Part 8

_16th-Century Savants._--One more division, and only one, that of scientific and learned writers pure and simple, remains. Much of the work of this kind during the period was naturally done in Latin, the vulgar tongue of the learned. But in France, as in other countries, the study of the classics led to a vast number of translations, and it so happened that one of the translators deserves as a prose writer a rank among the highest. Many of the authors already mentioned contributed to the literature of translation. Des Periers translated the Platonic dialogue _Lysis_, la Boetie some works of Xenophon and Plutarch, du Vair the _De corona_, the _In Ctesiphontem_ and the _Pro Milone_. Salel attempted the _Iliad_, Belleau the false _Anacreon_, Baif some plays of Plautus and Terence. Besides these Lefevre d'Etaples gave a version of the Bible, Saliat one of Herodotus, and Louis Leroi (1510-1577), not to be confounded with the part author of the _Menippee_, many works of Plato, Aristotle and other Greek writers. But while most if not all of these translators owed the merits of their work to their originals, and deserved, much more deserve, to be read only by those to whom those originals are sealed, Jacques Amyot (1513-1593), bishop of Auxerre, takes rank as a French classic by his translations of Plutarch, Longus and Heliodorus. The admiration which Amyot excited in his own time was immense. Montaigne declares that it was thanks to him that his contemporaries knew how to speak and to write, and the Academy in the next age, though not too much inclined to honour its predecessors, ranked him as a model. His Plutarch, which had an enormous influence at the time, and coloured perhaps more than any classic the thoughts and writings of the 16th century, both in French and English, was then considered his masterpiece. Nowadays perhaps, and from the purely literary standpoint, that position would be assigned to his exquisite version of the exquisite story of Daphnis and Chloe. It is needless to say that absolute fidelity and exact scholarship are not the pre-eminent merits of these versions. They are not philological exercises, but works of art.

On the other hand, Claude Fauchet (1530-1601) in two antiquarian works, _Antiquites gauloises et francoises_ and _L'Origine de la langue et de la poesie francaise_, displays a remarkable critical faculty in sweeping away the fables which had encumbered history. Fauchet had the (for his time) wonderful habit of consulting manuscripts, and we owe to him literary notices of many of the trouveres. At the same time Francois Grude, sieur de la Croix du Maine (1552-1592), and Antoine Duverdier (1544-1600) founded the study of bibliography in France. Pasquier's _Recherches_, already alluded to, carries out the principles of Fauchet independently, and besides treating the history of the past in a true critical spirit, supplies us with voluminous and invaluable information on contemporary politics and literature. He has, moreover, the merit which Fauchet had not, of being an excellent writer. Henri Estienne [Stephanus] (1528-1598) also deserves notice in this place, both for certain treatises on the French language, full of critical crotchets, and also for his curious _Apologie pour Herodote_, a remarkable book not

## particularly easy to class. It consists partly of a defence of its

nominal subject, partly of satirical polemics on the Protestant side, and is filled almost equally with erudition and with the buffoonery and _fatrasie_ of the time. The book, indeed, was much too Rabelaisian to suit the tastes of those in whose defence it was composed.

The 16th century is somewhat too early for us to speak of science, and such science as was then composed falls for the most part outside French literature. The famous potter, Bernard Palissy (1510-1590), however, was not much less skilful as a fashioner of words than as a fashioner of pots, and his description of the difficulties of his experiments in enamelling, which lasted sixteen years, is well known. The great surgeon Ambrose Pare (c. 1510-1590) was also a writer, and his descriptions of his military experiences at Turin, Metz and elsewhere have all the charm of the 16th-century memoir. The only other writers who require special mention are Olivier de Serres (1539-1619), who composed, under the title of _Theatre d'agriculture_, a complete treatise on the various operations of rural economy, and Jacques du Fouilloux (1521-1580), who wrote on hunting (_La Venerie_). Both became extremely popular and were frequently reprinted.

Malherbe.

_17th-Century Poetry._--It is not always easy or possible to make the end or the beginning of a literary epoch synchronize exactly with historical dates. It happens, however, that for once the beginning of the 17th century coincides almost exactly with an entire revolution in French literature. The change of direction and of critical standard given by Francois de Malherbe (1556-1628) to poetry was to last for two whole centuries, and to determine, not merely the language and complexion, but also the form of French verse during the whole of that time. Accidentally, or as a matter of logical consequence (it would not be proper here to attempt to decide the question), poetry became almost synonymous with drama. It is true, as we shall have to point out, that there were, in the early part of the 17th century at least, poets, properly so called, of no contemptible merit. But their merit, in itself respectable, sank in comparison with the far greater merit of their dramatic rivals. Theophile de Viau and Racan, Voiture and Saint-Amant cannot for a moment be mentioned in the same rank with Corneille. It is certainly curious, if it is not something more than curious, that this decline in poetry proper should have coincided with the so-called reforms of Malherbe. The tradition of respect for this elder and more gifted Boileau was at one time all-powerful in France, and, notwithstanding the Romantic movement, is still strong. In rejecting a large number of the importations of the Ronsardists, he certainly did good service. But it is difficult to avoid ascribing in great measure to his influence the origin of the chief faults of modern French poetry, and modern French in general, as compared with the older language. He pronounced against "poetic diction" as such, forbade the overlapping (_enjambement_) of verse, insisted that the middle pause should be of sense as well as sound, and that rhyme must satisfy eye as well as ear. Like Pope, he sacrificed everything to "correctness," and, unluckily for French, the sacrifice was made at a time when no writer of an absolutely supreme order had yet appeared in the language. With Shakespeare and Milton, not to mention scores of writers only inferior to them, safely garnered, Pope and his followers could do us little harm. Corneille and Moliere unfortunately came after Malherbe. Yet it would be unfair to this writer, however badly we may think of his influence, to deny him talent, and even a certain amount of poetical inspiration. He had not felt his own influence, and the very influences which he despised and proscribed produced in him much tolerable and some admirable verse, though he is not to be named as a poet with Regnier, who had the courage, the sense and the good taste to oppose and ridicule his innovations. Of Malherbe's school, Honorat de Bueil, marquis de Racan (1589-1670), and Francois de Maynard (1582-1646) were the most remarkable. The former was a true poet, though not a very strong one. Like his master, he is best when he follows the models whom that master contemned. Perhaps more than any other poet, he set the example of the classical alexandrine, the smooth and melodious but monotonous and rather effeminate measure which Racine was to bring to the highest perfection, and which his successors, while they could not improve its smoothness, were to make more and more monotonous until the genius of Victor Hugo once more broke up its facile polish, supplied its stiff uniformity, and introduced vigour, variety, colour and distinctness in the place of its feeble sameness and its pale indecision. But the vigour, not to say the licence, of the 16th century could not thus die all at once. In Theophile de Viau (1591-1626) the early years of the 17th century had their Villon. The later poet was almost as unfortunate as the earlier, and almost as disreputable, but he had a great share of poetical and not a small one of critical power. The _etoile enragee_ under which he complains that he was born was at least kind to him in this respect; and his readers, after he had been forgotten for two centuries, have once more done him justice. Racan and Theophile were followed in the second quarter of the century by two schools which sufficiently well represented the tendencies of each. The first was that of Vincent Voiture (1598-1648), Isaac de Benserade (1612-1691), and other poets such as Claude de Maleville (1597-1647), author of _La Belle Matineuse_, who were connected more or less with the famous literary coterie of the Hotel de Rambouillet. Theophile was less worthily succeeded by a class, it can hardly be called a school of poets, some of whom, like Gerard Saint-Amant (1594-1660), wrote drinking songs of merit and other light pieces; others, like Paul Scarron (1610-1660) and Sarrasin (1603? 4? 5?-1654), devoted themselves rather to burlesque of serious verse. Most of the great dramatic authors of the time also wrote miscellaneous poetry, and there was even an epic school of the most singular kind, in ridiculing and discrediting which Boileau for once did undoubtedly good service. The _Pucelle_ of Jean Chapelain (1595-1674), the unfortunate author who was deliberately trained and educated for a poet, who enjoyed for some time a sort of dictatorship in French literature on the strength of his forthcoming work, and at whom from the day of its publication every critic of French literature has agreed to laugh, was the most famous and perhaps the worst of these. But Georges de Scudery (1601-1667) wrote an _Alaric_, the Pere le Moyne (1602-1671) a _Saint Louis_, Jean Desmarets de Saint-Sorlin (1595-1676), a dramatist and critic of some note, a _Clovis_, and Saint-Amant a _Moise_, which were not much better, though Theophile Gautier in his _Grotesques_ has valiantly defended these and other contemporary versifiers. And indeed it cannot be denied that even the epics, especially _Saint Louis_, contain flashes of finer poetry than France was to produce for more than a century outside of the drama. Some of the lighter poets and classes of poetry just alluded to also produced some remarkable verse. The _Precieuses_ of the Hotel Rambouillet, with all their absurdities, encouraged if they did not produce good literary work. In their society there is no doubt that a great reformation of manners took place, if not of morals, and that the tendency to literature elegant and polished, yet not destitute of vigour, which marks the 17th century, was largely developed side by side with much scandal-mongering and anecdotage. Many of the authors whom these influences inspired, such as Voiture, Saint-Evremond and others, have been or will be noticed. But even such poets and wits as Antoine Baudouin de Senece (1643-1737), Jean de Segrais (1624-1701), Charles Faulure de Ris, sieur de Charleval (1612-1693), Antoine Godeau (1605-1672), Jean Ogier de Gombaud (1590-1666), are not without interest in the history of literature; while if Charles Cotin (1604-1682) sinks below this level and deserves Moliere's caricature of him as Trissotin in _Les Femmes savantes_, Gilles de Menage (1630-1692) certainly rises above it, notwithstanding the companion satire of Vadius. Menage's name naturally suggests the _Ana_ which arose at this time and were long fashionable, stores of endless gossip, sometimes providing instruction and often amusement. The _Guirlande de Julie_, in which most of the poets of the time celebrated Julie d'Angennes, daughter of the marquise de Rambouillet, is perhaps the best of all such albums, and Voiture, the typical poet of the coterie, was certainly the best writer of _vers de societe_ who is known to us. The poetical war which arose between the Uranistes, the followers of Voiture, and the Jobistes, those of Benserade, produced reams of sonnets, epigrams and similar verses. This habit of occasional versification continued long. It led as a less important consequence to the rhymed _Gazettes_ of Jean Loret (d. 1665), which recount in octosyllabic verse of a light and lively kind the festivals and court events of the early years of Louis XIV. It led also to perhaps the most remarkable non-dramatic poetry of the century, the _Contes_ and _Fables_ of Jean de la Fontaine (1621-1695). No French writer is better known than la Fontaine, and there is no need to dilate on his merits. It has been well said that he completes Moliere, and that the two together give something to French literature which no other literature possesses. Yet la Fontaine is after all only a writer of fabliaux, in the language and with the manners of his own century.

All the writers we have mentioned belong more or less to the first half of the century, and so do Valentin Conrart (1603-1675), Antoine Furetiere (1626-1688), Chapelle (Claude Emmanuel) l'Huillier (1626-1686), and others not worth special mention. The latter half of the century is far less productive, and the poetical quality of its production is even lower than the quantity. In it Boileau (1636-1711) is the chief poetical figure. Next to him can only be mentioned Madame Deshoulieres (1638-1694), Guillaume de Brebeuf (1618-1661), the translator of Lucan, Philippe Quinault (1635-1688), the composer of opera libretti. Boileau's satire, where it has much merit, is usually borrowed direct from Horace. He had a certain faculty as a critic of the slashing order, and might have profitably used it if he had written in prose. But of his poetry it must be said, not so much that it is bad, as that it is not, in strictness, poetry at all, and the same is generally true of all those who followed him.

Hardy.

Rotrou.

Corneille.

Moliere.

Racine.

The Academy.