IV. 2
State of German literature during this period.
1438-1519
While the empire was possessed by the princes of the house of Saxony, a copy of the Pandects of Justinian was discovered at Amalfi. “The discovery of them,” says Sir William Blackstone, in his Introductory discourse to his Commentaries, “soon brought the civil law into vogue all over the west of Europe, where before it was quite laid aside, and in a manner wholly forgotten; though some traces of its authority remained in Italy, and the eastern provinces of the empire.-The study of it was introduced into many universities abroad, particularly that of Bologna, where exercises were performed, lectures read, and degrees conferred in this faculty, as in other branches of science; and many nations of the continent, just then beginning to recover from the convulsions consequent to the overthrow of the Roman empire, and settling by degrees into peaceable forms of government, adopted the civil law (being the best written system then extant,) as the basis of their several constitutions; blending or interweaving in it their own feudal customs, in some places, with a more extensive, in others, a more confined authority.”
IV. 2. State of German Literature, from the Suabian Dynasty to Charles V.
This was a great step toward the civilization of Germany, and of the other countries in which the institutions of the civil law were thus introduced. They certainly tended to animate the nations, by whom they were received, to the study of the history and literature of the people from the works of whose writers they had been compiled. They produced this effect in several countries of Europe; but their influence in Germany was very limited: the disposition to subtilize, which was at that time universal throughout the German empire, led those who cultivated literature rather to refine upon what was before them, than to new inquiries. The language of the Pandects is of the silver age; it might therefore be expected, that it would have improved the general style of the times; but this improvement is seldom discernible.
1438-1519
IV. 2. State of German Literature, from the Suabian Dynasty to Charles V.
Good or evil is seldom unmixed: civil contests and dissensions, generally produce both public and private misery; sometimes, however, they generate mental excitement. This is favourable to Literature and Science. Its good effects appeared in the contests between the Popes and the Emperors. Great were the public and the private calamities which they caused, both in church and state; but they promoted inquiry and intellectual exertions. These were often attended with happy results. Irnerius, by birth a German, had studied Justinian’s law at Constantinople. Towards the year 1130, he was appointed professor of civil law at Bologna: the contests between the popes and the emperors produced a warfare of words among the disciples of Irnerius. It has been mentioned that the German emperors pretended to succeed to the empire of the Cæsars. The language and spirit of the Justinianean code, being highly favourable to this claim, the emperors encouraged the civilians, and in return for it, had their pens at command. The decree of Gratian was favourable to the pretensions of the popes; and on this account was encouraged by the canonists. Hence, generally speaking, the civilians were partisans of the emperors, the canonists of the popes. From their adherence to the law of Justinian, the former were called Legistæ; from their adherence to the decree of Gratian, the latter were called Decretistæ. The controversy was carried on with great ardour and perseverance; the schools both of Italy and Germany resounded with the disputes, and in both, numerous tracts in support of the opposite claims, were circulated. The question necessarily carried the disputants to many incidental topics: these equally increased the powers and curiosity of the disputants, and stimulated them to better and more interesting studies.