21 JANUARY 1837, Page 15

HALLAM'S INTRODUCTION TO THE LITERATURE OF EUROPE.

EXCEPTING one mind, which has hitherto exercised itself on fugi- tive productions, Mr. HALLAM is the only writer of the present day who entertains a due sense of the importance of his calling, and by setting to work with the careful industry of a better age produces works which reward the reader for the attentio I they

demand. And the success which has attended him shows, that

whatever may be the general disposition to patronize the slap- dash or striking style, there is yet sufficient soundness of taste

and judgment to encourage solid excellence when it really appears.

Appealing to no temporary feelings or circumstances, mad from its nature destitute of that poetical interest which a palms like LIVIA' or SCOTT S may sometimes impart to history, the Middle Ages of HALLAM exceeds Peter Simple in the number of its editions ; and the demand for that most amusing fiction is rivalled by the History of the British Constitution.

The Introduction to the Literature of Europe is equally valu- able as those two great works : it is more useful, perhaps, as sup-

plying a void in letters ; it displays equal if not superior powers of patient research. Yet it will not be so popularly admired; and for several reasons. Dealing with matters of a purely intellectual kind, and which are neither of the highest nature nor were exhi- bited in modes of composition that have survived to our age, the subject is remote, it' not abstract, and possesses few attractions save

for the student. It is another drawback, that, though not a com- pilation, it is derived from compilations ; and consequently wants that raciness, character, and spirit, which a recourse to originals

always produces. Nor could this drawback have been avoided ; for what mortal could have procured, much less have read, the various works that have been produced in literature, in all lan- guages, from the sixth to the sixteenth century ? But, fully

admitting these insuperable defects ; and not shutting our eyes to certain blemishes of style, that have been produced perhaps by too long a familiarity with bad Latin ; nor to a brevity that sometimes touches upon a subject so generally as to leave it hazy, if not ob- scure; nor to a want of skill in suddenly passing from one topic to another, which, if a better arrangement could not have removed, an introductory sentence would have rendered less abrupt,—we must regard the Introduction to the Literature of Europe as a very surprising work. It conveys a clear idea of the desultory and dreaming efforts of the human mind to throw off the incubus which oppressed it during the first ages that followed the over- throw of Rome. It traces briefly, but with a masterly hand, the slow advances of learning, or rather of its mere elements ; some- times struggling, in one or two places only, for existence itself, then spreading gradually over the nations ; now receding in one country, but advancing in others ; now seeming to ebb, now sta- tionary, now flowing, till at last it rose too high and spread too far to be ever extinguished. It investigates the formation and growth of the national literature of the different countries of Europe,. touching off their leading characteristics. It shortly describes the various systems It philosophy, or what was called such, of the middle ages. It gives an account of the subject and scope of the principal works that were produced, with notices, more or less full, of the leading peculiarities in the minds or fortunes of their authors ; thus furnishing a rapid, eloquent, and masterly coup d'wil of the mental history of Europe, from the decline to the full revival of learning. But perhaps the most extraordinary quality of the book is its readable nature. With all the drawbacks we have mentioned,—destitute of the interest of a story, of any stir- ring events, or of the changeable fortunes of individuals, it carries on the reader almost as quickly as if possessed of those attractions; though, to be sure, one sits down to HALLAM in a different frame of mind from that with which a trashy novel or a crude or silly disquisition is taken up. The work opens with Boni-tits and his consolations—the last of the Classics—and closes with the year 1330, when ancient learning was is the meridian splendour of its reputation, the European languages had assumed their present form, and the foundation of modern literature was laid. To enumerate the things and persons treated of in so long a space of time, would fill several columns with a " muster-roll of names." Even the principal topics cannot conveniently be mentioned. But amongst them will be found, the decline of the use of the Latin language, and the formation from its roots of the Italian, Spanish, and Pro- vencal tongues; the character of the songs of the Troubadours, and a brief (a too brief) account of the steps by which the more deeply-inflected Saxon was gradually curtailed into English. A history of the restoration of the Latin Classics throughout Europe— of the introduction of Greek literature into Italy, and its diffu- sion amongst the Transalpine nations—the revival of the study of Roman jurisprudence in Italy—the invention of paper, the disco- very of printing, and the creation of the modern sciences of as- tronomy, geography, anatomy, 'and chemistry—also stand out conspicuously. In so large a field, it is highly probable that un- intentional omissions or designed slights may be piclwd out; but the only subject which we can note as neglected, is popular or fairy literature—a class which Mr. HALLAM probably conceived did not full within the scope of his work. The length at which any particular branch is treated, or the apparent neglect of local lite- rature, which has had little. or no effect upon European letters., will be judged of differently by different minds. As regards ge- neral readers, we suspect the work could not be safely extended; and looking at its purpose, as expressed by its title, not pro- perly.

To give fair specimens of such a production—extracts which shall convey an idea of the b,..ok—is nut easy ; partly because it is intended by the author ;Is " an entire stud synoptical work; " partly because the reader of a newspaper cannot, by any exhor- tation, be got into the disp:sition requisite to appreciate the dis- jointed passages submitted to Lim, any more than we can regard a displaced itionutnent with the same feelings which it excited ill its original position in some time-honoured pile; and partly from the difficulty of selecting any whole subject, sufficiently brief to be adapted to our space. We will, however, take a few fitted for independent exhibition.

One of the most interesting parts of the volume is the account of the revival of ancient learning ; as one of the innst important points which the work when completed will suggest, will proba- bly be the doubt ns to how much longer the Classics will continue to be a branch of general education, or whether, in the future .conlition of timings, they may not lace outlasted their necessity. Whilst sciulists, however, who have little more definite notion of the dead languages than as a collection of " hard words," which they cannot readily comprehend, are decrying them as useless, it is well to let Mr. IIALLAm tell us of the obligation of the modern to the ancient world.

We have thus traced in outline the form of European literature, as it existed in the middle ages and in the first forty years of the fifteenth century. The result must be to convince us of 'der great obligations to Italy for her renewal

• of classical learniug. Whit might have been the intellectual progress of Europe if she had never gone back to the fountains of Greek and Boman geuius, it is impossible to determine; certainly, nothing in the fourteenth and fifteenth cen- turies gave pro4peet of a very abundant. harvest. It would be difficult to find any man of high reputation in modern times, who has riot reaped benefit, di. reedy or through mhos, from the revival of ancient learning. We have the greatest reason to doubt whether, without the Italians of these eggs, it would ever have occurred. The trite met 'idiots of light and darkness, of dawn and twilight, are used carelessly by those echo touch on the literature of the middle ages, and suggest by analogy an ur i terrupted progression, in which learning, like the sun, has dissipated the shadows of barbai ion. But with closer atten- lion, it is easily seen that this is net a correct representation ; that, taking Eu- rope generally, far from being in a more advanced stage of learning at the be- ginning of the fifteenth century thee two hundred years berme, she had, in many respects, gone backwards, and gave little sign of any telidency to recover her ground. There is, in fact, no security, as fir as the past history of man- kind assures us, that auy nation will be uniformly progressive in science, lots, and letters; nor do I perceive, whatever may be the current language, that we can expect this with touch greater confidence of the whole civilized world.

The orthography excepted, here is a true copy of the oldest letter in English ; written by Lady to Sir Jonx PELHAM, in 1399.

"My dear Lord-1 recommend me to your high lordship with heart and body and all my poor might, and with all this I thank you as my dear lord dearest and best beloved of all earthly lurds, I say for me, and thank you my dear lord with all this that I say before of your comfortable letter that ye scut ore hum Ponterract that come to use on Mary Magdalene day; for by my truth I was never so glad as when I heard byyour letter that ye were strong enough with the grace of God for to keep you from the malice of your enemies. And dear lord, if it like to your high lordship that as soon as ye might, that I might Lear of your gracious speed ; which as Uud Almighty continue and increase. And my dear lord, if it like you fur to know of my fire, 1 am here by laid in manner of a siege with the county of Sussex, Surrv, and a great parcel of Kent, so that I may nought out, no none victuals get me but with much 'bard. Where- fore, my dear, if it like you by the advice of your wise counsel fur to get remedy of the salvation cf your castle and withstand the malice of the shires aforesaid. And also that ye be fully informed of their great malice Ivo' kets its these shires which that haves so despitefully wrought to you, and to your castle, to your men, and to your teuants fur this country have yai [sic] wasted for agreat

Farewell, my dear lord, the Holy Trinity you keep from your enemies, and ever send me good tidings of you. Written at Pevensey in the castle, ou St. Jacob day last past. By your own poor

Tu any true Lord. J. PELHAM."

CHARACTER OF LIONARDO DA VINCI.

None of the writings of Loner& were published till more than a century after his death ; and trideed the most remarkable of them are still in manu- script. We cannot, therefore, give him a determinate place under this rather than any other deceonimn ; but, us he was born in 1452' we may presume his mind to have been in full expansion before 1490. His Treatise on Painting is known as a very early disquisition on the rules of the art. But his greatest literary distinction is derived from those short fragment's of his unpublished writings that appeared not many years since; and which, according at least to our common estimate of tire age in which he lived, are more like revelations of physical trutIlls vouchsafed to a single mind, than the superstructure of its reasoning upon any established basis. The discoveries which made Galileo, and Kepler, and Mwttlin, and Maurolycus, and Critelli, and other mimes illus- trious, the system of Copernicus, the very theories of recent geolugers, are au - ticipated by Da Vinci within the compass of a few pages, not perhaps in the most precise language or on the most conclusive reasoning, but so as to strike us with something like the awe of preternatural knowledge. In an age of su much dogmatism, he first laid down the grand principle of Bacon, that experi- ment and observation must be the guide* to just theory in the investigation of nature. If any doubt could be harboured, not as to the right of Lionardo da Vinci to stand as the first name of the fifteenth century, which is beyond all doubt, but as to his originality in so many discoveries, which probably no one 3112.1, especially in such circumstances, has ever made, it must be on an hypo- thesis, not very untenable, that some parts of physical science had already at- tained a height which mere books do not record. Tint extraordinary works of ecclesiastical architecture in the middle ages, especially in the fifteenth century, as well as thole of Toseanehli and Fioravanti, which we have mentioned, lend some countenance to this opinion ; and it is said to be confirmed by the notes of Fra Mauro, a lay brother of a convent near Venice, on a planisphere constructed by him, and still extant. Liooardo himself Speaks of theearth's armual motion, in a treatise that appears to have been written about LAO, as the opinion of many philosophers In his age.

ESTIMATE OF LUTHER.

In the history of the Reformation, Luther is incoitipatatify the greatest name. We see him, in the skilful composition of Robertson, the chief figure of a group of gownsmen, standing in contrast on the canvas with the crowned rivals of France and Austria and their attendant warriors, but blended ir: the unity of that historic picture. This amazing influence on the revolutions of his own age and on the opinions of mankind, seems to have produced, as is rent mina. torah an exaggerated notion of his intellectual greatness. It is admitted on all sides that lie wrote his own language with force and purity; and he is reckoned one of its best models. The hymns in use with the Lutheran Church, many of which are his own, possess a simple thgoity and devoutness, never, probably, excelled in that class of poetry, and alike distinguished from the poverty of Sterohold or Brady, and from the meretricious ornaments of later writers. But, from the Latin works of Luther, few readers, I believe, will rise without disappointment. Their intemperance, their coarseness, their inelegance, their scurrilaty, their wild paradoxes, that menace the foundations of religious morality, are not compensated, so far at least as my slight acquaintance with them extends, by much strength or acuteness, and still less by any impressive eloquence. Some of his treatises,—and we may instance his reply to Henry the Eighth, or the book Against the Falsely-named Order of IlisImpo,—can be described as little else than bellowing in bad Latin. Neither of there books display, as far as I can judge, any striking ability. ft is not to be imagined that a man of his vivid parts Las to perceive an advantage iii that close grappling, sentence by sentence, with an adversary, tibia ti!ls most of his con- troversial wahine; and in scornful irony he hail no superior. Ills epistle to Erasmus, prefixed to the treatise De Sara is bitterly insolent in terms as civil as he could use. But the clear and comprehensive line of arge- ment, which enlightens the reader's understanding, and resolves his ditlicultiee, it always wanting. An unbounded dogmatism, resting on an absolute confi- dence in the infallibility, practically speaking, of his own judgment, pervades his writings; no indulgence is shown, no pause allowed, to the hesitating; whatever stands in the way of his decisions, the fathers of the church, the sehoohnen and philosophers, the canons and councils, are swept away in a cur- rent of impetuous declamation ; and as every thing eon:aimed hi Scripture, ac- cording to Luther, is easy to be tualerstood. and call only be underatood in hie sense, every deviation hum his doctrine incurs the anathema of perdition. Jerome, he says, fir from being rightly canonized, must, but for some special grace, have been damned for his interpretation of St. Paul's Epistle to the Ito- mans. That the . Zwinglians, as well as the mule chureli of It rude and the Anabaptists, were shut out by their tenets from salvation, is more than in- sinuated in numerous passages of Luther's writioes. Yet he host pissed him- self through several changes of opinion. In 1318, he rejected auricalar con- fes-iou ; in 1520, it was both useful and necessary ; not long afterwards, it was again laid aside. I have found it impossible to reconcile or to is eleratatel his tenet: concerning faith and works; and can only perceive that, if there be any reservation in favour of the latter, not merely sophistical, of whicli I ant hardly well convinced, it consists in distinctions too subtle for the people to a p;:aehend. These are not the oscillations of the balance in a calm untie:eta:Mina, ennscious of the difficulty which so often attends tire estimate of impairy pte,urimtioos, but alternate gusts of dogmatism, during which, for the time, lie W.Ic is tena- cious of his judgment as if it had been uniform.

ANATOMISTS IN THE OLDEN TINE.

The zeal of Vesaliiie and his fellow •students for anatomical vier= led them to strange scenes of adventure. Those services which have since bceu thrown on the refuse of mankind, they voluntarily undertook.

o Entire affection seerneth nicer hates,"

They prowled by night in charnel-housea ; they dug 'up the dead fram the grave; they climbed the gibbet, in fear and silence, to steal the Ineuldering car- case of the murderer ; the risk of iglionduireis punishineat and the sect et stings of superstitious remorse exalting, no doubt, the delight of these useful but not very enviable pursuits. It may be mentioned here, that Vesalius, after living fur some years in tire court of Charles and Philip as their physician, met with estrange reverse, cha- racteristic enough of such a place. Being absurdly accused of naving dissected a Spanish gentleman before he was dead, Vestilies only escaped indite' punieli- !tient, at the instance of the Inquisition, by undertaking a pilgrimage to Jams salem, during which he was shipwrecked, and died of fainiue in one of the Greek island's.

Of the three centuries over which Mr. HALL' NI'S Introduction is more specifically to extend, only fifty years are yet completed; and we know not to what length the labours of time author will reach, or how lung they will occupy him. But we expect that the result of so extended a survey of mental ;history Mill be depressing to the intellectual pride of man, and saddening to those who have been accustomed to except the masterpieces of human genius from the moralists direction of " nil adtnirari." When we look at the learning, the penetration, the genius, which, from falling on a too early age, or being occupied on too limited or perishable a subject, or from some other accidents of nature or chances of fortune, has been deprived of its due reward,—when we reflect upon the entire destruction of some of the brightest efforts of an- tiquity, and the long obscurity of the rest—trace the fluctuations of human judgment, influenced as it must ever he by social necessities—witness systems of philosophy erected only to be superseded or overthrown—see the ardent devotion with which the Classics were first regarded, gradually cooling in each succes- sive age, till, having formed the taste of the modern world, they are put on their defence, whilst later works,conceivcd in a kindred spirit, finished with a similar care, and performing a similar office, drop out of use, if their authors continue to be spoken of,—the intellec- tual, like the natural world, appears to subsist in a perpetual change; the most fertile spots deriving their fertility from the de- composition of whole races of' sentient creatures, the life of one class being only maintained by the sacrifice of others, aad the present existing but by the destruction of the past. The Theist, comparing the limited nature of our globe with the boundless extent of creation, supposed that a superior being might look down upon the turmoils of man, as man regards the labours of' emraets on au ant-hill. But he r.eed not have traversed space fur a humiliating comparison, which our own history would have sup- plied. When we ponder on the perishable nature of man and of' his productions, the fluctuating character of his mind, the incon- sistencies of ages with one another, and of individuals with them- selves, the little that is known, and the uncertainty of that know- ledge, we aprear no more than moral and mental nautili floating at rand:m on an ccean of doubt.