A. Forster (1754-1794), who had accompanied Cook round the | Weimar, with which its leaders were in essential sympathy, world, and Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859), gave Germany but against the shallow, utilitarian rationalism of Berlin. models of clear and lucid descriptive writing. In practical Ludwig Tieck (1773-1853), a leading member of the school, politics and economics, when once the unbalanced vagaries of was in reality a belated Stürmer und Dränger, who in his early undiluted Rousseauism had fallen into discredit, Germany pro-years had chafed under the unimaginative tastes of the Prussian duced much wise and temperate thinking which prevented the capital, and sought for a positive faith to put in their place. spread of the French Revolution to Germany, and provided Friedrich Hölderlin (1770-1843), one of the most gifted poets of a practical basis on which the social and political fabric could this age, demonstrates no less clearly than Tieck the essential be built up anew, after the Revolution had made the old régime affinity between Sturm und Drang and Romanticism; he, too, impossible in Europe. Men like Wilhelm von Humboldt (1767- forms a bridge from the one individualistic movement to the 1835) and the philosopher J. G. Fichte (1762-1814) were, in other. The theoretic basis of Romanticism was, however, two widely different spheres, representative of this type of | established by the two brothers, August Wilhelm and Friedrich intellectual eminence. Schlegel (1767-1845 and 1772-1829), who, accepting, in great measure, Schiller's aesthetic conclusions, adapted them to the needs of their own more subjective attitude towards literature. While Schiller, like Lessing before him, insisted on the critic's right to sit in judgment according to a definite code of principles, these Romantic critics maintained that the first duty of criticism was to understand and appreciate; the right of genius to follow its natural bent was sacred. The Herzensergiessungen eines kunstliebenden Klosterbruders by Tieck's school-friend W. H. Wackenroder (1773-1798) contained the Romantic art-theory, while the hymns and fragmentary novels of Friedrich von Hardenberg (known as Novalis, 1772-1801), and the dramas and fairy tales of Tieck, were the characteristic products of Romantic literature. The universal sympathies of the movement were exemplified by the many admirable translations-greatest of all, Schlegel's Shakespeare (1797-1810)-which were produced under its auspices. Romanticism was essentially conciliatory in its tendencies, that is to say, it aimed at a reconciliation of poetry with other provinces of social and intellectual life; the hard and fast boundaries which the older critics had set up as to what poetry might and might not do, were put aside, and the domain of literature was regarded as co-extensive with life itself; painting and music, philosophy and ethics, were all accepted as constituent elements of or aids to Romantic poetry. Fichte, and to a much greater extent, F. W. J. von Schelling (1775-1854) were the exponents of the Romantic doctrine in philosophy, while the theologian F. E. D. Schleiermacher (1768-1834) demonstrated how vital the revival of individualism was for religious thought.

Meanwhile, in 1794, that friendship between Goethe and Schiller had begun, which lasted, unbroken, until the younger poet's death in 1805. These years mark the summit of Goethe and Schiller's classicism, and the great epoch of Weimar's history as a literary focus. Schiller's treatises had provided a theoretical basis; his new journal, Die Horen, might be called the literary organ of the movement—although in this respect the subsequent Musenalmanach, in which the two poets published their magnificent ballad poetry, had more value. Goethe, as director of the ducal theatre, could to a great extent control dramatic production in Germany. Under his encouragement, Schiller turned from philosophy to poetry and wrote the splendid series of classic dramas beginning with the trilogy of Wallenstein and closing with Wilhelm Tell and the fragment of Demetrius; while to Goethe we owe, above all, the epic of Hermann und Dorothea. Less important were the latter's severely classical plays Die naiürliche Tochter and Pandora; but it must not be forgotten that it was chiefly owing to Schiller's stimulus that in those years Goethe brought the first part of Faust(1808)to a conclusion. Although acknowledged leaders of German letters, Goethe and Schiller had considerable opposition to contend with. The Sturm und Drang had by no means exhausted itself, and the representatives of the once dominant rationalistic movement were particularly arrogant and overbearing. The literature associated with both Sturm und Drang and rationalism was at this period palpably decadent; no comparison could be made between the magnificent achievements of Goethe and Schiller, or even of Herder and Wieland with the "family" dramas of Iffland, still less with the extraordinarily popular plays of A. von The Romantic school, whose chief members were the brothers Kotzebue (1761-1819), or with those bustling medieval Ritter- Schlegel, Tieck, Wackenroder and Novalis, was virtually founded dramen, which were especially cultivated in south Germany. in 1798, when the Schlegels began to publish their journal the There is a wide gap between Moritz's Anton Reiser or the philo- Athenaeum; but the actual existence of the school was of very sophic novels which Klinger wrote in his later years, and Goethe's short duration. Wackenroder and Novalis died young, and by Meister; nor can the once so fervently admired novels of Jean the year 1804 the other members were widely separated. Two Paul Richter (1763-1825) take a very high place. Neither the years later, however, another phase of Romanticism became fantastic humour nor the penetrating thoughts with which associated with the town of Heidelberg. The leaders of this Richter's books are strewn make up for their lack of artistic form second or younger Romantic school were K. Brentano (1778and interest; they are essentially products of Sturm und Drang. 1842), L. A. von Arnim (1781-1831) and J. J. von Görres (1776Lastly, in the province of lyric and epic poetry, it is impossible 1848), their organ, corresponding to the Athenaeum, was the to regard poets like the gentle F. von Matthisson (1761-1831), Zeitung für Einsiedler, or Tröst-Einsamkeit, and their most or the less inspired G. L. Kosegarten (1758-1818) and C. A. characteristic production the collection of Volkslieder, published Tiedge (1752-1841), as worthily seconding the masterpieces under the title Des Knaben Wunderhorn (1805–1808). Compared of Goethe and Schiller. Thus when we speak of the greatness with the carlier school the Heidelberg writers were more practical of Germany's classical period, we think mainly of the work of and realistic, more faithful to nature and the commonplace life her two chief poets; the distance that separated them from of everyday. They, too, were interested in the German past their immediate contemporaries was enormous. Moreover, at and in the middle ages, but they put aside the idealizing glasses the very close of the 18th century a new literary movement of their predecessors and kept to historic truth; they wrote arose in admitted opposition to the classicism of Weimar, and historical novels, not stories of an imaginary medieval world to this movement, which first took definite form in the Romantic as Novalis had done, and when they collected Volkslieder and school, the sympathies of the younger generation turned. Just Volksbücher, they refrained from decking out the simple tradition as in the previous generation the Sturm und Drang had been with musical effects, or from heightening the poetic situation obliged to make way for a return to classic and impersonal by Romantic irony." Their immediate influence on German principles of literary composition, so now the classicism of Goethe intellectual life was consequently greater; they stimulated and Schiller, which had produced masterpieces like Wallenstein and deepened the interest of the German people in their own and Hermann und Dorothea, had to yield to a revival of individual-past; and we owe to them the foundations of the study of ism and subjectivity, which, in the form of Romanticism, pro- German philology and medieval literature, both the brothers foundly influenced the literature of the whole 19th century. Jakob and Wilhelm Grimm (1785-1863 and 1786-1859) having (c) The Romantic Movement.-The first Romantic school, been in touch with this circle in their early days. Again, the however, was founded, not as a protest against the classicism of Heidelberg poets strengthened the national and patriotic spirit

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of their people; they prepared the way for the rising against | poet. But, on the other hand, he was too liberal-minded a Napolcon, which culminated in the year 1813, and produced thinker and critic to be oblivious to the fruitful influence of the that outburst of patriotic song, associated with E. M. Arndt new movement. Almost without exception he judged the young (1769-1860), K. Th. Körner (1791-1813) and M. von Schenken- poets of the new century fairly, and treated them sympathetically dorf (1783-1817). and kindly; he was keenly alive to the new-and for the most part "unclassical "-development of literature in England, France and Italy; and his own published work, above all, the first part of Faust (1808), Die Wahlverwandtschaften (1809), Dichtung und Wahrheit (1811-1814, a final volume in 1833), Westöstlicher Divan (1819), Wilhelm Meisters Wanderjahre (1821-1829) and the second part of Faust (published in 1832 after the poet's death), stood in no antagonism to the Romantic ideas of their time. One might rather say that Goethe was the bond between the two fundamental literary movements of the German classical age; that his work achieved that reconciliation of "classic" and "romantic" which, rightly regarded, was the supreme aim of the Romantic school itself.

The subsequent history of Romanticism stands in close relation to the Heidelberg school, and when, about 1809, the latter broke up, and Arnim and Brentano settled in Berlin, the Romantic movement followed two clearly marked lines of development, one north German, the other associated, with Württemberg. The Prussian capital, hotbed of rationalism as it was, had, from the first, been intimately associated with Romanticism; the first school had virtually been founded there, and north Germans, like Heinrich von Kleist (1777-1811) and Zacharias Werner (1768-1823) had done more for the development of the Romantic drama than had the members of either Romantic school. These men, and more especially Kleist, Prussia's greatest dramatic poet, showed how the capricious VI. GERMAN LITERATURE SINCE GOETHE (1832-1906) Romantic ideas could be brought into harmony with the classic tradition established by Schiller, how they could be rendered (a) Young Germany.-With Goethe's death a great age in serviceable to the national theatre. At the same time, Berlin German poetry came to a close. Long before 1832 Romanticism was not a favourable soil for the development of Romantic had, as we have seen, begun to lose ground, and the July revolu ideas, and the circle of poets which gathered round Arnim and tion of 1830, the effects of which were almost as keenly felt in Brentano there, either themselves demonstrated the decadence Germany as in France, gave the movement its death-blow, of these ideas, or their work contained elements which in sub- Meanwhile the march of ideas in Germany itself had not been sequent years hastened the downfall of the movement. Friedrich favourable to Romanticism. Schelling had given place to G. de la Motte Fouqué (1777-1843), for instance, shows how easy W. F. Hegel (1770-1831), now the dominant force in German it was for the medieval tastes of the Romanticists to degenerate philosophy, and the Hegelian metaphysics proved as unfruitful into mediocre novels and plays, hardly richer in genuine poetry an influence on literature as that of Fichte and Schelling had been than were the productions of the later Sturm und Drang; and fruitful. The transference of Romantic ideas to the domain E. T. A. Hoffmann (1776-1822), powerful genius though he of practical religion and politics had proved reactionary in its was, cultivated with preference in his stories, a morbid super-effects; Romanticism became the cloak for a kind of Neonaturalism, which was only a decadent form of the early Romantic catholicism, and Romantic politics, as enunciated by men like delight in the world of fairies and spirits. The lyric was less F. von Gentz (1764–1832) and Adam Müller (1779-1829), served sensitive to baleful influences, but even here the north German as an apology for the Metternich régime in Austria. Only at Romantic circle could only point to one lyric poet of the first the universities-in Göttingen, Heidelberg and Berlin-did rank, J. von Eichendorff (1788-1857); while in the poetry of the movement continue, in the best sense, to be productive; A. von Chamisso (1781-1838) the volatile Romantic spirituality German philology, German historical science and German is too often wanting. Others again, like Friedrich Rückert jurisprudence benefited by Romantic ideas, long after Romantic (1788-1866), sought the inspiration which Romanticism was no poetry had fallen into decay. The day of Romanticism was longer able to give, in the East; still another group, of which clearly over; but a return to the classic and humanitarian spirit Wilhelm Müller (1794-1827) is the chief representative, followed of the 18th century was impossible. The social condition of Byron's example and awakened German sympathy for the Europe had been profoundly altered by the French Revolution; oppressed Grecks and Poles. the rise of industrialism had created new economic problems. the march of science had overturned old prejudices. And in a still higher degree were the ideas which lay behind the social upheaval of the July revolution incompatible with a reversion in Germany to the conditions of Weimar classicism. There was, moreover, no disguising the fact that Goethe himself did not stand high with the younger generation of German writers who came into power after his death.

Apart from Eichendorff, the vital lyric poetry of the third and last phase of Romanticism must be looked for in the Swabian school, which gathered round Uhland. Ludwig Uhland (17871862) was himself a disciple of the Heidelberg poets, and, in his lyrics and especially in his ballads, he succeeded in grafting the lyricism of the Romantic school on to the traditions of German ballad poetry which had been handed down from Bürger, Schiller and Goethe. But, as was the case with so many other disciples | of the Heidelberg Romanticists, Uhland's interest in the German past was the serious interest of the scholar rather than the purely poetic interest of the earlier Romantic pocts. The merit of the Swabian circle, the chief members of which were J. Kerner (1786-1862), G. Schwab (1792-1850), W. Waiblinger (1804-1830), W. Hauff (1802-1827) and, most gifted of all, E. Mörike (18041875) was that these writers preserved the Romantic traditions from the disintegrating influences to which their north German contemporaries were exposed. They introduced few new notes into lyric poetry, but they maintained the best traditions intact, and when, a generation later, the anti-Romantic movement of " Young Germany " had run its course, it was to Württemberg Germany looked for a revival of the old Romantic ideas.

Meanwhile, in the background of all these phases of Romantic evolution, through which Germany passed between 1798 and 1832, stands the majestic and imposing figure of Goethe. Personally he had in the early stages of the movement been opposed to that reversion to subjectivity and lawlessness which the first Romantic school seemed to him to represent; to the end of his life he regarded himself as a 'classic," not a romantic"

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"Young Germany" did not form a school in the sense in which the word was used by the early Romanticists; the bond of union was rather the consequence of political persecution. In December 1835 the German "Bund" issued a decree suppressing the writings of the "literary school" known as "Young Germany," and mentioned by name Heinrich Heine, Karl Gutzkow, Ludolf Wienbarg, Theodor Mundt and Heinrich Laube. Of these men, Heine (1797-1856) was by far the most famous. He had made his reputation in 1826 and 1827 with Die Harzreise and Das Buch der Lieder, both of which books show how deeply he was immersed in the Romantic traditions. But Heine felt perhaps more acutely than any other man of his time how the ground was slipping away from beneath his feet; he repudiated the Romantic movement and hailed the July revolution as the first stage in the "liberation of humanity"; while ultimately he sought in France the freedom and intellectual stimulus which Germany withheld from him. Heine suffered from having been born in an age of transition; he was unable to realize in a wholehearted way all that was good in the new movement, which he had embraced so warmly; his optimism was counteracted by doubts as to whether, after all, life had not been better in that

old Romantic Germany of his childhood for which, to the last, | drama," but soon won an independent place for himself; more he retained so warm an affection. Personal disappointments and unhappiness added to the bitterness of Heine's nature, and the supremely gifted lyric poet and the hardly less gifted satirist were overshadowed by the cynic from whose biting wit nothing was safe.

movement, and his best work is of a purely lyric character. M. von Strachwitz's (1822-1847) promising talent did not flourish in the political atmosphere; Annette von Droste-Hülshoff (1797-1848), and the Austrian, Nikolaus Lenau (1802-1850), both stand far removed from the world of politics; they are imbued with that pessimistic resignation which is, more or less, characteristic of all German literature between 1850 and 1870.

Of greater importance was the fiction which owed its inspiration to the Romantic traditions that survived the "Young German" age. To this group belongs the novel of peasant and provincial life, of which Immermann had given an excellent example in Der Oberhof, a story included in the arabesque of Münchhausen. A Swiss pastor, Albrecht Bitzius, better known by his pseudonym "Jeremias Gotthelf" (1797-1854), was, however, the real founder of this class of romance; and his simple, unvarnished and naïvely didactic stories of the Swiss peasant were followed not long afterwards by the more famous Schwarzwälder Dorfgeschichten (1843-1854) of Berthold Auerbach (1812-1882). Auerbach is not by any means so naïve and realistic as Gotthelf, nor is his work free from tendencies and ideas which recall "Young German rationalism rather than the unsophisticated life of the Black Forest; but the Schwarzwälder Dorfgeschichten exerted a decisive influence; they were the forerunners of a large body of peasant literature which described with affectionate sympathy and with a liberal admixture of dialect, south German village life. With this group of writers may also be associated the German Bohemian, A. Stifter (1805-1868), who has called up unforgettable pictures and impressions of the life and scenery of his home.

(b) Mid-Century Literature.-When once the revolution of 1848 was over, a spirit of tranquillity came over German letters; but it was due rather to the absence of confidence in the future than to any hopefulness or real content. The literature of the middle of the century was not wanting in achievement, but there was nothing buoyant or youthful about it; most significant of all, the generation between 1848 and 1880 was either oblivious or indifferent to the good werk and to the new and germinating ideas which it produced. Hegel, who held the earlier half of the 19th century in his ban, was still all-powerful in the universities, but his power was on the wane in literature and public life. The so-called "Hegelian Left" had advanced so far as to have become incompatible with the original Hegelianism; the new social and economic theories did not fit into the scheme of Hegelian collectivism; the interest in natural science-fostered Meanwhile, the Low German peoples also benefited by the by the popular books of J. Moleschott (1822-1893), Karl Vogt | revival of an interest in dialect and peasant life; it is to the (1817-1895) and Ludwig Büchner (1824-1899)-created a credit of Fritz Reuter (1810-1874) that he brought honour healthy antidote to the Hegelian metaphysics. In literature and to the Plattdeutsch of the north, the dialects of which had art, on which Hegel, as we have seen, had exerted so blight-played a fitful, but by no means negligible rôle in the earlier ing an influence, his place was taken by the chief exponent history of German letters. His Mecklenburg novels, especially of philosophic pessimism, Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860). Ut de Franzosentid (1860), Ut mine Festungstid (1863) and Ut Schopenhauer's antagonism to Hegelianism was of old standing, mine Stromtid (1862-1864), are a faithful reflection of Mecklenfor his chief work, Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung, had burg life and temperament, and hold their place beside the best appeared as far back as 1819; but the century was more than German fiction of the period. What Reuter did for Plattdeutsch half over before the movement of ideas had, as it were, caught prose, his contemporary, Klaus Groth (1819-1899), the auther up with him, before pessimism became a dominant force in of Quickborn (1852), did for its verse. We owe, however, the best intellectual life. German prose fiction of these years to two writers, whose affinity with the older Romanticists was closer. The north German, Theodor Storm (1817-1888) is the author of a series of short stories of delicate, lyric inspiration, steeped in that elegiac Romanticism which harmonized so well with mid-century pessimism in Germany. Gottfried Keller (1819-1890), on the other hand, a native of Zürich, was a modern Romanticist of a robuster type; his magnificent autobiographical novel, Der grüne Heinrich (1854-1855), might be described as the last in the great line of Romantic fiction that had begun with Wilhem Meister, and the short stories, Die Leute von Seldwyla (18561874) and Züricher Novellen (1878) are masterpieces of the first rank.

The literature produced between 1850 and 1870 was preeminently one of prose fiction. The beginnings which the Young German" school had made to a type of novel dealing with social problems-the best example is Gutzkow's Ritter vom Geiste-developed rapidly in this succeeding epoch. Friedrich Spielhagen (born 1829) followed immediately in Gutzkow's footsteps, and in a series of romances from Problematische Naturen (1860) to Sturmflut (1876), discussed in a militant spirit that recalls Laube and Gutzkow the social problems which agitated German life in these decades. Gustav Freytag (1816-1895), although an older man, freed himself more successfully from the "Young German" tradition; his romance of German commercialism, Soll und Haben (1855), is the masterpiece of mid-century fiction of this class. Less successful was Freytag's subsequent attempt to transfer his method to the milieu of German academic life in Die verlorene Handschrift (1864). As was perhaps only natural in an age of social and political interests, the historical novel occupies a subordinate place. The influence of Scott, which in the earlier period had been strong, produced only one writer, Wilhelm Häring (" Willibald Alexis," 1798-1871), who was more than a mere imitator of the Scottish master. In the series of six novels, from Der Roland von Berlin to Dorothe, which Alexis published between | 1840 and 1856, he gave Germany, and more particularly Prussia, a historical fiction which might not unworthily be compared with the Waverley Novcls. But Alexis had no successor, and the historical novel soon made way for a type of fiction in which the accurate reproduction of remote conditions was held of more account than poetic inspiration or artistic power. Such are the antiquarian" novels of ancient Egyptian life by Georg Ebers (1837-1898), and those from primitive German history by Felix Dahn (born 1834). The vogue of historical fiction was also transferred to some extent, as in English literature, to novels of American life and adventure, of which the chief German cultivators were K. A. Postl, who wrote under the pseudonym of Charles Sealsfield (1793-1864) and Friedrich Gerstäcker (1816-1872).

In the dramatic literature of these decades, at least as it was reflected in the repertories of the German theatres, there was little promise. French influence was, in general, predominant; French translations formed the mainstay of the theatre-directors, while successful German playwrights, such as R. Benedix (18111873) and Charlotte Birch-Pfeiffer (1800-1868), have little claim to consideration in a literary survey. Custav Freytag's admirable comedy, Die Journalisten (1852), was one of the rare exceptions. But the German drama of this epoch is not to be judged solely by the theatres. At the middle of the century Germany could point to two writers who, each in his way, contributed very materially to the development of the modern drama. These were Friedrich Hebbel (1813-1863) and Otto Ludwig (1813-1865). Both of these men, as a later generation discovered, were the pioneers of that dramatic literature which at the close of the century accepted the canons of realism and aimed at superseding outward effects by psychological conflicts and problems of social life. Hebbel, especially, must be regarded as the most original and revolutionary German dramatist of the 19th century. Unlike his contemporary Grillparzer, whose aim had been to reconcile the "classic" and the "romantic" drama with the help of Spanish models, Hebbel laid the foundations of a psychological and social drama, of which the most modern interpreter has been Henrik Ibsen. Hebbel's first tragedy, Judith, appeared in 1840, his masterpieces, Herodes

und Marianne, Agnes Bernauer, Gyges und sein Ring, and the trilogy of Die Nibelungen between 1850 and 1862.

with his Chroniknovellen, and Paul Heyse were the acknowledged masters. It was not until at least a decade later that the genius of Gottfried Keller was generally recognized. The historical novel seemed, in those days, beyond hope of revival. Gustav Freytag, it is true, had made the attempt in Die Ahnen (18721881), a number of independent historical romances linked together to form an ambitious prose epic; but there was more of the spirit of Ebers and Dahn in Freytag's work than of the spacious art of Scott, or of Scott's disciple, Willibald Alexis. The drama of the 'seventies was in an even less hopeful condition than during the preceding period. The classical iambic tragedy was cultivated by the Munich school, by A. Wilbrandt (b. 1837), | A. Lindner (1831-1888), H. Kruse (1815-1902), by the Austrian F. Nissel (1831-1893), and A. Fitger (b. 1840); but it was characteristic of the time that Halm was popular, while Hebbel and Grillparzer were neglected, it might even be said ignored. The most gifted German dramatist belonging exclusively to the decade between 1870 and 1880 was an Austrian, Ludwig Anzengruber (1839-1889), whose Pfarrer von Kirchfeld (1870) recalled the controversies of the Kulturkampf. This was Anzengruber's first drama, and it was followed by a series of power

In this period of somewhat confused literary striving, there is, however, one body of writers who might be grouped together as a school, although the designation must be regarded rather as an outward accident of union than as implying conformity of aims. This is the group which Maximilian II. of Bavaria gathered round him in Munich between 1852 and 1860. A leading spirit of the group was Emanuel Geibel, who, as we have seen, set a model to the German lyric in this age; F. von Bodenstedt (1819-1892), the popular author of Mirza Schaffy; and J. V. von Scheffel (1826-1886), who, in his verse-romance, Der Trompeter von Säckingen (1854), broke a lance for a type of literature which had been cultivated somewhat earlier, but with no very conspicuous success, by men like O. von Redwitz (1823-1891) and G. Kinkel (1815-1882). The romance was, in fact, one of the favourite vehicles of poetic expression of the Munich school, its most successful exponents being J. Wolff (b. 1834) and R. Baumbach (1840-1905); while others, such as H. Lingg (1820-1905) and R. Hamerling (1830-1889) devoted themselves to the more ambitious epic. The general tone of the literary movement was pessimistic, the hopelessnessful plays dealing with the life of the Austrian peasant; Anzenof the spiritual outlook being most deeply engrained in the verse of H. Lorm (pseudonym for Heinrich Landesmann, 18211902) and H. Leuthold (1827-1879). On the whole, the most important member of the Munich group is Paul Heyse (b. 1830), who, as a writer of " Novellen" or short stories, may be classed with Storm and Keller. An essentially Latin genius, Heyse excels in stories of Italian life, where his lightness of touch and sense of form are shown to best advantage; but he has also written several long novels. Of these, Kinder der Welt (1873) and, in a lesser degree, Im Paradiese (1875), sum up the spirit and tendency of their time, just as, in earlier decades, Die Riller vom Geiste, Problematische Naturen and Soll und Haben were characteristic of the periods which produced them.

(c) German Literature after 1870.-In the years immediately following the Franco-German War, the prevailing conditions were unfavourable to literary production in Germany, and the re-establishment of the empire left comparatively little trace on the national literature. All minds were for a time engrossed by the Kulturkampf, by the financial difficulties-the so-called Gründertum-due to unscrupulous speculation, and, finally, by the rapid rise of social democracy as a political force. The intellectual basis of the latter movement was laid by Ferdinand Lassalle (1825-1864) and Karl Marx (1818-1883), author of Das Kapital (vol. i, 1867). But even had such disturbing elements been wanting, the general tone of German intellectual life at that time was not buoyant enough to inspire a vigorous literary revival. The influence of Hegel was still strong, and the "historical " method, as enunciated in Der alte und der neue Glaube (1872) by the Hegelian D. F. Strauss, was generally accepted at the German universities. To many the compromise which H. Lotze (1817-1881) had attempted to establish between science and metaphysics, came as a relief from the Hegelian tradition, but in literature and art the dominant force was still, as before the war, the philosophy of Schopenhauer. In his Philosophie des Unbewussten (1869), E. von Hartmann (18421906) endeavoured to bring pessimism into harmony with idealism. In lyric poetry, the dull monotony was broken by the excitement of the war, and the singers of the revolution of 1848 were among the first to welcome the triumph and unification of Germany. At the same time, men of the older generation, like Herwegh, Freiligrath and Geibel could ill conceal a certain disappointment with the new régime; the united, Germany of 1871 was not what they had dreamed of in their youth, when all hopes were set on the Frankfort parliament.

The novel continued to be what it was before 1870, the most vigorous form of German literature, but the novelists who were popular in the early 'seventies were all older men. Laube, Gutzkow and Auerbach were still writing; Fritz Reuter was a universal favourite; while among the writers of short stories, Storm, who, between 1877 and 1888, put the crown to his work

gruber was, indeed, one of the ablest exponents of that village life, which had attracted so many gifted writers since the days of Gotthelf and Auerbach. But the really popular dramatists of this epoch were either writers who, like Benedix in the older generation, cultivated the bourgeoise comedy-A. L'Arronge (b. 1838), G. von Moser (1825-1903), F. von Schönthan (b. 1849) and O. Blumenthal (b. 1852)—or playwrights, of whom P. Lindau (b. 1839) may he regarded as representative, who imitated French models. The only sign of progress in the dramatic history of this period was the marked improvement of the German stage, an improvement due, on the one hand, to the artistic reforms introduced by the duke of Meiningen in the Court theatre at Meiningen, and, on the other hand, to the ideals of a national theatre realized at Bayreuth by Richard Wagner (1813-1883). The greatest composer of the later 19th century is also one of Germany's leading dramatists; and the first performance of the trilogy Der Ring der Nibelungen at Bayreuth in the summer of 1876 may be said to have inaugurated the latest epoch in the history of the German drama.

The last fifteen or twenty years of the 19th century were distinguished in Germany by a remarkable literary activity. Among the younger generation, which was growing up as citizens of the united German empire, a more hopeful and optimistic spirit prevailed. The influence of Schopenhauer was on the wane, and at the universities Hegelianism had lost its former hold. The sponsor of the new philosophic movement was Kant, the master of 18th-century "enlightenment," and under the influence of the "neo-Kantian" movement, not merely German school philosophy, but theology also, was imbued with a healthier spirit. L. von Ranke (1795-1886) was still the dominant force in German historical science, and between 1881 and 1888 nine volumes appeared of his last great work, Weltgeschichte. Other historians of the period were H. von Sybel (1817-1895) and H. von Treitschke (1834-1896), the latter a vigorous and inspiring spokesman of the new political conditions; while J. Burckhardt (1818-1897), author of the masterly Kultur der Renaissance in Italien (1860) and the friend of Nietzsche, exerted an influence on German thought which was not confined to academic circles. Literary criticism perhaps benefited most of all by the dethronement of Hegel and the more objective attitude towards Schopenhauer; it seemed as if in this epoch the Germans first formed definite ideas-and ideas which were acceptable and accepted outside Germany-as to the rank and merits of their great poets. A marked change came over the nation's attitude towards Goethe, a poet to whom, as we have seen, neither the era of Hegel nor that of Schopenhauer had been favourable; Schiller was regarded with less national prejudice, and-most important of all--amends were made by the new generation for the earlier neglect of Kleist, Grillparzer, Hebbel and Keller.

The thinker and poet who most completely embodies the spirit