BELLES LETTRES. Neither the voluminous dictionaries of the French language, nor those treatises which profess to point out the method of studying and teaching the belles lettres, have thought proper to give a precise definition, or an intelligible explanation, of the meaning they attach to the words, nor any summary of those sciences which are comprehended under this general denomination. The terms, indeed, appear to be so vague, that any one may include under them whatever he thinks proper. Sometimes we are told that, by the belles lettres, is meant a knowledge of the arts of oratory and poetry; sometimes that the true belles lettres include natural philosophy, geometry, and other essential parts of learning; sometimes that they comprehend the art of war, in its various branches, together with all that we know, and whatever we please; and one author, in treating of the belles lettres, introduces a discourse on the seven sacraments of the Roman Catholic church. Others, again, comprehend under the term all those instructive and pleasing sciences which chiefly occupy the memory and the understanding, and do not form part either of the superior sciences, of the fine arts, or of the mechanical professions; considering history, chronology, geography, genealogy, blazonry, philology, and such like subjects, as constituting the belles lettres. But it were endless to attempt to enumerate all the parts of literature and science which different learned men have comprehended under this title; nor would it be of any use to pretend to fix the true import of a term which is rapidly passing into desuetude.