and Place are too absurd to be spoken of: but they _are_ spoken of and shown to be absurd. A passage on rules, models, and imitations is perhaps the most effective of the whole, though it comes the best part of a century after Lessing. There is an excommunication of Delille (very interesting to compare with the glorification by Joubert, whose own theory of poetry fits Hugo as well, as it fits Delille, _to us_, strangely), leading to some remarks on _Cromwell_ itself, which have but minor interest, and a notable conclusion on Criticism. There is here more dignity than in those remarks in which he was wont to indulge later, when he drew upon himself the dignified reproof of M. Nisard: and they contain some really good observation on False Taste, old and new, a well-founded denunciation of critique by rule and kind, by faults and beauties, and a final protest against mere Authority. The piece is of great interest even now: and one can readily understand the immense influence it must have had as a manifesto. But it is injured by its length, by its want of method, and by the constant presence of the two dissonances above indicated. That the poet should fight _pro domo sua_ is natural, desirable, laudable: but why are we to be disturbed by the constant assertion of a lofty indifference? It is again natural, desirable, laudable, that he should fight the general Romantic prize—there was every possible justification for it. But why, again, the pretence of not troubling himself about any such business, and of the business being really over? [Sidenote: _and that to the_ Orientales.]