To understand the nature of the movements that follow we must recur, though with the utmost brevity, to the history of later Latin comedy. The comic recitals of the twelfth century and thereabout were succeeded by the comedy of the Italian humanists, still in Latin, but dramatic in form and apparently in intent, which, though it availed itself, like the elegiac school, of the outworn situations and devices of scabrous amours, contributed considerably to the enrichment of the romantic strain by the passion with which it invested its material, sometimes, also, to the cause of realism by its unconscious, though often repulsive, accuracy of detail. Although Plautus is to some extent cultivated, the Terentian model was still the favourite with youthful imitators until study of the older poet was revived by the recovery of the twelve lost plays and their introduction to Roman circles in 1427. The _Philologia_ of Petrarch's earlier years is accordingly fashioned in the style of Terence, and is even reported, for it is unfortunately lost, to have surpassed its classical forbears. Written about 1331, it was the first product of the new dramatic school, and was succeeded by a numerous train of ambitious effusions,--university plays we might call most of them,--a few witty, some sentimental, many libidinous, all very young, and still all, or nearly all, cleverly and regularly constructed. It concerns us here but to mention the _Paulus_ of Vergerio, which Creizenach dates 1370, Aretino's _Poliscene_, about 1390, Alberti's _Philodoxeos_, 1418, Ugolino's _Philogena_, some time before 1437, and Piccolomini's _Crisis_, 1444.[64] Of these erotic comedies,--pornographic were perhaps a more fitting term,--the most popular seems to have been the _Philogena_; the most eminent, according to Creizenach (but I don't see why), the _Crisis_. The _Paulus_ pretends to aim at the improvement of youth; one might for a moment imagine that it was intended to be a prodigal son play. But in none of these plays is there either punishment or repentance. In fact the unaffected verve with which they display the wantonness of life is not the least of their contributions to comedy. The _Poliscene_ is notable for its modernity of manners and of morals. The sole instance among these plays, so far as I can ascertain, of noble sentiment and harmless plot is the _Philodoxeos_. The use of abstract names for the characters lends it, indeed, somewhat the appearance of a moral interlude.