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THE SIXTEENTH -CENTURY. 287
it underwent such alterations.*" as were in the age of
scholasticism considered indispensable for preserving the
sanction of the Church and the spiritual welfare of the
-faithful. When people recognized that in this manner
they did not attain to the full, unrestricted possession of
the rich legacies of knowledge which ancient times had left
behind them, they began once more to study the writings of
antiquity in the form in which they were originally transmitted
to posterity. The classical authors of ancient
heathendom awoke to new life and in words of flame made
known the greatness and the glory of the past. This
occurred first in Italy where numerous remains of buildings,
statues, and inscriptions reminded men of the civilization
of the Romans. In that land a knowledge of true Latinity
was again acquired, and from thence spread to other
countries, in the 15th century.
At the German academies professorial chairs for Latin
eloquence and rhetoric were founded, the incumbents of
which excited by their successful efforts in prose and verse
the astonishment and envy of their contemporaries. At the
same time the knowledge of the Greek language obtained a
general prevalence in the circles of the learned. For this
thanks are to a large extent due to the Greek refugees, who,
after the conquest of their native country by the Turks,
came to Italy and founded there a new home. CHRYSO-
LARAS, GEORGIOS of Trebezond, THEODOROS GAZA, BES-
SARION, CONSTANTINE LASKARIS, and others brought many
valuable Greek manuscripts with them, and collected round
them a circle of select pupils. At the courts of the
Medici, those princes of Italy so pre-eminently susceptible
to the attractions of art and science, a worship of Hellenism
became developed which gathered around it the most prominent
men of the state. Learned societies which were
called Platonic Academies* made the cultivation of Greek
literature the task of their lives. The bright forms of
P. VILLARI : Nicolo Macchiavelli und seine Zeit, Deutsche Ubers.,
Rudolstadt 1882, i, 147 et seq.