Curiosities of Literature Volume Ii Part 39

Bayle's "Critique generale de l'Histoire du Calvinisme par le Pere Maimbourg," had more pleasantry than bitterness, except to the palate of the vindictive Father, who was of too hot a const.i.tution to relish the delicacy of our author's wit. Maimbourg stirred up all the intrigues he could rouse to get the Critique burnt by the hangman at Paris. The lieutenant of the police, De la Reynie, who was among the many who did not dislike to see the Father corrected by Bayle, delayed this execution from time to time, till there came a final order. This lieutenant of the police was a shrewd fellow, and wis.h.i.+ng to put an odium on the bigoted Maimbourg, allowed the irascible Father to write the proclamation himself with all the violence of an enraged author. It is a curious specimen of one who evidently wished to burn his brother with his book.

In this curious proclamation, which has been preserved as a literary curiosity, Bayle's "Critique" is declared to be defamatory and calumnious, abounding with seditious forgeries, pernicious to all good subjects, and therefore is condemned to be torn to pieces, and burnt at the _Place de Greve_. All printers and booksellers are forbidden to print, or to sell, or disperse the said abominable book, under _pain of death_; and all other persons, of what quality or condition soever, are to undergo the penalty of exemplary punishment. De la Reynie must have smiled on submissively receiving this effusion from our enraged author; and to punish Maimbourg in the only way he could contrive, and to do at the same time the greatest kindness to Bayle, whom he admired, he dispersed three thousand copies of this proclamation to be posted up through Paris; the alarm and the curiosity were simultaneous; but the latter prevailed. Every book collector hastened to procure a copy so terrifically denounced, and at the same time so amusing. The author of the "Livres cond.a.m.nes au Feu" might have inserted this anecdote in his collection. It may be worth adding, that Maimbourg always affected to say that he had never read Bayle's work, but he afterwards confessed to Menage, that he could not help valuing a book of such curiosity. Jurieu was so jealous of its success, that Beauval attributes his personal hatred of Bayle to our young philosopher overshadowing that veteran.

The taste for literary history we owe to Bayle; and the great interest he communicated to these researches spread in the national tastes of Europe. France has been always the richest in these stores, but our acquisitions have been rapid; and Johnson, who delighted in them, elevated their means and their end, by the ethical philosophy and the spirit of criticism which he awoke. With Bayle, indeed, his minor works were the seed-plots; but his great Dictionary opened the forest.

It is curious, however, to detect the difficulties of early attempts, and the indifferent success which sometimes attends them in their first state. Bayle, to lighten the fatigue of correcting the second edition of his Dictionary, wrote the first volume of "Reponses aux Questions d'un Provincial," a supposit.i.tious correspondence with a country gentleman.

It was a work of mere literary curiosity, and of a better description of miscellaneous writing than that of the prevalent fas.h.i.+on of giving thoughts and maxims, and fanciful characters, and idle stories, which had satiated the public taste: however, the book was not well received.

He attributes the public caprice to his prodigality of literary anecdotes, and other _minutiae literariae_, and his frequent quotations!

but he defends himself with skill: "It is against the nature of things to pretend that in a work to prove and clear up facts, an author should only make use of his own thoughts, or that he ought to quote very seldom. Those who say that the work does not sufficiently interest the public, are doubtless in the right; but an author cannot interest the public except he discusses moral or political subjects. All others with which men of letters fill their books are useless to the public; and we ought to consider them as only a kind of frothy nourishment in themselves; but which, however, gratify the curiosity of many readers, according to the diversity of their tastes. What is there, for example, less interesting to the public than the _Bibliotheque Choisie_ of Colomies (a small bibliographical work); yet is that work looked on as excellent in its kind. I could mention other works which are read, though containing nothing which interests the public." Two years after, when he resumed these letters, he changed his plan; he became more argumentative, and more sparing of literary and historical articles. We have now certainly obtained more decided notions of the nature of this species of composition, and treat such investigations with more skill; still they are "caviare to the general." An acc.u.mulation of dry facts, without any exertion of taste or discussion, forms but the barren and obscure diligence of t.i.tle-hunters. All things which come to the reader without having first pa.s.sed through the mind, as well as the pen of the writer, will be still open to the fatal objection of insane industry raging with a depraved appet.i.te for trash and cinders; and this is the line of demarcation which will for ever separate a Bayle from a Prosper Marchand, and a Warton from a Ritson; the one must be satisfied to be useful, but the other will not fail to delight. Yet something must be alleged in favour of those who may sometimes indulge researches too minutely; perhaps there is a point beyond which nothing remains but useless curiosity; yet this too may be relative. The pleasure of these pursuits is only tasted by those who are accustomed to them, and whose employments are thus converted into amus.e.m.e.nts. A man of fine genius, Addison relates, trained up in all the polite studies of antiquity, upon being obliged to search into several rolls and records, at first found this a very dry and irksome employment; yet he a.s.sured me, that at last he took an incredible pleasure in it, and preferred it even to the reading of Virgil and Cicero.

As for our Bayle, he exhibits a perfect model of the real literary character. He, with the secret alchymy of human happiness, extracted his tranquillity out of the baser metals, at the cost of his ambition and his fortune. Throughout a voluminous work, he experienced the enjoyment of perpetual acquisition and delight; he obtained glory, and he endured persecution. He died as he had lived, in the same uninterrupted habits of composition; for with his dying hand, and nearly speechless, he sent a fresh proof to the printer!

CICERO VIEWED AS A COLLECTOR.

Fuseli, in the introduction to the second part of his Lectures, has touched on the character of Cicero, respecting his knowledge and feeling of Art, in a manner which excites our curiosity. "Though Cicero seems to have had as little _native taste_ for painting and sculpture, and even less than he had taste for poetry, he had a conception of Nature, and with his usual ac.u.men frequently scattered useful hints and pertinent observations. For many of these he might probably be indebted to Hortensius, with whom, though his rival in eloquence, he lived on terms of familiarity, and who was a man of declared taste, and one of the first collectors of the time." We may trace the progress of _Cicero's taste for the works of art_. It was probably a late, though an ardent pursuit; and their actual enjoyment seems with this celebrated man rather to have been connected with some future plan of life.

Cicero, when about forty-three years of age, seems to have projected the formation of a library and a collection of antiquities, with the remote intention of secession, and one day stealing away from the noisy honours of the republic. Although that great man remained too long a victim to his political ambition, yet at all times his natural dispositions would break out, and amidst his public avocations he often antic.i.p.ated a time when life would be unvalued without uninterrupted repose; but repose, dest.i.tute of the ample furniture, and even of the luxuries of a mind occupying itself in literature and art, would only for him have opened the repose of a desert! It was rather his provident wisdom than their actual enjoyment, which induced him, at a busied period of his life, to acc.u.mulate from all parts books, and statues, and curiosities without number; in a word, to become, according to the term, too often misapplied and misconceived among us, for it is not always understood in an honourable sense, a COLLECTOR!

Like other late collectors, Cicero often appears ardent to possess what he was not able to command; sometimes he entreats, or circuitously negotiates, or is planning the future means to secure the acquisitions which he thirsted after. He is repeatedly soliciting his literary friend Atticus to keep his books for him, and not to dispose of his collections on any terms, however earnestly the bidders may crowd; and, to keep his patience in good hope (for Atticus imagined his collection would exceed the price which Cicero could afford), he desires Atticus not to despair of his being able to make them his, for that he was saving all his rents to purchase these books for the relief of his old age.

This projected library and collection of antiquities it was the intention of Cicero to have placed in his favourite villa in the neighbourhood of Rome, whose name, consecrated by time, now proverbially describes the retirement of a man of elegant taste. To adorn his villa at Tusculum formed the day-dreams of this man of genius; and his pa.s.sion broke out in all the enthusiasm and impatience which so frequently characterise the modern collector. Not only Atticus, on whose fine taste he could depend, but every one likely to increase his acquisitions was Cicero persecuting with entreaties on entreaties, with the seduction of large prices, and with the expectation, that if the orator and consul would submit to accept any bribe, it would hardly be refused in the shape of a ma.n.u.script or a statue. "In the name of our friends.h.i.+p," says Cicero, addressing Atticus, "suffer nothing to escape you of whatever you find curious or rare." When Atticus informed him that he should send him a fine statue, in which the heads of Mercury and Minerva were united together, Cicero, with the enthusiasm of a maniacal lover of the present day, finds every object which is uncommon the very thing for which he has a proper place. "Your discovery is admirable, and the statue you mention seems to have been made purposely for my cabinet." Then follows an explanation of the mystery of this allegorical statue, which expressed the happy union of exercise and study. "Continue," he adds, "to collect for me as you have promised, _in as great a quant.i.ty as possible_, morsels of this kind." Cicero, like other collectors, may be suspected not to have been very difficult in his choice, and for him the curious was not less valued than the beautiful. The mind and temper of Cicero were of a robust and philosophical cast, not too subject to the tortures of those whose morbid imagination and delicacy of taste touch on infirmity. It is, however, amusing to observe this great man, actuated by all the fervour and joy of collecting. "I have paid your agent, as you ordered, for the Megaric statues; send me as _many_ of them as you can, _and as soon as possible_, with any others which you think proper for the place, and to my taste, and good enough to please yours. You cannot imagine how greatly my _pa.s.sion increases_ for this sort of things; it is such that it may appear _ridiculous_ in the eyes of many; but you are my friend, and will only think of satisfying my wishes." Again--"Purchase for me, without thinking farther, all that you discover of rarity. My friend, do not spare my purse." And, indeed, in another place he loves Atticus both for his prompt.i.tude and cheap purchases: _Te multum amamus, quod ea abs te diligenter, parvoque curata sunt_.

Our collectors may not be displeased to discover at their head so venerable a personage as Cicero; nor to sanction their own feverish thirst and panting impatience with all the raptures on the day of possession, and the "saving of rents" to afford commanding prices--by the authority of the greatest philosopher of antiquity.

A fact is noticed in this article which requires elucidation. In the life of a true collector, the selling of his books is a singular incident. The truth is, that the elegant friend of Cicero, residing in the literary city of Athens, appears to have enjoyed but a moderate income, and may be said to have traded not only in books, but in gladiators, whom he let out, and also charged interest for the use of his money; circ.u.mstances which Cornelius Nepos, who gives an account of his landed property, has omitted, as, perhaps, not well adapted to heighten the interesting picture which he gives of Atticus, but which the Abbe Mongault has detected in his curious notes on Cicero's letters to Atticus. It is certain that he employed his slaves, who, "to the foot-boy," as Middleton expresses himself, were all literary and skilful scribes, in copying the works of the best authors for his own use: but the duplicates were sold, to the common profit of the master and the slave. The state of literature among the ancients may be paralleled with that of the age of our first restorers of learning, when printing was not yet established; then Boccaccio and Petrarch, and such men, were collectors, and zealously occupied in the manual labour of transcription; immeasurable was the delight of that avariciousness of ma.n.u.script, by which, in a certain given time, the possessor, with an unwearied pen, could enrich himself by his copy: and this copy an estate would not always purchase! Besides that a ma.n.u.script selected by Atticus, or copied by the hand of Boccaccio and Petrarch, must have risen in value, a.s.sociating it with the known taste and judgment of the COLLECTOR.

THE HISTORY OF THE CARACCI.

The congenial histories of literature and of art are accompanied by the same periodical revolutions; and none is more interesting than that one which occurs in the decline and corruption of arts, when a single mind returning to right principles, amidst the degenerated race who had forsaken them, seems to create a new epoch, and teaches a servile race once more how to invent! These epochs are few, but are easily distinguished. The human mind is never stationary; it advances or it retrogrades: having reached its meridian point, when the hour of perfection has gone by, it must verge to its decline. In all Art, perfection lapses into that weakened state too often dignified as cla.s.sical imitation; but it sinks into mannerism, and wantons into affectation, till it shoots out into fantastic novelties. When all languishes in a state of mediocrity, or is deformed by false tastes, then is reserved for a fortunate genius the glory of restoring another golden age of invention. The history of the Caracci family serves as an admirable ill.u.s.tration of such an epoch, while the personal characters of the three Caracci throw an additional interest over this curious incident in the history of the works of genius.

The establishment of the famous _accademia_, or school of painting, at Bologna, which restored the art in the last stage of degeneracy, originated in the profound meditations of Lodovico. There was a happy boldness in the idea; but its great singularity was that of discovering those men of genius, who alone could realise his ideal conception, amidst his own family circle; and yet these were men whose opposite dispositions and acquirements could hardly have given any hope of mutual a.s.sistance; and much, less of melting together their minds and their work in such an unity of conception and execution, that even to our days they leave the critics undetermined which of the Caracci to prefer; each excelling the other in some pictorial quality. Often combining together in the same picture, the mingled labour of three painters seemed to proceed from one palette, as their works exhibit which adorn the churches of Bologna. They still dispute about a picture, to ascertain which of the Caracci painted it; and still one prefers Lodovico for his _grandiosita_, another Agostino for his invention, and another Annibale for his vigour or his grace.[266]

What has been told of others, happened to Lodovico Caracci in his youth; he struggled with a mind tardy in its conceptions, so that he gave no indications of talent; and was apparently so inept as to have been advised by two masters to be satisfied to grind the colours he ought not otherwise to meddle with. Tintoretto, from friends.h.i.+p, exhorted him to change his trade. "This sluggishness of intellect did not proceed,"

observes the sagacious Lanzi, "from any deficiency, but from the depth of his penetrating mind: early in life he dreaded the ideal as a rock on which so many of his contemporaries had been s.h.i.+pwrecked." His hand was not blest with precocious facility, because his mind was unsettled about truth itself; he was still seeking for nature, which he could not discover in those wretched mannerists, who, boasting of their freedom and expedition in their bewildering tastes, which they called the ideal, relied on the diplomas and honours obtained by intrigue or purchase, which sanctioned their follies in the eyes of the mult.i.tude. "Lodovico,"

says Lanzi, "would first satisfy his own mind on every line; he would not paint till painting well became a habit, and till habit produced facility."

Lodovico then sought in other cities for what he could not find at Bologna. Ho travelled to inspect the works of the elder masters; he meditated on all their details; he penetrated to the very thoughts of the great artists, and grew intimate with their modes of conception and execution. The true principles of art were collected together in his own mind,--the rich fruits of his own studies,--and these first prompted him to invent a new school of painting.[267]

Returning to Bologna, he found his degraded brothers in art still quarrelling about the merits of the old and the new school, and still exulting in their vague conceptions and expeditious methods. Lodovico, who had observed all, had summed up his principle in one grand maxim,--that of combining a close observation of nature with the imitation of the great masters, modifying both, however, by the disposition of the artist himself. Such was the simple idea and the happy project of Lodovico! Every perfection seemed to have been obtained: the _Raffaeleschi_ excelled in the ideal; the _Michelagnuoleschi_ in the anatomical; the Venetian and the Lombard schools in brilliant vivacity or philosophic gravity. All seemed preoccupied; but the secret of breaking the bonds of servile imitation was a new art: of mingling into one school the charms of every school, adapting them with freedom; and having been taught by all, to remain a model for all; or, as Lanzi expresses it, _dopo avere appresso da tutte insegn a tutte_. To restore Art in its decline, Lodovico pressed all the sweets from all the flowers; or, melting together all his rich materials, formed one Corinthian bra.s.s. This school is described by Du Fresnoy in the character of Annibale,

---- Quos sedulus Hannibal omnes In PROPRIAM MENTEM atque morem mira arte COEGIT.

Paraphrased by Mason,

From all their charms combined, with happy toil, Did Annibal compose his wondrous style; O'er the fair fraud so close a veil is thrown, That every borrow'd grace becomes his own.[268]

Lodovico perceived that he could not stand alone in the breach, and single-handed encounter an impetuous mult.i.tude. He thought of raising up a party among those youthful aspirants who had not yet been habitually depraved. He had a brother whose talent could never rise beyond a poor copyist's, and him he had the judgment, unswayed by undue partiality, to account as a cipher; but he found two of his cousins men capable of becoming as extraordinary as himself.

These brothers, Agostiuo and Annibale, first by nature, and then by their manners and habits, were of the most opposite dispositions. Born amidst humble occupations, their father was a tailor, and Annibale was still working on the paternal board, while Agostino was occupied by the elegant works of the goldsmith, whence he acquired the fine art of engraving, in which he became the Marc Antonio of his time. Their manners, perhaps, resulted from their trades. Agostino was a man of science and literature: a philosopher and poet of the most polished elegance, the most enchanting conversation, far removed from the vulgar, he became the companion of the learned and the n.o.ble. Annibale could scarcely write and read; an inborn ruggedness made him sullen, taciturn, or, if he spoke, sarcastic; scorn and ridicule were his bitter delight.

Nature had strangely made these brothers little less than enemies.

Annibale despised his brother for having entered into the higher circles; he ridiculed his refined manners, and even the neat elegance of his dress. To mortify Agostino, one day he sent him a portrait of their father threading a needle, and their mother cutting out the cloth, to remind him, as he once whispered in Agostino's ear, when he met him walking with a n.o.bleman, "not to forget that they were sons of a poor tailor!"[269] The same contrast existed in the habits of their mind.

Agostino was slow to resolve, difficult to satisfy himself; he was for polis.h.i.+ng and maturing everything: Annibale was too rapid to suffer any delay, and, often evading the difficulties of the art, loved to do much in a short time. Lodovico soon perceived their equal and natural apt.i.tude for art; and placing Agostino under a master who was celebrated for his facility of execution, he fixed Annibale in his own study, where his cousin might be taught by observation the _Festina lente_; how the best works are formed by a leisurely haste. Lodovico seems to have adopted the artifice of Isocrates in his management of two pupils, of whom he said that the one was to be p.r.i.c.ked on by the spur, and the other kept in by the rein.

But a new difficulty arose in the attempt to combine together such incongruous natures; the thoughtful Lodovico, intent on the great project of the reformation of the art, by his prudence long balanced their unequal tempers, and with that penetration which so strongly characterises his genius, directed their distinct talents to his one great purpose. From the literary Agostino he obtained the philosophy of critical lectures and scientific principles; invention and designing solely occupied Annibale; while the softness of contours, lightness and grace, were his own acquisition. But though Annibale presumptuously contemned the rare and elevated talents of Agostino, and scarcely submitted to copy the works of Lodovico, whom he preferred to rival, yet, according to a traditional rumour which Lanzi records, it was Annibale's decision of character which enabled him, as it were unperceived, to become the master over his cousin and his brother; Lodovico and Agostino long hesitated to oppose the predominant style, in their first Essays; Annibale hardly decided to persevere in opening their new career by opposing "works to voices;" and to the enervate labours of their wretched rivals, their own works, warm in vigour and freshness, conducted on the principles of nature and art.

The Caracci not only resolved to paint justly, but to preserve the art itself, by perpetuating the perfect taste of the true style among their successors. In their own house they opened an _Accademia_, calling it _degli Incaminati_, "the opening a new way," or "the beginners." The academy was furnished with casts, drawings, prints, a school for anatomy, and for the living figure; receiving all comers with kindness; teaching gratuitously, and, as it is said, without jealousy; but too many facts are recorded to allow us to credit the banishment of this infectious pa.s.sion from the academy of the Caracci, who, like other congregated artists, could not live together and escape their own endemial fever.

It was here, however, that Agostino found his eminence as the director of their studies; delivering lectures on architecture and perspective, and pointing out from his stores of history and fable subjects for the designs of their pupils, who, on certain days exhibited their works to the most skilful judges, adjusting the merits by their decisions. "To the crowned sufficient is the prize of the glory," says Lanzi; and while the poets chanted their praises, the lyre of Agostino himself gratefully celebrated the progress of his pupils. A curious sonnet has been transmitted to us, where Agostino, like the ancient legislators, compresses his new laws into a few verses, easily to be remembered. The sonnet is now well known, since Fuseli and Barry have preserved it in their lectures. This singular production has, however, had the hard fate of being unjustly depreciated: Lanzi calls it _pittoresco veramente piu che poetico_; Fuseli sarcastically compares it to "a medical prescription." It delighted Barry, who calls it "a beautiful poem.

Considered as a didactic and descriptive poem, no lover of art who has ever read it, will cease to repeat it till he has got it by heart. In this academy every one was free to indulge his own taste, provided he did not violate the essential principles of art; for though the critics have usually described the character of this new school to have been an imitation of the preceding ones, it was their first principle to be guided by nature, and their own disposition; and if their painter was deficient in originality, it was not the fault of this academy so much as of the academician. In difficult doubts they had recourse to Lodovico, whom Lanzi describes in his school like Homer among the Greeks, _fons ingeniorum_, profound in every part of painting. Even the recreations of the pupils were contrived to keep their mind and hand in exercise; in their walks sketching landscapes from nature, or amusing themselves with what the Italians call _Caricatura_, a term of large signification; for it includes many sorts of grotesque inventions, whimsical incongruities, such as those arabesques found at Herculaneum, where Anchises, aeneas, and Ascanius are burlesqued by heads of apes and pigs, or Arion, with a grotesque motion, is straddling a great trout; or like that ludicrous parody which came from the hand of t.i.tian in a playful hour, when he sketched the Laoc.o.o.n whose three figures consist of apes. Annibale had a peculiar facility in these incongruous inventions, and even the severe Leonardo da Vinci considered them as useful exercises.

Such was the academy founded by the Caracci; and Lodovico lived to realise his project in the reformation of art, and witnessed the school of Bologna flouris.h.i.+ng afresh when all the others had fallen. The great masters of this last epoch of Italian painting were their pupils. Such were Domenichino, who, according to the expression of Bellori, _delinea gli animi, colorisce la vita_; he drew the soul and coloured life;[270]

Albano, whose grace distinguishes him as the Anacreon of painting; Guido, whose touch was all beauty and delicacy, and, as Pa.s.seri delightfully expresses it, "whose faces came from Paradise;"[271] a scholar of whom his masters became jealous, while Annibale, to depress Guido, patronised Domenichino, and even the wise Lodovico could not dissimulate the fear of a new compet.i.tor in a pupil, and to mortify Guido preferred Guercino, who trod in another path. Lanfranco closes this glorious list, whose freedom and grandeur for their full display required the ample field of some vast history.

The secret history of this _Academia_ forms an ill.u.s.tration for that chapter on "Literary Jealousy" which I have written in "The Literary Character." We have seen even the gentle Lodovico infected by it; but it raged in the breast of Annibale. Careless of fortune as they were through life, and free from the bonds of matrimony, that they might wholly devote themselves to all the enthusiasm of their art, they lived together in the perpetual intercourse of their thoughts; and even at their meals laid on their table their crayons and their papers, so that any motion or gesture which occurred, as worthy of picturing, was instantly sketched. Annibale catching something of the critical taste of Agostino, learnt to work more slowly, and to finish with more perfection, while his inventions were enriched by the elevated thoughts and erudition of Agostino. Yet a circ.u.mstance which happened in the academy betrays the mordacity and envy of Annibalo at the superior accomplishments of his more learned brother. While Agostino was describing with great eloquence the beauties of the Laoc.o.o.n, Annibale approached the wall, and s.n.a.t.c.hing up the crayons, drew the marvellous figure with such perfection, that the spectators gazed on it in astonishment. Alluding to his brother's lecture, the proud artist disdainfully observed, "Poets paint with words, but painters only with their pencils."[272]

The brothers could neither live together nor endure absence. Many years their life was one continued struggle and mortification; and Agostino often sacrificed his genius to pacify the jealousy of Annibale, by relinquis.h.i.+ng his palette to resume those exquisite engravings, in which he corrected the faulty outlines of the masters whom he copied, so that his engravings are more perfect than their originals. To this unhappy circ.u.mstance, observes Lanzi, we must attribute the loss of so many n.o.ble compositions which otherwise Agostino, equal in genius to the other Caracci, had left us. The jealousy of Annibale at length for ever tore them asunder. Lodovico happened not to be with them when they were engaged in painting together the Farnesian gallery at Rome. A rumour spread that in their present combined labour the engraver had excelled the painter. This Annibale could not forgive; he raved at the bite of the serpent: words could not mollify, nor kindness any longer appease, that perturbed spirit; neither the humiliating forbearance of Agostino, the counsels of the wise, nor the mediation of the great. They separated for ever! a separation in which they both languished, till Agostino, broken-hearted, sunk into an early grave, and Annibale, now brotherless, lost half his genius; his great invention no longer accompanied him--for Agostino was not by his side![273] After suffering many vexations, and preyed on by his evil temper, Annibale was deprived of his senses.

AN ENGLISH ACADEMY OF LITERATURE.[274]

We have Royal Societies for philosophers, for antiquaries, and for artists--none for men of letters! The lovers of philological studies have regretted the want of an asylum since the days of Anne, when the establishment of an English Academy of Literature was designed; but political changes occurred which threw out a literary administration.

France and Italy have gloried in great national academies, and even in provincial ones. With us, the curious history and the fate of the societies at Spalding, Stamford, and Peterborough, whom their zealous founder lived to see sink into country clubs, is that of most of our _rural_ attempts at literary academies! The Manchester society has but an ambiguous existence; and that of Exeter expired in its birth. Yet that a great purpose may be obtained by an inconsiderable number, the history of "The Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures,"

&c., may prove; for that originally consisted only of twelve persons, brought together with great difficulty, and neither distinguished for their ability nor their rank.

The opponents to the establishment of an academy in this country may urge, and find Bruyere on their side, that no corporate body generates a single man of genius. No Milton, no Hume, no Adam Smith, will spring out of an academical community, however they may partake of one common labour. Of the fame, too, shared among the many, the individual feels his portion too contracted, besides that he will often suffer by comparison. Literature, with us, exists independent of patronage or a.s.sociation. We have done well without an academy; our dictionary and our style have been polished by individuals, and not by a society.

The advocates for such a literary inst.i.tution may reply, that in what has been advanced against it we may perhaps find more glory than profit.

Had an academy been established in this country, we should have possessed all our present advantages, with the peculiar ones of such an inst.i.tution. A series of volumes composed by the learned of England had rivalled the precious "Memoirs of the French Academy," probably more philosophical, and more congenial to our modes of thinking! The congregating spirit creates by its sympathy; an intercourse exists between its members which had not otherwise occurred; in this attrition of minds, the torpid awakens, the timid is emboldened, and the secluded is called forth; to contradict, and to be contradicted, is the privilege and the source of knowledge. Those original ideas, hints, and suggestions, which some literary men sometimes throw out once or twice during their whole lives, might here be preserved; and if endowed with sufficient funds, there are important labours, which surpa.s.s the means and industry of the individual, which would be more advantageously performed by such literary unions.

An academy of literature can only succeed by the same means in which originated all such academies--among individuals themselves. It will not be "by the favour of the MANY, but by the wisdom and energy of the FEW."

It is not even in the power of royalty to create at a word what can only be formed by the co-operation of the workmen themselves, and of the great taskmaster, Time!

Such inst.i.tutions have sprung from the same principle, and have followed the same march. It was from a private meeting that "The French Academy"

derived its origin; and the true beginners of that celebrated inst.i.tution a.s.suredly had no foresight of the object to which their conferences tended. Several literary friends at Paris, finding the extent of the city occasioned much loss of time in their visits, agreed to meet on a fixed day every week, and chose Conrart's residence as centrical. They met for the purposes of general conversation, or to walk together, or, what was not least social, to partake in some refres.h.i.+ng _collation_. All being literary men, those who were authors submitted their new works to this friendly society, who, without jealousy or malice, freely communicated their strictures; the works were improved, the authors were delighted, and the critics were honest! Such was the happy life of the members of this private society during three or four years. Pelisson, the earliest historian of the French Academy, has delightfully described it: "It was such that, now when they speak of these first days of the Academy, they call it the golden age, during which, with all the innocence and freedom of that fortunate period, without pomp and noise, and without any other laws than those of friends.h.i.+p, they enjoyed together all which a society of minds, and a rational life, can yield of whatever softens and charms."

They were happy, and they resolved to be silent; nor was this bond and compact of friends.h.i.+p violated till one of them, Malleville, secretary of Marshal Ba.s.sompierre, being anxious that his friend Faret, who had just printed his _L'Honnete Homme_, which he had drawn from the famous "Il Cortigiano" of Castiglione, should profit by all their opinions, procured his admission to one of their conferences; Faret presented them with his book, heard a great deal concerning the nature of his work, was charmed by their literary communications, and returned home ready to burst with the secret. Could the society hope that others would be more faithful than they had been to themselves? Faret happened to be one of those light-hearted men who are communicative in the degree in which they are grateful, and he whispered the secret to Des Marets and to Boisrobert. The first, as soon as he heard of such a literary senate, used every effort to appear before them and read the first volume of his "Ariane." Boisrobert, a man of distinction, and a common friend to them all, could not be refused an admission; he admired the frankness of their mutual criticisms. The society, besides, was a new object; and his daily business was to furnish an amusing story to his patron, Richelieu.

The cardinal-minister was very literary, and apt to be so hipped in his hours of retirement, that the physician declared, that "all his drugs were of no avail, unless his patient mixed with them a drachm of Boisrobert." In one of those fortunate moments, when the cardinal was "in the vein," Boisrobert painted, with the warmest hues, this region of literary felicity, of a small, happy society formed of critics and authors! The minister, who was ever considering things in that particular aspect which might tend to his own glory, instantly asked Boisrobert, whether this private meeting would not like to be const.i.tuted a public body, and establish itself by letters patent, offering them his protection. The flatterer of the minister was overjoyed, and executed the important mission; but not one of the members shared in the rapture, while some regretted an honour which would only disturb the sweetness and familiarity of their intercourse.

Malleville, whose master was a prisoner in the Bastile, and Serisay, the _intendant_ of the Duke of Rochefoucault, who was in disgrace at court, louldly protested, in the style of an opposition party, against the protection of the minister; but Chapelain, who was known to have no party-interests, argued so clearly, that he left them to infer that Richelieu's _offer_ was a _command_; that the cardinal was a minister who willed not things by halves; and was one of those very great men who avenge any contempt shown to them even on such little men as themselves!

In a word, the dogs bowed their necks to the golden collar. However, the appearance, if not the reality, of freedom was left to them; and the minister allowed them to frame their own const.i.tution, and elect their own magistrates and citizens in this infant and ill.u.s.trious republic of literature. The history of the farther establishment of the French Academy is elegantly narrated by Pelisson. The usual difficulty occurred of fixing on a t.i.tle; and they appear to have changed it so often, that the Academy was at first addressed by more than one t.i.tle; Academie _des beaux Esprits_; Academie _de l'Eloquence_; Academie _Eminente_, in allusion to the quality of the cardinal, its protector. Desirous of avoiding the extravagant and mystifying t.i.tles of the Italian academies,[275] they fixed on the most unaffected, "_L'Academie Francaise_; but though the national genius may disguise itself for a moment, it cannot be entirely got rid of, and they a.s.sumed a vaunting device of a laurel wreath, including their epigraph, "_?