Poetry was a favourite study: the celebrated Gerbert, afterwards Pope Silvester II, and Waldram, bishop of Strasburgh, were the best poets of their times. Hroswith,[[004]] a nun in the monastery of Gardersheim, published comedies: "Many Catholics," she says, in her preface to them, "are guilty of a fault, from which I myself am not altogether free; they prefer profane works, on account of their style, to the holy Scriptures. Others have the Scriptures always in their hands, and despise profane authors; yet they often read Terence, and their attention to the beauties of his style does not prevent the objectionable passages in his writings from making an impression on them."

To this age, the origin of Romances is usually assigned: but these belong to the French; no specimen of them has been discovered in Germany. Music was much cultivated. Hroswith introduced it into her comedies.

It has been mentioned, that Sallust was read in the school at Paderborn. It is supposed that Tacitus was known to Wittikind or Dittmar: both relate visions, and several puerile circumstances; but they write with precision, and shew, on many occasions, great good sense.

The same cannot be said of the Legend-writers; the account which the authors of "The Literary History of France" give of them is very just. "The ancient legends," they say, "were lost, in consequence either of the plunder or the burning of the churches; it was considered necessary to replace them, as it was thought impossible to honour the memory, or to preserve the veneration of the saints, without some knowledge of their lives. It is to be remarked, that the saints, whose memories were thus sought to be honoured, had been long dead, or had lived in foreign countries, so that little was known of them except by oral tradition. From this it may be easily guessed, that those who employed themselves upon the legends, were deprived of necessary information, and upon that account could not produce exact and true histories. Thus, to the general defects of the age in which they lived, they added uncertainty, confusion, and some falsehood. Their pages abound with visions. In the place of the simple and natural, they substituted the wonderful and extraordinary. It even happened too frequently that they took leave to tell untruths. Heriger, the abbot of St Lupus, says, in direct terms, that they piously lied."

911-1024.

Dialectic was in great favour: it was called philosophy; no work was more read than "the Book of Categories," erroneously ascribed to St. Augustine; and a work, upon the same subject, imputed to Porphyry.

II. 2. State of Literature during the Saxon Dynasty.

The schools of the cathedrals and principal monasteries contributed essentially to the increase and diffusion of literature. Among the monasteries, those of Fulda, St. Gall, Corbie and Kershaw, were particularly renowned. Bishops and abbots exerted themselves to procure books, and to have copies of them made and circulated: they were often splendidly illuminated. Henry I. caused a painting to be made, of a battle which he had gained over the Hungarians. Bernard, bishop of Hildersheim, in imitation of what he had seen in Italy, ornamented the churches of his diocese with mosaic paintings; he also introduced, among his countrymen, the art of fusing and working metals; he caused precious and highly ornamented vases to be made in imitation of the antients. Large and small bells were cast; chalices, patines, incensories, images, and even altars of gold and silver, or ornamented with them, were fabricated. Aventin relates, that at Mauverkirchen, in Bavaria, figures in plaster, hardened by fire, had, in 948, been made of a duke of Bavaria and his general.

911-1024.

The establishment of schools, and the protection given to the arts and sciences, invited the whole body of the nation to the acquisition of useful and ornamental knowledge; but the invitation was not even generally accepted. There was much superstition in every order of the laity. An opinion prevailed among them, that the world was to end, and the day of judgment arrive, in the year 1000. An universal panic spread itself over Europe. Strange to relate, the people sought to avoid the catastrophe, by hiding themselves in caverns and tombs.