very manner in which such a person taking up a pen is likely to treat a subject of this nature, may present certain advantages that are not to be wholly disdained; for

"The world which neweth every day,"

as old Gower expresses it, will not be content with writings composed to suit the taste of the thirteenth or even of the seventeenth century. It may be well to present it with goodness and faith as seen with modern eyes, with eyes that are accustomed to the perspectives of the present civilization; and, after all, gratitude, admiration, reverence,-not gratuitously offered or supposed, but extorted, will be of all ages. One may reasonably hope, therefore, that this book, devoted to the memory of one who was accessary to such violence, will be not alone pardoned, but praised,-" professione pietatis aut laudatus erit aut excusatus."

"Neither," as Pliny said, "ought it to operate to his disadvantage that the person to be commemorated was our own contemporary;" for, as that Roman writer observes, "it is malignant not to admire one most worthy of admiration, for the sole reason that it is one who has been seen by ourselves, and also loved." Moreover, not to remark, as yet, that the life and death of such a person are full of tender mysteries, unutterably profound and capable of yielding food for poetry and philosophy, it is not in the present state of literature as it was with painting in the school of David, which had disdained as beneath it the representation of the ordinary scenes of life in which only private persons take part, and which, like tragedy, required heroes or demi-gods. A disposition has arisen, at least among a certain number, to think with the philosopher of Florence, that "plura suppetunt vulgaria humanorum casuum exempla, quæ efferri in lucem merentur *." These critics not only admit but proclaim, when eminent goodness in any one, however otherwise removed from the sphere of public notice, leaves this earth, that it is both natural and expedient for those who feel irresistibly impelled in that direction to attempt to recall its image.

* Poggius, de Varietate Fortunæ, i.

"I regard it as a right thing in itself," says Ballanche, writing to an accomplished friend, "that you should be loved and appreciated when you are no longer here on earth *." The same opinion is expressed by many. "If I could venture to suggest to you any thing, I would pray you," wrote Madame Swetchine to M. de Falloux, on the death of the Princess Alexis Galitzen, "to put down on paper some dates, some words, to preserve the memory of this holy woman. I know she needs it not, and all that concerns her is, that her name be inscribed in the book of life; but for us, for those who will follow, it is a great consolation to know somewhat of such a person †." Be that as it may, there is a moment, as Saint-Beuve remarks, in the life of most men when they feel bound to render what they owe to the memory of some one, the most regretted, and whose absence is most sensibly felt; when some loss so cruel and unforeseen carried at first such astonishment with it along with grief, as to leave no liberty of judgment; but when, after the first shock and confusion have subsided, when one can behold the vacancy that has been left, one naturally attempts, without drawing up any thing like an exact account, to give a rude general estimate of the extent and nature of the desolation. Perhaps for some it is now one of those moments, as Ballanche told M. Récamier. Perhaps some one else might say that his future destiny consists in contriving that some traces should be left on this earth of a noble existence that has lately passed from it. Certainly it would be more than a private misfortune, if so excellent a creature should vanish from our eyes as if it had been only a vision, making it momentary as a sound, swift as a shadow, short as any dream. And, in fact, of what use is memory or the art that helps to hand it down, if it be not to select for the object that it seeks to perpetuate what may be termed religion in action, faith in actual life, or in mind and manners the beautiful and the good?

You would transmit only the memory of the learned, and those who have erected for themselves a statue in the temple of Fame. Unwise and injurious limitation! when even the coryphee of

* Souvenirs de Mme. Récamier.
† Mme. Swetchine, Préface.

modern sophists, and the most voluminous of literary celebrities, felt himself constrained in a moment of awakened conscience to exclaim

"J'ai fait un peu de bien, c'est mon meilleur ouvrage."

There are, however, two reflections that might indeed arrest one in this enterprise; for, in the first place, as M. Berlioz said in the "Journal des Débats," on occasion of the death of the poet Brizeux :—“When one sees so many villainies attract the crowd, one ought to wish that noble things should not resemble them even in this respect. Things fine and delicate are for the fine and delicate; one may lead the multitude to make pretence of liking them, but at the bottom it detests them." And with regard to the latter consideration, which is graver still, could she whose innocent character we are about to notice, have anticipated a consequence of her departure hence, so little consonant with the humility of her whole existence, the words would certainly have been heard-"Sir, make me not your story." Alas! it may be doubted sometimes whether one ought to proceed; but then all the while who knows not that

Besides, there should be no fear in the present instance, since, as our Shakspeare saith,—

"A heavy heart bears not an humble tongue."

It is not for the transmitter of such memories to speak of the general interest of an intellectual kind which the subject is capable of eliciting; for an object connected with the purposes of literature was but very remotely and indirectly, and that too only towards its completion, aimed at; and yet, even on this ground, he may be permitted to remark that there is no want of encouragement for such a task as has devolved upon him, did it only answer the conditions, from the most devoted friends, and even kings, of literature itself. For what is it after all, even in regard to men, the most eminent for science, art, and

literature, what is it that their biographers seem most to trust to for exciting the interest of their readers? In the instances of the great celebrities, of whom Fontenelle pronounced his eulogiums before the Academy, it is to some trait of goodness or of simple piety that they trust; as, for example, when speaking of the disciple of Newton-M. de Montmort, the geometrician and algebraist-it is to the fact of his "having possessed qualities infinitely more estimable than intellect and scientific knowledge *," that our author appeals. Again, in the case of the mathematician and great Captain Marsigli, whose adventures in the wars were so striking and even heroic,—it is to his piety, as furnishing "the most remarkable ground for his panegyric," that the academician has recourse; for that great man having been captured by the Turks on the festival of the Visitation, the 2nd of July, and being ransomed on the day of the Annuncation, he was led to the reflection that, on these two festivals, the august protectress of the faithful had obtained for him two favours from heaven,-the one consisting in his salutary punishment for his past faults, the other in the cessation of punishment. This is what Fontenelle terms "la plus remarquable partie de son éloge puisqu'elle decouvre en lui un grand fonds de piété †." Then coming down even to our own times, in an Ary Scheffer, for instance, it is merely simple goodness that is wept for. 'Scheffer," we are told, "had himself in his character something attractive, not easily defined, which caused him to be loved. He exercised," it is added, "on all who approached him a sympathetic attraction. Of a tender and devoted nature, he in his turn easily inspired a tender devotedness, which his death has changed into inconsolable sorrow. He was

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of boundless generosity, and the young who came to him never failed to find with him encouragement and counsel ‡." Such is the nature of the details that are evidently dwelt on with most interest; and it is the same trait that we find expressed in other books which relate the lives of the most eminent and illustrious characters. Their authors seem obliged to leave great things, revolutions and destinies, missions and glory, dynasties and † Ibid. 402.

*Tome vi. 62.

Louis Ratisbonne.

battles, even too, like Fontenelle himself, what will surprise some more perhaps, discoveries and science; and then sinking down all of a sudden, in order to inspire real interest, and to verify the grave remark of Bossuet, that "le plaisir de l'homme c'est l'homme," they are obliged by their mere literary tact to give some lowly familiar details, which might be thought suitable only in the life of such a character as we are now engaged with. They have to come down at last, after all their altitudes, to this level of humanity, and to record some humble matter relating to a domestic existence, such as can indicate that their hero or philosopher is, like another, dear to some one, that he has a heart and qualities in the possession of which he only resembles a woman or a child. And rightly do they descend thus in appearance, in order to rise to true majesty; for, as Sir Philip Sidney says, "the ending of all earthly learning being virtuous action, those arts that most serve to bring forth that have a most just title to be princes over all the rest." The subject before us, therefore, involves no ground for any just discouragement, since the very theme itself almost inevitably furnishes, in spite of all demerits on the part of him who treats upon it, a pledge of success. "However agitated," says Saint-Beuve, "may be the times we live in-however withered or corrupt you may imagine them—there are always certain books exquisite and rare, merely in consequence of the materials of which they are composed, which manage to appear. There are always hearts to produce them in the shade, and other hearts to gather them. They are books which are not like books, and which sometimes even are really not books. They are simple and discreet destinies thrown upon cross-roads off the great dusty highway of life, and which, when wandering yourself off it, when you come up to them, arrest you by their sweet odours and purely natural flowers, of which you thought the race extinct. The form of these books varies-sometimes it is a collection of letters from the drawer of a person lately dead; sometimes it is a surviving lover, who consecrates himself to a faithful remembrance, seeking to transmit and perpetuate it. So under an exterior more or less veiled, he gives to his reader a true history. There are examples of more forms among those productions of hearts, and the form is a thing indifferent provided there is