sooner acquired ideas of civility, from the opportunity which that city above all others afforded them of seeing the felicities of polished life, of observing the conveniencies arising from political economy, of mixing with characters respectable for prudence and learning, and of employing in their counsels men of superior wisdom, whose instruction and advice they found it their interest to follow. But perhaps these northern adventurers, at least their princes and leaders, were not, even at their first migrations into the south, so totally savage and uncivilised as we are commonly apt to suppose. Their enemies have been their historians, who naturally painted these violent disturbers of the general repose in the warmest colours. It is not easy to conceive, that the success of their amazing enterprizes was merely the effect of numbers and tumultuary depredation; nor can I be persuaded, that the lasting and flourishing governments which they established in various parts of Europe, could have been framed by brutal force alone, and the blind efforts of unreflecting savages. Superior strength and courage must have contributed in a considerable degree to their rapid and extensive conquests; but at the same time, such mighty atchievements could not have been planned and executed without some extraordinary vigour of mind, uniform principles of conduct, and no common talents of political sagacity. Although these commotions must have been particularly unfavourable to the more elegant literature, yet Latin poetry, from a concurrence of causes, had for some time begun to relapse into barbarism. From the growing increase of christianity, it was deprived of its old fabulous embellishments, and chiefly employed in composing ecclesiastical hymns. Amid these impediments however, and the necessary degeneration of taste and style, a few poets supported the character of the Roman muse with tolerable dignity, during the decline of the Roman empire. These were Ausonius, Paulinus, Sidonius, Sedulius, Arator, Juvencus, Prosper, and Fortunatus. With the last, who flourished at the beginning of the sixth century, and was bishop of Poitiers, the Roman poetry is supposed to have expired. In the sixth century Europe began to recover some degree of tranquillity. Many barbarous countries during this period, particularly the inhabitants of Germany, of Friesland, and other northern nations, were converted to the christian faith. The religious controversies which at this time divided the Greek and Latin churches, roused the minds of men to literary enquiries. These disputes in some measure called forth abilities which otherwise would have been unknown and unemployed; and, together with the subtleties of argumentation, insensibly taught the graces of style, and the habits of composition. Many of the popes were persons of distinguished talents, and promoted useful knowledge no less by example than authority. Political union was by degrees established: and regular systems of government, which alone can ensure personal security, arose in the various provinces of Europe occupied by the Gothic tribes. The Saxons had taken possession of Britain, the Franks became masters of Gaul, the Huns of Pannonia, the Goths of Spain, and the Lombards of Italy. Hence leisure and repose diffused a mildness of manners, and introduced the arts of peace; and, awakening the human mind to a consciousness of its powers, directed its faculties to their proper objects. In the mean time, no small obstruction to the propagation or rather revival of letters was the paucity of valuable books. The libraries, particularly those of Italy, which abounded in numerous and inestimable treasures of literature, were every where destroyed by the precipitate rage and undistinguishing violence of the northern armies. Towards the close of the seventh century, even in the papal library at Rome, the number of books was so inconsiderable, that pope Saint Martin requested Sanctamand bishop of Maestricht, if possible, to supply this defect from the remotest parts of Germany 8. In f Care. Sæcul. Monoth. p. 440. Concil. Tom. xv. pag. 285. edit. Paris, 1641. the year 855, Lupus, abbot of Ferrieres in France, sent two of his monks to pope Benedict the third, to beg a copy of CICERO DE ORATORE, and QUINTILIAN'S INSTITUTES", and some other books: "for, says the abbot, although we have part of these books, yet there is no whole or complete copy of them in all France." Albert abbot of Gemblours, who with incredible labour and immense expense had collected an hundred volumes on theological and fifty on profane subjects, imagined he had formed a splendid library. About the year 790, Charlemagne granted an unlimited right of hunting to the There are very early manuscripts of Quintilian's Institutes, as we shall see below; and he appears to have been a favourite author with some writers of the middle ages. He is quoted by John of Salisbury, a writer of the eleventh century. Polycrat. vii. 14. iii. 7. x. 1. &c. And by Vincent of Beauvais, a writer of the thirteenth. Specul. Hist. x. 11. ix. 125. His declamations are said to have been abridged by our countryman Adelardus Bathoniensis, and dedicated to the bishop of Bayeux, about the year 1130. See Catal. Bibl. Leidens. p. 381. A.D. 1716. Poggius Florentinus, an eminent restorer of classical literature, says, that in the year 1446 he found a much more correct copy of Quintilian's Institutes than had been yet seen in Italy, almost perishing, at the bottom of a dark neglected tower of the monastery of Saint Gall, in France, together with the three first books and balf the fourth of Valerius Flaccus's Argonautics, and Asconius Pedianus's comment on eight orations of Tully. See Poggii Opp. p. 309. Amst. 1720. 8ve. The very copy of Quintilian, found by Poggius, is said to have been in lord Sunderland's noble library now at Blenheim. Poggius, in his dialogue De Infelicitate Principum, says of himself, that he travelled all over Germany in search of books. It is certain that by his means Quintilian, Tertullian, Asconius Pedianus, Lucretius, Sallust, Silius Italicus, Columella, Manilius, Tully's Orations, Ammianus Marcellinus, Valerius Flaccus, and some of the Latin grammarians, and other ancient * authors, were recovered from oblivion, and brought into general notice by being printed in the fifteenth century. Fr. Babarus Venetus, Collaudat. ad Pogg. dat. Venet. 1417. 7 Jul. See also Giornale de Letterati d'Italia, tom. ix. p. 178. x. p. 417. And Leonard. Aretin. Epist. lib. iv. p. 160. Chaucer mentions the Argonautics of Valerius Flaccus, as I have observed SECT. iii. p. 129. infr. Colomesius affirms that Silius Italicus is one of the classics discovered by Poggius in the tower of the monastery of Saint Gaul. Ad Gyrald. de Poet. Dial. iv. p. 240. But Philippo Rosso, in his Rittrato di Roma antica, mentions a very antient manuscript of this poet brought from Spain into the Vatican, having a picture of Hannibal, il quale hoggi si ritrova nella preditta libraria, p. 83. [From the following passage in one of Poggius's letters to Niccolo Niccoli, it appears that he had also travelled into England for the same purpose: "Mittas ad me oro Bucolicam Calphurnii et portiunculam Petronii quas misi tibi ex Britanniâ." See Ambr. Traversari Lat. Epist. &c. i. Præf. p. 49. It is probable, that upon this occasion he met with the copy of Quintilian above mentioned.— Douce.] i Murator. Antiq. Ital. iii. p. 835. And Lup. Ep. ad Baron. ad an. 856. R. 8, 9, 10. Fleury, Hist. Eccl. 1. lviii. c. 52. [This permission was not granted until after much entreaty on the part of the monks, and an assurance that the flesh of the deer would be the means of abbot and monks of Sithiu, for making their gloves and girdles of the skins of the deer they killed, and covers for their books'. We may imagine that these religious were more fond of hunting than reading*. It is certain that they were obliged to hunt before they could read: and at least it is probable, that under these circumstances, and of such materials, they did not manufacture many volumes. At the beginning of the tenth century books were so scarce in Spain, that one and the same copy of the bible, Saint Jerom's Epistles, and some volumes of ecclesiastical offices and martyrologies, often served several different monasteries". Among the constitutions given to the monks of England by archbishop Lanfranc, in the year 1072, the following injunction occurs. At the beginning of Lent, the librarian is ordered to deliver a book to each of the religious: a whole year was allowed for the perusal of this book: and at the returning Lent, those monks who had neglected to read the books they had respectively received, are commanded to prostrate themselves before the abbot, and to supplicate his indulgence". This regulation was partly occasioned by the low state of literature which Lanfranc found in the English mona re-establishing the health of their sick brethren, as well as for the other reasons above mentioned. That monks were addicted to the pleasures of the chase, appears from Chaucer's description of the monk in his Canterbury Tales.-DOUCE.] 1 Mabillon, De Re Dipl. p. 611. * [Hunting appears to have been expressly forbidden the religious of all denominations, as a profane amusement altogether incompatible with their profession. They obtained, however, this indulgence under certain restrictions, particularly set forth in their charters. It was a privilege allowed even to nuns. See more on this subject in M. le Grand's Vie privée des Français, tom. i. p. 323. By the laws of Eadgar, priests were prohibited from hunting, hawking, and drinking: "Docemus etiam ut sacerdos non sit venator, neque accipitrarius, neque potator. Sed incumbat libris suis sicut ordinem ipsius decet." Wilkins's Leges Anglo-Saxon. p. 86.-DOUCE.] [The Latin version which is here followed, is as usual inaccurate. The original text forbids a less disgraceful indulgence than "compotation," and contains a ludicrous play of words, hardly admissible in our present legal enactments: ne tæflere, ac plegge on his bocum swa his hade gebirath: i. e. nor tabler (player at tables), but let him play in his books as becomes his order (hood). -EDIT.] Fleury, ubi supr. 1. liv. c. 54. See other instances in Hist. Lit. Fr. par Rel. Benedict. vii. 3. "Unusquisque reddat librum qui ad legendum sibi alio anno fuerat commendatus: et qui cognoverat se non legisse librum, quem recepit, prostratus culpam dicat, et indulgentiam petat. Iterum librorum custos unicuique fratrum alium librum tribuat ad legendum." Wilkins. Concil. i. 332. See also the order of the Provincial chapter, De occupatione mónachorum. Reyner, Append. p. 129. t 1 steries. But at the same time it was a matter of necessity, and is in great measure to be referred to the scarcity of copies of useful and suitable authors. In an inventory of the goods of John de Pontissara, bishop of Winchester, contained in his capital palace of Wulvesey, all the books which appear are nothing more than "Septendecem pecie librorum de diversis Scienciis." This was in the year 1294. The same prelate, in the year 1299, borrows of his cathedral convent of St. Swithin at Winchester, BIBLIAM BENE GLOSSATAM, that is, the Bible, with marginal Annotations, in two large folio volumes: but gives a bond for due return of the loan, drawn up with great solemnity P. This Bible had been bequeathed to the convent the same year by Pontissara's predecessor, bishop Nicholas de Ely: and in consideration of so important a bequest, that is, "pro bona Biblia dicti episcopi bene glosata," and one hundred marks in money, the monks founded a daily mass for the soul of the donor. When a single book was bequeathed to a friend or relation, it was seldom without many restrictions and stipulations'. If any person gave a book to a religious house, he believed that so valuable a donation merited eternal salvation, and he offered it on the altar with great ceremony. The most formidable anathemas were peremptorily denounced against those who should dare to alienate a book Registr. Pontissar. f. 126. MS. "Omnibus Christi fidelibus presentes literas visuris vel inspecturis, Johannes dei gracia Wynton episcopus, salutem in domino. Noveritis nos ex commodato recepisse a dilectis filiis nostris Priore et conventu ecclesie nostre Wynton, unam Bibliam, in duobus volumi-, nibus bene glosatam, que aliquando fuit bone memorie domini Nicolai Wynton episcopi predecessoris nostri, termino perpetuo, seu quamdiu nobis placuerit, inspiciendam, tenendam, et habendam. Ad cujus Restitutionem eisdem fideliter et sine dolo faciendam, obligamus nos per presentes: quam si in vita nostra non restituerimus eisdem, obligamus executores nostros, et omnia bona nostra mobilia et immobilia, ecclesiastica et mundana, cohercioni et districtioni cu juscunque judicis ecclesiastici et secula- 4 Ibid. f. 19. As thus: "Do Henrico Morie scolari meo, si contingat eum presbyterari: aliter erit liber domini Johannis Sory, sic quod non vendatur, sed transeat inter cognatos meos, si fuerint aliqui inventi: sin autem, ab uno presbytero ad alium." Written at the end of Latin Homelies on the Canticles, MSS. Reg. 5. C. iii. 24. Brit. Mus. |