Taine was both a literary critic and an historian. He analysed literature as a reflection of its times and enviroment. His Histoire de la litérature anglaise/History of English Literature (1863) was an attempt to apply this principle to a foreign country. the French have always been fascinated with trying to understand the English and their philosophy. This is because the french are steeped in Philosophy at school, and can't understand a nation which neglects that study and proceeds on purely pragmatic grounds.