The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1874-06-27
OUR PARIS LITERARY LETTER.

half Of the sixteenth century, that the Rcnais-
sance period is generally comprised as expressing
an epoch for new art, the renovation Of law, the
return 70 the studies II antiquity, the invention
Of printing, the discovery Of America, the burst
ing forth Of science, and the claim for religious
liberty. Il was q time, viewed from the present,
full Of spontaneity and immensely appearing as
a creation at once sudden and original, where
society emerged for the first time into light, from
the darkness which covered 1t since the fall Of the
Roman Empire. According 10 NJ. RocQuain,
this state Of things is not quite exact as respects
France, as the twelfth century shows her history
TO have been full Of brilliant intellectual revivals,
but which were rendered aboFtiye by the then
governing classes, that delayed the grand event
by three centuries. If the sixteenth century was
the zenith of the Renaissance period, the twelfth
has no small claims 10 be ranked rs it's aurora.
Gregory VII. wrote, that the state Of society in
France during the eleventh century was such,
that perjury, s~acrilege, incest, murder, and trea-
son, were ~practised with impunity, as an heredit-
ary usage. By the terms of the Truce of
God, brigandage was SO regularized, as 10 be
interdicted pending certain days Of the week.
However, France had suffered 4 few years pre-
yiously from q succession Of famines, SO terrlbl
that in some market places human flesh was
offered for sale. y great many believed the end
of the world had arrived. The people, or rather
vassals, were not only trodden down by the arts
tocracy, but had then no protector in the church,
for the bishops We're the aristocracy and reflected
the barbarism of the times. Gregory VII. up
braided them; he said, instead OF the clergy aud
the churches being devoted to praising God aud
chanting psalms, they were occupied with arms
and packs of hounds, and that not a bishop in
France merited to be left in his see. The very
pressure of misfortune and the intensity Of suffer
ing, developed religious ideas among the people,
hence, pllgrimages to every shrine, commencing
with the tomb of St. Martin at Tours, and ending
with that of the Holy Sepulchre. The Crusades
were adopted by the vassals in the belief, that
dwelling In a country where God had lived, their
material misery would be at an end hence, they
brought with them their wives, their little ones,
and their cattle. The lords seduced by the pros
pect of adventures and the pleasures of the I'M
known, brought their hawks and their hounds.
Both classes before setting out commenced. by
massacreing the Jews, and could not do less on ar
irving, towards the SarOcens. The Crusades re-
generated France; they emancipated her force,
and kindled a spirit Of liberty; they fused the
diverse races composing the country, determined
its frontiers, effected national unity. Thus, when
the twelfth century opened, the inhabitants of the
towns were in rebellion against the barons, OBJ
tanning in exchange for acknowledging the right
Of lordIy sovereignty, the power of selEgovern-
ment and association for self-defcnce, all secured
by charters. At the same time the church had
been reformed in manners by the vigor Of Gre
CORY VII. and the a~usterity of st. Bernard, yet
strange, the purer it became, the more it lost it's
hold on lay Institutions. The rural serts being
too scattered for self-defence, were in q pitiable
condition; they were not so miserable as the
slaves of antiquity however; yet they could not
marry without their masters consent, and if the
wife belonged to a different owner, the children
were divided, like lands between the two masters.
Pope Adrian w., the only Englshman who ever
wore the tiara, and who had been himself n serf,
declared in 1855, that serfs married even without
their masters consent were duly welded. Louis
VII. asserted in 1852, that despite human inc
qualities God had created all men equal; and in
1854 q Norman poet sang, that before nature,
and in urpSpnCe of GutfprInp and the exercise of
courage, the serf and his lord were equal. The
twelfth century witnessed the birth Of the light
and lofty Gothic, over the heavy and low Roman
architecture; the former was of secular inspira-
ton. In this same age public education appeared,
for in the tenth century the greater part of the
priests were ignorant of the Latin of their pray
ers, and few bishops knew how to read. The
converts were the refuge for the wreck Of the
learned, whose attention was devoted to pious
legends, the Fathers, the Lives OF the Saints, and
49, D;Iio .il~~U 'OiAIueo were ivdsod IN P.esseo
and in addition, chained to the wall. Classics ;
those prOfane manuscripts were only patronized
by the monks for their parchment, after erasing
the writing, and thus served for a legend or a title
deed. However, improvised masters travelled
through the provinces, followed by a troop OF
scholars OF every age, sex, and condition, glad to
receive a lesson in the market square or in the
open field. 1t was Abailard who in lib led the
instruction of intelligence against the tyranny OF
darkness. His lectures attracted five thousand
auditors, and from every part of Europe. The
church required belief not from conviction, but
from obedience; Abailard aimed TO render that
conviction Ineligible; thus he addressed the rea-
son; drew upon nature for his imagery, and upon
profane literature for his reasons; he simplifed,
popularized, and humanizcd the symbols of re-
hgioD, asserting that love, was the law of Christ,
not fear. AS a layman Abailard rebelled against
the absoluti6m of theology. The memorable He.
lOIse demanded also liberty by her life and ad-
dresses she protested against asceticism, against
the cloister doctrines Of st. Bernard, asserting
that there was as much security for the Christian
soul in a married state, as in that of monastiC
celibacy, and that Christ never intended the
beauties of life to be unknown to those outside
the convent walls. st. Hildegarde was a woman
of a different stamp; she wrote 8 Danish from the
church all heretics; but do not kill them, for az
ourselves, they are made in the image of God. -
4 Montpelier and Nismes, the Jews conducted
! political schools. But all this sudden renovation
! of reason, Of art, and of poetry, OF healthy senti-
! ments and humanity, disappeared before the grow.
! ing power of royalty, whose "good pleasure -
! superseded the charters of the towns. The
church quickly followed in the a~utocracy Of
Kings; denying to every mind the right to hold
other doctrines than her own; that heresy was a
} revolt against God, to be punished by eternal
flames in a future state, and meriting the stake,
in anticipation, in This. Hence the crusade
against the Albigcnscs, and with the death Of
civil and religious liberty, thick darkness again
, for three hundred years.
, The predominant literary taste Of our day is un-
, quesIonably for exploring state records and
, family archives, which enable us to penetrate
> into the secret life Of those persOnages who have
~ left profound traces in history. We desire to
F.; pierce the mysteries which envelope their init
, mate existence, its material side. Thus NJ. Bas-
, chet satisfies a legitimate curiosity in cataloguinc
/, all the family papers lett by the celebrated Due dc
/, Saint-Simon, and that the French Foreign Office
declines at present 10 render public. The
! memoirs Of Saint-Simon as published, are very
? incomplete, and no documents are more valuable
B.. as recording the history of European events under
Louis XIV, the Regency, and Louis XIV. Ii
o was a courtier with a penetrating, cruel eye, that
I nothing escaped. He was an admirable writer
o though writing without art, or method, or cor