ing days of the month are variously given as his birthday; | Those to Madame (or, as the habit of the time called her, Mademoiselle) Vitart are free from anything of this kind, | spondence ceases, and it is not renewed till after the close This was a frequent kind of preliminary advertisement at The first but the least characteristic of the dramas by To and that Molière was in fault no one who has studied the character of the two men, no one even who considers the probabilities of the case, will easily believe. If, however, Alexandre was the occasion of showing the defects of Racine's character as a man, it raised him vastly in public estimation as a poet. He was now for the first time proposed as a serious rival to Corneille. There is a story, which a credible witness vouches for as Racine's own, that he read the piece to the author of the Cid and asked his verdict. verdict. Corneille praised the piece highly, but not as a drama, "Il l'assurait qu'il n'était pas propre a la poésie dramatique." There is no reason for disbelieving this, for the character of Alexander could not fail to shock Corneille, and he was notorious for not mincing his words. Nor can it be denied that Racine might have been justly hurt, though with a man of more amiable temper the slight would hardly have caused the settled antagonism to Corneille which he displayed. The contrast between the two even at this early period was accurately apprehended and put by Saint Evremond in his masterly Dissertation sur l'Alexandre, but this was not published for a year or two. this day it is the best criticism of the faults of Racine, though not, it may be, of the merits, which had not yet been fully seen. It may be added that in the preface of the printed play the poet showed the extreme sensitiveness to criticism which perhaps excuses, and which certainly often accompanies, a tendency to criticize others. These defects of character showed themselves still more fully in another matter. The Port Royalists, as has been said, detested the theatre, and in January 1666 Nicole, their chief writer, spoke in one of his Lettres sur Visionnaires of dramatic poets as "empoisonneurs publics." There was absolutely no reason why Racine should fit this cap on his own head; but he did so, and published immediately a letter to the author. It is very smartly written, and if Racine had contented himself with protesting against the absurd exaggeration of the decriers of the stage there would have been little harm done. But he filled the piece with personalities, telling an absurd story of Mère Angelique Arnauld's supposed intolerance, drawing a ridiculous picture of Le Maître (a dead man and his own special teacher and friend), and sneering savagely at Nicole himself. The latter made no reply, but two lay adherents of Port Royal took up the We have no definite details as to Racine's doings during quarrel with more zeal than discretion or ability. Racine the year 1664, but in February 1665 he read at the Hôtel wrote a second pamphlet as bitter and personal as the first, de Nevers before La Rochefoucauld, Madame de la Fayette, but less amusing, and was about to publish it when fortuMadame de Sévigné, and other scarcely less redoubtable nately Boileau, who had been absent from Paris, returned judges the greater part of his second acted play, Alexandre and protested against the publication. It remained accordle Grand, or, as Pomponne (who tells the fact) calls it, Porus.ingly unprinted till after the author's death, as well as a This is apparently the date of the pleasant picture of the four friends which La Fontaine draws in his Psyche, Racine figuring as Acante, "qui aimait extrêmement les jardins, les fleurs, les ombrages." Various stories, more or less mythical, also belong to this period; the best authenticated of them contributes to the documents for Racine's unamiable temper. He had absolutely no reason to complain of Chapelain, who had helped him with criticism, obtained royal gifts for him, and, in a fashion, started him in the literary career, yet he helped in composing the lampoon of Chapelain decoiffe. The sin would not be unpardonable if it stood alone, but unluckily a much graver one followed. After this disagreeable episode Racine's life for ten years and more becomes simply the history of his plays, if we except his liaisons with the actresses Mademoiselle du Parc and Mademoiselle de Champmeslé (which are undoubted, though there is not much to be said about them) and his election to the Academy on 17th July 1673. Mademoiselle du Parc (Marquise de Gorla) was no very great actress, but was very beautiful, and she had previously captivated Molière. Racine induced her to leave the Palais Royal company and join the Hôtel. She died in 1668, and long afterwards the infamous Voisin accused Racine of having poisoned her. Mademoiselle de Champmeslé was plain and stupid, but an admirable actress and apparently very attractive in some way, for not merely Racine but Charles de Sévigné and many others adored her. She was cruel to none, but for five years before his marriage Racine seems to have been her amant en titre. Long afterwards, just before his own death, he heard of her mortal illness and speaks of her to his son without a flash of tenderness. years later, that Mademoiselle de Champmeslé captivated The series of his dramatic triumphs began with Andromaque, and this play may perhaps dispute with Phèdre and Athalie the title of his masterpiece. It is much more uniformly good than Phèdre, and the character of Hermione is the most personally interesting on the French tragic stage. It is said that the first representation of Andromaque was on 10th November 1667, in public and by the actors of the Hôtel de Bourgogne, but the first contemporary mention of it by the gazettes, prose and verse, is on the 17th, as performed in the queen's apartment. Perrault, by no means a friendly critic as far as Racine is concerned, says that it made as much noise as the Cid, and so it ought to have done. Whatever may be thought of the tragédie pathétique (a less favourable criticism might call it the "sentimental tragedy"), it could hardly be better exemplified than in this admirable play. A ferocious epigram of Racine's own (an epigram not unworthy of Martial, and as difficult to comment on to modern ears polite as some of Martial's own) tells us that some critics thought Pyrrhus too fond of his mistress, and Andromache too fond of her husband, which is not likely to be the present verdict. In the contemporary depreciations is to be found the avowal of its real merit. The interest was too varied, the pathos too close to human nature to content Boileau, and the partisans of Corneille still found Racine unequal to the heroic height of their master's grandeur. A just criticism will probably hold that these two objections neutralize each other. Both parties agreed in saying that much of the success was due to the actors, another censure which is equivalent to praise. It so happens, too, that, though the four main parts were played by accomplished artists, two at least of them were such as to try those artists severely. Pyrrhus was taken by Floridor, the best tragic actor by common consent of his time, and Orestes by Montfleury, also an accomplished player. But Mademoiselle du Parc, who played Andromache, had generally been thought below, not above, her parts, and Mademoiselle des Oeillets, who played the difficult rôle of Hermione, was old and had few physical advantages. No one who reads Andromaque without prejudice is likely to mistake the secret of its success, which is, in few words, the application f the most delicate art to the conception of really tragic passion. Before leaving the play it may be mentioned that it is said to have been in the part of Hermione, three "Marion pleure, Marion crie, Marion veut qu'on la marie" is said to have annoyed Racine very much, and it has a most malicious appropriateness. Bajazet, which was first played on 4th January 1672 (for Racine punctually produced his piece a year), is perhaps better. As a play, technically speaking, it has great merit, but the reproach commonly brought against its author was urged specially and with great force against this by Corneille. It is impossible to imagine anything less Oriental than the atmosphere of Bajazet; the whole thing is not only French but ephemerally French-French of the day and hour; and its ingenious scenario and admirable style scarcely save it. This charge is equally applicable with the same reservations to Mithridate, which appears to have been produced on 13th January 1673, the day after the author's reception at the Academy. It was extremely popular and, as far as style and perfection in a disputable kind go, Racine could hardly have lodged a more triumphant diploma piece. His next attempt, Iphigénie, was a long step backwards and upwards in the direction of Andromaque. It is not that the characters are eminently Greek, but that Greek tragedy gave Racine examples which prevented him from flying in the face of the propriety of character as he had done in Bérénice, Bajazet, and Mithridate, and that he here called in, as in Andromaque, other passions to the aid of the mere sighing and crying which form the sole appeal of these three tragedies. Achilles is a rather pitiful personage, and the grand story of the sacrifice is softened very tamely to suit French tastes; but the parental agonies of Clytemnestra and Agamemnon are truly drawn, and the whole play is full of pathos. It succeeded brilliantly and deservedly, but, oddly enough, the date of its appear ance is very uncertain. It was assuredly acted at court in the late summer of 1674, but it does not seem to have been given to the public till the early spring of 1675, the usual time at which Racine produced his work. The last and finest of the series of tragedies proper was the most unlucky. Phèdre was represented for the first time on New-Year's Day 1677 at the Hôtel de Bourgogne. Within a week the opposition company or "troupe du roi" launched an opposition Phèdre by Pradon. This singular competition, which had momentous results for Racine, and in which he to some extent paid the penalty of the lex talionis for his own rivalry with Corneille, had long been foreseen. It has been hinted that Racine had from the first been bitterly opposed by a clique, whom his great success irritated, while his personal character did nothing to conciliate them. His enemies at this time had the powerful support of the duchess of Bouillon, one of Mazarin's nieces, a woman of considerable talents and imperious temper, together with her brother the duke of Nevers and divers other personages of high position. These persons of quality, guided, it is said, by Madame Deshoulières, a poetess of merit whom Boileau unjustly depreciated, selected Pradon, a dramatist of little talent but of much facility, to compose & Phedre in competition with that which it was known that Racine had been elaborating with unusual care. Pradon, perhaps assisted, was equal to the occasion, and it is said that the partisans on both sides did not neglect means for correcting fortune. On her side the duchess of Bouillon is accused of having bought up the front places in both theatres for the first six nights; on his part Racine is said to have repeated an old trick of his and prevailed on the best actresses of the company that played Pradon's piece to refuse the title part. There is even some ground for believing that Racine endeavoured to prevent the opposition play from being played at all, and that an express order from the king had to be obtained for it. It was of no value, but the measures of the cabal had been so well taken that the finest tragedy of the French classical school was all but driven from the stage, while Pradon's was a positive success. A war of sonnets and epigrams followed, during which it is said that the duke of Nevers menaced Racine and Boileau with the same treatment which Dryden and Voltaire actually received, and was only deterred by the protection which Condé extended to them. The unjust cabal against his piece and the various annoyances to which it gave rise no doubt made a deep impression on Racine. But in the absence of accurate contemporary information it is impossible to decide exactly how much influence they had on the subsequent change in his life. For thirteen years he had been constantly employed on a series of brilliant dramas. He now broke off his dramatic work entirely and in the remaining twenty years of his life wrote but two more plays, and those under special circumstances and of quite a different kind. He had been during his early manhood a libertine in morals and religion; he now married, became irreproachably domestic, and almost ostentatiously devout. No authentic account of this change exists; for that of Louis Racine, which attributes the whole to a sudden religious impulse, is manifestly little more than the theory of a son pious in both senses of the word. Probably all the motives which friends and foes have attributed-weariness of dissipated life, jealousy of his numerous rivals in Mademoiselle de Champmeslé's favour, pique at Pradon's success, fear of losing still further the position of greatest tragic poet which after Corneille's Surena was indisputably his, religious sentiment, and so forth-entered more or less into his action. At any rate what is certain is that he reconciled himself with Arnauld and Port Royal generally, and on 1st June married Catherine de Romanet and definitely settled down to a quiet domestic life, alternated with the duties of a courtier. For his repentance was by no means a repentance in sackcloth and ashes. The drama was not then very profitable to dramatists, but Louis Racine tells us that his father had been able to furnish a house, collect a library of some value, and save 6000 livres. His wife had money, and he had possessed for some time (it is not certain how long) the honourable and valuable post of treasurer of France at Moulins. His annual "gratification' had been increased from 800 to 1500 livres, then to 2000, and in the October of the year of his marriage he and Boileau were made historiographers-royal with a salary of 2000 crowns. Besides all this he had, though a layman, one or two benefices. It would have been pleasanter if Louis Racine had not told us that his father regarded His Majesty's choice as "an act of the grace of God to detach him entirely from poetry." Even after allowing for Louis Racine's religiosity and the conventional language of all times, there is a flavour of hypocrisy about this which is disagreeable, and has shocked even Racine's most uncompromising admirers. For the historiographer of Louis XIV. was simply his chief flatterer. Before going further it may be observed that very little came of this historiography. The joint incumbents of the office made some campaigns with the king, sketched plans of histories, and left a certain number of materials and memoirs; but they executed no substantive work. Racine, whether this be set down to his credit or not, was certainly a fortunate and apparently an adroit courtier. His very relapse into Jansenism coincided with his rise at court, where Jansensm was in no favour, and the fact that he had been in the good graces of Madame de Montespan did not deprive him of those of Madame de Maintenon. Neither in Esther did he hesitate to reflect upon his former patroness. reported sneer of the king, who was sharp-eyed enough, "Cavoie avec Racine se croit bel esprit; Racine avec Cavoie But a se croit courtisan," makes it appear that his comparatively | which a proved master in literature has a perfect right to low birth was not forgotten at Versailles. Racine's first campaign was at the siege of Ypres in 1678, where some practical jokes are said to have been played on the two civilians who acted this early and peculiar variety of the part of special correspondent. Again in 1683, in 1687, and in each year from 1691 to 1693 Racine accompanied the king on similar expeditions. The literary results of these have been spoken of. His labours brought him, in addition to his other gains, frequent special presents from the king, one of which was as much as 1000 pistoles. In 1690 he further received the office of "gentilhomme ordinaire du roi," which afterwards passed to his son. Thus during the later years of his life he was more prosperous than is usual with poets. His domestic life appears to have been a happy one. Louis Racine tells us that his mother "did not know what a verse was," but Racine certainly knew enough about verses for both. They had seven children. The eldest, Jean Baptiste, was born in 1678; the youngest, Louis, in 1692. It has been said that he was thus too young to have many personal memories of his father, but he tells one or two stories which show Racine to have been at any rate a man of strong family affection, as, moreover, his letters prove. Between the two sons came five daughters, Marie, Anne, Elizabeth, Françoise, and Madeleine. The eldest, after showing "vocation," married in 1699, Anne and Elizabeth took the veil, the youngest two remained single but did not enter the cloister. To complete the notice of family matters-much of Racine's later correspondence is addressed to his sister Marie, Madame Rivière. make of his forerunners. The beauty of the chorus, which Racine had restored more probably from a study of the Pléiade tragedy than from classical suggestions, the perfection of the characters, and the wonderful art of the whole piece need no praise. Almost immediately the poet was at work on another and a still finer piece of the same kind, and he had probably finished Athalie before the end of 1690. The fate of the play, however, was very different from that of Esther. Some fuss had been made about the worldliness of great court fêtes at Saint Cyr, and the new play, with settings as before by Moreau, was acted both at Versailles and at Saint Cyr with much less pomp and ceremony than Esther. It was printed in March 1691 and the public cared very little for it. The truth is that the last five-and-twenty years of the reign of Louis XIV. were marked by one of the lowest tides of literary accomplishment and appreciation in the history of France. The just judgment of posterity has ranked Athalie, if not as Racine's best work (and there are good grounds for considering it to be this), at any rate as equal to his best. Thenceforward Racine was practically silent, except for four cantiques spirituelles, in the style and with much of the merit of the choruses of Esther and Athalie. The general literary sentiment led by Fontenelle (who inherited the wrongs of Corneille, his uncle, and whom Racine had taken care to estrange further) was against the arrogant critic and the irritable poet, and they made their case worse by espousing the cause of La Bruyère, whose personalities in his Caractères had made him one of the best hated men in France, and by engaging in the ancient and modern battle with Perrault. Racine, moreover, was a constant and spiteful epigrammatist, and the unlucky habit of preferring his joke to his friend stuck by him to the last. A savage epigram on the Sesostris of Longepierre, who had done him no harm and was his familiar acquaintance, dates as late as 1695. Still the king maintained him in favour, and so long as this continued he could afford to laugh at Grub Street and the successors of the Hôtel de Rambouillet alike. At last, however, there seems (for the matter is not too clear) to have come a change. Some say that he disobliged Madame de Maintenon, some (and this would be much to his honour, but not exactly in accord with anything else known of him) that, like Vauban and Fénelon, he urged the growing misery of the people. But there seems to be little doubt of the fact of the royal displeasure, and it is even probable that it had some effect on his health. Disease of the liver appears to have been the immediate cause of his death, which took The almost complete silence in the literary sphere which Racine imposed on himself after the comparative failure, shameful not for himself but for his adversaries, of Phèdre was broken once or twice even before the appearance of the two exquisite tragedies in which under singular circumstances he took leave of the stage. The most honourable of these was the reception of Thomas Corneille on 2d January 1685 at the Academy in the room of his brother. The discourse which Racine then pronounced turned almost entirely on his great rival, of whom he spoke even more than becomingly. But it was an odd conjunction of the two reigning passions of the latter part of his life-devoutness and obsequiousness to the court-which made him once more a dramatist. Madame de Maintenon had established an institution, first called the Maison Saint Louis, and afterwards (from the place to which it was transferred) the Maison de Saint Cyr, for the education of poor girls of noble family. The tradition of including acting in edu-place on 12th April 1699. The king seems to have, at any cation was not obsolete. At first the governess, Madame de Grinon, composed pieces for representation, but, says Madame de Caylus, a witness at first hand and a good judge, they were "detestable." Then recourse was had to chosen plays of Corneille and Racine, but here there were obvious objections. The favourite herself wrote to Racine that "nos petites filles" had played Andromaque "a great deal too well." She asked the poet for a new play suited to the circumstances, and, though Boileau advised him against it, it is not wonderful that he yielded. The result was the masterpiece of Esther, with music by Moreau, the court composer and organist of Saint Cyr. Although played by schoolgirls and in a dormitory, it had an enormous success, in which it may be charitably hoped the transparent comparison of the patroness to the hex ine had not too much to do. Printed shortly afterward it had to suffer a certain reaction, or perhaps a certain vengeance, from those who had not been admitted to the private stage. But no competent judge could hesitate, Racine probably had read and to some extent followed the Aman of Montchrestien, but he made of it only the use rate, forgiven him after his death, and he gave the family a pension of 2000 livres. Racine was buried at Port Royal, but even this transaction was not the last of his relations with that famous home of religion and learning. After the destruction of the abbey in 1711 his body was exhumed and transferred to Saint Etienne du Mont, his gravestone being left behind and only restored to his ashes a hundred years later, in 1818. His eldest son was never married; his eldest daughter and Louis Racine have left descendants to the present day. A critical biography of Racine is, in more ways than one, an exceptionally difficult undertaking, not in regard to the facts, which, as will have been seen, are fairly abundant, but as to the construction to be placed on them. The admirers of Racine's literary genius have made it a kind of religion to defend his character; and strictures on his character, it seems to be thought, imply a desire to depreciate his literary worth. The reader of the above sketch of his life must judge for himself whether Racine is or is not to be ranked with those great men of letters, fortunately the greater number, whose personality is attractive and their foibles at worst excusable. There is no doubt that the general impression given, not merely by the flying anecdotes of the time, but by ascertained facts, is somewhat unfavourable. Racine's affection for his family |