tter than his times--failed to bring about a change.
"It is a Moor, not a Frenchman, who has written this play," cried a
spectator of Ducis' _Othello_ (1791); but Talma's conviction was almost
as strong as his capacity was great for convincing his public; and he
certainly did much to prepare the influence which Shakespeare was
gradually to assert over the French drama, and which was aided by
translations, more especially that of Pierre Letourneur (1736-1788),
which had attracted the sympathy of Diderot and the execrations of the
aged Voltaire.[121] Meanwhile, the command which classical French
tragedy continued to assert over the stage was due in part, no doubt, to
the love of Roman drapery--not always abundant, but always in the grand
style--which characterized the Revolution, and which was by the
Revolution handed down to the Empire. It was likewise, and more
signally, due to the great actors who freed the tragic stage from much
of its artificiality and animated it by their genius. No great artist
has ever more generously estimated the labours of a predecessor than
Talma judged those of Le Kain; but it was Talma himself whose genius was
pre-eminently fitted to reproduce the great figures of antiquity in the
mimic world, which, like the world outside, both required and possessed
its Caesar. He, like Rachel after him, reconciled French classical
tragedy with nature; and it is upon the art of great original actors
such as these that the theatrical future of this form of the drama in
France depends. Mere whims of fashion--even when inspired by political
feeling--will not waft back to it a real popularity; nor will occasional
literary aftergrowths, however meritorious, such as the admirable
_Lucrece_ of F. Ponsard and the attempts of even more recent writers,
suffice to re-establish a living union between it and the progress of
the national literature.

Comedy.

Moliere.

The rival influences under which classical tragedy has after a long
struggle virtually become a thing of the past in French literature are
also to be traced in the history of French comedy, which under the
co-operation of other influences produced a wide variety of growths. The
germs of most of these--though not of all--are to be found in the works
of the most versatile, the most sure-footed, and, in some respects, the
most consummate master of the comic drama whom the world has
known--Moliere. What Moliere found in existence was a comedy of
int