to the only sound argument—that of Cinthio and Pigna in the matter of the _Romanzi_, of Il Lasca in reference to Italian comedy—that Athens and Rome, and the lives and customs of both, are _not_ modern countries and their lives and customs, that the practice of the one can give no final and prohibitive rule to the practice of the other.[315] ----- Footnote 313: Some authorities give _this_ as the anagram, the other as the name. But it does not in the least matter. Footnote 314: The Pleiad tragedies (_v. supra_, p. 127) had been Senecan, but not quite “regular”; and though Hardy broke loose from Time and Place, it was not always very violently. Footnote 315: Ogier, like his Italian predecessors, is firm on the pleasure-giving quality of dramatic art. His manner is well illustrated by his remark that the constant arrival of messengers is more suitable to a good inn than to a good tragedy. One wonders whether he knew the Spaniards (_v. inf._ ch. 2). ----- We are not in the least concerned to argue for this Preface. It is enough to point out its bold and independent spirit, and to lay special stress on the fact that Ogier fully admits that he is defending, if not a heresy, an orthodoxy which is not popular, offers to explain “pourquoi nous nous sommes jetez à quartier du chemin ordinaire,” speaks of the Unity of Time as “cette règle que nos critiques veulent nous faire garder si religieusement à cette heure,” indirectly condemns the Unity of Place in his arguments, and vindicates the full tragi-comic blending of Actions. Now, this was in 1628, eight years before the _Cid_ and the _Sentiments de l’Académie_, even a year before Mairet’s _Sophonisbe_ earned the reputation of being the first French piece that was absolutely “correct.” This is of itself enough to show how erroneous is the idea, once common and still repeated, that the discussion over the _Cid_, with Scudéry for mover, was in the nature of a surprise, and that Chapelain, if he most certainly did not invent the Unities, introduced them into France.