SCIENCE. 



FRIDAY, OCTOBER 2, 1885. 



THE USE OF THE FRENCH ACADEMY. 



It is almost impossible to set down in exact 

 terms the advantages which follow the estab- 

 lishment of an}^ institution of learning, — a col- 

 lege, a universit3% or a learned society. It is 

 eas}^ to point to illustrious men who have been 

 developed in such fellowship, and just as easy 

 to name those of equal distinction who were 

 not so enrolled. The publications of the body 

 do not necessarily afford any surer evidence of 

 the advantages of association. In the case of 

 the French academ}^ it is eas}^ to show how its 

 plan and its methods have been approved un- 

 der the most diverse forms of civil government, 

 in generations far remote from one another, 

 and in foreign countries as well as at home ; 

 but no analysis can be so thorough as to say 

 what French literature would have been with- 

 out the academy. The perpetuity of an insti- 

 tution, when it might easily be given up, is a 

 good sign of its appreciation at home ; and the 

 imitation of its modes of procedure abroad is 

 evidence of impartial and disinterested appro- 

 bation. The French academy has both these 

 marks of success. 



There are also other modes of judging its 

 work. The prime object of the foundation, it 

 will be remembered, was the improvement of 

 the French language ; and, to promote this ob- 

 ject, four specific duties were imposed upon the 

 society : the preparation of a dictionary, and of 

 treatises upon grammar, rhetoric, and poetry. 

 The rhetoric and poetry were never composed, 

 perhaps, — as an early historian, the abb4 d'Oli- 

 vet, intimates, — because a ver}^ little reflection 

 would convince such a company of writers as 

 the academicians, that there is nothing pecul- 

 iar in the principles which govern literary ex- 

 pression in the French language. The arts of 

 literature are as universal as the arts of culti- 

 vated speech ; and the academ3% from the study 

 of Sophocles and >^schylus, Cicero and Vir- 

 gil, Dante and Petrarch, Shakespeare and 

 Spenser, could derive lessons quite as good as 

 those which it might gain from the study of 

 the poets and orators of France. Not so with 

 the grammar and vocabulary of the French 

 language. To lexicography, accordingly, their 

 attention was at once directed. Some progress 



No. 139. — 1885. 



was also made in grammatical science ; and 

 the results were set forth in 1G98, in a volume 

 edited by the abbe Tallemant, and entitled 

 ' Remarks and decisions of the French acad- 

 emy.' 



The dictionary, however, from first to last, 

 has been the magnum opus upon which suc- 

 cessive generations of academicians have ex- 

 pended their force. Any one who has had a 

 hand in the preparation of an elaborate index, 

 catalogue, or vocabulary, — and such persons 

 only, — can appreciate the labor of producing 

 the dictionary of a language. For a single 

 lexicographer to work alone, is almost futile ; 

 for him to work with co-ordinate assistants, is 

 to multiply difficulties and questions almost in 

 direct ratio to the number of helpers. One 

 person can pronounce an opinion : how can 

 a consensus be obtained in delicate matters of 

 literary taste ? We may even conjecture that 

 it took forty times as long to produce the fii^st 

 edition of the dictionary on the democratic or 

 equal-rights theorj^ of production, which pre- 

 vailed in this little republic of letters, as it 

 would have done to produce it on a monarchic 

 or military scheme of subordinated assistance. 

 Was it forty times better? Even at this da}^, 

 are there not many who think Littre's work far 

 better than the latest edition of academic eru- 

 dition ? 



Good or bad, the dictionary was of slow 

 growth. It first appeared in 1694, in two vol- 

 umes, folio. Frequent revisions have taken 

 place, the earliest of which was begun in 

 1700, and published in 1718 : the seventh and 

 latest is now in progress, the first number hav- 

 ing seen the light in 1858. Critics will var}" 

 in their estimate of the value of such a work, 

 according to their conception of what is desir- 

 able in the dictionary of a living language. 

 If an encyclopaedia is wanted of all the words 

 emploj^ed by all the writers, early and recent, 

 good and bad, — in all their uses, legitimate, 

 obsolete, or colloquial, — including all possible 

 derivatives, and the latest verbal inventions of 

 technology, however barbarous, — then the dic- 

 tionary of the academj^ will appear to be most 

 inadequate and unsatisfactoiy . If, on the other 

 hand, a standard of literaiy excellence is de- 

 sired, — an authority to which a writer or 

 speaker ma}' refer if he questions the fit use 

 of any part of speech or if he wishes to be 

 exact and elegant in his diction, free from pro- 



