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 CORNEILLE

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CORNEILLE

the "elder Corneille" (Corneille I'Afne), to distin- guish him from a younger brother, Jean-Baptiste Corneille, also a painter. His father was the first and the most indefatigable of his teachers; his other masters were Mignard and the celebrated Lebrun. Devoting himself wholly to historical painting, Mi- chel won the Academy Prize and went to Rome on the king's pension; but feeling his genius hampered by the restrictions of the prize, he gave up the money so that he might study the antique in his own way. Coming under the then powerful influence of the Eclectics, he studied with the Carracci and mod- elled his style on theirs. In 16G3 he returned to Paris and was elected a member of the Royal Acad- emy, his pictiu'e on entering being "Our Lord's Ap- pearance to St. Peter after His Resurrection". In 1673 he became an adjunct, and, in 1690, a full, pro- fessor in the Academy.

Corneille painted for the king at Versailles, Meudon, and p'ontainebleau, and decorated in fresco many of the great Paris churches, notably Notre-Dame, the church of the Capuchins, and the chapel of Saint- Gr^goire in the Invalides. His style, reminiscent of the old masters, is the conventional style of the Ec- lectics; his drawing is remarkably careful and exact, the expression on the faces of his religious subjects is dignified and noble, the management of chiar- oscuro excellent, and the composition harmonious, but suggestive of the Venetian School. From his insuf- ficient knowledge of the composition of pigments, the colour in many of his pictures has suffered such a change that it is to-day disagreeable; but the artist possessed a good colour-sense, and contemporary records go to jjrove that his colour was refined and pleasing. He etched and engraved over a hundred plates in a bold and free style, for he was a master of the line; but he subsequently spoiled the effect by too much and too precise work with the graver. A dishonest dealer put Raphael's name on some of Michel Corneille 's plates, anil for a long time no one disputed their attribution to the great master. For many years Corneille resided at the Gobelins manu- factory, and was sometimes called " Corneille des Gobelins". Among his painting.s are a "Repose in Egypt", now in the Louvre, and a "Baptism of Con- stantine", in the museum at Bordeau.x. Among his more important etched and engraved works are: "The Nativity"; "Flight into Egypt"; "Abraham journeying with Lot" (wrongly ascribed to Raphael), and "Jacob wrestling with the Angel", a plate after Annibale Carracci.

Memoirea inedits siir la vie et les ouvrages de V Academic rot/ale de peinlure (Paris, 1884); Atlgemeines Kunstlerlexikon (Berlin, 1870): Durrien, La peinlure fi V ex-position de primi- tifs franrais (Paris, 1904).

Leigh Hunt.

Corneille, Michel, the elder Michel, a French painter, etcher, and engraver, b. in Orleans about 1601; d. at Paris, 1664. He was one of many who studied with that celebrated master, Simon Vouet, who exerted a despotic influence over the French School, and impressed his artistic personality so strongly on all his pupils. Michel devoted himself to historical paintings, and was one of the twelve original members of the Royal Academy at its founda- tion in 1648. He became its rector in 1656. He was an excellent colourist — in this more Venetian than French — and his early style resembled that of Simon Vouet; later liis work had all the merits and all the faults of the post-Raphaehte, or decadent, "sweet", school of Italian art, showing the far-reaching in- fluence of the Carracci. He was long employed in the decoration of churches in Paris, his masterpiece being the celebrated "St. Paul and St. Barnabas at Lystra", painted for the Cathedral of Notre-Dame. His etched and engraved work differed very little from that of the Carracci and of his two sons. It was

chiefly reproductive. Notable examples are the "Murder of the Innocents", after Raphael, and the "Virgin Suckling the Infant Jesus", after Lodovico Carracci.

Meyer. Geschichte der franzosischen Malerei (Leipzig, 1867); see, also, bibliography under Cor.n'eille, Michel (the Younger). Leigh Hunt.

Corneille, Pierre, a French dramatist, b. at Rouen, 6 June, 1606; d. at Paris, 1 October, 1684. His father, Pierre Corneille, was avocat du roi and maltre des eaux et forets in the Vicomt^ of Rouen. His mother, Marthe Lepesant, belonged to an old family of Normandy. He was educated at the Jesuit college in Rouen, studied law at Caen, and was ad- mitted to the Bar in 1624. Four years later he was granted the office of Advocate to the Admiralty. Although the duties of his charge allowed liim leisure enough to follow his poetical voca- tion, he soon quitted the Bar and went to Paris, in 1629. The first comedy he produced, " M6- lite" (1629), met with so great a sur- cessthathe resohi'l to write for tli'' stage. Other play^ followed rapidly "Clitandre" (163-' i, "La Veuve", " La galerie du palais ' (16.3:!), "La sui- vante", "La place royale" (1634), "M6d^e" (1635), "L'illusion comique" (1636). Cardinal Richelieu, who took a great interest in dramatic matters and was even the writer of several plays, realized that the young author had some talent and enrolled him, in 1633, among "the five autliors", who.se functions consisted in revising and polishing the plays written by the great politician. Corneille was too indepen- dent a genius to get along easily with the autocratic playwright; he was dismissed, in 1635, because he had no esprit de suite, and returned to Rouen.

The year 1636 saw the production of " Le Cid" which marked the beginning of a new epoch in the French drama. Its remarkable success aroused Richelieu's anger and jealousy to such a degree that the French Academy, which was so much indebted to the great cardinal, was obliged to criticize the play in a public pamphlet, known as "Les sentiments de r.\cad^mie sur le Cid", written, under command, b' Chapelain. The public, however, admired "Le Cid none the less, and, as Boileau said, "all Paris saw Rodrigue with the same eyes as Chimene". After a silence of four years Corneille brought out " Horace and "Cinna" (1640). The poet was then in full pos- session of his talent and from this time to the year 1651 produced a series of plays, most of which are masterpieces: "Polyeucte", a Christian tragedy, perhaps the most perfect of Corneille's plays; "Pom- pee"; "Le Mentcur" (1643), a comedy; "Theodore, vierge et niartyre", a very poor drama which failed; "La suite du mcnteur" (1645); "Rodogune" (1646); "Heraclius" (1047); "Andromedo" (1650); "Don Sanche d'.\ragon" (16,50); "Nicomcde" (1651). Cor- neille was elected to the French Academy in 1647. Alter "Pertharitc" (1653), which was a decided failure, lie resolved to quit the stage, and in his retreat at Rouen began to translate the "Imitation of Christ" at the solicitation of Queen .\nne of .\ustria. \ few years later, vielding to Folic piet's entreaties, he began again to write plays: "(Edipe" (1659), "Sertorius" (1662),