The _Pléiade_, or constellation of the seven stars, was the term applied to seven men of letters, who formed themselves into a coterie or league about the year 1550, with the professed resolve of reforming the French language and French literary methods. The conception is very French. This cool manner of looking at language and literary expression as subject to definite laws of art, which may be codified by a league or academy, is contrary to English notions. Not so with the French. They have no desire for impulsive and perhaps erratic individuality. This is one of their clearest characteristics. Of the _Pléiade_ the two greatest names are Ronsard, the poet, and Du Bellay, who was both poet and manifesto-writer. Their object, as stated by themselves, was to bring French literature nearer to the classical models of Greece and Rome, and to create a nobler form and use of the language for literary purposes. And while Du Bellay was to write his manifesto, Ronsard was to give a practical illustration of the theory, by himself composing odes and sonnets in the proper style. The attempt was bold, and it was successful. For fifty years all French literature “Ronsardized.” Here are a few sentences of the manifesto concerning the _Défense et Illustration de la Langue Française_. “Our ancestors have left us our language so poor and bare, that it stands in need of the ornaments, and, so to speak, the features of other people.... By what means can we hasten its development? By the imitation of the ancients.... Translating is not a sufficient means of elevating our vulgar tongue to an equality with the most famous. What must we do? Imitate! Imitate the Romans as they did the Greeks!... We must digest the best authors and convert them into blood and nutriment.... You that mean to be a poet, read and re-read the Greek and Latin models. Then leave all those old French _rondeaux_, _ballades_, _virelais_, _chants royaux_, _chansons_ and other such vulgarities (_épiceries_), which corrupt the taste of our tongue, and only serve to testify to our ignorance. Throw yourself on those witty epigrams in imitation of Martial!... Distil with a flowing style tender elegies after the manner of Ovid and Tibullus!... Sing me some of those odes as yet unknown to the French tongue ... and let there be nothing in which does not appear some trace of rare and ancient learning.”