he Prodigal Son was printed in an almost endless number
of editions, as well as in various versions in modern tongues, among
which reference has already been made to the English, for the use of
schools, by J. Palsgrave (1540). Macropedius (Langhveldt) belongs wholly
to the Low Countries. In Germany the stream of these compositions
continued to flow almost without abatement throughout the earlier half
of the 16th century; but in the days of the Reformation it takes a turn
to scriptural subjects, and during the latter part of the century
remains on the whole faithful to this preference.[273] These Latin plays
may be called school-dramas in the most precise sense; for they were
both performed in the schools and read in class with commentaries
specially composed for them; nor was it except very reluctantly that in
this age the vernacular drama was allowed to intrude into scholastic
circles. It should be noticed that the Jesuit order, which afterwards
proved so keenly alive to the influence which dramatic performances
exercise over the youthful mind, only very gradually abandoned the
principle, formally sanctioned in their _Ratio studiorum_, that the
acting of plays (these being always in the Latin tongue) should only
rarely be permitted in their seminaries. The flourishing period of the
Jesuit drama begins with the spread of the order in the west and
south-west of the Empire in the last decade of the 16th century, and
then continues, through the vicissitudes of good and evil, with a
curious intermixture of Latin and German plays, during the whole of the
17th and the better part of the 18th. These productions, which ranged in
their subjects from biblical and classical story to themes of
contemporary history (such as the relief of Vienna by Sobiesky and the
peace of Ryswick), seem generally to bear the mark of their
authorship--that of teachers appointed by their superiors to execute
this among other tasks allotted to them; but, as it seems unnecessary to
return to this special growth, it may be added that the extraordinary
productiveness of the Jesuit dramatists, and the steadiness of
self-repetition which is equally characteristic of them, should warn us
against underrating its influence upon a considerable proportion of the
nation's educational life during a long succession of generations.

Beginnings of the vernacular German drama.

Hans Sachs.

The English comedians.

Separation between the stage and litera