Bern and Zurich, which had both risen to wealth and independence, were stout opponents of the French policy. Both cities were homes of the _belles lettres_, and Zurich was a veritable "poets' corner." The chief figure there was Bodmer, who wielded the literary sceptre in Switzerland and Germany for well-nigh half a century. A fellow-worker with him, and his well-nigh inseparable companion, was Breitinger, and these two more than any others helped to break the French spell. Bodmer (1698-1783), was the son of a pastor of Greifensee, and had himself been at first destined for the church, though he was at length put to the silk trade. But neither calling could keep him from his beloved letters, and in 1725 he became professor of history and political science at the Zurich Carolinum. His aim was to raise literature from its lifeless condition. As far back as 1721, he had joined with Breitinger and others, in establishing a weekly journal on the model of Addison's _Spectator_--"Discurse der Maler." Breitinger was professor of Hebrew, and later on, canon of the minster of Zurich, and was a man of profound learning and refined taste. The new paper treated not only of social matters, but discussed poetry and _belles lettres_ generally. Gottsched (1700-1766), who occupied the chair of rhetoric at Leipzig, was supreme as a literary critic. His tastes were French, and he held up the French classics as models. In his "Critical Art of Poetry" (1730), he tries to teach what may be called the _mechanics_ of poetry based on reason, and pretends that it is in the power of any really clever man to produce masterpieces in poetry. In 1732, appeared Bodmer's translation of "Paradise Lost," to the chagrin of Gottsched, who, feeling that he was losing ground, furiously attacked the Miltonian following. His mockery of the blind poet roused Bodmer's anger, and he replied with his work the "Wonderful in Poetry." A fierce controversy raged for ten years. In the name of Milton the young men of talent took the side of Zurich, that is, of the German, as opposed to the French influence in literature. The result was that by the efforts of such men as Haller, Klopstock, Wieland, and Kleist, the French influence was ousted and the national German influence came to the front.