province of fiction.  The intellect of an incisive moralist, like La Bruyere, the power of treating character as Moliere could treat it, the grand machinery of a Shakespeare, together with the portrayal of the most subtle shades of passion (the one treasury left untouched by our predecessors)—­for all this the modern novel affords free scope.  How far superior is all this to the cut-and-dried logic-chopping, the cold analysis to the eighteenth century!—­’The Novel,’ say sententiously, ‘is the Epic grown amusing.’  Instance Corinne, bring Mme. de Stael up to support your argument.  The eighteenth century called all things in question; it is the task of the nineteenth to conclude and speak the last word; and the last word of the nineteenth century has been for realities—­realities which live however and move.  Passion, in short, an element unknown in Voltaire’s philosophy, has been brought into play.  Here a diatribe against Voltaire, and as for Rousseau, his characters are polemics and systems masquerading.  Julie and Claire are entelechies—­informing spirit awaiting flesh and bones.

“You might slip off on a side issue at this, and say that we owe a new and original literature to the Peace and the Restoration of the Bourbons, for you are writing for a Right Centre paper.

“Scoff at Founders of Systems.  And cry with a glow of fine enthusiasm, ’Here are errors and misleading statements in abundance in our contemporary’s work, and to what end?  To depreciate a fine work, to deceive the public, and to arrive at this conclusion—­“A book that sells, does not sell."’ Proh pudor! (Mind you put Proh pudor! ’tis a harmless expletive that stimulates the reader’s interest.) Foresee the approaching decadence of criticism, in fact.  Moral—­’There is but one kind of literature, the literature which aims to please.  Nathan has started upon a new way; he understands his epoch and fulfils the requirements of his age—­the demand for drama, the natural demand of a century in which the political stage has become a permanent puppet show.  Have we not seen four dramas in a score of years—­the Revolution, the Directory, the Empire, and the Restoration?’ With that, wallow in dithyramb and eulogy, and the second edition shall vanish like smoke.  This is the way to do it.  Next Saturday put a review in our magazine, and sign it ‘de Rubempre,’ out in full.

“In that final article say that ’fine work always brings about abundant controversy.  This week such and such a paper contained such and such an article on Nathan’s book, and such another paper made a vigorous reply.’  Then you criticise the critics ‘C’ and ‘L’; pay me a passing compliment on the first article in the Debats, and end by averring that Nathan’s work is the great book of the epoch; which is all as if you said nothing at all; they say the same of everything that comes out.