The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1

H >> Hippolyte A. Taine >> The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1

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[12] Buffon, ibid. . "Supplement," II. 513; IV. ("Epoques de la
Nature"), 65, 167. According to his experiments with the cooling of a
cannon ball he based the following periods: From the glowing fluid
mass of the planet to the fall of rain 35,000 years. From the
beginning of life to its actual condition 40,000 years. From its
actual condition to the entire congealing of it and the extinction of
life 93,000 years. He gives these figures simply as the minima. We now
know that they are much too limited.

[13] Buffon, Histoire Naturelle, ib. I. 12: "The first truth
derived from this patient investigation of nature is, perhaps, a
humiliating truth for man, that of taking his place in the order of
animals."

[14] Voltaire, "Philosophie, Du principe d'action:" "All beings,
without exception, are subject to invariable laws."

[15] Voltaire "Essay sur les Mœurs,", chap. CXLVII., the summary;
"The intelligent reader readily perceives that he must believe only in
those great events which appear plausible, and view with pity the
fables with which fanaticism, romantic taste and credulity have at all
times filled the world."

[16] Note this expression," exegetical methods". (Chambers defines
an exegetist as one who interprets or expounds.) Taine refers to
methods which should allow the Jacobins, socialists, communists, and
other ideologists to, from an irrefutable idea or expression, to
deduct, infer, conclude and draw firm and, to them, irrefutable
conclusions. (SR.)

[17] "Traité de Metaphysique," chap. I. "Having fallen on this
little heap of mud, and with no more idea of man than man has of the
inhabitants of Mars and Jupiter, I set foot on the shore of the ocean
of the country of Caffraria and at once began to search for a man. I
encounter monkeys, elephants and Negroes, with gleams of imperfect
intelligence, etc" - The new method is here clearly apparent.

[18] "Introduction à l'Essay sur les Mœurs: Des Sauvages." -
Buffon, in "Epoques de la nature," the seventh epoch, precedes Darwin
in his ideas on the modifications of the useful species of animals.

[19] Voltaire, "Remarques de l'essay sur les Mœurs." "We may speak
of this people in connection with theology but they are not entitled
to a prominent place in history." - "Entretien entre A, B, C," the
seventh.

[20] Franklin defined man as a maker of tools.

[21] Condorcet, "Esquisse d'un tableau historique des progrès de
l'esprit humain."

[22] Montesquieu: "Esprit des Lois," preface. "I, at first,
examined men, thinking that, in this infinite diversity of laws and
customs, they were not wholly governed by their fancies. I brought
principles to bear and I found special cases yielding to them as if
naturally, the histories of all nations being simply the result of
these, each special law being connected with another law or depending
on some general law."

[23] Pinel, (1791), Esquirol (1838), on mental diseases. -
Prochaska, Legallois (1812) and then Flourens for vivisection. -
Hartley and James Mill at the end of the eighteenth century follow
Condillac on the same psychological road; all contemporary
psychologists have entered upon it. (Wundt, Helmholz, Fechner, in
Germany, Bain, Stuart Mill, Herbert Spencer and Carpenter, in
England).

[24] Condillac, passim, and especially in his last two works the
"Logique," and the "Langue des Calculs."

CHAPTER II. THE CLASSIC SPIRIT, THE SECOND ELEMENT.

This grand and magnificent system of new truths resembles a tower
of which the first story, quickly finished, at once becomes accessible
to the public. The public ascends the structure and is requested by
its constructors to look about, not at the sky and at surrounding
space, but right before it, towards the ground, so that it may at last
become familiar with the country in which it lives. Certainly, the
point of view is good, and the advice is well thought-out. The
conclusion that the public will have an accurate view is not
warranted, for the state of its eyes must be examined, to ascertain
whether it is near or far-sighted, or if the retina naturally, or
through habit, is sensitive to certain colors. In the same way the
French of the eighteenth century must be considered, the structure of
their inward vision, that is to say, the fixed form of their
intelligence which they are bringing with them, unknowingly and
unwillingly, up upon their new tower.

I. THROUGH COLORED GLASSES.

Its signs, duration and power. - Its origin and public supporters.
- Its vocabulary, grammar and style. - Its method, merits and defects.

This fixed intelligence consists of the classic spirit, which
applied to the scientific acquisitions of the period, produces the
philosophy of the century and the doctrines of the Revolution. Various
signs denote its presence, and notably its oratorical, regular and
correct style, wholly consisting of ready-made phrases and contiguous
ideas. It lasts two centuries, from Malherbe and Balzac to Delille and
de Fontanes, and during this long period, no man of intellect, save
two or three, and then only in private memoirs, as in the case of
Saint-Simon, also in familiar letters like those of the marquis and
bailly de Mirabeau, either dares or can withdraw himself from its
empire. Far from disappearing with the ancient regime it forms the
matrix out of which every discourse and document issues, even the
phrases and vocabulary of the Revolution. Now, what is more effective
than a ready-made mold, enforced, accepted, in which by virtue of
natural tendency, of tradition and of education, everyone can enclose
their thinking? This one, accordingly, is a historic force, and of the
highest order; to understand it let us consider how it came into
being. -- It appeared together with the regular monarchy and polite
conversation, and it accompanies these, not accidentally, but
naturally and automatically. For it is product of the new society, of
the new regime and its customs: I mean of an aristocracy left idle due
the encroaching monarchy, of people well born and well educated who,
withdrawn from public activity, fall back on conversation and pass
their leisure sampling the different serious or refined pleasures of
the intellect.[1] Eventually, they have no other role nor interest
than to talk, to listen, to entertain themselves agreeably and with
ease, on all subjects, grave or gay, which may interest men or even
women of society, that's their great affair. In the seventeenth
century they are called "les honnêtes gens"[2] and from now on a
writer, even the most abstract, addresses himself to them. "A
gentleman," says Descartes, "need not have read all books nor have
studiously acquired all that is taught in the schools;" and he
entitles his last treatise, "A search for Truth according to natural
light, which alone, without aid of Religion or Philosophy, determines
the truths a gentleman should possess on all matters forming the
subjects of his thoughts."[3] In short, from one end of his philosophy
to the other, the only qualification he demands of his readers is
"natural good sense" added to the common stock of experience acquired
by contact with the world. - As these make up the audience they are
likewise the judges. "One must study the taste of the court," says
Molière,[4] "for in no place are verdicts more just . . . With simple
common sense and intercourse with people of refinement, a habit of
mind is there obtained which, without comparison, forms a more
accurate, judgment of things than the rusty attainments of the
pedants." From this time forth, it may be said that the arbiter of
truth and of taste is not, as before, an erudite Scaliger, but a man
of the world, a La Rochefoucauld, or a Tréville.[5] The pedant and,
after him, the savant, the specialist, is set aside. "True honest
people," says Nicole after Pascal, "require no sign. They need not be
divined; they join in the conversation going on as they enter the
room. They are not styled either poets or surveyors, but they are the
judges of all these."[6] In the eighteenth century they constitute the
sovereign authority. In the great crowd of blockheads sprinkled with
pedants, there is, says Voltaire, "a small group apart called good
society, which, rich, educated and polished, forms, you might say,
the flower of humanity; it is for this group that the greatest men
have labored; it is this group which accords social recognition."[7]
Admiration, favor, importance, belong not to those who are worthy of
it but to those who address themselves to this group. "In 1789," said
the Abbé Maury, "the French Academy alone enjoyed any esteem in
France, and it really bestowed a standing. That of the Sciences
signified nothing in public opinion, any more than that of
Inscriptions. . . The languages is considered a science for fools.
D'Alembert was ashamed of belonging to the Academy of Sciences. Only a
handful of people listen to a mathematician, a chemist, etc. but the
man of letters, the lecturer, has the world at his feet."[8] - Under
such a strong pressure the mind necessarily follows a literary and
verbal route in conformity with the exigencies, the proprieties, the
tastes, and the degree of attention and of instruction of its
public.[9] Hence the classic mold, - formed out of the habit of
speaking, writing and thinking for a drawing room audience.[10]

This is immediately evident in its style and language. Between
Amyot, Rabelais and Montaigne on the one hand, and Châteaubriand,
Victor Hugo and Honoré de Balzac on the other, classic French comes
into being and dies. From the very first it is described at the
language of "honest people." It is fashioned not merely for them, but
by them, and Vaugelas,[11] their secretary, devotes himself for thirty
years to the registry of decisions according to the usages only of
good society. Hence, throughout, both in vocabulary and in grammar,
the language is refashioned over and over again, according to the cast
of their intellects, which is the prevailing intellect. -

In the first place the vocabulary is diminished:

* Most of the words specially employed on erudite and technical
subjects, expressions that are too Greek or too Latin, terms peculiar
to the schools, to science, to occupations, to the household, are
excluded from discourse;

* those too closely denoting a particular occupation or profession
are not considered proper in general conversation.

* A vast number of picturesque and expressive words are dropped,
all that are crude, gaulois or naifs, all that are local and
provincial, or personal and made-up, all familiar and proverbial
locutions,[12] many brusque, familiar and frank turns of thought,
every haphazard, telling metaphor, almost every description of
impulsive and dexterous utterance throwing a flash of light into the
imagination and bringing into view the precise, colored and complete
form, but of which a too vivid impression would run counter to the
proprieties of polite conversation.

"One improper word," said Vaugelas, "is all that is necessary to
bring a person in society into contempt,"

and, on the eve of the Revolution, an objectionable term denounced
by Madame de Luxembourg still consigns a man to the rank of "espèces,"
because correct expression is ever an element of good manners. -
Language, through this constant scratching, is attenuated and becomes
colorless: Vaugelas estimates that one-half of the phrases and terms
employed by Amyot are set aside.[13] With the exception of La
Fontaine, an isolated and spontaneous genius, who reopens the old
sources, and La Bruyère, a bold seeker, who opens a fresh source, and
Voltaire an incarnate demon who, in his anonymous and pseudonymous
writings, gives the rein to the violent, crude expressions of his
inspiration,[14] the terms which are most appropriate fall into
desuetude. One day, Gresset, in a discourse at the Academy, dares
utter four or five of these,[15] relating, I believe, to carriages and
head-dresses, whereupon murmurs at once burst forth. During his long
retreat he had become provincial and lost the touch. - By degrees,
discourses are composed of "general expressions" only. These are even
employed, in accordance with Buffon's precept, to designate concrete
objects. They are more in conformity with the polished courtesy which
smoothes over, appeases, and avoids rough or familiar expressions, to
which some views appear gross or rude unless partly hidden by a veil.
This makes it easier for the superficial listener; prevailing terms
alone will immediately arouse current and common ideas; they are
intelligible to every man from the single fact that he belongs to the
drawing-room; special terms, on the contrary, demand an effort of the
memory or of the imagination. Suppose that, in relation to Franks or
to savages, I should mention "a battle-ax," which would be at once
understood; should I mention a "tomahawk," or a "francisque,"[16] many
would imagine that I was speaking Teuton or Iroquois.[17] In this
respect the more fashionable and refined the style, the more
punctilious the effort. Every appropriate term is banished from
poetry; if one happens to enter the mind it must be evaded or replaced
by a paraphrase. An eighteenth century poet can hardly permit himself
to employ more than one-third of the dictionary, poetic language at
last becomes so restricted as to compel a man with anything to say not
to express himself in verse.[18]

On the other hand the more you prune the more you thin out. Reduced
to a select vocabulary the Frenchman deals with fewer subjects, but he
describes them more agreeably and more clearly. "Courtesy, accuracy",
(Urbanité, exactitude!), these two words, born at the same time with
the French Academy, describes in a nutshell the reform of which it is
the tool, and which the drawing-room, by it, and alongside of it,
imposes on the public. Grand seigniors in retirement, and unoccupied
fine ladies, enjoy the examination of the subtleties of words for the
purpose of composing maxims, definitions and characters. With
admirable scrupulousness and infinitely delicate tact, writers and
people society apply themselves to weighing each word and each phrase
in order to fix its sense, to measure its force and bearing, to
determine its affinities, use and connections This work of precision
is carried on from the earliest academicians, Vaugelas, Chapelain and
Conrart, to the end of the classic epoch, in the Synonymes by Bauzée
and by Girard, in the Remarque by Duclos, in the Commentaire by
Voltaire on Corneille, in the Lycée by la Harpe,[19] in the efforts,
the example, the practice and the authority of the great and the
inferior writers of which all are correct. Never did architects,
obliged to use ordinary broken highway stones in building, better
understand each piece, its dimensions, its shape, its resistance, its
possible connections and suitable position. - Once this was learned,
the task was to construct with the least trouble and with the utmost
solidity; the grammar was consequently changed at the same time and in
the same way as the dictionary. Hence no longer permitting the words
to reflect the way impressions and emotions were felt; they now
had to be regularly and rigorously assigned according to the
invariable hierarchy of concepts. The writer may no longer begin his
text with the leading figure or the main purpose of his story; the
setting is given and the places assigned beforehand. Each part of the
discourse has its own place; no omission or transposition is
permitted, as was done in the sixteenth century[20]. All parts must be
included, each in its definite place: at first the subject of the
sentence with its appendices, then the verb, then the object direct,
and, finally, the indirect connections. In this way the sentence forms
a graduated scaffolding, the substance coming foremost, then the
quality, then the modes and varieties of the quality, just as a good
architect in the first place poses his foundation, then the building,
then the accessories, economically and prudently, with a view to adapt
each section of the edifice to the support of the section following
after it. No sentence demands any less attention than another, nor is
there any in which one may not at every step verify the connection or
incoherence of the parts.[21] - The procedure used in arranging a
simple sentence also governs that of the period, the paragraph and the
series of paragraphs; it forms the style as it forms the syntax. Each
small edifice occupies a distinct position, and but one, in the great
total edifice. As the discourse advances, each section must in turn
file in, never before, never after, no parasitic member being allowed
to intrude, and no regular member being allowed to encroach on its
neighbor, while all these members bound together by their very
positions must move onward, combining all their forces on one single
point. Finally, we have for the first time in a writing, natural and
distinct groups, complete and compact harmonies, none of which
infringe on the others or allow others to infringe on them. It is no
longer allowable to write haphazard, according to the caprice of one's
inspiration, to discharge one's ideas in bulk, to let oneself be
interrupted by parentheses, to string along interminable rows of
citations and enumerations. An end is proposed; some truth is to be
demonstrated, some definition to be ascertained, some conviction to be
brought about; to do this we must march, and ever directly onward.
Order, sequence, progress, proper transitions, constant development
constitute the characteristics of this style. To such an extent is
this pushed, that from the very first, personal correspondence,
romances, humorous pieces, and all ironical and gallant effusions,
consist of morsels of systematic eloquence.[22] At the Hôtel
Rambouillet, the explanatory period is displayed with as much fullness
and as rigorously as with Descartes himself. One of the words most
frequently occurring with Mme. de Scudéry is the conjunction for (in
French car). Passion is worked out through close-knit arguments.
Drawing room compliments stretch along in sentences as finished as
those of an academical dissertation. Scarcely completed, the
instrument already discloses its aptitudes. We are aware of its being
made to explain, to demonstrate, to persuade and to popularize.
Condillac, a century later, is justified in saying that it is in
itself a systematic means of decomposition and of recomposition, a
scientific method analogous to arithmetic and algebra. At the very
least it possesses the incontestable advantage of starting with a few
ordinary terms, and of leading the reader along with facility and
promptness, by a series of simple combinations, up to the
loftiest.[23] By virtue of this, in 1789, the French tongue ranks
above every other. The Berlin Academy promises a prize to for anyone
who best can explain its pre-eminence. It is spoken throughout Europe.
No other language is used in diplomacy. As formerly with Latin, it is
international, and appears that, from now on, it is to be the
preferred tool whenever men are to reason.

It is the organ only of a certain kind of reasoning, la raison
raisonnante, that requiring the least preparation for thought, giving
itself as little trouble as possible, content with its acquisitions,
taking no pains to increase or renew them, incapable of, or unwilling
to embrace the plenitude and complexity of the facts of real life. In
its purism, in its disdain of terms suited to the occasion, in its
avoidance of lively sallies, in the extreme regularity of its
developments, the classic style is powerless to fully portray or to
record the infinite and varied details of experience. It rejects any
description of the outward appearance of reality, the immediate
impressions of the eyewitness, the heights and depths of passion, the
physiognomy, at once so composite yet absolute personal, of the
breathing individual, in short, that unique harmony of countless
traits, blended together and animated, which compose not human
character in general but one particular personality, and which a
Saint-Simon, a Balzac, or a Shakespeare himself could not render if
the rich language they used, and which was enhanced by their
temerities, did not contribute its subtleties to the multiplied
details of their observation.[24] Neither the Bible, nor Homer, nor
Dante, nor Shakespeare[25] could be translated with this style. Read
Hamlet's monologue in Voltaire and see what remains of it, an abstract
piece of declamation, with about as much of the original in it as
there is of Othello in his Orosmane. Look at Homer and then at Fenelon
in the island of Calypso; the wild, rocky island, where "gulls and
other sea-birds with long wings," build their nests, becomes in pure
French prose an orderly park arranged "for the pleasure of the eye."
In the eighteenth century, contemporary novelists, themselves
belonging to the classic epoch, Fielding, Swift, Defoe, Sterne and
Richardson, are admitted into France only after excisions and much
weakening; their expressions are too free and their scenes are to
impressive; their freedom, their coarseness, their peculiarities,
would form blemishes; the translator abbreviates, softens, and
sometimes, in his preface, apologizes for what he retains. Room is
found, in this language, only for a partial lifelikeness, for some of
the truth, a scanty portion, and which constant refining daily renders
still more scanty. Considered in itself, the classic style is always
tempted to accept slight, insubstantial commonplaces for its subject
materials. It spins them out, mingles and weaves them together; only a
fragile filigree, however, issues from its logical apparatus; we may
admire the elegant workmanship; but in practice, the work is of
little, none, or negative service.

From these characteristics of style we divine those of the mind for
which it serves as a tool. - Two principal operations constitute the
activity of the human understanding. -- Observing things and events, it
receives a more or less complete, profound and exact impression of
these; and after this, turning away from them, it analyses its
impressions, and classifies, distributes, and more or less skillfully
expresses the ideas derived from them. - In the second of these
operations the classicist is superior. Obliged to adapt himself to his
audience, that is to say, to people of society who are not
specialists and yet critical, he necessarily carries to perfection the
art of exciting attention and of making himself heard; that is to say,
the art of composition and of writing. - With patient industry, and
multiplied precautions, he carries the reader along with him by a
series of easy rectilinear conceptions, step by step, omitting none,
beginning with the lowest and thus ascending to the highest, always
progressing with steady and measured peace, securely and agreeably as
on a promenade. No interruption or diversion is possible: on either
side, along the road, balustrades keep him within bounds, each idea
extending into the following one by such an insensible transition,
that he involuntarily advances, without stopping or turning aside,
until brought to the final truth where he is to be seated. Classic
literature throughout bears the imprint of this talent; there is no
branch of it into which the qualities of a good discourse do not enter
and form a part. - They dominate those sort of works which, in
themselves, are only half-literary, but which, by its help, become
fully so, transforming manuscripts into fine works of art which their
subject-matter would have classified as scientific works, as reports
of action, as historical documents, as philosophical treatises, as
doctrinal expositions, as sermons, polemics, dissertations and
demonstrations. It transforms even dictionaries and operates from
Descartes to Condillac, from Bossuet to Buffon and Voltaire, from
Pascal to Rousseau and Beaumarchais, in short, becoming prose almost
entirely, even in official dispatches, diplomatic and private
correspondence, from Madame de Sévigné to Madame du Deffant; including
so many perfect letters flowing from the pens of women who were
unaware of it . - Such prose is paramount in those works which, in
themselves, are literary, but which derive from it an oratorical turn.
Not only does it impose a rigid plan, a regular distribution of
parts[26] in dramatic works, accurate proportions, suppressions and
connections, a sequence and progress, as in a passage of eloquence,
but again it tolerates only the most perfect discourse. There is no
character that is not an accomplished orator; with Corneille and
Racine, with Molière himself, the confidant, the barbarian king, the
young cavalier, the drawing room coquette, the valet, all show
themselves adepts in the use of language. Never have we encountered
such adroit introductions, such well-arranged evidence, such just
reflections, such delicate transitions, such conclusive summing ups.
Never have dialogues borne such a strong resemblance to verbal
sparring matches. Each narration, each portrait, each detail of
action, might be detached and serve as a good example for schoolboys,
along with the masterpieces of the ancient tribune. So strong is this
tendency that, on the approach of the final moment, in the agony of
death, alone and without witnesses, the character finds the means to
plead his own frenzy and die eloquently.