LECTURE XXX.

Origin of the German Theatre--Hans Sachs--Gryphius--The Age of Gottsched--
Wretched Imitation of the French--Lessing, Goethe, and Schiller--Review of
their Works--Their Influence on Chivalrous Dramas, Affecting Dramas, and
Family Pictures--Prospect for Futurity.




PREFACE OF THE TRANSLATOR.


The Lectures of A. W. SCHLEGEL on Dramatic Poetry have obtained high
celebrity on the Continent, and been much alluded to of late in several
publications in this country. The boldness of his attacks on rules which
are considered as sacred by the French critics, and on works of which the
French nation in general have long been proud, called forth a more than
ordinary degree of indignation against his work in France. It was amusing
enough to observe the hostility carried on against him in the Parisian
Journals. The writers in these Journals found it much easier to condemn M.
SCHLEGEL than to refute him: they allowed that what he said was very
ingenious, and had a great appearance of truth; but still they said it was
not truth. They never, however, as far as I could observe, thought proper
to grapple with him, to point out anything unfounded in his premises, or
illogical in the conclusions which he drew from them; they generally
confined themselves to mere assertions, or to minute and unimportant
observations by which the real question was in no manner affected.