CRAXE— MEDL^VAL SERMON-BOOKS AND STORIES. 399 



exempla are contained. Finally, he admits that certain stories, 

 properly speaking, are not exempla, as they are taken from chro)i- 

 icles, but claims that they belong to this selection since they contain 

 materials encountered in exempla, e. g.. No. 7. " Amicus et Amelius." 



Dr. Klapper's second collection is taken largely (164 stories) 

 from a single manuscript and may be dated about the end of the 

 thirteenth century. The group of stories just mentioned was evi- 

 dently made for the use of preachers, but are not arranged in any 

 systematic manner, alphabetical or topical. The editor thinks that 

 traces of the use of such systematic collections may be found in the 

 manuscript from which the majority of stories are taken. There 

 are small groups of stories devoted to the miracles of the Virgin, 

 penance, confession, temptation, liberality, justice, avarice, and 

 drunkenness. What collections were used it is impossible to say, 

 but the miracles of the Virgin resemble closely those in a ]SIS. of the 

 British ^luseum, Additional 18929 (Ward's " Catalogue," Vol. II., 

 p. 656), which came from the monastery of St. Peter at Erfurt. Dr. 

 Klapper thinks we must assume the existence at that spot, at the end 

 of the thirteenth century, of a collection of miracles of the Virgin 

 used by ^Middle German Dominicans and probably put together 

 by them, from which the London collection and most of the miracles 

 in the collection before us are derived. 



As I have already said the literary form of the exemphim differs 

 considerably in the various collections. Sometimes the story is ar- 

 independent tale of some length, sometimes it is (notably in the 

 systematic treatises for the use of preachers) the merest sketch, to 

 be expanded and adorned at the will of the preacher. Both of 

 Klapper's collections (although the exempla were undoubtedly in- 

 tended originally for use in sermons) contain almost exclusively 

 stories of the former class. It is only necessary to compare these 

 exempla with those in the " Speculum Laicorum " to see the great 

 difference between the two classes. Dr. Klapper's first collection as 

 we have jvist seen contained only such stories as were quoted without 

 specification of source, or the source of which is no longer known 

 to us at the present time. The second collection, now under con- 

 sideration, is taken, as has been said, largely from one manuscript, 

 and the stories are given just as they occur in it. Curiously 



