Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 9.djvu/63

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F A U F A U 53 in liia larger and more imaginative sphere of work. Invited by Buffon to Paris, he quitted the law, and was appointed by Louis XVI. assistant naturalist to the museum, to which office was added some years later (1785, 1788) that of royal commissioner for mines. In 1775 he had dis covered in the Velay a rich mine of pozzuolana, which he opened, and which was largely worked by the Government. One of the most important of his works was the Recherches sur les volcans eteints du Vivarais et du Velay, which appeared in 1778. In this work, rich in facts and observa tions, he developed his theory of the origin of volcanoes. In his capacity of commissioner for mines Faujas travelled in almost all the countries of Europe, everywhere devoting his chief attention to the surface of the globe, and the nature and constituents of the rocks composing it. It was he who first called attention to the basaltic formation of the cave of Fingal (Staffa). He sustained heavy losses during the early years of the Revolution, but for these ho was in 1797 indemnified by a grant made by the council of five hundred, Having been nominated in 1793 professor at the Jardin des Flantes, he held this post till he was nearly eighty years of age, retiring in 1818 to his estate in Dauphin6. Faujas took a warm interest in the balloon experiments of the brothers Montgolfier, and published a very complete Description des experiences de la machine aerostatique de J/J/. Montgolfier, &c. (1783, 1784). He contributed many scientific memoirs to the Annales and the Memoir es of the museum of natural history. Among his separate works, in addition to those already named are Ilistoire naturelle de la province du Dauphine (1781, 1782) ; Mineralogie des Volcans (1784) ; Voyage en Angleterre, en Ecosse, et aux lies Hebrides (1797) ; and Essai de geologie (1803-1809). Faujas died at his estate of Saint-Fond in Dauphine", July 18, 1819. FAUN. In Latin mythology, this name denoted a class of rural deities, who fostered the productive powers of the earth and of animals, and had their dwelling in woods and groves, where they sported with the nymphs. In the later traditions of the people, Faunus was said to have succeeded Picus and Saturnus as king of the Laurentes ; but these names may, like many others in the mythology of Italy, be referred to processes or phenomena in the natural world, Saturnus or Seviternus being the god of the seed time and the harvest, and Picus the deity who cleaves the trees of the forest with the stroke of the lightning or the fury of the storm. There is much likeness between the charac teristics of Fauuus and those of the Greek Pan, and the two names may have a common origin, although the Latin Faunus has been regarded as an euphemistic name (from the root of the verb/awo) applied to deities whose anger was dreaded. As revealing the secrets of the future, whether by dreams or by strange sounds, the male Faunus and the female Fauna or Faula were known as fatuus and futua, from the verb /art, to speak, which reappears in the Latin Fatum. In honour of these rural gods the festival of the Faunalia was celebrated yearly in December. FAURIEL, CHARLES CLAUDE (1772-1844), a distin guished French historian, philologist, and critic, was born at St Etienne, 21st October 1772. His parents belonged to the artisan class, but their circumstances were such as to enable them to afford him a good education at Tournon and Lyons. Though from his earliest years preferring a life of study and retirement, Fauriel could not at first altogether escape the claims of the restless times in which he lived, and in 1793 he became sub-lieutenant in the fourth battalion of light infantry then in garrison at Perpignan. He would appear to have resigned this appointment within a year, but it is certain in any case that he was for some time secretary to General Dugommier, and that he also served under Latour d Auvergne. In 1794, however, he had returned to St Etienne, where, but only for a short period, he filled a municipal office ; and from 1795 to 1799 he devoted himself to strenuous study, more especially of the literature and history, both ancient and modern, of Greece and Italy. Having paid a visit to Paris in 1799, he was introduced to Fouche, minister of police, who immediately conceived for him a strong liking, and induced him to be come his private secretary. The duties of this office Fauriel discharged both to the satisfaction of Fouchd and with such courtesy and kindness as to secure many lasting friendships ; but he must have found it scarcely congenial ; and as he continued to unite with the labour it entailed upon him the same continuous application to study aa formerly, he found it necessary in 1801 to recruit his health by foreign travel. In resigning his office in the following year, he was therefore actuated doubtless as much by these considerations as by the ostensible excuse that he had scruples in serving longer under Napoleon, when the latter, in violation of strict republican principles, became consul for life. Some articles which Fauriel in 1800 published in the Decade on a work of Madame de Stael were the means of ripening his slight acquaintance with that distinguished authoress into intimate friendship a friendship which in its intellectual relations had considerable influence on her future career. Through her he was shortly afterwards in troduced into the literary society of Auteuil. Neither in the literary history of his time nor in that particular circle can Fauriel be called the most prominent figure, but his position would not have been so unique in relation to either had it been more obtrusive. By nature strongly sympa thetic, gifted also with a finely balanced judgment which was informed and cultivated to a high degree of perfection by an almost unexampled erudition, and so intensely in terested in all that related to literature and history as to be almost forgetful of self and devoid of the love of fame, he soon became the confidant and almost the literary mentor of the most distinguished of his contemporaries, whom he benefited, not only by his contagious enthusiasm and suggestive criticism, but by placing at their dis posal the results of his own laborious researches. Those who enjoyed his closest intimacy were the physiologist Cabanis and the Italian poet Manzoni, and perhaps after these, the historians Guizot and Thierry, the latter of whom in his preface to his Etudes his oriques speaks of him as the friend and sure and faithful counsellor, whose judgment was his rule in doubt, and whose sympathy with his labours his greatest incentive to progress. During his connexion with Auteuil the attention of Fauriel was naturally turned to philosophy, and from the letter which Cabanis addressed to him on final causes it would appear that he must be named the precursor of that school of philosophy in France which recognizes Cousin as its head that he was the first to direct attention to the importance of study ing philosophy in its historical relations, and to advocate what is known as eclecticism. His great merit indeed is in emphasizing the necessity of studying, not only the philo sophy, but the general literature and civilization of modern times in their primitive sources ; although it must be ad mitted that his preference for early and uncultured forme of literature has in it something of exaggeration. For some years he was engaged on a history of Stoicism, but perhaps more on account of his attention having been acci dentally directed to the subject by others than from any special interest in philosophy, and at any rate the work was never completed, all the papers connected with it having accidentally perished in 1814. He also occupied himself at the same time with the study of Arabic, Sanskrit, and the old French dialects, but all with a special reference to his historical researches. The chief task he had set before