Chapter XLII: Introduction: The Thirteenth, the Greatest of Centuries (13)

Verily it would seem as though his days must have been at least twice as long as those of the ordinary scholar and student to accomplish so much; yet he is only a type of the monks of the Middle Ages, of whom so many people seem to think that their principal traits were to be fat and lazy. Thomas was fat, as we know from the picture of him which shows him before a desk from which a special segment has been removed to accommodate more conveniently a rather abnormal abdominal development, but as to laziness, surely the last thing that would occur to anyone who knows anything about him, would be to accuse him of it. Clearly those who accept the ancient notion of monkish laziness will never understand the Middle Ages. The great educational progress of the Thirteenth Century was due almost entirely to monks.

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There is another extremely interesting side to the intellectual character of Thomas Aquinas which is usually not realized by the ordinary student of philosophy and theology, and still less perhaps by those who are interested in him from an educational standpoint. This is his poetical faculty. For Thomas as for many of the great intellectual geniuses of the modern time, the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist was one of the most wondrously satisfying devotional mysteries of Christianity and the subject of special devotion. In our own time the great Cardinal Newman manifested this same attitude of mind. Thomas because of his well-known devotion to the Blessed Sacrament, was asked by the Pope to write the office for the then recently established feast of Corpus Christi. There are always certain hymns incorporated in the offices of the different Feast days. It might ordinarily have been expected that a scholar like Aquinas would write the prose portions of the office, leaving the hymns for some other hand, or selecting hymns from some older sacred poetry. Thomas, however, wrote both hymns and prose, and, surprising as it may be, his hymns are some of the most beautiful that have ever been composed and remain the admiration of posterity.

It must not be forgotten in this regard that Thomas's career occurred during the period when Latin hymn writing was at its apogee. The Dies Irae and the Stabat Mater were both written during the Thirteenth Century, and the most precious Latin hymns of all times were composed during the century and a half from 1150 to 1300. Aquinas's hymns do not fail to challenge comparison even with the greatest of these. While he had an eminently devotional subject, it must not be forgotten that certain supremely difficult theological problems were involved in the expression of devotion to the Blessed Sacrament. In spite of the difficulties, Thomas succeeded in making not only good theology but great poetry. A portion of one of his hymns, the Tantum Ergo, has been perhaps more used in church services than any other, with the possible exception of the Dies Irae. Another one of his beautiful hymns that especially deserves to be admired, is less well known and so I have ventured to quote three selected stanzas of it, as an illustration {288} of Thomas's command over rhyme and rhythm in the Latin tongue. [Footnote 24]

Adoro te devote, latens Deitas,
Quae sub his figuris vere latitas.
Tibi se cor meum totum subjicit,
Quia te contemplans totum deficit.

Visus, tactus, gustus, in te fallitur,
Sed auditu solo tute creditur:
Credo quidquid dixit Dei filius
Nihil veritatis verbo verius.

And the less musical but wonderfully significative fourth, stanza--

Plagas sicut Thomas non intueor,
Deum tamen meum te confiteor,
Fac me tibi semper magis credere,
In te spem habere, te diligere.

Only the ardent study of many years will give anything like an adequate idea of the great schoolman's universal genius. I am content if I have conveyed a few hints that will help to a beginning of an acquaintance with one of the half dozen supreme minds of our race.

[Footnote 24: The following translation made by Justice O'Hagan
renders sense and sound into English as adequately perhaps as is
possible:

Hidden God, devoutly I adore thee,
Truly present underneath these veils:
All my heart subdues itself before thee.
Since it all before thee faints and fails.

Not to sight, or taste, or touch be credit.
Hearing only do we trust secure;
I believe, for God the Son hath said it--
Word of truth that ever shall endure.

...

Though I look not on thy wounds with Thomas,
Thee, my Lord, and thee, my God, I call:
Make me more and more believe thy promise,
Hope in thee, and love thee over all.
]

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XVIII

ST. LOUIS THE MONARCH.

If large numbers of men are to be ruled by one of their number, as seems more or less inevitable in the ordinary course of things, then, without doubt, the best model of what such a monarch's life should be, is to be found in that of Louis IX., who for nearly half a century was the ruler of France during our period. Of all the rulers of men of whom we have record in history he probably took his duties most seriously, with most regard for others, and least for himself and for his family. There is not a single relation of life in which he is not distinguished and in which his career is not worth studying, as an example of what can be done by a simple, earnest, self-forgetful man, to make life better and happier for all those who come in contact with him.

His relations with his mother are those of an affectionate son in whom indeed, from his easy compliance with her wishes in his younger years one might suspect some weakness, but whose strength of character is displayed at every turn once he himself assumed the reins of government. After many years of ruling however, when his departure on the Crusade compelled him to be absent from the kingdom it was to her he turned again to act as his representative and the wisdom of the choice no one can question. As a husband Louis' life was a model, and though he could not accomplish the impossible, and was not able to keep the relations of his mother and his wife as cordial as he would have liked them to be, judging from human experience generally it is hard to think this constitutes any serious blot on his fair name. As a father, few men have ever thought less of material advantages for their children, or more of the necessity for having them realize that happiness in life does not consist in the possession of many things, but rather in the accomplishment of duty and in the recognition of the fact that the giving of happiness to others {290} constitutes the best source of felicity for one's self. His letters and instructions to his children, as preserved for us by Joinville and other contemporaries, give us perhaps the most taking picture of the man that we have, and round out a personality, which, while it has in the telling French phrase "the defects of its virtues," is surely one of the most beautiful characters that has ever been seen upon earth, in a man who took an active and extremely important part in the great events of the world of his time.

The salient points of his character are his devotion to the three great needs of humanity as they present themselves in his time. He made it the aim of his life that men should have justice, and education, and when for any misfortune they needed it,--charity; and every portion of his career is taken up with successful achievement in these great departments of social action. It is well known that when he became conscious that the judges sometimes abused their power and gave sentences for partial reasons, the monarch himself took up the onerous duty of hearing appeals and succeeded in making the judges of his kingdom realize, that only the strictest justice would save them from the king's displeasure, and condign punishment. For an unjust judge there was short shrift. The old tree at Versailles, under which he used to hear the causes of the poor who appealed to him, stood for many centuries as a reminder of Louis' precious effort to make the dispensing of justice equal to all men. When the duty of hearing appeals took up too much of his time it was transferred to worthy shoulders, and so the important phase of jurisprudence in France relating to appeals, came to be thoroughly established as a part of the organic law of the kingdom.

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NOTRE DAME (PARIS)

As regards education, too much can not be said of Louis' influence. It is to him more than to anybody else that the University of Paris owes the success it achieved as a great institution of learning at the end of the Thirteenth Century. Had the monarch been opposed to the spread of education with any idea that it might possibly undermine his authority, had he even been indifferent to it, Paris would not have come to be the educational center of the world. As it was, Louis not only encouraged it in every way, but also acted as the patron of great {291} subsidiary institutions which were to add to its prestige and enhance its facilities. Among the most noteworthy is the Sorbonne. La Sainte Chapelle deserves to be mentioned, however, and the library attached to it, which owed its foundation and development to Louis, were important factors in attracting students to Paris and in furnishing them interestingly suggestive material for thought and the development of taste during their residence there. His patronage of Vincent of Beauvais, the encyclopedist, was but a further manifestation of his interest in everything educational. His benefactions to the Hotel Dieu must be considered rather under the head of charity, and yet they also serve to represent his encouragement of medical education and of the proper care for the poor in educated hands.

Voltaire, to whom Louis' character as a supreme believer in revealed religion must have been so utterly unsympathetic, and whose position as the historical symbol of all that Voltaire most held in antipathy in medievalism, might have been expected to make the French philosopher avoid mention of him since he could not condemn, has been forced into some striking utterances in praise of Louis, one of which we quote:

"Louis IX appeared to be a prince destined to reform Europe, if she
could have been reformed, to render France triumphant and civilized,
and to be in all things a pattern for men. His piety which was that
of an anchorite, did not deprive him of any kingly virtue. A wise
economy took nothing from his liberality. A profound policy was
combined with strict justice and he is perhaps the only sovereign
who is entitled to this praise; prudent and firm in counsel,
intrepid without rashness in his wars, he was as compassionate as if
he had always been unhappy. No man could have carried virtue
further."

Guizot, the French statesman and historian, whose unbending Calvinism made the men and institutions of the Middle Ages almost incomprehensible to him from their Catholic aspects, has much of good to say of Louis, though there is not wanting rather definite evidence of the reluctance of his admiration:

"The world has seen more profound politicians on the throne, greater
generals, men of more mighty and brilliant intellect, princes who
have exercised a more powerful influence {292} over later
generations and events subsequent to their own times; but it has
never seen such a king as this St. Louis, never seen a man
possessing sovereign power and yet not contracting the vices and
passions which attend it, displaying upon the throne in such a high
degree every human virtue purified and ennobled by Christian faith.
St. Louis did not give any new or personal impulse to his age; he
did not strongly influence the nature or the development of
civilization in France; whilst he endeavored to reform the gravest
abuses of the feudal system by the introduction of justice and
public order, he did not endeavor to abolish it either by the
substitution of a pure monarchy, or by setting class against class
in order to raise the royal authority high above all. He was neither
an egotist nor a scheming diplomatist; he was, in all sincerity, in
harmony with his age and sympathetic alike with the faith, the
institutions, the customs, and the tastes of France in the
Thirteenth Century. And yet, both in the Thirteenth Century and in
later times St. Louis stands apart as a man of profoundly original
character, an isolated figure without any peer among his
contemporaries or his successors. As far as it was possible in the
Middle Ages, he was an ideal man, king, and Christian."

Guizot goes even further than this when he says, "It is reported that in the Seventeenth Century, during the brilliant reign of Louis XIV., Montecuculli, on learning of the death of his illustrious rival, Turenne, said to his officers, 'A man has died to-day who did honor to mankind.' St. Louis did honor to France, to royalty, to humanity, and to Christianity. This was the feeling of his contemporaries, and after six centuries it is still confirmed by the judgment of the historian."

Of Louis' wonderful influence for good as a ruler all historians are agreed in talking in the highest terms. His private life however, is even more admirable for our purpose of bringing out the greatness of the Thirteenth Century. Of course many legends and myths have gathered around his name, but still enough remains of absolutely trustworthy tradition and even documentary evidence, to make it very clear that he was a man among men, a nobleman of nature's making, who in any position of life would have acquitted himself with a perfection sure to make his life worthy of admiration. One of the most {293} striking traits of his character is his love of justice, his insatiable desire to render to all men what was rightly theirs. A biographer has told the story that gives the most telling proof of this in relating the solicitude with which he tried to right all the wrongs not only of his own reign, but of those of his predecessors, before he set out on the Crusade. He wished to have the absolute satisfaction that he, nor his, owed any man any reparation, as the most precious treasure he could take with him on his perilous expedition. He wished even to undo any wrongs that might have been done in his name though he was entirely unconscious of them.

"As he wished to be in a state of grace at the moment of departure,
and to take with him to the Holy Land a quiet conscience by leaving
the kingdom in as happy a condition as possible, he resolved to
carry out one of the noblest measures ever undertaken by a king. By
his order, inquisitors were sent into all the provinces annexed to
the royal dominion since the accession of Philip Augustus. All those
who had been maltreated or despoiled by the bailiffs, seneschals,
provosts, sergeants, and other representatives of the royal
authority, came to declare their wrongs to these newly appointed
judges, and to demand the reparation which was due to them; the
number was great, since for forty years there had been much
suffering in the country districts and even in the towns .... The
royal officers had too often acted as if they were in a conquered
country; they believed themselves to be safe from observation, so
that they might do as they pleased. The people had much to endure
during these forty years, and it was a noble idea to make reparation
freely and with elaborate care. No prince had been known, of his own
accord and at his own cost, to redress the wrongs inflicted on the
people during the reigns of his father and grandfather. This made an
immense impression, which lasted for centuries. Blanche's son was
not merely a good king, he became the unrivalled sovereign, the
impeccable judge, the friend and consoler of his subjects."

It is no wonder that so inappeasable a lover of justice should commend that virtue above all others to his son. When we read his letters to that son who was to be his successor, in the light of Louis' own career, we appreciate with what utter {294} sincerity they were written. Louis realized that simple justice between men would undo more of the world's wrongs than most of the vaunted cures for social ills, which are only too often the result of injustice.

"Dear son," he writes in his Instruction, "if you come to reign, do
that which befits a king, that is, be so just as to deviate in
nothing from justice, whatever may befall you. If a poor man goes to
law with one who is rich, support the poor rather than the rich man
until you know the truth, and when the truth is known, do that which
is just. And if it happen that any man has a dispute with yourself,
maintain the cause of your adversary before the council so as not to
appear partial to your own cause, until the truth is known. Unless
you do this, those who are of the council may fear to speak against
you, and this ought not to be. . . . And if you find that you
possess anything unjustly acquired, either in your time or in that
of your predecessors, make restitution at once, however great its
value, either in land, money, or any other thing. . . . If the
matter is doubtful and you cannot find out the truth, follow the
advice of trusty men, and make such an agreement as may fully
deliver your soul and that of your predecessors. If you hear that
your predecessors have made restitution of anything, take great
trouble to discover if anything more should be restored, and if you
find that this is the case, restore it at once so as to deliver your
own soul and that of your predecessors."

"The education of his children, their future position and
well-being, engrossed the attention of the King as entirely, and
were subjects of as keen an interest, as if he had been a father
with no other task than the care of his children. After supper they
followed him to his apartment, where he made them sit around him for
a time whilst he instructed them in their duty; he then sent them to
bed. He would direct their attention particularly to the good and
bad actions of Princes. He used to visit them in their own apartment
when he had any leisure, inquire as to their progress, and like a
second Tobias, give them excellent instruction .... On Maundy
Thursday, he and his children used to wash the feet of a dozen poor
persons, give them large alms, and afterward wait upon them whilst
they dined. The King together with his son-in-law {295} King
Thibault, whom he loved and looked upon as his own son, carried the
first poor man to the hospital of Compiegne, and his two oldest
sons, Louis and Philippe, carried the second. They were accustomed
to act with him in all things, showing him great reverence, and he
desired that they and Thibault should also obey him implicitly in
everything that he commanded."

Anyone who still retains any trace of the old-fashioned notion, which used to be unfortunately a commonplace among English speaking people, that the medieval Monks were unworthy of their great calling, and that the monasteries were the homes of lazy, fat-witted men whose only object in taking up the life was to secure an easy means of livelihood, will be thoroughly undeceived, if he but read with some attention the stories of Louis' relations to the monasteries. In all his journeys he stopped in them, he always asked to see their libraries, he insisted on not being treated better than the community and in every way he tried to show his esteem for them. There is a story which may or may not be true in the "Little Flowers of St. Francis," which comes from almost a contemporary source, however, that once on his travels he called on Brother Giles, the famous simple-minded companion of St. Francis, of whom so many delightfully humorous stories are told. Brother Giles received his affectionate greeting but said never a word in return. After the first words the King himself said nothing, but both sat and communed in silence for some time, and then the King departed apparently well-pleased with his visit. Needless to say when Brother Giles told the story of the King of France having called on him there was a commotion in the community. But by this time the King was far distant on his way.

Indeed Louis took so many opportunities to stop in monasteries and follow monastic regulations as to prayer and the taking of meals while there, that he quite disgusted some of the members of his retinue who were most with him. One of the ladies of the court in her impatience at him for this, is once said to have remarked under such indiscreet circumstances that it was reported to Louis, that she wished they had a man and not a monk for King. Louis is said to have asked her very {296} gently if she would prefer that he spend most of his time in sport and in excesses of various kinds. Even such remarks, however, had no effect in turning him from his purpose to live as simply and as beneficently for others as possible. His genuine appreciation of the monks must be recognized from his wishes with regard to his children. On the other hand his readiness to secure their happiness as far as possible in the way they wished for themselves shows the tenderness of his fatherly heart. A modern biographer has said of him:--

"He was very anxious that his three children born in the East during
the Crusade--Jean Tristan, Pierre, and Blanche--and even his eldest
daughter Isabella, should enter the monastic life, which he looked
upon as the most likely to insure their salvation; he frequently
exhorted them to take this step, writing letters of the greatest
tenderness and piety, especially to his daughter Isabella; but, as
they did not show any taste for it, he did not attempt to force
their inclinations. Thenceforth, he busied himself in making
suitable marriages for them, and establishing them according to
their rank; at the same time he gave them the most judicious advice
as to their conduct and actions in the world upon which they were
entering. When he was before Tunis and found that he was sick unto
death, he gave the instructions which he had written out in French
with his own hand to his eldest son, Philip. They are models of
virtue, wisdom and paternal tenderness, worthy of a King and a
Christian."

Perhaps the most interesting feature of St. Louis' life was his treatment of the poor. He used literally to recall the fact that they must stand to him in the place of God. "Whatever you do to the least of these you do even unto me" was a favorite expression frequently in his mouth. He waited on them personally and no matter how revolting their appearance would not be deterred from this personal service. It is easy to understand that his courtiers did not sympathize with this state of mind, though Louis used to encourage them not only by his example but by personal persuasion. Every Holy Thursday he used to wash the feet of twelve poor people at a public ceremonial, in honor of the washing of the feet of the Apostles by Christ.

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APOSTLE (LA SAINTE CHAPELLE, PARIS)

It must not be thought moreover, that such a {297} proceeding was perhaps less repugnant to the feelings of the men of that time than they are to the present generation. It might be considered that the general paucity of means for maintaining personal cleanliness in medieval times would make the procedure less disgusting. As a proof of the contrary of this we have the words of Joinville who tells of the following conversation:--

"Many a time," says Joinville, "I have seen him cut their bread for
them, and pour out their drink. One day he asked me if I washed the
feet of the poor on Maundy Thursday. "Sire," I answered, "What, the
feet of those dirty wretches! No indeed, I shall never wash them."
"Truly," replied the King, "you have spoken ill, for you ought not
to despise that which God intended for your instruction. I pray you,
therefore, first of all for the love of God, and then by your love
towards me, that you make a habit of washing their feet."

Even more striking than this however, was his attitude toward the lepers of the time. These poor creatures were compelled to live apart from the population and were not allowed to approach healthy individuals. They were of exceeding interest to Louis however, who took every opportunity to mitigate the trials and hardships of their existence. Whenever he met them on his journeys he insisted on abundant alms being given them, and gave orders that every possible provision for their welfare, consonant with the care that their affection should not be permitted to spread, be made for them. Over and over again he greeted them as his brothers and when his retinue feared to approach them, would himself go to them, in order to console them by his words and his exhibition of personal interest. There is an incident told of his having on one occasion, when a muddy stream intervened between him and some lepers, forded the stream alone in order to get to them, and neither any personal fear of contagion nor any natural repugnance was permitted to deter him from this sublime work of charity. It is no wonder that his people proclaimed him a saint, that is "one who thinks first of others and only second of himself," even during his lifetime.

The only supposed blot upon Louis' character is the denunciation by certain modern writers of what they call the fanaticism, {298} which prompted him to go on the Crusades instead of remaining at home properly to care for his people. The opinion with regard to the place that must be assigned to the Crusades as a factor in history and national as well as European development, has changed very much in recent years. Formerly it was the custom almost entirely to condemn them and to look upon them as a serious mistake. Such ideas however, are only entertained by those who do not realize the conditions under which they were undertaken or the important results which flowed from them. Bishop Stubbs in his lectures on Medieval and Modern History, delivered while he was professor of History at Oxford, has been at some pains to correct this false notion, and his passage constitutes one of the best apologies for Louis' interest in the Crusades which could be written. He said:--

"The Crusades are not, in my mind, either the popular delusions that
our cheap literature has determined them to be, nor papal
conspiracies against kings and peoples, as they appear to Protestant
controversialists; nor the savage outbreak of expiring barbarism,
thirsting for blood and plunder, nor volcanic explosions of
religious intolerance. I believe them to have been in their deep
sources, and in the minds of their best champions, and in the main
tendency of their results, capable of ample justification. They were
the first great effort of medieval life to go beyond the pursuit of
selfish and isolated ambitions; they were the trial-feat of the
young world, essaying to use, to the glory of God and the benefit of
man, the arms of its new knighthood. That they failed in their
direct object is only what may be alleged against almost every great
design which the great disposer of events has moulded to help the
world's progress; for the world has grown wise from the experience
of failure, rather than by the winning of high aims. That the good
they did was largely leavened with evil may be said of every war
that has ever been waged; that bad men rose by them while good men
fell, is and must be true, wherever and whenever the race is to the
swift and the battle to the strong. But that in the end they were a
benefit to the world no one who reads can doubt; and that in their
course they brought out a love for all that is heroic in human
nature, the love of freedom, the honor of prowess, sympathy with
sorrow, {299} perseverance to the last, the chronicles of the age
abundantly prove; proving, moreover, that it was by the experience
of these times that the forms of those virtues were realized and
presented to posterity." [Footnote 25]

[Footnote 25: Stubbs, "Seventeen Lectures on Medieval and Modern
History," p. 180.]

With the stigma of supposed imprudence or foolhardiness for having gone on the Crusade turned into a new cause for honor, Louis must be considered as probably the greatest monarch who ever occupied an important throne. Instead of being surprised that such a monarch should have come in the heart of the Middle Ages and during a century so distant as the Thirteenth, readers must now be ready to appreciate to some degree at least the fact, that his environment instead of being a hindrance in any sense of the word to the development of Louis' greatness, should rather be considered as one of the principal sources of it. Louis' character was representative of the men of that time and exhibits in their most striking form the qualities that were set up as ideals in that period. If the century had produced nothing else but Louis, it would have to be considered as a great epoch in history, for he was no mere accident but typically a son of his age. If this is but properly appreciated the true significance not only of Louis' life but the period in which he lived will be better understood than would be possible by any other means. Those who want to know the men of this wonderful century as they actually were should study Louis' life in detail, for we have been only able to hint at its most striking characteristics.

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DECORATION (QUEEN MARY'S PSALTER, XIII. CENTURY MS.)

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XIX

DANTE THE POET.

It is only too often the custom to talk of Dante as a solitary phenomenon in his time. Even Carlyle who knew well and properly appreciated many things in medieval life and letters and especially in the literary productions of the Thirteenth Century said, that in Dante "ten silent centuries found a voice." Anyone who has followed what we have had to say with regard to the Thirteenth Century will no longer think of Dante as standing alone, but will readily appreciate that he is only the fitting culmination of a great literary era. After having gone over even as hurriedly as has been necessary in our brief space, what was accomplished in every country of Europe in literature that was destined to live not only because of the greatness of the thoughts, but also for the ultimateness of its expression, we should expect some surpassing literary genius at the end of the period. It seems almost inevitable indeed that a supreme poet, whose name stands above all others but one or two at the most in the whole history of the race, should have lived in the Thirteenth Century, and should have summed up effectually in himself all the greatness of the century and enshrined its thoughts in undying verse for all future generations.

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PORTRAIT OF DANTE (GIOTTO, IN THE BARGELLO, FLORENCE)

When Dante himself dares to place his name with those of the men whom he considered the five greatest poets of all time, it seems sublimest egotism. At first thought many will at once conclude that his reason for so doing was, that in the unlettered times his critical faculty was not well developed and as he knew that his work far surpassed that of his contemporaries, he could scarcely help but conclude that his place must be among the great poets. Any such thought however, is entirely due to lack of knowledge of the conditions of Dante's life and education. He had been in the universities of Italy, and in his exile had visited Paris and probably also Oxford. He knew the poets of his country well. He appreciated them {301} highly. It was the consciousness of genius that made him place himself so high and not any faulty comparison with others. Succeeding generations have set him even higher than the place chosen by himself and now we breathe his name only with those of Homer and Shakespeare, considering that these three sublime immortals are so far above all other poets that there is scarcely a second to them.

Dante is the most universal of poets. He has won recognition from all nations, and he has been the favorite reading of the most diverse times and conditions of men. From the very beginning he has been appreciated, and even before his death men had begun to realize something of the supremacy of his greatness. Commentaries on his works that have been preserved down to our own day were written almost during his lifetime. Only supreme interest could have tempted men to multiply these by the hard labor of patient handwriting. Petrarch who as a young man, was his contemporary, recognized him as the Prince of Italian poets who had composed in their common tongue, and even was tempted to say that the subtle and profound conceptions of the Commedia could not have been written without the special gift of the Holy Ghost. Boccaccio was wont to speak of him as the Divine Poet, and tells us that he had learned that Petrarch deliberately held aloof from the Commedia, through fear of losing his originality if he came under the spell of so great a master.

Very few realize how great a poet Dante must be considered even if only the effusions of his younger years were to be taken as the standard of his poetical ability. Some of his sonnets are as beautiful of their kind as are to be found in this form of poetry. His description of his lady-love is famous among sonnets of lovers and may only be compared with some of the Sonnets from the Portuguese in our own day, or with one or two of Camoens' original sonnets in the Portuguese, for lofty praise of the beloved in worthy numbers. After reading Dante's sonnets it is easy to understand how a half century later Petrarch was able to raise the sonnet form to an excellence that was never to be surpassed. With a beginning like this it is no wonder that the sonnet became so popular in Europe during the next three centuries, and that every young poet, {302} down to Shakespeare's time, had an attack of sonneteering just as he might have had an attack of the measles. The first one of a pair of sonnets that are considered supreme in their class deserves a place here as an example of Dante's poetic faculty in this form, for which he is so much less known than he ought to be.

He sees completely fullest bliss abound
Who among ladies sees my Lady's face;
Those that with her do go are surely bound
To give God thanks for such exceeding grace.
And in her beauty such strange might is found.
That envy finds in other hearts no place;
So she makes them walk with her, clothed all round
With love and faith and courteous gentleness.
The sight of her makes all things lowly be;
Nor of herself alone she gives delight.
But each through her receiveth honor due.
And in her acts is such great courtesy,
That none can recollect that wondrous sight.
Who sighs not for it in Love's sweetness true.

It will be noted that Dante has nothing to say of the personal appearance of his beloved. This is true, however, of the whole series of poems to and about her. He never seems to have thought for a moment of her physical qualities. What he finds worthy to praise is her goodness which shines out from her features so that everyone rejoices in it, while a sweetness fills the heart as if a heavenly visitor had come. For him her supreme quality is that, with all her beauty, envy finds no place in others' hearts because she is so clothed around with love and faith and courteous gentleness. It has often been said that Shakespeare did not describe the physical appearances of his heroines because he realized that this meant very little, but then Shakespeare had to write for the stage and realized that blondes and brunettes, especially in the olden time, could not be made to order and that it was better to leave the heroine's physical appearance rather vague. It would be expected, however, that Dante, with his Southern temperament, would have dwelt on the physical perfections of his fair. The next {303} sonnet, however, of the best known group emphasizes his abstraction of all physical influence in the matter and insists on her goodness and the womanly beauty of her character. It will be found in our chapter on Women of the Century.

In his earlier years Dante considered himself one of the Troubadours, and there can be no doubt that if he had never written the Divine Comedy, he still would have been remembered as one of the great poets who wrote of love in this Thirteenth Century. Not only does he deserve a place among the greatest of the Minnesingers, the Trouveres, and the Troubadours, but he is perhaps the greatest of them. That he should have sung as he did at the end of the century only shows that he was in the stream of literary evolution and not being merely carried idly along, but helping to guide it into ever fairer channels. Dante's minor poems would have made enduring fame for any poet of less genius than himself. His prose works deserve to be read by anyone who wishes to know the character of this greatest of poets, and also to appreciate what the educational environment of the Thirteenth Century succeeded in making out of good intellectual material when presented to it. Dante's works are the real treasury of information of the most precious kind with regard to the century, since they provide the proper standpoint from which to view all that it accomplished.

While Dante was a supreme singer among the poets of a great song time, it was only natural, in the light of what we know about the literary product of the rest of this century, that he should have put into epic form the supreme product of his genius. With the great national epics in every country of Europe--the Cid, the Arthur Legends, and the Nibelungen, at the beginning of this century, and the epical poems of the Meistersingers during its first half, it is not surprising, but on the contrary rather what might have been confidently looked for, that there should have arisen a great national epic in Italy before the end of the century. The Gothic art movement spread through all these countries, and so did the wind of the spirit of esthetic accomplishment which blew the flame of national literature in each country into a mighty blaze, that not only was {304} never to be extinguished, but was to be a beacon light in the realm of national literatures forever after.

We have already said a word of the well-known contemporary admiration for the poet but it should be realized that due appreciation of Dante continued in Italy during all the time when Italian art and literature was at its highest. It dwindled only at periods of decadence and lack of taste. Cornelius' law with regard to Dante's influence on art is very well known, Italian art according to him, has been strong and vigorous just in proportion as it has worked under Dante's influence, while it became weak and sensuous as that influence declined. This has held true from the very beginning and has been as true for literature as for art. When the Italians became interested in trivialities and gave themselves up to weak imitations of the classics, or to pastoral poetry that was not a real expression of feeling but a passing fancy of literary folk, then Dante was for a time in obscurity. Even at the height of the Renaissance, however, when Greek was at the acme of its interest and the classics occupied so much attention that Dante might be expected to be eclipsed, the great thinkers and critics of the time still worshipped at the shrine of their great master of Italian verse. The best proof of this is to be found in Michael Angelo's famous sonnets in praise of Dante, the second of which would seem to exhaust all that can be said in praise of a brother poet.

Into the dark abyss he made his way;
Both nether worlds he saw, and in the might
Of his great soul beheld God's splendour bright.
And gave to us on earth true light of day:
Star of supremest worth with its clear ray.
Heaven's secrets he revealed to us through our dim sight.
And had for guerdon what the base world's spite
Oft gives to souls that noblest grace display,
Full ill was Dante's life-work understood,
His purpose high, by that ungrateful state.
That welcomed all with kindness but the good.
Would I were such, to bear like evil fate,
To taste his exile, share his lofty mood.
For this I'd gladly give all earth calls great.

{305}

In the first of this pair of sonnets, however, Michael Angelo gave if possible even higher praise than this. It will be recalled that he himself, besides being the greatest of sculptors and one of the greatest of painters and architects in a wonderfully productive period, was also a very great poet. These sonnets to Dante, the one to his crucifix, and one to Vittoria Colonna, are the best proof of this. He knew how to chisel thoughts into wonderfully suitable words quite as well as marble into the beautiful forms that grew under his hands. With all his greatness, and he must have been conscious of it, he thinks that he would be perfectly willing to give up all that earth calls great, simply to share Dante's lofty mood even in his exile. No greater tribute has ever been paid by one poet to another than this, and Michael Angelo's genius was above all critical, never thoughtlessly laudatory. As emphasizing the highest enlightened taste of a great epoch this has seemed to deserve a place here also.

What should be said of him speech may not tell;
His splendor is too great for men's dim sight;
And easier 'twere to blame his foes aright
Than for his poorest gifts to praise him well.
He tracked the path that leads to depths of Hell
To teach us wisdom, scaled the eternal height.
And heaven with open gates did him invite.
Who in his own loved city might not dwell.
Ungrateful country step-dame of his fate.
To her own loss: full proof we have in this
That souls most perfect bear the greatest woe.
Of thousand things suffice in this to state:
No exile ever was unjust as his,
Nor did the world his equal ever know.

In England, in spite of distance of country, race and language, the appreciation of Dante began very early. Readers of Chaucer know the great Italian as the favorite poet of the Father of English poetry, and over and over again he has expressed the feeling of how much greater than anything he could hope to do was Dante's accomplishment. Readers will remember how Chaucer feels unable to tell the story of {306} Ugolino and his starving sons in the Hunger Tower, and refers those interested in the conclusion of the tale to Dante. After the religious revolt of the early Sixteenth Century Dante was lost sight of to a great extent. His temper was too Catholic to be appreciated by Puritan England, and the Elizabethans were too much occupied with their own creation of a great national literature, to have any time for appreciation of a foreigner so different in spirit from their times. With the coming of the Oxford Movement, however, Dante at once sprang into favor, and a number of important critical appreciations of him reintroduced him to a wide reading public in England, most of whom were among the most cultured of the island. This renewed interest in Dante gave rise to some of the best critical appreciations in any language. Dean Church's famous essay is the classic English monograph on Dante, and its opening paragraph sounds the keynote of critical opinion among English speaking people.

"The Divina Commedia is one of the landmarks of history. More than a
magnificent poem, more than the beginning of a language and the
opening of a national literature, more than the inspirer of art and
the glory of a great people, it is one of those rare and solemn
monuments of the mind's power which measure and test what it can
reach to, which rise up ineffaceably and forever as time goes on,
marking out its advance by grander divisions than its centuries, and
adopted as epochs by the consent of all who come after. It stands
with the Iliad and Shakespeare's Plays, with the writings of
Aristotle and Plato, with the Novum Organon and the Principia, with
Justinian's Code, with the Parthenon and St. Peter's. It is the
first Christian Poem, and it opens European literature as the Iliad
did that of Greece and Rome. And, like the Iliad, it has never
become out of date; it accompanies in undiminished freshness the
literature which it began."

{opp306}

TORRE DEL FAME (DANTE, PISA)

PALAZZO PRETORIO (TODI)

No better introduction to Dante could be obtained than this from Dean Church. Those who have found it difficult to get interested in the great Florentine poet, and who have been prone to think that perhaps the pretended liking for him on the part of many people was an affectation rather than a sincere expression of opinion, should read this essay and learn {307} something of the wealth of sympathy there is in Dante for even the man of these modern times. Our Thirteenth Century poet is not easy to read but there is probably no reading in all the world that brings with it so much of intellectual satisfaction, so much of awakening of the best feelings in man, so many glimpses into the depths of his being, as some lines from Dante pondered under favorable circumstances. Like one of these Gothic cathedrals of the olden times he never grows old, but, on the contrary, every favorite passage seems to have a new message for each mood of the reader. This is particularly true for the spiritual side of man's being as has been pointed out by Dean Church in a well-known passage toward the end of his essay.

"Those who know the Divina Commedia best will best know how hard it
is to be the interpreter of such a mind; but they will sympathize
with the wish to call attention to it. They know, and would wish
others also to know, not by hearsay, but by experience, the power of
that wonderful poem. They know its austere yet submitting beauty;
they know what force there is in its free and earnest and solemn
verse to strengthen, to tranquillize, to console. It is a small
thing that it has the secret of Nature and Man; that a few keen
words have opened their eyes to new sights in earth, and sea, and
sky; have taught them new mysteries of sound; have made them
recognize, in distinct image of thought, fugitive feelings, or their
unheeded expression, by look, or gesture, or motion; that it has
enriched the public and collective memory of society with new
instances, never to be lost, of human feeling and fortune; has
charmed mind and ear by the music of its stately march, and the
variety and completeness of its plan. But besides this, they know
how often its seriousness has put to shame their trifling, its
magnanimity their faint-heartedness, its living energy their
indolence, its stern and sad grandeur rebuked low thoughts, its
thrilling tenderness overcome sullenness and assuaged distress, its
strong faith quelled despair, and soothed perplexity, its vast grasp
imparted the sense of harmony to the view of clashing truth. They
know how often they have found in times of trouble, if not light, at
least that deep sense of reality, permanent though unseen, which is
more than light can {308} always give--in the view which it has
suggested to them of the judgments and love of God."

As might have been expected from the fact of Dante's English popularity paralleling the Oxford Movement, both the great English Cardinals who were such prominent agents in that movement, looked upon him as a favorite author. Both of them have given him precious tributes. Newman's lofty compliment was the flattery of imitation when he wrote the Dream of Gerontius, that poem for poets which has told the men of our generation more about the immediate hereafter than anything written in these latter centuries. No poet of the intervening period, or of any other time, has so satisfactorily presented the after world as these writers so distant in time, so different in environment,--the one an Italian of the Thirteenth, the other an Englishman of the Nineteenth Century.

Cardinal Manning's tribute was much more formal though not less glorious. It occurs in the introduction to Father Bowden's English edition of the German critic Hettinger's appreciation of Dante, and deserves a place here because it shows how much a representative modern churchman thinks of the great Florentine poet.

"There are three works which always seem to me to form a triad of
Dogma, of Poetry, and of Devotion,--The Summa of St. Thomas, The
Divina Commedia, and the Paradisus Animae (a manual of devotional
exercises by Horstius). All three contain the same outline of Faith.
St. Thomas traces it on the intellect, Dante upon the imagination,
and the Paradisus Animae upon the heart. The poem unites the book of
Dogma and the book of Devotion, clothed in conceptions of intensity
and of beauty which have never been surpassed nor equalled. No
uninspired hand has ever written thoughts so high in words, so
resplendent as the last stanza of the Divina Commedia. It was said
of St. Thomas, _'Post Summan Thomae nihil restat nisi lumen
gloriae_'--After the Summa of Thomas nothing is left except the
light of glory. It may be said of Dante, _'Post Dantis Paradisum
nihil restat nisi visio Dei_,'--After Dante's Paradise nothing is
left except the vision of God."

Of course John Ruskin had a thorough-going admiration for so great a spiritual thinker as Dante and expressed it in no {309} uncertain terms. With his wonderful power to point out the significance of unexpected manifestations of human genius, Ruskin has even succeeded in minimizing one of the great objections urged against Dante, better perhaps than could be done by anyone else, for English speaking people at least. For many readers Dante is almost unbearable, because of certain grotesque elements they find in him. This has been the source and cause of more unfavorable criticism than anything else in the great Florentine's writings. Ruskin of course saw it but appreciated it at its proper significance, and has made clear in a passage that every Dante reader needs to go over occasionally, in order to assure himself that certain unusual things in Dante's attitude towards life are an expression rather of the highest human genius and its outlook on life, than some narrow limitation of medievalism. Ruskin said:--

"I believe that there is no test of greatness in nations, periods,
nor men more sure than the development, among them or in them, of a
noble grotesque, and no test of comparative smallness or limitation,
of one kind or another, more sure than the absence of grotesque
invention or incapability of understanding it. I think that the
central man of all the world, as representing in perfect balance the
imaginative, moral and intellectual faculties, all at their highest
is Dante; and in him the grotesque reaches at once the most distinct
and the most noble development to which it was ever brought in the
human mind. Of the grotesqueness in our own Shakespeare I need
hardly speak, nor of its intolerableness to his French critics; nor
of that of AEschylus and Homer, as opposed to the lower Greek
writers; and so I believe it will be found, at all periods, in all
minds of the first order."

Great reverence for Dante might have been expected in Italy but the colder Northern nations shared it.