France seems now to be generally admitted. One of the first writers who was subjected, and who, unhappily for French Literature, submitted to this literary yoke, was Corneille, a man of truly original genius, who, had he not stood in awe of Richelieu and the Academy, might have created in France a new school of dramatic poetry, a task to which, however gigantic, he was fully equal. This fear however, deprived Corneille of but a part of his glory, for to him is due that of being the founder of the French Drama, which before his time was scarcely deserving of the name; and whatever may be the merit of succeeding writers, the Cid, the Horaces and the Cinna of Corneille, will ever hold a distinguished place among the finest productions of the tragic muse. What Corneille had done for the dramatic poetry, was done for the language of France by Pascal, one of the most surprising men that perhaps any country ever produced. To him is due the merit of having given the French language a fixed and decided character; for the style in which he wrote his admirable "Lettres provinciales" was the model on which all the best writers of the age of Louis XIV formed their own, But this was the least of his claims to the admiration of posterity; at once eminent in piety, and distinguished for learning, sound as a philosopher, and acute as a reasoner, his style offers the double charm of thoughts well conceived and happily expressed, of a diction at once pure and animated; and hence it is that while his "Provinciales" delight the man of wit, his "Pensées," at once profound in thought, and sublime in expression, are calculated to afford equal pleasure to the christian and the scholar, to the man of taste and of piety. Few men indeed, have done more honour than Pascal, both to his country, and to the Society of Port-Royal, of which he was a zealous and distinguished member.* With Corneille and Pascal commenced that series of great writers, whose works shed so much glory upon the reign of Louis XIV, and procured it the distinguishing and not undeserved appellation of the Augustan age of * It may appear strange that no mention should have been made in this volume, of the productions of the Port-Royalists. It was the intention of the Editor to have given them a place in it, but finding that he could not, without increasing too much the size of the book, do justice to their extensive and valuable labours, he has reserved them for a future work, should this meet with such a reception as to warrant the supposition that French Literature is sufficiently interesting to render the work acceptable to the English public. French Literature. To enter upon an examination of the works of all the writers who lived at this period, would be a delightful, but a useless task; for to add praise where it has already been so frequently and so justly bestowed, were indeed"To gild refined gold, to paint the lily, To throw a perfume on the violet, To smooth the ice, or add another hue To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish. In support of this assertion, it will be sufficient to remind the reader, that France could then boast among her living writers, of such men as the tender and polished Racine, the witty and inimitable Molière, the artless and delightful La Fontaine ; of Boileau, the Juvenal of France, whose poems are not more admired for the wit they contain, than for the perfection of their style; Jean Baptiste Rousseau, one of the most distinguished poets of France; La Rochefoucauld and La Bruyère, both of whom (but particularly the latter) "held up, as it were, the mirror to nature," and finally, Bossuet, that literary giant, who as a profound scholar, a theologian, an historian, and an orator, has seldom been equalled and never been surpassed. Confined to the limits of a short Essay, it is |