e) of his father's
property at Crosne, was born in Paris, 1636, son of the registrar
of the Grand Chambre du Palais. His choice of a profession lay between
the Church and that with which his father was connected--the law;
but though he made some study of theology, and was called to the bar,
his inclination for literature could not be resisted. His whole life,
indeed, was that of a man of letters--upright, honourable, serious,
dignified, simple; generous to the friends whose genius he could
justly applaud; merciless to books and authors condemned by his reason,
his good sense, his excellent judgment. He was allied by an ardent
admiration to Racine, and less intimately to Moliere, La Fontaine,
and Chapelle; Jansenist through his religious sympathies, and
closely attached to the venerable Arnauld; appointed historiographer
to the King (1677) together with Racine; an Academician by the King's
desire, notwithstanding the opposition of his literary enemies. In
his elder years his great position of authority in the world of letters
was assured, but he suffered from infirmities of body, and from an
increasing severity of temper. In 1711 he died, bequeathing a large
sum of money to the poor.

Boileau's literary career falls into three periods--the first,
militant and destructive, in which he waged successful war against
all that seemed to him false and despicable in art; the second,
reconstructive, in which he declared the doctrine of what may be
termed literary rationalism, and legislated for the French
Parnassus; the third, dating from his appointment as historiographer,
a period of comparative repose and, to some extent, of decline, but
one in which the principles of his literary faith were maintained
and pressed to new conclusions. His writings include twelve satires
(of which the ninth, "A son Esprit," is the chief masterpiece); twelve
epistles (that to Racine being pre-eminent); the literary-didactic
poem, _L'Art Poetique_; a heroi-comical epic, _Le Lutrin_;
miscellaneous shorter poems (among which may be noted the admirable
epitaph on Arnauld, and an unhappy ode, _Sur la Prise de Namur_, 1693);
and various critical studies in prose, his Lucianic dialogue _Les
Heros de Roman_, satirising the extravagant novels not yet dismissed
to oblivion, and his somewhat truculent _Reflexions sur Longin_ being
specially deserving of attention. The satires preceded in date the
epistles; of the former, the first nine belong to the years