In the history of literature change means liberation. The intellectual aspect of a period having worn itself out, the forms which have supported it are felt to be a clog and a burden; and when these forms are dissolved, the channel of thought, from a natural sense of freedom, takes a course diametrically opposite. The transformation seldom takes place abruptly; it may even have been long prepared by pioneers more or less conscious of the advance of a new time with new ideals; but the greatest as well as the most characteristic productions of the victorious movement are not brought forth until the previous order of things has been completely overthrown, and sometimes there is but a short step from the zenith of a literary current to its decadence.

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