History Of Spanish Literature - Vol I

HISTORY OF SPANISH LITERATURE. BY GEOKGE TICKNOE. IN THBEE VOLUMES. YOL. I. PREFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION. THE third edition of the History of Spanish Literature, differing materially from those that had preceded it, was pub lished in 1863. In his Preface to this edition Mr. Ticknor says that it is not probable that he shall ever again recur to the task of revision, for the purpose of further changes or additions He was at that time seventy-two years old, and the statement was doubtless prompted by that distrust of the future natural in one who had already passed the Psalmists allotted limit of life. But the apprehension was not con firmed by the event. Mr. Ticknors life was prolonged for eight years more, and these years were passed, as his pre vious days had been, among his books. A copy of his His tory was always on his table and, retaining to the last his literary activity and his interest in his favorite studies, he constantly had it in hand for the purpose of making such revisions as were suggested by his own researches, or those of Spanish scholars in Europe. Thus the present edition is a reprint of the third, with such corrections and additions as were made by Mr. Ticknor during the last eight years of his life The text does not differ materially from that of the previous edition, bnt there are frequent corrections and ad ditions in the notes. Any one who will take the trouble to compare the two editions will see how carefully and conscien tiously Mr. Ticknor labored to the day of his death to se cure completeness and finish to the work to which the best viii PBEFACE TO THE FOURTH EDITION. portion of his life was dedicated with a singleness of devo tion rare in these days ofdesultory activity and rapid pro duction. The present edition brings the history of Spanish litera ture down to the present date, containing all that the most careful and vigilant research could gather in illustration of the subject It is not necessary to say anything in commen dation of a work which Spain has adopted and translated as her own, and on which all Spanish scholars have bestowed such generous praise. So far as the past is concerned, the history of Spanish literature need not be written anew, and the scholars who may hereafter labor in this field of letters will have little else to do than to continue the structure which Mr. Ticknor has reared. This new edition of the His tory is more ample and complete than those which have preceded it, and is that by which the claims of the author to a place in the literature of his country should be tried BOSTON, September, 1871. PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION, THE present edition of the History of Spanisli Literature differs materially from both of the American editions that have preceded it, as well as from the English edition and from the translations that have been made in conformity with all of them It omits nearly the whole of the inedited, primitive Castilian poems which have heretofore filled about seventy pages at the end of the last volume. These poems were inserted, not merely to make them known, but to secure them, once for all, as important remains of early modern cul ture, from the accidents to which they were inevitably exposed, so long as they existed only in a few manuscripts, or even only in one of value and authority...