se. The
South Germans, and the Saxons in England, tried to copy the old heroic
poems.

In the time of Theodoric, the Goths began to influence the Roman
language and literature; and it is at this period that Roman antiquity
comes to an end and the Roman writers from that time are classed as
belonging to the Middle Ages.

The whole history of literature during the Middle Ages was of a twofold
character. The first, Christian and Latin, was found all over Europe,
and made the protection and extension of knowledge, its chief object.
The other was a more insular literature for each nation, and always in
the language of the people. Theodoric the Goth, Charlemagne, and Alfred
the Great, the chief patrons of the literature of their age, sought to
carry on, side by side, and to improve, these two literatures, the
Latin and the vernacular. They aimed to refine and educate man by the
Latin, and to increase the national spirit by preserving their national
poetry. While these old heroic poems of the different races are full of
interest and charm for us, we must not forget that the Latin kept alive
and preserved from extinction the whole of classical and Christian
antiquity.

The Middle Ages, so inaptly called "dark," are in truth little
understood. A German writer of the nineteenth century, Friedrich von
Schlegel, says:

"The nations have their seasons of blossoming, as well as individuals.
The age of the Crusades, of chivalry, romance and minstrelsy, was an
intellectual spring among all the nations of the West. In literature
the time of invention must precede the refinements of art. Legend must
go before history, and poetry before criticism. Vegetation must precede
spring, and spring must precede the maturity of fruit.

"The succeeding ages could have had no such burst of intellectual
vigor, if the preparing process had not been going on in the Middle
Ages. They sowed and we reaped."

Hence, it will be seen that what is looked on as a period of stagnation
and ignorance, was in truth, the waiting time, during which the inner
process of development was going on, soon to blossom into glorious
fruit.

CHIVALROUS AND ROMANTIC LITERATURE OF THE MIDDLE AGES.

From the time of the first Crusade, A.D. 1093, to the end of the
twelfth century, was the golden age of chivalry in Europe. Hence the
poetry of this period partook of the spirit that was abroad in the
world. Of this chivalrous poetry of the Middle Ages there are three