THEOLOGY IN AMERICA.—Theology has been cultivated with much fruit by a large number of preachers and authors, of different religious bodies. Moses Stuart, by his commentaries on Biblical books, and Edward Robinson, especially through his published Travels in the Holy Land, were widely known. Charles Hodge, long a professor at Princeton; Nathaniel W. Taylor, who broached modifications of the Calvinistic system; Henry B. Smith, an acute and learned theologian; and Horace Bushnell,—are among the influential authors on the Protestant side. To these should be added the name of William Ellery Channing, the most prominent leader of the Unitarians, equally distinguished as a preacher and as a philanthropist.
The Unitarian movement in New England, which began in the early part of the nineteenth century, included other theological writers, one of the most learned and scholarly of whom was Andrews Norton (1786-1853). Theodore Parker (1810-1860) subsequently went so far in his divergence from received views as to reject miracle and supernatural revelation altogether. He was one of the most vigorous combatants in the warfare carried on through the press and in the pulpit against slavery. Out of the Unitarian school there came a class of cultured writers in literature and criticism, of whom George Ripley (1802-1880) was a representative. The "transcendentalists," as they were popularly styled, with whom these were often at the outset affiliated, were much influenced by contemporary French and German authors and speculations. Emerson, was the most prominent writer in this vaguely defined class. A periodical called "The Dial" was issued by them.
One of the most ingenious and active-minded thinkers in the Roman Catholic Church was Orestes A. Brownson, a prolific author on topics of religion and philosophy.
LITERATURE IN GERMANY.—The German mind has been so productive in almost all branches of literary effort, that the annual issues of the German press have numbered many thousands. The political condition of Germany until a recent date was such as to attract large numbers to the pursuits of literature and science. It is possible to allude to but few of the principal authors. In imaginative literature, Heinrich Heine (1799-1856), of Jewish extraction, was a most witty yet irreverent satirist, and one of the principal song-writers of modern times. Gustav Freytag has written some of the best of the later German novels. Auerbach, Keller, and Spielhagen stand very high on the roll of novelists. Of numerous recent poets, Lenau and Freiligrath are among the few best esteemed. In the long catalogue of German historical writers, to whom the world owes a debt, are found the names of Schlosser (1776-1861), Heeren (1760-1842), Raumer (1781-1873); Ranke, whose numerous works are based on original researches, and are written with masterly skill; Gervinus, a critic as well as historian; Von Sybel, Droysen, Duncker, Weber, Giesebrecht, Mommsen, Curtius, Treitschke. A powerful impulse was given to the study of history by Niebuhr (1776-1831). German researches have been carried into every region of the past. In Egyptology, Lipsius, Bunsen, Brugsch, and Ebers are leading authorities. Neander, Gieseler, Baur, Döllinger, Hefele, Alzog, Harnack, Janssen, and Pastor are writers on ecclesiastical history. German travelers have explored many of the countries of the globe. Schliemann has uncovered the ruins of Troy. In mathematics and the natural sciences, in philology and criticism, in philosophy, in law and the political sciences, and in the different branches of theology, the world acknowledges its debt to the patient, methodical investigations and the exhaustive discussions of German students during the nineteenth century.
THEOLOGY IN GERMANY.—The history of religious thought in Germany includes the successive phases of rationalism, or that general theory which makes the human understanding, apart from supernatural revelation, the chief or the exclusive source of religious knowledge, and the umpire in controversies. In the age of Frederick II., the Anglo-French deism was widely diffused (p. 493). Lessing; the genial poet and critic (1729-1781), allied himself to no party. In his work on The Education of the Human Race, he set forth the view that the Scriptures have a high providential purpose as an instrument for the religious training of mankind, but that their essential contents are ultimately verified by reason on grounds of its own; so that the prop of authority eventually becomes needless, and falls away. Not radically different was the position of Kant (p. 545), who gave rise to a school of theologians that for a time flourished. This school made the essential thing in Christianity to be its morality. With Semler (1721-1791), the rationalistic Biblical criticism took its rise. From that day, a host of scholars have engaged in the investigation of the origin and interpretation of the Bible, and of the early history of Christianity. A middle position between the established orthodoxy and the Kantian rationalism was taken by Frederick Schleiermacher (1768-1834), a man of genius, alike eminent as a critic, philosopher, and theologian. He placed the foundation of religion in the feeling of absolute dependence. In laying stress on feeling as at the root of piety, he had been preceded by the philosopher Jacobi. From the impulse given by Schleiermacher, there sprung up an intermediate school of theologians, many of whom departed less than he from the traditional Protestant creed. This they professed to undertake to revise in accordance with the results of the scientific study of the Bible and of history. In their number belong Neander, Nitzsch, Twesten, Tholuck, J. Müller, Dorner, Rothe, Bleek, Ullman, and many other influential authors and teachers. In the department of Biblical criticism, Ewald, Tischendorf, Meyer, Weiss, are among the names of German theological scholars which are familiar to Biblical students in all countries. The critical works of De Wette (1780-1849) were extensively studied. The philosophy of _Hegel_connected itself with a new form of rationalism, which found expression in the Life of Jesus, by Strauss, published in 1835, in which the Gospel miracles were treated as myths; and in the writings of Ferdinand Christian Baur, in connection with his followers of the "Tubingen School," who attempted to resolve primitive Christianity into a natural growth out of preëxisting conditions, and held that the historical books of the New Testament were the product of different theological "tendencies" and parties in the apostolic and the subsequent age. The Roman Catholic system has not lacked in Germany able defenders, one of the most noted of whom was Möhler, the author of Symbolism (Symbolik), an ingenious polemical work in opposition to Protestantism.
PHILOLOGY AND LAW IN GERMANY.—Classical philology was founded as a science by Heyne (1729-1812) and Wolf (1759-1824). Their work was carried forward by G. Hermann (1772-1848), Buttmann (1764-1829), Jacobs (1764-1847), K. O. Muller (1797-1840), and by numerous contemporaries and successors of these. By this succession of scholars, not only have the tongues of Greece and Rome been accurately learned and taught, but classical antiquity has been thoroughly explored. Comparative philology, under the hands of Bopp (1791-1867), of Lassen (1800-1876), a Norwegian by birth, of W. von Humboldt (1767-1835), of Pott (born in 1802), of Schleicher (1821-1868), and their coadjutors, has grown to be a fruitful science. In the study of the German language and early literature, J. Grimm (1785-1863), W. Grimm (1786-1859), Lachmann (1793-1851), Simrock (1802-1878), have been among the pioneers. The study of law, especially of Roman law, was placed on a new foundation by the labors of Savigny (1779-1861), while a like thoroughness was brought to the exposition of German law by Mittermaier and others. In political science, Mohl (1779-1875), Bluntschli (1808-1881), Stahl (1802-1861), and Gneist (1816-1895) gained a worldwide celebrity.
LITERATURE IN FRANCE.—A class of vigorous young writers in France broke loose from the restraints of the "classical" school and its patterns, and composed dramas in the more free method of the "romantic" school. They drew their ideas of the drama from Shakspeare, rather than from Corneille. Among these writers were Alexandre Dumas, a most prolific novelist as well as writer of plays; and the celebrated poet and dramatist, Victor Hugo. The romances of Dumas comprise more than a hundred volumes. In his historical novels, incidents and characters without number crowd upon the scene, but without confusion, while the narrative maintains an unfailing vivacity. Of the authors of light and witty comedies, Scribe is one of the most fertile. George Sand (Mme. Dudevant) is one of the principal novel-writers of the age. Eugene Sue and Balzac are both popular authors in this department. The leading poets are the song-writer Béranger, Lamartine, Victor Hugo, and Alfred de Musset. With the close of the first half-century romanticism began to give way before realism, from which, however, there was a reaction before the century closed. Among the greater poets are Sully-Prudhomme and Coppée; among the novelists, Daudet, Zola, Maupassant, and Bourget. In history some writers, as Villemain, are remarkable for their power of descriptive narrative; others, like Guizot, for their breadth of philosophical reflection, superadded to deep researches. Some, like Augustin Thierry, in his work on the Middle Ages, combined both elements. His brother, Amédée Thierry, depicted the state of society in Gaul and other countries in the period of the fall of the Roman Empire. Barante composed an interesting history of the Dukes of Burgundy. Among those, besides Guizot, who treated of the history of France, Sismondi, the spirited Michelet, and the thorough and dispassionate Henri Martin are specially eminent. Thiers, Mignet, Louis Blanc, Taine, and Lanfrey wrote on the Revolution or Napoleon. The most eminent of the newer school of scientific historians are Boissier, Sorel, Lavisse, Luchaire, and Aulard. In political economy and the science of politics, Chevalier, De Tocqueville (the author of Democracy in America), and Bastiat are among the writers widely read beyond the limits of France. Sainte-Beuve is only one of the foremost in the class of literary critics, in which are included Renan, Sarcey, Brunetière, Lemaître, Faguet, and others, themselves authors. The clearness of exposition which goes far to justify the claim of the French to be the interpreters of European science to the world, appears in numerous treatises in mathematics and physics. The qualities of lucid arrangement, transparency of style, and terseness of language have extended, however, to other branches of authorship; so that the French have presented a fair claim to precedence in the literary art.
SWEDEN AND RUSSIA.—There are Swedish authors who are well known in other countries. Such are the historian Geijer (1783-1847); and the novelist Fredrika Bremer, who wrote "The Neighbors," and other tales. The most famous of the Russian novelists is Ivan Turgenejff, some of whose stories contain admirable pictures of Russian life.
ARCHITECTURE.—The nineteenth century witnessed in Germany, France, and England a revival of the ancient or classic styles of architecture. This appears, for example, in edifices at Munich, and in such buildings as St. George's Hall at Liverpool. But a reaction arose against this tendency, and in behalf of the Gothic style, which is exemplified in the new Houses of Parliament in London. Many Gothic churches have been erected in Great Britain. Many-storied office buildings are characteristic of America.
SCULPTURE AND PAINTING.—One of the most original of modern sculptors was Schwanthaler (1802-1848), who carved the pediments of the Walhalla at Munich, and the bronze statue of Bavaria. French sculptors at the present day are fully on a level with the recent sculptors of Italy. Chantrey (1788-1841) and John Gibson (1791-1866), a pupil of Canova and himself an original mind, are high on the roll of English sculptors. A genius for sculpture appeared among Americans, and to the names of Powers and Crawford, of Story, Brown, and Ward, the names of other meritorious artists in this province might justly be added. The German national school of painting had Overbeck for its most eminent founder. Cornelius (1783-1867) revived the art of fresco-painting, and established the Munich school. Von Kaulbach, who painted the "Battle of the Huns" in the Berlin Museum, was one of his pupils. W. von Schadow is the founder of the Düsseldorf school. One of his eminent pupils was K. F. Lessing. Still more recent are Ad. Menzel, Liberman, and Lenbach. In Great Britain, Constable (1796-1837) painted English landscapes full of thought and feeling, and gave a fresh impulse to this branch of art. Stanfleld (1788-1864) was a master of the realistic school, which aims at a simple and faithful representation of the landscape to be depicted. Wilkie, a Scotchman (1785-1841), was chief among the genre painters, of whom Leslie (1794-1859), by birth an American, was one of the most forcible and refined. Eastlake (1793-1865) was a writer on art, as well as a painter. Landseer (1802-1873) was unrivaled as an animal painter. William Hunt (1790-1864) had decided skill as a painter in water-colors. The pre-Raphaelite school, professing to go back of Raphael to nature, included Turner, Hunt, Millais, and Burne-Jones. Other prominent artists have been Herkomer, Leighton, and Alma-Tadema. In France, Paul Delaroche (1797-1856) followed in the path of Horace Vernet (1789-1863), as a painter of battle-pieces and other modern historical scenes. Ary Scheffer (1795-1858), a Dutchman by birth, painted in a graceful and pathetic tone "Christ the Consoler," and other sacred subjects. The more recent French school, comprising Delacroix, Meissonier, Gérome, Cabanel, Millet, Rosa Bonheur, an artist of masculine vigor, the famous painter of animal pictures,—is distinguished for technical skill and finish, but also for a bold and peculiar method of treatment. Among the leading landscape-painters of this school, Corot, Daubigny, Rousseau, Diaz, are conspicuous. Still more recent are Bastien-Lepage, Chavannes, Bréton, Bouguereau, Dagnan-Bouveret, Lhermitte, Jean-Paul Laurens, and Dupré.