In 1886, following the development of a new type of literature three decades in the making by Stephane Mallarme and Charles Baudelaire among other french writers, Jean Moreas (1856-1910) published the essay titled Le Symbolisme, or, The Manifesto of Symbolism, in the French daily newspaper, Le Figaro, to promote the term “Symbolism”. A well-known symbolist poet himself, Moreas felt compelled to defend against “an evolution which hasty judges have termed, unbelievably and paradoxically, decadent,” claiming that Symbolism is the “the only term capable of truly designating the present thrust of the creative spirit in art”. Aside from the Decadent Movement, Moreas details the ways in which Symbolism differs from Romanticism yet traces its roots to Romantic writers such as Alfred de Vigny. Moreas was responsible for popularizing the label of Symbolism and sparked much ongoing discourse and disagreement about how the term should be defined and discussed.