to their purposes. Writings begin to reflect the personalities of the writers; the diction ceases to be that of clumsy or clever school compositions, and presents an evolution of tangible mediaeval styles. Henceforth, although a man be an eager student of the Classics, like John of Salisbury for example, and try to imitate their excellences, he will still write mediaeval Latin, and with a personal style if he be a strong personality. The classical models no longer trammel, but assist him to be more effectively himself on a higher plane.
If mediaeval civilization is to be regarded as that which the peoples of western Europe attained under the two universal influences of Christianity and antique culture, then nothing more mediaeval will be seen than mediaeval Latin. To make it, the antique Latin had been modified and reinspired and loosed by the Christian energies of the Fathers; and had then passed on to peoples who never had been, or no longer were, antique. They barbarized the language down to the rudeness of their faculties. As they themselves advanced, they brought up Latin with them, as it were, from the depths of the ninth and tenth centuries, but a Latin which in the crude natures of these men had been stripped of classical quality; a Latin barbarous and naked, and ready to be clothed upon with novel qualities which should make it a new creature. Throughout all this process, while Latin was sinking and re-emerging, it was worked upon and inspired by the spirit of the uses to which it was predominantly applied, which were those of the Roman Catholic Church and of the intimacies of the Christian soul, pressing to expression in the learned tongue which they were transforming.
In considering the Latin writings of the Middle Ages one should bear in mind the differences between Italy and the North with respect to the ancient language. These were important through the earlier Middle Ages, when modes of diction sufficiently characteristic to be called styles, were forming. The men of Latin-sodden Italy might have a fluent Latin when those of the North still had theirs to learn. Thus there were Italians in the eleventh century who wrote quite a distinctive Latin
