B O I 
file times in which he lived ; and he was likewife ex¬ 
tremely fevere againft vice, and the corrupt manners of 
the age. His pieces gained him vafb applaufe, but he was 
blamed for mentioning names. As incorrect copies of his 
performances were handed about in manufcript, and others 
afcribed to him of which he was not the author, he ob¬ 
tained a fpecial privilege from Louis XIV. to publifh his 
works himfelf. The king was a great admirer of Boileau’s 
performances; nor was he fatisfied with only fignifyihg 
his approbation in private, but likewife gave a public 
teftimony thereof, in the licence granted him for publifh - 
ing his works. The beginning of the' licence is in the fol¬ 
lowing words : “ Whereas our dear-and well-beloved the 
fieur Defpreaux has humbly remonftrated to us, that he 
has written divers pieces which he defires to have printed, 
and likewife to reprint his fatires, the licence whereof is 
expired, if we fhould pleafe to grant him our letters of 
permifiion for fo doing : wherefore, being defirous to en¬ 
courage the faid fieur Defpreaux-, and to give to the pub¬ 
lic, by the reading of his works, the fame pleafure we 
ourfelves received thereby, we have permitted him to 
caufe the faid works to be printed, &c.” The king alfo 
fettled upon him a penfion of 2000 livres per annum. In 
1684, Boileau was chofen a member of the French aca¬ 
demy ; but his fatirical pieces raifed him many enemies: 
his fatire againft the women, in particular, was much 
talked of, and occafioned great clamour. He however 
made a fort of apology for the liberty he had taken in 
painting their vices : “ All the pidhires I have drawn,” 
fays he, “ are fo general, that, far from being afraid of 
offending the ladies, it is on their approbation and curiofity 
that I ground my greateft hopes of fuccefs. One thing, 
at leaft, I am fure they will commend me for, which is my 
having treated this delicate matter fo, that not a word has 
efcaped me, which can give offence to modefty; wherefore 
I hope I (hall eafily obtain a pardon ; and that the ladies 
will not be more Blocked at my preaching againft their 
faults in this fatire, than at the fatires the preachers make 
every day againft the fame faults from the pulpit.” In 
1701, Boileau was elefted penfionary of the academy 
of inferiptions and medals, which place he filled with ho¬ 
nour till 1705, when, being grown deaf and infirm, he 
defired and obtained leave to refign. He quitted the court, 
and fpent the remainder of his life in quiet and tranquillity 
amongft a few felefl friends. He died March 2, 1711, 
aged feventy-four. 
Bruyere, in his fpeech to the French academy, fpeak- 
ing of Boileau as a writer, fays, “ that he excels Juneval, 
comes up to Horace, feems to create the thoughts of ano¬ 
ther, and to make whatever he handles his own. He has, 
in what he borrows from others, all the graces of novelty 
and invention : his verfes, ftrong and harmonious, made 
by genius, though wrought with art, w’ill be read even 
when the language is obfolete, and will be the laft ruins of 
it.” But his fame has not been confined to hisown country : 
he has been no lefs prailed by other nations. Baron 
Spanheim has beftowed upon him very high encomiums. 
Lord Shaftfbury calls him “ a noble fatirift, who applied 
his criticifm with juft feveritv even to his own works.” 
Dr. Warton, the ingenious author of an Elfay on the Wri¬ 
tings and Genius of Pope, fpeaking of Boileau’s Art of 
Poetry, fays it is the beft compofition of that kind extant, 
“ The brevity of his precepts, fays this writer, enlivened 
by proper imagery, the juffnefs of his metaphors, the 
harmony of his numbers, as far as Alexandrine lines will 
admit, the exaflnefs of his method, the perfpicuity of 
his remarks, and the energy of his ftyle, all duly confi-i 
dered, may render this opinion not unreafonable. It is 
to this work he owes his immortality, which was of the 
higheft utility to his nation, in diff’ufing a juft way of 
thinking and writing, banifhing every fpecies of falfe wit,, 
and introducing a general tafte for the manly fimplicity of 
the ancients, on whofe writings this poet had formed his 
tafte.” Few poets can be fo properly compared as Pope 
and Boileau; but, wherever their writings will admit of 
B O I 151 
comparifon, we may, without any national partiality, ad¬ 
judge the fuperiority to the Englifh bard. Thefe two 
great authors refembled each other as much in the in¬ 
tegrity of their lives as in the fubjedls and execution of 
their feveral compofitions. There are two anecdotes re¬ 
corded of Boileau, which fufficiently prove that this in¬ 
exorable fatirift had a moll generous and friendly heart: 
when Patru, the celebrated advocate, who was ruined by 
his paflion for literature, found himfelf under the painful 
neceffity of felling his expenfive library for a trifling fum, 
Boileau gave him a much fuperior price; and, after pay¬ 
ing the money, added this condition to the purchafe, that 
Patru fhould retain, during his life, the poffeflion and ufe 
of the books. The fucceeding inftance of his generofity 
is yet nobler : when it was rumoured that the king in¬ 
tended to retrench the penfion of Corneille, Boileau haf- 
tened to Madame de Montefpan, and laid, that his love- 
reign, equitable as he was, could not, without injuftice, 
grant a penfion to an author like himfelf, juft afeending 
Parnaffus, and take it from Corneille, who had fo long 
been feated on the fummit ; that he entreated her, for 
the honour of the king, to prevail on his majefty rather to 
ftrike off his penfion, than to withdraw that reward from 
a man, whofe title to it was incomparably greater; and 
that he fhould the more eafily confole himfelf under the 
lofs of that diftimSlion, than under the affliction of feeing 
it taken away from fitch a poet as Corneille. This mag-, 
nanimous application had the fuccefs which itdeferved; 
and it appears the more noble, when we recoiled that the 
rival of Corneille was the intimate friend of Boileau. 
There have been many editions of Boileau’s works ; 
but that publifhed by Proffette, with his notes and com¬ 
mentary, in four vols. is the moft efteemed. 
BOIL'ER,/ The perfon that boils any thing.—That 
fuch alterations of terreftrial matter are not impoffible,. 
feems evident from that notable practice of the boilers of 
falt-petre. Boyle .—The veffel in which any thing is boiled. 
—There are generally feveral pots and boilers before the 
fire. Woodward. 
BOIL'ING, or Ebullition,/! thebubblingup of any 
fluid, by the application of heat. This is, in general, oc¬ 
cafioned by the difeharge of an elaftic vapour through 
the fluid that boils, whether that be common air, fixed 
air, or (team, See. ft is proved by Dr. Hamilton,-of Dub¬ 
lin, in his Effay on the Afcent of Vapour, that the boil¬ 
ing of water is occafioned by the lowermoft particles of it 
being heated and rarefied into vapour, or ftearn ; in confe- 
quence of this diminution of their fpscific gravity, they 
afeend through the furrounding heavier fluid with great 
velocity, lacerating and throwing up the body of water 
in the afcent, and thus giving it the tumultuous motion 
called boiling. 
That this is occafioned by elaftic fleam, and not by par¬ 
ticles of fire or air, as fome have imagined, iseafiiy proved 
by the following fimple experiment: Take a common-- 
drinking-glafs, filled with hot water, and invert it into a 
veffel of the fame : as foon as the water^ F in the veffel 
begins to boil, large bubbleswill be feen to afeend in the 
glafs, by which the water in it will be difplaced, and 
there will foon be a continued bubbling from under its' 
edge ; but if the glafs be then drawn up, fo tharits mouth 
may juft touch the water, and a cloth wetted in cold 
water be applied to the outfide, the elaftic fleam within it 
will be inllantly condenfed, upon which the water will! 
afeend fo as nearly to fill it again. Some fmall parts of. 
air, &c. that may happen to be lodged in the fluid, may 
alfo perhaps be expelled, as well as the rarefied fteant. 
And this is- particularly recommended as a method of 
purifying quickfilver, for making barometers and ther<> 
mometers more accurately. 
We commonly annex the idea of a certain very great 
degree of heat to the boiling of liquids, though often, 
w-ithout reafon; for different liquids boil with different 
degrees of heat; and any on£ given liquid alfo, underdif- 
ferent preffures of the atmofphere. Thus, a veffel of tar 
i- being 
