PREFACE.

It is attempted in this volume to trace the gradual progress of English Prose Fiction from the early romance to the novel of the present day, in such connection with the social characteristics of the epochs to which these works respectively belong, as may conduce to a better comprehension of their nature and significance.

As many of the earlier specimens of English fiction are of a character or a rarity which makes any acquaintance with them difficult to the general public, I have endeavored so to describe their style and contents that the reader may obtain, to some degree, a personal knowledge of them.

The novels of the nineteenth century are so numerous and so generally familiar, that, in the chapter devoted to this period, I have sought rather to point out the great importance which fiction has assumed, and the variety of forms which it has taken, than to attempt any exhaustive criticism of individual authors—a task already sufficiently performed by writers far more able to do it justice.

THE AUTHOR.

"The Benedick." NEW YORK, Aug. 22, 1882.

B.T.

CHAPTER I.

THE ROMANCE OF CHIVALRY.

I

In the midst of an age of gloom and anarchy, when Feudalism was slowly building up a new social organization on the ruins of the Roman Empire, arose that spirit of chivalry, which, in its connection with the Christian religion, forms so sharp a division between the sentiments of ancient and modern times. Following closely on the growth of chivalry as an institution, there came into being a remarkable species of fiction, which reflected with great faithfulness the character of the age, and having formed for three centuries the principal literary entertainment of the knighthood of Europe, left on the new civilization, and the new literature which had outgrown and discarded it, lasting traces of its natural beauty. Into the general fund of chivalric romance were absorbed the learning and legend of every land. From the gloomy forests and bleak mountains of the North came dark and terrible fancies, malignant enchanters, and death-dealing spirits, supposed to haunt the earth and sea; from Arabia and the East came gorgeous pictures of palaces built of gold and precious stones, magic

rings which transport the bearer from place to place, love-inspiring draughts, dragons and fairies; from ancient Greece and Rome came memories of the heroes and mysteries of mythology, [2]like old coins worn and disfigured by passing, through ages, from hand to hand, but still bearing a faint outline of their original character. All this mass of fiction was floating idly in the imaginations of men, or worked as an embellishment into the rude numbers of the minstrels, when the mediæval romancers gathered it up, and interweaving it with the traditions of Arthur and Charlemagne, produced those strange compositions which are so entirely the product and repository of the habits, superstitions, and sympathies of the Middle Ages that they serve to

The men who wrote, and the men who read these romances, the first springs of our modern fiction, were influenced by two dominant ideas: "One religious, which had fashioned the gigantic cathedrals, and swept the masses from their native soil to hurl them upon the Holy Land; the other secular, which had built feudal fortresses, and set the man of courage erect and armed within his own domain."[1] These two ideas were outwardly expressed in the Roman Church and the Feudal System.

During the anarchy of the Middle Ages, every man was compelled to look upon war as his natural occupation, if he hoped to preserve life or property. His land was held as a condition of military service. As long as there was no effective administration of justice, redress for the aggrieved lay in the sword alone. A military career had no rival in the eyes of the ambitious and the noble. [3] There was no learning, no art, to share with skill in arms, the honors to which a youth aspired. Religion and love, the most powerful inspirations of his moral life, made force of arms the merit most worthy of their rewards. The growth of the people in the mechanical arts took the direction of improving the instruments of warfare; the increase of refinement and humanity tended less to diminish war than to make it more civilized, showy, and glorious. The armies of the Romans seem prosaic when we turn to the brilliant array of chivalry, to the ranks of steel-clad knights couching the lance to win fame, the smile of woman, or the reward of

religious devotion;—men to whom war seemed a grand tournament, in which each combatant, from the king to the poorest knight, was to seek distinction by his strength and valor. It was through the senses, and especially through the eye, that the feudal imagination was moved. Every heart was kindled at the sight of shining armor, horses with brilliant trappings, gorgeous dress, and martial show. The magnificent Norman cathedrals struck the mind with devotional awe; the donjons and towers of the great baronial castles were suggestive of power and glory. To the impressibility of the senses was added the romantic spirit of adventure, which kept the knighthood of Europe in a constant ferment, and for lack of war, burst forth in tournaments, in private feuds, or in the extravagances of knight-errantry. The feudal system, growing up to meet the necessities of conquerors living on conquered territory, and founded on the principle of military service as a condition of land tenure, made of Europe a vast army. The military profession was exalted to an importance which crushed all effort of a

more useful or progressive nature; the military class, including all who possessed land, and [4] did not labor upon it, became an aristocracy despising peaceful occupations, whose most powerful prejudice was pride of birth, whose ruling passion was love of war. Under the influence of this military spirit, intellectual was subordinated to active life; a condition of ignorance and danger was sustained; an overwhelming reverence for the supernatural was produced, and there resulted that predominance of the imagination over the reason of man which forms the distinctive feature of Romantic Fiction.

While the feudal system formed the framework of society, and, as much by inspiration as by law, governed the outward actions of men, the human mind was in complete, and almost universally willing, subjection to theological influence. The state of war, or of readiness for war, which was the inevitable accompaniment of feudal tenure, did much to sustain the state of profound ignorance and consequent superstition in which the people of mediæval times were plunged, both by preventing the pursuit of peaceful occupations and the growth of knowledge, and by increasing the element of danger in life, which always inclines the human mind to a belief in the supernatural. The same results were brought about by the character and aims of the Roman Church. The unswerving purpose of that church was to govern, temporally as well as spiritually. She sought to supply to men from her own store all the knowledge which was necessary for their welfare, and that knowledge was limited to dogmas and beliefs which would strengthen the power of the priesthood. A strict and absolute acceptance of the truths of

Christianity as she defined them, and a humble obedience to the clergy were made the sole and necessary conditions of salvation. A questioning [5] of those truths or a violation of that obedience was a crime before which murder and license faded into insignificance. The spirit of doubt and of inquiry which alone leads to knowledge, and through knowledge to civilization, was repressed by excommunication or in blood. As long as men continued in a state of helpless ignorance and willing credulity, the church was a fitting, even a beneficent, mistress and guide. For centuries she was the sole teacher and the sole external source of moral elevation. For centuries she alone pointed out the distinction between right and wrong, the beauty of virtue, and the ugliness of sin. Whatever there was in life to raise men above their earthly struggles, their evil passions, and the despair of a hard and dangerous existence, was supplied by her. The consolations of religion, the ennobling acquaintance with the character of Christ, and the hope of salvation

through Him were incalculable blessings. Her aid in suppressing disorder and in establishing a respect for law and government is not to be overlooked. She presented in her own organization an example of authority, of system, and of obedience, which, despite many failings and abuses, was of great value to the world. But there is in human nature an irrepressible tendency toward growth and progress, and when this tendency began to show itself in the Middle Ages, it found in the theological spirit, then personated by the Roman Church, its most bitter and most powerful enemy. The church, which had hitherto been a teacher and guide, became the champion of barbarism and the genius of retrogression. Instead of adapting herself to the growing wants of mankind, instead of preserving her influence and power by inward progress proportionate to that which she saw advancing without, she sought, stationary [6] herself, to keep the world stationary, and to stamp out in blood the progressive spirit of man. Hence it is that the blessings of our modern life have been achieved in spite of the Roman

Church, which should have promoted them, and the history of modern civilization and modern knowledge is in so large a part the history of emancipation from the tyranny of the theological spirit,—that is, the clerical opposition to mental and material advancement, both of which are as necessary to moral advancement as they are to the happiness of men. This spirit has been the same in every country and in every age, when the spiritual has exceeded the secular power, and its lamentable effects may be traced as well in the gloomy Protestant theocracy of Scotland as in the Catholic Inquisition of Spain. During the period, however, when the romances of chivalry were principally written and enjoyed, the convulsions arising from attempts to burst the bonds by which the minds of men were restrained, had not yet been sensibly felt. The church was still the controlling intellectual influence. A dark cloud of ignorance and superstition hung over Europe, to be dispelled at last by the new growth of learning, and the consequences following

upon it. The best intelligence of the time was confined to the clergy, who used it skilfully to maintain their authority. By every device they sought to usurp to themselves the sole power of ministering to popular wants. Nothing which could strike the mind through the senses was neglected. They offset tournaments by religious shows and pageantry, rivalled the attractions of the harp by sacred music, and to wean their flocks from the half dramatic entertainments of the minstrels, they invented the Miracle Play and the Mystery. The church forced herself on the attention of [7] every man without doors or within, by the friars black or gray who met him at every turn, by the imposing monasteries which formed a central figure in every landscape, and by the festivals and processions of priests which made the common occasions for the assemblage of the people. The constant recurrence of holy days and fasts called the mind to the consideration of spiritual things, and the rough superstition of the time was deeply excited when the approach of

death in a household brought the priestly train with lighted tapers, and the awe-inspiring ceremonies with which the lingering soul was sent on its way.

The military nature of feudalism explains the predominance of warlike incidents in romantic fiction, and the character of the Roman Church gives us an insight into the causes which, in addition to the ignorance of the time, induced men to refer all remarkable events to supernatural influence, and prepared their minds for the unquestioning belief in the fictions which are so important a characteristic of the romances of chivalry. The low standard of morality also, which is reflected in the same pages, is due quite as much to the predominance of the dogmatic over the moral element of Christianity, as to the unrefined and rude conditions of life.

There is much that is picturesque and brilliant in the times, but much more that is terrible. The nobles and knights, who lived sword in hand behind their battlements and massive walls, were the rulers of the country. Their ungoverned passions and their love of fighting for its own sake or for that of revenge, were perpetual dangers to internal peace. There was no power sufficient to keep them in check. The lawlessness and anarchy caused by the ceaseless quarrels between baron and [8] baron, found but a feeble remedy in the laws of King or Church. Of the darkness of the earlier Middle Ages Von Sybel[2] gives a graphic picture: "Monarchies sank into impotence; petty lawless tyrants trampled all social order under foot, and all attempts after scientific instruction and artistic pleasures were as effectually crushed by this state of general insecurity as the external well-being and material life of the people. This was a dark and stormy period for Europe, merciless, arbitrary, and violent. It was a sign of the prevailing

feeling of misery and hopelessness that, when the first thousand years of our era were drawing to their close, the people in every country in Europe looked with certainty for the destruction of the world. Some squandered their wealth in riotous living, others bestowed it, for the good of their souls, on churches and convents; weeping multitudes lay day and night about the altars; some looked forward with dread, but most with secret hope, toward the burning of the earth and the falling in of heaven." Gradually some order and security succeeded this chaos. The church exerted all her strength in subduing violence, and the character of her remedies are illustrative of the evils they were intended to abate. The truce of God set apart the days between Thursday and Monday of each week as a time of peace, when private quarrels should be suspended. The peace of the king forbade the avenging of an alleged injury until forty days after its commission. The Council of Clermont ordered that every noble youth on attaining the age of twelve

years should take an oath to defend the oppressed, the widows, and the orphans.[3] Much superfluous energy was exhausted in the crusades. [9] In England the growth of the universities and the study and development of law aided the establishment of social order, while the spread of commerce and the improvements in husbandry brought with wealth some refinement and luxury. The baronage wrested from the crown those liberties which finally became the common property of all. Trade pushed the inhabitants of the towns into prominence as an important class whose influence was thrown entirely into the scale of peace and quiet, on which its prosperity depended. No element of change was more essential, and none was greater in its civilizing effects than the development of the chivalric spirit into an institution of which the laws and customs were observed from England to Sicily. Its influence worked directly upon the disturbing classes of society. Only time and the slow march of civilization could calm the restlessness and the martial spirit of the powerful, but chivalry introduced into warfare

knightly honor and generosity, and into social life a courtesy and gallantry which formed a strong ally to religion in bringing out the better sentiments of humanity. At a time when force was greater than law, when the weak and defenceless were at the mercy of the powerful, when women were never safe from the attacks of the brutal, a body of men who were sworn to redress wrongs, to succor the oppressed, and to protect women and children, could not fail to be highly beneficial and to win the reverence of mankind. To be a good knight was to be the salt of the earth. The church gave easy absolution to the champion of the weak,—the soldier of God. Women smiled upon the cavalier whose profession was her service, and whose deeds, as well as the glitter of his arms and the fascination of his martial appearance, flattered her pride and gratified her imagination.

[10] Yet, in considering the period of chivalry, we must not yield too much to the attraction of its brilliant show, its high flown sentiments, and knightly valor. Beneath religion there ever lurked a bigoted superstition; beneath valor, cruelty; beneath love, mere brutal passion. The sympathies of the order were much confined to the higher classes, and there was little feeling for the sufferings of the common people. The reign of Edward the Third embraces the most brilliant days of chivalry. About that period is spread a mist of manly gallantry and feminine charms which conceals the darkness beneath. The Black Prince, after winning his spurs at Cressy, carried fire and sword among the peaceful and defenceless inhabitants of Garonne, gratifying a greed of gain by blood and rapine. The gallant deeds of Sir Walter de Manny, of Sir John Chandos, the fame of Edward himself, only make darker by contrast the desolation and suffering by which their glory was purchased. The poetic illusion inspired by Froissart's chronicles of knightly deeds and manners is rudely torn when we read Petrarch's

description of France after the battle of Poitiers; "I could not believe that this was the same France which I had seen so rich and flourishing. Nothing presented itself to my eyes but a fearful solitude, land uncultivated, houses in ruins. Even the neighborhood of Paris showed everywhere the marks of desolation and conflagration. The streets are deserted, the roads overgrown with weeds, the whole is a vast solitude."[4]

It is among the Northern conquerors that we must look for the origin of the spirit of chivalry, which consisted first and chiefly in manly valor exerted to obtain the favor of woman. Of this there is no trace in any ancient [11] civilization. Among the barbarous tribes of the North, physical strength and military prowess were the qualities most essential in a man, and woman naturally looked upon them as the merit she most loved, especially as they were needed for her own protection. But this condition is natural to all barbarous and warlike peoples, and cannot by itself account for that sentiment which we call chivalric. To the valor of the Goths were joined an extraordinary reverence and respect for their women, due, as these feelings always must be, to feminine chastity. The virtue for which the Northern women were distinguished elevated them to a position to which the females of other uncivilized nations never approached. It gave them a large influence in both public and private affairs, and made them something to be won, not

bought. To obtain his wife the Northern warrior must have deserved her, he must have given proofs that he was worthy of the woman who had preserved her chastity inviolate, and for whom love must be mingled with respect.[5] It is curious to observe how exactly these sentiments, which existed at so early a period among the Gothic nations, were continued into feudal times. Take, as one instance, the exclamation of Regner Lodbrog, the famous Scandinavian chieftain, who about the year 860 rescued a princess from a fortress in which she was unjustly confined, and received her hand as his reward: "I made to struggle in the twilight that yellow haired chief, who passed his mornings among the young maidens and loved to converse with widows. He who aspires to the love of young virgins ought always to be foremost in the din of arms!"[6] Compare to this a scene at Calais about the middle of the [12]fourteenth century. Edward III had just accomplished an adventure of chivalry. Serving under the banner of Sir Walter de Manny as a common