EVERY one knows how much is added to our under-
standing of an author's works when we become ac-
quainted with his biography. We thus discover what
qualities he has inherited, what others have been deve-
loped through the vicissitudes of his life, and what have
been attained by labor and aspiration. This is equally
true of the literature of a race. It has its pedigree, its
birth and childhood, its uncertain youth, and its vary-
ing fortunes through the ages, before it reaches a ma-
ture and permanent character. Although it grows in
grace and variety of expression, and charms us most
when it gives large and lofty utterance to the thought
and feeling of our own times, we none the less need to
turn back and listen to the prattle of its infancy.

I therefore propose to go back to the earliest known
foundation from which German Literature grew, and to
trace, in outlines which I shall try to make both simple
and clear, the chief phenomena of its early life. The task
is not easy; for the development of the literature of a
people must inevitably take hold of History with one
hand, and of Philology with the other,--both sciences
essential to the intimate knowledge of all important

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