The one unfailing characteristic of the salon, in all ages and in all countries, is the dominant position which it gives to woman. It is woman who creates the peculiar atmosphere and the peculiar influence of salons; it is she, with her instinct for society and for literature, who is most likely to succeed in the attempt to fuse two ideals of life apparently opposed, the social and the literary. The salon is not a mere drawing-room and not a lonely study, but mediates between the promiscuous chatter of the one and the remote silence of the other. The aims of the salon are well shown by the ridicule of those enemies who accuse the hostess of attempting to transform a school of pedants and hacks into a group of courtiers. The social world is likely to laugh at the salon because it suggests the lecture-hall, and scholars sneer at it because it pretends to the distinction of a literary court.
The first salons were indeed courts—the courts of the Italian Renaissance. We find in the Parisian salons of later centuries the disjecta membra of this earlier Italian society, whose true relationship is understood only when we trace them back to this remote original. In the light of that Italian dawn, all leaps into a consistent scheme. Much that seems odd and unrelated in salon life is brought into perspective: the authoritative position of the scholar, the unique influence of woman, and the tendency to set up ‘Platonic’ relations between the sexes. Humanism, Platonism, and gallantry were aspects of the Renaissance and of the Italian Court, and in their lesser manifestations as learning, philosophism, and ‘Platonic love,’ they remain characteristic of salons. Again, the courts of the fifteenth century brought into focus many movements: they carried on the mediæval system of patronage; they adopted many of the gallantries of the old ‘courts of love’; and they brought the new humanism into vital contact with society, so that the expression of serious thought was no less possible in conversation than in the study or the lecture-hall. Each of these lives on in the salon.
The Renaissance court may be studied in any one of a numerous group. We may find the ideal set forth in the group of artists and men of letters who surrounded the youthful Beatrice d’Este, patroness of Leonardo and many another; we may see it in the court of her sister, Isabella, Marchioness of Mantua; we may see it in the coterie of Caterina Cornaro, once Queen of Cyprus, and in her later days mistress of a little court[21] at Asolo. We may study it at its grandest in the somewhat earlier court of Lorenzo the Magnificent, with its conscious imitation of the Greek symposium. The court which held Politian, Pulci, Ficino the Platonist, Alberti, and, later, Michelangelo, might well have boasted itself ‘the little academe’ of Love’s Labour’s Lost. But perhaps the most useful example is the delightful court of Urbino, described by Castiglione in his Cortegiano.
If it be objected that Castiglione’s description of court life is too radiant to be quite true to fact, if it be a society fairer than any whose existence can be demonstrated, I reply that it is so much the better suited to our purpose. It is ideals that we would be at. We are spared the attempt to reconstruct them for ourselves. There is nothing to be gained by reminding ourselves that courts attracted the parasite, the flatterer, and the opportunist; it is the finer aims of the men of genius and of the noble women who patronized them that will reward our attention. Castiglione knew these aims, and we cannot do better than quote his words as they were given to Elizabethan England in Hoby’s beautiful translation.[22] The first quotation refers to Frederick, first Duke of Urbino:
This man emong his other deedes praisworthy, in the hard and sharpe situation of Urbin buylt a Palaice, to the opinion of many men, the fayrest that was to be founde in all Italy, and so fornished it with everye necessary implement belonging thereto, that it appeared not a palaice, but a Citye in fourme of a palaice, and that not onlye with ordinarie matters, as Silver plate, hanginges for chambers of verye riche cloth of golde, of silke and other like, but also for sightlynesse: and to decke it out withall, placed there a wonderous number of auncyent ymages of marble and mettall, verye excellente peinctinges and instrumentes of musycke of all sortes, and nothinge would he have there but what was moste rare and excellent. To this with verye great charges he gathered together a great number of most excellent and rare bookes, in Greke, Latin and Hebrue, the which all he garnished wyth golde and sylver, esteaming this to be the chieffest ornament of his great palaice....
We turn now to the court of his son Guidobaldo, who carried on the traditions of his father:
He sett hys delyte above all thynges to have hys house furnished with most noble and valyaunte Gentylmen, wyth whom he lyved very famylyarly, enjoying theyr conversation wherein the pleasure whyche he gave unto other menne was no lesse, then that he receyved of other, because he was verye wel seene in both tunges, and together with a lovynge behavyour and plesauntnesse he had also accompanied the knowleage of infinite thinges.... Because the Duke used continuallye by reason of his infirmytye, soon after supper to go to his rest, everye man ordinarelye, at that houre drewe where the Dutchesse was, the Lady Elizabeth Gonzaga. Where also continuallye was the Lady Emilia Pia, who for that she was endowed with so livelye a wytt and judgement as you knowe, seemed the maistresse and ringe leader of all the companye, and that everye manne at her receyved understandinge and courage.[23] There was then to be hearde pleasaunte communication and merye conceytes, and in every mannes countenaunce a manne myght perceyve peyncted a lovynge jocundenesse. So that thys house truelye myght well be called the verye mansion place of Myrth and Joye. And I beleave it was never so tasted in other place, what maner a thynge the sweete conversation is that is occasioned of an amyable and lovynge companye, as it was once there.... But such was the respect which we bore to the Dutchesse wyll, that the selfe same libertye was a verye great bridle. Neither was there anye that thought it not the greatest pleasure he could have in the worlde, to please her, and the greatest griefe to offende her. For this respecte were there most honest condicions coupled with wonderous greate libertye, and devises of pastimes and laughinge matters tempred in her sight.... The maner of all the Gentilmen in the house was immedyatelye after supper to assemble together where the dutchesse was. Where emonge other recreations, musicke, and dauncynge, whiche they used contynuallye, sometyme they propounded feate questions, otherwhyle they invented certayne wytty sportes and pastimes, at the devyse sometyme of one sometyme of an other, in the whych under sundrye covertes,[24] often tymes the standers bye opened subtylly theyr imaginations unto whom they thought beste. At other tymes there arrose other disputations of divers matters, or els jestinges with prompt inventions. Manye times they fell into purposes,[25] as we now a dayes terme them, where in thys kynde of talke and debating of matters, there was wonderous great pleasure on all sydes: because (as I have sayde) the house was replenyshed wyth most noble wyttes.
Such conversational ‘pastimes’ were enjoyed almost every night:
And the order thereof was such, that assoone as they were assembled where the Dutches was, every man satt him downe at his will, or as it fell to his lot, in a circle together, and in sittinge were devyded a man and a woman, as longe as there were women, for alwayes (lightlye) the number of men was farr the greater. Then were they governed as the Dutchesse thought best, whiche manye times gave this charge unto the L. Emilia.
Il Cortegiano is the tribute paid to this group and the conversation which passed in it. The spirit of the book is not to be shown by a few quotations, but a reading of it will reveal the following facts: that men and women meet on a plane of equality, that it is the presence of women (though fewer in number than the men), that gives the peculiar tone of lightness and gallantry; that the author looks to the court not only for reward, but for inspiration; that the conversation at its noblest (as in Bembo’s discourse at the end) passes over into poetry; that the conversation is of a classical and philosophic cast, often Platonic, but that this high seriousness does not exclude mirth and wit.[26] Now these aims are no other than the aims of the salon.
This ideal, diffused over Europe, had a long and brilliant history. We shall encounter it again in the courtly salons of Elizabethan England, and even in the comedies of Shakespeare. The tradition passed over into France and there became the formative influence in the great type and parent of the Parisian salon, the Hôtel de Rambouillet.
In tracing the Hôtel de Rambouillet back to the earlier Italian court, two facts stand out as of first importance. In the first place, that salon was established by a woman who was herself half Italian, had passed many years in Italy, and knew the traditions of the old nobility. In the second place, the Hôtel de Rambouillet originated in protest against the crudities of the Gascon court at Paris, and represented an attempt to realize a worthier society.
When, in the second decade of the seventeenth century, Cathérine de Vivonne opened her famous house in the Rue Saint Thomas du Louvre and initiated the reign of good taste in France, her salon displayed almost immediately certain aspects which had distinguished the Italian courts and which were to become, in varying degrees, permanent features of the Parisian salon and of its London counterpart. The Marquise de Rambouillet became the type and exemplar of all the later hostesses. Even the English bluestockings were aware that they were in the line of descent from her. In her poem Bas Bleu,[27] Hannah More compares the English group with that which met in the Hôtel de Rambouillet, and Wraxall[28] later took up the comparison and developed the parallel between the drawing-rooms of London and those of Paris. The Hôtel de Rambouillet, therefore, is the type of the salon. It enables us to distinguish what is permanent and common to all salons, from what is merely transitory. For the sake of convenience, I shall make a fivefold grouping of these features. It will of course be understood that this analysis does not afford a complete characterization of the Hôtel de Rambouillet; for that society had certain important aims—such as the attempt to purify the language—which were not destined to remain permanent marks of the succeeding salons, and are therefore passed over in silence. Nor must it be assumed that the fivefold analysis describes each and every later salon. A given salon may be entirely lacking in one of the features—though never, I think, in a majority of them—without losing its character; and in proportion as a given salon satisfies these five conditions, we may say that it approaches the ideal.
(1) In the first place, then, the house, the very room, in which the company gathers, is influential in forming its spirit and establishing its reputation. We have just examined Castiglione’s description of the magnificence of Urbino: something of that royal splendour is demanded of the salon. It was Madame de Rambouillet’s sense for architectural arrangement and decoration that contributed to her social success. Indeed the name by which her salon is known plainly implies it. As is well known, she began by breaking up the great reception-hall with its vast, unsocial coldness into a series of smaller rooms and alcoves, thus providing for the intimacies of conversation as distinct from the hubbub and the crowd. Her own favourite room, the chambre bleu d’Arthénice,[29] where a privileged few—at most eighteen—sat by her couch, was the centre and soul of the house. It was the perfumed temple of the Graces, where the year was always at spring, the haunt of Flora, and the throne of Athena herself. This room reproduced itself in countless ‘alcoves,’ ‘blue rooms,’ and ruelles throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Madame de Boufflers was famous for her apartments hung with rose-coloured damask, and Madame Geoffrin for her house, which was crammed with rare china and bronzes, portraits by Boucher, and easel-pictures by Van Loo.
(2) The salon must retain an aristocratic tone, but without submitting to the unyielding formality of the aristocracy. It sets up a standard of recognition based on talent,[30] and neither courts nor rejects the nobility. It was even possible for the bourgeois to obtain admission to the Hôtel de Rambouillet and to have a career there. Vincent Voiture, known as ‘Chiquito,’ the son of a wine-merchant, became the leading spirit in all the amusements. His position reminds us now of the mediæval jester, now of Beau Nash, the King of Bath.
In the eighteenth century the salons are proud to represent a democracy of genius. Madame Geoffrin was the daughter of a valet de chambre and the wife of a manufacturer; Madame Necker was the daughter of a Swiss parson; and Mlle. de Lespinasse, a foundling, who had been ‘humble companion’ to Madame du Deffand, and who had not means sufficient to entertain her guests at dinner. Wit, intellect, and personality, rather than noble birth, became the key to social success.
(3) The chief staple of entertainment offered by the salons is conversation, literary or philosophical in character. Other amusements, such as Castiglione describes at Urbino, are not necessarily excluded, and, in France, dancing, excursions, card-playing, and gaming were popular in various salons and at various times. But conversation always reasserted itself in the end. Discussion was stimulated by the reading of original poems, essays, sermons, and plays. The criticism of these, especially of the plays, was of no mean importance in forming the spirit of French literature. In particular the salon gives birth to certain minor forms of literature, epistles, epigrams, extempore verses of all kinds, ‘thoughts,’ maxims, bons mots, ‘portraits,’ and éloges;[31] but of more importance than these is its unconscious formative influence on such arts as letter-writing, biography, and all manner of anecdotal writing.
(4) The friendships of the salon are of peculiar depth and warmth, developing occasionally into passion, but always Platonic rather than domestic in their expression. Thus the salon, in which woman assumes the throne, and queens it over a coterie (chiefly men) is perhaps the last phase of the Italian court with its gallantries and lady-worship. It passed on to the French salon that note of sentiment and Platonic love which is found in Il Cortegiano, and which becomes characteristic of Sappho Scudéry and the later seventeenth century. In the eighteenth century this sentimental friendship united with the more practical system of patronage, and resulted in a type of relationship which eludes definition, for, on the one hand, it is at times so utilitarian as to savour of philanthropy, and, on the other, it may develop into a grande passion, and compare itself to Abelard and Héloïse. Examples of it are the various relations existing between Madame Geoffrin and Marmontel, Madame du Deffand and d’Alembert, Madame du Deffand and Horace Walpole, Madame de Boufflers and David Hume, Mlle. de Lespinasse and d’Alembert, Mlle. de Lespinasse and Guibert, Madame Necker and Edward Gibbon.
(5) The hostess of the salon is invariably the subject of ideal descriptions, ‘tributes’ which recite her charm as a hostess, her merits as a patron, and her general superiority to the Muses. From Castiglione’s eulogy of Elizabeth Gonzaga, through the Hôtel de Rambouillet (where Malherbe was a kind of poet laureate), down to the death of Mlle. de Lespinasse, whose genius was celebrated by d’Alembert in the Tombeau de Mlle. de Lespinasse, this is an almost unfailing result of salon life.
Such are, then, the permanent marks by which we may detect that interplay of the social and the literary life in what, for want of a better term, we call the salon. There are two features of the life manifested only at certain times which it is not proper to include, though they are more generally attributed to the salons than any that have been mentioned. They are transitory phases; but they must be briefly considered, if only by way of avoiding false assumptions.
The women of the salons are usually thought of as femmes savantes, or ‘learned ladies,’ who affect a learning which has no basis in fact. Such female pedants were common figures in the salons of a certain period. The depiction of them by Molière is no more exaggerated than the purposes of comic art demand. It must be further admitted that such women may appear now and again in the salons of any period; we shall meet with a few in the pages of this volume. But they are not common in the best salons of the best periods. Neither in the beginning, nor in the eighteenth century, were the hostesses of the salon what we ordinarily mean by the phrase femmes savantes. Of Madame de Rambouillet, for example, M. Vourciez writes:[32] ‘Ce sont les aliments les plus solides qu’elle digérait sans prétention à devenir une “femme savante,” car Balzac eût pu lui adresser à elle aussi le compliment qu’il fit à Madame des Loges: “Vous savez une infinité de choses rares, mais vous n’en faites pas la savante, et ne les avez pas apprises pour tenir école.”’ As for the women of the next century, they assisted their friends chiefly by qualities which have little to do with book-learning, by superb intelligence, wit, sympathy, and good taste. They made no pretence to erudition. Indeed they rather piqued themselves on their ignorance of it. To mistake Madame Geoffrin, who said she could not spell, and Madame du Deffand, who was bored by a savant, for a woman like Armande or Bélise is to have done with all distinctions at once. It is to confound Prospero with Polonius.
It is no less true that the women of the salons were not permanently précieuses ridicules. Preciosity had its day; it did its work (which was by no means contemptible); and it was laughed out of existence. There were no précieuses in 1750. Indeed the caustic penetration of Madame du Deffand,[33] the homely wit of Madame Geoffrin, and the romantic ardour of Mlle. de Lespinasse are at equal removes from the conceits and the mincing niceties of the earlier salons. ‘Il n’y a que le premier pas qui coûte,’ said Madame du Deffand of Saint Denis walking with his severed head in his hands; ‘Je suis une poule qui ai couvé des œufs de canard,’ said Madame Geoffrin of herself and her daughter; ‘Presque personne n’a besoin d’être aimé,’ said Mlle. de Lespinasse to her faithless lover. Is this the language of preciosity?