unscrupulous manner from him. Thus, too, Rabelais' eccentricities are proved to have furnished many a lively scene to Racine and Molière, and many an ingenious fable to La Fontaine; while Pascal, who is generally reckoned one of the most original thinkers of the seventeenth century, is described as surpassing all others by his daring feats of plagiarism. In a single chapter of his "Pensées," Nodier has pointed out seven or eight instances of this species of theft; and for further examples, he invites the curious reader to a comparison of the "Pensées" with the "Essays of Montaigne. The Chevalier Ramsay, author of "Les Voyages de Cyrus," is cited as another notable plagiarist. "His master, Fenelon," says Voltaire, "had published the Travels of Telemachus; and Ramsay could do no less than follow his example. He does not stop, however, at a cold imitation, but literally copies the language both of Fenelon and of Bossuet. When the chevalier was taken to task for this, his reply was: Qu'on pouvait se rencontrer; qu'il n'était pas étonnant qu'il pensât comme Fénélon, et qu'il s'exprimât comme Bossuet."" If Voltaire's forwardness in exposing the plagiarisms of others was intended to remove from himself all suspicion of similar practices, it failed of success. Nodier, in his valuable work, "Questions de Littérature Légale," quotes several instances of plagiarism in Voltaire, and especially in his romance of "Zadig." "Année Littéraire," 1767, Fréron, too, in the describes a whole chapter in this romance as copied from "Les Voyages et Aventures de trois Princes de Sarrendip," a work translated from the Italian, and published at Paris in 1719; and the same writer has shown that Voltaire's "Episode de l'Ermite " is adopted from Parnel's poem of "The Hermit.” J.-J. Rousseau, Voltaire's great contemporary and rival, presents a parallel case. He reproaches Mably with having borrowed, without acknowledgment, his philosophical systems; and the Benedictine, Don Joseph Cajot, brings a charge of plagiarism against Rousseau's "Emile." Nor is this all the Abbé Du Laurens, known as the author of "Compère Mathieu," in a work published in 1788, asserts that Rousseau copied his "Contrat Social," word for word, from Ulric Huber's Latin work, "De Jure Civitatis Libri III.” "We shall be told," adds Du Laurens, "that M. Rousseau, like a second Prometheus, stole the sacred fire from heaven: our answer is, that he stole his fire, not from heaven, but from a library." Among the plagiarists of less note (cited by Quérard) may be named M. Langlès, the orientalist, stealing his "Voyage d'Abdoul Rizzac " from Galland's "Arabian Nights;" M. Lefebre de Villebrune, in his translation of Athenæus, copying six thousand two hundred notes from Casaubon's critical works; De Saint-Ange, in his translation of Ovid's "Metamorphoses," borrowing about fifteen hundred verses from Thomas Corneille, and a still greater number from Malfillatre; Jacques Delille, in his translation of Virgil, his poem of "L'Imagination," and other works, appropriating a great number of lines from other poets; Malte-Brun, in his famous work on Geography, literally adopting the remarks of Gosselin, Lacroix, Walckenaer, Pinkerton, Puissant, &c.; Aignan, in his translation of the "Iliad," borrowing twelve hundred verses from a previous translation by Rochefort; Castil Blaze transferring to his "Dictionary of Modern Music" three hundred and forty notices from Rousseau's work on the same subject, and, all the while, abusing the latter for his ignorance of the principles of the art; Henri Beyle, under the assumed name of Bombet, publishing his wellknown "Letters" on Haydn and Italian Music, and leaving the public unacquainted with the fact that he had merely translated them from the Italian of Joseph Carpani; and lastly, the Count de Courchamps palming on the world, as the "Mémoires inédits de Cagliostro," a series of tales which turned out, after all, to be but a literal transcript of a romance published some twenty years before, by John Potocki, a Polish count. These notices of plagiarism bring us down to our own times, and to the most audacious plagiarist of any time or country, M. Alexandre Dumas, Marquis de la Pailleterie. Until recent years, plagiarism was reckoned a discreditable practice, and every means was resorted to, in order to disguise or palliate the offence. Some writers, on finding that their good things had been anticipated, were content to say with Terence: "Nullum est jam dictum quod non sit dictum priùs;" or, as La Bruyère has it, "Tout est dit." Others may have exclaimed with Donatus: "Pereant illi qui, ante nos, nostra dixerunt!" Others, like the Chevalier de Cailly, may have taken a philosophical view of the matter, and in a happy vein of badinage, laughed at the pretensions of those who went before them : "Dis-je quelque chose d'assez belle? Others, again, like Richesource, may have instituted schools of plagiarism, in which the "art" was cultivated in all its details. Indeed, the very title of the work, published by this "Professor of Plagiarism," shows that concealment was a principal feature of the new science. "Le Masque des Orateurs, ou la Manière de déguiser toutes sortes de Compositions, Lettres, Sermons, Panégyriques, Oraisons funèbres, Dédicaces, Discours, &c.," which made its appearance in 1667, inculcated, above all things, the necessity of concealing the literary theft; and this was to be done in so adroit a manner that the plundered author should find it impossible to recognize his own work, or even his own style. But it was reserved for the nineteenth century, and for Alexandre Dumas, not only to practise this infamous "art," but to claim a place for it among the rights and prerogatives of genius. His words deserve to be quoted: "The man of genius does not steal; he conquers: and what he conquers, he annexes to his empire. He makes laws for it, peoples it with his subjects, and extends his golden sceptre over it. And where is the man who, on surveying his beautiful kingdom, shall dare to assert that this or that piece of land is no part of his property?" M. Dumas descants in the same magniloquent strain upon Napoleon's conquests, wishing it to be understood that he is himself "The grand Napoleon of the realms of rhyme." At all events, he finds consolation in the thought that Shakspeare and Molière were subjected to similar charges of plagiarism, and that their detractors are now forgotten. He seems not to know, however, that there is a vast difference between him and those great men, whom he |