THE GROWTH OF THE CLASSIC SPIRIT IN ITALIAN CRITICISM
THE growth of classicism in Renaissance criticism was due to three
causes,--humanism, or the imitation of the classics, Aristotelianism, or
the influence of Aristotle's _Poetics_, and rationalism, or the
authority of the reason, the result of the growth of the modern spirit
in the arts and sciences. These three causes are at the bottom of
Italian classicism, as well as of French classicism during the
seventeenth century.
I. _Humanism_
The progress of humanism may be distinguished by an arbitrary but more
or less practical division into four periods. The first period was
characterized by the discovery and accumulation of classical literature,
and the second period was given up to the arrangement and translation of
the works thus discovered. The third period is marked by the formation
of academies, in which the classics were studied and humanized, and
which as a result produced a special cult of learning. The fourth and
last period is marked by the decline of pure erudition, and the
beginning of aesthetic and stylistic scholarship.[239] The practical
result of the revival of learning and the progress of humanism was thus
the study and imitation of the classics. To this imitation of classical
literature all that humanism gave to the modern world may be ultimately
traced. The problem before us, then, is this: What was the result of
this imitation of the classics, in so far as it regards the literary
criticism of the Renaissance?
In the first place, the imitation of the classics resulted in the study
and cult of external form. Elegance, polish, clearness of design, became
objects of study for themselves; and as a result we have the formation
of aesthetic taste, and the growth of a classic purism, to which many of
the literary tendencies of the Renaissance may be traced.[240] Under Leo
X. and throughout the first half of the sixteenth century, the
intricacies of style and versification were carefully studied. Vida was
the first to lay down laws of imitative harmony;[241] Bembo, and after
him Dolce and others, studied the poetic effect of different sounds, and
the onomatopoeic value of the various vowels and consonants;[242]
Claudio Tolomei attempted to introduce classical metres into the
vernacular;[243] Trissino published subtle and systematic researches in
Tuscan language and versification.[244] Later, the rhetorical treatises
of Cavalcanti (1565), Lionardi (1554), and Partenio (1560), and the more
practical manuals of Fanucci (1533), Equicola (1541), and Ruscelli
(1559), all testify to the tremendous impulse which the imitation of the
classics had given to the study of form both in classical and vernacular
literatures.
In Vida's _Ars Poetica_ there are abundant evidences of the rhetorical
and especially the puristic tendencies of modern classicism. The
mechanical conception of poetic expression, in which imagination,
sensibility, and passion are subjected to the elaborate and intricate
precepts of art, is everywhere found in Vida's poem. Like Horace, Vida
insists on long preparation for the composition of poetry, and warns the
poet against the indulgence of his first impulses. He suggests as a
preparation for the composition of poetry, that the poet should prepare
a list of phrases and images for use whenever occasion may demand.[245]
He impresses upon the poet the necessity of euphemistic expressions in
introducing the subject of his poem; for example, the name of Ulysses
should not be mentioned, but he should be referred to as one who has
seen many men and many cities, who has suffered shipwreck on the return
from Troy, and the like.[246] In such mechanical precepts as these, the
rhetoric of seventeenth-century classicism is anticipated. Its
restraint, its purity, its mechanical side, are everywhere visible in
Vida. A little later, in Daniello, we find similar puristic tendencies.
He requires the severe separation of _genres_, decorum and propriety of
characterization, and the exclusion of everything disagreeable from the
stage. In Partenio's _Della Imitatione Poetica_ (1560), the poet is
expressly forbidden the employment of the ordinary words in daily
use,[247] and elegance of form is especially demanded. Partenio regards
form as of superior importance to subject or idea; for those who hear or
read poetry care more for beauty of diction than for character or even
thought.[248]
It is on merely rhetorical grounds that Partenio distinguishes excellent
from mediocre poetry. The good poet, unlike the bad one, is able to give
splendor and dignity to the most trivial idea by means of adornments of
diction and disposition. This conception seems to have particularly
appealed to the Renaissance; and Tasso gives expression to a similar
notion when he calls it the poet's noblest function "to make of old
concepts new ones, to make of vulgar concepts noble ones, and to make
common concepts his own."[249] In a higher and more ideal sense, poetry,
according to Shelley, "makes familiar objects be as if they were not
familiar."[250]
It is in keeping with this rhetorical ideal of classicism that Scaliger
makes _electio et sui fastidium_ the highest virtues of the poet.[251]
All that is merely popular (_plebeium_) in thought and expression is to
be minutely avoided; for only that which proceeds from solid erudition
is proper to art. The basis of artistic creation is imitation and
judgment; for every artist is at bottom somewhat of an echo.[252] Grace,
decorum, elegance, splendor are the chief excellences of poetry and the
life of all excellence lies in measure, that is, moderation and
proportion. It is in the spirit of this classical purism that Scaliger
minutely distinguishes the various rhetorical and grammatical figures,
and carefully estimates their proper place and function in poetry. His
analysis and systematization of the figures were immediately accepted by
the scholars and grammarians of his time, and have played a large part
in French education ever since. Another consequence of Scaliger's
dogmatic teaching, the Latinization of culture, can only be referred to
here in passing.[253]
A second result of the imitation of the classics was the paganization of
Renaissance culture. Classic art is at bottom pagan, and the Renaissance
sacrificed everything in order to appear classical.[254] Not only did
Christian literature seem contemptible when compared with classic
literature, but the mere treatment of Christian themes offered numerous
difficulties in itself. Thus Muzio declares that the ancient fables are
the best poetic materials, since they permit the introduction of the
deities into poetry, and a poem, being something divine, should not
dispense with the association of divinity.[255] To bring the God of
Israel into poetry, to represent him, as it were, in the flesh,
discoursing and arguing with men, was sacrilege; and to give the events
of poetic narrative divine authoritativeness, the pagan deities became
necessities of Renaissance poetry. Savonarola, in the fifteenth century,
and the Council of Trent, in the sixteenth, reacted against the
paganization of literature, but in vain. Despite the Council of Trent,
despite Tasso and Du Bartas, the pagan gods held sway over Parnassus
until the very end of the classical period; and in the seventeenth
century, as will be seen, Boileau expressly discourages the treatment of
Christian themes, and insists that the ancient pagan fables alone must
form the basis of neo-classical art.
A third result of the imitation of the classics was the development of
applied, or concrete, criticism. If the foundations of literature, if
the formation of style, can result only from a close and judicious
imitation of classical literature, this problem confronts us: Which
classical authors are we to imitate? An answer to this question involves
the application of concrete criticism. A reason must be given for one's
preferences; in other words, they must be justified on principle. The
literary controversies of the humanists, the disputes on the subject of
imitation, of Ciceronianism, and what not, all tended in this direction.
The judgment of authors was dependent more or less on individual
impressions. But the longer these controversies continued, the nearer
was the approach to a literary criticism, justified by appeals to
general principles, which became more and more fixed and determined; so
that the growth of principles, or criteria of judgment in matters of
literature, is in reality coterminous with the history of the growth of
classicism.[256]
But one of the most important consequences of the imitation of the
classics was that this imitation became a dogma of criticism, and
radically changed the relations of art and nature in so far as they
touch letters and literary criticism. The imitation of the classics
became, in a word, the basis of literary creation. Vida, for example,
affirms that the poet must imitate classical literature, for only by
such imitation is perfection attainable in modern poetry. In fact, this
notion is carried to such an extreme that the highest originality
becomes for Vida merely the ingenious translation of passages from the
classic poets:--
"Haud minor est adeo virtus, si te audit Apollo,
Inventa Argivum in patriam convertere vocem,
Quam si tute aliquid intactum inveneris ante."[257]
Muzio, echoing Horace, urges the poet to study the classics by day and
by night; and Scaliger, as has been seen, makes all literary creation
depend ultimately on judicious imitation: "Nemo est qui non aliquid de
Echo." As a result, imitation gradually acquired a specialized and
almost esoteric meaning, and became in this sense the starting-point of
all the educational theories of the later humanists. The doctrine of
imitation set forth by John Sturm, the Strasburg humanist, was
particularly influential.[258] According to Sturm, imitation is not the
servile copying of words and phrases; it is "a vehement and artistic
application of mind," which judiciously uses and transfigures all that
it imitates. Sturm's theory of imitation is not entirely original, but
comes through Agricola and Melanchthon from Quintilian.[259] Quintilian
had said that the greater part of art consists in imitation; but for the
humanists imitation became the chief and almost the only element of
literary creation, since the literature of their own time seemed so
vastly inferior to that of the ancients.
The imitation of the classics having thus become essential to literary
creation, what was to be its relation to the imitation of nature? The
ancient poets seemed to insist that every writer is at bottom an
imitator of nature, and that he who does not imitate nature diverges
from the purpose and principle of art. A lesson coming from a source so
authoritative as this could not be left unheeded by the writers of the
Renaissance, and the evolution of classicism may be distinguished by the
changing point of view of the critics in regard to the relations between
nature and art. This evolution may be traced in the neo-classical period
through three distinct stages, and these three stages may be indicated
by the doctrines respectively of Vida, Scaliger, and Boileau.
Vida says that it is the first essential of literary art to imitate the
classics. This, however, does not prevent him from warning the poet that
it is his first duty to observe and copy nature:--
"Praeterea haud lateat te, nil conarier artem,
Naturam nisi ut assimulet, propiusque sequatur."
For Vida, however, as for the later classicists, nature is synonymous
with civilized men, perhaps even further restricted to the men of the
city and the court; and the study of nature was hardly more for him than
close observation of the differences of human character, more especially
of the external differences which result from diversity of age, rank,
sex, race, profession, and which may be designated by the term
_decorum_.[260] The imitation of nature even in this restricted sense
Vida requires on the authority of the ancients. The modern poet should
imitate nature because the great classical poets have always
acknowledged her sway:--
"Hanc unam vates sibi proposuere magistram."
Nature has no particular interest for Vida in itself. He accepts the
classics as we accept the Scriptures; and nature is to be imitated and
followed because the ancients seem to require it.
In Scaliger this principle is carried one stage farther. The poet
creates another nature and other fortunes as if he were another
God.[261] Virgil especially has created another nature of such beauty
and perfection that the poet need not concern himself with the
realities of life, but can go to the second nature created by Virgil for
the subject-matter of his imitation. "All the things which you have to
imitate, you have according to another nature, that is, Virgil."[262] In
Virgil, as in nature, there are the most minute details of the
foundation and government of cities, the management of armies, the
building and handling of ships, and in fact all the secrets of the arts
and sciences. What more can the poet desire, and indeed what more can he
find in life, and find there with the same certainty and accuracy?
Virgil has created a nature far more perfect than that of reality, and
one compared with which the actual world and life itself seem but pale
and without beauty. What Scaliger stands for, then, is the substitution
of the world of art instead of life as the object of poetic imitation.
This point of view finds expression in many of the theorists of his
time. Partenio, for example, asserts that art is a firmer and safer
guide than nature; with nature we can err, but scarcely with art, for
art eradicates from nature all that is bad, while nature mingles weeds
with flowers, and does not distinguish vices from virtues.[263]
Boileau carries the neo-classical ideal of nature and art to its
ultimate perfection. According to him, nothing is beautiful that is not
true, and nothing is true that is not in nature. Truth, for classicism,
is the final test of everything, including beauty; and hence to be
beautiful poetry must be founded on nature. Nature should therefore be
the poet's sole study, although for Boileau, as for Vida, nature is one
with the court and the city. Now, in what way can we discover exactly
how to imitate nature, and perceive whether or not we have imitated it
correctly? Boileau finds the guide to the correct imitation of nature,
and the very test of its correctness, in the imitation of the classics.
The ancients are great, not because they are old, but because they are
true, because they knew how to see and to imitate nature; and to imitate
antiquity is therefore to use the best means the human spirit has ever
found for expressing nature in its perfection.[264] The advance of
Boileau's theory on that of Vida and Scaliger is therefore that he
founded the rules and literary practice of classical literature on
reason and nature, and showed that there is nothing arbitrary in the
authority of the ancients. For Vida, nature is to be followed on the
authority of the classics; for Boileau, the classics are to be followed
on the authority of nature and reason. Scaliger had shown that such a
poet as Virgil had created another nature more perfect than that of
reality, and that therefore we should imitate this more beautiful nature
of the poet. Boileau, on the contrary, showed that the ancients were
simply imitating nature itself in the closest and keenest manner, and
that by imitating the classics the poet was not imitating a second and
different nature, but was being shown in the surest way how to imitate
the real and only nature. This final reconciliation of the imitation of
nature and the imitation of the classics was Boileau's highest
contribution to the literary criticism of the neo-classical period.
II. _Aristotelianism_
The influence of Aristotle's _Poetics_ is first visible in the dramatic
literature of the early sixteenth century. Trissino's _Sofonisba_
(1515), usually accounted the first regular modern tragedy, Rucellai's
_Rosmunda_ (1516), and innumerable other tragedies of this period, were
in reality little more than mere attempts at putting the Aristotelian
theory of tragedy into practice. The Aristotelian influence is evident
in many of the prefaces of these plays, and in a few contemporary works
of scholarship, such as the _Antiquae Lectiones_ (1516) of Caelius
Rhodiginus, whom Scaliger called _omnium doctissimus praeceptor noster_.
At the same time, the _Poetics_ did not immediately play an important
part in the critical literature of Italy. From the time of Petrarch,
Aristotle, identified in the minds of the humanists with the mediaeval
scholasticism so obnoxious to them, had lost somewhat of his supremacy;
and the strong Platonic tendencies of the Renaissance had further
contributed to lower the prestige of Aristotelianism among the
humanists. At no time of the Renaissance, however, did Aristotle lack
ardent defenders, and Filelfo, for example, wrote in 1439, "To defend
Aristotle and the truth seems to me one and the same thing."[265] In the
domain of philosophy the influence of Aristotle was temporarily
sustained by the liberal Peripateticism of Pomponazzi; and numerous
others, among them Scaliger himself, continued the traditions of a
modernized Aristotelianism. From this time, however, Aristotle's
position as the supreme philosopher was challenged more and more; and he
was regarded by the advanced thinkers of the Renaissance as the
representative of the mediaeval obscurantism that opposed the progress of
modern scientific investigation.
But whatever of Aristotle's authority was lost in the domain of
philosophy was more than regained in the domain of literature. The
beginning of the Aristotelian influence on modern literary theory may be
said to date from the year 1536, in which year Trincaveli published a
Greek text of the _Poetics_, Pazzi his edition and Latin version, and
Daniello his own _Poetica_. Pazzi's son, in dedicating his father's
posthumous work, said that in the _Poetics_ "the precepts of poetic art
are treated by Aristotle as divinely as he has treated every other form
of knowledge." In the very year that this was said, Ramus gained his
Master's degree at the University of Paris by defending victoriously the
thesis that Aristotle's doctrines without exception are all false.[266]
The year 1536 may therefore be regarded as a turning-point in the
history of Aristotle's influence. It marks the beginning of his
supremacy in literature, and the decline of his dictatorial authority in
philosophy.
Between the year 1536 and the middle of the century the lessons of
Aristotle's _Poetics_ were being gradually learned by the Italian
critics and poets. By 1550 the whole of the _Poetics_ had been
incorporated in the critical literature of Italy, and Fracastoro could
say that "Aristotle has received no less fame from the survival of his
_Poetics_ than from his philosophical remains."[267] According to
Bartolommeo Ricci, in a letter to Prince Alfonso, son of Hercules II.,
Duke of Ferrara, Maggi was the first person to interpret Aristotle's
_Poetics_ in public.[268] These lectures were delivered some time before
April, 1549. As early as 1540, Bartolommeo Lombardi, the collaborator of
Maggi in his commentary on the _Poetics_, had intended to deliver public
lectures on the _Poetics_ before a Paduan academy, but died before
accomplishing his purpose.[269] Numerous public readings on the subject
of Aristotle and Horace followed those of Maggi,--among them those by
Varchi, Giraldi Cintio, Luisino, and Trifone Gabrielli; and the number
of public readings on topics connected with literary criticism, and on
the poetry of Dante and Petrarch, increased greatly from this time.
The number of commentaries on the _Poetics_ itself, published during the
sixteenth century, is really remarkable. The value of these commentaries
in general is not so much that they add anything to the literary
criticism of the Renaissance, but that their explanations of Aristotle's
meaning were accepted by contemporary critics, and became in a way the
source of all the literary arguments of the sixteenth century. Nor was
their influence restricted merely to this particular period. They were,
one might almost say, living things to the critics and poets of the
classical period in France. Racine, Corneille, and other distinguished
writers possessed copies of these commentaries, studied them carefully,
cited them in their prefaces and critical writings, and even annotated
their own copies of the commentaries with marginal notes, of which some
may be seen in the modern editions of their works. In the preface to
Rapin's _Reflexions sur l'Art Poetique_ (1674) there is a history of
literary criticism, which is almost entirely devoted to these Italian
commentators; and writers like Chapelain and Balzac eagerly argued and
discussed their relative merits.
Several of these Italian commentators have been alluded to already.[270]
The first critical edition of the _Poetics_ was that of Robortelli
(1548), and this was followed by those of Maggi (1550) and Vettori
(1560), both written in Latin, and both exhibiting great learning and
acumen. The first translation of the _Poetics_ into the vernacular was
that by Segni (1549), and this was followed by the Italian commentaries
of Castelvetro (1570) and Piccolomini (1575). Tasso, after comparing the
works of these two commentators, concluded that while Castelvetro had
greater erudition and invention, Piccolomini had greater maturity of
judgment, more learning, perhaps, with less erudition, and certainly
learning more Aristotelian and more suited to the interpretation of the
_Poetics_.[271] The two last sections of Trissino's _Poetica_, published
in 1563, are little more than a paraphrase and transposition of
Aristotle's treatise. But the curious excesses into which admiration of
Aristotle led the Italian scholars may be gathered from a work published
at Milan in 1576, an edition of the _Poetics_ expounded in verse,
Baldini's _Ars Poetica Aristotelis versibus exposita_. The _Poetics_ was
also adapted for use as a practical manual for poets and playwrights in
such works as Riccoboni's brief _Compendium Artis Poeticae Aristotelis ad
usum conficiendorum poematum_ (1591). The last of the great Italian
commentaries on the _Poetics_ to have a general European influence was
perhaps Beni's, published in 1613; but this carries us beyond the
confines of the century. Besides the published editions, translations,
and commentaries, many others were written which may still be found in
Ms. in the libraries of Italy. Reference has already been made to
Salviati's (1586). There are also two anonymous commentaries dating from
this period in Ms. at Florence,--one in the Magliabechiana and the other
in the Riccardiana. The last work which may be mentioned here is
Buonamici's _Discorsi Poetici in difesa d' Aristotele_, in which
Aristotle is ardently defended against the attacks of his detractors.
It was in Italy during this period that the literary dictatorship of
Aristotle first developed, and it was Scaliger to whom the modern world
owes the formulation of the supreme authority of Aristotle as a critical
theorist. Fracastoro had likened the importance of Aristotle's _Poetics_
to that of his philosophical treatises. Trissino had followed Aristotle
verbally and almost literally. Varchi had spoken of years of
Aristotelian study as an essential prerequisite for every one who
entered the field of literary criticism. Partenio, a year before the
publication of Scaliger's _Poetics_, had asserted that everything
relating to tragedy and epic poetry had been settled by Aristotle and
Horace. But Scaliger went farther still. He was the first to regard
Aristotle as the perpetual lawgiver of poetry. He was the first to
assume that the duty of the poet is first to find out what Aristotle
says, and then to obey these precepts without question. He distinctly
calls Aristotle the perpetual dictator of all the arts: "Aristoteles
imperator noster, omnium bonarum artium dictator perpetuus."[272] This
is perhaps the first occasion in modern literature in which Aristotle is
definitely regarded as a literary dictator, and the dictatorship of
Aristotle in literature may, therefore, be dated from the year 1561.
But Scaliger did more than this. He was the first apparently to attempt
to reconcile Aristotle's _Poetics_, not only with the precepts of Horace
and the definitions of the Latin grammarians, but with the whole
practice of Latin tragedy, comedy, and epic poetry. It was in the light
of this reconciliation, or concord of Aristotelianism with the Latin
spirit, that Aristotle became for Scaliger a literary dictator. It was
not Aristotle that primarily interested him, but an ideal created by
himself, and founded on such parts of the doctrine of Aristotle as
received confirmation from the theory or practice of Roman literature;
and this new ideal, harmonizing with the Latin spirit of the
Renaissance, became in the course of time one of the foundations of
classicism. The influence of Aristotelianism was further augmented by
the Council of Trent, which gave to Aristotle's doctrine the same degree
of authority as Catholic dogma.
All these circumstances tended to favor the importance of Aristotle in
Italy during the sixteenth century, and as a result the literary
dictatorship of Aristotle was by the Italians foisted on Europe for two
centuries to come. From 1560 to 1780 Aristotle was regarded as the
supreme authority in letters throughout Europe. At no time, even in
England, during and after that period, was there a break in the
Aristotelian tradition, and the influence of the _Poetics_ may be found
in Sidney and Ben Jonson, in Milton and Dryden, as well as in Shelley
and Coleridge. Lessing, even in breaking away from the classical
practice of the French stage, defended his innovations on the authority
of Aristotle, and said of the _Poetics_, "I do not hesitate to
acknowledge, even if I should therefore be held up to scorn in these
enlightened times, that I consider the work as infallible as the
Elements of Euclid."[273] In 1756, a dozen years before Lessing, one of
the precursors of the romantic movement in England, Joseph Warton, had
also said of the _Poetics_, "To attempt to understand poetry without
having diligently digested this treatise would be as absurd and
impossible as to pretend to a skill in geometry without having studied
Euclid."[274]
One of the first results of the dictatorship of Aristotle was to give
modern literature a body of inviolable rules for the drama and the epic;
that is, the dramatic and heroic poets were restricted to a certain
fixed form, and to certain fixed characters. Classical poetry was of
course the ideal of the Renaissance, and Aristotle had analyzed the
methods which these works had employed. The inference seems to have been
that by following these rules a literature of equal importance could be
created. These formulae were at the bottom of classical literature, and
rules which had created such literatures as those of Greece and Rome
could hardly be disregarded. As a result, these rules came to be
considered more and more as essentials, and finally, almost as the very
tests of literature; and it was in consequence of their acceptance as
poetic laws that the modern classical drama and epic arose. The first
modern tragedies and the first modern epics were hardly more than such
attempts at putting the Aristotelian rules into practice. The cult of
form during the Renaissance had produced a reaction against the
formlessness and invertebrate character of mediaeval literature. The
literature of the Middle Ages was infinitely inferior to that of the
ancients; mediaeval literature lacked form and structure, classical
literature had a regular and definite form. Form then came to be
regarded as the essential difference between the perfect literatures of
Greece and Rome, and the imperfect and vulgar literature of the Middle
Ages; and the deduction from this was that, to be classical, the poet
must observe the form and structure of the classics. Minturno indeed
says that "the precepts given of old by the ancient masters, and now
repeated by me here, are to be regarded merely as common usage, and not
as inviolable laws which must serve under all circumstances."[275] But
this was not the general conception of the Renaissance. Muzio, for
example, specifically says:--
"Queste legge ch' io scrivo e questi esempi
Sian, lettore, al tuo dir perpetua norma;"
and in another place he speaks of a precept he has given, as "vera,
ferma, e inevitabil legge."[276] Scaliger goes still further than this;
for, according to him, even the classics themselves are to be judged by
these standards and rules. "It seems to me," says Scaliger, "that we
ought not to refer everything back to Homer, just as though he were the
norm, but Homer himself should be referred to the norm."[277] In the
modern classical period somewhat later, these rules were found to be
based on reason:--
"These rules of old, discovered not devised,
Are nature still, but nature methodized."[278]
But during the Renaissance they were accepted _ex cathedra_ from
classical literature.
The formulation of a fixed body of critical rules was not the only
result of the Aristotelian influence. One of the most important of these
results, as has appeared, was the rational justification of imaginative
literature. With the introduction of Aristotle's _Poetics_ into modern
Europe the Renaissance was first able to formulate a systematic theory
of poetry; and it is therefore to the rediscovery of the _Poetics_ that
we may be said to owe the foundation of modern criticism. It was on the
side of Aristotelianism that Italian criticism had its influence on
European letters; and that this influence was deep and widespread, our
study of the critical literatures of France and England will in part
show. The critics with whom we have been dealing are not merely dead
provincial names; they influenced, for two whole centuries, not only
France and England, but Spain, Portugal, and Germany as well.
Literary criticism, in any real sense, did not begin in Spain until the
very end of the sixteenth century, and the critical works that then
appeared were wholly based on those of the Italians. Rengifo's _Arte
Poetica Espanola_ (1592), in so far as it deals with the theory of
poetry, is based on Aristotle, Scaliger, and various Italian
authorities, according to the author's own acknowledgment. Pinciano's
_Philosophia Antigua Poetica_ (1596) is based on the same authorities.
Similarly, Cascales, in his _Tablas Poeticas_ (1616), gives as his
authorities Minturno, Giraldi Cintio, Maggi, Riccoboni, Castelvetro,
Robortelli, and his own countryman Pinciano. The sources of these and
all other works written at this period are Italian; and the following
passage from the _Egemplar Poetico_, written about 1606 by the Spanish
poet Juan de la Cueva, is a good illustration, not only of the general
influence of the Italians on Spanish criticism, but of the high
reverence in which the individual Italian critics were held by Spanish
men of letters:--
"De los primeros tiene Horacio el puesto,
En numeros y estilo soberano,
Qual en su Arte al mundo es manifesto.
Escaligero [_i.e._ Scaliger] hace el paso llano
Con general ensenamiento y guia,
Lo mismo el docto Cintio [_i.e._ Giraldi Cintio] y Biperano.[279]
Maranta[280] es egemplar de la Poesia,
Vida el norte, Pontano[281] el ornamento,
La luz Minturno qual el sol del dia....
Acuden todos a colmar sus vasos
Al oceano sacro de Stagira [_i.e._ Aristotle],
Donde se afirman los dudosos pasos,
Se eterniza la trompa y tierna lira."[282]
The influence of the Italians was equally great in Germany. From
Fabricius to Opitz, the critical ideas of Germany were almost all
borrowed, directly or indirectly, from Italian sources. Fabricius in his
_De Re Poetica_ (1584) acknowledges his indebtedness to Minturno,
Partenio, Pontanus, and others, but above all to Scaliger; and most of
the critical ideas by which Opitz renovated modern German literature go
back to Italian sources, through Scaliger, Ronsard, and Daniel Heinsius.
No better illustration of the influence of the Italian critics upon
European letters could be afforded than that given by Opitz's _Buch von
der deutschen Poeterei_.[283]
The influence of Italian criticism on the critical literature of France
and England will be more or less treated in the remaining portions of
this essay. It may be noted here, however, that in the critical writings
of Lessing there is represented the climax of the Italian tradition in
European letters, especially on the side of Aristotelianism. Shelley
represents a similar culmination of the Italian tradition in England.
His indebtedness to Sidney and Milton, who represent the Italian
influence in the Elizabethan age, and especially to Tasso, whom he
continually cites, is very marked. The debt of modern literature to
Italian criticism is therefore not slight. In the half century between
Vida and Castelvetro, Italian criticism formulated three things: a
theory of poetry, a rigid form for the epic, and a rigid form for the
drama. These rigid forms for drama and epic governed the creative
imagination of Europe for two centuries, and then passed away. But while
modern aesthetics for over a century has studied the processes of art,
the theory of poetry, as enunciated by the Italians of the sixteenth
century, has not diminished in value, but has continued to pervade the
finer minds of men from that time to this.
III. _Rationalism_
The rationalistic temper may be observed in critical literature almost
at the very beginning of the sixteenth century. This spirit of
rationalism is observable throughout the Renaissance; and its general
causes may be looked for in the liberation of the human reason by the
Renaissance, in the growth of the sciences and arts, and in the reaction
against mediaeval sacerdotalism and dogma. The causes of its development
in literary criticism may be found not only in these but in several
other influences of the period. The paganization of culture, the growth
of rationalistic philosophies, with their all-pervading influence on
arts and letters, and moreover the influence of Horace's _Ars Poetica_,
with its ideal of "good sense," all tended to make the element of reason
predominate in literature and in literary criticism.
In Vida the three elements which are at the bottom of classicism, the
imitation of the classics, the imitation of nature, and the authority of
reason, may all be found. Reason is for him the final test of all
things:--
"Semper nutu rationis eant res."[284]
The function of the reason in art is, first, to serve as a standard in
the choice and carrying out of the design, a bulwark against the
operation of mere chance,[285] and secondly, to moderate the expression
of the poet's own personality and passion, a bulwark against the morbid
subjectivity which is the horror of the classical temperament.[286]
It has been said of Scaliger that he was the first modern to establish
in a body of doctrine the principal consequences of the sovereignty of
the reason in literature.[287] That was hardly his aim, and certainly
not his attainment. But he was, at all events, one of the first modern
critics to affirm that there is a standard of perfection for each
specific form of literature, to show that this standard may be arrived
at _a priori_ through the reason, and to attempt a formulation of such
standard for each literary form. "Est in omni rerum genere unum primum
ac rectum ad cuius tum norman, tum rationem caetera dirigenda sunt."[288]
This, the fundamental assumption of Scaliger's _Poetics_, is also one of
the basic ideas of classicism. Not only is there a standard, a norm, in
every species of literature, but this norm can be definitely formulated
and defined by means of the reason; and it is the duty of the critic to
formulate this norm, and the duty of the poet to study and follow it
without deviating from the norm in any way. Even Homer, as we have seen,
is to be judged according to this standard arrived at through the
reason. Such a method cuts off all possibility of novelty of form or
expression, and holds every poet, ancient or modern, great or small,
accountable to one and the same standard of perfection.
The growth and influence of rationalism in Italian criticism may be best
observed by the gradual effect which its development had on the element
of Aristotelianism. In other words, rationalism changed the point of
view according to which the Aristotelian canons were regarded in the
Italian Renaissance. The earlier Italian critics accepted their rules
and precepts on the authority of Aristotle alone. Thus Trissino, at the
beginning of the fifth section of his _Poetica_, finished in 1549,
although begun about twenty years before, says, "I shall not depart from
the rules and precepts of the ancients, and especially Aristotle."[289]
Somewhat later, in 1553, Varchi says, "Reason _and_ Aristotle are my
_two_ guides."[290] Here the element of the reason first asserts
itself, but there is no intimation that the Aristotelian canons are in
themselves reasonable. The critic has two guides, the individual reason
and the Aristotelian rules, and each of these two guides is to serve
wherever the other is found wanting. This same point of view is found a
decade later in Tasso, who says that the defenders of the unity of the
epic poem have made "a shield of the authority of Aristotle, nor do they
lack the arms afforded by the reason;"[291] and similarly, in 1583, Sir
Philip Sidney says that the unity of time is demanded "both by
Aristotle's precept and common reason."[292] Here both Tasso and Sidney,
while contending that the particular law under discussion is in itself
reasonable, speak of Aristotle's _Poetics_ and the reason as separate
and distinct authorities, and fail to show that Aristotle himself based
all his precepts upon the reason. In Denores, a few years later, the
development is carried one stage farther in the direction of the
ultimate classical attitude, as when he speaks of "reason and
Aristotle's _Poetics_, which is indeed founded on naught save
reason."[293] This is as far as Italian criticism ever went. It was the
function of neo-classicism in France, as will be seen, to show that such
a phrase as "reason _and_ Aristotle" is a contradiction in itself, that
the Aristotelian canons and the reason are ultimately reducible to the
same thing, and that not only what is in Aristotle will be found
reasonable, but all that reason dictates for literary observance will be
found in Aristotle.
Rationalism produced several very important results in literature and
literary criticism during the sixteenth century. In the first place, it
tended to give the reason a higher place in literature than imagination
or sensibility. Poetry, it will be remembered, was often classified by
Renaissance critics as one of the logical sciences; and nothing could be
in greater accord with the neo-classical ideal than the assertion of
Varchi and others that the better logician the poet is, the better he
will be as a poet. Sainte-Beuve gives Scaliger the credit of having
first formulated this theory of literature which subordinates the
creative imagination and poetic sensibility to the reason;[294] but the
credit or discredit of originating it does not belong exclusively to
Scaliger. This tendency toward the apotheosis of the reason was diffused
throughout the sixteenth century, and does not characterize any
individual author. The Italian critics of this period were the first to
formulate the classical ideal that the standard of perfection may be
conceived of by the reason, and that perfection is to be attained only
by the realization of this standard.
The rationalistic spirit also tended to set the seal of disapprobation
on extravagances of any sort. Subjectivity and individualism came to be
regarded more and more, at least in theory, as out of keeping with
classical perfection. Clearness, reasonableness, sociableness, were the
highest requirements of art; and any excessive expression of the poet's
individuality was entirely disapproved of. Man, not only as a reasonable
being, but also as a social being, was regarded as the basis of
literature. Boileau's lines:--
"Que les vers ne soient pas votre eternel emploi;
Cultivez vos amis, soyez homme de foi;
C'est peu d'etre agreable et charmant dans un livre,
Il faut savoir encore et converser et vivre,"[295]
were anticipated in Berni's _Dialogo contra i Poeti_, written in 1526,
though not published until 1537. This charming invective is directed
against the fashionable literature of the time, and especially against
all professional poets. Writing from the standpoint of a polished and
rationalistic society, Berni lays great stress on the fact that poetry
is not to be taken too seriously, that it is a pastime, a recreation for
cultured people, a mere bagatelle; and he professes to despise those who
spend all their time in writing verses. The vanity, the uselessness, the
extravagances, and the ribaldry of the professional poets receive his
hearty contempt; only those who write verses for pastime merit
approbation. "Are you so stupid," he cries, "as to think that I call any
one who writes verses a poet, and that I regard such men as Vida,
Pontano, Bembo, Sannazaro, as mere poets? I do not call any one a poet,
and condemn him as such, unless he does nothing but write verses, and
wretched ones at that, and is good for nothing else. But the men I have
mentioned are not poets by profession."[296] Here the sentiments
expressed are those of a refined and social age,--the age of Louis XIV.
no less than that of Leo X.
The irreligious character of neo-classic art may also be regarded as one
of the consequences of this rationalistic temper. The combined effect of
humanism, essentially pagan, and rationalism, essentially sceptical, was
not favorable to the growth of religious feeling in literature.
Classicism, the result of these two tendencies, became more and more
rationalistic, more and more pagan; and in consequence, religious poetry
in any real sense ceased to flourish wherever the more stringent forms
of classicism prevailed. In Boileau these tendencies result in a certain
distinct antagonism to the very forms of Christianity in literature:--
"C'est donc bien vainement que nos auteurs decus,
Bannissant de leurs vers ces ornemens recus,
Pensent faire agir Dieu, ses saints et ses prophetes,
Comme ces dieux eclos du cerveau des poetes;
Mettent a chaque pas le lecteur en enfer;
N'offrent rien qu'Astaroth, Belzebuth, Lucifer.
De la foi d'un chretien les mysteres terribles
D'ornemens egayes ne sont point susceptibles;
L'Evangile a l'esprit n'offre de tous cotes
Que penitence a faire et tourmens merites;
Et de vos fictions le melange coupable
Meme a ses verites donne l'air de la fable."[297]
FOOT-NOTES:
[239] Symonds, ii. 161, based on Voigt.
[240] _Cf._ Woodward, p. 210 _sq._
[241] Hallam, _Lit. of Europe_, i. 8. 1. _Cf._ Pope, i. 182: "Omnia sed
numeris vocum concordibus aptant," etc.
[242] Bembo, _Le Prose_, 1525; Dolce, _Osservationi_, 1550, lib. iv.;
etc.
[243] _Versi e Regole de la Nuova Poesia Toscana_, 1539.
[244] Trissino, _Poetica_, lib. i.-iv., 1529; Tomitano, _Della Lingua
Toscana_, 1545; etc.
[245] Pope, i. 134. _Cf._ De Sanctis, ii. 153 _sq._
[246] Pope, i. 152.
[247] Partenio, p. 80.
[248] _Ibid._ p. 95.
[249] _Opere_, xi. 51.
[250] _Defence_, p. 13.
[251] _Poet._ v. 3.
[252] _Poet._ v. 1; vi. 4.
[253] _Cf._ Brunetiere, p. 53.
[254] Symonds, ii. 395 _sq._
[255] Muzio, p. 94.
[256] _Cf._ Dennis, _Select Works_, 1718, ii. 417 _sq._
[257] Pope, i. 167.
[258] Laas, _Die Paedagogik des Johannes Sturm_, Berlin, 1872, p. 65
_sq._
[259] _Inst. Orat._ x. 2.
[260] Pope, i. 165.
[261] _Poet._ i. 1.
[262] _Poet._ iii. 4.
[263] Partenio, p. 39 _sq._
[264] _Cf._ Brunetiere, p. 102 _sq._, and Lanson, _Hist. de la Litt.
fr._, p. 494 _sq._
[265] _Lettres grecques_, ed. Legrand, 1892, p. 31.
[266] "Quaecunque ab Aristotele dicta sint falsa et commentitia esse;"
Bayle, _Dict._ s. v. Ramus, note C.
[267] Fracastoro, i. 321.
[268] Tiraboschi, vii. 1465.
[269] Maggi, dedication.
[270] In an appendix to this essay will be found an excerpt from
Salviati's unpublished commentary on the _Poetics_, giving his judgment
of the commentators who had preceded him.
[271] Tasso, xv. 20.
[272] _Poet._ vii. ii. 1.
[273] _Hamburg. Dramat._ 101-104.
[274] _Essay on Pope_, 3d ed., i. 171.
[275] _Arte Poetica_, p. 158.
[276] Muzio, pp. 81 v., 76 v.
[277] _Poet._ i. 5.
[278] Pope, _Essay on Criticism_, 88.
[279] Viperano, author of _De Poetica libri tres_, Antwerp, 1579.
[280] Maranta, author of _Lucullanae Quaestiones_, Basle, 1564.
[281] Three writers of the Renaissance bore this name: G. Pontano, the
famous Italian humanist and Latin poet, who died in 1503; P. Pontano, of
Bruges, the author of an _Ars Versificatoria_, published in 1520; and J.
Pontanus, a Bohemian Jesuit, author of _Institutiones Poeticae_, first
published at Ingolstadt in 1594, and several times reprinted.
[282] Sedano, _Parnaso Espanol_, Madrid, 1774, viii. 40, 41.
[283] _Cf._ Berghoeffer, _Opitz' Buch von der Poeterei_, 1888, and
Beckherrn, _Opitz, Ronsard, und Heinsius_, 1888. The first reference to
Aristotle's _Poetics_, north of the Alps, is to be found in Luther's
_Address to the Christian Nobles of the German Nation_, 1520. Schosser's
_Disputationes de Tragoedia_, published in 1559, two years before
Scaliger's work appeared, is entirely based on Aristotle's _Poetics_.
[284] Pope, i. 155.
[285] _Loc. cit._, beginning, "Nec te fors inopina regat."
[286] Pope, i. 164, beginning, "Ne tamen ah nimium."
[287] Lintilhac, in _Nouvelle Revue_, lxiv. 543.
[288] Scaliger, _Poet._ iii. 11.
[289] Trissino, ii. 92.
[290] Varchi, p. 600.
[291] Tasso, xii. 217.
[292] _Defense of Poesy_, p. 48.
[293] _Discorso_, 1587, p. 39 v.
[294] _Causeries du Lundi_, iii. 44.
[295] _Art Poet._ iv. 121.
[296] Berni, p. 249.
[297] _Art Poet._ iii. 193. _Cf._ Dryden, _Discourse on Satire_, in
_Works_, xiii. 23 _sq._