Sir John Yorke and Catholic Plays--Abraham Cowley--Antoine
Danchet--Claude Crébillon--Nogaret--François de Salignac Fénélon.
Of the misfortunes of dramatists and romance-writers I have little to
record, but it would not be safe to conclude that this subject always
furnished a secure field for literary activity. However, the successes
of the writers of fiction and plays in our own times might console the
Muse for any indignities which her followers have suffered in the past.
In our own country the early inventors of dramatic
performances--Mysteries, Moralities, and Interludes--lived securely,
their names being unknown. When penal laws were in force against Roman
Catholics, plays inculcating their doctrines and worship were often
secretly performed in the houses of Catholic gentry. The anonymous
author was indeed safe, but Sir John Yorke and his lady were fined one
thousand pounds apiece and imprisoned in the Tower on account of a
play performed in their house at Christmas, 1614, containing "many foul
passages to the vilifying of our religion and exacting of popery."
Abraham Cowley was driven into retirement by his unfortunate play
_Cutter of Coleman Street_, which was an improved edition of his
unfinished comedy entitled _The Guardian_, acted at Cambridge before
the Court at the beginning of the Civil War. After the Restoration
he produced the revised version under the name of _Cutter of Coleman
Street_, the principal character being a merry person who bore that
cognomen. Some of the aspirants to royal favour persuaded the King that
the play was a satire directed against him and his Court, and the poor
poet, condemned by the enemies of the Muses, calumniated and deprived of
all hopes of preferment, retired in disgust to a country retreat among
the hills of Surrey. The disfavour of the Court was also increased by
his _Ode to Brutus_, wherein he had extolled the genius of his hero, and
praised liberty in language too enthusiastic for the Court of Charles
II. The spirit of melancholy claimed Cowley for her own. Disappointment
and disgust clouded his heart; ill-health followed, and soon the poor
poet breathed his last. As is not unusual, the learned and the great
mourned over and praised the dead poet whom when alive they had so
cruelly neglected.
Antoine Danchet was one of the most famous of French dramatic writers,
although his poetry was not of a very high order and lacked energy and
colour. He was born at Riom, in Auvergne, in 1671; he distinguished
himself at the college of the Oratorian fathers, and soon came to Paris
to become a teacher of youths and to finish his studies at the Jesuit
College. At a very early age he manifested a great love of poetry, and
when he used to recite the whole of Horace he was rewarded by a wealthy
patron with a present of thirty _louis d'ors_. He bore so noble a
character and had such a reputation for learning that a certain noble
lady on her death-bed entrusted him with the charge of her two sons,
giving him a pension of two hundred livres, on the condition that he
should never leave them. Soon after her death he was ordered to write
some verses for a ballet produced at Court; this led him to acquire
a taste for the theatre, and he produced in 1700 an opera entitled
_Hésione_, which met with a great success. The relations of his pupils
were aroused. It was scandalous that a teacher of youths should write
plays. All the arguments that superstition could suggest were used
against him. He must relinquish his charge; he must refund the pension
which he had received from the mistaken mother. But Danchet saw no
reason why he should conform to their demands, and refused to relinquish
his charge. They urged him still more vehemently, but met with the same
response. They at length refused to pay him the pension, and withdrew
his pupils from his care. A troublesome law-suit followed, but at length
the poet emerged triumphant from the troubles in which his love of
the drama had involved him. He produced also the tragedies of _Cyrus,
Tyndarides, Héraclides_, and _Nitétis_, but these did not meet with
the success of his earlier work. He was a devoted son to his mother,
depriving himself of even the necessaries of life in order to support
her. He showed himself a kind and generous friend to all, and always
took a keen interest in young men. One of these brought him an elegy
written to his mistress and bewailing her misfortunes. The verses began
with _Maison qui renfermes l'objet de mon amour_. "Is not that word
_maison_ rather feeble?" observed Danchet; "would not _palais, beau
lieu_ ... be better?" "Yes," replied the poet, "but it is a _maison de
force_, a prison!" A complete edition of his works was published after
his death in 1751.
The younger Crébillon (Claude Prosper Jolyot) was confined in the
Bastille on account of his satirical romance _Tanzai et Néadarné_ (1734,
2 vols., in-12). His father, Prosper Crébillon, was a very famous French
dramatic poet, and discarded the profession of the law for the sake
of the Muses. _Idomeneus, Atreus Electra, Rhadamistus_, and the
_Triumvirate_ were some of his works. The son possessed much of
his father's genius, and his wit and gaiety rendered him a pleasant
companion. At one time he was a great favourite amongst the _élite_ of
Parisian society. But his satirical and licentious romances brought
him into trouble, and the above-mentioned work conducted him to the
Bastille, wherein so many authors have been incarcerated. He died in
1777.
The name is not known of a young man who came to Paris with a marvellous
play which he felt sure would electrify the world and cover its author
with glory. Unhappily, he met with a cold reception by a stern critic,
who, with merciless severity, pointed out the glaring errors in his
beloved work. The poor author, overcome with vexation, returned home
with a broken heart, burnt his tragedy, and died of grief.
M. Nogaret is not the only author who has been unfortunate in the
selection of a subject for a romance. He wrote a book entitled _La
Capucinade_ (1765), and the heroes of his story are the Capuchin monks,
whom he treated somewhat severely. This work and his _Mémoires de
Bachaumont_ conducted the author to the Bastille.
Few are ignorant of that most charming, graceful, and immortal
work _Télémache_. Not only has it been studied and admired by every
Frenchman, but it has been translated into German, English, Spanish,
Flemish, and Italian. But in spite of the great popularity which the
work has enjoyed, perhaps few are acquainted with the troubles which
this poetic drama and romance brought upon its honoured author. François
de Salignac de la Mothe Fénélon, born in the castle of his ancestors
at Fénélon in 1651, was a man of rare piety, virtue, and learning,
who deservedly attained to the highest ecclesiastical honours, and was
consecrated Archbishop of Cambray. He had previously been appointed by
Louis XIV. tutor to the Dauphin, and his wit and grace made him a great
favourite at the Court, and even Madame de Maintenon for a time
smiled upon the noble churchman, whose face was so remarkable for its
expressiveness that, according to the Court chronicler Saint Simon, "it
required an effort to cease looking at him." His _Fables_ and _Dialogues
of the Dead_ were written for his royal pupil. It is well known that
the Archbishop sympathised strongly with Madame Guyon and the French
mystics, that he did not approve of some of the extravagant expressions
of that ardent enthusiast, but vindicated the pure mysticism in his
famous work _Maximes des Saints_. This work involved him in controversy
with Bossuet, and through the influence of Louis XIV. a bull was
wrung from Pope Innocent XII. condemning the book, and declaring that
twenty-three propositions extracted from it were "rash, scandalous, and
offensive to pious ears, pernicious and erroneous." The Pope was very
reluctant to pass this sentence of condemnation, and was induced to do
so through fear of Louis, and not because he considered the book to be
false. With his usual gentleness, Fénélon accepted the sentence without
a word of protest; he read the brief in his own cathedral, declaring
that the decision of his superiors was to him an echo of the Divine
Will. Fénélon had aroused the hatred of Madame de Maintenon by opposing
her marriage with the King, which took place privately in 1685, and she
did not allow any opportunity to escape of injuring and persecuting
the Archbishop. At this juncture, through the treachery of a servant,
_Télémache_ was published. At first it was received with high favour at
Court. It inculcated the truth that virtue is the glory of princes and
the happiness of nations, and while describing the adventures of the
son of Ulysses its author strove to establish the true system of
state-craft, and his work is imbued with a sense of beauty and
refinement which renders it a most pleasurable book to read. But Madame
de Maintenon was grievously offended by its success, and by the praise
which even Louis bestowed upon it. She easily persuaded him that the
work was a carefully executed satire directed against the ministers
of the Court, and that even the King himself was not spared. Malignant
tongues asserted that Madame de Montespan, the King's former mistress,
might be recognised under the guise of Calypso, Mademoiselle de
Fontanges in Eucharis, the Duchess of Bourgogne in Antiope, Louvois in
Prothésilas, King James in Idoménée, and Louis himself in Sésostris.
This aroused that monarch's indignation. Fénélon was banished from
Court, and retired to Cambray, where he spent the remaining years of his
life, honoured by all, and beloved by his many friends. Strangers came
to listen to his words of piety and wisdom. He performed his episcopal
duties with a care and diligence worthy of the earliest and purest ages
of the Church, and in this quiet seclusion contented himself in doing
good to his fellow-creatures, in spite of the opposition of the King,
the censures of the Pope, and the vehement attacks of his controversial
foes Bossuet and the Jansenists. In addition to his fatal book he
wrote _Démonstration de l'existence de Dieu, Réfutation du Système de
Malebranche_, and several other works.
The Jansenist Abbé Barral, in his _Dictionnaire Historique, Littéraire,
et Critique, des Hommes Célèbres_, thus speaks of our author and his
work: "He composed for the instruction of the Dukes of Burgundy, Anjou,
and Berri several works; amongst others, the Telemachus--a singular
book, which partakes at once of the character of a romance and of a
poem, and which substitutes a prosaic cadence for versification. But
several luscious pictures would not lead us to suspect that this book
issued from the pen of a sacred minister for the education of a prince;
and what we are told by a famous poet is not improbable, that Fénélon
did not compose it at Court, but that it is the fruits of his retreat in
his diocese. And indeed the amours of Calypso and Eucharis should not
be the first lessons that a minister ought to give to his scholars; and,
besides, the fine moral maxims which the author attributes to the Pagan
divinities are not well placed in their mouth. Is not this rendering
homage to the demons of the great truths which we receive from
the Gospel, and to despoil Jesus Christ to render respectable the
annihilated gods of paganism? This prelate was a wretched divine,
more familiar with the light of profane authors, than with that of the
fathers of the Church." The Jansenists were most worthy men, but in
their opinion of their adversary Fénélon they were doubtless mistaken.