BIOGRAPHER, HISTORIAN, AND MAN OF LETTERS. 243 



Scotus, Florence of Worcester, Eadmer, Ordericus Vitalis, 

 William of Malmsbury, Wace, Henry of Huntingdon, Fitz- 

 stephen, Thomas of Ely, and so on through subsequent 

 reigns, in which the relationship continues for a long time 

 to be marked, but during which the rise of secular competi 

 tors in the sphere of literature becomes gradually manifest. 

 Even without specification of such facts we might safely 

 infer that since, during mediaeval days, there was scarcely 

 any culture save that of ecclesiastics, the writing of biogra 

 phy and history was, by the necessities of the case, limited 

 to them. 



686. That fiction has developed out of biography 

 scarcely needs proof. Unless a biographer is accurate, 

 which even modern biographers rarely are and which an 

 cient biographers certainly were not, it inevitably happens 

 that there is more or less of fancy mingled with his fact. 

 The same tendencies which in early times developed anec 

 dotes of chiefs into mythological stories of them as gods, 

 operated universally, and necessarily produced in narratives 

 of men s lives exaggerations which greatly distorted them. 

 If we remember the disputes among the Greeks respecting 

 the birthplaces of poets and philosophers we see how reck 

 less were men s statements and how largely the actual was 

 perverted by the imaginary. So, too, on coming down to 

 Christian times it nefcds but to name the miracles described 

 in the lives of the saints to have abundant proof of such vitia 

 tions. As in our own days the repeater of an anecdote, or 

 circulator of a scandal, is tempted to make his or her story 

 interesting by making much of the striking points; so, still 

 more in early days, when truth was less valued than now, 

 were stories step by step perverted as they passed from 

 mouth to mouth. 



Of course the narrator who gave the most picturesque 

 version of an adventure or achievement was preferred by 

 listeners; and, of course, ever tempted to increase the im- 



