TANS. Again, blind and bad is not said of Destiny itself, because it is
of the same order and number and measure as the universe; but as to the
subjects it is said to be blind, for they are blind to fate, she being
so uncertain. So also is Fate said to be evil, because every living
mortal who laments and complains, blames her. As the Apulian poet says:
How is it, or what means it, Mæcenas,
That none on earth contented with that fate appear,
Which Reason or Heaven has assigned to them?
In the same way he calls the object the highest beauty, as it is that
alone which has power of attracting him to itself; and thus he holds it
more worthy, more noble, and feels it predominant and superior as he
becomes subject and captive to it. "My death itself," he says of
Jealousy, because as Love has no more close companion than she, so also
he feels he has no greater enemy; as nothing is more hurtful to iron
than rust, which is produced by it.
CIC. Now, since you have begun so, continue to show bit by bit that
which remains.
TANS. So will I. He says next of Love: he shows me Paradise, in order to
prove that Love himself is not blind, and does not himself render any
lovers blind, except through the ignoble characteristics of the subject;
even as the birds of night become blind in the sunshine. As for himself,
Love brightens, clears, and opens the intellect, permeating all and
producing miraculous effects.
CIC. Much of this, it seems to me, the Nolano demonstrates in another
sonnet:
7.
Love, through whom high truth I do discern,
Thou openest the black diamond doors;
Through the eyes enters my deity, and through seeing
Is born, lives, is nourished, and has eternal reign;
Shows forth what heaven holds, earth and hell:
Makes present true images of the absent;
Gains strength: and drawing with straight aim,
Wounds, lays bare and frets the inmost heart.
Attend now, thou base hind unto the truth,
Bend down the ear to my unerring word;
Open, open, if thou canst the eyes, foolish perverted one!
Thou understanding little, call'st him child,
Because thou swiftly changest, fugitive he seems,
Thyself not seeing, call'st him blind.
Love shows Paradise in order that the highest things may be heard,
understood, and accomplished; or it makes the things loved, grand--at
least in appearance. He says, Fate takes love away; because, often in
spite of the lover, it does not concede, and that which he sees and
desires is distant and adverse to him. Every good he sets before me, he
says of the object, because that which is indicated by the finger of
Love seems to him the only thing, the principal, and the whole. "Steals
it from me," he says of Jealousy, not simply in order that it may not be
present to me; removing it from my eyesight, but in order that good may
not be good, but an acute evil; sweet, not sweet, but an agonized
longing; while the heart--that is, the will, has joy by the great force
of love, whatever may be the result; the mind--that is, the intellectual
part, has pain through the Fear of Fate, which fate does not favour the
lover; the spirit--that is, the natural affections, are cold because
they are snatched from the object which gives joy to the heart, and
which might give pleasure to the mind; the soul--that is, the suffering
and sensitive soul, is heavy--that is, finds itself oppressed with the
heavy burden of jealousy which torments it. To this consideration of his
state he adds a tearful lament, and says: "Who will deliver me from
war, and give me peace? or who will separate that which pains and
injures me from that which I so love, and which opens to me the gates of
heaven, so that the fervid flames in my heart may be acceptable, and
fortunate the fountains of my tears?" Continuing this proposition, he
adds:
8.
Ah me! oppress some other, spiteful Fate!
Jealousy, get thee hence--begone! away!
These may suffice to show me all the grace
Of changeful Love, and of that noble face.
He takes my life, she gives me death,
She wings, he burns my heart,
He murders it, and she revives the soul:
My succour she, my grievous burden he!
But what say I of Love?
If he and she one subject be, or form,
If with one empire and one rule they stamp
One sole impression in my heart of hearts,
Then are they two, yet one, on which do wait
The mirth and melancholy of my state!
Four beginnings and extremes of two opposites he would reduce to two
beginnings and one opposite: he says, then, oppress others--that is, let
it suffice thee, O my Fate! that thou hast so much oppressed me; and
since thou canst not exist without exercise of thyself, turn elsewhere
thy anger. Get thee hence out of the world, thou Jealousy, because one
of those two others which remain can supply your functions and offices;
yet, O Fate! thou art none other than my love; and thou, Jealousy, art
not external to the substance of the same. He alone, then, remains to
deprive me of life, to burn me, to give me death, and to be to me the
burden of my bones; for he delivers me from death--wings, enlivens, and
sustains. Then two beginnings and one opposite he reduces to one
beginning and one result, exclaiming: But what do I say of Love? If this
presence, this object, is his empire, and appears none other than the
empire of Love, the rule of Love and its own rule; the impression of
Love which appears in the substance of my heart, is then no other
impression than its own, and therefore after having said "Noble face,"
replies "Inconstant Love."[A]
[A] Vago amore.
=Second Dialogue.=