FOUNDER OF THE FIRST SCIENTIFIC JOURNAL. 691 



marked, so that by this plan of studying he fitted himself to com- 

 pose treatises on every kind of subject, as he showed on several 

 occasions." 



It was probably the considerable quantity of material that he 

 collected in this way that suggested to him the thought of giving 

 the public those extracts the utility of which he had recognized 

 in his experiences. He associated with himself in the execution 

 of this work, which was colossal for that time, a number of men 

 of science and letters : De Bourzeis, a distinguished theologian ; De 

 Gemberville, chaplain, the famous author of La Pucelle ; and the 

 Abb^ Gaulois, who, according to Fontenelle, seemed " born for that 

 work " ; but De Sallo revised all the articles not verv numerous 

 which his colaborers furnished, and himself wrote the largest 

 number. 



The authorization having been obtained, the support of Colbert 

 assured, and the plan and x>eriods of publication fixed, the Jour- 

 nal des Sgavants appeared on Monday, January 3, 1665, in a sheet 

 and a half quarto, under the pen signature of Hedouville ; * and 

 it continued to appear every Monday till the 30th of March of 

 the same year, when the authorization was withdrawn. Although 

 its criticisms were always moderate and just, it had made many 

 enemies among men of letters, and among the Jesuits, then all- 

 powerful, " who were not pleased to see a literary and philosoph- 

 ical tribunal that was not set up by them, and who, moreover, de- 

 tested De Sallo and his friends as Parlementarians and Galileans 

 suspected of Jansenism ; these added their complaints to the cries 

 of wounded self-love. They secured the aid of the papal nuncio, 

 and he obtained a prohibition against De Sallo's continuing the 

 publication." The pretext alleged for this act was a passage in 

 the Journal in which De Sallo criticised a decree of the Inquisitors, 

 " whose delicate ears required so great circumspection." 



Colbert, however, still retained a friendship for his client, 

 recompensed him for the suppression of his journal with an 

 office in the treasury, and, realizing the full value of De Sallo's 

 work, commissioned the Abbd Gaulois to continue it. The Jour- 

 nal reappeared on the 4th of January, 1GG6, and was henceforth 

 illustrated ; t but Abbe Gaulois, who held the direction of the 



* The name of one of his servants. 



f As a specimen of the illustrations, we mention a superb engraving representing a 

 louse as seen under the microscope ; it measures not less than forty or fifty centimetres 

 (year 1666, page 292 of the reprint of 1'729). This reprint is a nearly textual reproduction of 

 the original edition, which is now very rare. It is well to remark here that the Journal des 

 S9avants, like all similar journals of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries that were 

 successful, was reprinted as the numbers were exhausted ; thus in the set that I have con- 

 sulted at the library of the Arsenal, the year 1665 is of 1733, and the year 1666 of 1729, 

 while the year 1676 was reprinted in 1717. Hence it is almost impossible to find two col- 



