Page:Works of Voltaire Volume 36.djvu/75

Rh  Meantime in an apartment by, Which Girardon and Puget vie With statues to adorn, where taste As well as just expression's traced; Poussin upon stretched canvas showed What genius in his bosom glowed. Le Brun with elevated mind, And genius nobly bold, designed. Le Sueur, in his art complete, Between both painters took his seat; None murmured to behold him there, All owned him worthy of the chair. The god, who with a critic eye Could every pencil's stroke espy, Grieved, whilst he much admired their art, They could not to their works impart Those vivid colors, whose bright glow On nature's self new charms bestow. A crowd of loves before him played, And to his touch new force conveyed, And raised each beauty to its height, By adding Rubens' colors bright. I was surprised that I did not meet at the sanctuary several persons, who, sixty or eighty years ago, passed for the greatest favorites of the God of Taste. The Pavillons, the Benserades, the Pellissons, the Segraises, the St. Évremonds, the Balzacs, the Voitures, were no longer in possession of the first places. They possessed them heretofore, said one of my guides; they made a figure before the bright period of the learned world; but they have at length given place to men of real genius. At present they are