L. 16. _Sans aller_ refers to _me_, the object in the principal clause.
_Sans que j'aille_ would be better syntax. But the prepositional
infinitive was used in older French in a still more disconnected manner.
'Rends-le-moi _sans te fouiller_,' writes Molière, _L'Avare_ I. iii.,
could easily be more explicit, with: 'without _me_ or _my_ searching
you,' See Haase, § 85 D.
Ll. 16-19. See Boileau, _Sat._ ix. 221-5, who is here excellently
satirized.
L. 28. An allusion to the fable of the Fox and the Grapes. La Fontaine,
_Fab._ III. xi.
L. 41. _Non d'aller._ An abrupt change in the construction. The meaning
is: 'But it is not useful to go...'
Ll. 47-60. The germ of all this development is in a letter of Chénier to
his friend de Pange: 'Tu sais combien mes muses sont vagabondes. Elles
ne peuvent achever promptement un seul projet; elles en font marcher
cent à la fois (a general marshalling his troops, ll. 49, 50). Elles
font un pied à ce poème et une épaule à celui-là. Ils boitent tous
et ils seront sur pieds tous ensemble (The image of the sculptor, ll.
51-6). Elles les couvent tous à la fois; ils sortiront tous à la fois'
(the simile of incubation, ll. 57-60).
L. 59. _Sauront._ This use of _savoir_, as also that of _pouvoir_, so
frequent in French, in sentences where the English translation is fain
to omit them, is a French idiom, especially noticeable in the language
of the seventeenth century. An Englishman cannot help being made aware
of this feature when reading Molière, for instance.
L. 71. _des traits._ Whatever there is that is salient, striking,
brilliant, in a literary composition, LITTRÉ says, s.v. 31°: fine
touches.
Ll. 73. _inspire._ For the verb in the singular see note to p. 25, l.
74.
Ll. 79-92. Here the simile of the founder has displaced that of the
potter in the letter quoted above: 'L'argile que j'avais amollie et
humectée pour en faire un pot à l'eau, sous mon doigt capricieux,
devient une tasse ou une théière.'