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360 A History of Sweden
CHAPTER XXIII
LITERATURE
A. THE NEW ROMANTICISM
A Movement of Reaction. The eighteenth century
was the Age of Illumination. Everything should be
measured, by the cool, sober intellect. Nothing but
what was useful and practical was considered worth-
while. People were so rational, so practically rational,
that finally times became unbearably dull. Even
preaching in the churches took on the characteristics
of the time. Thus on Christmas morn the minister,
from the text of the Christ-child, in the manger, would
preach a sermon on the importance of the proper
stabling and feeding of cattle. It was at this time that
the beautiful evening hymn beginning,
"Now all the earth is resting/’
was changed, in harmony with fact and reason, to read,
"Now half the earth is resting."
It was at this time, too, that people in solemn earnest-
ness discussed the question of making use of church
steeples for windmills. It seemed a pity to have them
stand there without serving any practical purpose.
But happily man is not only a creature of intellect,
but also of emotion and imagination. These long sup-
pressed powers of the soul were at last to assert their
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