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 French classicism, 
 
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HARVARD STUDIES IN ROMANCE 
 LANGUAGES 
 
 PUBLISHED UNDER THE DIRECTION OF THE 
 DEPARTMENT OF FRENCH AND OTHER 
 ROMANCE LANGUAGES AND LITERATURES 
 
 VOLUME IV 
 
FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 BY 
 
 C. H. C. WRIGHT 
 
 PROFESSOR OF THE FRENCH LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE 
 IN HARVARD UNIVERSITY 
 
 CAMBRIDGE 
 HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS 
 
 LONDON: HUMFHSEY MILFORD 
 OxrOBD Vnivessitv Press 
 
 1920 
 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1920 
 HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS 
 
PREFACE 
 
 Investigators of the French classical age are prone to isolate 
 the great writers of the seventeenth century. Students tend to 
 feel, even when they know better, that ComeiUe and Racine were 
 the undisputed leaders of the drama, that Boileau was the only 
 spokesman for criticism. In this short volume I have emphasized 
 the greater complexity of the age and have considered it also in 
 its political and social environment. The perspective changes, 
 and some great names give way to others less famous today: La 
 Fontaine disappears somewhat behind a Rapin or a Bouhours. 
 
 I have not attempted an encyclopaedic survey, but rather an 
 outline, in which I have sought to keep the chief ideas in the fore- 
 groimd, instead of making complete enumerations of works or 
 exhaustive bibliographies. Yet, as the book is meant primarily 
 for English-speaking students, I have sometimes included refer- 
 ences which to the French specialist may seem elementary. 
 
 I have tried to show, with even less emphasis on the technical 
 literary forms of the sixteenth century, that the classicism of the 
 Renaissance deserves almost as serious consideration as that of 
 the seventeenth century. In many ways, indeed, it is more akin 
 to ancient classicism and is, at least in its ideals, often ethically 
 superior to that of the age of Louis XIV. On the other hand, 
 inasmuch as the social and literary forces of the eighteenth cen- 
 tury became entangled with other forces, some of them foreign, I 
 have thought it wise to stop with the seventeenth century. 
 
 The criticism is anticipated that, though I have been brief, I 
 have included authors or books not strictly classical. I have pur- 
 posely avoided isolating writers or treating their works as logical 
 abstractions. I have sought to merge them with their times. If 
 this semi-historical method has defects, it has very distinct cor- 
 responding advantages. 
 
viii PREFACE 
 
 I am grateful to my colleagues, Professors J. D. M. Ford, C. H. 
 Grandgent and «E. S. Sheldon for useful suggestions made while 
 the work has been going through the press, and for cordial help 
 in reading proof. 
 
 C. H. C. W. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PART I 
 THE FOUNDATIONS 
 
 I. The Classical Spirit 3 
 
 n. Underlying Ideas. Platonists and Aristotelians ... 14 
 
 in. Renaissance Classicism. The Theories of the PlAiade 26 
 
 IV. The Forms or Sixteenth-Centtjey Classicism 38 
 
 V. Renaissance Classiusm m the World of Action. Philoso- 
 phers AND Moralists or the Sixteenth Century. Tran- 
 sition TO the Seventeenth Century 49 
 
 VI. General Manifestations of the Classical Period ... 60 
 
 PART n 
 
 THE STRUCTURE 
 
 Vn. Characters and Persons 81 
 
 Vni. The Principles 98 
 
 IX. The Drama 116 
 
 X. Other Poetical Forms 137 
 
 XI. Prose Forms 148 
 
 Xn. Art 162 
 
 Index 169 
 
PART I 
 THE FOUNDATIONS 
 
CHAPTER I 
 
 THE CLASSICAL SPIRIT 
 
 The student of French literature has read only a few pages 
 when he comes upon the word Classicism. Hardly a phase of 
 modem French letters can be satisfactorily explained without 
 a mention, if only for contrast, of this important tendency. 
 Indeed, a moment of reflection will convince us that " classi- 
 cism " is one of the chief contributions of the French to critical 
 and aesthetic discussion. This is true, even though to people of 
 Teutonic origin, as to many Frenchmen of to-day, romanticism 
 may seem more in harmony with one's natural feeling. 
 
 The words " classic " and " classical " are used in various 
 ways. At times they relate specifically to the Greeks and Ro- 
 mans, as when we call Virgil a classical author; at times they 
 refer to the best periods of any literature and the authors of 
 those periods, as when we term Shakespeare an English classic; 
 at times, again, they mean something based upon the best, or 
 what is thought to be the best, as when we speak of the classic 
 style of Addison.i 
 
 The expression classicism includes, then, at least two ideas: 
 one merely implying preeminence, the other definitely asserting ! 
 that the Greeks and the Romans exemphfy that preeminence. ' 
 In using it with reference to French literature, both meanings 
 are taken into account. Thfixl assical age of French lite rature is, i 
 lr^jgeneral.consent^assumedto be the seventeenth^entury. The ' 
 Uterature of that pejiQiis based.Qn.au Attemptedassimilatl^, of 
 what had long been considered the best in literature, the classical 
 aiitibors or, at ai^ rate, certain cla_ssical ajatiore antiquity. 
 Why, tihien,' should the ancients have seemed to the French the 
 
 ' Cf. Sainte-Beuve, Qu'est-ce qu'un dassique ? 
 
4 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 most worthy of imitation, and why did such imitation, after the 
 preliminary period of the sixteenth century, attain admired re- 
 sults in the seventeenth ? Can we trace any intellectual tradi- 
 tion connecting the three civilizations ? 
 
 /'The classical period of Greek literature, the golden age, if we 
 may be understood in our use of the words, is assumed to be 
 the time of Pericles. It was that epoch in the history of Athens 
 when its thinkers no less than its men of action, its poets and 
 historians no less than its generals, were the embodiment, the 
 former in literature, the latter in action, of the tendencies of the 
 Greek race; when the culture of the people best deserved the 
 specific name of Hellenic; when the current coin for the inter- 
 change of ideas was most purely national, based upon those con- 
 ceptions which, since prehistoric times, had down to Socrates 
 and Plato acquired a more conscious and concrete value^ 
 
 So it was in Rome. The golden age of Roman literature has 
 been placed at different times in the history of the people. But 
 to the majority, who think the Roman mind inapt to achieve by 
 its own unaided efforts the highest intellectual attainments,/me 
 golden age of Latin hterature is that of Augustus. Roman men 
 of letters were then most fully conscious of the aims and ideals 
 of their own race, and were able, with the somewhat artificial "^ 
 and stilted resources of their language, to give expression to the 
 thoughts constituting their intellectual stock-in-trade. These 
 happened, in this case, to be largely Hellenic, but they were at 
 least remoulded in harmony with the traditions and tendencies 
 of Roman civilization. And thus it came about that, though 
 Cicero's education was largely Hellenic, though he had " ground 
 in Molon's mill," though his letters are crammed with Greek, 
 and his philosophical writings are popularizations in hybrid 
 phraseology of the Greek philosophers, yet he is none the less 
 Roman. Virgil, when imitating Theocritus in the Eclogues or 
 Homer in the Aeneid, and Horace, when cop3dng Greek lyrics, 
 are hoth Roman poets, because to the best material at their 
 commaril they give a Roman application and value. / 
 
THE CLASSICAL SPIRIT S 
 
 So it was at the time of the Italian Renaissance( Let us re- 
 member, even if we do not fully accept it, the often repeated 
 statement of writers such as Burckhardt, that this was the 
 " coming to self-consciousness " of a people long " oppressed " 
 by the traditions of the Middle Ages, and the formation of a new 
 civilization by the grafting upon the Italian mind of classical 
 antiquity. The result was what John Addington Symonds calls 
 " the highly perfected individuality of the Italians that made 
 them first emerge from mediaeval bondage and become the 
 apostles of humanism for the modern world^ 
 ^Finally, in French literature, the Renaissance in the sixteenth 
 century began a new era which culminated in the classicism of 
 the seventeenth. This does not imply that the classics were , 
 better known- in the seventeenth century than in the previous 
 one. Never was imitation of the ancients more open and direct 
 than during the sixteenth century. But for that very reason it 
 was imitation rather than assimilation. In the seventeenth cen- 
 tury French civilization reached, in letters as in politics, a har- 
 mony of organization (the word is perhaps more suitable than 
 " development ") which permitted it to give play to its intel- 
 lectual activities arid produce the age of Louis Xljf/ The state- 
 ment holds good even when we concede that classicism was less 
 pervasive than used to be assumed and was far from permeating 
 every period or phase of the seventeenth century. 
 
 The classical stage of French Uterature seems, then, to occupy 
 thafpart of the national history when, as in the classical ages of 
 other nation^tEeorganizatiqn of life reached a full development. 
 TMs organization was more of the intellectual and higher social 
 classes than of all parts of the popul£|,tion. It need not even be 
 assumed that such a development has necessarily always seemed 
 the best, judged by varying ethical standards of other periods.. 
 The level of physical comfort in the twentieth century may be- 
 iAfinitely higher than that of the seventeenth. Other periods, 
 of French history, too, may in some respects have seemed more; 
 glorious, and Napo]|||^urvejring an empire extending iom the: 
 
6 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 Elbe to Rome and surrounded by tributary states, may well have 
 thought his the grandest epoch of national history. Yet no 
 period of French literature is more barren. 
 /What we mean is that under Louis XIV, or during a certain 
 part of his reign, the component elements of French social and 
 political life reached harmonious interworking.* French society 
 may have been coarse beneath its surface polish, the government 
 tyrannical, the nobility oppressive. Yet the administration of 
 affairs was organized by Colbert, following Sully, Richelieu and 
 Mazarin, and the monarch in person supervised the world of 
 letters with as much minuteness as he did that of business. 
 All elements combined in a political, social and religious unity 
 to produce a nation respected abroad and a literature which for 
 a himdred years was the model for Europe.^ 
 
 This literature was consciously based upon certain Greek 
 qualities as the French remotely saw them, modified by the in- 
 fluence of the Romans for whom they felt the affinity of history 
 and of tradition. Finally, the bequest of the ancients reached 
 France through Italy. 
 
 So it remains true that in the study of French literature we are 
 constantly harking back to the seventeenth century, that the 
 seventeenth century is the lineal descendant of the sixteenth, 
 and that the sixteenth-century literature shows the French mind 
 
 1 " L'Etat devint un tout rfigulier, dont chaque ligne aboutit au centre." — 
 Voltaire, Siecle de Louis XIV, ch. 29. 
 
 2 Cf. Voltaire's Sibcle de Louis XIV, ch. 25: "II semblait que la nature prit 
 plaisir alors k produire en France les plus grands hommes dans tous les arts, et i, 
 rassembler 3. la cour ce qu'il y avait jamais eu de plus beau et de niieux fait en hommes 
 et en femmes. Le roi I'emportait sur tous ses courtisans par la richesse de sa taiUe 
 et par la beautfi majestueuse de ses traits. Le son de sa voix, noble et touchant, 
 gagnait les coeurs qu'intimidait sa pr6sence." Contrast with this obvious exaggera- 
 tion the other side of the picture in the letter attributed to Ftoelon: " On a rendu 
 votre nom odieux, et toute la nation franfaise insupportable i tous nos voisins. 
 On n'a conserve aucun ancien allifi, parce qu'on n'a voulu que des esclaves." 
 Just as the Germans have been called Huns during the Great War, so Louis XIV 
 was called an Attila by contemporary German writers and his cruelties were at- 
 tacked by them. Cf. H. Gillot, le Rbgne de Louis XIV et I'opinion publique en 
 
 ne. 
 
THE CLASSICAL SPIRIT 7 
 
 first coming into contact with the spirit of antiquity. We em- 
 phasize advisedly the word " spirit," for though many ancient 
 authors had been known to the French throughout the Middle 
 Ages, they had usually failed to modify the course of French,^ 
 thought. The history of classicism tells how the French mindl,^ 
 tried to assimilate what it understood of antiquity. The result 
 was attained only after a long struggle, with steps backward as 
 well as forward, and was fully reached in the seventeenth century, l^ 
 Moreover, many critics of course feel that modem classicism is 
 atjjest a very imperfect copy of the originaL_^ / 
 
 6What is the antique spirit as it presented itself to the French, 
 though not as they always conceived Jt ? It is a product com- 
 posed both of HeUemc and of Roman elements, which it seems 
 wise to distinguish'''^ 
 
 We must, at the very outset, be on our guard against certain 
 false ideas. The idola specus of numerous critics and aesthetic 
 commentators of Greek life have so far vitiated our true con- 
 ceptions that it is almost as necessary to point out what we must 
 not as what we should believe. Professor Lewis Campbell in 
 his Religion in Greek Literature ^ gave a convenient classification 
 of the various " superficial generalities and rhetorical common- 
 places " which have to be swept aside: 
 
 1. The belief, prevalent since the Renaissance, that the Greek 
 was simply a lover of beauty, living a life devoted only to ' 
 enjojmaent, without serious care or ethical consideration. 
 
 2. The belief that the Greek is the type of pure reason. 
 
 3. The importance attributed to the Serenity (Heiterkeit) of the 
 Greeks. 
 
 4. The misuse of the moderation of the Greeks, from the Belphic 
 ixr]dkv &7aj' to the Aristotelian neahrris. 
 
 All these views contain a certain grain of truth and nearly all 
 should be given due space in an examination of theTlellenic 
 
 » P. 17. 
 
8 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 spirit. It is when we consider the idea from too abstract a point 
 of view and generalize too much that we begin to play cup and 
 ball with Hdterkeit and Allgemeinheit, or mouth such phrases 
 about Greek life as the following from Symonds's Greek Poets: 
 
 We may tell of blue Aegean waves islanded with cliffs that seem less real 
 than clouds, whereon the temples stand, burning like gold in sunset or 
 turning snowy fronts against the dawn. We may paint high porches of the 
 gods, resonant with music and gladdened with choric dances; or describe 
 perpetual sunshine and perpetual ease, no work from year to year that might 
 degrade the body or impair the mind, no dread of hell, no yearning after 
 heaven, but summer time of youth and autumn of old age, and loveless 
 death bewept and bravely borne. 
 
 It is unquestionable that almost every generation coming face 
 to face with Greece, in literature or in art, has felt the spell and 
 has experienced wonder and admiration. Few have echoed the 
 summary judgment of Dr. Johnson: " Demosthenes, Madam, 
 spoke to an assembly of brutes, a barbarous people." ' 
 , Different critics, poets or artists have, it is true, interpreted 
 the charm of Hellenism in varying ways, according to the bias 
 of their own temperament or according to the spirit of the times.* 
 They have seen separate elements of a singularly rich nature, 
 and have consequently in turn given sole emphasis to almost 
 diametrically opposed tendencies. The emotionalist finds in 
 Greek life something very different to admire from the rational- 
 ist. Yet both are apt to use the same name of Beauty. The 
 Pindarism of Ronsard, the Phedre of Racine, the edle Einfalt 
 und stille Grosse of Winckelmann, the anacreontic boudoir- 
 Hellenism of eighteenth-century France, the Alexandrinism of 
 Ch6nier, the romanticism of Chateaubriand's descriptions of 
 Greece, the sensuousness of Musset's blonde Astarti qu'idoldtrait 
 la Grece, the impassiveness of Leconte de Lisle and the Parnas- 
 
 1 See such works as G. Lowes Dickinson, The Greek View of Life; R. W. Living- 
 stone, The Greek Genius and Its Meaning to Us; Lane Cooper (editor). The Greek 
 Genius and Its Influence; Francis W. Kelsey (editor), Lalin and Greek in Ameri- 
 can Education, with Symposia on the Value of Humanistic Studies. 
 
 ' See, for example, R. Canat, la Renaissance de la Grice antique {1820-1850). 
 
THE CLASSICAL SPIRIT 9 
 
 sians, the mysticism of Louis Menard's Reveries d'un paien 
 mystique, all are tributes to the power of Greece. / Walter Pater 
 probably imagined that his Patervinity had something Greek, 
 and even decadent romanticists such as Oscar Wilde or d'An- 
 nunzio mask their aberrations imder the cult of Hellenic beauty.^ 
 The greatest enemies find themselves side by side. Keats sneered 
 at those who, 
 
 . . . taught a school 
 
 Of dolts to smooth, inlay, and clip and fit, 
 
 TiQ, like the certain wands of Jacob's wit. 
 
 Their ruses tallied. Easy was the task: 
 
 A thousand handicraftsmen wore the mask 
 
 Of Poesy. Ill-fated, impious race! 
 
 That blasphemed the bright Lyrist to his face, 
 
 And did not know it, — no, they went about. 
 
 Holding a poor decrepid standard out 
 
 Marked with most flimsy mottos, and in large 
 
 The name of one Boileau! ^ 
 
 Yet when Keats wrote in the Ode on a Grecian Urn, 
 
 Beauty is truth, truth beauty, — that is all 
 Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know, 
 
 he is at any rate using the same words as that very Boileau over 
 a century before: 
 
 Rien n'est beau que le vrai, le vrai seul est aimable. 
 
 Clearly, then, there must be something worth while in this long- 
 ing for Greek beauty. 
 r^ The Hellenic spirit, as manifested in Greek literature at the 
 time of, for instance, Sophocles, was the expression of life as a 
 whole — its religious, intellectual, political, social elementsT] 
 It is no new tale that in a Greek state or ttoXis, such as Athens, 
 we find one of the most sjmametricaUy developed organizations 
 known to history. From the statements of historians and of 
 political philosophers like Aristotle we infer that the conception 
 of what has been called the " city-state " of Greece was an artic- 
 ulated whole, not inconveniently large. There the free citizens, 
 ' Cf ., for instance, Trionfo ddla morte, Book V, ch. 3. ' Sleep and Podry. 
 
lo FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 relieved from manual labor, the search for subsistence or arduous 
 and ignoble toil, through the work of slaves, could find leisure 
 for general culture and the pursuit of man's highest good or 
 happiness, /^^he state is necessary for man's best development, 
 because it accords with his nature ^ as opposed to that of his 
 slave, who is but a living chattel. The state affords the best op- 
 portimity for the development of that expression of harmonious 
 activity" which is the fimction manifesting the perfection or 
 excellence of human nature/ 
 
 The citizen, then, exercising his highest fimction, tends towards 
 a harmonious and well-regulated life of culture, in which all his 
 faculties have full play, each according to its separate aptitudes. 
 The result is health, physical and intellectual. 
 
 This theory of Hfe, however academic it may have been and 
 t3^ical of Aristotle the professor and lecturer, at any rate helps 
 to account for much in Greek life. The thought is easily seen 
 to be quite different from our modem views, from the ideas which 
 Christianity has made natural to us. The conception of life was 
 of something finite, of equilibrium, measure and moderation. 
 There was no striving for imattainable ideals.' It is easy to see 
 how little place there was in Greek life for the mental torture 
 of religious enthusiasts or for a Greek to commit suicide from 
 the motive which has made moderns die, uncertainty as to 
 what will become of the soul after death. Nor does such a 
 scheme permit the annihilation of the body before the soul, the 
 mutilation of physical health on the groimd that the spiritual 
 element is thereby exalted. 
 
 To the Greek, on the contrary, mind and body had each its 
 function, and each function was noble in its way. When all the 
 elements of man were in perfect correlation, not encroaching 
 upon one another, those elements and faculties, physical and 
 mental, were at their best, just as in the state each individual 
 was a part of the whole and best performed his function as a 
 component part of that whole." 
 
 ' ipiarei voXiTiKiy ftooy. * cbSaiinmla. ' ipSv iSwi-roiv v6aos rrjs ^uxSs- 
 
THE CLASSICAL SPIRIT ii 
 
 I Now, when all was in working order the result was good and 
 deserved the term eS; and what was good or fitting was most 
 worthy of admiration, was most beautiful.^ J 
 
 Beauty was, therefore, a constituent element of the concep- 
 tion of Greek life. Hence the admiration for both intellectual 
 excellence or mental beauty and for the human form and physical 
 exercise, resulting in freshness and vigor, spontaneity of thought 
 and action, many-sided ability: Sophocles and Thucydides were 
 generals as well as writers, Socrates was a soldier and statesman 
 as well as a philosopher, and, to go backward a step in history, 
 Themistocles was, as Thucydides tells us, " most skilful in doing 
 offhand what was necessary." ^ 
 
 This instinct for beauty, this highest development of individ- 
 uality, combined with perfect relationship to the rest of the state, 
 was expressed concretely by the various forms of Greek art — 
 architecture, sculpture, poetry. An older school of aesthetic 
 critics used to say that architecture and sculpture are pre- 
 eminently Hellenic because of their definiteness, their finiteness, 
 which make us seek a principle of harmony in the various por- 
 tions of the Parthenon or admire the perfection of a noble statue. 
 This investigation may be continued into literature, where the 
 same quality is visible in Greek tragedy. 
 
 Greek tragedy has been called the sculpture of literature. It 
 manifests the same definiteness and harmony of parts, an 
 eurhythmy which critics think they distinguish even in the 
 minuteness of its verbal elements, as in the stichomythia, or in 
 its lyrical passages, such as the arrangement of the choral odes. 
 But, regardless of such small detailsjfe Greek tragedy is in its out- 
 lines a general portraiture of human emotions, not as in modern 
 literature, one usually confined to love alone. The disturbing 
 elements of the particular or of the contingent are eliminated. 
 On their place we find a portraiture of types, (^he characters, 
 imder the form of the individual, are shown in conflict with the 
 
 * Ti e5 = rd KoXiv = t6 iyaSiv. 
 
 * Thucydides, Book I, ch. 138: kp&tuttos abTo<rxfSii.j^ftv t4 Skovra. 
 
12 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 great principles which, by one name or another, rule the world, 
 fate, destiny, chancy or those upon which society is based, 
 justice, moderation.|3o that Greek tragedy is called a general- 
 ized picture of life, and what it represents is true of all timeo^ 
 
 Here we have at any rate one explanation of Greek bea^y 
 and the reason why Greek literature and art have remained 
 through succeeding centuries the type of harmonious and sym- 
 metrical development, surpassed by none and approached only 
 by those who during the Renaissance were able, for a time, to 
 throw themselves into a mental attitude somewhat similar to 
 that of the Greeks. They found their capacities acting in the 
 same way and were " imiversal " men, of rich functions like the 
 Hellenes. 
 
 One does not need, therefore, to be a metaphysical idealist to 
 find a model for the beautiful. Our universal has come down to 
 earth, and here it is " tumbling at our feet," where Socrates in 
 the Republic found justice. Here on earth and in created form is 
 a pattern of beauty which later ages seek to reproduce. Changes 
 in art are diiferent attempts to attain to koXov. This, however, 
 we are never likely practically to acquire, so long as with our 
 conception of the ideal we mingle other elements, such as the 
 dogmas of Christianity, or political theories inconsistent with 
 the ideal. Many, indeed, see beauty not in the finite but in the 
 infinite, not in the Greek temple but in the Gothic cathedral. 
 
 It would be ludicrous to maintain that the Greek attitude was 
 necessarily the best from every point of view. To the modem 
 mind the city-state may seem ethically incomplete because we 
 lay stress on strictness of conscience or replace moral by political 
 laissezfaire. Some think the greatest of Greek times the Homeric 
 age when family life was happier and the position of women 
 higher: the pictures of Hector and Andromache, of Odysseus 
 and Penelope are not paralleled in the days of the hetaerae. 
 
 Moreover, permanence is not the characteristic of all elements 
 of this system. The period of Greek supremacy was short and 
 that of Athens still shorter, so that the glories of Greek art and 
 
THE CLASSICAL SPIRIT 13 
 
 civilization sometimes seem like a rich growth covering an un- 
 healthy condition, what might be floridly described as the hectic 
 flush on the cheek of a consumptive. Finally, we must not push 
 too far the " universality " of Greek beauty. Just as Pascal 
 tells us that, had Cleopatra's nose been shorter, the history of 
 the world would be different, so ethnologists may remind us 
 that, if Charles Martel had lost the battle of Poitiers, the whole 
 ■eurhythmy of life, letters and art in Western Europe and America 
 •would be different to-day.^ The idea of beauty would be dif- 
 ferent, at least in the realm of " opinion." 
 
 But this much we can say: Hellenic art and literature were 
 the expression of beauty and vigor in a finite world. This world 
 was ruled by certain ethical principles as true to-day as they 
 "were then. The Hterature which sets forth those principles 
 enables us to recognize in the doubts and dilemmas of the Greek 
 author or actor our own feelings. Upon persons ruled by the 
 feelings more than by the intellect the reactions are even more 
 vividly sensuous: the poet is rarely irtesponsive to Hellenic 
 beauty. All these reasons account for the permanent meaning 
 to us of Greek hterature. 
 
 ' " L'art n'est pas un, ou plutdt il n'y a pas un seul ait. L'art japonais a ses 
 beaut6s conrme l'art grec. Au fond, qu'est-ce que l'art grec: c'est le rtalisme du 
 beau, la traduction rigoureuse du d'apres nature antique, sans rien d'une id6alit6 
 que Ijii prfitent les professeurs d'art da I'Institut, car le torse du Vatican est.un 
 torse qui dig^re humainement, et non un torse s'alimentant d'ambroisie, comme 
 voudrait le faire croire Winckelmann. 
 
 Toutefois dans le beau grec, il n'y a nl r6ve, nl fantaisie, ni mystire, pas enfin 
 ce grain d'opium, si montant, si hallucinant, et si curieusement Snigmatique pour 
 la cervelle d'un contemplateur." — Goncourt diary, ii, pp. 4-5. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 
 UNDERLYING IDEAS. PLATONISTS AND ARISTOTELIANS 
 
 The writer has not infrequently tried the experiment of asking 
 undergraduates, " What is classicism ? " Again and again he 
 has received a somewhat irrelevant answer amounting to : " It 
 is a play constructed according to the three xmities of Aristotle." 
 Now, though neither is classicism confined to the drama, nor are 
 the three unities to be found in Aristotle, yet the frequency of 
 the reply shows to what an extent the external side of classicism 
 is emphasized in the ordinary conception. Some historians go 
 so far as to mark an antithesis between classicism and romanti- 
 cism with the names of Aristotle and Plato. They say that classi- 
 cism is the expression of scientific or artistic formalism, in accord- 
 ance with the general tendency of Aristotle towards system; 
 that romanticism, on the other hand, represents the free and 
 unrestrained emotion, the poetical outpouring which they call 
 characteristic of Plato. Romanticism is to them the literature of 
 the intuitive imagination, classicism is the literature of the dis- 
 ciplined reason. As a matter of fact there are strong rational 
 elements in Plato and they are as disciplined as the reason of 
 Aristotle. What mysticism exists in true Platonism is super- 
 imposed on rationalism. Modern classicism is, in its' essence, not 
 merely Aristotelian but Platonic also, and the emphasis given to 
 its Aristotelianism is the result of the use or misuse of one work 
 of Aristotle, the Poetics, employed as a guidebook of practical 
 aesthetics for the study of objective truth. Moreover, there is 
 intuitive imagination in classicism as well as in romanticism. 
 
 The Greek mind, in the representatives whose works are of 
 value to-day, Plato as well as Aristotle, is under the control of 
 reason. There is abundant romanticism as well as classicism in 
 
 14 
 
UNDERLYING IDEAS IS 
 
 Greece, as there is in all human nature,' and a Greek mob was 
 as irrational as a modem one; but the symmetry of spirit pre- 
 dominates, and thati^what modems have taken as the essence 
 of their classicism./Tj\^e have discarded the non-essentials of 
 Greek civilization which, after all, were in the minority. In so 
 doing moderns, as well as th^^Greeks Plato and Aristotle, have 
 used the guidance of reason. J 
 
 The fundamental postulate of the classicist in aesthetics is an 
 ideal of beauty, a heau ideal, placed in or beyond reality and 
 giving fixity to his judgment. The discussions of this beau id&al 
 are, it is true, usually in the realm of art, but the principles and 
 arguments are the same and can be used for the other forms of 
 expression. Moreover, as this doctrine remained stable in France 
 for many generations, from the sixteenth to the early nineteenth 
 century, we can rather freely use illustrations from different 
 periods and ^jom writers on different subjects. The classicist's 
 belief ranged all the way from that of a reality, which may, in- 
 deed, be only in heaven, to a mere concept. But as we are told 
 by Sir Joshua Rejniolds, whose Discourses are an excellent ex- 
 position of the definitely crystallized classical theory: "The 
 poets, orators and rhetoricians of antiquity are continually en- 
 forcing this position; that the arts receive their perfection from 
 an ideal beauty superior to what is to be found in individual 
 nature." ^ 
 
 It is scarcely within the scope of the present work to attempt 
 an answer to the question, what is absolute beauty, beauty in 
 itself ? We can at most say how certain critics and theorists 
 have tried to express it and how they have come by their views. 
 We do not go into the essence of beauty except to see what it 
 tends to be among the Greeks, our intellectual ancestors, and 
 consequently what it may be in a literature and art derived from 
 them. The classicist is prone to say that beauty resides in the" 
 
 1 " Dans tout classique digne de ce nom il y a toujours une parcelle de roman- 
 tisme." — Castdain, Ben Jtmson, p. 864. 
 ' Sir Joshua Reynolds, Discourses, No. III. 
 
1 6 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 general or universal, which some may even call an abstract 
 motionless concept; the romanticist tends to think that beauty- 
 resides in change, in the individual or particular. Ancient 
 aesthetic theories, Taine pointed out in his Philosophie de I'art, 
 tried to define beauty, and said, for instance, that it is the ex- 
 pression of the moral ideal, or of the unseen, or of human pas- 
 sions; then starting from this point, th^ would absolve or con- 
 demn. The ancient ideas, as we have already seen, connected 
 the true, the beautiful and the good, and in beauty saw rhythm,. 
 ^ symmetry, harmony of parts, unity in variety. So the eighteenth- 
 ;■ century aesthetician Crousaz defined beauty as diversity re- 
 ^duced to unity, and as mathematics discovers uniformity he justi- 
 fied Plato for calling God the eternal geometer.^ Modem ideas^ 
 emphasize significance, expressiveness, utterance of all that life 
 contains, the conception of the characteristic. The romanticist 
 proceeds to the stupendous and even to the ugly on the frontier 
 of beauty. A writer like Victor Cousin says that beauty is seized 
 by the reason which judges the infinite in the finite, the absolute 
 in the individual. This judgment must not be confused with 
 feeling, which reduces the beautiful to the agreeable, the absolute 
 to the relative. Concrete or real beauty is " unity in variety," 
 the general in the particular, the essential in the non-essential. 
 It is the simultaneous miion of the general and the individual JE 
 a real object. The beau ideal is pure form and abstraction.^ 
 
 The rigid modern classicist emphasizes, therefore, what is gen- 
 eral. To Sir Joshua Reynolds perfect form in art is produced by- 
 leaving out particularities and retaining only general ideas. 
 Says he: "On the whole it seems to me that there is but one 
 presiding principle which regulates and gives stability to every 
 art. The works, whether of poets, painters, moralists or his- 
 torians, which are built upon general nature, live for ever; while 
 
 ' Formey's LHscours pr&iminaire to the P. Andrfi's Essai sur le Beau, ed. of 
 I7S9, p. xxxi. 
 
 2 Cousin, Du beau rSel et du beau idSal, in Cours d'histoire de la philosophie 
 moderne, ii. Cf. also Formey's introduction to Andr6's Essai, p. Iviii: consensum 
 in varietate. 
 
UNDERLYING IDEAS 17 
 
 those which depend for their existence on particular customs and 
 habits, a partial view of nature, or the fluctuation of fashion, can 
 only be coeval with that which first raised thejn from obscurity. 
 Present time and future may be considered as rivals; and he 
 who solicits the one must expect to be discountenanced by the 
 other." And he also says: " A history painter paints man in 
 general; a portrait painter, a particular man, and consequently 
 a defective model." '■ 
 
 Plato and Aristotle saw in manifested beauty much the same 
 thing, the expression of the ideal in forms of sense. Both saw 
 something which the artist creates with elements of reality ac- 
 cording to a model superior to reality, though Aristotle stopped 
 at the abstract concept, whereas to Plato it became almost a 
 living being or god. The modem seeker for the beautiful in 
 letters and art, who belongs to a civilization having its founda- 
 tions in Greece, has the simpler task of following a pattern 
 already upon earth. The anti-classicist charges him with ex- 
 ercising his reason on the cut-and-dried imitation of a model no 
 longer appropriate, and this charge of servile imitation the 
 pseudo-classicist justifies. The true classicist replies that his 
 use of reason is partly for ascesis and aids in the training of taste, 
 
 ' Discourses, No. IV. What he says in the ninth discourse about Fine Arts 
 applies also to literature: " The Art which we profess has beauty for its object; { 
 this it is our business to discover and to express; the beauty of which we are in ^ 
 quest is general and intellectual; it is an idea that subsists only in the mind; the 
 sight never beheld it, nor has the hand expressed it; it is an idea residing in the 
 breast of the artist, which he is always laboring to impart, and which he dies at 
 last without impartiag; but which he is yet so far able to communicate, as to raise 
 the thoughts and extend the views of the spectator; and which, by a succession of 
 art, may be so far diffused, that its effects may extend themselves imperceptibly 
 into public benefits, and be among the means of bestowing on whole nations re- 
 finement of taste: which, if it does not lead directly to purity of manners, obviates 
 at least their greatest depravation, by disentangling the mind from appetite, and 
 conducting the thoughts through successive stages of excellence, till that con- 
 templation of universal rectitude and harmony which began by Taste, may, as it 
 is exalted and refined, conclude in Virtue." See also Jouin, Conferences de I'Acadi- 
 mie de peinture, p. 204: " Sur cela quelqu'un de la compagnie, prenant la parole, 
 dit qu'jl parler universellement, la veritable beaut6 consistait en la perfection des 
 choses, en leur juste proportion et en une convenance raisonnable," etc. 
 
1 8 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 but that he, no less than the undisciplined romanticist, uses 
 iAtukion. 
 
 It can thus be seen that the customary antithesis between 
 romanticism and classicism is inaccurate: a literature of the 
 imagination opposed to a literature of reason. Both have intui- 
 tion, but the classicist makes that intuition obey law, as Malherbe 
 according to Boileau " r6duisit la Muse aux regies du devoir." 
 The classicist inclines to discipline, the romanticist to license; 
 the classicist tends to be a rationalist, the romanticist is almost 
 mevitably an emotionalist and his imagination lingers among 
 the Shadows of the Cave. ) 
 
 Plato puts at the hBad of his philosophy the idea, Aristotle 
 places at the goal of his the form, the object towards which 
 nature aims. Both conceive a universal behind the phenomenon 
 or the individual, though to Plato it stands in an eternal immo- 
 bility suh specie aeterniiatis, whereas in the philosophy of Aris- 
 totle there is a djmamic process towards a result perhaps never 
 attained. 
 
 So far Plato and Aristotle stand in agreement. It is in details 
 that modern critics have made them unnecessarily divergent 
 and patrons of antithetical literary schools. In Plato's world of 
 thought there are two faculties, intuitive thinking and discursive, 
 thinking . But intuitive and discursive tEmEngafe^not in paral- 
 lel opposition. By dialectic one rises from the unsystematized 
 hj^otheses of discursive thinking to the unity of intuition. In- 
 tuition deals with the idea, and discursive reason with general 
 notions which are not yet the idea, but intuition would not be 
 what it is without the help of discursive thought. To the modern 
 classicist as to Plato there is intuition as well as reason, and as 
 in Plato, but not with the romanticist, intuition is not severed 
 from the rational element. 
 
 According to Plato's aesthetics the creative artist has intui- 
 tion of the idea by reminiscence * of knowledge in some previous 
 existence, and his creation or imitation shares in the idea in so far 
 
 ' &.viiliVtl<Tlt. 
 
UNDERLYING IDEAS 1 9 
 
 as it participates more closely in the world of thought above and 
 behind the world of sense, by the processes aheady mentioned. 
 The so-caUed " romanticism " of Plato is due to the fact that, 
 in dialogues such as the Ion, the Phaedrus and the Symposium, he 
 speaks of a poetic frenzy, which seems a divine inspiration mak- 
 ing genius outstrip the conscious effort of rational intelligence. 
 Yet even to Plato the delirium cannot be separated from art. 
 Indeed, ia the Republic and the Laws the divine frenzy becomes 
 a dangerous madness, and the goet^ vdiojias b ut feeling andjdeals. 
 onlywi di copies of copies, i s far remgygdlrom-ttu^. 
 
 The modern classicist is justified, then, if he says that he is 
 Platonic as well as Aristotelian, that his intuition is not widely 
 divergent from that of Plato, even if in lyric poetry he is influ- 
 enced by the Horatian vates as well as by Platonic" enthusi- 
 asm." 1 
 
 The French seventeenth-century thinkers were, in certain 
 respects, quite in harmony with Plato who was closer to them 
 than they themselves realized. Many of them were under the 
 influence of St. Augustine, a Platonist with an admixture of Neo- 
 Platonism. He regarded the divine nature as fountainhead of 
 Beauty, professed the identity of the Beautiful and the Good 
 and coimected beauty with morals. The Pere Andre, writing 
 it is true in the eighteenth century, says he adopts St. Augus- 
 tine's principle " que c'est l'unit6 qui constitue, pour ainsi dire, 
 la forme et I'essence du beau en tout genre de beaute. Omnis 
 porro pulchritudinis forma unitas est." Now the PSre Andre was 
 a follower of the Oratorian Malebranche who turned Cartesian- 
 ism into a sort of Platonism, and Platonic Augustinianism had 
 been an important influence in the Oratory back to its founder 
 Berulle. 
 
 Unexpectedly enough even Descartes can be brought into re- 
 lation with Plato. It is true that Descartes banished all past 
 
 ' Charlton's Castdvetro's Theory of Poetry (p. 142) points out that in the Aristo- 
 telianism and Platonism of the Renaissance, Aristotle was materialized and con- 
 ventionalized by Horace, Plato was mysticized by Plotinus and Ficino. 
 
20 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 philosophies and started the processes of reasoning afresh; it 
 is true that he was a dualist instead of a monist and dealt with 
 the question of certitude instead of that of unity. But that parts 
 of the philosophy of Descartes are not inconsistent with Plato- 
 nism we see in the ease with which Malebranche Platonized it. 
 We can perhaps find more positive evidence: Descartes had been 
 a friend and follower of Berulle.i and, though only indirectly it 
 may be, Descartes's system is influenced in places by B6rulle. 
 There is a tendency towards Platonic realism in Descartes ^ even 
 if held in check. Nor is it overstraining matters to say that 
 Descartes's Reason grows to the authority of the Platonic 
 ideas, impersonal and the same for all men. "Le bon sens 
 est la chose du monde la mieux partag^e," says he in the 
 Discours de la meihode, and in a letter to Merseime on Lord 
 Herbert of Cherbury he says that all men have " une meme 
 lumiere naturelle."* 
 
 An interesting instance, even if to-day only historically signifi- 
 cant, of this Platonic bias is found in the doctrines of the nine- 
 teenth-century philosopher Victor Cousin. He was a great 
 admirer of the seventeenth century, and as an idealist he con- 
 tinued the tendencies of DescnTtes's a priori reasoning opposed to 
 empiricism. Finally, Cousin's thought was much influenced by 
 Plato, whose system he had studied and whom he translated. 
 
 ' " Or c'est prficisfiment cette influence pi6pond6rante du ndo-platonisme qui 
 fitablit la filiation de saint Augustin i de Bfirulle, et par dela de B6rulle k Gibieuf 
 et 4 Descartes. Sans doute nous ne retrouverons pas dans les oeuvres de Berulle 
 la conception mfime de la liberty divine que devait soutenir Descartes; on pounait 
 au contraire y relever des indications jusqu'i un certain point contradictoires. 
 ... Si done le fondateur de I'Oratoire a fitd le prficurseur de la th6orie cart6sienne 
 de la liberty divine, ce ne peut etre qu'indirectement, en mettant en circulation une 
 conception nto-platonicienne de Dieu dont la thterie de Descartes, comme aussi 
 celle de Gibieuf ne furent que les d6veloppements inun^diats et comme les pro- 
 longements. Or, prficurseur en ce sens, il ne paralt pas contestable que de 
 B6rulle I'ait itd," etc. — E. Gilson, la Doctrine cartisienne de la liberti et la thiologie, 
 p. 167. 
 
 ' " Nous ne voulons pas nier la tendence au r€alisme platonicien chez Des- 
 cartes." — O. Hamelin, le Systkme de Descartes, p. 179. 
 
 ' Cf. O. Hamelin, le Systkme de Descartes, p. 160. 
 
UNDERLYING IDEAS 21 
 
 Cousin's so-called " eclecticism " saw an impersonal and a per- 
 sonal reason. Reason, impersonal, universal and absolute, appears 
 in man without belonging to man. Human reason is the appear- 
 ance in man of universal reason. Reason is not intelligence but is 
 the object of intellection. Impersonal reason is the absolute; its 
 apprehension is by a faculty which may be called reason but is 
 not impersonal reason. Thus we have in us two reasons: one 
 is our intelligence, the other is the intelligible.^ Gk)d alone has 
 perfect intelligence of the intelligible, so that in him alone meet 
 and fuse those two reasons, unequally held in every finite mind. 
 Thus the impersonal reason of Cousin, which he spiritualizes as 
 God, plays very much the part of the Truth of Descartes or the 
 Idea of Plato. 
 
 We cannot find a more typical presojtation of French literary 
 classicism than appears in the pages o/Nisard's history of French 
 literature. He defines the esprit franqats, of which the seventeenth 
 centSry offers according to him the best expression, as the esprit 
 pratique. Its qualities are clearness, precision, coordination of 
 ideas. It stands for intellectual ascesis, training and the spirit f 
 of discipline. French literature seeks the expression of truth 
 and gives a generalized presentation of life: " la realite dont on 
 a retranch6 les traits grossiers et superflus." In the master- 
 pieces of French literature he finds " I'image la plus complete 
 et la plus pure de I'esprit humain." He adds that " en faisant 
 le portrait de I'esprit franjais j'ai presque fait le portrait de la 1 
 raison elle-m^me.'*^ 
 
 ' Alaux, la Pkilosophie de M. Cousin, p. 112. 
 
 ' The Frenchman has instinctive classifying habits. He is always seeking " une 
 formule," " un plan.'' This praiseworthy tendency is not without its dangers in 
 less brilliant minds, as the following quotations from G. Hanotaux, P. G. Hamer- 
 ton and Mark Fattison may show: " Elle [the bourgeoisie] garde, de ses origines, 
 un go<it maiqu6 pour les metiers de pliune et les gloires de papier, ime admiration 
 sans borne pour la parole £crite et parl£e, un respect pour les lemons du college, une 
 faveur pour les prix de concours et les notori6t6s de I'ficole, xm goftt classique pour 
 les opinions contrdl^es, les gestes mesur€s, les couleurs att£nu6es, les demonstra- 
 tions pioportionn6es." — Hanotaux, Histoire de la France contemporaine, ii, p. 517. 
 
 " Tliere may be some exceptions, but the general rule is that the Frenchman will 
 
2 2 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 French classicism was, then, the expression of an attitude 
 primarily intellectual. It tended towards abstract order and 
 without being metaphysical, looked more Platonico for the beauti- 
 ful behind the beautiful things. But in so far as formaUsm was 
 cultivated it turned to Aristotle more than to Plato. It tried to 
 embody truth and beauty in a static form as the expression of 
 reason tested by clearness and characterized by order and pre- 
 cision. It was interested in himian nature, rather than in the 
 outer world, because it is in human nature that the rational is 
 expressed. lEven the artist Nicolas Poussin, wrote, " J'ai choisi 
 la demeure de la viUe, et non pas eelle des champs ou je vivrais 
 d^console."'!] French classicism was objective, as the presenta- 
 tion of common traits rather than of personal idiosyncrasies. 
 Finally, it sought its models in the Kterature of antiquity, because 
 the ancients seemed to have best expressed the ideal of truth and 
 beauty, which is " universal." " The characters in French clas- 
 
 profess to admire what he thinks he ought to admire, even when he has no genera) 
 ardor of admiration at his disposal. The effect is to make conversations with 
 Frenchmen uninteresting so soon as they turn upon famous masters. They wiU 
 repeat the old laudatory commonplaces, and if you venture upon any criticism 
 with the slightest originality in it, they will look upon you as an insular eccentric. 
 They have been taught at school how to praise the famous men, they have been 
 taught even the proper terms of laudation. I believe the Chinese learn to J^eat 
 the praise of their Classics in the same way." — Hamerton, French and English, 
 Part V, ch. i. 
 
 " Even a false system elevates the thoughts; but to be general without being 
 exact, to systematize without reference to facts, this is to be superficial. In some 
 countries and periods, this tendency rules the national mind, and has possessed 
 itself of the higher education. In France, the impulse, given when about thirty 
 years ago \This was written in iSjj] the University and philosophical studies began 
 to raise their head for the first time since their de facto suppression under the des- 
 potism of Louis XIV, was in this spirit. The literature and educated men of that 
 country are characterized by habits of rapid generalization, a power of looking at 
 things in masses, and speaking of them in the dialect of philosophy. But being 
 based on no complete knowledge or solid acquisition of any kind, this habit is 
 essentially misleading, and indeed is little more than a brilliant imposture." — 
 Mark Pattison, Oxford Studies, in Essays, vol. i. 
 
 ' Letter to M. Lemaire, Feb. 19, 1639, quoted by P. Desjardins, la Mithode des 
 classiques frangais, p. 224. 
 
 ^ " — car il f aut poser pour une Maxime indubitable, que jamais personne ne 
 
UNDERLYING IDEAS 23 
 
 sical tragedy were, after all, not Greek, Roman or French, but 
 the expression of universal feelings.' [Practically, the model was ./ 
 the result of tradition, in which many other elements besides the 
 original ones had place, and in which these were sometimes even 
 misinterpreted^ In consequence French seventeenth-century 
 classicism was not identical with ancient classicism. Obviously ; 
 its concrete manifestation could not be absolutely the same be- 
 cause of the difference of time and environment. It tended to be 
 an imitation of a " general object," rather than the participation i 
 of the " general object " in the idea itself. In the great geniuses, y^; 
 however, the intuition or invention came closest to identification , 
 with the spirit of the model. Racine in poetry reaches the culmi- : 
 nation of that symmetry and harmony of which French classicism ■ 
 is capable. 
 
 Modern classicism may thus be studied as the mould in which 
 were cast certain Uterary forms in the seventeenth century, or 
 we can look behind these to consider the intellectual temper 
 which produced them. We can go further and see how certain 
 men, of whom we find examples in the sixteenth century, when 
 the study of ancient moralists was in favor, strove to make clas- 
 sicism a guide of life as well as a vade mecum for the production 
 
 sera seavant dans la Poesie Diamatique, que par le secours des Anciens, et I'mtel- 
 ligence de leurs Ouvrages." — Abb6 d'Aubignac, Pratique du theatre. Book I, 
 ch. 3. 
 
 > See Nisard's explanation of why Moliere and Racine are eternal, in his histoiy 
 of French literature, Book IH, Chap. 7, § 5. Cf. also: " Strictly speaking, indeed, 
 no subject can be of universal, hardly can it be of general concern; but there are 
 events and characters so popularly known in those countries where our Art is in 
 request, that they may be considered as sufficiently general for all our purposes. 
 Such are the great events of Greek and Roman fable and history, which early edu- 
 cation, and the usual course of reading, have made familiar and interesting to all 
 Europe, without being degraded by the vulgarism of ordinary life in any country." 
 — Sir Joshua Reynolds, Discourses, No. IV. 
 
 ' " Study, therefore, the great works of the great masters, for ever. Study, as 
 nearly as you can, in the order, in the manner, and on the principles, on which they 
 studied. Study nature attentively, but always with those masters in your com- 
 pany; consider them as models which you are to imitate, and at the same time as 
 rivals with whom you are to contend." — Sir J. Reynolds, Discourses, No. VI. 
 
24 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 of literary works. If we confine ourselves to the first of these 
 three methods of study, we shall not get beyond a technical 
 analysis of types like epic or tragedy, of their rationalism ex- 
 pressed in abstract terms, their tendency to part from experience 
 carried at times to such extremes that it has been said that " de 
 toutes les fatalites du corps les h6ros tragiques n'en ont gard6 
 qu'ime: ils peuvent mourir." ' If we are to consider the intel- 
 lectual temper behind these works, then we must analyze the 
 minds of people who planned their thought before writing, so 
 that their ideas became lucid and just, who preached aesthetic 
 as well as ethical moderation, but whose golden mean did not 
 exclude indignation against the bad. We shall find ourselves 
 on a Parnassus ruled by a dogmatic intellectualism, but where 
 the desire for elegance sometimes causes Apollo to welcome Mr. 
 Turveydrop. We understand the significance of the epithets in 
 Boileau's " agreable fureur," " douce terreur " and " pitie char- 
 mante." We shall add that classicism is useful to 1;he Frenchman, 
 not only of the seventeenth century but of all times, because he 
 is so logical that in rejecting classicism he goes to the other ex- 
 treme and is logically illogical and ultra-romantic. 
 
 If, finally, we try to find in classicism a general guide for life 
 in the modern world we shall welcome the sway of " wakeful 
 reason, our affections' king," ^ and sympathize with those who 
 try to unite common sense with the ideal, who are Platonists as 
 well as Aristotelians, whose rationalism is used to support 
 idealism. We shall find classicists of various kinds, some of them 
 in their criticism falling far short of what they preach, intolerant, 
 
 v- dogmatic and fault-finding. But we shall also understand that 
 the true classicist aims to keep his reason sane and unprejudiced, 
 to embody in his judgment common-sense, and in his life modera- 
 
 "^ tion, modesty and resolution^and among troubles aequam 
 servare mentem. He tries to be, if possible, a humanized stoic 
 
 ' Souriau, De la convention dans la tragSdie et le drame romanUque, p. 29. 
 * Ben Jonson, The Forest, Epode. 
 
UNDERLYING IDEAS 25 
 
 drawing from the study of the past such lessons as may give 
 stability to a world chaotic in literature, in politics and in social 
 evolution.* 
 
 ' True classicism is hospitable. Cf. Nisard's history of French literature, vol. i, 
 p. 21 : "Nous I'aimons [la France ] parce qu'elle nous paratt la meilleure patrie pour 
 Ilioimne en g€n€ral, et nous voudrions y donner le droit de cit£ i tout le genre 
 humain." This is different from the political, traditionalistic classicism recently 
 prevalent in Fiance in a small set. Still the best cannot always live up to it, and 
 Bossuet's attitude to a foe was as intolerant as that of Charles Maurras to a m&^que. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 RENAISSANCE CLASSICISM. THE THEORIES OF THE 
 PLfilADE 
 
 French classicism turned out to be vastly different from the ideal 
 we have described. Greek classicism and French classicism were 
 based upon dissimilar fundamental conceptions of creed and gov- 
 ernment. The seventeenth century, at any rate, placed " music " 
 above " gymnastic," and its sense of measure (au4>poffvvti) became 
 an intellectual rather than a moral quality.^ 
 
 Other factors, too, complicated matters. The moderns made 
 their model too comprehensive, so that it included not only all 
 Greek, but Roman antiquity as well. They gave, especially in the 
 sixteenth century, much attention to the Hellenistic or Alex- 
 andrian age, and at all times to Roman literature. 
 
 Euripides already represented the breaking away from the uni- 
 versal elements of Greek art. Instead of depicting with broad 
 lines the conflict of eternal passions and eternal laws, he intro- 
 duced a more subtle analysis. Just as in modern French realism 
 an effort to avoid monotony drove the novelist to the Salp^triere 
 and the study of morbid pathology, similarly Euripides, by show- 
 ing various phases of emotions and passions, seemed to Aristoph- 
 anes to have degraded tragedy. It has repeatedly been said 
 that Euripides is not typical of Greek genius, and to understand 
 him " requires no special sympathy with the Greek spirit." 
 
 Gradually the creative spirit of Greek genius merged into an age 
 of analysis. Instead of a spontaneous expression of ideals we get 
 encylopaedic surveys of science and the laborious writers of the 
 school of art for art's sake. A tour de force was valued above all 
 things. Literature was composed more by men of learning than 
 
 ' Hillebrand, France and the French in the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century, 
 ch. X, says this of modern France. 
 
 26 
 
RENAISSANCE CLASSICISM 27 
 
 by men of feeling. It is this feature which is usually meant when 
 the epithet Alexandrian is applied to contemporary writers. It is 
 life interpreted by the dweller in cities. Such is Anatole France in 
 his poems or in Thais} 
 
 The Romans were practical realists and did not so much as the 
 men of Hellas deal with the universal. Their most original writers 
 often imitated. In a language of highly artificial structure they 
 borrowed from the Alexandrians as well as from the pure Hel- 
 lenes. The Silver Age, in particular, after the Golden Age, lacked 
 spontaneity, though not vigor, and turned with pleasure to au- 
 thors of the kindred Alexandrian period. 
 
 When the Renaissance came to France, historical perspective 
 was neglected. The classical ideal was made to include all antiq- 
 uity, Rome as well as Greece, and it was stretched to include 
 Italy, which had transmitted so many of the old writers. 
 
 The esprit franqais, upon which sympathetic historians of 
 classicism like Nisard (Might to dwell, is chiefly the consequence 
 of the Latin training. The dominant features of the espritfranqais 
 and particularly of its seventeenth-century manifestation, the 
 esprit classique, are clearness of conception and logical deductioDij. 
 The qualities which made the Romans a " nation of gramma- 
 rians " and of lawyers, made Frenchmen students of language, 
 from Ramus and Estienne to Vaugelas, no less than investigators 
 of law. The result was a temperament inclined to practical rea- 
 son, clearness of analysis, accuracy of definition, logical in its 
 means of expression, gifted with power of rationalistic generaliza- 
 tion. To the French philosopher method is more important than 
 metaphysics, and French philosophers have often been mathe- 
 maticians: Descartes, Pascal, d'Alembert, Condorcet, Comte, 
 Bergson. 
 
 Such is the temperament of the great writers of the School of 
 1660. They rise to a more dignified height than does the vm- 
 bridled nineteenth-century romanticist, though they lose what 
 makes so much of the beauty of romanticism, lyrical emotion. 
 
 ' Foi much more about Alezandiinism, see Couat, la Poesie alexandrine. 
 
28 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 Critics proclaim that they are under the guidance of universal 
 reason. We seem, in a way, to be finding ourselves back in antiq- 
 uity, but we must not assume too perfect an identification. The 
 esprit classique has many elements of similarity with Greece, but 
 more with Rome. It is not a total organization of life, where art 
 and action are equal, expressing harmony of body and soul. In 
 France it is rather a definitely evolved attitude, worked out for a 
 practical purpose, intelligibility, and the authority which this 
 involves. Hence the Roman rather than the Hellenic ideal pre- 
 vails. In so far as it is Greek it is not infrequently self-conscious, 
 therefore Alexandrian. 
 
 The love of antiquity and of its Hterature had shown itself at 
 different periods in French literature before the Renaissance of 
 the sixteenth century. But the cult had been of a misunderstood 
 antiquity and not of its best period or manifestation. Through- 
 out the Middle Ages such writers as Ovid and Lucan had been in 
 high favor, and Greece had been seen largely through a disguised 
 Aristotle annexed by the church. In the sixteenth century practi- 
 cally for the first time " classicism " means more than merely the 
 study of certain Latin authors. 
 
 I The French Renaissance may perhaps be satisfactorily defined 
 as the period in which authority and tradition were overthrown.s! 
 The contributing causes were those to which we attribute the de- 
 velopment of the modern spirit in Europe: the appearance of 
 Greek churchmen in Italy; the downfall of Constantinople, and 
 the spread of Greek teachers through the Western world, a cause 
 somewhat exaggerated; the invention of printing, which made 
 literature more accessible and subject to scrutiny; the growth of 
 geographical discovery and knowledge.yThese same causes, of 
 course, tended also to bring about the Reformation. In fact, the 
 three great currents of French thought in the sixteenth century, 
 it is pointed out, are the Renaissance, the Reformation and Hu- 
 manism. Nor are these terms simply interchangeable: the Re- 
 naissance and the Reformation soon diverged. Both were a revolt 
 against authority, but the Renaissance emphasized the sense of 
 
RENAISSANCE CLASSICISM 29 
 
 freedom, the Reformation sought a new authority in the teachings 
 of the primitive church. The humanist could in certain respects 
 sympathize with either of the other tendencies: most humanists 
 were men of the Renaissance, and some of them were, at least for 
 a time, reformers. But the Reformation took a Hebraic bias dif- 
 ferent from the cult of Greece and Rome. Moreover, persecution 
 and the turmoil of contest were not to the taste of those who loved 
 the templa serena. These preferred the excitement of a conjectural 
 emendation to warfare over dogma. Humanism, as we ask to 
 define it in a way long accepted but narrower, it is true, than its 
 name, is the cult of the best in humanity seen under the guidance 
 of the ancients. In its older sense, indicated by the famous quo- 
 tation " Homo sum, humani nihil a me alienum puto," it did 
 imply that aU was of interest to man. Today, again, in the decline 
 of the classical tradition of culture, the word is constantly used to 
 imply interest in every experience,or even is confused with the 
 social or ethical phases of humanitarianism. But for generations 
 hmnanism was understood as the regulation of letters and of life 
 by the standard of antiquity. Such a use of the term should, 
 the);efore, go imcriticized in these pages. 
 
 ^lence it comes that the literature of sixteenth-century classi- 
 cism was largely dominated by humanism. The hmnanism of the 
 Renaissance we may differentiate from its mediaeval counter- 
 part, by calling it the love for a better understood antiquity. 
 Formerly the ancients had been seen through an unconscious and 
 partial tradition. Now they were viewed at closer range and with 
 truer knowledge of the best elements of ancient literature, the 
 authors of Greece, j ^ 
 
 The humanisi&T)f the first half of the sixteenth century were, 
 for the most part, erudite and technical scholars. We look about 
 almost in vain among the prose writers in pure Uterature for a 
 hmnanist, except in the greatest of them all, Rabelais. Among 
 the poets from Lemaire de Beiges to Marot-agd_Margaret of 
 Navarre we find here and there traces of hmnanism, but not 
 enough to characterize them absolutely as hmnanists. 
 
30 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 The spirit of humanism enters French poetry with the P16iade. 
 Ronsard and Du Bellay lead the movement to renovate the na- 
 tional literature and improve it by the study of classical models. 
 The underlying principle of this laudable effort preached in the 
 Defense et Illustration de la langue frangaise is Platonic. The 
 formulation of cast-iron " Aristotelian " rules for the different 
 
 .- genres or types was, it is true, proceeding in Italy, and towards 
 the third quarter of the sixteenth century it shows itself in the 
 French drama. But, on the other hand, the central thesis of the 
 Defense belongs, somewhat vaguely and indefinitely it is true, to 
 doctrines preaching varying forms of invention called assimilation 
 or innutrition, connected in principle with the Platonic notions of 
 methexis or anamnesis, of participation or recollection, which 
 Du Bellay got from Cicero, Horace and particularly Quintihan.^ 
 It is quite true that in practice the classicists of the Pleiade imi- 
 tated as much as they assimilated, that the pastiches of Homer, 
 ApoUonius Rhodius, Theocritus, Virgil and Horace, or even of 
 Ariosto, Serafino and Tebaldeo, outnumber the poems in which 
 the spirit of the models has become French. But this was a 
 defect of execution and not of theory. School exercise preceded 
 originality. 
 
 The sixteenth-century classicism of the Pleiade is therefore 
 shown in a literature of humanism striving, though not always 
 successfully, to express itseK with artistic taste. If we try to dif- 
 
 i ferentiate its content more fully, we find that upon the old stock 
 have been grafted numerous elements which, at times, merge into 
 one another, at times are almost incompatible. Chief among 
 these are Hellenism, Alexandrinism, the Encyclopaedic eagerness, 
 and Italianism, especially Petrarchism. We must be very careful 
 not to neglect the native spirit. It is no longer permissible to 
 adopt the former view which saw between the new Uterature and 
 the old an abyss, which thought that the French mind of the 
 
 Middle Ages was totally displaced by another one, that the new 
 
 classicism was a wholly exotic growth, that even the publication 
 
 ' Cf. Chamard, Du Bellay, pp. 6i and 124 (Quintilian, Inst. Orat., x, 2). 
 
RENAISSANCE CLASSICISM 31 
 
 of the Difense was a " coup de tonnerre." It is much more ac- 
 curate to say that obviously the French genie is the same in all 
 ages, that the author of the Quintil-Horatian was not entirely un- 
 true to fact in calling the new genres mere transformations of old 
 popular forms, that Ronsard was the heir of Jean Bouchet and the 
 rhetoriqueurs as well as of Theocritus and Apollonius.^ 
 By Hellenism, as already stated, is meant the impulse which 
 ' prompted the men of the Renaissance to draw inspiration from 
 I Greek Uterature. The Italians, as usual, had set the example, but 
 it was eagerly followed by the French humanists. An early 
 thinker, Lefevre d'Etaples, in spite of insufficient Greek training, 
 tried to rescue the authentic text of Aristotle from the confusion 
 of commentators. Lefevre's intellectual method led him to ini- 
 tiate the first form of Protestantism in France, Fabrisianism. 
 The technical scholar Bud6 was the ardent advocate of the study 
 of the Greek language and letters, and saw in them the perfection 
 of art, and in their study the best way to strengthen the intellect. 
 Rabelais's universal genius pours into his work countless frag- 
 ments of Greek erudition. Later, Henri Estienne argues the con- 
 formity of French with Greek. Above all Ronsard strives to imi- 
 tate and to emulate the Greek poets from Pindar to Theocritus, 
 ApoUonius and the Anacreontic verses. Though Hellenism was, 
 on the whole, a passing mood in French poetry and was destined 
 soon to yield to more accessible and easily read Latin or Italian 
 writers, yet its value is undeniable in strengthening the litera- 
 ture of the sixteenth century. Those poets who were Hellen- 
 ists rose to a nobler even though occasionally obscure form of 
 expression. ' 
 
 We give the name Alexandrinism to an intellectual temper apt 
 to characterize certain non-creative or imitative Uterary ages.* 
 The name, as we have seen, is derived from the Alexandria of the 
 
 • Some of the ways in which the rfUtoriqueurs paved the way for the P16iade were : 
 love of the vernacular, cult of Latin antiquity, use of mythology, feeling for. nature, 
 taste for poetical periphrasis, invention of strophes, alternation of rhjTnes. Cf. 
 H. Chamard, in Revue critique, vol. lii, p. 494. 
 
 ' Cf . E. Faguet, Propos lUt&raires, z' sirie. 
 
32 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 Ptolemies, the home of the great Ubrary and the resort for study. 
 Modern Alexandrinism has the same general characteristics as 
 the ancient one: an often painstaking erudition, a frequent 
 tendency towards finicky prettinesses in place of either the primi- 
 tive and spontaneous or the majestic. Above all it imitates 
 praiseworthy classical models in such a way as to emphasize the 
 exotic quality of those models, though this does not hinder an 
 Alexandrian age from thinking itself new and original. The mod- 
 ern poet, for instance, is likely to make mythological references, 
 to strew his verses with quotations or allusive epithets, to see 
 nature through books. His aim is to interest trained men of cul- 
 ture and he is at times aristocratically disdainful of the common 
 man. A hterature of Alexandrinism is therefore likely to be 
 learned, critical and well-bred. Its defects may be narrowness, 
 pedantry, over-wrought triviahty, and inabihty to distinguish 
 between the encylopaedic accumulation of facts and the true art 
 of using them. An Alexandrian period is too consciously Uterary, 
 an age of virtuosity, of artistry rather than of art. 
 
 The humanistic poets of the French Renaissance made one 
 fatal mistake in their conception of antiquity. They not only 
 fell into the natural confusion of lumping together all antiquity, 
 Hellenic and Hellenistic, Greek and Roman, but they saw it 
 largely through the Italy which had transmitted it to them. So 
 that Italy was raised from being a means of approach to equality 
 with the models. Even second-rate Italian writers were the ob- 
 ject of admiration and imitation. The French interpreted the 
 ancients as the ItaKans did, they accepted the verdicts of Italian 
 critics, they followed the same reconstruction of Uterary genres 
 and drew indiscriminately from the Italian poets. This is Italian- 
 ism. Moreover, inasmuch as the great Italian lyric poet had been 
 Petrarch, the Italianism of the poets often took the form of Pe- 
 trarchism. Nor was Petrarchism among the French confined to 
 the imitation of Petrarch alone. It was more likely to be the imi- 
 tation of often inferior ItaUan Petrarchists copied even in their 
 mannerisms. 
 
RENAISSANCE CLASSICISM 33 
 
 The social and intellectual environment of the Pleiade was 
 courtly and scholarly. At the CoUege de Coqueret and in the 
 university at large the humanistic writers came in contact with 
 the learned professors of the day from Daurat himself to Tusanus 
 and Danes. In the train of Lazare de Baif and of members of the 
 Du Bellay family they met men of culture from all Europe, par- 
 ticularly Italy. In the environment of learned patronesses like 
 Marguerite de Berry they were encouraged in their erudite cult of 
 the Muses. Moreover, in the court circles they were surrounded 
 by a spirit of neo-chivalry instigated by Francis I, developed by 
 Henry II and stimulated by the Amadis de Gaule. There was an 
 atmosphere of social Platonism with a poetical cult of woman, 
 partly due to literary traditions of chivalry, partly attributable 
 to the influence of Italy .* For Italy was omnipresent, whether in 
 theories of education derived from the Italian humanists, and of 
 good manners and social intercourse drawn from Castiglione's 
 Cortegiano, or in the poetic influence of the Petrarchists, of San- 
 nazaro or of Italian writers resident in France, such as Luigi Ala- 
 manni. Partly in imitation of Italy the mediaeval type of fortress 
 like Langeais was sdelding to the new order represented by Cham- 
 bord, Chenonceaux, Amboise or Azay-le-Rideau. Leonardo da 
 Vinci and Benvenuto Cellini came to France, and Fontainebleau 
 was decorated by Rosso and Primaticcio. The elaborate myth- 
 ologizing of the School of Fontainebleau in art corresponds to the 
 literary paganism of the P16iade. If critics are correct in draAAring 
 a parallel between the florid style of the rhetoriqueurs and the 
 flamboyant architecture of the late Middle Ages, we are no less 
 justified in appl3dng the term " stucco classicism " to at least 
 some of the writings of Ronsard.** 
 
 It was in such an environment that the theories of the P16iade 
 took form. Philosophically this sixteenth-century classicism is to 
 a considerable degree Platonic and is less entangled with Aris- 
 totelian formalism and the cult of the rules than the seventeenth- 
 
 ' Cf. the writings of E. Bourciez, Maulde la Clavifere, A. Lefranc, etc. 
 ^ On these topics see Tilley's Dawn of the French Renaissance. 
 
34 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 century classicism. It is the expression of those Platonic moods 
 which saw in the poet the inspired interpreter of the Gods, and in 
 poetry a reminiscence of a more perfect ideal of art.^ Yet, though 
 the poet is born and not made, he is not thereby exempt from toil 
 and endeavor. To an age thoroughly convinced of the dignity of 
 learning the poet was as industrious a craftsman as the pedagogue 
 or mechanic.^ In fact to many people poetry was a form of eru- 
 dition, and every member of a learned class, the advocate, the 
 physician, the teacher, thought himself qualified to be a irotTjnJs 
 and to write verse. 
 
 The theories of the Pleiade are set forth chiefly in the Defense 
 and the preface to the Olive of Du Bellay, in Ronsard's Ahrege de 
 I'art poetique and the prefaces to the Franciade. They amount to 
 this : Write in French and assimilate the ancients, for so the spirit 
 of antiquity will be brought into French. Advice for the attain- 
 ment of such an end is set forth very unsystematically in these 
 writings. The chief source that is of value for us is of course the 
 Defense. Much of the A brege de I'art poetique is merely of technical 
 interest, and relates to points of versification, even of pronuncia- 
 tion; the discussions of the Franciade concern the epic. The pre- 
 face of Du Bellay's Olive, however, almost contemporary with the 
 Defense, develops still more the theory of imitation. So we are 
 justified in taking the writings of Ronsard and of Du Bellay as a 
 whole, and we get practically the same conclusions. 
 
 We find, therefore, mainly in the D&fense et Illustration that: 
 
 Firstly, the French language has been unjustly treated and 
 deemed unworthy of comparison with the languages of the an- 
 cients. Let us defend it. 
 
 Secondly, it may be improved and made more illustrious. 
 French, then, is not barbarous: " ne doit estre nommee bar- 
 bare "; and we may remember that, years before, Lemaire de 
 
 ' Cf . Rosenbauer, Die Poetischen Theorien der Plejade. 
 
 2 Du Bellay's Defense, Part II, ch. 3, Que le naturel n'est suffisant d celuy qui en 
 poesie veuUfaire osuvre digne de I'itnmortaliti. 
 
RENAISSANCE CLASSICISM 35 
 
 Beiges had spoken of " la langue frangaise que les Italiens nom- 
 ment barbare, mais non est." For, though it lacks the wealth of 
 Greek and Latin, this is due to the neglect of those who failed to 
 cultivate it but let it grow like a rank weed. French is far from 
 lacking good qualities, and it may be improved still more by con- 
 tact with the classics of Greece and Rome./Ti the Defense, Du 
 BeUay reproduces Quintilian's theoiv, which represents imitation 
 as the chief principle of invention. vln the preface to the Olive, 
 Du BeUay emphasizes the theory of imitation but gives it more 
 independence. Let the imitation be intelligent, let it be the ab- 
 sorption of the qualities of the languages of the past, so that the 
 results may be new and original.^ The mind of the writer may 
 well be impregnated with the words of the ancients, so that these 
 shall be the language of his thoughts, the natural way of express- 
 ing what goes on within him. Consequently we may avoid trans- 
 lations, which, though useful to those who have no familiarity 
 with foreign languages, are ineffectual. Renew above all the 
 tactics of the old Romans face to face with the Greeks. " How 
 were they able thus to enrich their language, so as to make it even 
 almost equal to Greek ? By imitating the best Greek authors, 
 transforming themselves into them, devouring them, and after 
 having thoroughly digested them, converting them into blood and 
 sustenance, each one keeping before him according to his own 
 nature and the subject he wished to choose, the best author, 
 whose rarest and most exquisite qualities they diligently ob- 
 
 1 The ideas of Du Bellay in the Defense, however much they go back ultimately 
 to Plato, Quintilian and Horace, came more directly from the Italian Sperone 
 Speroni. Cf . P. Villey, les Sources italiennes de la Defense et Illustration de la langue 
 franQoise. See, for instance, pp. 71 ff. for Italians who wrote on imitation; p. 71 for 
 Italians who had argued in " defense " of Italian. — Du BeUay deals with the poet 
 particularly because Dolet had dealt with the orateur. Cf . Chamard's edition of the 
 Defense, p. 161, n. 4. 
 
 ^ As Du Bellay expresses it in the preface of his OKm : "Si, par la lecture des bons 
 livres, je me suis imprimfi quelques traits en la fantaisie, qui apr6s, venant i. exposer 
 mes petites conceptions selon les occasions qui m'en sont donn£es, me coulent beau- 
 coup plus facilement en la plume qu'ils ne me reviennent en la m6moire, doit-on 
 pour cette raison les appeler pifices rapport6es ?," 
 
36 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 served, and applied and grafted them, as I have said before, 
 to their language." * 
 
 The second part of Du Bellay's argument is an attempt to show 
 how the French language may be improved so as to express more 
 fittingly those quaUties of which it is capable. Thus he enters 
 upon a haphazard discussion of various features of French and 
 advises the poet with regard to genres, choice of words and similar 
 matters. But everywhere the trumpet note is heard exhorting 
 Frenchmen to use their own language, and it bursts forth in a 
 shrill call in the famous and often quoted passage: " So then, 
 Frenchmen, advance boldly against that arrogant Roman states 
 and, with its captured spoils, as you have done more than once, 
 adorn your temples and your altars. Fear no more those cackling 
 geese, that proud Manlius, that traitor Camillus, surprising you 
 in good faith off your guard counting the ransom of the Capitol. 
 Assail that false Greece and sow there once more the famous na- 
 tion of the Gallo-Greeks. Pillage without scruple the sacred 
 treasures of the Delphic temple, as you did of yore, and fear no 
 more the mute Apollo, his false oracles or his blunted arrows. 
 Remember your ancient Marseilles, a second Athens, and your 
 GaUic Hercules, drawing nations after him by their ears with a 
 chain attached to his tongue." 
 
 Ronsard's views are in harmony with these exhortations to 
 study the ancients and to renew their spirit in French. Thus in. 
 the Abrege de I' art poetique he tells us that a prime requisite is to 
 have grand and soaring conceptions. Car le principal point est 
 Vinvention. Invention is due to natural endowment and to the 
 study of the ancients. So the poet must studiously read good 
 poets. To a knowledge of Greek and Latin he must add his own 
 French language, the more dear to him because it is his mother 
 tongue. He may use it even to the extent of reviving old-fash- 
 ioned phrases, technical words or dialectal terms drawn from all 
 parts of the land. 
 
 ^ Defense, Book I, ch. 7. 
 
RENAISSANCE CLASSICISM 37 
 
 Such is the doctrine of innutrition or of assimilation which is at 
 the foundation of French classicism, and which we may say to 
 have been even more consistently followed in the sixteenth than in 
 the seventeenth century. Perhaps the most often quoted illus- 
 trative passage is from Andr^ Chenier's poem l' Invention : 
 
 Changeons en notre miel leurs plus antiques fleurs; 
 Pour peindre notre idee empruntons leurs couleurs; 
 Allumons nos flambeaux k leurs feux pw^tiques; 
 Sur des pensers nouveaux faisons des vers antiques. 
 
 There are, however, many other corroborative passages scattered 
 through Uterature. In the sixteenth century itself excellent speci- 
 mens of the same argument can be found in Montaigne's essays 
 Du Pidantisme and De VInstituiion des Enfants. We are too 
 ready, says Montaigne in the first of these essays, merely to bor- 
 row the wisdom and learning of others. We should make these 
 our own: " What does it avail to have a belly stuffed with food, 
 if that food cannot be digested and transformed into us, if it does 
 not strengthen and fortify us ? " Perhaps as vivid a way of put- 
 ting it as we can find are the words used by Sir Joshua Re3naolds in 
 his fifth Discourse, speaking of the French classicist painter Nico- 
 las Poussin : " He studied the ancients so much that he acquired a 
 habit of thinking in their way, and seemed to know perfectly the 
 actions and gestures they would use on every occasion." 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 THE FORMS OF SIXTEENTH-CENTURY CLASSICISM 
 
 The Pleiade was desirous of reviving the literary forms of the 
 ancients and of creating new ones worthy of the old. In Ronsard 
 especially we- find, with the exception of tragedy, examples of all 
 phases of the new classicism. 
 
 Ronsard is to be called chiefly a lyric and elegiac poet, though 
 one not content with the lyricism in a minor key of the writers of 
 the Middle Ages and early Renaissance. Consequently, though 
 we find him at certain periods of his life falling into the insignifi- 
 cant trifles of a court poet, yet his chief desire was to become the 
 inspired prophet of France. In this he showed his " Platonism." 
 Looking back even beyond his favorite Horace among the ancient 
 poets he perceived the Greek Pindar, who seemed half priest of 
 men, half interpreter of the Gods. So, with perhaps some hints 
 from the poems of Luigi Alamanni, Ronsard tried to introduce the 
 Pindaric ode as the noblest expression of lyricism. He had the 
 field, indeed, much to himself, for Pindar was a new poet to the 
 modern world, and is even now one of the most difficult authors of 
 antiquity to decipher, one whose odes have often been taken on 
 trust unread as a combination of obscurity and sublimity. 
 
 But Pindar was not the only majestic figure in ancient litera- 
 ture, nor were his poems the only ones to impress the world. 
 Homer was as striking a character as Pindar and no less deserving 
 of imitation. So Ronsard must reproduce Homer and those other 
 seemingly great names of Greek poetry, Theocritus and Apol- 
 lonius Rhodius, the author of the Alexandrian epic the Argonatt- 
 tica. To these was added the Roman Virgil. Virgil was pre- 
 eminent in more than one genre, in pastoral as well as in epic 
 poetry. Hence came the Theocritean-Virgilian pastorals and the 
 
 38 
 
FORMS OF EARLY CLASSICISM 39 
 
 epic of Ronsard. Finally, the Italians no less than the ancients 
 had had demi-gods, and Petrarch and Ariostowere models of Ron- 
 sard. So we can divide his genres into five chief divisions: odes, 
 sonnets, epic, pastorals, elegies. Nearly all his important writings I 
 can be brought imder one of these five heads. 
 
 The odes of Ronsard are of three kinds: Horatian, Pindaric 
 and Anacreontic. Early in life he had composed odes in imitation 
 of Horace and continued to love him. Later he was smitten with 
 the Pindaric fever, and after the publication in 1554 by Henri 
 Estienne of the pseudo-Anacreontic poems, Ronsard, in common 
 with all the poets of his day, fell a victim to Anacreontism. 
 
 Nothing is easier than to compare the Horatian strain in Ron- 
 sard with the epicureanism of Horace. Horace, in his turn inspired 
 by the Greeks, does not ask for much. Let him only live on his 
 Sabine farm, among country sights and soimds, far from the 
 hubbub of Rome. He does not dwell in a palace, he loathes Orien- 
 tal pomp, and asks but for fresh air and summer breezes, with 
 enough to eat and drink. Leave him with sweetly prattling 
 Lalage and, heedless of the gods of mythology, as the years go by 
 he will live in the present, unmindful of the future. All this is far 
 better than to imitate Pindar; for, as Horace says, such a one is 
 apt to fly aloft with waxen wing and, like Icarus, bestow his name 
 upon a sea. 
 
 Such is the epicureanism of Horace. The merit of Ronsard is to 
 have reproduced successfully the same feelings, and to have seen 
 in the little Loir the Anio, in the " Fontaine Bellerie " the Ban- 
 diisian spring, and in the forest of Gastine the country about 
 Tibur. 
 
 The Anacreontic qualities are not absolutely separable from the 
 Horatian ones. Here, in a more luscious and hedonistic setting, 
 Ronsard gives utterance to motives of love, wine and song, of 
 active physical enjoyment, rather than of contentment with a 
 modest fortune. 
 
 Ronsard did try also to emulate Pindar and soar on waxen wing. 
 At an early period, before the Anacreontic stage, he sought to 
 
40 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 work himself into the mystic frenzy or enthusiasm expressive of 
 the divinity, which according to him indicated the true poet. For 
 the poets of antiquity were to him demi-gods or heroes " non tant 
 pour leur divin esprit qui les rendait sur tous admirables et excel- 
 lens," he says in his Abrig^ de I'Art poetique, " que pour la con- 
 naissance qu'ils avaient avec les Oracles, Prophetes, Devins, 
 Sibylles, interpretes de songes, desquels ils avaient appris la 
 meilleure part de ce qu'ils savaient. Car ce que les Oracles 
 disaient en peu de mots, ces gentils personnages I'ampUfiaient, 
 coloraient et augmentaient, etant envers le peuple ce que les 
 Sibylles et Devins etaient en leur endroit." ' 
 
 Ronsard thought himself fitted to reproduce the Pindaric quali- 
 ties and interpret the muses to a new civilization. With punctil- 
 ious exactness he undertook to reproduce the spirit and setting of 
 Pindar, including the formal structure of strophe, antistrophe and 
 epode so difficult to express in the French language with its slight 
 stress and varjdng accent. Thus he chose a great man, the king, 
 the Cardinal de Lorraine, the Chancellor Michel de I'Hospital as 
 hero. Then, cramming the piece with mythological or historical 
 allusions he sought a noble disorder, which consisted in concealing 
 the filiation of ideas and in count^feiting poetic frenzy. The 
 sentences might be simple, but their union was hard to grasp. All 
 this seemed, at any rate for a time, a merit to Ronsard, who had 
 been taught by Daurat to admire Lycophron, the most obscure of 
 Alexandrian poets.^ We see that the sixteenth-century classicism 
 
 • Ronsard saw in the poet a demi-god, Malherbe and Boileau a man. Ronsard 
 was not of the opinion of those mentioned in the last chapter who thought all learned 
 men could be poets: " H disait ordinairement que tous ne devaient t6m6rairement 
 se meler de la po6sie, que la prose 6tait le langage des hommes, mais la pofisie 6tait 
 le langage des dieux, et que les hommes n'en devaient 6tre les interprStes s'ils 
 n'fitaient sacrfis des leur naissance et d6di6s k ce minist^re." — Binet's Vie de Ron- 
 sard. See Gaiffe's edition of the Art poUique of SebiUet (Sibilet) , p. 8, n., for reference 
 to passages on the divinity of Poesy. To SebUlet the list of inspired bards contains 
 names ranging from Moses, David and Solomon to Homer, Hesiod and Pindar. 
 
 ^ " C'est un m^chant tour que lui ont jou6 13, ses reminiscences de Callimaque, de 
 Lycophron, de Virgile, d'Horace, de Claudien, et surtout du Byzantin Marulle." — 
 Laumonier, Ronsard, pohte lyrique, p. 341. 
 
FORMS OF EARLY CLASSICISM 41 
 
 was far from laying stress on the clearness and logic which were so 
 important to the seventeenth century. 
 
 The Pindarism of Ronsard found few imitators. It was a single 
 mood in his own career, and its soaring strain was above the reach 
 of even his contemporaries. On the other hand, the Horatian and 
 Anacreontic odes, original or imitated, were cultivated in abun- 
 dance by the poets of the PMiade. Belleau, Baif, OHvier de 
 Magny, and others tried adaptations of the Anacreontic poems, 
 and the Horatian versions of Olivier de Magny are in spirit 
 among the best in French literature. 
 
 The sonnet Uterature of Ronsard and of his feUow-poets is far 
 less classical in its manfestations. Though they borrowed the 
 frequent title of their collections (Amours) from the Amores of 
 Ovid, yet here they tended most spedfically to imitate the ItaUans 
 and to run riot among the exaggerations of Petrarchism. Ron- 
 sard in his sonnets to Helene, Du BeUay in his romantic melan- 
 choly among the ruins of Rome, or in his satire of the corrupt 
 modern Rome, give examples of successful poetic invention, but 
 the vast majority of these love-poems represent the deUberate 
 choice of a real or imaginary woman as a Uterary object. Said 
 Etienne Pasquier: " Lorsque nos poetes discourent le mieux de 
 I'amour, c'est lorsqu'ils sont moins atteints de maladie." This is 
 a very different frame of mind, indeed, from the suflferings in verse 
 of a Musset: 
 
 Mais i'ai souffert un dur martyre, 
 
 £t le moins que j'en pourrais dire, 
 
 Si je I'essayais sur ma lire, 
 
 La briserait comma un roseau. 
 
 It explains, too, why poets could of their own free will after a time 
 reject the Petrarchistic mood,^ as Du Bellay, 
 J'ai oublie I'art de pStrarquiser.^ 
 
 Yet, none the less, the sonnet-hterature of the sixteenth century, 
 written as much to be simg as read, is the most fertile expression 
 
 ' Petrarchism may be a form of Flatonism, but it is very concrete and sensuous, 
 sometimes erotic. ■' Contre les Petrarquistes. 
 
42 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 of the poets of the time. But the writers are there modern rather 
 than ancient, and the Basia or " Kisses " of the Dutch neo-Latin 
 poet Secundus, or Bembo and Marullus, are to Ronsard as worthy 
 of imitation as Propertius or Catullus. Indeed, Du Bellay is at his 
 best when he assimilates lines by Navagero, the ItaUan Latin 
 writer of the Renaissance. 
 
 The sixteenth-century epic, as cultivated by Ronsard in his un- 
 finished Franciade, is as unsuccessful as the Pindaric experiments. 
 Here, again, Ronsard imitated instead of assimilating. Very 
 different, in spite of its invective, was the personal feeling of 
 the Huguenot epic satirist Agrippa d' Aubign^ in his Tragiques. 
 Different too, in the sincerity of its religious feeling, was the epic 
 on the Creation by the unjustly derided Du Bartas. 
 
 To the sixteenth-century classicist the epic was the result of 
 long incubation. The more laborious and involved a poet, the 
 better he seemed suited to express epic qualities. " Poetic " and 
 docte or savant were nearly synonjonous, and to ScaKger, Virgil 
 was as superior to Homer as an illustrious matron to a woman of 
 the people. Moreover, in the Franciade Ronsard scarcely shows 
 good imitation, much less assimilation. It is often a weak pas- 
 tiche of Greek and Latin authors, a cento of quotations smelling 
 strongly of the midnight oil, and elaborately built up from Virgil 
 and Apollonius Rhodius, helped out by Homer, Theocritus or a 
 Uttle of Ariosto. These passages manifest the author's applica- 
 tion in translating rather than an appreciation of beauty. Ron- 
 sard cranmied his poem full of episodes and descriptions extran- 
 eous to the general plan, whereby the action correspondingly lags. 
 
 Yet Ronsard was not acting in ignorance. In the first and 
 second prefaces of the Franciade he distinctly states his theory 
 concerning the heroic poem. His chosen model is Virgil. In the 
 first preface he says, it is true, that " j'ai patronn^ mon ceuvre 
 plut6t sur la naive facilite d'Homere que sur la curieuse diligence 
 de Virgile." But he afterwards adds his praise of Virgil as " plus 
 excellent et plus rond," and acknowledges that " j'allegue Virgile 
 plus souvent qu' Homere." 
 
FORMS OF EARLY CLASSICISM 43 
 
 In his epic Ronsard felt it his duty to take old annals of past 
 times and treat the narrative with descriptions " imitating the 
 effects of nature," according to Homer. Then, too, the poet must 
 seek out his comparisons or similes, borrowing them from aU the 
 trades and professions with which Nature has honored man: 
 " Ce sont les nerfs et tendons des Muses." Anything trivial or 
 vulgar must be avoided, for Ronsard is in terror lest he should 
 imitate, not " les bans mesnagers qui tapissent bien leurs salles, 
 chambres et cabinets," but " les galetas ou couchent les valets." 
 
 Clearly, then, Ronsard was no careless or inconsiderate com- 
 poser, whatever the result, and he was really appl3dng with great 
 elaboration his usual theories upon the formation of a new genre to 
 the epic as well as to the ode. In fact, it was the punctiliousness 
 with which he followed the rule of thumb, instead of trusting to 
 inspiration, that makes the Franciade so mechanical. 
 
 Finally, Ronsard 3delds to the moralizing tone, partly at the 
 king's desire, who wanted each monarch portrayed in the Fran- 
 ciade to be an object lesson to him. Herein we see a tendency 
 which is even much more marked in the seventeenth-century epic, 
 that of using the heroic poem as a vehicle for moral instruction. 
 
 It was in pastoral poetry that Ronsard and his fellows did some 
 of their best work. Theocritus was one of his favorite poets, and 
 the Alexandrinism of the Dorian muse of Sicily, with its touch of 
 artificiaUty, combined well with the refinements of Virgil. The 
 modem himianists were fond both of the Virgil of the Eclogues 
 and the Virgil of the Aeneid, and pastoral literature had been cul- 
 tivated by Petrarch, Mantuan, Poliziano and Sannazaro. Thus 
 the sixteenth-century eclogue in France reproduces in a rather 
 bookish way, but not without great charm, the rustic sights and 
 soimds of the sophisticated poems of Theocritus, the whispering 
 trees and sighing winds, the flowers and shrubs, the humming 
 bees and singing birds. But, largely through the influence of the 
 semi-allegorical Virgilian eclogue, French pastoral poetry, even in 
 Marot, is also allegorical in tendency. Both Marot's eclogue of 
 Pan and Robin and those of the Pleiade roughly satisfy Sebillet's 
 
44 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 definition of the eclogue, as a dialogue in which appear shepherds 
 and " gardeurs de bfetes," telling in pastoral terms of deaths of 
 princes, calamities, changes of nations, outcomes of fortune and 
 so forth, in such a transparent way that the truth may be read 
 behind the allegory. In the following century Boileau criticized 
 Ronsard for the uncouthness of his eclogues and for making his 
 shepherds speak " comme on parle au village." As a matter of 
 fact the eclogues of Ronsard are as aristocratic as the rest of the 
 literature of the Pleiade, and the shepherds and shepherdesses 
 who appear under the names of Carlin or Margot are no other 
 than kings and princesses. Nor did Ronsard, like Spenser, manu- 
 facture artificial rustic archaisms to give a factitious air of the 
 country to his idyls. Ronsard's pastorals would have been as 
 much at home at Versailles as the Ari poetique of Boileau. More- 
 over, they are among his best work, for he did have that apprecia- 
 tion of nature which made him seize the apt epithet, as the bruit 
 enroue of falling waters. 
 
 Ronsard's love of nature shows itself, sometimes in a less formal 
 manner, in his elegies, a miscellaneous collection, not always 
 answering to our English conception of the term, but in whose 
 tender sentiment, keen passion, or dreamy melancholy one finds 
 many of those characteristics which made Sainte-Beuve see in the 
 Pleiade the ancestors of the Romanticists. The elegiac qualities 
 of Ronsard are, however, also scattered through his other genres. 
 
 The l5nricism of Du Bellay differs from that of Ronsard in being 
 less ambitious, and correspondingly more personal and natural. 
 But it is particularly in his satire that he takes the lead in the new 
 classicism. Ronsard's Discours des miseres de ce temps are in a 
 strain of lofty rhetoric and patriotism, so that some critics think 
 they discern here his best work. Du BeUay's Poete courtisan is an 
 example of classical satire such as Regnier or Boileau wiU culti- 
 vate, and very different from the uncouth coq-a4'ane or " pillar- 
 to-post " poem, or even the satirical epigrams of Marot. Du Bel- 
 lay's attacks on the corruption of Rome reach the bitterness of the 
 Archilochan iambus, though they do not appear in the guise 
 
FORMS OF EARLY CLASSICISM 45 
 
 usually connected with the satire of Juvenal. It will remain for 
 writers like Vauquelin de la Fresnaye and Mathurin Regnier to 
 acclimatize, with the help of the Italians, the methods of Horace 
 a,nd Juvenal. 
 
 The classicism of the sixteenth century is chiefly characterized 
 by the lyrical element, just as drama preponderates in the seven- 
 teenth. But the drama was cultivated in the sixteenth century 
 as well. Here we note a peculiar phenomenon. The authority of 
 Aristotle had been discarded by the humanists and poets together 
 in favor of the cult of Plato. Yet, as his influence diminished in 
 literature and thought as a whole, it began to increase in the 
 drama. The Italian critics, from Trissino to Castelvetro, had ex- 
 pounded a somewhat misunderstood AristoteUanism, in which 
 ideas never originally expressed by Aristotle as to the three unities 
 were formulated, attributed to him and applied, with assistance 
 from Horace, to the content of tragedies based on Seneca. These 
 efforts the French continued from the days of Jodelle to Gamier 
 and Montchretien. In 1572 Jean de la Taille enunciated the 
 doctrine of the three unities as distinctly as Boileau did in the 
 following century. In comedy the imitation of Plautus and 
 Terence was combined with that of Italian writers of comedies, 
 Ariosto and others. For the most part the French tragedies con- 
 sisted of rhetorical tirades elaborating a suffering supposedly 
 tragic or atrox. They lacked a well developed plot and psychol- 
 ogy, and unity of action in the modern sense was apt to be want- 
 ing. One member of the Pleiade, Jean-Antoine de Baif, tried in 
 his Academy of Poetry and Music to revive the elements of dance 
 and song and to enrich the choral ode of modern tragedy so as to 
 bring it nearer to the Hellenic one. Posterity has laughed at him 
 for his pains and unjustly derided him as a pedant. 
 
 If we look for t3rpical expressions of the poetic theory of the 
 sixteenth century, we find them in the Arts of Poetry of Sebillet, 
 Peletier du Mans and Vauquelin de la Fresnaye, as well as the 
 Defense of Du Bellay. The Art poStique of Sebillet expresses, 
 indeed, mainly the ideas of the school of Marot. The Difense of 
 
46 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 Du Bellay is, in a large degree, a retort to Sebillet, his eulogy of 
 Marot, Saint-Gelais, Heroet and ScSve, his audacity in speaking 
 in one breath of Saint-Gelais, Pindar and Horace or of Marot, 
 Theocritus and Virgil, and in devoting so much attention to 
 metrical forms like the rondeau, ballade, coq-Or-Vdne, or enigma. 
 
 The Art poUique of Peletier du Mans, of 1555, expresses in many 
 ways the ideas of the Pleiade itself at the time of its glory, though 
 Peletier appreciates Marot more than does the new school, and is 
 ready to give him credit for what he did or might have done. He 
 scorns, however, many of the literary genres which brought suc- 
 cess to the school of Marot. His chief interest is in the forms to 
 which the new school attached itself: the epigram, the sonnet, 
 the ode, the epistle, the elegy, satire, comedy, tragedy, epic. 
 
 It is, however, particularly in the Art poetique of VauqueUn de 
 la Fresnaye that we find registered the fully developed ideas of the 
 sixteenth century on poetry. In some respects, even, it is not 
 thoroughly representative of the Pleiade because it goes beyond 
 it chronologically and has a wider survey. Begun in 1574, it was 
 published in 1605. Therefore it harks back well into Ronsard's 
 Ufetime, and yet it has perspective. From its chaotic cantos we 
 can, none the less, understand how the genres had crystallized to 
 the mind of an inteUigent critic, and what were the models held in 
 esteem. The Art poitique of Vauquelin de la Fresnaye is a dull- 
 useful handbook of sixteenth-century classicism. 
 
 VauqueHn claims as models Aristotle, Horace, Vida and Min- 
 tumo, of whom the two latter had themselves based their works 
 on the ancient writers. The influence of Mintumo is rather shght, 
 and Vida furnished Vauquelin chiefly with figures of poetic ex- 
 pression. Horace has passed entirely into Vauquelin with the 
 addition of allusions to contemporary literature. Aristotle adds 
 stability and dignity, so that in Vauquelin, as in the other late 
 sixteenth-century critics, we find codified what in Ronsard and 
 his contemporaries is more or less spontaneous.^ 
 
 ' Cf. G. Pellissier's introduction to the Art poUique of Vauquelin de la Fresnaye, 
 pp. 41 and 42. 
 
FORMS OF EARLY CLASSICISM 47 
 
 To Vauquelin Art and Nature are both necessary in poetry.* 
 The poet is divine and a certain ravissement and frenzy accompany 
 the invention of poetry: * 
 
 Les vers sont le parler des Anges et de Dieu, 
 La prose des humains: Le Foete au milieu 
 S'61evant jusqu'au del tout repu d'ambroisie 
 En ce langage ecrit sa belle po6sie.* 
 
 The chief tjrpes are: 
 
 The Epic, which describes the wars and wanderings of mighty 
 peoples. Its modek are Homer, Virgil, Statins, Apollonius, Ovid, 
 Tasso, Ronsard. The epic is a picture of life in which we can find 
 moral instructions. It is written in verses of ten or twelve sylla- 
 bles and should be Umited in time to a year.* 
 
 The Sonnet, a modem form, though credited to Italy is, says 
 Vauquelin, of French origin derived from the troubadours. Ron- 
 sard gave it new vogue, Du Bellay devised the epigrammatic or 
 satirical sonnet, Desportes expressed in his soimets softness and 
 gentleness.^ 
 
 The Ode, as restored by Ronsard, is serious and dignified and 
 addressed to lords and ladies. The models should be Pindar, 
 Horace. For the lighter ode or odelette seek Anacreon or Sappho.* 
 
 The Elegy is by French acceptation melancholy. The model 
 should be Propertius.^ 
 
 A Tragedy is a tale of woe, treating a topic of terror or pity. It 
 has five acts and three characters at once. It obeys the unity of 
 time. The chorus gives good counsel in sententious style. The 
 guides are Sophocles, Euripides, Seneca, and the topics should 
 preferably be drawn from a remote age, though Vauquelin does 
 not absolutely prescribe Greece and Rome.* 
 
 1 Cf. Book I, 55-56, 159-160; Book III, 905-916. 
 
 2 Book I, 91-118. 
 ' Book III, 29-32. 
 
 ' Book I, 413 ff; Book II, 254. ' Book I, 651 ff. 
 
 ' Book I, 565 ff. ' Book I, 515 ff. 
 
 8 Book n, 445; Book ni, 153; Book n, 461 ff; Book II, 255-258; Book n, 
 467 ff; Book n, 1107 ff. 
 
48 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 Comedy is, like tragedy, subject to the rules and is a presenta- 
 tion of some mean deed, which may, however, be remedied : 
 
 La com6die est done une contrefaisance 
 
 D'un fait qu'on tient mechant par la commune usance, 
 
 Mais non pas si mechant qu'a sa m6chancete 
 
 Un remede ne puisse 6tre bien apport6: 
 
 Comme quand vm garfon une fille a ravie 
 
 On peut en I'epousant lui racheter la vie.^ 
 
 Vauquelin alludes to the new Tragi-comedy, a tragedy with a 
 happy ending." 
 Pastoral poetry shouldfollow Theocritus, Virgil and Sannazaro.* 
 To the didactic poem and formal satire Vauquelin himself con- 
 tributed as much as anyone in the sixteenth century, by his Art 
 poetiqtie itself and his Horatian satires, though Ronsard and Du 
 BeUay composed satirical poems, and Regnier is the great ex- 
 ample of the formal satirist. The Horatian epistles or sermones 
 Vauquelin does not distinguish much from satire. 
 
 1 Book II, 25s ff.; Book III, iii B. 
 
 ' Book III, 163 ff. » Book III, 223 ff. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 RENAISSANCE CLASSICISM IN THE WORLD OF ACTION. 
 PHILOSOPHERS AND MORALISTS OF THE SIXTEENTH CEN- 
 TURY. TRANSITION TO THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY 
 
 The poet of sixteenth-century classicism was steeped in the sen- 
 suous moods of his lyrical models. If one seeks an ethical prin- 
 ciple beneath his sonnets it is the epicureanism of Horace or the 
 wine and roses of Anacreontism. The Platonism of the poets 
 often veils a crude amorous Petrarchism in which philosophical 
 terms occasionally appear for display. Rarely, as in Ronsard's 
 LHscours des miseres de ce temps, does the poet become a preacher. 
 Those whose epics or satires have a moral strain, Agrippa d'Au- 
 bign6 or Du Bartas, belong to the Huguenot faith and are, there- 
 fore, of less accoimt in the formulation of French classicism. 
 
 The sixteenth-century theoretical writings are confined so much 
 to poetry that people do not always realize the ethical aspects of 
 the early classicism. As a matter of fact, moraUsts, except re- 
 ligious reformers, are not numerous until the latter part of the 
 age. Yet sixteenth-century classicism is ethical as well as intel- 
 lectual or artistic, and the theories of writers on morals are as dis- 
 tinctly the result of ancient doctrines and the product of human- 
 ism, as are the odes and lyrics of the Pleiade. It is because phil- 
 osophical sjmthesis calls for more maturity than does poetry that 
 we wait until a Montaigne for the complete type of the new moral- 
 ist. The " Academie des Valois " testifies also to interest in moral 
 philosophy towards the end of the century. But, though Mon- 
 taigne's moral observations come fairly late, we can see, even 
 before their publication, the philosophy of the humanistic classi- 
 cism set forth by Pierre Ramus. We can also see its living ex- 
 ample in the person of the great chancellor Michel de I'Hospital, 
 — " that Hospital of France, than whom, I think," says Sir 
 
 49 
 
50 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 Philip Sidney,^ " that reahn never brought forth a more accom- 
 plished judgment more firmly builded upon virtue." 
 
 The philosophy of the sixteenth-century humanist first takes 
 the form of a revolt against scholastic authority and tradition, the 
 influence of a misunderstood Aristotle linked with the teachings 
 of the church, and the weight of obsolete textbooks in education 
 expressing dull routine. Ramus voices the revolt in thought 
 against the scholastic Aristotelianism, a revolt which he himself 
 carried to injustice.^ He took as his guide Plato and started out 
 in youth to prove that everything attributed to Aristotle was 
 both false and spurious. He linked the study of ancient literature 
 with that of philosophy and sought the common processes of 
 thought of both writers and thinkers. With him, as with the 
 members of the Pleiade, the ancients are those who have best ex- 
 pressed the best thoughts, and in his scientific and philosophical 
 works he uses their processes of thinking. In that sense it is to be 
 noted that the philosophy of Ramus, though its effort was in some 
 respects like that of Descartes in the next century, rested not so 
 much on universal laws of reason as on those of certain human 
 beings whose processes were conceived as universal. Thus the 
 philosophy of Ramus, harking back instead of reaching forward, 
 was not really a tool for the advancement of scientific truth, and 
 by its deductive syllogistic disposition it still kept many of the 
 defects of the debased Aristotelianism. Ramus dealt more with 
 persuasion than with discovery. 
 
 None the less, by his efforts to improve the divisions of science 
 and to renovate the study of them. Ramus made learning take a 
 decided step forward. By his emphasis on method and the clear 
 arrangement of material. Ramus made distinct progress towards 
 what the seventeenth century considered its own supreme quality. 
 The erudition of the sixteenth-century humanistic classicists was 
 chaotic, their literary productions, from the Defense of Du Bellay 
 to the essays of Montaigne or the Art poStique of Vauquelin de 
 
 1 The Defense of Poesy. 
 
 ' The best books on Ramus are Charles Waddington's Ramus and F. P. Graves's 
 Peter Ramus. 
 
IN THE WORLD OF ACTION ^ 51 
 
 la Fresnaye, were ineflfective through incoherence! Long before 
 Descartes, Ramus showed what greater effectiveness could be se- 
 cured by better arrangement. His value in the whole history of 
 the thought of his day is as an exponent of growing rationalism, 
 under the patronage of Plato instead of Aristotle, as one who did 
 more than any of his contemporaries to systematize learning, not 
 merely in its technical aspects, but in its popular manifestations. 
 Amid the chaotic erudition of the sixteenth century he tried to 
 introduce orderly method. If modern historians of philosophy 
 slight his name, it is because the foundations of his study rest, not 
 on the categories of the htmian understanding, but on the perhaps 
 fallible methods of persuasion of certain great men of antiquity. 
 
 The new philosophy of the sixteenth century was far from being 
 purely intellectual. The age is permeated with moral reflection, 
 though the true morahsts of classicism belong to the second rather 
 than to the first generation. The Reformation, until it became 
 entangled with political problems, was chiefly a moral movement. 
 The humanists of the Renaissance emphasized the third of three 
 moral currents which were then powerful: the tradition of the 
 Church, the return to primitive Christianity in the Reformation, 
 the non-Christian or Pagan moraUty. Montaigne did much to 
 acclimatize this last in France.^ 
 
 The humanists, full of veneration for the ancients, reproduced 
 the results of study in the different forms of the new literature. 
 Some, like Baiif in his proverbs, evolved gnomic poems or fables; 
 others, Uke Guy du Faur de Pibrac, wrote moral quatrains. The 
 hmnanistic tragedy was liberally sprinkled with sentences or moral 
 thoughts, often printed in brackets or quotation marks so as to 
 emphasize their proverbial quality and the ease with which they 
 could be separated from the context. Important influences were 
 Plutarch, known in time through Amyot's translation, Stobaeus, 
 Seneca, and among modern works the Adages of Erasmus. 
 
 ' On the whole question of the influence of Montaigne, see Pierre ViUey's im- 
 portant thesis, Us Sources et I'EvoluHon des essais de Montaigne. See also P. Lau- 
 monier's article in the Revtie d'histoire KttSraire, vol. iii, Montaigne precurseur du 
 xvii' sihcle. 
 
52 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 In one especial way the moral teachings of the ancients were 
 given currency. Indeed, to them we owe the origin of Montaigne's 
 essays/yThis writer is the best example of the moralists of French 
 humanism, by his rationalistic application of the principles of an- 
 cient philosophy to the conditions of modern times, by his moral 
 psychology which makes him a precursor of the psychological 
 moralists of the seventeenth century. The mediaeval vogue of 
 fables, ancedotes and apologues had been continued by various 
 compilations by the hiunanists. We need not seek prototypes of 
 the Essais in such works as the Discorsi of Machiavelli. They are 
 rather to be found in centos of anecdotes or didactic ethical col- 
 lections corroborative or illustrative of moral maxims, which 
 continued tendencies in certain ancient works, belonging intel- 
 lectually rather to an Alexandrian than to a creative stage, as the 
 writings of Stobaeus, Valerius Maximus and Aulus Gellius. In 
 the sixteenth century, cuUings of striking stories seemed an excel- 
 lent way of continuing the ancient tradition. Thus we get the 
 vogue of the DisHcha Catonis, the Anthology of Stobaeus and the 
 new Adagia of Erasmus. Directly connected with this vogue was 
 one of terse and pithy sayings called apophthegms, linked with 
 the names of Plutarch and again of Erasmus. Such collec- 
 tions received still greater development in the Diverses leqons 
 (Silva de varia leccion) of the Spanish writer Pedro Mexia, soon 
 translated by Claude Gruget, or plundered by men like Pierre 
 Bouaystuau. 
 
 Thus Montaigne's early essays are seen to be impersonal ag- 
 glutinations of anecdotes illustrative of a moral observation. The 
 material is derived entirely from books, and the illustrations are, 
 in the vast majority of cases, ancient ones. The underlying moral 
 principles which serve as a connecting link are equally cut-and- 
 dried, and are derived from the current fashionable stoicism, 
 drawn once again from communion with ancient writers like 
 Seneca. Thus Montaigne's early essays are instances of modes 
 of moral reflections then in vogue, which they tend to popularize 
 and hand on to the seventeenth century. 
 
IN THE WORLD OF ACTION S3 
 
 Little by little Montaigne began to reflect on the true signifi- 
 cance instead of the traditional import of morality. In spite of 
 his inherited faith, he always tended to divorce religion from re- 
 ligious authority and to view acts in the light of reason, being thus 
 sometimes led to conclusions, such as the justification of suicide, j 
 at variance with Christian lessons. He turned more to psycholog- 1 
 ical analysis and judgment, illustrating his reflections by self-ob-j 
 servation. To the guidance of the somewhat stilted Seneca he| 
 added the more hiraian and personal Plutarch, as seen in the^ 
 latter's Lives and particularly the MorcUia. Though Plutarch 
 attacked the stoics of his day, many of his observations are in 
 the stoic mood; but he offers to Montaigne a standard more 
 himianly realizable, and one seeming to show to Montaigne a 
 being like himself. Soon this condition was complicated by read- 
 ing the sceptical or pyrrhonist philosopher Sextus Empiricus and 
 his Hypotyposes. The widening of the field of Montaigne's obser- 
 vation through Plutarch and his aversion for dogmatism, in- 
 creased by the intolerance of both Catholics and Huguenots, 
 made Montaigne himself pass through a brief period of pyrrhon- 
 ism, which occupies a less considerable part of his life than has 
 often been assimied since Pascal, and which finds its full expres- 
 sion in the Apologie de Raimond Sebond. In fact this pjnrrhonism 
 of Montaigne is not so much scepticism as a sense of relativism, or 
 whatever we may call this form of the doctrine of suspended 
 judgment. He is particularly hostile to the dogmatism of science 
 and the products of reason. In this way Montaigne has reacted 
 violently against the stoical rationalism of his earlier days. 
 
 But this mood was not a permanent one. The most character- 
 istic form of Montaigne's thought is the moral psychology of man 
 and his place in the world. This becomes more important to him 
 than the stoical lesson or exemplum of his early days. It affords 
 an outlet for his untiring curiosity about others, and about him- 
 self as an illustration of the average man, the subject of the 
 rational positive moral Ufe. Montaigne, like Moliere, is a psycho- 
 logical realist. 
 
54 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 Thus the humanist Montaigne has followed in his unconscious 
 theory of morals an evolution somewhat in accord with the method 
 of Du Bellay's Defense. After close study, not rising above imi- 
 tation, of the ancients, particularly of the stoics, Montaigne, by 
 greater communion, assimilated the spirit of pagan rationalism 
 and acquired a view of Ufe which has its influence on seven- 
 teenth century morals. He conceives man as the gentleman, 
 the citizen of the world, the person of breeding and taste, 
 averse to pedantry and eccentricity, with trained taste and 
 judgment. The youth whose education is described in the Insti- 
 tution des Enfants anticipates the honnete homme of the seven- 
 teenth century. 
 
 It surely is not a fanciful proceeding if, in a gallery of great 
 classicists of the sixteenth-century humanism, we make room, 
 near Montaigne the easy-going observer, for Michel de I'Hospital, 
 the upright moralist in action. It would be hard to find two 
 men more dissimilar in many respects. Yet, if Montaigne is the 
 product of one temperament in communion with the ancients, in 
 Michel de I'Hospital we see how they have affected another tem- 
 perament. If Montaigne dabbles in the thoughts of a moral realist, 
 Michel de I'Hospital is the idealist trjdng to put his theories into 
 practice. Montaigne is the critic, Michel de I'Hospital the states- 
 man steeped in the learning of the humanists. He may seem an 
 exception rather than an example in his bloodthirsty times. None 
 the less we can caU this noblest of Frenchmen the embodiment of 
 an ethical classicism loftier than that of Montaigne. Moreover, 
 he is not only the reformer of justice and the advocate of reli- 
 gious toleration but a man of letters himself. 
 
 From his student days at the University of Padua Michel de 
 I'Hospital was the advocate of progress, whether in opposition to 
 the crabbed Bartolists in law, or in furtherance of the new scholar- 
 ship and literature. A follower of the Greeks and Latins, whether 
 or not we call him a direct disciple of Seneca and the stoics, he was 
 the encourager of Ronsard, who testifies, in his most ambitious 
 Pindaric ode, to Michel de I'Hospital's achievements for the 
 
IN THE WORLD OF ACTION 55 
 
 advancement of learning. To his efforts was partly due the recon- 
 ciliation by Margaret of Berry of Ronsard and Saint-Gelais. 
 
 In 1560 Michel de I'Hospital became chancellor of France and 
 tried to put into operation the principles which guided his Ufe: 
 justice, tolerance and mercy. He may seem to have toiled in vain 
 and to have seen for the time being his ideals made impossible of 
 realization. He ended his Ufe in semi-disfavor, yet he brought 
 about various edicts and decrees of reform. His policy was the 
 seed of that of the party of moderation in his own age, the Poli- 
 tiques, and expressed that mean of justice, or the juste milieu 
 which, though it may seem ineffective to rabid revolutionary or to 
 reactionary extremists, none the less is the truest form of Uberty. 
 Michel de I'Hospital tried to install reason and good sense as the 
 expression of justice and respect for the convictions of others, even 
 though in his attempt he satisfied neither CathoUcs nor Hugue- 
 nots. He sought at the Colloque de Poissy to reconcile the warring 
 factions, the edict of January for toleration was his work, and the 
 Edict of Nantes was the culmination of his policy. 
 
 Michel de I'Hospital's life in his retreat at Vignay is that of the 
 sage. There he lived studying his favorite authors, or composing 
 those Latin verses which were the humanist's solace: 
 
 Hue prima fero luce pedes, hie carmina eondo, 
 Aut aliquid Flaeei relego, doctive Maronis, 
 Nugarumve aliquid commentor, et ambvilo solus, 
 Instructis epulis eoenatum dum vocet uxor. 
 
 Here it was that, secure in the sense of duty fulfilled, he was ready 
 to give up Hfe itself. After the massacre of St. Bartholomew, whem 
 told that mounted murderers were seeking him and asked if it 
 would not be well to close the gates — " No," he rephed, " if the 
 small gate be not sufficient to admit them, then open the great 
 one." Thus Michel de I'Hospital appUes the principle of moral 
 classicism to politics, and rests his theory of the state on justice.* 
 
 • " In Plato's words it is ip/ia t^s a-AXaos, the link which binds society together,, 
 while injustice always brings ruin and disaster upon the states in which it is su- 
 preme." — C. T. Atkinson, Michel de I'Hospital, p. 159. 
 
56 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 Himself learned and yet modest, he was the patron of humanist 
 men of letters, the seeker for that righteousness which lies equi- 
 ^tant from the extremes of license and of oppression. 
 
 If one had asked Montaigne, whose writings contributed to the 
 formulation of the type of the honnete homme, what men he would 
 select as patterns of true nobility of character and as representa- 
 tives of moral " classicism," he would probably have coupled the 
 names of Michel de I'Hospital and of Etienne de la Boetie. To the 
 former, indeed, Montaigne dedicated the works of La Bo6tie.^ 
 
 In his relations with La Boetie, Montaigne saw perfect friend- 
 ship. La Bo6tie died young and his writings were immature and 
 fairly small in extent. Yet in them he illustrates or preaches ideas 
 of significance for our point of view. The Discours de la servitude 
 volontaire contains the views of a youthful Utopian in a somewhat 
 rhetorical style, but under classical inspiration and in the tone of 
 stoicism he has given utterance to political Uberty and brother- 
 hood. The Discours is the most famous of La Bo6tie's writings, 
 because it was taken as a programme for political parties. But 
 another work, a mere translation, shows also the bent of La Bo6- 
 tie's mind. His version of the Oeconomicus of Xenophon, pub- 
 lished with the title la Mesnagerie de Xinophon under the auspices 
 of Montaigne, illustrates the interest felt, at least among thought- 
 ful and sane men, for a life of justice and moderation in a peaceful 
 environment.'' 
 
 1 " Ce llger present, pour mdnager d'une pierre deux coups, servira aussi, s'il 
 vous plait, a vous t^moigner I'hoimeur et r6verence que je porte a votre suffisance 
 et qualit6s singulieres qui sont en vous." 
 
 ' " Sous I'influence salutaire des chanceliers Olivier et L'Hospital, on s'fitait mis 
 3, fitudier le minage des champs, comme on disait alors, et il 6tait juste que le char- 
 mant trait6 de Xfinophon retrouv^t, aprSs plus de quinze siScles, le mSme bienveil- 
 lant accueil que I'antiquitfi lui avait fait jadis. Si nos peres aimaient I'agriculture, 
 I'idfel de I'honn^te homme, qu'il s'etait form6 i, ce contact, avait plus d'un caractfere 
 commun avec l'id6al propre t Xenophon. Conune lui, Us aimaient la vertu facile, 
 aimable, cettre sagesse enjoufie faite de la moderation des besoins et de I'hormfitet^ 
 des d6sirs, que X6nophon avait prteh^e et qu'il affirmait se rencontrer surtout t la 
 campagne, dans un milieu paisible et sain." — P. Bormefon, Introduction to works 
 of La Bofitie, p. 6i. 
 
IN THE WORLD OF ACTION S7 
 
 Coinddently with the changes in political life and the advent of 
 a new dynasty, French thought at the end of the sixteenth cen- 
 tury undergoes sundry transformations. Sixteenth-century 
 classicism lapses as a formal literary school. The Hellenism of 
 Ronsard has come to naught and none of the tragedies of the 
 Pleiade proves to be a masterpiece. The attention given to them 
 in modem histories of literature has been an exaggerated one. 
 The drama of the Pleiade is much inferior to its lyric poetry. We 
 look for a period of chaos and the gradual formation of a new 
 social environment for seventeenth-century classicism. Life and 
 literature react upon each other. So the imder-currents of 
 thought must be kept in the reader's mind. 
 
 In the second half of the sixteenth century we have seen the 
 stoical current to be strong in morals.^ Amyot had popularized 
 the biographies of heroes. Those who disapproved of an easy- 
 going Epicureanism went to sources of inspiration in antiquity. 
 
 Prominent among the thinkers of the transition years was 
 Guillaume du Vair.* This upright magistrate, who became late in 
 Ufe a bishop, belonged to the party of the Poliiiques and was a 
 constant advocate of pacification under the aegis of royal author- 
 ity. A reader of Seneca among the ancients and of the modern 
 neo-Stoic author of the treatise De constantia, Justus Lipsius, pro- 
 fessor of Leyden and Louvain, Du Vair proved, by his writings 
 and his conduct, his desire to give new life to the ideas of anti- 
 quity. He is referred to by contemporaries as a stoic. He tried 
 to enrich the literature of his country with the thought of the 
 past and to apply the philosophy of old to the circiunstances of 
 to-day, thereby helping to place before the writers of the early 
 seventeenth century the great principles of stoical morals.* / 
 
 ' Cf . L. Zanta, la Renaissance du sioicisme au xvi' sUcle. 
 
 2 Cf . R. Radouant, Guillaume du Vair, I'homme et I'orateur jusqu'd la fin des 
 troubles de la Ligue; Cougny, Guillaume du Vair. 
 
 ' " Tirer la philosophie de I'^cole pour la jeter dans la tempfite des faits con- 
 temporains, lui dormer pour t^che non plus de disserter sur les malheurs d'H&ube, 
 mais de dfigager le sens des fiv^nements d'hier et d'aujourd'hui, non plus de ratio- 
 ciner sur les devoirs th6oriques, mais de r&oudre des cas de conscience actuals, 
 
S8 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 An older contemporary of Du Vair, Pierre Charron,^ had even 
 greater effect in disseminating the philosophy of antiquity. A less 
 original thinker than Montaigne or Du Vair, he had the advantage 
 of being, more popular than Du Vair and more systematic than 
 either. Therefore he had perhaps an even greater immediate 
 effect. Charron borrowed some of the stoicism of Montaigne and 
 of Lipsius, and even more of that of Du Vair, presenting his ma- 
 terial in la Sagesse much more clearly and dogmatically. Charron, 
 though a priest, borrows also from Montaigne some of his scepti- 
 cism, which, again, he makes more positive. His scepticism is, in 
 part, only a reaction against religious and scholastic formalism. 
 But it tends to overthrow the dogmatism of revealed religion, 
 to separate faith from morals, and to create an ideal of moral 
 reason in which man is an end in himself.'' 
 
 Thus Charron helped to carry humanism into practical morals 
 and to establish a theory with which the divine sanction has little 
 to do. The Renaissance, moreover, believed that nature is good 
 and that the moral law is one which does not hinder but helps to 
 develop our own energies. So to Charron morahty does not de- 
 pend so much on an outer will as on the law of man's own nature. 
 
 The stoicism of the late sixteenth century was eclectic and 
 vague, but by that very fact it was likely to spread. Even when 
 they are not followers of Montaigne or of Charron, or indeed of Du 
 Vair, we find philosophers, moralists and men of letters of the first 
 part of the seventeenth century showing stoical tendencies. The 
 libertins thought the pyrrhonism of Montaigne and the scepticism 
 of Charron a justification for severing the sHght bond which Char- 
 ron left between God and morals, and let the law of man's nature 
 be a law of liberty or license. Others magnified and generalized 
 [the law of nature until they conceived a common or universal 
 
 enfin se mettre soi-m6me dans son oeuvre, filt-ce sous des noms d'emprunt, avec ses 
 d6couragements et ses doutes, cela, c'est le mfirite propre de Du Vair. — Radouant, 
 Op. cit., p. 275. 
 
 ' C£. J. B. Sabri6, Pierre Charron; F. Strowski, Pascal et son temps, vol. i.; P. 
 Bonnefon, Montaigne et ses amis; E. Zyromski, I'Orgueil humain. 
 
 ' Of course this was not so felt in his own time and Chairon was no heresiarch. 
 
IN THE WORLD OF ACTION 59 
 
 Reason. This Reason is at times near to religion, as in Balzac;'? 
 at times it is on friendly though distant terms, as in Descartes, 
 Meanwhile, poets and dramatists preached stoical lessons. Mal-< 
 herbe consoled M. du P6rier by reminding him that death comes 
 to all; the heroes of Comeille are counterparts of the genireux of 
 Descartes and of the old Romans of Balzac, " masters of them- 
 selves as of the universe." Descartes devising his method formu- 
 lates a provisional moral code which has stoical elements. Even 
 the Jansenists, whose mysticism is so remote from the cold reason 
 of the independent moralists, were stoics in practice. 
 
 It would, however, be ridiculously inaccurate to consider sto- 
 icism in morals the only influence in early seventeenth-century 
 thought. The enviroimient in which the new classicism took form 
 was affected by the great spiritual influences and conflicts, for the 
 seventeenth century was, as to religion, one of the most active 
 periods of French thought. The seventeenth century has beenl 
 defined as un Steele theologico-poHHque.^ The first half was char- 1 
 acterized by the rise to power of the Jesuits, their struggle against l 
 the sway of Montaigne over the libertins and sceptics, their bitter; 
 rivalry with the Jansenists for supremacy in education and spirit-' 
 ual guidance. The second half of the century saw the firm estab-i 
 lishment of the Jesuits in power, and also a tendency towards) 
 Gallicanism, a national church half independent face to face with • 
 the Vatican. 
 
 So as we study the seventeenth century we see the formation of 
 a social environment, which presents, in spite of superficial differ- 
 ences, a strong unity from the first to the second half. The School 
 of 1660 grows amid this environment. 
 
 1 Balzac is by no means always a stoic. Cf . Sabrifi, les IdSes religieuses de J.-L. 
 Guez de Balzac, pp. 137 ff. 
 
 2 J. Denis, Essai sur la Uttiralure morale et politique du xviif sikcle, in Memoires 
 de I'AcadSmie de Caen, 1891. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 GENERAL MANIFESTATIONS OF THE CLASSICAL PERIOD 
 
 We must consider the milieu in Which classicism developed in the 
 first half of the seventeenth century as influenced by at least four 
 different forces: religion, affecting morals and education; phi- 
 losophy, including science; politics and society. Let us examine 
 them in turn. 
 
 The seventeenth century was marked by intense religious 
 activity. The wars of religion had determined once for all the 
 faith of the majority. The Huguenots were still an influential 
 remnant in spite of the victories of Richelieu, and remained so 
 until the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. But war and diplo- 
 macy so directed events that Bossuet and not Calvin provided 
 the model for French religious rhetoric. Within the Catholic 
 Church the Jesuits soon made themselves the dominant order. 
 
 Already in the sixteenth century the Jesuits had, by their in- 
 filtration in the country and by the establishment of schools, done 
 much to strengthen their footing. They had been called traitors, 
 because they were so closely connected with the League and be- 
 cause some of their writers were alleged to advocate regicide. 
 They were banished from the kingdom in 1594. But, being read- 
 mitted in 1603, they identified themselves closely with royalty 
 and were probably guiltless of Ravaillac's murder of Henry IV, 
 for which they were blamed. They established themselves^as 
 court confessors, and Father Cotton was the first of a.number of 
 supple and determined men. As spiritual^ advisers they con- 
 trolled the consciences of royalty and of nobility, and gave an 
 only haK-hearted support to Richelietl because he seemed over- 
 willing to grant concessions to Protestant powers. Under Louis 
 XrV they directed French politics, fought the Jansenists and 
 
 60 •^ 
 
GENERAL MANIFESTATIONS 6 1 
 
 worked for the disastrous revocation of the Edict of Nantes. 
 The Pfere de La Chaise, confessor of Louis XIV, was the most 
 famous of these court Jesuits. 
 
 But it was not only on the minds of mature men that the Jesuits 
 sought to act. Realizing that the most abiding impressions are 
 those made upon the young, who preserve them through life, they 
 devoted themselves with ardor to education. The College de 
 Clermont was already famous in the sixteenth century, and, in 
 the seventeenth, under the same name or that of College Louis-le- 
 Grand, it counted its pupils by thousands. The College of La 
 Flfeche, where Descartes received his schooling, was another of the 
 great Jesuit establishments. 
 
 The pedagogical methods of the Jesuits are important to con- 
 sider, because they contributed so much to the formation of tra- 
 ditions which lasted in education almost to our own time. In 
 addition to customs still recognizable in the lyc6es and colleges of 
 today, like the boarding school internat and prolonged separation 
 of pupil from family, they enrmirafred the. stiiHy of rhetnrir based 
 onLatin. Latin was the langu age of the Church, as weJTasTEe 
 ancgstor^ofTrencK.~Consequentiy7pT^i^^ all 
 
 things. They had to speakrLafinPto^act modexaXatin-plays, to 
 study- the beauties of Latin rhetoric, to memorize ^elected^as- 
 sages from great Latin authors. Thus education was to a very 
 great degree directed into aesthetic channels; ornate brilliancy 
 was cherished and people cultivated " flowers " of rhetoric. 
 - It must not, however, be supposed that Jansenism was without 
 influence on French classicism. In Pascal, Racine and Boileau, in 
 the salon of Mme de Sable, and in the maxims of La Rochefou- 
 cauld may be seen different aspects of Jansenist doctrine and 
 policy: determinism, the innate depravity of man, the need of 
 grace, hostiHty to the Jesuits. Jansenism helped to express in 
 ^?&rds, though it did not create, the disillusionment which showed ' 
 itself in the second half of the seventeenth century, due perhaps 
 in part to the exhaustion of the nobihty through duels, executions 
 and the Thirty Years' War. This was like the mal du siecle 
 
62 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 which in the nineteenth century followed the holocausts of the 
 Empire.^ It ranges from the worldliness of La Fontaine and the 
 disenchantment of le Misanthrope and of Don Juan to the pes- 
 simism of Racine and the cynicism of La Rochefoucauld and of 
 La BruySre. Meanwhile the Jansenists tried as hard as the 
 Jesuits to control the minds of the young, though they cultivated 
 the Garden of Greek Roots rather than the flowers of Latin 
 rhetoric. The Oratorians, too, were noteworthy instructors of 
 youth. 
 
 Finally, even the libertins, whom we are apt, from the present 
 use of the name, to associate with drunkenness and debauchery, 
 with tavern life and immorality, must in some instances enter a 
 survey of classicism. !^any an honnete homme was at heart a scep- 
 tic and libertin, and Mr. Worldly Wiseman displayed his graces 
 in salon, reduit and ruelle. Moreover, the chevalier de M6r6 and 
 the due de Roannez have the credit for smoothing Pascal's style 
 and giving him " Atticism." 
 To philosophy and science the Jesuits, the Jansenists and the 
 ! libertins all contribute varying elements. Outside of religion the 
 I nearest approach to metaphysics is in Descartes. The relation of 
 I Descartes to classicism is, it is true, a matter of dispute.^ In his. 
 I scientific method he admirably illustrates the qualities of clearness 
 and of order which we associate with classicism, and Cartesianism 
 was an intellectual fad among the learned ladies of seventeenth- 
 century drawing rooms. But in his hostility to dogmatism, his. 
 aversion to tradition and to all that antiquity had transmitted, 
 Descartes is one of the last to be connected with classicism. 
 ^ In scientific investigation, particularly in physics or Natural 
 '^ Philosophy, Pascal is the chief name. The popular physics, such as. 
 the Jesuits taught, even as found to a certain extent in Descartes, 
 or as expounded by Cyrano de Bergerac in his fantastic stories of 
 
 ' Grandsaignes d'Hauterive, le Pessimisme de La Rochefottcauld, pp. 34 and 107. 
 
 2 On this point see my History of French Literature, p. 321; Lanson, I'Influence de- 
 Descartes dans la littSrature frangaise, in the Revtie de MStaphysique, 1896; Brune- 
 ti6re, in Etudes critiques: vol. iii. (Descartes et la littirature classique), vol. iv. {Jan- 
 sSnistes et cdrtisiens). 
 
GENERAL MANIFESTATIONS 63 
 
 adventure, is a traditional one. The seventeenth century was not 
 to a great extent an age of experiment. In fact, part of the hos- 
 tility of the Jesuits to Pascal was because he upset accepted 
 theories and revolutionized opinions. 
 ^ Political causes were important in moulding French classicism. 
 The age of Louis XIV, a centralized despotic government in which 
 everything, including Uterature, contributed to the glorification of 
 the monarch, was the result of the efforts of earUer rulers and 
 ministers. Richelieu, in particular, by his subjugation of the 
 Huguenots and of the recalcitrant nobiUty, by his successful 
 participation in the Thirty Years' War, increased the prestige of 
 royalty and gave it predomiaance in the state and in Europe. To 
 this end men of letters were dragooned by pensions and gratifica- 
 tions into a band of dependent eulogists, much as in the great war 
 of our day the German university professors have been made th'e 
 partisan defenders of their government. 
 
 Richelieu promoted letters by the establishment of the Royal 
 Press in 1640, but he used writers as tools in furthering his po- 
 litical plans. He encouraged Theophraste Renaudot's newspaper, 
 the Gazette, as an organ of publicity and used the Mercwre Frangois 
 in the development of what we should today call a subsidized 
 press. But most important among his ways of controlling thought 
 was the French Academy. Originally an informal gathering of 
 friends, it was by Richelieu's efforts transformed into a court 
 which, under his patronage, asserted control over the language 
 and over the canons of taste, and by such documents as the Senti- 
 ments on the Cid helped to mould the French classical drama. 
 Richelieu even planned a great institution for wits and men of 
 letters, a sort of " Prytaneimi of belles lettres," of which the Acad- 
 emy should be the guiding spirit, and which should be the haven 
 of all who in his opinion deserved such honor.^ 
 
 Richelieu's influence was even more specific, and contributed in 
 no small degree to the vogue in the seventeenth century of the 
 drama, and especially of the regular tragedy. He was intensely 
 
 ' Cf. Ch. Amaud, I'Ahbe d'Attbignac, p. 198, note. 
 
64 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 interested in the stage: for a while he encouraged the abb6 d'Au- 
 bignac in his theories for the reconstruction of the drama; he had 
 his band of five authors, including Comeille and Rotrou, who in 
 collaboration wrote plays under his direction; he wrote, or it was 
 whispered that he wrote, much of Mirame, which he brought out 
 at lavish expense at a theatre made for the purpose in his own 
 palace. In particular, he believed in the rules, and the discussion 
 of the Cid, encouraged by him during his jealousy and hostility 
 with regard to CorneiUe, not only had an effect on tragedy in gen- 
 eral, but restrained the freedom of Corneille's own genius and 
 influenced him in the composition of plays like Horace and Cinna} 
 The Academy was an ofl&cial body, but all society was divided 
 into sets of greater or less lormahty. We do not hear the term 
 salon employed as much at first as later, because the bedroom of 
 the hostess was, in the earlier part of the century, still a gathering 
 place; but the terms ruelle, rond, alcove, cercle, show that the 
 equivalent of the salon aheady existed. The chambre bleue of Ar- 
 thenice, the " Saturdays " of Sappho are but the most famous of 
 a long list which had, at different periods, hostesses Kke Mme des 
 Loges, Mme d'Auchy, Mme de Sable, the " Grande Mademoi- 
 selle," Mme de Bouillon, Mme de la Sabli^re, with differences of 
 interest as fashions changed from preciosity to pedantry, from the 
 pohtics of the Fronde to Cartesianism. In addition to gatherings 
 of men and women, or the homes of fair courtesans like Marion de 
 Lorme or Ninon de L'enclos, there were reunions of men alone. 
 The Academie frangaise had its origin in just such an informal 
 coming-together, and more than one distinguished man, as Me- 
 nage or the President de Lamoignon, liked to gather admirers 
 
 * " Cardinal Richelieu, who was undoubtedly the ablest statesman of his time, 
 or perhaps of any other, had the idle vanity of being thought the best poet too: he 
 envied the great Comeille his reputation, and ordered a criticism to be written upon 
 the Cid. Those, therefore, who flattered skiUuUy, said little to him of his abilities 
 in state affairs, or at least but en passant, and as it might naturally occur. But the 
 incense which they gave him — the smoke of which they knew would turn his head 
 in their favour — was as a bel esprit and a poet. Why ? — Because he was sure of 
 one excellency, and distrustful as to the other.'' — Lord Chesterfield, Oct. i6, 1747. 
 
GENERAL MANIFESTATIONS 65 
 
 about tiiTn . The abbe d'Aubignac planned his own private " Aca- 
 demy." ^hus we see that the literature and the art of the seven- 
 teenth century were evolved in a setting of social groups, ranging 
 in patronage from a prince or princess of the blood to a distin- 
 guished commoner, man or woman^/ At the H6tel de Rambouillet 
 there were lively diversions, picnics, jaunts into the country, prac- 
 tical jokes, as well as the rondeaiix of Voiture or Julia's Garland; 
 at Mile de Scudery's they tried madrigals, at the Grande Made- 
 moiselle's " portraits "; the maxims of La Rochefoucauld were 
 polished in the salon of Mme de Sable. The learned M6nage fell 
 in love like any fashionable fop with his fair pupils, made his er- 
 udition wprldly, and exposed himself to ridicule as Moliere's 
 Vadius. /Language was gallantly placed by Vaugelas under the 
 guidance of the ladies, literature was witty and brilliant even in 
 the Academy, and the man of letters tried to be a man of the 
 world. Said Boileau: 
 
 C'est peu d'etre agreable et charmant dans un livre, 
 II faut savoir encore et converser et vivre.^ > 
 
 ( .. 
 
 yrhe society in which French seventeenth-century classiasm 
 
 developed was thus essentially aristocratic or, at least, leisurely. 
 Literature was the delectation of refined and educated peopleJ 
 The jests of the Pont-Neuf were scorned, at any rate, in theory. 
 At most, the burlesques and parodies of Scarron and his school 
 were welcome, especially if, like the Virgile travesti, they presup- 
 posed a certain amount of scholarship. But Boileau banished all 
 burlesque to the plaisants du Pont-Neuf. Drunkard and pick- 
 pocket might haunt the pit of the theatre, but the author, unless 
 he were Moliere, sought the favor of the pedants of criticism like 
 
 ' " A company wholly composed of men of learning, though greatly to be valued 
 and respected, is not meant by the words good company; they cannot have the easy 
 manners and Umrnure of the world, as they do not live in it. If you can bear your 
 part well in such a company, it is extremely right to be in it sometimes, and you will 
 be but more esteemed in other companies for having a place in that; but then do 
 not let it engross you, for, if you do, you will be only considered as one of the literati 
 by profession, which is not the way either to shine or rise in the world." — Lord 
 Chesterfield, Oct. 12, O. S. 1748. 
 
66 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 Lysidas of the Critique de I'Ecole des Femmes, or the ladies who 
 doted on the drama, such as Sestiane in the Visionnaires of Des- 
 marets de Saint-Sorlin. 
 
 The ruelles, alcdves and later salons buzzed with discussions of 
 the drama and of poetry in general. Works like Marini's Adone, 
 Corneille's Polyeucte, Chapelain's Pucelle, MoUere's Ecole des 
 Femmes and Racine's Phedre were judged' by informal tribunals 
 composed of both sexes, just as a formal court at the instigation 
 of RicheKeu set its verdict on the Cid. Consequently the influence 
 of polite society was enormous. It opened its doors readily to any 
 man of letters under the patronage of a prince or great" nobleman. 
 Under the speU of the sentimental romances, the origins of which 
 went far back of Astree, it formulated ideals of behavior and of 
 courtship which found vent in the novels of MUe de ScuSery, and 
 which may be considered a form of social Platonism. Thus, too, 
 we may in part account for the rise of preciosity, which was far 
 from being merely an effort to dibrutaiiser la langue, but aimed 
 also at a purification of manners. So fastidious did the pricieuses 
 grow that to Moliere prtcieuse and prude were almost synonymous ; 
 so etherealized did their love become that Ninon de Lenclos 
 called them the Jansinistes de Vamourj 
 
 I Preciosity, it should be remembered, was not a closed society 
 or coterie of fantastic women. Because of the fame of MoUere's 
 Precieuses ridicules and the vogue of its title many people seem to 
 think that only women made up preciosity. There were precieux 
 as well as precieuses. Linguistically the borders of preciosity are 
 indefinable, since the artificial jargon shaded oflf into good taste 
 and some of it was incorporated in the writings of great authors. 
 The abbe d'Aubignac, high priest of the rules and of verisimili- 
 tttde, was a precieux; the Pere Bouhours was a friend of both 
 MUe de Scudery and Boileau, and appreciated them both; the 
 maxims of La Rochefoucauld were a result of the inteUectual, if 
 not Unguistical, preciosity of Mme de SabM's salon; CorneiUe 
 indulged in " precious " figures; Racine made Pyrrhus woo 
 Andromaque with the help of pointes. Even MoUfere himself, 
 
GENERAL MANIFESTATIONS 67 
 
 wearing the spoils of Cathos and of Madelon, used in perhaps 
 every one of his plays linguistic or rhetorical metaphors origina- 
 ting in preciosity. Preciosity, not ridiculous preciosity, forms,; 
 therefore, part of the early background of French classicism^ | 
 / The literary society of French classicism based its standards in ; 
 the first place on the dogma and traditions of antiquity. In the 
 dramas of Euripides especially, modified by the Renaissance 
 Senecan tendencies, in the legends and history of Greece and 
 Rome it foxmd material for its plays l,* in the writings of Quintilian, 
 Horace and Longinus, influenced" by pseudo-Aristotelianism, it , 
 foimd inspiration for critical discussions.^'^seudo-Aristotelianism 
 held sway in many hterary forms, particularly in tragedy. It 
 came largely from Italian critics and commentators on Aristotle. 
 They, in the sixteenth century, had formulated rules of tragedy 
 vastly more precise than what Aristotle actually had said. These 
 ideas, partially adopted in France in the sixteenth century itself, 
 were in France forgotten, but were afterwards revived in prefaces 
 and arts of poetry. 
 
 ^-From Italy, too, and from Spain, came much of the actual ma- 
 terial used by men of letters. Italy furnished sources for the 
 pastoral romances, for comedy. Spain gave plots to plays and to / 
 stories, and above all supplied Comeille with the problems of con- I 
 duct and the characters which, blended with stoicism, he por- ! 
 trayed in his tragedies.^ 
 
 ' Authority everywhere: in philosophy, Aristotle; in medicine, Hippocrates 
 and Galen; in rhetoric, Cicero; inlaw, civil and canon law; in mathematics, Euclid 
 and Ptolemy. See H. Gillot, la Querelle des anciens et des modernes en France, 
 p. 281. 
 
 ' J.-E. Fidao-Justiniani, in I'Espril classique et la priciositi au xiiii' siide, p. 30, 
 suggests the influence of Italy and Spain in developing the political theories of 
 Kichelieu: " En g^nSral, les Espagnols de lettreS ont plus contrari6, en France, le 
 mouvement classique qu'ils n'y ont aid6. II en va autrement des thfiologiens 
 d'Alcali ou de Salamanque. Mais aprSs tout, I'influence des deux soeurs latines a 
 6t€ d'abord politique; et Machiavel un peu, mais surtout les nonces romains et les 
 , ambassadeixrs de la S6r6nissime R6publique pour ITtalie, et, pour I'Espagne, cette 
 lign^e d'hommes d'Etat qui va de Xim6n&s k Antonio Pdrez, voilsl les v6ritables 
 p^res de I'esprit classique, qui furent, d'autre part, les maltres avou6s de Richelieu." 
 — Barclay's Argenis was also said to be a political vade-mecum of Richelieu. 
 
68 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 There is unity, as well as difference, in the relations of the two 
 halves of the seventeenth century. The first portion shows a 
 gradual working into shape, in spite of the opposition of many 
 rebellious forces, such as Theophile and the libertins. The dra- 
 matic forms, at any rate, are more abundant and more free, and 
 the plays of Comeille have about them much that belongs to ro- 
 mance as well as to realism. The sentimental novels are all the 
 rage. 
 
 But, little by httle, as the School of 1660 took form, the vraisem- 
 blance on which the dramatic critics laid stress became fashionable. 
 Already Cinna and Polyeucte are more thorough psychological 
 studies than the Cid or Horace. In Racine we get the completely 
 realistic analysis of emotions, in which the poet's attention is 
 devoted to character-study. Meanwhile the long, fantastic story, 
 containing fine-spun but conventional descriptions of love, be- 
 came the brief, reahstic Princesse de Cleves. The development of 
 the School of 1660 in the environment of its own age is that of a 
 growing realism, assumed to be the portrayal of general characters 
 and tj^es true of all ages and all times. As vehicles for this litera- 
 ture there were gradually evolved a suitable language, philosoph- 
 ical and aesthetic principles of art and literature, definite literary 
 forms, and dogmatic standards of criticism expressed in conven- 
 tional terms used for the testing of intellectual works. 
 
 The School of 1660 was not an indiscriminate pot pourri of the 
 elements described. The great classical authors formed a sort of 
 group amid the successful writers of their time.- They led, as a 
 rule, rather than followed, the fashions of the salons; they crystal- 
 lized literary theories which minor writers at their discretion 
 imitated or neglected; they tried to study human nature in their 
 books instead of writing fantastic unrealities; they assimilated, so 
 far as circimistances allowed, the spirit as well as the letter of 
 antiquity. Occasionally they seemed in their preferences opposed 
 to the ancients: Malherbe, the idol of Boileau, disliked Pindar, 
 Descartes swept away the whole past indiscriminately and thought 
 it foolish to waste one's time over Rome. The line of demarcatioa 
 
GENERAL MANIFESTATIONS 69 
 
 between the genuine classiques and the other writers cannot be 
 made hard and fast, for the classiques came from the same en- 
 vironment but used better Judgment. Outside, on the one hand 
 was the humdrum and reactionary University, so immersed in 
 dogma, routine and the bUnd worship of Aristotle, that Boileau 
 wrote his arret burlesqtie banishing reason from the University; 
 on the other hand was the superficial band of fine wits and poetas- 
 ters, smart drawing-room versifiers and purveyors of flattery, 
 poets of a rococo and florid antiquity which had no counterpart in 
 real history. The classicists were in the minority and often on the 
 defensive. Malherbe was not such a popular favorite as Theo- 
 phile, or Racine as Quinault.^ The most successful play of the 
 century was not Pierre Comeille's Cid or Racine's Andromaque 
 but Thomas Comeille's heroico-galant Timocrate.^ 
 
 The transition years from the sixteenth to the seventeenth 
 century saw the extreme degeneration of poetry in the Italianism 
 of Desportes and his followers. Malherbe reacted from this state 
 of affairs. For years France now devoted its best efforts to the 
 improvement of style, whether in brilliant conversation and 
 graceful repartee in the cercles and ruelles, or in written prose under 
 the guidance of Balzac or Vaugelas, or in verse under Malherbe, 
 though the sway of each was contested. Malherbe, who had 
 begim by composing sorry Itahanistic conceits, became, as his fife 
 reached its half-century, a dogmatic and fault-finding critic of 
 poetry, exemplifying his own theories in majestic but cold and 
 unimpassioned verse. Malherbe was the high priest of slow andv^ 
 painstaking composition, in which fancy and the free imagination 
 were made to submit to the laws of " reason " and duty. Vigorous-/ 
 proscriptions were put in force against hiatus and overflow, ca- 
 cophony, verse-padding; so that, together with its stoicism and 
 its declamatory enunciation of general moral truths, Malherbe's 
 
 1 Perrault wrote: " — M. Quinault que toute la France regarde pr6sentement, 
 malgr6 tout ce que vous avez dit centre lui, comme le plus excellent poSte lyrique et 
 drama.tique tout ensemble, que la France ait jamais eu." Quoted in Berriat Saint- 
 Prix's edition of Boileau, vol. iii, p. 169, n. 
 
 * On these matters cf. H. Gillot, op. cit., passim and especially pp. 36s~369- 
 
70 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 verse became the model for the semi-ofl&cial eulogies and academic 
 compositions which accompanied the growth of royal state. Mal- 
 herbe also began to distinguish between " good use " and " bad 
 use " and to build up a " noble " language. He is often looked 
 upon as the initiator of seventeenth-century classicism in poetry, 
 and Boileau's " Enfin Malherbe vint " did more than one might 
 realize to consecrate him as a founder. But he was far from being 
 a blind worshipper of antiquity, for many of whose poets he had 
 such scant respect. 
 
 ^ The seventeenth century gradually evolved a prose style suited 
 to its self-conscious dignity. The written language of the six- 
 teenth century had been disjointed and welcomed increase of 
 vocabulary. The seventeenth century used far fewer words and 
 
 c its constructions were more precise,, ■'even though its numerous 
 i&cidental clauses with qui and que seem cumbersome today. In 
 spite of the mockery oiAe Anti-Ciceronians ever since the days 
 of Erasmus and others, the model of style was the rolling period of 
 Cicero. True enough a reaction against him was visible in many 
 writers,^ but the teachers of French prose classicism were Cic- 
 eronian rhetoricians. Balzac, Coeffeteau, Patru, Perrot d'Ablan- 
 court, Vaugelas, were the oracles of the day. The lawyer Patru, 
 the " French QuintiKan " of Vaugelas, exemplified the heavy side 
 with what Sainte-Beuve called his ore rotunda style. Coeffeteau," 
 in his history of Rome and his translation of Florus, gave to his 
 prose a polish which made Vaugelas take him for his chief au- 
 thority; Perrot d'Ablancourt by his translations, the " belles 
 infideles," won an admiration which Boileau shows by linking him 
 with Patru.' 
 
 But Balzac is the great reformer of prose, doing for it, as the 
 hackneyed statement runs, what Malherbe did for poetry; Vau- 
 gelas recorded the good use of his day and handed on his sceptre 
 
 ' Cf. Croll, Juste-Lipse et le mouiiement anti~ciUronien d la fin du xvi' et au dibut 
 du xvii' sihcle, in Revue du xvi' sibcle, 1914. 
 
 ' On Coeffeteau, cf. Ch. Urbain's Nicolas Coeffeteau. 
 » Satire IX, 1. 290. 
 
GENERAL MANIFESTATIONS 71 
 
 to the Pere Bouhours; ^ Bossuet reached the climax of the soaring 
 style for which Balzac had somewhat ineffectively groped. Mean- 
 while Descartes, busy with his " method," helped to give order 
 and logic to French prose, though his own style was externally 
 ponderous and cumbersome. Pascal, preoccupied like Descartes 
 with thought, wrote the purest and most limpid prose of all. In 
 both prose and verse, Voiture, in the first half of the century, culti- 
 vated an airy and whimsical manner, non-Ciceronian and verging 
 on preciosity, which seems to cut him off from consideration in a 
 study of the classical age, until we remember the admiration of 
 Bouhours for him and recall his eulogy by the disciple of Boileau 
 and the French classical school, Alexander Pope: 
 
 Ev'n rival Wits did Voiture's death deplore, 
 And the gay mourn'd who never mourn'd before; 
 The truest hearts for Voiture heav'd with sighs, 
 Voiture was wept by aU the brightest eyes: 
 The Smiles and Loves had died in Voiture's death, 
 But that for ever in his lines they breathe.^ 
 
 Balzac has been rather unfairly treated by posterity as a mere 
 rhetorician. It is perfectly true that the subject-matter of most 
 of his solemn and ornate letters and dissertations is now obsolete, 
 that his philautia or self-esteem has done him more harm than 
 good. But no less a person than Descartes admired him as a 
 thinker,' while his far-reaching friendships and influence in his 
 own day prove that, even though a Ciceronian rhetorician, his 
 effect on the prose of his century was in the highest degree impor- 
 tant. He gave utterance in well-balanced rhetoric, based on sound 
 principles of taste, to the current ideas in religion, politics, litera- 
 ture and morals. He was not an original thinker, like Descartes 
 
 ' " Bouhours, whom I look upon to be the most penetrating of all the French 
 critics." — Addison, Spectator, No. 62. 
 
 * Episde to Mrs. Blount, with the Works of Voiture. " Pope, in addressing ladies, 
 was nearly the ape of Voiture.'' Hallam's Literary History, Pt. iii, ch. 7. 
 
 ' " Le jugement le plus flatteur dont Balzac a €t& I'objet, non-seulement comme 
 dcrivain, mais aussi comme penseur est celui de Descartes." — Sabri£, les Idies 
 rdigieuses de J.-L. Guez de Balzac, p. 13. He quotes the passage in question from 
 Descartes's Epistolae, Amsterodaml, 1668, pp. 332-334. 
 
72 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 or Pascal, but he did more than any one had yet done in France to 
 make the reading of prose an easy instead of a laborious task. 
 
 If the names of Malherbe and of Balzac are linked together at 
 an earlier stage, so it may be said that Vaugelas in turn did for 
 prose what Boileau did for poetry. Vaugelas was the chief of those 
 seventeenth-century granunarians who, avoiding the pedantry of 
 the sixteenth-century fallacious ets^nological linguistics, sought to 
 be the registrars of noble style and of good taste in general. Vau- 
 gelas did not write a systematic grammatical treatise but wrote 
 instead Remarques sur la langue frangaise, nor would he even 
 classify his remarks according to the parts of speech, in order not 
 to have them seem like a grammar. 
 
 Vaugelas is a purist. He distinguishes between good use, the 
 language of good writers and honnites gens, and bad use, which is 
 turned over to burlesque, low comedy and satire. Good use is the 
 way of speaking of the most sensible elements of the court in con- 
 formity with the practice of the best authors, and Vaugelas in- 
 cludes women as important elements of the court, hence of high 
 value in judging matters of taste. His chief standard in written 
 literature is Coeffeteau, but he adheres to the practice of the 
 standard writers of his and the preceding generation: Malherbe, 
 Balzac, Voiture, Chapelain, Perrot d'Ablancourt and Patru. 
 
 Thus Vaugelas is an empirical grammarian, more interested in 
 the authorities of his own time than in the past. The effect of his 
 teachings was to help the establishment of a courtly and poUshed 
 language, dissevered from foreign influences, supercilious of 
 provincial and dialectal perversions and deserving those epithets 
 dear to English classicists of " elegant " and " judicious." ' This 
 style was not destined to the eternity which the seventeenth cen- 
 tury imagined, but the style noble was suited to its purpose in those 
 courtly days. It ran the risk of exaggeration. The sixteenth- 
 century classicism of Ronsard admitted technical terms to poetry; 
 the seventeenth-century classicism, as a result of the purists and 
 
 ' On the doctrine of Vaugelas see the preface to Chassang's edition of the 
 Remarques. 
 
GENERAL MANIFESTATIONS 73 
 
 the fastidiousness of preciosity, sought only general terms, until 
 contact with fact was missed and a thing was rarely called by its 
 name. In time, periphrasis and circumlocution came so much into 
 vogue that we understand the anger of the romanticists, Victor 
 Hugo's advocacy of the mot propre and his pride in calling le 
 cochon par son nom. 
 
 With the Jesuit critic. Father Dominique Bouhours, the " ur- 
 banity " praised by Balzac, as a quaUty of polished civilization 
 opposed to " rusticity," gets still more emphasis. The urbanity 
 of Bouhours has much of the smiling amenity with which his order 
 made converts, his teachings like the language of his characters 
 were suave,^ his language was often flowery and his purism was 
 often but bel esprit. For the classicism of Bouhours harks back 
 not only to Vaugelas but to Voiture. Like Vaugelas he takes as 
 guides good use and taste, which mean to him intercourse with 
 honnites gens and the reading of good books. But his true hero 
 is Voiture.2 
 
 Hence the ideals of Bouhours, dwelling on the middle heights, 
 express the general average of good taste to the later seventeenth 
 century: a language and style clear and smooth, more familiar 
 than Balzac taught, perhaps a Uttle too pretty to be always vigor- 
 ous, intended as a medium for witty women and polished men. 
 
 If, however, instead of looking for the average manifestation of 
 the style noble, we seek its best form, we find it in Bossuet. Here is 
 the culmination of the rhetoric of Balzac, strong without bom- 
 bast, individual without egotism, smooth without afEectation, 
 clear without weakness. Bossuet's sonorous eloquence, expressing 
 no longer rhetorical platitudes, or a social mievrerie, but great 
 religious principles, is the fit embodiment of the inteUectualism 
 which gave France its leadership in Europe in the seventeenth 
 century. 
 
 ' Cf. Doncieux, le Pire Bouhours, p. 30, n. 2: " Voyez les ErUreliens d'Ariste et 
 d'Eughne et la Manitre de Men penser, oA presque toujours les interlocuteurs ques- 
 tionnent, r6pliquent, intenompent 'en riant' ou 'en souriant.' " 
 
 ' Dondeux, op. cit., p. 249. 
 
74 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 It was not enough to create a literary manner or style, as some 
 of the more superficial rhetoricians evidently thought. The 
 French classical age would mean but little to us, if it had been only 
 a matter of words. Admittedly, even in the realm of general prin- 
 ciples the predominating quwtions are the aesthetics of literature 
 and of art. But underl3nng them were things more fundamental: 
 reason, intuition, and the like. Pascal brought thought into non- 
 technical literature and enriched its content. To him thought and 
 style are inseparable. Similarly Descartes bequeathed a method. 
 
 The classical age is the school of Reason, but this reason ranges 
 almost from a key to the riddle of the universe to the literary 
 -" good sense " of BoUeau./The traditionalists continued to be- 
 lieve that the ancients had been the depositaries of reason, and 
 that by following them as docilely as possible one could inherit the 
 transmitted torch of knowledge and of enlightenment. The 
 scholasticism of the mediaeval " Aristotle " was still the last word 
 in method, the Latin authors were the orthodox masters of taste. 
 The sceptics and Pyrrhonists among the Ubertines held their 
 judgment in suspense as Montaigne had done or, like Gassendi, 
 ventured no further in afl&rmation than the senses allowed. Pascal 
 relied on the help of reason for positive science,Cbut he showed 
 abnost the Pyrrhonist's disdain for it when he came to faith and 
 the supernatural^ Finally, Descartes set up a new reason common 
 to all men and equal in them which, when put in possession of an 
 infallible Method, can scorn past learning and experience and 
 erect a new world of knowledge. Reason cannot make a false in- 
 ference, thinks Descartes: mistakes are due to misuse of method.^ 
 It is by the discovery of such a method, he thought, that he had 
 performed for humanity a supreme service. Logic and clearness 
 of reasoning mean truth. 
 
 ' " Le bon sens est la chose du monde la mieux partagde; car chacun pense en 
 fitre si bien pourvu, que ceuz-m€mes qui sont les plus difficiles k contenter en toute 
 autre chose, n'ont point coutume d'en d6sirer plus qu'ils n'en ont. En quoi il n'est 
 pas vraisemblable que tous se trompent; mais plut6t cela t€moigne que la puissance 
 de bien juger le vrai d'avec le faux, qui est proprement ce qu'on nomme le bon sens 
 ou la raison, est natureUement 6gale en tous les hommes." — Discours de la methode. 
 
GENERAL MANIFESTATIONS 75 
 
 By his contempt for the past Descartes, it has already been 1 
 pointed out, was non-classical. By his method he helped to pro- J 
 vide French with lucidity and order and those qualities of logical 
 arrangement which have made French literature pre-eminent, 
 and of which, in the seventeenth century, the Cartesian Logic of 
 Port-Royal and BoUeau's Art poetique were great examples: 
 
 Avant que d'6crire apprenez i penser. 
 
 Perhaps, also, Descartes's mechanistic view of the world and his 
 insensibility to nature may, without creating it, have encouraged 
 the concentration of the School of 1660 on human nature to the 
 exclusion of the great outer one. 
 
 Descartes's philosophy does not consider reason to be a mere 
 logical implement, proceeding entirely by deduction. He be- 
 lieved in intuition, each step in his induction or deduction was 
 intuitional rather than syllogistic, and the original postulate of his 
 whole philosophical structure was an intuition. Yet as a vivifying 
 principle to literature interpreting life it was less potent than the 
 thought of Pascal. The system of Descartes was worked out a 
 priori by him in the solitude of his poele or of his study. The 
 storm-tossed- soul of Pascal did not dally with concepts, but en- 
 dured physical and mental agony. Pascal was not so much a 
 metaphysician as Descartes and his problems were more those of 
 hxmaanity. 
 
 The manifold physical sufferings of Pascal, the turmoil of his 
 mental life, have led many to call him unclassical and to link his 
 name with Rousseau and Chateaubriand. Moreover, Pascal 
 belonged to the defeated Jansenists and not to the lucky Jesuits 
 who swam in the full tide of social success. Yet the rich nature of 
 Pascal contributed, perchance, as much to the content of classi- 
 cism as the clock-work mechanism of Descartes did to its form; 
 and intellectually the School of 1660 is stamped by the influence 
 of the Jansenists as well as by that of the Jesuits. 
 
 Pascal had begun by being a rigid scientist having many affini- 
 ties with the spirit of Cartesianism, and his mathematical tem- 
 
76 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 perament had somewhat the rigidity of the Cartesian rationaUstic 
 processes; though, from the beginning, his genius had a greater 
 felicity of intuition. Uppermost, then, in Pascal at that time is 
 what he himself describes impersonally as the esprit de geometric, 
 the ability to use the reason well in handling principles. Des- 
 cartes remained all his Ufe practically in this condition. The 
 expression of his thought was never completely freed from the 
 technicalities of the sohtary and self-centered investigator. Such 
 was not Pascal's experience. Bene vixit qui bene latuit was not 
 Pascal's but Descartes's motto. For a time, at least, Pascal came 
 under mundane influences, the worldliness of the due de Roannez 
 and the chevalier de Mer6, the refinement of Mme de Sable's 
 salon, and he passed from mathematics to morals. As a result, 
 Pascal developed the esprit de finesse which relies on instinct, in- 
 sight and feehng. Men have generally one or the other, says 
 Pascal, the esprit de geomttrie or the esprit de finesse,. aoA it is a 
 mark of his supreme genius that he had both. 
 
 In time such became Pascal's desire to humiUate reason and 
 self -pride after his absolute conversion to Jansenism, that finally 
 the heart and instinct almost alone are exalted: " le cceur a ses 
 raisons que la raison ne connalt pas." But this condition is rather 
 that of the Pascal of the Pens&es, not pubUshed until after his 
 death. It is this fragmentary work, enriching and giving depth to 
 thought, which has contributed most to the fame of Pascal in 
 modem times, and contains the material which has made some 
 people consider Pascal a pure emotionalist with even some ro- 
 mantic pathological manifestations. In his Ufe-time it was the 
 Provinciales which gave him renown as a man of letters. There 
 Pascal showed the feUcity of the esprit de finesse. Specifically the 
 efforts in morals of Pascal were not successful, since the morale 
 des honnetes gens, with its Jesuit graces, erected as a superstructure 
 on a libertin foundation, persisted in spite of his Jansenist viru- 
 lence. But by the Provinciales he deserved the characterization 
 of the first complete prose classicist of the seventeenth century. 
 Here is a work of polished treatment endowed with both spon- 
 
GENERAL MANIFESTATIONS 77 
 
 taneousness and logic, clear and snaooth, a model of taste even 
 when unfair, an example of " Instinct et raison, marques de deux 
 natures," of which the Pensees speak.^ Pascal shows both in a 
 finished work, the expression of genius and of labor: " This letter 
 is long," he says in his sixteenth Provinciale, " because I had no 
 time to make it shorter." Pascal does not offer his mind as an 
 intellectual rag-bag like Montaigne, he is not a professional rhet- 
 orician like Balzac. He says inoneof thePe«5ees: "Do not say 
 that I have said nothing new: The disposition of the matter is 
 new. In playing tennis both use the same ball, but the one places it 
 better." Of course Pascal was an exception, nor did all appreciate 
 him in his own day. So the century which produced the Pro- 
 vinciales and the Pens6es was pleased with the prettinesses of the 
 Pere Bouhours, and even the abb6 Cotin had his admirers.^ 
 
 1 Compare another pensie: " Deux excfe: exclure la raison, n'admettre que la 
 raison." 
 
 ' On Pascal, in addition to such a standard reference as Sainte-Beuve's Port- 
 RoycU, see the useful hints found in the writings of V. Giraud (Pascal, I'homme, 
 I'oeuvre, I'infiuence), F. Strowski (Pascal et son temps), G. Michaut (Preface to his 
 edition of the PensSes), and the notes of L. Brunschvicg's editions of the Pensees. 
 
PART II 
 THE STRUCTURE 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 CHARACTERS AND PERSONS 
 
 /In the days of fully organized French classicism, under the ma-v^ 
 Lturity of Louis XIV, we witness as complete a development of 
 intellectual, political, and social centralization as modern civiliza- 
 tion exhibits.' In one sense we may compare the life of the French "'^ 
 aristocrat with that of the Athenian gentleman, inasmuch as both 
 can devote themselves to a life of cultivated leisure, the one main- 
 tained by the toil of slaves, the other by the peasants, those hu- 
 man wild beasts of whom La Bruy^re writes in a famous passage.^ 
 But the modem age was far from presenting that symmetrical 
 combination of " music " and " gymnastic " which lovers of 
 Greek harmony would have us admire. As life grew more and 
 more confined to the court and the town, the headstrong, wilful 
 and semi-feudal seigneur of the sixteenth century and of the wars 
 of religion degenerated into a hanger-on at the king's lever and 
 coucker. The swashbuckler duellist of days as late as Richelieu's 
 or the turbulent rebel of the Fronde no longer existed. The sei- 
 gneur found exercise and diversion in the chase, but he spent more 
 time in promenade or collation. If an officer engaged in one of 
 Louis's numerous wars, he would make haste, at the coming of the 
 rain and mud of autumn, to leave the troops in winter quarters in 
 Flanders and go back to court to enjoy himself until spring once 
 again summoned him forth. Ladies, too, were no longer the vig- 
 orous and rich-blooded amazons of the Fronde manipulating 
 
 ^ " L'on voit certains animaux farouches, des m^Ies et des femelles, r6pandus 
 par la campagne, noirs, livides et tout brdlds du soleil, attaches k la terre qu'ils fouil- 
 lent et qu'ils remuent avec une opinia,tret6 invincible: ils ont comme une voix arti- 
 cul£e, et, quand ils se Invent sur leurs pieds, ils montrent xine face humaine; et en 
 eSet ils sont des hommes. lis se retiient la nuit dans des taniSres, oil ils vivent de 
 pain noit, d'eau et de racines: ils 6pargnent aux auties hommes la peine de semer, 
 de labourer et de recueillir pour vivre et m€ritent ainsi de ne pas manquer de ce pain 
 qu'ils ont semS." — Des hommes. 
 
 8i 
 
82 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 conspiracies, as did Mme de Chevreuse and Mme de Longueville, 
 or a!rmed bodies of men, as did the Grande Mademoiselle, or them- 
 selves riding adventurous careers over Europe in male disguise 
 like a niece of Mazarin. Rather were they now pale drawing- 
 room flowers, suffering from vapeurs and migraines, whether their 
 time was taken up with petty intrigues and jealousies, or with 
 discussions of intellectual matters ranging from- a tragedy to 
 Cartesianism. 
 
 V Above a prostrate nation and amid the crowd of kneeling cour- 
 tiers was the king, the roi-soleil, like the sun at the centre of the 
 revolving planets, encouraged by the increased strength of per- 
 sonal rule and the adulation of eulogists to consider himself the 
 
 -i representative of God on earth. The controversies between the 
 Gallican party and the Vatican, and the teachings of Bossuet in- 
 creased still more the tendency to deify the king, not only as the 
 defender of the faith, but as the spokesman of God: 
 
 Souviens-toi, quelque eclat dont briUe ta personne, 
 Que de Dieu seulement tu refus la couronne; 
 Que devant tous les temps ses assures desseins 
 Distinguerent ton sort du reste des htunains, 
 Et, t'ayant retire de la masse commune, 
 Dans le rang souverain placerent ta fortune.^ 
 
 ^ Gradually there had b^ome crystallized about the king a system 
 of etiquette, far older than his generation, it is true, but the rigid- 
 ity of which made the routine of his daily existence have the sem- 
 
 ^ blance of a quasi-religious ritual.'' Even in a la3mian's way of 
 
 ' Abb6 Esprit, Maximes politiques, quoted by Nourrisson, Politique de Bossuet, 
 p. 40. 
 
 ' " Les grands de la nation s'assemblent tous les jours, k una certaine heure, dans 
 un temple qu'ils nomment figlise. II y a au fond de ce temple un autel consacre k ce 
 dieu, oil un prdtre c61ebre des mystjres qu'ils appellent saints, sacrSs et redoutables. 
 Les grands forment un vaste cercle au pied de cet autel, et paraissent debout, le dos 
 tourn^ directement au prfitre et aux saints mysteres, et les faces 61ev6es vers leur roi, 
 que I'on voit k genoux sur une tribune, et k qui Us semblent avoir tout I'esprit et tout 
 le coeur appliques. On ne laisse pas de voir dans cet usage une espfece de subordina- 
 tion, car ce peuple paralt adorer le prince, et le prince adorer Dieu." — La Bruyfire, 
 De la cour. 
 
CHARACTERS AND PERSONS 83 
 
 looking at it the king was as remote from his fellow-men as the 
 Oriental potentate whom Racine portrays in the Assuerus of 
 Esther. Each incident of the robing and disrobing of the king was 
 regulated by precedent. At Versailles gentlemen and ladies pas- 
 sing through the king's bed chamber removed their hats or made 
 deep obeisances before the empty couch as before an altar. The 
 sycophantic due de la Feuillade erected a statue of Louis XIV in 
 the Place des Victoires and wished to surround it like a shrine with 
 ever-burning lamps. An academy, ancestor of the Academie des 
 Inscriptions, was founded in 1663 for the purpose of devising 
 triumphal inscriptions and mottoes in commemoration of his 
 Majesty and his achievements. ] The king was not only the incar- 
 nation of genius in government, but the supreme master of taste. ' 
 Says FatherBouhours in the Entretiens d'Ariste et d'Eugene: 
 
 " II ne ressemble pas seulement k Auguste, dit Ariste, il ressemble aussi i 
 C6sar. Le Roi de France parle sa langue comme le conqu6rant des Gaules 
 parlait la sienne; c'est-a-dire qu'il la parle tres purement, et sans nuUe affec- 
 tation: de sorte que, si notre Prince se donnait la peine d'6crire lui-meme son 
 histoire, les Commentaires de Louis vaudraient bien ceux de C6sar." ' 
 
 Louis XIV in time built for himself a shrine worthy of his glory. 
 Disliking Paris and its Louvre, and tiring of Saint-Germain, he 
 erected for himself and his court the magnificent palace of Ver- 
 sailles destined to become the admiration of Europe and the model 
 for petty continental despots who interpreted royal pdwer as 
 Louis XIV had made it. Here were gorgeous ambassadorial stair- 
 cases, grand galleries frescoed with the victories of the conqueror 
 of Holland and Franche-Comte and innumerable state and private 
 apartments. For days of relaxation there was the palace of Marly, 
 pompous on a smaller scale. In the busy hive of Versailles Louis 
 was apotheosized not only by the evanescent genuflexions of fawn- : 
 ing courtiers, but by the more enduring memorials of writers of ' 
 the classical school.'. 
 
 About the king gravitated the dauphin, the princes of the royal 
 line, like the king's brother. Monsieur, or the head of the princes 
 
 ' Third entretien. 
 
84 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 of the blood, such as the Prince of Conde. All had their courts 
 and retinues on a smaller scale, as Cond6 did at Chantilly. 
 
 The French aristocracy and upper bourgeoisie as a background 
 for literature offered all varieties of human nature. For portraits 
 of general types we turn to the comedies of Mohere or the Char- 
 acters of La Bruydre. Just as royal etiquette in the environment 
 of the monarch was as rigid as the laws of the Medes and Persians, 
 so in drawing-room or public walk, in stately hdtel or in the Cours- 
 la-Reine, the discipline of social decorum was all-powerful, and 
 certain distinct tj^es were created as a result of early schooling 
 and social training. Of these the essential ones for understanding 
 the social spirit of French classicism were the honnete homme and 
 the lady of the salons, who evolved the goUt mondain expressed by 
 the writers of classicism. Obviously the literary and aesthetic 
 ideas of the time have many varied aspects. Some people were 
 devotees of antiqmty as they understood it, others were innova- 
 tors or " Moderns "; there were divergences between the stilted 
 ponderousness of certain conventional traditionahsts and the 
 inevitable iconoclastic radicals. The classicism of the seventeenth 
 century was less pervasively humanistic than was the Pleiade. Lit- 
 erature was the property of the man and woman of the world, and 
 the critic, guiding and reflecting taste, aspired to be a bel esprit 
 as well.i 
 
 Towards these results, praiseworthy in the great masters, super- 
 ficial in the minor writers, the pedagogical methods in vogue con- 
 tributed not a Uttle. In the training of the Jesuit schools emphasis 
 was placed on a florid literary virtuosity, graceful and well-bred, 
 disdaining " pedantry " and banishing the specialist from among 
 
 ' Cf. such passages as the following: " Nous somnies dans un temps oil tout le 
 monde croit avoir le droit de juger de la Po&ie, de laqueUe Aristote a fait son chef- 
 d'cEuvre; oi les ruelles des femmes sont les Tribunaux des plus beauz Ouvrages." — 
 Sarasin, Preface of Discours de la tragidie. " L'abondance des Uvres a apportfi en- 
 core un autre changement dans la Rfipublique des lettres, qui est qu'autrefois il n'y 
 avait que les savants de profession qui osassent porter leur jugement sur les ouvrages 
 des auteuTS, ^ qui ils donnaient beaucoup de louanges k la charge d'autant, et 
 qu'aujourd'hui tout le monde s'en m61e." — Perrault, ParaUkks, Dialogue I. 
 
CHARACTERS AND PERSONS 85 
 
 educated men. The Port-Royalists and the Oratorians of the 
 College de Juilly were less prone to emphasize rhetoric for itself. 
 The Jansenists, in particular, by the study of Greek enlarged the 
 boundaries of the intellectual world. All these orders realized the 
 ineffectiveness of the traditional scholasticism of the University, 
 butt of gibes by Moli^re and Boileau. The great Jansenist scholar 
 Amauld recognized the insufficiency of erudition and logic with- 
 out persuasiveness when he sought the help of Pascal. 
 
 The sway of Mme de Montespan during about thirteen years 
 corresponded with the greatest glamour and glory of the reign of 
 Louis XrV. Intellectually inferior to her successor Mme de 
 Maintenon, she was a more amiable and magnetic woman. In her 
 environment was fostered the combination of social good breediag 
 and aesthetic taste which we connect with the grand siecle. 
 
 Every age in every land has had its ideal in literature of the 
 gentleman, or perchance its exemplar of virtues in real Ufe, as 
 described by eulogists, a chevaUer Bayard, a Sir Philip Sidney. In 
 early modem French literature the influences of ancient moraUsts 
 and of the ItaJian social Platonists helped soon in the Renaissance 
 to make manners a matter of discussion. The pseudo-chivalry of 
 the reigns of Francis I and Henry II was artificial in practice, but 
 already in Rabelais, often considered the embodiment of ia- 
 decency, we find in the Abbey of Theleme a picture of refined life 
 where gentlemen and ladies of natural virtue and gentle training 
 meet in cultured intercourse. In the Abbey of Theleme of the 
 bourgeois Rabelais we already see foreshadowings of the honnete 
 homme of the seventeenth century. Montaigne, even more, of 
 recent mercantile lineage and striving to take his plate among the 
 landed gentry, discusses, we have seen, under the influence of his 
 reading of historians and moralists, the main of breeding, good 
 manners, trained judgment, free from narrow book pedantry, of 
 whom we may say he is " not a grammarian or a logician, but a 
 gentlemSn." 
 
 The prestige of Aristotle made the " Highminded Man " of the 
 fourth book of the Nicomachean Ethics become a t3^e for those 
 
86 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 who liked abstract ethical discussion. His calm reserve and in- 
 dependence were eulogized by Balzac in his studies of the man of 
 breeding,* and later Father Bouhours, among others, uses him as 
 a model in his essay on Bel esprit. The ideal of the stoic sage was 
 no less potent, rfhe characters represented by the ginereux of 
 Descartes ^ haoa more concrete counterpart in the CorneKan 
 hero, softened by the influence of the sentimental heroic romance. 
 Such a figure as Severe in Polyeticte more than the fanatical hero 
 of that tragedy, or the swashbuckler Rodrigue, or the heartless 
 Horace or the treacherous Cinna, seems an example of the true 
 gentleman conceivedly made possible in the real life of those 
 times. But, as a rule, the seventeenth-century conception, late 
 as well as early, did not call for the sympathy of the modern 
 gentleman. His amenity concealed much that was personal, and 
 the gloire of the Cornelian hero was as selfish as that of the sei- 
 gnmr of the Fronde or the courtier of Versailles-J 
 d{ fip.e honnete homme had to be not only a man of " sense -' but^ 
 man of breeding, and treatises of deportment were written, such 
 as Facet's I'Honnete homme ou Art de plaire d la cour (1630) or the 
 Lois de la galanterie (1644), which afforded material to Moh^re 
 for ridicule in his satires of the marquis.] 
 
 Pascal helps not a little to understand the honnete homme phil- 
 osophically considered, if it be permissible to apply that term to 
 what becomes often a mere matter of etiquette. Pascal had re- 
 ceived many Mnts from his friends the due de Roannez and the 
 chevalier de Mere, the latter the authority of his day on the hon- 
 nete homme. But his thoughts grow deeper as they become his 
 own. 
 
 "Le moi est haissable," says Pascal, very differently from 
 Comeille's Horace. Banish self-love and self-conceit. Mere had 
 taught that we should not say je but on. Theologically Pascal 
 carried this effacement of the self almost to self-annihilation be- 
 
 ' As in the essays on the Roman and on Maecenas. 
 
 ' Desjardins, la Methode des classiquesfraniais, p. 45; Lanson, le HSros com&ien 
 et le Ginereux selon Descartes, in Eommes et livres. 
 
CHARACTERS AND PERSONS 87 
 
 fore faith. But even in a worldly sense it meant a delicate absten- 
 tion from conspicuousness, and a desire to meet others intellec- 
 tually half way which is, after all, hard to reconcile with the 
 general intolerance characterizing the Jansenists in religion and 
 morals.' 
 
 Obviously Pascal's position here coincides ^th the trend of 
 seventeenth-century classicism towards the_universal or the 
 general, and the portrayaTof^t^es such as we find in Racine or 
 Moli^re, rathef^than ^e individual eccentrics that we see not 
 infrequently in nineteenth-century romanticism. Moliere, indeed, 
 more close to the realm of ethics, gives us, as Sainte-Beuve says, 
 the morale des honnStes gens,^ or the morale du juste milieu, repre- 
 sented by the author's mouthpiece in so many of his comedies, 
 the raisonneur or man of sense and good coimsel, particularly 
 Cleante in Tartuffe: 
 
 Les hommes la plupaxt sont 6trangement faits! 
 Dans le juste milieu on ne les voit jamais; 
 La raison a pour eux des bornes trop petites; 
 En chaque caractere ils passent ses limites; 
 Et la plus noble chose, Us la gatent souvent 
 Pour la vouloir outrer et pousser trop avant.' ( 
 
 We may, perhaps, find here some help in understanding such a 
 puzzling play as le Misanthrope, where Alceste, whose indignation 
 at the follies of those with whom he is in contact is justifiable, is 
 made the laughable character of the play,* while the pliant Phi- 
 
 ' Pensies (Bninschvicg edition, 35): " II faut qu'on n'en puisse dire, ni: il est 
 mathematician, ni pr6dicateur, ni Eloquent, mais il est honn£te homme; cette quality 
 universelle me plait sevile. Quand en voyant un homme on se souvient de son livre, 
 c'est mauvais signe; je voudrais qu'on ne s'aperjdt d'aucune quality que par la 
 rencontre et I'occasion d'en user — Ne quid nimis — de peur qu'une quaUt^ I'em- 
 porte, et ne fasse baptiser; qu'on ne songe point qu'il parle bien, sinon quand il 
 s'agit de bien parler; mais qu'on y songe alors.'' And Pascal adds (No. 36) : " II 
 faut done un honn^te homme qui puisse s'accommoder h. tons mes besoins g€n€rale- 
 ment." 
 
 » Sainte-Beuve, Port-Royal, Bk. Ill, chs. xv and xvi. ' Act I, Scene $. 
 
 * The present traditions of the Com^die franfaise are undoubtedly at variance 
 with Moli^re's own interpretation. He made Alceste comic. Rousseau {Lettre d, 
 d'Alembert) was partly responsible for the change. 
 
88 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 linte, who takes " tout doucement les hommes comme ils sont," 
 who has been compared to the " tricky Jesuit," as opposed to the 
 uncompromising Jansenist, is the spokesman for men of good 
 breedingj 
 
 In works like Father Bouhours's Maniere de Men penser dans 
 les ouvrages d'esprit, eulogized several times by Chesterfield/ 
 appears the urbanity supposed to characterize the honnete homtne 
 as a man of judgment and taste, an urbanity which made him 
 very different from the dogmatic Johnsonian critic usually con- 
 nected in thought with the name of classicism. Partisan of the 
 golden mean and of amenity in criticism afe in manners, this 
 manual of " good taste " is so benevolent that it overlooks much, 
 at least in others, and smiles forgivingly on the critic who is 
 Ovidian rather than Aristotelian. La Bruyere is at one with Bou- 
 hours when he writes in his chapter Des ouvrages de V esprit: " II 
 faut chercher seulement k parler juste, sans vouloir amener les 
 autres k notre gout et a nos sentiments; c'est une trop grande 
 entreprise." 
 
 If we look for concrete embodiments we find plenty of examples 
 among royalty and the aristocracy, at least as flatterers saw them. 
 The eulogists read into the characters of the king and of Conde 
 every perfection. For sovereigns, says La Bruyere, are even un- 
 consciously arbiters of taste,^ and princes unite with knowledge 
 the Atticism of the Greeks and the Urbanity of the Romans.* 
 Obviously Louis XIV was the, embodiment of every exceUraica 
 according to all who described him/even the cynical Saint-Simon. 
 With an air of authority, a majestic bearing, equanimity of tem- 
 perament, a sincere and open heart, every grace and charm of 
 manner, firmness and solidity of judgment, a spirit of equity, a 
 ready memory and many other virtues,* who was better fitted to 
 
 ' Thus in 1750: " I do not know any book that contributes more to form a good 
 taste." 
 
 ^ " Les princes, sans autre science ni autre rfigle, ont un godt de comparaison: ils 
 sont nfe et 61ev6s au milieu et comme dans le centre des meiUeures choses, k quoi Us 
 rapportent ce qu'ils lisent, ce qu'ils voient et ce qu'ils entendent." — Des Grands. 
 
 ' Des jugements. * La BruySre, Du Souverain. 
 
CHARACTERS AND PERSONS 89 
 
 guide his loyal subjects in peace as well as in war ? When the two 
 interlocutors in Bouhours's Entretiens d'Ariste ei d'Eugene dis- 
 cussed the French language in their second conversation, they 
 waxed so enthusiastic over the king's perfect mastery of French 
 that their talk lasted imtil the fall of night drove them within 
 doors. 
 
 -^flower in the scale, among human beings instead of demi-gods, 
 manners and social graces were much emphasized. Never were 
 there worse reprobates than the Prince of Conti or Mme de 
 S6vigne's cousin, Bussy-Rabutia, examples of the "grand sei- 
 gneur m^chant homme " before whom Sganarelle in Moliere's 
 Don Juan stood aghast J But Bussy and Mme de S6vign^'s other 
 friend Corbinelli thought themselves authorities on the honnete 
 homme} And when Bussy writes to Mme de Sevign6 ia 1650 
 about her husband that " II est teUement persuad6 qu'on ne 
 peut Stre honnfete hormne, sans fetre amoureux," ^ the honnete 
 homme is in danger of merging with the petit marquis or fop.' 
 
 English-speaking people are more likely to understand the 
 honnete homm£ of the drawing-rooms when they recall Lord 
 Chesterfield's comments on the Gentleman, his dignity of man- 
 ners, his ease and grace of carriage and behavior, his observation 
 of les hienseances, and his familiarity with les manieres nobles 
 which can be acquired only in the " best companies." The true 
 gentleman should avoid anything so undignified as a laugh. Just 
 
 ' Corbinelli to Bussy in Mme de S6vign6's Lettres (vol. v, p. 525): " Je ne puis 
 plus souffrir qu'on dise qu'un tel est honv&te homme, et que I'on conjoive sous ce 
 terme une chose, et I'autre une autre. Je veux qu'on ait une idfie particuliere de 
 ce qu'on nomme le galant homme, I'homme de bien, I'homme d'honneur, I'honnfite 
 homme; qu'on sache ce que c'est que le goUt, le bon sens, le jugement, le disceme- 
 ment, I'esprit, la raison, la dfilicatesse, I'honnetetd, la politesse, la civilit6." Bussy 
 TepUed (p. 529) : " VhonvMe homms est un homme poli et qui sait vivre; I'homme 
 de bien regarde la religion; le galant homme est une quality particuliere qui regarde 
 la franchise et la g&6rosit6; I'homme d'honneur est un homme de parole, et cela 
 regarde la probit6; le hrave homme, dont vous ne me parlez pas, ne regarde que le 
 courage." 
 
 2 Vol. 1, pp. 367-368. 
 
 ' La Rochefoucauld (Maxim cccliii) says: "Un honnete homme peut fetre amou- 
 reux conime un fou, mais non pas comme un sot.'' 
 
90 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 as La Rochefoucauld tells us in his own Portrait that he had 
 scarcely been seen to laugh three or four times in as many years, 
 so to Lord Chesterfield laughter was a " shocking distortion of the 
 face." 1 
 
 It is perhaps, after all, in such an abstract social moralist as 
 La Rochefoucauld that we get one of the best definitions of the 
 seventeenth-century honnete hotnme (even though he did not live 
 up to it), because he does not put the whole emphasis on manners. 
 The true honnete homme, says La Rochefoucauld, est celui qui ne se 
 pique de rien? His good taste, moderation and common sense 
 show themselves in evenly developed mental and social qualities, 
 which save him from being a narrow pedant or a self-centred 
 egoist. He was a well rounded man, fitted to play his part in 
 society, which of course reached its apogee in the court of Louis 
 the Great. Moliere, in the Femmes savantes, contrasts pedantry 
 and the wit of the court»JLa BruySre, though a somewhat less 
 cynical critic than LaRlBchefoucauld, touches more on the moral 
 side when he emphasizes the uprightness of the true honnete 
 hotnme,^ and in his differentiation between the honnete homme, the 
 
 ' " — I heartily wish that you may often be seen to smile, but never heard to 
 laugh while you live. ... In my mind there is nothing so illiberal, and so illbred as 
 audible laughter. . . . Not to mention the disagreeable noise that it makes and 
 the shocking distortion of the face that it occasions. ... — I am sure that since I 
 have had the fuU use of my reason, nobody has ever heard me laugh." — March g, 
 1748. "Loud laughter is the mirth of the mob, who are only pleased with silly 
 things; for true wit or good sense never excited a laugh since the creation of the 
 world. A man of parts and fashion is therefore only seen to smile, but never heard to 
 laugh." — Oct. 19, 1748. 
 
 2 The chevalier de Mfirfi, in his Discours des agrimens, says more fully what 
 La Rochefoucauld says so concisely: "II serait d. souhaiter pour toe toujours 
 agrfeble, d'exceller en tout ce qui sied bien aux honnfites gens, sans ndanmoins se 
 piquer de rien: je veux dire sans rien taire qui ne s'offre de lui-m6me, et sans rien 
 dire qui puisse tfimoigner qu'on se veut faire valoir. Carles choses qui viennent 
 d'elles-m^mes quand on s'en acquitte bien, ont toute une autre gr^ce que celles 
 qui semblent recherchdes." 
 
 ' " Un hoim^te homme qui dit oui ou non, mfirite d'etre cru: son caract6re jure 
 pour lui, donne crfiance k ses paroles, et lui attire toute sorte de confiance." — De 
 la sociSte et de la conversation. 
 
CHARACTERS AND PERSONS 91 
 
 kabUe homme and the homme de bien,^ he makes the idea of the 
 
 Itonnete homme approach our conception of the honest man.* 
 
 \ The honnete homme finds his social complement in the lady of 
 
 the salons. Like the honnete homme, the woman of true dignity and 
 
 charm ne se pique de rien, as Moliere, exponent of the morale des 
 
 honnetes gens, proclaims in his tirades against the bluestocking 
 
 and her 
 
 — passion choquante / 
 
 De se rendre savante afin d'etre savante. [ 
 
 l^he ladies of the seventeenth century cannot in reality be 
 brought under one category. But as the years went on they, like 
 the men, reached greater uniformity. The intriguing heroines of 
 the Fronde calmed down. The pricieuse, mothered in the salon 
 of Mme de Rambouillet, but truly fostered in that of Mile de 
 Scud^ry, continued to evoke the unfair diatribes of Moliere when 
 she appeared as a prude or a femme savante. But in tJie com- 
 panionship of Mme de Sable, Mme de Sevigne, Mme de la Fayette 
 and of countless other noble ladies of grace and charm, as well as 
 among women of less reputation, such as Ninon de Lenclos or 
 Mme de Villedieu, one finds examples in reply to Bouhours's 
 query — answered by him patronizingly in the affirmative — 
 whether a woman can be a bel esprit; a quality which, by the 
 way, he unhesitaitingly denies to a German. ' 
 
 Amid this world of men of breeding and women of intellect or 
 fashion there passed an eager and restless procession of men of 
 letters: poets and versifiers, authors of tragedies or sonnets and 
 epigrams; critics primed with the jargon of their trade and elo- 
 quent about " la protase, I'epitase et la peripetie," ' or beaux 
 esprits prolific in pointes. To all, the patronage of the king or of a 
 prince or princess was the source of comfort and happiness. Such 
 a one, unlike the beggairly hack writer CoUetet, 
 
 N'attend pas pour diner le succfe d'un sonnet.* 
 
 ' Des jugements. 
 
 ' D. Zevaco has an article, I'Honn^te homme au xvii' slide in the Remte de phi- 
 lologiefransaise, vol. xxv. 
 
 ' Critique de I'Ecole desfemmes. * Art poitique. 
 
92 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 In the environment we have described we need not be sur- 
 prised to find the intellectual average no higher than that of one or 
 two other periods of French history. The " universality " of fash- 
 ionable writers was sometimes parochial in its horizon bounded by 
 ^ la cour and la ville; they were superficially smart in wit, and desire 
 ^ for the approval of the powerful was the essence of their ethos. 
 , Fortimately we judge French classicism, not by Pradon or Qui- 
 nault, but by Racine. Racine, Moliere, Boileau and Bossuet are 
 the real standards. 
 
 Racine shows in his tragedies realistic psychological analysis 
 of human character. Under the guidance of ancient writers and 
 the legends of mythology he devised plots illustrating permanent 
 laws of human Hfe. The plays were written under the dominance 
 of a single school of religious thought, Jansenism, but the deter^ 
 minism of Saint-Cyran and Amauld was no newer than the fate 
 or necessity of the ancients. On the other hand the jealous Her- 
 mione, the scheming Agrippine, the criminal Phedre were in- 
 tensely modem to seventeenth-century spectators, and the 
 poisoning of Britannicus came home to an age which saw poison 
 in every mysterious death, like that of Henriette d'Angleterre, and 
 shuddered at the crimes of the marquise de BrinvilLiers and the 
 femme Voisin. The plays of Racine were tranches de vie considered 
 from the point of view of the seventeenth century, and yet they 
 presented problems such as the great writers of antiquity, or at 
 /^ny rate the most rea;listic of them, Euripides, had shown. In this 
 ; portrayal of unchangeable laws of human nature Racine was 
 more universal than CorneiUe, whose supermen and superwomen 
 belonged to one age rather than to all times. ComeiUe's Horace 
 interprets a period of heroism like that of the recent Great War, his 
 Polyeucte may inspire a religious enthusiast, or his Emilie a Char- 
 lotte Corday, but his characters are exceptions and of a grandeur 
 not always admirable. Generations ago La Bruyere wrote a true 
 parallel which later writers have merely paraphrased: 
 
 Comeille nous assujettit 3, ses caracteres et a ses idees, Racine se conf orme 
 aux notresj celui-la peint les homines comme ils devraient 6tre, celui-ci les 
 
^ CHARACTERS AND PERSONS 93 
 
 peint tels qu'ils sonti II y a plus dans le premier de ce que I'on admire, et de 
 ce que Ton doit mSme imiter; il y a plus dans le second de ce que Ton recon- 
 nalt dans les autres, ou de ce que I'on 6prouve dans soi-m6me. L'un 61eve, 
 ^tonne, maitrise, instruit; I'autre plait, remue, touche, pln^tre. J 
 
 As to style the poetry of Racine reaches a perfection of smooth-^ 
 ness and melod3^which Malherbe was groping for when he made 
 his brutal comments on Desportes. But Malherbe writing a poem 
 needed weeks of slow elaboration, whereas when Racine had dove- 
 tailed the parts of his plot his play was virtually done. This dove- 
 tailing was precisely the chief task in Racine's construction of 
 plays. Acts and scenes follow each other in an order which is 
 logical and plausible, converging to an effective climax and a 
 natural denoHment. 
 
 /S Moliere stands in contract to the other writers of comedy of his 
 century. Where they for the most part relied on buffoonery or 
 puppet characters entangled in comic incidents, Moliere added to'^ 
 the farce the study of characters and of manners. Tartuffe and 
 Alceste are analyses of human nature, in spite of some comic exag- 
 geration. ComediesjofjcQanners, like the Femmes savantes and 
 much of the Misanthrope itseff, jajre scenes_Qf contonporairy seven- 
 teenth-century life, but the persons who move in them are per- 
 majient beings. Moliere, the contemplcdeur, needs no justification 
 for the position universally awarded him of the great observer of 
 human nature. 
 
 In Boileau French classicism finds its theorist. Clear, orderly 
 and logical, he embodies the aspect of reason called " common 
 sense " in Kterary judgment. Somewhat prosaic, intolerant of 
 fantasy and flights of the imagination as well as of buffoonery 
 and grotesque, less familiar with the human heart than Racine, 
 less experienced in men beyond the walls of Paris than Moliere, 
 he still stands for sanity.. His horizon was not vafet enough to in- " 
 elude the literature of the Middle Ages or the efforts of the PMiade 
 to achieve a task like his own; he did not fully appreciate a master 
 of his own century like Comeille, or even his own friends Mohere 
 and La Fontaine; his classification of poetical forms has been 
 
94 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 thrown into the discard, but his individual judgments have, in the 
 majority of cases, been ratified by posterity. Moreover,though 
 Boileau like his fellows gravitated in the king's orbit and was one 
 of the adulators of Louis the Great, though he created hardly a 
 single critical dictum, but only formulated ideas which were in the 
 air, still the sturdy verdicts of the bourgeois of Pajris have their 
 independence and demand at least respectful consideration. He 
 is one of those who prove, otherwise than by success on the battle- 
 field, that the French have solidity and sanity. 
 
 It is in Bossuet that we find the incarnation of seventeenth- 
 century classidsm^^et in a way which the seventeenth century 
 did not itself fully realize, since it appreciated more other men, 
 like Bourdaloue, who were better fitted proprie communia dicer^ 
 Orator and writer in prose, he nevertheless has a certain lyrical 
 quality which adds poetry to his prose. His sermons are smooth 
 and natural, but in his funeral orations he rises to stately majesty 
 as expounder of the mysteries of the Catholic faith and preacher 
 to royalty. Bossuet is the great intellectualist of his Church, who 
 
 V appeals to the heart through the reason. 
 
 Especially as spokesman of royalty through his leadership of the 
 Gallican church, and through his own conception of the position 
 of the king in the hierarchy of the world, does he fittingly throw a 
 
 x/ lustre on his times. He places the sovereign on a high pinnacle, 
 making him the representative of God on earth. The king owes 
 account to God alone for his conscience and his actions. Bossuet 
 is the admirer of tradition and of authority. In faith as in poli- 
 tics his conception is of a static order. The monarch was indeed 
 to him that potentate Louis XIV felt himself to be when, in his 
 gorgeous shrine of Versailles, he exacted from fawning courtiers 
 genuflexions as precis^ and as graded as those of a religious rite. 
 In Bossuet decked out in the stately robes of his priestly oflB.ce, 
 preaching the last eulogy of queen or prince before the highest 
 bom in France, amid the ceremonial of the church and in an im- 
 
 • Cf . Bruneti6re, Bossuet, p. 62. 
 
CHARACTERS AND PERSONS 95 
 
 posing sanctuary, expounding the universal laws of a humanity 
 destined to die and the inscrutable decrees of Providence — in 
 Bossuet thus pictured we understand better than ever the monarch 
 and his regime. '• 
 
 It is obvious, from what has gone before, that French seven- 
 teenth-century classicism would not suit the present in all its 
 details any more than it itself coincided with the classicism of 
 antiquity. Each age has different needs. The great masters, 
 briefly characterized above, had enduring qualities which made 
 them override the boundaries of their own age. They participate 
 in the heritage of universal thought. But many writers of the 
 seventeenth century belong only to their own day and are quite 
 obsolete noW' especially those who were only the result of the 
 enviromnem, and suggest merely their rigidly graded aristocratic 
 age, subservient to a social ideal depending on one man. It was a 
 nationahsm too often imposed from the throne, rather than by 
 the dry light of pure reason. 
 
 In the present ignorance of Latin and Greek, with the cult of 
 applied science, any mention of modem classicism may seem a 
 contradiction in terms. Moreover, successive generations of 
 emotionalists, following Rousseau and passing though roman- 
 ticism, seem to have cut us off from even the seventeenth-century 
 classicism so often abused as a mass of pettifogging rules. Indeed, 
 romanticism did perform a useful task in shaiking off a degenerate 
 formalism and in making thought more cosmopolitan, thereby 
 wonderfully enriching the content of literature. 
 
 But romanticism ran the risk of becoming as reprehensible as 
 the formalism against which it rebelled. The absence of standards 
 in romanticism begets exaggerated impressionism, egotism and 
 triviality which culminated in the late nineteenth century. France 
 suffered through the very defect of its quaUties, and the desire to 
 carry to logical conclusions the individualism of its literature 
 brought about the contortions of the decadents and of their suc- 
 cessors, the " synthesists," the " svunptuarists," the " integral- 
 ists," the " impulsionists," the " unanimists," the " futurists," 
 
96 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 the " intensists " and others.* The human soul could emit all 
 kinds of aesthetic effluvia and all had poetic value. 
 
 Many people in contemporary France have tried to react 
 against this chaos. It was desired to find a permanent standard in 
 a world of apparent flux. Some young men thought they saw it in 
 the heritage of national tradition. Thinking they could trace a 
 close bond between literary chaos and the confusion of modem 
 democracy, and remembering the orderly government of the old 
 regime, they evolved under Charles Maurras a political " clas- 
 sicism " or " traditionalism." * The restoration of monarchy, 
 even under such a mediocrity as the Duke of Orleans, would in- 
 fallibly bring back sanity in intellectual matters and in the body 
 politic, and restore France to that world leadership which she had 
 in the seventeenth century and which modern ochlocracy made 
 impossible. For similar traditionalist motives the royalists 
 preached a Cathohc revival because of the union of the Church 
 and the old regime. This Catholic revival proceeded apace in 
 France after the great war began, but obviously for different mo- 
 tives, and was due to the longing for spiritual consolation in the 
 midst of grief and trial. 
 
 But true classicism does not need to be Unked with a political 
 or a religious creed. The pagan stoic could be a classicist as well 
 as the Christian Pascal. Classicism transcends in permanence 
 passing forms but it can use transitory material and content. 
 Thus it adapts itself to its time and can ever be modem, so that 
 Racine's plays were legends of antiquity and yet tme to the 
 seventeenth century. 
 
 Classicism is chiefly intellectual and demands obedience to a 
 standard. Reason gives order to the world which it envisages and 
 Imagination recreates it in terms of literature or art. We no 
 longer need to speak of " reducing the Muse to the laws of duty," 
 
 ' Cf., for these and many other terms, Florian-Parmentier, Histoire de la litUra- 
 ture fransaise de 1885 d nos jours. 
 
 ' Cf . difierent phases of anti-Romanticism in the writings of Lassene, SeilliSre, 
 Maigron (/e RomarMsme et les pueurs), Julian Benda (Belphigor), and in English 
 of Irving Babbitt. 
 
CHARACTERS AND PERSONS 97 
 
 nor to divide poetical genres into a hierarchy of separate types: 
 time and experience have shown how inadequate are such rigid 
 moulds to interpret the cosmopolitan universality which replaces 
 the nationalism of Louis XTV. But we need more than ever to 
 value qualities of logic, order, clearness, precision, and those of 
 sanity and moderation. The skilled judgment of the intellect is 
 best trained by contact with consecrated masterpieces, especially 
 those of antiquity which, deny it though one may, remain the 
 foundation of our aesthetic appreciation. But to these we may 
 now add great kindred writers of modem times, Shakespeare, 
 Racine or Molier^The judgment should not be too rigidly 
 intellectual and need not banish aU feeling, or its verdicts wiU be 
 one-sided and incapable of imderstanding the richness of the 
 human soul, which is emotiona;l as well as intellectual and cannot 
 be grasped by what is less complete than itself. The judgment 
 should be guided by taste, an insight intuitive in some, in others 
 to a certain degree acquired, and usually capable of improvement 
 by training. Consciously or not we find ourselves again and again 
 brought back to the standards and models of antiquity; for in the 
 literature of Greece, at all events, we see the record of experiments 
 like ours, carried out by geniuses whom posterity has, at any 
 rate, not excelled. These experiments, having been made in a 
 younger and less complicated world, stand forth the more clearly 
 as models and ideals for guidance and imitation. Especially are 
 we thereby saved from being led astray by the eccentricities of 
 aberra!tiomsts. ; A sane and clear-sighted intellect, linked with ans^ 
 inborn or trained taste, seeking the inspiration of great masters of 
 past literature who have themselves tried to interpret the uni- 1 
 versal laws of nature — this we may consider to be the founda-J 
 tion of true classicism. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 THE PRINCIPLES 
 
 The varied opinions expressed by seventeenth-century critics 
 make a consistent and systematic exposition of their views diffi- 
 cult.' It is not very easy, for instance, to differentiate in the 
 many discussions between the poet and the critic. Boileau, in his 
 Art poiiique, thinks chiefly of the poet; Pope, in his Essay on 
 Criticism, of the critic. But the poet, according to Boileau, must 
 be his own severest critic. So the terms " reason," " understand- 
 ing " and the Uke, may be studied as often applicable to both. 
 
 It will be as well to make, at the outset of this chapter, what 
 may be considered a normal and moderate statement of the fun- 
 damentals of seventeenth-century classicism as to poetry and 
 criticism, before passing to the individual writers. 
 
 The poet should have genius or inspiration, working in har- 
 mony with the rules, with a rich imagination or invention, re- 
 strained by decorum, and endeavoring to portray " nature " in 
 accordance with the principle of verisimilitude. 
 , The critic should have understanding and insight, with " wit " 
 and a power of Judgment based on reason or good sense, and 
 also on approved authority. This results in the setting-up of 
 standards of taste, in accordance with which works may be ap- 
 proved or condemned. 
 
 ' Vial et Denise, Idies et doctrines UtUraires du mi' sihcle is a useful collection of 
 critical passages, but the extracts are usually short and are separated from the con- 
 text. R. P. Cowl's The Theory of Poetry in English is a somewhat similar volume. 
 The chief English essays are collected in Spingam's Critical Essays of the Seventeenth 
 Century. See also Ker's edition of the essays of Dryden. Delaporte's Commentaire 
 sur I' Art poltigue de Boileau contains excellent material. One may mention also 
 Saintsbury's Loci Critici, and particularly Gayley and Scott's Methods and Ma- 
 terials of Literary Criticism. The fullest recent History of Criticism is again by Saints- 
 bury. Saint-R6al's seventeenth-century De la critique has nothing to the point. 
 
 98 
 
THE PRINCIPLES 99 
 
 The classical movement in France in the seventeenth century[^ 
 brought about conventional ideals of taste and style. The grand " 
 goUt found Its expression in the style noble with the beginnings of 
 which Balzac had much to do, and which reached its culmination 
 in certain of the writings of Bossuet. It was rhetorical or ora- 
 torical^ balsed ultimately on Latin models, and harmonized well 
 with the self-conscious aristocratic dignity upon which the seven- 
 teenth century prided itself. But there was, of course, also a less " 
 ambitious and less soaring style, of which we get an example in 
 the smooth and fluid amenity of Father Bouhours. Both these 
 styles ran the risk of deterioration when made the vehicle for false 
 figures "of speech, pointes and verbal agilities.^ But each was 
 deemed praiseworthy in its way and each was supposed to main- 
 tain certain standards. Says Boileau of poetry: "Le style le 
 moins noble a pourtant sa noblesse." One of the chief features of ^ 
 the style noble was the proscription of terms considered bas, not 
 necessarily vulgar, but merely commonplace. In preciosity this 
 had woeful consequences, but even Boileau, however hostile to 
 the exaggerations of preciosity, was punctilious about such mat- 
 ters. His mock-heroic poem, the Lutrin, was an example of the 
 style noble appUed to humor. In later generations the cult of the ' 
 style noble so impeded vivacity that it led to the stilted periphrases 
 of DeUllei One then understands the anger of the romanticists 
 and their cult of the mot propre.^ 
 
 1 Scudeiy, in the preface of Alaric, says that there are three styles: the sublime, 
 which degenerates into the bouffi and enJU; the midiocre, which degenerates into 
 thefaible and sUrile; the bas, which degenerates into the grassier and trap poptdaire. 
 
 ^ Concerning the Grand Style in art Reynolds says in his eighth Discourse: " De 
 Piles reconunends to us portrait painters, to add grace and dignity to the characters 
 of those whose portraits we draw: so far he is undoubtedly right; but, unluckily, he 
 descends to particulars and gives his own idea of grace and dignity. ' If,' says he, 
 ' you draw persons of high character and dignity, they ought to be drawn in such an 
 attitude, that the portraits must seem to speak to us of themselves, and, as it were, 
 to say to us: " Stop, take notice of me, I am that invincible King, surrounded by 
 Majesty ": " I am that valiant conunander who struck terror everywhere ": "I 
 am that great minister who knew all the springs of politics ": "I am that magis- 
 trate of consummate wisdom and probity." ' He goes on in this maimer with all the 
 characters he can think on." 
 
lOO FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 The standard of judgment was one of the chief questions of the 
 age. Was the principle Reason, or Authority, or Inspiration, 
 either fantastic or vaticinal ? Or was it, finally, the result of a 
 training of the faculties taking the specific name of Good Taste or 
 Taste, the " power of distinguishing right from wrong," that act 
 of the mind by which we like or dishke.' Or, better still, did not 
 / these different elements of reason, authority, and taste combine? 
 
 "* The easiest solution referred everything to authority, especially 
 of the ancients. The glamour of antiquity, the long sway of classi- 
 cal authors in the schools, had obviously invested them with an 
 infallibility readUy understood. LThis tendency had prevailed 
 during the sixteenth-century classicism which, in spite of Ron- 
 sard's glorification of poetical frenzy and the inspiration of the 
 Muses, resolved itself in so many cases into a slavish imitation of 
 individual modek, whether among the ancients or the modem 
 Italians. We haVe seen that with " Aristotle," as his authority 
 diminished in philosophy, it increased in poetry, especially the 
 drama, until rigid rules held tragedy in their iron graspA A con- 
 crete standard Was set up, and works were judged by the degree 
 in which they were sup^sed to approach the model through the 
 apphcation of the rules. This^was classicism in its simplest form, 
 and in the seventeenth centurylt was really often at the bottom 
 
 ~t of other apparently more subtle views.^ 
 
 Perhaps, however, the appeal to Reason was more frequent, 
 and the rules of the ancients were justified because they con- 
 formed with reason. For instance, the abb6 d'Aubignac, in his 
 chapter, Des regies des anciens,^ answers five objections made to 
 the rules. These were: 
 
 ' Sir J. Reynolds, Seventh Discourse. 
 
 2 Thus the abbfi d'Aubignac {Pratique du tMitre, Bk. I, ch. 5), gives a list of au- 
 thorities recommended to the aspiring dramatbt. He must read the Poetics of Aris- 
 totle and Horace; all their commentators and the later critics, Castelvetro, Vida, 
 Heinsius, Vossius, La Mesnardifere, and above all Scaliger; likewise Plutarch, 
 Athenaeus and Lilius Giraldus. Then, after the theorists, he should read all the 
 poems of Greek and Latin authors, not omitting their scholiasts and glossators. 
 
 ' Pratique du thidtre, Bk. I, ch. 4. 
 
THE PRINCIPLES loi 
 
 1. That no law should be by example, and that reason should 
 always prevail over authority. 
 
 2. That the ancients often violated their own rules. 
 
 3. That some ancient works brought out on the modern stage 
 have been poorly jeceived. 
 
 4. That sundry modern works in violation of the rules have 
 been most successful. 
 
 5. That, if these rules were strictly followed, the stage would 
 sacrifice much in losing the representation of true narratives 
 which are usually not confined by the unities. 
 
 To these objections the abb6 d'Aubignac replied that the rules 
 of the theatre are based, not on authority but on reason, not on 
 example but on le jugement naturel. The practical value of the 
 rules lies in being the result of the observation of the ancients. 
 Inasmuch as the rules are based on uniform reason, ancients, as 
 well as modems, may have failed in applying them. If ancient 
 works have sometimes failed in modern form, this has often been 
 due to subsidiary causes, such as a bad translation or an unjustifi- 
 able remodelling. When modern works have found favor it has 
 been only in so far as certain parts were in conformity with reason 
 and the rules. Finally, d'Aubignac considers the fifth objection 
 preposterous, because the rules do not prevent the representa- 
 tion of noteworthy incidents, but merely readjust and rearrange 
 them. 
 
 .Thus it appears that d'Aubignac, so often called a slavish, cut- 
 and-dried disciple of antiquity, really places something else above 
 the ancients, Reason, of which, however, they are usually the best ^ 
 interpreters. But he is ready to rebuke them if they f aU short of 
 the demands of Reason. Were it not that the Reason of d'Au- 
 bignac is static, we might see in him hints of the attitude of the 
 " Moderns " as exemplified in the great dispute with the " An- 
 cients." But d'Aubignac's Reason is intolerant, and we are far 
 from the view of Perrault's first dialogue that only God and the 
 King may speak dogmatically, and everywhere else Reason rules. 
 
102 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 Sensible moderates, like Boileau, held a mitigated form of the 
 same opinion. Boileau's Art po&tique is full of allusions to reason: 
 
 Aimez done la raison; que tou jours vos Merits 
 Empruntent d'elle seide et leur lustre et leur prix. 
 
 But Boileau uses another expression which is to him practically 
 equivalent to raison, and which shows him to be far from the ab- 
 stract formalist he has so often been called. This was le bon sens. 
 Reason, then, to the critic like Boileau, instead of being a formid- 
 able philosophical expression, merely meant the dictates of com- 
 mon sense. It was the neglect of hon sens which caused vulgar 
 burlesque or offensive bombast.^ Rules, says Rapin, make every- 
 thing juste, proportionne, naturel, being based on good sense and 
 reason more than on authority a^d example. 
 
 Another proof, if needed, that true classicism in the seventeenth 
 century was not confined to formal rules, is to be found in Boi- 
 leau's views on Inspiration. The attention which he perforce 
 devotes in his Art poetique to the description of Uterary forms and 
 the enumeration of their distinctive features obscures the fact 
 that he considers Inspiration no less important than rules; even 
 more so. The obviousness of this truth dispenses him from deal- 
 ing with it in detail. To Boileau also the poet is bom and not 
 made, as he teUs us in the opening lines of his treatise: 
 
 Cast en vain qu'au Pamasse un temeraire auteur 
 Pense de I'art des vers atteindre la hauteur: 
 S'il ne sent point du del I'influence secrete, 
 Si son astre en naissant ne I'a formd poete, 
 Dans son genie etroit il est toujours captif ; 
 Pour lui Phebus est sourd et Pegase est retif . 
 
 Boileau, therefore, requires genius as a sirte qua non, though he 
 does not give it the mystica)! power attributed to it by the six- 
 
 1 Cf. Bussy, in Mme de Sdvign6's Lettres (ed. Grands Ecrivains, vol. v, p. 513): 
 " Nous croyons que le bon sens, la raison et le bon esprit, c'est la mfime chose; nous 
 croyons que genie est g^nfiral, et talent particuUer; nous croyons que la bizarrerie est 
 continuelle et le caprice par intervaUes; nous croyons que c'est une bonne quality 
 que d'etre naif, ou du moins indifferent, et que c'est un dfifaut d'etre ingfinu; nous 
 croyons qu'il f aut plus d'esprit pour 6tre poU que pour fitre honnfete ; que I'honnfetetS 
 a plus de fonds et plus d'fitendue que la civiUtg, qui n'en a que I'apparence." 
 
THE PRINCIPLES 103 
 
 teenth-century classicism of Ronsard. In practice he does, in- 
 deed, conscious of the laiborious efforts of his own criticism, 
 emphasize toil, patience, and the application of the rules more 
 than iuspiration. Boileau would no more than Malherbe cry like 
 the romanticist: "Ah! frappe-toi le coeur, c'est Ik qu'est le genie! " 
 This would open the way to the errors of a Thfiophile who thought 
 that " Jamais un bon esprit ne fait rien qu'ais^ment." ^ It would 
 destroy all the benefits of long excogitation and the good results 
 of polishing and repolishing, of putting one's work back on the 
 stocks a score of times. Even when Boileau's muse is vaticinal 
 and the " chalste nymphs of the Permessus " inspire him with a 
 " docte et sainte ivresse," as in the Ode sur la prise de Namur, he 
 does not forget that " un beau d6sordre est un effet de I'art." 
 Boileau does not believe in violating the rules. He does, how- 
 ever, think that genius may sometimes transcend them: 
 
 Quelquefois dans sa course un esprit vigoureux, 
 Trop resserre par I'art, sort des regies prescrites, 
 Et de I'art mttne apprend a franchir les limites.^ 
 
 Says Rapin: You cannot be perfect in Poesy without both genius 
 and art. With Quintilian we must say that genius is preferable to 
 art. But it is not enough to have genius : one must feel and know 
 of what it is capable. The greater the genius, the more wisdom 
 and prudence are needed to moderate its fire and regulate its 
 
 1 Contrast Pope's Essay on Criticism: 
 
 True ease in wiiting comes from Art, not Chance, 
 As those move easiest who have leam'd to dance. 
 
 * Cf. Pope, Essay on Criticism: 
 
 A generous muse may sometimes take her flight 
 
 When too much fettered with the rules of art, 
 
 May sometimes from her stricter bounds and limits part. 
 
 Jouin, Cenf^ences de VAcadtmie de peinture, p. 90: " II [Philippe de Champagne] 
 soutenait ensuite que I'excellence de la peinture d6pendait moins des regies de I'att 
 que d'un beau g6nie," etc. On Coypel see Jouin, p. 283. Sir J. Reynolds (first Dis- 
 course) : " Every opportunity, therefore, should be taken to discountenance that 
 false and vulgar opinion, that rules are the fetters of genius; they are fetters only to 
 men of no genius; so that armour, which upon the strong is an ornament and a de- 
 fence, upon the weak and misshapen becomes a load, and cripples the body which 
 it was made to protect." 
 
104 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 natural vivacity: " Car la raison doit 6tre encore plus forte que le 
 g6nie, pour savoir jusques ou I'emportement doit aller." The poet 
 who wishes to do things rightly should heed above all Aristotle, of 
 whom Horace is the great interpreter. 
 
 The laws and rules of reason resulted in setting up standards of 
 
 Taste. Le go4t was to some a rigid tribunal applying a law, and 
 
 ; so it was very likely to be interpreted in the seventeenth century. 
 
 '' Taste is good or bad, says La Bruyere.^ To the less dogmatic it 
 
 ) was a delicacy of perception, a refined appreciation. To such an 
 
 idea men like Saant-Evremond inclined.^ 
 
 Wit, esprit, bel esprit, tended to be emphasized by those who 
 thought more of intellectual processes than of genius and inspira- 
 tion. The amiable and sensible Bouhours, in his essay on le Bel 
 esprit, treats in a more general way as respects both prose and 
 verse, what Boileau considers more pajrticularly with regard to 
 poetry. Here, agajn, we come upon definitions which tally vdth 
 
 ^ " II y a dans I'art un point de perfection, comma de bont6 ou de matuiitfi dans 
 la nature; celui qui le sent et qui I'aime a le gotlt pariait: celui qui le sent et qui aime 
 en degk ou au deli a le goAt d6fectueux. II y a done un bon et un mauvais gotUt, et 
 Ton dispute des go<lts avec fondement." — La Bruy^re, Des ouwages de I'esprit. 
 See also Sir Joshua Reynolds's seventh Dis,course, passim: " We will take it for 
 granted, that reason is something invariable, and fixed in the nature of things; and 
 without endeavoring to go back to an account of first principles, which for ever will 
 elude our search, we will conclude, that whatever goes under the name of taste, which 
 we can fairly bring under the dominion of reason, must be considered as equally free 
 from change. If, therefore, in the course of this enquiry, we can show that there are 
 rules for the conduct of the artist which are fixed and invariable, it follows, of course, 
 that the art of the connoisseur, or, in other words, taste, has likewise invariable prin- 
 ciples. ... It has been the main scope and principal end of this discourse to dem- 
 onstrate the reality of a standard in taste, as well as in corporeal beauty; that a false 
 or depraved taste is a thing as well known, as easily discovered, as ans^thing that is 
 deformed, misshapen, or wrong, in our form or outward make; and that this knowl- 
 edge is derived from the uniformity of sentiments among mankind, from whence 
 proceeds the knowledge of what are the general habits of nature; the result of which 
 is our idea of perfect beauty." The eighteenth-century critic Batteux, in his les 
 Beaux Arts riduits A un mtme frincipe, unites all arts by the common principle of 
 goiU, the entire object of whose laws is limitation de la belle nature. 
 
 2 To Bussy-Rabutin goiit = discernement and delicatesse. Cf . Mme de Sfivignfe's 
 Lettres (ed. Grands Ecrivains, vol. v, p. 529). 
 
THE PRINCIPLES 105 
 
 Boileau's bon sens, as an expression of la raison. True bel esprit , 
 says Bouhours, must not be confounded with superficial vivacity. 
 It is inseparable from bon sens and may be defined as le bon sens 
 qui brille. It proceeds from a straightforward and luminous int_ 
 tellect, a clgarj,nd agreeable imagaiation, and is full of gaiety, life 
 and fire, "such as it appears in the essays of Montaigne." When 
 one possesses this sort of esprit things are well conceived and 
 well expressed. Its characteristics are not only, among other 
 things, solif^ty, penetration, delicacy, richness, accuracy and 
 uniyersafi^Tbut clearness and modesty. A mere scholar is not 
 a bel espnt, and poetasters axelmly joUs esprits. A true bel esprit y 
 has the characteristics of the ideal honnete komme, his intellect / 
 has the qualities which imply reason and bon sens and which j 
 fimd expression in French classicism.^ Thus Bouhours and his 
 compeers belong to what some critics have specifically called the 
 " School of Taste." 
 
 Bel esprit is understood above in a much higher sense than it 
 appears in the superficial drawing-room Wit or Bel esprit of the 
 salons, with his affected manners and his conceit, like Trissotin: 
 
 Vous voulez de I'esprit, de la d61icatesse, 
 
 De l'agr6ment, de la justesse; 
 
 Vous voulez des termes choisis, 
 Un style naturel, noble, simple, conds; 
 Des traits ing^nieux que chacun puisse entendre; 
 
 En un mot, im esprit exquis. 
 
 Dites-moi, Monsieur le Marquis, 
 
 Ou vous en avez k vendre. 
 Le bel esprit est im titre fort beau, 
 Quand on aime a courir de ru^e en ruelle; 
 Mais ce n'est point le fait d'une sage cervelle 
 De chercher a briUer sur un terme nouveau, 
 Le bon sens de I'esprit est le guide fidele; 
 Lui seid peut le conduire, et salt le menager. 
 
 Un bel esprit, si j'en sais bien juger, 
 Est un diseur de bagatelle.' 
 
 ^ Cf. Doncieux, Bouhours, p. 224 ff. 
 
 ' Saint-Evremond, Oeuvres, ed. 1753, vol. ix, p. 230 {M&ange curieux des meil- 
 leures pUces qui hd sont aitrihuSes). 
 
io6 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 From what precedes we see that to the seventeenth-century 
 theorists there was a relation somewhat like a sliding-scale be- 
 tween the rules and that gift of heaven called genius. To use the 
 words of Rymer's translation of Rapin, a poet must have " a 
 genius extraordinary, great natural gifts; a wit just, fruitful, 
 piercing, solid, universal; an understanding clear and distinct; an 
 imagination neat ahd pleasant; an elevation of soul that depends 
 not on art or study, and which is purely the gift of Heaven, and 
 must be sustained by a lively sense and vivacity; a great judg- 
 ment to consider wisely of things, and a vivacity to express them 
 with that grace and abundance which gives them beauty." Judg- 
 ment without Wit is cold and heavy; Wit without Judgment is 
 extravagant and blind. 
 
 I Genius itself could, therefore, have degrees and qualities ac- 
 cording to different critics. In the seventeenth century it prob- 
 ably did not very often mean, as with Saint-Evremond, a sort of 
 fren2y.* It was more apt to go hand in hand with learning and 
 taste, judgment and wit." Boileau is less concerned with imagi- 
 nation than are some of his fellow-critics, and in practice is a some- 
 what consistent rationalist.' It is fairly safe to say that Sir Wil- 
 liam Temple was not very remote from the average contemporary 
 
 ' " La po^sie demande un gfinie particulier qui ne s'accorde pas trop avec le bon 
 sens. Tantdt, c'est le langage des dieux, tantdt c'est le langage des fous, rarement 
 celui d'un honnSte homme." — A. M. le marechal de Criqui. 
 
 2 Dryden says: " A happy genius is the gift of nature. It depends on the in- 
 fluence of the stars, say the astrologers; or the organs of the body, say the naturalists ; 
 it is the particular gift of Heaven, say the divines, both Christians and heathens. 
 How to improve it, many books can teach us; how to obtain it, none; that nothing 
 can be done without it, all agree: 
 
 Tu nihil invita dices faciesve Minerva." 
 
 ParaUel of Poetry and Painting. 
 
 ^ To Dryden (Preface to Annus Mirahilis), wit in the poet is the faculty of imag- 
 ination in the writer, of which the first happiness " is properly invention, or finding 
 of the thought; the second is fancy, or the variation, deriving, or moulding, of that 
 thought, as the judgment represents it proper to the subject; the third is elocution, 
 or the art of clothing and adorning that thought, so found and varied, in apt, signifi- 
 cant and sounding words: the quickness of the imagination is seen in the invention, 
 the fertility in the fancy, and the accuracy in the expression." 
 
THE PRINCIPLES 107 
 
 French opinion when he says in his essay Of Poetry that Genius 
 begets Invention, but invention must be perfected by time and 
 appKcation, that it express itself with sound judgment and good 
 sense, wit and taste. 
 
 The poet, with his subjective genius and those traits shared in 
 common with the critic, views objectively Nature, and practises^ 
 Imitation of it by means of imagination and invention. If heV 
 jdelds too much to the freedom of unregulated " inventidn " he is ' 
 likely to become unreal and fantastical in his imaginings. Through 
 the imitation of nature, guided by the rules, he cannot fail to 
 achieve the highest results. But what is nature P The seven- 
 teenth century, at least in the second half when men like Th6o- 
 phile and Saint- Amant had passed away, was far from conceiving 
 nature as Rousseau and the eighteenth century revealed it, with 
 its majesty and beauty, itself acting as an inspiration for poetry 
 and song. It was the time of the landscape gardening of Le N6tre, ^ 
 when the formal garden planned to resemble a drawing-room was 
 the ideal, the days of lawns called tapis verts, of clipped shrubbery 
 disposed as furniture. Interest was centred on the moral study of ^ 
 man, what we call human nature, guided by definite laws and 
 principles. If one transcended the microcosm, the conception of^ 
 nature was of a coherent system of laws expressive of the social i 
 order ' and best exemplified in the Ufe of civilized countries and qf> 
 their capitals, where wit and taste hold sway^* Nature is not only 
 " all sorts of material Objects and every species of Substance 
 whatsoever, but also general Notions and abstracted Truths, such 
 as exist only in the Minds of men and in the property and relation 
 of things one to another." * 
 
 In their use of the word Nature, many of the critics were, there- 
 fore, groping to express the Universal of Aristotle and the ideas 
 found, for instance, at the beginning of Chapter IX of the Poetics: 
 
 ' Cf. Spingam, Critical Essays of the Seventeenth Century, Intxod. p. Ixvii. 
 
 ' " II faut la capitale d'un grand royaume pour y Stablir la demeure du godt." — 
 Voltaire, DicHonnaire phUosophique, Art. goM. The bourgeois and commercial classes 
 do not have goM, only the leisured classes. Louis XIV was bom with goiU. 
 
 ' Robert Wolseley, Preface to Rochester's Valentinian. 
 
io8 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 It is, moreover, evident from what has been said that it is not the function 
 of the poet to relate what has happened, but what may happen — what is 
 possible according to the law of probability or necessity. The poet and the 
 historian differ not by writing in verse or in prose. The work of Herodotus 
 might be put in verse, and it would stiU be a species of history, with metre no 
 less than without it. The true difference is that one relates what has hap- 
 pened, the other what may happen. Poetry, therefore, is a more philo- 
 sophical and a higher thing than history: for poetry tends to express the 
 universal, history the particular. The universal tells us how a person of given 
 character will on occasion speak or act, according to the law of probability or 
 necessity; and it is this universaUty at which Poetry aims in giving expressive 
 names to the characters. The particular is — for example — what Alcibiades 
 did or suffered.' 
 
 In other words, the world of the universal is one of a higher and 
 more permanent reality than the world of everyday experience 
 seen in the chronological sequence of history; one of rationality 
 and nature; one of general principles giving firmness, fixity, and 
 balance to the universe as we interpret it. 
 
 From what goes before it appears that esprit or " Wit " in its 
 highest sense, as opposed to that wit which is mere cleverness, is a 
 " true and lively expression of Nature," or as Pope puts it: 
 
 True Wit is Nature to advantage dressed, 
 
 What oft was thought, but ne'er so well expressed.' 
 
 I Hence the importance of the rules, which are " Nature still, but 
 ^ Nature methodized "; and " to copy Nature is to copy them." 
 
 ' Professor Butcher's translation. Cf . his discussion of the universal in the essays 
 accompanjong his translation. 
 ' Cf . Essay on Criticism: 
 
 First follow Nature, and your Judgment frame 
 
 fiy her just standard which is still the same; 
 
 Unerring Nature, still divinely bright. 
 
 One clear, unchanged and universal light. 
 
 Life, force, and beauty must to all impart. 
 
 At once the source, and end, and test of Art. 
 
 Art from that fund each just supply provides. 
 
 Works without show, and without pomp presides. 
 
 In some fair body thus th' informing soul 
 
 With spirits feeds, with vigour fills the whole; 
 
 Each motion guides, and every nerve sustains. 
 
 Itself unseen, but in th' effects remains. 
 
 Some to whom Heav'n in wit has been profuse. 
 
 Want as much more to turn it to its use; 
 
 For Wit and Judgment often are at strife, 
 
 Tbo' meant each other's aid, like man and wife. 
 
THE PRINCIPLES 109 
 
 Thus, too, we understand the significance of Boileau's advice to 
 the writers of comedies: " Que la nature done soit votre etude 
 unique." They must study the moral nature of man, his ages and 
 passions. Mohere said to the same effect: " Lorsque vous peignez 
 les hommes il faut peindre d'apr^s nature." * To the strict and 
 docile classicist it was safe to imitate the ancients. When Virgil, 
 according to Pope, began to prepare his Aeneid, " Nature and 
 Homer were, he found, the same." At any rate it was safe to re- 
 echo Boileau's " Jamais de la nature il ne faut s'ecarter," and 
 follow the principles of reason. Otherwise one would sacrifice all 
 vraisemblance and go astray either among the incoherent and un- 
 coordinated facts of crass realism, or get lost amid the fantasies of 
 preciosity or the equally reprehensible extravagances of the 
 burlesque. 
 
 Vraisemblance I This is one of the catchwords of modem 
 classicism. It implies " probability " in poetical treatment, all 
 that is in conformity with the opinion of the pubUc, and expresses 
 that inclination towards a higher realism of which the seventeenth 
 century was fond. In poetry, says Rapin, the merveilleux and the 
 vraisemblable are both in place and should be mixed without of- 
 fending reason. Vraisemblance is even more perfect than truth, 
 for truth makes things out only as they are, and vraisemblance 
 makes them as they ought to be. In the drama vraisemblance, or 
 Verisimihtude, becomes one of the chief cares of the poet and is 
 the underlying motive of the famous rule of the three unities. 
 
 But even vraisemblance is, in a sense, subject to restrictions on 
 which all rules depend. The true basis of vraisemblance, says 
 Rapin, is la bienseance or Decorum, understood not as mere good 
 manners, but as the nobler proprieties manifested in the proper 
 working of the great laws of human morals. Objection is made in 
 the Sentiments of the Academy that Corneille in the Cid violates 
 the bienseance des mceurs of Chimene, who though presented to 
 the spectator as virtuous, nevertheless decides to marry the slayer 
 of her father. Whatever the possible reaUty of such an incident, 
 1 Critique del'Ecoh des femmes. 
 
no FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 Corneille should have violated the truth and have purified it by- 
 bringing it under the higher principle of Propriety. 
 
 Even solicitude for verisimilitude and the proprieties does not 
 suffice. Particularly in those thoughts, says the Pere Bouhours, 
 which enter into les ouvrages d'esprit truth is not enough, though 
 it is essential. Truth is fideUty of thought and should show itself 
 in verse as well as in prose.^ But truth may become commonplace 
 and trivial. It is advisable to impress the mind with something 
 striking, just as the solidity of a plain building needs to be set off 
 by grandeur, agreeableness or delicacy. In intellectual things the 
 corresponding ornaments or quahties are le sublime, I'agreable and 
 le dilicat. In all three the Natural ^ must be sought and not the 
 Affected, which may exist in thought as well as in words, and is 
 likely to result in overdoing the sublime, the agreeable and the 
 delicate.' 
 
 Boileau, the translator of Longinus, is especially significant for 
 the vogue of the Sublime as a factor of criticism. According to 
 Longinus the sublime is a certain loftiness and excellence of 
 language which strikes home and sinks deep, which transports the 
 soul, and it depends both on natural endowments and on art.* 
 The sublime therefore signifies the sudden flash by which the poet 
 carries us from the confines of our wonted feeling to a higher 
 plane. Boileau and Bouhours both repeat, after Longinus, as an 
 example of the sublime the Biblical : " Let there be light : and there 
 
 ' " A la fiction prSs, le vrai doit se rencontrer dans les vers comme dans la prose." 
 — Bouhours, Manihre de Men penser dans les ouvrages d'esprit (First Dialogue). 
 
 * " Qu'entendez-vous done, dit Philanthe, par ce que vous appejez naturel en 
 matiSre de pens6e ? — J'entends, repartit Eudoxe, quelque chose qui n'est point re- 
 cherch6 ni tir6 de loin; que la nature du sujet prfisente, et qui natt pour ainsi dire, du 
 sujet mdme." — Bouhours, Maniere de lien penser (Second Dialogue). 
 
 ' Cf. Boileau, Art poitique. Chant I", 11. 101-102: 
 
 Prenez mieuz votre ton. Soyez simple avec art, 
 Sublime sans orgueil, agr^able sans fard. 
 
 * " Pour le sublime, il n'y a, mfime entre les grands gfinies, que les plus 61evfis qui ■ 
 en soient capables." — La Bruyfire, Des ouvrages de I'esprit. La Bruy6re finds sub- 
 limity in Corneille: " Ce qu'il y a en lui de plus Eminent c'est I'esprit qu'il avait 
 sublime." 
 
THE PRINCIPLES ill 
 
 was light." Among modem examples both mention the " Qu'il 
 mouriit " of Corneille's Horace. Rapin, indeed, extends the sub- 
 lime to all things, even to human beings, and finds the sublime of 
 magistraqr in the Pr6sident de Lamoignon, of war in Turenne, of 
 private life in Conde and of pubUc life in the King! 
 
 To Boiihours the sublime, the agreeable and the delicate are not 
 necessarily mutually excluave^ Voiture is Bouhours's ideal of the 
 agreeable, but Voiture rubs shoulders with Virgil and Homer, and 
 Bouhours quotes "Boileau's Art poetique in corroboration of the 
 agrements of Homer: 
 
 On dirait que pour plaire, instruit par la nature, 
 Homere ait k Venus d6robe sa ceinture: 
 Son livre est d'agrements un fertile tresor. 
 Tout ce qu'il a touche se convertit en or, 
 Tout refoit dans ses mains une nouvelle grice, 
 Partout il divertit, et jamais il ne lasse. 
 
 Delicatesse, says Bouhours, is more easy to define in perfume, 
 viands or music than figuratively. Intellectually it adds to the 
 sublime and the agreeable an indeterminate something, a je ne 
 sais quoi, which the Eudoxe of Bouhours's dialogue himseK found 
 difficult to explain. 
 
 The phrase ^'e ne sais quoi was a convenient and constantly re- 
 curring expression. At one of the early meetings of the Academy 
 a paper was read on this subject, and Bouhours included in his 
 Entretiens d'Ariste et d' Eugene an essay on le Je ne sais quoi. It 
 was a mysterious and indefinable something adding a supreme 
 grace and a final touch to a beautiful work. The term was used in 
 almost every sort of contingency to delude people into a bfelief 
 that an unknown x was a known a. Even Grace is to Bouhours a 
 je ne sais quoi and all nature is fuU of " ces je ne sais quoi qu'on ne 
 peut expliquer." A discussion of the phrase was a constant op- 
 portunity for critical elusiveness. 
 
 People nowadays, who are taught to admire the extraordinary 
 and the mjrsterious and who find poetic inspiration in the awe of 
 the immeasurably great, must realize the great contrast offered by 
 
112 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 the feeling of some seventeenth-century critics towards the 
 " Vast." Saint-Evremond, for instance, in his dissertation Sur 
 le mot de Vaste, criticizes the Vast as a defect, and says that it 
 should never properly be employed in praise. The Great is per- 
 fection, but the Vast, being limitless, implies lack of measure. 
 Things that are vast are more akin to the horrible than to the 
 agreeable. A vast solitude is a wilderness, a vast house shocks the 
 eye, vast apartments are unsuited for habitation, vast gardens 
 lack the charm of art, vast forests terrify, vast landscapes be- 
 wilder. Similarly a vast imagination loses itself in idle dreams 
 and hallucinations. We see here very distinctly the frame of mind • 
 which conceives beauty only in the distinct and the orderly. 
 La Bruy^re, less censoriously says in his chapter Des ouwages de 
 I'esprit that " Les esprits vifs, plains de feu, et qu'une vaste 
 imagination emporte hors des regies et de la justesse, ne peuvent 
 s'assouvir de I'hyperbole." 
 
 The seventeenth-century writers had much to say about the 
 end and aims of poetry. Three possibilities present themselves: 
 the object of poetry may be pleasure, or profit, or it may be a 
 combination of the two. Most critics remember the Horatian 
 precept, omne tulit punctum qui miscuii utile dulci. Moliere in 
 the Critique de I'Ecole des femmes, Racine in the preface of Bere- 
 nice, Boileau in the Art poetique, all declare that the object of 
 poetry is to please, or to please and touch.^ But delight does not 
 prevent instruction. Poetry, says Rapin in his treatise on poetry, 
 quoting Horace, has for its purpose pleasure but especially profit, 
 and all poetry which is against morals is dissolute and vicious. 
 The rules, authors felt, were very helpful to this end in preserving 
 the general spirit of order and decorum. Hence, when the cautious 
 and irresolute Corneille undertook to discuss the purpose of 
 1, tragedy in his various prefaces, discours and examens, he said that 
 its purpose is to please, but it must please in harmony with the 
 A rules, and at the same time tragedy may have an improving value 
 "^i by means of the sentences or moral statements with which it is 
 * MoMre and Racine are dealing especially with the Drama. 
 
THE PRINCIPLES 1 13 
 
 sprinkled, as well as the lessons taught by the picture of vice and 
 virtue, and by witnessing the happy outcome of virtue and the 
 baneful results of crime.^ 1 ^ 
 
 I No sooner had classicism fought its way to the front than it 
 met new enemies. It is a mistake to think that the doctrine held 
 undivided sway and that all its teachings were meekly accepted. 
 The most important controversy was, however, not so much an 
 opposition to the new literary forms as a rebellion against the con- 
 secrated models of the past and a declaration of independence 
 of them. The contest was known as the Quarrel of the An- 
 cients and Modems, and it was but one phase of an almost peren- 
 nial dispute. In our day it is the battle in education between the 
 partisans of Latin and Greek, on the one hand, and the advocates 
 of modem languages as a substitute, on the other. In the seven- » 
 teenth century it was a wrangle between two forms of literary 
 nationalism. One party felt that the present greatness of French 
 literature was due, in a large measure, to the inspiration and 
 imitation of the master writers of Greece and Rome. The other 
 was convinced that the present age of Louis XIV had paid its 
 debt to the age of Augustus and now surpassed it, that the mod- 
 erns were superior to the ancients. The chief spokesman for the 
 Ancients was Boileau, for the Modems Charles Perrault, and 
 their immediate dispute was a tempest in a teapot.^ Boileau and 
 his fellow Ancients found themselves, as leading writers of the 
 reign of Louis, in the position of proclaiming the supreme excel- 
 lence of their predecessors. The Modems were in the even more 
 
 ' In English dramatic criticism we frequently come across the expression "poetic 
 justice." The idea of strict reward or retribution for right or wrong was implicit 
 in some French dramatists, but it was not held as a specific element of tragedy as it 
 was by Rjrmer who gave vogue to the idea in England, followed by Dryden and 
 Dennis. A well-known passage by Addison (Spectator, No. xl) shows that the theory 
 had its critics even in England: " The English writers of tragedy are possessed with 
 a notion, that when they represent a virtuous or innocent person in distress, they 
 ought not to leave him till they have delivered him out of his troubles, or made him 
 triumph over his enemies. This error they have been led into by a ridiculous doc- 
 trine in modem criticism, that they are obliged to an equal distribution of rewards 
 and punishments, and an impartial execution of poetical justice." 
 
114 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 paradoxical necessity of consecrating the very writers who were 
 their chief opponents. During the controversy the sense of bal- 
 ance was inevitably lost, as when Fontenelle in his Digression sur 
 les Anciens et les Modernes included the Ariane of Thomas Cor- 
 neille among works superior to the best plays of Sophocles, Euri- 
 pides or Aristophanes. 
 
 Charles Perrault wrote a poem, called le Siecle de Louis le 
 Grand, which began with the often quoted lines: 
 
 La belle antiqmte fut toujours venerable, 
 
 Mais je ne cms jamais qu'eUe fut adorable. 
 
 Je vols les anciens sans plier les genoux: 
 
 lis sont grands, il est vrai, mais honunes comme nous; 
 
 Et Ton peut comparer, sans crainte d'etre injuste, 
 
 Le siecle de Louis au beau siecle d'Auguste. 
 
 He afterwards elaborated his views much more fully in the Paral- 
 leles des anciens et des modernes to the great disgust of Boileau, in 
 time still more irritated by the references to himself in Perrault's 
 Apologia desfemmes. The result was Boileau's Reflexions critiques 
 sur Longin, which were really more remarks on Perrault. Before 
 many years were over the two chief opponents were reconciled, 
 and Boileau's letter to Perrault of 1700 made all sorts of polite 
 concessions and courteously agreed that, all in all, the age of 
 Louis XIV was superior to that of Augustus. 
 
 The real significance of the Quarrel of the Ancients and Mod- 
 erns has, as its chief historian H. Rigault ^ points out, in the op- 
 position between radically different critical postulates. The 
 Ancients conceived hterary ideals as already achieved long ago. 
 The Moderns were literary exponents of Cartesian rationalism 
 and conceived that reason can always progress to a " better " 
 state. The theory, true enough of science and of classified knowl- 
 edge, was very hazardous when applied to the art of a hterary 
 genius. Among other things Perrault cited the invention of print- 
 ing to prove the superiority of the present to the past. The 
 
 ' With all respect to H. Gillot's conscientious la Querelle des anciens et des mo- 
 dernes en France. 
 
THE PRINCIPLES IIS 
 
 Ancients could with justice retort that printing had had nothing 
 to do with the genius of Homer or of Racine. Moreover, the 
 superciliousness of the Moderns was partly ignorance. Polite 
 society had small Latin and less Greek and knew antiquity, not at 
 first hand, but through imperfect translations. The Cartesian idea 
 of progress was destined to become in the eighteenth century a 
 governing principle of that scientific age, and helps to explain the 
 theories of social and economic reconstruction which came to such 
 a violent climax in the French Revolution. The Quarrel of the "^ 
 Ancients and Modems is the beginning of the end of the suprem- ^ 
 acy of seventeenth-century classicism,? 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 
 THE DRAMA 
 
 How great was the break between the tragedy of the Pleiade and 
 that of the seventeenth century is a disputed question. The 
 answer depends partly on the uncertain point whether the six- 
 teenth-century plays belonged to the general repertoire, or could 
 be acted on a stage of the time. The chief theatre of Paris was the 
 H6tel de Bourgogne, where the traditions of the mediaeval plays 
 persisted in the simultaneous stage-setting, or decor simultane, by 
 which several places were portrayed at once, instead of succes- 
 sively, by different fragmentary portions of the backgroimd. This 
 tradition prevailed until well into the seventeenth century, and it 
 is the best explanation of the performaiice of the plays during the 
 first half of that century which do not pretend to conform to the 
 unity of place.' 
 
 On the other hand, the humanistic tragedies of the sixteenth 
 century, from JodeUe to Garnier and his contemporaries, were 
 performed, when at all, chiefly in colleges and chateaux.'^ Yet it is 
 probable that authors wrote their plays with the idea of per- 
 formance. Such a conclusion, at any rate, makes the tragedies of 
 Montchrestien, for instance, no longer isolated examples, but 
 part of a recognized tradition, thus paving the way for the So- 
 phonisbe of Mairet and the regular classical tragedies. 
 
 Be that as it may, the early seventeenth century shows, on the 
 acting stage, the greatest variety of dramatic forms or, at any 
 
 * These theories have been largely developed in the writings of E. Rigal. 
 
 * On the question of public performances of sixteenth-century plays, pro or con, 
 see J. Haraszti, edition of Schelandre's Tyr et Sidon, p. xxxiii and references; C. 
 Searles, The StageMlity of Gamier' s Tragedies, in Modern Language Notes, vol. xxii; 
 Rigal, De JodeUe d MoUire, Lanson, les Origines de la tragidie classique en France, in 
 Reme d'Histoire litUraire de la France, 1903. 
 
 116 
 
THE DRAMA I17 
 
 rate, of names. We are reminded of Polonius's description of the 
 players. There were tragedies, moral or allegorical, tragi-come- 
 dies, pastoral tragi-comedies, tragi-pastorals, bergeries, histoires 
 tragiques, and many others. 
 
 Alexandre Hardy was the most prominent purveyor of such 
 miscellaneous works. Regular hired poet connected with a com- 
 pany of actors who came to Paris from the provinces, Hardy was 
 a skilful manufacturer of acting plays, rather than a man of letters. 
 His merit is to have given life to the dramatic forms, and it is in 
 this sense that he has been called by some the " creator of the 
 modern French drama." 
 
 Four forms soon stood out pre-eminently: tragedy, comedy, y 
 tragi-comedy and pastoral. For a while, indeed, pastoral and 
 tragi-comedy were the most popular genres. From 1620 to 1630, 
 for instance, the pastoral stands for the party of rules and of rea- 
 son, of dramatic conventions, the party which looked back to 
 Renaissance tragedy and comedy, and which itself was to lead to 
 the regular tragedy of the seventeenth century.^ Tragi-comedy, 
 on the other hand, was more independent. The aptual designa- 
 tion of a pastoral play varied: "pastorale, comedie pastorale, 
 tragedie pastorale, pastorale tragique et morale, tragi-comedie 
 pastorale." ' 
 
 The Pleiade had made a spasmodic and futile effort to copy the 
 comedy of antiquity and of Italy. It amoimted to little and ended 
 with the school. If we except the comedies of Larivey, themselves 
 adapted from the Italian, which comedies we cannot with cer- 
 tainty affirm to have been acted, there is an interruption in 
 comedy at the beginning of the seventeenth century. The ever- 
 popular farce supplies the desire for boisterous amusement, and 
 the pastoral is the substitute for genuine comedy.' 
 
 > Cf. Marsan, la Pastorale dramatique en France, Preface, p. xi, and p. 389. Fran- 
 cois Ogier, in his preface to Tyr et Sidon {Ancien ThMre frangais, vol. viii, p. 10), 
 calls the partisans of rules and of ancient poetry les doctes as opposed to les modernes. 
 The antithesis is frequent in the seventeenth century. 
 
 ' Marsan, op. cit. p. 337. 
 
 ' Marsan, op. cit. pp. 346 and 348. 
 
Ii8 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 Meanwhile tragi-comedy ^ was reaching a vogue the decline 
 from which was more slow than that of the pastoral. The tragi- 
 comedy was the freest of the dramatic forms. It depended for its 
 interest on incident and on plot, rather than on psychological 
 analysis as tragedy was destined to do. Consequently, it paid less 
 attention to the unities, the plots were apt to be romanesques, the 
 denoHment was a happy one, the characters were less definitely 
 and consistentiy confined to the world of kings and heroes, lighter 
 touches often appeared in the rSles or in the language. French 
 tragi-comedy arose in the sixteenth century, the most famous 
 being Gamier's Bradamante (1582). It helped to carry over to 
 Hardy the tradition of the serious drama such as the mystery, 
 secularized but with its freedom of subject and treatment. Hatdy 
 gave the tragi-comedy vogue by his numerous plays, and in the 
 period down to about 1628 it had constantly increasing popu- 
 larity. All the imaginative and fantastic subjects were here wel- 
 come: " dreams, ghosts, disguises, recognitions, duels, shipwrecks, 
 captures by pirates, human sacrifices." ^ The extraordinary was 
 an important element of tragi-comedy. Hence the English heroic 
 play of love and valor is largely indebted to it. During the great- 
 est vogue of the tragi-comedy, from about 1628 to 1650, noted 
 writers contributed: Rotrou, Mairet, Du Ryer, Georges de Scu- 
 diry, even Corneille himself. Le Cid, for instance, was written as 
 a tragi-comedy. However, with the increasing prestige of tragedy, 
 tragi-comedy lost its repute and the term was used to cover an 
 omnium gatherum of plays that were not vulgar. By MoliSre's 
 dpath tragi-comedy had almost ceased to exist. 
 I French classical tragedy, which makes so much of the rules of 
 the ancients and seems, at first sight, learned in its origins, was, we 
 : know, in no small degree influenced by the drawing-rooms and by 
 the patronage of the theatre-lover and would-be dramatist, Riche- 
 Keu. French monarchs since Valois times had favored letters, and 
 during the Renaissance, the royal house, with its Italian afl&lia- 
 
 ' On this dramatic form, cf. H. C. Lancaster, The French Tragi-Comedy. 
 ' Lancaster, op. cU., p. 137. 
 
THE DRAMA 119 
 
 tions, had imitated the patronage of ItaKan princes. In the early 
 seventeenth century, before the days of Louis XIV, men and 
 women of fashion took the lead, and became interested even in the 
 technique of the drama. The comte de Carmail and the cardinal 
 de la Valette led Mairet to the rules and to the theories of Scaliger 
 and Heinsius, as we learn from the preface of Sihanire. Just as 
 Vaugelas was ready to take the ladies as arbiters of laiiguage, so 
 deference was paid to their views in the discussions in cdc&ve and 
 ruelle} Said the abb6 de Pure in his Idee des spectacles, " Pour les\- / 1 
 regies de I'art ce sont les dames qui dj&dden±.-dii.jn^rite de ces 
 choses." '' " Vraiment c'est un sujet pour une com6die," says 
 Sestiane in Desmarets de Saint-Sorlin's Visionnaires, and her 
 gossip about the rules is no exaggeration of life. Women un- 
 doubtedly helped also in the general improvement of taste which 
 began to condemn the indecency of the farces and encouraged 
 literary comedy. 
 
 Richelieu's desire was to lead the regulars. He had not only a 
 general literary secretary, Boisrobert, but his own authors, the 
 board of five, to compose plays under his direction, and his critics 
 to formulate and teach the rules. These critics included Chape- 
 lain, Scudery, La Mesnardiere and the abb6 d'Aubignac' This 
 last even proposed to enroll actors and actresses, so as to control 
 their lives and improve their morals. Thus the drama would be j 
 supervised, not only m the persons of authors, but of performers.' 
 
 It is a mistake to think that the Middle Ages had no concept of 
 tragedy and comedy, even though the forms were not cultivated. 
 Still, the ideas of the French seventeenth century were drawn, not 
 from the Middle Ages but, as we have seen in a previous chapter, 
 from modem, many of them ItaUan, commentators of Aristotle. 
 
 ^ There was plenty of hostility to the theatre in the seventeenth century, as the 
 experiences of MoliSre and the Maximes et Reflexions sur la Comidie of Bossuet 
 testify. 
 
 2 Quoted in Amaud's Etude sur la vie el les auvres de I'abbe d'Aubignac, p. 177. 
 
 > D'Aubignac and La Mesnardiere, both important dramatic critics, both authors 
 of wretched tragedies. 
 
 * Amaud, op. cit., p. 197. Cf. supra, p. 63. 
 
I20 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 Certain interpreters were important above others, and the ideas 
 of the French were largely influenced by the Poetics of Scaliger, as 
 concentrated in the Uttle treatise on tragedy of Heinsius, and 
 given new vogue by Chapelain and Mairet. The physician and 
 would-be poet Jules de la Mesnardiere tried to win favor with his 
 patron Richelieu by his unfinished Poetique, which is to a great 
 degree a discussion of Aristotle and Castelvetro, influenced by 
 Scaliger and Heinsius, together with destructive criticism of 
 Castelvetro as insufficiently Aristotelian, and numerous examples 
 based on ancient plays or on La Mesnardifere's own dramatic at- 
 tempts. It was probably Richelieu's hope that La Mesnardifire 
 would write for the French a definitive handbook of criticism and 
 be the new Aristotle or Scaliger. (jeorges de Scudery's attacks 
 had undoubtedly an influence on Comeille's important tragedies. 
 The Latin treatise on poetry of the Dutch scholar Vossius (1647), 
 De artis poeticae natura, ac consiitutione, and the Pratiqtie du theatre 
 of the abbe d'Aubignac (1657), register the standard views of the 
 seventeenth century. 
 3r JThe theories of tragedy of course go back to Aristotle, " notre 
 unique docteur Aristote," as ComeiUe calls him in the preface of 
 Heradius, so great that, as La Mesnardiere says, " Reason itself 
 seems to borrow the voice of Aristotle." According to Aristotle 
 tragedy " is an imitation of an action that is serious, complete, 
 and of a certaia magnitude; in language embellished with each 
 kind of artistic ornament, the several kinds being found in sepa- 
 rate parts of the play; in the form of action, not of narrative; 
 through pity and fear effecting the proper purgation of those 
 emotions." ^ ) 
 
 Among modern critics Julius Caesar Scaliger was placed by 
 some on a level with Aristotle, and Vossius, in his preface, involves 
 the two together. Scaliger defines tragedy as an imitation by 
 action of some illustrious fortune, having an unhappy outcome, in 
 noble language expressed ia verse.^ Scaliger also says, a littie 
 
 1 Poetics, vi.2, Butcher's translation. 
 
 2 " Imitatio per actionem illustris fortunae, exitu infelici, oratione gravi, me- 
 
THE DRAMA 121 
 
 earKer in the same chapter, partly under the influence of me- 
 diaeval concepts of tragedy, that it treats of kings and princes 
 and the dealings of cities, fortresses and camps.^ 
 
 *The theory of French tragedy in the seventeenth century 
 revolves to a considerable degree about the idea of vraisemblance, 
 verisimilitude or probabihty, often coupled in discussion with le 
 necessaire. The famous rules of the unities were merely a way to 
 secure enhanced verisimiKtude or probability of action." The 
 dramatic poet was to present his story, not with photographic 
 realism, but in such a way as to remain within the bounds of 
 likelihood and consistency. / 
 
 The origins of vraisemblance are to be found in Aristotle's 
 Poetics, Chapters IX, XV, XXIV, and XXV. There it is stated 
 that the function of the poet is to relate, not what has happened 
 but " what may happen — what is possible according to the law 
 of probability or necessity."' Aristotle's interpretation was a 
 transcendent, suprasensible view of life, as tragedy portrayed the 
 great stories of mythology. /The French turned this into realism, 
 though their idea of aristocratic decorum made them avoid sordid 
 realism. 
 
 As to Character, several things were to be considered, amongj, , 
 which were propriety, truthfulness to life, and consistency. In^ 
 plot, as well as in character, " the poet should always aim at the 
 necessary or the probable." The plot must not consist of inci- 
 dents rejected by reason; incident and plot must be developed in 
 
 trica." — Scaliger, Poetics, Bk. I, ch. vi. Heinsius's definition of tragedy (jDe tra- 
 goediae amstitutione, ch. ii) is: " Tragoedia est seriae absolutaeque actionis, et quae 
 justae magnitudinis sit, imitatio; sermone, hannonia, et lythmo, suaviter condita." 
 Mairet, in the preface of Silvanire: " Tragfidie n'est autre chose que la representa- 
 tion d'une aventure hgroique dans la misSre." Vossius's treatise on poetry (Bk. II, 
 ch. xi) : " Tragoedia est poema dramaticum, Ulustrem fortunam, sed infelicem, gravi 
 et severa oratione imitans." 
 
 1 " In Tragoedia reges, principes, ex urbibus, arcibus, castris. Principia seda- 
 tiora: exitus horribiles." — Bk. I, ch. vi. 
 
 * R. M. Alden's The Doctrine of Verisimilitude in the Matzhe Memorial Volume 
 (Leland Stanford University, 1912) is an incomplete study of the question. 
 
 ' Ch. ix. Cf . supra, p. 108. 
 
122 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 a plausible way, and even a " probable impossibility " is to be 
 preferred to a thing improbable yet possible. Thus the reality of 
 J tragedy is in a sense different from the reality of everyday life and 
 moves on a higher plane. The rule of the " necessary " and the 
 " probable " refers not so much to the sequence of events as " to 
 the internal structure of a poem; it is the inner law which secures 
 the cohesion of the parts." ^ j 
 
 Thus the general tendency of French critics in the seventeenth 
 century was to make vraisemblance much narrower than the 
 Verisimilitude of Aristotle, and to use the unities as a means to 
 enforce this narrower vraisemblance. For instance, Chapelain, at 
 times, made vraisemblance an effort towards realistic identification 
 rather than artistic harmony. " Je pose done pour fondement 
 que I'imitation en tous poemes doit fetre si parfaite qu'il ne pa- 
 raisse aucune difference entre la chose imitee et celle qui imite." * 
 This led to an attempted identification between the performance 
 and the thing represented, and the unity of time tried to give 
 approximate plausibility to the period supposed to elapse in the 
 five acts. The unity of place was used to get round the invraisem- 
 hlance which would result if a spectator saw.different places pass 
 before his eyes. As a matter of fact, even Chapelain outgrew his 
 early rigidity, and later realized that vraisemblance could not mean 
 such absolute identity. But the greatest of the critics, entangled 
 in the unities, interpreted the matter more narrowly than did 
 Aristotle. The warfare between the regulars and the independents 
 was waged largely about the questioij of the unities. The regulars 
 liked to narrow things down and to assert dogmatically what is in 
 truth only the registration of a tendency. In the sixteenth cen- 
 tury there had been a formulation of rigid rules in time forgotten. 
 In the seventeenth century the same phenomenon was repeated. 
 As to vraisemblance, the critics, ever seeing Aristotle through a 
 glass darkly, began to distinguish two kinds: the vraisemblable 
 
 1 Butcher, Poetics, ch. iii, p. 155. 
 
 2 Cf. Dissertation inidite, No. iv, in appendix of Amaud's study of the abb6 d'Au- 
 bignac. 
 
THE DRAMA 123 
 
 commun or ordinaire and the vraisemblable extraordinaire. The 
 former included things which ordinarily occur to men, " as when 
 a merchant seeks profit, a child does imprudent things, a spend- 
 thrift falls into poverty." The latter includes things which are 
 exceptional, as for a crafty scoundrel to be tricked, or a strong 
 man vanqiushed. Sometimes the vraisemblable was preferable to 
 the wai, when even the vrai was contrary to reason, the good of 
 society, propriety or the rules of art.* 
 
 The abbe d'Aubignac supplies us with the rules of vraisemblance 
 classified, cut-and-dried. The Pratique du theatre was begun in 
 1640 during Richelieu's lifetime, but was not published until 
 1657. Verisimihtude is to him the essence of a dramatic poem, 
 and he distinguishes between the vraisemblable, the vrai and the 
 possible. The vrai and the possible are not necessarily the object 
 of the theatre, but only in so far as they have vraisemblance, so 
 that all circumstances must be eliminated which have it not, and 
 everything which is to be represented must be brought under its 
 power. Now vraisemblance to the abb6 d'Aubignac amounts to 
 conformity with the feelings of the spectators. These must not be 
 jarred, even at the cost of historical accuracy. Moreover, as the- 
 audience was a seventeenth-century French one, it happened that 
 the real, that is to say real history, often had to be softened and 
 made unreal in order to harmonize with the needs of the au- 
 dience. Hence historical inj&delity was justified in the interest of 
 the verisimilitude of an age of decorum. Boileau says in the third 
 canto of the Art po&tique: 
 
 Jamais au spectateur n'offrez rien d'incroyable. 
 Le vrai peut quelquefois n'etre pas vraisemblable.^ 
 
 ^ Sentiments de I'Acadimie sur le Cid. 
 
 ' Cf. La Mesnardi4re's Poetique, p. 34: "Encore que la vfirit6 soit adorable par- 
 tout, la Vraisemblance I'emporte ici dessus elle; et le Faux qui est vraisemblable, doit 
 6tre plus estim6 que le Veritable Strange, prodigieux et incroyable: pourvu, comme 
 nous avons dit, que I'Aventure qu'on expose ne soit point de I'Histoire sainte, qui 
 doit paraltre en son entier, ou ne paraltre point du tout: 
 Ficta voluptatis causa sint proxima veris, 
 Nee quodcumque volet poscat sibi Fabula credi; 
 Neu pransa£ Lamiae vivum puerum eztcahat alvo.'' 
 
124 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 The connection of the unities with the above theories is ob- 
 vious. The unity of action may be taken for granted as necessary 
 in any well organized play.^ The unities of time and place grow 
 out of the misapprehension of Aristotle.| 
 
 Concerning the unity of time Aristotle merely says that a good 
 tragedy endeavors {ireipSiTai) to confine itself to a single revolu- 
 tion of the sun, or not to exceed that limit very much. The modern 
 critics turned this statement of a tendency into a rigid law, and 
 said that the action of a tragedy must be confined to a single day. 
 Aristotle says nothing about the unity of place. The abb6 d'Au- 
 bignac blandly tells us that Aristotle did not mention the rule 
 because it was too obvious.^ • 
 
 Credit was long traditionally given to Chapelain for the rein- 
 troduction of the unities in France. The anecdote has often been 
 repeated which PeUisson told in his history of the French Aca- 
 demy, how Chapelain enunciated the rules to his surprised com- 
 panions on issuing from one of the meetings.' Undoubtedly 
 Chapelain had very much to do with the new vogue of the 
 unities, and he probably got many of his ideas concerning them 
 from Castelvetro.* In turn he won. over Richeheu to the cult 
 of the unities. 
 
 But if Chapelain is important in the early history of the unities, 
 Mairet was contemporary with him in practice. His Silvanire, a 
 " pastoral tragi-comedy " of 1630 was limited to twenty-four 
 hours. When published the following year it was accompanied by 
 its famous preface. Then Corneille heard of the new ideas and 
 
 ' " Je tiens done, et je I'ai d6ja dit, que l'unit6 d'action consiste, dans la comfidie, 
 en I'unitfi d'intrigue, ou d'obstacle aux desseins des principaux acteurs, et en I'unitS 
 de pfiril dans la trag6die, soit que son heros y succombe, soit qu'il en sorte." — Cor- 
 neille, 3* Discours. 
 
 ^ Pratique du thSdtre, Bk. II, ch. vi. 
 
 ' CoUas, in his study of Chapelain (pp. 97-98), denies the truth of this story. 
 
 * Castelvetro " is responsible for the ushering of the unities into dramatic criti- 
 cism and for the theory of the difficulty overcome." — Charlton, Castelvetro' s Theory 
 of Poetry, p. 211. On Castelvetro as the chief source of Chapelain, of. Bovet, la Pre- 
 face de Chapelain d V Adonis, in the Festschrift to Heinrich Morf, Aus romanischen 
 Sprachen und Literaturen (1905), p. 27. 
 
THE DRAMA 125 
 
 wrote Clitandre, and there were several other prefaces to plays by 
 Isnard, Gombaud and Rayssiguier. In 1634 we come to the first 
 regular tragedy, Mairet's Sophonisbe. 
 
 Because we hear so much of the simplification effected by the 
 unities of time and of place, we must not think that either unity 
 stood for something identical in all writers. The Aristotelian 
 term " a revolution of the sun," interpreted as a " day," was so 
 vague that it wa^ susceptible of meanings ranging from twenty- 
 four hours to the artificial day of twelve. Other critics wanted 
 eight or six, down to the absolute identification with three hours' 
 time. Similarly the limit of place was made to range from a single 
 room to a single palace or a single city. 
 
 \A restriction from which French tragedy suffered quite as 
 much as from the unities was a narrowing in meaning of part of 
 Aristotle's description of tragedy as an imitation of characters of 
 a " higher type." ^ The characters of tragedy as of epic, according 
 to Aristotle, are to have heroic grandeur.^ In the French aristo- 
 cratic age the Greek notion of moral grandeur was interpreted as 
 meaning social grandeur. The personages were kings and heroes/ 
 of high degree. They alone were considered worthy of being 
 subjects of tragedy, as if the lowly were not good enough to ex- 
 perience emotions and undergo tribulations, but could only be 
 subjects of comedy. In France, says the abbe d'Aubignac,' 
 people bom or brought up among the great deal with lofty senti- 
 ments and tend to noble purposes. Hence their life is in harmony 
 with what tragedy depicts. On the other hand, the populace, 
 virtually wallowing in filth, do not rise above the buffoonery of 
 farces. 
 
 Obviously ComeiUe and Racine are the best expression of' 
 French classicism. But in CorneiUe one certainly notes marked 
 changes as his literary career progresses, and he is distinctly in- 
 
 ' liliojaa airouSalav, v. 4. 
 
 ' " Greatness cannot taie the place of goodness. Satan, though he were never 
 ' less than archangel ruined,' is not, under Aristotelian rules, a fitting character for 
 an epic poem." — Butcher, Aristotle's Theory of Poetry and Fine Art, p. 217, 
 
 ' Pratique du thiitre, Bk. II, ch. i, adfinem. 
 
126 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 fluenced by his critics. Corneille, of course, must not be looked 
 upon as a full classicist, but at times as regular against his will. 
 ♦ Corneille embodies the spirit of the first half of the seventeenth 
 century. The vigor and dash of the warlike age of Richelieu com- 
 bine with the turgid and romanesque influences and the compli- 
 cated plots of the Spanish drama. With these elements appears a 
 veneer of the language fashionable in the drawing-rooms, where 
 the fastidiousness of growing preciosity and the reading of fiction 
 were developing galanterie. Corneille's early comedies are in this 
 polite mannerism. He is at first heedless of rules because,(as he 
 says in the examen of Melit^, he did not know of their existence 
 and had as guides only " a little common sense and the examples 
 of the late Hardy." His first tragedy, Medie, is Senecan and 
 bombastic; and Spanish turgidness shows itself to some extent in 
 his earliest great success, the tragedy, or rather tragi-comedy, le 
 Cid. 
 
 In this play one sees more distinctly than before Corneille's use 
 of material and his adaptation of it to suit the French tempera- 
 ment and growing classicism. Corneille takes a passionate Span- 
 ish love-story permeated with a fierce honor or pride. This story 
 he proceeds to rationalize and to harmonize with the rules. But 
 Corneille's efforts to compress within fashionable limits a long 
 drawn out plot could not avoid loose joints. These were greedily 
 seized by jetilous rivalg,-- anxious moreover to curry favor with 
 Richelieu, already unfavorably disposed towards Corneille. 
 Mairet was at that time in general opinion a greater writer, and 
 RicheKeu preferred Scud6ry to Corneille whom he accused of lack- 
 ing esprii de suite. So these authors stirred up criticism of le Cid, 
 and Scudery brought definite charges against it. These were in 
 time laid before the newly established Academy, of which a com- 
 mittee under the guidance of Chapelain proceeded to pass judg- 
 ment. The verdict was in many ways a compromise. The play 
 was justified as to its main structural features in the existence of a 
 sufficient plot; it was criticized as lacking verisimilitude in many 
 ways (true but not truthful), and the conclu^on was thai " though 
 
THE DRAMA 127 
 
 the subject of le Cid is not good/though it sins by its solution,!^ 
 though it is burdened with useless episodes, though proprieties 
 are often transgressed as well as a good dramatic arrangement, 
 and though it contains many bad verses and inelegant forms of 
 expression; nevertheless, the truth and force of its passions, the 
 strength and deUcacy of many of its thoughts, and that undefin- 
 able charm which pervades even itis defectis, have won for it an 
 important place among French poems of its kind which have 
 given most satisfaction." 
 
 Lenient as this verdict wag by many thought to be, the sensi- 
 tive Comeille was hurt. His next few plays, Horace, Cinna, and 
 Polyeucte, show the result of criticism, and give evidence of 3deld- 
 ing, however unwillingly,, to the demand for structural regularity 
 by obedience to the unitie§^d by a plot of greater vraisemblance. ^ 
 In time Comeille again works away from these restrictions: he 
 always chafes more or less at the unities, and his idea that the 
 good tragedy should not necessarily end by a disaster but may 
 justify itself quite as well by arousing wonder or admiration 
 (tnerveUle), caused him to feel that the subject of a great tragedy 
 need not or should not be vraisetnUable. It is by the plays ranging 
 from the Cid to Pompee that Comeille's classicism is generally 
 tested, though it is our duty to take into account his own favorites 
 like Rodogune, Nicomede or Hiraclius. 
 
 Comeille tries, then, to rationalize his men and women and to V 
 introduce at least an elementary psychology. He wishes to make 
 them heroic embodiments of a feeling, say of honor or duty, and 
 to display them face to face witi some great crisis which they sur- 
 moimt by strength of reason or will power. Consequently, in 
 Comeille character is emphasized which depends on a psychology 
 however crude. -r 
 
 It is precisely this desire to show the heroic conflict of the 
 superman that leads Comeille to the exaggerations of later plays 
 when, as in Rodogune, Cleopitre wals exposed to the criticism that 
 strength of will becomes mere violence, and the exceptional rather 
 than the great is the object of portrayal. 
 
128 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 Corneille has fully set forth his theory of tragedy in various 
 writings, such as prefaces to individual plays, or the three Dis- 
 cours sur I' art dramaiique, and the examens of 1660.' These critical 
 essays composed fairly late in life may be looked upon as re- 
 joinders to Chapelain, and more especially to the abbe d'Aubi- 
 gnac. Corneille is troubled by the cramping influence of the unities, 
 particularly as some of his early plays, like the Cid, were written 
 before the traditions of the dicor simvltani had been abandoned. 
 
 The unities of time and of place are, therefore, a hindrance, and 
 Corneille tries to get round these conventions by other conven- 
 tions. Some of his plays, like Rodogune or Cinna, might be con- 
 ceived, he says, as not exceeding in time the two hours or so re- 
 quired for their performance. Others need more, and Corneille 
 would like latitude for different cases, while trying to avoid going 
 much beyond twenty-four hours. He would really like to leave 
 the time indeterminate and not emphasize the question too 
 much. 
 
 As to place, after suggesting the confines of a single city or two 
 or three localities within its walls, he again gravitates towards a 
 " fiction de theatre," such as a vague apartment on which open the 
 rooms of the chief characters.^ 
 
 Thus Corneille unfortunately did not always have the courage 
 of his convictions: he was inclined to hedge and make concessions 
 to his critics by tr3dng to prove thalt, after all, he and they were 
 really in agreement, and especially that he was in harmony with 
 the teachings of Aristotle. 
 
 Comeille's first treatise, De I'ufilite et des parties du poeme 
 dramatique, is characteristic of this hedging. The purpose of a 
 tragedy is to please (as, indeed, he had said years before in the 
 preface of the Suivante), but it must please according to the 
 rules. 
 
 ' See such works as J. Lemaltre, Corneille el la po&ique d'Aristote, or Lisle, Essai 
 sur les theories dramatiques de Corneille. 
 
 ' To Corneille, be it remembered, the unity of action is the unity of " peril," 
 and he admits that his Horace sins in making the hero undergo two dangers. 
 
THE DRAMA 129 
 
 Corneille enunciates certain specific " utilities " of a dramatic 
 poem, four in number.^ Though the purpose of a tragedy is to 
 please, still it may inculcate lessons by its sententious passages 
 and moral instructions; it will have an effect by its truthful por- 
 traiture of virtues and vices; the happy outcome of virtue will 
 excite us to embrace a similar course and the baneful results of 
 crime will increase our natural horror. Finally, it will effect the 
 purgation of the passions through pity and fear. We may well 
 feel that this allusion to the AristoteUan doctrine of the katharsis 
 by Comellle is largely a matter of formal fidelity to Aristotle. In 
 his Poetics Aristotle had made a casual and obscure remark that 
 the effect of tragedy is to " purge " the passions through pity 
 and fear. This ambiguous statement has been interpreted by 
 critics in half a hundred ways, some moral, some aesthetic, and 
 some medical. In fact the Kteral, medical interpretation, enun- 
 ciated by the Frenchman H. Weil, followed by the German 
 Bemays, is the one generally accepted now. Corneille's rendering 
 is, at all events, very unlikely to be genuinely Aristotelian: " The 
 pity for a misfortune, in which we see our fellow-beings fall, leads 
 us to fear a similar misfortune for ourselves; this fear makes us 
 desire to avoid it; and this desire leads us to purge, moderate, 
 rectify, and even uproot in us the passion which before our eyes 
 plunges into this misfortune the people whom we pity, for the 
 common, but natural and indubitable reason, that to avoid the 
 effect one must eradicate the cause." Thus, by the pity and fear 
 excited through tragedy, we are led to avoid the passions which 
 brought about the misfortunes of the characters involved.^ 
 
 In the course of time Corneille finds himself distinctly at vari- 
 
 ' Cf. supra, p. 112. 
 
 ' Professor Butcher, starting from the medical interpretation, reaches the follow- 
 ing conclusions: " Greek tragedy, indeed, in its beginnings was but a wild religious 
 excitement, a bacchic ecstasy. This aimless ecstasy was brought under artistic law. 
 It was eimobled by objects worthy of an ideal emotion. The poets found out how the 
 transport of htmian pity and human fear might, under the excitation of art, be dis- 
 solved in joy, and the pain escape in the purified tide of himian sympathy." — Aris- 
 totle's Theory of Poetry and Fine Art, p. 252. 
 
130 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 ance with his critics as to vraisemUance. His fondness for por- 
 traying the volonte and the strong-willed characters or supermen, 
 V and his desire to show them grappUng with obstacles^eads him to 
 prefer what is invraisemUdble. It is to him a false maxim that 
 " il faut que le sujet d'une tragedie soit vraisemblable." He adds, 
 " H n'est pas vraisemblable que Medee tue ses enfants, que 
 Clytemnestre assassine son mari, qu' Oreste poignarde sa mSre; 
 mais I'histoire le dit, et la representation de ces grands crimes ne 
 trouve point d'incredules. II n'est ni vrai, ni vraisemblable 
 qu' Andromede, exposee h. un monstre marin, ait 6t6 garantie de 
 ce p^ril par un cavalier volant, qui avait des ailes aux pieds; mais 
 c'est une fiction que I'antiquite a rejue; et comme elle I'a traais- 
 mise jusqu' a nous, personne ne s'en offense quand on le voit sur le 
 theatre." 
 
 So in the preface to Heraclius he reaches the often quoted con- 
 clusion that the subject of a fine tragedy should not be vraisem- 
 blable, because unusual ones are best adapted to awakening pity 
 and fear. Thus the melodramatic side of Comeille is explained 
 and accounted for, and we have the raison d'etre of a character 
 such a's CleopS,tre in Rodogune. Moreover, in spite of the Cid, 
 love should occupy a secondary place in tragedy, the dignity of 
 which calls for some great state interest, or a more noble and 
 vigorous passion {passion mdle) than love, such as ambition or 
 revenge. Comeille replaces love plots by historical intrigues and 
 poHtical dissertations in dramatic form. Love is the embellish- 
 ment rather than the material of a tragedy. 
 
 In another way Comeille sometimes deviates from the con- 
 ventional conception of tragedy. He admits a happy ending, if it 
 be impressive enough to arouse wonder or admiration. Aristotle 
 in the Poetics (xxiv) admits the wonderful {t6 davnaarbv), which, 
 however, seems to him to mean rather a form of the irrational. 
 Therefore, though permissible in tragedy, it is more fitted for epic 
 poetry, where the improbability is less noticeable. But in Cor- 
 neille t6 Oavnaffrbv is the justification of plays like Cinna or 
 Nicomede on the one hand, and of Rodogune on the other. The 
 
THE DRAMA 13 1 
 
 two former plays have a happy ending, yet need not (at least 
 Cinna) be called merely tragi-comedies because they are sup- 
 posed to produce in the spectator a feeling of admiration. Ro- 
 dogune deals with atrocities, but again the spectator is supposed 
 to be under the spell of wonder. Boileau says in his well-known 
 letter of 1700 to Perrault: 
 
 Pouvez-vous nier que ce ne soit dans Tite-Live, dans Dion Cassius, dans 
 Plutarque, dans Lucain et dans Sen^que que M. de Corneille a pris ses plus 
 beaux traits, a puis6 ces grandes idees qui lui ont fait inventer un nouveau 
 genre de tragedie inconnu k Aristote ? Car, c'est sur ce pied, k mon avis, 
 qu'on doit regarder quantity de ses plus belles pieces de th63,tre, ou, se met- 
 tant au-dessus des regies de ce philosophe, U n'a point songe, comme les 
 poetes de I'ancienne tragedie, a emouvoir la piti6 et la terreur, mais a exciter 
 dans I'ame des spectateurs, par la sublimite des pensees et par la beaut6 des 
 sentiments, une certaine admiration, dont plusieurs personnes, et les jeunes 
 gens surtout, s'accommodent souvent beaucoup mieux que des veritables 
 passions tragiques.' 
 
 1 Admiration was, according to the critics, originally a function of poetry in gen- 
 eral, along with instruction and delight. Then it was raised to the level of pity and 
 fear as a function of tragedy. See Gregory Smith's Elizabethan Critical Essays, vol. i, 
 p. 392. The merveille of Corneille has a precursor in the maraviglia of Castelvetro. 
 See Charlton's Castelvetro' s Theory of Poetry, p. 191 : " What Castelvetro meant pre- 
 cisely by his ' maraviglia ' is not clear. At any rate, the ' verisimile ' prevented any 
 wild flights. But any theory which propounds the effect of the marvellous as the 
 primary aesthetic function is false, and has the manifold dangers of all falsity. Its 
 place is in the art of melodrama, not in the art of poetry. The Heroic drama which 
 dazzled almost all Europe in the seventeenth century is its offspring; and under the 
 power of its enchantment Corneille turned from such masterpieces as the Cid and 
 Horace to produce monstrous imbroglios like Rodogune" Aristotle {Poetics, ch. 
 xiv, 9: suggests the justification of Corneille's happy ending to tragedy: " Thus in 
 the Cresphontes, Merope is in the act of putting her son to death, but, recognizing 
 who he is, spares his life. So in the Iphigenia, the sister recognizes the brother just 
 in time. Again in the Hdle, the son recognizes the mother when on the point of 
 giving her up." Note the following passages from Vossius: Bk. H, ch. xi: " Julio 
 Scaligero lib. i. de re Poetica cap. vi. definitur, imitatio Dlustris f ortunae, exitu inf elici, 
 oratione gravi metrica. Ubi iUud non probare possum, quod requirat exitum in- 
 felicem. Plurimum quidem id fit; sed non est de oialq. [materie, naturaque] tra- 
 goediae. In multis enim id Graecorum tragoediis non videas; ut postea dicetur. 
 Quare differentia elScnrotis [specifica, sive formae eSectrix], qua differt a comoedia, 
 in eo constitit, quod graves actiones imitatur; eoque graves etiam personas assumit. 
 Sed, utcumque non semper exitus sit infelix; semper tamen infelix conditio, vel 
 grave periculum, ob oculos ponitur. Nam affectus ei movere propositum est, in- 
 
132 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 In Don Sanche d'Aragon Comeille introduces another novelty, 
 which he declares in his dedication to have no parallel among the 
 ancients. This is the heroic comedy which may deal with kings 
 and princes, without plunging them into the dangers in which 
 tragedy or tragi-comedy puts them. It is, therefore, an interme- 
 diary between tragedy and comedy. The name has survived in 
 modem drama, though a comidie heroique, such as Cyrano de 
 Bergerac, is obviously a very different thing in its ending from 
 Don Sanche d'Aragon, which differs but little from the tragi- 
 comedy. 
 
 When we come to Racine ^ we reach the perfection of the clas- 
 sical school, and a theory of dramatic poetry which harmonizes 
 without difficulty with the most stringent rules of the critics. 
 
 To begin with, the plots of Racine are simpler, and depend for 
 their interest not so much on situations as on characters. They 
 are plays of psychological realism, concerned with Racine's age, 
 even though the characters and plots seem to belong to myth- 
 ological or heroic times. They portray single crises, so that the 
 action is concentrated and brief, and the unities of time and place 
 are no longer hindrances^/This does not mean a lack of action, for 
 a tragedy is to Racine " I'imitation d'une action complete ou 
 plusieurs personnes concourent." The action was as far as pos- 
 sible personal and original, for Racine's theory of invention was 
 " faire quelque chose de rien." ^ He found his starting-point in an 
 eiat d'dme of some person or persons, usually in antiquity, and 
 developed it. Almost invariably it was a love-crisis. Conse- 
 
 primis miseiicordiam." — Bk. II, ch. xiii, par. 19: " Maximeque conveniunt ac- 
 tiones, quae habent ri kXeavdv, ii t6 <t>oPep6v, miserabile ac terribile. Vt sunt caedes, 
 incestus, aliaque indigna, et atrocia. His addere possis ri davfiacrTip, admirabile." 
 — Par. 31 : " Neque, si exitus sit laetus, eo nomen tragoediae amittitur: quia non est 
 de oitrlq. ejus, ut exitus sit tristis. Alioqui minor pars tragoediarum Euripidis, 
 quae quidem hodie exstent, tragoediae esse desinerent. Quare si, quod est oiai&Ses, 
 attendamus; satis est, si fades ejus sit luctuosa et anxia; ita ut in atroci, et andpite 
 iUustrium personarum fortuna, natura tragoediae dare eluceat." 
 
 ' See such works as Robert, la Poitique de Racine, and Le Bidois, la Vie dans la 
 iragSdie de Racine. 
 
 2 Preface of Berenice. Invention = imagination, cf. p. 107. 
 
THE DRAMA 133 
 
 quently, the complication was in the workings of human souls 
 and not in adventures and hairbreadth escapes<^The whole play 
 had to follow strict waisemblance under the guidance of reason. 
 
 So the tragedies of Racine offer us a simple but impressive plot ^ 
 (" peu d' incidents et peu de matidre " 0, representing characters 
 on an heroic scale, undergoing plausible and realistic psycho- 
 logical experiences, usually coimected with the passion of love, 
 set forth in dignified and polished poetry. By individual cases 
 drawn from mythology or history are illustrated the great truths 
 of life, as valid now in the seventeenth century, as in the days of 
 Pyrrhus or of Nero.^ -^ 
 
 In Corneille and in Racine we see the culmination of dramatic 
 effort. But it must be remembered that these writers were not 
 absolutely typical. They created and led, instead of being repre- 
 sentative of the general average. Quinault and Thomas Corneille, 
 yoimger brother of the great Corneille, are better examples of the 
 general taste. The " lyrical tragedies " of Quinault incUne to 
 insipidity; Thomas Corneille treats the romanesque, at times 
 according to Corneille, at times according to Racine, and his 
 Timocrate with its eighty consecutive performances was the real 
 success of the century. Voltaire wrote in his Essai sur la poisie 
 epique that tragedy in France had become a series of conversations 
 in five acts with a love plot. Rapin complained in his Reflexions 
 sur la po&tique that modern tragedy is not satisfied with pity and 
 fear, but has introduced galanterie and love, the influence of wo- 
 men and of Spain; that plays are apt to have frivolous subjects, 
 badly constructed plots, superabimdant episodes, inconsistent 
 characters, forced machines, the mervdlleux instead of the vrai- 
 semhlable, together with various other defects as they seem to 
 him. 
 
 We have already seen how the seventeenth century in general 
 conceived of comedy. It was not heroic and was " une represen- 
 
 ' Preface of Alexandre. 
 
 ^ A more detailed analysis of the theory of Racine is unnecessary because it coin- 
 cides so thoroughly with the general principles enunciated above in Part 11, ch. 8. 
 
134 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 tation d'une fortune privee sans aucun danger de vie." ^ The 
 earlier comedies of the seventeenth century had tended to be 
 coarse and disjointed compositions, often with complicated plots. 
 To please they relied chiefly on incident. Scarron and his school 
 practised the burlesque and intentionally anti-heroic comedy. 
 Some popular plays were rough adaptations from Italian, or as 
 time went on, from Spanish models. 
 
 Comeille's early comedies, beginning with Melite, transform 
 the vulgar and superficial play of incident into a comedy of man- 
 ners consciously based on life, and deviating from it only in so far 
 as the attempt to be literary encouraged in the author lapses into 
 preciosity or the finical sentiment of galanterie. 
 
 Moliere in time raises comedy to the highest dignity. He still 
 cultivates the farce and the ballet, and seeks to enliven his plays 
 by deviceb appealing to the eye and to the ear. But in his come- ' 
 dies of manners, like les Femmes savantes, and of character, like 
 Tartuffe and le Misanthrope, we have plays of the highest art.^ 
 Moreover, though he did not write examens as Corneille or as 
 many plays as Corneille and Racine, he has in comedies such as 
 , the Critiqtie de I'Ecole des femmes and the Impromptu de Versailles 
 given suggestions of his dramatic theory. He remembers tag ends 
 of criticism, like castigare ridendo mores? But usually he disdains 
 subservience to the rules : " Vous Stes de plaisantes gens avec vos 
 regies," he makes one of his characters say in the Critique de 
 I'Ecole des femmes, and he goes on to say that people talk as 
 though these rules were the greatest mysteries in the world,* 
 whereas they are only common-sense observations which can be 
 made at any time without the help of Horace or of Aristotle. 
 
 In some respects comedy seems to Mbhere a greater achieve- 
 
 1 Mairet, Preface of Silvanire. 
 
 ^ "JJ emploi de la comedie est de corriger les vices des hommes." — Preface of 
 Tartufe. 
 
 " Racine says, in the preface to the Plaideurs, concerning the first performance 
 that: " Ceax mSme qui s'y fitaient le plus divertis eurent peur de n' avoir pas ri dans 
 les rfigles." 
 
THE DRAMA 135 
 
 ment than tragedy. It is easier, he says, to defy fortune in verse, 
 to accuse fate and insult the gods, than to show up to the life the 
 defects of human beings. A writer of tragedies creates his heroes 
 as his fancy dictates and can give full flight to his imagination, 
 abandoning the true for the marvellous. On the other hand, 
 comedy is the reaUstic portrayal of men, and to be successful this 
 portraiture must be not only Ufelike, sensible and well written, 
 but it must also be witty and achieve the difficult task of amusing 
 people of taste and breeding. The purpose of comedy, Moli^re 
 adds in the Imprompki de Versailles, is to represent all the defects 
 of men and particjmrly those of the present time. 
 
 Those who consider the Misanthrope Moli^re's masterpiece see 
 in it the perfect comedy of classicism. It is regular and it is a 
 realistic psychological play. The action takes place in the soul of 
 Alceste in the midst of that environment of the social hfe of the 
 time to which it belongs. It is a comedy of character and of 
 manners. ^ 
 
 Because of the emphasis given to the regular drama and the 
 attention devoted to the rules, it seems difficult to realize that 
 tragedies and comedies formed only a part of the dramatic enter- 
 tainments. The seventeenth century had also in reasonable quan- 
 tity its irregular plays of which MoH^re's Don Juan was one, its 
 pieces a machines with fairly elaborate stage settings and shifting 
 scenery, such as Corneille's Andromede or Thomas Corneille's 
 Demneresse. Some of these irregular plays were, Uke Don Juan, 
 successors to the old tragi-com&dies transformed from a heroic 
 play with a happy ending to a fantastic drama. Then there were 
 the " lyrical tragedies " of Quinault, interspersed with dance and 
 song even more than were MoUere's comedies with song and bal- 
 let. In time, however, music, song and ballet became identified 
 with the opera, the destiny of which has been to outlive the for- 
 mal tragedy and comedy. In the seventeenth century the opera 
 had its opponents. Said La Bruy^re: " Je ne sais comment 
 I'Opera, avec une musique si parfaite et une d6pense toute royale, 
 
136 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 a pu reussir a m'ennuyer." ' Boileau, Racine, La Fontaine, and 
 Saint-Evremond, all criticize it as a hybrid form.^ \ 
 
 ' Des ouiirages de I'esprit. 
 
 ' A few minor peculiarities of tragedy may be mentioned. Critics speak much of 
 the noeud, the piripMe and the denouemetU to correspond to the complication of 
 plot (dials), the reversal of action (Trcpixerao) and the solution of the moral sit- 
 uation (XOo-ts) of Aristotle. The division into five acts is Horatian. The dream 
 motif was influenced by the shades and ghosts of Seneca. The objection to violent 
 deaths on the stage followed the Horatian precept that " Medea must not slay her 
 children coram populo." A character could come to breathe his last on the stage if 
 the blow had already been struck behind the scenes. Stage madness was justified by 
 Seneca {Hercules furens) and was borrowed by comedy, where it became an artificial 
 and utterly unrealistic love madness. Cf . G. L. Van Roosbroeck, A Commonplace in 
 Corneille's " M&ite ": The Madness of Eraste, in Modern Philology, 1919. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 
 OTHER POETICAL FORMS 
 
 The great poetic forms are usually considered to be, at least his- 
 torically, the epic, the drama, and lyric poetry. The seventeenth 
 century placed at the simmiit tragedy, comedy and the epic. But 
 epic or heroic poetry, as it was perhaps even more frequently 
 called, was one of the most ignominious failures of the age. Some 
 critics followed Aristotle in placing tragedy first among the great 
 forms; others, like Rapin, thought epic the highest. It was 
 synonymous in public opinion with what was rare and exquisite.* 
 Said Madelon in the Precieuses ridicules: "J'aimerais mieux 
 avoir fait ce ok! ohl qu'un poeme €pique." The precepts of epic 
 criticism were as elaborately worked up as those of the drama, 
 and a writer of an epic poem scarcely ventured upon his task 
 without consulting critics as well as masterpieces. Scud^ry tells 
 us in the preface of his Alaric that he had studied Aristotle, 
 Horace, Macrobius, Scaliger, Castelvetro, Piccolomini, Mam- 
 brun and many others. He also had read the great epics of Greece, 
 Rome and Italy, down to the Franciade of Ronsard and the 
 Saint-Louis of Father Le Mo3nae. When Lady Froth, in Con- 
 greve's Double Dealer, planned her heroic poem, the Syllabub, she 
 read " Bossu," Rapin and " Dacier upon Aristotle and Horace." 
 The epics were accompanied by the traditional paraphernalia 
 of descriptions and comparisons of the approved Homeric pat- 
 tern, as transmitted by the poets of the Renaissance. Old editions 
 of Alaric contain indexed lists of one hundred and forty-six 
 descriptions and one hundred and twenty-nine comparisons, 
 ranging from the comparison of a boar and a general to that of 
 thunder and the king of Sweden. 
 
 ' On the epic in the seventeenth century, see Duchesne, Hisioire des poimes 
 ipiques fransais du XVII' siicle. 
 
 137 
 
138 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 The production of epics was not consistently uniform; it came 
 rather at two periods. The early epics of the seventeenth century, 
 unknown to fame as they are today,^ were under the influence of 
 Ronsard and Du Bartas. So we read of some Franciades, an 
 Austriade, a Magdaliade, a Mariade and a Christiade. Accord- 
 ingly they followed the traditional view of the P16iade, which 
 made the epic a mythological romance, or else they were religious 
 narratives. ; 
 
 But the chief production of epic poems belongs to the middle of 
 the century, lasting for a decade or more. To this period belong 
 Le Moyne's Saint-Louis,^ Scudery's Alaric, Chapelain's Pticelle, 
 to mention only some of the most important. These poems are 
 well defined as moral romances based on history,' though we come 
 again to religious titles, and are brought to the great conflict be- 
 tween the merveilleux paten and the merveilleux chretien. 
 \The seventeenth-century classicism was absolutely unable to 
 appreciate the spirit of the old mediaeval epic. The chansons de 
 geste and the romances had disappeared, except in so far as in 
 their prose form they were considered uncouth legends, for which 
 nobody save unexpectedly Chapelain {De la lecture des vieux 
 remans) had a good word. A poem like the Chanson de Roland 
 was considered rude and unpolished. On the other hand, the 
 beauties of the Homeric poems were deemed the result of con- 
 scious study. Consequently, the model for the epic was Virgil, 
 and the ideal heroic poem was the laborious and carefully wrought 
 scholar's task. The epics were written under the influence of 
 learning and the superstition of the rules. Virgil was esteemed on 
 the whole above Homer. 
 
 But the imitation of Virgil was not unmodified. The influence 
 of Tasso was considerable on the poets and critics of the period. 
 Homer, Virgil and Tasso were the favorite authors of Father 
 
 ' Cf. R. Toinet, Qudqties recherches auiour des podmes hSrmques ou ipiques 
 franiais du XV IP siecle. 
 
 ' " Nous n'avons aucun ouvrage en notre langue oA il y ait tant de po6sie." — 
 Rapin, Riflexions sur la poUique, Part I, No. xxxi. 
 
 ' Duchesne, op. cit., p. 59. 
 
OTHER POETICAL FORMS 139 
 
 Mambrun, who wrote a Latin Dissertatio peripatetica de epico 
 carmine. Says Father Le Moyne in his Traite du poeme Mroique: 
 " Que dirai-je du Godefroy de Torquato Tasso ? C'est un heros 
 de la force des andens Grecs et des vieux Romains." More than 
 one similar passage could be quoted.^ Consequently, Tasso's 
 romantic tale influenced the French epic, which was apt to be a 
 romance in verse.* Dryden, writing under the influence of the 
 epics of France and England, recalls in his Essay of Heroic Plays, 
 that such a play ought to be an imitation, in little, of a heroic 
 poem; and, consequently, that "Love and Valor ought to be the 
 subject of it."l 
 
 On the other hand, in some epics, the moral side was strongly 
 emphasized. Voltaire, writing in the eighteenth century, says, in 
 his Essai sur la poesie ipiqjte, that the current idea of savants 
 about epic poetry is a long story invented to inculcate a moral 
 truth, in which the hero achieves some great task, with the help 
 of the gods, in the course of a year. 
 
 Thus the epic found itself hedged in by as many restrictions as 
 tragedy, and some of these were clearly devised in order to make 
 the two t)^es symmetrical. In order to confine an epic to one 
 year a writer would plunge in medias res, and with such a prece- 
 dent as Aeneas's narrative to Dido would include earher incidents 
 in a similar recapitulation. Just so the writers of tragedies ha'd got 
 round the unity of time by the device of a dream. 
 
 Hence, the subject of a French epic poem is permissibly drawn, 
 like the works of Virgil, from legends of antiquity, or it might be 
 the poetical treatment of an historical subject, or even a romantic 
 tale in heroic verse. It was, in the large majority of cases, intended 
 to teach a moral lesson. 
 
 • " Tasso, the most excellent of modem poets, and whom I reverence next to 
 Virgil." — Dryden, Preface to Evening's Love. 
 
 ^ Cf. Duchesne, op. cit., pp. 81-82: "Malgr6 de notables diflE6rences de carac- 
 tSre et de talent, le frivole Scudfiry, le mystique Desmarets, le grave Le Moyne et le 
 docte Chapelain, se ressemblent tous par un point, I'esprit romanesque; tous 
 voient dans I'Epop^e une sorte de roman en vers; seulement ils le veulent moins 
 cfaim€iique, plus serrg, plus moral que les romans ordinaires." 
 
140 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 Father Le Bossu, the chief authority on the epic,^ defines it as 
 " un discours invente avec art pour former les mceurs par des 
 instructions d^guisees sous les allegories d'une action importante, 
 qui est racont6e en vers d'une maniere vraisemblable, divertis- 
 sante et merveilleuse." ^ In fact, the first thing a poet should do 
 is to decide his moral, and the story (fable) itself shall instruct 
 under the form of allegory.' Thus an almost essential element of 
 epic poetry was the merveilleux, that is, moral allegories, sym- 
 bolical fictions or figurative language.* 
 
 So, then, the epic poets do for morals what theologians do for 
 the divinity; ^ the poet is more suited to teach than is the phil- 
 osopher; ' and the epic is chiefly for les mceurs et les habitudes as 
 tragedy is for the passions.^ Heroic poetry was to Father Le 
 Moyne as to Father Mambrun the expression of the philosophy of 
 politics and of the court, which may be profitably used for the 
 training of the great. Hence it could be full of erudition. 
 
 In spite of the constant use of the merveilleux, the epic poem 
 should try to preserve verisimilitude. The poet was to build on 
 
 ' " Lisez, lisez le P. le Bossu; il a fait un petit traitfi de I'art pofitique, que Cor- 
 binelli met cent piques au-dessus de Desprfiaux." — Mme de S6vign6, Oct. 2, 1676. 
 ^ TraiU du poime ipique. Book I, ch. iii. Compare Boileau's Art poelique (Canto 
 III): 
 
 L^ pour nous enchanter tout est mis en usage; 
 Tout prend un corps, une ^e, un esprit, un visage. 
 Cbaque vertu devient une divimt6; 
 Minerve est la prudence, et V^nus la beaut£; etc. 
 
 ' Rapin discusses the epic, not only in his Art of Poetry, but in his Parallel of 
 Homer and Virgil: " Sa matiere est une action h6roique, sa forme est la fable, sa 
 fin est d'instruire les princes et les grands." 
 
 * Lord Chesterfield wrote to his son on Oct. 4, 1752: "You are so severe a 
 Classic, that I question whether you will allow me to call his Henriade an epic poem, 
 for want of the proper number of gods, devils, witches and other absurdities, req- 
 uisite for the machinery: which machinery is (it seems) necessary to constitute the 
 epopee." 
 
 ^ Le Bossu, Traits du poime Ipique, Book I, ch. ii. 
 
 ' Le Moyne, Du poeme epiqtie. 
 
 ' Le Bossu, op. cit. Cf. Dryden, Dedication of the Aeneis: " After all, on the 
 whole merits of the cause, it must be acknowledged that the epic poetry is more for 
 the manners, and tragedy for the passions." 
 
OTHER POETICAL FORMS 141 
 
 truth. His first heed, said Le Mojoie, should be to start from a 
 firm foundation of truth drawn from history, and to avoid Pulci, 
 Boiardo or Ariosto. Even then, it was to be a firm precept in epic 
 as in tragedy that verisimilitude was more important than truth, 
 that the merveUleux must be taken within the bounds of the 
 vraisemblaUe and the possible. As with Comeille in tragedy the 
 aim of epic poetry, according to Le Moyne, is to cause admira- 
 tion.^ 
 
 In time divided tendencies appeared in the treatment of the 
 merveilleux. Boileau, for instance, advocated the merveilleux 
 paten. It seemed irreverent to him to intermingle religion and 
 fiction, and mythology had on its side the weight of literary 
 tradition as an adornment for poetry. Moreover, art and archi- 
 tecture were permeated with pseudo-antiquity, and statues and 
 fountains represented monarchs in Olympian garb, or Neptvme 
 and Tritons in the gardens of Versailles. Louis XIV was ad- 
 dressed in terms of mythology, and people danced mythological 
 ballets. The writers who advocated paganism failed to realize 
 that their pagan trappings did not express religion as did 
 m)rthology to the ancients, which mythology in reality Chris- 
 tianity now stood for. 
 
 On the other hand certain writers, like Desmarets de Saint- 
 Sorlin or Charles Perrault, more trvdy saw that the merveilleux 
 chr&tien occupied the same place in modem literature that my- 
 thology did in paganism, and advocated religious subjects with 
 Christian concomitants./ Coras very truly relegates Saturn, 
 Jupiter, Mars, etc., to the almanachs.^ They are good as names 
 
 ' H. Ch&iot, Etude sur la vie et les asuwes du P. Le Moyne, p. 266. Cf. Dryden, 
 Preface to Annus MirabiUs: " Such descriptions or images, well wrought, which I 
 proEoise not for mine, are, as I have said, the adequate delight of Heroic Poesy; for 
 they beget admiration, which is its proper object; as the images of the Burlesque, 
 which is contrary to this, by the same reason beget laughter: for the one shows 
 nature beautified, as in the picture of a fair woman whom we all admire; the other 
 shows her deformed, as in that of a Lazar, or of a fool with distorted face and antic 
 gestures, at which we cannot forbear to laugh because it is a deviation from Nature." 
 
 ' See Delaporte, Du merveUleux dans la UttSrature franqaise sous le rigne de 
 Louis XIV, p. 282. 
 
142 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 for planets. Why encumber literature with them ? The party of 
 the " Ancients " in the famous quarrel tended to the merveilleux 
 paten, and the " Moderns " to the merveilleux chritien, though the 
 distinction was not absolute. 
 
 Pastoral poetry was one of the now obsolete forms in which the 
 seventeenth century, like the sixteenth, took great deHght. The 
 traditions of Theocritus and of Virgil, combined with those of 
 Neo-Latin poets and of the Itahan and French authors of the 
 Renaissance, were, as with the drama and the epic, reshaped into 
 a half-erudite, half-aristocratic mould very remote from the 
 simplicity of rustic or popular melody. Classicism demanded that 
 even shepherds and shepherdesses should speak and act like 
 gentlemen and ladies. 
 
 The idyls, as the pastoral poetry of French classicism was often 
 called, had a quaint charm, but they were more remote from 
 antiquity than the eclogues of Ronsard had been. Both Boileau, 
 in his Art poetique, and Rapin, in his Discours sur la pastorale, 
 emphasize the simplicity of thought and expression, and the 
 delicacy and neatness of the pastoral. Rapin and Fontenelle say 
 that the aim of the pastoral is to show the felicity of the Golden 
 Age, that blessed time when sincerity and innocence, peace, ease 
 and plenty reigned on earth, and the happiness of life led men to 
 song and poesy. A pastoral was, therefore, the imitation of the 
 actions of a shepherd or of one taken under that character. 
 
 As a matter of fact the shepherds of this rustic world were very 
 sophisticated creatures, counterparts of those unreal beings who 
 moved through pastoral romance or pastoral play. They were 
 not always held by the confines of the technical eclogue, but ap- 
 peared as well in song or in dramatic intermede, like shadow 
 shapes of literature rather than of life. Henriette, in the Femmes 
 savantes, begs Trissotin to spare her and go back to the Irises, 
 PhyUises and Amaranths of his verses, and M. Jourdain, in the 
 Bourgeois gentilhomme, exclaims in bewilderment: " Pourquoi 
 toujours des bergers ? on ne voit que cela partout." Moreover, 
 Rapin confessing that with regard to the pastoral he had not 
 
OTHER POETICAL FORMS 143 
 
 Aristotle or Horace to guide him, and actuated by the usual spirit 
 of system, evolved many restrictions. 
 
 The most important writers of pastoral poems, if we leave 
 Racan's Bergeries to the drama, were Segrais, Mme Deshoulieres 
 and Fontenelle. Segrais imitated most closely of them all the 
 Virgilian models, and his poems are those which have most charm. 
 Mme Deshoulieres, in her nature poems, steeped her hvmian 
 beings and her flocks of sheep in sugary sentiment. Fontenelle 
 converted his pastoral characters into mere city-people draped by 
 chance in a rustic stage costume. The shepherds of Theocritus 
 were too coarse for him. They lacked the keen wit and gallantry 
 of modem times. In fine, the pastoral poetry of the seventeenth 
 century was as remote from life as the epic, but as it was less 
 ambitious, it was not so difl&cult of achievement. Among the 
 countless hackneyed phrases of love and the conventional lines 
 we do often get a foreshadowing of the charm of Watteau's art. 
 
 Satire was another poetical form traditionally honored. Satire 
 has always been an important trait of the French temperament, 
 and the abxmdant parodies and burlesques of the early seven- 
 teenth century, together with the political lampoons and maza- 
 rinades, testify to its favor in the age we are considering. But we 
 are here concerned with the formal satire. Horace, Persius and 
 Juvenal, particularly the first and the third, were the deities of 
 the modem satirists, who often treated in a new way the old 
 topics. Horace was placed first, in the opinion of most, but the 
 indecent side of Juvenal was an excuse for the treatment of 
 scabrous subjects in the name of offended morals. So Regnier, at 
 the threshold of the century, as Boileau expresses it, " offensait 
 souvent les oreiUes pudiques." Members of Regnier's school 
 equalled in licentiousness their leaders. Boileau, lacking modera- 
 tion himself when he undertook to write, like Juvenal, his own 
 satire of women, was as a rule sufficiently dignified to meet the 
 demands of his age. His satires are among his best titles to the 
 name of the " French Horace." He passes from literature to 
 morals with ponderous and stilted humor, and thinking to slay his 
 
144 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 victims has occasionally given them immortality. Boileau prac- 
 tised also, in his Lutrin, the mock-heroic, a form of humorous 
 verse verging on satire. It is the antithesis of the burlesque, 
 which had sought to discredit its object of mockery by the in- 
 dignity of a familiar treatment. The mock-heroic, on the con- 
 trary, dealt with a trifling topic in a highflown epic style. Per- 
 rault, in his fourth dialogue, calls the Luirin a burlesque or, at 
 any rate, a burlesqiie retourne. 
 
 Three forms — the conte or story in verse, the fable, and the 
 verse epistle — are not treated by Boileau, though he himself 
 wrote many epistles, and the fable was very popular. They need, 
 however, httle discussion. The contes of La Fontaine are hu- 
 morous, often salacious tales, in tripping verse, frequently re- 
 peating old stories already known to readers of Boccaccio, or the 
 fabliaux of the Middle Ages. La Fontaine fortunately did not 
 have to square with any laws or rules decreed for the genre. In the 
 fable, too, a writer could let his fancy run free. Here La Fon- 
 taine created his works of greatest genius and many other writers 
 experimented in them. Some were in Latin and some, as those of 
 Fenelon, in prose. The verse epistles of Boileau are a pastiche of 
 those of Horace. 
 
 The position occupied by lyrical verse in the seventeenth cen- 
 tury is, at first sight, rather puzzling to the modern student. 
 Contemporary literature rates the lyric so high that one is sur- 
 prised to find Boileau classifying it among the minor genres. We 
 distinguish the true lyric so carefully from occasional verse and 
 vers de sociite that we wonder at Rapin's classification of sonnet 
 and ode, together with the rondeau and others, as usually works of 
 imagination, but not of genius.^ Yet Rapin does due honor to the 
 Pindaric ode as lofty and majestic,'' and Boileau recognizes the 
 merit of some of these various forms. Boileau strains himseK to 
 the highest pitch to write an ode on the capture of Namur, and 
 declares that " un soimet sans defaut vaut seul un long poeme." 
 
 ' RSjkxions sur la poetique, Part I, Sect. iii. 
 2 Op. cit., Part II, Sect. xxx. 
 
OTHER POETICAL FORMS 14S 
 
 The secret of the classification was that the lyric tended to be 
 personal and hence was considered less capable of treating the 
 great general ideas which were the fundamentals of modern 
 classical literature. But, in spite of the dicta of authorities and 
 however frivolous the form, it found favor in salon and ruelle. 
 
 The ode was of two kinds. On the one hand, it could be heroic 
 and soar with Malherbe and Boileau, commemorating a victory or 
 praising a king or prince. Some of the odes of Malherbe reach the 
 highest dignity of modern classicism and proclaim the universal 
 truths of life. Other odes are conventional eulogies and poems 
 of praise, often written in the hope of a gratification or pension. 
 A hungry muse cannot, as Boileau confesses, " subsister de 
 fumee." On the other hand, the lighter ode in the anacreontic 
 vein dealt with love and laughter. It merged often into the in- 
 determinate stances, of which the characteristic, says Sarasin, was 
 " d'etre galantes et serieuses tout ensemble." ' 
 
 The " plaintive elegy in trailing garb of sorrow " was, the 
 critics teU us, originally destined for tears and lamentation. But 
 it later became a means for the expression of love, whether sor- 
 rowful or gay. Here, as in the stances, the lines of demarcation 
 are indistinct, and Rapin declares that, though akin to heroic 
 verse, " on appelle indiff^remment Ellgie parmi nous tout ce 
 qu'on veut." \ ] 
 
 The sonnet had a great vogue towards the middle of the seven- 
 teenth century, but it was then more a tour deforce and a test of 
 cleverness than the strong love poems of the sixteenth century 
 had been. Many of the actual examples were trifling, though one 
 of the chief literary disputes of the period was between the 
 partisans of the Uranie of Voiture and the Job of Benserade 
 during the Fronde. Guillaume CoUetet, in his Traite du sonnet, 
 makes it somewhat akin to the epigram and points out that 
 modern Latin writers usually translated " sonnets " into Latin 
 as epigrammata. But he considers the sonnet not only as con- 
 fined by greater metrical restrictions, but as being more grave 
 
 ' Sarasin, Difaite des bouts-rimis. 
 
146 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 and dignified than the epigram. Both poems in the seventeenth 
 century often ended with a poink, like the sonnet of Oronte in the 
 Misanthrope. But Boileau, who passes from sonnet to epigram, 
 as Colletet in his discussions had passed from epigram to sonnet, 
 banishes the pointe from other forms than the epigram. This to 
 him consists in a brief satirical jest in verse concluding with a 
 point or witticism involving a play upon thought, but not ap- 
 propriately degenerating into a mere pun. To Rapin Maynard 
 seemed the best French epigrammatist. 
 
 The other poetical forms are of minor importance to consider. 
 GuiUaume Colletet wrote a treatise on moral and sententious 
 verse, and one is somewhat surprised to see how long a list he 
 enumerates of " poetes tetrastiches " who composed moral 
 quatrains after the pattern in which Guy du Faur de Pibrac had 
 won fame in the sixteenth century.' Among the quatrains of the 
 seventeenth century he rates highest those of Godeau, Bishop of 
 Vence, published under the title of Institution du Prince chretien. 
 In 1646 a priest named Pigeon turned the Psalms into French 
 quatrains, much as Benserade retold the Metamorphoses of Ovid 
 in rondeaux, or as Mascarille, in the Precieuses ridicides, was en- 
 gaged in writing the history of Rome in madrigals. The chanson 
 and its popular and plebeian subdivision, the satirical vaudeville, 
 were of universal application. The rondeau and the ballade, 
 mediaeval forms, had a considerable but temporary vogue about 
 the middle of the century. By the time of the Femmes savantes 
 the ballade " sent son vieux temps." The impromptu of what- 
 ever form, was the test of intellect and wit, the " pierre de touche 
 de I'esprit "; ^ the enigmas in verse were also " good exercise for 
 the wit"; the etrenne or New Year's greeting was a minor 
 diversion; the madrigal was an irregular, short poem of " gentle- 
 ness, affection, and love." The journee des madrigaux in Decem- 
 ber, 1653, is an illustration of the grace and frivolity which often 
 reigned. Mile de Scudery and her friends, gathered at the house 
 
 ' The Ecole des femmes testifies to the vogue of quatrains. 
 ^ Pricietises ridicules. 
 
OTHER POETICAL FORMS I47 
 
 of Mme Arragonais, were by a chance circumstance spurred to vie 
 with each other in the impromptu composition of madrigals, 
 which were gathered together for the delectation of posterity. 
 
 An example of the vogue of trivial forms is found in the history 
 of the bouts-rimes. Sarasin, in the preface of his Dulot vaincu, ou 
 la defaite des bouts-rimes, a mock-heroic poem, relates how an 
 insignificant poet named Dulot was in the habit of beginning his 
 sonnets by the rh3Tnes; that is, by selecting rh3mies to which he 
 fitted lines. People took up Dulot's device as a pastime and, 
 for a time, there was a great vogue of bouts-rimes. It died down 
 but was revived when Fouquet, the famous surintendant des 
 finances, wrote a jesting sonnet in bouts-rim&s on the death of a 
 parrot. By and large innumerable bouts-rimes were written, of 
 which frequent subjects were the selfsame parrot or the recent 
 capture of the town of Sainte-Menehould. But the bouts-rimis 
 were in time used for the usual love making or galanterie.^ 
 
 ' Addison in the Spectator (No. Ix) has an interesting criticism of bouts-rimis. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 PROSE FORMS 
 
 Prose in the seventeenth century was, it would ahnost seem, 
 more diversified than that of to-day. In criticism especially we 
 come across a varied terminology including Dissertations, Re- 
 flexions, Discours, Observations, Remarques, Entretiens, Dialogues, 
 Conversations, Eloges, and Paralleles. The meaning of many of 
 these terms is self-evident. It will be necessary in this chapter to 
 consider specifically only certain of these forms in addition to the 
 genres, such as fiction, which require a special study. 
 
 The history of prose fiction in the early seventeenth century is 
 an important one; the part played by the novel in the classical 
 school of 1660 is less so. It is to be noted that the palmy age of 
 romance was in the first half of the century from the days of 
 Astree to the novels of Mile de Scud€ry. During this time fiction 
 progresses from the purely pastoral type to the historical or semi- 
 historical heroic romance in the writings of d'Urfe, Gomberville, 
 La Calprenede, and Mile de Scudery. These were the works, 
 particularly those of the divine " Sappho," which aroused the 
 mirth of Moliere in the Precieuses ridicules and of Boileau in his 
 Dialogue des heros de roman. 
 
 The romances of the first half of the century were of inter- 
 minable length, and their ambitious size as weU as high-flown 
 contents made many rank the genre in popularity with tragedy 
 and epic. The novel was spoken of as a prose poem. The school of 
 1660 was less favorably disposed to novels, at any rate as hitherto 
 cultivated. They were an obstacle to the drama and moral writ- 
 ings. Furetiere, at the beginning of his Roman bourgeois, says that 
 " un roman n'est qu'une poesie en prose." Desmarets de Saint- 
 Sorlin, aUuding to his Clovis, wrote: " Le roman et le podme ne 
 
 148 
 
PROSE FORMS 149 
 
 different que d'une chose, savoir que I'un est en prose et que 
 I'autre est en vers." 1 To Huet, the learned bishop of Avranches, 
 novels were an " agreable amusement des honn^tes paresseux." 
 Their subject was love and their purpose instruction. In his 
 third dialogue Perrault speaks of Homer and the novels of Mile de 
 Scud6ry as being not perhaps equal, but as filling corresponding 
 places in literature.^ 
 
 The abbe d'Aubignac, author of the Pratique du thedtre, once 
 wrote an allegorical and pedagogical novel called Macarise. This 
 work was about as worthless as his tragedy Zenobie, but in a very- 
 long prefatory essay he took occasion to classify the novels which 
 had been popular, and his remarks at least help to distribute the 
 forms of fiction. He divides them into three groups: historical 
 novels, novels of imagination, and novels of manners and por- 
 traits.* The first kind, he thinks, is harmful to history itself by 
 the false impressions produced of things based on fact. This, by 
 the way, says he, is an error into which writers of tragedies and 
 epics fall as well.-* The second kind, novels entirely of the imagina- 
 tion, is to d'Aubignac scarcely worth mentioning; novels of the 
 
 * Quoted in Roy's Sorel, p. 227, n. 2. See Ker's edition of Diyden's Essays, 
 vol. i, p. liv: " Scudfiry-jln the preface to the epic poem of Alaric, 1654, takes the 
 relationship [of epic and novel] for granted; in the preface to his sister's romance of 
 the Illustrious Bashaw he had cited Homer, Virgil, Tasso and Heliodorus as the 
 authorities for that kind of fiction." 
 
 ^ Boileau, writing to Perrault in 1700 (ed. Berriat-Saint-Prix, vol. iy, p. 94), 
 speaks of " ces poSmes en prose que nous appelons Romans, et dont nous avons chez 
 nous des mod^es qu'on ne saurait trop estimer, k la morale prSs qvu y est fort 
 vicieuse, et qui en rend la lecture dangereuse aux jeunes personnes." Boileau 
 criticizes the novel unfavorably in the introduction to his Hiros de roman. 
 
 * Macarise, particularly pp. 124-149 (ed. of 1664). 
 
 * " Les Tragiques . . . dont les ouvrages ne sont que des Romans d'un joui^ 
 comme le Po6me Epique d'une ann6e " (p. 128). — " On ne trouvera pas 6trange 
 que dans ce Discours je r6duise les Romans k la mfime r6gle que les Poenies Epiques, 
 car ils ne sont distingugs que par la versification, tout le reste leur est commun, 
 I'invention, la disposition, la fabrique et les omements; et je ne puis comprendre 
 le sentiment de ceux qui se sont avisos d'en donner une nouvelle difi&ence entre 
 les rSgles d'Aristote et des autres savants, et de dire qu'il n'6tait pas n6cessaire que 
 le h6ros d'un Roman fdt aussi vertueux que celui d'un Po6me Epique, et qu'il ne 
 pouvait tomber dans quelques faiblesses et faire des lachet£s " (p. 144). 
 
150 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 third category, which like those of Mile de Scudery mingle 
 modern characters under disguised names, are reprehensible 
 because misleading. 
 
 Though we need not follow the abbS d'Aubignac in his desire to 
 put allegory into fiction,' his criticism helps us, at any rate, to 
 understand the point of view which literature was reaching. The 
 novel is no longer pre-eminently narrative or description in high- 
 flown, unreal language. Its subject is still usually aristocratic like 
 the Princesse de Cleves, though not necessarily heroic (so the trag- 
 edies of Racine as compared with those of Corneille), and works 
 like the Roman comique or the Roman bourgeois do not really 
 belong to the classical school. The old novels were far from losing 
 their readers, but the new ones became much shorter and devel- 
 oped an interest in psychology and the presentation of character 
 and morals. They tried to be strictly vraisemblables and when, as 
 often happened, they took the form of historical narratives, the 
 authors sought to make the illusion so complete that it was hard 
 for an uninitiated person to tell whether they were relating fact or 
 fiction, to such an extent do we come upon anecdotes, pseudo- 
 memoirs, and narratives, in which real or invented characters, 
 and incidents true or imagined are inextricably entangled. 
 AThe literature of French classicism is chiefly interested in man. 
 /That interest takes the shape of psychological or moral studies. 
 The former we find especially in the novel and in the drama, the 
 latter is aU pervasive and can appear, not only in romance and 
 play, but also in satire, sermon or fable. Many technical moral 
 treatises were written, as might be expected, as studies of pas- 
 sions and of morals, rather than as " essays " of which Mon- 
 taigne had given an example. But one group of writings presents, 
 under var)dng external forms, material for the delectation of 
 polite society, desirous of being amused and stimulated rather 
 than instructed. Prominent in this group were portraits, maxims, 
 and characters. 
 
 > Cf . also his Royaume de Coguetterie, a brief allegorical sketch, which has been 
 compared to Mile de ScudSry's episode of the "Carte de Tendre." 
 
PROSE FORMS 151 
 
 Portraits were a peculiar feature of French seventeenth-century 
 literature.! They were brief characterizations, usually in prose, 
 sometimes in verse, dealing with the qualities of an individual, 
 physical or mental, or both. They appear in fiction and as real 
 descriptions, and are often in the first person. ' 
 
 A suggestion, which seems rather far-fetched, has been made 
 that the form may have been copied from the famous relazioni of 
 Venetian ambassadors.'' In these were depicted the most impor- 
 tant personalities of the court to which the ambassadors were 
 accredited. These relazioni were, indeed, frequently imitated by 
 European diplomats.* It is, at any rate, certain that the taste for 
 portraits was largely due to the novels of Mile de Scudery, such as 
 the Grand Cyrus and Clelie, filled with pen portraits of imaginary 
 people or of real ones under fanciful names. They differ from the 
 free and haphazard descriptions of modem fiction in being often 
 composed in somewhat fixed forms, so that the general terms in 
 which seventeenth-century descriptions are expressed tend to give 
 them a somewhat close similarity. 
 
 / Portraits were the fashion in society between 1650 and 1658, 
 but these dates are not definite limits. They are found in novels 
 with keys, in poems, in memoirs, in works like Bussy-Rabutin's 
 Histoire amoureuse des Gaules, in the gossip of Tallemant des 
 Reaux. It will be remembered that Mascarille in the Pr6cieuses 
 declared that, " Les portraits sont difficiles et demandent un 
 esprit profond: vous en verrez de ma fajon qui ne vous d6- 
 plairont pas." There were portraits, precious, historical, political, 
 and satirical. People looked for portraits in the sermons of Bos- 
 
 ' Cf . Arthur Franz, Das literarische PortrM in Frankreich im Zeitalter Richdieus 
 und Mazarins (Leipz. Diss). Also T. F. Crane's edition of the H&ros de roman, 
 Introduction, p. 124. 
 
 ' A. de Boislisle, Annuaire-BvUetin de la Society de V Histoire de France^ 1896, 
 vol. xzziii, ed. of Ezfichiel Spanheim. 
 
 ' Works like the Cortegiano may have had something to do with the genesis of the 
 portrait. Polite society in Italy must have delighted in something similar. 
 
IS2 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 suet or Bourdaloue.' The vogue was to a great degree increased 
 through the influence of the Grande Mademoiselle. She states in 
 her menaoirs that in 1657 the princesse de Tarente and Ma- 
 demoiselle de la Tremoille showed her their portraits composed in 
 Holland. " Je n'en avals jamais vu; je trouvai cette manifire 
 d'ecrire fort galante, et je fis le mien." She invited her friends to 
 do the same, and in 1659 Segrais published the collection which, 
 afterwards reissued in larger editions, had great vogue. 
 
 These portraits assxmied a naive frankness in setting down 
 defects as well as quaUties. They began with a description of the 
 person's physical charms, which in a woman sometimes included 
 details that delicacy might to-day refrain from mentioning. 
 After this came the enumeration of mental and moral char- 
 acteristics. In order to appear sincere the writer would magnify 
 a few trifling defects. Among the most characteristic of the genre 
 are Mademoiselle's own portrait and that of La Rochefoucauld 
 by himself. In time portrait writing as a separate diversion ran 
 itself out, and the satirical Description de Vile de Portraiture et de 
 la Ville de Portraits of Charles Sorel (1659) contributed to that 
 end. The same influence which produced the concise " portrait " 
 favored the concentrated moral maxims such as those of La 
 Rochefoudalald atnd the more lengthy characters of La Bruyere.* 
 To' try to find, as Victor Cousin did, a close connecting hnk be- 
 tween the Pensies of Pascal and maxims like those of La Roche- 
 foucauld, through the common bond of Madame de Sable and 
 Port-Royal, appears rather fa,r-fet'ched. The maxim seems like a 
 concentrated and generalized portrait, as the character seems an 
 
 1 Cf. Boileau, Satire X: 
 
 " Nouveau pi£dicateui, aujourd'hui, je I'avoue, 
 Ecolier ou plutSt singe de Eourdaloue, 
 Je me plais X remplir mes sennons de portraits.'' 
 
 " Bourdaloue fitait le portraitiste en renom. On allait k ses sennons comme i une 
 galerie oil s'alignent des types." — Hurel, les Orateurs sacrls A la cour de Louis XIV, 
 vol. ii, p. 31. 
 
 2 In the Reme d'Histoire UiUraire de la France, 1917-18, R. Toinet has a long 
 bibliography of seventeenth<entury maxims and moral reflections. 
 
PROSE FORMS 153 
 
 expanded one.i The thoughts of Pascal are, at first sight, like 
 religious maxims, but we know them to be really notes and sug- 
 gestions for a long work and consecutive argument. On the other 
 hand, it is quite true that some of the thoughts of Pascal have the 
 concentration, glitter and polish, even the vivacity and dramatic 
 effect of niaxims, as those on the grain of sand in Cromwell's 
 bladder oir the length of Cleopatra's nose. Moreover, thoughts 
 were composed in the Jansenist salon of Mme de Sable.^ 
 
 The maxims, as cultivated by La Rochefoucauld, were in part 
 the result of Jansenism, though religious feeling is absent from 
 them. Composed in a polished lapidary style by a Uase and 
 C3aucal man of the world, they none the less harmonize perfectly 
 with views on hfe and on the corruption of mankind current in 
 Mme de Sable's Jansenist salon where they were discussed and 
 worked up. She composed maxims of her own, as did her friend 
 Jacques Esprit and the worldly chevalier de M6re. 
 
 But the writing of maxims was really of much wider prevalence 
 than the mention of Mme de Sable's salon would imply. They 
 were favorite diversions of the circles of preciosity and of later 
 drawing-rooms. Mme de S6vigne makes a maxim which she 
 tTiinks so good that she feels it may be from La Rochefoucauld.' 
 Corbiaelli reduced Roman historians to maxims, beginning with 
 Livy. In 1686 he says he has cut all Cicero into fragments like 
 the maxims of La Rochefoucauld.* Amolphe's maxims of mar- 
 riage in the Ecole desfemmes show the result in comic satire.^ 
 
 1 That contemporaries saw a connection between these different forms is shown 
 by the title of Brillon's Ouvrage nouveau dans le goUt des Caractdres de ThSophraste et 
 des Pensees de Pascal, 1697. 
 
 == On some of these questions see R. Grandsaignes d'Hauterive, le Pessimisme de 
 La Rochefoucauld, p. 140. 
 
 * Letters of Mme de S6vign6, vol. ii, p. 262. 
 
 * Ibid., vol. iii, p. 4S7 n. 
 
 ' E. Roy, in his thesis on Charles Sorel, p. 248 says: " Les jeux partis n'avaient 
 point its oubU6s au XVI° siScle, mais devenus avec le temps d'une rare naivetfi, ils 
 ne difi6raient plus de ces dayeries ou devinettes,qu'on pent entendre encore aujour- 
 d'hui dans les veiU6es de village. Us reviennent a la mode au XVII° sifecle, sous la 
 forme de Maximes, qui tantdt developpfies dans de longues conversations, tantdt 
 
154 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 The Character and the Memoir, the one general and imper- 
 sonal, the other individual, are in a certain sense radically dif- 
 ferent; in another they are much akin, and have much in common 
 with the portrait. La Bruyere had, of course, a prototype in 
 Theophrastus, but, on the other hand, his chapters are univer- 
 salized, or at any rate generalized portraits, sometimes of known 
 individuals who can be identified, like Coinde or Fontenelle,' 
 often expressed in aphoristic paragraphs or sentences like maxims 
 or thoughts. It is, moreover, probable that La Bruyere had com- 
 posed the first version of his own Characters before he translated 
 those of Theophrastus. The " character," then, fittingly belongs 
 to a literature of moral observation and generalization. 
 
 Something the same is true of the memoirs of the time. Though 
 necessarily more personal, nevertheless, as we have incidentally 
 seen, the writers of memoirs, in the midst of gossiping details and 
 passing comments, did not lose sight of moral characterization. 
 
 The word iloquence covers a variety of manifestations of the 
 written and spoken word. The chief ones were religious dis- 
 courses, sermons and funeral orations; that is, the eloquence de la 
 chaire, and the profane oratory of the bar.^ The unprejudiced 
 student sees in both of these divisions conditions of varying 
 excellence or imperfection. In the funeral orations of Bossuet 
 classical eloquence reaches supreme dignity. Not only in style 
 but in intellectual sweep the great bishop deserved the name of 
 " eagle of Meaux." The sermons of Bossuet are simple and 
 straightforward. His funeral orations, being of necessity formal 
 eulogies of great people, called for omateness and pomp. They 
 
 rdduites en quelques vers, sont toujours discut6es par les amis de I'auteur avant de 
 recevoir leur expression definitive." 
 
 ' " Je suis presque disposfi S, croire qu'il faut que mes peintures expriment bien 
 I'homme en gtodral, puis qu'elles ressemblent k tant de particuliers, et que chacun 
 y croit voir ceux de sa ville ou de sa province." — Discours de reception. 
 
 * On oratory see such works as P. Jacquinet, Des prHicateurs du XVII' siicle 
 avant Bossuet; A. Hurel, les Orateurs sacHs i la cour de Louis XIV; Munier- 
 Jolain, les Epoques de I'MoquetKejudiciaire en France; Aubertin, V Eloquence politique 
 et parlementaire en France avant 178Q. 
 
PROSE FORMS ISS 
 
 recall the ceremonial of the seventeenth century combined with 
 the elaborate ritual of the Catholic church. But they are master- 
 pieces of lucid thought, carefully arranged according to a pre- 
 conceived plan.] 
 
 Rapin says in' his Reflexions sur I'iloquence that sublime genius 
 calls for a gift of heaven and the work of centuries. The sovereign 
 art, he also says, is to attach oneseK to nature. This was good 
 advice which orators failed to observe strictly. " Le discours 
 chr6tien," says La Bruyere, " est devenu un spectacle." i " Do 
 we not see, every day," says Rapin in his Riflexions aheady 
 quoted, "young preachers, without virtue and without learning, 
 motmt the pulpit as an actor goes on the stage to play his part ? " 
 
 Balzac, though no orator, did much by his essays and teachings 
 to set the style for religious and profane rhetoric. His ponderous 
 manner, with its self-conscious dignity and rounded Ciceronian 
 periods, fostered the grand goUt and the academic style. He 
 established a prize of religious oratory to be administered by the 
 Academy. A condition to which the teachings of Balzac con- 
 tributed at least in part was that ah oration, instead of seeking to 
 " foUow nature," became an end in itself and degenerated into 
 artificiaUty. Not only the funeral oration but the ordinary 
 sermon got to be a fashionable function instead of a moral ex- 
 hortation. People went to a sermon to see and be seen. The 
 preacher sought to attract admiration by his elaborate style, or 
 especially in the days of Ucense during the Fronde, to win an im- 
 worthy reputation by the flashy famiUarity of trivial burlesque. 
 But it was especially by forced antitheses of style, by strained 
 allegorical comparisons and parallels, even by puns, that the 
 preacher tried to win approval. Even pointes came into play and, 
 as BoUeau says in his Art poetique, " the preacher in the pulpit 
 besprinkled the Gospel with them." 
 
 Of course such generalizations must not be too sweeping. The 
 austere and sometimes ponderous style of the Jansenists was very 
 remote from the florid manner of the fashionable Jesuits. But, 
 
 1 De la chaire. This is an important essay for students of the times. 
 
IS6 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 on the whole, the general tone of preaching was, through a con- 
 siderable portion of the seventeenth century, defective, partly- 
 through the self-conscious style of which Balzac was the most 
 noted representative. Any such result was, of course, far from his 
 intent, and in his Socrate chretien he advocates simplicity and 
 sincerity in rather turgid language.^ At any rate. La Bruyere 
 and, in the eighteenth century, Voltaire agree upon the conven- 
 tional arrangement of the ordinary sermon : " lis ont toujours, 
 d'une necessite indispensable et g^ometrique, ' trois sujets ad- 
 mirables de votre attention.' " ^ 
 
 It was against the defects of fashionable preaching that the 
 great orators reacted. Rapin says that the two greatest preachers 
 of his time, not living, were the Pere Claude de Lingendes and the 
 Pere Castillon, both Jesuits; La Bruyere alludes with praise, but 
 without mentioning names, to the abb6 Le Tourneux, a Jansenist, 
 and the Pere Seraphin, a Capuchin. JBut Bossuet, Bourdaloue, 
 and Fenelon were- the glories of French eloquence in the seven- 
 teenth or early eighteenth centuryJ MassiUon, Flechier, and 
 Mascaron, great as they were, were inferior to these. 
 
 The other chief form of eloquence was at the bar. Here, of 
 course, the general hterary influence of Balzac was also not with- 
 out effect. But, for a time at least, legal oratory was entangled in 
 lengthy periods like those of the Jansenist Antoine Le Maltre. 
 
 1 Jacquinet {Des pridicateurs du XVII' siicle, p. 267, n.) quotes Bossuet himself 
 on Balzac : "Selon ce que je puis juger par le peu de lecture que j'ai des Uvres franfais, 
 les CEuwes diverses de Balzac peuvent donner une id6e du style fin et toum6 d61ica- 
 tement. II y a peu de pens^es, mais il apprend, par U mSme, J. donner plusieurs 
 formes a une id6e simple. Au reste il le faut bient6t laisser; car c'est le style du 
 monde le plus vicieux, parce qu'il est le plus affectfi et le plus contraint. Mais il 
 parle tr& proprement, et a enrichi la langue de belles locutions et de phrases tr6s 
 nobles." Sur le style et la lecture des icrivains et des Peres de I'EgUse, pour former un 
 orateur, ficrit adressfi au jeune abbfi-cardinal de Bouillon en 1669; publi6 pour la 
 premiSre fois par M. Floquet, tome n des Etudes sur Bossuet, p. 515- 
 
 2 De la chaire. Cf. Voltaire: " Un sermon en France est une longue declamation, 
 scrupuleusement divisee en trois points, et r6cit6e avec enthousiasme. En Angleterre 
 un sermon est une dissertation solide, et quelquefois seche, qu'im homme lit au 
 peuple sans geste et sans aucun 6clat de voix. En Italie, c'est ime com6die spiri- 
 tuelle." — Essai sur la poesie. 
 
PROSE FORMS iS7 
 
 Olivier Patxu was more natural and avoided far-fetched quota- 
 tions and forced parallels. 
 
 The famous trial scene in the third act of Racine's Plaideurs is 
 an exaggeration rather than an absolute untruth. The pre- 
 posterous speeches of Petit- Jean and LTntim6 are satires of legal 
 oratory. Advocates, we are told, seemed more desirous of show- 
 ing classical erudition and historical knowledge, of dazzling court 
 and spectators by a display of learning, than of attending to the 
 facts of the case. We can appreciate Judge Dandin's anxiety to 
 have Petit- Jean get back from Japan " au fait de son chapon," 
 and his request to L'Intim6 to skip from the creation of the 
 world to the deluge. Perrault, in his first dialogue on the Ancients 
 and Modems, quotes the speech of a lawyer for his daughter: 
 
 Cette fille mienne. Messieurs, est heureuse, quidem, d'avoir epous6 le 
 sievir de la Hunandiere, gentilhomme des plus qualifies de la Province; 
 malheureuse autem d'avoir pour mari le plus grand chicaneur du royaume 
 qui s'est mine en proces et qui a r6duit cette pauvre femme k aller de porte en 
 porte demander son pain que les Grecs appellent ton arion} 
 
 The newspaper and the haste of modern life have so diminished 
 the length and importance of letters that we need to be reminded 
 of their importance in the past. Even the epistolary novel is to- 
 day almost obsolete." But in olden times news was commimicated 
 by the pen, and in the days of the " epistles " people based on 
 them in part their hopes of literary immortality. The corre- 
 spondence of Cicero and of Pliny had been models to the hu- 
 manists of the Renaissance eager for glory, and even when, Kke 
 those of Etienne Pasquier, the letters were written in French, 
 they preserved the stilted f ormaUty of communications to a more 
 numerous audience than the different friends to whom they 
 were addressed. The scholars of the early seventeenth century 
 
 '■ One cannot help thinking of Sganarelle in le MSdecin mcHgri hd and his " le 
 poumon que nous appelons en latin armyan " and " le cerveau, que nous nommons 
 en grec nasmus." 
 
 ^ It may be not without interest to note, in passing, that the first American work 
 of fiction was an epistolary novel, Mrs. Sarah Morton's Power of Sympathy, Boston, 
 1789. 
 
158 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 nearly all left an abundant correspondence which is, indeed, very- 
 useful for our knowledge of the intellectual life of the period. 
 
 In time, however, the distinction grew more obvious between 
 an epistle and a letter. Bouhours wrote: 
 
 Epitre ne s'emploie que dans 6p!tre dedicatoire, I'^pitre de la messe, les 
 6pitres de saint Paul, Ciceron, Sfineque, Pline et d'autres anciens; pour 
 indiquer des lettres en vers: epitres d'Horace, de Boileau. AiUeurs on em- 
 ploie lettre.' 
 
 In letter writing, as elsewhere, the importance of Balzac was 
 considerable. A dweller apart from the busy life of Paris, " her- 
 mit of the Charente," and yet arbiter in matters of judgment and 
 literary taste, he wrote a vast number of letters and became the 
 great epistolier of France." We have already touched upon the 
 characteristics of Balzac's style, his seH-love, his sonorous and 
 high-flown diction. But Boileau, in his seventh Riflexion sur 
 Longin, expressed the true verdict upon Balzac: 
 
 Dans quelle estime n'ont point 6t6, il y a trente ans, les ouvrages de 
 Balzac! on ne parlait pas de lui simplement comme du plus eloquent homme 
 de son siecle, mais comme du seul eloquent. II a effectivement des qualit6s 
 merveilleuses. On peut dire que jamais persoime n'a mieux su sa langue que 
 lui, et n'a mieux entendu la propri6te des mots et la juste mesure des periodes ; 
 c'est une louange que tout le monde lui donne encore. Mais on s'est aperfu 
 tout d'un coup que I'art oii il s'est employ6 toute sa vie 6tait I'art qu'il savait 
 le moins, je veux dire I'art de faire une lettre; car, bien que les siennes soient 
 toutes pleines d'esprit et de choses admirablement dites, on y remarque 
 partout les deux vices les plus opposes au gemre epistolaire, c'est a dire 
 I'affectation et I'enflure; et on ne peut plus lui pardonner ce soinvicieux 
 qu'il a de dire toutes choses autrement que ne les disent les autres hommes. 
 
 But the name of Balzac long remained one to conjure by as a 
 model of dignity, just as Voiture was praised for the wit and 
 charm of his letters. La Bruy^re ' coupled the names of these two 
 
 ' Quoted in Rosset, Entretien, demies, critique et remurques du Pire Bouhours sur 
 la langue framaise, p. 240. 
 
 ^ " Epistolier de profession en effet, et qui en avait patente." — Sainte-Beuve, 
 Causeries du lundi, vol. xi, p. 417. 
 
 ' Des ouvrages de V esprit. Chesterfield (July 20, 1747) recommends as models 
 Cicero and Cardinal d'Ossat for serious correspondence, and Mme de Sfivignfi and 
 Bussy for enjouemerU and badinage. 
 
PROSE FORMS IS9 
 
 and lauded their grace and polish. But La Bruyere recognized 
 another influence in letter-writing to which social life had given 
 importance. Women are even more peculiarly suited to a happy 
 choice of terms, delicacy, sentiment, and so forth. " Si les fem- 
 mes etaient tou jours correctes, j'oserais dire que les lettres de 
 quelques-unes d'entre elles seraient ce que nous avons dans notre 
 langue de mieux 6crit." 
 
 Correctness was not always a matter of diction but, with some 
 women, of spelling. Specimens of communications of even such a 
 high placed and puissant dame as Frang oise-Athenais de Roche- 
 chouart, marquise de Montespan, are appalling in the directness 
 of their phonetic simpUcity. But the mere mention of Mme de 
 Sevigne is sufficient proof of the importance of women as letter 
 writers. Unconscious of her own literary destiny, she is now read 
 by thousands to each one who looks at the pages of Balzac. 
 
 In the sentimental novels that sprang up in France, letters 
 often occupy half the voliune. Heroic gallant novelists, from 
 Gomberville to MUe de Scud6ry, employ them in increasing num- 
 bers. The letters are often intimately connected with the plot. 
 Then they also form an entity of their own, either like Boursault's 
 Lettres de Bdbet (1666) or the genuine Lettres portugaises (1669).* 
 
 The seventeenth century by no means confined itself to super- 
 ficial drawing-room erudition. It had its great scholars in dif- 
 ferent fields of learning whose names are still remembered with 
 respect to-day. Though Menage might provoke MoUere's mirth, 
 yet Dacier or Mme Dader could be laughed at only by the igno- 
 rant. Ducange, Baluze, Mabillon might head lists the length of 
 which would be disproportionate to the present study. As might 
 be expected, except for the independent and sound Ubertine 
 scholars, learning was largely under ecclesiastical domination. 
 The Congregation of Benedictines of Saint-Maur, founded in 
 1627, helped to make the name of Benedictine s3monymous with 
 
 * On the early history of the epistolary novel, see an unpublished doctorate dis- 
 sertation in the Harvard Library by C. E. Kany: The Beginnings cf the Epistolary 
 Novel in the Romance Languages, 1920. 
 
l6o FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 tireless industry. In the times of Mabillon the abbey of Saint- 
 Germain-des-Pres was a great centre of erudition. The Jansenist 
 solitaires and the Oratorians won distinction for work which was 
 technical and precise. 
 
 History,^ more closely connected by its consecutive narrative 
 with literature, was partly swayed by the traditions of Livy and 
 of his modern disciples De Thou and Du Haillan. To Boileau 
 M^zeray is synonymous with painstaking exactness." The same 
 accuracy can hardly be asserted of the numerous biased or 
 partial memoirs and souvenirs to which we have already alluded. 
 The century is to be credited with contributions to journalism in 
 the founding of the periodical of Theophraste Renaudot. But the 
 jingling gazettes of Loret (in prosaic verse), did but chronicle 
 small beer. Even great writers failed when they tried to go be- 
 yond their sphere. Racine wrote a very creditable history of 
 Port-Royal, but both he and Boileau came to grief when they 
 sought to record the deeds of Louis the Great.* \ 
 
 ' Cf . Monod, Du progres des sciences historiques en France depuis le XVI' siicle 
 in Reime historique, 1876; Ch.-V. Langlois, Manuel de MbUographie historique (2° 
 fascicule, livre i) : Les itudes historiques depuis la Renaissance jusqu'd, la fin du 
 XVIIP siecle. 
 
 " Art poetique, Canto II, 1. 79. 
 
 ' Mme de S6vign6 wrote to Bussy (Nov. 3, 1677) : " Vous me parlez fort bien, 
 en v^rit6, de Racine et de Despr^aux. Le roi leur dit, il y a quatre jours: ' Je suis 
 f4ch6 que vous ne soyez venu a cette demiere campagne; vous auriez vu la guerre, 
 et votre voyage n'eiit pas 6t6 long.' Racine lui rfipondit: ' Sire, nous sommes deux 
 bourgeois qui n'avons que des habits de ville; nous en commandijnes de campagne; 
 mais les places que vous attaquiez furent plus t6t prises que nos habits ne furent 
 faits.' Cela f ut recu agrfiablement. Ah! que je connais un homme de quality 3, qui 
 j'aurais bien plut6t fait 6crire mon histoire qu' 3. ces bourgeois-13., si j'fitais son 
 maltre." We read in the Mimoires sur la tour de Louis XIV of Primi Visconti (ed. 
 Jean Lemoine) p. 245 : " Racine etait 3, la mode aussi bien que Desprfiaux, son 
 compagnon inseparable. On les appelait les philosophes; je les ai connus tous les 
 deux. RacLae est tres pedant, mais Despr^aux est hommedejugement; il a compost 
 plusieurs satires pleines d'esprit et il me confia qu'il s'occupait d'histoire, plus par 
 ordre que de sa propre inspiration. Le mar€chal d'Estrades m'aborda un autre 
 jour en souriant et me dit: Je vous avals bien dit que nos historiographes feraient 
 mieux de s'en retoumer ^ leurs rimes., Ces messieurs ont lu hier chez Madame de 
 Montespan quelques parties de leur histoire; le Roi secouait la t6te et de temps en 
 temps il disait tout bas k Madame de Montespan: ' Gazettes, Gazettes.' " 
 
PROSE FORMS i6i 
 
 Dryden, in his preface to the translation of Ovid's Epistles, says 
 that there are three forms of translation: metaphrase, para- 
 phrase, and imitation. The French seventeenth century pre- 
 ferred the second and the third of these methods. Much of the 
 knowledge of Rome was drawn from the once admired but now 
 forgotten history of Coeffeteau, which was largely a paraphrase of 
 Florus. But not aU translations were as remote from the originals 
 as the famous beUes infideles of Perrot d'Ablancourt, in which, as 
 in tragedy, an unconscious preference for contemporary instead of 
 historical vraisemUance caused the translator to modernize the 
 ancients and use names or descriptive terms which were absolute 
 anachronisms. 
 
 Little need be said concerning the various miscellaneous forms 
 eniunerated at the beginning of this chapter.^ These remarks, 
 observations, entretiens, etc., were often in the form of dialogues, 
 in which, though the rule was not absolute, it was not customary 
 to introduce more than three characters. 
 
 ^ The tenth book of Tassoni's Pensieri diversi determines the form of Perrault's 
 Paralleles. Cf. Spingam, Seventeenth-Century Essays, vol. i, p. Ixxxix. 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 ART 
 
 The tendencies of classicism show themselves just as distinctly 
 in seventeenth-century art as in letters.^ The fondness for system 
 and the spirit of centralization were as manifest here as elsewhere. 
 The estabUshment of the Royal Academy of Painting and 
 Sculpture in 1648 corresponded to that of the French Academy, 
 and the control of Colbert, its " protector," was as definite and 
 far-reaching as that of Richelieu had been. It marks the assump- 
 tion of authority over art, of which the Academy had, so to speak, 
 the monopoly. The Academy at Rome linked ofl&cial French art 
 with that of Italy. Testelin's " tables of precepts " methodically 
 catalogued the artistic rules; Charles Le Brun was the acknowl- 
 edged manager of art and the deviser of its concrete manifesta- 
 tions. Thus grew up the so-called Academic School, conven- 
 tional and systematic, in which painting became more a science 
 than an art. 
 
 The greatest painter of the early classical school was Nicolas 
 Poussin. With him the theory of the beau ideal, which in art cor- 
 responds much to following " reason " in poetry and criticism, is 
 not so definitely formed. Poussin was the ardent admirer of the 
 ancients and of Italy, where he spent much of his Ufe. But he was 
 chiefly intellectual. He sought particularly by intelUgent and 
 assiduous study of the ancients to acqviire the pure harmony of 
 plastic form. Reason meant to him the critical sense expressive 
 
 ' The following works, among others, may profitably be consulted: L. Courajod, 
 Lemons professSes d I'Ecole du Louvre, vol. iii; P. Desjardins, la MUhode des classiques 
 franqais (article on Poussin) ; A. Fontaine, les Doctrines d'art en France; L. Hourticq, 
 I' Art academique, in Remte de Paris, June and July, 1904; H. Jouin, Conferences de 
 I'Acadlmie royale de peinture el de scidpUire; H. Lemonnier, PArtfrangais au temps 
 de Richelieu et de Mazarin; H. Lemonnier, I'Art fransais au temps de Louis XIV; 
 P. Manuel, Charles Le Brun. 
 
 163 
 
ART 163 
 
 of the inner meaning rendered through symmetry and harmony.' 
 A mediocre colorist, he took as models, besides the ancients, the 
 eclectic school of Bologna, the Carracci and Domenichino, as well 
 as the harmony of Raphael's outlines. 
 
 Very rapidly, along with the foundation of the Academy of 
 Painting and Sculpture, there grew up the rigid doctrine of 
 " Academism," in which the " reason " of Poussin was, like the 
 literary models, interpreted in the sense of discipline. Poussin 
 imitated with a certain independence and originality; the Acad- 
 emists were satisfied that perfection in art had been achieved, 
 and it now sufficed to imitate. Greek sculpture for form, Raphael 
 for drawing, Poussin himself for composition, such were the great 
 models'whom the school followed with docility. Moreover, just 
 as the French poets of the Renaissance reverenced their Italian 
 compeers, so the mediocre Italian disciples of the great masters 
 gained a borrowed prestige. 
 
 The theories of the Academic school were rigid. Vraisemblance 
 was glorified, as in literature, because it was considered the ex- 
 pression of rational truth, though mythological and allegorical 
 trappings made the general effect of a picture anything but 
 realistic in our sense. For nature was corrected by art, and reality 
 was exalted to the heroic in representation by means of S3anbol 
 and allegory, just as in tragedy d'Aubignac put the vraisemblable 
 above the vrai. Reality must be intellectualized and the enjoy- 
 ment of art must be logical. The Academy instituted regular 
 lectures at which masterpieces were analysed and interpreted. 
 Where intellectualism prevailed so strongly, form was all im- 
 portant, and drawing was rated almost higher than color. A 
 work of art had to be thought out beforehand as carefully as a 
 masterpiece of literature. Paraphrasing Boileau's " Avant done 
 que d'6crire, apprenez a penser," Coypel urged "Avant done que 
 de peindre, apprenez k penser." ^ As has been said, everything 
 was parcelled into precepts. Henri Testelin taught the treat- 
 
 ' Cf . Desjardins, Fontaine and Lemonniei passim. 
 * Cf. Jouin, Conferences de VAcadimie royde, p. 260. 
 
l64 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 ment of lines, expression, planning, coloring, and so forth. There 
 were rigidly conventional ways of indicating emotions and pas- 
 sions. The parting of the lips, the lines of the eyebrows, the 
 dilation of the pupil, even the position of the body, the meaning 
 of open hands, of clasped hands, of bent shoulders — all was duly 
 classified. A regular vocabulary grew up to express the scowl or 
 wrinkle. Le Brun placed valor in the nose because eagles are 
 courageous, and taught that heroes should, in consequence, be 
 portrayed with aquiline noses.' Students were instructed to ob- 
 serve the three unities in art, and the forms were classified in a 
 rigid hierarchy headed by historical painting, and descending 
 through portraits and landscapes, through other forms, to still 
 life and genre. 
 
 There were even writings which might be called Arts of Paint- 
 ing to balance Boileau's Art poitique. Freart de Chambray wrote 
 artistic " parallels " and studies of the idea of perfection in 
 painting, but the most important, which preceded Boileau's 
 work by several years, was Dufresnoy's Latin poem De Arte 
 graphica. The author was not a member of the Academy and 
 was, indeed, an advocate of richness of color, a " Rubensist " as 
 opposed to the " Poussinists " of form and draughtsmanship, but 
 it is nevertheless an important document in the history of French 
 classical aesthetics. 
 
 Efforts have been made * to draw academism from Cartesian- 
 ism, Just as the effort has been made for classicism in general. 
 The text of the Traite des passions of Descartes was freely used to 
 substantiate arguments concerning the interpretation of expres- 
 sion, but it is enough to suppose that the passages were used 
 chiefly as corroboration and explanation. The connection of the 
 aesthetics of Descartes, with art as with Kterature, was one of 
 parallelism rather than of anteriority. 
 
 The incarnation of seventeenth-century conventional art is 
 found in Charles Le Brun. Though a painter of undoubted merit 
 
 ■ Cf. Fontaine, les Doctrines d'art, p. 79, n. 2. 
 
 * Cf. L. Hourticq, I' Art acadimigue, in Revue de Paris, 1904. 
 
/ / 
 
 /■. /■. 
 
 ART i6S 
 
 he tended, by his large artistic enterprises and the absolute rules 
 which he administered, to make art fall into grooves and to be- 
 come, especially between 1661 and 1690, floridly and ornately 
 decorative. He was not only life rector of the Academy of Paint- 
 ing but director of the tapestry works of the Gobelins. He de- 
 signed the Galerie d'Apollon of the Louvre, the ceilings of 
 Versailles and many other ceilings and cupolas. 'He super- 
 intended painters and sculptors working under his direction. He 
 surrounded his ceiling decorations with heavy painted and gilt 
 stucco frames, carved with cupids, allegorical figures and gar- 
 lands of flowers. Examined in detail, the Grand Style in art was 
 ponderous and unreal; taken in a mass and in the vistas of long 
 galleries, it was impressive in its grandeur and symmetry .^ 
 
 It was especially in architecture that the qualities and defects 
 of the art of Loxiis XIV showed themselves in imposing unison. 
 Critics like Courajod point out with truth the stagy floridity of 
 Jesuit ecclesiastical architecture, and nobody denies that it is an 
 imitation of a debased period of Italian art. They are no less 
 logical but somewhat less convincing when they criticize Claude 
 Perrault's fajade of the Louvre or the huge palace of Versailles. 
 Obviously the pillars of the colonnade of the Louvre serve no real 
 purpose of support and had to be surmounted by a balustrade to 
 hide the flat roof, while they themselves were bound together by 
 iron girders. The enormous garden front of Versailles is monot- 
 onously regular. Nevertheless, the decorative value of Versailles 
 or of the H6tel des InvaUdes is undeniable; they became models 
 for the capitals of eighteenth-century continental Europe, and it is 
 the tradition of such buildings which accounts for the symmetry 
 of the vistas of modern Paris. These buildings have not the 
 soaring idealism of Gothic architecture, but they formed a most 
 fitting background for the courtly life of those days. 
 
 It was in landscape architecture that the Great Style was per- 
 haps most ambitiously unsuccessful. The iirban civilization 
 
 1 La Bruy£ie {Des Grands), speaking of the taste of rulers, says: " Tout ce qui 
 s'€loigne trop de Lulli, de Racine et de Le Bnin est condamn£." 
 
l66 FRENCH CLASSICISM 
 
 which spent its time mostly in drawing-rooms, and considered 
 outer nature inferior to human nature, tried to train scenery into 
 conformity with the salons. Le N6tre's rectilinear designs at 
 Versailles or Saint-Cloud were mathematically satisfying, but 
 the clipped trees, broad lawns conceived as carpets and decorated 
 with evenly-spaced statues like the chairs of a room were even 
 more inconsistent with nature than the colonnade of the Louvre 
 was with the purpose of columns. 
 
 In one important particular the methods of art and of literature 
 were confused in the seventeenth century, to the detriment of 
 both. This was a consequence of the De arte poetica of Horace and 
 the passage: 
 
 Ut pictura poesis: erit quae si propixis stes 
 Te capiat magis, et quaedam si longius abstes.^ 
 
 Critics corroborated this passage with a statement credited by 
 Plutarch to Simonides that painting is silent poetry and poetry is 
 a speaking picture. The passage of Horace did not intend to com- 
 pare the two arts, but merely implied that in neither is it fair to 
 make unjust demands on the artist. Some works must be judged 
 near to, others from a distance. This statement was misin- 
 terpreted into meaning that the aesthetics of painting and of 
 poetry are the same. It was against this idea that Lessing re- 
 acted in his Laocoon? The poem of Dufresnoy De arte graphica 
 begins with the specific words : 
 
 Ut pictura poesis erit; similisque poesi 
 Sit pictura. 
 
 Dryden's Parallel of Painting and Poetry, accompanying an Eng- 
 lish version of Dufresnoy's poem, is one of the important essays 
 on the subject in English. The consequence was that in seven- 
 teenth-century classicism hterature encroached on art. Painting 
 became stagy, partly because it was assimilated by the critics 
 
 ' Lines 361-362. 
 
 ^ On this matter see W. G. Howard's introduction to his edition of Lessing's 
 Laocoon and the same writer's Ut pictura poesis in the Publications of the Modern 
 Language Association of America, igop; also I. Babbitt's New Laocoon, incidentally. 
 
ART 167 
 
 chiefly to dramatic poetry. It borrowed the literary heroic and 
 mythological allegories and tried to teU a story. Coypel, writing 
 Sur I'esthitique du peintre says specifically ^ that " tous les arts 
 ont certainement les m^mes principes; par exemple, les pontes ne 
 pourront, je crois, disconvenir du rapport des parties de la 
 tragedie S. celles d'un tableau heroique." * Again, he says ' that 
 the great painter must be a poet, though he may not have written 
 a line. Even the rules of declamation must be familiar to him, so 
 that he may make the gestures of his subjects harmonize with the 
 expression of their countenances. Thus art found itself bound by 
 as many rules as tragedy itself. 
 
 • Cf. Jouin, Conferences de I'Acadimie de peinture. 
 " P. 239. ' P. 277. 
 
INDEX 
 
INDEX 
 
 Addison, 3, 71, 113, 147. 
 Alamanni, 33, 38. 
 Alaux, 21. 
 Alcibiades, 108. 
 Alden, R. M., 121. 
 Alembert, d', 27. 
 
 Amyot,sr,S7- 
 
 Anadreon, 31, 39, 47. 
 
 Aiidr6, 16, ig. 
 
 Amiunzio, G. d', 9. 
 
 Apollonius Rhodius, 30, 31, 38, 42, 47. 
 
 Ariosto, 30, 39, 42, 4S, 141- 
 
 Aristophanes, 26, 114. 
 
 Aristotle, 9, 10, 14, 15, 17, i8, ig, 22, 28, 
 45. 46, 50, SI. 67. 69, 74. 8s. 100, 104, 
 107, 119, 120, 121, 122, 124, I2S, 128, 
 129, 130, 131, 134, 136, 137, 143, 149. 
 
 Amaud, Ch., 63, 119, 122. 
 
 Amauld, 85, 92. 
 
 Anagonais, Mme, 147. 
 
 Athenaeus, 100. 
 
 Atkinson, C. T.., 55. 
 
 Attila,6. 
 
 Aubertin, 154. 
 
 Aubignac, abbfi d', 23, 63, 64, 65, 66, 100, 
 loi, 119, 120, 122, 123, 124, 125, 128, 
 
 149. 150. 163- 
 Aubign€, Agrippa d', 42, 49. 
 Auchy, Mme d', 64. 
 Augustine, St., 19, 20. 
 Augustus, 4, 83, 113, 114. 
 Aulus Gellius, 52. 
 
 Babbitt, I., 96, 166. 
 Baif, Jean-Antoine de, 41, 45, 51. 
 Baif, Lazaie de, 33. 
 Baluze, 159. 
 
 Balzac, J.-L. Guez de, S9. 69, 70, 71, 72, 
 73. 77. 86, 99, iss, 156, 158, 159. 
 
 Barclay, 67. 
 
 Bartas, du, 42, 49, 138. 
 
 Batteux, 104. 
 
 Bayaid, 85. 
 
 Bellay, du, 30, 34, 35, 41, 42, 44, 45, 46, 
 47. 48, SO, S4. 
 
 Belleau, 41. 
 
 Bembo, 42. 
 
 Benda, J.,96. 
 
 Benserade, 145, 146. 
 
 Benvenuto Cellini, 33. 
 
 Bergson, 27. 
 
 Bemays, 129. 
 
 Berriat Saint-Friz, 69, 149. 
 
 B6rulle, 19, 20. 
 
 Binet, 40. 
 
 Boccaccio, 144. 
 
 Bo6tie, Etienne de la, 56. 
 
 Boiardo, 141. 
 
 Boileau, 9, 18, 24, 40, 44, 45, 61, 65, 66, 
 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 74, 7S. 8s, 92. 93, 94. 
 98, 99, 102, 103, 104, IDS, 106, 109, 
 no. III, 112, 113, 114, 123, 131, 136, 
 140, 141, 142, 143. 144. 145, 146. 148, 
 149, 152, iss, 158, i60j 163, 164. 
 
 Boislisle, A. de, 151. 
 
 Boisrobert, 119. 
 
 Bonnefon, P., 56, 58. 
 
 Bossuet, 2S, 60, 71, 73, 82, 92, 94, 9S, 99, 
 119, 151, 1S4. 156. 
 
 Bouajrstuau, Pierre, 52. 
 
 Bouchet, Jean, 31. 
 
 Boubours, 66, 71, 73, 77, 83, 86, 88, 89, 
 91, 99, 104, los, 110, III, 158. 
 
 Bouillon, Cardinal de, 156. 
 
 Bouillon, Mme de, 64. 
 
 Bourciez, 33. 
 
 Bourdaloue, 94, 152, 156. 
 
 Bouisault, 159. 
 
172 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Bovet, 124. 
 
 Brillon, 153. 
 
 Biinvilliers, marquise de, 92. 
 
 Bruneti^re, 62, 94. 
 
 Brunschvicg, 77. 
 
 Bud6, 31. 
 
 Burckhardt, 5. 
 
 Bussy-Rabutin, 89, 102, 104, 151, 158, 
 
 160. 
 Butcher, Professor, 108, 120, 122, 125, 
 
 129. 
 
 Caesar, 83. 
 
 Calvin, 60. 
 
 Campbell, L., 7. 
 
 Canat, R., 8. 
 
 Carmail, comte de, 119. 
 
 Carracci, 163. 
 
 Castelain, 15. 
 
 Castelvetro, 19, 45, 100, 120, 124, 131, 
 
 137- 
 Castiglione, 33. 
 Castaion, P6re, 156. 
 Catullus, 42. 
 Chaise, Pere de la, 61. 
 Chamard,30,3i,3S. 
 Champagne, Philippe de, 103. 
 Chapelain, 66, 72, 119, 120, 122, 124, 126, 
 
 128,138,139. 
 Charlton, 19, 124, 131. 
 Charron, Pierre, 58. 
 Chassang, 72. 
 Chateaubriand, 8, 75. 
 Chfinier, 8, 37. 
 Ch6rot, H., 141. 
 
 Chesterfield, 64, 65, 88, 89, 90, 140, 158. 
 Chevreuse, Mme de, 82. 
 Cicero, 4, 30, 67, 70, 153, 157, 158. 
 Claudianus, 40. 
 Cleopatra, 13, 153. 
 Coefieteau, 70, 72, 161. 
 Colbert, 6, 162. 
 CoUas, 124. 
 CoUetet,F.,9i. 
 CoUetet, G., 145, 146. 
 
 Comte, 27. 
 
 Cond6, 84, 88, in, 154. 
 
 Condorcet, 27. 
 
 Congreve, 137. 
 
 Conti, 89. 
 
 Cooper, L., 8. 
 
 Coras, 141. 
 
 Corbinelli, 89, 140, 153. 
 
 Corday, Charlotte, 92. 
 
 ComeiUe, Pierre, S9, 64, 66, 67, 68, 69, 
 86,92,93, 109, no. III, 112,118, 120, 
 124, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129, 130, 131, 
 
 132, i33> 134. 13s. 136. 14I1 ISO- 
 Comeille, Thomas, 69, 114, 133, 135. 
 Cotin, abb6, 77. 
 Cotton, P6re, 60. 
 Couat, 27. 
 Cougny, 57. 
 Courajod, 162, 165. 
 Cousin, Victor, 16, 20, 21, 152. 
 Cowl, R. P., 98. 
 Coypel, 103, 163, 167. 
 Crane, T.F., 151. 
 Croll, 70. 
 CromweU, 153. 
 Crousaz, 16. 
 Cyrano de Bergerac, 62. 
 
 Dacier, 137, 159. 
 
 Dacier, Mme, 159. 
 
 Dan6s, 33. 
 
 Daurat, 33, 40. 
 
 Delaporte, 98, 141. 
 
 Delille,99. 
 
 Demosthenes, 8. 
 
 Denis, J., S9- 
 
 Denise, 98. 
 
 Dennis, 113. 
 
 Descartes, 19, 20, 21, 27, 50, Si> 59) 61, 
 
 62, 68, 71, 74. 7S, 76, 86, 164. 
 Deshouli6res,Mme, 143. 
 Desjardins, P., 22, 86, 162, 163. 
 Desmarets de Saint-Sorlin, 66, 119, 139, 
 
 141, 148. 
 Desportes, 47. 69. 93- 
 
INDEX 
 
 173 
 
 Dickinson, G. L., 8. 
 
 Dion Cassius, 131. 
 
 Dolet, 35. 
 
 Domenichino, 163. 
 
 Doncieux, 73, 105. 
 
 Diyden, 98, 106, 113, 139, 140, 141, 149, 
 
 161, 166. 
 Ducange, 159. 
 Dudiesne, 137, 138, 139. 
 Dufresnoy, 164, 166. 
 Dulot, 147. 
 
 Erasmus, 51, 52, 70. 
 Esprit, abb€, 82, 153. 
 Estienne, 27, 31, 39. 
 Estiades, mai^chal d', 160. 
 Euclid, 67. 
 Euripides, 26, 47, 67, 92, 114. 
 
 Faguet, 31. 
 
 Faret, 86. 
 
 Fayette, Mme de la, 91. 
 
 Ffinelon, 6, 144, 156. 
 
 Feuillade, due de la, S3. 
 
 Ficino, 19. 
 
 Fidao-Justiniani, 67. 
 
 Floquet, 156. 
 
 Fiorian-Pannentier, 96. 
 
 Florus, 70, 161. 
 
 Fontaine, A., 162, 163, 164. 
 
 Fontenelle, 114, 142, 143, 154. 
 
 Fonney, 16. 
 
 Fouquet, 147. 
 
 France, Anatole, 27. 
 
 Francis 1, 33, 85. 
 
 Franz, A., 151. 
 
 Fr£art de Cbambray, 164. 
 
 Furetifere, 148, 15°- 
 
 Gaifie, 40. 
 
 Galen, 67. 
 
 Gamier, 45, 116, 118. 
 
 Gassendi, 74. 
 
 Gayley, C. M.,98. 
 
 Gibieuf, 20. 
 
 Gillot, H., 6, 67, 69, 114. 
 
 Gilson,E., 20. 
 
 Giraud, V., 77. 
 
 Godeau, 146. 
 
 Gombaud, 125. 
 
 Gomberville, 148, 159. 
 
 Goncourt, 13. 
 
 " Grande Mademoiselle," 64, 65, 82,132. 
 
 Grandsaignes dHauterive, 62, 153. 
 
 Graves, F. P., so. 
 
 Gruget, Claude, 52. 
 
 Haillan, du, 160. 
 
 Hallam, 71. 
 
 Hamelin,0.,20. 
 
 Hamerton, P. G., 21, 22. 
 
 Hanotaux, G.,2i. 
 
 Haraszti, J., 116. 
 
 Hardy, A., 117, 118, 126. 
 
 Heinsius, 100, 119, 120, 121. 
 
 Heliodorus, 149. 
 
 Henriette d'Angleterre, 92. 
 
 Henry II, 33, 85. 
 
 Henry IV, 60. 
 
 Herbert of Cherbury, Lord, 20. 
 
 Herodotus, 108. 
 
 Hfiroet, 46. 
 
 Hesiod, 40. 
 
 Hillebrand, Karl, 26. 
 
 Hippocrates, 67. 
 
 Homer, 4, 30, 38, 40, 42, 43. 47i lOQ. i". 
 
 IIS, 138, 140, 149- 
 Horace, 4, 19, 30, 3s, 38, 39i 4°, 4Si 46, 
 
 47, 49, 55, 67, 100, 104, 112, 134, 136, 
 
 137, 143, 144, 158, 166. 
 Hospital, Michel de 1', 40, 49, 54, 55, 56. 
 Hourticq, L., 162, 164. 
 Howard, W.G., 166. 
 Huet, 149. 
 Hugo, Victor, 73. 
 Hurel, IS2, 154. 
 
 Isnard, 12s. 
 
 Jacquinet, P., iS4, 156- 
 Jodelle, 4S, 116. 
 
174 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Johnson, Dr., 8. 
 Jonson, Ben, 15, 24. 
 Jouin, 17, 103, 162, 163, 167. 
 Justus Lipsius, 57, 58, 70. 
 Juvenal, 43, 143- 
 
 Kany, C.E.,iS9. 
 Keats, 9. 
 Kelsey,F.W.,8. 
 Ker, W. P., 98, 149. 
 
 La Brayfire, 62, 81, 82, 84, 88, 90, 92, 
 104, no, 112, 13s, 152, 1S4, iSSi 156, 
 158, 159, 165. 
 
 La Calprenede, 148. 
 
 La Fayette, Mme de, 150. 
 
 La Fontaine, 62, 93, 136, 144. 
 
 La Mesnardifire, 100, 119, 120, 123. 
 
 Lamoignon, 64, in. 
 
 Lancaster, H. C, 118. 
 
 Langlois, Ch.-V., 160. 
 
 Lanson, 62, 86, 116. 
 
 Larivey, 117. 
 
 La Rochefoucauld, 61, 62, 65, 66, 89,90, 
 152, IS3- 
 
 Lasserre, 96. 
 
 Laumonier, 40, 51. 
 
 La Valette, cardinal de, 119. 
 
 Le Bidois, 132. 
 
 Le Bossu, 137, 140. 
 
 Le Brun, 162, 164, 165. 
 
 Leconte de Lisle, 8. 
 
 Lefevre d'Etaples, 431. 
 
 Lefranc, A., 33. 
 
 Lemaire, 22. 
 
 Lemaire de Beiges, 29, 34. 
 
 Le Maltre, A., 156. 
 
 Lemaltre, J., 128. 
 
 Lemonnier, H., 162, 163. 
 
 Le Moyne, 137, 138, 139, 140, 141. 
 
 Lenclos, Ninon de, 64, 66, 91. 
 
 Le N6tre, 107, 166. 
 
 Leonardo da Vinci, 33. 
 
 Lessing, 166. 
 
 Le Toumeux, abb€, 156. 
 
 Lilius Giraldus, 100. 
 Lingendes, P. Claude de, 156. 
 Lisle, 128. 
 
 Livingston, R. W., 8. 
 Livy, 131, IS3, 160. 
 Loges, Mme des, 64. 
 Longinus, 67, no, 114, 158. 
 Longueville, Mme de, 82. 
 Loret, 160. 
 
 Lorme, Marion de, 64. 
 Lorraine, Cardinal de, 40. 
 Louis XTV, 5, 6, 22, 60, 61, 63, 81, 83, 88, 
 90, 94, 97. "I, "3, "4, "9, Mi, 152, 
 
 160, l6!2, 165. 
 
 Lucan, 28, 131. 
 Lulli, 165. 
 Lycophitoa, 40. 
 
 Mabillon, 159, 160. 
 
 Michiavelli, 52, 67. 
 
 Macrobius, 137. 
 
 Maecenas, 86. 
 
 Magny, Olivier de, 41. 
 
 Maigron, 96. 
 
 Maintenon, Mme de, 85. 
 
 Mairet, 116, 118, 119, 120, 121, 124, 125, 
 
 126, 134. 
 Malebranche, 19, 20. 
 Malherbe, 18, 40, 59, 68, 69, 70, 72, 93, 
 
 103, 145. 
 Mambrun, 137, 139, 140. 
 Mantuan, 43. 
 Manuel, P., 162. 
 Margaret of Berry, 33, SS- 
 Margaret of Navarre, 29. 
 Marini, 66. 
 
 Marot, 29, 43, 44, 4S, 46. 
 Maisan, J., 117. 
 Martel, Charles, 13. 
 Marullus, 40, 42. 
 Matzke, 121. 
 Maulde la ClaviSre, 33. 
 Maurras, Charles, 25, 96. 
 Maynard, 146. 
 Mazarin, 6, 82, 151, 162. 
 
INDEX 
 
 I7S 
 
 M&iage, 64, 6s, iS9- 
 
 M€nard, Louis, 9. 
 
 M6t6, chevalier de, 62, 76, 86, 90, 153. 
 
 Mersenne, 20. 
 
 Mex!a, Pedro, 52. 
 
 M£zeray, 160. 
 
 Michaut, G., 77. 
 
 Minttimo, 46. , . 
 
 Molifere, 23, 53, 6^66, 84, 85, 87, 89, 90, 
 
 91. 92, 93. 97, 109, T127T16, 118, 119, 
 
 134, 13s, 148, 159- 
 Molon, 4. 
 Mdnod, G., 160. 
 Montaigne, 37, 49, 50, 51, 52, %z, 54, S6, 
 
 58, S9, 74, 77, 8s, 105, 150. 
 Montchrestien, 45, 116. 
 Montespan, Mme de, 85, 159, 160. 
 Morf,H.,i24. 
 Morton, Mrs. Sarah, 157. 
 Miinier-Jolain, 154. 
 Musset, 8, 41. 
 
 Napoleon, 5. 
 Navagero, 42. 
 Nisard, 21, 23, 25, 27. 
 Nourrisson, 82. 
 
 Ogier,F.,ii7. 
 
 Olivier, chancelier, 56. 
 
 OrUans, due d', 83. 
 
 Orleans, due d' (modem pretender), 96. 
 
 Ossat, Cardinal d', 158. 
 
 Ovid, 28, 41, 47, 146. 
 
 Pascal, 13, 27, ti, 61, 62, 63, 71, 72, 74, 
 
 75, 76, 77, 86, 87, 96, 152, IS3- 
 Pasquier, Etienne, 41, 157. 
 Pater, Walter, 9. 
 Patru, 70, 72, 157. 
 Pattison, Mark, 21, 22. 
 Peletier du Mans, 45, 46. 
 Pellissier, G.,46. 
 PeUisson, 124. 
 Perez, 67. 
 Pericles, 4. 
 
 Perrault, Charles, 69, 84, loi, 113, 114, 
 
 131. 141. 149, IS7, 161. 
 Perrault, Claude, 165. 
 
 Perrot, d'Ablaneourt, 70, 72, 161. 
 
 Persius, 143. 
 
 Petrarch, 32, 39, 43. 
 
 Pibrac, Guy du Faur de, 51, 146. 
 
 Piccolomini, 137. 
 
 Pigeon, 146. 
 
 Piles, de, 99. 
 
 Pindar, ^i, 38, 39, 40, 46, 47, 68. 
 
 Plato, 4, 14, x^, 16, 17, i8, 19, 20, 21, 22, 
 
 Z$, 45, 5°. SI. 55- 
 Plautus, 4S. 
 Pliny, IS7, 158. 
 Plotinus, 19. 
 
 Plutarch, 51, 52, 53, 100, 131, 166. 
 Poliziano, 43. 
 
 Pope, 71, 98, 103, 108, 109. 
 Poussin, Nicolas, 22, 37, 162, 163. 
 Pradon, 92. 
 Frimaticcio, 33. 
 Propertius,42,47. 
 Ptolemy, 67._ 
 Pulci, 14I. 
 Pure, abbfi de, 119. 
 
 Quinault, 69, 92, 133, 135. 
 Quintilian, 30, 35, 67, 103. 
 
 Rabelais, 29, 31, 85. 
 Racan, 143. 
 
 Racine, 8, 23, 61, 62, 66, 68, 69, 83, 87, 
 92, 93, 96, 97, 112, IIS, 125. 132. 133. 
 
 134. 136. 150, IS7. 160, 165. 
 Radouant, R., 57, 58. 
 Rambouillet, Mme de, 64, 91. 
 Ramus, 27, 49, 50, si. 
 Raphael, 163. 
 
 Rapin, 102, 103, 106, 109, iii, 112, 133, 
 137, 138, 140, 142, 144, 145. 146, IS5, 
 156. 
 
 Ravaillac, 60. 
 
 Rayssiguier, 125. 
 
 Regnier, 44, 4s, 48, i43- 
 
176 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Renaudot, Thfiophraste, 63, 160. 
 Reynolds, Sir J., 15, 16, 23, 37, 99, 100, 
 
 103, 104. 
 Richelieu, 6, 60, 63, 64, 67, 81, 118, 119, 
 
 120, 123, 124, 126, 151, 162. 
 Rigal, E., 116. 
 Rigau)t,H., 114. 
 Roannez, due de, 62, 76, 86. 
 Robert, 132. 
 Rochester, 107. 
 Ronsard, 8, 30, 31, 33, 34, 36, 38, 39, 40, 
 
 4I1 42. 43, 44, 46, 47. 48,49,54,55. 57, 
 
 72, 103, 137, 138, 142. 
 Rosenbauer, 34. 
 Rosset, 158. 
 Rosso, 33. 
 Rotrou, 64, 118. 
 Rousseau, 75, 87, 95, 107. 
 Roy, E.j, 149, 153. 
 Ryer, du, 118. 
 Rymer, 106, 113. 
 
 Sabl6,Minede,6i,64, 65,66, 76,91, 152, 
 
 153- 
 Sabli6re, Mme de la, 64. 
 Sabri6,J.-B., 58,59,71. 
 Saint-Amant, 107. 
 Saint-C3T:an, 92. 
 
 Sainte-Beuve, 3, 44, 70, 77, 87, 158. 
 Saint-Evremond, 104, 105, 106, 112, 
 
 136. 
 Saint-Gelais, 46, 55. 
 Saint-R6al, 98. 
 Saintsbury, 98. 
 Saint-Simon, 88. 
 Sannazaro, 33, 43, 48. 
 Sappho, 47. 
 Sarasin, 84, 145, 147. 
 Scaliger, 42, 100, 119, 120, 121, 131, 
 
 137- 
 Scarron, 65, 134, 150. 
 Sc6ve, 46. 
 Schelandre, 116. 
 Scott, F.N., 98. 
 
 Scudgiy, Georges de, 99, 118, 119, 120, 
 
 126, 137, 138, 139, 149. 
 Scudfiry, Mile de, 64, 65, 66, 91, 146, i48» 
 
 149. 150, 151, 159. 
 Searles, C, 116. 
 Sebillet,4o,43, 45,46. 
 Secundus,42. 
 Segrais, 143, 152. 
 SeiUiSre, 96. 
 Seneca, 45, 47, 51, 52, 53, 54. 57. 131. 
 
 136, 158. 
 Serafino, 30. 
 S6raphin, P6re, 156. 
 S6vign6, Mme de, 89, 91, 102, 104, 140, 
 
 153. 158, 159. i6o- 
 Sextus Empiricus, 53. 
 Shakespeare, 3, 97. 
 Sibilet, see Sebillet. 
 Sidney, Sir Philip, 49, 85. 
 Simonides, 166. 
 Smith, Gregory, 131. 
 Socrates, 4, 12. 
 Sophocles, 9, II, 47, 114. 
 Sorel, 149, 152, 153. 
 Souriau, 24. 
 
 Spanheim, Ez£chiel, 151. 
 Spenser, 44. 
 Sperone Speroni, 35. 
 Spingam, J. E., 98, 107, 161. 
 Statius, 47. 
 Stobaeus, 51, 52. 
 Strowski, F., 58, 77. 
 Swjly, 6. 
 Symonds,J. A.,S,8. 
 
 Taille, Jean de la, 45. 
 Taine, 16. 
 
 Tallemant des R€aux, 151. 
 Taxente, piincesse de, 152. 
 Tasso, 47, 138, 139, 149. 
 Tassoni, 161. 
 Tebaldeo, 30. 
 Temple, Sir W., 106. 
 Terfcnce, 45. 
 
INDEX 
 
 177 
 
 Testelin, 162, 163. 
 Themistocles, 11. 
 Theocritus, 4, 30, 31, 38, 42, 43, 46, 48, 
 
 142. 143- 
 Thtophile, 68, 69, 103, 107. 
 Theophrastus, 153, 154- 
 Thou, de, 160. 
 Thucydides, 11. 
 TiUey,A.,33. 
 Tomet,R., 138,152. 
 Trfimoille, Mile de la, 152. 
 Trissino, 45. 
 Turenne, III. 
 Tusanus, 33. 
 
 Urbam,Ch.,7o. 
 Urf6, d', 148. 
 
 Vair, du, S7, S8- 
 Valerius Maximus, 52. 
 Van Robsbioeck, G. L., 136. 
 Vaugelas, 27, 65, 69, 70, 72, 73, 119. 
 Vauquelin de la Fresnaye, 45, 46, 47, 48, 
 
 so- 
 Vial, 98. 
 
 Vida, 46, 100. 
 
 Villedieu, Mme de, 91. 
 
 Villey,P.,3S,si. 
 
 VirgU, 3, 4, 30, 38, 40, 42, 43, 46, 47, 48, 
 
 55, 109, III, 138, 139, 140, 142, 143, 
 
 149. 
 Visconti 160. 
 Voisin, femme, 92. 
 
 Voiture 65, 71, 72, 73, iii, 14s, 158. 
 Voltaire, 6, 107, 133, 139, 140, 156. 
 Vossius, 100, 120, 121, 131. 
 
 Waddington, Ch., 50. 
 Watteau, 143. 
 Weil, H., 129. 
 Wilde, Oscar, 9. 
 Winckelmann, 8, 13. 
 Wolseley, Robert, 107. 
 
 Xenophon, 56. 
 Ximenes, 67. 
 
 Zanta,L.,57. 
 Zevaco, D.,91. 
 iZyroniski,E.,s8. 
 
PEDJTBD AT 
 
 THE HAKVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS 
 
 CAMBRIDGE, MASS., IT. S. A.