He submitted in silence and sacrificed to the scorn of his time his enchanting elegy of _Esther_, his magnificent epic, _Athalie_.

So that we can but believe that, if he had not been paralyzed as he was by the prejudices of his epoch, if he had come in contact less frequently with the classic cramp-fish, he would not have failed to introduce Locuste in his drama between Narcisse and Neron, and above all things would not have relegated to the wings the admirable scene of the banquet at which Seneca's pupil poisons Britannicus in the cup of reconciliation.

But can we demand of the bird that he fly under the receiver of an air-pump?
What a multitude of beautiful scenes the _people of taste_ have cost us, from Scuderi to La Harpe! A noble work might be composed of all that their scorching breath has withered in its germ.

However, our great poets have found a way none the less to cause their genius to blaze forth through all these obstacles.

Often the attempt to confine them behind walls of dogmas and rules is vain.