et in various ways contributed to counteract
its prevailing tendencies, and to rouse and direct the dormant strength
of their countrymen. Some penetrated into the deepest mysteries of
Grecian art, and inspired a new, enthusiastic feeling for the beauties
of classical antiquity. Some opened the treasures of many interesting
but neglected fields of ancient and modern literature. Others exposed
with irresistible subtilty and force of criticism, the spurious rules
and blind imitations and hollow pomp of the French drama, so long an
object of unsuspecting faith, and directed the public attention to the
true classical and romantic models. The language itself, which in the
preceding period had lost much of its grace, raciness and vigour, and
had become at once weak and unwieldy, was carefully cultivated, and
gradually formed into a worthy organ of high conceptions and deep
speculations. The next generation grew up under happier auspices.
Shakespeare began to be known, felt and enjoyed in Germany, and the
young and rising spirits of the age turned from the effete and lifeless
literature of France, to contemplate the eternal freshness of nature
and her favorite child. The new school of poetry which they formed, and
which recognized no other guide than genius, truth and feeling, was
perhaps partial in its tendency and indefinite as to its objects; it
produced among much that was great and beautiful some morbid
extravagances and wild exaggerations; but viewed as a state of
transition it was both salutary and promising; it counteracted other
much more dangerous and mischievous innovations of the age; it
preserved many noble minds from the contagion of cold and heartless
theories, and contained within itself the fruitful elements of a still
more fortunate period.

The great political events which marked the close of the century gave a
new impulse to the mind of Germany. The principles and opinions which
then manifested themselves with tremendous consistency in France had
exerted a more or less noxious and disturbing force in the former
country, but the violent crisis to which they led was there at least in
the highest degree beneficial. It did not operate, as in some other
countries, merely as a lesson of political experience, to regulate the
external conduct of those who were interested in the maintenance of
established institutions without altering their principles, and thus to
produce a show of union and stability while the disco