'What colors! what variety! What richness of objects and ideas!' So the great philosopher and art critic Diderot wrote in 1761 about Francois Boucher's enormous painting Halt at the Spring, exhibited that year in Paris and the Salon of the Royal Academy. This is but one of the nearly 90 paintings included in French Paintings in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston: Volume 1, Artists born before 1790. Incorporated in this volume are the paintings of the sixteenth through the first part of the nineteenth centuries. In addition to Boucher, such notable artists as Poussin, Claude, Le Sueur, Largilliere, Greuze, Watteau, Vigee-Lebrun, Lancret, Baron Gros and Prud'hon are included. The MFA's French painting collection is one of America's greatest, and this catalogue marks the first scholarly publication of many of its highlights. Each work is fully illustrated (many in color), and each entry includes a full bibliography and provenance as well as text discussing the work's significance. An introductory essay also provides background on the history of the collection's formation from the acquisition of the Boucher in 1871 to the present day.