I. Jean Marie Napoleon Desire

Jean Marie Napoleon Desire, a French author, born in Chatillon-sur-Seine, March 20, 1806. At the age of 20 he became a regular contributor to the Journal des Débats, but after the revolution of 1830 he broke off his connection with it and wrote literary articles for the National. He opposed the new school of literature, and in his first publication, Les poëtes latins de la decadence (1834), drew critical parallels between the minor Latin poets of the imperial period and the new French poets. His Manifeste contre la litterature facile was answered by Jules Janin, and the controversy became one of the chief literary events in Louis Philippe's reign. In 1835 Nisard was appointed by M. Guizot maître de conferences on French literature in the normal school; in 1836 chief secretary to the minister of public instruction and master of requests in the council of state; and finally in 1837 chief of the department of science and literature. In 1842 he was elected to the chamber of deputies, and attached himself to the conservative party. Id 1843 he became professor of Latin eloquence in the college de France. In 1850 he was elected to the French academy.

In 1852 he was appointed general inspector of superior instruction, and succeeded Villemain in the chair of French eloquence at the Sorbonne. Here M. Nisard was at first coldly received, and in 1855 he was hissed from his chair by the students; but with the assistance of the police he continued his lectures. In 1857 he became director of the high normal school, his appointment being made the occasion of a reorganization of the school. He retired from this post in 1867, when he was made a senator, and he was also a member of the imperial council of public instruction. Besides the works above alluded to, he has published Histoire et description de la ville de Nimes (8vo, 1835); Melanges (2 vols. 8vo, 1838); Precis de l'histoire de la littérature frangaise depuis ses premiers monuments jusqu'à nos jours (18mo, 1840), a valuable sketch, which was first printed in the Dictionnaire de la conversation; and Histoire de la litterature frangaise (4 vols. 8vo, 1844-'61; new ed., 4 vols. 12mo, 1863), a remodelling of his lectures at the normal school.

His most important essays published in the reviews have been reprinted under the titles of Etudes sur les grands hommes de la renaissance (1856), and Etudes de critique litter aire (1858), containing his essays Les deux morales, and Nouvelles etudes d'histoire et de litterature (1864). He has also superintended the publication of the Collection des classiques latins, with a French translation (27 vols. 8vo, 1839 et seq.).

II. Marie Edonard Charles

Marie Edonard Charles, a French author, brother of the preceding, born in Chatil-lon-sur-Seine, Jan. 10,1808. He left commercial for literary life, was from 1831 to 1848 a journalist attached to the service of Louis Philippe, and subsequently became connected with the ministry of the interior. Among his principal works are: Histoire des livres populates depuis le XVe siècle jusqu'en 1852 (2 vols., 1854; 2d ed., 1864); Les gladiateurs de la republique des lettres aux XVe, XVLe et XVIIe siecles (2 vols., 1860); and Histoire de la langue populaire de Paris et de sa oanlieue (1873). In 1874 he proposed to publish, with notes, about 200 letters recently discovered by him in the library of Parma, including 152 from the count de Caylus and 48 from the abbé Barthelemy.