Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books Part 30

[Footnote A: Hippolyte Adolphe Taine (b. 1828; d. 1893) was one of the most distinguished French critics of the nineteenth century. He held the chair of esthetics at the ecole des Beaux Arts, and wrote a large number of works in history, travel, and literary criticism.

His "History of English Literature" is the most brilliant book on the subject ever written by a foreigner, and in this introduction he expounds the method of criticism which has come to be a.s.sociated with his name, and in accordance with which he seeks to interpret the characteristics of English authors.]

[Footnote 1: Darwin, "The Origin of Species." Prosper Lucas, "De l'Heredite."]

[Footnote 2: Spinosa, "Ethics," part iv., axiom.]

[Footnote 3: For this scale of coordinate effects consult, "Langues Semitiques," by Renan, ch I, "Comparison des civilizations Grecque et Romaine," vol I, ch I, 3d ed, by Mommsen, "Consequences de la democratie," vol III., by Tocqueville.]

[Footnote 4: "L'Esprit des Lois," by Montesquieu; the essential principles of the three governments.]

[Footnote 5: The birth of the Alexandrine philosophy is due to contact with the Orient. Aristotle's metaphysical views stand alone. Moreover, with him as with Plato, they afford merely a glimpse. By way of contrast see systematic power in Plotinus, Proclus, Sch.e.l.ling, and Hegel, or again in the admirable boldness of Brahmanic and Buddhist speculation.]

[Footnote 6: I have very often made attempts to state this law, especially in the preface to "Essais de Critique et d'Histoire."]

[Footnote 7: From 1550 to 1750.]