io8 ANALYSIS AND CRITICISM 



useful job of analyzing various interpretations of Taine's word, 

 classifying them in three categories. 



First, the term is taken to mean a 'moment of time', more or less 

 short or long. It is this meaning which is intended when it is 

 translated into English as 'epoch' or 'age', referring to time-spans 

 which range from such broad period designations as 'antiquity' 

 or the Renaissance, through the familiar references to an artist's 

 'siecle' (age or century), to the briefest of times, as when one says 

 that an action was taken at 'the psychological moment'. '^o 



A second group of critics, beginning with Sainte-Beuve, has 

 used the term to distinguish between long-range and short-range 

 forces. Thus, milieu would be taken to refer to such larger aspects 

 of Environment as might be indicated by 'civilization', involving 

 considerations of political and social organization, religious and 

 philosophical systems, and so forth; moment would refer to the 

 more specific and personal factors which enter into the individual's 

 life-story and development. Professor Rice rightly objects that the 

 latter too are included by Taine in his treatment of milieu, so 

 that He moment, then, is at once different from le milieu and a part of 

 it'; among the terms which are listed as equivalent to this sense of 

 moment are: 'influences historiques', 'circonstances', 'institu- 

 tions', 'changement dans la civilization', 'esprit du temps', 

 'habitats'. 41 A third group mentioned by Professor Rice does 

 hardly more than paraphrase Taine's original discussion. 



Because of this widespread misunderstanding — which is natural, 

 in view of the difficulties presented by the term — and since it has 

 been taken to mean nothing (by E. Droz) or everything (by F. 

 Brunetiere), Professor Rice suggests eliminating its use altogether, 

 and reduces Taine's reasoning to the following analogue, which 

 he considers absurd: 'water is made up of three component ele- 

 ments — H2, O, and Water'. 42 



However, this argument neither does justice to Taine's concep- 

 tion nor solves the problem. As Leo Spitzer writes: 



'To assume, as does Mr. Rice, that le moment is the product of 

 race and milieu as water is the product of hydrogen and oxygen 

 (for such is his chemical analogy) is to betray a lack of historical 

 feeling and to out-Taine Taine in the application of natural to 

 social science. The "hesitations" of Taine, that is to say his elastic 

 use of terms which prevent a "mutually exclusive" interpretation, 

 represent rather afelix culpa: this positivist had at least so much of 



