e, in the case of true love. (The best troubadours disagree with him
in this respect.)

A scholasticism of love, modelled on ecclesiastical scholasticism and
substituting the beloved woman for the Deity, was gradually evolved.
Love, veneration, humility, hope, etc., were the sacrifices offered at
her shrine. She was full of grace and compassion, and was believed in as
fervently as was God. Some of the poets were animated by a curious
ambition "to prove" their feelings with scholastic erudition, and more
especially by the later, Italian, school, _amore_, _cor gentil_,
_valore_, were conceived as substances, attributes, inherent qualities,
etc. The allegories of _amore_ played a prominent part, and spoiled many
a masterpiece. The German poets steered clear of these absurdities,
which even Dante did not escape.

At the famous courts of love, presided over by princesses, the most
extraordinary questions relating to love were discussed and decided with
a ceremonial closely following the ceremonial of the petty courts of
law. Andreas preserved for us a number of these judgments, some of which
prove the really quite obvious fact that love and marriage are two very
different things, for if spiritual love be considered the supreme value,
matrimony can only be regarded as an inferior condition. And it was a
fact that in the higher ranks of society,--the only ones with which we
are concerned,--a marriage was nothing but a contract made for political
and economical reasons. The baron desired to enlarge his estate, obtain
a dowry, or marry into an influential family; no one dreamed of
consulting the future bride, whom marriage alone could bring into
contact with people outside her own family. To her marriage meant the
permission to shine and be adored by a man who was not her husband. "It
is an undeniable fact," propounded Andreas as _regula amoris_, "that
there is no room for love between husband and wife," and Fauriel
translated a passage as follows: "A husband who proposed to behave to
his wife as a knight would to his lady, would propose to do something
contrary to the canons of honour; such a proceeding could neither
increase his virtue nor the virtue of his lady, and nothing could come
of it but what already properly exists."--Another judgment maintained
"that a lady lost her admirer as soon as the latter became her husband;
and that she was therefore entitled to take a new lover." At the court
of love of the Viscountess Erme