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LECTURE XII. 



ON THE MIDDLE OR DARK AGES. 



If we examine the history of Europe in a literary point of view, we 

 shall find it consist of three distinct periods — an era of light, of darkness^ 

 and of light restored. To the first of these periods I directed your atten- 

 tion in the preceding lecture. We noticed the general state of literature 

 and the mode of education adopted in Greece and Rome, at the most 

 splendid epochs of these celebrated republics, and briefly compared them 

 with the means of acquiring knowledge in our own day ; and we at the 

 same time glanced rapidly at the intervening space, or middle period ; or 

 rather only touched upon a few of its leading features, from an impossi- 

 bihty of compressing even a miniature sketch of its history into the limits 

 of a single lecture; though it maybe remembered that I threw out. a 

 pledge of returning to the subject on the present occasion, and of investi- 

 gating it in a more regular detail. 



A part of that pledge I shall now, by your permission, endeavour to re- 

 deem ; by taking a survey of the general literature, or ignorance of man- 

 kind, which characterized that wonderful era which has usually been de- 

 scribed by the name of the dark, or middle ages ; and which extends 

 fi-om the fall of Rome before the barbarous arms of the Goths, in the fifth 

 century, to the fall of Constantinople before the equally barbarous arms of 

 the Turks, in the fifteenth century ; thus comprising a long afilictive night 

 of not less than ,a thousand years ; yet occasionally illuminated by stars 

 of the first magnitude and splendour : and big with the important events 

 of the sack of Alexandria and the destruction of its library ; the triumph 

 and establishment of the Saracens, and their expulsion from Spain ; the 

 devastation of Europe, and the overthrow'of its ancient governments in 

 favour of the feudal system, by successive currents of barbarians from 

 the northwest of Asia, pouring down under the various names of Alans, 

 Huns, Ostro-goths, and Visi-goths, or eastern and western Goths ; -some- 

 times in separate tides, and sometimes in one united and overflowing 

 flood ; the deliriums of chivalry, of romance, and crusading ;'the intro- 

 duction of duels and ordeals ; of monkery and the inquisition ; the sepa- 

 ration of the eastern from the western church ; and the first gleams of the 

 Reformation, under the fearless and inflexible Wyckliff. And, in our own 

 country, the descent of Hengi&t on the isle of Thanet ; the establishment 

 of the Saxon octarchy ; the general sovereignty of Egbert ; the glorious 

 and golden reign of Alfred ; the conquest of the Norman invader ; the 

 bloody feuds of the houses of York and Lancaster ; and their termina- ^ 

 tion, on the union of the two families, after the memorable battle of Bos- 

 worth. 



This will lead us to the fair epoch of the revival of letters under the 

 patronage of Leo X., and the still more commanding influence of the 

 Reformation ; a period, however, upon which it will be impossible for us 

 to touch in the course of the present inquiry, though I shall still bear it in 

 memory, and request your attention to it on a subsequent opportunity. 



The literary taste and pursuits of Rome continued nearly the same 

 under her emperors as during her republican form of government. Athens 

 was still the alma mater of the higher ranks of her youth ; and, as she 

 increased in opulence and in luxury, she resigned herself more fully to' 



