LECTURES UPON THE HISTORY OF LITERATURE, Ancient and Modern, from the German of Frederick Von Schlegel. New York: J. H. & G. Langley. 1842; pp. 392.

VIEW OF THE STATE OF EUROPE DURING THE MIDDLE AGES. By Henry Hallam. New-York: Harper & Brothers. LECTURES ON MODERN HISTORY. By Thomas Arnold, D. D., late Regius Professor of History in the University of Oxford. New-York: J. Winchester. 1843.

UNQUESTIONABLY, the highest happiness of man results from the due cultivation and exercise of his intellectual and moral powers. The enjoyment which is sought in the indulgence of the senses, in mere physical cares and occupations, can never meet the higher wants of his nature, or yield to him any thing like adequate and permanent satisfaction. At his creation, he sprang up a living soul beneath the breath of the Godhead, and his material and sensitive nature was, from the very first moment of his being, made subordinate to the intellectual

and the spiritual. By the possession of a mind, glorious in its gifts, its vast capabilities of improvement, its aspirations, its impulses and affections, he is infinitely elevated above the range of mere physical existence. He has a nobler sphere of action and enjoyment—a higher and worthier path to tread. And hence, even in his most thorough and determined devotion to the inferior pursuits of society, he seldom ceases to feel a yearning after that higher good which they do not embody and cannot bestow.

The history of the human mind, in its progress and atchievements is, therefore, one of the most interesting as well as one of the most fruitful of studies. The scholar loves to dwell upon it-and even to the general reader it possesses charms which do not always invest the annals of empires or the progress of the race in mere power or social grandeur. To those who at all appreciate the blessings of knowledge, of civilization and refinement, it is rich in sources of interest, in lessons of experience, and in motives of encouragement.

Hence the value of such works as those of Schlegel, in which, by a rare power of analysis, only equalled by his admirable skill in presenting the results of extensive and laborious investigation in the briefest and most impressive form, this able critic furnishes us, in a single treatise, with a guide through the complicated paths of literary history. The editor of the edition before us has justly remarked, that the work is admirably designed and executed for inducing a love of literary pursuits; and that there is no work of its class possessing higher excellence or better adapted to fulfil its destiny. The lectures of Dr. Arnold are of a different scope and tendency, but equally admirable in furnishing to the student of literature the principles of successful research, without the aid of which, he, too often, will seem to be involved in a maze without a plan."

There is much in the history of the Middle Ages, viewed with especial reference to their literary aspect, to interest the student and to repay the labor of research. The light which has been recently shed upon this much neglected field, by the labors of such critics as Schlegel and Hallam, has discovered many a rich vein, where once all was supposed to be emptiness and sterility. In

this and a succeeding article, with occasional references to the books whose titles are given above, we propose to enter somewhat in detail into the question of the true literary aspect of the Medieval period.

It is generally supposed that the most melancholy feature of the middle ages is the intellectual darkness which attended them, and which has given them a name equally appropriate and distinguishing in the annals of the world. During the long dark period which elapsed from the fall of the Western empire to the close of the fifteenth century, the human mind is supposed to have been completely sunk in ignorance, and except in the case of a very few gifted individuals, to have lost all ambition of a proper development of its capacities. In the common view of the subject, one age rolls on after another-each wearing the same aspect of darkness and calamity-and although the shadows grow somewhat fainter as we advance, it is not until we arrive near the times of the reformation that the morning breathes upon us, and the twilight reddens into the lustre of day. Then, as if by miracle, we behold the light bursting suddenly over every quarter of the horizon. We behold mankind waking as from a profound sleep, to a life of activity and bold adventure; ignorance falls prostrate before advancing knowledge; a thousand forms of intellectual and moral strength and beauty spring up around us, and the common mind of humanity, from which scarce one ray or voice of intelligence had proceeded for ages, suddenly becomes a living fountain, from which issue streams of light and blessed oracles of truth.*

The most careless and cursory reader of history has, it is presumed, formed some definite idea of what the dark ages were, in point of intellectual development. We may therefore spare ourselves the labor of attempting to describe, at length, what is sufficiently designated by the general statement, that they were times of comparative ignorance, and, so far as the mass of society was concerned, of great mental imbecility.

But to those who remember that the age of Augustus, the palmy days of Roman literature, were but four centuries distant from the times of which we speak, it may,

* See Good's "Book of Nature."

at first sight, seem surprising that so complete a wreck of learning could have been effected in so short a time. How was it possible, we may ask, that the most splendid productions of Roman genius-the richest fruits of the Roman culture-should so soon have passed away and been forgotten? And our surprize is not at all lessened when we advance into the age of the Antonines. Every thing, in outward appearance, is here fair and promising, as regards the prospects of literature. The love of letters, or at least the profession of it, was fashionable. It was diffused over the whole extent of the empire-the very North-Britons had acquired a taste for Rhetoric-and Homer and Virgil were transcribed and studied on the banks of the Danube ?* How was it possible, then, we may ask again, that in a little more than two hundred years, so complete a blight should have come upon the literary promise of the empire? Within that interval, indeed, the Goths trampled upon its freedom and grandeur, but could they so soon and so completely extinguish the mind of the Romans? When Greece was conquered, the spirit of her elegant literature was transferred to her conquerors and even in her weakness she atchieved the noblest of triumphs over her haughty foes! Why, then, did not the same result take place in the one case as in the other?

We are apt to ascribe the decline of literature almost solely to the barbarian destroyers of the Roman empire. We are accustomed to think that the same iron heel that spurned the imperial purple, and trode upon the necks of the Cæsars, was wholly instrumental in trampling the torch of knowledge in the dust, and in annihilating the spirit while it defaced the monuments of the Arts. But this is by no means a legitimate conclusion. The spirit of decay was present in the Roman literature, long before Alaric stormed the gates of the Eternal City, or Attila trampled the enfeebled legions as the summer's dust beneath his feet. It is true that the Barbarians completed the work which other causes began. They poured, "like a long pent up and gathering tide, in a thousand destructive torrents throughout the land, sweeping away and overwhelming in a mass, life, property and institutions."

• See Gibbon's Decline and Fall.

"It is true, also, that had it not been for the Christian Church, which, by the power of God, held itself aloft and alive above the general inundation, the very memory and precious traditions of the past would have perished amidst the universal ruin."* But still it may very fairly be questioned, whether, in view of the gradual decay which for a long time had spread over all liberal studies, they would not have been almost equally extinguished if the imperial throne had been left to moulder by its intrinsic weakness. A semblance of literary activity, indeed, lingered in the empire long after the age of Augustus. But the spirit, the life, the genius of the Augustan age was gone. Even under the sway of the elegant and philosophic Marcus Aurelius-the noblest of the Antonines, the executions of genius in literature had lost their freshness, and in art their masterly conception. and high finish-taste had become depreciated, the purity of the Latin and Greek tongues had become seriously impaired. And this age, as is well known, marks the commencement of the rapid downfall of literature. The same slow and secret poison, infused by a long inglorious peace and characterized by all that luxury and debauchery which caused Rome to reel in very drunkenness ere she fell the same secret poison which preyed upon the vitals of the empire, and destroyed her once indomitable military spirit-gradually reduced all minds to the same puny stature, extinguished the fire of genius, and introduced into every department of literature a sickly corruption which was but too sure an indication of its coming downfall. Instead of Poets, Orators, Philosophers, a crowd of servile imitators and compilers darkened the face of learning, and the decline of literary power was soon followed by the corruption of literary taste. Such was the estimate which Longinus, in his retreat in Palmyra, placed upon his own age-that memorable fourth century, when as yet the swell of the last and most terrific barbarian deluge, was heard afar. "In the same manner," says he, as some children always remain pigmies whose infant limbs have been too closely confined; thus our tender minds, fettered by the prejudices and habits of a just servitude, are unable to expand them

James' "Chivalry and the Crusades."-Chapter I.