Chapter 11

"Will he lend us the money at one per cent a month? Once out of this pecuniary strait, we can marry Angélique, and be rich and virtuous. Besides, we have assets as well as debts: here is our schedule."

The elder softens a little and takes the paper. At the head of the list of debts he finds Hector's bill for wages and services rendered, leading off a long file of Aarons and Levys; and the assets consist of a debt of honor owing by an officer killed at the Battle of Fleurus, and the good-will of a match at _tric-trac_ with a poor player who had already lost games enough to make his defeat certain.

The action of the comedy does not lag or limp from the opening scene to Valère's last words. The versification is easy and natural; the dialogue abounds in wit and comic humor; it is short and quick, with none of those tedious declamations which weary and unsettle the attention of an audience. Take it all in all, we may say, that, if Molière had chosen the same subject, he could hardly have handled it better.

Not that Regnard can pretend to rank with Molière in genius, or even near him. The "Gambler" is admirably done; but it is the only comedy in which Regnard attempted character. He drew from his experience. Molière was so skilful a moral anatomist that he required only a whim or a weakness to construct a consistent character. This wonderful man found the French comic stage occupied by a few stock personages, imported from Spain and Italy. The elders were fathers or uncles, rich, miserly, and perverse, instinctively disposed to keep a tight rein on the young people, of whose personal expenses and matrimonial projects they invariably disapproved. The persecuted juniors were all alike, colorless shadows, mere lay figures to hang a plot on: _Léandre, amant de Célimène; Célimène amante de Léandre_: helpless creatures, who would have been quite at the mercy of the old dragons of the story, were it not for the powerful assistance of the rascally soubrettes. These clever sinners abounded in cunning contrivances, disguises, and tricks, which resulted in the signal discomfiture of the parents and guardians. In the last act, they are forced to consent to all the marriages, and are cheated out of most of their property; they are even lucky to escape with their lives. There was no mercy for Age in those plays.

"Pluck the lined crutch from the old limping sire; With it beat out his brains."

The theatre was the temple of youth, of love, and of feasting. Away with the dull old people! Providence created them only to pay the bills.

"Fuyez d'ici, sombre vieillesse,-- Car en amour les vieillards ne sont bons Qu'à payer les violons."

Did gentlemen of a certain age go to the theatre in the seventeenth century? expend their money to see themselves abused and ridiculed? Did they laugh at these indignities and enjoy them? We might wonder, if we did not know that Frenchmen never grow old, so long as they have an eye left for ogling or a leg to caper with.

Molière took these old inhabitants of the stage into his service, and injected new life into their veins. He gave them the foibles, the follies, and the vices he saw about him, and made them speak in a new language of unrivalled wit, humor, and mirth. But his genius was shackled by the artificial conventions of the theatre, which did not allow him time or space to fully develop a character. A grand comic creation like Falstaff was impossible. He introduces a single propensity of mankind, exhibits it in all its relations to society, shows it to us on every side; but it remains only a trait of character, although we see it in half a dozen different lights. Tartuffe is the one exception; in him, hypocrisy hides covetousness and lust; and Tartuffe is Molière's masterpiece. But in most of his comedies he displays rather a knowledge of the world than a knowledge of human nature. In his walk he has no equal at home or abroad; but his walk is not the highest. We feel that something is wanting, and yet we can hardly extol him too highly. He brought comedy into close relation with every-day life; he is the father of the modern French stage, which has gradually cast off the old conventional personages. The French dramatists of to-day are not men of genius like Molière, but, in their airy, sparkling plays, they represent the freaks, follies, and fancies of society so exquisitely that nothing remains to be desired. They furnish the model and the materials for the theatre of all other nations.

When Regnard came before the public, the stage remained as Molière had left it The only new personage was the Marquis, first introduced in the "Mère Coquette," by Quinault, the sweet and smooth writer of operas,--of whom it was said, that he had boned (_désossé_) the French language. The Marquis is the ancestor of our Fop,--

"Loose in morals and in manners vain, In conversation frivolous, in dress extreme,"--

who in turn has become antiquated and tiresome. Regnard's only original character is the Gambler; in his other comedies he made use of the old, familiar masks, and won success by his keen sense of the ridiculous, his wit, and his unceasing jollity and fun. His Crispins and Scapins are perfect. What impudent, worthless, amusing rogues! To keep inside of the law is their only rule of right. "Honesty is a fool, and Trust, his sworn brother, a very simple gentleman." They came of an ancient race, these Crispins and Scapins, that had flourished in Italy and in Spain since Plautus and Terence brought them over from Greece. They found their way to France, and even reached England in their migration, following in the train of Charles II. when he returned from exile, and during a short life on that side of the Channel added drunkenness and brutality to their gayer vices. The character was true to Nature in Athens or in Rome, where men of talent might often be bound to devote their brains to the service of those who owned their bodies, and by their condition as slaves were released from all obligations of honor or of honesty. In the seventeenth century it might pass in France; for the line between gentle and simple was so sharply drawn that ladies of rank saw no greater impropriety in disrobing before their footmen than before their dogs. But the progress of liberty or of _égalité_ blotted out the valets of comedy. Even in Regnard's time the inconsistencies of the character were noticed. Jasmin, in the "Sérénade," utters revolutionary doctrine:--"How can an honorable valet devote himself to the interests of a penniless master? We grow tricky in waiting upon such fellows. They scold us; sometimes they beat us. We have more wit than they. We support them; we are obliged to invent, for their benefit, all sorts of knavery, in which they are always ready to take a share; and, withal, they are the masters, and we the servants. It is not just. Hereafter I mean to scheme for myself, and become a master in my turn."

Scapin has joined his brother pagans beyond the Styx; but Lisette blooms in evergreen youth. This young French person's theory of woman's rights is different from the one which obtains in New England; nor does she trouble herself at all to seek for woman's mission. She found it years ago. It is to deceive a man. She is satisfied with her condition, and with the old mental and moral attributes of her sex. When Crispin disguises himself in her clothes, he exclaims,--

"L'addresse et l'artifice ont passé dans mon coeur; Qu'on a sous cet habit et d'esprit et de ruse-- Rien n'est si trompeur qu'animal porte-jupe."

This animal is as clever and as cunning in Paris to-day as when Crispin felt the inspiration of the petticoats.

In 1708, after another period of twelve years, "Le Légataire Universel" was played at the same theatre. In this piece the author relied entirely upon the _vis comica_ of his plot and dialogue. Géronte, a rich, miserly old bachelor, with as many ailments as years,--

"Vieux et cassé, fiévreux, épileptique, Paralytique, étique, asthmatique, hydropique,"--

has for a nephew Ergaste, with well-grounded hopes of inheriting, and that shortly. These are suddenly dashed by the announcement that his uncle has resolved to marry Isabelle, a girl to whom Ergaste himself is attached. The nephew keeps his own secret, and judiciously commends the choice of his uncle. Géronte is delighted with him; even asks his advice about a present for the damsel,--something pretty, but cheap.

"Je voudrais inventer quelque petit cadeau Qui coutât peu, mais qui parût nouveau."

Meeting with no opposition, the old gentleman gradually loses his relish for matrimony; and Madame Argante, the mother, promises Ergaste to give Isabelle to him, instead of to his uncle, provided Géronte will declare his nephew heir to his estate. Unluckily, there are two other collaterals, country cousins, whom Géronte has never seen, but whom he wishes to remember. Crispin, valet to Ergaste, assisted by Lisette, the old man's housekeeper and nurse, personifies first the male and then the female relative from the rural districts so well that Géronte orders them out of his house in disgust, swears that he will not leave them a sous, and sends for a notary to draw his will in favor of Ergaste. But the excitement of the last interview with Crispin, as a widow, is too much for his strength. He becomes unconscious, and apparently breathes his last just as the notary knocks at the door. In this moment of agonizing disappointment, the indomitable Crispin comes to the rescue. He puts on the dressing-gown and cap of Géronte, reclines in his easy-chair, counterfeits his voice, and dictates a will to the notary. Firstly, he bequeaths to Lisette two thousand crowns, on condition that she marry Crispin; secondly, he leaves to Crispin an annuity of fifteen hundred crowns, to reward his devotion to his master; the rest of the estate, real and personal, to go to Ergaste. The residuary legatee remonstrates warmly with the testator against his foolish generosity to Crispin and Lisette; but the sham Géronte insists, and Ergaste is obliged to submit. The notary withdraws to make the necessary copies of the will, and the plotters are chuckling over the success of their plans, when, to their dismay, Géronte enters, alive. He tells them that he feels his strength departing, and bids them send at once for the notary to settle his worldly affairs. The notary, who is ignorant of any deceit, assures him that he has made his will already, and shows him the document. The conspirators seize the chance of escape, confirm the notary's story, and relate all the circumstances of the conference, Géronte protests that he recollects nothing of it; he feels certain he could not have given more than twenty crowns to Lisette; as to Crispin, he had never heard of him. The answer is always, "_C'est votre léthargie_." While perplexed and hesitating, the old man discovers that a large sum in notes has been abstracted from his hoard. Ergaste had secured them as an alleviation in case of the worst, and had placed them in the hands of Isabelle. She promises to return them, if Géronte will make Ergaste his heir and her husband. In his anxiety for his money, Géronte consents to everything, and allows the will to stand.

Nothing, La Harpe tells us, ever made a French audience laugh so heartily as the scene of the will. Falbaire, one of the _poètes négligés_ of the eighteenth century, says, in a note to his drama, "The Monks of Japan," that the Jesuits furnished Regnard with the idea of this scene. In 1626, the reverend fathers, by precisely the same stratagem employed by Crispin, obtained possession of the estate of a M. d'Ancier of Bésançon, who died suddenly and intestate. It is proper to add that M. Falbaire's drama was written against the Jesuits.

There are two other plays, out of some twenty that Regnard published, which will repay a reader: "Les Menéchmes," imitated from Plautus, like Shakspeare's Dromios, and "Démocrite,"[G] which reminds one a little of Molière's "Amphitryon." Both are distinguished for that perpetual gayety, the most pleasing of all qualities, which is the characteristic of their author. It seems impossible for him to be dull; he never nods; his bow, such as it is, is always strung. It is remarkable that his comic scenes, although crammed with fun, never run down into farce; nor does he find it necessary to eke out his wit with buffoonery. He had an instinctive taste which preserved him from coarseness; although he wrote a century and a half ago, there is less of the low and indelicate than in the plays we see posted at the doors of our theatres. The French of the time of Louis XIV. must have been a much more refined people than the contemporary English. At least, Thalia in Paris was a vestal, compared with her tawdry, indecent, and drunken London sister. One is ashamed to be seen reading the unblushing profligacy of Wycherley, Cibber, Vanbrugh, and Congreve.

We must admit that Regnard's mantle of decorum is not without a rent. In the "Légataire," as in the "Malade Imaginaire," may be found a good deal of pleasantry on the first of the three principal remedies of the physicians of the period, as mentioned by Molière in his burlesque Latin:--

"Clysterium donare, Postea purgare, Ensuita seignare."

It seems to have been a good joke in France then; it is so now,--wonderfully fresh and new,--defying time and endless repetition. American eyes do not see much fun in it; they rather turn away in disgust. But on the risible organs of the French purgative medicines operate violently; and the favorite weapon of their medical service, primitive in shape and exaggerated in dimensions, is a property indispensable to every theatre. Regnard used it as a part of the stage machinery,--worked it in as a stock pleasantry, the effect of which was certain. Were he writing now, he would do the same thing. But in the "Joueur" nobody is ill; it may be read by that typical creature, the "most virtuous female," publicly and without a blush.

Gentlemen and ladies whose morals are not fully fledged are generally advised to beware of attempting to skim over the fiction of modern France. They may take up Regnard without risking a fall; for there is little danger of being led astray by the picaresque knaveries of Scapin and Lisette. In 1700 love for another man's wife had not come to be considered one of the fine arts. Nowadays the victims of this kind of misplaced affection are the heroes of French novels and plays. The husband, odious and tiresome _ex officio_, has succeeded to the miserly father or tyrannical guardian. He is the giant of French romance, who keeps the lovely and uneasy lady locked up in Castle Matrimony. He cannot help himself, poor fellow!--he is compelled to fill that unenviable position, whenever Madame chooses. Sentimental young Arthurs and Ernests stand in the place of Ergaste and Cléante, and are always ready to make war upon the unlucky giant. They overcome him as of old, scale the walls, and carry off the capricious fair one. We have hardly changed for the better. Ergaste and Cléante were not sentimental, but they were marrying men and broke no commandments.

Regnard's life of fifty years covers the whole of the literary age of Louis XIV. Before 1660 the French had no literature worth preserving, except Rabelais, Montaigne, a few odes of Malherbe, a page or two of Marot, and the tragedies of Corneille. Pascal published the "Provincial Letters" in the year of Regnard's birth. La Fontaine had written a few indifferent verses; Molière was almost unknown. In 1686, when Regnard became an author, the Voitures, Balzacs, and Benserades, the men of fantastic conceits, the vanguard of the grand army of French wits, had marched away to Pluto and to Lethe. One or two stragglers, like Ménage and Chapelle, lingered to wonder at the complete change of taste. The age had ripened fast. Not many years before, Barbin the bookseller ordered his hacks to _faire du St. Évremond_. St. Évremond was still living in England, dirty and witty; and Barbin still kept his shop, but gave no more orders for wares of that description. Many of the greatest names of the era were already carved on tombs: La Rochefoucauld, Pascal, Corneille, Molière. Bossuet was a man of sixty; La Fontaine a few years older; Boileau and Racine close upon fifty. When Regnard died, in 1710, the eighteenth century had begun. Fontenelle, Le Sage, Bayle, men of nearly the same age as himself, belong to it.

In 1686 King Louis had reached the full meridian of his _Gloire_, _Grandeur_, _Éclat_. No monarch in Europe was so powerful. He had conquered Flanders, driven the Dutch under water, seized Franche-Comté, annexed Lorraine, ravaged the Palatinate, bombarded Algiers and Genoa, and by a skilful disregard of treaties and of his royal word kept his neighbors at swords' points until he was ready to destroy them. The Emperor was afraid of him, Philip of Spain his most humble servant, Charles II. in his pay. He had bullied the Pope, and brought the Doge of Genoa to Paris to ask pardon for selling powder to the Algerines and ships to Spain. He was _Louis le Grand, le roi vraiment roi, le demi-dieu qui nous gouverne, Deodatus, Sol nec pluribus impar_. Regnard witnessed the cloudy setting of this splendid luminary. After the secret marriage with Mme. de Maintenon, in 1686, Fortune deserted the King. He was everywhere defeated, or his victories were Cadmean, as disastrous as defeats. The fleet that was to replace James II. on his throne was destroyed at La Hogue by Russell. The Camisards defied for years the army sent against them. Rooke took Gibraltar. Peterborough defeated the Bourbon forces in Spain. Blenheim, Oudenarde, Ramillies, Malplaquet, brought ruin upon France before Regnard was withdrawn from the scene.

Meanwhile the Eighteenth Century, with its godlessness and its debauchery, was born. Hypocrisy watched over its infancy. When Louis reformed, and took a pious elderly second wife, it was the fashion to be religious; and whoever wished to stand well at court followed the fashion. "You who live in France have wonderful advantages for saving your souls," wrote St. Évremond from London. "Vice is quite out of date with you. It is in bad taste to sin,--as offensive to good manners as to morality. And those of you who might be forgetful of their hereafter are led to salvation by a becoming deference to the habits and observances of well-bred people." The monarch himself was utterly ignorant in matters of religion; the Duchess of Orleans wrote to her German friends, that he had never even read the Bible. He was shocked to hear that Christ had demeaned himself to speak the language of the poor and the humble. "_Il avait la foi du charbonnier_," Cardinal Fleury said,--the blind, unreasoning faith of the African in his fetich. He considered it due to _gloire_ to assist Divine Providence in its government of the souls of men. Was he not the greatest prince of the earth, the eldest son of the Church, standing nearer to the throne of grace than any insignificant pope? Of course he was responsible for the orthodoxy of his subjects, a _demi-dieu qui nous gouverne_. He came to think religion a part of his royal prerogative, and misbelief treason against his royal person. He was quite capable of going a step beyond Cardinal Wolsey, and of writing, "_Ego et Deus meus_." He said to a prelate whose management of some ecclesiastical business particularly gratified him,--"_J'ignore si Dieu vous tiendra compte de la conduite que vous avez tenue; mais quant à moi, je vous assure que je ne l'oublierai jamais_." The spiritual powers are never backward in taking advantage of favorable circumstances: Huguenots, Jansenists, and Quietists were sternly put down, and the girdle of superstition tightened until it began to crack. The skeptics were quiet,--asked but few questions,--pretended to be satisfied with the time-honored answers Mother Church keeps for her uneasy children,--and seemed to be busy with the "Querelle des Anciens et des Modernes," and the "Dispute sur les Cérémonies Chinoises." It was not yet the time for them to announce pompously their radical theories as new and true. A thin varnish of decorum and orthodoxy overspread everything; but one may see the shadow of the coming _Régence_ in Regnard's works. He and gentlemen like him went to mass in the morning, and to pleasure for the rest of the day and night.

"Ils sont chrétiens à la messe, Ils sont païens à l'opéra."

Regnard was almost as much of a pagan as his favorite Horace,--called for wines, roses, and perfumes, and sang his Lydia and his Lalage almost in the same words. His creed and his philosophy were pagan. He adored three goddesses,--_la Comédie_, _la Musique_, _la bonne Chère_; his solution of the problem of life was enjoyment.

"Fair tout ce qu'on veut, vivre exempt de chagrin, Ne se rien refuser,--Voilà tout mon systême, Et de mes jours ainsi j'attraperai la fin."

Wisdom was given to man to temper pleasure,--to avoid excess, which destroys pleasure. Regnard had agreeable recollections of the past; the present satisfied him; he was as careless of the unknown future as De Retz, whose _épouvantable tranquillité_, appalling ease of mind on that point, so shocked poor Mme. de Sévigné. All other speculations he put quietly aside with a doubt or a _cui bono_. It was a witty and refined selfishness, and nothing beyond. Spiritual light, faith, none; hope that to-morrow might pass as smoothly as to-day; love, only that particular affection which man feels for his female fellow-creature. Such a heathenish frame of mind will find little favor in this era of yearnings, seekings, teachings. It was, indeed, a lamentable condition of moral darkness; but the error, though grievous, has its attractive side.

"On court après la vérité; Ah! croyez moi, l'erreur a son mérite."

It is a relief in these dyspeptic times to turn back to Regnard, the big, rosy, and jolly pagan, enjoying to the utmost the four blessings invoked upon the head of Argan by the chorus of Doctors:--

"Salus, honor et argentum. Arque bonum appetitum."

Comfortable, contented with himself and with the world, he was free from the sadness, the misgivings, and the enervating doubts which overrun so many morbid minds,--symptoms of moral weakness, and of the want of healthy occupation. Hence lady poets, more than all others, love to indulge in these feeble repinings, and take the privilege of their sex to shed tears on paper. In his bachelor establishment, Rue de Richelieu, there was, he tells us,--

"Grande chere, vin délicieux, Belle maison, liberté toute entière, Bals, concerts, enfin tout ce qui peut satisfaire Le goût, les oreilles, les yeux."

The _Société choisie_ was numerous; for a good cook never fails to make friends for his master, and Regnard's cook dealt with fat capons, plover, and ortolans. His lettuce, mushrooms, and artichokes were grown under his own eyes. The choice vintages of France, in casks, lay in his cellar. He gave wine to nourish wit, not to furnish an opportunity for ostentatious gabble about age and price. How he revels in the description of good cheer! There rises from his pages _fumet_ of game and the _bouquet d'un vin exquis_.

"Et des perdrix! Morbleu! d'un fumet admirable Sentez plutôt, Quel baume! Mon Dieu!"