a central position [p. 114-16] and leads to Cervantes Don Quixote—which is rather a critic of "romances" than a romance itself. The following long passage gives Huet's picture of the intellectual network behind the rise of the modern novel—and of the traditions which now met: All Europe was then overwhelmed with Darkness and Ignorance, but France, England, and Germany much less than Italy, which then produced but a small Number of Writers, and scarce any Authors of Romances. Those of that Country, who had a Mind to distinguish themselves by Learning and Knowledge, came for it to the University of Paris, which was the Mother of Sciences, and Nurse of the Learning of Europe. St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Bonaventure, the Poets Dante, and Boccace, came thither to study; and the President Fauchet produces, that the last of them took a great Part of his Novels from French Ro|<121>mances; and that Petrarch, and the other Italian Poets, have rifled for their Richest Fancies, the Songs of Thiband King of Navarre, Gace's Brussez, Chastelain de Corcy, and the Old French Romances. 'Twas then, in my Opinion, that the Italians learned from us the Science of Romance; which, by their own Confession, is to be ascribed to us, as well as that of Rhyming. Thus Spain and Italy received from us an Art, which was the Effect of our Ignorance and Barbarity, and which the Politeness of the Persians, Ionians, and Greeks had produced. As Necessity engages us, to sustain our Bodies|<122> with Herbs an Roots; so when the Knowledge of Truth, which is the Proper and Natural Aliment of the Mind, begins to fail, we have Recourse to Falsehood, which is the Imitation of Truth. As in Plenty we refuse Bread, and our ordinary Viands, for Ragousts; so our Minds, when acquainted with the Truth, forsake the Study and Speculation of it, to be entertained with its Image, which is Fiction. This Imitation according to Aristotle, is often more agreeable than the Original it self; so that two oppositely different Paths, which are Ignorance and Learning, Rudeness and Politeness, do often conduct us to the same End; which is|<123> an Application to Fictions, Fables, and Romances. Hence it is, that the most Barbarous Nations are taken with Romantic Inventions, as well as the most Refined. The Originals of all the Savages of America, and particularly those of Peru, are nothing but Fables;