Vtft^-.[ir Of CALlFtmNlA SAN DiCGO 3 1822 01169 7364 ur.sued by the various literatures that issued from these times. They came into being in the midst of a crowd of obscure and discordant circumstances which it would be necessary to distinguish and connect, in order properly to link together the chain of facts, and to discern their pro- gressive influence. Do we believe that we have discover- ed some of those decisive indications which serve to ex- plain the character and conduct of peoples? We soon perceive that even these indications do not disclose the secret of the causes which have determined the genius of literatures ; for the great events of history have acted upon letters only by unknown and indirect affinities, wliich it is almost impossible to apprehend. On beholding THE TIME OF CORNEILLE. 27 Dante in Italy and Milton in England, and observing the great resemblance that exists in the genius of these two poets, though born under climates so difterent, and that is still more evident between the subjects of their poetry, we are disposed to seek for the reasons of this conformity in general causes, and similarity of position. We per- suade ourselves that the religious controversies and civil troubles in the midst of which Dante and Milton both lived, by directing the imagination of these men to the most serious interests of life, produced the circumstances best calculated to fertilize their genius. In the grandeur of the thoughts which must have formed the subject of their meditations, in the violence of the passions which agitated their souls, we find the source of that terrible sublimity and sombre energy which are equally remarka- ble in the " Paradise Lost" and in the " Divina Com- media," and which are equally associated, in both poems, with that theological subtlety, that hyperbolic exaggera- tion, and that abuse of allegory, which are the natural defects oT an imagination that has hitherto known no check, and of a mind that is dazzled by the unexpected play of its own faculties. But when we think we have thus satisfactorily, accounted for these great poetical master-pieces of Italy and England, we must inquire why similar circumstances produced nothing of the kind in Franco ; why the disorders of the League did not bear fruit similar to that borne by the revolutions of England and the civil wars of Florence ; and why, though almost contemporary with Milton, and living at a time when literature was at least in as forward a state as when Dante wrote, Malherbe bears so little resemblance to either ? We shall look for the secret of the different effects which have resulted in the different literatures, in the special nature of the governments, in the manners 28 POETRY IN FRANCE BEFORE of the peoples, in the particular character of the troubles which agitated them, and in the personal position in which the authors and actors of these troubles were placed ; and we shall thus be led to acknowledge the in- fluence of those innumerable secondary causes, whose nature or power it is impossible accurately to define, and whose reality it is sometimes even impossible to affirm. Such are the principal difficulties encountered by the historian who is anxious to discover the causes that determined the character and direction of modern litera- tures, at their origin and during the epochs nearest the period of their greatest glory. Compelled to content himself with views of the subject that are seldom com- plete, and with researches that are rarely well-directed, he can do no more, after great study, than arrive at a few general results, and some certain affinities ; and afterward connect with these fixed and luminous points, all the facts which seem attached to them by any bond, more or less clear and more or less remote. This is what I shall attempt to do in giving a sketch of the progress of poetry in France until the period when Corneille in- augurated the glorious age of its fullest splendor. In their complicated and obscure position, the literary spirit was developed, among modern nations, in a very rapid and incomplete manner. We find it animated and active, even to refinement, in certain directions ; while, at the same time, it is inert and rude every where else. In the midst of the darkness of general ignorance, partial enlightenment of mind resembles those will-o'-the-wisps which deceive as regards the spot they illuminate as well as respecting those which they leave in obscurity. Too easily satisfied with what it perceives, the mind errs through ignorance, and exaggerates the importance of what it has discovered as well as the uselessness of that THE TIME OF CORAEILLK. 29 of which it is ignorant. Those great features of nature, those first outlines of society, which the simplicity and small number of objects allowed the ancients to catch with so much felicity and to depict with such fidelity, could not be so clearly discerned by the moderns. Sketches, frequently of a puerile character, but treated with a seriousness that increased their puerility, herald- ed the first efforts of that poetical spirit which taste could not accompany ; for taste is the result of a full knowledge of things, and of a just estimate of their true value. The want of truth, however, soon brought poets back to the observation of their own feelings — the only subject that they could thoroughly understand — and in- troduced into poetry the description of a kind of emo- tions almost unknown to the poets of antiquity. Love, which, in the form that has been given to it by our modern manners, is the most fruitful of all the passions in fine and delicate shades, was also best adapted to give occupation to minds disposed to the observation of details. In France especially, where it had become the principal business of an idle nobility, love was almost exclusively the subject of the earliest efforts of poetic genius. Often unaffected and truthful in its sentiments, it also fre- quently introduced into its inventions that subtlety, that search after ingenious and unexpected traits of character, which has constituted the chief defect of our literature. Raimbault de Vaqueiras, a poet and gentleman of Provence, loved and' was tolerated by Beatrice, sister of the Marquis of Montferrat.' Beatrice, on her marriage, thought it her duty not to continue to receive his atten- tions. Raimbault, nettled at this, " because the lady had " r dico I'uno e Taltro Raimbaldo Che cantar per Beatrice in Monferrato." . . .U .ic;-, .-V ^, PeirarcA, " Trionfo d'Amore," cap. iv. 30 POETRY IN FRANCE BEFORE changed her opinion, as well as to show that the change was agreeable to himself," wrote her a farewell song, sufficiently tender in its expressions, hut in which, " at each couplet, he changed the language in which he wrote." The first was in Provençal, the second in Tuscan, the third in French, the fourth in Grascon, the fifth in Spanish, " and the last couplet was a mixture of words borrowed from all these five languages ; so lively an invention," adds Pasquier, "that if it had been presented to the knights and ladies who were judges of love, I am willing to believe that they would have decided in favor of the renewal of the loves of Beatrice v/ith this gentle poet."* Thus, knights and ladies, if Pasquier judges them aright, would have granted every thing to the ingenuity of the poet, without giving much heed to love itself, which probably occupied only a small place in such a gentillesse. Much love, therefore, was not necessary to inspire a poet ; but the little love that he really felt, he could make large enough to fill his verses, just as scruples magnify devotion and occupy life. Pierre Vidal, a troubadour of Marseilles, who loved Adelaide de Roque-Martine, the wife of the Viscount of Marseilles, was so unfortunate in his amours as to afford sport to the Viscount himself. One day the poet found the Viscountess asleep and snatch- ed a kiss ; she awoke and was very angry. Probably Vidal annoyed her still more as a lover than he amused her as a poet ; for, delighted at having found a pretext for getting rid of a troublesome admirer, whose poetry was his only merit, she persisted so inexorably in her anger, that even her husband could not obtain Vidal's pardon. In despair, or thinking that he ought to be so, Vidal embarked for the Holy Land in the suite of King Richard. As poetical in his bravery as in his amours, ' " Recherches de la Franco," lib. vii. cap. iv. vol. ii. col. 695, 696 THE TIME OF CORNEILLE. 31 and doubtless one of those " whose tongue," to use Pe- trarch's phrase, " was at once their lance and sword, their casque and buckler,'" he fancied that he had per- formed great exploits, and so celebrated them in his songs. After several singular adventures, he returned to France, still enamored of the Viscountess of Marseilles, although in the mean time he had married a wife of his own, and miserable at not having obtained a return of the kiss which he had snatched. What Vidal de- manded was not a new kiss, but a liberal gift of the old one : not to have granted him this would have been very cruel. At the request of her husband, the Viscountess yielded at last ; Vidal was satisfied, and so well satisfied that, after having written a song in commemoration of his happiness, he ceased to pursue an amour which fur- nished no further theme for his Muse.^ Still more disposed than Pierre Vidal to be satisfied with the gifts of his imagination, GreofFroy Rudel, that troubadour of whom Petrarch said, " that he made use of the sail and the oar to go in search of death," sang the praises of the Countess of Tripoli, whom he had never seen, but with whom he had fallen in love from the re- ports which had been made to him of her beauty by many pilgrims on their return from the Holy Land. He sent his verses to her, and " it is highly probable," says Pasquier, "that he was not without the written thanks of the lady ; which was the cause that this gentleman, commanded more and more by love, deliberated to sail to her ; but, in order not to serve as a laughing-stock to his friends, he desired to cover his voyage under a pretext of devotion, saying that he was going to visit the holy places "A cui la lingua Lancia e spada fù senipre, e scudo ed clmo." Pc » S'y viennent fournir de quenouilles, De pipeaux, de joncs, et de glais," he will not immediately add : " Où l'on voit sauter les grenouilles, Qui de frayeur s'y vont cacher, Sitôt qu'on les veut approcher."* Truth of this kind, devoid alike of grace and interest, is not poetical truth ; for a poet, a man whose mind is deeply impressed with elevated or agreeable ideas and * These lines are quoted from Saint-AmanVs poem on " Solitude."' See the "Recueil des plus belles Pièces des Poètes Français," vol. iii. p. 236. 90 rOETUY IN FRANCE BEFORE images, will certainly not think of the frogs that are frisking about at his feet, or, at least, will not pay so much attention to them as to describe them. It was, nevertheless, by truth of this factitious and vulgar character, that readers, as destitute as the poets themselves of that feeling of the beautiful which is only the true placed in its right position, allowed themselves to be delighted. In Colletet's' Monologue^ which serves as the preface to the " Comédie des Tuileries," by five authors, we find these lines : " La canne s'humecter de la bourbe de l'eau, D'une voix enrouée et d'un battement d'aile Animer le canard qui languit auprès d'elle.'"^ Cardinal de Richelieu, to whom CoUetet read this mono- logue, was so enraptured with the piece, that he gave the author fifty pistoles on the spot, saying that it was a re- ward for these three lines only, and that " the King was not rich enough to pay for the remainder of the poem."^ The Cardinal merely desired that, for the sake of greater exactitude, Colletet should introduce this alteration into his first line : " La canne larhotter dans la bourbe de l'eau," and the poet^ found it very difficult to avoid making the ' The father of the Colletet mentioned by Boileau. ^ See this monologue at the commencement of the " Comédie des Tuil- eries." Paris, 1638. ^ Pel/ssun, " Histoire de l'Académie," p. 182 ; and Auhcry, " Histoire du Cardinal Duc de Richelieu," vol. ii. p. 434. •• On leaving the Cardinal, whom he had apparently not yet thoroughly convinced, Colletet wrote him a letter on the subject. " The Cardinal had just finished reading it," says Pelisaon, " when some of his courtiers arrived, who began to compliment hiAi about some success just achieved by the arms of the King, and said, 'that nothing could resist his Eminence.' 'You are mistaken,' answered Richelieu, laughing, ' I find even in I'aris persons who resist me ;' and when he was asked who these foolhardy persons were : ' (JoUetet is the man,' he replied, ' for after having fought with me yesterday about a word, he docs not surrender yet, but has just written me this long letter on the subject.' " Pelis.ton, " Histoire de l'Académie," p. 182, et scq. THE TIME OF CORNEILLE. 91 correction, which, at all events, would have been in per- fect keeping with the whole of the picture.' Any one who reads the poets of this period will be struck most forcibly with that want of meditation which prevented their taste from becoming pure, and their sensibility from becoming profound ; they sometimes pass before a great idea, but they never stop to consider it, for they have not the least suspicion of the poetry and grandeur which it contains ; in their view, it is a mere mental combination, a fleeting spark which, far from kindling a lasting fire, burns only to become extinguished speedily. To this coldness, which inflicts a mortal injury upon poetry, was soon added that negligence which is an essential characteristic of the grace of people of fashion, and by which they denaturalize the things which they in- tend to appropriate, in order to adapt them to their use. As soon as wit became fashionable, every body wished to write verses ; and, thanks to the privilege possessed by persons of quality "of knowing every thing without having learned any thing," every body wrote verses. Thenceforward it was necessary for poets, in order to be in the fashion, to write verses like persons of quality, that is, without labor — without what was called "ped- antry"; it was necessary to give them the "cavalicT turn" of which that Scudéry was so proud who boasted of having " used many more matches to light arquebuses than to light candles," and of being sprung from a family which had never " worn feathers elsewhere than in the hat," and who wished to learn to write with his left ' The whole passage runs thus : " A mesnie temps j"ay veu, sur le bord d'un ruisseau, La canne s'humecter de la bourbe de l'eau, D'une voix enrouée et d'un battement d'aisle. Animer le canard qui languit auprès d'elle, Pour appaiser le feu qu'ils sentent nuit et jour, Dans cette onde plus sale enc'or que leur amour." 92 POETRY IN FRANCE BEFORE hand, in order to be able to employ " the right hand more nobly.'" " May the devil take me, if I am a poet," says one of these coxcombical wits, " and if I have the re- motest conception of what enthusiasm is. I write verses, it is true, but it is to kill time ; and then they are only little gallant epistles which I compose while my hair is being dressed. I leave to professional poets all their cumbrous parade of fictions and bombastic phrases ; I deal only in tender and delicate expressions, and I think that I have succeeded in catching that court air whose sportive manner so far transcends all the wisdom of the wise."* These were the persons who criticised poetry, to please whom it was written, and whose style it was in- dispensable to imitate in order to give them satisfaction. Malherbe was reckoned one of the "professional poets" ; and, but for the French which he had taught at Court, he would have completely lost himself in that inundation of rhymes which no one ventured to call poetry. " I remember the time," says Saint-Evremond, " when Malherbe's poetry was considered admirable for style and justness of expression. Malherbe shortly afterward fell into neglect, as the last of our poets ; for caprice had turned the attention of the French to enigmas, burlesque, and bouts-rimes.''^^ From hence, however, were destined to issue the most brilliant epochs of our literary glory. Men of letters, by their presence and conversation, had labored to diffuse throughout society a taste for mental occupations: this taste had possessed for themselves all the attractiveness of a novelty which men hasten to enjoy and parade ; but we soon become accustomed to novelty ; and when the ' See the Preface of " Lygdamon," addressed to the Duke de Montmo- rency. * " Parnasse Réformé," p. 65. ' Saint-Evremond, "Œuvres," vol. v. p. 18. THE TIME OF CORNEILLE. 93 good which it at first served to adorn becomes in itself a real good, capable of supplying sweet and true pleasures, we are disposed, when the novelty has passed away, to enjoy these pleasures more silently and deeply, and do not feel it necessary to parade them every day. If the public had not yet become fully enlightened, it had at least in- creased in numbers ; and writers might hope to meet with admirers and critics beyond the limits of their own particular circle. They thus began to gain greater in- dependence, and acquired not only more leisure for medi- tation, but also more liberty to follow the natural im- pulses of their genius. Nothing was required but favora- ble circumstances to guarantee this liberty, to augment this leisure, and thus to place the poets in a position to produce works of sufficient merit to guide the taste of a public which no longer required to be daily amused by their wit in order to take an interest in their labors. The institution of the French Academy, the establish- ment of theatres, and, shortly afterward, the direct pro- tection of Louis XIV., were the principal causes which led to this great and felicitous result. I have already alluded to the general tendency which, at the commencement of the seventeenth century, direct- ed the attention of all minds toward literature. This tendency was not the fermentation produced by the ap- pearance of a superior genius, whose influence is para- mount and universal ; nor was it that strong and con- tinuous warmth which results from the equal and natural development of all the faculties of a free nation : it was an intense but uncertain movement toward the light ; an irresistible impulse to action without any determinate object, in which effort after perfection was much more perceptible than vigor of invention. Fully satisfied with the wealth they already possessed, the poets appeared to 94 POETRY IN FRANCE BEFORE be anxious only to set it in orderly array, before bringing it into Use ; and, of all the deficiencies of our poetry, they were conscious only of want of regularity and want of correctness. The principal object of their labors was the purification of the language ; following the example of Malherbe, " that doctor in the vulgar tongue," as Bal- zac calls him,' they believed themselves entrusted with the guardianship of its glory and prosperity, upon which, in their opinion, depended, perhaps in a greater degree than was generally believed, the prosperity of the State. ^ They devoted themselves to this task with all the assidu- ity that should be displayed in the discharge of a special function, and with all the zeal that belongs to the main- tenance of superior authority. The taste for literature, which had become diffused throughout society, rendered the men whose province it was to explain or enforce its laws, the chiefs of a vast and brilliant empire ; and "grammar, which gives rules even to kings," could not possibly be considered, by its own ministers, an object of slight importance. Thus, at the same time that men of letters went into the world to enjoy the success they had achieved, they were frequently brought together, among themselves, by a matter of more serious interest — the public welfare. On such occasions, whatever might be the subject of conversation, purity and elegance of language, and choice and propriety of terms, were ob- served with all the scrupulousness of a religious duty, and all the labor of an imperative task, "In contradis- tinction to the present practice," says Ménage, " great ' Bitlzac, " Socrate Chrestien." '^ In the letter which Cardinal Richelieu desired the Academicians to write to him to request his protection, wc road, "that it appeared that nothing was reijuired to complete tlie felicity of the kingdom, but to rescue the lan- guage that we speak from the category of barbariaq languages." Pellsson, " Histoire de l'Académie," p. 37. THE TIME OF CORNEILLE. 95 care was taken to speak correctly, and not to commit mistakes in these social conversations," * After one of these meetings, Balzac being left alone with Ménage, drew a long breath, and said : "Now that we are alone, let us speak freely, without fear of uttering solecisms." ' Although he sneered at the custom, Balzac observed it more strictly than most others, " He spoke," says Ménage, " much better than he wrote. If all those who profess to speak correctly had met together to construct a sen- tence they would not have succeeded better than he did All men of talent have been obliged to con- sider him as the restorer, or rather as the author, of our language, as it exists at the present day." * However wearisome these conversations may have been, the fatigue they occasioned was that which results from deey and amusing interest : from the records which we possess of the letters, anecdotes, witticisms, and opinions which formed the staple of conversation at this period, it is easy to perceive how active was the circulation of ideas, though intended almost entirely for mere ordinary interchange of daily life. Never, perhaps, were wit and erudition so entirely devoted to the habitual routine of existence. Literary meetings multiplied in every direc- tion ; some were held at the houses of Mile, de G-ournay * and of Balzac, and afterward at the residence of Ménage. Others took place in the Fai/s Latin,^ in the neighbor- hood of the Colleges, at which men had begun to inquire whether it were possible to make some reasonable use of the vernacular tongue. Pelisson relates that, on leaving ' "Menagiana," vol. i. p. 306. - Ibid. ^ Ibid. p. 311. "• I do not know upon what ground the Abbé de MaroUes says that it was at her house that " the first idea of the French Academy was conceived." "i\Ituiioires de Michel de Marolles," vol. iii. p. 289. " See PeZwson," Histoire de l'Académie," p. 356; and. the "Mémoires de Marblks," vol. i. p. 77. ' ' " v • 96 POETRY IN FRANCE BEFORE college, full of contempt for the French language, he looked with disdain upon " the romances and other new pieces" that were hrought under his notice, and "re- turned always," he says, "to my Cicero and my Terence, whom I found much more reasonable." At length, he was struck by some works that fell into his hands, among which was the fourth volume of " Balzac's Letters." " Thenceforward," he says, " I began not only no longer to despise the French language, but even to love it pas- sionately, to study it with considerable care, and to be- lieve, as I do still at the present day, that with talent, time, and trouble, it might be rendered capable of every thing."' It will at once be perceived how necessary literary meetings were to men educated in this manner. There were discussed all the difficulties of grammar, and opinions were pronounced upon new works : thither the wits of the coterie, sometimes inspired by the ideefs ex- pressed at these conferences, and always encouraged by the certainty of finding an attentive audience, brought the fruits of their labors. Some grave censors criticised these occupations, and complained that so much activity of mind was wasted upon words ; " but they did not per- ceive therein the first indications of a more important activity, and the natural feeling of men who, feeling dis- posed to meet together, and desirous to act in concert, were laboring to rescue from its long-continued barba- rism, that very language which was to serve as the medium of their communications — a work which they were obliged to undertake, as none of those superior ' Pclisson, "Histoire de l'Académie," p. 481. ^ " It was then," says Marolles, " that a young theologian, named Louis Masson, could not refrain from expressing uis astonishment, having come upon us while we were examining certain idioms of the language ; which he esteemed of little importance in comparison with other things in which, in his opinion, it would have been much more proper for us to have em- ployed our time " "Mémoires de Marolles," vol. i. p. 77, 78. THE TIME OF CORNEILLE 97 geniuses, who can make light spring from the midst of chaos, had spared them the trouble. About the year 1629, among thoso who were thus brought together by a taste for lit'erful over the minor poets, and though genius was not entirely free from its ascendency, it was never either stifled or subjugated by it. Every writer, in particular, may have been less free ; but literature, in general, was more so. Such was the direct and positive effect produced, upon the existence of men of letters, by the establishment of the Academy. The first moment of hesitation was short ; and general anxiety was oson manifested for admission into a company protected by the Prime Minister. The Chancellor Seguier, then Keeper of the Seals, did more than protect it when, in 1635, he requested to be received as a member ; and when, after the death of Richelieu, he became its protector, he solicited admission for his son.' '-.iwlpd tiie meetings of the Academy, at ., a .secretary of THE TIME OF CORNEILLE. 109 hold to call him Monseigneur. These little incidents and many others of a similar character, soon made the title of Academician a distinct and honorable title, which, when the King became protector of the Academy, was not thought beneath the ambition of any man at Court. The two classes were thus brought into closer connection than they had ever been before, but their respective position had changed ; the man of letters, certain of a good reception in society, could now bestow upon the man t)f fashion a distinction all the more precious because, during more than a century and a half, the literary class, so fertile in distinguished talents of different orders, had left very little space for a display of the less academ- ical talents of the men of the world. In proportion as, during the reign of Louis XIV., court distinctions became less honorable, distinctions of mind were more sought after, and these it was in the power of men of letters to bestow. At the beginning of the seventeenth century, they had been obliged to waste their talents in pandering to the frivolous pastimes of society : when the eighteenth century arrived, society was desirous to understand those serious ideas which formed the subject of their medita- tions. This revolution in manners was destined soon to become an intellectual revolution, and finally to operate a political revolution, and to change the face of the world, after having at first changed only the social rela- tions of men of letters to men of the world. But I pause before the immense horizon and the fathomless abyss which simultaneously open before me. I merely intend- ed to seek out the principal causes, and to sketch the original characteristics, of the state of literature, and especially of poetry, in France, at the commencement of the seventeenth century, during the period of preparation for the advent of Corneille. I have hitherto said nothing 110 POETRY IN FRANCE, ETC. about the fixed establishment of theatres, and the im- pulse which directed the taste of France toward dra- matic literature. To Corneille belongs the primal glory of that literature : and with his life must be connected the history of its earliest efforts. PIERRE CORNEILLE. (160G-1684.) The progress of dramatic art is not necessarily com mensurate with that made by other branches of literature In regard to those kinds of poetry which depend for their effect upon the talent of the poet himself, in order that the influence of this talent may be properly developed, it is necessary that the taste of the public should be suffi- ciently cultivated to feel and admire it. The external and material means at the disposal of the dramatic au- thor give much greater extension to his audience ; un- less his self-love be very delicate, he will have slight dif- ficulty in satisfying himself with the noisy applause of the multitude : indeed, according to all appearance, it was for the multitude that the first essays of dramatic art were every where intended. It was for men who were unsatisfied with merely mental gratifications that was first invented a spectacle, adapted to strike the senses : " Thespis fut le premier qui, barbouillé de lie, Promena par les bourgs cette heureuse folie. Et, d'acteurs mal ornés chargeant un tombereau, Amusa les passants d'un spectacle nouveau." Grenius could not fail at once to appreciate and appro- priate this happy invention. Poets who were accustomed to recite their verses in public, easily perceived the ad- vantage they would derive by the employment of dialogue, 112 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF and by the material representation of the objects which they formerly used only to describe. Among our Trouba- dours, similar causes produced analogous effects. It ap- pears certain that these earliest of modern poets had some idea of a kind of dramatic representation, or at least of a dialogized poetry, which was recited by actors who were either the poets themselves, or persons engaged by them. During the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, we fre- quently meet with theatrical pieces, of a historical or satirical character, which were represented sometimes by the orders, and at the expense of the princes whose pas- sions they flattered,' and sometimes even at the cost of the public, whom authors undertook, as at the present day, to amuse for money. ^ But the dramatic talents of those times, nurtured in Courts and amid the fantastic games of poetry, could not possibly understand either the taste of the people, or the proper character of an art which addresses itself as much to the senses as to the mind. Sprung from a soil which was not suited to their de- velopment, they bore no lasting fruits ; and, "when the Maecenases failed," says an old author, " the poets also fell away." The true origin of the theatre in France was popular. Every one knows how the society of the Brethren of the Passion originated. Pilgrims from Jerusalem, from Saint James of Compostella, and from the Holy Balm, with their minds filled with thoughts of the places they had just visited, and their imaginations excited by devotion ' Boniface, Marquis of Montfcrrat, the protector of the Albigenses, com- manded the representation ot a tlicatrieal piece by Ansehne Faydit against the Council of Lateran, entitled the " Heresy of the Fathers — VHcregia dels Feyrci.^' '^ This same Faydit, it is said, " not satisfied with the presents which nobles gave him for his works, erected a place suited to the performance of comedies, and recuived the money which the spectators gave him at tho door." " Histoire du Théâtre Français," vol. i. ]>. 13. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 113 and leisure, composed songs, which necessity taught them to adorn with every accessory that was likely to attract attention and obtain alms. To the pantomime with which they accompanied these songs they added the assistance of dialogue ; and, assembling in troops in public localities, clad in their copes, covered with images jof the saints, and with their staves in their hands, they edified and amused the people. Whether we are indebted to them for the first idea of theatrical representations, or whether they had themselves borrowed it from those rude performances which were employed in the churches to rekindle the piety of the faithful on the days of great festivals,' this idea was thought so excellent that it was speedily made use of as a means of popular amusement, and formed a part of the games by which the city of Paris was wont to solemnize great events. Charles VI., on his entrance, " beheld with pleasure what were then called mysteries; that is to say, various theatrical representations of en- tirely novel invention." On the entrance of Isabel of Bavaria, a number of young persons performed upon different stages, " divers histories from the Old Testa- ment." ^ These pious spectacles speedily became popular in all the provinces of the realm, and in most of the kingdoms of Christendom ; and zeal or industry soon at- tempted to turn them to profit. It appears probable that the first representations given at Saint Maur by the Brethren,^ were not gratuitous ; at all events it is certain that when the Provost of Paris forbade them to perform without the permission of the King, and obliged them to apply to Court for authorization, the letters-patent which ' Such as the Feast of Fools, the Feast of Asses, and so forth. ' " Histoire de la Ville de Paris," vol. xiv. pp. 686, 707. ^ In 1398, they had hired a room in Saint Maur, in which they repre- sented the " Mysteries of the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ.'' 114 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF they obtained from Charles VI., in 1402, granted them permission to perform for profit. ' Thus was instituted a theatrical performance according to the taste of the public, who, by paying for admission, obtained the right of expressing their opinion. For this, dramatic art was indebted to the Brethren of the Passion. But the public, as uncouth as the men who undertook to divert it, was not yet capable of training them; the actors were deficient in emulation, and the spectators in comparison ; and at the end of a hundred and fifty years the last mysteries, though quite as ridiculous as the first, were distinguished only by less simplicity and good faith ; and the orders given to the Brethren, in 1548, to dis- continue this kind of performance, proves that good taste and good sense had made progress, by which the mystery- mongers had not profited. At this period, there originated a new dramatic system, perfectly independent of that of the Brethren, and in- dependent also of the taste of the public, for whose grati- fication it was not designed. This system was one of the first fruits of that erudite literature which, according to the usage of pedagogues in all ages, imposed silence upon its disciples before making any effort to correct their taste. Already several Greek tragedies, among others the " Electra" and the " Hecuba," had been translated into verse, but simply as specimens of a foreign drama, ' The patent runs thus : " On which fact and mystery the said Brother- hood has paid and expended much of its property, as have also the Brethren, each only proportionally ; saying, moreover, that if they played publicly and in common (that is, before the people), tliat it would be to the profit of the said Brotherhood, and that they could not do so rightly without our leave and licence We, who desire the benefit, profit, and usefulness of the said Brotherhood, and that its rights and revenues should be by us increased and augmented by favors and j)rivileges, in order that each one by devotion may and ought to join himself to their company, have given and granted," &c. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 115 and without the slightest intention of enriching onr own therewith. On the other hand, the events of the fabulous history of the G-reeks had been represented upon our stage, but in the form peculiar to it,' and without any imitation of the art of the ancients, from whom were borrowed merely subjects more rich in interest or more widely known than those that might have been supplied by our own history. Jodellc, the contemporary and friend of Ronsard, Du Bellay, Baïf and Pasquier — a man of small erudition himself, but whose mind was deeply impregnated with the atmosphere of learning by which he was surrounded, was the first who conceived the idea of introducing, into French pieces of his own composition, the dramatic forms of the ancients, or at least of Horace ; that is to say, the division into acts, the three unities, and the scrupulous exclusion from the stage of all machinery and hideous representations, especially of the devils, hell, and tortures of the damned and of martyrs, which constituted, perhaps, the most approved part of the Mysteries. Comedy depicted manners more elevated than those of the populace, tragedy was reserved for the adventures of Kings and Princes ; and the poetical coterie celebrated this invention with transports of delight. " Those who at that time were judges of such matters," says Pasquier, " declared that Ronsard was the first of poets, but that Jodelle was the dœmon of poetry him- self.'"^ The unimpassioned frigidity of these tragedies, which were composed almost entirely of narratives and ' We have the " Mystère de la Destruction de Troyes la grant," in four days, which comprehend the whole period which elapsed from the judgment of Paris until the return of the Greeks after the capture of Troy. Paris is represented as offering a hundred croion-pkccs to the temple of Venus, and a note informs us that Troy was forty leagues in length and eight in breadth. The writer was probably ignorant of that passage in Homer in which Achilles chases Hector thrice round the walls of Troy ^ " Pasquier," book vii. p. 705. - . • 116 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF monologues, was not distasteful to men whose minds were driven to the opposite extreme by their contempt for the performances of the Brethren ; and the indecency of the comedies could not revolt an age in which farces were still tolerated. These two kinds of dramatic composition, then, pos- sessed in France at this period rules know^n and approved by the sovereign authorities in literature ; by the Court which, unskillful in creating pleasures for itself, willingly accepted those which were offered to it ; and by poets and learned men, by whom the new pieces were written, per- formed, and applauded. " ' Cleopatra,' a tragedy, by Jodelle, and ' La Rencontre,' a comedy, by the same author, were performed before King Henry at Paris, at the Hotel de Reims, with great applause from the whole company ; and afterward again at the College de Bon- court, at which all the windows were crowded by an infinity of persons of honor .... And the actors were all men of name, for even Remy Belleau and Jean de la Peruse played the principal parts.'" Jodelle, who was young and handsome, had undertaken the part of Cleopatra. This new form of dramatic art laid open to poets a career which they might well judge worthy of their tal- ents ; the imitation or even translation of the Greek tragedies furnished them with numerous and fertile sub- jects. In truth, they strangely changed their nature in their imitations ; for they lived at a time which could not conceive of grandeur without emphasis, and when naturalness speedily degenerated into coarseness ; the dignity of supreme rank, the lofty character of the learn- ed French spoken by the personages in their tragedies, did not always jireserve them from the tone and manners of low life ; and the lovers of antiquity were not shocked * " Pasquier," book vii. p. 704. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 117 at seeing Jodellc's Cleopatra, when Seleucus accuses her before Augustus of having concealed a portion of her treasures, seize Seleucus by the hair, and overwhelm him with blows and insults. . • • More successful in comedy, which he based upon the manners of the time alone, and supported perhaps by some national models of true comicality, endemic in France, as is proved by the old farce of " Patelin," Jo- delle was also more successfully imitated. Comedies devoid of character and probability, but not without intrigue and gayety, presented some more natural pro- ductions of the French mind. Ere long Larivey intro- duced, with considerable success, upon our stage, some imitations of Latin and Italian comedies ; and at the same time Gamier, the immediate successor of Jodelle, whose reputation he outshone, gave greater nobleness to the tone of tragedy. Without clothing it with an inter- est and verisimilitude which the art of the poets of that period was not capable of reoorlciling with the restraint imposed by observance of the unities, he imparted to it greater decency, arrayed it in a more poetical style, and introduced a pathos of sentiment which was not what Ronsard and his partisans had sought to imitate from the ancients. This progress was still confined within the narrow sphere by which poets were then surrounded. The Brethren of the Passion, in possession of the exclusive privilege of offering to the public a performance for ad- mission to which money was to be paid, but unable of themselves to turn this privilege to further advantage, since they had been forbidden to perform mysteries, leased the privilege and the Hotel de Bourgogne to a troop of comedians, whose aim was no longer to edify, but simply to amuse, the spectators, ft was not with 118 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF poetry in Ronsard's style, or with tragedies even more devoid of action than laden with erudition, that the spec- tators at the Hotel de Bourgogne were to be amused. Broad farces and moralities, the subjects of which were taken from recent and well-known occurrences — such as, for example, the execution of a valet at the Place de Grève for ^having seduced, his master's wife (the valet being hanged upon the stage) — were what suited the taste of the frequenters of the Théâtre des Confrères. The educated poets of the time do not appear to have ever intrusted their pieces to the comedians of the Hotel de Bourgogne, They were performed either in the col- leges, or at the expense of some of the nobility ; most were merely made public by means of the press, and then any one who pleased might perform them. Grar- nier, in the preface to his " Bradamante," informs " those who may choose to perform it" that, as there are no choruses to the piece, the acts must be separated by means of interludes; and we learn from the "Roman Comique" that the provincial actors used to play " Brad- amante." Sometimes, when tragedies had been printed and pub- lished, the comedians of the Hotel de Bourgogne endeav- ored to turn them to account ; but it is certain that they did not meet with a favorable reception from spectators who were unable to comprehend them. These perform- ances, however, and their publication, obtained for them a kind of popularity in the semi-literary world, which increased in numbers daily. This period was inundated by a host of tragedies divided into acts ; but it must bo confessed that these acts, which were sometimes seven in number,' frequently include, in the same performance, ' As, for example, tlie " Caminate" of Jean Hays, king's advocate in the bailiwick of Rouen, published in 1597. f»IERRE CORNEILLE. 119 as many years and countries as the old mysteries could have done. Fabulous and historical ideas are commin- gled therein in the strangest fashion. In 16G1, nine years after Jodelle's pieces had obtained such brilliant success, Jacques Grevin, in the preface to his dramatic works, complains of " the grievous faults that are daily committed in the games of the University of Paris, which ought to be a paragon of perfection in all kziowledge, but where, nevertheless, they perpetrate, after the manner of tumblers, a massacre upon a scaffold, or utter a speech of two or three month's length." "^ The rules of Aristotle, which were violated as frequently as those of common sense, were as incapable of reforming the taste of the public as they were of satisfying it. One fact is especially deserving of remark at this pe- riod, and that is, the small number of comedies, as com- pared with the countless host of tragedies, that were written. Perhaps the labor of invention which was in- dispensable in a kind of composition that, unlike tragedy, could not draw upon history for its subjects and materi- als, deterred literary men in general from devoting their talents to comedy. Thus much is certain that, in both kinds of dramatic composition, Jodelle, with his contem- poraries and successors, contributed but very little to the improvement of our national drama, if we may give such a name to those crude performances with which the peo- ple of Paris and the provinces allowed themselves to be amused or bored for nearly two centuries. ' In the " Soltane"' of Gabriel Bounyii, published in 1560, the Sultana Rose, a witch, in order to destroy the son of her husband, the Sultan Soly- man, proposes to call in the demons to her aid, among whom she enumer- ates Vulcan ivith his dragoons. In the " Aman" of Pierre Mathieu, Aman, whose pride drives him mad, boasts that he is the gun of the infernal troop. In the " Loyauté Trahie" of Jacques du Hamel, published in 1586, we meet ■with an Infanta of Asfracan at the court of a King of Canada. These are but a few out of many thousands of similar instances. 120 , LIFE AND WEITINGS OF It was, nevertheless, from this rude cradle that, dating from the early years of the seventeenth century, dramatic art issued to make most rapid progress. Civil war had broken up old customs ; peace and happiness, restored by the triumph of Henry IV., demanded the institution of new ones ; and the pleasures which Paris could afford, no longer satisfied its inhabitants. The contempt into which the Brethren of the Passion had fallen, encouraged men to attack their privileges. Various troops of playwrights had already unsuccessfully attempted to do so ; but at length, in the year 1600, notwithstanding the opposition of the Brethren and the decrees of the Parliament, a new troop established' itself in Paris, at the Hotel d'Argent, in the Marais, on condition of paying the privileged fratern- ity one crown-piece for every performance. The hopes of the new company were based upon an engagement which they had made with a man whose success is as astonish- ing to us as his talents w^ere marvellous to his contempo- raries. Hardy, the founder of the Parisian stage, and the precursor of Corneille, was not one of those men whose genius changes or determines the taste of his age ; but he was the first man in France who conceived a just idea of the nature of dramatic poetry. He understood that a theatrical piece ought to have a higher aim than merely to satisfy the mind and reason of the spectators ; and he was at the same time of opinion, that carefulness to employ their senses and excite their imagination, should not prevent the play from being regulated by rea- son and probability. Hardy was not one of those erudite and happy poets who were content to Ihnit their ambition to obtaining the suffrages of literary men and the applause of Courts. Though daily compelled to look to his talents to furnish him with the means of subsistence, ho was not one of those mountebanks who arc capable merely of PIERRK CORNEILLE 121 amusing a populace in whose ignorance they participate. His education had not left him unacquainted with the literary acquirements of his time. His poverty had con- nected him with a troop of wandering comedians, who were more at liberty to exercise their profession in the provinces than in Paris, whence they were banished by the monopoly possessed by the Brethren. Thus early ac- customed to stage plays,, he endeavored to apply to an im- portant mode of action the rude means of interest which those plays could furnish. The step which he had to take, and which he really did take, can alone explain the suc- cess which he obtained. Those foreign critics' who represent the French drama, subsequently to Jodelle, as trammelled by the general adherence of the public to the authority of Aristotle's rules, either have not read Hardy, or appreciate very im- perfectly his importance in the history of the stage in Fi"ance. Hardy was irregular enough to have been a Shakspeare, if he had possessed a Shakspeare's genius. His first dramatic work with which we are acquainted contains the whole romance of " Theagenes and Charic- lea ;"* it is divided into eight days, one for each book of the romance, and is wi-itten in precisely the same form as the Mysteries. To say truth, this work met with an un- favorable reception from men of letters : "I know, read- er," says Hardy himself,'' " that my ' Ethiopie Story,' rendered monstrous by the faults that crept into the first impression, produced an unfavorable feeling with regard to my other works in the minds of certain imitators of Aristarchus." In order for this piece, when printed, to ' Among others, M. Boutenvck, in his " History of French Literature." pulilished at Gottingen, in 1809. - " Les chastes et longues Amours de Théagène et Chariclée," in eight consecutive dramatic or theatrical poems. 1600 '* In preface to " Didon sc sacrifiant." ' F V2'A LIFE AND WRITINGS OF have been deemed worthy of the attention of the critics, it must have obtained considerable success when perform- ed. Perhaps, a larger amount of success would have gained their approbation for the work. At all events, if we judge of what the critics required by what Hardy gave them, it is evident that a very strict adherence to rules was not expected of dramatic authors, and that Aristo- tle's authority was not so great on the stage as it was in the schools. After the production of the " Loves of Theagenes and Chariclea," Hardy abandoned the arrangement of his dramas into days, and divided his pieces into acts, giving them the more becoming name of tragedies and tragi- comedies,' But he did not consider himself obliged, by the adoption of this new costume, to observe more rigid regularity. In the first act of his " Alcestis," he repre- sents Hercules at the court of Eurystheus ; in the sec- ond, third, and fifth acts, the scene is laid at the court of Admetus ; and in the fourth, we are taken to the infer- jial regions, whither Hercules goes to fetch Alcestis, and whence, on the same occasion, he delivers Theseus and carries off Cerberus. In " Phraates, or the Triumph of True Lovers," the spectator travels from Thrace into Macedonia, and from Macedonia back again into Thrace. The tragedy of " Pantheus" extends over several days ; the first three acts of " G-esippus, or the Two Friends," take place at Athens, and the last two at Rome, several years afterward. Doubtless relying very little upon af- fording gratification to the spectators by means of a dia- logue which, though sometimes rational, was always cold, languishing and unattractive, Hardy made up for the^ ' He givps the name of a "dramatic poem," however, to his "Gigan- tomachia," a piece in which machinery is introduced, to represent a com- bat of the gods with the giants. This piece is, nevertiiciess, divided into acts. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 123 omission of this by the introduction of action, which he employed without reserve. In " Scedasus, or Hospitality Violated," two young girls who are ravished by their hosts, defend themselves upon the stage to the last mo- ment, and probably end by retreating behind the scenes, though this is not indicated by any interruption of the dialogue. Their ravishers afterward put them to death upon the stage. In " Lucretia," who is certainly not Lucretia the chaste, a husband, the witness of his wife's infidelity, narrates to the spectator what is passing be- tween the two lovers behind the scenes, and does not in- terrupt them until he has " seen with his own eyes" that which he requires to authorize him to put them both to death. Aristoclea, in the " Unfortunate Marriage," dies upon the stage in consequence of the effort made by the servants of Straton, who is in love with her, to carry her oft" from the relatives of Callisthenes, her husband, who are naturally anxious to detain her. In these compositions, it is difficult to discern what constitutes the difference between tragedy and tragi- comedy ; it certainly depends neither upon the nature of the subject, nor upon the rank of the personages. " Scedasus," all the personages of which are merely private individuals, is a tragedy, and certainly deserves this title from its dénouement; but the frightful death of Aristoclea furnishes nothing more than a tragi-comedy. " Dido" is a tragedy ; but the dignity of the personages of " Alcestis," and the pathetic character of their posi- tion, do not raise it above the rank of a tragi-comedy. Two subjects, both equally tragic, derived from the Greek mythology, furnish Hardy with the tragedy of "Melea- ger," and the tragi-comedy of " Procris." The irregu- larity is the same in both kinds of composition ; and as regards tone, that of Hardy, in general not very lofty, 124 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF scarcely allows us to perceive the shades of that more familiar naturalness which he appears to have wished to introduce into some scenes of his tragi-comedies. In " Procris," for example, Tito complains to his confidant in very light terms of the infidelity of his w^ife, and Aurora banters Cephalus with considerable freedom of speech ; and in " Alcestis," the father and mother of Admetus, after having expressed their grief that they can not ransom their son's life by the sacrifice of their own, change their mind when informed by the oracle tliat it is in their power to save him by an act of self- devotion, and unite in declaring that they would rather live the whole time allotted to them by the Fates. Hardy, then^ was neither the successor of Jodelle and Garnier, nor the imitator of the Grreeks, but a national dramatic poet, as far as it was possible to be such in a literature in which recollections of the ancients occupied so prominent a position. Hardy was not guided by their precepts, although he sometimes profited by their example ; he frequently borrowed from them subjects for his dramas, but did not imitate their treatment of them; he omitted from their rules whatever he thought un- suited to the stage and the prevailing taste of his time ; and, while he adopted the arrangement of their trage- dies, he did away with the choruses, as being "superflu- ous to the performance, and too troublesome to recast." He remodelled, according to his own manner, the subjects which he adopted. Too sensible, and too unversed in the ways of the world, to dress up, as was done at a later period, Greek and Roman characters in the costume of the day, he was, nevertheless, careful to strip them of that antique and local coloring which would greatly have astounded an entirely French audience. In was in French, moreover, although in bad French, that Hardy PIKRRE CORNEILLE. 125 addressed the public. The faults of this style are neither the erudite obscurity, nor the contorted phraseology, nor the studied neologism of Ronsard ; he is characterized by the harshness, incorrectness, impropriety and triviality of a man whom the necessity of providing for his own sub- sistence and for that of a troop of comedians, sometimes compelled to furnish two thousand lines in twenty-four hours. Hardy's talent knew no other shackles but those of poverty ; fecundity was all that was expected from him, and never was a duty better fulfilled. Six hundred dramatic pieces,' all in verse, and some of which were composed, learned, and performed within three days,' served by their number, as much as by their merit, to establish Hardy's reputation, and a taste for dramatic works, in France. Like Hardy, Lope de Vega composed a play in twenty-four hours ; and both these men were the founders of the drama of their respective nations. Variety is the merit most necessary to insure the primary success of an art which requires a crowd to witness its efforts : before having formed that taste or habit which enlists the attention of spectators, movement must be supplied to attract them, and curiosity alone is able to produce this movement ; but this curiosity nmst be con- ^ Some say eight hundred ; onl}' forty-one are now extant, includinor the eight dramatic poems which relate the " Loves of Theagenes and Chariclea." See Gueret, " Guerre des Auteurs," p. 161. ^ It appears that the price of these was three crowns apiece. Made- moiselle Beaupré, the actress who performed in the dramas of both Hardy and Corneille, used to say : M. Corneille has done us great injury ; for- merly we used to have dramas at three crowns each, which were written for us in a night ; people were used to them, and we gained a great deal by them; now. Corneille's pieces cost us a great deal, and gain us very little." " It is true," adds Segrais, who relates this remark, " that these old pieces were wretchedly bad ; but the actors were excellent, and gained applause for them by their atlmirable performance." (" Segraisiana," p. 214.) Hardy was, it is said, the first man who received nionej' for his pieces. Pre- viously, the actors used to take such as they found in print, or else wrote dramas for themselves. - . , t- . , 126 1-lFE AND WRITINGS OF tinually renewed, and must incessantly recall the mind, by the expectation of novelty, toward pleasures which habit has not yet transformed into necessities. Neither the relative decency which Hardy infused into the tone of his characters, nor a certain measure of reason and probability which he endeavored to introduce into his plans, nor the movement which he invariably imparted to his action, nor even the machinery with which he sometimes adorned his plays, would long have reconciled the spectators to pieces in which they found nothing either to satisfy a discriminating taste, or to awaken profound emotion. If, however, Hardy had employed the same time in perfecting his plays which he did in varying their subjects, some few men of taste might possibly have applauded his intentions, but the multitude would certainly have withdrawn their patronage. Cin- thio, an actor belonging to an Italian troop, answered the Earl of Bristol, who found fault with him for the want of probability of the pieces which he performed : "If there were more of it, good actors would die of hunger with good comedies." And when actors die of hunger, they leave no successors, and dramatic authors, in consequence, come to an end. Hardy's performers did not starve ; and this was then the greatest service that he could have rendered to his art. Frequently, a thin attendance of spectators obliged the two troops to unite, and limit their exertions to a single performance at the Hotel de Bourgogne, the actors belonging to which obtained, in 1612, the title of the " King's Comedians," and a pension of twelve hundred livres ; but ever after the year 1600, there was always at least one troop of actors at Paris, and Hardy's dramas long constituted their principal stock in trade. The mo- ment had arrived when poets only required the establish- PIERRE CORNEILLE. 127 ment of a regular theatre to induce them to write for it. Hardy had rendered the stage more decent, and more worthy of their efforts. The taste which the public was beginning to feel for mental enjoyments found only weak, and chilling nutriment in the precise and formal verses of Malherbe's school. The stage summoned to its aid all those men whom a more lively imagination, a more un- fettered genius, and a more active character, urged upon a more animated career and to more boisterous success. Théophile, a poet very deficient in taste, though not want- ing in talent, thus addresses Hardy : " Jamais ta veine ne s'amuse A couler un sonnet mignard ; Détestant la pointe et le fard Qui rompt les forces à la muse. Je marque entre les beaux esprits, Malherbe, Bertaut, et Porchères, Dont les louanges me sont chères, Comme j'adore leurs écrits. Mais à l'air de tes tragédies On verroit faillir leur poumon, Et comme glaces du Strymon Seroient leurs veines refroidies.'' Théophile gave to the stage his " Thisbe," in which we sometimes meet with a poetic elegance of which Hardy never had any idea, mingled with the ridiculous concetti of the time. Racan, whose imagination Malherbe ad- mired, and whose negligence he blamed,' introduced into his " Bergeries" still greater elegance and purity. The names of Mairet and Rotrou became known by their dramatic works alone ; and Scudéry and La Calprenède devoted themselves to the stage with heart and soul. "After Théophile had performed his 'Thisbe,' and Mairet his ' Sylvie,' M. de Racan his ' Bergeries,' and M. de ' Malherbe used to say of Racan " that he had power, but that he did not labor enough at his vcr.scs." Fclisson, " Histoire de l'Académie,"' p. 47. 128 LIFE AND AVRITINGS OP G-ombaud his ' Amaranthe,' the stage became more cele- brated, and many persons endeavored to give it new sup- port. The poets no longer made any difficulty about allowing their names to appear on the bills of the actors ; for formerly, no author's name had been given, but it was simply stated that their author had written for them a comedy of a certain name." ' The dramatic poet was no longer the mithor of the actors, but of the public ; the dramatic art became in literature one of the most bril- liant means of achieving success, and the taste which Cardinal Richelieu felt for this kind of amusement soon made it one of the surest means of obtaining favor French poetry was evidently turning in the direction of dramatic composition ; but there was nothing as yet to announce the impulse it was about to receive from Cor- neille. It is easy to conceive what must have been the condition of a drama abandoned to the caprices of an imagination that sought only to deliver itself from the yoke of the rules imposed upon other kinds of poetry — of a drama satisfied with the applause of a public that desired nothing but novelty — subject to the whims of fashion, and to the ambition of all those poets who were led, by beholding a new career, to believe that they pos- sessed a new order of talent. Maire t presented himself on the stage at sixteen, and Rotrou at eighteen years of age. Scudéry wrote in G-ascon,' and boasted of his igno- rance : " In the music of the sciences," he says, " I sing only by nature. ...... I have spent more years in the camp than hours in my study, and used more matches to fire arquebuses than to light candles ; so that I can ar- range soldiers better than words, and square battalions ' Sorel, "Bibliothèque Française," p. 185. * Some say it was Norman. Scudéry was of Frovençal origin, but was bom at Havr*'. whrro hi.s father was married. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 129 better than I can round periods." ' The stage wa.s just suited to Scudéry's poetical impertinence : in dramatic literature it was thought allowable to dispense with care- fulness, and even correctness of style ; an author might mingle at his pleasure the finical with the bombastic, or the thoughtful with the trivial ; and extravagance of lan- guage was surpassed only by eccentricity of ideas. Move- ment, which had been almost entirely banished from other kinds of poetry, seemed to be the only merit re- quired on the stage ; and this movement, which never was allowed to originate in the passions of the soul, was kept up by an accumulation of romantic adventures : abductions, combats, disguises, recognitions, infidelities — nothing was spared to give animation to the scene, and to prevent the spectator from noticing the dulness and truthlessness of those insipid romances, which were almost invariably brought on the stage under the con- venient title of tragi-comedies ; the tragic element in which was distinguished only by a more singular mix- ture of triviality and bombast — the comic, by a stranger disregard for propriety — and the pastoral, by a more mon- strous employment of all available means. Amid this confusion, what became of the rules of Aristotle, and the recollections of the Grreeks and Romans ? The unities — observed by chance, or violated without scruple, prescribed by a few men of letters, and con- temned by most others — furnished only a subject of dis- cussion, and were regarded with utter indifference by those who should have paid most attention to them. The simplicity of ancient or historical subjects was thought too naked, and they had been superseded by subjects of pure imagination, in which there was nothing to trammel the eccentricity of the author's conceptions, and by ' Preface to " Lygdamon." I-* 130 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF innumerable imitations of the Spanish and Italian dramas, whither some men of taste advised the poets to repair in order to obtain some idea of the regularity necessary to the dramatic poem.' The less refined public gave full permission to those who undertook to cater for their amusement to select whatever means they chose to employ ; their ignorant favor was within the reach of all who took a little trouble to win it ; talent might succeed in gaining it, and mediocrity might lay claim to it ; no path had been definitely marked out, but all were equally open, when Corneille appeared. Pierre Corneille, born at Rouen on the 6th of June, 1606, of a family distinguished for magisterial services,' was intended for the bar, and was brought up to the severe studies of that learned profession.^ He felt his genius, however, early incline toward occupations more in unison with that career upon which he was urged by a ' Mairet having been requested by Cardinal de la Valette to compose a pastoral in the form and taste of the Italian school, was led by study of the Italian dramatists to perceive the necessity of observing the unities, which he had not thought it necessary to do so long as he considered them incul- cated only by the example of the ancients. He composed his '' Sylvanire" in 1625, in conformity with the unities; but did not always observe them afterward. " His father was royal advocate at the marble table of Normandy, and special master of the waters and forests in the viscounty of Rouen ; his mother, Marthe le Pesant de Boisguilbert, was the daughter of a Maitrc des Comptes. In the Appendix to this " Life of Corneille" will be found some interesting and novel details regarding his father, and the letters of nobility conferred upon him by Louis XIII. I am indebted for these documents to the kindness of M. Floquol, than whom no one is better acquainted with the political and literary history of Normandy. See Appendix A. ^ Ho pursued his studios at the Jesuits' College at Rouen, and gained a prize either in IfilS or 1G19. "I have seen." writes M. Floquet, "in the valuable library of tlie late M. Villenave, the volume which was then given to Pierre Corneille : it is a folio volume, and on the sides of the book are embossed in gold the arms of Aljdionse d'Ornano, lieutenant-general and governor of Normandy at this period, who, in that capacity, had paid the expense of the prizes distributed at the College. A notice of some length, signed by the princi[)al, indicates the number of the class, and the reason why this reward was given to young Corneille." PIERRE CORNEILLE. 131 vocation so well authenticated by the whole course of his life. Love dictated his first verses, and to love has he ascribed the glory which he achieved as a poet : " Charmé de deux beaux yeux, mon vers charma la cour, Et ce que j'ai de mieux, je le dois à l'amour.'" It will, nevertheless, be difficult to believe that love was the principal source of Corneille's genius ; and, in order to become convinced that he was but slightly indebted to this sentiment for his inspiration, we need only read what he says elsewhere of his first love : ' "Soleils, flambeaux, attraits, appas, Pleurs, désespoirs, tourments, trépas, Tout ce petit meuble de bouche Dont un amoureux s'escarmouche, Je savais bien m'en escrimer ; Par là je m'appris à rimer." Love taught him merely to rhyme, and to string rhymes together was a very small matter for Corneille. But, if we are to believe Fontenelle, love taught him something more than this : " Hardy was beginning to grow old, and his death would have made a great breach in the drama, when a slight event which occurred in a respectable family in a provincial town, gave him an ilkistrious successor. A young man took one of his friends to see a girl with whom he was in love ; the new- comer established himself upon the downfall of his intro- ducer ; the pleasure which this adventure occasioned him made him a poet ; he wrote a comedy about it — and behold the great Corneille !"* ^ " Excuse à Ariste," &c. '^ Fontenelle, " Histoire du Théâtre Français," pp. 78, 79. Such is, in reality, the subject of "Mélite," his first piece. This anecdote, however, seems to be contradicted by a note to the " Excuse à Ariste," in which we are informed that the " beautiful eyes" which so charmed Corneille belonged to Mme. de Pont, the wife of a Maître des Comptes at Rouen, "whom he 132 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF Such, at least, was the starting-point of the great Corneille ; but it contains no presage of his future glory. If, in his earliest works, we discover some traces of an had known as quite a little girl, while he was studying in the Jesuit College at Rouen." " Elle eut mes premiers vers, elle eut mes premiers feux," says Corneille ; and he repeats, in several passages of the same piece, that this love " taught hiiu to rhyme." and that the taste of his mistress for poetry, " Le fit devenir poëte aussitôt qu'amoureux." Soon after he adds : ■'Je ne vois rien d'aimable après l'avoir aimée ; Aussi n'aimai-je plus, et nul objet vainqueur N'a possédé depuis ma veine ni mon cœur." These lines were written in 1635 or 1636 ; therefore the object of that sole passion which occupied the first ten or eleven years of Corneille's life, and inspired the earliest efforts of his Muse, was of necessity his Mélite, if Mélite ever existed. But how can we reconcile this early liaison between Corneille when a student, and Mme. de Pont when quite a little girl, with the manner in which Fontenelle introduces Corneille to Mélite, as a full- grown lawyerl (See Fontenelle, "Vie de Corneille," p. 81, in the third volume of his Works.) It is equally difficult to harmonize with these various circumstances the date of the year 1625, which is indicated by Fontenelle as the period at which " Mélite" was performed. Corneille, who was born in 1606, would then have been only nineteen years old, and could hardly have completed his studies ; and it is difficult to believe that, before composing his piece, he had, as Fontenelle assures us, already appeared at the bar, although "without success." Other works place the date in 1629. Fontenelle, v^ho wrote seventy years afterward (about 1700), and who was horn fifty years after his uncle (in 1656), may only have found confused and doubtful traditions of his great relative in a family by whom literary anec- dotes of Corneille's life were probabl}' considered less interesting than they were afterward thought to be by a nephew who had grown rich by his fame. Those for whom they would have possessed the deepest interest, Thomas Corneille and Mme. de Fontenelle, a woman, it is said, of considerable talent, were born long after their elder brother (Thomas was born in 1025), and could have had no personal knowledge of the matter. I shall have occasion in the course of this sketch to correct several manifest errors of Fontenelle with regard to tiio facts of his uncle's life. M. Taschcreau, in his " Histoire de la Vie et des Ouvrages de Corneille," (Paris, 1829), has also called in question the anecdote related by Fontenelle ; and in a paper read by M. E. Gaillard before the Academy of Rouen, in 1834, which cont.ains some curious biographical notices of Corneille, 1 find the following passage : " M. Taschcreau has fallen into error regarding Mélite, whom he treats as an imaginary being. If he had read the ' Moréri des Normands,' a manuscript in the Library at Caen, he would have seen that Mclit.f. is the anagram of Milct; and Abbé Guyot, formerly Secretary riERRE CORNEILLE. 133 original mind, it is not the originality of genius, but merely of good sense beginning to discern the absurdity of that which it condescended to imitate. The models set up for Corneille's imitation were adapted neither to direct, nor to fetter him. " I had no guide," he says, in his examination of ' Mélite,' " but a little common sense, together with the examples of the late M. Hardy,' and of a few moderns who were then beginning to appear, but who were not more regular than he was." Consequently, to use his own expression, " ' Mélite' was not written in conformity to the rules ; " for," he adds, " I was not then aware that there were any rules." It was of little con- sequence for him to know them ; to learn how to confine within twenty-four hours an intrigue which Corneille has extended over a month, was then a progress of little im- portance to an art in which every thing still remained to be created, and which it was necessary to furnish with well-selected subjects, and true and passionate feelings, before thinking of laying a foundation, in the void, for forms as yet of no utility. Reason, however, had indicated some of thèse forms to Corneille. " That common sense," he says, "which was my only rule, taught me the use of unity of action to set four lovers at variance by a single intrigue, and gave me of the Puy de la Conception, at Rouen, affirms that Mile. Milet was a very- pretty young lady of our town. I may add that she lived at Rouen, in the Rue aux Juifs, No. 15. This fact was attested to me by M. Domniey, formerly Chief Clerk at the Chambre des Comptes, a man who, if alive, would now be 120 years old, and who told me that he had this information from some very old ladies who used to live in that house, in the Rue aux Juifs, when he was a very young man. The existence of Mile. Milet is, moreover, a tradition at Rouen. In my youth I have heard it related to octogenarians of the highest rank, one of whom, the Chevalier de Maisons, was the friend of M. de Cideville." "Précis Analytique des Travaux de l'Académie de Rouen pendant l'année 1834," pp. 165, 166. ' Hardy was dead when Corneille wrote his examinations ; but he was alive when " Mélite" was performed, and did not die until two or three years afterward. 134 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF sufficient aversion for that horrible irregularity which brought Paris, Rome, and Constantinople upon the same stage, to make me reduce mine to a single town.'" But here the art of young Corneille comes to an end ; here ceases his contribution to truth of representation and probability of action. Erastus, enraged against Tircis for having supplanted him in the favor of his mistress, writes love-letters, in the name of that mistress, to Phi- lander, who is in love with the sister of Tircis. Phi- lander's vanity does not allow him either to doubt his good fortune, or to resist it, or to conceal it ; and this is the intrigue which sets the four lovers at variance, with- out either of them attempting to obtain from each other the slightest explanation. Tircis and Mélite, the hero and heroine of the piece, are ready to die of grief, without inquiring its cause. Erastus believes they are dead, is seized with remorse, and becomes mad. In his madness he imagines that he is descending to Tartarus to rescue them, and expresses his determination, if Pluto Avill not give them up, to carry off Proserpine. He jumps upon the shoulders of a neighbor, whom he takes for Charon, and belabors him unmercifully, in order to force him to give him a passage in his boat. He afterward meets Philander, whom he takes for Minos, and confesses to him the trick of which he had been guilty. This was the kind of comedy which Corneille, " though condemning it in his heart,"* employed as " a theatrical ornament which never failed to please, and frequently gained admira- tion,"^ Mélite, to whom Tircis speaks of the love which she inspires, replies : " Jo nc reçois d'amour et n'en donne à personne : Le moyen de donner ce q^ue je n'eus jamais V Examination of ' Mélite." ' Ibid. ' Ibid. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 135 Instead of love, she is willing " to lend to Erastus the coldness" of her soul ; but coldness melts away when she is present : " Et vous n'en conservez que faute de vous voir !" Erastus gallantly replies ; to which Mélite, who is de- termined to have the last word, immediately answers — "Eh quoi ! tous les miroirs ont-ils de fausses glaces 1" Such was " the natural style which truly depicted the conversation of respectable persons" ; ' by such means comedy, for the first time obtained the honor of exciting laughter " without the introduction of ridiculous person- ages, such as jesters, valets, captains and doctors, but simply by the sportive humor of persons superior in rank to those represented in the comedies of Plautus and Ter- ence."* As regards the characters, Tircis might bç sub- stituted for Erastus, and Erastus for Tircis, without any perceptible difference. A gay, but rather cowardly lover, who is introduced in order to show off the hero of the piece, and a merry and careless girl, who is placed in contrast to the sensible Mélite, are the most salient char- acteristics of this comedy; but its style, "being unex- ampled in any language," and its originality and merit, compelling the approbation of the public, who had at first paid little attention to the work of an unknown poet,^ obtained such success and drew such crowds that the two troops of comedians, then united at the Hôtel de Bourgogne separated once more. The troop of the Marais, resting the most brilliant hopes upon the new ' Examination of "Mélite." 2 Ibid. ^ " The first three performances together were not so well attended as the least of those which took place during the same winter." — Corneille, " Epîtro dédicatoire de Mélite." 136 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF author who had made his appearance with so much dis- tinction, resumed their former habitation ;' and old Hardy, who continued connected with the troop which his labors had supported, frequently had occasion to acknowledge, at all events when the profits were divided, the superior merits of his young rival.^ How, then, are we to account for the astonishing suc- cess obtained by Corneille's first work ? Its merits were, a superiority of art and intrigue equalled by none of his contemporaries ; a wisdom of reason commensurate with its affluence of wit ; and last, though not least, the nov- elty of a first glimmering of taste, of a first effort toward truthfulness. Its style, which appears to us so very un- natural, was, nevertheless, as Corneille informs us, the lan- guage of gallantry and the common conversation of polite society. The dialogue in " Mélite" could not but appear simple and natural in comparison with that in " Sylvie,'" "which was so much recited," says Fontenelle, "by our fathers and mothers in their pinafore days,"* and ' See the " Histoire de la Ville de Paris," book xxix. As nearly as we can gather from the confused details which have reached us regarding the theatres of this period, it would appear that the comedians of the Hôtel de Bourgogne, faithful to their inheritance of the Confrères and the Enfants de Sans-Soucy, habitually performed farces, and that the actors of the Thea- tre du Marais devoted themselves more especially to comedy and tragedy. Mondory, the most celebrated tragic actor of those times, was leader of the troop at the Marais. The taste of the regular spectators, however, by ban- ishing farces, placed both troops at last upon the same footing. The come- dians of the Hôtel de Bourgogne were frequently recruited by actors from the troop of the Marais, who were transferred therefrom by order of the gov- ernment, probably at their own request. Notwithstanding these losses, the Marais troop maintained its position until 1673, when it was united to that of the Palais Royal, a third troop which had been formed under the auspices of Cardinal Richelieu. * .It would appear that, besides his three crowns for every piece, his con- tract secured him a share in the profits of the theatre. On receiving his share of the profits of the performance of " Mélite," he used to say, " It's a good farce," perhaps to indicate that he allowed it no higher merit. ^ A Pastoral, by Mairct. ^ Fontenelle, " Histoire du Theatre Français," p. 80. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 137 which is entirely composed of forty or fifty distichs of this kind : PHILEMON. " Arrête, mon soleil : quoi ! ma longue poursuite Ne pourra m'obtenir le bien de te parler 1 SYLVIE. C'est en vain que tu veux interrompre ma fuite ; Si je suis un soleil, je dois toujours aller. PHILEMON. Tu peux bien pour le moins, avant ma sépulture, D'un baiser seulement ma douleur apaiser. SYLVIE. Sans perdre en même temps Tune ou l'autre nature, Les glaces et les feux ne sauraient se baiser. PHILEMON. Oh cœur ! mais bien rocher, toujours couvert d'orages, * Où mon âme se perd avec trop de rigueur ! SYLVIE. On touche le rocher où l'on fait le naufrage ; Mais jamais ton amour ne m'a touché le cœur." However careful Corneille may have been to conform to this deplorable kind of wit, a correcter reason displayed itself continually, and, as it were, in spite of his efforts, in his work. In the style of " Mélite," also, might be perceived a kind of boldness necessarily unknown to those authors who were so proud of the haste and negligence with which they composed their dramatic works. No one had as yet introduced that tone of moderate eleva- tion which maintains the characters of a play in the same position throughout, and is equally removed from vul- garity and ridiculous pomp.' At length, excepting only ' The use of the second person singular which so much shocked Voltaire and which is frequent in all Corneille's early comedies, was probably at that time not an impropriety, and was less an indication of the intimacy of two lovers, than of a sort of familiarity which was allowable with persons with regard to whom it was not thought necessary strictly to observe the forms. It is thus used more frequently by women than by men, and appears to be one of the signs of that superiority which a woman assumes over a lover of 13S LIFE AND WRITINGS OF in his fantastic description of the pagan madness of Erastus.' Corneille had attained, if not to real and com- plete truth, at least to a kind of relative truthfulness, on which no previous writer had bestowed a thought. In- stead of figures naturally full of life and animation, he sought as yet merely to represent the artificial figures of contemporary society ; but he had felt the necessity of taking some model, and while the authors of his day were as incapable of imitation as of invention, he had at least striven to copy some characteristics of the world beneath his eyes. Of these rrierits, most of which were negative, and the only ones by which we can explain Corneille's first suc- cess, some were revealed to him by criticism. Having come to Paris "to witness the* success of ' Mélite,' " he learned " that its action was not included within twenty- four hours ; and this," he says, " was the only rule whose affection she is sure. In " Cinna," Emilie addresses Cinna in the second person singular, but he does not use it in his answers. In " La Veuve," one of Corneille's earliest comedies, Clarice thees-and-thous Philiste, who, far from thinking he has any claim upon her, has not even ventured to confess his love, and maintains the deepest respect in his language toward her. He informs us that she is of higher rank than himself, and this is probably the cause of her familiarity. In the same piece, Chrysanthe, an old woman, says thee and thou to Geron, a kind of business man, who never addresses her otherwise than as you. In other places we find instances of old ladies speaking in this manner to their servants. Fontenelle blames the thceing-and-thouing in Corneille's pieces only on account of its impo- liteness. See his " Vie de Corneille," p. 93. ' In all the comedies of the time we find the same use of the language of Paganism by thoroughly modern personages. Thus, in the comedy of the " Thuilleries," a production of the " five authors," the intrigue of which actually takes place in the garden of the Tuileries, the lovers tell us that they met in the temple, whither they had gone to adore the Gods ; and Aglante relates that a hermit whom he had consulted as to whether it was allowable to marry without love, spoke to him of love as the Master of the Gods, and threatened him with their anger if he dared to approach his altar with ir- reverence. At the same time his uncle, who is vexed by this decision, iron- ically calls the hermit " this venerable father," and laughs at his nephew because he can — " Au retour d'Italie, être encor scrupuleux." PIERRE CORNEILLE. 139 known at that period" ; ' although authors attached lit- tle or no importance to it. The charge of irregularity, however was not sufficient to console them for the suc- cess of " Mélite" ; they blamed it for its deficiency of events, and for its excessively natural style. "I learn- ed," says Corneille himself, "that those of the craft found fault with it because it contained few effects, and be- cause its style was too familiar." Fortunately for taste, Corneille had already entered the lists on its behalf. Self- respect came to the aid of reason. His firmness in the defense of truth rested complacently upon the success of his work. " To justify myself," he says, "by a sort of bravado, and to show that this kind of drama possessed the same theatrical beauties, I undertook to compose one regular piece, that is to say, extending over twenty-four hours only, full of incidents, and written in a loftier style, but which should be worth absolutely nothing — in which I completely succeeded." If Corneille's sole object in the composition of " Clitan- dre" really was to render the triumph of good taste more illustrious by a display of bad taste, never did an author sacrifice himself more entirely for the public good. A party of two couples, meeting by chance at the same time and place, in consequence of a double project of as- sassination ; the frustration of these projects by each other ; a man w^ho attempts to violate a girl upon the stage, and the girl who defends herself by piercing his eye with the bodkin from her hair ; combats, disguises, a tempest, the police, a prison — all these materials did Cor- neille laboriously combine, in order to furnish us in " Clitandre" with a monstrous drama, worthy of the pub- lic whom it was intended to please — for it is difficult to suppose that Corneille designed solely to instruct them. ' Examination of " Clitandre." 140 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF Perhaps he believed this himself thirty years afterward, when he wrote an examination of this work, which he then so heartily disdained : our present sentiments strangely modify the remembrance of our past feelings, and one of the most common effects of evidence, when we have been once struck by it, is to persuade us that we always were of that opinion. But at the time at which " Clitandre" appeared, thus to judge and sacrifice himself was above the taste of the author of " Mélite," and be- yond the courage of a self-love so keenly sensitive regard- ing the criticisms which had been passed upon his work. In the preface which he wrote in 1632, when " Clitan- dre" was printed. Corneille admits the obscurity which must result from the multiplicity of events and the brev- ity of the dialogue ; but he boasts " of having preferred to divert the eyes rather than importune the ears," by bringing upon the stage " what the ancients would have introduced into the dialogue"; and he congratulates him- self that, in adopting the rules, " he has culled their beau- ties, without falling into those inconveniences which the Greeks and Latins, who also followed them, were usually unable, or at least did not venture, to avoid." His dig- nity in his own defense is not the pride of a man who can dispense with the approbation of the public, but the con- fidence of an author who is certain of obtaining it what- ever means he may use to request it. " If I have confi- ned this piece," he says, " within the rule of a single day, it is not because I repent of not having pursued the same plan in ' Mélite,' or because I have resolved to do so in future. At the present day, some persons adore this rule, and many despise it ; for myself, I am desirous only to show that, if I depart from it, it is not for want of know- ing it."' But he was anxious to prove himself equal ' Preface to " Clitandre." PIERRE CORNEILLE. 141 in attainments to his contemporaries, and superior to them in his manner of employing his knowledge. " If any one should remark coincidences in my verses," ho says, " let him not suppose them to he thefts. I have not willingly horrowed from any body, and I have al- ways believed that, however fine a thought may be, you buy it at more than its value if it be suspected that you have taken it from some one else ; so that, in the state in which I lay this piece before the public, I think nothing will be found in it in common with most modern writers, except the little vanity which I display here.'" In the composition of "Clitandre," Corneille had not entirely renounced this vanity ; the pleasure of exhibiting his superiority to his rivals, even in a style of composition which he despised, had doubtless stimulated him not to leave any defects "wittingly" in his work, excepting those inseparable from the style itself, which he could not bet- ter disparage than by displaying enough talent to prove that, if the piece were bad, it was not the fault of the poet. He even took care to point out the faults which he had avoided ; and thus he explains, in his Preface, why he did not indicate the place in which the scene is laid. "I leave," he says, " the locality of my play to the choice of the reader, although it would be no trouble for me to name it here. If my subject be true, I have reasons for not mentioning it ; if it is a fiction, why should I, in order to conform to I don't know what chorography, give a fillip to history, assign imaginary princes to a country, and attribute to them adventures of which there is no record in the chronicles of their realm ?" Even in his irregularities. Corneille manifested a good sense which was quite unprecedented among his contem- ■ Preface to " Clitandre." 142 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF poraries and by which they were not yet in a condition to profit. After that sally of humor and self-respect which indu- ced him to write " Clitandre," Corneille no longer allowed the taste of his time tc- rule solely and despotically in his works, unless it were without his knowledge ; he prefer- red to rely upon his own reflections, and upon the experi- ence which he was daily acquiring of theatrical effects. The hour at which his genius was to awake had, never- theless, not yet arrived ; for some time still, he will grope painfully for his way amid the surrounding darkness ; but every effort will cast a ray of light upon his path, and every step will be a step in advance. Already a natural feeling of reserve had banished from Corneille's works that ex- cessive license which was scarcely noticed by his contem- poraries ; for an unsuccessful attempt at violation' can not be regarded as an indecency upon a stage on which a woman was represented as receiving her lover into her bed, merely recommending him to be discreet. It is only fair to say that after this piece of advice had been given, the curtain fell. If the custom of his time led Corneille to in- troduce an objectionable scene into " Clitandre," and to indulge in some questionable pleasantries in "Mélite," they had so little real connection with these pieces, that he had no difficulty in omitting them from the printed versions, and afterward he did not find it necessary to make any further curtailments. In his early days, too, he had composed some rather gay poems, which have never been inserted in the collected edition of his works. And at the same time that he banished from the stage these singular itianifestations of illegitimate or unbridled passion, he began to infuse a little more truthfulness into the language of honorable affection, and to divorce it from ' 111 " Clitandre." PIERRE CORNEILLE. 143 the jargon of gallantry. In the " Veuve," a mother in- quiring about the progress which her daughter is making in the heart of a young man whom she wishes her to marry, expresses her dissatisfaction at the tone of his dec- larations, which lay all the divinities of Olympus under contribution : " Ses yeux, à son avis, sont autant de soleils, L'enflure de son sein un double petit monde : C'est le seul ornement de la machine ronde. L'amour à ses regards allume son flambeau. Et souvent pour la voir il ôte son bandeau. Diane n'eut jamais une si belle taille ; Auprès d'elle Vénus ne serait rien qui vaille ; Ce ne sont rien que lys et roses que son teint." The anxious mother considers this the language of pleas- antry ; but her agent reassures her : " C'est un homme tout neuf, que voulez-vous qu'il fasse Il dit ce qu'il a lu." Corneille clearly perceived that it was not in books, nor even in the love-poems of his time, that he must seek a language capable of awakening, within the breasts of hit? audience, those sentiments which he was desirous to describe. In the " Galerie du Palais," two young people standing in front of a bookseller's shop, reason upon comedy, and the manner in which love is treated therein : " 11 n'en faut point douter, l'amour a des tendresses Que nons n'apprenons point qu'auprès de nos maîtresses ; Tant de sortes d'appas, de doux saisissements. D'agréables langueurs et de ravissements, Jusques où d'un bel œil peut s'étendre l'empire. Et mille autres secrets que l'on ne saurait dire. Quoique tous nos rimeurs en mettent par écrit, Ne se surent jamais par un effort d'esprit, Et je n'ai jamais vu de cervelles bien faites Qui traitassent l'amour comme font les poètes : 144 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF C'est tout un autre jeu. Le style d'un sonnet Est fort extravagant dedans un cabinet ; II y faut bien louer la beauté qu'on adore, Sans mépriser Vénus, sans médire de Flore ; Sans que l'éclat des lys, des roses, d'un beau jour, Ait rien à démêler avecque notre amour. O pauvre Comédie ! objet de tant de peines. Si tu n'es qu'un portrait des actions humaines, On te tire souvent sur un original, A qui, pour dire vrai, tu ressembles fort mal." The natural good sense, by which Corneille was distin- guished, is sometimes productive of singular effects by its mixture with those false habits from the influence of which the poet had not yet escaped. In the " Place Koyale," his fifth comedy, a young girl, unworthily treated by the man she loves, and by whom she believed she was loved, bursts into anger against him ; and when her perfidious admirer, who is anxious to drive her to extremities, insolently presents her with a mirror that she may behold therein the reasons for his indifference, she exclaims : " S'il me dit des défauts autant ou plus que toi. Déloyal, pour le moins il n'en dit rien qu'à moi : C'est dedans son cristal que je les étudie ; Mais après il s'en tait, et moi j'y remédie ; Il m'en donne un avis sans me les reprocher, Et me les découvrant, il m'aide à les cacher." To this very ill-timed outbreak, who would not answer in the words of Alidor, her false lover : " Vous êtes en colère, et vous dites des pointes !" This criticism is so just, that we are surprised that the good sense which dictated it to the poet did not preserve him from incurring it ; but the first step in advance is to perceive the truth ; the second, and most difficult, is to obey it. In the conduct of hia pieces, Corneille's progress was inore sure and rapid. The plot, being arranged with PIERRE CORNEILLE. 145 greater care and skill, fastens upon the ciiricjsity ; and all the characters present themselves with a marked physiognomy which distinguishes them from each other. These distinctive features are, in truth, more the result of fancies of the imagination than of natural disposi- tions and real varieties of character. An Alidor wishes to desert his mistress because she is so perfect and so tender that she gives him no cause for complaint to just- ify him in abandoning her^ and because he loves her too much to be master of his own liberty, when she is near. A Célidie* takes a sudden liking for a new comer, and in order to gratify her taste, strives to banish the feelings which speak within her breast on behalf of a faithful lover, to whom she has plighted her troth. These various whimsies are often rendered with a vivacity which somewhat diminishes their absurdity. Corneille's mind enlarged daily, but he had not yet discovered the legitimate and great use of his increasing powers ; instead of turning his attention to that inexhaustible source, the observation of nature, he wasted his strength in efforts to make the best of the barren field which he had chosen. He daily actjuired greater industry, but his art remained stationary at nearly the same point ; and Corneille had as yet succeeded only in showing what he could do in a style of composition in which excellence could be at- tained by no one. Six works,' the fruits of his earliest labors, had laid the basis of his fortune and established his reputation. The favor of Cardinal Richelieu had not overlooked his rising genius, and Corneille shared with CoUetet and Bois-Robert the honor of working, under the orders, su- ' In the " Galerie du Palais." - These were, "Mélite," in 1629 ; "Clitandre," in 1632; the "Veuve," in 1633; the "Galerie du Palais" and the "Suivante," in 1634; and the " Place Royale," in 1635. 146 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF pervision, and direction of his Eminence, at those pieces which were laboriously brought into being by the will of a minister, and the talents of five authors,' Corneille was still regarded by them merely as one of the part- ners in that literary glory which was common to them all: satisfied with their possession of bad taste, they were far from anticipating that revolution which was soon to overthrow its empire and their own. This revolution was not inaugurated by Corneille. It is difficult, at the present day, to divine what lucky chance dictated Mairet's " Sophonisbe," the only one of his pieces in which he rises at all superior to the taste of his times. Its merits taught nothing to its author, to whom it was nothing more than a piece of good fortune ; but there is reason to believe that it revealed to Corneille the powers of his own genius. " Sophonisbe" appeared in 1633. Corneille, then known only as a comic poet,^ not even knowing himself in any other character, and incapable of discerning tragedy amid that accumulated heap of whimsical and puerile inventions which he had, as it were in spite of himself, imitated in " Clitandre" — Corneille suddenly learned that it was possible for an- other kind of tragedy to exist. In the midst of that comic triviality from which Mairet was unable to free either his plot, or the tone of his characters. Corneille per- ceived that gi'cat interests were treated of, and many feelings depicted with considerable power. The sensitive chord had been touched ; his fine native faculties, placed far above the circle within which he was confined by ' These five authors were L'Etoile, Colletet, Boié-Robort, Rotrou, and Corneille, who, accordinfr to Voltaire, was " rather subordinate to the others, who exceeded liini in fortune or in favor," and who were probably more docile in a work in whic.li it was necessary to take care not to display either originality or indepenrtant feelings assume the place of childish mental amusements, and Corneille already manifests his wondrous powers of expression. We already perceive in Medea's " Moi," so far superior to Seneca's " Medea superest," an example of .that energetic conciseness to which he could reduce the expression of the loftiest and most sublime sentiments. ' Corneille " Médée," act i. scene 4. * Voltaire, " Commentaires." 148 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF In the following lines, which he has not imitated from the Latin tragedian — "Me peut-il bien quitter après tant de bienfaits 1 M'ose-t-il bien quitter après tant de forfaits 1" we are struck by the force and depth of thought that he can include in the simplest expressions ; and, in that scene in which Medea discusses with Creon the reasons which he may have for expelling her from his dominions, we acknowledge the presence of a powerful and serious reason, not often met with in the poetry of that time, and which gained for Corneille this eulogy from the English poet. Waller : " The others make plenty of verses, but Corneille is the only one who can think !" Even thus early he displayed that close and rigorous dialectics, which the recollection of his original studies, as much perhaps as the spirit of his time, caused too frequently to degen- erate into subtilties, but which, whenever it struck fully, dealt irresistible blows. It is of little importance to inquire whether Corneille, in " Médée," borrowed from Seneca or not ; for more than a century, his predecessors and contemporaries had not been wanting in models. In a translation of Seneca's " Agamemnon," published by Rolland Brisset, less than fifty years before, Clytemnestra called Electra a hussy ; and this line of Trissino's " Sofonisba," " E rimirando lui, pcnso a me stesso." was, in 1583, about the same period, thus translated by Claude Mermet, " En voyant «a ruine ot perte non pareille, Bien m'advisc qu'autant m'en peut pendre à l'oreille." To raise to the elevation of noble sentiments, great in- PIERRE CORNEILLE. 149 terests, and lofty thoughts a poetical language which had never had to express any thing but tender or natural f(îel- ings and ingenious or delicate ideas, was an achievement which Ronsard had commenced in reference to general poetry ; and this task Corneille first undertook for dra- matic poetry, which, though regarded as a more exact rep- resentation of nature, imitated her only in those grosser forms in which she sometimes appeared amidst a state of society still sadly deficient in delicacy and respect for pro- priety. It was a matter of little consequence whether an idea belonged originally to Corneille or to Seneca ; but it was essential that that idea, whoever its original inventor might have been, should not be robbed of all nobleness and gravity by expressions which conveyed to the mind none but the most ridiculous images ;' it was essential that details of the most puerile familiarity' should not be allowed to occupy a stage destined for the exhibition of higher interests ; it was essential that personages sup- posed to move in the highest circles of society, and to be actuated by mighty passions or important designs, should not use language similar to that employed by the vulgar herd in its brutal rage f in a word, it was essential, by ' In Mairct's " Sylvie," a prince, in despair at the death of his mistress, whom he deplores in a most tragic tone, speaks of his heart as a place — " Où l'amour avait fait son plus beau cabinet." ^ In Scudér-ifs " Didon," written in 1636, after ^neas and Dido, being forced by a storm to take refuge in a grotto, have given each other proofs of their mutual love, ^neas advances on the stage to look at the weather^ and says to the Queen, who had remained in the grotto : " Madame, il ne pleut plus ; votre Majesté sorte." " Then, being requested by her to climb upon a rock to summon her sister and suite to join them, he shouts out : " Hola ! hi ! l'on répond ; la voix est déjà proche. Hola ! . hi ! la voicy !" ^ Syphax, in Mairet's " Sophonisbe," calls his wife impudent and brazen- faced. It is true that she deserved both epithets ; but they are rather be- neath the dignity of tragedy. .,'_•',-' ^ > •' ■ . . f50 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF propriety, precision, and careful choice of terms, to estab- lish, between the style and the subject, a harmony which had previously been utterly unknown. This was a lesson which neither Seneca nor any other poet could teach Cor- neille. His genius alone raised him to a level with lofty thoughts, and he expressed them, as he had conceived them, in all their grandeur and sublimity. "After writing ' Médée,' " says Fontenelle, " Corneille fell back again into comedy; and, if I may venture to say what I think, the fall was great.'" I shall therefore say nothing of the " Illusion Comique," the last produc- tion of what we may call Corneille's youth, in which, taking leave of that fantastic taste which he was soon to annihilate, he gave himself up to its vagaries with a recklessness which might be charged with negligence, if Corneille's anxiety for success had ever allowed him to be negligent. This is the only one of his pieces into which he has introduced the " Matamore," a principal character in the comedies of the time, borrowed from the Spanish drama, as the name indicates,* and whose com- icality consists in bragging of the most extravagant achievements while giving continual proofs of the basest cowardice. The amorous conquests of the Matafnore are on a par with his warlike exploits ; Corneille's hero once delayed the dawn of day — Aurora was nowhere to be found, because, he says, she had gone — " Au milieu de ma chambre à m'offrir ses beautés." Scarron describes a hero of the same kind, who, for pastime, had — " Roué la fortune, Ecorché le hasard et brûlé le malheur." After the production of " Médée," such eccentricities ' Fontenelle, "Vie de Corneille," vol. iii. p. 94. * " Canitan Mata-moros," Captain Moor-killcr. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 151 were no longer allowable in Corneille; and the "Illusion Comique" would not he deserving of mention, if, by a singular coincidence, the date of its first performance' did not justify us in supposing that, even while his humor was taking such fantastic flights. Corneille was already busy with the " Cid." The genius of Corneille had at length discovered its true vocation ; but, timid and modest almost to humility, although inwardly conscious of his powers, he did not yet venture to rely upon himself alone. Before bringing new beauties to light, he had need, not of a guide to direct him, but of an authority upon which he could fall back for support: and he resorted to imitation, not to reinforce his owti strength, but to obtain a pledge for his success. The Court had brought into fashion the study of the Spanish language and literature, and men of taste had discovered therein beauties which we were still far from having attained. M. de Châlon, who had been secretary to the Q,ueen-mother, Marie de Medici, had retired, in his old age, to Rouen. Corneille, emboldened by the success of his first pieces, called upon him : "Sir," said the old courtier to him, after having praised him for his wit and talents, "the pursuit of comedy, which you have embraced, can only bring you fleeting renown ; you will find, in the Spanish authors, subjects which, if treated according to our taste, by such hands as yours, will produce immense effect. Learn their lan- guage; it is easy. I will teach you all I know of it, and until you are competent to read it yourself, I will trans- late for you some passages from Guillermo de Castro."^ Whether Corneille was indebted to himself or to his old ' During the year 1635. ^ This anecdote was related by Père Tournemine, one of Corncille"s tutors at the Jesuit College at Rouen. See the "Recherches sur les Théâtres de la France," vol. ii. p. 157. . ■ <- ■ . 152 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF friend for the choice of the subject of the " Cid," the " Cid" soon belonged to himself alone. The success of the " Cid," in 1636, constitutes an era in our dramatic history ; it is not necessary now to explain the causes of the brilliant reception which it obtained. " Before the production of Corneille's ' Cid,'" says Voltaire, "men were unacquainted with that con- flict of passions which rends the heart, and in the presence of which all other beauties of art are dull and inanimate." Neither passion, nor duty, nor tenderness, nor magnanimity had previously been introduced upon the stage ; and now, love and honor, as they may be con- ceived by the most exalted imagination, appeared sud- denly, and for the first time, in all their glory, before a public by whom honor was considered the first of virtues, and love the chief business of life. " Their enthusiasm M'as carried to the greatest transports ; they could never grow tired of beholding the piece ; nothing else was talked of in society ; every body knew some part of it by heart ; children committed it to memory ; and in some parts of France it passed into a proverb: — That is as fine as the CidP"^ Although carried away at first in the general stream, astounded at his remarkable success, and reduced to silence by their amazement, Corneille's rivals soon re- gained breath, and their first sign of life was an act of resistance against the torrent which threatened to sweep them into annihilation. The instinct of self-preservation },'ave unity to their efforts, and, with the single exception of Rotrou, the insurrection was general. A powerful aux- iliary undertook to support and direct their movements. At the distance at which wc stand from these events, it is difficult to assign any cause for Cardinal Richelieu's ' Prii.tsn», " Histoire ilc l'AccTiIrmic Française," p. 186 PIERRE CORNEILLE. 153 violent participation in this struggle against public opin- ion. Of all the motives which have been ascribed to him, the least probable is that ridiculous jealously which it is said that the minister entertained against the poet who labored in his service. The literary self-love of Richelieu was certainly very susceptible, but his vanity as a nobleman must have served as a counterpoise to it ; and a poetical prime minister could not possibly have felt any idea of emulation, nor consequently of jealousy, for a mere professional poet. That "vast ambition" of which Fontenelle speaks,' and which could so easily re- duce itself to the dimensions of the smallest objects, was according to all appearance, the ambition of power rather than a craving after glory. The suffrages of public opin- ion lose much of their value in the eyes of men who are raised above its censure ; and a powerful minister feels great inclination to believe that obedience is approval. Corneille was, however, unacquainted with that art which is so necessary to render obedience flattering. " At the end of 1635, a year before the performance of the ' Cid,' the Cardinal had given in the Palais-Cardinal, now called the Palais-Royal, the comedy of the ' Thuilleries,' all the scenes of which he had himself arranged. Cor- neille, who was more docile to his genius than subservient to the will of a prime minister, thought it necessary to make some alteration in the third act, which had been intrusted to him. This estimable liberty was ascribed to false motives by two of his colleagues, and gave great ofl'ense to the Cardinal, who told him that he must have an esprit de suite, by which he meant that submission which blindly obeys the orders of superiors.'" Whatever ' Fontenelle, " Vie de Corneille," p. 97. ^ Voltaire's Preface to the " Cid." He adds that " this anecdote was well known to the last princes of the house of Vendôme, the grandsons of 154 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF meaning may be ascribed to words spoken in an angry moment, the disposition which had dictated them was not likely to be mollified by such a success as the " Cid" had obtained without the orders of the minister. There is even reason to believe that, before achieving this insolent success, Corneille had seen marks of preference bestowed upon his associates, which he had disregarded ; and to fill up the measure of his offenses he seemed to boast of not having obtained them : " Mon travail sans appui monte sur le théâtre. Par d'illustres avis je n'éblouis personne. Je ne dois qu'à moi seul toute ma renommée.'" These lines he printed in 1636, between the appearance of " Médée" and that of the " Cid." This was doubtless a part of his crime. Astonished that any one should con- sider himself independent, and indignant that he should venture to declare it, Richelieu believed himself set at defiance. The enemies of Corneille, says Voltaire, " his rivals in the pursuit of glory and favor, had described him as an upstart spirit who ventured to brave the first min- ister, and who looked with contempt not only upon their works, but also upon the taste of their protector." They did not neglect this opportunity of satisfying their jea- lousy by the basest means. As Corneille lived at Rouen, and came to Paris only to arrange for the performance of his pieces, his only weapons against their attacks were his successes, and even these were turned into arms against him. The success of the " Cid" was regarded as an insult by the resentment of a protector whom he had C!é8ar de Vendôme, who was present at the performance of this piece of the Cardinal's." ' Corneille, " Excuse à Ariste." It is well known that this piece gained its author a host of enemies. It was frequently quoted during the quarrel that arose about the " Cid." PIERRE CORNEILLE. 155 neglected and irritated ; and it appeared, in his eyes, the triumph of a rebel. All arras were considered good enough to attack him ; Scudéry was thought less ridiculous, and even Claveret' was deemed a worthy and useful auxiliary. The Cardi- nal wrote, by means of Bois-Robert, to Mairet, who had praised the "Veuve," but declared against the " Cid :" " His Eminence has read with extreme pleasure all that has been written on the subject of the 'Cid,' and particu- larly a letter of yours which was shown to him." In this letter, Corneille's answers to the gross insults of his enemies are called libels ; and, though he had not read them, his Eminence, on seeing their rejoinders, " presup- posed that he had been the aggressor."* * ' , The biiterness of Corneille's enemies may easily be con- ceived by the humility of their confessions. Scudéry thus begins his attack upon the "Cid" : " There are certain pieces, like certain animals that exist in nature, which, at a distance, look like stars, and which, on close inspec- tion, are only worms." He then expresses his astonish- ment that such fantastic beauties "should have deluded wisdom as well as ignorance, and the Court as well as the citizen" ; and, begging pardon of that public whom he thinks it his duty to enlighten, he " conjures honor- able persons to suspend their judgment for a little while, and not to condemn without a hearing the ' Sophonis- be,' the 'César," the ' Cléopatre,' " the 'Hercule,'" the ' Marianne,' ' the ' Cléomedon,' '' and a host of other illus- ' The unknown author of a few dramas and other works, which are very bad even for the time at which they were written. ^ See Bois-Robert's letter to Mairet, in the preface to the " Cid," and in Abhé Granet's "Recueil des Dissertations sur Corneille et Racine." ^ By Scudéry. ■* By Benserade. ^ By Rolron. •> By Tristan. '' By Durycr. Most of these pieces had been performed during the same year as the " Cid," which, as it appears, was not brought on the stage until the end of the year. 156 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF trious heroes who have charmed them on the stage." Satisfied with this cry of distress, Corneille might well have pardoned enemies who, at the outset, confessed them- selves vanquished. But even self-love has its humility, and will disdain no opponent. Such is the strange mixture of loftiness and timidity, of vigor of imagination and simplicity of judgment ! By his success alone Cor- neille had become aware of his talents ; but when once he knew his own powers, he became, and remained, fully convinced of their extent and worth. As soon as he felt that Corneille was a superior man, he said so, without imagining that any one could doubt it : " Je sais ce que je vaux, et crois ce qu'on m'en dit," he says himself in the "Excuse à Ariste ;" and, in the same piece he speaks thus of his genius : " Quittant souvent la terre, en quittant la barrière, Puis d'un vol élevé se cachant dans les cieux, Il rit du désespoir de tous ses envieux. Je pense toutefois n'avoir point de rival, A qui je fasse tort en le traitant d'égal." It is not to be wondered at, that, holding this opinion of himself. Corneille considered the first criticisms of his works as an insult to evidence. Afterward, however, they caused him some anxiety, both regarding his glory, and the opinion which he had formed of it. Ho was afraid to call in question that which he had believed to be cer- tain ; and ho struggled against such a contingency at first, with the haughtiness of conviction, but afterward, with the violence of fear. At this juncture in his history, when Corneille is about to enter personally into the lists in opposition to such powerful enemies, it is necessary that we should obtain a PIERRE CORNEILLE. 157 complete idea of his character and position, in order to bo able rightly to judge both of the necessity for making con- cessions, and of the courage requisite for resistance. Cor- neille was immediately dependent upon the Cardiç^l, whom, in a letter to Scudéry, he calls " your master and mine." ' This expression shocked Voltaire ; but it was not at all at variance with the customs q{ Corneille's time. At a period when gentlemen of the highest birth entered the service of others more rich than themselves ; * when money was the natural price paid for all services,' and wealth a sort of suzerainty' which collected around itself vassals ready to pay it a kind of homage which was considered perfectly legitimate, we need not be surprised that a burgess of Rouen felt no shame in considering himself almost a domestic," or, if you prefer it, a subject ' See the " Réponse aux observations sur le ' Cid.' " He was in receipt of a pension from the Cardinal. ^ Cardinal de Retz, when merely Abbé de Gondi, during his travels in Italy, had in his suite " seven or eight gentlemen, four of whom were Knights of Malta." "Memoirs of De Retz," vol. i. pp. 16, 17. * It appears that, independently of the prologue in verse with which authors sometimes preceded their pieces, the first performance was opened by a sort of prose prologue, in which the authors were named. Cardinal dc Richelieu, feeling desirous that Chapelain should consent to have his name mentioned in the prologue to the comedy of the " Thuilleries," "besought him to lend him his name on this occasion," adding that, in return, he " would lend him his purse when he needed it." It is to be hoped, for the honor of Chape- Iain's taste, that he set a high price on the performance of a service of this kind. •* That sort of pride which maintains equality of condition under inequality of fortune, was then completely unknown. " I have never been touched with avarice," says the Abbé de Marolles, " nor of a humor to ask for any thing, although presents from rich and disinterested persons would have been agreeable to me, because they require no return, except pure civilities, which give no trouble ; whereas presents from poor persons, or equals, always com- pel us to give greater ones." " Mémoires de Marolles," vol. ii. p. 143. ^ Domestic was the title then assumed by all those who were attached to thfe service of powerful men. Pelisson speaks of several Academicians who were domestics of Chancellor Seguier. (" Histoire de l'Académie," p. 15.5.) La Rochepot, a cousin-german and intimate friend of that Abbé de Gondi, who had four Knights of Malta in his suite, was a domestic of the Duke of Orleans. ("Memoirs of De Retz," vol. i. p. 31.) It is not impossible that Corneille may have had the title of some office in the Cardinal's household. 158 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF of an all-powerful minister, whose liberality was his main- stay, and in whose favor his hopes were centred. The increased power and diiffusion of knowledge have, in our da^, enhanced the worth of merit, and established a juster proportion between man and things. The honest man has learned to estimate himself at his true value, and to respect himself even when his fortunes are low ; he has learned that the reception of a benefit can not enslave him, and has felt that he must not solicit benefits in re- turn for which he is expected to give gratitude only, and not personal work. Quickened by* that instinctive feel- ing of delicate pride which has been developed in us by education, and which a regard for propriety maintains even in those over whom it exercises the least influence, we shall meet with many actions and words, in the life of Corneille, utterly at variance with our ideas and habits. We shall pass with surprise from his tragedies to his dedicatory epistles ; and we shall blush to see the same hand — " La main qui crayonna L'âme du grand Pompée et l'esprit de Cinna," ^ stretched forth, if we may be allowed the expression, to solicit liberalities which it- did not always obtain,* We shall ask ourselves whether the same man could thus al- ternately rise to such lofty heights of genius and descend ' See the letter to Fouquct, printed at the beginning of "Œdipe," in Vol- taire's edition ; and in vol. x. p. 76, of the edition of 1758. ^ See his " Epître de la Poésie à la Peinture," in which he speaks of liberality as a virtue which has been so long banished from the Court that even its name has been forgotten : "J'en fais souvent reproche à ce climat heureux ; Je me plains aux plus grands conjine aux plus généreux ; Par trop m'en plaindre en vain je deviens ridicule ; Ou l'on ne iu"enlcnd pas, ou bien l'on dissimule." Corneille, " Œuvres," vol. x. p. 81. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 159 to such depths of abasement ; and we shall find that, in- fluenced sometimes by his genius and sometimes by his circumstances, he really was not the same man in both positions. Let us first look at Corneille in his social relations. Destitute of all that distinguishes a man from his equals, he seems to be irrevocably doomed to pass unnoticed in the crowd. His appearance is common,' his conversation dull, his language incorrect,* his timidity awkward, his judgment uncertain, and his experience perfectly childish. If he finds himself brought into contact, either by neces- sity or chance, with persons whom birth or fortune have placed above him, he does not rightly appreciate the posi- tion which he occupies in respect to them, but thinks only of the one connection of protector and protected, which subsists between him and them. Of all their dif- ferent titles to consideration, he regards only the claims which they may possibly have to his gratitude, and thus ^ " The first time I saw him, I took him for a shopkeeper," says Vignail- Manille, in his " Mélanges d'Histoire et de Littérature," vol. ii. p. 167. " M. Corneille was rather large and full of body, and very simple and com- mon in appearance," says Fontcndlc, in his " Vie de Corneille," vol. iii. p. 124. He had, however, according to Fontenelle, "a rather agreeable coun- tenance, a large nose, a pretty mouth, eyes full of fire, an animated phy- siognomy, and very marked features, well-adapted to be transmitted to pos- terity by means of a medallion or a bust." * " Another is simple and timid, very tiresome in conversation ; he takes one word for another He can not recite his own pieces, nor read his own writing." La Bruyère, "Des Jugements," vol. ii. p. 84. "His conversation was so dull that it became burdensome, even if it lasted only a short time. He never spoke the French language very correctly." Vigncul- Marr'dle, vol. ii. pp. 167, 168. " His pronunciation was not altogether clear ; he read his poems forcibly, but not with grace. In order to find out the great Corneille, it was necessary to read him." Fontenelle, p. 125. It was said that he was worth hearing only at the Hôtel de Bourgogne, and he was so conscious of this that he says himself, in his " Letter to Pelisson : " Et l'on peut rarement m'écouter sans eniiuy, Que quand je me produis par la bouche d"autrui." ■ Corneille, " Œuvres," vol. x. p. 124. 160 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF he will place a Montauron ' on a level with, if not above, Richelieu and Mazarin. It is always possible to de- termine by the nature of the homage which Corneille pays, the amount of the reward he received for it ; and the excessive character of his eulogies will never prove any thing but the excess of his gratitude. Nothing in these panegyrics seems to be at all repugnant to those feelings which he had not raised above his position ; and in most of his actions, he is nothing more than what fortune made him. "Let him elevate himself by composition; he is not inferior to Augustus, Pompey, Nicomedes, or Heraclius. He is a king, and a great king ; he is a politician — nay more, a philosopher."* He has passed into a new sphere ; a new horizon has opened before him ; he has escaped from the trammels of a position which bound down his imagination to the interests of a fortune far inferior to his faculties ; he can now appreciate all the duties necessarily imposed upon generous souls, by an important existence, ' The partisan Montauron, to whom Corneille dedicated " Cinna." In his dedicatory epistle he compares him to Augustus, because Augustus united clemency wdth liberality. M. de Montauron, who was as liberal as Augustus, must necessarily, like him, possess both virtues conjointly. It is somewhat singular that, in several editions in which this epistle is con- tained, the epithets liberal and generous, applied to M. de Montauron, are printed in large characters like those iised for the words Monseigneur or Votre Altesse, in order to point out M. de Montauron's title to this kind of homage. It is said that the dedication of "Cinna" gained Corneille a thou- sand pistoles. It is added that he at first intended to dedicate this play to Cardinal Mazarin ; but he preferred M. de Montauron, because he paid bet- ter. Although men were accustomed to the most inflated style of eulogy, great fault was found with Corneille for this epistle ; and praises of this kind, written on such terms?, were called thenceforward dedications à la Montauron. The eleventh article of the " Parnasse Réformé"' declares : " We Huppress all panegyrics à la Montauron.''' This Montauron having ruined himself, Scarron wrote : " Cc n'est que maro(\uin jierdu Que les livres que l'on dédie, Diipui.^ que Montauron mendie." * La Bruyère, " Caractères," vol. ii. p. 84. PIERRE CORNEILLE. ^ 161 a lofty destiny, and the possibility and expectation of glory ; and with all the force of deep, inward conviction, he has laid upon his heroes obligations which he had not been accustomed to attach to the humble social existence of Pierre Corneille.' There is, however, one point on which he is raised by this existence above the vulgar herd — his works issued from the obscurity in which his life was spent. By his literary renown he acquired public importance ; and thenceforward, he regarded his renown as an object of duty. In his works he pays proper respect to himself; with them were connected not only the honor of his glory, but also the dignity of his character ; he would deem himself degraded if he did not acknowledge their merit with all the frankness and boldness of a champion intrust- ed with their defense, or if he consented to abdicate the rank in which they had placed him. "It is not your fault," he says to Scudéry, "that, from that first rank in which I am placed by many competent persons, I have not descended lower even than Claveret, . .:.•.;. Of a truth, I should justly be reprehensible if I were incensed against you on account of a matter which has proved the accomplishment of my glory, and from which the ' Cid' has gained this advantage, that, out of the multitude of poems which have appeared up to this time, it is the only one whose brilliance/ has obliged envy to take up its pen."* Nevertheless, even while defending himself so proudly, Corneille did not depart from the ordinary ideas and habits of his conduct, in those things which concerned him as a man, and not as a poet. He evidently believed ' " He clothes his old heroes with all that is noble in the imatrinrition ; and you would say that he forbids himself the use of his own property, as if he were not worthy of it." Saint-Evrcmond, "Œuvres," vol. iii. p. 246. "' Corneille, "Réponse aux Observations de Scudéry." 162 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF in two very distinct kinds of honor, which it appeared to him all the more ridiculous to confound together, as he made no use at all of one of them. The same man who, in the "Cid," had dilated so loftily upon the duties im- posed by honor upon brave men,' did not think it neces- sary to fulfill those duties himself; and looking at his physical courage as entirely unconcerned in the question, he thus replied to Scudéry's rhodomontades :* "There is no necessity for knowing how much nobler or more val- iant you may be than myself, in order to judge how far superior the ' Cid' is to the ' Amant libéral." I am not a fighting man ; so that, in that respect, you have nothing to fear." Corneille was no longer either a Count of Grormas, or a Don Rodrigue, but a man whose glory consisted in writing fine poetry, and not in fighting ; though bold enough to brave the resentment of a minister by defending compositions which gained him universal admiration, he would not expose himself to a sword- thrust, in order to establish a reputation for courage, about which no one felt any interest. He thought it marvelous that such an idea should have found its way into a literary discussion ; so he looked with equal con- tempt on Scudéry's challenge and his arguments, without deigning an answer to either ; and did not think himself more dishonored by being less valiant than a practiced ^ At a time when eflbrts were being made to abolish duelinjr, it was found necessary to omit as dangerous the foUowmg Unes, in which the Count of Gonnas replied to Don Fernand's attempts to reconcile him to Don Dieguc : " Les satisfactions n'appaisent point une âme'; Qui les reçoit n'a rien ; qui les ftit se diffame ; Et de tous ces accords, relict le plus commun Est do déshonorer deux hommes au lieu d'un." ■ Contained in a private letter, in which Scudéry had sent him a sort of challenge. ' One of Scudéry's worst comedies. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 163 swordsman, than he could he by refusing to appear in a character which was not his own. So strong was his con- viction that the honor of Corneille did not depend upon his physical courage ! The tone, however, which these disputes assumed con- vinced Cardinal Richelieu of the necessity of putting a stop to them. In order to insure the triumph of the cause which he promoted, he judged it more prudent to appeal to the authority of a tribunal, than to leave the decision to the issue of a combat in which the voice of the people — which, in this case, was certainly " the voice of Grod" — did not seem disposed to give judgment in his favor. Silence was, therefore, imposed upon both parties, pending the decision of the Academy, which, for the second time, found itself involuntarily invested with the dangerous honors of authority.' In vain did it allege its well-grounded fear of making its young existence odious by the exercise of a power which it was not admitted to possess. The wisest of its members said, " that it was barely tolerated, upon the simple supposition that it claimed some authority over the language : what would be the result if it manifested any desire to vindicate that authority, and undertook to exercise it over a work which had satisfied the majority, and gained the approbation of the people ?"* The Cardinal was not, however, to he deterred from his purpose by such arguments as these : as Pelisson says, " they appeared to him of very little im- portance." But the Academy now urged conformity to its statutes, which enacted "that it could not judge a work without the consent and request of the author ;" and Corneille was not disposed to remove this obstacle. In ^ Scudéry had written to submit his case to the judgment of the Academy, and the Cardinal expressed a wish that it should pronounce upon the matter. Pelisson, " Histoire de l'Académie," p. 189. * Pelisson, "Histoire de l'Académie," p. 190. 164 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF vain did Bois-RoLert employ all the efforts of a Court friendship to obtain the accomplishment of his master's desires. By his residence at Court, Corneille had at least learned those formalities by which trickery may be frus- trated. " He continually maintained," says Pelisson, " a complimentary' tone, and answered that such an occupa- tion was not worthy of the Academy ; that a libel which deserved no answer was beneath its notice ; that the con- sequences of giving an opinion on the matter would be dangerous, because it would give envy a pretext for con- tinually appealing to their decision ; and that as soon as a fine piece had appeared on the stage, the poetasters would think themselves justified in bringing charges against its author before the members of the Academy.'" These unanswerable reasons were urged in reply to Bois- Robert's reiterated entreaties ; and the force of these rea- sons, independently of all personal considerations, resisted all the insinuations of a pretended friendship. At length, it became necessary to change these insinuations into positive language, and formally to announce the wish of a minister with whom a desire was a command. Then, also, it became necessary to understand clearly and an- swer distinctly. After Corneille had once more repeated his usual objections, "there escaped from him," says Pel- isson, " this addition : ' The gentlemen of the Academy may do as they please ; as you write that Monseigneur wpuld be glad to have their judgment, and that it would divert his Eminence, I have nothing more to say.' "* Corneille might regard these last words as a refusal,' but Richelieu would take them for a consent. The ^ Pelisson, "Histoire de l'Arailéniio," p. 192. ^ Ibitl. p. 193. ^ Sep in V^oltairc's edition of Corneille, vol. i. p. 1.59, the preface placed at tlic commencement of tlie " C^id," after the death of the Cardinal, in which he formally denies ever havin^r " agreed on judid, " (Euvros," vol. iii. p. 41. ' La Bruyère, " Caractères," vol. ii. p. 84. * Balzar, " Lettre sur Cinna," at the beginning of that traged}. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 199 But if there are points in which men recognize, al- though they may not resemble, one another, it is no less true that there are other jooints in which they resemble, but do not recognize, each other. Certain feelings be- long to the nature of all countries ; they do not char- acterize the Japanese or the Parisian only ; they are characteristic of man, and man every where will discern in them his own image. There is, on the other hand, a certain uniformity of ideas which can only belong to certain degrees and special circumstances of civilization ; and the more absolute and uniform these ideas become at any time, in any country, the more markedly will they characterize it. All the actions and writings of the pe- riod will bear their impress ; authors will assimilate their fictions and harmonize their characters therewith, what- ever may be their age and land : they will thus impress upon them a particular physiognomy, which will be taken for the local physiognomy, of the man and the time to which the action refers, although it is, properly speaking, the physiognomy of the author and the period at which the action is represented ; this will not, how- ever, be recognized, because it will manifest itself be- neath a different costume. When Emilie spoke of the " republic and liberty," could she appear any thing but a Roman lady ? And in the line : " Si j'ai séduit Cinna, j'en séduirai bien d'autres :" in the importance which she attaches to "her favors," which are to be the price of a revolution, which of the spectators ever thought of discerning the pride of a ro- mance-heroine of the seventeenth century ? Yet such she nevertheless was, but her character was the less discovera- ble by the eyes of her contemporaries, as she had borrow- ed from them all the singularity of their own manners in 200 LIFE AND WRITLNGS OF order to engraft it upon times and manners totally dif- ferent. Thus, unperceived and unintentionally, Corneille has subjected his characters to the sway of the ideas of his own time — a time at which protracted disorders had in- troduced into morality, which was still far from having made great progress, somewhat of that uncertainty which is engendered by party ties and the duties of position. The fewness of general ideas combined with the multi- tude and diversity of private interests to leave great latitude to that pseudo-morality, which is made to suit the necessities of the moment, and which the require- ments of conscience transform into a State virtue. The principles of common morality seemed binding only on those persons who were not authorized by great interests to contemn them ; and no one felt the slightest surprise at these words of Livie : " Tous ces crimes d'Etat qu'on fait pour la couronne, Le ciel nous en absout alors qu'il nous la donne ; Et dans le sacré rang où sa faveur l'a mis, Le passé devient juste et l'avenir permis." Unlimited devotion to the cause or condition which a man had embraced was a line of conduct which might not be approved, but which met with discussion 'rather than condemnation. Few actions were thought suffi- ciently culpable in themselves not to find an excuse in private motives ; and few characters were so well estab- lished as to be deemed inaccessible to the influence of such motives. Mme. de Rambouillet, the most respected woman of her time, received from Cardinal Richelieu, "who held her in great esteem,'" a message in which he begged her, as a friend, to inform him of whatever was said about him at the meetings which were then ' *' Segraisiana," p. 29. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 201 held at her house; and Segrais, on learning her refusal to comply with this request,' ascribes it to the fact "that she did not know what it was to be a partisan, and to do any one a bad turn." So, acting as the Cardinal's spy would have been nothing more than "becoming a par- tisan ! And who would have blamed Mme. de Rambou- illet for becoming a partisan of the prime minister ? Emeri, the superintendent of the finances, once said in open council, " that good faith was a quality expected only of merchants, and that those masters of requests who alleged it as a reason in matters concerning the king, deserved to be punished." ^ It is true that, in his youth, Emeri had been condemned to be hanged ; but the greatest scoundrels never say aloud any thing but what honest folks are willing to hear. Struck with wonder at a liberty which they did not feel themselves capable of attaining, these honest persons said: " He is ' an able statesman !" and their only conclusion was that, to be a statesman, it was necessary to be a dishonest man.^ Some men of superior mind, such as Cardinal de ' She told Bois-Uobert, who had undertaken this friendly office, " that those who visited her were so strongly persuaded of the respect and friend- ship which she entertained for his Eminence, that not one of them would be bold enough to speak ill of him in her presence ; and that therefore she would never have occasion to give him such information." — "Segraisiana," p. 30. " De Retz, "Mémoires,"' vol. i. p. 99. ' That Photin is an Emeri, who, in the "Mort de Pompée," says : " La justice n'est pas une vertu d'Etat," and who maintains that a prince should " Fuir comme un déshonneur la vertu qui nous perd, Et voler, sans scrupule, au crime qui le sert." And Voltaire, who is violently indignant at the want of probability of such a statement, and declares in his Commentaries that such maxims had never been uttered, and that a man who wishes his advice to be taken would not dress it in so abominable a garb — even Voltaire had not thoroughly exam- ined, and did not rightly understand the time of Corneille. In proof that that period was very different from the time of Voltaire, it is only necessary to observe that, in Voltaire's time not even an Emeri would have broached such am opinidn in open council - = 202 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF Retz, perceived in Emeri's opinions as much want of judgment as meanness of heart;' but this same Cardinal de Retz sought to obtain, by revolutionizing the State, "not only an honest, but an illustrious"* mode of desert- ing the ecclesiastical order with which he had unwill- ingly been connected. At this epoch, long-continued dis- orders had left every man the care and the power of making his own position in society ; all interests and all ambitions were incessantly in conflict, if only for the honor of gaining the victory. Upon a man's dignity de- volved the task of maintaining his rank ; glory dispensed with virtue, and pride might consist in believing one's self above the performance of duties.^ The most insignificant facts become worthy of notice when they clearly reveal and distinctly characterize the spirit of the age. M. de Luynes was one day bantering the young Duke de Rhételois, who was then sixteen years of age, on the care which he took to have his hair well curled. The Duke replied that it curled naturally ; "and when M. de Luynes, in presence of the king, affected as- tonishment at this, the king inquired if what he said were true. ' No, Sire,' replied the Duke de Rhételois. ' Why did you not say so when I asked you V inquired M. de Luynes. 'Because,' answered the Duke, 'I tell truth to the king, but to you what I please.'"* This same Duke de Rhételois would have laid his hand to his sword to answer a contradiction, for no one then suffered another man to give him the lie ; but claimed for him- self alone the right of contradicting his own statements. Such traits of character as these were continually oc- curring before the eyes of Corneille; and these traits he ' De Rctz, " Mémoires," vol. i. p. 99. * Ibid. vol. i. p. 31. ^ See Appendix C. * "Mémoires de Marolloj," vol. i. p. 8d. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 203 has bestowed upon the Greeks and Romans, who were thought " so like and yet so much flattered" by his fel- low-countrymen, who eagerly acknowledged the authen- ticity of these " illustrious ancients," as they had no diffi- culty in feeling themselves to be Greeks and Romans like them. The genius of Corneille, and the subtlety of his reasonings, appeared to the men of his time to justify manners which they were better able to maintain than to explain ; the force of his dialectics threw strong light upon principles, of which fhey possessed a feeling rather than a clear and precise idea ; and his political reflections struck them with all the more force, because they led them farther than they had ever yet traveled upon a road with which they were well acquainted. When the Maré- chal de Grammont said, " Corneille is the breviary of kings," it was less, I think, from a just appreciation of Cinna's noble deliberation, than from a courtier's admira- tion of that arrogant contempt for morality which is thought appropriate to lofty positions because it is at variance with vulgar maxims : but the true feelings and sublime impulses which a man of genius alone could de- rive from so strange a system were required to behold — " Le grand Condé pleurant avix vers du grand Corneille." The great vice of such a system is that the merit of its effects depends absolutely upon the position of its characters. Some moments may occur in the life of a man, when extraordinary circumstances render it im- perative on liim to be actuated only by one single feeling — when the maxims of prudence, and even of ordinary morality, may and must be silent, in presence of consid- erations of a probably superior order, and leave the man to the influence of a single virtue and a single interest. If that man, possessing an energetic and simple natural 204 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF character, has accustomed himself to sacrifice all to the object of his desire — if, proceeding always with firm step to the execution of his designs, he has never experienced either those mental disturbances which arise from uncer- tainty with regard to duty, or that hesitation of will which is occasioned by the conflict of two affections — then, when an imperious circumstance presents itself before him, with promptitude and firmness he sweeps away all obstacles at a blow, darts forward to the goal, and roughly seizes upon that fortunate necessity which makes him a great man. This sometimes occurs to the heroes of Corneille ; when the character with which he has endowed them becomes a virtue, that virtue subju- gates and governs the whole man, both as regards his feelings and his position ; and every thing bends before this character, to complete the greatness of which no- thing is wanting after it has found employment for all its power. But this power does not always find means for its worthy exercise, and the display of its strength some- times bears a closer resemblance to the pomp of parade than to the real activity of combat. Thus, in "He- raclius," Pulchérie exhausts herself in uttering insults against Phocas, which are not attended with sufficient difficulty and danger to be worthy of her ; she requires an opportunity in which the haughtiness of her contempt, and the inflexibility and frankness of her resentment, may be an act of courage and virtue. In the position of Nicomède, the necessity of braving and affironting all who surround him is not sufficiently evident to save his perpetual bravado from occasionally appearing out of place. Emilie's inflexibility is admirable, if wo only think of the position in which she hns been placed by her thirst for vengeance ; but it is excessive if we weigh PIERRE CORNEILLE. 205 the motives of her passion for revenge : the errors of Au- gustus, from whom she has consented to receive so many benefits, no longer deserve the firmness with which she perseveres in her hatred of him; and that " adorahle fury" of Balzac's doctor,' though "adorable" if you please, when the position suits her character, is, in fact, nothing better than a "fury," when such is not the case. It is impossible for their position not to frequently fail Corneille's characters, for they can not find a suitable place elsewhere than in the most extraordinary circum- stances of life. It has been urged against them that they speak too long, and talk too much of themselves. " They talk too much to make themselves known," said Vauvenargues ; but how could we know them if they did not speak ? A single dramatic action could not possibly include enough facts and circumstances for the display of such characters in their entirety, and could not show, by what they do, all that they are capable of doing. They are not characters who limit their conduct to the exertion of influence over the action of the moment, or to bursting violently into a particular passion ; they embrace and sway the whole individual ; and they would need an entire lifetime to make themselves thoroughly known and understood. Upon the stage, they have not enough time or space : Nicomède can not display thereon that military talent on which he rests his confidence and pride ; powerless at the court of Prusias, he can neither give evidence of that enlightened prudence which enables ' " A doctor in my neighborhood, who usually adopts the lofty style, certainly speaks of her in a strange manner ; and there is no hann in your knowing whither you have carried his mind. He was satisfied, on the first day, with saying that your Emilie was the rival of Cato and Brutus, in her passion for liberty. At this hour, however, he goes much farther ; some- times he says that she is possessed by the demon of the republic ; and some- times he calls her the beautitltl, the reasonable, the holy, and tho adorable fury.'* — Balzac, " Lettre sur Cinila." 206 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF him to foresee and to frustrate the designs of the Ro- mans, nor of that tranquil greatness of soul which can find no surer means of escaping from power than braving it— " D'estiruer beaucoup Rome et ne la craindre point." Consequently, in order to make us acquainted with Ni- comède, it becomes necessary for Prusias to draw him momentarily from his inactive position by permitting him to answer Flaminius in his stead. Corneille was not aware of another expedient for furnishing even Nicomède with enough words to supply the place of those actions which befit such a character as his. In " Rodogune," Cleopatra, hampered by her position, can not give vent to the violence of her hatred, and the unbending nature of her ambition ; time fails her to develop before us the progress of her combinations ; and she details them to us that we may know them. If the stern requirements of duty allowed Pauline to manifest in her actions the strength of her love for Sévère, as well as her persistence in sacrificing him, she would not be obliged to say so much about the great virtue involved in the sacrifice. All these characters speak when compelled to do so by the necessities of the scene, and not by the exigencies of the action; they speak sometimes without waiting the proper opportunity for so doing ; though such a course is not in harmony with the almost exclusive empire exerted over them by their character. Character, regarded as a simple natural disposition, is manifested only when it fijids itself in presence of an object adapted to bring it into play ; whereas passion, a violent movement of the soul, inclines in every direction, vents itself wherever it can, and is able to furnish nmch more naturally that abundance of discourtJo, which is ncccs;^ûry on the stage. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 207 AVhen dying Cleopatra reveals to her son her crimes and dreadful projects, she is hurried on by passion; her hatred is no longer able to act ; she has no consolation but in declaring it ; and her revelations are therefore perfectly natural. But the revelations which Cleopatra makes to Laonice in the early acts are not so, because they are simple developments of character, skillfully given by the person herself, instead of being naturally provoked by the course of events. Not only do Corneille's heroes possess few passions which wage war against their character, but it rarely happens that their character is set in motion by the or- dinary feelings of the heart, as they may exist under simple circumstances. They most frequently give ex- pression to ideas, and almost to doctrines ; their speeches generally consist of reasonings, animated by strong con- viction and pressing logic, but somewhat cold and con- fined within the circle of mental combinations. A prin- ciple, a general and systematic idea, holds sway and manifests itself throughout ; and on the truth or falsity of this principle the conduct of the persons of the drama invariably depends. Thus Pauline is guided by the idea of duty, and Polyeucte by that of religious faith ; and these ideas, admirably adapted to elevate the soul and exalt the imagination, develop a most passionate feeling in both personages ; but even this feeling is based upon a principle. "When Polyeucte exclaims : "Grand Dieu ! de vos bontés il faut que je l'obtienne ; ^ ,..( '. Elle a trop de vertu pour n'être pas chrétienne :" it is the inflexibility of the principle " out of the church there is no salvation," which produces this extremely touching and truthful movement. It is a reasoned knowl- edge of the devotion which patriotism imposes on a Ro- 208 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF man, which sustains the inflexible firmness of young Horace ; and that sublime outburst — " Quoi ! vous me pleureriez mourant pour mon pays V is an expression of the astonishment of a man who hears a truth which he deems incontestable, called in question. Cinna says to Emilie — " Vous faites des vertus au gré de votre haine;" and she answers : " Je me fais des vertus dignes d'une Romaine." Emilie's hatred is, in fact, a virtue and not a feeling, in her own opinion ; she thinks that she ought to hate Augustus, and she tells us why she hates him, rather than explains how she does so. Chimène's pertinacity in demanding the death of Rodrigue is altogether the result of reflection ; whatever grief she may have felt at the death of her father, it is not grief which hurries her to the feet of the king, but the idea of what she is bound by honor to do.. But the feeling which possesses her, con- tinually diverts her attention from the idea which governs her ; at the same time that she does what she thinks duty commands for her father, she says what she feels for her lover, and the " Cid," the only one of Corneille's tragedies in which love ventures to display all its power, is also the only one in which he has followed the natural rule of giving action to character and words to passion. Moreover, in Corneille, absolute truth is, here as else- where, superseded by relative truth ; where we can not discover the characteristics of man in general, we find the features of the Frenchman of the seventeenth century ; and the somewhat talkative virtue of his heroes could not bqt be well received at a time when the necessity of duly maintaining his rank in society placed tho act of asserting PIERRE CORNEILLE. 209 his own importance among the duties, or at least among the accomplishments, of a man of merit. To talk of one's self was then a most common practice. It was Balzac'-s custom, whenever he mentioned his own performances in conversation, to take off his hat, apparently out of polite- ness to those who were listening to him. One day, when he was suffering from a violent cold, Ménage said he had caught it IVom the number of opportunities which ho gave himself for taking off his hat ! This joke occasion- ed a serious quarrel between them. " M. de la Roche- foucauld," says Segrais, " was the most polite man in the world ; he well knew how to observe all the proprieties, and above all things, he never praised himself. M. de Roquelaure and M. de Miossans were men of great talent, but they were never tired of praising themselves. They had a great many admirers. Speaking of them, M. de la Rochefoucauld used to say : " I repent of the law which I have imposed upon myself not to speak' in my own praise; if I did so, I should have many more followers. Look at MM. de Roquelaure and de Miossans, who, for two mortal hours, have been talking to twenty people about nothing but their own merits. Among those who listen to them, there are only two or three who can riot endure them ; but the other seventeen applaud them loudly, and consider them incomparable.'" Nevertheless, while endowing his heroes with taste and the gift of speech. Corneille does not forget to place them in positions in which they will have opportunity to act ; in his dramas, every thing tends to effects of position ; and he is constantly seeking to prepare and to put forward these effects. In his " Examinations," he rarely praises himself for the expression which he has given to feelings and ideas ; but he is continually congratulating himself ' " Segraisiana," p. 32. 210 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF on the invention of this or that position, or else of the means which he had used to give likelihood and suit- ability to the position which he desired to introduce. In truth, he abuses the too easy art of creating the embar- rassments which he needs ; and it is to the subtleties of his age, rather than to nature, that he looks for the feel- ings necessary to the action which he intends to produce. Thus Rodogune, when ready to do her duty, and marry whichever of the two princes may be declared the elder, does not think herself at liberty to bestow her hand with- out exacting the condition that her first husband shall be avenged ; that is to say, without obliging the prince she may espouse to assassinate his mother : " Je me mettrai trop haut s'il faut que je me donne. Quoique aisément je cède aux ordres de mon roi, Il n'est pas bien aisé de m'obtenir de moi. Ce cœur vous est acquis après le diadème, Prince, mais gardez-vous de le rendre à lui-même ; Vous y renoncerez peut-être pour jamais Quand je vous aurai dit à quel prix je le mets." This fearful proposition is merely a subtle invention, intended to act as a basis for the position of the fifth act, by placing " Rodogune herself under the necessity of prolonging the uncertainty of the two princes ;" and when this uncertainty is terminated by her confession to Antiochus, and by the renunciation of Seleucus, the facility with which Rodogune abandons her project adds greatly to the whimsicality of the idea that produced it ; " Votre refus est juste autant que ma demande. A force de respect votre amour s'est trahi. Je voudrois vous hair, s'il m'avoit obéi ; Et je n'estime pas l'honneur d'une vengeance Jusqu'à vouloir d'un crime être la récompense." Thus it was that the age in which Corneille lived PIERRE CORNEILLE, 211 taught him to treat the feelings of the heart. The un- bounded devotion of this age to love is an example, among many others, of the eifects of superstition upon true wor- ship ; and the grave and simple Corneille, by his suLinis- sion to the superstitious gallantries of his time, affords a striking evidence of the manner in which a man of genius may subject his reason to the caprices of the multitude, to whose advice he listens that he may obtain a hearing for himself. The "Cid" and " Polyeuctc" effectually raised Cor- neille above the suspicion of having disregarded those characteristics of love which render it worthy of being depicted by a man of genius, and of having looked to the romances of his time for that coloring which his imagin- ation refused to supply. It is, however, impossible to deny that, in most of his pieces, Corneille has treated love, not as a passion that fills, agitates, and sways the soul, but as a position that imposes certain duties, pre- scribes a certain course of conduct, and coldly disposes of life, without lending it any charms. The author of the " Cid" and of "Polyeucte" could not have been igno- rant of the nature of true love ; even if he had not exper- ienced its full ardor and extravagance, he was certainly acquainted with that sincere and profound tenderness of heart, that perfect confidence, which brings two souls into union, although duty may call them in different, or even opposite directions — that sweet and intimate communion of two lovers, which, leads one to sympathize with all the sufferings of the other, which opposes union of hearts to the misfortunes of destiny, and establishes, between two beings who are separated by all beside, secret bonds which nothing can avail to sunder. Chimène and Rodrigue con- ■» ^rse of their common afiairs, when speaking of the op- '• ^site duties imposed upon them ; and, if such an exprès- 212 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF sion may be allowed, they arrange together for their per- formance : 1 " Tu n'as fait le devoir que d'un homme de bien ; Mais aussi, le faisant, tu m'as appris le mien " There is nothing which the love of one of the two lovers would desire to wrest from the honor of the other : " Va ; je ne te hais point. — Tu le dois. — Je ne puis. — Crains-tu si peu le blâme et si peu les faux bruits î Quand on saura mon crime, et que ta flanmie dure, Que ne publieront pas l'envie et l'imposture 1" But when Rodrigue and Chimène have become convinced that it is impossible to stifle their affection, and that they are not called upon to display their strength and virtue in this vain attempt, then, left for a moment to the unresisted influence of that love which constitutes their sole happiness in the midst of the most cruel misfor- tunes, they feel, they think, they almost speak together ; the echo of their words is that cry which escapes simul- taneously from two souls deeply affected by the same grief: " Rodrigue, qui l'eût cru î — Chimène, qui l'eût dit 1 Que notre heur fût si proche et si tôt se perdît !" And their farewell serves only to complete the union of their destiny : •' Adieu ! Je vais traîner une moUYante vie. Tant que par ta poursuite elle me soit ravie. — Si j'en obtiens relict, je te donne ma foi De ne respirer pas un moment après toi." They can now separate. Rodrigue could even fight Chimène's brother, if Chimène had a brother desirous of avenging his father ; and Chimène can pursue Rodrigue with hostile intentions. They have met, and discovered their mutual sentiments ; they will now understand each PIERRE CORNEILLE. 213 other in spite of appearances most unintelligible in the eyes of the world, and the mysterious freemasonry of love will never allow either of them to be exposed to the pain of being misunderstood by the adored being to whom he remains faithful, even at the moment of sacrificing him. Pauline, when united to Polyecute, and determined to endure all the sacrifices that may be imposed on her by this tie, nevertheless does not attempt to dissemble to Sévère those feelings with which he was so well ac- quainted ; but she appeals to the love of Sévère himself to support her in the performance of a duty which — " Moins ferme et moins sincère, N'auroit pas mérité l'amour du grand Sévère ;" and to him she still belongs even when she rejects him in the name of her virtue. The poet who could conceive thus of love undoubtedly possessed within himself the necessary qualifications for describing it. In a life least subject to the empire of the passions, experience, when properly used, supplies the imagination, on this point, with more touching details than it is ever able to employ. " Corneille's tempera- ment," says Fontenelle, " inclined him sufl^ciently to love, but never to libertinism, and seldom to strong attach- ments." ' Strong attachments are always rare, and it is enough to have been under the influence of one to know what opinion to entertain on the subject; but Corneille often forgot his own opinion to remember only what he had heard others say about it. Speaking of himself, he has said : " En matière d'amour je suis fort inégal ; J'en écris assez bien ; je le fais assez mal." "Whether he made love well or ill, he did not always ' Fontenelle, " Vie de Corneille," p. 125. 214 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF write about it as well as he thought. He too frequently allowed borrowed habits to trample upon the dictates, of his heart and reason ; and he sacrificed the feelings with which he had animated Chimène and Pauline for the insipidities which he had been taught to put into the mouths of Csesar and Cleopatra. At the present day, in order to judge the loves- of Caesar and Cleopatra, of Antiochus and Rodogune, as they were judged by the most talented and sensible men of the seventeenth century,' we must transport ourselves into the system of love generally adopted at that period, with which Corneille's characters, as it becomes well-educated persons, act in strict conformity. We must resign our- selves to behold in love neither liberty of choice, nor suit- ability of tastes, characters, and habits, nor any of those bonds which become all the more dear as we better ap- preciate them, and better understand their true motives. To the fashionable world of Corneille's time, love was nothing but an ordinance of Heaven, an influence of the stars, a fatality as inexplicable as it was inevitable. Every one knows by heart these lines of Rodogune : " II est des nœuds secrets, il est des sympathies Dont, par le doux rapport, les âmes assorties S'attachent Tune à l'autre, et se laissent piquer Par ces je ne sais quoi qu'on ne peut expliquer." The following lines, from the " Suite au Menteur," would be even better known than the foregoing, if the piece were read as much " Quand les ordres du ciel nous ont faits l'un pour l'autre Lise, c'est un accord bientôt fait que le notre ; Sa main, entre les cœurs, y)ar lui secret pouvoir, Sème l'intelligence avant que de se voir; * Among others, see Saint-Evremond's opinion in his "Discours sur l'Alexandre de Racine," in vol. iii p. 149 of his works. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 215 Il prépare si bien l'amant et la maîtresse, Que leur âme, au seul nom, s'émeut et s'intéresse ; On s'estime, on se cherche, on s'aime en un moment ; Tout ce qu'on s'entredit persuade aisément ; Et sans s'inquiéter d'aucunes peurs frivoles, La foi semble courir au-devant des paroles." The same idea occurs again in "Bérénice;"' it is ap- parent in all Corneille's dramas ; and no wonder, for it was the idea of the time. A passion thus predetermin- ate was necessarily of instantaneous origin. Thus arose the passion of the Duke de Nemours for the Princess of Cleves, the various movements of which were afterward ohserved with so much delicacy, and described with so much truthfulness. Beauty, the only charm whose full value is appreciated at a single glance, then held sway not only with irrisistible power, but with tyranny. "At forty-eight years of age," says Segrais, " Mme. de Mont- bazon was still so beautiful that she eclipsed Mme. de Roquelaure, who was only twenty-two years old ; and one day, happening to meet together at an assembly, Mme. de Roquelaure was obliged to withdraw."* The Memoirs of the time furnish us with many instances of ladies who were actually obliged to retire because a more beautiful rival had entered the room. It seemed as though beauty were a supreme and exclusive empire, the loss of which left the vanquished naught but shame and flight. La Bruyère himself declares that " that love which arises suddenly is longest in curing." He even seems to think that it alone deserves the name of love : "Love is born suddenly," he says, "without other re- flection, from temperament or from weakness ; a glimpse of beavity transfixes and decides us. That love which ' " Ce don fut I'efTet d'une force imprévue : De cet ordre du ciel, qui verse en nos esprits Les principes secrets de prendre et d'être pris." ' "Segraisiana," pp. 133, 134. 216 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF grows gradually is too much like friendship to be a vio- lent passion.'" Perhaps these sudden effects, these sun-strokes of love, which are now the exclusive property of our worst ro- mance-writers, were then able to obtain the belief of a philosopher. Men and women, whose worldly life was ceaselessly occupied with ideas or intrigues of love, were naturally always susceptible, or at least thought them- selves susceptible of its influence ; and if, as La Roche- foucauld observes, "there are some people who would never have fallen in love, if they had never heard love mentioned," many persons, through hearing it talked of wherever they went, fancied they had found it where it did not exist. Surprised at these effects of the imagination, some men endeavor to explain them by other causes than the influence of the stars ; and these causes were generally of a most ridiculous character. In order to prove that the seat of love is in the blood, Segrais relates a story of a German gentleman whose faithless mistress, desiring to get rid of him, tan him twice through the body with a sword. He did not die of his wounds ; but, strange to say, when he had recovered, says Segrais, " he felt as much indifference for the princess as if he had never loved her, and he attributed this to his loss of blood. '"^ This amorous devotion — ^the consequence of a fatal destiny — was then the ideal of a belle passion, at least as regarded the perfect lover ; for fatality, to which the heart of his mistress was equally subject, could have no influence upon her conduct toward him. The ladies held firmly, at least in theory, by this principle, which was as favorable to their vanity as to their virtue. Sole» * La Bruyère, " Caractères," pp. 179, 180. ' " Segraisiana," p. 10. PIERRE CORNEILLE. - 217 ly intrusted with the care and duty of defending them- selves, they felt themselves all the more powerful he- cause so high a value was set on the happiness of a pas- sion which accomplished the destiny of the loftiest souls. The proofs of this high price of their conquest constituted their glory ; for " a woman's glory" was then a common phrase. Madame de Sévigné, when she declared that "the honor of these gentlemen is quite as delicate and tender as that of these ladies," believed she had almost made a discovery ; and the Academy pronounced, in its " Opinions on the ' Cid,'" that if " it had been allowable for the poet to make one of the two lovers prefer love to duty, it may be said that it would have been more ex- cusable to lay this fault on Rodrigue than on Chimène ; as Rodrigue was a man, and his sex — which is, as it were, entitled to shut its eyes on all considerations in order to satisfy its love — would have rendered his action less strange and less unsupportable."' This is the key to, the almost constant superiority of Corneille's heroines over his heroes. She who commands both herself and others, in the most important circum- stance of life, must be, under all circumstances, the most illustrious ; and after the decision of the Academy, it is not surprising that Corneille should have sacrificed the inflexibility of Cinna to the advantage of bringing Emi- lie's unyielding nature into strong relief. But it will then be equally evident to what frivolous interests that glory must be attached which is based upon the petty events of a woman's life, and judged by the caprices of her vanity. No further astonishment will be felt at bo- holding Eurydice, in " Suréna," deliver her lover to death by her obstinacy in desiring that, as he can not marry ' See the Appendix to Voltaire's edition of the " Cid," p 392. K 218 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF her, he should marry none but the person of her choice. " T will," she exclaims — " Malgré votre roi, Disposer d'une main qui ne peut être à moi. Je veux que ce grand choix soit mon dernier ouvrage, Qu'il tienne lieu vers moi d'un éternel hommage, Que mon ordre le règle, et qu'on me voie enfin Reine de votre cœur et de votre destin." TLe same whim assists Bérénice to console herself for the loss of Titus : " Je veux donner le bien que je n'ose garder ; Je veux du moins, je veux ôter à ma rivale, Ce miracle vivant, cette âme sans égale. Qu'en dépit des Romains, leur digne souverain . S'il prend une moitié, la prenne de ma main ; Et pour tout dire enfin, je veux que Bérénice Ait une créature en leur impératrice." Corneille's " Sophonisbe," the ill-success of which Saint- Evrcraond ascribes solely to the excessive perfection with which Corneille had retained "her true character'" — this daughter of Hasdrubal, amidst her hatred of the Romans, and her dread of slavery, regards the pleasure of robbing a rival of Masinissa's affection as the greatest happiness of that marriage which is to deprive her of her triumph. The lovers of these illustrious coquettes, devotedly sub- missive to their whims, await, as Antiochus pleases, with- out rebellion and without blasphemy, whatever it may please their glory to ordain ; and tricks of vanity mingle without effort, in Corneille's latest pieces, with exaggera- tions of pride through which some few scintillations of ' Corneille, who almost alone possesses the good taste of antiquity, has had the misfortune of not pleasing our age, for having entered into the genius of those nations, and preserved to the daughter of Hasdrubal her true character. Thus, to the shame of our judgments, he who has surpassed all our authors, and who has, perhaps, here surpassed himself, has restored to these great names all that was due to them, and has not been able to oblige us to render to himself all that we owe to him.'' — Saint-EvremOnd, "Œuvres," vol. iii. pp. 141, 112. , ,' *;<; ^ PIERRE CORNEILLE. 219 gcnivis and mementoes of greatness are discernible only at rare intervals. Once entered upon a false train of ideas, Corneille was unable to regain the true path by using that resource which is supplied by the observation of the natural feel- ings ; for he had become too accustomed to seek them solely in his imagination. The imagination mingles much that is false with the truth which it presents ; it creates for the poet a kind of private world, placed between him and the real world which he no longer cares to contem- plate, for he no longer even suspects its existence. Into this world of fancy which Corneille had formed for him- self, swayed by the turn of mind of his contemporaries, and placing at their service the logical firmness of his imagination, he no longer received the light whicli the natural emotions of our soul cast upon the objects which excite them. Justice, goodness, indeed all the human virtues, were feelings before they were ideas ; who would ever have imagined generosity and dévotement, if feelings had not first made him aware of their existence ? By the order of these feelings, as they exist in a happy nature, properly developed by reflection, the order of our duties is regulated. Never will the most exalted soul, never will the severest virtue, sacrifice a single one of these duties, unless the sacrifice be commanded by a more im- portant duty : and where this consciousness of a superior duty does not exist, the sacrifice is unjust, the virtue is counterfeit, and the appearance of greatness is decep- tive. Old Horace, when he believes that his son has fled, forgets his paternal love, and desires, nay more, almost commands, the death of his son ; but love of his country, the obligations imposed upon his family by the confidence of his fellow-citizens, the criminality of the coward who had betrayed that confidence, and even the advantage of 220' LIFE AND WRITINGS OF his son, for whom death would be a thousand times more preferable than an infamous life — all these are feelings so powerful, and of so exalted an order, that we are not surprised to see that they gain the victory over even pa- ternal love, the well-known force of which only adds to the admiration inspired by the superior force which has conquered it. But when K-osamonde, the widow of Per- tharite,' threatened with the death of her son if she will not consent to marry Grimoald, the usurper of her hus- band's kingdom, declares to Grrimoald that she will marry him only on condition that he will put her son to death, because she hopes that so atrocious an act, by destroying the affection felt by the people for Grimoald's virtues, will render vengeance more easy to herself, we feel nei- ther admiration nor sympathy for her conduct ; for the thirst for vengeance could never be sufficiently powerful, or appear sufficiently legitimate, to stifle not only a moth- er's love for her offspring, but also that sentiment of just- ice which forbids us to sacrifice an innocent being to the memory or even to the interests of another. Rosamonde's proposition is, therefore, opposed to all human and poetic truth. Fontenelle, seeking for the cause of the ill suc- cess of " Pertharite," attributes it to oldness of mind, which, he says, " brings dryness and harsliness in its train." ^ But Corneille was not old when he wrote " Pertharite ;" ^ and he had no more reasons for being harsh at forty-seven years of age, when he had four sons,"* ' Or at least his supposed widow ; for Pertharite is not dead, but re- appears at the end of the piece. ^ Fontenelle, "Vie dc Corneille," p. 108. ^ He was forty-seven years old. •* ("orneille had four sons and two daughters. His eldest son, Pierre Corneille, was a captain of cavalry, and was wounded, in 1667, at the siege of Douai, which was captured on the 6tli of July, by Louis XIV. He was brought back to Paris on a litter ])lontifulIy supplied with straw. On ar- riving at the door of his father's house, in the Kue d'Argenteuil, the por- PIERRE CORNEILLE. 221 than when he was thirty-eight years old,' and just mar- ried ; and certainly he still possessed many more lively and true feelings than arc required to enlighten and reg- ulate the mind. But a false system, the fruit of his sub- mission to the ideas of his time, would not allow him to listen to his own feelings, and thus to paint nature with truthfulness ; so that the nature which ho reproduced was as factitious and false as the ideas of his contempo- raries. The style of Corneille varied with the vicissitudes of his genius. Astonishment has been expressed at this ; but there would have been more room for astonishment- had it been otherwise, and had his style not remained faithful, both in good and evil fortune, to the character of his thoughts. Writing was never any thing to him but the expression of his ideas ; and his contemporaries attest that carefulness of stylo was of no avail in effects which were entirely due to the grandeur of the subjects which he had to depict. " Corneille," says Segi-ais, "was not conscious of the beauty of his versification, and while writing he paid attention not to harmony, but only to feeling." And Chapelain informs us, that " Corneille, who has written such noble poetry, was unacquainted ters, solely intent upon carrying the wounded man into his room, scattered the straw about the street. This was during the early days of that strict system of police established in Paris by the administration of Louis XIV., and so strenuously enforced by D'Aubray and La Reynie. The commis- saries and inspectors rigorously executed the orders they had received. One of them cited Pierre Corneille before the lieutenant of police, at the Châtelet, for contravening the regulations in reference to the public thorough- fares. Corneille appeared, pleaded his own cause, and was immediately nonsuited, amidst the applause of the spectators, who conducted him home in triumph. This incident is frequently mentioned in the conversations and anecdote-books of the time, and Loret inserted an account of it in his " Muse Historique," in the form of a poetical letter to Madame , by Robinet. See Appendix D. I am indebted to M. Floquet for the discovery and communication of this interesting little fact. ' The age at which he wrote " Polyeucte." . «'■■ 222 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF v>àth the art of versification, and it was purely nature that acted in him."' An artistic style, which, at the time when Corneille appeared, constituted almost the whole merit of a fashionable poet, had very little indeed to do with the merit of a dramatic author. Corneille introduced style into the drama by introducing thoughts ; he said simply what he meant, and he therefore spoke nobly, for what he had to say was high and noble. The expression naturally clothed itself with the sublimity of that which it was intended to convey— or, rather, in the sublimity of his poetry, the expression appeared to count for nothing, for it was the thing itself. ^'In Corneille's writings," says Saint-Evremond, " grandeur is self-rec- ognized ; thé figures that he employs are worthy of it, when he intends to beautify it with any ornament ; but, ordinarily, he neglects these vain shows ; he does not go to the skies to seek for something to increase the value of that which is sufficiently important upon earth ; it is enough for him to enter thoroughly into a matter, and tile complete image which he givea of it forms that true impression which persons of good sense love to receive." ^ Corneille himself would have vainly sought "in the skies" for wherewithal " to.-increase the value" of some of the feelings which he presents to our view ; they are so lofty that, as nothing can exceed them, expression can add nothing to them ; and yet they are so determinate and precise that there are not two ways of expressing them. We must not, therefore, expect to find in Corneille that poetical expression which is intended to increase the impression produced by an object, by connecting with it accessory ideas which Ihe object would not have ' " Segraisiana," pp. 76, 187. ^ Sainl-Evremond, " Œuvres," vol. iv. p. 16. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 223 suggested of itself. We shall find in his writings that poetry which displays the object as it really is, and places it before our eyes endowed with life and anima- tion, by using words that are truly adapted to describe it. The narrative given by Rodrigue, in the "Cid," pre- sents a fine example of this : " Cette obscure clarté qui tombe des étoiles Enfin, avec le flux, nous fil voir trente voiles ; L'onde s'enlioit dessous, et, d'un commun effort, Les Maures et la mer entrèrent dans le port. r On les laisse passer, tout leur paroît tranquille ; Point de soldats au port ; point aux murs de la ville Notre profond silence abusant leurs esprits. Ils n'osent plus douter de nous avoir surpris. Ils abordent sans peur, ils ancrent, ils descendent, Et courent se livrer aux mains qui les attendent. Nous nous levons alors ; et, tous en même temps, Poussons jusques au ciel mille cris éclatants. . . . ." Ail these expressions are simple — just those which a man would use who washed to narrate the occurrences of which the Cid is speaking; but the Cid mentions only those matters which are worth mentioning. All necessary circumstances, and these alone, he brings be- fore our eyes, because he has seen them ; he could not fail to see them in the position in which he was placed, and into that position he transfers us. This is true poetry. But the nature of the objects to be represented does not always admit of this, so to speak, material descrip- tion. It frequently happens that the picture, being too vast to be reproduced in all its details, requires to bo confined within a single image, which shall nevertheless convey an impression of the whole. The employment of figurative expressions then becomes necessary ; and this is the character of Cinna's narrative : " Je leur fais des tableaux de ces tristes batailles Où Rome par ses mains décliiroit ses entrailles, 224 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF Où l'aigle abattoit l'aigle, et, de chaque côté, Nos légions s'armoient contre leur liberté ; Où les meilleurs soldats et les chefs les plus braves Mettoient toute leur gloire à devenir esclaves : Où, pour mieux assurer la honte de leurs fers, Tous vouloient à leur chaîne attacher l'univers ; ' , Et l'exécrable honneur de lui donner un maître. Faisant aimer à tous l'infâme nom de traître, Romains contre Romains, parens contre parens, Combattoient seulement pour le choix des tyrans. J'ajoute à ce tableau la peinture effroyable De leur concorde impie, affreuse, inexorable, Funeste aux gens de bien, aux riches, au sénat, Et pour tout dire enfin, de leur triumvirat, Mais je ne trouve point de couleurs assez noires Pour en représenter les tragiques histoires ; Je les peins dans le meurtre à l'envi triomphans ; Rome entière noyée au sang de ses enfans," No details could in this case have presented before the imagination all that is here exhibited to its view, en groupe, by two or three fine images. The remainder of the narrative is favorable to the introduction of details, and Cinna, resuming the simple tone of narration, ceases to paint matters figuratively, and limits his efforts to displaying them in their reality ; but at the end, when he finds it necessary to sum up his speech and to reduce the different emotions which he has awakened to a single feeling and idea, he thus proceeds : " Toutes ces cruautés, La perte de nos biens et de nos libertés. Le ravage des champs, le pillage des villes, Et les proscriptions et les guerres civiles, Sont les degrés sanglants dont Auguste a fait choix Pour monter sur le trône et nous donner des loix. Mais nous pouvons changer un destin si funeste. Puisque de trois tyrans c'est le seul qui nous reste ; Et que, juste une fois, il s'est privé d'appui, Perdant, pour régner .seul, deux méchans comme lui. Lui mort, nous n'avons point de vengeur ni de maître ; Avec la liberté Kome s'en va renaître ; Et nous mériterons le nom de vrais Romains, Si le joug qui l'accable est brisé par nos mains." PIERRE CORNEILLE. 225 In this speech, which is one of the finest productions of his pen, Corneille, making a simple and sober use of the necessary figures, employs them to express his idea, but never to extend it beyond its natural limits. Per- haps, among Corneille's most poetical expressions, we shall find few which do not possess this merit ; they aie generally the result of a vigorous conception which clearly discerns its object, and which, far from sur- rounding it with accessory ideas, removes them to a dis- tance in order to present it in isolated distinctness to the imagination. Thus, in these celebrated lines from " Othon :" " Je les voyois tous trois se hâter sous un maître Qui, chargé d'un long âge, a peu de temps de l'être, Et tous trois à l'cnvi s'empresser ardemment A qui dévoreroit ce règne d'un moment, — " the image of " devouring a reign" is only the sensible expression of a fact which, in no other manner, could be treated with as much felicity and power ; it places the fact itself beneath our eyes, but adds nothing to it. The same may be said of this other line : " Et monté sur le faîte il aspire à descendre." . . Corneille has embellished nothing and disguised nothing ; his style, guided by his thought, naturally rose and fell with it ; and he appears obscure only when an ill-con- ceived idea or an inopportune sentiment has failed to furnish him with a sufficiently precise expression or a sufficiently simple turn of phrase. He never disdains to use the trivial language which is required by a trivial emotion or position. In "Agésilas," for example, he puts these words into the mouth of a lover who is press- ing his mistress to confess her love for him : "Dites donc, m'aimez-vous T' 226 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF A puerile idea is always rendered in all its puerility, and the description of Attila's bleeding at the nose iî worthy of the idea which suggested the adaptation of this accident to the purposes of tragedy : " Le sang qu'après avoir mis ce prince' au tombeau. On lui voit chaque jour distiller du cerveau, Punit son parricide, et chaque jour vient faire Un tribut étonnant à celui de ce frère." The word brutal., which is used hy Pulchérie in speaking of Phocas, is in perfect accordance with the idea which she has formed of his character. In fine, the weakness of the poet's thought is manifested with as little disguise as its greatness ; and if he seeks to trick it out with a few ornaments, the abuses of mind to which he has re- course, the falsity of the images which he employs, and the vain inflation of his expressions, prove, as powerfully as the sublime simplicity of his beauties, that " art was not made for him." Corneille could not have made use of art ; and what his age failed to supply him with was a more simple riature, less overloaded by a multitude of conventionalisms and factitious habits, which he took for truth. If the state of society and the general character of ideas, at the time in which he lived, had been in greater conformity to the simplicity of his genius, per- haps, in one of our first poets, we should have also pos- sessed a classic poet. Corneille is not a classic; he is too deficient in that taste which is based upon a knowl- edge of truth, to serve always as a model ; but beauties beyond all comparison have nevertheless established his' rank, and after a century and a half of literary affluence and glory, no rival has deprived him of his title of " Grreat." Even his failures may be Jield to confirm his right to this name ; before the time of Corneille, " Per- ' His brother Bleda. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 227 tharite," " Othon," " Suréna," "Attila," and even "Agé- silas," would have been received with admiration by a public whom he alone had rendered critical. " Pcrtha- rite" was the first of his pieces which experienced this severe treatment. " The fall of the great Corneille," says Fontenelle, " may be numbered among the most re- markable examples of Ihe vicissitudes of human affairs ; even Belisarius asking alius is not more striking."' Corneille felt this blow to be a misfortune to which he had not believed himself exposed ; and somewhat of bit- terness is manifested in his preface *to " Pertharite." "It is just," he says, " that after twenty years of labor, I should begin to perceive that I am growing too old to continue in vogue." Taking leave of the public, "be- fore," he says, "they entirely took leave of him," he spent six years in perfect retirement, devoting himself to a metrical translation of the "Imitation of Jesus Christ." This work must be considered as a production of his piety rather than of his genius, although it occasionally exhibits brilliant traces of superior talent.* I shall not here refer to this poem, or to a considerable number of pieces of verse, written both in his youth and in his old age,^ as they only prove that the drama was the imperious vocation of Corneille, and the only field in which he could appear with glory. Of this he was personally conscious : " Pour moi, qui âe louer n'eus jamais le méthode, J'ignore encor le tour du sonnet ou de l'ode ; Mon génie au théâtre a voulu m'attacher ; Il en a fait mon sort, je dois m'y retrancher : Partout ailleurs je rampe et ne suis plus moi-même."'' 1 Fontenelle, "Vie de Corneille," p. 107.. * See Appendix E. 2 These pieces were printed in the edition of 1758, and have been rcr printed in most subsequent editions of Comeille's vrorks. ■» These lines occur in the " Remerciement au Roi, pouT l'avoir compris dans la liste des gratifications faites aux gens de lettres." 228 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF " He was well acquainted with elegant literature, his- tory, and politics," says Fontenelle ; "but he regarded them chiefly in their reference to the drama. For all the other branches of knowledge he had neither leisure nor curiosity, nor indeed much esteem." ' During these six years of retirement, also. Corneille prepared his three discourses on Dramatic Poetry, and wrote his Examinations of his pieces — an honorable evi- dence of the good faith of a great man who was sincere enough with himself to confess his faults, and with others, to speak without affectation of his talents. They furnish us with irrefragable proofs of the uprightness and strength of his reason, which was deficient only in experience of the world ; and with lessons that will ever be useful to dramatic poets, for they will find in thorn all that his experience of the s'tage had taught Corneille regarding theatrical positions and effects, with which he was all the better acquainted because he had not studied them until after he had divined their character, just in the same way as he sought to learn the rules of Aristotle in order to justify those which his own genius had dic- tated. His determination to renounce the drama was not, however, unalterable. " This," he says in the preface to " Pertharite," "will be the last importunity of this kind with which I shall trouble you ; not that I have adopted so strong a resolution that it can not be broken, but there is great likelihood that I shall abide by it." These words would seem to indicate that Corneille entertained some hope that attempts would be made to induce him to abandon the intention he thus formally announced; but he was not disposed to bo easily satisfied with the proofs 0Ï esteem which he wouid require. His dedications too ' Fontenelle, " Vie de Corneille," p. 125. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 229 plainly show of what nature those proofs might be, and Boileau's severe lines on — " Ces auteurs renommés, Dégoûtés (le gloire et d'argent affamés," were, it is said, merely the repetition of a saying of the great Corneille.' But Corneille, in the position in which he was placed, considered money the proof of his glory, and was perhaps as much offended as grieved at the mediocrity of his fortune. Gruided in all that concerned his personal conduct, by remarkably simple and ingenu- ous good sense, he had always observed that a handsome price was paid for things of value, and he felt indignant that this recompense was denied to his merit, "Whatever ' " Our author was congratulating the great Corneille on the success of his tragedies, and the glory he had gained thereby. ' Yes,' answered Cor- neille, 'I am satiated with glory, and famished for money.'" (Note by Brossette, to the " Art Poétique," canto iv. line 130.) The continual com- plaints of Corneille, both in prose and verse, reiterate almost in the same words the substance of this answer, whicli Père Tournemine indignantly denies, but without bringing any proof to the contrary. How, he asks, can such a sentiment have been attributed to Corneille, " who is known to have carried his indifference for money almost to blâmable carelessness ; who never gained from his pieces any thmg but what the actors gave him, with- out making any bargains with them ; who allowed a year to elapse without thanking M. Colbert for the renewal of his pension ; who lived without ex- pense and died without property T' (See the " Défense du grand Corneille," in vol. i. p. 81 of his works.) A "blâmable carelessness" for money is quite compatible with pressing wants, which compel a man afterward to solicit too vehemently that which he had disdained too negligently. " M. Corneille," says Fontenelle, " had more love for money than ability or ap- plication in amassing it." No man feels greater indignation that his wants are not all supplied than he who can not himself provide for them by pru- dence or activity. Much has been said of the disinterestedness and fraternal affection, which, until the death of Pierre Corneille, led the two brothers to consider all they possessed common property, and united both families into one. I have no wish to deprive praiseworthy conduct of the merit of a good motive or a fine feeling, though this merit is more common than is gener- ally believed ; but I will just observe that this disinterestedness does not la the slightest degree contradict the notion that has been transmitted to us of Corneille's neglect of his pecuniary affairs, nor, consequently, of the natural results of such neglect. See Appendix F. 230 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF he thought himself allowed to feel, he considered himself equally at liberty to express. When his friends found fault with him for not maintaining, by his conversation, the reputation he had gained by his writings, he quietly replied : " I am not the less Pierre Corneille." Just in the same manner, he frankly said to the world that Pierre Corneille had a right to expect better treatment. His wounded pride is always uppermost in his complaints, and— " L'ennui de voir toujours des louanges frivoles Rendre à ses grands travaux paroles pour paroles," appeared to him to be nothing more than " Ce légitime ennui qu'au fond de l'âme excite L'excusable fierté d'un peu de vrai mérite." Thus he explains himself in an epistle to Fouquet, in- serted at the beginning of " Œdipe." This epistle con- veyed his thanks to the superintendent, for what favor it is not known; but this favor was a recollection, and, there is reason to believe, made up for long neglect. Re- vived by this mark of esteem, Corneille desired nothing more than to resume his pen. Fouquet, " the superin- tendent," as he says, " not less of literature than of the finances," ' proposed to him three subjects for a tragedy ; Corneille made his choice, and, in 1659, " Œdipe" ap- peared. But the simple beauties of Grrecian antiquity were not destined to arouse a genius which had achieved its glory an& perfected its growth among the ideas and mental idiosyncracies of the seventeenth century. Cor- neille congratulated himself on having introduced, into the terrible subject of Œdipus, " the happy episode of the loves of Theseus and Dirce," upon which he has concen- ' See Appendix G. PIEUIIE CORNEILLE. 231 trated all the interest of the drama. " This has deprived me," he says, "of the advantage which I hoped to gain, of being frequently only the translator of those great men who have preceded me. But as I have chosen another course, I have found it impossible to fall in with them." He further informs us that he had the honor of obtaining an avowal from most of his auditors, " that he had writteu no dramatic piece which contained so much art as this." ' This unfortunate ayt, which is now forgotten, was then crowned with success ; at all events, " Œdipe" did not fall before the judgment of the public, and the Court, which probably only sought, by rewarding him, to adorn itself with a glory it had too long neglected, manifested its satisfaction by conferring new favors upon Corneille.* In 1661, on the occasion of the marriage of Louis XIV., he wrote the " Toison d'Or," a kind of opera, preceded by a prologue, into which the peace which had just been concluded gave him an opportunity to introduce some noble lines on the misfortunes of war. In 1662, an ad- mirable scene in " tSertorius" rekindled for a moment the hopes of Corneille's partisans. It was, it is said, on hear- ing these lines, addressed by Sertorius to Pompey — " Si dans l'occasion je ménage un peu mieux L'assiette du pays et la faveur des lieux," that Turenne exclaimed — " "Where did Corneille learn the art of war?" In 1663, " Sophonisbe" failed before the recollection of Mairet's piece of the same name, and not, as Saint- Evremond asserted, because Mairet, by depicting Sophonisbe as unfaithful to an old husband for the sake of a young lover, "had hit upon the taste of the ladies and the folks at court."' In 1664, " Othon" appeared ; ' See the Preface to " Œdipe." '• Ibid. ^ Saint-Evrcmond, "Œuvres," vol. iii. p. 141. 232 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF it contained four lines which have continued celebrated/ and a few traces of that firmness in the treatment of political interests and court intrigues which was then to be found in Corneille alone. "We must believe," says Fontenelle, "that ' Agésilas'^ is by M. Corneille, because his name is attached to it, and there is one scene between Agesilaus and Lysander which could not easily have been written by any one else."' By the production of "Attila," Corneille, to use his nephew's expression, " braved the opinion of his age, the taste of which, he perceived, was turning entirely toward the most passionate and least heroic love."^ Though we may not agree with Fontenelle in considering the development of this tragedy to have been "one of the finest things that Corneille ever did," we may recognize in it some traits of his peculiar vigor ; among others that well-known line on the decay of the Roman Empire and the commencement of the kingdom of the Franks : "Un grand destin commence, un grand destin s'achève." But the scenes between Attila and the capricious Honorie are far more suggestive of the idea of a quarrel between a ridiculous tutor and his unruly pupil, than of that " noble ferocity" which Fontenelle is pleased to attribute to the monarch of the Huns;^ A famous epigram by Boileau is connected with the production of the two last-mentioned pieces ;° but it has 1 See p. 261. 2 Published in 1666. ' FuHtmelle, "Vie dc Corneille," p. 112. * Ibid. p. 116. ' " There prevails througliout this piece a noble ferocity which he alone could delineate." Fontenelle, "Vic dc Corneille," p. 116. * "Après l'Agésilas, Hélas ! Mais après l'Attila, Holà." ÎIERRE CORNEILLE. 233 no other merit than that of expressing with considerable correctness the feeling of sorrow universally experienced at beholding, in " Agésilas," the decay into which a great man might fall, and in "Attila," how important it was to the glory of Corneille that his efforts should there end. His name, nevertheless, was still powerful. Molière chose him to versify his " Psyche," which he had not time to complete himself ; and Quinault, though already well- known, was intrusted only with the interludes. Cor- neille was also selected by Queen Henrietta of England to measure his strength against that of Racine upon a subject devoted to the description of the pangs of love. This subject — " Bérénice," with which, it is said, tender recollections were associated,' — was treated by each poet without the knowledge of the other. " Who will gain the victory ? — the youngest ?" says Fontenelle, forgetting that it was the great and old Corneille who gave the greatest empire to love and the most weakness to a Roman, as his Titus proposes to Berenice to renounce his kingdom for her sake' — an idea which Racine's Titus disdainfully rejects.' Finally, " Pulchérie" and " Suréna" appeared, ' The affection which Louis XIV. and Henrietta of England had felt for each other, and which they had sacrificed to the dictates of reason rather than to those of virtue. ' " Eh bien ! Madame, il faut renoncer à ce titre Qui de toute la terre en vain me fait l'arbitre ; ' . Allons dans vos Etats m'en donner un plus doux : Ma gloire la plus haute est celle d'être à vous. Allons où je n'aurai que vous pour souveraine, Où vos bras amoureux seront ma seule chaîne, Où l'Hymen en triomphe à jamais l'étreindra : , . v ■ ■ Et soit de Rome esclave et maître qui voudra!" It is to be regretted that this last line was not introduced upon a worthier occasion. ^ " Je dois moins encore vous dire Que je suis près, pour vous, d'abandonner l'empire, De vous suivre, et d'aller, trop content de mes fers, Soupirer avec vous au bout de l'univers. 234 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF notwithstanding their defects, to revive the recollection of that firm and imposing grandeur which Corneille had imparted to our tragedy ; and this fine saying of Eury- dice, on learning that the death of her lover has been caused by her obstinacy, " Non, je ne pleure point, Madame, mais je meurs," formed a noble termination to the poet's career — " Et son dernier soupir fut un soupir illustre." Corneille was then nearly seventy years of age. Look- ing backward, he could say with just pride, " I have finished my course ; my destiny as a superior man is accomplished ; whatever I was capable of doing I have done ; the rank that I was worthy to obtain I have obtained ; nothing more remains for me to desire." But few men can thus lay down for themselves the limits of their existence — can contemplate themselves only in the past which has so fully belonged to them, and acknowl- edge the justice of that dispensation of Providence which allots to each of us the time that each is to enjoy. Cor- neille, who had so long been in possession of undisputed superiority, could not tranquilly behold the rising glory of his successors. He regarded both Molière and Racine with dissatisfaction. " Sometimes," says Fontenelle, "lie placed too little confidence in his own rare merit, and believed too easily that it was possible for him to have rivals."' Nevertheless, swayed more by timidity than envy, he regretted the triumphs of a rival less than Vous-même rougiriez do ma hiche conduite ; Vous verriez ù regret marcher à votre suite Un indigne empereur, sans empire, sans cour, Vil spectacle aux humains des foiblesscs d'amour." liariiir, " Hi-runice," act v. scene 6, ' FontcneUc, "Vie de Corneille," p. 126. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 235 he feared that his own triumphs would be forgotten ; and on being told, in 1676, that three of his plays had been performed at Court, he exclaimed — " Est-il vrai, grand monarque, et puis-je me vanter Que tu prennes plaisir à me ressusciter! Qu'au bout de quarante ans, Cinua, Pompée, Horace, Reviennent à la mode, et reprennent leur place ?" Corneille now began to think he might die, and felt exceedingly anxious for a little popularity ; the grief of his failures seemed almost to have extinguished in him the reinembrance of his successes. His feeling of the state of abandonment into wliich he believed he had fallen is depicted in a manner which fills us with sympathy for the old age of a great man, in some lines in which he im- plores the favor of Louis XIV. for his last works : " Achève : les derniers n'ont rien qui dégénère. Rien qui les fasse croire enfans d'un autre père ; Ce sont des malheureux étoufîes au berceau, Qu'un seul de tes regards tiieroit du tombeau. ' Agésilas' en foule auroit des spectateurs. Et ' Bérénice' enfin trouveroit des acteurs. Le peuple, je l'avoue, et la cour les dégradent ; Je foiblis, ou du moins ils se le persuadent : Pour bien écrire encor j'ai trop long- temps écrit, Et les rides du front passent jusqu'à l'esprit. Mais, contre cet abus, que j'aurois de suffrages Si tu donnois les tiens à mes derniers ouvrages ! Que de tant de bonté l'impérieuse loi Raméneroit bientôt et peuple et cour vers moi ! Tel Sophocle à cent ans chamioit encore Athènes, Tel bouillonnoit encor son vieux sang dans ses veines, Diroient-ils à ren%'i " Corn«ille's jealousy was like that of a child who re- quires a smile for himself whenever any caresses are bestowed upon his brother. This weakness led him to see cause for disquietude in every event, and to regard the slightest circumstance as an object of dread. " He 236 LIFE AND WRITINGS OF was melancholy," says Fontenelle, " and he required more solid subjects for hope or rejoicing, than for grief or fear. His incapacity for business was equaled only by his aversion to it ; and the most trivial affairs caused him alarm and terror." ' At home, " his humor was hasty, and apparently rough sometimes; but, on the whole, he was very easy-temper- ed, a ^ood father, a good husband, a good relative — ten- der, and full of friendship."* In society, he was by turns haughty and humble, proud of his genius, but in- capable of deriving any authority from it. At the close of his life, this weakness of his character was greatly increased by the successive decay of his bodily organs. Corneille survived the loss of his faculties for a year, and died on the 1st of October, 1684, at the age of seven- ty-eight. He was the senior member of the French Academy, into which he was admitted in 1647. He had presented himself for admission in 1644 and in 1646; but the statutes of the Academy had pronounced him ineligible, be- cause he did not reside in Paris. In 1644, the Advocate- General Salomon was elected in preference to him, and in 1646, Duryer, the tragic poet. " The register in this place," says Pelisson, in reference to this second nomina- tion, " mentions the resolution which the Academy had adopted alw^ays to prefer, of two persons who each pos- sessed the necessary qualifications, that one who was resident in Paris." ' When Corneille had removed this obstacle by fixing his residence in Paris during a great part of the year, no rival ventured to contest his claim. Balesdens, a distinguished advocate attached to the serv- ice of Chancellor Seguier, the protector of the Academy, ' Fontenelle, " Vie de Corneille," pp. 125, 126. " Ibid. •* Pelisson, " Histoire de rAcadcmic," p. 362. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 237 offered himself for admission, but on being informed that Corneille was also a candidate, " he wrote to the Acade- my a letter filled with compliments to it, and also to M. Corneille, whom he prayed the company to prefer to him, protesting that he deferred the honor to him as being his due by all sorts of reasons." * On the death of Corneille, the Abbé de Lavau, then director of the Academy, and Racine, the director-elect, both claimed the right of pay- ing him the honors granted by the Academy to the mem- ory of each of its members. The Abbe's claim was al- lowed, and Benserade, who excelled in the art of express- ing pleasant truths, said to Racine, " If any one had a right to inter M. Corneille it was you, and you have not done it." Three months afterward, Racine made up for his disappointment by pronouncing at the reception of Thomas Corneille, who succeeded to his brother's seat in the Academy, a splendid panegyric of Pierre Corneille, equally remarkable for its subject, its eloquence, and its orator. Racine was Corneille's eulogist and Voltaire his com- mentator. The genius of both judges is pledge of their good faith ; but Voltaire's genius bore little resemblance to that of Corneille, and this dissimilarity has sometimes interfered with that justice which one great man loves to render to another. The poet of the tender and violent passions did not always feel his heart open to those beau- ties which dry our tears ; the favorite of the elegant world of the eighteenth century was unable to overcome his repugnance to the coarse incoherencies of a tast« which Corneille was the first to form ; in short, the haste of too easy and sometimes too careless a labor, has in- troduced into Voltaire's commentary, a sufficient number ' Pelisso7i, " Histoire de l'Académie," p. 364. 238 LIFE AMD WillTLNGS OF of errors of fact' to make us presume the existence of those errors of judgment which are, in reality, so appa- rent. By bestowing a little more attention on the work, and showing a little less complacency for petty passions, ' I will quote only two instances : When Felix, in " Polyeucte," has un- folded to his confidant, Albin, the coward hopes which are kindled within him by the dangerous position of Polyeucte, he adds : " Mais que plutôt le ciel à tes yeux me foudroyé Qu'à de pensers si bas je puisse consentir, Que jusque-là ma gloire ose se démentir !" Albin replies : " Votre cœur est trop bon et votre âme trop haute." Upon which Voltaire makes this reflection : " Felix at least says that he detests such base thoughts, and we can partially forgive him ; but can we forgive Albin for saying that his soul is too lofty V Can we forgive Voltaire himself for having so strangely misapprehended the meaning of this answer of Albin, who is represented throughout the piece as an honest and sensible man, who courageously defends Pauline and Polyeucte against his master, to whom he is continually showing the absurdity of his fears 1 When Felix, with whom Sévère, in compliance with Pauline's entreaty, has been interceding on behalf of Polyeucte, says to his confidant : " Albin, as-tu bien vu la fourbe de Sévère 1 As-tu bien vu sa haine, et vois-tu ma misère 1" Albm replies, with the indignation of a reasonable man : " Je n'ai vu rien en lui qu'un rival généreux ; Je ne vois rien en vous qu'un père rigoureux." A moment afterward he adds : " Grâce, grâce, seigneur! que Pauline l'obtienne." On another occasion lie represents the danger to which he will expose him- self by putting Polyeucte to death, both from the people and from the Em- /peror. Indeed, the character which Albin displayed throughout the piece is manifested in the line to which Voltaire objects ; it will be evident to those who read it, I will not say with attention, but without prejudice, that Albin's answer means simply this : " Your heart is too kind and your soul too lofty to allow you to stoop to such base cowardice ;" and it is plain that hconly alludes to Felix's loftiness of soul to prevent him from stooping to too great degradation. In " Œdipe," which, in truth, may excuse the inattention of the com- mentator, mention is made of a certain Phœdimc, who had just died of the plague, and to whose care the son of Laius was intrusted. Voltaire, mis- led by the name, speaks of this person as a woman : '' Phœdime knew who this child was, but she is dead of the plague." This error would not be worthy of correction if it did not prove the carelessness of the commentator. Such examples might bo multiplied to almost any extent. PIERRE CORNEILLE. 239 he would have given excellence to a work which, not- withstanding its frequently minute, and sometimes Cvces- sive, severity, is on the whole, by the abundance, just- ness, delicacy, and perspicuity of the observations which it contains, a model of literary criticism. Voltaire de- sired to perform an act of justice and kindness to the name and family of Corneille ; and it is much to be de- plored that, yielding to the natural weaknesses of his mind and character, he did not conceive and execute his design with sufficient care and conscientiousness to ren- der it a monument worthy both of Corneille and of him- self. JEAN CHAPELAIN. (1595—1674.) At once a poet and a critic — admired as a poet during his lifetime, at least, until the publication of the " Pu- celle," and revered as a critic by his contemporaries, even after his death — Jean Chapelain may be taken as the faithful representative of the taste of an age of which he was the oracle. Even when readers ceased to admire his poems, they did not charge them with having belied his principles, and his authority in the literary world was in no degree diminished by the disfavor with which his poetry was regarded. To his writings, therefore, we must look for information as to what was known and thought in reference to poetical art, in the early part of the seventeenth century : and as the judge of Corneille and predecessor of Boileau, Chapelain is deserving of at- tention. Jean Chapelain, the son of a Paris notary, was born on the 4th or 5th of December, 1595. His father's pro- fession would have well siiited his peaceful and prudent character, and his gentle, sedate and orderly mind ; but " if his star, at his birth," had not "formed him a poet," he was, at all events, predestined to write verses. His mother was a daughter of Michel Corbière, the friend of Ronsard. Her youth had been impressed, and her im- agination was still filled, with admiration for the "Prince JEAN CHAPELAIN. 241 of Poets ;" she coveted the same glory for a son whose precocity of intellect was highly flattering to the hopes of her maternal pride ; and if she had been satisfied with wishing her son the destiny of Ronsard, unaccompanied by his talent, her desires were fulfilled to a far greater extent than she had ventured to hope. Chapelain, " the King of Authors"' as long as he lived, and celebrated after his death as the model of unreadable poets, seems, like a dutiful son, to have undertaken the task of accom- plishing the destiny which his mother had marked out for him. His studies were pursued with direct reference to the career for which he was intended ; and one of his masters was Nicolas Bourbon, a celebrated Latin poet of that time, who entertained so profound a contempt for French verses that, Vvdien he read them, it seemed to him, he said, as if he were drinking water — which was, in his opinion, the worst of insults." Being afterward in- trusted with the education of the two sons of the Mar- quis de la Trousse, Chapelain spent the seventeen years through which their education was continued in the study of poetics, or, at least, of all that was then known on that subject. An unpleasant joke confirmed him in his purely literary taste. The Marquis de la Trousse, who filled the office of Prévôt de Vhôtel, had given him, either before, or during the time that he was engaged in the education of his children, an appointment as archer of the provostry.' This post conferred the right, or rather ' " Comme roi des auteurs qu'on l'élève à l'empire." Boileau, Satire ix., line 219. ' With all his taste for good wine and good cheer, Nicolas Bourbon was a miser ; in addition to his avarice, he was tormented by continual sleep- lessness ; and from the union of these three dispositions, resulted a singu- lar infirmity, viz., that an invitation to dinner, given beforehand, caused him such agitation that he was unable to sleep, so that his friends were careful to invite him only on the day of the feast. — " Menagiana," vol. i. p. 315. ' An old manuscript copy of the " Chapelain décoiffe," a well known L 242 CORNEILLE'S CONTEMPORARIES. the obligation of wearing a sword, and the sword was not at all in harmony with Chapelain's character ; for men of letters, in those days, did not consider them- selves bound to possess courage, and, of all men of let- ters, Chapelain was the most pacific. One of his ac- quaintance, by way of diversion, proposed to him to act as second in a duel. Chapelain declined ; but, renounc- ing thenceforward an ornament which was dangerous unless useless, he laid aside his sword and resigned his office as archer, and never resumed them. As he pos- sessed greater qualifications for employments which re- quired probity and capacity than for those which called for resolute firmness of soul, he was intrusted with the administration of the affairs of the Marquis de la Trousse. While he was engaged in the education of the young Seigneurs de la Trousse, and was seeking for poetical talent in the study of the rules of poetry, there arrived in Paris the Chevalier Marini, with his poem the " Adone," which he intended to have printed, and upon which he was desirous of obtaining the opinions of the wits of France. Chapelain, though he had as yet produced no- thing, was already highly esteemed by men of letters for his literary knowledge. Those to whom Marini applied, Malherbe among the number, wished to know his opin- parody of a scene in the " Cid," contains these lines which are quoted iii the " Menagiana," vol. ii. pp. 78, 79, but which were afterward altered : CHAPEL.'Vm. " Tout beau ! j'étois archer, la chose n'est pas feinte ; Mais j'etois un archer à la casaque peinte : Mon justc-au-corps do pourpre et mon bonnet fourré Sont encore les atours dont je me suis paré ; Hoqueton diapré de mon maître La Trousse, Je le suivois à pied quand il marchoit en housse. Recors impitoyable et recors éternel, Tu traînois au cachot le pâle criminel." JKAxN CHAPELAIN. 243 in ; and the Italian poet, alarmed by his criticisms, requested him to furnish a preface which might disarm further attacks on the part of the public. This preface, in the form of a letter to M. Faveréau, was printed at the beginning of the " Adone,'" and is a curious specimen of the criticism of that period. Some few reasonable ideas, taken, in the form of quotations, from the writings of the ancients, overwhelmed by a host of arbitrary divi- sions and sub-divisions, expressed in almost unintelligible French, the G-aulish barbarism of which was highly sug- gestive of the style de notaire, were the materials upon which Chapelain's reputation was built. This reputa- tion, however, was sufficient to gain for him the atten- tion and favor of Richelieu. An ode to the Cardinal bore witness at once to the gratitude of the poet and to his poetical talents ; and from that time forth no further difficulty was felt about the choice of a successor to Mal- herbe.^ Since the death of Chapelain, this ode has frequently been spoken of as worthy to secure him an infinitely more honorable reputation than that which he gained by the " Pucelle." His panegyrists never mention -it without expressions of admiration ; and we are assured that Boi- leau admitted that Chapelain "had once written a rather fine ode — ^how I can not tell," he used to add.^ I am quite at a loss to account for this opinion of Boileau. Doubtless surprised that the author of the " Pucelle" could have produced any verses of average excellence, written ' In the folio edition publislicd at Paris in 1623. "^ "M. Chapelain seemed to have succeeded to the reputation of Mal- herbe, after the death of that author ; and it was loudly published through- out all France that he was the prince of French poets. This appears by the testimonies of various persons who observed what was said during the ministry of Cardinals Richelieu and Mazarin." Baillet, ''Jugements des Savants," vol. v. p. 278, edit. 172?.. ^ " Menagiana," vol. iii. p. 73. -■ i 244 CORNEILLE'S CONTEMPORARIES. clean-ly and correctly, and free from harshness or bad taste, Boileau rather exaggerated the marvelous charac- ter of this prodigy. Perhaps, also, taking the ode on the " Capture of Namur'' into consideration, we may he per- mitted to doubt whether the author of the "Art Poétique" had a truly just and vivid feeling of that which consti- tutes the beauty of an ode. The most scrupulous atten- tion has not enabled me to discover, in Chapelain's per- formance, the slightest trace of poetic fire, or even of that nobility of thought of which we sometimes oatch a glimpse through the uncouth style of the " Pucelle." Its progress is cold and didactic ; the poet, confessing himself inca- pable of worthily celebrating the praises of his hero, lim- its his endeavors to the repetition of what is said of him: " Le long des rives du Permesse, "La troupe de ses nourrissons,"' and this frigid conception leads to the still more frigid repetition of the words, lis chantent, with, which he com- mences six strophes in succession. Poetry is as nndis- coverable in the imagery as in the ideas. Balzac bestowed great praise upon the lines in w^hich, to tranquilize the modesty of Richelieu, who thinks he is indebted solely to the King his master for his knowledge and magnifi- cence, the poet compares him to the pole-star, the guide of the pilot : " Qui brille sur sa route et gouverne ses voiles, Cependant que la lune, accomplissant son tour Dessus un char d'argent environné d'étoiles. Dans le sombre univers représente le jour.'"* The poet celebrates the "light" of the renown of Rich- ' The entire ode is given in the "Recueil des plus belles pièces des poètes Français," vol. iv. p. 181. " " Menagiana," vol. iii. p. 73. JEAN CHAPELAIN. 245 elieu, which, he says, is " ever pure," notwithstanding the attempts of calumny to darken it : " Dans un paisible mouvement Tu t'élèves au firmament, Et laisses contre toi murmurer sur la terre. Ainsi le haut Olympe, à son pied sablonneux, Laisse fumer la foudre et gronder le tonnerre Et garde son sommet tranquille et lumineux." As regards the appropriateness of his ideas and his selection of subjects of praise, an example is supplied by this strophe, which is really curious when we consider that it was addressed to Cardinal Richelieu : "Ton propre bonheur t'importune Alors qu'il fait des malheureux ; On voit que tu souffres pour eux. Et que leur peine t'est commune. Quand leurs efforts sont impuissans Contre tes acts innocens. Dans leur désastre encor ta bonté les révère ; Tu les plains dans les maux dont ils sont affligés. Et demandes au ciel, d'un cœur humble et sincère, Qu'ils veuillent seulement en être soulagés." "When flattery thus boldly assumes the character of falsehood, it becomes a conventional language, equally applicable to all men, which, not allowing the poet the choice of any feature peculiar to his hero, casts him without resource into the commonplaces of adulation. Without doing too much hon(n- to flattery, it is permis- sible to believe that, for it to be clever, it must at least have some slight connection with truth. I attach no personal blame, however, to Chapelain for the singular eulogies which he has lavished on his pro- tector. Such was then the general tone of praise, arising rather from want of taste and tact than from any base- ness especially belonging to that epoch in the life of courts. A sort of unskillfulness in the treatment of -falsehood, by forcing it to appear in its coarsest guise. 246 CORNEILLE'S CONTEMPORARIES. also compelled truth to display itself occasionally under harsli and peremptory forms. Richelieu himself had to endure some sallies of this inconvenient candor ; and even men of letters, though bound to him hy the ties of necessity and gratitude, rarely feared to maintain in pri- vate those opinions which they deemed reasonable, in opposition to that all-powerful minister upon whom, in public, they unhesitatingly lavished the most absurd praises. In the affair of the " Cid," Corneille and the Academy, with Chapelain at its head, courageously as- serted their right of opinion against the declared will of the Cardinal ; and, on a less public occasion, the " most circumspect" Chapelain, as he was called by Balzac,^ whose temerity he had frequently censured,* firmly main- tained his own opinion against one of those ideas to which a man of Richelieu's character would be likely to cling most tenaciously. Being appointed, together with several other literary men, to amuse the Cardinal's leis- ure by literary discussions, Chapelain had forwarded to Bois-Robert, the usual intermediary in correspondence of this kind, a lengthy and very reasonable criticism of Car- dinal Bentivoglio's "History of the Wars of Flanders." In this letter, remarkable for a liberality of ideas which was rare for his time, but which would, perhaps, have been even more bold and extraordinary fifty years later, Chapelain insisted strongly upon the impartiality which a historian ought to maintain in reference to the various religious creeds. "Vice and virtue," he says, "are two foundations upon which all are agreed, and which adndt of no contradiction. The true religion, which ought much rat.her to possess this privilege, is not so fortunate; ' " Aicnagiana," vol. iii. p. 73. ^ Sec the " Mélanges tic Littérature, tirés des lettres manuscrites de M. Chapelain," p. 63, 64, edit. 1720. JEAN CHAPELAIN. 247 each man calls his own the best ; and you prove nothing to an enemy of different creed when you derive your arc^uments and means of attack from the falsity of that which he believes. This is why I hold that the judicious historian, who wishes to be of service to the public, should not take his reasons from such sources, because they are sure not to meet with general approbation." ' He also blamed Cardinal Bentivoglio for his partiality toward the Spaniards, the oppressors of the Netherlands. Richelieu expressed himself satisfied with this letter, but declared against its author's opinion that " the historian ought to have nothing to do with judging the facts which lie re- lates."^ As firm on a point of literary criticism as any great scholar would be on a point of erudition, Chapelain replied to Bois-Robert: "I esteem myself very unfortu- nate in not being as completely of his Eminence's opinion on this subject, as I am and always wish to be in all things ;" and, after making suitable apologies, he declares himself as positively for the affirmative as the Cardinal for the negative, and develops his views at considerable length, basing them upon very sound reasons. The most singular circumstance in connection with the matter, is that, during the whole course of the discussion, Chapelain looks solely to the interest which the Cardinal took in the question as a mere reader of history, and never at that which he would be likely to feel in it as an historical personage. Flattery, which might here have found a fine field for display, alludes only to the angelic constitution of Monseigneur's mind,^ which rendered useless to him that assistance and information with which the weakness of the vulgar could not dispense. "Was this the simplicity ' See the " Mélanges de Littérature, tirés des lettres manuscrites de M. Chapelain," pp. 101-116. « Ibid. p. 123, et scq. ■ - ^ Ibid. p. 133. 248 CORNEILLE'S CONTEMPOHARIES. of a man of letters, or the address of a consummate court- ier ? We are too far distant both from the man and the time to decide. In the performance of his duties as critic to the Car- dinal, in which office he was associated with several other men of letters, Chapelain, who was really erudite and as judicious as the circumspect frigidity of his imagination could allow, naturally proved superior to all his colleagues ; and he therefore soon exceeded them in favor. It was not, hovrever, until the administration of Colbert, that he was intrusted with that special mission which established his sway, if not over literature, at least over men of let- ters ; but, under the government of Richelieu, the favor which he enjoyed was sufficiently great to induce them to attach considerable weight to his authority ; and, even including Boileau, who complained of it only as a man of taste, his dominion over the literary world was gener- ally acknowledged. In the year 1632, he had refused to accompany the Duke de Noailles to Rome, in the capacity of secretary of legation. Thenceforward, attached to the service of the Cardinal,* from whom he received a pension of a thousand crowns," Chapelain naturally preferred, to the ' His first letter, on Cardinal Bentivoglio's book, is dated December 10, 1631 ; and it is rather singular that the second is dated only on the 9th of June, 1633. Probablj' Bois-Robert, the intermediary through whom this correspondence passed, only communicated the letters to the Cardinal when a good opportunity occurred. - See the life of Chapelain in Lambert., " Histoire littéraire du Siùcle de Louis XIV.," vol. ii. p. 361. The sum appears rather large. In 1663, Chapelain was appointed by Colbert to draw up a list of the literary men whom he deemed worthy to receive the benefits of the king, and received a pension of a thousand crowns from that minister. This distinction gave rise to the famous parody of " Chapelain décoiffé," and was considered very extraordinary. (See the "Chapelain décoiffé," in the "Œuvres de Boileau," vol. iii. p. 193, edit. 1772.) Menage, speaking of the pension of two thousand livres granted to Chapelain by the Duke de Longueviilc, mentions it as "a great pension ;" and PeHsson (" Histoire de l'Académie," JEAN CHAPELAIN. 249 labor of a subordinate position, that kind of independence which, in the opinion of a literary man, specially consists in liberty to dispose of his time as he pleases. From this leisure, after long and painful cflorts, resulted the " Pu- celle." The success of his preface to the " Adone" had convinced Chapelain of the infallibility of his literary knowledge ; he never suspected that the composition of a poem required something more than a perfect acquaint- ance with the rules of poetry, and few persons were then- to be found who were any wiser than himself on this point. After mature thought, he considered himself called upon, when nearly forty years of age, to write an' epic poem. He spent five years in the arrangement of its plan ; but we have not been informed how much time he devoted to the choice of his subject. This choice was certainly the happiest circumstance of his undertaking. The Duke de Longueville, a descendant of Dunois, the bastard of Orleans, thought too much encouragement could not be bestowed upon a work which would add, to the glory of his family, all the renown that could be de- rived from the name and talents of such a mail as Chape- lain ; and a pension of two thousand livres,' to last until the composition of the poem should be completed, con- tributed largely to the anticipative celebrity of a work so well remunerated. The twenty years spent by Chapelain in the composi- p. 20), simply tells us that the Cardinal had manifested his esteem for Chapelain, by giving him a pension. Lambert, a careless writer, may have confounded the two dates. ' " Mena^iana," vol. i. p. 123. In a remark upon the 218th Hue of Boileau's 9th Satire : '■ Qu'il soit le mieux rente de tous les beaux-esprits,*' Brossette, one of the editors of Boileau's works, tells us that this pension from AT. de Longueville amounted to four thousand livres, and that it had then been doubled ; which agrees with v\'hat Menage snys about the original pension. Lambert raises it to a thousand ci-owns. like that grr.ntcd by the Cai'dinal. 250 CORNEILLE 'S CONTEMPORARIES. tion of the first twelve cantos of his work, were twenty years of unmixed glory. The reputation of the poet ; the prestige derived from reading isolated passages, a sure means for an author to interest in his success those whom he appears to have chosen as his judges ; the lively curiosity always felt regarding that which is known only in part or by hearsay — all united to concentrate universal interest upon this poem, which, though ever promised and incessantly shown in parts, seemed likely never to be given entire. The Duchess de Longueville alone, carried away by the general opinion, but enlightened by an instinct which did not incline her usually to coincide with her husband's tastes, said, in reference to those readings, which probably occupied more of her attention than she was willing to bestow upon them : " The poem is perfectly beautiful, but it is very tiresome." ' No great importance was attached to this isolated opinion of a lady devoted to interests very different from those of literature, and whoso taste might even be regard- ed with suspicion ; for in the famous duel of the sonnets, tshe had been almost alone in favor of Voiture's " Uranie" against Benserade's " Job." For twenty years nothing occurred to interrupt the pleasant seciirity of the poet, or his expectation of the brilliant success which he believed himself destined to achieve. The desire to receive for a longer period the emoluments attached to his labor,* in- duced him, it is said, to delay the enjoyments of publica- tion and success ; but even this unfavorable judgment of ' See the note on these lines of Boileau's 3d Satire : " La Pjicelle est encore une œuvre bien galante, Et je ne sais pourquoi je bâille en la lisant." "^ " M. Chapelain," snys Mâia^c, " was so long in bringing ont his ' Pu- cellc' only because he was paid a largo ponsioTi by M. dc Longueville. He feared that the prince would no longer circ about him after he had publish- CÛ bia work." "Mcnagiana,"' vol. i. p 133. JEAN CHAPELAIN. 251 Chapelain's probity allows the merit of rare moderation to his self-love. At length, he determined to enter the lists which he considered so little to be feared. In 1656, the first twelve cantos of the " Pucelle" were published. Issuing at length . from that limited circle which was formed around it by the literate few, and from which isolated rays of its glory had alone hitherto proceeded, it sought the suffrages of the general public. All might now judge what a few had pronounced worthy of unraingled admiration; and probably gaining encouragement from the presence of the public, men of letters ventured for the first time to ex- press an opinion which they had been afraid to pronounce so long as they were the only persons to support it.' Thff promptitude of the attack justifies the presumption that it was premeditated. " Three days after this so much extolled poem had been made public," says Vigneul-Mar- ville, " a criticism of very small merit'^ having given it the first scratch, every one fell upon it, and the whole reputation of both the poem and the poet fell to the ground — a fall," adds Yigneul-Marville, " the greatest and most deplorable that has ever occurred, in the memory of man, from the top of Parnassus to the bottom." ' The event, however, was iiot quite so dramatic as it is represented to have been by the imaginative author of ' He nevertheless had fervent admirers among the literary class. Sar- rasin and Maynard had eulogized him in their poems ; an