mously at Cahors in 1594, at Brussels in 1595, under the name of Benoit Vaillant, and also at Bourdeaux, under the name of the author. It was entitled "Les Trois Verités," and was intended to prove:—1st, That there is a God whom we ought to worship; 2nd, That of all religions the christian is the only true one; 3rd, That of all christian communions the Roman catholic is the only safe one. This treatise attracted at once the condemnation of Duplessis Mornay, and the favour of Ebrard of Saint Sulpice, bishop of Cahors, who appointed the author vicar-general of his diocese, and canon theological of his church. In 1600 Charron published at Bourdeaux, "Discours Chretiens," a work as irreproachably orthodox as the preceding. But the work by which he is now best known, "De La Sagesse," did not appear till the following year, at the same place. When he was in Paris in 1603, superintending a second edition of this work, Charron died suddenly in the street of an attack of apoplexy. The issuing of this work was opposed by the rector of the university of Paris, by the Sorbonne, and by the parliament. At length it appeared with many changes and mutilations in 1604. A third edition, from the MS. of the author, was published at Paris in 1607; the subsequent editions have been too numerous to be specified. His collected works were published in quarto at Paris, in 1635, with a life of the author by Michel de la Rochemaillet. There have been two translations into English of the treatise "De La Sagesse;" the latest by George Stanhope, D.D.
In his treatise, "De La Sagesse," Charron manifests much of the sceptical humour of his friend Montaigne. He almost equals him in the eloquence with which he delineates the miseries of human life (Liv. i. c. 6). His comparison of the state and faculties of man with those of the inferior animals is full of severe satire (Liv. i. c. 8). And notwithstanding his arguments in favour of religion, and especially of the christian religion, as professed by Roman catholics, he speaks of the various forms of worship among men as introduced and upheld not by reason and conviction, but by custom and policy. According to him true religion is an affair of the heart, and not the ceremonial or superstitious worship of God. External forms are not altogether to be neglected; but they should be in accordance with reason, and should be observed merely as the means of awakening and cherishing that true worship which is internal. In a similar spirit he dwells with complacency upon the differences in the opinions, customs, laws, and morals of men. He represents all knowledge as coming from the senses, and all our faculties as the results of organization and temperament (Liv. i. c. 12). And as to the immortality of the soul he speaks of it, as "a thing the most generally, religiously, and usefully believed, and the most feebly proved or established by reason" (Liv. i. c. 15). Notwithstanding these dangerous statements, the treatise, "On Wisdom," contains views which show the author to have been in many respects before the age in which he lived. In the first book he notices what is peculiar to our several senses; enumerates the different faculties of understanding, memory, and imagination; and hints at classifying human knowledge with reference to them, as was subsequently done by Bacon. He defines passion (Liv. i. c. 20) as a violent movement of the soul in its sensitive part, prompting it to seek what is apprehended as good, and to shun what is apprehended as evil. He analyses the different forms which passion assumes, as love and hatred, hope and fear, &c., and urges the great importance of knowing ourselves psychologically. In the second book he lays down the general rules of practical wisdom; and these rules, although savouring somewhat of selfishness and scepticism, contain much sound sense and knowledge of the world. The third book treats of the four cardinal virtues, and the rules to be observed in the practice of them by the different ranks and conditions of men. His style is lively; his remarks striking, and his spirit daring. If not always original, he seldom fails to embellish what he has borrowed; and although inferior to Montaigne in the vigour and richness of his thoughts, he often reminds us of his sarcasm and naïveté. The treatise "On Wisdom," notwithstanding the censures to which it was exposed, had astonishing success; and there can be little doubt that it had a beneficial effect in liberalizing the public mind, and preparing the way for more free and independent thinking than was then common. The errors which it contained were not unmixed with great and important truths, which attracted attention, and produced fruit; and the scepticism which pervades it seems in some degree to have been assumed, as it is not consistently maintained. Like many others, by his love of saying something startling, he seems sometimes to have been seduced into saying more than he really meant or thought. Dr. Stanhope, his translator, says, "he was a good man, and a good christian;" and Buhle, the historian of philosophy, did not think he was liable to the charges of infidelity which were levelled against him. Sir William Hamilton (Lectures, vol. i., p. 89) calls him "the pious Charron."—W. F.
CHARTIER, Alain, born at Bayeux between 1380 and 1390. The dates of his birth and death are uncertain. Du Chesne and Pasquier state his death to have occurred in 1458; by others it is referred to 1449. He was early distinguished at the university of Paris, and his whole afterlife was a succession of triumphs. He was successively secretary to Kings Charles VI. and VII.; and there is some reason to think he had been in the same office to King Charles V. The traditions of his family make him archdeacon and prebendary of the cathedral of Notre Dame, and send him as ambassador to Scotland. He had the reputation of being one of the cleverest and also one of the ugliest men of his day. Margaret of Scotland, wife of the dauphin, who afterwards became Louis XI., saw him asleep and kissed him. "How kiss so ugly a man?" asked the lord in attendance, for the favour was a public compliment. "I do not kiss the man," said she, "but the lips from which have proceeded so many brilliant sentences."
Alain wrote earnestly on subjects of church discipline, and vindicated the marriage of the clergy as the only cure for some of the abuses. He was best known as a poet. His poems were eminently national and patriotic. At a time when almost all France was in the possession of the English he published the "Quadriloque Invectif," a discussion in which France, the noblesse, the people, and the clergy are the interlocutors; and also, soon after the battle of Agincourt, the "Livre des Quatier Dames," in which each of four ladies laments her lover lost by death or captivity on that fatal day. Another of his publications was the "Bréviaire des Nobles." Of this book it is said that the pages and young gentlemen at court were obliged to get passages by heart, and to read it as regularly and as religiously as priests their breviary and devotional offices. Among other works written by Chartier, or attributed to him, there is one which professes to instruct us on the nature of the fire of hell, another is on the wings of the cherubim.
Alain Chartier contributed his part to the moral and political regeneration of his country. His songs aided in the creation or the diffusion of a sound public opinion. They echo or predict the great facts of the period. A strong reason with us that his death occurred in 1449 is, that the English abandoned their conquests in Normandy in 1450, and there is no song of exultation from Chartier on the event.—J. A., D.
CHARTIER, Guillaume, born at Bayeux about 1400; died at Paris in 1472; brother of Alain and Jean Chartier. Guillaume Chartier was councillor to the parliament of Paris, and afterwards bishop of Paris in 1447. In 1455 he was appointed one of the commissioners to examine the process against Joan of Arc, with the view of repairing the injustice to her memory. The bishop of Paris was for awhile a favourite of Louis XI.; but taking part with the leaguers, he so provoked the king, that his death occurring seven years after in no way softened his displeasure. An epitaph which recorded the virtues of the bishop the king ordered to be removed.—J. A., D.
CHARTIER, Jean, born at Bayeux; brother of Alain and Guillaume Chartier. The date of his birth is not recorded. He died about 1462. A Benedictine, Jean Chartier was chantre of the abbaye of St. Denis. From the time of Suger one of the monks of St. Denis was appointed to draw up the annals of the kingdom, and Jean Chartier filled this office for the reign of Charles VII. On the accession of Louis XI. another annalist or chronicler was appointed. Godefrin has published what he calls "L'Histoire de Charles VII., par Jean Chartier," but with such alterations and corrections as essentially to vary the character of the book.—J. A., D.
CHARTIER, René, a French physician, born in 1572; died in 1654. Chartier was a versatile scholar, and prior to his receiving his doctor's degree in 1608 had taught rhetoric and mathematics. He was afterwards attached to the French court, and in 1617 succeeded Etienne de la Font in the chair of surgery in the royal college. In 1624 he went to Spain, afterwards into Italy, and eventually followed Henrietta Maria into England. He wrote several medical works.—R. M., A.
