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 V;
 
 ART IN THE MODERN STATE.
 
 ^ART IN THE 
 
 MODERN STATE 
 
 BY 
 
 LADY DILKE, 
 
 S.ENAISSANCE IN FRANCE," 
 D'APRfcS DES DOCUMENTS IN^DITS," ETC. ETC. 
 
 AUTHOR OF "the RENAISSANCE IN FRANCE," "CLAUDE LORRAIN 
 
 LONDON: CHAPMAN AND HALL. 
 
 Limited. 
 
 iSSS. 
 
 [A// rights rcsei-ved.l 
 
 5V
 
 CHARLES DICKENS AND EVANS, 
 CRYSTAL PALACE PRESS.
 
 5-5 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 I'AGS 
 
 FRANCE UNDER RICHELIEU I 
 
 The origin of the modern state in the seventeenth 
 century — The Renaissance and the " Grand Siecle " — 
 The poHtical situation — Richelieu's poHcy — The As- 
 sembly of Notables — Judicial murder of the Duke de 
 ?kIontmorency and other opponents — Intimidation of 
 the Parliament of Paris — Abuse of church patronage — 
 Oppression of the Huguenots — Organisation of the 
 Academy as a literary police — The Cid — The dictionary 
 — Richelieu's death — The foundations of despotic power 
 secured. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 FRANCE UNDER COLBERT 29 
 
 The Fronde and Mazarin— Advent of Colbert — 
 Colbert and Fouquet — Fouquct'sfall — Colbert establishes 
 financial equilibrium — Creates the navy — His edict on 
 commerce — Chambers of marine insurance — Compagnie 
 des Indes — Colbert's system of protection — Thetarift"of 
 1664— His industrial policy — The Academy of Painting 
 and Sculpture placed in conmiand of State manufactories 
 and the schools established in connection with them.
 
 vi CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARCHITECTURE . . . .51 
 
 Colbert, Chief Commissioner of Works — His clerk, 
 Charles Perrault — Le Vau and Bernini— Colbert forms 
 the Committee of the Eoard of Works — The Lomre 
 Colonnade — Claude Perrault — Versailles — The Com- 
 mittee of the Board of Works becomes the Academy of 
 Architecture — Continues to advise the Board of Works 
 — Acts as a general court of appeal to the profession 
 — Mansard — His additions to Versailles — His in- 
 dependence — The Academy sinks into insignificance — 
 Character of the works under Louis XIV. — None of 
 Colbert's projects carried out. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF PAINTING AND SCULPTURE . 8 1 
 
 Important part played by the Academy in the 
 organisation of the arts — The struggle of the Academy 
 with the maitrisc — Colbert supports the Academy — Le 
 Brun director — Constitution of the Academy — School — 
 Exhibitions — Lectures — Library — Collections — Obli- 
 gation of paying court to ministers — Protestant members 
 turned out — The Academy completely dependent on 
 the administration — Its influence on French art and 
 industry. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE ACADEMICAL SCHOOL lOI 
 
 Contest between the maitrisc and the Academy for 
 the training of students — The model — Expenses of the 
 life-class met by voluntary contributions — Revolt of 
 students under Abraham Bosse— Colbert interferes — 
 Institution of competitions — The Grand Prix — The 
 School of France at Rome — Hogarth on the Italian 
 journey — Errard — Admission to the schools gradually 
 made less easy— Regulations — Difficulties of maintaining 
 discipline — Master and student — Democratic organi- 
 sation of the school in connection with the Academy — 
 From the Academy proceeded other schools all over 
 France which have constantly influenced French pro- 
 duction.
 
 CONTENTS. vii 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 LR BRUN AND THE DECORATORS OF VERSAILLES . . II9 
 
 Simon Vouet — Le Brun— The Little Gallery of the 
 Louvre — The Great Gallery— Le Brun's versatility — 
 His supremacy — The Degre des Ambassadcurs — The 
 Galerie des Glaces — The Salons de la Guerre and de la 
 Paix— Flimsy character of much of the decoration — 
 Marly — Rapid production— Theatrical purpose — Sir 
 Joshua and Le Brun— Le Brun and Alignard — Le Brun's 
 despotism — His influence on art — Landscape — Le Brun, 
 as opposed to Mignard, a representative of tradition. 
 
 CHAPTER VIL 
 
 THE SCHOOL OF SCULPTURE 1 46 
 
 Puget — Girardon — Sarrazin and Guillain — The 
 school of Sarrazin — Le Brun's skilful use of patronage — 
 Girardon becomes his right hand at Versailles — The 
 Grotte de Thetis — La Fontaine's visit— The works of the 
 interior — The queen's apartments — The state apart- 
 ments — Cafficri — Coysevox and "consors" — The present 
 state of the sculptures of Versailles — Under Le Brun's 
 rule sculpture a subordinate element of decoration — 
 The best traditions of the school nevertheless preserved. 
 
 CHAPTER \TII. 
 
 ENGRAVING 1 67 
 
 Engravers in subjection to printers — Two groups, 
 engravers and etchers — Claude Mellan and other 
 satellites of Simon Vouet — Jacques Callot — His origin- 
 ality—His followers — Fair dell' Impruncta — Siege of 
 Breda — His studies and character — Abraham Bosse — 
 Hisquarrelswith the Academy — Nanteuil — His influence 
 at Court- He obtains the edict of St. Jean de Luz — His 
 portraits — Ostentatious living — Edelinck — The Cabinet 
 d'Estampes— The salaries of engravers to the CrowTi — 
 Their lodgings in the Gobelins and Louvre — Their 
 ofiicial recognition — Their unpopularity in the Academy 
 — Their situation even now scarcely modified.
 
 viii CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 INDUSTRIAL ARTS : THE GOBELINS— THE SAVONNERIE . 189 
 Ivlanufactures started by Henri IV.— Revived by 
 Colbert — The Gobelins — The Louvre— The Savonnerie 
 — The king's visit — The organisation of 1667 — Ap- 
 prentices — Academical school — The aid given on 
 occasion by the Academy— The looms of the Gobelins 
 — The Savonnerie and the Louvre— Costly furniture — 
 Van Somer — Oppenord — Boulle — The forges of the 
 Gobelins and the Louvre— Claude De Villers — Ballin — 
 Warin the medallist— Effect of systematic training has 
 survived neglect and change. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 CONCLUSION 216 
 
 Disciplined reaction against the Renaissance in- 
 augurated by the " Grand Siecle " — Individualism built 
 up absolutism — The revolution of 1789 gave check to 
 absolutism — Modern democracy the protest of the 
 Renaissance against the crimes which stifled it politically 
 — In art \vc have a corresponding situation. 
 
 APPENDIX, 
 I. 
 
 MKMOIRE DU PROCUREUR DU ROV AU CHATELET CONTRE 
 
 L'ACADl^MIE 223 
 
 II. 
 RAISONNEMENT DKSINTKRESSE POUR LES MAiTRES TOU- 
 
 CHANT L'.\CAD1^MIE DE ST. LUC 225 
 
 III. 
 LIST OF PAPERS CONTAINED IN ARCHIVES OF THE ACADEMY 
 OF ST. LUKE AT ROME RELATIVE TO THE JUNCTION 
 PROPOSED WITH THE R.A. OF PAINTING AND SCULPTURE 
 AT PARIS, TOGETHER WITH AN UNPUBLISHED LETTER 
 OF LE BRUN jl227
 
 CONTEXTS. ix 
 
 IV. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 NOTE ON THE PRIVILEGES OF ACADEMICIANS . . . 230 
 
 NOTE OX THE ACADE.MV LECTURES 230 
 
 VI. 
 NOTE ON THE ACADEMY EXHIBITIONS 232 
 
 VII. 
 NOTE OX THE LOUVRE COLONNADE 232 
 
 VIII. 
 
 EXTRACTS AND SUMMARY OF CONTEXTS OF REGISTER OF 
 
 THE ACADEMY OF ARCHITECTURE FROM 1672 TO 1694 233 
 
 IX. 
 
 UNPUBLISHED DOCUMENTS RELATIVE TO CALLOT'S STAY 
 
 AND \VORK IN FLORENCE 24c 
 
 X. 
 
 EDIT DU ROY POUR L'KTABLISSEMENT D'UNE MANU- 
 FACTURE DES MEUBLES DE LA COURONNE AUX 
 GOBELINS 24: 
 
 A*
 
 ABBREVIATIONS. 
 
 Arch. Nat.— Archives Nationales. 
 
 C. DES Bts. — -Comptes des batiments du roi sous le regne de 
 Louis XIV., publics par Jules Guiffrey, 1664-16S7. 
 
 1-Cj. — Inventaire general du mobilier de la Couronnc sous Louis 
 XIV. (1663-1715), par Jules Guiffrey. 
 
 .\RCH DE l'Art Fr.— Archives de Fart frangais, Recueil de 
 documents inedits, publies sous la direction de AI. de 
 Chenneviires. Paris, 1852-1862. 
 
 Nouv. Arch. — Nouvelles archives de I'art fran9ais, Recueil de 
 documents inddits, publies par la socidte de I'histoire 
 de Part fran^ais. Paris, 1S72-1S85. 
 
 P.V. — Proces-verbaux dc I'Ancienne Acaddmie de Peinture et de 
 Sculpture. Publies par M. A, de Montaiglon, 1875. 
 
 M.I. — Memoires inedits sur la vie et les ouvrages des membres 
 de I'Academie Royalc, publies par ]\IM. Dussieux, 
 Soulic, etc. etc. 
 
 PiGANlOL. — Piganiol de la Force. Nouvelle description des chateaux 
 et pares de Versailles et Marly. Paris, 1764.
 
 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 FRANXE UNDER RICHELIEU. 
 
 To the student of the modern social system, a minute 
 knowledge of the various conditions of life in France 
 during- the " Grand Siccle " is indispensable. The 
 France of RicheHeu and Colbert gave birth to the 
 modern state, so that, if we would know anything- 
 accurately about modern political and social organisa- 
 tion, we have to look to the system which lies at the 
 root of our own growth. This is the case in every 
 branch of life. Administrative problems, social diffi- 
 culties, industrial needs, all the disturbing complexities 
 of our present economical situation were formulated and 
 constructively dealt with by the rulers of France in 
 the " Grand Siccle." The true greatness of this great 
 century consists in this, not in its vain wars, and formal 
 stage, and stilted eloquence, and pompous palaces, and 
 grandiose art, but in the formation and working out of 
 the political and social system of which these things 
 were the first fruits. It is idle to indulge in academical 
 discussions as to the merits of this system. We have 
 inherited it, it has penetrated our lives in every 
 direction, we act, we think under its invisible pressure, 
 /
 
 2 ART L\ THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 and its study is pregnant with teaching, not only for 
 the student, but also for the practical man. 
 
 One of the most noted, and justly noted connoisseurs 
 of Paris asked : " How can one dwell on the art of the 
 seventeenth century? It has no charm." The answer 
 is, that it presents in its organisation, from the point 
 of view of social polity, problems of the highest 
 intellectual interest. Throughout all its phases the life 
 of France wears, during the seventeenth century, a 
 political aspect. The explanation of all changes in the 
 social system, in letters, in the arts, in fashions even, 
 has to be sought in the necessities of the political 
 position ; and the seeming caprices of taste take their 
 rise from the same causes which went to determine 
 the making of a treaty or the promulgation of an edict. 
 This seems all the stranger because in times preceding, 
 letters and the arts at least appeared to flourish in 
 conditions as far removed from the action of statecraft 
 as if they had been a growth of fairyland. In the 
 ^Middle Ages they were devoted to a virgin image of 
 virtue ; they framed in the shades of the sanctuary an 
 ideal shining with the beauty born of self-renunciation, 
 of resignation to self-imposed conditions of moral and 
 physical suffering. By the queenly Venus of the Re- 
 naissance they were consecrated to the joys of life, 
 and the world saw that through their perfect use, men 
 might renew their strength, and behold virtue and 
 beauty \\ith clear eyes. It was, however, reserved for 
 the rulers of France in the seventeenth century fully 
 to realise the political function of letters and the arts 
 in the modern state, and their immense importance in 
 connection with the prosperity of a commercial nation. 
 
 The policy pursued by Louis XIV.'s great Minister, 
 Colbert, derived its impulse, in this as in every other
 
 FRAXCE UXDER RICHELIEU. 3 
 
 respect, from the state policy inaugurated by his great 
 predecessor, Richeh"cu ; and it is quite impossible to 
 rightly understand the relations between the state and 
 the arts which were created in France by Colbert, 
 unless we first recall the circumstances which led 
 Richelieu into the arbitrary courses which he invigorated 
 Avith his splendid talent, and which are alternately the 
 object of extravagant blame or extravagant admiration, 
 only because the conditions under which he had to work 
 are so little understood. 
 
 When the reign of Henri IV. came to its fatal 
 close, men weary of combat were ready to barter liberty 
 for law. The ideal to which the sixteenth century had 
 aspired — the ideal which had involved the liberation of 
 human life from all the restraints which prevented its 
 harmonious development — was replaced by the vision 
 of order. This love of order was the passion of the day, 
 and in the name of order all tyranny was justified. To 
 this attitude of mind, innovations, political or religious, 
 were alike odious, and power awaited those alone who 
 either divined or shared it. Step by step, every aspira- 
 tion after freedom — freedom of thought, freedom of 
 expression, freedom of life — was suppressed, and the 
 desire for individual liberty which the sixteenth century 
 had fostered, encountered everywhere a royal tyranny, 
 the very existence of which depended on its destruction. 
 
 The work of establishing this tyranny and of destroy- 
 ing the liberties of France fell to the lot of Richelieu. 
 Trained both as a soldier and a priest, equally ready 
 with measures of red-handed repression or secret police, 
 Richelieu w^as doubly fitted for the task. All that the 
 Renaissance prized most highly had no value for him, 
 and if he had little love for liberty, for letters he had 
 still less. It must not, however, be supposed that the 
 
 B 2
 
 4 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 system on which he worked — the system which ulti- 
 mately gave France that leading place in Europe which 
 she has ever since maintained — was the outcome of mere 
 personal and arbitrary caprice. Every great political 
 and social system which has given a new aspect to 
 histor}-, and constituted itself a power among men, has 
 necessarily had for the very principle of its existence 
 the consent of some great moral truth. In the affirma- 
 tion of this truth has lain the source of strength, but 
 also of weakness, for in pushing it to extreme con- 
 clusions the negation has been reached of other truths, 
 opposite in character, but equal in value, which have in 
 their turn asserted their existence and put to confusion 
 those who had ignored their force, 
 
 Richelieu was deeply imbued with the importance 
 of truths diametrically opposite to those which were 
 embodied in the movement of the Renaissance. For 
 the Renaissance had proclaimed that the most noble 
 fruits of life are produced only when complete scope is 
 allowed to the development of the individual, but 
 Richelieu remembered that the individual counts for 
 very little in the development of a people. The affirma- 
 tion of the supreme rights of the individual, having been 
 carried to its extreme, had ended in reaction, and the 
 whole tendency of Richelieu^s policy was necessarily 
 governed by the consequences which this reaction had 
 imposed. The day had not yet come for the asking in 
 what way individual liberty might be secured, whilst at 
 the same time there should be created in the mass that 
 unity of purpose which alone ensures collective action 
 and leads to national greatness. The task of the 
 moment was only the simple task of creating this unity 
 of purpose and of realising this ideal of collective action ; 
 to this task Richelieu devoted the most splendid
 
 FRANCE UNDER RICHELIEU. 5 
 
 energies which ever inspired a suffering human body, 
 and he accomplished that which he set himself to 
 do. 
 
 The Renaissance, in its devotion to a noble moral 
 ideal which had for its object the making of a great 
 man, had overlooked the value of the social and 
 political ideal which aspires to the making of a great 
 nation ; but if the Renaissance paid dear for its neglect 
 of the claims of citizenship, the reactron by which it was 
 followed was destined to pay no less dear for its neglect 
 of individual claims. The principles of absolutism have 
 now, in spite of slight vicissitudes, dominated in one 
 shape or another the social and political world of 
 Europe for two centuries ; and just as in the sixteenth 
 century we see the individual upraising himself against 
 moral and religious oppression, even so we see to-day 
 the revolt of those who have suffered from the social 
 and political tyranny inherent to that ideal of the state 
 which was inaugurated by Richelieu and Colbert. That 
 they did so inaugurate it was a necessity of their posi- 
 tion, a necessity of the reaction of which they were the 
 exponents. It is easy to represent Richelieu as an 
 ambitious priest, who, making himself the tool of abso- 
 lute monarchy, seized on wealth and power, crushing 
 out popular liberties, and destroying alike free cities and 
 free thought. In truth Richelieu cared for none of 
 these things; the royal power was not to him an object 
 for reverence, but for use, and if Protestantism were to 
 be put down, and the power of the great nobles broken, 
 it was not in the interest of the throne or the Church, 
 but to clear the way for the welding of all the forces 
 of the nation into one giant whole. The welfare of the 
 people, the glory of letters and the arts, the develop- 
 ment of trade, and industrial resources, were matters for
 
 6 ART L\ THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 consideration^ not in and for themselves, but only 
 inasmuch as they contributed to the building up of 
 that fabric of national grandeur which was the supreme 
 object of Richelieu's policy. It was not a selfish 
 polic}' ; his ambition was not for himself, but for the 
 nation to wdiich he belonged ; it was not a servile 
 polic}-, he cared naught for Louis and much for France ; 
 but he was utterly indifferent as to whether the people 
 he was called to govern were happy, or enlightened, or 
 prosperous, so long as by their united forces the state 
 grew strong. To bring about this result Richelieu 
 laboured, taking no rest, and as he worked he ruthlessly 
 destroyed all life and liberty the existence of which was 
 incompatible with regular growth. No cruelty was too 
 pitiless, no treachery too base, if required to maintain 
 the pressure necessary to force into even channels all 
 the springs of national energy. The pride of the great 
 nobles was brought to the scaffold; the pride of 
 the magistracy broken to the task of registering 
 decrees to order ; stiffnecked members of Huguenot 
 consistories stooped to accept civilities accorded to 
 them solely as men of learning; while learning and 
 letters themselves were forced to put on a ro}-al livery as 
 the i^rice of bare existence. 
 
 The pressure of things without coincided with the 
 necessities of the internal situation. On every frontier 
 of France the deadly presence of Austria-Spain made 
 itself felt, and helped to impose on Richelieu those 
 conditions Avhich he in his turn imposed on France. 
 All internal dissensions, all seeds of domestic opposition 
 had to be utterly destroyed, so that he might use the 
 whole resources of the nation in the struggle to main- 
 tain her place in Furope. The Huguenots challenged 
 their own ruin by striving: to take him at a disadvan-
 
 FRANCE UNDER RICHELIEU. 7 
 
 tage during his first campaign in the Valtelline. The 
 Cardinal turned and temporised with them at ]\Iont- 
 peUier (1626), but, having gained time, he deliberately 
 negotiated the Peace of Monzon witli the enemy, in 
 order that he might be free to crush Protestant France. 
 Until the walls of La Rochelle had fallen (1628), 
 Richelieu scrupulously avoided all foreign complica- 
 tions ; when that terrible hour of reckoning had struck, 
 when fire and famine and the sword had carried ruin, 
 with every circumstance of anguish inconceivable, to 
 the most heroic source of energy in France, then he 
 felt free once more to take the field. But again, the 
 Italian campaign had scarcely opened when a second 
 desperate rebellion, under the Duke de Montmorenc}', 
 compelled Richelieu to abandon his footing. He drew 
 back but for a moment, and the execution of the Duke 
 at Toulouse gave the signal for the third renewal of 
 the never-ending struggle with Austria-Spain. I'or 
 five long years it now continued with varying fortunes, 
 till in 1635 all seemed lost, and Paris herself was 
 actually threatened by the Spaniard ; but the tide 
 turned at its worst, Savoy Avas mastered, Alsace was 
 secured, and Richelieu, before his death, had the good 
 fortune to sec his highest hopes on the verge of fulfil- 
 ment, and to hear the news of victory for once ringing 
 louder than the echoes of defeat. If ever during his 
 long tenure of power the fight with dangers without 
 seemed to slacken for a moment, then indeed be sure 
 that the fiercest internal effort was being made in 
 preparation for its renewal : only once, and that when 
 he employed the prestige of his brilliant successes in 
 Italy (1629) to overawe Languedoc, had the Cardinal 
 felt himself sufficiently strong to face, at the same time, 
 his foes both foreign and domestic. The national
 
 8 ART IX THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 existence was at stake throughout these long years of 
 unequal struggle, during which the treachery of those 
 within her borders was an even greater menace to the 
 life of France than all the forces of her foes without. 
 To secure victor}', to prevent defeat abroad, lives and 
 liberties were freely sacrificed at home, and any act, 
 however oppressive or illegal, became just. 
 
 It was thus that the Cardinal was forced to have 
 recourse to the most bloody and unlawful measures in 
 order to crush the power of the great nobles of the 
 realm. He had founded his rule, curiously enough, 
 on a mock appeal to the popular will. The Assembly 
 of Notables which he called together in 1626 was, 
 like the plebiscite of 1S52, a farce intended to preface 
 the exercise of arbitrary' power. The country gentle- 
 men and tradesmen who had been invited to join the 
 magistracy at Paris ^ were flattered by the prospect of 
 a direct influence on public affairs, and Richelieu desired 
 them to counsel him "sans crainte ni desir de deplaire 
 ou complaire a personne."- But the line they were 
 expected to take on each point submitted to them was 
 distinctly indicated from the outset, and on assembling 
 in the great hall of the Tuileries, the Notables heard, 
 from the lips of the Cardinal's mouthpiece, ]\Iarillac, 
 the Keeper of the Seals, that it was necessar\-, in order 
 to check the lightness with which men engaged in 
 seditious practices, that new laws should be enacted 
 against political offenders, so that justice might be 
 done without awaiting the results of legal procedure.-' 
 
 It is clear that to obtain these laws was the chief 
 
 ' " Proccs- Verbal dc cc qui s'est passe ;i rassemblee des Notables, 
 tenue au Palais dcs Tuileries tn Tannec 1626. Extiait du Mvnnre 
 /><i;/}a/j de la meme annec." Paris, 1787. 
 
 ^ Jduu, p. 39. • Ji/c-M, p. 20.
 
 FRAXCE UNDER RICHELIEU. 9 
 
 if not the sole object for which Richeh'eu had called the 
 Assembly together. On its dispersal there instantly 
 followed, one after another, the judicial murders of 
 the greatest nobles of France. The temper of these 
 men was an undoubted danger which threatened not 
 only the unity but even the very existence of the power 
 which Richelieu sought to establish. Corneille, in the 
 opening scene of the Cid, records the arrogance of their 
 tone and pretensions. The speeches of Don Gomez 
 are evidently inspired by memories of the rebel Duke 
 de ^lontmorency, who had perished on the scaffold in 
 1632, just four }-ears previous to the appearance of this 
 famous pla\'. 
 
 The death of the Duke de Alontmorency — a man 
 who by marriage stood very near the king, for his 
 wife was a cousin of the queen-mother, in whose 
 interest he had taken up arms — was preceded and fol- 
 lowed by the fall of other victims hardly less illustrious. 
 In all these cases, judgment was procured by wholly 
 illegal expedients. It is, however, certain that it was 
 in each instance absolutely necessary, not only to 
 Richelieu's safety, but necessary in the interests of 
 France, that a conviction should be obtained at any 
 price. It was impossible to deal effectively with 
 dangers abroad whilst domestic plots and conspiracies 
 required to be strictly watched. Foreign complications 
 were actually made the signal for home intrigues ; every 
 threat of disaster to the national arms was welcomed as 
 giving fresh opening for an endeavour to compass the 
 downfall of the Cardinal. To achieve this result the 
 nobles of France intrigued with England or Spain 
 abroad, and stirred up the Huguenots to revolt at 
 home. Thus Soubise, at a critical moment of the 
 Italian campaign, in 1625, embarrassed Richelieu by
 
 lo ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 rousin^^ the country at his back, obliging him to sacri- 
 fice the prospects of the war and the interests of his 
 alHcs by the hasty conclusion of peace. To accomphsh 
 the hke end, princes of the blood crossed the frontier 
 and negotiated with the deadliest enemies of France. 
 Nor negotiated only ; secret treaties were actually 
 signed by them with Austria-Spain. Things went so 
 far that, in 1632, the French saw their territory invaded 
 by the heir to the crown ; they saw Gaston, Duke of 
 Orleans, the son of Henri IV., in arms, and accom- 
 panied by the very dregs of the Spanish forces. 
 
 As it was impossible to inflict on Gaston himself the 
 punishment which his crimes and his cowardice de- 
 served, the chastisement of his accomplices — whom he 
 always unscrupulously betrayed — had to be obtained by 
 fair means or foul. On this, the first occasion of a 
 serious plot against Richelieu's policy and life, there 
 was no evidence of the guilt of one of the chief culprits, 
 the young Count de Chalais, which could have been laid 
 before Parliament. The Cardinal, therefore, had recourse 
 to a commission, irregular both in its constitution and 
 in its form of procedure. At the arbitrary decree of 
 this chamber of justice, the young Count and Marshal 
 de Marillac died by the hand of the executioner in 1632. 
 In spite of repeated appeals to the Parliament of 
 Paris, by whom alone he could have been legally 
 tried, the Duke de iNIontmorency was brought before a 
 similar tribunal. The deliberations of the Parliament 
 of Toulouse were openly directed, in virtue of a royal 
 warrant, by an officer of the Crown specially despatched 
 for the purpose of obtaining a verdict. In justification 
 of these high-handed severities, Richelieu pleaded that 
 it would be unjust to try to set an example "par la 
 soumission dcs petits;" but he did not suffer " les petits"
 
 FRANCE hWDER RICHELIEU. ii 
 
 to escape, for on this occasion the minor culprits received 
 their full share of penalties, some being condemned to 
 be torn by four horses, whilst others were to be broken 
 on the wheel. 
 
 Having once entered on this course, Richelieu was 
 unable to draw back ; he was forced to take the same 
 steps over and over again — steps which, theoretically at 
 least, he did not approve. Not only were the proceed- 
 ings of these irregular commissions directed by Crown 
 officers, but the creatures nominated to sit were bought, 
 and bound to return a verdict in accordance with the 
 exigencies of the political situation. Thus, while the 
 Cardinal was announcing his desire to reform the magis- 
 tracy and to put an end to the sale of offices of trust, 
 his practice was in direct opposition to his principles. 
 
 A year after the execution of the Duke de Llont- 
 morency, the lengths to which Richelieu found himself 
 forced to go, are even more plainly illustrated by the 
 steps taken in reference to the trial of the Duke de la 
 Valette. The Duke, \\\\o was reckoned the best match 
 in France, had been forced, in 1633, to marry a niece of 
 Richelieu in order to make terms for his father, the 
 Duke d'Epernon, who had, as Governor of Guienne, 
 been involved in a desperate quarrel with the Arch- 
 bk^hop de Sourdis, apparently sent to Bordeaux b}- the 
 Cardinal for the express purpose of provoking it. De 
 la Valette revenged himself for being forced into a con- 
 nection which he regarded as a disgrace, by ironical 
 jests, which are said to have wounded Richelieu so 
 deeply that, in 1639, he declared that should the Duke, 
 his niece's husband, be put upon his trial for his alleged 
 incompetence or treachery at the siege of Fontarabia, 
 he himself was read}- to play the part of prociircur- 
 gaicral. Warned by the fate of others, De la Valette
 
 12 ART IX THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 fled to England ; and as England refused to give him 
 up^ the trial was proceeded with in his absence. 
 
 The officers of tlie Parliament of Paris were sum- 
 moned to St. Germain, where a curious mixture of 
 cajolery and coercion was employed to bring them to 
 compliance. No explanation was given of the object 
 for which they had been convoked until they had eaten 
 a splendid dinner, to which they had been set down on 
 their arrival. Not until they had well dined were they 
 informed that the king had required their attendance in 
 their capacity of councillors of state. In the council- 
 chamber, the king himself curtly informed them that 
 they had been sent for to try the Duke de la Valctte. 
 Though thus taken at a disadvantage, Le P"a}-, the 
 premier president, had the courage to represent that the 
 proposed course was illegal, and humbly to entreat his 
 majesty to act according to law. " Je ne le veux pas," 
 was the answer ; "vous faites les difficiles, et il semble 
 que vous voulcz me tenir en tutelle ; mais je suis le 
 maitre, et je saurai me faire obeir." The report was then 
 read to them, and the king himself solicited the votes, 
 challenging those present, one by one, and returning to 
 their abject protestations the same answer: "That's not 
 a vote. Vote." The Cardinal looked on without speak- 
 ing, but the fear which he inspired was so great that 
 only one man dared stand firm. Dc Bellelievre courage- 
 ously declared that the course adopted was incompatible 
 with the royal dignity, and refused, in answer to the 
 king's repeated demands, to swerve from his original 
 statement. He alone, too, when the second sitting of 
 this arbitrariK-constitutcd commission took place, on 
 the I4tii of May, 1640, coolly discussed the evidence, 
 and protested that it was absolutely insufficient to sus- 
 tain the charge of high treason. The others, to a man,
 
 FRANCE UNDER RICHELIEU. 13 
 
 gave their vote for death, justly alarmed at what might 
 be the consequences of any exercise of independent 
 judgment ; for Louis, in dismissing them on the first 
 occasion of their meeting, had made use of these signi- 
 ficant words : " Ceux qui discnt que je ne puis pas 
 donner les juges qu'il me plait a mes sujets quand ils 
 m'ont offense, sont des ignorants qui sont indignes de 
 posseder leurs charges." 
 
 On this wise Richelieu intimidated the magistrac}-, 
 strained, and even violated, the laws. To make head 
 against the foreign enemies of France, he had to crush 
 all opposition at home ; to crush all opposition at home, 
 he forced the guardians of justice to becoine the mere 
 tools of Government. The Parliament of Paris went on 
 protesting, but in vain, against his illegalities. It has, 
 indeed, been contended that the spirit displayed by this 
 body, its resistance to the high-handed exercise of abso- 
 lute power, was never inspired by the love of civic 
 liberties, but was prompted only by professional jealousy, 
 zealous in the tenacious observance of the letter of the 
 law, eager to defend details of effete procedure and all 
 vested interests, however obnoxious to the light of reason 
 or the common good. If, however, the Parliament had 
 confined its action to matters such as these, it would not 
 have become the object of extreme measures of coercion 
 on the part of the Crown ; it contained many who were 
 mere lawyers, but it also numbered among its members 
 those who believed in their responsibilities as magis- 
 trates, as citizens, as men, and occasionally the whole 
 body would be thus inspired to active protest in the 
 cause of liberty and justice. 
 
 In their dealings with Richelieu the Parliament 
 were always forced in the end to bow to his will, but 
 they seized on every opportunity of marking their
 
 14 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 disapproval, and the infinite annoyance with which 
 he regarded their attitude of irreconcilable opposition is 
 illustrated by many maxims laid down in the " Testament 
 Politique." It is not safe, of course, to take a work of 
 doubtful authenticity as an authority for what the 
 Cardinal wished to do, but it is an instructive com- 
 mentary on what he really did. Perhaps, too, in this 
 lies the best evidence against Richelieu's having had 
 any direct concern in its composition, otherwise he 
 would afford an unique example of public performance 
 in perfect harmony with private intentions, of success 
 attained, not only in the very direction, but by the 
 precise measures by which it was intended to be 
 compassed. According to the "Testament," that very 
 suppression of venality which Richelieu is elsewhere 
 represented as having had at heart, was a reform wholly 
 inexpedient, for the sale of public posts acted as a bar 
 to men of low birth, and men of \q\k birth ought to 
 be kept out of high office, for "les esprits de telles 
 gens sont d'ordinaire difficiles a manier." Richelieu — 
 governing always with one great object in view, 
 determined to enforce that union within, which alone 
 could make I'rance externally powerful, having need 
 at every turn of facile tools — found himself forced to 
 break the neck of theory in practice, and thus as late 
 as 1639, just before proceeding to try the Duke de la 
 Valctte, he refreshed his supply of persons easy to 
 handle by creating and selling no less than four 
 hundred places of *^ procurcur au Parlement de Paris." 
 
 Whilst he crushed the great nobles, and forced 
 the magistracy to become the tools of authority, 
 Richelieu was not slack to follow up the same lines 
 of policy in other directions. The benefices of the 
 Church, as well as the offices of state, were reserved
 
 FRANCE UNDER RICHELIEU. 1$ 
 
 for tlic poor in spirit ; a little learning- was no draw- 
 back, but the recognised qualifications for a bishop 
 were huinilit}', good birth, and general respectability- 
 unblemished by any touch of prick!}' austerity. Of 
 these, humility alone was indispensable, and throughout 
 the days of Richelieu the humble " petit collet " in- 
 variably received preferment. Now and then a high 
 post was attained by a great militant ecclesiastic, 
 like De Sourdis, who was, as we have seen, sent to 
 Bordeaux to worry the Duke d'Epernon ; but Godeau, 
 Bishop of Grasse, is a better representative of Kichelieu's 
 bishops. As the Abbe Antoine, Godeau was renowned 
 as a scribbling piquc-assiette, a hanger-on at the Hotel 
 Rambouillet, who pla}-cd lackey to Julie, and afforded 
 a daily butt for the witticisms of Voiture. He had just 
 enough pride left to feel uneasy in his position, and to 
 show it, whereupon his successful rival in the good 
 graces oi \\\^ prccieuscs counselled him in rhyme : 
 
 Quittez Tamour, ce n'est votre metier : 
 P'aitcs des vers, traduisez le psautier. 
 
 Godeau took the hint, bethought himself of the 
 Cardinal, and fell at his feet with a translation of 
 the " Benedicite," done into French verse. " Monsieur 
 I'Abbc/' graciously replied Richelieu, " vous me donnez 
 ' Benedicite,' et moi jc vous donnerai Grasse/' The 
 " nain de Julie," as he called himself, accordingly 
 became a bishop, and in that position admirably 
 fulfilled his benefactor's ideal of respectable mediocrity, 
 unblemished by any touch of " austeritc epineusc." 
 
 This same prickly austerity would alone have 
 sufficed to make the Huguenots hateful in Richelieu's 
 eyes, even if he had not seen in them " des ames 
 rebelles a la legitime autorite ; " but in the hands of
 
 i6 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 the Dukes de Rolian and de Soubise the organisation 
 of the party assumed an aggressive character, so that 
 in the interests of legitimate authorit}' its destruction 
 became necessary. Nor could a man of Richelieu's 
 peculiar genius ever regard with toleration those who 
 had once thwarted his plans and resisted his power. 
 Although the edict of 1629, which deprived the 
 Huguenots of their right of public meeting, expressly 
 maintained their freedom of worship, Richelieu always 
 refused to recognise, even by implication, their ecclesias- 
 tical constitution. When the Consistory of Montauban 
 came to do homage to the great Cardinal — who, with 
 the ruins of La Rochelle at his back, had carried 
 fire and sword throughout the province of Languedoc, 
 and deprived the Protestants of their last cit}- of 
 refuge — they were at once informed that as men of 
 letters they would be always welcome, though as an 
 ecclesiastical corporation they could not be received. 
 
 Xor was it possible, under this general and arbitrary 
 pressure, that even letters and learning should be free. 
 Having established his power, and obtained a firm 
 hold upon all civil and ecclesiastical organisations, it 
 would seem as if Richelieu had been in full possession 
 of the means of government ; but he saw his wa}' to 
 a further and more complete security by the vigilant 
 direction and control of all the opinions as well as of 
 all the acts of men. Those of independent spirit soon 
 became sensible of the weight of his intentions in this 
 direction. In the very year of that same "pacification " 
 of Languedoc, Descartes cjuittcd h^'ance for Holland, 
 foreseeing that in his native country he would be 
 neither "assez seul ni assez libre.^^ Balzac retired to 
 Angoulcme ; Corneille, after a moment of revolt, 
 humbly gave in his submission, and so obtained the
 
 FRANCE UNDER RICHELIEU. 17 
 
 protection of the tutelary god of letters : " unc pro- 
 tection/^ said Sarrasin, ''qu'on scrait plus que sacrilege 
 de violer."! And, to the last, this system of repression 
 held good ; in vain did the Sorbonne in 1638 unite 
 in desiring to receive the gifted Antoine Arnauld, 
 then a young man, whose merit was beyond doubt, 
 and whose theology had not yet incurred serious 
 suspicion. Richelieu, dying, still kept watch, and on 
 a technical point prevented his admission.- Nor did 
 minor men escape watchful observation. The Cardinal, 
 having strained the quality of justice and of mercy 
 in the service of a power to which he was himself a 
 slave, came to live on the breath of spies, came to 
 fear not only the influence of the great with his weakly 
 master, but the influence of the infinitely little with 
 the great. He would take note of the social rela- 
 tions of even quite obscure persons. The name of 
 Jacques Hillcrin, consciller an parlemcnt^ came up on 
 one occasion when arbitrary measures were in con- 
 templation against some of the body to which he 
 belonged: "Let him alone," said the Cardinal, "aussi 
 n'y a-t-il ricn a gagner avcc lui qui vit dc telle sorte 
 qu'il ne voit princes n'y grands, n'y se trouve en 
 compagnie.'' -^ The less fortunate Scarron, coiiseillcr dc 
 qraiid'cliainbrc, whose life was more worldly, and 
 
 <b 
 
 whose tongue had something of the bitter wit which 
 distinguished his more celebrated son, not only lost 
 his place, but was finally exiled from France. 
 
 The true reason for the extreme measures taken 
 against Scarron is doubtful, but it was known that 
 when the letters patent** creating the Academic Fran- 
 
 ' " D"scourssur laTragedie." See " L'Amourtyrannique, " Scmlcri. 
 - See p. 29, vol. i., "Vie d' Antoine Arnaukl." Lausanne, 1783. 
 3 " Lettres Chronologiques," p. 116. 
 
 "» Tiie Letters Paicitt wcie drawn up l-y \'alentin Conrart ; the privileges 
 
 C
 
 i8 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 caise came before Parliament for verification (1635)^ 
 he sarcastically remarked : " This reminds one of the 
 emperor who, having forbidden the senate to deal with 
 public affairs, consulted it as to what sauce should be 
 eaten with a large turbot, which had been sent to him 
 from a distance/^ ^ Scarron, it would seem, did not 
 realise that the Academy itself was called into exist- 
 ence to render definite political services, and that its 
 members were destined to discharge at the will of the 
 Cardinal, in a very practical fashion, the functions of a 
 literary police. 
 
 The list of the original members does not contain 
 a single name of note. Its nucleus was, indeed, formed 
 by a small society styling itself Academic des Beaux 
 Esprits, which, in 1630, had begun to meet at the house 
 of Valentin Conrart to read the rhymes of his gallant 
 relative, the Abbe Godeau. Conrart himself was a 
 Calvinist, who had retouched Marot's version of the 
 Psalms, but was better known by his rhymes in reply 
 to the popular ballad of " Le Goutteux sans pareii." 
 At a later date his name figured on Colbert's list of 
 literary pensioners :- " Au sieur Conrart, lequel sans con- 
 noissance d'aucune autre langue que sa maternelle est 
 admirable pour juger toutes les productions de Pesprit 
 — 1500 liv." Those who met at Conrart's house were 
 mostly rhymesters like himself ; one only — Gombault — 
 was a man of quality who had contributed to the " Guir- 
 landc de Julie," and therefore passed as a poet at the 
 Hotel dc Rambouillet. With two exceptions — IMalle- 
 
 conferrc'l were the exemption from " toutes tutellcs ct curatelles et cic tons 
 gueis et gardes," " le droit de commiltimus dc toutes leurs causes person- 
 nelles, possessoires, ct hypothecaires." — Pellisson, " Histoire de I'Aca- 
 demie Fran(;aise," ed. Olivet, vol. i. pp. 30, 33. ' IbU. p. 45, note. 
 
 - Clement, "Hist, de Colbert," ed. 1S74, vol. ii. p. 275, and Bourgoin, 
 " Un Bourgeois de Paris lettre."
 
 FRANCE UNDER RICHELIEU. 19 
 
 ville, a hanger-on of Bassompierre's (then confined to 
 the Bastille), and Serizay, who owed his fortunes to the 
 Duke dc la Rochefoucauld, whom the Cardinal had 
 practically exiled to Poitou — all were devoted to Riche- 
 lieu. The negotiations for the official organisation of 
 their body were carried on by the Abbe Boisrobert, who 
 had been brought to their meetings by Nicolas Faret, ^ 
 whose name, rhyming w^ith cabaret, now lives only in a 
 satire of Boileau's. Boisrobert, who describes himself 
 as 7in grand dupeur d'oreilles, occupied in the Cardinal's 
 court, the post that fifty years earlier would have been 
 conferred on an official fool, and his jests were so 
 necessary to his master's digestion that on one occasion, 
 Richelieu, having fallen ill, whilst the Abbe happened 
 to be in disgrace, his doctor would give no other pre- 
 scription than " Recipe Boisrobert.'' 
 
 Throughout the whole transaction, Boisrobert was 
 actively supported by two other members of the society 
 who lived, like himself, in dependence on the Cardinal : 
 Chapelain, the whipper-in of Richelieu's private pack of 
 poets, and Sirmond, a paid political pamphleteer, who 
 had replaced Alathieu de Mergues in the Minister's 
 service. It is, then, no matter for surprise that we find 
 the newly-constituted body bound by their prefatory 
 article to absolute submission to the Cardinal's wishes. 
 *' And firstly," the statutes begin, "personne ne sera 
 recu dans I'Academie qui ne soit agreable a Monseigneur 
 le Protecteur."- The members were not^ indeed, long 
 
 ' Faret was ordered to prepare a statement setting forth tlie nature of 
 the project, and Serizay a letter imploring the Cardinal to grant his 
 protection. The letter in substance said, " que si ^Ie^ le Cardinal avait 
 -public ses ecrits, il ne manqucroit rien a la perfection de la l.ani^ue, qu'il 
 ^uroit fait sans doute ce que I'Academie se proposoit de faire, mais tjue sa 
 modestie I'empechant de mcttre au jour ses grands ouvrages, etc., etc." 
 
 - Pellisson, " Histoirc de I'Academie Francaise," vol. i. p. 4S9. 
 
 C 2
 
 20 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 left in doubt as to the precise nature of the duties- 
 which they were expected to perform in return for 
 official recognition and protection, for the appearance 
 of Corncille's famous play^ the Cid, gave their pro- 
 tector an early opportunity of testing the docility of 
 his creatures. 
 
 The disgust with which Richelieu viewed the popular 
 success of this play has been usually explained by the 
 fact of a previous quarrel Avith Corneille, who had been 
 one of the paid poets attached to the Cardinal's court, 
 for the purpose of putting into shape, dramas of which 
 he himself suggested the subject. The freedom with 
 which, on one occasion, Corneille had departed from his 
 instructions brought on him an angr}^ reproof, to which 
 he replied by instantly quitting the CardinaFs service, 
 boasting publicly, as he did so, of his independence. 
 But all this does not fully explain the persistence with 
 which Richelieu fought against the success of the Cid. 
 He is represented as having spitefully set himself to 
 injure the man who had vexed his vanity, but another 
 reason is evident to any attentive reader of the play, a 
 reason which explains both its extraordinary vogue 
 and Richelieu's obstinate ill-will. The heroes of the 
 Cid are the "grands do la Cour," the very class with 
 which Richelieu was engaged in perpetual and deadly 
 warfare. These are the men to whom the king is repre- 
 sented as owing his kingdom and his crown ; it is they 
 whose quarrels shake the empire, but it is the force of 
 their arms which repels the foreign invader and gives 
 safety and splendour to the throne. There are many 
 passages which may well have been publicly applauded 
 by the enemies of the Cardinal with special intention, 
 and the whole tendency of the situation was such as 
 must have inspired him with disgust and anger. In-
 
 FRANCE UNDER RICHELIEU. 21 
 
 5tead, however, of taking up the point really at issue, 
 Richelieu probably thought it wiser to dispute the 
 public enthusiasm on literary grounds. He, therefore, 
 requested the Academy to pronounce judgment, and 
 the Academy, after months of negotiation, published 
 their " Sentiments on the Cid''' (1638). 
 
 The character of their official utterances had not 
 been calculated to give weight to the literary decisions 
 of the new Academy. Gombault, the man of quality, 
 had lectured on the "Je ne scais quoi ; '^ Racan had 
 followed suit with a diatribe, Contre Ics Sciences.'^ 
 Habert, a young artillery officer, had published three 
 hundred lines on the Temple de la Mart, whilst his 
 brother, the Abbe Cerisy^ was pronounced to have 
 dethroned Ovid by his masterpiece, La Metamorphose 
 dcs yeiix de Philis en Astres. The public, it must be 
 confessed, who compared Corneille's work with these 
 productions, was likely rather to find justification for 
 its enthusiasm than reasons for damning the too-suc- 
 cessful play. 
 
 The embarrassment of the unfortunate Academicians 
 was indescribable. They were indeed in a position of 
 great difficulty ; such a measure of criticism as would 
 have fully satisfied their protector would not only have 
 alienated the public, but have caused divisions in their 
 own councils. One of the four representatives deputed 
 by the Academy to review the expression of their 
 "sentiments" before submitting them to the protector 
 himself, was Serizay, a man who, as we have seen, 
 shared to the full both the popular feeling for Corneille's 
 play and the popular hostility to the Cardinal Minister. 
 The Sentiments, as handled by him, did not, as might 
 have been expected, meet the Cardinal's approbation. 
 
 ' Pellisson, " Ilistoire de rAcadcmie Francaise," vol. i. p. 76.
 
 22 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 Serizay was summoned to come to him at once^ in order 
 that he might " better explain his intentions." ^ Serizay, 
 however, promptly escaped to Poitou, pleading engage- 
 ments to his master, the Duke de la Rochefoucauld, and 
 the Cardinal's "intentions" Avere carried out by more 
 docile instruments. 
 
 The publication of the Sentiments thus reformed 
 sufficed to bring Corneille on his knees. Coupled with 
 the violent attacks of a host of scribblers eager, like 
 Scudcri, to pay court to the sole dispenser of patronage^ 
 the action of the Academy was an evident manifestation 
 of a displeasure which at any moment might visit him 
 with serious consequences. He, therefore, who had 
 once bravely boasted that his work should secure an 
 audience sans appui, hastened to appease the offended 
 Qirdinal by the submissive dedication prefixed to 
 Horace. 
 
 These details of Richelieu's proceedings against 
 Corneille, plainly show that the lines of policy which he 
 pursued in his dealings with letters, were precisely the 
 same as those followed by him in all other directions. 
 He put Corneille on his trial, just as he had put the 
 Duke de la Valettc on his trial, and when the verdict 
 of the Academy did not fulfil his requirements — ^just as 
 in the case of the Duke he had said to the Parliament 
 by his mouthpiece the king, '' That's not a vote. Vote ! " 
 until he got the reply he wanted — even so he sent back 
 their Sentiments to the united body of Academicians 
 until they had been brought into strict conformity with 
 his own. 
 
 There is, however, another aspect under which the 
 operations of the Academy, as influenced by Richelieu, 
 must be considered ; for the character of the whole 
 ' rdlisson, " Ilistoire de I'Acadcmie Frangaisc," vol. i. pp. iiS-19.
 
 FRANCE UNDER RICHELIEU. 23 
 
 brilliant future of French literature was so much the 
 very flower and outcome of the general conditions 
 created in France by the great Cardinal's rule, that no 
 review of the salient features of his policy can pass over 
 in silence those secret workings by which the world of 
 letters was brought into harmony with the new political 
 and social system. It was with his express approval, if 
 not at his instigation, that the great work of the 
 " Dictionar}- " was undertaken and pushed forward by 
 the French Academy. The two Academicians who 
 specially devoted themselves to the task — Chapelain 
 and Sirmond — were both in the Cardinal's paid service. 
 Sirmond, on joining the first meeting at Conrart's 
 house, had proposed that all the members of the 
 Academic des Beaux Esprits should bind themselves by 
 an oath to employ only words which had been approved 
 by a majority of votes, so that, as Pellisson observes, he 
 who failed to keep his engagement would have been 
 guilty, "not of a fault only, but of a crime." This was 
 the proposal which, rejected in its original form, 
 actually gave birth to the great project of the 
 " Dictionar}' ; " a work which from the first progressed 
 but slowl}', as in one of his epistles the Abbe i3oisrobert 
 tells us : 
 
 Dcpuis six mois dessus I'F on travaille, 
 
 Et le destin m'aurait fort oblige 
 
 S'ii m'avait dit, tu vivras juscja'au G. 
 
 But the effect which it had on French literature was 
 none the less certain and immediate. An overwhelming 
 importance came to be attached to the use onl\' of such 
 words as had been approved by the official judge of 
 taste ; man)- in the highest degree valuable as means of 
 expression were irrevocably ostracised on grounds of 
 euphon}-. The use of such as were old-fashioned, or
 
 24 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 betrayed any approach to uliat Voltaire has termed "la 
 malheurcuse facilitc du langage marotiquc/' was strictly 
 forbidden^ for this might have led to obscurity of style, 
 and '-'ce qui n'cst pas clair n'est pas francais," had 
 already become a ruling precept. The compass of the 
 French tongue was thus greatly reduced; but, within 
 given limits, it ^\■as rendered an instrument of remark- 
 able perfection. All that it was permitted to say it 
 could soon say perfectly. It was, however, no more 
 free than the Parliament or the Academicians them- 
 selves to say all that was to be said about anything. 
 The mechanical pressure applied destroyed the flexibility 
 of the language, destroyed its powers of suggestion, and 
 thus acted even as a restraint upon thought. There 
 could be no shadowing forth of those imaginative states 
 of feeling, of those vague emotions under whose inspira- 
 tion language becomiCS something other than a tool of 
 the intellect. For the very essence of such states of 
 feeling and emotion is indefinite, and refuses to submit 
 itself to the most delicate analysis; they could find, 
 therefore, no adequate form of expression in a language 
 to every particle of which had been assigned a precise 
 meaning distinctly recognised and exactly defined. 
 
 A literature fostered under these influences was 
 characterised, as might have been expected, by the 
 lustre of intelligence rather than by warmth of feeling. 
 The very consciousness of the determination to produce 
 that which was pronounced admirable prevented spon- 
 taneity of purpose. The intention to work up to a fixed 
 pattern cf excellence called forth splendid qualities of 
 mind, of judgment, of taste, but shackled the movement 
 of the passions, and thus the most magnificent effects 
 of the noble literature born under the auspices of the 
 Academy seem to have been conceived with preoccu-
 
 FRANCE UNDER RICHELIEU. 25 
 
 pations which barred the action of great enthusiasm. 
 These very conditions were, however, specially favourable 
 to the production of work which, in its commonest 
 forms, could receive an exquisite finish. Words having 
 all been prepared for use, like highly-cut gems, the 
 whole skill of a writer could be solely devoted to 
 employing them in such wise as should bring out their 
 full, recognised, and legitimate value. Narrative, 
 whether historical or familiar^ the exposition of critical 
 or scientific analysis, and rhetoric, in all its branches, 
 profited by the purity which the French tongue thus 
 acquired. The art of oratory^ of dramatic declamation 
 especially, obtained a splendid brilliance and polish, 
 whilst the French stage was carried to a point of regularity 
 which made it the model and admiration of Europe. 
 
 When Richelieu constituted the French Academy 
 the political organisation of France was accomplished. 
 The fears and interests of the great nobles were com- 
 bining to bring them to the foot of the throne ; law and 
 civil order lay within the grasp of the rulers of the state. 
 By the formation of the Academic Francaise the Cardinal 
 began thework of bringing under the direction and control 
 of the central authority, those social forces which had 
 never before been made the servants of direct political 
 purpose. Swiftly and surely the action which he had 
 taken in respect of literature was destined to be extended 
 to the sciences and the arts. All the forces of thought, 
 all the energies of labour, were now ready to be held by 
 similar ties to the administration, to accept popular tasks, 
 and to conform to an officially recognised standard of 
 excellence. This part of his work the Cardinal was not, 
 indeed, destined to complete, nor could he even attempt 
 those large measures, connected with the various 
 branches of the public service and the general economy
 
 26 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 of the state, which were necessary in order to bring the 
 whole conditions of the national life into perfect harmon}- 
 with the principles of his rule. The vast administrative 
 reforms required in order to place the financial system 
 on a satisfactory footing, and in order to relieve industry, 
 commerce, and agriculture from the obsolete trammels 
 of another age, were left to be dealt with bv Richelieu's 
 successors. But the solution of all these problems had 
 to be sought by them in the direction and by the 
 methods which his rule had imposed. 
 
 " Cc qui est libre dans son commencement devient 
 quclquefois necessaire dans la suite." The rising passion 
 for order which had seconded the Cardinal in every direc- 
 tion, had aided the rapid absorption into the national 
 system of the principles on which he governed, so that 
 although death came (1642) before he had filled in the 
 outlines of his great system, its completion in future 
 days had become a necessity. The Cardinal had 
 struck at the root of every force capable of offering any 
 resistance to the central authority. As he lay in his 
 dying agony, his enemies rejoiced, and believed that as 
 he passed away their own strength would return. Never 
 did men more gravely miscalculate their own weakness 
 and the might of the forces arrayed against them. The 
 Cardinal dead, the great nobles who had disputed his 
 power found themselves face to face with France ; the 
 new France, unknown to them, which he had created ; a 
 I'rance in which every organisation, civil and ecclesias- 
 tical, had begun to fear the central authorit}', in which 
 every corporation was looking to the Crown for protec- 
 tion and countenance; a France in which the}' them- 
 selves, the proudest princes in ICurope, should count but 
 as the ornaments of a Court. l''or it was no phantom 
 greatness that Richelieu had given to his countr}-, and
 
 FRANCE UNDER RICHELIEU. 27 
 
 although the royal power, which had been but an 
 instrument in his hands, became a scourge to those who 
 followed him, )-et its utmost excesses could not destroy 
 the bond into which he had knitted the vcr\' nerves and 
 sinews of France. That strange duality of mind which 
 characterises the whole nation, and gives a iM'actical 
 strain to all their speculation, leads them also to idealise 
 their practical life ; and the large lines of Richelieu's 
 policy, with its equally ordered hierarchy of labour and 
 service to the state, with its contingent and rising scale 
 of reward and consideration maintained in harmonious 
 action b}' supreme authority duly invested with the 
 splendid symbols as well as with the grave reality of 
 power, appealed not only to the national vanity and 
 love of show, but to that profound passion ior symme- 
 trical unity and completeness which is the leading, and 
 perhaps the noblest, trait of the French genius., 
 
 Richelieu himself had been the first to set the 
 example of that self-abnegation in the service of the 
 state which he rigorously exacted of others, lie has 
 been reproached with the fortune which he amassed, 
 with the number of his more than royal residences, with 
 the splendour of his more than princely household, with 
 the pomp and circumstance with which he surrounded 
 every act of his life. But these Vv-ere the incidents, not 
 the objects of Richelieu's career ; ambitious schemes for 
 self-aggrandisement waited on the uses of power. To 
 him everything had a political significance, and every- 
 thing was therefore a matter for the care of Government; 
 so letters and the arts, fur -which he had no natural 
 interest, could not be overlooked in this connection. 
 They were fitting attendants in the train of the great, 
 and as such it was necessary to give them due protection 
 and acknowledgment.
 
 28 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 Union, direction, and protection, in these lay the 
 future greatness of France, as conceived by Richelieu — 
 a greatness Avhich should be over and above all a poli- 
 tical greatness dominating the rest of Europe. To lay 
 the foundations of this political greatness, oppression 
 and cruelty laboured hand in hand with statecraft. But, 
 to rate Richelieu and his policy^ foreign and domestic, 
 by the prejudices of a Liberal and the principles of a 
 Freetrader, would be equally futile and inartistic. His 
 political ideal, if contrasted with that of others who 
 have controlled the destinies of France, attains a lofty 
 standard. His conception of the state, embracing in its 
 logical perfection the minutest details of life as well as 
 the vast interests of the nation, justifies itself as perhaps 
 the only political Utopia v.hich has ever had a practical 
 value. 
 
 After the wasteful husbandry of the Renaissance, 
 after its one-sided reclamation of individual liberty^ 
 France had need to be recalled, even harshly, to opposite 
 considerations ; France had need to be reminded that 
 the life of the state, like the life of the family, is founded 
 on much renouncement of personal liberty, on much 
 self-restraint and self-abnegation. Her great ruler had 
 no free field to work in ; the nation was bound to learn, 
 with him, at the cost of blood and tears, the value of 
 unity in great things and small, to be lessoned in self- 
 sacrifice, moral and ph)'sical, and to count all sacrifice 
 but a part of the just debt due from the citizen to the 
 Republic. The teaching of the Renaissance was thus 
 set at naught, for the fatal condition of learning one 
 thing well seems to be that, for the moment, ever^'thing 
 else shall be forgotten, and France was now destined to 
 forget — but too completely — the sacredness of liberty 
 and of life.
 
 CHAPTER ri. 
 
 FRANXE UNDER COLBERT. 
 
 The death of Richelieu arrested for a while the process 
 of transformation which was taking place in every 
 department of state government in France, and the 
 selfish ambitions which he had kept in check with an 
 iron hand immediately broke loose in the follies and 
 faction-fighting of the Fronde. The reminiscences of 
 liberty which Mazarin had aroused by a series of arbi- 
 trary edicts found no true-hearted exponent amongst 
 the leading partisans who joined the movement for pur- 
 poses of their own. The Parliament, indeed, attempted 
 to maintain the demand for something in the nature of 
 an Habeas Corpus Act ; but their Court allies, the 
 heroes of the Fronde, carried on the most shameless 
 intrigues, having naught in view except the satisfaction 
 of their personal interests. There were crying evils to 
 remedy ; the financial situation alone was a sufficient 
 rcasoii for revolt; tax upon tax was imposed without 
 regard to consequences or respect to the most formal 
 pledges ; whilst Mazarin's creature, ICmer}-, silenced 
 remonstrance with the biting jest, " That good faith 
 was a tradesman's virtue." To ride abroad redressing 
 human wiongs was, however, no part of the schemes 
 of men like tlie brilliant Condc or the adventurer De
 
 30 ART IX THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 Retz. The opportunity which the movement afforded 
 for attemptinf^ the rc-establishment of some counter- 
 poise to the royal power, the bearing which such an 
 attempt, if successful, might have on the future of 
 France, could not escape the notice of a man of such 
 high intelligence as De Retz. But in the conversation 
 which he has left on record as having taken place 
 between Conde and himself in the gardens of the 
 Archbishop's palace at Paris, De Retz makes no pre- 
 tence of urging these considerations because they were 
 weighty in themselves ; he only fastens on them as 
 offering a foothold for ambition. Even had the disin- 
 terested desire to reform the state of France existed, 
 the maxim that "a king must always be obeyed" had 
 been impressed so deeply on the minds of men that, 
 though it might be put to silence for a time, it could 
 not be forgotten. The great opportunities of the 
 Fronde were therefore wasted in years of selfish 
 disorder, which rendered men only the more ready for 
 unconditional surreridcr when Colbert preser.tcd him- 
 self, and, as has been happily said by M. Clement, with 
 Colbert the spirit of the great Cardinal came back to 
 power. 
 
 Born at Reims on the 29th of August, 1619, 
 Colbert was educated by the Jesuits, and at the early 
 age of nineteen ' entered the War Office, in which 
 department Le Tcllier, a connection of his famil}- by 
 marriage, filled the post of Under-Secretary of State. 
 From the first, Colbert distinguished himself by his 
 abnormal powers of work, by his extraordinary zeal in 
 the public service, and by an equal devotion to his own 
 interests. His Jesuit training showed fruit in his 
 dealings with all those who, like Le Tellier or ]\Iazarin, 
 
 ' Bibl. Nat. MSS. I'.aluze, " P.^picrs dcs Armoires," vol. ccclxii. fol. 12. 
 ^///./Clement, "Hist, de Colbert," 2nd ed., 1S74, vol. i. p. $.
 
 FRANCE UNDER COLBERT. 31 
 
 could be of use to him on his road to power, whilst the 
 old tradition of his Scotch blood is favoured by a 
 certain "dourness'' of character which rendered him 
 in general difficult of access. Men scanned his coun- 
 tenance when they approached him, eager for some 
 favourable indication of his humour, and the books of 
 the Academy formally record that once he received the 
 members with " un visage fort guay/' ^ As for women, 
 Madame de Sevigne tells us they could only obtain an 
 audience of Colbert by favour of the king, and to un- 
 welcome petitioners he would oppose so dead a silence 
 that they were reduced to sa\', like the witty INIadame 
 Corneuil : "At least, my lord, show by some sign that you 
 hear me ! " - His marvellous strength of brain, seconded 
 by rare powers of endurance, enabled him to work 
 habitually fourteen hours a day, to enter into every de- 
 tail of every branch of the administration, whilst at the 
 same time he ne\'er lost sight of that noble project of 
 universal reform which he had conceived, and which 
 embraced both Church and State. The rare intervals 
 of rest which his vast labours permitted were spent with 
 books, for the pleasures which are a snare to facile 
 natures had no hold on him, nor could the sincere 
 affection which he bore his family, and which is a 
 welcome and human trait of his iron nature, betray 
 him into weakness. When public interests were at 
 stake, Colbert spared no man, not e\cn the dearest of 
 his own household.^ 
 
 Qualified in every way for the work of administra- 
 tion, absolutely indifferent to popularity, Colbert seemed 
 destined by nature to lead the final charge against the 
 surviving forces of the feudal s}'stem. After the troubles 
 of the Fronde had died awa\-, and the death of Mazarin 
 
 ' P. v., vol. i. p. 372. "^ "Menagiann," ed. 1715, vol. v. p. 27. 
 
 3 See letters to his sons, " Lctlres et Insts. dc Colbert," Clement,
 
 32 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 had left Louis XIV. a king in deed as well as name, 
 these forces of the past were personified by Fouquet, 
 and the duel between Fouquet and Colbert was the 
 dramatic close of a struggle predestined to end in the 
 complete triumph of absolutism. The magnificent and 
 brilliant Fouquet, who for years past had taken advantage 
 of his position as Surintendant des Finances to lavish the 
 resources of the state on his private pleasures/ was 
 plainly marked out as the object of Colbert's hostility. 
 Mazarin, indifferent probably to depredations of which 
 he had himself set the example, persistently shut his 
 eyes to the scandals pointed out by Colbert, who_, in 
 1659,2 had loudly demanded the creation of a Chamber 
 of Justice to examine into the disgraceful abuses exist- 
 ing in the financial administration. Mazarin dead^ the 
 enemies of the Surintendant at once coalesced against 
 him, nor could the utmost efforts of those whom he had 
 obliged with more than royal munificence avail in his 
 defence. On the losing side were ranged all the spend- 
 thrift princes and facile beauties of the Court, all the 
 greedy recipients of I'ouquet's ostentatious bounties. 
 Fie had reckoned that the greatest names in France 
 would be compromised by his fall, and that by their 
 danger his own safety was assured.^ Fie had reckoned 
 without Colbert ; he had reckoned without that power 
 which had been steadily growing throughout all vicissi- 
 tudes of fate during the last two generations, and which 
 was now centred in the kincr. No stranger turn of 
 fortune can be pictured than that which, on the threshold 
 of the modern era, linked the nobles of France in their 
 
 ' P"or expenses at Vaux, sec BonafTe, " I.e Surintendant Fouquet;' 
 also Chcruel, "La Vie Publiciae et I'rivce de Fouquet;" Duiiiesnil, 
 "Iliit. des plus Celebres Amateurs Francais." 
 
 * Clement, "Hist de Colbert," vol. i. p. ()0 et scq. 
 
 ■3 Clement, ibid. p. 119 ; and " Lettres et Insts. de Colbert," vol. ii. p 8.
 
 FRAXCE UXDER COLBERT. 
 
 jj 
 
 last struggle for independence with the fortunes of a 
 rapacious and fraudulent financier, nor can anything be 
 more suggestive of the character of the coming epoch 
 than the si^ht of this last battle fought, not in the field 
 of arms, but before a court of law. 
 
 To Colbert, the fall of Fouquet was but the necessary 
 preliminary to that reform of every branch of the ad- 
 ministration which had been ripening in his mind ever 
 since he had entered the public service. To bring the 
 financial situation into order, it was necessary first to 
 call Fouquet to account. The preface to the Edict of 
 1661," creating that Chamber of Justice which Colbert 
 had vainly demanded of INIazarin in 1659, sets forth that 
 '* the scandalous abuses connected with the administra- 
 tion of the public purse had determined the king to hold 
 an inquiry into the details of all receipts and expendi- 
 ture throughout the kingdom, so as to prevent a few 
 private persons from making monstrous fortunes by 
 illegitimate means, and setting the example of a luxury 
 calculated to corrupt public character and morality." 
 
 Although the Chamber was carefully composed of 
 men whose zeal was supposed at least to equal their 
 capacity, Fouquet's party was so strong that the king 
 himself had to intervene in order to urge the proceed- 
 ings to a conclusion. " Lorsque je trouvai bon," said 
 Louis XIV., " que Fouquet eust un conscil libre, j'ay cru 
 que son proces dureroit peu de temps ; mais il y a plus de 
 deux ans qu'il est commence, ct je souhaite extresmement 
 qu'il finisse. II y va de ma reputation." - When the king 
 spoke thus it seemed, indeed, as if the trial might be 
 prolonged to all eternity. Colbert had made what 
 
 ' Clement, "Ilist. de Colbert," vol. i. p. 125. 
 
 - Cherucl, "Journal d'Ollivier Lefcvre d'Ormesson,"' ed. lS6r, vo'. ii. 
 p. 174. 
 
 D
 
 34 ART IX THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 appears to us to have been a mistake in tactics, for he 
 had carried on, with a high hand, his suppressions and 
 conversions of "rentes" simultaneously with his pro- 
 secution of Fouquet. All the vested interests menaced 
 by these proceedings were consequently armed against 
 him, and ready to combine with the personal friends of 
 the Stiriiitcndant in hindering the attempt to bring him 
 to justice. The termination of the trial, long delayed, 
 was only procured by repeated coercion ; judges thought 
 to be favourable to the accused were removed, and 
 replaced by others known to be less leniently inclined ;' 
 many were deprived of their public offices and emolu- 
 ments, and some were sent into exile.- But, in spite of 
 these oppressive measures, the sentence obtained fell 
 short of that which alone could have satisfied Colbert, 
 for the life of Fouquet was spared, and he was con- 
 demned only to banishment and the confiscation of all 
 his goods. There was, however, one last resource, nor 
 did Colbert hesitate to use it. The king was advised to 
 strain the royal prerogative yet further, and he therefore 
 arbitrarily increased the penalty pronounced by a court 
 the members of which he himself had nominated, and 
 the perpetual exile to which Fouc^uet had been con- 
 demned was changed into imprisonment for lifc.^ 
 Colbert attached so much importance to his share in 
 the case that he dictated the whole story to Perrault, 
 who says: "II me la fit retourncr trois ou quatre fois 
 avant de la transcrire dans le registre."^ 
 
 ' Clement, " Hist, de Colbert," vol. i. p. 136. 
 
 - Ibid. p. 145. 1 Ibid. p. 144. 
 
 ■* "Mem. de Perrault," Avignon, 1759, p. 39. The document itself 
 has been printed by Clement in vol. ii. ist part, p. l"] et se<j., " Lettrcs et 
 Insts. de Colbert." It is the most considerable composition by Colbeit 
 extant, and is entitled, " Memoire sur les affaires des fmances de France 
 pour scrvir a I'histoire, etc."
 
 FRANCE UNDER COLBERT. 35 
 
 It was the record of a cjreat triumph ; but the result 
 of this triumph must not be looked for in the mere 
 issue of a trial in which justice was obtained by the 
 brutal exercise of despotic power and at the price of 
 repeated violations of the law ; it must be looked 
 for rather in the consequent public exposure of the 
 fraudulent and rotten system which had prevailed in 
 the financial administration for long years past.' The 
 fall of the chief offender, Fouquet, having been brought 
 about, it was easy to force all those who had been 
 guilty of similar malversations on a minor scale, to 
 run the gauntlet of the High Commission. Restitution 
 and confiscation became the order of the day, and when 
 the Chamber of Justice was finally dissolved in 1669, 
 far beyond any advantage which might be reckoned 
 to the Treasury from these sources Avas the gain 
 to the nation in the general sense of security and 
 confidence. It was felt that the days of wholesale 
 ■dishonesty and embezzlement were at an end, and 
 that the economical future of France would now rest 
 on a sound basis. Relieved from all anxiety in this 
 direction, confident in the unconditional support of a 
 young monarch whose passion for absolute rule aptly 
 seconded his own purposes, inspired by an inborn 
 hatred of all abuses, of all corruption, and burning 
 with an extraordinary zeal for the public service, 
 Colbert went forward from this moment without 
 hesitation, devoting his whole energies to the gigantic 
 task of reshaping the internal economy of France. 
 
 Richelieu, as we have already seen, had indeed 
 secured the political position, but his strength had 
 been strained to the uttermost in the effort to combat 
 the dangers which menaced the very existence of 
 
 ' Clement, "Hist, de Colbert," vol. i. p. 138^/5^(7. 
 
 D 2
 
 36 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 authority, and he had been powerless to reform the 
 internal administration or to develop the industrial 
 resources of the country. All the talent of the brilliant 
 and spendthrift Mazarin but just availed to maintain 
 the situation as created by his great predecessor, and 
 he lacked the power, even if he had had the will, to 
 handle administrative or economical problems. These 
 questions fell to Colbert's lot, and at a moment 
 propitious beyond all others for giving practical 
 effect to schemes such as must usually make head 
 against a dead weight of resistance. Backed by 
 despotic power, his achievements in these directions 
 have, to an incredible extent, determined the destinies 
 of modern industry, and have given birth to the whole 
 system of modern administration, not onl}- in France, 
 but throughout Europe. 
 
 In the teeth of a lavish expenditure which he was 
 utterly unable to check, once and again did Colbert 
 succeed in establishing a financial equilibrium when 
 the fortunes of France seemed desperate.' In the 
 years 1660-4, when, as we have just seen, he forced 
 all those who had profited by the depredations of 
 Mazarin and Fouquet to disgorge, whilst at the same 
 time he inspected and revised all sources of public 
 revenue, and consolidated the public debt,^ these great 
 reforms were accomplished by unjust and arbitrary 
 measures.^ But Colbert could not shut his ej-es to 
 the teaching of experience, and just as at a later 
 date he found himself unable to ignore the facts 
 which made against the wisdom of his own commercial 
 policy, in spite of his profound conviction that national 
 
 ' Clement, " Hist, dc Colbert,"' vol. i. pp. 149-172, and see also his- 
 " Gouvernement de Louis XIV." 
 
 == Ibid. pp. 151, 163. 3 Ibid. pp. 155-6.
 
 FRANCE UNDER COLBERT. yj 
 
 prosperity must necessarily result from prohibitive 
 tariffs.i even so at the close of his career, when the 
 treasury of France was exhausted and her future 
 revenues burdened by wars which he had vainly 
 opposed, Colbert, taught by the strong representations 
 which had been made by Lamoignon and others 
 against the illegal courses of 1660-4, made choice of 
 different methods; and the measures by which he 
 succeeded for the second time in placing the national 
 finances on a sound footing would be recognised to-day 
 as just and regular.^ 
 
 Not even the great questions of finance were suffi- 
 cient to absorb the energies of Colbert. His extra- 
 ordinary grasp of every subject proper to the cares 
 of government is proved by volumes of letters and 
 instructions,^ in which he daily handled the affairs of 
 each department of State, discussing and directing with 
 a command of special detail so minute and a wisdom 
 so pregnant, that it seems as if each in turn must have 
 been the single object of a life's experience and devo- 
 tion. The French navy Colbert may, indeed, be said 
 to have created. "+ When the siege of La Rochelle 
 began in 1627, Richelieu had not a single man-of-war 
 ready to put to sea, and for the transport of arms and 
 ammunition was obliged to requisition trading-vessels 
 and fishing-boats in the harbours along the coasts ;5 
 nor at any time during the course of operations could 
 
 • Clement, "Hist, de Colbert," vol. i. pp. 297, 365. 
 
 - Il'iif. pp. 168-9 ^^ ^'l- 
 
 s Clement, " Lettres et Insts. de Colbert." 
 
 ■t " I'rincipcs de M. Colbert." Eug. Sue, "Ilist. de la Marine Fian- 
 9aise," vol. i. p. 287. 
 
 5 "'Vie dii Cardinal Richelieu," Ams\ 1714, vol. i. pp. 302-.?. 
 Clement, "Hist, de Colbert," ed. 1S46, chap. xix. ; and "Hist, de 
 Ministerio Cardinalis Richelij," ed. 1649, p. 222.
 
 58 ART IX THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 the French muster more than forty small vessels in 
 response to the Cardinal's appeals ; whilst the English 
 fleet despatched to the relief of the besieged was not 
 onl}- infinitely more numerous, but consisted of ships 
 vastly greater in size.^ The organisation then to some 
 extent introduced into this branch of the service by the 
 great Cardinal collapsed under the thriftless rule of 
 Llazarin, and the French navy again fell into a state 
 of deplorable neglect, which could not escape the 
 lynx-eyed watchfulness of Colbert. He took matters 
 promptly into his own hands, demanding exact reports 
 as to the number and tonnage of the merchant shipping 
 in the different ports and harbours of France, whilst at 
 the same time he pushed on the work of construction in 
 the ro)-al arsenals and dockyards with unparalleled 
 vigour,- creating the port of Rochefort, and bringing 
 up the Royal Navy in ten years from 20 or 22 vessels 
 all out of repair, to 196, of which 120 were vessels of line 
 with a tonnage of 107,950, and all this he did, although 
 his repeated entreaties failed to induce Louis XIV. to 
 visit either of the great ports or review the magnificent 
 fleet which had been created in his name. 
 
 The official documents concerning this subject all 
 show that the larger aspects of state policy were 
 familiar to Colbert ; he never forgot that the interests 
 of the monarchy were inseparable from all that con- 
 tributed to the welfare of the nation. His functions as 
 Minister of Marine (the duties of which department he 
 had actually discharged since 1661) were defined by a 
 regulation bearing date March 7th, 1669,^ which opens 
 
 ' "Mem. dc Bassompierre," ed, 1665, vol. iii. p. 159. 
 - "Tableaux des Vaisscaux," etc., L"ug. Sue, "Hist, dc la Marine," 
 vol. i. p. 344 ; and "Mom. d'TnTrcvillc," ibid. vol. i. p. 346. 
 3 Eug. Sue, " Hist, cc la Marine," vol. i. i>p. 2S5-6.
 
 FRANCE UNDER COLBERT. 39 
 
 ■with a clause pointing out the close connection uhich 
 exists between the navy and commerce. This, coupled 
 with the fact that since Colbert had taken the matter 
 in hand, as Minister of Finance, French commerce 
 had notably augmented throughout the kingdom/ is 
 assigned as the reason for transferring to him, as respon- 
 sible Minister, not only the whole care of the navy in 
 all the provinces of France, but also everything regard- 
 ing commerce both internal and external, all French 
 trading companies and their concessions, all colonies,^ 
 and manufactories in whatsoever land they may be 
 established. We have, indeed, but to turn to Colbert's 
 "Edict on Commerce," which appeared in 1673, and to 
 that on the navy issued in 1681, to find in their careful 
 provisions full justification of the trust reposed in him, 
 while the opinions of Lord Tenterden, Lord Mansfield, 
 and other authorities on the subject, bear witness to the 
 value of his fjreat work in the foundation of Chambers 
 of Marine Insurance, and the authority accorded to his 
 sagacious regulations in this matter down to the pre- 
 sent day.3 
 
 The creation of the Compagnie des Indes Orientales 
 had originated in a scheme of Fouquet's. The mer- 
 chants of Tours, Nantc-s, and La Rochelle, when in 1663 
 they presented their petition for its foundation, set 
 forth that what they proposed was the " memo dessein 
 que celui qui avait ete accepte par M. Fouquet quelque 
 temps avant sa detention." It is, therefore, more than 
 probable that Colbert had long been familiar with the 
 project which he supported by lavish expenditure of 
 
 ■ Sea Wolowski, " Dc I'Oiganisation Industrielle de la France avant 
 . . . Colbert." Revue dc Legislation et de la lunspritdcncc,yi2L\%, \%\l. 
 - See Pauliat, " Madagascar sous Louis XIV." 
 3 VValford, "Cyclopedia of Marine Insurance," vol. iv. pp. 309-313.
 
 40 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 influence and money, if indeed he were not himself the 
 author of it.' He is, indeed, often accused of having 
 developed his commercial policy at the expense of 
 those agricultural interests which Sully had fostered, 
 and which must always be a chief source of the pros- 
 perity of France. His edicts prohibiting the export 
 of grain constituted, it is true, a standing menace to 
 the producer, whose permit, terminable in three or six 
 months, depended now on the prospects of harvest, now 
 on the probable wants of the king's troops in winter 
 quarters, or again on the policy of cutting off the 
 enemy's supplies. 2 The husbandman, always uncertain 
 of his market, was thus practically discouraged, and 
 agricultural commerce was checked, but it must be 
 remembered that these measures were exceptional, and 
 that Colbert's industrial policy was in the main based 
 on the then universally accepted proposition that good 
 economy involved thedrawing within the national borders 
 of ever-increasing stores of the precious metals. Hence 
 his system of bounties on export of home produce, 
 hence the rewards given to the East India Company 
 (1671) for carrying French instead of Irish cattle to the 
 " Isles francoises d'Amerique," for he aimed at the 
 fostering of home production by an elaborate system 
 of protection, whilst at the same time the markets of 
 other countries were to be forced open and flooded with 
 I'^ench goods. Courtilz de Sandras puts into Colbert's 
 mouth the argument used to-day by United States pro- 
 tectionists : " Shouhl an)' one argue that if we put our- 
 selves on this footing . . . the foreigners can do the 
 same, so it would be simpler to lea\c things just as 
 
 ' r.'iuliat, " Madagascar sous Louis XIV." 
 
 = Clement, "Hist, de Co'.beri," vol. i. p. 365 ; and " Couvcrnemcnt 
 de Louis XIV.," cliap. xii. p. 227.
 
 FRANCE UNDER COLBERT. x\ 
 
 tlicy are ... to speak thus one must be ignorant 
 that we need no one, but our neighbours need us. 
 The kingdom has, with few exceptions, all within its 
 borders, but in tlic neighbouring states it is not so." ' 
 Any attempt on the part of a weaker power to imitate 
 Colbert's own polic}', such, for instance, as that made in 
 the Papal States byAlcxandcr Vll.and Clement IX., was 
 instantly repressed with a high hand ;~ and perhaps no 
 more eloquent condemnation of Colbert's whole scheme 
 is to be found than that furnished by the negotiations 
 conducted on this occasion by the Abbe de Bourlemont. 
 It was indeed necessary to the successful result of 
 Colbert's commercial policy, as it would be necessary 
 to the complete success of any protectionist policy, that 
 the nation pursuing it should be able to dictate her own 
 terms to the rest of Europe. 
 
 His leading idea was to lower all export dues on 
 national produce and manufactures, and whilst diminish- 
 ing import duties on such raw materials as were 
 required for French manufactures, to raise them until 
 they became prohibitive on all foreign goods. The 
 success of the tariff of 1664 misled Colbert. That tariff 
 was a splendidly statesmanlike attempt to put an end 
 to the conflict and confusion of the duties, dues, and 
 customs then existing in the different provinces and 
 ports of France, and it was in effect a tariff calculated 
 for purely fiscal purposes. -^ Far other were the con- 
 siderations embodied in the tariff of 1667, which led to 
 the Dutch and English wars, and which, having been 
 enacted in the supposed interests of home industry, 
 
 ' "Test. Polit. de Messire Jean Baptiste Colbert," chap. xv. : " Dcs 
 Marchands et du Commerce." 
 
 = Clement, "Hist, de Colljcrt," vol. i. p. 305. 
 3 Ibid. pp. 292-3.
 
 42 ART IX THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 eventually stimulated production in other countries. 
 England set up manufactures of silk, of hats, and also 
 of all those coarser kinds of cloth which up to 1659 she 
 had been accustomed to import in large quantities from 
 France, whilst the Dutch not only got hold of French 
 paper-makers, but having learnt how to fabricate canvas 
 for their own shipping, also secured the English market, 
 which had previously depended wholly on France for its 
 supply of the like goods. ' 
 
 If, however,, the industrial policy of Colbert cannot 
 be said to have realised his expectations, since it neither 
 brought about a great increase in the number of home 
 manufactures nor succeeded in securing a larger share 
 of foreign trade, there is not a doubt that, in spite even 
 of the disastrous wars which it provoked, it power- 
 fully contributed, on the whole, to place France in the 
 front rank as a commercial nation. The very pains 
 and penalties by which he vexed those same industries 
 which it was his main object to foster, and which became 
 much worse after his death,^ were not without a bene- 
 ficial influence on their general character. At first sight 
 such attempts as that to fix by law the length, width, 
 price, and quality of different stuffs by subjecting the 
 unhappy producer of material not precisely in con- 
 formity with the legal standard to infamous punish- 
 ments, would api)car to be an illegitimate interference 
 v.-ith individual liberty in the endeavour to attain, by 
 arbitrary tampering with the natural conditions of 
 production, that perfection of workmanship which should 
 properly result from mutual emulation between rival 
 
 ■ "Mem. sur la Commerce," etc., " Leltrcs et Insts.," vol. ii. 
 I"-" pnrtie, annexes, p. cclvii. Sec also Clement, " Gouvernement de 
 Louis XlV.,"c]iap. x. 
 
 * Levasseur,"llisloire des Classes Ouvrieics," 1st scries, vol. ii. chap. vi.
 
 FRANCE UNDER COLBERT. 43 
 
 competitors for custom. It may, however, be pleaded, 
 in extenuation of these and other like measures, that 
 since the guilds and corporations of the arts and trades 
 were becoming daily less powerful, it was needful that 
 the supreme authority should find some means whereby 
 the influence which they had previously exercised in 
 keeping up the standard of work in their respective 
 industries should be replaced. At the present day the 
 spirit of Colbert's legislation in this respect survives 
 in such establishments as the conditioning houses of 
 Roubaix and of Lyons, the functions of which are 
 described at length in the " Report of the Ro}-al Com- 
 mission on Technical Education." i But the conditioning 
 performed in these houses, which undertake the testing of 
 all raw material and manufactured goods, is entirely 
 optional. If buyer and seller agree to any transaction 
 without submitting to the official test and expenses they 
 are at liberty to do so ; whereas Colbert, b}^ penalties so 
 cruel that they could not be rigorously exacted, sought 
 to enforce the observance of perfectly arbitrary regu- 
 lations. 2 Most writers have, in fact, pointed to these 
 enactments as a series of glaring mistakes. P'rom an 
 economical point of view they are clearly right, but is 
 there not another aspect of the question — the political .'' 
 And from the political point of view may it not be justly 
 urged that, although industrial development was checked 
 by Colbert's severe penalties against the manufacture or 
 
 • " The condilioning house of Roubaix, like the similar establishments 
 of Lyons and Crcfeld, undertakes the testing of all raw materials and 
 manufactured goods with regard to actual weight, measurement, and 
 condition. Certain standards of condition are recognised in various 
 materials, upon which allowances are made for the moisture they 
 contain. . . . The house was built by the town at a cost of ^^ 16, 000.' — 
 Vide " Report of Royal Commission on Technical Education." 
 
 = Clement, " Hist, dc Colbert," vol. i. pp. 326-7.
 
 44 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 sale of inferior goods, \-et, in so far as these regulations 
 
 tended to maintain a high standard of excellence, they 
 
 did actually fulfil to a large extent his purpose of 
 
 adding lustre to the character of French industry, and 
 
 thereby increasing the importance of France in Europe. 
 
 Evcr3-thing that could increase the importance of 
 
 the nation, as well as all that could add to its real 
 
 power, was an object of Colbert's patriotic solicitude. 
 
 To surround the throne of France with every attribute 
 
 of majesty which could heighten its lustre in the eyes 
 
 of foreign courts was but to complete his general 
 
 scheme for the political aggrandisement of France. 
 
 Why was he ready to confer substantial encouragement 
 
 on men of letters and artists, but because they alone 
 
 could give to luxury a dazzling elegance ? To the pure 
 
 pleasures of art Colbert was as indifferent as Richelieu 
 
 himself; he saw, however, not only its value as a means 
 
 of national glory; he was also the first to appreciate the 
 
 immense services which it might be brought to render 
 
 to national industry. Hence arose Colbert's intimate 
 
 relations with the chief of the Academy of Painting and 
 
 Sculpture, and herein, too, lies the explanation of much 
 
 that at first sight appears to be abnormal in the 
 
 character of French seventeenth-century work, especially 
 
 if compared with that of the period immediately 
 
 preceding. 
 
 This matter alone, which, if compared to the whole 
 scheme of his administration, seems but a puny detail, 
 serves to show the completeness of Colbert's conception 
 of the modern state. The devoted servant of the 
 most despotic Crown in Europe, he never lost sight 
 of the interests of the people. The Academy of 
 Painting and Sculpture and the School of Architecture 
 were not called into being in order that royal palaces 
 should be raised surpassing all others in magnificence.
 
 FRANCE UNDER COLBERT. 45 
 
 Bievrebache and the Savonneric were not established 
 only that sucli palaces should be furnished more 
 sumptuously than those of an Eastern fairy tale. 
 Colbert did not care chiefly to inquire, when organising 
 art administration, what were the institutions best fitted 
 to foster the proper interests of art; he asked, in the 
 first place, what would most contribute to swell the 
 national importance. I'>ven so, in surrounding the king 
 with the treasures of luxury, his object was twofold — 
 their possession should indeed illustrate the Crown, but 
 should also be a unique source of advantage to the 
 people. Glass-workers were brought from Venice, and 
 lace-makers from Flanders, that they might yield to 
 France the secrets of their skill. Palaces and public 
 buildings were to afford commissions for French artists, 
 and a means of technical and artistic education for all 
 those employed on them. The royal collections were 
 but a further instrument in educating the taste and 
 increasing the knowledge of the working classes. The 
 costly factories of the Savonneric and the Gobelins were 
 practical schools, in which every detail of every branch 
 of all those industries which contribute to the furnishing 
 and decoration of houses was brought to perfection, 
 whilst a band of chosen apprentices were trained in the 
 adjoining schools. 
 
 To these schools Colbert assigned a prominent posi- 
 tion in his scheme, looking on them as the home and 
 nursery of French industry. After six years of ap- 
 prenticeship and four of service, the bo\-s, who were 
 received into them free of charge, went forth passed 
 masters in their respective crafts, and carried the fruits 
 of their training into all the provinces of France.* 
 
 These schools, as well as the institutions of which 
 
 ' " Notice Ilistorique sur les Manufactures Impcriales de Tapisseries, 
 etc." Lacordairc, 1853, p. 55.
 
 46 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 they formed a part, were placed by Colbert in direct 
 relations with the privileged Academy of Painting and 
 Sculpture, and under the protectorate of this body, 
 officially organised and recognised corporations of 
 artists, eager to enjoy the privileges of the central 
 society of Paris, spread themselves over France. 
 On the other hand, the facilities afforded for foreign 
 study by the foundation of the School of France 
 at Rome, secured the interests of art education in 
 its highest form, and gave into the hands of the ruling 
 Minister a supply of men perfectly accomplished, and 
 fitted to undertake the execution of the most compli- 
 cated tasks or the direction of the most important estab- 
 lishments. Thus, that unity of authority which had been 
 the precept of the great Cardinal's policy imposed its 
 extreme consequences, and prevented in France that 
 lamentable divorce between art and industry which 
 took place at this moment in every other country in 
 Europe. Each link was complete in the chain which 
 connected the humblest institutions v.'ith the proud 
 central Academy, and from the director of the central 
 Academy all received ultimate guidance and control. 
 
 To Colbert, therefore, is due the honour of having 
 foreseen, not only that the interests of the modern 
 state were inseparably bound up with those of industr}^ 
 but also that the interests of industry could not without 
 prejudice be divorced from art. The principles on 
 which he worked contained, indeed, certain seeds of 
 failure ; in his industrial system protection was pushed 
 to an extreme which injured those whom it was meant 
 to serve ; and the arbitrary caprices of the power which 
 he and his great predecessor liad rendered sovereign 
 speedily brought about financial disaster. The pitiless 
 and despotic Louvois, who had succeeded his father,
 
 FRANCE UNDER CGLBERT. 47 
 
 Colbert's old patron Le Tcllicr, as Secretary of State 
 for War, played on the imperious vanity of King Louis, 
 and engaged him in wars big and little, v.hich in most 
 cases wanted even the shade of a pretext. Wars big 
 and little caused reckless expenditure, together with 
 that terrible corruption which seems invariably to 
 follow in its train, and against which Colbert had 
 fought from the first with bitter earnest. All the zeal 
 of the great ^Minister's strict economy could only stay 
 for a while the sure approach of national distress. 
 In cruel vexation he saw himself forced to close his 
 establishment of Bicvrebache, and to sacrifice the 
 industrial training of French workmen to the expenses 
 of the war with Holland which the king had arrogantly 
 provoked, and for which the exigencies of his own 
 commercial policy had been made the excuse. i 
 
 When Colbert died, on 6th September, 1683, the 
 misery of France, exhausted by oppressive taxation,^ 
 and depopulated by armies kept constantly on foot, 
 cried out against the Minister who, rather than fall 
 from power, had lent himself to measures which he 
 heartily condemned. For the moment men forgot 
 how numerous were the benefits which he had con- 
 ferred, how great a work had been accomplished by 
 his hand, and remembered only the harshness with 
 which he had dealt justice and stinted mercy. Yet 
 order reigned where, before his advent, all had been 
 corruption and confusion; the navy of France had 
 been created, her colonies fostered, her forests saved 
 from destruction ; ^ justice and the authority of the 
 
 ' See "Mem. de Terrault," p. 16S, ct scq. 
 
 ^ See " Abus du Credit et le Desoidre financier a la fin du Regnc de 
 Louis XIV."— Vuitry, Kevite des Deux Motidcs, Jan., 1884. 
 -^ See Maury, " Les Forets de la France."
 
 48 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 law had been carried into the darkest corners of the 
 land ; religious toleration, socially if not politically, 
 had been advocated ; whilst the encroachments of 
 the Church had been more or less steadfastly opposed. 
 Colbcrt^s attempts to unify legislation were premature, 
 but, aided by his uncle Pussort, he got embodied the 
 Code Louis (1667), the Ordonnance Criminale (1670), the 
 Ordonnance des Eaux et Forets (1669), the Edict on 
 Commerce (1673), the Code Maritime (1681)^ and pre- 
 pared his Code Colonial, commonly called the Code 
 Noir, which appeared after his death. 
 
 To the material prosperity of the nation — even 
 after we have made all possible deductions for the 
 evils arising from an exaggerated system of protection 
 — an immense and enduring impulse had been given. 
 "One single instance," says Levasseur, "suffices to 
 measure the distance which separates the administration 
 of Colbert from that of his predecessors. Whilst 
 Fouquet did not get even twenty-three millions of 
 the eight\--four levied on the nation, Colbert knew^ 
 in his first year, how to get in fifty-three millions of 
 the cight\--eight which he levied. . . . For eleven \-ears 
 he balanced receipts and expenditure. He inherited 
 a debt of eleven millions of 'rente' and left behind 
 him only a debt of eight millions, after having met the 
 expenses of two wars and of the wildest extravagance." ^ 
 In spite of disgrace and death his influence survived ; 
 in spite of the financial disorders, which went on 
 steadily increasing, and which at last brought France 
 to the verge of bankruptcy, his work bore fruit in the 
 frequent efforts which were made to equalise the 
 pressure of taxation. When, in 1695, the difficulties 
 
 ' Levasseur, " Hiit. des Classes Ouvrierts," vol. ii. pp. 169-170.
 
 FRAXCE UNDER COLBERT. 49 
 
 were so great that even the food of tlic wild beasts 
 in the menagerie was cut off/ and the desperate expe- 
 dient of a poll-tax was resorted to in order to meet the 
 ruinous expenses of war; several intendants at once 
 pointed out its unfair incidence, and urged the adoption 
 of schemes by which it might be made proportional. 
 
 They remembered the statesman who, when a war 
 Avas contemplated, had bidden them report whether the 
 peasants " se retablissent un peu, comment lis sont 
 habillez, mcublez, et s'ils se rejouissent d'avantage les 
 jours de fcstes et dans les mariages qu'ils ne faisaient 
 cy-devant." At a later date, 1701, these representations 
 in favour of proportional taxation actually took effect : 
 " La capitation de 1695 etait tin ivipol dc quotitCyTp\nsc\uQ 
 chaque contribuable etait directement impose a la taxe 
 que lui assignait le tarif, et que le produit total, non 
 fixe a Tavance, etait le resultat des cotes individuelles 
 inscrites aux roles. Celle de 1701 devient tui inipot de 
 repartition : la somme a percevoir dans chaque gencralite 
 est arretee en conseil, et elle est ensuite repartie entrc 
 les contribuables par des officiers publics determines et, 
 en dernier ressort, par les intendans, Cette repartition 
 ne pent plus s'operer exclusivement suivant le tarif 
 de 1695, et le plus souvent ellc se fait a raison des 
 facultes des contribuables. Sous ce rapport, la capita- 
 tion est plus proportionnelle aux fortunes." - 
 
 These were considerations of a new order in state 
 government, which should mean the good husbandry 
 of national resources, and it is the glory of the age 
 of Louis XIV., and its great importance to men, that 
 it saw the inauguration of this new ideal, to the 
 
 ' O.' 1053. Arch. Nat. 
 
 - Vuitry, Revue des Deux MjnJes, 1SS4. See also Forbonnais, 
 " Recheiches et Considerations sur les Tinances de France." 
 
 E
 
 50 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 realisation of which modern poh'tical and social economy 
 constantly aspires. The brilliant Fouquet had played 
 with these problems.' Colbert gave his life to their 
 solution. 2 
 
 ' " Interrogation de Fouquet," F. de Laborde. 
 
 - See M, Cheruel, " Histoire de rAdministration Moderne en France." 
 Also Joubleau, " Etude sur Colbert."
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 Ix the dialogue which Diderot invents at Marly between 
 the two most celebrated kings of France, Henri IV. 
 thus addresses Louis XIV. : "You are right, my boy, all 
 this is very magnificent ; but I should like to see the 
 homes of my peasants at Yonne ; " i and Diderot adds : 
 " What would he have thought to have found, all round 
 these magnificent palaces, his peasants starving on straw, 
 in their roofless lairs ? " 
 
 This is the picture put before us by an eye-witness in 
 1762, when the Grand Siccle had borne its proper fruit : 
 during no other century had so many splendid archi- 
 tectural monuments been raised in France, and, at its 
 close, never had the poor been so ill housed, never had 
 their lives been devoured by a more hungry misery ! 
 The love of building, which prevailed in the Renaissance, 
 and which Fouquet, at a later date, carried to an extra- 
 vagant excess, was inherited by the Grand ]\Ionarque, 
 and became, in virtue of the social conditions of the day, 
 an appanage of the Crown, A hundred years before 
 Diderot, Colbert wrote: "There is no one now in 
 France, but the king, who employs sculptors, painters, 
 and other skilful workmen : if his Majesty docs not find 
 
 ' Letter to Mdlle. Yoland. 
 
 E 2
 
 52 ART IX THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 them employment, they must go elsewhere to seek their 
 living.'^ ^ 
 
 " Vingt-quatre violons du roi etaient toute la musique 
 de la France," and the history of French architecture in 
 the seventeenth century is simply the history of the 
 royal palaces of France ; for though Colbert would 
 have had it otherwise, not even he could divert to works 
 of public utility the gold required for the wars and 
 pleasures of the king. 
 
 During the Renaissance, when Paris had still her 
 rivals, every province in France could show some costly 
 pile in progress — some chateau or church, fit to be the 
 wonder of a future age — whilst on the smaller houses of 
 eood citizens were lavished all the resources of a humbler 
 beauty, full of variety and charm. The work of the 
 Grajid Sikle, on the other hand, is not only all royal 
 but all monotonous. Since none but the king could 
 give employment, all that was made was made to please 
 him, and his tastes, superb and practical, were those of 
 one whose ideals w^ere wholly external. " Mazarin," 
 says M. de Laborde, " could not inspire the king with 
 love of art, for that cannot be taught ; and, wanting in 
 that natural instinct which discovers genius, and that 
 delicacy of taste which loves perfection, Louis XIV. got 
 out of the difficulty by appealing to the grandiose ; in- 
 capable of feeling any beauty in simplicity, he threw 
 himself into profuse magnificence." ~ 
 
 No greater contrast could be desired to the loveliness 
 of Blois, of Chambord, or of Ecouen — a loveliness which 
 once lingered even where the formal gardens of Le 
 Notre glowed in the sunshine of the Tuileries — than 
 the orderly grandeur of Versailles and the stately glories 
 
 ' Letter, 1672, cited by Clement, " Hist, de Colbert," ed. 1846, chap. 
 xvii. p. 340. = De Laborde, " Le Talais Mazarin," p. 32.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 DJ 
 
 •of its courts. Not that this grandeur and glory arc un- 
 intelligent, for, at the king's call, there came a crowd of 
 all the talents, eager to fulfil his purposes of magnifi- 
 cence and splendour; but the result has an eminently 
 unintellectual aspect, for in truth a ray of genius would 
 have embarrassed the builders of Versailles and dis- 
 turbed the convincing effects at which they aimed with 
 much just pride of skill. 
 
 The cradle of Versailles was Vincennes. Whilst 
 Louis XIV. was yet a boy, the old fortress was trans- 
 formed with a view to his amusements, and Colbert, 
 then no more than Mazarin's man of business, was 
 instructed to bring together there " tout cc qui s'y pent 
 faire pour Ic plaisir du roy."' Any residence, beyond 
 the reach of a Paris mob, must have had peculiar charm 
 to a boy whose childhood had seen the restless days of 
 the Fronde. The freedom and safety of Vincennes 
 became very dear to him, but Vincennes was soon out- 
 grown, and at Versailles he sought a vaster theatre for 
 the display of those tastes which, fostered by Colbert 
 on his way to power, were destined to bring to the 
 ground his darling schemes for the welfare of the 
 French people. 
 
 Nominated publicly to the post of Commissioner 
 of Works in January, 1 664, a post which he had 
 been for some time secretly preparing to occup)', 
 Colbert had settled to his own satisfaction the line 
 which he intended to pursue. He held that, for the 
 <Tlorv and honour of the king of France, the Louvre 
 had to be completed in such wise that, for size and 
 magnificence, it should surpass the palaces of ail other 
 kings and countries, whilst Paris should be filled with 
 public monuments destined to eclipse the triumphs of 
 ' " Lettres de Colbert," November 29, 1653.
 
 54 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 Greece and Rome. But, on this head, as on many 
 others, Colbert had miscalculated his strength, for the 
 claims of that enlightened self-interest which to him 
 appeared all-convincing, were easily outweighed in the 
 mind of his master by the dictates of pleasure or caprice. 
 
 Colbert himself was not a man of taste, but he had 
 too exact a mind to remain unconscious of his own 
 deficiency. In early days, when making purchases for 
 Mazarin, he used anxiously to solicit the Cardinal's 
 guidance,! and he prepared himself to take over the 
 Board of Works by selecting a few confidential advisers 
 who formed a small committee which ultimately became 
 the Academy of Inscriptions, and gave birth, a few 
 years later, to yet another academy — the Academy of 
 Architecture. 
 
 One of the chief in influence among these advisers 
 was Colbert's own clerk, Charles Perrault,- the author 
 not only of the Contes des Fees, but of the curious 
 memoirs 3 which contain so much of the secret historv 
 of these transactions. He enumerates the projects 
 named at their first meeting, held on the 3rd Februar}', 
 1663 ; and when we find that the Louvre was to 
 be finished, many monuments to be raised to the glory 
 of the king, and numbers of medals were to be struck, 
 it seems odd that not one of those called to advise as to 
 the execution of these schemes possessed any practical 
 qualifications. 
 
 Shortly after this first meeting the members were 
 formally presented to the king, whom they found in a 
 closet behind his mother^s bedchamber, "which," says 
 
 ' De Laborde, " Le Palais Mazarin," p. 262. 
 
 - The others were the Abbe de Bourseis and the Abbe de Canaques, 
 both, lil<e Chapelain, members of the Academic P'ran^aise. De Canaques 
 was satirised by Boileau. 
 
 ^ "Mem. de Perrault," Avignon, 1759.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARCHITECTURE. 55 
 
 Pcrrault, " he incessantly quitted to watch her, waiting 
 on her in her sickness, ministering to almost all her 
 wants.'^i The queen-mother was sick to death, but her 
 son's anxiety did not make him the less superb in com- 
 mitting to the care of the new Academy " that which he 
 held dearer than anything in the world — his glory ! " 
 
 But " ma gloire '^ had a twin brother in " mon bon 
 plaisir/' and before he had been a year in office, we 
 find Colbert appealing to the king against that reckless 
 expenditure at Versailles, which hindered the execution 
 of all other projects. " I entreat your ]\Iajesty to allow 
 me to say two words as to the reflections I often make 
 on this subject, and to be pleased to forgive my zeal. 
 That building is far more a question of your ^Majesty's 
 amusement than of your Majesty's credit, . , . Vet if 
 your Majesty seeks where the 500,000 crowns are gone 
 which have been spent there the last two years, your 
 Majesty will have great difficulty in finding them. 
 Whilst your Majesty has spent such great sums on this 
 building, the Louvre has been neglected. . . . Ah ! 
 what a pity that the greatest and most virtuous king, 
 of that true virtue which is the stuff of the greatest 
 princes, should be measured by the yard of Versailles ! " 
 Already this absorbing passion for show and pleasure 
 had begun to vex the soul of Colbert ; already that 
 economy which he was bent on introducing into the 
 public service was menaced by the expense of the king's 
 diversions. "As for me,"' he continues, " I confess that 
 in spite of your Majesty's dislike to running up the 
 current account, could I have foreseen how great would 
 have been the drain of Versailles, I should have advised 
 the carrj'ing it under that head so as to conceal the 
 amount." In his despair, Colbert next urged as a 
 ' " Mt'm. dc rcrrault," p. 4c.
 
 56 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 compromise that a fixed yearly sum should be allotted 
 to this pleasure-house, whilst more strenuous efforts 
 should be made for the completion of the Louvre ; but 
 in vain. Versailles was the creation of the king himself; 
 as to the Louvre and the buildings of Paris, he could 
 force himself occasionally to give them dignified atten- 
 tion, but he took no more interest in them than he did 
 in his fleet, and thus Colbert's prediction is verified, and 
 this chief of kings is now judged by the crumbling 
 glories of a deserted palace. 
 
 Still Colbert refused to forego his projects. Having 
 formed his council, his next care was to select an 
 architect, and he at once found himself in a sea of 
 difficulties. As " Surintendant et ordonnateur general 
 des maisons royales, jardins et tapisseries de Sa Ma- 
 jeste, arts et manufactures de France," he had, under 
 his orders, four intendants, three supervisors, three 
 treasurers, and the first architect to the king, Le Vau. 
 But the plans of Le Vau for the principal facade of the 
 Louvre were too modest for him, so he stopped the 
 works, and invited the profession to criticise Le Van's 
 plans and send in designs of their own.' This was the 
 first act of the play in which Bernini was eventually 
 called to take a principal part. 
 
 The Paris architects were, of course, all delighted to 
 criticise Le Vau ; many, too, were ready with designs of 
 their own, to be exhibited in the same room with the 
 condemned model by the man in disgrace. Amongst 
 these was one, as Charles Perrault tells us, b\- his 
 "brother^ the doctor,'' which all approved, probably 
 because none feared an amateur as a serious rival, but 
 they reckoned without the doctor's brother. TJic 
 great feature of this plan was an immense peristyle, 
 ■ " Mem. (.Ic reriaull," p. 6o. ■ Ibid. p. 6i.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARCHITECTURE. 57 
 
 or colonnade of fluted pillars, crowned by elaborate 
 capitals of the Corinthian order, and the novelty and 
 splendour of the project are said to have astonished 
 Colbert; but his admiration of the doctor's genius, as 
 well as his disapprobation of Le Van's designs, had 
 probabl}' both been inspired of set purpose by the 
 <astute Charles Perrault, who had from the first laid his 
 plans to procure the honour of finishing the Louvre for 
 his own family. For the moment, however, he had 
 to content himself with seeing his brother's design 
 despatched to Rome, together with that of Le Vau, 
 which had held its own well in this com,petition, for 
 Colbert naturally hesitated to commit so important an 
 undertaking to the doctor's hands without further advice. 
 The fresh plans and fresh criticisms received from 
 Rome were but a further embarrassment ; Colbert could 
 not make up his mind to take the responsibility of a 
 decision. Seeing his hesitation, the Abbe Benedetti^ 
 took the opportunity to press the claims of Bernini, 
 from whom a criticism and a project had also been 
 solicited by the French Ambassador ; and although 
 Colbert noticed that the Cavaliere seemed to have 
 thought of nothing but the outside, he was in such 
 difficulties that he took the desperate step of inviting 
 Bernini to Paris. 2 
 
 The Perraults now appeared to have been com- 
 pletely checkmated, and the most absurd concessions 
 were made to the vanity of the very vain old Italian to 
 secure his co-operation in the completion of the palace 
 
 ' Benedetti had been employed by Mazaiin, in 1644, to negotiate with 
 Bernini before he entrusted the building of his palace to Fran9ois Mansard, 
 and had again endeavoured to introduce an Italian architect, when Le Vau 
 was selected to carry out additions to Vincennes. See " Le Palais Mazarin," 
 note 189. 
 
 = Colbert's Letters, 3rd October, 1664.
 
 58 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 of palaces. He was escorted to Paris by the French 
 Ambassador, the Duke de Crequi himself, who^ when 
 he had taken leave of the Holy Father, " colla solita 
 pompa/' visited the Cavaliere, " colla medesima," in order 
 to request him to depart. His progress across France 
 was triumphal ; every city through which he passed had 
 the king's orders to present him with addresses and 
 gifts. Even the great tOAvn of Lyons, paying by custom 
 such homage to princes of the blood alone, had to acquit 
 itself like the rest. M. de Chantelou, the Steward of the 
 Royal Household, was sent out to meet Bernini, when 
 he approached Paris in the month of May, with orders 
 to take his commands and bear him company, and he 
 was received almost immediately by the king at St. 
 Germain with all imaginable honours. 
 
 On the other hand, those of the profession who had 
 been ready to combine against Le Vau were not pre- 
 pared to yield the place to a foreigner, though they had 
 criticised Le Vau and quizzed the doctor. Forced now 
 to receive Bernini with every outward demonstration 
 of respect, they in secret made common cause against 
 him, whispering about that this new rival eclipsed all 
 others only by his pretensions and his arrogance. 
 
 Bernini soon gave them their open opportunity ; 
 in the magnificent scheme which he elaborated, he 
 betrayed the weakness on which the practical e}-c of 
 Colbert had fastened at the outset ; he neglected all 
 those domestic requirements on providing for which 
 h^'ench architects had begun to pride themselves ; he 
 took thought for banqueting halls, for theatres, and 
 state reception chambers, and left such common matters 
 as sleeping rooms and offices, Italian fashion, to take 
 care of themselves. Colbert, who attached a reasonable 
 importance to the distribution of comfortable living
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARCHITECTURE. 59 
 
 rooms.i not onl}' for the king but for his Court, was 
 no less exacting as to provisions which might facih- 
 tate the discharge of their duties by the officers of 
 the household^ and loudly expressed his dissatisfaction. - 
 Charles Perrault at once improved the occasion, and by 
 dint of persistently dwelling on these particular defects, 
 worked Colbert up into a state of exasperation. Yet, 
 in bringing Bernini to Paris, and in treating him as one 
 inspired, Colbert had committed, not only himself, but 
 the king, so deeply, that to dismiss the Italian like 
 an ordinary mortal was impossible ; he was therefore 
 forced to temporise, and even to continue to approve 
 openly what he secretly condemned. So successfully 
 did he conceal his irritation, even from those about him, 
 that at one moment the wily Perrault thought he had 
 overreached himself, and, alarmed at the public 
 reprimand he had received at a meeting of the Board 
 of Works, pursued Colbert down a corridor,^ humbly 
 entreating him to overlook the liberty he had taken 
 in criticising Bernini's plans. " What,'' replied Colbert 
 furiously, " do you think I don't see it all as well as 
 you .'' Peste soit dn B. . . . qui pensc nous en /aire 
 acci'oire ! " "I was astonished," says Perrault, ''and 
 gave thanks to Almighty God that He granted me 
 this clear view of the Court, and of the dissimulation 
 necessary to those who would live therein!" It was 
 evident that the fate of Bernini's plan was sealed. 
 
 Meanwhile, in spite of the gathering storm, prepara- 
 tions for the new buildings of the Louvre went on. 
 The first stone was laid on 17th October, 1665, by the 
 
 ' The question of interior arrangements was frequently the chief problem 
 of the plans submitted to the Academy, See Register of Academy of Arclii- 
 tecture, June 9, 1677, etc., now preserved in ihe Archives of the Insliiut, 
 extracts from which will be found in Appendi.\ VIII. 
 
 = " Mem. de Perrault," p. 86. 3 Jbid. p. 93.
 
 •6o ART ly THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 king himself, with flourish of trumpets and much pomp 
 of flowing wigs, and coats weighty with gold.' Before 
 the close of the year the foundations were far advanced, 
 but the situation became more and more embarrassing 
 every day. No petty act of discouragement and annoy- 
 ance vv^as left unpractised by which Bernini might be 
 forced to take the initiative^ and relieve his unwilling 
 hosts of his irksome presence. The old man's vanity, 
 no mean defence against indirect attacks, at last gave 
 way; forced to entertain the unwelcome suspicion 
 that his triumphant honours were to be exchanged for 
 humiliation and defeat, he requested leave to depart, 
 and his ill humour broke forth when his secret and 
 deadly enemy^ Charles Perrault, carried to him the 
 king's parting gifts : a grant of a yearly pension of 
 I2pool. for himself, another of 1200 1. for his son, 
 and three bags, each containing a thousand gold coins. 
 "These I carried to him in my own arms," says 
 Perrault, *Sn order to do him the more honour." But 
 Bernini was not to be so deceived. " Such good-days," 
 said he, "would be pleasant enough if they came often ; 
 as for your patents, I don't look to see them paid above 
 once or twice at the most.'' And so they parted. 2 
 
 Perrault had got rid of Bernini ; he had now to get 
 rid of Le Vau. By adroit suggestions the king had 
 been disgusted with the magnificent schemes of the 
 Italian ; by the pretence of imposing on his admiration 
 a second and more modest design of Le Vau, he 
 was warily brought to pronounce himself finally in 
 favour of the colonnade by Claude Perrault.-^ Even 
 then, however, Colbert hesitated to commit himself 
 
 ' These coais for great ceremonies were so heavy wiili metal that tlicy 
 ■were instantly laid aside on entering tlie jirivate apaitments. See 
 "Journal de Dangeau," 19 Fevrier, 1714. 
 
 -"Mem. de Perrault," p. no. See also Gazette dcs Ikaux Arts, Mars, 
 JSS4. 5 ihiJ, p. 127.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARCHITECTURE. 6i 
 
 Avliolly to a man who might be an ingenious and 
 brilhant draughtsman, but who had no professional 
 training or experience. The friends of Le Vau, who 
 counted thirty years of service, were merciless in their 
 chaff, "Architecture/' they said, "must be very ill 
 since she was to be put into the doctor's hands ! '■" But 
 the doctor's devoted brother^ ever fertile in expedientSj 
 again came to the rescue, and by his invention of the 
 " Conseil des batiments " which ultimately became the 
 Academy of Architecture (1671) the difficulty was solved. 
 Strong in the outspoken approval of Louis XIV.,. 
 Perrault advised that his brother's design should 
 be placed in the hands of a committee of the Board 
 of Works contrived on the model of the first committee 
 appointed by Colbert to aid him in his functions as 
 Chief Commissioner^ the committee which had de- 
 veloped into the Academy of Inscriptions. ^ The early 
 meetings of this committee were quite informal. Charles 
 Perrault acted as secretary, the doctor submitted his 
 designs, Le Vau pointed out, as in duty bound, certain 
 unprofessional artifices which were undoubtedly bad 
 building.2 Colbert called Le Brun to his aid, Le Brun 
 concurred with Le Vau in condemning the employment 
 of iron braces, to counteract the pressure of the archi- 
 traves, and other such unworkmanlike devices ; but these 
 objections were overruled, the die was cast, the works 
 went on. 
 
 Perrault the doctor was told, just as Bernini had 
 been told, that on no account must he interfere with 
 or injure the old Louvre, and more especially must 
 he respect the work of Pierre Lescot on the facade of 
 the interior of the court facing east. Bernini had cast 
 
 ' "Mem. de Perrault," p. 122. 
 
 - See Registre du Conseil des Batiments, Arch. Nat., and see also 
 Blondel, vol. iv. p. 4.
 
 62 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 all such warnings to the winds ; in his scheme, the old 
 court was filled up by four enormous pavilions, which, 
 projecting- inwards, gave it the shape of a Greek 
 cross ; building round this nucleus, he had arranged 
 four smaller courts, irregular in shape, and ill lighted, 
 the different parts all of various heights, finished up 
 by terraces, which, serving the upper storeys and con- 
 nected by staircases, aff'orded a kind of promenade. 
 Bold projections broke up the line of the palace on the 
 south by the Seine ; there, as well as on the north and 
 east, the moat remained. As for the fagade on the 
 east, where Perrault's colonnade was destined ultimately 
 to stand, that also was broken up irregularly, and as far 
 as can be judged from the plans, the cornice with its 
 consoles and statues must have crushed the whole.' 
 The central entrance was poor, though the vestibule 
 within was magnificent, and the staircases well placed. 
 The same defects marked the proposed fagade to face 
 the Tuileries on the west ; the central body of the 
 building seems out of all proportion with the pavilions 
 at the corners, and the double rows of arcades in the 
 first and second storeys look as if they were stuck to, 
 or hanging from, the enormous Corinthian columns 
 which run up past them, and which are, as it were, 
 cut through by the cornice on which the second 
 storey rests.^ The great space between the Louvre 
 and the Tuileries lay empty, only covered by an 
 immense connecting gallery, running along on the 
 north side ; wdiile on the east, Bernini would have 
 cleared the ground right up to the Pont Neuf, raising 
 in the centre a rock a hundred feet high, surmounted 
 
 ' Blondel, vol. iv. book 6, No. i. plate 8. 
 
 -De Clarac, " Musee de Sculpture," ed. 1S41, vol. i. p. 372. Sec 
 also Perrault's criticisms of and defence of such treatment of an order. 
 Appendix VII.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARCHITECTURE. 63 
 
 by the statue of the king, decorated on all sides by 
 nymphs and urns, out of which water should have 
 flowed to the most distant parts of Paris. 
 
 That this scheme was stupendous, nobody will 
 deny ; that it was, as Bernini did not scruple to assert, 
 the fruit of direct Divine inspiration, not even Bernini 
 himself could have believed ; but whatever the defects 
 of his plan, the reproach specially brought against it 
 by his Parisian critics applied with equal force to 
 the designs of Claude Perrault. If Bernini, as they 
 said, had thought of nothing but the outside of 
 the palace, most certainly Claude Perrault, when he 
 designed that magnificent mask, the colonnade, had 
 paid very little attention to the inside :i if he were a 
 genius he was not an architect, and he never seems 
 to have thought of putting his own work into relation 
 with that of his predecessors. Until his advent, all 
 additions and alterations in the Louvre had been made 
 more or less in reference to the facade by Lescot, on 
 the west of the old court. Its proportions had been 
 disturbed by Lemercier,^ but Lemercier religiously 
 preserved the style of the Renaissance, and Le Vau, 
 in 1660, took up his work in the same spirit. In 
 1663 the desire to complete the fourth facade so as to 
 make it more magnificent than all the rest, overleaped all 
 other considerations, and the construction of Perrault's 
 colonnade was allowed to disturb the whole economy 
 of the Louvre.^ It was so much too long for the 
 side to which it was attached,"^ that another sham 
 front had to be carried along the side facing the Seine, 
 
 ' De ClaiMC, " Musce de Sculpture," vol. i. p. 3S2. 
 - The original size of the court was one-fourth that of the present area. 
 ' Guilhermy, " Itineraire Archeologique," p. 268. 
 
 •* Mr, Fergusson considers it too long also for its height, but adds that 
 this was not the fault of the architect.
 
 64 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 and so much too high for the rest of the court, that 
 the balustrade which surmounted the cornice stood 
 considerably above the line of roof on the inside. In 
 short it was about as adapted to its purpose as the 
 Observatory with which the doctor had at the same 
 time endowed Paris. ^ 
 
 The fatal consequence of his dealings with the 
 Louvre was that it became impossible to carry along 
 on the inside the attic and French roof of Lescot, 
 which had been hitherto respected and continued round 
 the court by his successors. Nothing daunted, Perrault 
 destroyed their work, and replaced it on three sides 
 of the Court by a repetition of the order employed in 
 the first storey, a scheme the effect of which has been 
 disastrous. For the west wing now alone remains 
 with its original attic, at once a provocation and a 
 protest ; again and again it has been menaced by those 
 who had rather sacrifice its beauty than leave it out 
 of line with the rest of the quadrangle, whilst it has 
 as often been saved by those to whom perfect symmetry 
 was too dear a price to pay for loss of the original record. 
 
 In the noisy war of blunders and spites which 
 raged round the colonnade, Le Vau, the humbled first 
 architect to the Crown, plays his part in silence. He 
 had not only to bear the pain of seeing himself set 
 aside for a layman, but was obliged to give that layman 
 the practical help indispensable to the carrying out of 
 his plans. This he seems to have done so loyall}' that 
 many believed him to have been himself the author of 
 the work. To these Claude Perrault triumphantly 
 replied : " Look at Le Vau's plans ; show me his 
 peristyle V^~ and this test, which had helped to suppress 
 Bernini by making Colbert feel that there was some- 
 
 ' See Lcgrand and Landon, " Description de Pari:-. " -Mem., p. 125.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARCHITECTURE. 65 
 
 thing humiliating in the absence of a colonnade, success- 
 fully served to shame Le Vau. The pensce du peristyle 
 was the unanswerable argument which silenced those 
 who, like Germain Brice ' or Francois Dorbay, believed 
 that Perrault had as much share in the colonnade of the 
 Louvre as Catherine de Medicis in the Tuileries ; but 
 Le Vau himself, essentially an architect of the old 
 French school, can scarcely have envied the honours of 
 that last and greatest triumph of the heavy transitional 
 architecture which had arisen with the Jesuits in the 
 reign of Plenri IV. 
 
 M. de Labordc aptly said of Le Van's predecessor, 
 Lemercier, that he showed in the building of the 
 Sorbonne " qu'il savait inventer, dans Ic Louvre qu'il 
 savait respecter." 2 Le Vau was less happy than 
 Lemercier in that he was forced by the king to destroy 
 in the Louvre what he would fain have respected ; just 
 as, at an earlier date, he had been forced to destroy in 
 the Tuileries the spiral staircase of Delorme, a triumph 
 of construction, by the same royal order. At Versailles, 
 however, Le Vau suddenly obtained some small com- 
 pensation. In 1669 Colbert had spoken of the building 
 of Versailles as a matter not absolutely settled ; he had 
 informed his Council that the Tuileries and Louvre 
 must be finished, had gone into minute questions con- 
 nected with the great staircase, the colonnade, the attic, 
 and had even considered the rebuilding of neighbouring 
 houses ; but, as to Versailles, he only suggested that "a 
 definite understanding should be come to in respect of 
 the plans and designs of the additions to be made.'" ^ 
 
 ' "Description de Paris," ed. 169S, vol. i. p. 26. 
 - " De rUnion des Arts," vol. i. p. 99. 
 
 3 " Lettres et Insts.," vol. ii. p. ccx. These plans are now in the 
 Cabinet des Estampes. 
 
 F
 
 66 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 Up to this date he had succeeded in staving off any- 
 thing more than some sh'ght alterations in the wings of 
 the " petit chateau,'^ ^ as the pleasure-house of Louis XIII. 
 was popularly named, but even as he spoke the future of 
 Versailles was determined ; the king decided ^to make 
 additions sufficient to house himself and his Council for 
 many days whenever it suited him ; and the chateau 
 forthwith had to be transformed into a royal palace. 
 Then it was that Le Vau, forced to abandon the Louvre 
 to Perrault, was called to make plans for Versailles- — 
 plans by which he had hoped to justify the reputation 
 he had won at Vaux le Vicomte as the architect of 
 Fouquet ; but an ill fate pursued him, and even as they 
 were taking shape he died. 
 
 Now, the informal Committee of Works had con- 
 tinued to act satisfactorily as long as Le Vau was alive; 
 his authority had always been sufficient to settle vexed 
 questions of practical detail, but there was no one to 
 replace him. Neither his son nor his son-in-law, 
 Francois Dorbay — to whose superintendence the plans 
 for Versailles were necessarily entrusted — was a man of 
 sufficient standing to take his place.-^ Colbert therefore 
 largely increased his committee, calling to his aid 
 Liberal Bruand, the builder of the Invalides and of 
 Richmond Palace, Pierre Gittard, Antoine Lepaultre, 
 and Pierre Mignard_, whose task it was to supervise the 
 sculptors employed in the royal palaces, just as Le Brun 
 directed all the painters and decorators. To these were 
 added Francois Blondel,^ as lecturer, and Felibien des 
 
 ' Dussieux, "Chateau de Versailles," vol. i. p. 90. 
 
 * For plans of the Louvre and Versailles see J. F. Blondel, "Arch. 
 Fran. Recueil," etc., vol. iv., Paris, 1756. 
 
 3 He was made also Garde des Antiques in 1673. O.'' 1053. Arch. Nat. 
 
 ■* Diplomatist and mathematician, having great theoretical and some 
 practical knowledge of architecture, author of " Cours d'Architecture,"etc.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARCHITECTURE. 67 
 
 Avaux, to fulfil the same duties which he already- 
 discharged, as Secretary to the iRoyal Academy of 
 Painting and Sculpture. The next step was to set 
 aside part of the gallery of the Palais Royal for the 
 Thursday meetings of the committee, w^hich was formally 
 •installed on the 31st day of December, 167 1, and recog- 
 nised as the " Academie des Architectes du Roy/' ^ 
 
 As we turn over the leaves of the old registers 
 •of the proceedings, now preserved in the library of 
 the Institute, our first impression is, that this Academy, 
 so far from serving any practical end, spent most of 
 its time in useless discussions. Debates on propositions 
 such as that " Toutes choses faites de bon goust doivent 
 necessairement plaire^ mais qu'il y a plusieurs choses qui 
 peuvent plaire qu'on ne pent pas pour cela dire de bon 
 goust," are diversified by much reading of Vitruvius, 
 Serlio, Scamozzi and Battista Alberti. One asks one- 
 self how is it that the Society came to fail so completely 
 of its high purpose ? True, as the days go on, the 
 reading serves chiefly as a text for the examination 
 of professional problems, and even these are not 
 discussed merely in the air ; but it is comparatively 
 rare to find the Academicians holding council over 
 difficulties regarding public works actually in progress. 
 
 Up till the death of Colbert in 1683 the members took 
 a certain share in the decision of questions concerning 
 the Louvre. In June, 1674, they approved Perrault's 
 proposal to suppress some details in the pediment ; in 
 Alarch, 1677, his designs for the attic were submitted to 
 them ; in January, 1679, they inspected models of the 
 west front in order to determine the proper elevation 
 of the wings, each man being desired to send his 
 opinion to Colbert privately. But at this date all hope 
 
 ' See Appendix VIII., " Registre de I'Acad. d'Avch." 
 
 F 2
 
 68 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 of the completion of the palace must have been given 
 up, for in 1672 Colbert had been reduced to add in 
 a note to the Budget of Expenditure, " il faut mettre le 
 Louvre en etat de ne pas perir," ^ and although the 
 Colonnade was carried so far that in 1676 the two 
 enormous blocks, each fifty feet long, quarried at Meudon, 
 were raised with infinite pains on the cornice of the cen- 
 tral pediment, the works continued to languish as if every 
 one's patience had been exhausted by the effort, till with 
 the death of Colbert they came wholly to a standstill, re- 
 maining in a state of such utter neglect that Bachaumont, 
 writing seventy years later, notes that " ces nouvelles 
 parties . . . ne sont ni achevees ni couvertes." 2 
 
 If the share of the Academy in the completion of 
 the Louvre was little, the part it played in the building 
 of Versailles was still less. Shortly after Le Van's death, 
 at the sitting of March, 1672, the "'assemblee des archi- 
 tectes nommes par le roy," deliberated as to the 
 disposition of certain pilasters near the entrance to the 
 great court, and other matters in connection with his 
 plans ; but, after this for several years, the Academy hears 
 no more of Versailles. Not, indeed, until the moment at 
 which the chateau, as rehandled on Le Van's plans, was 
 almost complete (20th May, 1674), were the members 
 again taken into council, and then only concerning 
 points of interior decoration. 
 
 The old chateau of Louis XIII. stood, when Le Vau 
 was called to remodel it, between court and garden, its 
 wings extending along the court on the north and south. 
 Le Vau, faithful to the traditions which had guided him 
 in dealing with the Louvre, respected the '' little 
 chateau," isolating it from his own work, except on 
 
 ' Clement, " Hist, de Colbert," ed. 1846, chap. xvi'. p. 340. 
 ^ "Essai sur rArchitecture," p. 81, ed. 1751.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARCHITECTURE. 69 
 
 the west or garden front — this front he carried on to 
 right and left, throwing out two other wings north and 
 south, which were separated by open courts, l3nng on 
 either side of tlie central Cour de Marbre. In this w^ay 
 he preserved the older wings of the chateau, which 
 gave much grace and lightness to the general aspect ; 
 and on the east, where the new buildings were extended 
 up to the offices of Louis XIII., they were also con- 
 nected with the old hunting lodge, portions of which 
 may still be detected behind the Galerie des Glaces, and 
 in the great corridor. Violently opposed by Perrault's 
 partyj who were anxious to give the doctor the oppor- 
 tunity for another colonnade,' Le Vau found an un- 
 expected supporter in the king himself, for a too great 
 persistency in suggesting that the chateau was so 
 ruinous that it must be pulled down, irritated him into 
 peremptorily declaring that it should stand. '^ Pull it 
 down if you like, but if you do, it shall be rebuilt stone 
 for stone." 2 An outburst of temper which is popularly 
 set down to filial piety, but if filial piety was the cause, 
 then it is odd to find a little later that the chapel of 
 Louis XIII. was sacrificed without protest by Mansard, 
 to the wardrobe of his son. 
 
 Jean Hardouin Mansard, on being called to Versailles, 
 W'as not in the least inclined to begin discussions with 
 the Board of Works, or to refer difficulties to the judg- 
 ment of his brother Academicians. " He was," says 
 St. Simon, '' a well-made handsome man of the scum 
 of the people, with much mother wit, wholly applied to 
 
 ' The doctor's plans filled two vols., " Dcssins d'Aichitecluie pour le 
 Louvre et Versailles, etc.," par Claude Perraull. Sold by Charles Perrault 
 to the Crown (together with " Registre du Conseil des B'\" now in 
 Arch. Nat.), and after various vicissitudes burnt in the Louvre, 1S71. 
 Cited by I'iganiol ; and by lilondcl, vol. iv. pp. 4, 4S, et seq. 
 
 = Mem., pp. 161, 162. " Lettres et Insts.," vol. v, p. 266.
 
 70 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 the art of pleasing, but unpurged from the grossness 
 contracted in his origin. Hodman, stone-cutter, mason, 
 pointer, he worked himself in with the great Mansard 
 . . . who tried to train him and make something of him. 
 He was thought to be his son. He called himself 
 his nephew, and some time after his death (1666) 
 took his name to give himself importance, in which he 
 succeeded." I Nominated as an " architecte du roy" in. 
 1675,2 he soon found favour at Court, for though 
 ridiculously inferior to the great Francois Mansard in 
 originality and abilit}^, he had just those gifts of facility 
 and expedition which pleased Louis XIV.-^ The 
 Versailles of Le Vau was then practically finished, al- 
 though the noble Dcgrc des Anibassadcurs^ (destroyed by 
 Louis XV.) and other portions of the interior were still 
 in progress, but the Versailles of Le Vau \\as no sooner 
 finished than it was condemned as too small. The 
 vast additions, which the king impatiently demanded. 
 Mansard instantly supplied, working with such rapidity 
 that, in the space of a few years, he not only 
 rehandled Versailles, but called into being those 
 typical creations of the day, Marly, Trianon, and 
 Clagny. The great wing was thrown out on the south 
 and tacked on to the chateau by building along the 
 Coiir des Princes (1679-81) ; the terrace of Le Vau on 
 the west became the Galerie des G laces (1679), a new 
 and lofty chapel arose on the north (i68i-2),5 and 
 within five years from the commencement of the reign 
 of Mansard, Louis XIV. began to make the palace his 
 habitual residence. Throughout all these alterations the 
 
 ' St. Simon, Mcmoires, ed. 1S73, vol. v. pp. 459, 460. 
 - See " Registre de I'Acad. d'Arch." Appendix VIII. 
 
 3 "Journal de Dangeau," April 3rd, 1685. 
 
 4 Finished in 16S1, Dussieux, "Chateau de Versailles," vol. i. p. 99. 
 
 5 Replaced by the present chapel in 17 10.
 
 ■ THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARCHITECTURE. 71 
 
 little chateau was still respected; coming from the town, 
 even to-day, and looking up the slope from the wide 
 Place d'Armes, the eye travels over the vast area of the 
 Great Court lined with statues, and beyond, again, across 
 other courts of lessening size, till it rests on the small 
 building which is enveloped in the immense palace of 
 Louis XIV. Long and narrow, the new palace engulfs 
 the old, and the toy-like red-brick building, daintily 
 faced with pale buff stone, is lost at the end of the 
 distant perspective. 
 
 Only twice, whilst he was carrying out this immense 
 enterprise, did IMansard condescend to consult his 
 fellows. In 16S9, when it was nearly finished, he 
 graciously allowed them to inspect his design for the 
 chapel, just as he had previously^ submitted to them 
 the plans for the construction of the great north wing, 
 the building of which destroyed Perrault's famous Grotte 
 de Thetis- and the reservoirs of Louis XIII.; these plans 
 being presented for inspection solely that the Academi- 
 cians might save his time by arranging for their execution 
 with the contractors "qui pourront se presenter." In 
 like manner, Mansard's project for the entrance to the 
 Hotel de Noailles (1679) came before them, as well as 
 that for the Dome des Invalides (1689) ; but the points 
 Avhich he allowed them to consider were such as the 
 proper depth of vaulting on walls of given dimensions^ 
 or the simplest construction for the roof he had ordered 
 for the Town Hall of Aries. -^ His extraordinary favour 
 with the king enabled Mansard to rule as dictator. "If 
 any one had a house to build," says St. Simon, "he 
 expected him to send for Mansard, just as an invalid 
 was expected to send for Fagon.'" His salary was in- 
 cessantly augmented, in spite of the pressing need for 
 
 ^ October 27th, 16S4. = Mem., p. 157. 3 16S4.
 
 72 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 economy ; he was ennobled ; was made, after Colbert's 
 death, Intendant des Batiments (1684), Inspector-General 
 (1691) ; and when Colbert de Villacerf, Louvois' creature, 
 was forced to resign, Mansard obtained the coveted Sur- 
 intendance, selling his post of Intendant to the younger 
 Blondel,! whilst he kept his appointment of First Archi- 
 tect to the Crown. As Surintendant, the lustre which 
 he contrived to give to his post^ the account to which he 
 turned the opportunities it afforded of private interviews 
 with the kingC'qu'il connoissoit en perfection "j, were 
 so great that at his death^ in 1708, nobles intrigued 
 for his succession, and the Due d'Antin, the son of 
 Louis XIV. and Madame de Montespan, only secured 
 it through the active support of Madame de Maintenon.2 
 Under these conditions the credit and consequence 
 of the Academy rapidly diminished, and its part, as far 
 as regarded works undertaken for the Crown, was 
 reduced to nothing. Cut off from the brilliant prospects 
 which had glittered before their eyes when they first 
 assembled, having had little to do with the Louvre and 
 less with Versailles, with no more likelihood of being 
 allowed by Mansard to share in the construction of the 
 Place V^endome than they had had of touching the 
 Invalides under Liberal Bruand, the Academicians were 
 forced to narrow their ambitions. They lectured to 
 students, read amongst themselves, and welcomed appli- 
 cations for advice from private persons. Sometimes they 
 furnished plans, sometimes surveyed their execution, or 
 even acted as arbitrators in such professional disputes 
 as a quarrel between the brothers Lepaultre,-^ or a 
 difference between the Due de Bouillon and his builder 
 
 ' Dussieux, "Chateau de Versailles," vol. i. pj). loc, loi. 
 =" " De r Union des Arts, ' vol. i. p. 130. 
 3 July I2th, 1677.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARCHITECTURE, u 
 
 Vauban.i Occasionally even legal points, such as right 
 of way, were brought before them for settlement. 
 
 Even the practical applications which they received 
 were of such a nature as proves the truth of Colbert's 
 remark that no one in France employed skilled work- 
 men but the king. The Prince of Orange, indeed, 
 requests plans for a palace (1685) ; but we hear next to 
 nothing of building on an important scale by French 
 nobles, and during fifteen years the most considerable 
 projects brought before the Academy were designs for a 
 hospital at Besancon (1673), for finishing the towers of 
 Rcnnes Cathedral (1674), and for a Jesuit church at 
 Caen (1682). For the most part their attention is 
 occupied with matters no more considerable than a 
 gateway at the P^euillants (1677), an altar for the 
 Sorbonne (168 1), or a chapel at St. Eustache (1682). 
 Frequently advice is sought on points of a most ele- 
 mentary character : the Chapter of Beauvais (1676) have 
 to be told that, until they can replace the leaden roof of 
 their cathedral, they had better make a provisional frame- 
 work of wood, and thatch it or cover it in with loose straw, 
 and Chartres (1676) wishes to know if a man is obliged 
 to prop up his neighbour's house when he is engaged in 
 pulling down his own, the Academy being requested to 
 take into account the fact that at Chartres all the houses 
 are of wood. 
 
 As for matters of archaeological interest they are 
 rarely touched on. In February, 1678, at Perrault's 
 instance, the drawing is examined of a triumphal arch, 
 recently discovered at Reims ;- and once they discuss the 
 plans of some old work sent up from Troyes ; but in 
 
 ' May, 16SS. 
 
 - The Porte de Mars, built by Agrippa ia honour of C?esar Augustus, 
 now standing built into the walls of the city near the Porte de Laon.
 
 74 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 each case the main interest is eminently practical ; just 
 as the one problem which engaged their whole attention 
 throughout the course of that inspection of the ancient 
 monuments of Paris and the neighbourhood, which they 
 began by Colbert's orders in July, 167S, was — " How to 
 render masonry durable ? " ^ 
 
 Louvois, who, shortly after his accession to power,^ 
 made the most magnificent promises as to the im- 
 portance and prosperity he intended to confer on the 
 Academy of Architecture, ended, after a message con- 
 cerning an " Arc de Triomphe/' 3 and a request for 
 advice on the scheme for carrying the Eure to Versailles,^ 
 with a series of consultations about repairs for broken- 
 down bridges in various parts of France, which were 
 carried on chiefly through Pierre Bulet, the architect of 
 the Porte St. Martin, whom he had ordered them, in 
 1685, to receive of their company. As for the building 
 of the Place Vendome, the only trace left of the project 
 in the councils of the Academy is that discussion on 
 "grandes places," in which it is decided that they ought 
 not to be occupied by the houses of private persons. 
 
 Suddenly this harmless society was surprised by the 
 terrible announcement that Felibien had received a 
 letter from M. de Villacerf ; a letter as brief as it was 
 conclusive : ^' Le roy," said the Surintendant, " m^a 
 ordonne de faire cesser TAcademie d'Architecture ; je 
 vous prie d'en avertir M, de la Hire ^ affin qu'il n'enseigne 
 plus, et MM. les Architectes affin qu'ils ne s'y trouvent 
 plus." 
 
 The Academicians needed no explanation of this 
 
 ' Printed in extenso by M. de Laborde, see " Revue de I'Architecturc 
 cl Travaux Publics. C. Daly, annee 1852." - 29th December, 1684. 
 
 ^ Jan. 12, 16S5. See Registre, Appendix VIII. 
 ■* Ibid. Mars 2, 16S5. 
 s La Hire had succeeded Blondcl as professor and lecturer.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARCHITECTURE. 75 
 
 order. Louvois was dead, and with him liad departed 
 the energy which alone had supported the nation in the 
 kinjj's mistaken courses ; discouracrement had seized on 
 the pubhc mind ; pushed hard by the alhed forces of 
 Europe, France had been forced to exchange the excite- 
 ment of active warfare for the dull necessity of defence. 
 Famine stalked the land ; all trades languished ; com- 
 merce was annihilated. I " Famines, floods, cattle plagues 
 had afflicted a nation exhausted/' says Forbonnais, " by 
 twenty-two years of war and misery." To an adminis- 
 tration overwhelmed with debt, even the small subven- 
 tion due to the Academy of Architecture was a burden 
 of Avhich it was well to be rid. There was but one way 
 of saving the prestige attaching to their titles and 
 functions, and the members at once entreated to be 
 allowed to meet and teach gratuitously. The desired 
 permission was granted; but from this date their at- 
 tendance became irregular, there were no more visits 
 from Commissioners of Works, no more practical interest 
 in their proceedings ; sometimes Dorbay attends and 
 reads Blondel's "Architecture" with Felibien, sometimes 
 the register of these academic studies is sadly interrupted 
 by the chronicle of deaths. 
 
 At the close of the reign, the great works with which 
 Colbert had dreamed of endowing Paris under the 
 auspices of the Academy of Architecture were repre- 
 sented by three triumphal arches,^ the Invalides, the 
 Observatory, the Louvre Colonnade, and the unfinished 
 Place Vendomc ; whilst, in the levelling of the Butte des 
 Moiilins^ and in the piercing of a couple of avenues. 
 
 ' See Fenelon's Lc'Ltcr, Qluvrcs, vol. iii. p. 443, ed. 1S37. 
 = Porte St. Antoine, restored ; I'orte Si. Denis, built by Blondel ; and 
 Porte St. Martin, built by his pupil, Pierre Pulet. 
 3 Clement, "Hist, de Colbert," vol. ii. p. 221.
 
 76 ART IX THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 many noble monuments had been mercilessly destroyed 
 as Gothic. There has been, it is said, great exaggeration 
 as to the sums spent on Versailles and its dependencies ; 
 it is evident, too, that there can be no foundation for the 
 popular story that the king burnt the accounts for very 
 shame, for he spent as he ruled, by Divine right. Setting 
 aside all fable and conjecture as to the cost of much 
 that has escaped us, the figures that we have are startling 
 enough. In vain Colbert strove to keep down by rigorous 
 supervision the outgoings on works in progress,^ and 
 to ""prevent the losses incurred through the thefts of 
 servants and dependants ; ^ in vain he exacted incessant 
 watchfulness from his subordinates in the attempt to 
 check the frauds inevitable on the employment of 
 thousands of workmen ; the expenditure increased with 
 every year. About ;^ 14,000,000 of our present money 
 (165,000,000 liv.) are accounted for by the Board of 
 Works under Louis XIV., and of that sum at least two- 
 thirds went on Versailles and the dependent palaces of 
 Trianon, Clagny, and St. Cyr ; of the remaining third, 
 half was absorbed by Marly, the Louvre, the Tuileries, 
 and other royal palaces ; Marly, that last caprice of the 
 Gi^aiid JMonarqiie, of which now only a few ruins remain, 
 swallowing up 22,000,000 fr. reckoning at the present 
 rate,3 so that only a very small portion of the total 
 was expended on works of any public utility such as 
 the Invalides or that Canal des deux Mers from which 
 
 ' His orders to Lefebvre, one of his inspectors at Versailles, were to 
 rise at five o'clock to visit all the wurks, check the number of the 36,000 
 men employed, and be ready to answer questions on all points of detail. 
 — " Letlrcs et Insts.," vol. v. p. 337. 
 
 ' Petit, a controleur, reports in 1665 that when the Court left St. 
 Germain the servants took even the locks off the doors. Dussieux, 
 " Chateau de Versailles," note, vol. i. p. 103. 
 
 3 Clement, " Hist, de Colbert," vol. ii. p. 207.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARCHITECTURE, -j-j 
 
 Riquet was called in the heat of his labours that he 
 might scheme idle schemes for bringing- the Loire to 
 Versailles.! 
 
 Depense totale de Versailles, Eglises, Tiianon, Clagny, 
 Saint Cyr, la Machine dc Marly, la Riviere d'Eure, 
 Noisy, et les Moulineaux ..... 
 
 Tableaux, etoffes, argenterie, antiques .... 
 
 ■Nleubles et autres depenses ..... 
 
 Chapelle (construite de 1699 a 1710) .... 
 
 Autres depenses de tout genre ..... 
 
 Total pour Versailles et dependances 
 Saint Germain ........ 
 
 Marly (non-compris la machine qui figure a I'article Versaillei) 
 - Fontainebleau ........ 
 
 Chambord ......... 
 
 Louvre et Tuileries (expenses on this stopped in 1679) . 
 Arc de Triomphe de St. Antoine ..... 
 
 Observatoire de Paris (construit de 1667 a 1672) . 
 Hotsl Royal et Eglise des Invalides .... 
 
 Place Royale de I'Hotel Vendosme (Louvoi?, 16S7-99) 
 Le Val de Grace ....... 
 
 Annonciades de Meulan ...... 
 
 Canal des Deux Mers (non-compris ce qui a ete fourni par 
 les Etats de Languedoc) ..... 
 
 Manufactures des Gobelins et de la Savonnerie . 
 Manufactures etablies en plusieurs villes 
 Pensions et gratifications aux gens de lettres 
 
 Liv. 
 
 81,151,414 
 
 6,386,774 
 13,000,000 
 
 3,260,241 
 13,000,000 
 
 116,798,429 
 6,455,561 
 4,501,279 
 2,773,746 
 1,225,701 
 10,608,969 
 
 513,755 
 
 725,174 
 
 1,710,332 
 2,062,699 
 
 3,000,000 
 
 88,412 
 
 7,736,555 
 3,645,943 
 1,707,990 
 1,979,970 
 
 165,534,515 
 
 The fact that the king never put a check to the 
 sums he spent on himself enables us at least to take 
 
 ■ "Mem. de Perrault," p. 146, 
 
 - Fontainebleau — a good deal going on, 1039-42. Extracts from 
 "C. des B'-.," 1639-43. Miintz et Molinier, 1886. 
 
 3 Calculated by Clement, "Lettres et Insts.," vol. i. p. cli., to represent 
 350,000,000 of modern French money. See also " Hist, de Colbert," note, 
 vol. ii ]ip. 207 and 2IO. Eckhardt calculated Versailles at 116,238,893 
 liv., equivalent, according to him, to (in 1834) 500,000,000 f. See 
 " Etats au vrai de toutes les sommes employees par Louis XIV. a 
 Versailles, Marly, et dependances ; au Louvre, Tuileries, Canal de Langue- 
 doc, secours, etc." Eckhardt, Versailles, 1836.
 
 78 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 his palaces as the complete expression of his mind ; 
 the love of size and the love of ornament which they 
 betray corresponded with that passion for show and 
 effect which was ingrained in his intensely theatrical 
 nature. The pleasant graces which entice the eye to 
 the dwellings of the Renaissance were born of individual 
 fancy, and contrast with that vanity of display which, 
 growing steadily throughout the Grand. Siecle, replaced 
 variety of interest by a monotonous pomp. The change 
 had in truth begun before King Louis was born ; it 
 was inaugurated by the construction of the Place 
 Royale (1615), when the historic Palais des Tournelles 
 was razed to the ground to open up its spacious square, 
 and the demolitions of Sully began to impart to the 
 physiognomy of Paris that prosaic aspect which, 
 heightened by the improvements of successive reigns, 
 was finally brought to perfection by the Prefects of 
 the Second Empire. 
 
 The Place Royale set the fashion of erecting rows 
 of buildings consisting of houses built on a symmetrical 
 plan, regardless of the possibly different tastes and 
 occupations of their inhabitants. "They stand," says 
 Michelet, " like men in the mines of Siberia, distinguished 
 from each other only by their number;" and Germain 
 Bricc notes the commonness, the clumsiness of its aspect. 
 The houses round this Place are, he says, "d'une sym- 
 metric cgale mais assez grossiere.''^ A further triumph 
 of regularity at the expense of variety and originality of 
 purpose was proclaimed by the Luxembourg, built by 
 Jacques Desbrosses^ for Marie de Mcdicis ; and the abuse 
 
 ' ''Description dc Taris," ed. 1713, vol. ii. p. 62. 
 
 - Jacques Desbrosscs built also the Portal of St. Germain, pronounced 
 byPeirault to be "one of the most beautiful buildings of the last hundred 
 years." — " Ordonnance des Cinq Especes deColonnes," Paris, 16S3, p. 117.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF ARCHITECTURE. 79 
 
 of rustication on wall and pillar, probably intended to 
 recall the Florentine palaces of the queen's youth, adds 
 to the general appearance of heaviness from which not 
 all the skill of the architect, displayed in the bold and 
 simple distribution of the masses, can redeem the 
 building. 
 
 This same heaviness, which M. de Laborde fancies 
 to have been dispelled by the gracious influence of 
 Poussin's stay in Paris, ^ prevails even in the best work 
 of Fran9ois Mansard, whose Chateau de Maisons, like 
 the north front of the Louvre,^ marks the period when 
 the architecture of the day became settled in style. The 
 Colonnade of Perrault is heavy; heavier still the aspect 
 of that Palace of Versailles whose dimensions "are 
 unsurpassed by any other, either of ancient or modern 
 times." 3 This impression of dulness, of heaviness, of 
 commonness even, is heightened when as at Versailles 
 colossal size is combined with profusion of ornament. 
 Colossal size demands simplicity of treatment, perfection 
 of proportion, and King Louis hated the one and could 
 not understand the other. He had no perception of 
 constructive beauty, and could see no merit in work 
 which, like the north front of the Louvre, was practically 
 without ornament, and relied for effect on the happy 
 disposition of its masses and window openings. His 
 love of decoration had been fostered by Bernini's visit ; 
 and the vases and trophies which originally crowned the 
 balustrade above the attic of Versailles, show how 
 Mansard borrowed from the Italian's plans for the 
 Louvre, decorative features which had commended 
 themselves to the king's approval. Shorn of these 
 
 ' " Le Palais Mazarin," quatriemc lettre, Les Hotels de Paris, 
 
 - Begun by Lemeicier and finished on his lines by Lc Vau and Dorbay. 
 
 3 Fcrgusson's "Modern Architecture," p. 233.
 
 8o ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 additions the elevation of the garden front has lost, 
 it is said, its proper effect ; and it is clear that 
 throughout the building, all considerations of style were 
 sacrificed to the display of ornament, much of which, 
 owing to the gigantic size of the palace, seems sadly 
 inefficient. 
 
 Walking on the deserted terraces, beneath the 
 crumbling walls of Versailles, what is the message 
 that comes to us from this ruin of royal things ? What 
 is left there to-day of the great king, and of that virtue 
 excelling the virtue of all other kings in which Colbert 
 would fain have believed ? An empty pleasure house 
 haunted by memories of lust, and insolence, and greedy 
 self! A princely life at once so small of purpose and so 
 great in place, was fitly housed in this mighty palace, 
 great, not by the imperial gifts of space and height, but 
 by a gigantic accumulation of littleness. This, then, is 
 that yard of Versailles with which Colbert threatened 
 King Louis that he should at last be measured.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF PAINTING AND SCULPTURE 
 — THE MAITRISE — ERRARD — LE BRUN. 
 
 The Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture 
 played a far more important part in the organisation 
 of the vast works carried out during the Grand Siecle 
 than did the Academy of Architecture. Necessarily so, 
 for building had come to be regarded merely as a 
 vehicle for decoration, and to win familiarity with the 
 difficult beauties of proportion and construction, of 
 balance and symmetry, has always required more 
 court than any minds except those of rare constitution 
 have been willing to pay. 
 
 The circumstances which led to the foundation of this 
 society were preciselysimilar to thosewhich in every other 
 direction heralded the coming of the modern era. The 
 battle between the new Academy and the ancient guild of 
 painters, sculptors, and gilders, was fought out during 
 the seventeenth century, with hostility as bitter as that 
 which marked the great war between Richelieu and the 
 princes of France. The incidents of the struggle were 
 less picturesque, but the interests at stake were equally 
 weighty, for the triumph of the Academy determined 
 the future of France as a commercial nation, and 
 
 G
 
 82 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 largely contributed to the brilliant prosperity of her 
 industrial undertakings. 
 
 The feudal system had pressed heavily not only on 
 the artisan, but on every class of the community. The 
 guilds, which had in their origin done good service by 
 enabling the producer to make head against seigneurial 
 oppression, grew to exercise a cruel and vexatious 
 tyranny over the poorer workmen, whilst at the same- 
 time they became in the highest degree burdensome to 
 the consumer. '^ These rules/' says the edict of Charles 
 V. concerning the tailors (1356), ''were made in the 
 interest of each trade rather than for the common, 
 good." I It had already become evident that the action 
 of the corporations, by limiting the number of skilled 
 workmen — since no one who had not, at much expense, 
 been received by them could exercise his calling — was 
 prejudicial to the public, inasmuch as ''the more skilled 
 artisans there are, so much the cheaper will be the articles 
 produced ; '' 2 ^nd this which was said of the tailors 
 applied in truth to the members of all the other 
 trades. 
 
 The pretensions of the corporations greatly increased 
 under Louis XI. ,3 who looked to them for political 
 support ; and they were vigorously maintained through- 
 out the sixteenth century in the teeth of growing 
 opposition and dislike. Concessions were sometimes 
 made by the government to their adversaries, partly by 
 the granting of immunities for special causes, and partly 
 by the exercise of extreme tolerance in applying to work- 
 men laws enacted in the interest of those who claimed 
 
 ^ Valleroux, "Corporation cl'Arts et Metiers," p. 79. == Edict, 1597. 
 
 3 Some of the statutes renewed in 1464 and 1467 restricted admission to 
 mastership to the sons of mailrcs (Valleroux, " Corporalion d'Arts et 
 Metiers," p. 82).
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OP PAINTIXG, ETC. 83 
 
 jurisdiction over them. The main tendency of the 
 royal power was, however, rather to identify its authority 
 with that of the corporations, making use of their 
 organisation for fiscal and other purposes, whilst granting 
 in return for these services such concessions of privilege 
 that by degrees the right to work became throughout 
 France the monopoly in every trade of a close 
 corporation. 
 
 At the beginning of the seventeenth century no 
 body of skilled artisans were in a more difficult and 
 distressful position than the painters and sculptors of 
 Paris. Oppressed by the incessant and annoying inter- 
 ference of the corporation of peintres-ymagiers, they 
 were ready to sell themselves to government in exchange 
 for an}' measure of reasonable protection. The inaitrise 
 claimed absolute authority over all artists not exercising 
 their calling within the precincts of royal palaces under 
 license of a brevet dn I'oi. The privileges of the corpora- 
 tion, which had been less boldly maintained during the 
 troubles which marked the reigns of the Valois and the 
 close of the sixteenth centur}', were persistently reasserted 
 under Henri IV. and Sully as soon as a more settled 
 order prevailed ; but the legal judgments given in their 
 favour were often successfully evaded by the brevet- 
 holders, and consequently in 1619 matters came to a 
 crisis, and the inaitrise once more appealed directly to 
 the Crown. 
 
 In this appeal the guild of master painters asserted 
 their exclusive right not only of producing but of selling 
 works of art. They forbade the holder of a brevet from 
 working even in the house of a master until he had 
 complied with the rules of their corporation, and con- 
 cluded by demanding increased authority over their own 
 apprentices. A long struggle ensued, till in 1622 the 
 
 G 2
 
 84 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 master painters actually obtained the royal assent to 
 their demands, and all artists in Paris would have lain 
 at their mercy had not the brevet-holders pertinaciously 
 opposed the registration of the Act. For seventeen 
 years they carried on the war by a series of ingenious 
 legal delays till, in 1639, all means of resistance being 
 exhausted, the letters patent granted in 1622 were duly 
 registered, and the corporation, inspirited by their 
 triumph, began immediately to put forth fresh 
 pretensions. 
 
 In 1646, when the follies and disorders of the 
 Fronde were at their height, the corporation seized the 
 occasion to make a violent onslaught on all the holders 
 oi brevets. At this moment the precincts of the Court 
 were no longer a stronghold whence the attacks of the 
 guild of master painters could be successfully repelled, 
 and it was necessary to seek other means of safety. 
 The existence of the Academic Fran^aise, and the 
 emoluments and immunities conferred on its members, 
 probably suggested to the persecuted brevet-holders the 
 possibility of obtaining for themselves equal protection, 
 if not equal privileges. In 1648^ therefore, they enrolled 
 themselves in a self-constituted society,' and entered on 
 negotiations with the view of obtaining the countenance 
 of the Crown, which, after many difficulties, they carried 
 to a successful issue. 2 
 
 Various attempts were now made to conciliate the 
 
 ' See " Statuts et Reglements dc rAcademie," Fev. 1648, and 
 "Leltres Patentcs," O.' 1056, "Arch. Nat." 
 
 " See "Reqiic.'e to Queen in Council," by J\I. dc Cliarmois, January, 
 1648, and "Arret du Conseil d'Estat ; portant deffences aux maitres jures, 
 peintres et sculpteurs de donner aucun trouble ou empeschement aux 
 Pcintres et Sculpteurs de I'Academie en quelque sorte et maniere que ce 
 soit a peine de deux mille livres d'amende." O.' 1056, "Arch. Nat." 
 Vitet, " Acad. Roy.," pp. 195, 208, et seq.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF PAIXTIXG, ETC. 85 
 
 old corporation, and in 165 1 a junction was actually- 
 effected between the young Academy and the vmitrise ;^ 
 but irreconcilable differences arose, and at last an open 
 breach took place. The masters, who, it must not be 
 forgotten, counted amongst their number men of no 
 mean talents, were animated by a spirit of independence 
 which rendered them averse to any compromise, and 
 ensured the failure of any attempt at union which 
 involved the abdication of their long- established 
 supremac}-. For nearly three centuries their body had 
 possessed complete legal control, not only over all 
 artists, but over all the trades in which carving, painting, 
 or even gilding played a part. They had maintained 
 an active police, entering houses and workshops, and 
 forcibly interfering with the labour of all those who 
 either did not acknowledge their jurisdiction or had 
 infringed the most trifling of their regulations. Thus 
 they not only formed an organisation as obnoxious to 
 the centralising tendencies of the day as the consistories 
 of the Huguenots or the Parliament of Paris itself, but it 
 was impossible that they should tamely accept the inno- 
 vations and pretensions of a younger society aspiring to 
 lead the way in the path of reform. Open hostilities 
 immediately followed the breakdo^\•n of the junction. 
 
 The Academ}', having drawn up a new code of rules 
 and obtained the protection of Mazarin,- made a deter- 
 mined stand, and thenceforth the struggle between 
 them and their opponents followed its natural course, 
 modified only by the changes in the political situation. 
 When Mazarin seemed likely to be driven from power 
 the masters became threatening ; when the authority of 
 
 ' " Articles pourla Joncfion," O.' 1056. "Arch. Nat."\'itet, "Acad. 
 Roy.," ch. iii. "Hist, de I'Acad.," Montaiglon, vol. i. p. 17. 
 ^ //'/</. pp. 165, 166, 173-7.
 
 86 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 the Crown was re-established the Academy recovered 
 courage. 
 
 Foredoomed to failure, the members of the old 
 guild fought tenaciously, raising their claims the higher 
 as it became the more certain that they would never be 
 gratified. In vain did the more prudent, like Laurent 
 Magnier, entreat them to reform ; they persisted in 
 their foolish courses, and, like other corporations of 
 more recent date, brought themselves into disrepute 
 by reckless expenditure on eating and drinking. i 
 If, however, we remember that these men were the 
 sons of those who built the cathedrals of France ; the 
 sons of those to whom she owed the enamels, the 
 painted glass, the pictured books, and all the lovely 
 household art of the Renaissance ; their struggle — even 
 in all its obscure windings and all its spiteful jealousies 
 — wins from us something like pity and reverence : the 
 pity and the re\erence to be accorded to those who at 
 their own peril hold to the forms of a dying creed, nor 
 see that its grace departs at the touch by which they 
 would fain protect it. 
 
 The battle, apparently doubtful, was in reality 
 carried on against adverse fates. Colbert, in deter- 
 mining the general lines of his industrial policy, had 
 been led to examine into the situation of the Academy. 
 Always inclined to exaggerate the power of legislation 
 in respect to the development of com.merce, he had 
 resolved active!}' to control and support the organisa- 
 tions of the various arts and trades;- and, just as he 
 was bent on reducing the fiscal system to one uniform 
 method throughout the provinces of France, even so he 
 determined on bringing the various guilds to accept a 
 
 ' M. I. vol. i. p. 417. 
 
 - Neymaik, " Colbert ct son Temps," vol. i. pp. 26S-2V2.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF PAINTING, ETC. 87 
 
 single code of regulations for each art or trade — a code 
 which in every instance Avas to embody enactments far 
 more stringent^ as well as wider in scope, than those 
 which had been in force of old.^ 
 
 In the case of the painters and sculptors, Colbert had 
 to choose between the Academy and the inaitrisc, and his 
 choice would not be doubtful. On the one hand, he 
 found the masters bent on maintaining an insolent 
 independence ; on the other, a body of men equal if not 
 superior in ability, of bolder views, of greater energy, 
 panting for official position and official support, ready 
 to give any pledges and assume any duties in return for 
 his gracious countenance and protection. Le Brun, the 
 mouthpiece of the Academ.y, might have urged in vain 
 the good example set by Italian princes in the en- 
 couragement of the arts,2 had he not been able to enforce 
 his arguments by an appeal to the interests of French 
 industry and the pressing needs of those branches of 
 foreisrn manufacture which he knew Colbert to be 
 anxious to naturalise in France. The sturdy masters, 
 who kept shop with their bands of lusty apprentices, 
 were therefore set aside for those in whom Colbert 
 discerned tools more fitting to his hand and purpose, 
 and in their place arose the Academicians — the 
 associates of wits and men of letters, not unwelcome 
 even at Court, but slavishly bound to the strict per- 
 formance of services to the State, such as their rivals, 
 bred in traditions which they obstinately refused to 
 modify, were incapable of rendering. 
 
 Secretly and speedily Colbert-^ and Le Brun elabo- 
 rated new statutes and regulations, Avhich, whilst entirely 
 
 * Valleioux, " Corporations d'Arts et Metiers," p. 97. 
 
 - Statuts et Rcglements IV., *' Proces-Verbaux," vol. i. p. S. 
 
 3 Elected Vice-rrotector in 1661.
 
 88 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 liberating the Royal Academy of Painting and Sculpture 
 from all fear of the inaitrise, placed that body wholly in 
 dependence on the Crown. These statutes were finally 
 confirmed by the Parliament of Paris on the 14th May, 
 1664/ and this event was so decisive of the fortunes of 
 the Academy, which thenceforth stood in direct con- 
 nection with the Board of Works, and discharged the 
 functions of a State department, that it is always styled 
 the " Grande Restauration,^' as marking the moment 
 when its history, so to speak, ceases to be a matter of 
 mere private interest, since it becomes inseparably con- 
 nected with the work of government in France. 
 
 At this critical juncture fortune also gave her timely 
 aid ; for the death of M. Antoine Ratabon, Chief 
 Commissioner of Works and Director of the rising 
 Academy, who had been but an unworthy successor to 
 Sublet des Noyers, enabled Colbert to take the Board 
 of Works into his own hands, whilst securing the 
 appointment of Le Brun to an office of which he had 
 long enjoyed the secret povver.2 No time was now lost 
 in working out a systematic organisation. Le Brun, 
 who had skilfully kept himself clear from all the com- 
 promising disasters of the junction, came boldly to the 
 front. The administration of public works, of the royal 
 galleries and collections, and of all provincial academies 
 and schools, was centralised under the direction of the 
 Academy, whilst to the Director was entrusted not only 
 the government of the Academy itself, but the practical 
 
 ' This confirmation was preceded by: "Arret du parlement pour 
 verification du brevet," 28 Dec, 1654. "Arret renvoyant brevets et ordonnant 
 aux peintres du roi de se joindre," 8 Fev., 1663. "Lettres patentes pour 
 approbation des Statuts," Oct., 1663. *' Les Statuts," 24 Dec, 1663. 
 "Arret du parlement pour verification des lettres patentes du Dec, 1663," 
 14 Mai, 1664. See O.' 1056, "Arch. Nat." 
 
 - "Hist, de I'Acad.," Montaiglon, vol. ii. pp. I11-I19, and p. 13S.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF PAIXTIXG, ETC. 89 
 
 control of all branches of industry which demanded the 
 co-operation of art." The great majority of the members, 
 recognising the value of his services and the force of his 
 character, gave to Lc Brun their hearty support, whilst 
 the party which for a time had put forward the claims 
 of Charles Errard, Ratabon's natural son, was reduced 
 to acquiescence in his supremacy. Assembling the 
 whole body at his lodgings in the Gobelins, Le Brun 
 celebrated the occasion by a 'Mnagnificent dinner" at 
 which no expense was spared to render it worthy of 
 their common triumph. - 
 
 The opposition with which the masters had met the 
 first establishment of the new corporation, the pre- 
 tensions by which they had made the junction a source 
 of fruitless vexation, the irritating persecutions by 
 which they had tried to assert their authority, recoiled 
 heavily on themselves. The Academy, which in 1648 
 had only sought to be delivered from the tyranny of the 
 masters, now claimed in turn the privileges of the 
 oppressor ; that liberty which it had demanded for 
 itself it now denied to others ; and by royal decree the 
 right to teach and lecture publicly was reserved to 
 members of the new corporation, and all outsiders, no 
 matter what their condition or quality, were strictly 
 forbidden to estabhsh life classes either for sculpture or 
 painting.^ 
 
 Within its own lines the Academy was, how^ever, 
 extremely liberal. Pupils of inferior ability who faileci 
 to reach the rank of Academicians were allowed to 
 reckon the years of study passed in the schools in the 
 
 ' "Hist. dd'Acacl.," Montaiglon, vol. ii. p. 75. 
 = Ibid. p. 138. 
 
 3 Vitet, "Acid. Roy.," p. 241 ; and "Hist. del'Acad.," Montaiglon, 
 vol. ii. p. 144.
 
 •90 ART IX THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 place of the apprenticeship required by the statutes 
 of the inaitriscs in the various cities of the realm. ^ 
 The number of Academicians was practically un- 
 limited ; any painter, sculptor, or engraver,^ who ful- 
 filled certain easy conditions,^ received a certificate ^ 
 and became at once an " Academiste," and was ad- 
 mitted to all the deliberations of the society, although 
 not permitted to vote. The right to be present at 
 private meetings, to take part in the yearly exhibitions, 
 together with freedom to exercise their calling, were 
 indeed almost the only advantages enjoyed by those 
 Academicians who were not on the list of officials. 
 The special advantages — such as exemption from 
 taxation — granted by the Crown to forty of their 
 number,^ went in the first place to those actually filling 
 some post in connection either with the teaching or the 
 business of the society.^ As for the salaries which these 
 chief officers were supposed to receive, it seems more 
 than doubtful whether any large proportion of them 
 ever went into their own pockets. The expenses of the 
 school were so great that the)^ always exceeded the 
 sum allotted for its maintenance and left a deficit^ which 
 the Academy had of course to make good. 7 
 
 Nor Avere these the only heavy responsibilities from 
 which the main body of Academicians wholly escaped. 
 Various duties were incumbent on the holders of official 
 posts, to the punctual discharge of which Colbert 
 
 ^ " Hist, de TAcacl.," Montaiglon, vol. ii. p. 112. 
 
 = P. v., vol. i. p. 25S. 
 
 ■^ Applicants had to produce a certificate of good conduct, a diploma 
 work, and to pass a viva vac examination. Ibid. pp. 192, 256. 
 
 "* Rule xxii. Rules of 1664. 
 
 s By the settlement of 1655 to thirty, but their priviltges were only 
 xnade valid in 1604. P. V., vol. i. p. 257. 
 
 * Ibid. p. 277, and Appendix IV., Priv. of Acad., Statutes of 1664. 
 
 ^ Ibid. vol. ii. pp. 52, 76.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF PAINTING, ETC. 91 
 
 attached great importance. Any slackness in their 
 fulfihnent was invariably made an excuse for the impo- 
 sition of further obligations. If the Academicians 
 begged to be let off holding yearly exhibitions/ he 
 replied : " Very well, they shall be biennial, but I shall 
 attend, and you must lecture before me on the works 
 sent in." If they complained that to draw up reports of 
 their own discussions was a task for which they had 
 neither time nor patience, he instantly saddled them 
 with a secretary,- whilst insisting that their discussions 
 should be better worth reporting. If the delivery of the 
 monthly lectures in the Academy became irregular, he 
 insisted that twelve more should be given yearly on the 
 paintings in the royal galleries ; ^ and whenever these 
 tasks became a weariness to the flesh, or professional 
 engagements interfered with their punctual discharge, 
 his chief clerk ■+ would appear and utter such alarming 
 threats as to the stoppage of allowances as goaded the 
 unfortunate Academicians to fresh exertions. 
 
 Yet though unsparing in his exactions, Colbert 
 showed no ungenerous care for the real interests of 
 the society. Even their collections did not escape his 
 watchful solicitude. The library from the first grew 
 rapidly by the gifts of friends and members ;5 but casts 
 from the antique had been less readily obtained. Colbert, 
 therefore, not only ordered that splendid series of special 
 casts, some of which, executed at Rome by the care 
 of M. de Chantelou, are still amongst the ornaments of 
 
 ' See Appendix VI. 3. 
 
 = Felibien ties Avaux. P. V., vol. i. pp. 315, 324. 
 
 3 Conf. de I'Acad., Felibien des Avaux, i;05. For royal collections, 
 -see Felibien's "Tableaux du Cabinet du Roy," and "Statues et Bu^tts 
 Antiques des Maisons Koyales." 
 
 ■* P. v., 31st August, 1669. 
 
 s Ibid. vol. i. pp. 270, 280, 325, 362 ; vol. ii. p. 139, etc.
 
 92 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 the Louvre, but also authorised the Academy to take 
 from the royal collections several valuable works of 
 classic sculpture.! He descended even to the perpetually 
 recurring difficulties of the life class,^ and actually 
 bestowed on the school "deux esclaves Turque," poor 
 wretches, whom we are told " Monseigneur a faict venir 
 des Galer de Toulon pour servir de modelle lesquels la 
 Compagnie a veu les ayant fait despouller." ^ 
 
 It is always a question how much the unconscious 
 working of human forces, and how much the clear 
 insight of administrators and law-makers, may count 
 for in the development of any great intellectual or 
 social problem. If Colbert were, by his business 
 instinct?, eminently fitted to put the house of France 
 in order, so was Le Brun a man made to rule in an 
 epoch when art was destined to be the handmaid either 
 of public use or public show. All that a strong intellect, 
 backed by great physical powers, could yield was within 
 his reach. Whether he was painting gigantic battle- 
 pieces, or lecturing the members of the Academ}-, or 
 drawing up a scheme of instruction for the workmen in 
 royal factories, or designing fireworks for Vaux le 
 Vicomte,4 or works of sculpture for Versailles,^ every- 
 thing that he did was planned in an admirably sound 
 and practical fashion ; but we look in vain for any 
 evidence of what we call "feeling.'^ The elements of 
 moral fervour which gave to the work of the Renaissance 
 some of that power over the heart of man which is the 
 rarest attribute of art, were extinct in France when Le 
 Brun became the Director of the new Academy, but the 
 
 ' P. v., vol. i. pp. 14, 366; also "Lettre? de Poussin," p. 273. 
 "" Ibid. pp. 355-6. 3 Ibid. p. 328, 
 
 ■* M. I., vol. i. p. 20. See also for the illuminations at Versailles in 
 1674, Diissieux, " Chateau de Versailles," vol. i. p. 73. 
 5 M. I., vol. i. p. 28.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF PAINTIX<^, ETC. 93 
 
 task which he fulfilled, the task of bringing into order and 
 cohesion the traditions, teaching, and interests of French 
 artj required no such stimulus for its apt performance.^ 
 ''Les premiers ouvrages/^ says Coypel, in running 
 over a list of Le Brun's own work, ^'^sont beaucoup plus 
 piquants que les derniers, mais il ne faut s'en prendre 
 qu'a la necessite ou il se trouvait de satisfaire le Prince 
 et le Ministre." So pressing was this necessity, that 
 Le Brun soon found that in order to maintain his credit 
 and influence he was forced to spend much time in 
 paying court not only to Colbert, but to all those in 
 power. Little by little his example and the force of 
 circumstances imposed the same obligation on all the 
 other officers of the Academy, until it became, as we 
 learn from the curious account given by d'Argenvillc in 
 the life of Bon Boullogne, a daily occupation and tax. 
 Boullogne, having set his pupils to work, went out, we 
 are told, at nine in the morning, "pour faire sa cour 
 aux Ministres," nor did he return till noon. Severe 
 was the penalty paid for slackness in these observances, 
 for the same writer, alluding to the poverty of Halle, 
 remarks that " had he only known how to pay his court 
 to Ministers, his merits would certainly have procured 
 him a pension." Nor was the loss of pensions and 
 employment the only punishment incurred by such 
 neglect ; the subjection of the Academy grew to be so 
 complete that they dared receive no one, however 
 considerable his claims, if obnoxious to those in power. 
 Louis Dorigny's reception, for example, was successfully 
 prevented by a mere whisper to Mansard, then Chief 
 Commissioner of Works, that he was the son of the 
 man who had engraved the Mansaradc- a satirical 
 
 ' De Laborde, " De TUnion des Arts," vol. i. p. 97. 
 - D'Argenvillc, " Vies des Peintres," vol. iv. p. 273.
 
 94 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 print, which in 165 1, three years before the birth of 
 Louis, his father had published in ridicule of the tax on 
 the fine arts then proposed by Mansard. Nor was 
 the court which had to be paid to the great and 
 powerful confined to mere empty homage. The 
 extreme urgency displayed in exacting diploma works^ 
 was largely due to the necessity under which the Academy 
 laboured of making presents to those from whom it 
 obtained support. Mazarin, Seguier, Ratabon, the First- 
 President BanvillCj and even Colbert himself, had to be 
 propitiated in this fashion by gifts of no mean value. 2 
 
 The tolls thus constantly levied were, however, but a 
 minor portion of the tribute paid by the Academy to 
 their patrons ; the very constitution of the society 
 underwent great modifications. For the certainty of 
 employment, for the exclusive right of public teaching, 
 and for the increase of pensions and privileges, the 
 members bartered much of their early independence. 
 The statutes of 1664 contained additions which if not 
 numerous w^ere important. In 1655, when the first 
 allowance, or rather promise of an allowance, was made 
 to the Academy by the Crown, it was agreed that all 
 commissioners and sub-commissioners of works should 
 be permitted to vote and even preside at the election 
 of rectors ;3 but w^hen pensions and allowances were 
 increased at the Gi'ande Restaui'atiou, this small con- 
 cession was not considered sufificient. All the four 
 rectors, whose election previously had been at least 
 supposed to be determined by a majority of votes, 
 became nominees of the Crown, the Academicians 
 exercising only such indirect influence over their 
 
 ' r. v., vol. i. pp. 261-274, etc. 
 
 = Ibid. pp. Ill, 131, 140, 162, 360, 383, 387-8 ; vol. ii. pp. 12, 13, 105. 
 
 ■5 Vitet, "Acad. Roy.," p. 230, rule 3.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF PAL^TING, ETC. 95 
 
 selection as might arise from the agreement that they 
 should be appointed from among the number of pro- 
 fessors past or present, the choice of whom was still left 
 in the hands of their brother artists. 
 
 Under this pressure the temper of the Academy 
 speedily became as pliant as could be desired, and when 
 the word was reluctantly given by Colbert in 1681 to 
 turn out the Protestant members of their body, the 
 Academy seconded the measure with an eagerness which 
 contrasts with their treatment of such propositions at an 
 earlier date. The masters, during the junction, had 
 always tried to make capital out of the religious 
 difficulty, and attempts were made to exclude from the 
 higher offices all those who were of "la religion :'^i 
 these failing, a formal complaint was embodied in a 
 statement of their case laid by them before the Procurcnr 
 dii Roiau Chatelct. In this document, drawn up probably 
 shortly before the Grande Res tan ration, tlio. Academicians 
 are taxed with giving power to "un homme de la re- 
 ligion pretendue Refformee de faire prester le serment 
 aux academistes catholiqucs soulz le tiltre de Secretaire 
 de I'Academye dont les mceurs seront suspects.^' ~ 
 
 Yet, as far as we can see, no distinction was made 
 between Catholics and Huguenots in the election to 
 offices as long as the Academy was left to itself. In 
 1 650,, when Louis Testclin, the most generous and 
 active of the original members, was received as 
 professor, the post of secretary was conferred on his 
 brother Henri, as staunch a Calvinist as himself.^ 
 
 ' P. v., vol. i. p. 93. 
 
 = Coll. Delamare, Police Reports, Fonds. 2791, Libl. Xalionale. This 
 document, which is undated, is, I believe, hitherto unpublished. See 
 Appendix I. 
 
 s P. v., vol. i. p. 33. See Preface to the "Hist, de I'Acad."^ 
 attributed to II. Testclin. Montaiglon, Paris, 1S53.
 
 96 ART Ii\ THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 Sebastian Bourdon, a noted Huguenot, whose enemies 
 had in early days driven him from Rome by threats of the 
 Inquisition/ was one of their most distinguished rectors, 
 and when Le Brun read over the hst^ of those whom 
 the king ordered to recant or be deprived of their 
 posts, besides the names of Henri TesteHn and of 
 L'Espagnandell, a well-known sculptor, we find those of 
 no fewer than three keepers : Ferdinand, Besnard, and 
 Rousseau — together with that of Michelin, one of the 
 assistant professors. 
 
 All resigned ; Testelin made up his mind to retire 
 to the Hague and die in exile, only asking that a 
 certificate might be given him that the cruel blow 
 from which he suffered had been caused by no fault of 
 his own, he having for thirty-three years faithfully and 
 honourably discharged all his duties towards that body 
 which he and his brother had been chiefly instrumental 
 in creating. Yet after having been turned out as 
 a Huguenot, he was insulted as a deserter and a 
 fugitive P L'Espagnandell and]Besnard, who seem to 
 have had no resources, after struggling for a time 
 abjured, and were again received as Academicians ;4 
 but D'Agard^ (a painter not named in the first list), with 
 Rousseau and Louis Cheron, took refuge in England, 
 where they found employment from the Duke of 
 Montagu, and the Academy having struck from off 
 their books all these devoted names, demonstrated 
 further zeal by setting as subjects for diploma pictures 
 such themes as " Le Retablissemcnt de la Religion 
 Catholique dans Strasbourg," " I'Heresie terrassee," and 
 
 ' M. I., vol. i. p. 89. = P. v., vol. ii. p. 198. 
 
 ^ p. v., vol. ii. pp. 197-S. Nouv. Arch. 1879, p. 134. See alsa Mem. 
 inel. de Jean Ron (a Protestant assistant of Testelin). F. Waddington, 
 
 1857. 
 
 •* P. v., ^ol. ii. p. 313. 5 Jbid. p. 215.
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF PAINTING, ETC. 97 
 
 '^ Le Triomphe de I'Eglisc," or by inventing', as in the 
 case of Fontenay, the flower painter, little favouritisms 
 for the encouragement of those who were "nouvelle- 
 ment convertiz a la foy Catholique." ^ 
 
 After this all semblance of independence dis- 
 appeared, and the Academy continued to exist only as 
 a highly-organised department of State. The system on 
 which it was worked, though admirable in many of its re- 
 sults, by giving this peculiarly public and official character 
 to the leading artists of the day, altered the private con- 
 ditions of their lives, dictated to them their daily thoughts 
 and cares, and changed the very quality of their work. 
 
 That which is expressively called " qualite intime" 
 disappears from French art during the " Grand Siccle/' 
 It was impossible that a man living under the con- 
 ditions of which we have now traced the growth, forced 
 to give up the best hours of every day to the inexorable 
 necessities of official ante-chambers, should produce work 
 nourished by the more secret forces of his being. The 
 noblest talents were brought to share in solicitation and 
 intrigue, to perform daily homage to the powerful, to 
 think continually, not of what they themselves would 
 make with joy, or even of what the king might like to 
 see, but rather always of what it would best become the 
 ruler of France to possess. 
 
 Even the study of nature was carried on with an eye 
 to courtly representation, and thus led to that choice of 
 theatrical pose and movement, to that preference for the 
 most striking effects both of composition and colour, 
 which is characteristic of even the best art of that day. 
 French eyes, which of old had been charmed by silver 
 greys, soft blues, and jewel-like touches of scarlet, 
 began to demand costly masses of ultramarine and such 
 
 ' P. v., vol. ii. pp. 237, 241, 31J, 325. 
 
 H
 
 98 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 juxtaposition of other hues as might enhance their 
 telHng effect. Onward through the seventeenth and 
 eighteenth centuries rises the steady crescendo, till we 
 come to that acme of not inharmonious riot for which 
 David's pupils coined the verb " vanloter." 
 
 To those who care for no work in which they cannot 
 find evidence of the continuous ripening of some 
 deep passion and purpose, the magnificent productions 
 of the age of Louis XIV. can bring little but disgust. 
 We must go outside the circle within which centred the 
 real movement of the day; we must turn to the 
 etchings of Callot, who repudiated France ; to the 
 classic dreams of Poussin, who, like Descartes, lived in 
 voluntary exile ; to the intensely human portraits of 
 Philippe de Champagne — the grave Fleming whom no 
 letters of naturalisation could ever make a Frenchman ; 
 or to the modest canvases of the three brothers Lenain, 
 if we wish to find something of that which it was 
 necessary to sacrifice in order to carry out the splendid 
 scheme inaugurated by Colbert and Le Brun. 
 
 The end imposed the means ; the enormous in- 
 fluence over the whole field of national industry which 
 the Academy acquired could not have been obtained at 
 a lesser price. To judge the work done for France by 
 these men and their chief we must look, in the first 
 place, to the political importance of their enterprise, to 
 the splendour and magnificence of the whole conception, 
 and to the perfect fitness and finish of every detail. 
 Everywhere we see signs of a marvellous promptitude of 
 purpose and certainty in the calculation of desired 
 effect, the outcome of a training exactly adapted to its 
 ends. If, on close inspection, the " sublime style," 
 which leaves its imprint on things great and small, 
 seems like that of Bossuet's funeral discourses to have a
 
 THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF PAINTING, ETC. 99 
 
 nobler show than substance ; if, as Michelet wittily 
 remarks, the "trumpet appears to have become the 
 national instrument," it was at least an instrument most 
 appropriate to the ceremonial of an ostentatious court. 
 Stage effects were the object of every artist, and to his 
 contemporaries Le Brun appeared, as he did to Lepicie, 
 " our great poet in painting.'^ 
 
 Up till 1793, in spite of the check received in 
 1694, when all the Academies were ordered to close 
 their doors, ^ the huge machine performed its double 
 functions with a regularity that was in itself majestic. 
 Tasks of the humblest or the loftiest order were 
 fulfilled with equal zeal and dignity. Academicians 
 might one day be despatched to found great schools 
 or direct great manufactures who were ordered to 
 Marly the next and given tin leaves to paint and nail 
 in the semblance of a hedge where stubborn nature 
 had refused to grow the hornbeams ordered by the 
 Grand Monarque.2 But, no matter what the task of 
 these royal servants, the same high standard of per- 
 formance presided at its execution. And so widespread 
 was the sense of the value of the Academy as a teaching 
 power, that when the general crash came and it was 
 suppressed in its academic capacity it was spared as an 
 educational body. The Ecole des Beaux Arts sprang 
 in direct descent from that life class established with so 
 much pains in the teeth of the angry masters and 
 opened in February, 164S, by Le Brun. 
 
 Suppressed in 1793-^ as an Academy, the old society 
 
 » P. v., vol. iii. p. 141. 
 
 ^ D'Argenville, " Vies des Peintres," " Life of Blain de Fontenay," 
 vol. iv. p. 2S3. 
 
 3 The Proces-verbaux of the sittings were saved by Renou who bec.ime, 
 on the suppression of the Academy, Secretary of the School. See " Diet, 
 de I'Acad. des Beaux Arts."' Paris, 1S5S. 
 
 H 2
 
 loo ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 lived on in the school, and the collections which had 
 accumulated in the long course of years, the library, 
 the casts, the diploma works/ and archives, naturally 
 became the property of the school, which then also 
 inherited and carried on the old traditions of academical 
 training and accomplishment, which had been matured 
 by so much self-abnegation and sacrifice. That training 
 has always been based since the days of Le Brun on the 
 " eternelle etude du modele de I'ecole," with which 
 reactionary writers from Diderot onwards have ever 
 been ready to reproach it; but whilst we admit its 
 insufficiency as an exclusive means of instruction, it is 
 impossible to ignore the fact that the very antagonists 
 of this system have owed to its method and discipline 
 more than half their practical strength. 
 
 One result is plain — that is, whether lending its 
 powers to express the pompous materialism of the 
 epoch of Louis XIV., the frivolities of the age by which 
 it was succeeded, the heroes of the Revolution, the 
 romantic movement of the Restoration, the common- 
 place sentiment which flourished under Louis Philippe, 
 the cosmopoHtan interests and elegance of the Second 
 Empire, or the so-called Realism of to-day, French art 
 always preserves its characteristic excellence ; no matter 
 what the varied fluctuations of style and intention, all 
 that it pretends to make — it makes well. 
 
 ^ See "Description des oeuvres d'art dans lessalles de I'Academie" ( 1 715), 
 Guerin. The Gallery of the Louvre has now carried off some of the most 
 important of the diploma works, such as Watteau's " Embarquement pour 
 Cythere ; " others, less remarkable, have been drafted into provincial 
 museums. Great importance was also attached from the first to the 
 library. See P. V., vol. i. pp. 325, 362, vol. ii. p. 139; see aho vol. i. 
 p. 270, and M. I., vol. i. p. 76.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE ACADEMICAL SCHOOL. 
 
 *' To pester the three great estates of the Empire about 
 twenty or thirty students drawing after a man or a horse, 
 appears, it must be acknowledged^ foolish enough ; but 
 the real motive is, that a few bustling characters, who 
 have access to people of rank, think that they can thus 
 get a superiority over their brethren, be appointed to 
 places and have salaries — as in France — for telling a lad 
 when a leg or an arm is too long or too short." ^ When 
 he wrote this, Hogarth had no idea that the painters of 
 Paris had been driven " to pester the three great estates 
 of the Empire " before they could get permission to tell 
 a lad whether an arm or a leg was too long or too 
 short ! Training apprentices was far too profitable 
 a monopoly for the masters to relinquish without a 
 struggle, and on this grave question the quarrel between 
 them and the members of the Academy hinged from 
 the very beginning of troubles. 
 
 Every means of persecution, legal and illegal, was 
 used to prevent students from attending the Academy 
 school for "I'enseignement d'aprcs le naturel," or syste- 
 matic study from the living model. Defeated in their 
 
 ' Hogarth, "Anecdotes of Himself," ed. 1833.
 
 102 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 appeals to the arm of the law, the masters raised the 
 cry of immorality ; but the charm of novelty continued 
 to work, the crowd continued to flock to the rooms io 
 the Hotel Clissoni jn which the Academy class was held,, 
 and the masters seeing that one live model was an 
 irresistible attraction, swallowed their scruples and 
 opened a second "academy" with two. They christened 
 themselves the Academy of St. Luke, and elected Simon 
 Vouet their " Prince " on the undertaking that he would 
 superintend the life-class ; but Vouet was ill ; after placing 
 the model once or twice he left the pupils to their own 
 devices, and his death, which happened shortly after, 
 put an end to the hope that he Avould some day return 
 and reinvigorate their languishing studies. 
 
 One by one the neglected lads returned to the 
 Academy,^ which was on the point of closing its doors ; 
 but the return of the students could not restore its 
 broken fortunes, for having no funds, the members were 
 unable to imitate the generosity of the wealthy masters 
 and keep up a life-class gratis. 3 The maintenance of the 
 model was a serious question, for the fees of the students 
 were insufficient to cover his wages, and these, as well as 
 all other expenses, had to be paid by the Academy. 
 Recourse was had, therefore, to all sorts of expedients ;. 
 the Academicians taxed themselves,^ with the result 
 that Sarrazin, one of the ablest of their number, had to 
 
 ^ The Academy had early been forced to seek a more spacious lodging 
 than that near the church of St. Eustache, which had been found for them, 
 by the generosity of their early patron, M. de Charmois. 
 
 - The monthly receipts from fees suddenly doubled. December, 1650. 
 P. v., vol. i. pp. 38-9. 
 
 3 The lessons in perspective by A. Bosse, in anatomy by the friendly 
 surgeon Quatroussc, had always been given gratis, and it was from the 
 first enacted that whenever the king paid for the model that class also, 
 should be free. 
 
 ■t March, 164S.
 
 THE ACADEMICAL SCHOOE 103 
 
 leave them avowedly on this account ; they doubled the 
 charge to students, they asked the model to take the 
 fees, but all in vain. The vicissitudes of the attempted 
 coalition ^ with the maitrisc further disturbed the finances, 
 and many2 Academicians, finding they could not attend 
 and teach without being out of pocket, became shy of 
 fulfilling their duties. 
 
 Heroic efforts were made by the Protestant secretary, 
 Louis Testelin_, to keep the class going at his own ex- 
 pense; but if the model arrived there were no teachers, 
 if the teachers attended there were no students, if the 
 students assembled there was no model, "Girar" finding 
 it not worth while for the "peu d'escoliers qu'il y a." 
 A change was made, and on March 3rd, 1657, we find 
 the pathetic entry : " Charlie le modelle," Girar's 
 successor, " a manque plusieurs fois." Their place of 
 meeting was equally uncertain ; no sooner had they put 
 in order the rooms assigned them in the Louvre than 
 they had notice to quit,^ and were forced to spend some 
 years in lodgings in the Rue de Richelieu, whilst waiting 
 again for temporary quarters in the Palais Royal. 
 
 It was impossible for a school carried on under these 
 conditions to be efficient. The teachins: had Ions: become 
 
 o o 
 
 a matter of complaint, for it was so difficult to induce 
 competent men to give their time regularly, that great 
 laxity crept into the choice of those appointed as 
 professors."* The students, justly discontented, rebelled, 
 under the leadership of a lad named Jean Friquet ; and 
 
 ' 1652. 
 
 - M. I., L. Testelin, vol. i. p. 221. P. V., January, 1654. 
 
 3 P. v., vol. i. p. no, et scq.^ and "Hist, de I'Acad.," Montaiglon, 
 vol. ii. pp. 59, 60, 
 
 '' The arrangement was that for two hours every day, Sundays and 
 holidays excepted, in winter from 3 till 5, in summer from 6 till 8, the 
 " ansien " or professor for the month should preside and teach. P. V., 
 vol. i. p. 8, Rule iv.
 
 I04 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 encouraged by the engraver, Abraham Bosse, who had a 
 bitter quarrel with the Academy, which fills the pages 
 of many now forgotten pamphlets, they set up a rival 
 school of their own i in the cnclos of St, Denis a la 
 Charte. There they worked, placing the model and 
 criticising each other in turn, till on November 2nd, 
 1662, they were suddenly dispersed by an order from 
 Chancellor Seguier himself. 
 
 Against this decree the panvres estudiants at once 
 petitioned, pleading that the situation of the Academy 
 was objectionable, inasmuch as poor students setting 
 out on foot after seven o'clock, to return to such distant 
 quarters as the Faubourgs St. Antoine, St. Victor, 
 St. Jacques, or the Marais, did so at the peril of their 
 lives, and making out also a very good case in the 
 name of liberty of private study, which, however, 
 they somewhat injured, being instigated by Bosse to 
 add an inconsequent rider to the effect that the perspec- 
 tive lately taught in the Academy was nicely calculated 
 to turn the mind away from the objects it should be led 
 to comprehend. 
 
 The action of the students, however justifiable, was 
 ill-timed ; and Colbert, who had just brought Fouquet to 
 the ground, was not likely to tolerate the revolt of a 
 handful of mutinous lads against the authority of a body 
 he had chosen to protect. The rebellious students 
 were promptly forced on their knees, and at one and 
 the same sitting (January 13th, 1663) the " academistes " 
 received the humble submission of the deserters, and 
 enjoyed the long-expected satisfaction of deliberating 
 how they should employ the salaries and allowances 
 promised to them by Colbert in the king's name. 
 
 On this memorable occasion Colbert not only 
 ' r. v., vol. i. p. 197.
 
 THE ACADEMICAL SCHOOL. 105 
 
 granted salaries to the officials, and an allowance for the 
 iife-class of the Academy, but he instituted a prize fund 
 for the students by the en:iployment of which the 
 Academicians hoped to win over their refractory pupils, 
 Le Brun also announced that Du Metz, Colbert's chief 
 clerk, would give a gold watch and two gold medals as 
 prizes for the three best drawings of " Moses Breaking 
 the Tables of the Law ; " ^ and Du Metz's example was 
 speedily followed by another pcrsonne airieuse, whose 
 good intentions were made known on the 14th July, when 
 the Academy was sitting for the purpose of awarding 
 the prizes in the preliminary competition for the Grand 
 Prix.^ 
 
 The details of the arrangements made for this 
 competition are curious, not only because they contain 
 the germ of a system pursued down to the present day, 
 but also because from these small beginnings sprang 
 that great institution, the School of France at Rome. 
 The competition was divided into two stages, and in the 
 first place drawings were sent in of the subject proposed. ^ 
 That selected in 1663, as the first of the series to be 
 continued every year on the "actions eroiques du roy," 
 was an allegorical treatment of the taking of Dunkirk, 
 the town figuring as Danae, whilst Great Britain, in the 
 guise of an old woman, gratefully received a shower of 
 French gold from Jupiter — Louis XIV.'^ The acqui- 
 sition of Dunkirk was the news of the day. Charles 
 Perrault had been requested by Chapelain, at Colbert's 
 instance, to compose some fine prose on this theme j but, 
 
 ' These prizes fell to Meunier (M. I., vol. i. pp. 57-S), Comeille, and 
 Friquet, all men who afterwards distinguished themselves. 
 
 - P. v., vol. i. p. 231. 
 
 3 The expenses of these were paid out of class receipts, so as to keep all 
 tlie Royal Fund for the trial competition. Idid. p. 231. ^ 
 
 * Ibid. p. 221.
 
 io5 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 despite the prompting of Le Brun, the students showed 
 no great alacrity, and when June arrived, only a {q.\<! 
 "dessains et modelles'' having been brought in of the 
 subject, which had been given out in April, it was pro- 
 claimed that all those who had failed to enter for the 
 preliminary should be shut out from the final compe- 
 tition, i Furthermore — moved probably quite as much 
 by anger at this sluggishness on the part of the students 
 as by the fear, openly expressed, that they would none 
 of them be able, as yet, to produce anything worthy 
 consideration — Academicians, and even all persons of 
 age and discretion who attended the life-class, were in- 
 vited to compete.2 It is true that the title of Academician 
 was very liberally bestowed, since all whose diploma work 
 satisfied the rather moderate requirementsof theAcademy 
 were at once allowed to take the oath and style them- 
 selves " academistes," so it is probable enough that the 
 admission to the competition for the Grand Prix did 
 not imply an influx of mature talent likely to prove a 
 formidable obstacle to the success of " la jeunesse.-" 
 
 Perhaps the Academicians declined to take advantage 
 of the invitation ; perhaps on second thoughts the 
 invitation was cancelled ; at any rate we find, when the 
 prescribed works were completed, and the prizes awarded, 
 a 3^ear later, that all the three successful competitors 
 belonged to the student class. A curious ceremony took 
 place when these works, after having been exhibited for a 
 week at the Academy, were transferred to the students' 
 class-room. They had to run the gauntlet of free 
 criticism, and their authors were instructed to " soutenir 
 leurs instanssions et resonner en presence du Professeur 
 
 ' P. v., vol. i. p. 233. 
 
 = Not to deprive " la jeunesse du prix qu'elle esperoit," a second prize 
 was restricted to the students. Ibid, vol. i. p. 209.
 
 THE ACADEMICAL SCHOOL. 107 
 
 quy se treuvera." As an encouragement to those 
 going through this ordeal, the prizes, consisting of 
 three gold medals by Warin, were meanwhile hung up 
 to view above the President's chair ; for the presentation 
 had been put off, in consequence of a hint that Colbert 
 himself intended to be present ; and the written awards, 
 which had already been opened, were solemnly sealed 
 up again for 'M'ouvertur quy s'en fera en la presence de 
 Monseigneur Colbert." ^ 
 
 On the loth of September, 1664, this great ceremony 
 took place. A minute, pointing out the five qualities to 
 be esteemed in judging an historical picture, had been 
 prepared for Colbert's guidance, but the document 
 ended with " ce sont les sentiments de 1' Academic, 
 Monseigneur, qu'elle soumet a votre jugement." The 
 prizes were awarded to Meunier, Corneille, and Roger, 
 but, as each treated a different subject,- it would seem 
 that the Academy had departed in more than one 
 particular from their original programme,^ and, whilst 
 restricting the competition to pupils in their own school, 
 had allowed considerable liberty in the choice of subject, 
 provided only that it contained allusion to the " fais 
 croiques du roi." The prize, too, had become a matter 
 of far greater consequence, for the medals awarded were 
 presented by Colbert to Meunier, Corneille, and Roger, 
 " en leur promestant que le Roy leur donnera panssion 
 pour aller a Rome quand TAcademie le jugera apropos." 
 
 '' This same travelling to Italy," says Hogarth,''- " has, 
 in several instances that I have seen, reduced the 
 student from nature, and led him to paint marble 
 
 ' r, v., vol. i. p. 265, 
 
 - Meunier, " The Golden Fleece;" Corneille, " Danac ;" and Roger, 
 a bas-relief of Marsyas. F. V., vol. i. p. 266. 
 
 3 Ibid.^ Rule .\xiv. p. 256. 
 
 4 "Hogarth Anecdotes," ed. 1S33.
 
 io8 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 figures, in which he has availed himself of the great 
 works of antiquity as a coward does when he puts on 
 the armour of an Alexander; for, with similar pre- 
 tensions and similar vanity, the painter supposes he 
 shall be adored as a second Raphael Urbino." 
 
 It was, however, no new thing for the Crown to pay 
 the expenses of young artists studying in Italy. Michel 
 Corneille, the elder brother of Jean-Baptiste, himself 
 had been in receipt of a pension '^ pour lui donner 
 moien de se rendre plus capable dans son art ; " and as 
 far back as 1618 we find Cristofle Cochet, a young 
 sculptor, receiving an allowance for the same purpose. i 
 Then, as always, it was far easier to obtain a nominal royal 
 grant than to get it paid ; and the difficulties of the boys 
 in receipt of pensions were enhanced by spasmodic 
 attempts to relieve the Treasury at their expense, when 
 they would suddenly find, as in 1625, that their 
 allowances, not originally calculated on too liberal a 
 scale, had been reduced by a quarter, or even a half.^ 
 
 The first winners of the Grand Prix fared no better ; 
 they had to wait for two years before they received 
 their due. As early as November, 1664, the Academy 
 had formally certified that Corneille and Meunier had 
 both made such progress that they were fully fit to 
 profit by study in Italy.3 A few w^eeks later, Du Metz 
 announced that, instantly on receipt of the certificates, 
 orders had been given to hold ready the money required 
 for the journey and maintenance of the students. 
 Unfortunately at this very moment Colbert was deeply 
 preoccupied by his great fiscal reforms, and by his 
 attempt to regularise taxation in France.'* It was 
 
 ' Nouv. Arch. Chateaux Roy., 1S72, p. 16. 
 
 = Ibid. p. 53. ' P. v., vol. i. pp. 271, 272. 
 
 ■» Clement, " Hist, dc Colbert," vol. i. pp. 175, 292. See also chap, ii., 
 ed. 1846.
 
 THE ACADEMICAL SCHOOL. 109 
 
 probably due to this fact that the departure of the 
 students was so long delayed ; they were not, however, 
 wholly losers by their two years' waiting-, for the scheme 
 for their residence in Italy was greatly enlarged, and 
 before they started had developed into the foundation 
 of the School of France at Rome.^ 
 
 The statutes of this new creation were read out, in 
 the presence of the assembled Academicians, on March 
 26th, 1666, together with the names of the students "tant 
 peintre que sculpteur et architecte retenus pour lad. 
 Academic de Romme." After which, Charles Errard, 
 the Academician who had been nominated Rector, took 
 his leave, meaning to start upon his journey before the 
 next meeting of the Company.^ The Academy then 
 formally recorded its desire for his success, and bidding 
 Errard " God speed," commended to his care the little 
 band selected to accomjpany him. 
 
 Errard had had private reasons for accepting a post 
 which at an earlier date would not have satisfied his 
 ambition. The death of his reputed father, Ratabon, 
 had deprived him of the support which gave him 
 consequence ; and when Colbert, after his accession to 
 power, called Le Brun to take a seat in the newly 
 created Board of Works, Errard saw that he could never 
 hope to acquire the ascendency. 
 
 The fate of Pierre Mignard was in evidence to show 
 how far Colbert would go to maintain his authority. 
 He had taken up Le Brun and was decided in crushing 
 opposition. Therefore, when Mignard placed himself at 
 the head of the brevet-holders in order to wage war 
 on the Academy, Colbert sent him word, through 
 
 1 r. v., vol. i. pp. 300, 301. 
 
 - Ibid. p. 301. Poussin had refused the post ("Mem. de Perrault," 
 p. 62).
 
 no ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 Perrault, that "if he persisted in disobedience, he should 
 be made to quit the country/' ^ and though Mignard 
 retorted with big words he felt obliged to take refuge 
 with the maitres in the Academy of St. Luke^ and 
 thenceforth set such a limit to his acts as enabled 
 Colbert to ignore him. 
 
 Errard no more than Mignard was inclined to 
 submit to the dictatorship of Le Brun, but Errard was 
 too deeply committed to the Academy to hope to make 
 his peace with the maitres, amongst whom he would 
 have acain found himself constrained to take the 
 second place, therefore, says his biographer, " il fit une 
 retraite glorieuse et utile ; " for having advocated the 
 establishment of the Academy of France at Rome, 
 he not only obtained the post of Director, but induced 
 Colbert to pay down in full, before his departure, all 
 the sums which had long been owing to him for work 
 executed for the Crown.^ 
 
 At Rome Errard did well. The school grew rapidly 
 in importance, and his name was justly associated with 
 its success. He seems to have had the power of 
 inspiring his pupils with honourable emulation, " les 
 jeunes peintres sous son inspection y faisaient a I'envi 
 des copies des bons tableaux, et les jeunes sculpteurs en 
 faisaient reciproquement des plus belles statues et des 
 meilleurs bas-reliefs," thus realising that ideal course of 
 study which the Academicians had laid before Bernini 
 in 1665, "assavoir qu'avant d'estudier d'aprez nature 
 il faust remplire Tesprist des belles hidee de lAntique." ^ 
 Nor did his services stop with the inspection and 
 direction of the students. In 1676, he all but brought 
 about the junction of the Royal Academy with the 
 
 ' " Vie de Pierre Mignard," by Monville. 
 = M. I., vol. i. pp. Si, S2. 
 ^ P. v., vol. i. p. 290.
 
 THE ACADEMICAL SCHOOL. iii 
 
 Academy of St. Luke.^ and took the casting of Trajan's 
 Column, and many of the finest casts from the antique 
 now in the Louvre were executed under his eye. 
 
 The exercises of the school at Rome were also 
 turned to account for the instruction of the school 
 in Paris. The first drawings done by the students 
 under Errard's direction were laid before the Academy 
 by Du Metz ; then it was decided that the " envois de 
 Rome " should always be publicly exhibited, but 
 eventually they were made the occasion for a contest 
 amongst the Paris pupils who discussed their merits in 
 full conclave, '^ ou par escrit ou de vive voix." ~ 
 
 Admission to the school, which had been at first so 
 easy a matter that it was almost a mere question of 
 fees, became far more difficult after the liberality of 
 Colbert enabled the Academy to open the life-class free 
 of charge ; and the privileges which had been accorded 
 to all holders of diplomas were gradually restricted by 
 the regulations necessary to prevent too great pressure 
 on the limited space at disposal. When the rights 
 granted to the sons of masters during the junction^ 
 were cancelled in 1663,4 an exception was made in favour 
 of those whose fathers had died, from which it would 
 seem that the Academy was still anxious to win over 
 young recruits from the maitrise. The children of 
 Academicians, as well as all Academicians and persons 
 of a certain age, and "de discretion considerable," were 
 allowed also to profit by the royal subsidy to the 
 fullest extent,^ whilst the same privilege of free 
 admission was also conferred each week on the six 
 
 ' O. ' 1056, "Arch. Nat.," for documents concerning this junction ; also 
 in Archives of Academy of St. Luke at Rome. See Appendix III. ; also 
 P. v., vol. ii. p. S9. 
 
 ^ P. v., vol. i. pp. 309, 338. 5 Ibid. p. 54. ■» Ibid. p. 223. 
 
 5 Ibid. pp. 20S-9.
 
 112 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 students adjudged to have done the best in the week 
 preceding, and half the payment required from out- 
 siders was remitted to six others. In this way a 
 certain amount of emulation was created, and some 
 check put on " le trouble que les plus jeunes et qui ne 
 sont poin capable de profhter en ceste etude ont 
 accoutume de faire." 
 
 From these regulations it must be inferred that the 
 Academicians, though they had the right of free entry 
 for themselves and their children, were unable to pass in 
 any of the student-pupils whom to 'the number of six 
 each t they were allowed to take under their protec- 
 tion.- These, who all paid a fee at their matriculation, 
 made also — like the masters' apprentices during the 
 junction^ — a further payment for admission to the life- 
 class. This is proved by the fact that in October, 1666, 
 a special decree was required of the Academy in order 
 to pass in free " les jeunes hommes qui sont auprez de 
 Monsieur le Brun de la par du Roy." ^ Restrictions 
 were further imposed in October, 1668,^ as it was found 
 that students frequently abused the facility with which 
 they could obtain " protection pour designer.'' Letters 
 of permission were then printed and made current only 
 for three months, whilst it was further enacted that no 
 official should take under his wing more than six, no 
 Academician more than three outside pupils. 
 
 Even under the statutes of 1664, the discipline 
 instituted for the students preserved something of the 
 old relations observed in the guilds between master and 
 apprentice. No lad could enter the Academy to draw 
 until he had chosen for himself a "protector" from 
 amongst the members, to whom he was bound to give 
 
 ' P. ^'., vol. i. p, 267. " Ibid. p. 294. 3 /^/,/. p, 54. 
 
 4 Ibid. p. 308. 5 Jl^id, p. 334.
 
 THE ACADEMICAL SCHOOL. 113 
 
 account of his actions and occupations, and to whom at 
 least once a month he submitted his drawings.^ Nor 
 could a lad change from one master to another without 
 the consent of the "protector" whom he desired to 
 quit : the only exception to these rules was made for 
 " masters," who could, if they liked, retain the entire 
 responsibility for their sons' conduct;- and from an 
 entry made on November 29th, 1664, it is clear that this 
 was no mere form, for all the masters sending their 
 children to the life-class are on that day summoned to 
 answer for them at the next meeting of the Academy 
 — whether or no they complied with the injunction may 
 be doubtful. 
 
 To answer for a student's conduct was no sinecure ; 
 in early days no less a person than Eustache le Sueur 
 had to report " des desordres et des friponneries '^ 
 which he was unable to repress. Two unruly youths 
 named Bomme and IMarot had proved more than a 
 match for the gentle painter of the life of St. Bruno. 
 Bomme was promptly expelled, and Marot shared his 
 fate shortly after, having meanwhile succeeded in 
 getting a lad named Mantagon into serious trouble. 
 These disorders led to the passing of a resolution that no 
 one should enter the life-class unless he had first been 
 approved by the " ansien quy est en mois/' and after 
 thisj things for a while went peacefully; but, in 1663, 
 the sculptor Girardon, a very different person from 
 Le Sueur, was treated to "plusieurs insollances, raillerie 
 €t argarade ^' on the part of "^ sertains estudiants adonnez 
 a la desbauche," some of whom were old oftenders, 
 having been already expelled from the Academy. 
 These turbulent spirits in revenge broke into the life- 
 class, committed " divers impertinence quy seroyen 
 
 ' P. v., vol. i. p. 267. = Ibid, p. 267. 
 
 I
 
 114 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 trot longue a resiter," succeeded in exciting a regular 
 outbreak and went off in triumph, carrying in their 
 train a large number of the pupils. 
 
 Amongst these was the afterwards celebrated sculptor 
 Antoine Coysevox, then a young man of twenty-three ; 
 but he seems to have speedily repented him of his 
 misdoings, and to have made humble submission together 
 with two other culprits named La Perdrix and Baudet 
 — the latter a pupil of Sebastian Bourdon's.^ The rioters 
 through Le Bran's influence were signally punished ; 
 but in spite of this, though Coysevox and Baudet 
 subsided, we find the incorrigible La Perdrix two years 
 later sharing the disgrace of an abominably ill-conducted 
 boy called Jaquin, and once more humbly entreating to 
 be allowed to "rentrer dans la liberte d'estudier a 
 I'Academie.'' 2 
 
 The wearing of a sword or carrying of other arms, a 
 practice to which all these lads were addicted, greatly 
 aggravated both ^'acsidans et scandalz." It had been 
 forbidden to all students shortly after the date of the 
 "Grande Restauration ; ^' but further precautions were 
 found necessary to prevent the incessant recurrence of 
 serious riots. It was resolved that students should not 
 be allowed to assemble in the rooms before the prescribed 
 hour, and access to the life-class was denied to all who^ 
 came only " to look at the model," unless, indeed, they 
 were accompanied by an Academician. ^ A more decent 
 order was for a space maintained through the enforce- 
 ment of these regulations, and during several years the 
 worst excesses that had to be chronicled in the register 
 were the scribbling of " des escriture insollente " on the 
 
 ' P. v., vol. i. p. 240. Baudet in later life distinguished himself by his 
 masterly engravings after Poussin. See Jlariette, " Abecedario." 
 = JOid. p. 292. 3 jiii(i_ p. 294.
 
 THE ACADEMICAL SCHOOL. 115 
 
 walls of the staircase,! or quarrels about seats. But, in 
 November, 1670, a tremendous revolt took place which 
 had to be vigorously repressed. Thirteen students, 
 amongst whom was young Vanloo, were expelled for 
 disgraceful misconduct within the walls of the Academy, 
 accompanied with street-rioting, fighting, and yelling, 
 "des urlements estrange," attacking the neighbouring 
 shops, and throwing of stones and filth. 
 
 This, which Avas one of the worst, seems to have 
 been also the last serious difficulty experienced by the 
 Academy in maintaining a decent order amongst its 
 pupils, and, indeed, though the ears of the visitor- are still 
 often greeted by " des urlements estrange " in the 
 corridors of the Ecole des Beaux- Arts, and the students 
 of the Paris school have not unfrequently challenged 
 the decisions of their superiors by mutinous conduct, 
 such conduct has of late been invariably prompted b}' 
 some serious motive, and has never been characterised 
 by incidents such as disgraced the outbreak in which 
 the younger Vanloo was implicated. 
 
 It was not alone in the relations between a student 
 and his protector that the traditions of an older time 
 modified the constitution of the new society. In one 
 important respect, as M. Vitet has observed, the Academy 
 preserved a thoroughly democratic character. Every 
 boy who entered the school was sure that, when he had 
 reached a certain stage of facility, he would be received 
 an Academician. Once an Academician, he enjoyed 
 the right of being present at all deliberative meetings 
 of the forty acting members of the society, and, though 
 he could not vote, yet, being present, no measure 
 affecting the society or the profession could be passed 
 without his full knowledge. He and his children were 
 
 ' P. v., vol. i. p. 310. 
 
 I 2
 
 ii6 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 free of tlie life-school and of the other academical 
 classes, and their recognised connection with the 
 Academy was a title to employment, whilst it pro- 
 tected them from the harassing- interference of the 
 old guild. Thus every lad felt, when he took his 
 seat in class, that there was no insurmountable barrier 
 between himself and the elect who filled the most 
 distinguished posts ; and the whole body of those who 
 passed through the course w^ere interested in the main- 
 tenance of a corporation to which they were sure of 
 being attached, even if they could never hope to attain 
 the full power and privileges of an acting member. 
 
 In this way the Academy for a time preserved in its 
 constitution something of the collective character of the 
 ancient guilds, but little by little the traces of the past 
 order were obliterated. Besides the enormous power 
 which was gradually lodged in the hands of the leading 
 members of the society, through whom alone a share in 
 Crown commissions could be obtained, must be reckoned 
 the influence acquired through the foundation, under 
 their authority, of other schools and provincial academies 
 — satellites of the central sun of Paris. The corpora- 
 tions formed in the various towns of France were 
 obliged to submit their claims to Le Brun and the body 
 which he governed ; and by him and his fellow 
 Academicians their statutes were revised, and the course 
 of instruction to be pursued within their walls was laid 
 down on a strictly academical pattern.' 
 
 M. Courajod has, indeed, reproached the Academy 
 with timidity and jealousy, and taxed its members with 
 unwillingness to permit the establishment of any schools 
 outside its own body, except that little school at the 
 
 ' Lyons, 1676; Reims, 1677; Bordeaux, 1676. But Lyons lapsed for 
 want of funds, and was re-established in 1756.
 
 THE ACADEMICAL SCHOOL. 117 
 
 Gobelins rendered necessary by the Crown manufactory.! 
 The Academy was, however, powerless to find the 
 funds, without which the decree of 1676, authorising the 
 establishment of academical schools of painting and 
 sculpture in all the towns of France, remained of neces- 
 sity a dead letter. Add to the want of funds the steady 
 opposition offered by the guilds^ in every town to the 
 foundation of academical schools, and we find a very 
 sufficient reason for the length of time it took before 
 such teaching was widely disseminated in the provinces. 
 
 Even in the eighteenth century, when these schools 
 became common, their expenses were in all instances 
 provided, as at Lyons (1756), by " un petit nombre de 
 citoyens amateurs," who showed a public-spirited gene- 
 rosity which is worth noting. Their organisation, on the 
 other hand, was as constantly due to the enterprise of 
 some painter trained in the Academy of Paris.-^ In 
 this way that Academy most effectively contributed to 
 the spread of academical teaching, just as the workmen 
 from the Gobelins schools — which were, as conceived by 
 Colbert, the very nursery and cradle of French industry 
 — went forth, after their years of apprenticeship and 
 service, to carry the secrets of their training and their 
 skill to the remotest corners of France. 
 
 Nor must it be forgotten that the teaching which 
 even these workmen received was exactly the same in 
 kind as that given within the walls of the Academy 
 itself; for the very painters who made designs for Sevres 
 
 ' " L'Ecole Royale des Elcves proteges," p. lix. 
 
 - The Academy School was established at Bordeaux, 1676, by letters 
 patent. This Academy had, in 1706, to have recourse to an "arret du 
 conseil d'etat" to prevent the "Corps de Metiers" from destroying it. 
 O.' 1056. Divers. 1642-1750. " Arch. Nat." 
 
 5 Courajod, xHd. pp. Ix.-lxi. " Lettre de I'Abbe Lacroix," O." 1923, 
 " Arch, Nat." Cited also by M, Courajod.
 
 ii8 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 and the Gobelins, whose costly products were the toys 
 of princes, were actually obliged to organise the instruc- 
 tion, given in the schools attached, on the same principles 
 as that which they provided in the Academy for their 
 own sons. The artisan who left Paris for Bordeaux 
 found, therefore, that he could continue in the province 
 the course which he had begun in the capital ; just 
 as the lads who were sent up from local institutions 
 to the Academy of Paris were already prepared to fall 
 into the ranks of her students. 
 
 When Colbert died, many of his noblest foundations 
 were at once suppressed. The school of the Gobelins — 
 the great hive of Bievrebache — was emptied of its 
 people ; but there is no more astonishing testimony to 
 the soundness of the methods he employed than the 
 evidence on all hands that the principles on which 
 Bievrebache was conducted are still animatin;? the 
 great national manufactories of France. The workmen 
 of the Gobelins and of Sevres still go forth, like their 
 forefathers, to enrich the resources and raise the level of 
 private enterprise. The autocratic tyranny of the 
 Academy still bears fruit ; for the conditions created 
 under the auspices of Le Brun preserved sound tradi- 
 tions of teaching and training, and, in spite of wars 
 and revolutions, the connection between the arts and 
 industry, which other nations seek painfully to re-estab- 
 lish, has never been lost in France. French provincial 
 cities still maintain their academic schools, and we may 
 even now see the municipal councils of poor country 
 towns taxing their slender resources, with a noble public 
 spirit, to give the boy, who they hope may one day 
 distinguish himself, a start on his way to Paris.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 LE BRUN AND THE DECORATORS OF VERSAILLES. 
 
 Slmox Vouet, first painter to Louis XI II., had pre- 
 pared the way for the tyranny of Charles Le Brun. 
 Vouet it was who drove Poussin out of France, and 
 snatched commissions from Philippe de Champagne.^ 
 All his life long he allowed his pupils to vex the guild 
 of masterS;^ but as soon as Le Brun began to work the 
 Academy in organised opposition to the old corporation, 
 Vouet sprang from his death-bed, in order^ by their help, 
 to crush one in whom he saw a rival. 
 
 Vouet had then reigned for twenty years. On his 
 return to France^ in 1627, he started with immense 
 advantages, for he had spent ten years in Italy,^ and 
 had even visited Constantinople in the train of De Sancy, 
 the French ambassador. Turning to account the 
 experience thus acquired during the familiar hours in 
 which he gave lessons to the king, Vouet speedily 
 became a favourite, and " little by little got hold of all 
 great works, was followed by all the painters of Paris, 
 for whom he found employment, and became the 
 teadier of all those who desired to learn his art."-*- 
 
 ' Ltpicie, "Viesdes Peintres. Disc. Pref.," pp. Ixiii., l.\x. 
 
 = Vitet, "Acad, Roy.," p. 49. 
 
 3 Nouv. Arch., 1S72, p. 51, ■* Lcpicie, ibid.
 
 I20 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 On this wise the traditions of the school of 
 Fontainebleau were preserved throughout the reign of 
 Louis XIII. The king's first painter had knowledge, 
 method, much dignity, and more manner ; his drawings i 
 are sometimes grave^ if not noble in character ; his 
 paintings often recall (as in the Madonna of the 
 Brunswick Gallery) the work of his contemporary, 
 Sassoferato ; and the best results of his teaching were 
 exemplified in Eustache Le Sueur, a charming draughts- 
 man if an overrated painter.^ Vouet was not, however, 
 destined to found a school ; Le Brun, coming to the 
 front, transformed the traditions which his master had 
 respected, inherited his post, and enlarged its authority. 
 
 From his earliest days Le Brun had given proof of 
 that adroitness and worldly tact to which, quite as 
 much as to his professional talent, he owed the great 
 position which he eventually secured. He had in large 
 measure the faculty of success, was always happening to 
 draw what people wanted just when they wanted it, and 
 happening to be in the way himself whenever it was to 
 his own advantage. Aged eleven, he contrived to 
 attract the attention of Chancellor Seguier, and next 
 obtained a commission from Richelieu, which oppor- 
 tunely caught the eye of Poussin, with whom, in 1642,-^ 
 he travelled to Rome. Returning to France four years 
 later, Le Brun, then a young man of twenty-seven, 
 found a formidable rival in Charles Errard, into whose 
 hands his father, the Chief Commissioner of Works, 
 Ratabon, had put work at the Louvre, Versailles, 
 Fontainebleau, the Tuileries (where he succeeded 
 Claude's friend, Jean Nocret), and other royal palaces.^ 
 
 ' See Louvre, and Print Room, British Museum. 
 
 - See Dussieux, " Noiiv, Recherches sur la Vie d'Eustache Le Sueur." 
 
 3 See M. L, "Vie de Le Brun." ■» Nouv. Arch., 18S2, p. 92.
 
 LE B RUN AND DECORATORS OF VERSAILLES. 121 
 
 Immediate employment under the Crown seemed out 
 of the question, and Le Brun accordingly entered the 
 service of Fouquet, but in so doing he showed his ordi- 
 nary and admirable prudence, using his opportunities at 
 Vaux le Vicomte to secure the favour of Mazarin^ and 
 to make friends with Colbert. Supported by them, he 
 fought the battle of the new school against the old^ 
 and, having got the control of the Academy, remained 
 master of the position. Commanding the industrial 
 arts through the Gobelins,^ and the rest of the profession 
 through the Academy, he put his stamp on everything 
 produced in France throughout the seventeenth century, 
 so that the so-called style of Louis XIV. is in truth 
 the style imposed by Le Brun on all his pupils and 
 assistants. 
 
 The starting-point of his long career of official work 
 and favour was the Little Gallery of the Louvre, 
 destroyed by fire, which spread even to the Great 
 Gallery, through the carelessness of a workman of 
 Henry de Gissey's in 1661,^ the very year in which 
 the downfall of Fouquet set free all his chosen servants 
 to take the livery of the Crown. Ratabon, though 
 failing in health and power, was still alive, and at his 
 instigation an attempt was made to checkmate Le Brun 
 by insisting that he should divide the work of restora- 
 tion with Errard. Sarrazin, the chief sculptor at the 
 
 ' Le Brun got himself introduced to Mazarin by Valdor. Florent le 
 Comtc, "Cabinet des Singularitez," ed. 1700, vol. iii. p. 160. Valdor 
 published " Le Triomphe de Louis le Juste," Paris, Ant. Etienne, 1649. 
 
 - Founded 1660, as manufactory of meubles de la Conronne. AL L, 
 vol. i. p. 23. De Laborde, " De I'Union des Arts," vol. i. pp. 121-2. 
 
 3 See Montaiglon, " Henry de Gissey, dessinateur ordinaire des Plaisirs 
 et Ballets du Roi," and for '"Petite Galerie " the "notice" by M. de 
 Chenneviercs, second edition, 1S55, and " Petite Galerie du Louvre, du 
 dessin de AL Le Brun, etc.," gravee par St. Andre, 1695.
 
 122 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 Louvre, had died in the previous year, and it seemed 
 easy to set his assistants aside and suggest that Errard 
 should have sole conduct of the works of relief, whilst 
 to Le Brun should be committed the painting of walls 
 and ceiling. Le Brun, however, determined to try his 
 strength. Ignoring his instructions, he prepared a com- 
 plete scheme, including the works of relief which it had 
 been proposed to leave to Errard ; backed by Colbert he 
 carried his point, and the unfortunate Errard endured 
 the humiliation of seeing the pupils whom he had 
 trained, transferred (like Claude Audran and the two 
 Marsy) to the service of his rival. i 
 
 Colbert had risked nothing by pushing Le Brun at 
 Errard's expense : he knew how pleased the king had 
 been by the decorations for his marriage triumph, which 
 had been entrusted to Le Brun by the city of Paris, and 
 had witnessed in the previous year the royal satisfac- 
 tion with the enormous canvas of "Alexander and the 
 Family of Darius," painted at Fontainebleau under the 
 eyes of the Court. The check received by Errard was 
 final as far as his Paris career w^as concerned, though for 
 the moment, aided by the faithful Noel Coypel, he con- 
 tinued to carry out various decorations in the "little 
 chateau " at Versailles, which were, however, destined 
 to be swept away, almost as soon as finished, by the 
 alterations and additions of Mansard.- The death of 
 his reputed father, Ratabon, left him completely at 
 Colbert's mercy, and w^ien in his new capacity of 
 Siirintendant, Colbert announced to the assembled 
 Academy that there would be work for all in the royal 
 palaces,^ the conditions were so well understood that 
 Le Brun was promptly elected Chancellor for life, and 
 
 ' M. I., vol. i. p. 8i. = Ibid. p. 8i. 
 
 ■5 p. v., vol. i. p. 246. Vitet, "Acad. Roy.," p. 254.
 
 LE BRUM AND DECORATORS OF VERSAILLES. 123 
 
 the gratefulness of this selection ^ was as speedily 
 acknowledged by orders that under Le Brun's direction 
 the Academy should at once begin v/ork on the plans 
 for the completion of the "Grande Galerie du Louvre." 
 
 To Louis Boulogne — it is said by Colbert's initia- 
 tive, that is by Le Br-un's desire — the chief part in 
 this work was confided. 2 Aided by his sons and 
 daughters, he took up Poussin's unfinished designs and 
 carried them out to completion as best he could. Li the 
 Little Gallery, or " Galerie d'Apollon," Le Brun, besides 
 the two Marsy whom he took over from Charles Errard 
 had already associated with himself some of the ablest 
 members of the society. The dignified and academic 
 Thomas Regnauldin, Gervaise, and Girardon,^ were told 
 off to model the stucco figures of the interior, "f- whilst 
 the Chancellor himself began to execute with his own 
 hand the most important compartments of the ceiling.^ 
 
 No work, however, was more frequently interrupted 
 than this of the Apollo Gallery, and one of Le Brun's 
 designs, " Le Reveil de la Terre," actually remained to 
 be carried out in 1850 by M. Guitard.6 The master 
 was called off right and left to further other projects 
 and decorate other palaces. At one time, in his capacity 
 of Keeper of the Royal Collections, he must gather 
 together works of art; at another the Gobelins claimed all 
 his attention; then there was St. Germains to decorate; 
 the king to be accompanied in his Flanders campaign ;7 
 
 » 29th March, 1664. M. I., vol. i. p. iS. 
 = Jbid. p. 203. 
 
 3 See "Sculpture ; "seealsothe "Notice" by de Chennevicres, p. i^j^ctseq. 
 '' Lepicie, "Vies des Peintres," vol. i. p. 45. 
 
 5 See plates engraved by St. Andre, and for the ornaments, " CEuvre 
 de Jean Berain," Paris, 1659. 
 
 ^ See " Notice des Dessins," Musee du Louvre, No. S40. 
 7 Lepicie, ibid. p. 39.
 
 124 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 the pomp of the Dauphin^s baptism to be organised ; 
 the figure-heads of men-of-war to be sketched for 
 Toulon arsenals ; and, finally^ the monster demands of 
 Versailles, which grew till it became the one absorbing 
 enterprise, and the Great Gallery of the Louvre, like 
 the famous Gallery of Apollo, and the Colonnade 
 of Charles Perrault, remained unfinished. ^ 
 
 At Versailles, Le Brun, for whom the title of First 
 Painter had been revived, ^ took command of all the 
 works of decoration, whether sculpture or painting. 
 Over the whole palace his rule was supreme, and all 
 other artists had to accept the position of his assistants. 
 Imagine the situation of Sir Frederic Leighton, cumu- 
 lating the offices of President of the Royal Academy, 
 Keeper of the Queen's Pictures, Director of the National 
 Gallery and of the South Kensington Museum and 
 Schools, having also under his hand the Board of 
 Works and several great national manufactories, as well 
 as the biggest building in the world to decorate and 
 furnish royally! Sir John Millais would of course sulk 
 off somewhere else, as Errard did to Rome ; Mr, 
 Herkomer would go to New York, perhaps, and found 
 the school of the future ; but their disappearance would 
 onl}' make Sir Frederic's position stronger, and thus,, 
 left to rule in undisputed sovereignty, imagine the 
 President (if you can) producing several vast historical 
 paintings a year, furnishing the designs which Hook 
 and Horsley, Fildes, Calderon, Poynter, Frith and 
 Goodall, P'aed, Long, Orchardson, everything, in short, 
 that writes itself R.A., would be sworn to carry out or 
 
 ' Lepicie says: "After tlie death of Chancellor Seguier (1672) 
 Lou's XIV. positively determined to fix hii residence at Versailles.'' So 
 Seguier would seem to have joined Colbert in opposition to the scheme 
 (pp. 50-1). M. I., p. 27 et seq. ^ O.* 1053, "Arch. Nat."
 
 LE BRUM AND DECORATORS OF VERSAILLES. 125 
 
 Starve ; wliilst Boehm, MacLean, and Gilbert com- 
 peted for the chance of embodying his projects for the 
 sculptured decorations of halls and gardens, and a crowd 
 of minor artists waited for patterns by which to work out 
 such details as locks and bolts for doors and windows. 
 
 As early as 1671, whilst the plans of Le Vau were 
 yet in progress, the whole force of the Academy was 
 centred on Versailles. The conventional and amiable 
 Blanchard, together with Houasse, Jouvenet, De la Fosse, 
 Claude Vignon, J. B. Champagne, and Nicolas Loir,i 
 deserted the Tuilcries, whilst Claude Audran, who, 
 together with Noel Coypel,^ had previously been em- 
 ployed, under Errard, at Versailles, returned thither, 
 leaving his task in the Great Gallery of the Louvre 
 unfinished. To these, shortly after, came Rousseau, the 
 Huguenot painter of perspectives, his co-religionist, 
 Henri Testelin, Baptiste Monnoyer (deservedly famous 
 for his lovely flowers), Verdier, and many others of 
 less note. Nor did Louis Boulogne and his family 
 remain behind. Aided by Nicolas Loir, who was 
 afterwards carried off to the king's apartments, the 
 father and his children decorated the attic of the 
 chateau with works which were speedily displaced or 
 destroyed by the construction of the Gallery of Mirrors.^ 
 
 So great have been the successive changes and 
 alterations of Versailles that the only portions which 
 genuinely represent the decorations of the palace of 
 
 ' Loir had been painting at the Tuilcries the " Salle des Gardes," 
 under I-e Brun's direction. AI. I., vol. i. pp. 338-340. Lcpicic, "Vies 
 des Peintres," vol. i. p. 42, 
 
 ^ In 1661-2, in the apartments of the Queen. Florent le Comte, vol. 
 iii. p. 125. M, I., vol. ii. p. 12. These works were destroyed by subse- 
 quent changes. M. I., vol. i. p. Si. Coypel decorated the "Salle des 
 Machines," at the Tuilcries, under Le Brun. Lepicie, ibid. p. 43, 
 
 3 C. des B'^, 1671-2-3. M. I., vol. i. p. 203.
 
 126 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 Louis XIV. are the king's state apartments, the Gallery 
 of Mirrors, the Halls of Peace and War, and one or 
 two of the queen's rooms. Even so, Versailles is the 
 only place where the works of Le Brun and his school 
 can be studied with anything like completeness. For 
 himself he reserved the magnificent state staircase, 
 commonly called the Degrc dcs Avibassadeurs, the 
 Gallery of Mirrors, and the Halls of Peace and War.i 
 which gave access to that gallery at either end. For 
 the decoration of the chapel, which at first took the 
 place of the old building left by Louis XHI., Le Brun 
 also prepared a great scheme which was never carried 
 out, the chapel itself being speedily destroyed to make 
 way for the present portentous structure ; and Louvois, 
 was delighted to deny the old master even the satisfaction 
 of seeing his great cartoon, the " Chute des Anges 
 Rebelles," painted by his pupils in the College des 
 Quatre Nations.- With the reign of Louvois the reign 
 of Mignard had begun, and such parts of the decoration 
 of Hardouin Mansard's last project as were left in the 
 hands of Le Brun's assistants — like the Resurrection 
 by Lafosse, and the Day of Pentecost painted by 
 Jouvenet, in the Chapel of St. Louis — now show but 
 as passages a trifle less tawdry than the rest.^ 
 
 If we set aside all additions of a later date, we yet 
 find remarkable evidence of two distinct schools of 
 thought and expression existing side by side in the 
 decorations of Versailles : on the one hand, wc have 
 the pupils of Le Brun, and on the other, the men who 
 preserved more strictly than himself the traditions of 
 the reign of Louis XIII., men who had been trained by 
 Philippe de Champagne, by Sebastian Bourdon, or by 
 
 ' Lepicie, "Vies des I'cintres," vol. i. p. 52. 
 = Ibid. p. 59. M. I., vol. i. pp. 49, 50. 
 
 3 riganiol, vol. i. pp. 37, 77, 79. D'Argenvillc, "Vies des Tcintres," 
 vol. iv. p. 206.
 
 LE BRUN AXD DECORATORS OF VERSAILLES. 127 
 
 Simon Vouet. Le Brun in liis masterful ^^•ay tried at 
 first to use them all indifferently. He put Baptiste de 
 Champagne to work in the Mercury room/ but shortly 
 after sent him into the queen's apartments, to which 
 he appears finally to have relegated all those whose 
 work was least suited to his own schemes. In these 
 apartments, Baptiste de Champagne decorated the 
 Orator}',^ whilst Errard's whilom assistant, Gilbert de 
 Scve, worked in the bed-chamber.^ To the queen^s 
 guardroom w^as transferred the work of another pupil 
 of Errard — the ceiling subject of Jupiter in a silver car, 
 and the accompanying chimney-pieces,'^ which had been 
 originally executed by Noel Coypel for a room absorbed 
 in the construction of the Hall of War. For Le Brun 
 always ruled with a certain magnanimity ; and even 
 during his stay in Rome, where he succeeded his master, 
 in 1672, as Director of the School of France, Coypel 
 continued to work for Versailles, and exhibited in the 
 Pantheon, before despatching them to Paris^ four 
 canvases intended for the Royal Council-chamber.^ 
 
 To the queen's drawing-room Le Brun despatched 
 Mignard's pupil, Michel Corneille ;6 and Bourdon's 
 scholar, Nicolas Loir, who carried out, in accordance with 
 his suggestions, the group of Flora and Iris on the 
 
 ' 1673, C. des B*^. For details on the family of P. de Champagne, see 
 "Note Biographique concernant le Peintre, J.-B. de Champagne," by M. 
 Galesloot, Acad. Roy. de la Belgique, Extr, du Bulletin, 2. Serie, t. xxv. 
 No. 2, 1S68. 
 
 - Piganiol, p. 151. C. des B'^ 16S0. Vl. I., vol. i. p. 34S. But his chief 
 works were at the Tuileries and at Vincennes. Felibien, vol. ii. p. 643. 
 
 3 Destroyed in remodelling the rooms for Marie Antoinette. Dussieux, 
 "Chateau de Versailles," vol. i. p. iSl. D'Argenville, " Vies des Peintres," 
 vol. iv. p. 2S5. •• Jbid. p. 176. 
 
 5 Jbid. p. 172. D'Argenville adds that these were then in the Cabinet 
 du Roi au Luxembourg (1672). Can these be the four said to be four out of 
 five originally destined for the king's guardroom and now in the Louvre? 
 
 * iSL I., vol. i. p. 384. D'Argenville, ibid. p. 202. His drawings, see 
 Louvre and Print Room, British Museum, were empty, coarse, and formal.
 
 128 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 ceiling of her ante-chamber ;i Paillet, another scholar of 
 Bourdon's, aided by Claude Vignon, executed the 
 cameos of the same room, whilst yet another named 
 Meunier,2 together with Poerson and Blain de Fontenay 
 (who also decorated the bathroom), painted the per- 
 spectives and flowers of the staircase, where we still find 
 a figure leaning blandly forward past a vase of flowers 
 and gazing with a look of pleased surprise, no longer 
 warranted by anything that he can be supposed to see. 
 All the other decorations have been replaced by 
 stucco and whitewash, and the motley Sunday mob 
 swarms up the steps once trodden only by the king and 
 those whom it pleased him to honour. 
 
 Le Brun's own most docile pupil was Verdier,^ 
 whose wife, a woman " de peu de conduite," says 
 Mariette, was Le Brun's niece by marriage. Verdier 
 aided him largely in all that he undertook himself, as, 
 for instance, in the Gallery of Mirrors ; but the master 
 had also great confidence in the ability of Houasse, who 
 carried out his design of the " Triumph of Constantine,"^- 
 and whom he employed, together with Jouvenet, in the 
 Halls of Peace and War,5 and in the Mars room,'^ 
 where hung the famous picture of the " Family of 
 Darius," which had laid the foundation of Le Brun's 
 favour with the king.7 To Houasse also was allotted 
 the ceiling of the Venus room, on the walls of which we 
 still find two perspectives by Rousseau,^ and by Houasse 
 
 ' C. desB'^ 1674, 1678. D'Argenville, "Vies des Peintres," vol. iv. 
 p. 165. 
 
 - Meunier, Paillet, and Loir were amongst the better pupils of Sebastian 
 Bourdon. M. I., vol. i. pp. 97, 10?. 
 
 3 D'Argenville, ibid. j). 13S. •• //'/(/. pp. 13S, 142. 
 
 5 Piganiol, vol. i. pp. 144, 227. Dussieux, " Chateau de Versailles," 
 vol. i. p. 149. M. I., vol. i. p. 204. 
 
 '' Piganiol, ibid. p. 143. " Ibid. p. 146. 
 
 ^ Ibid. p. 136. D'Argenville, ibid. p. 15S. Dussieux, Hid. p. 147.
 
 LE BRUN AND DECORATORS OF VERSAILLES. 129 
 
 are the two subjects from the story of Apollo and 
 Daphne' in the Apollo or Throne-room, where was 
 hung, at a later date, Rigaud's splendid portrait of the 
 king; 2 but the work in this room was shared with 
 De la Fosse, a pupil very highly esteemed by Le Brun, 
 although perhaps the least servile of all his assistants. 
 The ceiling of the Throne-room was entrusted to De la 
 Fosse,^ and in the Diana room the Iphigenia of the 
 mantelpiece, and two other subjects, were also by his 
 hand ;"•• here, too, De la Fosse had, as fellow-worker, 
 Blanchard, who painted the ceiling, and who then enjoyed 
 a reputation as a colourist w^hich almost rivalled that of 
 Houasse and Claude Audran, the latter of whom, on the 
 suggestion of Claude Perrault, there executed two 
 designs from the stories of Cyrus and of Caesar, which 
 formed pendants to those by De la Fosse. ^ 
 
 Audran is indeed to be found everywhere at 
 Versailles, exercising his special talent for imitating, 
 with illusive reality, reliefs of gold and bronze. Origi- 
 nally an assistant of Errard's assistant, Noel Coypel, he 
 had attracted Le Brun's notice by his skill in this class 
 of work, and had even been employed to carry out parts 
 of his famous designs of the battles of Granicus and 
 Arbela. After working on the Great Staircase with 
 Le Brun himself, Audran joined Jouvenet and Houasse 
 in the Halls of Peace and \Var,6 aiding them also in 
 the works of the Mars and Diana rooms,7 and painting 
 a subject, now destroyed, in the king's bath-room. ^ 
 
 ' D'ArgenviUe, "Vies des Pcintres," vol. iv. p. 13S. 
 
 = Piganiol, vol. i. p. 165. ^ H'iJ. p. 162. 
 
 •» "Jason at Colchos" and " Alexander Lion-hunting." M. I., vol. ii. 
 p. 3. D'ArgenviUe, ibid. p. 191. ^ Piganiol, p. 140. M. I., vol. ii. p. 14. 
 
 ^ Piganiol, p. 143. ' D'ArgenviUe, ibiJ. p. 137. 
 
 ^ '•Venus receiving the arms of ^neas from Cupid." M. I., vol. ii. 
 p. 15. 
 
 K
 
 I30 ART IN THE MODERN STATE 
 
 For all these works sketches and indications were 
 given by Le Brun^ and for the Degre des Am- 
 bassadeiLVS, engraved by Etienne Baudet, he actually 
 finished in detail drawings, not only for the paintings 
 in fresco and oil, but for all the ornaments which 
 gave this stair so sumptuous a character, as well as 
 the designs for all the sculptures and reliefs. ^ It 
 was for these stairs that Van der Meulen painted the 
 battle of Cassel and the sieges of Valenciennes, of 
 Cambrai, and of St. Omer, going himself to Cambrai 
 that he might make his studies on the spot.- So much im- 
 portance was, indeed, attached to the faithful representa- 
 tion of the king's glorious campaigns that Van der Meulen 
 followed in the train of Le Brun when he was carried 
 in Colbert's carriage to witness the taking of Luxem- 
 bourg, which had to be depicted in the halls of Marly,^ 
 
 The four canvases carried out for the Great Stairs, 
 drawings for which are now in the Louvre, were 
 originally placed between pilasters at the side of doors 
 giving access to the king's state apartments, and were 
 relieved magnificently on imitation tapestries with 
 golden grounds, and accompanied with ornaments in 
 relief. Between these Claude Audran painted the four 
 galleries, or tribunes, out of which looked life-size 
 representatives of different Asiatic nations all amaze- 
 ment at the glories unrolled before them.4 The same 
 arrangement of alternate reliefs and suggested openings 
 was carried out in the splendid decorations overhead. 
 Balustrades, on which perched birds of many colours, 
 
 ' Lepicie, "Vies des Peintres," vol. i. p. 55 et seq. 
 
 - Nouv. Arch., 1879, PP- 127, 129. Piganiol, vol. i. p. 21. lepicie, 
 ibid. p. 56 et seq. 
 
 3 Lepicie, ibid, p. 39. Dussieux, "Chateau de Versailles," vol. i. 
 p. 151. See also a very curious letter of Henri Testelin's to Charles Errard, 
 giving an account of Le Brun's reception at the camp by Louis XIV., 
 in April, 1677. iS'ouv. Arch., 1S78, p. 27S. •* M. L, vol. ii. p. 13.
 
 LE BRUN AND DECORATORS OF VERSAILLES. 131 
 
 flutterinij their plumes against the sky, showed above 
 the pictured galleries, and were spaced by boldly 
 modelled groups which surmounted the framework of 
 Van der Meulen's canvases. ^ Lighted by a vaulted 
 opening in the centre, the marbles of the walls and stair, 
 the trophies and other decorations of gilt bronze, the 
 carvings of the gilded doors, and the brilliant hues of 
 the paintings above and below the cornice, appeared 
 to enormous advantage; for the heavy character of 
 Le Brun's work generally causes his ceilings to detract 
 from, rather than enhance, the effect of his schemes of 
 decoration. 
 
 This is especially the case with the Grande Galerie, 
 •or Gallery of Mirrors, the works in which were 
 ■commenced before the Great Stairs were finished. 
 Le Brun, who had meantime remodelled and re- 
 decorated the chateau of Sceaux^ for Colbert, began to 
 paint in the Gallery of Mirrors about 1679,^ and this 
 gallery still remains the most perfect monument of his 
 genius and the typical embodiment of the triumphs of 
 the great reign. Between long rows of marble columns 
 •of various colours enriched by bases and capitals of gilt 
 bronze, into which many details^ of Le Brun's composite 
 " French order " were introduced, are ranged trophies 
 of gilt bronze composed of eagles, lion-skins, suns 
 and garlands admirable alike in design and execution. 
 Above these the mimic architecture of the ceiling is 
 splendidly supported by caryatides of bronze and gilt, 
 whilst the angles and bays between the twelve 
 immense canvases of Le Brun, which are the principal 
 ,glory of the place, are spaced with rich hangings and 
 
 ' See " Gravures de la Chalcographie," Nos. 2219-27, 2557-54. 
 
 ' M. I., vol. i. p. 30, vol. ii. p. 13. 
 
 3 Lepicie, "Vies des Peintres," vol. i. p. 59. 
 
 ^ M. I., vol. i. pp. 32, 33, and 37. 
 
 K 2
 
 133 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 wreathed with garlands of flowers faUing from the hands 
 of women and children — golden images personifying all 
 the arts and all the sciences. Bas-reliefs of lapis and 
 gold form the keys of the vaulting, and the vast 
 allegorical canvas,^ which represents the king in the 
 prime of his youth turning from Pleasure to seek Glory, 
 is set like a jewel in the centre. Minerva, Mars, the 
 Graces, Peace and Honour do him service, whilst 
 Discord lies crushed beneath the mighty shield of 
 France. All Olympus has flocked to the young 
 prince's feet ; but Glory, with her star-like crown, attracts 
 his eyes, and Time shows deeds which fill the Sun with 
 wonder. The Dutch campaign is chronicled in four 
 minor compartments ; then come the League of Spain, 
 Germany, and ^ Holland ; the conquest of Franche- 
 Comte ; the Flemish campaigns and the Dutch peace. 
 These chief subjects are supplemented by oval designs 
 of less importance, but all showing forth the triumphs 
 and virtues of the king, who expressed his admiration 
 for what Lepicie calls " this veritable epic " by a royal 
 gift to Le Brun conferred actually without consultation 
 with Colbert.- 
 
 The Halls of Peace and War, when uncovered m 
 1686,^ were hailed, like the Gallery of Mirrors, by 
 universal admiration ; now, stripped of their costly 
 furniture, and showing the eff"ect of incessant restoration,, 
 they preserve but the outlines of former splendour. It 
 is not easy to picture them hung with winter velvet or 
 summer silks — jegal stuffs, '^faites du temps de 
 Colbert" — and when jewelled tables and silver seats, 
 and vases glittered amongst the green leaves and fair 
 blossoms of stately orange-trees. 
 
 ' D'Argenville, "Vies des Peintres,'' vol. iv. p. 141, engraved by Masse. 
 * Lepicie, " Vies des Peintres," vol. i. p. So. ^ M. I., vol. i. p. 69.
 
 LE BR UN AND DECORATORS OF VERSAILLES. 133 
 
 Even then the theatrical element — the element of 
 stage display and pretence — prevailed in the paltry- 
 means employed to produce this effect of superb mag- 
 nificence. Painted canvas needs must fade, gilded 
 cameos scale and drop, fresco perspectives must be 
 repainted ; but why sham tapestry on the Great Stairs ? 
 Why sham lapis in the compartments of wall and 
 ceiling ? Why not inlay rather than paint on the polished 
 surfaces of marble basins ? Why, in all this royal splen- 
 dour, should abject poverty be so often confessed ? 
 
 One reason was certainly the haste imposed by the 
 impatience of the king to see his stately house of 
 pleasure finished. If the reliefs had been, not of stucco, 
 but of chiselled marble, if walls and ceilings had been 
 jewelled with lapis, ten times ten years would scarce have 
 sufficed for its building. A recent writer, M. Genevay,i 
 has suggested that the taste for sham decoration was 
 intentionally fostered by Colbert for reasons of economy. 
 No reasons of economy would, though, have induced the 
 king, had he preferred the real thing, to put up with 
 shams. He must have thought them superior ; the cheat 
 probably appeared to him the smarter thing, just as, in 
 the eyes of the Spanish monarch, the cardboard suit of 
 liis spendthrift painter outshone the livery of gold 
 brocade which it replaced. 
 
 Decoration was, indeed, in the eyes of Le Brun and 
 his master, '' la science du decor," and he understood to 
 perfection how to prepare the stage on which the royal 
 puppet and his minions should play their parts to advan- 
 tage. From what remains of his work, and from the en- 
 gravings by means of which he obtained a careful record 
 of every design he made, his system is clear.- He took as 
 
 ' "Le Style Louis XIV." 
 
 - .See list given by \"illot in " Notice des Tableaux ilu Louvre." A
 
 134 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 his point of departure the indications of the architect, 
 and filled in his constructive hnes with scene-painting of 
 marvellous skill, employing mimic architectural enrich- 
 ments, painted frieze, and cornice, and galleries, and 
 caryatides of seeming bronze, supporting painted orders 
 and interspersed with reliefs of stucco, which broke the 
 transition to the sculptured busts and statues of marble, 
 just as sham draperies were so designed as to enhance 
 the pictured movement of the canvases which rested on 
 them. 
 
 The staircase, recklessly destroyed by Louis XV., ^ 
 was in even a higher degree than the Gallery of Mirrors, 
 a triumph of this class of combinations. The decorations 
 in strong relief, which spaced the balustrades, Avere in 
 direct relation to lower reliefs which led the eye gently 
 to the flat compartments, storied with tales of the royal 
 successes, and, if there was anything more remarkable 
 than Le Brun's skill in marrying the seeming to the 
 real, the round to the flat, then that greater marvel is 
 doubtless his perfect mastery of the use of gold. In 
 the utmost profusion of lavish spending, he yet so 
 distributes it that it is never tawdry, never interferes with 
 the coloured surfaces in its neighbourhood, and this treat- 
 ment of gold was, we may infer from Florent le Comte's 
 remarks on the frames at the Louvre exhibition in 1699, 
 an object of special study, for the pleasure of the golden 
 frame does not consist in its shining but in its quiet, 
 which should be broken only by the points selected for 
 polish. As M. Genevay notes, in speaking of the work 
 
 great deal of importance was attached to this matter of engraving. 
 On 14th February, 1685, it is recorded that Mosnier asked Le Brun (wish- 
 ing clearly to pay his court) whether he should comply with the proposal 
 made to him to engrave a work by Mignard, and said Le Noire had put 
 Mignard up to asking him through La Chapelle, but that he would only 
 do it if well paid. M. I., vol. i. p. 57. 
 
 ' D'Argenville, "Vies des Peintres," vol. iv. p. 142.
 
 LE BRUX AND DECORATORS OF VERSAILLES, i 
 
 J3 
 
 in the Gallery of Mirrors^ "les eclats de bruni sur les 
 extremitcs en relevent le mat." 
 
 Still, in spite of this wonderful magnificence, the 
 aspect of the great palace, although carrying with it — at 
 an\- rate when Le Brun had his way — an imposing 
 impression of grandeur, can never have been other than 
 cold and formal. The heaviness of the ceilings, the 
 depth and strength of their colouring, are in themselves 
 oppressive. In this respect, as in the determination to 
 produce complete illusion, LeBrun's practicecontrasts un- 
 favourably with that of all great masters. The truescience 
 of mural painting is to respect the wall ; the outlines in 
 Raphael's wall-paintings are ever3'where purposely of 
 equal value, and if we look at the walls of the Sistine, 
 where the Sibyls grow from the flat surface into strong 
 relief by the forcible accentuation of points of light, we 
 find the outline for the most part in half shadow, and 
 nowhere do the medallions, as at Versailles, make any 
 pretence of illusion ; no one could take them for real 
 sculpture. As for the ceiling, the colour perceptibly 
 lightens towards the centre, whereas in all the ceilings 
 of Le Brun the reverse effect is produced. Hot and 
 heavy arc the paintings overhead in the Mars room, and 
 in the Hall of Plenty there is nothing to lift the eye, 
 as it were, beyond the roof. Something may have to 
 be allowed for the darkening process of time, but in 
 the Gallery of Mirrors the ceiling must always have 
 hung like a dark pall above the floors from which 
 it was separated by walls of dazzling light. 
 
 Very soon the system of painted shows, which, 
 practised at triumphal entries and such like passing 
 ceremonials, admirably fulfilled the purposes of a holiday 
 pageant,' invaded not only the whole field of internal 
 
 ' See for Dauphin's baptism at St. Germain-en-Laye, M. I., vol. i. 
 p. 20 ; also the funeral pomp of Chancellor Seguier, ibid. p. 29.
 
 136 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 decoration, but that of the exterior also. Extensive 
 works of this kind had been carried out by Le Brun at 
 St. Germain-en-Laye after his return from the campaign 
 of Flanders (1667), but the facades of Marly, which he 
 took in hand in 16S3, owed a great deal more to paint 
 than simple decoration. In point of architecture, Marly 
 may be said to have been practically all paint.' Every- 
 thing that should have been sculpture, and even some- 
 thing more, was paint. The king's own pavilion, the 
 principal wing of the chateau, was noticeable only for 
 " une riche architecture" painted from the designs and 
 under the conduct of Le Brun. Rousseau, the Huguenot 
 painter of the perspectives in the Venus room, who had 
 begun the work, had to fly- France on the revocation 
 of the Edict of Nantes ; but it was completed by his pupil 
 Mosnier, and the gaiety of this fugitive splendour so 
 charmed Louis XIV. that he caused the homes of his 
 carp to be in like manner emblazoned. No less a person 
 than Blain de Fontenay was called from his work in the 
 queen's apartments to trace upon their gilded basins 
 garlands of flowers which could only be kept in bloom 
 by incessant vigilance and repair.'^ 
 
 Day by day this wasteful theatricality gained ground, 
 until rapidity of execution became the merit valued 
 beyond all others. Poussin, in 1641, had written from 
 Paris to M. de Chantelou, "I could bear my burden 
 cheerfully if it were not that works which should demand 
 much time have to be finished at a blow. I swear to 
 you that if I had to live in this country I should become 
 a regular mountebank like all the rest. Study and 
 reflection are unknown ; whosoever desires to study or 
 
 ' Gencvay, " Le Style Louis XIV. ," p. 112. Lepicie, "Vies dcs 
 Pcintres," vol. i. p. 57. 
 
 = D'Aigenville, " \"its dcs Peintres," vol. iv. p. 2SS. = Ibid. p. 2S3.
 
 LE BRUN AND DECORATORS OF VERSAILLES. 137 
 
 do well should fly from France." ' Thirty years later, 
 tlie leading men habitually boasted of the despatch with 
 which they worked. " Rousseau/' says D'Argenville, 
 " went extremely fast, declaring that he should be too 
 happy if his hand would be as quick as his thought." 
 Time went on, and Vivien bragged of painting a picture 
 without leaving the breakfast table;- Largilliere plumed 
 himself on doing in a week, what would take another 
 man a month ; Rigaud, yielding to the common weak- 
 ness, knocked off a mock Vandyck at a sitting, whilst 
 Lagrenee, according to Diderot, produced, in addition 
 to minor work, seventeen large pictures in two years ! 
 
 The gravity of purpose which had marked the old 
 academical set fast disappeared. Contrast the drawings 
 of Lc Sueur, or even of La Hire, with those of De la 
 Fosse or Michel Corneille ; the portraits of Philippe dc 
 Champagne, with those of Mignard or De Troy ! Now 
 this contrast is just as marked in lesser men. The 
 portraits of the brothers Beaubrun, the court painters, 
 who delighted to entertain in their studio Henrietta 
 Maria and her ladies, were sincere though wooden ;3 and 
 Gilbert de Seve, if highly uninteresting,'* retained that 
 indescribable air which means that a man takes himself 
 and his profession seriously, and which is almost wholly 
 lacking in the succeeding generation. 
 
 Of Le Sueur, Sir Joshua Reynolds has said that he 
 was the only French painter who had " a truly correct 
 taste, free from any mixture of affectation or bombast. 
 . . . h\\ the others of that nation," he adds, "seem to 
 have taken their ideas of grandeur from romances. . . . 
 
 ' Letter to Chantelou, " Lettres de Nicolas Poussin," p. 64, eil. 1824. 
 ° D'Argenville, "Vies des Pcintres," vol. iv. p. 308. 
 3 See portrait, Queen of Louis XIV., Versailles. 
 ^ See works at Versailles.
 
 138 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 Their heroes are decked out so nice and fine, that they 
 look like knights errant just entering the lists at a 
 tournament in gilt armour and loaded most unmercifully 
 with silkj satin, velvet, gold, jewels, etc., and hold up 
 their heads and carry themselves with an air like a 
 petit maitre with his dancing master at his elbow, thus 
 corrupting the true taste, and leading it away from the 
 pure, the simple and grand style, by a mock majesty and 
 a false magnificence.'^ i 
 
 This sweeping condemnation is rather hard on Le 
 Brun, for, " after his fashion," as M. Ingres has said, " Le 
 Brun was a great artist. Look at his fine compositions 
 on the History of Alexander and at his immense labours 
 at Versailles. His reputation to-day has sunk, but, in 
 reality, he is far greater than that which remains to 
 him," 2 Jii iiis own work he always retained a certain 
 measure of dignity which leavened the theatrical 
 grandeur which he inaugurated, and which destroyed for 
 a while that tendency towards sober distinction which 
 is a natural element of all typical French work. Nor 
 was he to blame for best expressing that which all 
 wished to express ; everybody was posing a little ; even 
 the Lenain, as M. Champfleur}'^ has remarked, were not 
 free from this reproach ; but pose, restrained by Le 
 Brun within certain courtly limits, degenerated through 
 Mignard, whose very name happens to be an appro- 
 priate synonym for all mincing graces, into the sprawl- 
 ing affectations of the eighteenth century. Curiously 
 enough, Le Brun, who was the younger man of the two» 
 stands forth, if compared with Mignard, as the represen- 
 tative of tradition ; and even in developing the theatrical 
 tendencies of his day, he inculcated on his disciples an 
 
 ' Leslie's Life, vol. i. p. 87. 
 
 - De Laborde, " Ingres, sa Vic, etc. etc.,' p. 163. 
 
 3 " Les Freres Lenain," p. 31.
 
 LE BRUN AND DECORATORS OE VERSAILLES. 139 
 
 amount of" school" which his elder rival was incapable of 
 appreciating. Vouet's pupils, and men of the serious and 
 formal type of Jean Baptiste de Champagne, naturally- 
 grouped themselves about Le Brun, whilst Mignard 
 became the precursor of the epoch of Louis XV. His 
 tricky draperies and fluttering movement heralded the 
 future popularity of Boucher and Vanloo, whilst his 
 graceful conventionalities of form encouraged that 
 disuse of the model which shortly grew to the height 
 which excited the indignant remonstrances of Diderot. ^ 
 Patronised by Monseigneur, for whom, in i6jj, he 
 had carried out the decorations of St. Cloud, Mignard 
 could obtain no footing at Versailles until, after the 
 death of Colbert, Louvois was free to pit his own protege 
 against Le Brun. " Ces Messieurs les Mignards," said 
 the Grand Monarque, " sont difficiles ; ils n'ont d'eloges 
 que pour leur heros;"- but the apartments of Mon- 
 seigneur, destroyed in 1728, were confided to Mignard 
 in 16S4, and, two years later, he obtained the little 
 gallery and private rooms of the king, where he painted 
 in allegorical disguises all the prettiest women of the 
 Court.3 Mignard was at his best in portraits, yet 
 Poussin, writing from Rome in 164S, says : " It vexes 
 me to spend a single sixpence on a portrait such as 
 Mignard's, who is, however, the man here who does 
 them best, although they are plastered and without 
 power or vitality ; '' but, though there is much truth in 
 this bitter criticism, the favour which Mignard enjoyed 
 with his Court patrons was not without justification. He 
 had a certain feeling for grace of arrangement, his 
 details, if common, were well put together, and his colour, 
 
 ' Salon, 1765. 
 
 ^ Dussieu.\, " Les Arl"^^ Fr^ a I'etranger," p. 69. 
 
 3 Destioyed in 1736. Engraved by Audran, C. des B'\ 16S6. 
 D'Argenville, "Vies des Peintres," vol. iv. p. 83. See list of drawings, 
 and Mignard's Inventory, Nouv. Arch. 1S74, pp. 42-4.
 
 I40 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 if poor and cold, sometimes had wonderful delicacy of 
 carnation in the flesh. ^ 
 
 Mignard, however, had neither the vigour nor the 
 remarkable command of all resources of decoration 
 possessed by Le Brun or even by a second-rate man 
 like Jouvenet, who not only excelled in compositions 
 calculated for great effect, but redeemed some vul- 
 garity in choice of type by his strong dramatic 
 sentiment^ and who, by a remarkable breadth and 
 suggestiveness of light and shade, generally succeeded 
 in masking the unpleasantness of his local colour. As a 
 colourist, too, Mignard was inferior to Houasse, if judged 
 by the damaged remains of his work in the Hall of 
 Plenty^ or even to De la Fosse^ as seen in his paintings 
 at the Invalides,^ for his work at Versailles had been 
 disfigured by restoration, and his decorations at Alon- 
 tague House, like those of Rousseau and Monnoyer, 
 have been totally destroyed. 
 
 Inferior in many respects to several of Le Brun's 
 assistants, Mignard was yet more inferior to Le Brun 
 himself, not only in point of capacity, but also as to 
 strength and breadth of character. Le Brun was a 
 tyrant, but he was never a petty or vexatious one. 
 Those who opposed his authority he put aside, but his 
 worst enemies have not recorded of him any such mean 
 and furtive tricks as Mignard employed when he 
 secretly stirred the maitrcs to annoy the Academy of 
 which he, after the death of Le Brun, was actually the 
 head.4 Of course the system which enabled Le Brun to 
 
 ' See portrait of a lady in the possession of Mrs. Ker, portrait of 
 Henriette, Duchess of Orleans, belonging to Sir Charles W. Dilke, and 
 portrait of Descartes (?) at Castle Howard. 
 
 ' De la Fosse left for England at Lord Montague's invitation, when, 
 after the death of Colbert, Lc Brun's authority was sensibly diminished. 
 
 '' See engravings by Picart and Cochin. 
 
 *■ Lepicie, " Viesdes Feintrcs," vol. i. p. 74.
 
 LE B RUN AND DECORATORS OF VERSAILLES. 141 
 
 do so much was an abuse. For one man to get, like this 
 painter, all he wants, must be an abuse : it means the 
 use of others by him to such an extent that their 
 individuality is sacrificed. After all, however, for one 
 who needs the help of many to express that which he 
 can think, the most think nothing that is worth 
 expressing. 
 
 Under their Chancellor's rule, the Academy, which 
 had been ordered as a means of bringing to bear the 
 corporate wisdom of many on special problems, be- 
 came a mere bundle of tools ; the tyranny of Mansard 
 and the tyranny of Le Brun ran parallel to the 
 lines of royal absolutism. The king supported Le 
 Brun, as he supported Mansard, as he supported 
 Colbert; they were his vice-regents. The sole channel 
 of employment in any and every field was favour ; and 
 thus " skilful artists, painters, and sculptors fully capable 
 of rising on their own wings, out of deference to the 
 credit of the First Painter, associated their talents with 
 his, and were ready to follow out his noble designs." 
 The crowd of distinguished members of the Royal 
 Academy found at Versailles "favourable opportunities 
 for the exercise of gifts already great either by working 
 out the sketches of M. Le Brun ... or at least by 
 agreeing with him both on the choice of subject and on 
 the details accompanying it. Thus, the different rooms 
 which form the apartments of this superb chateau, have 
 been so skilfully painted by IMINL Noel Coypel, 
 Audran, Houassc, Jouvenet, De la Fosse, and many 
 others." i 
 
 The influence, though, which was favourable to the 
 development of docile natures, was fatal to any form of 
 original talent; and now and again there surges out of 
 this sea of busy movement the trace of some obscure 
 
 ' Lcpicic, "Vies dcs Peintrc?," vol. i. pp. 51-2,
 
 142 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 disturbance ; some man rises and protests against this 
 order of things, and is remorselessly swept away, like 
 that humble worker in ivory, Simon Jaillot, who refused 
 to be taxed by the Academy for the funeral pomp of 
 Chancellor Seguier, saying he saw no reason why he 
 should pay in acknowledgment of the advantages that 
 M. Le Brun " en avait resceu." Of course the speech 
 was repeated ; of course Le Brun insisted on an apology, 
 which failing to obtain, he, equally of course, expelled 
 the insolent one from the Academy. In vain Jaillot 
 continued to protest against the arbitrary oppression of 
 one " to whom the first rank has been given amongst the 
 painters of the day, but who holds it rather by his 
 wrath than by his deserts." Le Brun was not to be 
 appeased, and if the memorial reciting Jaillot's wrongs 
 awoke secret sympathy in the breast of any Acade- 
 mician no one raised his voice in Jaillot's favour. i Not 
 until Colbert had passed away was Van der Meulen 
 free to vent the malice with which he regarded the 
 author of his fortune, and working through Louvois to 
 contrive for Lc Brun humiliations which not even the 
 king's constancy could wholly palliate.^ 
 
 Le Brun died in his lodgings at the Gobelins on the 
 1 2th February, 1690;^ and up till the day of his death, 
 in spite of Louvois and the Mignards, he bravely held 
 his own. He died, so to say, erect, giving proof to the 
 last of the same powers of organisation, the same 
 inexhaustible activity and fertility which justify his 
 claims to fame. No branch of art, no interest of his day 
 
 ' P. v., vol. ii, p. 112. 
 
 - A recent writer, M. Genevay (" Lc Style Louis XIV.," p. 200), has 
 stated that we have no proof of the alleged hostility of Van der Meulen to 
 Le Brun, but the M. I. abound with allusions to it. See vol. i. pp. 57, 
 58, 71-2. 
 
 ^ Lepicie, " Vies des Peintres," vol. i. p. 87.
 
 LE BRUN AND DECORATORS OF VERSAILLES. 143 
 
 was unfamiliar to him, not even that love of landscape 
 which had begun to stir the world, growing and thriving 
 as if it were a necessary relief from the prevailing 
 passion for display and formality. Poussin himself had 
 been gradually absorbed by it ; at first, the lines of hill and 
 field, the shadows of the woods and the depth of waters 
 appear in his works as a mere architectural background 
 to the drama of human passions, but, by degrees, the 
 figures become mere furniture, just as the Angel and St. 
 Matthew of the Tiber landscape at Berlin count only for 
 as much as the rocks of the foreground, and, lastly, as in 
 the great tempera paintings of the Doria Palace, 
 landscape borrows no interest from human life. Caspar 
 Dughet and the host of minor men — Patel, Francisque 
 Millet, Forest,! and Abraham Genoels — followed in the 
 footsteps of Poussin and Claude. With Cenoels Le 
 Brun worked out the backgrounds of his Battles of 
 Alexander, and they show in a marked degree the 
 freshness of feeling with which, in spite of fixity of 
 doctrine as regarded points of treatment, it was 
 becoming possible, even for the most academic mind, 
 to look at nature. 
 
 The variety and extent of Le Brun's powers and 
 acquirements make it as absurd for us to call "Mignard 
 his rival, as it was to make him say that the death of 
 Le Sueur had " taken a thorn out of his foot.''^ - Le 
 Brun had far too just a knowledge of his own strength 
 to have thought, far too much dignity to have said, 
 anything so silly. His natural force of character, even 
 more than his extraordinary powers of work, gave him 
 
 ' Forest, like the two Ellc, Michelin, Housseau, L'Espagnandell, 
 Rousseau, etc., etc., had to fly France on the revocation of the Edict of 
 Nantes. 
 
 - Le Sueur and Le Brun had worked together at the Hotel Lambert in 
 1649. Both were pupils of Simon Voiiet.
 
 144 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 his firm hold over other men. As an artist he knew 
 more than others, and he also knew better how to turn 
 his knowledge to account ; but he was not only an artist, 
 lie was an administrator, and to his powers of adminis- 
 tration every branch of the art of the " Grand Siecle '^ 
 bears eloquent witness. 
 
 As his influence died away, and the men whom he 
 had trained disappeared, exaggeration of movement 
 and pettiness of style made progress hand-in-hand with 
 that self-indulgent luxury which, as Diderot says, 
 degrades the greatest talents, "en les assujettissant a des 
 petits ouvrages, et les grands ouvrages en les reduisant 
 a la bambochade." The new school which stigmatised 
 Velasquez as " a Spaniard who, in spite of his visit to 
 Italy, remained an artist of very middling capacity," i 
 rejoiced over Lagrenee's Truth, Justice, and Religion 
 masquerading in a banker's dressing-room, or wept 
 before his dying Dauphin assisted in the last extremity 
 by the little Duke of Burgundy, stark naked, but saving 
 the proprieties by his cordon bleu. When taste had 
 taken this turn, well might the Arts of Vanloo grieve 
 lest Heaven should deprive them of their fitting patron, 
 Madame de Pompadour. 
 
 Nothing but little pictures, mean thoughts, frivolous 
 compositions, " propres au boudoir d^un petit maitre, 
 faites pour des petits abbes, des petits robins, des gros 
 financiers ou autres personnages sans moeurs et d'un 
 petit gout " ! We have stepped from the great stage to 
 the puppet-show ; and to these charming littlenesses, 
 prettinesses, emptinesses which make up the glorified 
 upholstery of Boucher, of Baudoin, of Fragonard, there 
 is allied a love of turbulence which in all phases of life 
 is a sure sign cf something wrong. Diderot speaks of 
 
 ' G. Brice, " Description de Paris," ed. 1713, vol. i. p. 40.
 
 LE BRUN AXD DECORATORS OF VERSAILLES. 145 
 
 Boucher as the " most deadly enemy of silence/^ and, 
 Avhen the younger Restout paints Anacreon singing, 
 exclaims, " If he sings it cannot be French music, for 
 he does not screech enough/' Yet Diderot himself 
 suffers from the same unrest, and is always begging 
 for more noise, more action, more passion ! 
 
 Brilliant, indeed, were many of these men ; all too 
 fascinating the idylls of their theatrical Arcadia, the 
 powdered charms of their voluptuous nymphs; and 
 surely the names of Watteau and of Chardin shall 
 ever be counted as an honour to France. Yet, looking 
 back, we see the elder days were other. "' Soyez 
 galant ! " cries Boucher ; but Le Brun said, " Soyez 
 ■noble I "
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE SCHOOL OF SCULPTURE — SARRAZIN, PUGET, AND' 
 
 GIRARDON. 
 
 The first name which comes to our lips when we call 
 over the roll of French sculptors in the seventeenth 
 century is that of Pug-et. Painter, architect, and 
 engineer, he was also by far the most vigorous repre- 
 sentative of sculpture during the reign of Louis XIV. 
 Curiously enough, in spite of his visits to Paris and his 
 years of residence in Italy, his work never lost its strong 
 local character. The Virgin of Lorgues, which he 
 executed for the Benedictines of Le Thoronet, is a 
 woman of Marseilles, her features strongly marked, and 
 the structure so forcibly indicated as to give an air of 
 age to a model already older than is usually the case 
 with those who sit for virgins. The deep line between 
 her eyebrows indicates that from her birth Puget's sitter 
 had faced the southern sun, and her thick hair, growing 
 stubbornly off the forehead, seems to uplift the veil she 
 wears ; on the boldly-cut lines of her mouth lies a 
 Provencal accent ; her hands have picked the fruits of the 
 olive and the vine, and everywhere falls the same rather 
 heavy emphasis in the modelling, which makes the 
 muscular forms of the body tell plainly, even beneath, 
 the broken and uneasy lines of the drapery.
 
 SARRAZTN, PUGET, AND GIRARDON. 147 
 
 This Virfjin of Lorijues, executed when Pu^et 
 was between thirty and forty, shows all the features 
 which individualise his talent, and give his work its 
 typical and local character, whilst, at the same time, it 
 promises that energy and life, that skill in contrasting 
 decorative accessories with the simple surface of the 
 nude, to which he attained in the Saint Sebastian of the 
 Carignano church at Genoa. The Saint Sebastian, 
 which is, perhaps, Puget^s most complete work, belongs 
 to the same period as the French Hercules of the 
 Louvre, which, destined for Vaux le Vicomte, fell 
 into the hands of Colbert, and became the chief orna- 
 ment of the courts of Sceaux.^ Executed at Genoa, 
 this extraordinarily vigorous statue is nevertheless a 
 transcript from the galleys of Toulon, an embodiment of 
 that superb force which can defy the utmost tyranny of 
 Fate. Colbert, if he could not — and it seems he could 
 not — appreciate it at its full value, was, at least, so far 
 impressed that he unwillingly conceded the conditions 
 imposed by Puget, as the price of his consent to serve in 
 the arsenals of Toulon, and ordered him to return to 
 France.2 
 
 At this date, known, as Puget must have been in 
 Paris since the arrival of the Hercules, by work re- 
 markable for startling vigour, for character, and for 
 admirable decorative fitness, it is astonishing that he 
 was not summoned to Versailles instead of being con- 
 signed to the dockyards for the rest of his life.^ 
 
 Was Le Brun envious of his gifts, or did he distrust 
 his power to control Puget and carry him through the 
 intrigues which would have greeted his coming to Paris ? 
 
 ' Mariette, "Abecedario," vol, iv. p. 225; and Leon Lagrange, "Pierre 
 Puget," 2nd ed., p. 61. - (i65S). Leon Lagrange, ibU. p. 117. 
 
 3 See Correspondance, Arch, do I'Art Fr^., 1S56, p. 225 et sea. 
 
 L 2
 
 148 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 It is clear from the terms of tlie i^enerous letter written 
 by him to Paget on the arrival of the Milo at Versailles 
 (1683), that he fully recognised his claims as a sculptor. 
 "I took care to be present/' he says, "at the opening of 
 the case containing your Milo, when the king had it 
 opened ; and when S. M. did me the honour to ask my 
 opinion, 1 tried to make him notice all the beauties of 
 your work. In so doing I only did you justice, for in 
 truth your statue appeared to me very beautiful in every 
 respect and wrought by a great artist." ' If, therefore, 
 Le Brun did not urge the employment of Puget on the 
 works at Versailles, it cannot have been from distrust of 
 his ability, but it may have been from distrust of his 
 character. The violent element in his work, which, on 
 first seeing the Hercules, must have startled and discon- 
 certed a man like Colbert accustomed to all the academic 
 proprieties, had its corresponding quality in Puget's 
 nature. Proud, self-confident, and authoritative, not to 
 say dictatorial, Puget was anything but easy to work 
 with, and the letters of Arnoul, the intendant des galcres, to 
 Colbert at this epoch show the difficult side of his nature. 
 " He seeks to build his own reputation rather than the 
 king's arsenal," complains Arnoul, and again, " He thinks 
 of nothing but the beautiful, whilst I must look to what 
 is useful and necessary." ~ Le Brun had had probably 
 some opportunity of judging Puget in this respect, in 
 connection with the works at Vaux, for Puget was well 
 known to Lepautre, who had recommended his employ- 
 ment by Fouquet on those works of sculpture for which, 
 at the moment of the S 2 ir intend anfs fall, he was actually 
 buying marbles in Italy. Early in the year, too (166S), 
 Puget had visited Paris,^ and Le Brun may then have 
 learnt something of that independence of temper, which, 
 
 ' Lagrange, " Pierre Puget," p. 191. -Ibid. p. 156. ^ Ibid.^. 114.
 
 SARRAZIN, PUGET, AND GIRARDON. 149 
 
 in 1688, led Puget to throw up the work to which he 
 had been called by Louvois and leave Paris, rather than 
 disentangle the intrigues by which he was hindered in 
 its execution. 
 
 There were obstacles in the way of placing Puget at 
 Versailles which were certainly grave enough to fright 
 the wariest schemer. The defeat of Poussin, the dis- 
 comfiture of Bernini, were not precedents likely to 
 engage any man of the higher sort to tempt the fates of 
 Paris, and Le Brun himself was also deeply committed 
 to Francois Girardon/ who had for years courted his 
 favour with obsequious subserviency. Already (1668) 
 he had, however, been obliged to despatch Girardon to 
 Marseilles, where trained workmen appear to have been 
 as scarce as at Toulon, and where disastrous conse- 
 quences resulted from the attempt to carry out Le Brun's 
 designs for the prow of the Royal Louis ; and, from the 
 letters of DTnfreville to Colbert, it is clear that there 
 was no one in the yards of either port capable of direct- 
 ing the " works of sculpture." The choice lay, therefore, 
 between the permanent appointment of Girardon to the 
 dockyards, and the recall of Puget, 
 
 Girardon was a practised, if not a born Parisian, 
 practised too in all the intrigues, professional and other, 
 aeainst which Pu^et would have been defenceless, whilst 
 Pueet, on the other hand, would have found at Paris no 
 employment for those special scientific acquirements, 
 which might have rendered his services in the dockyards 
 invaluable. Le Brun can scarcely have hesitated in his 
 choice of tools. Girardon was recalled to Paris, and 
 
 ^ A pupil cf Arguier tsxiA protege of Chancellor Seguier. lie executed 
 Colbert's tomb on Le Brun's designs, and succeeded Le Brun as Inspector- 
 General of works of sculpture in 1690. One of his chief assistants at 
 Versailles was Robert le Lorrain. See Corrard de Breban, M. L, vol. ii. 
 p. 214 ; and ibid. vol. i. p. 291 ct scq.
 
 I50 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 Puget was left at Toulon ; but he got no free hand, and 
 his energies were constantly cramped in every direction, 
 in spite of D'Infreville's support, by Colbert's persistent 
 distrust of one who cared in the first place for "the 
 beautiful.'^ 
 
 Through the generosity of Chancellor Seguier, Le 
 Brun's early patron, Girardon, had also enjoyed an 
 Italian training, but nearly all those whom he called 
 about him had been pupils or assistants of a sculptor 
 who had had for many years a preponderating influ- 
 ence in Paris. Jacques Sarrazin, the friend of Do- 
 menichino, had married, on settling in France, one of 
 Simon Vouet's nieces, and there had been no one to 
 dispute his authority, except, perhaps, the son of his 
 early master, Simon Guillain, whose name figures with 
 that of Sarrazin on the list of founders of the Academy. 
 Guillain, who died leaving a great fortune in 1656,1 had, 
 indeed, indignantly refused to work with Sarrazin in the 
 court of the old Louvre,^ for he also made a great figure 
 in those days. It was said of him, " Sa probite etoit 
 grande, ses sentiments honnetes, sa fierte noble et 
 civile, sa taille belle, et son coeur incapable de crainte." 
 His immense bodily strength, and skill in the use of the 
 " fleau,^^ which he always carried under his cloak, made 
 him a terror to street marauders, who fled from their 
 victims at his approach crying, "^ Voici notre fleau ; 
 passons vite notre chemin ! " In all things Guillain 
 belonged to the old school, was a favourite sculptor of 
 Anne of Austria, and maintained in his work (as if a 
 lineal descendant through Bartelemy Prieur) those tra- 
 ditions of the sixteenth century which were preserved 
 amongst painters by the pupils of Vouct and Sebastian 
 
 ' Nouv. Arch., 1S72, p. 28. 
 ' M. I., vol. i. p. 259.
 
 SARRAZIN, PUCET, AXD GJRARDON. 151 
 
 Bourdon. Sarrazin, who survived him only four years.i 
 was, on the other hand, an innovator, and his caryatides 
 on the front of the Louvre show the results of his 
 eighteen years' residence in Rome, and how certain it 
 was that Le Brun could be sure of finding amongst his 
 disciples and assistants just those who would most 
 readily take to his views and assimilate his style. 
 
 Thus, it is not surprising that nearly all the sculptors 
 whom Le Brun called to Versailles, and certainly all the 
 most noted, had been pupils or assistants of Sarrazin. 
 Legendre, Lehongre, Thibaut Poissant, Gaspard and 
 Balthazar Marsy, Lerambert, Legros, Gilles Guerin and 
 Philippe Buyster^ had all been his disciples, and of some 
 we are told, as of Legendre, that, although they were 
 most deeply devoted to their master, they found this 
 devotion no stumbling-block to the closest relations of 
 friendship with Le Brun.^ Buyster and Guerin, who 
 had been apprenticed to Le Brun's father, a master 
 sculptor, worked under Sarrazin for many years ; carry- 
 ing out (after Guillain's refusal) the famous caryatides 
 and other decorations of the Lemercier pavilion of the 
 Louvre.4 Sarrazin must indeed have thought very 
 highly of Guerin, for after employing him on various 
 works for private persons, he recalled him to the Louvre 
 and entrusted him (1652)^ with the sculpture of the 
 king's bed-chamber. There, Guerin had amongst his 
 assistants another of Sarrazin's pupils, Nicolas Legendre 
 (who brought with him Laurent Magnier),^ Thomas 
 Regnauldin, a young disciple of ]\Iichel Anguier, and 
 -Francois Girardon, who, like Regnauldin, was then but 
 
 ■ M. I., vol. i. p. 125. 
 
 ' Ibid. vol. i. pp. 125, 259, 281, 307, 319, 330, 363.4"- 
 
 3 IbiJ. vol. i. p. 411. *• ibid. p. 119. 
 
 s Ibid. p. 415. ° Ibid. p. 417.
 
 152 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 beginning to form himself in the exercise of his artJ 
 As a pupil and assistant of Guerin, who afterwards 
 employed him on the Hotel de Ville,^ Girardon, as well 
 as Regnauldin, may be considered to have been trained 
 in the school of Sarrazin, although he had previously 
 worked under Guillain's scholars the Anguier^^ and 
 the same may be said of another no less known artist, 
 Antoine Coysevox, who was trained by one of the 
 master's most loyal and devoted followers, the courtly 
 garde dcs antiques dit rot, Louis Lerambert^ — the friend 
 and fellow pupil of Le Brun and Le Notre, He is said, 
 however, to have owed his success with persons of " la 
 premiere qualite/' quite as much to his curly hair and 
 his graceful dancing as to his professional ability. 
 
 Even the Fleming, Van Opstal^ — who afterwards 
 brought in his compatriot Martin van der Bogaert, 
 commonly called Desjardins — worked under Sarrazin 
 on his first coming to Paris, and the Italian Tuby must 
 also have had personal relations with him, since we find 
 that he and Legros were the authors of the two 
 memorial notices of the master, which were presented to 
 the Academy after his death in 1660.6 Not alone by 
 his talent and the authority which he held at the Louvre 
 can the immense number of Sarrazin^s pupils be ex- 
 plained ; the attachment felt for him was due in great 
 measure to the beauty and nobility of his character. In 
 
 ' M. I., %-ol. i. p. 263. " //'/(/. p. 264. 3 Jhid.^. 296. 
 
 ''Ibid. vol. ii. p. 33, and Arch, de I'Art Fr\, 1855, p. 22S. See 
 Genevay, " Le Style Louis XIV.," p. 21S. 
 
 5 Le Van employed Van Opstal on his house in the He Notre Dame, 
 and he also worked on the Hotel Lambert. (M. I., vol. i, p. 17S.) See 
 "Sculptures de G. Van Opstal" (Louis Courajod). The bas-relief of 
 "The Flight into Egypt,'' inserted in the mantelpiece of the Diana room, 
 is attributed by M. Dussieux to Van Opstal. It is possibly one of the two 
 small marble reliefs by Van Opstal, taken to Versailles from the I Intel 
 de Gramont. M. I., vol. i. p. ib'2. ^ Ibid. p. 115.
 
 SARRAZIN, PUGET, AND CIRARDON. 
 
 !)J 
 
 a note, which is attributed to Legros, we arc told that 
 Sarrazin "all his life strove to serve the interests of 
 all who had understanding ; if such as these found 
 themselves in any difficulty, he would take up their 
 concerns, and" (as he did for Philippe Buyster) ^ 
 "carry them through with ministers; in the case of 
 others he would see that they received liberal payment, 
 so that it might be said that he did well by all men, but 
 chiefly by those who were men of capacity : thus, it was 
 plain that he loved all who were of high worth/' ~ On 
 this wise, it came to pass that all the abler men fell 
 under his influence, and that with the single exception of 
 Guillain's pupil, Michel Anguier,J all the sculptors of 
 Versailles may be referred to his school. 
 
 The struggle between Errard and Le Brun for 
 the conduct of the works of relief in the " Galerie 
 d'Apollon " was the first direct consequence of 
 Sarrazin's disappearance from the scene. Never before 
 had the direction of works of such a character been 
 placed in the hands of a painter. When Gilles Guerin 
 was carrying out the reliefs in the king's bed-chamber 
 at the Louvre, Thibaut Poissant and Michel Anguier 
 were engaged, in like manner, in the queen's apartments, 
 and in the hall opening into them. Sarrazin dead, the 
 attempt by Ratabon to push Errard, furnished Le Brun 
 with exactly the opportunity he desired for getting into 
 his hands that general control of all the artists working 
 for the Crown of which lie had long been ambitious. 
 
 Le Brun had paved the way for peaceable acceptance 
 of his authority by skilful use of the patronage which 
 first came into his hands through Fouquet ; he had 
 carried Anguier to St. Mandc in 1655, and transferred 
 
 ' M. I., vol. i. p. 2S3. - Ibid. p. 126. 
 
 ^ Ibid. pp. 192, 436, 452.
 
 154 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 him later on to Vaux le Vicomte,i where, in 1658, he 
 introduced Poissant and Legendre^ who had been 
 previously working at Meudon with Sarrazin. To Le- 
 eendre 2 he committed all the stucco ornaments of the 
 ceilings, which are still one of the glories of Fouquet's 
 noble chateau, whilst by his relations with Anne of 
 Austria, he again procured employment for Anguier at 
 Val de Grace. When fresh power came to him through 
 the defeat of Errard, Le Brun's use of it could not have 
 been more prudent in its calculations, for he called to 
 the Apollo Gallery, Francois Girardon, the brothers 
 Marsy, and Thomas Regnauldin, thus attaching to 
 himself four men of great ability, whose support against 
 the maitres was invaluable. 
 
 The result of this adroit management was seen when 
 that final break with the guild of masters took place 
 which preceded the reconstitution of the Royal 
 Academy. Then the leading sculptors amongst the 
 masters all came over to Le Brun. Michel Anguier, 
 who — under the influence of Mignard and Du Fresnoy 
 — had for a time been violent in opposition, forsook his 
 allegiance, declaring that he left the masters '' par 
 consideration pour M. Colbert," vv'ho had, indeed, at the 
 instigation of Le Brun, given him a commission in the 
 Church of St. Eustache ; but Anguier required fuller 
 wage than this, and accordingly obtained the hand of a 
 niece of Remy, the king^s broiderer, in marriage, being 
 at the same time commissioned to execute ''six Termes 
 en pierre de Vernon " for the avenue of the park at 
 Versailles. 3 Buyster,^ a thorough artisan, who began 
 his career at Paris, in the yard of a coach-builder, and 
 who had at one time outrivalled Anguier in violence, 
 
 ' M. I., vol. i. p. 440. - Ibid. p. 411. 
 
 3 Ibid. pp. 460-1. •» Ibid. p. 284.
 
 SARRAZIN, PUGET, AND GIRARDON. 155 
 
 was reached through his friend Thibaut Poissant, whilst 
 Legendre, taking as his second wife one of the 
 •Chancellor's connections, not only re - entered the 
 Academy himself, but brought with him Laurent 
 Magnier — a most important triumph, for IMagnier, inde- 
 pendently of his powers as a sculptor, was one of the 
 best heads amongst the masters, and about the only one 
 who would have been capable of governing that body 
 successfully. 
 
 Girardon now gave himself absolutely over to 
 Le Brun, and practically held under him, from this 
 ■date, that post of Chief Inspector of all works of 
 sculpture to which he was officially appointed in 1690, 
 after the death of his master. He appears to have been 
 a man whose cotip (Tceil and certainty of execution was 
 equalled only by his extraordinary sluggishness of 
 initiative. Whether this arose from mere laziness, from 
 that natural inability to compose and design which has 
 been acknowledged sometimes by artists such as Henner 
 — in other respects of no mean powers — or whether it 
 was the result of purely servile calculation, the fact is 
 that Girardon hardly ever did anything the pattern of 
 which was not furnished or suggested to him by Le Brun. 
 His principal achievement — the Tomb of Richelieu, now 
 in the Sorbonne — was not only carried out (as also that 
 of Colbert at a later date) from the designs of Le Brun.i 
 but shows in every touch of the chisel that Girardon 
 was so penetrated by his manner that it cost him no 
 effort to reproduce it in marble. 
 
 At Versailles, Girardon's work in the famous Grotte 
 
 de TJictisf' the construction of which had been begun 
 
 by Pierre de P^rancine, the engineer of all the playing 
 
 fountains of the palace, established his reputation. 
 
 ' See Florent le Comte. - M. I., vol. i. p. 477.
 
 156 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 Le Brun found himself thoroughly understood, and the 
 king was delighted. The execution of the side groups 
 by Guerin and the Marsy, and of that portion of the 
 central one which was the work of Regnauldin, showed, 
 by contrast, how superior was Girardon to his fellow- 
 workers ; for if he had, as Piganiol de la Force ^ puts it, 
 less fire than some of his rivals, he was free from that 
 academic stiffness which mars the productions both of 
 Regnauldin and of Guerin, whilst, in point of precision,, 
 the brothers Marsy could not match him, though they 
 might rival him in vigour. ^ 
 
 The remains of the Grotte de Thetis, now in the 
 Bosquet d'Apollon (having been transferred thither by 
 Mansard in 1684 to make room for the north wing), 
 would suffice, even if we had nothing else, to show how 
 invaluable Girardon's remarkable powers of calculating 
 effect at great distances,-^ must have been in the direction 
 of the vast works of exterior decoration at Versailles, 
 which filled the years between 1664 and 1671. There 
 is nothing more rare in modern art than to find a work 
 of sculpture, such as the group of Apollo and the 
 Nymphs, containing a large number of figures all in 
 true relations to each other. This is the particular 
 virtue which distinguishes most of the decorations of 
 Versailles, and which survives even now, although injury 
 and neglect have deprived them of the other claims 
 they may once have had to admiration, and this is the 
 virtue which they probably owe to Girardon's watchful 
 
 ^ Piganiol, vol. ii. p. 329. 
 
 ^ Amongst the chief works of Girardon at Versailles were four Tritons 
 at the Fountain of the Pyramid [ibid. p. 20) ; bas-relief on Charles Perrault's 
 design at the Baths of Diana (M. I., vol. i. p. 420 ; Piganiol, ihiii. p. 27) ; 
 a Proserpine — bronze {ibid. p. 166) ; " Winter " [ibid. p. 41) ; " Saturn," etc. 
 (ibid. p. 155) ; besides various restorations, as of the \'enus tl'Arlcs and 
 three vases. 
 
 ^ See Perrault, " Ordonnancc des Cinq Especes de Colonnes," p. 14.
 
 SARRAZTN, PUGET, AND GIRARDO.Y. ^ 57 
 
 eye. From this time forward we find him everywhere, 
 indoors and out, working at everything of importance 
 either singly or in company with Gaspard Marsy — on the 
 great groups of the entrance court, and on the figures 
 right and left of the centre pediment of the little chateau ; 
 with Desjardins and '' coJisors" on the statues in the 
 marble court ; with Tuby, Magnier and Legendre, at the 
 Pyramid ; on the Great Stairs with the full strength of 
 the staff; at the Fountains of Saturn with Regnauldin ; 
 at the Water garden with Lehongre and his assistants ; 
 with Espingola at the Fountains of Fame, In the 
 very thick of these labours, he found time to journey to 
 Rome, so as further to perfect himself for the king's 
 business, and to superintend divers works in the Louvre 
 and other royal palaces ; even the "belle chapelle'' of 
 Fontainebleau owed its decorations to his hand.' 
 
 When La Fontaine, who, like Boileau, was an intimate 
 friend of Girardon,- went over to visit Versailles in 
 1668,^ he found the Fountain of Latona just finished by 
 the Marsy, and most of the chief Avorks in the grounds 
 far advanced.4 It was a fatal year for those employed 
 there ; Buyster, who, in addition to his labours in the 
 court of the little chateau, ^ had just completed a 
 marble Faun near the Pyrajuidc d'Eaii,^ died in March ; 
 Van Opstal, whose bas-reliefs in the famous Grotte de 
 Thetis were destroyed by Mansard on its removal to its 
 present position, followed him in August,^ and in the 
 course of the next month Poissant, who had been busy 
 in the Horse Shoe enclosure, was also carried off^ In 
 
 ' See C. des B'=. for years 1664-80. Lives of Girardon and assistants 
 in M. I. ; and also Piganiol. - M. I., vol. i. p. 302. 3 //;/,/. p. g^. 
 
 ■• For the Statues of Ver?ailles see Thomassin (Simon), " Recucil dcs 
 Figures, Groupes, etc." Paris, 1694. = Piganiol, vol. i. p. 15. 
 
 * M. I., p. 289. Piganiol, vol. ii. p. 26. 
 
 ^ M. I., vol. i. p. 183. •'^ Ibid. p. 329.
 
 158 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 fact, when the great distribution of royal commissions 
 in 1671 took place, five leading sculptors were missing;, 
 the fertile Lerambert, who always produced at least two 
 important works a year, died in 1670,1 and Legendre, 
 who with Magnier had but just arrived from the Great 
 Gallery in the Louvre,^ early in 167 1. 
 
 At this critical date, the interior of the palace 
 absorbed all attention ; Legendre, Legrand, Besnard, 
 and Magnier, who executed all the carvings of the 
 Bath-room, 3 had been called from the gardens in the 
 previous year to work in the ground - floor rooms. 
 Nothing, indeed, is more remarkable than the readiness 
 vvith which Girardon and all the members of Le Brun's 
 staff handled the greatest diversity of materials ; plaster 
 or metal, stone or wood, modelling, carving, casting, 
 were as familiar to their fingers as every variety of size ; 
 to work on a miniature or on a gigantic scale was all 
 the same to them. The very men who worked on the 
 colossal statues and decorations outside the palace gave 
 a gem-like finish and elegance to the delicate mouldings 
 and reliefs of the interior. 
 
 Tuby, aided by Legros, Masson, Mazeline, and 
 Hutinot, designed all the stucco work of the queen's 
 apartments,^ and Hutinot was also employed in a like 
 manner with Regnauldin and Raon in the king's. 
 Lehongre, who, like Legendre, had a special gift of 
 excellence in delicate wood-carving, having decorated the 
 attic,5 descended to the ground-floor and took the Ionic, 
 afterwards called the Diana room,<J which gave access 
 to the Bath-room where Caffieri and Temporiti, \\\\o like 
 Tuby had long been attached to the Gobelins, were at 
 work aided by the Huguenot L'Espagnandell, Gaspard 
 
 ' M. I., vol. i. p. 333. Piganiol, vol. ii. p. 336. 
 
 = Ibid. p. 419. C. des B'\, 1670. 3 /^/,/. 4 c. des B'^, 1G71-2, 
 
 s M. I., vol. i, p. 375. 6 /^,^;/_ p_ .-(5_ c. des B*\, 1671.
 
 SARRAZIN, PUGET, AND GIRARDON. 159 
 
 Marsy, and Desjardins.^ In the Octagon Cabinet, for 
 Avhich Tuby executed statues, Lehongre, and afterwards 
 Legros, aided him by carving ornamentj^ but in the 
 Cabinet of Curiosities he not only carried out a large 
 proportion of the wood-carving and stucco reliefs, but 
 also the gilt bronzes which enriched the walls and the 
 furniture.-^ Ornament of a similar character, in the 
 vestibule, guard-room, bed and ante-chamber of the state 
 apartments, was entrusted to the two Marsy.4 These 
 rooms are, however, better known to us at present as the 
 Venus, Mars, Mercury, and Apollo rooms, for the Great 
 Stairs, from which the Venus room once gave access to 
 the state apartments, have disappeared. The guard- 
 room was even more speedily diverted from its original 
 use, being transformed into a ball-room and re-handled 
 by Magnier and Lehongre ;^ the Mercury room, on the 
 other hand, has always been known as the Chanibre dtt lit, 
 and was assigned as such by Louis XIV. to his grand- 
 child, Philip of Anjou, wdien King of Spain ; and in the 
 Apollo room the nails which fixed the dais still remain 
 to show its original use as a state ante-chamber, in which 
 the throne was placed when it pleased the king there to 
 give audience. 
 
 In delicate wood-carving and other ornamental 
 work Lehongre and his French brethren were rivalled, if 
 not surpassed, by the Genoese Cafifieri and by Temporiti 
 of Milan. Assisted by L'Espagnandell, Caffieri executed 
 all the doors and windows ; completing those of the 
 state apartments in 1672, then working in the queen's 
 oratory in 1673, and furnishing in the same year his 
 designs for the magnificent openwork bronze doors 
 which it was proposed to employ, but which were 
 
 ' M. I., vol. i. pp. 309, 395. C. des B*5., 1672. 
 
 - M. I., vol. i. p. 376. C. des B'^, 1 67 1-2, 1676. 3 //,;v^. p. 376. 
 
 ■* Ji'-d. p. 30S. C. des B'^, 1671. 5 Jlfid. pp. 37S, 419.
 
 i6o ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 replaced by doors of wood, so terrible were the draughts 
 which chilled the air in those vast and splendid rooms. 
 
 On the 1 2th December, 1673, Colbert writes from 
 Sceaux to King Louis : '' Les ouvrages de Versailles 
 s'avancent et j'espere que dans la fin de ce mois le 
 Labirinte, le Marais, les appartements de Votre Majeste 
 et de la Reyne seront entierement achevez ; " and the 
 king replies from Nancy four days later^ writings as was 
 his wont, on the margin of Colbert's letter: '^Je seray 
 bien aise en arrivant de trouver Versailles dans I'estat 
 que vous me mandez." i Every possible means was now 
 taken to press forward the completion of the palace, and 
 whilst these works were finished in the various private 
 and state apartments of the ground-floor and first storey, 
 the construction of the Gallery of Mirrors had been begun, 
 and the Degre des Ambassadeiu's was rapidly progressing. 
 From 1674 to 1679 almost every one of the leading 
 sculptors already mentioned was engaged on it, but 
 gradually the larger and more important parts of the 
 work fell to three men, Tuby, Coysevox,^ and Cafifieri. 
 These three, under Girardon, seem to have approved 
 themselves to Le Brun as best capable of carrying out his 
 schemes, for, immediately on the completion of the stair- 
 case, he placed the chief work in the Gallery of Mirrors 
 in their hands. At the same time, also, there took place 
 a general re-handling of all the royal apartments^ neces- 
 sary to bring them into harmony with the Gallery of 
 Mirrors on which Lc Brun reckoned as his master work. 
 
 ' Extract from MS. correspondence in the Archives of the Due de 
 Luynes at Dampierre. 
 
 ^ Coysevox was a protege of the Cardinal Furstemberg, Abbot of St. 
 Germain des Prcs. He employed him first at Saverne. Besides work men- 
 tioned in the text he executed many statues in the gardens of Versailles. 
 (See Piganiol.) He was lodged in tlie Gobelins in 1694(0.^ 10S3, " Arch. 
 Nat."), where he died in 1720. 3 See C. des B'^, 16S0.
 
 SARRAZL\, PUGET, AND GIRARDOX. i6i 
 
 For this gallery Le Brun picked his assistants with 
 extreme care : Tuby, Coysevox, Caffieri, L'Espagnandell 
 (who seems to have replaced Temporiti), and Legeret 
 were told off to work on the cornice of gilt stucco. To 
 Caffieri also fell the task of carrying out the gilt bronze 
 capitals of the marble columns against the walls^ accord- 
 ing to the details of Le Brun's ordre francais ; he de- 
 signed^ too, the noble doors giving access to the king's 
 apartments, nor did lie and L'Espagnandell disdain to 
 execute with their own hands such seemingly trivial 
 details as the '^ roses de metail " which fastened the 
 sections of the mirrors which fill the spaces between 
 the pillars. I The execution of the trophies of gilt 
 bronze^ which ]\I. Dussieux says were modelled by 
 Coysevox, seems to have been distributed amongst 
 various hands, for besides Caffieri, L'Espagnandell, and 
 Coysevox, six other sculptors received payment for them 
 in 1 68 1 — the year, too, in which Coisevaiix et Consors 
 completed the decoration of the Hall of War. The 
 "Consors '' were probably, in this instance, his nephews 
 and pupils, Guillaume and Nicolas Coustou,^ with whose 
 aid Coysevox began to carry out in marble the great 
 equestrian relief of the victorious king, the plaster 
 model of which, designed by Desjardins, is still in place 
 above the chimney-piece of the Hall, for the king died 
 whilst the work was in hand, and consequently the 
 marble was left unfinished.^ 
 
 With the purely decorative work of the Great Gallery 
 
 and its adjoining halls Girardon had very little, if any, 
 
 concern ; it was simply a frame to the immense canvases 
 
 » C. des B'^, i6So. 
 
 = Lodged in Louvre, 1703. O.' 1053, "Arch. Nat." 
 
 3 Piganiol, vol. i. p. 172. INI. L A fine bust of Louis XlV.by Coysevo.x, 
 
 from the collection of Sir Richard Wallace, was exhibi'.ed at the Quai 
 
 IMalaquais this summer. 
 
 M
 
 i62 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 of Le Brun, who naturally kept the general supervision 
 in his own hands. Girardon's co-operation was here 
 confined to the bringing in of a white marble Apollo,^ 
 and to the draping of the antique busts which were 
 placed in the Halls of Peace and War.^ After the 
 death of Le Brun, although Girardon had then had the 
 '^ conduitte des ouvriers ^' in his hands for many years,^ 
 Louvois and Mansard strove, by all means in their power, 
 to set aside one whom they looked on as a man of 
 "la vieille cour.'^ To some extent Girardon's own 
 habits put him at a disadvantage. He had never 
 attempted, like the other leading artists of his day, to 
 make a social figure, and was considered to be "un 
 peu menager." At the height of his fortune, he 
 contented himself with his modest lodgings in the 
 Louvre, w^here in 1679 he had succeeded Claude Ballin,'^ 
 whilst his fellows built magnificent hotels, and his wife 
 (the beautiful flower-painter, Catharine du Chemin) 
 found herself obliged to economically sacrifice her 
 "grands talents" to her household cares. ^ Girardon's 
 compatriot, Mignard, found it easy to patronise and dic- 
 tate to him, regarding him as little better than a stone- 
 cutter, and, when Colbert had passed away, Louvois and 
 Mansard held him at their mercy, employing him only, 
 when they could not do without him, on works which 
 no one else dared to undertake. 
 
 When he died in 171 5, Girardon had seen all his 
 fellow- workers fall beside him one by one ; one by one 
 all his powerful patrons had perished. Many, like the 
 great Conde, who used to visit him at his work, had 
 passed away whilst he was yet in the prime of man- 
 hood, but he also outlived all those with whom he had 
 
 ' C. dcsB*^., 1683. = Ilnd. 16S6. ■' //;/,/. 1687. 
 
 " O.' 1055, "Arch. Nat." s m. I., vol. i. p. 304.
 
 SARRAZIN, PUGET, AND GIRARDON. 163 
 
 chiefly laboured : — the two Marsy, Gilles Gucrin, 
 Buyster, Lehongre, Desjardins, Regnauldin ; he out- 
 lived his chosen friends La Fontaine, Santeuil, and 
 Boileau ; he outlived the unfriendly Louvois and the 
 equally unfriendly ]\Iansard, consoled during his last 
 years by his pleasant and faithful relations to his native 
 town of Troyes, and reminded by an occasional visit from 
 the Regent Orleans that he was a last representative of 
 the great days of the " Grand Siecle." i 
 
 Of his work — and the same may be said of that of all 
 the sculptors of Versailles — there is scarcely any satis- 
 factory evidence remaining except in such parts of the 
 interior as have escaped the chances of change. With 
 the exception of his arrangement of the busts which were 
 left to Louis XIV. by JMazarin, and which are still in the 
 Halls of Peace and War, Girardon's chief work lay out of 
 doors, where time and neglect, with all the vicissitudes 
 of icy frosts and burning suns, have wreaked their wall 
 unhindered amongst the marbles and bronzes which 
 decorated the exterior of the palace and peopled its 
 gardens. The ground-work, so to say, is intact in the 
 state-rooms, except where minor details (as in the 
 chimney-piece of the Salon de Merciire) have suffered 
 alteration. The Great Gallery, the Halls of Peace and 
 War, the Bed-chamber of Louis XIV., the ante-chamber 
 of his queen,- are good specimens of the original scheme 
 of decoration and evidence of the perfection of work- 
 manship generally attained. I\Iany portions of the 
 work in these rooms are still exquisitely fresh : after the 
 lapse of two hundred years the surface of the stucco 
 reliefs is as clean and sharp as that of the chiselled 
 bronzes gleaming on the walls as if they had been 
 fastened there but yesterday. The look of newness, in 
 
 ' M. I., vol. i. p. 302. 
 
 M 2
 
 1 64 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 - many details such as these, is startHng, especially when 
 contrasted with the signs of frequent repair and re- 
 novation shown by the paintings in their neighbourhood. 
 When we go into the gardens the case is very- 
 different. Apart from the filthy neglect which disgraces 
 them, the state of marbles such as the groups at the 
 Baths of Apollo, the group of Latona by the Marsy, the 
 Nymph of Coysevox, or Tuby's Chariot of the Sun, could 
 not be rendered satisfactory by any amount of care. 
 An arm}' of restorers incessantly on the Avatch for every 
 trace of injury, could not prevent the certain deteriora- 
 tion of the surface which leaves them but the idle ghosts 
 of what they may have been. The low reliefs of the vases 
 by Tuby and Coysevox, which stand on either hand as we 
 go down to the Water garden, are still beautiful in spite 
 of the carelessness which seems to accept wanton injury 
 as a matter of course. Here and there, too, metal 
 statues and groups such as Houzeau's spirited Blood- 
 hound and Stag, preserve some recognisable character- 
 istics. Worn, even into holes, as are the fine bronzes of 
 the Kellers, neglected, foul with dirt, corroded by con- 
 tact with the rubbish thrown on them, it is still possible 
 to distinguish the different styles of the men who 
 modelled the groups from which they were cast ; it is 
 still possible to note that Thomas Regnauldin was stiff 
 and academic ; that Lehongre, or L'Ongre, as he was 
 sometimes called, was bent on steering clear of all 
 violence and affectation, and that in his dignified manner 
 he must have been revolted by the weakness and man- 
 nerism of the hands and feet and waving sinewless lines 
 bestowed by Tuby on several neighbouring nymphs. 
 Nor can the ridiculously small heads set on the thick 
 necks of Raon's ladies have pleased the older master 
 much better than Tuby's empty modelling ; though, 
 perhaps, he might have joined us in pardoning Legros
 
 SARRAZh\\ PUGET, AND GIRARDOX. 165 
 
 the cramp which affects the extremities of all his sub- 
 jects for the sake of the graceful and animated move- 
 ment, the life and energy which make his groups, on 
 the whole, the best of those which surround the two 
 basins of the famous Water garden. 
 
 If the bronzes of the Kellers have suffered deplorably, 
 what shall be said of the groups and statues cast in 
 lead ? Already, in 1749, their condition w^as a matter 
 of remark. Speaking of Regnauldin's group of Ceres 
 and her children, the Comte de Caylus says : " It would 
 be WTong to estimate a man's worth by such a work. 
 Cast in lead and laid down, as are nearly all those of 
 Versailles, on a flat surface, it cannot be spirited. Be 
 sides which, if the softness of the lead at first renders all 
 the delicacy of the mould, it also lends itself the more 
 readily to effacement." When, however, M. de Caylus 
 turns from these works to those executed in stone, he 
 cites Regnauldin's figure of Peace in the marble court 
 and has no better report to make. " You know," he 
 cries, " the changes which mere exposure to w^eather 
 causes, yet the group is fine, and the execution appears 
 great and free, but in very truth what can one say of 
 a work of sculpture such as this, done at least sixty 
 years ago .'' " ' 
 
 Little enough could then be said ; but what can 
 be said now.'' In the deserted courts, along the garden 
 front, on the wings, the countless statues, worn down by 
 weather, have lost all form and shape. Girardon's 
 " Hercules Victorious " is in no better stead than 
 Regnauldin's '* Peace : " whilst the condition of those in 
 less protected situations — the nymphs, the fauns, the 
 satyrs and hamadryads of the gardens — justifies the 
 reproach of a recent writer : "The statues in the North 
 Garden and in the grove of the Baths of Apollo, look, 
 
 ' See M. I., vol. i. Life of Regnauldin.
 
 1 66 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 for all the worlds like scarecrows meant to frighten the 
 birds, if, indeed, they don't terrify any belated loiterer 
 at set of sun." ^ This is the more to be regretted 
 because, wherever the work has been under cover, we 
 find plain evidence of that style and character which 
 still make the French School of Sculpture the chief in 
 Europe. For awhile, the sculptors of France, under the 
 dominant rule of Le Brun, had to accept the post of 
 assistants in the common work of decoration — archi- 
 tecture herself had to be content with the mere makings 
 of the framework — but it cannot be denied that the 
 French sculptors did all they had to do with unrivalled 
 intelligence and skill. 
 
 Even in dealing with the pictorial motives which 
 Le Brun and the taste of his age had imposed, the 
 school continued to preserve its great traditions of 
 scholarly treatment, and the succeeding century saw the 
 perfection of Houdon's busts - — the Mercury and the 
 Diana of Pigalle — exquisite examples of the measure, 
 tact, and elegance which are proper to all French sculp- 
 ture. One influence, and one influence alone, had 
 seemed capable, during the " Grand Siecle," of adding 
 something to these qualities and of invigorating their 
 formality by that energy and vigour which can atone 
 even for faults of taste. That influence was carefully 
 kept at a distance. The virility and audacity of the great 
 Provencal master, Pierre Puget, could find no place in the 
 hierarchical organisation of the arts imposed by Colbert 
 and Le Brun ; yet, after his death, in more than one direc- 
 tion traces of his influence have been recognised in the 
 renewal of energy amongst the members of that Academy 
 which, during his life, he was not found worthy to enter. 
 
 ' Figaro, i8th Aug., iSS6. 
 
 ^ A scholar of Girardon's pupil, Sebastian Slodtz.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 ENGRAVING. 
 
 At first sight it would seem that when the guilds began 
 to giv^e way under the pressure of the new social order, 
 engravers were in much the same position as other 
 artists. They lived, it is true, under the heels of the 
 printers, and were tyrannised over by them just as 
 painters and sculptors were tyrannised over by the 
 guild of the peiiiti'es-ymagiers ; but, like them, they too 
 could obtain a certain amount of liberty by means of 
 the brevets du roi. Unfortunately, this brevet could not re- 
 move the social disabilities by which they were further 
 handicapped; they might run away from the printers, but 
 then the painters and sculptors declined to receive them, 
 and when the doors of the Academy were at last opened 
 to their knock, they found themselves put in the corner, 
 strictly forbidden to paint, and regarded generally as an 
 inferior class. " Excellens graveurs,^' says Art. 15 of 
 the statutes of 1664, " pourront estre resceus Academiste 
 sans neanmoins qu'il leur soit permis d'entreprendre 
 aucun ouvrage de peintres,"i but a strict censorship of 
 all engravings published by members was maintained 
 by their brother Academicians. 2 
 
 Throughout the great movement of the sixteenth cen- 
 ^ P. v., vol. i. p. 25S. = Ibid.
 
 1 68 ART IX THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 tury, engravincj had, indeed, played a very secondary part, 
 and although men such as Rabel and De Leu showed 
 ability in the reproduction of portraits, whilst Cousin, 
 Delaulne, and Duvet engraved important series of their 
 own designs, by far the larger number were engaged 
 in work which had not even the semblance of in- 
 dependence. In the seventeenth century a new era 
 began, and before its close two groups of engravers 
 were formed as distinct in the character of their work as 
 they were in the choice of tools. On the one hand 
 were the engravers proper_, who continued to devote 
 themselves to the old task of reproduction, whilst, on 
 the other, there arose the vast army of etchers, who 
 for the most part transcribed their own impressions, 
 and whose ranks were swelled by painters innumerable, 
 attracted, like Claude, by the adventurous charms of 
 the newer method. Of course lines of division such as 
 these must not be drawn absolutely, for occasionally 
 etchers used the burin, or placed their skill at the service 
 of others, whilst engravers, in their turn, handled the 
 needle, or, like Audran, that unrivalled master of 
 technique, mingled its varied lines with the more regular 
 curve of their orthodox tools. 
 
 In the first of these two groups, amongst the en- 
 gravers proper, Pierre Daret, Claude Mellan," and Michel 
 Lasne stood conspicuous : they were, during the first 
 half of the " Grand Siecle," no unworthy successors to the 
 men of the school of Fontainebleau, and although they 
 may be roughly classed with Jacques Perrier and other 
 engravers of the reign of Louis XIII. as satellites of 
 Simon Vouet, yet they were not wanting in individuality; 
 each had his own special method of work, his own 
 manner of seeing and feeling. Nothing, indeed, more 
 clearly distinguishes French engravers of this date from 
 
 ' Eom at Abbeville in 1598 ("Arch, de I'Art Fr\," 1S52, p. 262).
 
 ENGRAVING. 169 
 
 those of other nations than the intelh'gence and origi- 
 nahty which they displayed in the interpretation of 
 the masters whose works they reproduced. Even 
 if we group them, as, indeed, \l. Duplessis has done in 
 his " History of Engraving in France," under the names 
 of the masters whose designs they were chiefly engaged 
 in rendering; even if we class them as the engravers of 
 Vouet, of Poussin, of Mignard, or of Le Brun, we are 
 still forced to admit the personality of each one of those 
 who practised what it has pleased some foolish persons 
 to stigmatise as a purely mechanical art. It is, how- 
 ever, true that in no other fine art can so high a degree 
 of manual skill be attained without any corresponding 
 artistic insight or accomplishment ; so that men may be 
 cited, such as Masson or Claude Mellan, adroit even to 
 trickery, yet destitute to a great extent of all those quali- 
 ties which constitute artistic value. It is none the less 
 certain that the best engraver will be always he who 
 is the best draughtsman, and it was in virtue of their 
 eminence in this respect, even more than by the right of 
 their intelligent and skilful technique, that Pesne, and 
 Audran, and (to her honour be it remembered) Claudine 
 Stella, achieved their unsurpassed reputation, and con- 
 ferred an unrivalled lustre on the school to which they 
 belonged. 
 
 Whilst, however, Daret, and Mellan, and Lasne 
 handed on the torch of tradition to those in whose 
 hands it was destined to shine with undying brilliance, 
 it was reserved for Jacques Callot to give a new 
 development to his art. Although he made no scholars, 
 properly so called, his influence can be traced, telling 
 with extraordinary force on many of the most able 
 masters of later days ; and the wonderful impetus 
 which the use of the etching needle obtained, either 
 alone or in combination with the burin, was directly
 
 I70 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 due to Callot's initiative. Abraham Bosse, Nicolas 
 Cochin, and that whole school, in short, whose exquisite 
 skill has rendered for ever famous the illustration of 
 French books, must be reckoned as Callot's followers, 
 and so, too, should Etienne de la Belle, who had pro- 
 bably studied the master's work at Florence, and also 
 Sebastian Leclerc, who, born after Callot's death, had 
 never come within the sphere of his personal influence. 
 
 De la Belle had, indeed, studied Callot to such 
 purpose that, for delicacy of execution, he has been 
 held to have surpassed his model; it is, however, a mere 
 exaggeration to put him above Callot. If isolated 
 passages of his work may be compared with that of his 
 predecessor, yet even when he treads most closely on the 
 heels of the master, as, for example^ in his sketch of the 
 Pont Neufji should you examine in detail the groups by 
 which it is peopled, you will find the drawing less ex- 
 pressive — for example, less character of form in the 
 horses and the movement everywhere less forcibly alive. 
 Were he not, even in these points, superior to his follower, 
 Callot's grasp and width of interest would put him into 
 a far higher rank than any that could be assigned to 
 De la Belle. There is no phase of human life which he 
 has left untouched : the vices and sorrows of men, their 
 peaceful joys, their basest crimes, their most sacred 
 aspirations, their utmost stretch of cruelty and lust are 
 alike familiar to his eyes ; and it is on account of this 
 extraordinary range of thought and feeling that we 
 should put him in a different category from those by 
 whom in technical skill he may have been surpassed. 
 
 Take the " Fiera dell' Impruneta,"- one of the 
 masterpieces of Callot's needle, and quite as remark- 
 able for the delicacy and vivacity of the workmanship 
 
 ' Print Room, British Museum. ^ Meaumc, 624, etc.
 
 ENGRAVING. 171 
 
 as for the immense variety of tlie types rendered : 
 the terrible beggars who display their sores, the in- 
 evitable Turk gazing at the waterworks, the mounted 
 cavalier, the peasant woman who watches the horse- 
 race, perched between the panniers of her mule — all 
 ages, all conditions, all occupations, alert, bewildered, 
 amused or weary, idle dames or busy men, the rich and 
 his neighbour Lazarus ; all arc characterised by the 
 same feather-stroke of graceful wit and genius. Or, 
 take again the equally astonishing variety of incident 
 and t}'pe in '^ The Siege of Breda. ^^ ^ Look at the 
 outskirts of the camp, where the despairing and 
 maddened peasant sees his flocks driven off before 
 his e}'es ; his hopeless protest met b\- savage blows, 
 whilst his ears are filled with the prayers of his wife and 
 the shrieks of his children ; pass within the lines where 
 dogs devour the fallen horses, and carrion crows flit 
 round the deadly company of the gallows ; beyond are 
 the troops exercising, and besieging parties marching 
 past the walls of the beleaguered town, and everywhere 
 the beggar and the starving cur, now skulking b\' the 
 coach of Her Serene Highness Isabella, or flying from 
 the cottage whose walls reek with lust and blood. 
 Yet Callot, who reached a terrible intensity of ex- 
 pression in rendering such things, as for instance the 
 awful face of the monk preaching to the wretch about 
 to be hung in '' Miseres et Malheurs de la Guerre, "2 
 or in delineating the crowd of the Crucifixion, ^ so 
 that we even seem to hear the yell of the dissipated 
 youth rejoicing with the jeering mob, touches \\\\\\ 
 
 ' Meaume, 510. Tlic original ('rawing for the "Siege of Rochelle,'' 
 which recorded the position of Riclielieu between the king and his brother, 
 changed hands at the sale of Andre Charles Boulle's effects. See Mariette, 
 " Abecedario," vol. i. p. 2S3. 
 
 = Paris, 1633. 3 Meaume, 23.
 
 172 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 the tenderest affection commonplace episodes of peace- 
 ful domestic life. Two women spinning, with their 
 companion pussy lurking at their side,i are a sufficient 
 indication for Callot to call before us a vision lovely 
 with the joys of hearth and home, or, as in the "Vices, "2 
 he will show exquisite sense of decorative purpose, and 
 chisel every figure like a jewel till it gleams as if it 
 were some enamelled bit of goldsmith's work full of 
 colour and sharply cut ; or, again, the wand of his 
 "Caprice ^'3 creates for us an endless swarm of beings 
 full of dance and fun. 
 
 It was this broad sweep of Callot's mind, his origi- 
 nality, his virility and vitality, which lifted him out of the 
 ordinary category of engravers and gave the place 
 apart which it would be idle to justify on purely tech- 
 nical grounds, for whether he had used this tool or that, 
 whether he had or had not inaugurated that method the 
 invention of which Sandrarf liberally attributes to 
 Jacques Bellange, Callot would have been none the less 
 Callot, he would have been just as great. "When 
 young," says M. Duplessis, '^ Callot studied with zeal 
 and sought his path ; as he grew older he created for 
 himself his own manner and became a master."^ All his 
 life he was a student ; the leaves of his sketch-book in 
 the Albertina^ show how ardent an observer he was, not 
 only of nature, but of the different methods by which 
 masters of old had interpreted nature; no less than 
 eight pages are filled by studies from the Danse 
 Macabre, of which he seems at one time to have in- 
 tended to produce an independent version.^ But not 
 
 ^ Meaume, 671. = Ibid. 157-163. 3 Jbid. 76S-S67. 
 
 '' " Hist, de la Gravure," p. 174. 
 
 5 " Livre d'esquisses de Jacques Callot, public par ]\Icritz Thausing." 
 '' Sec Drawings in the Uffizi, published 1S75, by Pini.
 
 ENGRAVIXG. 173 
 
 alone Holbein ; Lucas van Leyde, Lionardo, and 
 Diirer, all in turn seem to have occupied Callot's mind. 
 
 Nor was Callot only a strong and independent 
 artist, he was a strong and independent man. His 
 early experiences in the household of the Grand Duke^ 
 of Tuscany had failed to make a courtier of him ; in 
 vain Louis XHI., after his triumphal entry into the 
 capital of Lorraine, invited him to depict the Siege of 
 Nanc}'. " Sire," he replied, " je suis Lorrain, et je crois ne 
 devoir rien faire contre I'honneur de mon prince et dc 
 mon pays."- Yet neither Callot's high character, nor 
 his honours, nor the immense celebrity which his art 
 attained, could affect the low esteem in which members 
 of the profession generally were held, although it is 
 possible that his distinction and success stimulated 
 their efforts to improve it. 
 
 One of his immediate followers was Abraham Bosse, 
 of Tours, a talented but mistaken engraver,^ who 
 deliberately made it a point of honour to use the 
 etching needle as if it were an engraver's burin. He 
 was proud and sensitive in character, and, knowing 
 himself to be a man of high accomplishment in man}- 
 ways, was little likely to brook any neglect or to put 
 up with slights, whether personal or professional. On 
 the foundation of the Royal Academy he instantl\- 
 seized the opportunity to put himself in connection with 
 the members, and dedicated to them his book, " Senti- 
 ments sur la Distinction," two copies of which he 
 presented to the library .4 The new society was not in 
 
 ' His name appears on list of Household in 1620. See documents 
 preserved in the Florence Archives and printed in Appendix IX. 
 
 = Felibien, cd. Mariette, vol. ii. p. 171. 
 
 3 SeeDuplessis, "Catalogue dero2uvredc Abraham Bossc." Paris, 1S59. 
 
 •• P. v., vol. i. p. 23. His " Traite dcs manieres de graver en taille- 
 douce " appeared in 1645.
 
 174 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 a situation to repudiate help, and they gladly accepted 
 his adhesion and availed themselves of his services as 
 a lecturer. For two long years Bosse steadily gave 
 two sets of lectures on perspective to the students 
 gratuitously, and at last, as a reward for his services, he 
 was grudgingly made an honorary Academician. Even 
 this scanty recognition of his zeal and labours was 
 rendered ineffectual, for he was assured that he must 
 not look on this honour as conferred upon him in his 
 capacity of engraver, " lest it should be regarded as a 
 precedent by others.^^ He v/as, moreover, desired to 
 note that even as he was not made chargeable for 
 expenses, so neither were any of the "^privileges'" of 
 the Academy communicated to him.' 
 
 Naturally Bosse felt aggrieved, but he smothered his 
 resentment and continued to devote much time to his 
 labour of love. In 1665, after seven years of weekly 
 teaching, he added a weekly lecture on geometry to his 
 course on perspective, and these lectures were so 
 successful, that in the pride of his heart Bosse prepared 
 them for publication and offered to bring them out, with 
 the sanction of the Academy, as the approved result of 
 their deliberations. At this point, however, difficulties 
 arose. 
 
 The Academicians seem to have been unwilling to 
 take any responsibility in connection with the publica- 
 tion, but, anxious not to lose his services as a lecturer, 
 they tried to soften their refusal by proposing to pro- 
 mote Bosse to the post of Councillor, an office which 
 would have admitted him to the privileges of the 
 thirty chief Academicians, and by offering to accept a 
 dedication.2 This, however, could not satisfy Bosse. 
 He felt that his position was ill-defined, and therefore 
 ' P. v., vol. i. p. 58. "- Ibid. p. 103.
 
 ENGRAVING. 175 
 
 challenged the terms of his letters of associatioiij de- 
 manding also a distinct understanding as to what 
 authority his book was to have. On this, it was decided^ 
 "apres divers reprises et deliberations," that he should 
 print in his own name, a decision which deeply wounded 
 his vanity. His irritation smouldered again until 
 one Le Bicheur, also an Academician, brought out a 
 treatise on perspective, by which Bosse conceived his 
 rights of authorship to have been seriously injured. ^ 
 
 Round this nucleus a disturbance gathered which 
 soon assumed vast proportions. The company were 
 slow to redress the grievances under which Bosse be- 
 lieved himself to suffer ; he became more and more 
 violent in complaint^ and retaliated by making use, in 
 a small essay on the proportions of the human figure, 
 of diagrams which Charles Errard claimed as his pro- 
 perty. 2 Parties were now formed, and the quarrel grew 
 to such a head that the Academy were forced to appeal 
 to their Director, seeing that '^a I'occasion dudit Sieur 
 Bosse, il est arive combustion entre plusieurs personne 
 dc la Compagnie,'' but the arrival of the Director made 
 things no better^ for at the first mention of the matter 
 Bosse burst out into a torrent of abuse, gave the lie to 
 his accusers, refused with scandalous oaths to give up 
 his original letters of association, and left the assembly 
 breathing fire and fury. Then came vain attempts to 
 heal the breach, but Bosse continued to send insulting 
 letters and to circulate a statement to which he obtained 
 many signatures ; finally, after a conflict in which heated 
 partisans actually came to blows, he brought about his 
 own ignominious expulsion, Alay, 1661, from the body 
 which he had served zealously for many years, and which 
 had at no time rewarded his services with generosity. 
 
 ' P. v., vol. i. p. 169. ^ Ibid. p. 171.
 
 176 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 The pages of the reports of these proceedings are 
 full of indications of the sort of be-littleing which drove 
 the irascible engraver wild. When the others had 
 nothing more unpleasant to say they always began to 
 impertinently question his " calite," ^ until he waxed hot 
 and left the sitting in bitterness : no wonder that when 
 at last they made up their minds to admit him amongst 
 the thirty, and at the same time required him to return 
 his old letters of association,^ he became suspicious and 
 refused to deliver them, doubtless believing in some 
 plot by which his position, instead of being bettered, 
 would be further cheapened. 
 
 Curiously enough, at the very moment when Bosse 
 forfeited his connection with the Academy, not only 
 was that body rapidly rising in importance, but the 
 profession to which he belonged had gained enormously 
 in public opinion through the edict in favour of engraving 
 obtained by Nanteuil from Louis XIV. at St. Jean de 
 Luz. Nanteuil, after various essays, had developed the 
 manner in which he executed the magnificent series of 
 life-size portraits which were his great title to favour -.^ 
 that of M. de Bellievre engraved after Le Brun (1657), 
 his engravings of his own portraits of the Bishop of 
 St. Brieuc, of Lotin de Charny, of Loret the gazetteer, 
 of Lomenie de Brienne, of the President de Maisons, 
 and many other celebrities, had brought him into close 
 relations with the Court ; and this near association with 
 all the most distinguished in the world of Paris 
 probably heightened the irritation which Nanteuil, in 
 common with the rest of his profession, felt at the 
 
 ' P. v., vol. i. p. 169. = Ibid. p. 172. 
 
 "■ Duplessis' "Hist, de la Gravure en France;" R. Dumesnil, " Le 
 
 reintre-Graveur Francais;" and De Laboide, " Le Palais Mazarin," 
 note 62.
 
 ENGRA VING. 177 
 
 annoyances to which they were subjected in other 
 directions.! Shortly after his arrival in Paris, he had 
 witnessed the difficulty experienced by the Academy in 
 protecting its members from the audacious attempt 
 made by Francois Mansard, the great architect, to 
 arrogate to himself, by royal privilege, the control and 
 censure of all the engravers of Paris, i In 1659, ^i^ 
 had obtained a royal pension, having been nominated 
 engraver in ordinarj^ to the Crown,^ and whilst Abraham 
 Bosse was unwisely fighting his battles with the Aca- 
 demy, Nanteuil skilfully used his opportunities of 
 approach to Colbert and the king, until in answer to 
 his solicitations the celebrated edict appeared which 
 affirmed the "excellence and advantages of the en- 
 graver's art, distinguished it from the mechanical arts, 
 and delivered it from the hindrances and restrictions 
 to which it had been subjected,^^ conferring on it in 
 official terms "that distinction and freedom due to all 
 the liberal arts.'^ 
 
 Shortly after this important step had been taken, 
 Fouquet, Colbert, and the king himself all gave sittings 
 to Nanteuil, and amongst his chief masterpieces, most of 
 which were, as Sandrart says, "effigies viventium mole 
 efformatae," must be reckoned repeated portraits of 
 Colbert and his master. Nanteuil, indeed, cared above all 
 things to have distinguished sitters, not necessarily men 
 of rank, but men who were either famous or deserved to 
 be so. After a time, when he had attained such a 
 height of fashion and favour that he was practically 
 able to choose his own sitters, Nanteuil did not hesitate 
 jcven to solicit the interference of the king in order to 
 gain his ends, if celebrities proved refractory. When 
 
 ' " Hist, de TAcad,," Montaiglon, vol. i. p. 81. 
 "- " Arch, de I'Art Fr^," 1855, p. 267. 
 
 N
 
 178 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 praises of the spirited defence of Maestricht by the 
 "brave de Calvo/' in 1676, were on every tongue, we 
 are not surprised to find Madame de Sevigne relating in 
 her letters that Nanteuil presented himself at the royal 
 dinner and requested the king to " order " M. de Calvo 
 to sit to him. The features of the eccentric daughter 
 of the great Gustavus — Oueen Christina of Sweden — 
 naturally aroused the interest which he evidently felt in 
 every kind of unusual character ; but, as a rule, women 
 rarely engaged his attention, though his heads of Anne 
 of Austria, of the Duchesse de Nemours, of the Queen 
 of Poland, and of Marie de Bragelonne show that this 
 was from no want of power on his part to render their 
 softer lines. Even as it stands, cut short in 1678 by his 
 early death, the work which Nanteuil completed — 
 aided, perhaps, by his skilful subordinates Pitau, 
 Regnesson, Simon, and Corneille Vermeulen^ — is a 
 magnificent record. Richelieu, Mazarin, De Retz ; the 
 Dukes de Beaufort, de Longueville, and de Bouillon ; 
 the great Conde, Turenne, Bossuet, Le Tellier, 
 Perefixe, Fouquet, and Colbert ; Loret, Menage, and 
 Voiture ; statesmen, soldiers, priests, men of letters, and 
 men of fashion ; to know them we have only to turn to- 
 that great gallery which, in the summer of his days, 
 " Nanteuil ad vivum faciebat.^^ 
 
 Nanteuil's action in obtaining the edict of St. Jean- 
 de Luz bore immediate fruit. The intemperate 
 Bosse had stormed and raged in vain, his scientific 
 acquirements and his very real claims to recognition 
 had been held of no account, but Nanteuil, " qui menait 
 la douce vie^' and loved life and letters better than 
 either geometry or perspective, had no sooner triumphed 
 at Court than the doors of the Academy were opened 
 
 ' R. Dumcsnil, " Le Peintre-Gravcur Francais," vol. iv. p. 39.
 
 ENGRA VING. 179 
 
 to his brothers. Hurct, Van Schuppen, Daret. and 
 Chateau, were received in 1663 ; Vallet and Picart 
 entered the following year ; next came the turn of 
 Herrard and Silvestre/ the latter of whom was a 
 protege of Le Brun ; Sebastian Leclerc^ was admitted 
 in 1672, and in 1674 came the great Gerard 
 Audran,3 together with Etienne Baudet of turbulent 
 memory.4 Lepautre was received in 1677,^ which year 
 saw also the tardy admission of Edelinck, Nanteuil's 
 nephew by marriage, who had arrived in Paris from 
 Flanders as early as 1666.6 
 
 At his coming Edelinck had applied for a place on 
 the list of those to be sent to the Academy of France at 
 Rome ; but Le Brun had warned the ever-watchful 
 Colbert how remarkable was the promise shown by the 
 lad as an engraver. He represented that if Edelinck 
 were sent to Rome — which was the centre of a vast 
 commerce in prints — he would certainly be kept there, 
 whereupon the boy's nomination was revoked ; he was 
 commissioned to engrave the Holy Family of Raphael, 
 and Colbert himself did not disdain to negotiate a 
 marriage for him with the daughter of Nicolas Regnesson, 
 the wealthy engraver, whose sister had married Nanteuil. 
 Edelinck found himself doubly happy in the connections 
 
 ' See "Recherches sur quelques artistes Lorrains," parM. E. Meaume; 
 also, *' Renseignements sur quelques Peintres et Graveurs du XVII. et 
 XVIII. Siecles." Paris, 1S69. 
 
 - See Sebastian Leclerc, Meaume, Paris, 1SS7. 
 
 ■* See for this family, " Les Audran, Peintres et Graveurs,"' Edmond 
 Michel. •* See chap. v. p. 114. 
 
 s A man of extraordinarily flexible genius, besides his innumerable de- 
 corative designs, "propria invcntione in folio ederet historias biblicas et 
 profanas alias quia et fabulosas exOvidio." — Sandrart. Secal^o Daplessis, 
 " Hist, de la Gravure en France," p. 279. 
 
 ^ See Mariette, " Abecedario," vol. ii. p. 217. Edelinck's porlrait of 
 Graef is dated 1666. 
 
 N 2
 
 i8o ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 which this marriage brought him ; he was as fond of 
 a pleasant hfe as Nanteuil himself, and became famous 
 for the magnificent way in which he received his friends 
 and men of mark in Paris ; but this magnificence, whilst 
 it no doubt contributed to modify the feeling generally 
 entertained as to the social inferiority of engravers, pre- 
 vented him from amassing that wealth which his high 
 prices, his prosperous business, and the fortune he 
 received with his wife, would have led us to expect, ^ for 
 his various sources of income did no more than cover 
 the expenses of his household. 
 
 All these great engravers seem to have been 
 curiously ostentatious, as if the novelty of their credit 
 and honours had been too much for their good sense, 
 Gerard Audran, indeed, who was a family connection of 
 Poussin's brother-in-law, Caspar Dughet, and who 
 married Mdlle. Lichery,^ seems to have lived, in spite of 
 his great situation, as simply as his brother Claude, con- 
 tented always with much the same sort of honourable 
 professional consideration. But of Michel Lasne 
 Marietta says "^qu'il aimait excessivement le plaisir ; " 
 to which Florent le Comte adds " il aimait la douce vie 
 et faisait son capital de la joie.''^ In fact, his capital was 
 so completely invested in this security that M. de 
 Montaiglon recently discovered that Lasne's death was 
 the signal for the descent of swarms of creditors on his 
 house in the galleries of the Louvre. ^ As for Nanteuil, 
 we know that he spent in pleasure the greater part of 
 the wealth which he so readily amassed ; the remainder 
 of his fortune went to Edelinck,^ whose lavish expendi- 
 ture was also to some extent justified by the rank of the 
 
 ' M. I., vol. ii. p. 56. ' M. I., vol. ii. pp. 12 and 64. 
 
 3 "Arch, de I'Art JV.," 1862, p. 219. 
 
 '» Mariette, " Abecedario," Nouv. Arch., 1S83, p. 26 ei seg.
 
 ENGRAVING. iSi 
 
 visitors whom his high character and the credit which 
 he enjoyed at Court attracted to him. Foreign am- 
 bassadors, and even princes of the blood, did not disdain 
 to seek him out in his lodgings at the Gobelins. There, 
 in 1699, he completed the plate from Philippe de 
 Champagne's " Moses/' which Nanteuil had left un- 
 finished at his death, twenty-one 3.'ears before; and 
 there Philippe d'Orleans, afterwards Regent, publicly 
 glorified him by declaring that, with his tools in his 
 hands, Edelinck Avas better worth seeing than all his 
 pictures and statues. ^ 
 
 The creation of the ^' Cabinet d'Estampes," - in 1670, 
 gave further importance to the profession. The edict 
 of St. Jean de Luz had broadly defined the legal position, 
 and the organisation of this collection, which became a 
 complement of the splendid series of works which 
 formed the " Cabinet du Roi," effected a corresponding 
 change in the professional situation. Le Brun had 
 naturally conceived a strong desire to see his compo- 
 sitions reproduced by skilled hands ; he had entrusted 
 his portraits to Nanteuil ; he had interfered to prevent 
 Edelinck from leaving Paris ; he had suggested his 
 employment, and that of his fellows, on the engraving 
 of pictures in the king's possession. The next step was 
 to secure the preservation of all plates executed at the 
 royal cost. J As far back as 1667 Colbert had secured 
 for the king the marvellous collections of the famous 
 Abbe Michel de Marollcs, in which he had brought 
 tocrether the works of no fewer than six thousand 
 masters ; and out of this purchase, which was at first 
 
 ' M. I., vol. ii. p. 55. 
 
 = Sec Duplessis, " Le Cabinet du Roi, Collection d'Estampes commandee 
 par Louis XIV. ;" also De Laborde, " Le Departement des Estampes." 
 
 •■' Duplessis, •' Ilist. de la Gvavure en France," p. 2S2. De Laborde, 
 ibid. p. 15.
 
 iS2 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 regarded only as an addition to the Royal Library,^ 
 grew that great department which has served as a 
 model to all other countries. It was easy for Le Brun 
 to induce Colbert to add to this vast gathering in of the 
 past by contemporary work, and in a few years the 
 original collection was increased by that series of over 
 a tho:;sand plates which, guarded in the Louvre at 
 La ChalcograpJiie, remains to all time one of the chief 
 records of" French art. 
 
 Each class is here represented — the men who worked 
 in little, the men who worked in big — the irascible 
 Abraham Bosse, in whose work we find our most 
 accurate source of information as to the manners and 
 customs of half the century ; Sebastian Leclerc, who 
 faithfully represented the traditions of Callot ; Israel 
 Silvestre, to whose picturesque needle we owe many 
 graceful records of the royal palaces and great houses 
 of France; then, in full contrast to the needle-point of 
 Jean Morin, come the life-size portraits of Nanteuil ; the 
 magnificent series in which Gerard Audran reproduced 
 the grandiose compositions of Le Brun ; Edelinck's 
 brilliant print of the famous Crucifix aiix A]iges ; and the 
 faithful translations from Poussin which have rendered 
 the names of those fine draughtsmen, Pesne and 
 Claudine Stella, ever memorable.^ 
 
 All this was carried out at the expense of the nation. 
 In one year alone (1671) no fewer than eight men of mark 
 were entered on the royal accounts as " graveurs de 
 planches.'^ Gerard Audran was reproducing Le Brun's 
 series of the Battles of Alexander, interchanging the 
 engraving burin and the etching needle, with a skill 
 
 ' Marolles was keeper. See C. des B'\, 166S-9. Dc Laborde lit sup., 
 p. 12. 
 
 ' C. des B^, 166S-69-71.
 
 ENGRAVING. 183 
 
 which perhaps has never been equalled ; Edelinckj also, 
 was employing his pure engraving method in the same 
 service ; Rousselet (whose art dated from the days of 
 Louis XI 1 1.), I Chateau, and Picart were busy with 
 paintings by Guido, Domenichino, and the Caracci ; 
 Claude Mellan, whose foolish pride it was to engrave 
 subjects of great size — like his famous head of Christ — 
 by a single line, had been told off to reproduce the 
 ancient sculptures at the Tuileries, a style of work with 
 which he was especially familiar, for Sandrart relates 
 how, during their years of study in Rome, ]\Iellan 
 engraved many classical statues " mea manu prius 
 delineatas." At the Tuileries, also, Israel Silvestre was 
 sketching the garden front ; many others, with Berain 
 at their head, were at work recording the ornamental 
 designs which formed a principal feature of the palace 
 decorations ; others, like Abraham Bosse, Patigny, 
 Tournier, and Vanderban, were preparing illustrations 
 for works which owed their publication to royal liberality, 
 such as Perrault's magnificent Vitruvius, the first edition 
 of which appeared in 167S.- 
 
 Many of these men received yearly salaries from the 
 Crown, and their names w^ere entered on the books of 
 the Royal Household. We know that Nanteuil had en- 
 joyed not only Court favour, but a Court pension as 
 graveur ordinaire dn roi as early as 1659.3 Claude 
 Mellan, who was lodged in the Louvre, and Soube}Tan 
 both held similar posts, in which they were succeeded 
 at their death by Sebastian Leclercand Etienne Baudet.^ 
 In 1667, Rousselet, Leclcrc, and Gerard Audran all had 
 
 ' There are many drawings by Rousselet in the Albertina of a purely 
 academical character. 
 
 "- C. des B'\, 166S-73. 3 Arch, de I'Art Fr-., 1S55, p. 267. 
 
 •» O.'* 1053, "Arch. Nat." O.' 10S3, ibid.
 
 1 84 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 apartments in the Gobelins/ where Leclerc married the 
 dyer Van Kerchove^s daughter,^ the year after his re- 
 ception at the Academy (1672). All three were in 
 receipt of pensions, and they had probably been lodged 
 there at a much earlier date, for we find their names on 
 the royal accounts, under the heading gjmveiirs de 
 planches, as far back as 1668-9, Edelinck, too, had 
 joined them there without doubt in 1672, when he 
 began to engrave the plates of the Histoire d' Alexandre 
 on which both he and Audran worked under the eye of 
 Le Brun, and Edelinck's credit as a draughtsman must 
 in popular estimation have rivalled that of Audran, who, 
 on the whole, is much the greater artist, for after the 
 retirement of Louis Lichery from the post, Edelinck was 
 appointed director and professor of the Academy school, 
 and received the full salary of fifty crowns from the king. 
 
 Yet although, from the moment that engraving 
 received full official recognition, the art steadily in- 
 creased in importance, and the position of engravers 
 themselves was improved, the highest offices in the 
 Academy were still denied to them. They were 
 admitted as Associates, but not even the extraordinary 
 enthusiasm excited by Gerard Audran's masterly inter- 
 pretation of Poussin's great composition " Tim.e and 
 Truth ^' — a work in which he showed himself as fine 
 a draughtsman as he was an engraver — could induce 
 the jealous Academicians to bestow on him any higher 
 rank than that of " conseiller," a distinction which they 
 had been quite willing to pay even to Abraham Bosse. 
 
 In spite of the immense popularity of their art, in 
 spite of the honours which the leading men enjoyed in 
 spite of intermarriages such as that of Gerard Audran 
 
 ' Marolles, " Livre des Peintres," p. 92. 
 - Ibid. p. 92. Nouv. Arch., 1S72, p. 31S.
 
 ENGRAVING. 185 
 
 with Louis Lichery's sister, engravers, curiously enough, 
 continued to be regarded by their brother artists as 
 constituting a lower grade and class apart. Disputes 
 within the walls of the Academy perpetually turned on 
 their assumed inferiority to painters or sculptors. Van 
 der IMeulen was a very unpopular man with his fellow 
 workers_, but he had no sooner to open his mouth 
 against engravers than he had all the world on his 
 side. In 1686, the whole assembly unanimously 
 acknowledged that he had grave cause of complaint, 
 seeing that, in the list of councillors, painters, sculptors, 
 and engravers were '^confusement mesles,'^ and satis- 
 faction on this head was at once given to him by a 
 resolution which enacted that for the future the names 
 of engravers should all be put together at the bottom.' 
 
 A slight such as this naturally encouraged the old 
 enemies of engravers, the printers, who every now and 
 again seized an opportunity for annoyance. They saw 
 in the bad dispositions of the Academy an encourage- 
 ment to persecution, and shortly became so daring that 
 Gerard Audran, at the climax of his honours, and in the 
 very year of his death, had to be protected, together with 
 Picart le Romain ~ and Giffart, against the interference 
 of the printers' community with the "ouvrages de leurs 
 mains." -^ Nor was this lesson sufficient ; they had come 
 so near success and had given so much trouble that a 
 few years later they made a dead set against what they 
 looked on as amateur competition. It was then the 
 turn of the painters and sculptors to defend themselves, 
 and another royal decree was registered by the Conseil 
 d'etat to enable all members of the Academy to engrave 
 and publish their own works.''- 
 
 ' P. v., vol. ii. p. 330. 
 
 - A Calvinist who hnd had to leave for Amsterdam. Piganiol, vol. ii. 
 p. 347. ^ O." 1056. ■* O." 1056.
 
 1 86 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 This, be it remembered, was an extension of the 
 liberty already secured to engravers by profession, so as 
 to include that great body oi peintres-graveitrs of which 
 ■Claude had been the most distinguished forerunner, 
 and which soon counted in its ranks almost the whole 
 profession. Vouet and Le Brun himself had not 
 disdained the needle ; and their example had been 
 followed by the whole Academy, and, in some instances, 
 notably by Francisque Millet, Jacques Rousseau, and 
 Claude Lefebvre, with a success so brilliant that, should 
 all their other work have perished, the plates which they 
 engraved would suffice to preserve their memory. 
 
 Yet, day by day, these men showed an invincible 
 contempt for the professors of the art they themselves 
 did not disdain to practise, and it is difficult to see 
 exactly what lay at the root of this persistent disregard 
 of a profession many members of which were held in 
 exceptional honour. One thing is certain, and that is 
 the extreme distaste for any approach to commercial 
 methods which prevailed in the Academy after its 
 members took to playing the part of courtiers and men 
 of the world, and it seems possible that the explanation 
 of some of their hostility to engravers lies in the 
 fact that long after painters had closed their shutters 
 and retired into the comparative seclusion of their 
 studios, engravers continued to keep shops. 
 
 Now, the feeling against keeping shops was very 
 strong amongst the members of the Academy ; so much 
 so that acts which we should now consider perfectly 
 justifiable, were viewed with extreme disfavour. On 
 one occasion the Academy even went so far as to 
 strike off the list of Academicians one of their number, 
 Michel Scrre, the painter of the king's galleys, ^ for the 
 
 ' "Arch, de I'Art Fr^," 1S52, pp. 333 and 376.
 
 ENGRAVING. 187 
 
 simple reason that he had permitted his picture of 
 the Plague at JMarseilles to be exhibited for money to 
 the public. Whilst this feeling was very strong in the 
 Academy, the engravers, on the other hand, were 
 naturall)- loth to forego the substantial advantages 
 which they derived from the direct sale of their works, 
 since they found in the combination of the trade of 
 print-selling with the art of engraving their most 
 lucrative source of income. At any rate, it was not 
 subject to the chances which often rendered work 
 executed by agreement an intolerable annoyance or 
 even a serious loss, as in the case of the ever unfortu- 
 nate Abraham Bosse, who was nearly ruined over the 
 plates which he engraved for Guy de la Brosse, the 
 founder of the Botanical Garden.' However anxious, 
 therefore, the engravers were to obtain that general 
 social consideration which as artists they felt to be 
 their due, they of course declined to relinquish the 
 substance for the shadow. 
 
 The situation changed very gradually, but changed 
 rather through the desire of painters to be associated in 
 the profits derived from the sale of plates which repro- 
 duced their most popular works, than from any alteration 
 on the side of the engravers ; and we learn from the 
 inimitable paper in which Greuze recorded with un- 
 paralleled unreserve his complaints against his wife, 
 how tempting must have been the revenue which the 
 commerce d'cstampes, skilfully conducted, could bring in. 
 If, however, the battle which had been so hardly fought 
 by Nanteuil and his colleagues was nearly won in France, 
 it was not so in other countries and notably in England, 
 where a very strong prejudice persistently attached to 
 the engraver's art, 
 
 ' " Aich. dc I'Art tV.," 1S52, p. 2S0.
 
 1 88 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 Early in the present century John Landseer, in his 
 discourses at the Royal Institution, renewed the strife, 
 placing engraving as of equal rank with either painting 
 or sculpture, and when the Academy (iSo5) offered him 
 the degree of Associate, his indignant protests, and the 
 passion w'ith which he demanded an equal place for 
 engravers in the constitution of the society, recall the 
 frantic struggles of the angry Abraham Bosse. In vain 
 he protested, in vain he appealed to the House of 
 Commons for the redress of his grievance. The House 
 of Commons was of one mind with the Academy, and 
 the strictest demarcation was maintained. Although in 
 Paris an engraver might be a member of the Institute, 
 in London up to 1876 he took a place apart, as Van 
 der Meulen would have rejoiced to see, on the bottom 
 line of every printed list.
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE GOBELINS — THE SAVONNERIE, 
 
 *' II n'est pas etonnant," says Voltaire, " que la peinture, 
 la sculpture, la poesie, I'eloquence, la philosophie fussent 
 presque inconnues a une nation qui, ayant des ports 
 sur I'ocean et la Mediterranee, n'avait pourtant point 
 de flotte, et qui, aimant le luxe a I'exces, avait a peine 
 quelques manufactures grossieres." Exaggerated as it 
 is in some respects, this picture of France in the early 
 days of Louis XIV. does not go far wrong in respect 
 of French industry. Most of the manufactures which 
 had been the pride of Henri IV. failed to survive their 
 creator. In i6iO the silk, the glass, the soap factories, 
 which he had established were closed ; the high-warp 
 looms of Laurent and Dubourg, which in 1603 he had 
 transferred to the Louvre from the Faubourg St. 
 Antoine, were as inactive as the carpet factory which, 
 under Pierre Dupont,i he had also installed there ; niany 
 workmen were dismissed, and even the Gobelins were 
 shut. Fifty years later Colbert re-inaugurated the 
 policy which had been cut short by the knife of Ravaillac, 
 and succeeded not only in completely reviving those 
 industries which Henri IV. had been unable to establish, 
 
 ' Author of " La Stromatourgie," reprinted by Darcel. Paris, 18S2.
 
 190 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 but also in setting up others which became rooted on 
 their new soil. 
 
 Gradually a new division, under the heading " Manu- 
 factures de France," occupies more and more space in the 
 royal accounts : the first separate division occurs in 1668,- 
 but for many years previous the entries respecting these 
 manufactures had been growing in importance and fre- 
 quency. Colbert, too, had been actively endeavouring 
 to foster by legislation the general development of 
 French industry. Whenever it was possible, he based 
 his action on the existing guilds,^ and wherever he found 
 a falling off in the excellence of any manufacture, he 
 instantly conferred on the corporation connected with 
 it tremendous powers of exacting fines and penalties 
 for the slightest deviation from a fixed standard of 
 perfection.- These enlarged powers were not, however^ 
 an unmixed benefit, and the governing bodies of the 
 guilds AA'ould often gladly have eluded a responsibility 
 as odious as it was weighty. Stringent and vexatious 
 as he was in his dealings with industries already estab- 
 lished, Colbert counted no privileges too great when 
 he had to reward those who seconded his efforts to im- 
 plant new ones. The accounts are full of rewards, in- 
 demnities, and subventions which all have the same end 
 in view. Just as the " Compagnie des Indes" received 
 bounties for taking French cattle rather than "boeufs 
 d'Irlande" in their bottoms to the "Isles francaises," 
 even so glass-workers from Venice were paid to establish 
 their factories at Paris, ^ and the tapestries of Beauvais ; ^ 
 
 ' I have explained in chap. iv. p. 87, why Colbert preferred the R. A. to 
 the existing guild. 
 
 -' See edict of 1666 respecting " Sarsche d'Aumale," also that of 1669. 
 The influence of that of 1673 cannot be exaggerated as regards French 
 industry. ^ O.' 1054, and C. des B'^, 1665. Edicts of 1683, 16SS, 1693. 
 
 •* The manufactory at Aubusson was a private enterprise. See " La 
 Tapisserie d'Aubusson," par Leopold Gravier, Paris, 1S86.
 
 THE GOBELINS— THE SAVONNERIE. 191 
 
 the point laces of Auxerrc and Rheiins, the EngHsh 
 serges of Troyes, and the fine cloths of Abbeville are 
 but a ^ew of the new industries started by Colbert at a 
 heavy cost to the yearly budget. 
 
 In vigorous pursuance of these schemes, the organi- 
 sation of the great establishment, called the " Manu- 
 factures des Meubles de la Couronnc/' was pushed 
 forward at the Gobelins, nor were the other centres 
 forgotten which had been dependent of old on the 
 administration. Amongst these, one of the most im- 
 portant was the royal carpet factory at the Savonnerie — 
 an offshoot, under Louis XIII., from the factory which 
 his father had established under Pierre Dupont in the 
 Louvre. The importation, in 1647, of two Florentines, 
 Pierre and Jean Lefevre, to assist in the direction of the 
 high-warp looms in the Louvre, and the establishment of 
 Dupont's pupil, Simon Lourdet, at the Savonnerie, stand 
 out, indeed, like isolated facts which bear witness to the 
 general neglect of industrial interests under the rule of 
 Louis XI 1 1. 1 The Savonnerie, where Simon Lourdet 
 was at work on the carpets {tapis sarrazinois) destined for 
 the Great Gallery of the Louvre,^ now became, like the 
 works at the Louvre itself, a dependence of the Gobelins, 
 and its buildings underwent thorough restoration. As 
 for the Gobelins, whose name now suggests only a 
 great manufactory of tapestries, it became, during this 
 most famous epoch of its existence, even busier in the 
 making of splendid services of plate, of costly inlaid 
 
 ' lytli April, 1627. Arret du Conseil d'Etat du roy portant I'etablisse- 
 ment et reglemens de la manufacture de la Savonnerie. " Arch. Nat.,"0.' 
 1054. See also " Arch, de I'Art Fr^," 1S52, p. 207. 
 
 - From 1665 to 1669 he receives payment on this account yearly, then 
 he was replace! by his son Philippe, who was succeeded in 1670 by his 
 wife Jeanne Ilaffray, to whom came in 1671 Louis Uupont, probably one 
 of the family in the Louvre. See C. des B'^, and Lacordaire, "Notice 
 Historique sur les Manufactures Imperiales de Tapisseries," ttc, 1SS5, 
 p. "Jl ct scq.
 
 192 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 cabinets, of carven frames and of gilded coaches^ than in 
 producing the storied hangings with which the name of 
 the old hotel is identified ; but the looms were never 
 more merrily active than when the sculptor's mallet and 
 the hammer of the smith were resounding under the 
 same roof; when the weaver wove his costly webs to the 
 tune of the lapidary's file, whilst the saw and chisel 
 made constant chorus in his ears. Yet fame persists in 
 declaring the glories of the Gobelin looms, and takes little 
 account of its special connection with all the other marvels 
 of a new luxury which represented " la magnificence 
 mesuree du gout nouveau, la profusion choisie de I'in- 
 dustrie nouvelle/' and which became, as M. Taine has 
 pointed out in his " Essai sur Flechier," a political engine 
 under Louis XIV.^ 
 
 The selection by Colbert of the Gobelins^ as the 
 nucleus round which all the other establishments for the 
 production of the ineubies de la Conronne should be 
 grouped, was, however, probably determined by the 
 reputation which the tapestries already enjoyed.- The 
 family from whom the old hotel took its name had been, 
 it is said, dyers from Reims, who, attracted by the purity 
 of its waters, placed their works on the banks of the 
 Bievre. To them came the Camaye (who were probably 
 workers in tapestry), and, at a later date, the looms of 
 the Comans, who, together with Francois de la Planche, 
 had been brought from Flanders by Henri IV., were 
 transferred from Les Tournelles to the Gobelins. 3 
 Patterns for working were habitually furnished by 
 some of the miost distinguished men in Paris. La Hire, 
 
 ' See " Inventaire general du Mobilier de la Couronne." Guiffrey, iS86. 
 
 - See letter of 1651 cited by 'SI. Guiffrey, " Nouv. Arch.," 1S80-1, 
 p. 142. 
 
 ' See Lacordaire, "Notice Historique sur les Manufactures Imperiales 
 de Tapisseries, " etc., 1853 and 1885.
 
 THE GOBELINS— THE SAVONNERIE. 193 
 
 for example, was the author of designs for a series 
 destined to be hung in St. Etienne du Mont. Tapestry, 
 therefore, from the first held its own at the Gobelins, and 
 continued to do so even after the building became one 
 vast workshop, where painters, sculptors, goldsmiths, 
 lapidaries, wood -carvers, cabinet- makers^ workers in 
 metal, and embroiderers in silk, formed that great 
 colony which had for its object not only the decoration 
 of Alarly and Versailles, but also the maintenance of 
 French taste at the highest possible level in all that 
 concerned industrial art. 
 
 This idea was a familiar one to Colbert ; in }-ears 
 past he had been accustomed to hear from his old 
 master Mazarin justifications of extravagant expenditure 
 on furniture and other masterpieces of Italian art, based 
 on the ground that they would serve as models for 
 French industry, and there is no more amusing feature 
 in Colbert's correspondence with the Cardinal than the 
 expressions which betray his uneasy amazement at the 
 sums given for objets d'art.^ It was a grief to him to 
 send such sums out of the country, and the attempt to 
 produce similar masterpieces on French soil was a 
 necessary corollary of his economical theories. For 
 the concentration of all his workers on one spot, he had 
 the example of Fouquet, who had brought together at 
 Maincy, not far from Vaux le Vicomte, all the artists 
 and artisans engaged in embellishing his marvellous 
 palace.2 Nor had Colbert anything better to do when 
 the fall of Fouquet left them unemployed (1662) than to 
 carry them to Bievrebache. 
 
 The Hotel had come into Colbert's hands as early 
 
 ' " Le Palais Mazarin," note 227, p. 262. 
 
 = "Arch. del'ArtFr^,"IS62,p. 15. Gcnevay, "Le Style Louis XIV.," 
 p. 42. 
 
 O
 
 194 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 as 1662,1 but over and above the most necessary repairs 
 very little was done there for some years.- In 1665, 
 alterations and improvements on a large scale were 
 commenced ; the meadows at the back were enclosed : 
 in place of the single carpenter who had hitherto slowly 
 mended looms and patched up falling rafters, an army 
 of plumbers, masons, glaziers, locksmiths, and their 
 men, figure in the accounts. Even the long-abandoned 
 brewery was put in order, and finally in 1667, a royal 
 decree gave to the establishment its settled organisation, 
 and a royal visit of encouragement and approbation 
 bore witness to the interest taken by Louis XIV. in his 
 " manufactures des meubles de la Couronne." 
 
 There is a painting by De Seve at Versailles, in 
 which this visit is commemorated ; we see at once the 
 immense extension which the works in the Faubourg 
 St. Marceau had already acquired. Enormous tubs of 
 silver and their stands are displayed ready to receive 
 the orange-trees of the Gallery of Mirrors, and the size 
 and quantity of goldsmiths' work alone, all of which had 
 been cast and chiselled on the spot, are sufficient to ex- 
 plain the expenses reported in the accounts as incurred 
 by Jans and Tuby in setting up and decorating the 
 buffet on which it was placed for the king's inspection. 
 
 The dateof this visit was in the history of the Gobelins, 
 as momentous as the date of 1664 in the history of 
 the Academy ; it marked an epoch of full development 
 in comparison with Vv'hich the previous period was one 
 
 ^ It was previously the property of the " Sieur Leleu, conseiller au 
 parlement." Lacordaire, " Notice Historique sur les Manufactures Im- 
 periales de Tapisseries," 1853, p. 57. 
 
 ^ C. des B'^ Accounts of Prou the joiner for 1662-3-4. Prou is 
 mentioned by the Al)be Marolles amongst " ceux qui font fleurir les beaux 
 arts dans I'hostel des manufactures royales aux Gobelins." Lacordaire, 
 " Notice Historique sur les Manufactures Imperiales de Tapisseries," 1853, 
 P- 75-
 
 THE GOBELINS— THE SAVONNERJE. 195 
 
 'of stunted ^rowth. The maGfnificent Le Brun himself 
 took up his lodgings in the building/ thus identifying 
 himself with the undertaking, and in time his connection 
 with the Gobelins was felt to add so much to his im- 
 portance, that one of the plans devised by his enemies in 
 1665 for diminishing his influence at Court, was the offer 
 of a post of honour in another parish, his acceptance of 
 which would have enabled them to say to the king that 
 Le Brun was absenting himself from Bievrebache.^ 
 
 After Le Brun, the Concierge Rochon seems to have 
 had a good deal of power ; he certainly was the pro- 
 prietor of part of the buildings, as in 1666 he received 
 payment for rent due to him for the "maison du 
 'Gobelins," ^ and in previous years, in addition to what 
 he receives on account of the " manufactures/' he is 
 paid for rooms occupied by the artisans employed in 
 the works. Five apprentices were boarded by him, and 
 he received a yearly salary, as did also Van Kerchove, 
 the Dutchman in charge of the dyeing-rooms .4 Baudren 
 Yvart, who, under Louis Blamard, had been the chief 
 designer for Fouquet's nineteen tapestry-workers at 
 Maincy,5 occupied an equally responsible position at 
 Bievrebache. He was made resident keeper, a post 
 in which he was afterwards succeeded by his son Joseph ; 
 •and, probably in order to give him official status, Le 
 Brun had early secured his reception by the Academy, 
 his diploma picture on "The Glories of Sculpture," 
 having been presented in 1663.6 
 
 ' M. I., vol. i. p. 23. - //;/,/. p. 58. 
 
 3 C. des B'^ Le Brun also had private property there which he sold 
 the king, in 1668, "pour I'accroissement des Gobelins." 
 
 •* C. des B'^ 1665. His daughter married Sebastian Lichery ; his son, 
 in 16S1, became a pupil of Lacroix. Nouv. Arch., 1872, pp. 2S0 nnd 318. 
 
 5 Bonaffc, " Le .Surintendant Fouquet," pp. 25, 46 et seq. Xouv. Arch. 
 ut supra. " M. L Vie de Prou, vol. ii. p. 31. 
 
 O 2
 
 196 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 Yvart, who was also employed on designs for the 
 Louvre^ factories, was specially engaged in the pro- 
 duction of large cartoons, and his name is remembered 
 in connection with those from which the History of 
 Constantine was worked, 2 with those for the borders of 
 the Meleager and Atalanta series, with the principal 
 figures in the set called the " Maisons Royales," and 
 with several of those in the series called "I'Histoire du 
 Roi." The figures in the "Baptism of the Dauphin" 
 were all from his hand, and, at the very day of his death, 
 he was busy on those for the Entry of the Queen at 
 Douai.3 Amongst the earliest workers, too, must be 
 remembered Anthony Mathew, "Antoine Mathieu," an 
 Englishman famous for his power as a portrait-painter, 
 who died, Florent le Comte tells us, in 1674, having "beau- 
 coup travaille aux Gobelins pour les ouvrages du Roy/^4 
 
 In addition to Yvart, four salaried designers, each 
 with his specialty, were attached to the works : Baptiste 
 Monnoyer, the flower-painter ; Besnard, who had a won- 
 derful gift for animals ; Francart, the ornamental designer ; 
 and Abraham Genoels, who devoted himself to landscape. 
 The conditions, too, of payment by the piece, on which 
 system Colbert had at first elected to proceed, were later 
 somewhat modified by his decision to assign salaries also 
 to the tapestry contractors ; those who were responsible 
 for the high-warp looms receiving a third more than 
 those engaged on the looms for the less costly sort.5 
 
 These contractors actually discharged the functions 
 of middlemen, and not the least curious of the regu- 
 lations under which the establishment was worked are 
 
 ' Miintz, " La Tapisserie," p. 2S2. 
 
 - Begun on Le Brun's designs for Fouquet. See Bonaffc, " Le Sur- 
 intendant Fouquet," and M. I., vol. i. p. 20. 
 
 3 "Deux Pcintres Boulonnais," Vaillant, 1884. 
 
 '■ Florent le Comte, vol. iii. p. 130. Received into R. A. in October, l66lv 
 r. v., vol. i, p. 187. s c. desB'^
 
 THE GOBELINS— THE SAVONXERIE. 197 
 
 those which determine their relations to their fellow- 
 workmen on the one hand, and their obligations to the 
 Crown on the other. The Crown furnished them with 
 the cartoons to be worked/ and sold them the raw 
 materials ; the contractor on his side undertook to 
 deliver a certain amount of tapestry every year at a fixed 
 tariff. Haiite-lisse, or high-warp tapestry, cost about 
 eighty pounds the square metre, but low warp [basse-ljsse) 
 •could be produced at half this rate, and when we find 
 that between 1663 and 1690, the Gobelins turned out 
 nineteen sets of the more costly description, in addition 
 to thirty-four of the cheaper sort, we realise the great 
 importance of this particular industry.- Only one 
 Frenchman, Henry Laurent, figures amongst the con- 
 tractors in high warp. Jans, whose son appears on the 
 books in 1695,-^ was a Fleming, who came to Paris from 
 Oudenarde in 1650,'* whilst Jean Lefebvre, who had been 
 transferred from the Louvre^ to the Gobelins, was a 
 Florentine. As for the less important low-warp looms, 
 they remained under the sole direction of Jean la Croix, 
 until one named Mosin was called in as fine-drawer and 
 assistant in 1670.^ 
 
 From the other workmen should be specially singled 
 out, as one of the earliest comers, Domenico Cucci, joiner 
 and carver, a wonderful worker in ebony, and strangely 
 skilful in the use of bright jewelled incrustations, who 
 had been at work ever since 16647 on the two vast 
 •cabinets. Temples of Fame and Virtue, which were 
 intended to form the principal ornaments of the Galerie 
 
 ' See later, p. 203. ' Miintz, " La Tapisseric," p. 291. 
 
 3 O.' 1083, "Arch. Nat." 
 
 * His letlres de provision, date 1654. O.' 1053, " Arch. Xat." 
 
 s Lodged in Louvre, and allowed to have a shop in Tuileries Gardens 
 in 1655. O.' 1057, "Arch. Nat." 
 
 ^ C. des B'^, and Lacordaire, " Notice Historique sur les .Manufactures 
 Imperiales de Tapisserie," 1855, p. 59. 
 
 7 See Lettre de naiiiralisaiion, "Arch, de I'Art Fr\," 1873, p, 243.
 
 198 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 d'ApoUon. At the same date, too, Gucci's compatriots,. 
 Tuby and Temporiti, were probably taken on the staff, 
 for although Temporiti's name first appears in the 
 royal accounts for 1667, his act of naturalisation 
 (granted in 1671) sets forth that for many years past 
 he has been working at the Gobelins/ and the same 
 phrase is also employed in the letters accorded to Tuby^ 
 in 1672. 
 
 The immediate control of men of this class could 
 not of course be left to the Goncierge Rochon^ and 
 before long we find a body of inspectors created,, 
 who lodged in a separate Hotel where they received 
 several of the younger painters,^ but in addition to 
 these and the great body of workers, they had the 
 care of no fewer than sixty children. These childrea 
 were distributed as apprentices in the different work- 
 shops, and also had to be housed and taught and fed. 
 At first Le Brun does not seem to have contemplated 
 the giving to them any other than a purely professional 
 training. Experience, however, seems to have con- 
 vinced him that, as Descartes had first suggested, it was 
 necessary to supplement the teaching of the workshop. 
 by the training of the school ; and in this connection it 
 is extremely interesting to find that in 1667, when the 
 state formally recognised ^ the settled order which had 
 been slowly worked out at the Gobelins, some of the 
 most carefully considered provisions in the Edict are 
 those devoted to the children. A quite new departure 
 is made in the seventh clause, which directs that the 
 children, on their entrance into the establishment^ 
 should be immediately placed in the Scminairc dii 
 directeitr, who was to appoint as his assistant a master 
 
 ' Kouv. Arch., 1873, p. 248. =" O.' 10S3, "Arch. Nat." 
 
 3 See Appendix X.
 
 THE GOBELINS— THE SAVONNERIE. 199 
 
 painter having for his special duty their instruction and 
 education. This appointment, which afterwards fell to 
 the great engraver Edelinck, was first held by one 
 of Le Bran's own pupils, Louis Lichery,^ and it is 
 noteworthy that this class, intended solely for the 
 instruction of the little apprentices, was academical. 
 The teacher's work was daily to pose the model, correct 
 the drawings, and discharge, in a word, all the functions 
 of the Academy professor, and for the performance of 
 these duties he received a salary equal to that assigned 
 to the other painters attached in different capacities to 
 the Gobelins.2 
 
 Further teaching of a non-professional kind was also 
 given regularly to the children by the priest who, 
 besides celebrating mass for the whole body of workers 
 in accordance with regulations which were also in force 
 at the Savonnerie, was bound to give certain instruction 
 to the apprentices.^ By-and-by, as time went on, and 
 the numbers of the tapestry-workers, chiefly Flemings, 
 had increased to two hundred and fifty, a second 
 priest, one of the " religieux flamans de Piquepuce," was 
 also attached to the establishment, and a surgeon, M. 
 de la Chambre, was included amongst the officials in 
 1669. He and his successor, Clement, are regularl}' 
 borne on the books down to 1698, when Lemargue, 
 chinirgieii, receives a certificate in a similar capacity.''- 
 
 The year after the great settlement of 1667 pre- 
 parations were made to receive three Florentine lapi- 
 daries, Mcgliorini, Branchi, and Gachetti, all of whom 
 were occupied in preparing the stones used by Cucci 
 and his fellows for their inlaid cabinets and other 
 
 ' See M. I. Vie dc Louis Lichery, and " Recherches sur Louis Licherie, 
 membre de I'ancienne Academic Royale, etc." Caen, i860. Bellier de la 
 Chavignerie. " M, L, vol. ii. p. 62. 
 
 3 C. des B'-., 1670. •» O.' 1083, " Arch. Nat."
 
 200 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 articles of costly furniture. These three were after- 
 wards joined by three French gem-cutters, Jean and 
 Andre Dubois and Francois Chef-de-ville.i The looms 
 at the same time were in full activity ; Jans had in 
 hand sets of the Seasons, the Elements, the Acts of 
 the Apostles, the History of Alexander, the story of 
 Meleager,2 and the Life of the King, which Fouquet's 
 workers at Maincy had begun to execute from Le Brun's 
 designs. The magnificent series of the Life of the King 
 is no doubt that in which, as M. Miintz has remarked, 
 the talent of Le Brun is seen to the best advantage, and 
 the liberal reward which Jans received on New Year's 
 Eve, proved the measure of the royal satisfaction. Two 
 embroiderers, Philibert Balland and Simon Fayette, 
 were added to the staff in 1670, and to them were 
 entrusted the working of the wide borders used to frame 
 the hangings for doors and windows, and of the raised 
 work on silk brocade, such as the king's famous 
 "brodeur," Remy, Michel Anguier^s father-in-law, was 
 used to produce either for state dress or furniture; but of 
 the fragile result of their labours the only trace remains 
 in the royal account books. Bailly, too, whose specialty 
 was " tapisserie de peinture en teinture sur tissu de soie,"^ 
 was shortly after this date attached to the Gobelins. 
 
 The numbers of new arrivals continued to increase 
 at such a rapid rate, that it became necessary to make 
 a complete revision of the brevets of the lodgings which 
 had been accorded by the Crown.4 Great confusion 
 prevailed, owing to the fact that, whereas many workers, 
 like Jean Lefebvre, had been transferred from the 
 Louvre to the Gobelins, the privileges granted to the 
 workers there in 1608 by Henri IV. were still in force. 
 
 ' C. des Bt=., 1669, 1670. 
 
 = /hilt 166S. See Le Brun,C., " Tapisseries du Roi," etc. Paris, 1760. 
 
 ' Jbid. 1674. 
 
 ■> O.' 10S4, ''Arch. Xat." See also " Nouv. Arch.," JS73, ji. 40
 
 THE GOBELINS— THE SAVONNERIE. 201 
 
 The Gobelins had, indeed, always occupied many more 
 designers than could be housed on the spot. Van der 
 Meulen had been requisitioned as early as i666\ 
 Caffieri^ was also, like his compatriots, Tuby, Cucci, and 
 Temporiti, to be found quite as often at Bievrebache as 
 at Versailles. Caffieri had as versatile a talent as Le 
 Brun himself; he would go from making bronze and gilt 
 trophies or chiselling the doors of state apartments to 
 the decoration of men-of-war at Le Havre^^ and his 
 brother Italians shared his extraordinary facility. It is 
 not, therefore, surprising to find their names connected 
 with all that concerned the costliest forms of carved and 
 decorated furniture, and the making, as Guillet de St. 
 Georges says, of " tout ce qui fait aujourd'hui la magni- 
 ficence des maisons royales et tout ce qui a servi a regalcr 
 non-seulement les ambassadeurs des potentats del'Europe 
 mais ceux des climats les plus eloignes." ^ As he wrote 
 this Le Brun's biographer was doubtless thinking of that 
 coach for the Great Mogul which, in accordance with 
 Colbert's orders, had been made at the Gobelins, on 
 Le Brun's designs, in the early days of 1665, and which 
 probably owed its wealth of sculpture and of goldsmiths' 
 work to the skilful fingers of the master's Italian /r^- 
 icgcs, who found their only formidable rival in the 
 Spaniard, Antoine Coysevox, then also lodging in the 
 Gobelins."^ 
 
 Towards 1675, a fresh influx of artists took place, 
 when on the list of salaried painters, instead of the 
 names of Besnard, Genocils, and Francart, we find those 
 ■of De Seve, Houasse, and Guillaume Anguier ^ in 
 
 ' See Guiffrey, "Les Caffieri." Paris, 1877. Nouv. Arch., 1876, 
 pp. 54, 55, etc. C. des B'"^., 1679. 
 
 - C. des B'^, 1673. See also Genevay, " Le Style Louis XIV.," p. 2c8. 
 
 3 M. L, vol. i. p. 24. See also Inventaire de Menningue cited 
 Lacordaire. -t O.' 10S3, "Arch. Nat." 
 
 5 Brother of Michel, and skilful architectural designer. M. I., vol. i. 
 p. 445. C. des B'^., 1674, and O.' 10S3, "Arch. Nat."
 
 202 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 addition to Cussac and Le Brun's two pupils, Verdier ^ 
 and Bonnemer. In the same year, too, the engravers^ 
 Rousselet and Gerard Audran, were added to the 
 permanent staff, Lepautre and Berain, who had received 
 the appointment of " dessinateur de la chambre," - being 
 constantly called in as ornamental designers. Berain's 
 post, which obliged him to direct the mise-en-sccnc of all 
 Court ceremonies, can have been no sinecure, but his 
 fertility of invention enabled him to incessantly produce 
 designs for every sort of decorative work, carved, painted, 
 or woven ; and the French grace and lightness with 
 which he adapted arabesque, intermingled with figure 
 and animal subjects, to the heavy forms in vogue 
 under Louis XIV., have earned for him well-deserved 
 renown. 3 
 
 Sometimes if any special work were taken in hand, 
 half the strength of the Academy would be called in, and 
 a curious account of the way in which this was done 
 when it was proposed to execute a new set of hangings^ 
 is given by Le Brun's biographer, in relating some of 
 the intrigues to which he was exposed after the death of 
 Colbert. His enemies were first successful in stopping 
 the completion of a set of the celebrated series called 
 "^I'Histoire du Roi," and next they induced Louvois to 
 approve, on La Chapelle's suggestion, two series of 
 drawings — the one set attributed to Raffaelle, the other 
 composed of drawings by Giulio Romano — all of which 
 were in the royal collections. Coloured sketches were 
 prepared from these, and distributed to fourteen 
 Academicians — one man, one drawing — and on the list 
 of names we find those of Boulogne the elder, Coypel, 
 
 ' See Quittances duregne de Louis XIV., "Nouv. Arch.," 1S76, p. 60. 
 '-' O.* 1053, " Arch. Nat." See " CEuvre de Jean Berain, dessinateur 
 du Cab. du Kui Louis XIV.," Paris, 1659. 
 
 3 Mariette, ".\becedario," alsoGencvay, " Le Style Louis XIV., "p. 221,
 
 7 HE GOBELINS— THE SAVONNERIE. 203 
 
 Corncille^ Verdier, Houasse, and the younger De Seve, 
 who were amongst the ablest and most conspicuous 
 members of the society.' Le Brun, who was present 
 when the coloured sketches were distributed, took 
 occasion to criticise the indecent license taken in the 
 treatment of some of the subjects — a license to which 
 Giulio Romano, as in the decorations of the Palazzo del 
 Te, is frequently inclined — but he only drew on himself 
 a snub from La Chapelle ; the paintings were at once 
 put in hand, exhibited, on completion, in the chapel of 
 the Tuileries, and then, with Louvois' sanction, des- 
 patched to the Gobelins, about two years having been 
 occupied in their preparation. 
 
 For this system, which gradually led to a mistaken 
 rivalr)' with the brush on the part of the loom, Le Brun 
 himself is said to have been responsible ; with him 
 began the practice of giving to the tapestry-worker a 
 painted study, instead of a cartoon washed with colour, 
 which was but a summary of that which the painted study 
 inevitably represented with more or less realism. The 
 drawings by La Hire, from which the "MM. Gobelin " 
 worked the hangings for St. Etienne du Mont, appear to 
 have been carried out, at any rate in the first instance, 
 onl}- in black and white — siir papier blanc a la picrrc 
 noire'^ — completed probably by some general scheme of 
 colouration. Le Brun went to the opposite extreme, 
 and did so, according to M. Miintz, with the deliberate 
 intention of " diminishing the interval " separating 
 tapestry from painting, and thus inaugurated the 
 tendency which has recently culminated in the ill-advised 
 attempt to triumph over the material limitations of this 
 manufacture, by the production of works of an imitative 
 rather than a decorative character. Le Brun himself 
 could not carr}' the change very far, for he was whole- 
 
 ' M. I., vol. i. pp. 56-7. - Ibid. vol. i. note, p. 112.
 
 204 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 somely restrained by tlie traditions in which those who 
 had to weave from his designs had been bred, and he was 
 forced, whether he would or no, to work under certain 
 restrictions. 
 
 It was owing to these restrictions that Le Brun, as 
 M. Denuelle has noticed,^ never made use of more than 
 three planes, getting his perspective by the scale of his 
 details ; but his desire for a full scheme of colour is 
 betrayed in the foregrounds of all the pieces worked 
 after his compositions, and he went as far in this direc- 
 tion as the six shades of colour, which his dyers allowed 
 him, would permit. The result obtained was indescrib- 
 ably magnificent. " Ouand ces tentures eblouissantes 
 s'agitent, on eprouve," says M. Miintz, " comme un 
 fremissement religieux, on croit voir Alexandre le roi 
 dieu, et Louis XIV., le roi soleil, descendre de leur char 
 triomphal ou des marches de trone pour se meler a 
 nous ! ^' Especially justified is this enthusiasm by those 
 tapestries in which " le roi soleil " figures, for Le Brun, 
 always mannered when v/orking on classical subjects, 
 distinguished himself in giving historical style to the 
 events of his own day; his power in portraiture, coupled 
 with this peculiar excellence and consummate knowledge 
 of the art of decoration, enabled him to produce effects 
 unrivalled in magnificence even by the famous hangings 
 of Mortlake, for which Vandyke drew the borders to 
 Raffaelle's cartoons. 
 
 Although the looms of the Gobelins eclipsed all 
 the rest, those of the Savonnerie were constantly 
 active, and rich stuffs of gold and silver continued also 
 to be produced in the Louvre, where Louis Dupont 
 wove his tapis de Perse, or made brocades on golden 
 
 ' Rapport de la Commission de la manufacture des Gobelins, p. 27. 
 Miintz, " La Tapisserie," p. 278, See also Lacordaire, " Notice Historique 
 sur les Manufactures Imperiales de Tapisseries, etc.," 1S53, p. So.
 
 THE GOBELINS— THE SAVON.YERIE. 205 
 
 grounds ; ^ there, too, a Jarge proportion of furniture 
 was produced. One named Golle was busy on costly 
 cabinets, marquetry floors were turned out from the 
 workshops of Jacques Somer,^ near to whom worked 
 the Guelder Jean Oppenord, whose costly parquet of 
 coloured woods was destroyed with the little gallery 
 at Versailles.^ In the Louvre, too, was established 
 Jean Masse,4 but he was replaced in 1672 by the 
 celebrated Andre Charles Boulle (in England often 
 called Buhl), who gave a new impulse and a new 
 direction to the making of costly furniture, and whose 
 credit grew with such rapidity, that within seven 
 years a second lodging had to be granted to him 5 so 
 that he might house the vast manufactory for all sorts of 
 furniture in bronze and wood, which employed no fewer 
 than eighteen sets of cabinet-makers, besides joiners, 
 and subsidiary groups of filers, mounters, polishers, 
 workers in bronze and gilt, over whom his sons and 
 himself exercised a ceaseless supervision. The works of 
 Boulle were the rage of Paris — clock-cases, tables, 
 bureaux, marquetry of every description from simple 
 joiners' work, such as the cs trade de bois de rapport made 
 for the queen's bed-chamber,^ down to the most costly 
 incrustations of copper gilt and tortoise-shell, the value 
 of which was so great that when his workshops were 
 destroyed by fire in 1720, the loss on the furniture being 
 made to order was enormous. 7 In spite of his immense 
 
 ' C. des B'=., 1666 et seq. - Ibid. 1668, succeeded by his widow. 
 
 3 See " CEuvres de Gille Marie Oppenord, etc., mis au jour . . . par 
 Gabriel Huquier." See C. des B'\ , 16S5. He was naturalised in 1679. 
 Nouv. Arch., 1873, p. 258. 
 
 4 See brevet, Arch. I. 222, cited in Nouv. Arch., 1873, p. 74, and O'.* 
 1053, *' Arch. Nat." See quatrain of Marolles, " Livres des Peintres- 
 Graveurs," ed. 1S55, p. 88. s Q'.* 1053, "Arch. Nat." 
 
 * C. des B'5., 1674. Nouv. Arch., 1876, p. 53. 
 
 7 80,000 It. [livres tournois). Arch, de I'Art Fr»., 1856, note, p. 334. 
 Asselineau,
 
 2o6 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 vogue, nothing went well with Boulle ; he quarrelled 
 with his workmen and got the worst of it,i and his 
 affairs, owing partly to his mania for collecting, which 
 constantly brought him to the verge of bankruptcy, were 
 so involved that more than once the Crown had to inter- 
 pose between him and his creditors, lest their just claims 
 should prevent the fulfilment of royal commissions.- 
 
 The forges of the Louvre soon became as active as its 
 factories and workshops^ although Guillaume Dupre had 
 his foundry in the Louvre as early as 1603.3 At first, the 
 smiths seem to have been busiest at Bievrebache, for 
 the wonderful silver which figures in De Seve's picture 
 of the visit of Louis XIV. to the Gobelins in 1667^ was 
 in all probability the work of Jacques Dutel and his 
 comrades Viaucourt, Cousinet, Merlin, and Alexis Loir 4 
 (brother of the painter), who were all established on the 
 spot. At that date Claude De Villers, the great English 
 smith, who had arrived from London in 1665 with all his 
 family, had only produced a couple of silver bowls ; it 
 was not long, however, before the sums paid to him for 
 grands ouvrages d' argenterie were almost as considerable 
 as those which went to his French rival Claude Ballin, 
 who in that same critical year 1667, was constructing 
 his forges near the Great Gallery of the Louvre. 
 
 Thenceforth Ballin stood chief amongst his fellows, 
 chiselling seats and stands and standards for the Gallery 
 of Mirrors, on the candelabra for which he had at his 
 arrival been instantly employed. Like De Villers, Ballin 
 turned with equal readiness to work of the most 
 
 ' Nouv. Arch., 1880, p. 316 ; 1SS2, p. 106 ; and Arch, de I'Art Fr\, 
 1S56, p. 321. 
 
 - O.' 1054, "Arch. Nat." 21 Juin, 1701, see order staying execution 
 for three months repeated in October with extension to six. 
 
 3 Nouv. Arch., 1872, p. 178. 
 
 ■* Conseiller of R. A. received 1678. M. I., vol. i. pp. 15, 29, 49, 70. 
 See " Nouveaux dessins de gueridons, etc. Gravez par A. Loire. A Paris 
 chez N. Langlois."
 
 THE GOBELINS— THE SAVONNERIE. 207 
 
 enormous size, or to such trifles as an inkstand or 
 a pounce-box. 1 Many voices celebrate his praises, and 
 Mariette, a century later, described with enthusiasm the 
 beauty of certain delicate mountings in silver gilt which 
 Ballin had executed for a volume in which Le Sueur's 
 friend Anne de Chambre had collected the compositions 
 of Denis Gaultier, binding them in costly green shagreen, 
 and illustrating them by drawings from the hands of 
 Nanteuil and Abraham Bosse.^ This volume, like the 
 toilet toys chiselled by De Villers, or the golden ship ^ 
 — nef d'or — of Jean Gravet, or the silver mirrors of 
 Debonnaire,4 has long since disappeared, and of all the 
 glories which figure in De Seve's picture none remain : 
 silver seats and silver candelabra, golden mirrors and 
 caskets, were all swept into the melting-pot in 16S9, 
 and then the sacrifice of these priceless works of art, 
 on which sums unknown had been expended, realised 
 but a trifle. "The king said to-night" (l2th Dec. 1689), 
 writes Dangeau, '' that he had thought to get more than 
 six millions out of the silver which he had sent to the 
 Mint, but that he would scarcely get as much as three ! " 
 Claude Ballin was saved by death from the mortifica- 
 tion of seeing his life's work perish before his eyes,^ for 
 the destruction was wholesale, and it is almost impossible 
 to identify the work of any one of these famous smiths : 
 the few objects which escaped, either on account of their 
 unimportance or because they were in private hands, 
 like the silver "flambeaux" in the collection of M. Spit- 
 zer, are rarely or never signed. The works of Warin,^ 
 
 ' C. des B^, 16S5. - j\r. I., vol. i. p. 171. 
 
 ^ The ship or nef \\z.s, says Little, a "petite machine en forme de 
 navire ou I'on enfermait le convert du roi et qui se servait sur im bout de la 
 table." ■• See C. des B'\ and I. G. 
 
 5 Succeeded in 1679 by GirarJon ia his lodgings in the Louvre. 
 Noviv. Arch., 1S73, p. 75. 
 
 •^ Naturalised in 1626. Nouv. Arch., 1S73, p, 236.
 
 2o8 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 the famous medallist and master of the Mint, who like 
 most medallists had the habit of thus marking his work, 
 form, therefore, an exception all the more valuable. 
 
 " Nous avons," says Voltaire, "egale les anciens dans 
 les medailles. Varin fut le premier qui tira cet art de la 
 mediocrite." And though this sweeping statement is a 
 little unfair to Guillaume Dupre, the able medallist of 
 Henri IV., whose work generally shows Italian influence,^ 
 there is no doubt that his fame has been eclipsed by 
 Warin's greater importance and astonishing success. 
 
 Warin, who in 1628 had been forced to fly the country 
 to save his neck from the halter which he had deserved 
 as a coiner, managed matters so cleverly that in 1663 we 
 find him " Conseiller du Roy en ses Conseils, Intendant 
 de ses bastiments et Conducteur general du moulin de la 
 Monnoye." 2 He owed something probably to family 
 connection, for although born at Liege, and receiving 
 letters of naturalisation only in 1650, his son asserts that 
 the " charge de garde des machines du Louvre" had been 
 in his family for two hundred years. 3 As early as 1661, 
 his crimes had been condoned by the Academy, who 
 showed their opinion of his talent by sending for him to 
 execute the seal of the company, and four years later they 
 elected him a member of their body.4 It was the year of 
 Bernini's visit to Paris, and it is probable that Warin 
 owed this accession of honour to the satisfaction felt at 
 his execution of the gold medals which he had modelled 
 for the foundations of the Louvre. 5 He had had the fore- 
 
 ' See Catalogue du Louvre. His Marie de Mcdicis is well known ; one 
 of his best is that of Jacques Boisseau. For further details see Nouv. Arch. , 
 1S72, p. 178 ; ibid. 1876, p. 172; and ibid. iSSo, p. 1S2. 
 
 - See Fetis, "Les Artistes beiges a I'etranger," and Nouv. Arch., 
 1876, pp. 35-6 ; ibid. 1872, p. 50. 
 
 3 Ibid. 1876, p. 235. •» P. v., vol. i. pp. 1S6, 291. 
 
 s In 166S Warin was paid for other medals, probably those for the 
 foundations of the Observatoirc and for Versailles. C. des B'^, 1668.
 
 THE GOBELINS— THE SAVONNERIE. 209 
 
 sight to acquire property on the very spot required for 
 the completion of the new plans, and consequently was 
 bought out, much to his advantage, so that the royal 
 accounts alternately record the payments made on this 
 head and those for medals and busts of the king. ^ 
 The last payment is on account of a series of medals of 
 " riiistoire du Roy," on which he was engaged during 
 his latter years, and for which, in 1677, long after his 
 death, his heirs received a sum in "parfait payement ; " 
 but, nevertheless, the total due was not cleared off in 
 i693> when Francois Warin appealed for justice in the 
 name of his father's services and his own misery.^ 
 
 Warin, who seems to have been a detestable charac- 
 ter, regardless where money was concerned of his own 
 honour or the happiness of others, did not neglect to 
 secure his professional reputation. In most instances 
 he carefully signed his work, so that we know a great deal 
 more about it than we do about that of any other of the 
 minor artists of his day. x'\s one would expect, some of 
 his earlierworks,3 executed apparently under the influence 
 of Guillaume Dupre, are amongst the best. His medal 
 of Richelieu (1631) is good, and that of Anne of Austria — 
 a magnificent medal executed in the very year of her 
 widowhood — shows Warin's full strength of hand and 
 power of delicate finish. 
 
 The most distinguishing feature of Warin's art is, 
 however, one which is equally typical of that of his 
 fellows. At the exhibition on the Ouai ]\Ialaquais, 
 during the present summer, all the world has admired 
 the two "Commodes" made by Boulle for the bcd- 
 
 ' C. desB'^, 1667. He executed two busts, one in bronze and one in 
 marble. The statue of Louis XIV., a heavy, poor work, now on the 
 Escalier des Princes at Versailles, was left by him to the king. .Vrch. de 
 I'Art Fr\, 1S52, p. 293. 
 
 - Nouv. Arch., 18S0, p. 30. 
 
 3 Sec his bust of Richelieu in the Bibliotheque Nationale.
 
 2IO ' ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 chamber of Louis XIV. at Versailles^ and which have 
 been preserved since the Revolution in the Mazarin 
 Library. The noble arabesques which unfold them- 
 selves on the inlay of dark shell, the graceful curves and 
 volutes of the feet, the severe and splendid character of 
 the winged figures at the sides, combine to make these 
 perhaps the finest models extant of the art of Boulle 
 under the influence of Le Brun. The celebrated' 
 '' bureau de Colbert," lent by the Ministry of Marine, 
 the bureau en contre pai'tie — inlaid with shell on a ground 
 of copper — had suffered much from unskilful restoration ; 
 yet in it also, as in the innumerable other works of the 
 school which figured at this remarkable exhibition, the 
 same indelible marks of a great style were to be recog- 
 nised — dignity, and noble symmetr}^, and a fine taste. 
 Perfect power, too, of fusing decorative and pic- 
 torial detail — power which is just as noticeable in the 
 treatment of a medal as in the design of tapestries for the 
 Gobelins or of sculptures for Versailles — was also a lead- 
 ing feature of all the art which bears the name of Louis 
 XIV. When we come to the purely decorative details, 
 to the trophies of Coysevox, Tuby, and '•' consors;" to 
 the rosettes and bands still retaining the glass panels of 
 the Gallery of Mirrors ; to the bronze and gilt orna- 
 ments of the Venus and Diana rooms, or the locks and 
 bolts chiselled by Domenico Cucci in the Hall of Apollo,, 
 which, like the draperies cast by Pierre le Nerve for the 
 busts in the Cabinet de Mcdaillcs, have happily escaped 
 the general destruction, we fin.d a predominant aptness 
 of judgment, a tact and skill, especially manifest in the 
 calculated introduction of relief into the flat. By this 
 extreme skilfulness in gradation of planes even violence 
 is prevented from becoming vulgar, and it is 110 less 
 striking than that union of great boldness of general 
 outline with the utmost delicacy of chiselling, which
 
 THE GOBELINS— THE SAVOXXERIE. 211 
 
 distinguishes alike the smallest and largest objects, the 
 J7ilt button of a shutter, or ironwork on a scale as 
 imposing as the balconies of the Cour de Marbrc.^ 
 
 The same admirable treatment of relief, masterly, 
 strong, and firm, is shown in the smallest bits of stucco 
 modelling, in the carving of the frames of the two 
 tables — one in the GEil-de-Boeuf with a granite top, and 
 one with a mosaic top in the Diana room — which are 
 almost the sole relics of furniture made at the Gobelins 
 now at Versailles. The same beautiful quality marks 
 the sculptured surface of the w^ooden doors, the remains 
 of which, at the entrance to the rooms of Venus and 
 Diana, arc now the only record of the pristine glories of 
 the Ambassadors' Stairs. These doors, carved by 
 Caffieri in 1678,2 or the even finer pair in the Hall 
 of Plenty, are of the very best time of Louis XIV., and 
 even if we take work produced thirty years later — work 
 done, not by the men whom Le Brun with rare judgment 
 selected as his assistants, but by those w^iom they 
 trained — we find that it retains the character, the dis- 
 tinction, the excellence of execution which were proper 
 to the work of their masters. The beautiful golden 
 frieze of children playing with birds and beasts which 
 runs round the Q^il-de-Boeuf,-^ the wood-carvings of the 
 same chamber,^ the cornice of the bedroom,^ and the 
 metal work of both these apartments, (^ were all executed 
 
 ' Carried out by Delobel (C. des B'^.), 1684. 
 
 = C. des JB'^ See also Genevay,"Le Style Louis XIV.," for doors of the 
 Salon at Marly, p. ilS. 
 
 "i Flanien, Van Clivc, Ilurtrclle, Poultier, Poirier-IIarsly. C. des E'*., 
 1701-2. 
 
 * By Taupin, Dugoulon, Lc Goupii, and Billan. C. des E'^, 1701-2. 
 See also Piganiol, vol. i. p. 259. 
 
 5 Lespingola, who also executed cornices of the Oilil-de-Bceuf. C. des 
 B*^, 1 701-2. 
 
 ''Jules Lochon. C. des B'\, 1702. See also Dussieux, "Chateau 
 de Versailles." 
 
 P 2
 
 212 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 in the earliest years of the eighteenth century by a 
 generation to wliom Le Brun was ahnost unknown. 
 
 That the work of these younger men should have 
 been what it was is in itself a testimony to the sound- 
 ness of the system under w^hich they had been trained. 
 Colbert and Le Brun had directed their most strenuous 
 efforts to the miaintenance of the highest possible 
 standard of excellence in workmanship, and the result 
 was that, even after direct pressure was removed, 
 tradition compelled respect, and the very button of a 
 window-catch was expected to show the same kind of 
 merit as the costliest products of an artist's skill. 
 
 Even in his own day the influence which Colbert's 
 stringent system had had on excellence of production 
 was fully recognised, and we find from inventories of 
 royal furniture ^ that the note ''^etoffe faite du temps de 
 Colbert," was held to be a certificate of value. Regu- 
 lations such as those of his Edict on Commerce, 1673, 
 or of that famous decree bearing date 1667, in which he 
 so curiously mapped out the whole internal order of 
 French industry, had direct results other than those 
 of a vexatious character. The mere fact, too, of the 
 enormous attention paid to industrial and commercial 
 interests by Louis XIV.'s great Minister raised the 
 status of labour, and brought about a certain respect 
 for "business" in quarters to which it was unfamiliar, 
 and this respect had a close connection with the success 
 of Colbert's educational work. 
 
 Le Brun, in his own field, was a no less exacting 
 taskmaster ; everything that was produced under his 
 rule bears witness to the perfection of finish which he 
 demanded, and to the admirable manner in which he 
 was seconded by those about him. If we examine, for 
 example, the mosaic marble panelling which lines the 
 
 ' Cited by Dussieux, "Chateau dc Versailles," vol. i. pp. 441-2.
 
 THE GOBELINS— THE SAVONNERIE. 213 
 
 rooms of Venus and Diana, we shall find that the work- 
 manship of the jointings is as exquisite as in the best 
 Italian work, so that in all these years not one has 
 stirred. If we look at the rosettes and bands which 
 fasten the bevelled mirrors to the walls of the Great 
 Gallery we find ac^ain the same justness of fitting and 
 finish, and it is difficult to persuade ourselves that the 
 gilded trophies and ornaments, wherever they remain, 
 are not things of yesterday, so fresh are they, so sharp 
 in line, so keen, so fine of edge. 
 
 One thing is certain : if this excellence of per- 
 formance was in large measure due to the practical 
 training obtained in the workshops and workrooms 
 of the Gobelins, the influence of the academical school 
 and of the lessons there given was equally powerful 
 in raising and invigorating the tastes of the ornamental 
 designers bred within the Gobelin walls. For Le Brun, 
 to Avhose initiative the foundation of this academical 
 school in the centre of an establishment devoted wholly 
 to the production of works of decoration was due, had 
 recognised the fact that the highest and widest possible 
 artistic training is none too good for your art-workman, 
 and that you will defeat )'our own ends if you limit his 
 attention to those forms which may happen to be con- 
 sidered as the special province of industrial art. It 
 is said, in Paris of to-day, that the only school which 
 furnishes no new blood to the ranks of that great army 
 of ornamental designers who give the law to Europe, is 
 that school in which ornamental design is expressly 
 taught — the school in which work the students of archi- 
 tecture. " Quel plus mauvaisservice,'' says M. Ravaisson.i 
 "serait-il done possible de rendre au plus grand nombre en 
 tout pays et dans le notre surtout, que de faire partout pre- 
 valoir des methodes d'enscignement propres a borner a la 
 ' " L'Enseignement du Dessin," pp. 39-40.
 
 214 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 mesurc de la mcdiocritc le developpement des talents ?" 
 and in still plainer language he adds, ''Pour I'industrie 
 frangaise en particulier, si elle est a tant de titres au 
 premier rang parmi les industries europeennes, a quoi en 
 est-elleredevable sinonaceque le premier rang appartient 
 depuis longtemps dejaa nos peintres et anos statuaires?" 
 
 It was the close connection of the greatest painters 
 and statuaries of the day with the schools that gave the 
 Gobelins their brief splendour in the reign of Louis XIV., 
 and the practical utility of the Academy Avas felt to be 
 so great that it was carried on long after the death of 
 its founder. Although in 1694 the w^orkshops were 
 closed and many workmen forced to join the army/ 
 four years later Germain Brice says: "There is 
 still a sort of Academy at the Gobelins where young 
 men can study from the model daily posed for them, 
 but,'"^ he adds, " in spite of all that, things have greatly 
 changed there, as they say, these last few years."- As 
 long as it lasted the school was not only powerful for 
 discipline, but continued to be the connecting link by 
 which the decorative arts at their very centre were 
 attached to the great staff of painters and sculptors 
 who were themselves centralised in the Academv ; it 
 effected the solidarity of all the arts, and justified the 
 policy Avhich had led Colbert to injure and cramp the 
 authority of the guilds. 
 
 Under the rule of Mignard,3 wlien Le Brun had 
 passed away, the Gobelins, as Germain Brice says, were 
 greatly changed, and when, on the death of Mignard, 
 the direction of Colbert's great creation passed into the 
 hands of the Board of Works, it fell to the ground, for 
 funds vv'ere wanting to support the schools and other 
 institutions connected with it which he had been unable 
 
 ' Lacordaire, "Notice Historique sur les Manufactures Imperiales de 
 Tapi5senes,etc.," ed. 1S53, p. 83. ^ "Description de Paris," vol. ii. p. 23. 
 3 See Lacordaire, ibid. p. 81.
 
 THE GOBELINS— THE SAVONNERIE. 215 
 
 to place on a sound financial footing. It was not until 
 Charles Antoine Coypel succeeded Boulogne as First 
 Painter, in 1746, that this part of Colbert's schemes 
 again received attention. Then, whether Coypel had 
 misunderstood Colbert's object or was out of sympathy 
 with it, he certainly gave a totally different direction to 
 that ^cole des Aleves proteges, which was formed, as it 
 were, in the very name of the Gobelins. i In place of 
 ■an institution which should give to children living in the 
 workshop an insight into the noblest forms of art, 
 Coypel seems to have planned a little seminar}^ in which 
 twelve boys were nursed for the Academy. 
 
 Such a system could not meet the want which had 
 been created under Le Brun's administration, and in 
 1766 royal letters patent authorised the position of the 
 Ecole gnxtiute de dessiii, which had been opened in the 
 old College d^Auluu by Bachelier during the previous 
 year. In this school the attempt was once more made 
 to give " chaque ouvrier la faculte d'executer lui-mcme 
 et sans secours etranger les differens ouvrages que son 
 ^enie particulier pour son art lui fait imaginer." - 
 
 This school was of course swept away by the 
 Revolution, and other ways and methods less arbitrary 
 have since been shaped in accordance with the demands 
 of to-day ; but these later ways and methods defy that 
 severity of discipline by virtue of which French art 
 attained its magnificent superiority over that of other 
 nations ; the training of the workman has gradually 
 become little more than mere apprenticeship to his 
 trade, and this tends to encourage those personal 
 vagaries which are prompted by the selfish desire to 
 attract the public notice. 
 
 •^ Courajod, " L'Ecole des Eleves proteges,'' p. 115 ci scg. 
 
 - Lettres Patentes. See Courajod, '• L'Ecole dej Eleves proteges," p. 232.
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 CONCLUSION. 
 
 " Your revenue and your expenditure have passed all 
 bounds. You have been raised to the skies for having, 
 it is said, efifaced the greatness of all your predecessors 
 put together — that is to say, for having impoverished 
 the whole of France in order that you might introduce 
 at Court a monstrous and miserable luxury." i In 
 these words Fenelon addressed the Grand Monarque in 
 1693. Was it a true indictment } 
 
 To some extent doubtless "Yes^'! Pleasure and 
 superstition had had their will of one who, in spite 
 of the lines of lust and bigotry which disfigured his 
 character, was nevertheless a man of mark. Incapable 
 of love for either God or man — yet grovelling before his 
 confessor and his mistress — the king, when dealing with 
 practical affairs, showed conspicuous ability and energy. 
 His judgment, when the narrow lights of selfishness and 
 pride were sufficient for its guidance, w'as unerring ; his 
 natural powers of discernment and apprehension of a 
 very high order, his capacity for Avork and endurance 
 
 ' In 1710 the tenth of each mcin's income was demanded, " pour sou- 
 tenir la guerre" (declared on 14 Oct., 1710). See Vuitry, " De Tabus, 
 etc." Revtie des Deux Mondes, 1884.
 
 CONCLUSION. 217 
 
 far beyond the common ; his understanding sharp 
 enough to make him a most dangerous master to a 
 Minister Hke Colbert. The one-sided arguments by 
 which the latter, eager for success, had backed up his 
 policy of aggrandisement having once been taken in by 
 the king were by the king employed with despotic logic, 
 and Colbert dying, saw his work in large measure 
 destroyed by the very means on which he had reckoned 
 to ensure its success. France, instead of being made 
 the richer and the more prosperous by the activity of 
 her fostered industries and protected commerce, was 
 actually bankrupt through the scandalous luxury of a 
 dissolute Court. 
 
 This is the reverse side of the shield, and there is 
 much to justify the terrible words of Fenelon : the 
 blood, the anguish and the exile of the Huguenots ; the 
 hunger and nakedness of the peasantry ; the deaths of 
 fathers and husbands, who fell in thousands over the 
 pestilential labours enforced to please a harlot's fancy ; 
 commerce harassed by arbitrary legislation ; the pro- 
 ducer now coaxed with bounties, now ground by 
 taxation to the earth ; the professions sacrificing their 
 independence for the support and countenance of men 
 in power ; whilst those nearest to the throne held their 
 honour cheap at the price of a pension or a place. 
 
 Apart from the terrible shadows which blacken its 
 lustre, nothing can be more joyless than the aspect of 
 the Great Century. The mystic passion born of 
 Christian sentiment, which tinctured with fervour the 
 splendid realism of classic ideals, lifted the problems of 
 the Renaissance into the highest sphere of intellectual 
 interest : the social and political problems of the age of 
 Louis XIV. have no such spiritual fascination. Not less 
 complicated, not less exciting, not less momentous to
 
 2i8 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 human life and society are they, but of Avholly different 
 value, and belonging to another order of things. 
 
 Out of the crumbling ruins of feudalism, the modern 
 state had to be created, its administration organised, its 
 commerce developed, its institutions established, its 
 officers housed, and the keynote of all this activity was 
 not the satisfaction of happy energies, but the calculated 
 considerations of business. Active and far-reaching in 
 schemes of practical work, great in devotion to the most 
 arduous tasks of government, noble in sacrifice to popu- 
 lar interests, splendid in her intelligent zeal to know 
 and do, France became the foremost amongst nations ; 
 but the fervid love of beauty haunted her common paths 
 no more. 
 
 Had her people been still in the full heat of that 
 creative energy which had marked the Renaissance, the 
 institution of such a system as this, in spite of the 
 political and social benefits which it conferred, might 
 have been a matter for regret. But France had "spoiled 
 the bread and spilled the wine," riot and ruin had been 
 her heritage, and out of riot and ruin Richelieu and his 
 successors had to rebuild an imperial state. 
 
 The means by which they succeeded in doing this 
 were for a while abused, but they succeeded, and not 
 all the vicissitudes of fortune nor the sins and wicked- 
 ness of after rulers could destroy their work. A spirit 
 of co-operation, of zeal for the grandeur of the state and 
 for the national reputation, was called forth in France by 
 the men of the Grand Siccle, a spirit which is perhaps 
 not the very noblest spring of energy, but which is an 
 undoubted element of national strength, and which, 
 markedly as it has affected the external progress of 
 France, has had a no less marked influence on every 
 branch of her internal development.
 
 CONCLUSION. 219 
 
 " Tout pour la patric " — all for France — the watchword 
 Avhich is ever on the lips of her sons, is ever in their 
 hearts. In this absolute devotion to France lies the 
 national point of stability : the Bourbon tradition may 
 die, the Napoleonic legend may die, but France never 
 dies ; she always claims, no matter who may be the ruler 
 of the day, the same unquestioning self-sacrifice in her 
 service. And — by a strange revenge of fate — this spirit 
 in which the French have found, again and again, the 
 force necessary to repair the losses entailed by the 
 follies or the crimes of their fallen rulers, was called forth 
 in them by the very measures which were employed in 
 the seventeenth century to secure the foundations of 
 arbitrary rule. 
 
 Not to her fair skies alone nor to the wealth of her 
 happy soil does France owe her rank in Europe, but 
 chiefly to the devoted passion with which she is served 
 by every Frenchman. That zeal for the national 
 honour which enabled her on the morrow of Sedan to 
 begin the work of reconstruction v/ith dauntless ardour, 
 to uphold her commercial credit and to stablish her 
 future, that same zeal it is \vhich sustains the artist in 
 his poverty rather than set his hand to work unworthy 
 one to whom his country has given the highest training 
 which her school can bestow. 
 
 At the present moment, when the bonds of national 
 life seem somewhat slack amongst us, the means by 
 which this spirit was called forth are full of interest, 
 and the more so since the perplexing conditions, social 
 and political, with which we have to deal may be 
 referred, in great measure, to that disciplined reaction 
 against liberty of thought and life which was in part the 
 work of the seventeenth century. In no country of 
 Europe was this reaction more plainly defined than in
 
 220 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 France : there, the moral and intellectual revolution 
 which had in the preceding age been carried out, if but 
 partially, to a logical conclusion ; there, too, the forces 
 of the reaction were taken in hand by those in supreme 
 power, and promptly put to that work of political and 
 social reorganisation, the effects of which in some shape 
 or other have endured even to this day. The revolution 
 which we call the Renaissance was necessarily incom- 
 plete, seeing that it never affected either political or 
 social life. Moreover, as soon as the fabric of political 
 and social life appeared to be menaced and the forces of 
 the reaction were aroused, the very principle to which 
 the Renaissance had owed its existence, the principle of 
 individualism, was turned against itself. 
 
 The great class organisations, the industrial guilds, 
 which had sprung up in the Middle Ages had been 
 based on the opposite principle — the principle of col- 
 lectivism ; the legal rights, privileges, and immunities 
 w'hich had accrued in the course of centuries to these 
 bodies, formed formidable obstacles to the establish- 
 ment of a system of arbitrary centralisation. Those in 
 power, however, found no agent more powerful for the 
 destruction of those societies than an appeal to that 
 very principle of individual liberty which they desired 
 to crush out in other directions. The great guilds had 
 always represented the common interest of the arts 
 and trades as distinct from, and sometimes even in- 
 compatible with, those of the artisan himself; nothing 
 was easier, therefore, than to encourage the disposition 
 to revolt, always latent amongst the abler and more 
 enterprising members, since all who w^ere suffering from 
 the frequently vexatious restraints imposed by the 
 combination of their fellow-workers naturally looked to 
 the Crown for protection.
 
 CONCLUSION. 221 
 
 Thus it came to pass that, one by one, the ancient 
 guilds lost that power and importance which they had 
 so long enjoyed, and were relegated to a situation of 
 political insignificance ; thus, too, whilst all those 
 organisations by which the interests of the individual 
 or of the family had been subordinated to those of the 
 class or trade were broken up, class distinctions, bred of 
 the old order of things, were increased and maintained. 
 
 In a certain sense — for class distinctions marked out 
 individuals as having advantages not belonging to the 
 common rank — these caste distinctions lent themselves 
 to the aims of absolutism, and found their parallel in the 
 titles and privileges granted to those who bore rule in 
 the new Academies. They ruled, not as representatives 
 of their brothers, but as delegates of the Crown ; they 
 aided in the work of decentralisation, completed the 
 absorption of provincial types, and gave to P^rench art 
 and French industry that uniform character and style 
 which it has since maintained throughout all the changes 
 of fashion down to our time. 
 
 In the conflict between the vialtrise and the 
 Academies was reflected the great struggle of central 
 absolutism as against a democracy of many centres ; 
 the struggle between a system based on individualism, 
 which tends to the building up of absolutism, as against 
 that collectivism which is its overthrow. The violent 
 outburst of 1789, with all its frenzied iconoclasm, was 
 but a protest born of the crimes which stifled the 
 Renaissance, for the irresistible development of de- 
 mocracy, which is the keystone of the modern situation, 
 begun in the moral world by the Renaissance, received 
 so severe a check politically and socially in France 
 during the seventeenth century, that 1789 was needed 
 in order to redress the balance.
 
 222 ART IN THE MODERN STATE. 
 
 The moral evolution of the sixteenth century having 
 failed to obtain social and political expression, the 
 assertion of the rights of the individual was turned 
 to the profit of arbitrary government^ and now for the 
 last hundred years the protest against the suppression 
 of the Renaissance has been gathering strength. To 
 fight against it is as irrational as to become its fanatical 
 apologist ; it requires neither advocacy nor apology, it 
 is an inevitable transformation — an historical evolution. 
 When the moral type changes in character, it is of 
 necessity that the world seeks new courses ; only the 
 death of the old must be the price of the new birth. 
 
 Nam quodcumque suis mutatum finibus exit, 
 Continuo hoc mors est illius quod fuit ante.
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 This piece, and that following, in which the masters state 
 their grievances against the Academy, are, I believe, both 
 unpublished. I give them here, because the case for the 
 Academy has been fully placed before the world by the docu- 
 ments printed in the Appendix to M. Vitet's admirable study, 
 " L' Academic Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture,'"' whilst that 
 for the masters has been passed over. 
 
 " Mcmoire " of the Procureur du Roy au Chatelet (jM. de 
 Riantz, see Montaiglon, " Histoire de Tx^cademie," vol. ii. 
 p. 126), on behalf of the Alaitrise against the Academy. 
 (National Library MSS. Collection Delamare, Fonds 
 fran^ais, 21791.) Probable date, 1664. 
 
 " Le procureur du roy au Chastelet il' le lieutenant du 
 prevost de Paris pour le faict des arts ^ metiers Auquel seul 
 appartient (et en possession de tous temps immemorial) de 
 recevoir les maistres dans la ville de Paris . . . et . . . juger 
 . . . tous les differents (pi naissent de maistre a maistre pour 
 le faict des maistrises. 
 
 " Entr'autres communaultez II y a celle des peintres et 
 sculpteurs qui a este erige'e en maistrise II y a plus de quatre 
 ans, ausquelz a este concedde des statuts & privileges par les 
 Roys . . . ils ont toujours vescus dans I'obeissance & se sont 
 perfcctionnes en sorte que Ton pent dire quil y a en cette 
 communaultc les plus habilles hommes de I'Europe. Neant- 
 moings en I'annee 1648 le Roy par I'lmportunitc accorda a
 
 224 APPENDIX. 
 
 quelques particuliers peintres certains articles soubz le tiltre 
 de I'Academye Royalle Lesquelz troublerent la communaulte 
 des peintres & sculpteurs, en sorte que des le procureur du 
 Roy en recevoit un prejudice considerable, Mais les Acade- 
 mistes sestans accomodez avec la communaulte des peintres & 
 sculptures par un concordat passe pardevant notaires au mois 
 d'Aoust 1651 & ayant reduit leur nombre a trente le procu- 
 reur du Roy les a soufferts, & lorsquils ont porte pardevant 
 luy leurs differends centre les maistres de la ditte communaulte' 
 il leurs a rendu la justice quil leurs debvoit. 
 
 " Ces Academistes non voulant pas demeurer la ont obtenus 
 d'aultres articles de sa majestic par les quelles Ton donne aux 
 Academistes seuls le droit de travailler et d'enseigner dans 
 paris I'art de peinture, Ton faict des deffenses a toutes sortes 
 de personnes de travailler que soubz les ordes de I'Academye 
 & Ton establist des officiers pour cognoistre & juger de leurs 
 differents, souverainement soubz I'authorite de gens d'lllustre 
 condition, Ton estably en tiltre d'office un secretaire qui recoit 
 le serment des academistes bien quil professe la Religion 
 pretendue Reforme'e' Lequel exige deux Louis dor en deslivrant 
 les provisions & enfin Ton donne pouvoir aux deux huissiers 
 qui balairont le lieu [see Art. XX. of the Statutes of 1664, 
 P. v., vol. i. p. 255] ou se tiendra I'accademie de travailler dans 
 paris en qualite de maistres, & ainsi soubz pretexte de 
 chercher les moyens d'avoir des habilz peintres ce qui est sauf 
 correction bien Inutil puisquil y a une Academye bien 
 establye & une maitrise dans Paris remplye d'habilz gens, ou 
 Ton professe I'art de la peinture autant bien que Ton peult 
 desirer Ion veult soustraire de la jurisdiction du procureur du 
 Roy la communaulte des peintres & sculpteurs & dans la 
 suitte celle des menuisiers parcequils ont droict de faire des 
 ornements de sculpture, des serruriers, & charpentiers. Sup- 
 primer les ordonnances que les Roys ont faict de siecle en 
 siecle depuis que la monarchye est monarchye les statuts con- 
 ceddees a toutes ses communaulte'z par les Roys successive- 
 ment Depuis plus de cinq a six cens ans donner pouvoir a un 
 homme de la Religion pretendue Refformee de faire prester le 
 serment aux accade'mistes Catholiques soubz le tiltre de Secre-
 
 APPENDIX. 225 
 
 -taire de I'Accadcmye dont les inoeurs seront suspects, aux 
 accadtimistes de faire des assemblees dans Paris qui ont 
 toujours este estioitement deffendues, de se soustraire de la 
 police des juges ordinaires pour abuser de leur art soit en 
 faisant des nuditees soit d'autres figures scandaleuses & enfin 
 •establir une nouvelle Jurisdiction qui sera composee de Juges 
 de conseilleurs de grieffier i.^ huissiers & par ce moyen ruyner 
 la charge du procureur du Roy." 
 
 (The spelling in this and the following document has been 
 ■carefully preserved.) 
 
 11. 
 
 The j\IS. above cited is followed by another, entitled 
 " Raisonnement desinteressc pour les maistres peintres & 
 sculpteurs de la ville de Paris touchant I'Academie de S' Luc." 
 The following extracts contain all the important passages of 
 this document, which, like the preceding, bears no date : 
 
 " Le corps des maistres peintres & sculpteurs subsiste 
 dans Paris II y a plus de quatre cens ans. . . . Si ce corps 
 a este plus vigoureux dans ses premieres annees que dans 
 les suivantes & que Ion ayt eu sujet d'accuser de foiblesse 
 aucuns de ses membres comme Ton a faict pour pretexter 
 I'establissement faict en 1648 de I'Academie Royalle des 
 mesmes arts Ce defiant ne provient que du trop de tranquillite 
 dont il a jouy-qui par faute d'ennemis ou plustost d'emulateurs 
 on a laisse engourdir la vigueur. . . . Mais estant pre'sen- 
 tcment reveille comme il est par la noble emulation de 
 TAcademie Royalle, il sent encores en soy assez de vigueur 
 pour maintenir avec justice son droict d'aisnesse soit pour la 
 conservation de ses privileges <.\: droicts soit pour les ouvrages 
 de I'art qu'il conviendra faire. 
 
 '•L'unique reproche quils veullent advouer qu'on leur a 
 pu faire avec quelque raison, est d'avoir souffert dans leur 
 corps pour membres co-egaux &: communs avec eux en 
 privileges ceux qui n'en exercent que les plus basses & grossieres 
 fonctions telz que les doreurs, Marbriers & autres estoffeurs 
 qui par raison doivent etre distinguez «!\: tenus autant au dessous 
 
 Q
 
 226 APPENDIX. 
 
 des peintres & sculpteurs que I'ouvrage de ceux cy est pardessus 
 le leur. lis pourroient dire que c'est un abus invetere quilz 
 ont toUere plustost par habitude que par aprobation. . . . 
 Neantmoins pour oster a I'advenir tout sujet a I'Academie de 
 leur objecter ce deffault & profiter en cela de son advis Les 
 ^ts ]y[rs gQjj|. j-ggolus d'apporter parmy eux toulte la reforme & 
 la distinction que Ton pent desirer sur ce sujet. 
 
 " L'establissement de I'Academie Royalle est a la verite 
 dans le dessein que Ton a eu de relever le lustre de ces 
 arts. . . . Neantmoins comme ce nouveau corps n'a este 
 forme qu'aux despends de celuy de la Maitrise, & que par 
 les articles de son establissement, Sa Majeste par Sa prudence 
 (Sc justice a expressement reserve que c'est sans quil puisse 
 nuire n'y prejudicier au corps des Maistres ; les d^ Acade'mistes 
 n'ont pas de grace de pretendre d'obliger ceux qui se contentent 
 d'estre Maistres a ce faire Academistes n'y encores moins de 
 droict de les troubler dans leurs antiens privileges. . . . 
 Les Maistres veulent bien passer soubz silence le contrat 
 d'union faict par eux avec les Academistes le 7 Juin 165 1 
 puisque ces derniers I'ont enfraint et violez de leur part. 
 Ce contract leur a servi a faire enregistrer au Parlement Les 
 patentesde I'Establissement de la d^ Academie a I'enregistrement 
 desquelles les Maistres s'estoient opposes, & il contient cette 
 clause expresse acceptee respectivement par les parties que 
 c'est sans aucun dessein de prejudicier au corps des Maistres 
 ny aux particuliers que les deux corps seront joints avec 
 voix desliberatives . . . ce qui n'a pas este observe par les 
 Academistes qui se sont depuis sequestrez des Maitres & 
 faict bande a part De sorte que ceux cy se contentent de 
 demeurer dans leur corps separez comme ilz I'estoient avant 
 le d*" contrat avec leurs antiens droicts & privileges accordez a 
 leurs Maitrises. . . . 
 
 " La senile chose que non seulement les IMaistres mais 
 encore tous les vertueux ont droit d'improuver avec raison 
 dans lad" Academie comme une oppression manifeste a la 
 vertu est la pretention qu'elle a eu (usurpant I'antien droict 
 des Maistres) d'estre seule dans Paris .... ceux qui s'en 
 estiment les premiers & principaux membres .... voulant
 
 APPENDIX. 227 
 
 par ce moyen esviter silz pouvaient avoir des coegaux en 
 d'autres academies qui pourroient meriter le niesmc honneur 
 queiix. L'on ne peut pas desnier que les Maistres n'ayent droict 
 d'en tenir plusieurs .... cependant lesd"^ Academistes au 
 pre'judice de cctte liberie & de I'honneur d'une Acade'mie 
 Royalle ou Ton devroit enseigner gratuitement la jeunesse 
 puisquelle est entretenu aux despends de Sa Majeste en ont 
 congedier les filz des Maistres ou pour les souffrir veullent 
 en exiger de I'argent. ... Si I'instruction de la jeunesse est 
 comme elle doit estre le principal motif de I'Academie Ton y 
 doit aussijoindre la commodite des estudians, &: quelle raison 
 (Sc proportion y a il dune seule academie dans un petit monde 
 comme Paris ou tant de jeunes gens & pauvres ouvriers logez 
 aux extremitez de la ville & fauxbourgs perdroicnt plus de 
 temps a aller & venir avec bien de la peine quilz n'en pourroient 
 employer a I'estude. II faut done par necessite' & charite 
 en establir en divers quartiers de la ville. ... A quoy 
 Maistres voulants de leur part contribuer tout ce quilz 
 peuvent ont cru estre obligez se servant de leur antien droit 
 de restablir une academie de S' Luc dans la chambre de 
 leur communaulte non seulement pour I'instruction quilz 
 doivent naturellement a leurs enfans mais encores pour faire 
 connoistre que cest a tort qu'on les a voulu accuser de 
 n'avoir pas assez de zele pour se donner cette peine & que 
 d'ailleurs ilz nont pas moins de Capacite' pour enseigner la 
 Jeunesse que ceux qui ont I'honneur d'estre de I'Academie 
 Royalle ny moins de passion queux de servir & plaire a Sa 
 Majeste en tout ce quilz pouront." 
 
 Res faciunt non verba fidem. 
 
 III. 
 
 PROPOSED JUNCTION OF THE ROYAL ACADEMY OF PAINTING AND 
 SCULPTURE WITH THE ACADEMY OF ST. LUKE AT ROME. 
 
 The archives of the Academy of St. Luke at Rome contain 
 a few papers relative to the association of the Royal Academy 
 of France with that of St. Luke. There is more than a 
 
 cj 2
 
 228 APPENDIX. 
 
 sheet in French, and one in ItaHan, concerning the ne- 
 gotiations for the union. That in French is signed by 
 " Le Brun, premier peintre du Roy, ChanceUer & principal 
 Recteur de I'Academie, Anguier, Girardon, ]\Iarsy, C. Beaubrun, 
 M. G. de Seve, Besnard, Ferdinand, Tettehn, Regnaudin, 
 Paillet, Coypel, De Campagne, P. de Seve, Blanchard, De la 
 Fosse, Le Hongre, Raon, Houasse, Baptiste Tuby, Migon, 
 Rousselet, Yvar, Tortebat, Rabon, Silvestre, Friquet." 
 
 Annexed to this are the royal letter assenting to the union 
 of the two Academies ; a letter of Testelin's, in his capacity 
 of secretary ; the power of attorney, given by the Royal 
 Academy of Painting and Sculpture of Paris to Charles Errard, 
 authorising him to conclude the union ; the report of the 
 discussion of the terms by the Academy of St. Luke, of 
 which Errard was vice-prince ; the original letters patent of 
 the King of France, by which he confers nobility on Le 
 Brun, together with an Italian translation of the same ; 
 and the heads of the agreement for the union, subscribed 
 by Colbert for the king. 
 
 The archives also contain two letters, written by Le Brun 
 in acknowledgment of his election to the Academy of St. 
 Luke, and of his having been made its prince. The first 
 of these letters has already been published from the copy 
 preserved, together with the Italian translation, in the Bibl. 
 Nat. Fonds Se'guier (see "Arch, de I'Art Frangais," 1852, 
 p. 52), and, as the text preserved in the archives of the 
 Academy of St. Luke differs from it only verbally, except 
 that it bears date loth April (corrected into loth February), 
 1676, it is unnecessary to reproduce it here. 
 
 The text of the second letter, a copy of which I owe 
 to the friendly offices of M. Eugene Miintz, is subjoined. 
 From it, it would appear that the oftice of prince to which 
 Le Brun had been elected, carried with it, by grace of the 
 Academy, special advantages and privileges. 
 
 " Messieurs, 
 
 II faut avouer que je ne puis penser a vous faire un 
 remerciment que je n'aye un nouveau sujet de vous en faire
 
 APPENDIX. 229 
 
 un autre, La lettre que je viens de recevoir de vostre illustre 
 & scavante Academic est un nouveau sujet de graces que j'ai 
 a vous rendre, Cette lettre, Messieurs, est rachevement de 
 vostre ouvrage, vous avez voulu par elle faire connoistre a 
 tout le monde I'lionneur que vous m'avez fait en me nommant 
 Prince de vostre illustre Compagnie, vous avez voulu que 
 chacun fust informe comme vous m'avez associe a tous les 
 avantages que vous possedez quy ne sont dus qu'a vos 
 illustres personnes, Quand je pense a la grandeur du rang 
 ou vous m'avez eleve, et que je considere combien je 
 merite peu cet honneur, je ne scay laquellc est plus grande 
 en moy, ou de la joye que j'en ressens, ou de la confusion 
 que j'en ay, Et s'il y a quelque chose quy puisse justifier 
 vostre choix, c'est du moins que je me puis vanter de bien 
 connoistre le prlx de la grace que vous m'avez faitte, Je scay 
 que j'entre en societe avec les plus habilles et les plus 
 scavans hommes de nostre siecle, que je dois tout a leur 
 generosite, Je scay encore qu'il ne faut pas seulement de 
 parolles pour vous remercier de tant de faveurs, qu'il faut 
 s'esforcer par des actions a se rendre digne de la place ou vous 
 m'avez eleve', C'est, ISIessieurs, ce que j'essayeray de faire 
 par mes assiduitez et raes services, en cherchant avec ardeur 
 les occasions de vous tesmoigner ma reconnoissance, et de 
 vous faire paroistre en tout rencontre que personne ne sera 
 jamais avec plus de soubmission a tous vos ordres que moy, 
 quy suis avec une forte passion, et beaucoup de respect pour 
 vos illustres personnes 
 
 Messieurs 
 Vostre tres humble et tres obeissant serviteur 
 
 Le Br UN 
 a Paris le io«^ Avril 1676"' 
 
 It is disappointing to find that after an elaborate exchange 
 of civilities between the chiefs, and after the formal ne- 
 gotiations had proceeded to the length almost of conclusion, 
 the proposed union of the two Academies came to nothing 
 (M. L, vol. i. p. 30).
 
 230 APPENDIX. 
 
 IV. 
 
 PRIVILEGES OF ACADEMICIANS. 
 
 Over and above the small sum (600 l.t. — livres tournois) set 
 apart for the maintenance of the model, the salaries, promised 
 by Colbert to the Rectors and Professors in 1662, were 
 considerably increased in 1664 (P. V., vol. i. p. 248). The 
 four Rectors, each of whom had to attend every Saturday 
 evening during his quarter to assist the Professor for the 
 month in the correction of drawings, and in the direction 
 of the pupils and their studies, were allotted 300 l.t. apiece ; 
 whilst the twelve Professors, each bound to attend every day 
 during his month of oflice, "pour posser le modelle en attitude, 
 le dessigner, corriger les estudians «S; veiller a toutes les 
 affaires de I'academie" (vol. i. p. 248), only received 100 l.t. 
 It must, however, be remembered that the Rector was obliged, 
 at his weekly visit, to hold a revision of the whole week's work 
 from the model, on the results of which depended the choice 
 of those who were to compete for prizes. The lecturers on 
 Perspective, Geometry, and Anatomy (MM. Migon and 
 Quatrousse), who each taught on three days a week, received 
 200 l.t. each. 
 
 I learn from my friend, M. Eugene Miintz, that drawings 
 executed by the Professors in the discharge of their duties in 
 class, are still preserved in the Ecole des Beaux Arts. After 
 correcting these proofs I received from him the MS. of part 
 of a work which he has in progress, in which those who desire 
 to follow up the subject will find the History of the Aca- 
 demical School in France treated in the fullest detail. 
 
 V. 
 
 THE LECTURES ON GEOMETRV, PERSPECTIVE, AND ANATOMY. 
 
 These lectures were open to pupils and to the public on 
 payment of the same fee as that required for the life-class 
 (vol. i. p. 251, Art. IV.). For at least a year after the quarrel
 
 APPENDIX. 231 
 
 'with Abraham Bosse, no lectures on Geometry and Perspective 
 •were given. Eventually M. Migon presented himself (March, 
 1662), and, although warned that he could expect no pay till 
 it should please the king to grant " les panssions," and that 
 he must always submit to the company "le projet de ses 
 lecons " before addressing the students, he persisted in taking 
 the vacant post. In the following December the Academy 
 decided to grant Migon a seat and vote (except at the 
 reception of Academicians or election of officials), and to 
 make him one of the thirty members (then) enjoying special 
 privileges (P. V., vol. i. p. 203). The position of the lecturer 
 on Anatomy was greatly inferior to that of the lecturer on 
 Perspective. M. Quatrousse must have lectured for many 
 years without pay, since in 165 1 we find him offering "to 
 continue" his lectures (vol. i. p. 59), when it was decided to 
 give him a seat without vote at ordinary meetings ; but he 
 never obtained much consideration, for in September, 1670 
 (vol. i. p. 351), he is invited to open a public conference, it 
 being alleged as a reason that " personne de la Compagnie ne 
 s'y est offert." Yet in 1670 his position was not so bad as at 
 first, for on 5th July of that year his name appears amongst the 
 signatures to the draft of the day's proceedings (P. V., vol. i. 
 p. 350), and continues to recur until 1672, when Quatrousse 
 resigned his thankless office (P. V., vol. i. pp. 391, 400). 
 The skeleton which he had lent to the Academy had been 
 purchased from him in 1671 (P. V., vol. i. p. 364). but no note 
 of regret or acknowledgment was placed on the register after his 
 resignation. The "'Compagnie," on November 5, when re- 
 ceiving, in the place of Quatrousse, Jean Friquet " en la calite 
 de Professeur en anathomie pour en fair les fonctions & donner 
 les lecons au Estudians un jour de chaque semaine a savoir le 
 samedit,'' unkindly remark that " une personne de la profession 
 se treuvant capable de donner des lemons d'anathomie devoit 
 toujours estre pre'fere a un chirurgien." Friquet, who was no 
 other than the unruly student who had headed the revolt of 
 1663, enjoyed at once all the advantages denied to Quatrousse, 
 and took rank " en suite de ^P' les Conseiller Professeur 
 avecq la qualite de Conseiller."
 
 232 APPENDIX. 
 
 VI 
 
 THE EXHIBITIONS. 
 
 The right to a place in the yearly exhibitions was, at first, 
 regarded rather as a tiresome obligation than as a coveted 
 advantage. The exhibition lasted " quelques jours seulement," 
 and, in order to ensure sufificient contributors, it had to be 
 enacted that those v;ho did not exhibit could not take part 
 in the yearly elections to office, which were held on the 
 opening day, whenever any renewals or changes had to be 
 made in the governing body. Some trouble was taken to 
 make the show imposing on the first occasion after the 
 confirmation of the new statutes, when, on account of the 
 move to the Palais Royal, the exhibition was postponed until 
 August. Colbert was expected, and it was decided that "la 
 salle serait tapissee " (P. V., vol. i. p. 286). Beaubrun, 
 the treasurer, was directed to buy what was necessary, and a 
 hanging committee was appointed, on which we find the well- 
 known names of Sebastian Bourdon, Van Opstal, Philippe de 
 Champagne, and Nicolas INIignard, commonly called Mignard 
 d'Avignon in order to distinguish him from Pierre, his able 
 and refractory younger brother. So much difficulty was, 
 however, experienced by them {ibid. vol. i. p. 297) in carrying 
 out these plans that, in the follovving year (1666), it was 
 decided that the exhibition should be triennial only, opening 
 always during Holy Week. 
 
 VII. 
 
 NOTE ON COLONNADE OF THE LOUVRE. 
 
 " Le sixieme abus est de faire un grand ordre, comprenant 
 plusieurs etages, au lieu de donner un ordre a chaque etnge. . . . 
 Ce n'est pas que cela ne puisse etre permis quelqucfois dans les
 
 APPENDIX. 233 
 
 grands palais, mais il faut que Tarchitecte ait I'adresse de 
 trouver un pretexte \ ce grand ordre, & qu'il paroisse qu'il y 
 a este oblige par la symetrie qui demande qu'un grand ordre 
 qui est necessaire h. quelque partie considerable du bastiment. 
 Cela a este pratiqud avec beaucoup de jugement en plusieurs 
 edifices, mais principalenient dans le palais du Louvre, lesquel 
 estant basti sur le bord d'un grand fleuve, qui donne une 
 espace & un eloignement fort vaste a son aspect avoit besoin 
 pour ne paroitre pas chetif d'avoir un grand ordre. Celuy 
 qu'on luy a donne qui comprend deux e'tages, & qui est pose 
 sur Tetage d'embas qui luy sert comme de Piedestail, & qui est 
 proprement le rempart du chateau, est ainsi exhausse a cause 
 de deux grands & magnifiques portiques qui regnent le long 
 de la piincipale face a i'entrce du Palais, t\; qui estant comme 
 pour servir de Vestibule a tous les appartements du premier 
 e'tage, demandoit cette grandeur & cette hauteur extraordinaire 
 que Ton a donnee h son ordre, qu'il a falu poursuivre & faire 
 regner ensuite tout au tour du reste de Te'difice : Car cela 
 autorise ou du moins excuse I'incongruite que Ton aurait pu 
 objecter a. I'architecte, s'il avait fait sans necessite une chose 
 qui d'ellememe est sans raison : scavoir ne donner pas a 
 chaque ^tage qui est proprement un batiment separe son ordre 
 propre et separe, & de faire servir une meme colonne a 
 porter deux planchers, supposant qu'elle en soutint un par 
 maniere de dire sur sa teste, & un autre comme pendu a sa 
 ceinture." — C. Perrault, Ordoiuiance des Ciiuj Es^cces de 
 Colojincs, p. 119. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 EXTRACTS FROM THE REGISTER OF THE ACADEMY OF 
 ARCHITECTURE (UNPUBLISHED), AND SUMMARY OF CON- 
 TENTS FROM 1672 10 1694. 
 
 Vol. I. — This register is preceded by the following entry : 
 
 "Annees de reception. 1672, M. Colbert sur-intendant. 
 1680, M. Dormoy surintendant.
 
 234 APPENDIX. 
 
 " Academiciens, 1672. M. Blondel Directeur & Professeur. 
 Le Van" (this is the son of F. Le Vau, who died 1670). 
 " Bruand. Gittard. Le Pautre " (Le Paiiltre in another 
 hand). " Mignard. Dorbay. Felibien secretaire. 
 
 " 1673. Perrault Officier des Bat" du Roy en charge. 
 1675, Hardouin Mansart surintendant en 1699. 1678, La 
 motte coquard officier des Bat" en charge de controUeur 
 general. 1680, Perrault officier en charge. 26 Fev. Daucourt 
 officier en charge. Gobert, officier en charge d'Intendant 
 general des Bat'^ 168 1, Le Nautre officier en charge."' (In 
 another hand Le Nostre, p. 440.) 
 
 The " registre des conferences de I'Academie Royale 
 d'Architecture," which follows the above, is so voluminous 
 and so same, that, althougli I have taken a copy of the greater 
 part, it seems needless to do more than print a few extracts 
 illustrative of the text, which will show the character of the 
 proceedings. The report of the first sitting is given in cxtenso. 
 
 " Du dernier jour de Decembre 1671, 
 
 " Le jeudi der° jour de X'"'" 167 1 I'Academie royalle des 
 Architectes du Roy a este' establie par Monseign"" Colbert sur- 
 intendant des bastiments dans un des appartements du palais 
 royal a un des bouts de la raesme gallerie ou de I'Academie 
 royalle de Peinture. Et en pre"" de Mond'seig' Colbert & 
 de plus" personnes de qualite M"" Blondel professeur royal 
 aux mathematiques & en archif^ en a fait I'ouverture par un 
 discours sur I'excellence de rArchit'". Ensuite duq' il a 
 declare les intentions de S. M"- sur I'establissement de cette 
 compagnie composee des M" Le Vau, Bruand, Gittard, le 
 Pautre, Mignard et Dorbay, architectes choisis par sa M-"-' et 
 I'ordre que Mondseig' le surintendant veult qu'on garde qui 
 est que tous les Mardis et Vendredis de la semaine le d'S 
 Blondel fera legon publique d'Arch'^*^ a tous ceux qui voudront 
 se trouverdans la sale de I'Academie depuis deux heures . . . 
 jusques a quatre. Pendant la premiere heure il dictera les 
 lerons & pendant la seconde il expliquera ou les elements 
 d'Euclide ou autres connoissances necess'^' aux architectes.
 
 APPENDIX. 235 
 
 "Tous les jeudis de la semaine a pareille heure se feront 
 des assemblees particulicres des personnes nommcs par S. M. 
 pour conferer sur I'art &: les regies de rArcht'" & dire leur avis 
 sur les matieres qui auront este proposees selon I'estude & les 
 observations que chacun aura faites sur les matieres qui 
 auront este proposees. Ouvrages antiques tS: sur les escrits 
 de ceux qui en ont Iraite. Chacun y adjoutant ses raisons par 
 ores selon le sujet qui sera en deliberation. Et pour com- 
 mancer le d S"" Blondel a dit que dans la premiere assemblee 
 qui se fera le jeudi prochain Ton dira ce que c'est que le bon 
 goust dont Ton parle d'ord'" dans les ouvrages d'Arch"''' et 
 qui marque leur excellence. 
 
 (Signed) " Bloxdel. Le Vau. 
 
 " GiTTARD. BrUAND. 
 
 " Mignard. Dorbay." 
 " Felibien. 
 
 On the said Thursday, 7th January, 1672, it was decided 
 that, "Toutes les choses faites de bon goust doivent necessaire- 
 ment plaire mais qu'il y a plus"'^^ choses qui peuvent plaire 
 qu'on ne peut pas pour cela dire de bon goust." On the 
 18th February we find them all agreed that, considering the 
 services of Scamozzi in preserving all that he could find in 
 classic authors concerning architecture, he should hold second 
 rank amongst moderns, and be followed, like Palladio, "en 
 gros." 
 
 On the 17th March it is decided that Leon Battista Aiberti 
 " doit estre considere comme un auteur plustost que come un 
 ouvrier de bon gout." Viole and Cataneo are next disposed 
 of, and on March 31st they proceed to their first deliberation on 
 a practical question : '• Sur la proposition qui a este faict de la 
 nianiere de disposer les pilastrcs opposcz aux colonnes qui 
 sont mises en saillie aux pavilions des ailes a I'entre'e de la 
 grande cour du chasteau de Versailles, scavoir si Ton disposerait 
 une colonne en saillie de deux tiers pres le mur desd' pavilions 
 vis a vis des colonnes angulaires de la facade du dehors ou si Ton 
 continueroit au dedans un rang de mesme colonnes alignees
 
 236 APPENDIX. 
 
 sur ces premieres &: repondant a celles du dehors laissant de 
 chaque coste aux encoigneures du mur des pilastres en maniere 
 
 3 d'arrieres corps, ou si laissant un alignem' de pilastres 
 seulem' allignez sur ceux des encoigneures renforcant le mur 
 par dedans pour soutenir la poussee des coupes de I'architrave, 
 
 4 ou si enfin laissant les pilastres allignez comme dessus Ton 
 feroit porter depuis le mur jusques aux colonnes angulaires des 
 poitrails revestus de pierre de taille, ou des barres de fer bien 
 corroyes pour estre joints ensemble & posees de clamps pour 
 soutenir I'architrave d'une seule piece & descharge'e par le 
 hault. 
 
 " L'assemblee des architectes nommes par le Roy dans son 
 Academic d'iVrchitecf^ est d'avis que pour plus grande facilite 
 du passage des carosses entre le mur & les colonnes pour la 
 conservation du plus grand jour des logements & pour ajuster 
 autant qu'il se pent ce qui reste a faire avec ce qui est deja 
 fait Les colonnes de dedans seront ostees & les pilastres vis a vis 
 des colonnes doivent estre faites sur I'align' de ceux des en- 
 coigneures, & pour porter les architraves qui doivent estre de 
 pierre depuis le mur jusques aux colonnes angulaires il sera 
 mis trois bandes de fer plat, de trois pouces sur un et demy 
 chascun posees de clamp, bien corroyes &: joints ensemble 
 traversees par les bouts d'ancres entrez dans la colonne d'une 
 part & au deld du mur de Fault" cesd' barres de fer revesteus 
 d'architraves frise &: corniche de pierre posee en coupe & lie'es 
 par les bouts par lesd' ancres & tirans. 
 
 " Pour ce qui est du dessein de la balustrade qu'on a fait 
 voir, elle paroisse devoir faire un assez bon effet dans la 
 hauteur marque'e dans le dessein, mais pour les figures qui 
 sont de huict pieds de hault dans le dessein Elles sont trop 
 forts & trop haults & feront un meilleur effet les reduisant 
 compris le socle a la haulteur de sept pieds et demy." 
 
 (For these works see Piganiol, vol. i. pp. 14, 15.) 
 (Signed) 
 
 Blondel. Le Vau. 
 
 GiTTARD. BrUAND. 
 
 MiGNARD. DORCAY. 
 
 Felibien.
 
 APPENDIX. 237 
 
 At tlieir next meeting, on the ytli April, the king's architects 
 discuss the claims of Philibert de I'Orme, speak of his system of 
 wood-jointing for vaulting (see " Renaissance of Art in France," 
 vol. i. pp. 134-5), and give him the highest rank amongst 
 French architects. On the 3rd May it is the turn of Jean 
 BuUant, and, in the following month, of La Erosse (Desbrosses), 
 the builder of the Luxembourg. 
 
 In January the architects received the first application, 1673 
 from outside, for counsel, and examined the designs for the 
 new hospital at Besan^on submitted to them by a certain 
 S' le Royer. On the 23rd of the same month, having been 
 unable to decide the question "de la rencontre des architraves 
 sur les colonnes accompagnes de pilastres," they agree to read 
 Vitruvius, but on Feb. 28th, having discovered the " peu de 
 rapport " that Jean ^NLirtin's translation has with Vitruvius, 
 they break off and take Palladio, agreeing to wait for Perrault's 
 translation of Vitruvius. This reading of Palladio serves them 
 throughout the year (with the single exception of a decision 
 iaken, 31st July, to the effect that the inscription on the 
 front of the church of the " College Mazarini " should be not 
 in two lines but one), and is continued till the 9th of April, • 
 1674, when they are consulted by the Chapter of Rennes as to 1674 
 finishing the towers of their cathedral. On April 23rd Gittard 
 submits to them his drawing for the capitals of the pilasters in 
 the Church of St. Sulpice ; 31st May, IMignard gives exact 
 notes on the Maison carrce of Nimes ; nth June, a drawing is 
 laid before them for the altar of the parish church of Vineuil ; 
 all the meetings between these different dates having been 
 steadily occupied by reading Palladio. The first chapter of 
 Vitruvius is begun with Perrault's notes on the iSth June, and, 
 with an interlude from 7th Sept. to 19th Oct., during which 
 Feiibien's " Traite des Principes de I'Architecture " is under 
 examination, this reading of Vitruvius is continued uninter- 
 ruptedly till the end of 1674. 
 
 During 1675 the attendance became slack, and when 1675 
 the numbers were scanty, as on February 4th, they took 
 to reading the " Dictionnaire des Arts." To profit by 
 Vitruvius they seem to have required the help of Blondel,
 
 238 APPENDIX. 
 
 who submitted to them in July his design for the Porte S. 
 Denis and began to read out his " Livre d' Architecture.'^ 
 In the May previous Perrault submitted to them the difficuUies 
 arising in a room at Versailles concerning the place of certain 
 columns which had been fixed without regard to the projection 
 of their capitals, and in June he brought drawings of arches at 
 Autun constructed without mortar. The tomb of Mazarin 
 occupied them on the 29th July and 9th August, when also 
 Perrault brought them letters from Rome on the use of 
 " gouttes dans le soffit de la corniche du dorique " in the 
 Theatre of Marcellus. After this they returned to reading 
 Felibien's book, which carried them to the end of the year 
 without other incident than the reception of Hardouin 
 Mansard on December 23rd. 
 
 From the above extracts and summary a clear idea may 
 be gained as to the course of proceedings in the Academy; 
 1676 and 1677 were marked by nothing noteworthy, but the 
 following year, 1678, saw the whole body engaged at Colbert's 
 instance in visiting the old churches and buildings of Paris 
 and the environs, with the special object of reporting (see 
 MS. in fol. 262, Bibl. Nat.) on their condition of preservation, 
 so as to decide what was the best stone to employ and the 
 best method of employing it. This portion of the Register 
 has already been published by M. de Laborde (see " Revue 
 d' Architecture et de Travaux Publics" de C. Daly, 1852, t. x. 
 p. 194), and therefore needs no longer mention here. The in- 
 spection, which included the quarries of Pontoise and Fecamp, 
 was completed during the summer months, and the report was 
 finished in December, when they returned to their usual 
 occupations, arbitrating between employers and employed, as 
 in the dispute between the Marquis de Bullion and le 
 S"' Le Brun, "maitre masson " (5th December), and reading 
 between whiles Alberti, Scamozzi, and Serlio. Thus things went 
 on till, in 1694, the awful announcement came to them, as to 
 all the other Academies, that their doors should be closed. 
 1694 "3 May Le Mercredy 21 avril 1694 Monsieur le Marquis 
 
 de Villacerf surintendant des batiments a envoye a M. Felibien 
 un ordre du roy pour faire cesser les conferences & les legons
 
 APPEi\DIX. 239 
 
 de I'Academie d'Architecture aussi tost Ion en a donne avis a 
 M. Ft'libien afin que chacun cust a obeir ce qui a estc execute 
 salon la teneur du d ordre. Et sur ce que la Cie a depuis 
 supplic M. de Villacerf de vouloir bien luy faire la grace 
 d'obtenir du Roy qu'elle pent continuer les conferances & les 
 lecons ordinaires sans pour cela avoir autre dessin que de 
 marquer a Sa Majeste le zele & Tattachement que tous ceux 
 qui composent la d' Compagnie ont a son service. Monsieur 
 de Villacerf a eu la bontc d'obtenir du Roy pour la Cie la 
 grace qu'elle a souhaite ainsy qu'il est porte par la lettre du 
 30 avril adresse au d' S' Felibien & qui avec la premiere lettre est 
 insere'e dans le present registre conformement a I'intention de 
 M. de Villacerf. 
 
 " Copie de la premiere lettre : 
 
 " 'A Paris le 21 av>-il 1694. 
 
 " ' Le roy m'a ordonne de faire cesser I'Academie d'Archi- 
 tecture je vous prie d'en avertir M. de la Hire affin qu'il 
 n'enseigne plus & M'^ les Architectes affin qu'ils ne s'y 
 trouvent plus. Je suis Monsieur vostre &c.' 
 
 " ' Signe De Villacerf & sur I'adresse a M. Felibien &c. 
 
 " Copie de la seconde lettre mentionnee cy devant : 
 
 " ' A Taris Ic 30 avril 1694. 
 
 " ' J'ay rendu compte au Roy de la proposition que Mess", 
 de I'Academie de I'Architecture m'ont fait de s'assembler 
 gratuitement pour faire des conferances. Sa Majeste I'aprouve, 
 & vois pouvez avertir ces INlessieurs, qu'ils peuvent conferer 
 ensemble is: s'assembler les jours ordinaires, mais vous ne 
 devez point marquer leurs assistances puisqu'ils n'en doivent 
 pas etre payez presentement. Sa Majeste trouve bon aussi que 
 M. de la Hire acheve gratuitement son cours d'architecture 
 ainsi (ju'll I'a propose je vous prie de le luy faire savoir. Je 
 suis oblige de vous dire qu'il est ne'cessaire que les lettres que 
 je vous ecrit de la part du Roy, qui concernent I'Academie 
 d'Architecture, soient registrees dans le Registre de lad'
 
 240 APPENDIX. 
 
 Academic, a quoy je vous prie de tenir la main. Je suis 
 Monsieur vostre &c. 
 
 '• ' Signe De Villacerf & plus bas pour adresse a 
 M. Felibien.' 
 
 "Apres la lecture des lettres precedentes Ton a continue 
 d'examiner le livre des edifices antiques du S' des Godets. 
 
 " Bullet. De La Hire. Dorbay. Felibien." 
 
 The sentence with which the report of the above sitting 
 concludes shows that the system, by which the old corporations 
 had been replaced, was now rooted against the possibility of 
 overthrow. 
 
 IX 
 
 Callot's Work at Florence. 
 
 The following communication, obtained for me through the 
 kindness of M. Eugene jAIiintz from the Keeper of the x\rchives 
 at Florence, gives some valuable details concerning Callot's 
 early life and stay in that city. 
 
 " The subscriber certifies that the following notes concern- 
 ing Jacques Callot and some of his works are established 
 by documents preserved in the Medicasan section of the 
 Archives of Florence : 
 
 "On the list of the household, from 1610 to 1620 in- 
 clusively, Callot appears amongst the members of the same for 
 the space of a year (probably from July, 1619, to July, 1620), 
 without salary, but in the enjoyment of all the privileges con- 
 ceded to those in receipt of salaries (F"" 303). 
 
 "In 1618, and in 1619, he is commissioned by the Grand- 
 Duke to etch thirty-two views of the most noteworthy spots in 
 Jerusalem, as will be seen by the two facsimiles of accounts 
 subjoined (F'^ 359, a.q.).
 
 
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 APPENDIX 241 
 
 "In 1619, and in 1620, Callot has a shop in the Galleria 
 di Corte, and works there on commissions for the above-named 
 Grand-Duke, as appears from a (quantity of memoranda, ad- 
 dressed by Callot to Cosimo Latini, the overseer of the gallery, 
 to obtain weekly payment of the wages of a certain Francesco 
 di Paolo, who served him as printer, and, from time to time, to 
 get repaid for expenses incidental to these commissions, amongst 
 which may be noted some engravings representing scenes from 
 the tragedy of ' Solimano,' written by Count Prospero Bonarelli 
 
 (F" 375)- 
 
 "In 1623, the plate by Callot representing the ' Fiera deir 
 Impruneta ' figures amongst the most valuable works of art 
 existing in the Pitti Palace (F" 421 to 26). 
 
 "In 1713, by order of the Grand-Duke Cosimo III., the 
 ' Cruardaroba di Corte ' lends to the grand-ducal printers, 
 Jacopo Guiducci and Santi Franchi, 35 plates by Callot, of 
 various sizes, representing views of the Holy Land ; 15, repre- 
 senting the deeds of the Grand-Duke Ferdinand I. ; 2, repre- 
 senting fireworks which took place in Florence, on the river 
 Arno, in the days of Cosimo II. ; i, representing a ball in the 
 Pitti Palace, with the arms of Cosimo II., and with those of his 
 wife, Maria Maddalena of Austria (F'^ 957 to 82)." 
 
 (Signed) L'archivista, 
 
 Ferdinando Soldi. 
 The 30th April, 18 78. 
 
 Stamped with the seal of the Royal Household, and signed 
 by the " administrator " Perone.
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 X. 
 
 27 NOV'^ 1667. EDIT DU ROY POUR l'eTABLISSEMENT d'uNE 
 MANUFACTURE DES MEUIiLES DE LA COURONNE AUX 
 GOBELINS.* (EXTRACT.) 
 
 ". . . Le roy Henry le Grand notre ayeul, se voyant au milieu 
 de la paix, estima n'en pouvoir mieux faire gouster les fruits a 
 ses peuples qu'en retablissant le commerce & les manu- 
 factures , . . il auroit, par son edit du mois de Janvier 1607 
 etabli la manufacture de toutes sortes de tapisseries tant dans 
 notre bonne ville de Paris qu'en toutes les autres villes qui 
 s'y trouveroient propres, et prepose a I'e'tablissement & 
 direction d'icelles les sieurs de Comans & de la Planche, 
 ausquels, par le meme edit, Ton auroit accorde plusieurs 
 privileges et avantages ... les premiers etablissements qui 
 furent faits ayant e'te negliges & interrompus pendant la licence 
 d'une longue guerre . . . pour les retabllr & pour rendre 
 les etablissements plus immuables en leur fixant un lieu 
 commode & certain, nous aurions fait acquerir de nos deniers 
 I'hostel des Gobelins & plusieurs maisons adjacentes, fait 
 rechercher les peintres de la plus grande reputation, des 
 tapissiers, des sculpteurs, orphevres, ebenistes & autres ouvriers 
 plus habiles en toutes sortes d'arts & metiers, que nous y 
 aurions loges, donne des appartemens a chacun d'eux & 
 accorde des privileges & avantages ; mais d'autant que ces 
 ouvriers augmentent chaque jour . . . aussi nous avons 
 estime qu'il estoit necessaire, pour I'affermissement de ces 
 etablissements de leur donner une forme constante & per- 
 petuelle & les pourvoir d'un reglement convenable a cet effet. 
 A ces causes . . . de I'advis de nostre conseil d'Etat, qui 
 a vu I'Edit du mois de Janvier 1607 . . . nous avons diet, 
 statue & ordonne, disons, statuons & ordonnons ainsi qu'il en 
 suit : 
 
 " 1° C'est k scavoir que la manufacture des tapisseries & 
 autre ouvrages demeurera establie dans Thostel appele des 
 
 * Arch. Nat. O.^ 1054. Edits, Lettres patentes, arrets, declarations, 
 ordonnances du roy. Annees 1573-1731.
 
 APPENDIX. 243 
 
 Gobelins maisons & lieux & deppendances a nous appartenanr, 
 sur la principale porte duquel hostel sera . . . inscript : 
 Manufacture royallc dcs mcublcs de la Couro7ine. 
 
 " 2" Seront les manufactures & deppendances d'icelles regies 
 & administre'es par les ordres de nostre ame & f^al conseiller 
 ordinaire en nos conseils, le sieur Colbert, surintendant de nos 
 bastimens, arts is: manufactures de France & ses successeurs 
 en ladite charge. 
 
 "3° La conduite particulicre des manufactures appartiendra 
 au sieur Le Brun, nostre premier peintre, soubs le titre de 
 directeur, suivant les lettres que nous luy avons accordees 
 le 8 mars 1663, etc., etc. ... 
 
 "4° Le surintendant de nos bastimens & le directeur 
 soubs luy tiendront la manufacture remplie de bons peintres, 
 maistres tapissiers de haute lisse, orphevres, fondeurs, graveurs, 
 lapidaires, menuisiers en ebene & en bois, teinturiers & autres 
 bons ouvriers, en toutes sortes d'arts & mestiers qui sont 
 t^tablis & que le surintendant de nos bastimens tiendra 
 necessaire d'y etablir. . . . 
 
 " 6° Voulons qu'il soit entretenu, dans les dites manufac- 
 tures, a nos dcpens, le nombre 0\: quantite de soixante 
 •enfans. . . . 
 
 " 7° Seront les enfans, lors de leur entree en la dite maison, 
 mis & places dans le Scminaire du Directeur, auquel sera 
 donne un maistre peintre soubs luy, qui aura soin de leur 
 education & instruction. 
 
 "... 10° lis pourront, apres six annees d'apprentissage 
 et quatre annees de service, estre receus maistres, tant dans la 
 bonne ville de Paris que dans toutes les autres du royaume, 
 sans faire experience ny estre tenus d'autre chose que de se 
 presenter devant les maistres gardes des dites marchandises, 
 arts & mestiers. . . . Les dits maitres et gardes seront tenus 
 de les recevoir, sans aucuns frais, sur le certificat du surin- 
 tendant des finances. 
 
 " 11° Les ouvriers employes dans les dites manufactures 
 se retireront, dans les maisons les plus proches de I'hostel des 
 Gobelins ... en toute liberte. . . . 
 
 ''. . . 17" Nous avons faict c\: faisons trcs-cxpresses
 
 244 APPENDIX. 
 
 inhibitions & deffenses a tons marchands et autres personnes- 
 . . . d'achepter ny faire venir des pays estrangers des tapisseries, 
 nv vendre ou debiter aucune des manufactures estrans^eres 
 ou autres que celles qui sont presentement dans notre royaume,. 
 a peine de confiscations d'icelles & d'amende de la valeur de 
 ]a moitie des tapisseries confisquees. . . . 
 
 "... Donnees a Paris, au mois de novembre 1667 «Sc de 
 notre regne le vingtcinq. 
 
 '' (Signe) Louis." 
 & plus bas, " Par le roy 
 
 "De Genegaud.'"
 
 INDEX 
 
 Academical Schools, the, loi 
 Academic des Beaux Esprits, the, 
 
 18,23 
 Academie Fran5aise, the, 18; "Sen- 
 timents on the Cid," 21 ; the 
 
 Dictionary, 23 
 Academy of Architecture, the, 51-81 
 Academy of Inscriptions, the, 54 
 Academy of Painting and Sculpture, 
 
 the, 44, 46, 81-123, 141. 176, 
 
 184, 1S6 
 Academy of St. Luke, the, 102, 1 10 
 Alexander, the Battles of, 182, 184 
 Anguier, Guillaume, painter, 201 
 Anguier, Michel, sculptor, 153, 154 
 Antin, the Due d', surintcndant des 
 
 batiments, 72 
 Antique, study of the, no, 11 1 
 Apollo Gallery, the, 123, 154 
 Architecture, the Academy of, 54, 
 
 61-75 
 Aries, Mansard's roof for the town 
 
 hall of, 71 
 Arnauld, Antoine, 17 
 Arnoul, intendant des galeres, 148 
 Arsenals, Puget employed in the, 
 
 147, 148 
 Art in the seventeenth century, 
 
 French, 2, 44, 46, ico 
 Assembly of Notables, the, 8 
 Audran, Claude, painter, 122-130 
 Audran, Gerard, engraver, 168, 169, 
 
 179-185, 202 
 Auxerre point-lace, 191 
 Avaux, Felibien des, 66 
 
 Bachaumont, quot., 68 
 Bailly, tapestry worker, 200 
 Balland, Philibert, embroiderer, 200 
 
 Ballin, Claude, silversmith, 162, 
 
 206, 207 
 Balzac, 16 
 Banville, 94 
 Bassompierre, 19 
 Baudet, Etienne, engraver, 114, 130, 
 
 I79> 183 
 Baudoin, 144 
 
 Beaubrun, the, court painters, 137 
 Beaufort, the Duke de, 178 
 Beauvais, the tapestries of, 190 
 Bellange, Jacques, engraver, 172 
 Belle, Etienne de la, engraver, 170 
 Bellelievre, De, 12 
 Benedetti, the Abbe, 57 
 Berain, engraver, 183, 202 
 Bernini, Italian architect, 56-62 
 Besan9on, the hospital at, 73 
 Besnard, animal painter, 96, 158, 
 
 196, 201 
 Bicheur, Le, his treatise on Perspec- 
 tive, 175 
 Bievrebache, 45, 47, 118, 193, 201, 
 
 206 
 Blamard, Louis, painter, 195 
 Blanchard, painter, 125, 129 
 Blois, 52 
 
 Blondel, Franjois, lecturer, 66 
 Boehm, 125 
 Boileau, 157 
 
 Boisrobcrt, the Abbe, 19, 23 
 Bomme, expelled from the academi- 
 cal school, 113 
 Bonnemer, painter, 202 
 Bosse, Abraham, engraver, 104 (etc. , 
 
 etc.), 170-187 
 Bossuet sits to Nanteuil, 178 
 Boucher, 139, 144 
 Bouillon, the Duke de, sits to Nan- 
 teuil, 178
 
 246 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Boulle, Andre Charles, 205, 209, 
 210 
 
 Boullogne, Bon, 93 
 
 Boulogne, Louis, 123, 125, 202 
 
 Bourdon, Sebastian, Huguenot pain- 
 ter, 96, 114, 126, 128, 150 (etc., 
 etc.) 
 
 Bourlemont, the Abbe de, 41 
 
 Branchi, Florentine lapidary, 199 
 
 "Breda, the siege of," etching by 
 Callot, 171 
 
 Brice, Germain, 65 
 
 Brosse, Guy de la, founder of the 
 Botanical Gardens, 187 
 
 Bruand, Liberal, architect, 66 
 
 Brun, Le, see Le Brun 
 
 Bulet, Pierre, architect, 74 
 
 Butte des Moidins, the, 75 
 
 Buyster, Philippe, sculptor, Iji, 
 154, 157 
 
 "Cabinet d'Estampes," 181 
 Cabinet of Curiosities, the, 159 
 Caen, designs for a Jesuit church 
 
 at, 73 
 Caffieri, Genoese wood-carver, 158- 
 
 161, 201 
 Calderon, 124 
 Callot, Jacques, engraver, 98, 169- 
 
 173 
 
 Calvo, De, the defender of Maes- 
 
 tricht, 178 
 Camaye, tapestry workers, the, 192 
 Canal des deitx Me>s, the, 76 
 "Caprice," etching by Callot, 172 
 Caracci, engravings of the paintings 
 
 of the, 183 
 Carpet factory, the royal, 189, 191 
 Cartoons, Yvart's, 196 
 Caryatides at the Louvre, the, 151 
 Caylus, Comte de, 165 
 Cerisy, the Abbe, 21 
 Chalais, Count de, 10 
 Chakographic, La, 182 
 Chambers of Marine Insurance, 39 
 Chambord, 52 
 
 Chambre, De la, surgeon, 199 
 Champagne, J. B. de, painter, 125, 
 
 127, 139 
 Champagne, Philippe de, portrait 
 
 painter, 98, 119, 126, 137 
 Chantclou, De, steward of the royal 
 
 household, 58, 91, 136 
 
 Chapelain, poet, 19, 23, 105 
 Chapelle, La, 202, 203 
 Chardin, 145 
 
 Chateau, engraver, 179, 183 
 Chateau de Maisons, 79 
 Chef-de-ville, Fran9ois, French gem - 
 
 cutter, 200 
 Chemin, Catharine du, flower pain- 
 ter, 162 
 Cheron, Louis, Huguenot painter, 
 
 96 
 Church patronage, abuse of, 96 
 Cid, the, 9, 20 
 Clagny, Mansard builds the palace 
 
 of, 70, 76 
 Claude, 143, 168 
 Clement, surgeon, 199 
 Clisson, the Hotel, 102 
 Cochet, Cristofle, sculptor, 108 
 Cochin, Nicolas, engraver, 170 
 Code Louis (1667), the, 48 
 Code Maritime (1681), the, 48 
 Code Noir, the, 48 
 Code of Commerce {1673), the, 48 
 Colbert, 2, 18, 30-80, 86, 90-98, 
 
 104, 107, 121, 122, 133, 147, 177, 
 
 178, 189, 193, 212 
 Comans, the, tapestry workers, 192 
 Compagnie des Indes Orientales, 39, 
 
 190 
 Comte, Florent le, quot., 134, 180 
 Conde, 29, 30; sits to Nanteuil, 178 
 Conditioning houses of Roubaix and 
 
 Lyons, the, 43 
 Conrart, Valentin, poet, 18 
 " Conseil des batiments," the, 61 
 Consistory of Montauban, the, 16 
 Corneille, author of the Cid, 9, 16, 
 
 20-22 
 Corneille, Michel, painter, 107, 108, 
 
 127, 137, 203 
 Courajod, 116 
 Cousin, engraver, 168 
 Cousinet, silversmith, 206 
 Couston, Guillaume and Nicolas, 
 
 161 
 Coypel, Charles Antoine, Spanish 
 
 sculptor, 114, 152, 161, 164,201 
 Coypel, Noel, painter, 93, 122, 125, 
 
 127, 202 
 Crequi, the Due de, 58 
 Croix, Jean la, tapestry worker, 
 
 197 
 Crucifix aux Anges, the, 182
 
 INDEX. 
 
 J47 
 
 Cucci, Domenico, joiner and carver, 
 
 197. 199, 201 
 Curiosities, the Cabinet of, 159 
 Cussac, painter, 201 
 
 D'Agard, painter, 96 
 
 D'Antin, tlie Due, 72 
 
 Daret, Pierre, engraver, 168, 169, 
 
 179 
 D'Argenville, qiiot., 137 
 De Beaufort, the Duke, 178 
 De Bellelievre, 12 
 Debonnaire's silver mirrors, 207 
 De Bouillon, the Duke, 178 
 De Bourleniont, the Abbe, 41 
 De Calvo, defender of Maestricht, 
 
 178 
 De Caylus, Comte, 165 
 De Chalais, Comte, 10 
 De Chambre, Anne, 207 
 De Champagne, J. B., 125, 127, 
 
 139 
 
 De Champagne, Philippe, 98, 119, 
 
 126. 137 
 De Chantelou, steward of the 
 
 royal household, 58, 91, 136 
 De Crequi, the Due, 58 
 De Fontenay, Blain, flower painter, 
 
 97. 136 
 De Francine, Pierre, engmeer. 155 
 De Gissey, Henri, 121 
 De la Belle, Etienne, engraver, 170 
 De Laborde, quot., 65 
 De la Brosse, Guy, the founder of 
 
 the Botanical Garden, 187 
 De la Chambre, surgeon, 199 
 De la Fosse, painter and decorator, 
 
 125-140 
 De la Hire, professor and lecturer, 
 
 De la Blanche, Fran90is, Flemish 
 
 tapestry worker, 192 
 De la Rochefoucauld, the Duke, 19 
 Delaulne, engraver, 168 
 De la Valette, the Duke, 1 1 
 De Leu, engraver, 167 
 De Longueville, the Duke, 178 
 Delorme's spiral staircase, 65 
 De MaroUcs, the Abbe Michel, his 
 
 collection, 181 
 De Mergues, Mathieu, 19 
 De Montmorency, rebellion of the 
 
 Duke, 7, .9 
 D'Epernon, the Duke, 11 
 
 De Pompadour, Madame, 144 
 
 De Retz, 30; sits to Nanteuil, 178 
 
 De Rohan, the Duke, 16 
 
 De Sancy, French Ambassador at 
 
 Constantinople, 119 
 De Sandras, Courtilz, 40 
 Des Avaux, Felibien, 66 
 Desbrosses, Jacques, builder of the 
 
 Luxembourg, 78 
 Descartes, 16 
 De Seve, Gilbert, painter, 127, 137, 
 
 194, 201, 203 
 Desjardins, sculptor, 157-161 
 De Soubise, the Duke, 9, 16 
 De Sourdis, the Archbishop, 11, 15 
 De Troy, portrait painter, 137 
 De Villacerf, Colbert, surintendant 
 
 des batiments, 72, 74 
 De Villers, Claude, silversmith, 206 
 " Dictionary," the, 23 
 Diderot, 51, 137, 139, 144 
 D'Infreville, 149 
 Dome des Invalides (1689), 71 
 Domenichino, engravings of the 
 
 paintings of, 183 
 Dorbay, Fran5ois, architect, 65, 66, 
 
 75 
 Dorigny, Louis, 93 
 
 Dubois, Jean and Andre, gem- 
 cutters, 200 
 
 Dubourg, the looms of, 189 
 
 Du Chemin, Catharine, flower 
 painter, 162 
 
 Du Fresnoy, 154 
 
 Dughet, Caspar, painter, 143, 180 
 
 Du Metz, Colbert's chief clerk, 105, 
 108 
 
 Dunkirk, allegorical treatment of 
 the taking of, 105 
 
 Duplessis' " History of Engraving 
 in France," 169, 172 
 
 Dupont, Louis, tapestry worker, 204 
 
 Dupont, Pierre, at the Savonncrie, 
 189, 191 
 
 Dupre, Guillaume, silversmith, 206 
 
 Diirer, Callot studies, 173 
 
 Dutel, Jacques, silversmith, 206 
 
 Duvet, engraver, 168 
 
 liCoi.E DES Beaux Arts, the, 99 
 Ecouen, 52 
 
 Edelinck, engraver, 179-184, 199 
 Edict des Eaux et Forets (1669), 
 the, 48
 
 248 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Edict of St. Jean de Liiz in favour 
 of engraving, the, 1 76-181 
 
 Edict on Commerce, Colbert's, 39 
 
 Emery, 29 
 
 England, the prejudice against en- 
 graving in, 187 
 
 Engraving and etching, 167-188 
 
 Epernon, the Duke d', 1 1 
 
 Errard, Charles, Ratabon's son, 89; 
 rector of the school of Erance at 
 Rome, 109 ; in charge at the 
 Louvre, etc., 120; his rival Le 
 Brun, 122, 153; Bosse, 175 
 
 I'^spingola, 157 
 
 Etchers, 168-188 
 
 Fa ED, 124 
 
 Fame and Virtue, the temples of, 
 
 197 
 Fame, the fountains of, 157 
 Faret, Nicolas, 19 
 Fayette, Simon, embroiderer, 200 
 Fenelon, 216 
 
 Ferdinand, Huguenot painter, 96 
 "Fiera dell' Impruneta," Callot's, 
 
 170 
 Fildes, 124 
 
 Flanders, lacemakers from, 45 
 Fontaine, La, 157 
 Fontainebleau, 120, 157 
 Fontarabia, siege of, 11 
 Fontenay, B. de, flower painter, 
 
 97, 136 
 
 Forest, decorator, 143 
 
 Fosse, De la, painter, 125-129, 
 
 ^yi, .140 
 
 Fountain of Latona, the, 157 
 Fountains of Fame, the, 157 
 Fouquet, 32-39, 48-51, 121, 148, 
 
 153, 177, I7«, 193 
 Fragonard, 144 
 Francart, ornamental designer, 196, 
 
 201 
 France, school of, at Rome, 127 
 Francine, Pierre de, engineer, 155 
 French navy, the, 37 
 Fresnoy, Du, 154 
 Friquet, Jean, student at the 
 
 academical school, 103 
 Frith, 124 
 Fronde, the, 29 
 
 Gachetti, Florentinelapidary, 199 
 Gallery of Mirrors, the, 160, 206 
 
 Gaston, Duke of Orleans, 10 
 
 Genevay, quot., 13'^, 134 
 
 Genoa, Puget's Saint Sebastian at, 
 
 147 
 Genoels, Abraham, landscape 
 
 painter, 143, 196, 201 
 Gervaise, sculptor, 123 
 Giffart, engraver, 185 
 Gilbert, 124, 125 
 "Girar," the model, 103 
 Girardon, Francois, sculptor, 113, 
 
 123, 149-162" 
 Gissey, Henri de, 121 
 Gittard, Pierre, sculptor, 66 
 Glassworkers from Venice, 45, 190 
 Gobelins, the, 45, 117-123, 142, 
 
 184, 1S9-200 
 Godeau, Bishop of Grasse, 15, 18 
 Gold medals by Warin, the, 105, 
 
 107 
 Golle, cabinet-maker, 205 
 Gomb.iult, poet, 18, 21 
 Goodall, 124 
 
 Grand Prix, the, 105, 106 
 Gravet, Jean, his nef d'or, 207 
 Greuze, 187 
 
 Grotte de Thetis, the, 155-157 
 Guerin, Gilles, sculptor, 151, 153, 
 
 Guido, engravings from the pic- 
 tures of, 183 
 
 Guilds, the, 82, 116, 117, 123, 150, 
 190, 220 
 
 Guillain, Simon, sculptor, 150 
 
 Guitard, from Le Brun's design, 
 does "Le Reveil de la Terre" in 
 1850, 123 
 
 Habert, poet and soldier, 21 
 Halle, 93 
 
 Halls of Peace and War, the, 162 
 Henri IV., manufactures started by, 
 
 189 
 Hercules, Puget's, 147 
 Herkomer, 124 
 Herrard, engraver, 179 
 Hillerin, Jacques, conseillcr an 
 
 pat'le/nejit, 17 
 Hire, La, 74, 137, 192, 203 
 Hogarth, loi, 107 
 Holbein, Callot studies, 173 
 Hook, 124 
 Horsley, 124
 
 INDEX. 
 
 249 
 
 Houasse, painter and decorator, 125, 
 
 128, 140, 201, 203 
 Houdon, sculptor, 166 
 Houzeau, sculptor, 164 
 Huguenots, the, 6, 9, 16, 95, 96 
 Huret, engraver, 179 
 Hutinot, sculptor, 158 
 
 Indes Orientales, the Compag- 
 
 nie des, 39 
 Industrial policy, Colbert's, 40 
 Industry and art, 45 
 Ingres on Le Brun, quot., 138 
 Insurance, the Chambers of Marine, 
 
 39 
 
 Invalides, the Dome des (1689), 
 
 71, 75 
 Italy, French students in, 107-109 
 
 Jaii.lOT, Simon, worker in ivory, 
 
 142 
 Jans, tapestry weaver, 194, 197, 200 
 "jaquin, student, 114 
 Jouvenet, painter, 125, 126, 128, 
 
 140 
 
 Kellers, the, sculptors, 164, 165 
 Kerchove, Van, dyer, 195 
 
 Laborde, De, quot., 65 
 
 La Chapelle, 202 
 
 La Croix, Jean, tapestry worker, 
 
 '97 
 La Fontaine, 157 
 
 Lagrenee, painter, 137, 144 
 
 La Hire, 137, 192, 203 
 
 Landseer, John, iSS 
 
 Languedoc, the "pacification" of, 
 7, 16 
 
 La Pcrdrix, student, 1 14 
 
 Lapidaries, Florentine, 199 
 
 Largilliere, painter, 137 
 
 La Rochelle, 7, 37 
 
 Lasne, Michel, engraver, 16S, 169, 
 I So 
 
 Latona, the fountain of, 157, 162 
 
 Laurent, Henri, tapestry worker, 
 189, 197 
 
 Le Bicheur, his treatise on per- 
 spective, 175 
 
 Le Brun, 61, 87-92, 98, 99, 105, 
 109, 116, I19-156, 179, 181, 186, 
 195, 200, 203 
 
 Leclerc, Sebastian, engraver, 170, 
 
 179, 182, 183 
 Le Comte, Florent, qitot., 134, iSo 
 Lefebvre, Pierreand Jean, Florentine 
 
 weavers, 191, 197, 200 
 Legendre, Nicolas, sculptor, 151-158 
 Legeret, sculptor, 161 
 Legrand, sculptor, 158 
 Legros, sculptor, 151, 158, 159, 164 
 Lehongre, sculptor, 151, 157-159 
 Leighton, Sir Frederic, 124 
 Lemargue, surgeon, 199 
 Lemercier, architect, 63, 65 > 
 Lenain, the three brothers, painters, 
 
 98, 138 
 Lepaultre, Antoine, sculptor, 66 
 Lepautre, engraver, 148, 179, 202 
 Lerambert, Louis, sculptor, 151, 
 
 158 
 Le Romain, Picart, engraver, 185 
 
 Lescot, Pierre, architect, 61 
 
 L'Espagnandell, Huguenot painter, 
 
 96, 158-161 
 Le Sueur, Eustache, painter, 113, 
 
 120, 137 
 Le Tellier, 30, 178 
 Leu, De, engraver, 167 
 Levasseur, quot., 48 
 Le Vau, architect, 56-6S, 125 
 Leyde, Lucas Van, Callot studies, 
 
 173 
 Lichery, Louis, director of the 
 
 Academy school, 184, 199 
 Life classes, 89, 92, 99-105, III, 
 
 114 
 Lionardo, Callot studies, 173 
 Loir, Alexis, silversmith, 206 
 Loir, Nicolas, decorator, 125, 1 27 
 Long, 124 
 
 L'Ongre, see Lehongre 
 Longueville, the Duke de, 178 
 Lorgues, the Virgin of, 146 
 Lourdet, Simon, tapestry worker, 
 
 191 
 Louvois, 74, 75, 126, 142, 162, 202 
 Louvre, the, 53-76, 120, 123, 1S9 
 Luxembourg, the, 78, 130 
 Luxury of the French court, 217 
 Lyons, the art school at, 117 
 
 MacLean, 125 
 
 Magnier, Laurent, sculptor, 86, 151- 
 159
 
 :5o 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Maincy, the tapestry workers at, 
 
 193, 195 
 
 Maitrise, the, 83, loi, 103 
 
 Malleville, poet, 18 
 
 Afansarade, the, 93 
 
 Mansard, Fran9ois, architect, 79, 
 122, 162, 177 
 
 Mansard, Jean Hardouin, archi- 
 tect, 69 
 
 Mantagon, student, 113 
 
 " Manufactures de France," 190 
 
 Marillac, Marshal de, 8, 10 
 
 Marly. 70, 76, 130, 136 
 
 MaroUes, Abbe Michel de, 181 
 
 Marot, student, 113 
 
 Marsy, Gaspard and Balthazar, de- 
 corators, 122, 123, 1 51-159 
 
 Masse, Jean, 205 
 
 Masson, engraver, 158, 169 
 
 Mathew, Antony, 196 
 
 Mazarin, Cardinal, 29, 32, 36, 52, 
 85, 94, 121, 163, 178, 193 
 
 Mazeline, sculptor, 158 
 
 Megliorini, Florentine lapidary, 
 199 
 
 Mellan, Claude, engraver, i58, 169, 
 
 183 
 
 Mergues, Mathieu de, 19 
 
 Merlin, silversmith, 206 
 
 Meulen, Van der, painter of battle- 
 pieces, 130, 142, 185, 201 
 
 Meunier, prize winner at the aca- 
 demical school, 107 
 
 Michelin, Huguenot painter, 96 
 
 Mignard, Pierre, portrait painter, 
 66, 109, 126, 137-139. 154. 214 
 
 Millais, Sir John, 124 
 
 Millet, Francisque, painter and 
 engraver, 143, 186 
 
 Mirrors, Gallery of, 125, 128, 131, 
 160, 206 
 
 " Miseres et Malheurs de la Guerre," 
 etching by Callot, 171 
 
 Monnoyer, Baptiste, flower painter, 
 125, 196 
 
 Montagu, the Duke of, 96 
 
 Montmorency, the Duke de, 7> 9 
 
 Montpellier, 7 
 
 Monzon, the Peace of, 7 
 
 Morin, Jean, engraver, 182 
 
 " Moses," engraving by P. de 
 Champagne, 181 
 
 Mosin, tapestry worker. 197 
 
 Mosnier, painter, 136 
 
 Nanteuil, engraver, 176-183 
 National greatness, 4 
 Navy, the French, 37 
 Noailles, Hotel des (1679), 71 
 Nocret, Jean, 120 
 Notables, the Assembly of, 8 
 
 Observatory, the, 64, 75 
 Octagon Cabinet, the, 159 
 Oppenard, Guelder Jean, parquetry 
 
 maker, 205 
 Opstal, Van, Flemish sculptor, 152, 
 
 157 
 Orange, the Prince of, 73 
 Order, the love of, 3 
 Ordonnance Criminale (1670), the, 
 
 48 
 
 Paillet, painter, 128 
 Palais des Toiirnelles, the, 78 
 Parliament of Paris, intimidation of 
 
 the, 12 
 Patel, painter, 143 
 Patigny, engraver, 183 
 Peace and War, the halls of, 127- 
 
 133 
 
 Pcmtres-ymagiers, the corporation 
 
 of, 83 
 Perdrix, La, student, 114 
 Perefixe sits to Nanteuil, 178 
 Pe^rault, Charles, author, Colbert's 
 
 clerk, 34, 54-59. 105. 124 
 Perrault, Claude, architect and 
 
 doctor, 56-64, 129 
 Perrier, Jacques, engraver, 168 
 Perspective, Bosse lecturer on, 174; 
 
 Le Bicheur, 175 
 Pesne, engraver, 169, 182 
 Picart, engraver, 179, 183 
 Pigalle, sculptor, 166 
 Pitan, engraver, 178 
 Place Royale, the, 78 
 Planche, Francois de la, Flemish 
 
 weaver, 192 
 Point-lace of Auxerre and Rheims, 
 
 191 
 Poissant, Thibaut, painter, 151-155 
 Poll-tax, the, 49 
 Pompadour, Madame de, 144 
 Poussin, painter, 98, 1 19-123, 136, 
 
 139 
 Poynter, 124 
 
 Protestant Academicians turned out, 
 the, 95
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Puget, rierrc, sculptor, 146-148, 
 166 
 
 Pussort, Colbert's uncle, 48 
 Pyramid, the, 157 
 
 Rabkl, engraver, 167 
 
 Racan, author, 21 
 
 Raon, sculptor, 158, 164 
 
 Raphael, 135 
 
 Rapid production, 136, 137 
 
 Ratabon, Antoine, chief com- 
 missioner of works, 88, 94, 109, 
 121 
 
 Ravaillac, 189 
 
 Regnauldin, Thomas, sculptor, 123, 
 
 151-158 
 Regnesson, Nicolas, engraver, 178, 
 
 179 
 Reims, Porte de Mars at, 73 
 Remy, embroiderer, 200 
 Renaissance, the, 4, 52 
 Rennes Cathedral, 73 
 Restout, painter, 145 
 Retz, De, 30, 178 
 Reynolds, Sir Joshua, 137 
 Rheims point-lace, 191 
 Richelieu, Cardinal, 3-28, 120, 155, 
 
 178 
 Rigaud, portrait pamter, 129, 137 
 Riquet, engineer, 77 
 Rochefort, the port of, 38 
 Rochefoucauld, the Duke de la, 19 
 Rochelle, La, 7, 37 
 Rochon, the Concierge, 195, 198 
 Roger, prize winner at the academical 
 
 school, 107 
 Rohan, the Duke de, 16 
 Romain, Ficart le, engraver, 185 
 Romano, Giulio, painter, 202, 203 
 Rome, the school of France at, 46, 
 
 109 
 Roubaix, the conditioning house of, 
 
 43 
 Rousseau, Jacques, Huguenot 
 
 painter, 96, 125, 128, 136, 137, 
 
 186 
 
 Rousselet, engraver, 182, 202 
 
 St. Cyr, 76 
 
 St. Germains, 123 
 
 St. Luke, the Academy of, 102, no 
 
 St. Mandc, 153 
 
 St. Sebastian, Puget's, 147 
 
 Sancy, De, French ambassador at 
 
 Constantinople, 119 
 Sandras, Courtik de, qtiot., 40 
 Sarrazin, Jacques, sculptor, 102, 
 
 121, 150-153 
 Sassoferato, painter, 120 
 Saturn, the fountains of, 157 
 Savonnerie, the, 45, 191-205 
 Scarron, conseilkr de grand' chambre, 
 
 Sceaux, the courts of, 147 
 School of Architecture, the, 44 
 School of France at Rome, the, 46, 
 
 109, 127 
 School, the academical, 101-118 
 Schuppen, Van, engraver, 179 
 Scuderi, poet, 22 
 Seguier, Chancellor, 94, 104, 120, 
 
 142, 150 
 Serizay, poet, 19, 21, 22 
 Serre, Michel, painter, 186 
 Seve, Gilbert de, painter, 127, 137, 
 
 194, 2CI, 203 
 Sevigne, Madame de, 31 
 Sevres, 117, 118 
 " Siege of Breda," Callot's, 171 
 Silvestre, Israel, engraver, 179-183 
 Simon, engraver, 17S 
 Sirmond, pamphleteer, 19, 23 " 
 Somer, Jacques, maker of mar- 
 quetry, 205 
 Sorbonne, the, 17, 65, 155 
 Soubeyran, court pensioner, 183 
 Soubise, the Duke de, 9, 16 
 Sourdis, the Archbishop de, II, 1$ 
 Stella, Claudine, engraver, 169, 182 
 Sueur, Eustache le, 113, 120, 137 
 
 Tapestry, 190-201 
 
 Tellier, Le, under secretary of state, 
 
 30, 178 
 Temporiti, sculptor, 158, 159, 198, 
 
 201 
 "Testament Politique," the, 14 
 Testelin, Henri, 96, 125 
 Testelin, Louis, 95, 103 
 Thetis, the Grotto de, 155"' 57 
 "Time and Truth," Poussin's, 1S4 
 Toulon, Puget at, I47-I49 
 Tournier, engraver, 183 
 Trianon, 70, 76 
 Troy, De, 137 
 Troyes, English serges made at, 
 
 161
 
 252 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Tuby, decorator, 157-164, 194, 198, 
 201 
 
 Tuileries, 76, 120, 125 
 Turenne sits to Nanteuil, 178 
 
 Val de Grace, 154 
 Valette, the Duke de la, 11 
 Vallet, engraver, 179 
 Vanderban, engraver, 183 
 Vander Meulen, battle painter, 130, 
 
 142, 185, 201 
 Van Kerchove, dyer, 195 
 Van Leyde, Lucas, 173 
 Vanloo, painter, 115, 139 
 "Vanloter," 98 
 Van Opstal, Flemish sculptor, 152, 
 
 157 
 Van Schuppen, enf^raver, 179 
 Vau, Le, 56-68, 125 
 Vaux le Vicomte, 66, 121, 154, 193 
 Velasquez, 144 
 Vendome, the Place, 72-75 
 Venetian glassworkers, 45, 190 
 Verdier, painter, 125, 128, 202, 203 
 
 Vermeulen, Corneille, engraver, 178 
 Versailles, 52-80, 120-145, 156-164 
 Viaucourt, silversmith, 206 
 "Vices," etching by Callot, 172 
 Vignon, Claude, painter, 125, 128 
 Villacerf, Colbert de, 72, 74 
 Villers, Claude de, silversmith, 206 
 Vincennes, 53 
 
 Virgin of Lorgues, Puget's, 146 
 Vitruvius, Perrault's, 183 
 Vivien, painter, 137 
 Vouet, Simon, painter, 102, iig, 
 
 127, 139, 150, 168, 186 
 Vuitry, quot., 49 
 
 Wall-painting, 135 
 
 Warin, medallist and master of the 
 
 Mint, 207-209 
 Water Garden, the, 157, 164 
 Watteau, 145 
 
 YvART, Baudren, designer of tapes- 
 tries, 195, 196 
 
 THE END. 
 
 CHARLES DICKENS AND EVANS, CRYSTAL PALACE PRESS.
 
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