As

and developed it in the verse of the Vita Nuova. it occupies such a prominent place in the history of Italian lyrical poetry, and so profoundly influenced Dante, we quote it in full.

OF THE GENTLE HEART.1

Within the gentle heart Love shelters him,
As birds within the green shade of the grove.
Before the gentle heart, in nature's scheme,
Love was not, nor the gentle heart ere Love.
For with the sun, at once,

So sprang the light immediately; nor was
Its birth before the sun's.

And Love hath his effect in gentleness
Of very self; even as

Within the middle fire the heat's excess.

The fire of Love comes to the gentle heart
Like as its virtue to a precious stone;
To which no star its influence can impart
Till it is made a pure thing by the sun:
For when the sun hath smit

From out its essence that which there was vile,
The star endoweth it.

And so the heart created by God's breath
Pure, true, and clean from guile,

A woman, like a Star, enamoreth.

In gentle heart Love for like reason is

For which the lamp's high flame is fanned and bow'd:

Clear, piercing bright, it shines for its own bliss ;

Nor would it burn there else, it is so proud.

For evil natures meet

With Love as it were water met with fire,
As cold abhorring heat.

Through gentle heart Love doth a track divine,—
Like knowing like; the same

As diamond through iron in the mine.

The sun strikes full upon the mud all day:

It remains vile, nor the sun's worth is less.

1 Dante and his Circle, D. G. Rossetti, p. 187. Little, Brown, and Company. (By permission.)

"By race I am gentle," the proud man doth say:
He is the mud, the sun is gentleness.

Let no man predicate

That aught the name of gentleness should have,
Even in a king's estate,

Except the heart there be a gentle man's.

The star-beam lights the wave, —
Heaven holds the star and the star's radiance.

God, in the understanding of high Heaven,
Burns more than in our sight the living sun :
There to behold His Face unveiled is given;
And Heaven, whose will is homage paid to One,
Fulfils the things which live

In God from the beginning excellent.
So should my lady give

That truth which in her eyes is glorified,
On which her heart is bent,

To me whose service waiteth at her side.

My lady, God shall ask, "What daredst thou?"
(When my soul stands with all her acts review'd)
"Thou passedst Heaven, into My sight, as now,
To make Me of vain love similitude.

To Me doth praise belong,

And to the Queen of all the realm of grace
Who slayeth fraud and wrong."

Then may I plead :

66

As though from Thee he came,

Love wore an angel's face:

Lord, if I love her, count it not my shame."

The Provençal solution of the origin, nature, and influence of Love was that it springs from seeing and pleasing. "The image of beauty," says Gaspary,1 "penetrates through the eyes into the soul, takes root in the heart and occupies the thoughts, which is nothing but a superficial statement, describing the subject without fathoming it. In Guido's canzone, an entirely new conception takes the place of this well-worn succession

1 Italian Literature to the Death of Dante, trans. by H. Oelsner, p. 101.

of phrases. Love seeks its place in the noble heart, as the bird in the foliage; nobility of heart and love are one and inseparable as the sun and its splendor; as the star imparts its magic power to the jewel when the sun has purified it from all gross matter, in the same way the image of the beloved lady inflames the heart, which nature has created noble and pure; and, as fire by water, so, too, every impure feeling is extinguished by the contact of love; the sentiment inspired by the loved lady shall fill him who is her devoted slave, even as the power of the Deity is transmitted into the heavenly intelligences. To such a degree has the conception of love changed; the earthly passion has become transfigured, and has been brought into contact with the sublimest ideas known to man ; it is a philosophical conception of love, and the similes that serve to illustrate and to explain it in so elaborate and diversified a manner, show no traces of the old repertory." The poetry of Platonic love which Guinicelli introduced and which was further elaborated by Guido Cavalcanti and Cino of Pistoia, finds its highest and finest expression in Dante's Vita Nuova, in which a simple Florentine maiden stands transfigured in the light of his intense spiritual passion. Of the lofty, mystical love, based on such a slight foundation of fact, no one has written more illuminatingly than Gaspary.

II

THE MEANING AND CHARACTER OF THE VITA NUOVA 1

1

THE great event of Dante's youth is his love, and the figure that dominates everything and fills his entire life is Beatrice. He saw her for the first time when they both were children, he nine and she eight years of age. She appeared to him "clothed in a most noble color, a humble and subdued red, girded and adorned as became her very youthful age." And his life-spirit began to tremble violently; for he has found one who will dominate him. From that time he feels himself urged on to seek the place where he may see this "youthful angel." One day, after the lapse of another space of nine years from the day of the first meeting, she appears to him again, robed in the purest white, between two other ladies, and "passing along the way, she turned her eyes and by her ineffable courtesy . . she saluted him in such virtuous wise, that he appeared to behold the highest degree of bliss." It was the first time that her voice reached his ear, and it fills him with such joy, that he is as it were intoxicated, and takes refuge from the intercourse of man in the solitude of his chamber. He falls asleep and has a dream. On waking he puts it down in verse, and this was the origin of Dante's first sonnet:

1 Gaspary's History of Early Italian Literature to the Death of Dante, trans. by H. Oelsner, pp. 221–232. Bell & Sons. (By permission.)

A ciascun' alma presa e gentil core,
Nel cui cospetto viene il dir presente,
A ciò che mi riscrivan suo parvente,
Salute in lor signor, cioè Amore.
Già eran quasi ch' atterzate l' ore

Del tempo che ogni stella è più lucente,
Quando m' apparve Amor subitamente,
Cui essenza membrar mi dà orrore.
Allegro mi sembrava Amor, tenendo

Mio cor in mano, e nelle braccia avea
Madonna involta in un drappo, dormendo.
Poi la svegliava, e d' esto core ardendo
Lei paventosa umilmente pascea;
Appresso gir ne lo vedea piangendo.1

The poem is addressed to the lovers, that is, to the poets, and demands an explanation of the dream. In these verses, written by Dante at the age of eighteen, we have an allegory in the form of a vision, a psychological process symbolically represented,- Amore giving the loved one to eat of the poet's heart; images these, which appear to us grotesque, but which are full of significance and rich in ideas. Here we have again the poetic manner of the new Florentine school, and so we can understand how Dante da Majano, the representative of the old Provençal manner, received the sonnet in a hostile spirit and answered it in an indecent and scoffing manner, while Guido Cavalcanti congratulated the new poet from his heart, and from that time remained the dearest of his friends.

1 To every captive soul and noble heart, that comes to see the present song, so that they may write me back their opinion, greeting in the name of Love, their lord. Already had a third almost of the time passed, in which each star shines brightest, when suddenly Amore appeared to me, to recall whose being fills me with horror. Joyous seemed Amore to me, holding my heart in his hand, and in his arms he held Madonna sleeping, wound in a cloth. Then he woke her, and of this glowing heart he gently gave her to eat, she showing signs of fear. Then I saw him go his way weeping.