(01 



DANTE, ALIGHIKRI. 



DANTE, ALIGHIERI. 



01 



report of hu guilt, " fumit publics," which iu this case mennt the 

 report of bin enemies. Thii curious document was found in the 

 archive* of Florence in the hit century, and ha* been ttnnBcribed by 

 Tirabotcbi, ' Storia dell* Lttteratura," torn, v., part 2, cap. 2. Dante 

 now began bin wandering*, renouncing bU Guelph connections, and 

 intent upon exciting the Ghibelinea of Italy against hi* enemies and 

 the oppressors of bis country. He appears to have repaired first to 

 Verona, which waa then ruled by the family of La Scala, powerful 

 leaden among the Qhibelinea. But he soon after returned to 

 Tuscany, where the Bianchi and Ghibelim s DOW united were gathering 

 their strength in the neighbourhood of Arezzo. 



The death of Boniface VIII. iu September 1303 inspired them with 

 fiesh hope*. Itenedict XL, the new pope, a man of a mild and concili- 

 atory spirit, sent Cardinal de I'rato to endeavour to restore peace in 

 Tuscany, but the cardinal was opposed by the ruling faction at Flo- 

 rence, who frightened him out of the town. Florence was left a prey 

 to anarchy, during which a fire broke out which destroyed 1900 houses 

 iu June 1304. The Bianchi and Gbibelines thought of availing them- 

 selrrs of the confusion to surprise the town ; and some of them actually 

 entered one of the gates, but they were badly supported by those 

 outside, and the attempt totally failed. Dante (' Purgatorio,' xvii.) 

 censures the want of prudence and concord in the leaders on that 

 occasion. He seems soon after to have left them in disgust, deter- 

 inincd to regulate himself in future according to bis owu judgment. 

 He says himself that " it was difficult to say which of the two contend- 

 ing parties was most in the wrong." (' I'uradis.i,' vi. 102.) Dante 

 appears to have been at Padua about 130G, and in the following year 

 with the Malispina, the lords of Luuigioca ; he was also at times in 

 the valleys of Casentino, and in the mountains near Arezzo ; some say 

 he went afterwards to Pali*, and remained there some years ; others 

 believe that he did not go to France until after the death of Henry VII. 

 in 1313. But his visit to Paris is very doubtful ; though in canto x. 

 of the ' Paradise,' ho speaks of a certain Sigieri, professor of that 

 university, and designates the street in which he lived. 



Dante made also an attempt to obtain the revocation of his own 

 sentence by writing to his countrymen a pathetic letter beginning 

 with the words" Popule race, quid feci tibi ? " but all to no purpose. 

 The family of Adimari, who had taken possession of his property, 

 opposed his return. Accordingly, iu canto xvi. of the ' Paradiso,' he 

 has launched a violent invective aguintt tin in. 



The election of Henry of Luxemburg, or Henry VII., to the crown 

 of Germany, revived the hopes of Dante, as llinry was preparing to 

 come to Italy in order to assert the long-neglected rights of his prede- 

 cerson as kings of the Romans. The Qhibcline leaden were ready to 

 support his claims as imperial vicars, and the Ghibeline cities, such as 

 Pisa, were likewise in bU favour. In order to strengthen their zoal, 

 Dante, about 1310, addressed a circular letter "to the king*, dukes, 

 marquises, counts, the senators of Rome, nnd all the people of Italy, 

 congratulating them on the prospect of happiness for lt.il v through 

 the ministry of the pious Henry, who will punish the felons who 

 opposed him and bestow mercy on the repeutunt," &c. It was about 

 this time that he wrote his book 'do Monarchia,' which may be con- 

 tillered as a profession of Ghibeliue political faith : it as-crts the 

 right* of the emperors, as successors of the Cicma, to the supreme 

 temporal power, entirely independent of the popes, who are the 

 spiritual heads of the church. This creed was in opposition to the 

 assumed rights of Gregory VII., Innocent III., and other pontiffs, who 

 pretended to be above all crowned heads, and to have the disposal of 

 thrones and principalities, an assumption which the Quclphs favoured 

 in Italy in order to keep themselves free of the imperial authority. 

 Loth parties in fact acknowledged an external superior, although both 

 wished to rule in their respective communities with as little sub- 

 serviency aa possible to the nominal supremacy of either pope or 

 emperor. But there was this difference, that the imperial, or Ghibe- 

 line party, was mostly supported by the nobles, especially of North 

 Italy, who styled themselves vicars of the emperor, and was therefore 

 more aristocratic in its spirit, while the Quelpbi of Tuscany looked 

 upon the pope chiefiy as an auxiliary in time of need, whose temporal 

 interference was lew direct, and could be more easily evaded than that 

 of the emperor, so aa to admit of a more popular or democratic spirit 

 in their institutions. Such at least was the theory of the two parties, 

 for in reality the Ouelpb or popular families formed an aristocracy of 

 wealth as much as the Ghibeliues were an aristocracy of birth and 

 rank. Daute, in his book, 'de Monarchia,' is no servile advocate for 

 despotism, for be maintains that sovereigns are made to promote the 

 food of their subjects, and not subject* to serve the ambitious pleasure 

 of their sovereign*. The latter are to rule so aa to soothe the way- 

 ward passions of men, in order that all may live in peace and brotherly 

 feeling. Bat still be derives their authority from God, and he quotes 

 in support of hi* system, Aristotle, the Scriptures, and the Human 

 History, agreeably to the scholastic logic of bis times. This book ' de 

 Monarcbia ' was burnt at Bologna by order of the papal legate after 

 Dante's death. 



Henry VII. came to Italy in 1810, was crowned at Milan aa king of 

 Lombardy, and the following year be besieged Cremona, Breccia, and 

 other places. It wa* about thia time that Dante, impatient to see the 

 emperor come into Tuscany to nut down the Ouelpb*, addressed to 

 him an epistle which begins thus : ' Sanctisnimo triumphatori et 



domino singular!, dnmii:o Henrico, divina 1'rovidentia Roinaunrum 

 regi, semper Augnsto, devotissimi stii D.mtes Aligherius FlonMitinu* 

 et exul immeritus, ac univei-Ealiter omnes Tusci qui pacein deri 

 terra, osculantur cedes.' He then entreats the emperor not to tarry 

 any longer on the banks of the Po, but to advance bouth of the Apen- 

 nines and put down the spirit of Guelph sedition at Florence, against 

 which he inveighs in no moderate terms, and which, he Bays, strive* 

 to predispose against him the mind of the sovereign pontiff. He 

 speaks of Florence as revolting unnaturally against her parent Rome, 

 for Dante always affects to consider Rome a* still the. seat of the 

 empire, and Rome and the empire are often employed by him a* 

 synonyms. This remarkable epistle, of which we had only an Italian 

 version until the Latin text was discovered some thirty years cince in 

 the library of St Mark, is dated from Tuxuia, near the founts of A in >, 

 April, 1311. ('Dautis Allighieri, Kpi->tohc qua> extant. s'ir.rh 



\Vittc,' Padua, 1827.) Henry came into Tuscany, threatened Florence, 

 but without effect, was crowned at Rome, and on bis return died sud- 

 denly at Buouconvento, near Siena, in August, 1313. This was a 

 terrible blow to the hopes of the Ghibelines, and of Dante especially. 

 He now took refuge at Verona, at the court of Cune della 

 where he appears to have been before, between 1303 and 1310. ( '.me 

 was hospitable and generous to the Ghibeline emigrants, but Dante, 

 with his proud spirit and temper soured by adversity, could ill 

 accommodate himself to the flattery of courts and the flippancy of 

 courtiers, and he is said to have had some unpleasant bickerings with 

 the people about Cone. 



In a well-known passage of his poem he feelingly deplores the lot of 

 the exile who is constrained to cat the bitter bread of patronage : 



" Tu proverni si come si di inle, 

 la pimp nltrui, e com' i; duro callo, 

 Lo sccndcie, e '1 salir per 1' altrui scale." 



' Paradiso,' canto xvii. 



"Thou shall prove 



llow salt the savour is of other's brer..! ; 

 How hanl the pastugo, to descend and climb 

 By others' fUirs." CAEV. 



With Cane himself however be seems to have continued on good 

 terms; he speaks very highly of his hospitality iu a passage just 

 preceding the above lines, and there is a cordial letter from him to 

 Ciuie, written probably in the latter years of hii life, in which lie 

 <1. ilii.ite* to him his ' Paradiso,' the latter part of his great poem, and 

 explains the object of it. He fays that ho btyled it a domudy, because, 

 contrary to the style of tragedy, it begins with sorrow and ends with 

 joy ; he distinguishes between the literal and the allegorical sense 

 of his verses, and observes that his poem may bo called polyxcnsuuni, 

 having many meanings. He telU Cane the title of hu work : 

 ' lucipit Comoedia Dantis Allighcrii, Florentini natione non moribus.' 

 But the title of the part which he sends to him with the letter is : 

 ' Incipit Cantica tvrtia Coimvdiic Dantis qu:o dicitur Paradisus.' It is 

 evident from this and other circumstances, that Caun had not seen 

 the rest of the poem ; indeed it in not lik.ly that Dante ever commu- 

 nicated the whole of it to any one during his lifetime, as it would 

 have made it impossible for him to have found refuge anywhere, aa 

 Foscolo closely argues in his very elaborate and very critical ' Di 

 sul te.-t.> di Duutc,' which is one of the most judicious and Rcholar-liko 

 commentaries on that poem. 



Uf Dante's ' Comrnediu' we cannot enter hero into any detail*, and wo 

 must refer the reader to the numerous commentaries, illustrations, 

 and translations of it in every language of Europe. It is one of the 

 few works of imagination which have stood the test of ages, and which 

 will pass down to the remotest generations. It resembles no other 

 poem ; it is not an epic ; it consists of descriptions, dialogues, and 

 didactic precept*. It u a vision of the realms of eternal punishment, 

 of expiation, and of bliss, iu the invisible world beyond death. Its 

 beauties are scattered about with a lavish baud, in the form of 

 episodes, similitudes, vivid descriptions, and above till, sketches of 

 the deep workings of the human heart. It is especially in this last 

 department of poetical painting that Dante excels. Whether ho 

 describes the harrowed feelings of the wretched father in Ugolino, or 

 the self-devotedncss of the lover iu Franceses, or the melting influence 

 of the sound of the evening bell on the mariner and the pilgrim ; 

 whether he paints the despair of the reprobate souls gathered together 

 on the bonks of Acheron, cursing God and the authors of their being, 

 or the milder sorrow of the repentant, chanting the ' miserere ' along 

 their wearisome way through the regions of purgatory, ho displays 

 hi* mastery over the human fueling*, and his knowledge of those 

 chords that vibrate deepest in the heart of man. No other writer 

 except Shakspere can be compared to Dante in thia respect. His 

 touches are few, but they all tell, His power of invective is grand 

 and terrific ; witness bis imprecations against Pisa, against Florence, 

 against hi* enemies, bis address to the German, Albert, representing 

 to him the anarchy of Italy, and hi* repeated denunciations of the 

 vice* of the court of Rome. Yet Dante was a sincere Hainan 

 Catholic ; in hi* poem be places tbe heretics iu hell, and Dominic 

 in Paradise; and manifestly shows everywhere his belief in the 

 dogma* of the Roman church, but he attacks it discipline, or rather 

 tbe relaxation of its discipline. He urges, like Petrarch nnd other 



