ant progress in justice, in society, and in the state. To her
Guizot owed his idea of _Amour dans le Mariage_. _The Historical
Essays on England_, by Remusat, an ardent admirer of hers, was largely
influenced by her _Considerations_, while Tocqueville's _Ancien
Regime_ contains many of her ideas.

Literature owes even more to her works, which encouraged the study of
foreign literatures; almost all translations were due to her works.
Michelet, Quinet, Nodier, Victor Hugo, so much influenced by German
literature, owe their knowledge of it mainly to her. Too much credit
may be given her when it is stated that all Mignons, Marguerites,
Mephistopheles, etc., proceeded indirectly from her work, as well as
nearly all descriptions of travels. Lamartine undoubtedly used her _De
l'Allemagne_ and her _Des Passions_ freely. The heroine of _Jocelyn_
is called but a daughter of _Delphine_, and the same author's terrible
invective against Napoleon was inspired by her.

Mme. de Stael had an indestructible faith in human reason, liberty,
and justice; she believed in human perfection and in the hope of
progress. "From Rousseau, she received that passionate tenderness,
that confidence in the inherent goodness of man. Believing in an
intimate communion of man with God, her religion was spirit and
sentiment which had no need of pomp or symbols, of an intermediary
between God and man." She was not so much a great writer as she was a
great thinker, or rather a discoverer of new thoughts. By instituting
a new criticism and by opening new literatures to the French, she
succeeded in emancipating art from fixed rules and in facilitating the
sudden growth of romanticism in France.

In her life, her great desire was to spread happiness and to obtain
it, to love and to be loved in return. In politics it was always the
sentiment of justice which appealed to her, in literature it was the
ideal. Sincerity was manifested in everything she said and did. Pity
for the misery of her fellow beings, the sentiment of the dignity of
man and his right to independence, of his future grandeur founded
on his moral elevation, the cult of justice, and the love of
liberty--such were the prevailing thoughts of her life and works.

Mme. de Stael's chief influence will always remain in the domain of
literature; she was the first French writer to introduce and exercise
a European or cosmopolitan influence by uniting the literatures of the
north and the south and clear