STUDY OF ROMANCE MEDIEVAL LITERATURE 451 



and expression " that might be vividly felt by the author's country- 

 men, arid even some fragments of general beauty sufficient for the 

 admiration of all nations," 1 he ended the study of Dante by calling 

 him not only the greatest poet of the Middle Ages, but "a poet 

 whose sublime and spontaneous verses will never be forgotten as 

 long as the Italian tongue exists, as long as poetry is beloved in the 

 world." 2 



Villemain could speak of Dante with first-hand knowledge; but the 

 greater part of the medieval domain w r as for him (nor does he at all 

 hide this) 3 an unknown country. Hence it is all the more noteworthy 

 that he should enter there to stay. 4 Far different is the case of a man 

 for whom towards the end of the very year that Villemain ventured 

 on these shores, 1830, a new chair of Litterature Etrangere had been 

 founded in the same Faculte des Lettres. 5 "Have you not known 

 in Paris. Fauriel, the editor of the popular songs of Greece? He 

 is one of the pleasantcst Frenchmen I have ever met, and at that 

 time" (in 1814) "he did much in Provencal, possessing accurate 

 copies even of MSS. in the Vatican, and intending to publish some 

 longer narrative compositions that Raynouard docs not mention at 

 all." Thus Jakob Grimm wrote to Diez in 1826. 6 "Oneof the pleasant- 

 est Frenchmen " ; let us add, in genius of the richest, and, perhaps, also 

 the greatest scholar amongst them. And how well within him the 

 powers of the mind, which transformed into living forces the heavy 

 food of erudition, answered to profound goodness! Consider Fauriel, 

 such as Sainte-Beuve has known how to paint him with his magic 

 palette, 7 look at him as he shows himself in his letters, and then try 



1 La Harpp, Cours de Litterature ancienne et modcrne, in the "Discours sur 

 1'etat des Lettres en Europe, depuis la fin du siecle de Louis XIV " (vol. iv, p. 178. 

 in the edition of 1817). La Harpe means, in his own manner, to exalt the influence 

 exercised by Italy at the end of the middle ages : "... Ces deux hommes furent le 



Dante et Petrarque: 1'un, dans un poeme d'ailleurs monstrueux et rempli d'ex- 

 travagances que la manie paradoxale de notre siecle a pu seule justih'er et pre- 

 coniser, a repandu une foule de beautes de si'.yle et d'expression qui devaicnt ("ire 

 vivenient senties par ses compatriotes, et memo quelques morceaux assez gene- 

 ralement beaux pour etre admires de toutes les nations . . ." 



2 Cnitrs de Literature francaisc, Littirature du moyc.n age, vol. I, p. -110: ''C'est 

 dans ce melange de sentiments si divers, d'inspirations si opposees. que s'est forme 

 le plus grand poete du moyen age, ee poete dont les vers suhlinn s et nalurels no 

 s'oublieront jamais, tant que la langue italienne sera conservce, taut que la poesie 

 si'i-a eherie dans le monde." 



3 Ibid., p. 1: "Jusqu'a present, je parlais de choses que je connaissais assez 

 bien. . . . Maintenant, je vais parler de choses que je sais a peinc, que j'apprcnds 

 a inesure que je les clis." 



4 The importance of the subject is proclaimed in the " Avertissement des 

 editturs": "Pour la premiere fois, dans une chaire publique de France, on aura 

 cssaye" d'expo<cr le developpement simultane de plusieiirs litteraturos qui sont 

 sorties de la meme sourc<\ qui se toucli;iient dans l"iirs eommencemcTils. (pii se 

 sont souvc nt rapprochees dans leurs procres, i t <|iii n'ont cesse de communique! 1 

 ensemble." 



5 I should be glad to know that in this fart Villemain had a part. IT" was at the 

 time a member of the Royal Council of Public Instruction, and could exercise a 

 great authority. 



6 Zeittn-l>r. j. roman. PJiilol.. vol. vr, p. 501. 



7 Portraits contcmporains, vol. iv. 



