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And when at length the winged wanderers stoop,
Then is the prey-birds' triumph, then they share
The spoil, o'erpower'd at length by one fell swoop.
Yet some have been untouch'd, who learn'd to bear,
Some whom no power could ever force to droop,
Who could resist themselves even,
hardest care,

And task most hopeless! but some such have been :
And if my name amongst the number were,
That destiny austere, and yet serene,

Were prouder than more dazzling fame unblest.
The Alp's snow summit nearer heaven is seen

Than the volcano's fierce eruptive crest,

Whose splendour from the black abyss is flung,
While the scorch'd mountain, from whose burning breast

A temporary torturing flame is wrung,

Shines for a night of terror, then repels

Its fire back to the hell from whence it sprung,

The hell which in its entrails ever dwells.

CANTO IV.

MANY are poets who have never penn'd
Their inspiration, and perchance the best:
They felt, and loved, and died, but would not lend
Their thoughts to meaner beings; they compress'd
The god within them, and rejoin'd the stars
Unlaurell'd upon earth, but far more blest
Than those who are degraded by the jars
Of passion, and their frailties link'd to fame,
Conquerors of high renown, but full of scars.
Many are poets, but without the name ;
For what is poesy but to create
From overfeeling good or ill; and aim
At an external life beyond our fate,

And be the new Prometheus of new men,
Bestowing fire from heaven, and then, too late,
Finding the pleasure given repaid with pain,
And vultures to the heart of the bestower,
Who, having lavish'd his high gift in vain,
Lies chain'd to his lone rock by the sea-shore !
So be it; we can bear.-But thus all they,
Whose intellect is an o'ermastering power,
Which still recoils from its encumbering clay,
Or lightens it to spirit, whatsoe'er

The form which their creations may essay,

bear

;

Are bards. The kindled marble's bust may wear
More poesy upon its speaking brow
Than aught less than the Homeric page may
One noble stroke with a whole life may
Or deify the canvass till it shine
With beauty so surpassing all below,
That they who kneel to idols so divine

glow,

Break no commandment, for high heaven is there
Transfused, transfigurated: and the line

Of poesy which peoples but the air

With thought and beings of our thought reflected,
Can do no more then let the artist share
The palm, he shares the peril, and dejected
Faints o'er the labour unapproved-Alas!
Despair and genius are too oft connected.
Within the ages which before me pass,

Art shall resume and equal even the sway
Which with Apelles and old Phidias
She held in Hellas' unforgotten day.
Ye shall be taught by ruin to revive
The Grecian forms at least from their decay,
And Roman souls at last again shall live

In Roman works wrought by Italian hands,
And temples loftier than the old temples give
New wonders to the world; and while still stands
The austere Pantheon, into heaven shall soar
A dome, 13 its image, while the base expands
Into a fane surpassing all before,

Such as all flesh shall flock to kneel in: ne'er
Such sight hath been unfolded by a door

As this, to which all nations shall repair,

And lay their sins at this huge gate of heaven.
And the bold architect unto whose care

The daring charge to raise it shall be given,
Whom all arts shall acknowledge as their lord,
Whether into the marble chaos driven

His chisel bid the Hebrew,13 at whose word
Israel left Egypt, stop the waves in stone,
Or hues of hell be by his pencil pour'd
Over the damn'd before the Judgment throne,14
Such as I saw them, such as all shall see,
Or fanes be built of grandeur yet unknown,
The stream of his great thoughts shall spring from me,15
The Ghibelline, who traversed the three realms

Which form the empire of eternity.

Amidst the clash of swords and clang of helms,
The age which I anticipate, no less

Shall be the age of beauty, and while whelms
Calamity the nations with distress,

The genius of my country shall arise,
A cedar towering o'er the wilderness,
Lovely in all its branches to all eyes,
Fragrant as fair, and recognised afar,
Wafting its native incense through the skies.
Sovereigns shall pause amid their sport of war,
Wean'd for an hour from blood, to turn and gaze
On canvass or on stone; and they who mar
All beauty upon earth, compell'd to praise,

Shall feel the power of that which they destroy;
And art's mistaken gratitude shall raise

To tyrants who but take her for a toy

Emblems and monuments, and prostitute

Her charms to pontiffs proud, 16 who but employ The man of genius as the meanest brute

To bear a burthen, and to serve a need, To sell his labours, and his soul to boot. Who toils for nations may be poor indeed,

But free; who sweats for monarchs is no more Than the gilt chamberlain, who, clothed and fee'd, Stands sleek and slavish bowing at his door. Oh, Power that rulest and inspirest! how Is it that they on earth, whose earthly power Is likest thine in heaven in outward show, Least like to thee in attributes divine, Tread on the universal necks that bow; And then assure us that their rights are thine? And how is it that they, the sons of fame, Whose inspiration seems to them to shine From high, they whom the nations oftest name, their days in penury or pain, Or step to grandeur through the paths of shame, And wear a deeper brand and gaudier chain? Of if their destiny be borne aloof From lowliness, or tempted thence in vain, In their own souls sustain a harder proof,

Must pass

The inner war of passions deep and fierce?
Florence! when thy harsh sentence razed
I loved thee, but the vengeance of my verse,
The hate of injuries, which every year
Makes greater and accumulates my curse,
Shall live, outliving all thou holdest dear,

my

roof,

Thy pride, thy wealth, thy freedom, and even that,
The most infernal of all evils here,

The

sway of petty tyrants in a state;

For such sway is not limited to kings,

And demagogues yield to them but in date,

As swept off sooner; in all deadly things

Which make men hate themselves and one another,

In discord, cowardice, cruelty, all that springs
From Death, the Sin-born's incest with his mother,
In rank oppression in its rudest shape,
The faction chief is but the sultan's brother,
And the worst despot's far less human ape.
Florence! when this lone spirit which so long
Yearn'd, as the captive toiling at escape,

To fly back to thee in despite of wrong,
An exile, saddest of all prisoners,

Who has the whole world for a dungeon strong,
Seas, mountains, and the horizon's verge for bars,
Which shut him from the sole small spot of earth
Where, whatsoe'er his fate-he still were hers,
His country's, and might die where he had birth;-
Florence! when this lone spirit shall return
To kindred spirits, thou wilt feel my worth,
And seek to honour with an empty urn

The ashes thou shalt ne'er obtain.-Alas!

"What have I done to thee, my people?" "7 Stern
Are all thy dealings, but in this they pass
The limits of man's common malice, for
All that a citizen could be, I was:

Raised by thy will, all thine in peace or war,

And for this thou hast warr'd with me.-'T is done : not overleap the eternal bar

may Built up between us, and will die alone,

Beholding, with the dark eye of a seer, The evil days to gifted souls foreshown, Foretelling them to those who will not hear, As in the old time, till the hour be come

When truth shall strike their eyes through many a tear, And make them own the prophet in his tomb.

NOTES.

Note 1. Page 419.

'Midst whom my own bright Beatrice bless'd.

The reader is requested to adopt the Italian pronunciation of Beatrice, sounding all the syllables.

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Canzone, in which Dante describes the person of Beatrice, strophe third.

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in which he represents Right, Generosity, and Temperance, as banished from among men, and seeking refuge from Love, who inhabits his bosom.

Note 4. Page 421.

The dust she dooms to scatter.

"Ut si quis prædictorum ullo tempore in fortiam dicti communis pervenerit, talis perveniens igne comburatur, sic quod moriatur."

Second sentence of Florence against Dante and the fourteen accused with him.— The Latin is worthy of the sentence.

Note 5. Page 422.

Where yet my boys are, and that fatal she.

This lady, whose name was Gemma, sprung from one of the most powerful Guelf families, named Donati. Corso Donati was the principal adversary of the Ghibellines. She is described as being " Admodum morosa, ut de Xantippe Socratis philosophi conjuge scriptum esse legimus," according to Giannozzo Manetti. But Lionardo Aretino is scandalized with Boccace, in his life of Dante, for saying that literary men should not marry. "Qui in Boccacio non ha pazienza, e dice, le mogli esser contrarie agli studj; e non si ricorda che Socrate il più nobile filosofo che mai fosse, ebbe moglie e figliuoli e ufficj della Repubblica nella sua Città; e Aristotele che, &c., &c. ebbe due mogli in varj tempi, ed ebbe figliuoli, e ricchezze assai.-E Marco Tullio e Catone-e Varrone-e Seneca-ebbero moglie," &c., &c. It is odd that honest Lionardo's examples, with the exception of Seneca, and, for any thing I know, of Aristotle, are not the most felicitous. Tully's Terentia, and Socrates' Xantippe, by no means contributed to their husbands' happiness, whatever they might do to their philosophy-Cato gave away his wife-of Varro's we know nothing-and of Seneca's, only that she was disposed to die with him, but recovered, and lived several years afterwards. But, says Lionardo, "L'uomo è animale civile, secondo piace a tutti i filosofi." And thence concludes that the greatest proof of the animal's civism is "la prima congiunzione, dalla quale moltiplicata nasce la Città."

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