As long as Richelieu lived the Academy worked under his presiding authority. He encouraged no frivolity, no discussion of trifles, but insisted on hard, steady work. The great Dictionary, first planned by the poet Chapelain, was seriously begun in 1634 and carried on by the most methodical among the new academicians, some of whom were considerably laughed at by the free literary world outside. They were, in fact, slaves to a Minister who, besides having an unfounded faith in his own taste, was a critic swayed by reasons extra-literary: one need hardly mention that the Academy, under Richelieu, snubbed Corneille and condemned _Le Cid_, too Spanish and too independent to please His Eminence. The slavery was profitable: places and pensions made life liveable for the wiser academicians of Richelieu’s day--whose survivors were described by La Bruyère as “vieux corbeaux,” croaking as their master had taught them. And they grew to love their chains, while pouring flattery at the great man’s feet. Guillaume Colletet, more drunkard than poet, composed a _rondeau_ which was presented by Boisrobert to the Cardinal: “Au grand Armand je vous invite à boire! Trinquer pour lui, c’est œuvre méritoire. C’est le support du Parnasse françois; C’est l’Appollon qui verse quelquefois Ses rayons d’or jusque dans nostre armoire. Si sa vertu veut qu’on chante sa gloire, Sa santé veut qu’on en fasse mémoire Et que l’on crie, à table, à haute voix: Au grand Armand! N’y boire pas, c’est avoir l’âme noire. Donc, pour blanchir la nostre comme yvoire, Roys des esprits, beuvez comme des Roys! Bacchus viendra couronner vos exploits Et Boisrobert en contera l’histoire Au grand Armand!” It is to the honour of Pierre Corneille that he did not, till many years later, find a place among these “roys des esprits.” The Cardinal had been disappointed in him. Before the Academy existed he was one of five poetical secretaries who were employed by His Eminence to arrange his own original ideas in poetry and drama. The other four were Boisrobert, l’Estoile, Colletet, and Rotrou. It seems that Corneille was too honest for his place; his criticism too frank and his opinion too positive. He was soon dismissed, the Cardinal finding that he lacked “esprit de suite”; which may be translated as the gift of following blindly wherever his patron chose to lead.