9. EDUCATION.—At present there is little education, in our sense of the word, in Arabia. In the few instances where public schools exist, writing, grammar, and rhetoric sum up the teaching. The Bedouin children learn from their parents much more than is common in other countries. Great attention is paid to accuracy of grammar and purity of diction throughout the country, and of late literary institutions have been established at Beyrout, Damascus, Bagdad, and Hefar.
Such is the extent of Arabic literature, that, notwithstanding the labors of European scholars and the productions of native presses, in Boulak and Cairo, in India, and recently in England, where Hassam, an Arabian poet, has devoted himself to the production of standard works, the greater part of what has been preserved is still in manuscript and still more has perished.
ITALIAN LITERATURE.
INTRODUCTION.—1. Italian Literature and its Divisions.—2. The Dialects. —3. The Italian Language.
PERIOD FIRST.—1. Latin Influence.—2. Early Italian Poetry and Prose.—3.
Dante.—4. Petrarch.—5. Boccaccio and other Prose Writers.—6. First
Decline of Italian Literature.
PERIOD SECOND.—1. The Close of the Fifteenth Century; Lorenzo de'
Medici.—2. The Origin of the Drama and Romantic Epic; Poliziano, Pulci,
Boiardo.—3. Romantic Epic Poetry; Ariosto.—4. Heroic Epic Poetry;
Tasso.—5. Lyric Poetry; Bembo, Molza, Tarsia, V. Colonna.—6. Dramatic
Poetry; Trissino, Rucellai; the Writers of Comedy.—7. Pastoral Drama and
Didactic Poetry; Beccari, Sannazzaro, Tasso, Guarini, Rucellai, Alamanni.
—8. Satirical Poetry, Novels, and Tales; Berni, Grazzini, Firenzuola,
Bandello, and others.—9. History; Machiavelli, Guicciardini, Nardi, and
others.—10. Grammar and Rhetoric; the Academy della Crusca, Della Casa,
Speroni, and others.—11. Science, Philosophy, and Politics; the Academy
del Cimento, Galileo, Torricelli, Borelli, Patrizi, Telesio, Campanella,
Bruno, Castiglione, Machiavelli, and others.—12. Decline of the
Literature in the Seventeenth Century.—13. Epic and Lyric Poetry; Marini,
Filicaja.—14. Mock Heroic Poetry, the Drama, and Satire; Tassoni,
Bracciolini, Andreini, and others.—15. History and Epistolary Writings;
Davila, Bentivoglio, Sarpi, Redi.
PERIOD THIRD.—1. Historical Development of the Third Period.—2. The Melodrama; Rinuccini, Zeno, Metastasio.—3. Comedy; Goldoni, C. Gozzi, and others.—4. Tragedy; Maffei, Alfieri, Monti, Manzoni, Nicolini, and others.—5. Lyric, Epic, and Didactic Poetry; Parini, Monti, Ugo Foscolo, Leopardi, Grossi, Lorenzi, and others.—6. Heroic-Comic Poetry, Satire, and Fable; Fortiguerri, Passeroni, G. Gozzi, Parini, Giusti, and others. —7. Romances; Verri, Manzoni, D'Azeglio, Cantù, Guerrazzi, and others. —8. History; Muratori, Vico, Giannone, Botta, Colletta, Tiraboschi, and others.—9. Aesthetics, Criticism, Philology, and Philosophy; Baretti, Parini, Giordani, Gioja, Romagnosi, Gallupi, Rosmini, Gioberti.—From 1860 to 1885.
INTRODUCTION.
1. ITALIAN LITERATURE AND ITS DIVISIONS.—The fall of the Western Empire, the invasions of the northern tribes, and the subsequent wars and calamities, did not entirely extinguish the fire of genius in Italy. As we have seen, the Crusades had opened the East and revealed to Europe its literary and artistic treasures; the Arabs had established a celebrated school of medicine in Salerno, and had made known the ancient classics; a school of jurisprudence was opened in Bologna, where Roman law was expounded by eminent lecturers; and the spirit of chivalry, while it softened and refined human character, awoke the desire of distinction in arms and poetry. The origin of the Italian republics, giving scope to individual agency, marked another era in civilization; while the appearance of the Italian language quickened the national mind and led to a new literature. The spirit of freedom, awakened as early as the eleventh century, received new life in the twelfth, when the Lombard cities, becoming independent, formed a powerful league against Frederick Barbarossa. The instinct of self-defense thus developed increased the necessity of education. In the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, Italian literature acquired its national character and rose to its highest splendor, through the writings of Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio, whose influence has been more or less felt in succeeding centuries.
The literary history of Italy may be divided into three periods, each of which presents two distinct phases, one of progress and one of decline. The first period, extending from 1100 to 1475, embraces the origin of the literature, its development through the works of Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio, in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, and its first decline in the fifteenth, when it was supplanted by the absorbing study of the Greek and Latin classics.