former level, and betrayed, not so much the decay of genius from the growing infirmities of nature, as that fatal mistake in writing themselves out, so common to authors in the province of imagination. The cold reception of Pertharite disgusted the poet, and he renounced the stage in a splenetic little preface to the printed play, complaining that "he had been an author too long to be a fashionable one." The turmoil of the court and the gaiety of the theatre had not effaced his early sentiments of piety and religion; he therefore betook himself to the translation of Kempis's Imitation of Jesus Christ, which he performed very finely. This gave rise to a ridiculous and unfounded story, that the first book was imposed on him as a penance; the second, by the Queen's command; and the third, by the terrors of conscience during a severe illness. As the mortification of failure faded away with time, his passion for the theatre revived. Notwithstanding some misgivings, he was encouraged by Fouquet Destrin in 1659, after six years' absence. He began again, with more benefit to his popularity than to his true fame, with Edipus ;-the noblest and most pathetic subject, most nobly treated, of ancient tragedy. La Toison d'Or came next; a spectacle got up for the King's marriage ;-a species of piece in which the poet always plays a subordinate part to the scenepainter and the dress-maker. Sertorius is to be noticed as having given scope to the fine declamatory powers of Mademoiselle Clairon, the Siddons of the French stage. Berenice rose to an unenviable fame, principally in consequence of the following circumstances. Henrietta of England, then Duchess of Orleans, whom Fontenelle had the good manners to compliment as 66 a princess who had a high relish for works of genius, and had been able to call forth some sparks of it even in a barbarous country," privately set Corneille and Racine to work on the same subject. Their pieces were represented at the same time; and the struggle between a worn-out veteran and a champion in the vigour of youth, terminated, as might have been expected, in the victory of the latter. This literary contest was known by the title of " the duel." The experiment proves the love of mischief, but says little for the good taste or benevolence of the royal instigator. Pulchérie and Surena were his last productions: both better than Berenice, with sufficient merit to render the close of his literary life respectable, if not splendid. The personal history of Corneille furnishes little anecdote: we have only further to state, that he was chosen a member of the French Academy in 1647, and was Dean of that society at the time of his death, which took place in 1684, in his seventy-ninth year. He is said to have been a man of a devout and melancholy cast. He spoke little in company, even on subjects which his pursuits had made his own. The author of 'Mélanges d'Histoire et du Literature,' a work published under the name of Vigneut Marville, but really written by the Père Bonaventure d'Ayounne, a Cistercian monk of Paris, says, that "the first time he saw him, he took him for a tradesman of Rouen. His conversation was so heavy as to be extremely tiresome if it lasted long." But whatever might be the outward coarseness or dulness of the man, he was mild of temper in his family, a good husband, parent, and friend. His worth and integrity were unquestionable; nor had his connexion with the court, of which he was not fond, taught him that art of cringing, so necessary to fortune and promotion. Hence his reputation was almost the only advantage accruing to him from his productions. His works have been VOL. II. 2 A often printed, and consist of more than thirty plays, tragedies and comedies. Those who wish for a more detailed account of this great writer will find it in his Life, by Fontenelle, in Voltaire's several prefaces, in Racine's Speech to the French Academy, on the admission of his brother Thomas, and in Bayle. Many scattered remarks on him may also be found throughout Dryden's critical prefaces. THE celebrated physician, Thomas Sydenham, in many respects the most eminent that England has produced, was born in the year 1624, at WynfordEagle, in Dorsetshire, where his father, William Sydenham, enjoyed a considerable estate. The mansion in which he was born is now converted into a farm-house, and stands on the property of Lord Wynford. In the year 1642, when eighteen, he was admitted as a commoner at Magdalen-Hall, Oxford; but quitted it in the same year, when that city became the head-quarters of the royal army, after the battle of Edgehill. He was probably induced to take this step by reasons of a political nature; for we find that his family were active adherents of the opposite party. Indeed he is said, though on doubtful authority, to have held a commission himself under the Parliament during his absence from Oxford; and his elder brother, William, is known to have attained consider able rank in the republican army, and held important commands under the Protectorate. The political bias of his family is not without interest, as affording a probable explanation of some circumstances in his life which would otherwise be rather unaccountable, such as the fact, that though he reached the first eminence as a practising physician, he was never employed at court, and was slighted by the college, who invested him with none of their honours, nor even advanced him to the fellowship, though a licentiate of their body, and qualified by the requisite University education. When Oxford was surrendered to the Parliament, Sydenham determined to resume his academical studies; and passing through London on his way, he met accidentally with Dr. Thomas Coxe, a physician of some repute at that time, who was attending his brother. The choice of a profession became the subject of a conversation between them, which determined him in favour of medicine; for in a letter addressed to Dr. Mapletoft, thirty years after this time, which forms the preface to one of his writings, he refers with much warmth to this conversation as the origin of his professional zeal, and, consequently, of whatever useful advances he had made in medicine. Thus his success, both in the practice and reformation of his art, may show the advantage of waiting till the faculties are fully matured, before they are exercised in a study which requires independence as well as vigour in thinking for the circumstances of his family being sufficiently affluent to place him above the necessity of choosing a profession early, he had not turned his attention to physic till an age at which the medical education is generally almost completed. We are not, however, to believe in the justice of an accusation brought against him, that he had never studied his profession till he began to practise it; for : |