view, accompanied with such sweet behaviour and gentle manners that he,
as an adept in love, feels that his spirit accords with hers: as soon as
he finds that his eyes lay hold upon her image and carry it to his
heart; and that his soul begins to contemplate her with pleasure and to
feel that influence within which stirs and warms it little by little;
and that those quick spirits which shine out through the eyes
continually add fresh tinder to the fire;—he ought at this first stage
to provide a speedy cure, and arouse his reason, and therewith arm the
fortress of his heart, and so shut the way to sense and appetite that
they cannot enter there by force or trickery. Thus, if the flame is
extinguished, the danger is extinguished also; but if it survives or
grows, then the Courtier, feeling himself caught, must resolve on
shunning wholly every stain of vulgar love, and thus enter on the path
of divine love, with reason for guide. And first he must consider that
the body wherein this beauty shines is not the fountain whence it
springs, but rather that beauty (being an incorporeal thing and, as we
have said, a heavenly beam) loses much of its dignity when it finds
itself joined to vile and corruptible matter; for the more perfect it is
the less it partakes thereof, and is most perfect when wholly separate
therefrom. And he must consider that just as one cannot hear with the
palate or smell with the ears, so too can beauty in no wise be enjoyed,
nor can the desire which it excites in our minds be satisfied, by means
of touch, but by that sense of which this beauty is the very object,
namely, the power of vision.
“Therefore let him shun the blind judgment of sense, and with his eyes
enjoy the splendour of his lady, her grace, her amourous sparkle, the
laughs, the ways and all the other pleasant ornaments of her beauty.
Likewise with his hearing let him enjoy the sweetness of her voice, the
concord of her words, the harmony of her music (if his beloved be a
musician). Thus will he feed his soul on sweetest food by means of these
two senses—which have little of the corporeal and are ministers of
reason—without passing in his desire for the body to any appetite less
than seemly.
“Next let him obey, please and honour his lady with all reverence, and
hold her dearer than himself, and prefer her convenience and pleasures
to his own, and love in her not less the beauty of mind than that of
body. Therefore let him take care not to leave her to fall into any kind
of errour, but by admonition and good advice let him always seek to lead
her on to modesty, to temperance, to true chastity, and see to it that
no thoughts find place in her except those that are pure and free from
every stain of vice; and by thus sowing virtue in the garden of her fair
mind, he will gather fruits of fairest behaviour too, and will taste
them with wonderful delight. And this will be the true engendering and
manifesting of beauty in beauty, which by some is said to be the end of
love.
“In such fashion will our Courtier be most acceptable to his lady, and
she will always show herself obedient, sweet and affable to him, and as
desirous of pleasing him as of being loved by him; and the wishes of
both will be most virtuous and harmonious, and they themselves will thus
be very happy.”
63.—Here my lord Morello said:
“To engender beauty in beauty, forsooth, would be to beget a beautiful
child in a beautiful woman; and pleasing him in this would seem to me a
much clearer token that she loved her lover than treating him with the
affability of which you speak.”
Bembo laughed, and said:
“You must not go beyond bounds, my lord Morello; nor does a woman give
small token of her love when she gives her lover her beauty, which is so
precious a thing, and by the ways that are the avenues to her soul (that
is, sight and hearing) sends the glances of her eyes, the image of her
face, her voice, her words, which strike home to the lover’s heart and
give him proof of her love.”
My lord Morello said:
“Glances and words may be, and often are, false proofs; therefore he who
has no better pledge of love is, in my judgment, far from sure; and
truly I quite expected you to make this lady of yours a little more
courteous and generous to the Courtier than my lord Magnifico made his;
but methinks that both of you are in like case with those judges who
pronounce sentence against their friends for the sake of appearing
wise.”
64.—Bembo said:
“I am very willing that this lady should be much more courteous to my
unyouthful Courtier, than my lord Magnifico’s is to the youthful
Courtier; and with reason, for my Courtier will desire only seemly
things, and therefore the lady can grant him all of them without blame;
while my lord Magnifico’s lady, who is not so sure of the youthful
Courtier’s modesty, ought to grant him only seemly things, and to refuse
him the unseemly. Hence my Courtier, to whom is granted what he asks, is
more happy than the other, to whom part is granted and part refused.
“And to the end that you may still better understand that rational love
is happier than sensual, I say that the same things ought sometimes to
be refused in sensual love and granted in rational love, because they
are unseemly in the one and seemly in the other. Thus, to please her
worthy lover, besides granting him pleasant smiles, familiar and secret
discourse, and leave to joke and jest with her and to touch her hand,
the lady may in reason even go so far as kissing without blame, which is
not permitted in sensual love according to my lord Magnifico’s rules.
For since the kiss is the union of body and soul, there is danger lest
the sensual lover incline more in the direction of the body than in that
of the soul; while the rational lover perceives that although the mouth
is part of the body, yet it gives issue to words, which are interpreters
of the soul, and to that inward breath which is itself even called soul.
Hence a man delights to join his mouth to that of his beloved in a kiss,
not in order to arouse any unseemly desire in him, but because he feels
that bond to be the opening of a passage between their souls, which,
being each drawn by desire for the other, pour themselves each into the
other’s body by turn, and so commingle that each has two souls, and a
single soul (thus composed of these two) rules as it were over two
bodies. Hence the kiss may be oftener said to be a joining of soul than
of body, because it has such power over the soul that it draws her to
itself and separates her from the body. On this account all chaste
lovers desire to kiss as a joining of the soul; and thus the divinely
enamoured Plato says that in kissing the soul came to his lips to escape
his body. And since the separation of the soul from things material, and
its complete union with things spiritual, may be denoted by the kiss,
Solomon, in his divine book of the Song, says: ‘Let him kiss me with the
kiss of his mouth,’ to express desire that his soul might be so
transported with divine love to the contemplation of celestial beauty,
that by joining closely therewith she might forsake the body.”
65.—Everyone gave closest heed to Bembo’s discourse; and he, having made
a little pause and seeing that no one else spoke, said:
“As you have made me begin to teach our unyouthful Courtier happy love,
I fain would lead him a little farther; for it is very dangerous to stop
at this stage, seeing that the soul is very prone to the senses, as has
many times been said; and although reason and argument choose well and
perceive that beauty does not spring from the body, and although they
therefore put a bridle upon unseemly desires, still, always
contemplating beauty in the body often perverts sound judgment. And even
if no other evil flowed therefrom, absence from the beloved object
brings much suffering with it, because the influence of her beauty gives
the lover wonderful delight when she is present, and by warming his
heart wakens and melts certain dormant and frozen forces in his soul,
which (being nourished by the warmth of love) spread and blossom about
his heart, and send forth through the eyes those spirits that are very
subtle vapours made of the purest and brightest part of the blood, which
receive the image of her beauty and fashion it with a thousand various
ornaments. Hence the soul delights, and trembles with awe and yet
rejoices, and as in a stupour feels not only pleasure, but that fear and
reverence which we are wont to have for sacred things, and speaks of
being in paradise.
66.—“Therefore the lover who considers beauty in the body only, loses
this blessing and felicity as soon as his beloved lady by her absence
leaves his eyes without their splendour, and his soul consequently
widowed of its blessing. Because, her beauty being far away, that
amourous influence does not warm his heart as it did in her presence;
wherefore his pores become arid and dry, and still the memory of her
beauty stirs a little those forces of his soul, so that they seek to
scatter abroad the spirits; and these, finding the ways shut, have no
exit, and yet seek to issue forth; and thus hemmed in by those goads,
they sting the soul and give it keenest suffering, as in the case of
children when the teeth begin to come through the tender gums. And from
this proceed the tears, the sighs, the anguish and the torments of
lovers, because the soul is ever in affliction and travail, and becomes
almost raging until her dear beauty appears to it again; and then it
suddenly is calmed and breathes, and all intent upon that beauty it
feeds on sweetest food, nor would ever part from so delightful a
spectacle.
“Hence, to escape the torment of this absence and to enjoy beauty
without suffering, there is need that the Courtier should, with the aid
of reason, wholly turn his desire from the body to the beauty alone, and
contemplate it in itself simple and pure, as far as he can, and fashion
it in his imagination apart from all matter; and thus make it lovely and
dear to his soul, and enjoy it there, and have it with him day and
night, in every time and place, without fear of ever losing it; bearing
always in mind that the body is something very different from beauty,
and not only does not enhance it, but diminishes its perfection.
“In this wise will our unyouthful Courtier be beyond all the bitterness
and calamities that the young nearly always feel: such as jealousies,
suspicions, disdainings, angers, despairings, and certain furies full of
madness whereby they are often led into such errour that some of them
not only beat the women whom they love, but deprive themselves of life.
He will do no injury to the husband, father, brothers or kinsfolk of his
beloved lady; he will put no infamy upon her; he will never be forced to
bridle his eyes and tongue with such difficulty in order not to disclose
his desires to others, or to endure suffering at partings or
absences;—because he will always carry his precious treasure with him
shut up in his heart, and also by force of his imagination he will
inwardly fashion her beauty much more beautiful than in fact it is.
67.—“But besides these blessings the lover will find another much
greater still, if he will employ this love as a step to mount to one
much higher; which he will succeed in doing if he continually considers
within himself how narrow a restraint it is to be always occupied in
contemplating the beauty of one body only; and therefore, in order to
escape such close bounds as these, in his thought he will little by
little add so many ornaments, that by heaping all beauties together he
will form an universal concept, and will reduce the multitude of these
beauties to the unity of that single beauty which is spread over human
nature at large. In this way he will no longer contemplate the
particular beauty of one woman, but that universal beauty which adorns
all bodies; and thus, bewildered by this greater light, he will not heed
the lesser, and glowing with a purer flame, he will esteem lightly that
which at first he so greatly prized.
“This stage of love, although it be very noble and such as few attain,
still cannot be called perfect; for since the imagination is merely a
corporeal faculty and has no perception except through those means that
are furnished it by the senses, it is not wholly purged of material
darkness; and hence, although it considers this universal beauty in the
abstract and intrinsically, yet it does not discern that beauty very
clearly or without some ambiguity, because of the likeness which
phantoms bear to substance. Thus those who attain this love are like
tender birds beginning to put on feathers, which, although with their
frail wings they lift themselves a little in flight, yet dare not go far
from their nest or trust themselves to the winds and open sky.
68.—“Therefore when our Courtier shall have reached this goal, although
he may be called a very happy lover by comparison with those who are
plunged in the misery of sensual love, still I would have him not rest
content, but press boldly on following along the lofty path after the
guide who leads him to the goal of true felicity. And thus, instead of
going outside himself in thought (as all must needs do who choose to
contemplate bodily beauty only), let him have recourse to himself, in
order to contemplate that beauty which is seen by the eyes of the mind,
which begin to be sharp and clear when those of the body lose the flower
of their loveliness. Then the soul,—freed from vice, purged by studies
of true philosophy, versed in spiritual life, and practised in matters
of the intellect, devoted to the contemplation of her own substance,—as
if awakened from deepest sleep, opens those eyes which all possess but
few use, and sees in herself a ray of that light which is the true image
of the angelic beauty communicated to her, and of which she then
communicates a faint shadow to the body. Grown blind to things earthly,
the soul thus becomes very keen-sighted to things heavenly; and
sometimes, when the motive forces of the body are absorbed by earnest
contemplation or fettered by sleep, being unhampered by them, she is
conscious of a certain far-off perfume of true angelic beauty, and
ravished by the splendour of that light, she begins to kindle and
pursues it so eagerly that she almost becomes phrensied with desire to
unite herself to that beauty, thinking that she has found God’s
footstep, in the contemplation of which she seeks to rest as in her
beatific end. And thus, glowing in this most happy flame, she rises to
her noblest part, which is the intellect; and here, no longer darkened
by the gloomy night of things earthly, she sees the divine beauty; but
still she does not yet quite enjoy it perfectly, because she
contemplates it in her own particular intellect only, which cannot be
capable of the vast universal beauty.
“Wherefore, not well content with this boon, love gives the soul a
greater felicity; for just as from the particular beauty of one body it
guides her to the universal beauty of all bodies, so in the highest
stage of perfection it guides her from the particular to the universal
intellect. Hence the soul, kindled by the most sacred fire of true
divine love, flies to unite herself with the angelic nature, and not
only quite forsakes sense, but has no longer need of reason’s discourse;
for, changed into an angel, she understands all things intelligible, and
without veil or cloud views the wide sea of pure divine beauty, and
receives it into herself, and enjoys that supreme felicity of which the
senses are incapable.
69.—“If, then, the beauties which with these dim eyes of ours we daily
see in corruptible bodies (but which are naught but dreams and faintest
shadows of beauty) seem to us so fair and gracious that they often
kindle most ardent fire in us, and of such delight that we deem no
felicity able to equal that which we sometimes feel at a single glance
coming to us from a woman’s beloved eyes,—what happy wonder, what
blessed awe, shall we think is that which fills the souls that attain to
the vision of divine beauty! What sweet flame, what delightful burning,
must that be thought which springs from the fountain of supreme and true
beauty!—which is the source of every other beauty, which never waxes nor
wanes: ever fair, and of its own self most simple in every part alike;
like only to itself, and partaking of none other; but fair in such wise
that all other fair things are fair because they derive their beauty
from it.
“This is that beauty identical with highest good, which by its light
calls and attracts all things to itself, and not only gives intellect to
the intellectual, reason to the rational, sense and desire for life to
the sensual, but to plants also and to stones communicates motion and
that natural instinct of their quality, as an imprint of itself.
“Therefore this love is as much greater and happier than the others, as
the cause that moves it is more excellent; and hence, just as material
fire refines gold, so does this most sacred fire in our souls destroy
and consume that which is mortal there, and quickens and beautifies that
celestial part which at first, by reason of the senses, was dead and
buried in them. This is the Pyre whereon the poets write that Hercules
was burned on the crest of Mount Œta, and by such burning became divine
and immortal after death.[478] This is the Burning Bush of Moses, the
Cloven Tongues of fire, the Fiery Chariot of Elias,[479] which doubles
grace and felicity in the souls of those who are worthy to behold it,
when they leave this earthly baseness and take flight towards heaven.
“Let us, then, direct all the thoughts and forces of our soul to this
most sacred light, which shows us the way that leads to heaven; and
following after it, let us lay aside the passions wherewith we were
clothed at our fall, and by the stairway that bears the shadow of
sensual beauty on its lowest step, let us mount to the lofty mansion
where dwells the heavenly, lovely and true beauty, which lies hidden in
the inmost secret recesses of God, so that profane eyes cannot behold
it. Here we shall find a most happy end to our desires, true rest from
our toil, certain cure for our miseries, most wholesome medicine for our
diseases, safest refuge from the boisterous storms of this life’s
tempestuous sea.
70.—“What mortal tongue, then, O most holy Love, can praise thee
worthily? Most fair, most good, most wise, thou springest from the union
of beauty and goodness and divine wisdom, and abidest in that union, and
by that union returnest to that union as in a circle. Sweetest bond of
the universe, joining things celestial to things terrestrial, thou with
benignant sway inclinest the supernal powers to rule the lower powers,
and turning the minds of mortals to their origin, joinest them thereto.
Thou unitest the elements in concord, movest nature to produce—and that
which is born, to the perpetuation of life. Thou unitest things that are
separate, givest perfection to the imperfect, likeness to the unlike,
friendship to the unfriendly, fruit to the earth, tranquillity to the
sea, vital light to the heavens.
“Thou art father of true pleasure, of grace, of peace, of gentleness and
good will, enemy to rustic savagery and sloth—in short, the beginning
and the end of every good. And since thou delightest to inhabit the
flower of beautiful bodies and beautiful souls, and thence sometimes to
display thyself a little to the eyes and minds of those who are worthy
to behold thee, methinks that now thy abode is here among us.
“Deign, then, O Lord, to hear our prayers, pour thyself upon our hearts,
and with the splendour of thy most holy fire illumine our darkness and,
like a trusted guide, in this blind labyrinth show us the true path.
Correct the falseness of our senses, and after our long pursuit of
vanities give us true and solid good; make us to inhale those spiritual
odours that quicken the powers of the intellect, and to hear the
celestial harmony with such accord that there may no longer be room in
us for any discord of passion; fill us at that inexhaustible fountain of
content which ever delights and never satiates, and gives a taste of
true beatitude to all who drink of its living and limpid waters; with
the beams of thy light purge our eyes of misty ignorance, to the end
that they may no longer prize mortal beauty, and may know that the
things which first they seemed to see, are not, and that those which
they saw not, really are.
“Accept our souls, which are offered thee in sacrifice; burn them in
that living flame which consumes all mortal dross, to the end that,
being wholly separated from the body, they may unite with divine beauty
by a perpetual and very sweet bond, and that we, being severed from
ourselves, may, like true lovers, be able to transform ourselves into
the beloved, and rising above the earth may be admitted to the angels’
feast, where, fed on ambrosia and immortal nectar, we may at last die a
most happy and living death, as died of old those ancient fathers whose
souls thou, by the most glowing power of contemplation, didst ravish
from the body and unite with God.”
71.—Having thus far spoken, with such vehemence that he almost seemed
transported and beside himself, Bembo remained silent and motionless,
keeping his eyes towards heaven, as if wrapped in ecstasy; when my lady
Emilia, who with the others had been listening most attentively to his
discourse, took him by the border of his robe, and shaking him a little,
said:[480]
“Have a care, messer Pietro, that with these thoughts your soul, also,
does not forsake your body.”
“My Lady,” replied messer Pietro, “that would not be the first miracle
that love has wrought upon me.”
Then my lady Duchess and all the others again began urging Bembo to
continue his discourse: and everyone seemed almost to feel in his mind a
spark of that divine love which inspired the speaker, and all desired to
hear more; but Bembo added:
“My Lords, I have said that which love’s sacred phrensy dictated to me
at the moment; now that it seems to inspire me no further, I should not
know what to say: and I think love is not willing that its secrets
should be further disclosed, or that the Courtier should pass beyond
that stage which it has been pleased to have me show him; and therefore
perhaps it is not permitted to speak more of this matter.”
72.—“Verily,” said my lady Duchess, “if the unyouthful Courtier should
prove able to follow the path that you have shown him, he ought in all
reason to content himself with such great felicity, and to have no envy
of the youthful Courtier.”
Then messer Cesare Gonzaga said:
“The road which leads to this felicity seems to me so steep that I
believe it is very hard to travel.”
My lord Gaspar added:
“I believe it is hard for men to travel, but impossible for women.”
My lady Emilia laughed, and said:
“My lord Gaspar, if you return to wronging us so often, I promise you
that you will not be pardoned again.”
My lord Gaspar replied:
“No wrong is done you by saying that women’s souls are not so purged of
passion as those of men, nor given to contemplation, as messer Pietro
said those must be who would taste divine love. Thus we do not read that
any woman has had this grace, but that many men have had it, like Plato,
Socrates and Plotinus,[481] and many others; and so many of our holy
Fathers, like St. Francis, upon whom an ardent spirit of love impressed
the most holy seal of the five wounds:[482] nor could aught but the
power of love lift St. Paul to the vision of those mysteries whereof man
is not allowed to speak;[483] nor show St. Stephen the opened
heavens.”[484]
Here the Magnifico Giuliano replied:
“In this, women will by no means be outdone by men; for Socrates himself
confesses that all the mysteries of love which he knew were revealed to
him by a woman, who was the famous Diotima;[362] and the angel who
wounded St. Francis with the fire of love, has also made several women
of our age worthy of the same seal. You must remember, too, that St.
Mary Magdalen had many sins forgiven her because she loved much,[485]
and perhaps with no less grace than St. Paul was she many times lifted
to the third heaven by angelic love; and so many others, who (as I
narrated yesterday more at large) for the love of Christ’s name took no
heed of life, nor were afraid of torments or any manner of death however
horrible and cruel it might be; and they were not old, as messer Pietro
would have our Courtier, but tender and delicate girls, and of that age
wherein he says that sensual love ought to be allowed in men.”
73.—My lord Gaspar began making ready to reply, but my lady Duchess
said: