The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1901-03-10

| America, had indeed n literature long.
before the War of Independence; but IL
was not literature for every reader o.
today. Now, and for long, the States have
| taken their own part in history fiction.
poetry and all other branches OF letters
| Germany came back into world lite~a
/ ture again. just at the ending OF the lac
| century. after unregarded ages OF nee
| lect. Russia and the Scandinavian mort,
awoke about the same time and DALI
| widen their influence, as does Belgium,
| In the sunshine of Maeterlinck France.
| or course, has in all time been in the FORE
most rank while to balance America.
Russia, and the North, Italy and Spain
| have scarcely held the place. which
through so many centuries was their own
Such changes in natural llteratures re-
| semble the political waXings and wan
| ings of national fortunes. The English
| speaking peoples may have their eciipse
perhaps 1t is heralded by modern com
paratiVe deficiency in humor which ~
England and America cease to laugh will
die out of profoundly solemn world
In the foregoing remarks little has beer,
sald ABOUT the literature of the century.
except among neutrality-suspicious. peoples
Not being a Mezzofanti, / am not person
ally acquainted with the literature OF an
languages. and it is a vain thing to speak
OF BOOKS at second hand. IL was not the
nineteenth, but the eighteenth century.
that saw Germany re-enter the field Of
pure literature, as distinguished from that
or scholarship and science. Since the end
of the Middle Ages. with their poets, Ger
man writer's had mainly been devoted 10
theology and classical criticism Latin
was the language Of the learned Many
ascertainable causes. in the middle and
end of the last century and doubtless
many causes which cannot be ascertafned
awoke again the Teutonic genius. The
victories of Frederick the Great gave
Germans patriotism and confidence in
their own tongue.
The phiiosophic and social works which
preluded the French Revolution stirred
the German mind and required popular
expression. Thus Kant wrote in his own
native speech in reaction against the
skeptfcal philosophy of David Hume and
Kant became the father of the long array
OF German metaphysicians, from HegeI
ana flchte to Schopenhauer and Hart
mann. Their philosophy cannot be
briefly stated, especially in French" as
one of them said. but its general effect
has been rather to counteract materialism
by making it pretty plain that human
nature is not so simple and easily to be
explained as the Scottish philosophers
ridge gave an Anglican heart to the new
German philosophy, which also influenced
Hamilton, and still affects the philosophi
cal teaching of oxford. 1T is nonsense,
but is it the right sort OF nonsense2"
asked the late Prof. Sidgwick "a Cam
bridge mann when struggling with the
examination papers of a Hegelian under
graduate.
More important as literature were the
double influences of return on the med
ieyal past and of inspiration by the
the impulse to the genius of Goethe.
Schiller, Burger and others. Goethe be-
gan as the child of Rousseau, but as
child Who had read Kant. and drunk deep
of the romance of the Middle Ages.
Doubtless his is the greatest name of
modern Germany, both as a student of
He was the spiritual parent of Scott, with
his "Goetz Ton Berlichingen," and with
Richter, of Carlyle. Through himself
and his English or Scottish disciples,
he mo
OF change in the literature of the nine
teenth century. In extreme old age. Gu
rious to say. he gave the first impulse to
the study OF early religion as displayed
in the obscure rites and beliefs of the
natives; a theme remote
enough from his effect on the poetry OF
Matthew Arnold. Probably the two parts
OF his Faust" and his Roman Lyrics
are the most popular. and, as literature,
the most most permanent .s parts Of his work,
with 'Werther,' Wilhelm Meister.' anu
Elective Afiinities," in prose Schiller
with the boyish romanticism
Of The Robbers" became n kind Of
were the most sound and
fertile influences in criticism. The
remains Indispensable. The
patriotic Wrists resurrected the national
ipirit of the Teutonic race and Heine,
Hebrew by race and half French in char
lcter. combined the characteristics of
-ucian, Burns. and Voltaire.
Wolf: writing in Latin and | believe
hat his work on Homer has never at
aimed a third edition, and has never
,een translated into English). became the
,arent. for good or evil. of what is called
he Higher Criticism, Lachmann intro
iucing the painfully conjectural tenden-
les of that intellectual exercise. Its ap
,lication to scriptural texts is notorious,
jut not precisely as part of literature.
ike other European countries, the Ger
many of the close of the century is not
for Respondent genius in
'oetry or fiction, though novels abound.
The scientific, historical. and Scho,arly
literature is of vast profusioR. In -or-
ughness and tireless patience, Germany
5 the teacher of the world. while in Gu
ious contrast to her practical genius, is
he love of some of her scholars for base
ess conjecture. The insularity' wiz
Which the English are charged is a mat
er of reproach by French scholars
gainst Germany. Some sets of lucas.
Ong familiar in America. England, and
he Latin nations, are only now DC sln-
ing to reach German classical scholars.
To write an account of the changes IN
french literature during the century is
impossible within moderate space. Toe
and Napoleonic wars were
to the literary art and the
cad of so great a poet as Andre Chenier
ell under the guillotine. Till about 1875
$50 the Restoration was accompanied by
terature in the old classic style of Boil
au and of the Augustan age, only en-
vened by the romantic If somewhat af-
acted style of that great rhetorician,
The year 1850 is the sa-
red year of French romanticism. drawing
s ideals partly from the German roman
c movement, partly from Scott ana
Everything was now to be
edieval. Spanish. and passionate; the
rama was to be emancipated from
ristotle. also read in TRANSACTIONS. A.
IT as classicism went the young advei
lrers had no more Greek than Shakes
care or Scott But they had the coius-
Il and Titanic genius of Hugo. eXqlis-
ely sweet, rapid. strange, and versatile.
lyric; potent, IL inflated, in the drama
nd the novel. They had the charminS
amor and exquisite taste of Theo"s'
autier; the feverish passion ard mast
verse of Alfred de Musset; the deli Be
-eamy. and wandering spirit OF C
Nerval; and the manly, courageous
orous and unwearied vigor. in dirn--
I'd in fiction of Alexandra Dumas.
This was indeed, an eNtraortiL-.f
alton, by far the greatest since -
Drneille Racine. and Moliere- As.T
hers might be named; the reserved for
ID incisive irony of Merimee; tie 80. "a
I'd genial criticism of Sainte- Scuve; ne
exhaustible talent of George sand, and
e mighty Balzac, the maker and founder
the modern work of introsIection-
'obably. Of all these writers, Dumas and
,lzac have exercised most iufueuC" on
ter fiction in England ard America.
aubert continued, with painful -'abora-
m, the traditions of Balzac; from F'au-
TT and round him grew up Daudet and
lola and the Goncourts. Poetry. afte-
martine. dwndled into the prettine-srs.
the ParnaS...- and the eccentricities, too
viously intentional. of Baudelaire, YER
ne, and the Symbolistes. Literary .,--
the end of the century, became
too fond OF argument ,uC
,als and methods, the tattle Of the
ldio. Great men have not thus dissi-
ted their energy: they have done what
" could do: they have not talked about
" they did it. What English literature
5 borrowed from France at this time,
rore in the nature of words than work