FONTENELLE, BERNARD LE BOVIElt DE, born nt Rouen, 11th February 1657 was, by his mother's side, nephew of the great Corneille. Educated at the College of tho Jesuits in his native city, he displayed, at a very early period, the quickness and the aptitude of his talents, which he cultivated with the greatest diligence and application. At the age of thirteen Fontenelle successfully contended for the prize offered for the best composition in Latin verse; and in general literature had deserved honourable mention-on the records of his college. From this time to his sixteenth year the law was the study to which his attention was nominally directed. But his heart was not with the science : poetry, philosophy, and history engrossed the time which should have been devoted to the Corpus Jurie. During this period principally Fontanelle acquired those vast stores of varied and accurate knowledge which, giving an appearance of catholic learn ing to his works, are constantly recurring in the shape of apposite and almost unconscious allusions. Having completed, the term of his legal studies, he lost the first cause in which he was retained, and thereupon abandoning for ever the distasteful profession of the law., devoted himself to the more attractive and congenial pursuits of literature.
In his private fortunes there is little to interest the curiosity so commonly felt respecting the doings of men of genius ; the biographer has consequently little to do 'but to follow him in his literary career, which was neither without honour nor profit. For the last years of his life he was in the enjoyment of a yearly income of nearly 900/., and left behind him at his death a very considerable sum. From 1699 to 1741 he held the distinguished and responsible office of secretary to the Academy of Sciences at Paris, and was an honorary member of that of Berlin and of the Royal Society of London. Fontenelle died at Paris on the 9th January 1757, having completed his hundreth year within a few weeks, and expired exclaiming "Je ne souffrde pas, men amis • main je seas une certaine d'fitre." The calmness with he met his death was in keeping with the serenity of his whole life.
In his personal character Fontenelle presents a rare instance of self command and moderation, neither confounding virtue with austerity nor pleasure with excess. To the measured reserve of his character there is a somewhat exaggerated allusion in his oft-repeated declara tion, that in his whole life he had never laughed nor wept. As he held it to be the duty of the sage to cultivate all his senses, internal as well as external, and to combine in the enjoyment of all nature the exercise of all his faculties, the tone of his mind exhibited a happy harmony with his personal character. The universality of his pursuits,
which embraced nearly the whole domain of literature, offered on the one hand an insuperable obstacle to unrivalled excellence in any single department, but contributed on the other, by enlarging his views and increasing his stores of knowledge, to render respectable his attainments in all.
As a poet, in which character he made his first appearance in the world of letters, he composed several tragedies and operas, most of which were unfavourably received ; and if the ' Thetis et l'elde' met with some success and the praises of Voltaire, it has since fallen with the rest into neglect and oblivion. His Pastorals, which were recommended solely by their novelty, are full of conceits : on the other hand, there is much of nature and grace in the which, with the 'Apologia de 1'Amour,' is alone worthy of being pre served. His poetic pieces occasionally display much delicacy of senti ment, and extreme polish and elegance both in the thought and diction ; but in all of them the poetic feeling is weak, and there is little invention, and a decided want of originality and force.
The 'Dialogue des Morta,' published in 1683, first laid the founda tion of his literary fame, which was firmly established by the appearance two years afterwards of the Entretiens eur la Pluralit6 des Mendes,' one of the ablest of his works, and exhibiting a rare combination of science and wit. The object of the latter was to familiarise his countrymen with the Cartesian astronomy; and in the preface he compares himself to Cicero presenting the philosophy of Greece in a form and language intelligible to the Romans. For the execution of such a task Fontenelle was eminently qualified, and rarely, if ever, has it been so ably accomplished. By the happiness and point of his illustrations, he interests while he instructs his reader : quick to discover in common things unimagined beauties, he adduces and presents new truths in so obvious a light, that even when most opposed to received opiniou, they are at once adopted as old and firmly established. In the Eloges,' which, as secretary of the Aca demy, he pronounced upon its deceased members, and by which he is best known to posterity, his peculiar talents are most felicitously dis played. Of a mixed character, between memoirs and criticism, they combine history and encomium with such tact and delicaoy, that the panegyric is almost imperceptible, and the commendation the highest when apparently least intended.