Chapter IV: Diderot and the French Transition

The position of Diderot 89
Difficult to authenticate 90
But hardly to be exaggerated. His Impressionism 91
The Richardson éloge 92
The _Reflections on Terence_ 93
The Review of the _Lettres d’Amabed_ 94
The Examination of Seneca 94
The quality and eminence of his critical position 95
Rousseau revisited 97
Madame de Staël 100
Her critical position 100
And work 100
The _Lettres sur Rousseau_ 101
The _Essai sur les Fictions_ 102
The _De La Littérature_ 102
The _De l’Allemagne_ 105
Her critical achievement: imputed 107
And actual 108
Chateaubriand: his difficulties 109
His Criticism 110
Indirect 111
And Direct 111
The _Génie du Christianisme_ 112
Its saturation with literary criticism 113
Survey and examples 114
Single points of excellence 116

And general importance 117
Joubert: his reputation 118
His literary αὐτάρκεια 118
The Law of Poetry 119
More on that subject 119
On Style 120
Miscellaneous Criticisms 121
His individual judgments more dubious 122
The reason for this 123
Additional illustrations 123
General remarks 125
The other “Empire Critics” 126
Fontanes 127
Geoffroy 128
Dussault 129
Hoffman, Garat, &c. 129
Ginguené 130
M. J. Chénier 131
Lemercier 131
Feletz 132
Cousin 133
Villemain 133
His claims 133
Deductions to be made from them 134
Beyle 135
_Racine et Shakespeare_ 136
His attitude here 138
And elsewhere 138
Nodier 139