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1659.
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(THE ORIGINAL IN PROSE.)1659.
Molière began in The Pretentious Young Ladies to paint men and womenas they are; to make living characters and existing manners theground-work of his plays. From that time he abandoned all imitation ofItalian or Spanish imbroglios and intrigues.
There is no doubt that aristocratic society attempted, about the latteryears of the reign of Louis XIII., to amend the coarse and licentiousexpressions, which, during the civil wars had been introduced intoliterature as well as into manners. It was praiseworthy of somehigh-born ladies in Parisian society to endeavour to refine the languageand the mind. But there was a very great difference between theinfluence these ladies exercised from 1620 until 1640, and what tookplace in 1658, the year when Molière returned to Paris. The Hôtel deRambouillet, and the aristocratic drawing-rooms, had then done theirwork, and done it well; but they were succeeded by a clique which caredonly for what was nicely said, or rather what was out of the common.Instead of using an elegant and refined diction, they employed only apretentious and conceitedly affected style, which became highlyridiculous; instead of improving the national idiom they completelyspoilt it. Where formerly D'Urfe, Malherbe, Racan, Balzac, and Voiturereigned, Chapelain, Scudéry, Ménage, and the Abbé Cotin, "the father ofthe French Riddle," ruled in their stead. Moreover, every lady in Paris,as well as in the provinces, no matter what her education was, held herdrawing-room, where nothing was heard but a ridiculous, exaggerated, andwhat was worse, a borrowed phraseology. The novels of Mdlle. de Scudérybecame the text-book of the précieux and the précieuses, for suchwas the name given to these gentlemen and ladies who set up for wits,and thought they displayed exquisite taste, refined ideas, fastidiousjudgment, and consummate and critical discrimination, whilst they onlyuttered vapid and blatant nonsense. What other language can be used whenwe find that they called the sun l'aimable éclairant le plus beau dumonde, l'epoux de la nature, and that when speaking of an old gentlemanwith grey hair, they said, not as a joke, but seriously, il a desquittances d'amour. A few of their expressions, however, are employedeven at the present time, such as, châtier son style; to correct one'sstyle; dépenser une heure, to spend an hour; revètir ses penséesd'expressions nobles, to clothe one's thoughts in noble expressions,etc.
Though the précieux and précieuses had been several times attackedbefore, it remained for Molière to give them their death blow, and afterthe performance of his comedy the name became a term of ridicule andcontumely. What enhanced the bitterness of the attack was the differencebetween Molière's natural style and the affected tone of the would-beelegants he brought upon the stage.
This comedy, in prose, was first acted at Paris, at the Théâtre du PetitBourbon, on the 18th of November, 1659, and met with great success.Through the influence of some noble précieux and précieuses it wasforbidden until the 2d of December, when the concourse of spectators wasso great that it had to be per