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excluding the various characteristics they have offered. In the process, promote critical thinking
about the traditional definition of personality.

LECTURE/DISCUSSION TOPIC: THE CONNECTION BETWEEN


PERSONALITY THEORIES AND PSYCHOTHERAPY
APPROACHES
Purpose: To enhance understanding and critical thinking regarding psychotherapy
approaches and the personality theories that underlie them.
According to the textbook, the development of personality theories and the development of
psychotherapy approaches have “gone hand in hand.”
Using what they know about Freud and Skinner from previous courses and from Chapter 1, ask
students to imagine how therapy for depression might differ if they (as therapy clients) went to
see a Freudian/psychoanalytic therapist or a Skinnerian/behavioral therapist. Encourage
volunteers to share their preferences for one of these types of therapy, as well as the reasons for
these preferences. Finally, ask students to what extent a psychotherapist should be required to tell
a new or prospective client about the theory of personality to which he/she prescribes. As clients,
would they want to know this information about a therapist they might see?

LECTURE/DISCUSSION TOPIC: COMPELLINGNESS


Purpose: To actively engage students in a discussion of how they and others are compelled
or persuaded by statements.
According to the textbook, the ultimate criterion for a philosophical assumption is its
compellingness, which consists of coherence, relevance, and comprehensiveness. Ask students if
these three ingredients do, in fact, constitute the compellingness of a philosophical assumption (or
any kind of message intended to convince them of something). If so, which one is most
important? Why? Which one is most often used by advertisers, politicians, or others who may try
to convince them of something? Which one do they use themselves when trying to compel or
persuade a friend or family member?

2 Chapter 1
HANDOUT 1–1: PERSONALITY OPINION SURVEY
Instructions: This is not a test but is designed to give you a better understanding of your present
orientation and understanding concerning the following topics in personality theory. Think before
answering, and try to give a clear and complete opinion on each item. There are no “right” or
“wrong” answers, so answer each according to your personal beliefs.
Define personality:

Define self:

Define normal behavior:

Give the characteristics of a healthy personality:

When you first meet a person and have no prior knowledge concerning the person, on what
basis do you characterize, stereotype, or decide how to act toward and interact with the
person?

What gives a person’s life meaning?

What makes human beings “human”? (How are all alike at the core?)

What motivates all human beings? Is motivation learned or innate? Does it change during
one’s lifetime?

Do humans have an unconscious? If yes, to what extent is normal, adult behavior controlled
or guided by the unconscious?

What is socialization, and how and why does it occur in human beings?

How and on what basis is the self-concept formed in normal human beings?

In what ways are all human beings alike?

Why are human beings different? (Is the difference a product of the environment, or are we
born different?)

Chapter 1 3
How consistent is a normal, adult human being from one situation to the next? What causes
inconsistencies, if there are any?

What does a person have to do or be in order for you to believe he or she is abnormal, sick, or
crazy?

Schick, C., & Arnold, J.D. (1986). Increasing students’ awareness of their theoretical orientation
toward personality. In V.P. Makosky, L.G. Whittemore, & A.M. Rogers (Eds.), Activities
Handbook for the Teaching of Psychology, Vol. # 2, pp. 185–190. Washington, DC: American
Psychological Association.

4 Chapter 1
Testbank

Multiple Choice
1. When we use the term personality in everyday speech, we are usually referring to
a) unconscious forces.
b) an unorganized pattern of the perception of “I.”
c) that which determines an individual’s behavior.
d) an individual’s public image or social role.
Ans: d Learning Objective: 1 Ref: What Is Personality? Type: F
2. Which of the following personality theorists considered the concept of personality to be
unnecessary?
a) Gordon Allport
b) Sigmund Freud
c) Carl Rogers
d) B. F. Skinner
Ans: d Learning Objective: 1 Ref: What Is Personality? Type: F
3. Sigmund Freud viewed personality as
a) a concept unworthy for psychologists to study.
b) unconscious and hidden.
c) entirely dependent on temporary circumstances.
d) independent from the influence of childhood experiences.
Ans: b Learning Objective: 1 Ref: What Is Personality? Type: C
4. A set of abstract concepts used to explain a group of facts or events is called
a) an empirical statement.
b) an operational definition.
c) a theory.
d) personality.
Ans: c Learning Objective: 2 Ref: What Is a Theory? Type: F
5. Historically, formal discussion of theories of personality have been dominated by a(n)
a) Western focus.
b) feminist focus.
c) Afrocentric focus.
d) Asian focus.
Ans: a Learning Objective: 2 Ref: What Is a Theory? Type: C
6. Of the following questions, which most accurately reflects the study of personality?
a) How do humans differ from animals?
b) Who am I?
c) How have humans changed over the course of history?
d) When are behavior patterns determined?
Ans: b Learning Objective: 2 Ref: The Role of Personality Theory in Psychology
Type: F

Chapter 1 5
7. People of ________________ have engaged in scholarly efforts to understand themselves
by constructing theories of personality.
a) North America
b) the United States and Europe
c) all cultures
d) the Western world
Ans: c Learning Objective: 2 Ref: What Is a Theory? Type: C
8. Why are theories of personality constructed?
a) To help us understand human nature
b) To zero in on one general explanation
c) To sum up research
d) Because they’re necessitated by nature
Ans: a Learning Objective: 2 Ref: What Is a Theory? Type: C
9. John Watson recommended that psychologists should emphasize the study of
a) overt behaviors.
b) mental processes.
c) introspection.
d) covert behaviors.
Ans: a Learning Objective: 3 Ref: The Role of Personality Theory in Psychology
Type: F
10. John Watson’s extreme behaviorist views were adopted and taken even further by
a) Gordon Allport.
b) Carl Rogers.
c) Sigmund Freud
d) B.F. Skinner
Ans: d Learning Objective: 3 Ref: The Role of Personality Theory in Psychology
Type: F
11. Freud’s theory of personality was developed on the basis of
a) rigorous scientific testing of human behavior in laboratory settings.
b) experimentation on animals, the results of which were generalized to humans.
c) his experience living in Europe, Asia, and Africa.
d) his own clinical observations.
Ans: d Learning Objective: 3 Ref: The Role of Personality Theory in Psychology
Type: F
12. The study of personality stems from two different approaches. What are these?
a) academic psychology and clinical practice
b) meditation and self-assessment
c) laboratory research on animal behavior and case studies on group behavior
d) social psychology and learning theory
Ans: a Learning Objective: 3 Ref: The Role of Personality Theory in Psychology
Type: C
13. Macro theories of personality are to micro theories as ________ is to ________.
a) global; specific
b) implicit; explicit
c) optimistic; pessimistic
d) reactive; proactive
Ans: a Learning Objective: 3 Ref: The Role of Personality Theory in Psychology
Type: F

6 Chapter 1
14. What do personality theorists seek to accomplish in their role of scientists?
a) They deal with the study of ultimate reality.
b) They apply their findings to foster better living.
c) They explore what it means to be a person.
d) They test hypotheses to explain human behavior.
Ans: d Learning Objective: 4 Ref: The Evaluation of Personality Theory
Type: C
15. According to the text, personality theorists develop, test, and apply their theories in three
complementary orientations, in which they act as philosophers, scientists, and
a) artists.
b) theorists.
c) architects.
d) engineers.
Ans: a Learning Objective: 4 Ref: The Evaluation of Personality Theory
Type: C
16. Because they refer to an extraordinary vision, philosophical statements are said to be
a) global.
b) comprehensive.
c) relevant.
d) epiphanic.
Ans: d Learning Objective: 6 Ref: Philosophical Assumptions Type: F
17. Of the following philosophical assumptions, which one concerns a person’s ability to
control his own behavior and understand the motives behind it?
a) Freedom versus determinism
b) Heredity versus environment
c) Uniqueness versus universality
d) Optimism versus pessimism
Ans: a Learning Objective: 6 Ref: Philosophical Assumptions Type: F
18. The basic philosophical issue of optimism versus pessimism that personality theorists
consider centers on whether
a) people can change their personalities over time.
b) human nature is fundamentally good or bad.
c) hope is an essential feature of psychotherapy.
d) personality theories can adequately explain or predict human behavior.
Ans: a Learning Objective: 6 Ref: Philosophical Assumptions Type: F
19. To be meaningful, a philosophical assumption should have some bearing on our view of
reality. In other words, it should be
a) comprehensive.
b) coherent.
c) relevant.
d) compelling.
Ans: c Learning Objective: 6 Ref: Philosophical Assumptions Type: C

Chapter 1 7
20. If a personality theory is riddled with inconsistencies and contradictions, it is most likely to
be criticized as
a) irrelevant.
b) lacking comprehensiveness.
c) unscientific.
d) incoherent.
Ans: d Learning Objective: 6 Ref: Philosophical Assumptions Type: C
21. The logical consistency of a philosophical assumption refers to the criterion of
a) comprehensiveness.
b) coherence.
c) compellingness.
d) relevance.
Ans: b Learning Objective: 7 Ref: Philosophical Assumptions Type: F
22. Philosophical statements are ultimately tested by
a) rigorous experimentation.
b) perceptual observation.
c) empirical means.
d) their compellingness.
Ans: d Learning Objective: 7 Ref: Philosophical Assumptions Type: C
23. Thomas Kuhn suggests that scientific activity is
a) an inappropriate way to study human behavior.
b) based on private, intrinsically unique perceptions.
c) secondary to philosophical knowledge.
d) based on a paradigm that existed before the scientific activity took place.
Ans: d Learning Objective: 8 Ref: Scientific Statements Type: F
24. A model or concept of the world that is shared by the members of the community and that
governs their activities is called a(n)
a) paradigm.
b) operational definition.
c) philosophical assumption.
d) scientific statement.
Ans: a Learning Objective: 8 Ref: Scientific Statements Type: F
25. Who is most closely associated with the term paradigm as applied to scientific study?
a) Sigmund Freud
b) Thomas Kuhn
c) B. F. Skinner
d) Carl Rogers
Ans: b Learning Objective: 8 Ref: Scientific Statements Type: C
26. Subjective data differ from objective data because
a) subjective data are not based on empirical data.
b) subjective data are more difficult to validate consensually.
c) psychologists are not concerned with subjective data.
d) subjective data refer to things outside the self.
Ans: b Learning Objective: 9 Ref: Scientific Statements Type: C

8 Chapter 1
27. Scientists use the term __________________ to describe agreement among observers.
a) validity
b) consensual validation
c) subjective data
d) generalization
Ans: b Learning Objective: 9 Ref: Scientific Statements Type: C
28. A psychological researcher notices that in his or her studies, people with physical
characteristic A possess high levels of personality trait B. The researcher then concludes
that people outside his or her studies who have physical characteristic A also have high
levels of personality trait B. This application of the results to individuals outside the study
sample illustrates
a) generalization.
b) validation.
c) paradigm shift.
d) consensual validation.
Ans: a Learning Objective: 9 Ref: Scientific Statements Type: A
29. What is an operational definition?
a) An inferred conclusion based on coinciding observations
b) A specification of the behaviors included in a concept
c) An imaginary, or hypothetical, construct
d) A statement based on deductive reasoning and knowledge
Ans: b Learning Objective: 9 Ref: Scientific Statements Type: F
30. Imaginary, or hypothetical, concepts that are invoked by scientists are called
a) empirical statements.
b) objective data.
c) operational definitions.
d) scientific constructs.
Ans: d Learning Objective: 9 Ref: Scientific Statements Type: F
31. Sasha can be characterized as shy, tired, hungry, and attractive. Which of the following
describes one of Sasha’s personality traits?
a) She is shy.
b) She is attractive.
c) She is tired.
d) She is hungry.
Ans: a Learning Objective: 9 Ref: Scientific Statements Type: A
32. One requirement of scientific statements is that they be
a) based on extrasensory perception.
b) open to falsification.
c) based on an epiphanic act of knowledge.
d) evaluated by their compellingness.
Ans: b Learning Objective: 10 Ref: Scientific Statements Type: F
33. The compatibility of a hypothesis refers to its
a) simplicity of purpose.
b) compelling epiphanic character.
c) agreement with previously established information.
d) ability to generate confirmatory findings.
Ans: c Learning Objective: 10 Ref: Scientific Statements Type: F

Chapter 1 9
34. After first having read about Freud’s theory in her textbook, Joyce exclaimed, “I don’t
believe any of this is really true.” Joyce is disputing the theory’s
a) coherence.
b) compellingness.
c) comprehensiveness.
d) relevance.
Ans: b Learning Objective: 10 Ref: Thinking Critically: Evaluating Personality
Theories Type: A
35. In evaluating the usefulness of an assessment technique, the most important factor to
consider is the test’s
a) objectivity.
b) reliability.
c) standardization.
d) validity.
Ans: d Learning Objective: 10 Ref: The Art of Personality Theories Type: F
36. A psychometrist constructs a new personality test. He finds that the test scores do not vary
from one administration of the test to the next. He also finds that the test does not
adequately measure the global concept of personality. We can categorize the test as being
________ in reliability and ________ in validity.
a) high; low
b) high; high
c) low; high
d) low; low
Ans: a Learning Objective: 10 Ref: The Art of Personality Theories Type: A
37. What is an objective personality test that is made up of over 550 self-report items to which
the participant answers “true,” “false,” or “cannot say”?
a) Thematic Apperception Test (TAT).
b) Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI).
c) Rorschach.
d) Stanford-Binet IQ Test.
Ans: b Learning Objective: 11 Ref: The Art of Personality Theories Type: F
38. The major problem with projective tests, such as the Rorschach, is that they
a) are difficult to score objectively.
b) present ambiguous stimuli.
c) are interpreted differently by each patient.
d) lack standardized instructions for administration.
Ans: a Learning Objective: 11 Ref: The Art of Personality Theories Type: F
39. What is a statistical tool that indicates the extent to which changes in one factor are
accompanied by changes in a second factor?
a) variance
b) correlation
c) mean
d) dependent variable
Ans: b Learning Objective: 11 Ref: The Art of Personality Theories Type: F

10 Chapter 1
40. An experiment is a research method in which the researcher
a) systematically varies one factor to see if it has any effect on another factor.
b) assumes that changes in the dependent variable create changes in the independent
variable.
c) systematically varies two or more factors at the same time and records the results.
d) is able to make predictions in everyday life with the same precision as in the
laboratory.
Ans: a Learning Objective: 11 Ref: The Art of Personality Theories Type: F
41. Carl Rogers, who focused on improving a client’s life by creating the kind of climate that
fosters therapeutic change, best exemplifies which motive of therapy?
a) Curative
b) Ethical
c) Primary
d) Scholarly
Ans: b Learning Objective: 12 Ref: The Art of Personality Theories Type: F
42. Which of the following approaches to psychotherapy did Hans Eysenck advocate the most?
a) behaviorist
b) psychoanalytic
c) humanistic
d) cognitive
Ans: a Learning Objective: 12 Ref: The Art of Personality Theories Type: F
43. In 1952, ______________ stunned the therapeutic community with a report on treatment
outcomes indicating that various forms of psychotherapy are no more effective than a
placebo or no treatment.
a) Freud
b) Rogers
c) Eysenck
d) Rychlak
Ans: c Learning Objective: 12 Ref: The Art of Personality Theories Type: F
44. The word therapy comes from a Greek term, the literal meaning of which is
a) “relate” and “observe.”
b) “attending” and “healing.”
c) “dialogue” and “communication.”
d) “teaching and “educating.”
Ans: b Learning Objective: 12 Ref: The Art of Personality Theories Type: F
45. A Freudian psychoanalyst would probably prefer to be evaluated in terms of
a) the number of his or her patients who no longer display troublesome symptoms.
b) the cost- and time-effectiveness of his or her therapeutic methods.
c) whether he or she created the kind of conditions in therapy that promote therapeutic
change.
d) whether he or she helped patients to understand themselves better.
Ans: d Learning Objective: 12 Ref: The Art of Personality Theories Type: C

Short Answer
1. Explain why personality is difficult to define and briefly cite two different definitions given
by personality theorists.
2. Define the term theory.

Chapter 1 11
3. Discuss the roles of academic psychology and clinical practice in the evolution of the study
of personality.
4. Describe three functions of personality theories.
5. Explain the philosophical issue of freedom versus determinism as considered by personality
theorists.
6. Explain the philosophical issue of heredity versus environmental factors as considered by
personality theorists.
7. Discuss the criteria by which philosophical assumptions are evaluated.
8. What is a paradigm, and how is this concept relevant to the study of personality?
9. Explain the characteristics of scientific statements.
10. Assume that you are a scientist faced with two rival hypotheses. Explain the criteria you
would use to decide between them.
11. Describe two major techniques of assessing personality and three primary research
approaches used in personality.
12. Identify three major motives or goals of therapy and give an example of a therapy that
addresses each goal.
13. Explain why it is important to distinguish among the different functions of personality
theories.
14. What are some of the paradigms that we share today and that govern our activities?
Compare these to some of the paradigms shared by society 100 years ago.
15. One of the philosophical issues about which personality theorists debate is uniqueness
versus universality. Which of these two points of view do you prefer?
16. How can an appreciation of a wide range of personality theories (e.g., both Western and
non-Western) influence one’s tolerance for cultural diversity or political viewpoints?
17. How does the scientific concept of generalization, with which personality theorists struggle,
relate to the concepts of stereotyping and prejudice?
18. Why do such close relationships exist between particular psychotherapy approaches and
particular theories of personality?

12 Chapter 1
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the things in them which seem to me most interesting are not quite
those which struck M. Rigault.
419. This is referred to, in the extract from Leone Allacci prefixed
to the 1646 ed. of Tassoni, as libellus Patavii editus. Tassoni seems
to have replied under a pseudonym and pretty savagely (magis
aculeatis dentibus).
420. Eight volumes, in 16 parts, of a not small quarto (Venice,
1643). This is one of the many books for the opportunity of studying
which, without burdening shelves and lightening purse, I am
indebted to the Library of the Faculty of Advocates.
421. Venice, 1612-13.
422. See Professors Gayley and Scott’s invaluable book so often
cited, p. 447, a passage based on Blankenburg’s older Zusätze (3
vols., Leipsic, 1796-98).
423. Venice, 1613.
424. Blankenburg is the sinner here.
425. Padua, 1681, pp. 1025-1088.
426. Henry Cary, Earl of Monmouth, translated the book in 1656.
427. Spain can boast, however, perhaps the very best History of
its criticism as a whole that any European language has—if not as
yet the only good one—in the Historia de las Ideas Estéticas en
España of Don Marcelino Menéndez y Pelayo (Ed. 2, 9 vols.,
Madrid, 1890-1896). This is fortunate for me, inasmuch as I do not
pretend to any extensive familiarity with Spanish literature beyond
the early poets, and indeed do not read the language with very great
facility. Besides Señor Menéndez I have relied chiefly on the texts
and comments recently furnished (v. inf.) by M. Morel-Fatio (who will,
I hope, continue in so good a road), on Ticknor, on the short but
valuable notices of this period in Mr Spingarn, op. cit., on those in my
friend Mr Hannay’s The Later Renaissance (Edinburgh and London,
1898), and on Mr James Fitzmaurice Kelly’s History of Spanish
Literature (London, 1898). I am particularly obliged to Mr Kelly for a
copy of the recent (undated) Spanish translation of his book, with a
few corrections, and a preface by Señor Menéndez himself. The
Spanish critic combines, with a just praise of the book, a mild
remonstrance as to the small space which Mr Fitzmaurice Kelly has
given to this very critical subject—a fact in which I own I myself had
felt some comfort. The silence of the specialist is the shield of the
expatiator. I have not failed, wherever I could, to verify all the critical
deliverances in the text, and examine almost all, if not all, the books
mentioned; but I do not know the circumference of them as I do
elsewhere. And as I began this History on the principle of going to
the sources, I think myself bound to warn the reader of any case in
which I have been obliged to modify that principle.
428. This was written before M. Morel-Fatio had expressed the
same view in his Les Défenseurs de la Comedia (Bulletin
Hispanique, ubi cit. inf.) See also on the point Mr Ker’s Essays of
Dryden, i. lxvi, and the references in his index to Dryden’s mention of
Spanish plays. Of course the main interest of the matter lies in the
much stronger resemblances that exist between the great English
and Spanish dramas than between any other two national branches
of the European theatre.
429. They say now that he was not only not (as used to be said)
the premier and only Marquis of Spain, but not a Marquis at all. Non
moror: non sum invidus—especially as the next monographer will
probably restore the Marquisate.
430. I have duly looked this up in what appears to be the only
accessible place (a place valuable for other documents), the
Orígenes de La Lengua Española, Madrid, 1737, of Mayáns y
Siscar. It is merely a tissue of troubadours’ names, scholastic
citations, and minute details of pronunciation and versification. Señor
Menéndez has reprinted part of it in the Appendix to his second
volume.
431. Poesias Castellanas anteriores al siglo xv. (Paris, 1842) pp.
13-17.
432. Quem nova concepit olla servabit odorem. It may be
observed that, on the principles of Low Latin scansion from
Commodian downwards, the first four words will do well enough.
433. I have used the somewhat later Grenville copy in the British
Museum Salamanca, 1509, fol.; and Señor Menéndez' reprint in the
Appendix to his second volume, which also contains one or two
other early documents.
434. The plural was used in the version of Mayans y Siscar
(Origenes, v. supra), which was long the only one accessible. In
1860 a better text appeared at Madrid with the singular, which
Ticknor and Mr Kelly approve. For any one who professes no
Spanish scholarship to set himself against these authorities may
seem absurd. But in the book itself sub finem the author writes
“habiendo considerado estas tres lenguas,” and the changes are
rung on Latin, Tuscan, and Spanish throughout.
435. After a conversation with Navagero which he has reported,
and which is, in its way, also a critical document.
436. Señor Menéndez refers to two Poetics anterior to Rengifo,
neither of which I have seen. The first, by Miguel Sanchez de Lima
(sometimes called de Viana), Alcala, 1580, has a slight interest in
the wording of its title, “El Arte Poética en romance castillano.” The
second—which from its date (1593) would seem to be a little later
than Rengifo, though the historian mentions it first—is Hierónymo de
Mondragon’s Arte para componer en metro castillano (Saragossa,
1593).
437. The above paragraph was written from notes taken while
reading Rengifo at the British Museum. In subsequently reading
Señor Menéndez on him I was surprised to find the learned historian
protesting against the Labyrinth, and other such things, as having
been foisted in cir. 1700-1720, and referring to the editions of 1592
and 1606 as alone genuine. But the British Museum copy is that of
1606! Let it by us even be said to Rengifo’s credit that, like Sidney,
he felt the charm of old romance. See M. y P., p. 320.
438. “The inexorable Cascales,” as Señor Menéndez calls him in a
passage which I had not read when I wrote the text. Of Cascales, as
of Pinciano (v. infra), the Señor thinks far more highly than I do. Both
seem to me (though Cascales more than Pinciano) to be simply
uncompromising Aristotelians who borrowed from the Italians; but,
like most borrowers and imitators, hardened and emphasised what
they borrowed. Both were forced to allow little “easements” in regard
to the drama; but only such as are consistent with Aristotle’s text,
though not with some glosses on him. And Pinciano simply
translates the Aristotelian definition of tragedy, while Cascales,
doubtless with reference to the different heresies of Castelvetro and
Giraldi, is quite Athanasian in his doctrine that poetic verities are
absolutely unchangeable, and independent of custom and time.
439. The book appeared in 1616; but I have had to use the reprint
of 1779. I have not seen Mesa’s Compendio de la Poética (Madrid,
1607) or Carillo’s Libro de Erudicion poética.
440. Madrid, 1596.
441. The Filosofía Antigua is extremely rare, and does not appear
to be in the British Museum either under “Pinciano” or under Lopez,
his real name. Fortunately there is a recent reprint (Valladolid, 1894),
ed. by Professor Don Pedro Muñoz Peña, which I duly possess. It
may be observed that bibliographers and librarians are particularly
hard on the laity in the Spanish department. It is surely needless to
make one hunt in vain for an author of world-wide reputation under
his world-name till one runs him to earth as Gómez de Quevedo [y]
Villegas.
442. Señor Peña, himself a professor (catedrático) of Valladolid in
Rhetoric and Poetry, explains that this surname was taken by
distinguished alumni of that University, and derived from the Roman
city (Pincia) supposed to have existed on the site. Few definite dates
or facts seem to be known about Alfonso Lopez, except that he was
physician to Mary of Austria, daughter of Charles V. and widow of
Maximilian II. during her life at Madrid from 1576 to 1603, and that
he wrote, besides the Filosofía and other things, a poem on Pelayo,
languide nec eleganter, one regrets to hear.
443. As where Fadrique substitutes, for the stately old image of
the honey on the edge of a bitter cup, the familiar come quien dora
una píldora, “as one who gilds a pill,” ed. cit., p. 120.
444. Ejemplar Poético, first printed, and, I think, still only to be
found, in the Parnaso Español, Madrid, 1774, vol. viii.
445. See Spingarn, p. 146, who gives the passage.
446. The Later Renaissance, p. 39.
447. Cf. Spingarn, p. 233.
448. (With a much longer title), Medina del Campo, 1602. The
quaint title is connected with a quainter fancy, that the poet is noble
as such—a “Knight of the Swan.” Señor Menéndez makes some use
of Carvallo, but admits that he is pedagogo adocenado, “a common
dominie.”
449. Nueva Idea de la Tragedia Antigua, &c. Madrid, 1633.
450. La misma lobreguez y el mismo desconsuelo, M. y P., iii. 364.
451. In the passage quoted by M. y P., iii. 366, 367.
452. Madrid, 1624. Noted by Señor Menéndez (who has given the
whole passage, iii. 457-60) as a specially rare book. Fortunately the
British Museum, according to a wise habit of its own in such cases
(cf. Capriano), has two copies, and M. Morel-Fatio has included the
piece which concerns us in an invaluable collection (also including
Lope’s Arte Nuevo and other things) of Spanish critical documents,
which he is issuing in the Bulletin Hispanique of the Faculty of
Letters of Bordeaux, and republishing separately (Paris, Fontemoing;
Bordeaux, Feret, 1901-1902). The man who gives a text attains merit
which mere commentators and historians can never hope to have
imputed to them.
453. Also reprinted by M. Morel-Fatio in the issue noticed above.
454. Los casos de la honra son mejores, Porque mueven con
fuerça a toda gente—A.N., 327, 328. At least one of Lope’s
innumerable works, the Laurel de Apolo, written late in his life
(1630), is busied with the poets of his time in the fashion of Caporali
and Cervantes, but, it would seem, in a spirit of wholly uncritical
panegyric.
455. V. sup., pp. 49, 50 note. It is fair to say that Lope quotes
Robortello.
456. Omnes dilaberentur. Señor Menéndez (iii. 444) gives all the
important parts, both in Latin and Spanish. R. de[l] Turia, infra, has
been reprinted, but the marrow of him also will be found in the
Historia, as well as much else: for instance, an interesting Invectiva y
Apologia, by Francesco de la Barreda in 1622, which is dignified by
the words: “There was no greater dramatic-poetic written in the
seventeenth century”—a large statement. But Barreda is certainly a
staunch anti-Unitarian, and has well reached the important doctrine
that “Art is merely a careful observation of classified [graduados]
examples.” The whole dispute, in which the more or less great
names of the Argensolas, Artieda, Cristóbal de Mesa, and others,
figure, together with the subsequent one on culteranism, will be
found exhaustively treated in the tenth chapter of the Historia, and
more summarily, but still usefully, in Ticknor. Since most of the text
was written M. Morel-Fatio, in his Défenseurs de la Comedia (v. sup.,
p. 343), has subjoined Turia to Tirso, and a certain Carlos Boyl to
both, adding a notice of the Frenchman Ogier (v. sup., pp. 256, 257),
who is already familiar to readers of these pages. Boyl, one of the
Valencian group above referred to, wrote in “romance” form rules of
the comedia nueva.
457. Let it be remembered that the curious passage on which
Pope dwells (Ess. Crit., 267 sq.) is not Cervantic, but from the
spurious and intrusive work of the mysterious Avellaneda.
458. Enthusiastically Englished, with much apparatus, by the late
James Y. Gibson (London, 1883). It is closely modelled on the
Viaggio di Parnasso of Cesare Caporali (1531-1601).
459. Or of their Spanish followers, such as Pinciano and Cascales.
This opinion, formed independently from reading of Don Quixote,
agrees with one of much more importance, that of Señor Menéndez
himself. Nay, Mr Fitzmaurice Kelly (op. cit., p. 237) roundly
pronounces Cervantes “the least critical of men.”
460. In his Works. Bibl. de Ribadeneyra.
461. In his Works. 2 vols., Barcelona, 1748.
462. Later Renaissance, p. 172.
463. Hist. Spanish Lit., p. 340.
464. I am very well aware that culteranismo and conceptismo are
perhaps not identical, and have been asserted to be quite different.
But both alike belong to the “better-bread-than-is-made-of-wheat”
division of writing.
CHAPTER III.

GERMAN AND DUTCH CRITICISM.


THE HINDMOST OF ALL—ORIGINS—STURM—FABRICIUS—VERSION A.—
VERSION B.—JAC. PONTANUS—HEINSIUS: THE ‘DE TRAGŒDIÆ
CONSTITUTIONE’—VOSS—HIS ‘RHETORIC’—HIS ‘POETICS’—OPITZ—
THE ‘BUCH DER DEUTSCHEN POETEREI.’

It is not necessary to add much to what has been said in the first
chapter of the last Book on the subject of Erasmus, in order to
indicate the reasons why the growth of criticism in Germany, High
and Low,[465] was far more tardy, and for a long time far scantier, than
even in England; and why, when it came, it displayed a one-eyed
character which is not visible in any other of the great European
The hindmost countries.[466] Want of unity, religious and political
of all. troubles, Grobianism and its opposite or companion
Pedantry—all had to do with this; but the principal hindrance was the
non-existence of any considerable German vernacular literature, and
the consequent inveteracy of the habit of writing in Latin. So long as
this lasted the Germans and Dutch might be and were
commentators, scholars, grammarians—but they could hardly be
critics, because they still lacked the comparative stimulus. And it is
not a little noteworthy that the earlier development of Criticism in the
Low Countries as compared with Germany, during our present
period, at least coincided with a greater development of Dutch
vernacular literature, though this is a matter which lies out of our
direct route.
There may easily be differences of opinion as to the persons, not
mere Humanists, who shall be selected as representing the
beginning of German criticism in modern times, in so far at least as
Origins. the section of Poetics is concerned. The choice may
lie between the famous Johann Sturm, who touches
on literary matters in his letters, who wrote on Rhetoric, and whose
pupil, late in his life, drew up a commentary on the Epistle to the
Pisos in 1576; Georgius Fabricius, of Chemnitz, the first form of
whose De Re Poetica appeared in 1565; and Jacobus Pontanus,
whose real name was Spanmüller, whose book on the subject was
published thirty years later, but who, as he was then a man of over
fifty, and had long been a professor, had probably dealt with the
subject, if only in lectures, much earlier.[467]
Sturm’s interests were more in pædagogy than in poetry, and he
does not rank high as a critic: though there is no doubt that he
Sturm. helped to spread devotion to books. It is not in his
favour that, in the teeth of both external and internal
evidence, he fights[468] for the name De Arte Poetica, on the special
ground that the work of Horace is an Ars Perfecta (which, put its
merits as high as you please, it most certainly is not), and that it has
all the six parts of poetry—fable, character, dianoia, lexis, melopœia,
and “sight.” For the rest he has few general remarks, and is almost
wholly commentatorial. His Rhetorical writing yields little really
critical: nor in his Letters have I yet found half so much criticism as is
extant in that single letter of Ascham to him, which has been noticed
above.[469]
The other two were both men of very wide influence as teachers of
Poetics: and both underwent the process—complimentary but
disfiguring, and specially usual in the late sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries—of having their work watered out, or boiled down, by
Fabricius. others. I do not know, and I have not considered it
tanti to spend much time or labour in the attempt to
discover, the exact process by which the small four books of the first
edition of Fabricius’ De Re Poetica[470] became the fat volume of
seven, which presents itself under the same title thirty years later.[471]
Version A. It seemed better to give this time and labour to the
reading of the books themselves. Version A (as we
may call that of 1565) is an early example of the kind of gradus
which was particularly popular among the northern nations, though,
as we have seen from the work of Mazzone da Miglionico,[472] it was
by no means unknown in Italy. In his first book Fabricius discusses
quantity, metre, and diction in general, with plentiful examples. Book
II. is an elaborate table of locutions from the Latin poets, listed under
heads as thus:—
Amor tangit. Matrimonium
promittere.
” versat. ” ” inire.
” torquet. ” ” fallere.
” dat vulnus. ” ” odisse.
” mordet.
” torret.
Book III. provides the dull-witted versifier with store of clichés of the
same kind, but a little more elaborate; there being, for instance,
dozens of phrases for embracing. And IV. is a sort of common place-
book of short copies of verses on everything in Heaven and Earth.
Version B (which is dated long after Fabricius’ death in 1571) is
Version B. not only much enlarged but differently arranged.
Book I. deals as before with Quantity and Feet;
Book II. with the subject of A, Book III.; and the rest follow the same
schemes,—III. B with tags on Ages, Seasons, Heavenly Bodies, &c.;
IV. with epithets suitable to proper names; V. with ditto to common;
VI. with a pot-pourri of poetical faults and beauties, &c.; while VII.
gives a sort of appendix on prosody and diction generally.
There is no need to say much on the inevitable critical result, the
obvious critical value or valuelessness, of this. There is in A a
reference to Scaliger’s Poetic, which had appeared a little before. As
a matter of fact Scaliger and Fabricius between them provided the
average late sixteenth-century man—sometimes even when he was
a professed critic or poet, constantly when he was merely a person
of ordinary culture—with a sort of joint poetical Thesaurus,—Scaliger
doing the historical, critical, and (of its kind) philosophical business
for him, and Fabricius keeping a general marine-store of materials,
with precepts for their use.
The Institutiones Poeticæ of Spanmüller [Pontanus] appeared first
Jac. in 1594. Its author is quoted, among other prophets
Pontanus. of criticism, by the Spaniard Juan de La Cueva a
dozen years later, and, independently of its original form, the book
acquired, early in the seventeenth century, a large currency by being
arranged (concinnata) in the Sacrarum Profanarumque Phraseum
Thesaurus of J. Buehler,[473] where it serves as theoretic handbook to
another Gradus. Indeed Pontanus’ own work has all the
characteristics of a decoction or abstract of Scaliger himself. And
once more the same reflection applies. It is impossible not to see
how powerful and (beyond mere school-work, in which they were no
doubt invaluable[474]) how maleficent must have been the influence of
such works on the critical temper of the generations influenced by
them. La Bruyère’s Tout est dit—an ironical fling in its author’s mouth
partly, no doubt, though perhaps not quite so even there—tended to
become matter of breviary. Everything had been said and done; all
the Kinds found out; all the phrases set down; all the poetry raised
from shaft and vein and seam. You simply rearranged it like a child’s
house of wooden bricks, according to patterns provided on the lid.
The “Causes of Corrupted Arts” into which Vives inquired, “The Lost
System of Speaking” which Sturm deplored, were all to be found,
and found sufficiently, in the Ancients.
The solid qualities of the German race have not commonly
distinguished themselves in pure criticism, and to this day Lessing
and Goethe are rather captains without companies, and with at best
a staff of Schlegels, and suchlike, for lieutenants and ancients.
Germans were, however, to do something better, in this century of
erudition, than the mere preparation of fourth-form handbooks.
Daniel Heinsius and Gerard Voss may be regarded with some
reason as the Jachin and the Boaz of the temple of seventeenth-
century Poetics. The De Tragœdiæ Constitutione of the first, which
appeared at Leyden in 1611,[475] is the succinctest and best argued
statement of the neo- and to a great extent pseudo-Aristotelian view
of Drama. The new Institutes of Oratory,[476] and the much later
Poetical Institutes[477] of the second, construct, with a great deal of
learning and a very considerable amount of good sense, an entire
neo-classical Rhetoric and Poetic. To both we must give some
attention.
The De Tragœdiæ Constitutione is beyond all doubt a very
Heinsius. The remarkable book. It is quite short; only some 250
De Tragœdiæ very small pages of very large print, so that there
Constitutione. are scarcely more than a hundred words in a page.
But Heinsius writes as one having authority; and we can read but
little of him before it becomes perfectly clear why that authority was
accepted, for the rest of the century at least, with more docility and
less cavil than that of almost any other critic. He takes the Poetics—
as many, indeed most men for more than half a century, had taken
them—for gospel. But he neither translates them on the one hand,
nor wanders in the wilderness of scrappy and desultory commentary
on the other. Not merely does he confine himself to that part of the
book which concerns his actual subject, but he renders this part in a
fashion which may best be described as a very rare, and very
masterly, kind of lecturing. He neither slavishly keeps nor prudishly
avoids the actual words of his author; his paraphrases are brief but
lucid; he adds to Aristotle what he thinks necessary[478] in the way of
illustrations from the Greek tragedians, citation from Horace,
examples (by no means always laudatory) from Seneca, and the
like; but in such a fashion as never to overload, or water down, the
milk of the Aristotelian word. That he always gives that milk quite
“sincere” we cannot say; he emphasises the “single revolution of the
sun” more than he has any right to do, though he does not do the
same for the still more pestilent and apocryphal Unity of Place. He
may sometimes, or often in the disputable places (as of “purgation”
and so forth), miss the full meaning of Aristotle according to the view
of some judges, or impute a wrong one according to others. But
nobody, let it be repeated, can read him impartially without seeing
that he has soaked himself with the spirit of his author, has equipped
himself pretty thoroughly with the literature of his subject, and, as a
result, is speaking, as we said, with authority. There is no clearer or
more workmanlike exposition of the neo-classic, and not too neo-
classic, dramatic ideal than his.
Heinsius, like his successor Hédelin in France, and like Hédelin’s
successors Rymer and Dennis in England, was rash enough to
forget that though a critic is (thank Heaven!) not bound to write good
Voss. poetry, he is bound not to publish bad. And he
ventured on a tragedy, Herodes Infanticida, and
other things which did not meet much quarter even from those who
agreed with him in critical principles. Voss was wiser, and confined
himself to the pure erudition and comment of which the two books
referred to above are far from being the worst examples. Indeed his
unboastful scholarship, his immense reading, and his untiring
industry would seem to have fitted him quite exceptionally for the
duty; and he has actually given us in these two books, or rather
collections of books, the completest Rhetoric and Poetic of modern,
if not of any, times. Only two things more were needed to put these
books in a place even more unique; but Nature refused the one to
Voss personally, and the other was a thing almost unreasonable to
require from a Dutch savant of the seventeenth century. The first
was positive critical genius; and the second was an impartial
appreciation of ancient and modern literature.
His Rhetoric. The Rhetoric, which the author put out in its first
form in 1606, revising and enlarging it for at least
thirty years, till it forms a quarto of a thousand closely printed pages,
has some seventy more of minute index, but lacks the Table of
Contents, or displayed syllabus of section headings, for which we
have so often had to be thankful in Italian work. Voss evidently had
the practice of the Roman Law constantly before him, and he thus
follows the method of the Latin treatises in a way which makes it for
the most part superfluous for us to follow him, though he has plenty
of modern instances and applications. From the Fourth Book
onwards, however, he deals with Elocution and Style, chiefly of
course by the way of Figures, yet, according to his lights, in the most
careful and exhaustive fashion. But what is at once noteworthy and
rather tell-tale is his unqualified admiration for the Scaligers,—father
and son. “That divine man,” “that man, ad unguem factus,” that
“emperor of the literary world,” that “prince of the senate of criticism”;
without some phrase of this kind he seems unable to name them.
And in fact the whole book is rather a huge commentatorial digest of
what they and others, from Aristotle downwards, have said than
anything more.
The Poetical Institutions are somewhat more original, and they
His Poetics. had much greater influence. The book consists
really of three separate works, a brief De Arte
Poetica of less than ninety pages, of which Grotius, in a
commendatory epigram prefixed to some editions, says—

“non magnus dat tibi cuncta liber;”

of the Institutiones proper in about four hundred; and of a De


Imitatione which is rather shorter than the Ars. The first, as reason
and its title both import, is a purely general tractate, which, after
pointing out that Poetry has much in common with Oratory, and that
therefore much which concerns it has been said in the earlier book,
discusses all the old generalities about the origin, nature, moral
character, and so forth, of poetry, with expositions of most of the
cruces and technical catchwords from Ψιλὸς λόγος down to furor
poeticus. Voss is here also very generally Scaligerian; he adheres to
the “natural” origin of poetry, love-songs, cradle-songs, &c., as
against the religious and the deliberately “imitative”; gives very wide
scope of subject to the poet, and defends him handsomely against
his enemies and detractors from Plato downwards, but is properly
indignant with naughty poets.[479]
The Institutions deal more directly with the question of Poetic Art,
and proceed by a series of section-headings in the form of
Propositions, which are then explained, commented, and defended.
The first of the Three Books deals with the matter common to all
kinds of poetry; the Second with the Drama; the Third with the Epic
and the minor Kinds. All this is old stuff rehandled. There is
somewhat more originality in the De Imitatione, which does not
exactly correspond to any of the older books, or parts of books, on
that subject. Voss generally supposes the question, “How is the poet
to set about his work?” “How is he to apply all these rules that we
have given him?” and before very long we see that he is really
thinking of the wrong Imitation no less than Vida was. He devotes
himself (no doubt under the happier inspiration of Quintilian) to
discussing how we are to imitate, how to read. But he very soon slips
into the inquiry, practical indeed but a little undignified, “How are we
to escape plagiarism?” to which one is tempted to reply, “By not
imitating in this sense at all.” That is not his opinion. He thinks, if we
may vary a well-known proverb, that the safe way is to take all your
eggs out of one basket. But you are never to imitate bad words and
thoughts; you must plan your work carefully beforehand, correct
carefully, invite criticism, but distinguish between what is good and
what is not. It is all very just in this way; but that way has led us far
from furor poeticus. We feel at the end of Voss’s laborious and
erudite book that we are indeed in the century of the Gradus. And
here, as in his other volume, we also feel that he has, for good or for
evil, caught up and uttered the gospel of Neo-Classicism.
So far we have dealt only with Latin authors. The work of Heinsius
is mentioned, both in the text by the author, and by the introducer,
Augustinus Iskra, of the Buch von der Deutschen Poeterei[480] of
Opitz. Martin Opitz. This interesting and agreeable little book,
though not exactly (as it has sometimes been incorrectly
called) the first[481] piece of German poetic in the vernacular, is
entitled, with the usual reserves, to the place of origin in modern
German Poetics. It cannot be called prolix, for it only occupies sixty
pages in the recent reprint; but it is equally modest and business-
like, and helps to redeem from the utter absurdity of most of such
appellations (though it still remains absurd) the title of German
Dryden which somebody or other has given to Opitz. Augustine Iskra
does not exaggerate when he says—

“Altius scandes patria canendo


Barbyto, quam si Latium peritæ
Atticæ jungas, Syriæque Peithus
Noveris artem.”

And it is the peculiar glory of the Silesian poet that he not only sang
himself on the lyre of his country, but did his best to enable others to
do so. The spirit of genuine patriotism breathes in his dedication of
the booklet to the magistrates of his native town, Buntzlau; and that
of a modest scholarship (an adjective and substantive which make
such an agreeable couple that it is pity they should live so much
apart) in the opening of the book itself. He has not the least idea, he
says, that you can make a poet by rules and laws; nor has he any
intention of doing over again the work which Aristotle, Horace, Vida,
The Buch der and Scaliger have done. But he arrays himself (to
Deustchen speak ecclesiastically) in a “decent tippet” of the old
Poeterei. stuff about Linus and Orpheus, with the Strabo
passage all complete, and a train of citations as to the nobility of the
poet’s office and the like. He comes in his fourth chapter to business.
He actually quotes Walther von der Vogelweide; and I do not think
that he can be fairly charged with that ὕβρις towards the ancient
poetry of his country which too frequently marks others in other
countries. But he is evidently set on the work of Reform—of
substituting “smoothness of numbers” for the “wild sweetness” of the
folk-song. Wherein no doubt he was wrong. Not that way did the
counsels of perfection lie for the Higher Dutch; and they have always
had to come back to the woodnotes and the wood-Muses to find
poetic luck. But Opitz was entitled—was in his day almost bound—to
think differently. The interesting thing—much more interesting to us
than the details to which it led him, such as the patronage of the
Alexandrine, the alternation of masculine and feminine rhymes, &c.
—is the particular source to which he turned for inspiration and
guidance. He knew, as has been said, the Italian critics, at least
those in Latin, and he probably knew the Italian poets (he cites
Petrarch). But it is to France, and specially to Ronsard, that he fondly
turns. Now it need hardly be said that in 1624 the influence of the
Pléiade in its own country, though not quite dead, was moribund; the
correctness of Malherbe, on the one hand, was doing its best
deliberately to throttle it, and the Italianated and Spaniolated
extravagances which were fashionable were choking it in another
way. This is no doubt not the only instance of a literary influence
which is dead or dying in its own country showing full vitality in
another, but it is one of the most remarkable. For, beyond question,
the French influence—in successive forms, but still French—reigned
in Germany for some hundred and fifty years; and it was Opitz who
first brought it to bear.
His details, as has been said, are less interesting: yet they do not
lack interest. He begins by stickling for pure High German: and
certainly no one who, for his sins, has been condemned to read
much of late fifteenth- and early sixteenth-century German—one of
the ugliest and most mongrel speeches in history, and quite
astounding after the musical sweetness of the best
Mittelhochdeutsch—will owe him a grudge for this. He protests
against the mingle-mangle of foreign words which was flooding the
language, and even against the famous -iren by which, to the
present day to some extent, Germans give a sort of spurious
naturalisation to such foreigners. He would have limits set (though
he does not forbid it altogether) to that odd custom of declining
classical names in German speech, which is also maintained to
some extent, but which sometimes made a mere Macaronic of
sixteenth-century German. On the other hand, it is curious to find
him urging on Germans, who by right were, and by practice long
have been, among the busiest and most successful of word-
compounders, the sonderliche anmuthigkeit of compounds: and
actually quoting the French as, next the Greeks, the masters of such
things.[482] Of course the historical student, even if citations from
Ronsard were not on the same page, would know at once whence
this comes. Still, there still remains the oddity of alleging the
undoubtedly awkward and exotic-sounding chasse-nue, ébranle-
rocher, and irrite-mer as warrants and patterns for words like
wolkentreiber, felsenstürmer, and meeraufreitzer, which simply seem
to us natural-born, and to require no warranty but their own sound
and appearance.
But Opitz (of whom if any critic speaks disrespectfully, I fear that it
argues him uncritical) wrote not merely on the eve, but in the actual
stormy morning, of the Thirty Years’ War: and Germany had
something else to do for a long time besides listening to him. When
matters settled down again, the advice to attend to the French was
rather unfortunately “carried over” to a state of things in which
French influence was still less the influence for Germany. But this
imitation, whether right or wrong, found no important critical
expression, and it would be losing labour and space to devote either
to German criticism in the last half of the seventeenth century.
It is more remarkable that the real activity and accomplishment of
Dutch during the early part of the century did not lead to some
development of vernacular criticism. But to the best of my
information[483] it did not. The Dutch and the Germans, however, of
course still continued to write in Latin, to edit, to comment, to carry
on that division of critical work which, according to the laying out of
our subject, lies, except at particular seasons and for special ends,
beyond the scope of this book. Moreover, both Holland and some of
the German Free-towns, but especially the former country, became
the adopted, as they were almost the natural, homes of those
beginners of judicial criticism, who have been noticed in part at the
conclusion of the French chapter of this Book. Bayle’s Nouvelles de
la République de Lettres were Hollandish by domicile, as was the
Bibliothèque Universelle of Le Clerc, while at Leipsic the Acta
Eruditorum maintained the same principle of critical annals for nearly
a century. Bayle, as has been said before, was too much of a
partisan, and perhaps of a wit, for anything of his to have a judicial,
however much in some senses of the word it might have a critical,
character: but the less mercurial talents of Jean Le Clerc, which
have been characterised under the head of the Ana (v. sup., p. 276),
were very well suited to the conduct of a critical record.

465. I do not know any general-special books on the subject of this


chapter, except those of Blankenburg, and Gayley and Scott, cit.
sup.
466. Of course Olmucensis (v. supra, p. 27) and Cornelius Agrippa
(p. 28) in strictness belong to the subject, as does Erasmus himself.
But the last is too cosmopolitan, and the two first too unimportant, to
make the abstraction of them from this place a great wrong to the
Teutsche Nation. Ulrich von Hutten wrote on versification, but not
importantly.
467. The Disputationes de Tragœdia of Schosser (1559) are
earlier than any of these; but they seem to be pure commentary on
Aristotle. I have not been able to see them.
468. Commentarii in Art. Poet. Horat. (Strasburg, 1576). The
compiler was Johann Lobart. Sturm’s Rhetorical works are rather
numerous, and range from the De amissa dicendi ratione (ibid.,
1538) onwards.
469. P. 155.
470. De Re Poetica, Lib. iv. (Antwerp, 1565).
471. Ibid., Lib. vii. (Leipsic, 1595).
472. V. sup., p. 107.
473. S. l. 1633, and continually reprinted.
474. Let me not be supposed for one moment to depreciate Latin
verse-making. I hardly know (speaking from actual experience as a
school-master) a single study which is better for boys; and the
intelligent use of the gradus is a better discipline in observation,
critical selection, and method, than smatterings of a hundred so-
called “sciences.” But there is a time to put away childish things as
well as a time to use them.
475. The copy of this which belongs to the University of Edinburgh
has the additional interest of having belonged to, and of having been
given by, Drummond of Hawthornden, and so of having been, not
improbably, in the hands of Ben Jonson.
476. Commentariorum Rhetoricorum sive Oratoriarum
Institutionum Libri Sex, 8vo, Dordrecht, 1609. But this was greatly
enlarged in the 4to of Leyden, 1643, which I use.
477. De Artis Poeticæ Natura ac Constitutione, 4to, Amsterdam,
1647.
478. He has no room for much historical illustration, but what he
says is generally sound, though it is odd that in mentioning the
Christus Patiens (which, of course, he attributes to Gregory
Nazianzen) he should not have noticed its cento character, and
though his remarks on Muretus and Buchanan smack a little of the
rival author of Herodes Infanticida.
479. Our whole history has shown us the obsession of the pius
poeta, the vir bonus; but I think the uncompromising submission to it
of the later seventeenth and eighteenth century is as much due to
the influence of Voss as to that of any single mediate person.
480. Printed at Brieg and published at Breslau in 1624; reprinted
as the first number of Niemeyer’s Neudrucke des xviten und xviiten
Jahrhunderts, at Halle in 1886. The title of Prosodia Germanica,
which the later editions bore, does not seem to be the author’s own.
481. For instance, the very interesting Grundlicher Bericht des
Deutschen Meistergesangs of Adam Puschmann, edited by Herr
Jonas for the same collection as No. 73 (Halle, 1888), is more than
half a century older than Opitz’s book, having appeared at Görlitz in
1571. But Puschmann, a pupil of Hans Sachs himself, and active in
the Masterschool, is only looking back on that school, the rules and
regulations of which he lays down in the most approved fashion.
“The face” of Opitz “meets the morning’s breath.”
482. Buch der Poet., ed. cit., p. 29.
483. I must here repeat, with additional emphasis, the caution and
apology which I put in as to Spanish. I do not know anything of this
language. I have been content to apply to Low Dutch the precept of
a great High Dutchman, Entbehren sollst du. But for our purpose I
believe it will be generally admitted that the renunciation is not fatal,
important Dutch critics having, almost to a man, written in Latin.
CHAPTER IV.

DRYDEN AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES.


DEAD WATER IN ENGLISH CRITICISM—MILTON—COWLEY—THE
PREFATORY MATTER OF ‘GONDIBERT’—THE “HEROIC POEM”—
DAVENANT’S ‘EXAMEN’—HOBBES’S ANSWER—DRYDEN—HIS
ADVANTAGES—THE EARLY PREFACES—THE ‘ESSAY OF DRAMATIC
POESY’—ITS SETTING AND OVERTURE—CRITES FOR THE ANCIENTS
—EUGENIUS FOR THE “LAST AGE”—LISIDEIUS FOR THE FRENCH—
DRYDEN FOR ENGLAND AND LIBERTY—‘CODA’ ON RHYMED PLAYS,
AND CONCLUSION—CONSPICUOUS MERITS OF THE PIECE—THE
MIDDLE PREFACES—THE ‘ESSAY ON SATIRE’ AND THE ‘DEDICATION
OF THE ÆNEIS’—THE PARALLEL OF POETRY AND PAINTING—THE
‘PREFACE TO THE FABLES’—DRYDEN’S GENERAL CRITICAL POSITION
—HIS SPECIAL CRITICAL METHOD—DRYDEN AND BOILEAU—RYMER—
THE ‘PREFACE TO RAPIN’—THE ‘TRAGEDIES OF THE LAST AGE’—THE
‘SHORT VIEW OF TRAGEDY’—THE RULE OF TOM THE SECOND—
SPRAT—EDWARD PHILLIPS—HIS ‘THEATRUM POETARUM’—
WINSTANLEY’S ‘LIVES’—LANGBAINE’S ‘DRAMATIC POETS’—TEMPLE—
BENTLEY—COLLIER’S ‘SHORT VIEW’—SIR T. P. BLOUNT—
PERIODICALS: THE ‘ATHENIAN MERCURY,’ ETC.

The middle third, if not the whole first half, of the seventeenth
century in England was too much occupied with civil and religious
broils to devote attention to such a subject literary criticism. Between
Dead water in the probable date of Jonson’s Timber (1625-37) and
English the certain one of Dryden’s Essay of Dramatic
Criticism. Poesy (1668) we have practically nothing
substantive save the interesting prefatory matter to Gondibert
Milton (1650). Milton, the greatest man of letters wholly of
the time, must indeed during this time have
conceived, or at least matured, that cross-grained prejudice against
rhyme, which is more surprising in him than even in Campion, and
which was itself even more open to Daniel’s strictures. For not only
is Milton himself in his own practice a greater and more triumphant
vindicator of rhyme than Campion, but Daniel’s strongest and
soundest argument, “Why condemn this thing in order to establish

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