FOSCOLO, UQO. 



F06SATI, DOMENICO. 



Ml 



rersity without baring made np his mind to any particular profession, 

 he returned to Venice and wrote a tragedy, ' 11 Tieste,' which waa 

 performed in January 1797. In that samo year the ancient aristocracy 

 of Venice fell by the hand* of Bonaparte, and Foecolo, who, like 

 othen of hi* countrymen, had expected the establishment of a new 

 and popular republic, felt bitterly disappointed at the conqueror 

 Airing np Venice to Austria. At Milan on. I Florence he gave Tent 

 to hi< excited feelings in the ' Lettere di duo Aiuanti,' afterwards pub- 

 lUtiu I uud.-r tlie name of ' Lettero di Ortis.' This work, of little 

 ralue r.s a novel, poetesses a higher sort of interest from the political 

 allusion*, the bursts of invective, and the picture of society in those 

 dUjointcd times, which it contains. The language is beautiful and the 

 tone affecting, though too querulous and desponding ; but as such it 

 was in harmony with the then prevailing feeling. The ' Lettere di 

 Ortis' had a prodigious success in Italy; but all the editions were 

 mutilated except a private one printed nt Venice in 1802, and that of 

 1814, which Foscolo himself published at Zurich with the date of 

 London, which alone contains, among several passages left out in the 

 oilier edition*, the letter dated 17th of March 1798, in which Foscolo 

 clearly expressed his opinion of Bonaparte's character. Foscolo 

 served as a volunteer in the Lombard Legion through the disastrous 

 campaign of 1790, and followed the French in their retreat to Genoa, 

 where he remained during the siege of that city till Juno 1SOO, when 

 the garrison capitulated, and was carried to France by the English 

 ships. Meantime the battle of Marengo took place, Lombardy was 

 reconquered, and Foscolo repaired to Milan ; peace being concluded 

 soon after, he returned to private life and to his literary pursuits. 



In 1S02, Bonaparte having called together at Lyon a meeting of 

 Italian deputies in order to device a new constitution for the Cisalpine 

 republic, Foscolo was requested by some indivfduals then in office, 

 to write an address to the First Consul, with an exposition of the 

 state of the country, and the wishes of the people. He did write it, 

 but in n very different strain from what they expected : he drew an 

 eloquent but fearful retrospect of the oppressions, the depreciations. 

 the injuries of every kind which the people of Italy had suffered at 

 the bauds of the various military and civil authorities appointed by 

 the French since 1796 ; the disgraceful persecution of the clergy and the 

 so-called aristocrat*, and other abuses of party triumph. This oration 

 was, of course, never read to the First Consul, but it was published 

 some time after at Milan ' Orazione a Buonaparte pel Congresso di 

 Lione : ' it forms an important memorial of the times, and an honour- 

 able testimonial of the unconpromising spirit of Foscolo, who seems 

 to have taken Dante and Alfieri for his models. Foscolo remained 

 for some years quietly at Milan under the mild administration of the 

 vice-president Melzi. He published an Italian version of Callimaclms 

 ' De Coma Berenices/ with interesting notes and commentaries. 



In 1S05 we find him again serving in an Italian regiment which 

 formed part of the army assembled near the coast of the British 

 Channel for the intended invasion of England. Being stationed at 

 St. Omer he there attempted an Italian translation of Sterne's 

 ' Sentimental Journey,' in which he was most successful. When a 

 few months after the camp of Boulogne was broken up, Foscolo went 

 back to Milan, and did not return into active service. He lived for 

 some time near Brescia, where he wrote his poem, 'Dei Sepolcri,' 

 1807, deprecating certain harsh regulations which forbade any monu- 

 ment or memorial being raised over the tombs of the dead. This 

 beautiful little poem, full of lofty thoughts and lyric power, was 

 dedicated by the author to a brother poet, Ippolito Piudemoute of 

 Verona, and it secured to Foscolo a distinguished rank among the 

 Italian poets. It was commented on, imitated, and even translated 

 into Latin hexameters. 



In 1808, Foscolo being appointed professor of Italian eloquence at 

 Pavia, was privately urged by some official persons to begin hU course 

 by some tribute of praise to the emperor Napoleon, according to the 

 received custom; and it was hinted to him that the decoration of the 

 Legion of Honour would be the reward of his compliance. Foscolo 

 remained unmoved: he took as the subject of his inaugural oration 

 the origin and the object of literature' Dell' Origino e dell' Ufficio 

 dellaLetteratura;' and descanted on the moral and civil duties of 

 literary men ; on the nobleness of their calling when conscientiously 

 mrdsed ; and be exhorted the Italian youth to devote themselves to 

 literature for it* own sake; "to study above all the history of their 

 country, and the lives and works of Dante. Machiavelli, Galileo, and 

 Tasso ; to bend over their totnbs and learn from those illustrious dead 

 how they fed the sacred fire of genius through persecution!", torments, 

 ., in the gloom of dungeons and amidst the squalidneu of 

 domestic poverty, and bow they were supported in their trials by the 



re of their country, of truth, and of fame, which enabled them to 

 toave to posterity the rich legacy of their works and the benefit of 

 their example. This address, delivered before a numerous audience, 

 produced a thrilling sensation, and was followed by burst* of applause. 



>t a word hd I o, C olo said about emperor or prince, government or 

 miniUr. A few toouths after the chair of Italian eloquence was sup- 

 ine iiDiverniii.ii of the kingdom of Italy, and Foscolo re- 

 tired to Borgo di Vico, near Coino, where he e njoyed the society of Count 

 Qiotioand his family, lie there wrote bis tragedy of ' Ajax,' which 

 wa* performed at Milan, and not only proved a failure, but involved 

 bim k a sort of ministerial persecution, because be was suspected to 



have alluded in hi* play to Napoleon's ambition. At the same time 

 certain academicians whose pedantry he had ridiculed in another 

 work, expressed their opinion in the Poligrafo, a literary journal, 

 " that whoever sneers at the labours of professors, academicians, and 

 librarians, taxes thereby with ignorance the monarch who protects 

 them, and becomes, by so doing, guilty of treason." Foscolo however 

 had some influential friends, and he was merely banished from Milan. 

 At Florence, where he fixed his residence, ho completed his trai, 

 of ' .Sterne : ' ' Viaggio Sentimentale di Yorick lungo la Fraucia, tra- 

 duzionc di Didimo Cuierico; ' and wrote another tragedy entitled 

 ' Kicciarda,' a Hymn to the Graces, and other compositions. 



In 1818 he was allowed to return to Milan, and in the following 

 year, when the French abandoned the country and a pro\ 

 government was formed, Foscolo was appointed major on the staff, 

 and endeavoured, though ineffectually, to save the ex-ministei 

 from the fury of the mob. When the Austriaas took possession of 

 Milan, Foscolo drew up a protest in the name of the inhabitants of 

 Lomburdy addressed to the allied powers. He remained howev 

 at Milan, and had the offer from some of the Austrian authorities of 

 the editorship of a new literary journal ; but having learnt that ha was 

 charged by the more rigid patriots with being a turncoat, and on the 

 other hand finding that if he remained he would have to servo in tlie 

 militia, he, all of a sudden, disappeared from Milan towards the end of 

 1814, and repaired to Switzerland, where he resided for almost two 

 years, chiefly at Hottingon, near Zurich. Here he published a correct 

 edition of his ' Lettere di Ortia,' and also a satire in Latin prose, 

 entitled ' Didymi Clerici Propheto Minimi Hypercalypseos,' in which 

 he lashed his Milan enemies of the literary and courtly coteries who 

 had annoyed him about his ' Ajax.' Not finding sufficient encourage- 

 ment in Switzerland for his literary labours as a means of subsi 

 he came to England about the end of 1816, and was introdiu 

 some of the best society of the metropolis : he formed literary con- 

 nexions, delivered a course of lectures on Italian literature, and wrote 

 articles both for the Edinburgh and Quarterly Reviews. In London 

 he published his ' Ricciorda,' the Essays on Petrarch and Danta, which 

 are among his best compositions, the ' Discorso Storico nul testo del 

 Dccamcrone,' and the ' Uiscorso Storico sul testo di Dante,' which is a 

 work full of erudition. He had engaged to superintend a new edition 

 of Dante, with ample commentaries, bat he did not live to finish this 

 work. Want of order, extravagance, the unbridled indulgence iu 

 licentious habits, and an immoderate love of gaming, combined with 

 the absence of all judgment in money matters, involved him in em- 

 barrassments, which, joined to his fretful and overbearing temper and 

 assiduous application, shortened his days. Ho died of the dropsy on 

 the 10th of October, 1827, fit Turiiham Green, near London, 

 fifty years of age, and was buried in Cuiswick churchyard, with a plain 

 marble slab and inscription over his tomb. Notwithstanding \>. 

 temper and many eccentricities, to use a very mild term, he secured 

 wherever he lived some warm and lasting friends, who felt hi < 

 as a loss. The life of Foscolo derives a certain importance from the 

 times he lived in, and the political scenes in which ho mixed. Ho had 

 the merit of standing aloof, one of the few, amidst the general pros- 

 tration of hia countrymen before the shrine of Napoleon. " ilia un- 

 conquerable silence,' observes a by no means partial biographer, 

 " amidst the strains of vulgar adulation, deserves to be recorded iu 

 history. If amidst the Asiatic idolatry towards Napoleon, any kiud 

 of opposition can be said to have existed in Italy, Foscolo must be 

 considered as the leader of it." (Pecchio,/ Vita di Ugo Foscolo.') 

 When the reaction came he refused likewise to associate with thu-o 

 who would not restore his country to national independence. His 

 sentiments, as expressed in his works, are never those of a pa: 

 he deals out with an impartial hand to all ; his thoughts are often 

 generous and pure, his learning is real, and he has added fresh vigour 

 to Itali.iu prone. His dramas are the weakest of his productions. To 

 his compositions already mentioned, may be added an Italian version 

 of some cantos of the Iliad, ' Alcuni soritti e trattati iuediti,' Lug mo, 

 IS'J'.i, including Borne of hi* lectures at Pavia, and various poetical 

 effusions. 



(Of ere Settle di Ugo Fotcolo, 2 vols. 8vo ; Fiesole, 1838 ; Gen,. Hi, 

 Delia Vila <tc., di Uyo Poicolo ; and article! on 1'oicolo in No. XVI II. 

 of t/te Foreign Quarterly Jierieir, May, 1832. Athencciun, Dec, 14, 18 JO.) 



FOSSATI, DOME'NICO, born at Venice iu 1743, was the on of 

 Giorgio Forsati, who, besides practising as an architect, was also a 

 painter and engraver. The elder Fo.ts.iti uioy also claim to be con- 

 i-iderr d an author, having published iu 1747 an Italian translation of 

 Felibien's ' Lives of Architects,' a second edition of which appeared 

 iu 177'). Gifted with a fertile imagination, and delighting in the 

 poetic effect* which architecture is capable of producing, Don 

 chose for himself a walk of art which, although generally looked 

 upon as a secondary one, enabled him to improvite at will the must 

 splendid conceptions, quite unchecked by either utilitarian or neces- 

 sitarian considerations. Having finished his studies, he commenced 

 scene-painter, and was abundantly employed uot only as such, but 

 hi adorning various palaces and churches with architectural and other 

 decorative painting. On the Teatro di San Benedetto in Venice 

 burnt dowu in 1776, he made a model for a new edifice ; yet greatly 

 as it wag admired, it was not adopted, on account of being fouud too 

 expensive. He however painted a great deal of the scenery for tlio 



