Literature and Art.
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the peoples of the Teutonic race before their converfion to Chrittianity,
but the Chriilian clergy felt the neceflity of keeping up feltive religious
ceremonies in fome form or other, and alfo of impretiing upon people's
imagination and memory by means of rude fcenical reprefentations fome
of the broader facts of fcriptural and eccletiaftical hiftory. Thefe per-
formances at firlt confitted probably in mere dumb ihow, or at the mott
the performers may have chanted the fcriptural account of the tranfaction
they were reprefenting. In this manner the choral boys, or the younger
clergy, would, on fome fpecial faint's day, perform fome ftriking act in
the life of the faint commemorated, or, on particular feftivals of the
church, thofe incidents of gofpel hiftory to which the feitival efpecially
related. By degrees, a rather more impofing character was given to thefe
performances by the addition of a continuous dialogue, which, however,
was written in Latin verfe, and was no doubt chanted. This incipient
drama in Latin, as far as we know it, belongs to the twelfth century, and
is reprefented by a tolerably large number of examples {till preferved in
mediaeval manufcripts. Some of the earlieft of thefe have for their author
a pupil of the celebrated Abelard, named Hilarius, who lived in the iirft
half of the twelfth century, and is undertiood to have been by birth
an Englifhman. Hilarius appears before us as a playful Latin poet,
and among a number of fhort pieces, which may be almott called
lyric, he has left us three of thefe religious plays. The fubject of the
firft of thefe is the raifing of Lazarus from the dead, the chief peculiarity
of which confitts of the fongs of lamentation placed in the mouths of
the two lifters of Lazarus, Mary and Martha. The fecond reprefents
one of the miracles attributed to St. Nicholas; and the third, the
hittory of Daniel. The latter is longer and more elaborate than the
others, and at_its conclution, the Itage direction tells us that, if it were
performed at matins, Darius, king of the Medes and Perfians, was to
chant Te Deum Laudamus, but if it were at vefpers, the great king was
to chant Magngficat anima mea Dominumfi
_ That
Figta: Hilarii Versus ct I-"db" 3V0-Q P?-F15, I335. Edited by M. Champollion