Charles XIV. died March 8, 1844, at the age of eighty-one. During the last years of his reign he received strong and repeated evidence of the love of his people, especially upon the occasion of his twenty-fifth anniversary as king of Sweden. “No one has made a career like mine,” he said shortly before his death. He was a child of the revolutionary epoch, favored by its opportunities to receive a high station, without being sullied by any of its vices. If it be true that his position often was made difficult through lack of appreciation by his new subjects, it is not less true that he, through lack of intimacy with the Swedish language, national character and traditions, was unable to further the development of his new country, in the same degree as would a native provided with such rich endowment. The sun of Charles XIV., which rose in brilliancy, set in the glory of full appreciation.
The reign of Charles XIV. produced a new line of eminent scientists and was the golden age of Swedish literature. The remarkable genius of J. J. Berzelius remolded the science of chemistry, placing it on a basis where there are hardly any limits to its scope. Elias Fries devised a new system of botany. Sven Nilsson, a distinguished zoölogist, also became the founder of a new science, comparative archæology. K. J. Schlyter edited a complete collection of the old provincial laws, a work of equal importance to philology and jurisprudence. P. H. Ling invented the Swedish system of gymnastics and founded the Central Institute of Gymnastics in Stockholm, where the Swedish massage or movement cure has won a scientific development worthy of its world-wide fame. E. G. Geijer, as a philosopher, was a noble follower of Hœijer, while as a historian he is the greatest genius of his country. As a poet and composer Geijer is also noteworthy. Professor of history at Upsala, he was once accused of heterodoxy, but acquitted. His political career was remarkable. Geijer was a firm supporter of the government and conservative principles, until fifty-seven years of age, when he joined the opposition.
The world of letters was divided in parties as bitterly opposed to each other as those of the political world. The old Gustavian school, of which Leopold remained the last representative, was attacked by the “New School,” which, inspired by German Romanticism, was brimful of inspiration, imagination and feelings, but very little that was original, clear or national. Of this so-called “phosphoristic” school Atterbom was the distinguished leader. Stagnelius, a poet of rare attainments, but who died early, belongs in this group. The New School was in turn attacked by the “Gothic Society,” a school of national Swedish Romanticism, which introduced a cult of the Old Northern spirit of individuality, terseness and power. Ling and Geijer were among the leading men of this school, whose enthusiasm for everything national had a lasting influence upon the research for, and gathering of, folk lore, songs, traditions, customs, and every trait of the popular culture of bygone days. In Franzén and Wallin, Sweden had two religious poets of the very first rank. More famous than any of these was Esaias Tegnér, the second great national poet of Sweden, whose “Frithiof’s Saga” was destined to become the most celebrated literary work of all Europe in its day, appearing in a vast number of translations in a great number of languages. Tegnér was in sympathy with the old Gustavian school, but a member of the Gothic Society, and by his choice of subjects in harmony with the national school. There is a wonderful richness of sparkling life and wit in Tegnér’s poems, but they are sometimes overladen by the vivid ornamental images in which they abound. Tegnér was a man of extremely broad and liberal views on every phase of human life and effort. He hated with the whole power of his fiery soul the mysticism, obscurantism and morbid sensualism of his age. He was the sworn enemy of the “Holy Alliance” and the reactionary powers in state, church and literature. In his chivalrous spirit and love of the great individuals, he became the admirer of Charles XIV., whose policy he therefore supported. Tegnér is not the one who in the grandeur and faultlessness of his creations has attained the very highest rank among Swedish poets, but is the greatest and most unbiased thinker among them, and has as such exerted a beneficial influence upon the national consciousness and cultural development. Tegnér’s judgment upon one of his Gustavian precursors may be repeated in his own case: “Perchance the greatest not as poet, but as genius.”