^"^^S^ '{ LIBRARY OF THE University of California. GIFT OF ^J^^AA^ry^ Class t^f^x 1 L, m A ^^^^^^^■B^^Bfl^^S^lSn^^^^^H ijK N^ U '< ' A^ ■ h-:^. 'M ^"""^^s.^ \^^;^T^/^ '' ^. < Yf ^'^ :_^>i^ Y^/ s/ O 7 k,}--^" THE POESIES DIVERSES OF ANTOINE FURETIERE A PARTIAL REPRINT FROM THE EDITION OF 1664 Edited with Introduction, Notes and Glossary BY ISABELLE BEONK Professor of French in Swarihmore College BALTIMORE J. H. FURST COMPANY 1908 3)e.JtufPaud» g tiUlindCj(^P OFK THE POESIES DIVERSES OF ANTOINE FURETIERE A PARTIAL REPRINT FROM THE EDITION OF 1664 Edited with Introduction, Notes and Glossary BY ISABELLE BRONK Professor of French in Suarlhmore College BALTIMORE J. H. FURST COMPANY 1908 PREFACE. The reasons for a new edition of Furetiere's poems, which have now become rare, are sufficiently evident from the Introduction. In preparing the present text for publication, the second edition of the Poesies diverses, that of 1664, has been followed, as this was the last corrected and revised by the poet. The reason adduced by M. Edouard Fournier in his edition of Le Roman bourgeois for the retention of Furetiere's orthography is felt to obtain in this edition: Furetiere was a lexicographer, hence his usage may be considered a criterion for seventeenth century spelling and pro- nunciation. I have also followed the original in punctuation and in capitalization, since these accord well with the irregular spelling. Of the Poesies diverses I have reprinted all that seemed of even remote interest ; the omissions include * some of the stances, the vers libres, many of the epigrams, several madrigals, some epitaphs and enigmas, and most of the airs. These, because of coarseness or tediousness, seemed distinctly undeserving of reproduction. In issuing this modest volume, I desire to express my thanks to Pro- fessor T. Atkinson Jenkins, of the University of Chicago, for his encouragement and valuable suggestions; also to the librarians in the E^ational Library and the Library of the Arsenal, at Paris. ISABELLE BkONK. Swarthmore College, March, 1908. * For an exact list of the omissions, cf. the Table of Contents, reprinted p. 96. iii 209850 INTRODUCTION. Furetiere's quarrel with the Academy brought upon him obloquy and upon his works obscurity. When, in the second half of the nineteenth century, an effort was made by scholars to clear his name, all the writings which he composed during his struggle with the Academy were republished. Kecrudescence of interest in him resulted further in several modern editions of the Roman bourgeois. This interest, however, did not extend to the publish- ing anew of his other literary productions; the only editions of his poetical works are those issued during his lifetime. Of these the volume of Poesies diverses is the most important from a literary point of view, since its contents are the most varied and at the same time indicative of all the author's literary tendencies. This volume of poems is the third in the order of Furetiere's published works. The satires and most of the other pieces it contains really antedate, however, the two books published earlier. The author states this in his preface, where he adds that these first poems were composed soon after he left college. We may, there- fore, assign to them a date between 1640 and 1647 or 1648. All of Furetiere's verse is evidence that the writer was an active participant in the movenient, essentially bourgeois, towards com- mon sense and naturalness in literature. We find this fact the more interesting when we consider that his early poems anticipated Boileau by several years, and also Moliere. There is therefore reason to suppose that Furetiere's first works materially influenced these writers, particularly the former. Aside from their author's- connection with Boileau and his group, Furetiere's poems are not without interest as containing realistic pictures of French bourgeois society during the years just before the middle of the seventeenth century. Although using many poetic forms, — satire, ode, epigram, madrigal, epitaph, enigma, air or song, epistle, and elegy, — it is as a satirist that Furetiere particularly deserves at- VI THE POESIES DIVERSES OF ANTOINE FUKETIERE. tention. The nature of his influence upon Boileau, as well as the scope and value of his satire on the French society of 1640-1650, may be better appreciated after some account of his life is given. As the work of his former biographers is either but partial or erroneous, the following sketch has been made as complete as the facts permit. I. Sketch of Furetii^ee's Life. jjig Antoine Furetiere was born at Paris on December 28, 1619. Family. The same month he was baptized at St-Etienne du Mont, being given his father's name. Everything points to probity and to a high degree of respectability among Furetiere's immediate rel- atives.^ The father belonged to an honest family of the middle class; in 1619 he was secretary of the king's chamber.^ He was also, perhaps later, king's porte manteau.^ The mother, Marie, was likewise of good bourgeois stock, and was sister of the Ponce * The defamatory and forged Dialogue, published by Fureti&re's enemies during his quarrel with the Academy, has been the usual source for informa- tion regarding his family. The aspersions upon his life and character con- tained in the Dialogue were set at naught by M. Wey (Revue contemporaine, Tomes II and III, 1852) and M. Asselineau (Recueil des Factums, Paris, 1859, Tome II), but the assurances of his low parentage it contains have continued to be quoted. However, since the investigations undertaken by M. Jal and published in his Dictionnaire critique de hiographie et d'histoire, we are no longer forced to fall back upon the statements of the Dialogue, ' " Secretaire du Cabinet. Ce sont des officiers qui ^crivent les lettres par- ticuli&res du Roy. II y en a quatre qui servent par quartier. lis se quali- fient, Conseillers du Roy en tous ses Conseils. Sur I'^tat ils sont qualifiez Secretaires de la Chambre & du Cabinet." — Fureti&re's Dictionary. ^ " Officier chez le Roi. II y a douze Porte manteaux servant par quartier & un Porte manteau ordinaire. lis pr§tent serment de fidelit6 entre les mains du premier Gentilhomme de la Chambre. Leur fonction est de garder les hardes que le Roi quitte pour les reprendre, comme son chapeau, ses gans, sa canne, son manchon, son 6p6e, &c. lis les recoivent imm^diatement du Roy en I'absence du grand Chambellan, du premier Gentilhomme, ou du grand Maltre de la Garderobe." — Furetifere's Dictionary. INTRODUCTION. VU Sauvage whose wife, l^icole Beauchamp, stood as sponsor to our Furetiere in baptism. This uncle Ponce was procurator at the Chatelet and godfather to one of his sister's sons who was named for him and born three years after Antoine. It is inter^ting to note that a third brother, Gilles, was presented at the baptismal font under the sponsorship of another habitue of the Chatelet, the notary M® Gilles Le Semelier. After the end of the year 1630 the family moved from the rue Ste-Genevieve, where Antoine and six or seven brothers and sisters had been bom, to the rue des Bernardins. There their number was increased by the addition of two or three more children.^ For one of these, Marie, the young Antoine stood with his sister Madeleine as godfather. It was not the time of superficial educations, and the Furetiere parents, although thus blessed with a numerous progeny, evidently possessed both the means and the willingness ^ to give their chil- dren a thorough training. Benoit, the fourth son, entered holy orders and became pretre de VOratoire, as did also ]^oel, another member of the family. ]!^icolas, a younger brother, followed the law and was admitted to the bar, after which he was made assessor to the prevot des marchands of Beaujcu. Late in life he married the daughter of Jean Favier, " avocat au parlement." The sister Marie contracted an honorable alliance, her husband being M. de Boumer, " cheualier, seigneur de Chantelou." Of the two brothers Ponce and Gilles, as well as of the three sisters Anne, Claude, and Madeleine, we have no trace. M. Jal thinks the two former must have died before the year 1664, as they do not figure in a receipt given in that year by Benoit Furetiere, " tant en son nom que * The date of the birth of the sister Madeleine and of a brother Noel is unknown. =* Tallemant des R6aux relates (Les Historiettes, Paris, Techener, 1854-60, Vol. 7, p. 509) that the young Antoine one day asked his father for money to buy a book and was met with the response, " Et sais-tu tout ce qui est dans celui que tu achetas I'autre jour?" that one being a dictionary. One need not necessarily infer from this anecdote, as some critics do, that Furetifere was of humble extraction, or that there was a lack of intellectual culture in the family. VUl THE POESIES DIVERSES OF ANTOINE FURETIERE. comme procureur " of Antoine Furetiere, Nicolas Furetiere, and the husband of the sister Marie, " enf ans et heritiers de deffunct M. Antoine Furetiere et de dam"® Marie Sauvage leurs pere et mere." But neither is the brother l^oel mentioned here, and he seems to have been living at the time of the marriage of Ii[icolas Furetiere, in 1687. His Antoine Furetiere, judging by the man of later years, vras a lad Education, of studious tastes and possessed of much linguistic ability. He was evidently an omnivorous reader and greedy for information of all kinds. From the knowledge of the languages which he shows in his works, we know that he must when young have given much attention to the oriental and modern, as well as classical tongues. What institution numbered him among her sons ? Of this we are ignorant, nor do we know if the pictures of stupid, clamoring pedants, strewn throughout his writings, represent the teachers of his early years. Was he a victim of the sterile instruction and rigors of a university college, or did he enjoy the more modern methods of rendering science attractive, together with the gentler discipline, of the Jesuits ? His attainments would indicate that he was a pupil at one of the large colleges belonging to this order, where some of the oriental languages were taught, beside the humanities and philosophical sciences, scholastic and positive philosophy. Perhaps he learned Spanish and Italian at the Petites-Ecoles, together with history and geography. However it be, he was educated before the Latin language had yielded its su- premacy in scholastic and professional circles to the mother- tongue, the French. As a After successfully completing his studies at college, Furetiere Lawyer, turned his attention to civil and canonical law and acquired a thorough mastery of these subjects. He was then admitted to the bar and began the practice of law. Later he was chosen procureur fiscal ^ of the royal abbey Saint-Germain-des-Pres, upon which posi- *A procureur fiscal prosecuted at the same time all causes wherein the lord paramount or the public was interested. The office was a most honorably one, its functions bearing some relation to those of a vidame. INTRODUCTION. IX tion he entered May 29, 1652. His natural zeal for reformation here brought him into trouble in the following manner: The clergy of the abbey St-Germain-des-Pres were in general dis- tinguished for their serious and pious lives and for their erudition. But the jurisdiction in which the procureur fiscal' s position lay had been decried by the bad conduct of some of the preceding officers. Furetiere tried to enforce the law and to introduce re- forms. In overhauling abuses of which complaint had been made, he discovered that the principal disorders were in the recorder's office. A certain recorder, d'Hirson, in retaliation for this justifi- able interference, attempted to ferret out or invent charges against Furetiere, and went so far as to suborn witnesses to testify against him. The only persons he could find to do this were rogues and vagabonds. Their true characters were, however, not fully known, and their testimony had some weight against the procureur fiscal. But the latter followed up the accusations thoroughly and cleared himself of the false charges. One of these was bribery, the state- ment being made that he had received money from a woman of ill repute who was in one of the prisons of the bailiwick. We find Furetiere's defence in a factum ^ which he himself wrote in 1656 or somewhat later. This factum is in reply to a demand by the procureur general for an explanation of reports that have come to him against the procureur fiscal. The pamphlet has not been used previously by Furetiere's biographers. If M. Wey had seen it before writing his plea for Furetiere (see the Revue contempo- raine. Tomes II and III, 1852), he would not have had to look further for any cause of the libellous charge against his protege's integrity found in the Dialogue. As a The life of cavilling and pettifogging in which the procureur Churchman, fiscal of the royal abbey St-Germain-des-Pres found himself proved extremely distasteful to him. In all of Furetiere's works, not only those written while he was still in discharge of* his procura- tor's duties, but also in his writings of later years, there is ex- ^ Bibliothfeque nationale, fol. 132, Thoisy 176. X THE P0P:SIES DIVERSES of ANTOINE FURETIERE. pressed a great dislike for the law. And it was probably because of this aversion that he renounced his first profession, to enter the Church. Then too, he had a taste for literature and had already acquired something of a reputation as a poet. At that time it was very common for men of letters to take orders, that they might enjoy the benefices which would enable them to give themselves to literature. Furetiere became prior of the secular priory St- Laurent-sur-Saone and commendatory prior ^ of the conventual priory ^ of St-Pierre-Gigny, order of Cluny, diocese of Lyons. On August 22, 1662, he exchanged these two priories for the abbey of Chalivoy, order of Citeaux, diocese of Bourges. He was at that time living in the rue des Boucheries, off the faubourg St- Germain-des-Pres. We do not read anywhere that he ever exer- cised the functions of priest, but only that he was abbe of Chalivoy, diocese of Bourges, and prior of Chuine(s),^ diocese of Chartres. The privilege for the second edition of his Poesies diverses is dated August 26, 1664. It speaks of " Fvretier Aduocat," although he was no longer in the legal, profession. In the late sixties we find Furetiere invested with the abbey of Montpeyroux. He is again in litigation, this time with Jean Gilbert de la Verchere, who is a claimant of the abbey. This La Verchere and Charles his brother had formerly been in possession of the. abbey, Furetiere says,* but in the year 1661 they had been convicted of the alienation of church property. The king had been apprised of the vacancy and had installed M. Thomas Cocquart. The latter had now resigned his rights to Furetiere, who obtained his brevet December 5, 1666. Furetiere pleads that the abbey was rightfully vacant through the incapacity of La Verchere, this in- * " Beneficier qui jouissait en tout ou en partie des revenus d'un prieur6, et qui en portait le titre, sans avoir aucune autorite sur les religieux." — Nouveau dictionnaire national. ^ " Un prieur6 conventuel oblige a Stre Pretre, mgme quand il est Com- mendataire." — Furetifere's Dictionary. ' Chaisne in his acte mortuaire. * See printed Factums, Pour Messire Antoine Furetiere, etc. Contre Messire Jean Gilbert de la Verchere. (Bibl. Nat.) INTRODUCTION. xi capacity resulting first, from La Verchcre's not being tonsured, and secondly, from his being guilty of simony or of having entered into a simoniacal contract in the selling of church property. The complaint made by Furetiere is rejected by the grand conseil August 4, 1668, but he continues the fight. In one of the documents ^ in this lawsuit, we see already the writer of the later Factums. Simony is strongly denounced as a leper that threatens the Chvirch, and the procureur general is exhorted to chase from the sanctuary all buyers and sellers, as did the Messiah of old. First Works After being invested with the abbey of Chalivoy, which he held Published— until he died, Furetiere seems to have devoted himself almost Admission exclusively to literature. He had already made his appearance to ca emy. ^^ ^^^ realm of letters, having published in 1649 a travesty of the fourth book of Virgil's Aeneid; in 1653, the Voyage de Mercure, a satire; in 1655, a volume of poetry; and in 1658, the Nouvelle allegorique. These works, especially the last-named,- had pro- cured him admission to the Academy, and he had been received into this company May 15, 1662. Friends and At this time Furetiere was not only acquainted with many of Associates— ^j^g leading men of letters, but was bound to some of them by Character— ^j^g ^^ friendship. An insight into his character and literary 1 erary |^j^g|^^pg |g afforded bv a knowledge of his friends and of the society Tastes. . i- o ,/ which he frequented. Two or three years after leaving college he writes : ^ ^ See last note. *This popular work may be seen to-day in several editions: the first, published at Paris in 1658 by Pierre Lamy, duodecimo with chart, octavo without chart, also by Guillaume de Luynes; the second Paris edition, less personal than the first, issued also in 1658, both by Lamy and Luynes, and with its acheve d'imprimer bearing the same date as that of the first edition; 1659 copies of the first edition as well as of the second, published at Paris; an edition issued at Amsterdam in 1658 by Raphael Smith; another published at Heidelberg in 1659 by G. Fitzer and A. Liils; and another at Amsterdam by H. des Bordes in 1702. M. Wey speaks of a pretty edition published by the Elzevirs in 1678, that had become very rare. This I have been unable to find. =• See Satire II. xii THE POESIES DIVERSES OF ANTOINE FURETIi^RE. " lusqu' icy i'ay v6cu sans femme, et sans affaire, Sans soucy que de rire, aymer, faire grand' chere." The abbe Furetiere was probably a galant homme in his youth. This we should infer from his love poetry, which is decidedly worldly in tone. Like most of the writers of his day, he passed through the school of the precieuses, as is shown by the fact that in Somaize's Dictionnaire he is given the name Filante and allusion is made to his Nouvelle allegorique under the title of Histoire des quarante barons. His intelligence and wit made him a desirable member of the literary coteries, never more numerous in Paris than in the years shortly before and after the middle of the seventeenth century. Through Tallemant we learn that he frequented the Wednesday academies or mercuriales of the vain and rather pomp- ous Menage, with whom, he was on cordial terms. ^ Thither he bore his malicious tongue, and with Liniere, Gilles Boileau, and other kindred spirits, did what he could to make life miserable for Chapelain, Mile, de Scudery, and the precieux in general. Con- rart and Pellisson too came in for their share of raillery. Prob- ably Furetiere joined in these attacks, although two of his satires, written when he was younger, are dedicated to these same men. It is known that Chapelain stood in fear of Furetiere, Boileau, Scarron, and some of the rest, and, to propitiate them, instead of economically associating them in groups of two, gave to each an entire copy of his Pucelle.^ At Menage's Mercredis Furetiere met people of fashion and of letters, among the latter not only Chapelain, Pellisson, Liniere, Gilles Boileau, and Conrart, but also Sarrazin, Costar, Galland, Charles Perrault, the de Valois brothers, and others. Tallemant records several of Furetiere's * See Les Historiettes, Vol. 5, p. 234. This was evidently during the fifties. M6nage's assemblies began about 1652 in the street of the Cloitre-Notre- Dame, (Cf. Les Ennemis de Chapelain, par I'Abb^ A. Fabre, Paris, Thorin, 1888, pp. 286 ff.). After Manage met with the accident to his limb, in 1680, he held a kind of little academie every day, but Furetifere probably attended these reunions rarely. * See Lea Historiettes, Vol. 3, p. 276. INTRODUCTION. xiii bright speeches.^ Menage, as is well known, was himself fond of railing at people. He fell out with Gilles Boileau, drawing Pellis- son into the quarrel, and also incurred the wrath of Cousin, the translator and royal censor, by his ill-timed pleasantries. He would rather lose a friend than a chance to show his wit, but Furetiere seems to have been able to remain on amicable terms with him. Tallemant tells us also of Furetiere's being present at the Abbe de MaroUe's exclusive Lundis and of the conspiracy hatched there against Chapelain and Conrart, whom Furetiere and Boileau at- tacked, calling them the " tyrans des Belles-lettres," ^ Furetiere has dedicated one of his satires to the Abbe de Marolles. In the year 1662 he was still an habitue of the latter's salon, although * Among them one suggested by the fact that many young people were present at these gatherings. A certain president having taken his son to Menage in September and having begged him to approve of this young man's coming to his academies, Furetiere, who was present, said maliciously: "Mais, Monsieur, vous ne songez pas qu'il n'est pas encore la Saint-R^my" (day of opening of schools). — Les Eistoriettes, Vol. 5, p. 234. The following anecdotes also show his wit: " J'ai oui dire que Furetiere et la Fontaine allant un jour, dans le tems qu'ils 6toient amis, rendre visite il Patru, le virent venir a eux avec Chape- lain. Voici, dit Furetiere, un Auteur pauvre et un pauvre Auteur." — Menagiana, Paris, 1715, I, 126. " Au lieu de Moyse sauvd, Furetiere I'apelloit Moyse noy^." — Les Eis- toriettes, Vol. 3, p. 310, where Tallemant speaks of lack of success of St. Amant's work. " Ceux qui la connoissoient un peu (Mile, de Scudery) virent bien, d6s les premiers volumes de Cyrus, que Georges de Scud6ry gouverneur de Nostra Dame-de-la-Garde, car il se qualifie tous jours ainsy, ne faisoit que la preface et les epistres dedicatoires. La Calprenede le luy dit une fois, en presence de sa soeur, et ils se fussent battus sans elle; c'est pourquoi Furetiere disoit qu'a la clef qu'on en a donn^e il falloit adjouster: M. de 8cudery, gouverneur, etc. — Mademoiselle sa soeur." — Les Eistoriettes, Vol. 7, p. 56. " Pour escrocquer Furetiere, trois ou quatre jours devant sa mort, elle (Claudine Colletet) alia luy demander de quoy enterrer sa mere, qui se portoit bien; et quand la mere vint luy demander de quoy faire enterrer sa fille : " Vous vous mocquez ! luy dit-il, c'est vous qui estes morte, et non pas elle." — Les Eistoriettes, Vol. 7, p. 113. " See Les Eistoriettes, Vol. 3, p. 295. XIV THE POESIES DIVERSES OF ANTOINE FUKETIEKE, Chapelaiii, in a letter to Huet/ would lead us to infer that, while Furetiere was a familiar friend of Marolles, he was one of those who appreciated the latter's sensitiveness to reputation and glory. The abbe refers to Furetiere most graciously in his memoirs writ- ten in the year 1648. Furetiere, in his turn, spares the abbe in his Nouvelle allegorique.'^ M. Morillot makes Furetiere ^ a partaker of the delicate cheer which was offered in Scarron's humble apartment, rue i^euve- Saint-Louis, at the corner of the street of the Douze Fortes. It is easy to think of him here, where were gathered the wit and fashion of the time and where war was waged against the prevalent bad taste in literature and against preciosity in its various forms. This was after Scarron's marriage, which occurred in 1652, and some time during the fifties, before Furetiere's entrance into the Academy. The Menagiana speak of Furetiere's visiting Patru, and we must infer that there existed a mutual esteem between these two men from the fact that Furetiere treats Patru so well in the Factums. The terms of respect and almost admiration in" which Furetiere is mentioned invariably in the Historiettes of Tallemant would, for the same reason, lead us to believe that the abbe and Tallemant des Reaux were friends. This opinion is corroborated, according to M. Paulin Paris, by the fact that certain anecdotes and witticisms are found both in the Historiettes and in the Roman bourgeois or Nouvelle allegorique.^ The unusual powers ^Of Feb. 18, 1662. " Ceux qui ne bougent de chez luy le bernent au sortir en toute rencontre, et vous trouverez icy une epigramme de Furetiere, I'un de ses familiers, qui vous fera voir en quel predicament (categoric) il est parmy eux." * Ste-Beuve thinks the favorable judgment of Marolles found here would do scanty honor to Furetiere's critical powers, and that we must believe he did not speak seriously when he wrote it (Causeries du lundi, Vol. XIV, p. 138, note 3). * See Scarron et le genre burlesque, p. 91. * Such are : The story of Mme. Lgvesque {Les Historiettes, Vol. 4, p. 264) and the first episode in Furetiere's novel. INTRODUCTION. XV of observation and the malicious wit of these two men would natu- rally draw them together. Furetiere joined with Patru, Racine, Boileau, and especially with La Fontaipe, in esteem and liking for Maucroix, the rather uncanonlike canon of the cathedral at Rheims. Maucroix had formerly been a lawyer at Paris, and Furetiere has dedicated to him his most famous satire, one upon the legal profession. According to the historian of the Academy, our abbe had been a friend of Boileau-Despreaux, Racine, and La Fontaine from their childhood. Similarity of literary tastes kept him near these writers, and through them he came into association with Moliere. The quartette of great poets fell into the habit of holding reunions, and of these reunions Furetiere was often a part. The late Edouard Fournier and Charles Asselineau have shown clearly the striking similarity between several characters in Furetiere's Roman bourgeois and some in Moliere's comedies, Boileau's satires, and Racine's Plaideurs.^ They have brought out also coincidences of words and situations, all of which points to fre- The story of the cuffs of President Tambonneau's wife [Les Historiettes, Vol. 7, p. 82) and the story of the presidente (Le Roman hourgcois, Paris, 1854, p. 72). The story of the surgeon and plate {Les Historiettes, Vol, 7, p. 53G). This witticism is found also in the Roman bourgeois. ^The former, in his notes to Le Roman bourgeois, ed. of 1854, has pointed out the resemblance between Furetifere's polite preacher and the Abbe Cotin or Cassaigne of Boileau's satire; between Vollichon of Furetifere's novel and Rolet of Boileau's satire; between Furetifere's "good friend" and Boileau himself; between Belastre buying a book in which, to press his ties and Chrysale of Les Femmes savant es ; between the same person offering to secure a good place to see the hanging, the offer to take his lady to enjoy a dissection, in the Malade imaginaire, and the sinjilar offer in Racine's Plaideurs; between the enumeration of expenses in Le Roman bourgeois and that in Les Fourberies de Scapin (1671). M. Asselineau, in his preface to the same edition of Le Roman bourgeois, has shown the analogy of the principal characters in Moli&re's works with those in L' Amour esgare of Fureti&re's novel. In his edition of the Factums (Paris, 1859), Vol. I, note on pp. xvii and xviii, he returns to the subject, and calls attention to the resemblance between Furetifere's plaideuse and the Countess of Pimbeche of the Plaideurs. XVI THE POESIES DIVERSES OF ANTOINE FURETIERE. quent intercourse of our abbe with the other writers and to a com- munity of tastes and opinions. They must have used to some ex- tent the same originals, had the same faith, and, above all, the same enemies. The relations between Furetiere and Boileau seem to have been always especially friendly. We know that the younger man was encouraged by the older to continue along the thorny path of satire. In regard to Boileau's first satiric effort Brossette tells us that Boileau did not think much of this piece. He could hardly bring himself to the point of reading it to a few intimate friends. One day the Abbe Furetiere paid a visit to Gilles Boileau, his friend and colleague at the Academy, and, finding him out, staid with Despreaux and read this satire. He was very much pleased with it and willingly conceded that it was better than any he had himself written. He encouraged the young poet to continue, etc.^ Boileau was also aided directly by Furetiere. If we may credit the Bolaeana,"^ it was the latter man who suggested to the former the Abbe Cotin's name for a lacking hemistich in the third satire, and the famous scene of Chapelain decoiffe was composed by the two working together.^ This scene was written at the Croix de Lorraine, near the Bastille.* The Croix de Lorraine was the most illustrious of the Paris cabarets in the second half of the seven- teenth century, succeeding in popularity the Pomme de pin. There Boileau read his satires, Racine his short verses, Furetiere pointed his epigrams, and Chapelle enlivened all with his gayety. * See Oeuvres de Mr. Boileau-Despreaux. Par Brossette. Genfeve, 1716, Vol. I, p. 9. On p. 74 Brossette says that this circumstance explains lines 88 and preceding of Boileau's seventh satire. * Amsterdam, 1742, p. 85. See also note by Brossette on verse 60 of Boileau's third satire. ^ See Boileau's letter to Brossette, Dec. 10, 1701. This parody was invented towards the end of 1663 and appeared in 1664. (C/". M. Kerviler, La Bretagne a V Acad4mie, p. 250.) * See Histoire des hdtelleries, cabarets', hotels garnis, restaurants et cafes, par Francisque Michel et Ed. Fournier, Paris, 1851, Vol. II, p. 302. Brossette says {Oeuvres de Mr. Boileau-Despreaux, p. 438, note) that this parody wag composed at the traiteur's in the Place du Cimeti&e St-Jean, OF -ME UNIVtRSITY OF INTRODUCTION. XVll Several features of Racine's comedy, Les Plaideurs, were the result of the meetings at Le Mouton blanc of Racine, Boileau, Chapelle, Furetiere, and others. Each one present endeavored to contribute something to the author. Louis Racine assigns to M. de Brilhac, counsellor in parliament, the credit of teaching Racine the legal terms used at the Palais, and to Boileau that of giving in- formation in regard to the manners of pleaders.^ We can well imagine, however, that the Abbe Furetiere, who had himself worn the robe, and who had written two satires describing the peculiari- ties of attorneys, was not behind the others in apt suggestions. If Furetiere haunted the cabarets, it was because he expected to find there choice wits and appreciation for his own clever speeches. Boileau was sometimes drawn by Chapelle to excess in the use of wine, and the more circumspect Moliere would also at times aban- don his regimen, but we read nowhere that Furetiere ever drowned his sorrows in the bowl. His was a life of abstemiousness and of toil. Besides his own work, the labors of the Academy demanded his attention, and into these he threw himself heart and soul. Among the members of this illustrious company he took a high rank and received marks of honorable preferment. When the king, in 1676, ordered that six places be reserved for Academicians at the court theatrical representations, Furetiere was one of the delegates of the forty Immortals. ^ Most of the active Aca- demicians were his intellectual inferiors. As his learning was formidable and his humor sarcastic, he never became a favorite among them. In all his academic relations we see that he was never tolerant of the mental shortcomings of his fellows, and not at all conciliatory. After his first youth, love seems to have played no role in the life of Furetiere. In the Fureteriana he is quoted as saying that * See Louis Racine, Mcmoires sur la vie de J. Racine, Lausanne, 1747, p. 74. Les Plaideurs appeared in 1668. Le Mouton blanc was on the place of the cemetery St- Jean, and was kept at the time by the widow Bervin . ( See His- toire des hotelleries, etc., Vol, II, p. 302.) . 'See Histoire de V Academic francaise, ed. Livet, Vol. II, p. 21. 2 xvill THE POESIES DIVERSES OF ANTOINE FURETIERE. a woman is convenient only in illness and bad fortune. However, he never rails against women, but rather desires that due justice be done them. " On crie fort contre les femmes ; on les accuse d'estre la cause de tons les plus grands maux qui sont arrivez dans le monde, n'a-t-on point tort ? " -^ He then proceeds to speak of the advantages that women have enjoyed among different nations, and tells for what the world is indebted to them. As in Boileau's heart, so in Furetiere's love may have been a transient sentiment. But friendship could not mean for him what it did for Boileau, as his nature was a more independent and solitary one. Later In 1666 Turetiere published the Roman bourgeois. A volume Works, of fables ajDpeared in 1671, and, a year after, some translations in verse of certain Gospel parables. A second volume of these metrical translations, a continuation of the first, was issued in 1673. His The story of Furetiere's last years is so closely interwoven with Declining that of his dictionary that it is impossible to separate the two.- The author himself tells us that he had worked all his life upon this dictionary, hence we must infer that it was begun several ic lonary. y^^^g j^gfoyg j^e entered the Academy. When he was admitted to this body, he probably put aside his individual labors, in order to unite his powers and learning with those of the other Academicians in work upon the official dictionary. Disappointed in the methods pursued and in the little interest for the mutual undertaking shown by the more intellectual members of the company, he must have resolved, after some years of membership, to return to his original plan and continue his own dictionary. As testimony to the fact * Fureteriana. ' Most of the pieces pertaining to his quarrel with the Academy, as well as what had been written on both sides, were published in the last edition of the Factums issued during the seventeenth century. This is entitled Nouveau liecueil des Factums, considerahlement augmentee, etc. A Amsterdam, Chez Henry Desbordes, 1694, 2 vols., 12mo. It is this that M. Asselineau has followed in his excellent modern edition of the Factums. For this study I have used not only these collections, but, to a large extent also, the originals of the articles that they contain. Years. — The INTRODUCTION. xix that he did not carry on the work so clandestinely as the Academy afterwards pretended, we have the words of Tallemant the elder and of Etienne Pavilion. The former, in a letter purporting to be written in 1687, states that Furetiere some ten or twelve years previously threatened he would show a dictionary one hundred times more useful than that of the Academy and one which would contain the most curious terms of all the arts. Etienne Pavilion, in a letter to Euretiere in 16Y9, warned him that a conspiracy was being formed by some of the Academicians to force him to give up to them the plan of his dictionary. This reference is the first we find to the Dictionnaire universel. The conspiracy evidently did not prove successful, for the work was finished in January, 1684, and the license to print it was obtained in August of the same year. The Academy had in 1674 procured a license for its own dic- tionary. This was very exclusive in tone, since it forbade the print- ing of any new dictionary in France before the dictionary of the Academy should have appeared, and also during the twenty years of its license. This license had been obtained through the agency of a few Academicians only, and had been kept secret. It is probable Furetiere knew about it, but that he considered it unfair. M. Wey thinks it may have been extorted from the authorities after Furetiere had announced that he would write a dictionary of his own, and with the express design of paralyzing his efforts later on. The terms in which it is worded and the time at which it was obtained bear out this assumption. However it be, the Academi- cians were indignant when it became known that one of their number intended to publish a dictionary. They claimed that he was encroaching upon their rights, and that he ought not to have worked alone at anything which he knew to be the principal occu- pation of the whole body. The report was circulated that he had profited by their labors. To remove these suspicions, he had a specimen or abridgment of his dictionary printed, — the Essais,^ *A quarto volume, in which there are eight pages upon each letter of the alphabet, except upon H, I, K, Q, and the last three. H and I have four pages respectively and the others none at all. The author had only a few XX THE POESIES DIVERSES OF ANTOINE FURETIERE. — that the public might see how different his work was from that of the Academy. But no amicable adjustment of the matter was ever reached. In January of the following year, 1685, the Acad- emy petitioned the royal council for the recall of the lexicogra- pher's license and the suppression of the Essais, alleging that he had appropriated the work of his colleagues, and that then, upon a certificate issued for a dictionary of the arts only, he had fraudu- lently obtained a license for the printing of his pretended Dic- tionnaire universel. ■ At this juncture Furetiere wrote his first Factum,^ the object of which was to make clear the validity of his own license and the underhand way iii which the exclusive clause contained in the Academy's license was obtained. The Essais had shown clearly great and fundamental differences between the Universal Dictionary and the Dictionary of the Acade- my. But as the two parties were not heard together, Furetiere ad- dressing himself to the judges and the Academy to the king, and as the matter was not sifted by a comparison of the two dictionaries, the decision was given to the stronger adversary. So on March 9 it was ordered in the royal council that Furetiere's license be re- called and his Essais suppressed. Meanwhile, on January 22 of this year, — 1685, — twenty Academicians had assembled and ex- pelled him from their midst. ' The whole Academy had not been notified of this assembly, and the decision reached was entirely the result of the rancor of thirteen Academicians, whose animosity ex- tended so far that it did not allow them to wait for the royal de- cision. Since the king had not favored the expulsion, this could not be consummated, nor the vacant place filled during our abbe's lifetime. In this connection Furetiere wrote his second Factum." copies of the Essais struck off and did not sell them, but distributed them to his friends. They appeared without name of city and printer, but the fol- lowing year were reprinted at Amsterdam by Henri Desbordes. ^ There are to be seen in the Biblioth&que Nationale octavo and duodecimo copies of this, published by H. Desbordes in 1685; a duodecimo copy, published by him in 1686, and an octavo copy, in 1688; and also quarto copies without date and place of publication. *This Factum was printed by H. Desbordes in 1686, duodecimo, and in INTRODUCTION. xxi After the publication of this Factum, neither Furetiere nor the Academy attempted to keep within bounds. Epigrams, satirical verses, sonnets, libels, and the like rained upon every side, and in these the public also took part. Among the amenities exchanged were several between Turetiere and La Fontaine, who had been the only one of the lexicographer's old friends to desert him.^ As a general thing, men of letters were upon Furetiere's side. People became eager to see his whole dictionary in print, and there was much murmuring against the decree that deprived them of it. The chancellor therefore resolved to subject this decree to a second examination; but his death in I^ovember, 1685, prevented the carrying out of his design. The April previous Furetiere had suffered an apoplectic stroke. This had been followed by a long illness, and his health continued so bad that he was able only with the greatest difficulty to go to see the new chancellor at Versailles. He was therefore reduced to writing. From the letters and peti- tions ^ which he sent at intervals during more than a year, we hear constantly his insistent cry for a comparison of the two dictionaries and a final judgment of the matter. What he desired above all things was a regular jurisdiction and an examination into the facts. The chancellor scrupled to change a decision given by his predecessor, and Furetiere, in the fear that his convincing argu- ments did not penetrate to the one for whom they were intended, 1688, octavo. Another edition, also duodecimo, bears the date 1688. Three other editions, quarto, but all different, were published without date or name of place; and still other editions can be found. * Brossette says {Oeuvres clc Mr. Boileau-Despreaux, Vol. I, p. 346, note) : " M. Despr^aux condamnoit vivement la foiblesse que la Fontaine avoit eue de donner sa voix pour exelure de I'Academie frangoise l'Abb6 Furetifere, son confrfere et son ancien ami." Benserade, to spite Boileau, had helped La Fontaine into the Academy. He was one of the pillars of the institution, and La Fontaine, in voting for the exclusion of Fureti&re, may have done so in order not to go contrary to his wishes. ^ These Placets are three in number. In them Fureti&re goes over many of the arguments he has advanced in the Factums, sets forth new ones, and recalls the facts of his case. Together with the Factums and the Apologie they constitute his defence and justification against the calumnies of his xxii THE POESIES DIVERSES OF ANTOINE FURETIERE. reaffirmed often the statements he had already made and pleaded ever more eloquently his own cause and that of his dictionary, for which he felt all the tenderness of a parent for a child. His enemies insisted that he should confine himself to particular arts, and that they themselves be allowed to extract all other words from his manuscript. He naturally wanted neutral parties to do the work. To add to his misfortune, on the 24th of December a sen- tence was rendered against him in the name of the procureur du roy, declaring his Factums and petitions defaming libels, and or- dering that all copies of them be suppressed. He discerned in this injury not so much the action of the magistrates of France as that of his secret enemies, at whose head was Charpentier. To show their artifices and deceit, as well as the nullity of their proceed- ings, he wrote the third Factum.^ A perusal of this is sufficient to show that, although the writer's body was weakened by disease, his mental powers were as strong and acute as in former years. The condition of Furetiere's health grew more and more pitiable. A letter of May 5, 1687, tells us that he was then confined to the bedj unable to do anything. At last commissioners were appointed to examine his work and to compare it with that of the Academy. The chancellor was desirous that Furetiere should go over the dic- tionary with the commissioners, to see what could be taken out of it to satisfy his opponents. Furetiere said this was an impossibility on account of his age and infirmities. The years when he could labor sixteen hours a day had passed, and he could now give hardly one or two to the work. A month later, however, we find him sub- missive and ready to devote his few remaining days to the cutting down of his beloved dictionary. Disease and the approach of death had taken away his courage and power of resistance and had suc- ceeded in accomplishing what no other enemies could have effected. The dictionary was the work of a lifetime, and whole days had been spent in turning one sentence or in looking for one expression. To ^ This was published by H. Desbordes in 1688, duodecimo, in two different editions. Its popularity caused it to be reissued several different times. INTRODUCTION. - xxiii: it he had sacrificed his strength and his fortune, and he was now past study and work. He had desired to leave as a monument to his name and as a gift to posterity a great and comprehensive en- cyclopaedia, the largest and fullest ever written in any language. But he would consent to disfigure the work, and, for the privilege of printing it, would, with a few necessary reservations, cut from it all the definitions and decisions which it contained that were peculiar to the dictionary of the Academy, as well as the proverbs that the Academy also used, and the common words of the language not having any relation to the sciences or arts. While devoting himself to his dictionary, Furetiere had become indebted to creditors who were now pursuing him. His enemies were largely responsible for this, as their persecutions had extend- ed to the point of looking up his creditors and inciting them to seize his revenues. Booksellers had bidden for his work up to ten thousand crowns, but this availed him nothing. The great ex- penses of his lawsuit had completed his ruin and reduced him to actual need. The paralysis to which he was a victim had brought on asthma and a cruel sciatic rheumatism. Only a total loss of physical strength forced him to a point where he ceased to defend himself and to attack his enemies. Among his last replies to those who pursued him so relentlessly was a pamphlet in prose and verse, Les Couches de V Academie. I^otwithstanding the Academy's boast that it opposed to him only moderation and silence, many libels against him were circulated, both in manuscript and verbally. Most of the slanders are incor- porated in the Dialogue, of which mention has already been made, and of which Charpentier was the author. Almost in Furetiere's last hour the Academy put into circulation a letter of Doujat,^ in which were reproduced nearly all the slanderous statements of the Dialogue; and the very month of his death there was published in the Mercure galant ^ a letter written by Frangois Tallemant, giving, * Published with some similar pieces in book form and under the auspices of the Academy. La Haye, Perier, 1688. ' The journal of which La Bruyfere says in his CaracUres, that it was " im- XXIV THE POESIES DIVERSES OF ANTOINE FURETIERE. with some variations, the same story of his dishonesty in using the work of others for his dictionary, which Charpentier and Don j at had served up. On Friday, May 14, 1688, Furetiere's troubled existence came to an end, and he was carried from his lodgings in the rue de Grenelle and laid to rest in St-Eustache. The curate . of this church had been his confessor. Frangois Tallemant states in his letter that our abbe gave to this priest a hlanc signe when he con- fessed to him about Easter time of this year. Boileau wrote to Racine from Auteuil on the 19th of May, 1687 : " On me vient dire que Furetiere a ete a I'extremite, et que, par I'avis de son con- fesseur, il a envoye querir tons les academiciens oifenses, et qu'il leur a fait une amende honorable dans les formes, mais qu'il se porte mieux maintenant. J'aurai soin de m'eclaircir de la chose, et je vous en manderai le detail." As this letter was written just after Furetiere's critical state of health the year before his death, and as he at that time expressed a willingness to give the chancel- lor carte hlanche in regard to amends for the Academicians, we may reasonably suppose that it was a confused report of this that had reached Boileau's ears. This carte hlanclie may also be the hlanc signe to which Frangois Tallemant alludes. In any case, the impression that Furetiere died remorseful and repentant has been the prevalent one during most of the years that have elapsed since his time. When it was learned at the Academy that Furetiere was dead, the question was examined whether the customary memorial ser- vices for a deceased member should be observed in this case. Des- preaux, accompanied by Racine, went thither purposely the day the matter was to be decided.^ Seeing that the majority were not in favor of the service, he spoke out boldly, exhorting them not to mMiatement au-dessous du rien." It was always systematically opposed to Racine and praised his mediocre rivals, being the organ of Benserade and his coterie. (See Les Ennemis de Racine au XVIIe siecle, F. Deltour, Paris, 1898.) * See the Bolaeana, Amsterdam, 1742, pp. 67 S. INTEODIJCTION. XXV pursue their enemy beyond the tomb, but to sacrifice their resent- ment to God, answering injuries with prayers, and not begrudging to a Christian the resources which the Church affords to appease the wrath of the Most High. Furetiere's enemies at the Academy were those of Racine and Boileau. I^early all these men were champions of Chapelain and the precieux taste and opposed to the two greater writers. Worthy of note is the fact mentioned by Furetiere, thr-t not one of the illustrious Academicians took up his pen in defence of the Academy, as he surely would have done, had its course seemed just. Menage tells us that with the exception of a few interested persons all extended to Furetiere their hands. Many well-known men gave their testimonials in favor of the dictionary. Among others, the archbishop, the president of the Academy, the bishops, Pellisson, Racine, and Desprcaux proclaimed verbally that they approved the work and recognized its utility. But it was the approbation of the public which sustained Fure- tiere through the long and trying months of his struggle, the ap- plause of this " grave, sincere, and enlightened judge," whose sym- pathy was with him at the first and continued with him to the last. The support of the public was doubly grateful to him, because it was for this public that he had labored and fashioned his diction- ary. Indeed, it is impossible to read his Factums, petitions, and letters, without being convinced that their writer's motives were largely altruistic. In attacking the exclusive clause of the Acad- emy, he defended the cause of the public as well as his own. He himself says : " It is right that having worked for it (the public) all my life, I should maintain its interest to the end. In short, I am acting for the glory of the nation." And again : " It is to all men of letters that you will grant this favor rather than to me." It is upon the public, the people, that he relies for his acquittal, and he comforts himself with the thought that, although he can bring about no formal comparison between his dictionary and that of the Academy, the public will compare the two and will vindi- cate him. Posterity also he constantly invokes for the vindication XXVI THE POESIES DI VERSES OF ANTOINE FURETIERE. of his name and cause. In so far then as he fought for his in- dividual rights, we must consider him in the wrong. But in so far as he labored for the public and the cause of letters, his course is to be justified. And he was surely right in thinking that a body- established to protect the arts should give encouragement to arts of every kind. Furetiere found a way of sending the manuscript of his Diction- naire universel to Holland, and it was printed at the Hague and at Rotterdam in 1690.^ Three editions were issued the same year. Posterity was late in clearing the name of the author from the accusation of plagiarism which rested upon it. In an unparalleled manner it adopted the conclusions of Regnier Desmarets, who had been charged with drawing up all the memoirs against the unfortu- nate lexicographer, and of the Abbe d' Olivet, historian of the Aca- demy. Their statements were reproduced by nearly all the biog- raphers and historians, although proofs of Furetiere's innocence were at hand. In speaking of M. le Gallois and of his misfortunes, Furetiere says that the tribunal of letters is the one where there are the most wicked judges. This is proved by his own case. Al- though he was treated with comparative fairness by the Abbe Goujet in his History of French Literature,^ still this was not enough to establish him in his true position, and it was not until 1852 that an effort was made to show the world how greatly he had been maligned and misrepresented. M. Francis Wey then suc- ceeded in revising the process and in setting forth Furetiere in his correct light both as writer and man.^ Another champion of the oppressed lexicographer was found two * Racine wrote to Boileau four years later (Sept. 28, 1694): "Pendant qu'on pr6sentoit ainsi le Dictionnaire de VAcaMmie, j'ai appris que Leers, libraire d'Amsterdam, avoit aussi pr^sentg au Roi et aux ministres une nouvelle edition du Dictionnaire de Furetiere, qui a 6t6 trfes-bien regu. C'est M. de Croissy et M. de Pomponne qui ont pr^sent^ Leers au Roi. Cela a paru un assez bizarre contretemps pour le Dictionnaire de I'Academie, qui me parolt n'avoir pas tant de partisans que I'autre." * BihliotMque francoise, Vol. I, pp. 242 ff. * See the Revue contemporaine, July 31 and Aug. 15, 1852. INTRODUCTION. xxvii years later in the person of M. Charles Asselineau. The notice written by him for the Fournier edition of the Roman bourgeois is based upon original researches as well as upon M. Wey's articles. M. Asselineau returned to the subject in 1859 when he published his excellent edition of the Factums. Since that time the different editions of the Roman bourgeois have given statements in regard to Furetiere's life, all of which, however, are rather incomplete or inaccurate. M. Pierre Jannet is one of the best of Furetiere's critics and biographers, showing himself always sympathetic as well as discriminating. Littre also has paid honor to the pioneer lexicographer in the preface of his dictionary, and the Academy, shortly after the middle of the last century, placed him among the authorities cited on matters of language. More perfect reparation, however, has been rendered him by M. Ch-L. Livet in his edition of Pellisson and d'Olivet's History of the French Academy. Here, in a most impartial and just manner, before proceeding to his able analysis of Furetiere's Factums, M. Livet sets forth the causes that led to these writings. N^or does he spare the original historian of the af- fair. Abbe d'Olivet, whom he pronounces unduly biased against Furetiere. N^otwithstanding all this, it is by no means unusual to find al- lusions in comparatively recent works to the " theft " committed by Furetiere. In a history of the Academy published as late as 1881, we read that the abbe " appropriated the labors of the Com- pany by a miserable act of plagiarism." ^ * Fauteuils de l'Acad4mie frangaise, par Pr. Vedrenne, Vol. IV, under Fure- tiere. The articles upon Fureti&re in the biographical and historical dictionaries, as well as in the encyclopaedias, contain, in general, incomplete bibliographies of his works and erroneous statements concerning both his life and writings. The best short article regarding him is in Vol. V of Le grand Dictionnaire historique by Moreri. The article in La grande EncyclopMie, Vol. 18, is very good except for the editions of his works. In the Examen critique et compU- ment des dictionnaires historiques (Paris, 1820), Vol. 1, there is an excellent article. Another, entitled Furetiere et I'Academie francoise, in Vol. IV of Querelles litt4raires (Paris, Durand, 1761), is tolerably good, although one- sided. xxvill THE POESIES DIVERSES OF ANTOINE FURETIERE. II. The Poesies Diverses. When The Poesies diverses first saw the light in 1655. But, as we Written, have stated, the composition of most of these poems preceded that of the Aeneide travestie and Le Voyage de Mercure. The author tells us in his dedicatory epistle that he composed the satires and nearly all the other pieces upon leaving college. He also states that they were apparently condemned to remain in obscurity, but hr-d been printed as a defence against the corsairs of Parnassus, — booksellers, publishers, and poor authors, — who so wilfully took possession of the literary property of other men. The Satires. The satires, which are given the place of honor in the collection, certainly deserve the precedence accorded them. Le Medecin pe- dant, first in the early edition, was composed three years after the writer left college. Furetiere's satirical ventures, like those of Moliere, began by attacking physicians. From this satire, as well as from Le Voyage de Mercure, we see that he was a forerunner of Moliere in his ridicule of the Medical Faculty of Paris. The popular farce of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries and the sotties had often attacked the medecin ridicule as well as the pedant ; and, although the fabliaux had not yet been printed in the seventeenth century, they were not unknovsm, as they had passed, with more or less alteration, into the sixteenth century writers, both French and foreign. Rabelais had made physicians and medicine the objects of his satire, and Furetiere knew this author well. He must have been familiar too with the Italian farce, in which the pedant was often caricatured. But, aside from this, the condition of medical study and medical practice in his time would naturally appeal to a person of Furetiere's satiric bent of mind. The spirit of scientific investigation was not yet awake in France, but it was casting its shadow before, and there existed much doubt in regard to the methods of the famous Faculty, as INTEODUCTION. xxix well as to its omniscience. Furetiere is one of the sceptics. In his satire we find packed, as in a nutshell, nearly all the material which Moliere will use to such good effect in his comedies. Here are the latter's allusions to physicians as assassins ; his dirty pedant in peculiar costume and with patriarchal beard, riding upon a slow-stepping mule; the pedantic physician's use of Latin and sometimes of terms from the Greek ; his assurance that the disease proceeded from excessive inward heat; his abuse of bleeding and I3urging; his recommendation of clysters made of catholicon; his haphazard prescriptions of senna, cassia, and the like; his advis- ing of juleps, sirups, and ptisans ; his senseless reasoning ; his citing of Galen and Hippocrates, as well as of the philosophers ; his lack of sympathy with other ideas; the long enumeration of dis- eases ; the physician's locating of the organs of the body ; his plac- ing of one hand behind his back to collect the fee, and his feigned reluctance to receive this ; in short, his " pompous nonsense," his '' chatter which is apparently plausible, which gives you words for reasons, and promises for effects." Both Furetiere and Moliere undoubtedly drew from the com- mon fund of pleasantries handed down by tradition, and it is not improbable that the greater poet derived many a suggestion from the lesser's work. Furetiere's precise picture, with its abundance of details, would offer an attractive source to Moliere. Seizing upon its salient points, he would be able to introduce them into a half dozen of his comedies and with inimitably humorous strokes to crystallize forever this peculiar and now antiquated type, the seventeenth century French physician. Furetiere was born and reared in the little world of trade and chicanery near the Place Maubert. It is therefore not strange that with his power of careful and minute observation he should have chosen at an early age both merchants and lawyers as ob- jects of his satire. The first satire, Les Marchands, shows him at his best. When reading it, we regret that he did not carry his idea still further and depict in some work les Bourgeois marchands. In Le Dejeuner d'un procureur and Le Jeu de houle des procureurs XXX THE POESIES Dl VERSES OF ANTOINE FUEETIERE. Epigrams and Epitaphs. are vividly portrayed the appearance, customs, and manners of the seventeenth century attorneys of Paris. The former of these also bears witness to the writer's skill in representing interiors, a faculty which resembles strongly that of the Dutch masters. The last of the five satires is especially interesting, as it begins that literary satire which is to run, like a thread, through all of Furetiere's works. These satires are the best poems we have from Furetiere's pen. The pictures they contain are as well painted as those in the more famous Roman bourgeois, and their tone is much more pleasing than that of the novel. The writer's benignant attitude of mind towards the shortcomings of others, as expressed by the closing lines of the third satire, is a little unusual. In reading his satires, we often miss Regnier's pleasant unconcern and indolence and wish there were not so much sermon and invective. " Le style c'est I'homme." Furetiere is a born fighter and seems therefore sometimes to have little tolerance. A satirist with him is a preacher and a censor, and never for a moment should one re- nounce the struggle. Regnier's " Puisque le temps le veut, nous n'y pouvons rien faire. II faut rire de tout," is very far from Furetiere's philosophy. That our writer's critical bent could find expression in other than unmixed satire, is shown by the satirical epigrams and ep- itaphs contained in the Poesies diverses. N^early all these little pieces are well pointed, and some undeniably coarse. Many pre- sent vivid pictures, by no means flattering, and, if they were per- sonal or less general in their nature, they might certainly be termed venomous and would furnish a parallel to Tallemant's anecdotes. Furetiere's fondness for the epigram led him to frequent indul- gence in this form of expression. He gave much care and thought to the composition of some of his epigrammatic verses, thereby win- ning the condemnation of Boileau, who claimed that epigrams ordinarily spring up in conversation.^ The most celebrated of this * See the Bolaeana, 1742, p. 152. INTRODUCTION. xxxi collection is number VIII, in regard to which. Boileau blamed the writer's self-felicitations when it was reduced to four lines, after having been made over thirty different times. Epigram VI was evidently inspired by the eighty-third of the Cent nouvelles nouvel- les. It is not, however, copied from it, as Sallengre states in his Histoire de Pierre de Montmaur. Sallengre thinks this epigram a little profane. We find further criticism of Furetiere's epigrams in the Traite de la vraie et de la fausse heaute, published by the author of the Recueil des plus belles epigrammes des poetes fran- gois, depuis Marot jusqua present (Paris, 1698). This writer says he supposed that in an epigram the thought should not diminish, but increase. And he omits Furetiere's name from the list of the best known French writers in this genre, — " Marot, St- Gelais, Mainard, Brebeuf, Guillaume Colletet, Gombaud, Desre- aux, Talemant, d'Acille, et Maillet." The criticism last quoted cannot be applied to all of Furetiere's epigrams. With his railing spirit, however, he enjoyed the surprise occasioned by a descent from the more elevated to the trivial. Elegies. The elegies breathe forth much true sentiment. The beautiful but cruel Phyllis, who is going to depart for a foreign country, ap- pears to inspire our poet with real feeling. Who was this lovely and accomplished lady? Furetiere has already sung of love for Phyllises and Phylises and Philises. Are they all the same per- son ? We are loath to identify the Phylis of the small-pox or the mercenary Phyllis whose affection increases with her desire for jupes, with the more ethereal and poetical being who has inspired the elegies. ISTo, Phyllis was merely a favorite name with the poet and used by him indiscriminately. But in an epigram, A Mile. Ch., he extols the beautiful eyes of a certain Phyllis. If the Mile. Ch. to whom one of the amorous epigrams is inscribed, and who is intending to take up her residence in Sweden, be the same person, then we can connect the latter with the lady of the elegies. One of the stances too bears witness to the fact that Mile. Ch. sang and played upon the lute in an entrancing fashion, as did the elegiac lady. xxxil THE POESIES DIVERSES OF ANTOINE FURETIERE. General The love to which Furetiere gives utterance in his poetry is not Character- at all Platonic or subjective, but rather of the old Gallic order, istics. Very rarely does he allude to any of the beauties of nature, and, if he does, it is in a stereotyped manner. His verses cannot be called brilliant, and it is in vain that we look them through for any deep inspiration. Yet we find in these early poems most of the charac- teristics that are to distinguish the writer's work in general, and which are important for the literary history of his age. They show his tendency to paint subjects, types, chosen from the narrow world about him ; they are marked by correctness, richness and sometimes elegance of language, clearness and uniformity of style, common sense, sound judgment, wit, fullness of detail, a strong leaning to satire, and realism. Written before Moliere began to paint the manners of his age, so long before Boileau's injunction not to depart from nature, these first poems, and especially the satires, are intensely realistic in tone. Style and Furetiere's work is clearer than Regnier's and shows the progress Language.^ of the century. Few old constructions are found in his poems, and but seldom an archaic word. As we have seen, he combats the rage for Latin, nor would he admit into his language Italian or Spanish words or constructions. He uses the French of Paris * These poems show plainly the unfixed condition of French orthography at the time they were written, a time wlien neither grammarians nor lexicog- raphers observed the rules they formulated. In the Poesies diverses we find many hesitations and contradictions. Turetifere follows in his Dictionary the old orthography for the most part. But his poems contain much phonetic spelling, and this notwithstanding his ridicule of the efforts made by the precieuses towards the elimination of superfluous letters. The principal characteristics of his orthography are the following: 1. Confusion of u and i vowel and consonant ( j appears in several places). 2. Y is usually written for modern final i. It is also often used for i in diphthongs, but here we find numerous vacillations: crpyez and croiez, even croyioient ; moyen and moien; payroit and pairoit. Y also occurs in some words from the Greek, and creeps in instead of i in other places. 3. Great irregularity in regard to writing the s (plus consonant) that had disappeared from pronunciation. Furetifere most frequently inserts this s. It is not, however, found in these poems so generally as in the Dictionary. By the side of such forms as tousjours, couste, vestir, eust, monstre, etc., we find toujours and toujours, coute, vetir, eUt, montre, etc. INTKODUCTION. xxxiii and of the people. His poems, as well as his dictionary, show him to be a champion of popular expressions. In his treatment of 4. The other unnecessary consonants that have since been dropped^, are often inserted. Here they are found more generally than in the Dictionary; e. g., advance, acheptez, droicts, deites, etc. Cf. also neufve. 5. The acute accent, as is seen from 3, is sometimes used over an e after which s had fallen: ete, prScher, ecrit, etc. It even creeps in with s followr ing: escabelle. It is also used ordinarily where we find it to-day over initial e after which no s has fallen: eglise, epistre. 6. In the interior of a word where we find to-day close e, the acute accent is usually employed over e, unless this e is followed by an s since dropped. Fureti^re is less conservative in this respect than the general usage of his day as indicated by his Dictionary. But his poems show much irregularity. To- gether with such forms as legcr, secretaire, prSsente, etc., we find leger, secretaire or secretaire, presente, etc. 7. The acute accent is ordinarily used to mark open e in the masculine demonstrative cet, and is sometimes used to mark this sound in other mono- syllables and in the last tonic syllable of a word; e. g., des, piece, colcre, creve, etc.; des, piece, colere, acheue, secrettes, achepte, etc. Cf. also guicMts, Examine, examples, etc. 8. -ez is usually employed for the ending -es. The latter, however, is sometimes found; e. g., qualites. 9. The grave accent is used only to distinguish « preposition, oii and la adverbs, and dcla, voild. But, cf. also voila. 10. The circumflex accent, as we have seen from 3, is sometimes used over a vowel after which a letter has fallen: pate, soUtient, dme, etc. 11. It is also sometimes used over a long vowel formed by contraction: age together with aage, pit together with j)eu occur, etc. 12. The diaeresis is employed to distinguish contiguous vowels from diphthongs, and also to distinguish u vowel from u consonant. But when this u vowel is followed by mute e, the diaeresis is generally placed over the e: joiier, reueue, auoue, etc. 13. The cedilla is sometimes written under c before e. 14. We find in some words the ending d changed to t: demant; in others, d not yet changed to t: vid, void (but also voit) , etc. 15. The s of the 1. pers. s. pres. indie, of verbs, that did not exist in the O. F., is often not written. But, together with voy, pren, etc., are vois, prends, apprens, etc. 16. The s of the 2. pers. s. imper. is often not written: j)ren, rend, vien. 17. Exchange of the vowel in nasals: confidante, audiance, vanger, an- noblir, etc.; ai for ei: serain, etc.; such forms as meiner, estreines; confusion of ss and c, s and z, etc.: hazard, grimassant, etc.; confusion of ge and j: cageoller, cajoller, and even cajeoller; use of tiltre, autheur, etc.; indecision as to single or double consonants; irregularities in the formation of the plural, etc. 3 xxxiv THE POESIES DIVERSES OF ANTOINE FURETIEKE. common things and people he employs a sober, unadorned style and everyday expressions. The few classical allusions which we find, more particularly in the love poems, are well chosen. If he uses a comparison, his common sense asserts itself and restrains him from extravagance. His realism extends to his language. The frankness of speech which is so evident in the Aeneide travestie and later in the Roman bourgeois, is found in these poems. It was the old Gallic spirit of revolt against unnatural discipline and restraint which led to the treatment of many of the themes pre- sented in the Poesies diverses, and the same spirit is indicated by the lang-uage. The result, although often coarse, shows the har- mony of thought and expression. Boileau, so severe in his criticism of Regnier's free language, has no censure for Furetiere. Versifica- The five satires are in Alexandrine verse. This verse is found tion.^ elsewhere in these works, although octosyllables are the poet's favorite meter in his shorter poems. Sometimes — particularly in the madrigals and airs — the Alexandrine is seen in combination with other forms of verse. In the second stance the strophes lack identity of genre. The epigrams have four, six, eight, or ten lines. There is also one of twelve lines and one of five. Furetiere is not an artist, but his technique is good. His caesuras are well placed, ^ Deuement, 1. 118, p. 26, is dissyllabic; 1. 222, p. 29, is the only other line which contains a mute e following an accented vowel, in a position where it can not be elided; 1. 10, p. 90, may be due to a printer's error. Furetifere sometimes rhymes infinitives in -er with cher, chair, and air, but this is no more than was done by the best poets of his century. The rhyme paroles: roles (p. 30) is at first misleading. From the fact, however, that paroles is elsewhere rhymed correctly and that relies is made to rhyme with pistolles, we must conclude that our poet pronounced the word rolles in whatever way he wrote it. We find in the rhyme jeune: hrune (p. 10) the sixteenth century pronun- ciation of u for eu in the adj. jeune. Cf. also Dejuner in Table of Contents, p. 96. Furetiftre sometimes rhymes a word in r with one ending in r + mute cons.; e. iLigavx, Epitaphes, Enigmes, Airs. Epigrammes Amoureuses 12 Madrigaux . . .' 20 Autres Epigrammes 52 Epitaphes G Enigmes 4 Airs . 8 EPISTRES. ELEGIES. EPISTEE DEDICATOIRE. P. 2, 1. 16 : tt force de Prefaces, etc. Laudatory prefaces are one of Euretiere.'s favorite themes of satire. Cf. Preface to Le Voyage de Mercure, various passages in Le Roman bourgeois, and elsewhere. P. 2, 1. 35: cjuil soit masculin. Littre says: " Quelques-uns font mal a propos alcove masculin." P. 5, 1. 5 : vne mal-heureuse mode de faire des Recueuils. 98 THE POESIES DIVEESES OF ANTOINE FUKETIERE. Cf., for similar sentiments, Le Roman bourgeois, first book, a con- versation at the home of Angelique. P. 5, 1. 11: tons seuls. Cf. pp. 47, 1. 10; 70, 1. 14. Vaugelas says that nearly every one in his time made the mistake of using the adj. ious for the adv. tout. P. 6, 1. 4 : donne. Furetiere occasionally commits this solecism, so common in his day. Cf. pp. 37, 1. 166; 58, 1. 4; 91, 1. 56. P. 6, 11. 17, 18: Courhe, Sovimauille. Two well-known book- sellers and publishers. The Ae?ieide travestie bears on its title- page the words : " Chez Avgvstin Covrbe, Au Palais, en la salle des Merciers, a la Palme." LES MARCHANDS. Satyre peemieee. (P. 8.) L. 10 : Gazette. " Cahier, feuille volante, qu'on debite toutes les semaines, qui contient des nouvelles de toutes sortes de pais." — Furetiere's Dictionary. Extraordinaire = " extra." L. 12 : la rue aux fers. In the Epistre dedicatoire of the first edition, the author says : " lors que dans la seconde Satyre i'ay nomme la rue aux Fers, celle ou demeurent les marchands de soye : si vous rencontrez, comme i'ay fait, quelque chicaneur qui tranche de I'habile-homme qui soutienne que ie suis vn ignorant, et qu'elle se nomme la rue au Feurre: vous leur direz que si ie faisois vn Contract, ie la nommerois ainsi, mais qu'icy i'ay raison de suiure le commun vsage, qui tout corrompu qu'il est, vaut mieux que celui des Praticiens." L. 52: gemeaux. Furetiere latinizes the word (from gemellus). L. 66 : la place Dauphine. A triangular place, on the ground formed by the two little islands between the Palais and the Pont- IS^euf. The base of the triangle has disappeared, and is replaced by the rue de Harlay. L. 75 : Mecredy, i. e., mercredi. Both pronunciations, together NOTES. 99 with the double orthograj^hy, were current at this time. The former was used more, as it was considered softer. L. 76 : foires du Landy. " Landi. Foire qu'on tient a St. Denis en France, qui etoit autrefois fort solemnelle, comme il se voit en ce qu'encore a present le Parlement, et I'TJniversite prennent un jour de vacation qu'on appelle landi, sous pretexte d'aller a cette Foire." — Furetiere's Dictionary. Vaugelas approves the form landit, and the Dictionary of the Academy also writes the t. The word comes from the Low Latin indictum, fair, Latin in- dictus. Lendit is produced by the agglutination of the article with endit. L. 112 : c'est mon. Old adverbial particle, used in affirmation or question. L. 147 : Monsieur de Chastillon. Either " Gaspard, comte de Coligny, marechal de Chastillon, 1584-1646 " (See Tallemant's anecdote, vol. 4, CCVIII), or his son, the duke of Chatillon. The latter was born in 1615 and died three years after his father. L. 153: vous plaist-il pas. Cf. p. 41, 1. 61, where the style is not so familiar as here. The omission of ne with pas or point in an interrogation, was considered more elegant than its use. L. 165 : pistoles. The French pistole = 10 livres, the livre being about a franc. The louis= 11 livres. In conversation pistole was often used for louis. L. 198 : les enfans du Marechal de Chaune. The Marechal de Chaune was Honore d' Albert, seigneur de Cadenet. He stood high at court and among other honors received an appointment as em- bassador to England in the year 1620. His wife belonged to the illustrious house of Ailly in Picardy. They had eight children. L. 206 : et si, i. e., et avec tout cela, or, possibly, et outre cela. This expression was used only in familiar conversation. For et si = cependant, toutes fois, cf. pp. 73, 1. 10; 74, 1. 28. L. 211 : drap d'vsseau,.ov simply Usseau, a kind of cloth manu- factured at Usseau, near Carcassonne. Cf. Regnier's erroneous expression, drap du sceau. 100 THE POESIES DIVEKSES OF ANTOINE FURETIERE. LI. 269 ff. : Cf. Boileau's escape from a repas ridicule in Satire III. L. 278 : la tigne, i. e., la teigne. LE DEIEVNER D'VX PROCVREVR. Satyee Secoistde. (P. 17.) LI. 5-6 : Cf. the similar language of Boileau in his second satire : " Je n'aurais qu'a chanter, rire, boire d'autant, Passer tranquillenient, sans souci, sans affaire," etc. L. 18 : si, i. e., neanmoins. Si est-ce que was also used in the same way. Both are now obsolete. L. 27 : estans. Vaugelas says that most people erroneously added an s to the gerundive when thus used. Cf. p. 41, 1. 81. L. 54: pour luy parler. Furetiere construes the verb parler only with a conjunctive pronoun. (See T. A. Jenkins, " On the Prononimal Object with ParZer/' Mod. Lang. litotes, April, 1905.) Cf. pp. 18, 1. 56; 19, 1. 79; 21, 1. 163; 36, 1. 125; 86, 1. 156. L. 76 : pied de veau =^ reverence. Cf. Villon's " Danceurs, saulteurs, faisans les piez de veaux." — Oeuvres completes. Gamier^ 167: 12. L. 78 : comme quoy. A new expression at this time and very popular. L. 91: carolus. " Monnoye de compte qui vaut dix deniers. . . . car quoique nous n'ayons point d'espece qui vaille 10. deniers, on se sert encore parmi le peuple du terme de Karolus, pour signi- fier dix deniers, Le Blanc." — Furetiere's Dictionary. L. 105 : auant questre mangees. The omission of de was con- demned by most of the good authorities of the seventeenth century. L. 115: souloit = souloit. Cf. souler, p. 36, 1. 113. L. 128 : Beaune. Petrarch claimed that the cardinals of Avignon NOTES. 101 persisted in their obstinacy not to return to Rome because they were afraid of not finding there the wines of Beaune. Pouilly. Ponilly-sur-Loire, noted for its white wines. L. 154: chapon du Mans. The rearing of poultry is one of the principal industries of Le Mans, Its chickens and capons have still a high reputation. L. 159 : Lors, etc. Many of the best writers, especially the poets, used lors as adverb, instead of alors. This use was upheld by Menage, although condemned by Vaugelas. Cf. pp. 22, 1. 168 ; 23, 1. 19; 25, 1. 95; 28, 1. 199; 30, 1. 256; 37, 1. 145; 78, 1. 53; 85, 1. 117; 87, 1. 182. LE lEU DE BOVLE DES PEOCVREVKS. Satire Troisi^me. (P. 23.) This was evidently the game of grosses houles, which was former- ly very common in the whole of France, but which is now in favor only in certain departments. At one extremity of the long, covered alley or galene, a little trench is dug, called the noyon, and about seventy-five or eighty centimeters further a visible mark is put upon the ground. This serves as hut. The players cast lots for order of precedence. Each plays ordinarily two balls, one at a time, the aim being to place the balls at the nearest possible distance to the hut and to chase away those of the adversaries. Every ball which rolls into the noyon is morte and does not count. When all the balls have been played, the one whose balls are nearest the hut marks a point for each ball, and the game is won by the player who first succeeds in counting the number of points upon which the players agreed before beginning. L. 33: Tant qu'on parla de houle. Cf. p. 26, 1. 115. On pp. 18, 1. 48 ; 81, 1. 38, we find tant que correctly employed with the subjunctive. 10 102 THE POESIES DIVEESES OF ANTOINE FURETIERE. L. 208 : Prez-aux-Clercs. The Pre-aux-Clercs was at first a vast space of ground on the left bank of the Seine, and was divided into the grand Pre and the petit Pre. But in the seventeenth cen- tury the term Pres-aux-Clercs meant simply the western portion of the larger Pre, which was the last part of this famous extent of land to maintain its old aspect as a place for games and distractions in general. Tournelle. Court of justice at the Palais, the judges of which were parliamentary members who sat in turii. The Tour- nelle civile was instituted only in 1667. Before that time there was but one chamber for judging both civil and criminal cases. L. 219 : balet. The taste for' ballets was introduced into France by Catherine de' Medici. These dances continued popular with the court, and the people, following the example set by the higher classes, flocked to the theatre to see ballets executed. L. 250: lettres pour la confortemain. Term of feudal law. Letters from the chancellor's office taken out by a feudal lord to render his seizure more authentic. L. 269: s'inscrit en faux, protests. Cf. Les Precieuses ridicu- les, Sc. IX. L. 302 : juste-au-corps. A kind of vest, extending to the knees and fitting closely. The term was applied also to the crust of a pie containing a hare. L. 303 : la Bazoche. Probably a pastry-cook. LE MEDECIN PEDANT. Satyee Qvateiesme. (P. 33.) L. 47 : ajambee = enjambee. L. 60 : Mediane. " C'est une veine ou petit vaisseau qui se fait par I'union de la basilique et de la cephalique dans le pli du coude." — Furetiere's Dictionary. NOTES. 103 L. 68 : Mathiole, Mattioli, a celebrated Italian naturalist and physician of the sixteenth century. Author of several works. Oribase. A celebrated Greek physician of the fourth century. At the request of Julian, he abridged the writings of Galen. Among his numerous works is an encyclopoedia of the medical knowledge of his time. Auincenne. Probably a misprint for Avicenne, Avisena, a corruption of Ebn-Sina. The most illustrious of Arabic phy- sicians ; born in 980 and died in 1037. L. 69 : Le Conciliateur. Furetiere says in his Dictionary that Pierre d'Appone, the physician, was surnamed le Conciliateur. Paracehe. The German physician and chemist Paracel- sus (1490 or 93-1541). Cardan. An Italian mathematician, astrologer, physi- cian, philosopher, gambler, charlatan, and devotee of science (1501- 76). The author of numerous works. L. 70: Du Laurens (Andre). A French physician, born at Aries. The reputation which he acquired as professor in the Faculty of Montpellier caused him to be called to Paris, where he became court physician. Although living in the French capital, he was given the title of Chancellor of the University of Mont- pellier. He was one of the most remarkable physicians of his time and produced numerous medical works. He died in 1609. Fracastor, Fracastori, an Italian physician, poet, and astronomer (1483-1553). He practised medicine at Verona and left numerous medical works. Fallope, Fallopio, an Italian anatomist and surgeon of the sixteenth century. ISTumerous anatomical discoveries are due to him. lliolan. There were two French physicians by this name, father and son, and both named Jean. Both died at Paris, the father in 1606, the son in 1657. The father was dean of the Medical Faculty and zealously defended the doctrine of Hippo- crates as opposed to chemical medicine. The son was professor 104 tup: poesies diverses of antoine furetiere. royal of anatomy and botany. He was one of the first physicians of the Faculty to engage in dissections. L. 71: Arnaut de Villc-7ieufue. A physician and alchemist, born about 1240, but whether in France, Spain, or Italy, is not known. He taught medicine and alchemy at Paris, Barcelona^ and Montpellier. His works have been reprinted many times. Albert. Albertus Magnus. Erasistrate. A celebrated Greek, physician and anatomist of the third century, B. C. L. 72: Theophraste. A Greek philosopher (371-264, B. C). Sennert (Daniel). A celebrated German physician of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Professor of medicine at Wittenberg. LI. 77-88 : The '' Faculty " of Paris possessed an esprit de corps in the narrowest sense of the term, a spirit of exclusion, chicanery, stubbornness, and routine. The men of this school were in gen- eral deeply versed in Latin and Greek. They gave themselves up ardently to studying the primitive texts, and believed in the rules of Hippocrates as in the Gospels. But, unlike their great teacher, they neglected the practical side of medicine and put their faith in dialectics. Bleeding they carried to excess. The great enemy of the Faculty of Paris was that of Montpellier. This school, having lived nearer the Arab physicians, became the center of the mede- cine chymique. (See Maurice Raynaud, Les Medecins au temps de Moliere, Paris, 1862 ; A. M. Brovsna, M. D., Moliere and his Medical Associations, London, 1897.) L. 91 : Cleohule. One of the seven sages of Greece. L. 115: pied de Chat. A little red herb, shaped like a cat's foot. pas d'Asne. A medicinal herb of which sirups are made for those afflicted with weak lungs; Eng. colt's foot. L. 117 : Confection Hamec. A common remedy, composed of several simples and purgatives. LI. 121-124 : In the Fureteriana, Furetiere is credited with the saying: " Un Medecin est un homme que I'on paye pour center NOTES, 105 des fariboles clans la chambre d'un malade, iusqu'a ce que la nature I'ait guery, ou que les remedes I'ayent tue." (Ed. T. Guillain, Paris, 1696, p. 211.) LI. 129-130: VAutheur D'vne autre Faculte sest fait passer Docteur. Theo2)liraste Renaudot, a physician graduated from Montpellier. He was called to Paris in 1612, but the Medical Faculty of the university claimed that he was a charlatan and at- tacked him for practising. ITotwithstanding his appeal, a con- demnatory sentence was rendered against him in 1644. In 'Dl he began publishing the GazetU^ the first French newspaper. L. 137 : Du feu du Pont au Change. This old bridge was con- sumed entirely by fire the 24th of October, 1621. It was then re- built in wood, and was destroyed again by fire in 1639. Later it was reconstructed in stone. Du grand Hyuer. Gabriel Peignot in his Essai chro- nologique sur les hirers les phis rigoureux depuis 396 A. C. jusqu'en 1820, Dijon, 1821, says the winter of 1608 was remarkable as well by the duration of the cold as by its excess. Mczerai wrote in 1650 in the third volume of his liistoire de France: ^' I'annce 1608, encore appelee I'annee du grand hiver." Cyrano cites this winter in his Pedant joue; the Journal de Henri IV speaks of it, and the Mercure frangais as well. This winter is mentioned also in Dutch annals. L. 155: Poligone, i. e., polygonum. The polygones are used in medicine and in domestic economy. L. 156: Dioscoride. A Greek writer on medicine and botany, who has bequeathed us some very strange prescriptions. LES POETES. Satyee Cinqviesme. (P. 39.) L. 15 : Anguien = Enghien. Later the great Conde. L. 83 : Maillet. A beggarly poet who was always hunting for dedications. The butt of ridicule for his colleagues, the heaux- 106 THE POESIES DI VERSES OF ANTOINE FURETIERE. esprits. St-Amand put him on the rack in his Poete crotte, May- nard wrote an epigram upon him, Tallemant mentions him more than once, etc. Furetiere continues the tradition, although Ma- illet had died in 1628. Maillet's Poesies a la louange de la reyne Marguerite were published at Paris in 1612, his Epigrammes in 1620 and again in 1622. L. 104: la prise d' Arras. That ctf 1640, after which the French remained in possession of the city. See the Precieuses ridicules, Scene XI, where, according to M. Eugene Despois, the reference is to the same siege. L. 114: sur et tant moins = en deduction. L. 118: Luis. A misprint. STANCES AV ROY. (P. 44.) LI. 18 ff. : Cf. Boileau's words in his EpUre, au Roy : " Jouissons h loisir du fruit de tes bienfaits, Et ne nous lassons point des douceurs de la paix," and also " Mais, quelques vains lauriers que promette la guerre, On peut etre hgros sans ravager la terre." Boileau's epistle was written in order to second the pacific views of Colbert, who, after the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, in 1668, wished to extinguish in Louis's soul his fatal taste for conquest. Furetiere's Stances do not appear in the first edition of his Poesies diverses. They were probably written after the year 1661, perhaps when Louis XIV. threatened Spain with war in conse- quence of the quarrel for precedence at London in 1662. LI. 23-24: La Fontaine's words in his fable Un Animal dans la lune are strikingly similar: "La carriere d' Angnste a-t-elle ^t^ moins belle Que les farneiix exploits du premier des Cesars?" NOTES. 107 LA BELLE AVARRE. Stances. (P. 45.) L. 35 : Guidon des Finances. Mentioned also by Boileau, Satire VIII. " Prends, au lieu d'un Platon, le Guidon des finances." Le Guidon general des finances was published by Henneqiiin, Paris, 1651, 2 vols, in 8vo. A MADEMOISELLE CH. SVR Ce Qu'eLLE ChANTOIT ET JOtJOIT FORT BIEN DU LUTH. (P. 47.) L. 19 : les Quinze-vingts. The three hundred blind inmates of the hospital founded at Paris by St. Louis in memory of the three hundred Christians rendered blind by the Saracens. Pp.54 ff. It is noteworthy that some of these madrigals are not in vers lihres, according to the tradition. SVR VNE HARANGVE DE MONSIEVR LE PREMIER PRESIDENT. Epigeamme I. (P. 58.) This was the first speech of the President Bellifevre, ^N'ovember 24, 1653, as we read in the title given in the first edition of these poems. 108 THE POi^SIES DIVERSES OF ANTOINE FURETIERE. SVR LA MORT DE MONSIEVR DE BALSAC. Epigeamme III. (R 59.) Balzac died February 18, 1654. LE PARASITE AFFAME. Epigeamme VI. (P. 60.) L. 1 : Mommort. The most audacious parasite of the seven- teenth century and the best known. Furetiere makes him the target for his thrusts very often. This Montmaur (Monmort, Mommort, Monmor, Mommor, Montmor, Monmaur, Mommaur, Mormon, etc.) was professor of Greek at the College de France. He seems to have been by nature very parsimonious and at the same time fond of good cheer. For this reason, and also because of his talent for rhyming, he easily gained entrance to the best houses of Paris. Vigiieul-Marville reports {Melanges d'histoire et de litterature) that he was accustomed to say to his friends: " Sirs, you furnish the meats and wine and I will furnish the salt." In order to attain greater success as a professional enter- tainer, he invented so-called bons mots, in which none of the men of letters of his time were spared. This malignity met with its just return. He was attacked by the pen of Balzac, Chas. Feramus, Menage, A. de Valois, Sarrazin, Dalibray, le Vayer, Sorel, Scarron, and others. The unfortunate pedant died in 1648. All the different factums against him were carefully col- lected by Sallengre and published in 1715. NOTES. lOy SVR VN LIVRE DE LA VIE ILLVMINATIVE. Epigeamme XVIII. (P. 64.) Illuminative is used only in terms of mystic devotion. La vie illuminative, la contemplation illuminative. Cheualier de I'Ordre, Chevalier dii Saint-Esprit. L. 5: II auoit bien le saint Esprit. This curious idea that the Holy Spirit inspires writers (of poetry especially) goes back to the Psalms and certain expressions of David. It is popular in France. The point of the epigram is, of course, that someone else wrote the work. POVR VNE GOV RTIS ANNE PAIS ANT LA PRVDE. Epigeamme XX. (P. 64.) L. 2 : voiage de Surie. M. Pierre Jannct says in his edition of Le Roman bourgeois: " Des le seizieme siecle, on fait plaisam- ment voyager en Suede ou Surie, en Baviere et Claquedent les mal- heureux blesses aux combats de Venus. C'est une allusion au traitement par les sudorifiques et par le mercure." L. 10 : saint Cosme et saint Damien. Two brothers, phy- sicians, bom in Arabia. According to tradition, they cured the most serious maladies by the laying on of hands and by the sign of the cross. They are considered the patron saints of physicians and su^'geons. LA VIEILLE PAREE. Epigeamme XXVII. (P. 65.) L. 10 : le Pont-au-change was the bridge where the money- changers and goldsmiths lived in early times. Hat and doll 110 THE POESIES DIVERSES OF ANTOINE FUKETIERE. manufacturers settled there afterwards; and various merchants of petty wares made this bridge their headquarters at different times. SVR LE VOYAGE DE MONSIEVR SCARRON EN L'AMERIQVE. Epigeamme XXXI. (P. 66.) Scarron's contemplated departure for America, announced by him late in 1651, seems to have been the subject of much jesting. Loret's Gazette of Dec. 31, the same year, contains the following: " Monsieur Scarron, dit-on, se pique De transporter en Amgrique Son corps niaigret, faible et menu, Quand le printemps sera venu," etc. At the same time there appeared at Paris verses containing the comic poet's farewell to the king. Furetiere's epigram was probably written about this time. A little later, Scarron him- self wrote to Sarrazin at Bordeaux a comic letter, in which he ex- plained the reasons for his journey and took a general farewell. The strange project of emigration was abandoned by the poet after his marriage in 1652. (See M. Morillot, Scarron et le genre burlesque.) L. 2 : avec arihan, i. e. , ahan. Furetiere says that Menage takes this word from the Italian; that he, however, derives it from ao, spiro. He says it was used particularly of those who split wood and cried at each blow of the axe ham. It is now used only in the sentence suer d'ahan, to do something very laborious. L. 9 : Ze meure = Que je meure. NOTES. 1 1 1 POVR VN POETE DE CAMPAGNE. Epigeamme XXXVIII. (P. 67.) L. 3 : mettre a la Taille. The taille was a certain money as- sessment imposed in former times upon all who did not belong to the nobility or clergy or who did not enjoy exemption; mettre a la taille = to tax. Jj. 4:1 la Charite = Vhospital de la ChariteT LA CONFESSION INGENVE. Epigramme XLVI. (P. 70.) L. 7: epoindre. A sixteenth century word, meaning faii'e sentir un aiguillon, un desir. — Littre. POVR MADAME NIC. PL., GRANDE CHICANEUSE. Epitaphe V. (P. 72.) L. 9 : acrauante, an old word = ecraser, accabler. EPISTRES. (Pp.77 ff.) These Epistres are somewhat in the style of Marot's Epistres du Coq a VAsne. 112 THE POESIES DI VERSES OF ANTOINE FURETIERE. A CLITON. Epistre II. (P. 80.) L. 6 : hanicroclies, i. e., anicroches. The word was written with an h in the seventeenth century. Littre says it seems to be formed of croche, crochet, and of a word hani, the sense of which is unknown, unless we see in it the German hand: croc a main. L. 11: chansie = chancie. A MONSIEVR CASSANDRE. Epistee III. (P. 82.) This was Frangois Cassandre, known by Boileau's first satire, where he is called Damon. Boileau was fond of him and often aided him by his advice and purse. In 1654 Cassandre pub- lished a translation of Aristotle's Rhetoric, and in 1680 his Paralleles historiques, so highly esteemed by Boileau. Cas- sandre knew Latin and Greek and wrote tolerably good verse. But his life was obscure and wretched on account of his morose temperament. He died in 1695. In a letter to Maucroix, dated April 29, 1695, Boileau states that M. Cassandre died as he had lived, very misanthropical, and not only hating men, but even having much difficulty in becoming reconciled to God, to whom, he said, if he is reported truthfully, he had no obligation. LI. 7-12. This passage is a refutation of the usual statement that Cassandre was, by reason of his surliness, unfit for society. L. 8 : Grand Maitre des ceremoniesi See p. 1, 1. 21. LI. 76-7: Le Maistre du Bureau d'adresse, Faisant Conference chez-luy. Theophraste Renaudot founded in 1630 a bureau of informa- NOTES. 113 tion. On certain days conferences upon all sorts of subjects were held there. In 1669 Eusebe Renaudot, son of the founder of this establishment, published a Recueil general des questions traitees es conferences du Bureau d'adressc, in 5 vols. L. 116. Evidently ironical. NAISSANCE D' AMOVE. Elegie I. (P. 90.) L. 38: les roses et les lys confuses, etc. The adj. part, agrees with the first noun, for the sake of the meter. GLOSSARY. Aduste, p. 36, 1. 100, adust, hot and fiery. A la charge d'autant, p. 88, 1. 222, on condition of returns. Bastande, p. 25, 1. 91, := bastante, sufficient. Boire en tirelarigot, p. 21, 1. 143, " drinli lilce a fish." Cause, p. 18, Ih 43, 46, lawsuit. Compulsoire, p. 21, 1. 138, warrant, order. Confront, p. 31, 1. 274, = confrontation, confronting of witnesses. Consorts, p. 26, 1. 130, party-defendants. Contredis, p. 25, 1. 90, deny. Contredits, p. 26, 1. 120, pleas. Cordon bleu, p. 64, 1. 1, knight of the Holy Ghost. Cal d'un manequin, p. 24, 1. 54, bottom of a hamper. Debatre, p. 25, 1. 91, contest. Deboute de deffense, p. 25, 1. 88, the court having rejected the defence. Debouter, p. 26, 1. 122, reject the claim of, overrule. Declinatoire, p. 30, 1. 255, plea to the jurisdiction of the court. Bedit, p. 29, 1. 209, forfeit, bond. Distraction, p. 30, 1. 252, the claiming back, by a tliird party, of a piece of land or an object wrongfully comprised in a seizure. Dol, p. 30, 1. 270, fraud. Eau, p. 80, 1. 8, sweat, labor. Epanouir ma ratte, p. 22, 1. 173, make merry. Exception dilatoire, p. 65, 1. 5, dilatory plea. Exploit, p. 25, 1. 90, writ. Exploit de demande, p. 25, 1. 72, writ to my suit. Fait dSfaut, p. 25, 1. 78, is in default. Fait r Antechrist, p. 78, 1. 55, "raises Cain." Fait la chattemite, p. 70, 1. 4, dissembles, gives a demure look. Fait le mutin, p. 7 8, 1. 55, is refractory. Friperie, p. 24, 1. 52, place where old clothes are sold, rag-fair. Gargate, p. 36, 1. 104, O. F. word for throat. 115 116 THE POESIES DIVERSES OF ANTOINE FURETIERE. Greffe, p. 19, 1. 83, registry, court of records. Grief, p. 25, 1. 94, damage (le vous auray hizn-tost repare ce grief = I will soon have recovered damages for you). Hypericon, p. 37, I. loo, = hypericum, St. John's wort. Instance, pp. 18, 1. 57 ; 19, 1. 81, action, suit, demand. Instndte, p. 19, I. 81, examined. Joue la gausserie, p. 31, 1. 284, been jesting. Lettres de relief, p. 25, 1. 93, letters from the chancellor to allow the appeal. Mettre hors de cour, p. 26, 1. 122, non-suit. Partie, pp. 25, 1. 79 ; 28, 1. 176, adversary. Partis, p. 27, 1. 152, sides. Passe, p. 31, 1. 280, difference' (to make the amount good). Peremptoire, p. 26, 1. 127, final, not admitting appeal. ' Petitoire, p. 30, 1. 256, action by petiticm. Piece, p. 25, 1. 91, papef, writing. Piece sans contredit, p. 30, 1. 258^ unimpeachable title. Postulant, p. 18, 1. 43, Solicitor. Preciput, p. 74, 1. 24, jointure. PrestoU, p. 86, 1. 134, ^^ prestolct, worthless priest, priestling. Pris un defant, p. 25, 1, 92, been in default. Production, p. 26, 1. 119, suit. Produisant, p. 25, 1. 90, plaintiff. Qaartane, p. 34, 1. 59, = quarfaine, quartan, intermittent fever. Rabatre, p. 25, 1. 92, to abate. Pa(pdtte, p. 31, 1. 276, =;= racquitte, indemnify. Pecol, p. 31, 1. 274, =z recolement, cross-examination. R6intSgrande, p. 30, 1. 253, restoring to one's rights. Rogatons, p. 42, 1. 107, worthless little verses. Sentence, pp. 18, 1. 58 ; 25, 1. 87, decree. Se pouruoir en matiere d'exces, p. 25, 1. 86, enter a complaint on the ground of excessive speed (in nliug). Sommaiion, p. 30, 1. 262, summing up. Somme, p. 24, 1. 40, summons, challenges. Soyez en ceruelle, p. 73, 1. 15, be tormented. GLOSSARY. 117 Stellioiiataire, p. 31, 1. 271, a real-estate swindler. Sternon, p. 38, 1. 181, sternum. Suhi^ogatlon, p. 30, 1. 251, appointing of a substitute, subrogation. Tabis, p. 9, 1. 40, watered silk. Taraxacon, p. 34, 1. 62, ^ taraxacum, dandelion. Tent, p. 28, 1. 198, skull. 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