Trench and camp. ([Admiral, Md.) 1917-1919, 1918-12-19

In recent years neither in. Great
britain nor in the United States has
Ine study OF Italian been so favored
nS IN Canada. The University of To-
ronto has been particularly distin-
gu1Sned iq this matter, thanks largely
70 the labors of the late Professor
fraser. That the policy Of encourag-
ing this study has been far-sighted
and not capricious is all the more evil
dent now that the war has drawn un-
usual attention to Italy, and to the
future as well as the past of italian
civilization.
The Intellectual awakening of Italy
IN the fourteenth, fifteenth and six
teenth centuries, not only recovered
the classical literature and the tradi-
lions Of Greece and Rome, which had
been largely lost since the fall of the
Roman Empire, but also gave birth
to clear and general conception of
the rights and privileges of the indi-
vidual man: hts right to develop and
use his reason in all matters; his
privilege to enjoy to the full the good
things of this world by the cultiva-
ton of all his senses. knowledge
and reason, imported from Italy, laid
the foundation on which were built
the religious reformation of Northern
Europe, the scientific progress of the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries,
and the French revolution. On the
other hand. the aesthetic literature
Of Italy, her fine arts and her cult
walton of taste in all matters. repro
duced themselves copiously on for
eign soil, SO that the scholar, the
artist and the gentleman" were
everywhere "Italian-made." There
had been provided common civiliza-
ton for the peoples of the Western
world.
The Renaissance, although posi-
bly, the most important event IN the
history of the world. Is a bygone
event, but the glamor of those enter
prtsing times. when it was realized In
one country that any man may be-
come anything, still fascinates, and
the power Of the literature which re-
cords those events and mirrors those
times. still lives. The greatest of the
italian authors Of the past are more
Influential than they ever we're:
yelli, Ariosto, Benvenuto, Tasso, Cali
leo: these are not dead" authors.
The literature of the Renaissance,
indeed, Is not only never-ending joy
for the reader who knows the Ian
guage in which it is written: it is a
mine Of information for the historian
Of critical period in the worlds his
tory, period when Italy was the
centre of European interest, and be-
coming the battle-ground of the ma
lions. For the student OF English
literature it is the key to the mean
ing Of currents of thought which
deeply affected Spencer, Shakespeare
and al the Elizabethan poets and
dramatists, and later Milton and
Coteridge.
The charm and influence of Italian
writer's on foreign readers and trav-
elers continued to make themselves
felt in the seventeenth and eigh-
teenth centuries, the latter being the
century Of European travel par ex-
cellence," When the revolution Of
the nineteenth century introduced
Italy into the society OF nations, a
debutante who bore herself CALAMITY
be our ally in the Crimean war, the
sympathy Of England was earned
Afresh. The popularity Of Alferi and
Goldoni in the eighteenth century
Was followed by that Of Manzoni, Fos-
colo and Leopard in the nineteenth
and the pre-Raphaelite friends of D.
G. Rosetti brought about revival Of
interest In early Italian art and lit
erature which affected almost every
modern poet In English.
In our own times this newborn
nation has worthily adorned itself
with a hourishing literature which
testifies to an Intellectual maturity
made possible by the antiquity Of the
peoples that compose it. One poet
the greatest Of our time in any Ian
guage-towers above the rest:
Giouse Carducci.' By his side stand
d'Annunzio, the dazzling master of
figures, and Pascon, the modern pas