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makes that the basis of his discourse: he never gives way to sudden emotions of any kind, and never indulges in personality. The parliamentary life of M. Guizot has been, since 1830, one continued and violent struggle; all the stringent measures he has succeeded in passing through the Chambers as bulwarks of peace and order, have always been opposed with vigor and impetuosity, often with rancor and abuse, by many of the most formidable men of our time. M. Guizot must have a soul of adamant, a frame of iron, to have withstood the reiterated and virulent assaults to which he has been lately exposed in the Chamber: we have heard MM. Berryer, Odilon Barrot, Thiers, Arago, Mauguin, shower down upon him in succession philippics of the fiercest and most envenomed character; while he, ever calm and dignified, refutes all, parries all, with passionless arguments, with austere, overpowering reason. However restrictive may be the constitutional principles of M. Guizot, let it be said to his honor, that his inexorable perseverance, his firmness and courage in resistance, arise from a sincere conviction that his own views are the most salutary for his country: not one of his antagonists, not his most implacable foe, would venture to allege that M. Guizot had ever acted from mere ambitious views or from personal interest. So much for M. Guizot as a politician and orator: we will afterwards regard him as the immortal historian.

We have spoken of the present opposition party in the Chamber of Deputies (the Chamber of Peers is a complete nullity). This party is the most popular in the nation it often counterbalances and vanquishes the conservative party, and the measures it has in view are of vital importance to France-the most vital of all, as we have said, the reform of the electoral system. The opposition in the French Chamber of Deputies is the expression of the democratic tendencies of France; and it cannot be doubted that, despite the resistance of M. Guizot, Count Molé, Marshal Soult, and others, it will in time triumphantly obtain all it contends for, and France will then be a complete democratic monarchy, unless any imprudence on the part of the crown or other enemies of democracy, provoke a new conflagration, which would probably be followed by a republic, by a European war, and by an immediate definitive struggle between the two principles, aristocracy and democracy. Or if there be no imprudence, no violence, the slow but sure progress of constitutional liberty and democratic ideas will eventually work out its inevitable consequences.

The opposition in the Chamber of Deputies has now M. Thiers

again in its ranks, M. Odilon Barrot, M. Garnier Pagès, known for his energetic eloquence, and M. Mauguin, whose commanding person and style of oratory remind one of O'Connell. All who hear M. Mauguin are forcibly impressed with the nerve, manliness, readiness, clearness, and fluency of his oratory; he adds great strength to the opposition by his well-deserved popularity and influence. To the list must be added M. Arago, who stands pre-eminent among the celebrated men of Europe. Unlike many orators who will speak on all subjects, M. Arago only speaks on questions that he has studied-questions possessing either the interest of political circumstances or the attraction of science. When he ascends the tribune, his noble figure and fine head awe the assembly into attention. If he confines himself to the narration of facts, his eloquence has the natural grace of simplicity; when face to face with a question of paramount importance to the liberty of his country, or with one of science, whether in the Chamber or in the professional chair, he contemplates his subject with earnestness, unravels its subtleties, and evinces a power of comprehension and elucidation which bespeaks the superior mind; proceeding, he begins to employ a splendid phraseology—his voice swells-his style grows richer and richer, and his eloquence rises to the grandeur of his theme. M. Arago's speeches have both generality and actuality; they equally address themselves to the intelligence and the passions of his audience; when he enters upon any question or matter, whether scientific or political, he clears it of its difficulties and technicalities, and renders it so precise and perceptible, that the most ignorant and dull are enabled to see and comprehend it. His is one of the most luminous intellects of the age.

The democratic party of the Chamber of Deputies reckons also other men of great personal influence; among whom for instance, are M. Dupont-de-l'Eure, Lafitte, M. Audry de Puyraveau, and Viscount de Cormenin, the celebrated pamphleteer.

We cannot close our cursory observations on the orators of France, and their influence on its political tendencies, without speaking of the most illustrious of all, M. Berryer. M. Berryer is the sole but powerful supporter of the legitimist party, whose ranks grow daily thinner; indeed, without M. Berryer, legitimacy and the elder branch of the Bourbons would be now as deeply buried in oblivion as during the prosperous period of Napoleon's reign. The torrent of democratic ideas seems to carry down and overbear every other feeling, in like manner as the military glory of the empire engrossed all minds at the

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commencement of the century. But M. Berryer, although a legitimist, and thus politically isolated, is also a sincere and ardent patriot, and he loses no opportunity of rendering conducive to the advantage and liberty of his country his natural hostility to the government of 1830. During the last ten years, he has ever shown himself ready to oppose, with all the powers of his intellect and oratory, every measure he deemed detrimental to the freedom and welfare of the nation; and has proved himself a most formidable antagonist to the new government. M. Berryer has received from nature all the gifts that tend to form the complete orator his face and figure are at once engaging and commanding, and his voice is of such extraordinary compass, as to exercise on an audience a stimulating, exciting effect, altogether indescribable. But, sonorous as are the tones of his voice, he modulates them with exquisite taste and grace. He is likewise endowed with a prodigious memory, and he often amazes his hearers by his accuracy in citing facts, dates, and matters of minute detail.

M. Berryer has an admirable mode of distributing his arguments, and managing his transitions; he is a profound master of rhetoric; nothing can exceed his skill in laying the train for an effect, or working his way towards his main object from afar, or in introducing a parenthetical allusion to arouse attention, and prepare the way for those vivid bursts and apostrophes by which he electrifies his hearers. During a late and celebrated discourse of his in the Chamber of Deputies, on the conduct of France upon the Eastern question, the whole assembly, breathless and riveted, twice instinctively rose, so great was the febrile excitement caused by his overpowering eloquence. M. Berryer's speeches are always unprepared; he merely studies the subject of debate, sums up in his mind the preceding discussions, and ascends the tribune. Many of his finest oratorical displays have been provoked by some unexpected observation or proposition; being taken unawares is a matter of perfect indifference to him, for he invests whatever he may say with all the charms of order and felicitous adaptation. It would be a great error to suppose that M. Berryer is an orator actuated by passion and imagination only; those impulses are kept in subjection to the purer emotions of the heart, and to lofty ratiocination. Upon many political questions canvassed since 1830, no one has surpassed him in logical power. Whoever has heard him only once, cannot well judge him, for his eloquence varies according to his subject: when necessary, he appeals, with the impetuosity of Mira

beau or of Chatham, to honor, glory, and justice; on another occasion, he grapples firmly and calmly with his topic, and analyzes it with grave judgment; and he has been heard to discuss for hours a financial question, with the sagacity and clearness of a deeply versed chancellor of the exchequer. M. Berryer combines, in a higher degree than any modern orator, the qualifications of a perfect speaker. Lord Chatham is the only man who can be compared to him; but the French orator is far more intellectual, and of a more universal genius. The eloquence of the English statesman was roused by flagrant errors and iniquities, fitted to excite indignation in the breast of any one possessing a spark of feeling. M. Berryer, besides similar outbursts of wrathful elocution, has often mounted in his speeches to the highest spheres of intellect, and handled multifarious and diversified special questions with the ease and knowledge of a man solely conversant with each. The great misfortune of M. Berryer, in our opinion, is to belong to the legitimist party; for there he is very far from exercising on his country the influence he might otherwise command; the deputies and the nation, always perceiving his legitimist ideas lurking in his parliamentary efforts, endeavor to shake off, as soon as possible, the stunning effect of his eloquence.

To conclude. The French legislature has had vast difficulties, both internal and external, to contend with during these last ten years. A nation has little time to think of creating and enforcing laws favorable to its liberty and prosperity, when threatened with civil war, and when the sovereigns of Europe, uneasy on their thrones, have their eyes, flashing defiance and hatred, anxiously fixed on all its movements. To this must be attributed the little progress that has resulted to French civilization and legislative improvement from the national crisis of 1830. But we repeat, the symptoms of tranquil progress and of firmly established liberty seem evident. There is every reason to hope, that those who steer the vessel of the state duly appreciate those blessings, and are now made aware that the grandeur and futurity of a nation depend wholly on a social education founded on religion, on a just and humane organization of industry and labor, under the balmy and fecund influence of rational freedom.

CHAPTER FIFTH.

CRITICISM.

Character of Modern Criticism.-Hume's Observation.-Object of Critical Literature-its Progress.-Laharpe's Work-his System of Criticism compared with that of our Time.-Ginguené's History of Italian Literature.-Sismondi's History of the Literature of the South of Europe.-Chénier's Tableau.-M. de Barante's Account of the Literature of the Eighteenth Century.-M. Villemain— first part of his Literary Life-his subsequent Labors-his Life of Cromwellhis Lectures on French Literature-their Popularity-Character of his Delivery --his Sources of Knowledge--Beauty and Defects of M. Villemain's Criticisms --his two Additional Volumes on the Literature of the Eighteenth Century--his style.-M. Nisard.-M. Sainte-Beuve--his Criticisms--his work on Port-Royal. --Account of the Convent of Port-Royal--its Fame--Learning of its Recluses-their Works-Destruction of the Convent.-Character of M. Saint-Beu ve's History of Port-Royal.-Dr. Reuchlin's Work on the same Subject.-M. Gustave Planche-compared to M. Sainte-Beuve-M. Planche's Criticisms-his free Use of English Materials-his Criticisms on several English Writers-on Sir E. Bulwer.-M. Ampère's History of the Literature of France before the Twelfth Century-Object and Character of the Work.-M. de Chateaubriand.-M. Lerminier. -Study of English and German Literature in France.-M. Victor Hugo's Prefaces.-Criticisms of the Periodical Press.-French Reviews.-Le Journal des Savants.-The Periodical Press of France compared to that of England.-The Paris Newspapers.-Their Literary Merit.-General Tendency for Newspaper Writing -arises from Education.-Difference of the Education given in France and England.-Royal University of France-its Organization.-Classical Learning.— French Editions and Translations of the Classics.-M. Letronne. General View of the State of Criticism.

CRITICISM, in its more lofty departments especially, has undergone many changes in our time, which will hereafter produce good fruit: it has acquired a character of superiority, resulting naturally from the extension of intercourse among nations and the growth of their reciprocal influences. The observation of Hume, that "criticism will never be of any value until critics cite numerous examples," could only be applied now to the inferior branch of criticism-to scholastic criticism, which at all times has fed upon examples.

The excellence of high critical literature consists in combining a profound and comprehensive knowledge of history with great powers of imagination, in order to vivify the past. Criticism must follow the tide of ages, marking not only the vigorous in