acting of plays (these being always in the Latin tongue) should only rarely be permitted in their seminaries. The flourishing period of the Jesuit drama begins with the spread of the order in the west and south-west of the Empire in the last decade of the 16th century, and then continues, through the vicissitudes of good and evil, with a curious intermixture of Latin and German plays, during the whole of the 17th and the better part of the 18th. These productions, which ranged in their subjects from biblical and classical story to themes of contemporary history (such as the relief of Vienna by Sobiesky and the peace of Ryswick), seem generally to bear the mark of their authorship--that of teachers appointed by their superiors to execute this among other tasks allotted to them; but, as it seems unnecessary to return to this special growth, it may be added that the extraordinary productiveness of the Jesuit dramatists, and the steadiness of self-repetition which is equally characteristic of them, should warn us against underrating its influence upon a considerable proportion of the nation's educational life during a long succession of generations. Beginnings of the vernacular German drama. Hans Sachs. The English comedians. Separation between the stage and literature. While the scholars of the German Renaissance, who became so largely the agents of the Reformation, eagerly dramatized scriptural subjects in the Latin, and sometimes (as in the case of Luther's protégé P. Rebhun[274]) in the native tongue, the same influence made itself felt in another sphere of dramatic activity. Towards the close of the middle ages, as has been seen, dramatic performances had in Germany, as in England, largely fallen into the hands of the civic gilds, and the composition of plays was more especially cultivated by the master-singers of Nuremberg and other towns. It was thus that, under the influence of the Reformation, and of the impulse given by Luther and others to the use of High German as the popular literary tongue, Hans Sachs, the immortal shoemaker of Nuremberg, seemed destined to become the father of the popular German drama. In his plays, "spiritual," "secular," and _Fastnachtsspiele_ alike, the interest indeed lies in the dialogue rather than in the action, nor do they display any attempt at development of character. In their subjects, whether derived from Scripture or from popular legend and fiction,[275] there is no novelty, and in their treatment no originality. But the healthy vigour and fresh humour of this marvellously fertile author, and his innate sympathy with the views and sentiments of the burgher class to which he belonged, were elements of genuine promise--a promise which the event was signally to disappoint. Though the manner of Hans Sachs found a few followers, and is recognizable in the German popular drama even of the beginning of the 17th century, the literature of the Reformation, of which his works may