ite, and wished to have his life and
literature judged by his aspirations, rather than by his achievements.
Hence, too, the vague longings, the gentle melancholy or violent revolt,
the spiritual uplift. The new sense of the wonder and glory of the
universe, as well as the spiritual reality behind the material, has
suggested as a definition of Romanticism the "Renascence of Wonder."

4. _Revival of the Middle Ages and national traditions_. The
Romanticists were inclined to turn away from the prosaic present and to
seek material for their writings in the Middle Ages, the time of
unrestrained feelings and emotions, of chivalrous adventure and romance,
of strong religious faith, of miracles and superstition. The historical
novel, in which the powerful imagination of a Walter Scott made the past
live again, became popular throughout Europe; innumerable dramas sought
their plots in medieval history and legend. Spain, with her rich
literature of popular ballads and drama, a storehouse of picturesque
legends and traditions, attracted the attention of Romanticists
everywhere, so that for Spaniards the movement came to have a patriotic
significance. The best Romanticists did not limit themselves to the
Middle Ages; they broadened their vision to include the whole past of
the human race, whereas the Classicists, fixing their eyes steadily upon
ancient Greece and Rome, whenever they were inclined to turn away from
the present, ignored entirely the medieval period and the early modern.

5. _Picturesqueness_. Seeking to give polished expression to the
probable and typical, the Classicist abhorred exaggeration and violent
contrasts. The Romanticist, on the other hand, was attracted to the
grotesque, mingled the ugly and the beautiful, the commonplace and the
fantastic; he delighted in striking antitheses.

6. _Love of inanimate nature_. The Classicist, instead of going directly
to Nature for individual inspiration, was content to repeat in new ways
the generally accepted ideas regarding natural scenery. His interest lay
almost wholly in mankind, so that inanimate Nature usually served as a
merely conventional background. The Romanticist loved Nature for its own
sake, and many masterpieces of lyric poetry were due to its inspiration.
He loved Nature in all her aspects and moods; if these were grandiose or
violent, the greater was his admiration.

7. _Freedom from rule and conventionality in literary forms and
technique._ The foregoi