A Short History of French Literature
Here the portion due to William of Lorris ends. Its main characteristics
have been indicated by this sketch, except that the extreme beauty and
grace of the lavish descriptions which enclose and adorn the somewhat
commonplace allegory perforce escape analysis. It is in these
descriptions, and in a certain tenderness and elegance of general
thought and expression, that the charm of the poem lies, and this is
very considerable. The deficiency of action, however, and the continual
allegorising threaten to make it monotonous had it been much longer
continued in the same strain.
It is unlikely that it was this consideration which determined Jean de
Meung to adopt a different style. In his time literature was already
agitated by violent social, political, and religious debates, and the
treasures of classical learning were becoming more and more commonly
known. But prose had not yet become a common literary vehicle, save for
history, oratory, and romance, nor had the duty of treating one thing at
a time yet impressed itself strongly upon authors. Jean de Meung was
satirically disposed, was accomplished in all the learning of his day,
and had strong political opinions. He determined accordingly to make the
poem of Lorris, which was in all probability already popular, the
vehicle of his thoughts.
In doing this he takes up the story as his predecessor had left it, at
the point where the lover, deprived of the support of Bel Acueil, and
with the suspicions of Dangier thoroughly aroused against him, lies
despairing without the walls of the delightful garden. Reason is once
more introduced, and protests as before, but in a different tone and
much more lengthily. She preaches the disadvantages of love in a speech
nearly four hundred lines long, followed by another double the length,
and then by a dialogue in which the lover takes his share. The
difference of manner is felt at once. The allegory is kept up after a
fashion, but instead of the graceful fantasies of William of Lorris, the
staple matter is either sharp and satirical views of actual life, or
else examples drawn indifferently from sacred and profane history. One
speech of Reason's, a thousand lines in length, consists of a collection
of instances of this kind showing the mobility of fortune. At length she
leaves the lover as she found him, 'melancolieux et dolant,' but
unconvinced. Amis (the friend), who has appeared for a moment
previously, now reappears, and comforts him, also at great length,
dwelling chiefly on the ways of women, concerning which much scandal is
talked. The scene with Reason had occupied nearly two thousand lines;
that with Amis extends to double that length, so that Jean de Meung had
already excelled his predecessor in this respect. Profiting by the
counsel he has received, the lover addresses himself to Riches, who
guards the way, but fruitlessly. The god of love, however, takes pity on
him (slightly ridiculing him for having listened to Reason), and summons
all his folk to attack the tower and free Bel Acueil. Among these Faux
Semblant presents himself, and, after some parley, is received. This new
personification of hypocrisy gives occasion to some of the author's most
satirical touches as he describes his principles and practice. After
this, Faux Semblant and his companion, Contrainte Astenance (forced or
feigned abstinence), set to work in favour of the lover, and soon win
their way into the tower. There they find an old woman who acts as Bel
Acueil's keeper. She takes a message from them to Bel Acueil, and then
engages in a singular conversation with her prisoner, wherein the
somewhat loose morality of the discourses of Amis is still further
enforced by historical examples, and by paraphrases of not a few
passages from Ovid. She afterward admits the lover, who thus, at nearly
the sixteen-thousandth line from the beginning, recovers through the
help of False Seeming the 'gracious reception' which is to lead him to
the rose. The castle, however, is not taken, and Dangier, with the rest
of his allegorical company, makes a stout resistance to 'Les Barons de
L'Ost'--the lords of Love's army. The god sends to invoke the aid of his
mother, and this introduces a new personage. Nature herself, and her
confidant, Genius, are brought on the scene, and nearly five thousand
verses serve to convey all manner of thoughts and scraps of learning,
mostly devoted to the support, as before, of questionably moral
doctrines. In these five thousand lines almost all the current ideas of
the middle ages on philosophy and natural science are more or less
explicitly contained. Finally, Venus arrives and, with her burning
brand, drives out Dangier and his crew, though even at this crisis of
the action the writer cannot refrain from telling the story of Pygmalion
and the Image at length. The way being clear, the lover proceeds
unmolested to gather the longed-for rose.
[Sidenote: Popularity of the Roman de la Rose.]
It is impossible to exaggerate, and not easy to describe, the popularity
which this poem enjoyed. Its attacks on womanhood and on morality
generally provoked indeed not a few replies, of which the most important
came long afterwards from Christine de Pisan and from Gerson. But the
general taste was entirely in favour of it. Allegorical already, it was
allegorised in fresh senses, even a religious meaning being given to it.
The numerous manuscripts which remain of it attest its popularity before
the days of printing. It was frequently printed by the earliest
typographers of France, and even in the sixteenth century it received a
fresh lease of life at the hands of Marot, who re-edited it. Abroad it
was praised by Petrarch and translated by Chaucer[88]; and it is on the
whole not too much to say that for fully two centuries it was the
favourite book in the vernacular literature of Europe. Nor was it
unworthy of this popularity. As has been pointed out, the grace of the
part due to William of Lorris is remarkable, and the satirical vigour of
the part due to Jean de Meung perhaps more remarkable still. The
allegorising and the length which repel readers of to-day did not
disgust generations whose favourite literary style was the allegorical,
and who had abundance of leisure; but the real secret of its vogue, as
of all such vogues, is that it faithfully held up the mirror to the
later middle ages. In no single book can that period of history be so
conveniently studied. Its inherited religion and its nascent
free-thought; its thirst for knowledge and its lack of criticism; its
sharp social divisions and its indistinct aspirations after liberty and
equality; its traditional morality and asceticism, and its half-pagan,
half-childish relish for the pleasures of sense; its romance and its
coarseness, all its weakness and all its strength, here appear.
[Sidenote: Imitations.]
The imitations of the _Roman de la Rose_ were in proportion to its
popularity. Much of this imitation took place in other kinds of poetry,
which will be noticed hereafter. Two poems, however, which are almost
contemporary with its earliest form, and which have only recently been
published, deserve mention. One, which is an obvious imitation of
Guillaume de Lorris, but an imitation of considerable merit, is the
_Roman de la Poire_[89], where the lover is besieged by Love in a tower.
The other, of a different class, and free from trace of direct
imitation, is the short poem called _De Venus la Deesse d'Amors_[90],
written in some three hundred four-lined stanzas, each with one rhyme
only. Some passages of this latter are very beautiful.
Three extracts, two from the first part of the _Roman de la Rose_, and
one from the second, will show its style:--
En iceli tens deliteus,
Que tote riens d'amer s'esfroie,
Sonjai une nuit que j'estoie,
Ce m'iert avis en mon dormant,
Qu'il estoit matin durement;
De mon lit tantost me levai,
Chaucai-moi et mes mains lavai.
Lors trais une aguille d'argent
D'un aguiller mignot et gent,
Si pris l'aguille a enfiler.
Hors de vile oi talent d'aler,
Por oir des oisiaus les sons
Qui chantoient par ces boissons
En icele saison novele;
Cousant mes manches a videle,
M'en alai tot seus esbatant,
Et les oiseles escoutant,
Qui de chanter moult s'engoissoient
Par ces vergiers qui florissoient,
Jolis, gais et pleins de leesce.
Vers une riviere m'adresce
Que j'oi pres d'ilecques bruire.
Car ne me soi aillors deduire
Plus bel que sus cele riviere.
D'un tertre qui pres d'iluec iere
Descendoit l'iaue grant et roide,
Clere, bruiant et aussi froide
Comme puiz, ou comme fontaine,
Et estoit poi mendre de Saine,
Mes qu'ele iere plus espandue.
Onques mes n'avoie veue
Tele iaue qui si bien coroit:
Moult m'abelissoit et seoit
A regarder le leu plaisant.
De l'iaue clere et reluisant
Mon vis rafreschi et lave.
Si vi tot covert et pave
Le fons de l'iaue de gravele;
La praerie grant et bele
Tres au pie de l'iaue batoit.
Clere et serie et bele estoit
La matinee et atempree:
Lors m'en alai parmi la pree
Contreval l'iaue esbanoiant,
Tot le rivage costoiant.
* * * * * *
Une ymage ot empres escrite,
Qui sembloit bien estre ypocrite,
_Papelardie_ ert apelee.
C'est cele qui en recelee,
Quant nus ne s'en puet prendre garde,
De nul mal faire ne se tarde.
El fait dehors le marmiteus,
Si a le vis simple et piteus,
Et semble sainte creature;
Mais sous ciel n'a male aventure
Qu'ele ne pense en son corage.
Moult la ressembloit bien l'ymage
Qui faite fu a sa semblance,
Qu'el fu de simple contenance;
Et si fu chaucie et vestue
Tout ainsinc cum fame rendue.
En sa main un sautier tenoit,
Et sachies que moult se penoit
De faire a Dieu prieres faintes,
Et d'appeler et sains et saintes.
El ne fu gaie ne jolive,
Ains fu par semblant ententive
Du tout a bonnes ovres faire;
Et si avoit vestu la haire.
Et sachies que n'iere pas grasse.
De jeuner sembloit estre lasse,
S'avoit la color pale et morte.
A li et as siens ert la porte
Deveee de Paradis;
Car icel gent si font lor vis
Amegrir, ce dit l'Evangile,
Por avoir loz parmi la vile,
Et por un poi de gloire vaine,
Qui lor toldra Dieu et son raine.
* * * * * *
_Comment le traistre Faulx-Semblant
Si va les cueurs des gens emblant,
Pour ses vestemens noirs et gris,
Et pour son viz pasle amaisgris._
'Trop sai bien mes habiz changier,
Prendre l'un, et l'autre estrangier.
Or sui chevaliers, or sui moines,
Or sui prelas, or sui chanoines,
Or sui clers, autre ore sui prestres,
Or sui desciples, or sui mestres,
Or chastelains, or forestiers:
Briement, ge sui de tous mestiers.
Or resui princes, or sui pages,
Or sai parler trestous langages;
Autre ore sui viex et chenus,
Or resui jones devenus.
Or sui Robers, or sui Robins,
Or cordeliers, or jacobins.
Si pren por sivre ma compaigne
Qui me solace et acompaigne,
(C'est dame Astenance-Contrainte),
Autre desguiseure mainte,
Si cum il li vient a plesir
Por acomplir le sien desir.
Autre ore vest robe de fame;
Or sui damoisele, or sui dame,
Autre ore sui religieuse,
Or sui rendue, or sui prieuse,
Or sui nonain, or sui abesse,
Or sui novice, or sui professe;
Et vois par toutes regions
Cerchant toutes religions. Mes de religion, sans faille,
G'en pren le grain et laiz la paille;
Por gens avulger i abit,
Ge n'en quier, sans plus, que l'abit.
Que vous diroie? en itel guise