The Idea of Character in The Encyclopedie

American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies (ASECS)
The Idea of Character in the Encyclopedie Author(s): Patrick Coleman Source: Eighteenth-Century Studies, Vol. 13, No. 1 (Autumn, 1979), pp. 21-47 Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press. Sponsor: American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies (ASECS). Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2738063 . Accessed: 30/08/2013 15:27
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The Idea of Character

in the Encyclopedie
PATRICKCOLEMAN
MOST STUDIES of the Encyclopedie have, quite naturally, emphasized those aspects of the work that express eitherbold criticismof the ancien regime or the even bolder attemptto establish new modes of philosophic and scientific thought. Taking their cue, perhaps, from Diderot's own admission of the relative weakness of the semantic, lexicological, and literarypartsof the text, critics have neglected them and it is only recently that attentionhas been drawnto what might be called the discourseof the Encyclopedie.1Thatthereis a verbal as well as a conceptualorderingof its subjectmatteris suggested by Diderotin his article "Encyclopedie,"2 where he tries to distinguish among the various levels of order in the work. The article, is of course, mostly in nature,but it does reflect, as the Discours preliminaire programmatic does not, the actual process of compilation and composition. It is this experience that leads Diderot to acknowledgethe lack of explicit treatment of linguistic problems in the volumes already published; this failing is, however, compensatedby a greaterfeeling for what is actually involved in the writing as opposed to the planning of the work. Diderot sees five levels of order in an encyclopedia. Of these, four touch on familiarthemes. Thatthe most generalplanof the work should conformto the division of the mind into its componentfaculties;thatthe
1 See Walter Moser, "Les Discours dans le Discours preliminaire," Romanic Review, 47 (1976), 152-67; and "D'Alembert: L'ordre philosophiquede ce discours," MLN, 91 (1976), 722-33. Among studies of individualarticlesmay be mentionedR. Grimsley, "Turgot's Article 'Existence' in the Encyclopedie," in From Montesquieuto Laclos (Geneva: Droz, 1974), pp 109-24; and Stephen Werner, "Diderot's Encyclopedie Article 'Agnus Scythicus,"' Studies on Voltaire and the Eighteenth Century (hereafterSVEC), 79 (1971), 79-92. The presentessay is perhaps closer to the type of appreciationfound in R. Barthes, R. Mauzi, and J. P. Seguin, L' Univers de 1'Encyclopedie(Paris: Les Librairesassocies, 1964). 2 All references are to the original edition of the Encyclopedie (Paris, 1751-65). Spelling has been modernized.Diderot's article"Encyclopedie," writtenin 1755, appearsin Volume V. Some interestingremarks on Diderot's approach to languagemay be found in JacquesProust, "Diderotet les problemes du langage," Romanische Forschungen, 79 (1967), 1-27.
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22
EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY STUDIES
space allotted to each science should be determinedby the specialists and not accordingto some abstractmeasureimposed fromwithout;that the account given of a science or art should proceed by means of principles rather than by description; that, in other cases, the order should be the genetic one of the transformations undergoneby a substance as it is shaped by human purpose-these principles are well known to be vital to the philosophic enterprise. There is also the alphabeticalorderof the entries, which is merely a matterof convenience, and whose arbitrarynature will be softened by the system of renvois. Yet even here Diderot sees a sourceof potentialorder, the one "qui distribue convenablement plusieurs articles compris sous une meme denomination." There are, he writes, "des termes solitairesqui sont propres -a une seule science, et qui ne doivent donner aucune sollicitude. Quant 'aceux dont l'acception varie et qui appartiennent a plusieurssciences et 'aplusieursarts, il faut en formerun petit systeme dont l'objet principalsoit d'adouciret de pallier autantqu'on pourrala bizarreriedes disparates." The term "bizarrerie," usually taken as characteristicof Diderot's later thought, testifies to the philosophe's awareness in 1755 that the vauntedprogramof the Discours preliminaire must confrontthe vagaries of ordinaryusage and even the "abus de metaphores"that bring togetherdisparatemeaningsundera single head. The task of the encyclopedist is not only to classify the products of human thought and ingenuity accordingto a logical pattern,not only to establish new and sometimes subterranean connections between phenomenathroughthe renvois, but to account for the links unwittingly and yet inevitably forged by languageitself. "II faut . . . se laisser conduiretantotparles rapports, quand il y en a de marques, tantot par l'importance des matieres; et au defaut de rapports, par des tours originaux qui se d'autantplus frequemmentaux editeursqu'ils aurontplus presenteront de genie, d'imaginationet de connaissances." It is with such discursive " turns"thatwe shall be concernedin examiningthe entries, eighteenin all, under the title "Caractere."3 Why this particularterm? My project had been to investigate the in the literature of the period, especially the problemof characterization link between ideas of literaryandmoralcharacter as they affect, and are affectedby, creativeworks. I was struck,in the process, by the ubiquity
3They appearin Volume II. For a complete enumeration,see R. N. Schwab, W. E. Rex, andJ. Lough, Inventoryof Diderot's Encyclopedie, in SVEC, 83 (1971), 183-84, where they are given the numbers (II) 5510-27.
CHARACTERIN THE ENCYCLOPEDIE
23
and resonance of the very term "caractere" (or "character") in eighteenth-century discourse. Like "esprit," or "mceurs," it is one of those terms whose precise meaning is difficult to pin down but which play a key role in the Enlightenmentattemptto redefine the shape of man's moral and cultural life. The philosophes spoke not only of the characterof an individualor of a literaryfigure, but of the character of the workitself, or of a nation, or even of a sex. In suchcontexts, the term often signifies an elusive "essential quality," yet when botanistsspoke of the "characters"of a plant, they claimed to referto reliablephysical markersessential to scientific classification. Finally, "caractere"was, and still is, used to designate symbols used in writing. Today, this last sense is of little moment, but in a centuryfascinatedby hieroglyphsand universalcharacteristics,its implicationswere the focus of considerable attention.The taskof gatheringall these meaningsinto " le toutle moins irregulier et le moins decousu" is thus a challenging one, and the attemptin the Encyclopedie to fulfill Diderot's programin this instance takes us to the heartof some of the centralproblemsof Enlightenment thought. This essay, then, analyzesthe entriesunder"Caractere"not only for their content, but for the mannerof their arrangement and articulation. Although it will be importantto note specific sources and influences in the individualarticles, the originalityof the Encyclopedistsis of secondary importanceto the use they make of their material, to the overall patternof meaning that emerges from the work. In a sense yet to be defined, my purpose is to relate the semantic field of "caractere" to what I would call the character of the work they have given us to read.
That we are, indeed, called upon to "read," in an active sense, the articlesin question is indicatedby the fact that, far from handingus the synthesis promisedin "Encyclopedie," Diderotoffers, in "Caracteres d'imprimerie," a most provocativeandpuzzling invitationto make our own connections. This passage is an indispensablecomplement to the programmatic observationsin the former article. "Caracteresd'imprimerie," certainly the most well known of the "Caractere" articles, concludes discussion of the various instancesof "caractere" as written or inscribed symbol-for Diderot the literal meaningof the word-and Diderot's remarksserve as a transitionto its figurative extensions.
24
Le mot dont il s'agit n'est pas le seul qu'on ait transporte du propreau figure:on peutdire avec assez de veriteque presquetous les mots de la languesontdansce cas. I1en est meme quelques-unsqui ont perduleur sens propre,et qui n'ont plus que le metaphorique, comme aveuglement et bassesse; d'autres qui s'emploient plus souvent au sens metaphorique qu'au sens propre;et d'autres qui s'emploientegalementet aussi souventdansl'un que dansl'autre; caractere est de ce nombre. Voici les principalesacceptions au figure: elles ont toutes, ainsi que les acceptions de cette espece, un rapportplus ou moins eloigne au sens propre;c'est-a-dire, qu'elles designent une sorte de marque ou d'empreintesubsistanteavec plus ou moins de tenacite:on peut meme ajouterque le mot caractereest de ceux oiu le sens proprediffere le moins du figure.
The apparentlyobvious connection between the senses of "caractere" is asserted,but not shown. It is, in fact, made less obvious by the comparisonwith "aveuglement" and "bassesse," examples thatfunction as implicit renvois. The first points to d'Alembert's article "Aveugle, " which quotesextensively fromDiderot's condemnedLettresur les aveugles (1749), a text thatplayed upon the relationbetween physical and metaphysicalor metaphoricalblindness in the depictionof the blind man Saunderson.As Diderot found out, there are concretepolitical consequencesto the figurativeuse of words, the "blindness" of the authoritieshaving a far more debilitatingeffect thanany physical handicap. D'Alembertfocuses on the evolutionof the word " aveuglement," remarkingthat "ce mot n'est usite que dans un sens moral, et ce n'est pas le seul de notre langue qui ne se prenneque metaphoriquement," and suggesting the use of "cecite" for literalblindness. He, too, refers us to " Bassesse, " thus passing implicitjudgmenton the metaphorically but willfully blind. "Bassesse," however, is an indignantprotest by Diderot against an unfairextension of a word whose propermeaning is "lowliness of economic status" but which is used to condemn the characterof those in that unfortunate position. Here is an unwarranted proximitybetween senses that should give us pause when we consider those given to "caractere." Diderot's "on peut meme ajouter" in the text cited above is deceptivelycasual in tone, as if his finalremarkmight not really follow logically from the rest. Diderot's unease might stem, however, from a sincere desire to see the various uses of the term coincide at some level, so thatlanguage, purifiedof abusive interpretations, might be able to mark correctly the true features of the world. Such a wish would be most appropriate at the end of an articledealing with the techniquesof printing,where the technical advancesof the art enable more stable and versatile instruments of communication to emerge. But it is finally up to the readerto makewhatconnectionhe can
25
among the articles devoted to "caractere," encouragedand warned at the same time by the editor's ambiguous words. The entries are, then, divided into two groups. In the first, "literal" group, we find a generalarticleon the historyof writingby d'Alembert, followed by a series of specializedentrieson the signs and symbols used in arithmetic,astronomy, chemistry, pharmacy, and other systems of abbreviation."Caracteresd'imprimerie"takes prideof place at the end of this section, by its length and its many illustrations, as a prime example of Diderot's technical skills. The "figurative" group begins with an entry on character in morals, followed by "Caractere des nations" and "Caracteredes societes ou corps particuliers."The use of the term in theology, especially as "sacramentalcharacter" is then explained. The abbe Mallet contributesa series of articleson "Caractere, dans les personnages," "d'un ouvrage," "en parlantd'un auteur," all dealing with literature,and two briefer entries on botanical and artistic charactersconclude the series. We should ask, first, what possible senses have been excluded from dictionariesenables us to the Encyclopedie. A survey of contemporary get a roughidea.4Most obvious to a literaryreaderis "caractere"in the in the mannerof La Bruyere,who is nowhere sense of a literaryportrait Two othermeanings mentionedin the text. This is certainlysurprising.5 found in the dictionariesare "caractere" as the distinctivehandwriting of an individual, and "caractere" as a sortilege, which the Academy defines as "lettres ou figures auxquellesle peuple attribueune certaine vertu, en consequenced'un pacte pretenduavec le diable." The firstof these may have been too simple to requirecomment, and the second belongs to a world of superstitionthatthe Encyclopedie chooses in this case to neglect ratherthan satirize. On the other hand, the dictionaries tend to lump togetherthe moral, social, andother literarysenses under the generalheadingof "distinctive feature," andherethe Encyclopedie is at pains to discriminateamong these meanings. It should be noted,
I These includethe dictionariesof Richelet (1680), Furetiere (editionof 1727), Tr6voux(1732), andtheAcademie(editionof 1762). Chambers'sCyclopaedia (London, 1728) providessome of the material on which the Encyclopedie articles are based, especially in the sections on scientific symbols, but is silenton those meaningsof 'character' relatedto moralquestions, andits discussion of literarycharacter,despite superficialresemblancesto Mallet's, is quite different in scope, the examples all being taken from classical antiquitywhere Mallet's are all modem. I There might, however, be a personal reason. Diderot's mistress, Mme de Puisieux, had publishedin 1749 a work entitledLes Caracteres,premierepartie, but the relationshiphadcooled off by 1751 andin fact therewas a violent quarrel betweenherselfandMme Diderotin Decemberof thatyear. The omission of an entryon thecaractere as a genre (includedin Chambers'swork) may reflectthese vicissitudes. See Diderot,Correspondance,ed. G. Roth andJ. Varloot(Paris:Minuit, 1955-70), I, 118-19.
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STUDIES EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY
too, thatneitherin the dictionariesnorin the Encyclopediedoes "caractere" have the medicalor properlypsychological sense it sometimeshas development.6 today: this is a nineteenth-century For the Encyclopedists, all the various entries on "caractere" find their place among the signs that make up the "Science de l'instrument du discours," which is, in turn, part of the "Art de communiquerla pensee, " one of the main divisions of logic. At least, this is whatwe are told at the beginningof the series, where, as usual, referenceis made to the systematic tableau of knowledge presented in the Discours preliminaire. Accordingto this scheme, "caractere"is a means of talking aboutthings, even when it refersto moralor botanicalcharacters,thatis, to qualities that seem rooted in the things themselves. Of course, the sciences of which differentsubheadingsin the serieslocate the particular "caractere"is an element, butthe overall situationof'"caractere"is, in line with Diderot's remark, among the means of communication, not among its subjectmatter.To what extent these means are given to us by the world, andto whatextentthey areinvented, properlyor improperly, the juxtapositionof by human agency, is a central issue underpinning literaland figurative"caracteres"in the plan of the Encyclopedie. The literal should not, however, be confused with the given, nor the figurative with the invented. As Diderot and d'Alemberttry to show, our use thatwhatappearsto us at any time as given of languageis so problematic may be in fact the " figurative"meaning, andwe may, conversely, have "literalized" a meaning we have projectedonto an object or person. What is at stake, rather, is the appropriate use of words in different contexts and the connections made through words like "caractere" across these contexts. At the intersectionof these polarities would be what Diderot calls the "tours originaux" requiredof the editors of an encyclopedia, and, in the ideal case, of the readertoo. In the spiritof Diderot's exhortations,I shall begin with the entryon botanical character as perhaps the clearest instance of the relation between the instrumentsof communication and the "marks" of the naturalworld. I shall then take up the articleson literarycharacterization, where of necessity the link between the means and the objects of communication is very close, if not always clear, whatever view is finally takenof the mimetic value of art. I shall next advertto the moral and social meanings of the term, and then to the religious ones. The entrieson writtencharactersin generalwill be consideredlast, bringing
6 As in the expression "troublescaracteriels." This latterderivativeof "caractere"dates from 1841.
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us back to our point of departure in Diderot's "Caracteres d'imprimerie," and the Encyclopedie itself.
The question of nomenclaturein naturalhistorywas much discussed in the 1750s.7 The publicationof the first volume of Buffon's Histoire naturelle (1749) marked the beginning of a long and sometimes acrimoniousdebate over the value of Linnaeus's system of classification of botanical features or "caracteres." The terms of the dispute are reflected in Jaucourt's entry on "Caractere, terme moderne de botanique," which he defines as "ce qui la [la plante]distingueessentiellement de toute autre chose." The problem is in the "essentiellement." What is essential depends on the type of classification envisaged, on what kind of description (itself called, metonymically, a "caractere") best fits scientific needs, which include both faithfulness to realityandinternalcoherence andconvenience. Jaucourt moves from his first definition, which seems to imply that the "caractere" is in the plant, to an explanationof two kinds of descriptiondividedjust on this point. There is the "caractere artificiel, celui dans lequel on decrit seulementquelquespartiesde la fleur, en gardant le silence surles autres parties, que par la methode qu'on a proposee, l'on suppose inutiles. . . ." This is the system of Linnaeus, who suggested that a clear and adequatenomenclaturecould be developed using the variationsin the reproductivemechanismof the plant. It is an artificialselection of the features deemed most relevant, and is arbitrary to the extent that the selection is made before an exhaustive study of all plants, a study that, for Linnaeus, cannot be carried out without some sort of guideline. Linnaeus did hope that his system, with modifications, would eventually become a "natural"one in extent and accuracy, and his insistence on the artificial nature of his nomenclaturereflected in part a deep suspicion of finalistic elements in the "natural" classifications proposed by others.8 This was not always recognized at the time, and Jaucourt's reference to the uselessness of the features neglected in Linnaeus's system alludes to a criterionemphasized by Buffon in his
I See F. A. Bather, "Biological Classification: Past and Future," QuarterlyJournal of the Geological Society, London, 83 (1927), lxii-civ; W. T. Steam, "Linnaeus's Species Plantarum and the Language of Botany," Proceedings of the Linnaean Society, London, 145, (1952-53), 158-64. For Buffon, the edition of his Oeuvresphilosophiques, ed. Jean Piveteau (Paris:P.U.F., 1954), and Otis Fellows, "Buffon's Place in the Enlightenment,"SVEC, 25 (1963), 603-29. 8 A. J. Cain, "The NaturalClassification," Proceedings of the LinnaeanSociety, London, 174 (1961-62), 115-21.
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rival method, that of social utility as opposed to scholarly convenience. For Buffon and his French contemporaries,Linnaeus's system appeared reactionary in its apparentconcentrationon simplicity of identification.In Daubenton'sarticle "Botanique, methode," to which Jaucourtrefersus, it is dismissed as a mere " artde la memoire." To it, Daubenton9 opposed the prudentand practicalmethodof Buffon who, suspicious indeed of all methods, called for a complete descriptionof things before any attemptat a formal nomenclature. This descriptionJaucourt defines as the "caracterenaturel,celui dans lequel on designe toutes les parties de la fleur, et l'on en considere le " Of course, this is a huge nombre,la situation,la figureet la proportion. undertaking,and Buffon did not suggest that no classification at all should be allowed before its completion. He conceded the necessity for preliminary collocations basedon the empiricalbasis of familiarexperience. This led him, unfortunately,to group togetherthings, especially animals, accordingto their place in a humanlyorganizedcontext, and his criterion of utility, intended as a realistic corrective to abstract categorizing, tended to impose a different kind of distortion in the selection of "essential" features.10 Jaucourtdoes not take a position on the relative merits of the two systems. The importanceof his brief article lies ratherin the way it points out the difficulty in arrivingat suitableinstruments of discourse for the analysis of naturalobjects. This is all the more important as each plant's "essential" qualities emerge by comparisonwith other plants, part by part, not by perceptionof a self-evident mark such as Michel Foucault describes when he contrasts the taxonomic obsession of the classical periodwith the earlierassumptionthateach entity bore its own special manifestsign, open to individualrecognition." The influenceof thatconceptionis still felt in the choice of the word "essentiellement" in a context that deprives it of its traditionalresonance. What concerns Jaucourt is simply thatone entity shouldnot be takenfor anotherthrough a confusion of perspective. It is interestingto see how the emphasison techniquesof description is carried over into the following article on "caractere" in painting. Once again, characteris defined as what distinguishes a thing from another, and the author, Landois, considers how this should be exI PierreDaubenton(1703-76) was the brotherof Buffon's famous collaborator.The identification of this and othercontributors to the Encyclopedie is facilitatedby J. Lough, The Contributors to the Encyclopedie (London: Grant and Cutler, 1973).
10 Buffon, Oeuvres philosophiques, pp. xxx-xxxii. I Les Mots et les choses (Paris: Gallimard, 1966).
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pressedon canvas. But he notes a shift in usage thatmay be tracedback to the esthetics of Roger de Piles.12 "On dit beau caractere de tete, non seulement pour dire qu'elle exprime bien la passion dont la figure est affectee; mais on le dit aussi pourle rapport du dessin convenable'acette meme tete." "Rapport" I take to mean the formal integrity of the drawing itself, since it appearsto be distinguished from the mimetic fidelity of the picture. The next paragraph,indeed, sees the object's featuresas mediatedby the painter'stalent. "Caracterede dessin se dit encore pour exprimer la bonne ou mauvaise maniere dont le peintre dessine, ou dont la chose en questionest rendue." This emphasison the importanceof drawingrecalls de Piles's dictumthat "caractere"is "le sel du dessin,"1'3 and therefore a central aspect of painting as such. Landois's articlefollows his example in moving from "caractere" as a quality of objects to "caractere" as a technique of expression. What is remarkablehere is the lack of any allusion to a specific criterionfor the judgmentof character of its expresor the appreciation sion. Thereis no "essentiellement," oddly enough, in this artisticentry, to signal a concern for peculiar accuracyor intensity of effect. "Nature," for instance, does not appear in the text except through an enumeration of some of its objects, each requiringa different"touche" fromthe painter,butthe sourceor groundof beautyin the "caractere"is not made clear. But Landois's article is a short one. We must turn to Mallet's entries on literarycharacterfor a more extended discussion. Edme Mallet's articleon "Caracteredans les personnages" may be taken as representativeof critical reflection on the subject in the years preceding Diderot's landmark essays of 1757-58. According to d'Alembert,14 the abbe's intentionin his literaryworks was basically a pedagogical one, reformulatingthe consensus of his contemporaries. His essay is useful, therefore, in determiningwhat was generally understood by the term in dramaticcriticism at midcentury. "Caractere,"then, for Mallet, "qu'un poete dramatique introduit sur la scene," is "l'inclination ou la passion dominante qui eclate dans toutes les demarches et les discours de ces personnages, qui est le principeet le premiermobile de leurs actions;par exemple, l'ambition
dans Cesar, lajalousie dans Hermione,
. . .
l'hypocrisie dans Tartuffe,
etc.
See his Idee du peintre parfait, in his Abrege de la vie des peintres (Paris, 1699). Abrege, pp. 71-72. 14 "Eloge de I'Abbe Mallet," in Oeuvres (Paris: B&lin,1821), III, 476-80. See also Franco Venturi, Le Origine dell'enciclopedia (Florence: Einaudi, 1946), pp. 35-37.
12 13
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Les caracteresen general sont les inclinations des hommes considerees par rapporta leurs passions." "Caractere"does not designatethe dramaticfigure itself, but refers to the basic tendencies expressed through the "personnage." It is interestingto note that, whereas in England at this time, "character" was coming into use in the formersense,"5this evolution of the termdid not take place in French, no doubtbecause of the ratherstrictdemarcations between genres that limited its use to certain forms of comedy. Another sign of conservatism is the restriction of the discussion to dramaticcharacter:no mention is made of prose fiction in the article. Withinthis conventionalframework,however, one featurestandsout as an even more significant omission. The enlightened Mallet, taking a neutralstance in the study of humaninclinations,makes no mentionof the "nobility" and "baseness" traditionally ascribed to tragic and comic character. This lack of prejudice reflects also, however, the separation of character from moeurs in the classical sense, and the as set isolationof bothof these fromplot, the action-contextof character is in the "rapport"between forthin Aristotle. If the essence of character inclination and passion, between the enduringdisposition of an agent andthe dramaticsourceof his action, the reductionof character-analysis to a formal classification makes that relationshipproblematic. In the previousarticleswe saw the hesitationin viewing natureas the groundof in humannatureand character.The problemnow is in locatingcharacter interaction, as embodied in art. What is interesting about Mallet's discussion is the focus on techniques of composition, and the very looseness of his conceptions. The unity imposed on characterby commonplaces about moral and social status has not yet been replaced by the assumptionof a psychological into a new idenwholeness synthesizing the various character-features tification of characterwith the "personality" of the literary figure. Psychological coherence can easily allow moral assumptionsto reappear in a new guise. Our attentionis, instead, redirectedto the constitution of characteras a problem of discourse. What, outside the usual given cultural boundaries, makes the unity or wholeness of dramatic Whatareits essentialtraits?The hesitationbetweenan ethical character? (in the Aristoteliansense) and a psychological view of characteris also valuable for the difficulties it reveals when characteris deprivedof any integrative setting at all, as often happens in criticism today. In this respect we are not strangersto the predicamentconfrontedby Mallet.
15
The OED gives instances from Tom Jones (1749) as early examples of this use.
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The abbedistinguishesfirstof all betweenthe "caracteresgeneraux" commonto all nationsandthe "caracteresparticuliers"sharedeitherby the people of a single nation or by a social group (the court, the town) within the nation. There are, he says, in all times and places ambitious princes preferringpolitical glory to love and vice versa, heroines who distinguishthemselvesby theirnoble spirit,andso on. Underthe second in categoryof charactersmay be foundthose featuresor types portrayed the new and distinctly French genre of the comedie de caractere, of
which Le Misanthrope and Le Glorieux are examples. By proceeding
backwardsfrom the works to society, Mallet avoids considerationof what constitutes the typicality of these characters,of the way general and particular"caractere" are integratedinto a single "personnage." have theirown definition:the " generWithineach work, the characters ality,"' in an esthetic sense, of the particular figure is not a problem. A ruling passion is its own rule, and the enduringsuccess of a work is its own guaranteeof value. Mallet does point out that there are "certains ridicules attaches'aun climat, a un temps, qui dans d'autresclimats et dans d'autres temps ne formeraientplus un caractere," such as the preciosity of Moliere's precieuses ridicules, but this difficulty is the purely contingent one of a change in fashion. Charactersdiffer "en consequencedes usages etablis dans la societe," nothingmore, andthe generalizationsabout dramaticsuitabilityrefer to no other critical authoritythan that of a generally acceptedrepertoireof geographicaland historical characteristics.It is perhapsthis absence of normativeconstraintthat enables Mallet to pass easily from the sources of "caracin the formal structure teres" to their arrangement of the work, without frettingover the problemof general mimetic fidelity. He does hold in reserveone touchstoneof value, buthe introducesit only afterfollowing his analysisof generalandparticular characters with a further distinction between what he calls "caracteressimples et dominants" and "caracteres accessoires" within the structure of the play. These are analogues of the former categories on the level of form. By these internal"caracteres," Mallet designates the hierarchyand distributionof attributesand passions that give rise to the dramatic conflict. Since each role is, theoretically,defined by one main characteristic, it is easy to identify dominantand subordinatecharacterswith the leading and secondaryactors. This is partof Mallet's meaning. He cites Riccoboni to the effect that there should be different degrees of in orderthat the interestand attentionof the spectators characterization not be divided: there must be only one hero. The adoptionof a formal
32
view of characterdoes not, it seems, entail a freedomfrom any outside constraint. This is apparentalso in the other sense in which Mallet speaks of internal characters:as the different passions within each dramaticperson. Althoughhe had defined "caractere"as the dominant inclination, he feels the need to emphasize the difference between dominantand accessory characters,as if "caractere" had lost some of its force of meaning. He recognizes thatambition,for instance, is often accompaniedby suspiciousness, inconstancy,andotherpassions, but in order that the characternot be at odds with himself -be consistent in termsof the play-these otheraspectsmustbe subordinated to the ruling
passion.
This leads to a dilemma. On the one hand, it seems as if character must be rescued from incoherence, as if its naturaltendency is to lose clarity of outline and fail to attractattention. On the other, the clarity wished for by Mallet, within and amongthe personsof the play, would remove most of the sources of conflict and interest in the dramaas a whole. Certainly, the actual repertoirediscussed by Mallet contains worksin which the problemof character is recognizedby him to be more complex. Following the ideas of the actor-directorLuigi Riccoboni,
whose Observations slir la comedie et slir le genie de Moliere (Paris,
1736) supplies a numberof Mallet's examples, the latter adduces Le Misanthrope, where Celimene, although a "caractere subalterne," shares the spotlight with Alceste without fragmentingthe audience's interest. This is, of course, because Alceste is a more problematiccase: he threatensto disrupt the play altogetherby the force of his ruling passion. Riccoboni senses this when he writes: "Si l'on ne veut pas convenir que le Misanthropesoit un caracterepurementmetaphysique; on doit du moins avouerqu'il l'est en partie,puisqu'onne peut le mettre au rang de ces caracterescommuns dont le genre humainnous presente
des modeles 'achaque pas ...
16
Alceste is nothing if not a distinct
character,so much so that he needs an opposing interestto counterhis influence and bring him back to earth, so that he might continue to interestthe audience. As in Rousseau'sLettrea d'Alembert,the discussion of Moliere's masterpiece is a test case for the analysis of the connectionbetween dramaticcompositionand audienceresponse. Mallet is compelled to confrontthe context of receptionof the work, lest his own formalistic approachlapse into "metaphysical" error. Why is it that Mallet emphasizes the orderingof "caracteres" in a hierarchical arrangement? It is because he fearsthe spectatorsmight not
16
Riccoboni, p. 39.
33
be able to tell the differencebetween the variouscharactersand misdirect their sympathies.The problemof compositiongives way to thatof interpretation as the apparentlyself-evident distinctionbetween dominant and accessory charactersis subordinated to a preoccupationwith the reception of the work, over whether the distinction will "come " through. We recall that severing the connection between "caractere" and "mceurs" at the beginning of the articleenabledMallet to take a freer, more impartialview of the different kinds of human characters.The unreliabilityof the contemporarypublic requires taking moeurs into accountonce again, only now thereis no means of doing so. Mallet has defined "caractere" as the inclination "qui eclate dans toutes ses demarcheset les discoursde ces personnages"(emphasismine). "Eclat" must be taken here in a strong sense, as involving a recognitionby the audience of the special effect of each characterin the play, and as manifestingthis effect with an intensitybelied by the concernfor formal arrangements. Mallet is forcedto change his groundto accommodatethe audience's ability and willingness to see in the characterwhat the charactershouldin some sense make manifest.Forthe firsttime, Mallet invokes the concept of nature,but only to show how it fails to providea solution. He asks "si l'on peut et si l'on doit, dans le comique, charger les caracterespour les rendreridicules. D'un cote, il est certainqu'un auteurne doit jamais s'ecarter de la nature, ni la faire grimacer:d'un autre cote, il n'est pas moins evident que dans une comedie on doit
peindre le ridicule, et meme fortement .
.
" For the sake of moral
edification, Mallet concludes that exaggeration is permissible, when done with tact. "Qu'on caracteriseles passions fortement, 'ala bonne heure, mais il n'est jamais permis de les outrer." An ethical measure thus reappearsat the end of Mallet's articleand modifies the concept of characterization in the text, by making the recognition of characteran explicitly culturalprocess as well as a simple cognitive procedure. Other articles in the "Caractere" series will describe the role of characterin moral life, but before we come to them it is worth going furtherinto the problemof literaryrecognition and its eclat. Since the articles "Caractere d'un ouvrage" and "Caractere, en parlant d'un auteur" take as their point of departureauthorand work as part of a culturalinstitution,they serve as a useful transitionto the wider social sphere. In both these articles (written, most likely, by Mallet)17we find the
17 "Caractere d'un auteur"is signed by Mallet. "Caractered'un ouvrage," which immediately precedes it, is probablyby the same hand.
34
same persistentdifficulty in defining the distinctivenessof character. The character of a work is said to be the " differencespecifiquequi le distingued'un autreouvrage de meme genre." Curiously, we find that in fact the authorof the article is not actually speaking of individual works when he speaksof "ouvrage," butof what we are accustomedto call genres. By genrehe meanspoem, or oratory.By work, he meansthe epic, the ode, the elegy, which are all poems, each with its "tourpropre et particulier; c'est ce qu'on appelle son caractere."The "caractere"is furtherdefined as the "methode qu'on y suit" to producethe work. The actualpoem is not seized in its specificity, but as a type of poem obeying certain rules of composition. "Tour propre" may be opposed to Diderot's "tours originaux" in thatthe poem is subsumedundera definite classification and does not itself modify literary categories. Such a conceptionfits in with the maintenorof Mallet's articleon the fitness of charactersto dramaticgenres; it is also just as abstract. The "caractere" of an author is a very different matter, not only because of the more personalcontext, althoughin fact the personalities of authorsarenot at issue, butbecauseof the differenceof tone andstyle of presentationin the article itself. Characteris again defined as "la manierequi lui [the author]est propreet particulierede traiterun sujet, dans un genre que d'autresont traitecomme lui ou avantlui, et ce qui le distingue de ces auteurs." Two very differentthings are meant, however, by "manner" in this instance. In the examples drawnfrom poets, ancient and modern, what is emphasized is the play of attributesby which criticism quickly "places" each author.Thus Pindaris sublime and obscure, Malherbe subtle and harmonious, La Motte clever and delicate. Characterization, here, is the witty use of epithet. But the more substantialpartof the entry is given over to a quotationfrom Fenelon's Lettre a' l'Academie on the charactersof the ancient historians.'8The appealto this augustauhoriyfits e gravityof the one genreleft untreated in the previous article, that of eloquence. The use of direct quotation allows the encyclopedist to give a more heightened tone and more of true special weight to the ideas, not to mentionthe silent identification eloquence with the the work of the persecutedarchbishopof Cambrai. Fenelon's characterizations standout from the ones just mentionedby their more scrupulous evaluation of the quality of historical works.
18Malletgives the title as Lettressur 1'eloquence, thus confusing, perhapscarriedaway by his concern for eloquence, the Lettre sur les occupations de 1'Academie with the Dialogues sur l'eloquence. The two workswere often publishedtogether.The passagecited is fromCh. viii of the Lettre, "Projetd'un traitesurl'histoire." A fully annotated edition is thatof E. Despois, Dialogues sur l'eloquence (Paris: Dezobry, 1846), where the passage may be found on p. 83.
35
Tacitus, for example, "montre beaucoupde genie, avec une profonde connaissance des cceurs les plus corrompus:mais il affecte trop une
brievete mysterieuse .
. .
. I1 attribue aux plus subtils ressorts de la
politique, ce qui ne vient souvent que d'un mecompte . . . que d'un caprice." In this type of analysis, as Mallet pointsout in his conclusion,
"le caractere . . . ne consiste pas moins dans leurs defauts que dans
leurs perfections." Fenelon's judgments matter more than those pronounced on the poets. The latterare concernedwith classification;the formerwith everythingthatcontributesto the total effect and influence of the work. These historiansareall drawn,however, fromantiquity.Even though Voltairewill be quotedat lengthelsewherein the "Caractere"series, no modern representativeof eloquence is cited. Whetherthis is to avoid controversy or because modern eloquence does not have the same paradigmatic "caractere" as the earliermodels, it is hardto say. But in the light of the precedingarticleon the drama,we may wonderto what extent such a perspective is still applicableto works destined for the contemporary public. Even Fenelonbelongs alreadyto anotherage. The problem of eloquence in the Enlightenmenthas attractednotice from critics preoccupiedwith the problemof literaryauthorityand the prospects of an original, well-characterized discourse. Jean Starobinski,for instance,19has seen a connection between reflection on the quality of oratoryin the period and the philosophy of history adumbrated by the philosophes. His thesis is confirmedby the Encyclopedieitself, or more precisely, in the Supplement,which adds to the "Caractere" series an article by the Swiss esthetician J. G. Sulzer on "Caracteredans les beaux-arts." Sulzer, much influenced by the ideas of Diderot and Condillac,20 sheds some light on the ambivalent attitude adopted in Mallet's entries. He takes characterand moeursto be inseparable,and sees in the decline of freedomin the modernage the reasonfor weakness in literarycharacterization. In ancient Greece, he broods, "ou chaque citoyen se permettaitde paraItre tel qu'il 'tait . . . 1 etait aussi aise au dessinateur de lire chaquesentimentsurles visages et dansles gestes. 9 Modernpeoples no longer dare to show their true selves, and the French and German theaters are deprived both of "original" charactersand the power of
19 "Eloquence and Liberty," JHI, 37 (1979), 195-210. On Sulzer, see Walter Moser, "Jean-GeorgesSulzer, continuateur de la pensee sensualiste dans l'academie de Berlin," MLN, 84 (1969), 931-41; and LawrenceKerslake, "JohannGeorg Sulzer and the Supplementto the Encyclop&die,"SVEC, 143 (1979), 225-47. Quotationsfrom Sulzer's article are from the third edition of the Encyclopedie (Geneva, 1768).
20
36
original characterization. The climate of ancient freedom allowed for a clear definition of characterbecause that definition was a self-definition, an assertionof autonomy in which formal clarity and thematic force were one, and mutual recognition was the result of practical (and political) will as much as of rationalcognition. Today, says Sulzer, "nous n'osons nous
montrer . . . que sur un ton de convention, dont nous souffrons que
d'autresnous imposentla loi. " Nowhere is this moretrue, if not always obvious, than in the constrictingpower of linguistic convention. Still, we are not in the world of Rousseau'sDiscours sur les sciences et les arts. We have seen how the renewed interestin naturalscience evinced in the entryon botanicalclassificationled to an awarenessof the complexities attendant on even such an innocuousenterpriseas classification, when the latter is taken seriously as an attemptto approximate the variety of nature. Nature does not characterize itself, and it is through a more self-conscious use of language that characterization must be accomplished. In the same way, underthe aegis of Diderot's exhortation, a searching critique of linguistic habits may be the most opportuneway of reappropriating thatpracticaldimensionof characterizationobscuredin the humanrealmby the power of convention. Just as the character of the authorsdiscussed by Mallet consists as much in the weaknesses as in the strengthsof the style, the discrimination-if it can be accomplished-of the differentdegrees of conventionalityin moral characterization may help in developing more serviceable instruments of discourse. The natureappealedto by Buffon's science as the ground of character is clearly a morepotentforce thanthe natureinvoked, rather fruitlessly, by Mallet. Whetherby a "tour original" humannaturecan recapturesome of its earliervigor remainsto be seen, as we turnto the analysis of moral and social characteristics.
"Caractereen Morale" is defined as "la disposition habituelle de l'ame, par laquelle on est plus porte 'afaire et l'on fait en effet plus souvent des actions d'un certain genre, que des actions d'un genre oppose. This in itself is a fairly standarddefinition. The rest of the article is strikingmore at first for what it omits thanfor what it says. No mention is madeof the relativepriorityof the actionsandthe disposition(is one a liar because one lies, or are lies the productof a lying disposition?):the two are simply broughttogetherby the conjunction"et." Nor is any-
37
thing said about human "nature" in general. The authoris more concerned to give us Duclos's distinction between "caractere" and "esprit":one can have a lot of innatequalities, like Cicero, andstill be weak in character.2'The examplechosen testifies to Duclos's ratherdim view of a certain kind of eloquence in the context of today's maurs. The encyclopedist, too, focuses less on humancapacities thanon reliability and predictability of conduct. A social perspectiveis imposed from the start. "Rien n'est plus dangereuxdans la societe," writes the author, "qu'un homme sans caractere, c'est-a-dire, dont l'ame n'a aucune dispositionplus habituellequ'une autre.On se fie 'al'homme vertueux; on se defie d'un fripon.L'homme sanscaractere l'un est alternativement et l'autre, sans qu'on puisse le devineret ne peut etre regardeni comme
ami, ni comme ennemi. .
. ."
The man without definite habits is not a
fit inhabitant of society, andthe necessaryrelationof character to milieu is summedup by a biological metaphor used to describethe manwithout character:"c'est une espece d'anti-amphibie,s'il est permis de s'exprimer de la sorte, qui n'est bon 'avivre dans aucun element." The biological analogy is really a counteranalogy,since what constitutes a marvelof the scientific world is shown to be a social nuisance. Neither fish nor fowl, the man without character frustratesour attempt at classification by endangeringthe whole network of social bonds on which stablehumaninteraction depends.Moreover,this resultis viewed as the consequenceof a choice on the partof the subject, who refusesto adopt a position in politics. "Cela me rappellecette belle loi de Solon, qui declaraitinFamestous ceux qui ne prenaientpoint de partidans les seditions: il sentaitque rien n'etait plus 'acraindreque les caractereset les hommes non decides." Definition of characteris essential because society is a conflictual milieu in which observer and observed are caught up. Social cohesion requiresa sortingout of the differencesbetween men as a preludeto any common action. And such a definition is part of the decisionmaking process, as is suggested by the very phrase "hommes non decides." This last term means both "well-marked, well-defined" and "determined on a course of action": it fuses the theoretical and practical aspectsof characterization andallows "caractere"and "homme" to be used interchangeably in this context. One may ask, however, whatis the basis for the recognizabilitythus demanded,whetherit emergesthrough the free self-assertion of each individual or whether it is imDosed by
"1Thereferenceis to CharlesPinot-Duclos, Considerationssur les maeursde ce siele (1750), Ch. iii.
38
social conventions whose need for clarity may stem from less exalted motives thanthe preservation or recoveryof freedom. It is clear, at any rate, that it is impossible to develop a reliable discourse on moral characterwithout the cooperationof those to whom it will be applied. They must, at the very least, be accessible to scrutiny. "Caractereen morale" does not, however, help us resolve the tensions it expresses, and we go to the next entry, on "Caracteresdes nations," to see what perspectiveis adoptedas regardsthe social unit. Significantly, the entity discussed is not "society," but the nation, the concreteembodimentof particular political arrangements. By doing so, d'Alembert, as the probableauthorof the piece,22may claim to adopta supranational and cosmopolitan attitudewithout pretendingto knowledge of how society as such might be characterized.On the otherhand, his intention is not to show how nationalcharactersare rooted in any organic essence-this was the dream only of later generations.23His perspective may be described as a formal one in that it is comparative and relative ratherthan being concerned with intensity of definition. "Le caractere d'une nation," we read, "consiste dans une certaine disposition habituellede l'ame, qui est plus commune chez une nation que chez une autre, quoique cette disposition ne se rencontrepas dans tous les membresqui composentla nation:ainsi le caracteredes francais est la legerete, la gaiete, la sociabilite, l'amour de leurs rois et de la monarchiememe, etc. " The beginningof the definitionis the same as in the previous case, but instead of opposing characterto its absence or weakness, d'Alembert merely contrastsit with other charactersfound elsewhere. We areback to the kind of characterization found in the first part of "Caractered'un auteur," where the distinctive featuresof the poets were treatedin an easygoing manner. Anotherlink to this latter article is a reference to Tacitus's treatmentof the "moeursdes Germains," but no judgmentof the historian'swork or of the worthinessof those maurs is implied. We have returned, it seems, to the kind of unsubstantiated more appropriate characterization to salon discussion than to intellectual inquiry. The context, however, is very different.Whereasin the formercase, formalism was an obstacle to a responsible account of the effect and
22 His initialappears only atthe end of "Caracteres des societes, " butthis articleis presentedas a subsection of "Caracteresdes nations." The whole piece is usually taken as d'Alembert's. See Ren& Hubert,Les Sciences sociales dans 1'Encyclopedie (Paris:Alcan, 1923), pp. 39, 55, 264; and EberhardWeis, Geschichtsschreibungund Staatsauffassungin der franzosischen Encyclopedie (Wiesbaden:F. Steiner, 1956), pp. 155, 234. 23 See FrankManuel, "From Equality to Organicism," JHI, 17 (1956), 54-60.
39
influence of the work of art in relation to its public, d'Alembert's ascriptionof traitsto the nation testifies to a certainindependencefrom the narrowconstraints of a socially determined perspective.It is itself, at a higher level, a manifestationof that freedom so forcefully and even oppressivelydemandedin the articleon moralcharacter.It is also not as trivial in content as it appears.The pieties expressed aboutthe Frenchman's love of the monarchy, as well as the overfamiliarreference to French "legerete," are to be read in the light of the next paragraph, which speaks of the sad absence of characterin lands demoralizedby despotic rule. "Dans un etat despotique, par exemple," d'Alembert writes, concerning the influence of the form of government on the national character,"le peuple doit devenir bientot paresseux, vain, et amateurde la frivolite;le gout du vrai et du beau doivent s'y perdre,on ne doit ni faire ni penser de grandes choses." In such a state, no charactertrait could stand out, given the absence of any true action of the Frenchis in fact ironic, and there. D'Alembert's characterization mustnot be takenas literallylighthearted,but as a provocationto a new seriousness of purpose. We are encouraged, by the juxtaposition of French"legerete" and despotic " frivolite," to see a possible contamination of the one by the other. Irony would then be, on d'Alembert's part, a response tailored to the ambiguity of the context: it speaks obliquely to those menaced by despotism, taking the risk of a literal readingby those alreadyunderits sway, and does so, not only to avoid the censorship but to elude, by the appearanceof esthetic play, the perniciousaspects of the demandfor recognizabilitythatfreedomitself makes, when too literally pursued. D'Alembert's characterizationis thus at the opposite pole from that found in "Bassesse" and in Diederot's other examples of linguistic abuse. It is truethat d'Alembert'sperspectivedoes not exclude partisanship in other ways. The allusion to despotism at the end of "Caracteredes nations" leads to the discussion, in the next entry, of the "Caracteredes societes ou corps particuliers." The target here is the Churchwhich, except for a passing jibe at the Academie, is the only societe actually named. D'Alembert defines these groups as "en quelque maniere des petites nations entouree d'une plus grande;c'est une espece de greffe bonneou mauvaise, entee surun grandtronc;aussi les societes ont-elles pourl'ordinaireun caractere particulier,qu'on appelleespritdu corps. " By "caractere"here, d'Alembertmeansa kind of internaldispositionin the sense of a tendencyto exclusiveness, a refusalto be assimilatedinto a largercontext. "Souvent le caractered'une societe est tres diff6rente
40
de celui de la nation, otuelle se trouvepour ainsi dire transplantee.Des corps, parexemple, qui dansune monarchieferaientvceude fidelite 'aun autreprincequ'a leur souverainlegitime, devraientnaturellement avoir moins d'attachement pource souverainque le reste de la nation;c'est la raisonpourlaquelle les moines ont fait tantde mal 'ala France,du temps
de la Ligue .
. . ."
The problem here is not a lack of character, as in
"Caractere en Morale," but too great a self-definition in a partisan sense. D'Alembert adopts the point of view of a militant Gallican to counter the pernicious independenceof a body really dependenton a foreign power. He demandsa single, uniformloyalty from all citizens. Once again, a biological simile ("greffe," "entee") is used to support the integrityof the milieu and its boundariesagainstartificialmodifications. Such naturalism, only slightly nuanced by the familiar "en quelquemaniere" or "une espece de" so frequentin the Encyclopedie, stands in sharpcontrastto the attitudeof the previous article. To reinforce his point, d'Alembert, like Mallet in "Caractered'un " makesroom for a passagefroma celebratedwriter.This time it auteur, is Voltaire, andthe quotationis drawnfromthejust-published Si'eclede Louis XI V.24 Voltairehad left France, and from his sanctuaryin Berlin sharpenedhis attacksagainstreligious institutions.He writes, "Preter sermenta un autrequ'"a son prince, est un crime de lese-majestedans un laique;c'est dans le clolitre,un acte de religion." And he praisesLouis XIV for bringing about "la persuasion dans laquelle les religieux commencent tous ai etre, qu'ils sont sujets du roi avant que d'etre serviteursdu pape." The historian'sremarksdisplay a forcefulness in tune with the earlierappeal for "hommes decides," and d'Alembert's conclusion is just as straightforward. "Ainsi, pour le salut des etats, la philosophiebrise enfin les portes fermees." Irony is out of place when confronting a clear enemy, nor is it necessary when the conviction expressed coincides with a nationalistic sentiment shared by many in high places. One wonders what would have been the result if the
parlements had been included among the corps particuliers whose
characteris put in doubt. "Caractere" in the moral and social articles remains, finally, a convenientlyambiguousterm. As before, it designatesa traitascribedto entities in the world as well as the ascriptionitself. But because the
entities
24
characterized
are themselves
agents
canahle
of self-
Voltaire'swork appeared at the end of 1751. D'Alembertwouldjust have hadtimeto includeit in Volume IIof the Encyclopedie, dated 1751 butpublishedin January1752. It shouldalso be noted that the passage in question representsa late revision by Voltaire himself. See Voltaire, Oeuvres historiques. ed. R. Pomeau (Paris: Gallimard, 1957), p. 627.
41
characterization and of influencing the characterizing power of others, including that embodied in the original discourse, the problem of a recognitionboth exact and free has become more complex. One kind of recognitionmay exclude the other, and the identificationof characters may preventidentificationwith or against them, and vice versa. As in the discussionof botanicalnomenclature,the elaborationof a system of discursive elements cannot be made apart from considerationof the utility of the system as a factor in the very constructionof the system. Yet the natureand above all the scope of the utility used as a criterionis partlydeterminedby the way it is thoughtthroughthe discoursealready available, whose figurativetours enable the context of utility governing the "proper" sense to be defined more or less literally, more or less narrowly. An entry devoted to anothersense of "caractere" helps us to see in delicatebalancethe differentpossibilitiesoffered by the use of the term. "Caracteredes societes ou corps particuliers"is followed by two more articlesrelatedto political andreligious concerns. The second, "Caractere, en theologie," discusses sacramentalcharacter,which is defined as "une marquespirituelleet ineffacable, imprimee'al'ame parquelque sacraments,ce qui fait qu'on ne peut pas reitererces sacraments."The anonymousauthorquotes a numberof ecclesiastical authoritiesto the effect thatthe Churchknows thatthereis such an uneradicable mark,but cannot say in what it consists. So much so that the Protestantsdeny its existence, even though they agree that baptism, at least, cannot be conferredtwice.
From the point of view of the philosophes, this doctrine is typical of
the exclusiveness and obscurantismof Catholic doctrine. The sacraments bearing a special characterall have to do with the quality of membershipin the Christiancommunity, and involve an authoritative recognitionof the statusof the member, irrespectiveof secularposition in the world. In the religious context, they resolve the problem of characterization in the moral sense by appealingto a higher authority and an uncontrovertiblediscourse. The permanenceof their mark is beyond the reach of time's corruption.Such a conception is totally at odds with the enlightened approach of d'Alembert in the previous article,who neverthelessaccordsa priorityalmostas absoluteto the oath of loyalty to the king.
se dit aussi de certainesqualitesvisibles qui attirent Caractere du respectet de la veneration 'a ceux qui ens sont revetus. La majeste des rois leur donne un
42
caractere qui leur attirele respectdes peuples.Un ev&que soutiendrait son caractere parson savoiret sa vertu,beaucoup plusqueparl'eclatde la vanite acouvert mondaine, etc. Ledroit desgensmetle caractere desambassadeurs de touteinsulte. In this context, the link between the characterand the person is so intimate that it is immediately apparentto all. The definition recalls Mallet's remarkson the "eclat" necessary (althoughhardto define) to literary characters. The reference to ambassadorsalso suggests the relationbetween this kind of "caractere" andthe importanceof fiction in public communicationwhere the usefulness of the character exceeds the boundariesof utility narrowly defined by the audience or nation. Monarchsandbishops, too, play an essential publicrole, whose theatrical connotationsare emphasizedby the phrasing, "un eveque soutiendraitson caractere," which echoes a common requirementin dramatic composition. Much depends, however, on the kind of representation that is envisaged, and to what extent the "caractere" is viewed as an immediateandessential qualitydefining andconsecratingthe role, or as a construct mediated by as well as mediating the process of public communication.As JurgenHabermashas shown,25the very concept of the public as a networkof representation, communication,and critique in the eighteenthcentury, underwenta profoundtransformation. "Publicity" (Offentlichkeit) shifts from being a quality manifestedby things or especially personssuch as high dignitaries,to indicatingan openness or accessibilityto scrutinyby public opinion. The transitioncan be seen in use of the word "caractere" in this article. The first sense of Offentlichkeit can be seen in the descriptionof the monarch,the second in the admonitionto the bishop. That the latteris really the predominant one can be seen by the openly iconoclastic tone of d'Alembert's and Voltaire'sremarksin the earlierpiece: it is hard,ultimately,not to see in them a critique of authorityratherthan a true positive defense of la
raison d'etat.
Yet an ambiguityremains, for there is without doubt a desire for a kind of immediate recognition of a source of authority and proper function in social life. The theatrical vocabulary used, here as elsewhere, expresses, throughdiscussion of the elements and effects of literature,the dual wish for charactersavailable to criticism yet still "untouchable" and exemplary in their presentationof the integrityof their "caractere." The connection between personnage (and in this
25 Jurgen Habermas, Strukturwandel der 6ffentlichkeit: Untersuchungen zu einer Kategorie der biurgerlichen Gesellschaft (Neuwied am Rhein and Berlin: Luchzerhand, 1962).
43
entrythe social, hierarchical connotationsof the word come to the fore) andcaractere is brokenin life, but is held to remainin fiction, and such fictions are partof the communicativecontext of social life: the ambassador retains his characterwhen that of his sovereign becomes less secure. Just in this way did Diderot express his desire to see the necessary distinctionsmade that would enable a penetratingcritiqueof linguistic usage to emerge, and at the same time his wish that the figurative and literal senses of "caractere" be brought together to counterthe distances and disparitiesstandingin the way of our making our language "le tout le moins irregulieret le moins decousu" compatible with the bizarrerie of life. We have, up to this point, tried to explicate the various figurative meanings of "caractere," and have concluded as to the necessity of in this area, where even the most maintaininga degree of indeterminacy of in applications is danger of being too easily "metaphorical" literalized. We must now turn to the literal sense of the term as it is analyzed in the articles on the instrumentsof discourse that precede Diderot's "Caracteresd'imprimerie."In these articles, dealingwith the development of writing, we find that the mode of signification of the "literal" charactersis just as problematicas thatof the figurativeones. The entriesunder"Caractere"as writtenmarkserve a dual purpose. They are intendedto acquaintthe readerwith the kinds of symbols that are used, not only in writtenlanguage (for the details of which we are referred to "Alphabet"), but in various scientific disciplines: astronomy, mathematics,chemistry. Concern for the scientific precision of these symbols and abbreviationsrequires, however, a survey of the history of written representationin general, from crude pictograms, which at least hadthe virtueof directness,to modem systems of abstract letters and signs.26 D'Alembert, the authorof much of this section, divides all charactersinto "litteraux, numeraux, et d'abbreviation." These correspondto the symbols of ordinarylanguage, mathematics, and science; theircommon goal is economy, objectivity, and exactness of meaning. D'Alembert furtherdistinguishes, among the "caracteres litteraux," between "nominaux," "ce qu'on appelle proprementdes lettresqui servent "a ecrirele nom des choses." and "emblematiquesou
26 The main source here is Condillac's Essai sur l'origine des connaissances humaines(1746), and, throughhim, Warburton's Divine Legation of Moses (1737-41), of which partwas translated underthe titleEssai sur les hieroglyphes(1744). Althoughd'Alembertis the principalauthorof this section, some parts are contributedby Dumarsais, La Chappelle, and Venel.
44
symboliques," which "expriment les choses memes, et les personnifient en quelque sorte, et represententleur forme: tels sont les hieroglyphes des anciens egyptiens." In general, the formerhave displaced the latteramong the charactersin common use; the role of "personnification" has been almost eliminated, although the entry on chemical symbols manifests a curious nostalgia for the emblematic power of alchemical signs. Like the hieroglyphs, these signs are viewed as instruments,more of mystificationthan of true discourse, yet they exercise a persistentfascinationamongthephilosophes, dissatisfiedwith the failure of linguistic progressto supply universalclarity and conceptual rigor by nominalistic characterization. This theme has attractedmuch attention in recent studies of the Enlightenment,and it would exceed the limits of this paperto rehearse here the debateover the historyof ecriture as seen by thephilosophes. 27 Remarkable,however, is the way d'Alembertshares some of the misgivings expressed aboutlinguistic evolution. He speaks wistfully of the attempts, by Leibniz and others, to producea universalcharacteristic, that is, a conventionalsystem of characterswhich would, nevertheless, by unanimous agreement and by the perfection of its organization, constitute a sure method for representingthe world. To be successful, the system would have to be made of characters "reels, et non nominaux, c'est-'a-dire,exprimer des choses, et non pas comme les caracteres communs, des lettres ou des sons." How this could be accomplished, he does not say, but does not consider the difficulties insurmountable. The real obstacle is an externalone. It is "bien moins d'inventer les caracteres les plus simples, les plus aises, et les plus commodes, que d'engagerles diff6rentesnations 'aen faire usage; elles ne s'accordent, dit M. de Fontenelle, qu'a ne pas entendre leurs interets." In citing Fontenelle with approval, d'Alembert takes a completely opposite tack from the one in "Caractereen morale," where the needs of the individualnation furnishedthe highest criterionof judgmentfor the interestandclarityof characters.D'Alembertpresumesthatthe lack of recognitionand acceptanceof a universalcharacteristic stems from a kind of aveuglement, but such blindness would be the by-productof an
27 An idea of the rangeof investigationsmay be gained fromClifton Cherpack,"Warburton and the Encyclopedie," PQ, 36 (1957), 221-33; and JacquesDerrida,De la grammatologie (Paris: Minuit, 1967), as well as his "L'Archeologie du frivole," in Condillac, Essai sur l'origine des connaissances, ed. CharlesPorset(Paris:Galilee, 1973), pp. 13-95. It shouldalso be recalledthat Diderot had touched on the problem a year before the publicationof this volume of the Encyclopedie, in his Lettre sur les sourds et muets (1751).
45
excessively vivid perceptionof local interests. In the other article, the interests of the immediate community were clear enough; it was the clarityof characterization thatwas foundwanting. Now, in the light of a more universalperspective, the instruments of reliablecharacterization seem almost to hand, but local interestshave lost their authority:they includemere prejudice.D'Alembertdoes not, however, condemnthese weaknessesentirely. He recognizesthat"literal" characters arenothing until they are appropriated by the active participation of the people in their day-to-day communication. Individual societies, " separees par des mers vastes et des continents arides," as d'Alembertputs it, were forced to invent different instrumentsof discourse, "turns" of their own, as a response to the climactic and other peculiarities of their material situation. These contributedto the formationof the national character, and, as Condillac showed, the national characterand the actual "characters"of writing (letters, but syntax and vocabularytoo) develop in mutualinteractionover a long period until an equilibriumis reached. After that, modification of the nation's linguistic characters comes only seldom, fronthe poets whose literaryoriginalityenrichesthe language and, ultimately, the life of the people. On a larger scale, however, the "disparates"thatimpedethe smooth flow of communication among nations cannot be removed by linguistic invention alone, certainlynot by poets, but only by more concretemeans of rapprochement based on the discovery of common interests. Here, even the most literal characters are never literal enough to properly represent the variety of national interests. The prospectof a universalcharacteristic based on a purely "natural" model misses the whole dynamic of characterformation as accepted by d'Alembert. We are left with the resources of what are still called, paradoxicallybut inescapably, the naturallanguages. The entries under the literal sense of "Caractere" complement the articles on its figurativemeanings. The latter showed the necessity of the preservinga degree of indeterminacy in the delineationof character: "essential quality" of a thingis not to be equatedwith any permanent set of featureslest the subjectiveelement in its determination be forgotten. The literal entries, on the other hand, emphasize the importanceof taking into account the whole range of material conditions underlying humancommunication,conditions that are obscured in idealistic projects for a universalset of linguisticcharacters with which to describethe world. Thus are we reminded, in the series as a whole, of the objective determinantsof our discourse and the discursive determinantsof our
46
objects. Such is the objective in discoursingon the shifting senses of "caractere."
But hasDiderot's program been fulfilled?Do the variousarticlesform a totality? We seem to be left with only the beginnings of a true synthesis, since the two aspectsof the problemdo not appearto engage each other directly. Following Diderot's injunction,however, we must be attentiveto the exact extent of the distancebetween them, andto the "tours originaux" thatdistinguishthe Encyclopedie's mode of totalizaOne such tion. The latteris not, finally, a questionof meredenomination. turnmay be seen in the central articleof the group, "Caracteresd'imprimerie." The article that concludes with remarkson the figures of language forms part of the literal series, and yet we cannot fail to be impressed with the spectacularaspect of Diderot's piece, which celebrates the whole institutionof printingand the versatilityof its forms. No sharpercontrastcould be imaginedwith the doleful remarkson the difficulties of a universalcharacteristic.It is as if the practicalgenius of industry,as Diderotsees it, could resolve by its own power the question that perplexes philosophers. No example of the potentialof the printingpress is more significant than the Encyclopedie itself, the work that may be seen as the most original "turn" of them all in the universality of its scope and the exhaustivenessof its realization.The Encyclopedie does what it can to reduce the disparitiesof discourse, but in the process of composition Diderotcomes to a new awarenessof the difficulty inherentin any total view of languageandits uses. Ouridea of this work sometimesobscures its actual bizarrerie, its attempt to exploit the juxtapositions of the alphabetic order and still profit from the systematic classification of
knowledge in the Discours preliminaire and the Tableau des connais-
sances. This duality, along with indirectnessof the renvois (explicit and implicit)is integralto the shapeof the work. What, then, is the "character" of the Encyclope'die? Discussing the renvois in "Encyclopedie," Diderot writes: "Si ces renvois de confirmationet de refutationsont preparesavec adresse, ils donneront'al'encyclopedie le caractereque doit avoir un bon dictionnaire;ce caractere est de changer la fagon commune de penser." Having reviewed the various ways in which "caractere" may be understood, we can give new meaning to this famous quotation. The character of which Diderot speaks is not merely the distinguishing
47
feature that sets it off from other books: it is the integrity, the active disposition of the work, the mode of its assertion, all of which are inseparablefromthe way it is receivedby its public. Its aim, in fact, is to be no less than a fully characterizedwork, both in the extensive and intensive senses of the word. But if characterization depends on the context of receptionfor its eclat, and the properreceptionof the text is only hypotheticalgiven the problematicabsenceor weakness of character of the contemporarypublic under near-despoticregimes, to what extent can the Encyclopedie anticipateand incorporateits reception in its presentation? It can only do so through its style, by constant attention to the of its discourse, the verbal as well as conceptualtools at its instruments disposal. "Je renfermerais,"Diderot says again, "le caracteregeneral du style de l'encyclopedie en deux mots, communia,propre; propria, communiter. En se conformant "a cette regle, les choses communes seronttoujourselegantes;et les choses propreset particulieres,toujours claires." The intentionis to make availablewhat has been restrictedto a few, so thatthe sens propre of things be accessible to open scrutinyand shared knowledge. By insisting on elegance, Diderot reassures the gentle reader of his time that no vulgarity of understandingor of utterancewill be permitted:circumlocutionsof various kinds will be necessaryin some cases, for the sens propre is not always the literalone. But he also therebypoints to an economy of presentationthat includes the "tours originaux" required both to reduce and to highlight the disparitiesinherentin any appropriate discourse.The very formDiderot uses to express his principle, with its balancedclauses, with, too, the slight differences in meaning between the Latin and the Frenchwords, suggests a form of tense proximitybetween words andtheir senses, and between readerandwork, a context of communicationmost compatible with freedomof thought, and most inimical to literal-mindedassimilation.
University of California, Los Angeles

The Idea of Character in The Encyclopedie

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American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies (ASECS)

The Idea of Character

CHARACTERIN THE ENCYCLOPEDIE

CHARACTERIN THE ENCYCLOPEDIE

CHARACTERIN THE ENCYCLOPEDIE

CHARACTERIN THE ENCYCLOPEDIE

l'hypocrisie dans Tartuffe,

CHARACTERIN THE ENCYCLOPEDIE

Alceste is nothing if not a distinct

CHARACTERIN THE ENCYCLOPEDIE

" For the sake of moral

CHARACTERIN THE ENCYCLOPEDIE

. I1 attribue aux plus subtils ressorts de la

CHARACTERIN THE ENCYCLOPEDIE

The man without definite habits is not a

CHARACTERIN THE ENCYCLOPEDIE

The problem here is not a lack of character, as in

CHARACTERIN THE ENCYCLOPEDIE

CHARACTERIN THE ENCYCLOPEDIE

CHARACTERIN THE ENCYCLOPEDIE

objects. Such is the objective in discoursingon the shifting senses of "caractere."

CHARACTERIN THE ENCYCLOPEDIE

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