very narrow in its significance and exercised a tyranny over form and subject. The outcome of this adherence to a narrow point of view was eventually a false classicism of the most persistent nature, so that towards the end of the eighteenth century "literature had got into a sort of treadmill in which all the effort expended was expended merely in the repeated production of certain prescribed motions." All this applies specially to France, but largely owing to her influence, the spirit spread far and wide. Fortunately for England, it never obtained so strong a hold there. The giant force of Shakespeare was too powerful to admit of any permanent departure from his ideals. Therefore the "classical" age in England was of no very long duration. In Germany the imitation of France was carried far, but the ultimate triumph of her literature was upon absolutely different lines. Italy and Spain also felt, to their ultimate hurt, the influence of the same narrowing spirit.

Against this pseudo-classicism which "arose in the fifteenth century, ripened in the sixteenth, and rotted in the eighteenth," the first rebel was a Frenchman, Jean Jacques Rousseau. His life (17121778) was in strong antagonism to most of the powers that were, and his writings produced such an effect that he has been called the Father of Romanticism. He revolted against the established usages of the day -in politics as well as literature. Rousseau brings us to the second term under discussion-Romanticism.

Upon the very threshold of the nineteenth century there occurred a movement of importance almost similar to the Renaissance. At this time, says Taine, the French historian, began in Europe the great modern revolution. The thinking public and the human mind changed, and underneath these two collisions a new literature sprang up.

As in the Renaissance, there was a vast international movement. The trend of the whole thing was towards liberation-liberation in politics and social life, in thought and feeling. Of this epoch the French Revolution of 1789 was the most tangible outcrop, but by no means the only result. The whole tenor of European life was changed. Enough here to mention the fact; some of its particular phases will be touched on hereafter. A new type of literature came into existence. And the great movement which brought about the change is called broadly Romanticism. The most important characteristic of the century has been the triumph of this spirit. Upon that triumph hinges the literary history of the age.

As has been said above, romanticism is of a very complex nature. But we get sufficiently near the truth when we understand that it was essentially a movement of change. The old régime had become outworn. It was time for something new. When one process has done its work, another must take its place. So powerful a force as classicism required one equally strong to succeed it; thus the romantic

movement spread over the whole of Europe. Above all things romanticism was a literary movement; considering it in this light, we may term it "an extraordinary development of imaginative sensibility." We may even define it-while remembering our limitations-in distinction to classicism, as that mode of literary treatment which presents its object not simply and directly, but through a glamour of imagery and emotion. Classicism places the object, as it were, in a white light, eschewing any warmth or color of treatment; romanticism depends upon the feelings excited by the object. It was a return to the fuller appreciation of those thousand features of nature and human life which had lain neglected for so long. Classicism would have none of the rough, or the unconventional. In its severe landscape all was flat country and smoothshaven lawns. Everything was decorous; the brooks were tamed into propriety, the trees were a mass of trimmed verdure, with here and there, perhaps, the gleam of some small Greek temple peering through them. All the youths were shepherds and all the maidens shepherdesses in dainty skirt and bodice, or, more frequently, "nymphs." The world, once so vast and broad, was narrowed by the classicists into a contracted sphere where satire and social manners were the highest subjects for a writer's art. "To correct society in its vices, and hold the mirror up to its foibles, was the great and only end of literature." This was the monotonous

environment from which France and England and the others by and by sought to escape. When clas. sicism began to decay, the world gradually acquired a new power of appeal, and came to wear the beauty and the freshness of a dream. The response to this appeal, as well as the appeal itself, is found in romanticism. The glory of natural scenery, the dignity of man even in his lowliest estate, the maj esty of cloud-capt towers and gorgeous palaces, the mystery of the unseen world-these all at once opened up a wonderland for the author's interpretation and the reader's delight.

Of course this great revival-so varied and so powerful-was not simultaneous throughout Europe. The revolt against classicism broke forth at different times in the different nations. France, though the first to enter protest, was the last to attain complete emancipation. Not until 1830 did she finally shake off the trammels which had bound her. Germany showed earliest the practical results of romanticism. They were gained by the very important and very interesting movement called the "Sturm und Drang "—or Storm and Stress-which occurred about 1770. The strong hands of Goethe and his co-workers won the victory and wrought the golden age of German literature. England's first champions were Cowper and Burns, both of whom appeared about 1785, and Wordsworth, who published with Coleridge in 1798 a famous book called Lyrical Ballads, "the clarion call of the new poetry."

Italy and Spain, strongly under French influence, preserved the classic tradition until after its fall in France. Russia stood somewhat apart from the sphere of European thought, and consequently her literary development was not very closely akin to that of other nations. We may mark off the militant period of the romantic movement by the years 1749 and 1830; the former signalized by the emergence of Rousseau, the latter by the triumph of romanticism in France.

Two other influences of this broad phase of international thought call for mention. The first was a revival of the past which is seen in the origin, growth, and immense popularity of the historical novel under Scott, Hugo, and Dumas, and the study of past literature such as appears in Germany during the beginning of the century. The second was the mysticism, the "Renascence of Wonder," which was so prominent a feature of the early romantic movement; it was due to the newly awakened spirit of awe which led men to look at the world invisible with a graver regard and a more imaginative speculation. The very essence of this is found

Min Coleridge's Ancient Mariner.

The brief foregoing sketch will serve to indicate what is meant by the terms classicism and romanticism, and how they arose. It cannot pretend to anything more than the most general outline of the two historical movements. Having an idea of their trend, we shall be able to proceed more clearly with