acon and Locke. It was
no part of the plan of the English philosophers, however, to inculcate
such ideas as the French philosophers drew from their writings. Bacon,
who was profoundly Christian, believed that man alone was the type of
God, and nature the work of God's hands; but the French leaders in
philosophy went beyond this, they deified nature, and threw aside as
mysticism whatever could not be proved by sense. Voltaire made use of
all the wonderful greatness of science, as revealed by Bacon and
Newton, not to exalt the Creator; but to lower man to the level of the
brute. Like the old Greek sophists, who defended first one side of a
question, and then the one diametrically opposed to it, Voltaire would
write one book in favor of God, and another to deny Him; but it is not
difficult to see which is his real belief. This perverted philosophy of
Voltaire in turn reacted on the English mind, and particularly on
history. We see its workings in both Gibbon and Hume. The "little
philosophy" which "inclineth a man's mind to atheism," led the
eighteenth century philosophers to fancy that Newton's discoveries
meant that everything could be attained without religion, and that the
only true and wide vision could be reached by the senses alone. They
taught a pure materialism, to their own undoing; for it is not possible
to thus lightly throw aside our great links with the past, in which
both Christian and heathen, knowingly and unknowingly, in mediaeval
poetry, in heroic ballad, and in Egyptian prose, testified to the
existence of God.

The nineteenth century in France has been rich in dramatists,
novelists, historians and poets, as well as in science and learning of
all kinds; but it has had no especial power, or aim, and its opinions
are constantly changing. The early novelists were strongly directed by
the writings of Sir Walter Scott, while later ones have sought to
imitate Victor Hugo and George Sand. The literature of this period has
had no effect outside of France. Poetry has not risen any higher than
Alfred de Musset; and any further greatness in French poetry must come
from a revival of their own ancient poems and legends.

Poetry that deals only with the present becomes local, and in the end
is influenced by the constant caprice and change of fashion instead of
by the deep, heart-stirring beliefs of a strong and united people.

ITALIAN.

The first general language of Italy was the Latin, and so strongly was
t