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other poets , philosophers and historians arise , of equal merit with their predecessors . After producing Dante , Boccacio . and Petrarca , Italy seemed to labour under a sentence of barrenness
t * ll the age of Ariosto and Tasso , and again a long interval elapsed , to Metastasio and Alfieri . After Chaucer , no English poet of celebrity appeared till Spenser and Shakespeare : from the time of Pope till that of Southey and Scott and Moore and Byron , what
a dearth of poetical genius our literature exhibited 1 Yet surely our national intellect was not retrograde . If the imaginative and creative part of literature thus disproves the tendency of the mind to remain stationary , those in which improvement is the result of
the collection of facts , and the comparison and examination of ideas , prove its tendency to be progressive . We -can , therefore , by no means admit Mr . R . ' s position , except in this sense , * ' that the human mind , controuled as it is by circumstances , does not exhibit that uniform progression which might
be expected from its own nature and powers . " Even the limited concession thus made to the opponents of the doctrine of perfectibility must be still further reduced by the observation , that it is the tendency of literature itself to remedy those imperfections in social institutions , by which its progress has been retarded .
There still remains a formidable objection derived from the vicissitudes to which literature has been subjected in consequence of political revolutions ; and the darkness which followed the downfal of the western empire , is commonly alleged as a most decisive
instance of intellectual degeneracy . Various attempts have been made to evade the force of this objection . Frederic Schlegel , in his Lectures on the History of Literature , delivered at Vienna in 1812 , expresses his opinion , that we exaggerate the barbarism of
the dark ages . Madame de Stael , in her eloquent work on Literature , boldly denies the fact . * ' On compte dans Thistoire plus de dix siecles pendant lesquels Ton eroit assez
generaletnent que Tesprit humain a retrograde . Cette objection que je regarderois comme toute pujssante si elle etoit flbndee je la refute d ' unemanieresimple . * Je ne pense pas . que Tespece humaine mXt retrograde pendant . cette epoque 5 je
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crois au contraire que des pas immense ^ ont ete faits dans le cours de ces dix siecles et pour la propagation des lumieres et pour le developpement des facultes intellectuelles . " Ch . viii . Vol . I .
r I his immense progress appears to consist chiefly in the mixture of the people of the north with those of the south , the result of which has been an intellectual character , comprising the excellencies of both . We fear there is
more fancy than truth in this favourite idea of hers ; as far as we can trace the primitivepopulation of Europe , G reece , Italy and Scandinavia appear to have been peopled by the same tribes , so that there could scarcely exist that
radical diversity between the barbarians and those whom they invaded , which she supposes . We can see no other reason , as far as the interest of the inhabitants of the Roman empire was concerned , why it was necessary they should be blended with the
barbarians , than that this was the requisite preliminary to the formation of those new systems of policy , which have proved so much more favourable to the progress of civilization , than
even the freest republics of ancient times . But in respect to the barbarians themselves , a most important purpose was attained , and one which it seems could have been attained in
no other way . The civilization which the Roman could communicate , had reached its term ; if a bold and fortunate commander sometimes carried his arms beyond the Rhine , the Danube and the Euphrates , these acquisitions were made to be abandoned . The
people which needed and the people which possessed civilization , could mingle no further by the conquests of the latter ; peaceful intercourse was not agreeable to the habits of either ; there seemed , therefore , no method
remaining , but that the progress of conquest should be inverted . In reading ancient history , we are very apt to make ourselves parties to the feeling with which the Greeks and Romans
regarded all foreign nations as the mere materials of their triumphs , and to forget that these barbarians were members of the same great family from which the people who despised them had been called at an earlier hour
to civilization and knowledge , waiting their turn to be admitted to these benefits . In this equalisation of light *
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198 Review . — -Roscoe on the Origin and Vicissitudes of Literature .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), March 2, 1818, page 196, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2474/page/44/
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