LAURA AND PETRARCH CONTINUED.
Much power of lively ridicule, much coarse wit,--principally French
wit,--has been expended on the subject of Laura's virtue; by those, I
presume, who under similar circumstances would have found such virtue
"too painful an endeavour."[29] Much depraved ingenuity has been
exerted to twist certain lines and passages in the Canzoniere into a
sense which shall blot with frailty the memory of this beautiful and
far-famed being: once believe these interpretations, and all the
peculiar and graceful charm which now hangs round her intercourse with
Petrarch vanishes,--the reverential delicacy of the poet's homage
becomes a mockery, and all his exalted praises of her unequalled virtue,
and her invincible chastity, are turned to satire, and insult our moral
feeling.
But the question, I believe, is finally set at rest, and it were idle
to war with epigrams. All the evidence that has been collected, external
and internal, prose and poetry, critical and traditional, tends to
prove, first, that Laura preserved her virtue to the last; and,
secondly, that she did not preserve it unassailed; that Petrarch, true
to his sex,--a very man, (as Laura has been called a _very woman_,) used
at first every art, every effort, every advantage, which his diversified
accomplishments of mind and person lent him, to destroy the very virtue
he adored. He only _hints_ this in his poetry, just sufficiently to
enhance the glory which he has thrown round his divinity; but he speaks
more plainly in prose.
"Untouched by my prayers, unvanquished by my arguments, unmoved by my
flattery, she remained faithful to her sex's honour; she resisted her
own young heart, and mine, and a thousand, thousand, thousand things,
which must have conquered any other. She remained unshaken. A woman
taught me the duty of a man! to persuade me to keep the path of virtue,
her conduct was at once an example and a reproach; and when she beheld
me break through all bounds, and rush blindly to the precipice, she had
the courage to abandon me, rather than follow me."[30]
But whether, in this long conflict, Laura preserved her heart untouched,
as well as her virtue immaculate; whether she shared the love she
inspired; or whether she escaped from the captivating assiduities and
intoxicating homage of her lover, "_fancy-free_;"--whether coldness, or
prudence, or pride, or virtue, or the mere heartless love of admiration,
or a mixture of all together, dictated her conduct, is at least as well
worth inquiry, as the exact colour of her eyes, or the form of her nose,
upon which we have pages of grave discussion. She might have been
_coquette par instinct_, if not _par calcul_; she might have felt, with
feminine _tacte_, that to preserve her influence over Petrarch, it was
necessary to preserve his respect. She was evidently proud of her
conquest: she had else been more or less than woman; and at every
hazard, but that of self-respect, she was resolved to retain him. If
Petrarch absented himself for a few days, he was generally better
treated on his return.[31] If he avoided her, then her eye followed him
with a softer expression. When he looked pale from sickness of heart and
agitation of spirits, Laura would address him with a few words of
pitying tenderness. He thanks her in those exquisite lines, which seem
to glow with all the renovation of hope,
Volgendo gli occhi al mio novo colore
Che fa di morte rimembrar le gente
Pieta vi mosse, onde benignamente
Salutando teneste in vita il core.
La frale vita ch'ancor meco alberga,
Fu de' begli occhi vostri aperto dono,
E della voce angelica soave![32]
He presumes upon this benignity, and is again dashed back with frowns.
He flies to solitude,--solitude!--Never let the proud and torn heart,
wrung with the sense of injury, and sick with unrequited passion, seek
that worst resource against pain, for there grief grows by contemplation
of itself, and every feeling is sharpened by collision. Petrarch sought
to "mitigate the fever of his heart" amid the shades of Vaucluse, a spot
so gloomy and so solitary, that his very servants forsook him; and
Vaucluse, its fountains, its forests, and its hanging cliffs, reflected
only the image of Laura.
L'acque parlan d'amore, e l'aura, e i rami
E gli augeletti, e i pesci e i fiori e l'erba;
Tutti insieme pregando ch' io sempr'ami![33]
He is driven again to her feet by his own insupportable thoughts--and in
terror of himself;--
Tal paura ho di ritrovarmi solo!
He endeavours to maintain in her presence that self-constraint she had
enjoined. He assumes a cold and calm deportment, and Laura, as she
passes him, whispers in a tone of gentle reproach, "Petrarch! are you so
soon weary of loving me?" (ten or eleven years of adoration were, in
truth, nothing--_to signify_!) At length, he resolved to leave Laura and
Avignon for ever; and instead of plunging into solitude, to seek the
wiser resource of travel and society. He announced this intention to
Laura, and bade her a long farewell; either through surprise, or grief,
or the fear of losing her glorious captive, she turned exceedingly pale,
a cloud overspread her beautiful countenance, and she fixed her eyes on
the ground. This was to her lover an intoxicating moment; in the
exultation of sudden delight, he interpreted these symptoms of
relenting, this "vago impallidir," too favourably to himself. "She bent
those gentle eyes upon the earth, which in their sweet silence said,--to
me at least they seemed to say,--'who takes my faithful friend so far
from me?'"
Chinava a terra il bel guardo gentile,
E tacendo dicea, com' a me parve--
"Chi m'allontana il mio fedele amico?"
On his return to Avignon, a few months afterwards, Laura received him
with evident pleasure; but he is not, therefore, more _avance_; all this
was probably the refined coquetterie of a woman of calm passions; but
not heartless, not really indifferent to the devotion she inspired, nor
ungrateful for it.
Petrarch has himself left us a most minute and interesting description
of the whole course of Laura's conduct towards him, which by a beautiful
figure of poetry he has placed in her own mouth. The passage occurs in
the TRIONFO DI MORTE, beginning, "La notte che segui l'orribil caso."
The apparition of Laura descending on the morning dew, bright as the
opening dawn, and crowned with Oriental gems,
Di gemme orientali incoronata,
appears before her lover, and addresses him with compassionate
tenderness. After a short dialogue, full of poetic beauty and noble
thoughts,[34] Petrarch conjures her, in the name of heaven and of truth,
to tell him whether the pity she sometimes expressed for him was allied
to love? for that the sweetness she mingled with her disdain and
reserve--the soft looks with which she tempered her anger, had left him
for long years in doubt of her real sentiments, still doating, still
suspecting, still hoping without end:
Creovvi amor pensier mai nella testa,
D' aver pieta del mio lungo martire
Non lasciando vostr' alta impresa onesta?
Che vostri dolci sdegni e le dolc' ire--
Le dolci paci ne' begli occhi scritte--
Tenner molt' anni in dubbio il mio desire.
She replies evasively, with a smile and a sigh, that her heart was ever
with him, but that to preserve her own fair fame, and the virtue of
both, it was necessary to assume the guise of severity and disdain. She
describes the arts with which she kept alive his passion, now checking
his presumption with the most frigid reserve, and when she saw him
drooping, as a man ready to die, "all fancy-sick and pale of cheer,"
gently restoring him with soft looks and kind words:
"Salvando la tua vita e'l nostro onore."
She confesses the delight she felt in being beloved, and the pride she
took in being sung by so great a poet. She reminds him of one particular
occasion, when seated by her side, and they were left alone, he sang to
his lute a song composed to her praise, beginning, "Dir piu non osa il
nostro amore;" and she asks him whether he did not perceive that the
veil had then nearly fallen from her heart?[35]
She laments, in some exquisite lines, that she had not the happiness to
be born in Italy, the native country of her lover, and yet allows that
the land must needs be fair in which she first won his affection.
Duolmi ancor veramente, ch'io non nacqui
Almen piu presso al tuo fiorito nido!--
Ma assai fu bel paeese ov'io ti piacqui.
In another passage we have a sentiment evidently taken from nature, and
exquisitely graceful and feminine. "You," says Laura, "proclaimed to all
men the passion you felt for me: you called aloud for pity: you kept not
the tender secret for me alone, but took a pride and a pleasure in
publishing it forth to the world; thus constraining me, by all a woman's
fear and modesty, to be silent."--"But not less is the pain because we
conceal it in the depths of the heart, nor the greater because we lament
aloud: fiction and poetry can add nothing to truth, nor yet take from
it."
Tu eri di merce chiamar gia roco
Quand'io tacea; perche vergogna e tema
Facean molto desir, parer si poco;
Non e minor il duol perch' altri 'l prema,
Ne maggior per andarsi lamentando:
Per fizion non cresce il ver, ne scema.
Petrarch, then all trembling and in tears, exclaims, "that could he but
believe he had been dear to her eyes as to her heart, he were
sufficiently recompensed for all his sufferings;" and she replies, "that
will I never reveal!" ('_quello mi taccio._') By this coquettish and
characteristic answer, we are still left in the dark. Such was the
sacred respect in which Petrarch held her he so loved, that though he
evidently wishes to believe--perhaps _did_ believe, that he had touched
her heart, he would not presume to insinuate what Laura had never
avowed. The whole scene, though less polished in the versification than
some of his sonnets, is written throughout with all the flow and fervour
of real feeling. It received the poet's last corrections twenty-six
years after Laura's death, and but a few weeks previous to his own.
* * * * *
When at Milan, I was taken, as a matter of course, to visit the
Ambrosian library. At the time I was ill in health, dejected and
indifferent; and I only remember being led in passive resignation from
room to room, and called upon to admire a vast variety of objects, at
the moment when I was pining for rest; when to look, think, speak, or
move, was pain,--when to sit motionless and gaze out upon the sunshine,
seemed to me the only supreme blessedness. In such moments as these, we
can have sympathies with nature, but not with old books and antiquities.
I have a most confused recollection both of the locality and the
contents of this famous collection; but there were two objects which
roused me from this sullen stupor, and indelibly impressed my
imagination and my memory; and one of these was the celebrated copy of
Virgil, which had been the favourite companion and constant study of
Petrarch, containing that memorandum of the death of Laura, in his own
handwriting, which, after much expenditure of paper, and argument, and
critical abuse, is at length admitted to be genuine. I knew little of
the controversy this famous inscription had occasioned in Italy,--though
I was aware that its authenticity had been disputed: but as a homely
proverb saith, _seeing is believing_; to look upon the handwriting with
my own eyes, would have made assurance double sure, if in that moment I
needed such assurance. I do not remember reasoning or doubting on the
subject;--but gushing up like the waters of an intermitting fountain,
there was a sudden flow of feeling and memory came over my heart:--I
stood for some moments silently contemplating the name of LAURA, in the
pale, half-effaced characters traced by the hand of her lover; that name
with which his genius and his love have filled the earth: confused
thoughts of the mingling of vanity and glory,--of the "poco polvere che
nulla sente," and the immortality of deified beauty, were crowded in my
mind. When all were gone, I turned back, and gave the guide a small
gratuity to be allowed to do homage to the name of Laura, by pressing my
lips upon it. The reader smiles at this sentimental enthusiasm; so would
I, if time had not taught me to respect, as well as regret, what it has
taken from me, and never can restore.
The memorandum has often been quoted; but this account of the love of
Petrarch would not be complete were it omitted here. It runs literally
thus:--
"Laura, illustrious by her own virtues, and long celebrated by my
verses, I beheld for the first time, in my early youth, on the 6th of
April, 1327, about the first hour of the day, in the church of Saint
Claire in Avignon: and in the same city, in the same month of April, the
same day and hour, in the year 1348, this light of my life was withdrawn
from the world while I was at Verona, ignorant, alas! of what had
befallen me. The terrible intelligence was conveyed in a letter from
Louis, and reached me at Parma the 19th of May, early in the morning.
"Her chaste and beautiful remains were deposited the same day after
vespers, in the Church of the Fratri Minori (Cordeliers). Her spirit, as
Seneca said of Scipio Africanus,[36] has returned, doubtless, to that
heaven whence it came.
"To preserve the memory of this afflicting loss, it is with a bitter
pleasure I record it here, in this book which is ever before my eyes,
that nothing in this world may hereafter delight me: and that the chief
tie which bound me to life being broken, I may, by frequently looking on
these words, and thinking on this transitory existence, be prepared to
quit this earthly Babylon, which, with the help of the divine grace, and
the constant and manly recollection of those fruitless desires, and vain
hopes, and sad vicissitudes which have so long agitated me, will be an
easy task."
Laura died of the plague, which then desolated Avignon, and terminated
the life of the sufferer on the third day. The moment she was seized
with the fatal symptoms, she dictated her will; and notwithstanding the
pestilential nature of her disorder, she was surrounded to the last by
her numerous relations and friends, who braved death rather than forsake
her.
Her tomb was discovered and opened in 1533, in the presence of Francis
the First, whose celebrated stanzas on the occasion are well known.
Of the fame, which even in her lifetime, the love and poetical adoration
of Petrarch had thrown round his Laura, a curious instance is given
which will characterise the manners of the age. When Charles of
Luxemburgh (afterwards Emperor) was at Avignon, a grand fete was given,
in his honour, at which all the noblesse were present. He desired that
Petrarch's Laura should be pointed out to him; and when she was
introduced, he made a sign with his hand that the other ladies present
should fall back; then going up to Laura, and for a moment contemplating
her with interest, he kissed her respectfully on the forehead and on the
eyelids. Petrarch alludes to this incident in the 201st sonnet, the last
line of which shows that this royal salutation was considered singular.
"M'empia d'invidia l'atto dolce e strano."
Petrarch survived her twenty-six years, dying in 1374. He was found
lifeless one morning in his study, his hand resting on a book.
* * * * *
The inferences I draw from this rapid sketch are, first, that Laura was
virtuous, but not insensible;--for had she been facile, she would not
have preserved her lover's respect; had she been a heartless trifler,
she could not have retained his love, nor deserved his undying regrets:
and secondly, that if Petrarch had not attached himself fervently to
this beautiful and pure-hearted woman, he would have employed his
splendid talents like other men of his time. He might then have left us
theological treatises and Latin epics, which the worms would have eaten;
he might have risen high in the church or state; have become a bold,
intriguing priest; a politic archbishop,--a cardinal,--a pope;--most
worthless and empty titles all, compared with that by which he has
descended to us, as Petrarch, the poet and the lover of Laura![37]
FOOTNOTES:
[29] Madame Deshoulieres speaks "avec connaissance de fait," and even
points out the very spot in which Laura, "de l'amoureux Petrarque
adoucit le martyre."--Another French lady, who piqued herself on being a
descendant of the family of Laura, was extremely affronted and
scandalised when the Chevalier Ramsay asserted that Petrarch's passion
was purely poetical and platonic, and regarded it heresy to suppose that
Laura could have been "_ungrateful_,"--such was her idea of feminine
_gratitude_!--(Spence's Anecdotes.) Then comes another French woman,
with the most anti-poetical soul that God ever placed within the form of
a woman--"Le fade personage que votre Petrarque! que sa Laure etait
sotte et precieuse! que la Cour d'Amour etait fastidieuse!" &c. exclaims
the acute, amusing, profligate, heartless Madame du Deffand. It must be
allowed that Petrarch and Laura would have been extremely _desplaces_ in
the Court of the Regent,--the only _Court of Love_ with which Madame du
Deffand was acquainted, and which assuredly was not _fastidieuse_.
[30] From the Dialogues with St. Augustin, as quoted in the "Pieces
Justificatives," and by Ginguene (Hist. Litt. vol. iii. notes.) These
imaginary dialogues are a series of Confessions not intended for
publication by Petrarch, but now printed with his prose works.
[31] Sonnet 39.
[32] Ballata 5.
[33] Petrarch withdrew to Vaucluse in 1337, and spent three years in
entire solitude. He commenced his journey to Rome in 1341, about
fourteen years after his first interview with Laura.
[34] Petrarch asks her whether it was "pain to die?" she replies in
those fine lines which have been quoted a thousand times:
La Morte e fin d' una prigion oscura
Agli animi gentili; agli altri e noia,
Ch' hanno posto nel fango ogni lor cura.
[35]
Ma non si ruppe almen ogni vel quando
Sola i tuoi detti, te presente accolsi
"_Dir piu non osa il nostro amor_," cantando.
(The song here alluded to is not preserved in Petrarch's works, and the
expression "_il nostro amore_," is very remarkable.)
[36] This sounds at first pedantic; but it must be remembered that at
this very time Petrarch was studying Seneca, and writing a Latin poem on
the history of Scipio: thus the ideas were fresh in his mind.
[37] The hypothesis I have assumed relative to Laura's character, her
married state, and the authenticity of the MS. note in the Virgil, have
not been lightly adopted, but from deep conviction and patient
examination: but this is not the place to set arguments and authorities
in array--Ginguene and Gibbon against Lord Byron and Fraser Tytler. I am
surprised at the ground Lord Byron has taken on the question. As for his
characteristic sneer on the assertion of M. de Bastie, who had said
truly and beautifully--"qu'il n'y a que la vertu seule qui soit capable
de faire des impressions que la mort n'efface pas," I disdain, in my
feminine character, to reply to it; I will therefore borrow the
eloquence of a more powerful pen:--"The love of a man like Petrarch,
would have been less in character, if it had been less ideal. For the
purposes of inspiration, a single interview was quite sufficient. The
smile which sank into his heart the first time he ever beheld Laura,
played round her lips ever after: the look with which her eyes first met
his, never passed away. The image of his mistress still haunted his
mind, and was recalled by every object in nature. Even death could not
dissolve the fine illusion; for that which exists in the imagination is
alone imperishable. As our feelings become more ideal, the impression of
the moment indeed becomes less violent; but the effect is more general
and permanent. The blow is felt only by reflection; it is the rebound
that is fatal. We are not here standing up for this kind of Platonic
attachment, but only endeavouring to explain the way in which the
passions very commonly operate in minds accustomed to draw their
strongest interests from constant contemplation."--_Edinburgh Review._