But as though not satisfied with a general statement which should justify Père Bouhours, Mr. Carlyle continues until he makes the justification clear in terms and specific by dates, telling us: "From the time of Opitz and Flemming to that of Klopstock and Lessing, that is, from the early part of the seventeenth to the middle of the eighteenth century, they [the Germans] had scarcely any literature known abroad, or deserving to be known."
Now, Dominic Bouhours, born in Paris, 1628, asked the famous question, Si un Allemand peut être bel esprit? in 1671, and died in 1702. Thus his earthly career was comprised precisely within the period specified by Mr. Carlyle as that during which the Germans were without not only belles-lettres, but any literature whatever deserving to be known.
But, going back to the middle ages, Mr. Carlyle, strangely enough holds Bouhours responsible, because of his want of familiarity with the Niebelungen-Lied, Reinecke-Fuchs, and other monuments of early German literature. "Had he known the Niebelungen-Lied" is asked mockingly. This is hardly just, when we reflect that no one better than Mr. Carlyle knows that Germany of the Bouhours period was itself, in the main, ignorant of and profoundly indifferent to the merits of these remarkable productions. Only long years afterward, following on ages of oblivion as to their very existence in their own country, were they brought to light, and it is principally owing to the exertions of the comparatively new Romantic school that modern Germany has been made acquainted with the Niebelungen-Lied and other great middle-age poems.
It is true that Bodmer in Switzerland first put a portion of the Niebelungen ("Chrimhilde's Revenge") in print, in 1757; but, as Mr. Carlyle has elsewhere informed us, it was August Wilhelm Schlegel who "succeeded in awakening something like a universal popular feeling on the subject," and he refers to this and the like poems as "manuscripts that for ages have lain dormant," and now come "from their archives into public view," "a phenomenon unexpected till of late"—stating that "the Niebelungen is welcomed as a precious national possession—recovered after six centuries of neglect." From which it would appear that, at his peril, Bouhours, in 1671, must be familiar with "a precious national possession" of the Germans, which they themselves, before and after that period, treated with "centuries of neglect." Being a Jesuit, it is, of course, eminently proper, according to a time-honored custom in English literature, that he should be made responsible for everything—the Spanish Inquisition and Original Sin included.
Mr. Carlyle patriotically closes his eyes to English ignorance and indifference touching German literature, even when claiming for Great Britain only a lesser density of ignorance concerning it than afflicted France.
Writing as late as 1827, he fairly admits that the literature and character of Germany "are still very generally unknown to us, or, what is worse, misknown," that its "false and tawdry ware" reached England before "the chaste and truly excellent," and that "Kotzebue's insanity spread faster by some fifty years than Lessing's wisdom." And the British ignorance, it is admitted, is not confined to German literature. "For what more do we know"—thus Mr. Carlyle clinches the question—"of recent Spanish or Italian literature than of German; of Grossi and Manzoni, of Campomanos or Jovellanos, than of Tieck and Richter?"
Really, when we contemplate the enlightened Englishman of 1827 thus held up to our gaze, how can we withhold from the abused Frenchman of 1671 our profound admiration?
Now, if, on reflection, Mr. Carlyle estimates the imputation on German literature of a lack of wit and humor as a serious offence—if he considers actionable and punishable Father Bouhours's query,
SI UN ALLEMAND PEUT ETRE BEL ESPRIT?
he need not go back two centuries for a criminal of whom to make an example. We have in custody for him one of this century—of this decade—nay, of this very year. He is a living culprit, and, moreover, a distinguished one. Here is a copy of the words in which he offends, and, if we are not mistaken, he may be found in Mr. Carlyle's bailiwick: "There is, perhaps, no nation where the general standard of wit and humor is so low as with the Germans—no other people at least are so easily entertained with indifferent jokes" (Saturday Review, London, March 18, 1871).