measures resorted to which could have given any chance of imposing on the public. The silence of Mad. Dutour, by whose inadvertence the discovery is principally made, ought at all events to have been in the first place secured.

But the principal defect of the story is, that it has been left unfinished, so that the mind remains disappointed and unsatisfied. Yet had the conclusion been as far inferior to the last half of the novel as that portion is to the first, the indolence of Marivaux has detracted little from his own fame, or the amusement of posterity.

It is chiefly in what I have formerly styled the Ornaments of Romance that Marivaux excels. In portrait painting, indeed, he is unrivalled: he has drawn with inimitable art of distinction the natural goodness of Madame Miran, and the enlightened virtue of her friend Madame Dorsin. The character of Marianne is a mixed one. Vanity seems her ruling passion, but it is of a species so natural and inoffensive that it only excites a smile, and never raises contempt nor disgust, nor a wish for her mortification. The author is never só happy as when he exposes the false pretences of assumed characters, the insolence of wealth, the arrogance of power or grandeur, the devices of mere formal or exterior religion, and the dissimu

lation of friends. He has also well represented the harshness of benefactors, their still more revolting compassion, and the thin veil of delicacy which they sometimes assume. But of all subjects, he has most happily depicted the stupid curiosity and offensive kindness of the vulgar. He had an opportunity for this species of delineation in the character of Madame Dutour, who pierces the hearts of those she means to console and treat with cordiality. "Est il vrai," says her shop girl to Marianne," que vous n'avez ni pere ni mere, et que vous n' etes l' enfant a personne ? Taisez vous, idiote, lui dit Mad. Dutour qui vit que J' etois fachée; qui est ce qui a jamais dit aux gens qu'ils sont des enfans trouvés ? J' aimerois autant qu'on me dit que Je suis batarde." It is well known that Marivaux preferred his character of Climal to the Tartuffe of Moliere; but the delineations scarcely admit of comparison. The hypocrites in the novel and the comedy, as has been remarked in D'Alembert's eloge of Marivaux, are not of the same description. Climal is a courtly hypocrite, and accustomed to polished society: Tartuffe is a coarser and more vulgar character. The dying scene, in which Climal repents and makes atonement to Marianne, is accounted the finest part of the work: he, indeed, utters the true

and touching language of contrition, but, it must be confessed, he has too great a command of words for a person expiring of apoplexy.

-The sentiments and reflections in this novel are very numerous, and turn for the most part on the secret tricks of vanity, the deceptions of self-love in the most humiliating circumstances, and the sophisms of the passions. Marivaux untwists all the cords of the heart, but he is accused of dilating too much on a single thought, and of presenting it under every possible form. His delineations, too, have more delicacy than strength. "Le sentiment," says D'Alembert, "y est plutot peint en miniature qu'il ne l' est a grands traits;" and according to the expression of another philosopher, "il connoissoit tous les sentiers du coeur, mais il en ignoroit les grandes routes."

A chief defect of Marivaux lies in his style; of this fault the English reader cannot be so sensible as his countrymen, but all French critics concur in reprobating the singularity and affectation of his idiom.

Marivaux' Paysan Parvenu resembles his Marianne (to which, however, it is wonderfully inferior) in many of its features. It would be difficult, however, to give any analysis of a work in which there are few incidents, and of which the chief

merit consists in delineations of almost imperceptible shades of feeling and character.

The Abbé Prevot,' who holds the second rank among French novelists, is as much distinguished for imagination, as Marivaux for delicacy and knowledge of the heart. He was the first who carried the terrors of tragedy into romance; and he has been termed the Crebillon of this species of composition, as he is chiefly anxious to appal the minds of his readers by the most terrifying and dismal representations. Thus, in his earliest production, the Memoires d' un Homme de Qualité, printed in 1729, the Marquis de **** having lost a beloved wife, retires to an insulated mansion in Italy, of which the walls and pavement are covered with black cloth, except where the garments of the deceased are suspended. A gold casket, containing her heart, is placed beside him. Here he remains by torch-light for many months, which he spends in gazing on the portrait of the departed object of his affections. From this habitation he launches at once into the gaieties of a Carthusian monastery, whence he is extracted by the Duc de ***, who persuades him to accompany his son in his travels through the courts of Europe. The

See Appendix, No. 10.

story of Manon Lescaut, containing the adventures of a kept mistress and a swindler, the most singular and interesting of the novels of Prevot, has usually been appended to the Memoirs of a Man of Quality, though it was written long after, and has also been published separately. It is the history of a young man possessed of many brilliant and some estimable qualities, but who, intoxicated by a fatal and almost irresistible attachment, is hurried into the violation of every rule of conduct, and finally prefers the life of a wretched wanderer, with the worthless object of his affections, to all the advantages presented by fortune and nature.

This young man, while at college, elopes with Manon Lescaut, the heroine of the novel, and from this disgraceful connection he is never reclaimed. His mistress, unable to bear the ills of poverty, and seduced by an extravagant vanity, procures her own maintenance, and that of her lover, by the most disgraceful expedients. Yet while betraying, she preserves for him the most ardent affection. He, from corresponding motives of attachment, is induced to cheat at the gaming table, and to aid his mistress in extortion on her admirers; thus presenting in every situation the