Chapter II: Dante

The _De Vulgari Eloquio_: Its history and authentication 417
Its importance 418
And the scanty recognition thereof 418
Abstract of its contents: The “Vulgar Tongue” and “Grammar” 419
The nature, &c., of the gift of speech 420
Division of contemporary tongues 421
And of the subdivisions of Romance 422
The _Italian Dialects_: Some rejected at once 423
Others—Sicilian, Apulian, Tuscan, and Genoese 424
Venetian: Some good in Bolognese 424
The “Illustrious” Language none of these, but their common 425
measure
Its four characteristics 425
The Second Book—Why Dante deals with poetry only 426
All good poetry should be in the Illustrious 427
The subjects of High Poetry—War, Love, Virtue 427
Its form: Canzoni 427
Definition of Poetry 428
Its styles, and the constituents of the grand style 428
_Superbia Carminum_ 428
_Constructionis elatio_ 429

_Excellentia Verborum_ 429
_Pexa et hirsuta_ 430
The Canzone 430
Importance of the book 431
Independence and novelty of its method 432
Dante’s attention to Form 433
His disregard of Oratory 433
The influence on him of Romance 434
And of comparative criticism 434
The poetical differentia according to him 435
His antidote to the Wordsworthian heresy 436
His handling of metre 436
Of diction 437
His standards of style 438
The “Chapter of the Sieve” 439
The _pexa_ 440
The _hirsuta_ 441
Other critical _loci_ in Dante 441
The Epistle to Can Grande 441
The _Convito_ 442
Dante on Translation 443
On language as shown in prose and verse 443
Final remarks on his criticism 444