ever God did was right. The teaching of the Meditations is summarised in the following text from Epictetus:

Remember that you are an actor in a drama, of such a kind as the author pleases to make it. If short, of a short one; if long, of a long one. If it be his pleasure you should act a poor man, a cripple, a governor, or a private person, see that you act it naturally. For this is your business, to act well the character assigned you; to choose it, is another's.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

The following is a list of valuable books for the student of literature and culture of Ancient Greece and Rome.

F. B. Jevons, A History of Greek Literature.

Sir Richard Jebb, Primer of Greek Literature.

Gilbert Murray, Ancient Greek Literature, Euripides and His Age, and The Plays of Euripides.

W. Warde-Fowler, Rome.

J. C. Stobart, The Glory that was Greece and The Grandeur that was Rome.

Prof. A. S. Wilkins's Roman Literature.

Translations of most of the important Greek and Latin authors are accessible in such series as the Loeb Classical Library, the Everyman's Library, the World's Classics, and Bohn's Library.

The Loeb Classical Library, of which many volumes are now ready, will ultimately include all the classical writers of importance. Every volume in this series contains the Greek or Latin text with English translation on opposite pages.

Sir R. C. Jebb's English Prose Translation of the Plays of Sophocles.
Plato's Republic and The Trial and Death of Socrates.

The Pocket Horace (the Latin Text with Conington's translation on opposite pages), is published complete in one volume, or in two separate volumes, The Odes and The Satires, Epistles, etc.

Translations from Horace, by Sir Stephen E. De Vere, Bart.

The Works of Horace, 2 vols., translated into English verse, with a life and notes by Sir Theodore Martin.

Prof. W. Y. Sellar's Virgil, and his Horace and the Elegiac Poets.

VIII

THE MIDDLE AGES

T

THE MIDDLE AGES

§ 1

IN DARKEST EUROPE

HE Middle Ages is the name commonly given to that period of European history that lasted from the sack

and capture of Rome in A.D. 410, by the Visigoths under Alaric, to the capture of Constantinople by the Turks in 1453. Even before the passing of the Roman Empire of the West, there had been for over two hundred years a period of stagnation in which little, if any, literature was produced. Rome was, for years, fighting a losing battle against the barbarian hordes who had crossed the old imperial frontier of the Rhine and the Danube, the most terrible of these hordes being the Huns under the leadership of Attila. The whole fabric of Roman civilisation was gradually overwhelmed by the armies of the ignorant, and was apparently, but only apparently, lost for ever.

The Gradual Creation of Nationalities

The new masters of the West cared nothing for culture, and for the most part they could neither read nor write. In the centuries that followed, Europe saw the gradual creation of nationalities and distinctive national life, by the amalgamation of races, and after persistent struggles between rival kings and

England was invaded by Angles and Saxons, by Taces and by Normans, who although they came from France were the descendants of Scandinavian pirates. France was over

by Franks, a Teuton people, and by Normans; and the Norman knights established their rule as far south as the island of Sicky

For a thousand years Europe was the scene of constant waz, pestilence, and famine, the sole protection that the common people had against the reckless and ruthless tyranny of barons and overlords being the steadily increasing power of the Church. In such a time of unexampled turmoil it was impossible for any Eterature to be produced. The learning that had been born in Greece and nurtured in Rome was neglected and despised by the rude fighting chieftains, but the great books produced by the ancient world were not entirely lost. Copies were carefully preserved and recopied in the monasteries of the Benedictine monks, who alone cherished the remains of Roman civilisation. St. Benedict was born in 480, and was one of the brilliant lights of the Dark Ages. The monks who obeyed his rule were ordered to read and study. Longfellow says of St. Benedict in his

"Monte Cassino":

He founded here his Convent and his Rule

Of prayer and work, and counted work as prayer;
The pen became a clarion, and his school

Flamed like a beacon in the midnight air.

In Ireland and certain parts of England, countries which suffered less than the continent of Europe from the mediæval ravages, the old learning survived when it was practically lost everywhere else everywhere else in Europe, that is to say, except in Spain, which was invaded by the Arabs in 709, and remained for nearly eight hundred years wholly or partially under Moslem rule. The Arabs had come into contact with Greek culture when they overran Egypt, and while Christian