g insult for insult, delivered over those amongst his enemies who
offered a butt for ridicule to the derision of the court and of
posterity. The _Festin de Pierre_ and the signal punishment of the
libertine (free-thinker) were intended to clear the author from the
reproach of impiety; _la Princesse d'Elide_ and _l'Amour medecin_ were
but charming interludes in the great struggle henceforth instituted
between reality and appearance. In 1666, Moliere produced _le
Misanthrope,_ a frank and noble spirit's sublime invective against the
frivolity, perfidious and showy semblances of court. "This misanthrope's
despitefulness against bad verses was copied from me; Moliere himself
confessed as much to me many a time," wrote Boileau one day. The
indignation of Alceste is deeper and more universal than that of Boileau
against bad poets; he is disgusted with the court and the world because
he is honest, virtuous, and sincere, and sees corruption triumphant
around him; he is wroth to feel the effects of it in his life, and almost
in his own soul. He is a victim to the eternal struggle between good and
evil without the strength and the unquenchable hope of Christianity. The
_Misanthrope_ is a shriek of despair uttered by virtue, excited and
almost distraught at the defeat she forebodes. The _Tartuffe_ was a new
effort in the same direction, and bolder in that it attacked religious
hypocrisy, and seemed to aim its blows even at religion itself. Moliere
was a long time working at it; the first acts had been played in 1664, at
court, under the title of _l'Hypocrite,_ at the same time as
_la Princesse d'Elide_. "The king," says the account of the
entertainment in the _Gazette de Loret,_ "saw so much analogy of form
between those whom true devotion sets in the way of heaven and those whom
an empty ostentation of good deeds does not hinder from committing bad,
that his extreme delicacy in respect of religious matters could with
difficulty brook this resemblance of vice to virtue; and though there
might be no doubt of the author's good intentions, he prohibited the
playing of this comedy before the public until it should be quite
finished and examined by persons qualified to judge of it, so as not to
let advantage be taken of it by others less capable of just discernment
in the matter." Though played once publicly, in 1667, under the title of
_l'Imposteur,_ the piece did not appear definitively on the stage until
1669, having undoubt