672 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



propriate quotations and authorities. Such an article takes the reader 

 into the depths of philosophical speculation ; in tracing the history of 

 a word he follows the history of thought. The verb passer runs to no 

 less than sixty-six meanings, many of them amusing, proverbial, anec- 

 dotical. The vrord faire in French represents the two English verbs 

 to make and to do. It consequently covers an immense field of action. 

 M. Littre defines it as the word " qui denote toute espece d'operation 

 qui donne etre ou forme." He traces it through eighty-two shades of 

 meaning, and the article he devotes to it is an essay of no less than 

 eight quarto pages. Hence this Dictionary becomes attractive and 

 even fascinating. Like Forcellini's Lexicon, which it most resem- 

 bles, there is scarcely a passage or marked expression in the French 

 classics which is not cited in it ; but Forcellini and Ducange were 

 dealing with dead or expiring languages ; M. Littre had to force his 

 way through the Babel of modern literature and society. 



"We now pass from the book to the man, whose life is scarcely less 

 remarkable than the work to which he devoted it, and here we shall 

 avail ourselves of the guidance of M. Pasteur in his discourse. Emile 

 Littre was born in Pans, February 1, 1801. His father was an artil- 

 leryman of the first Republic, who had adopted with passion, both in 

 politics and religion, the stern theories of the Revolution of 1791, and 

 defended them in the patriotic army. He transmitted these opinions 

 to his son, who inherited the same austerity of principles, tempered, 

 however, by great natural benevolence. His mother was a woman of 

 the same energetic stamp, though uneducated. Sainte-Beuve described 

 her as " a Roman matron." The lad was educated at the Lycee Louis- 

 le-Grand, his father having a small appointment in the office of inland 

 revenue in Paris. The elder Littre learned Greek, and even began 

 Sanskrit, to assist in the education of his son. On leaving college the 

 young man acted for a time as secretary to M. Daru ; but he desired 

 to follow the medical profession, and had all but completed his hos- 

 pital training, when his father died, leaving him too poor to take his 

 degree and to enter upon practice. Accordingly, he never did practice 

 medicine, except gratuitously among the poor of his village. Yet 

 such was the medical reputation he acquired by his subsequent writ- 

 ings, that, as we have been informed, he was ultimately elected a mem- 

 ber of the Medical Council of Paris. At this early stage of his life, 

 in 1831, he was compelled to fall back on the humble occupation of a 

 teacher of foreign lan^uao-es and mathematics, and a translator of ar- 

 tides for the " National " newspaper, which made him acquainted with 

 Armand Carrel. Meanwhile his mind, conscious of its strength, yet 

 modest to excess, formed vast and varied projects, which he hesitated 

 to execute. Such was the mastery he had already acquired over the 

 sources of the French language, that he amused himself by translating 

 a book of the " Iliad " into French verse of the thirteenth centurv. 

 He also translated the elder Pliny, and in 1831 plunged into a greater 



