Page:Gesta Romanorum - Swan - Wright - 1.djvu/29

similar in character and spirit to those of the Gesta Romanorum, and were calculated for serving the same purpose. Thus the mediæval compilers of the Gesta Romanorum might have found their models in the fables of Æsop, just as well as in the Eastern stories. In fact the Oriental taste for such collections of stories moralized may probably be considered as derived originally from the early classical times. The Æsopean fables were certainly known in Western Europe before the knowledge of these Eastern collections was imported hither, and they were used by the mediæval preachers much in the same manner for the same purpose. We are informed of this fact by Vincent of Beauvais, a well known writer of the thirteenth century, in his great work, entitled Speculum Historiale (the Mirror of History). Vincent approves of this practice, but with qualifications which would seem to show that in his time it