See C. Smith,Ancient and Present State of the County and City of Cork(1750), edited by R. Day and W. A. Copinger (Cork, 1893); C. B. Gibson,History of the City and County of Cork(London, 1861); M. F. Cusack,History of the City and County of Cork, 1875.
See C. Smith,Ancient and Present State of the County and City of Cork(1750), edited by R. Day and W. A. Copinger (Cork, 1893); C. B. Gibson,History of the City and County of Cork(London, 1861); M. F. Cusack,History of the City and County of Cork, 1875.
CORK(perhaps through Sp.corchafrom Lat.cortex, bark, but possibly connected withquercus, oak), the outer layer of the bark of an evergreen species of oak (Quercus Suber). The tree reaches the height of about 30 ft., growing in the south of Europe and on the North African coasts generally; but it is principally cultivated in Spain and Portugal. The outer layer of bark in the cork oak by annual additions from within gradually becomes a thick soft homogeneous mass, possessing those compressible and elastic properties upon which the economic value of the material chiefly depends. The first stripping of cork from young trees takes place when they are from fifteen to twenty years of age. The yield, which is rough, unequal and woody in texture, is called virgin cork, and is useful only as a tanning substance, or for forming rustic work in ferneries, conservatories, &c. Subsequently the bark is removed every eight or ten years, the quality of the cork improving with each successive stripping; and the trees continue to live and thrive under the operation for 150 years and upwards. The produce of the second barking is still so coarse in texture that it is only fit for making floats for nets and for similar applications. The operation of stripping the trees takes place during the months of July and August. Two cuts are made round the stem—one a little above the ground, and the other immediately under the spring of the main branches. Between these three or four longitudinal incisions are then made, the utmost care being taken not to injure the inner bark. The cork is thereafter removed in the sections into which it has been cut, by inserting under it the wedge-shaped handle of the implement used in making the incisions. After the outer surface has been scraped and cleaned, the pieces are flattened by heating them over a fire and submitting them to pressure on a flat surface. In the heating operation the surface is charred, and thereby the pores are closed up, and what is termed “nerve” is given to the material. In this state the cork is ready for manufacture or exportation.
Though specially developed in the cork-oak, the substance cork is an almost universal product in the stems (and roots) of woody plants which increase in diameter year by year. Generally towards the end of the first year the original thin protective layer of a stem or branch is replaced by a thin layer of “cork,” that is a layer of cells the living contents of which have disappeared while the walls have become thickened and toughened as the result of the formation in them of a substance known as suberin. Fresh cork is formed each season by an active formative layer below the layer developed last season, which generally peels off. Where the formation is extensive and persistent as in the cork-oak, a thick covering of cork is formed. In some cases, as on young shoots of the cork-elm, the development is irregular and wing-like outgrowths of cork are formed. In northern Russia a similar method to that used for obtaining cork from the cork-oak is employed with the birch.
Cork possesses a combination of properties which peculiarly fits it for many and diverse uses, for some of which it alone is found applicable. The leading purpose for which it is used is for forming bungs and stoppers for bottles and other vessels containing liquids. Its compressibility, elasticity and practical imperviousness to both air and water so fit it for this purpose that the term cork is even more applied to the function than to the substance. Its specific lightness, combined with strength and durability, recommend it above all other substances for forming life-buoys, belts and jackets, and in the construction of life-boats and other apparatus for saving from drowning. On account of its lightness, softness and non-conducting properties it is used for hat-linings and the soles of shoes, the latter being a very ancient application of cork. It is also used in making artificial limbs, for lining entomological cases, for pommels in leather-dressing, and as a medium for making architectural models. Chips and cuttings are ground up and mixed with india-rubber to form kamptulicon floor-cloth, or “cork-carpet.” The inner bark of the cork-tree is a valuable tanning material.
Certain of the properties and uses of cork were known to the ancient Greeks and Romans, and the latter, we find by Horace (Odesiii. 8), used it as a stopper for wine-vessels:—
“corticem adstrictum pice dimovebitamphorae”—
“corticem adstrictum pice dimovebit
amphorae”—
It appears, however, that cork was not generally used for stopping bottles till so recent a period as near the end of the 17th century, and bottles themselves were not employed for storing liquids till the 15th century. Many substitutes have been proposed for cork as a stoppering agent; but except in the case of aerated liquids none of these has recommended itself in practice. For aerated water bottles several successful devices have been introduced. The most simple of these is an india-rubber ball pressed upwards into the narrow of the bottle neck by the force of the gas contained in the water; and in another system a glass ball is similarly pressed against an india-rubber collar inserted in the neck of the bottle. By analogy the term “to cork” is used of any such devices for sealing up a bottle or aperture.
CORK AND ORRERY, MARY,Countess of(Mary Monckton) (1746-1840), was born on the 21st of May 1746, the daughter of the first Viscount Galway. From her early years she took a keen interest in literature, and through her influence her mother’s house in London became a favourite meeting-place of literary celebrities. Dr Johnson was a frequent guest. According to Boswell, Miss Monckton’s “vivacity enchanted the sage, and they used to talk together with all imaginable ease.” Sheridan, Reynolds, Burke and Horace Walpole were among her constant visitors, and Mrs Siddons was her closest friend. In 1786 she married the seventh earl of Cork and Orrery, who died in 1798. As Lady Cork, her love of social “lions” became more pronounced than ever. Among her regular guests were Canning and Castlereagh, Byron, Sir Walter Scott, Lord John Russell, Sir Robert Peel, Theodore Hook and Sydney Smith. She is supposed to have been the original of Lady Bellair in Disraeli’sHenrietta Temple, and Dickens is believed to have drawn on her for some of the peculiarities of Mrs Leo Hunter inPickwick. Lady Cork had a remarkable memory, and was a brilliant conversationalist. She died in London on the 30th of May 1840. She was then ninety-four, but within a few days of her death had been either dining out or entertaining every night. There is a fine portrait of her by Reynolds.
CORLEONE(Saracen,Korliun), a town of Sicily, in the province of Palermo, 42 m. S. of Palermo by rail and 21 m. direct, 1949 ft. above sea-level. Pop. (1901) 14,803. The town was a Saracen settlement, but a Lombard colony was introduced by Frederick II. Two medieval castles rise above the town, and there are some churches of interest.
CORMENIN, LOUIS MARIE DE LA HAYE,Vicomte de(1788-1868), French jurist and political pamphleteer, was born at Paris on the 6th of January 1788. His father and his grandfather both held the rank of lieutenant-general of the admiralty. At the age of twenty he was received advocate, and about the same time he gained some reputation as a writer of piquant and delicate poems. In 1810 he received from Napoleon I. the appointment of auditor to the council of state; and after the restoration of the Bourbons he became master of requests. During the period of his connexion with the council he devoted himself zealously to the study of administrative law. He was selected to prepare some of the most important reports of the council. Among his separate publications at this time are noted,—Du conseil d’état envisagé comme conseil et comme juridictiondans notre monarchie constitutionnelle(1818), andDe la responsabilité des agents du gouvernement. In the former he claimed, for the protection of the rights of private persons in the administration of justice, the institution of a special court whose members should be irremovable, the right of oral defence, and publicity of trial. In 1822 appeared hisQuestions de droit administratif, in which he for the first time brought together and gave scientific shape to the scattered elements of administrative law. These he arranged and stated clearly in the form of aphorisms, with logical deductions, establishing them by proofs drawn from the archives of the council of state. This is recognized as his most important work as a jurist. The fifth edition (1840) was thoroughly revised.
In 1828 Cormenin entered the Chamber of Deputies as member for Orleans, took his seat in the Left Centre, and began a vigorous opposition to the government of Charles X. As he was not gifted with the qualifications of the orator, he seldom appeared at the tribune; but in the various committees he defended all forms of popular liberties, and at the same time delivered, in a series of powerful pamphlets, under the pseudonym of “Timon,” the most formidable blows against tyranny and all political and administrative abuses. After the revolution of July 1830, Cormenin was one of the 221 who signed the protest against the elevation of the Orleans dynasty to the throne; and he resigned both his office in the council of state and his seat in the chamber. He was, however, soon re-elected deputy, and now voted with the extreme Left. The discussions on the budget in 1831 gave rise to the publication of his famous series ofLettres sur la liste civile, which in ten years ran through twenty-five editions. In the following year he was elected deputy for Belley. In 1834 he was elected by two arrondissements, and sat for Joigny, which he represented till 1846. In this year he lost his seat in consequence of the popular prejudice aroused against him by his trenchant pamphletOui et non(1845) against attacks on religious liberty, and a second entitledFeu! Feu!(1845), written in reply to those who demanded a retractation of the former. Sixty thousand copies were rapidly sold.
Cormenin was an earnest advocate of universal suffrage before the revolution of February 1848, and had remorselessly exposed the corrupt practices at elections in his pamphlet—Ordre du jour sur la corruption électorale. After the revolution he was elected by four departments to the Constituent Assembly, and became one of its vice-presidents. He was also member and president of the constitutional commission, and for some time took a leading part in drawing up the republican constitution. But the disputes which broke out among the members led him to resign the presidency. He was soon after named member of the council of state and president of thecomité du contentieux. It was at this period that he published two pamphlets—Sur l’indépendance de l’Italie. After thecoup d’étatof December 2, 1851, Cormenin, who had undertaken the defence of Prince Louis Napoleon after his attempt at Strassburg, accepted a place in the new council of state of the empire. Four years later, by imperial ordinance, he was made a member of the Institute. One of the most characteristic works of Cormenin is theLivre des orateurs, a series of brilliant studies of the principal parliamentary orators of the restoration and the monarchy of July, the first edition of which appeared in 1838, and the eighteenth in 1860. In 1846 he published hisEntretiens de village, which procured him the Montyon prize, and of which six editions were called for the same year. His last work wasLe Droit de tonnage en Algérie(1860). He died at Paris, on the 6th of May 1868. Two volumes of hisReliquiaewere printed in Paris in the same year.
CORMON, FERNAND(1845- ), French painter, was born in Paris. He became a pupil of Cabanel, Fromentin and Portaels, and one of the leading historical painters of modern France. At an early age he attracted attention by the better class of sensationalism in his art, although for a time his powerful brush dwelled with particular delight on scenes of bloodshed, such as the “Murder in the Seraglio” (1868) and the “Death of Ravara, Queen of Lanka” at the Toulouse Museum. The Luxembourg has his “Cain flying before Jehovah’s Curse”; and for the Mairie of the fourth arrondissement of Paris he executed in grisaille a series of Panels: “Birth,” “Death,” “Marriage,” “War,” &c. “A Chief’s Funeral,” and pictures having the Stone Age for their subject, occupied him for several years. He was appointed to the Legion of Honour in 1880. Subsequently he also devoted himself to portraiture.
CORMONTAINGNE, LOUIS DE(c. 1697-1752), French military engineer, was born at Strassburg. He was present as a volunteer at the sieges of Freiburg and Landau in the later years of the War of the Spanish Succession, and in 1715 he entered the engineers. After being stationed for some years at Strassburg he became captain, and was put in charge (at first in a subordinate capacity, and subsequently as chief engineer) of the new works, Forts Moselle and Bellecroix, at Metz, which he built according to his own system of fortification. He was present at the siege of Philipsburg in 1733, and as a lieutenant-colonel took part in most of the sieges in the Low Countries during the War of the Austrian Succession. He attained the rank of brigadier and finally that ofmaréchal de camp, and was employed in fortification work until his death. HisArchitecture militaire, written in 1714, was long kept secret by order of the authorities, but, an unauthorized edition having appeared at the Hague in 1741, he himself prepared another version calledPremier mémoire sur la fortification, which from 1741 onwards was followed by others. His ideas are closely modelled on those of Vauban (q.v.), and in his lifetime he was not considered the equal of such engineers as d’Asfeld and Filley. It was not until twenty years after his death that his system became widely known. Fourcroy de Rainecourt, then chief of engineers, searching the archives for valuable matter, chose the numerous memoirs of Cormontaingne for publication amongst engineer officers in 1776. Even then they only circulated privately, and it was not until the engineer Bousmard published Cormontaingne’sMémorial de l’attaque des places(Berlin, 1803) that Fourcroy, and after him General La Fitte de Clavé, actually gave to the general public theŒuvres posthumes de Cormontaingne(Paris, 1806-1809).
His system of fortification was not marked by any great originality of thought, which indeed could not be expected of a member of thecorps du génie, the characteristics of which were a close caste spirit and an unquestioning reverence for the authority of Vauban. Forts Moselle and Bellecroix are still in existence.
See Von Brese-Winiari,Über Entstehen etc. der neueren Befestigungsmethode(Berlin, 1844); Prévost du Vernois,De la fortification depuis Vauban(Paris, 1861); Cosseron de Villenoisy,Essai historique sur la fortification(Paris, 1869).
See Von Brese-Winiari,Über Entstehen etc. der neueren Befestigungsmethode(Berlin, 1844); Prévost du Vernois,De la fortification depuis Vauban(Paris, 1861); Cosseron de Villenoisy,Essai historique sur la fortification(Paris, 1869).
CORMORANT(from the Lat.corvus marinus,1through the Fr., in somepatoisof which it is still “cor marin”; in certain Ital. dialects are the forms “corvo marin” or “corvo marino”), a large sea-fowl belonging to the genusPhalacrocorax2(Carbo,HalieusandGraculusof some ornithologists), and that group of the Linnaean orderAnseres, now partly generally recognized by Illiger’s termSteganopodes, of which it with its allies forms a familyPhalacrocoracidae.
The cormorant (P. carbo) frequents almost all the sea-coast of Europe, and breeds in societies at various stations, most generally on steep cliffs, but occasionally on rocky islands as well as on trees. The nest consists of a large mass of sea-weed, and, with the ground immediately surrounding it, generally looks as though bespattered with whitewash, from the excrement of the bird, which lives entirely on fish. The eggs, from four to six in number, are small, and have a thick, soft, calcareous shell, bluish-white when first laid, but soon becoming discoloured. The young are hatched blind, and covered with an inky-black skin. They remain for some time in the squab-condition, and are then highly esteemed for food by the northern islanders, their flesh being said to taste as well as a roasted hare’s. Their first plumage is of a sombre brownish-black above, and more or less white beneath. They take two or three years to assume the fully adultdress, which is deep black, glossed above with bronze, and varied in the breeding-season with white on the cheeks and flanks, besides being adorned by filamentary feathers on the head, and further set off by a bright yellow gape. The old cormorant looks nearly as big as a goose, but is really much smaller; its flesh is quite uneatable.
Taken when young from the nest, this bird is easily tamed and can be trained to fish for its keeper, as was of old time commonly done in England, where the master of the cormorants was one of the officers of the royal household. Nowadays the practice is nearly obsolete. When taken out to furnish sport, a strap is fastened round the bird’s neck so as, without impeding its breath, to hinder it from swallowing its captures.3Arrived at the waterside, it is cast off. It at once dives and darts along the bottom as swiftly as an arrow in quest of its prey, rapidly scanning every hole or pool. A fish is generally seized within a few seconds of its being sighted, and as each is taken the bird rises to the surface with its capture in its bill. It does not take much longer to dispose of the prize in the dilatable skin of its throat so far as the strap will allow, and the pursuit is recommenced until the bird’s gular pouch, capacious as it is, will hold no more. It then returns to its keeper, who has been anxiously watching and encouraging its movements, and a little manipulation of its neck effects the delivery of the booty. It may then be let loose again, or, if considered to have done its work, it is fed and restored to its perch. The activity the bird displays under water is almost incredible to those who have not seen its performances, and in a shallow river scarcely a fish escapes its keen eyes, and sudden turns, except by taking refuge under a stone or root, or in the mud that may be stirred up during the operation, and so avoiding observation (see Salvin and Freeman,Falconry, 1859).
Nearly allied to the cormorant, and having much the same habits, is the shag, or green cormorant of some writers (P. graculus). The shag (which name in many parts of the world is used in a generic sense) is, however, about one-fourth smaller in linear dimensions, is much more glossy in plumage, and its nuptial embellishment is a nodding plume instead of the white patches of the cormorant. The easiest diagnostic on examination will be found to be the number of tail-feathers, which in the former are fourteen and in the shag twelve. The latter, too, is more marine in the localities it frequents, scarcely ever entering fresh or indeed inland waters.
In the south of Europe a much smaller species (P. pygmaeus) is found. This is almost entirely a fresh-water bird, and is not uncommon on the lower Danube. Other species, to the number perhaps of thirty or more, have been discriminated from other parts of the world, but all have a great general similarity to one another. New Zealand and the west coast of northern America are particularly rich in birds of this genus, and the species found there are the most beautifully decorated of any. All, however, are remarkable for their curiously-formed feet, the four toes of each being connected by a web, for their long stiff tails, and for the absence, in the adult, of any exterior nostrils. When gorged, or when the state of the tide precludes fishing, they are fond of sitting on an elevated perch, often with extended wings, and in this attitude they will remain motionless for a considerable time, as though hanging themselves out to dry. It was perhaps this peculiarity that struck the observation of Milton, and prompted his well-known similitude of Satan to a cormorant (Parad. Lost, iv. 194); but when not thus behaving they themselves provoke the more homely comparison of a row of black bottles. Their voracity is proverbial.
(A. N.)
1Some authors, following Caius, derive the word fromcorvus voransand spell it corvorant, but doubtless wrongly.2So spelt since the days of Gesner; but possiblyPhalaracoraxwould be more correct.3According to Willoughby it was formerly the custom to carry the cormorant hooded till it was required; in modern practice the bearer wears a face-mask to protect himself from its beak.
1Some authors, following Caius, derive the word fromcorvus voransand spell it corvorant, but doubtless wrongly.
2So spelt since the days of Gesner; but possiblyPhalaracoraxwould be more correct.
3According to Willoughby it was formerly the custom to carry the cormorant hooded till it was required; in modern practice the bearer wears a face-mask to protect himself from its beak.
CORN(a common Teutonic word; cf. Lat.granum, seed, grain), originally meaning a small hard particle or grain, as of sand, salt, gunpowder, &c. It thus came to be applied to the small hard seed of a plant, as still used in the words barley-corn and pepper-corn. In agriculture it is generally applied to the seed of the cereal plants. It is often locally understood to mean that kind of cereal which is the leading crop of the district; thus in England it refers to wheat, in Scotland and Ireland to oats, and in the United States to maize (Indian corn). SeeGrain Trade;Corn Laws;Agriculture;Wheat;Maize; &c.
The term “corned” is given to a preparation of meat (especially beef) on account of the original manner of preserving it by the use of salt in grains or “corns.”
CORN(from Lat.cornu, horn), in pathology (technicallyclavus), a localized outgrowth of the epidermic layer of the skin, most commonly of the toe, with a central ingrowth of a hard horny plug. The underlying papillae are atrophied, causing a cup-shaped hollow, whilst the surrounding papillae are hyper-trophied. The condition is mainly caused by badly fitting boots, though any undue pressure, of insufficient power to give rise to ulceration, may be the cause of a corn. Corns may be hard or soft. The hard corn usually occurs on one of the toes, is a more or less conical swelling and may be extremely painful at times. If suppuration occurs around the corn, it is apt to burrow, and if unattended to may give rise to arthritis or even necrosis. The best treatment is to soften the corn with hot water, pare it very carefully with a sharp knife, and then paint it with a solution of salicylic acid in collodion. The painting must be repeated three times a day for a week or ten days. The soft corn occurs between the toes and is usually a more painful condition. Owing to the absorption of sweat its surface may become white and sodden in appearance. The treatment is much the same, but spirits of camphor should be painted on each night, and a layer of cotton wool placed between the toes during the daytime.
CORNARO, CATERINA(1454-1510), queen of Cyprus, was the daughter of Marco Cornaro, a Venetian noble, whose brother Andrea was an intimate friend of James de Lusignan, natural son of King John II. of Cyprus. In the king’s death in 1458 the succession was disputed, and James, with the help of the sultan of Egypt, seized the island. But several powers were arrayed against him—the duke of Savoy, who claimed the island on the strength of the marriage of his son Louis to Charlotte, the only legitimate daughter of John II.,1the Genoese, and the pope. It was important that he should make a marriage such as would secure him powerful support. Andrea Cornaro suggested his niece Caterina, famed for her beauty, as that union would bring him Venetian help. The proposal was agreed to, and approved of by Caterina herself and the senate, and the contract was signed in 1468. But further intrigues caused delay, and it was not until 1471 that James’s hesitations were overcome. Caterina was solemnly adopted by the doge as a “daughter of the Republic” and sailed for Cyprus in 1472 with the title of queen of Cyprus, Jerusalem and Armenia. But she only enjoyed one year of happiness, for in 1473 her husband died of fever, leaving his kingdom to his queen and their child as yet unborn. Enemies and rival claimants arose on all sides, for Cyprus was a tempting bait. In August the child James III. was born, but as soon as the Venetian fleet sailed away a plot to depose him in favour of Zarla, James’s illegitimate daughter, broke out, and Caterina was kept a prisoner. The Venetians returned, and order was soon restored, but the republic was meditating the seizure of Cyprus, although it had no valid title whatever, and after the death of Caterina’s child in 1474 it was Venice which really governed the island. The poor queen was surrounded by intrigues and plots, and although the people of the coast towns loved her, the Cypriot nobles were her bitter enemies and hostile to Venetian influence. In 1488 the republic, fearing that Sultan Bayezid II. intended to attack Cyprus, and having also discovered a plot to marry Caterina to King Alphonso II. of Naples, a proposal to which she seemed not averse, decided to recall the queen to Venice and formally annex the island. Caterina at first refused, for she clung to her royalty, but Venice was a severe parent to its adopted daughter and would not be gainsaid; she was forced to abdicate in favour of the republic, and returned to Venice in 1489. The government conferred onher the castle and town of Asolo for life, and there in the midst of a learned and brilliant little court, of which Cardinal Bembo (q.v.) was a shining light, she spent the rest of her days in idyllic peace. She died in July 1510. Titian’s famous portrait of her is in the Uffizi gallery in Florence.
Bibliography.—A. Centelli,Caterina Cornaro e il suo regno(Venice, 1892); S. Romanin,Storia documentata di Venezia, vol. iv. (Venice, 1855), and hisLezioni di storia Veneta(Florence, 1875); L. de Mas Latrie,Histoire de l’île de Chypre(Paris, 1852-1861); and Horatio Brown’s essay in hisStudies in Venetian History(London, 1907), which gives the best sketch of the queen’s career and a list of authorities.
Bibliography.—A. Centelli,Caterina Cornaro e il suo regno(Venice, 1892); S. Romanin,Storia documentata di Venezia, vol. iv. (Venice, 1855), and hisLezioni di storia Veneta(Florence, 1875); L. de Mas Latrie,Histoire de l’île de Chypre(Paris, 1852-1861); and Horatio Brown’s essay in hisStudies in Venetian History(London, 1907), which gives the best sketch of the queen’s career and a list of authorities.
(L. V.*)
1Whence the kings of Italy derive their title of kings of Cyprus and Jerusalem.
1Whence the kings of Italy derive their title of kings of Cyprus and Jerusalem.
CORNARO, LUIGI(1467-1566), a Venetian nobleman, famous for his treatises on a temperate life. In his youth he lived freely, but after a severe illness at the age of forty, he began under medical advice gradually to reduce his diet. For some time he restricted himself to a daily allowance of 12 oz. of solid food and 14 oz. of wine; later in life he reduced still further his bill of fare, and found he could support his life and strength with no more solid meat than an egg a day. At the age of eighty-three he wrote his treatise onThe Sure and Certain Method of Attaining a Long and Healthful Life, the English translation of which went through numerous editions; and this was followed by three others on the same subject, composed at the ages of eighty-six, ninety-one and ninety-five respectively. The first three were published at Padua in 1558. They are written, says Addison (Spectator, No. 195), “with such a spirit of cheerfulness, religion and good sense, as are the natural concomitants of temperance and sobriety.” He died at Padua at the age of ninety-eight.
CORNBRASH,in geology, the name applied to the uppermost member of the Bathonian stage of the Jurassic formation in England. It is an old English agricultural name applied in Wiltshire to a variety of loose rubble or “brash” which, in that part of the country, forms a good soil for growing corn. The name was adopted by William Smith for a thin band of shelly limestone which, in the south of England, breaks up in the manner indicated. Although only a thin group of rocks (10-25 ft.), it is remarkably persistent; it may be traced from Weymouth to the Yorkshire coast, but in north Lincolnshire it is very thin, and probably dies out in the neighbourhood of the Humber. It appears again, however, as a thin bed in Gristhorpe Bay, Cayton Bay, Wheatcroft, Newton Dale and Langdale. In the inland exposures in Yorkshire it is difficult to follow on account of its thinness, and the fact that it passes up into dark shales in many places—the so-called “clays of the Cornbrash,” withAvicula echinata.
The Cornbrash is a very fossiliferous formation; the fauna indicates a transition from the Lower to the Middle Oolites, though it is probably more nearly related to that of the beds above than to those below. Good localities for fossils are Radipole near Weymouth, Closworth, Wincanton, Trowbridge, Cirencester, Witney, Peterborough and Sudbrook Park near Lincoln. A few of the important fossils are:Waldheimia lagenalis,Pecten levis,Avicula echinata,Ostrea flabelloides,Myacites decurtatus,Echinobrissus clunicularis;Macrocephalites macrocephalusis abundant in the midland counties but rarer in the south; belemnites are not known. The remains of saurians (Steneosaurus) are occasionally found. The Cornbrash is of little value for building or road-making, although it is used locally; in the south of England it is not oolitic, but in Yorkshire it is a rubbly, marly, frequently ironshot oolitic limestone. In Bedfordshire it has been termed the Bedford limestone.
SeeJurassic; also H. B. Woodward, “The Jurassic Rocks of Britain,” vol. iv. (1894); and C. Fox Strangways, vol. i.; bothMemoirs of the Geological Survey.
SeeJurassic; also H. B. Woodward, “The Jurassic Rocks of Britain,” vol. iv. (1894); and C. Fox Strangways, vol. i.; bothMemoirs of the Geological Survey.
(J. A. H.)
CORNEILLE, PIERRE(1606-1684), French dramatist and poet, was born at Rouen, in the rue de la Pie, on the 6th of June 1606. The house, which was long preserved, was destroyed not many years ago. His father, whose Christian name was the same, wasavocat du roi à la Table de Marbre du Palais, and also held the position ofmaître des eaux et forêtsin thevicomté(orbailliage, as some say) of Rouen. In this latter office he is said to have shown himself a vigorous magistrate, suppressing brigandage and plunder without regard to his personal safety. He was ennobled in 1637 (it is said not without regard to his son’s distinction), and the honour was renewed in favour of his sons Pierre and Thomas in 1669, when a general repeal of the letters of nobility recently granted had taken place. There appears, however, to be no instance on record of the poet himself assuming the “de” of nobility. His mother’s name was Marthe le Pesant.
After being educated by the Jesuits of Rouen, Corneille at the age of eighteen was entered asavocat, and in 1624 took the oaths, as we are told, four years before the regular time, a dispensation having been procured. He was afterwards appointed advocate to the admiralty, and to the “waters and forests,” but both these posts must have been of small value, as we find him parting with them in 1650 for the insignificant sum of 6000 livres. In that year and the next he wasprocureur-syndic des États de Normandie. His first play,Mélite, was acted in 1629. It is said by B. le B. de Fontenelle (his nephew) to have been inspired by personal experiences, and was extremely popular, either because or in spite of its remarkable difference from the popular plays of the day, those of A. Hardy. In 1632Clitandre, a tragedy, was printed (it may have been acted in 1631); in 1633La Veuveand theGalerie du palais, in 1634La SuivanteandLa Place Royale, all the last-named plays being comedies, saw the stage. In 1634 also, having been selected as the composer of a Latin elegy to Richelieu on the occasion of the cardinal visiting Rouen, he was introduced to the subject of his verses, and was soon after enrolled among the “five poets.” These officers (the others being G. Colletet, Boisrobert and C. de l’Étoile, who in no way merited the title, and J. de Rotrou, who was no unworthy yokefellow even of Corneille) had for task the more profitable than dignified occupation of working up Richelieu’s ideas into dramatic form. No one could be less suited for such work than Corneille, and he soon (it is said) incurred his employer’s displeasure by altering the plan of the third act ofLes Thuileries, which had been entrusted to him.
Meanwhile the year 1635 saw the production ofMédée, a grand but unequal tragedy. In the next year the singular extravaganza entitledL’Illusion comiquefollowed, and was succeeded about the end of November by theCid, based on theMocedades del Cidof Guillem de Castro. The triumphant success of this, perhaps the most “epoch-making” play in all literature, the jealousy of Richelieu and the Academy, the open attacks of Georges de Scudéry and J. de Mairet and others, and the pamphlet-war which followed, are among the best-known incidents in the history of letters. The trimming verdict of the Academy, which we have in J. Chapelain’sSentiments de l’Académie française sur la tragi-comédie du Cid(1638), when its arbitration was demanded by Richelieu, and not openly repudiated by Corneille, was virtually unimportant; but it is worth remembering that no less a writer than Georges de Scudéry, in hisObservations sur le Cid(1637), gravely and apparently sincerely asserted and maintained of this great play that the subject was utterly bad, that all the rules of dramatic composition were violated, that the action was badly conducted, the versification constantly faulty, and the beauties as a rule stolen! Corneille himself was awkwardly situated in this dispute. Theesprit bourruby which he was at all times distinguished, and which he now displayed in his rather arrogantExcuse à Ariste, unfitted him for controversy, and it was of vital importance to him that he should not lose the outward marks of favour which Richelieu continued to show him. Perhaps the pleasantest feature in the whole matter is the unshaken and generous admiration with which Rotrou, the only contemporary whose geniusentitledhim to criticise Corneille, continued to regard his friend, rival, and in some sense (though Rotrou was the younger of the two) pupil. Finding it impossible to make himself fairly heard in the matter, Corneille (who had retired from his position among the “five poets”) withdrew to Rouen and passed nearly three years in quiet there, perhaps revolving the opinions afterwards expressed in his threeDiscoursand in theExamensof his plays, where he bows, somewhat as in the house of Rimmon, to “the rules.” In 1639,or at the beginning of 1640, appearedHoracewith a dedication to Richelieu. The good offices of Madame de Combalet, to whom theCidhad been dedicated, and perhaps the satisfaction of the cardinal’s literary jealousy, had healed what breach there may have been, and indeed the poet was in no position to quarrel with his patron. Richelieu not only allowed him 500 crowns a year, but soon afterwards, it is said, though on no certain authority, employed his omnipotence in reconciling the father of the poet’s mistress, Marie de Lampérière, to the marriage of the lovers (1640). In this year alsoCinnaappeared. A brief but very serious illness attacked him, and the death of his father the year before had increased his family anxieties by leaving his mother in very indifferent circumstances. It has, however, been recently denied that he himself was at any time poor, as older traditions asserted.
In the following year Corneille figured as a contributor to theGuirlande de Julie, a famous album which the marquis de Montausier, assisted by all the literary men of the day, offered to his lady-love, Julie d’Angennes. 1643 was, according to the latest authorities (for Cornelian dates have often been altered), a very great year in the dramatist’s life. Therein appearedPolyeucte, the memorable comedy ofLe Menteur, which though adapted from the Spanish stood in relation to French comedy very much asLe Cid, which owed less to Spain, stood to French tragedy; its less popular and far less goodSuite,—and perhapsLa Mort de Pompée.Rodogune(1644) was a brilliant success;Théodore(1645), a tragedy on a somewhat perilous subject, was the first of Corneille’s plays which was definitely damned. Some amends may have been made to him by the commission which he received next year to write verses for theTriomphes poétiques de Louis XIII. Soon after (22nd of January 1647) the Academy at last (it had twice rejected him on frivolous pleas) admitted the greatest of living French writers.Héraclius(1646),Andromède(1650), a spectacle-opera rather than a play,Don Sanche d’Aragon(1650) andNicomède(1651) were the products of the next few years’ work; but in 1652Pertharitewas received with decided disfavour, and the poet in disgust resolved, like Ben Jonson, to quit the loathed stage. In this resolution he persevered for six years, during which he worked at a verse translation of theImitation of Christ(finished in 1656), at his threeDiscourses on Dramatic Poetry, and at theExamenswhich are usually printed at the end of his plays. In 1659 Fouquet, the Maecenas of the time, persuaded him to alter his resolve, andŒdipe, a play which became a great favourite with Louis XIV., was the result. It was followed byLa Toison d’or(1660),Sertorius(1662) andSophonisbe(1663). In this latter year Corneille (who had at last removed his residence from Rouen to Paris in 1662) was included among the list of men of letters pensioned at the proposal of Colbert. He received 2000 livres.Othon(1664),Agésilas(1666),Attila(1667), andTite et Bérénice(1670), were generally considered as proofs of failing powers,—the cruel quatrain of Boileau—
“Après l’AgésilasHélas!Mais après l’AttilaHolà!”
“Après l’Agésilas
Hélas!
Mais après l’Attila
Holà!”
in the case of these two plays, and the unlucky comparison with Racine in theBérénice, telling heavily against them. In 1665 and 1670 some versifications of devotional works addressed to the Virgin had appeared. The part which Corneille took inPsyché(1671), Molière and P. Quinault being his coadjutors, showed signs of renewed vigour; butPulchérie(1672) andSuréna(1674) were allowed even by his faithful followers to be failures. He lived for ten years after the appearance ofSuréna, but was almost silent save for the publication, in 1676, of some beautiful verses thanking Louis XIV. for ordering the revival of his plays. He died at his house in the rue d’Argenteuil on the 30th of September 1684. For nine years (1674-1681), and again in 1683, his pension had, for what reason is unknown, been suspended. It used to be said that he was in great straits, and the story went (though, as far as Boileau is concerned, it has been invalidated), that at last Boileau, hearing of this, went to the king and offered to resign his own pension if there were not money enough for Corneille, and that Louis sent the aged poet two hundred pistoles. He might, had it actually been so, have said, with a great English poet in like case, “I have no time to spend them.” Two days afterwards he was dead.
Corneille was buried in the church of St Roch, where no monument marked his grave until 1821. He had six children, of whom four survived him. Pierre, the eldest son, a cavalry officer who died before his father, left posterity in whom the name has continued; Marie, the eldest daughter, was twice married, and by her second husband, M. de Farcy, became the ancestress of Charlotte Corday. Repeated efforts have been made for the benefit of the poet’s descendants, Voltaire, Charles X. and theComédie françaisehaving all borne part therein.
The portraits of Corneille (the best and most trustworthy of which is from the burin of M. Lasne, an engraver of Caen), represent him as a man of serious, almost of stern countenance, and this agrees well enough with such descriptions as we have of his appearance, and with the idea of him which we should form from his writings and conduct. His nephew Fontenelle admits that his general address and manner were by no means prepossessing. Others use stronger language, and it seems to be confessed that either from shyness, from pride, or from physical defects of utterance, probably from all three combined, he did not attract strangers. Racine is said to have assured his son that Corneille made verses “cent fois plus beaux” than his own, but that his own greater popularity was owing to the fact that he took some trouble to make himself personally agreeable. Almost all the anecdotes which have been recorded concerning him testify to a rugged and somewhat unamiable self-contentment. “Je n’ai pas le mérite de ce pays-ci,” he said of the court, “Je n’en suis pas moins Pierre Corneille,” he is said to have replied to his friends as often as they dared to suggest certain shortcomings in his behaviour, manner or speech, “Je suis saoul de gloire et affamé d’argent” was his reply to the compliments of Boileau. Yet tradition is unanimous as to his affection for his family, and as to the harmony in which he lived with his brother Thomas who had married Marguerite de Lampérière, younger sister of Marie, and whose household both at Rouen and at Paris was practically one with that of his brother. No story about Corneille is better known than that which tells of the trap between the two houses, and how Pierre, whose facility of versification was much inferior to his brother’s, would lift it when hard bestead, and call out “Sans-souci, une rime!” Notwithstanding this domestic felicity, an impression is left on the reader of Corneille’s biographies that he was by no means a happy man. Melancholy of temperament will partially explain this, but there were other reasons. He appears to have been quite free from envy properly so called, and to have been always ready to acknowledge the excellences of his contemporaries. But, as was the case with a very different man—Goldsmith—praise bestowed on others always made him uncomfortable unless it were accompanied by praise bestowed on himself. As Guizot has excellently said, “Sa jalousie fut celle d’un enfant qui veut qu’un sourire le rassure contre les caresses que reçoit son frère.”
Although his actual poverty has been recently denied, he cannot have been affluent. His pensions covered but a small part of his long life and were most irregularly paid. He was no “dedicator,” and the occasional presents of rich men, such as Montauron (who gave him a thousand, others say two hundred, pistoles for the dedication ofCinna), and Fouquet (who commissionedŒdipe), were few and far between, though they have exposed him to reflections which show great ignorance of the manners of the age. Of his professional earnings, the small sum for which, as we have seen, he gave up his offices, and the expression of Fontenelle that he practised “sans goût et sans succès,” are sufficient proof. His patrimony and his wife’s dowry must both have been trifling. On the other hand, it was during the early and middle part of his career impossible, and during the later part very difficult, for a dramatist to live decently by his pieces. It was not till the middle of the century that the customof allowing the author two shares in the profits during the first run of the piece was observed, and even then revivals profited him nothing. Thomas Corneille himself, who to his undoubted talents united wonderful facility, untiring industry, and (gift valuable above all others to the playwright) an extraordinary knack of hitting the public fancy, died, notwithstanding his simple tastes, “as poor as Job.” We know that Pierre received for two of his later pieces two thousand livres each, and we do not know that he ever received more.
But his reward in fame was not stinted. Corneille, unlike many of the great writers of the world, was not driven to wait for “the next age” to do him justice. The cabal or clique which attacked theCidhad no effect whatever on the judgment of the public. All his subsequent masterpieces were received with the same ungrudging applause, and the rising star of Racine, even in conjunction with the manifest inferiority of Corneille’s last five or six plays, with difficulty prevailed against the older poet’s towering reputation. The great men of his time—Condé, Turenne, the maréchal de Grammont, the knight-errant duc de Guise—were his fervent admirers. Nor had he less justice done him by a class from whom less justice might have been expected, the brother men of letters whose criticisms he treated with such scant courtesy. The respectable mediocrity of Chapelain might misapprehend him; the lesser geniuses of Scudéry and Mairet might feel alarm at his advent; the envious Claverets and D’Aubignacs might snarl and scribble. But Balzac did him justice; Rotrou, as we have seen, never failed in generous appreciation; Molière in conversation and in print recognized him as his own master and the foremost of dramatists. We have quoted the informal tribute of Racine; but it should not be forgotten that Racine, in discharge of his duty as respondent at the Academical reception of Thomas Corneille, pronounced upon the memory of Pierre perhaps the noblest and most just tribute of eulogy that ever issued from the lips of a rival. Boileau’s testimony is of a more chequered character; yet he seems never to have failed in admiring Corneille whenever his principles would allow him to do so. Questioned as to the great men of Louis XIV.’s reign, he is said to have replied: “I only know three,—Corneille, Molière and myself.” “And how about Racine?” his auditor ventured to remark. “He was an extremely clever fellow to whom I taught the art of elaborate rhyming” (rimer difficilement). It was reserved for the 18th century to exalt Racine above Corneille. Voltaire, who was prompted by his natural benevolence to comment on the latter (the profits went to a relation of the poet), was not altogether fitted by nature to appreciate Corneille, and moreover, as has been ingeniously pointed out, was not a little wearied by the length of his task. His partially unfavourable verdict was endorsed earlier by Vauvenargues, who knew little of poetry, and later by La Harpe, whose critical standpoint has now been universally abandoned. Napoleon I. was a great admirer of Corneille (“s’il vivait, je le ferais prince,” he said), and under the Empire and the Restoration an approach to a sounder appreciation was made. But it was the glory of the romantic school, or rather of the more catholic study of letters which that school brought about, to restore Corneille to his true rank. So long, indeed, as a certain kind of criticism was pursued, due appreciation was impossible. When it was thought sufficient to say with Boileau that Corneille excited, not pity or terror, but admiration which was not a tragic passion; or that
“D’un seul nom quelquefois le son dur ou bizarreRend un poème entier ou burlesque ou barbare;”
“D’un seul nom quelquefois le son dur ou bizarre
Rend un poème entier ou burlesque ou barbare;”
when Voltaire could think it crushing to add to his exposure of the “infamies” ofThéodore—“après cela comment osons-nous condamner les pièces de Lope de Véga et de Shakespeare?”—it is obvious that theCidandPolyeucte, much moreDon Sanche d’AragonandRodogune, were sealed books to the critic.
Almost the first thing which strikes a reader is the singular inequality of this poet, and the attempts to explain this inequality, in reference to his own and other theories, leave the fact untouched. Producing, as he certainly has produced, work which classes him with the greatest names in literature, he has also signed an extraordinary quantity of verse which has not merely the defects of genius, irregularity, extravagance,bizarreté, but the faults which we are apt to regard as exclusively belonging to those who lack genius, to wit, the dulness and tediousness of mediocrity. Molière’s manner of accounting for this is famous in literary history or legend. “My friend Corneille,” he said, “has a familiar who inspires him with the finest verses in the world. But sometimes the familiar leaves him to shift for himself, and then he fares very badly.” That Corneille was by no means destitute of the critical faculty hisDiscoursesand theExamensof his plays (often admirably acute, and, with Dryden’s subsequent prefaces, the originals to a great extent of specially modern criticism) show well enough. But an enemy might certainly contend that a poet’s critical faculty should be of the Promethean, not be Epimethean order. The fact seems to be that the form in which Corneille’s work was cast, and which by an odd irony of fate he did so much to originate and make popular, was very partially suited to his talents. He could imagine admirable situations, and he could write verses of incomparable grandeur—verses that reverberate again and again in the memory, but he could not, with the patient docility of Racine, labour at proportioning the action of a tragedy strictly, at maintaining a uniform rate of interest in the course of the plot and of excellence in the fashion of the verse. Especially in his later plays a verse and a couplet will crash out with fulgurous brilliancy, and then be succeeded by pages of very second-rate declamation or argument. It was urged against him also by the party of theDoucereux, as he called them, that he could not manage, or did not attempt, the great passion of love, and that except in the case of Chimène his principle seemed to be that of one of his own heroines:—
“Laissons, seigneur, laissons pour les petites âmesCe commerce rampant de soupirs et de flammes.”(Aristie inSertorius.)
“Laissons, seigneur, laissons pour les petites âmes
Ce commerce rampant de soupirs et de flammes.”
(Aristie inSertorius.)
There is perhaps some truth in this accusation, however much some of us may be disposed to think that the line just quoted is a fair enough description of the admired ecstasies of Achille and Bajazet. But these are all the defects which can be fairly urged against him; and in a dramatist bound to a less strict service they would hardly have been even remarked. They certainly neither require, nor are palliated by, theories of his “megalomania,” of his excessive attention to conflicts of will and the like. On the English stage the liberty of unrestricted incident and complicated action, the power of multiplying characters and introducing prose scenes, would have exactly suited his somewhat intermittent genius, both by covering defects and by giving greater scope for the exhibition of power.
How great that power is can escape no one. The splendid soliloquies of Medea which, as Voltaire happily says, “annoncent Corneille,” the entire parts of Rodogune and Chimène, the final speech of Camille inHorace, the discovery scene ofCinna, the dialogues of Pauline and Sévère inPolyeucte, the magnificently-contrasted conception and exhibition of the best and worst forms of feminine dignity in the Cornélie ofPompéeand the Cléopâtre ofRodogune, the singularly fine contrast inDon Sanche d’Aragon, between the haughtiness of the Spanish nobles and the unshaken dignity of the supposed adventurer Carlos, and the characters of Aristie, Viriate and Sertorius himself, in the play named after the latter, are not to be surpassed in grandeur of thought, felicity of design or appropriateness of language. “Admiration” may or may not properly be excited by tragedy, and until this important question is settled the name of tragedian may be at pleasure given to or withheld from the author ofRodogune. But his rank among the greatest of dramatic poets is not a matter of question. For a poet is to be judged by his best things, and the best things of Corneille are second to none.
The Plays.—It was, however, some time before his genius came to perfection. It is undeniable that the first six or seven of his plays are of no very striking intrinsic merit. On the other hand, it requires only a very slight acquaintance with the state of the drama in France at the time to see that these works, poor as they may now seem, must have struck the spectators as somethingnew and surprising. The language and dialogue ofMéliteare on the whole simple and natural, and though the construction is not very artful (the fifth act being, as is not unusual in Corneille, superfluous and clumsy), it is still passable. The fact that one of the characters jumps on another’s back, and the rather promiscuous kissing which takes place, are nothing to the liberties usually taken in contemporary plays. A worse fault is theστιχομυθία, or, to borrow Butler’s expression, the Cat-and-Puss dialogue, which abounds. But the common objection to the play at the time was that it wastoonatural and too devoid of striking incidents. Corneille accordingly, as he tells us, set to work to cure these faults, and produced a truly wonderful work,Clitandre. Murders, combats, escapes and outrages of all kinds are provided; and the language makesThe Rehearsalno burlesque. One of the heroines rescues herself from a ravisher by blinding him with a hair-pin, and as she escapes the seducer apostrophizes the blood which trickles from his eye, and the weapon which has wounded it, in a speech forty verses long. This, however, was his only attempt of the kind. For his next four pieces, which were comedies, there is claimed the introduction of some important improvements, such as the choosing for scenes places well known in actual life (as in theGalerie du palais), and the substitution of the soubrette in place of the old inconvenient and grotesque nurse. It is certain, however, that there is more interval between these six plays andMédéethan between the latter and Corneille’s greatest drama. Here first do we find those sudden and magnificent lines which characterize the poet. The title-rôle is, however, the only good one, and as a whole the play is heavy. Much the same may be said of its curious successorL’Illusion comique. This is not only a play within a play, but in part of it there is actually athirdinvolution, one set of characters beholding another set discharging the parts of yet another. It contains, however, some very fine lines, in particular, a defence of the stage and some heroics put into the mouth of a braggadocio. We have seen it said of theCidthat it is difficult to understand the enthusiasm it excited. But the difficulty can only exist for persons who are insensible to dramatic excellence, or who so strongly object to the forms of the French drama that they cannot relish anything so presented. Rodrigue, Chimène, Don Diègue are not of any age, but of all time. The conflicting passions of love, honour, duty, are here represented as they never had been on a French stage, and in the “strong style” which was Corneille’s own. Of the many objections urged against the play, perhaps the weightiest is that which condemns the frigid and superfluous part of the Infanta.Horace, though more skilfully constructed, is perhaps less satisfactory. There is a hardness about the younger Horace which might have been, but is not made, imposing, and Sabine’s effect on the action is quite out of proportion to the space she occupies. The splendid declamation of Camille, and the excellent part of the elder Horace, do not altogether atone for these defects.Cinnais perhaps generally considered the poet’s masterpiece, and it undoubtedly contains the finest single scene in all French tragedy. The blot on it is certainly the character of Émilie, who is spiteful and thankless, not heroic.Polyeuctehas sometimes been elevated to the same position. There is, however, a certain coolness about the hero’s affection for his wife which somewhat detracts from the merit of his sacrifice; while the Christian part of the matter is scarcely so well treated as in theSaint Genestof Rotrou or theVirgin Martyrof Massinger. On the other hand, the entire parts of Pauline and Sévère are beyond praise, and the manner in which the former reconciles her duty as a wife with her affection for her lover is an astonishing success. InPompée(forLa Mort de Pompée, though the more appropriate, was not the original title) the splendid declamation of Cornélie is the chief thing to be remarked.Le Menteurfully deserves the honour which Molière paid to it. Its continuation, notwithstanding the judgment of some French critics, we cannot think so happy. ButThéodoreis perhaps the most surprising of literary anomalies. The central situation, which so greatly shocked Voltaire and indeed all French critics from the date of the piece, does not seem to blame. A virgin martyr who is threatened with loss of honour as a bitterer punishment than loss of life offers points as powerful as they are perilous. But the treatment is thoroughly bad. From the heroine who is, in a phrase of Dryden’s, “one of the coolest and most insignificant” heroines ever drawn, to the undignified Valens, the termagant Marcelle, and the peevish Placide, there is hardly a good character. Immediately upon this in most printed editions, though older in representation, follows the play which (therein agreeing rather with the author than with his critics) we should rank as his greatest triumph,Rodogune. Here there is hardly a weak point. The magnificent and terrible character of Cléopâtre, and the contrasted dispositions of the two princes, of course attract most attention. But the character of Rodogune herself, which has not escaped criticism, comes hardly short of these.Héraclius, despite great art and much fine poetry, is injured by the extreme complication of its argument and by the blustering part of Pulchérie.Andromède, with the later spectacle piece, theToison d’or, do not call for comment, and we have already alluded to the chief merit ofDon Sanche.Nicomède, often considered one of Corneille’s best plays, is chiefly remarkable for the curious and unusual character of its hero. OfPerthariteit need only be said that no single critic has to our knowledge disputed the justice of its damnation.Œdipeis certainly unworthy of its subject and its author, but inSertoriuswe have one of Corneille’s finest plays. It is remarkable not only for its many splendid verses and for the nobility of its sentiment, but from the fact that not one of its characters lacks interest, a commendation not generally to be bestowed on its author’s work. Of the last six plays we may say that perhaps only one of them,Agésilas, is almost wholly worthless. Not a few speeches ofSurénaand ofOthonare of a very high order. As to the poet’s non-dramatic works, we have already spoken of his extremely interesting critical dissertations. His minor poems and poetical devotions are not likely to be read save from motives of duty or curiosity. The verse translation of à Kempis, indeed, which was in its day immensely popular (it passed through many editions), condemns itself.