On the other hand the Romantic school has also broadened the realm of
poetic material in a very important manner, by adding to it the
provinces of the phantastic, the visionary, the fairy-like, and by
giving to the symbolical an undreamed-of expansion.

On the whole, modern German literature has probably a richer field
from which to choose her material than any other literature can boast
of. In fact it is perhaps too variegated, and thus, because of the
richness and originality of its subject matter, allows too much
latitude to genius. One field only in poetry, considered from the
viewpoint of real art, is almost uncultivated. All the efforts and all
the attempts on the part of both Catholics and Protestants have not
succeeded in producing religious poems of any degree of importance
since Annette von Droste-Hülshoff ceased to sing; whereas, on the
other hand, poetry that is hostile to the church has brought to
maturity some great productions, not only in Anzengruber or Karl
Schoenherr, in Friedrich Theodor Vischer, in Storm, and Keller, but,
above all, in Nietzsche. A turn in the tide that seems just now to be
taking place is exemplified in the important epic poems of Enrica von
Handel-Mazzetti.

Finally, as the last and, in a certain sense, the strongest, pillar of
permanency we will name the public. It is just as much a product as a
contributing factor of literature; in both respects, however,
preëminently important as a conservative force. The predominant and
enduring tendencies, forms, and subjects are naturally chiefly
conducive to the formation of a circle of "fixed subscribers" among
the crowd of possible patrons. These subscribers, on their part, of
course insist upon the preservation of those tendencies, forms, and