A Political and Social History of Modern Europe Part 20

So long as they were not largely written, they could achieve no fixity, and it was not until after the invention of printing that the national languages produced extensive national literatures.

Just when printing was invented, the humanists--the foremost scholars of Europe--were diligently engaged in strengthening the position of Latin by encouraging the study of the pagan cla.s.sics. Virgil, Cicero, Caesar, Tacitus, and the comedies of Plautus and Terence were again read by educated people for their substance and for their style.

Petrarch imitated the manner of Latin cla.s.sics in his letters; Erasmus wrote his great works in Latin. The revival of Greek, which was also due to the humanists, added to the learning and to the literature of the cultured folk, but Greek, even more than Latin, was hardly understood or appreciated by the bulk of the people.

Then came the sixteenth century, with its artistic developments, its national rivalries, its far-away discoveries, its theological debates, and its social and religious unrest. The common people, especially the commercial middle cla.s.s, clamored to understand: and the result was the appearance of national literatures on a large scale. Alongside of Latin, which was henceforth restricted to the liturgy of the Roman Catholic Church and to particularly learned treatises, there now emerged truly literary works in Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese, German, English, etc. The printing of these works at once stereotyped their respective languages, so that since the sixteenth century the written forms of the vernacular tongues have been subject to relatively minor change. Speaking generally, the sixteenth century witnessed the fixing of our best known modern languages.

To review all the leading writers who employed the various vernaculars in the sixteenth century would encroach too much upon the province of professed histories of comparative literature, but a few references to certain figures that tower head and shoulders above all others in their respective countries may serve to call vividly to mind the importance of the period for national literatures.

[Sidenote: Italian Literature]

At the very outset, one important exception must be made in favor of Italy, whose poetry and prose had already been immortalized by Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio a hundred years and more before the opening of the sixteenth century. But that country, as we have already repeatedly observed in many kinds of art, antic.i.p.ated all others in modern times.

Italy, almost the last European land to be politically unified, was the first to develop a great national literature.

But Italian literature was broadened and popularized by several influential writers in the sixteenth century, among whom stand preeminent the Florentine diplomat Machiavelli (1469-1527), whose _Prince_ really founded the modern science of politics, and who taught the dangerous doctrine that a ruler, bent on exercising a benevolent despotism, is justified in employing any means to achieve his purpose; Ariosto (1474-1533), whose great poem _Orlando Furioso_ displayed a powerful imagination no less than a rare and cultivated taste; and the unhappy mad Ta.s.so (1544-1595), who in _Jerusalem Delivered_ produced a bulky epic poem, adapting the manner of Virgil to a crusading subject, and in Aminta gave to his countrymen a delightful pastoral drama, the exquisite lyrics of which were long sung in opera.

[Sidenote: French literature]

French literature, like other French art, was encouraged by Francis I.

He set up printing presses, established the College of France, and pensioned native writers. The most famous French author of the time was the sarcastic and clever Rabelais (c. 1490-1553), whose memorable _Gargantua_ comprised a series of daring fanciful tales, told with humor of a rather vulgar sort. The language of _Gargantua_ is somewhat archaic--perhaps the French version of Calvin's _Inst.i.tutes_ would be a better example of the French of the sixteenth century. But France, thus seriously beginning her national literature, was to wait for its supremacy until the seventeenth century--until the inst.i.tution of the French Academy and the age of Louis XIV.

[Sidenote: Spanish Literature]

Spanish literature flourished in the golden era when Velasquez and Murillo were painting their masterpieces. The immortal _Don Quixote_, which was published in 1604, ent.i.tles its author, Cervantes (1547-1616), to rank with the greatest writers of all time.

Lope de Vega (1562-1635), far-famed poet, virtually founded the Spanish theater and is said to have composed eighteen hundred dramatic pieces.

Calderon (1600-1681), although less effective in his numerous dramas, wrote allegorical poems of unequaled merit. The printing of large cheap editions of many of these works made Spanish literature immediately popular.

[Sidenote: Portuguese Literature]

How closely the new vernacular literatures reflected significant elements in the national life is particularly observable in the case of Portugal. It was of the wonderful exploring voyages of Vasco da Gama that Camoens (1524-1580), prince of Portuguese poets, sang his stirring _Lusiads_.

[Sidenote: German Literature]

In the Germanies, the extraordinary influence of humanism at first militated against the development of literature in the vernacular, but the Protestant reformer, Martin Luther, in his desire to reach the ears of the common people, turned from Latin to German. Luther's translation of the Bible const.i.tutes the greatest monument in the rise of modern German.

To speak of what our own English language and literature owe to the sixteenth century seems superfluous. The popular writings of Chaucer in the fourteenth century were historically important, but the presence of very many archaic words makes them now difficult to read. But in England, from the appearance in 1551 of the English version of Sir Thomas More's _Utopia_, [Footnote: Originally published in Latin in 1516.] a representation of an ideal state, to the publication of Milton's grandiose epic, _Paradise Lost_, in 1667, there was a continuity of great literature. There were Cranmer's Book of Common Prayer and the King James Version of the Bible; Edmund Spenser's graceful _Faerie Queene_; [Footnote: For its scenery and mechanism, the Orlando Furioso of Ariosto furnished the framework; and it similarly shows the influence of Ta.s.so.] the supreme Shakespeare; Ben Jonson and Marlowe; Francis Bacon and Richard Hooker; Thomas Hobbes and Jeremy Taylor; and the somber Milton himself.

BEGINNINGS OF MODERN NATURAL SCIENCE

[Sidenote: Two-fold Development of Culture, Science and Art]

Human civilization, or culture, always depends upon progress in two directions--the reason, and the feelings or emotions. Art is the expression of the latter, and science of the former. Every great period in the world's history, therefore, is marked by a high appreciation of aesthetics and an advance in knowledge. To this general rule, the sixteenth century was no exception, for it was distinguished not only by a wonderful development of architecture, sculpture, painting, engraving, music, and literature,--whether Roman, Greek, or vernacular,--but it is the most obvious starting point of our modern ideas of natural and experimental science.

Nowadays, we believe that science is at once the legitimate means and the proper goal of the progress of the race, and we fill our school curricula with scientific studies. But this spirit is essentially modern: it owes its chief stimulus to important achievements in the sixteenth century and the first half of the seventeenth.

[Sidenote: Characteristics of the Sixteenth Century]

Five elements contributed to impress the period that we are now reviewing with a scientific character. In the first place, the humanists encouraged a critical spirit in comparing and contrasting ancient ma.n.u.scripts and in investigating the history of the distant past; and their discovery and application of pagan writings served to bring clearly and abruptly before the educated people of the sixteenth century all that the Greeks and Romans had done in astronomy, physics, mathematics, and medicine, as well as in philosophy, art, and literature. Secondly, the invention of printing itself was a scientific feat, and its extended use enabled scientists, no less than artists, immediately to acquaint the whole civilized world with their ideas and demonstrations.

Thirdly, the marvelous maritime discoveries of new routes to India and of a new world, which revolutionized European commerce, added much to geographical knowledge and led to the construction of scientific maps of the earth's surface. Fourthly, the painstaking study of a small group of scholars afforded us our first glimpse of the real character of the vast universe about our own globe--the scientific basis of modern astronomy. Lastly, two profound thinkers, early in the seventeenth century,--Francis Bacon and Descartes,--pointed out new ways of using the reason--the method of modern science.

In an earlier chapter, an account has been given of the maritime discoveries of the sixteenth century and their immediate results in broadening intellectual interests. In this chapter, some attention already has been devoted to the rise of humanism and likewise to the invention of printing. It remains, therefore, to say a few words about the changes in astronomy and in scientific method that characterized the beginning of modern times.

[Side Note: Astronomy]

In the year 1500 the average European knew something about the universe of sun, moon, planets, and stars, but it was scarcely more than the ancient Greeks had known, and its chief use was to foretell the future.

This practical aspect of astronomy was a curious ancient misconception, which now pa.s.ses under the name of astrology. It was popularly believed prior to the sixteenth century that every heavenly body exerted a direct and arbitrary influence upon human character and events, [Footnote: Disease was attributed to planetary influence. This connection between medicine and astrology survives in the sign of Jupiter 4, which still heads medicinal prescriptions.] and that by casting "horoscopes," showing just how the stars appeared at the birth of any person, the subsequent career of such an one might be foreseen.

Many silly notions and superst.i.tions grew up about astrology, yet the practice persisted. Charles V and Francis I, great rivals in war, vied with each other in securing the services of most eminent astrologers, and Catherine de' Medici never tired of reading horoscopes.

[Sidenote: "The Ptolemaic System"]

Throughout the middle ages the foremost scholars had continued to cherish the astronomical knowledge of the Greeks, which had been conveniently collected and systematized by a celebrated mathematician and scholar living in Egypt in the second century of the Christian era --Ptolemy by name. Among other theories and ideas, Ptolemy taught that the earth is the center of the universe, that revolving about it are the moon, Mercury, Venus, the sun, the other planets, and the fixed stars, and that the entire machine is turned with incredible velocity completely around every twenty-four hours. This so-called Ptolemaic system of astronomy fitted in very nicely with the language of the Bible and with the popular prejudice that the earth remains stationary while the heavenly bodies daily rise and set. It was natural that for many centuries the Christians should accept the views of Ptolemy as almost divinely inspired.

[Sidenote: "The Copernican System"]

However, a contradictory theory of the solar system was propounded and upheld in the sixteenth century, quite supplanting the Ptolemaic theory in the course of the seventeenth. The new system is called Copernican after its first modern exponent--and its general acceptance went far to annihilate astrology and to place astronomy upon a rational basis.

Copernicus [the Latin form of his real name, Koppernigk (1473-1543)]

was a native of Poland, who divided his time between official work for the Catholic Church and private researches in astronomy. It was during a ten-year sojourn in Italy (1496-1505), studying canon law and medicine, and familiarizing himself, through humanistic teachers, with ancient Greek astronomers, that Copernicus was led seriously to question the Ptolemaic system and to cast about in search of a truthful subst.i.tute. Thenceforth for many years he studied and reflected, but it was not until the year of his death (1543) that his results were published to the world. His book--_On the Revolutions of the Celestial Bodies_, dedicated to Pope Paul III--offered the theory that the earth is not the center of the universe but simply one of a number of planets which revolve about the sun. The earth seemed much less important in the Copernican universe than in the Ptolemaic.

The Copernican thesis was supported and developed by two distinguished astronomers at the beginning of the next century--Kepler (1571-1630) and Galileo (1564-1642), one a German, the other an Italian. Kepler taught astronomy for a number of years at Gratz and subsequently made his home in Prague, where he acquired a remarkable collection of instruments [Footnote: From Tycho Brahe, whose a.s.sistant he was in 1600-1601.] that enabled him to conduct numerous interesting experiments. While he entertained many fantastic and mystical theories of the "harmony of the spheres" and was not above casting horoscopes for the emperor and for Wallenstein, that soldier of fortune, [Footnote: See below, pp. 223, 226.] he nevertheless established several of the fundamental laws of modern astronomy, such as those governing the form and magnitude of the planetary orbits. It was Kepler who made clear that the planets revolve about the sun in elliptical rather than in strictly circular paths.

Galileo popularized the Copernican theory. [Footnote: Another "popularizer" was Giordano Bruno (c. 1548-1600).] His charming lectures in the university of Padua, where he taught from 1592 to 1610, were so largely attended that a hall seating 2000 had to be provided. In 1609 he perfected a telescope, which, although hardly more powerful than a present-day opera gla.s.s, showed unmistakably that the sun was turning on its axis, that Jupiter was attended by revolving moons, and that the essential truth of the Copernican system was established. Unfortunately for Galileo, his enthusiastic desire to convert the pope immediately to his own ideas got him into trouble with the Roman Curia and brought upon him a prohibition from further writing. Galileo submitted like a loyal Catholic to the papal decree, but had he lived another hundred years, he would have rejoiced that almost all men of learning--popes included--had come to accept his own conclusions. Thus modern astronomy was suggested by Copernicus, developed by Kepler, and popularized by Galileo.

The acquisition of sound knowledge in astronomy and likewise in every other science rests primarily upon the observation of natural facts or phenomena and then upon deducing rational conclusions from such observation. Yet this seemingly simple rule had not been continuously and effectively applied in any period of history prior to the sixteenth century. The scientific method of most of the medieval as well as of the ancient scholars was essentially that of Aristotle. [Footnote: Exception to this sweeping generalization must be made in favor of several medieval scientists and philosophers, including--Roger Bacon, a Franciscan friar of the thirteenth century.] This so-called deductive method of Aristotle a.s.sumed as a starting-point some general of principle as a premise or hypothesis and thence proceeded, by logical reasoning, to deduce concrete applications or consequences. It had been extremely valuable in stimulating the logical faculties and in showing men how to draw accurate conclusions, but it had shown a woeful inability to devise new general principles. It evolved an elaborate theology and a remarkable philosophy, but natural experimental science progressed relatively little until the deductive method of Aristotle was supplemented by the inductive method of Francis Bacon.

[Sidenote: Modern Method of Science: Introduction. Francis Bacon]

Aristotle was partially discredited by radical humanists, who made fun of the medieval scholars who had taken him most seriously, and by the Protestant reformers, who a.s.sailed the Catholic theology which had been carefully constructed by Aristotelian deduction. But it was reserved for Francis Bacon, known as Lord Bacon (1561-1626), to point out all the shortcomings of the ancient method and to propose a practicable supplement. A famous lawyer, lord chancellor of England under James I, a born scientist, a brilliant essayist, he wrote several philosophical works of first-rate importance, of which the _Advancement of Learning_ (1604) and the _Novum Organum_ (1620) are the most famous. It is in these works that he summed up the faults which the widening of knowledge in his own day was disclosing in ancient and medieval thought and set forth the necessity of slow laborious observation of facts as antecedent to the a.s.sumption of any general principle.

[Sidenote: Descartes]

What of scientific method occurred to Lord Bacon appealed even more to the intellectual genius of the Frenchman Descartes (1596-1660). A curious combination of sincere practicing Catholic and of original daring rationalist was this man, traveling all about Europe, serving as a soldier in the Netherlands, in Bavaria, in Hungary, living in Holland, dying in Sweden, with a mind as restless as his body. Now interested in mathematics, now in philosophy, presently absorbed in physics or in the proof of man's existence, throughout his whole career he held fast to the faith that science depends not upon the authority of books but upon the observation of facts. "Here are my books," he told a visitor, as he pointed to a basket of rabbits that he was about to dissect. The _Discourse on Method_ (1637) and the _Principles of Philosophy_ (1644), taken in conjunction with Bacon's work, ushered in a new scientific era, to some later phases of which we shall have occasion to refer in subsequent chapters.

ADDITIONAL READING

THE RENAISSANCE. GENERAL. _Cambridge Modern History_, Vol. I (1902), ch. xvi, xvii; _Histoire generale_, Vol. IV, ch. vii, viii, Vol. V, ch.

x, xi; E. M. Hulme, _Renaissance and Reformation_, 2d ed. (1915), ch.

v-vii, xix, xxix, x.x.x. More detailed accounts: Jakob Burckhardt, _The Civilization of the Period of the Renaissance in Italy_, trans. by S.

G. C. Middlemore, 2 vols. (1878), 1 vol. ed. (1898), scholarly and profound; J. A. Symonds, _Renaissance in Italy_, 5 parts in 7 vols.

(1897-1898), interesting and suggestive but less reliable than Burckhardt; Ludwig Geiger, _Renaissance und Humanismus in Italien und Deutschland_ (1882), in the great Oncken Series; F. X. Kraus, _Geschichte der christlichen Kunst_, 2 vols. in 4 (1896-1908), a monumental work of great interest and importance, by a German Catholic.

HUMANISM. The best description of the rise and spread of humanism is J.

E. Sandys, _A History of Cla.s.sical Scholarship_, Vol. II (1908). For the spirit of early humanism see H. C. Hollway-Calthrop, _Petrarch: his Life and Times_ (1907); J. H. Robinson and H. W. Rolfe, _Petrarch, the First Modern Scholar and Man of Letters_, 2d ed. (1914), a selection from Petrarch's letters to Boccaccio and other contemporaries, translated into English, with a valuable introduction; Pierre de Nolhac, _Petrarque et l'humanisme_, 2d ed., 2 vols. in 1 (1907). Of the antecedents of humanism a convenient summary is presented by Louise Loomis, _Mediaeval h.e.l.lenism_ (1906). A popular biography of Erasmus is that of Ephraim Emerton, _Desiderius Erasmus_ (1899); the Latin _Letters of Erasmus_ are now (1916) in course of publication by P. S.

Allen; F. M. Nichols, _The Epistles of Erasmus_, 2 vols. (1901-1906), an excellent translation of letters written prior to 1517; Erasmus's _Praise of Folly_, in English translation, is obtainable in many editions. D. F. Strauss, _Ulrich von Hutten, his Life and Times_, trans. by Mrs. G. Sturge (1874), gives a good account of the whole humanistic movement and treats Hutten very sympathetically; _The Letters of Obscure Men_, to which Hutten contributed, were published, with English translation, by F. G. Stokes in 1909. An excellent edition of _The Utopia_ of Sir Thomas More, the famous English humanist, is that of George Sampson (1910), containing also an English translation and the charming contemporary _Biography_ by More's son-in-law, William Roper. The standard summary of the work of the humanists is the German writing of Georg Voigt, _Die Wiederbelebung des cla.s.sischen Alterthums_, 3d ed., 2 vols. (1893). Interesting extracts from the writings of a considerable variety of humanists are translated by Merrick Whitcomb in his _Literary Source Books_ of the Renaissance in Germany and in Italy (1898-1899).

INVENTION OF PRINTING. T. L. De Vinne, _Invention of Printing_, 2d ed. (1878), and, by the same author, _Notable Printers of Italy during the Fifteenth Century_ (1910), two valuable works by an eminent authority on the subject; G. H. Putnam, _Books and their Makers during the Middle Ages_, 2 vols. (1896-1897), a useful contribution of another experienced publisher; Johannes Janssen, _History of the German People_, Vol. I, Book I, ch. i. There is an interesting essay on "Publication before Printing" by R. K. Root in the _Publications of the Modern Language a.s.sociation_, Vol. XXVIII (1913), pp. 417-431.