Date: 1818
But the impor tunate vanity of Louis XIV.  found, in the feebleness of Racine's character, and in the elegance of his genius, a fit engine to con firm that esprit de systeme, which enters into every relation under his government, to dazzle and enslave the dramatic taste of the day ; to conform to the cold severity of the Greek rules; and avoiding all referen ces to national history, to liberty, or go vernment, to weave with the religious and historical fables of antiquity, the characters  154 BOOK VII.