Madame de Staël et la Suisse. Etude biographique et littéraire avec de nombreux documentsinédits by Pierre KohlerReview by: J. G. RobertsonThe Modern Language Review, Vol. 13, No. 4 (Oct., 1918), pp. 504-506Published by: Modern Humanities Research AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3714053 .

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than a studied literary production would be likely to do. As regards the,ideas on the other hand, in spite of the preacher's evident devotion to the Virgin Mary, we find only slight traces of the picturesque metaphors and similes which occur so frequently in the mediaeval writings and preachings. Dr Carnahan mentions one or two allegorical allusions, but does not draw attention to the common mediaeval legend of Leviathan caught by the jaw on the hook of Christ's divinity which lay hidden in the flesh as the body hung on the cross-the passage with its jeu de mots has a truly mediaeval ring:-' Or y es tu. bien confuz, maleureux ennemi, vielz serpent, Leviathan: tu as cuide mordre la precieuse char de Ihesus par la morsure de la mort, et l'ameson de la divinite qui estoit dedens, mussee et joincte, a percie tes maxilles, et a delivrre la proie que tu cuidoies tenir et devorer.' But such a passage is the exception rather than the rule.

The 'frequent touches of mysticism' which Dr Carnahan notes in his Introduction are of such a mild nature as to emphasize the lack of mysticism in the whole work rather than its presence. One has only to compare Gerson's sermon with those of the famous mystics of the fourteenth century in Germany, or with contemporary writings in England and elsewhere, to see how practical and tangible, and perhaps more suited to a French audience, are the sermons of. the French preacher. Mysticism had not at this epoch the same vogue in France as it had in other continental countries, and Gerson, a typical Frenchman of his age, excels in his description of the noisy crowd, the rough soldiery and the altogether human side of things rather than in that of the intangible delights of the mystic's life. It is for the dramatic and powerful scenes, and for the tender pathos attaching to his descriptions of the Virgin's grief for her dead Son, that the sermon deserves to be known, and the more so as it follows a century very barren in that type of religious feeling in France. It is to be hoped therefore that this publication will be followed by others of the same author's works in due course.

JESSIE CROSLAND. LONDON.

Madame de Stael et la Suisse. Etude biographique et litteraire avec de nombreux documents inedits. Par PIERRE KOHLER. Lausanne and Paris: Payotet Cie. 1916. 8vo. x + 720 pp.

It may be, as an eminent but not very kindly English critic of Madame de Stael once said, that she is conspicuous among French writers in not being honoured by new editions of her works, but the literature dealing with her life and influence has, in recent years, grown apace. This latest contribution to the biography of Madame de Stael by M. Pierre Kohler is of very considerable importance. He provides us liberally with 'documents inedits,' or extracts from such; and although these documents are, separately and individually, rarely of striking interest, yet in the aggregate they help materially to complete the

than a studied literary production would be likely to do. As regards the,ideas on the other hand, in spite of the preacher's evident devotion to the Virgin Mary, we find only slight traces of the picturesque metaphors and similes which occur so frequently in the mediaeval writings and preachings. Dr Carnahan mentions one or two allegorical allusions, but does not draw attention to the common mediaeval legend of Leviathan caught by the jaw on the hook of Christ's divinity which lay hidden in the flesh as the body hung on the cross-the passage with its jeu de mots has a truly mediaeval ring:-' Or y es tu. bien confuz, maleureux ennemi, vielz serpent, Leviathan: tu as cuide mordre la precieuse char de Ihesus par la morsure de la mort, et l'ameson de la divinite qui estoit dedens, mussee et joincte, a percie tes maxilles, et a delivrre la proie que tu cuidoies tenir et devorer.' But such a passage is the exception rather than the rule.

The 'frequent touches of mysticism' which Dr Carnahan notes in his Introduction are of such a mild nature as to emphasize the lack of mysticism in the whole work rather than its presence. One has only to compare Gerson's sermon with those of the famous mystics of the fourteenth century in Germany, or with contemporary writings in England and elsewhere, to see how practical and tangible, and perhaps more suited to a French audience, are the sermons of. the French preacher. Mysticism had not at this epoch the same vogue in France as it had in other continental countries, and Gerson, a typical Frenchman of his age, excels in his description of the noisy crowd, the rough soldiery and the altogether human side of things rather than in that of the intangible delights of the mystic's life. It is for the dramatic and powerful scenes, and for the tender pathos attaching to his descriptions of the Virgin's grief for her dead Son, that the sermon deserves to be known, and the more so as it follows a century very barren in that type of religious feeling in France. It is to be hoped therefore that this publication will be followed by others of the same author's works in due course.

JESSIE CROSLAND. LONDON.

Madame de Stael et la Suisse. Etude biographique et litteraire avec de nombreux documents inedits. Par PIERRE KOHLER. Lausanne and Paris: Payotet Cie. 1916. 8vo. x + 720 pp.

It may be, as an eminent but not very kindly English critic of Madame de Stael once said, that she is conspicuous among French writers in not being honoured by new editions of her works, but the literature dealing with her life and influence has, in recent years, grown apace. This latest contribution to the biography of Madame de Stael by M. Pierre Kohler is of very considerable importance. He provides us liberally with 'documents inedits,' or extracts from such; and although these documents are, separately and individually, rarely of striking interest, yet in the aggregate they help materially to complete the

504 504 Reviews Reviews

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portrait of a woman who, in spite of the fact that she lived the greater part of her life in the limelight of publicity, still remains much of a 'femme incomprise.' Her position in the history of thought and litera- ture at the beginning of the nineteenth century is still a debateable one; and we have to thank M. Kohler for having helped to make it clearer.

He entitles his work Madame de Stael et la Suisse. It is not quite clear whether this is a self-imposed limitation, on the part of a writer of Swiss nationality, to a biographical task which threatens-as previous biographers have discovered-to extend into unlimited dimensions: or whether there is behind it a semi-conscious desire to write a chapter in the history of that Swiss 'national literature' on which the younger generation of Swiss critics have been insisting. But it no doubt makes the impression on the reader of a certain apparent lack of proportion. At the same time, there is no chauvinistic spirit-if one may use the word 'chauvinistic' with regard to anything Swiss-in M. Kohler's estimate of the Swiss element in Madame de Stael. Quoting Amiel's character- isation of her he says:

C'etait le sort de Mme de Stael de cherir le pays oh elle etait nee, mais d'en etre exilee par les gouverneients, d'y etre raillee par'la societ6, de souffrir des defauts du caractere et de l'esprit franQais: parce qu'elle n'6tait gubre Frangaise que de cceur; parce qu'elle 6tait etrang6re par son origine, son heredite imm6diate, son education premiere, ses traditions domestiques, sa parent6, par beaucoup de ses plus chbres affections, par une grande partie de son existence et de son exp6rience.

M. Kohler sees the Swiss side of Madame de Stael in the didactic and moralising strain in her religious thought, in her individualism, and in her claim for the individual's freedom from the shackles of society and social obligation. She is Swiss, too-although this does not seem at all so apparent-in the fact that she is nothing of an artist. It wai France, on the other hand, that moulded her for the world. In this sense she is, as she herself claimed, a citizen of two nations.

Turning to details, M. Kohler has written skilfully and sugges- tively on Madame de Stael's relations to Rousseau: on the dependence of Delphine on the Nouvelle Helose, 'as in another chapter he deals equally convincingly with the relations of Corinne to Madame de Charriere's Caliste. In the chapter on Madame de Stael's relations to Constant-and nowhere is this 'femme incomprise' rmore enigmatic than just here-M. Kohler is inclined to leave the difficult points to be cleared up by M. Rudler in the sequel to his fine study of Constant. After all, Constant's relations to Madame de Stael are not specifically Swiss. On the other hand, we get characteristic glimpses of Bonstetten and Sismondi (with hitherto unpublished materials). M. Kohler hazards the suggestion that Madame de Stael's sympathetic attitude towards Germany and-German literature in De l'Allemagne was due to the in- fluence of German Switzerland on her:

Mais les Suisses allemands...lui ont-ils rendu. peut-etre un service essentiel en contribuant h l'initier aux myst6res de la pensee germanique? Autrement dit, Mme de Stael aurait-elle 6crit son ouvrage le plus fecond De l'Allemagne, si elle n'avait pas eu, dbs sa jeunesse, des rapports avec les Suisses des cantons allemands

Reviews 505

33 M. L. R. XIII.

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I doubt if much is to be made of this. In any case, the whole question of De 'VAllemagne is bound up with Madame de Stasl's relations to August Wilhelm Schlegel, which might well have been discussed in con- nection with her life at Coppet: but evidently M. Kohler did not regard this as falling within his purview.

M. Kohler is apologetic for his book having to appear in the midst of the Great War, that the proofs of a work which, so to speak, expresses the spiritual neutrality of Switzerland, should have been corrected in the trenches, whither he had been summoned to maintain the military neutrality of Switzerland. He seeks a justification for publication in the fact that 'l'6poque dramatique oh l'h6roine de ce volume ajoue l'un des premiers r6les offre de singulieres analogies avec la crise que nous subissons.' But if an apology is necessary, a subtler one might be sought in the share which Switzerland may have to bear in the spiritual reconstruction of Europe. Here, in a sense which is not touched upon by M. Kohler, Madame de Stael is Swiss: for she is a 'good European,' a representative of the European comity of nations; and where, if not from large-hearted cosmopolitanism like hers, is the healing of the future to come from ?

J. G. ROBERTSON. LONDON.

Studies in Dante. Fourth Series. Textual Criticism of the Convivio and Miscellaneous Essays. By EDWARD MOORE. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1917. 8vo. xii + 303 pp.

The most important sections in this, the fourth, and, we regret to add, the last volume of Edward Moore's Studies in Dante, are un- doubtedly those containing his contributions to the textual criticism of the Convivio. The scheme of the Oxford Dante did not allow of an apparatus criticus, so that Moore was obliged to introduce such emenda- tions as he included without comment or explanation. Moreover, his text was at that time based upon a comparatively restricted knowledge of the manuscripts. He here enters into a detailed discussion of a number of disputed passages and sets forth the principles by which he has been guided in his long and careful study of virtually all the existing manuscripts of the Convivio. While fully acknowledging our debt to Giuliani, he has no sympathy with that critic's love of emenda- tion for its own sake. He introduces no alteration if the text as it stands can possibly be explained, and this principle, combined with a careful collation of the manuscript readings, meets with its reward in such a certain restoration of the text as that given on p. 35 from a little-known Paris MS. He leaves a lacuna rather than re-write a hopeless passage.

The other papers, three of which have appeared in the pages of this review, display all the qualities that have won for the earlier volumes of Moore's Studies the high rank they hold in Dante literature- thoroughness of research, leisurely and orderly marshalling of material and argument, modesty in stating his own conclusions. He is as ready

I doubt if much is to be made of this. In any case, the whole question of De 'VAllemagne is bound up with Madame de Stasl's relations to August Wilhelm Schlegel, which might well have been discussed in con- nection with her life at Coppet: but evidently M. Kohler did not regard this as falling within his purview.

M. Kohler is apologetic for his book having to appear in the midst of the Great War, that the proofs of a work which, so to speak, expresses the spiritual neutrality of Switzerland, should have been corrected in the trenches, whither he had been summoned to maintain the military neutrality of Switzerland. He seeks a justification for publication in the fact that 'l'6poque dramatique oh l'h6roine de ce volume ajoue l'un des premiers r6les offre de singulieres analogies avec la crise que nous subissons.' But if an apology is necessary, a subtler one might be sought in the share which Switzerland may have to bear in the spiritual reconstruction of Europe. Here, in a sense which is not touched upon by M. Kohler, Madame de Stael is Swiss: for she is a 'good European,' a representative of the European comity of nations; and where, if not from large-hearted cosmopolitanism like hers, is the healing of the future to come from ?

J. G. ROBERTSON. LONDON.

Studies in Dante. Fourth Series. Textual Criticism of the Convivio and Miscellaneous Essays. By EDWARD MOORE. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1917. 8vo. xii + 303 pp.

The most important sections in this, the fourth, and, we regret to add, the last volume of Edward Moore's Studies in Dante, are un- doubtedly those containing his contributions to the textual criticism of the Convivio. The scheme of the Oxford Dante did not allow of an apparatus criticus, so that Moore was obliged to introduce such emenda- tions as he included without comment or explanation. Moreover, his text was at that time based upon a comparatively restricted knowledge of the manuscripts. He here enters into a detailed discussion of a number of disputed passages and sets forth the principles by which he has been guided in his long and careful study of virtually all the existing manuscripts of the Convivio. While fully acknowledging our debt to Giuliani, he has no sympathy with that critic's love of emenda- tion for its own sake. He introduces no alteration if the text as it stands can possibly be explained, and this principle, combined with a careful collation of the manuscript readings, meets with its reward in such a certain restoration of the text as that given on p. 35 from a little-known Paris MS. He leaves a lacuna rather than re-write a hopeless passage.

The other papers, three of which have appeared in the pages of this review, display all the qualities that have won for the earlier volumes of Moore's Studies the high rank they hold in Dante literature- thoroughness of research, leisurely and orderly marshalling of material and argument, modesty in stating his own conclusions. He is as ready

506 506 Revievus Revievus

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