Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 39.djvu/96

86 this incident, and the rejection of Molière, Boileau, La Bruyère, and Pascal; but these were almost the only exceptions to the rule that the greatest names in French literature were among the "Forty Immortals." And, as a matter of fact, Corneille was later on elected to membership, as were also Boileau and La Bruyère. If Molière was rejected because he was an actor, is it not currently reported that Henry Irving in our day is denied a knighthood for a like reason? But even of this action the Academy has thought better, for Molière's bust, which has been placed in the Salle des Séances, bears these words, "Bien ne manque à sa gloire; il manquait à la notre."

There are no two opinions as to the influence of the Academy upon the French language. It can be said, almost without exaggeration, that the French language has made greater conquests than the French army, for surely it has subdued courts where the French soldier had been impotent. As to its efficiency as a vehicle for literature classified as belles-lettres, it is the language par excellence, and its influence upon the world's literature is still tremendous. In clearness of expression, in perfection of form, in all that is meant by style, the French language is perhaps second only to the ancient Greek.

What the schools and philosophers of Athens did toward the perfection of the Ionic dialect, the French Academy has done for the French. Could there be any higher term of encomium than this? Yet this is the heritage of the Academy—not of one individual or of one generation, but of the accretions of generations of men laboring toward one end.

From the halcyon days of le Grande Monarque, three of the academies—II, III, and IV—date their beginning.

L'Academie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, originally appointed to prepare inscriptions and mottoes for medals for King Louis XIV, became a chartered body under Colbert in 1663, when its scope was widened by assuming as its province the discussion of archæology in its various bearings.

L'Académie des Beaux-Arts arose from the Académie de Peinture, founded by Le Brun in 1648, and enlarged and incorporated by Colbert in 1664, as the Académie Royale de Peinture et Sculpture; it busies itself with painting, sculpture, architecture, and music.

L'Académie des Sciences Morales et Politiques is the youngest of the five, dating only from 1832, and has for its especial investigation mental philosophy, jurisprudence, and political economy.