BOOK THE FIRST _THE MIDDLE AGES_ CHAPTER I NARRATIVE RELIGIOUS POETRY--THE NATIONAL EPIC--THE EPIC OF ANTIQUITY--ROMANCES OF LOVE AND COURTESY The literature of the Middle Ages is an expression of the spirit of feudalism and of the genius of the Church. From the union of feudalism and Christianity arose the chivalric ideals, the new courtesy, the homage to woman. Abstract ideas, ethical, theological, and those of amorous metaphysics, were rendered through allegory into art. Against these high conceptions, and the overstrained sentiment connected with them, the positive intellect and the mocking temper of France reacted; a literature of satire arose. By degrees the bourgeois spirit encroached upon and overpowered the chivalric ideals. At length the mediaeval conceptions were exhausted. Literature dwindled as its sources were impoverished; ingenuities and technical formalities replaced imagination. The minds of men were prepared to accept the new influences of the Renaissance and the Reformation. I NARRATIVE RELIGIOUS POETRY The oldest monument of the French language is found in the Strasburg Oaths (842); the oldest French poem possessing literary merit is the _Vie de Saint Alexis_, of which a redaction belonging to the middle of the eleventh century survives. The passion of piety and the passion of combat, the religious and the warrior motives, found early expression in literature; from the first arose the Lives of Saints and other devout writings, from the second arose the _chansons de geste_. They grew side by side, and had a like manner of development. If one takes precedence of the other, it is only because by the chances of time _Saint Alexis_ remains to us, and the forerunners of the _Chanson de Roland_ are lost. With each species of poetry _cantilenes_--short lyrico-epic poems--preceded the narrative form. Both the profane and what may be called the religious _chanson de geste_ were sung or recited by the same jongleurs--men of a class superior to the vulgar purveyors of amusement. Gradually the poems of both kinds expanded in length, and finally prose narrative took the place of verse.