He is not alone. In Paradox, Rey, and in Los últimos románticos Pío Baroja introduces a fresh and reckless note of social satire, while novelty of thought and style characterise Martínez Ruiz in Las confesiones de un pequeño filósofo and Valle-Inclán in Flor de Santidad and Sonata de otoño. These are the immediate hopes of the future. But prophecy is a vain thing: the future lies on the knees of the gods.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] ‘Nierva’ in Eugenio de Ochoa, Rimas inéditas (Paris, 1851), p. 305.
[2] The Archpriest’s poems are preserved in three ancient manuscripts known respectively as the Gayoso, Toledo, and Salamanca MSS. (1) The Gayoso MS. was finished on Thursday, July 23, 1389; it formerly belonged to Benito Martínez Gayoso, came into the possession of Tomás Antonio Sánchez on May 12, 1787, and is now in the library of the Royal Spanish Academy at Madrid. (2) The Toledo MS., which belongs to the same period, has been transferred from the library of Toledo Cathedral to the Biblioteca Nacional at Madrid. (3) The Salamanca MS., formerly in the library of the Colegio Mayor de San Bartolomé at Salamanca, is now in the Royal Library at Madrid: though somewhat later in date than the Gayoso and Toledo MSS., it is more carefully written, and the text is less incomplete.
[3] In a contribution to the Jahrbücher der Literatur (Wien, 1831-2), vols. iv., pp. 234-264; lvi., pp. 239-266; lvii., pp. 169-200; lviii., pp. 220-268; lix., pp. 25-50. See the reprint in Ferdinand Wolf, Studien zur Geschichte der spanischen und portugiesischen Nationalliteratur (Berlin, 1859).
Interpone tuis interdum gaudia curis,
Ut possis animo quemvis sufferre laborem.—Disticha, iii. 6.
[5] In Letters from an English Traveller in Spain, in 1778, on the origin and progress of Poetry in that Kingdom (London, 1781). This work was published anonymously by John Talbot Dillon, who acknowledges his ‘particular obligations’ to the works of Luis José Velázquez, López de Sedano, and Sarmiento.