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 letters, he again broke it with bis admirable satire of the Femmes Savantes. We do not recollect any similar revolution effected by a single effort of genius, unless it be that brought about by the Baviad and Mæviad. But Mr. Gifford, in the Della-Cruscan school, but "broke a butterfly upon the wheel," in comparison with those enemies, formidable by rank and talent, whom Molière assailed. We have noticed, in its proper place, the influence which his writings had in compelling the medical faculty of his day to lay aside the affected deportment, technical jargon, and other mummeries then in vogue, by means of the public derision to which he had deservedly exposed them, In the same manner, he so successfully ridiculed the miserable dialectics, pedantry, and intolerance of the schoolmen, in his diverting dialogues between Dr. Marphurius and Dr. Pancrace, that he is said to have completely defeated the serious efforts of the University for obtaining a confirmation of the decree of 1624, which had actually prohibited, under pain of death, the promulgation of any opinion contrary to the doctrines of Aristotle. The arrêt burlesque of his friend Boileau, at a later period, if we may trust the Menagiana, had a principal share in preventing a decree of the Parliament against the philosophy of Descartes, It is difficult to estimate the influence of our poet's satire on the state of society in general, and on those higher ranks in particular whose affectations and pretensions he assailed with such pertinacious hostility, If he did not reform them, he at least depri-