marked, so that by this plan of studying he fitted himself to compose treatises on every kind of subject, as he showed on several occasions."
It was probably the considerable quantity of material that he collected in this way that suggested to him the thought of giving the public those extracts the utility of which he had recognized in his experiences. He associated with himself in the execution of this work, which was colossal for that time, a number of men of science and letters: De Bourzeis, a distinguished theologian; De Gemberville, chaplain, the famous author of La Pucelle; and the Abbé Gaulois, who, according to Fontenelle, seemed "born for that work"; but De Sallo revised all the articles—not very numerous—which his colaborers furnished, and himself wrote the largest number.
The authorization having been obtained, the support of Colbert assured, and the plan and periods of publication fixed, the Journal des Sçavants appeared on Monday, January 3, 1665, in a sheet and a half quarto, under the pen signature of Hedouville;[1] and it continued to appear every Monday till the 30th of March of the same year, when the authorization was withdrawn. Although its criticisms were always moderate and just, it had made many enemies among men of letters, and among the Jesuits, then all-powerful, "who were not pleased to see a literary and philosophical tribunal that was not set up by them, and who, moreover, detested De Sallo and his friends as Parlementarians and Galileans suspected of Jansenism; these added their complaints to the cries of wounded self-love. They secured the aid of the papal nuncio, and he obtained a prohibition against De Sallo's continuing the publication." The pretext alleged for this act was a passage in the Journal in which De Sallo criticised a decree of the Inquisitors, "whose delicate ears required so great circumspection."
Colbert, however, still retained a friendship for his client, recompensed him for the suppression of his journal with an office in the treasury, and, realizing the full value of De Sallo's work, commissioned the Abbé Gaulois to continue it. The Journal reappeared on the 4th of January, 1666, and was henceforth illustrated;[2] but Abbé Gaulois, who held the direction of the
- ↑ The name of one of his servants.
- ↑ As a specimen of the illustrations, we mention a superb engraving representing a louse as seen under the microscope; it measures not less than forty or fifty centimetres (year 1666, page 292 of the reprint of 1729). This reprint is a nearly textual reproduction of the original edition, which is now very rare. It is well to remark here that the Journal des Sçavants, like all similar journals of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries that were successful, was reprinted as the numbers were exhausted; thus in the set that I have consulted at the library of the Arsenal, the year 1665 is of 1733, and the year 1666 of 1729, while the year 1676 was reprinted in 1717. Hence it is almost impossible to find two col-
