The MS. from which the following extracts are taken is a beautiful vellum codex, substantially bound in dark red stamped morocco leather, with plain brass clasps, numbered 1586, 4to, Gl. Kong. Saml. (Old Royal Collection). It was written in 1488, at Mariager Cloister, near Aarhus in Jutland, by a monk residing there named Niels Morgensen, by order of the Prioress, Elizabeth Herman's daughter, as we are informed at the end of each part. It is the only text known. It contains, in addition to the portions now published, which form the second and fourth parts respectively, (I) A letter from St. Eusebius to Domacius, Bishop of Portoci, and Theodosius, a Roman Senator, announcing the death of St. Jerome, (III) Cyril's reply to St. Augustine's letter, and (V) A Life of St. Katharine of Siena, which last comprises almost a third of the whole.

There is much divergence of opinion among scholars as to the naming of the main periods of the English language, and hardly any two agree in regard to the limits of each period. But in treating of the absolute participle, an arbitrary division must be made according to the occurrence and development of this form in the language.

These literary forms, as given, are found in the earliest texts. But a mere casual reading of the texts will reveal also many variants; this makes evident the fact that a succession of stages or steps was gone through before the above forms were adopted as the regular ones. The simplest method to be followed in discovering what these successive stages of development were must be to begin with the earliest texts in which the variants were sometimes the rule, and follow the occurence of these variants in chronological order down into those texts in which they are exceptions; thus finally arriving at literary monuments in which no variants occur, but where they have been merged completely into the prevailing literary forms.

Die Beziehung Rabelais’ zu Erasmus von Rotterdam drängt sich beim Stadium der beiderseitigen, zumal satirischen Schriften mächtig von selber auf und ist infolge dessen auch längst erkannt worden. Keiner hat diese Beziehung stärker betont als Birch-Hirschfeld. Aber eine eingehende Abhandlung, eigens zu dem Zwecke verfasst zu erweisen, warum Rabelais fast in allen Stücken seiner Satire mit dem wahlverwandten Erasmus übereinstimmt, steht meines Wissens noch aus.

In his collection of essays Von Luther bis Lessing,1 F. Kluge discusses at some length W. Scherer's proposition, that Luther marks but a transition period in the history of the German language, while the Modern High German period proper does not begin till the middle of the seventeenth century. I cannot find in Scherer's Geschichte der deutschen Litteratur anything so definite as to warrant Kluge's assertion that for Scherer “Schottel marks the beginning of the Modern High German period.”2 In the chronological tables, the Modern High German period begins with the Peace of Westphalia, and after various works by Spee, Gryphius, Lauremberg, Logan, Angelus Silesius and Scriver, Schottel's Ausführliche Arbeit von der deutschen Hauptsprache is mentioned, but it does not appear from this or from anything in the text of the volume, that Scherer intended to give Schottel anything like as prominent a place in this period as he had given Luther in the one immediately preceding. That the efforts of Schottel and other grammarians and purists of the seventeenth century contributed much to the wealth as well as the purity and regularity of the modem German language, there can be no doubt. It needs to be determined what Schottel's own share in this work was, what contributions he made to the vocabulary, what reforms he suggested, what position he took with reference to the reforms suggested by others, how far he understood the spirit of the language and the tendencies of its development. The present paper is intended as a step in this direction.

The central narrative in Bojardo's epic, the Orlando Innamorato, relates how the appearance of the beautiful Angelica at the court of Charlemagne completely turned the heads of all the noble paladins present, notably Orlando and Rinaldo. These two cousins and brothers-in-arms now become hated rivals, and set out in pursuit of the fair maiden when she returns to her native country. Much time passes before the two knights meet, and when this finally does occur, it is before Albracca, Angelica's castle, where she is besieged by another lover, Agricane, King of Tartary. The meeting is stormy, as was to be foreseen, and a duel is begun which lasts for two days, and which would have ended badly for Rinaldo had not Angelica, who just then is in love with him, held back the blow that would have wounded him mortally. She knows that Rinaldo is safe only if Orlando can be gotten out of the way, and to do this successfully she sends the latter on a perilous and distant expedition. Among the many adventures which he encounters on this journey is the destruction of an enchanted garden which had been fabricated by an enchantress named Falerina. Orlando's impulse is to slay her as well, but his mind is changed when he learns that her death would have as consequence the death of many knights and ladies who are kept prisoners in a tower. In exchange for her life she promises to lead him to that prison (ii–v, 1–24). When they arrive there Orlando sees hanging on a tree beyond the moat the armor of his cousin Rinaldo, and, believing him dead, remorse for his former quarrels with him seizes him, and he rushes over the bridge to engage battle with Aridano, the guardian of the tower. The two antagoniste clutch, and soon roll down the shore into the enchanted lake which surrounds the prison (ii–vii, 32–63). They descend through the water until they arrive on dry ground, a meadow, lighted up by the rays of the sun, that break through the water above them. Here the battle continues, until Orlando succeeds in slaying his enemy. Then he looks about him for a way of escape. He is surrounded on every side by mountainshore and rocks; but on one side he notices a door cut into the rock, and near that entrance he sees chiselled a picture of the labyrinth and its history with the minotaur, and not far from this another picture, showing a maiden wounded in the breast by a dart of love thrown by a youth. This should have taught him the manner of escape, but he passes on without heeding its meaning. Soon he arrives at a river and a narrow bridge, on either side of which stand two iron figures, armed. Beyond it in the plain is placed the treasure of the Fata Morgana. He attempts to cross this bridge, but at every trial the two iron figures demolish it, and a new bridge at once rises in the place of the old one. Finally, with a tremendous leap he clears the river, and now he finds himself near the coveted treasure. After many wonderful incidents, which it is not to the purpose to relate he arrives near the prison where Rinaldo is held with other knights. This latter, it should be stated, had also left Angelica after his duel with Orlando, and arrived here by a shorter way. As Orlando approaches this prison, he comes to a fissure in the rock, into which he enters, and which leads him to a door.

(a) Few subjects connected with Anglo-Saxon prose have been so persistently slighted as that of the position of words and clauses. The grammars either omit it entirely or touch upon it only in the most vague and general terms. No monographs treating the whole subject in all its periods and aspects have yet appeared, Kube's dissertation1 being the only attempt, so far as I know, to investigate the word-order of even a single monument of Anglo-Saxon literature. But this work, though valuable, is awkwardly arranged, and devotes too little proportionate space to the subject of dependent clauses, the element of Anglo-Saxon word-order which offers the greatest contrast to modern English and which is therefore the most interesting as well as the most important. Kube's results are further vitiated by his having selected a monument written at long intervals apart and therefore incapable, if treated as a single synchronous work, of exhibiting any successive changes in word-order, or the word-order of any fixed date.

The primitive purity of the early Church soon yielded to a Church hierarchy. In those early times, before the New Testament was admitted to equal canonical authority with the Old, the Church became the supreme authority and the Bible was subordinate. After the incorporation of the New Testament into the Bible, the Scriptures and the Church appear to be coördinate authority in the patristic writings of that period. During the Middle Ages the Church grew rapidly in political power and the influence of the Scriptures waned accordingly, so that Dante complains of the way in which not merely creeds and fathers but canon law and the decretals were studied instead of the gospels. It is true that pious people, ever since the days of Pentecost, had believed that “the inward spiritual facts of man's religious experience were of infinitely more value than their expression in stereotyped forms recognized by the Church,” and that, too, “ in such a solemn thing as the forgiveness of sin man could go to God directly without human mediation.” These pious souls had found the pardon they sought, but the good majority were under the dominion of the Church, which at last degraded the meaning of “spiritual ” so that it signified mere ritualistic service, and “thrust itself between God and the worshipper, and proclaimed that no man could draw near to God save through its appointed ways of approach. Confession was to be made to God through the priest; God spoke pardon only in the priest's absolution. When Luther attacked indulgences in the way he did he struck at the whole system.” After the Reformation a reaction set in. New and better translations of the Bible were made, and the Word became accessible to every-body. The successors of the Reformers emphasized “the verbal inspiration of the Scripture and its infallible authority (more) than had been done for the most part by the first Reformers, Luther and Calvin and their contemporaries, who never seemed to have sanctioned the famous dictum of Chillingworth, ‘the Bible, and the Bible only, is the religion of the Protestants.‘” The Reformers took the Holy Scriptures, because they are the divine word, and require no further supplement from tradition and custom, merely as the rule and canon of their faith. Traditions, dogmas, ordinances established by the Church, were null and void. This freedom of the religious conscience and the Holy Scriptures as the living, pure source of religion brought a rich blessing to Christians. Religion was elevated above that sphere in which mere morality and outer ordinance were the determining principles, and raised man to a new spiritual life. The real motive principle of this new life is justification by faith.

Of the main streams of medieval poetry three were so seriously checked by the Renascence that they are only at the present day beginning to flow again as literary influences. They are the Norse Edda, the German Heldensage, and the Celtic national cycle. From these abundant sources the literature of Europe during the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries drew but little.

Four years ago I read before this Association a paper upon a single figure of speech,—allegory. In order to make a careful study of that figure, it was necessary to give some attention to other figures, especially to these three,—simile, metaphor, and personification. From time to time during the last four years I have followed up trains of thought that were opened by my earlier study, and thus have been led almost unconsciously to note the various relations of the more important figures, until I have come to feel that the best way to arrive at an understanding of any one figure is to study figurative language as a whole as well as in its parts.1 Each year the subject has been brought anew to my mind by the necessity of presenting it in the class-room.