Next to Chiteaubriand a name predominates, less great assuredly, but one nevertheless of surprising brilliancy: Madame de Stiiel. Like him she was an aristocrat by birth and repub lican by temperament. The French of the Revolutionary period were cosmopolitan in theory while she was in practice. Madame de Stiel possessed the European mind and to her we owe the denationalization of our intellects, the curiosity for penetrating beyond our front iers. Born of Swiss parents this inclination became accentuated. As an exile she lived at Coppet where she received people from all countries. Expelled from this refuge she traveled throughout Europe, understood it and did her best to make it understood. Like Chateaubriand she extended the boundaries of our comprehension. But she was not an artist, her sphere was intelligence. She described but did not suggest. Her book from Germany, great and beautiful, acquainted us with her intellect, her inner mind, her morals. As she progressed she created romantic criticism. Her mind was critical rather than national. She read every thing, wrote of everything, argued on every thing. A highly strung and elated being she was a great and extraordinary writer. Con nected with her name was one both dear and fatal — Benjamin Constant. Their quarrels, which made diverting reading in their days, only interest us by reason of the works which they bequeathed. Their passion was beauteous inasmuch as it was creative. Benjamin Con stant was an orator, but words after all are mere flights of speech and a political career is an ever changing regime. He was his own exe cutioner as well as that of his beloved; one work alone lives, a book of knowledge and deep thought 'Adolphe.' was a masterpiece of acute analysis, of melancholic irony, of clear composition. This little romance made its ap pearance at the very beginning of the period of Romanticism like a defiant note or a wager, which moreover it won inasmuch as the book lives to-day whereas so many other dull and heavy works of the time have sunk into ob livion. Before touching upon the Romantic period we should not overlook a few littera teurs, a portion of whose works, aside from party polemics, speak more than volumes. Let us cite Joseph de Maistre, stoical and poor, cornerstone as it were of a structure swept by the sea. He disowned all that tne 18th century created. He combatted the new ideas already tried and proved successful. The passion of unity animated him, he nauseated that which distinguished and dissociated. To his some what puerile vehemences scanty thought would be paid were it not for their almost perfect conception. His 'Nights of Saint Petersburg' charm us provided that we discard all reference to the political aspect. In Paul Louis Cour rier we have a democrat of a strange turn of mind; a rugged artist, liberal, Voltarian. He also dabbled in politics, but his great talents as a writer mark with immortal beauty the temporary passion which agitated him. His writings live despite their now antiquated sub jects. His dialogues conjure up the picture of a wealthy Roman living in his villa enamored of his library and landscape. Lammennais be came embroiled in other quarrels: episcopal contests and a bitter fight with deism and Christianity. What remained to him? Time aiding we see the triumph of something which our ancestors believed to have killed forever. Art alone is immortal. In his 'Paroles d'un croyant,' a work of an apocalyptical order written in verse, by turns violent and tender, gloomy and serene, no doctrine is formulated but we have evidence of a large and generous mind, one tender, rebellious, graphic, poetical. The work is soberly and powerfully written. Lammenais will live as he was essentially a creator of symbols. J. P. Prudhon, also, will live, not so much. on account of the vehemence of his democratic diatribes but as a writer of nature; for instance, when bearing in mind that part of his boyhood spent as a shepherd he narrates in fresh and vigorous terms his first emotions. Royer, Collard, Guizot, Thiers, re tain our attention although they touch too deeply on politics to allow of an exclusive literary study being given them.
Compared to them Victor Cousin is more eclectic. A philosopher of the bourgeois class, guardian of propriety of religion, of property, he wrote voluptuous pages of the women of the Fronde period which endear us to him. It should not, moreover, be forgotten that it was he who discovered the precious text of the de Pascal.> Romanticism.— We have now reached the great evolution of the century— the advent of Romanticism. The change was not a sudden
movement; it had been prepared, its nature de fined and its introduction duly announced. It might be said that it existed in embryo and had even taken shape in the works of the past masters, but certain it is that humankind as portrayed by literature is ever the same. The same potentials exist ready to be exercised as circumstances permit. A high order of genius always leads the way for others to follow. We witness the birth of a new school called Roman ticism, an intellectual crisis following closely on the Revolutionary crisis. Chateaubriand was its leader and foreign influences aided its devel opment. The great Breton borrowed ideas from the foremost English classics: Bryon, Walter Scott and Wordsworth; Madame de Stad intro duced the German school with Schiller and the Italian with Manzoni. What after all is meant by Romanticism? It is giving the reins, so to speak, to lyricism, the expression of integral individuality. By dwelling on its more pathetic side and exaggerating it to a veritable pa roxysym, the poet voices human thought. Dis daining method and logic it follows instinct without restraint. Disdaining a limited style the poem becomes a discourse, the theatre a tss box and history a poem. The tradi of the past are severed, but only the tradi as the substance matter remains. In ae was inherent all the degeneracy of the Talc writers. Phadre closely resembles But Phedre's manner of expression is rent to that of Rene: The mode is the ex ;ion which varies its color to renovate our itions. At this time appear the first works se romantic style: 'Les Messeniennes' by triir Delavigne, 'Panhypocrisiade' by Nepo !me Lemercier, 'Meditations' by Lamartine, first poems of Alfred de Vigny, the first of Victor Hugo. Having appeared without aster, a definition of Romanticism became scary, and it was Stendhal who launched First manifesto in his pamphlet We Racine akespeare.' Charles Nodier was the central -e around which evolved the younger and brilliant exponents of Romanticism, their es being, besides those already cited, Emile Antony Deschamps, Soumet, Chenedolle. :ader became necessary for this new troupe it was found in the person of Victor Hugo Lis de Cromwell) (1827). It was desirable to discover an analyst or legis r who would legitimate the claims of the comers, the lot falling to Saint-Beuve. He ed back as far as Regnier and Ponsard, ig Andre Chenier, to determine the certain iation of the new school with the old. This find in his study of the poeny of the 16th tury which he published in 1=4. The ro itic writers then established their rules and trines which were to abolish the cold, urd academic language and replace it by a timental and sensational one using whenever sible evocationary words and local expres ns.
Romantic Poetry.— Victor Hugo played leading role in this symbolical romanticism, origin of which can be traced to Château and. To practically the whole world Victor igo is the poet par excellence. As a matter fact he was the outstanding figure of the itury which he permeated with his vocabu y. Is his life's work a wonderful example French genius or a mere construction of °positions? Both, but in distinct parts. Hugo is proud, adroit, not particularly sensitive, d wished to occupy the foremost place while crouching on all branches of literature. Lying a secluded and bourgeois life his aim as to be the master thought of a perturbed ntnry. He discussed the pros and cons of e great problems of the day and rubbed ioulders with the leading journalists. In te role of a prophet he was apt to exaggerate id distort. That which Chateaubriand had Ldicated he approved, overlooking the fact that verity ceases to be such once it is an open .cret. He was dazzling and disconcerting but e molded new ideas. He exploited everything: s sufferings, his pleasures, his exile. He as not exactly tender although he knew the Lnguage of tenderness. He was not brave but ked to strike heroic attitudes. He was a umanitarian because he saw in it the great ogue of the century. He had the mind of a bowman, possessed little witty intellect and no ense whatever of moderation. He was quite erenely extravagant, ridiculously vain, merely iediocre — in a word, small. Such was Victor -Ingo, but such also is the power of words that this strangely composed mind was able to manipulate them in a wonderfully dexterous manner. Open at random any of his volumes in verse: 'Les Chitiments,' 'Les Feuilles d'Au tomne,) 'Les Contemplations' and one can not but be enthralled by the majestic tone of such wildly passionate rhythms.