidation of thisvariety that constitutes the principle of Evolution.PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH EDITION xviiLet us now apply this theory to the history ofliterature or art . A given variety of literature, forinstance, the English drama of the sixteenthcentury, or the French comedy of the seventeenthcentury, or the English novel of the eighteenthcentury is in process of development, slowlyorganising itself under the double influence of theinterior and exterior " environment. " The movement is slow and the differentiation almostinsensible. Suddenly, and without its beingpossible to give the reason, a Shakespeare, aMolière, or a Richardson appears, and forthwithnot only is the variety modified, but new specieshave come into being: psychological drama, thecomedy of character, the nove of manners. Thesuperior adaptability and power of survival of thenew species are at once recognised and proved,indeed, in practice. It is in vain that the olderspecies attempt to struggle: their fate is sealed inadvance. The successors of Richardson, Molière,and Shakespeare copy these unattainable modelsuntil, their fecundity being exhausted-and bytheir fecundity I mean their aptitude for strugglingwith kindred and rival species-the imitation ischanged into a routine which becomes a sourceof weakness, impoverishment and death for thespecies. I shall not easily be persuaded that thismanner of considering the history of literature orart is calculated to detract from the originality1*xviii PREFACE TO THE ENGLISH EDITIONof great artists or great writers . On the contrary,as is doubtless perceived, it is precisely theirindividuality that is responsible for the constitution of new species, and in consequence for theevolution of literature and art.Such, in my eyes, is the chief advantage of theapplication of the evolutionary doctrine or methodto the history of literature or art . Other advantages could be enumerated, but this is theprincipal: the combination or conciliation of"hero worship, " as understood by Emerson orCarlyle, with the doctrine of slowly operatinginfluences and the action of contemporarycircumstances.This is the task I have attempted in the presentManual, in which those who are interested in thehistory of French literature will find, I trust,useful information, but the true object and primaryintention of which has been to try what resultsare to be obtained in criticism from a methodthat has renewed all around us in the course ofthe last forty years. It will be for the reader todecide whether I have been successful. But ifI should have failed, it is not the method but Imyself, and I only, that is to blame; moreover,in laying down the principle, I shall have giventhe reader the means of checking and rectifyingmy work. " Neither Nature nor even God, it hasbeen said, produce all their great works at aPREFACE TO THE ENGLISH EDITION xixstroke: a plan must be made before building iscommenced, you must draw before you can paint, ”and that this is the case is in absolute conformitywith the very spirit of the evolutionary method.It is not in a day, nor even in a hundred years, ora thousand years, that one given species transformsor changes itself into another. Darwin was wellaware of this truth, which he has repeated oftenenough! Similarly in history or criticism, time,a great deal of time, is necessary for a methodto render all the services that may rightly beexpected of it; while one of the worst errors itis possible to commit is to make the methodresponsible for the shortcomings of the author.F. B.

TABLE OF CONTENTSBOOK ITHE MIDDLE AGES842-1498Pages 1-39.1. The Formation of the French Language, p. 1; -II. The Evolution of the Epopee, p. 4;-III. The Song Writers, p. 13; -IV. The Fabliaux, p. 17; —V. Allegorical Literature, p. 19; —VI. The Farce de Pathelin, p. 27;-VII. François Villon, p. 29; —VIII. The Mysteries, p. 32; —IX. Philippe de Commynes, p. 37.BOOK IITHE CLASSIC AGE1498-1801Pages 40-394.CHAPTERTHE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL1498-1610Pages 40-107.xxixxii TABLE OF CONTENTSFIRST PERIODFrom Villon to Ronsard1498-1550Pages 40-54.I. Clément Marot, p. 40; -II. Marguerite de Valois, p. 42; —III.François Rabelais, p. 44; -IV. The Amadis. p. 50; -V. The LyonsSchool, p. 51.SECOND PERIODThe Teachings of Antiqui1550-1580Pages 54-80.The Renaissance of Poetry. -I. The Formation of the Pleiad,p. 54; -II. Joachim du Bellay, p. 56; -III. Pierre de Ronsard,p. 58;-IV. Jean-Antoine de Baïf, p. 62.Scholars and Translators. -V. Henri Estienne, p. 63; —VI. JacquesAmyot, p. 66; -VII. Jean Bodin, p. 69.The Origin of the Classic Drama. -VIII. The First Period of theClassic Drama, p. 71; -IX. Robert Garnier, p. 73;-X. TheBeginnings of Comedy, p. 75; -XI. The Work of the Pleiad,p. 77.THIRD PERIODFrom the Publication of Montaigne's " Essays " to thePublication of the " Astrée "1580-1610Pages 80-107.Bernard Palissy, p. 80;-II. François de la Noue, p. 82; -III.Guillaume du Bartas, p. 84;-IV. Michel de Montaigne, p. 86; -V. The Satire Ménippée, p. 92; -VI. Pierre Charron, p. 93; -VII.Guillaume du Vair, p. 96; -VIII. François de Sales, p. 98; -IXMathurin Regnier, p . 102; —X. Honoré d'Urfé, p . 103.TABLE OF CONTENTS xxiiiCHAPTER IITHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE1610-1722Pages 107-281.FOURTH PERIODFrom the Formation of the " Precious " Society to theFirst Representation of the " Précieuses Ridicules "1610-1659Pages 107-168.I. The Hotel Rambouillet, p. 107; -II. Irregulars and Libertines,p. 113; -III. Alexandre Hardy, p. 116; -IV. François de Malherbe, p. 118; -V. Jean- Louis Guez de Balzac, p. 121; -VI.Claude Favre de Vaugelas, p. 125; -VII. Pierre Corneille, p.127; —VIII. The Foundation of the French Academy, p. 134; —IX. The Origin of Jansenism, p. 137; -X. René Descartes, p .139; -XI. Port- Royal and the Arnaulds, p. 143; —XII. The Novelsince the " Astrée, " p. 145; -XIII. The Heroic Poem, p. 150; —XIV. Comedy from 1640 to 1658, p. 154; -XV. Burlesque, p.157; -XVI. Blaise Pascal, p. 159.FIFTH PERIODFrom the First Performance ofthe "Précieuses Ridicules"to the Quarrel between the Ancients and Moderns1659-1687Pages 168-219.IFrançois duc de la RochefoucauldPages 168-171.IIJean- Baptiste Poquelin de MolièrePages 171-183.xxiv TABLE OF CONTENTSIIIJean de la FontainePages 183-191.IVJacques- Bénigne BossuetPages 191-202.VJean RacinePages 203-210.VIouis BourdalouePages 210-214.VIINicolas Boileau- DespréauxPages 214-219.SIXTH PERIODFrom the Cabal Organised against " Phèdre " to the issueof the " Lettres Persanes "1677-1722Pages 220-280I. The Beginnings of French Opera, p. 220; -II. Nicolas Malebranche, p. 222;-III. Pierre Bayle, p. 225; -IV. Fontenelle,p. 231; -V. The Reorganisation of the Academy of Sciences,p. 236; -VI. Charles Perrault, p. 238; -VII. Jean de la Bruyère,p. 241; -VIII. Fénelon, p. 247; -IX. The Quarrel between theAncients and Moderns, p. 255; -X. Jean- Baptiste Massillon,p. 259 -XI. French Tragedy from 1680-1715, p . 261; -XII.Jean-Baptiste Rousseau, p. 265; -XIII. Comedy from the timeof Molière to that of Destouches, p. 267; -XIV. Alain- René LeSage, p. 272; -XV. Mme de Lambert's Salon, p. 277,TABLE OF CONTENTS XXVCHAPTER IIITHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL1720-1801Pages 281-393.SEVENTH PERIODFrom the " Lettres Persanes " to the Publication of the"Encyclopedia "1722-1750Pages 281-311I. Montesquieu, p. 281; -II. Marivaux, p. 287; -III. The AbbéPrévost, p. 292; -IV. Pierre-Claude Nivelle de la Chaussée, p.295; —V. The First Period of Voltaire's Life, p. 297; —VI. JeanBaptiste Gresset, p. 305; -VII. Vauvenargues, p. 307;-VIII.Charles Pineau Duclos, p. 309.LIGHTH PERIODThe Encyclopedia and the Encyclopedists1750-1765Pages 312-333.I. The Early Phases of the Undertaking, p. 314;-II. Jean LeRond d'Alembert, p. 316; -III. Denis Diderot, p. 317; -IV. TheFirst Difficulties Encountered by the Encyclopedia, p. 319;-V. The Second Period of Voltaire's Life, p. 320; -VI. After theSuppression of the Encyclopedia, p. 325; -VII. Claude-AdrienHelvétius, p. 327; -VIII. Frédéric- Melchior Grimm. p. 328; —IX.The Encyclopedic Propaganda, p. 329.NINTH PERIODFrom the " Encyclopedia " to the " Génie duChristianisme "1765-1800Pages 333-393.I. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, p. 333; -II. Michel-Jean Sedaine, p.349;-III. The Last Period of Voltaire's Life, p. 351; --IV. Thexxvi TABLE OF CONTENTSEconomists, p. 361; -V. Pierre-Augustine Caron de Beaumarchais, p. 365; —VI. The End of Tragedy, p. 368; -VII. AndréMarie de Chénier, p. 372; -VIII. Buffon, p. 377; -IX. Condorcet,p. 385; -X. Bernardin de Saint- Pierre, p. 388.BOOK IIIMODERN TIMES1801-1875Pages 394-531.FIRST PERIODFrom the Publication of the " Génie du Christianisme "to the First Performance of the " Burgraves "1802-1843Pages 394-448.I. Chateaubriand, p. 394; -II. Mme de Staël, p. 401; -III. TheIdeologists, p. 405; -IV. M. de Bonald, p. 407; -V. Joseph deMaistre, p. 408; —VI. Paul- Louis Courier, p. 412; —VII. Béranger,p. 414; -VIII. Lamennais, p. 419; -IX. Stendhal, p. 424; —X.Lamartine, p. 428; -XI. The Sorbonne Triumvirate, p. 434; —XII. Augustin Thierry, p. 437; —XIII. Romantic Drama, p.438; -XIV. Alfred de Musset, p. 441; -XV. Prosper Mérimée,p. 444; -XVI. Alexis de Tocqueville, p. 446.SECOND PERIODFrom the Performance of the " Burgraves " to the Publication of the " Légende des Siècles "1843-1859Pages 449-489.Honoré de BalzacPages 449-460.TABLE OF CONTENTS xxviiIIMicheletPages 460–465.IIIVictor HugoPages 465-478.IVGeorge SandPages 478-483.VCharles-Augustin Sainte- BeuvePages 483-489THIRD PERIODNaturalismPages 489-531.I. Alfred de Vigny, p. 489; -II. Théophile Gautier, p. 493;-III.Émile Augier, p. 497; -IV. Octave Feuillet, p. 501;-V. Lecontede Lisle, p. 504;-VI. English Influence, p. 507;-VII. GustaveFlaubert, p. 509;-VIII. Taine, p. 513; -IX. Ernest Renan, p.517;-X. Charles Baudelaire, p. 525; -XI. German Influence.p. 524; -XII. Alexandre Dumas fils, p. 525.INDEX.Pages 533-569.

LIST OF PORTRAITS.PAGE.FERDINAND BRUNETIÈREPHILIPPE DE COMMYNESFRANÇOIS RABELAISPIERRE DE RONSARD .MICHEL EYQuem, Seigneur DE MONTAIGNEFrontispiece58.37445886PIERRE CORNEILLE 127JEAN-BAPTISTE POQUELIN DE MOLIÈRE 171FRANÇOIS DE Salignac de LA MOTHE-FÉNELON . 247CHARLES DE SECONDAT, BARon de la BrÈDE ET DE MONTESQUIEU 281DENIS DIDEROT 317JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU .333VOLTAIRE . . 351PIERRE-JEAN DE BÉRANGER . 414HONORÉ DE BALZAC .VICTOR MARIE HUGO449465ERNEST RENAN . 517

MANUAL OF THE HISTORYOFFRENCH LITERATUREBOOK ITHE MIDDLE AGESI"I have had occasion-a philosophic historian hassomewhere said to study the political institutions ofthe Middle Ages in France England, and Germany;THE AUTHORS AND THEIR WORKSI. The Formation of the French Language.1. THE SOURCES. -Amédée Thierry, Histoire des Gaulois, andHistoire de la Gaule sous la domination romaine; -Roger de Belloguet, Ethnologie gauloise, Paris, 1861-1868;-Fustel de Coulanges,Histoire des Institutions politiques de l'ancienne France, vol. i . , 2ndedition, Paris, 1887.G. Körting, Encyclopædie und Methodologie der romanischenPhilologie, Heilbronn, 1884-1886; -G. Gröber, Grundriss der romanischen Philologie, Strasburg, 1888-1896.Raynouard, Lexique roman, Paris, 1838-1844; -Édelestand duMéril: Essai philosophique sur la formation de la langue fran212 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREand as I advanced with this work, I was filled withastonishment on noting the prodigious similarity thatis to be met with in all these laws; and I admired thefact , that peoples so different and communicating solittle with each other should have been able to assurethemselves laws so alike. " [ Tocqueville , L'Ancien Régimeet la Révolution , book i . , chap. iv. ] The same admirationor the same astonishment is inspired by an attentive studyof the European literature of the Middle Ages. Nothingis so similar to a Chanson de geste as another Chansonde geste, while as much may be said of the likeness ofone Romance of the Round Table to another Romanceof the Round Table, of one Tale to another Tale, orfinally, of one Mystery Play to another Mystery Play;and two drops of water are not more alike, or, to usea better comparison, two classic tragedies or two naturalistic novels. At a first examination one may fancy heçaise, Paris, 1852; -F. Diaz: Grammaire des langues romanes,translated into French by Gaston Paris and Morel- Fatio, 3rd edition,Paris, 1874-1876; W. Meyer- Lübke, Grammaire des languesromanes, translated by Rabiet and Doutrepont, Paris, 1890-1895; —the Historical Grammars of Darmesteter, Brunot, Etienne, Schwan,and Behrens; the Etymological Dictionaries of Diez, Scheler,Körting; and the Historical Dictionaries of Forcellini for ClassicalLatin; du Cange for Low Latin; La Curne Sainte- Palaye and F.Godefroy for Old French.2. THE SUCCESSIVE ELEMENTS OF THE FRENCH LANGUAGE.A. The Celtic element;-and of the difficulty of determining itsnature at the present day; -especially if the Celtic languages and theLatin language are themselves sister languages. [ Cf. Thurneysen,Kelto-Romanisches; and Zeuss, Grammatica celtica. ] - That ifthe influence of the Celtic element is to be traced in French,this would seem to be less the case in the vocabulary thanin the syntax; -and perhaps still less in the syntax than in thepronunciation. -Considerations on this subject; and of the influenceof the conformation of the organs or of the nature of the water,atmosphere, and locality upon pronunciation. That though theTHE MIDDLE AGEdetects differences, but when it comes5to point them out with precision, they disable, and, if theuniformity is complete. It would seem, in cdal Europe,that in the Middle Ages, a common mode of thimaryand feeling, enforced throughout Europe by the tripleauthority of religion , the feudal system, and scholasticism ,kept under and indeed destroyed in literature all distinctions of origin, race, and individuality.Quis primus? . . . What is the origin of the Chansonsde geste; and of our Romans de la Table-Ronde? Is theirfountain-head Romance or Germanic? or Celtic, perhaps,unless it is to be held, like that of our Fabliaux, tobe Arab or Hindoo? The truth is , we are wholly in thedark on the subject . This literature is without documents establishing its identity. [ Cf. Pio Rajna, Le Originidell' Epopea francese, Florence, 1884. ] To say this,moreover, does not suffice, and even when we know thatCeltic influence be ill-defined , still it cannot be explained away;-andin its absence it would be impossible to explain the differentiation ofFrench, Spanish, and Italian.99 B. The Latin element. Literary Latin and vulgar Latin;conquest and " Romanisation " of Gaul; -futility of " patriotic 'arguments in this connection. [ Cf. Granier de Cassagnac, LesOrigines de la langue française.] —The hypothesis of Raynouard asto the formation of a " Romance language " intermediary betweenLow Latin or vulgar Latin and the New Latin languages; -to whatextent it can be upheld;-and, in any case, of the convenience it offers.-Deformation or transformation of vulgar Latin by local accents; —andby the sole effect of time. -Provincial linguistic peculiarities: dialectsand patois.C. The Germanic element; -and in the first place the conditionsunder which the " barbaric invasions " took place. [Cf. Fustel deCoulanges, Histoire des Institutions , etc . ] -How and why it was thatthe " Germanisation " of Gaul could not follow its " Romanisation, "Gallia capta ferum victorem cepit ...of certain categories of ideas and words that seem to have passed2 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREwand as I advan or vstery saw the light for the firstastonishment or in Italy, it is in vain that we endeavouris to be in it the marks of its origin, a local impress,f word, one of those " racial " characteristics to thepsychological or aesthetic determination of which theattempt has too often been made in our time to reducethe whole history of literature . In the same way thereis nothing more French about a Gothic cathedral-opusfrancigenum-in Paris than in Cologne, or more Germanabout one in Cologne than about one in Canterbury.And, in truth, the " races of modern Europe merelyrepresent historical formations, whose literatures are lesstheir expression than one of their multiple " factors. "Whether we be Germans or Frenchmen, Italians ,Spaniards or Englishmen, in literature and art as inhistory and politics , we have all been nations prior todeveloping into " races." But before being nations wefrom the German tongues into French [ Cf. Gaston Paris, Littérature française au Moyen Age]; —terms relating to warfare, -architectural terms, -maritime terms, etc.-Whether the conclusion canbe drawn from these indications, that the Germanic element has lefta deep impression on the French language?3. THE EARLIEST SPECIMENS OF THE LANGUAGE. -The Gloses deReichenau, seventh and eighth centuries;-The Serments de Strasbourg, 842; -the Prose de Sainte Eulalie, c. 880; -the Homélie surJonas, first half of the tenth century; -the Passion and the Vie desaint Léger, second half of the tenth century; -the Vie de saintAlexis , c. 1040.II. The Evolution of the Epopee.1. THE SOURCES.'-Christoforo Nyrop, Storia dell' Epopea francese nel medio evo, translated from the Danish by Egidio Gorra,Florence, 1886; - Pio Rajna, Le origini dell' Epopea francese,Florence, 1884;-Léon Gautier, Les Epopées françaises, Paris, 2nd1 As in the notes to this first chapter, we do not follow-and for obvious reasons -the chronological order, but rather a systematic order, we shall follow this order as well in the enumeration of the Sources , and we are less concerned with the date of publication of the works than with the nature of their contents.THE MIDDLE AGES 5all formed but one homogeneous, indivisible, and, if theterm be permissible, inarticulate Europe-feudal Europe,the Europe of the Crusades; -and this is why the primarycharacteristic of the French literature of the Middle Agesis its uniformity.Being uniform, it is also impersonal. By this is tobe understood that at no period has a writer put less ofhis individuality into his work. It may be said thatalmost all our Chansons might be bythe same poet andall our Metrical Tales by the same narrator. Even whenwe know the authors, the works are none the less alwaysanonymous, after the manner, let us say, of the tragediesof La Harpe-which might be by Marmontel, and viceversa. Is it that prevented from emancipating himselffrom his social rank by the pressure, the number, and theenduring constraint of the obligations that bind him down.to it , "the individual, " serf or lord, clerk or layman ,edition, 1878-1894;-Paulin Paris, Les Chansons de Geste, in l'Histoirelittéraire de la France, especially vols. xxii. and xxv.; —GodefroiKurth, Histoire poétique des Mérovingiens, Brussels, 1893; -GastonParis, Histoire poétique de Charlemagne, Paris, 1865; -AmbroiseFirmin Didot, Essai de classification des romans de chevalerie, Paris,1870.Léopold Constans, Le roman de Thèbes, Paris , 1890; -Joly, Benoîtde Sainte- More et le roman de Troie, Paris , 1870; -Paul Meyer,Alexandre le Grand dans la littérature du Moyenâge, Paris, 1886;-Arturo Graf, Roma nella memoria e nelle immaginazioni delmedio evo, Turin, 1882.Paulin Paris, Les Romans de la Table- Ronde, Paris, 1868-1877;-Birch-Hirschfeld, Die Sage vom Gral, Leipsic , 1877; —Alfred Nutt,Study on the Legend of the Holy Grail, London, 1888; -GastonParis, Les Romans de la Table- Ronde, in the Histoire littéraire de laFrance, vol . xxx.; -J. Bédier, Les Lais de Marie de France, in theRevue des Deux Mondes, October 15 , 1891 .2. EVOLUTION OF THE Epopee.A. The Heroic Epopee. -Various forms of the epopee: -the Mahabahrata; the Homeric Epopee; the Virgilian Epopee; the Niebe-6 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREIt ismonk or baron, does not belong to himself? is the representative of his order or his class before being himself?lacks at once the liberty, the leisure, and the stimulus hewould need to venture to distinguish himself from others?The man who desires to be distinct from his fellowscan only effect his purpose by isolating himself as a firststep; and the man of the Middle Ages does not seem tohave thought or even to have felt except as it werecorporately, as the member of a group or a mass.doubtless to this cause that is to be attributed the povertyof the lyrical vein during the Middle Ages. Herein, too ,lies in particular the explanation of that total absence ofall artistic preoccupation , which has been disguised underthe specious terms " spontaneity " or " naïveté. " " Themen of this period, " it has been said, " are less given toreflection than we are; they do not observe themselves,they live naïvely like children. " [ Cf. Gaston Paris, La66lungen; the Epopee of Dante; the French Epopee; the Gerusalemmeliberata. That at its origin the essence of the epopee seems tobe:-1, the having an historical foundation , or a foundation believedto be historical; -2, the poetising of a conflict not merely between"nationalities, " but between " races "; -3, and the personification ofthe triumph of one of these races over the other in an eponymoushero. That these characteristics once admitted, there can scarcelybe question of a Merovingian epopee; -and that a knowledge of what were the " cantilenes or vulgaria carmina that are supposedto have preceded the national epopee becomes almost a matter ofindifference. —Further, there is no occasion to examine whether theFrench epopee is of " Romance or "Germanic " origin; -and stillless, to make the question one of patriotism. -The precise momentof the birth of the French epopee is that of the encounter or shockof the East and West, of Islamism and Christianity, of the Arab andthe Frank; it is personified to begin with in Charles Martel,who was confounded at a later period with his grandson Charlemagne; and that in this way it can even be said " where " ourChansons de geste came into existence: it was on the battle- fieldof Poitiers.THE MIDDLE AGES 7Poésie du Moyen-âge] . And this remark is justified! Atthe same time, like children , they only experienced verygeneral or " typical " sentiments, whose expression is asgeneral as are the sentiments themselves; and art is precisely an individual matter. What distinguishes onepainter from another is the different light in which eachof them sees the same model. The Middle Ages, fortheir part, scarcely went further at first than notingwhat was similar or identical in the model. In theirview all men resembled each other, much as in oureyes all negroes or Chinamen are alike. And in realitywhat is it diversifies human countenances, and bydiversifying them individualises them, unless it be thereflection on them of an inward complexity, of a richnessor of an intensity of life unknown to the men of theMiddle Ages? Their literature in consequence is verygeneral, is wanting in individual significance and also inHowfrom these characteristics of the epopee proper it is possibleto divide off its history. -This history must have begun with the songs of the Cycle of the King, with those, that is , of which Charlemagne is the hero [ Ex. the Chanson de Roland]; -to which succeededthe songs of the Cycle de Garin de Montglane [ Ex. the Chansond'Aliscans] , whose heroes continue the struggle between the greatEmperor and the Saracen; -next came the songs of the FeudalCycle [ Ex. Renaud de Montauban] the heroes of which are the baronsin revolt against a royal authority that has ceased to fulfil its office.-It is to be noted that the songs of this last cycle coincided with thewaning of the fortunes of Islam. -To the same period should alsobelong the songs that show us the different nationalities strugglingwith one another [ Ex. the Chanson de Garin le Loherain]; -andthe genealogical poems [ Ex. Les Enfances Guillaume] , whose objectis to give the heroes a birth and beginnings, whose marvels shallbefit the greatness of their exploits . A comparison between thepoems of this order and the cyclic poems of Greek poetry; —andthe Semitic " genealogies. " -That the later of our Chansons de gesteare already, in the true sense of the word, literary epopees; —notless artificial than at another period , a Henriade or a Pétréide;—8 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURElocal significance, and this is what is meant when itsimpersonal character is insisted on.Finally—and in comparison with the rapid successionof artistic ideas and of forms of art in our modern literatures, and especially in contemporary literatures -theimmobility of the literature of the Middle Ages constitutesits remaining characteristic. For it is not only from oneend of Europe to the other that one Chanson de gesteresembles another Chanson de geste, or one Mystery Playanother Mystery Play, but it is also from one century toanother century, and from the time of good King Robertto that of Saint Louis. Such differences as there are between the Chanson de Roland, which is dated from theyear 1080, and that of Raoul de Cambrai, which isheld to have been written towards 1220, being scarcelymore than " philological " differences, are only apparentto the erudite. Let us make this point clear . If thebut with the reappearance of the cause, a really genuine inspirationis once that, simultaneously more to be found in the songs thatform the Cycle of the Crusades [ Ex. the Chanson du chevalier auCygne] .It is almost directly afterwards that history proper begins to differentiate itself from the epopee: -Geoffroi de Villehardouin and theConquête de Constantinople, 1210-1215; -the " epic " circumstancesof the event, and the " epic " turn of the narrative; -comparison, inthis connection, between the evolution of the French epopee and thatof the Greek epopee: -the author of the Conquête de Constantinopleis to the author of the Chanson de Roland what Herodotus is toHomer. To affect to find "epic " characteristics in the Sire deJoinville's Vie de Saint Louis (1275) would be more arbitrary-andyet, if St. Louis is its hero, may it not be said that this hagiographyis the veritable Christian epopee? -or if the hero is Joinville himself,then the work is already history in the form of autobiography.—The characteristics of the epopee are to be found, struggling as itwere with those of history, in Froissart's Chroniques. The trouvèreCuvelier's Chronique de Bertrand du Guesclin; -and the Geste desBourguignons, " which closes the series of poems in single-rhymedTHE MIDDLE AGES 9date of the Cid or of Horace were not known, onewould have to be blind not to see that Britannicus orBajazet are certainly posterior to them. On the otherhand, the Chronique de Bertrand du Guesclin by thetrouvère Cuvelier, although it be more insipid than theChanson de Renaud de Montauban, resembles the latterwork far more than it differs from it. In both there isthe same heroic matter and the mode of treating it is the[ Cf. Paulin Paris, Histoire littéraire de la France,vol . xxiii. ] It is clear that the hours slip by more slowlyin those days than in ours-much more slowly, at alazier pace; life is not so fast, and since it is not onthis account intenser or more individual, the result isthat if a silent travail is in progress in the depthsof this immobility, there is no trace of it at first onthe surface .same.Still the quickening process is nevertheless going on,stanzas, " -take us from this point to the threshold of the fifteenthcentury.B. The Ancient Epopee; -and that this name ought not to be givento " romances of adventure " which offer none of the characteristicsof the epopee; -the Roman d'Alexandre le Grand and the Roman deTroie are the Trois Mousquetaires or the Quarante- Cinq of theirtime; -which amounts to saying that the Middle Ages were onlyalive to the " marvellous " or the " surprising " element in thelegends of antiquity; -and that in this sense the epopees inspired byantiquity, together with the least historical of our chansons de gesteserve as stepping stones to the Romans de la Table Ronde.C. The Romantic Epopee. -Whether the origin of the romanticepopee is to be sought for in a transformation of manners; and, inthis connection, of the contrast between the Courteous Epopee andthe National Epopee. -That the true origin of the romantic epopee isin the differentiation of the elements of the national epopee; -theauthentic element of which has become history; —while the marvellous, symbolical and mythical element has become the novel ofadventure.-Sources of the Romances of the Round Table. -The Historia Regum Britanniæ by Geoffrey of Monmouth, 1135, and his Vita10 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREand this is the occasion to remark that, as is the casewith that impersonality or that uniformity alreadyreferred to, so this immobility is and can only be merelyrelative. There is nothing absolute in history. Indeed ,let us add here that the great historical interest of theliterature of the Middle Ages is due to the fact that thisliterature was not hurried or interfered with in its movement by any intervention from without or any individualcaprice. It developed slowly, but it developed upon itsown soil , there where it sprang up, so to speak, and inconformity with its nature. The philologists teach usthat the language of Joinville and of Guillaume de Loris-the language of the Vie de Saint Louis and of thefirst part of the Roman de la Rose-less rich assuredly,less coloured, less supple, less subtle, and less refinedthan our own, was yet, in a certain sense, nearer toits perfection, because it was more logical; and byMerlini. -The Geste des Bretons or Roman de Brut, by Wace[translation in verse of Geoffrey of Monmouth] , 1155. -Constitutionof the Cycle of Arthur. -The lais of Marie of France. -Béroul'sTristan. -Other " Anglo-Norman " tales. -The connection betweenthe adventures of Tristan and other Gallic heroes and the Cycle ofArthur. -Crestien de Troyes draws upon the matter offered by Brittany;-and it is here that it is possible to trace for the first time inthe history of mediæval literature the influence of talent upon the transformation of a literature .General characteristics of the romantic epopee; -and that theyare neither those of the heroic epopee, -nor those of the poetry ofProvence: ( 1) the marvellous in these epopees is not that of sunnycountries, and the same is to be said of their background;—(2) theadoration at once mystic and sensual of which woman is the objectin them in no way resembles that which is met with in the songs of thetroubadours;—(3) passion in them is distinguished by a tendernessand depth it presents nowhere else; (4) and as a whole they areenshrouded in a veil of melancholy or even of sadness about whichthere is assuredly nothing meridional. -Other characteristics distinguish our romantic epopee to an equal extent from Arabian poetryTHE MIDDLE AGES 11this they mean that it was in closer conformity withthe organic evolution of languages. And the truth isthat no great writer, whether prose writer or poet, hadventured as yet to disturb its development. The evolution of the literature of the Middle Ages is a similarcase, and is all the more instructive for the very reasonthat it was logical. We have now to see how this evolution took place.IIIt has sometimes been asserted that it began withlyrical poetry; and without going back to those songs,of which Salvin relates that they served our forefathersas a consolation in their afflictions -cantilinis infortunia-in spite of its having been alleged that the Arabs were the initiators of " chivalry. " -Its inspiration is also different to that of theNiebelungen.-At bottom the inspiration of the Romances of theRound Table is Celtic.How their origin explains their success by their novelty. -The longinfluence of the Romans de la Table-Ronde; -their diffusion abroad;-the compilation of Rusticien of Pisa, 1270; -Italian , German,Netherland, English, Spanish and Portuguese translations, continuations and imitations. -The Parsifal of Wolfram of Eschenbach andthe Tristan et Iseult of Gottfried of Strasburg. -Reciprocal penetration of the Cycle of Arthur and of the Cycle of the Crusades. -Proseversions are made of the most ancient Romans de la Table- Ronde; -original works of this class are written in prose, for instance, Merlin,the Grand Saint Graal, etc.; —in this new shape they become thesource of inspiration of the Amadis; -and thus, through them, connect the modern " novel " and classical literature with the literatureand romance of the Middle Ages.3. THE WORKS.-The complete list of our Chansons de geste will befound in the work by M. C. Nyrop cited above; and in M. G. Paris'article in the Histoire littéraire de la France, vol. xxx. , an analysis12 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURE66 sua solantur, -we are told of cantilenes of which ourgreat epopees are alleged to be only the reunion anddevelopment. There is, however, nothing lyrical whatever about these cantilenes, and an effort to discerntheir nature shows them to be, properly speaking,merely diffuse epopee, epopee that is not as yet, thatis about to be, but is already epopee. They aspire toform a composite whole; and with us, as formerly inGreece, it may be said with truth that they have noraison d'être except in virtue of and as forming a partof the epopee they are one day to become. The epopee,then, must be our starting- point.At first, as once more was the case in Greece, it wassimply history, supposing it to be beyond doubt that themen of the Middle Ages were as convinced of the realityof the exploits of Roland as of the existence of PhilipAugustus or of Saint Louis. Are not children convincedof most of the romances in verse that are allied to the Breton Cycle.We refer the reader to these works, and content ourselves here withindicating more particularly:The Chanson de Roland, numerous editions, among which it willbe well to point out: Léon Gautier's edition or editions, Tours,1872-1883; - Th. Müller's editions, 1863 and 1878; -Clédat'sedition, Paris , 1886; -the Chanson d'Aliscans, Guessard andMontaiglon's edition , Paris , 1870; -the Chanson de Renaud deMontauban [Les Quatre fils Aymon ] , Michelant's edition, 1862,Stuttgard; [ Cf. an article by Taine in his Essais de critique etd'histoire];-the Chanson de Girart de Roussillon, P. Meyer'sedition or translation, Paris, 1884; -the Chanson de Raoul deCambrai, Paul Meyer's and Longnon's edition , Paris , 1882; —andthe Chanson du Chevalier au Cygne, Reiffenberg's edition , Brussels ,1846-1848.The principal reprints of the ancient epopee are: the Roman deThèbes, L. Constans' edition , Paris, 1890; -the Roman de Troie, byBenoist de Sainte - More, edited by M. A. Joly, Paris , 1870-1871; —theRoman d'Enéas, edited by M. J. S. de Grave, Halle, 1891; -and theRomans d'Alexandre le Grand, edited by M. Paul Meyer, Paris, 1886.THE MIDDLE AGES 13of the existence of Tom Thumb or of Puss in Boots?But it is history amplified, history " heroified, " if onemay risk the barbarism; and thanks to this amplification,which is nothing else than an effort on the part of thepoet to suit his language to the magnitude of the eventshe is singing, there is already introduced into history acommencement of exaggeration, and before long a marvellous or fabulous element. Virtues greater than thoseof humanity are ascribed to the Rolands, the Guillaumes,the Renauds; exploits worthy of their virtues are attributed to them; one of them is armed with his " Durandal, " another is mounted on " Bayard "! Moreover asthis fabulous element flatters agreeably men's imaginations, it is not long in encroaching upon the historicalelement, of which it is even seen to serve as anexplanation, until finally it occupies the entire field ,in the Romans de la Table- Ronde, for example, inNext in order come, among the Romances of the Round Table, andindependently of the Works of Crestien de Troyes, of which M.Wendelin Förster has undertaken the publication in full: [ Chrestienvon Troyes sämtliche Werke, Halle, 1884, 1887, 1890]; -the Lais deMarie de France, Karl Warnke's edition , Halle, 1885; -Lancelot duLac [analysed by Paulin Paris, op. cit. ]; -Perceval, Potvin'sedition, Mons, 1866-1871; -Le Saint Graal, Hucher's edition, LeMans, 1874;-Merlin, Gaston Paris and Ulrich's edition in thecollection of the Société des anciens textes français, Paris, 1886;-and Tristan, collection of what remains of the poems relatingto his adventures, Fr. Michel's edition, London and Paris,1835-1839.III. The Song Writers.1. THE SOURCES.-Paulin Paris' article on the Song Writers in theHistoire littéraire de la France, vol. xxiii .; -Raynaud, Bibliographie des chansonniers français des XIIIe et XIVe siècles, Paris,1884;-V. Jeanroy, Les Origines de la Poésie lyrique en France auMoyen-âge, Paris, 1889; -G. Paris, Les Origines de la Poésie lyriqueen France, Paris, 1892.14 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREwhich history only serves the trouvère as a pretextfor exercising the fertility of his invention; andin this way the romance becomes distinct from theepopee.The epopee does not cease to exist; and the Songswhich constitute the " Cycle of the Crusades " are convincing testimony of the long survival of this literaryform . Henceforth, however, it is but a shadow, a reflection of itself, an unsubstantial survival whence littleby little the colour and the life disappear. On theother hand, as the purely human greatness of historicalevents comes to be better understood, the epopee is transformed into the chronicle as in the Chanson de Bertranddu Guesclin. Nothing can be more prosaic, or thatthere is less reason to put into verse! The authorsare quite alive to the fact, and their readers, or rathertheir audience, still more so. Three or four centuries2. THE DIFFERENT FORMS OF LYRIC POETRY.A. The " Chansons de Toile, " or Historical Songs; -and thatthey are contemporary with the national epopee as is proved by:-their essentially narrative style; -the part played in them by women;[the advances come from them, and the men treat them with thebrutality to which they always have recourse in such cases]; —finallyby the want of distinction between the epic, lyric and even the dramatic elements. -The epic element predominates in the HistoricalSongs proper;-the dramatic element comes to the front in the Pastourelles and Dancing Songs whose ulterior development resultsunder the influence of the entertainments of the May Fêtes-in veritable plays, such as the Jeu de Robin et Marion by Adam de la Halle,1260; -but the second element, the lyric or personal, does not makeits appearance until the influence is felt of the poetry of Provence.B. Artificial character of Provençal poetry; -and that it is merelya jeu d'esprit;-whose invariable theme is " courteous " love;—butwhose artistic value is not lessened on this account: Materiamsuperavit opus [ Cf. in Greek literature the poets of the Alexandrineperiod]; —and whose aristocratic destiny is explained by its defects asmuch as by its qualities.THE MIDDLE AGES 15before the Art poétique, they are conscious that theepopeeIs based upon fable and draws its vitality from fiction.And when reading the Vie de Saint Louis by the Sire deJoinville , or the Conquête de Constantinople by Geoffroy deVillehardouin, how should they fail to remark that theuse of prose in no way detracts from the interest of evenan heroic narrative? In any case it is a fact that MasterJehan Froissart, who, the better to honour Prowess, hadbegun to write his Chroniques in verse, re-wrote them inprose; and thus history at once branches off from theepopee and becomes distinct from the romance.The meaning and nature of the evolution are here,then, perfectly clear: it is a differentiation of literaryforms that is in progress . Instead of one form , forthe future we have three, to which, if desired, aC.-The principal representatives of lyrical poetry in the langue d'oil are: Conon or Quesne de Béthune, -Gace Brûlé, -Blondelde Nesle, -Guy, Châtelain de Couci, -Gautier d'Espinaus, —Gontierde Soignies, Thibaut de Champagne, King of Navarre, -Charlesd'Anjou, King of Sicily, -Colin Muset, -and Rutebeuf. -A veryfew 66 commoners practised this branch, -particularly in thepuys " of the north of France; -and among them are cited:Adam de la Halle, -Jean Bodel, -Baude Fastoul, all three belongingto Arras. '6699D. Whether either class added anything to their Provençal models ,-and that it would seem that they made a more serious matter oflove. But this is perhaps due to the character of the language;-lessformed and in consequence apparently more naïve than the langued'oc. Still they expressed some sentiments that had not beenexpressed before them;-and in the matter of form some of theseCourteous Songs are perhaps the most finished productions offered usby the literature of the Middle Ages.We borrow these two lists of names from M. Gaston Paris' Histoire de lalittérature française au Moyen-âge, p. 184-187, 2nd edition, 1890, Hachette.16 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREfourth might be added, the satiric epopee, of the typeof Baudoin de Sebourg or of the Pèlerinage de Charlemagne à Jérusalem, -all the three clearly characterised; and as we said, it is not any intervention fromwithout that has thus separated them from each other,but, on the contrary, a necessity from within. It willbe noticed that a like differentiation of forms cameabout in the past in Greece, the Odyssey having certainly succeeded the Iliad , and the Histories of Herodotusthe Odyssey.A differentiation of classes, whose remote cause wouldbe found in the progress of civilisation in general, appearsto be almost contemporary with the last phase of thedifferentiation offorms.The date of Richeut, the oldest of the fabliaux thathave come down to us, is 1159, but Richeut can barelybe classed as a fabliau; and " the majority of theE. Last transformation of lyrical poetry. -Development of varietieshaving a fixed form [ Ballad, Rondeau, Virelay, Chant Royal] .—Disappearance of the personal sentiment. -Guillaume de Machaut, -Eustache Deschamps, -Christine de Pisan, -Alain Chartier.—" Circumstantial " character of their work; -they essay to make passingevents the subject of poetry. -That there is room for astonishmentthat, being the contemporaries of du Guesclin or of Joan of Arc, theyshould not have been more successful in this effort [ Cf. the best knownof Eustache Deschamps ' ballads, that on du Guesclin]:Estoc d'honneur et arbre de vaillance.They make an effort, too, to " moralise "; -and poetry becoming confounded with prose, it is necessary to wait at least until Charlesd'Orléans, even until Villon before lyricism is seen to reappear.3. THE WORKS. -Romanzen und Pastourellen , Karl Bartsch'sedition, Leipsic , 1870; -Euvres complètes d'Adam de la Halle,Coussemaker's edition, Paris, 1872. Chansons de Conon de Béthune,Wallensköld's edition, Helsingfors, 1891; -Euvres de Blondel deNesle, Tarbé's edition , Rheims, 1862; -Chansons du châtelain deTHE MIDDLE AGES 17others seem to belong to the end of the 12th or tothe beginning of the 13th century. " The fabliauxbear witness to the intellectual emancipation of thevillain. The same remark may be made of the Romande Renart and of the second part of the Roman dela Rose. Whatever be the satirical bearing of theseworks, even if it be reduced to the measure of ridiculepresent of necessity, since we are not angels , in alldepictions of manners, -they are " popular " works, ofwhich an entire class of society has made as it were aliterature in its own image and procuring it amusement.The social unity to which the Chansons de geste boreeloquent testimony is breaking up, and the feudalhierarchy is taking for a time fixed shape. In responseto different functions we now have new customs, andof these new customs are born new literary forms.The villain in his turn would have his pleasures; and heCouci, Fath's edition , Heidelberg, 1883; -Poésies de Thibaut deChampagne, editions of Lévesque de la Ravallière , Paris, 1742, andof Tarbé, 1851; -Trouvères Belges au XIIe au XIVe siècles , Scheler'sedition, 1st series, Brussels , 1876 , and 2nd series , Louvain, 1879;—Les plus anciens chansonniers français, Brakelmann's edition , Paris,1891 , and Marbourg, 1896.Almost all the poems of Guillaume de Machaut are still unpublished.The complete works of Eustache Deschamps have been issued in ninevolumes, Paris, 1878-1894.IV. The Fabliaux.1. THE SOURCES. -Victor Le Clerc's article on the Fabliaux in theHistoire littéraire de la France, vol. xxii.; —A. de Montaiglon's introduction to the Recueil général et complet des Fabliaux, Paris , 1875; —G. Paris, Les Contes orientaux dans la littérature française duMoyen-âge, 1875, Paris; -J. Bédier, Les Fabliaux, Etude d'histoirelittéraire du Moyen- âge, 2nd edition , Paris , 1895.2. CHARACTERISTICS OF THE FABLIAUX. -Whether many Fabliauxhave failed to come down to us; -and whether, on the contrary,318 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREfinds a very keen pleasure , at first in having his portraitdrawn, and one still keener a little later, in executing portraits in caricature of other people.At the same time, in the better though barely educatedaristocratic class, the individual , under the double influence of the Romans de la Table- Ronde and the exampleof the Provençal troubadours, is attaining to a commencement of self- consciousness; and lyric poetry comes intoexistence. Our trouvères, -a Quesne de Béthune, the Sirede Couci, Thibaut de Champagne, Huon d'Oisi, Charlesd'Anjou, —all of noble birth , attempt to introduce the expression of their personal sentiments into the conventionalforms they borrow from these early masters, forms ofwhich they accept the exigencies with docility, whenthey do not modify them with a view to making theirconstraint the closer and the more monotonous. Theyare but very imperfectly successful . Fresh to and unit is not to be regretted that more than a hundred have reachedus. Of the origin of the Fabliaux; -and whether it should besought for in the remote East [ Cf. Gaston Paris for the affirmativeand J. Bédier for the negative view] .-That it may be, indeed ,that a few Fabliaux have come to us from India; -but that ingeneral great abuse has been made in our time of " oriental origins ";-and that the majority of our Fabliaux, such as Brunain, theVache au Prêtre, or the Vilain Mire or the Bourgeoise d'Orléans,only call for an inventive effort that does not exceed the capacityof the most ordinary experience. -Grossness of the Fabliaux; —and the difficulty of reproducing even their titles; -on accountof obscenity. The satirical side of the Fabliaux; -and in thisconnection, that they seem to have avoided attacking powerfulpersonages. -How, on the other hand, they treat the priest, the"village curé," not the monk or the bishop; -and how they treatwomen. Of the " documentary " value of the Fabliaux; —andwhether they teach us anything more than the Dits for example;-or a number of other " documents " of every kind. -The favourenjoyed by the Fabliaux throughout Europe; -and supposing theirorigin not to have been French, -of the slight gratitude we owe-THE MIDDLE AGES 19""skilled in self- observation , when celebrating their " ladyor their " love pains, " they would fain note the characteristic trait, give the precise and distinguishing touch,render, in a word, their sentiments in a manner thatshall be peculiar to themselves, but they are ignoranthow to effect their purpose. They are perhaps too earlyin the field! Their period is that which has sometimesbeen called the golden age of medieval literature, but thetime has not come to dissolve the solidarity that bindsthe individual to his fellows. Neither the mental conditions nor the manners of the period permit this. Itis too soon as yet; and in the meanwhile all theirSongs, in which there are real qualities-if not artisticqualities at least those of grace, elegance and prettiness -continue without or almost without exception toresemble each other. Still the signal has been given,and this " courteous " poetry, in which the personalour trouvères for the form of wit the Fabliaux have propagated in theworld.3. THE WORKS.-See Anatole de Montaiglon's and Gaston Raynaud'sRecueil général et complet des Fabliaux, 6 vols. 8vo, Paris, 1872-1890.V. Allegorical Literature.Of the advantages that accrue from studying from the same pointof view all the works of the literature of the Middle Ages distinguishedby the same allegorical character, and these are: A. The Roman deRenart; -B. The Bestiaires, the Dits, and the Débats or Disputes; —and C. The Roman de la Rose. -In this way it is easier to trace theconnection between them and the forms that preceded them.-Bynoting that they all, or almost all, belong to the same time itis perceived that the " allegory " characterises an entire " period of medieval literature; -and one is led to seek the reasons'for this taste for allegory. -There are found to be social reasons,such as the danger the writer might run in openly " satirisingsomebody more powerful than himself; -but there are more especially literary reasons resulting, -from the slight extent to whichthe "direct " observation of reality was practised in the Middle""20 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREsentiment essays to come to the front, is already thesymptom of an approaching emancipation of the individual.Is it to oppose this tendency that the clergy, for theirpart, encourage the literature of the Miracle and MysteryPlays? At any rate, it may be said that these representations, which they countenance or favour, strike usas being diversions by means of which they endeavour toretain an authority they feel to be eluding their grasp.A literature intended to edify or even to instruct, thereason why these Miracles and Mysteries sprang up inthe shadow of the sanctuary is because in reality theywere at first merely a further religious observance; andtraces of this origin will subsist down to the representations of the Brotherhood of the Passion . This fact willbe overlooked by those who later on will be seen toscoff at these works, and perhaps by those who inAges; from the comparative unfitness of the language for theexpression of general ideas without the intermediary of a materialpersonification; -and from the tendency of the " wits " of allperiods to speak a language that shall not be understood by themultitude .A. The Roman de Renart.1. THE SOURCES. -Édelestand du Méril, Poésies Latines du Moyenâge, preceded by a Histoire de la fable Esopique, Paris, 1854; -Léopold Hervieux, Les Fabulistes Latins depuis le siècle d'Augustejusqu'à la fin du Moyen- âge, Paris, 1884 [ Cf. Saint- Marc Girardin;Les Fabulistes français]; -Léopold Sudre, Les Sources du Romande Renart, Paris , 1892; -W. J. Jonckbloet, Etude sur le Romande Renart, Groningen, 1863; -Ernest Martin, le Roman de Renart,Strasburg, 1881-1887; -Jacobs, History of the Esopic Fable,London, 1889; -G. Paris , le Roman de Renart, in the Journal desSavants, 1893.2. THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE ROMAN DE RENART. -Popularity ofthe Isopets or collections of fables more or less " Esopic, " -provedby the number of them that have come down to us. -How theirTHE MIDDLE AGES 21our time will attempt to trace back to them thebeginnings of modern drama. Further, supposing thequasi-liturgical pomp of the Mysteries to have been atfirst the continuation in the street of the ceremoniescelebrated in the church; supposing them to have been,as the processions were, a mode of causing the sensesof the populace, and its natural appetite for amusement and spectacles to be interested in the duration ofreligion; and, finally, supposing their decline, as mightbe shown to be the case, to be solely due to the anathemacast upon them by the Church, it may be said, and it mustbe said, that just as the courteous poetry expressed theideal of the nobility, and the Fabliaux that of the villain,so the Mysteries to begin with expressed the ideal of theclergy.Side by side with this differentiation of forms andclasses, we see finally a differentiation of nationalities;diffusion must have incited to a closer observation of the characterof familiar animals; -and how in this waythe " Animal Epopee " cameinto existence. Commentary on a saying of St. Augustin: Vitiumhominis natura pecoris; —it was perceived that we have doubtlessperfected our vices, but that in us and in their mutual relationsthey are like " animals " that are fighting with each other [ Cf. a finepassage of Bossuet in his Elévations sur les mystères, 4th week, 8thElevation];-and in this connection of the employment of apologuesor of animal " examples " in the medieval collections of sermons.This is the second phase of the evolution of the Roman de Renart.-Writers perceive the infinite facilities for satire offered by this newvehicle of expression [ Cf. Taine, La Fontaine et ses Fables]; -theycease to joke at the expense of the awkwardness or cowardice of theirneighbour; but deride these failings in Brun, the bear, or Couard,the hare; and here, perhaps, we have the explanation of the almostsudden disappearance of the Fabliaux: -if from being direct and brutal,satire by becoming " allegorical " has become more general and lessdangerous. In the same way is explained the number and diversity of the "'branches " of the Roman de Renart: -from one end ofthe territory to the other the animal epopee serves as the common22 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREand when it is clearly established that neither thePapacy nor the Empire is capable of maintaining theunity of Europe in face of the conflicting interests thatdivide it, it becomes the turn of the nations, after theforms and the classes, to attain to self-consciousness.This is nowhere better perceived than in the history ofliteratures. The ground-work of our Chansons de gestecontinues to subsist in France, and also that of ourRomans de la Table- Ronde, which are destined to servefor the compilations of the Bibliothèque bleue, —but itwould seem as if their spirit emigrates on the onehand to Germany, and on the other to Spain. Inopposition to the Spanish genius, which is about tocombine what is most extravagant in the Chansons degeste or the Romans de la Table-Ronde with what ismost heroic in the " folly of the Cross, " the Frenchgenius manifests itself as a spirit of mockery, of ironyvehicle, and as it were as the " passe-partout " for satire; -pains aretaken, too, to imitate the animals ' habits more exactly:-and theoutcome of all this is something analogous to the " ample comedy "of La Fontaine; -but of a La Fontaine who is no artist-perhaps nota poet.Finally, in a last period, -on the threshold of the fourteenthcentury-the new " branches " become purely satirical; -and alle.gorical; " the grossness of the worst Fabliaux invades thesewritings -or "they serve as a vehicle for bitter and excessivesatire " [ Cf. Gaston Paris, La Littérature française au Moyen- âge] .—The matter outgrows the scope of the work; -the general interestgives way to a purely topical interest; —and as this latter phasecoincides with the perversion of the language, the Middle Ages oncemore miss an opportunity of giving definite shape in a masterpieceto an ingenious idea.3. THE WORK. -See for the Roman de Renart proper, ErnestMartin's edition , mentioned above. In Méon's edition , 1826, Parisshould be mentioned as well: Le Couronnement Renart-Renard leNouvel; and Renart le Contrefait, Wolf's edition , 1861 , Vienna.-A piece such as that which Rutebeuf has entitled Renart le BestourenTHE MIDDLE AGES 23and already of revolt. Very different from the Englishgenius, as exemplified almost at the outset in Chaucer'sTales, it is no less different from the German genius.Again, is it not almost as distinct from the Italiangenius, as the latter is beginning to take shape inthe Divine Comedy, for example, or in the sonnetsof Petrarch? And thus it is that in Europe, whichin the past was so closely united, the nationalities areforming by the agglomeration of like to like, by a sort ofprocess of grouping round certain ideas or certain sentiments, to be transformed later on by heredity into racialcharacteristics .It is impossible to think without some uneasiness ofwhat would have become of the French genius had itpersevered in this direction, or rather, for it wasdestined so to persevere, as we shall see, -if this influence of the Gallic bent of mind had not beenmay serve to prove the popularity of the Roman, but, on the otherhand, does not form part of it in any way whatever.With the Roman de Renart may be compared, on account of theirmore or less allegorical characteristics:B.-The Bestiaires, among which are cited those; -of Philippede Thaon, of Guillaume Le Clerc, -and of Richard de Fournival.They are animal tales moralised; —and whence are sometimes drawn,as by Philippe de Thaon, Christian lessons; -or, as by Richard deFournival, amatory lessons;C. The Dits, and still more the Débats—for instance the Bataillede Carême et de Charnage; -the theme of which has been reproduced by Rabelais in his epic account of the struggle between theReine des Andouilles and Quaresme prenant; -or the Bataille desSept Arts by Henri d'Andeli;D. The Arts d'Amour, among which are cited André leChapelain's De arte honeste amandi, translated into French byDrouart la Vache;-Jacques d'Amiens' Clef d'Amours;--le Conseild'Amours by Richard de Fournival. -It is due to the influence ofthese works that courteous poetry finds its way into the Roman de la Rose.24 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREcounterbalanced, almost from the start, by other influences, and foremost amongst them by " scholasticism . "Many hard things have been said of scholasticism ingeneral, and doubtless with some justice, though, afterall , St. Thomas is not perhaps so much the inferiorof Aristotle, nor Duns Scotus of Hegel. However,this is not the question here; and we shall confineourselves to saying that if, (as La Bruyère declares,"the whole art of writing consists in defining welland in depicting well, " then scholasticism has certainlytaught us the half of it. Owing to the lack of asufficiently wide knowledge of nature, and still moreto the lack of a sufficiently experimental knowledge,there is nothing " scientific, " in the true sense ofthe word, about the scholastic definitions; but theynevertheless served to discipline the French geniusby imposing upon it that need of clearness, precision,E. The Roman de la Rose.1. THE SOURCES. -Paulin Paris' article on the Roman de la Rose, inthe Historre littéraire, vol. xxiii.; —and his article on Jehan de Meung,in the Histoire littéraire, vol. xxviii .; -Langlois, Origines et sourcesdu Roman de la Rose, Paris, 1891; -Gaston Paris, La Littératurefrançaise au Moyen-âge.2. THE CONTENTS OF THE ROMANCE. -The two authors of theRoman, Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meung; -and the fact notto be overlooked that there was a difference of age of forty yearsbetween them;--or about the distance of time that separates leCouronnement Renart or Renart le Nouvel from the principalbranches of the Roman de Renart. - The relation of the " psychological epopee " (Gaston Paris) of Guillaume de Lorris to the " animalepopee " of the Roman de Renart. -Guillaume de Lorris , in his Artd'aimer, personifies the varieties of love, just as the authors ofRenart personified the vices of humanity in their animals. His conception of love; -and its relation to that in the " courteous poetry. ” —His skill in the handling of allegory; —and that it was probably notthe least important cause of the success of the Roman de la Rose.-THE MIDDLE AGES 25and propriety which throughout has had a notableinfluence on the destinies of our prose. It may be, too ,that we owe to scholasticism our habit, not of going tothe bottom of questions, but of viewing them in everylight, and thus of perceiving their unexpected aspectsand of finding ingenious solutions to them, solutionstoo ingenious perhaps, yet bordering at times on thetruth , which, as it is complex, may be garbled bya too simple mode of expression . In any case, wecannot be otherwise than grateful to scholasticism forhaving taught us to "compose "; for, as is notorious,it is this balance in the composition, this subordination of detail to the main idea, this nice proportionof the parts that will prove to be one of the superlative and characteristic features of French literature.It may be said indeed that the French genius, whilemanifesting itself as a spirit of satire and oppoFor all these reasons, the Roman de la Rose may be considered asthe ideal expression of the sentiments of the society, of which theRoman de Renart is the satirical picture.It would be well to seek to establish which were the works;-in theinterval that separates G. de Lorris from Jean de Meung, that " filledthe place " of the Roman de la Rose; and why Jean de Meung, whowas about to alter its nature, should have chosen to continue it ratherthan the Roman de Renart?―Jean de Meung's Roman; --and that the poet himself regarded thispart of his work merely as a sally of his youth; while its significance is on this account only the more characteristic . -Whilerespecting the story and the scope of Guillaume de Lorris' work,Jean de Meung introduced into them a marked disposition towards"social satire " and " natural philosophy ";-the first tendency connects him with the authors of the additional " branches " of theRoman de Renart; -with whom he has also in common the violenceof his language; and his license of expression . His inclinationtowards " natural philosophy " seems more exclusively peculiar tohimself; although it can be compared with the doubtless very unconscious philosophy of the authors of our Fabliaux.26 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREsition took the shape as well of a spirit of logic andclearness .Further, in opposition to the feudal spirit , which is aspirit of individualism and of liberty, it took the shape ofa spirit of equality, not to say in so many words, of justiceand "fraternity. " Omnia quæ loquitur populus isteconjuratio est. Of all the characteristics of the Europeanliterature of the Middle Ages there is none that hasremained more national, and, if one may venture so toexpress oneself, more personal to French literature thanthis leaning towards universality. It might be maintained without exaggeration , that the " Rights of Man "are already set forth in the second part of the Roman dela Rose, that by Jean de Meung, and what is more, thecontention could be proved. k From the first it is , as itwere, an understood thing that authors shall not writein French for the sake of writing, but with a view toProdigious success of the Roman de la Rose; and that Jean deMeung, with Christien de Troyes, is one of the very few writers of theMiddle Ages of whom it may be said that their works were epochmaking. The attacks of Gerson; -and of Christine de Pisan; —evidence of Petrarch; -" Since you desire a foreign work in the vulgartongue, he wrote to Guy de Gonzague of Mantua, I cannot suggestanything better than this one [ the Roman de la Rose] , unless allFrance, with Paris leading the way, be mistaken as to its merit. " -Numerous copies of the poem; —and immediately after the inventionof printing, the numerous editions of the book.3. THE WORK. —Independently of the edition issued by Marot atthe beginning of the sixteenth century there may be cited Méon'sedition, Paris, 1813; --and Pierre Marteau's [ a pseudonym] editionwith translation , Orléans, 1878-1879.The importance of " allegorical " literature in the Middle Ages isseen from these summary details; -it would remain to compare these"personifications " with the " Entities " and " Quiddities " of scholasti- cism;-and both with what will be called later " the reduction to theuniversal, " —or, in other words, general ideas. -That unfortunately,THE MIDDLE AGES 27exerting an action , and that the object of this actionshall be the propagation of general ideas, Later on, thispeculiarity will be found to contribute more than anything else to extend throughout the world the popularityof the French language and literature; and is it not exactthat this is the quality in our tongue which pleasesforeigners, who spoke of it , as far back as the thirteenthcentury, as "the most delectable in existence "? Theexplanation of this characteristic lies: in part in thepersistence and continuity of Latin traditions; in partin the efforts of our legists to secure the triumph ofthe spirit of Roman law over the Germanic or feudalspirit; and finally in the encouragement by our kingsof an effort that serves the ends of their noblestambition, since it makes for the unification of theirsubjects' aspirations and for the formation of theFrench nation.if the intentions were excellent, the method was false; -for the ideadid not become clearer in proportion as recourse was had more andmore to allegory; -and the writers got further away from nature andtruth in the same proportion. —This is what Petrarch meant when,in the letter quoted above, he made the authors of the Roman de laRose the reproach that their " Muse was asleep "; —and when hecontrasted with their coldness, the passionate ardour breathed by theverses of " those divine singers of love": Virgil , Catullus, Propertius,and Ovid.VI.-The Farce de Pathelin.1. THE SOURCES.-Petit de Julleville, La Comédie et les Mours auMoyen-âge, Paris, 1887; -Littré, Histoire de la langue française,Paris;-Lenient, La Satire en France au Moyen- âge; -ErnestRenan, la Farce de Pathelin, in his Essais de critique et demorale.2. MORALITIES AND FARCES. -That the examination of the Moralities confirms directly or indirectly the preceding observations uponallegorical literature ":-directly if the moralities are merely a formof this literature:-by the nature of the personages who are the heroes6628 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREIIIHow was it, then, that this movement was abruptlyinterrupted? and in point of fact, was it interrupted?For we possess but an indifferent knowledge of the longperiod that elapsed between the reigns of the earliestValois and the time when the Renaissance was in fullprogress.The language becomes confused, faltering and heavy,grows more complicated without growing more refined,becomes at once more obscure, more pedantic and moreinsipid. " An ordinance of Saint Louis, it has been said,and an ordinance of Louis XIV. are both in French ";this doubtless amounts to saying that an ordinance ofJean le Bon, or an ordinance of Charles VII. are scarcelyin French or are not in French. [A. de Montaiglon, inCrépet's Recueil des Poètes français. ] The old formsof them: Mal- Avisé, Bien- Avisé, Rébellion , Malefin, etc.; -by theintention of "moralising " evinced by their very names; -and bythe covert satire they contain. -The same observations are indirectlyconfirmed:-by the superiority of the Farces to the Moralities; —and by the nature of this superiority, —which consists essentially inthe fact that the personages in the former works are not allegories, —but real personages.The Farce de Maitre Pathelin; -and whether the origin ofclassical comedy is to be traced to it; and if its author is tobe regarded as a "forerunner of Molière. "-Of the abuses in connection with this perpetual search after " origins "; —and that afew good comic scenes do not warrant the pronouncing of thename of Molière. -The Farce de Pathelin is after all only a Fabliauin dialogue; the central idea of which is neither very clevernor very deep; -though for all that the farce is excellent. Thatthe distinction between literary forms must be observed; -and inthis connection of an excellent passage of Renan on the lownessof the sentiments that find expression in the Farce de MaîtrePathelin.--A few remarks upon the Soties; -which belong to the period of theTHE MIDDLE AGES 29are exhausted and the new have not arisen as yetupon their ruins. The epic vein has run dry: thereare no more Chansons de geste or Romans. Fabliauxare no longer composed, and even the importantMysteries only make their appearance towards theclose of the period . [ Cf. V. Le Clerc, Histoirelittéraire de la France, vol. xxiv. ] The Chronicle,on the other hand, has encroached in every direction.There are chronicles in verse and chronicles in prose.Eustache Deschamps is a chronicler, and so is GeorgesChastelain . The most wise Christine de Pisan, andFroissart himself, are also merely chroniclers . Theyare all of them exclusively preoccupied with the present;and this is comprehensible when one bears in mind thetime in which they are living.Of a surety, it is not the moment to dream of themystic conquest of the Grail when the English areliterature of the Middle Ages that is still almost unexplored. -Thatit would seem, however, that they bear the same relation to sucha Farce as Pathelin, as the last branches of the Renard to theearliest;-or as the inspiration of Jean de Meung to that of G.de Lorris:-once more it is the allegory that itself reacts uponitself, by endeavouring to avoid dullness by recourse to grossness.3. THE WORK. -The principal edition of the Farce de MaitrePathelin is that of F. Genin , Paris, 1854.VII.-François Villon [ Paris, 1431 ....].1. THE SOURCES.-A. Campaux, François Villon, sa vie et sesœuvres, Paris, 1859; -A. Longnon, Etude biographique sur FrançoisVillon, Paris, 1877; -Aug. Vitu, Le Jargon au XVe siècle, Paris,1884;-Lucien Schöne, Le Jargon et Jobelin de François Villon,Paris, 1888; -A. Bijvanck, Essai critique sur les œuvres de FrançoisVillon, Leyden, 1883; -Euvres de François Villon, edited by M.Aug. Longnon, Paris, 1892.2. THE POET; -that Boileau was not mistaken in hailing him asunique among or the " first " of our " old romance writers " --The30 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREmasters of three- quarters of France; and people have noheart for rhyming amid the tumult of arms. Furtherthere was the Black Plague, the Jacquerie, the madnessof King Charles VI. , and the sanguinary quarrels betweenArmagnacs and Burgundians. To sing the ladies " orthe return of springThe year has doffed its mantleOf wind, of cold, and of rain ,66amid all these horrors and the universal distress ,the heedlessness is needful of a Charles d'Orléans. Andwhen finally, during the last years of the reign of CharlesVII. , or under Louis XI. , there is a return of peace andtranquillity, one or two exceptions do not prevent whatI may perhaps describe as a Flemish or Burgundianheaviness from invading the whole domain both ofliterature and art-the tomb of the dukes of BurgundyParisian student of the fifteenth century; -his adventures, and howthey nearly brought him to the gibbet; -he was perhaps on the eveof being hanged when he wrote his Ballade des Pendus and his twoTestaments; -although on the other hand the " Testament " was aform of composition frequently adopted in the literature of his time.-Whether he was a member of a band of robbers, -and that in anycase he was in the prison of Charité- sur- Loire when Louis XI. cameto the throne. He was released on this occasion, and from thismoment we lose sight of him. -But enough is known to allow itto be affirmed that the great superiority of his work is due to hishaving " lived " his poetry.That in point of fact he possesses all the qualities of a great poetand of a lyric poet; -and even those of a wit; -although his wit wasgenerally in very bad taste; -and his jests are those of the stews[ Cf. the ballad of the Belle Heaumière and that of the GrosseMargot] . But he is touching when expressing his repentance [ Cf.le Grand Testament, 169-224] , proof of the sincerity of which isafforded by la Ballade que Villon fit à la requête de sa mère. Furtherhe had the gift of seeing and of evoking the vision of " things seen[Cf. la Ballade des Contredits de Franc Gontier] , a keen sentimentTHE MIDDLE AGES 31at Dijon is proof—and from crushing everything beneathits incubus, which the ostentatious display of riches aggravates rather than alleviates . [ Cf. Ernest Renan, Histoirelittéraire de la France, vol . xxiv. ]Doubtless there is Villon , François Villon, " born inParis, near Pontoise, " a true gallows-bird, but a truepoet as well-one would even venture to say a greatpoet; and assuredly some of his Ballades exemplify thegrace and vigour of style, the emotional sincerity, andthe originality of sentiment and ideas that attach tothis name of poet when it is deserved. What is theregrimmer than the Ballade des pendus? what fuller ofcolour than the Ballade de la grosse Margot? morenaïvely " limned " than the Ballade que fit Villon à larequête de sa mère? and-since Villon cannot be namedwithout the reference-what is there more human inits melancholy than the Ballade des Dames du tempsof the grim [ Cf. Grand Testament, 305–329, and 1728-1778]; -infinitegrace and delicacy when he liked [ Cf. la Ballade des dames du tempsjadis]; —the rugged eloquence of the satirist; -to such a degreeindeed that in none of our poets is the close relationship betweenlyricism and satire better perceived; —such artistic mastery thatnobody in his own time or since has surpassed or equalled him inthe ballad; and finally his entire work gives utterance to a cry ofprofound anguish by which we ourselves are moved in our innermostbeing.Be it added that to Villon belongs the merit of having at least"summarised " what Boileau believed he had " cleared up. " --Villon'sideal is assuredly far removed from that of the " courteous poetry, "but if there exists a poetry of adventure and Bohemian life it ishis; and he did not invent it. —Again, the form in which deathhaunted the imaginations of the Middle Ages has had no moreeloquent interpreter [ Cf. the Vers de la Mort by the Monk Hélinandin the Histoire littéraire de la France, vol. xiii. ]; -and if thecourteous poetry itself, though it went the wrong way to work, tendednevertheless to liberate from all restraint the expression of the poet'spersonality; -this end, too, was attained by Villon .32 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURE66jadis? But it was not the example of Villon that wasfollowed. The men who founded a school were thegreat rhetoricians ": Jean Meschinot, Jean Molinet,Guillaume Cretin, -the Raminagrobis of Rabelais, -JeanMarot, Lemaire de Belges. Already prosaic with AlainChartier, poetry with these writers becomes pretentiouslydidactic. Were they alive to the fact themselves; and,"being unable to make their poetry beautiful, " was itfor this reason that they made it " artificial " by overloading it with infinite complications and regrettableornament? Their poetry reminds us of the villagequeen of whom Pascal will somewhere write, the " prettymaid, all mirrors and chains, who admires herself butwho provokes laughter. " And the result is that nothingof their work has remained, and it cannot even be saidthat the succeeding age turned its fragments to account.Nevertheless, in their own time they choked, as it were,3. THE WORKS. -Villon's authentic works consist of his twoTestaments and of five Ballades, the best edition of which is thatof M. Longnon referred to above.He is the author neither of the Repues franches nor of the Francarcher de Bagnolet, which are persistently given a place in almost alleditions of his works; -and of the eleven Ballades in jobelin or slangwhich are attributed to him, there are at least four that are certainlynot by him;-but all these pieces, since they are attributed to him,are of great interest, as they prove for this very reason the representative character of his work; -and that his contemporaries appreciatedit at once.VIII. The Mysteries.1. THE SOURCES.-Onésime Leroy, Études sur les mystères, Paris,1837; -Charles Magnin, les Origines du théâtre moderne, Paris, 1846,1847, 1858, Journal des Savants; -Édelestand du Méril, les Origineslatines du théâtre moderne, Paris, 1849; -Coussemaker, Dramesliturgiques, Rennes, 1860; -Léon Gautier, les Origines du théâtremoderne, in the newspaper le Monde, 1873; —and les Tropes, Paris,1887 -Marius Sepet, le Drame Chrétien au Moyen- âge, Paris, 1877; —THE MIDDLE AGES 33the reputation of Villon, and more than fifty years willelapse before the Lunettes des princes or the Complaintesur le trépas de Messire Guillaume de Byssipat will besurpassed in the estimation of poets by the Petit andthe Grand Testament.In the same lamentable fashion as in the rhapsodies ofthe " great rhetoricians, " the sterility of the period comesinto view in connection with the apparent abundance ofMysteries, supposing indeed the Mysteries to belong tothe history of literature, and their text to be of greatervalue than that of a modern opera libretto. For just asin an opera it is first of all the music and in the nextplace the scenery, costumes, and ballet that by definitionare the essential features of this class of work, while thetext in reality is only the peg on which they are hung;so in our great Mysteries the principal, capital, andcharacteristic element is the spectacle or representation ,and les Prophètes du Christ, 1878; -Petit de Julleville , les Mystères ,Paris, 1880; -A. d'Ancona, Origini del teatro in Italia, Florence,1872;-W. Creizenach, Geschichte des neueren Dramas, Halle, 1893.2. THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE MYSTERIES.A. The origin of the Mysteries; -and in this connection of theanalogy between the origin of French mediæval drama and that ofGreek drama; -but while this analogy should be pointed out it mustnot be exaggerated. Of the Tropes or interpolations in liturgicaltexts, and what was the object of the Church in allowing them: -itdoubtless desired to add to the solemnity of certain services or certainfêtes;-to interest the faithful in a more active manner in the celebration of worship; -to maintain its hold on them, to fix theirattention and to instruct them by " amusing them " [ Cf. down to ourown time the " pomps " and " processions " ] .-Gradual formation ofthe liturgical drama: -by the introduction of the vulgar tongue intothe recognised texts; -by the material and costumed representation of the "mystery " appropriate to the season; [ Cf. the dramasl'Époux and the Prophètes du Christ]; -by the intervention oflay authors .-The Representation d'Adam, and the fragment ofthe Resurrection. -Removal of the site of the stage. -Why was it434 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREor more exactly the exhibition. Whether clerks orlaymen, the authors, or, as it would be more correct toterm them, the purveyors of our Mysteries, do not evenpropose to narrate the " drama of the Passion," to teachthe masses new truths, or to present them old truths ina new guise; their aim, or rather their office , all thatthey do and all that is asked of them, is merely to sketcha sort of scenario, which shall serve as a pretext to theburgesses of Tours or of Orleans for mounting on thestage arrayed in resplendent finery, —and thus for procuring themselves the kind of pleasure afforded themto-day by a so- called historical " cavalcade. " At thesame time, for this very reason, and on account of theliving reality of the topical matter they contain of thetime of Louis XI. or of Charles VII. , it is not to begainsaid that the Mysteries are precious documents forthe history of manners.66that the development of the liturgical drama was at a standstillfor nearly two centuries?-Impossibility of answering the question;--and whether this impossibility does not throw some doubt on thealleged continuity " of the evolution of the drama during theMiddle Ages. That in any case the two plays of the thirteenthcentury that have come down to us [the Jeu de Saint Nicolas, byJean Bodel, and the Miracle de Théophile, by Rutebeuf] do not reestablish the continuity;-any more than do the Miracles de NotreDame;-which have only a remote connection with the Mysteries.B. THE MIRACLE PLAYS. -They consist of an incident taken fromordinary life, and terminating in the intervention of the Virgin orof a saint; -about the climax, and especially about "the plot " ofwhich, there is nothing obligatory; -there is not necessarily anything more or less historic about the personages of these plays; —they can scarcely be said to aim at edifying and still less at instructing;—indeed they are often hostile to the clergy; —and thereis no evidence that the Church took them under its protection.—In consequence, their chief point of resemblance with the Mysteries is that they promoted a taste for the theatre; -which theymay even be said to have developed by means of the fraternities,THE MIDDLE AGES 3566 But are not a royal ordinance " or a " decree ofParliament " also " documents "? and to whom has itequally ever occurred to regard them as "literature "?The only name in this period, apart from that ofVillon, which stands out and survives is that of Philippede Commynes. It would be a mistake to compare,as has been done, Commynes with his contemporaryMachiavelli. The " Decades " or " The Prince " of thegreat Italian are written in a very different style; theirvalue and significance are very different from that of theMémoires of the shrewd servant of Charles the Bold andLouis XI. Still he, too, has his merits! Commynes hasfew prejudices, -always an excellent qualification forwriting history, and above all he lived on familiarterms with one of the most original models an artisthas ever been offered. This being the case, it is unfortunate that his example, as also happened to Villon ,the puys, or the chambers of rhetoric. -That in contrast to thesecharacteristics, the Mysteries for their part are really stage representations ofthe "mysteries " of religion; —a fact that relieves us of thenecessity of dilating upon the signification and etymology of theirname. Herein moreover, and not in any other peculiarity, lies theirtrue character; —which is not altered by the episodic scenes in whichthey abound; -as is further proved by the only classification that can be given of them.C. THE DRAMATIC CYCLES. -They are three in number: ( 1) theCycle de l'Ancien Testament; (2) the Cycle du Nouveau Testament;and (3) the Cycle des Saints. That in the first of these three cyclesnone of the Biblical themes are treated for their own sake, —as in theEsther or the Athalie of Racine for example; —but solely in their connection with the coming of Christ, -whose life entirely takes up thesecond cycle. This peculiarity is the explanation and the only explanation of the choice of episodes [ Job, Tobiah, Daniel, Judith,Esther];―of the grossness of some of them, which is meant to bringinto keener relief the figure of Christ; -and finally of the part that waslong taken by the clergy in the representation of the Mysteries. -Ofthe Cycle des Saints and of its generally local character; -which is

36 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREbore no fruit, but that on the contrary, far from his havinggiven rise to a literary movement, in him and with himour chroniclers come to an end. His talent is merely anaccident, as was that of Villon; and not only is it notfrom him that our classical historians descend, but hecan scarcely be regarded even as the forerunner of thoseauthors of Memoirs, who are soon to become so numerousin the history of our literature.Thus, whichever way we look, and neglecting one ortwo exceptions such as there must always be, we discover nothing but symptoms of decadence, and it seemsthat the literature of the Middle Ages in all its branches,at any rate in France, has met with a check in its growthat the climacteric moment of its development. Thisamounts to saying that the literature we refer to wasmarked by all the qualities that are characteristic ofchildhood; and for this reason we may still turn to it- 66 not the more lay on that account. The Mysteries are ' objectlessons," a mode of teaching the masses the essential truths ofreligion; and as has been said, a means of obtaining a hold on themasses. That there are only two Mysteries that constitute anexception: the Mystère du Siège d'Orléans and the Mystère deTroie; -but the mood that inspired the former had nothing incompatible with the essential character of the sacred Mysteries;-and that the latter was doubtless never represented.D. THE VALUE OF THE MYSTERIES, -and that in general, from aliterary point of view, they are mediocrity itself; -which is easilyunderstandable granting that the drama is as self- dependent asany other independent art; -further it is only by an accident thattheir history coincides with that of literature.-But the Mysteriesare not even drama: they are merely " spectacle, " --and their authorsonly handled them as such. -That this opinion is borne out bythevery conditions under which the Mysteries were represented. —Andby this is not meant that they do not occasionally contain interesting"incidents," for such incidents are found in some of the Mysteriesof the Cycle des Saints; -scenes in which there are traces of thegreatness of the model, as in the Mysteries of the Cycle de l'AncienTHE MIDDLE AGES 37to-day, as to a purer source, and refresh in it ourfevered imaginations . But from the qualities of childhood it passed by an abrupt transition to the infirmities of decrepitude, and nothing or scarcely anythingoccupies the interval. Never perhaps since the remotetimes of Homer and the Greek epopee had epic matterbeen more abundant, richer, and fresher than that ofthe Chansons de Geste or the Romans de la TableRonde. We ourselves are still living on it! Yetduring four hundred years, from one poem to another,from the earliest Chansons de geste to the latestprose versions of the Bibliothèque bleue, this epicmatter floated in a diffuse state, without any of ourold trouvères, the author of Roland, as little as thatof Parsifal, being successful in giving it a shape thatshould present it "under its eternal aspect. " The"dramatists " did not perceive the fact that the natureTestament; and curious " episodes " of a more or less realisticcharacter as in the Cycle du Nouveau Testament; —but what ismeant is that they have no literary value; -that there is no cause toregret their decadence or their extinction , -and that they furnishedno element even to the " Christian " drama of the classic period.3. THE WORKS. -The Mystère du Vieux Testament, edited byJames de Rothschild and Émile Picot, Paris , 1878-1891; -theMystère de la Passion, by Arnoul Gréban, edited by MM. GastonParis and Gaston Raynaud, Paris, 1878; -Les Actes des Apôtres, bySimon and Arnoul Gréban, in 62,000 verses;-the Mystères deSainte Barbe, Saint Denis, Saint Laurent, Saint Louis, &c.; —theMystère du Siège d'Orléans , by MM. Guessard and Certain in thecollection of Documents inédits sur l'histoire de France, Paris , 1862.Further, excellent analyses will be found of all the Mysteries thathave come down to us, whether in manuscript or printed , in the secondvolume of M. Petit de Julleville's work on the Mysteries.IX.-Philippe de Commynes [ Château de Commynes, 1447;1511 , Château d'Argenton].1. THE SOURCES.-Lenglet du Fresnoy in his edition of the Mémoires,38 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREor essence of drama is action; and for want of this intuition, it is seen, from the procession it began by being,to become at first an exhibition, after an exhibition aspectacle, and finally after a spectacle a show of the sortthat is seen at fairs . And lyric poetry, fettered in itsflight by circumstances, had no sooner spread its wingsthan it was constrained to fold them, and confining itsfree inspiration in poems of a conventional impersonality,to content itself with the commonplaces of the " courteous " poetry. What has just been said is expressed in ageneral way, when it is affirmed that the Renaissance, farfrom having accomplished a work of destruction, did noteven interrupt what was already in progress . If the literature of the Middle Ages were not dead when the spirit ofthe Renaissance began to get abroad in the world, it hadbeen expiring for two hundred years and more. It istherefore possible, it is even probable, that in the absence1747;- Mlle Dupont's Notice preceding her edition of the Mémoires,Paris, 1840; -Kervyn de Lettenhove, Lettres et négociations dePhilippe de Commynes, Brussels , 1867, 1874; -Chantelauze, Noticepreceding his edition of the Mémoires, Paris, 1880; -Fierville, Documents inédits sur Philippe de Commynes, Paris, 1881.2. THE MAN AND THE WRITER. -The favourite of Charles the Boldand the counsellor of Louis XI.-His numerous missions and hispolitical rôle. -His disgrace, 1486. -He reappears at court, 1492.-His retirement, 1498. -His last years, 1505-1510; -and his death.Originality of Commynes. -He is himself, and this distinguisheshim from the chroniclers contemporary with him; -who, whetherthey write in French or Latin, are scarcely more than the expressionof their time; -reflecting public opinion rather than uttering theirown thoughts. His experience of public affairs. -Qualities of hisMémoires; they are those of a politician;-and also of a psychologist[Cf. Mémoires, iv. 6 , and vii . 9] .— It may even be said that in placesthey are those of a philosopher [ Cf. ii . 6 , for example, and v. 18] .—But they are not the work of an artist [ Cf. Froissart]; -or of anhistorian who is at the same time a moralist-capable, that is, ofdeducing from events a signification of greater import than the factsPHILIPPE DE COMMYNES.

THE MIDDLE AGES 39of the spirit of the Renaissance some other new spiritwould have entered and quickened this remnant of anexistence. But this did not happen; and in the meantime the Renaissance was about to provide us withthree things we had so far lacked: an artistic model,by setting before us the great examples of antiquity;the ambition to reproduce and imitate the ancient formsof art; and to fill up these forms, if I may so expressmyself, new methods, in the shape of a new manner ofobserving nature and man.themselves;-It is this trait among others that distinguishes him fromhis contemporary Machiavelli; -and not to mention his ignorance ofLatin or of classical traditions. -His qualities as a writer; —and theextent to which they are marked by the spirit of the Middle Ages.3. THE WORK. -Apart from his " negociations , " the work ofCommynes is restricted to his Mémoires. He did not have the timeto finish them, and they stop at 1498.The first edition of them appeared in 1524, under the title ofChronique de Louis XI.; and as to the last portion in 1528, under thetitle of Chronique de Charles VIII.The best modern editions are those of Mlle Dupont, Paris, 1840; —and Chantelauze's edition, Paris, 1881.BOOK IICHAPTER ITHE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEALIIt was in Italy that the signal was given, and it wasthe humanists who gave it . This name of humanists isapplied to the poets, to the men of culture and also tothe pedants-who revived or rather who rediscovered theTHE AUTHORS AND THEIR WORKSFIRST PERIODVillon to Ronsard1490-1550I.-Clément Marot [ Cahors, 1495; † 1544, Turin] .

1. THE SOURCES. L'Adolescence and la Suite de l'AdolescenceClémentine; Bayle Dictionnaire historique et critique, art.MAROT. -Lenglet du Fresnoy in his edition of the Works of Marot,vols. i . and vi .; -Goujet: Bibliothèque française, vol . xi.; -Ch.d'Héricault, Euvres choisies de Marot, introduction, Paris, 1867;We expressly include the works of a writer among the Sources of his biography only when they contain, as does l'Adolescence Clementine, information that is personal and given as such by the author.40THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 41lost significance of antiquity. Not that they themselves.always appreciated it quite aright, or more particularly,as was too long believed, that the Middle Ages entirelyignored it. The Middle Ages were acquainted with Ciceroand Virgil, Livy and Horace, Ovid and Seneca, Plautusand Juvenal; they even translated and imitated them!But "they had only turned them to account, says anhistorian there is little reason to mistrust, -Canon J.Janssen, in his memorable work on the Reformation inGermany, as a medium that might help them to a moreprofound understanding of Christianity, and to an improvement of the moral life "; and this was doubtless aperfectly legitimate manner of making use of them, butit was possible to conceive a different manner. The chiefinnovation effected by humanism was to make the objectof the study or knowledge of Latin antiquity that study or-0. Douen: Clément Marot et le Psautier huguenot, Paris , 1878; —G. Guiffrey: Euvres de Marot, vols. i . and ii . , which are all thathave appeared, Paris, n.d.2. THE MAN AND THE POET. - Did he belong to Quercy or toNormandy?—The disciple of his father, Jean Marot, and of the"great rhetoricians ";-his youth and his love affairs; -his edition ofthe Rommant de la Rose, 1527.-The valet de chambre of François I.-Marot's imprisonments. -The publication of l'Adolescence Clémentine, 1532; and the edition of the Works of Villon , 1533. - Marot andProtestantism.-His stay at Ferrara. -Return to Paris. -The Traduction des Psaumes, 1541. —Marot in Geneva; -his quarrels with Calvin;-he leaves Geneva for Turin, where he dies in 1544.Esteem in which Marot is held; -and the qualities that justify it:wit, clearness , and sly humour. -That these qualities are scarcelythose of a poet, but rather of a prose writer, who should have fittedrhymes to his prose. -Marot possessed neither the intensity of feeling,nor the picturesqueness of vision, nor the vividness of style of a poet;-Marot's ideas commonplace; -and that Marot must not be underestimated; but that it is necessary to assign him no more than hisproper value, if the work of Ronsard and the reform he accomplishedare to be rightly appreciated.42 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREknowledge itself, and in this way to transform, solely bydisplacing them, the very foundations of education andintellectual culture. For there is a wide differencebetween the disposition of mind which induces thereader to search the Tusculanae or the sixth book of theEneid for premonitory signs of the approaching adventof Christianity, and that which leads him merely to seekin these works, with a view to deriving pleasure fromthem, the evidences of the melancholy genius of Virgilor of the eloquence of Cicero. Numerous points whichwere overlooked in the first case came into sight in thesecond, aroused attention and held it. Suppose that atthe present day we were to affect toand Molière merely as the " forerunners of the FrenchRevolution "-and they are its forerunners in a certainmeasure and a certain sense-and endeavour to countregard Rabelais3. THE WORKS. -The works of Marot are composed: (1 ) ofTranslations and Allegories, such as his translation of the Metamorphoses, bk. i . and ii. , and his Temple de Cupido, or again hisEnfer;-(2) of Chants royaux, Ballads, and Rondeaux;-(3) ofElegies, Epistles, and Epigrams;-(4) of occasional pieces, thatfigure in anthologies under the titles Etrennes, Epitaphes, Blasons,Cimetières, and Complaintes;-(5) of his translation of fifty of thePsalms.The best editions are the Niort edition , 1596, published by ThomasPortau; -Lenglet du Fresnoy's edition, The Hague, 1731 , Gosse andNéaulme; —and among the modern editions , that published at Lyonsby Scheuring, 1869; -and that of Guiffrey, which unhappily hasremained unfinished.II.-Marguerite de Valois [Angoulême, 1492; †1549, Châteaud'Odos] .1. THE SOURCES. -Brantôme: Les Dames Illustres , sixth discourse,article 6; -Bayle, Dictionnaire historique, article MARGUERITE; —Génin: Notice sur Marguerite preceding his edition of the Lettres,Paris. 1841;-Leroux de Lincy: Notice preceding his edition of theHeptameron, Paris, 1853; -La Ferrière: Le Livre de dépenses de laTHE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 43how many of their most characteristic traits would belost for us. To search Tartuffe with a view to learningthe religious opinions of Molière is one way of reading thework, but not the only way, -and above all not the mostliterary way. [ Cf. Janssen, l'Allemagne et la Réforme;French translation, Paris, 1887, vols. i. and ii .; and FurcyRaynaud's translation of Pastor's Histoire des Papes,Paris, 1888, vol . i . ]On the other hand, while the Middle Ages were fairlywell acquainted with Latin literature, they were almostwholly ignorant of Greek literature. Græcum est, nonlegitur! Greek was the language of the chief heresies,the language of Nestorius, Arius, and Eutyches. Itis true indeed that in spite of the proverb, St. Thomasd'Acquinas, to mention but him, was deeply versed inAristotle. But it does not seem that the Middle Agesreine de Navarre, Paris, 1862; -Marguerite de Valois, by the authorof Robert Emmet [ Ctesse d'Haussonville] , Paris, 1870.2. THE WOMAN AND THE WRITER. -The mischances of a royalreputation; and how Marguerite has been the victim of the excessor the indiscreetness of her affection for her brother, François I.;-and of the liking of biographers for scandalous anecdotes; -and ofher homonymy with another Marguerite, whose memory has beenpopularised by Le Pré aux Clercs, Les Huguenots, and La ReineMargot. But the evidence of her contemporaries, —and the examination of her works themselves, the Heptameron included, -give anexactly contrary idea of her.Composition of the Heptaméron; -testimony of Brantôme; -comparison between the Heptameron and Boccaccio's Decameron and thePropos et Joyeux devis of Bonaventure des Périers. That the grossness of some of the stories in it merely proves the grossness of themanners and language of the time; -but that Marguerite's object wasto combat this grossness; -and that the proof of this is to be found inthe Dialogues that separate the " days. " -The historical allusions in theHeptameron, that it is the book of a virtuous woman and even of awoman somewhat given to " preaching "; -testimony of du Verdier inhis Bibliothèque, vol. iv. , edition of 1772. The study of the Poésies44 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREwere acquainted with Homer, Herodotus, Eschylus,Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes, Pindar, Demosthenes, and the Alexandrians. How could a knowledgehave been acquired of these writers since there wasnot a single professor of Greek at the University ofParis? In consequence, when the Humanists began tosteep themselves in Grecian lore, they inaugurated averitable revolution . The fact is too commonly overlooked when it is attempted, doubtless with a view tolessening our debt to the Renaissance, to contest theoriginality of that movement. One of the reasons,probably, why the Renaissance did not come to a headsooner, is that the study of Latin was insufficientto provoke it. To accomplish this the dispersion wasnecessary of the Greek element throughout the Europeof the fifteenth century, as the consequence of theand the Lettres confirms this interpretation; -since Marguerite'sPoésies are in general pious poetry; -" She was very fond of composing devout verses, " says Brantôme, " for she was much inclinedto godliness "; -and her Lettres , when they were not businessletters or poetical letters , are " mystic " letters. -Of Marguerite'sattitude towards Protestantism. -The incident of the Miroir de l'âmepécheresse. The last years of Marguerite and her death.3. THE WORKS. -Les Marguerites de la Marguerite des Princesses,1547;-L'Heptameron des nouvelles de la Reine de Navarre, firstedition, 1558, and second edition, 1559; -Lettres de Marguerited'Angoulême, published by Génin, Paris, 1841 , for the Société del'histoire de France; -Dernières poésies de la Reine de Navarre,edited by Abel Lefranc, Paris, 1896.The best edition of the Heptameron is that of Leroux de Lincy.III.-François Rabelais [Chinon , 1483, or 90 or 95; † 1552 or53, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -Niceron in his Hommes illustres, vol. xxxii.; —Chaufepié, in his Dictionnaire, article " Rabelais, " very exhaustiveand very important; -J. Ch. Brunet: Recherches sur les editionsoriginales de Rabelais, Paris, 1834, and the new edition, greatlyF. RABELAIS

THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 45taking of Constantinople by the Turks. And even ifit be impossible to say in what manner, or preciselyin what connection , the influence made itself felt, itseffects are not on this account less certain , but merelymore hidden and far reaching. [ Cf. Emile Egger,l'Hellenisme en France, Paris, 1869; and Voigt, DieWiederbelebung des classichen Alterthums. ]into account the essential"Does the human plant, "66It is needful, too, to takequality of the Italian genius.in Alfieri's famous words, grow more sturdily inItaly than elsewhere? " The question is open to discussion, and it might be found that there is muchingenuousness in the sort of admiring bewilderment ourdilettanti experience or affect to experience in presence ofa Cæsar Borgia-who, perhaps, as the son of his father,was as much a Spaniard as an Italian . What, however,augmented, Paris, 1852; -A. Mayrargues: Rabelais, Paris, 1868;- Eugène Noël: Rabelais et son œuvre, Paris , 1870; -ÉmileGebhart: Rabelais et la Renaissance, Paris , 1887, and second edition,Paris, 1893; -Jean Fleury: Rabelais, Paris, 1877; -Paul Stapfer:Rabelais, sa personne, son génie et son œuvre, Paris , 1889; -RenéMillet: Rabelais, Paris, 1892, in the collection of Grands Ecrivainsfrançais;-and finally the Notices or Notes in the editions of LeDuchat, le Motteux, Desoer, Burgaud des Marets, Moland, andMarty-Laveaux.2. THE LEGEND OF RABELAIS.-How it was formed; -the attacks ofhis contemporaries;-Ronsard's epitaph on Rabelais:Avine will grow upFrom the stomach and paunchOf good Rabelais who was drinkingAlways, while he lived; . . .-Rabelais' quarrels with the monks; -with the Sorbonne; -withCalvin; -the declarations in the Prologues; —the general character ofRabelais' work; -and in this connection, that in spite of the tendencyof the critics to make men resemble their works, -there was nothingeither of the drunkard or the buffoon, nor even of the revolutionary46 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREis undeniable is that Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio onlydeserved to be called the " first of the moderns " becausethey were distinguished from their contemporaries by acharacteristic sign, whose nature we shall attempt shortlyto make clear. Still less can we disregard the consequences of the wars of Charles VIII. , Louis XII. , andFrançois I. The truth is that for us Frenchmen ourfirst contact with Italy was a sort of revelation . “ Amidthe feudal barbarity of which the fifteenth century stillbore the imprint, Italy-says Michelet-offered thespectacle of an ancient civilisation. It commanded therespect of foreigners by its long- standing authority inreligion and the pomp of its opulence and arts. " Itwould be impossible to state the truth better or more accurately. The charm of the Italian climate and mannersmay be adduced as well. The Italy of the Renaissance,about Rabelais.-Ginguené's opuscule dealing with " the authorityof Rabelais in the present revolution " (1791 ); -and the notes inEsmangart and Johanneau's edition.3. RABELAIS' WORK.A. The Sources of the Romance.-Its mythical or mythologicalground-work [ Cf. P. Sebillot, Gargantua dans les traditions populaires];-and that it is doubtful whether Gargantua is a "solarmyth. "-Moreover it is not certain that he is a caricature ofFrançois I.-The Gallic ground- work and the tradition of the MiddleAges. -The Græco- Latin antiquity, and in this connection of Rabelais' erudition: totius encyclopædia profundissimum abyssum. -Thewriters of the Renaissance; -of some of Rabelais' borrowings: fromSir Thomas More [ the Abbey of Thelema] , —from Merlin Coccaie[the sheep of Dindenaut] , -from Pogge (the ring of Hans Carvel] ,-from Cœlio Calcagnini [ the allegory of Physics and Antiphysics, theThawed Words] , -from Cœlius Rhodiginus, etc. , etc. -The historical allusions in Rabelais' romance; and the satire of contemporarymanners.-Imitation in a general way of the " Iliad " in the earlier,and of the " Odyssey " in the last books. [ Cf. in Frederic Bernard's edition, Amsterdam, 1741 , an amusing " Parallel between Homer andRabelais, " by Dufresny, the author of the Lettres Siamoises].THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 47invaded, devastated, and trampled under foot by the menfrom the North, whether Germans or Frenchmen, subtlymastered its rude conquerors as Greece had done beforeit . They conceived the idea of a different life , freer,more ornate, more " human " in a word, than that theyhad led for five or six centuries: an obscure sentimentof the power of beauty stole into the minds of even the"men at arms " or the lansquenets; almost unawares,the whole of Europe became Italianised; and then itwas at last that the spirit of the Renaissance, recrossingthe mountains with the armies of Charles VIII. , LouisXII. , and François I. , seemed to have destroyed in lessthan fifty years the little that remained of the traditionsof the Middle Ages.In this respect the Renaissance is without question thework of the Italian genius. When two or more elementsB. The signification ofthe Romance; -and it not being necessarythat a romance should have a signification or a philosophy, —how isit that one is sought for in Rabelais' romance? —The Prologue to thefirst book;-two verses of Théodore de Bèze:Qui sic nugatur, tractantem ut seria vincat,Seria quum faciet, dic, rogo, quantus erit;four verses of Victor Hugo:Rabelais, whom none understood;Rocks Adam to sleep,And his vast ringing laughIs one of the abysses of the mind;-and of the danger of seeing too much mystery and too much profundity in Rabelais' romance.Of Rabelais' romance as a satire of manners; -and in this connection of the authenticity of the fifth book. -Necessity of fixing thedates: Pantagruel, first book, 1533; Gargantua, 1535; Pantagrucl,second book, 1546; Pantagruel, third book, 1552.-Satire of scholas-48 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREare brought into contact, to bring about or to completethe mystery of their combination , it is not sufficient(this is taught us by science itself) that they shouldhave elective affinities for one another, but the intervention is necessary of a new force from without. Itwas much in this way that the Italian genius consummated the work of the Renaissance; it served asthe spark. Moreover, if the Italian element were to beoverlooked, not only would the true character of theRenaissance movement be misunderstood, but it wouldbe difficult as well to explain the formation of classicismand the reasons of its long domination.The primary characteristic of this new spirit is thedevelopment of Individualism. To be " themselves" isnow going to be the chief concern of men; to be themselves to the utmost possible extent; and in consequenceticism,―of monks in general, —of the Romish Court-of kings and thegreat ofthe magistracy and of justice.Of Rabelais' romance as the expression of the ideal of the Renaissance:-Rabelais ' pedagogy; -Pantagruclism;--the philosophy of nature.Of Rabelais romance as a programme of reforms; —and that inthis respect with regard to a number of points it should not havebeen displeasing to François I. any more than to Henri II .-Circumstances under which the third book was published. -Rabelais ' moraland political ideas; -how far his book reflects the fact that he was adoctor and a physiologist; —and that he had been a monk.Of some of the shortcomings of Rabelais' romance. His contemptfor women, and that in this respect Rabelais is a thorough Gaul.—What is meant when it is said that he did not possess the sentimentof beauty [ Cf. Gebhart: Rabelais et la Renaissance] .—He also lackedthe sense of the tragic side of life . -That for all these reasons , the" filth with which he strewed his writings , " as La Bruyère said, doesnot mark any depth of intention . -Comparison in this connection ofPantagruel with Gulliver's Travels. -Of Rabelais' obscurity; andthat where he is obscure it is perhaps a question whether he alwaysunderstood himself.THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL - 49to be themselves " at all costs. " Whereas up till now,men were humiliated, as they might be by a blemishor deformity, on discovering that they differed sensiblyfrom others of their race or class, henceforth, on thecontrary, if they think they detect in themselves anoriginal or distinctive quality they will regard it assomething of which to be proud. Est sane cuiquenaturaliter, ut in vultu et in gestu sic in voce et sermonequiddam suum ac proprium, quod colere et castigarequam mutare quum facilius, tum melius atque feliciussit. Such were already the terms in which Petrarchexpressed himself in a letter to Boccaccio; and in factmen will make it a point of honour for the future todevelop in themselves this quiddam suum ac proprium,that is, to differ from other men with a view to surpassing them. Nothing could be in closer conformityC. The literary value of the Romance. -Luxuriance, richness, andcomplexity of Rabelais' imagination; -and that possessing in thehighest degree the gift of seeing, that of depicting, and that of narration, he even had the gift of inventing veritable myths. -Allegory,Myth, and Symbol. -Rabelais ' humour. -The gift of provokinglaughter. -Rabelais' style, and that two periods should be distinguished in his style; -of which the first is the better. -Of someartifices of Rabelais. -The gift of verbal invention; —how Rabelaislet himself be carried away by it; —and while abandoning himself toit, rises at times to lyricism. -That Rabelais does not seem to havefounded a school, and why not?4. THE REAL RABELAIS. -That far from having been in any waythebuffoon or the revolutionary of legend, Rabelais was the shrewdestand most prudent of men.-His relations with the du Bellays, thecardinal of Châtillon , François I. , and Henri II.; -his squabbles withCalvin and with Etienne Dolet [ Cf. Richard Copley Christie: EtienneDolet, le martyr de la Renaissance, trans. Stryienski, Paris, 1886 ]; —which nearly got him into trouble. -Rabelais and the Romish Court.-His appointment as curé of Meudon, in 1550.-Personal intervention of Henri II. in the publication of the fourth book, in 1552.—Apassage in Théodore de Bèze: Pantagrucl, cum libro suo quem fecit550 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREwith the spirit of antiquity, or more opposed, it maybe, to that of the Middle Ages. Not only will men bedesirous to " surpass " their fellows, but what is more,they will wish them to admit their inferiority. It is thissentiment that Dante somewhere describes as lo granddisio d'eccellenza, the keen desire to excel, and Boccaccioas the ambition to outlive oneself: perpetuandi nominisdesiderium. A mere "latent " superiority, as it were,will not be sufficient; a superiority deriving its principal satisfaction from a proud but undemonstrativeself- consciousness. The superiority will have to bepublicly acknowledged, proclaimed and recompensed;and this will be the case, as we now know, notmetaphorically but in fact. In this way the poet, thewriter, and the artist find themselves condemned to aninevitable, continuous, and violent struggle for glory. Inimprimere per favorem cardinalium. . . .—He resigns his position as curé of Meudon in 1552.-His death in Paris in 1553.5. THE WORKS. -Neglecting some Almanachs and two or threebrochures, the Works of Rabelais are confined to his romance, ofwhich it is sufficient to indicate the principal editions, which are:(Original editions) the editions of 1533, 1535, 1542, 1546, 1548, 1552,1562 and 1564; and(The complete works) the Elzevir edition, 1663; -le Duchat'sedition, Amsterdam, 1711, H. Desbordes;-le Duchat and leMotteux' edition , Amsterdam , 1741; J. F. Bernard;-D. L. (del'Aulnaye's) edition , Paris, 1820, Desoer; -and the more recenteditions of Rathery, Paris , 1857 , F. Didot; -Jannet, Paris, 1874 ,Picard; and Marty- Laveaux, Paris, 1868-1881 , Lemerre.IV. The Amadis.It is impossible to make no allusion to a book of the author ofwhich its contemporaries said " that he was the gentleman of histime who had the greatest reputation for speaking French well andas an orator " [La Croix du Maine, in his Bibliothèque, article NICOLASDE HERBERAY, SIEUR DES ESSARS]; -and of the book itself " that therecould be gathered in it all the beautiful flowers of our language " [ Et.THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 51every manner and by every expedient they are going toapply themselves to surpass their fellows , and by everyexpedient and in every manner they will endeavour tothrow discredit upon those who rival them in popularity.[ Cf. J. Burckhardt, La Civilisation de la Renaissance enItalie. ]Who has not heard of the famous quarrels of theItalian humanists, of their overflowing vanity, of theinsults they bandied, and whose coarseness is generallyequalled only by the insignificance of the matters atissue? Vadius and Trissotin will be " gentlemen " incomparison with Philelphus and Poggius. This is anatural consequence of the development of individualism.There will be other and pleasanter consequences, foremost among which it is proper to point out forthwiththe revival or the birth of criticism. Who is it hasPasquier, in his Recherches de la France] . See too on the subject ofAmadis de Gaule: La Noue, in his Discours politiques et militaires.The Sieur des Essars only translated the first eight books of theAmadis, which appeared from 1540 to 1548; -and the best edition ofwhich is that issued by Christophe Plantin, Amsterdam, 1561 .V. The Lyons School.1. THE SOURCES. -La Croix du Maine, Bibliothèque françaiso,articles LOUISE LABÉ, MAURICE SCÈVE, PERNETTE DU GUILLET; -Goujet Bibliothèque française, vol. xi. and vol. xii.; -Niceron:Hommes illustres, vol. xxiii .; —Paradin: Mémoires de l'histoire deLyon;-Edouard Bourciez: Les mœurs et la société polie à la courd'Henri II. , Paris, 1886; -Charles Boy: Recherches sur la vie et lesœuvres de Louise Labé, and vol. ii . of the Euvres de Louise Labé.Paris, 1887.2. THE POETS.-A passage of Michelet on the subject of the temperament of the inhabitants of the Lyons district [ Hist. de France,vol. ii. Cf. E. Montégut: En Bourbonnais et en Forez ] .-Italianemigrants in Lyons; the great Printers; -a town of passage.-Maurice Scève and his sisters or cousins , Claudine and Sybille; -Pernette du Guillet;-and Louise Labé. -Testimony of Billion and52 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREsaid, what moralist or what preacher, La Bruyère orBourdaloue, that at the starting- point of all large fortunes there are commonly found " things that cause ashudder "? This is precisely the case with criticism;for it would be vain for us to attempt to hide that atfirst it was merely a form of literary envy! In themeantime, however, and thanks to this very rivalry,men's characters begin to show themselves, even inFrance, in their works.Here we touch on the reason that has caused some historians of literature to hesitate as to the place that oughtto be assigned to Villon, for example, or to Commynes.Are they the end or the beginning of something, the lastof our medieval or the first of our modern writers?What, at any rate, is certain is that they are alreadysomebody. Still more must this be admitted of Master...of Pasquier: " Continuing our story, and beginning with the town ofLyons . . . it is notorious that it is proud of having produced . . .the remarkable Marguerite du Bourg . . . and two very virtuoussisters, called Claudine and Jane Scève . . . and Claude Perronne... and Jeanne Gaillarde . . . and Pernette du Guillet " [ Le FortInexpugnable de l'honneur féminin, Paris, 1555, Ian d'Allyer . Cf.Pasquier, Recherches de la France, bk. vii . ] .—The Délie of MauriceScève, 1544; and the Rimes of Pernette du Guillet, 1552.-The Worksof Louise Labé , 1555.Characteristics common to these works; -[ Cf. Délie, decastich 331,416, 418, 274, 168, 169 and 273; and Louise Labé: Œuvres, elegy i .and sonnets 8, 9, 14 and 24 . ] -The learned allusions and the intentional obscurity; —and in this connection of the symbolism of theLyons school; -intensity of feeling; -the conception of love as something painful and tragic . -Mysticism and sensuality. -Growing Italianinfluence;-new concern for form; -new conception of poetry.Of the connection between the Lyons school and the Pleiad. -Testimony of Estienne Pasquier: " The first, he says, to innovate wasMaurice Scève of Lyons "; and of du Bellay [ L'Olive, sonnet 59] .-They applaud him for having wanderedFar from the path traced by ignorance,THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 53-Clément Marot, of whose poetry it may be said withtruth that it is full of himself and of himself alone;indeed the title of his first work, l'Adolescence Clémentine,makes this clear enough to us. In this volume he tellshis own story; he lays himself bare; he exhibits himselfto our curiosity. Similarly, in the Heptaméron , -thanwhich, by the way, it would be hard to find less entertaining reading, it is her own personal experience oflife and men, it is even occasionally her own adventures,that Marguerite puts into her anecdotes. Need I mention here the name of Etienne Dolet, who has sometimesbeen called " the martyr of the Renaissance, " though intruth he was only the victim of the overbearing violenceof his character and of the excessive development of hispersonality? It would be easy to join a dozen othernames to those given. And it is because it was the first-and also for having broken with court, circumstantial and occasional poetry. It is in imitation of Scève that the Pleiad will compose its Erreurs Amoureuses , its Olive, its Sonnets à Cassandre, itsAmours de Francine. -Maurice Scève and Pontus de Tyard. - Personal relations of Louise Labé with Pontus and with Olivier de Magny.-Comment on saying of Cicero: Nihil est simul et inventum ct perfectum.3. THE WORKS. -The works of Maurice Scève are composed, omitting sundry short works, of Délie , objet de plus haute vertu, Lyons,1544; and of the Microcosme, a descriptive poem in three songs,Lyons, 1560.The works of Louise Labé include:-(1) a prose dialogue, le Débatde Folie et d'Amour;-(2) three Elegies; and (3) twenty- four Sonnets, one of which is in Italian. They appeared for the first time in 1555.There are Italian verses too in the Rymes de Pernette du Guillet.Scève's Délie and Pernette du Guillet's Rymes, which had becomeextremely rare, have been reprinted at Lyons by Scheuring, 1862 and1864.The last edition of the works of Louise Labé is M. Charles Boy's,Paris, 1887, A. Lemerre.54 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREtime that the writer appeared distinctly in his work thatthere has been talk, and that it is still the customto talk emphatically of the richness, abundance, andoriginality of the French literature of the time of theRenaissance. The fact is, however, that it is somewhatpoor in works, yet poorer in ideas, and not less poor inmen; and for very many years its chief originality willconsist in the freedom, quite novel at the period , withwhich each writer will show himself as he is.It is true that owing to the exercise of this very freedom, to this basis of individualism, another idea takesshape, which may be termed the central idea of theRenaissance, an idea of which foreigners themselvesadmit that François Rabelais was the living incarnation;we allude to the idea of the goodness or of the divinity ofNature. Its connection with the preceding idea is easilySECOND PERIODThe Teachings of Antiquity1550-1585I. THE RENAISSANCE OF POETRYI. The Formation of the Pleiad.1. THE SOURCES. -Claude Binet: La Vie de Pierre Ronsard.-Estienne Pasquier: Recherches de la France, book vii. -Bayle, in hisDictionnaire, articles DAURAT and RONSARD. -Moréri: Dictionnaire,edition of 1750, article DORAT. -Goujet: Bibliothèque française, vols.xii. and xiii.; and Histoire du Collège de France, vol. i . —SainteBeuve: Tableau de la poésie française au XVI siècle, 1828; andJoachim du Bellay, in the Nouveaux Lundis, vol . xiii.-A. Jeandel,Pontus de Tyard, Paris, 1860. —Plötz , Joachim du Bellay et son rôledans la réforme de Ronsard, Berlin, 1874. -Marty- Laveaux: hisNotices in the collection of the Pléiade française, Paris, 1867-1896.2. THE POETIC SYSTEM OF THE PLEIAD. The first meeting ofRonsard and du Bellay; -Lazare de Baïf's house; -the college ofCoqueret. -Formation of the Pleiad. -Origin of the name; the astro-THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 55seen. We can only develop in ourselves what nature hasput in us, and nature had its reasons for what it put inus. The consequence is that in reality we are followingnature when we develop our originality, just as inversely,or reciprocally, to obey nature is to assure the development of our personality; and such is precisely the"philosophy " of Rabelais' romance, or, if one declineto allow that his vast, uproarious laugh covers so muchdepth and mystery, such is at least the signification ofhis Pantagruel. He preaches the easy morality of theAbbey of Thelema, and " in his rule of conduct thereis but this clause: Do what you will." However, onexamination, this morality is found to go further thanwould be thought at first; it has a wider bearing if itbe not of greater depth; and at bottom the rule of theThelemites is seen to be the contradiction , or even thenomical Pleiad; the mythological Pleiad; the Alexandrian Pleiad;the French Pleiad; -and to keep in view that in French as in Greek a "Pleiad " must contain more than six and less than eightnames. -Romanticism generally in error as to the objects and workof the Pleiad. -Publication of the Défense et Illustration de la languefrançaise, 1550.Afew words on the Arts Poétiques of Pierre Fabri, 1521; [ L'Art dePleine Rhétorique] of Gracien du Pont, 1539; and of Thomas Sibilet ,1548. -That to understand the Défense it must be connected with theintention of reacting against the school of Marot; -and that it isthen seen that what its authors desired was: (1) The Renewal of thesubjects ofinspiration; —the fact being that for two hundred years,and even with Marot, poetry had been merely " rhymed chronicle ";—while what was now to be undertaken was to sing the past, nature,fame, and love. -But to succeed in this, it was above all necessary toget rid of the restrictions imposed upon the liberty of the poet by thetyranny of fixed literary forms; and therefore:-(2) the Renewal ofliterary forms;-which will be those of antiquity: epic poem, ode,satire, comedy, tragedy, etc. -The sonnet, however, is spared inhonour of Petrarch. -And finally to make these forms the vehicleof matter worthy of their beauty, it is needful: (3) To Reform the56 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREnegation of all that manners, the school, and the Churchhad then been teaching for over a thousand years.We have proof of this in Rabelais' commentary on orrather justification of his Laissez faire, in which he setsforth that " free men, of good birth , well educated, keeping honourable company, have by nature an instinct andincentive which always inclines them to virtuous deeds,and restrains them from vice. " This amounts to sayingthat Nature itself inculcates virtue, and it is in thisconnection that Pantagruel may rightly be called " theBible " of the Renaissance. It is saturated with Naturalism, for throughout it gives expression to the conviction that all the ills of humanity solely result fromnot following nature closely enough and faithfullyenough. But we need only recall the memorableallegory of Physics and Antiphysics. " Physics, that66Language:-by making a work of art of it. -Linguistic theories ofthe Défense. How widely they differ from those of the " Greekifiers "and Latinisers " at whom Rabelais scoffed in Pantagruel. - Insignificance of the metrical innovations of the Pleiad . -The innovationsin rhythm will be the personal work of the genius of Ronsard.Stir aroused by the Défense et Illustration; -Rejoinder of QuintilHoratian.-Hostility of Mellin de Saint - Gelais. —Counter- rejoinder ofdu Bellay:-Publication of the Olive and of the Odes, 1550; -Theprotectors of Ronsard and du Bellay: -Triumph of the Pleiad. —It isbacked by the Hellenists, the poets and by the king, when Charles IX.mounts the throne. —It had already had the support of Mary Stuartand of Catherine of Medicis.3. THE WORKS. -La Défense et Illustration de la Langue française; -Du Bellay, le Poète Courtisan; —Pontus de Tyard, Solitairepremier, Solitaire second; -Ronsard, Abrégé de l'Art poétique,dedicated to M. A. d'Elbène, 1565; —Préface de la Franciade, 1572.II. Joachim du Bellay [ Liré, 1525; † 1560, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -Marty- Laveaux, Euvres de du Bellay, inthe collection of the Pleiade française; -Sainte- Beuve, loc. cit.;-J. H. de Heredia and F. Brunetière: Speeches pronounced at theinauguration of the statue of J. du Bellay at Ancenis, 1894.THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 57•is Nature, will bear as her first issue Beauty andHarmony. Antiphysics, who is ever opposed toNature, was straightway envious of this so brave andhonourable child-birth, and contrariwise bore Amoduntand Discordance. . . . And afterwards she will bear theMatagots, Cagots, and Papelards . . . and other uncouth and misshapen monsters in despite of Nature. "[Pantagruel, book iii . , ch . 32. ] In fact it is in thename of Physics that Rabelais attacks what still subsistsof the institutions of the Middle Ages. It is in the nameof Physics that he draws up the scheme for the encyclopedic education of his Gargantua. It is in the name ofPhysics that he demands the reform or suppression ofwhatever interferes with the liberty of his development.He does not state his aims expressly, since he is not theprophet or the apostle he has been represented to be, any2. THE POET. -A younger son of a great family in the sixteenthcentury. The youth of du Bellay; -his severe illness and hisstudies; his friendship with Ronsard. -He enters the service of hisrelative the Cardinal. -His stay at Rome. -Liaison with " Faustine ";-Vexations and disgust. -Return to France. -Publication of hisRegrets. He falls out with the Cardinal.The first verses of du Bellay; -L'Olive and the Recueil à MmeMarguerite; and that du Bellay in these works, in spite of the verybeautiful verses they contain, falls far short of his earliest ambitions.-He perceives this himself; and this is perhaps the origin of hismelancholy. His piece against the Petrarchists. -The very vexationsof his existence with Cardinal du Bellay supply him with the subjectmatter of his masterpiece. -Originality of his Regrets. -The Antiquités de Rome and the poetry of ruins.That du Bellay was the creator in France of "introspective poetry "and of the satire; -Comparison between his elegies and those ofMarot. He possesses grace, delicacy, and melancholy. -Also lightirony. Why it is that the ardour which marks his Latin poetry doesnot appear in his French verses [ Cf. E. Faquet, XVIe Siècle] .3. THE WORKS. -The Works of J. du Bellay are composed of: -1. A collection of amorous sonnets, l'Olive, followed in the first58 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREmore than he is a buffoon or a drunken Silenus, and sincein reality he has only one trait in common with hisPanurge, which is that he has a natural dread ofblows! But he does better than express himself clearlywhen he insinuates his views with an air, as it were, oftheir not being in his thoughts, when he urges themwith involuntary ardour and almost unconscious enthusiasm rather than in a systematic spirit. Nothing innature is repugnant to him; he loves all its manifestations, not excepting the grossest and the most humiliating, which seem merely to awaken in him the ideaof their cause. Are they not what they ought to be?and can we do better than conform ourselves to them?Ζῆν ὁμολογουμένως τῇ φύσει, the Stoics used to say in aformula that summed up the loftiest teaching of Paganwisdom. Rabelais repeats it after them; he repeats itedition by the Rccueil à Mme Marguerite;-(2) of another collectionof sonnets, les Regrets;-(3) of a third collection , les Antiquités deRome, together with les Jeux Rustiques; and finally (4) of a trans- lation in verse of books iv. and vi. of the Eneid.The principal old editions are those of Paris, 1561 , Langelier; -Paris, 1569 , Frédéric Morel; -and Rouen, 1597 , F. Maillard . Thebest edition is that already cited of M. Marty- Laveaux, in thePléiade française, 1866-1867, A. Lemerre.III.-Pierre de Ronsard [ La Poissonnière, 1524; † 1585, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -To the works already cited should be added: —Gandar, Ronsard imitateur d'Homère et de Pindare, Metz, 1854;A. de Rochambeau, La Famille de Ronsard, Paris, 1869; —G.Chalandon, Essai sur Ronsard, Paris, 1875; -E. Faquet, XVISiècle, Paris, 1894; -Mellerio, Lexique de la langue de Ronsard,Paris, 1895; and Pieri, Pétrarque et Ronsard, Marseilles , 1895.2. THE POET.A. Les Amours. -Of the sincerity of Ronsard's love poems;-andin this connection of the amorous poetry of the sixteenth century.-It partakes rather of the artificial character of the " courteous poetry"of our old literature than of the passionate character of modernVINDOMIESIS.POE.GALRVSRONSARDVSPETRVSRRonfardus NafciturXi. Seys,An 1524 OF 27 Daru 1. 1385Bytony cecenit Vates ad Strymonis undasNon melius, tibi quam funditur ore melosNnnPIERRE DE RONSARD.

THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 59after the Italians; and by this I do not wish to saythat he himself learnt it either from the Italians or theStoics. I might make the assertion, since the allegory of Physics and Antiphysics is not his own, whileassuredly he was as well acquainted with the ancientsas anybody of his time. What seems to me, however,much more significant is that, in respect to this adorationof the energies of nature, he is merely the inspired interpreter of the current ideas of his time; and on thisaccount his Pantagruel really possesses a significance thatmay be called, that must indeed be called " European. "In a world that is still Christian , Pagan culture has madeof him, as of the Italians of the Renaissance, a purePagan; and while others before him or among his contemporaries have been this, none has been it in a largersense, with more verve , -and even with more lyricism.lyric poetry. Still, while this remark is just when applied to theSonnets à Cassandre, it is already less so applied to the Sonnets àMarie; and Marie seems really to have existed. The language ofRonsard's sonnets; and that it constitutes, perhaps, their principalmerit. The merit is all the greater seeing that Ronsard often givesexpression to very subtle sentiments in his sonnets. Another qualityof his sonnets is that they leave the impression of being the outcomeof a single effort. -We know, however, that Ronsard corrected andrewrote them to a prodigious extent. -Were the corrections alwayshappy? However this may be, none of his lines leave the impressionthat they were " patched. " [ Cf. Sonnets 1 , 20, 46, 62, 66, 94, 114,133, 206 of the edition of 1584]; -Voluptuousness in Ronsard'sSonnets;-how its ardour is always tempered by melancholy; —andin this connection of Ronsard's Paganism and Epicureanism.B. The Odes, the Hymns and the Poems. -That it was Ronsard'sOdes and Hymns that established his reputation during his lifetime.—Were his contemporaries mistaken in their admiration of them?—And what did they admire in them? —( 1) Their diversity ofnote:-if some of them are " Pindaric, " others are "Horatian"; some ofthem are " Bacchic, " some of them " heroic, " some of them " Gallic 'and some of them " eligiac. "-They also rightly admired in them:60 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREBut there is more of note in this famous romance.For instance, beneath the humanist and the scholar thereis little difficulty in detecting the Gaul, a Gaul by raceand temperament, the continuator or the heir of Villon, ofthe Roman de la Rose, of the authors of our old Fabliaux.There is no example of an author breaking singly andat one stroke with a tradition several centuries old!And there is something of the monk, or more precisely ofthe friar, in the indelicacy of Rabelais' jesting, in thegrossness of his language, in the license of his manners.It may be, too, that there is something of the doctorabout him. Still , however diverse are the traits that givehim so complex a character-and this very complexity issignally expressive of the confusion of ideas of the period-there is one of these traits, the one precisely we aretrying to make clear, that stands out from, summarises(2) The variety of rhythm; —and, in this connection , of Ronsard asan inventor of rhythms; -he created almost all those which ourpoets have used since, and he created some that are still unutilised.—(3) The flow of inspiration; comparison of the Ode au chancelier del'Hôpital with the Mages of Victor Hugo; -how a descriptive or' objective " element introduces itself; -and causes their lyricism toevolve imperceptibly towards the epopee.66The epical inspiration of Ronsard's Hymns; —and that by dint ofliving in the company of the ancients he himself became one of them;[Cf. Calays et Zethes or Castor et Pollux]; -He is as much athome in mythology as if it were his natural element; —and it lendshim the power of creating myths in his turn; —[Cf. the Hymne del'Or or the Hymne de l'Equité des vieux Gaulois ]; -But in theseproductions the purity of his outline is not always on a level with thevigour of his colouring. -Growing importance of description in theHymns; —and of rhetoric; -[ Cf. the Hymne de la Mort or the Templede Messeigneurs le Connétable et des Chatillons] .-From the epicform the poet evolves towards oratorical prose.He does not quite reach this point in the Poems; -the reason beingthat he has first to traverse a period of alexandrinism, - [Cf. laFourmi, l'Alouette, le Houx, le Frelon, la Grenouille] .-DefinitionTHE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 61and dominates all the others. Rabelais was the first ,perhaps the greatest, and also the most sincere of thoseof his race who believed in the goodness of Nature; whoheld that the great enemy of man went by the names.of usage, custom, rule, authority and restraint; that inconsequence this was the enemy who ought to be attackedby every method, by raillery, violence and insult; andfinally that the supreme achievement of education wasthe liberation of the instincts .But while he was making in this way open and cynicalprofession of his religion of nature, another sentiment,which he lacked, had sprung up and was in course ofdevelopment in some of his contemporaries: this sentiment was that Sentiment of Art, in which, as we haveseen, the Middle Ages were so grievously deficient andwhose reappearance in the world is so characteristic ofof alexandrinism;-its three characteristic traits:-(1) Indifferenceto the subject matter, whence results:-(2) The preference given topetty subjects; whence results in turn:-(3) A disproportion betweenthe development and the interest and between the words and thematter.-One cannot help noting these characteristics in Ronsard'sPoèmes. In consequence they would rightly be the most forgottenportion of his work, if they did not contain information of value forthe story of his life; -[Cf. the ElegySince God has not fitted me to bear arms ];and for the literary history of his time;-Cf. Le Voyage d'Arcueil orLes Iles Fortunées]; -and finally if he had not written the Franciade.C. His other Works. -That it is not to be concluded that theFranciade is contemptible. -But Ronsard's heart was not in his workin this case. —Of the conditions of the epopee; -and that the subjectof the Franciade realised none of them. -But the prose writer andthe orator develop in Ronsard in proportion as his poetical inspirationdeclines;-[Cf. the Discours des Misères de ce temps];-and in thisconnection of Ronsard's Catholicism;-and of the relationship betweenthe lyric form and the oratorical form. -Of Ronsard's Discours asevidence of this relationship. -The patriotic inspiration of the Dis-62 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREthe spirit of the Renaissance. Who is unacquaintedwith the expression given to it by Raphael in a celebrated letter to Baldassare Castiglione: Essendo carestiadi belle donne, io mi servo di certa idea che mi vieni nellamente? I am reminded too of a sentence of Cicero:Nihil in simplici genere ex omni parte perfectum naturaexpolivit. The meaning of both writers is that ourimagination never finds entire satisfaction in nature;that nothing natural, in any form, comes up to the ideawe conceive of its perfection; and that thus we arealways able to add to it a something that is our own,It is this doctrine, which inspired the great works ofantiquity, that was spread abroad by the Italians ofthe Renaissance after they had elaborated it by thoughtful study of their models, and had endeavoured to realiseit in their turn; and, as might be proved, it has modifiedcours. It was Ronsard's Discours that endowed our literature withthe satire, though du Bellay may have had an inkling of this form ofcomposition.-Ronsard's last love affair and the Sonnets pour Hélène.3. THE WORKS. -As we have enumerated Ronsard's principalworks, it will suffice here to indicate the principal editions of them ,which are:G. Buon's edition , Paris , 4 vols. in 16mo, 1560; -the edition of 1567,Paris, 5 vols. in 8vo; -the edition of 1584, 1 vol. in folio, the last revised and corrected by Ronsard; -the edition of 1623, 2 vols . in folio;And among the modern editions:-Blanchemain's edition 8 vols. in18mo, Paris, 1857-1867 , Frank;-and Marty- Laveaux' edition, 5 vols.in 8vo, in the collection of the Pléiade française.IV. -Jean-Antoine de Baïf [ Venice, 1532; † 1589, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -Cf. above; -and add Marty- Laveaux' Notice;—and l'Académie des derniers Valois , by Ed. Fremy, Paris, s.d.2. THE MAN AND THE POET. -It being useless to study the poets ofthePleiad one after the other, for what reasons Baïf is given the preferenceover Jodelle or Remy Belleau.-Ronsard's caricature.-A naturalson; his youth and education;-mediocrity of his work. - Thatwhere he is at his best, in his Ravissement d'Europe or his HymneTHE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 63not merely the conception of art and literature, butthe conception of life itself. "The language of theItalians of the Renaissance, it has been possible tosay with truth, their ideal of society, their moralideal, their entire being is conditioned and determinedby the ideal they formed of art. " [John AddingtonSymonds, Renaissance in Italy; the Fine Arts, ch. i . ]In other words, the Renaissance, having rediscoverednature and freed the individual , perceived that it wasimpossible to trust the development of either entirelyto chance, and it subordinated the imitation of natureand the development of the individual to the realisationof beauty.The first of our French writers to experience, a littleconfusedly but profoundly, this new sentiment was apoet of Lyons, Maurice Scève, in his Délie, objet de plus-à Vénus, Baïf holds the same position with respect to Ronsard asdo Primatice or Rosso to their masters. -Extensiveness of his work;-and that it is eminently representative of the artificial side of thePleiad movement. His orthographical reforms; -his metrical innovations; his attempts to combine music and poetry; -his Academy.3. THE WORKS.-Baïf's works are composed of:—(1 ) nine books ofAmours, consisting of the Amours de Francine, in four books; theAmours de Méline, in two books; Amours diverses, in three books;-(2) his Météores;—(3) nine books of Poems on all sorts of subjects; —(4) nineteen Eclogues, which are more or less translations or imitations of those of Theocritus and Virgil;—(5) five books of Passe- temps;-(6) and four books of Mimes, which are the most wearisome collection of all sorts of trivialities and moralities .The best and only modern edition is that of Marty- Laveaux.II. SCHOLARS AND TRANSLATORSV.-Henri Estienne [ Paris, 1528; 1598, Lyons].1. THE SOURCES. -Niceron, in his Hommes illustres , vol. xxxvi.; —A. Renouard, Annales de l'Imprimerie des Estienne, Paris , 1843; —Léon Feugère, Caractères et portraits du XVIe siècle, 1859; and a64 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREhaute vertu, a symbolical poem, imitated from Petrarch,the obscure night of which, if the expression may beventured on, glitters with rare beauties. It is, however, the poets of the Pleiad, Pontus de Tyard, Joachimdu Bellay, Ronsard and Baïf, that really perceived itsforce and revealed it to us; and herein lies the essenceof the revolution they effected in our language, literature, and poetry. Their aim was to produce " works ofart," and this ambition, which with them dominates.every other, accounts for and explains their subsidiaryefforts .It was not, for instance, as grammarians, or, as weshould say at the present day, as philologists, but asartists that they endeavoured to reform or to transformthe language, with a view to rendering it capable of conveying their " sublime and impassioned conceptions, " tonew edition , Paris, 1875; -Sayous, Les Ecrivains français de laRéformation, 2nd ed., Paris, 1881.2. THE PUBLISHER, PHILOLOGIST, AND WRITER. -The Estiennefamily [ Cf. Prosper Marchand, Dictionnaire historique] .—A scholar'seducation. -Henri's first publication: Anacreontis Teij oda, græceet latinc, 1554.-Is the translation by Henri Estienne or by Dorat? -What is certain is the influence exerted on the Pleiad by this tinyvolume. Evidence drawn from the works of Ronsard and RemyBelleau. Of some other Greek writers published for the first timeby Henri Estienne; -that they are all of the second or third rank; -and that he translated them all into Latin. -Of Estienne's predilectionfor Analecta [ Cf. the Adages of Erasmus] .-The first Latin translation of the Anthologie grecque and the first Conciones, 1570; -TheThesaurus Græcæ Linguæ, 1572-1573.Estienne's three chief treatises:-La conformité du Langagefrançais avec le grec, 1565; Deux dialogues du Langage français italianisé, 1578; La Précellence du Langage français, 1579; -and their connection with each other. -Resistance to Italian influences.—Of Henri Estienne's views upon the relations between French andGreek [ Cf. J. de Maistre, Soirées de Saint- Pétersbourg, 2nd Conversation; and Egger, L'hellénisme en France, lessons 10 and 11 . ] —THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 65use the expression of one of them, and above all in orderto bring to light its more hidden and previously unperceived beauties. For words are something more than thesigns of ideas, and a language is not merely an algebraor an organism: it is also a work of art. There are poorlanguages and rich; rugged languages and harmonious;languages that are obscure and others that are clear.Similarly, the reason they condemned the old literaryforms the ballad, the rondeau, the virelai, the chantroyal, and "other like trivialitics "-was that theyseemed to them somewhat forced , jejune and antiquated; and it was then that Ronsard, guided in hiseffort by the very genius of rhythm, himself invented somany varieties, that some are found in his work thathave not been turned to account down to the presentday. And lastly, what they attempted to appropriateHenri Estienne's etymologies. His frequent digressions and howalmost all of them are prompted by his hatred of Italianism; —byhis Protestantism; -and by his hatred of the Valois . -The result isthat his love for his native language is all the more passionate.—Why it is that if the importance of his Précellence only lay in itstitle it would still be considerable.Is Henri Estienne a " writer "?-and that at any rate neither theverve of Rabelais nor the artistic preoccupations of Ronsard are to befound in his works. Is he the author of the Quart livre de Pantagruel,1564? -His Apologie pour Hérodote, 1566. -In what respect thebook belies its title and is at bottom only a Protestant pamphlet; -Henri Estienne and Rabelais on the subject of "ecclesiastics. "Comparison between the Apologie pour Herodote and the Quatrièmelivre de Pantagruel. -Whether some few " tales " agreeably told justifyHenri Estienne being ranked much above Bandello, as has beendone. That it is difficult too, to detect in the Apologie a foretaste ofthe Provinciales [ Cf. Sacy, Variétés littéraires ] .-Is the Discoursmerveilleux des déportements de Catherine de Medicis, 1575 , by HenriEstienne?-His last years and his death in the Lyons hospital.3. THE WORKS.-The list both of the " editions " and of the worksproperly so- called of Henri Estienne will be found in Renouard's666 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREfrom antiquity was not its " science " or its " philosophy,"but its "art": and by " art " it is to be understood thesecret of awaking in the reader the impression of almostsensual pleasure, which the writers of the Pleiad themselves experienced when reading the Æneid or the Iliad,Pindar or Horace. How far were they successful? Thisis another question, which we will answer in a word bysaying that they may have erred in the choice of theirmodels, assuredly a regrettable and serious mistake forimitators to make; and they pay the penalty of nothaving been always alive to the distance that separatesHomer from Quintus of Smyrna or Virgil from Claudian.They were uncritical or they lacked the spirit of discernment; and in their impatience to produce theirwork they did not always observe the conditions of fruitful imitation. Still, their example was not wasted. IntoAnnales de l'Imprimerie des Estienne. We have cited the mostimportant of these books; we shall confine ourselves in consequenceto mentioning here the principal new editions, which are:That of the Discours merveilleux, in the Archives curieuses del'Histoire de France, by Cimber and Danjou; —of La Précellence byL. Feugère, Paris, 1850; —of La Conformité, by the same, Paris, 1853;of the Apologie pour Hérodote, by P. Ristelhuber, Paris , 1879; —and of the Deux Dialogues du langage français italianisé, Paris , 1883.VI.-Jacques Amyot [ Melun, 1513; † 1593, Auxerre] .1. THE SOURCES. -Rouillard, Histoire de Melun; -Bayle in hisDictionnaire, article AMYOT; -Abbé Lebœuf, Mémoires sur l'Histoirecivile et ecclésiastique d'Auxerre; —De Blignières, Essai sur Amyot,Paris, 1851; -Léon Feugère, Caractères et portraits du XVIe siècle,Paris, 1859.2. THE MAN AND THE WRITER. —A passage of Montaigne on Amyot[ Cf. Essais, II . chap. iv. ] .- Amyot's parentage and youth; —hisstudies; his tutorships; -his translation of the romance of Héliodorus, 1547.-He is appointed abbé of Bellozane. His translation ofDiodorus Siculus, 1554. -His mission to the Council of Trent [ Cf. deThou, Hist. universelle, vol . viii . ] .-He is appointed tutor to theTHE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 67a literature which ignored both the art of composition andthat of writing, and whose masterpieces had previouslybeen scarcely more than happy accidents, they introduced the sentiment of the virtue of form or of style;and while this does not constitute all that is meantby classicism, it is one of its elements or essential" factors. "If we now place all these characteristics in juxtaposition-the sentiment of art, the glorification or deification ofthe energies of nature, and the development of individualism-it has already been seen that they areclosely dependent on one another. The very notion ofa perfection that surpasses nature or that completesit can only be derived from the observation of nature,and only be realised in the work of art with andby methods that are themselves furnished by nature.princes of the blood, 1554; -grand almoner, 1561:-and bishop ofAuxerre, 1570.Of some translators prior to Amyot; -Lefèvre d'Etaples and histranslation of the New Testament, 1523;-Lazare de Baïf and histranslation of the Electra, 1537; -Pierre Saliat and his translationof Herodotus, 1537; -Views of Thomas Sibilet and du Bellay upontranslations from the ancients; -and what do they mean when theyaffirm that " the translators are the source of more profit to us thanthe authors themselves "?—The translations of the Greek poets in thework of the Pleiad [ Cf. Gandar, Ronsard imitateur d'Homère et de Pindare] .—Of the translators of Plutarch who preceded Amyot.Of the choice of Plutarch; -and in this connection of some modernopinions [Dacier, Villemain, Ch. Graux in his edition of the Lives ofDemosthenes and Cicero] on the author of the Vies Parallèles . -Theattractiveness of biographies; -remarkable skill with which Plutarchputs his heroes before the reader; -moral tendency of his work. -ThatPlutarch in his Scripta Moralia touched upon all the ideas of histime; —and in this connection of a superiority of the writers contemporary with the Empire over the more classic writers of Greekliterature. In consequence Plutarch was the best author that couldhave been put before the readers of the time of the Renaissance.68 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREIt will further be noted that these characteristics,taken together or separately, are in opposition to thecharacteristics of the spirit of the Middle Ages. Notonly did the Middle Ages lack the sentiment of form,but they were constantly suspicious of nature as ofa teacher of error or of a power hostile to man; andthe essence of their policy was the imprisonment ofthe individual in the shackles of his corporation, hisclass or his caste . And since every created thing bearswithin it, by the very conditions of its birth, thegerm of its future death, it must not be overlooked,that just as the sentiment of form was capable ofspeedily leading up to the conception of a beauty independent of its contents, so the glorification of theenergies of nature carried with it the possibility ofan ultimate justification even of immorality; and theAmyot's translation; -and whether he has made more than " twothousand blunders " as Méziriac declared. -Opinion of Ch. Graux:"Amyot's translation is of real philological value. " -That this point,however, is here secondary; -and that it is the style of Amyot'sPlutarch that we are concerned with. -Amyot's translation naïve,natural, graceful and vigorous. -Comparison between some passagesin Amyot and the corresponding passages in Rabelais [ in his Pantagruel, iii . , chap. xxviii . , cf. Traité de la cessation des oracles ]; —inShakespeare [ in his Julius Cæsar, cf. Vie d'Antoine]; -in Joseph deMaistre [ Traité des délais de la justice divine].Last years of Amyot's life. -His translation of Plutarch's moral andmiscellaneous works. -Amyot at the " States " of Blois. -His rôleduring the League. -His return to Auxerre, and his death. -Generalidea of the services rendered by his translations . -To what extentAmyot's work profited by the circumstances of his life . -A passage ofRivarol on the utility of translations [ preface to his translation ofDante] . Duration of the influence of Amyot's Plutarch, and the reasons of this influence.3. THE WORKS. -Théagène et Chariclée, 1547; -Les sept livresdes histoires de Diodore Sicilien, 1554; -Daphnis et Chloé, 1559; —Les Vies des hommes illustres grecs et latins, 1st edition, 1559;THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 69development of individualism that of the ultimate destruction of society.IIThis was not perceived at once by the Church nor evenby Royalty, a fact that is sufficiently surprising! ThePopes at least a certain number of Popes-took a keenpleasure in making the capital of Christianity the capitalof the Renaissance; and in France, Francis I. , the" Father of Letters, " either did not comprehend thenature of the revolution that was in progress, or onlyconcerned himself with the immediate advantages hewas able to derive from it. But when the generalcorruption of morals by which this self-confident enthu2nd edition, 1565; 3rd edition , 1567.-Euvres morales et mêlées dePlutarque, 1st edition , 1572; 2nd edition, 1574; 3rd edition , 1575 .Amyot has also left a few short works, such as the Projet de l'Eloquence royale, written for Henri III.; and the Apology in which herebuts the charge of having been mixed up in the assassination ofthe Duke of Guise.The best edition of his Plutarque is that of Vascosan [ 3rd edition ofthe Vies and 2nd of the Œuvres mêlées ] forming 15 volumes in 18mo.VII. -Jean Bodin [ Angers, 1530; † 1593, Laon] .1. THE SOURCES. -Bayle, in his Dictionnaire, article BODIN; -Niceron, in his Hommes illustres, vol. xvii.; -Baudrillart, Bodin etson temps, Paris, 1853.2. THE MAN AND THE WRITER. -Scarceness of information. -Washe of Hebrew extraction? [ Cf. Ant. Possevini de quibusdam scriptis.. judicium, 1583] .-Early studies of Bodin. -He starts with atranslation of Oppian's Cynegetica. -His Réponse à M. de Malestroit,and the beginnings of political economy. -His Méthode pour la connaisance de l'histoire and his quarrel with Cujas. -That his protestagainst the authority of Roman Law, is of the same order as theprotests of his contemporaries against the sovereignty of Aristotle.70 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREsiasm was followed began to be clear, when it wasperceived that it was in a certain sense the very foundations of human society that were imperilled by thisphilosophy of nature, it seemed that at this price themiracles of art were being too dearly paid:—and theReformation broke out.Nothing could be more erroneous, or proof of a moresuperficial philosophy, than to represent the Reformationas analogous in its principle to the Renaissance, of whichit is exactly the opposite. The only point they had incommon was, that they both contributed for a short whileto the emancipation of the individual . In consequencethey were confronted for a moment by the same enemies,the schoolmen and the theologians, and for a momentthey fought the same fight. Let us further admit, if itbe wished, that in order to abolish a detested state ofHis République. Bodin's originality;-his conception of history;-and that to appreciate him it is well to keep in view Sir ThomasMore's Utopia and Machiavelli's Prince. - He attempts to conciliatemorality and politics. -His theory of slavery, book i . , chap. v.; -hischapter on monarchy, ii. , chap. ii .; -his theory of revolutions, iv. ,chap. iii .; —his theory on climates, v. , chap . i . —He is a mixture oferudition and credulity. -Whether it can be said that he conceivedthe idea of Progress [ Cf. his Methode, chap. vii. , Confutatio eorumqui ... aurea sæcula ponunt, and his République, v. , chap. i . ]; —Of Bodin as a predecessor of Montesquieu.Other works of Bodin; —and how the author of the République is atthe same time that of the Démonomanie des sorciers and of the Heptaplomeres. Of the belief of his contemporaries in sorcery; -and thatthe Protestants believe in it no less firmly than the Catholics; -howdoes Bodin reconcile his belief in sorcerers with his religious scepticism?-History of the Heptaplomeres. [ Cf. Guhrauer, in his edition ,1841, Berlin. ]3. THE WORKS. -Translation into Latin of Oppian's Cynegetica,1555; -Methodus ad facilem historiarum cognitionem, 1566; -Réponse aux paradoxes de M. de Malestroit sur l'enchérissementde toutes choses, 1568; -Six books of the République, 1577;THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 71things , the one and the other, and the one after the other,found or sought in the present their weapons against thepast. Here, however, the resemblances between them areat an end. Is not the second, moreover, most deceptive,if it be a fact that while the Renaissance made for therooting out of Christianity in the world and the revivalof Paganism, the efforts of the Reformation, on thecontrary, were directed precisely towards bringing Christianity back to the severity of its primitive institutions?Is it necessary to recall in this connection the wordsof Luther so often quoted? " We Germans . .resemble a bare canvas, while the Italians are trickedout and garish with all sorts of false opinions.Their fasts are more magnificent than our most sumptuous feasts. Where we expend a florin onclothes, they devote ten to a silk garment.•• • They-La Démonomanie des sorciers, 1582; -Amphitheatrum naturæ,1596; -Heptaplomeres. This last work only existed in manuscriptuntil M. Guhrauer's edition of it in 1841.There is no modern edition of the works of J. Bodin.III. THE ORIGIN OF THE CLASSIC DRAMAVIII. The first period of the Classic Drama [ 1552-1570].1. THE SOURCES. -The brothers Parfaict , Histoire du théâtrefrançais; L'ancien théâtre français, published by Viollet-le- Duc; —Ebert, Entwickelungs-geschichte der französichen Tragödie, 1856,Gotha;-Edelestand du Méril , Du développement de la tragédie enFrance, Paris , 1869; - Emile Faguet, La tragédie française auXVI siècle, Paris , 1883 .2. THE AUTHORS AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE TRAGIC DRAMA.—The decree of the Parliament of Paris [ 17 November, 1548] forbiddingthe Brothers of the Passion to " play the Mystery of the Passion ofOur Lord or other Sacred Mysteries "; -and whether the Parliamentin issuing this decree intended to sacrifice the Mysteries " to the Paganenthusiasm of the poets of the New School "?-Italian origin of theclassic drama. -Petrarch's Triomphes [ Cf. in particular the Triomphe72 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREcelebrate the Carnival with extreme impropriety andfolly. " [ Cf. Michelet, Mémoires de Luther; and Merled'Aubigné, La Réformation au temps de Luther. ] Howwas it possible for him to state more clearly, that whataroused his indignation in Rome, was precisely thespectacle of the Renaissance? Far from having any holdon him, it was the very splendour of the arts, themagnificence of the fêtes, the luxury of the dress thatforced him into a schism. And in preaching the Reformation, it was not merely the Papacy as such that he wasfighting, nor Catholicism, but it was the very spirit ofthe Renaissance that he wished to destroy and over whichhe was nearly triumphant.I am not sure that the same intention is not evenmore manifest in the work of Calvin . We hold himrightly to be one of our great writers, and the Institutionde l'Amour, and the Triomphe de la Renommée]; -Trissin's Sophonisbe, 1515; —Tragic drama in Italy from 1515 to 1550 [ Cf. Ginguené,Histoire littéraire d'Italie, vol . vi . , chap. 19, 20, and 21 ]; -Lazarede Baïf's translations [ Electra and Hecuba]; those of Bonaventuredes Périers [ Andrienne]; of Ronsard [ Plutus]; -the representationsin the colleges; -Jodelle's Cléopâtre, 1552. -Hesitation of the Pleiadbetween tragedy and comedy.The preference is accorded tragedy, thanks to Scaliger's Poétique,1561; -thanks to the popularity of Seneca's tragedies; -and thanksfinally to the success of Amyot's Plutarque.La Mort de Jules César, by J. Grévin, 1560; -The determination ofthe characteristics of tragedy [ Cf. Scaliger, Poetices libri septem,book i . , chap. 5, 6, 8, 9 , 11 , 16 ]; -the choice of subjects. -The rule ofthe unities. -Jean and Jacques de la Taille. —Of the unity of tone ofthe tragedies of the Renaissance. Of the advantage the writers findin treating well- known subjects , and even subjects already dealt with.-The utilisation of history in tragedy. The trend of classic tragedyis already determined in 1570.3. THE WORKS.-Of Jodelle: Cléopâtre, Didon and Eugène; -ofJean de la Taille, Médée, 1554; -of Ch. Toutain, Agamemnon, 1556;-of Jacques Grévin, La Mort de César, 1560; —of Gabriel Bounyn,THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 73Chrétienne is one of the noble books of the sixteenthcentury. It is certain, on the other hand, that no bookcould conceivably be more different fromthe Pantagruel ofRabelais, and that none can be named that is less " confiten mépris des choses fortuites," or that expresses less confidence in the goodness of nature. Nobody has believedto a less degree than Calvin, that it is possible for man,without aid and succour from on high, to escape from hisnatural " filth , " or to prevent himself continually fallingback into it . Nobody has been less of opinion, that weare justified in freely abandoning ourselves to our instincts,and in making the joy of satisfying them to the full theunique ambition of our existence. Nobody even hasbelieved to a less degree that liberty has been grantedus that we may turn it to account, for, on the contrary,he held that its rightful use lay in its abdication . SoLa Sultane, 1561; -of F. Le Duchat, Agamemnon, 1561; -ofJacques de la Taille, Daire et Alexandre, 1562; —of N. Filleul,Achille, 1563, and Lucrèce, 1567; —of Florent Crestien, La fille deJephté, 1567; —of Jacques de la Taille , Saül le Furieux, 1568.Few of these works, with the exception of those of Jodelle, havebeen reprinted in modern times. There is, however, a modern editionof the Mort de César, Marburg, 1886 .IX.-Robert Garnier [ La Ferté- Bernard, 1534; † 1590, Le Mans. ]1. THE SOURCES. -Niceron, in his Hommes illustres , vol . xxi.; —A. Ebert, Entwickelungs- geschichte des französischen Tragödie,Gotha, 1856; -B. Haureau, Histoire letteraire du Maine, Paris , 1872;-Emile Faguet, La tragédie française au XVIe siècle, Paris, 1883;-P. Bernage, Etude sur Robert Garnier, Paris, s.d.2. THE MAN AND THE POET. -Extraordinary popularity of Garnier'stragedies; -more than forty editions in less than forty years from1586-1616; -and were they represented? -His Roman tragedies:Porcie, Cornélie, Antigone; —and that they are simply history interspersed with lyric and descriptive interludes [ Cf. the choruses; andin Porcia: Description of Hell, verses, 45-66; Description of theAges of Humanity, verse 725 and fol.; The Labours of Hercules,74 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREmuch for the essence of his book. As for its manner,having regard to its monumental severity, there wasnever a book whose beauty was less " æsthetic, " so tospeak, or at the same time more logical. In no book hasthe art of the writer consisted more manifestly in beingable to dispense with art, in renouncing every expedient,even those that are most legitimate, by which the feelingsof the reader may be interested in the truth of the doctrine taught. In no book, to conclude, has assuredlyvigorous thought adopted to express itself what Bossuethas termed a " sadder " style; and I fancy that he meansa style more proper to discourage the reader. Such, too ,is the opinion of Ronsard, who is disturbed, offended,and wounded in his artistic instincts by this gloomyPuritanism; and I was mistaken just now when I saidthat the Institution Chrétienne differs from no book soverses 1076-1110] .—Abundance of translations. -Influence of Seneca.-Greek tragedies: Hippolyte, Antigone and La Troade; -thatGarnier composed this latter piece by combining the Hercules andTroades of Euripides and the Troades of Seneca. -Analysis of Hippolyte. -Noticeable effort of the poet in the direction of psychology [Cf. Hippolyte, verses 545-690, verse 1360 and fol.; verses 1963- 2150] . The first tragi- comedy: Bradamante. -That Garnier'sBradamante marks a decisive moment in the history of the drama:tragedy " retreats " and gives way to tragi-comedy. -Glance at thestate of the drama in Europe at the same period. -Whether this eclipse of tragedy is or is not a symptom of emancipation from theancients? Qualities of Garnier's tragedies: -loftiness of his imagi- nation; his style is that of Ronsard's school. -Further that he wasmistaken in his view of the nature of dramatic action; -of the meansof interesting the public; -and in the choice of his models.3. THE WORKS. They are almost restricted to his tragedies:—Porcie, 1568; -Hippolyte, 1573; -Cornélie, 1574; -Marc Antoine,1578; -La Troade, 1578; -Antigone, 1579; -Bradamante, 1580(tragi- comedy); -and Les Juives, 1583.He is also the author of an Hymne à la monarchie, 1567; —and ofan Elégie sur le trépas de Ronsard.THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEALmuch as from Rabelais' romance: it differs at lemuch from the Sonnets à Cassandre, from the Ol'Hospital, and from the Hymne de l'Or.But this is why it is that we shall not be surprised at theresistance the Reformation encountered at first in France.France had not emancipated itself from the dominationof scholasticism to fall at once under the tyranny of Protestant Puritanism. Having tasted the seductions ofindependence and of art, it was not going to allow itselfto be deprived of them for the future. It had not castaside what it held to be too " Germanic " in its constitution, as contained in the feudal system, in order toreinstate, in the shape of Protestantism, something atleast as " Germanic. " For this is a further point onwhich the spirit of the Reformation is opposed to thatof the Renaissance; indeed it is perhaps the most imAn excellent edition of Robert Garnier's dramas has been issuedby M. Wendelin Förster, 4 vols . , Heilbronn, 1882-1884.X.-The beginnings of Comedy.1. THE SOURCES. -The brothers Parfaict, Histoire du théâtre français; —L'Ancien théâtre français, edited by Viollet-le- Duc; -Ch.Magnin: Les commencements de la comédie italienne en France, inthe Revue des Deux Mondes for December 15, 1847; -Rathery: Influence de l'Italie sur les lettres françaises, Paris, 1853; ArmandBaschet, Les Comédiens italiens à la cour de France, Paris, 1882; -Ad. Gaspary, Storia della litteratura italiana, translated from theGerman, Turin, 1891 , vol. ii . , second part.2. THE AUTHORS AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF COMEDY. -The lastsoties. That comedy in France is not of French, nor of purely Latinbut of Italian origin. -Italian comedy of the sixteenth century; —its Latin sources; -its popular and national sources: La Commediadell' Arte. -Influence of the " novellieri . " -The personages of thiscomedy. Disguises, misunderstandings and recognitions. -The plothinges upon the valet; -and this continues the case until theMariage de Figaro. -The Italian comedians in France; the firsttroupe of Gelosi, 1571 [ Cf. Baschet, op. cit . ]; -the second Gelosi,76 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREportant point. When one attempts to arrive at the veryessence of their opposition , it seems to lie in one of thoseracial antagonisms that of all are the most insuperable.Those who lived at the time overlooked this fact at first ,but they were quick to recognise their mistake. Theyawoke to the necessity of choosing whether they wouldbecome Germans or retain their Latin race, whether theywould follow the path that humanism was treading, orattach to moral preoccupations a greater. importance thanto those of every other order; and the differentiation ofthe literatures of the North from the literatures of theSouth was the outcome of this conflict. [ Cf. Mmede Staël, De l'Allemagne; and H. Taine, Littératureanglaise. ] It will be seen that it exactly coincides withthe division of the Europe of the Middle Ages into twogreat " nations, " which, separated for the future, will not1577; —and is it a fact that they played the comedies of Pierre deLarrivey?Pierre de Larrivey [ 1540-1612]; -his Italian origin; -his translation of the Facétieuses Nuits de Straparole, 1576; -his comedies,1579. -There is not one of the nine that is not translated oradapted " from some Italian comedy. -Declaration of Larrivey in his Dedication to M. d'Amboise. -It is also to be noted that hiscomedies are all in prose. -They are examples of the comedy of pureintrigue. The principal point of interest in connection with them isthat they were imitated later on by Molière [ Cf. in particular L'Avareon the one hand, and on the other Le Laquais, i . , sc. 1; -La Veuve(the author of the Italian original of which is a Bonaparte) , iii . , sc. 2;-and Les Esprits, iii . , sc . 6 ] .-Of a curious difference in the toneof the first and last of Larrivey's comedies: La Constance, LeFidèle, Les Trompeuses; —and in what respect the latter are moreromantic.Of some other authors of comedies: Jean Godard, Odet de Turnèbe, etc.-The development of comedy, as that of tragedy had been,is interrupted by the success of tragi - comedy. -Was French society ofthe time of Charles IX. and Henry III. ripe for comedy? -Reasonsfor doubting that it was; -the principal of which is the license thatTHE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 77be drawn together, will not again meet in the course oftheir literary evolution for a long time to come. Thetransition from the homogeneous to the heterogeneous isaccomplished, and the work of differentiation will not beinterrupted again. It is here that comes to an end withthe history of the Middle Ages the history of " European " literature, and that begins with the history ofnationalities that of modern literatures.IIIOne of the first consequences of the transformationthat is beginning is what has been happily termed theLatinisation of culture. [ Cf. Burckhardt, Civilisation autemps de la Renaissance. ] Little by little, and almostwithout being aware or conscious of what they are about,reigned at the time in satire.-A second may be found in the circumstance that the national character was still unfixed -what makesone race laugh has not the same effect on another, and the Frenchcharacter was scarcely formed.3. The Works. —Jodelle's Eugène; -Remy Belleau's La Reconnue;-J. H. de Baïf's translations, the Eunuque and the Miles gloriosus;-Grévin's La Trésorière, 1558, Les Esbahis , 1560; -Jean de laTaille's Les Corriveaux, 1562; -Louis le Jars' Lucelle, 1576; -PierreLarrivey's first collection, containing Le Laquais, La Veuve, LcsEsprits, Le Morfondu, Les Jaloux, Les Escoliers, 1579; -Odet deTurnèbe's Les Contens, 1580.P. Larrivey's comedies have been reprinted by Viollet- le- Duc inhis Ancien théâtre français, vols. v. , vi . and vii.XI. The Work of the Pleiad.1. THE SOURCES. -Cf. the texts given above and add: Vauquelin dela Fresnaye: Art poétique, edit . G. Pellissier, Paris , 1885; -MathurinRegnier, in his Satires, in particular Satire V. and Satire IX.; —A. P. Lemercier, Études sur . . . Vauquelin de la Fresnaye, Nancy,1887; -Ferdinand Brunot, La doctrine de Malherbe, Paris , 1891;É. Faguet, XVIe siècle , Paris , 1894;-and Marty- Laveaux, La languede la Pleiade in the collection of the Pléiade française. It will be78 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREit is to the Latin school that our poets attach themselves,though they continue the while to profess a great admiration for Grecian models; they are disposed to imitateHorace rather than Pindar; and this tendency is sogeneral that even Ronsard, in his Franciade, but moreespecially in his theory of the epopee, though he invokethe great name of Homer, draws his inspiration in realityfrom Virgil alone. A scholar of renown, Julius CæsarScaliger, goes a step further in his Poétique, in which heopenly proclaims the superiority of the Latins over theGreeks. Is it that he is alive to the circumstance thatthe Greeks, as a philosopher will point out later [ Hegel,Esthétique, trans . Bénard, vol . i . ] , were only acquaintedwith the Greeks and barbarians, whereas the Latinsattained to a knowledge of man? However this may be,towards 1560, or thereabouts, in spite of certain efforts , —well to consult from a general point of view: A. Couat's Poésiealexandrine, Paris, 1882.2. THE WORK OF THE PLEIAD.-As regards style; it gave thealexandrine verse a definite footing in French poetry. -Comparisonbetween the ten- syllable verse and the alexandrine. The Pleiad putinto circulation for poetical use all the rhythms which we employ; -it considerably enriched the language; —and in this connection whatimportance is to be attached to the reproach addressed by Ronsardof having " spoken Greek and Latin in French "?-The Pleiad alsotaught French poets and even prose writers the " intrinsic strength "of words; that is that in every language, and independently of theirmeaning, there are beautiful words and ugly words. Of some exaggerations of the Romanticists on this score [ Cf. Th. Gautier, Noticesur Baudelaire] .-Finally the Pleiad set itself the task of raising thedignity of the poet simultaneously with that of poetry; —and it wassuccessful. Of the acclimatisation of the literary forms of antiquityin our literature.The Pleiad would have been more successful still but for havingcommitted three capital errors:-(1) It blundered in the choice ofmodels, confounding them all in a like admiration provided they wereancient; ( 2) It blundered as to the conditions to which literaryTHE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 79such as those of Henri Estienne in his Conformité dulangage françois avec le grec, -the language of Homerand Plato is seen to drop out of general circulation, so tospeak, and to retire to the seclusion of the colleges . It isthe object once again of the attention of none but theerudite. It is no longer to Sophocles or Aristophanesthat the earliest authors of our " classic " tragedies andcomedies will go for lessons in their art, but to Plautusand to Seneca. The imitation of " antiquity " is , or willsoon be confined to the imitation of Latin antiquity; andthus it is that Greek, like a leaven that is only destinedto contribute to a combination into which it is not toenter, is eliminated from the classic ideal after serving todetermine it.Be it remarked, moreover, that if Greek has greatqualities, Latin has others, more suited, perhaps, toforms are subject, thinking it could create forms at will withoutregard to time, place, or the laws of the human mind.—Theory of theEpopee considered as the expression of a conflict of races; -Theory ofLyricism considered as the expression of the personality of the poet;-Theory of the Drama considered as an encounter between the forceof circumstances and the human will.- (3) Finally the Pleiad was mistaken as to its rcal capacities; it was not sufficiently cognisant of its deficiencies in the matters of experience of life and observation of man.Still, and even as regards subject matter, its errors do not preventits having marked out the boundaries as it were of classicism. —It wasalive to or at least had an inkling of the potentialities of style; —itrecognised in what true imitation consists; —and the nature of thetransition from imitation to invention [ Cf. on this head AndréChénier, Epitre IV. à M. Lebrun and his Invention]; —it communicated to its successors the ambition of putting the dignity of theFrench language on a level with that of Greek and Latin; —andfinally it laid down in advance even the limits of classic art. -In thissense Ronsard, lyricism excepted, is already Malherbe; -and Malherbe,when completed by the wide acquirements and the integrity ofreflection in which he will be wanting, will be already Boileau.80 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREthe nature of the French genius. " The dignity, it hasbeen said, of the Latin language is unequalled.It was spoken by the sovereign people, who stamped itwith that character of grandeur that is unique in thehistory of human language. . . . It is the language ofcivilisation. Mingled with the speech of our barbarianforefathers, it had the power to refine , to render supple,to spiritualise those rude tongues which have becomewhat we see. . . Take the map of the world and drawa line within which this universal language was spoken:it marks the limits of civilisation and of the Europeanstock. . . . The Latin language is the sign of theEuropean " [Joseph de Maistre, Du Pape] . The Frenchmen of the Renaissance recognised this, and though theymight have been unable to adduce the reasons just setforth, they were the reasons that induced them to returnTHIRD PERIODFrom the Publication of the “ Essays " to thePublication of " Astree "1580-1588 * to 1608I. Bernard Palissy [ Paris, 1510; 1590, Agen] .1. THE SOURCES. -Bernard Palissy, Discours admirables de l'artde terre, edit. B. Fillon, vol. ii . , p. 206 and fol.; Lamartine in theCivilisateur, July, 1852; -Haag, La France Protestante, articlePALISSY, 1857; -Louis Audiat, Bernard Palissy, Paris, 1863 and1868;-A. Jacquemart, Les Merveilles de la céramique, vol. ii . , Paris,1868; -Louis Audiat, Palissy, sa vie et ses œuvres, preceding Fillon'sedition, Niort, 1888; -Ernest Dupuy, Bernard Palissy, Paris , 1891 .2. THE ARTIST, THE WRITER, AND THE MAN OF SCIENCE . Of someextravagant eulogies that have been made of B. Palissy [Cf. the articlealluded to by Lamartine, and Henri Martin in his Histoire deFrance]; and that the masterpieces of the potter's art do not de-

  • I note here, without further delay, that the edition of the Essais (Montaigne)

dated 1580 only contains the two first books of the work, to which the third was added for the first time in the edition in 4to dated 1588.THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 81in a body to the Latin tradition after the brief and poeticenthusiasm for Greek by which they had been carriedaway for a moment.66 toSimultaneously, they feel the need of putting thesolidity, gravity, and dignity of their matter on a levelwith the perfection of manner which they esteem theyhave achieved [ Cf. Estienne Pasquier, Recherches de laFrance, book vii. , chap. 8, 9 and 10] . I see curiousevidence of this desire, in the naïve and pedantic coquetrywith which they resort to inverted commasdraw the reader's attention every time they express ageneral idea. The result is that while the Italians arealready going astray prior to losing themselves entirely,as they will soon do, amid the subtilties of alexandrinismand become according to the expression of one of thebest historians of their literature [ Cf. Francesco de Sanctis ,serve so much enthusiasm;-there may be infinite art in them, butthere is no great art where there is no great intention;-and there is nothing of the sort in a pot. -Literary interest of the distinction.—Life and adventures of Bernard Palissy.-The famous passage in theArt de Terre [ Fillon's edition , ii . , 206 and fol . ]; -and that there is agreat deal of declamation in it [ Cf. Benvenuto Cellini in his Memoirs];-but it is sincere " declamation or declamation of which its authoris himself the dupe; -and in this connection of Palissy as a writer.That his self- opinionatedness is due to his ignorance; —and in thisconnection of a form of vanity peculiar to the self- taught. Thededication of the Discours admirables to the Seigneur de Pons.-Palissy's work bears witness to the state of mind of a " poor artisan "of his time.—It is this that constitutes its singularity, originality andnaturalness . His talent as a tale-teller [ Les ammonites de Marennes,ed. Fillon, i . , 48, 49; -the Débat des outils d'agriculture, i . , 106, 107.-The allegory Essay de la teste des hommes, i . , 108 and fol] .-Hissentiment of nature. -In his writings, as in his enamels, Palissy is oneof those artists whose characters are not merely lifelike, but lifelike toan extraordinary degree. The observer and the experimenter.Should he be regarded as a 66 man of science "?-For what reasonshe cannot have had anything more than presentiments. -Testimony of782 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREStoria della Lett. italiana, vol . ii . , chap. ii. ] , almost “ indifferent to the subject matter, " whose form alone iscapable of appealing to their senses, it is precisely withthe " subject matter " or the essence of things that ourwriters are concerned; and it is to what they see , orthink they see, to be the most durable and the mostuniversal side of things that they endeavour to giveexpression. This liking for general ideas, or liking as itwill shortly be called for the reduction to the Universal,is a second trait of the classic ideal that is beginning totake shape.We touch here upon the explanation of the prodigioussuccess of Amyot and his translations. His Plutarch isonly a rhetorician; but this rhetorician has composedbiographies which are perhaps the most interesting weknow; and given the manner in which Amyot has trans--Cuvier [Histoire des sciences naturelles] and of Isidore Geoffroy- SaintHilaire [ Histoire des règnes organiques] . His attacks on theAlchemists. Importance of the form he has given his work [ Dialogues between a Theorist, or the a priori idea, and a Practical Man,or experience ] .-It does not seem, however, that he made anyimportant discovery; --or laid down any principle in the sphere ofmethod; —or formed a single disciple. —That his great merit lies in hishaving emancipated himself from the servitude of the ancients general in his time.3. THE WORKS.-- Recette véritable, " true recipe " by which all themen of France may learn to multiply and augment their treasures;1563, -and Discours admirables de la nature des eaux et desfontaines; 1580.The best edition of Palissy's Works is that of M. Benjamin FillonNiort, 1888, Clouzot.II.-François de la Noue [Fresnay- en- Retz (Loire-Inférieure)1531 1591 , Moncontour (Côtes - du- Nord)] .1. THE SOURCES. -La Noue himself in his Mémoires;-Brantômein his Hommes illustres; —Moïse Amyrault, Vie de François seigneurde la Noue, 1661; -Albert Desjardins, Les moralistes français auTHE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 83·lated them, it would be impossible to imagine moreinstructive object lessons . "If we feel a singularpleasure in listening to those who return from a distantjourney, when they relate the things they have seen instrange countries, the manners of the inhabitants , thenature of the localities and if we are sometimes sojoyous and enraptured that we do not perceive the passing of the hours as we hearken to the discourse of awise, fluent, and eloquent old man, when he is tellingthe adventures of his years of youth and vigourhow much greater should be the pleasure and rapture weshould feel at seeing human examples vividly representedin a comely, vivid, and truthful picture.' Thus heexpresses himself in the preface to his Vies parallèles;and it would be impossible to state more aptly the natureof the teachings, or, as we should say to-day, of the·XVIe siècle, Paris, 1870; -H. Hauser, François de la Noue, Paris,1892.2. THE MAN AND THE WRITER. -As was Bodin, as was Palissy, hetoo is an 66 observer," though of a different kind. -His military career;-but his sobriquet of " Iron- Arm " must not be taken as evidence ofhis energy; —and that besides being a soldier he was something of apolitician. The scruples of conscience of a Protestant captain; -comparison between Montluc and De la Noue; —moral superiority of thelatter. His Discours politiques et militaires. —He composed this workin prison. Curious points of contact between Bodin, Palissy, andLa Noue. Classification of La Noue's discourses: Strictly MilitaryDiscourses [ 11 , 13, 14, 15 , 16, 17 , 18]; -compare the manner in whichhe writes of war with a famous passage in the Soirées de SaintPétersbourg.-Political Discourses [ 1 , 4, 6, 12 , 20, 21 , 22]; -comparethe political views of La Noue with the " great plan " of Henry IV.—But of most interest as regards the history of ideas are his MoralDiscourses [ 3, 5 , 6 , 7 , 10 , 19 , 23, 24, 25] and among them Discourse23 on the philosopher's stone; 6 against the Amadis; and 24 againstthe Epicureans;-La Noue a predecessor of Bossuet [ Maxims oncomedy] in his Discourse against the Amadis; —and of Rousseau inhis Discourse against the Epicureans. -This amounts to saying that84 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURE" documents, " relating to man contained by his Vies.In strict truth the influence of Amyot has not been commendable in every respect; and if it be indeed his Plutarque that may be said to have imbued us with that vagueideal of heroism of the Greek or Roman pattern, whichwill become the ideal of our classic tragedy; if it be indeed his Agesilauses and his Timoleons, his Coriolanusesand his Mariuses, that for two hundred and fifty years ata stretch will be the subject of French drama, or ratherwill encumber French drama without always providingit with adequate subjects; —then it is allowable to regrethis influence. How would things stand after this if wewere to enumerate here all our painters, from Poussinto David, who have borrowed off him? And are weto be asked to be grateful to him for that ideal of afalse, sentimental, and declamatory virtue of which hishe is above everything else a " moralist. " -The composition of LaNoue's Discours; —their oratorical turn; -their vigour of languageand style; their impassionate patriotism. -Success of the Discours.-A few words as to La Noue's Mémoires. -His death at the siege ofLamballe.3. THE WORKS . -Discours politiques et militaires du sieur Françoisde la Noue; Bâle, 1587 , François Forest.There are no modern reprints of his works, and the most recenteditions date from the beginning of the seventeenth century; butsundry of La Noue's Letters are to be found in a certain number ofhistorical publications.III. Guillaume de Saluste, Seigneur of Bartas [ Montfort(Gers) 1544; 1590, Montfort] .1. THE SOURCES. -J. de Thou, in his Histoire, book 99; -Goujet, inhis Bibliothèque française, vol. xiii .; -Sainte- Beuve, Poésie françaiseau XVIe siècle; and Revue des Deux Mondes, February, 1842; —Poirson , Histoire littéraire du Règne d'Henri IV. , vol. iv. , 2nd edition ,1867;-G. Pellissier, La vie et les œuvres de du Bartas, Paris , 1882.2. THE POET. -His Protestant education; —and that while profitingby the example of Ronsard, he goes back beyond him, and must beTHE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 85Lycurguses and his Philopoemens, his Catos and hisBrutuses, have offered the model to our publicists orto the members of our revolutionary assemblies? [ Cf.J. J. Rousseau, in his Confessions; and Mme Roland inher Mémoires and in her Correspondance. ] On the otherhand, however, it is unquestionably in his Vies parallèlesthat the great figures of that antiquity which previousto him had been shrouded in a sort of mythological orlegendary mist, assumed what seems to be an air ofreality and life . Whether they resemble the originalsor not, this is not the point, -his personages are substantial, have ceased to be vain phantoms; it seems thatone touches themwith the finger. Indeed his own expression deserves to be retained: it is exact that he offers ushuman examples vividly represented, whose description hasenriched our knowledge of humanity. Absorbed by theconnected with the author of the Miroir de l'âme pécheresse. —Thecourt of Jeanne d'Albret. -Popularity of Du Bartas among the Protestant community; -Goethe's estimate of him [ Complete Works, Cotta,1868, Stuttgart, vol . xxv. , p. 261 ].-His avowed intention of combating the current Paganism of the time. -The Premiere Sepmaine, 1579,and the Seconde, 1584.--The Première has for theme the adoration ofGod in the marvels of nature; -the Seconde is a sort of universalhistory. The descriptive and oratorical passages in the poems of DuBartas. Of the style of Du Bartas and of the absence of art thatcharacterises it. That together with Baïf he is responsible for theneglect that overtook Ronsard. -Of Du Bartas as a caricature ofRonsard. -Unavailing efforts of the critics to restore him to favour.—It is very difficult to account for his influence, but his work was verypopular in his time. -Explanation of this peculiarity.3. THE WORKS. -La Muse Chrétienne, 1574, containing theTriomphe de la foi, Judith and Uranie; -La Sepmaine ou créationdu monde, 1578; -La seconde sepmaine ou enfance du monde, 1584,comprising 1st Day (1) Eden; (2) The Imposture; (3) The Furies;(4) The Artifices; and 2nd Day: (1) The Ark; ( 2) Babylon; (3) The Colonies; (4) The Columns.In addition to the above, in the posthumous edition published by86 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREinterest of the narrative , we compare his Lycurgus or hisSylla with ourselves rather than with each other, andwithout perceiving what we are about. An unconsciouscomparison is instituted, of which the effect, if it beon the one hand to abolish the historical sense inus,-I mean the sense of the diversity of epochsis on the other hand to teach us the essential identityof human nature. None before Amyot had broughtthis truth into sight; and if it should be thoughtsurprising that a mere translator should occupy soconsiderable a place in the literary history of his time,let it be remembered that his " comely, vivid, andtruthful pictures " awakened the vocation of Michel deMontaigne.For whence comes the interest we take in all thesepersonages, and what is its true natre? MontaigneHaultin at La Rochelle, 1590, 1591, are found: The Fathers, and theHistory of Jonas, fragments of the 3rd Day; The Trophies, thefirst part of the 4th Day; the Magnificence; and a translation inverse of the Lépanthe de Jacques VI. , roi d'Ecosse. The edition alsocontains the Cantique de la victoire d'Ivry.IV. Michel Eyquem, Seigneur de Montaigne [ Château ofMontaigne, near Bergerac, 1533; † 1592, in the same place] .1. THE SOURCES. -Above all the Essays themselves; -Dr. Payen,Documents inédits sur Montaigne, 1847-1855-1857-1862, and Noticesur La Boétie, 1853; —Feuillet de Conches, Causeries d'un curieux,vol. iii . , Paris, 1862; —A. Grün, La vie publique de Montaigne, Paris,1855; —Th. Malvezin, Michel de Montaigne, Bordeaux, 1875; ---- PaulBonnefon, Montaigne, l'homme et l'œuvre, Paris, 1893; and Montaigne et ses amis, Paris , 1898; -Paul Stapfer, Montaigne in theseries of Grands Ecrivains, Paris, 1895, and La famille de Montaigne, Paris, 1896; -Villemain, Eloge de Montaigne, 1812; —J.V. Le Clerc, Discours sur la vie et les ouvrages de Montaigne preceding his edition of Montaigne's Works; --- Sainte - Beuve, PortRoyal, vol. ii . , book iii . , chap. ii . and iii .; -Vinet, Moralistesfrançais du XVIe et du XVIIe siècle, Paris, 1859. -Gust. Allais, LesFrom a portrait in theMONTAIGNE.Depot Des Archives du Royaume " at Paris .

THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 87will tell us it is " that every man carries in his ownperson the model of the human condition . "Humani generis mores tibi nosse volenti ,Sufficit una domus ...The lines are Juvenal's, and without a doubt Montaigneis sufficiently nourished on Latin, his book is sufficiently that of a " humanist, " or even it may be of apedant, for one to suspect him of having borrowed theaphorism from the Latin satirist. This great reader isa great pilferer, and he has not always indicated hislarcenies, as if he feared in truth that were he to havedone so there would remain nothing of his entire book.A very useless precaution, but an almost vainer fear!Were the Essais only a collection or, if I may risk theexpression, a string, a chaplet of quotations, that wouldEssais de Montaigne, Paris, 1887;-D. Motheau, Notice sur Montaigne, introduction to his edition of Montaigne's Works, Paris, 1886;-E. Faquet XVI Siècle; —Eug. Voizard, Étude sur la langue deMontaigne, Paris, 1885.(2) THE LIFE OF MONTAIGNE. -The origin of the Eyquem familyand Montaigne's pretensions to nobility. -His studies at the collegeof Guyenne. He is appointed Councillor of the Court of Aides atPérigueux in 1557; -and councillor to the Bordeaux Parliament in1561. His friendship with Estienne de la Boétie; —and in this connection of the Contr'un or Discours sur la servitude volontaire, whichis nothing but purely rhetorical declamation . -Death of La Boétie,1563.-Montaigne's marriage, 1565.-Death of his father, 1568.-In1569 Montaigne publishes his translation of Raymond Sebon's NaturalTheology. Of Raymond Sebon and his Natural Theology; —and hemust not be confused with another Spaniard, Raymond Martin, theauthor of the Pugio Fidei. -In 1570 Montaigne abandons law for thearmy; but he does not see any fighting. -In 1580 he publishes thefirst edition of his Essays. Montaigne's travels [ June 22, 1580-November 30, 1581 ]. He is made mayor of Bordeaux in 1581.-Theplague of Bordeaux, and that Montaigne's conduct during it was thereverse of heroic. -He ceases to be mayor in 1585, and publishes in88 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREnot prevent them being all that they are in the history of our literature: the first book in which a manformed the project of depicting himself, consideringhimself as an example of average humanity, and ofenriching the natural history of humanity with thediscoveries he made in his own person. " Every onelooks beyond himself, I look within myself, I am onlyconcerned with myself, I reflect on myself, I examinemyself, I take pleasure in myself. . . . Others are alwaysharking elsewhere .Nemo in se tentat descendere;for my part I wrap myself up in myself." And by thecomparison I make between others and myself, he mightadd, I not only know myself, I know others as well; Iprocure myself some notion of that general and common1588 the real second edition of his Essays. -His relations with HenriIV. His last years. He dies September 13, 1592, leaving to hiswife and his adopted daughter, Mlle le Jars de Gournay, the task ofissuing the definite edition of the Essays, which is that of 1595.(3) COMPOSITION AND CHARACTER OF THE ESSAYS.A. The composition of the book. -A remark of Prévost- Paradol[ Cf. Moralistes français ] on Montaigne's quotations and the impossibility of separating them from the context. -But he has forgottenthat the edition of 1595 contained more than " six hundred " additionsto the text of 1588; --and, from a general point of view, that thedistinctive character of the Essays is precisely their successive composition. It is probable that the project of writing his Essays didnot occur to Montaigne earlier than 1572 [ Cf. book i. chap. xx. ] . Theedition of 1580; -and why good judges are of opinion that this editionis the truest reflection of Montaigne's individuality; -it contains fewerquotations, and presents in consequence a less pedantic appearance; —the arguments, being interrupted by fewer digressions , are easier tofollow in it; and there is something livelier about its general toneand style. Comparison between the chapter on the Education ofChildren in the first and second editions .-The way in which Montaigne's text is added to and often becomes overloaded in consequenceTHE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 89humanity of which I form part with them, and to whichthey belong as I do.Informed of the intentions of the author of the Essais,let us now picture him in his library in converse with hisfavourite authors. He has been reading his Tusculanes,and has been struck by a sentence or a saying of Cicero;he then remembers having read something similar inSeneca's Letters to Lucilius; he refers to the passage;and he proceeds to compare Cicero with Seneca, andboth of them with his own experience, which sometimesconfirms theirs and sometimes contradicts it. Or it maybe that, reversing the process, having first observed theeffects of pain or passion on himself, it happens that insearching his Plutarch or his Tacitus he finds corroboration of his own experience; and he is surprised andpleased to see that Cicero, for instance, or Agricola haveof his wide and varied reading; —that Montaigne rarely deletes but isalways making corrections; -and that he is much given to makingadditions. Comparison between the Apology for Raymond Sebonin the editions of 1580 and 1588; -entire absence of plan and composition. The scruples of the stylist. -To what extent the additionsmade in the edition of 1585 ought to be adopted.B. The inspiration of the book. -The chapter: " To study philosophy is to learn how to die "; -and that the chief concern ofMontaigne's life was to overcome his horror of death. This preoccupation explains: his curiosity with regard to himself; -differencesin manners and customs; -and history. His Epicureanism, whichhas sometimes been termed his Christianity, is to be ascribed to thesame cause; -Christianity being, in fact, merely a preparation fordeath; —but in reality there was nothing of the Christian aboutMontaigne. How his preoccupation with death explains the depthand the fund of human feeling of his philosophy; -a remark ofSchopenhauer [ The World as Will and Idea, iii . chap. xli . ] .-It is onthis head that Montaigne is distinguished from Rabelais. -There issomething morbidly keen and in a certain sense something pessimisticabout his curiosity. This is just the characteristic too that gives theEssays their singular value:—they are a confession; the effort of a90 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREVexperienced before him what he has just perceived andnoticed in his own person . In this way each successiveedition of his book is augmented, enriched, and diversified with the material he lights on in his daily observations or in the course of his reading. It is in thisway, too, that his pilferings reveal to us the very manhimself, and that as he becomes a more critical readerand as his experience widens he perceives, and we perceive with him, that his nature is always his own, but itis my nature and yours as well.It is for this reason that, whereas " authors appeal tothe public in virtue of some special and distinguishingquality, " he is the first author to base his appeal on thecharacteristics he has in common with all humanity, topresent himself " as Michel de Montaigne, not as a gramman to make the knowledge of himself the basis of a knowledge of thehuman race; —and an attempt to deduce a rule of conduct from thisknowledge. That the Essays are a melancholy book.C. Montaigne's style. The way in which this melancholy is maskedbythe charm of the style. -What did Montesquieu mean when hecalled Montaigne " one of the four great poets "?--Montaigne's styleis a " perpetual creation . "-The metaphors of Shakespeare himselfare not more numerous, more natural, or fresher; -and in this connection of the metaphor as a cause and mode of the " fructification oflanguages. "-Universality of Montaigne's vocabulary. -Sainte- Beuve'sjudgment on Montaigne's style [ Cf. Port- Royal, ii . p . 443 , 450, editionof 1878] . Moreover it is Montaigne's style that atones for what wouldotherwise be the impertinence of his constant talk of himself. -Strangedetails furnished by Montaigne about himself. But by the way inwhich he relates them, he contrives to express what is human aboutthem, as much as or more than what is individual and singular.(4) INFLUENCE AND SIGNIFICANCE OF THE ESSAYS. -That " every mancarries in his own person the model of the human condition "; —anda comparison in this connection between Montaigne's Essays andRousseau's Confessions; -the points of resemblance are external , butthe differences relate to essentials . -Montaigne made moral andpsychological observation the basis of French literature. — HisTHE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 91marian, poet, or jurist . " What is to prevent him adoptingthis course? "Is not all philosophy contained in a humbleand private life as well as in a life on more spaciouslines?" Is it necessary to be Aristides to have known theingratitude of men? Alexander or Cæsar to have experienced the inconstancy of fortune? And thereupon headds: " If people complain that I talk too much aboutmyself, my complaint is that they do not even thinkabout themselves. " We are ignorant of our own nature;and we hide or disguise our ignorance beneath the raillerywe mete out to those who study in their own personswhat is in fact the history of humanity!Shall I insist further, or is not the consequence clearas it is? Instead of plodding, as they had done hitherto,in the footsteps of the ancients, instead of trying to passinfluence abroad: on Bacon [ Cf. his Essays, 1597]; -—and onShakespeare [ Cf. Philarète Chasles, Études sur Shakespeare, Paris,s.d. ] .-Shakespeare's numerous borrowings from Montaigne [ Id. ibid .] .-That in this respect Montaigne returns to the tradition of the European influence of French literature. -Certain matter in the Essays of anature bound to be displeasing to another generation. -Testimony ofBalzac [ eighteenth Conversation ]; - of Pascal [ Pensées ]; —of Bossuet[second sermon for All Saints' Day]; -of Malebranche [ Recherche dela Vérité, ii . , p. 3 , ch. v. ] .5. THE WORKS . -Neglecting his translation of the Théologie naturelle de Raymond Sebon, 1569; -and the Journal de ses Voyages,which was first published in 1774; -Montaigne's works are confined tohis Essays, of which it will suffice to note here the principal editions.The Essais, 1st, 2nd, and 3rd editions, 1580 , 1582, and 1587 [ MM.Dezeimeris and Barkhausen's edition , Bordeaux, 1874, is an exactreproduction of the text of the 1st edition, and gives in addition thedifferent readings of the 2nd and 3rd editions];-The Essais, 4thedition, 1 vol. in 4to, 1588, Abel l'Angelier [ reprinted in MotheauJouaust's edition, 7 vols. in 18mo, Paris, 1872, 1875, Jouaust]; -TheEssais, 5th edition , 1 vol. in folio , 1595 , Abel l'Angelier and MichelSonnius [ reprinted in Courbet and Royer's edition , 4 vols. in 8vo,Paris, 1872-1877 , A. Lemerre] .92 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREfor, say, a Pindar or a Petrarch, our writers know forthe future that they can find in themselves the materialto put into and, as it were, sustain the literary formsof which they had previously done little more thanimitate the outline. They will probe their own being.Should they fail to discover in it the reasons for selfsatisfaction, a like inquiry afforded this Epicurean, theireffort will not have been wholly vain, for its outcomewill be the increase of the common treasure of humanity.And finally, since at all times and under all circumstancesman's most interesting, instructive, and useful subject ofstudy is man, we find literature is based henceforth onmoral and psychological observation.At the same time, the condition is enforced that a codesuperior to that of nature shall serve as guide, or, as itWe may also cite P. Coste's edition (it is P. Coste who is related tohave blushed when Montaigne was mentioned in his presence) , 3 vols .in 4to, London, 1724, to which is adjoined in the same format avolume containing the Voyages; Naigeon's edition , 4 vols. in 8vo,Paris, 1802, Didot; and J. V. Leclerc's edition , 5 vols . in 8vo, Paris,1826, Lefèvre.--This is the edition that has become the standardsource of Montaigne's text.V. The Satire Ménippée [ 1593-1594] .1. THE SOURCES. -Almost all the more special documents necessaryto or useful for the understanding of the Satire Menippée have been collected in the Ratisbon edition, edited by Prosper Marchand, 3 vols.in 12mo, 1726, and published by the successors of Mathias Kerner. -In addition there is Charles Labitte's introduction to his edition ofthe Satire, Paris, n.d.; -and Les Prédicateurs de la Ligue, Paris,1841 , by the same writer.2. THE PAMPHLET; -and that neither its merit, which is quitesecond-rate, nor its audacity, nor its consequences ought to beexaggerated. It cannot be said that the Satire " gave France toHenri IV. , " since it was published in 1594, and the civil war did notend until 1598; -there is no audacity: (1) in five writers producinga book between them, since it is well known that it is precisely onTHE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 93were, as a law to this observation of ourselves . We areto study nature in our own persons, but it will be with aview to its discipline. On this point both Catholics andProtestants will be quick to agree, and here, if we mayventure on the expression, we have the net profit of theReformation and the wars of religion. As we haye said,France had shrunk from the gloomy and hopeless moralityof Calvin. His teaching, however, had one result: it leftmen convinced of the utility, the necessity, and even theurgency of fighting against the growing licentiousness ofmorals. Read in this connection La Noue's Discourspolitiques et militaires; Charron's Sagesse and his TroisVérités; or again Du Vair's Philosophie stoïque. Bydifferent roads , all these writings, varied as are theirorigin and characteristics, verge towards two or threethe division of risks that the principle of insurance is based;-(2) further, there is no audacity in remaining anonymous; —and (3)in having published a pamphlet of this nature nine months afterthe conversion and three months after the re- entry into Paris ofHenri IV. The bravery of the authors wholly consists in consequence of having egregiously insulted men already vanquished ,and in whose overthrow, moreover, they had had no hand. Theauthors of the Ménippée: Pierre le Roy, Gillot, Nicolas Rapin, JeanPasserat, Florent Chrestien, and Pierre Pithou; --and that workingtogether they have not displayed a talent that none of them possessedindividually. —There is , however, a certain vigour of caricature in somepassages of the Satire; —of satire even; —and almost of eloquence [ Cf.the oft- quoted Harangue " of the civic lieutenant, Dreux d'Aubray] .-But there is not a trace of elevation or nobleness of feeling in thework; the writers are middle- class citizens infuriated at finding theirpleasures interfered with; -they are also pronounced enemies of theJesuits; and they doubtless loved their country;-but neverthelessthe Satire Menippée must not be numbered among the " great monuments ofthe French genius."66VI.-Pierre Charron [ Paris , 1541; † 1603, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -Bayle, in his Dictionnaire, article CHARRON; —94 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREcommon ends: the first of which is to restore to themorality of all time at least something of its formerauthority; the second to withdraw the French geniusfrom foreign influences, which are looked on at theperiod far less as hindrances to its liberty than as thecauses of its corruption; and the third to demand of theindividual, in the common interest of society, the qualitiesor the virtues which, left to himself, he would be inclinedto spurn.Of these three intentions, the first is specially noticeable in the Discours of honest La Noue, for it would bedifficult to display greater concern than this soldier does.for purity of morals, the education of the young, and thefuture of his country. Identical is the attitude ofGuillaume du Vair in his " Philosophy of the Stoics, "Franck, Dictionnaire des sciences philosophiques, article CHARRON;---Poirson, Histoire du Règne d'Henri IV. [ see above]; -Vinet,Moralistes française au XVIe siècle.2. THE PHILOSOPHER.--Enigmatical character of the personage;—he had been a priest; -he had even wished to enter the order of the Carthusian monks; -there were pious prelates among his protectors;-yet he had the reputation of being a " libertine, " and the contradiction that seems to exist between his personality and his reputa- tion reappearsin his two principal works:-the Traité des Trois Vérités(" Treatise on the Three Truths ") , which are: ( 1) that there is aGod; (2) that this God is only known to the Christians; ( 3) that thisGod is only worshipped as he should be worshipped by the RomanCatholics; and the Traité de la Sagesse, which has generally beenlooked upon as merely the systematisation of Montaigne's " scepticism . " -That the order of publication of the works does not removethe difficulty, seeing that he was acquainted with Montaigne when he issued the Traité des Trois Vérités.Examination of the Traité de la Sagesse. -Three contemporary, tosay nothing of ancient, writers are copied unscrupulously in the work:Bodin [ Cf. Sagesse, ii . , ch. 44 ]; Montaigne [ Cf. ii . , chap . viii . ]; andG. du Vair [ Cf. iii . , chap. xxviii . ] .-Meaning of these plagiarisms.——Charron's object is to make a synthesis of the ideas of his time; —as isTHE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 95a work whose spirit is sufficiently indicated by its title.The writer, forestalling Pascal, already aims at opposingEpictetus to Montaigne, the teaching that prescribesan effort of the will to Epicurean indifference, the philosophy of reason to that of Nature! We must livein accordance with Nature; but our " nature " is determined by the end to which we have been created; and"the end of man, of all our thoughts and all our actions,is to lead a good life "; and " our good " consists merelyin " the right use of reason, that is to say in virtue.How different already is this teaching from that ofRabelais, or even of Montaigne! And, admitting thatDu Vair is here only paraphrasing Epictetus, the choiceof Epictetus as guide is in itself a symptom of importance. Experience has demonstrated the necessity of aproved by the attention he pays to composition, a preoccupation thatis the chief originality of his book.--The three central ideas of thework: (1) the goodness of nature [ Cf. ii . , ch. iii . ]; —and yet (2) the infinite wretchedness of man [ Cf. i. , passim]; —which should breed (3) asovereign contempt for death [ Cf. ii . , ch. ii . ] .- Connection Charronestablishes between these three ideas; -his confidence in humanreason; in the power of the will; -in the universality of moral law.That after this examination we are disposed to regard him as a"transitional type "; —a forerunner of Descartes, —and of Pascal, —asmuch as a disciple and continuator of Montaigne. -Had Descartesread him?—In any case, it is certain that Pascal was very familiarwith his works; -and in this connection that Pascal's annotatorshave been too neglectful of Charron. -It is generally recognised howeasy, and at the same time how difficult, it is to bridge over the distance between Montaigne and Pascal; -but in reality the connectinglink is afforded by Charron. - Moreover, he did not believe that itcould possibly harm religion to establish its authority on a rationalbasis; --which is what he loyally attempted to accomplish;--and inthis way his contradictions result from his having failed to grasp thesignificance of certain of his assertions.3. THE WORKS.-Les Trois Vérités contre les athécs, idolâtres,juifs, hérétiques et schismatiqucs, Bordeaux, 1593; -Discours96 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREmoral directing force. The crimes of Catherine, thedebauchery of Henri III. , the corruption of the court,have filled the cup to overflowing. There must be anend to this state of things! And while waiting for themovement to terminate in a religious revival, an effort ismade to establish on a rational basis, to secularise or to"layicise, " the teachings which religion had inculcated inthe past solely on its own authority.To attain this end, our writers endeavour at the sametime to escape from the pressure, the besetting pressure,of foreign influences. There are two such influences:first, the Italian, which during the long reign of themother of three kings has spread from literature to thelanguage, and from the language to manners; and in thesecond place the Spanish influence, the progress of whichchrétiens de la Divinité, Création, Redemption, Bordeaux, 1600; —Traité de la Sagesse, Bordeaux, 1601.The last of these works is the only one of the three that has oftenbeen reprinted .VII.—Guillaume du Vair [ Paris, 1556; † 1621 , Tonneins] .1. THE SOURCES. -Richelieu , in his Mémoires; —Niceron, in hisHommes illustres, vol. xliii .; -C. Sapey, Essai sur la vie et lesouvrages de G. du Vair, Paris, 1847; -E. Cougny, Guillaume duVair, a study based upon new documents, Paris, 1857.2. THE MAN AND THE WRITER. -Undeserved oblivion into whichDu Vair has fallen; -although he was bishop and Count of Lisieux; —First President of the Parliament of Provence; -and twice Keeper ofthe Seals of France; -or perhaps it is because he held these officesthat he is forgotten. -The truth is, his political career does not seemto have added greatly to his reputation [ Cf. Bazin, Histoire de Francesous le règne de Louis XIII. ]-Moreover, he has not left his mark onthe history of the Church; -having only been appointed bishop ofLisieux when over sixty years old; but he was a great lover ofliterature; and he did more for French oratory than any of hispredecessors; -by his translations of Aeschines, Demosthenes andCicero [Pour and Contre Ctesiphon and Pour Milon]; —by the seriesTHE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 97throughout Europe has kept pace with the political ormilitary successes achieved by Charles V. and Philip II.While the women of France were bestowing theiradmiration on the romantic qualities of the Amadis, thelanguage of current use was becoming loaded and disfigured by Italianisms. Henry Estienne has drawn up alist of the military terms and the terms in vogue at court,of the terms relating to the arts and those relating todebauchery that invaded our vocabulary, and all , or almostall , of which have since retained their place there. Theprotest of La Noue, in his Discours sur les Amadis,against the taste for romances and against the imitationof Spanish manners was equally unavailing . It mightseem at first sight that the authors of the Satire Ménippéewere more successful, but has not the political importanceof his Arrêts rcndus en robe rouge; —and by his very delicate perception of the qualities the language was still wanting in [ Cf. his Traitéde l'Eloquence française, et des raisons pour quoi elle est démeurée si basse].66Furthermore, he exerted a really important influence as aphilosopher. Of his translation of the Manual of Epictetus andof his Traité de la philosophie des Stoïques.-In what respect hiswork is related to and throws light on that of Charron; -but he wasmixed up in public affairs to a greater extent than Charron, and inconsequence he has the advantage of the latter as regards experience;-his field of psychological and moral observation is proportionatelywider. His conception, too, of the dignity of reason and of the powerof the will is more Stoic ";-and in consequence loftier in themeasure in which the Stoic point of view is loftier than that of theEpicureans. And to conclude, in his Traité de la sainte philosophiehe takes the final step: -after having essayed to secularise morality,he renounces the effort; -and failing to see a remedy for the prevailing corruption except in a return to Christian morality, he assertsthe necessity of this return. -Analogy between this evolution andthat of the thought of Pascal. -The Traités philosophiques of DuVair are as necessary as La Sagesse to an understanding of themovement from which Jansenism is to be evolved.898 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREof this celebrated pamphlet been somewhat exaggerated?In any case, and supposing it to have been as effective asseveral armies, its literary importance is not much moreconsiderable on that account. But here again, as above,the symptom is significant. There has been broughtinto being a spirit of resistance against the enthusiasmof the Pleiad and the infatuation of the courtiers foreverything Italian or Spanish. Moreover, a goal hascome into view: a goal which, though it will not bereached at once, will not be lost sight of for the future.The " nationalisation " of French literature, impossibleas circumstances for the time being may render itsrealisation, has become the object at which writers,society and even royalty, are about to aim; in a word,the classic ideal may be only vaguely self- conscious as yet,3. THE WORKS. -There being very many editions of Du Vair, inenumerating his works here we follow the order observed in what hasseemed to us the most complete edition , that published at Cologne byPierre Aubert in 1617.'-(1 ) Actions et Traités oratoires, 1586-1614,among which are to be noted: Exhortation à la paix adresséc a ceuxde la Ligue and Suasion de l'arrêt pour la loi salique au Parlement;—(2) De l'Eloquence française, including the treatise properly socalled and the three translations cited above;—(3) Arrêts prononcésen robe rouge, of which there are three more in the folio edition of1641 than in the edition of 1617, or in all eight;—(4) Philosophictreatises, including, in addition to the works already cited, a Traitéde la Constance and an Exhortation à la vie civile;-(5) Treatiseson piety and Meditations, including the Traité de la sainte philosophie and Meditations on the Lord's Prayer, the Canticle of Ezekiel,the Psalms of Penitence, etc. , etc.We do not know of a modern edition of Du Vair.VIII.-François de Sales [ Château of Thorens, in Savoy, 1567;Lyons, 1622] .We have been unable to fix the exact dates of the first publication of the separate works of Du Vair; and we would remark, for instance, that the dateassigned to his Traités philosophiques, 1606, is certainly erroneous, since entire passages from it are found in La Sagesse of Charron, who died in 1603.THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 99but nevertheless it is already in existence . Similarly,a man of genius or talent may spend his youth in confused agitation, may appear to fritter away or even todissipate his energy, whereas all the while an inner forcekeeps him from straying and directs him to his goal; andhis originality only gains by the chequered nature of hisexperiences.Again Guillaume du Vair has written in one of hisworks: " Of all the benefits procured us by civil society,there is none we should rate more highly or set greaterstore on than the friendship of honourable men; for it isthe foundation and pivot of our felicity. It shapes ourwhole existence, it sweetens the bitterness of life, it givessavour to the pleasant experiences that befall us. Inprosperity it gives us persons to whom we may render1. THE SOURCES. -Charles- Auguste de Sales, Histoire du bienheureux François de Sales, 1634; -Bossuet, Panegyrique de Françoisde Sales, 1662; -Bulle de canonisation de Saint François de Sales,1665; -Sainte- Beuve: Port- Royal, book i. , chap . ix. and x. , andCauseries du lundi, vol. vii .; —A. Sayous: La littérature française àl'étranger, vol. i. , chap. i . and ii .; Paris , 1853; -Robiou: Essai sur lalittérature et les mœurs pendant la première moitié du XVIIe siècle,Paris, 1858; -F. Strowski , Saint- François de Sales, Paris, 1898; -dom Mackey's Notices in the edition of the Works, Annecy, 1892 andfollowing years. '2. THE CONTROVERSIALIST, THE WRITER, THE ORATOR.- Françoisde Sales has his place in literary history as a controversialist, an"ascetic " writer and a preacher. -His family and education. -Thecollege of Clermont and the university of Padua [ Cf. AntonioFavaro Galileo Galilei e lo studio di Padova, Florence, 1883 ] . Theearly career of François de Sales . -His meeting with Théodore deBèze. —The mission to Chablais [ 1594–1598]; —and the first writingsof François de Sales: Les Controverses and the Défense de l'étendardde la Croix. The keen perspicacity and clearness of argument withwhich he reduces the essentials of the controversy between Protestants¹ We naturally do not feel called upon to enumerate here the very numerous publications belonging rather to hagiography than to literary history.100 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREservice and with whom we may rejoice at our goodfortune, in affliction persons to aid and console us , in ouryouth persons to advise and instruct us, in old agepersons to help us and reason with us, and in manhoodpersons to assist and second us. " At first sight one istempted to consider these words merely as the expressionof a commonplace of morality. But when one weighsthem "as with the scales of the goldsmiths "; andfurther when one considers them in connection with thehistorical events of the period; when one reflects , infact, that they were penned at a time when the pacificpolicy inseparably connected with the most glorious yearsof the reign of Henri IV. was yielding its results, theyseem to acquire fresh significance . While suffering fromthe combined evils of foreign and civil war, people learnedand Catholics to the matter of the unity of Church. -His sojourn inParis in 1602; -and the Oraison funèbre du duc de Mercœur. -He isordained bishop of Geneva, 1602.Of the Introduction à la vie dévote [ Cf. Jules Very, La Philothée deSt. François de Sales , Geneva, 1878]; —and in what respect Françoisde Sales continues the work of Du Vair in this book. -Charm and seduction of the book. —The “ harmonies of nature " in François de Sales'book. He is the first of the several Savoyards who will contribute tothe glory of French literature [ Cf. Sayous, Littérature française àl'étranger ] .- Howfar can he be said to have rendered piety accessible,fashionable, and attractive? —In reality his doctrine is severe; -andthat had he presented it in a different manner it would no longerhave been Christianity, but Stoicism. -The Traité de l'amour deDieu.Of François de Sales as a preacher; -and why has he beenomitted from among the " forerunners of Bossuet " [ Cf. Jacquinet:Les prédicateurs du XVIIe siècle avant Bossuet; -and Freppel:Bossuct et l'eloquence sacrée au XVIIe siècle] .— Comparison betweenthe " Sermon for the Fête of the Assumption " and Bossuet's sermon,on the same subject. -Utility of comparisons of this kind, and thatthere is no surer method of characterising the different preachers.—Another comparison between the " Sermon for Twelth Night " andTHE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 101to appreciate the incomparable importance of the socialfabric, and awoke to the fact that its destruction orweakening is the direst of misfortunes. The belief thatthe aim of the individual should be the free developmentof the forces with which nature has endowed him, fallsinto disrepute; and the belief is abandoned too , of theauthor of the Essais, that men, like nuts in a sack,always end by " making a heap " by settling down in asort of inertia born of habit, that bears a resemblanceto order. But just as bodily health, which is thoughtto be a gift of nature, is really the outcome of adherence to a system of hygiene, and, in consequence,of an appropriate " effort, " so to enable society tomaintain its equilibrium, it is not sufficient that it beleft to itself, but on the contrary this stability demandsFenelon's sermon on the same subject. —The Traité de la prédicationand the rhetoric of François de Sales.- " The sovereign artifice isto dispense with artifice. " -Whether François de Sales has alwaysobserved his own precept?-That there is a certain affectation, acertain striving after " prettiness " and intentional simplicity in hismanner.3. THE WORKS. —They fall into two groups: Polemical Works andAscetic Works. The first includes: Les Controverses, —the Défense del'estendard de la Croix, -and some shorter works of less importance.--The second group includes the Introduction à la vie dévote, 1608; —the Traité de l'Amour de Dieu, 1612; -and the Entretiens spirituels,which were not published until 1629.—To these works must be addeda few opuscules, notably the opuscule Degrès d'oraison , the LettresSpirituelles ou de direction and the Sermons. The lay correspondence of the Saint also deserves to be read.Few books have had so many editions as the Introduction à la vicdévote. There are two good editions of the complete works, but theywill be superseded henceforth by an edition at present in course ofpublication " under the supervision of the nuns of the Visitation of thefirst monastery of Annecy, " and under the direction of the Reverenddom Mackey, O.S.B. Eight volumes of this edition have alreadyappeared; Annecy, printed by Niérat.102 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREa constant personal effort on the part of each oneof us.Such is the meaning of the excellent Du Vair, and ofa like way of feeling and thinking are the Canon ofCondom, Pierre Charron, author of the Traité de laSagesse; Honoré d'Urfé, the Forezian gentleman, theunhappy husband of the beautiful Diane de Chateaumorand, and the author of that Astrée which is about tobecome the code of polite society; and François de Salesas we see from his Introduction à la vie dévote. We donot exist for ourselves alone, but for other men as well;and what is more, we can only reach our full developmentas the result of commerce with our fellows . In consequence, in the interest of human society, and therefore inour own individual and personal interest , let each of usIX. -Mathurin Regnier [ Chartres, 1578; † 1613, Rouen] .1. THE SOURCES. -Goujet in his Bibliothèque française, vol. xiv.; —Sainte-Beuve, Tableau de la Poésiefrançaise au XVIe siècle; MathurinRegnier et Andre Chénier, 1829; -Viollet- le- Duc, Notice preceding hisedition of the Satires, 1853; -Robiou, Essai sur l'histoire de lalittérature et des mœurs, etc. , Paris, 1858; -Garsonnet, Etude surMathurin Regnier, Paris, 1859 and 1877; -Courbet, Notice precedinghis edition of the Satires, Paris, 1875; —J. Vianey, Mathurin Regnier,Paris, 1896.2. THE MAN AND THE POET.-That Regnier, even when he begins towrite, is already behind his time, -as a libertine, who is bent onkeeping up the licentious traditions of another age; -and as adisciple of Ronsard, whom he copies outrageously. -His qualities: —afreedom of expression and plainness of language that often degenerateinto grossness [ Cf. Satire xiii . ]; -the gift of observing, depicting,and satirising [ Cf. Satire viii . ]; —at least apparent if not always realease and naturalness [ Cf. Satires iii . and vii . ] .-His defects: -- solecisms and prolixity [ Cf. Satire i . ]; -want of taste and inartisticness[Cf. Satire x. ]:His carelessness is his chief artifice.-lack of invention and of ideas. What is the reason of hisTHE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 103renounce in a measure that egoism that comes, it must beconfessed, so natural to us! We shall be more thanrepaid for the sacrifices we may have to make by thepleasures the increased amenity of life will offer. Sincewe all of us stand in continual need of one another, letus arrange to live on a footing of " honourable friendship, " of friendship which, from being a service or ahelp, will become sooner or later a pleasure. Let usorganise our life on a social basis , and in such a waythat, in addition to an habitual exchange of services,it shall embrace an exchange of sentiments or ideas.Let us multiply our occasions of meeting, since to doso will be to multiply the means of arriving at amutual understanding; and from each of us will beevolved, as it were, a social type without any distinreputation?—It is due to the fact that Boileau was pleased to draghim from obscurity; -to the fact that he is a Gaul; -and to the factthat in a certain sense, on account of the vigour of some of his lines,he is one of the links between Rabelais, for instance, and Molière.3. THE WORKS. -Putting aside some epigrams, -two elegies; —anda few obscene pieces that have found their way into the Cabinetsatyrique; the works of Regnier are restricted to his Satires, ofwhich there are in all nineteen.-The best edition is that of Courbet, Paris, 1875 , Lemerre; -in whichtwo opuscules of M. Dezeimeris, Bordeaux , 1876 and 1880; —and theresearches of M. Vianey [ 1896] would permit of numerous improvements still being madeX.-Honoré d'Urfé [ Marseilles, 1568; † 1625 , Villefranche, AlpesMaritimes] .1. THE SOURCES. -D'Urfé himself in several episodes of his Astrée,which are merely incidents of his life " put into a romance "; --Patru,Eclaircissements sur l'histoire de l'Astrée in the Plaidoyers et œuvresdiverses de M. Patru, Paris, 1681 , Mabre- Cramoisy -AugusteBernard, Les d'Urfé, Paris, 1839; -Norbert Bonafous, Études surl'Astrée et Honoré d'Urfé, Paris , 1846; -Louis de Loménie, L'Astréeet le roman pastoral in the Revue des Deux Mondes for July 15,ANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREshing "sign," or, as would be said at the presentday, without any " speciality. " We touch here on thefundamental idea of classicism, and for one hundredand fifty or two hundred years the history of Frenchliterature will be merely the history of the transformations or the development of this governing idea.Thus, when we come to determine in a few words theprogress made, we are offered the spectacle, during thelast years of the reign of Henri IV. , of an original andnational literature endeavouring to emancipate itselffrom the imitation of foreign literatures. To judge fromthe most characteristic of the symptoms we haveenumerated, this literature will prove more especially"social "; by which is meant that it will set itself thetask of preserving , developing, and perfecting the social1858; -Emile Montégut, En Bourbonnais et en Forez, Paris, 1880;-Körting, Geschichte des Französischen Romans im XVII Jahrhundert, Leipsic and Oppeln, 1885-1887.2. THE SOURCE OF THE ASTRÉE. -Biography of Honoré d'Urfé; --his first work: The Epistres Morales, 1598; —his marriage withDiane de Chateaumorand; -his conjugal misfortunes; -his poem LeSireine, 1606 .–– The framework of the Astrée. —The mingling of fictionand reality [ Cf. Patru, Eclaircissements, etc . ].-The background ofthe narrative and the Diana enamorada of Georges de Montemayor.-Thetone of the narration and the pastoral romance; -the Europeanvogue of the pastoral romance; -the Arcadia of Sannazar and ofSydney; the descriptions of Forez in d'Urfé's romance [ Cf. Montégut,En Bourbonnais, etc . ]; -the anecdotes of the court; --the symbolicalintention [ Cf. the dedication of the Astrée] .- Connection between theIntroduction à la vie dévote and the romance of the Astrée.3. THE CHARACTER OF THE ASTRÉE. -General features of the work;--and that far from the episodes in it being hors - d'œuvre as comparedwith the main plot , as is the case in other romances of the same type,it is on the contrary the main plot that is the pretext or the opportunity for the episodes . -Varied interest of the book in consequence:-(1 ) Historical episodes [ Eudoxe et Valentinian, part ii . , book 12];-(2) Contemporary allusions [Euric, Daphnide et Alcidon, part iii . ,THE FORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 105edifice. Since it is to be social, it will be general, whichamounts to saying that it will not be, or that it willrarely be, the expression of the personality of the writer,but rather that of the relations of the individual with therequirements of an ideal humanity, always and everywhere analogous to or identical with itself, subsistingeternally, so to speak, and offering on that account immutable characteristics. Social in its aims and generalin regard to its modes of expression, this literature willalso be moral to the exact extent to which morality isindispensable to the existence of society. We wouldconvey by this restriction that the literature we are aboutto deal with will be less concerned with embodying in itsworks the absolute side contained in the principle of everymorality, than with rendering the relative element that isbook 3]; -- (3) Personal inventions [ Damon et Madonthe, part ii . ,book 6] . The form of the narrative is no less varied: -descriptions[part ii., book 5]; -conversations [part ii. , book 12]; -narrations[part iii. , book 7]; -examples of every kind of composition are foundin the work, including letters and love sonnets; -to say nothing ofpassages of a more realistic or more brutal stamp. -Of the style ofthe Astrée:-its elegance and clearness; -it is smooth and flowing;---it combines precision with copiousness; -its psychological value; —and in this connection of the sketches of the different varieties of lovein the Astréc. -Sensual and brutal love [ Eudoxe et Valentinian, partii. , book 12]; -fickle and capricious love [ Hylas, part i . , passim];-young and passionate love [ Chryseide et Arimant, part iii . , books 7and 8];--chivalrous love [ Rosanire, Céléodante et Rosiléon, part iv. ,book 10]; -mystic love [ Céladon et Astrée] .— Variety of the characters.-That the book as a whole leaves an impression of charm and gracefulness to which there had been nothing analogous previously in Frenchliterature; a fact that explains the success of the book, a success asprodigious as almost any in literary history: and the duration of its influence.4. THE INFLUENCE of the AsTRÉE. -Ought it to be ascribed a sharein the formation of " precious " society? That in any case the workwill shape the destiny of the drama for more than twenty years; -and106 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREalways to hand in its applications. In consequence, themorality in question will be neither the Christian moralityof renunciation and sacrifice, nor even the Stoic moralityof effort it will be a morality for the use of good society.In the last place, this literature will not fail to attachgreat importance to the charms of style; first , becauseto persuade it will need to please; secondly, because stylealone is able to save generalities from the danger theyare always exposed to of degenerating into " commonplaces "; and thirdly, because it has already fashionedits rules of poetry and rhetoric on the Latin model.Let us now proceed to consider its performances andso follow its development.of the romance for more than fifty years; -supposing that thePrincesse de Clèves is, properly speaking, only an episode of theAstrée. It is possible to go still further [ Cf. Montégut, En Bourbonnais, etc. ] , and to trace something of the inspiration of the Astrée;-in Racine's tragedies; -in Marivaux' comedies; -in Prévost's novels;-in J. J. Rousseau; -and perhaps even among contemporary writersin certain of the novels of George Sand. -What precedes amounts tosaying that the success of the Astrée determined the direction takenby an entire and important current in our literature.5. THE WORKS. -We have already mentioned the Epistres Morales,1598; and le Sireine, 1606. - There must be added Sylvanire, awoodland fable, 1627, and the Amours de Floridon.As to the Astrée, the two first volumes appeared in 1610 or perhaps in 1608; the two following volumes in 1616; and the fifth andsixth volumes in 1619. The four others are posthumous, and it isscarcely possible to distinguish between what of them should beattributed to d'Urfé and what of them is the work of Baro, hiscontinuator. It is for this reason that we have not referred to themin our analysis of the romance.The best edition of the Astrée is that of 1647, published by ToussaintQuinet and Antoine de Sommaville.CHAPTER IITHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCHLITERATUREII do not know whether war is " divine, " but a stateof conflict certainly seems " a law of the world "; notriumph is really peaceful, and even ideas rarely asserttheir empire except at the expense and on the ruinsof other ideas whose place they take. Several conTHE AUTHORS AND THEIR WORKSFOURTH PERIODFrom the formation of the " precious " society to thefirst representation of the " Précieuses Ridicules "1610-1659I. The Hotel Rambouillet.1. The SOURCES. -The Historiettes of Tallemant des Réaux;-theletters of Balzac and Voiture;-Madeleine de Scudéry's Artamène, oule Grand Cyrus; -Bodeau de Somaize, Le Grand dictionnaire desPrétieuses, 1661; -Fléchier's funeral orations in honour of the Dukeand Duchess of Montausier.Roederer: Mémoire pour servir à l'histoire de la société polic,Paris , 1835; -Walckenaer, Mémoires sur Mme de Sévigné, vols . i. andii . , Paris, 1852; -V. Cousin, La Société française au XVIIe siècle,Paris, 1858; -A. Fabre, La jeunesse de Fléchier, Paris, 1882.2. THE GENERAL THEORY OF PRECIOSITY.A. Of preciosity as a literary conception. -It consists in believing(1) that there is something specific or unique in its class about thepleasure derived from literature as about that derived from music or 107108 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREditions, in consequence, had still to obtain, at thebeginning of the seventeenth century, to permit ofFrench literature completely realising its true character;and first of all it was necessary that public opinionshould master or stay the progress of that individualist ,unruly, and licentious spirit, which had not been entirelysubdued by Henri IV. even in the sphere of politics . Abook which is at once one of the most enigmatical, andone of the foulest in our literature, Béroalde de Verville'sMoyen de Parvenir, is contemporary with the Astrée,which itself is not exempt from a certain shamelessnessof language and grossness of sentiment; while the obscenecollection of the Parnasse satyrique, of which one scarcelyfrom the picturesque, —and this is the truth;-(2) that the essentialcause of this pleasure is style, that is the turn the writer gives what hesays, the manner in which he expresses himself, —which is already lesstrue; and (3) that the pleasure is in proportion to the effort thathas been expended or to the difficulties that have been surmounted inhitting upon this mode of expression, -which is not true at all.-Analogies and differences between this conception and the conceptionof " art for art. "-The principal of them is that preciosity aimedat the realisation of the " fashion " instead of at that of " beauty. "-The resulting consequences are:-(1 ) A horror of pedantry, eruditionand even of tradition;-(2) That in intellectual matters as in conversation and in clothes, store is only set on an air of modernity;—(3)A tendency, the outcome of this latter disposition , to exaggerate thedistance that separates polite society from the vulgar herd.B. Of preciosity as a disease of language. -That it consists intreating language no longer as a " work of art " even; -but as apretext for the writer himself to make a display of virtuosity.E del poeta fin la maravigliaChi non sa far stupir, vada alla striglia. [ MARINO. ][ Cf. de Sanctis: Storia della letteratura italiana, vol. ii .; Menendezy Pelayo, Historia de las ideas esteticas en España, vol. ii .; andMézières, Prédécesseurs et contemporains de Shakespeare. ] -Somecharacteristics of the disease: -Never to call anything by its name,but always to have recourse to paraphrase, allusion or sous- entendu;THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 109ventures to cite the title , would alone suffice to illustratethe state of morals towards 1610.-Further testimony is offered by the Satires of MathurinRegnier. Often quoted, on account of some few happylines, which prior to those of Boileau became proverbsdirectly they were published, -little read, but only themore vaunted, the Satires of Regnier are as it were theprotest of the Gallic genius against the new ideal.Instinctively hostile, not only to all restraint, but toevery rule or every law, Regnier defends and upholds inhis Satires, not dogmatically, but with that nonchalancewhich is " his greatest artifice " and his charm, the entireand absolute liberty of the individual . Each of us is very-to lend an exaggerated and jesting importance to trifles and totreat matters of moment in a conversational tone;-to play uponwords, to make points, conccits, agudezas,Ne dis plus qu'il est amaranteDis plutôt qu'il est de ma rente;to draw unexpected comparisons; -to force metaphors [ Cf. LesFemmes savantes]; in a word, to couch all one says in a languageonly comprehensible to the initiated; and in this connection thatslang and jargon are to some extent the same thing.C. Ofpreciosity as a turn or disposition of mind. —It consists in anatural or acquired dislike for the commonplace; -danger of this dislike; but, on the other hand, its advantages; -and that its counterpart is a taste for what is refined , delicate, subtle and complex .--Theway in which this disposition of mind tends to make affairs of loveand gallantry the constant preoccupation of those who possess it.—Great resulting advantage to: conversation, --polite manners; -andsocial relations in general. -Women make their entry into literature-and with them make their appearance the qualities more peculiarto women;-qualities of which neither Montaigne nor Rabelais hadhad an idea; --and as much may perhaps be said of some of thegreatest of the ancient writers.3. THE HOTEL RAMBOUILLET.A. Catherine de Vivonne, Marquise de Rambouillet [ 1588, † 1665] .-Her family; —and her father, although the Marquis de Pisani , must110 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREwell as he is; has the right to remain as he is; andwhoever would interfere with this right deserves thename of pedant. At any rate, I know of no ideaon which he harps in his verses more often or morecomplaisantly than the idea that everything is relative;which clearly is another way of expressing what Ihave just said. Around him is a numerous school thatthinks and feels as he does, that is not properlyspeaking a school, in the sense that it is not inspiredby him or by anybody it is possible to call its chief,but a school that along with him represents this spiritor rather this instinct of resistance: vulgar Epicureansof the type of the Motins, the Sigognes and thenot be taken to have been an Italian nobleman; -her marriage withCharles d'Angennes, Marquis de Rambouillet. -Tallemant's portraitof her [Historiettes, Paulin Paris ' edition, in 8vo, ii. , 485]; -Mlle deScudery's portrait of her [ Lc Grand Cyrus, edition of 1654, vol. vii. ,489]; Fléchier's portrait in his Oraison funèbre. -She hit uponthe idea of genius of assembling in her " ruelle " or private circlenoblemen and men of letters on a footing of temporary equality.-The part played by the Salons in the history of French literature.-That it is strange that it should still be at the expense of Mme deRambouillet that jests are made-while Mme Geoffrin is spoken ofwith admiration.B. Vincent Voiture, the living incarnation of Preciosity [ Amiens,1598; 1648].-His Poems, -and that among them there are manythat are very insipid; —but there are a few that are exquisite; -andvery superior to many of those of Cl. Marot; -and that can be compared with the most vaunted poems of Voltaire [ Cf. Stances à Silvie,-Epitre à Condé; -Impromptu pour Anne d'Autriche] .-HisLetters; -and whether it be true, as Voltaire has declared, thatthey are the mere " triflings of a rope- dancer "?-Boileau's estimatewas juster.- Voiture's love- letters have the obvious fault of being toowitty;--but among his miscellaneous letters there are many thatare quite admirable [ Cf. Nos. 123, 109, 101 , 63, 90 in Ubicini'sedition]; —and a few that are distinguished by real emotion.C. Julie d'Angennes, Duchesse de Montausier [ 1607 , † 1671 ] .—That she contributed more than any one else to render the HotelTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 111Berthelots; irregulars and libertines , such as the Théophile against whom Father Garasse will write hisDoctrine curieuse des beaux esprits; daring and cynicalfree-thinkers of the kind that will be found depictedby the dozen in the Historiettes of Tallemant desRéaux. It may be worth while to note in passingthat writers of a similar stamp have been seen or willbe seen to arise during all the " regencies " of ourhistory the regency of Catherine, the regency of Mariede Médicis, the regency of Anne of Austria, and theregency of Philippe d'Orléans.To whom must be attributed the honour of having, tobegin with, checked and interrupted, and finally of havingRambouillet ridiculous; —and that at any rate all that we know ofher from contemporary testimony shows her in a sufficiently disagreeable light. -She was spoiled by too much homage; -her suitorsor her " dying admirers " gave too much encouragement to her pretensions to wit; -she seems to have been far vainer than her motherof her good birth and high rank; -and finally the length of time shemade Montausier wait before she accorded him her hand has investedthem both with a certain amount of ridicule. [ Cf. for Montausier,Montausier et son temps, by Amédée Roux, Paris, 1860. ]4. THE INFLUENCE OF PRECIOSITY.A. On the Language. -It refined , enriched, and elevated thelanguage. Preciosity cleared the language of a certain pedantic overgrowth which encumbered it even in Montaigne;--and also of acoarseness that disgraced it [ Cf. Béroalde de Verville's Moyen deparvenir and Tallemant des Réaux' Historiettes].-It enriched thelanguage:-by determining the exact meaning of words; -by adopting, inventing or creating new turns of speech; -and above all byinculcating " the force a word acquires when put in its right place. "-Finally, preciosity elevated the language; -though it is true that inelevating it, it drew too deep a dividing line between the speech of thevulgar and that of polite society.B. On Manners. -Roederer's exaggeration on this head; -and V.Cousin guilty of the same fault; -in their studies of the polite societyof the period. -A saying of Pascal as to the malignity and kindlinessof people in general, “ which is always the same "; -still, the names112 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREstemmed this current? And shall we exclaim once morewith Boileau ·At last Malherbe came? . . .Doubtless no, if four or five very beautiful Odes andsome paraphrases of the Psalms are, after all , nothingmore than rhetoric; and further, if Malherbe himself,while not making a display of licentiousness or incredulity, was utterly wanting nevertheless both as awriter and as a man in distinction and true intellectualnobility. To take another point, it is not easy to seehow his influence should have made itself felt, since hisfinest poems, which during his lifetime were scatteredby which things are designated have great importance. -The wayin which preciosity raised the tone of conversation; -and improvedthe position of women. [ Cf. Huet, Sur l'origine des Romans. ] —Onthe other hand, preciosity accustomed the French intellect to treatserious matters too frivolously; -and by binding it down to theobservation of good society, kept it from a wider and more sincereobservation of reality.C. On the direction taken by literature. By establishing thepredominance of the manners of good society, preciosity completedthe downfall of lyricism; -since people do not frequent society witha view to making a display of their inmost feelings; -and still lesswith the intention of contradicting those they meet; —indeed , it mayperhaps be said that nothing is more obligatory in society than theavoidance of " originality; —and all these rules of society run exactlycounter to lyricism or personal literature. Again, while preciosityfurthered the development of the " universal branches " of literatureoratory and the drama, -its influence even in this direction was notwithout its drawbacks; -admitting that it was with a view to contentthe Précieuses that our drama, in a general way, has refrained fromtoo spirited an imitation of reality; —has deserved to be styled " aconversation beneath a chandelier "; -and that gallantry instead ofpassion has become its mainspring? —On the other hand , preciosityaided the development to a notable extent of letter writing; —of books of Maxims and Characters; —and of the psychologicalromance.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 113through and to some extent lost in the anthologies ofthe period, did not appear in collected form until 1630,two years after his death. Moreover, if we are to believethe memoirs of his faithful Racan, he was almost withoutideas except on the subject of his art. These variousconsiderations will lead us to seek elsewhere than inhis influence the causes of a transformation, of whichhe experienced the consequences far more than hebrought it about or even conceived it. The transformation which is effected in French literary historybetween 1610 and 1630, -let us say 1636, so as to reachthe Cid at one step,-is the work of the Précieuses.All that is remembered in general of the Précieuses isII.-Irregulars and Libertines.1. THE SOURCES. -Leonardi Lessii, De providentia numinis etanimi Immortalitate libri duo adversus athcos et politicos , Antwerp,1613; -Garasse, La doctrine curieuse des Beaux Esprits de ce temps,Paris , 1623; -Tallemant des Réaux, Historiettes , articles DESBARREAUX, LUILLIER, PRINCESSE PALATINE, etc .; -Bossuet, Oraisonfunèbre d'Anne de Gonzague; -Bayle's Dictionnaire, articles DESBARREAUX, HESNAULT, and passim; —the works of Théophile de Viau,Saint-Evremond, and La Motte le Vayer; -the Caractères of LaBruyère.Sainte- Beuve's Port- Royal; -Victor Cousin, Vanini, ses écrits ,sa vie et sa mort, in the Revue des deux Mondes, December 1 ,1843; Ch. Bartholomess , Giordano Bruno, Paris, 1847; -F. Fiorentino, Benardino Telesio , ossia studi storici sull' Idea della naturanel risorgimento, Florence, 1874; -Alleaume's Notice preceding theworks of Théophile, Paris, 1856; -T. Perrens, Les Libertins auXVIIe siècle, Paris, 1896; —Kathe Schermacher, Théophile de Viau,sein Leben und seine Werke, Paris, 1898.2. OF THE LIBERTINES IN GENERAL. -Signification of this name inthe seventeenth century; -and that it applies as much to " freedom ofthinking " as to "license of morals." That from both a philosophicaland a literary point of view the libertines are belated survivors ofMontaigne's century;-and the " Bohemians " of their time;--butthat this in no way prevents them professing very pronounced9114 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREthe characteristics by which they lend themselves toridicule, and it must be owned that they had many such,on which Molière's comedies and Boileau's satires willdispense us from dilating here. They might be reproached more especially with having again broughtFrench literature under the influence of the Spanish andItalian schools, the influence of Antonio Perez andthe Chevalier Marin, of Guarini and Gongora,—alwayssupposing, however, that it would have been possible forthem to avoid this result, at a Court wholly Italian, andat a time when the influence of Spain was reappearingin France across a frontier open to its inroads at everypoint. Nevertheless, the Précieuses rendered us greatprinciples; and that if they had lacked the formula for theseprinciples it would have been supplied them by Lessius in his deProvidentia, and by Garasse, Doctrine curieuse des Beaux Esprits.—That as disciples of Montaigne and even of Rabelais, they werenaturally hostile to almost all the projects of the Précieuses;-whichwere directed indeed against the libertines.3. THEOPHILE DE VIAU [ Clairac, 1590; † 1626, Paris] .-His earlyeducation; his relations with des Barreaux and Balzac; --his tragedyPyrame et Tisbé, 1617; —and that it is a better work than the twolines which have immortalised it might seem to indicate:Ah! behold the dagger which with the blood of its ownerWas stained in cowardly fashion; the traitor blushes at it!There are lyric passages of singular vigour in this tragedy; -and partsof the dialogue are already almost in the style of Corneille.-Other works of his deserve to be remembered; -for their animation[ The Ode du Roi, ed. Alleaume, i . , 135]; —for the keen feeling fornature they evince [ The Lettre à son frère (in verse) ii. 178]; —for acertain sensual or Epicurean grace [ La Solitude, vol. i. , 176] .--It is apity that his works are spoiled by lapses into the most offensivevulgarity. See too his Satires [ vol. ii . , pp. 238 and 241 ] .-Whether itwas his Satires or his Traité de l'Immortalité de l'âme and hisParnasse that brought about his first banishment in 1619? —Henceforth the poet's life is entirely upset;-the publication of the bookTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 115services, which cannot be forgotten, slighted , or overlooked without falsifying the history during twenty orthirty years of manners and literature . For instance,because they were women, and women of social standing,they rid literature of the pedantry which hampers theworks of Ronsard and even of Montaigne. One wouldbe tempted to say at times that Ronsard and Montaigneonly wrote for scholars . Their injudicious, or rather theircomplacent display of erudition; their perpetual allusionsto an antiquity with whose scholiasts and grammarianswe are not familiar as they were; their naïve, andsometimes indeed their rather suspicious, admirationfor the " false beauties " of Cicero or Seneca; theirof Father Garasse, which was aimed against him, deals him thefinal blow; he is put on his trial; -- he is sentenced to perpetualbanishment by a decree dated September 1 , 1625.-4. THE NEW TACTICS OF THE LIBERTINES. -From this moment theLibertines change their tactics. -They keep their opinions; —buthenceforth they abstain from expressing them in public; or if theyexpress them, they moderate and disguise them, as did Saint - Evremond and La Mothe le Vayer. -Their convictions are not deepenough for them to endeavour to assure their triumph in opposition to public opinion; -and provided they are allowed to liveas they think fit, they will not ask for more. This attitude isthe indirect cause of the discredit into which they fell; -and fromwhich they will scarcely recover until half a century later withBayle.5. THE WORKS. -Of Théophile we have: his Poems [ Odes, Stanzas,Elegies, Sonnets, Satires ]; -a tragedy: Pyrame et Tisbé; —hisLetters; and the Traité de l'Immortalité de l'Ame, a paraphraseof Phedon in prose interspersed with verse. In addition, there area few detached pieces relating to his trial. The best and most complete edition is that to which we have referred of M. Alleaume in theBibliothèque Elzévirienne , Paris, 1896.The best edition of Saint- Evremond is the Amsterdam edition,1739, Cövens and Mortier, 7 vols. in 8vo; and of La Mothe le Vayer,the Dresden edition , 1749, published by Michel Groell , 7 vols. in 8vo,issued in fourteen volumes.116 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREhabit of never making an assertion without supporting iton the authority of an ancient writer; these variouspractices, while they may dazzle our ignorance for a time,end before very long in tiring us, in trying our patience,and, to be frank, in boring us. It is disagreeable to usthat a poet should bind himself down to aperpetual commentary of Mark Antony Muret or of Peter Marcassus;and we do not wish to have to learn Latin as a preliminary to understanding a French book. Such, at anyrate, was the feeling of the Précieuses, and their attitudeexplains how it was, that by merely playing their partand taking an interest in literature, they at once obligedthe writer to shake off the dust of his library. TheyIII.-Alexandre Hardy [ Paris, 1570; 1631, Paris].1. THE SOURCES. -The brothers Parfaict, Histoire du théâtrefrançais -Ad. Ebert,Entwickelungsgeschichte, etc., already citedabove, pp. 71 and 73;-Edelestand du Méril, Evolution de la tragédiefrançaise, etc.; -E. Lombard, Étude sur Alexandre Hardy in theZeitschrift für neufranzösiche Literatur, vols . i . and ii. , 1880-1881;-Eugène Rigal, Alexandre Hardy et le théatre français, Paris , 1889 .2. THE SECOND PERIOD OF FRENCH DRAMA. -Alexandre Hardy maybe accounted one of the " irregular " or " belated " writers who continue the literary traditions of the preceding age. The " strollingplayer " at the beginning of the seventeenth century [ Cf. Scarron'sRoman comique; S. Chappuzeau, Le théâtre français; and H.Chardon, La Troupe du Roman comique, Le Mans, 1876 ] .- The stateof the theatre towards 1610.- Material organisation , actors and spectators [ Cf. especially Eugène Rigal, loc. cit. and his brochure:Esquisse d'une histoire des Théâtres de Paris de 1548 à 1653, Paris ,1887 ]. The incredible fertility of Alexandre Hardy.-Of the strugglefor predominance between the different forms of drama as seen in thepieces of Alexandre Hardy. -The saying of Aristotle: Tpaycia, wolλÀÇμεταβολὰς μεταβαλοῦσα, ἐπεὶ αὐτῆς τὴν φύσιν ἔσχε, ἐπαύσατο . —Pastorals,tragedies and tragi - comedies. -That in literary history as in nature,the competition is the keener in proportion as the species are morenearly related. -Growing confusion between the art of the drama andthe art of romance; -and that the " father of the French drama "THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 117compelled him to comply with some of the exigenciesof their sex, and the result was that a literature, whichbefore had been purely erudite, adopted forthwith thetone of polite society.This change was consummated, almost simultaneouslyand again in consequence of the influence of thePrécieuses, by literature acquiring an air, it had hithertolacked, of decency and politeness. Besides claiming theliberty of indulging their humour without restraint, thelibertines and irregulars of the regency had asserted noless stoutly their right to remain faithful to the worsttraditions and habits of the Gallic genius. They wishedto be coarse, cynical, and shameless to the top of theirentirely failed to make for clearness; —if in all respects save one histragedies are less modern than those of Robert Garnier. -Their utterlack of literary merit. -They bear about the same relation to classictragedy as the melodramas of Guilbert de Pixérécourt will one daybear to the romantic drama of 1830. -That to see any interest in hisplays they must be considered as " experimental " efforts to determinethe laws or conditions of the drama of the future; -and also as evidenceof the recrudescence of Spanish and Italian influences .That from this standpoint, Alexandre Hardy must be allowed themerit, and it is a real merit, of having transformed a college amusement into a public representation. -He also essayed to differentiatetragi- comedy from tragedy. -Digression in this connection: on whatdepends the difference between the two branches?-It would seemto depend on the social status of the personages; -on the natureof the dénouement; -and of the reality of the personages taken fromhistory. Was Hardy alive to the importance of history in tragedy?3. THE WORKS. -We know of forty-one plays by Hardy. Theyinclude: an interminable tragi - comedy, Théagène et Chariclée, basedupon the romance of Heliodorus, in eight " days "; -eleven tragediesborrowed from antiquity, with among them a Didon, a Mariamnaand an Alexandre; -twelve tragi - comedies, on ancient and modernsubjects, imitated from the Spanish or Italian, Gésippe, Phraarte,Cornélie, La Force du sang, Félismène, La Belle Egyptienne; —and finally five Pastorals; -and five mythological pieces, includingan Alceste and an Ariane.118 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREbent. There were to be no concessions to woman, whosemission, as in the case of Mme de Montaigne, was heldto be limited to keeping house for her husband, to bearing him children, to perpetuating his race or-as happenedto the Cassandre and the Marie of Ronsard, the Francineof Baïf, the Hippolyte of Desportes-to serving as aninstrument of pleasure or a stepping- stone to literaryfame. The Précieuses demanded that men should accordthem the respect to which every woman, as a woman, isentitled in civilised society; and they gained their end.No doubt it would be easy to point to passages even inBalzac or Voiture of which the indecency, the naïvecrudity and the bad taste are astonishing. Still, in aThe best and only modern edition of Alexandre Hardy's plays isM. Stengel's, 5 vols. in 18mo, Marburg, 1883, 1884, Elwert.IV. François de Malherbe [ Caen, 1555; † 1628, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES . -Racan, Vie de Malherbe, printed in most editionsof Malherbe's works; Godeau, Discours sur les œuvres de M. deMalherbe, preceding the edition of 1666. —Malherbe's Letters. — Bayle'sDictionnaire, article MALHERBE; -Sainte- Beuve, Tableau de la poésiefrançaise; Causeries du Lundi, vol . viii .; and Nouveaux Lundis,vol . xiii .; -G. Allais , Malherbe et la poésie française à la fin du XVIesiècle, Paris, 1891; -F. Brunot, La doctrine de Malherbe, Paris,1891; -V. Bourienne, Points obscurs et nouveaux de la vie deMalherbe, Paris 1895; -Duc de Broglie, Malherbe, Paris, 1897.2. THE MAN, THE POET, AND THE REFORMER.A. That Malherbe, in spite of the disdain with which he affectedto regard his predecessors, did not differ from them to the extent thathas been alleged. His general conception of poetry is that ofRonsard; and the resemblance between them extends to matters ofdetail; he makes " conceits " as Ronsard did; -like Ronsard, he drawsupon mythology and to an abusive extent [ Cf. Stances à M. du Perier;--Ode à Marie de Médicis; --Stances sur le départ de Louis XIII. ]; -and finally his sentiments, as were those of Ronsard, are often Pagan[Cf. Consolation à Caritée] .— Of some anecdotes told of him, whichsupport this latter assertion [ Cf. Tallemant des Réaux, i . , 287 , 290 , 284] .B. That he lacks, or only possesses in an indifferent degree, theTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 119general way, the influence of the Précieuses tended topurify, or if the expression be preferred , to polish literature and even manners. Neither Mme de Rambouillet,"the incomparable Arthénice , " nor her daughter Julied'Angennes, so patiently wooed by Montausier, nor themany gracious women whose training was effected bythe conversations of the famous " blue chamber, " permitthe naked image to be thrust on them, in social converseor in books, of what each of us endeavours to hide in real ,everyday life. There are acts that cannot be talked of,and not all that is talked of can be written about. Forthe future it is incumbent on men to have regard to socialconsiderations, to the season or the circumstances, to agequalities which make the poet, but he has the qualities of an excellentversifier. —It would be impossible to be more deficient than he is inenthusiasm; —the saying of Cavalier Marin. -His want of imagination. Mythology, which with Ronsard is still instinct with life,becomes a mere "tool " with Malherbe; -and the metaphors hederives from it are not the expression of his emotion, but simply serveas ornaments to his theme. His want of sensibility. It is the lifeand still more the variety imparted by sensibility, when it is keen,that is lacking in his Odes. -Finally his want of naturalness. -On theother hand, he posesses the sense of logical development; —thatof oratorical harmony; —a taste for work well done. -His theoriesas to the importance and the " richness " of rhyme: -his strict regardfor grammar [ Cf. Racan, Vie de Malherbe]; --and that in view of thischaracteristic it is strange that the Banvilles and Gautiers of contemporary French poetry should not have recognised that he is their true ancestor.C. That while the very nature of the lessons inculcated by Malherbe explains their influence, he is none the greater as a writer onthat account. -His ideal, as was the case with that of Ronsard as hegrew older, tended towards the entire elimination of the personalelement from lyricism; —and in consequence to transform lyricisminto oratorical verse [ Cf. Stances au roi Henri le Grand partantpour le Limousin] .-This transformation responded exactly to thetaste of the time;-and it had been effected , moreover, by Bertautand the Cardinal du Perron in some of their poems [ Cf. the Recueil120 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREand to sex. As a consequence, the situation of womenis at once improved to a notable extent. Henceforththey will have to be taken into account, their modestywill be respected, they will be treated as equals. Andshould any belated survivor of another century be incapable of this self- restraint, he may fall back upon thetaverns, and rhyme his Bacchic verses and his coarsesongs amid men companions at the Pomme de Pin or theMouton Blanc.The refinement of language accompanies the polishingof manners, and were I not afraid of seeming to playupon words, I should be disposed to say that " politeness "and " polish " are matters that go naturally together.des plus beaux vers de ce temps, 1606]; - Malherbe accomplishednothing else, but he did the work better. [ Cf. the Sonnet sur la Mortde son fils;-the Ode sur l'attentat de 1605; --the Ode à M. de Bellegarde. ] -That in consequence it should rather be said that he witnessed than that he realised the reform with which his name isconnected;-besides, the first collected edition of his poems, whichhad been scattered previously, did not appear until 1630; -that hedoes not appear to have left any disciples rightly so - called, if the onlytwo that can be named are Maynard and Racan; -and that thebudding Academy criticised his masterpiece, the Stances de 1605, asseverely as it did the Cid itself.3. THE WORKS. -The works of Malherbe are composed: ( 1) of hisPoems, in all 125 pieces, the first of which: Les Larmes de saintPierre, appeared in 1587; and the last, Les Vers funèbres sur la mort d'Henri le Grand, and the Invective contre le maréchal d'Ancre:Va- t-en à la malheure, excrément de la terre,not until the edition of 1630;-(2) of his Commentaire sur Desportes,which was not published until 1825;-(3) of his translations of the23rd Book of Livy, 1621; of the De beneficiis; and of Seneca'sletters to Lucilius , 1637 , 1638, 1639;—(4) of his Correspondence, ofgreat interest for the history of Marie de Médicis' regency.We may mention among the editions of Malherbe subsequent tothe first, which was issued in 1630 by Charles Chappelain:-theTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 121Refinement in words follows on that in habits, and thechoice of ideas induces the choice of terms. In consequence, the triumph of preciosity was the starting pointof a linguistic revolution; a result , indeed, to which allthat was achieved by preciosity has been too often andwrongly restricted . Many historians of literature wouldconfine the rôle of the Précieuses to having struck certainwords out of the vocabulary, to having introduced others,and more especially to having replaced the habitual useof the proper, straightforward, and exact term by theemployment of the metaphor. And I admit that theyaccomplished all this! But what is perhaps more interesting, and in any case more important, than toedition of 1666, published by Thomas Joli, and containing theobservations of Ménage; -the edition of 1757, published by Barbou,Paris; -Charpentier's edition , 1842, containing André Chénier's commentaries; and Lalanne's edition , Paris, 1862, Hachette.V.-Jean-Louis Guez de Balzac [ Angoulême, 1594; † 1654,Angoulême] .1. THE SOURCES. -Ogier, Apologie pour M. de Balzac, 1627; —Goulu, Lettres de Phyllarque à Ariste, 1628; -Balzac himself "pro domo sua " in his Entretiens: Relation à Menandre (Maynard) , andthe Passages défendus; -Cassagne's preface to the great editionof Balzac's works, 1665; -Niceron, Hommes illustrcs, vol. xxiii .; -Bayle's Dictionnaire; -d'Olivet, Histoire de l'Académie.Ræderer, Mémoire pour servir à l'histoire de la société polie;-Sainte- Beuve, Port- Royal, appendix to vol. ii . , Balzac le GrandEpistolier;-F. Lotheisen, Geschichte des französischen Literatur.vol. i. , pp. 165-201 , Vienna, 1877.2. BALZAC'S INFLUENCE. -Of the privilege of poetry, and that it isthe sole explanation of the fact that Malherbe's reputation has outlasted that of Balzac. -Admiration of his contemporaries: testimonyof Descartes [V. Cousin's edition, vol. vi . , p. 189 ]; -of Bossuet [ Sur lestyle et la lecture des ecrivains pour former un orateur, in Floquet'sÉtudes, vol . ii. ]; --of Boileau [ Réflexions sur Longin, vol. vii . ] —Theinfluence of Balzac was far more considerable than that of Malherbe,122 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREenumerate here the sundry words or locutions for whoseintroduction they were responsible, is to arrive at thereasons which determined the choice of these particularwords and locutions. We referred to them above. Thereare acts which are ignoble in themselves, and of thisnature are in general all of our acts that are to be tracedto our animal origin: the words that serve to designatethem share their ignominy and bageness, or it should ratherbe said, perhaps, that they heighten these characteristics ,owing to the debasing intention that attaches to theiruse. There are other acts, walking or sitting down forexample, that have no significance good or bad, and inconsequence the terms that render them are equallywith which it was almost contemporary; —in a certain sense too itwas happier, as it had not been forced to accomplish a work ofdestruction to enable it to exert itself. -At the same time it tendedin the same direction; -and though they may mutually have spokenill of one another, they nevertheless had the same disciples and thesame admirers.Of the principal qualities which his contemporaries admired inBalzac;-(1) The purity of his elocution; -definition of this word,and that it implies the choice , the appropriateness, and the charm ofterms.—(2) The harmony of his phraseology and sentences [ Cf. Cassagne's Preface and Godeau's Discours sur Malherbe] .—The boldness,appositeness, and abundance of his metaphors. -Whether Balzac wasin this respect an imitator of the Spaniards; -and in this connectionof the influence of Antonio Perez [ Cf. Philarète Chasles, Études surle XVIe siècle, and de Puibusque, Histoire comparée des Littératuresfrançaise et espagnole].-A remark of Cassagne: " M. de Balzac, " hesays, " is always happy in the choice of his metaphors, and havingchosen them he does not fail to abide by them. ” —To these natural oracquired qualities must be added that of never neglecting to turnthem to account [ Cf. the letter to Costar on the subject of "thehigher eloquence " ] .That the principal defect which spoils Balzac's qualities is due lessto their exaggeration than to his lack of ideas. —A just remark ofBoileau,-to the effect that in giving his attention more particularlyto letter writing, Balzac erred as to the suitability of the epistolaryTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 123wanting in significance. On the other hand there arenoble acts, such as that of self- sacrifice, or, withoutgoing so far, such as all acts which constitute avictory of the mind over the body, of the will overinstinct, of civilisation over nature; and the nobilityof these acts is communicated to the words, and soto speak to the very syllables that express them.There is therefore a standard by which even customis judged, whatever may have been said to the contrary.Our character is revealed by our manners, which inturn are betokened by our words even more than byour actions; a race or a nation betrays itself by thecharacter of the language it speaks; and finally a period.Still, neitherstyle to his talent. This mistake is clearly seen when his Treatisesor his Dissertations are compared with the Letters proper. -That evenin these Treatises themselves he lacks experience to some extent ofthe matter he discusses; -his politics are essentially " bookish ";-and his philosophy was forged entirely in his study.Pascal [ Cf. Le Prince, p. 27, in the edition of 1665 ] , nor Bossuet[Cf. Socrate Chrétien, pp. 239, 240] , seems to have read him withoutprofit. But it was more particularly by Corneille that he was studied[Cf. the four Dissertations politiques addressed to Mme de Rambouillet,sur les Romains and sur la gloire].In consequence, in spite of all his defects, he may be said to havedone something more for the French genius than to " coach it inrhetoric," according to Sainte- Beuve's expression. -He was acquaintedwith the sources and, as the ancients said, with the "topics " of loftyeloquence; -on more than one occasion he displayed a sufficientlyexact and practised critical sense [ Cf. his estimates of Ronsard andMontaigne];-and finally he always strove after elevation.-- That forall these reasons his personality is a considerable one in our literaryhistory. He has had many followers and many imitators; -- thetransformation of lyricism into oratorical prose was completed in hiswritings; and his chief error, which he shared with all his contemporaries, merely consisted in his having believed that the objectof art is to adorn nature with a view to making it more beautiful.—The means by which this end may be attained ought to be studied,but with the intention of having recourse to them as little as124 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREis characterised by the choice of its words and the turnof its phrases.The merit of the Précieuses is to have been consciousof these truths. Their mode of expression was the exactcounterpart of their manner of thinking; and they oughtto be judged from the psychological rather than from thelinguistic or philological point of view. Their efforts torefine or to reform the language were not, as was thecase with the poets of the Pleiad , their principal concern,but were only a secondary undertaking entered on becausethey had perceived that the reform of literary habitudescould only be effected by the reform of the language.Doubtless while endeavouring to attain their end by allpossible; and taking care to adapt them to the theme and tocircumstances.3. THE WORKS. -The works of Balzac are composed: ( 1 ) of 27books of Letters, of which the earlier appeared in 1624, and the lastafter his death. Six books of these Letters are addressed to Chapelain and four to Conrart. All or almost all of them are of greatinterest for the literary history of the period.— (2) Of his Entretiensor Dissertations, of which there are 67, divided into: Christian andMoral Dissertations, 25; -Political Dissertations , 14; -CriticalDissertations, 28. [The Relation à Menandre and Les Passagesdéfendus, in which he defends himself against the attacks of FatherGoulu, the author of the Lettres de Phyllarque à Ariste, form partof the Christian Dissertations. The three dissertations on theRomans form the first three Political Dissertations. ] -In additionthere are: (3) The Treatises , that is: Le Prince, 1631; —Le Barbon,1648; -Socrate Chrétien, 1652; —and Aristippe, 1658. And in conclusion (4) a series of letters in Latin.The best editions of Balzac's works are: -the edition formed bycombining the six volumes printed by the Elzeviers either at Leydenor at Amsterdam, and adding Socrate Chrétien; -and the standardedition of 1665 , in 2 vols . in folio, Paris, published by LouisBillaine.There are no modern editions, unless a " selection " of Balzac'swritings, edited by M. Moreau, Paris, 1854, Lecoffre, be counted as such.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 125the means at their disposal, they did not resist the desireor the temptation to distinguish themselves from thecrowd, to form coteries amongst themselves, and, as thesaying is, to be " peculiar. " However, if among the waysof being peculiar there be one that is assuredly excusable,and even in some respects legitimate, is it not that whichconsists in desiring to feel, think, and act more nobly,more delicately, and with more refinement than otherpeople? To this ambition is to be ascribed the vogue ofsuch very different productions as the trifling verse ofVoiture, among which there is much that is charming;the Letters or the Treatises of Balzac; and the romancesof Gomberville and Gombaud, Endymion and PolexandreVI.-Claude Favre de Vaugelas [ Meximieux (Ain), 1585;† 1650, Paris].1. THE SOURCES. -Niceron, Hommes illustres , vol. xix .; -Pellison.et d'Olivet, Histoire de l'Académie française; -Goujet, Bibliothèquefrançaise, vol. i.; -Abbé Lambert, Histoire littéraire du siècle deLouis XIV. , vol. iii.Moncourt, De la méthode grammaticale de Vaugelas, Paris, 1851; —Sayous, Littérature française à l'étranger, Paris and Geneva, 1853,vol. i . , ch. 3 and 4; -Sainte- Beuve, Nouveaux Lundis, vol. vi.; —Chassang, Notice preceding his edition of the Remarques sur la languefrançaise, Paris and Versailles, 1880.2. THE RÔLE OF VAUGELAS. -Vaugelas' birth and early surroundings;-and in this connection a few remarks on the subjectof the Academy of Florimon. -Vaugelas ' father: Antoine Favre; —his relation with François de Sales and Honoré d'Urfé . -Vaugelas,a tutor to the Carignan family.Importance of his book Remarques sur la langue française.-Byaffirming that language is governed by usage, Vaugelas shielded theevolution of language from the caprices of individual taste; -bydrawing a distinction between good and bad usage, he divided offthe language of the " court from that of the " street-porters of thePort aufoin ";-and by making the usage prevailing in the spokenlanguage the standard of usage in the written language, he gave theclassic language its essential character, which is that of being a""126 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREfor example. A further reason of this vogue is thatwhile the great letter writer is at pains to hit on expressions and turns of phrase the grandiloquence of whichshall be in keeping with what is termed around himthe "grand goût " (or it may perhaps be translated the"best taste "), his fellow writers, the novelists , attemptpsychological observation and analysis in their interminable narratives.We are under yet another obligation to the Précieuses:the conversation cultivated in their salons, besides increasing the suppleness and fluency of the language,made for intellectual refinement. The evolution of thesentiments or the passions is studied with closer attentionspoken language. -Digression in this connection; -and that Bossuet,Molière, Saint- Simon, and how many others will write as " they willspeak. " This being the case, the greater part of the blunders andlicenses with which grammarians reproach them cease at once to beof any account; -this circumstance also explains the inner qualitiesof the classic language; -its vivacious clearness; -its briskness andnaturalness. -The scruples of Vaugelas; -and that they concordwith those of Balzac; —and with the teachings of Malherbe.--Bossuet's saying to the effect " that nothing eternal is entrusted tothe keeping of languages that are always changing "; —and, in thisconnection, of the comparison between a language and an organism.-That there is a distinction between " immobilising " a language (orshutting the door against all change) and " fixing " it (or giving itstability as far as essentials are concerned); —that Vaugelas ' object wasto "fix " the current usage; -and in what measure he was successful[Cf. Haase, Obert's trans. , Syntaxe du XVIIe siècle, Paris, 1898] .Vaugelas at the Hôtel Rambouillet, -and at the French Academy.Rejoinders provoked by his Remarques. —La Mothe le Vayer's opusculedealing with the Remarques sur la langue française. - P. Bouhours'estimate of Vaugelas [ Cf. Entretiens d'Ariste et d'Eugène].3. THE WORKS. -Remarques sur la langue française, Paris, 1647,in 4to; -and Quinte Curce: de la vie et des actions d'Alexandre leGrand, translated by A. Favre de Vaugelas, Paris, 1653, in 4to.We have referred above to the excellent modern edition of theRemarques edited by M. A. Chassang (1880) .THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 127till an inkling is obtained of a number of their finer shades ,of which there is no indication that the " ancients " hadany idea, nor even the writers of the preceding generation .Is it not essential that the notions conveyed by thesenice distinctions should be analysed or, to use a betterexpression, be " dissected, " if only with a view to animproved classification of the terms of politeness andgood manners? What constitutes elevation? To decidethe matter it must be carefully examined. The result isthat, thanks to preciosity, appropriate expression anddelicate analysis are introduced simultaneously into conversation. The interest of society in grammar andpoliteness has extended imperceptibly to psychology.VII.-Pierre Corneille [ Rouen , 1606; 1685, Paris].1. THE SOURCES .'-Bibliographie Cornélienne ou descriptionraisonnée . . . des ouvrages relatifs à Corneille et à ses écrits, by M.Emile Picot, Paris, 1876; -Fontenelle, Vie de Corneille, 1685, 1729,1742; -Thomas Corneille, Dictionnaire géographique, article Rouen;-Goujet, Bibliothèque française, vol. xviii.; -F. Guizot, Corneilleet son temps, 1st edition , 1813, last edition, 1852; -Taschereau, Histoire de la vie et des ouvrages de Pierre Corneille, 1829 and 1855; —Marty- Laveaux, Notice preceding his edition of Corneille's Works ,Paris, 1862; -F. Bouquet, Les Points obscurs de la vie de Corneille ,Paris, 1888.Corneille Discours and his " Examinations " of his own tragedies.-Granet, Recueil de dissertations sur plusieurs tragédies de Corneilleet de Racine, Paris, 1740, Gisseq et Bordelet; -Voltaire, Commentairesur Corneille, 1764. -Laharpe, Cours de littérature, 1799, 1805; -Schlegel, Cours de littérature dramatique, 1809; -Sainte- Beuve,Portraits littéraires, vol. i . , 1829; Port- Royal, vol . i . , 1837; andNouveaux Lundis, vol. vii . , 1864. -Desjardins, Le grand Corneillehistorien, Paris, 1861; -Levallois, Corneille inconnu, Paris, 1876.--J. Lemaître, Corneille et Aristote , Paris, 1882; -G. Lanson, Corneille,Paris, 1898.The enumeration of the sources, complete up to the date of issue of the work [1875 ] , will be found in M. Emile Picot's Bibliographie Cornélienne. In the case of Corneille and in that of the great writers generally, we shall only mention the sources a knowledge of which appears to us indispensable.128 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREThe effort to express old ideas in a novel, original, and,on occasion, eccentric manner has led to the discoveryof new ideas, the search for which will now become thegeneral ambition and will soon be the chief concern ofthe makers of Maxims -and in the end La Rochefoucauld, if he be given his proper place, will be merelythe last of the illustrious Precieux .We should add that this movement was the outcomeof the efforts, made in common, not only of the men ofletters, but also of the " honnêtes gens " or the membersof good society; and it is doubtless due to this factthat "preciosity, " speaking generally, did not meet withthe same fate in France as in England, Spain, and Italy.Frédéric Godefroy, Lexique de la langue de Corneille, Paris, 1862;Marty-Laveaux, Lexique, etc. , Paris, 1868, forming the two lastvolumes of the edition of Corneille in the collection " Les GrandsEcrivains. "2. THE MAN AND THE POET.A. Corneille's emulators; -and in this connection, that it is urgentto "disencumber " the history of literature; —and that only the namebut not the work of Mairet, or even Rotrou, having survived, theyare only worth attention in so far as they are a " function " of Corneille.-In what way and to what extent they paved the way for him. -Mairet's Sophonisbe and that Corneille was well acquainted with it,since he borrowed from it the imprecations he puts in the mouthof his Camille. -Predominance of the romantic element in Mairet'sdramas. The preface to Silvanire, 1625, and the rule of the threeunities [ Cf. Breitinger, Les unités avant le Cid de Corneille, Zurich,1883] .-General tendency of the writers of tragedy to treat subjectsalready dealt with. -The four Sophonisbe [ Trissino, 1515; Mellin deSaint- Gelais, 1559; Claude Hermel, 1593; Monecrestien , 1596 ] .-Backwardness of comedy in comparison with tragedy. -The Galanteries duduc d'Ossone. The imitation of the Spanish drama in the dramas ofRotrou [ Cf. Puibusque, Histoire comparée des littératures françaiseet espagnole, Paris , 1842; and Jarry, Essai sur les œuvres dramatiques de Rotrou, Paris, 1858] .-How the romantic element inRotrou's dramas perpetually tends towards extravagance; -and thesentiment in them towards bombast. -The traces of Rotrou's influencePIERRE CORNEILLE .

THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 129For why is it that Euphuism in England, Marinism inItaly, or Gongorism in Spain did not exert the sameinfluence as was exercised among us by preciosity?The reason is that the purely literary side of themovement was overruled in France by its social side ,the desire to be peculiar by the need that this peculiarity should find a host of admirers. Our Précieusesnever forgot that the adversaries they had to combatin the first instance were the enemies of all order anddiscipline. In consequence, while in Spain or in Italy,Gongorism or Marinism led up to fresh excesses onthe part of individualism, in France, on the contrary,it was the social ideal that came victorious out of thein the history of French drama: -on Corneille, on Molière, onRacine.B. Corneille's early years. -The false idea that is commonly entertained that Corneille was throughout an "heroic " writer; -andthat on the contrary he began as a writer of comedy. -Mélite, 1629;Clitandre, 1632; La Veuve, 1633; La Galerie du Palais, 1633; LaSuivante, 1634; La Place Royale, 1634; L'Illusion comique, 1636.—Literary interest of the comedies of Corneille's youth. -They owenothing to the imitation of foreign writers; -they consist of incidentstaken from ordinary life and but very slightly " romanced "; -and theirpersonages are already of almost middle-class rank. -The scenes ofgallantry in Corneille's comedies; -and that the language in whichthey are written is a perfect imitation of that of the Précieuses; —and,in this connection , that there is a Louis XIII . style in literature as inarchitecture. The " young girl " in Corneille's comedies; -the styleof the comedies. -Singular character of the Illusion comique; —andwhy, towards 1635, there were so many comedies turning on actorsand stage life.-Médée, Corneille's first tragedy. -What reasons induced Corneille to turn his attention to tragedy [ Cf. Hatzfeld, Lescommencements de Corneille, 1857;-P. Vavasseur, Corneille poètecomique, 1864;-and F. Hémon, Étude sur les comédies de Corneillepreceding his edition of the Works, 1886 ] .C. The masterpieces. -The Cid, 1637; Horace, 1640; Cinna, 1640;Polyeucte, 1642; Pompée, 1643; the Menteur, 1643; La Suite duMenteur, 1643; Théodore, 1645; Rodogune, 1646; Héraclius, 1647;10130 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURE""crisis in the end. It was the Précieuses who developed, strengthened, and consolidated that deep-lyingtendency in French literature to give expression tocommon or general ideas rather than to particularopinions a tendency already foreshadowed in certainof the writers of the preceding age. By their attitude ,the Précieuses assured the vogue of those branches ofliterature which are termed " universal, " and whoseessential characteristic lies in the circumstance that theirvery existence depends upon the existence of a public toencourage them. Our meaning is that it is quite conceivable that a writer should compose an " elegy " or even·Andromède, 1650; Don Sanche d'Aragon, 1650; Nicomède, 1651;Pertharite, 1652. -Of some influences that have unquestionably lefttheir mark on Corneille:-and, in this connection, of the allusions tocurrent events in Corneille's dramas; -the Cid and the duellingquestion; the influence of Balzac and of his Entretiens sur lesRomains [ Cf. his letter to Corneille on the subject of Cinna]; —theplots against Richelieu and the tragedy of Cinna; -Polyeucte andJansenism [ Cf. Sainte Beuve, Port - Royal] .— Corneille's geniussuffers when he deals with subjects of pure " invention . "-The complicated plots of Rodogune and Héraclius. —But here again hisintention is to vie with the romance writers of his time: La Calprenède and Scudéri. -The sketches of the manners of the timeof the Fronde in Corneille's masterpieces. -He exaggerates what isalready too " high flown " in his Roman and Spanish models. -Heessays for an instant, in Don Sanche and Nicomède, a more soberform of comedy; -but he is quick to renounce this effort as is seenin his Pertharite; -in consequence of the failure of which he leavesoff writing for the stage for seven years.D. The genius and the dramatic system of Corneille; -and thathis Discours and his Examens should only be consulted on this pointwith much precaution; because they are scarcely and only indirectly dogmatic and explanatory, but rather apologetic andpolemical; the abbé d'Aubignac and his Pratique du théâtre [ Cf.Arnaud, Théories dramatiques au XVIIe siècle, Paris, 1888] .— Thecharacteristics of Corneille's imagination. -In the first place hisimagination was strong and daring;-that is to say it was dis-THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 131a "satire " and keep it to himself, that he should writea novel and lock it up in his desk, that he should notedown in secret the chronicles of his time; on the otherhand it has never occurred to any one to prepare a " discourse " or to write a tragedy in five acts and in versesolely for his own personal satisfaction .It is these various influences that paved the way for,determined, and gave final sanction to the success of the"great " Corneille. For nothing is less like the realCorneille than the easy-going man of genius whose heroicfigure is placed before us in all our histories , the truthbeing that the poet followed the veering of opinion with•tinguished by a leaning, at once natural and the outcome of circumstances, towards the extraordinary and the improbable; —hence histheory that the subject of a fine tragedy ought to be improbable [ SeeMarty-Laveaux' edition , i. , 147 ]; —hence his theory as to the use tobe made of history in drama [ Marty- Laveaux' edition, i. , 15] , —hencehis theory of heroismWhen fate allows us to pursue a career of honour,It affords us a glorious opportunity to display our fortitude.-Hence, too, the epic character of the personages in his dramas[ Cf. an admirable passage on this point in Heine's La France];—the comparative absence of analysis and psychology; -the subordination of the characters to the situations [ Cf. Saint- Evremond's studyof Racine's Alexandre] .-Comparison in this connection betweenRodogune and Ruy Blas, or between Cinna and Hernani.-- ThatCorneille's taste for complications of plot grafted on these tendencies,would have landed him in melodrama.But while his imagination was strong and daring, it was at thesame time noble and lofty; —that is to say he prefers what is nobleto what is base in the domain of the extraordinary and the romantic;-what elevates the soul to what demeans it; -and in general heroesto monsters. Still it is not true as has been said [ Cf. V. de Laprade,Essais de critique idéaliste] that his drama represents the triumphof duty over passion; -it represents the triumph of the will [ Cf.J. Lemaître, Corneille et Aristote ] over the obstacles that interferewith its development; —and hence, in his drama: -his liking for132 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREunrivalled acumen, and guided his supple talent inaccordance with his observations. Quite rightly, he isgiven an important place , a place of honour, in the GrandDictionnaire des Prétieuses , of Bodeau de Somaize, wherehe is termed " the greatest man who has ever writtenpieces for the playhouse. " The appreciation is just; andthe chief preoccupation of Corneille, both in the comediesof his youth, in Mélite, the Veuve or the Galerie du Palais,and in the masterpieces of his maturity, was to win theapprobation of the Précieuses.In his Examen de Mélite, he himself claims with pridethat his earliest achievement was to establish the reign ofpolitical tragedy, which is pre- eminently the field for the exercise ofthe will;-his contempt for the passions of love, which he regards asbeing too " encumbered with weakness "; -the moral purpose orrather the apparent moral purpose; hence, too, the highly- strungsentiments;—and hence, finally, the art with which he exhausts thesubjects he treats [ Cf. Examen de Rodogune, Marty- Laveaux' edition ,iv. , 421 ] .—“ The second act surpasses the first; the third is superiorto the second; and the last act throws all the others into the shade."-He is the master of his subjects just as his heroes are the mastersof their fate. [ Compare the contrary state of things in the Romanticdrama. ]66It is a pity, after this, that his imagination should be tortuous andquibbling;—which amounts to saying that he partakes to someextent if not of the lawyer at any rate of the casuist. -The cases ofconscience " in Corneille's tragedies; -and that they constitute theirgreatness;-but they also give them a certain tortuousness. -Hence theactions in his drama which he terms " implex " [ Cf. the character ofSabine in Horace and that of Sévère in Polyeucte]; -analysis ofHéraclius; -admissions of Corneille on this subject . -To complicationof plot he adds complication of motives; -Schlegel's observations onthis point [ Cf. Littérature dramatique, Saussure's translation , ii . ,p. 41 ].-Corneille's Machiavellism, —and that it would be possible toextract as many immoral maxims from his work as from the Prince.All those State crimes committed to wear a crown,Heaven absolves us of them, when it gives us the crown.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 133decency and morality on a stage whose license previous tohis time had kept women away from the theatre. Wefind then that if he borrows a subject from Spain, sinceSpain is the fashion, -he imparts to his personages inthe Cid the quality of humanity, in the Menteur thequality of polish, and in both the quality of generalitythat are the characteristics of the polite society aroundhim, and as it were the signs by which its membersrecognise one another. Similarly, when in Horace,Cinna, or Rodogune, he mingles politics and gallantry, itmust not be supposed that he is imitating Justinus,Seneca, or Livy: he is sketching from the life theCorneille's pretensions to a knowledge of politics;-the remark ofCondé, cited in this connection , after the representation of Sertorius:"When did Corneille learn the art of war? "—and of Grammont afterthat of Othon.E. The old age of Corneille. -Edipe, 1659; Sertorius, 1662; —Sophonisbe, 1663; Othon, 1664; Agesilas, 1666; Attila, 1667; -Titeet Bérénice, 1670; Pulchérie, 1672; Suréna, 1674; —Corneille as adelineator of history; —and ofthe falseness of the paradox of Desjardinsin his Grand Corneille historien.-- Local colour in the work of Corneille .-That the defects of his last plays proceed from the same causes asthe qualities of his masterpieces.-That they are mere special pleadings written in support of a thesis. -The Machiavellism of the motives[Cf. Pertharite, vol. vi. , p. 571; -Othon, vol. vi. , p. 632; —Attila, vol.vii. , pp. 107, 162].-That the author's nobleness and elevation degeneratein them:-into affectation [ Nicomède, vol. vi. , p. 531 ]; —into bombast[Don Sanche, vol. vi. , p. 458 ]; -into inhumanity [ Attila, vol. vii. , p.172];--and finally that the bent of his imagination takes the changedshape of a mania for unreasoned inventions, innovations, and complications. It is for this reason that " he now loads his subjects withmatter ";-that after having banished love from his plays he reintroduces it in the guise of the most frigid gallantry [ Cf. Othon, vol. vi. ,p. 587; Attila, vol. vii . , p. 140, 141 ]; -and that he puts history to afalse use in tragedy.F. The language and style of Corneille. -That the poet amid thisshipwreck of the qualities of his prime retains one gift to the end-fornobody, perhaps, has ever written better in verse than Corneille.134 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREmanners and personages of his time. Who is thePrécieuse of whom Somaize tells us that " not only wasshe much esteemed for her beauty, but as well for theloftiness of her soul, while her intelligence was not solelypreoccupied with trifles, but rose to the consideration ofmatters of the first importance "? This Précieuse isfamiliar to us; and before being called Emilie in Corneille's Cinna, or Cléopâtre in his Rodogune, she had morethan once in actual history been a source of uneasiness tothe great Cardinal under her real name of the Duchessede Chevreuse. Numerous are the parallels it would bepossible to draw of a like nature. When Corneille compli-- [Cf. the speech of Auguste in Cinna and the narrative passages ofthe Menteur.Qualities of his style; -and to appreciate them, a comparison between the style of Polyeucte and that of Andromaque; —orbetween the comic style of Corneille and that of Molière and ofRegnard. -Appropriateness and vigour of his language. - Richness andharmony of his verse. -Amplitude and vigour of his periods. -Inwhat sense Corneille remains natural and consistent with himself evenwhen he is guilty of incoherence and preciosity. Of certain pointswhich Corneille has in common with the Romanticists; —and in consequence of the points in common between Romantic literature andthe literature of the time of Louis XIII.3. THE WORKS.-Apart from his tragedies and comedies, the onlywork of Corneille of any importance is his translation in verse of theImitatio Christi.We shall content ourselves with citing here among the editions ofhis works: the edition of 1660 in 3 vols.; -that of 1664 in two foliovolumes, which is the most monumental, but unfortunately it lacksthe plays of his later years-the edition of 1738 with Jolly's commentaries; the edition of 1738 which is the first that contains Voltaire'scommentaries and Gravelot's illustrations; -finally, among moderneditions, to say nothing of very many others , that of Marty- Laveauxin the collection of the Grands Écrivains de la France, Paris, 1862-1868, Hachette.VIII. -The Foundation of the French Academy, 1635.1. THE ORIGIN OF THE ACADEMY. -The Italian academies of theTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 135cates, embroils, and entangles his plots to the utmost inhis Sertorius, his Othon, his Attila, he does so less inresponse to his own inspiration than with a view to vyingas a romantic writer with the Gombervilles, the LaCalprenèdes, and the Scudéris!And his genius is not diminished on this account! Hissuperiority is unaffected by his compliances with thevariations and exigencies of the taste of his time, sincethe numerous writers who surround him, -Mairet, Rotrou,du Ryer, Scudéri, La Calprenède, though they followthe fashion as he did, produced nothing of the stampof the Cid, of Polyeucte, of Pompée, or of Héraclius.66time of the Renaissance [ Cf. Pellisson , Histoire de l'Académie]; -theacademy of the last of the Valois [ Cf. on this head M. Edouard Fremy'sbook, Paris, n.d. ]; -the Florentine Academy. -A remark of the Abbé d'Olivet on Balzac: " Up to that time," he says, men of letters hadformed a republic of which the dignities were divided between anumber of persons, but this republic suddenly became a monarchy tothe throne of which Balzac was raised by an unanimous vote. " -ThatConrart's original scheme for the Academy [ Cf. his Mémoires] wasdevised precisely with a view to introducing an ordered hierarchyinto the world of letters. -This purpose coincided with the wishesof the Précieuses of the Hôtel Rambouillet; -with the generaldesire of men of letters; -and with the more far-reaching plansof Cardinal Richelieu . -The " Letters Patent of January 29, 1635."-Why did the Parliament refuse to ratify them for two years?-It may be that established bodies dislike to see other bodiesorganised around them. —But Richelieu effected his purpose in theend. The first academicians.-[ Cf. Pellisson and d'Olivet, Histoirede l'Académie française, Livet's edition, Paris, 1858; -Paul Mesnard,Histoire de l'Académie, Paris, 1857; —The successive prefaces of theDictionary of the Academy; -A. Bourgoin, Valentin Conrart, Paris,1883; and the Abbé A. Fabre, Chapelain et nos deux premièresAcademies, Paris, 1890.]2. THE OBJECT OF THE ACADEMY. - That it did not differ in principlefrom that which had been projected by the Précieuses , Malherbe,Balzac, and Vaugelas: -it was proposed to raise the French languageto the dignity of Latin and Greek; -and in consequence to the uni-136 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURE1I merely contend that his greatness is not dependent onhis isolation, and that though he towers above his rivalshe is bound to them nevertheless by ties of relationship .But he belongs essentially to that Precious society, whichrecognised and applauded itself in his works, which willremain faithful to him to the end, and will defend himagainst young and audacious rivals; and the consequenceis , that although the Précieuses may have had their faultsand even have exposed themselves to ridicule, the dramaof Corneille is lasting testimony to the nobility, loftiness,and generosity of their artistic ideal.There is a man who made no mistake on this score.versality they had formerly enjoyed. -Conformity of this very clearly defined intention with the intentions of Ronsard and the Pleiad.—Why was it that all the translators who enjoyed a reputation at thetime were members of the Academy? -Because the sole object oftheir translations was to spread and, as it were, to incorporate withthe substance of the French genius an exhaustive knowledge ofantiquity.-The " belles infidèles " of Perrot d'Ablancourt. -Why allthe grammarians? -Because it lay with them to set forth and tocatalogue the riches, the resources, and the " possibilities " of thelanguage. And why all the critics? -Because it was believed at thetime that there exists a necessary relation between the perfection ofliterary works and the observance of the rules or laws that governthe branch of literature to which they belong.-Chapelain's Prefaces.-Controversies as to "the excellence of the French language " [ Cf.Goujet, Bibliothèque française, vol . i. ] .-The early labours of theAcademy; -services rendered in general by the French Academy; —and in what sense it may be said of the Academy that it really fixedthe language.3. THE IMMEDIATE INFLUENCE OF THE ACADEMY. -In the first placeit substituted a central literary authority for the influence of dispersedcoteries; and in this way, it was due to the Academy, and in theworks of its members, that individual efforts began to converge towardsa common goal. -Advantages and disadvantages of this literarycentralisation. The establishment of the Academy enforced the conviction that literary glory is an integral and necessary part of thegreatness of a nation [ Cf. Du Bellay, Défense et Illustration, etc. ] .—THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 137I refer to Richelieu, whose perception of the truth is thesecret motive of his attitude, now friendly, now hostile,towards Corneille . The moment the writer and the poet,instead of keeping to themselves, began to mix in society,and to submit, as an earnest of their intention to please,to the discipline society imposed on them, Richelieu conceived the idea of making this new-born docility serve hispolitical designs . It seemed to him that it would surelybe a master stroke to turn to account the power of theintelligence, to make it an instrument of his authority;or, to put the matter a little differently, to interest menof letters in the realisation of his ambitious plans withoutIn this way it raised the status of the man of letters; -in the State;—and in his own eyes. -Finally, when the Academy set itself thetask of " fixing " the language, it seemed at first as if the effort weredestined to be successful; -and in any case, by enforcing respect forthe language, it paved the way for what foreigners themselves willspeak of a hundred and fifty years later as the universality of French[ Cf. Rivarot, Discours sur l'universalité de la langue française, inanswer to the question raised by the Berlin Academy].IX. —The Origin of Jansenism.1. THE SOURCES. -Ranke, Histoire de la Papauté aux XVIe etXVIIe siècles; -M. Philippson, La Contre- Révolution religieuse auXVIe siècle, Paris and Brussels, 1884; - Dejob, De l'influence duconcile de Trente sur la littérature, Paris , 1884.Molina, Concordia liberi arbitrii cum gratiæ donis, 1595; —Jansenius, Augustinus, seu Sancti Augustini doctrina de naturæhumanæ sanitate, ægritudine et medicina, 1640; -C. Mazzella, DeGratia Christi, Woodstock Marylandiæ, 1878.Dom Clémencet, Histoire générale de Port- Royal, 10 vols. in 12mo,Amsterdam, 1756; -N. Rapin, Histoire du Jansénisme depuis sonorigine jusqu'en, 1644, edited (and arbitrarily mutilated) by the AbbéDomenech, Paris, 1861; -Sainte- Beuve, Port- Royal, vols. i. and ii.;-the Abbé Fuzet (at present Bishop of Beauvais) , Les Jansénisteset leur dernier historien, Paris, 1876.2. THE FORMATION OF THE DOCTRINE.-The importance of Jansenism138 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREacquainting them with the secret of his intentions; andhe fancied he saw the means of effecting his purpose inthe movement in progress around him. All the smallliterary coteries that had come into existence in imitationof the Hôtel Rambouillet, -of which in reality they wereonly the caricature, -were evidence of a desire to seereign, even in intellectual matters, a measure of orderand discipline. There seemed to be a tendency, operating on different lines to those he was following, infavour of that unity or, to use a stronger expression,that homogeneousness which was the principal or theunique object of his home policy. Just as he wished toin the history of religious ideas; -of French literature; —and ofpolitics. The still existing hostility against Jansenism of an entireparty.66The movement of the Counter- Reformation [ Cf. Ranke, Histoirede la Papauté]; -Self-concentration of Catholicism; -the revivalof religious fervour during the last years of the sixteenth century.-Molinism [which must not be confounded with Molinosism]; —and how it seems to have accredited the idea that we are masters ofour destiny. -Du Vergier de Hauranne, Abbé of Saint- Cyran [ 1581;1643] and Jansénius or Janssen [ 1585; † 1638] combat this corruption " of Christianity. -Early writings of Saint- Cyran.-TheQuestion royale, 1609; -Apologie pour Henri ... de la Rocheposayévêque de Poitiers, 1615.-Meeting between Saint- Cyran and Arnauldd'Andilly, 1620; —their relations with the Fathers of the Oratory; —the Refutation de la Somme du Père Garasse, 1626; —the publicationof the Petrus Aurelius, 1631; —The Port- Royal des Champs is transferred to Paris, 1626; -Saint- Cyran, director of the Port- Royal; -his imprisonment in the Bastille, 1638; -Publication of the Augustinus in 1640.Analysis of the Augustinus. -The five propositions [ Cf. the AbbéFuzet, Les Jansénistes et leur dernier historien; and with regard tothe essence of the question of grace, C. Mazella, De Gratia Christiprælectiones scholastico - dogmatica].-That the points at issue inthis controversy are: -free will; -the definition of human nature;—and, finally, the entire question of conduct. -Further, from the pointof view of the history of literature, an acquaintance with the con-THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 139make the French monarchy the type in some sort of themodern State, a veritable whole, really living and reallyorganised, so literature also seemed to be tending towardsthe same ideal of organisation and common life. In thesame way, while the object of his foreign policy was tomake France the regulator of European politics, the secretambition of the grammarians and critics of Vaugelas,for instance, or of Chapelain-was to insure the Frenchlanguage inheriting the proud position of the Latin andGreek languages. A mutual understanding should beeasy; and it took shape after some tentative essays inthe conception of the French Academy. The Frenchtroversy is necessary to an understanding of the Provinciales and ofthe Pensées.X.-René Descartes [la Haye (in Touraine) , 1596; † 1650 ,Stockholm].1. THE SOURCES. -F. Cournot, Considérations sur la marche desidées dans les temps modernes, vol . i . , book iii . , ch. 1 , 2, 3 , 4 , Paris,1872; — Fiorentino, Bernardino Telesio , Florence, 1874; -- Ch.Renouvier, Philosophie analytique de l'histoire, v. iii. , Bk. xi . , ch. 1 ,2 , Paris, 1897.A. Baillet, La vie de Monsieur Descartes, Paris , 1691 .J. Millet, Histoire de Descartes avant 1637, Paris, 1867; -LouisLiard, Descartes, Paris, 1882.-A. Fouillée, Descartes, in the series ofGrands Ecrivains Français, Paris, 1893.Bordas-Demoulin, le Cartesianisme, Paris, 1843; -V. Cousin,Fragments philosophiques, vols . iv. and v.: Philosophie moderne,Paris , 1845;-Francisque Bouillier, Histoire de la philosophie cartésienne, Paris, 1854; -Ravaisson, Rapport sur le prix VictorCousin, 1884; -G. Monchamp, Histoire du cartésianisme enBelgique, Brussels, 1886; -F. Brunetière, Etudes critiques, fourthseries.2. THE MAN, THE PHILOSOPHER, and the WRITER. -What was theconception of science and philosophy in vogue before Descartes?—andthat to attribute him the honour of having overthrown the philosophyof Aristotle is to make an error of something like a hundred years.—The rôle of Italy in the formation of the idea of science. -Galileo [ Cf.140 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREAcademy was created for no other purpose than to bindup the destinies of literature with those of France itself;and that it might not happen that a social force so considerable as was already that of the intelligence shouldentirely escape the action of the central authority.It remained to be seen under what conditions theunderstanding would be completed. For on severaloccasions, and even on the morrow of the foundationof his Academy, Richelieu had been brought to perceive-by the incident of Corneille and the critics of the Cid,-that he would not govern men of letters as he did his"intendants. " Men of letters are lacking at times inthat esprit de suite, which the cardinal demanded fromFiorentino op. cit. , and J. Bertrand, Les fondateurs de l'astronomiemoderne, Paris, 1865 ] .-A few words as to Bacon and as to theslightness of his influence [ Cf. Liebig, Bacon, Paris, 1866; andClaude Bernard, Introduction à la médecine expérimentale, Paris,1865] . Of the learned ignorance of Descartes; -and how much hewas indebted to his predecessors. That he had certainly readCharron's Traité de la Sagesse; -the Doctrine curieuse of FatherGarasse; --and, on his own admission, the Letters of Balzac.-Whether, as Huyghens believed, he was renown of Galileo. "66 very jealous of theDescartes' education; -his early studies at the College of La Flèche,1604-1612; -his early career in Paris and his passion for gambling[ Cf. Baillet, ch. 8]; -his military career, 1617-1621; -he is presentat the battle of Prague, 1620. -His journey to Italy and his pilgrimageto Notre- Dame- de- Lorette, 1624–1625; —his sojourn in Paris, 1625–1629; -where it is probable that he wrote his Regulæ ad directionemingenii. The mythological allusions and the preciosity of expressionin the Regula:-one is reminded of the Latin style of Bacon. —Thatthese details reveal a Descartes who is an entirely different man fromthe speculative genius of legend. -No philosopher has seen more ofthe world; has obtained an acquaintance at first hand with morevaried social conditions; -which he studied with the express intentionof learning "to know the human race. "-He drew from life and fromthe observation of mankind what Montaigne sought in the observationof himself and in books. -He decides to settle in Holland, and takesTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 141those he took under his protection; and though theirobedience is quite capable of going to the length ofservility, still it is always to a certain extent capriciousand intermittent .It is at this juncture that the historians of Frenchliterature place the influence of Descartes and of hisDiscours de la méthode, the date of publication of whichis 1637. " The influence of Descartes," wrote DésiréNisard, " was that of a man of genius who taughtmen their true nature, and together with the art ofattaining to a knowledge and control of their intelligence, the art of employing it to the best purpose. "In another passage he says: " This is the reason whyup his residence in Amsterdam, 1629.-His romance: Hélène etFrancine.Some peculiarities of Descartes' character, and how is it hisbiographers have not given greater attention to them? -The widescope of his interests. -What has become of his verses on the " Peaceof Munster "?-and of the comedy "in prose interspersed withverse, " of which mention is made in the list of his manuscripts? —His habitual state of uneasiness; -his absentmindedness; -his changesof residence; —his mysterious existence; —his " fads. ” —Some curiousfragments of his Journal; -his hallucinations and his dreams; -thememorable night of November 10, 1619, when " it seemed to himthat the spirit of truth descended into him from heaven andpossessed him. "-Nothing similar is found in the life of Corneille;-and still less in that of Malherbe. -That it is time that a placeshould be given these peculiarities in the historical character ofDescartes; and that they should be kept in view in passingjudgment on his philosophy.The publication of the Essais de philosophie [in 4to, Leyden,1637] comprising: the Discours sur la méthode, the Dioptrique, theTraité des météores and the Géométrie. -His controversy with Voet[ Cf. J. Bertrand, Revue des Deux Mondes, 1891 ].-He publishes hisMéditations métaphysiques, 1641; -his Principes de philosophie,1644.—“ He takes a dislike to the function of author, that depriveshim of all desire to publish anything " [ Cf. Baillet, Vie de Descartes] .-His taste for the study of natural history and physiology. —His last142 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREthe writers who came immediately after Descartesare almost all his disciples. They are his disciples by the doctrines they adopt wholly or in part,and by the systematic treatment they apply to everyorder of ideas , and every branch of literature. " Nisardalso says in praise of Descartes that "he reached perfection in the art of writing French "; and he adds thatthis perfection consisted "in the perfect conformitybetween the language of Descartes and the Frenchgenius." I am of opinion, however, that it would be impossible to be more utterly mistaken; and without referring to the " perfection of Descartes' style, " of which Ishould be disposed to remark, to borrow a well-knownjourney to France, 1648.- The disappointment he experiences in hiscountry [ Cf. his Letters at this date ].-That, in any case, the troubles of the Fronde would have sufficed to drive him out ofFrance. He takes up his residence in Stockholm, October, 1649; –where he dies [ February 11 , 1650].Whether Descartes' style deserves the praise that has beenbestowed on it by some critics?-If his style be considered impartially, it seems that he wrote clearly; --and that he expresses wellenough what he wishes to express; -but there is nothing verysuperior in his style to that of Arnauld in his Fréquente communion.-Its principal merit is that it is free from those " ornaments " and"embellishments " with which Voiture and Balzac " enriched " theirstyle. On the other hand, for his style to be perfectly " natural, ” itwould have to be a reflection of his true character, which it is not; -it is only his reason that finds expression in his prose; -and yet imagination played a greater part in his life than in that of any otherphilosopher.3. THE WORKS. -They consist of the Essais de philosophie, published in 1637; -of the Meditations métaphysiques, 1641; -of theRéponses aux objections, 1641-42; -of the Lettre à Gisbert Voet,1643; of the Principes de philosophie, 1644; -and of the posthumous works; -Traité des passions , 1650; -Traité de l'homme, 1662;--Traité dufœtus, 1662; -and Traité du monde. -To these works isto be added a voluminous Correspondence, published for the first timein 1657 by Clerselier.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 143saying, that it may be likened " to pure water, which hasno special flavour, " -the influence of Descartes, as will beseen further on, was not exerted in the direction that isalleged, and still less at the precise moment at which itis said to have taken effect. The truth is, that the publication of the Discours sur la méthode, far from havingbeen followed by any progress in the domain of reason orgood sense, was merely followed chronologically by aresumption of the offensive on the part of foreign influences of Spanish influence to start with, then ofItalian influence, and before long of both influencescombined. The explanation of this circumstance iseasy. Richelieu's work has been interrupted by hisAdd also the Regulæ ad directionem ingenii and the Inquisitioveritatis per lumen naturæ, 1701 .There are several editions of the works of Descartes:-(1) TheAmsterdam edition, 8 vols. in 4to, 1670-1683 and 9 vols. in 18mo,1692-1713;-(2) the Paris edition , 1724–1729, 13 vols. in 12mo; -and(3) Victor Cousin's edition , 11 vols. in 8vo, Paris, 1824-1826, Levrault.M. Foucher de Careil has published two volumes of a Supplementto the works of Descartes, Paris, 1859-1860, Durand.XI.-Port-Royal and the Arnaulds.1. THE SOURCES. -Add to the sources given in article IX.: -Bayle,Dictionnaire, article Arnauld; —Histoire du Jansénisme, 3 vols. in12mo, Amsterdam, 1700 [by Dom Gerberon]; -Mémoires du P.Rapin [a continuation of his Histoire du Jansénisme, covering theperiod 1644-1669] edited by M. Louis Aubineau, 3 vols. 8vo, Paris,1865; -Mémoires d'Arnauld d'Andilly, edited by Petitot and byMichaud and Poujoulat;-P. Varin, La vérité sur les Arnauld,2 vols. , Paris, 1847;-P. Faugère, Lettres de la mère Agnès Arnauld,2 vols. 8vo, Paris, 1858.2. THE ARNAULDS, and in particular ANTOINE ARNAULD [Paris,1612; † 1694, Brussels].-A letter of Balzac on the subject of theArnaulds: " The entire household argues, preaches, persuades . . .and one Arnauld is worth a dozen Epictetuses. " -The history of thefamily. Soldiers, civil servants, courtiers, priests and nuns.—Arnauld d'Andilly, the father of Pomponne, the Minister, and the144 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREdeath before he has been able to complete it; the Frondehas broken out; and for eighteen years the sovereigntyis wielded by a Spanish Queen and an Italian Minister:Anne of Austria and Mazarin.It is customary to date the Spanish influence fromthe great success of the Cid and the Menteur; but ifsomething more be in viewthan a mere exchange ofsubjects between the two literatures, this is placing thedate too late or too early. It is too late , since longbefore Corneille the Astrée, as we have seen, wasnothing more than an adaptation in the French spiritof Montemayor's Diane; since Hardy, Mairet, andRotrou had done little else than imitate or translateauthor of the Mémoires [ 1588; † 1674]; -Angélique Arnauld, whoreformed the Port- Royal [ 1591; † 1661]; -Agnès Arnauld, theauthoress of the Lettres [ 1593; † 1671 ]; —Antoine Arnauld, whoshared with Louis XIV. the honour of having been called the Greatby his contemporaries.The publication of his book La Fréquente communion, 1643.—History of the book [ Cf. Rapin, Mémoires, i. 22, and Sainte- Beuve,Port-Royal, vol. ii . ].—Whether it be true, as Rapin asserts, that nobetter written work had previously appeared in French; -and does henot overlook the Introduction à la vie dévote? —In what respect thebook was really an innovation; -because it brought theology properlyso called within reach of the lay public. -As to the authority of laymen in the matter of religion.--The Prince of Condé [ father of theGreat Condé] refutes Arnauld's first book in his Remarques chrétienneset catholiques, 1644; -another refutation by the learned FatherPetau: De la pénitence publique, 1644. —The fortunes of Arnauld'sbook come to be bound up with those of the Augustinus, for whichwork Arnauld writes an apology in answer to the bull of UrbanVIII.; —and in this way the Port- Royal becomes the fortress ofJansenism. -Arnauld's conflicts with the Sorbonne; -his condemnation;-appearance on the scene of Pascal.Jansenism becomes a definitely organised party; -its numerousadherents; the "Mothers of the Church ": Mme de Guéménée,Mme du Plessis- Guénégand, Mme de Sablé, the Duchesse de Luynes,the Duchesse de Longueville; -and in this connection, of theTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 145Cervantes, Lopez de Vega, and Rojas; since thePrécieuses, as has been said, confined their efforts at firstto acclimatising Gongorism in France. But it is tooearly if the object in view be to fix the moment whenthis Spanish influence became a real menace to thedevelopment of our national literature, as the Italianinfluence had been in the past. In point of fact it isscarcely prior to the period between 1645 and 1660 thatour dramatic authors, Thomas Corneille, Quinault, orScarron-to mention but those whose names are notentirely forgotten-wholly restrict their activity toimitating the Spanish drama, and that they arrive at lastat such a pitch that they are even unable to write a playimprudence of the abbé Fuzet's scoffs [ Cf. Les premiers Jansénistes,p. 154 and following pages] .-Growing progress of the party underthe Fronde. -Alliance between Jansenism and Gallicanism. -A pronouncement of Ranke on the subject of Jansenism: "While theJesuits were piling up erudition in enormous folios, or were losingthemselves in the labyrinth of scholastic systems of morals anddogma, the Jansenists addressed themselves to the nation. " [Histoirede la Papauté, French translation, vol. iii . , p. 307] .3. THE WORKS. —Of Arnauld d'Andilly we have his Mémoires; atranslation of the Confessions of St. Augustin; the Vies des Pères dudésert, without counting other translations and a considerable numberof shorter works of edification or controversy;-(2) Of Agnès Arnauld ,the Lettres published or rather collected by M. Faugère;-(3) OfAntoine Arnauld, " the Doctor, " one hundred and forty volumes ofworks, the list of which is to be found in the Dictionnaire de Moréri.We are not aware that more than two or three have been reprinted;and the only work of his that is still read is his Logique de PortRoyal [written in collaboration with Nicole ] , 1662.XII. The Novel since The " Astree. "1. THE SOURCES. -Huet, De l'origine des romans, preceding Mmede Lafayette's Zayde, Paris, 1671;--Gordon de Percel [ LengletDufresnoy] , De l'usage des romans, 2 vols. , Amsterdam, 1734; -G.Körting, Geschichte des französischen Romans im XVII. Jahrhundert,Oppeln and Leipsic, 1885-1887; -A. Lebreton Le roman au XVII11146 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREon a subject of their own, without placing the scene of itin Lisbon or Salamanca. At this juncture, there becomesrampant in every branch of literature a sort of exaltation ,a predilection for the high-flown that amounts to extravagance. The great Corneille in person persuades himself,and proclaims in his preface to Héraclius, " that the subject of a fine tragedy ought to be improbable. " TheGascon Gautier de Costes de la Calprenède his namedeserves to be printed in full-and Scudéri, who is fromNormandy, and who, moreover, in this matter only lendshis name to his sister Madeleine, are writing theirIbrahim and their Cassandre, their Cléopâtre and theirArtamène, genuine novels of adventure, which stir thesiècle, Paris, 1890;—P. Morillot, Le roman en France depuis, 1610;Paris, 1893.V. Cousin, La société française au XVIIe siècle; -Rathery,Mademoiselle de Scudéry, Paris , 1873; —René Kerviler, Marin LeRoy de Gomberville, Paris, 1876.2. THE EVOLUTION OF THE NOVEL. -That the influence of Descartesis no more to be discerned in the novel than in the drama; -andthat it hindered the novelists and their readers from adopting theAstrée as their standard, as little as it had affected the literary careerof Corneille. -Can it be said that there is such a thing as a Cartesiansystem of Esthetics? [ Cf. Emile Krantz, l'Esthétique de Descartes,Paris, 1882]; --and, in any case, the reading of the Grand Cyrus orof Faramond would never lead one to suppose that such a systemexists. It is the influence of preciosity that continues to make itself felt in these works .The idealist tendency of the novel in the seventeenth century; —andthat parodies , such as that by Sorel in his Francion, only confirm itsexistence; since it is only what is in fashion that is parodied. -Thecomplicated plots of these works; —and, in this connection, as to theconnection between Corneille's tragic drama and the novels of LaCalprenède and Mlle de Scudéri . -In both cases history is put tothe same use, and in both cases there is the same preoccupationwith current events. -The novelists, however, ascribe to hazardwhat Corneille attributed to the action of the will . -The epicalstructure and the impersonal character of the novel in the seven-.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 147imaginations of all their contemporaries, while thePicaresque literature is giving birth, so to speak, toburlesque under the auspices of the Scarrons, thed'Assoucis, and the Saint- Amants. The Italian influence comes into play side by side with the Spanish.Robortelli or Castelvetro is cited in justification ofcriticisms on Corneille. The writers of epopees, rendered prudent for half a century by the failure ofthe Franciade, take courage again in consequence ofTasso and his Gerusalemme. Mazarin acclimatises theopera in France. La Fontaine, who is beginning hiscareer, completes his literary education by the study ofthe Decameron; Molière produces the Etourdi; Boileauteenth century. -Its " documentary " interest and its psychologicalvalue.A. Marin Le Roy de Gomberville. [ Chevreuse or Etampes, 1599,or 1600; † 1674, Paris] .- His Polexandre [ 1629-1637 ] . In this novel the kind of interest found in the Amadis is combined with ageographical interest:-the adventure of Prince Zelmatide and thehistory of Mexico; -the story of Almanzaïre, Queen of Senegal; —the adventure of the Princess Perselide and the court of Morocco; -Analogy between the sort of interest offered by Polexandre and that of certain " exotic " novels of our own time.B. Gautier de Costes de la Calprenède [ Cahors, 1609 or 1610; † 1663,Andely- sur- Seine] .-A few words as to La Calprenède's dramaticwritings his Mithridate, 1635; his Essex, 1639; his Hermenegilde,1643. His effort to combine the sort of interest he sees is taken onthe one hand in Corneille's and on the other in Du Ryer's translations .-The use to which history is put in La Calprenède's novels; -andthe sub- titles that might be given them; -Cléopâtre, or the dissolutionof the Roman Empire; -Faramond, or the foundation of the Frenchmonarchy. —The declarations of Mme de Sévigné on the subject ofLa Calprenède.--" The beauty of the sentiments, the violence of thepassions, the magnitude of the events, and the miraculous efficacyof their redoubtable sword, all these features entrance me as theymight a young girl " [letter of July 12, 1671 ]; and in a letter ofJuly 15: " As to the sentiments . . . I confess that they please meand that their perfection is such as to satisfy my ideal of what the148 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREchides and exclaims in a tirade that will afterwardsdisappear from his first satire:Who can to-day, without just scorn,See Italy in France, and Rome in Paris!• I cannot without horror and without painSee the Tiber mingling its swollen waters with the Seine,And flooding Paris with its children , its mountebanks,Its language, its poisons, its crimes and its manners.Where is a trace to be found in all this of the influence ofDescartes and Cartesianism? No! it is entirely untruethat the publication of the Discours de la méthode was anepoch-making event in the history of our literature. Thecontemporaries of Descartes , while full of admiration forsentiments of noble characters ought to be. "—Whether, too, La Calprenède's style is as bad as Mme de Sévigné alleges it to be in thesame passage. That its qualities do not stand comparison with thoseof Corneille's style; -but that the defects of both styles are identicalor at any rate kindred.-La Calprenède's abundant imagination.—The whole of his art consists in exciting " astonishment, " which hedoes with success . -Distant but indisputable analogy between thenovels of La Calprenède and those of Alexandre Dumas.C. Madeleine de Scudéri [ Le Havre, 1607; † 1701 , Paris ] .-Whetherher rôle does not consist in her having adapted preciosity to the requirements of the middle classes?-In any case, it is a fact that shevulgarised preciosity by superadding, in her Artamène, to theadventures in Polexandre and to the historical details in Cléopâtre:- (1) allusions to and portraits of the men and women of " precious 'society [ Cf. Cousin, Société française au XVIIe siècle];—(2) contemporary episodes; for example, the story of Scaurus and Lydiane(Scarron and Françoise d'Aubigné) in her Clélie; Hesiod's dream (apicture of the literature of the period); the description of the " countryof the Tender Passion " (the " Pays de Tendre "); —and ( 3) a politeness or a gallantry very superior to anything of the kind to be foundin La Calprenède or de Gomberville.--Perspicacity of some of heranalysis of character.-- Mlle de Scudéri's novels are " psychological "novels.The success of all these novels was considerable. -For example,there were four or five editions in less than twenty years of LaTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 149him as a mathematician, almost ignored him as a philosopher. And if literature finally threw off the yoke ofall the influences that seemed in league to prevent itsbecoming purely French, it owes its release to entirelydifferent causes , of which the first and most importantwas the revival of the Christian idea under the guise ofthe Jansenist idea.For whatever difference there may be and such adifference doubtless exists-between the Christian andthe Jansenist idea, it was not detected at the outset;and while to- day it is no longer allowable for us toconfound the two ideas, it is a fact that they wereconfounded for a time. It never occurred to Jansenius,Calprenède's Cassandre. -His Cléopâtre was printed by the Elzevirs,a circumstance that was in itself a first step towards fame [ Cf.Balzac's letter to the Elzevirs reproduced in A. Willem's book, LesElzevier Brussels , 1880] .- There are German and Italian translations of these novels; -English imitations; and, if Pradon is to bebelieved, there was even a version in Arabic of the Grand Cyrus[ Remarques sur tous les ouvrages du sieur Despréaux, The Hague,1685] .--The reasons of this success are to be sought for in the factthat the romantic tone of the works was in accordance with the spiritof the time; these novels did as much as or more than more vauntedworks to establish the supremacy of the French language and of French literature.3. THE WORKS.- (1) Of Gomberville: -Carithée, 1621; --Polexandre,1629-1637; -Cythérée, 1640 and following years [ 2nd edition of theearlier volumes in 1642]; -La Jeune Alcidiane, 1651: " This is aJansenist novel, " wrote Tallemant, " for its heroes are preachingsermons and offering up prayers at every turn " [Historiettes, iv.467] .--There is also a collection of verses by Gomberville.(2) Of La Calprenède: -Cassandre, 1642; -Cléopâtre, 1647; -Faramond, 1661, only the first three parts of which are by LaCalprenède. The novel was finished by P. de Vaumorière, 1665. Wehave already mentioned that La Calprenède wrote several tragedies.(3) Of Madeleine de Scudéri: -Ibrahim ou l'illustre Bassa, 1641;-Artamène ou le Grand Cyrus, 1649-1653; -Clélie, histoire romaine,1654-1661 .-There is no doubt as to the authorship of these three150 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURESaint-Cyran, Sacı, Arnauld and their followers that theywere engaged on a different work from that of a Vincentde Paul, an Olier, a Bérulle, or a François de Sales; and itwas not till later that their initial emulation in promotingthe good of mankind was transformed into mutual hostility. If, moreover, as is proper in the history of ideas,we understand by Jansenism less a rigorously definedtheological doctrine than a general manner of feelingand thinking, it will be found that Jansenism is notconfined to the Port-Royal writers, but is also acharacteristic of some of their most illustrious adversaries. The style that will most closely resemble that ofNicole, "a grave, serious, scrupulous style, " will be thenovels, which, although they purport to be by Georges, are certainlythe works of Madeleine. It is less certain that she is also theauthoress of Almahide ou l'esclave reine, 1660-1663 [ which, moreover,is unfinished]; -but she certainly wrote Mathilde d'Aguilar, 1667, ashort novel which, -with those by Segrais, published under the titleLes divertissements de la princesse Aurelie , '-forms the link betweenthe long novels of this period and Zayde and the Princesse de Clèves.Mlle A. Scudery has also left a work entitled Conversations morales,Paris, 1886;-and an interesting Correspondence.XIII. The Heroic Poem.1. THE SOURCES. -The Prefaces to Adone, 1623; -Alaric, 1654; -La Pucelle, 1656; -Saint Louys, 1658; --Boileau, Art poétique,"chant " iii . , 1674; -Voltaire, Essai sur la poésie épique, 1728.J. Duchesne, Histoire des poèmes épiques français du XVIIe siècle,Paris, 1870.Théophile Gautier, article on Scudéri in his Grotesques. -Rathery,Mlle de Scudéri [ Cf. above].Chapelain, Correspondance published by M. Tamizey de Larroquein the collection: Documents historiques , 1880, 1883.-Les douzederniers chants de la Pucelle, with an introduction by M. RenéKerviler, Orleans , 1882 —the abbé Fabre, Les Ennemis de Chapelain,Paris , 1888.René Kerviler, Jean Desmarets de Saint- Sorlin , Paris, 1879.1 Racine borrowed the subject of Bajazet from one of these short novels.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 151style of Father Bourdaloue. And supposing Jansenism,after all, as was the case with Protestantism before it ,to have done the Christian idea no other service thanthat of forcing it on the attention of polite society, theachievement would be sufficient for our purpose. We arenot entitled to appeal from the decisions of Rome in amatter of faith, nor to reopen the quarrel, nor to allegethat in default of Jansenism another cause would nothave produced its effects; but we have the right toascribe these effects to Jansenism if it were indeedresponsible for them; and to affirm that in the history.of our literature the victory of the Jansenist idea was thetriumph of the Christian idea.H. Rigault, Histoire de la querelle des anciens et des modernes,Paris, 1856;-P. Delaporte, S.J. , Le Merveilleux dans la littératurefrançaise sous le règne de Louis XIV. , Paris, 1891 .2. THE AUTHORS. -Of the natural relationship between the noveland the epopee; -and, in this connection , of the histories of Herodotusand of Homer's Odyssey. -The seventeenth century was well awareof this relationship [ Cf. the preface to Polexandre and Ibrahim, andBoileau, Réflexions sur Longin] .-On the other hand, the HeroicPoems of the period are not the outcome of a natural communicationbetween the two branches; -all their authors did was to follow in thefootsteps of Ronsard; --it was also their ambition to emulate theEuropean success of Tasso's Gerusalemme liberata; —and, in thisconnection, of Tasso's influence on French literature. -Finally, it wasthe current opinion that the dignity of France demanded that thecountry should possess its Virgils and Homers.-The double error ofclassicism:-as to the necessary condition of the epopee; -and as tothe efficacy of rules. -This double error is nowhere more apparentthan in the history of such efforts as Alaric or La Pucelle. -Anotherkind of interest presented by these works, failures and unreadablethough they be: -they raised the question of the utilisation inliterature of themes drawn from Christianity; and in this way, as willbe seen, they started the quarrel between the ancients and moderns.A. Georges de Scudéri [ Havre, 1601; † 1667, Paris] .- The first line of his Alaric:I sing the conqueror of the earth's conquerors.152 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREIt is in view of these considerations that the appearancein 1643 of Arnauld's book La Fréquente Communion marksa date of importance. " No devotional book, it has beensaid, exerted a greater influence, " was more read, morediscussed, even by women, and for this reason, while thework did not take the direction of literary opinion out ofthe hands of the Précieuses, it contributed more than anyother book to divert their attention from merely agreeablequestions towards questions of a more serious character.It appeared, too, at precisely the right moment to barthe possible progress of Cartesianism by renewing theauthority of " tradition," the strength of which might-A mixture of history, fiction, and the marvellous; -the table ofcontents of the poem Alaric: list of the " descriptions " and list of the"comparisons. " -The unfailing bad taste of Scudéri; —it reaches sucha pitch that it almost renders him witty, by leaving the impression onthe reader that he is parodying himself.B. Jean Chapelain [ Paris, 1595; † 1674, Paris].-It would be impossible to be less " Parisian " and less " Gallic " than Chapelain,though he was born in Paris, lived in Paris for eighty years, and diedin Paris. It is strange that anybody should have wished to revive hisreputation [ Cf. V. Cousin, La Société française, vol . ii . , p . 158] . –His admiration for the Chevalier Marin and his preface to Adone,1623; --his translation of Guzman d'Alfarache, 1631; —his reputationas a critic; —and as a prose writer. -His rôle in the quarrel over theCid -and that Les Sentiments de l'Académie sur le Cid is in any case his best work. The character of the man; --and that he wasone of the most commonplace of individuals, and one of the most rancorous as well.The theme of La Pucelle; -and whether it be true, as Cousinasserts , that a finer theme does not exist. -Patriotism and æstheticsought not to be mixed up uselessly; -and that what Cousin admiresin the " plan " of La Pucelle is precisely what constitutes itsinferiority.-Logic and Poetry. - Chapelain's chief pretension:-hedesired that his poem should be at once history, poetry, and a moralallegory [ Cf. his preface].-" In order to consider action under itsUniversal aspect, in accordance with the precepts, and so as not todeprive of the allegorical sense by which Poetry is made one of the in-THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 153have been singularly weakened had there been nothingto counterbalance the influence of the Discours de laméthode. Shall we add that the book was written inFrench? In 1643, however, this circumstance, whatevermay have been said to the contrary, was only a noveltywhen taken in connection with the Augustinus of Jansénius; and unhappily, as Sainte- Beuve has remarked, themethod adopted in the book was still wholly scholasticor theological. It was reserved for Pascal to have donewith this method, and to bring into existence a prose thatshould be purely French, by ranging talent or genius onthe side of Jansenism in his Lettres provinciales. [ Instruments of architectonics, I have arranged my matter in such sortthat ... France represents the Soul of man, . . . King Charlesthe Will, . . . the Englishman and the Burgundian the transportsof the irascible appetite, . . . Amaury and Agnès the concupiscentappetite, ... Tanneguy the Understanding, . . . the Pucelle (Joanof Arc) Divine Grace," etc.-That preoccupations such as these mighthave cooled a more ardent imagination than Chapelain's. -Prosaiccharacter of his verse [ Cf. his Père éternel, ch. i.; his portrait ofAgnès Sorel, ch. v.; the description of the burning of Joan of Arc,ch. xxiii. ].That it must be well understood that in spite of the legend-thepublication of the Pucelle in no way diminished the reputation or theliterary authority of Chapelain.-There were six editions of his Pucellein less than two years. —The work was praised in high- flown terms byGodeau, Ménage, Gassendi, Huet, and Montausier [ Cf. Goujet,Bibliothèque française, vol. xvii . , p. 378 , etc . ] .—It is Chapelain who ischosen by Colbert in 1661 for a part that may be described as"superintendent of letters "; -and the truth is that, until the time ofBoileau, the only reproach made the Pucelle is that it is tedious; —acriticism of which Polyeucte had also been the object.C. Jean Desmarets de Saint- Sorlin [ Paris, 1595; † 1676, Paris]. Heattempted every branch of literature:-the novel, in his Ariane, 1632;-comedy, in his Visionnaires, 1637; -tragedy, in his Erigone, 1638;-in his Scipion, 1639; -lyric poetry, in his Office de la Vierge, 1645;-epopee, in his Clovis, 1657.-Moreover the sole interest of Clovislies in the preface to the edition of 1673, in which Desmarets, almost154 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREthis work, and in it alone, are found united all thequalities to attain to which had been the incessant effortof the writers of the previous fifty years. For almostthe first time, the Provinciales brought within reach ofwhoever could read those great problems, of which itreally seemed as if the theologians had desired to depriveus of a knowledge or to hide from us the interest, byoverloading them with the weight of their eruditionand dialectics. Even that air of fashion, that easeand distinction of manner, that sprightly and gracefulwit to which so much importance and so much mysterywere attached by the Précieuses, peeped forth fromfor the first time, sets forth clearly the theory of " the literary uses ofChristianity. "There is no occasion to allude to the writers of epopee who were therivals of Desmarets and Chapelain.-- The Saint- Louys of Père LeMoyne has fallen into utter oblivion , and this in spite of the efforts that have been made to resuscitate it. -The century was already tooreasonable, and above all too ordered for the writing of an epopee tohave been possible at the period . Nevertheless, from a feeling ofnational pride, Frenchmen will obstinately continue to produce epopees from generation to generation; —and while it is the habitto talk of the continuity of dramatic production; -that of pseudoepic production will remain no less regular in France.XIV. -Comedy from 1640 to 1658.1. THE SOURCES. -The brothers Parfaict, Histoire du théâtrefrançais, vols. vi . , vii . , and viii .; -Léris, Dictionnaire des théâtres; -dePuibusque, Histoire comparée des littératures française et espagnole,Paris, 1843; -L. de Viel - Castel, Essai sur le théâtre espagnole in theRevue des Deux Mondes, 1840, 1841 , 1846; —V. Fournel, Les contemporains do Molière, Paris , 1863-1875 .Goujet, Bibliothèque française, articles SCARRON, vol. xvii. , andQUINAULT, Vol. xviii .; -Morillot, Scarron, sa vie et ses œuvres, Paris ,1888; -G. Reynier, Thomas Corneille, Paris, 1892.2. THE TRANSITION FROM CORNEILLE TO MOLIÈRE. Of the utilityof statistics; -and that they prove better than anything else that thehistory of literature and literary history are two different matters.—THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 155amid the theology of the Lettres Provinciales. Thetone varied from letter to letter in accordance with thechanging necessities of the controversy, and great asmight be the gulf between direct and personal satire andthe highest eloquence, the author bridged it with asuccessful mastery, of which it is no exaggeration to saythat it enraptured the reader. No comedy that had everbeen put on the stage had produced so delightful animpression. No more eloquent utterance had ever beenmade even from the pulpit. Moreover, if the necessitywere felt of opposing to the corruption of manners, to thegrowing relaxation of the discipline formerly in force, notDuring the twenty years, 1640-1660, there were played or printedmore than two hundred tragedies, tragi-comedies, comedies orpastoral plays; -how many of them have survived?-or of howmany of the authors are the names remembered? -It would seem,then, that between the Menteur and Les Précieuses ridicules therewas nothing but .. a void; -which accounts for the honour that isaccorded the Menteur of having paved the way for the comedy ofMolière. —What is to be thought of this allegation [ Cf. Les époques duthéâtre français].—That in reality something did take place between1640 and 1660; —and that what it was may be gathered from thestatistics themselves.Tragedy continues to gain ground; -and of the two hundred playsreferred to it claims scarcely less than a half; -among which areincluded Horace, Cinna, Polyeucte, Pompée, Rodogunc, Héraclius, tosay nothing of Théodore or Pertharite; —and much below these , butstill of a certain rank, the Saint- Genest, 1646; the Wenceslas, 1647;the Cosroès, 1649, of Rotrou; -the Saül, 1639, and the Scévole, 1646,of Du Ryer; the Mort de Sénèque, 1644; -the Mort de Crispe, 1645;and the Mort du Grand Osman, 1647 , of Tristan l'Hermite. —Tragicomedy, on the other hand, with only fifty plays during the sameperiod, loses ground; -while it is comedy that makes progress at itsexpense. According to the exact figures given by the brothersParfaict, from thirty-nine plays [ 1639-1646] tragi- comedy falls tosixteen [ 1646-1653] and then to twelve [ 1653-1660], while comedyadvances from eighteen to twenty -five and from twenty-five to twentyeight. Conclusion: plays of a clearly defined order are ousting andwill soon entirely supplant those of a hybrid or doubtful kind.156 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREindeed a new morality, but rather a morality of whichsome even of those whose mission it was to teach itwere oblivious, it was just this morality that was contained in the Provinciales. And finally and above all—I only speak from the point of view of literature—if theaspiration of the moment was to be natural, and theefforts in this direction had as yet been unavailing; ifa mistake had been made hitherto as to the means bywhich this end was to be attained, the Provinciales wereat once the signal and the model that had been awaited." The first book of genius to appear in prose, Voltaire hassaid, was the collection of the Lettres provinciales "; andBut while the true nature of tragedy has been determined by themasterpieces of Corneille, comedy is hesitating between two or threedirections; -writers have discovered the art of drawing tears; -theyare still in search of that of provoking laughter. -Thomas Corneille[1625; 1709] endeavours to solve the problem by putting on thestage romantic and complicated adventures; -Philippe Quinault[ 1635; 1688] by combining a realism of detail that is suggestive ofthe humbleness of his birth; -with an insipid gallantry that gives aforetaste of his operas; -Paul Scarron [ 1610; † 1660] by what Molière will term his " buffoonery," that is by the most exaggerated caricature,when he does not have recourse to obscenity. -Moreover all threewriters continue to go to Spain for their models. -Dom Japhetd'Arménie, 1652, is an adaptation of a comedy by Moreto. -LesRivales, 1653, is merely a fresh version of Rotrou's Pucelles, whichitself is said to have been borrowed from Lope de Vega; -Le charmede la voix, 1653, is an imitation of a comedy by Moreto. -It seems asif all these authors had " eyes that see not " and " ears that hearnot"; and hence it is that, in a certain sense, all these dramas aremerely of interest to the curious .Still they accustom the public to distinguish between the elementsof its pleasure, with a view to experiencing a pleasure that shall bekeener and more complete; -and the fact is it is only Rabelais thatmakes us laugh and cry at the same time. -The public is about to setits face against the mixing up of the different branches of the drama;-an attitude that constitutes a first step towards naturalness .--Thelanguage also becomes more natural; -it grows more supple, moreTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 15799 a little further on he makes " the fixing of the languagecoincide with the issue of this work. This assertion isexcellent as far as it goes, but it does not go far enough.Another and still more important period dates fromthe issue of the Provinciales-that of the determination of the characteristics of classic literature and of theclassic ideal.The sun has arisen , let the stars retireWere it not that this line of Scudéri's is slightly ridiculous, this would be the appropriate time and place to citeit. The " naturalness " of the Provinciales made no imdiversified; the vocabulary of Thomas Corneille is copious; Quinaultis fluent; Scarron is often spirited; and, in this connection, a comparison between the comedy of L'Ecolier de Salamanque or of DomJaphet d'Arménie and that of Ruy Blas or of Tragaldabas.-Finallyeven a taste for the burlesque necessitates a measure of observation;-since a caricature is only good when it offers a resemblance withwhat is caricatured.3. THE WORKS: -of Scarron: Jodelet ou le maître valet, 1645; -Les trois Dorothées, 1646; -of Th. Corneille: Les engagementsdu hasard, 1647; -Le Feint Astrologue, 1648; —of Scarron: L'Héritierridicule, 1649; -Th. Corneille: Don Bertrand de Cigarral, 1650;-L'Amour à la mode, 1651; -Scarron: Dom Japhet d'Arménie,1653; -Th. Corneille: Le Berger extravagant, 1653; —Le Charme dela voix, 1653; -Quinault: Les Rivales , 1653; -Scarron: L'Ecolier deSalamanque, 1654: -Th. Corneille: Les Illustres Ennemis, 1654; —Quinault: L'Amant indiscret, 1654; -Scarron: Le Gardien de soimême, 1655; —Th. Corneille: Le Geôlier de soi- même, 1655; —QuinaultLa Comédie sans comédie, 1655; -Scarron: Le Marquis ridicule, 1656.The best edition of Scarron is that published by Welstein in sevenvolumes, Amsterdam, 1752; -of Thomas Corneille, that by David infive volumes, Paris, 1748; -and of Quinault, that by Duchesne in fivevolumes, Paris, 1778.XV. -Burlesque.It would be sufficient to mention burlesque and then to refer thereader to Boileau, were there not three remarks to be made with158 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREpression upon the men of the preceding generation, uponthe aged Corneille, for example; and when the author ofthe Cid, after having stood aloof from the theatre for sixyears, resumes writing for the stage in 1659, it will bewith his Edipe, to be followed shortly afterwards by hisSertorius or his Othon! On the other hand, to all theyoung and ardent writers the Lettres Provinciales were arevelation.Shall I say that Bossuet himself was, as it were,transformed by the work? The expression might seemsomewhat strong; and yet , seeing that his eloquencenever made greater progress than in passing from his firstrespect to the origin of this branch of literature; —its true character;-and its consequences:( 1) It is of neither French nor Gallic origin; -and Saint-Amant,Scarron and d'Assouci in no wise continued the tradition of Rabelais.-It is in the main of Italian [ Cf. Vianey, Mathurin Regnier, Paris,1896 ]; -and in part of Spanish origin [ Cf. the entire series of thePicaresque Romances] .With regard to its true character, one is tempted to connect it withpreciosity. Voiture in his " petty " verse [ Cf. A une demoiselle quiavait les manches de sa chemise retroussées et sales , and the versesAMlle de Bourbon qui avait pris médecine] , displayed a tendencytowards burlesque; -while Saint- Amant and Scarron were membersof " precious " society. -The Précieux aimed at being more refinedthan nature and truth; -the writers of burlesque at exaggeratingnature and truth; --but both classes of writers belong to the schoolwhose motto we quoted above:Chi non sa far stupir, vada alla striglia . . .Their object is to excite admiration; -and the means all of thememploy to this end is to excite astonishment.Finally, an important consequence of burlesque was to break upthe party of the libertines into two groups: -on the one side theScarrons or the Saint- Amants, who will put up with anything provided they be free to follow their humour; -on the other those whocare less for being at liberty to live as they choose, than for the rightto think as they please.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 159manner to his second, between 1653 and 1658-from theSermon sur la bonté et la rigueur de Dieu to the Panégyriquede saint Paul, how can one refrain from noting that thisprogress coincides exactly with the moment at which theLettres Provinciales were at the height of their vogue?It was the example of Pascal, too, that liberated thegenius of Boileau, since, as we are aware, his first Satireswere composed between 1658 and 1660, while, in addition ,the admiration Boileau will entertain for the Provincialesthroughout his life is no secret. The truth is , it is thisbook that will convert him in the end to Jansenism! Inthe meantime, however, it is also the Provinciales thatXVI.-Blaise Pascal [ Clermont- Ferrand, 1623; 1662 Paris].1. THE SOURCES.-Mme Perier (Gilberte Pascal) , Vie de Pascal,1684; Bayle, Dictionnaire, article PASCAL, 1696; -Condorcet, Eloge de Pascal, in his collected works, 1776; -Bossuet, Discours sur la vieet les ouvrages de M. Pascal, 1779; —Sainte- Beuve, Port- Royal, vols . ii.and iii.;-Victor Cousin, Jacqueline Pascal, 1844; -Lélut, l'Amulettede Pascal, 1846; -Gazier, Le Roman de Pascal, in the Revuepolitique et littéraire, November 24, 1877; —J. Bertrand, BlaisePascal, Paris, 1891; -Ch. Adam, Pascal and Mlle de Roannez, Dijon,1891.Bauny, Somme des péchés qui se commettent en tous états , 1630; –Caramuel y Lobkowiez, Theologia moralis ad clarissima principiareducta, 1643; -Escobar, Liber theologia moralis, 1656, Paris , 42ndedition; the Notices preceding most of the editions of the Provinciales; -Réponses aux Lettres provinciales, 1657, by FathersAnnat, Nouet and Brisacier, S.J.; -Daniel, S. J. , Entretiens deCléandre et d'Eudoxe, 1694; -Sainte- Beuve, Port- Royal, vol. iii .-Garasse, Doctrine curieuse des beaux esprits, 1623; -Et. Périer,Preface (anonymous) to the first edition of the Pensées, 1670Voltaire, Remarques sur les Pensées de M. Pascal, 1728-1734; -Boullier, Sentiments sur la critique des Pensées de Pascal, 1741; -Condorcet's edition of the Pensées, 1776; -the Notices preceding theeditions of the Pensées from that of Frantin , Dijon , 1835, to thatof M. Guthlin, Paris, 1896; -A. Vinet, Études sur Blaise Pascal,160 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREopen, or unseal, so to speak, the eyes of Molière. For thedate of the Etourdi is 1653, and that of the Dépit amoureux1655; but by what masterpiece in its class were theseimbroglios in the Italian manner followed in their turn?It is clear that Molière, Boileau and Bossuet read theLettres provinciales. But supposing we had no proof ofthis, there would remain the fact that the Provinciales,by completing the purification of the literary atmosphereof the time, and sweeping from it the last obscuringclouds, at any rate, by rendering them possible, paved theway for almost all the masterpieces that are about tosucceed the work of Pascal. The Provinciales founded a1833-1844 [collected in a single volume, 1848]; -Victor Cousin,Études sur Pascal, Paris, 1842, 1844; -Sainte-Beuve, Port-Royal,vol. iii .; -abbé Maynard, Pascal, sa vie, son caractère et ses écrits,Paris, 1890; G. Dreydorst, Pascal, sein Leben und seine Kämpfe,Leipsic, 1870; -Gory, Les Pensées de Pascal considérées commeapologie du christianisme, Paris, 1883; -Edouard Droz, Étude surle scepticisme de Pascal, Paris, 1886;-Sully Prudhomme, La philosophie de Pascal, in the Revue des Deux Mondes, July, October,and November, 1890.2 THE MAN AND THE WRITER. -Diversity of the opinions thathave been formed on Pascal. —Some [ Voltaire and Condorcet] haveregarded him as a mere " fanatic , " or at least as a " sectary ";-others have made him out to be a 66 mystic ";-others [ Sainte- Beuve]a semi- Romanticist, by fits and starts a believer and an unbeliever.-There have also been critics who have reproached him with " scepticism " [ Cf. V. Cousin, Études sur Pascal; and in the contrary sense,Droz, Étude sur le scepticisme de Pascal, p. 18, etc . ], —and, in thisconnection, of the numerous false ideas on literary questions put incirculation by V. Cousin. -That this diversity of interpretation issolely due to the mutilated state in which the Pensées have comedown to us; -to the mistaken view according to which the Penséesare regarded as Pascal's " confession, " whereas they are only thematerial for a work of Christian apologetics; —and to the insufficientattention that has been given to the fact that Pascal's life was brokenup into several successive periods .

Pascal's birth. His family; -his education; -precociousness ofTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 161school of writers who were to take nature for their model,a school that is equidistant from the stiltedness of Balzacand the preciosity of Voiture, authors whose characteristics were determined in each case by the ambition toornament, embellish, and disguise nature; and thusit came about, by one of those ironies frequent inhistory, that it was the man who of all our greatwriters was most hostile to nature, -and even to reason-owing to his uncompromising moral attitude, thatit was nevertheless this man who had the chief handin influencing Molière and Boileau, and I now addLa Fontaine and Racine, in the direction of " thehis genius [ Cf. J. Bertrand, Pascal]; his Traité des sections coniques,1639; his arithmetical machine, 1642; -his experiments on vacantspace, 1646; -and that these efforts afford sufficient evidence of thegreat inventive talent, the possession of which has been foolishlydenied him [ Cf. a diatribe by Nodier in his Questions de littératurelégale]. His conversion to Jansenism, 1646; -and his first seriousillness [ Cf. Mme Perier, Vie de Pascal]; -first relations with thePort- Royal. -Pascal's experience of society, 1649-1653; —his relations with the Chevalier de Méré and the Duc de Roannez.-The alleged romance in the life of Pascal. -Was Pascal a"gambler " as Sainte- Beuve has asserted; -" handsome, a physicalsufferer, a mixture of languidness and ardour, impetuous and deliberate, proud and melancholy " as Cousin sketches him; -or, as anotherwriter holds, had he an ambition to play a part in politics [Cf.Derome in his edition of the Provinciales].-That without thesesuppositions we can understand his having studied the theory ofprobabilities; —his having written the Discours sur les passions del'amour, supposing it to be indeed his work; --and his being theauthor of the remarks which Nicole has collected under the title Discours sur la condition des grands. -Pascal's second conversion,1654; —and that it is to be regarded as a passage from a religionallowing some freedom of observance to a stricter religion . His visitsto Port- Royal. The influence his sister Jacqueline obtains over him[ Cf. V. Cousin, Jacqueline Pascal, and in particular the two letters ofSister Sainte- Euphémie (Jacqueline) to Mme Perier, p. 240, etc . ] .---Whether the Entretien avec M. de Saci is to be ascribed to this12162 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREimitation of nature " and of respect for the " rights ofreason. "It is impossible to imagine two geniuses more unlikethan the genius of Molière and that of Racine, unlessindeed it be yet more difficult to draw a parallelbetween the heedless Epicureanism of La Fontaine andthe middle-class staidness of Boileau. And yet, in spiteof their dissimilarity, these four great men not only knewand appreciated each other, but were united by a realaffection; and the hostelry, whose name has not comedown to us, where Ronsard and Du Bellay met on a dayin the year 1548, is not more famous in literary historyperiod; his invention of the dray; -of the wheel- barrow; -he hitson the idea of omnibuses. -Definite conversion and entry into PortRoyal, 1655.-The miracle of the Holy Thorn, March, 1656 [ Cf.Jacqueline Pascal].—Whether it was not at this juncture that Pascalplanned writing his Pensées, but was hindered from executing hisdesign owing to circumstances inducing him to produce the Provinciales?—Advantages of this hypothesis. -It explains at once thegrowing boldness of the Provinciales from the sixth and seventhonwards; and, in the later Letters, the close and too little heededconnection there is between the conclusion of the Provinciales andthe general scheme of the Pensées.The question of fact in the first three Letters, and that it is ofslight importance. The way in which Pascal, by changing his tacticsfrom the fourth letter onwards, raised the real question at issue,which concerned the essence of the matter in dispute, —and put it onits proper ground. -The point to be decided was whether the Jesuitsor the Jansenists should direct opinion; -and, more generally,whether an almost " society " morality should triumph or an uncompromising morality [ Cf., in the Pensées, the fragment entitled: Comparaison des premiers chrétiens et de ceux d'aujourd'hui].—It maybe that Pascal, while he was right in attacking the excesses ofProbabilism, made a mistake in scoffing at the same time at casuistics;--and that this mistake is of far graver import than the fact that hetampered with some few quotations. - For in the place of the fewquotations of which the absolute exactitude is open to question , hecould have found a score of others; whereas, although he may haveTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 163than that classic tavern of the " Mouton Blanc," atwhich foregathered Ariste and Gélaste, Acanthe andPolyphile. What was there in common between thefour friends? Merely two or three ideas, and no more,but two or three ideas that were fruitful. All fourof them believed that the essential principle of artconsists in the imitation of nature, and, in this connection, I have been at pains to show, on more thanone occasion, that what the four admired in the ancientswas the fidelity with which they had imitated nature[Cf. Evolution des genres, vol . i . , Paris, 1889] . It wasnot at all because they were the ancients that theywon over to his severity a few souls of exceptional purity, he ran therisk of offending others of less purity, but souls for all that [ Cf. SainteBeuve, Port-Royal, bk. iii. , the chapter on the morality of theaverage man].-The Provinciales, from the fourth to the fifteenthinclusive, went near to ruining the moral credit of the Jesuits; -butthey would have proved as well the destruction of a part of religionitself;-had not the scheme of the forthcoming Pensées come intosight in the three last Letters.The first edition of the Pensées, 1670; —and the successive additionsto the text:-in 1727 [ letter of the bishop of Montpellier to thebishop of Soissons ]; -in 1728 [ Père Desmolet's Mémoires de littérature et d'histoire] , -in 1776 [ Condorcet's edition],-in 1779 [ Bossut'sedition], in 1841 [V. Cousin's observations], -in 1844 [ Faugère'sedition ], -in 1879 [ Molinier's edition ].-Is it possible to determinethe plan of the Apology projected by Pascal? -Efforts in thisdirection of Frantin, 1835; -Faugère, 1844; —Astié, 1856; —Rocher,1873;-Molinier, 1879. That they have all failed, as all similarattempts will fail, so far as arranging the fragments of the unfinishedbook in their proper place is concerned . -But it is possible to form ageneral idea of the projected work; -the spirit in which such an ideais to be conceived is given by the spirit of the Augustinus itself; —admitting Pascal's Pensées to be the fragments of a Jansenist work ofapologetics. To the Augustinus are to be added among the booksread by Pascal: Montaigne's Essais; Charron's Sagesse; Du Vair'sEpictete and Sainte Philosophie; Balzac's Lettres and Traités . -Thislist indicates as it were the worldly element [the element of a nature164 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREadmired them, and they have said so clearly enough:" The ancients are the ancients and we are the men ofthe present day "; but they admired them " for havingexcelled in hitting off nature, " doubtless because theywere nearer to nature: Novitas tum florida mundi!They believed, in the second place, that to allow thatthe imitation of nature is the principle or the " beginning " of art, is to declare in plain language that it isnot the object or the " end " of art, and they heldthat a writer fails to fulfil his mission or his function , ifhe does not " improve on nature, " as Bossuet is about toput it he did not say "embellish " nature! And theyto persuade society] he added to the arguments of the Augustinus.-His own more especially personal addition consisted in his desire toconvert the " libertines , " -whom he had had an opportunity ofbecoming acquainted with and even of frequenting while he moved insociety;-and in his conviction that, in connection with the miracleof the Holy Thorn, he had been the object of a special Divine intervention. -If, after this, we keep in view the succession of dates, thatis: 1654, the Entretien avec M. de Saci; -1655, his entry into PortRoyal; -1656, the miracle of the Holy Thorn; -1657, the last Provinciales; -and 1658 or 1659, the sketch of the plan of his Apologyas transmitted us by his nephew, Etienne Périer , we are in a positionto picture Pascal's scheme very much as follows:Everything within us and around us bears loud witness to ourmisery; and whether it be in the feebleness of our frame, —or inthe vices of the organisation of society, --or in the impotence of ourreason; —we are confronted by nothing but motives for despair.--Towhat, then, is to be ascribed the protest that arises from the depthsof this despair itself? —the fact that on this account, we form anexception in nature?-and the invincible confidence we have that abetter destiny awaits us? -We shall obtain a solution of these problems if we accept the doctrine of original sin , -the obligation we areunder to expiate it , and the doctrine of the redemption, —threepoints of dogma which, it will be remarked, are the essence ofChristianity. —It may be that we are averse to accepting thesedoctrines?-In that case let us reflect, that to believe in them issufficient in itself to allow of us being as good men as human frailtyTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 165believed, in the last place, that the surest means toachieve this purpose, or, if I may be allowed this ratherpedantic expression , -to evolve this " end " from this"principle " was to make form or style the perpetualobject of their concern.It is this community of ideas that is to be met with atevery turn, in Boileau's satires as in Molière's comedies,in the prefaces of Racine as in the confessions of La Fontaine. And the aims of the four writers were novel in theextreme if they be considered merely in connection withthe ideas of their contemporaries, but the novelty disappears if it be a fact that the goal they had set themselves.will permit;-that these dogmas, too, were foreshadowed by the OldTestament,-announced by the prophets, -confirmed by miracles;-and finally, that if our reason will not admit them, we can at anyrate accept them by an effort of the will.That there is not a single fragment of the Pensées, that does not tendto establish some one of the preceding propositions;-though tothoroughly realise this fact, it must be borne in mind that Pascal'sapology, as he himself conceived it , was directed at once against thelibertines; the philosophers, -the Jesuits, and the Jews.- Importance of this remark. Of the present day value of the Pensées as awork of apologetics.-[ Cf. Sainte- Beuve, Port- Royal, vol. iii . appendix,and A. Gory, Les Pensées de Pascal considérées comme apologie duchristianisme, Paris, 1883] .—Of certain fresh facts which need to betaken into account in modern apologetics; —and, in this connection , ofthe science of the comparative study of religions. -Of the remarkableconfirmation of Pascal's apologetics afforded by the Pessimism ofSchopenhauer;-and by the doctrine of evolution [ Cf. Brunetière, Lamoralité de la doctrine évolutive, Paris, 1896] . That the moralvalue of Pascal's apology subsists in its entirety, so far as rationalcertitude is not the only mode or the only species of certitude; -as man is not born good; —and as nothing human is organised onpurely human principles.Of Pascal's style, and that there is nothing in French superior tocertain of the Provinciales; —unless it be certain fragments of thePensées. Whether his style lacks grace, or (so as to avoid seeming toplay upon words) tenderness and sweetness?-But, in any case, his166 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREwas that towards which literature had been tending forsomething like a hundred years. After a century oftentative efforts, during which French writers hadaddressed themselves in turn to the ancients , to theItalians, to the Spaniards, for means to achieve a purposeas to the nature of which they were a good deal in thedark, the goal was at last in sight, and to reach it all.that had to be done was to cease imitating the Spaniardsor Italians, and, following the example of the ancients,to stand face to face with nature. " The imitationof nature is the chief matter, an illustrious painterwill declare at a later period and the only object of allstyle ranges from the most familiar simplicity to the loftiest eloquence. "Pascal's rhetoric ," - and that it does not consistin entirely dispensing with rhetoric; -but in making rhetoricalexpedients serve to their own destruction;--and in only having recourse to art to attain to a more faithful imitation of nature. -Ofthe sentiment of the mysterious in Pascal's prose; -of his way ofintervening in person in the cause he is pleading; —of his profoundsensibility;—and of the " poetic " qualities that result from themingling of all these elements. -Of sundry other qualities of Pascal'sstyle:-its sharpness and conciseness, its copiousness , —and its "compactness. "-Sainte- Beuve's remark: Pascal, an admirablewriter when he completes the expression of his thought, is a yet greater writer in his unfinished utterances. "663. THE WORKS. -We shall only make a passing reference toPascal's scientific works, of which we may cite the Essais pour lesconiques, 1640; -Avis à ceux qui verront la nachine arithmétique,1645; -Expériences touchant le vide, 1647; -Récit de la grandeexpérience de l'équilibre des liqueurs, 1648; -Traité du trianglearithmétique, 1654; and his writings relating to roulette, 1658[ Cf. A. Desboves, Étude sur Pascal et les Géomètres contemporains,Paris, 1878] .The principal editions of the Provinciales and of the Pensées are:Of the Provinciales; -the original editions , 1656–1657, the artificialselections of which differ from each other to a considerable extent; —the Latin translation issued by Nicole under the name of Wendrock,1658; --the Cologne edition published by Nicolas Schouten in 1659; —THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 167rules is to enable us to imitate nature the more easily "[ Cf. a lecture by Oudry in Watelet's Dictionnaire desBeaux-Arts, vol . i. , Paris, 1760 ] . A final coincidence,of the kind which, because they cannot be foreseen,lend history its varying and ever novel attractiveness,was destined to prevent this principle being responsiblefor the abusive consequences it might otherwise haveinvolved: Mazarin had just died; Anne of Austria wasabout to follow him into the tomb; and Louis XIV. , bythree or four master strokes, had inaugurated his personal government.Maynard's edition, Paris, 1851 , Firmin- Didot; -Derome's edition ,Paris, 1880-1885, Garnier; -Molinier's edition , Paris, 1891 , Lemerre;-Faugère's edition , Paris, 1886-1895 , Hachette.Of the Pensées: -the original edition , Paris, 1669-1670, of which atleast five examples offering a certain dissimilarity are known; -Condorcet's edition, Paris, 1776; —Frantin's edition , Dijon, 1835, Lagier;-Faugère's edition , Paris, 1844, Andrieux; -Havet's edition , Paris ,1852, 1887, Dezobry and Delagrave; —Astie's edition , Lausanne, 1857 ,Bridel;-Rocher's edition, Tours, 1873 , Mame; -Molinier's edition,Paris, 1879, Lemerre; -Guthlin's edition , Paris, 1896, Lethielleux; -Michaut's edition , Friburgi Helvetiorum , 1896; -and Brunschwieg'sedition, Paris, 1897, Hachette.None of these editions is an exact reproduction of that whichpreceded it, and there is not one of them that should not be consultedfor special reasons: theological, critical , literary, or paleological.With the Pensées are usually given some opuscules of which themost important are: l'Entretien avec M. de Saci; -Trois discourssur la condition des grands; -De l'esprit géométrique; -- the Préfacedu Traité du vide; —and the Lettres à Mlle de Roannez.168 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREIIAt this period the great king was young, gallant, andaddicted to ostentatious splendour; there was nothingformal, solemn, or pompous about his youthful court,which bore no resemblance whatever to the idea that isformed of it by the study of what it became in later years.FIFTH PERIODFrom the first performance of the " Précieuse Ridicules "to the beginning of the quarrel between the ancientsand moderns1659-1687I.-François [ vi. ] , Duc de la Rochefoucald [ Paris , 1613;+1680, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -La Rochefoucauld himself in his Mémoires [ Cf.Mémoires du cardinal de Retz and Lettres de Mme de Sévigné]; —Sainte-Beuve, Portraits de femmes [ Mme de Longueville, Mme deSablé, Mme de La Fayette, M. de la Rochefoucauld] , 1840; —V.Cousin, Madame de Sablé, 1858; -Ed. de Barthélemy, Les amis deMme de Sablé, Paris, 1865; —-Gilbert's Notice sur La Rochefoucauldpreceding his edition of the Works, Paris, 1858; -d'Haussonville,Madamede La Fayette, Paris, 1891; -J. Bourdeau, La Rochefoucauld,Paris, 1893.A. Vinet, Les Moralistes français au XVIIe siècle: La Rochefoucauld, 1837; -Prévost- Paradol, Études sur les Moralistes français,1865.2. THE MAN AND THE WRITER. -His family and his entry intosociety; where he reads novels aloud. The " ladies' favourite ":-he is indebted for his first successes to the Duchesse de Chevreuse;-he endangers his fortunes by his adventure with the Duchesse deLongueville; he finds consolation for the shattering of his ambitionsin his close friendship with the Marquise de Sablé; -and he spendsthe last years of his life , which was that of an Epicurean, at the sideof the Comtesse de La Fayette. -To this amatory and societyTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 169In proof of this, it is only necessary to consult the eyewitnesses of the beginning of the reign: Mmede Mottevillein her Mémoires, Mme de La Fayette in her Histoire deMadame Henriette, Montglat, Loret in his Gazette, Bussyin his Histoire des Gaules, and finally Molière, Molièrehimself, the adroit Molière, in his account of the Pleasuresof the Enchanted Island (Plaisirs de l'Ile enchantée) .After the rather melancholy and even surly restraintof the preceding reign, on the morrow of the futileexperience add that of politics; -or at least of intrigue; -and thequalities or the defects of a nobleman who is at the same time a manof letters, which are: -the superiority that accompanies good breedingand taste;—the constant fear of being duped; -independence of spirit;-and impertinence [ Cf. Fénelon and Chateaubriand].How the book of Maxims was written, —and that it is a quintessenceof the " precious " spirit. -Mme de Sablé's dinners, her " soups" andher " preserves " [ Cf. Cousin, Mme de Sablé, pp. 105, etc].-The way in which the Maximes were raved over in Mme de Sable's salon. Thisvogue was due, so far as the subject matter of the Maxims isconcerned, to the same intellectual tendencies that prompted thepsychological analysis in Mlle de Scudéri's novels; -and so far astheir style is concerned, to the prevailing taste at the Hôtel de Rambouillet. -La Rochefoucauld's early writings: his Portrait parlui-même, 1659; —his Mémoires, 1662; —and, in this connection , ofthe state of mind of a man who publishes his memoirs during his lifetime. The preparatory stages through which the Maximes passed.—They are communicated to the author's friends [ Cf. Gilbert, in hisedition, vol. i. , pp. 372-398]; -they are even made public without beingactually published [ Cf. Willems, Étude sur la 1re édition des Maximes,1864] . Whether this manner of sounding opinion was as commonas some have alleged?Of the value of the Maximes, and that it has been strongly overrated.-Does La Rochefoucauld possess a system or merely a " doctrine ”?—That if he possess one, it merely consists in blaming men in generalfor the defects of his own character. -The Maximes do no more thansum up his own experience of life; -and his experience is limited inthree directions; -by his immense ignorance; -by the comparativenarrowness of the circle in which he moved; -and by his indifferenceto momentous questions. Some of his maxims are commonplace170 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREthough disastrous troubles of the Fronde, the court, thesovereign, and his youthful following of brilliant menand women were bent on amusement, eager for pleasureand possessed by an almost frenzied desire to taste lifeto the full. In what Mme de Motteville described asthe " enchanted " gardens of Versailles and Fontainebleau, a thousand intrigues began and ended, complicated and crossed each other, to the indignation ofthe cross-grained champions of virtue, of those whom[ Cf. Gilbert's edition, Max. 2, 31, 79, 132, 134, 174, etc. ] .-Repetitionsin the Maximes [ Cf. on the subject of love, 74, 76, 77 , 136, or on thesubject of fortune, 53, 57 , 58, 60, 165, 470] .- Absence of compositionand order in the Maximes. -The style of the Maximes and its conformity of idea with the " precious " style [ Cf. 4, 115, 175, 252, 355,etc. ] . Whether this preciosity does not degenerate in places intononsense [ Cf. 69, 78, 97 ] .-But there remain a few maxims thatdeserve their reputation:-for real ingeniousness [ Cf. 165, 182, 218];-for vivacity [ Cf. 19, 367 , 370]; —and above all for clearness. -Thatthis last quality, which, up to then, had been extremely rare, doubtless assured the success of the book.Did La Rochefoucauld collaborate with Mme de La Fayette?—Thestatement in Segraisiana: " Mme de La Fayette used to say of M. deLa Rochefoucauld: ' I have to thank him for my wit, but it is I whoregenerated his heart.' "-The earlier novels of Mme de La Fayette:La Princesse de Montpensier, 1660; -Zayde, 1670; -La Princesse deClèves, 1672; -Mme de Scudéri's evidence on this point [ Cf. Correspondance de Bussy- Rabutin, Lalanne's edition , iii . 340] , —andconfusion must be avoided between Mme de Scudéri, the wife ofGeorges, and Madeleine, her sister- in- law. That after a thoroughexamination it is difficult to find any trace of the hand of LaRochefoucauld in the Princesse de Clèves; —-that it is merely truethat both the Princesse de Clèves and the Maximes are naturaloff- shoots of the " precious " spirit, though of a slightly differentorder; and that there is no trace either in the one or in the otherof " Cartesianism ";-while it is easy to point to traces of " Jansenism "in them [ Cf. the preface to the first edition ] .Of La Rochefoucauld's place in the literature of his time; —and ofthe impropriety there would be in making him out " a great writer. 'A"great writer " is always abundant and fertile, and above all offersTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 171Molière attacked in Tartuffe, perhaps with the consentof the king and in any case greatly to his satisfaction.It seemed says an historian, whose idea I should be lothto borrow without giving it in his own words "it seemedas if pleasure were eager to encircle with its garlands andto deck with its flowers the throne whose possession it wasjealously disputing with fame " [ Cf. Walckenaër, Mémoiressur Madame de Sévigné, vol . ii . , Paris, 1844] . The timepassed in a perpetual succession of banquets, repasts ,greater variety than La Rochefoucauld did. -That on this account,and in every sense of the word, he may be called " a writer of raretalent":-rare by reason of his sterility; -rare by reason of hisoriginality;—and finally, when he is at his best, rare by reason of hisexquisite qualities.3. THE WORKS. -Portrait de M. la Rochefoucauld in the Portraitsde Mlle de Montpensier, 1659; -Mémoires de M. D. L. R. , Cologne,1662, Vandyck; -Réflexions ou sentences, et Maximes Morales, TheHague, 1664, J. and D. Stencker, reprinted by M. Alphonse Pauly,Paris, 1883, D. Morgand. -Still the genuine " original " edition isthat of 1665, Paris, Barbin.La Rochefoucauld has also left some minor works or fragmentswhich, according to their nature, are included in the editions either ofthe Mémoires or of the Maximes; -and about a hundred Letters .The last edition of the Maximes that appeared under his ownsupervision was that of 1678, containing 541 maxims instead of 314;-the best edition of his works is that of MM. Gilbert and Gourdault,Paris, 1868-1883, Hachette.II.-Jean-Baptiste Poquelin de Molière [ Paris, 1621; † 1673,Paris] .1. THE SOURCES .-Bayle's Dictionnaire, article POQUELIN, 1695;-Grimarest, La Vie de M. de Molière, 1705; -Baillet, Jugements des savants, No. 1520, vol. v. in the edition of 1722 -thebrothers Parfaict, Histoire du théâtre français, vol. x. 1747; -J. Taschereau, Histoire de la vie et des ouvrages de Molière,1825, and the 5th edition, 1863; -Bazin, Notes historiques surla vie de Molière, 1847, 1848, 1849, 1851; -Soulié, RecherchesConsult M. Paul Lacroix, Bibliographie Molièresque. Paris, 1875, Auguste Fontaine.172 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREpromenades, carousals, water parties, " river baths,'masquerades, concerts, comedies and ballets , whencearose and assumed definite shape, not without someprejudice to morality, a new politeness, less studiedand freer than that of old, equally removedFrom the rigorous virtue of the remote agesand from the ceremoniousness of preciosity, both ofwhich it rendered ridiculous in a different way but tosur Molière et sur sa famille, Paris , 1803; -Jal, Dictionnairecritique de biographie et d'histoire, articles BÉJART and MOLIÈRE ,1864 and 2nd edition , Paris, 1872; -J. Loiseleur, Les Points obscursde la vie de Molière, Paris, 1877;-L. Moland, Molière, sa vie et sesouvrages, 2nd edition, Paris , 1885;-Henri Chardon, Monsieur deModène et Madeleine Béjart, Paris , 1886; -G. Larroumet,La comédie de Molière, l'auteur et le milieu, Paris , 1887;-PaulMesnard's Notice forming volume x. of the Molière in the collection ofthe Grands Ecrivains de France, 1889; —G. Monval, Le Moliériste,ten volumes, 1879-1889. [ The brochures dealing with Molière's staysin the various provincial towns he visited are too numerous for a listof them to be given here, but almost all of them are referred to in thelast five works] .Vauvenargues, Réflexions critiques sur quelques poètes, 1746; —Diderot, Entretiens sur le Fils naturel, and Essai sur la poésiedramatique, 1758; -Rousseau, Lettre sur les spectacles, 1758; —Chamfort, Eloge de Molière, 1769; -N. Lemercier, Cours analytiquede littérature, 1810-1816, vol . iv.; -Schlegel , Cours de littérature dramatique, 1809-1814; -Sainte-Beuve, Portraits littéraires,1835; Port- Royal [ bk. iii . , ch. 15 and 16]; and Nouveaux Lundis,1864;-P. Stapfer, La Petite Comédie de la critique littéraire, Paris,1866; Louis Veuillot, Molière et Bourdaloue, Paris, 1863 and 1875;F. Brunetière, La Philosophie de Molière [ Etudes critiques, vol . iv . ]and Les Epoques du théâtre f cais,-Jules Lemaitre, Impressionsde théâtre, 1886-1896.F. Génin, Lexique comparé de Molière, Paris, 1845; -Paringault,De la langue du droit dans le théâtre de Molière, Paris, 1861; -Alexandre Dumas fils, preface to Un père prodigue, 1868; -EdmondScherer, Une hérésie littéraire, 1886; -Ch. Livet, Lexique comparéde la langue de Molière, Paris, 1895-1897.MOLIÈRE. ( Mignard. )

THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 173an equal extent. This new politeness speedily exertedits influence, at first on manners, which became at oncemore elegant and more natural; on the language, of whichit completed the refinement; on the sentiments, whichbecame more subtle and more complicated. The successof the Misanthrope in 1666, of Andromaque in 1667, ofAmphitryon in 1668 was the outward evidence of itstriumph. It spread throughout the capital, and beforelong even to the provinces; and still further afield , abroad,V. Fournel, Les Contemporains de Molière, Paris, 1863-1875.Samuel Chappuzeau, Le Théâtre français, with a preface and notesby G. Monval, Paris, 1876; -Eugène Despois, Le Théâtre françaissous Louis XIV. , 4th edition , Paris, 1894.2. THE MAN AND THE POET.A. His youth and his years of apprenticeship and travel [ Cf.Goethe, Wilhelm Meister] .- Molière's family;-his father, JeanPoquelin, and his mother, Marie Cressé; -second marriage ofMolière's father, 1633; -Molière's studies at Clermont College; -itis untrue that the Prince de Conti was among his comrades there;-on the other hand, he frequented the household of Luillier, of whomChapelle was the natural son [ Cf. Luillier's Historiette in Tallemantdes Réaux, vol. iv. , and the notes of Paulin Paris]; —and that there heperhaps became acquainted with Gassendi; —who most certainly wasnot a Cartesian. -Did Molière, in a well -known passage of theMisanthrope,La malpropre, sur soi de peu d'attraits chargée, &c. ,translate a not less well- known passage of Lucretius?-and that inany case others had imitated the passage before him; -among themDesmarets in his Visionnaires and Scarron in his Japhet d'Arménie.-The company frequented by Molière in his early years was not thebest that was open to a young man of the middle class in 1640;-while the company he kept became still worse when he made theacquaintance of Béjarts [ Cf. Jal in his Dictionnaire, and HenriChardon, Monsieur de Modène, etc . ] -He gives up his post of valetattached to the royal household and becomes an actor, 1643; -Founding of the Illustrious Theatre, 1643; -the enterprise is unsuccessful;-a second theatre started in the Croix Noire tennis- courthas a still shorter existence; -Molière is imprisoned for debt, 1645.-174 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREin the petty German courts and on the restored throneof the Stuarts, it became for the whole of Europe theexample and lesson it was for France.The truth is the change marked an epoch not onlyin the history of manners, but also in the fortunes ofFrance. Amid all these innovations, amid the verypleasures in vogue, the action of the sovereign wasmaking itself felt by the energy of his will , the fixityof his purpose, the ubiquity of his regard, and the mightChanges in the troupe and departure of Molière for the provinces,end of 1646 or beginning of 1647.His tour through the provinces [ Cf. Chardon , La troupe du Romancomique dévoilée, Paris, 1876 ] .-He plays successively: -1647, atCarcarsonne, Toulouse, and Albi; —1648, at Nantes, and Fontenayle- Comte; -at Angoulême? —at Limoges? [It will be remarkedthat Limoges is the only French town of which Molière specificallymentions a street in his plays]; -1649, at Toulouse and Narbonne; —1650, at Agen; -and why this stay at Agen authorises the belief thatprior to it Molière gave two or three representations at Bordeaux[ Cf. Etudes critiques , v. i . ]; —1651, at Pézenas and Carcarsonne; —1652, at Lyons; -1653, at Lyons , La Grange des Prés [ Cf. Mémoiresde Daniel de Cosnac]; -1654, at Montpellier, Lyons and Vienne?;-1655, at Montpellier, Lyons, and Pézenas; -1656, at Pézenas,Narbonne, and Béziers; -1657, at Béziers, Nimes, Lyons, Dijon,and Avignon; -1658, at Grenoble and Rouen.-On October 24 ofthe same year, Molière plays for the first time in the presence ofthe king, " in the guard-room of the old Louvre, " the pieces represented being Nicomede and the Docteur amoureux.The advantages Molière derived from his years of travel. -In thefirst place, he learnt his profession in the course of his tours; -and,in this connection, that it is strange that it should have occurredto no student of Molière to draw up a list of the pieces in whichhe acted. There would be several ways of setting about this task,for instance -an effort might be made to ascertain what playswere successful in Paris between 1646 and 1658; -and to ascertain who were the authors with whom the Béjarts were personallyacquainted [ and at least three of them are known: Rotrou, Magnon,and Tristan l'Hermitte]; -and, finally, his library might be searched[ Cf. E. Soulié, Recherches] for plays, which he seems to haveTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 175of his arm. He had done more than merely acceptas the natural heir the authority which had been, asit were, stored up for him by Mazarin and Richelieu;he had taken it over with the intention of keeping itintact in his own hands. In the place of ministersthere were to be more managing clerks! Counsellorswere to give way to courtiers! He was to have nomore equals, not even abroad, but instead, on thebanks of the Thames or amid the sands of Brandenimitated in his own pieces, but in which he does not appear tohave acted in Paris [ Cf. Desmaret's Visionnaires; Gilet de laTeyssonnerie's Le Déniaisé; Cyrano's Le Pédant joué] .-Otheradvantages derived by Molière from his tours. -During the wars ofthe Fronde he saw the provinces in naturalibus; —and, in thisconnection, of the services rendered literature by revolutions. —As a"Bohemian " and an actor, he was well placed to observe the comicside of life from an independent standpoint; -and to gauge socialinequalities; the foolishness of the great; —the power of resistanceor of inertia of prejudices. -Finally, as actor, author, and themanager of a company he learnt what responsibility meant;-amatter of which his friend La Fontaine, for example, will never haveany conception; -while, if a certain bitterness resulted from thesemanifold experiences, it is to this bitterness that he owes thesuperiority of his genius.B. Molière's plays.That there are at least two reasons why the language in whichthey are written should be studied first of all; -the first is thatMolière's language is almost the only point on which Molière isstill taken to task at the present day; -and the second, that it isprimarily as a writer that he contrasts with those who preceded him,Pascal excepted. -Alexandre Dumas is mistaken in thinking thatMolière would be reproached with making an involved use of sentencesbeginning with the relative pronouns “ qui " and " que. " [ Cf. prefaceto Unpère prodigue] .-On the contrary, he is blamed: —for not havingan organic style [ Scherer ]; -for mixing his metaphors [ Scherer,Fénelon, La Bruyère]; —for being " abominably " addicted to the useof " chevilles, " that is , of expressions introduced solely with a viewto filling up a line or to obtaining a rhyme [ Scherer]; -for beingincorrect in his grammar [ Vauvenargues, Bayle, La Bruyère ] .-It176 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREburg, mere "pensioners " and " clients." A bare fiveor six years sufficed to achieve these results. Underthe influence of this sovereign action, the establishmentof order was witnessed, peace was seen to reign in theprovinces, justice to penetrate there, honesty to resumeits sway in business transactions, commerce, industry andthe arts attracted and transplanted into France fromFlanders or Italy, to make a fresh and vigorous start.France speedily became the richest and most populous ofmay be rejoined: that many of his grammatical blunders are notblunders at all, as is the case with those with which Voltaire findsfault in Corneille [ Cf. his Commentaire] or Condorcet in Pascal [ Cf.Éloge de Pascal]; -that it is true that " chevilles " abound in hisverses, because he writes too rapidly; -on the other hand, strictadherence to metaphors is a characteristic of that " preciosity " ofwhich he openly declared himself the enemy [ Cf. the metaphors ofSaint- Simon or Montaigne]; —while, to conclude, the " organic style "is not proper to comedy. -Again, it was impossible that Arnolpheshould employ the same language as Agnès, Agnès as Armande,Armande as Angélique; -the fact is, Molière's style adapts itself tothe character of his personages; —it is a dramatic and a comic style;-or, in other words, it is primarily expressive of the truth ofthe characters .-Had Molière written like Terence, he would onlyhave been half himself. -Further, for reasons of temperament; -of extraction;-and of personal experience of life , Molière's style is:-middle- class, which distinguishes it from Racine's style; -" affluent,"to use Saint- Beuve's expression , which distinguishes it from Regnard'sstyle [ Cf. J. J. Weiss, Eloge de Regnard]; —it is " life-like, " whichdistinguishes it from Boileau's style, which, though it issues from thesame source, remains " bookish "; -finally, and since it is throughoutprosaic, a feature that distinguishes it from La Fontaine's style ,Molière's style is eminently realistic or " naturalistic."The naturalism of Molière; and how it shows itself in the firstplace in his attitude; —if his two first plays be excepted; —and it bestudied in Les Précieuses ridicules, 1659; Sganarelle, 1660; L'Ecoledes maris, 1661; L'Ecole des femmes, 1662; Critique de l'école desfemmes, 1663; Impromptu de Versailles , 1663; and the Tartuffe of1664.-" Précieux " and pedants; -nobles and commoners; -actorsand authors; -courtiers and ecclesiastics;-prudes and grotesqueTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 177all the European states, and when, after a campaign ofa few months, the treaty of Aix-la- Chapelle consummatedwhat had been accomplished in the Pyrenees and inWestphalia, there was at once no more brilliant Courtthan that of Louis XIV. , and no sovereign better obeyedby his subjects, or more admired, more feared and moreenvied by his rivals than this monarch of twenty- nine!It is not surprising, under these conditions, that the"men of letters " should have admired him with the restcharacters , all those whom he attacks in these works are thosewho disfigure and tamper with nature; -are those who interposepedantic rules or respect for prejudices between art and the representation of life; —and are more especially those who claim to putnature under restraint or to discipline it. -Nature cannot be transformed; and the vanity of the efforts that are made to transformit is the source whence Molière draws his comic effects. -This consideration, too, accounts for his showing himself independent ofrules;-and of foreign writers; -an end to plays of the stamp ofBertrand de Cigarral or dom Japhet d'Arménie! —It is for thesame reason that Molière attacks Corneille and the " great comedians," those of the Hôtel de Bourgogne; —since they do not workfrom the living model; -but set themselves an ideal of which wecannot verify the excellence by comparing it with nature.That this naturalism is also met with in Molière's philosophy; —for there is a connection between these principles and those of the"libertines ";—and those of Montaigne and Rabelais [ Cf. above, pp.59 and 88] . In his earlier plays and down to Tartuffe, Molière doesnot appear to doubt for an instant of the goodness of nature; —and,in any case, he prefers leaving nature to itself to endeavouring tomake it " unnatural. " -The signification of Tartuffe, -[Cf. Stendhal,Racine et Shakespeare; Louis Veuillot, Molière et Bourdaloue; abbéDavin, Les sources de Tartuffe, in the newspaper Le Monde, August 2,13, 15, 22, 27 and September 3, 15, 19, 1873; Louis Lacour, LeTartuffe par ordre de Louis XIV. , 1877]; —and that to understandthe indignation the play aroused, attention must be directed moreparticularly to the character of Orgon. -Both Jansenists and Jesuitsare taken to task in the play;-while it is beyond question that religion is attacked in it, so far as religion be conceived as a restraining principle. "-Of the reasons Molière had to believe that he was13178 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREof their contemporaries, and that like them, they shouldhave resolved of a common accord to lend him obedience,or, if a nobler, —and perhaps a more just, -expression bepreferred, that they should all have gravitated towardsthis rising sun, as to a natural and inevitable centre ofattraction. Their interests, even the interests of theirart, and their concern for their dignity invited themto adopt this course. Admitting, for example, thatapproved by Louis XIV.; -and of the vexations which Tartuffeprocured him.That these vexations coincide with the critical period of Molière'slife; with his connubial misfortunes; -and with the early stagesof his illness .-Was his faith in his philosophy of " nature " shaken inconsequence? —The doubtful and almost enigmatical character of theplays he produced between 1664 and 1669: Don Juan, 1665; LeMisanthrope, 1666; Tartuffe (the second) , 1667; L'Avare, 1668;Georges Dandin, 1668.—The signification of these plays is not clear;-he seems to admit in them that nature sometimes stands in need ofbeing modified; he is doubtless undergoing the influence of the"politeness " in vogue around him; —and the obligations he is underas a courtier hinder him from following the bent of his temperament.-At last, however, the authorisation to play Tartuffe in public freeshim from this restraint, 1669; —and the absurdities of medical sciencestrengthen him in his ideas [ Cf. Maurice Raynaud, Les Médecins autemps de Molière]; —and his plays become as clear as ever they were.Monsieur de Pourceaugnac, 1669; Le Bourgeois gentilhomme,1670; Les fourberies de Scapin, 1671; Les femmes savantes, 1672;La Comtesse d'Escarbagnas, 1672; Le malade imaginaire, 1673.—How Monsieur de Pourceaugnac takes us back to the period of theEtourdi and of the Depit amoureux, especially if the Fourberies deScapin be considered together with it. Similarly the Femmes savantestakes us back to the Précieuses ridicules; -perhaps without therebeing any very excellent reasons at the time for the reversion; -andthe Malade imaginaire takes us back to the Médecin malgré lui.—Of the character of Molière's jests at the expense of doctors, -andthat the essence of his quarrel with them is that he blames them forwishing to be more skilful than nature. -Nature cannot be " patchedup" when once it is " broken up, "--but rather to attempt to patch itup is to break it up altogether [ Cf. Malade, iii . , sc. 3] . "NatureTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 179they stood in need of a Mæcenas, who should securethem the boon of leisure, -and how could it be otherwiseat a period at which the idea had not occurred to menthat a writer might live by his pen?-the protection ofthe king relieved them of the necessity of being the servants of some nobleman or rich citizen, exempted them forthe future from writing " dedications à la Montauron, ” andgave them a definite, though doubtless still a modest rank66has veiled our eyes too closely to allow of our fathoming the mysteries of our frame. . . . When a doctor talks to you of ... againputting the natural functions in full working order . . . he is tellingyou a medical fairy tale. . . . When we are ill, nature of itselfcontrives to find a way out of the trouble with which it is beset."Finally, in Molière's art, ―his naturalism shows itself by his choiceof his subjects, which are less and less complicated. There is butvery little ' matter, " to use the expression Racine will shortlyemploy, and scarcely any plot in the Misanthrope, 1666; in L'Avare,1668; in Le Bourgeois gentilhomme, 1670; in La Comtesse d'Escarbagnas, 1672; in Le Malade imaginaire, 1673; -or where there is asemblance of a plot, as in the Femmes savantes , it is of no interest;-and, in this connection, of the endings of Molière's plays. In thesecond place, whereas up to Tartuffe Molière introduced none butindividual characters into his plays, in his later pieces he is constantlydepicting " the family "; -as in L'Avare; Georges Dandin; Le Bourgeois gentilhomme; Les femmes savantes; Le malade imaginaire; —and the reason is , that it is only in our relations with others that ourludicrous traits and our vices come into full view and bear all theirconsequences . In the third and last place Molière widens more andmore his field of observation, so as to make it include the whole ofhis experience of life:—for instance his knowledge of the provinces inPourceaugnac and La Comtesse d'Escarbagnas; —of the middleclasses in Le Bourgeois gentilhomme; -of the semi-middle class inGeorges Dandin.-It is as if one were to say that in each successivework he summoned a greater number of spectators; —and a greatervariety, to judge of the truth of his delineations;-and to recognisethemselves, their children and their neighbours in the pictures oflife he offers them. This is the explanation of the bitterness thatunderlies a portion of his work; -and, in this connection, ofthe connection between Naturalism in literature and Pessimism.—Whether this connection, perceived by Molière, did not oblige him,180 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREin the social hierarchy. In view of these benefits, ofwhat importance is it that some indulgence in flatterywas the price of this protection? And who will arguethat Molière, Boileau, Racine, and their fellow writerswould have been the greater had they been wanting ingratitude? In reality they were well aware that in apurely aristocratic society neither their talent nor theirgenius would have sufficed to allow of their accomplishfrom fear of finding himself writing drama, to give more and moreroom to buffoonery in his later works: Monsieur de Pourceaugnac,Le Bourgeois gentilhomme, Le Malade imaginaire: —and whether ameasure of sadness is not inherent to all observation of life that is inany way deep?How Molière escaped the consequences of his naturalism; —and tobegin with he did not always escape them; -as for example inGeorges Dandin or in Le Malade imaginaire.—Still, being absolutelyin need of the protection of Louis XIV. , he endeavoured to fall inwith the latter's tastes; and, in this connection of Molière as acourtier [ Cf. Tartuffe and Amphitryon].- How his principle of subordinating his situations to his characters was yet more efficaciousin saving him from his naturalism;-because there are few"characters " in nature, few Tartuffes , Harpagons or Alcestes; -butthere are the beginnings of such personages in everybody; -and todevelop these beginnings to the full is to add something to nature; —and to outstrip nature while imitating it [ Cf. the " types " in Balzac'snovels, in Eugénie Grandet or Le Père Goriot] .-That the ideal doesnot consist solely in the representation of beauty;-but also in theportrayal of characters or of types. -Add to this that most of themore important of Molière's comedies are written to some extentin support of a thesis; -and a thesis , in the drama as in the novel,implies that the writer criticises nature while imitating it; -not to goso far as to say that he proposes to correct nature. This is exactlyMolière's case; and to this circumstance is due the " satirical 'force of his comedy. -Finally, Molière wrote in general in verse; —and prosaic as his verse may be in general, -there are things it isimpossible to express in verse.19C. Molière's influence;-and that in no branch of literature hasthe influence of a writer been more considerable upon the worksbelonging to that particular branch. -His influence on Regnard; theFolies amoureuses is merely the Ecole des femmes travestied bytheTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 181ing their work in liberty, of their enforcing the esteem oftheir adversaries, or of their triumphing over the resistanceof the coteries and of opinion. Without the protection ofLouis XIV. , Molière would have succumbed to the hostility of his enemies; and it was the king in person whoovercame the disinclination of the courtiers of the formerrégime to admire the masterpieces of Racine. They allof them preferred Corneille; and to say nothing here ofintroduction, after the Italian fashion , of disguisements and lazzi; —theLégataire universel is merely a skilful combination of the Maladeimaginaire and the Fourberies de Scapin.-His influence on LeSage:-Turcaret is merely a combination of the Bourgeois gentilhomme and the Comtesse d'Escarbagnas; —and Gil Blas itself ismerely a comedy of Molière related in narrative and presented inthe form of a novel. -His influence was not less great abroad [Cf.Macaulay, Le Théâtre anglais sous la Restauration ] . Fielding'scomedies are merely " adaptations " of the comedy of Molière; --andthe same must be said of one of the masterpieces of English drama,Sheridan's School for Scandal [ Cf. Louis Moland, Histoire posthumede Molière]. We again meet with the influence of Molière inBeaumarchais' masterpiece, which is Le Barbier de Séville [ Cf. forthe central idea L'Ecole des femmes, and for the subsidiary details ,for instance, for the scene of the singing master, the Malade imaginaire] .—In consequence, one might almost say that for the past twohundred years a comedy has been good in proportion as it hasresembled the comedy of Molière; —and mediocre or bad in proportion as it has differed therefrom; -or, in other words, that for twohundred years Molière's comedy has determined the form of " European comedy."On the other hand Molière has exerted less influence on ideas, —and,as will be seen later on, his attacks on preciosity were entirelyunavailing [ Cf. Roederer, Mémoire sur l'histoire de la société polie].—Why it is that women do not care for Molière. -Was he successfulin his attacks on religion?-This, also, does not seem to have beenthe case; even his attacks on affected piety were unsuccessful;—admitting his Tartuffe to be almost nearer the truth as a picture ofthe manners of French society in 1690 than as a picture of thosemanners in 1665 [ Cf. La Bruyère].-But he was most unsuccessful ofall in his attacks on doctors; indeed, it is since he scoffed at themthat doctors have come to be accepted as veritable guides in matters182 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREthe cabal of the two Phédre, who is not acquainted withMme de Sévigné's estimate of the author of Andromaque?I fear, too, that had the times been different, such writersas Chapelain and Montausier would have caused the authorof the Satires to be well beaten, to the damage of theirreputation and to that of the shoulders of the poet. And,finally, ought we to-day to underrate the extent of the services rendered French literature by Louis XIV. , renderedalmost without an effort, I mean by the sole effect of hisof conscience. -Ought the conclusion to be drawn from Molière'sfailures that art should have no other object but itself?No, if a number of persons continue to regard Molière as their masterin the matter of conduct. -The exaggeration on this score of Molière'sadmirers , —and of Sainte- Beuve himself [ Cf. Nouveaux Lundis, vol. v. ,1864] . A remark of Goethe [ Cf. Conversations with Eckermann]; —and that neither the perfection of Molière's masterpieces, -nor thetrials of his existence should blind us or prevent us calling attention tothe limitations of his genius. His philosophy consists in part in caricaturing or deriding all delicacy [ Cf. Bossuet, Maximes sur la Comédie,and Rousseau, Lettre sur les spectacles]; —and that this fact is theexplanation of his failure in his conflict with preciosity; -since the"precious " spirit represented in part a legitimate resistance to naturalcoarseness, and Molière did not refrain from scoffing at this feature ofpreciosity. Whether it can be said that this hatred of preciosity isthe very essence of the Gallic genius [ Cf. Renan, La Farce de Pathelin, and La Théologie de Béranger] .-That a still graver error ofMolière, and another error that is perhaps inseparable from theGallic genius, lies in his having persistently set himself against everyidea of restraint and discipline.It is our master that is our enemy,This I tell you in plain French. . .He must not be reproached with having lacked nobleness andelevation; -since one does not go to comedy for lessons in elevationor nobleness; the higher sentiments not coming within its scope; -and as much may perhaps be said of too studied politeness . — Still,the greatness of Molière would not suffer had he here and there beenless forcible or even less violent when making his points. -And hisplays might have inculcated a less easy- going morality.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 183example and authority, when it is remembered that heobliged men of letters, by causing them to mix with thecourtiers, to rid themselves little by little of a certain middleclass self- sufficiency, of a certain rusty pedantry with whichthey were still besmeared, so to speak; that in this wayhe secured their admission into the ranks of politesociety; and that it is due to him that they acquired, bycoming in contact with and frequenting statesmen andmen and women of fashion , a number of qualities which3. THE WORKS. -It will suffice to enumerate here those of Molière'sworks to which we have not had occasion to refer above. They are:Le Médecin volant, and La Jalousie du Barbouillé, two sketches ofdubious authenticity: -Dom Garcie de Navarre, 1661; Les Fâcheux,1661; La Princesse d'Elide, 1664; Le mariage forcé, 1664; l'Amourmédecin, 1665; Le médecin malgré lui, 1666; Mélicerte, 1666; LeSicilien, 1667; and Les amants magnifiques, 1670; -two pieces ofverse: Le Remerciement au roi and La Gloire de Val- de- Grâce; —and in the last place his Prefaces and Dedications and his Petitions tothe King in connection with Tartuffe.The principal editions are, as regards original editions or editionsdeserving to be regarded as such, the edition of 1666; —that of 1673;—that of 1674; —and that of 1682 by Lagrange and Vivot. These foureditions form a first connected batch to which may be added theElzevir editions. The edition of 1682, which some publishers adoptas their standard even to - day, is as incorrect as it is ugly.Next in order come: the edition of 1734 [ with the commentary ofJoly and La Serre and Bouchers' illustrations] 6 vols. in 4to, Paris,Prault; and the edition of the " Librairies associés " [with Bret'scommentary and Moreau's illustrations ] , Paris , 1773. The first is thefiner, and the second the more estimable.Among the many modern editions may be cited: A Regnier'sedition, 5 vols. 4to, Paris, 1878, Imprimerie Nationale; -and theedition in the series of the " Grands Ecrivains, " edited by MmeEugène Despois and Paul Mesnard, Paris, 1873-1893, Hachette,11 vols. in 8vo.III.-Jean de La Fontaine [ Château- Thierry, 1621; † 1695,Paris].1. THE SOURCES. -Baillet, Jugements des savants, vol . v. of the edition184 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREare not come by as a rule in the back parlour of amaster upholsterer " or in the household of a clerk ofthe Courts?For it is at this juncture that under the combinedinfluence of all these causes, French literature becomesat once really human, in the widest sense of the word,and really naturalist or natural. What is more " natural "than the comedy of Molière unless it be the tragedy ofRacine; and what is more human? It is by this chaof 1722, No 1551 [ Cf. Furetèire's second Factum]; -Louis Racine,Mémoires sur la vie de son père, 1747; —Matthieu Marais, Histoirede la vie et des ouvrages de la Fontaine, published for the first timein 1811;-Walckenaër, Histoire de la vie et des ouvrages de LaFontaine, Paris, 1820, 1822, 1824, 1858; -Paul Mesnard's biographicalnotice preceding the La Fontaine in the series of the " GrandsEcrivains," Paris, 1883.C. Robert, Fables inédites des XII , XIIIe et XIVe siècles andFables de La Fontaine, Paris, 1825; -Lessing, Abhandlungen überdie Fabel [ 1759] , vol . viii . of the collected edition of his workspublished by Göschen, 1868, Leipsic; -Saint- Marc Girardin, LaFontaine et les Fabulistes, a series of lectures delivered in 1858-1859,and published in 1867, Paris; -Max Muller, La Migration desfables, in his Essais de mythologie comparée, London and Paris,1870.Chamfort, Eloge de La Fontaine, 1774; -Taine, La Fontaine etses fables, Paris, 1853–1860; -Sainte- Beuve, Portraits littéraires,vol. i . , 1829, and Causeries, vol. xiii. , 1857; -G. Lafenestre, LaFontaine in the " Grands Ecrivains français " series, Paris, 1895.Damas- Hinard, La Fontaine et Buffon, Paris, 1861;-P. deRémusat, La Fontaine naturaliste, in the Revue des Deux Mondes,December 1, 1869; Nicolardot, La Fontaine et la Comédiehumaine, Paris, 1885.-Marty-Laveaux, Essai sur la langue de la Fontaine, Paris, 1853:-Th. de Banville, La Fontaine, 1861 , in Crépet's collection ofFrench poets, vol. ii . , and at the end of the 2nd edition of his Petittraité de poésie française, Paris , 1881 .2. THE ARTIST, THE MAN AND THE POET.-The first part of LaFontaine's life [ 1621-1660].-His neglected education; -his sojournat the Oratory; his marriage [ 1647]; -and that were it not forTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 185racter of humanity that the work of these writers differsfrom, though at the same time it be a continuation of,the tragedy of Corneille, the novel of La Caprenède andthe burlesque comedy of Scarron, -l'Ecolier de Salamanqueor Dom Japhet d'Arménie, —and as La Fontaine says inspeaking of the Fâcheux:We have changed our method,Jodelet is no longer in fashion,And now it is incumbent on usTo follow nature with the utmost closeness .Molière, he would doubtless have been merely a " Précieux " and a"libertine. "-His adaptation of the " Eunuch " of Terence, 1654.-He is pensioned by Superintendent Fouquet, 1657.-His Sonnets,Madrigals, and Ballads. His poem Adonis [ Cf. the Adonis of Shakepeare], 1658.-Le Songe de Vaux, 1658; -Elegie aux nymphes deVaux, 1661.-La Fontaine's relations with Molière , Boileau, andRacine [ Cf. the prologue to Psyché, and Scherer, Le Cabaret duMouton blanc in his Etudes critiques].—He exchanges the protectionof Fouquet for that of the Duchesse de Bouillon [ Cf. Amédée Renée,Les Nièces de Mazarin] .-The first of the Contes, 1664–1666; —andthe early Fables, 1668.La Fontaine's character. -His easy- going nature and his egoism; -his lack of dignity; -his parasitism . -What would have become ofthe social status of the man of letters if there had been many LaFontaines?-La Fontaine's " riskiness " (gauloiserie); —and what isto be understood by this word [ Cf. Taine La Fontaine et ses fables].—Of the danger that might attach to treating La Fontaine with toomuch indulgence; —that his Contes are, in general , unwholesome productions; and that he contrives to be even more licentious thanBoccaccio, where he follows his text [ Cf. Marc Monnier, La Renaissance de Dante à Luther, Paris, 1884].-The reception accorded theContes by his contemporaries. -That La Fontaine's naïveté prevented him neither from depicting himself as a beau in the prologueto Psyché; -nor from having amply sufficient cunning to allow of his"eating the bread of idleness "; -and how, in defiance of morality,some of his finest qualities were the outcome of his very defects.A. The Artist. -A remark of Mme de la Sablière on the subject of"the Fablier."-For the very reason that he never took life seriouslyand that he lived, as it were, outside it, life for him was never anythingmore than a spectacle. -In what respect this disposition of mind is186 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREIt is well understood, however, that this close imitationof nature shall be confined to the copying of the mostgeneral and permanent characteristics observed in it,and shall not include the rendering of any of the accidental features, of the exceptions and deformities thatdistort or corrupt it, -that make nature, in fact, " unnatural. " Indeed, although there is no doubt that aman who is one- eyed, lame, or humpbacked, is still aeminently that of the " artist " [ Cf. G. Flaubert, Préface pour lesœuvres de L. Bouilhet]; —and that this disposition, coupled with LaFontaine's desultory existence, explains how it was that his Fableswere works of a character unique at the time. -Corneille had beena writer with a purpose; -Molière had written in support of this orthat thesis and had engaged in conflicts; -La Fontaine merely aimedat depicting what pleased him; -or even had no aim whateverexcept that of pleasing himself. This attitude affords the key tothe character of his alleged satire; -and Taine's exaggeration onthis score. That men are perverted and that women are gossips;-that the rich are insolent, and that the poor are invariably obsequious;-that the great abuse their authority and that the humbleallow themselves to be trodden on; —or, finally, that the lion is theking of animals, and that the ass is eternally a dupe; -that such thingsshould be, never irritates La Fontaine or arouses his indignation; -andyet that they should do so is the primary condition of satire . -Satirecannot exist unaccompanied by a moral purpose. -La Fontaine merely"observes"; he never passes judgment. His maliciousness never goesfurther than the amusement a poor philosopher may find in convictingthe great of this world of foolishness; —he is of opinion, too, that whatever is human, since it is " natural, " has an equal claim upon theattention of the artist; -and in this way his artistic epicureanism leadshim insensibly to naturalism.B. The Naturalist. —That in applying this word to La Fontaine, itwould be going too far to make it mean that he was a curious observerof the habits of animals [ Cf. Paul de Rémusat, La Fontaine naturaliste]; it is even a question whether he was a very close observerof their habits . Of scientific truth and poetic truth . -That, in anycase, it is sufficient that La Fontaine's animals should be somethingmore for him than mere human beings in disguise; —and in point offact, they fulfil this condition . They possess for him a very individualand clearly defined character; -they have their peculiar outwardTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATUFman, it is held, and quite rightly, not altogether thsight or the representation of such beings is painful, butthat they themselves fall short, as it were, of the definitionof a man. Similarly, while the reality of an Attila, of aJodelet, or of a Dom Japhet d'Arménie is not denied, -though the denial might be made, were it desired, —it isheld that the characteristics which distinguish these personages from ordinary mortals, cause them to be exceptions,aspect; -and more especially they have idiosyncrasies. -But indescribing him as a naturalist what is meant is: That in his case, hiscuriosity with respect to and the freedom with which he imitates naturewas never restrained or moderated; -by any necessity of "playing thecourtier"; by obligations of the kind which the exigencies of the stageimposed on Molière and Racine;--or by any moral consideration .-Itresulted that his interests were wider than those of many of his contemporaries; —and in consequence that his work contains and depicts moreof nature than the work of any of his contemporaries. -They, for theirpart, merely depicted man and not even the whole of man;-thereverse is the case with the La Fontaine; -who goes to the length ofshowing us man in attitudes he had better have left alone. He alsodepicted animals; -a circumstance which gives life to his fablesand distinguishes them from the jejune Aesopian fable [ Cf. Lessing,Abhandlungen].-He also introduced into his work the stars, the sky,water, an entire " exterior nature, " which is absent from the work ofhis contemporaries. Herein lies the charm of his work; -and it isthis characteristic that renders it eminently suitable, in one respect atleast, and despite what has been said to the contrary [ Cf. J. J. Rousseau,Emile] for the education of children. -Children derive from anacquaintance with La Fontaine's fables much the same benefits asfrom visits to a zoological garden; -and supposing children to learnfrom the fables that " people must not be judged by appearances, " orthat "humble folk are the victims of the folly of great personages, "what harm is done? —The same characteristic of familiarity is alsomet with in his style. However studied his style may be it is stillthat of a " naturalist "; -owing to the freedom with which he chooseshis words; he does not draw the line at words of any class; -owingto his rare employment of abstract terms, or to his happy way ofaccompanying such terms with popular expressions; and, finally,owing to his free and easy phraseology, he is always more inclinedto follow the dictates of sensibility than the rules of logic.188 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREand place them outside nature and humanity. This is allas yet for care must be taken not to confound one epochwith another! Nothing more is aimed at than to pleasethe average man. But to please him it is necessary in thefirst place to enter into his feelings, and since it isimperative that we should ourselves have experiencedthese feelings before we can be acquainted with themand before we can give them expression , it comes aboutHowthe " naturalism " of La Fontaine brings him into touch withMolière; and that both of them have the same " philosophy ";-though in the case of La Fontaine it is less reasoned than in that ofMolière. La Fontaine is a practical but not a militant Epicurean;-he is as much of the school of Saint- Evremond as of that of Molière,-more concerned with enjoying life than with preaching; -andsufficiently easy- going not to be ruffled when fortune elects totrouble his enjoyment. However, he is above everything else a poet; —and it is this last characteristic that definitely distinguishes him fromcertain of his illustrious contemporaries.C. The Poet. -A first proof that he is essentially a poet is his choiceof irregular or " lyric " verse; —and, in this connection , of the depictingor expression of sentiment by means of diversity of rhythm. -TheAlexandrine only became " lyrical " by becoming " romantic, " that isto say by abandoning classic uniformity.-Of La Fontaine's versification [ Cf. Théodore de Banville, La Fontaine] .—Lamartine's strange opinion on this subject; -and that when he blamed La Fontaine for his"unequal " verses, he had doubtless forgotten for howmany such verseshe was responsible for himself. -The poet is also recognisable in LaFontainein the discreet but perpetual intervention of his own personalityin his work; it is he in person who acquaints us with his tastes andhis mode of life, —who even gives us information as to his furniture; —and this is another lyrical characteristic, in view of the limitationsimposed on lyricism by the taste of the time. —Add the gift of depicting, of calling up before the eye, material objects; —the rhythm,harmony, and music of his verse; —and the higher gift, displayed evenin his Contes, of stripping reality of what is too material about it, ofspiritualising it . -There are verses of his which are a landscape in themselves:But you are born most oftenOn the watery shores of the kingdoms of the wind . . .THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 189that what is unusual or singular is eliminated little bylittle from the conception of literature. " What, Boileauis about to ask, is a new thought? It is in nowise, as theignorant are disposed to believe, a thought nobody has everhad, or that it is improbable has ever occurred to anybody:on the contrary it is a thought that must have occurred toevery one." This point established, let us call to mind oneof the Satires or Epistles of Boileau himself, one of thecomedies of Molière, the Ecole des Femmes or the MisanThere are others that evoke a season of the year:When the mild zephyrs have renewed the grassand there are others which, while they caress the eye and charm theear, transport us into dreamland and the realm of illusion:Softly cradled by calm vapours,Her head on her arm and her arm on the cloud,Letting flowers fall, and not strewing them ...If these qualities make of him a man " unique in his kind," do they sever all connection between him and the literature of his time?—No; and his artistic ideal is in close conformity with that of hisillustrious contemporaries. -By his general mode of thinking he is ofthe family of Molière and of Boileau; -by his mode of depicting andof expression he is of the family of Racine; -and we have said that tostart with he belonged to the school of Voiture and Racan. -The maindifference between him and his contemporaries lies in the fact that hewrote more especially for himself; —which is doubtless permissible inthe Fable as in the Ode; —while it is not permissible in the drama.The last years of La Fontaine. -Admiration aroused by his Fables;--and why did Boileau make no allusion to them in his Art poétique?-Suppositions on this score; -and that in any case the Dissertationsur Joconde relieves us of the necessity of regarding the fact in a lightunfavourable to Boileau. -The successive editions of the Contes:1667; 1669; 1671; 1674; -The lieutenant of police decides to confiscate them. The Fables of 1678 [ books, 7 , 8 , 9 , 10, and 11] .—Testimony of Mme de Sévigné. -The incident in connection with theAcademy, 1683.-—Did La Fontaine keep the promise he had made "tobe on his best behaviour "?-The Aveux indiscrets and the FleuveScamandre. -His relations with Mme d'Hervart, -with the Vendôme190 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURE .thrope, one of the tragedies of Racine, Andromaque orBajazet, one of the fables of La Fontaine, Les Animauxmalades de la Peste or Le Meunier, son Fils et l'Ane, oneof La Rochefoucauld's maxims or one of the sermons ofBossuet or of Bourdaloue. Different as these works maybe, their chief merit is to belong to all periods and to allcountries, to depict man in general and not merely theFrenchman of the seventeenth century, to be natural inthat they are human, human because they are natural,ญfamily [Cf. Desnoiresterres, Les cours galantes and La jeunesse deVoltaire]-with Mme Ulrich [ Cf. Euvres de la Fontaine, Regnier'sedition, letters 26 and 27] .— That it is unfortunate that we shouldknow nothing of the poet's last protectress except what we learn fromthe police records. The illness and conversion of La Fontaine in1692. He takes to writing pious poetry. His last letter to his friendMaucroix, and his death.3. THE WORKS. -In addition to his Fables, of which the dates ofpublication have been given above, La Fontaine is the author:-(1)of five books of Contes, of which the dates have also been given;—(2)five Poems: Adonis, 1658, published for the first time in 1669;Quinquina, 1682; La captivité de saint Malc, 1673; Philémon et Baucis; and Les Filles de Minée, 1685;—(3) various poems, includingsix Elegies, nine Odes, thirteen Ballads, twenty- five Epistles , and anumber of Dizains, Sizains, Chansons, Madrigaux, etc.;—(4) someminor works in prose, interspersed with verse: Psyché et Cupidon;Le Songe de Vaux [a fragment]; Lettres à sa femme; —and (5) hisDramas, of which there are twelve in all, from his adaptation ofL'Eunuque, 1654, to the two first acts of a piece entitled Achille,published for the first time in 1785. La Fontaine was destitute ofdramatic genius.The separate editions of the Contes and of the Fables are toonumerous for it to be possible to give even the principal of them here,and we shall confine ourselves to mentioning, on account of thebeauty of their illustrations, the edition of the Fables, 1735–1759, 4vols. in folio, illustrated by Oudry; -and the edition of the Contesknown as that of the " Fermiers Généraux," Amsterdam [ Paris] , 1 vol.in 8vo, 1762, illustrated by Eisen.The best editions of the complete works are: the successive editionsbrought out by Walckenaër, who made the life and works of LaTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 191Indeed-were I not afraid of the expression appearingsomewhat metaphysical, -I would say of these worksthat they are fragments of nature and humanity shownunder their eternal aspect.Their human character does not prevent them beingnational at the same time: and by the word national Iwould express three things, which go together, but whichit is possible and necessary to distinguish. Henceforthour writers esteem, that were they to take lessons fromFontaine his own special property as it were, Paris, 1822, 1826, 1835,1838, 1840; -Marty- Laveaux' edition , in the " Bibliothèque Elzévirienne, " Paris, 1857-1877; —and H. Regnier's edition , in the " GrandsEcrivains " series, Paris , 1883-1892 , Hachette.IV. Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet [ Dijon, 1627; † 1704, Paris].1. THE SOURCES. -Lévesque de Burigny, Vie de Bossuet, 1761;-Cardinal de Bausset, Histoire de Bossuet, Paris, 1814; -Floquet,Études sur la vie de Bossuet, Paris, 1855; and Bossuet précepteur duDauphin, 1864; -Abbé Guettée, Journal [ 1 vol . ] and Mémoires [ 3vols. ] de l'abbé Le Dieu, Paris, 1856; -Abbé Réaume, Histoire deJacques-Bénigne Bossuet, Paris, 1869; -Abbé Delmont, Quid conferant latina Bossuetii opera ad cognoscendam illius vitamParis, 1896.P. de la Rue, Oraison funèbre de Bossuet, 1704; —Maury, Essai surl'éloquence de la chaire, 1777; —Dom Deforis , in his notices precedingthe volumes of the first edition of Bossuet's sermons, 1772; —Jacquinet, Les Prédicateurs du XVIIe siècle avant Bossuet, Paris ,1863 and 2nd edition , 1885: -Abbé Vaillant, Études sur les sermons deBossuet, Paris, 1851; -Gandar, Bossuet orateur, Paris, 1867; andEdmond Scherer's review of this book, Études, 1867; -Abbé Lebarq,Histoire critique de la prédication de Bossuet, Paris, 2nd edition ,1891;-Freppel, Bossuet et l'éloquence sacrée au XVIIe siècle, Paris ,1893.Gérin, Recherches sur l'assemblée du clergé de France en 1682,Paris, 1870, 2nd edition; -Abbé J. T. Loyson, L'Assemblée du clergéde France en 1682, Paris, 1870 [ Cf. the books of J. de Maistre, DuPape and De l'Eglise gallicane, the second of which in particular isdirected against Bossuet].Voltaire, Essai sur les moeurs; -Turgot, Discours de Sorbonne and192 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREthe foreigner, from the Spaniards, or the Italians, astheir fathers had done and a few of their belated contemporaries were still doing, they would be false to theguiding spirit of the reign, and guilty of a public act ofingratitude to the sovereign who has accorded them hisprotection. It is for this reason that they refuse toconsider the works, which had been most admired by thepreceding generation, -Tasso's Gerusalemme liberata orGeorges de Montemayor's Diane enamourée, for exampleFragments historiques , vol. ii. of his collected works; -Herder, Idéessur la philosophie de l'histoire de l'humanité.Rébelliau, Bossuet, historien du protestantisme, Paris, 1891Abbé Bellon, Bossuet, directeur de conscience, Paris, 1895.Abbé de la Broise, Bossuet et la Bible, Paris , 1890.Th. Delmont, Bossuet et les saints Pères, Paris, 1896.Tabaraud, Supplément aux histoires de Bossuet et de Fénelon,Paris, 1822;-A. Bonnel, La controverse de Bossuet et de Fénelon surle quiétisme, Mâcon, 1850; -Guerrier, Madame Guyon, sa vie et sadoctrine, Paris, 1881: —Crouslé, Bossuet et Fénelon, Paris, 1894.Sainte-Beuve, Causeries du lundi, vol . x. , 1854; vol. xii . , 1856; vol.xiii. 1857; and Nouveaux lundis, vol. xii. -Poujoulat, Lettres surBossuet, Paris , 1854; -G. Lanson, Bossuet, Paris, 1891.2. THE LIFE, THE RÔLE AND THE INFLUENCE OF BOSSUET. -Bossuetnever having written a line that was not an act, the history of his lifeis inseparable from that of his work. -His birth, and that it isimportant to keep in view that he came of a family of magistrates;—his studies at Dijon [ collège des Godrans]; -and in Paris at thecollege of Navarre and at the Sorbonne. -He is ordained priest andappointed archdeacon of Sarrebourg, 1652; —his sojourn at Metz [ Cf.Floquet, vol. ii . and Gandar, Bossuet orateur]; -and that it is atMetz, from 1653-1659, that he, as it were, fixed on almost all hisideas. -Did Bossuet traverse a period of doubt?—and in what sensethe question must be understood. -An observation as to his characterand that few men have less resembled their style. That it does notappear, however, that his doubts ever shook the foundation of hisfaith. To what extent his perplexities resembled those of Pascal andto what extent they differed from them. -Of Bossuet's predilection forSaint Chrysostom among the Greek Fathers, and for Saint Augustinamong the Fathers of the Latin Church.-Whether, in the course ofTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 193-otherwise than as the obstacle which has hindered themtoo long from being themselves. To appreciate this feeling, it is only necessary to read Boileau's Dissertationsur Joconde, -which is one of his first works, and tonote with what assurance he accords La Fontaine thesuperiority over Ariosto, in a case were the former istreating a subject borrowed from the latter! His attitudeis tantamount to a declaration that in a work of art thesubject is of no account, while the style is all important;his studious life, he did not somewhat neglect the study of men?-Difference in this respect between him and Pascal. -His firstpublished work: La Réfutation du catéchisme de Paul Ferry, 1665.-His first sermons [ Cf. Gandar, and more especially Lebarq, Histoirecritique].-He takes up his residence in Paris , 1659.A. Bossuet's Sermons. -The history of Bossuet's sermons [ Cf.Lebarq, Histoire critique ] .— He preached in Paris: -in 1660, theLenten sermons at the Minimes of the Place Royale; -in 1661 , theLenten sermons at the Carmelites of the Faubourg Saint- Jacques; —in 1662, the Lenten sermons before the Court; -in 1665, the Adventsermons before the Court; -in 1666, the Lenten sermons before theCourt; -in 1668, the Advent sermons at Saint-Thomas du Louvre;-and in 1669 the Advent sermons before the Court. -The Oraisonfunèbre de Nicolas Cornet, 1663, and the funeral oration on the Queenof England, 1669, must be included in the same period. -The lattersermon is the second work he published, at the desire of Madame theDuchesse d'Orléans. -Bossuet's three " manners. "-The first is moreespecially "theological and didactic " [ Cf. Sermon sur la Bonté et laRigueur de Dieu; —Premier sermon pour Vendredi Saint; —Panégyrique de saint Gorgon; —Panegyrique des saints Agnès gardiens] .—The sermons in this manner are longer than those that followed them;more encumbered with dissertations; -less skilfully composed; -theyoffer too a realism of expression that is sometimes excessive:--but forthis very reason they are more " coloured. " -The masterpiece of thisfirst manner is the Panégyrique de saint Paul, 1657-in which moreover the second manner is foreshadowed. This second manner ismore especially "philosophic and moral ";-although not at all"lay " on this account; moreover, these distinctions are not to betaken too literally [ Cf. the sermons: sur la Providence, 1656 and1662,-sur la Mort, 1662, —sur l'Ambition, 1662 and 1666,—sur le-14194 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREand since it was generally admitted that we were justified in regarding the Greeks and more especially theRomans as ancestors rather than as foreigners, it is byfreeing itself, by means of originality of style, from allforeign influence, that our literature takes the first steptowards becoming truly national.It makes further progress in this direction by developinghenceforth, out of its own resources, and shut off, as itwere, from every external influence, certain more deepDélai de la conversion , 1665, —sur la Justice , 1666, -pour lafête de laToussaint, 1669 ] .-Bossuet, like Pascal, endeavours to prove thatreligion, independently of the numerous other reasons that make beliefin it incumbent, is of all the " philosophies " that which offers thebest explanation of man and nature. —The composition is at oncefreer and more original; -the style, while perhaps less coloured,has more spaciousness and movement, is more oratorical, or it mayeven be said more " lyric. " -Finally, and if only the sermons properbe taken into account, the third manner might rather be describedas homiletic, " by which is meant less strained, more indulgent,and above all less imperious;-in the sermons in this mannerthere is less of the spirit of the Bible or of the Old Testament and moreof that of the Gospels [ Cf. the sermons: pour la Pentecôte,—(thethird) pour la fête de la Circoncision, -(the third) pour le jour deNoël] . The sermons in this last manner are fewer in number; -doubtless because Bossuet had come to improvise with greater ease;and it must be remembered that they were contemporary with themost important Funeral Orations.66Did Bossuet's contemporaries appreciate his sermons at their fullvalue?-Evidence on this subject [ Cf. Études critiques, vol. v. ,l'Éloquence de Bossuet] .—In any case it seems that the glory of thecontroversialist was prejudicial to that of the orator. -To say ofBossuet that he was too superior to his audience to be appreciated byit, is to make a strange mistake with respect to listeners who werePascal's readers and Racine's spectators. —A remark of Nisard on thissubject. It is also not to recognise the way in which eloquence exertsits influence. That if, as Voltaire declares, " Bossuet ceased to beaccounted the first among the preachers from the moment Bourdaloueappeared, " the reason is very simple; -it is that Bourdaloue made hisappearance in the Paris pulpits just as Bossuet was leaving them, —THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 195lying qualities it is somewhat difficult to define, but the"national " character of which is evinced by the circumstance that foreigners, to whom they do not appeal, areblind to them. Among them are some of the qualitieswhich Frenchmen esteem more highly, perhaps, than anyothers in Racine: depth and subtlety of analysis andmoral observation; a style of apparent but studied negligence, and of a suppleness that may be said to respond tothe most hidden movements of passion; harmony ofand was only to mount them again at rare intervals; -owing to hisbeing appointed bishop of Condom, 1669; —and tutor to the Dauphin,1670.B. Bossuet's rôle at Court. -He publishes his Exposition de ladoctrine de l'Église sur les matières de controverse, 1671; —he endeavours to estrange Louis XIV. from Mmede Montespan; -his " Lettersto the King," 1675; -his " Letter to Marshal de Bellefonds, " 1675.-Was Bossuet wanting in courage on this occasion?-and what could he have done in addition to what he did?-Of the education ofthe Dauphin, and of the way in which Bossuet conducted it [ Cf. theLettre au pape Innocent XI. , March 8 , 1679] .-The question of the"régale " and the assembly of the clergy [ Cf. Gérin and Loyson] .—Was Louis XIV. prepared to go as far as a schism?-The sermon surl'unité de l'Église, 1681.- How the parliamentary traditions of hisfamily; his education at the Sorbonne; -the complaisance of afaithful subject and of a good Frenchman; —and the idea he hadformed of Pope Innocent XI. , induced Bossuet to take up the attitudehe adopted on this occasion. -Characteristic remarks of Joseph deMaistre in his book, de l'Église gallicane [ bk. ii . , ch. 8] .- The fourarticles.-Marriage of the Dauphin, 1680; -Bossuet is appointedchaplain to the Dauphine, 1680; -and the following year bishop of Meaux.C. The Discours sur l'histoire universelle. -Of all the writingsBossuet composed for the education of the Dauphin, the Discours isthe only one Bossuet published himself. His reasons for publishing it; and that they are analogous to those which led Pascal to composehis apology. Of the criticisms of which the Discours has been theobject, and that some of them do not take into account that theDiscours which has come down to us was to have been followed bya second;-that others are the consequence of the Discours not196 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURE.proportion; and in general all the qualities, which, itmust be admitted, the oratorical character of his tragediesseems to place beyond the ken of all those who are notof French birth. To the same category belong certainof the qualities ofBossuet. Universal justice is renderedto the vigour and precision of his language; he is admiredas an historian and as a controversialist; and homage ispaid the orator, who was more abundant than Cicero andmore nervous than Demosthenes. I am not certainbeing read aright, and of its second part being neglected: the partentitled La suite de la Religion. —And yet this second part is themore important; -in this sense, that in it Bossuet replies: to theattacks of the "libertines " on religion; —to Spinoza's Traitéthéologico -politique; -and to the new- born exegesis of Richard Simon.-Beauty of the scheme of the Discours. -Simplicity, vigour, andmajesty of the style . —To what extent has modern erudition destroyedthe value of the Discours sur l'histoire universelle? -Confession ofRenan on this point; and that the final effort of his " philology " wasto recognise that there were only "three histories of paramountinterest: Grecian, Roman, and Jewish "; and that in consequenceto lead up from the two first to their point of contact with the third,even though it be only a method, is the right method. -That, thispoint conceded, Bossuet's judgments on particular incidents retain areal, " scientific " value; -and contain observations, the justice anddepth of which have not since been surpassed. -It should be addedthat he founded the " philosophy of history as a part of Europeanliterature [ Cf. Robert Flint, La Philosophie de l'Histoire] .9999D. Bossuet's leading idea: the reunion of the Churches.-Whatwere his reasons for believing this reunion possible. -Numerous conversions in which he had a share. The conversion of Turenne.—Difficulties experienced by the Protestants in refuting the doctrine ofthe Exposition. -The Conference avec M. Claude, 1682.-The greatOraisons funèbres. -The progress of " libertinism and the Oraisonfunèbre d'Anne de Gonzague. —The Oraison funèbre de Michel LeTellier and the repeal of the Edict of Nantes. -That just as the ideaof Providence dominates all Bossuet's philosophy, so the idea or thedream of the reunion of the Churches dominates all his controversialwritings . That this circumstance explains: -his indulgent attitude[Cf. Ingold, Bossuet et le Jansenisme, Paris, 1897 ] towards Jansenism;THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 197whether the fund of naturalness, of simplicity, and I willventure to say of familiarity, that underlies the splendour of his inimitable eloquence is appreciated outsideFrance, where it may be, too, full justice is not done tohis remarkable freedom, from rhetoric, artificiality, andself- sufficient literary vanity. ) Again, to take La Fontaine, how many foreigners are there who understand therare admiration we have for the unique combination heoffers of easy-going Epicureanism, Gallic maliciousness ,-his severity towards the Casuists; —his rôle in the assembly of 1682;-and his apologetic method. -In his opinion only one questionseparates Protestants and Catholics: the question of the Church; -and his only reason for writing his Histoire des variations was toshow by what sure signs the true Church is to be recognised.-E. The Histoire des variations des églises protestantes, 1688.-Recent discussions on this subject [ Cf. Rébelliau, Bossuet historien];and that Bossuet showed himself a true historian in this great work.His solid erudition; -his acute and impartial criticism. -Moreover, inthis book, which is too little read, are to be found some of the finest passages Bossuet ever wrote. The portraits in the Histoire desvariations; the narrative passages; -the dialectics. - Sobriety,vigour, and fluency of Bossuet's style. Effect produced bythe Histoire des variations. It is attacked by Burnet and byJurien in his Lettres pastorales . -Bossuet replies to Burnet inhis Défense de l'Histoire des Variations, 1691;-and to Jurien by his Avertissements аих Protestants, 1689-1691 . In whatsense the Avertissements form a constituent part of the Histoire desvariations. The three first Avertissements [ Cf. Pressensé, Les troispremiers siècles de l'Église chrétienne; and Ad. Harnak, Lehrbuch derDogmen Geschichte, 2nd edition , Fribourg, 1888-1890 ]; -the fourth Avertissement dealing with Christian marriage; -the sixth Avertissement; and whether in it Bossuet did not foresee, point out anddescribe in advance, the evolution of contemporary Protestantism?—That in any case the problem continues to turn upon the reconciliation of Protestant individualism with the pretension of Protestantismto found churches. Of the masterly clearness of Bossuet's treatmentof these difficult and obscure questions; -and that even in his sermons there is nothing more oratorical than in the Avertissements or in theHistoire des variations.198 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREand unalloyed poetry? Above all they have a difficultyin comprehending how it is that a writer who, more thanany of his fellows, " went to the ancients for his inspiration " should be "the most French of our poets "; thata collection of Fables, every one of which is borrowedfrom a foreign source, should yet be wholly creativework throughout.There is still another point, however, for in my opinionthe most national feature of all these works is preciselyF. Other works of Bossuet. -His Defensio cleri gallicani [ posthumous work].-His Défense de la tradition et des saints Pères directedagainst Richard Simon. -Bossuet's respect for tradition. -Opinion ofthe Brandenburg envoy upon Bossuet's rôle [ Cf. Ezéchiel Spanheim,Relation de la cour de France en 1690] .-Correspondence withLeibnitz [ Cf. Foucher de Careil, Euvres de Leibnitz, vols. i. and ii. ,Paris , 1867 ] . The Maximes sur la comédie, 1693. — The Quietist episode.-How Bossuet came to be mixed up in it without such being his intention. Importance of the question , and how it was complicated by apolitical question [ Cf. A. Griveau, Étude sur la condamnation du livredes Maximes des saints , Paris, 1878] . The party of the Dauphin andthat of the Duc de Bourgogne [ Cf. the correspondence of Madameduchesse d'Orléans] .- Of Bossuet's rôle in the controversy. -Hisconception of mysticism.-His writings: Instruction sur les Étatsd'oraison, and Relation sur le quiétisme, 1697-1698. -That if duringthe heat of the conflict he was wanting in " charity, " his adversarieswere wanting in frankness. -The last years of Bossuet [ 1700-1704] .—He finishes off the works he had long had in hand. -He finishes hisPolitique; his Élévations and his Méditations; —he resumes writinghis Défense de la tradition et des saints Pères. —His work as a directorof consciences . His family preoccupations and his weakness for hisnephew. His solicitations of the king. -His death.G. The Élévations sur les mystères and the Méditations surl'Évangile. The conditions under which these two works werewritten; and that Bossuet's aim was to embody in them thesubstance of his sermons. -He resorted to the same process in hisPolitique [Cf. the sermons: sur les Devoirs des rois, and sur laJustice] .-It is possible , too, that in the Meditations and the Élévations there is something of what Bossuet had had to learn over again in order to combat Fénelon. -Plan of the Élévations and of theTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 199the impossibility by which we are confronted of distinguishing in them between what is properly and purelyFrench and what is universal . They possess the qualityof universality, and yet it is inconceivable that they shouldhave seen the light except in the France of the seventeenth century! While belonging to all times and toevery country, not only are they of their own time andtheir own country, but the fact that they are so seemsto constitute a part at least of their originality. In thisMéditations.-Originality of the former work and its philosophicalimport. The first " weeks " of the Élévations contain some ofBossuet's finest inspirations. —Of the accent of tenderness there isin the Méditations; —and, in this connection, of Bossuet's gentlenessof character. -Testimony on this point: -of Père de la Rue in hisfuneral oration; -of Abbé Le Dieu in his Journal; -of Saint- Simonin his Mémoires. -That the very letters of the Élévations and theMéditations are evidence of the lyric element there was in Bossuet'stemperament [ Cf. Vigney's Élévations and Lamartine's Méditations] .-That for this reason the Élévations and the Méditations, takentogether, are perhaps the most " personal " of Bossuet's works;-and in this way by leading him back to the preoccupations of hisearly years they give his life an harmonious ending: -after the enthusiasm of his youth, the agitation, the cares, and the conflicts of hismaturity;-perhaps, too, the weaknesses;-and to end with hisretirement into the sanctuary of lofty ideas and of hope.H. Of the influence exerted by Bossuet on his contemporaries,—and of the injustice of the reproach that has been addressed him [ Cf.Sainte- Beuve, Port- Royal, and Renan in his introduction to Kuenen'sHistoire de l'Ancienne Testament] of not having foreseen Voltaire.—How, on the contrary, a part of his work is directed against the“ libertines ”; —how the object of another part is to prevent theincrease of the difficulties in the way of belief; -and how finallyanother part proves that he was alive to the fact that the chief dangerrun by religion lay in the division among Christians [ Cf. Sermons surla Vérité de la réligion, 1665; -Oraison funèbre de la PrincessePalatine, 1685;-Lettre à un disciple du P. Malebranche, 1687; —Sixième Avertissement aux protestants , 1691 ] .—That he also foresawwhat would be the outcome of Richard Simon's method of criticism;-and that he cannot reasonably be found fault with for not having200 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREsense they are the equivalent of the Italian painting ofthe Renaissance or of the Greek sculpture of the bestperiod, the very universality of whose masterpieces isproof of their national character, since, although theyhave been imitated everywhere, they have nowhere beeneven reproduced, let alone equalled . The case is thesame with Racine's tragedies or Molière's comedies; andthe fact that it is difficult to explain this mystery is noreason for denying it . Above we said of these works thatadmitted with the " father of modern exegesis " that the Bible is abook of the nature of the Iliad or the Ramayana. -That in realityBossuet was the master for nearly a century of orthodox thought;—in consequence, it is against him that the " philosophers " will soondirect their principal efforts; -and for this reason Voltaire cannot beunderstood without a previous acquaintance with Bossuet3. THE WORKS. -The works of Bossuet, which form some fortyvolumes [in the Versailles edition ] may be divided into ExegeticalWorks;-Works of Edification and Piety; -Controversial andPolemical Works; Works composed for the instruction of theDauphin; -and Miscellaneous Works.A. His Exegetical Works scarcely come within our scope, as theyare written in Latin; —while those written in French, —such as hisExplication de l'Apocalypse, 1689; and his two Instructions sur laversion du Nouveau Testament imprimé à Trévoux, —also form part,and even more properly, of his Controversial Works.B. His Works of Edification and Piety, not including his PastoralWorks, which moreover are inconsiderable in number, comprise: hisOratorical Works, sermons, panegyrics and funeral orations; —hisÉlévations sur les mystères, his Méditations sur l'Evangile; —and hisLettres de direction.Of these works, only the six great Oraisons funèbres, 1670, 1670,1683, 1685, 1686, 1687; and the sermon, l'Unité de l'Église, 1682,appeared during Bossuet's lifetime.The Elévations and the Méditations, which he had himself intendedto have printed, did not appear until 1727 and 1730–1731 , when theywere published by his nephew, the bishop of Troyes.The Lettres de direction, almost all of which are addressed tonuns, and of which the most important are the Lettres à la sœurSainte- Bénigne [ Mme Cornuau] and the Lettres à Mme d'Albert deTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 201they were natural in so far as they were human; wenow have to say of them that they were national inso far as they were universal, and universal in so faras they were national.From these characteristics there proceeds or results athird, which explains the others and is explained by them.It consists in the fact that while all these works aremarked by a desire to please, they are animated as wellby the ambition to instruct; they are didactic or moralLuynes, were published the former in 1746 and 1748 and the latter in 1778.As to the Sermons, the majority o which exist in manuscriptat the Bibliothèque Nationale, they were first published between1772 and 1778 by Dom Deforis. They were revised by M. Lachatfor his edition of Bossuet's works, Paris, 1862, etc. Finally andmore recently they were again revised and classified for the firsttime in chronological order by M. l'abbé Lebarq for his edition ofBossuet's oratorical works, Paris, 6 vols. in 8vo, 1890-1896; Descléeand de Brouwer.C. The Works composed for the education of the Dauphin, orrather in connection with the education of the Dauphin, are: (1)the Discours sur l'histoire universelle, published by Bossuet himselfin 1681; (2) the Politique tirée des propres paroles de l'EcritureSainte, published by his nephew, together with the Lettre au papeInnocent XI sur l'education du Dauphin [ in Latin] , 1709;—(3) theTraité de la connaissance de Dieu et de soi-même, published for thefirst time in 1722, and ascribed to Fénelon, among whose papers ithad been discovered, and for the second, under the name of its realauthor, in 1741; -and (4) the Abrégé de l'histoire de France, whichappeared for the first time in 1747.It is the habit to put in this class the Traité du liore arbitre,published by the bishop of Troyes in 1731, but we find it difficultto believe that this work was written for the instruction of theDauphin.D. The Controversial Works include: ( 1) the works against theProtestants, of which the principal are: the Exposition de la doctrinede l'Eglise catholique en matière de controverse, 1671; -the Conférence avec M. Claude, 1682; —the Histoire des variations des églisesprotestantes, 1688; —the six Avertissements aux protestants, 1689–202 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREworks in the highest and the widest sense of each of thetwo words. It is only natural that this characteristicshould be perceived at a glance in a sermon of Bossuetor of Bourdaloue, in a chapter of Malebranche, or ina satire of Boileau, and it may even seem somewhat superfluous to call attention to its presence. It is already ofgreater interest to meet with the same intention in theMaximes of La Rochefoucauld or the Fables of La Fontaine, who of all these great writers is doubtless the most1691; —and the two Instructions sur les promesses de l'Église , 1700 and 1701. Hereto must be added the series of dissertations andletters, written with a view to reunite the Protestants of Germany tothe Catholic Church, published for the first time in 1753; completedin the successive editions of Bossuet's works; and by M. Foucher deCareil, in the two first volumes of his edition, left unfinished, ofLeibnitz, 1867 .2. The works relating to Quietism, of which the principal are:-Instruction sur les états d'oraison, 1697; —the collection entitled:Divers écrits sur les Maximes des saints, 1698; -and the Relationdu Quiétisme, 1698. -Add a voluminous Correspondence, which didnot appear until 1788, and which takes up three entire volumes ofthe Versailles edition.3. The works relating to the Gallican question , almost all of themin Latin.4. Finally, the works relating to Richard Simon, the principal ofwhich are the Instructions sur la nouvelle version du NouveauTestament donnée à Trévoux, 1702 and 1703; -and the Défense de latradition et des Saints Pères, which appeared in 1753.E. A last class may be formed of the Miscellaneous Writings andMinor Works and of the Correspondence of Bossuet. We shallconfine ourselves to citing among these writings: -the Maximes surla comédie, 1693; -the Traité de la concupiscence; -the Traité dulibre arbitre, 1731; -the Traité de l'usure, 1753; -and a considerablecorrespondence [ Cf. H. H. Bourreaud, Histoire des manuscrits et des éditions originales de Bossuet, Paris, 1897] .The best editions of Bossuet are the Versailles edition in 43 vols. in8vo, Versailles , 1815-1819, printed by Lebel; -and M. Lachat'sedition, 31 vols. in 8vo, Paris, 1862, Vivès. -Also Abbé Lebarq'sedition of the oratorical works, Paris, 1890-1896.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 203irregular, or whom indeed there is perhaps too common adisposition at the present day to regard as an exceptionin his time. As he was well aware " that in France onlywhat pleases is esteemed, " that " this is the chief andeven the only rule, " he was careful to observe this necessary condition! Elsewhere, however, he remarks: "Thesetriflings, he refers to his Fables and not, as might beimagined, to his Contes, these triflings are such inappearance only, for at bottom they have a very subV.-Jean Racine [ La Ferté- Milon , 1639; † 1699, Paris. ]1. THE SOURCES. -Racine's Correspondence, especially that withBoileau, in the majority of editions of his works;-Louis Racine,Mémoires sur la vie de son père, 1747; —Sainte- Beuve, Port- Royal,book vi. , chap. 10 and 11; -Paul Mesnard's biographical noticepreceding his edition of the works.Saint-Evremond, Dissertation sur l'Alexandre, 1670; -Longepierre,Parallèle de Corneille et de Racine, in Baillet's Jugement des savants,edition of 1722, vol . v. , No. 1553 [ the article was written in 1686]; —La Bruyère, in his Caractères, 1688; -Fontenelle, Parallèle deCorneille et de Racine, 1693; -Abbé Granet, Recueil de plusieursdissertations sur les tragédies de Corneille et de Racine, 1740; -the brothers Parfaict, Histoire du théâtre français, 1734-1749, vols.ix. , x. , xi . , xii.; —Stendhal, Racine et Shakespeare, 1823 and 1825:—A. Vinet, Les poètes français du siècle de Louis XIV. , Paris, 1861; —Sainte - Beuve, Portraits littéraires, 1830; and Nouveaux lundis,vol . iii . , 1862, and vol . x. , 1866; -Taine, Essais de critique et d'histoire,1858;-F. Deltour, Les ennemis de Racine au XVIIe siècle, Paris ,1859;-P. Robert, La poétique de Racine, Paris, 1890; -F. Brunetière, Histoire et littérature, vol . v.; Études critiques, vol. i.; andLes époques du théâtre français, 1893; -Jules Lemaître, Impressions du théâtre, 1886-1896; -G. Larroumet, Racine, in the " GrandsEcrivains français " series, 1897.Marty- Laveaux, Lexique de la langue de Racine, Paris , 1873, inthe 8th volume of Mesnard's edition.2. RACINE'S EARLIER YEARS. -His family.-Would it be suspectedthat he came from the same part of France as La Fontaine?—and inthis connection of the theory of environment. -His education at PortRoyal, and that he was the only one or almost the only one of the204 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREstantial meaning. And just as by the definition of apoint, a line and a surface, and by other very familiarprinciples we become acquainted with sciences whichenable us at last to measure heaven and earth, so by thearguments and consequences that may be drawn fromthese Fables the judgment and character are formed, andthe reader is rendered capable of great things. " Is itnecessary that I should point out, that supposing it wasnever the design of Molière to improve or purify """great writers of his time who had a thorough knowledge of Greek; -a knowledge that has left its trace upon his work, into the compositionof which there enters, let it be noted to start with, at least as muchcleverness and 66 virtuosity " as genius. His precocious taste fornovels; his early poems; -La promenade de Port- Royal, and,in this connection , of the sentiment of nature in the seventeenthcentury.-La Nymphe de la Seine, 1660; -Racine's stay at Uzès; —Les Stances à Parthénice, 1661-1662 [ Cf. Voiture's poemJe me meurs tous les jours en adorant Sylvie . . .Ubicini's edition, No. 9]; -the Ode sur la convalescence du roi andthe Renommée aux Muses. -None of these poems seemed to foreshadow a dramatic poet; -and at another period perhaps Racinewould have been only an elegiac poet; -or a novelist. -A compatriotand one of the youthful friends of La Fontaine, to whom he wasrelated [ by Mdlle Héricart, La Fontaine's wife] he might even havejoined the ranks of the Précieux had it not been for his liking foractors; -for the gatherings at the Mouton blanc; -for his thirst forfame, which at the time the drama was able to satisfy more completely than any other branch of literature; -for the facilities offeredhim by his friendship with Molière; —and for an inner warmth ofpassion or genius, which could not rest content with moderateemotions [ Cf. Sainte- Beuve, Port- Royal] .Racine's two first tragedies: the Thébaïde , 1664, —and Alexandre,1665; they procure him numerous enemies; -as many as the Cidhad formerly procured Corneille , while Corneille himself was prominent among them. -Racine's enemies are also those of Boileau andMolière. In spite of Racine leaving Molière's theatre for the Hôtelde Bourgogne, and of Corneille passing from the Hôtel deBourgogne to Molière's theatre, the situation remained the same.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 20566morals, at any rate his Tartuffe, his Misanthrope, or hisFemmes savantes are there to show that it was certainlyhis purpose to modify" or to " mould " them? In aword, it may be said that no great writer of this periodseparated the idea of art from that of a certain socialfunction or purpose. Far from affecting contempt forthe vulgar after the manner of the Précieux and thegreat writers of the preceding age, far from taking uptheir cry:Racine's estrangement from the leaders of Port- Royal; - andthat in writing his Lettre à l'auteur des Visionnaires, 1666,he seems publicly to take the defence of the Tartuffe partyagainst them [ Cf. , in the second letter, the passage referring toTartuffe, which would have left little doubt on the matter if theletter had been printed ] .- How the conflict came to lie between twodramatic schools or systems [ Cf. d'Aubignac, La pratique du théâtre ,1657]; and how the coinciding of the success of Andromaque, 1667with the failure of Attila heightens the antagonism. -Britannicus,1670, and the criticisms of Robinet, Boursault, and Saint- Evremond[ Cf. his letter to M. de Lionne] .—Madame, duchesse d'Orléans bringsthe rivalry of the two poets to a pitch, by pitting them against oneanother on the subject of Bérénice; —and, in this connection , of thecruelty that marked her thoughtlessness; —and how fortunate it isfor this frivolous and perfidious Henriette that she is defended byher funeral oration. The preface to Bérénice, 1670; —and how theradical antagonism of the two poetical systems is at last broughtclearly into view in it .3. RACINE'S POETICAL SYSTEM.A. The theory of invention. —Corneille had declared in the prefaceto his Héraclius [ edit. Marty- Laveaux, vol . v. , p. 147]: " I shall nothesitate to assert that the subject of a fine tragedy ought not to beprobable ";-and Racine replies to him: " Only what is probable iseffective in tragedy " [edit. Mesnard, vol . ii . , p. 147 ] .-Consequences ofthis principle. (1 ) The exceptional, extraordinary, and " complex "action found in Corneille's plays is replaced by a simple action, " butlittle burdened with matter," and turning upon everyday experiences[ Cf. the Cid, Héraclius, Rodogune, or Horace, on the one hand, andon the other Andromaque, Britannicus, Bérénice, Bajazet] .-- Fewmen have found themselves in the situation of Horace or of Rodogune,206 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURENothing is to my taste, except what is likely to offendThe judgment of the rude populace;they endeavoured, as is admirably explained by LaFontaine, to raise this " populace " to their own level.They wrote for " everybody "; and there has never beena doctrine more widely removed than theirs from whathas since been termed the paradox of art for art — inwhichever of its several senses the expression be taken.66--but many women have known what it is to undergo experiencessuch as those of Hermione or Bérénice, invitus invitam. —A stillmore decisive comparison is that between Andromaque and Pertharite,where the subject is the same; —or between Bajazet and Floridon[ Cf. Segrais, Les divertissements de la princesse Aurélie].— (2) Theimitation of living reality takes the place of romantic combinations.-Fontenelle's remark on the characters of Racine's personages,"which," he says, are only true to nature because they are commonplace "; —and it would be impossible to praise Racine more highly thanin this remark intended as a criticism. -Racine's heroes resemble ourselves; his invention is bolder than Corneille's in the measure inwhich his subjects are more commonplace; -more in touch withourselves; more akin to what goes on around us every day.—Of amistake of Taine on this point [ Cf. Essais de critique et d'histoire]-and that of the two, Corneille and Racine, it is assuredly Corneillewho is the " Précieux. " -(3) The very subject matter with which theinvention deals is regarded from a different point of view.-The objectis no longer to supplement reality, to embellish it, to arrange it inaccordance with " the grand goût "; -but to have a better insightinto it and to give it better expression. -Racine's singular predilection for subjects already dealt with [ Cf. Les Epoques du théâtrefrançais]; --and how he finds scope for his inventive faculty intreating such subjects . —Molière and La Fontaine regarded inventionin the same light; -and this is Fontenelle's grievance against them,when, as he says of Racine, he declares that they are " low by dintof being natural. "B. Of the psychology and art of Racine; -and in the first placethat they are inseparable; -as are Corneille's " dramatic system "and the "' quality of his imagination. " —Racine's principal concernis the depiction of character [ Cf. Molière in the Critique de l'ÉcoleTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 207The question, too, has been raised whether "the mostsignificant characteristics attaching to the glory of theseventeenth century are not the result of the generalmarch of civilisation , rather than of the influence anddestinies of France "? The question was assuredly worthputting. Moreover, if the answer made to it be-andsuch was the answer of the writer who mooted thequestion [ Cournot, Considérations sur la marche des idéesdans les temps modernes, vol. i. , Paris, 1872] -that "itdes femmes, and Boileau, Epître à Seignelay] .-Unprecedented importance given in his tragedy to the passion of love; —as being themost 66 common " or the most general of all; —as being the most"natural," and perhaps the most tragic [ Cf. Aristotle's remark onEuripides, whom he terms тpayukúrarоç]; -and finally as being thepassion which, while it remains identical in its essence, best displaysthe diversity of men's characters. -It is a fact that there are fewerways of being " avaricious " than there are of being " in love "; —the love of Hermione is different from that of Bérénice, and the loveof Iphigénie from that of Phèdre; -while the love of Néron is no lessdifferent from that of Titus, and the love of Achilles from that ofXipharés. -Voltaire's mistake on this point [ Cf. his Temple dugoût] .-How a new dramatic system arises out of this diversity in thedepiction of character, -a system based, as was clearly seen bySaint-Evremond [ Cf. his Dissertation sur l'Alexandre] , on thesubordination of the situations to the characters. -Comparison, inthis connection, between Rodogune and Bérénice. How all thepoints just enumerated are mutually interdependent, —and turn uponthe principle of probability. -Observations on this head; —and thatthere are entire schools that have based art upon "the exaggeration of the real relations between things. "C. Racine's style; —and ( 1) that it, too, obeys the law involved inthe principle of probability,-as regards its degree of naturalness, —and, in this connection, of a remark of Sainte- Beuve: " Racine's style, "he has said, " borders, as a rule, on prose, except as regards theinvariable elegance of its form. "-Accuracy and fruitfulness of thisobservation. The truth is there is no prose more simple, it mightalmost be said more bare than that of Racine [ Cf. his Abrégé del'histoire de Port- Royal]; -and in his plays it is to this same prosethat the passion of his character imparts colour, variety, animation,208 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURE·was the privilege of the France of Louis XIV. to be sosituated, that its own movement took the direction of themovement of Europe in general in such sort as tomake it the interpreter or the vehicle of the current ideasof the epoch, " if this be the answer given the question,a vivid light will certainly have been thrown on aperiod of the history of our literature, and more particularly a good deal will have been done to explain therapidity of its propagation . At the same time, how itwarmth, and fire.- (2) That the simplicity of Racine's style makesit an incomparable vehicle for psychological analysis; —and in consequence for complex sentiments, which it expresses in the mostusual words:I loved even the tears I made her shed [BRIT. ] .Take care of her, my hatred demands that she should live [ Baj. ] .That this mode of writing is exactly the contrary of that of thePrécieux;-who express very simple things in a very complicatedmanner.—(3) Further, that this simplicity is not prejudicial to theelegance and still less to the boldness of Racine's style; —and thatRacine is one of the most daring writers in existence; -his associations of words; -his ideas conveyed by masterly touches [ Cf. P.Mesnard, Étude sur le style de Racine] .—Other qualities of Racine'sstyle; -harmoniousness, life, colour, plasticity [ Cf. Epoques du théâtrefrançais]; —and that the pains he is at to conceal them again leadsus back, to finish with, to the principle of probability.4. THE SECOND PART OF RACINE'S LIFE.-Vexations caused him by hisMithridate, 1675; -his Iphigénie, 1675; —and finally by Phedre, 1677[ Cf. Deltour, Les Ennemis de Racine and Amédée Renée, Les Niècesde Mazarin] . The two Phèdre. -Whether the very daring of Racine'stragedies was not one of the causes of the implacable animosity of hisenemies?-People refused to admit the truth of his depictions of love; —and because they were too " true " they were held to be " excessive. "-Aremark of Subligny: " I should consider M. Racine very dangerousif he had made this hateful criminal ( Phèdre) as pleasing, and as muchto be pitied, as he desired to do. " -That sufficient stress has not beenlaid on this feature of Racine's tragedies; —and yet he was thoroughlyalive to it himself; -that in asking Arnauld to accord Phèdre hisapprobation, what he really demanded was an "absolution ";—andTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 209was that France came by this " prerogative " would stillremain to be accounted for; and, without entering onthis somewhat long inquiry, may it not be held that thecharacter of our literature, that of French civilisation ofthe time of Louis XIV. , and lastly the influence ofLouis XIV. himself are, even in this connection, effectsrather than causes? Can it be said that the ideas ofPascal or those of Bossuet, for example, were "inthe direction of the movement of Europe in general "?that having obtained it, it did not satisfy him. — Voisin's evidencein the affair of the Poisons [ Cf. Ravaisson, Archives de la Bastille,vi, 51] .—The innermost cause of Racine's conversion was his abhorrence of his own writings; —and it is for this reason that, havingonce turned his back upon the stage, he even ceased to concern himself with the new editions of his plays; -and that he devoted himself entirely to his historical studies, and to his family.His genius, however, far from waning after he had thus soughtretirement, gathered strength as its inspiration grew purer. -HisEsther, 1689, is sufficient to prove this; —and his Athalie, 1691.—Theconditions under which these two plays were written. -It is noteworthy that in choosing the subject of Esther, Racine resorted toa subject that had already been treated six times by previous Frenchdramatists. Success of Esther at Saint- Cyr, —and the vexation, inconsequence of Racine's enemies.-The changing opinions of Mme deSévigné [ Cf. the letters dated 1690] .-Disdainful criticisms of Mme deLa Fayette [ Mémoires] .—Athalie, 1691.-The criticisms redouble, —and Racine is more dissatisfied than ever.-In accordance with theopinion of Boileau and Voltaire, should Athalie be esteemed Racine's"finest work "?-Racine's last years. -Racine as an historiographerand as a courtier. -His intervention in the quarrel over the ancientsand moderns. His indifference to his own works [ Cf. the letter toBoileau, dated April 4, 1696] . " For a long time past God hasgraciously permitted that the good or evil that may be said of mytragedies scarcely moves me, and I am only troubled by the accountof them I shall one day have to render Him. "-He enters into closerrelations with the Port- Royal; and it is doubtless for this reason thathe forfeits the king's favour [ Cf. Louis Racine, Mémoires sur la vie deson père] . His death, April 21, 1699.5. THE WORKS.-It may properly be said of the works of Racine15210 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREWould not the statement apply rather to the ideas ofLocke or Grotius? Besides, what would be the explanation of the resistance, of the opposition encountered inFrance itself by Molière, Boileau, Racine and theirfellows, opposition over which, I repeat, they wouldnot have triumphed but for the personal interventionof Louis XIV.? But it is especially necessary toremark that the " century of Louis XIV. " scarcelylasted for more than twenty- five years, which is shortthat apart from his youthful poems and a few epigrams; —all,or almost all of which are extremely biting and malicious; —theyare confined to his eleven tragedies and to his comedy, LesPlaideurs.The principal editions are: -the edition of 1697, Paris, Barbin,whichit is in nowise certain was revised by Racine himself; the editionof 1743, Amsterdam, J. L. Bernard, with Abbé d'Olivet's observations;the edition of 1807, 7 vols . in 8vo, with Laharpe's commentary, Paris,Agasse; the edition of 1808, also in 7 vols. , with Geoffroy's commentary, Paris, Lenormand; -Aimé Martin's series of editions , 1820,1822, 1825, 1844, Lefèvre;-P. Mesnard's edition in the " GrandsEcrivains de France " series, Paris, 1865–1873, Hachette.VI.-Louis Bourdaloue [ Bourges, 1632; † 1704, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -Mme de Pringy, Eloge du P. Bourdaloue in theMercure galant, June, 1704; -Abbé Lambert, Histoire littéraire durègne de Louis XIV. , 1751, vol . i.; —Maury, Essai sur l'éloquence dela chaire, 1777.Vinet, Bourdaloue in the Semeur, 1843, and in his Mélanges; —Sainte- Beuve, Causeries du lundi, vol. ix.; -J. J. Weiss, Bourdalouein the Revue des cours littéraires, September, 1866; -Abbé Hurel,Les prédicateurs sacrés à la cour de Louis XIV. , Paris, 1872; —A.Feugère, Bourdaloue, sa prédication et son temps, Paris, 1874; —Father Lauras, S.J. , Bourdaloue, sa vie et ses œuvres, Paris, 1881;-Abbé Blampignon, Etude sur Bourdaloue preceding his Choix deSermons du P. Bourdaloue, Paris, 1886; -H. Chérot, S.J. , Bourdaloue inconnu, in Études Religieuses, Paris, 1898.Louis Veuillot, Molière et Bourdaloue.2. THE ORATOR. -Absence of information respecting his early years;THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 211measure for a century, if only the number of yearsbe considered, but the period will seem longer whenit is borne in mind that there was not one of thesetwenty-five years that was not rendered illustrious by theappearance of a masterpiece. We have no sooner climbedone side of the hill , than we have to descend the other;and why should we complain of this necessity, if life andmovement be one and the same thing?The truth is, the Treaty of Nimeguen in 1678, which-and absolute uneventfulness of his life; -sincerity of his vocation; --simplicity of his existence; -and unity of his work. His first appearance in the Paris pulpits, 1669; -and as to Voltaire's remark that"Bossuet ceased to be accounted the first among the preachers fromthe moment that Bourdaloue appeared. " -Bourdaloue at court; -theAdvents of 1670, '84, '86 , '89, '91 , '93, '97 and the Lents of 1672, '74,'76, '80, '82, '95. -Bourdaloue's prodigious success [ Cf. the letters ofMme de Sévigné passim and the Journal de Dangeau] .- Shouldthis success be attributed to the exclusively moral and seldomdogmatic character of his preaching? -Nisard's exaggeration on thispoint. Does the cause of Bourdaloue's success lie in the " portraits "or "allusions " his sermons may contain? -Difficulty of answeringthis question. We do not possess the sermons Bourdaloue reallydelivered; but his sermons touched up, recast, and several of themamalgamated into one. -The " portraits " of Pascal, in the Sermonsur la médisance; -and of Arnauld, in the Sermon sur le sévéritéchrétienne;—and are they really " portraits "? Bourdaloue's " outspokenness ❞—and that it does not seem to have surpassed thedegree of outspokenness customary at the time in the pulpit. -Theexplanation of Bourdaloue's success must be sought elsewhere; -andis easily found:-A. In the richness of his oratorical invention. -Diversity of theplans of Bourdaloue's sermons, and, in this connection, of the foursermons for All- Saints Day, -or of the three sermons: sur la Craintede la Mort, -sur la Preparation à la Mort, -sur la Pensée de laMort.-Peculiar beauty of this last sermon. -Severity of Bourdaloue'smethod; —and, in this connection, of Fénelon's paradox in hisDialogues sur l'éloquence. —That it is as puerile to find fault with asermon because it is divided as a rule into three parts, as to takeobjection to a tragedy because it is in five acts;-that Bourdaloue,212 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREseems to mark the zenith of the power of Louis XIV. ,marks in reality the beginning of its decline . Thegallantry of the opening of the reign had degeneratedinto a public scandal, against which the preachers hadinveighed in vain from the pulpit! Louis XIV. hadpersisted in preferring the teaching of Molière to that ofBourdaloue:Un partage avec JupiterN'a rien du tout qui déshonoremoreover, was of opinion, that it is unseemly to seek to pose as a"wit " in the pulpit; —and that it is impossible to go too far inthe matter of subdividing, distinguishing, and insisting, when theorator's chief preoccupation is, as was his case, to instruct and to"moralise. "-The transitions in Bourdaloue's sermons;-and, moregenerally, of the importance of transitions in the art of oratory;-asserving as a means of intercommunication " between the ideasexpounded; -to establish their natural gradation; —and as a meansof passing from them to kindred ideas . Of the superlative and inparticular of the sustained clearness, -which these qualities lendBourdaloue's sermons; and the primary cause of his success mustbe attributed to this characteristic. -Another cause lies:66B. In the practical character of his preaching. —Bourdaloue'ssermons are of the class in which precise rules of conduct abound.-[Cf. the sermons sur les Devoirs des pères , —sur le Soin des domestiques,—sur les Divertissements du monde, —sur la Restitution. ] —Heis not content with setting forth what people should not do; —but hepoints out what they ought to do; -his instructions are concrete andhis advice is definite. -The way in which Bourdaloue goes for hisinspiration to current events [ Cf. the sermon sur l'Impureté].—Contemporary polemics in Bourdaloue's sermons [ Cf. the sermonssur le Sévérité chrétienne, directed against Jansenism; —sur l'Obėissance due à l'Eglise, against Gallicanism; -sur l'Hypocrisie, againstMolière and Tartuffe] .—A last cause of Bourdaloue's success lies:C. In the nature of his eloquence and of his style. -Bourdaloue isthe French preacher whose eloquence is most sustained. -By which ismeant that he throws an equal light upon every part of his subject;—that the ordinary flow of his eloquence is ample rather than varied; —and that he seldom makes points or indulges in passages of exceptionalbrilliance. -Simplicity of Bourdaloue's style. His disdain for allTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 213Excess of power or its intoxication , now induce him toengage in enterprises that are beyond his strength. Hishaughtiness and self- sufficiency, untempered henceforthby the least familiarity, and congealed, as it were,in a perpetually solemn attitude; his abuses of power;his "chambres de réunion, " his great quarrel withthe Court of Rome, and the repeal of the Edict ofNantes; his intervention in English affairs and thebrutal and despotic policy of Louvois; -all these thingsrhetoric, —and whether he did not go to extremes in this direction?—That the manner of the man who has been rightly called " the livingrefutation of the Provinciales, " is the most Jansenist there is; -afterthat of Nicole; -and that this very manner stood him in good stead atthe time. That it is too exact or too reasonable a manner for thetaste of the present day; -but we must not on this account be blind tothe subtlety, the depth, -and the breadth of his psychology.-Comparison, in this connection, between Nicole's Essais and Bourdaloue'sSermons.-Mme de Sévigné's equal admiration for both.-That allthese reasons for Bourdaloue's success as a preacher of sermons,explain his inferiority when he essays funeral orations, panegyrics, orwhen he preaches upon the mysteries of religion.On the other hand and for the same reasons , -Bourdaloue is thereal master among Frenchmen of the art of handling a subjectoratorically;-admitting him to have had no superior in the art ofsetting forth, subdividing, and arranging a subject; -of treating itaccording to its nature; -and of refraining from introducing into itany extraneous or superfluous matter. This absolute sincerity doesno less honour to his character than to his talent, -or rather histalent and his character form an inseparable whole.—The appreciationhe received at the hands of his contemporaries [ Cf. Lauras, S.J. ,Bourdaloue, sa vie et ses œuvres]; -of all those who discussed him;-both Catholics and Protestants.3. THE WORKS. -Bourdaloue's works are confined to his sermons;to fragments of his sermons, collected by his editors under the title ofPensées;-and of a very small number of letters .The original edition of the sermons or works of Bourdaloue, certainlyprepared in part by himself, but issued by his colleague, Father Bretonneau, appeared from 1707 to 1734, Rigaud, director of the RoyalPrinting Works, being the publisher. It comprises:-for the Advent214 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREestrange, alarm, and irritate the opinion, and turnagainst him the arms of the whole of Europe. Infatuated, too, as he is with his own parts, he choosesthe moment when he has no longer a Colbert toadminister his finances, a Turenne, a Condé or aLuxembourg to lead his armies, a Lionne or a Pomponneto inspire his diplomacy, he chooses this moment toembark rashly on the war, which is destined to end inthe fatal treaty of Utrecht.sermons, one volume, 1707; -Lenten sermons, three volumes, 1707;Mystères, two volumes, 1709; -Sermons de vêture, Panegyriques,Oraisons funèbres, two volumes, 1711; -Domincales, three volumes,1716;-and finally Instructions chrétiennes, Exhortations de retraiteor Pensées diverses, five volumes, 1721-1734.The best modern editions are:-the edition of 1822-1826, Paris; -and Guérin's edition, 1864, Bar- le- Duc.VII.-Nicolas Boileau- Despréaux [ Paris, 1636; 1711 , Paris].1. THE SOURCES.'-Desmaizeaux, Le vie de M. Despréaux: Amsterdam, 1712; -Louis Racine, Mémoires sur la vie de son père, 1747;this work is printed too in a number of editions of Racine; —Cizeron .Rival, Lettres familières de MM. Boileau- Despréaux et Brossette,Lyons, 1770; -d'Alembert, Eloge de Despréaux, in his collectedÉloges académiques, Paris, 1779; -Berriat Saint- Prix, Essai surBoileau, Paris , 1830.Sainte-Beuve, Portraits littéraires , vol. i .; -Port-Royal, bk. vi. ,ch. vii.; and Causeries du lundi, vol. vi.; -Philarète Chasles, LesVictimes de Boileau, in the Revue des Deux Mondes, June andAugust, 1839; -F. Brunetière, article BOILEAU in the Grande Encyclopédie, 1887; notice preceding the Euvres poétiques de Boileau;1889; and L'évolution des genres, vol . i . , 1890;—P. Morillot, Boileauin the " Classiques populaires " series , 1891; -Lanson, Boileau in the"Grands Ecrivains francais " series, 1892.Delaporte, S. J. , L'art poétique de Boileau commenté par ses contemporains, Lille, 1888.2. THE MAN AND THE WRITER. -Boileau's birth and early years;-the legal profession in 1640; -Boileau's " theological studies ";-hisI Consult, too, the biographical notices printed at the beginning of the first volume of Berriat Saint-Prix' edition, Paris, 1830, Langlois and Delaunay.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 215Simultaneously the situation pecomes gloomy at home.The tragic and scandalous affair of the poisons suddenlylays bare unfathomable depths of ignominy [ Cf. Ravaisson,Archives de la Bastille, vols . iv . , v. , vi . , vii . , Paris, 1870–1875] . While the immense majority of Frenchmen unhappily regard with approval the repeal of the Edict of Nantes,commerce and industry are sapped and the foundations ofpublic morality are shaken by this wholesale expulsion ofthe Protestants. The character of the court itself underlegal studies; his early writings;-the writing of the first Satires,1660, 1661; -the Stances pour l'École des femmes, 1662.-Boileau'sfriendship with Molière, La Fontaine and Racine. -The Mouton blanctavern once more! -The Dissertation sur Joconde. -Readings of theSatires in society. The collection printed in Holland, 1665.-Boileaudecides to print his writings , 1666. -Emotion caused by the firstSatires [ I. , VI. , VII. , II. , IV. , III . , V. ] —particularly in the " precioussociety. " —Cotin replies to them: La satyre des satyres , 1666, —alsoBoursault, 1669.-Their scurrilous violence . -Boileau's courage andperseverance. The Discours sur la Satire, 1668.-Coalition of Boileau's enemies.-Chapelain and Perrault prevent his being inscribedon "the list of the King's bounties, " -and endeavour to prevent hisobtaining the authorisation to print his works;-while M. de Montausier threatens him with personal violence. -The Épître au Roi;—Boileau has it presented the King by Mme de Montespan; -and, inthis connection, of the services rendered men of letters by Mme deMontespan, services which explain, though they do not excuse, theflattery bestowed on her by all or almost all contemporary men ofletters . Could they be more prudish than Vivonne, the lady'sbrother?—and living as they did [ Cf. Mme de Sévigné's letters,1671];--are we to accuse them of baseness?-Publication of thefirst Épitres; -of the Art poétique; and of the first cantos of theLutrin, 1674.-Boileau figures for the first time on the "list of theKing's bounties " in 1676; —he is appointed " to write the history ofthe King, " 1677; —and he renounces " the profession of poetry. "A. Boileau as a Critic. -The great merit of Boileau's criticismis:-that it turned away the reading public from the Chapelains andScarrons; that it may almost be said to have revealed Molière [ Cf.the Stances sur l'École des femmes]; -La Fontaine [ Cf. the Dissertation sur Joconde]; -Racine [ Cf. the Dialogue sur les héros de216 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREgoes a change. La Vallière expiates her passion in theaustere seclusion of a cloister; Fontanges is dead," stricken in the king's service "; Mme de Montespanhas had to retire from court; and in their stead reignsMme de Maintenon, who occupies an ill -defined situation,partaking at once of that of a mistress, a housekeeper,and a governess. " Such is the state in which thingswere in 1690, an eyewitness tells us, Ezechiel Spanheim,the Brandenburg envoy, and in which they still are soroman] .—He revealed these writers to themselves as well as to thepublic; and enforced admiration for them. -The hatreds naturallyengendered by this manner of conceiving satire; -and how Boileauheld his own against them; -without any protection except hishonesty [ Cf. Discours sur la satire and Satire IX. ].-Boileau'smoral superiority [ Cf. Satires I. , V., VIII. and Épîtres III. , V. , VI. ]over the majority of his adversaries; —and over two at least of hisillustrious friends. -The absolute independence of his situation ,humour, and taste; -his freedom of judgment [ Cf. Satire V., on thenobility, and Épîtres VIII. and IX. ] , —and that it was far greaterthan might be thought at first sight. -Fruitfulness of his criticism ,—and, in this connection , whether the " criticism of faults " may not helpto an appreciation of the contrary qualities. Of the personal influenceBoileau may have exerted on Molière; -on La Fontaine; -on Racine;-and of an opinion of Sainte- Beuve on this subject. -Of the Artpoétique; and how it forms a continuation of Boileau's " critical "work [ Cf. in particular, canto iii . ] .—The " rules " laid down in it areat once a eulogy of Virgil and a satire on the Pucelle from a literarypoint of view;-while the " rules " it gives for tragedy constitute atonce an apology for the tragedy of Racine and a criticism of that ofCorneille. In the same way the Lutrin is the criticism in actionof the Virgile travesti . —How a doctrine grew naturally out of thiscriticism; and what is this doctrine?B. Boileau's doctrine . -That its starting- point is the imitation ofnature .Nature must never be departed from; —and hence, as in Molière's comedy, the condemnation alike of burlesque;—and of preciosity.-Novelty of the advice at the time it wasgiven, since it was so many years since anybody had proffered it;—THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 217far as is known—a state of things which, at the finish,of a woman of undistinguished birth, old, poor, thewidow of a writer of burlesque, an attendant on themistress of the king, whose court, too, is the mostgallant in Europe, has made of this woman the confidant,the mistress and it is even believed the wife of a greatmonarch " [ Cf. Ezéchiel Spanheim, Relation de la Courde France en 1690, Paris, 1882] . Whether wife ormistress, the aged woman esteems that the only wayto inwith the sole exception of Pascal.-The way, however, in which thegeneral principle of the imitation of nature suffers restrictions inBoileau's doctrine; -owing to his indifference as a citizen of Paristo external nature;-to his taste, derived from his contemporaries,for purely moral observation; —and by the exigencies of the currentpoliteness:Never touch upon what is low.Of the usefulness of these restrictions; -and of their dangers; -ofwhich the most considerable is to reduce the imitation of nature to the imitation of what all men have in common; -and in consequenceto reduce nature itself to what is most abstract in nature. HowBoileau, who was fully alive to this danger, essayed to avoid it; -by giving to style the importance he has accorded it ·In this dangerous art of rhyming and writingThere is no intermediary stage between the mediocre and the bad,and by recommending the imitation of the ancients; -whose works inhis eyes are not only models; -but are the treasure store as well ofthe accumulated experience of men; —and are so much evidence ofthe identity of human nature beneath all its outward variations . -HowBoileau's doctrine is completed by a moral side; -and how muchloftier his morality is than of the other men of letters of his time.C. Boileau's Polemics against the Moderns. - Of the usefulness ofpolemics as obliging us to look clearly into our own ideas. Thetranslation of the Traité du sublime, 1674; -and the Réflexionscritiques sur Longin, 1694.-Whether Boileau's admiration for theancients was not almost superstitious?—and what did he imagine was"Pindaric " about his Ode sur la prise de Namur, 1693? [ Cf. hisDiscours sur l'Ode].—That in any case the quarrel obliged Boileau torevise his principles; —and that while he did not abandon them; -he218 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREsure the duration and the condonation of her extraordinaryfortune is to affect to be pious and a prude. Altri tempi,altre cure! Her chief concern is for the king's salvation.He is governed by her, and she is governed in turn byNanon her servant . The glorious period of the reign isover. After Ryswick and the Savoy marriage, thevivacious Duchess of Burgundy is scarcely successful inbringing about some semblance of a revival of the splenextended the range of their consequences; -and better defined theirapplication. The Septième réflexion sur Longin, 1694.-Of thedistinction which Boileau admits should be made between Lycophronand Homer; —and of the importance of this distinction; -seeing thatRonsard and Corneille put all the ancients in the same category.—That he made yet another step in advance; -when he determined the"historical conditions " on which the perfection of literary worksdepend; and he was the first to make these conditions lie in thejuncture or coinciding of the arrival at perfection of the literarybranches with the arrival at maturity of the language.-Boileau's lastworks: the three last Epitres, 1695; -the preface to the edition of1701, containing the letter to M. Perrault; -and the three last Satires, 1694, 1698, and 1705.Of Boileau as a poet, -or rather as a writer; -his admissions onthis head [ Cf. Satires II . à M. de Molière, and XII . l'Equivoque andEpitres VI. and X. ] .-Would one suspect in reading him the closerelationship between Satire and Lyricism?-Howmuch narrower andabove all how much less daring his art is than his criticism.-The qualities he lacks are those in which Molière is too oftendeficient;-elevation, distinction , and grace; —and these are not onlyamong the essential qualities of a poet; -they are also the qualitiesupon which depend " aristocracy " of style: -and, in this connection,that this enemy of the Précieuses might have learnt more than oneuseful lesson from them. -On the other hand, and as was the casewith Molière, he possesses all the " middle-class " qualities, and inthe first place, and within the limits of his horizon, the sense of thepicturesque side of reality, -[ Cf. Le repas ridicule, the Satire desfemmes, the four first cantos of the Lutrin];-he has humour, too,humour of no very lofty order but often biting; -and finally hepossesses in a high degree the gift of rendering his thoughts with theexpressive brevity of the proverb; —a gift which consists in the ability to find a handy " form of expression for common experiences. -The 66THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 219dour that has vanished beyond recall. The king maystill be alive, but the reign is at an end though he livefor ten, fifteen, or twenty years! The laughter andthe pleasure are things of the past, and in their placereigns a gloomy sadness. And little by little a thick,lugubrious atmosphere of boredom settles down over allthat remains of what was once " the most gallant courtin Europe. "same qualities and the same defects are to be found in his prose [ Cf.his correspondence, the Discours sur la Satire and his prefaces ] —accompanied by less restraint; -and by a certain impressionablenessand off- handedness; —which exactly reflect his character; —and whichdo him honour.3. THE WORKS.-The poetical works of Boileau comprise:-hisSatires, of which there are twelve; -his Epitres, also twelve innumber; his Art poétique, in four cantos; -his Lutrin, in sixcantos;-and finally some miscellaneous poems including the Ode surla prise de Namur and a certain number of epigrams.His prose works comprise:-the Dissertation sur Joconde and theDialogue sur les héros de roman, which he did not publish himself;his translation of the Traité du sublime; his Réflexions critiques surLongin; —the prefaces to the different editions of his works, 1666,1674, 1675, 1683 , 1685, 1694, 1701; —and an entire volume of letters ofwhich the most interesting are those addressed to Racine and to Brossette.The early editions of the Satires, and in particular that of 1666,contain a considerable number of passages which were suppressed,transposed, or modified in the succeeding editions . And it is doubtlessinteresting to know that the first edition of the Satire des femmes,which is that of 1693, did not contain the famous portrait of thecriminal lieutenant Tardieu:Mais pour mieux mettre ici leur crasse en tout son lustre . . .Boileau having deleted it on the advice of Racine. In a general way,however, the editions that furnish the standard text are neverthelessthat of 1701 , and in a certain measure that of 1713, which there isreason to believe he prepared for the press himself.The best posthumous editions are: Saint- Marc's edition , Paris,1747, five volumes; -Berriat Saint- Prix' edition, Paris, 1830; —andGidel's edition, Paris , 1880.220 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREIIIBeyond the pale of the court, however, the formationof fresh coteries is soon in progress. Molière is dead andRacine converted. Boileau, charged with writing thehistory of the royal campaigns, is overjoyed " at beingengaged, as he says, on the glorious task, which hasreleased him from the poetical profession ": and thusengaged he is silent. The victims these writers thoughtthey had slain return at once to life with smirk andbow the adepts of preciosity reappear on the scene.Mme Deshoulières rallies them around her, and under herprotectionPradon and his crew dare to write verse and go unpunished!SIXTH PERIODFrom the cabal organised against " Phèdre " to theissue of the " Lettres Persanes "1677-1722I. The beginnings of French Opera.1. THE SOURCES. -Goujet, Bibliothèque française, articles, BENSERADE and QUINAULT; -Chauffepié , Dictionnaire, article QUINAULT;-Titon du Tillet , Parnasse français, articles QUINAULT and LULLY;—Grimm, in the Encyclopédie, article POÈME LYRIQUE; —the life ofQuinault preceding the edition of his works, Paris, 1778; -Léris,Dictionnaire des Théâtres.Nuitter and Thoinan, Les origines de l'Opéra français, Paris, 1886;-Romain Rolland, Histoire de l'Opéra en Europe, Paris, 1895.2. THE CONFLICT BETWEEN OPERA AND DRAMA. -The triumph oftragedy and comedy, the pure species, did not entirely do away withthe hybrid species: tragi- comedy, the pastoral, and the ballet.-Spectacular plays: Andromède, 1650, and the Toison d'or byCorneille;-Isaac de Benserade and his ballets; -Molière's balletcomedies: La princesse d'Elide, 1664; Mélicerte, 1666; Psyché, 1671.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 221Jesuits join in, and now give lessons in taste as they usedto give lessons in morality. Criticism is overrun withprofessors. Father Bouhours publishes his " dialogueson the art of thinking aright as applied to literature. "He teaches in them that it is incumbent on an author toimitate nature. Unfortunately, he cites the followingquotation as a specimen of a perfectly natural thought:" The actions of princes resemble mighty rivers of whichfew have seen the source, but of which all men see thecourse. " Father Rapin, his colleague, when not engagedon his history of Jansenism, discusses with Bussy thequestion " whether a man should address his mistress inthe second person singular? ": doubtless the question ismerely one of style, but to Pascal it would indeed haveseemed a " pretty " question. In the meanwhile Quinault-Analogy between all these essays, and that their object was:-toprocure the eye satisfactions which tragedy did not furnish:-to turnto account the fables of mythology; -and to set free the musicalelement that is contained in all " poetry. "-The foundation of theAcademy of Music, 1669, —and the first French opera: Pomone, 1671.-Jean-Baptiste Lully [ Cf. the Mémoires of Mme de Montpensier].-His collaboration with Molière, and with Quinault. -Their firstoperas: Cadmus et Hermione, 1673; -Alceste, 1674;-Thésée, 1675;Atys, 1676;-Isis, 1677.Quinault's remarkable talent for opera; -Voltaire's pompous eulogyof him;-and that of Quinault and Lully it was the former who duringa hundred and fifty years was accounted " the great man. " -Pleasingfrivolity of Quinault's imagination;-his fluent style; -and, in thisconnection, of the frequent recurrence in his verses of comparisonsdrawn from " liquids ";-his constant desire to please; -and wishingto please, his avoidance of the more profound aspects of passion. - Ofthe " commonplaces of licentious morality " in Quinault's operas.How the success of the opera influenced the direction taken by theevolution of the drama.-The triumphs of Quinault undoubtedlyaroused the jealousy of Racine; -and what is worse, his emulation.-Of the evidence there is in Phedre of an intention on the part ofRacine to vie with Quinault [ Cf. Les époques du théâtre français].—That Racine's retirement favoured the development of opera.-222 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREis triumphant; the success of his Atys, his Persée, or hisArmide is his vengeance for the onslaughts of the authorof the Satires; while half a dozen opera librettos refurbishhis reputation so entirely that Voltaire, eighty years later,will be led astray by its brilliancy. There is an activeproduction of novels of the stamp of the Histoireamoureuse des Gaules, the work of pamphleteers of thecalibre of Courtilz de Sandras, the author of the Mémoiresde Rochefort and of the Trois Mousquetaires—I mean ofthe Mémoires de M. d'Artagnan. At the same time,writers of the class of Montfleury, of Poisson , and ofDancourt, who is beginning his career, exhibit their"buffooneries " on the stage made illustrious by Molière-on the stage they have converted into a show of asbase an order as "a public execution " according toThomas Corneille's Psyché, 1678; -Fontenelle's Bellerophon, 1679;-Quinault's Proserpine, 1680.—The " tragic authors " take to writingindifferently either tragedy or lyric tragedy.—Of some consequencesof this practice; —and how after having influenced style in the direction of greater laxity, -it extends its influence from the style to thematter; -it enfeebles the conception of the drama; -and substitutesfor the art of depicting character or the passions, the art of appealingto the sensibility.

3. THE WORKS. -Of Quinault: Cadmus, 1673; -Alceste, 1674; —Thésée, 1675; —Atys, 1676; —Isis , 1677; —of Fontenelle and Th.Corneille Psyche, 1678; - Bellerophon, 1679; -of QuinaultProserpine, 1680; -Persée, 1682; -Phaeton, 1683; -Amadis, 1684; —Roland, 1685; —Armide, 1686; —of Campistron: Acis et Galathée,1686; -Achille, 1687; -of Fontenelle: Thétis et Pélée, 1687;-Enéeet Lavinie, 1690.II. Nicolas Malebranche [ Paris, 1638; † 1715 , Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -Fontenelle, Eloge de Malebranche; -Tabaraud,Biographie universelle, article MALEBRANCHE.Cousin, Fragments de philosophie moderne; -F. Bouillier, Histoirede la philosophie cartesienne, 1854; -Sainte- Beuve, Port-Royal,bk. vi . , chap . v. and vi .; —Blampignon, Étude sur Malebranche, Paris,1861;-Ollé- Laprune, La philosophie de Malebranche, Paris , 1870.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 223Racine's vigorous expression . La Fontaine, now thathis former friends are dead or live apart from him,abandons himself to his natural inclinations, and almostconfines himself to writing tales-and such tales, for anauthor who is over sixty years of age! From the otherside of the Channel, Saint- Evremond, who has also grownold, encourages him in his course. At the residence ofthe Vendôme family in the Temple it is the custom toget royally intoxicated, and this is not the worst thatpasses there. The Princesses of the blood have taken tosmoking pipes. Finally, to complete the parallel betweenthe last years of the century and its opening, it is theturn of the " libertines " to reappear on the scene towhich the rakes and the Précieux have returned or arereturning.Father André: Vie du Père Malebranche, published by FatherIngold, Paris, 1886.2. THE PHILOSOPHER; -and in the first place of the homage it isjust to pay the writer. -Daunou's fine eulogy of the style of Malebranche;-Daunou not having forgotten that he had himself belongedto the Oratory [ Cours d'études historiques, vi. and xx . ] .-Perfectsimplicity;-naïveté; -eloquence; -and more particularly the ease ofhis style, qualities which in his case are the more admirable owingto the abstruse nature of the topics he treats. -No French philosopher has a style that can compare with that of Malebranche.The disciple of Descartes [ Cf. his Éloge by Fontenelle];-and thatthe philosophy of Malebranche is an attempt to reconcile Christianityand Cartesianism. Malebranche's exaggerated confidence in thepower of reason, -and in its capacity to give a " natural " explanationof the inexplicable. His optimism; -and that though he owes itdirectly to Descartes, --still it is more in conformity with the Christianconception of life than is the optimism of his master. The idea ofProvidence in the philosophy of Malebranche; -and that it scarcelydiffers from the idea of Providence entertained by the Stoics ofantiquity. —That all these theories tended to establish the sufficiencyof " natural religion ";-and it is a fact that the influence of Malebranche achieved this result, though doubtless in opposition to hiswishes.

224 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREBossuet was the only man who might perhaps havebeen able to cope with these invaders, to keep them incheck and to overawe them: and Bossuet, it happens,though he delivered his last Funeral Orations in 1685 ,1686, and 1687, preaches but rarely. On the other hand,being no longer burdened with, or at least being no longerresponsible for the education of the Dauphin, it is at thisvery period that he is producing almost all his principal.works. The date of the Discours sur l'histoire universelleis 1681, and that of the Histoire des variations des églisesprotestantes, 1688. Of these two works, it is the firstthat comes in for the most praise . And yet it must besaid ofthe second that there is no finer book in the Frenchlanguage, for while, like the Provinciales, it contains unperishable examples of every kind of noble writing , it hasThe critics of Malebranche: -Arnauld, --- Bossuet, - Fénelon, -Leibnitz;—a letter of Bossuet [ May 21, 1687] to a disciple of Malebranche.-Fénelon refutes the Traité de la nature et de la grâce.-The critics of Malebranche object more particularly to his theorythat the Divine action takes effect " on general lines ";-since theyconsider this theory leads to that of the " stability of the laws ofnature ";—that is to the denial of the supernatural; —and at the sametime to the disappearance of the possibility of miracles; -of thenecessity for a revelation; —and of the utility of religion.3. THE WORKS. -La recherche de la vérité, 1674-1675; -Conversations chrétiennes, 1676; -Traité de la nature et de la grâce; -Méditations chrétiennes , 1683; -Traité de morale, 1684; —Entretienssur la métaphysique, 1688; -Traité de l'amour de Dieu, 1697; —Réponses à M. Arnauld, four volumes, the last of which appeared in1709; -Réflexions sur la prémotion physique, 1715.In his Fragments de philosophie moderne, vol . ii . , Victor Cousinhas published an important series of letters by Malebranche, theliterary interest of which lies in their showing the philosopher intouch with Mairan and with Fontenelle and his group.There is only one edition of the complete works of Malebranche,two volumes in 4to , Paris, 1837.In 1871 Jules Simon published an edition of the works of Malebranche in four volumes containing the Entretiens sur la méta-THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 225this advantage over Pascal's work, that it is a book in thehighest sense of the word, a book of which all the parts,though distinct , form an indivisible whole, whose everypage, indeed whose every line, is inspired by and helps toprove the soundness of the idea that underlies the entirefabric. Recent researches, moreover, have revealed thatgreater labour and greater impartiality have never beenexpended on the preparation of a polemical work [ Cf.Rébelliau, Bossuet historien du protestantisme, Paris,1891 ] . And why should we not add that it would behard to cite a work of this class, whose aim is nobler ormore generous, since its author's sole object in writing itwas to labour for that "reunion of the Churches " which,after being the dearest dream of his youth, remained tothe end of his life the most tenacious of his illusions?physique, the Méditations chrétiennes, and the Recherche de la vérité.III.-Pierre Bayle [ Le Carlat (Ariège) , 1647; 1706, Rotterdam] .1. THE SOURCES. -Calendarium Carlananum, 1660-1687, andBayle's correspondence; -Desmaizeaux, Vie de M. P. Bayle, 1730,found in the last editions of the Dictionnaire and in vol. xvi. ofBeuchot's edition; -Abbé Marsy, Analyse raisonnée des œuvres deBayle, 1755; -Sainte- Beuve, Portraits littéraires, vol . i . , 1835; -L.Feuerbach, Pierre Bayle, ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Philosophieund Menschheit, Leipsic , 1838 and 1848; -Damiron, Essai sur l'histoire de la philosophie en France au XVIIe siècle, Paris, 1846; —A.Sayous, La littérature française à l'étranger, Paris and Geneva, vol . i. ,1853; Lenient, Étude sur Bayle, Paris, 1855; -Arsène Deschamps,La genèse du scepticisme érudit chez Bayle, Brussels , 1878; -EmileGigas, Choix de la correspondance inédite de Pierre Bayle, Copenhagen, 1890;-F. Brunetière, Études critiques, 5th series , Paris, 1893;-Ch. Renouvier, Philosophie analytique de l'histoire , v. iii . , Paris ,1897.2. THE CRITICISM OF BAYLE.A. The early years and the first efforts of Bayle. -He came of aProtestant stock; his studies at Puylaurens and at Toulouse, 1666–1669;-he is converted to Catholicism , 1669; -he is reconverted16226 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREThe Avertissements aux Protestants, which completeand strengthen the Histoire des variations, were writtenbetween 1689 and 1691. But the " reunion " was notdestined to be accomplished, nor was Bossuet, in spiteof his eloquence and his masterly dialectics, to be successful to any notable extent in stemming the progress of"libertinism . "If he failed , however, it was not because he was blindto this progress, as is proved sufficiently by the manypassages that might be quoted from his works [ Cf. inparticular the Sermon sur la divinité de la religion, 1665;the Discours sur l'histoire universelle, part ii . , 1681; andthe Oraison funèbre d'Anne de Gonzague, 1685 ] . Fromthe very first he was fully alive to the tendencies ofthe exegesis of Richard Simon, and yet to divine themProtestantism , 1670; —his departure for Geneva and his tutorships: —in the family of M. de Normandie; -in that of the Comte de Dhona;—his return to France, 1647. —Bayle professor of philosophy at theProtestant Academy of Sedan, 1675-1681 [ Cf. his Cursus philosophia, and Bourchenin Les académies Protestantes ] .- Suppressionof the Sedan academy. —Bayle takes up his residence at Rotterdam ,1681 , -where he holds the post of unattached professor of philosophy,in the pay of the town. -Publication of the Pensées sur la comète,1682 , -and of the Critique générale de l'histoire du Calvinisme duPère Maimbourg. — Singular character of these two works; -thestyle of which is behind, -and the ideas of which are in advance ofthose of his contemporaries by thirty or forty years. -Bayle embarksupon the publication of the Nouvelles de la République des lettres,1684.-It is a paper or a magazine, and Bayle must not for a momentbe judged by it: "I did not exercise the functions of a critic inthis publication," he has himself declared, " merely noting in thebooks what was of a nature to call attention to them. "-Revocationof the Edict of Nantes. -Bayle publishes his two pamphlets: Ceque c'est que la France toute catholique sous le règne de Louis leGrand, 1686; and the Commentaire philosophique sur le Compelleintrare, 1686; -indignation of the Protestant party, and of Jurienin particular. Bossuet's adversary is equally the adversary of Bayle;-whom he bitterly reproaches with " preaching the dogma of reli-THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 227so early as 1678 was none too easy. Again, as early as1687, he foresaw what he himself spoke of as "the greatattack, which, under the name of Cartesianism, was preparing against the Church. " He was as little mistaken inhis opinion that, if the progress of libertinism were to beresisted efficaciously, a beginning must be made by reuniting in a single body the scattered elements of theChurch; for both time and the admissions of orthodoxProtestantism have borne out the correctness of his viewson this point. Under these circumstances, what werethe reasons of his failure? The first was that the Protestants, encouraged at the time by their successes inthe war which followed the formation of the League ofAugsburg, believed they would profit by all the lossesthat might be sustained by Catholicism, an opinion that-gious indifference and universal tolerance. "-Bayle conceals hisauthorship of the book; -himself makes ironical allusions to it inhis Lettres; -complains in his Nouvelles of its being ascribed tohim; and thus sets the example of those rather dishonourabletactics, which will be adopted by Voltaire. -He has the " courage ofhis opinions, " but he is afraid of their consequences. -The Avisaux réfugiés, 1690; -and whether Bayle is its author [ Cf. Sayous,Littérature française a l'étranger]? — Interest of the question .-The discussion between Bayle and Jurien grows more andmore bitter. Jurien accuses him of atheism; -in support ofJurien's accusation the " Protestant ministers " call attention tocertain characteristic passages in the Pensées sur la comète; —the Rotterdam magistrates deprive Bayle of his pension;-andcancel his authorisation to teach. Curious passage in one ofBayle's letters [ December 28, 1693] , — which goes to show thatthe hostility he had excited was more especially due to his beinga Cartesian:-" The Rotterdam ministers . he says, are obstinateadmirers of Aristotle, whom they do not understand, and theycannot hear Descartes spoken of without falling into a rage. "B. The Dictionnaire historique et critique. -The original schemeof the Dictionnaire [ Cf. the scheme of 1692]; -and that the workwas intended to be one of pure erudition; -having for its sole objectto trace and to rectify the errors in the other dictionaries. —The228 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREproved to be correct from a political but erroneous from amoral point of view. Another reason was that the Protestants, instead of allowing the discussion to turn uponthe all important question of the authority of the Church,diverted the controversy, and made it deal with suchsecondary issues as the authority of the Deutero- canonicBooks [ Cf. Leibnitz' works, Foucher de Careil's edition ,vols. i . and ii . ] , or the period of the formation of thedogma of the Trinity [ Cf. Jurien , Lettres pastorales] . Thefinal and paramount cause of Bossuet's failure, was thatwith the kind of ingenuousness that characterised him ,he imprudently permitted his adversaries to take theirstand on ground on which the lay public, not feelingitself at home, was unable to judge or even to join inthe conflict.scheme, however, is modified as it takes shape; -Bayle's grudgescome into play; —and he finds " that the discovery of errors is ofno importance or utility for the prosperity of States. "-Moreover,while making a searching study of systems and history, he contractsthe sort of scepticism that such studies engender; and, in thisconnection, a comparison between Bayle and Montaigne. He is themore struck, however, -and here the influence of Descartes must notbe overlooked, by the obstacles which prejudices , custom, and tradition, place in the way of the conquests of reason; —and, insensibly,from being " an institution to insure the republic of letters againsterror ";-the Dictionnaire becomes the arsenal of rationalism.The contents of Bayle's dictionary. -Singular omissions to benoted in it; the historical dictionary does not contain articles onSocrates, Plato, Cicero , Thomas Aquinas, Descartes or Pascal; -norin general on the authors whose dogmatism would have clashed withBayle's opinions; -on the other hand there are articles on Epicurus,Anaxagoras , Zenon of Elea, Lucretius, Xenophanes, and Erasmus; —and they happen to be the most exhaustive. The key to Bayle'sdictionary. He aims at shaking the very foundations of the dogmaof Providence [ Cf. the articles on Rorarius, Timoleon, and Lucretius]by dint of confronting the respective teachings of religion and reason[ Cf. the articles on the Manicheans and on Pyrrho]; -and to enforce the conclusion that humanity, when instituting its morality, shouldTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 229A similar experience befell him in his quarrel with theQuietists. And yet it is impossible to admire too highlythe vigour, eloquence, and passionate ardour he displayedin the course of this memorable quarrel, in which, as hedeclared, the whole of religion was at stake . Some ofhis finest passages are buried as it were in his Instructionsur les états d'oraison which dates from 1697, and nothinghe wrote is stronger and more strenuous in style than theRelation sur le quiétisme, of which the date is 1698.The Relation sur le quiétisme is the most personal ofhis books, for in it, beneath the restraint he imposeson himself so as to avoid giving a handle to publicmalignity, already tickled by this strife between twobishops, there throbs the indignation and even the angerof an honest man who has been odiously duped . Greatsolely consider itself. -Comparison between this design and that ofMalebranche; and that of Spinoza. -Subtlety of Bayle's dialectics;—and his way of having recourse to " references " [ Cf. Diderot in hisarticle Encyclopédie] .Of certain defects of the Dictionnaire; —and in particular ofBayle's taste for trifling disputes [ Cf. the notes to the articles onAchilles, Amphitryon, and Loyola]; -for a form of impiety, thatis already Voltairean [ Cf. the notes to the articles on Adam, David,and Francis of Assisi ]; —and for obscenity. -The dissertation " onobscenity. "-Whether there was not a hidden motive for Bayle'sindulgence in obscenity? —and it must be remembered that Bayle,as regards his character, belonged to the sixteenth century;-andhe is a scholar. Of the taste of scholars for obscenity. -That in anycase Bayle's obscenity served him as a sort of passport for his mostdaring ideas [ Cf. Voltaire in Candide and Montesquieu in his Lettrespersanes].-Prodigious success of the Dictionnaire; -the esteem inwhich Boileau held it. -In forty years there were eight successiveeditions of these bulky folios [ 1697, 1702, 1715, 1720, 1730, 1734,1738, 1740]; and two English translations [ 1709, and 1734-1741 ] .—Bayle's dictionary gave the eighteenth century encyclopedists theidea and the plan of their encyclopedia.C. Bayle's other works and his last years. -The publication ofthe dictionary stirs up Bayle's enemies. He is summoned before the230 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREwas the sensation aroused by the Relation sur le quiétisme,and the book was literally devoured. Victory followedclose on the appearance of the work, which brought aboutthe downfall of Quietism . Still for five whole years apurely theological question, and a question too of mysticaltheology, had diverted Bossuet's attention from a matterwhich, perhaps, was of greater urgency. Once again ,moreover, public opinion had taken but a languid interestin a quarrel, the violence of which it found so incomprehensible, that it had sought an explanation in reasonsthat were little to the honour of either of the combatants." I assure you, " wrote the Princess Palatine, "that thisquarrel between bishops turns on anything rather thanon matters of faith. "Rotterdam consistory; -and to justify himself he writes his four dissertations on "Atheists ";-on the " Manicheans "; -on " Obscenities "; and on the " Pyrrhonians. " -Remarks, in this connection,on the subjects of " Protestant tolerance " and " liberty in Holland."The Réponses aux questions d'un provincial, 1703; - and theContinuation des Pensées sur la comète, 1704.-The theory of theincompetency of universal consent; -and the chapter: " It is in nowise sure that the impressions left by nature are to be accepted asthe expression of the truth " [Cf. Continuation, ch. 23 and 24].—Death of Bayle: -Perfect dignity of his life . -His disinterestedness .His only vices were intellectual vices; —and with Spinoza; —althoughhis existence was less noble than Spinoza's; -he was one of the firstwriters whose intellectual libertinism was not prompted by morallibertinism. -Importance of this fact [ Cf. Bossuet's and Bourdaloue'sattacks on the libertines]; —and how greatly it contributed to thepropagation of Bayle's philosophical ideas.3. THE WORKS. -We have enumerated Bayle's principal works,and there only remains to mention in addition a voluminous andinteresting correspondence.The best edition of his Works is the great edition of 1727, 1731 in 4folio vols , the Hague, published by Husson, Johnson , Gosse, &c . [ thereprint of this edition of 1737 contains about 150 additional letters ];the best edition of the Dictionnaire is that of 1720, also in 4 vols. ,Rotterdam , published by Michel Bohm.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 231She quoted the epigram:In these conflicts in which our French prelatesAppear to seek the truth,One declares it is hope that is being destroyed,The other that it is charity.But it is faith that is being destroyed without anybody givingthe matter a thought.And under cover of this controversy it was libertinismthat was making giant strides in proportion as religionlost its prestige and authority.For while "the secret of the sanctuary " [ Cf. Diderot,Apologie pour l'abbé de Prades] was being betrayed, as itseemed, in this way, Cartesianism was biding its time,was merely awaiting an opportunity to enter the citadel.In 1820 Beuchot published an edition of the Dictionnaire in sixteenvolumes, enriched with the commentaries or remarks of all the notablestudents of the author, Prosper Marchand, Chaufepié, Leclerc,Joli, &c.It cannot be too much regretted that there are no modern editionsof the Works, not even of the famous Avis aux réfugiés or of the Pensées sur la comète.IV. Bernard le Bouvier de Fontenelle [ Rouen, 1657;+1757, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -Grimm, Correspondance littéraire February,1757; -Abbé Trublet, Mémoires pour servir à l'histoire de la vie et desouvrages de M. de Fontenelle, 2nd edit . Paris, 1761; -Villenave'sNotice preceding his edition of Fontenelle's works, Paris , 1818; —Garat, Mémoires sur la vie de M. Suard, Paris, 1820; Flourens,Fontenelle ou de la philosophie moderne, Paris, 1847; Sainte- Beuve,Fontenelle in the Causeries du lundi, vol. iii .; -J. Bertrand, L'Académie des sciences de 1666 à 1793, Paris, 1869.2. THE MAN ANd the Writer. -The Cydias of La Bruyère, -thatLa Bruyère's experience of life was insufficient to allow of his knowing and appreciating the real Fontenelle. -Fontenelle's universality;-he is the author of tragedies , eclogues, operas, and comedies; -andof dissertations , dialogues, novels and of works that are of the natureof works of history and criticism. -His characteristic trait is that he232 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREIt may be that this Cartesianism was a degenerate formof the true doctrine of Descartes, but it was a logicalCartesianism logically evolved from the philosopher'sprinciples; and this is the moment to trace its realinfluence."Every philosophy, Sainte-Beuve has said [ Cf. PortRoyal, bk. iv. , ch. 5 ] , whatever it be at the outset andin the mouth of its original founder, becomes antiChristian or at least heretical with the second generation;this is a law it is essential not to overlook. ” An instructive example of its operation is afforded by the gentle ,eloquent and candid Malebranche. A faithful and indeeda passionate disciple of Descartes, it occurs to him toform the project of applying his master's principles to66 was a man of wit ";-in every sense of the word; -that is to say aman of culture, a witty man, and almost a man of great intellect; -and that he is a remarkable example of what the intellect is capableand incapable of.A. The Man of Culture:-He was Corneille's nephew; -and for thisreason the born enemy of Racine and Boileau; —his first literary effortsin the Mercure galant, 1677; —he collaborates in the operas Psychéand Bellerophon, 1678 and 1679; -his tragedy Aspar [ Cf. Racine'sepigram]; -the Dialogues des Morts, 1683; —the Lettres du chevalierd'Her . . . , 1683; -and of the sort of family likeness there isbetween this work and Voiture's Lettres. -Bayle's eulogy of thisbook [ Cf. Nouvelles de la République des lettres , December, 1687]; -Fontenelle publishes his Entretiens sur la pluralité des mondes , 1686.Success of this book and the nature of its success [ Cf. Garat, Mémoiressur M. Suard] .- Injustice of La Bruyère. -With the Entretiens surla pluralité science makes its entry into literature for the first time;—and even into the conversation of society. -Fontenelle's otherwritings; his Mémoires sur le nombre 9; -his Doutes sur le systèmedes causes occasionelles; —his Histoire des oracles, 1687. -The wayin which Fontenelle's culture enables him to procure acceptance fora number of ideas which are as daring as they are novel. -Extensiveness and diversity of the world in which his intellect moves, ascompared with the narrowness of the world to which Racine andBoileau had confined themselves.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 233the demonstration or the development of the truths.ofChristianity; and now suddenly, through a rent in theveil, the essential contradiction comes into view. It isimpossible to be at once a Christian and a Cartesian! itis clear in an instant that the universal determinism ofthe philosophers is incompatible with the conception ofa divine Providence. Pascal had detected this latentantagonism, and it does not escape Bossuet, for it is atthis juncture that he causes Fénelon to write his Refutation du Traité de la nature et de la grâce, in answer toMalebranche. Arnauld also, the great Arnauld as he isalready called, is alive to the truth . " The more mindfulI am that I am a Christian, writes the one, the lesscan I share the ideas he (Malebranche) propounds "; andB. The " homme d'esprit. " -New signification acquired by theword " esprit " at the time of Fontenelle; —and in the first place itconveys the idea that the man who possesses the quality it expressesis a man of wide interests. -Fontenelle is interested in very manythings; and in the essence of things [ Cf. among his Dialogues:Laure et Sapho, Agnès Sorel et Roxelane, Socrate et Montaigne,Anne de Bretagne et Marie Tudor, Brutus et Faustine] -Secondlyan " homme d'esprit " is a man who does not attach more importanceto things than they deserve; -and to employ one of Fontenelle'sfavourite expressions he is " that man [ Cf. among his Dialogues:Erasme et Charles- Quint, Alexandre et Phryné, Guillaume deCabestan et Frédéric de Brandebourg, Straton et Raphaël] .—Hisliking for what is new [ Cf. Digression sur les Anciens et lesModernes]. His independent attitude towards tradition .-Finally an"homme d'esprit " is a man who perceives the relations betweenthings and the category to which they belong [ Cf. Histoire desoracles]; —who makes further suggestions to his readers in theseconnections; -pointing out relations and categories which are unexpected and remote. —That Fontenelle makes his readers think; —andthat the distinguishing features of his talent are its subtlety; —andthe far-reaching import of the hints he gives.C. Fontenelle as a great intellect; —that it is justifiable to regardhim as such merely because he applied his intelligence to the consideration of matters of great moment. -His preface to the Histoire234 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREin turn the second declares: " The further I progresswith this work (it was a refutation of the Traité denature et de la grâce) the more I am struck by theantagonism between religion and these metaphysicalimaginings. " But the mighty theologian has been longin perceiving this antagonism, and what is more, wellequipped as he is in some respects, he labours under thedisadvantage of lacking the rich, fluent, and seductivestyle of Malebranche. Nobody reads him, while Malebranche is read. He is confronted at last by a writer, agenuine writer, by the great writer whom up to nowCartesianism had been without. And it is a fact thatMalebranche finds disciples. While Bossuet and Fénelonare wasting their energy in other conflicts, he goes onde l'Académie des sciences , 1699. -The idea of the " solidarity of thesciences " finds expression in it for perhaps the first time in literature; -also the idea of the " invariability of the laws of nature. "-Fontenelle's " eulogies " [ See in particular the eulogies of Vauban,d'Argenson, Newton ( 1727) , Boerhaave, Malebranche, Leibnitz ]; —theyare evidence of a subtle intellect; -of a wide power of comprehension;-and of a faculty of grouping things so as to allow of their beingregarded from the same point of view.-Growing authority ofFontenelle among men of learning; -in society; -among literarymen. -Fontenelle's later works; -his Vie de Corneille, 1729; —hisRéflexions sur la Poétique; -his Théorie des tourbillons cartésiens,1752 -The numerous points on which Fontenelle was the harbinger ofVoltaire; -the many personal traits which make him the forerunnerof Voltaire; and what were the deficiencies that prevented himplaying Voltaire's part?In the first place he was wanting to a certain degree in originality; -and above all, to a certain degree, in conviction . -Mme de Tencin'sremark: " You have a brain where you ought to have a heart "; -and, in this connection, of Fontenelle's scepticism; -it did not consistso much in the belief that it is impossible to arrive at the truth; —asin the belief that truth is essentially aristocratic; -that it cannot becommunicated to the masses; —and further that it is of no very greatutility. How this conception of truth is characteristic of the "wit ";-of the society man and of the epicurean. -Whether it was not thisTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 235with his work in the retirement of his humble chamber, andhis work consists in humanising-in " laicising " it wouldbe said to-day-those elements of Christian doctrine whichmankind is most disposed to regard as harsh or as contraryto reason. He softens down the doctrine of the fall; hetempers the doctrine of grace; he banishes God to a distance from the world; he denies His intervention in theaffairs of men; he has a way of interpreting the supernatural which makes of it a sort of less obvious conformity with the laws of nature; and his contemporariesmade no mistake as to his teaching: they recognised itto be Cartesianism .They saw a further exemplification of this samedoctrine in the scepticism or criticism of Pierre Bayle, ofphilosophy that prevented Fontenelle putting his whole soul into somegreat work? The Fragments d'un traité de la Raison humaine.—And that in any case it prevented him exerting the influence he couldhave exerted had he chosen. -Still, on the other hand, it is a fact thatwith the exception of Bayle, he did more than any other writer tofashion the generation of the Encyclopedists.3. THE WORKS. -Fontenelle's works being too little known, wethink it right to outline here the contents of the eight volumes of theedition of 1790.VOL. I.-Documents relating to Fontenelle's biography; -Dialoguesdes morts anciens; -Dialogues des morts anciens avec les modernes.VOL. II.-Entretiens sur la pluralité des Mondes; -Théorie des tourbillons;-Histoire des oracles.VOL. III.-Histoire du Théâtre français; -Vie de Corneille;—Réflexions sur la Poétique; -Description de l'empire de Poésie [ Cf.the Carte du pays de Tendre] .- In this last work occur the followinglines, which were evidently [ 1678] intended for Racine, Boileau, andtheir followers: " The High Poetry is inhabited by solemn,melancholy, surly people who speak a language which, comparedwith that spoken in the other provinces of poetry, is what low Bretonis to the language of the rest of France. " -Fontenelle's operas andtragedies, of which one is in prose, complete the volume.VOL. IV. His eight comedies: Macate, Le Tyran, Abdolonyme,the Testament, Henriette, Lysianasse, the Comète, and Pygmalion.236 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREwhom almost the only work consulted to-day is his greatDictionary. But his Pensées sur la comète date from 1682,and no work made more noise at the time, or stood theparty of the libertines in greater stead. For briefly put,what else is Bayle's criticism but the extension of theCartesian principle of doubt to dangerous matters , whichDescartes had skilfully avoided, and excluded as it werefrom the application of his method? Bayle, writing likehis master from his retreat in Holland, and armed withhis Cartesianism, is the first who dares to subject religionand morality to a dissolvent criticism . It may be urged atfirst sight that he criticises and doubts for the sole pleasureof doubting and criticising. But examine his work moreclosely and consider attentively some of his conclusions.The last of these comedies is in verse; the other seven are inprose.VOL. V. His ten eclogues; his miscellaneous poems; -theDigression sur les Anciens et les Modernes; -the Fragments d'untraité de la Raison humaine; —and a few minor works of the samestamp at once playful and philosophic.VOLS. VI. and VII. -The Eloges (Eulogies) .VOL. VIII.-The Doutes sur le système des causes occasionelles.—The Lettres galantes du chevalier d'Her letters..;-and Fontenelle'sThere is a modern edition of Fontenelle's works dated 1817.There have been numerous modern reprints of the Entretiens surla pluralité des Mondes and the Éloges.V. The Reorganisation of the Academy of Sciences.1. The SCIENTIFIC MOVEMENT PRIOR TO FONTENELLE, -and of themistake that is made in overlooking its importance. -The great discoveries in mathematics and the physical sciences were made duringthe earlier years of the seventeenth century; —also some of the greatdiscoveries in natural science; -and discoveries of greater importancewill not be made in any of these fields until towards the close of thefollowing century. -In proof of this assertion it is sufficient to cite some few names: Kepler, 1571-1630; -Galileo, 1564-1642; —Descartes, 1596-1650; -Pascal, 1623-1662; -Huyghens, 1629-1695;THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 237It will be found that he is in nowise addicted to paradox,and when he writes " it is better to be an atheist thanan idolater," he knows perfectly well what he is saying,and above all he knows the goal at which he is aiming.Again, is there any doubt as to his intention when hecontrasts "the evidences afforded by reason " with "thetruths of our religion "; and who does not see or suspectthe end he has in view? The truth is , this allegedsceptic is engaged in establishing the sovereignty ofreason on the ruins of tradition and authority. " Duringthe reign of Louis XIV. there were already men whoare our contemporaries, " Diderot will say referring toBayle, who in fact was the thinker who served theencyclopedists as master. Descartes had been but the-Newton, 1642–1727. —Or in the field of natural science: Harvey,1578-1658; -Malpighi, 1628-1694; -Leuvenhoeck, 1632-1723; -Svammerdamm, 1637-1680. -Effects produced by their discoveries.—The telescope and the microscope. -Pascal's observations on the twoinfinite quantities [ Cf. Pensées]; -physiology in Bossuet's Traité dela connaissance de Dieu; -astronomy in La Bruyère's Caractères[ Cf. the chapter entitled: Les esprits forts]; —and again in theEntretiens sur la pluralité des mondes. —A passage in Perrault'sParallèles [ fifth and last dialogue, edition of 1696, p. 41 , &c] .2. THE ACADEMY OF SCIENCES .-Its first establishment, 1666, —andits early labours [ Cf. Fontenelle, and J. Bertrand, L'Académie dessciences]. The construction of the Observatory, 1667.-Huyghensand Romer are invited to settle in France. The laboratory of theAcademy. The king is present at the dissection of an elephant fromthe Versailles menagerie. -Reorganisation of the Royal BotanicalGarden (Jardin des Plantes) , 1671.-The " second birth " of theAcademy, 1699. -The number of academicians is increased fromsixteen to fifty. The sections: Geometry, Astronomy, Mechanics,Chemistry, Anatomy, and Botany. -The Academy after being underthe precarious tutelage of a minister, is accorded the personal protection of the sovereign.3. SOME OF THE CONSEQUENCES OF THIS REORGANISATION,-or someproofs of the wide diffusion of a taste for science. The lectures onchemistry by the apothecary Lémery [ Cf. Fontenelle, Éloge de238 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREharbinger of rationalism: it is Bayle who is its truefather.But where will this rationalism find a foundation onwhich to take its stand? what will be the model or typeof certainty? the point of leverage? "the ultimate immovable basis? " the rock to which we shall cleave soas not to be carried away and drowned in the ocean ofdoubt? They will be found in science is the answer givenat the opportune moment by the witty author, himselfanother Cartesian, of the Entretiens sur la pluralité desmondes.The nephew of Corneille , and therefore the bornenemy of Molière, Boileau, Racine and their supporters, Fontenelle was long considered to be adeLemery] . " Even the ladies , following the fashion, are bold enoughto show themselves at such learned gatherings. "-They flock, too, tothe dissections practised by Du Verney; —as do numerous foreigners[ Cf. Fontenelle, Éloge de Du Verney] .-Corroborative evidencefurnished by the memoirs of Mme de Staal- Delaunay. -The chemicalexperiments of the Duc d'Orléans [ Cf. Saint- Simon, ix. , p. 268, &c.; —and Fontenelle, Éloge de Homberg] .—The conception of science takesdefinite shape, and the idea of progress is evolved [ Cf Brunetière,Études critiques , v. ].VI.-Charles Perrault [ Paris, 1628; 1703, Paris. ]― -1. THE SOURCES. -Perrault's memoirs published for the first timein 1759;-P. Clément, Lettres, Instructions et Mémoires de Colbertparticularly vol. v.; Niceron, Hommes illustres , vol . xliii .;d'Alembert, Éloge de Charles Perrault, in his Éloges académiques;-Sainte- Beuve, Charles Perrault in his Causeries du lundi, vol. v. ,and Nouveaux lundis , vol. i .; —Ch. Giraud, Lettre critique precedinghis edition of the Contes des Fées, 1864; -Arvède Barine , LesContes de Perrault in the Revue des Deux Mondes, December 1 ,1890.2. THE MAN AND THE WRITER.A. Chief Clerk of the Works.-Perrault's family; -the Boileaufamily and the Perrault family; -Pierre Perrault, the translator ofthe Secchia rapita, 1678 [ Cf. Racine in his preface to Iphigénie];THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 239quately depicted in the Cydias sketched by La Bruyère,"a mixture of the pedant and the Précieux, " whoseoriginality scarcely went further, to continue to quoteLa Bruyère, " than merely avoiding the profession ofother people's ideas while contriving to be of the opinionof somebody." And all these criticisms were deserved.Fontenelle's tragedy Aspar is only known to us by anepigram of Racine, but we have his Eclogues and hisLettres galantes du chevalier d'Her ... What wasBoileau to think of such a passage as the following:"We have been told, sir, that you have become a philosopher, but that your philosophy is the most extraordinaryin the world. You do not believe that colours exist!I broached the matter one day with Mme de B----Nicolas Perrault; Claude Perrault, architect and doctor [ Cf.Fontenelle, Éloge de Claude Perrault]; -Charles Perrault; hisearly studies and his early verses; -his "travesty " of the sixthbook of the Aeneid; -and, in this connection, of the revival ofburlesque. Colbert appoints Perrault secretary of the Academy ofInscriptions;-Perrault gives him the idea for the first Academyof Sciences; he is charged, together with Chapelain, with drawing up the " List of the King's Bounties. " He is given thecontrol of the Public Works; -his labours; -he suggests to hisbrother the colonnade of the Louvre; -his disappointments and hisretirement. His " occasional pieces. " -The Saint-Paulin, 1686; —and, in this connection, of the revival of the epopee. -The Siècle deLouis le Grand, 1687; -and of the double claim on our attention ofthis work; —first as having suggested to Voltaire his Siècle de LouisXIV.:—and secondly as having given rise to the quarrel between the ancients and moderns.B. Perrault as the Apologist of the Moderns. —The Parallèles desAnciens et des Modernes, 1688-1696. -Emotion aroused by thesedialogues;-Boileau and Perrault; -Perrault and La Bruyère;-Perrault's thesis and the object of his work [ Cf. below " THEQUARREL BETWEEN THE ANCIENTS AND MODERNS. "]-Perrault's politeand courteous attitude in the discussion. Moreover that there ismuch that is excellent in the Parallèles. -That in reading this book,only the opinions of the Abbé of the Dialogues should be imparted240 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREcase.who is a friend of yours, and who is really pained at yourShe would strangle Descartes if she had him inher power. And it must be admitted that his philosophy is a scurvy doctrine: it strips the ladies of theircharms. If there be no such thing as a complexion,what becomes of the roses and lilies of our beauties! Itwill be useless for you to tell them that colours are in theeyes of those who look, and not in the objects; the ladies.will not permit their complexion to be dependent on theeyes of other persons; they intend that it shall be theirown property, and if there is no colour at night M. deM is nicely caught, for he has fallen in love with.Mlle D. L. G. on account of her beautiful complexionand has married her. " Voiture has written nothing moreto Perrault. -Reconciliation between Perrault and Boileau. -Thepublication of the Hommes illustres de ce siècle, 1696–1700.C. Perrault as a writer of fairy stories; —and that d'Alembert inhis eulogy of Perrault does not even mention his fairy stories; -an omission that is none to d'Alembert's credit; -since Cendrillonand the Chat botté are the best things Perrault ever wrote; —and from 1680 to 1715 no kind of literature was produced inmore abundance than fairy stories. Of some of Perrault's rivals;-Mme d'Aulnoy, the author of the Oiseau bleu; -Mlle de laForce;-Mlle Lhéritier; [ Cf. Histoire littéraire desfemmesfrançaisesby the abbé de la Porte, Paris, 1769]; —and whether this taste for fairystories should not be connected with that , manifested at the sametime, for oriental tales?-The translation of the Arabian Nights, 1704-1708. -Do Perrault's fairy tales deserve the praise that has beenbestowed on them? -Sunt bona, sunt mala quædam, mediocriaplura. The naïveté of Perrault's tales only exists in the imagination of those whom they amuse; -La Fontaine's remark onPerrault's Peau d'âne; -Perrault's subjects are entertaining in themselves; but he has chosen to present them in a style devoid of charm.3. THE WORKS. -Perrault's works comprise: ( 1) a certain numberof occasional pieces, such as the Discours sur l'acquisition deDunkerque par le Roi, 1663, or his Parnasse poussé à bout, sur ladifficulté de décrire la conquête de la Franche- Comté, 1668;-(2) hisPoème sur la Peinture, 1668; his Saint-Paulin, 1686; and his SiècleTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 24166""precious, " Balzac nothing more affected. But neitherBalzac nor Voiture were acquainted with the art of conveying a scientific truth in a similar affected or " preciousdress and to have done this constitutes Fontenelle'soriginality. He may be said indeed to serve up Cartesianism, astronomy, physics, and natural history in madrigals;and from this point of view the Entretiens sur la pluralitédes mondes is a masterpiece unique of its kind. In gallantand insinuating fashion the work introduces into literaturefor the first time an entire order of ideas and facts whichbefore had had no part in it . Fontenelle devotes hisingenuity to fostering the new preoccupations that arebeginning to steal into men's minds. His effort is successful, and, owing to his footing in society, these novelde Louis le Grand, 1687;—(3) his Parallèles, five dialogues in fourvols. , published, as has been said, from 1688 to 1696; to which mustbe joined, as being conceived in the same spirit, his Hommes illustres,1696-1700; and finally (4) his fairy tales:-La Belle au bois dormant, Le petit Chaperon rouge, La Barbe bleue, Le Chat botté, LesFées, Cendrillon, Riquet à la houppe, Le Petit Poucet in prose; -andGriselidis, Peau d'âne, and Les souhaits ridicules in verse.They were published for the first time separately in Hollandbetween 1694 and 1711; and in volume form by Barbin, 1697-1698,the author being given as Perrault d'Armancour, son of CharlesPerrault.There are innumerable modern editions of the fairy stories.The Oiseau bleu, which is frequently adjoined to them, is by Mmed'Aulnoy; and Finette ou l'Adroite Princesse by Mlle Lhéritier.VII. Jean de la Bruyère [ Paris, 1645; † 1696, Versailles].1. THE SOURCES. -Suard, Notice sur la vie et les écrits de LaBruyère, 1781, and printed at the head of several modern editions.-Walckenaer, Étude sur La Bruyère, preceding his edition of theCaractères, Paris, 1845; -Sainte- Beuve, Portraits littéraires, vol. i.;Nouveaux Lundis, vol. i. and vol. x.; —A. Vinet, Moralistes françaisdes XVIe et XVIIe siècles, Paris, 1839; -Edouard Fournier, Lacomédie de La Bruyère, Paris, 1866; -Etienne Allaire, La Bruyère,dans la maison de Condé, Paris, 1866.17242 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREmatters become topics of fashionable conversation. Underthese circumstances it may be asked what is there that isstill wanting to the victory of Cartesianism and even ofscience itself? What is wanting is exactly and solely theelement which the quarrel between the ancients andmoderns is about to supply.66Charles Perrault, a man of wit and merit-who can onlybe reproached with having, like Scarron, begun his literarycareer by travestying " Virgil and with being morelearned in " buildings " than in literature-conceives theidea of flattering his king in somewhat novel fashion .He can hit on no better notion than to call his centurythe " Century of Louis the Great. " Is there not thecentury of Augustus or the century of Pericles? But is2. THE MAN AND THE Writer.A. The Moralist.-La Bruyère's birth; -and that he was the onlyone of the great writers of his time who was acquainted with four orfive languages, including German; -his family and his youth [ Cf.Servois, Notice biographique] .-He is appointed treasurer of thefinances for the district of Caen; -he enters the household of Condéin the capacity of tutor to the young Duke of Bourbon, 1684.-Thespectacle presented by the Condé household [ Cf. Saint- Simon,Mémoires.] -La Bruyère's reactions with Bossuet; —and with Boileau.-The alleged " romance " in La Bruyère's life; —and that it has nobearing on literary history. -Was the pean of La Bruyère's booksuggested him by Mlle de Montpensier's Galerie de Portraits?—or by the " portraits " scattered through the novels of Mlle deScudéri? —Improbability of this supposition . -On the other handhe was greatly influenced by La Rochefoucauld , -Pascal, —andMalebranche [ Cf. Auguste Damien, Étude sur La Bruyère et Malebranche, Paris, 1866 ] .—Whether the characters of Theophrastus onlyserved him as a pretext; -or whether he was mistaken as to theirliterary value; -as was Boileau as to that of the Treatise of Longinuson the Sublime?-The first edition of the Caractères, 1688; -andthat it contains barely half a dozen portraits; -maxims predominatingin it; and La Bruyère merely emulating La Rochefoucauld in his book as at first produced.Is there a " plan " in the Caractères; —and that in any case it wasTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 243it enough to say that the century of Louis XIV. is in nowise inferior to that of Augustus or that of Pericles?Perrault holds that it is not. The century of Louis XIV.is not the equal of those of Pericles and Augustus; itsurpasses them! and in proportion as the sovereignhimself is the superior of Augustus and Pericles, soBossuet, for instance, is the superior of Demosthenes,Molière the superior of Plautus or Terence, Racine thesuperior of Euripides, so France is in advance of Athensor Rome, and so in general the moderns are superior tothe ancients. In this way begins or is fomented a dispute of which Perrault himself did not foresee the consequences. He merely proposed to flatter his sovereign ,and, satisfied with having acted like a good courtier, henot perceived by Boileau; —and that it is certain that if the chapterdu Mérite personnel were to follow that de l'Homme; -or thechapter de la Conversation to precede that du Cœur; -it does notappear that the economy of the book would be affected in consequence. This fact, however, does not prove that the chapter desEsprits forts is not a precaution; on the contrary, in a certain sense, it may be maintained with the author that all the restof the work leads up to this chapter. The friend and protégéof Bossuet, the future author of the Dialogues sur le quiétisme,purposed writing a work of apologetics; or at any rate he aimedat being a moralist; -as plainly appears, moreover, from a carefulreading of the first edition of the book; -or again of the Dis- cours sur Theophraste. -La Bruyère proposed to strike a blowat once at the moderns and at the libertines, -as if he had perceived the solidarity of the two causes; -he proposed to reply atthe same time to the Perrault's Siècle de Louis le Grand;—and tothe Entretiens sur la pluralité des mondes; -and this double reference to current controversies stood him perhaps in as good steadas his talent in the early editions of his book.B. The Artist. -There was an " artist, " however, in La Bruyère;-or, as would be said at the present day, a stylist; -and the artistovershadowed the moralist; -as is proved by the following strangestatement: " Moses, Homer, Plato, Virgil , and Horace are superiorto other writers solely on account of their images. " -Boileau, who244 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREwould have gone no further, had not the partisans ofthe ancients compelled him in some sort to look moreclosely into his paradox. In reality it is the idea ofprogress, vague as yet, inchoate or floating, scarcely selfconscious, but still this idea and no other that pervades theParallèles des anciens et des modernes. It is in vain thatRacine, that La Bruyère in his Caractères, 1688–1696,that Boileau in his Réflexions critiques sur Longin, 1694,endeavour to stem the current, to exert a contraryinfluence. The witty retort is made them that theythemselves adduce proof in their works of the superioritythey are vexed should be accorded the moderns.much, exclaims Perrault, does the public prefer to thecharacters of the divine Theophrastus the reflections of"Howinclined to this opinion, when expressing it had at least made therestriction:Before starting to write, learn to think.La Bruyère's style; -and that while lacking continuity,—it is nevertheless oratorical; -in the sense that the Caractères are the repertoryof classic rhetoric . -There are to be found in it every one of the"movements " enumerated in treatises on rhetoric: the interrogation,the exclamation, the suspension, the digression, the interpellation,the adjuration; -every one of the " figures ": the extenuation, thehyperbole, the synecdoche, the catachresis , the prosopopoeia; —every one of the " modalities or modulations from irony to emphasis.-This rhetoric, however, is saved from its own excesses; -by itstendency to realism; -that is to the close imitation of nature; —and,in this connection , of the " naturalism " of La Bruyère. -How carefulhe is to thoroughly observe his models; -to note in them theirrespective, individual characteristics; —and to see that each portraitonly fits the character it is intended to represent. The circumstancethat La Bruyère's characters were often the portraits of real persons;--and without examining his intention to indulge in personalsatire, that where the identity of these persons can be tracedthe resemblance of the portrait to the original furnishes proof ofthe truth to nature of La Bruyère's depictions. -That further proofof his truthfulness to nature is found in his pessimism; —and, inTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 245the modern who has given us a translation of them! "[ Cf. Parallèles, third dialogue, 2nd edition, 1693] . Tothe side of the moderns flock the rising generation andthe women, to say nothing of the members of theAcademy, of whom barely six are supporters of Racineand Boileau. Society follows suit. On all sides it is urgedthat if the matter be strictly examined it is found that itis we, the so-called moderns, who are really the ancients.Our knowledge is more extensive than that of our fathers,and the knowledge of our sons will be more extensivestill. Long enough, and indeed too long, have " men,garbed in black and wearing the pedant's cap, held upto us the works of the ancients, not merely as being allthat is most beautiful in the world, but as embodyingthis connection, a reference once again to the connection betweenpessimism and realism. -The fact that La Bruyère is rather amelancholy writer than otherwise, -is due to his having endeavouredto see things as they are, -in order to render them as they are. -Hemay be suspected, however, of having seen things uglier than theyare;-or more grotesque than they are; -in order to make them lendthemselves to fine effects of style; -and in this way of having beenled by the very artifices of his rhetoric into the exaggeration he desired to avoid.C. The Satirist. -Of the interest of this question owing to itsbearing on the solution of another question; -that, namely, of thephilosophic import of La Bruyère's book. -The famous saying: " Aman who is born a Christian and a Frenchman feels himself shackledwhen attempting satire . " —The fourth edition of the Caractères, 1689; —and of the growing daring of La Bruyère up to the ninth edition, 1696.-It must be noted, however, that to spare nobody is almost equivalentto attacking nobody. —When a writer scoffs alike at men and women,-at courtiers and townsmen, at financiers and at the magistracy,-at the pious and at the libertines; —he is doubtless a pessimist; —buthe is not a revolutionary [ Cf. Taine, Nouveaux essais de critiqueet d'histoire].- This observation once made, it may and it should beadmitted:-that La Bruyère's indignation is deeper than that ofLa Fontaine;-that he reconciled himself less easily than Molière tothe society of his time; —and that the dawning is seen in his writings246 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREthe very idea of the Beautiful "! The moment has cometo escape from this servitude. And the emancipation,which is speedily an accomplished fact, is followed bythree consequences.Men's curiosity takes an altered direction. Forsakingthe study and meditation of the works of the ancients,it becomes exclusively bent on the observation of therealities of contemporary existence. Those who werescoffed at in the Femmes Savantes have their revenge."Almost infinite, " writes Perrault in his fifth and lastdialogue, " are the discoveries that have been made in ourcentury "; and it is a fact, that while in general thehistorians of our literature have dated wrongly thetriumph of Cartesianism, placing it thirty or fortyof a pity that is absent from those of Boileau.-It is the idea ofhumanity that is beginning to take shape.Of some other merits of the Caractères; —and in particular ofcertain portraits and narratives; —which herald the approaching vogueof the novel [ Cf. Lesage's Diable Boiteux ] .—The transition is accomplished in La Bruyère's book from character as it is understood in thecomedy of Molière; -to characters as they are about to be understoodin the novel of manners. -La Bruyère's enemies. -He replies to themin his Discours de réception à l'Académie, 1693; -and in the preface tothis discourse. He also essays on this occasion to define the " plan "of his book; but rather late in the day, imitating in this respectLa Rochefoucauld in the preliminary notice to his Maximes. —He issuccessful in showing that all the other chapters are subordinate tothe last;-but not that they observe a fixed order or gradation, orthat they have a constant bearing on his principal idea. That it isworth while noting, moreover, that his principal idea is wholly a layidea;-La Bruyère's religion being a degree less Christian than thereligion of Malebranche; -if, indeed, it may not be termed a purelynatural religion .-The Dialogues sur le quiétisme; -and that theyadded nothing to the glory of La Bruyère.3. THE WORKS. -We have mentioned all the works of La Bruyère.The editions to be consulted are: -the first edition , 1688, reprintedin the Cabinet du bibliophile, 1868; -all the following editions downto the ninth inclusive, which appeared in 1696.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 247years too early, on the other hand they have placedthirty or forty years too late what may be termed theadvent of the scientific spirit [ Cf. on this point F.Cournot, Considérations sur la marche des idées, vol . i . ,book iii . ] . In reality, the reorganisation or the renewalof the Academy of Sciences in 1699 is almost as importantand significant a date in French intellectual history asthat of the founding of the French Academy in 1635.Boileau may compose if he chooses his Satire des femmes:Good! it is that blue- stockingOfwhom Roberval has a high opinion and whom Sauveur frequents;but nevertheless the very women henceforth take aninterest in geometry, and the spectacle of a dissection,We shall confine ourselves to citing among modern editions:-Walckenaër's edition, 1845; -Destailleur's edition, 1854; -G. Servois'edition in the " Grands Ecrivains de la France " series, Paris , 1865-1878, Hachette.Two " classic " editions also deserve mention: -Hémardinquer'sedition, 1849, 1854, 1872, 1890, Delagrave; -and Rébelliau's edition,1890, Hachette.VIII.-François de Salignac de la Mothe- Fénelon [ châteauof Fénelon, near Sarlat, 1651; † 1715, Cambrai]1. THE SOURCES. -Fénelon's voluminous correspondence, printed atthe end of the Versailles edition, and completed by a considerablenumber of letters published in 1849, 1850, 1853, 1869, 1873, and 1892.La Harpe, Éloge de Fénelon, 1771; -a embert, Éloge de Fénelon,1774; -Cardinal de Bausset, Histoire de Fénelon, 3rd edition, 1817;-Abbé Gosselin, Histoire littéraire de Fénelon , 1843; -Sainte-Beuve,Causeries du lundi, vol. ii . , 1850, and vol. x. , 1854;-P. Janet, Fénelonin the " Grands Ecrivains Français " series, Paris, 1892; -R. Mahrenholz, Fénelon, ein Lebensbild, Leipsick, 1896.O. Douen, L'intolérance de Fénelon, 2nd edition, Paris , 1875.Tabaraud, Supplément aux histoires de Bossuet et de Fénelon,Paris, 1822; -A. Bonnel, La controverse de Bossuet et de Fénelon surle quiétisme, Mâcon, 1850; -Algar Griveau, Étude sur la condemna-248 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREwhich Molière thought so comic when he made hisThomas Diafoirus offer it to Angélique in the Maladeimaginaire, is now a spectacle the sex flocks to witness.The anatomist Du Verney, when introducing Mlle deLaunay to the Duchesse du Maine, explains that " ofall the young women of France, it is she who is bestacquainted with the human body, " and the statement isconsidered perfectly natural. On the other hand it isheld to be extraordinary that men should still be foundwho, while priding themselves on their judgment andtaste, confess to an admiration for Pindar. We are themen of the present day, and what we are chiefly concernedto know is the world in which we live and to which webelong! And what can Aristotle the Stagyrite andtion du livre des Maximes des saints, Paris, 1878; -Guerrier,Madame Guyon, sa vie et sa doctrine, Paris, 1881; —Crouslé, Fénelonet Bossuet, Paris , 1894; -abbé Delmont, Fénelon et Bossuet, Lyons,1896.Emmanuel de Broglie, Fénelon à Cambrai, Paris, 1884.Consult too, but cautiously, Saint- Simon's Mémoires; -the lettersof the Duchesse d'Orléans;-and La Beaumelle, Mémoires et correspondance de Madame de Maintenon.2. THE MAN AND THE WRITER.-He is a further example of awriter who does not resemble his style; -and the real Fénelon wasjust as hard, inflexible and overbearing as the style of Télémaque ismellifluous and even unctuous. -If there be added to this essentialcharacteristic a very high idea of himself, of his family, and of hispersonal dignity; a natural preciosity displayed in a taste for strangeand unusual opinions; and finally a sort of insincerity of which he isscarcely conscious; -an idea will be obtained of the Fénelon of thefirst period of his life, -from whom the second Fénelon was onlyevolved very late in his career; —and the idea will be incomplete sinceFénelon is a strangely complex and fluctuating character; -still itwill allow of his being understood; -and will give a sort of unity tohis life , his rôle, and his work.A. Fénelon's early years. —His family; —his early studies; Cahors,the collège du Plessis , and the seminary of Saint- Sulpice. -HisFÉNELON .

THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 249Cicero, who hailed from Arpinum, know on this subjector teach us in connection with it?The influence of these new ideas, or more accurately ofthe new direction taken by men's curiosity, may quicklybe traced even in the partisans of antiquity themselves,in the Caractères of La Bruyère, for instance , or inFénelon's Télémaque, the respective dates of which are1696 as regards the last edition of the Caractères, and1699 for Télémaque. It was La Bruyère who was thefirst to be attacked or railed at by the moderns, whileas for Fénelon he was destined to remain faithfulto the ancients to the end of his life. And yet inwhat direction did the interests of La Bruyère reallylie? He has told us explicitly in a very curious passageyouthful letters [ to Bossuet and to the Marquise de Laval];-andthat they are characterised by preciosity. He is put in charge of theNouvelles catholiques. —Is what Saint- Simon says of the intrigues ofFénelon to secure his advancement to be believed?-and that, as ageneral rule, it is always prudent at any rate to begin by disbelievingSaint- Simon. -Did he even ever see Fénelon?-That in any caseLouis XIV. distrusted Fénelon to start with; -never inviting him, inspite of his early successes as an orator [ Cf. the Sermon pour la fêtede l'Epiphanie, 1685] , to preach before the court; -while after thesuccess of his " Saintonge Mission, " 1686-1687, the king declined toconfer on him either the bishopric of Poitiers , or that of La Rochelle.-How Fénelon triumphed over his sovereign's prejudice against him;-thanks to the intervention in his behalf of the Duc de Beauvilliers,of Mme de Maintenon, -and of Bossuet. -He belonged to the groupof persons who formed Bossuet's habitual society. -At the request ofBossuet he writes his Réfutation du Traité de la nature et de lagrâce, directed against Malebranche.-He is appointed tutor to theroyal children , 1689.B. His early works. -The Sermon pour la fête de l'Epiphanie, 1685,-and that it almost marks an epoch in pulpit eloquence. -Seduction, charm, and elevation of Fénelon's manner.-The Traité del'éducation des filles, 1686; -and, in this connection, of the progressmade since Molière and his Femmes savantes. -Télémaque, 1693-1694?—and of the principal questions it raises. -What was Fénelon's250 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURE66of his book, which is not a book, but the collected fruitof his direct and close observation of his contemporaries. There arise among men infinite combinationsof power, of favour, of genius, of riches, of dignities ,of birth, of strength, of industry, of capacity, of vice, ofweakness, of virtue, of stupidity, of poverty, of powerlessness, of humbleness, and of vileness. These elements,mingled together in a thousand different manners andmutually compensated, give rise to the different classes andthe different social grades. " And we declare in turn, thatin his Caractères, it is these thousand combinations, thesedifferent classes and different social grades that he delightsto depict, and no longer " man in general. " He doesmore than take nature for his model in reality he goesintention in writing the work?—In writing it did he merely take anartistic satisfaction in so 66 disfiguring " antiquity as to bring it intoaccordance with his own conception of the period? or was it hisintention to indulge in satire? [ Cf. the Lettre à Louis XIV. ]; —or,again, was his purpose to set forth his scheme of government?-Howfar was Fénelon responsible for the publication of the book in 1699?-and, in this connection, of strange sentence in his Mémoire inwhich he exonerates himself from all responsibility in the matter; —"he preferred, he says, to allow it to appear in a deformed and distorted shape, than to issue it as he had written it. "-Whether theunfaithful copyist whom he accuses of having stolen his manuscriptwas not well inspired in only publishing it after Fénelon had beenappointed to the see of Cambrai in 1695? —[ Cf. L. Genay, Étude littéraire et morale sur le Télémaque, Paris , 1876; and L. Boulvé , Del'hellénime chez Fénelon, Paris, 1897] .C. The great controversies . —The Quietist controversy [ Cf. above,BOSSUET ] . Difficulties of Fénelon's situation . -His dilatory tactics;-and beneath his apparent gentleness, his unconquerable resistance.-The essence of the controversy and the question of pure or disinterested love. The seduction the doctrine would exercise on Fénelongiven his aristocratic and singular nature. The quarrel becomescomplicated by political considerations. -Fénelon's ambition, —andthat it is superabundantly proved; -by his Lettre à Louis XIV.;-byTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 251to current events for his inspiration , and his one ambitionis to give a vivid picture of " the manners of his time."We touch here on the chief reason of the immense successof his book. People recognise their neighbours in itspages. Such an one is Diphile, such an one Théodecte.Everybody can put a name to Irène, to Laïs , or to Césonie.Hence it is that the book is amusing , that it is instructive: it teaches in how many ways one man may differfrom another. But Le Bruyère complains that " greatsubjects are forbidden him "; five or six years pass andFénelon essays them in his Télémaque.I do not believe there exists a book, a celebrated andjustly celebrated book, in which antiquity is presented usin a falser light than in Télémaque; and I do not exceptTélémaque and by his Tables de Chaulnes. -The utopia of Fénelon;-and its retrograde character. -Is it to be regretted that his pupildid not reign?-His condemnation, March 12, 1699, and the LettersPatent of August 14th . -His exile at Cambrai .-In his exile he continues to keep in communication with his party [ Cf. his correspondencewith the Duke of Burgundy] , and to occupy himself with the schemeof government he looks forward to being able to put in force.-Hisconflict with the Jansenists; -and of the unscrupulousness he displayed in the course of it. -His attitude in this instance may beregarded as his revenge for the defeat he had suffered; -and in anycase as wholly characteristic of one side of his policy. -Imprudence ofthis policy; -seeing that the ruin of Port- Royal contributed as muchas the revocation of the Edict of Nantes to the progress of libertinism .-Hopes conceived by Fénelon at the time of the death of the Dauphin[ Cf. his letter of April 14, 1711];-it is at this juncture that he composes his Tables de Chaulnes. -Death of the Duke of Burgundy[ February, 1712] .D. Fénelon's last years . -Although the hopes that had buoyed himup for the last fifteen years are shattered, he does not abandon himself to despair; -but on the contrary accepts his fate as a specialmanifestation in his interest of the will of God [ Cf. his correspondence for the years 1712, 1713, 1714] .-His remark to the Duc deChaulnes: "My dear Duke, let us die without regret " [ March, 1712]; —and it maybe said that from this moment his sole and ardent concern252 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREeven the Cyrus or the Clélie of Mlle de Scudéri, to whom,moreover, it owes as much as to Sophocles or Homer.Bossuet esteemed the work to be "unworthy" of a priest,and I am much afraid that he was right. Still , if thebook be read as it ought to be read, that is with the date atwhich it was written constantly in view, the impression itproduces is at once modified . As is the case with LaBruyère, it is " portraits " and " contemporary portraitsthat Fénelon draws. Mentor is he himself, and Télémaqueis the Duke of Burgundy. He lectures the prince, and lesson the subject of morality than on that of government.The tale serves to pass off the precept.""He discusses problems of statesmanship, and chimericalwas to prepare himself for death. Still he seeks distraction; -andwrites his Lettre sur les occupations de l'Académie française, 1714; —perhaps, too, he revises his Dialogues de l'éloquence; and his Traitéde l'existence de Dieu. -He continues to combat the last remnants ofJansenism; —and administers his diocese admirably. He is mortallystricken, however; and the spectacle of his gradual throwing off ofhis former self, year by year and almost month by month, is exceedingly beautiful.E. Of some other of Fénelon's works. -The Lettre sur les occupations de l'Académie française; —and that it bears traces of Fénelon'sstrange and unusual bent of mind. His judgment on French poetry; —which he complains is the slave of the laws of versification. -His judgmenton Molière. -His scheme for a treatise on history. -His Dialoguessur l'éloquence [ published in 1718]; and that they contain all theobjections against and the criticisms of pulpit eloquence, which willafterwards be elaborated by Voltaire; —that in this respect the workwould have come better from a man of letters than from a bishop;—while it is sovereignly unjust as far as it refers to Bourdaloue. -IndeedFénelon is already quite of the view of a modern critic; -and thewords of Edmond Scherer might almost be put into his mouth: "thesermon is a spurious branch of literature. " -The Traité de l'existencede Dieu; and of the influence of the scientific movement of the timeon the first part of the book. -Comparison between the second partand Malebranche's Entretiens sur la métaphysique;-and of the easeTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 253though his views may be they are closely connected withthe situation of France at his time. In short, he tooseeks his inspiration in current events. He has a goal inview, and a goal that is neither distant nor indistinct, butin proximity and clearly defined. Was it possible, underthese conditions, that Télémaque should not have arousedthe eager curiosity of its writer's contemporaries, that theyshould not have seen that they themselves were its subjectmatter, that they should not have essayed to gather fromthe lessons of the tutor what manner of government wouldbe that of his royal pupil? For these reasons Fénelon's"novel" is the outcome, as were the Caractères, of thenewly developed thirst for knowledge. It is the book of areformer, and this despite the fact that the aristocratic idealwith which more than one passage in it might be made out to havepantheistic leanings.After what precedes it is incumbent to add:-that, while in Fénelon's case the style is not " the man "; -for the only point of resemblance between his character and his style is the marvellous supplenessof both; yet his style is instinct with a very keen charm; —a sortof social optimism; -and also a very keen sentiment for what isabout to be called humanity. —The truth is that Fénelon was verykind, to those who recognised his superiority; -and he was verysensitive. It is evidently to these two characteristics that he oweshis reputation as a philosopher or even as a philanthropist [ Cf. LaHarpe in his eulogy, and the Fénelon of Marie- Joseph Chénier];—andin this way the world has formed an idea of Fénelon, as it has ofBossuet, which is false as far as it is arrived at-but no further-byan attempt to judge of the character of the men from the nature oftheir writings.3. THE WORKS. They are divided, or rather they have beendivided in the Versailles edition , into five classes .(1) Theological and controversial works, of which the principalare -the Traité de l'existence et des attributs de Dieu, 1712, 1718;-the Lettre à l'évêque d'Arras sur la lecture de l'Ecriture sainte enlangue vulgaire, 1707 , 1718; -and the Refutation du Traité de lanature et de la grâce, published for the first time in 1820 [ vols. i . , ii.and iii . ]-Volumes iv. , v. , vi. , vii . , viii . and ix. contain Fénelon's dif-254 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREof the archbishop of Cambrai lies wholly in the past, aswe clearly see to- day, though nobody perceived the truthat the time. Fénelon interests the men of his epoch inthemselves, an achievement that accorded exactly withthe demands of the coterie of the moderns.There are other works which, although they are ofinferior literary merit, are not less significant of the transformation that is in progress; and disrespectful as it mayseem to speak in the same breath of Télémaque or theCaractères and of the comedies of Dancourt, in realitythe association of these works is more interesting andinstructive than it is slighting to Fénelon or LaBruyère. It is in Dancourt's pieces that the transformation takes place of the comedy of character into theferent writings on the subject of Quietism with the exception of theMaximes des saints; —while volumes x. , xi . , xii. , xiii. , xiv. , xv. and xvi.contain his writings against Jansenism.(2) His moral and devotional works, comprising: -his Sermons, ofwhich the principal are the Sermon pour l'Epiphanie, 1685, and theSermon pour le sacre de l'Electeur de Cologne, 1707; —his Lettressur divers points de spiritualité, 1718, 1738; —and, included in thisclass for no obvious reason, the Traité sur l'éducation des filles, 1687[vols. xvii. and xviii. ].(3) Fénelon's diocesan charges, 1701 to 1713 [ vol. xviii . ](4) Literary works including: -thirty- six Fables; the Dialoguesdes morts, an imitation, probably, of Fontenelle's work. The editionof 1700 contains four dialogues , -that of 1712 forty- seven, -that of1718 sixty-nine, -that of 1787 seventy- four, -that of 1823 eighty - one;-the Aventures de Télémaque, 1699 and 1717;-the Dialogues surl'éloquence, 1718, and sundry minor works including the Lettre surles occupations de l'Académie française, 1716 [ vols. xix. , xx. , xxi. andxxii . ](5) Political writings including: -Divers Mémoires concernant laguerre de la succession d'Espagne; -the Examen de conscience surles devoirs de la royauté; -and the Essai philosophique sur le gouvernement civil. This last work is not by Fénelon, but was writtenby the Chevalier de Ramsai " in accordance with the principles of M.de Fénelon, " and published in London in 1721 [ vol. xxii. ] .THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 255comedy of manners, in his "curtain-raisers " as well as inhis more important plays-in the Moulin de Javelle, inthe Foire de Besons, in the Vendanges de Suresne, as inthe Chevalier à la mode, in the Femme d'intrigues, or inthe Agioteurs. And as for the comedy of manners, inwhat does it exist if not in the presentation of the foiblesof the hour and the follies of the period in a scenario thatitself is wholly contemporary? Plays of this stamp are amirror in which the comic author invites us to recogniseourselves; and, for our part, after making allowance forthe exaggeration inseparable from caricatures, and furthernecessitated, as we are aware, by the requirements ofdramatic art, what we look for in such plays is our ownlikeness. The attractiveness, however, of comedy of thisIt remains to mention the Correspondence in twelve volumes:--Correspondence with the Duke of Burgundy [vol. i. ]; —Miscellaneousletters [vols. ii. , iii. , iv. ]; —letters dealing with spiritual matters [vols.v. and vi. ]; -letters relating to the Quietist controversy [ vols. vii. ,viii. , ix. , x. , xi. ]-Vol. xii. contains a good review of Fénelon's works.IX.-The Quarrel between the Ancients and Moderns.1. THE ORIGIN OF THE QUARREL. -Three lines of Horace:Etas parentum, pejor avis, tulitNos nequiores, mox daturosProgeniem vitiosiorem;--and that notwithstanding Bodin [ Cf. above BODIN]; -Bacon and hisDe augmentis; -Descartes [ Cf. Discours de la méthode, vi. ]; —andPascal [Fragment d'un Traité du vide]; —the idea expressed by thesethree lines was entertained " by all thoughtful persons " until towards1680.-The real quarrel, —the result, like many important events, ofinsignificant causes, has a threefold origin . It arose out of:-(1) thecontroversies touching the " miraculous character of Christianity ";-controversies which inevitably raised the question of the superiority ofChristianity over Paganism [ Cf. Desmarets de Saint- Sorlin's prefaceto Clovis and to Marie-Magdeleine];-(2) the mere spectacle of theprogress made by science between the time of Descartes and that of256 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREorder, whatever its literary value, lies, just as doesthe attractiveness of the Caractères, in the fidelity ofobservation displayed in it. What is asked of the authoris no longer that he shall unravel a plot or develop a thesis,but that he shall hit off his models accurately; and, inresponse to this demand, the author allows himself to bedirected both in his choice of subjects and in his mode oftreating them by passing events. Dancourt is such anauthor. He is without genius, his talent is slight, hiscomedy is superficial, his wit is often coarse; on the otherhand, his plays abound in details relating to manners, inscraps of dialogue transported on to the stage from reallife, and I will not dare to say in portraits-it would bedoing him too much honour-but at least in silhouettes ofNewton; (3) the idea that occurred to Charles Perrault of disparagingthe ancients with a view to flattering Louis XIV. -The sitting of theFrench Academy held on January 27, 1687 [ Cf. Rigault, Histoire dela querelle des Anciens et des Modernes ] .—Indignation of the partisansof the ancients: La Fontaine, Boileau, Racine. -Fontenelle supportsPerrault in his Digression sur les Anciens et les Modernes, 1688.-Thefirst edition of the Caractères appears almost simultaneously [ the royalauthorisation for its printing is dated October, 1687]; -and Perraultdetermines to write his Parallèles, of which the first volume appearedin October of the same year. -Fontenelle elected to the FrenchAcademy, 1691; -election of La Bruyère, 1693.-Boileau replies tothe Parallèles in his Réflexions critiques sur Longin, 1694; -Perrault publishes the concluding volume of his Parallèles in 1696; —he treats in it of the superiority of the moderns in the matter ofscience; and the quarrel seems appeased by Boileau's letter toPerrault, 1701.2. IMPORTANCE OF THE QUARREL; -and of the error that has beencommitted in regarding it as a quarrel between pedants. In additionto Rigault's estimable book on the subject, students should readAuguste Comte's pronouncement on the matter [ Cf. Cours de philosophie positive, vol. iii. , forty- seventh lesson;-and Pierre Leroux'streatise, Sur la Loi de la continuité qui relie le XVII au XVIII®siècle]. The real point at issue in the quarrel is:A. From the pedagogic point of view , -Will the ancients remainTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 257personages, who dress, speak, move about, behave themselves, feel and think after the fashion of people of theyear 1700. It remains that there shall appear on thescene a more skilful artist , and above all a more conscientious artist and one more devoted to his art, andthat he shall improve on Dancourt if he can! Still , as itis, the comedy of Molière is threatened, or even alreadyundermined. The case is the same with the politics ofBossuet and with the æsthetics of Boileau, and all threewriters are the butt of the same patient, subtle, and almostinvisible enemy.This enemy might be said , if desired, to be a contemptor rather a disdain for tradition, but I prefer to speak of itas a frenzy or a rage for novelty. Nothing gives more flavourthe educators of humanity for all time?—for what reasons? —and invirtue of what privilege? -Ronsard was saturated with Greek tradition, and Malherbe with Latin tradition; —and the question is, hasnot the time come for writers to be purely French? -La Bruyère, inhis Discours sur Théophraste, shows that he appreciates that theseare the points at issue, and very skilfully defends the ancients; —byjustifying the authority of tradition on the ground of the element ofeternal truth contained in the writings of the ancients; -and containedin consequence of their greater faithfulness to nature; -while healso urges that they expressed ideas the propriety of which is stillrecognised after the lapse of three thousand years; -in spite ofthe immense changes in manners, -in customs, -and in the veryconception that obtains of life . —In the second place:B. From the philosophic point of view;-the question at issue isthat of progress; —an idea of which a conception , confused as yet, butundoubtedly existent, was abroad at the period; —and an idea thepaternity of which has wrongly been ascribed to Turgot. -Explicitpassages in the Parallèles: —[ Cf. vol . iv. , p. 40] arithmetical progress.—[Cf. vol. iv. , p. 72] organic progress.-[ Cf. vol . iv. , p. 119] evolutionor progress by differentiation; -and in this connection that it is undoubtedly Perrault who triumphed over convictions; -which Pascaland Descartes had only shaken.C. From the aesthetic or literary point of view; -the point atissue was whether the ancients had attained to perfection; -and laid18258 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREor " spice " to a literary work than an air of novelty!Unfortunately, although truth may "have a beardedchin, " as Malebranche said, it is the truth for allthat; and what is more, it is not given to every one tostrike out a new line, or to strike out a new line whenhe wishes to or because he wishes to. It must alsobe borne in mind that tradition at no period representsthe whole of the past, but, on the contrary, only that smallportion of it which has survived. Tradition is not Meviusor Bavius, who have passed into utter oblivion, but Virgiland Horace, who have survived. And why have theysurvived? Boileau has answered the question in excellentfashion: "It is because the esteem in which they are helddoes not depend in reality on the length of time duringdown laws that can only be swerved from to the detriment of art;--or whether, on the contrary, the various branches of literaturemust not necessarily be developed and transformed in the course oftime.3. SOME CONSEQUENCES OF THE QUARREL. -It transferred the goldenage of humanity from one period to another; -dealt tradition in thisway a serious blow; -and completed the triumph of Cartesianism.—For whatever the divisions among the Cartesians, they are all agreedon this point: that optimism is justified by reason; -or that optimismis the only reasonable opinion [ Cf. in this connection Spinoza's Ethics,Malebranche's Entretiens, and Leibnitz's Théodicée] .—Another consequence of the quarrel was to subject literature in all its branches tothe authority of fashion; fashion being merely the search for noveltywhether in the matter of ideas or of that of dress and customs; —and,in this connection, of the great number of women writers at the closeof the reign of Louis XIV.; -Mme Deshoulières [ Cf. Sainte- Beuve,Une ruelle politique sous Louis XIV. in his Portraits de femmes]; -Mme de Villedieu , Mlle Bernard, Mme Durand, Mlle de la Force,Mme d'Aulnoy, Mlle Lhéritier, Mme de Murat [ Cf. Abbé de la Porte,Histoire littéraire des femmes, and Gordon de Percel (Lenglet duFresnoy), Bibliothèque des romans].-And from all these consequences there results in turn another consequence: -the disorganisation of pulpit eloquence; -and of tragedy; -the parodying of lyricism;-the transformation of comedy and of the novel.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 259which their works have survived, but on the length of timeduring which their works have been admired, " or, inother words: " The antiquity of a writer is not a certain sign of his merit, but the long-standing and constant admiration that has always been entertained forhis works is sure and infallible proof that they ought tobe admired. " [ Cf. Réflexions critiques sur Longin, reflection vii . ] . It would be impossible to employ moresensible language. But in the year 1700, Boileau is notamong those who are listened to, if indeed he be notamong those who are scoffed at; and at this juncturewriters, instead of aiming, as they did in his time,at being superior to their predecessors, seek to be" different " from them. Massillon expressly made thisX.-Jean- Baptiste Massillon [Hyères, 1663; † 1742, ClermontFerrand]1. THE SOURCES. -D'Alembert, Eloge de Massillon, in his Élogesacadémiques;-Maury, Essai sur l'éloquence de la chaire; -AbbéBayle, Massillon, Paris, 1867; -Abbé Blampignon, Massillon, Paris,1879, and L'Episcopat de Massillon, 1884; -F. Brunetière, L'Eloquence de Massillon, Paris, 1881; -Abbé Allais , Massillon, Toulouse,1883; M. Cohendy, Correspondances, Mandements, etc. , de Massillon,Clermont, 1883.-2. MASSILLON'S ELOQUENCE. Of the " profane " character of Massillon's Sermons; -and of the defects and at the same time of thequalities this epithet " profane " must be understood to convey.-No orator has ever contrived to say so little while employing such amultitude of words; -or, on the other hand, to say that little in moreharmonious language; -no orator, again, has made more abusive useof every rhetorical expedient; -but no orator has known better howto turn rhetoric to account; -to give life to abstract truths;-to lendhis discourse an air of " elegance or sustained distinction; -and tosuit religion to an audience of fine ladies and courtiers.Massillon had recourse to the same rhetorical expedients even inplanning his sermons. -His method is to sketch the plan of hissermon before he is very sure as to what he will put into it. —Of themeasure of ingenuousness that this mode of composition presupposes;260 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREconfession. The highly impertinent question was puthim whether, mounting the pulpit after such men asBossuet and Bourdaloue, he flattered himself he wouldsurpass them: " I shall preach differently," he answeredhis indiscreet questioner. And—this justice must be donehim he kept his word: he preached differently but notso well. As for the consequences of this rage fornovelty, of which Massillon was an eloquent example, theyspeedily prove to be what it might have been foreseenthey would be the decadence or demeaning of all thenobler or more elevated branches of literature.May it be the case that certain of these branches hadexhausted themselves as it were, owing to over-production,owing to their having furnished too many masterpieces in-and of the measure of artifice [ Cf. the sermons Sur la Mort dupécheur et la Mort du juste, or Sur l'enfant prodigue] .—Comparison,in this connection , between Massillon's expedients and Bourdaloue'smethod. Of the importance of the details in Massillon's sermons.—His affectation of preciosity.How this preciosity has its influence even on his doctrine; -andleads him to display alternately excessive rigorism, or excessivecomplaisancy.-Carried away by his flow of words he says more than he means to say; -as when he declares that " ambition is the mostmarked characteristic of a base soul "; —or when he exaggerates thegood it is in the power of nature to accomplish. -It will now beunderstood what is meant when he is reproached with having beena mere rhetorician; -it only remains to add that he is one of the mostdelightful of rhetoricians; —a fact that explains his success as apreacher; the admiration the Encyclopedists will profess for him;-and the real pleasure experienced in reading him.3. THE WORKS. -The works of Massillon comprise two series ofAdvent sermons, joined together, and numbering in all ten sermons;-forty-one High Lent sermons; -ten minor Lent sermons; —eightsermons on the Mysteries; -ten panegyrics; -six funeral orations,including those on Louis XIV. and on the Dauphin; -four Sermonsde vêture; and a certain number of Conferences, Charges, Synodical Discourses, etc.Apart from the funeral orations, the only sermons whose date isTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 261too short a space of time? This is the reason Voltairewould content himself with, and we are not going to denythat it contains a portion of the truth. Literary branches.are subject to fatigue and exhaustion; they die outas species do in nature, when they cease to find aroundthem the conditions necessary to their development.Genius itself would seek in vain to revive them underthese conditions. But they die out yet more surelywhen they become blind to their true nature.is the fate which, at the point we have reached,definitely overtakes lyric poetry-of the true genius ofwhich Malherbe, as we have seen, was but partiallyconscious as exemplified in the Odes and Cantatas ofJean-Baptiste Rousseau. Jean-Baptiste is the model orThisabsolutely certain are the twelve minor Lent sermons. They werepreached in 1718 in the chapel of the Tuileries for the benefit and inthe presence of Louis XV. , still a child at the time.The first authentic edition of Massillon's works is that published byhis nephew, Father J. Massillon of the Oratory, in 1745, and in theabsence of manuscripts all subsequent editions have had no option butto follow this edition [ Cf. Sacy, Variétés littéraires et morales].XI. -French Tragedy from 1680 to 1715.1. THE SOURCES.-The brothers Parfaict , Histoire du théâtrefrançais, vol . xii. to xx; -Léris , Dictionnaire des Théâtres; -Petitot,Répertoire du théâtre français, vol. i . and ii .; -d'Alembert, Eloges deCampistron et de Crébillon; -Villemain, Littérature française auXVIIIe siècle;-A Vitu, Crébillon , notice preceding his edition of thiswriter's works, 1885; -F. Brunetière , Les Époques du théâtrefrancais ,1892.2. THE SUCCESSORS OF RACINE . -The actors of the Hôtel deBourgogne combine with those of Molière's theatre-and the ComédieFrançaise is founded. The first performance at the Comédie- Française: Phèdre and the Carrosses d'Orléans. -J. G. Campistron [ 1656,1723], and whether, as Voltaire has declared, " his plots arebetter constructed than those of Racine "?—He doubtless means thatthey are more romantic. -Arminius, 1684 and Andronic, 1685.- Thefirst statutes of the Comédie- Française, April-October, 1685.—Pradon's262 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREtype of the spurious man of talent. It is merely with aview to completeness that I mention the comedies ofRegnard, the Ménechmes, the Folies amoureuses, theLégataire universel, -the least of whose errors is toimagine that he has struck out a newline by returning,after an interval of fifty years, to the lazzi and imbrogliosof Italian comedy. Still, let it be conceded him that hisplays are cleverly written! It is impossible to say asmuch for the tragedies of the elder Crébillon from themoment that Atrée et Thyeste and Rhadamiste et Zénobieare his masterpieces! Whereas tragedy had owed its evolution to the elimination from its scope of the romanticelement, under the auspices of this sombre poet it is againinvaded and even swamped by this discarded materialvery successful piece: Régulus, 1688.-The " King's Comedians " takepossession of their theatre in the Rue des Fossés- Saint- Germain [ atthe present day Rue de l'Ancienne- Comédie]; —and give their firstperformance 18th April, 1689: Phèdre and the Médecin malgré lui.—Mlle Bernard's Brutus [ written in collaboration with Fontenelle] ,1690. -Lagrange- Chancel's first tragedy: Adherbal, 1694; -Longepierre's first tragedy: Médée, 1694. -Thomas Corneille's last tragedy:Bradamante, 1695. -Antoine de la Fosse [ 1653, † 1708]; —and thesuccess of his Manlius Capitolinus, 1698; -of which as late a writeras Villemain speaks as if it were a sort of masterpiece. —And yet,leaving on one side the recrudescence of novelty by which such a playas Manlius might benefit between 1790 and 1820 owing to favouringcircumstances; and to the genius of Talma; -what is best inManlius belongs to Saint - Réal as the author of the Conjuration desEspagnols contre Venise; —or to Thomas Otway, the English dramatist, as the author of Venice Preserved; -and only what remains toAntoine de la Fosse. -Crébillon's first tragedies: Idoménée , 1705; —and, in this connection , of the influence of Télémaque on the conception of antiquity which will obtain henceforth .3. CRÉBILLON'S PLAYS. -Prosper Jolyot de Crébillon (1674, † 1762);-his extraction and his youthful years;-his lack of primaryinstruction and of mental culture; -Boileau's remark concerningCrébillon: " The Scudéris and the Pradons at whom we scoffed soheartily in my youth, were eagles compared with these writers. "-ATHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 263Crébillon sells as a pure Burgundy wineA fumy wine of Auvergne blended with the grape of Lignage.What becomes of pulpit eloquence, at this samejuncture, is known to everybody by the sermons ofMassillon . As one of his contemporaries says, it hasdeveloped into " a pleasure in which the very senses seemto participate " and if this appreciation be just, as in myopinion it is , what terms at once more flattering and moreprofane could be employed to characterise the merit of amadrigal, of a love elegy, or of some Anacreontic ode?Under the influence of all these causes the character ofthe language itself undergoes a change. To the statelysentence, a little long at times but so nobly spacious, toremark of Montesquieu to the contrary effect; -and what does hemean when he says that Crébillon " made him enter into transportsakin to those of the Bacchantes "?-Crébillon's most successfulpieces: Atrée, 1707; —Electre, 1708; -Rhadamiste, 1711. -How theromantic element reappears in tragedy through the intermediary ofCrébillon's " masterpieces. " -His choice of subjects; —and that whilehe is careful as a rule that they shall be " atrocious, " he is still morecareful that they shall be " extraordinary " [ Cf. the subject of Atrée,that of Rhadamiste or that again of Pyrrhus ] .— The nature of theplots in Crébillon's plays; -and of the two signs by which theirromantic side, and their artificial and arbitrary side, are seen -thestarting point of the action is a misapprehension, it proceeds to turnon a qui pro quo and the end is brought about by the recognition ofthe truth. The depiction of character in Crébillon's plays; -and thatit is as wantingin conscientiousness as is the depiction of the passionstherein in truth to nature; -his tragedies are entirely lacking in generalor human interest. Of some other characteristics of Crébillon's plays;—and of the declamatory affectation which he takes to be eloquence.-Crébillon's tragedies are merely “ melodramas " written in verse .4. THE FORERUNNERS OF VOLTAIRE; -and the new tendencies oftragedy. -Abundance of tragedies based on biblical subjects: AbbéBrueys' Gabinie, 1699; -Abbé Nadal's Saül , 1705; —and, one afterthe other:-Hérode, 1709; —Joseph, 1710; —Absalon, 1712; —Jonathas, 1714.-The first performance of Racine's Athalie, 1716.-264 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREthe complex and genuinely " organic " sentence of Pascaland Bossuet, of Racine and Malebranche, to this periodicsentence, whose sinuous construction is such an admirablepresentment of the processes of thought, there now succeeds a lighter and brisker sentence, a sentence that isunencumbered and quicker of foot, so to speak. Theperiod, after tending for a while towards heaviness , becomes disjointed or is broken up. "For the past twentyyears writers have strictly observed the rules, -La Bruyèredeclares as early as 1688, -they have been the slaves ofconstruction , they have enriched the language with newwords, thrown off the yoke ofLatinism and evolved a stylein which the sentence is purely French. " What he meansto say is that the rules have been laid down of a style whichMythological subjects, —and that they are the outcome of the growinginfluence of the Opera: Lagrange- Chancel's Méléagre, 1699; -de laFosse's Thésée, 1700; -La Mort d'Ulysse, 1707; —The Tyndaridesand Atree and Thyeste, 1707; -Electre, 1708; -Ino et Mélicerte,1712;-and how the pieces of this class completed the deformationof the conception of tragedy;-by giving less and less place in it tothe observation of reality, -and converting it into a mere recreationwithout profit or significance . -Whether this mistake is counterbalanced by the political tendencies which creep into some of thesetragedies, in such a way as to make them herald the coming ofVoltaire? —But the efforts to rejuvenate this branch of the dramaare vain; —and nothing can prevail against the opinion which istaking root;-to the effect that people no longer go to the theatreto have their feelings profoundly stirred; -but to be diverted oramused;—and that the primary charm of stage fiction lies preciselyin its air of unreality. -Henceforth the subjects are merely pretextsfor stage effects or ingenious verses; -neither authors nor spectatorsattach any importance to them, -except so far as it is necessary to doso with a view to passing an hour or two agreeably.5. THE WORKS. -Of all the pieces just enumerated there are nothalf a dozen that are still remembered; -or a single one that theatricalmanagers still venture to play; -while not one of the authors deservesmore than a passing mention in a history of literature.However, it may be worth while to consult the Répertoire duTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 265is far more impersonal even than it is regular. For thefuture every word will have its appointed place in the sentence, and will have to occupy that place; henceforth it isforbidden to place the subject after the verb, or the attribute before the subject! Further on he adds: " Theliterary language has been endowed with the utmostpossible measure of order and clearness: a state of things.which tends insensibly to make authors introduce wit intotheir utterances . " This is the use to which he putslanguage himself, and his example encourages others todo likewise. He would have been nearer the truth hadhe said that authors are more concerned with achievingbrilliancy, or spurious brilliancy, than any more sterlingqualities . " It seems to me, my dear Sacy, " writes MmeThéâtre français for: Campistron's Andronic; -de la Fosse's Manlius; —and Lagrange- Chancel's Amasis; -and for Crébillon the editionof the Collection des classiques Lefèvre; or Vitu's edition mentionedabove, Paris, 1885.XII.-Jean- Baptiste Rousseau [ Paris, 1671; † 1741 , LaGenette, near Brussels].1. THE SOURCES. -Seguy, Notice preceding the edition of 1743; —Voltaire, Vie de Jean- Baptiste Rousseau, 1748; —Cizeron Rival,Remarque sur les œuvres de Jean-Baptiste Rousseau, 1760; LaHarpe, Cours de littérature, part ii . , ch. 9; —Amar, Notice precedingthe edition of 1820; —Sainte- Beuve, Portraits littéraires , 1829 , vol. i .2. THE POET; —and in the first place of the uselessness of alludingto the man, who was a sorry personage; -but between whose life andworks there is scarcely any connection; -a fact that in itself determines indirectly the nature of his lyricism . -Rousseau's " lyricism "is impersonal lyricism; -that is it is the very contrary of lyricism; —and nothing is more difficult than to account for his reputation. -Hisearly and unsuccessful efforts at writing for the stage. His paraphrases of the Psalms; -his Odes and Cantatas; -his Allegories.—How he endeavours to make up for his lack of personal sentiment, —by the irregular movements or contortions which the author of theArt poétique had seemed to declare were the essential characteristics266 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREde Lambert to one of her friends, " that in quoting Latinto you I overstep the bounds ofmodesty, and that I acquaintyou with mysecret excesses. " However, it is at least possible to understand her, but what, will it be supposed, isthe meaning of Massillon when he reproaches the great ofthis world "with transporting into thefield ofthe Lord whattakes up room uselessly in their own field "? His intentionis to blame the great for making over to the Church thesons or daughters whom they are unable to provide witha portion . Mlle de Launay, more learned and clearer,writes in her Memoirs: " He used to offer me his hand toescort me home. We had to traverse a spacious square,and during the early period of our acquaintance he wouldmake the round of its sides . Later he took to walkingof the ode;-by bombastic or declamatory language;-and by thepiling up of mythological allusions [ Cf. the Ode au comte du Luc:Tel que le vieux pasteur du troupeau de Neptune,and the Cantate de Circé:Sa voix redoutableTrouble les enfers,Un bruit formidableGronde dans les airs ].Close connection between this false conception of lyricism and thevogue of opera; -a vogue which is also the explanation of the vagueness and generality of Rousseau's abstractions. -That this form oflyricism is merely the unconscious caricature of true lyricism;-sinceits principle is to feign emotions the writer does not feel; —and toinvest those he does experience with a counterfeit elevation; —that isconfined to the phraseology, and has nothing in common with elevation of ideas or of sentiment.3. THE WORKS. -The works of Rousseau consist of:-(1) hiswritings for the stage, including a short piece in prose, Le Café,performed in 1694; -two operas, Jason, 1696 and Venus et Adonis,1697; and five comedies in verse, of which, however, only two wereput on the stage: Le Flatteur, 1696 and Le Capricieux, 1700;—(2)of his lyric poems, comprising four books of Odes, the first of whichcontains his paraphrases of the Psalms; two books of Allégories andTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 267straight across the middle of it , and I judged that his lovehad diminished by the difference between the diagonal andthe two sides of the square." Whatever may be the differences between these modes of expression, at bottom theyall resemble one another; and are they not those at whichMolière had been wont to scoff? They evince , however,a desire to please, and this desire explains a final characteristic of the transformation the language is undergoing:grown more logical and simpler in construction, easier tofollow and livelier, it becomes at the same time more"social " or, if it be preferred, more " fashionable. "I have sometimes wondered whether this transformation should not be attributed in a measure to that resumption of the offensive on the part of Spanish influence which,some twenty Cantates;-(3) of his other poems, namely, two booksof Epitres, four books of Epigrammes, the last of which containsnothing but gross obscenities, and a book of miscellaneous poems; -(4) of his Letters, in which some items of information touching literarymatters can be gleaned here and there.It is proper to add that between 1710 and 1820 few writers were sooften reprinted as Jean- Baptiste Rousseau.XIII.-Comedy from the time of Molière to that ofDestouches.1. THE SOURCES.-[ Cf. above, Article XI. ] and in addition: Petitot,Répertoire du Théâtre français, vols . viii . , ix. , and x.-Gherardi,Théâtre italien; -Sainte- Beuve, Regnard, Causeries du lundi, vol.vii.; —J. J. Weiss, Éloge de Regnard, 1859, in his Essais sur l'histoirede la littérature française; -Gilbert, Regnard in the Revue des DeuxMondes, 1859; -Edouard Fournier, Notice preceding his edition, Paris,1874, 1875; -Notice on Dufresny preceding the edition of his works,Paris, 1747; -J. Lemaitre, Le Théâtre de Dancourt, Paris , 1882.2. THE TRANSFORMATION OF COMEDY.A. Jean-François Regnard [ Paris , 1655; † 1709, Grillon].He was born and brought up in Paris; -his Epicurean existence; -his travels and adventures; -they form an unexpected justification ofthe endings to Molière's plays-Regnard's captivity in Algeria.--268 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREbetween 1700 and 1714, coincided with, or rather was theresult of, the accession to the throne of Charles V. , of agrandson of Louis XIV. For this to be permissible, however, it would be necessary that the only man of real talentwho shows signs of this influence-I refer to Le Sageshould not also be the only writer who scoffs at this newform of preciosity. In his Diable boiteux, which appearedin 1707, he merely makes passing allusions to the subject,but he returns to the attack in his Gil Blas, the date of thefirst part of which is 1714. With a boldness that recallsLa Bruyère and Molière, he makes Mme de Lambert herself figure in his work under the name of the Marquise deChaves. At a much later period, he has a final thrust atthe fashionable affectation in the Bachelier de Salamanque,His first plays at the Théâtre Italien: Divorce, 1688; L'Hommeà bonnes fortunes, 1690; Les Chinois in collaboration with Dufresny,1692; -his comedies of " character ": the Joueur, 1696; the Distrait,1697; Démocrite, 1700; -and how he endeavours in these works toimitate at the same time the methods of observation of Molière andthose of La Bruyère. His observation, however, lacks depth andstrength; —not to say conscientiousness; —and it is obvious that hetakes neither his subjects nor his art seriously; -It is for this reasonthat his real masterpieces:-the Folies amoureuses, 1704, and theLégataire universel, 1708, —are works of a different class; -in which,to the accompaniment of better constructed plots and a more rapidaction, the characters of Italian comedy reappear; -clothed in thelatest French fashion; -and speaking the language of the extremelyfree and easy world in which Regnard moved. -Regnard's style,-and whether it deserves the very high praise that has been bestowedon it?-His style is really vivacious, supple and brilliant; -qualitieswhich are those of the language of his time as much as or morethan they are his personally; -qualities which are met with in theCrispin or the Diable boiteux of Le Sage, 1707—or in the Mémoiresde Grammont, 1713.B. Florent Carton Dancourt [ Fontainebleau, 1661; † 1725,Courcelles (Berry) ] .The favourite pupil of Father de la Rue; -his youthful exploits;-THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 269when he indulges in ironical praise of the " proconchi "dialect. " If you ask me what proconchi ' is , I replythat it is a language which has its declensions and itsconjugations, and that it can be learned as easily as theLatin language, more easily even, for it is a living language which it is possible to master in a short time bydint of conversing with Indian purists. " It is a Spaniardwho is speaking, and he continues: " It is an harmoniouslanguage, too, and even richer than our own in metaphorsand high-flown figures of speech. Should an Indian whoprides himself on speaking proconchi well decide to payyou a compliment, he will employ none but strange andunusual thoughts and far- fetched expressions. The resultis an obscure, inflated utterance, a brilliant verbiage, ahe runs away with the daughter of the actor La Thorillière; -becomesan actor on her account; -makes his first appearance on the stage in1685, —and as a dramatic author in 1686 with his comedy Les Fondsperdus. This work is followed by the Chevalier à la mode, 1687; -the Femme d'intrigues , 1692; -the Bourgeoises à la mode, 1692; -and if these plays, which are all of them in prose, be considered inconnection with such pieces of minor importance as: —the Maison decampagne, 1888; -the Parisienne, 1691; —or the Gazette, impromptude garnison, 1692; -the rise is seen of a new stamp of comedy;-inwhich greater importance is attached to current events; -which is amore exact reflection of contemporary manners; -is less satirical andmore jocose than the comedy of Molière. -which, in a word, is thecomedy of manners.Of the comedy of manners as exemplified in Dancourt's plays; —and in what respects it still remains faithful to the Molièresque traditions. Thus it adopts the old , oft- used subjects and without any verygreat concern as to their " reality ": for instance the befooled guardian[ Cf. Le Tuteur, 1695; -the Enfants de Paris, 1699; -the Trois Cousines, 1700; -Madame Artus, 1708] -and the unmasked rogue [ Cf. theChevalier à la mode, 1687; -L'Eté des coquettes, 1690; -the Femmed'intrigues, 1692; -the Agioteurs, 1710] .—But new features are to bedistinguished amid these general resemblances.-Dancourt is in thehabit of putting an entire social category on the stage, as is indicatedindeed by the fact that his titles are frequently in the plural [Les270 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREpompous rigmarole, but this is precisely what constitutesthe excellence of the language. Such is the fashion at theAcademy of Petapa. " But the raillery of the worthynovelist, as happened in the past to that of La Bruyèreand Molière, has no effect . Le Sage is endowed with wit,endowed with it indeed in abundance, and he has a fairamount of learning, which he is rather prone to display.Shall I venture to say that he is not very intelligent andthat he is lacking in social polish? The reasons of thetransformation that is in progress escape him, and notunderstanding it he scoffs at it, an attitude eminentlyFrench. But more circumspect critics look closer intothe matter, and although they do not perceive , or they illperceive, what will be the outcome of the transformation,Enfants de Paris, Les Bourgeoises à la mode, Les Agioteurs. -Henceforth, to represent a given phase of character, several personages areintroduced instead of a single personage as had previously been thecustom; -and this scattering, as it were, of the satire results in itsbecoming more superficial; —though, on the other hand, it owes its"topicalness " to the same cause [ Cf. the Foire de Bezons, 1695; -theMoulin de Javelle, 1696; —the Loterie, 1697; —the Mari retrouvé,1698 ] . Subordination of the choice of subjects to topical, anecdoticincidents; and of the quality of the humour to the exigences offashion."Documentary " value of Dancourt's plays; and, in this connection,of a paradox of Eugène Scribe [ Discours de réception ] to the effectthat the stage is independent of manners. -The types of character inDancourt's plays. -The world of finance [ Cf. the Femme d'intrigues,1692, or the Agioteurs , 1710] .- The " demi-monde " or the world ofshady morality [ Cf. the Chevalier à la mode, 1687; -the Bourgeoisesà la mode, 1692; -the Femme d'intrigues, 1692] .-Comparisonbetween Dancourt's plays and Le Sage's fiction. -The beginnings ofrealism;--and in what respect it differs from naturalism. -Dancourt'slater plays: Sancho Pança, 1713; -the Vert Galant, 1714; —thePrix de l'arquebuse, 1717; -the Déroute du Pharaon, 1718.-Thedeficiencies which have prevented him leaving a profounder trace onthe history of the French stage.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 271they are struck by two or three advantages it offers, andreserve their judgment."Were they disposed to reply to the novelist, they wouldtax him in the first place with ingratitude, and withoutinsisting on the classical reminiscences which are frequentin his own style to the detriment at times of its fluency,they would point out to him that he is the first to profitby the transformation at which he is pleased to scoff.French prose, after having been essentially oratorical, isbecoming narrative at the close of the seventeenth century.Fifty or sixty years of the history of our literature willnow elapse before we again meet with prose that is reallyeloquent. On the other hand, what writers of narrativeprose had we had since the death of Marguerite andC. Charles Rivière-Dufresny [ Paris, 1648; 1724, Paris].จLate period of his life at which Dufresny began to write. -He wasone of the valets de chambre of Louis XIV.; —his passion forgardening and his dilettantism; -his collaboration with Regnard;-he begins writing for the Théâtre Italien: the Opéra de campagne,1692; the Adieux des officiers, 1693; -he writes for the Théâtrefrançais: the Negligent, 1692; -the Chevalier joueur, 1697, —andwhether Regnard was indebted to Dufresny for the idea? —Thecharacter of Dufresny would invite the belief that this is the case; —since he was " a man of ideas, " and it seems probable that at alater period Montesquieu was indebted to him for the idea of theLettres persanes; —another of Dufresny's ideas was to emancipatehimself from the influence of Molière [ Cf. the prologue to theNégligent]; and how far was he successful in this ambition? -HisMalade sans maladie, 1699; —and his Esprit de contradiction, 1700.-That Dufresny depicts himself to some extent in this latter work.-His chief plays: the Joueuse, 1709; -the Coquette de village, 1715;-the Réconciliation Normande, 1719.- Studied novelty of the plot;-of the dialogue; -and even of the versification in Dufresny's plays.-Whether it can be said that there is already, as it were, a foretaste of Marivaux in his work?3. THE WORKS. -Independently of his plays , Regnard has left accounts of his travels in Flanders, Lapland, Poland, and Germany;-a272 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURERabelais, or genuine " historical " writers since the timeof Amyot? The name of Mme de Sévigné must not becited here, because the first of her letters will not see thelight before 1726. Bossuet himself, Bossuet indeed in particular, remains an orator while writing history-in historiaorator-and unless higher value be set on La Fontaine'sPsyché than ought to be done in our opinion, La Fontaineis only a narrative writer in his verse. In consequence,since Le Sage is assuredly one of the masters of the art ofnarrative among French writers, are we not justified inholding that he owes something at least of his superiorityin the art to the new practices against which he yetprotests? He would have been a less excellent narratorhad he written some twenty years earlier. A circumstancethat goes to prove this assertion is the spectacle of thesort of novel La Provençale, which is the narrative of his adventuresin Algeria;—and some miscellaneous poems, among which should bementioned his Satire contre les maris, and the Tombeau de M. Despréaux.The best or the finest edition of his works is that of 1790 , Paris,Vve Duchesne.Dancourt's plays are his only works, and there exists noor even complete edition of them."critical "The best edition of Dufresny, and it is not very good, is that of1747, the three first volumes of which contain his plays and the lastvolume a number of short pieces in prose, among which may be mentioned the Amusements sérieux et comiques;--a Parallèle de Rabelaiset d'Homère;-and a dozen " Historical Stories, " that resemble somany scenarios for vaudevilles or comedies.XIV.-Alain- René Le Sage [ Sarzeau (Morbihan) , 1668; † 1747,Boulogne- sur- Mer].1. THE SOURCES. -Gordon de Percel (Lenglet- Dufresnoy) , Bibliothèque des romans; -La Harpe, Cours de littérature , part iii . , booki . , chapter v. , section 4; chapter vii, section 2; and book ii. , chapteriii .; —Malitourne, Éloge de Le Sage, and Patin, Éloge de Le Sage,preceding the edition of 1810-1823; -Audiffret, Notice sur Le Sagepreceding the edition of 1822 , Paris; -Sainte- Beuve, Causeries duTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 273narrative writers, his inferiors, who crop up around him incontinually increasing numbers, from the author of theMémoires de Rochefort and of d'Artagnan, whom we havealready mentioned, to the author of Fleur d'épine and ofthe Quatre Facardins. And if the reason be sought of thisprogress of the narrative style, where will it be found ifnot in the new-born interest taken at this juncture infamiliar and contemporary matters? It would not be easyand it would even be rather absurd to relate " oratorically "the adventures of Gil Blas; or how would it be possible toset forth the medical theories of Doctor Sangrado in statelyand eloquent periods?Simultaneously and for the same reason, —and this despite the authority of Fénelon, or whatever may be urgedon the strength of his " Letter on the Occupations of thelundi, vol. ii .; and Jugements sur Gil Blas et Le Sage, preceding thetable of contents of the Causeries du lundi; -F. Brunetière, Étudescritiques, vol. iii .; -Léo Claretie, Le Sage romancier, Paris , 1890; -Lintilhac, Le Sage, in the " Grands Ecrivains français " series, 1893.François de Neufchâteau, Examen de la question de savoir si LeSage est l'auteur de Gil Blas, 1818, and reprinted in Lefèvre's edition ,Paris, 1820; -Llorente, Observations critiques sur le roman de GilBlas, Paris, 1822; -Franceson, Essai sur la question de l'originalité de Gil Blas, Berlin, 1857; -Veckenstedt, Die Geschichte des Gil BlasFrage, Berlin, 1879.2. THE MAN AND THE WRITER.-Obscurity surrounding his earlyyears; his family difficulties; -and his start in literature; Lettresgalantes d'Aristénète, 1695. -His relations with the Abbé de Lionne.-He publishes his Théâtre espagnol, 1700; —and Don Quichotte, atranslation from the Spanish of Avellaneda.-His first play at theThéâtre français, 1707 , —and his Turcaret, 1709.-In what respects Turcaret concentrates and summarises the novel features in Dancourt'splays; although without swerving from the Molièresque tradition.-Why Turcaret was never a success; -and did Le Sage possessdramatic genius?-The farmers of the revenue endeavour to havethe acting of Turcaret forbidden; -intervention of the Dauphin, theson of Louis XIV.;-Le Sage quarrels with the actors of the ThéâtreFrançais; -and secedes, to spite them, to the Théâtre de la Foire.-19274 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREFrench Academy," the vocabulary is being enriched to aconsiderable extent . A few old-fashioned words drop outof use withdrawn from circulation, they are no longercurrent coin. Their place is taken, however, by otherand far more numerous words. "We have added a greatmany words," declares in 1718 the writer of the Prefaceto the second edition of the Dictionary of the Academy;and in another passage he makes the following observationwhich does not solely concern the language: " TheAcademy has not thought it right to exclude certainwords to which the freaks of custom or perhaps of ourhave given currency during the past fewyears.... It would seem, indeed, that there exists asort of equality between the words of a language asbetween the citizens of a republic; they enjoy the samemanners ·Henceforth he devotes all his time not occupied by his novels towriting for this theatre. -The collaboration of Le Sage, d'Orneval,and Fuzelier; —and of the documentary interest attaching to theThéâtre de la Foire. -The Diable boiteux, 1707; —and Gil Blas, 1715,1724, 1735.A. The elements which Le Sage's novels owe to his predecessors.—The development of story writing between 1680 and 1700; -and thetransition from the oratorical to the narrative style; -the abundance ofMemoirs; —and the growth of the personal form of narrative. -WhatLe Sage owes to Le Bruyère; -and that in a certain sense the Diableboiteux is merely a series of portraits or characters [ Cf. the oldcoquette, the old gallant, the German, the Frenchman, the schoolmaster, &c. ] .-Just as Dancourt did in his plays, the novelist seeks toarouse the interest of his readers by resorting to the " depiction ofsocial classes ";-and in this respect Gil Blas itself is merely acomedy. The allusions to contemporary events in Le Sage's novels;-and whether, when he denies these allusions, he is more sincerethan was the author of the Caractères under similar circumstances?-Le Sage's imitation of Spanish writers; —and, in this connection ,of the picaresque novel [ Cf. Ticknor, Histoire de la littérature espagnole, and Eug. de Navarrete in the collection of Spanish Classics(Ribadeneira) ] .—Le Sage's numerous borrowings; -and the puerilityof the reproaches that have been addressed him on this score [ Cf.THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 275privileges and are governed by the same laws; and justas a general of an army or a magistrate are not citizens ina greater degree than a common soldier or the humblestartisan . . . so the words ' justice ' and ' valour, ' althoughthey express the highest of all the virtues, are notFrench words in a greater degree or better French wordsthan those destined to express the basest and mostdespicable things. " Shall we cite some of these words?In the Preface itself are pointed out the words Falbala,Fichu, Battant l'œil, Ratafia, Sabler; as will be seenat once, they are popular or concrete terms in use inevery-day life. Others of these new words are termsrelating to the toilette, for example, or terms employed inthe sciences -in mechanics, physics, or natural history.Their introduction is accompanied by the development ofLlorente, loc. cit.; Baret, Littérature espagnole; F. Brunetière,Histoire et littérature, vol. iii .; and Léo Claretie, op. cit .] .B. The originality of Le Sage's novel; -and that to judge of it,it is necessary of course to eliminate the subsidiary incidents whichinterrupt the main narrative [ Cf. the love affairs of the Comte deBelflor and Léonor de Cespédés ] .—Where Le Sage has imitated thepicaresque novel he has " humanised " it; -and that exactly whatthis means may be understood by comparing his Gil Blas with histranslation of Estevanille Gonzalez, 1734.—The rogues ' confessions tobe found in the picaresque novels become in his hands a picture ofhuman life;—and in the place of a succession of adventures devoid ofsignificance, he gives us a satire on the social conditions of his time.—In other words, he considers what in his models is too exclusivelypeculiar to the individual under its universal aspect; —and in this waygives a moral import to incidents in themselves insignificant.C. The importance of Le Sage's novel; —and that it lies in the fact that it is due to Gil Blas that the realistic novel became a branch ofliterature. Coming after La Bruyère and resorting to analogousmethods, Le Sage transferred the satire of manners from the stageto books; and by so doing he struck out a genuinely new line. —Itwas his good fortune to determine the fundamental distinctionbetween the stage play and the novel. -The hero of a novel isalways the victim or the creature of circumstances; -and he resigns276 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREan interest in the things they designate. These thingsare made to serve for the drawing of fresh comparisonsand as the source of new figures and metaphors. Thewhole of a vast province that hitherto had been outsideliterature is now incorporated with it. Words, too, areintroduced from Holland, where they are coined by thenewspapers to express ideas for which no term existedin France; while from England come yet other wordswhich are not exactly English, but French words thathad crossed the Channel as " refugees " -if the termbe allowable. The plasticity of the French genius permits it to absorb and assimilate all these heterogeneouselements, to conform them to its exigences, and to subjectthem to the rules of French grammar. And what is thefinal outcome of this movement? It is-and the facthimself to circumstances; —whereas the stage hero claims to domi.nate them. The imitation of every- day life in Le Sage's novel; -and that neither the Spanish background, nor the continual aimingat satire result in the masking of its exactitude. -Comparison betweenthe " fictitious history in Gil Blas and the history proper of Duboisor Alberoni. —Of the nature of the incidents in Le Sage's novel; -andthat there is nothing " romantic " about them, so far as the word issynonymous with arbitrary or extraordinary. -The mistake sometimesmade in this connection is the outcome of insufficient acquaintancewith the private life of the time of Louis XIV. and the Regency.—Abundance of realistic touches in Le Sage's novel; -and how, as inBoileau's satires , —their excessiveness is always tempered by hisliterary training.-A strange remark of Nisard on Le Sage consideredas a moralist; -and that there is nothing in common between LeSage and Rollin except their abuse of Latin quotations.""The last works and the last years of Le Sage. -His translation,Guzman d'Alfarache, 1732; -his exotic novels: the Aventures duchevalier de Beauchesne, 1732; —and the Bachelier de Salamanque,1736. In the meantime he continues to write for the Théâtre de laFoire; and on the stage as in the novel to satirise the classes ofpersons he most disliked, namely:-actors themselves; -financiers;-and the Précieux. -His literary opinions [ Cf. in Gil Blas theconversations of Gil Blas with Fabrice; in the Bachelier de Sala-THE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 277must be insisted on--that while a more elevated, a graver,a more serious French may have been spoken previously,there has never been spoken a " prettier " French thanthat in use between 1685 and 1715 or thereabouts, aFrench more limpid, a French that is a closer transcriptof thought, or at the same time a more concrete French.For proof it is only necessary to read Fontenelle and LeSage, Mme de Lambert and Mlle de Launay, Regnardand Massillon. The truth is, the writers of this period.are merely deficient in composition, in depth and inharmony, important qualities no doubt, but not alwaysand everywhere indispensable, since their very absencewas to contribute to the European vogue of our literature.In reality what was happening was that, in proportion as the influence of royalty waned, " society " wasmanque the thrusts at Mme de Lambert and the account of theAcademy of Petapa; and Hönncher, Die litterarische Satire Le Sage's,Leipsic, 1886 ] . This realistic novelist is almost the last of the "classic writers. His protracted old age. His last works: theValise trouvée, 1740; and the Mélange amusant, 1743.-His influence in France and abroad.3. THE WORKS. -They are composed, as has been seen:-(1) of hisplays;—(2) of dramas, comedies, and picaresque novels translatedfrom the Spanish;-(3) of his original novels: the Diable boiteux,Gil Blas, the Aventures du chevalier de Beauchesne, and the Bachelierde Salamanque;-(4) of the pieces he wrote in collaboration withOrneval and Fuselier for the Théâtre de la Foire [ four volumes];-(5) and of some works written for the booksellers, among which maybe mentioned his revision of the Mille et un Jours of Pétis de laCroix, the Orientalist.The " definite " edition of Gil Blas is that of 1747 in four volumes.The modern editions are innumerable.Two good editions of the complete works are the edition of 1810-1823;-and Renouard's edition, Paris, 1820.XV.-Mme de Lambert's Salon.1. THE SOURCES .-Lettres choisies de M. de la Rivière, Paris, 1751;-Fontenelle, Éloge de Mme de Lambert; -the Memoirs of Mme de278 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURErecovering its independence, and far from the sovereign,far from the Court, " in the town "--to use the expressionof the period-the salons, and with the salons womenwere reconquering their authority. Between 1660 and1690 they had been excluded to a certain extent fromliterature and art-they had been kept a little in the shade.Now, however, that the aged King regards them withindifference, and awaiting the time when the Regent willtreat them in the way that is notorious, they regain theirnatural influence, and as a prelude to the revels of Sceaux,the glories, thought to have vanished for ever, of theHôtel de Rambouillet are revived in the salon of Mmede Lambert. Moreover, since lofty speculations rebutthem, and they are rather afraid than otherwise ofstrenuous passions, authors tax their ingenuity to presentStaal- Delaunay, d'Argenson, and the President Hénault; -d'Alembert,Éloges de Sacy, de Sainte- Aulaire, de la Motte; -Sainte- Beuve,Mme de Lambert, Causeries du lundi, vol. iv.; -Desnoiresterres, Lescours galantes;—Ch. Giraud, La Maréchale de Villars, Paris, 1881;-Lescure's study preceding his edition of the works of Mme deLambert, Paris, 1882; -Emmanuel de Broglie, Les mardis et lesmercredis de la Marquise de Lambert, in the Correspondant, April10 and 25, 1895.2. THE REVIVAL OF PRECIOSITY; -and that, as at its first appearance, it is to be regarded as a protest on the part of the women againstcoarseness of language; ―indecency of manners; and the tendencytowards naturalism. -Anne- Marie Thérèse de Marguenat de Courcelles,Marquise de Lambert [ 1647 , 1773]; -her youth;-her marriageand her early writings.-Her " correspondence " with Fénelon. -TheAvis d'une mère à son fils and the Avis d'une mère à sa fille. —Mmede Lambert takes up her residence at the Hôtel de Nevers, 1698[to- day the Bibliothèque Nationale];-and assigns herself the rôle ofpatroness of letters.-Her "Tuesdays " and " Wednesdays. " -Asformerly at the Hôtel de Rambouillet, men of letters mingle ather receptions with noblemen, -actresses [ Cf. Lettres d'AdrienneLecouvreur, edited by M. G. Monval, Paris, 1892]; -and ladiesof high birth [ Cf. Giraud, La Maréchale de Villars ] .- However,a greater freedom of tone prevails than at the earlier salon; -orTHE NATIONALIZATION OF FRENCH LITERATURE 279such matters to them under an amusing form; whilethey, for their part, rid the language of all trace ofpedantry and strip thought itself of the sort of prideon which it fed in solitude. And it is for these reasonsthat this thought and this language become the mostfaithful image that exists of the French genius, admitting this genius to be, as we have endeavoured to showis the case, the genius of " sociability. " The authorsof the period have the public, and the public only,in view in their writings. They write to amuse theirfellow-men, to please them, to win their applause-andto a slight extent to instruct them. Whatever be theauthor's extraction, in whatever rank of society he mayhave been born , whatever conception he may have ofhis parts, his first care is to determine the relationsa freedom of a different kind; -and the conversations had a widerrange.-3. THE GREAT MEN OF MME DE LAMBERT'S SALON. AntoineHoudar de la Motte [ 1672, 1731 ] . [ Cf. the Abbé Trublet, Mémoiressur M. de la Motte, and d'Alembert, Éloge de La Motte] .- Histriumphs at the opera: L'Europe galante, 1697; Issé, 1698; Amadisde Grèce, 1699.-His Odes, 1706, and his Fables, 1719.-His Discourssur Homère, 1714; -and Mme Dacier's rejoinder: Des causes de lacorruption du goût. -Mme de Lambert's intervention in the quarrel.-The entire Salon sides with the Moderns; -and as it was held torepresent both polite manners and good taste, -the opposition ofliterary opinion to the Ancients is consummated. -Other works of LaMotte. His tragedies: the Macchabées, 1721; -Romulus, 1722; —Inès de Castro, 1723. -La Motte scores further successes with his"academical speeches "; —and becomes the literary oracle of Mmede Lambert's salon . [ Cf. Paul Dupont, Houdar de la Motte, Paris,1898] .4. THE FORMATION OF-PUBLIC OPINION. -The mixture of men ofculture and business men in the salon of the Hôtel de Nevers resultsin the formation of a public opinion. -Mme de Lambert becomes the"Great Electress " of the French Academy; -to the increase of herown influence and that of the Academy. -This result is promoted bythe indifference of the authorities; -and also by the growing disorder.-280 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREbetween his personality and the ideas of his time andto put himself in accordance with them. In no otherway are literary vogue, authority, glory or reputation tobe acquired. This attitude is one way of understandingliterature, and we have just reviewed its advantages. Butmay it not be that these advantages are counterbalancedby drawbacks? This is the point we shall examine in thefollowing chapter.The court, which has ceased to direct opinion , is blind to the significanceof the movement in progress. -Budding talent no longer looks to Versailles for definite recognition; -but to the salon of Mme de Lambert.-While Fontenelle and La Motte reign over the salon, Marivaux andMontesquieu are its new recruits. With their appearance on thescene; and that of the Abbé Saint- Pierre [ Cf. G. de Molinari,L'abbé de Saint- Pierre, Paris, 1857; and Goumy, Étude sur la vieet les écrits de l'abbé de Saint- Pierre, Paris, 1859]; -begins the discussion of " serious subjects "; -and the sway of the salons and theauthority of the intellect are founded simultaneously.CHAPTER IIITHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEALIDespite what has been said in support of the contention, literature is not always "the expression ofsociety," but when once it has become so, it is doubtlessonly natural for its destinies to follow the fortunes of thesociety of which it is the expression. As has just beenTHE AUTHORS AND THEIR WORKSSEVENTH PERIODFrom the " Lettres Persanes " to the publication of the"Encyclopedia"1722-1750I.-Charles de Secondat, Baron de la Brède et de Montesquieu [Château de la Brède, near Bordeaux, 1689; † 1755, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -Maupertuis, Éloge de Montesquieu, 1755; -d'Alembert, Éloge du Président du Montesquieu, 1755, in the 5th vol.of the Encyclopedia; -Voltaire, Siècle de Louis XIV. , in the Cataloguedes Ecrivains, 1756; his article Esprit des Lois in his Dictionnaire philosophique, 1771; and Commentaire sur l'Esprit des Lois,1777; —-Villemain, Éloge de Montesquieu, 1816; -Garat, Mémoireshistoriques sur la vie de M. Suard, 1820; -Sainte- Beuve, Causeriesdu lundi, vol. vii. , 1852; -Louis Vian, Histoire de la vie et desouvrages de Montesquieu, Paris, 1879; -Albert Sorel, Montesquieuin the " Grands Ecrivains français " series , Paris, 1887.281282 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREseen, this is what is beginning to happen to literature inthe early years of the reign of Louis XV. , and the processis consummated during the same period.Freed from or rid of the Protestants, Jansenism andLouis XIV. , the " Libertines " gain ground unceasinglyand become the leaders and masters of opinion. "Theremay have been ungodly persons in the past, -exclaimsMassillon in his Petit Carême, but the world regardedthem with horror. . . . To- day, however, ungodlinessalmost lends an air of distinction and glory; it is amerit that gives access to the great, that adds lustre,as it were, to humbleness of name and birth, that procuresfor obscure men the privilege of familiarity with thepeople's princes. " [ Cf. Petit Carême, third sermon " Onthe respect due to religion. "] The people's princes are>the Vendôme family, unless-for we are in 1718-theBertolini , Analyse raisonnée de l'Esprit des Lois , 1754, printed tooin vol. iii . of Laboulaye's edition; -d'Alembert, Analyse de l'Espritdes Lois, 1755, printed too in Parrelle's edition; -Crévier, Observationssur le livre de l'Esprit des Lois, 1764; -Destutt de Tracy, Commentaire sur l'Esprit des Lois, Philadelphia, 1811; and 1819 , Paris; -Sclopis, Recherches historiques et critiques sur l'Esprit des Lois, Turin,1857; -Laboulaye, Introduction à l'Esprit des Lois, Paris , 1876.See, too, Auguste Comte, Cours de philosophie positive, vols. v. andvi. ,Paris, 1842; -Ernest Bersot, Etudes sur le XVIIIe siècle, Paris, 1855;-J. Barni, Histoire des idées morales et politiques en France auXVIIIe siècle, Paris, 1865;-P. Janet, Histoire de la science politique, Paris, 1858; and 2nd edit. , 1872; -Robert Flint, The Philosophy of History in France; -H. Taine, L'ancien régime, Paris,1875; -Emile Faguet, Dix-huitième siècle, Paris, 1890.2. THE MAN ANd the Writer. -Montesquieu's extraction; —he wasa Gascon, of good birth, and a magistrate. —He enters the Parliamentof Bordeaux, 1714; -and in succession to one of his uncles he isappointed President of the Bordeaux Court of Justice, 1716. -Interesting analogy between the beginning of his career and the beginningof Montaigne's career.-Montesquieu's early works; their scientificcharacter;-his " Discourse on the cause of echoes, " 1718; and onTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 283allusion be to Philippe d'Orléans himself; and theobscure men whose "low estate is ennobled " by the>profession of atheism or libertinism are also known to us:they are the wits who assemble at the Café Procope orthe Café Gradot, and among them is the "little Arouet,as he is called, who the previous year was imprisoned inthe Bastille. If they have not their entry into societyas yet, it will soon be given them, and to deserve it theyadopt, or rather they have already adopted, societymanners. They are met with in the salons, in that ofMme de Lambert for instance, and in these resortsthe freedom of their conversation beguiles the idlenessof the women and the careless humour of the men.They even find their way into the boudoirs, and thereas well their wit is triumphant over social prejudices.In the meantime, and until they form a sort of corpothe " Functions of the renal glands, ” 1718; —and that traces of thisscientific culture will be met with in the Esprit des Lois. -Strangenessof his literary tastes; -his admiration for the tragedies of Crébillon,"which, he declares, make him enter into transports akin to thoseof the Bacchantes "; -he publishes his Lettres persanes, 1721-1722.A. The Lettres persanes; —and in the first place the bibliographicalquestion; -Pierre Marteau of Cologne and his spurious editions. -Theworks that suggested the Lettres persanes; —and that it is doingDufresny too much honour to assert that they were solely suggestedby his Amusements sérieux et comiques. -The truth is Montesquieuwas influenced, as much as by Dufresny, by the Caractères of LaBruyère and the Diable boiteux of Le Sage; -by Fénelon's Télémaque [Cf. the episode of the Troglodytes]; -by the books of travel ofTavernier and Chardin; -and even by the Arabian Nights. -Regrettable dwelling on the intrigues of the harem in the Lettres persanes;and that Montesquieu will never renounce the depiction of scenes ofthis nature [ Cf. his Temple de Gnide; Arsace et Isménie, etc . ] .—The satire of contemporary manners in the Lettres persanes [ Cf. inparticular Lettres 48, 57 , 72, 143, etc . ]; —and that it strikes far deeperthan the satire of Le Sage or Le Bruyère [ Cf. 24, 29, 44, 68, etc. ] .—The last portion of the book-and of the singular importance the284 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURErate body, or almost a State within the State, the richand persons of good birth are at first a little astonished,and affect to be galled, but they do not take real umbrage,and reconcile themselves in the end to being treated withthe unrestraint and pleasant impertinence they themselvesin the past had shown the newcomers.It must be kept in view in this connection that forseveral years previously a curious mixing up of socialranks and fortunes has been in progress. "The corporation of lackeys-writes Montesquieu in his Lettrespersanes in 1721-is more respectable in France thanelsewhere; it fills up the vacancies in the other classes.Those who compose it take the places of the great whofall upon evil days, and when they cannot do this inperson they reinvigorate the great families by means oftheir daughters, who serve in some sort as the manureauthor ascribes in it , long before Malthus, to the population question[ Cf. 113 to 123] .-His perpetual comparisons between Europe andAsia. Great success of the Lettres persanes; -Montesquieu resignshis post of President, 1726; —he enters the French Academy, 1728; —and undertakes a series of journeys, -in the course of which hebecomes acquainted with almost the whole of civilised Europe,1728-1731 [ Cf. Voyages de Montesquieu, Paris and Bordeaux, 1892,1894, 1896] . He takes up his residence on his property at Brède; -and publishes his Considérations in 1734.66B. The Considérations sur les Causes de la grandeur et de ladécadence des Romains. What was Montesquieu's intention inwriting this work; —and whether it should not perhaps be regardedas a fragment " of the Esprit des Lois; -or whether the authorreally proposed to vie " with Tacitus and with Florus "?-Montesquieu's predilection for Florus [ Cf. his Essai sur le goût]; —andgenerally for the Latins of the decadence; -a predilection which doesnot prevent him blaming Livy " for having belauded the giants ofantiquity. "-Comparison between Montesquieu's book and the thirdpart of the Discours sur l'histoire universelle; -and to what extentit was Montesquieu's intention to combat Bossuet. -His theory of thecauses;—and his philosophy of history.THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 285with which mountainous and arid land is improved[Cf. Lettres persanes, No.99] . La Bruyère had madea somewhat similar remark in his Caractères. Thesecond part of Gil Blas should be read in the sameconnection. Its date is 1725, and in it figures a lackeywho becomes the arbiter of the Spanish monarchy "bydint of filling disgraceful posts. " As to any hesitationthere may be to ascribe " documentary " value, politicalsignificance, or social import to this novel, it will belessened when it is remembered that the effective mastersof Europe on the eve of its appearance were a Dubois,the son of the apothecary of Brive-la-Gaillarde, or anAlberoni , the son of a gardener of Parma! The Lettreshistoriques et galantes of Mme Dunoyer or the Memoirsof Saint- Simon should also be consulted on the point.It is of special importance, however, to bear in mind.C. The Esprit des Lois.-The bond of union between the Lettrespersanes and the Esprit des Lois; -and in what sense it may be saidthat in reality Montesquieu has only written one work. Of the planof the book;-and that it must be that it is not clear; -since everyone of Montesquieu's commentators gives a different explanation of it.-That Montesquieu's real ambition was to write a great book; -inwhich he was only half successful. -Indefiniteness of his plan; —regrettable trend of his humour; -Inadequacy or triflingness of hiscriticism [ Cf. Voltaire's commentary] .-Of certain errors he waspleased to let subsist in his book [ Cf. bk. vii. , ch. 16; bk. xv. , ch. 4;bk. xxi . , ch. 22]; —and what can have been his reasons for notcorrecting them?-What was Sainte-Beuve's meaning when he declared " that Montesquieu's works were scarcely more than an idealrecapitulation of his reading "; —and that the statement amounts tosaying that they are deficient in order and logic. -Of Mme duDeffand's remark on the Esprit des Lois; -and that it well characterises the defects of Montesquieu's manner. But that all thesecriticisms do not do away with the fact that Montesquieu brought anentire order of ideas into the domain of literature, which before hadnot formed part of it; -that he was the first to outline a philosophyof history conceived from a purely lay point of view; -that he arrived286 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREthe upheaval wrought in social conditions by the>system of Law, 1716-1721, nothing similar to whichhad previously been known. "All those who werewealthy six months ago are now in poverty, and thosewho lacked bread are now overflowing in riches. . . .This foreigner has turned society inside out as a dealer inold clothes turns a coat . . . . What unhoped for fortuneshave been witnessed, fortunes incredible even to thosewho have made them! God himself does not bring meninto existence more rapidly out of the void. How numerous are the valets served by their comrades, and to- morrowperhaps by their masters! " [Cf. Lettres persanes, No.138] . The words are again those of Montesquieu, who,though doubtless he was a satirist, was a serious man and>a magistrate. Like the froth in a boiling mixture, thedregs of society rise to the surface in this way, overspreadat an inkling of the analogies between history and natural history; —and, from a more general point of view, that he gave eloquent expression to ideas, -on liberty, -on tolerance, and on humanity-whicheven at the present time are not so commonplace and so prevalentas is alleged. -Success of the Esprit des Lois both in France andabroad; and whether the defects of the book did not contribute toits success to as great an extent as its qualities?Montesquieu's lesser writings: the Temple de Gnide, 1725; -theVoyage à Paphos, 1727; -the dialogue between Sylla and Eucrates,1745; Lysimaque, 1751-1754; —Arsace et Isménie, 1754; —and theEssai sur le goût, 1757. —Of the qualities of Montesquieu's style;-and that it is a kindred style to that of Fontenelle; -althoughgraver, richer, and more compact; -and, in this connection, ofMontesquieu's preciosity. Of the art of and the capacity for conceiving general ideas; —and that they constitute another pre- eminentcharacteristic of Montesquieu's style; -as does the power of expressing in a few words not only many things, but many differentthings, and in consequence many relations between things. -Montesquieu's last years. He is on intimate terms with Mme de Tencinand Mme Geoffrin [ Cf. Marmontel's Memoirs, and P. de Ségur,Le royaume de la rue Saint- Honoré, Paris, 1897] .-His uniqueTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 287it and remain at the top. A new aristocracy is in courseof formation, an aristocracy of doubtful or impure origin,crassly ignorant, cynical and of loose morals, but refinedin its tastes and assuredly unable to reproach the men ofletters with their humble extraction , since of the brothersPâris or of the little Arouet it is the latter who is the"better born. "Amid this general confusing of the classes, or rather inconsequence of it, the influence of women continues toincrease, and with the Marquise de Prie, under theMinistry of the Duc de Bourbon (1723–1726) it extendsto affairs of State for the first time for a century. Mmede Lambert only made Academicians; the Marquise dePrie makes a Queen of France, Mme de Tencin cardinals.and ambassadors. " There is nobody-writes Montesquieu-in possession of a post at the court in Paris orposition in the literary world;-and in the European opinion ofhis time.3. THE WORKS. -Montesquieu's principal works have been mentioned above. It remains to add a hundred and fifty or a hundredand sixty (exactly 152 in Laboulaye's edition) letters; —and threevolumes of Unpublished Works issued by Baron de Montesquieu[Paris and Bordeaux, 1892, 1894, 1896].The principal edition of Montesquieu, independently of the originaleditions which it is well to consult, at any rate in the case of theLettres persanes and the Esprit des Lois, are: -Parrelle's edition inthe " Collection des Classiques français series , Paris , 1826, Lefèvre;-and Laboulaye's edition , Paris, 1875–1879, Garnier.II.-Pierre Carlet de Chamblain de Marivaux [ Paris,1688; † 1763, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES . -D'Alembert, Éloge de Marivaux , 1785; Marmontel's Memoirs; -Geoffroy, Cours de littérature dramatique, 1825,vol. iii.;-Sainte- Beuve, Marivaux in the Causeries du lundi, vol. ix. ,1854; -Edouard Fournier, Étude sur Marivaux, preceding his editionof the Théâtre complet, Paris, 1878; -Lescure, Éloge de Marivaux,Paris, 1880; -Jean Fleury, Marivaux et le Marivaudage, Paris , 1881;288 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREin the provinces who has not a woman who distributesall the favours it is in his power to bestow and whosometimes commits the injustices he is able to perpetrate ";and naturally this " woman " is not his wife. In consequence, it is necessary henceforth that whoever desires tomake his way in the world shall have the women on hisside, shall possess the gift of pleasing them and ofinteresting them in his fortunes or his reputation . Thewriters of the period are alive to this necessity; and itmust be admitted that although their complaisancy is notwithout its dangers-the least of which is to make them,as were their predecessors the Précieux, the servants orthe courtiers of fashion-it results in the first place in anadvantage. " The somewhat volatile and inconstantFrench character, chilled by convention and artificiality,seems to gain in warmth to a sensible extent " [ Cf.-G. Larroumet, Marivaux, sa vie et ses œuvres, Paris, 1882; —F.Brunetière, Études critiques, vol. ii . and vol . iii . , 1881 and 1883; andÉpoques du théâtrefrançais, 1892; -G. Deschamps, Marivaux in the"Grands Ecrivains français " series, Paris , 1897 .2. THE WRITER.-Marivaux' family. His early education; -thesociety in which he moved in Paris at first; -his early protectors orliterary patrons: Fontenelle and La Motte. -His tragedy Annibal.—His first novel: Pharsamon ou les folies romanesques, 1712; —and howMarivaux, considered as a Précieux, goes back to the Grand Cyrusand to Polexandre. -His contempt for antiquity: the Iliade travestie,1716; —and, in this connection, of the peculiarly spiteful character ofMarivaux' parodies.A. The Novelist. -His Effets suprenants de la sympathie, 1713-1714; the Voiture embourbée, 1714; —and, in this connection , of thepoverty of Marivaux' imagination; -the Vie de Marianne, 1731-1741and the Paysan parvenu, 1735–1736 . -Essential characteristics ofMarivaux' novels . -They are realistic novels as far as regards: thesocial status of the personages, -who are usually middle- class or lowermiddle-class; the simplicity of the plot; —and the faithfulness withwhich they depict every-day life . In the second place they arepsychological novels;-whose principal interest lies solely in theTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 289Michelet, Histoire de France; Louis XV. ]; and thanksto the women, and with a view to their conquest, sensibility is emancipated from the strict and suspicioustutelage in which it had been kept by the masters of thepreceding age.Timidly at first, but soon with growing boldness , it isseen to show itself, to attempt its first exploits in thecomedies of Marivaux:-the Jeu de l'amour et du hasard,1730; the Serments indiscrets, 1732; the Mère confidente,1735; the Fausses confidences, 1737, -in a dozen otherplays which not only revenge women for the slights ofMolière, but bring comedy under the control of their sex,firmly establish this control and ensure its lasting maintenance. Of a surety there is wit, indeed too much wit,there is studied elegance and subtlety, and there is exces-> sive refinement of ideas and expression (marivaudage) inanalysis of sentiment;-the adventures in them being of slightimportance; so slight indeed even in the eyes of the author himself, that Marianne and the Paysan remained unfinished . -Finallythey are novels if not of love at any rate of gallantry; -which distinguishes them from Le Sage's novels. -Whether, too, they are"decent " and as moral as has been alleged?-Comparison in thisrespect between Gil Blas and the Paysan. -Of Marivaux' curiouspredilection for domestic servants.asB. The Dramatic Author; —and that his threefold originality consists in his having ceased to follow in the footsteps of Molière;-hishaving transported the tragedy of Racine into ordinary life; -and hishaving made his plots turn more especially on the transformation of thesentiments: the Double inconstance, 1723; -the Seconde surprise del'amour, 1728; -the Jeu de l'amour et du hasard 1730; -the Faussessconfidences, 1737; -the Epreuve, 1740. -The criticisms of his contemporaries and Marivaux's rejoinder. " All his pieces turn on thedelivery of lovers from a predicament in which they are involved byfalse pride, timidity, the difficulty of coming to an explanation , orsocial inequalities. " -Importance of the women's parts in Marivaux'plays. The originality that accrues to his pieces from the importance of the women's parts as seen in:-the curtailing of the rôle20290 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREthe masterpieces of Marivaux: where else would thesecharacteristics be looked for if not in his plays? Hiscomedies, too, are marked by a coldness, and even byan irony, which he seems to have inherited from Fontenelle, his friend and master. Still, sensibility is thesoul of his writings, even though it does not occupythe entire place in them; for if there be one qualityit is impossible to deny the Aramintas and Silvias ofthis gallant man, it is assuredly that of being what iscalled " touching. " Voltaire's Zaïre ( 1732) and his"American " Alzire (1736) are more than touching:they are pathetic. As a good judge has well remarked[ Cf. A. Vinet, Littérature française au XVIIe siècle, vol.ii . pp. 24, 37] , it is insufficient to say that their adventures stir our feelings: they positively distress us. In thisrespect-as in several others--Voltaire's tragedies are asplayed by satire; -the increased importance accorded the sentimentalelement in the very conception of comedy; —and the revolution inmatters theatrical that is the necessary consequence of these features.-Marivaux' comedies and Watteau's pictures .-Marivaux and Shakespeare; and that together with the vaguely poetic background andthe Italian names, —what is most Shakespearian in Marivaux, —isperhaps the " marivaudage. "-" Marivaudage " and " Euphuism . "—Marivaux' preciosity, however, does not prevent him being oftensomewhat blunt; -and even at times coarse. -The Jeu de l'amour etdu hasard and Victor Hugo's Ruy Blas.C. The Publicist. -A remark of Sainte- Beuve touching " certainserious sides of Marivaux' mind "; -and that evidence of them mustbe sought for in his " papers. " -The Spectateur français, 1722–1723;-and that the idea of this production is evidently taken from Addison'sSpectator. The Indigent philosophe, 1728, and the Cabinet duphilosophe, 1734.-Borrowings from these works made by the authorof the Neveu de Rameau and that of the Mariage de Figaro [ Cf.Brunetière, Études critiques, vol . iii . ] .-Of certain of Marivaux'ideas; -on criticism; -on the organisation of a literary " marshalship "; -on the status of women and on the education of children; —onthe inequality of human conditions. -To what extent did MarivauxTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 291much superior to those of Crébillon or La Motte, as Marivaux' comedies are superior to those of Destouches or evenof Regnard. And after making allowance for the " romantic " and the "melodramatic " elements in Voltaire's creations, is it going too far to say that after a lapse of a hundredand fifty years his Alzire, and more especially his Zaïre,still make us shed real tears? But there is another poetwho causes the shedding of yet more abundant tears: werefer to the author of Manon Lescaut, 1731; of Cleveland,1733; of the Doyen de Killerine, 1735, to the kindly,soft-hearted, sentimental Abbé Prévost. Tempered orrestrained in the case of Marivaux by a certain dread ofridicule, and mingled in Voltaire's tragedies with othernovelties, sensibility overflows in Prévost's novels. It is thesole source both of their inspiration and of their attractiveness. A superficial observer of the manners of his time,himself takes his ideas seriously?—and how his work paved the wayfor the generation to which Vauvenargues and Rousseau belonged.3. THE WORKS. -Marivaux' works comprise:-(1 ) His short writings, of which we have just mentioned theprincipal, and to which may be added, with a view to making theenumeration sufficiently complete, sundry articles written for theMercure.(2) His plays , of which there are thirty-two in all , the principalbeing: Arlequin pol par l'amour, 1720; -La surprise de l'amour,1722; -La double inconstance, 1723; -Le prince travesti , 1724; —Laseconde surprise de l'amour, 1728; —Le jeu de l'amour et du hasard,1730; -Les serments indiscrets, 1732; -L'heureux stratagème, 1733;-LaMère confidente, 1735; -Le legs , 1736; -Les fausses confidences,1737; -L'épreuve, 1740; —and Le préjugé vaincu, 1746.(3) His novels: Pharsamon, 1712, but not published till 1737; -theEffets surprenants de la sympathie, 1713-1714; -the Voitureembourbée, 1714; -the Vie de Marianne, in eleven parts , 1731–1741[ The twelfth part, which is not found in all editions , is by MmeRiccoboni];—and the Paysan parvenu , in five parts, 1735-1736. Thereremain for mention the Iliade travestie, 1716, and the Télémaquetravesti, 1736.292 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURELa copious, fluent, and harmonious, but an unequal andnegligent writer, Prévost's chief originality and bond ofunion with his readers lies in the readiness with whichhis feelings are stirred by his own imaginings; they interest him, they trouble him profoundly. He weeps, he isan adept at weeping-if the expression be allowable; andhis whole century starts weeping with him.This incursion of sensibility into literature deals theclassic ideal a second, a serious and a profound blow thefirst, as we have seen , proceeded from the renunciation oftradition. For while it is impossible, as has been rightlyobserved, " to make languages that are perpetually changing the vehicle of anything that is eternal " [ Cf. Bossuet,Discours de réception] , it is equally true that that character of eternity which is the very condition or the definitionof the work of art cannot be conferred on what itself isThe best edition of Marivaux, or up to now the most completeedition, for it is not particularly good, is the edition of 1781 in 12volumes, Paris, Vve Duchesne.III.-Antoine-François Prévost d'Exiles [ Hesdin, 1697; †1763 , St. Firmin, near Chantilly] .1. THE SOURCES. -Prévost's own novels, and in particular: theMémoires d'un homme de qualité; Cleveland; and the Histoire deM. de Montcal [ Cf. too his journal: Le Pour et Contre] .-Bernardd'Héry's Notice preceding the editions of 1783 and 1810; -SainteBeuve, Portraits littéraires , vols. i . and iii .; and Causeries du lundi,vol. ix. , 1853; -Ambroise Firmin- Didot, article PREVOST in theBiographie universelle;-A. de Montaiglon's biographical notice atthe end of Glady frères ' edition of Manon Lescaut, 1875 , Paris; —F.Brunetière, Études critiques, vol . iii .; -Henry Harrisse, l'AbbéPrévost, 1896, Paris; -and the Notices preceding various editions ofManon Lescaut, notably those by Alexandre Dumas fils and Guy deMaupassant.2. THE MAN AND THE NOVELIST. -His adventurous youth.-Jesuit,oldier, and Benedictine, 1721. -He helps with the Gallia christiana.-He leaves the Benedictines, 1728; -publishes the first part of theTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 293changeable; and what is more changeable than the sensibility of one man with regard to another, or of the sameman at different moments? Who was it declared in thisconnection that sensibility "being a disposition that accompanies organic weakness, that results from the mobilityof the diaphragm , from the vivacity of the imagination ,from the sensitiveness of the nerves, a disposition whichinclines us to sympathise, to be thrilled, to fear, to admire,to weep, to faint, to succour, to cry aloud, to take toflight, to lose our reason, to have no exact idea of thetrue, the good, and the beautiful, to be unjust, to be mad,"that sensibility, for all these reasons, was merely the"characteristic of a kindly nature and of a mediocregenius "? It was Diderot who made this declaration in amoment of frankness [ Cf. his Paradoxe sur le comédien];and the fact is that it seems that sensibility, left free toMémoires d'un homme de qualité, 1728; —and visits England; —andafterwards Holland [ Cf. Memoires du Chevalier de Ravannes, andMélanges de Bois- Jourdain ] .—The first edition of Manon Lescaut,1731 or 1733?-He returns to France. -Publication of Cleveland, 1731;-Le Pour et le Contre, 1733.-Prévost writes for the booksellers; —Le Doyen de Killerine , 1735.-He becomes " almoner to the Princede Conti. "These details help to an understanding of Prévost's novels:-hemay truthfully be said to have lived his works; -the desultory character of which is explained by the hasards of his existence; —moreover, such of his work as he did not " live, " he " felt " rather than"imagined. "-The sombre and melancholic character of Prévost'snovels; and how greatly they differ from the novels of Le Sage andMarivaux. The passion of love in Prévost's novels;-how they arealmost exclusively occupied with it; -and that it offers in them thesame features of suddenness;-violence; --and fatality as in Racine'stragedies. —It is this circumstance that constitutes the conspicuousmerit of Manon Lescaut, and not the fact that the novel is a sketchof the courtesan. -The depiction of manners in Prévost's novels;-and how insignificant or superficial it is.-Prévost's novelsare idealist novels; —moreover, they are not in the least degree294 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREpursue the impetuous irregularity of its course, has neverproduced in any age or in any branch of literature workthat is other than inferior or of secondary importance.The novels of Prévost himself or the comedies of De laChaussée [ La Fausse antipathie, 1733; Le préjugé àla mode, 1735; Mélanide; La gouvernante ] may serveas excellent examples in point! If the reason of thisbe asked, it is again Diderot who furnishes it when heremarks that " the man whose sensibility is highly developed is too much at the mercy of his diaphragm . .to be a profound observer of and in consequence a sublimeimitator of nature. " Here, indeed, we have a man whoknows himself! What we see through a cloud of tears,-he is entirely in the right! -is indistinct, confused,and uncertain, and one of the first effects of thisuntrammelled indulgence in sensibility is to modify propsychological; -and their style is that proper to passion; -that is tosay, it rises at times to the highest eloquence; -and descends inplaces to the lowest depths of the commonplace; while it is alwayseasy, harmonious, copious, and prolix.Prévost's last years; —and his rôle of intermediary between theliteratures of England and France;-his translations of Richardson:Pamela, Clarisse , Grandison; -of Hume's History of England; —andof Middleton's Life of Cicero. -He writes for the Journal étranger;—and is one of the authors of the Histoire générale des voyages. -Hisrelations with Rousseau; —and that he and Marivaux are the onlymen of letters to whom sympathetic allusion is made in the Confessions;-natural reasons for this sympathy;-and the interest ofthis remark. Of certain information respecting Prévost's novels; —and in particular that furnished by Mlle Aïssé; -and by Mlle deLespinasse. The legend of Prévost's death [ Cf. Henry Harrisse,L'Abbé Prévost] .3. THE WORKS. -The works of Prévost are composed of his novels,among which we will mention: -the Mémoires d'un homme de qualité,of which Manon Lescaut forms the seventh part, 1728, 1731; -theHistoire de M. Cleveland, 1731; —the Doyen de Killerine, 1735–1740;--the Histoire d'une Grecque moderne, 1740; -the CampagnesTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 295foundly the observation of nature, and the nature ofthis observation.The great writers of the preceding generation hadnotforeseen that the consequence of making a certain social tendency a constituent part of the classic ideal would one daybeto cause the realisation of beauty and the imitation ofnatureto be held of less account than the pleasing the fashionableworld, or than considerations of social utility! This, however, is what happens. The psychological and moralobservation, which for a hundred and fifty years had beenthe basis or the pedestal of the classic ideal, gives place tosocial observation. " Man is in no way an enigma, as youimagine him to be in order to have the pleasure ofsolving it. . . . There is no more apparent contradictionin man than in the rest of nature. . . . What intelligentman is there who will be filled with despair because he isphilosophiques ou les Mémoires de M. de Montcal, 1741; -and theMémoires d'un honnête homme, 1745.He also wrote almost the whole of Pour et Contre, 1733-1740;-further he translated or adapted all of Richardson's work, severalvolumes of Hume, etc.; -and wrote, it is said, the first 17 volumesof the Histoire générale des voyages, 1745–1761 .There exist two editions of Prévost's works, joined to those of LeSage, and forming in all 54 volumes, 39 of which are occupied byPrévost's writings. These editions were issued in Paris in 1783 and in1810-1816.The editions of Manon Lescaut are innumerable.IV. -Pierre Claude Nivelle de la Chaussée [ Paris, 1691 or1692; 1754, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES.-D'Alembert, Éloge de La Chaussée; -Geoffroy,Cours de littérature dramatique, vol. iii .; -Lanson, Nivelle de laChaussée et la comédie larmoyante, Paris, 1887.. 2. THE ORIGIN OF THE " MIDDLE- CLASS " DRAMA. -La Chaussée'sfirst successful work: Lafausse antipathie, 1733; —and that his freshdeparture consisted less in his having " mixed " the branches of thedrama,—Marivaux having already done that in his comedies, -than in296 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREacquainted withonly some few of the attributes ofmatter? "[Voltaire, Beuchot's edition, vol . 37 , pp. 41 , 46] . Itis in these terms that Voltaire combats Pascal, and thetruth is that all these questions have ceased to interesteither Voltaire or his contemporaries. He believes heknows all about man that can be known; he esteemsthat the time is past for man to resort to introspection:in sese descendere as Montaigne put it; and that on thecontrary the moment has come for man to look beyondhimself. And here we have the explanation of thatuniversal curiosity to which his Charles XII. , 1732, hisZaïre, 1732, his Lettres anglaises , 1734, and a little laterhis Essai sur les mœurs, bear convincing witness. Hiscontemporaries, with the single exception of Vauvenargues,are of his opinion . They too believe that they have asufficient knowledge of man, of his inner promptings, ofhis having treated seriously, -and turned to account for tragediesdealing with middle-class life, the very same incidents of ordinaryexistence which Dancourt, Destouches, and Marivaux had made thesubject matter of their plays. -How this idea takes clearer shape inthe Préjugé à la mode, 1735; -in the École des amis, 1737; —and inMélanide, 1741.-La Chaussée's aim is to provoke the same kind ofemotion as is aroused by tragedy; -without having recourse to anhistorical background; -to princely personages; -or to too violent passions . That this conception brings comedy into line with the novel; -and that in point of fact La Chaussée's comedies are merely novels; —though at the same time they pave the way for the plays of Diderotand Beaumarchais. -That, given the character of La Chaussée'sdramas, it was a singular idea on his part to write them in verse;-and, bearing in mind the nature of the subjects he treated[ Cf. Lanson, loc. cit. , pp. 170, 175] , — and the success theywere to meet with a little later, the oblivion into which his playsbave fallen is perhaps explained by the fact that they are in verse.—It is difficult enough to write comedy in verse; -but to write middleclass drama in verse is impossible.3. THE WORKS. -La Fausse antipathie, 1733; -the Préjugé à lamode, 1735; —the École des Amis, 1737; —Mélanide, 1741; —AmourTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 297the secret motives of his actions, of his passions, of hisinstincts; and, like Voltaire, they are solely concernedwith depicting manners. Whether, like Gresset, whoseMéchant dates from 1747, they write for the stage, or pridethemselves on being philosophers as was the case withDuclos, whose Considérations sur les mœurs will appear in1750, their observation is not only restricted to man considered as a member of society, but it does not attempt todeal with the fundamental qualities of man, held to bealways and in every respect identical. Voltaire expresslystates that such is his belief: "Nature, he says , is everywhere the same. " He is never weary of repeating theassertion of Harlequin: " Tutto il mondo é fatto come lanostra famiglia. " His object in studying history is to discover proofs of this saying; and he even styles his method"the philosophic view of history. " Any differences onpour amour, 1742; —Paméla, 1743; —the École des mères, 1744; —theRival de lui-même, 1746; —the Gouvernante, 1747; -the Ecole dela jeunesse, 1749; -the Homme de fortune, 1751; -the Retourimprévu, 1756.La Chaussée is also the author of a number of somewhat coarseContes in verse; -of an Epître in defence of the Ancients, which, published in 1731 under the title Epitre de Clio, was the beginning of hisliterary reputation; -and of a wretchedly bad tragedy, Maximien,1738.The only complete edition of La Chaussée's works is that publishedin Paris by Prault, 1761-1762.V. The first period of Voltaire's life [ 1694-1750] .1. THE SOURCES. -The complete works of Voltaire himself(Beuchot's edition); -and the eighteen volumes of his correspondence(Moland's edition, Paris 1878-1882); -Condorcet, Vie de Voltaire,1787; -G. Desnoiresterres, Voltaire et la société française auXVIIIe siècle , 2nd edition , 8 vols. , Paris, 1871-1876; -and G. Bengesco, Bibliographie des œuvres de Voltaire, 4 vols . , Paris, 1882-1890.The two last mentioned works summarise or refer the student to themajority of the other books dealing with Voltaire.298 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREwhich he mayhappen, in passing from one epoch to another,he ascribes to the slow "progress of enlightenment. " Hishistorical studies may not give him a very lofty idea ofhuman nature, but he nevertheless continues of opinion.that " we are a species of monkey that can be taught toact either reasonably or unreasonably ": and to afford ussuch teaching is precisely the end he has in view. And inthis way the conception is arrived at of an - universal man,an extremely tractable and pliable being, a man whoremains everywhere the same, who, properly speaking, isneither a Frenchman nor an Englishman, but " man, ” andthe diversity of whose manners is only interesting so faras there seems a possibility of replacing it by uniformity.The same idea underlies the Esprit des Lois ( 1748) ofMontesquieu, unless indeed some other idea be discoverable of a nature to elucidate the obscurities and to reconHowever, we add the following works from which foreign opinionon the subject of Voltaire may be learned: John Morley, Voltaire,London, 1874; -J. F. Strauss's six lectures on Voltaire; -JamesParton, Life of Voltaire, London, 1881; —and W. Kreiten, S.J. ,Voltaire, ein Characterbild, 2nd edition, Fribourg (Brisgau) , 1885.2. VOLTAIRE'S EARLIER YEARS.-His family and his middle- classextraction [ Cf. above the articles MOLIÈRE, BOILEAU, REGNARD]; -hiseducation at the College of Clermont; —his early masters [ FathersPorée, Tournemine, Thoulié (d'Olivet) ]; —his early friends [ d'Argenson, Cideville, Maisons, d'Argental]; —and his entry into society , 1711.-The society gathered round the Vendôme family; —and that it wasa school of gallantry, vulgar debauchery, and infidelity. -The Hollandincident, and Arouet's first love affairs [ Cf. Correspondance between1713 and 1714, and Mme Dunoyer's Lettres historiques et galantes] .-His first satirical writings . -First exile at Tulle, and then at Sullysur- Loire, 1716.-His return to Paris; -two new satires are ascribedto him; and he is imprisoned in the Bastille for the first time [ May,1717-to April, 1718] .-The first performance of Edipe [ November,1718] and the first important success of Arouet; -who on this occasiontakes the name of Voltaire. -Of the importance at this period of asuccess scored on the stage; —and of the acquaintances Voltaire makes,THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 299cile the contradictions of this celebrated book. For to denythat the book is obscure is impossible: the different interpretations that have been given are proof of its obscurity.Was Montesquieu's sole intention in the Esprit des Lois togive a further version of or a sequel to his Lettres persanes; and can it be that this great work, which occupiedtwenty years of his life is mainly a political pamphlet, inwhich it sometimes happens that the author points outwhat he considers to be the proper remedies for the evilshe denounces? Voltaire rather inclines to this opinion,and he had it in view when he blamed Montesquieu “ forhaving played the witling in a book of universal jurisprudence. " The opinion is also that of the last editor ofthe Esprit des Lois. Or, on the other hand, did Montesquieu propose, as the author of the Politique tirée del'Ecriture sainte had done before him, to give a sketch ofthanks to his Edipe; -acquaintances that improve his social standing[the Villars and Richelieu families, the Duchesse de Maine]; —usefulacquaintances [ the banker Hogguers and the brothers Paris] .-Voltaire's business instinct is awakened;-his intrigues with a view toembarking on a diplomatic career through the agency of Dubois; —and his taste for secret missions. -Voltaire's second journey to Holland. The Epitre à Uranie, 1722; —and why it is important to bearin mind the date of this work. The first publication of the Henriade,1723;-Marianne, 1724. - Voltaire installs himself in the good gracesof the Marquise de Prie. -The Chevalier de Rohan incident [ December,1725]; -second imprisonment in the Bastille [ April, 1726]; —and hisexile in England [ May 2, 1726] .Voltaire's first impressions in England [Cf. Beuchot, vol . xxxvii. ]; -and, in this connection, a few words as to the French colony inLondonin 1726 [ Cf. Prévost, Histoire de M. de Montcal, and J. ChurtonCollins, Bolingbroke . . . and Voltaire in England, London, 1886] .-Voltaire renews his acquaintance with Bolingbroke, and makes theacquaintance of Pope, of " the merchant " Falkener, etc.-He learnsEnglish and studies Newton, Locke, and Bacon; -he sees Congreve'scomedies performed, and Shakespeare's dramas.-He writes hisEssai sur la Poésie épique. -The English freethinkers [ Cf. Tabaraud,300 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREwhat he considered the best form of government, and didhe discover it, according to his own expression , “ in thewoods," as his predecessor, Bossuet, had lighted on it inthe Bible? This latter view is held by certain of his commentators, by d'Alembert for instance; and since d'Alembert by Tracy; and since Tracy by several others. It hasalso been suggested that his intention may have been tosystematise historical data according to the method in usein natural science, or in other words to apply the " positivemethod, " at a period at which it had not yet been invented,to a subject which even at the present day admits of itsutilisation to a less degree than any other. This was theview adopted by Auguste Comte, and Taine also adheredto it in his Ancien régime. The truth is, however, thatnone of these interpretations mutually exclude oneanother. If the Esprit des Lois is wanting in clearness,Histoire du Philosophisme anglais, Paris, 1806; and Leslie Stephen,English Thought in the Eighteenth Century, London, 2nd edition,1881]; —and that, while taking into account their influence on Voltaire,it must be remembered how much they owe to Bayle. -Of the advantage Voltaire derived from his stay in England [ Cf. John Morley,Voltaire];—and that it has perhaps been a little exaggerated.The Histoire de Charles XII. , 1731, and the Lettres philosophiques.-How did the idea of writing the history of Charles XII. occur tóVoltaire?—and that it probably dates from the time of his acquaintance with the Baron de Görtz. -Character of the work; -and that whileconceiving it as a tragedy, -Voltaire spared no pains to make it aserious, historical work [ Cf. Bengesco, Bibliographie, vol. i . , p. 373and fol. ] . Of the use that is made in Charles XII. of informationobtained orally; -and that the value of the book is due in part to thisinformation. -Charles XII. regarded as an early attempt to writehistory in a philosophic spirit [ Cf. the Essai sur les guerres civiles andthe notes to the Henriade] , —and, in this connection , of Voltaire'scurious mixture of admiration for his hero and of indignation againsthim. -Zaïre, 1732.-The publication of the Lettres philosophiques,1734. Significance of the book, and how much more considerable itis than that of the Lettres persanes, -and particularly so if it beTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 301if it makes greater claims upon the perspicacity of thereader than the Essai sur les mœurs, if we can only regardit as the rough draught of a great book, the reason is thatit is a confused medley of three or four things, of theconnection between which Montesquieu himself had noexact intuition. " If it be desired to inquire into thedesign of the author, he wrote, -in a Preface which is amonument of literary vanity, —it can properly be discoveredonly in the plan of the work "; a statement which is anindirect way of confessing or rather of dissembling thetruth that in reality and at bottom he had no design orplan. In short, let us have the courage to admit thatthe Esprit des Lois is a failure, and that it will always beimpossible to establish the unity of its plan for theexcellent reason that Montesquieu himself in writing itwas never very sure of his own purpose.taken together with the Remarques sur les Pensées de Pascal,—which belong to the same date. The subjects dealt with in theLettres.-Religion and tolerance [ Lettres, 1 , 2, 3, 4, 5 , 6, 7] .— Government, politics and commerce [ 8 , 9, 10] .- Science and philosophy [ 11,12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17] .-English literature and the social standing ofmen of letters [ 18, 19, 20, 21 , 22, 23, 24] . Of certain ideas Voltaireand Montesquieu possess in common: -on the supreme importanceof the social institution;-on the dangers of religion,-Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum!on the lay constitution of the society of the future; -and on theforce of opinion. -Condemnation of the Lettres philosophiques [June,1734].Voltaire's sojourn at Cirey. -His liaison with Mme du Châtelet; —he takes up his residence at Cirey [ Cf. Eugène Asse's editions of theLettres de Mme de Graffigny, Paris, 1879; and of the Lettres de Mmedu Châtelet, Paris, 1882] .—Varied nature of Voltaire's writings: —his Alzire, 1736; -Le Mondain, 1736; —and of the clearness withwhich the idea of progress is expressed in this work. The comedyL'enfant prodigue, 1736; -Voltaire enters into correspondence withthe Prince Royal of Prussia, afterwards Frederick II .; -the Essai sur302 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREIt remains to explain why the book had such a brilliant,such a notable success in its time throughout Europe aswell as in France, and to determine what it is that weourselves still like or admire in it. Montesquieu's contemporaries were charmed by the wit or sedate humourof the work, by its epigrammatic tone and phraseology, bythe chapter on Despotism or the chapter on Slavery; byits allusions, quotations and singularities; by the fashion,at once discreet and licentious, in which it treats of thecurious or indecent customs of Benin, of Calicut and ofBorneo; by its anecdotes; by the novelty of the information it contained; by its praise of " honour " and"virtue." Montesquieu was the first to enable ladies toimagine, as they proceeded with their toilette, that theyunderstood legal language, and it was due to him that' universal jurisprudence " became a topic of conversation 66la nature du feu, 1737 [ Cf. Émile Saigey, La Physique de Voltaire,Paris, 1873 ]; -the Discours sur l'homme, 1738; —the Eléments de laphilosophie de Newton, 1738;-the quarrel with Desfontaines, 1738-1740 [ Cf. Maynard, Voltaire, sa vie et ses œuvres, Paris , 1867, vol. i .;and Nisard, Les ennemis de Voltaire, Paris , 1853 ]; -Zulime, 1740;-Doutes sur la mesure des forces motrices , 1741; —Mahomet, 1742; —Mérope, 1743.Voltaire's plays [ Cf. Geoffroy, Cours de littérature dramatique,vol. iii.; Emile Deschanel, Le théâtre de Voltaire, Paris, 1886; andH. Lion, Les Tragédies de Voltaire, Paris, 1896 ] .-Voltaire's passionfor the theatre; —and the reality , flexibility, and variety of his dramaticaptitudes . Successive influence of Racine, the elder Crébillon , andShakespeare on Voltaire's conception of the drama. -Zaïre, 1732;-and whether Voltaire had Bajazet or Shakespeare's Othello mostin mind in writing it? -The Mort de César, 1735; —and the ideaof tragedy from which love should be absent. Of certain innovations introduced to the French stage by Voltaire. -Subjects of pureinvention. -Extension of the localities in which the scene is laidand the development of local colour: -Zaïre and the Mussulmanworld.-Alzire and America;-the Orphelin de la Chine and theAsiatic world. -National reminiscences; —and, in this connection,THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 303in the salons and at court-where he was not withoutfriends. As Fontenelle had done before him, he annexedto the domain of literature a new and spacious province.For this service we are still grateful to him, if it be thesign of a great writer to utilise for literary purposes asubject hitherto foreign to literature, to bring it at oncewithin general reach, and by the sole authority of his workand name to ensure its remaining common property forthe future. But in the eyes of the men of his time, profoundly convinced as they were of the " charm of living,"his chief claim upon their gratitude was the ardent , thealmost religious respect he professed for the " socialinstitution, " whose intangibility he seemed to have basedon deep-lying grounds that raised it even above the laws.And finally his contemporaries were thankful to him forthe perspective of increasing perfection he opened upof the influence of the Henriade on the tragedy of the eighteenthcentury. The abuse in Voltaire's tragedies of such romanticexpedients as misunderstandings and recognitions [ Cf. in thisrespect Crébillon's plays].-Voltaire's pathos; -and does it meritthe praise that has been bestowed on it [ Cf. Vinet, Littératurefrançaise au XVIIe siècle]?-How Voltaire compromised his qualifications as a dramatist; -by converting tragedy into a vehicle for thepropagation of philosophic theories; -by choosing his subjects inaccordance with the exigences of the taste of his time rather than inaccordance with any conception of art; -and by the fact that he grewmore and more unable to dissociate himself from his personages.-That for all these reasons it is unnecessary to study those of Voltaire'splays that are posterior to Sémiramis, 1748; -since from this dateonwards, ―with the possible exception of Tancrède, ―he will producenothing in the way of tragedy, -and still less in the way of comedy, -that is not far inferior to his earlier efforts. -A few words as to themediocrity of Voltaire's comedies.Voltaire at Court.-His relations with Mme de Châteauroux; -andmore particularly with Mme de Pompadour. He flatters himselfthat the king will be prevailed on by his new mistress to espouse thecause of the philosophers; -and he overwhelms the sovereign with304 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREbefore them. At the present day we may not be able toadmit that this fervent faith in the destinies of humanitylends the Esprit des Lois the unity in which it is deficient,but we can at least allow that it gives the book itselevation.66 Every man-he had written in his Lettres persanes-is capable of contributing to the good of a fellowman, but to assure the welfare of an entire society is toresemble the Gods! " Montesquieu, like the Stoics ofwhom he was so great an admirer, desired to resemblethe Gods, and as a means to this end he subordinated, asdid the Stoics, every consideration to the good of society.In the view of the author of the Esprit des Lois weare men merely so far as we are fitted for society. Inhis eyes the social utility of a law is the criterion, notonly of its character and merit, but also of its moralflatteries;-which bring him the title of historiographer of France[ 1745] . The Poème de Fontenoy, 1745; and the Temple de la Gloire,1745.-Voltaire elected to and received at the French Academy [ May,1746] . He is appointed gentleman in waiting to the king [ December,1746].—Voltaire's imprudences. He wearies the king by his excessiveflatteries; -Mme de Pompadour by his familiarity; —and the courtiersby his self- sufficiency.He retires to the residence of the Duchesse de Maine at Sceaux,1747.-His early tales: Le Monde comme il va, Cosi Sancta, Zadig,Micromégas, 1747; -the quarrels with the Duchesse de Maine.—He leaves Sceaux for Cirey; -his stay at the Court of Lorraine.—Mme du Châtelet's treachery; —and, in this connection, a few wordson the subject of the Court of Lorraine, King Stanislas , and theMarquis de St. Lambert; -death of Mme du Châtelet, 1749; -andreturn of Voltaire to Paris. -Difficulties of his situation; -owing tohis being regarded with equal suspicion by the court and the newgeneration of " men of letters . "-His dramatic rivalry with the elderCrébillon. -His Oreste, 1750, and his Rome sauvée, 1752.-Frederickproposes to him that he shall take up his residence in Berlin.-Voltaire's hesitations [ Cf. Marmontel in his Memoirs ] .- Frederick'sadvances to Baculard d'Arnaud cause him to make up his mind.-HisTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 305excellence or hatefulness and even of its intrinsic justice.Indeed he has allowed the observation to fall from hispen, that from the reprehensible principle of the denial ofthe immortality of the soul " the Stoics deduced consequences which, although not accurate, were admirablefrom a social point of view " [ Cf. Esprit des Lois, xxiv. ,chap. 19 ] . In another passage he writes [ Cf. Esprit desLois, xxiv. , chap. 1 ]: " Just as in the dark it is possibleto distinguish different degrees of obscurity . . . so wemay compare false religions with a view to deciding whichof them are most in conformity with the good of society. "And if we probe his opinions to the bottom, what do wefind is his grievance-vented, be it said, with infinite precaution-against the " true religion "? It is that certainof its laws may clash with the good of society. " Whathold has the law on a man who firmly believes that thedeparture for Berlin [ June 18, 1750]; -and his arrival at Potsdam[July 10, 1750] .-Sincerity of his enthusiasm for Frederick; -and, in this connection, of the benefits Voltaire derived from his sojourn inPrussia. When he left Paris he was in evil odour, -and was onlyregarded there as one man of letters among many; -his stay inBerlin, —and his intimacy with Frederick, -in spite of the Frankfort incident, —will make of him in less than three years,-a man whosesituation is henceforth unique, -the trusted literary adviser of thePowers; and already almost the king of European literature.VI. Jean- Baptiste Gresset [ Amiens, 1709; † 1777, Amiens] .1. THE SOURCES . -D'Alembert, Réponse au discours de réceptionde l'abbé Millot, 1777; -Father Daire, Vie de Gresset, Paris, 1779; —Maximilien Robespierre, Éloge de Gresset, Paris, 1785; -Notice preceding Renouard's edition, Paris, 1811; -Campenon, Essai sur la vieet les ouvrages de Gresset, Paris , 1823; -E. Wogue, Gresset, Paris ,1894.2. THE POET; --and that his sole merit is that he is representativeof a very special phase in the art of writing in verse; -the publicationof Ver- Vert in 1734 having been almost a literary event; —and theMéchant (1747) being certainly the best comedy in verse we have of21306 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREseverest penalty the magistrates are able to inflict on himwill end in a moment in ushering him into a state ofbliss? " [ Cf. Esprit de Lois, xxiv. , chap. 14] . We touchhere on the central idea of his book, and this is the standpoint we must take up if we desire "to discover thepurport " of his work. However confused the composition of the book may seem, and strange as may bethe medley of laws that form its subject matter, wehave only to consider these various laws from the pointof view of their bearing on the " good of society, " andat once the reasons of the author's mode of proceedingbecome apparent and a fresh light is thrown on hisbook. In this way Montesquieu has his revenge. Whatwas obscure in his work grows less obscure, what wasdisconnected acquires cohesion, and what seemed contradictory ceases to be so. The Esprit des Lois remainsthe eighteenth century;-without excepting even Alexis Piron'sMétromanie. -The work, moreover, is not without a certain satiricalforce; —and some " documentary " value; -admitting the principalpersonage in the Méchant to be a transitional type between thedandies of Marivaux [ Cf. L'Epreuve] and the heroes of the Liaisonsdangereuses. -Gresset's recantation, 1759; -and Voltaire's lines:Gresset is mistaken, he is not so guilty . .Have we lost much by the auto-da- fé Gresset made of his manuscripts?-and that his unpublished pieces, the Ouvroir or theGazetin, doubtless contained nothing that is not to be found in hisVer- Vert.3. THE WORKS. -Gresset's works comprise:(1) His poems, including Ver- Vert, the Carême impromptu, theLutrin vivant, the Chartreuse, and some Epistles and Odes; -alsoa somewhat feeble translation in verse of Virgil's Eclogues.(2) His plays, comprising Edouard III., a tragedy; Sidney, adrama in verse; and the Méchant, a comedy.(3) Some prose writings , of which the most noteworthy is perhapshis Discours de réception, 1748. A posthumous poem of Gresset's inirregular verse, Le Parrain magnifique, was published in 1810.THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 307for all this an imperfect book, but it is felt to be lessunworthy of its lofty fortune; it becomes comprehensiblethat its influence should have surpassed its merit, a circumstance explained by the consideration that the geniusof Montesquieu was doubtless superior to his work.At the same time this central idea of the Esprit desLois was not the exclusive property of Montesquieu; onthe contrary it is met with in the writings of almost allhis contemporaries. A" social " literature was bound tolead up to it , and thus to gain at first in comprehensiveness what it was losing in depth, and to perish orat least be distorted and disorganised by the carryingto extremes of its principle? At the very momentwhen Montesquieu was completing the Esprit des Lois,Vauvenargues was issuing his Introduction à la connaissance de l'esprit humain (1746) , where the followingThe best edition of his works is Renouard's edition, 2 volumes,Paris, 1811.VII .-Luc de Clapiers, Marquis de Vauvenargues [ Aix inProvence, 1715; † 1747, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES .-Suard's notice; and Saint- Maurice's Éloge deVauvenargues to be found at the beginning of vols. i . and iii . oftheedition of 1821; -Sainte- Beuve, Causeries du lundi, vol. iii . , 1850; —A. Vinet, Littérature française au XVIIIe siècle; -Prévost- Paradol,Moralistes français; -Gilbert, Éloge de Vauvenargues, precedinghis edition, Paris, 1857; -Maurice Paléologue, Vauvenargues in the"Grands Ecrivains français " series, Paris, 1890.2. THE MORALIST. -His melancholy destiny. -He is a transitionaltype. The essential and original characteristic of Vauvenargues consists in his having combined some of the traits of Pascal's pessimismwith J. J. Rousseau's optimism; —while his work, though uncompleted,is the confession of a soul.Vauvenargues' military career and campaigns; -his love of glory;his generosity of heart; -and his love of humanity. -Comparison inthis respect between Vauvenargues and La Rochefoucauld.-DidVauvenargues possess a doctrine?-and that in any case his pre-308 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREpassage is to be read: " For anything to be regarded asgood by the whole of society, it is necessary that itshould tend to the advantage of the whole of society, andfor it to be regarded as an evil , it must tend to thedestruction of society: herein lies the main characteristicof what is morally good or morally evil. " He was brieflydiscussing, not the " spirit," but the " origin " of laws; andhe added: " We are born and we grow up in the shade ofthese solemn conventions; we owe them the security ofour life and the tranquillity that attends it . The laws arealso our only title to our possessions: from the very dawnof our life we profit by their beneficent consequences, andwe are attached to them by bonds that growever strongerand stronger. Whoever claims to throw off this authorityto which he owes everything, cannot esteem it unjustthat it should deprive him of everything—even of his life.mature death prevented him from reconciling its contradictions , -and from developing all its consequences. -His veneration for socialinstitutions [Introduction à la connaissance, &c. , chap. 43] .- Hisindulgent attitude towards the passions and the apology he makes forthem [ Cf. Introd. bk. ii . , chap. 42, and Réflexions et Maximes, Ed.Gilbert, 122, 123, 124, 149, 151 , 153, 154] .—His belief in the goodnessof nature; and his theory as to the superiority of sentiment overreason [ Cf. Réflexions et Maximes, passim, and Réflexions sur diverssujets, 54].-Analogy between these ideas and those to whichRousseau will soon give expression; -and to what is this analogyto be attributed?-to the resemblance between the two periods?-or to the fact that Vauvenargues, like Rousseau, was selftaught?Howsuperior his moral personality is to that of Rousseau; -thoughhis talent is inferior.-Vauvenargues' eloquence. -Melancholy toneof some of his thoughts. -Delicacy of his literary taste.3. THE WORKS. -Vauvenargues' works consist of (1) his Introduction à la connaissance de l'esprit humain, which was first publishedin 1746, and to which were joined the Réflexions sur divers sujets;the Conseils à un jeune homme, the Réflexions critiques sur quelquespoètes and some Caractères in the manner of La Bruyère;-(2) hisTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 309Is it reasonable that an individual should dare to sacrificehis fellows solely in his own interest, and that societyshould not be able to restore the public peace at the costof his ruin! " To discuss these daring principles isbeyond our province here, but it is not impossible thatMontesquieu had some knowledge of them, and in anycase their resemblance to those of the Esprit des Lois isplain. The truth doubtless is that they pervaded theatmosphere of the time in a disconnected and inchoatestate, and that in succession the author of the Introduction à la connaissance de l'esprit humain, the authorof the Esprit des Lois and the author of the Essai sur lesmœurs did no more than give them literary expression,while adapting them respectively the first to his subject,the second to his vague " plan, " and the third to thebent of his intellect.Dialogues;-(3) his correspondence with Voltaire, Fauries de SaintVincent and the Marquis de Mirabeau.Vauvenargues was prevented by his early death from completing any of his writings with the exception of his Introduction. Theremainder of his works have been enriched by the successive additionof unpublished fragments, which have nearly doubled their volume.For example, Suard published for the first time in 1806 the Traitésur le libre arbitre; -eighteen of his dialogues did not see the lighttill 1821; —while his correspondence with Mirabeau is only to befound in the last edition of his works that has been published, thatedited by Gilbert, in 2 volumes 8vo, Paris, 1857, Furne.VIII.—Charles Pinot Duclos [ Dinan, 1704; † 1772, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -Duclos' Memoirs (unfinished); -Mme d'Epinay,Mémoires; —Noual de la Houssaye (Duclos' nephew) , Éloge deDuclos, 1806; -Villenave, Notice preceding his edition of the works,1821;-Sainte- Beuve, Causeries du lundi, vol . ix. , 1853;-LucienPerey and G. Maugras, La Jeunesse de Mme d'Epinay, Paris , 1882;-L. Brunel, Les philosophes et l'Académie française au XVIII®siècle, Paris, 1884.2. THE WRITER. -His licentious youth, -and his habit of adopting310 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREAnother idea takes definite shape at about the sameperiod: the idea of progress which, first evolved, as wesaw, some fifty years before in the course of the quarrelbetween the ancients and moderns, has since been profiting, as it were, by the losses sustained by the spirit oftradition and now penetrates into the very sanctuary ofroutine, into the Sorbonne itself. Are we to believe thatbecause Voltaire and Montesquieu did not expressly givethis idea the name by which we know it , they on thataccount had no " presentiment of the important part itwas about to play on the world's stage "? This viewcan only be taken by those who have read these writersmost inattentively, for they are full of the idea ofprogress. Shall we suppose that Montesquieu was notaware of what he was saying when he wrote that"human laws-as compared with the laws of religion-cynical airs . His eccentric humour; —and the mediocrity of histalent. His novels: Histoire de la baronne de Luz, 1741;—and theConfessions du comte de . . . 1742; -and that they are of a kindredstamp to those of the younger Crébillon; -that is as indecent, astedious, and doubtless as false .-His Histoire de Louis XI. , 1745, isalmost unreadable at the present day. -On the other hand hisConsidérations sur les mœurs de ce siècle, 1750, -a fairly well writtenwork, contains somewhat interesting observations on varioussubjects; —and helps to an understanding of the manners of his time[ See in particular the second chapter dealing with " education " and"prejudices "; -the fifth with " reputation, " " celebrity,'," "renown, "and " consideration ";-the seventh with " people who are thefashion ";-and the eleventh with " men of letters " ]. -The successof this book, too, was considerable; —no literary man has been morethe fashion than was Duclos in his time; -while none have betterlooked after their interests . -He was also successful in preserving hisindependence; —and his dignity; -not only with respect to personsof position and social standing; -but more especially with respectto his fellow men of letters; -and particularly with respect to theEncyclopedists.-For these reasons his personality has a significancethat is not possessed by his works; —and on this account he deservesto be remembered.THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 311-owe their advantage to their novelty " [ Cf. Espritdes Lois, xxvi. , ch. 2] , or that Voltaire was blind towhat he was about, when he got himself into troublein connection with his Mondain? Moreover we haveno hesitation in affirming that the young Bachelor ofLetters, who expressed himself in the following termsin a Discourse dated 1750, had read Voltaire and Montesquieu, even if he did not owe them his inspiration:"Societies are seen to come into existence and the foundation is witnessed of nations, which in turn dominate othernations or are subject to them. . . . Interest, ambition,and vainglory perpetually change the aspect of the worldand deluge the earth with blood, but amid their ravages,human enlightenment advances, manners grow milder,the nations are brought closer together, commerce andpolitics at last unite the different parts of the globe, and3. THE WORKS .-They include in addition to his novels, to hisLouis XI. , and to his Considérations:(1) A certain number of memoirs contributed to the Recueil del'Académie des Inscriptions, the two most important among themrelating to the origin of and the changes in the French and Celticlanguages; -an annotated edition of the Port- Royal Grammar, 1754.A new system of orthography is followed in the printing of thiswork; and the Preface to the 4th edition of the dictionary of theAcademy, 1762.(2) Of his Mémoires secrets sur les règnes de Louis XIV. et deLouis XV. This work was first published in 1791 , and its interest hasgreatly diminished since the appearance of the Memoirs of SaintSimon.(3) Of his Considérations sur l'Italie, [ 1766-1767] also publishedfor the first time in 1791.(4) Of his Essai sur les corvées, 1759, and of his Réflexionssur les corvées , 1762, two works which are certainly by the sameauthor, though it has not been absolutely proved that that author isDuclos.The most complete edition of Duclos' works is that edited byVillenave, Paris, 1821.312 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREthe total mass of the human race, traversing alternateperiods of calm and agitation, of prosperity and ofsuffering, moves on, unceasingly though slowly, towardsa state of greater perfection " [ Cf. Turgot's Works, Daire'sedition , vol. ii . ] . Without wishing in any way to robTurgot of his merit, or of the honour that is paid him,one is justified in pointing out that there is not a word inthis quotation or a line in the whole of the Discourse,which does not recall some passage or other of the Espritdes Lois or the Essai sur les mœurs. That Turgot givesus the very spirit of these works is still clearer, if Voltaireconceived his Essai sur les mœurs solely with a viewtodemonstrating the superiority of his century over allothers; and if Montesquieu, for his part, sought toground his conviction that " history offers nothing comparable with the might of the Europe of his time " onEIGHTH PERIODThe Encyclopedia and the Encyclopedists1750-17651. THE SOURCES. -The Memoirs and Letters of the time, and inparticular: Voltaire's correspondence; -the Memoirs of d'Argenson;of Barbier; of Morellet; of Marmontel; -Frederick the Great'scorrespondence [ Preuss' edition];-Ravaisson, Archives de la Bastille,vol. xii . , covering the years 1709-1772; -Barruel, Histoire duJacobinisme, vol. i . , London, 1797; -Picot, Mémoires pour servir àl'histoire ecclésiastique pendant le XVIIIe siècle, Paris, 1806 and thelast edition , 1853-1857; -Fréron's Année littéraire; —Grimm's Correspondance littéraire;-P. Rousseau's [ of Toulouse] collection ofthe Journal encyclopédique.The complete works of d'Alembert, Paris, 1821; -of Diderot, theAssézat and Maurice Tourneux edition , Paris , 1875-1877;-of Voltaire,Beuchot's edition, and more especially the Mélanges [ vols. 37-50];-of Helvétius, Didot's edition, Paris , 1795; -and of Condorcet,O'Connor's edition, Paris, 1847-1849.THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 313the superiority of the laws of his period? Is it necessaryto make the further remark that Turgot's Discourse,written and delivered in Latin by an obscure individual,attracted but the slightest attention? In consequence,are we not in some measure entitled to conclude thatwhile he was perhaps the first to speak of the idea ofprogress in express terms, it was not until after theconception had been spread abroad by his masters?In reality it would seem difficult to suppose that thediscoveries in the domain of Science alone to saynothing of the improvements in the mechanical arts or inthe conditions of daily life-should not have suggestedthe idea of progress to the men of whom Turgot was thedisciple. With scarcely an exception they were men ofscience themselves. Montesquieu had begun his careerby composing treatises on the functions of the renalWith regard to Diderot in particular consult: his correspondencewith Mlle Volland; his Paradoxe sur le comédien; and his Neveu deRameau; -Mme de Vandeul's (his daughter) Mémoires sur Diderot,1787;-Naigeon, Mémoires historiques et philosophiques sur M.Diderot, Paris, 1821; -Rosenkranz, Diderot's Leben und Werke,Leipsic, 1866;-John Morley, Diderot and the Encyclopedists,London, 1878; -Edmond Scherer, Diderot, étude, Paris, 1880.Consult for the second half of Voltaire's life , in addition to theworks mentioned above: -his correspondence with Mme du Deffand,Lescure's edition , Paris, 1865; -Lucien Perey and G. Maugras, La vieintime de Voltaire aux Délices, Paris, 1885; -G. Maugras, Voltaire etJean-Jacques Rousseau, Paris, 1886 .Consult for d'Alembert: his correspondence with Frederick-theCorrespondance de Mme du Deffand, Lescure's edition , 1865; --thecorrespondence of Mlle de Lespinasse, edition Eug. Asse, 1876; —Condorcet, Éloge d'Alembert, among his Éloges académiques, 1784; -Charles Henry, Correspondance inédite d'Alembert, Paris , 1887; —J. Bertrand, d'Alembert in the " Grands Ecrivains français " series,Paris, 1889.Useful details may be obtained from the following works:-Malesherbe's Mémoires sur la librairie, Paris, 1809; -Garat, Mémoires sur314 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREglands (1718) and on the causes of the weight of bodies,while the first important work he had planned was aphysical history of the earth . Voltaire's essays on thenature of fire and on the measurement of motive forces(1741) were held in esteem. On his return from hissojourn in England he had promulgated the theories ofNewton. While it might be questioned whether hisAlzire or his Zaïre raised him above Racine or Corneille ,there could be no doubt that he possessed a knowledgeof many matters with which the author of the Cidand the author of Andromaque had had no acquaintance and could have had no acquaintance.He wasconscious, and those around him were conscious also,that new horizons had opened out before the humanintelligence . It was the joint action of all these considerations, and not a theoretical view expressed by ala vie de M. Suard, Paris, 1820; -Felix Rocquain, L'espritrévolutionnaire avant la Révolution, Paris, 1878; -J. Küntziger, Lapropagande des Encyclopédistes français en Belgique, Paris, 1891; -Henri Francotte, La propagande des Encyclopédistes français aupays de Liège, Brussels, 1880; -Edmond Scherer, Melchoir Grimm,Paris , 1887.Finally, the subject should be studied in the following works froma general point of view: Damiron, Mémoires pour servir à l'histoirede la philosophie au XVIIIe siècle, 1858-1864; -Lanfrey, L'église etles philosophes au XVIIIe siècle, 1855; -Ernest Bersot, Études sur leXVIIIe siècle, 1855; —Barni, Histoire des idées politiques et moralesen France au XVIIIe siècle 1865-1866; -and H. Taine, AncienRégime, 1875.I. The Early Phases of the Undertaking.The encyclopedias of the Renaissance-and in particular theEncyclopedia omnium scientiarum of Alstedius or Alstedt, 1620; -Bayles' Dictionary [ Cf. supra] , 1696-1706; —and Ephraim Chambers'English Cyclopedia, 1728.-The translation of this latter work issuggested to the bookseller Lebreton; -who agrees to the idea,1740;-but the translators and the publisher falling out, theTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 315Bachelor of the Sorbonne, that was contributing tothe formation, the development, and the popularity ofthe idea of progress. The number and variety of therecent acquisitions made by science gave weight to theconception, with the result that science, if not alreadythe idol it was destined to become, was universallyregarded with respect or even with superstition , whilethese preoccupations of a scientific order invested literature with a new character. Buffon, who may almostbe said to have learned to read in the mathematicalwritings of the Marquis de l'Hôpital, began his careerin the field of " letters " with translations of Hales'work on vegetable statics and Newton's treatise onfluxions (1740) . There were still writers of tragedies,novels, and comedies, but it was with a new Systemof Musical Notation that Rousseau arrived in Parisundertaking remains in abeyance until the intervention of theAbbé du Gua de Malves [ Cf. as to du Gua de Malves, Diderot'sSalons; and Condorcet's Éloge de du Gua de Malves] , whowidens the scope of the undertaking; —but he too falls out withLebreton; -who approaches d'Alembert and Diderot on the subject.The scheme is still further enlarged; -Lebreton secures additionalfinancial support; -d'Alembert and Diderot recruit numerous writers;-and d'Aguessau is prevailed on to grant the " privilege " necessary forthe publication of the work, 1746.-Of the " privilege " to publish abook under the old régime and of its true nature [ Cf. Saugrain, Lecode de la librairie, 1744; Diderot, Lettre sur le commerce de lalibrairie, 1767; and Malesherbes, Mémoires sur la librairie, 1809] .That the authorities in nowise looked askance at the publication ofthe Encyclopedia; -and how Diderot having been incarcerated atVincennes, -it was due to the efforts of the booksellers that he wasset at liberty, so as to allow him to work at the Encyclopedia, 1749.-The Prospectus of the Encyclopedia; -it sets forth that the objectof the work was twofold: (1) to systematise the branches of humanknowledge;-(2) to give the " mechanical arts " the place they deserved in this schema. -This dual purpose is again insisted on in thePreliminary Discourse to the Encyclopedia. -Other novelties an-316 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURE(1741) from Geneva or Lyons, and it was his Thoughtson the Interpretation of Nature that first raised Diderotfrom obscurity. This new trend of literature was tobecome more clearly defined every day, and in 1750 wasto find its ultimate expression in the Encyclopedia.What share in this movement is to be ascribed toEnglish influence? It is difficult to answer the questionwith exactness [ Cf. on this subject: Tabaraud, Histoiredu philosophisme anglais, and Leslie Stephen, EnglishThought in the Eighteenth Century] . The influence is beyond doubt, and if it merely be desired to fix the date atwhich it began to operate, it is not of much importancewhether choice be made of the year 1725, the year ofpublication of Béat de Muralt's Lettres sur les Anglais,or of the year 1733, in which the Abbé Prévost foundedhis newspaper, or of the year 1734, the year of publicanounced in the Discourse, and that they are of more far-reachingsignificance than would be thought at first sight; -while they may betraced to the influence of Descartes as well as to that of Bacon. - Butto arrive at the true significance of the Discourse it must be read inconnection with the article on Encyclopedias in the Encyclopediaitself. -D'Alembert is the author of the Discourse, and Diderot thatof the article.II. Jean Le Rond d'Alembert [ Paris, 1717; † 1783, Paris] .His parents [he was the son of Mme de Tencin, and, it is said, ofthe Commissary Destouches]; -his studies at the Mazarin college; —his talent for geometry; -his early treatises on the laws of refraction(1739) and on the integral calculus ( 1740) .— He is elected a memberof the Académie des Sciences, 1741.-His Traité de dynamique, 1743,and his Mémoire sur la cause générale des vents, 1746 [ Cf. as to thevalue of d'Alembert's scientific labours, J. Bertrand's d'Alembert] .What were the reasons which induced the bookseller Lebreton to givehim the editorship of the Encyclopedia, —and, in this connection, of thesituation of an Academician under the old régime.-Whereas the titleof Academician is to - day only an honorary distinction , to be an Acade-THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 317tion of Voltaire's Lettres philosophiques. It is known,too , that Voltaire visited England in 1726, Montesquieuin 1729, and Prévost towards the same period. Themere enumeration of the translations from the Englishabout this time would demand several pages, and it canbe affirmed without exaggeration that between 1725 and1750 French versions were given of the entire writingsof Pope, Addison, Swift, and Richardson, not to mention minor authors [ Cf. Joseph Texte, Jean JacquesRousseau et les origines du cosmopolitisme littéraire,Paris, 1895] . If we do not include Locke and Bacon inthe list , the reason is that Bacon wrote more especiallyin Latin, and that in consequence, in 1750, the Novumorganum, the De augmentis scientiarum, and the Instauratio magna had already been within the reach ofmerely cultured readers for a hundred and fifty years;mician in d'Alembert's time was almost to occupy a State function;-and in particular the Academician possessed influence, —and in virtueof his membership he entered the ranks of " privileged persons. "-Other considerations which induced Lebreton to fix his choice ond'Alembert; —his conciliatory disposition; —his social position;—hisliaisons with Mme du Deffand, -which should date from 1746 or1747 [Cf. Lescure's edition of Mme du Deffand's correspondence,Paris, 1865]; -his relations with Mme Geoffrin. -He was alreadyalmost a personage when he consented to take the Encyclopedia inhand; and it was in 1752 that Frederick offered to make himPresident of his Academy of Sciences when the post should becomevacant by the death of Maupertuis.III.-Denis Diderot [ Langres, 1713; † 1784, Paris ] .Diderot's family; -his early studies at Langres and Paris; -hisrefusal to become a doctor, a barrister, or a solicitor; -he quarrelswith his family.-His early poverty; -he writes for the booksellersand gives lessons in mathematics; -he even thinks of turning actor.-His escapades [ Cf. Mme de Vandeul, Mémoires, and Naigeon, loc.cit. ].-His marriage, 1743; —and his definite estrangement from hisfather. His first translations; Stanyan's History of Greece, 1743; —318 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREwhile Locke's Essay on the Human Understanding hadbeen accessible to the French public for a shorter periodindeed, but still for half a century, through Coste'stranslation published in 1700.This observation has its importance, as it helps us tounderstand the nature of the English influence. Forsince it is Locke and Bacon who are about to becomethe intellectual masters of the new generation, the factthat they did not occupy this position earlier doubtless.points to the conclusion that the English influence didnot come into effect by means of what may be termedinfiltration , as the Spanish influence had done formerly,but in consequence of the substitution of a new idealfor that previously in vogue. In other words, so longas the French genius was dominated by the classicdeal, and as French literature, as has been seen, reJames' Dictionary of Medicine, 1746; -his Essai sur le mérite et lavertu, which is a paraphrase of Shaftesbury. -His first original work,Les pensées philosophiques, 1746; -and whether it is true that hewrote it to satisfy a caprice of Mme de Puisieux, his mistress?—Inany case she gave him a still more unhappy inspiration when sheprompted him to write his Bijoux indiscrets , 1748;;—an — obscene novelin the style of those of Duclos and Crébillon, though infinitely coarser;-and a book of which he will say at a later period " that he wouldwillingly have cut off an arm not to have written it . -His Lettre sur lesaveugles à l'usage de ceux qui voient, 1749; -and of the interest ofacomparison between this work and Condillac's Traité des sensations.-The work, moreover, procures Diderot a term of imprisonment atVincennes; not on account of its audacity; -but of a passage in itwhich aroused the displeasure of Mme Dupré de Saint- Maur, —theintimate friend of Réaumur, of the Académie des Sciences . Of thedifference between the situations of Diderot and d'Alembert; -andthat it perhaps accounts to some extent for the subsequent strainingof their relations.-Diderot has been faithfully portrayed by Baconin the following sentence: Sunt qui cogitationum vertigine delectantur, ac pro servitute habent fide fixa aut axiomatis constantibusconstringi.DENIS DIDEROT.

THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 319mained “ national " despite its " social " characteristics,so long as this was the case, we did not come under theEnglish influence; but when the classic ideal began tolose ground, the English influence at once entered thebreach, qua data porta, and asserted its supremacy. Theseconsiderations enable us to obtain a better view of theeffects of this influence, and to affirm that, to begin with,they were not particularly happy."We have borrowed from the English annuities,reversible funds, sinking funds, the construction andmanoeuvring of ships , the laws of gravitation, the differential calculus, the seven primary colours, and vaccination. Imperceptibly we shall acquire from them theirnoble freedom of thought and their profound contemptfor the petty trifling of the schools. " It is in theseterms that Voltaire wrote to Helvétius, but he forgot toIV. The First Difficulties Encountered by the Encyclopedia.Whether the Jesuits who were bringing out the Journal de Trévouxwere jealous of the success of the Encyclopedia? [ Cf. Diderot, Lettreau père Berthier, vol. xiii . of his works; Voltaire, Le Tombeau dela Sorbonne, vol. xxxix.; and d'Alembert, Sur la destruction desJésuites]. The thesis of the Abbé de Prades, who was writingarticles on theological subjects for the Encyclopedia; -its condemnation by the Sorbonne [ Cf. Picot, op. cit. , vol . iii . , p . 185] .—Jesuits, Jansenists, and the official world seize this opportunity toattack the Encyclopedia. -The Abbé de Prades, exiled from Paris,goes to Berlin; -Voltaire seeks to interest Frederick in him; —and itis on this occasion that his relations with d'Alembert and Diderotbecome for the first time in any way close. -The Encyclopedia is"suppressed " by a decree in Council, 1752 [ Cf. Mémoires de Barbier,vol. v.; and Mémoires d'Argenson, vol. vii . ] .-But as the work hasits protectors at court, -including Mme de Pompadour, who is interested in the undertaking by her doctor, Quesnay;-and in theCabinet, including M. de Malesherbes himself [ Cf. Mme de Vandeul,Mémoires sur Diderot] , its publication is allowed to go on;-and320 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCHI LITERATUREadd that for his part he had borrowed further his Micromégas from Swift, his Poème de la loi naturelle fromPope, and Zaïre from Shakespeare. Moreover, havingpillaged Shakespeare himself, he would doubtless havebeen better advised had he refrained from deterring hiscontemporaries from the study of one of the deepest andpurest sources of poetry the world possesses . Again, ifwe examine what he terms the " noble freedom ofthought " of the English, we find that he refers to theaggressive infidelity of such writers as Bolingbroke,Collins, and Toland. As for the " contempt for the pettytrifling of the schools, " it is doubtless in these termsthat he alludes to the narrow utilitarianism of Locke:"There is no knowledge worthy the name but that whichleads to some new and useful invention , which teaches usto do something better, quicker, or more easily thanvols. iii . , iv. , v. , vi. and vii. are issued regularly between 1753 and1757. The Encyclopedists profit by the conflicts between the Parliament and the court, 1756 [ Cf. Rocquain, L'Esprit révolutionnaire,etc.]; their imprudences [ Cf. the article, Encyclopédie]; —and theiradmissions. —Barrister Moreau's pamphlet: Mémoires pour servir àl'histoire des Cacouacs, 1757, —and the article in the Encyclopediaon Geneva. -Outcry raised by the Geneva pastors, indignant athaving been praised for their Socinian tendencies. -Intervention inthe quarrel of Voltaire and Rousseau; -Rousseau writes his Lettresur les spectacles, 1758. -D'Alembert's discouragement. -Diderotpublishes his Père de famille, and Helvétius his De l'Esprit, 1758.—The archbishop of Paris issues his pastoral charge. -The Parliamenttakes cognisance of the affair; -it is decided to judge the Encyclopedia and the book of Helvétius together. -Speech of the ProcurorGeneral; -condemnation of the Encyclopedia; -the " privilege " ofwhich is definitely revoked, March, 1759. —Pitiable retractation ofHelvétius; -d'Alembert retires from the scene;-and Rousseau abandons the cause.V.-The Second Period of Voltaire's Life, 1750-1762.Voltaire's sojourn in Berlin, 1750-1753; -and whether he foundTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 321before " [Cf. Joseph Texte, loc . cit. , p. 100] . Is not theconclusion enforced , that the only English thought whichexerted an influence on Frenchmen between 1730 and1750, was that which offered the least analogy with theclassic ideal, which was most contrary and even mosthostile to that ideal? The purpose of literature, whichfrom being " psychological and moral " had been first"social, " and then " scientific, " was now to become purelypractical under the influence of Bacon and Locke. Backedby the authority of Newton, who somewhere speaks ofpoetry as ingenious fiddle- faddle, geometricians are aboutto ask what a tragedy " proves "; while d'Alembert willnot hesitate to declare in the preliminary notice to theEncyclopedia " that if the ancients had produced an encyclopedia, as they produced so many great works, and hadthis manuscript alone survived the burning of the famous-Frederick a more indulgent master than Louis XV.?-The mistakeshe made; he insists on the king dismissing Baculard d'Arnaud; —and on his not taking Fréron as correspondent. -The incident in connection with the Jew Herschel [ Cf. Desnoiresterres, vol. iv.; andStrauss, Voltaire] .-Voltaire's license of language and attitude towardsFrederick. His quarrels with Lessing and La Beaumelle.- He fallsout with Maupertuis, -a former friend of Mme du Châtelet, and thePresident of the Berlin Academy of Sciences. -The Diatribe du docteurAkakia, 1752.-Frederick has the pamphlet burned by the publicexecutioner. -Voltaire's anger, humiliation, and submission [ Cf. Cor- respondence, Preuss' edition , 1752-1753 ];-he decides to ask for leaveof absence on the plea that he desires to drink the waters at Plombières; -Frederick eagerly grants his request;-and accepts Voltaire'sresignation of his title of " Chamberlain to the King of Prussia. " -Voltaire's departure, March 26, 1753. -The Frankfort incident.-- Hemakes successive stays at Strasburg, Colmar, Lyons and Geneva.Voltaire's historical works. -Voltaire's two principal historicalworks belong to this period of his life: -the Siècle de Louis XIV. , ofwhich the first edition was issued in Berlin in 1751; -and the Essaisur les mœurs, of which the first edition under this title appeared atGeneva in 1756; -thoughit was eleven years earlier that the Mercure de22322 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREAlexandrian library, it would have sufficed to console usfor the loss of the others . "IIOne of the consequences of these new principles is , thatthere being scarcely anything in the world less " literaryin its essence than the Encyclopedia of d'Alembert andDiderot, the work scarcely belongs to the history of literature . For this reason we shall not relate here how theFrench Encyclopedia, originally conceived as a meretranslation of the Cyclopedia of Ephraim Chambers,developed into the most important piece of publishingenterprise that had as yet been seen , nor how circumstances, far more than men, converted what was at firstFrance had begun to publish detached passages of the work. —TheAnnales de l'Empire ( 1753) also belong to this period; -as too doesthe definite edition of Charles XII. , the date of which is 1756-1757.—The two first-mentioned works introduced a new method of writinghistory into European literature.In Voltaire's hands history, which had previously been the work ofmere annalists or had been purely polemical, became in the first placenarrative in the true sense of the word, and by this is implied: —theexercise of choice as regards the subject and the choosing of a subjectof general interest and not of interest to the learned only; —the useof discrimination as regards the facts to receive mention, those whichmerely obstruct the narrative, or are useless and uninviting, beingeliminated; and a continuity of interest only obtainable by recourseto art and intentionally. This amounts to saying that whereas historybefore Voltaire's time had been erudite or learned, in his hands itbecame, in the second place, literary, and by this is implied: -the .paying attention to style and to the arrangement of the componentparts; the constant reminding the reader of the interest offered bypast events to the living generation; —and in consequence a perpetualinvitation to the reader to exercise his faculty of thought. -Finally,history which had been indifferent to its own subject matter becameTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 323a purely commercial undertaking into the most formidableweapon of offence that had hitherto been forged againsttradition . Furthermore we shall not attempt to determinethe general or central idea of the work, an idea whichdoubtless was never particularly " general " as conceivedby the jejune, rigid and narrow mind of d'Alembert orparticularly clear as reflected in the nebulous brain ofDiderot [ Cf. in Diderot's works his article Encyclopédie] .The number of writers engaged in carrying out the schemecould not fail to be an additional source of obscurity;masterpieces are never the outcome of the combinedefforts of two authors and still less of those of several.Finally, in spite of the anecdotal interest of the story, weshall not narrate how the Encyclopedia, after multipleincidents and many successive " suppressions, " developedinto the monumental compilation of which Lord Chesterin Voltaire's hands philosophic, by which is implied: —the subordination of facts to the consequences in which they resulted; -the appreciation of these facts in the light of a given ideal:-and the basing ofthis ideal on a given conception of life and of humanity.The disadvantages of this mode of understanding history; -andthat Voltaire himself was not uninfluenced by them.The disadvantages of treating history philosophically are:-thesubstitution, when judging men and things, of the authority of anabstract criterion for the sentiment of the diversity that distinguishesthe different epochs; —the putting all history in this way on the samelevel; and in consequence the distorting or perversion of history.—Voltaire's respect for literary considerations makes no less forhistorical misrepresentation; -if the importance of historical eventshas nothing to do with the possibility of presenting them under anattractive guise; -if the interest the events may have for posterity isat any rate no measure of their importance; -and if nothing is morecalculated to obscure the true significance of a period than the desireto present it in such a manner as shall please our contemporaries.—Finally Voltaire's method offers disadvantages in so far as it is narrative;-if the choice of the facts to be dwelled on ought not to dependon the caprice of the historian; -if there are subjects which make a324 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREfield said, in a letter to his son who had asked himwhether he should make its acquisition:66"You will buy it , my son, and seated on it you willread Candide. " Onthe other hand, since even at thepresent day a regrettable confusion is often made betweenthe spirit of the Encyclopedia " and " the classic spirit, "recalling that which was long made between the spirit ofthe Reformation and the spirit of the Renaissance; sincethere has even been a disposition to regard the encyclopedic spirit as the final and in some sort preordainedexpression, as the necessary outcome of the classic spirit;for these reasons an effort must be made to dissipate thisconfusion, and to show that while there may perhaps beone or two features in common between the encyclopedic and the classic spirit , as there were between thespirit of the Renaissance and that of the Reformation , inclaim upon the attention " and it is " impossible to make the straining of the attention other than a laborious effort "; -and if, finally,there are no useless or cumbersome facts in history, but merely factsof which we do not perceive the significance.How the accumulation by Voltaire of all these defects , -defectsaggravated moreover by his very success , -reduced his other historieshis Histoire du Parlement (1769) for example-to the rank of merepamphlets; —and thus degraded history till it became the mereinstrument of his philosophic passions. -History, like tragedy,demands to be treated for its own sake; -but this does not preventthe Essai sur les mœurs; —and above all the Siècle de Louis XIV.being epoch- making works in the art of writing history;-or Voltairehimself from having exerted on the direction taken by historicalstudies, almost as considerable an influence as on the drama itself,and perhaps indeed an influence even more considerable.Voltaire takes up his residence at the villa Délices, 1755. —Publication of the poems La loi naturelle and Le Désastre de Lisbonne,1756; -Rousseau addresses him his letter on the subject of Providence.-Voltaire's difficulties with the authorities of Geneva. -He suggeststo d'Alembert the article on Geneva printed in the Encyclopedia.—Renewed intervention of Rousseau in the quarrel [ Cf. above, p. 320] .THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 325every other respect they offer nothing but opposition andcontradiction.For example, " the classic spirit " only took shape bydint of freeing itself, and at the same time Frenchmenand French literature, from all foreign influence . The" encyclopedic spirit , " on the contrary, attained to selfconsciousness, as has just been seen, owing to thequickening action of English thought. What is more,after failing to recognise its harbingers in Descartes andBayle, it preferred to trace its origin to Locke and Bacon.Who is unaware that, in a certain sense, the Esprit desLois is merely a glorification of the English Constitution?The case is the same with the Traité des sensations,which is nothing more than an " adaptation " of Locke'sEssay on the Human Understanding. The Encyclopédieitself, as we remarked above, was intended originally to-Purchase of Ferney, 1758. -Candide, 1759; -Tancrède, 1760; -theEcossaise, 1760; -and, in this connection , of the rôle of Fréron [ Cf.Ch. Nisard, Les ennemis de Voltaire] .—At the same period Voltairewrites what we possess of his Memoirs [ Cf. Beuchot's edition , vol. xl. ] .-Afew skits of indifferent value: the Relation de la maladie et dela mort du Père Berthier, 1759; -Les Quand, 1760, a rejoinder to anacademical discourse in which Lefranc de Pompignan had attackedthe philosophers; -his Dialogues chrétiens , 1760; —and a more important work, the Extrait des sentiments de Jean Meslier, 1762,-causehim to be ranked definitely as the unquestioned leader of the philosophic party. The Éloge de Crébillon, 1762; —the Commentaire surCorneille, and the Recueil de pièces originales concernant la mortdes sieurs Calas, 1762.VI. After the suppression of the Encyclopedia.Howthe issue of the Encyclopedia was proceeded with in spite ofits " suppression "; -thanks to the protection of M. de Malesherbes,who had supreme control over the printing and publishing of books;—of M. de Sartine, Lieutenant of Police; —and of Mme de Pompadour;-and also because the Government was influenced by the importanceof the material interests involved in the enterprise. —The consideration326 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREbe a mere translation of an English work; while as toDiderot, who has undoubtedly some pretensions to beregarded as the incarnation of the encyclopedic spirit, thereis nothing that is not English in the work of a writer, whois still often termed the " most German " of Frenchmen.He began by translating Stanyan's History of Greece; hisEssai sur le mérite et la vertu is a mere paraphrase ofShaftesbury; while he imitates Richardson and Sterne inhis stories and novels, and Moore and Lillo in his dramasor his middle-class tragedies. . . . It would be superfluousto multiply the examples! Seeing, however, that theforeigner is now translated or appealed to as a source ofinspiration with an ardour equal to that with which theimitation of him was formerly avoided, can it be said thatno change has occurred? is it possible to consider thisdifferent disposition as the effect of the same causes?of the Government went further still; -as is proved by the incidentin connection with the comedy Les Philosophes (May, 1760); —and yetmore so by that in connection with the Ecossaise (July, 1760) , —if itbe a fact that Fréron, whom Voltaire had grossly insulted by name,came very near to being prevented from replying to him in the Annéelittéraire [ Cf. Desnoiresterres , La comédie satirique au XVIIIe siècle,Paris, 1885]. That this tolerance of the Government was not unconnected with the fear of seeing an undertaking forbidden in Francebrought to a successful conclusion abroad, in Berlin perhaps or in St.Petersburg; and further with the necessity the authorities were underof making some concessions to the philosophers,-on the eve of theexpulsion of the Jesuits , 1762. -D'Alembert's work: De la destructiondes Jésuites en France; —and that it is curious to note that its publication coincided with the issue of the last ten volumes of the Encyclopedia. Remarks on this subject; —and of the difficulty of circulatingten folio volumes clandestinely. - Comparative indifference amid whichthey appeared; -and that this indifference was natural; -seeing thatthey contained scarcely anything that had not been touched on, tosay the least, in the first seven volumes; —and that these first sevenvolumes had realised all the effect that could be expected from the work.THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 327And if the answer is negative from both an historical anda logical point of view, a first difference is perceivedbetween the " encyclopedic spirit " and the " classicspirit. "A second difference lies in the fact that whereas theclassic spirit, from the time of Ronsard to that ofBoileau, for a hundred and fifty or two hundred years,had displayed the utmost respect for the ancients andfor tradition, the very essence of the encyclopedic spirit ,on the contrary, is contempt for the ancients andhatred of tradition . These terms are not too strong.The encyclopedists not only did not appreciate theancients; they despised them. They regarded as a mereprejudice, as a foolish prejudice, not to say as merepedantic hypocrisy, the admiration which some fewhumanists still ventured to profess for Virgil andVII.-Claude- Adrien Helvétius [ Paris, 1715; † 1771 , Paris] .-His father and grandfather were doctors; -he becomes a farmerof the taxes and a patron of literature; -steward to Queen MarieLeczinska; -beset with a desire for celebrity, he starts by acquiringa reputation as a dandy. —He next essays poetry; —and submits hisefforts to Voltaire; -who encourages him by reminding him thatAtticus was a farmer of the taxes; -though at the same time hedeclares the poems somewhat commonplace. -Helvétius then turnshis attention to mathematics; —and finally to philosophy. Heresigns his post of farmer of the taxes, and with much labourcomposes his book De l'Esprit, 1758.-Mediocrity of the book ingeneral. The worst paradoxes are propounded in it on the strengthof proofs;-which for the most part are mere scandalous " anecdotes ";-in spite of which no book has made more noise in its time;-orspread abroad more ideas destined to make their way in the world.—Helvétius was the first writer to declare " that ethics ought to be -treated according to the methods of experimental physics. " [ Cf. Del'Esprit, Discourse ii . , chap. 15 ]; -that moral questions are atbottom merely social questions, -" since the vices of a people alwayslie hid in its legislation " [ Cf. De l'Esprit, Discourse ii . , chap. 15];328 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREHomer. "At one time I was made to believe that I tooka pleasure in reading Homer, -are the words the authorof Candide puts in the mouth of the senator Pococurante,-but this perpetual repetition of combats . . . boredme beyond measure. It has happened to me to askthe learned whether they, too, found Homer tediousreading. . . . All of them who were sincere confessedthat the work could not hold their attention an instant,though it was necessary to have it in a library as amonument of antiquity, just as one preserved thoserusty coins that have lost all commercial value " [ Cf.Candide, chap. 25] . Let a comparison be made betweenthis quotation from Candide and the following passagefrom the Discours sur l'histoire universelle [ Cf. part iii . ,chap. 5 ]: " One of the reasons of the enthusiasmaroused by the poetry of Homer is the fact that he-and further that there is nothing education cannot accomplish[ Cf. De l'Esprit, Discourse iii . ] .— Sensation aroused by the book.—Helvétius makes a full and pitiful retractation; -and afterwardsremains silent; —and disappears from the literary scene.VIII. Frederic- Melchior Grimm [ Ratisbon, 1723; † 1807,Gotha].Grimm's classical and philosophic culture; -his first literary effortsand his tragedy Banise (in German) .- His arrival in Paris; -hisrelations with Diderot, Rousseau, and the society of which Mmed'Epinay was the centre, 1749-1750. -His two Letters on GermanLiterature [ Cf. Mercure de France, 1751 ]; —the letter on the subjectof Omphale [ Destouches' opera] , 1752; -and the Petit prophète deBoehmischbroda, 1753 [ Cf. Adolphe Jullien, La Musique et lesPhilosophes au XVIIIe siècle, Paris, 1873 ] .- The Correspondancelittéraire [ 1754-1790]; -and that it is inseparable from the encyclopedic movement, -of which it was for fifteen or twenty years whatmay be called the secret official organ in Europe. -What Grimm andthe numerous assistants who worked under his supervision really did, -was to make accessible to the German sovereigns, his subscribers, the ideas of the " corporation of philosophers "; -whileTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 329sang the victories and advantages scored by Greece overAsia. On the side of Asia was Venus, the emblem ofpleasure, of profligate passion and of effeminacy; on theside of Greece were Juno, the grave patroness of conjugal love, Mercury, the god of eloquence, and Jupiter,who personifies political wisdom. On the side of Asiawas the impetuous and brutal Mars, or war conductedwith fury; on the side of Greece was Pallas, that isthe military art and valour guided by intelligence.From this moment Greece could not suffer thatAsia should harbour the thought of effecting her conquest,for had she submitted to this yoke she would have seemedto make virtue subject to profligacy, the mind to the body,and true courage to an unreasoning force residing solelyin numbers. " The light in which the classic spiritregarded the masterpieces of antiquity has never been• ..contriving with great skill to soften down what there was in theseideas that might not have been to the liking of princes; -by dintof showing the ideas in such a light as to make the sovereignsregard them as a means of destroying the hindrances that still stoodbetween them and absolute power. On the other hand, as theCorrespondance was not published until 1812, this is not the placeto judge it on its merits; -and it will suffice to have noted to whatextent it contributed to the encyclopedic propaganda.IX. The Encyclopedic Propaganda.Financial success of the undertaking. There were 4,800 subscribersin 1750. -Foundation of the Journal encyclopédique, 1756; -itseditor, P. Rousseau (of Toulouse) and his co-workers; -its widecirculation. -Centres of the encyclopedic influence in Paris: Mmede Geoffrin's salon [ Cf. Mémoires de Marmontel; and P. de Ségur,Le royaume de la rue Saint- Honoré, Paris, 1897]; -Mme d'Epinay'sgroup [ Cf. Mémoires de Mme d'Epinay, Boiteau's edition , Paris,1863; and L. Perey and G. Maugras, La jeunesse de Mme d'Epinay,Paris, 1882 ]; -Baron d'Holbach's group [ Cf. Diderot, Correspondanceavec Mlle Volland; and d'Avezac- Lavigne, La société du barond'Holbach, Paris , 1875]; —and Mlle de Lespinasse and her friends [ Cf.330 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREbetter defined: masterpieces it looked on as lessons insocial morality presented under the guise of poetic fictions.The encyclopedists considered these fictions as meretrifling, and were blind to the lesson they convey.Tradition, too, in their eyes, in literature and in everyother sphere, is only an impediment, bred of superstition, to their freedom of thought, to the " diffusionof enlightenment, " and to the progress of reason . "Itis by weakening the foolish veneration of the masses.for ancient laws and customs, " writes Helvétius, "thatsovereigns will be enabled to rid the earth of thegreater number of the evils that afflict it, and to assurethe duration of their empires " [Cf. De l'Esprit, 2nddiscourse, ch. 17] . His meaning surely is that emancipation from tradition is the very essence of progress.And shall we not admit that there is certainly a differenceher correspondence] .-How the very adversaries of the Encyclopediaserved its cause; and in particular Palissot and Fréron; -who werealways referring to it; and often for no other reason than with aview to filling their papers. -Spread of the encyclopedic ideas amongthe lower middle class [ Cf. Correspondance de Mme Roland avecles demoiselles Cannet]; -and doubtless even in the provinces; -although it is impossible to give trustworthy proof of the fact [ Cf.however the letters of Mme Butet in J. Cruppi's work, L'avocatLinguet, Paris , 1895 ] .- There is proof, on the other hand, of thespread of the ideas abroad; -in the district of which Liège is thecentre, for instance [ Cf. Francotte, La propagande encyclopédique,chap. ii . and iii .; and Küntziger, Les encyclopédistes français enBelgique, chap. iv. ]; -in Switzerland, where the 28 volumes of theoriginal work were thrice reprinted; -in Italy, where the work wastwice reprinted , once at Leghorn and once at Lucca; -in Germanyand Russia by the intermediary of Grimm. -How this propagandanecessarily contributed to the diffusion of French ideas; -and indirectly to the formation of a European literature.THE WORKS.The only works of importance of Grimm and Helvétius are thosementioned above.THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 331between appealing in everything to the authority oftradition and treating it persistently as an obstacle andan enemy?How many other differences of a moral or philosophicand even of a political order would it be possible, would itbe a duty to point out, were it not for the fear that toindicate them might seem somewhat beyond the scope ofa history of literature! While the classic spirit had ingeneral regarded the instincts and passions with propersuspicion, the encyclopedic spirit , on the contrary, madeinsolent and cynical profession of the trust it placed inthem. "A man becomes stupid when he ceases to bepassionate , " writes Helvétius [ Cf. De l'Esprit, 3rd discourse, ch. 8] . In Diderot's eyes the vice of " all political,civil , and religious institutions " is that they have “ instilled men with the poison of a morality contrary toIn the case of Diderot, on the contrary, while his writings for theEncyclopedia are not the least portion of his work, and still less theportion which has had the least influence, they are not the mostconsiderable and in particular not the most original portion . On theother hand, almost all his most vaunted writings only appeared afterhis death, for which reason we did not think it proper to deal withthem in the article devoted to him. It is necessary to bear in mindthat Diderot's contemporaries were acquainted neither with theReligieuse, the Neveu de Rameau, the Supplément au voyage deBougainville, the Rêve de d'Alembert, nor the Salons; and in faceof this fact how is it possible to discuss the effect of the writings inquestion on the thought of the period? Since , however, this is stilltoo often done, we shall proceed to classify Diderot's works in thechronological order of their publication , which is the order followed inthe general divisions adopted in the edition of Assézat and MauriceTourneux.1. BELLES- LETTRES [ Novels, Plays, Criticism and History] .- Lesbijoux indiscrets, 1748; -Le Fils naturel, 1757; —Le Père defamille,preceded by a Discourse on Dramatic Poetry, 1758; -Essai sur la viede Sénèque et sur les règnes de Claude et de Néron, 1778; -LaReligieuse, 1796; -Jacques le fataliste, 1796; -Ceci n'est pas un conte,332 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREnature [ Cf. Supplément au voyage de Bougainville].The Cartesian tenet which the classic spirit had combatted most energetically had been the dogma, new atthe time, of the omnipotence and sovereignty of reason,of that reason which opines " that two and two makefour, " which denies, when it does not take a pleasurein scoffing at, whatever is outside the range of itsdeductions. "Be silent, foolish reason! " Pascal hadsaid. The encyclopedic spirit , on the contrary, regardedreason as the sole source of truth; and the many thingsin the world that appeared to it to be " irrational, "proclaiming the antagonism between the world andreason, it decided that a work of destruction was its mostimmediate concern . Again, the classic spirit esteemedthat laws are a reflection of morals, or in other wordsthat the public good is secured by the combined action of1798; -Le Neveu de Rameau, 1823; -Paradoxe sur le comédien,1830.2. ART CRITICISM.-The Salons, of which the dates of publicationwere as follows: Salon of 1761 , 1819; -Salon of 1763, 1857;-Salonof 1765, 1795; -Salon of 1767, 1798; -Salon of 1769, 1819, and 1857;-Salon of 1771 , 1857; -Salon of 1775 , 1857; -Salon of 1781 , 1857.3. PHILOSOPHY. —Essai sur le mérite et la vertu, 1745; —Penséesphilosophiques, 1746; -Lettre sur les aveugles, 1749; -Lettre sur lessourds et muets, 1751; -Apologie de l'abbé de Prades, 1752 [ Part iii .only];-Pensées sur l'interprétation de la nature, 1754;-Supplémentau voyage de Bougainville, 1796; —Le rêve de d'Alembert, 1830; -LaPromenade du sceptique, 1830.4. Plan d'une université pour le gouvernement de Russie, 1813-1814.5. We also possess sundry scientific works by Diderot, the value ofwhich does not appear to be very great; —and an extremely interestingbut unfortunately incomplete Correspondence, the most curious portions of which are the letters addressed to Falconet and the correspondence with Mlle Volland.The best and most complete edition of Diderot's works is that ofMM. Assézat and Maurice Tourneux, 20 vols . in 8vo, Paris, 1875- 1877, Garnier frères.THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 333the best efforts of the individual members of society,whereas the encyclopedic spirit spread abroad the ideathat " if the laws are good, morals will be good, and ifthe laws are bad, morals will be bad. " It is thus thatDiderot expresses himself in another passage of hisSupplément au voyage de Bougainville. Helvétius emitsa like opinion, picked up doubtless in one of the salonsof the period: " The vices of a people always lie hiddendeep down in its legislation; it is there that searchmust be made with a view to extirpating the root fromwhich a people's vices spring up " [ Cf. De l'Esprit,2nd discourse, ch . 15 ] . And since this irreconcilableopposition or even contradiction between the classicspirit and the encyclopedic spirit is thus everywherepatent, is it not natural enough that we should againmeet with it in literature?The principal literary works of d'Alembert in addition to theDiscours préliminaire de l'Encyclopédie, 1750, are; -his pamphletLa destruction des Jésuites en France, 1765; -some translations; -a few short writings, and the valuable series of his Éloges Académiques, 1779-1787.NINTH PERIODFrom the Encyclopedia to the " Genie du Christianisme "1765-1800I.-Jean-Jacques Rousseau [ Geneva, 1712; † 1778, Ermenonville] .1. THE SOURCES. -Almost all the works of Rousseau himself, andparticularly his Confessions; his Dialogues (Rousseau, juge de JeanJacques); the Rêveries d'un promeneur solitaire; and his Correspondence;-Mmed'Epinay's Memoirs; -Grimm, Correspondance littéraire;-Fréron, Année littéraire, 1754-1776; -Diderot, Essai sur les règnesde Claude et de Néron; -Bernardin de Saint- Pierre, Fragmens andEssai sur Jean- Jacques Rousseau.334 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREThat this is indeed the case is naïvely admitted byd'Alembert in the preliminary notice he wrote for theEncyclopedia. " Abuse is made of the best things. Thatphilosophic spirit, so much in the fashion at the presentday, which demands conviction and spurns hypothesis,has spread even to literature: it is even asserted thatits influence on literature is harmful, and it is difficult tohide from oneself that the accusation is well-founded.Our century seems desirous of applying rigid and didacticmethods of discussion to matters of sentiment. " But,given the definition he himself offers of the philosophicspirit, -defining it, that is, as a taste for "analysis "and "combination " -what was likely to become evenof psychological observation , let alone of poetry or ofeloquence? I have somewhere asserted , I believe, thata wider and above all a deeper knowledge of man isMusset- Pathay, Histoire de la vie et des ouvrages de J. J. Rousseau,Paris , 1821; -G. H. Morin, Essai sur la vie et le caractère de J. J.Rousseau, Paris , 1851; -Saint- Marc Girardin , Jean- Jacques Rousseau,sa vie et ses ouvrages, Paris, 1848, 1851, 1852, 1856 and 1875; -Streckeisen- Moultou, Jean- Jacques Rousseau, ses amis et ses ennemis,Paris, 1865; -John Morley, Rousseau, London, 1873; —F. Brockerhoff, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, sein Leben und seine Werke, Leipsic,1863-1874; -Jean- Jacques Rousseau jugé par les Genevois d'aujourd'hui, Paris and Geneva, 1878; -H. Beaudouin, La vie et les ouvresde J. J. Rousseau, Paris, 1891.These works, which are of a somewhat general character, shouldbe completed, checked, and connected by the more special investigations of M. Eugène Ritter; La famille de J. J. Rousseau, 1878;Nouvelles recherches sur les confessions , 1880; La jeunesse de J. J.Rousseau, 1896; -of M. Albert Jansen: Rousseau als Musiker, 1884;Rousseau als Botaniker, 1885; Documents sur J. J. Rousseau, 1885; —of M. Fritz Berthoud, Jean- Jacques Rousseau au Val de Travers, 1881;Jean-Jacques Rousseau et le Pasteur de Montmollin, 1884; -of M. G.Maugras, Voltaire et Jean- Jacques Rousseau, 1886; -of M. P. J.Möbius, Rousseau's Krankheits- geschichte, Leipsic , 1889; —of M.Châtelain, La Folie de Rousseau, 1890; —of M. F. Mugnier, MadameROUSSEAU.

THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 335displayed in the memoirs of the least important writersof the time of the Fronde, of any petty woman authorof the seventeenth century, -in the memoirs of Mmede Motteville, or in Mme de La Fayette's Histoire deMadame Henriette, -than in the whole Encyclopedia.The reason for this fact is now perhaps plain . It isthat the Encyclopedists did not concern themselveswith the study either of man in general or of menindividually, but solely with the study of the " relations between men "; and the exclusive study of therelations between men " speedily leads to the losingsight of the diversity of nature by which men are distinguished from one another. Voltaire and d'Alembertare examples in point. The former declares in disparagement of Racine that his Hippolytes and hisAchilles are all of them much alike [ Cf. Le Temple du66de Warens et Jean- Jacques Rousseau, 1891; -of H. H. de Montel,Mme de Warens et le pays de Vaud, Lausanne, 1891 .Consut as well: Mme de Staël, Lettres sur les ouvrages et lecaractère de Jean-Jacques Rousseau, 1788; —Villemain, Tableaude la littérature française au XVIII ' siècle, 1828-1840; — LordBrougham, Voltaire and Rousseau, 1845; -Louis Blanc, Révolution française, vol . ii . , 1847; -Sainte- Beuve, Causeries du lundi,vols. ii. , iii . , xv. , 1850-1861; and Nouveaux lundis, vol. ix . ,1864; -Vinet, Littérature française au XVIIIe siècle, 1853; —Ernest Bersot, Études sur le XVIII siècle, 1855; -Taine, Ancienrégime, 1875, and La Révolution, vol. ii . , 1881; -J. Texte, JeanJacques Rousseau et les origines de cosmopolitisme littéraire,Paris, 1895.2. THE MAN AND THE WRITER.99A. The character of Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Of the absolute conformity between the writings and the character of Rousseau; —andthat his Emile and even his Nouvelle Héloïse are in reality memoirs and confessions in which the " romance element is of the slightest;-Rousseau's extraction; —his birth and education; -his adventurousyouth; his precocious, varied and bitter experience of life .-Rousseau's psychology:-(1) The Plebeian; —and that this first feature of336 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREgoût] , and the latter is astonished that Marivaux " wasso successful a dramatic writer, seeing that he is alwaysgiving what is practically the same comedy under different titles " [Cf. Éloge de Marivaux ] . In their eyesthe delicate, penetrating and subtle psychology of theseauthors is so much " metaphysics, " which amounts tosaying that it is little better than gibberish. They areblind to the fine distinctions between the characters.When they do not perceive a distinction they deny itsexistence without further scruple, while if they happento detect one they dismiss it as mere " hair- splitting."Who will be astonished, under these circumstances , thatthere is no trace of psychology in Voltaire's tragedies,in Sémiramis, in the Orphelin, or in Tancrède? thatthere is still less, if possible, in those of his discipleMarmontel? in the Incas or in Bélisaire? and generallyhis character accounts for:-the innate simplicity of his tastes;-hisaffectation of coarseness; -the turbid and passionate nature of his style;-the violence of his hatreds; -the nature of his pride, which is thepride of a self-taught or self-made man; -his contempt for culturedwit, which he considers an aristocratic quality; -his incorrigibleoptimism; —and finally the depth of some of his views.-(2) Hissensitiveness;—and that this second feature of his character accountsfor -the ease with which the slightest pleasure or the slightest painmakes an impression on him; —the quickness with which he giveshimself over entirely to the impression of the moment; -the perpetual vibration of his style; -his habitual inability to control hisideas; the contradictions in which his work abounds; -and the earlyweakness and final atrophy of his will.-(3) The Madman, that is tosay "the neurasthenic and the lipamaniac " [ Cf. Möbius, op. cit. ]; —and that this last characteristic accounts for: -the incoherency of hisconduct; the ease with which he took offence even at kindnessshown him; his suspicion of everybody; -the suddenness of hisquarrels [ Cf. Eug. Ritter , Nouvelles Recherches]; —his naïve egoism;-and the eccentricities of his later years. -Importance of this lastfeature; -if it was impossible that it should not manifest itself inhis works in the shape of a disposition to literary morbidness; —andTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 337that the entire literature of the Encyclopedists, on accountof its philosophic trend, should be wanting in nothing somuch as in reality, substance, and life?Like exception must be taken to the language of theEncyclopedists. Everybody is acquainted with Voltaire'sCommentary on Corneille, and is aware of the timidity oftaste to which the work bears instructive and melancholytestimony! In the opinion of d'Alembert, " the prefacesof Racine are weakly written, " and those of Corneille areas "excellent as regards the matter as they are defectivein respect to the style " [Mélanges littéraires, art. Elocution] . Condorcet, too, will complain a few years later"of finding in the Provinciales too many familiar andproverbial expressions, which appear at present to bedeficient in elevation " [ Cf. Éloge de Pascal] . In reality,in spite of their professed admiration for " the models,"if it thus comes about that what was perhaps, in more than onerespect, mere corruption;-has been taken for an innovation inliterature and art.B. The Early Career of Jean- Jacques Rousseau. —The novels ofLa Calprenède and Plutarch's Lives are his earliest reading. -Hisdeparture for Geneva and his life of adventure. -The experience heacquires in the servants' hall and while tramping the roads; -hisliaison with Mme de Warens; -his life at Charmettes, 1738–1741; —and, in this connection, of the novel Flaubert has entitled L'éducationsentimentale. -Rousseau at Lyons. -His first stay in Paris, 1741: —his system of musical notation; -the beginning of his intercoursewith Grimm and Diderot. -His stay in Venice, 1743-1744 [ Cf. P.Faugère in the Correspondant for June 10 and 25, 1888]; —and hisquarrel with his patron, M. de Montaigu . -His return to Paris. -Heremodels the Princesse de Navarre of Voltaire [ Les Fêtes de Ramire],with whom he is brought into contact in consequence, 1745.-Hebecomes secretary to Mme Dupin, 1746 [ Cf. Le Portefeuille de MmeDupin, edited by M. de Villeneuve- Guibert, Paris, 1884 ]; -the representation of the Muses galantes, 1747.-He makes the acquaintanceof Mme d'Epinay [ Cf. Mme d'Epinay's Memoirs, L. Perey andG. Maugras' edition , Paris, 1882; -and Edmond Scherer, Madame23338 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREthey are convinced at bottom that the progress madein the domain of thought owing to the action of thephilosophic spirit has extended insensibly to the art ofwriting. And the fact is that the straightforward andsomewhat rugged but rich, unconstrained, familiar andyet eloquent language of the past has undergone achange with a view to the necessities of their propaganda. There has been introduced, or rather theyhave introduced, not indeed more order than existed inthe old language, but a different, an inverse order, anorder too that is very distinct from that which prevailedat the beginning of the century, a genuinely " encyclopedic " order, algebraic instead of merely logical.Words in their eyes have become mere conventional,artificial, and arbitrary signs; sentences mere " multinomials " to be " ordered " in accordance with certaind'Epinay, in his Études, 1866]; —and, in this connection, of theindulgence shown by the biographers of Mme d'Epinay. -Rousseaucontributes to the Encyclopedia. -The Dijon discourse, 1749; —andthe conditions under which Rousseau wrote it [Cf. Rousseau's versionin his Confessions; Diderot's in his Essai sur les règnes de Claudeet de Néron; and those of Morellet and Marmontel in their Memoirs] .-Prodigious success of the Discourse, 1751; —and that this successmust be attributed to a warmth of eloquence to which the public hadbeen unaccustomed for half a century; -to the unexpected assistance furnished the enemies of the Encyclopedists by the Discourse; —and to the conformity between its tendencies and the spirit of reactionagainst the artificial character of the civilisation of the century, whichwas beginning to show itself; -the preface to Narcisse, 1752;—theDevin du village, 1752; -the article on Political Economy for theEncyclopedia, 1755; -the Discours sur l'origine et les fondementsde l'inégalité, 1755.-Rousseau's journey to Geneva, and his reconversion to Protestantism. -His return to Paris.-He takes up hisresidence at the Ermitage, 1756.-The Lettre sur la Providence,1756.-Rousseau and Mme d'Houdetot, 1756–1758. -Rousseau's earlydissensions with Grimm and Diderot. -The article on Geneva in theEncyclopedia, 1757.-Rousseau replies to it by his Lettre sur lesTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 339rules; while they regard style as merely the equation ofpure thought. Indeed, in their estimation progress consisted in the impoverishing of the vocabulary, in imposinga more rigorous syntax, in the abuse of " general terms, "and in the subordination of individual originality to theexigences of the public. Condorcet has admitted as muchin so many words: " The necessity has been felt that aliterary style should be more elevated and more sustainedthan the language of conversation. . . Conversationitself has adopted a nobler tone . . . and it may be thatwe owe to conversation the advantage of possessing at thisperiod of our literature, he writes in 1776, -a greaternumber of men of letters who write with charm and ele---gance " [ Cf. Éloge de Pascal] .•The more attentively these facts are considered, themore difficult it becomes to regard the formation orspectacles, 1758.-Marmontel's rejoinder. -Rousseau's definite rupturewith the philosophic party. -His new liaisons with the Maréchale deLuxembourg, the Comtesse de Boufflers, the Marquise de Créqui andMme de Verdelin. -He takes up his residence at Montmorency, 1758.C. Rousseau's Chief Works.-(1 ) La Nouvelle Héloïse, 1761 [Cf.Lettres inédites de Rousseau à Marc-Michel Rey, Paris, 1858] .—Thereal sources of the novel; the Swiss background [ Cf. Jean- JacquesRousseau et le pays romand]; -Rousseau's passion for Mmed'Houdetot [Cf. Lucien Brunel, La Nouvelle Héloïse et Mmed'Houdetot, Paris , 1888] .- His imitation of Clarissa Harlowe;-and of Marivaux' novels. -The moral purpose of the book; —andthat, to judge it equitably, it is only necessary to compare it with thesalacious productions of the younger Crébillon. -The novelty of thesurroundings in which the scene of the book is laid; -and that itsprimary merit at the time of its issue was that it was not a" Parisiannovel " [ Cf. the novels of Crébillon, Duclos, and Marivaux] .-Thepersonages of the book belong not only to the middle classes , but tothe provinces;-though their adventures are not the less tragic onthat account. The incidents are of a psychological order instead ofbeing incidents in the lives of the personages [ Cf. the novels of Prévostand Le Sage] . Further, the novel which had hitherto been looked340 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREdevelopment of the encyclopedic spirit as the naturaloutcome of the classic spirit . One is tempted rather toregard them as contrary to each other. If it were underthe influence of any general idea that the Encyclopedistsgathered round d'Alembert and Diderot in the room behindLebreton's bookshop or in the apartment of the RueTaranne, if their association were prompted by some definite design, their purpose was to change the trend of theFrench genius; and on the whole their efforts were crownedwith success. In art as in philosophy, in literature asin morals, their attitude was just the contrary of thatof Corneille, Racine, Pascal, Bossuet, La Bruyère, andBoileau. Their wish was to overthrow the ideal that hadformerly obtained; and this being the case, of what importance are some dozens of tragedies whose mediocreauthors imagined that their imitations of Andromaqueupon as an inferior branch of literature,—is regarded by the author ofthe Nouvelle Héloïse as a vehicle of thought on a par with tragedyitself; and, in this connection, of the abuse of digressions in theNouvelle Héloïse. —Finally nature occupies less space in the workthan man; —but more space than had customarily been allotted it inworks of art; and if the style of the book is not absolutely new, itis widely different from the style of the period; -owing to the warmthand movement that animate it; -owing to the imprint it bears of thepersonality of the writer; —and finally owing to its tone, which is notpurely oratorical, but lyric as well. -Divided opinion of the critics onthe Nouvelle Héloïse [ Cf. Voltaire, Lettres sur la Nouvelle Héloïse,Beuchot's edition , vol. xl.; Fréron, Année littéraire, 1761 , vol. ii.;Grimm, Correspondance littéraire, February, 1761]; - nd successof the novel among the general public [ Cf. Rousseau. onfessions,bk. xi. ] .(2) The Contrat social, 1762 [ Cf. Lettres inédites cited above; J.Hornung, Les idées politiques de Rousseau, 1878; and André Lichtenberger, Le socialisme au XVIIIe siècle, 1895]; —and that to appreciate the work properly it must be borne in mind that Rousseau wasa plebeian; -a Protestant, -who had been brought up to believe inthe sovereignty of the people; —and finally a native of Geneva. -ToTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 341were improvements on the original? It only remains toadd that the influence of the Encyclopedists was at onceaided and thwarted by another influence of which it is anextremely delicate task to define the nature: I refer tothe influence of Rousseau; and it is doubtful whetherthere had been a more considerable or more revolutionaryinfluence since that exerted by Pascal.IIIStultos facit fortuna quos vult perdere! and in truthit would be hard to explain the progress, the vogueand, following a moment of uncertainty at the outwhat extent Rousseau's conception of the Social Contract wasinfluenced by the constitution of Geneva; —and how by taking anideal view of this constitution, -it appeared to him as even moretyrannical than it actually was.-That the citizen of Geneva in theeighteenth century was not to be envied. -Rousseau's unconsciousCalvinism [ Cf. Jurieu, Lettres pastorales; and Bossuet, Avertissementsaux protestants]; -and, in this connection, of Calvin's fundamentalerror in the domain of politics; —which consists in his having made aconfusion between the rights of religion and those of the government;-and in his having mixed up the object of government with that ofmorality. The traces of Rousseau's plebeianism in the Contrat social;--and that they are seen more especially in his incapacity to understandthe social function of inequality. -Rousseau's three dogmas; -universalequality; the sovereignty of the people:-the omnipotence of theState. Individualism and Socialism; —and how it has come aboutthat while some people regard Rousseau as a forefather of " revolutionary socialism, " -others praise him " for having made the independence of the individual the firm basis " of his philosophy [ Cf. as regardsthe numerous contradictions on this head, Lichtenberger's book referredto above, pp. 129 and 130] .- The explanation of these conflictingviews lies first of all in the fact that it has been overlooked that theessential characteristics of his dialectics, or of his rhetoric , -is the342 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREset, the rapid spread of the encyclopedic doctrine,were we to overlook how this result was furthered tothe most regrettably imprudent or the most signallyfoolish extent by all those whose interests the doctrinethreatened by the very adversaries of the Encyclopedia, by the Government, and in particular by thesalons.Unmeasured praise has been bestowed on the famousand vaunted salons of the century with which we aredealing. While it has become the custom to expendnothing but raillery on the ruelles of the precedingcentury, and to adopt, in referring to them, the tone ofMolière in his Précieuses ridicules or in his Femmessavantes, we are all indulgence and complaisancy even atthe present day for the charmers who, like Mme de Tencinor Mme d'Epinay, had the art to combine looseness ofgiving eloquent expression to aggressive paradoxes; -whose consequences he at once proceeds to attenuate; -in the further fact that hissocialism is only a means to an end which is individualism; —and wefind the same contradiction exists for the same reason in the socialismof the present day; -when Anarchists seemingly make common causewith Collectivists; -although their respective ideals are utterly contradictory; —and finally in the fact that Rousseau does not boggle atcontradicting himself; -if indeed it can be said that he even perceiveshis self- contradictions.(3) Emile, 1762 [ Cf. Lettres inédites , cited above; Jean-JacquesRousseau, ses amis et ses ennemis, vol. ii .; and Gabriel Compayré,Histoire des théories de l'éducation en France, 1885] .-Wide- spreadinterest taken in educational matters towards 1760.-That while it isnot easy to show the Contrat social to be the development of a singlemaster principle, a like task is still more difficult in respect to Emile;-but Emile being the treatment from an ideal point of view ofRousseau's experiences as a tutor, -Rousseau's personality suffices togive the book an appearance of unity. -Of the imitation of Locke inEmile [ Cf. De l'Education des enfants, Paris, 1721 ] .-The maindefect of Emile; -and that having formed the design of writing atreatise on education, -it is a pity that the author should have startedTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 343morals with philosophic pedantry. Indeed, we do notesteem quite so highly Mme du Deffand, who was no friendof the Encyclopedists, who even ventured to jest at theirexpense in her correspondence, or the Maréchale deLuxembourg, who throughout kept them at a distanceand who, in addition to her other delinquencies, choseto protect Rousseau. On the other hand, what anatmosphere of sympathy, not to say what a halo ofrespect, surrounds the figures of Mlle de Lespinasse,of passionate memory, and Mme Geoffrin, that queenamong women of her rank! However, since we havenot to thank them for food and lodging, since we donot owe them such a debt of gratitude as did d'Alembert and Marmontel, let us venture to say that therôle they played-it being necessary to admit that theydid play a rôle -was of disastrous effect. It was in theby imagining a child without father or mother; —a rich child; —achild without hereditary tendencies, temperament, or character, —andon the other hand a tutor who subordinates his whole life to that ofthe child in question; -two suppositions that run equally counter tonatural and social reality.—That apart from this reservation, the importance of which cannot be exaggerated, —there are three chief reasonsfor the success of Emile: -the high key in which the moral sentimentis pitched in the book [ Cf. in particular the Profession de foi duVicaire Savoyard]; -its ardent spiritualism, which afforded a welcomecontrast to the grovelling materialism of the Encyclopedia; -and theentire confidence it displays in the possibility of moral progress resulting from education. -Comparison in this respect between Emile andHelvétius' work De l'Esprit; -and as to certain ideas common toHelvétius and Rousseau. -Emile, moreover, is Rousseau's literarymasterpiece; it is less stilted than the Nouvelle Héloïse; —moresupple and more varied than the Contrat social; -and though oratorical , less declamatory than the Discours of 1751 and 1755. -Of some ofthe secondaryideas in Emile; -the suckling of children by their mothersthemselves; the importance of physical education;-the usefulnessof a manual calling; -the advantages of what have since been termedobject lessons "; —and that these secondary ideas did not contribute 66344 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURE"talent factories " they severally kept that was forgedthe reputation of so many literary mediocrities of thestamp of Marmontel, Morellet, Thomas, and M. Suard.They induced Europe and the world to believe that therewere no men of note in France beyond the few whowere to be met with at their table or in their salon.They are responsible for the practice of treating seriousquestions wittily-a manifest absurdity, since how is itpossible to treat wittily such questions as poverty, or thefuture of science?-and trivial matters seriously. Theirflatteries encouraged men of letters to vie with oneanother in paradox, while they were destructive ofgenuine originality. " To energy they objected: ‘ Youdisplay an exaggerated interest in persons and things ';to depth: You make too great a demand on our time ';-to sensibility: You are too exclusive '; -and finally toless to the success of the book, --than the general ideas which constitute its framework, -or the persecution of which it was to be theobject.D. Rousseau's last years.-Seizure, condemnation, and burning ofEmile in Paris (June 9th); -in Geneva (June 19th); —and in Holland(June 23rd) .- Rousseau obliged to leave France, -and expelled fromthe territory of the Republic of Berne, -takes up his residence in theVal de Travers, -where he stays from 1762 to 1765. -He writes therehis Lettre à l'archevêque de Paris, 1763; -his Projet de constitutionpour la Corse [published for the first time in 1861 ]; —and his Lettresde la Montagne, 1764.-He is the object of fresh persecution on accountof this last work. -Obliged in succession to quit the Val de Travers[ September, 1765]; -the Ile de Saint- Pierre [October, 1765];-andSwitzerland; he spends a few days in Paris; -and decides to take uphis residence in England, 1766. -His sojourn at Wootton, 1766–1767;-his quarrel with Hume, and the slight interest that attaches to allthese incidents . -His stays at Fleury; —at Trye; -at Grenoble; -atMonquin;--and his return to Paris , 1770. -His relations with Dusaulx,Rulhière and Bernardin de Saint- Pierre. -He gives readings of hisConfessions; —but is obliged to stop them owing to denunciations onthe part of his former friends; —and in particular of Mme d'Epinay.—THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 345intelligence: You are too individual a distinction." "Such, at least, is the judgment that has been passed onthem by a woman [ Cf. Mme de Staël, De l'Allemagne,part i. , chap. xi. ] . But it is now understandable thatthey should have been the precious auxiliaries of theEncyclopedists. They may not have had a clearer insightthan had Diderot himself into his confused genius, and,above all, they may not have gauged the signification ofthe doctrine they elected to champion, but they madeDiderot and his doctrine the fashion, and procured themthe recognition of society. Thanks to them, it was considered " good form " to be a " philosopher ". [ Cf. Taine,Ancien régime, book iv. ] . And, we repeat, it is natural,and even to their credit that the " philosophers " shouldhave repaid them with gratitude. On the other hand,from our point of view the case is different, and if, for theIt is at this period that he becomes afflicted with the mania of persecution from which he suffers almost without intermission for the restof his life . He writes his Considérations sur le gouvernement dePologne, 1772; -Dialogues de Rousseau juge de Jean- Jacques, 1772–1776; —and Rêveries d'un promeneur solitaire, 1777.— Singular cha- racter of these last two works;-and novel character of the second.—Rousseau goes to reside at Ermenonville with the Marquis de Girardin; —his death, July 2, 1778. —Did Rousseau commit suicide? —theimprobability of this supposition; -which has nevertheless given rise to an entire literature.E. Rousseau's influence; -and that during his lifetime his notorietywas out of all proportion to the influence he exerted; -as if thepassionate interest aroused by his personality;-the strangeness ofhis fortunes; —and the real charm he knew how to display when inthe humour; -had diverted attention from, or masked the importanceof his fundamental ideas. -A further reason is that the public did notget to know him completely until after the publication of hisConfessions; the issue of which did not begin until after his death;-while their unique character shed an unexpected light on hisentire work. Are the Confessions the product of a healthy intelligence? That to justify doubts on this score it suffices to compare346 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREreasons which have been set forth, the intrinsic tendencyof the encyclopedic spirit was to make for the disorganisation of literature, what grounds have we to congratulatethese women on their having chosen to sound the praisesof the Encyclopedia?The complicity of the government of Louis XV. ,though less apparent, and in particular less loudly proclaimed than that of the salons, was not less real. Thefact has been insufficiently insisted on, important thoughit is to take it into account. It was under the auspicesof Chancellor d'Aguesseau, and of d'Argenson, Ministerof War, that the Encyclopedia was launched. WhenDiderot was imprisoned at Vincennes at the entreaty ofthe scientist Réaumur, whose mistress he had libelled,it was the booksellers who, in their capacity of publishers of the Encyclopedia, procured his liberation inthem with certain portions of Montaigne's Essays; -and in thesecond place to consider them in connection with the Dialogues; —a work whose every page bears striking testimony to the mentaldisease of the writer; —and to compare them as well with the confessions of Restif de la Bretonne, who has rightly been called"the Rousseau of the gutter. " —In any case, however, few bookshave produced a more considerable effect; -Rousseau's Confessionsseeming indeed to have given his ideas the prestige of a sort ofrevelation. -Of Rousseau's influence on the French Revolution [ Cf.the works of Maximilien Robespierre, Paris, 1840; Fichte's Considérations sur la Révolution française; Carlyle's Revolution; andTaine, Origines, etc., vols. i . and iii . ] .- Rousseau's influence in thedomain of philosophy: on Kant [ Cf. Diettrich , Kant et Rousseau,1878; and D. Nolen, Les Maîtres de Kant, in the Revue philosophique];-and on Fichte. His influence on Jacobi and Schleiermacher. -Rousseau's literary influence [ Cf. H. Hettner, Literaturgeschichte des XVIIIe Jahrhunderts, vol. i .; Marc Monnier, JeanJacques Rousseau jugé par les Genevois; and J. Texte, Jean-JacquesRousseau et le cosmopolitesme littéraire]; -on — Goethe; -and, in thisconnection, a comparison between Werther and the Nouvelle Héloïse[ Cf. Erich Schmidt, Rousseau, Richardson et Goethe]; —on Schiller; -THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 347order that he might devote himself to their enterprise.M. de Malesherbes, the official entrusted with the controlof the booksellers , allowed the issue of the Encyclopediato continue, in spite of the decree of the king's councilin 1753 suspending its publication. In 1758, after thedefinite condemnation of the work, he showed himselfmore complaisant still , for " he consented to ensure thesafety of Diderot's manuscripts, by preserving them inhis own study " [ Cf. Mme de Vandeul, Mémoires sur lavie de son père] . The same condemnation did not prevent d'Alembert's name remaining on the list of the"royal censors,' while it was doubtless for similarreasons that, when Fréron attacked the Encyclopedists inhis Année littéraire, it was the Année littéraire that wassuspended and Fréron who was sent to the Bastille . Farfrom being injured, indeed, by the suppression of itson Byron, etc.-His influence in France, and that, —as will be seen inthe history of Romanticism, -its most characteristic feature is that itpaved the way for the emancipation of the personality of the individual.3. THE WORKS. -The works of Jean-Jacques Rousseau may bedivided into three principal groups, clearly determined by thecorresponding periods of his life. It is of slight importance that theprecise dates of publication of the works in each group are not exactlythe same as the dates at which they were composed.1734-1749. - Narcisse, 1734; -Le verger des Charmettes (in verse) ,1739; -Dissertation sur la musique moderne and Projet concernantde nouveaux signes pour la notation musicale, 1742; -Les Musesgalantes (opera) 1743; -L'allée de Silvie (in verse) , 1747; -L'Engagement téméraire (comedy in verse) , 1747.1751-1765. -Discours sur les sciences et les arts, 1751; -sundrywritings dealing with the refutations of this work, 1751-1752; —Lettre sur la musique française, 1753; -Discours sur l'Economiepolitique, 1755; -Discours sur l'origine et les fondements de l'inégalité, 1755;-Lettre sur les spectacles, 1758; -La Nouvelle Héloïse,1760; -Le Contrat social, 1762; -Emile, 1762; -Lettre à l'archevêque de Paris, 1763; -Lettres de la Montagne, 1764; -Lettres sur lalégislation de la Corse, addressed to M. Buttafuoco, 1765.348 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREprivilege, the Encyclopedia profited by the action of theauthorities, whose sole result was to make the workindependent of the approval of the censor. When M.de Malesherbes resigned his post of supervisor of thebooksellers , Mme de Pompadour took the Encyclopediaunder her protection at the instigation of Quesnay, herdoctor, and when the Jesuits were expelled in 1762 sheshared the satisfaction of the philosophers. After herdeath in 1764 she must have had a successor in the rôleof protectress, since the last ten volumes of the Encyclopedia were freely circulated in Paris.At the same time it must be admitted that the enemiesof the Encyclopedia, owing to their blundering attacks, theweakness of their polemics, and their utter lack of talent,were largely responsible for the admiring attitude of thesalons, and what may almost be described as the co-opera1765-1805. -Dictionnaire de musique, 1767; —Considérations surle gouvernement de Pologne, 1772; -the Confessions (the six firstbooks) and the Rêveries d'un promeneur solitaire, 1782; -Confessions(the last six books) and the Dialogues, 1790; -Lettres sur la Botanique,1805.To the above should be added a voluminous correspondence, onlyabout a half of which is contained in the five or six volumes devotedto the Correspondance in the majority of editions; -the volume ofunpublished works issued by Streckeisen- Moultou, Paris, 1861; -andnumerous fragments scattered through various publications.The Neufchâtel library possesses an important collection (Nos.7,829 to 7,941) of Rousseau manuscripts, or manuscripts left behindby Rousseau, from which there would doubtless be a certain amountof information to be derived.It follows from what has just been said, —and although the editionsof the works are numerous, the best being Petitain's edition, 22 vols. ,Paris, 1819-1822; and Musset- Pathay's edition, 23 vols. , Paris, 1823-1826, that there is no edition of Rousseau that can be regarded asdefinite, or that is comparable with Kehl's [ Decroix and Condorcet ]or Beuchot's editions of Voltaire.-[Cf. for the bibliography of Rousseau, Quérard, La France littéraire, vol. viii. , pp. 192–230] .THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 349tion of the Government in the enterprise . That the truthdoes not shine by its own light, and that excellent causessuffer grievously owing to their being ill defended , are unfortunately only too common occurrences. The Nouvellesecclésiastiques, the Jansenist organ, is a sample of theefforts of the enemies of the Encyclopedia. The publication is as malevolent as possible, but also as insipid, thewriters in it being capable of little else than of brandingall the productions of the encyclopedic school as so much"nonsense " and " rubbish. " Fréron , the editor of theAnnée littéraire, may not have been invariably wanting inwit and good sense, and still less in courage, but it wouldbe difficult to imagine anything pettier, narrower, andmore superficial than his criticism; while his bad reputation, whether justified or not, and this is not the pointhere, ―made it impossible that weight should be attachedII.-Michel- Jean Sedaine [Paris, 1719; † 1797 , Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -Grimm, Correspondance littéraire; -Ducis,Notice sur Sedaine, 1797, to be found in vol. iii . of the 1826edition of Ducis ' works; -Mme de Vandeul's [ Diderot's daughter]Notice in vol. xvi . of Tourneux' edition of Grimm's Correspondence;-Alfred de Vigny, De Mlle Sedaine et de la propriété littéraire,1841;-Jal, Dictionnaire critique, article SEDAINE.2. THE DRAMATIC AUTHOR.-The legend attaching to Sedaine [ Cf.Mme de Vandeul's notice] .-His first literary efforts; -the Epitre àmon habit, and the Recueil of 1752; -Le Diable à quatre, 1758.—Sedaine writes in collaboration with Philidor; -Blaise le savetier,1759; —and with Monsigny: -On ne s'avise jamais de tout, 1761; —Le Roi et le Fermier, 1762; —Rose et Colas, 1764, etc.; —The transformation of comic opera. -He writes for the Théâtre- Français , LePhilosophe sans le savoir; —and that over- estimated little comedy,La Gageure imprévue, 1768.That the Philosophe sans le savoir is the realisation of the middleclass drama as conceived by Diderot; -by reason of the nature of theplot; the social status of the personages; -the solemnness of theirconversation; their preoccupation with morality; -and the unvary-350 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREesteem.to his utterances . Palissot was scarcely held in greaterIn his comedy Les Philosophes (1760), theutmost he could do in the way of satire was to representMme Geoffrin, under the name of Cydalise, as anauthoress-Mme Geoffrin whose ignorance was so proverbial that it was said of her that she reverenced it " asthe active and fruitful principle of her originality! " [ Cf.Garat, Mémoires sur M. Suard, vol. i . , bk. vi. ] . Of anotherwork of Palissot, Petites lettres sur de grands philosophes,La Bruyère might have said, as he declared of the Mercure of his time, that it ranks " immediately afternothing." This being the calibre of the adversaries ofthe Encyclopedia, their thrusts failed to take effect . Theimpotent lampoon of Moreau, the barrister, Mémoire pourservir à l'histoire des cacouacs ( 1757) , might raise a laughfor a moment, though without its being very clear whethering vulgarity of the style. -On the other hand, in connection withthe incident of the duel skilfully made to supervene just as a marriage is being arranged, -with the delicately drawn character ofVictorine [ Cf. George Sand, Le mariage de Victorine] , —and with thesincerity of the author, ―the work offers almost all the qualities whichDiderot's dramas lack; -and in this way the honour belongs toSedaine of having been the first to construct a drama on really thesame lines as will be followed later by such writers as Scribe, Augier,and Dumas.Of some of Sedaine's other works; -and that their characteristicis that they are " pleasing "; -but deficient in strength and humour;--even more than in style; -and this in spite of the opinion of hiscontemporaries. -Moreover he doubtless owes much to the composerswho wrote the scores for his works; -and in particular to Grétry; -whose music procured him his greatest success, Richard Cœur- deLion, 1874; —and his admission to the Academy.3. THE WORKS. -Sedaine is the author of a number of comic operas,the principal of which we have mentioned; -of the Philosophe; -ofthe Gageure [based on the tale by Scarron which Molière turned toaccount in his École des femmes]; -and of two long dramas, of amore or less historical order: Raymond V. , Comte de Toulouse, whichTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 351the laugh was at the expense of the author or of those hewas attacking. On the other hand, it was obvious thatnone of these criticisms, whether in a serious or a jocosevein, went to the root of the matter, or even came nearto doing so. In consequence, the reputation of theEncyclopedists, who gloried as much in the inefficacyof their adversaries' efforts as in their own talent, and thefortunes of the Encyclopedia gained ground and acquiredadditional strength and solidity owing to the very onslaughts of their enemies." It is precisely at this moment, " writes Garat, " thata voice which, though not young, was entirely unknown,made itself heard, not from out of the deserts and theforests, but from the very midst of these societies, academies, and philosophers, among which the many triumphs ofthe intelligence were giving birth to such infinite hopes ...has been neither played nor printed; and Maillard ou Paris sauvé,printed but never produced on the stage.III. The Last Period of Voltaire's Life [ 1762-1778] .1. THE SOURCES.-[ Cf. above: The First Period of Voltaire'sLife.]The Potentate of Ferney; —and that there is no exaggeration in thisexpression when one takes into consideration:-the very situation ofFerney [ Cf. Correspondance, Decemver 24, 1758]; the footing on whichVoltaire stood both with the King of Prussia and the Empress of Russia;-his growing reputation; —and the sort of seal that is put on his fameby his intervention in favour of Calas [ Cf. Athanase Coquerel, JeanCalas et safamille, 2nd edition , Paris, 1869]; —and of the Sirven family[ Cf. Camille Rabaud, Étude historique sur l'avènement de latolérance, 2nd edition , Paris, 1891 ] .— He at once takes advantage ofhis exceptional situation to publish his Anecdotes sur Fréron, 1761; —his Lettres sur la Nouvelle Héloïse, 1761; -his Éloge de Crébillon,1762; -and the Relation du voyage de Pompignan, 1763; —writingswhich are mere collections of insults directed against his variousadversaries. During the same period he is visited at Ferney bythe"philosophers "; -he continues to write tragedies , Olympie, 1762; —352 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREand appealing in the name of truth to the human race, thevoice brings an accusation against literature, the arts , thesciences and society itself " [ Cf. Garat, Mémoires sur M.Suard, vol. i . , p. 164]. The author adds-and the information is precious-" It was not, as has been stated, ageneral scandal that was aroused; the universal feelingwas one of admiration and, in a way, of terror. " Thispassage should be taken in connection with the following lines from the Confessions: " Proud, daring, andcourageous, writes Rousseau, I displayed an unfailingassurance that was the more steadfast because it wasunaffected, because it was rooted in my inmost beingrather than expressed in my attitude. The contemptwith which my profound meditation had inspired me forthe morals, maxims, and prejudices of my century mademe insensible to the scoffing of those who were imbuedtales , Jeannot et Colin, 1764; -he composes his Philosophie del'histoire, 1765; —-his Dictionnaire philosophique, 1765 [ Cf. withregard to the order in which the articles in the Dictionnaire werewritten, Beuchot's edition, vol. xxvi. , and Bengesco, vol. iii . ]; —andkeeps up animmense correspondence. His intervention in connectionwith the Chevalier de la Barre [ Cf. Cruppi, L'Avocat Linguet, Paris,1895; -and Edouard Herz, Voltaire und die Strafrechtspflege, Stuttgart, 1887]; -and his Commentary on Beccaria's treatise on crimesand penalties, 1766. -He judges that the moment has come to makea determined onslaught on Christianity; -and any expedient is goodenough for his purpose; encouraged as he is both by the instigations of Frederick, -and by the entry into favour of Mme Du Barry,1769.-His Histoire du parlement regains him the favour of the authorities. Publication of the Questions sur l'Encyclopédie, 1770–1772.-His intervention in the Montbailly affair, 1770; -the Morangiésaffair, 1772; -the Lally affaif, 1773 [action for rehabilitation ]; -inthe matter of the serfs of Saint-Claude, 1770-1777; -and the way inwhich the habitual indecency of his jests spoilt the effect of his efforts.-His relations with Turgot, 1776.-Voltaire's last writings .-HisCommentary on the Esprit des Lois and his last tilt againstMontesquieu. His last series of comments on Pascal's Pensées; —VOLTAIRE.

THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 353with them, and with my sentences I crushed their pettywitticisms as I would crush an insect between myfingers " [ Cf. Confessions, part ii . , book 9, under thedate 1756] . Both Rousseau and Garat are in the right.It was contempt for their " morals, " their " prejudices, "and their " maxims " that brought about the violentbreach between Rousseau and his former friends thephilosophers. Alone and unaided he struck out a newline; and it is because they will perceive what heis about, or rather because they will have an inklingof it before they really perceive it, that the Marmontelsand the Morellets, the Grimms and the Diderots,d'Alembert, the group of Baron d'Holbach and thatof Mme d'Epinay, that Voltaire himself after the Lettresur les spectacles (1758)-which is the declaration ofwar of "the citizen of Geneva "-that they will all-- and of the interest offered by a comparison between the last and thefirst series; the two series being separated by an interval of fiftyyears. -The Dialogues d'Evhémère and the Prix de la justice et del'humanité, 1777.-His efforts to obtain permission to return to Paris.-He leaves Ferney, February 5, 1778; —and arrives in Paris on the10th of the same month.Voltaire's philosophy; —and that without desiring to exaggerate itsimportance, it has greater significance; -but above all more cohesionthan is sometimes thought; -while its object only differs from that ofMontesquieu in so far as the temperaments of the two writers aredifferent. Three main ideas are met with in his Dictionnaire philosophique as in his tragedies; —and again in Candide or the Ingénu noless clearly than in the Essai sur les mœurs; -of which the firstwould be correctly described as respect for the social institution; -were it not that owing to Voltaire's manner it is difficult to use theword " respect " in connection with him. -The fact remains, however,that his philosophy is a social philosophy;-and there is justificationfor the remark that he was " a conservative in everything except inreligion. " -Although he holds that men are decidedly sorry creatures[Cf. Candide and the Histoire d'un bon Bramin]; -he considers thatthey can be taught to act reasonably as well as foolishly "; --and 6624354 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREcombine to form the most compact and implacablecoalition against him.The futile question is still occasionally argued as towhether Diderot or Rousseau was the first to " rediscover " that idea of " nature " against which the three orfour generations of writers and thinkers that precededthem had fought so vigorously. Let it be conceded thatthe merit belongs to Diderot, and let it be conceded aswell, since he himself lays claim to the honour, that hehad " laboured at " the early works of Rousseau.Under these circumstances, Diderot would have donewell to explain how it was that none of his own worksproduced the impression " of universal admiration andterror " aroused by Rousseau's two first Discours.Moreover, why does he not boast of having labouredat Emile, the Contrat social, and the Lettres de lathat the object of civilisation is to turn this circumstance to account[Cf. his Remarques sur les Pensées de Pascal] , -and that society hasthe same object [ Cf. the A.B.C. ] .--It is his views on this subject thatbring him into conflict with Rousseau; -far more than the divergencyof their interests; —a fact which explains the violence of their disputes;-Voltaire having always held that the possibility of men accomplishingsuch progress as they are capable of lies in the very conditions which,in Rousseau's eyes, are the cause of their " depravity. "-This idealeads him to adopt another, in pursuance of which he violently attacks,--and unfortunately by any means he finds ready to hand, -what inhis opinion is irrational or merely unreasonable in the organisationof society; hence his attacks on " justice, ” —he himself having beenthe victim of injustice; —his diatribes against war, -which he ascribeswithout hesitation or reflection to motives in every case low andinterested; —hence, too, his attacks on religion , which he considers inhuman, irrational, and " good enough for the commonherd " [ Cf. Dieu et les hommes, the Examen de Mylord Bolingbroke, and a dozen other pamphlets] .-On the other hand, as heis Voltaire, -as he is too clear- sighted, that is, not to be aliveto the value of religion as a "repressive principle, " he believesin the existence of a " rewarding and avenging God, ”'-a— belief which•THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 355montagne? The truth is that Rousseau, when oncein possession of this idea of " nature, " perceived allits consequences, including those which had escapedthe too hasty and fuliginous imagination of Diderot;he made the idea his own, his very own property,and at his epoch solely his property; and vivifyingit with the ardour of his grudges, his hatreds, and hispride, enriching it, so to speak, out of his ownsubstance, and communicating to it the fire of his eloquence and of his passion , he gave it an importanceand contagious properties with which it had not beenendowed previously.Be it observed that Rousseau, by his mode of contrasting nature, not as Rabelais or Montaigne hadformerly done with the vices which dishonour it, but withart itself, proclaimed, at his first appearance in the arena,implies belief in the immortality of the soul; -in Providence; —andgenerally in all that constitutes " natural religion "; —including trustin the " God of honest folk "; -a belief accompanied by the secretconviction that this God looks with special favour on the friends ofenlightenment; -particularly when they write verse; -and composetragedies.66Voltaire did not perceive that there is no such thing as " naturalreligion "; —any more than there is such a thing as " free necessity "or unvarying chance "; -" natural religion " being a contradiction interms; -all the truths that natural religion teaches having a sourceoutside itself; —and being merely a lay adaptation of the teachings ofsome " revealed " religion. -He also did not perceive that, -if reasonbe capable of arriving at some of the constituent truths of religion, —it is not the highest truths that may be thus arrived at; -and stillless the most efficacious; —and that a belief in a " rewarding andavenging God " being incapable of serving as a principle and still lessas a motive of action, -being only capable indeed of serving as amotive for inaction, -is an insufficient base for morality; -whichthus becomes purely social; -and in consequence relative, diverse,and changeable. -Furthermore, in his coarse and insulting attacks onChristianity, he was often unfair as well as unjust; —for instance,-356 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREnot merely that all that had been accomplished for twohundred and fifty years past in the way of treatingnature from an artistic standpoint had had its day, butalso that the effort itself was based on an initial error.For more than two centuries writers had been on thewrong road! There was nothing but " error and follyin the doctrine of the wise men " of the Encyclopedia.His contemporaries were engaged in thinning the growthof prejudices, but without going to its root or evenperceiving it, so that how could it be supposed that itwould not put out fresh shoots from age to age? " Tellus, oh! celebrated Arouet, how many sturdy and virilebeauties you have sacrificed to our false delicacy? "[ Cf. Lettre sur les spectacles, and compare NouvelleHéloïse, part ii . , letters 14, 17 , 21] .Admit, saysRousseau in other words, that your art has impairedwhen he refuses to admit the superiority of Christianity overMohammedanism or Paganism; -although, from the purely historical or human point of view, Christianity has changed the face ofthe world; and intolerance and " fanaticism " existed before theadvent of Christianity; -for it will not be maintained that it was theirproselytising ardour that pitted the Persians against the Greeks; -orthat the partisans of Marius and Sylla fell to butchering each otherover a question of dogma. -What, however, he perceived less clearlystill, was that reason alone and unaided has never founded anythingreally durable in the social domain; -if, indeed, it cannot be said thatit tends to anarchy rather than to union. -The failure of reason inthis sphere had been firmly established by Bossuet and Pascal; -which is the reason why Voltaire attacked them so persistently,without always understanding them. - Possessing in an incomparable degree the gift of perceiving the superficial aspects ofgreat questions and the external resemblance between them, -Voltaire was deficient throughout in the meditative faculty; -henever gave himself the time or prosecuted the studies requiredfor their adequate examination; -and this is what good judgesmean, --when they refuse him the title of philosopher or thinker,-and term his work " a chaos of clear ideas " [ E. Faguet]THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 357your genius by forcing you to make concessions whichyour nature would certainly have led you to refuse.You have given utterance, not to what you hadto say, but to what you believed would please yourcontemporaries; and not content with wishing toplease them, with a view to their satisfaction you haveimitated, you have submitted to be influenced by modelswhich were none of your choice, models which you sufferedshould be forced on you. You were bent on obtaining theapproval of the public! Born to be yourself, uniqueperhaps of your kind, you have accepted the tyranny offashion, you have made it your glory to resemble others ,to resemble your entire generation . But if art in thisway, far from aiding your natural gifts, has hinderedtheir development, enslaved them, and finally pervertedthem, what is the remedy for this evil, what is the lessonNevertheless his philosophy forms a connected system; -admittingthat few people are inclined to make a thorough examination of greatquestions; and that this very disposition of mind may be said toconstitute what is termed Voltaireanism. -The attitude is commonenough;—and while it would be going too far to say that it is naturalto the French genius; -Frenchmen have always inclined to it in virtueof a sort of intellectual Epicureanism. -Voltaire's genius made himthe incarnation of this bent of mind; -and the secret of his influencelies in the fact that he secured it recognition , -thanks to the authorityhe wielded by reason of his intellectual gifts; -his literary renown; —and his social position. He dealt with all the ideas of his time [Cf.Taine, Ancien Régime]; —and he summed up all or almost all of themin " a portable form "; -expressing them in terms that were sometimes coarse; -but most often witty, ingenious, and humorous; --andas a rule clear. He perceived the more superficial affinities betweenthem; -gave a sufficient exposition of their relations; -and connectedthem with each other more or less satisfactorily; --so that his chiefmerit lies in his having saved his readers the laborious effort thatattaches necessarily to the straining of the attention . -His readersenjoyed the illusion that they understood complex problems; —and onfinding themselves so intelligent they accorded him their admiration358 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREtaught by your example? The answer is that we shouldreturn to nature, that we should conform ourselves tonature; and by the mere assertion of this principleespecially in view of the arguments he adduces in favourof its adoption-Rousseau overthrows at one stroke thelong- standing authority of the established rules, the littlethat survived of the power of tradition, and the rights towhich the community pretended over the sentiments ofthe individual .For our sentiments are we ourselves, or rather each ofus is only himself so far as he is entirely free to giveexpression to his sentiments, and it is this very freedomthat constitutes nature: "We are all born capable ofexperiencing sensations. . . . As soon as we are conscious, so to speak, of our sensations, we are disposed toregard with favour or to avoid the objects which produceand affection. It was probably something of this sort that Goethemeant when he termed Voltaire "the greatest writer that can beimagined amongst the French "; -and, in this connection, that beforeaccepting the compliment, -which perhaps is not without a trace ofenvy, —it must be well weighed; -and the question asked whether atbottom it does not involve a somewhat contemptuous criticism, —ofFrench literature and of the genius of the French race.Voltaire's return to Paris and death. -It only remains to recallbriefly the circumstances of Voltaire's last sojourn in Paris [ Cf.Desnoiresterres, Voltaire et la société française, etc. , vol. viii . ] .—Arriving in Paris on February 10, he takes up his residence atthe Hôtel de Bernières; -where he is besieged at once by thecourt and society; the Academicians and the actors of theComédie Française; the musical world and the philosophers; —the old and the new world. -Madame du Deffand writes: " Peoplefollow him in the street and raise cries recalling his interventionin favour of the Calas family "; -and that there is perhaps someexaggeration in this picture; - as indeed in most of the contemporary testimony, -which takes a pleasure in contrasting theenthusiasm of society with the frigid attitude of the court [ Cf.Grimm, or rather Meister and La Harpe in their CorrespondancesTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 359them. These dispositions acquire a wider range and become strengthened . . . but they are more or less pervertedby the repressive influence of our habits. Before theyundergo this perversion they constitute what I call ournature " [Emile i . 1 ]. What does this mean if notthat " nature " is as much in opposition with civilisation in general as with art in particular? Rousseauindeed expressly states that such is his meaning:"Everything is good as it leaves its Maker's hands,everything degenerates in the hands of man. Prejudices, authority, necessity, example, all the socialinstitutions in which we are submerged stifle nature inus " [Emile i. 1 ]. In consequence, the aim of true education will be to rid us of the prejudices which preventour nature developing in conformity with itself. " Menin the natural order of things being all equal, theirlittéraires] .-The celebrations of the 30th of March: the sitting ofthe Academy; -and the sixth performance of Irène. -The crowningof Voltaire. He takes steps with a view to fixing his residence inParis . His visit to the Masonic Lodge, the Neuf Sours. - He isinvested with the apron of " brother Helvétius "; -which he " desiresto kiss before accepting it " [ Cf. Desnoiresterres, vol. viii . , pp. 305-307] .-The sitting of April 29th at the Academy of Sciences. -Voltaire andFranklin. -The sitting of the French Academy of May 7th and thescheme for an Historical Dictionary. -Weariness, illness , and deathof Voltaire [ May 30, 1778] .— Tronchin's letter relating Voltaire's lastmoments [ Cf. Desnoiresterres, vol. viii . , pp. 364-366]; —and whetherthe construction that has been put upon it is justified . —The legendsin circulation in connection with Voltaire's death; -and that it wouldseem that they are legends and nothing more.3. THE WORKS. -Voltaire's works are composed of:(1) His Poems, comprising a little of everything: an epic poem, theHenriade, 1723, 1728; -Odes, Epistles, Satires, Epigrams, Madrigals,and Tales; -didactic or philosophic poems, such as: the Discours surl'homme, 1738, the Poème sur la loi naturelle, the Poème sur le désastrede Lisbonne, 1756; -translations; -and the Pucelle.(2) His plays, which include: tragedies, of which the most cele-360 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURE LITERATcommon vocation is to be men, and whoever is sobrought up as to fit him to be a man cannot be ill fittedfor the various vocations of men. . . . When he leavesour hands our pupil will be neither magistrate, soldier,nor priest; he will be primarily a man, and he willbe as capable as no matter who else of being whatevera man may be called upon to be " [Emile i . 1 ] . Is itnecessary to point out that Rousseau is thus in directconflict with the former theory of education, accordingto which the chief aim of the educator should be theadaptation of man to society; with the former systemof morality, whose principle was to substitute generalmotives of action for the individual impulse given by theinstincts; and with the former system of æsthetics, whichproclaimed that it was above all things imperative toregard the faculty of sensation with suspicion , it beingbrated are Edipe, 1718; Zaïre, 1732; Alzire, 1736; Mahomet, 1742;Mérope, 1743; Semiramis, 1748; the Orphelin de la Chine, 1755;and Tancrède, 1760; -comedies not one of which has escapedoblivion, unless it be, for reasons that have nothing to do withliterature, the Ecossaise, 1760; -and a few operas.(3) His histories: Histoire de Charles XII. , 1731; -Le siècle deLouis XIV. , 1751-1752; —Annales de l'Empire, 1753–1754; —theEssai sur les Mœurs, 1756; -Histoire de Russie, 1763; -and hisHistoire du Parlement, 1769.(4) His prose tales , the principal of which are: Zadig, 1747; —Micromégas, 1752; -Candide, 1759; -Jeannot et Colin, 1764; -theIngénu, 1767; —the Homme aux quarante écus and the Princesse deBabylone, 1768; -the Oreilles du comte de Chesterfield, 1775.(5) His Dictionnaire philosophique, 1764; —and his Questions surl'Encyclopédie, 1770-1772. In Kehl's and subsequent editions thesetwo works are combined into one and printed in alphabetical order.(6) His Commentary on Corneille , 1764.(7) His miscellaneous works, which, like his poems, contain alittle of everything: veritable works such as the Lettres anglaises,1734; the Traité de Métaphysique, 1734; the Traité de la Tolérance,1763; -and mere tracts of the length and nature of our newspaperTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 361of all our faculties the most fluctuating and the mostvariable.There remains, however, a further point: since mandoes not constitute the whole of nature, what are therelations between nature and man? What is man'sposition in nature? After borrowing an idea fromDiderot, Rousseau now appropriates Buffon's mainidea, and proceeds to develop its most extreme consequences. Nature is the cause of which we are theeffects. We are thus absolutely dependent on nature,and in consequence we only become intelligible to ourselves in proportion as we perceive the complexity of therelations that exist between us and nature. Herein liesthe secret of happiness. " Nothing is so proper as afavourable climate to make the passions which wouldotherwise be the torment of man contribute to hisarticles such as his skits on Lefranc de Pompignan, les Car, lesQuand, les Si.These miscellanea may be divided into scientific , philosophic,historical, literary, and anti- religious writings.(8) His Correspondence, -consisting of more than 10,000 letters ,filling 20 volumes in Beuchot's and 18 in Moland's edition, -whileeven thus it is far from complete. New letters of Voltaire are continually being discovered. We ourselves are aware of the existence ofhundreds of unpublished letters , and when they have been printedfresh ones will probably be discovered. Moreover, the wonderfulthing about these letters is that scarcely one of them is whollyinsignificant, a fact which distinguishes them from Rousseau'sLetters, for example, and still more from Montesquieu's. We will gofurther still and say that, if the correspondence of some few womenbe excepted, or rather with the sole exception of the Letters of Mmede Sévigné, Voltaire's Correspondence stands alone in our literature,while of his entire work it is the most living portion.IV. The Economists.1. THE SOURCES. -Grimm, Correspondance littéraire; -Voltaire,L'homme aux quarante écus; -the Memoirs of Mme du Hausset,Marmontel, and Morellet; -Galiani's Correspondence.362 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREfelicity " [Nouvelle Héloïse, part i . , letter 23]; and itis nature and nature only that procured Rousseauhimself "some few moments of that perfect andabsolute happiness, which leaves the soul with novoid it feels the need of filling " [ Cf. Letter to M. deMalesherbes]. Let us, then, abandon ourselves tonature, and henceforth, instead of priding ourselves ondominating it , let us yield it a wise obedience. Wemust not break, we must not try to break or even toloosen, the bonds between us and nature. " Let usplunge into its bosom, " as a poet will shortly expresshimself, and entrust it with the conduct of our destiny,unhappy hitherto for no other reason than our passion forshaping it in accordance with the dictates of reason. Inthis way, after having emancipated the individual fromthe tyranny of the community, and transferred toGarat, Mémoires sur la vie de M. Suard, Paris, 1820; -LouisBlanc, Histoire de la Révolution française, vol . i .; -Tocqueville,L'Ancien Régime et la Révolution , 1856; -Mastier, La philosophiede Turgot, Paris, 1862; -F. Cournot, Considérations sur la marchedes idées, etc., vol . ii . , Paris, 1872; —L. de Loménie, Les Mirabeau,vols. i . and ii . , Paris, 1879; -A. Neymarck, Turgot et ses doctrines,1885; -Léon Say, Turgot, 1887; -Aug. Oncken's introduction to theworks of Quesnay, Paris , and Frankfort, 1888.2. THE DOCTRINE. -It is not the custom to accord the " Economists " a place in the history of French literature; —but this neglectis a mistake; —since after all they write no worse than the majorityof the Encyclopedists; -since the best estimate of the book ofHelvétius is that we owe to Turgot [ Cf. Correspondance inéditede Turgot et de Condorcet, edited by M. Ch. Henry, Paris , 1882];-since one of the most interesting correspondences it is possibleto read is that between the Marquis de Mirabeau and Rousseau [ Cf.J. J. Rousseau ses amis et ses ennemis, Paris , 1865]; -and since theAmi des hommes, 1756; --or the Essai sur le despotisme de la Chine,1767-1768, are among the works which in their time made the mostnoise and produced the most effect, and this quite rightly.The founder of the doctrine: François Quesnay [ Mérey, 1694;THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 363sensibility the rights of the intelligence itself, Rousseaucompletes his work by laying down the principle thatman shall henceforth be regarded as a function of nature.There could scarcely be an idea more contrary tohumanism, of which indeed it is the direct contradiction ,or in consequence an idea which must deal the classicideal a graver, a more mortal blow.What was the attitude of contemporary opinion towardsall these novelties? and what reception did it accord them?It greeted them with applause. Never, perhaps, has aliterary reputation been more speedily or more universallyestablished than that of Rousseau. Ten or a dozen yearssufficed to raise him as high in public esteem as evenVoltaire. Moreover, public opinion was mistaken neitherin its estimate of Rousseau nor in the reasons for itsestimate. In the Dijon Discours, in the Discours sur1774, Paris];-he begins life as a surgeon; -he is appointed doctorin ordinary to the king; -and he enjoys the confidence of Mme dePompadour [ Cf. Mémoires de Mme du Hausset]; -his scientificwritings; his first economic writings; -his articles on the farmersof the taxes and on cereals in the Encyclopedia; -his friendship withthe Marquis de Mirabeau.The enfant terrible of the party: Victor de Riquetti, Marquis deMirabeau [ Perthuis in Provence, 1715; † 1789, Argenteuil] .-Hisboisterous youth, and his first campaign, 1734; -his friendship withVauvenargues [ Cf. vol . ii . of Gibert's edition of Vauvenargues]; -hewrites, in collaboration with Lefranc de Pompignan, the Voyage duLanguedoc, 1740-1746; -his marriage, 1743; -his brochure on theutility of the provincial States- General, 1750. -He publishes his Amides hommes, 1756, a work which is the beginning of his friendshipwith Quesnay. His work on the Théorie de l'Impôt, 1760, -procureshim the honour of imprisonment at Vincennes; -after which he isexiled to his estate at Bignon.-His return to Paris, -and his firstLetter to Rousseau, 1766; -his friendship with Turgot; -and thetriumph of the Economists.The great man of the party: Anne- Robert- Jacques Turgot [ Paris,1727; † 1781, Paris]; —his extraction and his studies at the Sorbonne;364 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREl'Inégalité, in the Lettre sur les spectacles, Rousseau'scontemporaries recognised the accents of an eloquence ,the secret of which, there was ground to fear, had been lostin the course of the preceding fifty years. They felt thatthe Nouvelle Héloïse was athrill with an ardour of passionof which they were fully conscious, although they themselves had ceased to be acquainted with it, that the dramaand the novel of the time offered them but an inadequateand sorry parody. The women went into ecstasies overthe book and the author [ Confessions, ii . 2]; while themen, for their part, were vaguely aware that the pagesof Emile, of the Lettre à l'archevêque de Paris, of theContrat social were eloquent of some ill -defined menace!The public, however, does not always understand what itadmires or even what it dreads; and in reality Rousseauwas not understood by his contemporaries, because his-his career as a magistrate. -He writes for the Encyclopedia [ Cf.the articles, Etymology, Existence, Expansibility, Fairs and Markets,Endowments] . He is appointed Intendant at Limoges, 1761-1774;-his Ministry, 1774-1776.From a general point of view-the side which interests us--theEconomists are distinguished from the Encyclopedists by threeessential characteristics: -their belief in the laws of economics, whichthey hold to be as " necessary " as the laws of physiology or ofphysics; their opinion that these laws and a knowledge of themare of more importance to civilisation and progress than progress inthe arts or in letters;-and their conviction that the only way toimprove nature is to begin by submitting to it. Other differencesmight be pointed out, for example:-that they are " empirics " or" utilitarians "; -who consider that they affirm nothing that cannotbe demonstrated by facts; -while the Encyclopedists are " theoricians " and " rationalists . " - Further they have a respect forauthority, which Diderot, d'Alembert, and their followers , and evenVoltaire, were in general without; --a fact which explains thefavour shown them down to the fall of Turgot.3. THE WORKS. -Of Quesnay: Essai physique sur l'économieanimale, 2nd edition , 1747; -Maximes du gouvernement économiqueTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 365readers were people of fashion, the frequenters of thesalons he attacks, and being people of fashion, after thepassing emotion caused them by this citizen of Geneva,their attention is claimed and held by an endless varietyof other objects of distraction, curiosity, and discussion .For example, have not the Jesuits just been expelledand even suppressed-indeed a " subject of conversation, "and as well a victory for philosophy! Voltaire leaped forjoy at the measure, and d'Alembert regarded it as amerited chastisement for the hostile attitude the Jesuitshad thought fit to adopt towards the Encyclopedia."Their diatribes in society and at court against theEncyclopedia had stirred up against them a class ofmen who are more to be feared than is often thought:the men of letters "; and it is incumbent to avoid makingenemies who, " enjoying the privilege of being read fromd'un royaume agricole, 1758; -Le Droit naturel, 1765; -Du Commerce, 1766; -Le Despotisme de la Chine, 1767, 1768.Of the Marquis de Mirabeau: L'Ami des hommes, 1756; —and theThéorie de l'Impôt, 1760.Of Turgot: Réflexions sur la formation et la distribution desrichesses, 1716. This is almost the only work of Turgot's, apart fromhis articles in the Encyclopedia, with which his contemporaries wereacquainted. Moreover, all or almost all his writings which figure inhis collected works (Eug. Daire's edition) were in reality mere roughdraughts, which owe most of their interest to the rôle played by their author.V.-Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchis [ Paris , 1732;1799, Paris].1. THE SOURCES. -Gudin de la Brenellerie, Histoire de Beaumarchais, 1801-1809? [ first published by M. Maurice Tourneuxin 1888]; - Sainte- Beuve, Causeries du lundi, vol. vi. , 1852; -L.de Loménie, Beaumarchais et son temps, Paris, 1855; -Jal, Dictionnaire critique, article BEAUMARCHAIS; -d'Arneth, Beaumarchais etSonnenfels, Vienna, 1868; -Paul Huot, Beaumarchais en Allemagne, Paris, 1869; -Clément de Royer, Les Mémoires de Beau.366 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREone end of Europe to the other, are in a position to wreaka signal and lasting vengeance with a stroke of the pen! "[Cf. d'Alembert, vol. ii . , p. 48, edition of 1821; andDiderot, Letter to Mlle Volland, August 12, 1762] . Beit said that it is not of himself or of Diderot that he speaksin these terms, but of Voltaire. The beginning of theincident of the Jesuits preceded the burning of Emile,and the Calas incident occurred immediately after it .Never has public emotion been more legitimately arousedthan on this latter occasion, if there be no example of amore deplorable judicial error. "From one end of Europeto the other " -the expression is justified here-the entiremagistracy is affected by the scandal, and the wholesystem of French criminal law is put on its trial. Oncemore it is Voltaire who leads the campaign, and hisTraité de la tolérance (1763) does more to popularisemarchais, Paris, 1872; -Bettelheim, Beaumarchais, eine Biographie,Frankfort, 1886; -E. Lintilhac, Beaumarchais et ses Euvres,d'après des documents inédits, Paris, 1887; —A. Hallays, Beaumarchais, in the " Grands Ecrivains français " series, Paris, 1897; —Henri Cordier, Bibliographie des œuvres de Beaumarchais, Paris, 1883.2. THE MAN AND THE WRITER. -Beaumarchais' extraction, family,and early education; he begins life as a clock-maker. -His firstquarrel with Lapaute, 1753-1755.-He is appointed teacher of theharp to the daughters of Louis XV. , 1759.-His duels and his successwith women.—-He makes the acquaintance of Paris-Duverney, —through whom he becomes mixed up in all sorts of financial affairs.—The Spanish adventure, 1764 [ Cf. the fourth Mémoire againstGoëzman; and Goethe's Clavijo] .—His first literary efforts: Eugénie,1767, and the Essai sur le genre dramatique sérieux. -Beaumarchaisas an unsuccessful imitator of Sedaine, and a faithful disciple ofDiderot. Of the value of Beaumarchais' main argument againstclassic tragedy: " Of what concern to me . . . are the revolutionsof Athens and Rome; " —and that it has a social as well as a literarysignificance. -Beaumarchais' second drama: Les Deux amis, 1770.The Goëzman incident, -and the Mémoires, 1773-1774. -Promptsensation they cause; -and sudden popularity of Beaumarchais.—THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 367his name in a single day than all the rest of his workin half a century. The Parliament of Paris rejoins in1765 by ordering his Dictionnaire Philosophique to beburned, but the odious legal procedure resorted to atAbbeville and the punishment inflicted on the Chevalierde la Barre again causes opinion to side with thephilosophers. Already victorious over the clergy, theyare now victorious over the magistracy [ Cf. FélixRocquain, L'esprit révolutionnaire avant la Révolution, bk. vii. , Paris, 1878] . To complete their triumphit only remains for them to throw discredit on theGovernment, and it happens that towards 1768 the" Economists " seem to give them their opportunity.The philosophers pretend to regard Turgot and hiscompanions as "extollers and upholders of despoticauthority "; they reproach them with employingReasons for this success; -and that while they are in part political; -they are also in part literary; -although the humour of the Mémoiresis sometimes in doubtful taste; -their style is always on the verge ofbeing declamatory, and the matters they treat are of rather atrumpery order. -The Barbier de Séville, 1775; -and how, whileturning to account in this work a subject that might be thoughtworn out, -Beaumarchais produced his masterpiece; —and themasterpiece of the French comedy of the eighteenth century. —Thesuccess of the Barbier de Séville won definite recognition for prosecomedy; —and it is from the appearance of this piece onwards thatskill in the conduct of the plot; -dramatic action; -and daring andvivacious dialogue become the essential characteristics of plays ofthis order. -Beaumarchais' political and commercial intervention inAmerican affairs, 1776, 1778.- The qualities of the Barbier de Sévilleare again met with in the Mariage de Figaro, 1783; -though this latterwork contains additional characteristics , -of a kind less theatrical perhaps, and as proper to the pamphlet as to comedy. -The politicalinfluence of the Mariage; -and that it would doubtless have beeneven greater than it was; -had not Beaumarchais, who was alwaysoccupied with business speculations as well as with literature, hadthe misfortune to fall foul of Mirabeau, 1786; -and to intervene368 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURE66 apocalyptic and pious language, " with being "enemiesof the Fine Arts " [ Cf. Grimm, Correspondance, October,1767] . Voltaire attacks them in his Homme aux quaranteécus, which, although not one of his best skits, is nevertheless a success, its title passing into a proverb. Andthus, thanks to the patriarch of Ferney, the Economiststoo, vanquished and discontented, are kept in check for atime.We say "thanks to the patriarch " advisedly, for the truthis that the various incidents just referred to would scarcelybelong to the history of literature, were it not for Voltaire's intervention in them, and in particular for the factthat the place he occupies in the history of his century isdue to this very intervention . It is because he intervened in the question of the " nett product " and in thatof "legal despotism " that he is Voltaire; and he would(1787) in the trial of Kornmann and his wife; -on which occasion thecounsel Bergasse handled him as severely as he himself had handledGoëzman twelve years previously;-for different reasons indeed, —but with an equal appearance of justice; —and amid like applause.Beaumarchais ' last years. -His opera Tarare, 1787. -Obscurity ofhis rôle during the revolution; -his drama La Mère coupable, 1792.-Although rich and already sixty years of age, his passion forspeculation reasserts itself. His purchase of fire-arms [ Cf. Loménie,vol. ii. , p. 460]; —and, in this connection , of Beaumarchais' patriotism; his arrest; --his release and his Mémoire à la Convention.-He is entrusted with a mission by the Committee of Public Safety, -while simultaneously the Paris Commune declares him a suspect andan emigrant. His stay in Hamburg; —his return to France; —histwo letters on Voltaire and Jesus Christ, 1799; —and his death.3. THE WORKS. -Beaumarchais' principal works are mentioned above,and it will suffice to indicate as the best edition of his complete worksthat issued by his friend Gudin, Paris, 1809, Collin [ Cf. E. Fournier'sedition, Paris, 1876, Laplace and Sanchez]VI.—The End of Tragedy, 1765–1795.1. THE SOURCES. -Grimm , Correspondance littéraire;-Laharpe,THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 369not be Voltaire if he had not undertaken the defence ofthe Calas and of the Chevalier de la Barre. We are notexamining here the motives of a more or less politicalorder which prompted his intervention, and we do notdesire to analyse, as it were, his outburst of generosity.We merely note that his real masterpiece was his life .If his contemporaries admired him chiefly for his extraordinary faculty of assimilation , combined with a not lessextraordinary facility of execution or expression, it iscertain that they admired these qualities the more, in proportion as the objects in connection with which he turnedthem to account were more numerous, more varied, andmore foreign in appearance to his interests or any considerations of personal vanity. It is to be noted finally,that while until 1760, or thereabouts, he had been butone man of letters among-unus ex multis—from thisCorrespondance littéraire; --Geoffroy, Cours de littérature dramatique; -Mgr. Lemercier, Cours analytique de littérature générale; —Petitot, Répertoire du théâtre français, vols . v. and vi.; and Supplement, vol. i.; -Laharpe's, de Belloy's, Ducis ' and M. J. Chénier'sPrefaces and notes to their tragedies; -Saint- Surin's Notice in hisedition of Laharpe's works; -Campenon's Notice in his edition ofthe posthumous works of Ducis; -Etienne and Martainville, Histoiredu théâtrefrançais pendant la Révolution, Paris, 1881 .2. THE RIVALRY BETWEEN THE DIFFERENT KINDS OF TRAGEDY.—Voltaire's predominant and sovereign influence over the tragic dramaof his time; -reasons of this influence; -and its consequences [Cf.the Discours de réception de Ducis] .Philosophic tragedy; —and its evolution in the direction of melodrama; -Laharpe's Mélanie, 1770; -and his Brames, 1783. —Thedramas of Mercier [ 1740; † 1814]; -and the tragedies of MarieJoseph Chénier [ 1764; † 1811]: Charles IX. , 1789; -Henri VIII.,1791; -Jean Calas, 1791; —Fénelon, 1793. —Comparison between thesubject of Fénelon and that of Mélanie; -and that these works mustnot be regarded as imitations of Diderot's Religieuse, which was notpublished until 1796. -Definition of philosophic tragedy; -and thatso far as it is confined " exclusively to the defence of some political,251370 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREdate onwards he has become the man of his century andthe personage known to history. All these events, then,which might seem to have nothing to do with the historyof literature, belong to it in consequence of the part heplayed in them. They brought into existence the realVoltaire; they acquainted Voltaire with the nature of hispower, they raised him out of the ruck and put him on anequality with the " dozen men " of whom Diderot declaredas late as 1762, that " without standing on tip- toe theywould still surpass him by a head " [ Cf. Letter to MlleVolland, August 12, 1762 ] . Furthermore they investedhim in the eyes of the nation with that universal, thatauthoritative influence which, in spite of his efforts , hadhitherto been disputed or denied him; and certain essential consequences were almost at once the outcome of theunique, the predominant, the almost sovereign situationwhich events had procured him.religious, or moral thesis " [ Cf. Laharpe, Works, vol . ii . , p. 639] , -it is the very opposite of tragedy, —and of drama.1National tragedy; -and that it is again Voltaire who with hisHenriade and his Zaïre, -is found to be the originator of " nationaltragedy," that is of tragedy based on the history of France; -andprincipally intended to familiarise the spectators with that history.—De Belloy's very successful pieces: Le siège de Calais , 1765; —Gaston et Bayard, 1771; -Gabrielle de Vergy, 1777; —and that theobject of these tragedies is scarcely dramatic; -but rather didactic.[Cf. the Prefaces of de Belloy himself in Petitot's Répertoire, vol . v. ]Exotic tragedy; -and that in spite of what might be thought atfirst sight, the conception from which it proceeds is akin to thatunderlying " national tragedy "; -if its object be to make the theatrea medium for the vulgarisation of geography and foreign history.—Lemierre's [ 1723; † 1793] Guillaume Tell and his Veuve du Malabar,1766 and 1770.-De Belloy's Pierre le Cruel, 1773, and Laharpe'sMenzicoff, 1775. Laharpe's Barmécides, 1778. - Du Buisson'sThamas Kouli Khan, 1780. -Marignié's Zoraï or Les Insulaires de laNouvelle- Zélande, 1782; --and that all these creations are inspiredby Voltaire's Alzire or his Orphelin de la Chine.THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 371During the closing years of the reign of Louis XV. , ifthe religious question be excepted, a sort of appeasementis seen to succeed the tumult and agitation of the preceding period . The conflicting parties are not reconciled ,but they agree at least to a truce. The Sorbonne maycensure Marmontel's Bélisaire, " but neither the court northe parliament interferes in the matter; the author ismerely recommended to keep silent "; the printing ofBélisaire is proceeded with, and the work is on salebearing the king's privilege [ Cf. Marmontel's Memoirs,bk. viii . ] . The encyclopedic doctrine is circumscribed byits upholders themselves until it is nothing more than theDeism of Voltaire. The Parliament condemns, indeed,Baron d'Holbach's work, Le système de la nature ( 1770) ,but it declines to insert in its decree the speech of theAdvocate General, Séguier, while it is Voltaire himselfGræco-Roman tragedy; —and that it is astonishing that nothing ofvalue resulted from this effort to attain to historic truth;-and toexactness of local colour. -Lemierre's Hypermnestre, 1758, and hisIdoménée, 1764.-Laharpe's Timoléon, 1764.-Ducis' Edipe chezAdmète, 1778. -Laharpe's Philoctète, 1783, and his Coriolan, 1784.—N. Lemercier's Méléagre, 1788.-Chénier's Caius Gracchus, 1792; —Legouvé's Epicharis, 1794. -The reason that induced these writers togive a preference to Greek subjects [ Cf. below ANDRÉ CHÉNIER]; -andwhether this tendency should not be regarded as evidence of a formalintention to fight against the English influence; —and to return , tothis end, to the most remote sources of Classicism?Shakespearean tragedy; —and of Campenon's significant eulogy of Ducis [ 1733; 1816]; -in whose favour he urges " that he has neveronce been seen to go to the Greek tragic writers for his subjects. ” -Relative importance of the rôle of Ducis in this respect. —His “ adaptations ": Hamlet, 1769; -Roméo et Juliette, 1772; -Roi Lear, 1783;-Macbeth, 1784; -Othello, 1792; -and of Sedaine's curious remark[letter to Ducis]: "The writer to whom Othello only suggested Zaïreneglected what is essential " in Shakespeare's play. - Still it was theauthor of Zaïre who showed the way to the imitators and adapters ofShakespeare; and to Ducis in particular; -and if with the exception372 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREwho undertakes to attack and refute the book. Theattitude of Voltaire is the same when De l'homme, a posthumous work of Helvétius, appears in 1773. Rousseau,who lives obscurely in his humble retreat in the RuePlatrière, has ceased to attract attention. " It was hiswish to avoid men, " writes La Harpe, " and men haveforgotten him." D'Alembert is translating Tacitus, andDiderot is at work on his Essai sur les règnes de Claude etde Néron. Grimm, who in 1768 predicted " a revolutionto be imminent and inevitable, " declares in 1770 that"public tranquillity has never been more assured. " WhenChancellor Maupeou effects his coup d'état against theParliaments in 1771 , he is applauded by the men ofletters, who have become the supporters of the centralauthority. In 1774, on the succession to the throne ofLouis XVI. , the reconciliation of the Encyclopedists andof philosophic tragedy [ Cf. however, Victor Hugo's Preface to hisplays ];-all the other branches just referred to are those which willbe essayed before long by the Romanticists; —the latter, in conse- quence, followed the initiative of Voltaire.3. THE WORKS. -Nothing survives at the present day of the workswe have just been mentioning; and still less of many other productions it would be easy to enumerate. For the curious, however, thereexist excellent editions of Lemierre ( selected works) , Paris, 1811, F.Didot; -of Laharpe (complete works with the exception of the Lycée)Paris, 1820-1821, Verdière; -and of Ducis [complete works, 3 vols. ,and posthumous works, 1 vol . ] , Paris, 1826, Nepveu.VII.-André-Marie de Chénier [ Constantinople, 1762; † Paris,1794] .1. THE SOURCES. -H. de Latouche's Notice in the edition of 1819;-Saint- Beuve, Mathurin Regnier et André Chénier, 1829, in hisTableau de la poésie française au XVIe siècle; Portraits littéraires, 1839, vol. i .; Portraits contemporains, 1844, vol. v.;Causeries du lundi, 1851, vol. iv.; and Nouveaux lundis, vol . iii . ,1862.-A. Michiels, Histoire des Idées littéraires au XIXe siècle,1843; -Becq de Fouquière's Notice in his edition of the works, 1862;THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 373the Economists is consummated by the simultaneouspresence in the Ministry of Malesherbes and Turgot.The two parties are now at the head of affairs anddisposed to scoff at the younger generation , " which onleaving college believes itself under the obligation ofteaching those in authority how to govern their States! "A curious movement comes into existence under coverof this appeasement. The classic spirit concentrates itsforces and takes the offensive, as if about to delivera last battle before abandoning its dismantled stronghold. It essays what little strength it still possessesagainst that " anglomania " whose " alarming progressit regards as an equal menace to " the gallantry ofthe French, the culture of their society, their taste forthe toilette," and their literature . Voltaire writes:"A few Frenchmen are setting up amongst us an effigyand Documents nouveaux, Paris, 1875; -G. L. de Chénier's Noticesand Notes in his edition of the works, Paris, 1874; -Caro, La fin duXVIIIe siècle, vol . ii. , 1880; -Anatole France, La vie littéraire,vol. i . , 1888, and vol. ii . , 1890; -J. Haraszti, La poésie d'AndréChénier, translated from the Hungarian by the author, Paris, 1892; —Em. Faguet, XVIIIe siècle; —L. Bertrand, La fin du classicisme et leretour à l'antique, Paris , 1897.2. THE POET; -and that although his works did not appear untilafter his death, -this is the place to deal with them; -since a number of his contemporaries were acquainted with them in part; —andeven imitated them (Millevoye for example) , —and since their essentialfeatures are characteristic of a renaissance of Classicism, --of whichproof has survived in the shape of Caylus' Histoire de l'art, —ofDavid's pictures; -and of Abbé Barthélemy's Voyage du jeuneAnarcharsis.-There cannot, in consequence, be a greater error thanto regard André Chénier as a " forerunner of Romanticism. "-On thecontrary, it is proper to consider him not merely as a Boileau or aMalherbe gifted with inspiration; —but as a Ronsard, -who shouldhave read Voltaire, Montesquieu and Buffon; -Buffon more especiallyperhaps; and more modern than the original Ronsard by two hundredand fifty years.374 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREof the divinity of Shakespeare, just as another set ofimitators have recently erected a Vauxhall in Paris, oras others have distinguished themselves by calling aloyauxroastbeef. ' Formerly the court of Louis XIV.helped to polish that of Charles II.; nowadays, it isLondon that rescues us from a state of barbarism. " LaHarpe re-echoes his complaints in his Correspondancelittéraire. Translations from the Greek and Latinabound, and are contrasted with versions of Shakespeareand Ossian. The appearance in 1769 of Abbé Delille'sGéorgiques was quite an event, Voltaire declaring thework together, it is true, with Saint-Lambert's Saisonsand after the Art poétique-" the best poem by whichFrance has been honoured. " Four translations of theIliad and the Odyssey, two in verse and two in prose,were issued between 1770 and 1789. Even archæologyChénier's Elegies, —and that they are characteristic of their periodas regards their somewhat complicated phraseology; -their dedicationto a " Lycoris, " a "Camille, " or a " Fanny "; -the impersonalcharacter the poet is at pains to give them; -their sensuousness; -and a sort of amorous ferocity that marks them, -a ferocity thatpoints to the influence of the Liaisons dangereuses . -Chénier's Elegiesare the work of a greater poet than those of the Chevalier de Parny,but they are work of a kindred type [ Cf. H. Potez, l'Élégie depuisParnyjusqu'à Lamartine, Paris, 1898]; -for though doubtless moreGreek and Latin in their inspiration; -they nevertheless offer thesame characteristics; -when indeed they do not remind the readerof P. J. [ Gentil] Bernard; -and of the Abbé Delille:Pourquoi vois- je languir ces vins abandonnésSous le liège tenace encore emprisonnés?The fragments of Hermès; -and that it is easy to trace the samecharacteristics in them; -and to point out others which also belongto the eighteenth century.-Full of the ideas of Buffon, AndréChénier appears in this work as an enthusiastic interpreter of theideas of his time; -and already as the poet of the " struggle for life."THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 37566and erudition, which had been so disdainfully handled inthe Preliminary Discourse of the Encyclopedia, come intofashion again. A young writer declares, in the notes hescribbles on the margin of his copy of Malherbe, thateven when we depict modern scenes and characters, wemust learn how to delineate them by studying Homer,Virgil, Plutarch, Tacitus, Sophocles, and Eschylus. "A little later he will write in verse: " Feast on theseductive fare offered by the mighty writers of Greece,but avoid the heavy intoxication of that spurious andboisterous Permessus, where drink the harsh singers ofthe nebulous North. " Would Boileau himself havegiven different advice?The reader will perhaps be surprised that in proof ofthis renaissance of the classic spirit we should cite theauthor of the Barbier de Séville and of the Mariage de-Like Voltaire and Condorcet he deals with the origin of religions; -laying to their door most of the sufferings of humanity; —and accusingthe " priests " of having turned them to account in their own interest.--Finally in the third Canto he develops the doctrine of " transformedsensation "; -proclaims the invincible tendency of man towards"virtue and truth "; -and concludes by addressing a hymn to"science " [ Cf. Condorcet's Esquisse des progrès de l'Esprithumain] . This is the pure philosophy of the Encyclopedists;-and doubtless Chénier would have developed it otherwise than didhis friend Le Brun;--but no philosophy is further removed notmerely from that of the Romanticists who are about to appear onthe scene; -but even from that of Rousseau.André Chénier's Idylles; -and that without doubt it is not theinspiration of Oaristys or of the Jeune Malade, -that differs fromthat of Hermès or of the Elégies; —at least if this latter inspirationbe taken as just defined . -But as André Chénier is in immediatetouch with Greek literature; -and is in deep sympathy with Alexandrinism; —if not with the antiquity of Sophocles, Pindar, andHomer; -by dint of imitating his models his verse has a strengthwhich the inconsistent, colourless verse of his rivals lacks; -but hispoetry is not on this account in contradiction with the ideas of his376 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREFigaro? It is a fact that Beaumarchais is scarcely aman of letters; he is a man of business, and a man ofbusiness whose transactions were often or even usually ofno very reputable order. Few, assuredly, of his contemporaries were less versed than he in the ancients , who werequite unknown to the society he frequents. His case,however, is only the more interesting on this account,and his example the more significant . For so longas he followed in the footsteps of Diderot and Sedainein his Eugénie (1716) of which he laid the scene inEngland, and in the Deux amis (1770) —he did but poorwork. However, after producing those Mémoires, whosespiritedness excited the jealousy of Voltaire-and the workindeed would be wholly in the classic tradition but forits shortcomings in the matter of good taste and in particular of good manners-it occurs to him to be the thirdtime. Or rather, while resembling his contemporaries in every otherrespect, he is distinguished from them solely by a subtler intelligenceof that antiquity they have ceased to understand, -and by the factthat he combined their admiration for their own time, -- with anartistic sense which finds utterance in the proverbial line:Let us express new thoughts in verse such as the ancients wrote.Moreover Chénier's doctrines are in entire conformity with the character of his work, as is proved, -by his protests against " Anglomania ":-" The English poets . . . sad as their ever cloud- girt sky,swollen as the sea that washes their shores, sombre and heavy; . .--and still more by the fourth of his Epitres addressed to Le Brun; —or again by his Poème de l'Invention; —the precepts in which are precisely those of Boileau;-but of a Boileau more emancipated, and inparticular more cultured, and perhaps, too, more " aristocratic " thanthe real Boileau . -Comparison in this respect between the Poème del'Invention and the Art poétique; -and the Défense et Illustrationde la Langue française [ Cf. in particular verses 299-390] .- In consequence, Chénier must in nowise be regarded as the " first of theRomanticists, " but on the contrary as the " last of the classic writers. "-Had he lived, his influence would not perhaps haveTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 377writer to treat the subject dealt with in the Foliesamoureuses and the École des femmes: the guardian of theold comedy, duped by the eternal ingénue. He gives thissubject a Spanish background, the background of LeSage's stories and of Scarron's plays, and he produces theBarbier de Séville (1775) in reading which we are reminded of Gil Blas. In 1783 he repeats his performance,and the result is the Mariage de Figaro. And whetherFigaro be he, Beaumarchias, himself, drawn from thelife , with his utter absence of scruples and his fundof gaiety, or, as some regard the character, a "forerunner of the Revolution, " he is first of all and aboveall the valet of old comedy, the last and most entertaining of the Frontins, the Crispins, and the Scapins.Might we not declare, in other words, that directlyBeaumarchais followed in the footsteps or rather reabsolutely modified the direction taken by literature; -owing to thestrength of the movement in progress; -but it is certainly in Chénierthat the disciples and literary imitators of Rousseau would havefound their most redoubtable adversary.3. THE WORKS. -The works of André Chénier are composed of:(1) his poetry, forming three principal divisions: the Idylls , theElegies, and the Poems or fragments of poems. Students of hispoetry ought to consult at least four editions: H. de Latouche'sedition , Paris, 1819; Becq de Fouquière's edition , Paris , 1862, Charpentier; G. de Chénier's edition , Paris, 1874, Lemerre; and the lastedition issued by Becq de Fouquières, Paris, 1888, Charpentier;-(2) his prose writings, all or almost all of which have to do withpolitics; and (3) of a somewhat brief but extremely importantCommentary on Malherbe, first published in 1842, in the standardedition of Malherbe's works (Paris, Charpentier) .VII.-Georges- Louis Leclerc de Buffon [ Montbard, 1707;† 1788, Paris. ]1. THE SOURCES .-Grimm, Correspondance littéraire; —Héraultde Séchelles, Voyage à Montbard, Paris, 1785; -Vicq d'Azyr, Discours de réception , 1788; -Condorcet, Éloge de M. le Comte de Buffon,378 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREsumed the traditions of Regnard and Molière he metwith the success he had in vain sought to achieve byimitating Sedaine and Diderot? And what is morecharacteristic of the movement of which we are endeavouring to determine the nature? Apart from Voltaire'slast pamphlets and the concluding volumes of Buffon'sHistoire naturelle, which are " continuations, " only two"novelties " destined to survive appeared between 1775and 1785, two comedies whose inspiration is certainlyclassic, " whatever opinion be held with regard to theirqualities or their shortcomings.66Towards the same period, tragedy, like comedy, harksback to its original sources of inspiration, though withless happy results, in this sense that it has left us nothing,I will not say comparable to the Barbier de Séville or theMariage de Figaro, but nothing that will bear readingto be found in vol. iii . of Condorcet's complete works; -Cuvier,Rapport historique sur les progrès des sciences naturelles, Paris,1810;-Flourens, Histoire des travaux et des idées de Buffon, Paris,1844; and Des manuscrits de Buffon, 1859.Correspondance inédite de Buffon, edited by Henri Nadault deBuffon, Paris, 1860.Sainte- Beuve, Causeries du lundi, vol. iv. , 1851; vol. x. , 1854; andvol. xiv. , 1860; -Emile Montégut, Souvenirs de Bourgogne, 1874,Paris; -F. Hémon, Éloge de Buffon, Paris, 1878; -N. Michaut,Éloge de Buffon, Paris, 1878; -0. d'Haussonville, Le salon de MmeNecker, Paris, 1882; -Émile Faguet, XVIIIe siècle, Paris , 1890; -De Lanessan's introduction to his edition of Buffon's works, 1884; —Edm. Perrier, La Philosophie zoologique avant Darwin, Paris , 1884.2. THE MAN OF SCIENCE AND THE PHILOsopher.A. Buffon's early years. -His birth and education. -Dijon as anintellectual centre during the first half of the eighteenth century [ Cf. Th. Foisset, Le Président de Brosses, 1842; and Em. deBroglie, Les Portefeuilles du Président Bouhier, 1896] .- TheAngers duel, -and Buffon's friendship with the Duke of Kingston[Cf. Desnoiresterres, Epicuriens et Lettres au XVIIIe siècle, 1879] .Buffon's travels, 1730-1732 [ Cf. his correspondence] .-His firstTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 379at the present day. After having gone the round of theuniverse, having sought for subjects in Mexico, Peru,China, Malabar, and even in New Zealand, and havingexplored every epoch of the national history in quest ofsomething new, tragedy at the finish returns to theGreeks and Romans, and again offers us plays whoseheroes are Coriolanus and Virginia, Hypermnestra andPhiloctetes . It is admitted that the " simplicity of theancients is still capable of serving as a lesson to ourluxury, a word that may be fitly used, says Laharpe,in connection with our tragedies, which we have made attimes somewhat too ornate. " The same writer opinesthat " our overweening delicacy, in its desire to ennobleall it touches, may cause us to overlook the charm ofprimitive nature "; and he concludes that while it isdoubtless a mistake " to imitate the Greeks in everything,Memoir to the Academy of Sciences; -he is appointed assistant tothe mechanical section of that body; -and his translation of Hale'swork on vegetable statics , 1735.-He is appointed " Intendant of theKing's Garden, " 1739; -he devotes himself exclusively to naturalhistory; and brings to bear on his studies the independent spiritand wide curiosity characteristic of the men of his time; -thequalities of his own well- balanced Burgundian temperament; —atemperament not without analogies to that of Bossuet; -his geniusfor assimilation; —his wealth of imagination; —and his elevated style.-The three first volumes of the Histoire naturelle.Of Buffon's style; -and does it deserve the sharp criticism ofwhich it has been the object; -or the jokes in doubtful tastethat are still made at its expense; -on account of the occasionaloccurrence in it of rather pompous sentences, or somewhat garishtouches?-Buffon's co- workers: Daubenton, Bexon, Guéneau deMontbeillard; and his method of correcting them [ Cf. Flourens,Manuscrits de Buffon].-On the other hand, his frigid treatment ofsome of the great scenes he has described or imagined has also beenreproached him [ Cf. Em. Montégut, Souvenirs de Bourgogne]; —a fact that might tempt one to say that these criticisms counterbalanceor annul each other. -It is more accurate, however, to say that they380 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREstill so far as the expression of the natural sentiments isconcerned, there exists no purer model than that theyoffer us in their best works " [ Cf. Laharpe, Cours delittérature, part i . , bk. i . , chap. 5] . It would seem, moreover, that tragedy, in returning to its early traditions,acquires fresh vigour; for its struggle against the melodrama of such writers as Diderot and Mercier, or a littlelater of Guilbert de Pixérécourt, is the almost exactcounterpart of the former conflict between the tragedy ofCorneille and the tragi-comedy of Rotrou, Mairet, andHardy. The men of the Revolution are about to goback a step further, for, as is well known, they willmodel their attitude in public life not on the Romans ofBalzac or Corneille, but on the Greeks and Romans ofPlutarch-or of Amyot.In the meantime another writer, a poet, and the onlyauthor of the time possessed of artistic feeling, harksare only apparently at variance; -since Buffon's style, being naturallyrich, and adapting itself without effort to the loftiest subjects, seemsto fall rather below what we should expect when treating suchsubjects, -a circumstance that accounts for its striking us as toomajestic, and superior in some sort to the dignity of its object-whenit deals with less considerable matters; -and particularly in descriptive passages. -Buffon, moreover, can heighten his style whennecessary; and to say nothing of his rhythm, precision, and colour,-he has on more than one occasion attained to lyricism [ Cf. theHistoire naturelle de l'homme]; -and more than once to the level ofthe epopee [ Cf. the Époques de la nature .--B. The successive phases of Buffon's thought. -Buffon's fondnessfor hypothesis; —and how this taste, in presence of the exigences ofthe observation of nature; -and the successive acquisitions resultingfrom study, seems to have introduced some confusion into Buffon'sideas. From 1748 to 1759 he is the sworn enemy of " classifications "; which he feels to be artificial; -and not grounded onnature; ―he esteems themin consequence mere aids to the memory; —and what is more dangerous, -as tending to deprive man of his rankas king of creation [ Cf. vol . i . of the edition of the Imprimerie royale,THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 381further back still to the very beginnings of classicism: werefer to André Chénier, in whom Ronsard may truthfullybe said to live again. The temptation is great to dwell atlength on André Chénier, but his work is posthumous, andwe can only consider him here as representative of theintellectual tendencies of his contemporaries or of some ofhis contemporaries. At least we can say that his inspiration , like that of Ronsard, was purely Latin and Greek.Like Ronsard, too, but with a clearer consciousness ofthe reasons for his choice, he applied himself in particularto the imitation of the erotic Latin writers and of thepoets of the Alexandrian school. Like Ronsard, he heldthat all beauty, all perfection was contained in themasterpieces of the ancients, and in consequence, likeRonsard, he believed all invention, all genius even, toconsist in clothing his thought in their immortal formsof expression.p. 4; and vol. iv. , p. 433] .-Hence the order he follows in arranging hismatter; -passing from " domestic " animals to " wild " animals; —and from " wild " animals to " carnivorous " animals; —or fromEurope to the rest of the old Continent;-and from the OldContinent to the New; -a mode of proceeding which amounts tosubordinating the entire evolution of nature to the formation ofman; and the development of civilisation. -But between 1757 and1764, while studying the animals of the New World, -and laying thefoundations, in the meantime, of zoological geography, he perceivesthat the animals of the New World are not the same as those of theOld;-that, although not the same, they are analogous;-and finallythat they are in general smaller. —To explain these phenomena hesees no other way open to him than to have recourse to the influenceof climate, food, and the rivalry between the different species; —andto attribute to nature a greater plasticity than he had done hitherto.-It is at this period that his ideas most closely resemble what will oneday be the ideas of Darwin; -in spite of the fact that he always continues to regard man as a being occupying a place apart innature [ Cf. his nomenclature of monkeys] .-Finally, between 1764and 1787 further new ideas occur to him; -which he opposes to those382 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURELet us express new thoughts in verse such as the ancients wrote.APagan like Ronsard, as profoundly Pagan in his Idyllesas the author of the Hymnes and of the Sonnets à Cassandre, he loved, he was affected by, he conceived naturein the same way as Ronsard. Sensual and voluptuous asRonsard was, his melancholy, like that of Ronsard, scarcelydiffered from that of the great Epicureans. And whyshould it not be said that he was a completer Ronsardthan even Ronsard himself, if over and above Ronsardhe represents the reaction against Malherbe and theprotest of the subjective against the objective school?It is for these reasons, that if it had been possible toresuscitate Classicism , the feat would doubtless have beenachieved by this son of a Grecian mother. But was theresuscitation of Classicism possible?We do not think so , and for more reasons than one,of Rousseau [ Cf. vols. vi. and vii . ] .-He now has a greater masteryof his subject. -New views abound in his work. He writes theÉpoques de la nature; —and as he becomes more and more con- vinced of man's insignificance in nature; -of the humbleness of ourposition; and of the irrevocableness of the laws to which we aresubjected; he seems to set a higher value on society; -an attitudethat again brings him into agreement with the general ideas of hiscontemporaries; -and with that religion of humanity with which theywere all of them imbued by this time.C. Buffon's influence. -This is the place to examine what Buffontaught his contemporaries; -and to begin with, from a purely literarypoint of view, whether his Discours sur le style, -which is merelythe speech he delivered on the occasion of his reception at theAcademy, is as important as it is sometimes held to be? -In anycase there are two passages in it that are ill understood and on whicha meaning almost the opposite of that intended is put: " The styleis the man";-Buffon meant by this that since ideas belong tonobody in particular, the expression we give them is our only meansof appropriating them; -and the passage in which he advises writersto make use of none but " the most general terms . ” —The mostTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 383the first being that it had existed for a hundred and fiftyyears. Nothing human is eternal, and strive as it may torender the eternal aspect of its subject matter, everyartistic ideal is subject to that decay which is the universallaw. In the second place, if Classicism-as we haveshown, or at least as we have endeavoured to show wasthe case-owed its definite shape as much to social as toliterary considerations, it was inevitable that it shouldperish as the result of the exaggeration of its own principle, or in other words that it should follow the fortunesof the society of which it was the expression. It is muchin the same way that the genius of the great mastersof Italian painting was unable to prevent their art endingin the rhetoric of the Carracci, or, the world havingchanged, to hinder their Humanism being supplanted byDutch naturalism. Finally, if French Classicism, asrepresented in its masterpieces, had been nothing more, SOgeneral terms are in nowise vague or abstract terms, but " nontechnical " terms; -and to say with Buffon that what is mostpersonal about an author is his manner of writing, does not for amoment convey that an author's personality is absolutely reflected inhis style. There are writers whose character did not correspond totheir style; and we have cited more than one example.In the case of Buffon himself it was more especially his ideas thatinfluenced his contemporaries , or, more accurately, the consequencesof his ideas; -for nobody has done more than, or as much as Buffon, —to make us feel the insignificance of our planet; -and the boundlessimmensity of the universe; -considerations whose outcome could notfail to be the destruction of the very foundations of humanism , —sofar as they were bound up with the supposition that man is nature'smasterpiece; and that the earth is the centre of the world.—Another consequence of the diffusion of Buffon's ideas;-and aconsequence almost more important, —-as tending to a revolution inscientific methods,-was to bring men to regard the natural insteadof the mathematical sciences as typical of science;-to substitute,that is, the results of experience and observation for those of calculation and meditation; -a change of attitude which, while giving a384 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREto speak, than the imprint left by the French genius onuniversal literature, it is inconceivable that it could haveavoided being driven back behind its own frontiers owingto the very progress of that literature, and thus perishingas the result of its own triumph. The generally acceptedideal throughout Europe for a hundred and fifty years,Classicism could only endure so long as this Europeitself endured; but this Europe passing away, it wasimpossible that Classicism should not be transformed anddisorganised and at last disappear along with it.The truth is, it is necessary to keep clearly in viewthe fact that there was something contradictory inthe dream of André Chénier. To " express newthoughts in verse such as the ancients wrote " is,as he proves in his own person, an impossible feat,for while in Oaristys or the Mendiant there areassuredly lines in the manner of the ancients, what donew and " biological " trend to human curiosity brought into existencea new mode of thinking; -the effects of which have still to beexhausted [ Cf. Ernest Haeckel's History of Creation] .3. THE WORKS. -The mistake has been made in all editions ofBuffon, the first included [ Paris, 1749-1804] , of endeavouring tojustify the title he himself chose for his great work, and to this end ofprinting along with his own work, and mixed up with it, the work dueto those who continued his labours so as to form a 66 Complete Courseof Natural History." It is of importance in consequence to pointout what really belongs to Buffon in the 127 volumes of Sonnini'sedition, 1798-1807; -or in the 90 volumes of the edition published from 1752 to 1805;--or in the 44 quarto volumes of the first edition.It comprises:The Théorie de la terre; the Histoire de l'homme and theHistoire des quadrupèdes, 15 vols. in 4to, written in collaborationwith Daubenton so far as regards the anatomical portion, 1749- 1767.The Histoire des oiseaux, 9 vols in 4to, in collaboration with theAbbé Bexon and Guéneau de Montbeillard, 1770-1783.The Époques de la nature, 1778.THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 385these poems offer in the shape of " new thoughts "? Inthe same way, it is not for a writer who has ceased tofeel and think after the fashion of Corneille or Racineto take their tragedies as his model: it is impossibleto acquire the secret of their manner, while neglectingtheir fundamental ideas. That they attempted this impossibility was the cardinal mistake of the men who maybe termed the pseudo- Classicists of the revolutionaryperiod, --Marie-Joseph Chénier, Gabriel Legouvé, Népomucène Lemercier, and how many others besides , —writerswho were not absolutely wanting either in talent or ideas ,and whose rhapsodies, nevertheless, were only surpassed,as regards the mediocrity of their style and the abjectpoverty of their matter, by the verbose eloquence of aRobespierre or a Saint-Just-than which, however, theydid less harm. And be it not said that literature " issilent " in times of civil discord . The theatres and theThe Histoire des minéraux, 5 vols . in 4to , in collaboration withAndré Thouin, 1783–1788.And finally seven volumes of Supplements, published , the two first1774-1775, -the third in 1776; -the fourth in 1777, -and the threelast 1782-1789. -The best edition is M. de Lanessan's, Paris, 1884, LeVasseur.IX.—Jean-Antoine- Nicolas Caritat, Marquis de Condorcet[Ribemont, 1743; 1794, Bourg- la- Reine].1. THE SOURCES. -Condorcet's manuscripts preserved in the libraryof the French Institute; -F. Arago's biography of Condorcet preceding his edition of the works, Paris , 1847-1849; — Sainte- Beuve,Causeries du lundi, vol. iii . , 1859; -Charma, Condorcet, sa vie et sesœuvres, 1863; -Ch. Henry, Correspondance inédite de Condorcet etde Turgot, Paris, 1883; -M. Gillet, L'utopie de Condorcet, Paris,1883; -F. Picavet, Les Idéologues, Paris, 1891; - Dr. Robinet,Condorcet, sa vie et son œuvre, Paris , 1895; -Guillois, Madame deCondorcet, Paris, 1896.2. THE PHILOSOPHER; -and that it may be that he has not as yet beenimpartially judged; -seeing that he is almost the only Encyclopedist, -26386 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREbooksellers were as busy during the storm and stress ofthe Revolution as were, of course, the orators. But withan entire misapprehension of the diversity of successiveperiods, and of the conditions to which eloquence andliterature are subject, the men of the time considered itwas possible to borrow the style of generations whose ideasthey had ceased to share, and held that masters, whosesupremacy was no longer acknowledged in the domain ofthought, might still be appealed to as guides in the artof writing. It is found in consequence that the threemen-Condorcet, Buffon, and Bernardin de Saint- Pierre-who continue to exert an influence on opinion duringthe closing years of the century, the years of the slowagony of classicism, have a single trait in commonthey have broken resolutely with the past.It has been said of Condorcet " that he was the superiorproduct of the civilisation of the eighteenth century," andand even almost the only Girondin, proscribed though he was with therest of the party; -who has not benefited by a sort of amnesty thatis accorded the Encyclopedists on account of the persecutions theynever suffered [ Cf. above the articles dealing with the Encyclopedia];-and the Girondins because want of time did not allow of their showing themselves in their true light [ Cf. Edmond Biré, La légende desGirondins] .—Whether the explanation ofthe treatment the “ Marquisde Condorcet " has met with does not lie in the facts that he was untrue to his birth? -that the amiable woman who bore his nameacquitted herself ill of the task of defending and keeping up hismemory [ Cf. Guillois , Madame de Condorcet]?-and that while atalented man in some respects, he was a foolish one in others . -Thetruth is a greater measure of fanaticism and of credulity; -even ofnaïveté; —have never been combined in one individual, nor has thereever been a man who concealed in quite a natural manner less realoriginality behind a more considerable fund of science and intelligence.-Still, and without any reference to his scientific labours proper, -his edition of the Pensées and his Panegyric of Pascal, 1776, togetherwith his great edition Voltaire , —the edition known as Kehl's edition,the promoter of which was Beaumarchais, -are among the mostTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 387beyond doubt he is the embodiment of what is best andworst in the encyclopedic doctrine. He might also betermed a fanatical Fontenelle were it not for the incongruity of coupling fanaticism with the name of the authorof the Entretiens. A disciple of Voltaire, a very intimatefriend of Turgot, a member of the French Academy,and perpetual secretary of the Academy of Sciences,it will scarcely be held that his scientific labours bearwitness to any great originality or erudition; while hehas never been esteemed a great writer. Still, evento-day he exerts a potent influence on the lives ofFrenchmen, since the organisation of the national systemof education should be traced in reality to his Mémoiressur l'instruction publique, a work whose excellencemay best be appreciated by comparing it, for example,with the writings of his friend Cabanis. Then he is theauthor of the famous Esquisse d'une histoire des progrès deinteresting evidence that exists of the state of men's minds on theeve of the French Revolution; -a fact which alone lends Condorceta considerable " representative " value. -A further point is that hisinfluence is still felt in France; -since it was he in reality whoorganised or inspired the French system of public education; —while to gauge the worth of his ideas on this matter it is sufficientto compare them with those, for example, of his friend Cabanis.-The programme of studies followed in French schools at the presentday is conceived in the spirit of Condorcet's views on education.-Finally his Esquisse d'une histoire des progrès de l'esprit humain;-which does honour to his courage and to his strength, orrather his serenity of character; -if he wrote it, as is said, when inhourly expectation of being guillotined; —remains a work of capitalimportance in the history of modern thought, -European as well asFrench, owing to the precision of outline, the wide diffusion , and thestrong impulsion it gave the idea of Progress.3. THE WORKS. -Neglecting his scientific, economic, and politicalworks, which cannot be considered as belonging to the history ofliterature owing to the absolute lack of any originality in their contents and of any merit in their style, there only remain for mention:388 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREl'esprit humain, of which it may be said that if otherbooks have expressed the idea of progress with greatereloquence, few have done so with more persuasiveness.His contemporaries were fully alive to the value of thework, and the National Convention was well aware ofwhat it was about, when it decreed [ April 2 , 1795] , onthe recommendation of Daunou, the " sage, " that thevolume should be printed at the public expense and distributed " throughout the territory of the Republic." It willbe admitted that if the progress of science be accepted, asit was by Condorcet, as the measure of progress in general,it is difficult not to be struck by the advance of humanknowledge. The religious veneration for science stillentertained at the present day was founded by Condorcet's Esquisse, which transmitted to posterity in portableand handy form all the mingled error and truth contained in the encyclopedic doctrine.(1) His academical panegyrics (Éloges) , some of which are verynteresting; ( 2) His Éloge de Blaise Pascal; —his Vie de M. Turgot;--and his notes to Kehl's edition of Voltaire-the majority of whichare reproduced in Beuchot's edition; (3) His Esquisse d'une histoiredes progrès de l'esprit humain; (4) His Mémoires sur l'instructionpublique; and (5) His Correspondence.The best, or it may be said the only, edition of Condorcet's works isthat edited by Arago, Paris, 1847-1849, Firmin- Didot.X.-Jacques- Henri Bernardin de- Saint- Pierre [Le Havre,1787; 1814, Eragny] .1. THE SOURCES. -Aimé Martin, Essai sur la vie et les ouvragesde Bernardin de Saint-Pierre, preceding his edition of the works,Paris, 1818 and 1826; -Bernardin de Saint- Pierre's correspondence,edited by Aimé Martin, together with the latter's Supplément auxMemoires de sa vie, Paris, 1826 [ In consulting this Supplément,as in reading the Essai, it must be remembered that Aimé Martinmarried the widow of Bernardin de Saint- Pierre];-Villemain,Littérature française au XVIIIe siècle; -Saint- Beuve, Portraitslittéraires, vol. i.; Chateaubriand et son groupe littéraire, vol. i .; andTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 389Buffon, by his Histoire naturelle, also aided in propagating this veneration for science. The Encyclopedistshad been parsimonious in their praise of him, and not torefer to the treatment he received at the hands of Grimm,he is caricatured, and spitefully caricatured, in theportraits the vapid Marmontel has left of him in hisMemoirs [Cf. Marmontel, Mémoires, bk. vi. ] . A newgeneration, however, had already done him greaterjustice. The Époques de la nature, issued in 1778, raisedBuffon to the rank he merited. The Hermès of AndréChénier was inspired by the great naturalist, whileallowing that the Abbé Delille merely rendered himridiculous in his Trois Règnes, it is certain that suchwas not the intention of the author. Moreover, itwas Buffon's good fortune that, having left his workincompleted, it was continued by his assistants, byDaubenton, Guéneau de Montbeillard, Lacépède andCauseries du lundi, vol. vi .; -Arvède Barine, Bernardin de SaintPierre, in the " Grands Ecrivains français " series, Paris, 1891;-Fernand Maury, Étude sur la vie et les œuvres de Bernardin deSaint-Pierre, Paris, 1892.2. THE MAN AND THE WRITER. -His family and education; ---hisadventurous youth; -his travels in Germany, Holland, and Russia.-A favourite with women [ Cf. Maury, Essai, etc . ] .-He goes to theMauritius in the capacity of colonial engineer, 1768.-His return toFrance, 1771; —his quest of a wife, or rather of a dowry; —and hisfriendship with Jean- Jacques Rousseau. -He publishes his Voyage àl'Ile de France, 1773; —a work which procures him admittance tothe society of Mlle de Lespinasse, -and of Mme Geoffrin; -wherehe makes the acquaintance of " the philosophers "; -whose adversaryhe promptly becomes owing to incompatibility of humour; -and alsobecause d'Alembert fails to induce Turgot to accord him a pensionand a post. He publishesthe Études de la nature, 1784; and Paul etVirginie, 1787.-His rôle during the early years of the Revolution; —his appointment as Intendant of the King's Garden, 1792. -HisMemoir on the " necessity of adjoining a menagerie to the Horticultural Garden. "-The reorganisation of the Museum causes the390 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURELamarck, who were shortly to be followed by suchnaturalists as Cuvier and Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire. He hadbrought a new science into existence, the science oforganic life, and this fresh department of knowledge wasabout to be enriched, was daily being enriched, by thediscussion of his bold theories as much as by his discoveries themselves. But since these discoveries andtheories all tended to strip man not precisely of his rankin nature-where he continued to occupy the first place-but of the sovereignty he assigned himself in thenatural world, they could not fail sooner or later toproduce effects analogous to those which resulted fromNewton's discoveries, making of the earth, instead of the"centre of the universe, " merely one of the " smallplanets " of a siderial system which is itself constitutedby an infinity of other planets [ Cf. E. Haeckel's Historyof Creation, chap. i . and ii . ]abolition of his post. He is appointed professor of ethics at the ÉcoleNormale [ Cf. as to the École Normale, Picavet, Les idéologues,Paris, 1891, and the Livre du Centenaire de l'École normale, Paris,1895] .

-

Importance of Bernardin de Saint- Pierre's rôle in literature; –and that he is eminently representative of three things:-the firstattempts to introduce the exotic element into descriptive literature; —the reaction of the champions of sentiment against the abuses ofRationalism; -and the transformation of the algebraic style into a concrete style instinct with life and colour. -His accounts of his travels:-and how they widen the horizon opened up by Rousseau in his Nouvelle Héloïse. -The descriptions in the Voyage à l'Ile de France, 1773,and those in the Abbé Delille's Jardins, 1782.-Opposition betweenthe two writers' manners; and how Bernardin de Saint- Pierre supplements and completes Buffon. -Whether the principal merit of Paulet Virginie does not lie in the novelty of the background; -and whatwould remain of the rather silly child's idyll, -if it were stripped ofthe seduction and charm of the descriptive passages that set it off[ Cf. Sainte- Beuve, Chateaubriand et son groupe littéraire, vol. i . ,eighth and ninth lessons] .THE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 391Had Bernardin de Saint- Pierre a presentiment of someof these consequences? To-day he is solely rememberedby a brief novel, Paul et Virginie, which has caused theshedding of more tears than the story of " Iphigenia offeredup in sacrifice in Aulis. " This fate is inadequate to hisdeserts. A sincere and appreciative moralist-thoughindeed an egoist, a schemer, ambitious of success and aman whose gallantry has often a wheedling tone that isunctuous and unpleasant-Bernardin de Saint-Pierre isan admirable writer. The delightful and brilliant hues,or the delicate and nicely graduated tones with which helends variety to his descriptive passages-one is temptedto say to his " palette "-in the Études de la nature aretoo generally ignored . He aimed, too, at protestingagainst the narrow rationalism of the Encyclopedists,and, after his fashion, at preventing his contemporariesabandoning all belief in God and still more in ProviThe philosophy of Bernardin de Saint- Pierre; -and that it mayalmost be said to begin and end with the idea of finality. His exaggerations on this head; —already in the Études; -but still more inthe Harmonies; —which it is true did not appear until after his death.-The cause of these exaggerations; -and that they are the outcomeat once of the author's intimate knowledge of nature, -and of hisintention to counteract the philosophy of his century. -How theyled Bernardin de Saint- Pierre to impeach the science of his time;-to subordinate science to morality; —and morality itself to æsthetics.-That in this and several other respects Bernardin de Saint- Pierreforms the connecting link between Chateaubriand and Rousseau;between the Génie du christianisme and the Profession de foi duvicaire Savoyard; -and between the renovation of the Christian ideaand the crisis undergone by sentimentalism in the second half of theeighteenth century.Moreover all three writers mark distinct stages in the renewal ofstyle; and, in this connection, that it must not be forgotten that theÉtudes de la nature were written before the publication of the Confessions and the Rêveries du promeneur solitaire [ Cf. Correspondance, I. and II. ] .-Suppleness, precision , and colour of Bernardin de392 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREdence. It has to be confessed that the way in whichhe set about this task is proof that he was not whatwas termed in his time a " thinking head. "His useand abuse of final causes is only too notorious, while,to speak plainly, his excessive sentimentalism lands himin sheer silliness . His chief misfortune, however, wasto have been preceded by Rousseau and followed byChateaubriand. His entire work, so far as concerns thethought that finds expression in it , or attempts to findexpression amid the overgrowth of verbiage, is a meredevelopment or amplification of the Lettre sur la Providence. On the other hand, considered as a championof the rights of sentiment he is merely a forerunner of,or is paving the way for, the author of the Génie duchristianisme. Similarly, while his style is neither assober, as vigorous, nor as eloquent as that of Rousseau,it is without the brilliancy, the beauty, and the statelySaint- Pierre's descriptive style . That it is the objects themselvesthat he describes, and not at all, or to quite a secondary extent,-the feelings or moods the objects arouse in him. -Freshness,richness, and " technicality " of his vocabulary. Of the nature of hispicturesqueness; -and that it is more especially the result of afaithfulness of imitation; -which obtains broad effects by processesof the kind employed by the miniaturist.-Last years of Bernardin de Saint- Pierre; -and that he furnishesanother good example of the writers whose character has beenstrangely different to their style [ Cf. F. Maury, Bernardin de SaintPierre] .—His lectures at the École Normale, 1795; —and his electionto the Institute; -he works at his Harmonies de la nature. -HisMort de Socrate [a fragment of the Harmonies] and his Mémoire surla nature de la morale, 1798.-His relations with Bonaparte andChateaubriand. His second marriage; —and the light which thecircumstances under which it was contracted throw upon hischaracter; —and how Aimé Martin, his secretary, and the secondhusband of his widow, -has made of him the "respectable andvirtuous personage " he is popularly believed to have been. —Thegreat edition of Paul et Virginic, 1806 [in 4to, Didot]; and theTHE DEFORMATION OF THE CLASSIC IDEAL 393measure of the style of Chateaubriand. His very life,while it has something of the adventurous character ofthe lives of Chateaubriand and Rousseau, lacks the psychological interest that attaches to the existence of Rousseau, without possessing the public or almost politicalinterest offered by the career of Chateaubriand. Finally,whether it be the fault of circumstances or his ownfault, it cannot be said of him that he either closed afinishing or started a commencing period in the historyof literature. This honour belongs to Chateaubriand.It is with Chateaubriand that a really new period begins ,and for once in history, by the greatest of hazards, ithappens that the opening of the new period coincideswith that of a new century.preface " against the tyrants of literature and of common sense.'His last controversies and his death.""3. THE WORKS. -Bernardin de Saint- Pierre's works comprise:(1) his novels: Paul et Virginie, 1787; —Arcadie, bk. i. , 1788; -theChaumière indienne, 1790, followed by the Café de Surate; -Empsaël, the Prière d'Abraham, and the fragments of the Amazone[posthumous, as are also the fragments of Arcadie, bks. ii . and iii . ] .(2) The Études de la nature, 1784, which resumed, developed, completed and exaggerated, form the Harmonies de la nature, first pub- lished in 1815.(3) Of his political works and a certain number of short writings , ofwhich the principal are: Les vœux d'un Solitaire, 1790; —and theEssai sur Jean-Jacques Rousseau [ 1820] .(4) The Voyage à l'Ile de France, 1773, and a certain number ofnotes or narratives of travel [ Holland, Prussia, Poland, Russia] .The best, though very imperfect, edition of the works is that of AiméMartin in 12 vols. 8vo, Paris, 1826, Dupont, to which should beadjoined the Correspondence, also very incomplete, in 4 vols. , Paris,1826, Ladvocat.BOOK IIIMODERN TIMESIOne of the first results of the waning of the classicideal was necessarily to emancipate " the individual, ” torestore to him his natural independence, and to make ofhim , in the words of the ancient philosopher or sophist ,"the measure of all things." The ego, formerly pronounced " hateful, " and as such kept in subordination ,THE AUTHORS AND THEIR WORKSFIRST PERIODFrom the Publication of the " Génie du Christianisme "to the First Performance of the " Burgraves "1802-1843I. François- René de Chateaubriand [ Saint- Malo, 1768;† 1848, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES . -Marie-Joseph Chénier, Tableau de la littératurefrançaise en 1810; —Essai sur la vie et les ouvrages de Chateaubriand,vol. i. of Pourrat's edition, Paris, 1838; -Chateaubriand's Prefaces inthe same edition of his works; -and the Mémoires d'outre- tombe,Biré's edition, Paris, 1898.Sainte - Beuve, Portraits contemporains , vol. i. , 1834; Chateaubriand et son groupe littéraire, 1849; Causeries du lundi, vol. i . ,1850; ii . , 1850 and 1851; x. , 1854; and Nouveaux lundis , vol. iii. ,394MODERN TIMES 395recovered its sovereign rank, and once more found initself its object , its adequate justification, and its finalcause. Such, as we have seen, were the views of theauthor of the Confessions; and the renown he had wonseemed to have proved the truth of his opinion . For theoriginality for which he had been admired, for which hehad been feared, without its nature being very clearly discerned, what else was it, at least in the main, than hiscontempt for fashionable conventions, than the jealous.care, the savage obstinacy with which he had avoidedbeing contaminated by current prejudices, than his violentassertion of his personality in the face of these conventions and these prejudices?If Rousseau, however, had been a mere impassioned1862; -A. Vinet, Mme de Staël et Chateaubriand, professorial lectures delivered at Lausanne in 1844; -A. Villemain, M. de Chateaubriand, sa vie, ses ouvrages, et son influence, Paris, 1858; —De Marcellus , Chateaubriand et son temps , Paris, 1859; —L. deLoménie, Esquisses biographiques et littéraires, 1849, 1861 , 1862;-J. Danielo, Les conversations de M. de Chateaubriand, Paris, 1864;-H. de Bornier, Éloge de Chateaubriand, 1864; -Em. Faguet, XIXesiècle, Paris, 1887; -De Lescure, Chateaubriand in the " GrandsEcrivains français " series, 1892.P. de Saman, Les enchantemens de Prudence, Paris , 1869; -A.France, Lucile de Chateaubriand, Paris, 1879;-P. de Raynal, Lescorrespondants de Joubert, Paris, 1883; -A. Bardoux, Mme de Beaumont, Paris, 1884; Mme de Custine, Paris , 1888; and Mme de Duras,Paris , 1898; -G. Pailhès, Chateaubriand, sa femme et ses amis,Paris , 1896; -René Kerviler, Essai d'une bio- bibliographie deChateaubriand, Vannes, 1895.2. THE MAN AND THE WRITER. -His birth, education, and earlyyears; and to what a slight extent they throw light on his character, seeing that Lesage, for example, and Duclos were of Bretonextraction, as he was; -that Maupertuis and Lamennais were born,as he was, at Saint- Malo; -and that Bonald and de Maistre came, ashe did, of a good family. -His sub- lieutenancy in the regiment ofNavarre, 1786; —his presentation at court; -his first stay in Paris;-and his departure for America, 1791.-He returns to France, but at396 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREadvocate of the theories of individualism, a mere " selfexhibitor," so to speak, his cynicism would rather havetended to estrange a certain proportion of his admirers andin particular of his imitators. It must on no account beoverlooked that when the Confessions saw the light in 1782,they aroused at first a general impression of disgust. " Iam astounded to think that I should have veritably worshipped Rousseau, " wrote Mme de Boufflers, " for itseems to me that his Confessions might be the work of astable-man, or of some one of even lower rank" [Lettreà Gustave III. , May 1, 1782] . A few years later, afterthe publication of the last six books of the Confessions,Volney, who represents the opinion of a different circle,urged the same objection against the work in plainer andonce joins the " Emigrants, " 1792; -and serves in Condé's army,1792-1793. His years of hardship and privation; -his residence inLondon; and the Essai sur les Révolutions, 1797. —The death ofhis mother, 1798; -and his conversion. -He conceives the idea of hisGénie du christianisme. - His return to France, 1800. -Publication ofAtala, 1801; -and of the Génie du christianisme, 1802. -The secondedition of this latter work and its dedication: " To the First Consul,Citizen. "-Chateaubriand is appointed Secretary to the Embassy atRome; and French Minister in the Valais; -he resigns his post onaccount of the execution of the Duc d'Enghien. -He commences theMartyrs and goes on a journey to the East. -Publication of theMartyrs, 1809; and of the Itinéraire de Paris à Jerusalem, 1811.—Elected a member of the Academy, 1811.-The Emperor refuses toapprove the speech he was to have made at his reception by theAcademy, a circumstance which definitely converts him into anirreconcilable enemy of Napoleon. -His pamphlet, De Buonaparteet des Bourbons, 1814; -and how its success forced Chateaubriandto abandon literature for politics . -His literary work is now terminated;-whatever additions he may make to its volume; -and afterthe disappointments caused him by the Government of the Restoration, his role will be confined during twenty- five years to observingthe effects of his influence; -which a poet [ Th. Gautier, in his Histoire du romantisme] has happily summarised by saying: —that he"restored the Gothic cathedral "; -" threw open to men the immen-MODERN TIMES 397stronger terms. Writing in 1796, he deplores the fact"that the author of Emile, after having had so much tosay on the subject of nature, should not have imitatedthe discretion of nature who, while exposing to view whatis so designed as to flatter the senses, has hidden in ourbowels and covered with a thick veil what threatened toshock our delicacy " [ Cf. Leçons d'histoire in vol. vi . ofVolney's works] . At the same time, however shamelessRousseau may have been in his boastful exposure of hisshortcomings, it is nevertheless a fact that the citizen ofGeneva was a moralist; and it was the moralist in himthat the philosophers more particularly disliked, but thattheir adversaries especially esteemed, a circumstance whichexplains how it comes about that Rousseau, by a crownsity of nature from which they had been shut off "; -and " inventedmodern melancholy. "A. How Chateaubriand widened and renewed our feeling fornature; on the one hand by giving the additional charm of splendour of colouring to the still " monochrome " descriptions ofRousseau; -by the way in which he expanded into frescoes the"miniatures " of Bernardin de Saint- Pierre; -by the vivid reflectionof his own ardent personality he introduced into his descriptions; -and on the other hand by the diversity of the scenery he sketched; —now borrowing his material from the still virgin nature of North andSouth America; -now bringing into sight the poetry of the calmer,temperate nature of his own land; -now indulging in a melancholy,a sadness, and a majesty worthy of the country round Rome.-Further he gave completer expression than any of his predecessorsto the secret affinities that exist between nature and man;-torelationships and " correspondences "; -which are themselves representative of a relationship still more remote; -that between natureand its Creator; -and here is perceived the bond of union in hiswork between the feeling for nature and the religious sentiment.B. Of the apologetic value of the “ Génie du christianisme "; —andthat to estimate it , it is specially necessary to consider the work inconnection with the needs of its author's time. -The desideratum atthe period in question was to "reinstall " the religious sentiment inits rights; while to counteract the philosophy of Voltaire, it was398 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREing and most characteristic singularity, is at once theman whose Contrat social was the gospel of Robespierreand Babeuf, and the man who is found to be the intellectual ancestor of Mme de Staël and Chateaubriand.At the same time we are far from asserting that Mmede Staël or Chateaubriand refrained from imitating theindividualism of Rousseau. It would be hard to pointto more "personal " novels, to novels that is that morestrongly resemble confessions , than René, Delphine, orCorinne. There were certainly fewer personal revelationsin the Nouvelle Héloïse, and at a later date we shall notfind completer or more sincere confessions in Adolphe orin Indiana. It is her own cause that Mme de Staël pleadsboth in Delphine and in Corinne, while Chactas and66urgently necessary to define the rôle of Christianity in civilisation.-Chateaubriand accomplished this task by showing in his own waythat art and literature themselves as well as morality are indebted to religion for new beauties "; —and by showing what Christianity hasdone in the way of awakening sentiments unknown to the ancients;--and of procuring human nature satisfactions of a profound order.-Proceeding on these lines, he established three points, which, sincehis time, have secured general adhesion; -the dissidents being confined to some few freemasons; -the first point is that a believer isnot necessarily a fool or a knave; -the second that " Voltairianism "is contrary to historica truth; -and the third, that supposing allreligions to be false , the reality of the " religious sentiment " would still subsist.C. Chateaubriand's influence on the development of the historicalsentiment; and that to appreciate it, it is sufficient to compare theMartyrs with Voltaire's Histories; -for whatever be the measure ofabsolute truth offered by his Franks, his Gauls, his Romans and hisGreeks; and the point is open to discussion owing to the advancein accuracy of modern research; —they do not resemble one another;-a circumstance which distinguishes them from the Greeks andRomans of pseudo- classic tragedy.--This amounts to saying that hepossessed the art of " individualising " historical epochs; —as he hadindividualised natural scenes; — a side of his talent to which justiceis done by Augustin Thierry [Cf. below, the article AUGUSTINMODERN TIMES 399Eudore as well as René were no other than Chateaubriandhimself in real life . The Mémoires d'outre- tombe wouldserve to remind us of this latter fact if we were temptedto forget it, and in the case of Mme de Staël, who hasleft no Memoirs, we have the evidence of Mme Neckerde Saussure [ Cf. her Notice in vol. i . of Mme de Staël'sworks] . "Her object in writing was far more to giveexpression to her feelings than to execute works of art ";or again: " Corinne represents an ideal Mme de Staël,and Delphine, Mme de Staël as she really was in heryouth." In a word, Chateaubriand and Mme de Staëlwere the creators of the novel that is at once psychological and lyric, of the novel whose effusions maybe said to be nothing more than the unrestrainableTHIERRY] . Of the importance of this innovation in art; -and howby becoming the principle of what Romanticism will term localcolour;-it contributed to the renovation of poetry; -to the renovation of the mode of writing and conceiving history; -and evento the renovation of criticism; -since traces of the influence ofChateaubriand are to be detected in Villemain, Sainte- Beuve, andRenan.Chateaubriand's political career; —and that it is of slight interest asregards its bearing on the history of ideas. —Chateaubriand's politicalwritings and speeches added nothing to his glory; —while the articleshe wrote for the Journal des Débats between 1824 and 1830 did theutmost harm to the monarchy of 1815; -and to the cause of which theirauthor was the champion. -Of the element of self- sufficiency whichhe introduced into the literature of his time. -The Mémoires d'outretombe;-and that they do not differ in character from Rousseau'sConfessions; but that they deal in places with more importantinterests; -in appreciating which Chateaubriand has been guided ingeneral solely by his personal vanity. -Whether the Mémoires d'outretombe are Chateaubriand's masterpiece?-and that while no doubtthey have not detracted from his renown as a writer, the rhetoricianis too often manifest in them beneath the poet; -and not only therhetorician but the actor; -while, a graver matter still, they invitedoubt as to the sincerity of their author's convictions. -The lastyears of Chateaubriand; -the Abbaye- au- Bois and Mme Récamier's400 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREoutpourings of a personality which reveals itself ingiving vent to them. In spite of this, however, itmust not be overlooked that it was the moralist inRousseau who attracted the two writers, and his holdover them was due to the possibility they thoughtthey saw of utilising his ethics as a basis on whichto reconstruct all the Revolution had ruined, to thebeginning or the promise of a new order of things theyfancied was contained in his works. It was because shethought she had found a firm foundation for her hopesof progress in the Profession de foi du vicaire savoyard,that Mme de Staël, on the morrow of the Terror, wrotean entire book with a view to proving " that reasonand philosophy were continually acquiring fresh vigourcircle. -Publication of the Mémoires d'outre- tombe, 1849; —and thecontroversies around the name of Chateaubriand that are the result.-Sainte- Beuve's book on Chateaubriand; -the caution with whichit must be read; —and that the judgment of posterity on Chateaubriand has still to be pronounced.3. THE WORKS. -Chateaubriand having supervised during his lifetime the issue of his Complete Works in 36 volumes, Paris, 1836-1839,Pourrat; we might confine ourselves to giving the contents ofthe 36 volumes, were not the arrangement of the matter in themreally too arbitrary, and chronology too little respected. Theprincipal titles and dates that should be borne in mind are thefollowing: Essai sur les révolutions, London, 1797; -Attala, 1801; —Le génie du Christianisme and René, 1802; -Les Martyrs, ou leTriomphe de la religion chrétienne, 1809; —Itinéraire de Paris àJérusalem, 1811; -De Buonaparte et des Bourbons, 1814; -LesNatchez, 1826; -Voyage en Amérique, 1827; -Études historiques,1831.The Congrès de Vérone; —and the Vie de M. Rancé; -which arenot included in Pourrat's edition, were published respectively in 1838and 1844.Vols. xxvi. to xxxii. of the edition in question contain the miscellaneous political writings and the speeches, vols . xxxiii . and xxxiv. theEssai sur la littérature anglaise, and vols. xxxv. and xxxvi. thetranslation of Paradise Lost.MODERN TIMES 401amid the innumerable misfortunes of the human race.Again, if the religious sentimentalism of Chateaubriandhad not been the outcome of his birth and education, hetoo would have found in this same Profession de foi theessence of his Génie du christianisme.As proof that Chateaubriand and Mme de Staël werelogically as well as chronologically the descendants orsuccessors of Rousseau, the fact would suffice that at thetime of the appearance of La littérature ( 1800) and theGénie du christianisme, the two works are indeed, tostart with, pronounced to be in opposition, and Fontanes, although not as yet at the head of the University organised by Napoleon , rails somewhat bitterlyat Mme de Staël on the score of her chimerical,II. Anne- Louise-Germaine Necker, Baroness de StaëlHolstein [ Paris, 1766; † 1817, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -Notice sur les écrits et le caractère de Mme deStaël [by Mme Necker de Saussure] preceding the edition of theComplete Works, Paris, 1820; -O. d'Haussonville, Le salon de MmeNecker, Paris, 1882; -Sainte- Beuve, Portraits de femmes, Mme deStaël, 1835; Chateaubriand et son groupe littéraire, 1849; andNouveaux lundis, vol. ii . , 1862; -A. Michiels, Histoire des Idéeslittéraires au XIXe siècle, Paris, 1843; -A. Vinet, Mme de Staël etChateaubriand;-Baudrillart, Éloge de Mme de Staël, 1850; -G.Merlet, Tableau de la littérature française sous le premier Empire,Paris, 1877; —Lady Blennerhasset, Mme de Staël et son temps;-Em. Faguet, Politiques et moralistes au XIXe siècle, Paris , 1891;-Albert Sorel , Madame de Staël, in the “ Grands Ecrivains français 'series , Paris , 1890; -G. Brandes, Die Hauptströmungen der Literatur des 19 Jahrhunderts, 5th edition , Leipsic, 1897.""Mme Lenormant, Madame de Staël et la grande- duchesse Louise,Paris, 1862; -Saint- René Taillandier, La Comtesse d'Albany, Paris,1862; -Dejob, Mme de Staël et l'Italie, Paris , 1890.2. THE RÔLE OF MME DE STAËL. -Mme de Staël may be shown tohave had a threefold influence on the development of contemporaryideas; and, according to her own expression , her influence was"European " or cosmopolitan, -as befitted the birth of the daughter27402 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURE"indefinite perfectibility." He did not perceive thatperfectibility for the author of La littérature means"moral perfectibility, " of which she expected great things,while she expected little or nothing from the progress ofscience or philosophy. She does not quarrel for amoment with science and philosophy, but she regardsthem merely as means to an end which is the moralamelioration of humanity. There are persons, however,who are fully alive to what escaped the attention ofFontanes, and they combine to a man against Mme deStaël and Chateaubriand without troubling to draw finedistinctions between the two, whom they even place onoccasion in the same category as Bernardin de SaintPierre. But those who adopt this attitude are found toof the Neckers. She rescued what was worth preserving of the spiritof the eighteenth century;-she reunited the " literatures of theNorth " and the "literatures of the South "; -and she laid down theprinciple of what is to- day known as the Feminist movement orthe movement in favour of Women's Rights.A. The Lettres sur Jean- Jacques Rousseau, 1788; -and her workLa littérature, &c . , 1800. - In what respect these two books, althoughthe Revolution intervened between their publication, -are the outcome of the same inspiration; -and are conceived in the spirit ofthe eighteenth century as regards the confidence they exhibit inthe power of reason; -in the adequacy of natural religion; —and inthe indefinite perfectibility of the human race. -Originality of thevolume La littérature; —and the abundance of its author's " views ";-which are always intelligent, often ingenious, and sometimes profound. -Theory of the distinction between the literatures of the Northand the South;-and that it is a fruitful theory.B. Her book De l'Allemagne; -and of the progress it indicates inthe development of its author's ideas . Her eyes opened by theobjections of Fontanes and Chateaubriand to her book la Littérature;-enlightened by a wider experience of life; -having visited Italy andundergone its charm; -and in turn restrained or stimulated by theconversation of the visitors to Coppet; -Mme de Staël does notabandon her early ideas; -on the contrary, in a certain sense, herestimate of the literature of the North is too favourable; -conceivedMODERN TIMES 403be precisely the former enemies of Rousseau; they arethe men who are continuing the traditions of Voltaireand the Encyclopedia-the " Ideologists, " in a word.They are numerous and influential , for besides havingthe control of almost all the newspapers, while they areon the eve of invading the reconstituted and reorganisedAcademies, they lack neither merit nor talent. LesRuines are but little read at the present day-unless it bein Germany, where new editions of the work are frequent-and yet Volney must be regarded as one of the foundersof exegesis and one of the reformers of philology. Thereal significance of the celebrated book of Cabanis, Les rapports duphysique et du moral, is that it contains the germsof the science of psychological physiology, or of psychoas it is in a spirit of opposition to the Empire; -and affected as it isbyher tendency, as a woman, to be attracted by novelty. -But in thisnew work she demonstrates admirably that the " social spirit, " afterhaving been the soul of French literature, has become the cause ofits disorganisation; -and that French literature, in consequence,can only be regenerated by going to new models for inspiration; —models whose originality will emancipate it from obsolete conventions; and serve both as an example of and to promote a taste forliberty. The next step will be the constitution by all concerned of aWestern or European civilisation; -of which literature will be thecommon expression; -and whose characteristics will be substantially the same in Paris and Berlin, in London and Saint Petersburg.-The object of this literature will be the improvement of the condition of humanity; -a goal which brings us back to the book Lalittérature;—but an improvement achieved more especially by moralor religious means; -a stipulation that brings the writer into touchwith the Génie du christianisme; -and thus re- establishes at theclose the harmony which existed between Mme de Staël and Chateaubriand at the opening of their literary careers .C. Mme de Staël's novels; -and that the two most important ofthem, Delphine and Corinne, are in reality a protest against woman'slot in modern societies; -as regards the obligation she is under tosubmit to opinion on every occasion; —the obstacles she encountersin the way of developing her " superiority " when she happens to be404 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREphysiology to employ the term in use to-day. Destutt deTracy, too, the author of the Eléments d'idéologie, hasmore than one illustrious contemporary at the presenttime. These writers, however, are assuredly not men ofsentiment, and nothing is more foreign to them than thetendency to melancholy that characterises Mme de Staël,or than the poetry of Christianity; if indeed it oughtnot to be said that they are resolutely hostile to themelancholy of Mme de Staël and the fanatical opponentsof the doctrines of Chateaubriand. The ideas of theauthors of La littérature and the Génie du christianismeare as little to the taste of Garat, for instance, or ofGinguené, or of the other writers on the Décade, whichalthough the philosophic organ of the period, accords itsexceptionally gifted; -and the price she is made to pay for thissuperiority. It should be added that the eloquence of the protest isincreased by the fact that, according to the expression employedby Mme Necker de Saussure, -" if Corinne represents an ideal Mmede Staël, Delphine shows her as she really was in her youth "; -andthus it is that Mme de Staël's novels pave the way for those of theauthor of Indiana and Valentine.3. THE WORKS. -The works of Mme de Staël are composed of:(1) Her novels: —Mirza, Adélaïde et Théodore, the Histoire dePauline, written about 1786 and first published, together with thecurious Essai sur les Fictions , in 1795; -Delphine, 1802; —andCorinne, ou de l'Italie, 1807.(2) Her critical works: -Lettres sur les écrits et le caractère de J.-J.Rousseau, 1788; -De l'Influence des passions sur le bonheur desindividus et des nations, 1796; -La littérature considérée dans sesrapports avec les Institutions sociales, 1800; -De l'Allemagne, 1810,which was destroyed by the Imperial police, and reprinted in Londonin 1813 and in Paris in 1814; -and Réflexions sur le suicide, 1812.(3) Her political writings:-Réflexions sur le procès de la Reine,1793; her apology for her father: Du caractère de M. Necker et desa vie privée, 1804; -the Memoirs she has entitled: Dix annéesd'exil; and the Considérations sur la révolution française. Theselast two works were published in 1818 by her son and her son- in- law,Baron A. de Staël and the Duc V. de Broglie.MODERN TIMES 405hospitality to the most slippery productions of citizenParny. The men of science, for their part, the truemen of science that is those whose immortal discoverieshave counterbalanced or compensated the sterile abundance of the literature of the Revolution and the Empire,Laplace and Monge, Berthollet and Fourcroy, Chaptal,Cuvier, Lamarck and Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, -are scarcelymore favourable to the new sentimentalism. Theiropinions will one day be profoundly modified, togetherwith their interests, but for the moment, as becomes thetrue descendants they are of the preceding generation,their chief concern is the free exercise of their " thinkingfaculty," and in their eyes even the " rewarding andavenging" God of Voltaire is a mere hypothesis, inMme de Staël also wrote some poetry and essayed the drama.The authentic edition of her works is that of 1820-1821 , 17volumes, Paris, Treuttel et Wurtz.III.-Ideologists, Men of Science, and Philologists.The role of the ideologists , -who were long regarded as merely"the tail end of the Encyclopedia " and treated in consequence byhistorians , has recently been given its rightful importance by M.Ferraz in his Histoire de la Philosophie pendant la Révolution[ 1789-1804] , Paris , 1889; —and by M. F. Picavet in his Idéologues,Paris, 1891. The Ideologists included Saint- Lambert, Sieyès,Garat, Tracy, and Laromiguière, and they were frequently to bemet with in the offices of the newspaper La Décade philosophique.-They frequently met, too, at the house of Mme Helvétius atAuteuil [ Cf. Guillois, Le salon de Mme Helvétius, Paris, 1894; andLa Marquise de Condorcet, Paris, 1896]; —or at that of Condorcet'swidow, who had become the intimate friend of the tribune MaillaGarat. They were the uncompromising champions of the purestEncyclopedic principles, -which they defended against Chateaubriand, Mme de Staël and the First Consul [ Cf. Jules Simon, Uneacadémie sous le Directoire, Paris, 1884] .Some of them had leanings towards science; - Cabanis, forexample, the author of that famous book Les Rapports du physiqueet du moral, 1802; -or were even genuine men of science: Lamarck406 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREwhose absence the movements of the heavenly bodiesor the manufacture of beetroot sugar would go onequally well. The critics and the erudite holdsimilar opinions. "That the French genius needsto be regenerated by an infusion of more generousblood " is not at all the view of such men as Daunou,Marie-Joseph Chénier, or Hoffmann, of an entire generation of skilled Hellenists that included Clavier, Villoison ,and Boissonnade, of Courier himself, the author of theLettre à M. Renouard (1810) , an artillery officer whowould give the Génie du christianisme, La littérature,Delphine, Attala and Héloïse into the bargain for anunpublished manuscript of Longinus or an Homericscholiast! Furthermore, they are all suspicious of, theyor Etienne Geoffroy Saint - Hilaire, for instance; —and this is the placeto note the prodigious development between 1789 and 1810 or 1815of the natural sciences [ Cf. Cuvier, Rapport sur les progrès dessciences naturelles]; —the methods in use which are about to creepinto criticism and literature. -The articles in the Decade [ Cf. Picavet,loc. cit.] .-Sainte- Beuve belonged, to begin with, to this school [ Cf.Causeries du lundi, vol. xiii . ]; —and it will be seen that AugusteComte was a product of it as well.Another group which included Volney, Daunou, Guiguené andFauriel; and with which Raynouard had points in common; -givea new direction to exegesis [ Cf. Volney, Leçons d'histoire, 1795;Recherches sur l'histoire ancienne, 1814] -or lend precision [ Cf.Daunou] and significance [ Cf. Fauriel] to literary history; -converting it from a mere subject of curiosity into what will be calledlater on " the science of the products of the human intelligence "[Cf. Sainte-Beuve's articles on Fauriel and Daunou in his Portraits contemporains, vol. v.; and Renan, L'avenir de la science,1890]; while from the " philosophy of history " as understood byVoltaire, they derive a conception of history which, though moreor less open to discussion, is genuinely philosophic. -It is right toadd that the consequences of their efforts do not make themselvesfelt at once, and in the meantime the development of the newliterature goes on, not merely unaffected by, but in opposition to their influence.MODERN TIMES 407believe they have grounds to be suspicious of, the"Baroness " de Staël and the " Viscount " de Chateaubriand! They seem to be afraid that these " aristocrats "may one day contemplate reinstating the old régime;-and they are greatly mistaken in entertaining this fear;they have too little confidence in the work of the Revolution! --but who will be surprised at their apprehensionson the morrow of the Restoration, and if attention bedirected no longer to the author of the Monarchie selonla Charte, or to that of the Considérations sur la Révolution Française, but to the Vicomte de Bonald, ComteJoseph de Maistre and the Abbé de Lamennais?99 These men, of a surety, are as much " politicians aswriters, and if their earlier works, -which coincide withIV. -Louis-Gabriel-Ambroise de Bonald [ Milhau, 1754; †1840, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES .-H de B [onald] , Notice sur la vie et les ouvragesde M. le vicomte de Bonald, Paris, 1841; -Barbey d'Aurevilly, LesProphètes du passé, 1851; -Sainte- Beuve, Causeries du lundi, vol . iv. ,1851; -A. Nettement, Histoire de la littérature sous la Restauration,Paris, 1853; -Em. Faguet, Politiques et moralistes au XIXe siècle,Paris, 1891; -Henry Michel, L'idée de l'État, Paris, 1895.2. THE THEORIST OF AUTHORITY. -Two of his sayings are inseparably associated with his name:-" man is an intelligence served byorgans ";-and " literature is the expression of society. "-He is theauthor, too, as is well known, of a bold paradox concerning the originof language; —and of a remarkable essay on the subject of divorce.—Above everything else, however, he is the " theorist of authority "; -and the man who, -combating the author of the Esprit des Lois;-or that of the Contrat social, -has done more than anybody elseto establish that society is the work neither of men, nor of nature;—but of God Himself. -Less eloquent than Jean- Jacques Rousseauand less ingenious than Montesquieu; -he has yet contrived to find,with a view to varying his enunciation of this his unique or principalidea, -forms of expressions which are not only varied; -but often ofthe utmost brilliancy and precision . —There are thinkers who " write 'and others who " speak ": Bonald " formulates ";-and for all these408 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREthe issue of L'Allemagne or are even anterior to theGénie du christianisme-attracted but little notice, theirtalent, nurtured in solitude and ripened in obscurity,now shines forth with all the more brilliancy. Allthree of them enter the arena at the same moment; andit will be seen, it ought to be seen, if their efforts beregarded attentively, that it is against individualism thatall three of them more especially direct their attacks,though they are not acting in concert, and are even asyet unacquainted with one another. Their contemporaries do not realise the situation at once, and publicopinion insists on regarding the Essai sur l'indifférenceen matière de religion ( 1817 ) , Bonald's Recherches philosophiques (1818) , his Pape (1819) , his Soirées de Saintreasons, having been the metaphysician of the religious revival, —he deserves more attention than is often given him in histories ofliterature.3. THE WORKS. -Bonald's chief works are: his Théorie du pouvoirpolitique et religieux dans la société civile, 1796; -his Essai analytique sur les lois de l'ordre social, 1800; -his Divorce considérérelativement à l'état domestique et à l'état de société, 1801; —hisLégislation primitive, 1802; -his Recherches philosophiques sur lespremiers objets de nos connaissances morales, 1818; -two volumes(1819) of articles that appeared in the Mercure de France from 1801to 1810; -a few speeches and various short political or religiouswritings.The best editions of Bonald's works are Le Clère's edition, Paris,1817, 1819, 1843; —and Nigne's edition , Paris, 1864 .V. Joseph Marie de Maistre [Chambéry, 1753; † 1821 ,Turin] .1. THE SOURCES. -Sainte- Beuve, Port- Royal, iii . chap. 14, 1837-1839; Portraits littéraires, ii . , 1843; and Causeries du lundi, vol. iv. ,1851, vol. xv. , 1860; -Barbey d'Aurevilly, Les prophètes du passé,1851; -Edmond Scherer, Mélanges de critique religieuse, Paris,1853; -L. Binaut, Joseph de Maistre in the Revue des Deux Mondes,December, 1858, and February, 1861; -A. Nettement, Histoire de lalittérature française pendant la Restauration , Paris, 1853; -AlbertMODERN TIMES 409Pétersbourg (1821), and Lamennais' second volumemerely as the most furious onslaught of which thephilosophy of the eighteenth century has as yet beenthe object. After having previously attempted to destroythe authority of Montesquieu, Bonald-the most systematic, and in appearance, but in appearance only, theleast impassioned of the three-now measures himselfwith Condorcet and Condillac . Joseph de Maistre, onhis side, has taken in hand Bacon and Voltaire, muchas Voltaire formerly tried to account for Pascal andBossuet. His choice of Voltaire as the object of hisattacks is the explanation of more than one analogythat may be pointed out between his manner andthat of Bossuet. He has fought his way, so toBlanc, Mémoires et correspondance diplomatique de M. de Maistre,Paris , 1858-1861; -G. Merlet, Tableau de la littérature françaisesous le premier Empire, Paris, 1877; -Em. Faguet, Politiques etmoralistes au XIXe siècle, Paris, 1891; -F. Descotes, Joseph de Maistreavant la Révolution, Paris, 1893; and Joseph de Maistre pendant laRévolution, Paris, 1895; —M. de Lescure, Le comte Joseph de Maistre,Paris, 1893; -G. Cogordan, Joseph de Maistre in the " GrandsÉcrivains français " series , Paris, 1894 .2. THE MAN AND THE WRITER. -His birth, youth, and education[Cf. Descostes, loc. cit. ]; -his early writings: Éloge historique deVictor- Amédée III. , 1775; and Adresse à la Convention nationale,1794. His stay at Lausanne. -Cinq Paradoxes à la Marquise deM***, 1795 [published in 1851]; -and of the importance of a studyof this work with a view to defining J. de Maistre's talent; -—sincethe book is proof that none of his contemporaries had a greatertaste for paradox; -or greater leanings towards preciosity. -LesConsidérations sur la France, 1796. —The King of Sardinia appointshim his Minister at Saint Petersburg, 1802; -where he resides until1817; -and composes his principal works: the Essai sur le principegénérateur des constitutions politiques, 1810; -the Traité dePlutarque sur les délais de la justice divine (translation) , 1815; —his book Du Pape, 1819; -his Soirées de Saint- Pétersbourg; -andhis Essai sur la philosophie de Bacon.Of the general inspiration of J. de Maistre's writings; -and that it410 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREspeak, through Voltaire to Bossuet, and identifyinghimself as Bossuet had done with the idea of Providence, of which he might be termed the lay apostle,the grandeur of his doctrine is reflected at times in thecharacter of his style. Lamennais, on the other hand,the most impetuous, violent, and gloomy of the three,singles out Rousseau, -the Rousseau of the Discours surl'inégalité and of the Contrat social, with whom he willone day fall into line! The public, be it repeated , doesnot always understand them, does not clearly perceivewhither they are bound, does not gauge the significanceof their principles. They themselves have no inkling ofthe amalgamation that will shortly be made by certainthinkers between their ideas and those now coming intois in accord with that of Bonald's writings. -Both propose to reascendthe stream of thought; -to effect the overthrow of the philosophy ofthe eighteenth century; -and to re-establish the authority of religionon its ruins. -De Maistre's superiority over Bonald lies in his havingbeen mixed up to a certain extent in affairs of State; -and moreespecially in his having possessed an admirable gift for writing; —agift enhanced by his aristocratic superciliousness; —and his indefatig- able " combativity. "The " theologian of Providence "; —and how all de Maistre's workshinge upon his desire to prove that the world is governed by God.-The Considérations sur la France; —and that, guided by the idea ofProvidence, nobody has been more alive than de Maistre to the"apocalyptic " character of the French Revolution. -His admirationfor France; and how it shows itself even in his invectives. -Hisbooks on the Gallican Church and on the Pope; -and that theirobject is to show the injury France has done itself; -every time ithas become estranged from the Papacy; -considered as the instrument of Providence on earth; -and the centre that cannot bedeparted from without error. -The Soirées de Saint-Pétersbourg; —how characteristic is the sub- title of the book: " Conversations onthe temporal government of Providence "; -and of the connectionbetween the Soirées de Saint- Pétersbourg and the Examen de laphilosophie de Bacon; -if what de Maistre attacked in particular inVoltaire was the philosophy of the Essai sur les Mœurs; -and inMODERN TIMES 411existence of Saint- Simon and his school . Still, they havea following, and are more successful in their onslaught onthe Encyclopedists, the Ideologists, and the Revolutionthan was Mme de Staël with all her intelligence orChateaubriand with all his genius; though they are moreimbued than they believe with the spirit of the revolution,a fact that makes them witnesses to its " satanic " orapocalyptic character-to use the expression of Joseph deMaistre.It cannot be doubted that the Méditations, whichappear in 1820, and the first Odes, which are dated 1822,are due in a certain measure to their inspiration. Bonaldand Lamennais, both of them frequenters of the aristocratic salons of Paris, are among the privileged few tothe Essai sur les Mours the Baconian conception which, by excludingthe consideration of final causes, -excludes all action of God Himselfon the world.Joseph de Maistre's style; -and that in certain respects it is akindred style to that of Bossuet; -which may be explained by thefact that, among all the truths of religion, they both of them concernedthemselves more especially with the idea of Providence. -A furtherresemblance between Bossuet and de Maistre lies in the fact that theessence of their character, —which was gentleness, -differs from thecharacter of their style; -in the same way, and so to speak to thesame extent . -As, however, they are separated from each other by acentury; and that the century is that of the Encyclopedia; --deMaistre has an insight into matters of which Bossuet was necessarilyignorant;-while he possesses faults Bossuet was without.De Maistre's insulting violence in controversy; and his tendencyto paradox. -His defence of capital punishment [ Soirées, 1st conversation];-of war [ Ibid. , 7th conversation];-of the Inquisition[Lettres à un gentilhomme russe] .-Whether he would not havedone his cause greater service had he displayed greater moderation?—and that in any case, had he done so, more credit would beaccorded him; -if not for certain strange theories with which hiswritings are strewn; -and certain more than hazardous predictions[Cf. Considérations, ch. iv. ]; —at any rate for a number of fruitfuland profound ideas; -to which he gave his imprint; -if indeed412 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREwhom the Méditations are first communicated [ Cf.Correspondance de Lamartine, April 13, 1819] . Lamartinewrites to de Maistre (March 17 , 1820): " M. de Bonaldand you, Monsieur le Comte . have founded animperishable school of lofty philosophy and Christianpolitics ... it will bear fruit , of a kind that may bejudged in advance. " To his contact with or to theconversations of de Maistre, Lamennais, and Bonald,he owed, perhaps, that vigour and decision whichweaned him for a moment from the vagueness inwhich he aspired to lose himself; and it is possiblethat in the absence of their influence the Méditationswould have been merely " pure as air, sad as death, andsoft as velvet " [ Cf. his letter of April 13, 1819 ] . Again,it ought not to be said that he was the first to promulgatethem.3. THE WORKS. -Joseph de Maistre's works include: his Considérations sur la France, 1796, a work it is of extreme interest tocompare with the writings of Burke and Fichte;-the Essai sur leprincipe générateur des constitutions politiques, 1810-1814; -hisbook Du Pape, 1819; -the Église gallicane, 1891 [posthumous];-the Soirées de Saint- Pétersbourg, 1821; —and the Examen de laphilosophie de Bacon, first issued in 1836.Two volumes of his Letters and Unpublished Short Writings wereissued in 1851 [Lyons, Vitte et Pérussel] by his son Comte Rudolphede Maistre; -while M. Albert Blanc edited in 1858 his PoliticalReminiscences and in 1861 his Diplomatic Correspondence [ 1811-1817] , Paris, Michel Levy.There is an edition of his complete works in 14 volumes, Lyons,Vitte et Pérussel, 1884-1886 . The last six volumes contain the twovolumes issued in 1851, M. Albert Blanc's three volumes, and sometwo hundred unpublished letters.VI.-Paul-Louis Courier [Paris, 1772; † 1825, Veretz, Indreet-Loire] .1. THE SOURCES. -Armand Carrel, Essai sur la vie et les écrits deP-L. Courier, preceding the edition of the Works, Paris, 1834 [theNotice is dated 1829]; -Sainte- Beuve, Causeries du lundi, vol. vi. ,MODERN TIMES 413there are the familiar opening lines of the first preface tothe Odes: "A dual intention underlies the issue of thisbook, a literary intention and a political intention, but inthe mind of the author, the latter is the consequence ofthe former, for poetry is only to be detected in the history ofmankind when it isjudgedfrom the pinnacle ofmonarchicalideas and religious beliefs . " Is not this the place to recallthe fact that before the publication of the Odes, VictorHugo was on terms of close intimacy with Lamennais?[Cf. Victor Hugo raconté par un témoin de sa vie, ii . 38] .Such pieces as La Vendée, Quiberon, Les Vierges de Verdunand Buonaparte, did not belie the declarations of the preface; and the author, if we are to believe Stendhal,becomes the favourite poet of the " Ultras," a destiny he1852; -A. Nettement, Littérature française sous la Restauration,Paris, 1853.2. THE MAN AND THE WRITER; -and that he deserves to be remembered if only for the originality of his figure; -while in the army, hedid little else but perpetually desert his post; -in his public life heaffected to be a " peasant, " while engaged in translating Greek authorsinto the French of Amyot; —and in his best writings he combines themost delicate sense of style with a rare rudeness of thought. —Whatwere his reasons for siding with the Liberal opposition under theRestoration; and whether the principal of them was not his failureto secure admission to the Académie des Inscriptions , 1818?—In anycase, it is from this moment onwards that he becomes irreconcilable;and that he issues his bitterest pamphlets;-though his views did notprevent his being in private life the most exacting of landlords; -the most pitiless of masters; -and the harshest of creditors;-andthat a knowledge of this side of his character makes it possible not toattribute his murder to the " bigots ";-as is still done in some histories [ Cf. Paul Albert, Littérature française au XIXe siècle, vol . ii. ] .3. THE WORKS. -Paul- Louis Courier's works comprise:-his imitations or translations of the ancients, among which may be mentionedhis translation of the Pastorals of Longinus, of some fragments ofHerodotus, and of Xenophon's short work on the leading of cavalry.The choice of this last work is pure affectation, while his translationof " Daphnis and Chloe " is extremely heavy and pedantic.-(2) His414 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREdeserved, seeing that neither Lamennais, Bonald, nor deMaistre had denounced more energetically " the saturnaliaof atheism and anarchy " or treated with loftier contemptthe " sophistical and licentious writings of the Voltaires ,the Diderots, and the Helvétius. "The literary effect of the Méditations and the Odes on ageneration whose favourite poets were Andrieux, Népomucène Lemercier, Casimir Delavigne, and Pierre- Jean deBéranger may be imagined. While Béranger, for example,was laboriously rhyming such songs as La bonne vieilleor Le Dieu des bonnes gens , -masterpieces it may be,but masterpieces in what would be the lowest branch ofwriting if the vaudeville did not exist, -French poetryliterary pamphlets: Lettre à M. Renouard, 1810; and the Lettre àMM. de l'Académie des Inscriptions, 1819; -and his politicalpamphlets Pétition aux deux Chambres, 1816; -Lettres au Rédacteur du "Censeur, " 1819-1820; -Simple Discours (written in connection with the subscription for the acquisition of Chambord) , 1821; -Procès de Paul- Louis Courier, 1821; -Pétition pour des Villageoisqu'on empêche de danser, 1822; -and the Pamphlet des pamphlets,1824. (3) Diverse fragments, the most interesting of which is theConversation chez la duchesse d'Albany (composed in 1812); —and(4) a volume of Letters, often reprinted under the title Lettres deFrance et d'Italie (1797-1812) .The best edition of Paul- Louis Courier's works is that in fourvolumes, Paris , 1834, Paulin and Perrotin.VII. -Pierre-Jean de Béranger [ Paris, 1780; † 1857, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -Sainte- Beuve, Portraits contemporains, vol. i. ,1832, 1833; Causeries du lundi, vol. ii . , 1850; and Nouveaux lundis,vol. i. , 1861.Béranger, Ma Biographie; also his Correspondence edited by M. Paul Boiteau in 1860.Gustave Planche, Revue des Deux Mondes, June, 1850; -EmileMontégut, Nos morts contemporains, 1857 and 1858; -SavinienLapointe (the cobbler poet) Mémoires sur Béranger, 1857; —ErnestRenan, La Philosophie de Béranger, in the Journal des Débats,December 17, 1859; -Paul Boiteau, Vie de Béranger, Paris, 1861; —PIERRE-JEAN DE BÉRANGER.

MODERN TIMES 415in the Méditations was reaching heights it had neverperhaps attained to, and in the hands of the poet of theOdes the " bronze lyre " was yielding notes such as hadnot been heard since the time of Ronsard. That thescale of " values " had changed could only be doubted bya few belated Voltairians. What till quite lately hadbeen taken to be poetry was now seen to be a merecaricature or spurious imitation of the genuine article.Was there any comparison between the lofty design andvigorous colouring of Hugo's Buonaparte, or the voluptuous melancholy of the Lac, and the prosaic declamationof a Messénienne on " the need of union after the departure of the foreigners "? The pseudo-lyricism of theN. Peyrat, Béranger et Lamennais, 1861; -Arthur Arnould, Béranger,ses amis et ses ennemis, Paris, 1864; -Jules Janin, Béranger et sontemps, Paris, 1866; -Brivois, Bibliographie de l'œuvre de Béranger,Paris, 1876; -Legouvé's Notice preceding the Béranger des Écoles,1894.2. THE SONGWRITER; -and, in this connection, of the song inFrance prior to Béranger. -Panard [ Cf. Marmontel's Memoirs]; -and Desaugiers [ Cf. Chansons et Poésies diverses de Désaugiers,Paris, 1827, Ladvocat] .—The heartrending character of their gaiety;and the vulgarity of sentiment displayed by their songs. -But if it isdesired to trace Béranger's " ancestors,"-it is necessary to go backto the Chansonnier Maurepas; -and his work is then found to be theresult of a combination of the political song:-the erotic song; -andthe " Bacchic " song; -but, on the other hand, there is nothingwhatever of the " popular " vein in his work. —Of a serious error thatis still made in this connection; —and that there is nothing in theentire work of Béranger, -which recalls either the customary melancholy; or the habitual frankness; -or the naïve generosity of thepopular mind; his songs, on the contrary, bring the expression ofwhat is most "bourgeois " in the French temperament.Of another error made in connection with Béranger; -and consisting in representing him as a " simple, easy-going fellow " of thestamp of La Fontaine; -who himself was nothing of the kind [ Cf.above article LA FONTAINE]; -the truth being that he could hardlyhave displayed more unfairness, perfidy, and cunning than he did in416 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREclassicists, of a Chênedolle, a Fontanes, a Lebrun-Pindare,even of Jean-Baptiste Rousseau himself ceased to exist inpresence of this revelation of a new poetry. For a fewyears to come, efforts will be made, solely for politicalreasons, to bolster up the doomed traditions, but theirsupporters will be restricted at last to readers of theConstitutionnel, to a few aged Academicans, and to themost narrow-minded and retrograde element in the socalled "liberal " bourgeoisie.There were other symptoms that pointed to a revolution in literature, and first among them was a growingand, while not a new, a henceforth reasoned enthusiasmfor foreign literatures. This disposition was neither thehis conflict with the Government of the Restoration [ Cf. Le Fils duPape, l'Enfant de bonne Maison, les Révérends pères and le Vieuxcaporal] .—It would be impossible to flatter more skilfully passions,which Béranger does not seem to have shared himself;;-as - it wouldbe impossible to turn to more ingenious account, with a view tosowing suspicion and hatred, a more shallow [ Cf. La Nature, le Dieudes bonnes gens]; —or more ignoble philosophy [ Cf. les Filles, les DeuxSœurs, etc. ]; —or a more indecent suggestiveness [ Cf. le Vieux célibataire, les Cinq étages, etc . ] .—There is no need to go further afield forthe reasons of Béranger's popularity; -reasons moreover which are itsjustification;-if this taste for suggestiveness; -this refusal to think;-and this spirit of opposition for the sake of opposition; —are unfortunately among the most assured characteristics that are included inthe expression " gauloiserie. "Still , it cannot be contested that there is infinite art in certain ofBéranger's songs [ Cf. la Bonne vicille, le Vieux célibataire, les Cinqétages, le Vieux caporal, etc . ] .-There is art in his choice of hischoruses; —which almost always express in a single verse the themeof the entire song; -while he always leads up to the chorus with theutmost ease and naturalness [ Cf. Mon habit, les Cartes, la Fille dupeuple, le Vieux vagabond] .-There is still more art in the way in which his songs are 66 composed ";-they may be said to be so many"genre " pictures; -appealing directly to the eye;-and invitingillustration. Of the depiction of bourgeois life in Béranger's songs;-and that there exists no surer evidence respecting; -or moreMODERN TIMES 417least unexpected nor the least natural result of thegreat wars of the Empire. Over a period of twentyyears a mixture of races to which nothing similar hadbeen seen for centuries, had taken place on the battlefields of Europe, where the blood that had been shed hadended in cementing, as it were, a sort of Europeancommunity. " We should aim at having a Europeanbent of mind, " wrote Mme de Staël, around whom, atCoppet, an entire school had grown up, whose labours ,after perhaps inspiring hers, now complete, continue andprolong them. Through the wide-open breach thereenter not only Shakespeare, accepted without restriction ,but the Italians Alfieri and Manzoni, and the Germansaccurate and more faithfully limned representation of the life of thelower French middle- class between 1815 and 1830. -Again there ismuch art in the way in which the rhythm of the Songs is suited to the sentiments they convey;;—-as also in the choice of expression;-and in the clearness of the style. —Of Béranger as a writer; —and thatsome few rather ridiculous lines do not prevent his having a right tothis title. As has been said of him with propriety; " he is a greatprose writer who has fitted his prose with rhymes. "On the other hand it is difficult to term him a poet; -thoughdoubtless he has here and there been successful in giving poeticexpression to such poetry as is occasionally offered by bourgeois life[Cf. la Bonne vieille, le Vieux célibataire]; —and, in this connection, of the poetry of old age in Béranger's work. -Occasionally, too,he has struck a patriotic note [ Cf. le Vieux drapeau, le Cinq mai, lesSouvenirs du peuple] .-In general, however, he lacked force and, stillmore, elevation when expressing strong sentiments. -He was alsowanting in generosity of feeling; -and far from having raised theSong to the level of the Ode; -it was on the contrary the triumphof the Ode; -and in general of Romantic lyricism; -that openedpeople's eyes to the " prosaicness of Béranger's songs.Béranger's correspondence; -and that incomplete though it is, —though the four volumes of it we possess may not justify theenthusiasm of his admirers; -it is a part of his work that meritsattention. It contains nothing very striking; —and nothing that isevidence of conspicuous large- mindedness; -but it completes our28418 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURESchiller, Goethe, Burger, Novalis, and Hoffmann, to befollowed shortly by the philosophers Kant, Fichte, andSchelling. Nor must the Scotchmen Thomas Reid andDugald Stewart be forgotten. The events of 1815accelerate the movement, which is furthered, too, by thereturning emigrants, of whom it would be a mistake tobelieve that they have " neither forgotten anything norlearned anything " during their exile: they have learnedEnglish or German, and that France does not constitute the universe. In this way, during the early yearsof the Restoration, between 1815 and 1825, there comesinto existence a common mode of thinking and still moreof feeling; the limits of the old horizon are extended,insight into Béranger's character; -and shows us, behind theBéranger of popular legend, a dexterous, cautious , and calculatingman; and a writer who has never been surpassed for the skillwith which he turned his popularity to the utmost account.—The literary criticism in Béranger's correspondence [ Cf. SainteBeuve, Nouveaux lundis, vol. i . ] .-His last years, —his death, —andhis "funeral. "3. THE WORKS. -Béranger's works are practically restricted to hisSongs, of which the principal original editions are those of 1815 ,Paris, Eymery; -1821 , Paris, Firmin Didot; -1825, Plassan; -1827, Brussels; —1834, Paris, Perrotin; -and 1857 (his last songs) ,Perrotin.Sainte- Beuve [ Causeries du lundi, vol . ii . , 1850] has proposed thefollowing more critical classification of his songs: ( 1 ) Old-fashionedsongs, in the style of Panard and Desaugiers: le Roi d'Yvetot; laGaudriole; M. Grégoire;—(2) Sentimental songs, such as le Bonveillard, le Voyageur, les Hirondelles;-(3) Party and patrioticsongs [among which one is surprised to see Sainte-Beuve, who isusually less accommodating, include le Dieu des bonnes gens]; —(4) Satirical songs, such as le Ventru or the Clefs du Paradis;—(5)Poetic songs, such as les Contrebandiers, le Vieux vagabond, les Bohémiens.We have already said that to the Songs have to be added Béranger'sMemoirs, Ma Biographie, 1857, and his Correspondence in fourvolumes.MODERN TIMES 419or rather they disappear, and literary cosmopolitanismcomes into being. It differs from the old humanismin this, that instead of taking Greco-Latin culture forits foundation, it proposes to appropriate, to assimilate as completely as possible, what is most national inthe " national " literatures; and the universality it aimsat is an universality, not of abstraction or generalisation ,but of composition, under the sway of which each element,far from renouncing, will develop its originality owing toits very contrast with the other elements.To this evolution of criticism corresponds a parallelevolution of history, or rather the two are identical, ifspace and time, as Kant has just demonstrated, formVIII.-Hugues- Félicité- Robert de Lamennais [ Saint- Malo,1783; 1854, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -Lamennais' Correspondence; -Sainte- Beuve,Portraits contemporains, 1832, 1834, 1836; and Nouveaux lundis,vol. i . , 1861, and vol. xi . , 1868.... Censure de cinquante-six propositions extraites des écrits de M. de Lamennais par plusieurs évêques de France, Toulouse, 1836; -the papal Encyclical Mirari vos . . . printed in Lamennais' volumeLes Affaires de Rome, 1836-1837; -and the Encyclical Singulari nos ... to be found in the same work.Ange Blaize, Essai biographique sur M. de Lamennais, 1857; -E. Forgues, Notes et Souvenirs, preceding his edition of theCorrespondance de Lamennais, 1859; -Ernest Renan, Lamennais etses écrits, 1857 [ in his Essais de morale et de critique]; -EdmondScherer, Lamennais, 1859 [in his Mélanges de critique religieuse];-Louis Binaut, Lamennais et sa philosophie, in the Revue des DeuxMondes, August 15, 1860; -Ravaisson, Rapport sur les progrès de laphilosophie en France au XIXe siècle , 1868;-P. Janet, La philosophiede Lamennais, 1890; -E. Spuller, Lamennais, Paris, 1892;-A.Roussel, of the Oratory of Rennes, Lamennais, d'après des documentsinédits, Rennes, 1892; -Mercier, S. J., Lamennais d'après sacorrespondance et de récents travaux, Paris, 1893;-P. Le Cannet,La Jeunesse de Montalembert, Paris , 1896; -Em. Faguet, Politiqueset Moralistes, Paris, 1898.420 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREtogether but one and the same category of pure reason.The sentiment of the diversity of places is inseparablefrom that of the diversity of periods; and the twocombined constitute local colour. The honour of havingrevealed the importance of this conception to his contemporaries must be ascribed to Augustin Thierry, for withoutany desire to belittle the merit that accrues to Vitet for hisEtats de Blois, or to Vigny for his Cinq- Mars, it must yetbe borne in mind that these two works were preceded in1825 bythe Histoire de la Conquête de l'Angleterre par lesNormands. The part taken by Augustin Thierry inthe formation of the doctrine of Romanticism has beenunderestimated, and it is time to repair this injustice,2. THE RÔLE OF LAMENNAIS; -and that nobody perhaps, in recenttimes, has exerted a more considerable influence on the history ofreligious ideas.Lamennais' birth and early education. -His early writings: theRéflexions sur l'état de l'Église en 1808, suppressed by the Imperialpolice; —and the Tradition de l'Église sur l'institution des évêques,1814. His visit to England, 1814-1815; —and the issue of the firstvolume of the Essai sur l'indifférence en matière de religion , 1817.—Emotion aroused by this work; -an emotion that is increased by thepublication of the second volume in 1821. -Lamennais, attacked bya portion of the French clergy, -is defended by de Maistre andBonald [ Cf. de Maistre, Correspondence, September, 1820; andBonald, Mélanges] .-He replies himself to these attacks in hisDéfense de l'Essai sur l'indifférence, 1821; the first effect ofwhich work is to make him numerous enemies at Rome. -He visitsRome, 1824. -His return to France. -Foundation of the Mémorialcatholique and of the Association for the Defence of Religion.-Publication of the Progrès de la Révolution et de la guerre contrel'Église, 1828-1829. -Lamennais' conflict with M. de Frayssinous andM. de Vatimesnil. -The revolution of 1830, and the foundation of thenewspaper l'Avenir. -Fresh difficulties. -Second journey to Rome,1832 .--Lamennais' submission, dissolution of the Catholic Association,and definite suppression of l'Avenir, 1832 [ Cf. Affaires de Rome] .-Lamennais' difficult situation. -He publishes his Paroles d'uncroyant, 1834. -Prodigious effect of this book [ Cf. Sainte- Beuve,MODERN TIMES 421since it may be that of all the conquests made byRomanticism it is Thierry who realised one of the mostdurable.Ought a like reparation to be accorded the writers onthe Globe or, on the contrary, has not somewhat toomuch been made, in almost all histories of literature,of the group whose principal members were Ampère andRémusat, Dubois and Magnin? Goethe, who read themwith an assiduous attention which was explained in partby the terms in which they were accustomed to speak ofhim, esteemed them " supremely daring "! [ Cf. Conversations with Eckermann] . To- day, we are rather inclinedto smile at the daring of Jean-Jacques Ampère andPortraits contemporains, 1834] .-The Encyclical Singulare nos ...1834, and the condemnation of Lamennais. -He rejoins by issuingthe volume entitled Les Affaires de Rome, 1836, -which brings to aclose the first series of his works and the first period of his life .Whether the second period of his life differs as profoundly fromthe first as Lamennais himself believed? —and that in reality, althoughthe means he resorted to were different, -it might almost be contendedthat the end he had in view remained substantially the same.His aim was to establish the sovereignty of religion amongst men;-and it was to this end that he wrote the Essai sur l'indifférence; —while as several ways of attempting to effect his purpose were opento him; he began by calling on " the old- established sovereigntiesto league themselves " against the growing progress of irreligion.—Perceiving, however, that the old - established sovereignties were onlydisposed to defend such of the elements of religion as they believedto be serviceable to their own interests; -and seeing that in consequence of their attitude the suspicion with which they wereregarded by the political parties tended to fasten on religion itself; -he conceived the idea of separating religion and politics; —and, asRenan appropriately puts it, of constituting a religious party; —anidea which was the starting- point of the movement which has sincecome to be known as " Liberal Catholicism."Rome, for reasons of which she was alone the judge, -though theywere not without their political value in 1836 , -refused to follow hislead, or to allow herself to be enticed into adopting this policy.-422 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURECharles Magnin; and which of their writings seem tocall for mention? Let it simply be said then that theyhad their share of influence both as continuators ofMme de Staël , and as having formulated the principleof the distinction between " literary " works and worksthat do not belong to literature. In this latter connection, it might be said that the theory of art for art iscontained in germ in their writings, surprised thoughthey were destined to be to see it evolved therefrom.They also helped Romanticism to emancipate itself froma political tutelage it was beginning to find burdensome.For all these reasons, even if they cease to be read,they will not be grudged the gratitude that is due toLamennais' rupture with the Papacy was due to motives which hehas set forth himself [ Cf. Affaires de Rome]; —and 'in this way he wasbrought to state the question in the following terms: " What isChristianity considered in its relation to human societies? What isit that characterises it? What order of thoughts and sentiments hasit developed in the world? On what fundamental ideas of right andjustice has it established the mutual relations between men?—But tothe question stated in these terms, -which are tantamount to thesuppression of history, he could only give one answer; -he whoat an earlier date had founded religion itself on the authority of"universal consent "; —and this answer was that Christianity anddemocracy are one and the same thing.We have here the origin of what has since been called " socialChristianity " or " Christian Socialism ";-the irresistible trend ofwhich is towards pure Socialism , -directly it breaks away fromauthority and tradition. - Nevertheless we return to the point fromwhich we started; and Lamennais' error does not consist in hishaving contradicted himself; -but in his having desired to establishbetween the two terms religion and democracy, —an identity whichwould render them always convertible; -while it left him noalternative but to be a pure democrat, —should the Church refuseto admit this identity.Lamennais' other writings; -and how inferior they are to hisearlier productions; -if an exception be made in favour of his Esquissed'une philosophie, 1841-1846; -which has been said with truth toMODERN TIMES 423those who are sincere lovers of literature and who faithfully serve its interests-though without contributingmuch to its glory. In the articles of the Globe, as inthe lectures at the Sorbonne, towards the same period,of Villemain, Guizot and Cousin , the old and the newæsthetics, -university criticism and Romantic criticism , -endeavoured to effect their mutual reconciliation: aneffort attended, it must be confessed, with only a limitedmeasure of success.Numerous definitions have been given of Romanticism,and still others are continually being offered, and all oralmost all of them contain a part of the truth. Mme deStaël was right when she asserted in her Allemagne thatbe " a philosophy of evolution " [ Cf. Paul Janet, La philosophie deLamennais]; —while it contains some of the finest passages he haswritten [ Cf. his Esthétique] .- Still, his great works are his earlyworks:-and it is by them that the writer must be judged. -He isone of the most powerful of contemporary writers , —but his peculiarityis that while his style is one of the least " personal " that can bementioned, ―few authors have held " stronger " ideas. His style, too,which was very harsh to begin with [ Cf. Essai sur l'indifférence,vols. i . and ii . ] ,-softened down as he grew older [ Cf. his accounts ofhis journey in the Affaires de Rome]; -while if there are traces ofimitation and declamation in the Paroles d'un croyant, -there ispoetry as well .3. THE WORKS.-There are two editions of Lamennais' completeworks, one in twelve volumes, Paris, 1836-1837, P. Daubrée andCailleux;-and the other in ten volumes, Paris , 1844, Pagnerre. -Botheditions are very incomplete, and to the writings contained in theseeditions must be added: -Amschaspands et Darvands, 1843; -Ledeuil de la Pologne, 1846; -the Esquisse d'une philosophie, 1841–1846;-the Mélanges philosophiques et politiques, 1856; -his translation of the Gospels; -and his translation of the Divine Comedy[posthumous] , 1855-1858.Of his correspondence, still very incomplete, has been publishedup to now: 2 vols . in 1859 , Paris, Paulin; —2 vols . in 1863, Paris ,Dentu;-1 vol. in 1884 (Correspondance avec M. de Vitrolles),Paris, Charpentier; -1 vol. in 1897 (Correspondance avec Monta-424 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURE66 Paganism and Christianity, the North and the South,antiquity and the Middle Ages, chivalry and the institutions of Greece and Rome, " having divided between themthe history of literature, Romanticism in consequence, incontrast to Classicism, was a combination of chivalry, theMiddle Ages, the " literatures of the North " and Christianity [ Cf. De l'Allemagne, part ii . , chap. ii. ] . It shouldbe noted, in this connection, that some thirty years laterHeinrich Heine, in the book in which he will rewrite thatof Mme de Staël, will not give such a very different ideaof Romanticism! On the other hand, Stendhal, for hispart, was not wrong when he wrote in 1824: " Romanticism is the art of acquainting the nations with thoselembert) , Paris, Perrin; -and 1 vol. in 1898 ( Correspondance avecBenoit d'Azy) , Paris , Perrin.IX.-Stendhal (Marie- Henri Beyle) [Grenoble, 1783; † 1842,Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -Journal de Stendhal, Paris, 1888; Vie de HenriBrûlard, Paris, 1890; Souvenirs d'égotisme, 1892, posthumous workspublished by M. Casimir Stryienski; -R. Colomb, Notice sur la vie etles ouvrages de Beyle, preceding Hetzel's edition of the Chartreuse deParme, 1846.H. de Balzac's article [ 1840] printed at the end of Hetzel'sedition of the Chartreuse de Parme;-P. Mérimée, H. B., Paris,1850;-Sainte- Beuve, Causeries du lundi, vol. ix. , 1854; -Taine,Essais de critique et d'histoire, Paris , 1857 [the article is onlyto be found in the 2nd edition]; —A. Collignon, L'art et lavie de Stendhal, Paris , 1868; -A. Paton, Henri Beyle, London,1874; Émile Zola, Les romanciers naturalistes, 1881; - P.Bourget, Essais de psychologie contemporaine, Paris, 1883;-Edouard Rod, Stendhal, in the " Grands Ecrivains français " series ,Paris, 1892.-2. THE WRITER; -and to begin with, of the traces there are in hiswork of the influence of the Ideologists and even of the Encyclopedists. Stendhal's first masters: Montesquieu, Marivaux, Duclos,Helvétius, Cabanis. -Henri Beyle's military and administrative careerMODERN TIMES 425literary works which, given the state of their customs ortheir beliefs , are susceptible of procuring them the greatestpossible degree of pleasure " [ Cf. Racine et Shakespeare].It has been remarked, however, in regard to this declaration, that, if " Romanticism " were merely equivalent to"Modernism, " Racine, Boileau, and Voltaire would havebeen Romanticists in their time, a proposition that iswholly indefensible. Shall we recall yet other definitions, that of Hugo for example? After asserting in1824, in the second preface to the Odes, " that he wasabsolutely ignorant of what was meant by the Classicschool and the Romantic school, he nevertheless definedRomanticism, three years later, in the preface to Crom1800-1814; and that he acquired early an experience of life that isuncommon among men of letters. His admiration for Napoleon[ Cf. Le Rouge et le Noir and his Vie de Napoléon] .-His longresidence at Milan, 1814-1817 and 1817-1821 [ Cf. the Chartreusede Parme, chap. i. , and the celebrated epitaph: Arrigho Beyle,Milanese] -Stendhal's early writings: Vies de Haydn, Mozart etMétastase, 1814, 2nd edition , 1817; -and the Histoire de la peinture en Italie, 1817.-His relations with Lord Byron and Destuttde Tracy. The volume entitled Amour, 1822; —and that it mighteasily pass for a work of the eighteenth century; —owing to thejejuneness and sustained irony of its tone;-to its affectation ofcynicism;—and to its desultory composition. -Still the influence ofCabanis is plainly discernible in the work [ Cf. Rapports du physiqueet du moral];-which contains, moreover, two or three new andoriginal elements; -that make of Stendhal one of the forerunners ofRomanticism. His intervention in the quarrel: Racine et Shakespeare, 1823; —and that it is worth noting that this book appeared inpart in an English magazine; -if the fact may be taken as evidenceof Beyle's cosmopolitanism.-The Promenades dans Rome, 1829; -and Le Rouge et le Noir, 1830.That Stendhal, besides helping in a general way to direct attentionto foreign literatures, supplied Romanticism with the three essentialprinciples of its aesthetic system, even although he may not haveclearly defined them. These principles are:-1. The Principle of theequivalence of the arts; -or of the possibility of a perpetual exchange426 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREwell, to be the mingling of the branches of literature, thealternating the sublime with the grotesque, and finallythe substitution, as the ideal of art, of an "effort torender character " for the realisation of beauty. Thereare further the ironical definitions contained in Musset'sLettres de Dupuis et Cotonet (1836); definitions which,although they are not so much witty as intended to beso, possess the great advantage over all the others ofbeing " successive, " and thus of putting the question asit ought to be put. The definition of Romanticism isa question neither of etymology nor of doctrine, but ofhistory; and the word " Romanticism, " having in itselfno principal or primary signification, merely conveys theof their respective " methods, "-and, in consequence, of their effects ,-between poetry, painting, and music; -2. the Principle that therepresentation of character is the essential object of art; —so far ascharacter is the expression of the physiological " temperament " ofindividuals; —and of nations; -3. The Principle of the glorificationof energy; —if his admiration for Napoleon; -for Italy; -and forEngland prove essentially that he sympathised with the resistance ofindividuals to the conventions and laws of society. He was also oneof the first to make the " cultivation of the individuality " the law ofthe development of the artist.It was due to other and different, though allied, reasons;-that hehimself outlived Romanticism; -for instance to his taste for minor orprecise and " documentary " details; -to his tendency to transformparticular incidents into laws of the intelligence or of nature;—to hisanonymous or impersonal but, in particular, " analytic " manner ofwriting;-and also, indeed, to the value of certain of his observations.-It may be questioned, however, whether the " documentary " value,and still more whether the literary value, of the Chartreuse de Parme,1839, -are as considerable as has sometimes been maintained; —or,again, whether the profoundness of the work is not often moreapparent than real? —and, in this connection , of the strange pretensionof ironists to make the reader believe that merely because they indulgein raillery he ought to credit them with being thinkers. -Stendhal'slast works: Vittoria Accoramboni, 1837; -Les Cenci; La duchessede Palliano, 1838; -L'Abbesse de Castro, 1839. -Stendhal's letter toMODERN TIMES 427different meanings which have been given it in the courseof history; in the course, that is, of time, by men and byliterary works.Still, in spite of the multiplicity of senses which havebeen attributed in turn to Romanticism by Hugo, Dumas,Vigny, Musset, Saint- Beuve, or George Sand, —to omitminor names, —and of the diversity of its characteristics,if it be essayed to isolate and determine a single featurethat shall include all the others, there would not seemto be room for long hesitation. Romanticism is aboveeverything else the triumph in literature and art of individualism, the entire and absolute emancipation of theEgo. Once again we are confronted by the influence,Balzac, 1840;-and the two sentences of it that have become famous:"The Chartreuse de Parme is written in the style of the Civil Code ";-and: " I fancy that I may perhaps meet with some success towards1880."3. THE WORKS. -Stendhal's works comprise:(1) His novels, all of which we have mentioned with the exceptionof the first: Armance, 1827; -his Chroniques italiennes , 1855; andLamiel, published in 1888 by M. Stryienski;(2) His critical works [art criticism or literary criticism ] , of whichthe principal are: the Vies de Haydn, Mozart et Métastase, 1814-1817 [ under the pseudonym of Louis César Alexandre Bombet]; —theHistoire de la peinture en Italie, 1817, by M. B. A. A.; —Rome,Naples et Florence, 1817; -Racine et Shakespeare, part i . , 1823, andpart ii. , 1825; -Vie de Rossini, 1824; -and Promenades dans Rome,Paris, 1829;(3) His miscellaneous works, of which the principal are: L'Amour,1822; - Mémoires d'un touriste, 1838; - his correspondence, twovolumes of which were published in 1855; —and a volume of Lettersto his Sister, 1892.An edition of his complete works has been issued in 13 volumes,followed by 4 volumes containing his posthumous works, Paris, 1853-1855, Calmann Lévy. There have since been added the Vie deNapoléon, 1876; and the five or six volumes published by M. CasimirStryienski.428 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREvictorious at last over the obstacles that had longstood in its way, of Rousseau and Chateaubriand. Eachof us, according to the Romanticists, is his own undisputed master. The artist and the poet, as such,are subject to but one law and as men have but oneduty it is incumbent on them to reveal themselvesin their works. Their contemporaries may ask nomore of them, and they themselves can accomplishno more without being wanting in the respect theyowe in some sort to their own originality. But as wehave insisted on this point, on various occasions, sostrongly that we may deem it useless to again lay stresson it, we shall content ourselves with adding that betweenX.-Alphonse-Marie- Louis Prat de Lamartine [ Mâcon,1790; 1869, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -Lamartine's correspondence, edited by MmeValentine de Lamartine, 1st edition, 1873-1875; and 2nd edition,1881-1882 [completer but still very incomplete]; -his Confidences,1849; his Nouvelles confidences , 1851; —his Mémoires inédits [ 1790-1815] , 1870; —and the Manuscrit de ma mère, 1871 .Sainte - Beuve, Portraits contemporains, vol . i . , 1832, 1836, 1839; andCauseries du lundi, vol. i. , 1849; and vol. iv. , 1851; -A. Vinet,Études sur la littérature française au XIXe siècle, vol. ii . , 1845; —Gustave Planche's articles in the Revue des Deux Mondes, June, 1851 ,November, 1859; -Cuvillier- Fleury, Dernières études littéraires, 1859,-Victor de Laprade, Le sentiment de la nature chez les modernes,1868; -Eugène Pelletan , Lamartine, sa vie et ses œuvres, Paris, 1869;Ch. de Mazade, Lamartine, sa vie littéraire et politique, Paris, 1870;—Emile Ollivier, Lamartine, Paris, 1874; -Ernest Legouvé, Soixantede souvenirs, Paris, 1876; — Ch. Alexandre, Souvenirs surLamartine, Paris, 1884; -F. Brunetière, La poésie de Lamartine, inthe Revue des Deux Mondes, August, 1886; and L'évolution de lapoésie lyrique, vol. i . , 1894; -Em. Faguet, XIXe siècle, 1887; -Ch. dePomairols, Lamartine, Paris, 1889; -Chamborand de Périssat,Lamartine inconnu, 1891; -F. de Reyssié, La Jeunesse de Lamartine, Paris, 1892;-Em. Deschanel, Lamartine, Paris, 1893; -JulesLemaître, Les contemporains, vol. vi. , 1895; -E. Zyromski, Lamartine,poète lyrique, Paris, 1896.ansMODERN TIMES 4291825 and 1835 there was nothing,-from the example ofByron to the " subjective idealism " of Fichte, —that didnot concur to favour this development of individualism.Moreover, this is precisely why, of all the characteristics ofRomanticism, none is more essential than individualism:by which I mean that none better explains the causes ofits rise and fall and the nature of the reaction it wasdestined to provoke.The truth is that all the other matters about whichso much noise was made-hostility to Classicism, liberty,truth in art, local colour, the imitation of foreign literatures -merely served to cover or disguise the primarypreoccupation of the period, which was self- exhibition.2. THE POET, and that whatever may have been his rôle in otherfields , whatever disdain he may have affected at times for poetry; —and finally whatever be the service he may have rendered France onone memorable occasion; -his glory will always be that he is theauthor of the Méditations and the Harmonies; -and not that hewrote the Histoire de la Restauration, or even the Histoire desGirondins.His birth and education [ Cf. his Correspondence, which is full ofprecious information] . —Lamartine's family; and of a remarkof Sainte- Beuve's: "that it is an excellent thing to come ofa sound stock. " The sentiment of nature; -and that to possessit Lamartine had no need to acquire it; -as he was imbued withit from his childhood upwards. -The religious sentiment; --and howmuch more sincere it is in Lamartine than in Chateaubriand; --or at least more " innate "; -and perhaps, too, more favourable topoetry. -Natural nobleness of Lamartine's imagination. -His earlyverses [ Cf. his Correspondence]; -and their resemblance with thoseof Chênedollé; -but still more with those of Parny.-The Elvireof the Meditations [ Cf. A. France, L'Elvire de Lamartine] .—His essays in dramatic writing and his relations with Talma. -Thepublication of the Méditations, 1819.-They produce an incomparablygreater effect than the poems of Chénier, 1819; —and give a new trendto poetry. -The Nouvelles Méditations, and the Mort de Socrate,1823. Stay in Italy. -The Dernier chant du pélerinage de ChildeHarold, 1825.-Lamartine French chargé d'affaires at Florence.-He430 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREVictor Hugo and Musset, the elder Dumas and GeorgeSand, confined their imitation of Goethe or Byronto copying their practice of living their novels, of"romancifying " their lives, of introducing themselvesinto their works, of relating and publicly confessingtheir love affairs, after the manner of Goethe inWerther, and of Byron in Don Juan: they did notimitate either the rare perseverance with which Goetheendeavoured to perfect his individuality or the heroicdeath of Byron. Similarly, if we examine what constituted liberty in their eyes, -liberty in art, and not theliberty of art, which are two very different things, —itdoubtless consisted neither in the right to choose theircomposes the Harmonies; -returns to Paris. -Reception at theFrench Academy; -publication of the Harmonies, 1830. —Heretires from his official position on the morrow of the Revolutionof 1830; -and publishes his first political writing. -He is a candidate in the Var, but fails to be elected; -he leaves for the East;-his meeting with Lady Esther Stanhope.-Return to France,1833; -publication of the Voyage en Orient, 1835; —and of Jocelyn,1836.A. The Méditations. —Of the general character of the first Méditations; and that whenthey are compared with Béranger's Songs (1816-1824); -a comparison that is almost a sacrilege; -or even with theElégies of Chénier ( 1819); -their most novel feature is found to bethat their author returns to the genuine lyric "themes ";-which areNature, Love, and Death; -themes he treats with as much elevation as there is sensuality in Chénier's verses; -and sniggering"gauloiserie " or sly epicurism in Béranger's songs. -The Mort deSocrate; -and of Lamennais' aptitude for philosophic poetry [Cf.Voltaire in his Discours sur l'homme] .-The Nouvelles Méditations[Cf. M. Pomairols, Lamartine]; —and that this work, while offeringthe characteristics of the first volume of Méditations, is further distinguished by the union of more grace [ Cf. Ischia] with more vigour[Cf. le Crucifix]; and not less sincerity with greater virtuosity[Cf. les Préludes]; -while it is at once the noblest and the mostvoluptuous work in French poetry.B. Jocelyn; -and that it has the merit in the first place;-and the?MODERN TIMES 431にsubjects, since no objection had been raised when Voltaire had gone for his subjects to America or China;nor in the right to write prose dramas, since Cromwell,Hernan , Christini, Othello , are in verse; nor cven inthe right to violate the " rules, " since what " rules "can be said to have been in force in connection withthe elegy, the ode, or the novel, and Cinq-Mars, theOrientales, Notre-Dame de Paris, the Confessions deJoseph Delorme, are they, or are they not, Romanticworks? In short, it must be admitted that the Romanticists understood liberty merely as the right to bethemselves in everything, to subordinate the “sovereignty " of the artist to no authority whatever, and to-merit is a real one; -of being the only " poem " of any considerablelength that exists in French. -Of the subject of Jocelyn; -and ofcertain objections that have been urged in this connection [ Cf. on thispoint the articles of Vinet and Em. Deschanel for one side of theargument and those of Sainte- Beuve and J. Lemaître for the other] .-That to blame Lamartine for not having married Jocelyn andLaurence;-is to blame Corneille for having separated Polyeucte andPauline; —and to forget that beyond a doubt Corneille wrote hisdrama and Lamartine his poem solely with a view to bringingabout this " separation. " —Of a comparison Sainte- Beuve has madebetween the " country clergyman's poetry, " which he pretends to admire particularly in Jocelyn; · and Wordsworth's poetry; andthat to adopt this attitude is to praise Jocelyn for its least merit; ---for while the work really possesses the merit in question; —and istraversed by a vein of familiar poetry; -it also bears the imprint ofthe poet of the Méditations; —of his sentiment of nature; —and ofhis conception of love, always as chaste in its expression as it is ardentin its passion. The work, too, displays that exuberance of inspirationand that descriptive facility which can only be found fault with onthe score that they tend to develop themselves towards an abusivedegree. Finally, Jocelyn is illustrative of that " philosophic " side.of Lamartine's poetry; —which we have already referred to in connection with the Méditations; —and which reminds the reader inplaces of Fénelon.C. The Harmonies; -and that having appeared before Jocelyn; -432 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATURErecognise no law beyond that of their caprice or theirfancy:Toujours le cœur humain pour modèle et pour maître!Le cœur humain de qui? Le cœur humain de quoi?Quand le diable y serait, j'ai mon " cœur humain " moi!Finally, if it has been possible to assert―and I believe Ihave myself made the remark-that Romanticism wasin every respect the exact opposite of Classicism , theessential, the sole reason is that Classicism had made theimpersonality of a work of art one of the conditions ofits perfection.This liberty for the artist to be himself and nothingif we deal with them after that poem; -the reason is that " beingwritten as they were felt, neither connectedly nor consecutively "; —they are the very essence of Lamartine's poetry; —when instead ofbeing kept under jealous control it is allowed to vent itself freely.—The Harmonies show the fundamental character of Lamartine'spoetry; which consists in an inability to set itself a limit; -and ina tendency towards philosophy; -and what is more, pantheisticphilosophy; -and towards vagueness and indeterminateness in consequence of its exuberance. -At the same time the object of thisremark is not to belittle the Harmonies; -since Lamartine, whilefollowing the general inspiration, attains in some passages to asgreat a precision as anywhere in his work [ Cf. Le premier regret,Milly ou la terre natale]; -but to show him losing his self- control; -unconcerned henceforth either with selecting his ideas; —or with restraining the ever more abundant flow of his improvisation; —and thus getting ready to write La chute d'un ange. Whetherit is to be regretted that Lamartine turned his attention to politics;--and that in any case, from the moment of his doing so his poeticinspiration seems to have been, if not dried up, assuredlypersonalised. "-However, he continues to occupy a place in thehistory of literature; -in virtue of some of his speeches [ Cf. L. deRonchaud, La politique de Lamartine, Paris, 1878]; -of certainof his presentiments [ Cf. E. M. de Vogué, Heures d'histoire, Paris,1893 ]; of his Histoire des Girondins, 1847; -a work in whichhistory is doubtless strangely distorted; —but certain pages of which“ un-MODERN TIMES 433-but himself, or to " refract " in himself the universe, isalso the explanation of the exuberance, richness , andbrilliancy of Romantic lyricism. There is nothing inthe French language superior to Lamartine's Méditations, to certain of the finest of Hugo's odes, -fromthe Deux Iles (1824) to the Mages (1856) , or to theNuits of Alfred de Musset. If these very great poetsdo not always interest us when they talk of themselves,they never interest us except when they talk of themselves; or rather the happenings in history and in lifeby which they themselves were stirred are the originand the theme of their songs, which do not interest uswhen they make them the vehicle merely of what iscould only have been written by a poet; -and finally in virtue ofhis personal novels: Raphaël, 1849; -the Confidences, 1849; -theNouvelles Confidences, 1851; —Graziella, 1852.-Reduced henceforthto " writing for the booksellers , " -his books and newspaper articlescontain, no doubt, some reminiscences of his past; —and in particulardisplay more critical acumen and judgment than it is somewhat thefashion to allow; -but he has ceased to influence opinion; -and hisliterary rôle is terminated nearly fifteen years before his death.3. THE WORKS. -Lamartine's Works comprise:(1) His poetry: the Méditations, 1819; —La mort de Socrate, 1823;-the Nouvelles Méditations, 1823; —the Dernier chant du pèlerinage de Childe- Harold, 1825; -the Harmonies poétiques et religieuses, 1830; -Jocelyn, 1836; -La chute d'un ange, 1838; —theRecueillements poétiques, 1839.To the above must be added the volume of Poésies inédites,published in 1873; and a certain number of youthful poems scatteredthrough the first volume of his Correspondence;(2) His novels: Raphaël, 1849; —Geneviève, 1850; -Le tailleur depierres de Saint- Point, 1851; -Graziella, 1852; —and [although theseworks contain a large amount of truth mixed up with a great dealof imagination] , --the Confidences, 1849;-and the Nouvelles Confidences, 1851;(3) The Voyage en Orient, 1832-1833;(4) The Histoire des Girondins, 1847; -and the Histoire de laRestauration, 1852, &c.;29434 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREmost singular in their own nature; whereas our entirebeing thrills in harmony with their utterances when wefind they express our own emotions reverberated, amplified and multiplied by the echo of their voice. It may besaid indeed that they were the first to reveal to us thathighest order of lyric poetry of which Ronsard hadhad but the presentiment, while Malherbe, by strikingoff in the direction of eloquence, had reduced it toa matter of laws. But the question arises, what isthe difference between eloquence and lyricism, seeingthat both are characterised by the same " movements, "the same " imagery," and the same " qualities oflanguage "? There is perhaps but one, and it is atthe same time a very slight and a very great difference.(5) The Correspondance;(6) The Cours familier de littérature.There are several editions of Lamartine's complete works: thatpublished by Gosselin in 13 vols . , Paris, 1840; —that by Furne, 8 vols. ,Paris, 1845-1849 [ in reality these editions contain only the politicalworks and the Voyage en Orient]; —and that published by the authorin 40 vols. , Paris , Rue de la Ville- l'Evêque, 1860-1863 [ which containsneither the Correspondence nor the whole of the Cours familier delittérature] .XI.-The Sorbonne Triumvirate [ 1815-1830] .Of the similarity between the careers of François Guizot [ Nîmes,1787; 1874, Val- Richer]; -Abel Villemain [ Paris, 1790; † 1870,Paris];-and Victor Cousin [ Paris, 1792; † 1867, Cannes]; —and thatit lies less in their having all three used literature as a stepping stone;-in their having all three been Minister of Public Instruction; -oreven in their having all three of them been professors at the Sorbonneand at the same period; -than in their having aroused the same mistrust or the same enthusiasm by their teaching; -spread the fame of"professorial " eloquence until it rivalled that of the eloquence of thepulpit, the tribune, or the bar; -and given the same trend to philosophy and literary criticism. -For this reason they should be takentogether; and also because, not being very original, they were lessgenuine innovators than the eloquent spokesmen of the "commonMODERN TIMES 435While the orator endeavours to give the most generalexpression possible to his emotions so as to reach thewidest and most varied audience, the poet, on the contrary, aims at giving the most individual expression heis able to the emotions that are common to everybody.Such, at any rate, was the mode of proceeding of Musset,Hugo, and Lamartine, and, longo intervallo , of the poetof Iambes or of that of the Confessions de Joseph Delorme.Yet all these writers have been reproached with being ingeneral rather orators than poets . The reproach is basedon a misconception at once of the conditions of lyricismand of the principle of Romanticism . If the writers inquestion are indeed the greatest of our lyric poets , thereason is that of all our poets they are the most perideas " of their times:--less " thinkers " than " vulgarisers "; -whileat least two of them were 66 rhetoricians " rather than genuine orators-the exception being Guizot.---All three contributed to arouse curiosity in foreign literature andaffairs -Guizot by his translations of Shakespeare and Gibbon; —andby his Histories, in writing which he had England perpetually in hismind's eye; -Villemain, by the most celebrated of his series of lectures,the Cours de littérature française au XVIIIe siècle; - in whichEnglish writers and, in particular, English political orators occupy asmuch space as French authors; —and Cousin by his " adaptations " ofthe philosophy of Reid or Dugald- Stewart and of the metaphysics ofSchelling and Hegel. -All three indulged in general criticism; —orrather in " eclecticism "; -Villemain in literature and with the greateracumen;-Cousin in philosophy and with the more ardour; - andGuizot in history and in the more formal spirit; -but without possess.ing, in reality, in Guizot's case a personal method; -in Cousin's anoriginal philosophy; -in Villemain's an artistic doctrine; -and relying merely on the guidance afforded them by their " Liberalism. "-However, if literary criticism , prior to Villemain, was based almostexclusively on the individual humour of the critic; -philosophy, priorto Cousin, on the supposed necessity of having recourse to it to combator bolster up this or that set of opinions; -and history, prior toGuizot, on the desire to find in the past arguments applicable to thepresent; all three caused general criticism to achieve considerable436 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREsonal; and because they are the most personal, they arethe most Romantic of our poets.Their irresistible leaning to take themselves as theirsubject matter is, lastly, the starting-point of all the innovations it is only just to credit them with.If theyrendered more pliant, if they, in a way, broke up theclassic alexandrine, the reason is that it was to thoughtand still more to the feelings a sort of sheath or armour,whose rigidity lent itself ill to the exigencies of whatis most personal in thought and in the feelings.sirous of expressing the more inward emotions, theRomanticists stood in need of greater freedom of movement, and it was to secure it , and to no other end, thatthey reformed the alexandrine . They also felt theDeprogress by making it rest on principles which, though more or lessdebatable, were regarded at any rate as scientific . -Finally, all three bytheir manner of treating history, philosophy, and literary criticism, —brought into view the solidarity that exists between the elements of thesame civilisation: -Guizot by including history, literature, and philosophyinhis historical generalisations; -Cousin by showing the connectionbetween Condillac's philosophy and the general spirit of the eighteenthcentury;-and Villemain by mingling history and literature.All three of them too, though in different ways, helped to direct"the century of criticism and history " into the path it was to follow;-to freshen the atmosphere of the higher French scholastic establishments; and to bring the French educational programme into harmonywith the spirit of the age. As they all lived to a considerable age; —and exercised as Ministers, Councillors , and Academicians a greatinfluence, they each of them formed a school; —and brought theuniversity into touch with " society "; -from which it may be said tohave been isolated for two centuries. -They also caused their ownspecial studies to be accorded a place in " general literature "; —andin this respect, since they did not confine their attention to France;-but followed the example set by Mme de Staël;-their influence wasEuropean as well as national; -and if only on this score they playedtheir part, from amid the seclusion of the Sorbonne, in the formationof Romanticism;-so far as that movement was an effort to emancipate literature from purely classic tradition.MODERN TIMES 437necessity of a more extended vocabulary. In this connection the following lines of Victor Hugo may be recalled:"When, in an effort to understand and to judge, I lookedon nature and on art, the language was the image of thekingdom with its vulgar sort and its nobility; poetrywas the monarchy, a word was a duke and peer, or a merecommon fellow. " The reason for what the poet says inthese famous verses has been seen above. It is that atthe period to which he refers even nature was merelyexpressed as a function of man, and man as a function ofsociety. From the moment, however, that the individualwas allowed to be wholly himself, these distinctionsdisappeared with the doctrine of which they were theexpression; every word which helped the writer to maniXII. Jacques - Nicolas - Augustin Thierry [Blois, 1795; t1856, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -Augustin Thierry, Dix ans d'études historiques,preface of 1840; -Charles Magnin, Augustin Thierry, in the Revuedes Deux Mondes, May, 1841; -A. Nettement, Histoire de la littérature française sous la Restauration, 1853; —Ernest Renan, Essaisde morale et de critique, 1857; -Pierre Dufay and René Ribour, LeCentenaire d'Augustin Thierry, Blois, 1895.2. THE TRANSFORMATION OF HISTORY; —and that it is no going toofar to attribute it to Augustin Thierry; -the bent of whose mind wasnot greatly influenced, it should be remarked in the first place, -either by the fact that he was for a time a student at the thenrecently founded École Normale Supérieure; -or by his relationswith Saint- Simon; -and the Liberal newspapers of the period ( 1820);-the Courier français, for instance. -It was to begin with Chateaubriand; and afterwards Walter Scott, who revealed to him his truevocation;-which was: (1) to introduce into history the sentiment ofthe diversity of epochs; -all, or almost all , of which had hithertobeen confounded owing to the uniformity with which they had beendepicted;—(2) to introduce into history, through the medium of thedoctrine of the irreducibleness of races, a sort of physiological fatalism;--but also a leaven of poetry;-since, as we saw in connectionwith the Medieval epopee, —all epopees are the expression of a racial438 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREfest his personality passed muster; and individualism inliterature as in politics ended in equality. And finally,was it not inevitable that in prose, as in verse, liberty inthe choice of words should be followed by liberty asregards the turning of the sentence, a more variedvocabulary by a more pliant phraseology, a revolutionin the language by a revolution in syntax?Romanticism in short, from whatever point of view itbe regarded, is found to mean individualism; or it maybe said that lyricism is the medium by means of whichindividualism came forth out of Romanticism-and viceversa. Further proof of this assertion is found in thecontagious rapidity with which all three overran , pervaded, and transformed every branch of literature betweenconflict; —and (3) finally, to show that an active preoccupation withthe present throws a flood of light on the obscurities of the past; —and leads to an understanding of their true significance.3. THE WORKS. -Augustin Thierry's works comprise: —(1 ) His Lettres sur l'histoire de France, 1820, augmented, corrected, and printed in volume form in 1827;-(2) his Histoire de laconquête de l'Angleterre par les Normands, 1825, his principal work;—(3) his Considérations sur l'histoire de France, which is an introduction to the Récits des temps mérovingiens, 1840; -and (4) hisEssai sur la formation et le progrès du Tiers- État, 1853 .The volume entitled Dix ans d'études historiques, published in1834, contains, besides the Lettres sur l'histoire de France [newedition] , essays on various subjects , historical , literary, and philosophic.There are two editions of Augustin Thierry's complete works:Paris , 1859, Furne; -and Paris, 1883, F. Didot.XIII.-Romantic Drama.1. THE SOURCES. -G. Schlegel, Cours de littérature dramatique,1814; -F. Guizot's preface to Letourneur's reprint of his Shakespeare,Paris, 1821; -Stendhal, Racine et Shakespeare, Paris, 1823-1825; -Ch. Magnin, Le théâtre anglais à Paris, 1827-1828 [ in his Causerieset Méditations, vol . ii . , Paris , 1843 ]; -Benjamin Constant, DeWallenstein et du théâtre allemand, in his Mélanges, Paris, 1829; —MODERN TIMES 4391830 and 1840. It is a matter of common knowledge thatthe plays of Hugo, of Musset, and of Dumas himself, thatsuch fiction as Vigny's Stello, as George Sand's Indiana,Valentine, or Lélia, as the Confession d'un Enfant dusiècle, are at once the most " Romantic " and the most"personal " works in French literature. The same mustbe said of Lamartine's Raphaël and of his Graziella.These writings in truth, to borrow Du Bellay's expression, are " merely the diaries of or the commentaries on "their authors' impressions of every description! But acircumstance still more worthy of attention is the factthat a like tendency is observable even in criticism . Theearly writings of Sainte- Beuve, the Portraits littéraires,or the Portraits contemporains, -at least when the writerFauriel, Carmagnola et Adelghis, two of Manzoni's tragedies , followed by a study entitled Une lettre à M. C. sur l'Unité de temps etde lieu, Paris, 1834 [ Cf. Waille, Le romantisme de Manzoni, Algiers,1890] .The prefaces of N. Lemercier; Alexandre Dumas; Alfred de Vigny;Victor Hugo, &c.Jules Janin, Histoire de la littérature dramatique, Paris , 1853-1858;-Gustave Planche's dramatic criticisms in the Revue des DeuxMondes, 1832-1857;-Théophile Gautier, Histoire de l'art dramatique,Paris, 1859; -Saint-Marc Girardin, Cours de littérature dramatique,Paris, 1853.2. THE EVOLUTION OF ROMANTICISM IN THE DRAMA; and that itsprinciple will be sought for in vain in the appropriation of English orGermanplays; -in the introduction on to the French stage of nationalsubjects;-or in the employment of exotic backgrounds. -Romanticism, as far as the drama is concerned, consisted in proceeding ineverything on exactly contrary lines to Classicism; -in denying theexistence of the " rules "; -and in claiming a liberty, the first effectof which was to lower tragedy to the level of melodrama. -Theaccuracy of this view may be established by considering the groundtraversed, by Vigny between Othello, 1829, and Chatterton, 1835; —by Hugo between Cromwell, 1827, and the Burgraves, 1843; -andby Dumas between Henri III. et sa cour, 1829, and Mademoiselle deBelle-Isle, 1839. -A second characteristic of Romantic drama is that440 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREis to some extent sincere, are merely the diary of theliterary impressions of Joseph Delorme. And how shallwe describe Michelet's Histories, if not as the lyric notation of the emotions their author experienced as he livedover again, in the peaceful silence of the archives, theshame or the glory of the past? To these names I wouldadd those of Lacordaire and Berryer, were it not that,although the great preacher and the great orator haveonly been dead some thirty or forty years, their workshave become almost unreadable.A reaction was inevitable. " Men are made to livetogether and to form civil bodies and societies . But itmust be remarked that none of the individuals whocompose these societies will consent to be regardedit breathes a spirit of revolt which, -without its being necessary to goas far as the lucubrations of Félix Pyat, -is easily recognisable inDumas' Antony, 1831; —in Victor Hugo's Le roi s'amuse, 1832; —and even in Vigny's Chatterton, 1835.-But since the most unbridled liberty ends inevitably in fashioning a code for itself,--a final characteristic of Romantic drama is the affirmation of the sovereigntyof passion; and the glorification of crime under the name ofenergy.Happily, while their imitators , a Frédéric Soulié for example, -carrythe doctrine to extremes, -Vigny is saved from its consequences bythe natural elevation of his character; -Hugo by his lyricism, whichin Hernani or Ruy Blas raises him above his subject; -and Dumasby the fertility of his dramatic invention . -It thus happens thatRomantic drama, after having made a great stir, but having accomplished comparatively little, -returns with the Burgraves to theepopee;-and with Mademoiselle de Belle Isle or Les demoisellesde Saint- Cyr to the drama as understood by Scribe; -withouthaving conquered for the dramatic author anything more than avery vague general liberty; -the applications of which only becomeclear when contrasted with the obligations imposed by Classicism .-The Romantic drama is a Classic tragedy; -in which the authorhas the right to violate the three unities; -the personages of whichmay be mere private individuals; —and in which the " grotesque " isconstantly alternating with the " sublime. "MODERN TIMES 441as the most inferior member of the body to which hebelongs. It thus happens that those who vaunt themselves, raising themselves above their fellows, whomthey regard as inferior members of society, necessarilyrender themselves odious to the entire community. " TheRomanticists were assuredly unacquainted with thesewords of the modest and timid Malebranche, but had itbeen otherwise they would have had little weight withthem. They were mistaken, however, in neglecting thisadmonition, for what it is possible to put up with fromthe author of the Méditations or of the Nuits, becomesinsupportable after a while even from a Sainte-Beuve, -it is of the poet I speak, -or a Desbordes-Valmore. Weesteem it impertinence on their part to trouble us with3. THE WORKS.—( 1) Alfred de Vigny: Le More de Venise, 1829;-La Maréchale d'Ancre, 1831; -Chatterton, 1835.(2) Victor Hugo: Cromwell, 1827; -Hernani, 1829; -MarionDelorme, 1830; -Le roi s'amuse, 1832; -Lucrèce Borgia, 1833; —Marie Tudor, 1833; -Angelo, 1835;-Ruy Blas, 1838; -Les Burgraves, 1843.(3) Alexandre Dumas: Henri III. et sa cour, 1829; -Christine àFontainebleau, 1830; -Napoléon Bonaparte, 1831; -Antony, 1831;—Charles VII. chez ses grands vassaux, 1831; —Richard Darlington,1831; -Teresa, 1832; -La Tour de Nesle, 1832; —Angèle, 1833; —Catherine Howard, 1834; -Don Juan de Marana, 1836; -Kean,1836; -Caligula, 1837; -Paul Jones, 1838; -Mademoiselle de BelleIsle, 1839; -the Alchimiste, 1839; —Un mariage sous Louis XV. ,1841;-Lorenzino, 1842.XIV. Alfred de Musset [Paris, 1810; 1857, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES. -Sainte- Beuve, Portraits contemporains, vol . ii . ,1833, 1836, 1840; and Causeries du lundi, vol. i . , 1850, and vol. xiii. ,1857; -Alfred de Musset's Nuits; and his Confession d'un enfant dusiècle, 1835; —George Sand, Elle et lui , Paris, 1859; -Paul de Musset,Lui et Elle, Paris, 1860; and Biographie d'Alfred de Musset, Paris,1877; -Mme O. Jaubert [ née d'Alton Shee] , Souvenirs, Paris , 1881;-Émile Montégut, Nos morts contemporains, Paris , 1884; -ÉmileFaguet, Dix-neuvième siècle, Paris, 1887; -Jules Lemaître, Intro-442 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREtheir personal concerns as if we had none of our own!-and as they lack as a rule the gift of expression , we areirritated by their airs of superiority. They are well awarethat this is the impression they create, and with a viewto being able to pretend, on the strength of their originality, to a right to bore us with their affairs , theycompose themselves, they laboriously attempt to composethemselves an originality, and in doing so quickly landthemselves in the fantastic and the monstrous. Theythen claim for the maladies they have given themselvesthe indulgence and attention they despaired of obtainingby other means, and literature becomes pathological asa consequence of this self-exhibition. At this juncture,however, good sense revolts, common sense resumes itsduction au théâtre d'Alfred de Musset, Jouaust's edition, Paris,1889-1891; -Arvède Barine, Alfred de Musset, in the " GrandsÉcrivains français " series , Paris, 1893; -F. Brunetière, Évolutionde la poésie lyrique, 1895; -Lettres d'Alfred de Musset et de GeorgeSand, edited by M. S. Rocheblave, Paris, 1397.2. THE POET. -His middle- class extraction and his aristocraticpretensions; his Voltairian education [ Cf. what he says himself inthe Confession, as to his early reading]; -and the primary trait ofhis character, which is impatience or eagerness for pleasure. -Hisearly poems; and that they would be spoiled by a perpetual affectation of " dandyism " [ Cf. Mardoche]; -and of elegant debauchery,of the stamp of that of Laclos and the younger Crébillon [ Cf.Namouna]; -and as well by a phraseology which is still reminiscent of the eighteenth century; -if it were not for the beauty theyderive from the " pride of life " with which they are instinct; —andfrom the ardent and objectless [ Cf. La Coupe et les lèvres] passionthey breathe. -Effect they produce among the " Romantic clique "; —the premature reputation they procure their author; -and that neverhas a more precocious celebrity been purchased more dearly by aman more disposed to drain its intoxication to the dregs.The " poet of love ";-and that it is as the " poet of love " thatMusset must always be thought of; -since although exception mayand indeed must be taken to his style and versification; —more beautiful, more sincere, more impassioned, and more poignant love poems;MODERN TIMES 443rights, and the sentiment of the social function of literature and art is reawakened. The public ventures at lastto call in question the " sovereignty " to which the poetpretended. It is simultaneously perceived that the essential defect of Romanticism consists in this invasion bylyricism of all the branches of literature; and if furtherproof were wanted that Romanticism is at bottom lyricism, it would be found in the fact that the attempts thatare beginning to be made to impose restrictions on theone result in the other losing ground.The sensational failure of the Burgraves in 1843,contrasted with the not less sensational though certainlyless merited success of Ponsard's Lucrèce in the sameyear, deals romantic drama a blow from which it did-than the Lettre à Lamartine or the Nuit d'octobre; -do not existin French. Moreover, and with the exception of his Lorenzaccio; –which represents his contribution to the Romantic controversy;—hisplays constitute one long hymn to love [ Cf. Les caprices de Marianne;the Chandelier; On ne badine pas avec l'amour; Il ne faut jurer derien; Fantasio, etc . ]; —and to love conceived as the sole reason forexistence; and for continuing to live . Herein lies the secret of hisdramatic strength; —and of the often unhealthy or questionable, butalways infinitely seductive poetry that envelops his plays, as it were,in an atmosphere that is unique; -and herein lies in consequence thesecret of the vitality of his work. It may be, too, that the samequalities; -together with the information the work contains withregard to the " pathology of love "; -save his Confession from whatwould otherwise be the disastrous effects of the declamation by whichit is marred; and finally that this worship of love constitutes almostthe sole merit of his Contes and Nouvelles.Remarks on this subject; -and that after all it was a happy thingfor Musset that he was a victim of love; —if the result of his gettingover his great crisis (1832-1837); —was to restore him to his formerself;-and to make of him once more the " dandy "; -or, as Flaubertput it, the bourgeois, he was at the outset of his career. That the" bourgeois " side of Musset's work is not, however, without itsmerit; -to appreciate which it is sufficient to term " Parisian whatFlaubert styled " bourgeois "; -and thus to make the author of Une444 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREnot recover. But François Ponsard is unequal to thetask of playing the part with which he has been investedalmost in spite of himself, and in reality it is EugèneScribe and Alexandre Dumas, though they have far less"literary " pretensions than the author of Lucrèce, whobring back the drama to an understanding of its trueconditions. The two playwrights must be taken togetherand reconciled in death, for if both of them write badly,almost as badly indeed as anybody has ever written inFrench, at any rate it cannot be said that either ofthem writes worse than the other. In any case theythoroughly comprehended that twelve or fifteen hundredspectators of all ages and ranks do not shut themselvesup for four or five hours in a closed building to listen tobonne fortune and of Après une lecture; —a lineal descendant ofVoltaire, Regnard, Boileau, and La Fontaine.3. THE WORKS. -Musset's works, which are excellently classifiedin the complete edition of them in 10 vols. , Charpentier, 1865, 1866,1867, 1876, 1886, comprise: ( 1 ) his Poems;-(2) his Plays;-(3) theConfession d'un enfant du siècle;—(4) his Contes and Nouvelles; —(5) his miscellaneous writings, and—(6) his posthumous works [ Cf.Vte de Spoelberch, Étude critique et bibliographique sur les Œuvresd'Alfred de Musset, Paris, 1867; and Derôme, Les éditions originalesdes romantiques, vol . ii . , Paris , 1887] .XV. -Prosper Mérimée [ Paris, 1803; † 1870, Cannes] .1. THE SOURCES. -Sainte- Beuve, Portraits contemporains, vol. iii . ,1841; Causeries du lundi, vol. vii. , 1853; -Taine, Prosper Mérimée,1873; -Mérimée himself, Lettres à une Inconnue, 1873; and Lettresà Panizzi, 1881; -O. d'Haussonville, Prosper Mérimée in the Revuedes Deux Mondes, April, 1879; -Maurice Tourneux, Prosper Mérimée,sa bibliographie, Paris, 1876; and Prosper Mérimée, ses portraits , etc. ,Paris, 1879; -Émile Faguet, XIXe siècle, 1887; -Aug. Filon , Mérimée,Paris, 1893; -Mérimée, Une correspondance inédite, 1896.2. THE RÔLE OF MÉRIMÉE; -and that it seems to have been that ofan ironist; -who pretended to believe in Romanticism, ―merely inorder to become better acquainted with it; -to be able the better toridicule it; and finally to bring it into discredit. -Mérimée's firstMODERN TIMES 445an author talk to them of himself. In consequence, ifthey do not return to the ways of the classic dramathough it may be that what is best in Scribe is due toBeaumarchais-they tend in that direction, and theirworks, Mademoiselle de Belle- Isle (1839) and the Demoiselles de Saint- Cyr ( 1843) , for example, or the Bataillede Dames and the Verre d'eau, are works of an undecidedcharacter that do not differ to a great extent either fromeach other or from the works of the past . They aredoubtless lacking in observation and psychology, andalso, I repeat, in style, but if only in consequence ofthe historical pretensions of which they make a show,some slight measure of reality is reintroduced into thedrama, which seeks, as it were, in their writings toworks: the Théâtre de Clara Gazul, 1825, —and La Guzla, 1827; —and that if they are the work of a Romanticist as regards their"colour, ” —as regards their initial idea they are that of a man ofwide curiosity or of a dilettante; -the work, in fact, less of a discipleof Chateaubriand, -than of a pupil of Fauriel and of a friend ofStendhal. The Chronique du règne de Charles IX. , 1829; -theVase étrusque, 1830; -the Double méprise, 1833; -and that alreadyin these last two works the author has almost discarded his Romanticism. Those which followed: Les âmes du Purgatoire, 1834, —andthe Vénus d'Ille, 1837, might seem to be a return to the Romanticformula;-but the tendency is only apparent; -as is proved byColomba, 1840; -Arsène Guillot, 1844; -Carmen, 1845; -in whichonly two of the characteristics of Romanticism are met with: astriving after " local colour "; -and the glorification of energy; -butscarcely any intention of self- exhibition . -These works are also freefrom declamation; -and the art in them consists, on the contrary, inthe subjecting what is rare or singular to the ordinary conditions ofreality. This attitude would have sufficed, even if it had not beenaccompanied by a taste for archæology and erudition, to turnMérimée's attention to history;-and it was as an historian that heended; though somewhat obscurely; -while the close of his careeralso found him ridiculing that " realism " of which he was one of thefounders; —just as he had formerly ridiculed " Romanticism ";—although fighting in its ranks.-446 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREreturn to its natural laws. The fact has been realisedthat the drama cannot exist in the absence of a subjectof really general interest, and in particular of a certain"self- alienation , " which, forbidding the poet to be preoccupied by his own individuality, leads him to embodyhimself in his personages. It is recognised , it is confessedthat in the drama the individuality of the author must besubordinate to something outside itself; and this is tantamount to saying that the drama is unable to turn itsmethods to account so long as it continues to beRomantic.But the evolution of the novel is about to furtherthe development of the resources of the drama.Itis at this juncture-towards 1840-that the author of3. THE WORKS. -Mérimée's works comprise: (1) the Théâtre deClara Gazul, 1825, and La Guzla, 1827;-(2) his Nouvelles, theprincipal of which have been mentioned;--(3) his historical writings,of which the principal are: his Essai sur la guerre sociale, 1841; —Don Pedro de Castille, 1848; and the Faux Démétrius, 1852; -(4) his archæological writings , the principal being his Description despeintures de Saint - Savin, 1845;—(5) his translations from theRussian: Pouchkine's La dame de pique; Gogol's Inspecteurgénéral; Tourguenieff's Apparitions;-(6) four volumes of travels:Dans le Midi de la France; Dans l'ouest; En Auvergne; and EnCorse; and numerous magazine articles , all of which have not beenreprinted in volume form;-(7) his Correspondence composed so farof Lettres à une inconnue, 2 vols . , 1873; Lettres à une autre inconnue, 1 vol. , 1875; Lettres à Panizzi, 2 vols . , 1881; and Unecorrespondance inédite de P. Mérimée, 1 vol . , 1896. This Correspondence does not constitute the least interesting portion of his work,and we have reason to believe that it might easily be doubled involume.XVI. Alexis-Charles- Henri Clérel de Tocqueville [Paris,1805; 1859, Cannes] .1. THE SOURCES.-His Correspondance inédite, Paris , 1861; andhis Nouvelle correspondance inédite, Paris, 1865; -G. de Beaumont,MODERN TIMES 447Indiana, of Valentine, of Lélia, after having " sown herwild oats, " so to speak, after occupying attention withthe story of her marriage and the scandal of her loveaffairs , that George Sand herself begins to see thatobjective, impersonal and disinterested observation, whichis the very definition of the novel, also constitutes itsvalue. With the facility for going to extremes characteristic of women, and with their tendency to obey themasculine influences that sway them for the time being,George Sand, guided at first by Lamennais and afterwardsby Pierre Leroux, passes at a bound from the subjectiveor lyric to the social and even the Socialist novel: withthe result that the Péché de M. Antoine or the Compagnon du Tour de France, if they be novels at all, are·Notice sur Alexis de Tocqueville, preceding the latter's Œuvres etcorrespondance inédites, 1861, Paris; -L. de Loménie, Esquisseshistoriques et littéraires, Paris, 1859; -Sainte Beuve, Premierslundis, vol . ii. , 1856; Causeries du lundi, vol . xv. , 1860, 1861; andNouveaux lundis, vol . x. , 1865; —É.mile Faguet, Alexis de Tocquevillein the Revue des Deux Mondes, February, 1894; -G. d'Eichthal ,Alexis de Tocqueville, Paris, 1897.2. THE HISTORIAN. -Originality of his manner; -which differs noless from that of Guizot, with which it has often been compared; -than from that of Thiers or that of Augustin Thierry. -La Démocratie en Amérique, 1835-1840; -and that Americans admit thatnothing that has been written about them shows more conscientiousobservation; —or remains truer on the whole after a lapse of sixtyyears. The reason is that the author combines the serene impersonality of the philosopher with the perspicacity of the bornobserver; the disinterestedness of the man of learning with thecuriosity of the politician; -and the art of formulating the laws ofphenomenawith that of grasping their essential character. -The AncienRégime et la Révolution, 1856; -and that this book marks an epochin the manner of conceiving the causes and of representing the historyof the Revolution. -Tocqueville saw clearly: (1) that the work accomplished by the Revolution was the necessary sequel of themost remote French history;-(2) that the Revolution owed its"religious " character to the depth of its causes; and (3) that448 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREassuredly not good novels. Are those of AlexandreDumas, Frédéric Soulié, and Eugéne Sue any better?Their vulgarity admitted, they are at least better composed, more interesting and more dramatic; whileEugène Sue's works, to an equal or greater degree thanGeorge Sand's, help by diverting attention from themiseries the Romanticists had brought into such strongrelief, to direct it to other sufferings which are more real,deeper, and more cruel. Mention , too, may be madehere of the names of Mérimée, Jules Sandeau, andCharles de Bernard. But it was reserved for Honoréde Balzac to rid the novel, by recourse to methodsthat are a further innovation, of the conventions ofRomanticism, and to raise it in his masterpieces to afor this reason it was beyond the power of any political force tonullify its effects. By these two works Tocqueville contributedmore than anybody else, to make history independent of thearbitrary judgment of historians; -to pave the way for the conceptionof history that now obtains , —and to give history all the characteristics of a science it is susceptible of acquiring.3. THE WORKS. -As we have neglected the politician in this articleand merely considered the historian, we shall not refer to deTocqueville's political writings: to his Rapports, Discours orSouvenirs [published in 1893] .—His Démocratie appeared in 1835-1840; his Ancien Régime et la Révolution in 1856.-His otherhistorical writings consist of fragments, all of which bear on one orthe other of these two works. His Correspondence, which is veryinteresting, has been published by Gustave de Beaumont, whoaccompanied him on his journey to the United States .Mme de Tocqueville has edited his complete works in 9 vols . , Paris,1864-1868. The two volumes edited by M. G. de Beaumont form thefifth and sixth volumes of this edition.MODERN TIMES 449perfection which perhaps has never since been surpassed-or equalled.Doubtless there had been novels, and good novels,before the time of Balzac, and among them two or three-the Princesse de Clèves, Gil Blas, Manon Lescautwhich will last, it may be believed , as long as the Frenchlanguage. These productions, however, were merelyhappy " accidents," chance " finds, " which were not ofa nature to be repeated or to prove the parent stockof works of a like order. None of Balzac's predecessorshad divined that the true rôle or the true literary functionof the novel is to be the abridged representation ofordinary life. The novelist in reality is nothing morethan a witness whose evidence should rival that of theSECOND PERIOD.From the performance of the " Burgraves " to the publication ofthe " Légende des siècles. "1843-1859I.-Honoré de Balzac [ Tours, 1799; † 1850, Paris] .1. THE SOURCES .'-Balzac's Correspondence [ 1818-1850] , formingvol. xxiv. of his complete works, Paris, 1876; and his Lettres àl'étrangère [ Mme Hanska, afterwards Mme de Balzac] in the Revuede Paris, 1894, 1895, 1896.-Sainte Beuve, Portraits contemporains, vol. ii . , 1836; andCauseries du lundi, vol. ii. , 1850;-P. de Molène's articles in theRevue des Deux Mondes, March, April, November, 1842, and June1843; -Lerminier, in the Revue des Deux Mondes, April, 1847; —Mme de Surville [Balzac's sister] , Balzac, sa vie et ses œuvres, Paris,1858, and preceding the volume containing his Correspondence.Eugène Poitou, M. de Balzac, ses œuvres et son influence, in theRevue des Deux Mondes, December, 1856; -Taine, Nouveaux essaisde critique et d'histoire (the date of the article is 1858); —Th. Gautier,Honoré de Balzac, Paris, 1859;-Edmond Werdet, Portrait intime de1 Cf. Histoire des Euvres de Balzac by the Vicomte Spælberch de Lovenjoul,3rd edition, Paris, 1888, Calmann Lévy.30450 MANUAL OF THE HISTORY OF FRENCH LITERATUREhistorian in precision and trustworthiness. We lookto him to teach us literally to see. We read his novelsmerely with a view to finding in them those aspects ofexistence which escape us owing to the very hurry andstir of life, an attitude we express by saying, that for anovel to be recognised as such, it must offer an historical or documentary value, a value precise and determined, particular and local , and as well a general andlasting psychological value or significance.Both these conditions are fulfilled by Balzac's novels.Les Chouans, although one of his earliest works, butmore especially Une ténébreuse affaire, Un ménage degarçon, César Birotteau, La Cousine Bette are amongthe most lifelike pictures that exist of the revolutionaryBalzac, Paris, 1859;-Champfleury, Grandes figures d'hier et d'aujourd'hui, Paris, 1861; -Lamartine, Balzac, in his Cours de littérature,1864, and in volume form, Paris, 1866; -Émile Zola, Le roman expérimental, 1880; and Les romanciers naturalistes, 1881; -ÉmileFaguet, Dix- Neuvième siècle, 1887; -Marcel Barrière , l'Euvred'Honoré de Balzac, Paris , 1890; -Julien Lemer, Balzac, sa vie etson œuvre, Paris, 1891; -Paul Flat, Essais sur Balzac, 1893; andNouveaux essais, Paris , 1895; -Edmond Biré . H. de Balzac, Paris,1897.Anatole Cerfbeer and Jules Christophe, Répertoire de la Comédiehumaine, Paris, 1887.2. THE NOVELIST.A. His early years and career. -His extraction; -and th