CANTO I

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_THE OLDEST LOMBARDIC MANUSCRIPT._

Facsimile from an Edict of King Rotharis,

A.D. 643.

Translation.

LXX If anybody of another the great toe from the foot

severs, he pays solidi sixteen.

LXXI If the second toe from the

foot he severs, he pays solidi six.

LXXII If the third toe he

severs, he pays solidi three.

LXXIII If the fourth toe he severs,

he pays solidi three.

LXXIIII If the fifth toe he severs,

he pays solidi two.

LXXV Upon all these damages

or injuries, above

described, which

among men exempt occurred,

therefore, a heavier punishment,

have we placed than

our ancestors, that the Faida (feud, vendetta), that

is, the hatred, after the receiving the above described

(ssta--suprascripta)

punishment, may cease, and,

moreover, not be required, nor craftiness

[Illustration]

LIBRARY OF THE

WORLD'S BEST LITERATURE

ANCIENT AND MODERN

CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER

EDITOR

HAMILTON WRIGHT MABIE

LUCIA GILBERT RUNKLE

GEORGE HENRY WARNER

ASSOCIATE EDITORS

=Connoisseur Edition=

VOL. XI.

1896

THE ADVISORY COUNCIL

CRAWFORD H. TOY, A.M., LL.D.,

Professor of Hebrew,

HARVARD UNIVERSITY, Cambridge, Mass.

THOMAS R. LOUNSBURY, LL.D., L.H.D.,

Professor of English in the Sheffield Scientific School of

YALE UNIVERSITY, New Haven, Conn.

WILLIAM M. SLOANE, PH.D., L.H.D.,

Professor of History and Political Science,

PRINCETON UNIVERSITY, Princeton, N. J.

BRANDER MATTHEWS, A.M., LL.B.,

Professor of Literature, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, New York City.

JAMES B. ANGELL, LL.D.,

President of the UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN, Ann Arbor, Mich.

WILLARD FISKE, A.M., PH.D.,

Late Professor of the Germanic and Scandinavian Languages

and Literatures, CORNELL UNIVERSITY, Ithaca, N.Y.

EDWARD S. HOLDEN, A.M., LL.D.,

Director of the Lick Observatory, and Astronomer,

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, Berkeley, Cal.

ALCEE FORTIER, LIT.D.,

Professor of the Romance Languages,

TULANE UNIVERSITY, New Orleans, La.

WILLIAM P. TRENT, M.A.,

Dean of the Department of Arts and Sciences, and Professor of

English and History, UNIVERSITY OF THE SOUTH, Sewanee, Tenn.

PAUL SHOREY, PH.D.,

Professor of Greek and Latin Literature,

UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, Chicago, Ill.

WILLIAM T. HARRIS, LL.D.,

United States Commissioner of Education,

BUREAU OF EDUCATION, Washington, D.C.

MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN, A.M., LL.D.,

Professor of Literature in the

CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA, Washington, D.C.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

VOL. XI

LIVED PAGE

RICHARD HENRY DANA, SENIOR 1787-1879 4285

The Island ('The Buccaneer')

The Doom of Lee (same)

Paul and Abel ('Paul Felton')

RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR 1815-1882 4302

A Dry Gale ('Two Years Before the Mast')

Every-Day Sea Life (same)

A Start; and Parting Company (same)

DANTE 1265-1321 4315

BY CHARLES ELIOT NORTON

From 'The New Life': Beginning of Love; First Salutation of His

Lady; Praise of His Lady; Her Loveliness; Her Death; The

Anniversary of Her Death; The Hope to Speak More Worthily of Her

From the 'Banquet': Consolation of Philosophy; Desire of the Soul;

The Noble Soul at the End of Life

From the 'Divine Comedy': Hell--Entrance on the Journey Through the

Eternal World; Hell--Punishment of Carnal Sinners; Purgatory--The

Final Purgation; Purgatory--Meeting with His Lady in the Earthly

Paradise; Paradise--The Final Vision

JAMES DARMESTETER 1849-1894 4379

Ernest Renan ('Selected Essays')

Judaism (same)

CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN 1809-1882 4385

BY E. RAY LANKESTER

Impressions of Travel ('A Naturalist's Voyage')

Genesis of 'The Origin of Species' ('Life and Letters')

Curious Atrophy of AEsthetic Taste (same)

Private Memorandum concerning His Little Daughter (same)

Religious Views (same)

Letters: To Miss Julia Wedgwood; To J.D. Hooker; To T.H. Huxley; To E.

Ray Lankester; To J.D. Hooker

The Struggle for Existence ('Origin of Species')

Geometrical Ratio of Increase (same)

Of the Nature of the Checks to Increase (same)

Complex Relations of All Animals and Plants to Each Other in the

Struggle for Existence (same)

Of Natural Selection: or the Survival of the Fittest (same)

Progressive Change Compared with Independent Creation (same)

Creative Design ('Variation of Animals and Plants under

Domestication')

Origin of the Human Species ('The Descent of Man')

ALPHONSE DAUDET 1840- 4435

BY AUGUSTIN FILON

The Two Tartarins ('Tartarin of Tarascon')

Of "Mental Mirage," as Distinguished from Lying (same)

Death of the Dauphin ('Letters from My Windmill')

Jack Is Invited to Take Up a "Profession" ('Jack')

The City of Iron and Fire (same)

The Wrath of a Queen ('Kings in Exile')

MADAME DU DEFFAND (Marie de Vichy-Chamrond)

1697-1780 4471

Letters: To the Duchesse de Choiseul; To Mr. Crawford;

To Horace Walpole

Portrait of Horace Walpole

DANIEL DEFOE 1661-1731 4479

BY CHARLES FREDERICK JOHNSON

From 'Robinson Crusoe': Crusoe's Shipwreck; Crusoe Makes a New

Home; A Footprint

From 'History of the Plague in London': Superstitious Fears of the

People; How Quacks and Impositors Preyed on the Fears of the

People; The People Are Quarantined in Their Houses; Moral Effects

of the Plague; Terrible Scenes in the Streets; The Plague Due to

Natural Causes; Spread of the Plague through Necessities of the

Poor

From 'Colonel Jack': Colonel Jack and Captain Jack Escape Arrest;

Colonel Jack Finds Captain Jack Hard to Manage; Colonel Jack's

First Wife Is Not Disposed to be Economical

The Devil Does Not Concern Himself with Petty Matters ('The Modern

History of the Devil')

Defoe Addresses His Public ('An Appeal to Honor and Justice')

Engaging a Maid-Servant ('Everybody's Business is Nobody's

Business')

The Devil ('The True-Born Englishman')

There Is a God ('The Storm')

EDUARD DOUWES DEKKER 1820-1887 4513

Multatuli's Last Words to the Reader ('Max Havelaar')

Idyll of Saidjah and Adinda (same)

THOMAS DEKKER 1570?-1637? 4521

From 'The Gul's Horne Booke': How a Gallant Should

Behave Himself in Powles Walk; Sleep

Praise of Fortune ('Old Fortunatus')

Content ('Patient Grissil')

Rustic Song ('The Sun's Darling')

Lullaby ('Patient Grissil')

JEAN FRANCOIS CASIMIR DELAVIGNE 1793-1843 4528

BY FREDERIC LOLIEE

Confession of Louis XI.

DEMOSTHENES 384-322 B.C. 4535

BY ROBERT SHARP

The Third Philippic

Invective Against License of Speech

Justification of His Patriotic Policy

THOMAS DE QUINCEY 1785-1859 4555

BY GEORGE R. CARPENTER

Charles Lamb ('Biographical Essays')

Despair ('Confessions of an English Opium-Eater')

The Dead Sister (same)

Levana and Our Ladies of Sorrow (same)

Savannah-La-Mar (same)

The Bishop of Beauvais and Joan of Arc ('Miscellaneous Essays')

PAUL DEROULEDE 1848- 4580

The Harvest ('Chants du Paysan')

In Good Quarters ('Poemes Militaires')

"Good Fighting" (same)

Last Wishes (same)

RENE DESCARTES 1596-1650 4585

Of Certain Principles of Elementary Logical Thought

('Discourse on Method')

An Elementary Method of Inquiry (same)

The Idea of God ('Meditations')

PAUL DESJARDINS 4596

BY GRACE KING

The Present Duty

Conversion of the Church

Two Impressions ('Notes Contemporaines')

SIR AUBREY DE VERE 1788-1846 4609

The Crusaders

The Children Band ('The Crusaders')

The Rock of Cashel

The Right Use of Prayer

The Church

Sonnet

BERNAL DIAZ DEL CASTILLO 1498-1593 4613

From the 'True History of the Conquest of Mexico': Capture of

Guatimotzin; Mortality at the Conquest of Mexico; Cortes; Of Divine

Aid in the Battle of Santa Maria de la Vitoria; Cortes Destroys

Certain Idols

CHARLES DIBDIN 1745-1814 4620

Sea Song Poor Jack

Song: The Heart of a Tar Tom Bowling

CHARLES DICKENS 1812-1870 4625

BY LAURENCE HUTTON

The One Thing Needful ('Hard Times')

The Boy at Mugby ('Mugby Junction')

Burning of Newgate ('Barnaby Rudge')

Monseigneur ('A Tale of Two Cities')

The Ivy Green

FULL-PAGE ILLUSTRATIONS

VOLUME XI

PAGE

The Oldest Lombardic Manuscript (Colored Plate) Frontispiece

Dante Alighieri (Portrait) 4316

Charles Robert Darwin (Portrait) 4386

"The Ape-Man" (Photogravure) 4398

Alphonse Daudet (Portrait) 4436

Daniel Defoe (Portrait) 4480

"Robinson Crusoe" (Facsimile) 4486

Demosthenes (Portrait) 4536

Thomas De Quincey (Portrait) 4556

Rene Descartes (Portrait) 4586

Charles Dickens (Portrait) 4626

"Gadshill" (Photogravure) 4634

VIGNETTE PORTRAITS

Richard Henry Dana

Richard Henry Dana, Jr.

Madame du Deffand

Jean F. C. Delavigne

Paul Deroulede

Sir Aubrey De Vere

Charles Dibdin

RICHARD HENRY DANA, SENIOR

(1787-1879)

[Illustration: RICHARD H. DANA]

Richard Henry Dana the elder, although he died less than twenty years

ago, belonged to the first generation of American writers; he was born

in 1787, in Cambridge, four years after Washington Irving. He came of a

distinguished and scholarly family: his father had been minister to

Russia during the Revolution, and was afterwards Chief Justice of

Massachusetts; through his mother he was descended from Anne Bradstreet.

At the age of ten he went to Newport to live with his maternal

grandfather, William Ellery, one of the signers of the Declaration of

Independence, and remained until he entered Harvard. The wild rock-bound

coast scenery impressed him deeply, and ever after the sea was one of

his ruling passions. Only one familiar with all the moods of the ocean

could have written 'The Buccaneer'. After quitting college he studied

law, and was admitted to the Boston bar. Literature however proved the

stronger attraction, and in 1818 he left his profession to assist in

conducting the then newly founded North American Review. The critical

papers he contributed to it startled the conservative literary circles

by their audacity in defending the new movement in English poetry, and

passing lightly by their idol Pope. Indeed, his unpopularity debarred

him from succeeding the first editor. He withdrew, and began the

publication of The Idle Man in numbers, modeled on Salmagundi and the

Sketch-Book. His contributions consisted of critical papers and his

novelettes 'Paul Felton,' 'Tom Thornton,' and 'Edward and Mary.' Not

finding many readers, he discontinued it after the first volume. He then

contributed for some years to the New York Review, conducted by William

Cullen Bryant, and to the United States Review. In 1827 appeared 'The

Buccaneer and Other Poems'; in 1833 the same volume was enlarged and the

contributions to The Idle Man were added, under the title 'Poems and

Prose Writings.' Seventeen years later he closed his literary career by

publishing the complete edition of his 'Poems and Prose Writings,' in

two volumes, not having materially added either to his verse or

fiction. After that time he lived in retirement, spending his summers in

his seaside home by the rocks and breakers of Cape Ann, and the winters

in Boston. He died in 1879.

Dana's literary activity falls within the first third of this century.

During that period, unproductive of great work, he ranked among the

foremost writers. His papers in the North American Review, as the first

original criticism on this side of the Atlantic, marked an era in our

letters. He was one of the first to recognize the genius of Wordsworth

and of Coleridge; under the influence of the latter he wrote the poem by

which he is chiefly known, 'The Buccaneer.' He claimed for it a basis of

truth; it is in fact a story out of 'The Pirate's Own Book,' with the

element of the supernatural added to convey the moral lesson. His verse

is contained in a slender volume. It lacks fluency and melody, but shows

keen perception of Nature's beauty, especially in her sterner, more

solemn moods, and sympathy with the human heart. Dana was not so much a

poet born with the inevitable gift of song (he would otherwise not have

become almost silent during the last fifty years of his life), as a man

of strong intellect who in his youth turned to verse for recreation.

Though best known by his poems, he stands out strongest and most

original as novelist. 'Paul Felton,' his masterpiece in prose, is a

powerful study of a diseased condition of mind. In its searching

psychologic analysis it stands quite apart from the more or less flaccid

production of its day. He indeed could not escape the influence of

Charles Brockden Brown, whom he greatly admired, and he in turn reached

out forward toward Poe and other writers of the analytic school. One

powerful story of Poe's, indeed, seems to have been suggested by Dana's

work: the demon horse in 'Metzengerstein' is a superior copy of the

Spectre Horse in 'The Buccaneer.' These stories were not popular in his

day: they are too remote from ordinary life, too gloomy and painful;

they have no definite locality or nationality; their characters have

little in common with every-day humanity. His prose style however is

clear, direct, and strong.

Even after he ceased to write, he had an important influence on American

letters by the independence of his opinions, his friendships with

literary men, chief among whom was Bryant, and his live interest in the

younger literature produced under conditions more favorable and more

inspiring than he had known.

THE ISLAND

From 'The Buccaneer'

The Island lies nine leagues away;

Along its solitary shore

Of craggy rock and sandy bay,

No sound but ocean's roar,

Save where the bold wild sea-bird makes her home,

Her shrill cry coming through the sparkling foam.

But when the light winds lie at rest,

And on the glassy, heaving sea,

The black duck with her glossy breast

Sits swinging silently,

How beautiful! no ripples break the reach,

And silvery waves go noiseless up the beach.

And inland rests the green, warm dell;

The brook comes tinkling down its side;

From out the trees the Sabbath bell

Rings cheerful, far and wide,

Mingling its sound with bleatings of the flocks

That feed about the vale among the rocks.

Nor holy bell nor pastoral bleat

In former days within the vale;

Flapped in the bay the pirate's sheet;

Curses were on the gale;

Rich goods lay on the sand, and murdered men:

Pirate and wrecker kept their revels then.

But calm, low voices, words of grace,

Now slowly fall upon the ear;

A quiet look is in each face,

Subdued and holy fear.

Each motion gentle; all is kindly done--

Come, listen how from crime this Isle was won.

THE DOOM OF LEE

From 'The Buccaneer'

Who's sitting on that long black ledge

Which makes so far out in the sea,

Feeling the kelp-weed on its edge?

Poor idle Matthew Lee!

So weak and pale? A year and little more.

And bravely did he lord it round this shore!

And on the shingles now he sits,

And rolls the pebbles 'neath his hands;

Now walks the beach; then stops by fits,

And scores the smooth wet sands;

Then tries each cliff and cove and jut that bounds

The isles; then home from many weary rounds.

They ask him why he wanders so,

From day to day, the uneven strand?

"I wish, I wish that I might go!

But I would go by land;

And there's no way that I can find--I've tried

All day and night!"--He seaward looked, and sighed.

It brought the tear to many an eye

That once his eye had made to quail.

"Lee, go with us; our sloop is nigh;

Come! help us hoist her sail."

He shook.--"You know the Spirit Horse I ride!

He'll let me on the sea with none beside!"

He views the ships that come and go,

Looking so like to living things.

O! 'tis a proud and gallant show

Of bright and broad-spread wings,

Making it light around them, as they keep

Their course right onward through the unsounded deep.

And where the far-off sand-bars lift

Their backs in long and narrow line,

The breakers shout, and leap, and shift,

And send the sparkling brine

Into the air, then rush to mimic strife:

Glad creatures of the sea, and full of life!--

But not to Lee. He sits alone;

No fellowship nor joy for him.

Borne down by woe, he makes no moan,

Though tears will sometimes dim

That asking eye--oh, how his worn thoughts crave--

Not joy again, but rest within the grave.

* * * * *

To-night the charmed number's told.

"Twice have I come for thee," it said.

"Once more, and none shall thee behold.

Come! live one, to the dead!"--

So hears his soul, and fears the coming night;

Yet sick and weary of the soft calm light.

Again he sits within that room;

All day he leans at that still board;

None to bring comfort to his gloom,

Or speak a friendly word.

Weakened with fear, lone, haunted by remorse,

Poor shattered wretch, there waits he that pale Horse.

Not long he waits. Where now are gone

Peak, citadel, and tower, that stood

Beautiful, while the west sun shone

And bathed them in his flood

Of airy glory!--Sudden darkness fell;

And down they went,--peak, tower, citadel.

The darkness, like a dome of stone,

Ceils up the heavens. 'Tis hush as death--

All but the ocean's dull low moan.

How hard Lee draws his breath!

He shudders as he feels the working Power.

Arouse thee, Lee! up! man thee for thine hour!

'Tis close at hand; for there, once more,

The burning ship. Wide sheets of flame

And shafted fire she showed before;--

Twice thus she hither came;--

But now she rolls a naked hulk, and throws

A wasting light; then, settling, down she goes.

And where she sank, up slowly came

The Spectre Horse from out the sea.

And there he stands! His pale sides flame.

He'll meet thee shortly, Lee.

He treads the waters as a solid floor:

He's moving on. Lee waits him at the door.

They're met. "I know thou com'st for me,"

Lee's spirit to the Spectre said;

"I know that I must go with thee--

Take me not to the dead.

It was not I alone that did the deed!"

Dreadful the eye of that still, spectral Steed!

Lee cannot turn. There is a force

In that fixed eye which holds him fast.

How still they stand!--the man and horse.

"Thine hour is almost past."

"Oh, spare me," cries the wretch, "thou fearful one!"

"My time is full--I must not go alone."

"I'm weak and faint. Oh let me stay!"

"Nay, murderer, rest nor stay for thee!"

The horse and man are on their way;

He bears him to the sea.

Hark! how the Spectre breathes through this still night!

See, from his nostrils streams a deathly light!

He's on the beach, but stops not there;

He's on the sea! that dreadful horse!

Lee flings and writhes in wild despair!

In vain! The spirit-corse

Holds him by fearful spell; he cannot leap.

Within that horrid light he rides the deep.

It lights the sea around their track--

The curling comb, and dark steel wave:

There yet sits Lee the Spectre's back--

Gone! gone! and none to save!

They're seen no more; the night has shut them in.

May Heaven have pity on thee, man of sin!

The earth has washed away its stain;

The sealed-up sky is breaking forth,

Mustering its glorious hosts again,

From the far south and north;

The climbing moon plays on the rippling sea.--

Oh, whither on its waters rideth Lee?

PAUL AND ABEL

From 'Paul Felton'

He took a path which led through the fields back of his house, and wound

among the steep rocks part way up the range of high hills, till it

reached a small locust grove, where it ended. He began climbing a ridge

near him, and reaching the top of it, beheld all around him a scene

desolate and broken as the ocean. It looked for miles as if one immense

gray rock had been heaved up and shattered by an earthquake. Here and

there might be seen shooting out of the clefts, old trees, like masts at

sea. It was as if the sea in a storm had become suddenly fixed, with all

its ships upon it. The sun shone glaring and hot on it, but there was

neither life, nor motion, nor sound; the spirit of desolation had gone

over it, and it had become the place of death. His heart sunk within

him, and something like a superstitious dread entered him. He tried to

rouse himself, and look about with a composed mind. It was in vain--he

felt as if some dreadful unseen power stood near him. He would have

spoken, but he dared not in such a place.

To shake this off, he began clambering over one ridge after another,

till, passing cautiously round a beetling rock, a sharp cry from out it

shot through him. Every small jut and precipice sent it back with a

Satanic taunt; and the crowd of hollows and points seemed for the

instant alive with thousands of fiends. Paul's blood ran cold, and he

scarcely breathed as he waited for their cry again; but all was still.

Though his mind was of a superstitious cast, he had courage and

fortitude; and ashamed of his weakness, he reached forward, and stooping

down looked into the cavity. He started as his eye fell on the object

within it. "Who and what are you?" cried he. "Come out, and let me see

whether you are man or devil." And out crawled a miserable boy, looking

as if shrunk up with fear and famine. "Speak, and tell me who you are,

and what you do here," said Paul. The poor fellow's jaws moved and

quivered, but he did not utter a sound. His spare frame shook, and his

knees knocked against each other as in an ague fit. Paul looked at him

for a moment. His loose shambly frame was nearly bare to the bones, his

light sunburnt hair hung long and straight round his thin jaws and white

eyes, that shone with a delirious glare, as if his mind had been

terror-struck. There was a sickly, beseeching smile about his mouth.

His skin, between the freckles, was as white as a leper's, and his teeth

long and yellow. He appeared like one who had witnessed the destruction

about him, and was the only living thing spared, to make death seem more

horrible.

"Who put you here to starve?" said Paul to him.

"Nobody, sir."

"Why did you come, then?"

"Oh, I can't help it; I must come."

"Must! And why must you?" The boy looked round timidly, and crouching

near Paul, said in a tremulous, low voice, his eyes glancing fearfully

through the chasm, "'Tis He, 'tis He that makes me!" Paul turned

suddenly round, and saw before him for the first time the deserted tract

of pine wood and sand which has been described. "Who and where is he?"

asked Paul impatiently, expecting to see some one.

"There, there, in the wood yonder," answered the boy, crouching still

lower, and pointing with his finger, whilst his hand shook as if

palsied.

"I see nothing," said Paul, "but these pines. What possesses you? Why do

you shudder so, and look so pale? Do you take the shadows of the trees

for devils?"

"Don't speak of them. They'll be on me, if you talk of them here,"

whispered the boy eagerly. Drops of sweat stood on his brow from the

agony of terror he was in. As Paul looked at the lad, he felt something

like fear creeping over him. He turned his eyes involuntarily to the

wood again. "If we must not talk here," said he at last, "come along

with me, and tell me what all this means." The boy rose, and followed

close to Paul.

"Is it the Devil you have seen, that you shake so?"

"You have named him; I never must," said the boy. "I have seen strange

sights, and heard sounds whispered close to my ears, so full of spite,

and so dreadful, I dared not look round lest I should see some awful

face at mine. I've thought I felt it touch me sometimes."

"And what wicked thing have you done, that they should haunt you so?"

"Oh, sir, I was a foolhardy boy. Two years ago I was not afraid of

anything. Nobody dared go into the wood, or even so much as over the

rocks, to look at it, after what happened there."--"I've heard a foolish

story," said Paul.--"So once, sir, the thought took me that I would go

there a-bird's-nesting, and bring home the eggs and show to the men. And

it would never go out of my mind after, though I began to wish I hadn't

thought any such thing. Every night when I went to bed I would lie and

say to myself, 'To-morrow is the day for me to go;' and I did not like

to be alone in the dark, and wanted some one with me to touch me when I

had bad dreams. And when I waked in the morning, I felt as if something

dreadful was coming upon me before night. Well, every day,--I don't know

how it was,--I found myself near this ridge; and every time I went

farther and farther up it, though I grew more and more frightened. And

when I had gone as far as I dared, I was afraid to wait, but would turn

and make away so fast that many a time I fell down some of these places,

and got lamed and bruised. The boys began to think something, and would

whisper each other and look at me; and when they found I saw them, they

would turn away. It grew hard for me to be one at their games, though

once I used to be the first chosen in. I can't tell how it was, but all

this only made me go on; and as the boys kept out of the way, I began to

feel as if I must do what I had thought of, and as if there was

somebody, I couldn't think who, that was to have me and make me do what

he pleased. So it went on, sir, day after day," continued the lad, in a

weak, timid tone, but comforted at finding one to tell his story to;

"till at last I reached as far as the hollow where you just now frighted

me so, when I heard you near me. I didn't run off as I used to from the

other places, but sat down under the rock. Then I looked out and saw the

trees. I tried to get up and run home, but I couldn't; I dared not come

out and go round the corner of the rock. I tried to look another way,

but my eyes seemed fastened on the trees; I couldn't take 'em off. At

last I thought something told me it was time for me to go on. I got up."

Here poor Abel shook so that he seized hold of Paul's arm to help him.

Paul recoiled as if an unclean creature touched him. The boy shrunk

back.

"Go on," said Paul recovering himself. The boy took comfort from the

sound of another's voice:--"I went a little way down the hollow, sir, as

if drawn along. Then I came to a steep place; I put my legs over to let

myself down; my knees grew so weak I dared not trust myself; I tried to

draw them up, but the strength was all gone out of them, and then my

feet were as heavy as if made of lead. I gave a screech, and there was a

yell close to me and for miles round, that nigh stunned me. I can't say

how, but the last thing I knew was my leaping along the rocks, while

there was nothing but flames of fire shooting all round me. It was

scarce midday when I left home; and when I came to myself under the

locusts it was growing dark."

"Rest here awhile," said Paul, looking at the boy as at some mysterious

being, "and tell out your story."

Glad at being in company, the boy sat down upon the grass, and went on

with his tale:--"I crawled home as well as I could, and went to bed.

When I was falling asleep I had the same feeling I had when sitting over

the rock. I dared not lie in bed any longer, for I couldn't keep awake

while there. Glad was I when the day broke, and I saw a neighbor open

his door and come out. I was not well all day, and I tried to think

myself more ill than I was, because I somehow thought that then I

needn't go to the wood. But the next day He was not to be put off; and I

went, though I cried and prayed all the way that I might not be made to

go. But I could not stop till I had got over the hill, and reached the

sand round the wood. When I put my foot on it, all the joints in me

jerked as if they would not hold together, so that I cried out with the

pain. When I came under the trees there was a deep sound, and great

shadows were all round me. My hair stood on end, and my eyes kept

glimmering; yet I couldn't go back. I went on till I found a crow's

nest. I climbed the tree, and took out the eggs. The old crow kept

flying round and round me. As soon as I felt the eggs in my hand and my

work done, I dropped from the tree and ran for the hollow. I can't tell

how it was, but it seemed to me that I didn't gain a foot of ground--it

was just as if the whole wood went with me. Then I thought He had me

his. The ground began to bend and the trees to move. At last I was nigh

blind. I struck against one tree and another till I fell to the ground.

How long I lay there I can't tell; but when I came to I was on the sand,

the sun blazing hot upon me and my skin scorched up. I was so stiff and

ached so, I could hardly stand upright. I didn't feel or think anything

after this; and hardly knew where I was till somebody came and touched

me, and asked me whether I was walking in my sleep; and I looked up and

found myself close home.

"The boys began to gather round me as if I were something strange; and

when I looked at them they would move back from me. 'What have you been

doing, Abel?' one of them asked me at last. 'No good, I warrant you,'

answered another, who stood back of me. And when I turned around to

speak to him he drew behind the others, as if afraid I should harm

him;--and I was too weak and frightened to hurt a fly. 'See his hands;

they are stained all over.'--'And there's a crow's egg, as I'm alive!'

said another. 'And the crow is the Devil's bird, Tom, isn't it?' asked a

little boy. 'O Abel, you've been to that wood and made yourself over to

Him.'--They moved off one after another, every now and then turning

round and looking at me as if I were cursed. After this they would not

speak to me nor come nigh me. I heard people talking, and saw them going

about, but not one of them all could I speak to, or get to come near me;

it was dreadful, being so alone! I met a boy that used to be with me all

day long; and I begged him not to go off from me so, and to stop, if it

were only for a moment. 'You played with me once,' said I; 'and won't

you do so much as look at me, or ask me how I am, when I am so weak and

ill too?' He began to hang back a little, and I thought from his face

that he pitied me. I could have cried for joy, and was going up to him,

but he turned away. I called out after him, telling him that I would not

so much as touch him with my finger, or come any nearer to him, if he

would only stop and speak one word to me; but he went away shaking his

head, and muttering something, I hardly knew what,--how that I did not

belong to them, but was the Evil One's now. I sat down on a stone and

cried, and wished that I was dead; for I couldn't help it, though it was

wicked in me to do so."

"And is there no one," asked Paul, "who will notice you or speak to you?

Do you live so alone now?" It made his heart ache to look down upon the

pining, forlorn creature before him.

"Not a soul," whined out the boy. "My grandmother is dead now, and only

the gentlefolks give me anything; for they don't seem afraid of me,

though they look as if they didn't like me, and wanted me gone. All I

can, I get to eat in the woods, and I beg out of the village. But I dare

not go far, because I don't know when He will want me. But I am not

alone, He's with me day and night. As I go along the street in the

daytime, I feel Him near me, though I can't see Him; and it is as if He

were speaking to me; and yet I don't hear any words. He makes me follow

Him to that wood; and I have to sit the whole day where you found me,

and I dare not complain nor move, till I feel He will let me go. I've

looked at the pines, sometimes, till I have seen spirits moving all

through them. Oh, 'tis an awful place; they breathe cold upon me when He

makes me go there."

"Poor wretch!" said Paul.

"I'm weak and hungry, and yet when I try to eat, something chokes me; I

don't love what I eat."

"Come along with me, and you shall have something to nourish and warm

you; for you are pale and shiver, and look cold here in the very sun."

The boy looked up at Paul, and the tears rolled down his cheeks at

hearing one speak so kindly to him. He got up and followed meekly after

to the house.

Paul, seeing a servant in the yard, ordered the boy something to eat.

The man cast his eye upon Abel, and then looked at Paul as if he had not

understood him. "I spoke distinctly enough," said Paul; "and don't you

see that the boy is nigh starved?" The man gave a mysterious look at

both of them, and with a shake of his head as he turned away, went to do

as he was bid.

"What means the fellow?" said Paul to himself as he entered the house.

"Does he take me to be bound to Satan too? Yet there may be bonds upon

the soul, though we know it not; and evil spirits at work within us, of

which we little dream. And are there no beings but those seen of mortal

eye or felt by mortal touch? Are there not passing in and around this

piece of moving mold, in which the spirit is pent up, those whom it

hears not? those whom it has no finer sense whereby to commune with? Are

all the instant joys that come and go, we know not whence nor whither,

but creations of the mind? Or are they not rather bright and heavenly

messengers, whom when this spirit is set free it will see in all their

beauty? whose sweet sounds it will then drink in? Yes, it is, it is so;

and all around us is populous with beings, now invisible to us as this

circling air."...

The moon was down and the sky overcast when they began to wind among the

rocks. Though Paul's walks had lain of late in this direction, he was

not enough acquainted with the passage to find his way through it in

the dark. Abel, who had traversed it often in the night, alone and in

terror, now took heart at having some one with him at such an hour, and

offered unhesitatingly to lead. "The boy winds round those crags with

the speed and ease of a stream," said Paul; "not so fast, Abel."

"Take hold of the root which shoots out over your head, sir, for 'tis

ticklish work getting along just here. Do you feel it, sir?"

"I have hold," said Paul.

"Let yourself gently down by it, sir. You needn't be a bit afraid, for

'twill not give way; man couldn't have fastened it stronger."

This was the first time Abel had felt his power, or had been of

consequence to any one, since the boys had turned him out from their

games; and it gave him a momentary activity, and an unsettled sort of

spirit, which he had never known since then. He had been shunned and

abhorred; and he believed himself the victim of some demoniac power. To

have another in this fearful bondage with him, as Paul had intimated,

was a relief from his dreadful solitariness in his terrors and

sufferings. "And he said that it was I who was to work a curse on him,"

muttered Abel. "It cannot be, surely, that such a thing as I am can harm

a man like him!" And though Abel remembered Paul's kindness, and that

this was to seal his own doom too, yet it stirred the spirit of pride

within him.

"What are you muttering to yourself, there in the dark," demanded Paul;

"or whom talk you with, you withered wretch?" Abel shook in every joint

at the sound of Paul's harsh voice.

"It is so dreadfully still here," said Abel; "I hear nothing but your

steps behind me, and they make me start." This was true; for

notwithstanding his touch of instant pride, his terrors and his fear of

Paul were as great as ever.

"Speak louder then," said Paul, "or hold your peace. I like not your

muttering; it bodes no good."

"It may bring a curse to you, worse than that on me, if a worse can be,"

said Abel to himself; "but who can help it?"

Day broke before they cleared the ridge; a drizzling rain came on; and

the wind, beginning to rise, drove through the crevices in the rocks

with sharp whistling sounds which seemed to come from malignant spirits

of the air.

They had scarcely entered the wood when the storm became furious; and

the trees, swaying and beating with their branches against one another,

seemed possessed of a supernatural madness, and engaged in wild

conflict, as if there were life and passion in them; and their broken,

decayed arms groaned like things in torment. The terror of these sights

and sounds was too much for poor Abel; it nearly crazed him; and he set

up a shriek that for a moment drowned the noise of the storm. It

startled Paul; and when he looked at him, the boy's face was of a

ghostly whiteness. The rain had drenched him to the skin; his clothes

clung to his lean body, that shook as if it would come apart; his eyes

flew wildly, and his teeth chattered against each other. The fears and

torture of his mind gave something unearthly to his look, that made Paul

start back. "Abel--boy--fiend--speak! What has seized you?"

"They told me so," cried Abel--"I've done it--I led the way for

you--they're coming, they're coming--we're lost!"

"Peace, fool," said Paul, trying to shake off the power he felt Abel

gaining over him, "and find us a shelter if you can."

"There's only the hut," said Abel, "and I wouldn't go into that if it

rained fire."

"And why not?"

"I once felt that it was for me to go, and I went so near as to see in

at the door. And I saw something in the hut--it was not a man, for it

flitted by the opening just like a shadow; and I heard two muttering

something to one another; it wasn't like other sounds, for as soon as I

heard it, it made me stop my ears. I couldn't stay any longer, and I ran

till I cleared the wood. Oh! 'tis His biding-place, when He comes to the

wood."

"And is it of His own building?" asked Paul, sarcastically.

"No," answered Abel; "'twas built by the two wood-cutters; and one of

them came to a bloody end, and they say the other died the same night,

foaming at the mouth like one possessed. There it is," said he, almost

breathless, as he crouched down and pointed at the hut under the trees.

"Do not go, sir," he said, catching hold of the skirts of Paul's

coat,--"I've never dared go nigher since."--"Let loose, boy," cried

Paul, striking Abel's hand from his coat, "I'll not be fooled with."

Abel, alarmed at being left alone, crawled after Paul as far as he dared

go; then taking hold of him once more, made a supplicating motion to

him to stop; he was afraid to speak. Paul pushed on without regarding

him.

The hut stood on the edge of a sand-bank that was kept up by a large

pine, whose roots and fibres, lying partly bare, looked like some giant

spider that had half buried himself in the sand. On the right of the hut

was a patch of broken ground, in which were still standing a few

straggling dried stalks of Indian corn; and from two dead trees hung

knotted pieces of broken line, which had formerly served for a

clothesline. The hut was built of half-trimmed trunks of trees laid on

each other, crossing at the four corners and running out at unequal

lengths, the chinks partly filled in with sods and moss. The door, which

lay on the floor, was of twisted boughs; and the roof, of the same, was

caved in, and but partly kept out the sun and rain.

As Paul drew near the entrance he stopped, though the wind just then

came in a heavy gust, and the rain fell like a flood. It was not a dread

of what he might see within; but it seemed to him that there was a spell

round him, drawing him nearer and nearer to its centre; and he felt the

hand of some invisible power upon him. As he stepped into the hut a

chill ran over him, and his eyes shut involuntarily. Abel watched him

eagerly; and as he saw him enter, tossed his arms wildly shouting,

"Gone, gone! They'll have me too--they're coming, they're coming!" and

threw himself on his face to the ground.

Driven from home by his maddening passions, a perverse delight in

self-torture had taken possession of Paul; and his mind so hungered for

more intense excitement, that it craved to prove true all which its

jealousy and superstition had imaged. He had walked on, lost in this

fearful riot, but with no particular object in view, and taking only a

kind of crazed joy in his bewildered state. Esther's love for him, which

he at times thought past doubt feigned, the darkness of the night, and

then the driving storm with its confused motions and sounds, made an

uproar of the mind which drove out all settled purpose or thought.

The stillness of the place into which he had now entered, where was

heard nothing but the slow, regular dripping of the rain from the broken

roof upon the hard-trod floor; the lowered and distant sound of the

storm without; the sudden change from the whirl and swaying of the

trees to the steady walls of the building, put a sudden stop to the

violent working of his brain, and he gradually fell into a stupor.

When Abel began to recover, he could scarcely raise himself from the

ground. He looked round, but could see nothing of Paul. "They have bound

us together," said he; "and something is drawing me toward him. There is

no help for me; I must go whither he goes." As he was drawn nearer and

nearer to the hut he seemed to struggle and hang back, as if pushed on

against his will. At last he reached the doorway; and clinging to its

side with a desperate hold, as if not to be forced in, put his head

forward a little, casting a hasty glance into the building. "There he

is, and alive!" breathed out Abel.

Paul's stupor was now beginning to leave him; his recollection was

returning; and what had passed came back slowly and at intervals. There

was something he had said to Esther before leaving home--he could not

tell what; then his gazing after her as she drove from the house; then

something of Abel,--and he sprang from the ground as if he felt the

boy's touch again about his knees; then the ball-room, and a multitude

of voices, and all talking of his wife. Suddenly she appeared darting by

him; and Frank was there. Then came his agony and tortures again; all

returned upon him as in the confusion of some horrible trance. Then the

hut seemed to enlarge and the walls to rock; and shadows of those he

knew, and of terrible beings he had never seen before, were flitting

round him and mocking at him. His own substantial form seemed to him

undergoing a change, and taking the shape and substance of the accursed

ones at which he looked. As he felt the change going on he tried to

utter a cry, but he could not make a sound nor move a limb. The ground

under him rocked and pitched; it grew darker and darker, till everything

was visionary; and he thought himself surrounded by spirits, and in the

mansions of the damned. Something like a deep black cloud began to

gather gradually round him. The gigantic structure, with its tall

terrific arches, turned slowly into darkness, and the spirits within

disappeared one after another, till as the ends of the cloud met and

closed, he saw the last of them looking at him with an infernal laugh in

his undefined visage.

Abel continued watching him in speechless agony. Paul's consciousness

was now leaving him; his head began to swim--he reeled; and as his hand

swept down the side of the hut, while trying to save himself, it struck

against a rusty knife that had been left sticking loosely between the

logs. "Let go, let go!" shrieked Abel; "there's blood on 't--'tis

cursed, 'tis cursed." As Paul swung round with the knife in his hand,

Abel sprang from the door with a shrill cry, and Paul sank on the floor,

muttering to himself, "What said They?"

When he began to come to himself a little, he was still sitting on the

ground, his back against the wall. His senses were yet confused. He

thought he saw his wife near him, and a bloody knife by his side. After

sitting a little longer his mind gradually grew clearer, and at last he

felt for the first time that his hand held something. As his eye fell on

it and he saw distinctly what it was, he leaped upright with a savage

yell and dashed the knife from him as if it had been an asp stinging

him. He stood with his bloodshot eyes fastened on it, his hands spread,

and his body shrunk up with horror. "Forged in hell! and for me, for

me!" he screamed, as he sprang forward and seized it with a convulsive

grasp. "Damned pledge of the league that binds us!" he cried, holding it

up and glaring wildly on it. "And yet a voice did warn me--of what, I

know not. Which of ye put it in this hand? Speak--let me look on you?

D'ye hear me, and will not answer? Nay, nay, what needs it? This tells

me, though it speaks not. I know your promptings now," he said, folding

his arms deliberately; "your work must be done; and I am doomed to it."

RICHARD HENRY DANA, JUNIOR

(1815-1882)

[Illustration: R. H. DANA, JR.]

The literary fame of Richard Henry Dana the younger rests on a single

book, produced at the age of twenty-five. 'Two Years Before the Mast'

stands unique in English literature: it reports a man's actual

experiences at sea, yet touches the facts with a fine imagination. It is

a bit of Dana's own life while on a vacation away from college. The

manner in which he got his material was remarkable, but to the

literature he came as by birthright, through his father, Richard Henry

Dana the elder, then a well-known poet; novelist, and essayist. He was

born in Cambridge in 1815, growing up in the intellectual atmosphere of

that university town, and in due course of time entering Harvard

College, where his father and grandfather before him had been trained in

law and letters. An attack of the measles during his third year at

college left him with weakened eyes, and an active outdoor life was

prescribed as the only remedy. From boyhood up he had been passionately

fond of the sea; small wonder, then, that he now determined to take a

long sea voyage. Refusing a berth offered him on a vessel bound for the

East Indies, he chose to go as common sailor before the mast, on a

merchantman starting on a two-years' trading voyage around Cape Horn to

California. At that time boys of good family from the New England coast

towns often took such trips. Dana indeed found a companion in a former

merchant's clerk of Boston. They left on August 14th, 1834, doubled Cape

Horn, spent many months in the waters of the Pacific and on the coast of

California, trading with the natives and taking in cargoes of hides, and

returned to Boston in September, 1836. Young Dana, entirely cured of his

weakness, re-entered college, graduated the next year, and then went to

study in the law school of Harvard. During his cruise he had kept a

journal, which he now worked over into the narrative that made him

famous, and that bids fair to keep his name alive as long as boys, young

or old, delight in sea stories. It is really not a story at all, but

describes with much vivacity the whole history of a long trading voyage,

the commonplace life of the sailor with its many hardships, including

the savage brutality of captains with no restraint on passion or

manners, and scant recreations; the sea in storm and calm, and the

California coast before the gold fever, when but few Europeans were

settled there, and hides were the chief export of a region whose riches

lay still secreted under the earth. The great charm of the narrative

lies in its simplicity and its frank statement of facts. Dana apparently

did not invent anything, but depicted real men, men he had intimately

known for two years, calling them even by their own names, and giving an

unvarnished account of what they did and said. He never hung back from

work or shirked his duty, but "roughed it" to the very end. As a result

of these experiences, this book is the only one that gives any true idea

of the sailor's life. Sea stories generally depend for their interest on

the inventive skill of their authors; Dana knew how to hold the

attention by a simple statement of facts. The book has all the charm and

spontaneity of a keenly observant yet imaginative and cultivated mind,

alive to all the aspects of the outer world, and gifted with that fine

literary instinct which, knowing the value of words, expresses its

thoughts with precision. Seafaring men have commented on his exactness

in reproducing the sailor's phraseology. The book was published in 1840,

translated into several languages, and adopted by the British Admiralty

for distribution in the Navy. Few sailors are without a copy in their

chest. 'The Seaman's Friend,' which Dana published in the following

year, was inspired by his indignation at the abuses he had witnessed in

the merchant marine.

Dana did not follow up his first success, and his life henceforth

belongs to the history of the bar and politics of Massachusetts, rather

than to literature. The fame of his book brought to his law office many

admiralty cases. In 1848 he was one of the founders of the Free Soil

party; later he became an active abolitionist, and took a large part in

the local politics of his State. For a year he lectured on international

law in Harvard college. He contributed to the North American Review, and

wrote besides on various legal topics. His one other book on travel, 'To

Cuba and Back, a Vacation Voyage,' the fruit of a trip to that island in

1859, though well written, never became popular. He retired from his

profession in 1877, and spent the last years of his life in Paris and

Italy. He died in Rome, January 6th, 1882.

A DRY GALE

From 'Two Years Before the Mast'

We had been below but a short time before we had the usual premonitions

of a coming gale,--seas washing over the whole forward part of the

vessel, and her bows beating against them with a force and sound like

the driving of piles. The watch, too, seemed very busy trampling about

decks and singing out at the ropes. A sailor can tell by the sound what

sail is coming in; and in a short time we heard the top-gallant-sails

come in, one after another, and then the flying jib. This seemed to ease

her a good deal, and we were fast going off to the land of Nod,

when--bang, bang, bang on the scuttle, and "All hands, reef topsails,

ahoy!" started us out of our berths, and it not being very cold weather,

we had nothing extra to put on, and were soon on deck. I shall never

forget the fineness of the sight. It was a clear and rather a chilly

night; the stars were twinkling with an intense brightness, and as far

as the eye could reach there was not a cloud to be seen. The horizon met

the sea in a defined line. A painter could not have painted so clear a

sky. There was not a speck upon it. Yet it was blowing great guns from

the northwest. When you can see a cloud to windward, you feel that there

is a place for the wind to come from; but here it seemed to come from

nowhere. No person could have told from the heavens, by their eyesight

alone, that it was not a still summer's night. One reef after another we

took in the topsails, and before we could get them hoisted up we heard a

sound like a short quick rattling of thunder, and the jib was blown to

atoms out of the bolt-rope. We got the topsails set, and the fragments

of the jib stowed away, and the foretopmast staysail set in its place,

when the great mainsail gaped open, and the sail ripped from head to

foot. "Lay up on that main yard and furl the sail, before it blows to

tatters!" shouted the captain; and in a moment we were up, gathering the

remains of it upon the yard. We got it wrapped round the yard, and

passed gaskets over it as snugly as possible, and were just on deck

again, when with another loud rent, which was heard throughout the ship,

the foretopsail, which had been double-reefed, split in two

athwartships, just below the reef-band, from earing to earing. Here

again it was--down yard, haul out reef-tackles, and lay out upon the

yard for reefing. By hauling the reef-tackles chock-a-block we took the

strain from the other earings, and passing the close-reef earing, and

knotting the points carefully, we succeeded in setting the sail, close

reefed.

We had but just got the rigging coiled up, and were waiting to hear "Go

below the watch!" when the main royal worked loose from the gaskets, and

blew directly out to leeward, flapping and shaking the mast like a wand.

Here was a job for somebody. The royal must come in or be cut adrift, or

the mast would be snapped short off. All the light hands in the

starboard watch were sent up one after another, but they could do

nothing with it. At length John, the tall Frenchman, the head of the

starboard watch (and a better sailor never stepped upon a deck), sprang

aloft, and by the help of his long arms and legs succeeded after a hard

struggle,--the sail blowing over the yard-arm to leeward, and the

skysail adrift directly over his head,--in smothering it and frapping it

with long pieces of sinnet. He came very near being blown or shaken from

the yard several times, but he was a true sailor, every finger a

fish-hook. Having made the sail snug, he prepared to send the yard down,

which was a long and difficult job; for frequently he was obliged to

stop and hold on with all his might for several minutes, the ship

pitching so as to make it impossible to do anything else at that height.

The yard at length came down safe, and after it the fore and mizzen

royal yards were sent down. All hands were then sent aloft, and for an

hour or two we were hard at work, making the booms well fast, unreeving

the studding sail and royal and skysail gear, getting rolling-ropes on

the yard, setting up the weather breast-backstays, and making other

preparations for a storm. It was a fine night for a gale, just cool and

bracing enough for quick work, without being cold, and as bright as day.

It was sport to have a gale in such weather as this. Yet it blew like a

hurricane. The wind seemed to come with a spite, an edge to it, which

threatened to scrape us off the yards. The force of the wind was greater

than I had ever felt it before; but darkness, cold, and wet are the

worst parts of a storm to a sailor.

Having got on deck again, we looked round to see what time of night it

was, and whose watch. In a few minutes the man at the wheel struck four

bells, and we found that the other watch was out and our own half out.

Accordingly the starboard watch went below, and left the ship to us for

a couple of hours, yet with orders to stand by for a call.

Hardly had they got below before away went the foretopmast staysail,

blown to ribands. This was a small sail, which we could manage in the

watch, so that we were not obliged to call up the other watch. We laid

upon the bowsprit, where we were under water half the time, and took in

the fragments of the sail; and as she must have some headsail on her,

prepared to bend another staysail. We got the new one out into the

nettings; seized on the tack, sheets, and halyards, and the hanks;

manned the halyards, cut adrift the frapping-lines, and hoisted away;

but before it was half-way up the stay it was blown all to pieces. When

we belayed the halyards, there was nothing left but the bolt-rope. Now

large eyes began to show themselves in the foresail; and knowing that it

must soon go, the mate ordered us upon the yard to furl it. Being

unwilling to call up the watch, who had been on deck all night, he

roused out the carpenter, sailmaker, cook, and steward, and with their

help we manned the foreyard, and after nearly half an hour's struggle,

mastered the sail and got it well furled round the yard. The force of

the wind had never been greater than at this moment. In going up the

rigging it seemed absolutely to pin us down to the shrouds; and on the

yard there was no such thing as turning a face to windward. Yet there

was no driving sleet and darkness and wet and cold as off Cape Horn; and

instead of stiff oilcloth suits, southwester caps, and thick boots, we

had on hats, round jackets, duck trousers, light shoes, and everything

light and easy. These things make a great difference to a sailor. When

we got on deck the man at the wheel struck eight bells (four o'clock in

the morning), and "All star-bowlines, ahoy!" brought the other watch up,

but there was no going below for us. The gale was now at its height,

"blowing like scissors and thumb-screws"; the captain was on deck; the

ship, which was light, rolling and pitching as though she would shake

the long sticks out of her, and the sails were gaping open and splitting

in every direction. The mizzen-topsail, which was a comparatively new

sail and close reefed, split from head to foot in the bunt; the

foretopsail went in one rent from clew to caring, and was blowing to

tatters; one of the chain bobstays parted; the spritsailyard sprung in

the slings, the martingale had slued away off to leeward; and owing to

the long dry weather the lee rigging hung in large bights at every

lurch. One of the main-topgallant shrouds had parted; and to crown all,

the galley had got adrift and gone over to leeward, and the anchor on

the lee bow had worked loose and was thumping the side. Here was work

enough for all hands for half a day. Our gang laid out on the

mizzen-topsailyard, and after more than half an hour's hard work furled

the sail, though it bellied out over our heads, and again, by a slat of

the wind, blew in under the yard with a fearful jerk and almost threw us

off from the foot-ropes.

Double gaskets were passed round the yards, rolling tackles and other

gear bowsed taut, and everything made as secure as it could be. Coming

down, we found the rest of the crew just coming down the fore rigging,

having furled the tattered topsail, or rather, swathed it round the

yard, which looked like a broken limb bandaged. There was no sail now on

the ship but the spanker and the close-reefed main-topsail, which still

held good. But this was too much after-sail, and order was given to furl

the spanker. The brails were hauled up, and all the light hands in the

starboard watch sent out on the gaff to pass the gaskets; but they could

do nothing with it. The second mate swore at them for a parcel of

"sogers," and sent up a couple of the best men; but they could do no

better, and the gaff was lowered down. All hands were now employed in

setting up the lee rigging, fishing the spritsail yard, lashing the

galley, and getting tackles upon the martingale, to bowse it to

windward. Being in the larboard watch, my duty was forward, to assist in

setting up the martingale. Three of us were out on the martingale guys

and back-ropes for more than half an hour, carrying out, hooking, and

unhooking the tackles, several times buried in the seas, until the mate

ordered us in from fear of our being washed off. The anchors were then

to be taken up on the rail, which kept all hands on the forecastle for

an hour, though every now and then the seas broke over it, washing the

rigging off to leeward, filling the lee scuppers breast-high, and

washing chock aft to the taffrail.

Having got everything secure again, we were promising ourselves some

breakfast, for it was now nearly nine o'clock in the forenoon, when the

main-topsail showed evident signs of giving way. Some sail must be kept

on the ship, and the captain ordered the fore and main spencer gaffs to

be lowered down, and the two spencers (which were storm sails,

brand-new, small, and made of the strongest canvas) to be got up and

bent; leaving the main-topsail to blow away, with a blessing on it, if

it would only last until we could set the spencers. These we bent on

very carefully, with strong robands and seizings, and making tackles

fast to the clews, bowsed them down to the water-ways. By this time the

main-topsail was among the things that have been, and we went aloft to

stow away the remnant of the last sail of all those which were on the

ship twenty-four hours before. The spencers were now the only whole

sails on the ship, and being strong and small, and near the deck,

presenting but little surface to the wind above the rail, promised to

hold out well. Hove-to under these, and eased by having no sail above

the tops, the ship rose and fell, and drifted off to leeward like a

line-of-battle ship.

It was now eleven o'clock, and the watch was sent below to get

breakfast, and at eight bells (noon), as everything was snug, although

the gale had not in the least abated, the watch was set and the other

watch and idlers sent below. For three days and three nights the gale

continued with unabated fury, and with singular regularity. There were

no lulls, and very little variation in its fierceness. Our ship, being

light, rolled so as almost to send the fore yard-arm under water, and

drifted off bodily to leeward. All this time there was not a cloud to be

seen in the sky, day or night; no, not so large as a man's hand. Every

morning the sun rose cloudless from the sea, and set again at night in

the sea in a flood of light. The stars, too, came out of the blue one

after another, night after night, unobscured, and twinkled as clear as

on a still frosty night at home, until the day came upon them. All this

time the sea was rolling in immense surges, white with foam, as far as

the eye could reach, on every side; for we were now leagues and leagues

from shore.

EVERY-DAY SEA LIFE

From 'Two Years Before the Mast'

The sole object was to make the time pass on. Any change was sought for

which would break the monotony of the time; and even the two-hours'

trick at the wheel, which came round to us in turn, once in every other

watch, was looked upon as a relief. The never-failing resource of long

yarns, which eke out many a watch, seemed to have failed us now; for we

had been so long together that we had heard each other's stories told

over and over again till we had them by heart; each one knew the whole

history of each of the others, and we were fairly and literally talked

out. Singing and joking we were in no humor for; and in fact any sound

of mirth or laughter would have struck strangely upon our ears, and

would not have been tolerated any more than whistling or a wind

instrument. The last resort, that of speculating upon the future, seemed

now to fail us; for our discouraging situation, and the danger we were

really in (as we expected every day to find ourselves drifted back among

the ice), "clapped a stopper" upon all that. From saying "_when_ we get

home," we began insensibly to alter it "_when_ we get home," and at last

the subject was dropped by a tacit consent.

In this state of things a new light was struck out, and a new field

opened, by a change in the watch. One of our watch was laid up for two

or three days by a bad hand (for in cold weather the least cut or bruise

ripens into a sore), and his place was supplied by the carpenter. This

was a windfall, and there was a contest who should have the carpenter to

walk with him. As "Chips" was a man of some little education, and he and

I had had a good deal of intercourse with each other, he fell in with me

in my walk. He was a Finn, but spoke English well, and gave me long

accounts of his country,--the customs, the trade, the towns, what little

he knew of the government (I found he was no friend of Russia), his

voyages, his first arrival in America, his marriage and courtship; he

had married a country-woman of his, a dressmaker, whom he met with in

Boston. I had very little to tell him of my quiet sedentary life at

home; and in spite of our best efforts, which had protracted these yarns

through five or six watches, we fairly talked each other out, and I

turned him over to another man in the watch and put myself upon my own

resources.

I commenced a deliberate system of time-killing, which united some

profit with a cheering-up of the heavy hours. As soon as I came on deck,

and took my place and regular walk, I began with repeating over to

myself in regular order a string of matters which I had in my

memory,--the multiplication table and the table of weights and measures;

the Kanaka numerals; then the States of the Union, with their capitals;

the counties of England, with their shire towns, and the kings of

England in their order, and other things. This carried me through my

facts, and being repeated deliberately, with long intervals, often eked

out the first two bells. Then came the Ten Commandments, the

thirty-ninth chapter of Job, and a few other passages from Scripture.

The next in the order, which I seldom varied from, came Cowper's

'Castaway,' which was a great favorite with me; its solemn measure and

gloomy character, as well as the incident it was founded upon, making it

well suited to a lonely watch at sea. Then his 'Lines to Mary,' his

address to the Jackdaw, and a short extract from 'Table Talk' (I

abounded in Cowper, for I happened to have a volume of his poems in my

chest); 'Ille et nefasto' from Horace, and Goethe's 'Erl-Koenig.' After I

had got through these, I allowed myself a more general range among

everything that I could remember, both in prose and verse. In this way,

with an occasional break by relieving the wheel, heaving the log, and

going to the scuttle-butt for a drink of water, the longest watch was

passed away; and I was so regular in my silent recitations that if there

was no interruption by ship's duty I could tell very nearly the number

of bells by my progress.

Our watches below were no more varied than the watch on deck. All

washing, sewing, and reading was given up, and we did nothing but eat,

sleep, and stand our watch, leading what might be called a Cape Horn

life. The forecastle was too uncomfortable to sit up in; and whenever we

were below, we were in our berths. To prevent the rain and the sea-water

which broke over the bows from washing down, we were obliged to keep the

scuttle closed, so that the forecastle was nearly air-tight. In this

little wet leaky hole we were all quartered, in an atmosphere so bad

that our lamp, which swung in the middle from the beams, sometimes

actually burned blue, with a large circle of foul air about it. Still I

was never in better health than after three weeks of this life. I gained

a great deal of flesh, and we all ate like horses. At every watch when

we came below, before turning in, the bread barge and beef kid were

overhauled. Each man drank his quart of hot tea night and morning, and

glad enough we were to get it; for no nectar and ambrosia were sweeter

to the lazy immortals than was a pot of hot tea, a hard biscuit, and a

slice of cold salt beef to us after a watch on deck. To be sure, we were

mere animals, and had this life lasted a year instead of a month, we

should have been little better than the ropes in the ship. Not a razor,

nor a brush, nor a drop of water, except the rain and the spray, had

come near us all the time: for we were on an allowance of fresh

water--and who would strip and wash himself in salt water on deck, in

the snow and ice, with the thermometer at zero?

A START; AND PARTING COMPANY

From 'Two Years before the Mast'

The California had finished discharging her cargo, and was to get under

way at the same time with us. Having washed down decks and got

breakfast, the two vessels lay side by side in complete readiness for

sea, our ensigns hanging from the peaks and our tall spars reflected

from the glassy surface of the river, which since sunrise had been

unbroken by a ripple. At length a few whiffs came across the water, and

by eleven o'clock the regular northwest wind set steadily in. There was

no need of calling all hands, for we had all been hanging about the

forecastle the whole forenoon, and were ready for a start upon the first

sign of a breeze. Often we turned our eyes aft upon the captain, who was

walking the deck, with every now and then a look to windward. He made a

sign to the mate, who came forward, took his station deliberately

between the knightheads, cast a glance aloft, and called out, "All hands

lay aloft and loose the sails!" We were half in the rigging before the

order came, and never since we left Boston were the gaskets off the

yards and the rigging overhauled in a shorter time. "All ready forward,

sir!" "All ready the main!" "Crossjack yards all ready, sir!" "Lay

down, all hands but one on each yard!" The yard-arm and bunt gaskets

were cast off; and each sail hung by the jigger, with one man standing

by the tie to let it go. At the same moment that we sprang aloft a dozen

hands sprang into the rigging of the California, and in an instant were

all over her yards; and her sails too were ready to be dropped at the

word. In the mean time our bow gun had been loaded and run out, and its

discharge was to be the signal for dropping the sails. A cloud of smoke

came out of our bows; the echoes of the gun rattled our farewell among

the hills of California, and the two ships were covered from head to

foot with their white canvas. For a few minutes all was uproar and

apparent confusion; men jumping about like monkeys in the rigging; ropes

and blocks flying, orders given and answered amid the confused noises of

men singing out at the ropes. The topsails came to the mastheads with

"Cheerly, men!" and in a few minutes every sail was set, for the wind

was light. The head sails were backed, the windlass came round

"slip--slap" to the cry of the sailors;--"Hove short, sir," said the

mate; "Up with him!"--"Ay, ay, sir." A few hearty and long heaves, and

the anchor showed its head. "Hook cat!" The fall was stretched along the

decks; all hands laid hold;--"Hurrah, for the last time," said the mate;

and the anchor came to the cathead to the tune of 'Time for us to go,'

with a rollicking chorus. Everything was done quick, as though it _was_

for the last time. The head yards were filled away, and our ship began

to move through the water on her homeward-bound course.

The California had got under way at the same moment, and we sailed down

the narrow bay abreast, and were just off the mouth, and, gradually

drawing ahead of her, were on the point of giving her three parting

cheers, when suddenly we found ourselves stopped short, and the

California ranging fast ahead of us. A bar stretches across the mouth of

the harbor, with water enough to float common vessels; but being low in

the water, and having kept well to leeward, as we were bound to the

southward, we had stuck fast, while the California, being light, had

floated over.

We kept all sail on, in the hope of forcing over; but failing in this,

we hove back into the channel. This was something of a damper to us, and

the captain looked not a little mortified and vexed. "This is the same

place where the Rosa got ashore, sir," observed our red-headed second

mate, most mal-apropos. A malediction on the Rosa, and him too, was all

the answer he got, and he slunk off to leeward. In a few minutes the

force of the wind and the rising of the tide backed us into the stream,

and we were on our way to our old anchoring place, the tide setting

swiftly up, and the ship barely manageable in the light breeze. We

came-to in our old berth opposite the hide-house, whose inmates were not

a little surprised to see us return. We felt as though we were tied to

California; and some of the crew swore that they never should get clear

of the "bloody" coast.

In about half an hour, which was near high water, the order was given to

man the windlass, and again the anchor was catted; but there was no

song, and not a word was said about the last time. The California had

come back on finding that we had returned, and was hove-to, waiting for

us, off the point. This time we passed the bar safely, and were soon up

with the California, who filled away, and kept us company. She seemed

desirous of a trial of speed, and our captain accepted the challenge,

although we were loaded down to the bolts of our chain-plates, as deep

as a sand-barge, and bound so taut with our cargo that we were no more

fit for a race than a man in fetters; while our antagonist was in her

best trim. Being clear of the point, the breeze became stiff, and the

royal-masts bent under our sails, but we would not take them in until we

saw three boys spring aloft into the rigging of the California; when

they were all furled at once, but with orders to our boys to stay aloft

at the topgallant mastheads and loose them again at the word. It was my

duty to furl the fore-royal; and, while standing by to loose it again, I

had a fine view of the scene. From where I stood, the two vessels seemed

nothing but spars and sails, while their narrow decks, far below,

slanting over by the force of the wind aloft, appeared hardly capable of

supporting the great fabrics raised upon them. The California was to

windward of us, and had every advantage; yet, while the breeze was

stiff, we held our own. As soon as it began to slacken, she ranged a

little ahead, and the order was given to loose the royals. In an instant

the gaskets were off and the bunt dropped. "Sheet home the fore royal!"

"Weather sheets home!"--"Lee sheets home!"--"Hoist away, sir!" is bawled

from aloft. "Overhaul your clew-lines!" shouts the mate. "Ay, ay, sir!

all clear!" "Taut leech! belay! Well the lee brace; haul taut to

windward,"--and the royals were set. These brought us up again; but the

wind continuing light, the California set hers, and it was soon evident

that she was walking away from us. Our captain then hailed and said that

he should keep off to his course; adding, "She isn't the Alert now. If I

had her in your trim she would have been out of sight by this time."

This was good-naturedly answered from the California, and she braced

sharp up, and stood close upon the wind up the coast; while we squared

away our yards, and stood before the wind to the south-southwest. The

California's crew manned her weather rigging, waved their hats in the

air, and gave us three hearty cheers, which we answered as heartily, and

the customary single cheer came back to us from over the water. She

stood on her way, doomed to eighteen months' or two years' hard service

upon that hated coast; while we were making our way home, to which every

hour and every mile was bringing us nearer.

DANTE

(1265-1321)

BY CHARLES ELIOT NORTON

[Illustration: DANTE]

I

To acquire a love for the best poetry, and a just understanding of it,

is the chief end of the study of literature; for it is by means of

poetry that the imagination is quickened, nurtured, and invigorated, and

it is only through the exercise of his imagination that man can live a

life that is in a true sense worth living. For it is the imagination

which lifts him from the petty, transient, and physical interests that

engross the greater part of his time and thoughts in self-regarding

pursuits, to the large, permanent, and spiritual interests that ennoble

his nature, and transform him from a solitary individual into a member

of the brotherhood of the human race.

In the poet the imagination works more powerfully and consistently than

in other men, and thus qualifies him to become the teacher and inspirer

of his fellows. He sees men, by its means, more clearly than they see

themselves; he discloses them to themselves, and reveals to them their

own dim ideals. He becomes the interpreter of his age to itself; and not

merely of his own age is he the interpreter, but of man to man in all

ages. For change as the world may in outward aspect, with the rise and

fall of empires,--change as men may, from generation to generation, in

knowledge, belief, and manners,--human nature remains unalterable in its

elements, unchanged from age to age; and it is human nature, under its

various guises, with which the great poets deal.

The Iliad and the Odyssey do not become antiquated to us. The characters

of Shakespeare are perpetually modern. Homer, Dante, Shakespeare, stand

alone in the closeness of their relation to nature. Each after his own

manner gives us a view of life, as seen by the poetic imagination, such

as no other poet has given to us. Homer, first of all poets, shows us

individual personages sharply defined, but in the early stages of

intellectual and moral development, the first representatives of the

race at its conscious entrance upon the path of progress, with simple

motives, simple theories of existence, simple and limited experience. He

is plain and direct in the presentation of life, and in the substance

no less than in the expression of his thought.

In Shakespeare's work the individual man is no less sharply defined, no

less true to nature, but the long procession of his personages is wholly

different in effect from that of the Iliad and the Odyssey. They have

lost the simplicity of the older race; they are the products of a longer

and more varied experience; they have become more complex. And

Shakespeare is plain and direct neither in the substance of his thought

nor in the expression of it. The world has grown older, and in the

evolution of his nature man has become conscious of the irreconcilable

paradoxes of life, and more or less aware that while he is infinite in

faculty, he is also the quintessence of dust. But there is one essential

characteristic in which Shakespeare and Homer resemble each other as

poets,--that they both show to us the scene of life without the

interference of their own personality. Each simply holds the mirror up

to nature, and lets us see the reflection, without making comment on the

show. If there be a lesson in it we must learn it for ourselves.

Dante comes between the two, and differs more widely from each of them

than they from one another. They are primarily poets. He is primarily a

moralist who is also a poet. Of Homer the man, and of Shakespeare the

man, we know, and need to know, nothing; it is only with them as poets

that we are concerned. But it is needful to know Dante as man, in order

fully to appreciate him as poet. He gives us his world not as reflection

from an unconscious and indifferent mirror, but as from a mirror that

shapes and orders its reflections for a definite end beyond that of art,

and extraneous to it. And in this lies the secret of Dante's hold upon

so many and so various minds. He is the chief poet of man as a moral

being.

To understand aright the work of any great poet we must know the

conditions of his times; but this is not enough in the case of Dante. We

must know not only the conditions of the generation to which he

belonged, we must also know the specific conditions which shaped him

into the man he was, and differentiated him from his fellows. How came

he, endowed with a poetic imagination which puts him in the same class

with Homer and Shakespeare, not to be content, like them, to give us a

simple view of the phantasmagoria of life, but eager to use the fleeting

images as instruments by which to enforce the lesson of righteousness,

to set forth a theory of existence and a scheme of the universe?

The question cannot be answered without a consideration of the change

wrought in the life and thoughts of men in Europe by the Christian

doctrine as expounded and enforced by the Roman Church, and of the

simultaneous changes in outward conditions resulting from the

destruction of the ancient civilization, and the slow evolution of the

modern world as it rose from the ruins of the old. The period which

immediately preceded and followed the fall of the Roman Empire was too

disorderly, confused, and broken for men during its course to be

conscious of the directions in which they were treading. Century after

century passed without settled institutions, without orderly language,

without literature, without art. But institutions, languages, literature

and art were germinating, and before the end of the eleventh century

clear signs of a new civilization were manifest in Western Europe. The

nations, distinguished by differences of race and history, were settling

down within definite geographical limits; the various languages were

shaping themselves for the uses of intercourse and of literature;

institutions accommodated to actual needs were growing strong; here and

there the social order was becoming comparatively tranquil and secure.

Progress once begun became rapid, and the twelfth century is one of the

most splendid periods of the intellectual life of man expressing itself

in an infinite variety of noble and attractive forms. These new

conditions were most strongly marked in France: in Provence at the

South, and in and around the Ile de France at the North; and from both

these regions a quickening influence diffused itself eastward into

Italy.

The conditions of Italy throughout the Dark and Middle Ages were widely

different from those of other parts of Europe. Through all the ruin and

confusion of these centuries a tradition of ancient culture and ancient

power was handed down from generation to generation, strongly affecting

the imagination of the Italian people, whether recent invaders or

descendants of the old population. Italy had never had a national unity

and life, and the divisions of her different regions remained as wide in

the later as in the earlier times; but there was one sentiment which

bound all her various and conflicting elements in a common bond, which

touched every Italian heart and roused every Italian imagination,--the

sentiment of the imperial grandeur and authority of Rome. Shrunken,

feeble, fallen as the city was, the thought of what she had once been

still occupied the fancy of the Italian people, determined their

conceptions of the government of the world, and quickened within them a

glow of patriotic pride. Her laws were still the main fount of

whatsoever law existed for the maintenance of public and private right;

the imperial dignity, however interrupted in transmission, however often

assumed by foreign and barbarian conquerors, was still, to the

imagination, supreme above all other earthly titles; the story of Roman

deeds was known of all men; the legends of Roman heroes were the

familiar tales of infancy and age. Cities that had risen since Rome fell

claimed, with pardonable falsehood, to have had their origin from her,

and their rulers adopted the designations of her consuls and her

senators. The fragments of her literature that had survived the

destruction of her culture were the models for the rude writers of

ignorant centuries, and her language formed the basis for the new

language which was gradually shaping itself in accordance with the

slowly growing needs of expression. The traces of her material dominion,

the ruins of her wide arch of empire, were still to be found from the

far West to the farther East, and were but the types and emblems of her

moral dominion in the law, the language, the customs, the traditions of

the different lands. Nothing in the whole course of profane history has

so affected the imaginations of men, or so influenced their destinies,

as the achievements and authority of Rome.

The Roman Church inherited, together with the city, the tradition of

Roman dominion over the world. Ancient Rome largely shaped modern

Christianity,--by the transmission of the idea of the authority which

the Empire once exerted to the Church which grew up upon its ruins. The

tremendous drama of Roman history displayed itself to the imagination

from scene to scene, from act to act, with completeness of poetic

progress and climax,--first the growth, the extension, the absoluteness

of material supremacy, the heathen being made the instruments of Divine

power for preparing the world for the revelation of the true God; then

the tragedy of Christ's death wrought by Roman hands, and the expiation

of it in the fall of the Roman imperial power; followed by the new era

in which Rome again was asserting herself as mistress of the world, but

now with spiritual instead of material supremacy, and with a dominion

against which the gates of hell itself should not prevail.

It was, indeed, not at once that this conception of the Church as the

inheritor of the rights of Rome to the obedience of mankind took form.

It grew slowly and against opposition. But at the end of the eleventh

century, through the genius of Pope Gregory VII., the ideas hitherto

disputed, of the supreme authority of the Pope within the Church and of

the supremacy of the Church over the State, were established as the

accepted ecclesiastical theory, and adopted as the basis of the

definitely organized ecclesiastical system. Little more than a hundred

years later, at the beginning of the thirteenth century, Innocent III.

enforced the claims of the Church with a vigor and ability hardly less

than that of his great predecessor, maintaining openly that the

Pope--Pontifex Maximus--was the vicar of God upon earth.

This theory was the logical conclusion from a long series of historic

premises; and resting upon a firm foundation of dogma, it was supported

by the genuine belief, no less than by the worldly interests and

ambitions, of those who profited by it. The ideal it presented was at

once a simple and a noble conception,--narrow indeed, for the ignorance

of men was such that only narrow conceptions, in matters relating to the

nature and destiny of man and the order of the universe, were possible.

But it was a theory that offered an apparently sufficient solution of

the mysteries of religion, of the relation between God and man, between

the visible creation and the unseen world. It was a theory of a material

rather than a spiritual order: it reduced the things of the spirit into

terms of the things of the flesh. It was crude, it was easily

comprehensible, it was fitted to the mental conditions of the age.

The power which the Church claimed, and which to a large degree it

exercised over the imagination and over the conduct of the Middle Ages,

was the power which belonged to its head as the earthly representative

and vicegerent of God. No wonder that such power was often abused, and

that the corruption among the ministers of the Church was wide-spread.

Yet in spite of abuse, in spite of corruption, the Church was the ark of

civilization.

The religious--no less than the intellectual--life of Europe had revived

in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, and had displayed its fervor in

the marvels of Crusades and of church-building,--external modes of

manifesting zeal for the glory of God, and ardor for personal salvation.

But with the progress of intelligence the spirit which had found its

expression in these modes of service, now, in the thirteenth century in

Italy, fired the hearts of men with an even more intense and far more

vital flame, quickening within them sympathies which had long lain

dormant, and which now at last burst into activity in efforts and

sacrifices for the relief of misery, and for the bringing of all men

within the fold of Christian brotherhood. St. Francis and St. Dominic,

in founding their orders, and in setting an example to their brethren,

only gave measure and direction to a common impulse.

Yet such were the general hardness of heart and cruelty of temper which

had resulted from the centuries of violence, oppression, and suffering,

out of which Italy with the rest of Europe was slowly emerging, that the

strivings of religious emotion and the efforts of humane sympathy were

less powerful to bring about an improvement in social order than

influences which had their root in material conditions. Chief among

these was the increasing strength of the civic communities, through the

development of industry and of commerce. The people of the cities,

united for the protection of their common interests, were gaining a

sense of power. The little people, as they were called,--mechanics,

tradesmen, and the like,--were organizing themselves, and growing strong

enough to compel the great to submit to the restrictions of a more or

less orderly and peaceful life. In spite of the violent contentions of

the great, in spite of frequent civic uproar, of war with neighbors, of

impassioned party disputes, in spite of incessant interruptions of their

tranquillity, many of the cities of Italy were advancing in prosperity

and wealth. No one of them made more rapid and steady progress than

Florence.

The history of Florence during the thirteenth century is a splendid tale

of civic energy and resolute self-confidence. The little city was full

of eager and vigorous life. Her story abounds in picturesque incident.

She had her experience of the turn of the wheel of Fortune, being now at

the summit of power in Tuscany, now in the depths of defeat and

humiliation.

The spiritual emotion, the improvement in the conditions of society, the

increase of wealth, the growth in power of the cities of Italy, were

naturally accompanied by a corresponding intellectual development, and

the thirteenth century became for Italy what the twelfth had been for

France, a period of splendid activity in the expression of her new life.

Every mode of expression in literature and in the arts was sought and

practiced, at first with feeble and ignorant hands, but with steady gain

of mastery. At the beginning of the century the language was a mere

spoken tongue, not yet shaped for literary use. But the example of

Provence was strongly felt at the court of the Emperor Frederick II. in

Sicily, and the first half of the century was not ended before many

poets were imitating in the Italian tongue the poems of the troubadours.

Form and substance were alike copied; there is scarcely a single

original note; but the practice was of service in giving suppleness to

the language, in forming it for nobler uses, and in opening the way for

poetry which should be Italian in sentiment as well as in words. At the

north of Italy the influence of the trouveres was felt in like manner.

Everywhere the desire for expression was manifest. The spring had come,

the young birds had begun to twitter, but no full song was yet heard.

Love was the main theme of the poets, but it had few accents of

sincerity; the common tone was artificial, was unreal.

In the second half of the century new voices are heard, with accents of

genuine and natural feeling; the poets begin to treat the old themes

with more freshness, and to deal with religion, politics, and morals, as

well as with love. The language still possesses, indeed, the quality of

youth; it is still pliant, its forms have not become stiffened by age,

it is fit for larger use than has yet been made of it, and lies ready

and waiting, like a noble instrument, for the hand of the master which

shall draw from it its full harmonies and reveal its latent power in the

service he exacts from it.

But it was not in poetry alone that the life of Italy found expression.

Before the invention of printing,--which gave to the literary arts such

an advantage as secured their pre-eminence,--architecture, sculpture,

and painting were hardly less important means for the expression of the

ideals of the imagination and the creative energy of man. The practice

of them had never wholly ceased in Italy; but her native artists had

lost the traditions of technical skill; their work was rude and

childish. The conventional and lifeless forms of Byzantine art in its

decline were adopted by workmen who no longer felt the impulse, and no

longer possessed the capacity, of original design. Venice and Pisa,

early enriched by Eastern commerce, and with citizens both instructed

and inspired by knowledge of foreign lands, had begun great works of

building even in the eleventh century; but these works had been

designed, and mainly executed, by masters from abroad. But now the

awakened soul of Italy breathed new life into all the arts in its

efforts at self-expression. A splendid revival began. The inspiring

influence of France was felt in the arts of construction and design as

it had been felt in poetry. The magnificent display of the highest

powers of the imagination and the intelligence in France, the creation

during the twelfth and early thirteenth centuries of the unrivaled

productions of Gothic art, stimulated and quickened the growth of the

native art of Italy. But the French forms were seldom adopted for direct

imitation, as the forms of Provencal poetry had been. The power of

classic tradition was strong enough to resist their attraction. The

taste of Italy rejected the marvels of Gothic design in favor of modes

of expression inherited from her own past, but vivified with fresh

spirit, and adapted to her new requirements. The inland cities, as they

grew rich through native industry and powerful through the organization

of their citizens, were stirred with rivalry to make themselves

beautiful, and the motives of religion no less than those of civic pride

contributed to their adornment. The Church was the object of interest

common to all. Piety, superstition, pride, emulation, all alike called

for art in which their spirit should be embodied. The imagination

answered to the call. The eyes of the artist were once more opened to

see the beauty of life, and his hand sought to reproduce it. The bonds

of tradition were broken. The Greek marble vase on the platform of the

Duomo at Pisa taught Niccola Pisano the right methods of sculpture, and

directed him to the source of his art in the study of nature. His work

was a new wonder and delight, and showed the way along which many

followed him. Painting took her lesson from sculpture, and before the

end of the century both arts had become responsive to the demand of the

time, and had entered upon that course of triumph which was not to end

till, three centuries later, chisel and brush dropped from hands

enfeebled in the general decline of national vigor, and incapable of

resistance to the tyrannous and exclusive autocracy of the printed

page.

But it was not only the new birth of sentiment and emotion which

quickened these arts: it was also the aroused curiosity of men

concerning themselves, their history, and the earth. They felt their own

ignorance. The vast region of the unknown, which encircled with its

immeasurable spaces the little tract of the known world, appealed to

their fancy and their spirit of enterprise, with its boundless promise

and its innumerable allurements to adventure. Learning, long confined

and starved in the cell of the monk, was coming out into the open world,

and was gathering fresh stores alike from the past and the present. The

treasures of the wisdom and knowledge of the Greeks were eagerly sought,

especially in translations of Aristotle,--translations which, though

imperfect indeed, and disfigured by numberless misinterpretations and

mistakes, nevertheless contained a body of instruction invaluable as a

guide and stimulant to the awakened intelligence. Encyclopedic compends

of knowledge put at the disposition of students all that was known or

fancied in the various fields of science. The division between knowledge

and belief was not sharply drawn, and the wonders of legend and of fable

were accepted with as ready a faith as the actual facts of observation

and of experience. Travelers for gain or for adventure, and missionaries

for the sake of religion, were venturing to lands hitherto unvisited.

The growth of knowledge, small as it was compared with later increase,

widened thought and deepened life. The increase of thought strengthened

the faculties of the mind. Man becomes more truly man in proportion to

what he knows, and one of the most striking and characteristic features

of this great century is the advance of man through increase of

knowledge out of childishness towards maturity. The insoluble problems

which had been discussed with astonishing acuteness by the schoolmen of

the preceding generation were giving place to a philosophy of more

immediate application to the conduct and discipline of life. The 'Summa

Theologica' of St. Thomas Aquinas not only treated with incomparable

logic the vexed questions of scholastic philosophy, but brought all the

resources of a noble and well-trained intelligence and of a fine moral

sense to the study and determination of the order and government of the

universe, and of the nature and destiny of man.

The scope of learning remained, indeed, at the end of the century,

narrow in its range. The little tract of truth which men had acquired

lay encompassed by ignorance, like a scant garden-plot surrounded by a

high wall. But here and there the wall was broken through, and paths

were leading out into wider fields to be won for culture, or into

deserts wider still, in which the wanderers should perish.

But as yet there was no comprehensive and philosophic grasp of the new

conditions in their total significance; no harmonizing of their various

elements into one consistent scheme of human life; no criticism of the

new life as a whole. For this task was required not only acquaintance

with the whole range of existing knowledge, by which the conceptions of

men in regard to themselves and the universe were determined, but also a

profound view of the meaning of life itself, and an imaginative insight

into the nature of man. A mere image of the drama of life as presented

to the eye would not suffice. The meaning of it would be lost in the

confusion and multiplicity of the scene. The only possible explanation

and reconcilement of its aspects lay in the universal application to

them of the moral law, and in the exhibition of man as a spiritual and

immortal being for whom this world was but the first stage of existence.

This was the task undertaken and accomplished by Dante.

II

Of the events in Dante's life few are precisely ascertained, but of its

general course enough is known, either from his own statements or from

external testimony, to show the essential relations between his life and

his work, and the influence of his experience upon his convictions and

character. Most of the biographies of him are untrustworthy, being

largely built up upon a foundation of inferences and suppositions, and

often filled out with traditions and stories of which the greater part

are certainly false and few have a likelihood of truth. The only

strictly contemporary account of him is that given by the excellent

Chronicler of Florence, Giovanni Villani, a man of weight and judgment,

who in the ninth book of his Chronicle, under the year 1321, recording

Dante's death, adds a brief narrative of his life and works; because, as

he says, "on account of the virtues and knowledge and worth of so great

a citizen, it seems to us to be fitting to give a perpetual memorial of

him in this our chronicle, although the noble works left by him in

writing afford a true testimonial to him, and honorable fame to our

city." "Dante was," says Villani, "an honorable and ancient citizen of

Florence, of the gate of San Piero, and our neighbor." "He was a great

master in almost every branch of knowledge, although he was a layman; he

was a supreme poet and philosopher, and a perfect rhetorician alike in

prose and verse, as well as a most noble orator in public speech,

supreme in rhyme, with the most polished and beautiful style that had

ever been in our language.... Because of his knowledge he was somewhat

presumptuous, disdainful, and haughty; and, as it were after the manner

of a philosopher, having little graciousness, he knew not well to bear

himself with common people (_conversare con laici_)."

Dante was born in Florence, in May or June 1265. Of his family little is

positively known.[1] It was not among the nobles of the city, but it had

place among the well-to-do citizens who formed the body of the State and

the main support of the Guelf party. Of Dante's early years, and the

course of his education, nothing is known save what he himself tells us

in his various writings or what may be inferred from them. Lionardo

Bruni, eminent as an historian and as a public man, who wrote a Life of

Dante about a hundred years after his death, cites a letter of which we

have no other knowledge, in which, if the letter be genuine, the poet

says that he took part in the battle of Campaldino, fought in June 1289.

The words are:--"At the battle of Campaldino, in which the Ghibelline

party was almost all slain and undone, I found myself not a child in

arms, and I experienced great fear, and finally the greatest joy,

because of the shifting fortunes of the fight." It seems likely that

Dante was present, probably under arms, in the later part of the same

summer, at the surrender to the Florentines of the Pisan stronghold of

Caprona, where, he says ('Inferno,' xxi. 94-96), "I saw the foot

soldiers afraid, who came out under compact from Caprona, seeing

themselves among so many enemies."

Years passed before any other event in Dante's life is noted with a

certain date. An imperfect record preserved in the Florentine archives

mentions his taking part in a discussion in the so-called Council of a

Hundred Men, on the 5th of June, 1296. This is of importance as

indicating that he had before this time become a member of one of the

twelve Arts,--enrollment in one of which was required for the

acquisition of the right to exercise political functions in the State,

and also as indicating that he had a place in the chief of those

councils by which public measures were discussed and decided. The Art of

which he was a member was that of the physicians and druggists (_medici

e speziali_), an Art whose dealings included commerce in many of the

products of the East.

Not far from this time, but whether before or after 1296 is uncertain,

he married. His wife was Gemma dei Donati. The Donati were a powerful

family among the _grandi_ of the city, and played a leading part in the

stormy life of Florence. Of Gemma nothing is known but her marriage.

Between 1297 and 1299, Dante, together with his brother Francesco, as

appears from existing documentary evidence, were borrowers of

considerable sums of money; and the largest of the debts thus incurred

seem not to have been discharged till 1332, eleven years after his

death, when they were paid by his sons Jacopo and Pietro.

In May 1299 he was sent as envoy from Florence to the little, not very

distant, city of San Gemignano, to urge its community to take part in a

general council of the Guelf communes of Tuscany.

In the next year, 1300, he was elected one of the six priors of

Florence, to hold office from the 15th of June to the 15th of August.

The priors, together with the "gonfalonier of justice" (who had command

of the body of one thousand men who stood at their service), formed the

chief magistracy of the city. Florence had such jealousy of its rulers

that the priors held office but two months, so that in the course of

each year thirty-six of the citizens were elected to this magistracy.

The outgoing priors, associated with twelve of the leading citizens, two

from each of the _sestieri_ or wards of the city, chose their

successors. Neither continuity nor steady vigor of policy was possible

with an administration so shifting and of such varied composition, which

by its very constitution was exposed at all times to intrigue and to

attack. It was no wonder that Florence lay open to the reproach that her

counsels were such that what she spun in October did not reach to

mid-November ('Purgatory', vi. 142-144). His election to the priorate

was the most important event in Dante's public life. "All my ills and

all my troubles," he declared, "had occasion and beginning from my

misfortunate election to the priorate, of which, though I was not worthy

in respect of wisdom, yet I was not unworthy in fidelity and in age."[2]

The year 1300 was disastrous not only for Dante but for Florence. She

was, at the end of the thirteenth century, by far the most flourishing

and powerful city of Tuscany, full of vitality and energy, and beautiful

as she was strong. She was not free from civil discord, but the

predominance of the Guelf party was so complete within her walls that

she suffered little from the strife between Guelf and Ghibelline, which

for almost a century had divided Italy into two hostile camps. In the

main the Guelf party was that of the common people and the industrious

classes, and in general it afforded support to the Papacy as against the

Empire, while it received, in return, support from the popes. The

Ghibellines, on the other hand, were mainly of the noble class, and

maintainers of the Empire. The growth of the industry and commerce of

Florence in the last half of the century had resulted in the

establishment of the popular power, and in the suppression of the

Ghibelline interest. But a bitter quarrel broke out in one of the great

families in the neighboring Guelf city of Pistoia, a quarrel which raged

so furiously that Florence feared that it would result in the gain of

power by the Ghibellines, and she adopted the fatal policy of compelling

the heads of the contending factions to take up their residence within

her walls. The result was that she herself became the seat of discord.

Each of the two factions found ardent adherents, and, adopting the names

by which they had been distinguished in Pistoia, Florence was almost

instantly ablaze with the passionate quarrel between the Whites and the

Blacks (Bianchi and Neri). The flames burned so high that the Pope,

Boniface VIII., intervened to quench them. His intervention was vain.

It was just at this time that Dante became prior. The need of action to

restore peace to the city was imperative, and the priors took the step

of banishing the leaders of both divisions. Among those of the Bianchi

was Dante's own nearest friend, Guido Cavalcante. The measure was

insufficient to secure tranquillity and order. The city was in constant

tumult; its conditions went from bad to worse. But in spite of civil

broils, common affairs must still be attended to, and from a document

preserved in the Archives at Florence we learn that on the 28th April,

1301, Dante was appointed superintendent, without salary, of works

undertaken for the widening, straightening, and paving of the street of

San Procolo and making it safe for travel. On the 13th of the same month

he took part in a discussion, in the Council of the Heads of the twelve

greater Arts, as to the mode of procedure in the election of future

priors. On the 18th of June, in the Council of the Hundred Men, he

advised against providing the Pope with a force of one hundred men which

had been asked for; and again in September of the same year there is

record, for the last time, of his taking part in the Council, in a

discussion in regard "to the conservation of the Ordinances of Justice

and the Statutes of the People."

These notices of the part taken by Dante in public affairs seem at first

sight comparatively slight and unimportant; but were one constructing an

ideal biography of him, it would be hard to devise records more

appropriate to the character and principles of the man as they appear

from his writings. The sense of the duty of the individual to the

community of which he forms a part was one of his strongest convictions;

and his being put in charge of the opening of the street of San Procolo,

and making it safe for travel, "eo quod popularis comitatus absque

strepitu et briga magnatum et potentum possunt secure venire ad dominos

priores et vexilliferum justitiae cum expedit" (so that the common people

may, without uproar and harassing of magnates and mighty men, have

access whenever it be desirable to the Lord Priors and the

Standard-Bearer of Justice), affords a comment on his own criticism of

his fellow-citizens, whose disposition to shirk the burden of public

duty is more than once the subject of his satire. "Many refuse the

common burden, but thy people, my Florence, eagerly replies without

being called on, and cries, 'I load myself'" ('Purgatory,' vi. 133-135).

His counsel against providing the Pope with troops was in conformity

with his fixed political conviction that the function of the Papacy was

to be confined to the spiritual government of mankind; and nothing could

be more striking, as a chance incident, than that the last occasion on

which he, whose heart was set on justice, took part in the counsels of

his city, should have been for the discussion of the means for "the

conservation of the ordinances of justice and the statutes of the

people."

In the course of events in 1300 and 1301 the Bianchi proved the stronger

of the two factions by which the city was divided, they resisted with

success the efforts of the Pope in support of their rivals, and they

were charged by their enemies with intent to restore the rule of the

city to the Ghibellines. While affairs were in this state, Charles of

Valois, brother to the King of France, Philip the Fair, was passing

through Italy with a troop of horsemen to join Charles II. of Naples,[3]

in the attempt to regain Sicily from the hands of Frederic of Aragon.

The Pope favored the expedition, and held out flattering promises to

Charles. The latter reached Anagni, where Boniface was residing, in

September 1301. Here it was arranged that before proceeding to Sicily,

Charles should undertake to reduce to obedience the refractory opponents

of the Pope in Tuscany. The title of the Pacifier of Tuscany was

bestowed on him, and he moved toward Florence with his own troop and a

considerable additional force of men-at-arms. He was met on his way by

deputies from Florence, to whom he made fair promises; and trusting to

his good faith, the Florentines opened their gates to him and he entered

the city on All Saints' Day (November 1st), 1301.

Charles had hardly established himself in his quarters before he cast

his pledges to the wind. The exiled Neri, with his connivance, broke

into the city, and for six days worked their will upon their enemies,

slaying many of them, pillaging and burning their houses, while Charles

looked on with apparent unconcern at the wide-spread ruin and

devastation. New priors, all of them from the party of the Neri, entered

upon office in mid-November, and a new Podesta, Cante dei Gabrielli of

Agobbio, was charged with the administration of justice. The persecution

of the Bianchi was carried on with consistent thoroughness: many were

imprisoned, many fined, Charles sharing in the sums exacted from them.

On the 27th of January, 1302, a decree was issued by the Podesta

condemning five persons, one of whom was Dante, to fine and banishment

on account of crimes alleged to have been committed by them while

holding office as priors. "According to public report," said the decree,

"they committed barratry, sought illicit gains, and practiced unjust

extortions of money or goods." These general charges are set forth with

elaborate legal phraseology, and with much repetition of phrase, but

without statement of specific instances. The most important of them are

that the accused had spent money of the commune in opposing the Pope, in

resistance to the coming of Charles of Valois, and against the peace of

the city and the Guelf party; that they had promoted discord in the city

of Pistoia, and had caused the expulsion from that city of the Neri, the

faithful adherents of the Holy Roman Church; and that they had caused

Pistoia to break its union with Florence, and to refuse subjection to

the Church and to Charles the Pacificator of Tuscany. These being the

charges, the decree proceeded to declare that the accused, having been

summoned to appear within a fixed time before the Podesta and his court

to make their defense, under penalty for non-appearance of five thousand

florins each, and having failed to do so, were now condemned to pay this

sum and to restore their illicit gains; and if this were not done within

three days from the publication of this sentence against them, all their

possessions (_bona_) should be seized and destroyed; and should they

make the required payment, they were nevertheless to stand banished from

Tuscany for two years; and for perpetual memory of their misdeeds their

names were to be inscribed in the Statutes of the People, and as

swindlers and barrators they were never to hold office or benefice

within the city or district of Florence.

Six weeks later, on the 10th of March, another decree of the Podesta was

published, declaring the five citizens named in the preceding decree,

together with ten others, to have practically confessed their guilt by

their contumacy in non-appearance when summoned, and condemning them, if

at any time any one of them should come into the power of Florence, to

be burned to death ("talis perveniens igne comburatur sic quod

moriatur").[4]

From this time forth till his death Dante was an exile. The character of

the decrees is such that the charges brought against him have no force,

and leave no suspicion resting upon his actions as an officer of the

State. They are the outcome and expression of the bitterness of party

rage, and they testify clearly only to his having been one of the

leaders of the parties opposed to the pretensions of the Pope, and

desirous to maintain the freedom of Florence from foreign intervention.

In April Charles left Florence, "having finished," says Villani, the

eye-witness of these events, "that for which he had come, namely, under

pretext of peace, having driven the White party from Florence; but from

this proceeded many calamities and dangers to our city."

The course of Dante's external life in exile is hardly less obscure than

that of his early days. Much concerning it may be inferred with some

degree of probability from passages in his own writings, or from what is

reported by others; but of actual certain facts there are few. For a

time he seems to have remained with his companions in exile, of whom

there were hundreds, but he soon separated himself from them in grave

dissatisfaction, making a party by himself ('Paradiso,' xvii. 69), and

found shelter at the court of the Scaligeri at Verona. In August 1306 he

was among the witnesses to a contract at Padua. In October of the same

year he was with Franceschino, Marchese Malespina, in the district

called the Lunigiana, and empowered by him as his special procurator and

envoy to establish the terms of peace for him and his brothers with the

Bishop of Luni. His gratitude to the Malespini for their hospitality and

good-will toward him is proved by one of the most splendid compliments

ever paid in verse or prose, the magnificent eulogium of this great and

powerful house with which the eighth canto of the 'Purgatory' closes.

How long Dante remained with the Malespini, and whither he went after

leaving them, is unknown. At some period of his exile he was at Lucca

('Purgatorio,' xxiv. 45); Villani states that he was at Bologna, and

afterwards at Paris, and in many parts of the world. He wandered far and

wide in Italy, and it may well be that in the course of his years of

exile he went to Paris, drawn thither by the opportunities of learning

which the University afforded; but nothing is known definitely of his

going.

In 1311 the mists which obscure the greater part of Dante's life in

exile are dispelled for a moment, by three letters of unquestioned

authenticity, and we gain a clear view of the poet. In 1310 Henry of

Luxemburg, a man who touched the imagination of his contemporaries by

his striking presence and chivalric accomplishments as well as by his

high character and generous aims, "a man just, religious, and strenuous

in arms," having been elected Emperor, as Henry VII., prepared to enter

Italy, with intent to confirm the imperial rights and to restore order

to the distracted land. The Pope, Clement V., favored his coming, and

the prospect opened by it was hailed not only by the Ghibellines with

joy, but by a large part of the Guelfs as well; with the hope that the

long discord and confusion, from which all had suffered, might be

brought to end and give place to tranquillity and justice. Dante exulted

in this new hope; and on the coming of the Emperor, late in 1310, he

addressed an animated appeal to the rulers and people of Italy,

exhorting them in impassioned words to rise up and do reverence to him

whom the Lord of heaven and earth had ordained for their king. "Behold,

now is the accepted time; rejoice, O Italy, dry thy tears; efface, O

most beautiful, the traces of mourning; for he is at hand who shall

deliver thee."

The first welcome of Henry was ardent, and with fair auspices he assumed

at Milan, in January 1311, the Iron Crown, the crown of the King of

Italy. Here at Milan Dante presented himself, and here with full heart

he did homage upon his knees to the Emperor. But the popular welcome

proved hollow; the illusions of hope speedily began to vanish; revolt

broke out in many cities of Lombardy; Florence remained obdurate, and

with great preparations for resistance put herself at the head of the

enemies of the Emperor. Dante, disappointed and indignant, could not

keep silence. He wrote a letter headed "Dante Alaghieri, a Florentine

and undeservedly in exile, to the most wicked Florentines within the

city." It begins with calm and eloquent words in regard to the divine

foundation of the imperial power, and to the sufferings of Italy due to

her having been left without its control to her own undivided will. Then

it breaks forth in passionate denunciation of Florence for her impious

arrogance in venturing to rise up in mad rebellion against the minister

of God; and, warning her of the calamities which her blind obstinacy is

preparing for her, it closes with threats of her impending ruin and

desolation. This letter is dated from the springs of the Arno, on the

31st of March.

The growing force of the opposition which he encountered delayed the

progress of Henry. Dante, impatient of delay, eager to see the

accomplishment of his hope, on the 16th of April addressed Henry himself

in a letter of exalted prophetic exhortation, full of Biblical language,

and of illustrations drawn from sacred and profane story, urging him not

to tarry, but trusting in God, to go out to meet and to slay the Goliath

that stood against him. "Then the Philistines will flee, and Israel will

be delivered, and we, exiles in Babylon, who groan as we remember the

holy Jerusalem, shall then, as citizens breathing in peace, recall in

joy the miseries of confusion." But all was in vain. The drama which had

opened with such brilliant expectations was advancing to a tragic close.

Italy became more confused and distracted than ever. One sad event

followed after another. In May the brother of the Emperor fell at the

siege of Brescia; in September his dearly loved wife Margarita, "a holy

and good woman," died at Genoa. The forces hostile to him grew more and

more formidable. He succeeded however in entering Rome in May 1312, but

his enemies held half of the city, and the streets became the scene of

bloody battles; St. Peter's was closed to him, and Henry, worn and

disheartened and in peril, was compelled to submit to be ingloriously

crowned at St. John Lateran. With diminished strength and with loss of

influence he withdrew to Tuscany, and laid ineffectual siege to

Florence. Month after month dragged along with miserable continuance of

futile war. In the summer of 1313, collecting all his forces, Henry

prepared to move southward against the King of Naples. But he was seized

with illness, and on the 24th of August he died at Buonconvento, not far

from Siena. With his death died the hope of union and of peace for

Italy. His work, undertaken with high purpose and courage, had wholly

failed. He had come to set Italy straight before she was ready

('Paradiso,' xxxi. 137). The clouds darkened over her. For Dante the cup

of bitterness overflowed.

How Dante was busied, where he was abiding, during the last two years of

Henry's stay in Italy, we have no knowledge. One striking fact relating

to him is all that is recorded. In the summer of 1311 the Guelfs in

Florence, in order to strengthen themselves against the Emperor,

determined to relieve from ban and to recall from exile many of their

banished fellow-citizens, confident that on returning home they would

strengthen the city in its resistance against the Emperor. But to the

general amnesty which was issued on the 2d of September there were large

exceptions; and impressive evidence of the multitude of the exiles is

afforded by the fact that more than a thousand were expressly excluded

from the benefit of pardon, and were to remain banished and condemned as

before. In the list of those thus still regarded as enemies of Florence

stands the name of Dante.

The death of the Emperor was followed eight months later by that of the

Pope, Clement V., under whom the papal throne had been removed from Rome

to Avignon. There seemed a chance, if but feeble, that a new pope might

restore the Church to the city which was its proper home, and thus at

least one of the wounds of Italy be healed. The Conclave was bitterly

divided; month after month went by without a choice, the fate of the

Church and of Italy hanging uncertain in the balance. Dante, in whom

religion and patriotism combined as a single passion, saw with grief

that the return of the Church to Italy was likely to be lost through the

selfishness, the jealousies, and the avarice of her chief prelates; and

under the impulse of the deepest feeling he addressed a letter of

remonstrance, reproach, and exhortation to the Italian cardinals, who

formed but a small minority in the Conclave, but who might by union and

persistence still secure the election of a pope favorable to the return.

This letter is full of a noble but too vehement zeal. "It is for you,

being one at heart, to fight manfully for the Bride of Christ; for the

seat of the Bride, which is Rome; for our Italy, and in a word, for the

whole commonwealth of pilgrims upon earth." But words were in vain; and

after a struggle kept up for two years and three months, a pope was at

last elected who was to fix the seat of the Papacy only the more firmly

at Avignon. Once more Dante had to bear the pain of disappointment of

hopes in which selfishness had no part.

And now for years he disappears from sight. What his life was he tells

in a most touching passage near the beginning of his 'Convito':--"From

the time when it pleased the citizens of Florence, the fairest and most

famous daughter of Rome, to cast me out from her sweetest bosom (in

which I had been born and nourished even to the summit of my life, and

in which, at good peace with them, I desire with all my heart to repose

my weary soul, and to end the time which is allotted to me), through

almost all the regions to which our tongue extends I have gone a

pilgrim, almost a beggar, displaying against my will the wound of

fortune, which is wont often to be imputed unjustly to [the discredit

of] him who is wounded. Truly I have been a bark without sail and

without rudder, borne to divers ports and bays and shores by that dry

wind which grievous poverty breathes forth, and I have appeared mean in

the eyes of many who perchance, through some report, had imagined me in

other form; and not only has my person been lowered in their sight, but

every work of mine, whether done or to be done, has been held in less

esteem."

Once more, and for the last time, during these wanderings he heard the

voice of Florence addressed to him, and still in anger. A decree was

issued[5] on the 6th of November, 1315, renewing the condemnation and

banishment of numerous citizens, denounced as Ghibellines and rebels,

including among them Dante Aldighieri and his sons. The persons named in

this decree are charged with contumacy, and with the commission of ill

deeds against the good state of the Commune of Florence and the Guelf

party; and it is ordered that "if any of them shall fall into the power

of the Commune he shall be taken to the place of Justice and there be

beheaded." The motive is unknown which led to the inclusion in this

decree of the sons of Dante, of whom there were two, now youths

respectively a little more or a little less than twenty years old.[6]

It is probable that the last years of Dante's life were passed in

Ravenna, under the protection of Guido da Polenta, lord of the city. It

was here that he died, on September 14th, 1321. His two sons were with

him, and probably also his daughter Beatrice. He was in his

fifty-seventh year when he went from suffering and from exile to peace

('Paradiso,' x. 128).

Such are the few absolute facts known concerning the external events of

Dante's life. A multitude of statements, often with much circumstantial

detail, concerning other incidents, have been made by his biographers; a

few rest upon a foundation of probability, but the mass are guess-work.

There is no need to report them; for small as the sum of our actual

knowledge is, it is enough for defining the field within which his

spiritual life was enacted, and for showing the conditions under which

his work was done, and by which its character was largely determined.

III

No poet has recorded his own inner life more fully or with greater

sincerity than Dante. All his more important writings have essentially

the character of a spiritual autobiography, extending from his boyhood

to his latest years. Their quality and worth as works of literature are

largely dependent upon their quality and interest as revelations of the

nature of their writer. Their main significance lies in this double

character.

The earliest of them is the 'Vita Nuova,' or New Life. It is the

narrative in prose and verse of the beginning and course of the love

which made life new for him in his youth, and which became the permanent

inspiration of his later years, and the bond of union for him between

earth and heaven, between the actual and the ideal, between the human

and the divine. The little book begins with an account of the boy's

first meeting, when he was nine years old, with a little maiden about a

year younger, who so touched his heart that from that time forward Love

lorded it over his soul. She was called Beatrice; but whether this was

her true name, or whether, because of its significance of blessing, it

was assigned to her as appropriate to her nature, is left in doubt. Who

her parents were, and what were the events of her life, are also

uncertain; though Boccaccio, who, some thirty years after Dante's death,

wrote a biography of the poet in which fact and fancy are inextricably

intermingled, reports that he had it upon good authority that she was

the daughter of Folco Portinari, and became the wife of Simone de'

Bardi. So far as Dante's relation to her is concerned, these matters are

of no concern. Just nine years after their first meeting, years during

which Dante says he had often seen her, and her image had stayed

constantly with him, the lady of his love saluted him with such virtue

that he seemed to see all the bounds of bliss, and having already

recognized in himself the art of discoursing in rhyme, he made a sonnet

in which he set forth a vision which had come to him after receiving his

lady's salute. This sonnet has a twofold interest, as being the earliest

of Dante's poetic composition preserved to us, and as describing a

vision which connects it in motive with the vision of the 'Divine

Comedy.' It is the poem of a 'prentice hand not yet master of its craft,

and neither in manner nor in conception has it any marked distinction

from the work of his predecessors and contemporaries. The narrative of

the first incidents of his love forms the subject of the first part of

the little book, consisting of ten poems and the prose comment upon

them; then the poet takes up a new theme and devotes ten poems to the

praise of his lady. The last of them is interrupted by her death, which

took place on the 9th of June, 1290, when Dante was twenty-five years

old. Then he takes up another new theme, and the next ten poems are

devoted to his grief, to an episode of temporary unfaithfulness to the

memory of Beatrice, and to the revival of fidelity of love for her. One

poem, the last, remains; in which he tells how a sigh, issuing from his

heart, and guided by Love, beholds his lady in glory in the empyrean.

The book closes with these words:--

"After this sonnet a wonderful vision appeared to me, in which I

saw things which made me resolve to speak no more of this blessed

one until I could more worthily treat of her. And to attain to

this, I study to the utmost of my power, as she truly knows. So

that, if it shall please Him through whom all things live that my

life be prolonged for some years, I hope to say of her what was

never said of any woman. And then, may it please Him who is the

Lord of Grace, that my soul may go to behold the glory of its lady,

namely of that blessed Beatrice, who in glory looks upon the face

of Him _qui est per omnia saecula benedictus_" (who is blessed

forever).

There is nothing in the 'New Life' which indicates whether or not

Beatrice was married, or which implies that the devotion of Dante to her

was recognized by any special expression of regard on her part. No

interviews between them are recorded; no tokens of love were exchanged.

The reserve, the simple and unconscious dignity of Beatrice, distinguish

her no less than her beauty, her grace, and her ineffable courtesy. The

story, based upon actual experience, is ordered not in literal

conformity with fact, but according to the ideal of the imagination; and

its reality does not consist in the exactness of its record of events,

but in the truth of its poetic conception. Under the narrative lies an

allegory of the power of love to transfigure earthly things into the

likeness of heavenly, and to lift the soul from things material and

transitory to things spiritual and eternal.

While the little book exhibits many features of a literature in an early

stage of development, and many of the characteristics of a youthful

production, it is yet the first book of modern times which has such

quality as to possess perpetual contemporaneousness. It has become in

part archaic, but it does not become antiquated. It is the first book in

a modern tongue in which prose begins to have freedom of structure, and

ease of control over the resources of the language. It shows a steady

progress in Dante's mastery of literary art. The stiffness and lack of

rhythmical charm of the poems with which it begins disappear in the

later sonnets and canzoni, and before its close it exhibits the full

development of the sweet new style begun by Dante's predecessor Guido

Guinicelli, and of which the secret lay in obedience to the dictates of

nature within the heart.

The date of its compilation cannot be fixed with precision, but was

probably not far from 1295; and the words with which it closes seem to

indicate that the design of the 'Divine Comedy' had already taken a more

or less definite shape in Dante's mind.

The deepest interest of the 'New Life' is the evidence which it affords

in regard to Dante's character. The tenderness, sensitiveness, and

delicacy of feeling, the depth of passion, the purity of soul which are

manifest in it, leave no question as to the controlling qualities of his

disposition. These qualities rest upon a foundation of manliness, and

are buttressed by strong moral principles. At the very beginning of the

book is a sentence, which shows that he had already gained that

self-control which is the prime condition of strength and worth of

character. In speaking of the power which his imagination gave to Love

to rule over him, a power that had its source in the image of his lady,

he adds, "Yet was that image of such noble virtue that it never suffered

Love to rule me without the faithful counsel of the reason in those

matters in which to listen to its counsel was useful." His faculties

were already disciplined by study, and his gifts enriched with learning.

He was scholar hardly less than poet. The range of his acquisitions was

already wide, and it is plain that he had had the best instruction which

Florence could provide; and nowhere else could better have been found.

The death of Beatrice was the beginning of a new period of Dante's

self-development. So long as she lived she had led him along toward the

right way. For a time, during the first ecstasy of grief at her loss,

she still sustained him. After a while, he tells us, his mind, which was

endeavoring to heal itself, sought for comfort in the mode which other

comfortless ones had accepted for their consolation. He read Boethius on

the 'Consolations of Philosophy,' and the words of comfort in Cicero's

'Treatise on Friendship.' By these he was led to further studies of

philosophy, and giving himself with ardor to its pursuit, he devoted

himself to the acquisition of the wisdom of this earth, to the neglect,

for a time, of the teachings of Divine revelation. He entered upon paths

of study which did not lead to the higher truth, and at the same time he

began to take active part himself in the affairs of the world. He was

attracted by the allurements of life. He married; he took office. He

shared in the pleasures of the day. He no longer listened to the voice

of the spirit, nor was faithful to the image of Beatrice in following on

earth the way which should lead him to her in heaven. But meanwhile he

wrote verses which under the form of poems of love were celebrations of

the beauty of Philosophy; and he was accomplishing himself in learning

till he became master of all the erudition of his time; he was

meditating deeply on politics, he was studying life even more than

books, he was becoming one of the deepest of thinkers and one of the

most accomplished of literary artists. But his life was of the world,

worldly, and it did not satisfy him. At last a change came. He suddenly

awoke to consciousness of how far he had strayed from that good of which

Beatrice was the type; how basely he had deserted the true ideals of his

youth; how perilous was the life of the world; how near he was to the

loss of the hope of salvation. We know not fully how this change was

wrought. All we know concerning it is to be gathered from passages in

his later works, in which, as in the 'Convito,' he explains the

allegorical significance of some of his poems, or as in the 'Divine

Comedy,' he gives poetic form to his experience as it had shaped itself

in his imagination. There are often difficulties in the interpretation

of his words, nor are all his statements reconcilable with each other in

detail. But I believe that in what I have set forth as the course of his

life between the death of Beatrice and his exile, I have stated nothing

which may not be confirmed by Dante's own testimony.

It is possible that during the latter part of this period Dante wrote

the treatise 'On Monarchy,' in which he set forth his views as to the

government of mankind. To ascertain the date of its composition is both

less easy and less important than in the case of his other long works;

because it contains few personal references, and no indications of the

immediate conditions under which it was written. But it is of importance

not only as an exposition of Dante's political theories and the broad

principles upon which those theories rested, but still more as

exhibiting his high ideals in regard to the order of society and the

government of mankind. Its main doctrine might be called that of ideal

Ghibellinism; and though its arguments are often unsound, and based upon

fanciful propositions and incorrect analogies, though it exhibits the

defects frequent in the reasoning of the time,--a lack of discrimination

in regard to the value of authorities, and no sense of the true nature

of evidence,--yet the spirit with which it is animated is so generous,

and its object of such importance, that it possesses interest alike as

an illustration of Dante's character, and as a monument in the history

of political speculation.

Its purpose was, first, to establish the proposition that the empire, or

supreme universal temporal monarchy, was necessary for the good order of

the world; secondly, that the Roman people had rightfully attained the

dignity of this empire; and thirdly, that the authority thus obtained

was derived immediately from God, and was not dependent on any earthly

agent or vicar of God. The discussion of the first proposition is the

most interesting part of the treatise, for it involves the statement of

Dante's general conception of the end of government and of the true

political order. His argument begins with the striking assertion that

the proper work of the human race, taken as a whole, is to bring into

activity all the possibilities of the intelligence, first to the end of

speculation, and secondly in the application of speculation to action.

He goes on to declare that this can be achieved only in a state of

peace; that peace is only to be secured under the rule of one supreme

monarch; that thus the government of the earth is brought into

correspondence with the Divine government of the universe; and that only

under a universal supreme monarchy can justice be fully established and

complete liberty enjoyed. The arguments to maintain these theses are

ingenious, and in some instances forcible; but are too abstract, and too

disregardful of the actual conditions of society. Dante's loftiness of

view, his fine ideal of the possibilities of human life, and his ardent

desire to improve its actual conditions, are manifest throughout, and

give value to the little book as a treatise of morals beyond that which

it possesses as a manual of practical politics.

There is little in the 'De Monarchia' which reflects the heat of the

great secular debate between Guelf and Ghibelline; but something of the

passion engendered by it finds expression in the opening of the third

book, where Dante, after citing the words of the prophet Daniel, "He

hath shut the lions' mouths and they have not hurt me, forasmuch as

before him justice was found in me," goes on in substance as follows:--

"The truth concerning the matter which remains to be treated may

perchance arouse indignation against me. But since Truth from her

changeless throne appeals to me, and Solomon teaches us 'to

meditate on truth, and to hate the wicked,' and the philosopher

[Aristotle], our instructor in morals, urges us for the sake of

truth to disregard what is dear to us, I, taking confidence from

the words of Daniel in which the Divine power is declared to be the

shield of the defenders of the truth, ... will enter on the present

contest; and by the arm of Him who by his blood delivered us from

the power of darkness, I will drive out from the lists the impious

and the liar. Wherefore should I fear? since the Spirit, co-eternal

with the Father and the Son, says through the mouth of David, 'The

righteous shall be had in everlasting remembrance, he shall not be

afraid of evil tidings.'"

These words perhaps justify the inference that the treatise was written

before his exile, since after it his experience of calamity would have

freed him from the anticipation of further evil from the hostility of

those to whom his doctrine might be unacceptable.

But whether or not this be a correct inference, there can be no doubt

that the years between the compilation of the 'New Life' and his

banishment were years of rapid maturity of his powers, and largely

devoted to the studies which made him a master in the field of learning.

Keenly observant of the aspects of contemporary life, fascinated by the

"immense and magic spectacle of human affairs," questioning deeply its

significance, engaged actively in practical concerns, he ardently sought

for the solution of the mysteries and the reconcilement of the

confusions of human existence. The way to this solution seemed to lie

through philosophy and learning, and in acquiring them he lifted himself

above the turmoil of earth. All observation, experience, and acquisition

served as material for his poetic and idealizing imagination, wherewith

to construct an orderly scheme of the universe; all served for the

defining and confirming of his moral judgments, all worked together for

the harmonious development of his intellectual powers; all served to

prepare him for the work which, already beginning to shape itself in his

mind, was to become the main occupation of the remainder of his life,

and to prove one of the abiding monuments of the highest achievements of

mankind.

The 'De Monarchia' is written in Latin, and so also is a brief

unfinished treatise, the work of some period during his exile, on the

Common Speech, 'De Vulgari Eloquio.' It has intrinsic interest as the

first critical study of language and of literature in modern times, as

well as from the acute and sound judgments with which it abounds, and

from its discussion of the various forms and topics of poetry, but still

more from its numerous illustrations of Dante's personal experience and

sentiment. Its object is to teach the right use of the common speech;

instruction required by all, since all make use of the speech, it being

that which all learn from birth, "by imitation and without rule. The

other speech, which the Romans called _Grammatica_, is learned by study

and according to rule.... Of these two the Common is the more noble,

because it was the first used by the human race, and also because it is

in use over all the world, though in different tongues; and again

because it is natural to us, while the other is artificial." Speech,

Dante declares, is the prerogative of man alone, not required by the

angels and not possible for brutes; there was originally but one

language, the Hebrew. In treating of this latter topic Dante introduces

a personal reference of extraordinary interest in its bearing on his

feeling in respect to his exile:--

"It is for those of such debased intelligence that they believe the

place of their birth to be the most delightful under the sun, to

prefer their own peculiar tongue, and to believe that it was that

of Adam. But we whose country is the world, as the sea is for

fishes, although we drank of the Arno before we were weaned, and so

love Florence that because we loved it we suffer exile unjustly,

support our judgment by reason rather than feeling. And though in

respect to our pleasure and the repose of our senses, no sweeter

place exists on earth than Florence, ... yet we hold it for certain

that there are many more delightful regions and cities than Tuscany

and Florence, where I was born and of which I am a citizen, and

that many nations and people use a more pleasing and serviceable

speech than the Italians."

The conclusion of this speculation is, that the Hebrew, which was the

original language spoken by Adam, was preserved by the Hebrew people

after the confusion of tongues at the building of the Tower of Babel,

and thus became the language used by our Redeemer,--the language not of

confusion but of grace.

But the purpose of the present treatise is not to consider all the

divers languages even of Europe, but only that of Italy. Yet in Italy

alone there is an immense variety of speech, and no one of the varieties

is the true Italian language. That true, illustrious, courtly tongue is

to be found nowhere in common use, but everywhere in select usage. It is

the common speech "freed from rude words, involved constructions,

defective pronunciation, and rustic accent; excellent, clear, perfect,

urbane, and elect, as it may be seen in the poems of 'Cino da Pistoia

and his friend,'"--that friend being Dante himself. They have attained

to the glory of the tongue, and "how glorious truly it renders its

servants we ourselves know, who to the sweetness of its glory hold our

exile as naught."[7] This illustrious language, then, is the select

Italian tongue, the tongue of the excellent poets in every part of

Italy; and how and by whom it is to be used it is the purpose of this

treatise to show.

The second book begins with the doctrine that the best speech is

appropriate to the best conceptions; but the best conceptions exist only

where there is learning and genius, and the best speech is consequently

that only of those who possess them, and only the best subjects are

worthy of being treated in it. These subjects fall under three heads:

that of utility, or safety, which it is the object of arms to secure;

that of delight, which is the end of love; that of worthiness, which is

attained by virtue. These are the topics of the illustrious poets in the

vulgar tongue; and of these, among the Italians, Cino da Pistoia has

treated of love, and his friend (Dante) of rectitude.

The remainder of the second book is given to the various forms of

poetry,--the canzone, the ballata, the sonnet,--and to the rules of

versification. The work breaks off unfinished, in the middle of a

sentence. There were to have been at least two books more; but, fragment

as it is, the treatise is an invaluable document in the illustration of

Dante's study of his own art, in its exhibition of his breadth of view,

and in its testimony to his own consciousness of his position as the

master of his native tongue, and as the poet of righteousness. He failed

in his estimate of himself only as it fell short of the truth. He found

the common tongue of Italy unformed, unstable, limited in powers of

expression. He shaped it not only for his own needs, but for the needs

of the Italian race. He developed its latent powers, enlarged its

resources, and determined its form. The language as he used it is

essentially the language of to-day,--not less so than the language of

Shakespeare is the English of our use. In his poetic diction there is

little that is not in accord with later usage; and while in prose the

language has become more flexible, its constructions more varied and

complex, its rhythm more perfected, his prose style at its best still

remains unsurpassed in vigor, in directness, and in simplicity.

Changeful from generation to generation as language is, and as Dante

recognized it to be, it has not so changed in six hundred years that his

tongue has become strange. There is no similar example in any other

modern literature. The force of his genius, which thus gave to the form

of his work a perpetual contemporaneousness, gave it also to the

substance; and though the intellectual convictions of men have changed

far more than their language, yet Dante's position as the poet of

righteousness remains supreme.

It is surprising that with such a vast and difficult work as the 'Divine

Comedy' engaging him, Dante should have found time and strength during

his exile for the writing of treatises in prose so considerable as that

on the Common Tongue, and the much longer and more important book which

he called 'Il Convivio' or 'Il Convito' (The Banquet). It is apparent

from various references in the course of the work that it was at least

mainly written between 1307 and 1310. Its design was of large scope. It

was to be composed of fifteen parts or treatises; but of these only four

were completed, and such is their character both as regards their

exhibition of the poet's nature and their exposition of the multifarious

topics of philosophy, of science, and of morals treated in them, that

the student of Dante and of mediaeval thought cannot but feel a deep

regret at the failure of the poet to carry his undertaking to its

intended close. But though the work is imperfect as a whole, each of its

four parts is complete and practically independent in itself.

Dante's object in the book was twofold. His opening words are a

translation of what Matthew Arnold calls "that buoyant and immortal

sentence with which Aristotle begins his Metaphysics,"--"All mankind

naturally desire knowledge." But few can attain to what is desired by

all, and innumerable are they who live always famished for want of this

food. "Oh, blessed are the few who sit at that table where the bread of

the angels is eaten, and wretched they who have food in common with the

herds." "I, therefore, who do not sit at the blessed table, but having

fled from the pasture of the crowd, gather up at the feet of those who

sit at it what falls from them, and through the sweetness I taste in

that which little by little I pick up, know the wretched life of those

whom I have left behind me, and moved with pity for them, not forgetting

myself, have reserved something for these wretched ones." These crumbs

were the substance of the banquet which he proposed to spread for them.

It was to have fourteen courses, and each of these courses was to have

for its principal viand a canzone of which the subject should be Love

and Virtue, and the bread served with each course was to be the

exposition of these poems,--poems which for want of this exposition lay

under the shadow of obscurity, so that by many their beauty was more

esteemed than their goodness. They were in appearance mere poems of

love, but under this aspect they concealed their true meaning, for the

lady of his love was none other than Philosophy herself, and not

sensual passion but virtue was their moving cause. The fear of reproach

to which this misinterpretation might give occasion, and the desire to

impart teaching which others could not give, were the two motives of his

work.

There is much in the method and style of the 'Convito' which in its

cumbrous artificiality exhibits an early stage in the exposition of

thought in literary form, but Dante's earnestness of purpose is apparent

in many passages of manly simplicity, and inspires life into the dry

bones of his formal scholasticism. The book is a mingling of

biographical narrative, shaped largely by the ideals of the imagination,

with expositions of philosophical doctrine, disquisitions on matters of

science, and discussion of moral truths. But one controlling purpose

runs through all, to help men to attain that knowledge which shall lead

them into the paths of righteousness.

For his theory of knowledge is, that it is the natural and innate desire

of the soul, as essential to its own perfection in its ultimate union

with God. The use of the reason, through which he partakes of the Divine

nature, is the true life of man. Its right use in the pursuit of

knowledge leads to philosophy, which is, as its name signifies, the love

of wisdom, and its end is the attainment of virtue. It is because of

imperfect knowledge that the love of man is turned to fallacious objects

of desire, and his reason is perverted. Knowledge, then, is the prime

source of good; ignorance, of evil. Through knowledge to wisdom is the

true path of the soul in this life on her return to her Maker, to know

whom is her native desire, and her perfect beatitude.

In the exposition of these truths in their various relations a multitude

of topics of interest are touched upon, and a multitude of opinions

expressed which exhibit the character of Dante's mind and the vast

extent of the acquisitions by which his studies had enriched it. The

intensity of his moral convictions and the firmness of his moral

principles are no less striking in the discourse than the nobility of

his genius and the breadth of his intellectual view. Limited and

erroneous as are many of his scientific conceptions, there is little

trace of superstition or bigotry in his opinions; and though his

speculations rest on a false conception of the universe, the revolting

dogmas of the common mediaeval theology in respect to the human and the

Divine nature find no place in them. The mingling of fancy with fact,

the unsoundness of the premises from which conclusions are drawn, the

errors in belief and in argument, do not affect the main object of his

writing, and the 'Convito' may still be read with sympathy and with

profit, as a treatise of moral doctrine by a man the loftiness of whose

intelligence rose superior to the hampering limitations of his age.

In its general character and in its biographical revelations the

'Banquet' forms a connecting link between the 'New Life' and the 'Divine

Comedy.' It is not possible to frame a complete reconciliation between

all the statements of the 'Banquet' in respect to Dante's experience

after the death of Beatrice, and the narrative of them in the 'New

Life'; nor is it necessary, if we allow due place to the poetic and

allegoric interpretation of events natural to Dante's genius. In the

last part of the 'New Life' he tells of his infidelity to Beatrice in

yielding himself to the attraction of a compassionate lady, in whose

sight he found consolation. But the infidelity was of short duration,

and, repenting it, he returned with renewed devotion to his only love.

In the 'Convito' he tells us that the compassionate lady was no living

person, but was the image of Philosophy, in whose teaching he had found

comfort; and the poems which he then wrote and which had the form, and

were in the terms of, poems of Love, were properly to be understood as

addressed--not to any earthly lady, but--to the lady of the

understanding, the most noble and beautiful Philosophy, the daughter of

God. And as this image of Philosophy, as the fairest of women, whose

eyes and whose smile reveal the joys of Paradise, gradually took clear

form, it coalesced with the image of Beatrice herself, she who on earth

had been the type to her lover of the beauty of eternal things, and who

had revealed to him the Creator in his creature. But now having become

one of the blessed in heaven, with a spiritual beauty transcending all

earthly charm, she was no longer merely a type of heavenly things, but

herself the guide to the knowledge of them, and the divinely

commissioned revealer of the wisdom of God. She looking on the face of

God reflected its light upon him who loved her. She was one with Divine

Philosophy, and as such she appears, in living form, in the 'Divine

Comedy,' and discloses to her lover the truth which is the native desire

of the soul, and in the attainment of which is beatitude.

It is this conception which forms the bond of union between the 'New

Life,' the 'Banquet,' and the 'Divine Comedy,' and not merely as

literary compositions but as autobiographical records. Dante's life and

his work are not to be regarded apart; they form a single whole, and

they possess a dramatic development of unparalleled consistency and

unity. The course of the events of his life shaped itself in accordance

with an ideal of the imagination, and to this ideal his works

correspond. His first writing, in his poems of love and in the story of

the 'New Life,' forms as it were the first act of a drama which proceeds

from act to act in its presentation of his life, with just proportion

and due sequence, to its climax and final scene in the last words of the

'Divine Comedy.' It is as if Fate had foreordained the dramatic unity

of his life and work, and impressing her decree upon his imagination,

had made him her more or less conscious instrument in its fulfillment.

Had Dante written only his prose treatises and his minor poems, he would

still have come down to us as the most commanding literary figure of the

Middle Ages, the first modern with a true literary sense, the writer of

love verses whose imagination was at once more delicate and more

profound than that of any among the long train of his successors, save

Shakespeare alone, and more free from sensual stain than that of

Shakespeare; the poet of sweetest strain and fullest control of the

resources of his art, the scholar of largest acquisition and of

completest mastery over his acquisitions, and the moralist with higher

ideals of conduct and more enlightened conceptions of duty than any

other of the period to which he belonged. All this he would have been,

and this would have secured for him a place among the immortals. But all

this has but a comparatively small part in raising him to the station

which he actually occupies, and in giving to him the influence which he

still exerts. It was in the 'Divine Comedy' that his genius found its

full expression, and it is to this supreme poem that all his other work

serves as substructure.

The general scheme of this poem seems to have been early formed by him;

and its actual composition was the main occupation of his years of

exile, and must have been its main, one might say its sufficient,

consolation. Never was a book of wider scope devised by man; and never

was one more elaborate in detail, more varied in substance, or more

complete in execution. It is unique in the consistency of its form with

its spirit. It possesses such organic unity and proportion as to

resemble a work of the creative spirit of Nature herself.

The motive which inspired Dante in the 'Divine Comedy' had its source in

his sense of the wretchedness of man in this mortal life, owing to the

false direction of his desires, through his ignorance and his misuse of

his free will, the chief gift of God to him. The only means of rescue

from this wretchedness was the exercise by man of his reason,

enlightened by the divine grace, in the guidance of his life. To

convince man of this truth, to bring home to him the conviction of the

eternal consequences of his conduct in this world, to show him the path

of salvation, was Dante's aim. As poet he had received a Divine

commission to perform this work. To him the ten talents had been given,

and it was for him to put them to the use for which they had been

bestowed. It was a consecrated task to which both heaven and earth set

their hand, and a loftier task was never undertaken. It was to be

accomplished by expounding the design of God in the creation, by setting

forth the material and moral order of the universe and the share of man

in that order, and his consequent duty and destiny. This was not to be

done in the form of abstract propositions addressed to the

understanding, but in a poetic narrative which should appeal to the

heart and arouse the imagination; a narrative in which human life should

be portrayed as an unbroken spiritual existence, prefiguring in its

mortal aspects and experience its immortal destiny. The poem was not to

be a mere criticism of life, but a solution of its mystery, an

explanation of its meaning, and a guide of its course.

To give force and effect to such a design the narrative must be one of

personal experience, so conceived as to be a type of the universal

experience of man. The poem was to be an allegory, and in making himself

its protagonist Dante assumed a double part. He represents both the

individual Dante, the actual man, and that man as the symbol of man in

general. His description of his journey through Hell, Purgatory, and

Paradise has a literal veracity; and under the letter is the allegory of

the conduct and consequences of all human life. The literal meaning and

the allegorical are the web and woof of the fabric, in which the

separate incidents are interwoven, with twofold thread, in designs of

infinite variety, complexity, and beauty.

In the journey through Hell, Dante represents himself as guided by

Virgil, who has been sent to his aid on the perilous way by Beatrice,

incited by the Holy Virgin herself, in her infinite compassion for one

who has strayed from the true way in the dark forest of the world.

Virgil is the type of the right reason, that reason whose guidance, if

followed, leads man to the attainment of the moral virtues, by the

practice of which sin may be avoided, but which by themselves are not

enough for salvation. These were the virtues of the virtuous heathen,

unenlightened by divine revelation. Through the world, of whose evil

Hell is the type and fulfillment, reason is the sufficient guide and

guard along the perilous paths which man must traverse, exposed to the

assaults of sin, subject to temptation, and compelled to face the very

Devil himself. And when at last, worn and wearied by long-continued

effort, and repentant of his frequent errors, he has overcome

temptation, and entered on a course of purification through suffering

and penitence, whereby he may obtain forgiveness and struggle upward to

the height of moral virtue, reason still suffices to lead him on the

difficult ascent, until he reaches the security and the joy of having

overcome the world. But now reason no longer is sufficient. Another

guide is needed to lead the soul through heavenly paths to the

attainment of the divine virtues of faith, hope, and charity, by which

the soul is made fit for Paradise. And here Beatrice, the type of

theology, or knowledge of the things of God, takes the place of Virgil,

and conducts the purified and redeemed soul on its return to its divine

source, to the consummation of its desires and its bliss in the vision

of God himself.

Such is the general scheme of the poem, in which the order of the

universe is displayed and the life of man depicted, in scenes of immense

dramatic variety and of unsurpassed imaginative reality. It embraces the

whole field of human experience. Nature, art, the past, the present,

learning, philosophy, all contribute to it. The mastery of the poet over

all material which can serve him is complete; the force of his

controlling imagination corresponds with the depth and intensity of his

moral purpose. And herein lies the exceptional character of the poem, as

at once a work of art of supreme beauty and a work of didactic morals of

supreme significance. Art indeed cannot, if it would, divorce itself

from morals. Into every work of art, whether the artist intend it or

not, enters a moral element. But in art, beauty does not submit to be

subordinated to any other end, and it is the marvel in Dante that while

his main intent is didactic, he attains it by a means of art so perfect

that only in a few rare passages does beauty fall a sacrifice to

doctrine. The 'Divine Comedy' is indeed not less incomparable in its

beauty than in its vast compass, the variety of its interest, and in the

harmony of its form with its spirit. In his lectures 'On Translating

Homer' Mr. Arnold, speaking of the metre of 'Paradise Lost,' says:--"To

this metre, as used in the 'Paradise Lost,' our country owes the glory

of having produced one of the only two poetical works in the grand style

which are to be found in the modern languages; the 'Divine Comedy' of

Dante is the other." But Mr. Arnold does not point out the extraordinary

fact, in regard to the style of the 'Divine Comedy,' that this poem

stands at the beginning of modern literature, that there was no previous

modern standard of style, that the language was molded and the verse

invented by Dante; that he did not borrow his style from the ancients,

and that when he says to Virgil, "Thou art he from whom I took the fair

style that has done me honor," he meant only that he had learned from

him the principles of noble and adequate poetic expression. The style of

the 'Divine Comedy' is as different from that of the AEneid as it is from

that of 'Paradise Lost.'

There are few other works of man, perhaps there is no other, which

afford such evidence as the 'Divine Comedy' of uninterrupted consistency

of purpose, of sustained vigor of imagination, and of steady force of

character controlling alike the vagaries of the poetic temperament, the

wavering of human purpose, the fluctuation of human powers, and the

untowardness of circumstance. From beginning to end of this work of many

years there is no flagging of energy, no indication of weakness. The

shoulders, burdened by a task almost too great for mortal strength,

never tremble under their load.

The contrast between the inner and the outer life of Dante is one of the

most impressive pictures of human experience; the pain, the privation,

the humiliation of outward circumstance so bitter, so prolonged; the

joy, the fullness, the exaltation of inward condition so complete, the

achievement so great. Above all other poetry the 'Divine Comedy' is the

expression of high character, and of a manly nature of surpassing

breadth and tenderness of sympathy, of intensity of moral earnestness,

and elevation of purpose. One closes the narrative of Dante's life and

the study of his works with the conviction that he was not only one of

the greatest among poets, but a man whose character gives to his poetry

its highest and its most enduring interest.

[Illustration: Signature]

NOTES

For the student of Italian, the following books may be recommended as

opening the way to the study of Dante's life and works:

1. Tutte le Opere di Dante Alighieri. Nuovamente rivedute nel testo da

Dr. E. Moore. Oxford, 1894, 1 vol.; sm. 8vo; pp. x. 490. [The best text

of Dante's works, and the only edition of them in one volume. Invaluable

to the student.]

2. La Divina Commedia di Dante Alighieri. Riveduta ... e commentata da

G. A. Scartazzini. 2d ediz., Milano. 1896, 1 vol.; sm. 8vo; pp. xx,

1034; col Rimario ed Indice, pp. 122. On the whole the most useful

edition for the beginner. The historical and biographical notes and the

references to the sources of Dante's allusions are abundant and good;

but interpretations of difficult passages or words are not always

unquestionable.

Scartazzini's edition of the 'Divina Commedia' in three volumes, with

his volume of 'Prolegomeni,' may be commended to the more advanced

student, who will find it, especially the volume of the 'Paradise,' a

rich storehouse of information.

For the English reader the following books and essays will be

useful:--Cary's translation of the 'Divine Comedy,' in blank verse,

modeled on Milton's verse, and remote from the tone of the original.

This is the version of a refined scholar; it has been much admired and

is generally quoted in England. It is furnished with good notes.

Longfellow's verse-for-verse unrhymed translation is far the most

accurate of the English translations in verse, and is distinguished also

for the verbal felicity of its renderings. The comment accompanying it

is extensive and of great value, by far the best in English.

Of literal prose translations, there are among others that of the

'Inferno' by Dr. John Carlyle, which is of very great merit; that of the

whole poem, with a comment of interest, by Mr. A. J. Butler; and that

also of the whole poem and of the 'New Life' by C. E. Norton.

The various works on Dante by the Rev. Dr. Edward Moore, of Oxford, are

all of the highest worth, and quite indispensable to the thorough

student. Their titles are--'Contributions to the Textual Criticism of

the Divina Commedia,' 'Time References in the Divina Commedia,' 'Dante

and his Early Biographers,' and 'Studies in Dante.'

Lowell's essay on 'Dante' (prose works of James Russell Lowell,

Riverside edition, Vol. iv.), and 'Dante,' an essay by the Rev. R. W.

Church, late Dean of St. Paul's, should be read by every student. They

will open the way to further reading. The 'Concordance to the Divine

Comedy,' by Dr. E. A. Fay, published by Ginn and Company, Boston, for

the Dante Society, is a book which the student should have always at

hand.

C. E. N.

SELECTIONS FROM THE WORKS OF DANTE

In making the following translations from Dante's chief works, my

attempt has been to choose passages which should each have interest in

itself, but which, taken together, should have a natural sequence and

should illustrate the development of the ruling ideas and controlling

sentiment of Dante's life. But they lose much of their power and beauty

in being separated from their context, and the reader should bear in

mind that such is the closeness of texture of Dante's work, and so

complete its unity, that extracts, however numerous and extended, fail

to give an adequate impression of its character as a whole. Moreover, no

poems suffer greater loss in translation than Dante's, for in no others

is there so intimate a relation between the expression and the feeling,

between the rhythmical form and the poetic substance. C. E. N.

FROM THE 'NEW LIFE'

1. The beginning of love.

2. The first salutation of his Lady.

3. The praise of his Lady.

4. Her loveliness.

5. Her death.

6. The anniversary of her death.

7. The hope to speak more worthily of her.

FROM THE 'BANQUET'

1. The consolation of Philosophy.

2. The desire of the Soul.

3. The noble Soul at the end of Life.

FROM THE 'DIVINE COMEDY'

1. Hell, Cantos i. and ii. The entrance on the journey through the

eternal world.

2. Hell, Canto v. The punishment of carnal sinners.

3. Purgatory, Canto xxvii. The final purgation.

4. Purgatory, Cantos xxx, xxxi. The meeting with his Lady in the

Earthly Paradise.

5. Paradise, Canto xxxiii. The final vision.

The selections from the 'New Life' are from Professor Norton's

translation, copyrighted 1867, 1892, 1895, and reprinted by

permission of Professor Norton and of Houghton, Mifflin and

Company, Boston, Mass.

THE NEW LIFE

I

THE BEGINNING OF LOVE

Nine times now, since my birth, the heaven of light had turned almost to

the same point in its own gyration, when the glorious Lady of my mind,

who was called Beatrice by many who knew not why she was so called,

first appeared before my eyes. She had already been in this life so long

that in its course the starry heaven had moved toward the region of the

East one of the twelve parts of a degree; so that at about the beginning

of her ninth year she appeared to me, and I near the end of my ninth

year saw her. She appeared to me clothed in a most noble color, a modest

and becoming crimson, and she was girt and adorned in such wise as

befitted her very youthful age....

From that time forward Love lorded it over my soul, which had been so

speedily wedded to him: and he began to exercise over me such control

and such lordship, through the power which my imagination gave to him,

that it behoved me to do completely all his pleasure. He commanded me

ofttimes that I should seek to see this youthful angel; so that I in my

boyhood often went seeking her, and saw her of such noble and

praiseworthy deportment, that truly of her might be said that word of

the poet Homer, "She seems not the daughter of mortal man, but of God."

And though her image, which stayed constantly with me, gave assurance to

Love to hold lordship over me, yet it was of such noble virtue that it

never suffered Love to rule me without the faithful counsel of the

reason in those matters in which it was useful to hear such counsel. And

since to dwell upon the passions and actions of such early youth seems

like telling an idle tale, I will leave them, and, passing over many

things which might be drawn from the original where these lie hidden, I

will come to those words which are written in my memory under larger

paragraphs.

II

THE FIRST SALUTATION OF HIS LADY

When so many days had passed that nine years were exactly complete since

the above-described apparition of this most gentle lady, on the last of

these days it happened that this admirable lady appeared to me, clothed

in purest white, between two gentle ladies, who were of greater age;

and, passing along a street, she turned her eyes toward that place where

I stood very timidly, and by her ineffable courtesy, which is to-day

rewarded in the eternal world, saluted me with such virtue that it

seemed to me then that I saw all the bounds of bliss.... And since it

was the first time that her words came to my ears, I took in such

sweetness that, as it were intoxicated, I turned away from the folk, and

betaking myself to the solitude of my own chamber, I sat myself down to

think of this most courteous lady.

And thinking of her, a sweet slumber overcame me, in which a marvelous

vision appeared to me.... And [when I awoke] thinking on what had

appeared to me, I resolved to make it known to many who were famous

poets at that time; and since I had already seen in myself the art of

discoursing in rhyme, I resolved to make a sonnet, in which I would

salute all the liegemen of Love, and would write to them that which I

had seen in my slumber.

III

THE PRAISE OF HIS LADY

Inasmuch as through my looks many persons had learned the secret of my

heart, certain ladies who were met together, taking pleasure in one

another's company, were well acquainted with my heart, because each of

them had witnessed many of my discomfitures. And I, passing near them,

as chance led me, was called by one of these gentle ladies; and she who

had called me was a lady of very pleasing speech; so that when I drew

nigh to them and saw plainly that my most gentle lady was not among

them, reassuring myself, I saluted them and asked what might be their

pleasure. The ladies were many, and certain of them were laughing

together. There were others who were looking at me, awaiting what I

might say. There were others who were talking together, one of whom,

turning her eyes toward me, and calling me by name, said these

words:--"To what end lovest thou this thy lady, since thou canst not

sustain her presence? Tell it to us, for surely the end of such a love

must be most strange." And when she had said these words to me, not only

she, but all the others, began to await with their look my reply. Then I

said to them these words:--"My ladies, the end of my love was formerly

the salutation of this lady of whom you perchance are thinking, and in

that dwelt the beatitude which was the end of all my desires. But since

it has pleased her to deny it to me, my lord Love, through his grace,

has placed all my beatitude in that which cannot fail me."

Then these ladies began to speak together: and as sometimes we see rain

falling mingled with beautiful snow, so it seemed to me I saw their

words issue mingled with sighs. And after they had somewhat spoken among

themselves, this lady who had first spoken to me said to me yet these

words:--"We pray thee that thou tell us wherein consists this beatitude

of thine." And I, replying to her, said thus:--"In those words which

praise my lady." And she replied:--"If thou hast told us the truth,

those words which thou hadst said to her, setting forth thine own

condition, must have been composed with other intent."

Then I, thinking on these words, as if ashamed, departed from them, and

went saying within myself:--"Since there is such beatitude in those

words which praise my lady, why has my speech been of aught else?" And

therefore I resolved always henceforth to take for theme of my speech

that which should be the praise of this most gentle one. And thinking

much on this, I seemed to myself to have undertaken a theme too lofty

for me, so that I dared not to begin; and thus I tarried some days with

desire to speak, and with fear of beginning.

Then it came to pass that, walking on a road alongside of which was

flowing a very clear stream, so great a desire to say somewhat in verse

came upon me, that I began to consider the method I should observe; and

I thought that to speak of her would not be becoming unless I were to

speak to ladies in the second person; and not to every lady, but only to

those who are gentle, and are not women merely. Then I say that my

tongue spoke as if moved of its own accord, and said, _Ladies that have

intelligence of Love_. These words I laid up in my mind with great joy,

thinking to take them for my beginning; wherefore then, having returned

to the above-mentioned city, after some days of thought, I began a

canzone with this beginning.

IV

THE LOVELINESS OF HIS LADY

This most gentle lady, of whom there has been discourse in the preceding

words, came into such favor among the people, that when she passed along

the way, persons ran to see her; which gave me wonderful joy. And when

she was near any one, such modesty came into his heart that he dared not

raise his eyes, or return her salutation; and of this many, as having

experienced it, could bear witness for me to whoso might not believe it.

She, crowned and clothed with humility, took her way, showing no pride

in that which she saw and heard. Many said, when she had passed: "This

is not a woman; rather she is one of the most beautiful angels of

heaven." And others said: "She is a marvel. Blessed be the Lord who can

work thus admirably!" I say that she showed herself so gentle and so

full of all pleasantness, that those who looked on her comprehended in

themselves a pure and sweet delight, such as they could not after tell

in words; nor was there any who might look upon her but that at first he

needs must sigh. These and more admirable things proceeded from her

admirably and with power. Wherefore I, thinking upon this, desiring to

resume the style of her praise, resolved to say words in which I would

set forth her admirable and excellent influences, to the end that not

only those who might actually behold her, but also others, should know

of her whatever words could tell. Then I devised this sonnet:--

So gentle and so gracious doth appear

My lady when she giveth her salute,

That every tongue becometh, trembling, mute;

Nor do the eyes to look upon her dare.

Although she hears her praises, she doth go

Benignly vested with humility;

And like a thing come down she seems to be

From heaven to earth, a miracle to show.

So pleaseth she whoever cometh nigh,

She gives the heart a sweetness through the eyes,

Which none can understand who doth not prove.

And from her countenance there seems to move

A spirit sweet and in Love's very guise,

Who to the soul, in going, sayeth: Sigh!

V

THE DEATH OF HIS LADY

After that I began to think one day upon what I had said of my lady,

that is, in these two preceding sonnets; and seeing in my thought that I

had not spoken of that which at the present time she wrought in me, it

seemed to me that I had spoken defectively; and therefore I resolved to

say words in which I would tell how I seemed to myself to be disposed to

her influence, and how her virtue wrought in me. And not believing that

I could relate this in the brevity of a sonnet, I began then a canzone.

_Quomodo sedet sola civitas plena populo! facta est quasi vidua

domina gentium._ [How doth the city sit solitary, that was full of

people! How is she become as a widow! she that was great among the

nations.]

I was yet full of the design of this canzone, and had completed [one]

stanza thereof, when the Lord of Justice called this most gentle one to

glory, under the banner of that holy Queen Mary, whose name was ever

spoken with greatest reverence by this blessed Beatrice.

VI

THE ANNIVERSARY OF THE DEATH OF HIS LADY

On that day on which the year was complete since this lady was made one

of the denizens of life eternal, I was seated in a place where, having

her in mind, I was drawing an angel upon certain tablets. And while I

was drawing it, I turned my eyes and saw at my side men to whom it was

meet to do honor. They were looking on what I did, and, as was

afterwards told me, they had been there already some time before I

became aware of it. When I saw them I rose, and saluting them, said,

"Another was just now with me, and on that account I was in thought."

And when they had gone away, I returned to my work, namely, that of

drawing figures of angels; and while doing this, a thought came to me of

saying words in rhyme, as if for an anniversary poem of her, and of

addressing those persons who had come to me.

After this, two gentle ladies sent to ask me to send them some of these

rhymed words of mine; wherefore I, thinking on their nobleness, resolved

to send to them and to make a new thing which I would send to them with

these, in order that I might fulfill their prayers with the more honor.

And I devised then a sonnet which relates my condition, and I sent it to

them.

Beyond the sphere that widest orbit hath

Passes the sigh which issues from my heart:

A new Intelligence doth Love impart

In tears to him, which guides his upward path.

When at the place desired, his course he stays,

A lady he beholds in honor dight,

Who so doth shine that through her splendid light,

The pilgrim spirit upon her doth gaze.

He sees her such, that dark his words I find--

When he reports, his speech so subtle is

Unto the grieving heart which makes him tell;

But of that gentle one he speaks, I wis,

Since oft he bringeth Beatrice to mind,

So that, O ladies dear, I understand him well.

VII

THE HOPE TO SPEAK MORE WORTHILY OF HIS LADY

After this, a wonderful vision appeared to me, in which I saw things

which made me resolve to speak no more of the blessed one, until I could

more worthily treat of her. And to attain to this, I study to the utmost

of my power, as she truly knows. So that, if it shall please Him through

whom all things live that my life be prolonged for some years, I hope to

say of her what was never said of any woman.

And then may it please him who is the Lord of Grace, that my soul may go

to behold the glory of its lady, namely of that blessed Beatrice, who in

glory looks upon the face of Him _qui est per omnia saecula benedictus_

[who is blessed forever].

The translations from the 'Convito' are made for 'A Library of the

World's Best Literature' by Professor Norton

THE CONVITO

I

THE CONSOLATION OF PHILOSOPHY

"When the first delight of my soul was lost, of which mention has

already been made, I remained pierced with such affliction that no

comfort availed me. Nevertheless, after some time, my mind, which was

endeavoring to heal itself, undertook, since neither my own nor others'

consoling availed, to turn to the mode which other comfortless ones had

adopted for their consolation. And I set myself to reading that book of

Boethius, not known to many, in which he, a prisoner and an exile, had

consoled himself. And hearing, moreover, that Tully had written a book

in which, treating of friendship, he had introduced words of consolation

for Laelius, a most excellent man, on the death of Scipio his friend, I

set myself to read that. And although it was difficult for me at first

to enter into their meaning, I finally entered into it, so far as my

knowledge of Latin and a little of my own genius permitted; through

which genius I already, as if in a dream, saw many things, as may be

seen in the 'New Life.' And as it sometimes happens that a man goes

seeking silver, and beyond his expectation finds gold, which a hidden

occasion affords, not perchance without Divine guidance, so I, who was

seeking to console myself, found not only relief for my tears, but the

substance of authors, and of knowledge, and of books; reflecting upon

which, I came to the conclusion that Philosophy, who was the Lady of

these authors, this knowledge, and these books, was a supreme thing. And

I imagined her as having the features of a gentle lady; and I could not

imagine her in any but a compassionate act; wherefore my sense so

willingly admired her in truth, that I could hardly turn it from her.

And after this imagination I began to go there where she displayed

herself truly, that is to say, to the school of the religious, and to

the disputations of the philosophers, so that in a short time, perhaps

in thirty months, I began to feel so much of her sweetness that the love

of her chased away and destroyed every other thought."

'The Banquet,' ii. 13.

II

THE DESIRE OF THE SOUL

The supreme desire of everything, and that first given by Nature, is to

return to its source; and since God is the source of our souls and Maker

of them in his own likeness, as is written, "Let us make man in our

image, after our likeness," to him this soul desires above all to

return. And as a pilgrim, who goes along a road on which he never was

before, thinks every house he sees afar off to be his inn, and not

finding it so, directs his trust to the next, and thus from house to

house till he comes to the inn, so our soul at once, on entering the new

and untraveled road of this life, turns her eyes to the goal of her

supreme good, and therefore whatever thing she sees which seems to have

in it some good, she believes to be that. And because her knowledge at

first is imperfect, not being experienced or instructed, small goods

seem to her great, therefore she begins with desiring them. Wherefore we

see children desire exceedingly an apple; and then proceeding further,

desire a little bird; and further still a beautiful dress; and then a

horse, and then a woman, and then riches not great, and then greater,

and then as great as can be. And this happens because in none of these

does she find that which she is seeking, and she trusts to find it

further on....

Truly this way is lost by error as the roads of earth are; for as from

one city to another there is of necessity one best and straightest way,

and another that always leads away from it, that is, one which goes in

another direction, and many others, some less diverging, and some

approaching less near, so in human life are divers roads, of which one

is the truest, and another the most deceitful, and certain ones less

deceitful, and certain less true. And as we see that that which goes

straightest to the city fulfills desire, and gives repose after

weariness, and that which goes contrary never fulfills it, and can never

give repose, so it falls out in our life: the good traveler arrives at

the goal and repose, the mistaken never arrives there, but with much

weariness of his mind always looks forward with greedy eyes.

'The Banquet,' iv. 12.

III

THE NOBLE SOUL AT THE END OF LIFE

The noble Soul in old age returns to God as to that port whence she set

forth on the sea of this life. And as the good mariner, when he

approaches port, furls his sails, and with slow course gently enters it,

so should we furl the sails of our worldly affairs and turn to God with

our whole mind and heart, so that we may arrive at that port with all

sweetness and peace. And in regard to this we have from our own nature a

great lesson of sweetness, that in such a death as this there is no pain

nor any bitterness, but as a ripe fruit is easily and without violence

detached from its twig, so our soul without affliction is parted from

the body in which it has been. And just as to him who comes from a long

journey, before he enters into the gate of his city, the citizens

thereof go forth to meet him, so the citizens of the eternal life come

to meet the noble Soul; and they do so through her good deeds and

contemplations: for having now rendered herself to God, and withdrawn

herself from worldly affairs and thoughts, she seems to see those whom

she believes to be nigh unto God. Hear what Tully says in the person of

the good Cato:--"With ardent zeal I lifted myself up to see your fathers

whom I had loved, and not them only, but also those of whom I had heard

speak." The noble Soul then at this age renders herself to God and

awaits the end of life with great desire; and it seems to her that she

is leaving the inn and returning to her own house, it seems to her that

she is leaving the road and returning to the city, it seems to her that

she is leaving the sea and returning to port.... And also the noble Soul

at this age blesses the past times; and well may she bless them, because

revolving them through her memory she recalls her right deeds, without

which she could not arrive with such great riches or so great gain at

the port to which she is approaching. And she does like the good

merchant, who when he draws near his port, examines his getting, and

says: "Had I not passed along such a way, I should not have this

treasure, nor have gained that which I may enjoy in my city to which I

am drawing near;" and therefore he blesses the way which he has come.

'The Banquet,' iv. 28.

The selections from the 'Divina Commedia' are from Professor

Norton's translation: copyrighted 1891 and 1892 and reprinted by

permission of Professor Norton and of Houghton, Mifflin and

Company, Publishers, Boston, Mass.

HELL

CANTO I

THE ENTRANCE ON THE JOURNEY THROUGH THE ETERNAL WORLD

[Dante, astray in a wood, reaches the foot of a hill which he

begins to ascend; he is hindered by three beasts; he turns back and

is met by Virgil, who proposes to guide him into the eternal

world.]

Midway upon the road of our life I found myself within a dark wood, for

the right way had been missed. Ah! how hard a thing it is to tell what

this wild and rough and dense wood was, which in thought renews the

fear! So bitter is it that death is little more. But in order to treat

of the good that I found, I will tell of the other things that I saw

there. I cannot well recount how I entered it, so full was I of slumber

at that point where I abandoned the true way. But after I had arrived at

the foot of a hill, where that valley ended which had pierced my heart

with fear, I looked on high and saw its shoulders clothed already with

the rays of the planet[8] that leads men aright along every path. Then

was the fear a little quieted which in the lake of my heart had lasted

through the night that I passed so piteously. And even as one who, with

spent breath, issued out of the sea upon the shore, turns to the

perilous water and gazes, so did my soul, which still was flying, turn

back to look again upon the pass which never had a living person left.

After I had rested a little my weary body, I took my way again along the

desert slope, so that the firm foot was always the lower. And lo! almost

at the beginning of the steep a she-leopard, light and very nimble,

which was covered with a spotted coat. And she did not move from before

my face, nay, rather hindered so my road that to return I oftentimes had

turned.

The time was at the beginning of the morning, and the Sun was mounting

upward with those stars that were with him when Love Divine first set in

motion those beautiful things;[9] so that the hour of the time and the

sweet season were occasion of good hope to me concerning that wild beast

with the dappled skin. But not so that the sight which appeared to me of

a lion did not give me fear. He seemed to be coming against me, with

head high and with ravening hunger, so that it seemed that the air was

affrighted at him. And a she-wolf, who with all cravings seemed laden in

her meagreness, and already had made folk to live forlorn,--she caused

me so much heaviness, with the fear that came from sight of her, that I

lost hope of the height.[10] And such as he is who gains willingly, and

the time arrives that makes him lose, who in all his thoughts weeps and

is sad,--such made me the beast without repose that, coming on against

me, little by little was pushing me back thither where the Sun is

silent.

While I was falling back to the low place, before mine eyes appeared one

who through long silence seemed faint-voiced. When I saw him in the

great desert, "Have pity on me!" I cried to him, "whatso thou art, or

shade or real man." He answered me:--"Not man; man once I was, and my

parents were Lombards, and Mantuans by country both. I was born _sub

Julio_, though late, and I lived at Rome under the good Augustus, in the

time of the false and lying gods. Poet was I, and sang of that just son

of Anchises who came from Troy after proud Ilion had been burned. But

thou, why returnest thou to so great annoy? Why dost thou not ascend the

delectable mountain which is the source and cause of every joy?" "Art

thou then that Virgil and that fount which poureth forth so large a

stream of speech?" replied I to him with bashful front: "O honor and

light of the other poets! may the long study avail me, and the great

love, which have made me search thy volume! Thou art my master and my

author; thou alone art he from whom I took the fair style that has done

me honor. Behold the beast because of which I turned; help me against

her, famous sage, for she makes my veins and pulses tremble." "Thee it

behoves to hold another course," he replied when he saw me weeping, "if

thou wishest to escape from this savage place: for this beast, because

of which thou criest out, lets not any one pass along her way, but so

hinders him that she kills him; and she has a nature so malign and evil

that she never sates her greedy will, and after food is hungrier than

before. Many are the animals with which she wives, and there shall be

more yet, till the hound shall come that will make her die of grief....

He shall hunt her through every town till he shall have set her back in

hell, there whence envy first sent her forth. Wherefore I think and deem

it for thy best that thou follow me, and I will be thy guide and will

lead thee hence through the eternal place where thou shalt hear the

despairing shrieks, shalt see the ancient spirits woful who each

proclaim the second death. And then thou shalt see those who are

contented in the fire, because they hope to come, whenever it may be, to

the blessed folk; to whom if thou wilt thereafter ascend, there shall be

a soul more worthy than I for that. With her I will leave thee at my

departure; for that Emperor who reigneth thereabove, because I was

rebellious to his law, wills not that into his city any one should come

through me. In all parts he governs and there he reigns: there is his

city and his lofty seat. O happy he whom thereto he elects!" And I to

him:--"Poet, I beseech thee by that God whom thou didst not know, in

order that I may escape this ill and worse, that thou lead me thither

where thou now hast said, so that I may see the gate of St. Peter, and

those whom thou makest so afflicted."

Then he moved on, and I behind him kept.