Antiquarianism, by a purely historical effort, by putting its object in
perspective, and setting the reader in a certain point of view, from
which what gave pleasure to the past is pleasurable for him also, may
often add greatly to the charm we receive from ancient literature. But
the first condition of such aid must be a real, direct, aesthetic charm
in the thing itself; unless it has that charm, unless some purely
artistic quality went to its original making, no merely antiquarian
effort can ever give it an aesthetic value, or make it a proper subject
of aesthetic criticism. This quality, wherever it exists, it is always
pleasant to define, and discriminate from the sort of borrowed interest
which an old play, or an old story, may very likely acquire through a
true antiquarianism. The story of Aucassin and Nicolette has something
of this quality. Aucassin, the only son of Count Garins of Beaucaire, is
passionately in love with Nicolette, a beautiful girl of unknown
parentage, bought of the Saracens, whom his father will not permit him
to marry.
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