Marquess de la Fayette. It is, no doubt, very agreeable for a young man to find himself regarded as a drawing-room oracle, merely because his ancestors have fought in the Crusades. It is very convenient, when one knows not what reply to make to a man of plebeian origin, to take refuge under the pri vilege of high birth, and throw out hints about vulgarity. But this paltry triumph is paid by the sacrifice of happiness. Our young noblemen are marquesses and liberals, and yet neither the one nor the other. This is the most wretched condition imaginable. They do not, like M. M. de la Mennais and de Maistre, acknowledge the omnipotence of despotic authority; nor do they, like M. M. Royer-Collart, B. Constant, and Jeremy Bentham, admit the right of examining, and the necessity of judging of the legality of all laws, solely according to their degree of utility to the majority of the people. To complete the vexation of our young nobles, the Bourbons do not even gratify them with a war, which would, at least, afford them an opportunity of proving their courage and gaining promotion. The Congregation proposes that they should become short-robed Jesuits; and they know very well that, without the aid of the Jesuits, in spite of their illustrious birth, they may remain lieutenants all their lives. On the 8th instant, I attended the first representation of the Siège de Paris, by the Vicomte d'Arlincourt. This writer, who has just sufficient talent to qualify him to write novels at 20 sous per volume for country ladies and Parisian ladies' maids, possesses 80 thousand francs a-year. A considerable portion of this income is employed in bribing certain ultra journalists, for praising "Ipsiboe," "Le Solitaire," "Le Renegat," and the other rhapsodies that have been extolled even in the London journals, and translated into thirteen different languages; at least so we are assured by M. Hoffman of the Debats, one of our most celebrated Parisian critics, who has not been able to resist the dinners of the rich Vicomte ! On the first performance of the Siège de Paris, the whole of the pit and one-half of the boxes were filled with the supporters of M. d'Arlincourt. One might have counted upwards of 800 persons put in requisition by the rich Vicomte; but he seemed to have forgotten that a Frenchman can never resist sneering at what is ridiculous; and the best bribed man ever sent into a theatre will laugh where he sees his neighbour do so. M. d'Arlincourt's play is a mere tissue of absurdities. Among other innovations introduced by the "Vicomte inversif," (the nickname given to M. d'Arlincourt) he has suppressed all those little developements of plot and character which usually occur in the first act of a play. He has tried the experiment of applying to tragedy the obscurity, or, as he is pleased to term it, the mystery" of his romances. The story of the Siège de Paris is literally unintelligible. As far as I could make any thing of it, it would appear that Paris is besieged by the Normans, in the 9th century, a period when our capital is described as being situated in the midst of a thick forest, which enables the different characters to surprise each other every moment. The tragedy commenced at seven o'clock, and at half-past seven the audience began to laugh; and their merriment continued increasing until the close of the piece, at half-past nine; when Lafont stepped forward, amidst loud hooting and hissing, to announce the name of Vicomte d'Arlincourt. I have not been so much amused at the theatre for a long time before. Since Beaumarchais' time, certainly none of our dramatists have afforded so much entertainment at the Theatre Français as M. d'Arlincourt. The Theatre du Gymnase is the only one which enjoys the privilege of representing little sketches of Parisian manners; and, I believe, the best of their pieces are very speedily transferred to your French theatre, in Tottenham Court Road. The only novelty, however, produced this month at the Gymnase has been an imitation of Tobin's Honey Moon. The wish to amuse the public by smart sayings rather than by accurate details, has occasioned a considerable degree of insipidity and sameness in our dramatic productions. The Honey Moon is merely a new edition of the Diable à Quatre, an old French opera, which was much admired before the revolution. M. Scribe collects all the most popular German, Italian, English, and Spanish comedies, and turns them into little French dramas of one act, which occupy about three-quarters of an hour in performance. Parisian manners are becoming daily more and more pure, in spite of the toleration, or rather encouragement, extended to indecency on the stage. We have five or six coteries, all of which are exerting their efforts to regenerate and re-model the French people for the benefit of the said coteries; and it is singular enough that this object is openly avowed. M. de Peyronnet, in bringing forward his bill in favour of primogeniture, which was lost on the day on which M. d'Arlincourt's play was condemned, avowed that the Bourbons wished to regenerate the throne. It is amusing enough to hear all this openly avowed to the French, who, of all people in the world, have the greatest dread of being supposed to be duped. Among other regenerations, the Director of the Police, aided by M. M. Lacretelle, Lemontey, and the rest of our dramatic censors, use their best endeavours to corrupt the people of Paris. With a corrupt population, such as we had 50 years ago, the absolute monarchy of 1776 might be easily restored. One knows not whether to wonder most at the folly or the immorality of this project. If you think me too severe upon our ruling powers, let me inform yon that government pays M. de Bonald, one of our French peers, a pension, raised by a tax of three francs per week, paid by every prostitute in Paris; and I recommend you to read the pamphlet published about three weeks ago by M. de Bonald, on the liberty of the press. M. Victor Cousin, a young man about thirty-four years of age, is celebrated by his imprisonment in Prussia, and the eloquent lectures he delivered in Paris in the years 1817, 1818, and 1819. All our French philosophy owes its birth to your illustrious countryman, Locke. The Germans, pursuing the footsteps of Leibnitz, attack Condillac and Tracy, the followers of Locke. M. Victor Cousin enjoys the honour of having introduced into France the mystic and visionary philosophy of sentiment. As this philosophy is essentially obscure, it is more agreeable to the government and the clergy, than the philosophy of Condillac, which every body understands. M. Cousin just published a volume entitled Fragmens Philosophiques. It is a collection of about twenty articles, which M. Cousin has written for different literary journals. Those which go back as far as 1819 and 1820 are somewhat obscure. The preface, written in 1826, commences as follows: Philosophy, speculative or practical, is the union of liberty and necessity in the human mind, which spontaneously harmonizes with the laws of universal existence. The end is in eternity: but the point of departure is ourselves." Is this intelligible in England? It is to be regretted that such a clever man as M. Cousin does not endeavour to comprehend his own meaning before he writes. He has too much talent not to be capable of explaining clearly what he himself clearly understands. M. Tommaso Grossi, one of the most popular poets of Italy, has just published the first five cantos of an epic poem, entitled "The Lombards in the Crusades." This is an unfortunate choice of a subject. The crusades only serve to remind us of the folly of our forefathers, and interest no one. In the next place, the subject of every crusade is Jerusalem, and the very name never fails to revive recollections of Tasso. But, after all, subject is a matter of little consequence to a great poet; and Grossi may, perhaps, be considered the first poet in Italy since Monti has ceased to write. There are several passages in his new poem which cannot fail to be admired by all persons of taste, to whatever nation they may belong. I have as yet only had time to look through one volume of M. Vitet's new work, entitled "Les Barricades." It is a series of historical dialogues in prose. The scene is supposed to take place on the 12th of March, 1588, sixteen years after the massacre of St. Bartholomew; and Jaques Clement, the assassin of Henry III., is one of the characters. In one of my future letters I shall return to Grossi's poem and to Vitet's dialogues. Vitet, who belongs to the romantic party, does not enjoy the favour of the government, nor does he occupy the place of Censor, Librarian, or Professor. To this young writer we are, however, already indebted for the plays of Clara Gazul. M. M. Jouy and Co., indignant at finding themselves forgotten by the public, have recently brought out the first number of "La France Chretienne." They have purchased the privilege of an old ecclesiastical paper, and are thus, according to law, obliged to style themselves Christians. It is to be hoped that this new paper will be as ably conducted as the Minerve. The appearance of a new journal is always a happy event for French literature, which is suffering from the baneful influence of our coteries. The sale of David's pictures has excited a considerable degree of interest here. Our Ministers, with the view of pleasing the old ultras, who are particular friends of the King, opposed the interment of David's remains in France, in compliance with the wish he expressed on his death-bed. We happen to have no law which pronounces sentence of banishment on the ashes of regicides, and nothing could be more silly, or more fatal to the popularity of the Royal Family, than the conduct of our Ministers on the subject of David's burial. M. de Talleyrand has accustomed us to despise acts of -petty meanness, when they can be attended by no sort of utility. What could it signify to the French government whether the remains of the cele brated painter reposed in Brussels or in Père la Chaise? This imbecile conduct of our Ministers has served only to augment the curiosity naturally excited by the sale of David's works. The pictures which attracted the highest degree of curiosity, are: 1st, Marat expiring in the bath, after being stabbed by Charlotte Corday; and, 2d, the Dead Body of M. Lepelletier, one of the Judges of Louis XVI., who was assassinated by M. Paris, of the king's body guard. This latter picture represents the body of Lepelletier, stretched on a couch. Above it is suspended the sword with which he was murdered, with a label inscribed: "Je vote la mort du Tyran." The sword is an exact copy of that which was employed by the assassin; and David painted, from nature, the dead body of his colleague Lepelletier. The wound is seen on the left side of the victim, and the fatal blade is stained and dripping with blood. All the pretty women in Paris have thronged to view this horror-stirring picture; and the police directed that it should not form one of the collection of David's works, now open for public exhibition, A curious circumstance has tended to enhance the interest which this picture was naturally calculated to inspire. After the death of Lepelletier, his only daughter was adopted by the nation, and endowed with an estate worth 20,000 francs a year. She married a young Dutch officer named de Witt, of the family of the famous patriot of that name. The "Daughter of the Nation," as she was styled, was afterwards divorced from M. de Witt, and married M. de Morfantaine. She is now a widow, and is celebrated in the Faubourg Saint Germain for her rigid aristocratic principles, and, it is added, for her devotedness to the Jesuits. It is reported that she offered 100,000 francs for David's celebrated picture of her father, and that her object was to burn it. It is one of David's very best productions. His works usually betray a certain degree of coldness, but in the two pictures which I have just noticed, he is less so than in any others. David was a man of courage, but he never formed any correct ideas on the subject of the revolution. He by turns admired Robespierre, Napoleon, and Pius VII. Of the latter he made an admirable portrait, which now hangs in the Louvre. The handsome countenance of Napoleon captivated him at first sight. David was endowed with the highest genius as an artist, but he was no politician. If any of the Conventionalists deserved to be recalled from exile, certainly David did. He adored his country, and was anxious to return to it that he might once again behold some of his greatest works, such as the Rape of the Sabines, Leonidas, Brutus, the Horatii, &c. It is said that a proposition was made to him by which he might have been allowed to return to France on condition of his signing a certain declaration. But he regarded this as dishonourable, and therefore preferred dying in exile. About the year 1780, our French artists painted as the Abbé Delille wrote, that is, in a ridiculously affected style. David taught our young students to copy the antique. Most of the figures in his pictures are undressed, and are remarkable for fineness of drawing. David was certainly one of the most distinguished men that France has produced during the 18th century. His famous picture of Napoleon at Mount St. Bernard was sold on the 18th instant. The celebrated improvisatore, Sgricci lately exhibited his talent with great éclât at a party given by Baron Gerard, now the first of our French painters. Madame Pasta sung the favourite air from Gluck's Orfeo, to which she imparts such exquisite expression. At the conclusion of the song, the company requested M. Sgricci to improvise the fifth act of a tragedy on the subject of Orpheus, a task which he performed with extraordinary ability. Some of our leading fashionables are just now engaged in getting up a concert for the benefit of the Greeks. M. Sosthene de la Rochefoucault has, it is said, prohibited Rossini from presiding at this concert. THE SUNBEAM. THOU art no lingerer in monarchs' hall; Sunbeam! what gift has the world like thee? Thou art walking the billows, and Ocean smiles- To the solemn depths of the forest shades, I look'd on the mountains-a vapour lay, Thou tak'st through the dim church-aisle thy way, And thou turnest not from the humblest grave, One thing is like thee, to mortals given, The Faith, touch ing all things with hues of Heaven. F. H. POPULAR FALLACIES. That great wit is allied to madness. -So far from this being true, the greatest wits will ever be found to be the sanest writers. It is impossible for the mind to conceive of a mad Shakspeare. The greatness of wit, by which the poetic talent is here chiefly to be understood, manifests itself in the admirable balance of all the faculties. Madness is the disproportionate straining or excess of any one of them. "So strong a wit," says Cowley, speaking of a poetical friend, -did Nature to him frame, As all things but his judgment overcame; His judgment, like the heavenly moon did show, The ground of the fallacy is, that men, finding in the raptures of the higher poetry a condition of exaltation, to which they have no parallel in their own experience, besides the spurious resemblance of it in dreams and fevers, impute a state of dreaminess and fever to the poet. But the true poet dreams being awake. He is not possessed by his subject, but has dominion over it. In the groves of Eden he walks familiar as in his native paths. He ascends the empyrean heaven, and is not intoxicated. He treads the burning marl without dismay; he wins his flight without self-loss through realms of chaos "and old night." Or if, abandoning himself to that severer chaos of a "human mind untuned," he is content awhile to be mad with Lear, or to hate mankind (a sort of madness) with Timon, neither is that madness, nor this misanthropy, so unchecked, but that,-never letting the reins of reason wholly go, while most he seems to do so, he has his better genius still whispering at his ear, with the good servant Kent suggesting saner counsels, or with the honest steward Flavius recommending kindlier resolutions. Where he seems most to recede from humanity, he will be found the truest to it. From beyond the scope of Nature if he summon possible existences, he subjugates them to the law of her consistency. He is beautifully loyal to that sovereign directress, even when he appears most to betray and desert her. His ideal tribes submit to policy; his very monsters are tamed to his hand, even as that wild sea-brood, shepherded by Proteus. He tames, and he clothes them with attributes of flesh and blood, till they wonder at themselves, like Indian Islanders forced to submit to European vesture. Caliban, the Witches, are as true to the laws of their own nature (ours with a difference), as Othello, Hamlet, and Macbeth. Herein the great and the little wits are differenced; that if the latter wander ever so little from nature or actual existence, they lose themselves, and their readers. Their phantoms are lawless; their visions night-mares. They do not create, which implies shaping and consistency. Their imaginations are not activefor to be active is to call something into act and form—but passive, as men in sick dreams. For the super-natural, or something super-added to what we know of nature, they give you the plainly non-natural. And if this were all, and that these mental hallucinations were discoverable only in the treatment of subjects out of nature, or transcending it, the judgment might with some plea be pardoned if it ran riot, and a little wantonized: but even in the describing of real |