XIV.

LE SAGE.

1668-1747.

Le Sage was a fruitful father of literary product, but it is as the author of "Gil Blas" that he is entitled to his place in these pages. "The Adventures of Gil Blas" justly enjoys the distinction of being among the few works of fiction that are read everywhere, and everywhere acknowledged to be masterpieces in literature. Lapse of time and change of fashion seem not to tend at all toward making "Gil Blas" obsolete. With every generation of men it takes as it were a fresh lease of inexhaustible immortality.

Of course, there must be something elemental in the quality and merit of a book, especially a book of fiction, concerning which this can truly be said. A novel "Gil Blas" is generally called. The name is hardly descriptive. Le Sage's masterpiece is rather a book of human nature and of human life. It constitutes already, embraced within the compass of a single work, that which it was the ambition of the novelist Balzac to achieve in an Alexandrian library of fiction; "Gil Blas" is the whole "comedy" of man. The breadth of it is enormous. There is hardly any thing lacking to it that is human--unless it be some truly noble human character, some truly noble human action.

We spoke of it not amiss, when we used Balzac's half-cynical word and called it the _comedy_ of man. Le Sage involuntarily reveals his own limitation in the fact that he has converted into comedy the whole mingled drama of man's earthly condition. Within his proper individual bounds, this man's dimensions are so large that he has been not unfitly styled Shakespearean. But Shakespeare exceeds Le Sage in measure by a whole hemisphere. Shakespeare knows how to be serious, to be tragic; as Le Sage does not. Matter of tragedy indeed abounds in "Gil Blas," but it is all treated lightly, in the manner of comedy. You are allured, in reading, to laugh, when, if you return at all upon yourself, you are conscious you ought rather to weep. Le Sage is the antithesis of Rousseau, of Chateaubriand, of Lamartine, of George Sand--writers who know as little of laughter as Le Sage does of tears.

But it should at once, and strongly, be said that Le Sage is no cynic. It is not a sneering, but a smiling, mask that he wears. The smile is of a worldly-wisdom not ill-pleased with itself, and therefore not ill-pleased with the world which it rallies. It is a genial smile. But for all that, if you are yourself at bottom a serious man, you are disturbed at last. You are vexed to find yourself incessantly brought to smile at what you know ought to move your shame, your indignation, or your grief. The moral temper which Le Sage exhibits and which he engenders is not the "enthusiasm of humanity." It is less the temper to help your fellow-men than the temper to profit the most that you can by their weaknesses, by their follies, and even by their crimes. Le Sage's hero, "Gil Blas," goes through a series of "adventures," in which nearly every human sin is committed by him and by his fellows, either unblushingly, or, if with any show of compunction at all, then with such show of compunction as is almost worse than perfect indifference would be. The book is not in intention immoral, but only unmoral. It may well be questioned whether in effect it be not the more immoral for this very character in it. The abounding gay animal spirits of the narrative go frisking along as if let loose in a lucky world where moral distinctions were things that did not exist; the real world indeed, only with the deepest reality of all left out!

Verisimilitude seems hardly sought. The situations often waver on the edge of the ludicrously farcical. The tenor of the production stops barely short of sheer extravaganza. There is no unity, progressiveness, culmination of plot. The whole book is a mere concatenation, scarcely concatenation, succession, say rather, of "adventures," any one of which is nearly as good a starting-point for the reader as any other would be.

The scene of the story and the local color are all Spanish. Le Sage's previous experience of travel in Spain, as well as his long occupation in translating from the Spanish into French, probably influenced him to this choice of medium for his masterpiece; which, by the way, it cost the author intervals of time covering twenty-two years to bring to its completion. The fact of its Spanish character gave color to the charge, deemed now to have been exploded, that "Gil Blas" was plagiarized by Le Sage from a Spanish original. It may be added that laying the scene and action of his story in Spain left Le Sage the more free to satirize, as he undoubtedly does, certain persons and certain manners belonging to his own country, France.

Of Alain Rene Le Sage, the man, there need little be said. He was a successful writer of comedies for the stage. Of these the most were ephemeral productions. Two, however, and one especially, the "Turcaret," have the honor of ranking, in French literature, next to the very highest in their kind, the comedies of Moliere. Never rich, Le Sage was always independent in spirit. The story is told of him that, arriving once unavoidably late at a noble mansion where he had made an appointment to read one of his own productions, he was reproached by the distinguished hostess for making the company lose an hour in waiting; whereupon he replied: "I give the company a chance to recover their lost hour," and refusing to be placated bowed himself out.

Smollet, the celebrated English novelist--and historian so-called--has translated "Gil Blas." We make use of his translation in presenting our extracts from this novel to our readers. There are two passages, both deservedly famous, which will admirably exemplify Le Sage at his best; one of these is the immortal episode concerning the illustrious physician, Doctor Sangrado, and the other is the instructive relation of Gil Blas's experience in discharging the office of what one might call literary valet and critic to an archbishop.

First we introduce Doctor Sangrado.

Gil Blas is at this time in the Spanish town of Valladolid serving an ecclesiastic in the capacity of lackey. His master, falling sick, sends for a physician. Gil Blas--the novel is autobiographic in form--shall tell his own story:

I therefore went in search of Dr. Sangrado, and brought him to the house.... The licentiate having promised to obey him in all things, Sangrado sent me for a surgeon, whom he named, and ordered him to take from my master six good porringers of blood, as the first effort, in order to supply the want of perspiration. Then he said to the surgeon: "Master Martin Omnez, return in three hours and take as much more; and repeat the same evacuation to-morrow. It is a gross error to think that blood is necessary for the preservation of life; a patient cannot be blooded too much; for as he is obliged to perform no considerable motion or exercise, but just only to breathe, he has no more occasion for blood than a man who is asleep--life, in both, consisting in the pulse and respiration only." The doctor having ordered frequent and copious evacuations of this kind, he told us that we must make the canon drink warm water incessantly; assuring us that water, drank in abundance, was the true specific in all distempers whatever.... We set about warming water with all despatch; and as the physician had recommended to us, above all things, not to be too sparing of it, we made my master drink for the first dose two or three pints, at as many draughts. An hour after we repeated it, and returning to the charge, from time to time, overwhelmed his stomach with a deluge of water, the surgeon seconding us, on the other hand, by the quantity of blood which he drew from him. In less than two days the old canon was reduced to extremity.

Blood-letting, as an expedient of the healing art, has happily gone out of fashion; but Dr. Sangrado's other master secret, the therapeutic drinking of hot water, has been rehabilitated in our days. We sincerely hope that none of our hot-water-drinking readers will let Le Sage laugh them out of countenance in holding to their habit--if it really does them good!

Gil Blas is promoted to be servant, and then professional assistant, to the famous Dr. Sangrado. Gil Blas and the doctor's maid were warned by their master against eating much, but, now, however, Gil Blas shall himself again resume the part of narrator:

He allowed us, by way of recompense, to drink as much water as we could swallow: far from restricting us in this particular, he would sometimes say, "Drink, my children; health consists in the suppleness and humectation of the parts: drink water in great abundance: it is an universal menstruum that dissolves all kinds of salt. When the course of the blood is too languid, this accelerates its motion; and when too rapid, checks its impetuosity".... "If thou feelest in thyself," said he to me, "any reluctance to simple element, there are innocent aids in plenty that will support thy stomach against the insipid taste of water; sage, for example, and balm will give it an admirable flavor; and an infusion of corn-poppy, gillyflower, and rosemary, will render it still more delicious."

Notwithstanding all he could say in praise of water, and the excellent beverages he taught me to compose, I drank of it with such moderation, that perceiving my temperance, he said: "Why, truly, Gil Blas, I am not at all surprised that thou dost not enjoy good health. Thou dost not drink enough, my friend. Water taken in small quantities serves only to disentangle the particles of the bile, and give them more activity; whereas they should be drowned in a copious dilution: don't be afraid, my child, that abundance of water will weaken and relax thy stomach: lay aside that panic fear which perhaps thou entertainest of plentiful drinking."

Gil Blas, discouraged, was about to leave Dr. Sangrado's service, when that distinguished physician said to him--we take up the text of the story once more:

"I have a regard for thee, and without further delay will make thy fortune.... I spare thee the trouble of studying pharmacy, anatomy, botany, and physic: know, my friend, all that is required is to bleed the patients and make them drink warm water. This is the secret of curing all the distempers incident to man".... I assured him that I would follow his maxims as long as I lived, even if they should be contrary to those of Hippocrates. But this assurance was not altogether sincere; for I disapproved of his opinion with regard to water, and resolved to drink wine every day, when I went out to visit my patients.

This resolution Gil Blas carried out, and, returning home drunk in consequence, gave Dr. Sangrado an artfully heightened account of a scuffle he had had with a rival physician of his master named Cuchillo. Let Gil Blas pursue the narrative:

"Thou hast done well, Gil Blas," said Dr. Sangrado, "in defending the honor of our remedies against that little abortion of the faculty. He affirms, then, that aqueous draughts are improper for the dropsy! Ignorant wretch! I maintain, I do, that a dropsical patient cannot drink too much."... He perceived that I drank more water that evening than usual, the wine having made me very thirsty, ... and said, with a smile, "I see, Gil Blas, thou hast no longer an aversion to water. Heaven be praised! thou drinkest it now like nectar."... "Sir," I replied, "there is a time for all things: I would not at present give a pint of water for an hogshead of wine." The doctor, charmed with this answer, did not neglect such a fair opportunity of extolling the excellence of water.... "There are still a few," he exclaimed, "who, like thou and I, drink nothing but water; and, who, as a preservative from, or cure of all distempers, trust to hot water unboiled: for I have observed that boiled water is more heavy and less agreeable to the stomach."

... I entered into the doctor's sentiments, inveighed against the use of wine, and lamented that mankind had contracted a taste for such a pernicious liquor. Then (as my thirst was not sufficiently quenched) I filled a large goblet with water, and having swallowed long draughts of it: "Come, sir," said I to my master, "let us regale ourselves with this benevolent liquor." ... He applauded my zeal, and during a whole quarter of an hour exhorted me to drink nothing but water. In order to familiarize myself to this prescription, I promised to swallow a great quantity every evening; and that I might the more easily perform my promise, went to bed with a resolution of going to the tavern every day.

In passing from the humor of Le Sage's Dr. Sangrado, we cannot refrain from exhorting the reader not to miss that refinement about water made hot without actually boiling. The present writer seems to himself to have encountered the same delicacy of hot-water-drinking in his own personal observation of those who now practice this method of health or of cure.

A later fortune of Gil Blas, in his long career of extremely various "adventures," shaken from change to change as in a kaleidoscope, was to fall into the service of an archbishop, by whom he was soon advanced to a post of confidential favor. Gil Blas became in fact the archbishop's "guide, philosopher, and friend," in the very important matter of that high dignitary's literary and historical reputation. This happened through Gil Blas's felicity in copying out with judicious calligraphy--a calligraphy such as seemed to their author to commend those productions in some fit proportion to their worth--the venerable archbishop's homilies. Gil Blas thus relates the immediate, and then the more remote, result of his submitting to the archbishop his maiden essay in copy-hand reproduction of that prelate's pulpit rhetoric:

"Good heaven!" cried he in a transport, when he had surveyed all the sheets of my copy, "was ever anything seen so correct? You transcribe so well that you must certainly understand grammar. Tell me ingenuously, my friend, have you found nothing that shocked you in writing it over? Some neglect, perhaps, in the style, or improper term?" "O, sir," answered I, with an air of modesty, "I am not learned enough to make critical observations; and if I was, I am persuaded that the works of your grace would escape my censure." The prelate smiled at my reply; and, though he said nothing, discovered through all his piety, that he was a downright author.

By this kind of flattery, I entirely gained his good graces, became more and more dear to him every day.... One evening he repeated in his closet, when I was present, with great enthusiasm, an homily which he intended to pronounce the next day in the cathedral; and, not satisfied with asking my opinion of it in general, obliged me to single out the particular passages which I most admired. I had the good luck to mention those that he himself looked upon to be the best, his own favorite morceaus: by which means I passed, in his judgment, for a man who had a delicate knowledge of the true beauties of a work. "This is," cried he, "what is called having taste and sentiment: well, friend, I assure thee thou hast not got Boeotian ears." In a word, he was so well satisfied with me, that he pronounced with some vivacity, "Gil Blas, henceforth give thyself no uneasiness about thy fortune: I undertake to make it extremely agreeable; I love thee; and, as a proof of my affection, make thee my confidant."

I no sooner heard these words than I fell at his grace's feet, quite penetrated with gratitude; I heartily embraced his bandy legs, and looked upon myself as a man on the high way to wealth and opulence. "Yes, my child," resumed the archbishop, whose discourse had been interrupted by my prostration, "thou shalt be the repository of my most secret thoughts. Listen with attention to what I am going to say: my chief pleasure consists in preaching; the Lord gives a blessing to my homilies; they touch the hearts of sinners, make them seriously reflect on their conduct, and have recourse to repentance.... I will confess my weakness; I propose to myself another reward, a reward which the delicacy of my virtue reproaches me with in vain! I mean the esteem that the world shows for fine polished writing. The honor of being reckoned a perfect orator has charmed my imagination; my performances are thought equally strong and delicate; but I would, of all things, avoid the fault of good authors who write too long, and retire without forfeiting the least tittle of my reputation. Wherefore, my dear Gil Blas," continued the prelate, "one thing that I exact of thy zeal is, whenever thou shalt perceive my pen smack of old age, and my genius flag, don't fail to advertise me of it: for I don't trust to my own judgment, which may be seduced by self-love." ... "Thank heaven, sir," said I, "that period is far off: besides, a genius like that of your grace will preserve its vigor much better than any other; or, to speak more justly, will be always the same. I look upon you as another Cardinal Ximenes, whose superior genius, instead of being weakened by age, seemed to receive new strength from it." "No flattery, friend," said he, interrupting me. "I know I am liable to sink all at once: people at my age begin to feel infirmities, and the infirmities of the body often affect the understanding. I repeat it to thee again, Gil Blas, as soon as thou shalt judge mine in the least impaired, be sure to give me notice; and be not afraid of speaking freely and sincerely, for I shall receive thy advice as a mark of thy affection. Besides, thy interest is concerned; if, unhappily for thee, it should come to my ears that the public says my discourses have no longer their wonted force, and that it is high time for me to repose myself, I frankly declare that thou shalt lose my friendship, as well as the fortune I have promised. Such will be the fruit of thy foolish reserve!"

Gil Blas was destined soon to be put to the extreme proof of his fidelity. Himself must tell how:

In the very zenith of my favor we had a hot alarm in the episcopal palace: the archbishop was seized with a fit of the apoplexy; he was, however, succored immediately, and such salutary medicines administered that in a few days his health was re-established; but his understanding had received a rude shock, which I plainly perceived in the very next discourse which he composed. I did not, however, find the difference between this and the rest so sensible as to make me conclude that the orator began to flag, and waited for another homily to fix my resolution. This, indeed, was quite decisive; sometimes the good old prelate repeated the same thing over and over, sometimes rose too high or sunk too low; it was a vague discourse, the rhetoric of an old professor, a mere capucinade. [The word, "capucinade," satirizes the Capuchin monks.]

I was not the only person who took notice of this. The greatest part of the audience when he pronounced it, as if they had been also hired to examine it, said softly to one another, "This sermon smells strong of the apoplexy." Come, master homily-critic, said I then to myself, prepare to do your office; you see that his grace begins to fail; it is your duty to give him notice of it, not only as the depository of his thoughts, but, likewise, lest some one of his friends should be free enough with him to prevent you; in that case you know what would happen: your name would be erased from his last will....

After these reflections I made others of a quite contrary nature. To give the notice in question, seemed a delicate point. I imagined that it might be ill-received by an author like him, conceited of his own works; but, rejecting this suggestion, I represented to myself that he could not possibly take it amiss after having exacted it of me in so pressing a manner. Add to this that I depended upon my being able to mention it with address, and make him swallow the pill without reluctance. In a word, finding that I ran a greater risk in keeping silence than in breaking it, I determined to speak.

The only thing that embarrassed me now was how to break the ice. Luckily the orator himself extricated me from that difficulty by asking what people said of him, and if they were satisfied with his last discourse. I answered that his homilies were always admired, but in my opinion the last had not succeeded so well as the rest in affecting the audience. "How, friend!" replied he with astonishment, "has it met with any Aristarchus?" "No, sir," said I, "by no means; such works as yours are not to be criticised; everybody is charmed with them. Nevertheless, since you have laid your injunctions upon me to be free and sincere, I will take the liberty to tell you that your last discourse, in my judgment, has not altogether the energy of your other performances. Are you not of the same opinion?"

My master grew pale at these words, and said with a forced smile, "So, then, Mr. Gil Blas, this piece is not to your taste?" "I don't say so, sir," cried I, quite disconcerted, "I think it excellent, although a little inferior to your other works." "I understand you," he replied, "you think I flag, don't you? Come, be plain; you believe it is time for me to think of retiring." "I should not have been so bold," said I, "as to speak so freely if your grace had not commanded me; I do no more, therefore, than obey you, and I most humbly beg that you will not be offended at my freedom." "God forbid," cried he, with precipitation, "God forbid that I should find fault with it. In so doing I should be very unjust. I don't at all take it ill that you speak your sentiment; it is your sentiment only that I find bad. I have been most egregiously deceived in your narrow understanding."

Though I was disconcerted, I endeavored to find some mitigation in order to set things to rights again; but how is it possible to appease an incensed author, one especially who has been accustomed to hear himself praised? "Say no more, my child," said he, "you are yet too raw to make proper distinctions. Know that I never composed a better homily than that which you disapprove, for my genius, thank heaven, hath as yet lost nothing of its vigor. Henceforth I will make a better choice of a confidant and keep one of greater ability than you. Go," added he, pushing me by the shoulders out of his closet, "go tell my treasurer to give you a hundred ducats, and may heaven conduct you with that sum. Adieu, Mr. Gil Blas, I wish you all manner of prosperity, with a little more taste."

It would be hard, we think, to overmatch anywhere in literature the shrewd but genial satire, the quiet, effective comedy, of the foregoing. How deep it gently goes, probing and searching into the secret springs of our common human nature! The cool, the frontless calculation of self-interest on Gil Blas's part throughout the whole course of his conduct of the relation between himself and the archbishop is perfectly characteristic of the impudent easy-heartedness everywhere displayed of this conscienceless adventurer. It illustrates the consummate art of the author that the whole is so managed that, while you do not sympathize with his hero, you still are by no means forced to feel unplesantly offended at him. This is a great feat of lullaby to the conscience of the reader; for the character of the work is such that if, in perusing it, you should throughout keep vigilantly obeying the wholesome safeguard injunction of the apostle, "Abhor that which is evil," you would be so busy doing the duty of abhorring as seriously to interfere with your enjoyment of the comedy. To get the pleasure or the profit, and at the same time leave the taint, that is the problem often in studying the masterpieces of literature. As generally, so in the case of "Gil Blas," it is a problem perhaps best to be solved by being still more intent on leaving the taint than on getting the pleasure or the profit.

On the whole, the reading of "Gil Blas" entire is a task or a diversion that may safely in most cases be postponed to the leisure of late life. The whole is such, or is not so good, as the part that has here been shown. It is an instance in which the building is very fairly represented by a single specimen brick. Multiply what you have seen by the necessary factor, and you have the total product with little or no loss.

It ought to be added that "Gil Blas," as in local color and in what might be styled medium not French at all, is also in general character the least French of French productions. It seems almost as if expressly written to be part of what Goethe taught his disciples to look for, namely, a "world-literature." "Gil Blas," though French in form, is in essence French only because it is human. And for the same reason it is of every other nation as well. It possesses, therefore, as French literature a unique and, so to speak, paradoxical importance in not being French literature; it is, in fact, perhaps quite the only French book that is less national than universal.