432 



GERMANY. (LITERATURE AND SCIENCE.) 



poetry degenerated to a mere mechanical labour. 

 Nevertheless, there were, among the Mastersingers, 

 men like Hans Sachs, and before him, Hans Rosen- 

 plut and Hans Foil, who laid the foundation of the 

 German theatre. Hans Sachs (1494 1576), per- 

 haps the most fertile of poets, excepting the Span- 

 iard, Lope de Vega, was the most distinguished. 

 Tiie period of the Mastersingers, in general, displays 

 much comic and satiric humour. The celebrated 

 satirical poems of this period were, at the same time, 

 effects and causes of the great intellectual fermenta- 

 tion which resulted in the reformation. Among 

 1 1 ifin are distinguished Renard the Fox, by Henry of 

 Alckmaer ; the Narrenschiff (Ship of Fools), by Se- 

 bastian Brand ; Thomas Murner's Narrenbeschwo- 

 rung (Conspiracy of Fools), and Schellenzunft, Rol- 

 lenhagen's Froschmausler, and the writings of John 

 Fischart. Unconnected with these schools are many 

 popular songs, produced in the thirteenth century, 

 which, from the variety of their subjects, relating to 

 all the ranks, feelings, and situations of life in those 

 times, and their spirit, liveliness, boldness and 

 gayety, present a phenomenon in literature. In the 

 fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, singing and music 

 had become a necessary amusement of the German 

 people. This produced a popular poetry, which 

 spread through all classes of society, and superseded, 

 in some measure, the degenerate productions of the 

 Mastersingers ; as instances, may be mentioned the 

 excellent war songs of Veit Weber. In the seven- 

 teenth century, the revival of learning, and the de- 

 cline of the national prosperity, were equally injuri- 

 ous to this kind of poetry. In the fifteenth and six- 

 teenth centuries, epic poetry began to assume an 

 allegorical and historical character, as, for instance, 

 Melchior Pfinzing's, Teuerdank (of which the em- 

 peror Maximilian I. is the hero), and to approach 

 the form of the romance. Ballads had already be- 

 come distinct from the longer romantic poems, and 

 gave rise to those popular books, Die Melusine, Ma- 

 galone, the reading of which is the delight of the 

 lower classes at the present day ; and to which have 

 been added later original productions, as the famous 

 Till Eulenspiegel. See Eulenspiegel. 



III. The third period of German poetry com- 

 mences with Luther, not so much on account of his 

 poetry as on account of his influence as the creator 

 of a new German language. Asa religious poet, he 

 stands between this and the former period. His 

 hymns are animated and vigorous ; his images are 

 taken from the Bible ; his poetical style and lan- 

 guage he formed himself, and took the materials, 

 not so much from any preceding poetry as from the 

 circumstances of his country at the time. With him 

 began a series of sacred poetry, which for a long 

 time was unaffected by the influences of profane 

 poetry. Melissus Andrea and Weckherlin were the 

 earliest writers of the new school. The latter enter- 

 tained the design of transforming the poetry of his 

 country. He introduced the ^Alexandrine verse. 

 At the head of the first Silesian school was Martin 

 Opitz, of Boberfeld (born at Buntzlau, 1579, died 

 1639.) He endeavoured to supply by correctness 

 what he wanted in inventive genius, and, in this 

 respect, was of service to the language. The 

 ancient classics were his models ; yet he was con- 

 tented with imitating the French, and their imitators, 

 the Dutch poets. He introduced the use of quantity, 

 instead of framing his verses merely with reference 

 to the number of syllables. As he is not without 

 richness of imagery and warmth of feeling, his 

 lyrical poems contributed, notwithstanding his false 

 taste, to revive and enrich German poetry. Among 

 his numerous followers, many of whom are religious 

 l>oets, the most distinguished are Paul Flemming 



(I GOG 40), Sim. Dach (160559), A. Tschernina 

 (161159), Paul Gerhard (160676), F. von Logan 

 (IG04 55), A. Gryphius (1016 46), John Rist 

 (1607 67), George Phil. Harsdorfer and Joh. Klai, 

 the founders of the Order of Flowers. The thirty 

 years' war destroyed, in a great measure, the Ger- 

 man national character and feeling. In the midst of 

 its desolation appeared two poets, full of patriotism 

 and mystical enthusiasm, both Jesuits. The first. 

 Jacob Balde (1603 62), wrote in Latin verse ; the 

 other, Frederic Spec, published his poems in Ger- 

 man, under the title Trutz Nachtigall. In this 

 period, a number of poetical societies were estab- 

 lished ; for instance, Die fruchtbringende (the fruit 

 bearing), founded 1616, by prince Louis of Anhalt ; 

 the Order of Flowers, the Shepherds of the Pegnitz, 

 established 1644, at Nuremberg, and others, most of 

 which aimed at the improvement and unity of the 

 language, and the reformation of poetry, but eventu- 

 ally degenerated into petty pedantry and affectation. 

 With the second Silesian school, an affected imita- 

 tion of foreign taste, particularly of the French, de- 

 graded German poetry to the lowest degree. Chris- 

 tian Hoffmann, of Hoffmannswaldau (1618 79), a 

 poet of some wit, but without genuine feeling, intro- 

 duced the conceits of Marino and similar poetasters 

 to the admiration of his contemporaries. His poetry 

 is bombastic, impure, and empty ; he endeavoured 

 to hide his want of genuine feeling by a revolting 

 sentimentality. The same false taste also wasted 

 the poetical talents of Daniel Gasper von Lohenstein 

 (1635 83), to whom fire and originality cannot be 

 denied, notwithstanding his conceited and antitheti- 

 cal style. His novel Arminiusand Thusneldaun\tes 

 uncommon vigour with the greatest faults of his 

 time. His imitators are distinguished by exaggera- 

 tion and affected sentimentality ; as, for instance, 

 Henry Ariselm von Ziegler (1663 97), author of the 

 Asiatic Banise. This mania lasted till the middle of 

 the eighteenth century, and was ineffectually opposed 

 by the satire of Wernike and others. It was fol- 

 lowed by a flood of stale and insipid occasional 

 poems, among the authors of which, the baron 

 Canitz (1654 99), Neukirch, Besser, &c., were 

 celebrated in their time. Only a genius like that of 

 the unfortunate Gunther, was able to sustain itself 

 above the general deluge. Gottsched endeavoured to 

 purify the language from foreign additions; but, on the 

 other hand, he deprived poetry of life, by placing its 

 chief merit in smoothness and clearness, in the 

 French taste. He was soon opposed by the Swiss, 

 Boclmer, and Breitinger, who were animated by the 

 great minds of antiquity and the spirit of English 

 poetry, and who endeavoured to revive the German 

 poetry of the middle ages. Albert von Haller sup- 

 ported this school by his vigorous poems, abounding 

 in thought. Gottsched' s school was followed by the 

 Leipsic association of younger poets and authors, 

 some of whom are to be mentioned as the heralds of 

 the golden age of German poetry ; as, for instance, 

 J. A. Cramer (died 1788), Chr. Furchtegott Geller, 

 (died 1769), with his fables and sacred hymns; G.W. 

 Rabener (died 1770), known by his satires ; F. W. 

 Gleim (died 1803), more successful in his war songs 

 than in his Anacreontics ; Chr. F. von Kleist (died 

 1759), I. P. Uz (died 1796), F. W. Zacharia (died 

 1777), a satiric? 1 poet, not without wit and imagina- 

 tion. Frederic von Hagedorn (died 1754) was dis- 

 tinguished for an easy and natural style and refined 

 taste ; Solomon Gessner, the creator of a new idyllic 

 poetry, was cliaracterizecl by simplicity and inno- 

 cence, and a taste for the beauties of nature. The 

 revolution was finally effected chiefly by three men. 

 unlike each other in every respect, except in their 

 just esteem for antiquity, and an independence and 





