and fantastic as a philosopher but well instructed and sometimes
profound; he had a gentle and smiling sensibility capable at times of
melancholy and also now and again of a delicious elegiac; above all, he
was endowed with incomparable artistic sense, which rendered him the
safest and most dexterous manipulator of verse, of rhythms, and of
musical sonorities, who appeared in France prior to Victor Hugo. It is
much more difficult to state what he lacked than to enumerate the
multiple and miraculous gifts with which he was endowed. His complete
lack of morality or his ingenuous carelessness in this respect formed the
only subject for regret.

SECONDARY ABILITY.--Near such great geniuses, it is only possible to
mention those of secondary talent; but no compunction need be felt at
alluding to Segrais, a graceful manufacturer of eclogues, and Benserade,
who rhymed delightfully for masquerades and was capable, on occasions, of
being wittily but also tenderly elegiac.

GREAT PROSE WRITERS.--The writers in prose of the second half of the
seventeenth century are legion and but few fail to attain greatness. La
Rochefoucauld, in his little volume of _Maxims_, enshrined thoughts
that were often profound in a highly accurate and delicate setting.
Cardinal de Retz narrated his tumultuous career in his _Memoirs_,
which are strangely animated, vivid, and representative of what occurred.
Arnauld and Nicole have explained their rigid Catholicism, which was
Jansenism, in solid and luminous volumes; the latter, more especially,
merits consideration and in his _Moral Essays_ proved an excellent
writer. Mezeray, conscientious, laborious, circumstantial as well as
capable writer, should be reckoned as the earliest French historian.
Bourdaloue, sound logician and good moralist, from his pulpit as a
preacher uttered discourses that were admirable, though too dogmatically