grandeur and prosperity, the early impressions of Dante must certainly have been entirely Guelf; although, perhaps, even at that early period, tempered in his generous mind, and moderated from all the excesses of that party." But influences of a more potent and stirring description had still to confirm the youthful bias, and to mould the character of the man. * The annals of Florence have furnished a favourite subject of contemplation to three men of different ages and countries, of commanding abilities, and of various attainments. The statesman, the historian, the orator, have all turned to this fruitful source of instruction. And, indeed, the subject presents political attractions of no common description. But the historical and satirical poem of the "Divine Comedy," so pregnant with allusions to contemporary events, has encircled the annals of the city with such a literary interest, that many have made them their study, in other respects little disposed to devote themselves to the long, and, in some instances, perplexed inquiry into the constitutional revolutions of a Republic, according to Dante, as frequent as those of the moon. His own age, and that which immediately followed, may be regarded as constituting the period of the greatest political and commercial prosperity of Florence. has been sometimes, but without due reason, referred to a later date. "Some of its citizens were wealthier than reigning princes; two of its banking-houses lent to Edward III. of England, a sum equal to about three millions sterling. Its revenue exceeded that of the King of Naples, that of the King of Arragon, and that of the British Queen Elizabeth three centuries later."S It Many of the great works which now arrest the attention of the traveller, were commenced, and some completed, at that epoch; amongst others, the exquisite Campanile by Giotto, the magnificent Cathedral, and principal churches. Dante speaks of the pride generated in the minds of the citizens by the sudden influx of wealth, the "subiti guadagni ;" but no body of men ever accorded a more liberal aid to the Arts, or made a more generous use of their wealth, than did the Florentine merchants of that *Macchiavelli, Gibbon, Thiers. The latter is understood to have been many years engaged upon a History of Florence. Gibbon, at one period, designed to employ his masterly pen upon that subject, and only abandoned it for the work which has constituted him the greatest historian of modern times. It has been proved by Baron Rumohr, from documents in the archives of the Duomo at Florence, that hamlets in the Florentine territory, which now consist only of three or four farms, were, in the 13th century, villages containing twenty families of hereditary tenants. The English King was readier with his sword than his payments; an expostulatory letter from the Priors of the Republic is preserved in the British Museum, Cott. MSS. Nero, B. VII. Art. 8. § Pecchio, Storia dell' Economia Pubblica in Italia, ediz. second. p. 14. age. In 1294, a decree was passed by the public magistracy, for the erection of the Duomo "upon such a scale of lofty and sumptuous magnificence, as to leave it impossible for human industry or power to invent any thing grander or more beautiful;" and the genius of Arnolpho, to whom the work was entrusted, was stimulated by the intimation that the State had determined that its contracts ought not to be undertaken, unless with the view of making the effect correspond with the conception, "che vien fatto grandissimo perchè composto dall' animo di più cittadini uniti insieme in un sol volere." Indeed, the Cathedral of Florence must be ever regarded as one of the most splendid monuments of the middle ages. Its materials are of costliest description; its dome second to that of the Pantheon alone in diameter. To form any clear or satisfactory notion of the private or public life of a citizen of a turbulent Italian Republic of the middle ages, rent by internal disturbances, we must figure to ourselves not merely its actual condition and political interests, but those other important influences arising from the friendship or alliances, the animosities or rivalries, of families, and more especially of those dwelling in the same neighbourhood. The Alighieri resided close to the Church San Martino del Vescovo, and in their immediate vicinity dwelt three families, destined to exercise peculiar influence upon the fortunes of the young Dante. These were the Portinari, the Donati, and the Cerchi; from the first he chose his love, from the second his wife, from the third his political associates. Although the name of Folco Portinari cannot be traced† as an historical one in the annals of Florence, he is commemorated by all the biographers of Dante, and has deserved the grateful remembrance of his countrymen, as the founder of the magnificent Hospital of Santa Maria Nuova. By his wife, Cilia Caponsacchi, he had a daughter, Beatrice, the child and woman of the "Vita *The language of exaggeration is, it is true, essentially that of a democracy. "The Americans," says Mr. Tyler, "have a government, the strongest in the world, because emanating from the popular will, and firmly rooted in the affections of a great and free people."-Message of the President of the U. S. 1842. But he never would have hazarded the expression without a strong conviction of the extraordinary resources of his country. † According to Fontani, (Viaggio Pittorico della Toscana, tome I. p. 245, ediz. 2nd,) Folco di Ricovero Portinari, father of Beatrice, was one of the first four Priors of the Florentine Republic, which magistracy was founded in 1282; but this cannot be so-they were originally only three in number. Malispina, Storie Fior. c. 231; Cantini, Antichità Toscane, tom. III. c. 1, give the names, which comprise no member of the Portinari family. From the diligent writer last mentioned, it appears that Simone de' Bardi, husband of Beatrice, was a man of political weight at that period, who held offices of importance in Tuscany. Antich. Toscan. tom. VI. p. 163, 164. Nuova," the saint of the "Divine Comedy." The first sight of her was to Dante, as he himself affirms, the commencement of a new life, Incipit vita nova.* The narrative of Boccaccio recals to us the youthful attachments of Rousseau and Byron. Beatrice had barely completed her eighth, Dante was in his ninth year. They met in her father's house, at a festivity in celebration of the commencement of Spring. After detailing her graceful demeanour, her maiden beauty and modesty, in one of those exquisite descriptions which Boccaccio, best perhaps of all writers, knows how to handle, he concludes by telling us, "that child as Dante then was, he received her image into his heart with such intense emotion, that from that time thenceforth he never parted with it to his dying day." "She appeared before me," says Dante, "clad in a dress," d'un nobilissimo colore umile ed onesto sanguigno, "with such a band and ornaments as were becoming at her years. At her sight, I say it in all sincerity, the spirit of life which dwells in the most secret chamber of the heart began to tremble so violently, as to render even the minutest pulsations horribly perceptible." Some days afterwards he again meets Beatrice accompanied by two ladies of elder years. She was clad in a dress of exquisite whiteness; she for the first time courteously accosts him; he describes his timidity, and the intoxicating effect produced upon him by her address. Having withdrawn to the solitude of his chamber, he dwells upon the incident which had just occurred at last he is overtaken by a sweet sleep, when a marvellous vision appears to him, "the vision of the burning heart," to which he afterwards gives a poetical form in a sonnet, perhaps the earliest composition of his extant. Without reference to that enduring monument to the memory of his first love, furnished by Dante in his great poem, there are many passages in his Canzoniere, which present such a portrait of female excellence and purity, as would be calculated to satisfy even the most unreasonable aspirations of a man of the loftiest mind and most ardent imagination. *Fraticelli, however, and other writers, give a different sense to the words vita nova, which according to them means the period of youth. Umile, vergognosa e temperata, Intra' suoi be' costumi un atto regna, And indignation if offence provoke ; O'er all her noble manners reigns a charm From some particulars detailed in a subsequent part of the "Vita Nuova," which will be presently alluded to, it would appear that the Poet had occasion to verify the trait mentioned in the second line of the last extract. From what he affirms in the "Vita Nuova," it appears that he was conscious how much her gentle influence had effected in softening the harsher features of his own character. "As soon," says he, "as she appeared, a sudden flame of charity was kindled within me; I pardoned all men, and no longer recognized any enemies." Such was Beatrice, as she has been handed down to us in the verses of her lover: but their destinies were not to be united, and the heroine of the 66 Vita Nuova," became the wedded wife of a Guelf cavalier, Messer Simone de' Bardi.† And yet Dante never ceased to cherish the remembrance of his youthful attachment. "The tie which binds the first endures the last." He sang her praises when living, her apotheosis when dead. Censure is disarmed by the undeniable purity of his affection, attested at once by the voice of tradition, by the whole tenor of his great poem and other writings, and by the positive assertion of Boccaccio. In the "Vita Nuova," Dante says that Beatrice was of such "eminent virtue, that upon no occasion did she * Canzoniere, p. 226, Lyell's ed. Fraticelli doubts this being the composition of Dante. + The fact is proved by the will of her father, cited by Pelle (Memorie per servire alla Vita di Dante, p. 76.) It bears date January 15, 1287. "Item D. Bici filiæ suæ et uxori D. Simonis de Bardis reliquit lib. quatuor." Those who are fond of tracing how men of empassioned temperaments, but otherwise of widely different modes of thought, approach each other in forms of expression, when they touch upon the subject of love, may contrast the "Vita Nuova" with the private Memoirs of Sir Kenelm Digby, written by himself, and recently published by Sir Harris Nicolas, from a MS. in the British Museum. In both, passion is made to speak occasionally the language of allegory, but, as may be expected, it prevails more in the page of the lover than of the husband. The fame of Beatrice Portinari and of Lady Venetia Stanley has been differently dealt with by the voice of their countrymen. Benvenuto d'Imola says, that the former was "miræ pulchritudinis sed majoris honestatis ;" whereas, according to Clarendon, the latter was a lady of "extraordinary beauty, and of as extraordinary reputation." ever suffer me to be swayed by my passion, so as to slight the faithful counsel of the reason in those matters in which it was profitable to listen to its admonition."* From the same book it appears that she subsequently refused the customary salutation, and avoided him in society: that he was not present at her death is also certain. The loss of her father, on the 31st of December, 1289, was bitterly deplored by Beatrice, and Dante accounts for it by the remark, "Questa donna fosse in altissimo grado di bontà"-a saint on earth. His sympathy for her sufferings seriously impairs his own health,† and he becomes dangerously ill. "On the ninth day, being in intolerable pain, an idea struck me, which was of my lady. After being some time occupied with this subject, my thoughts reverted to my own precarious existence; and considering of how brief a duration it was even in health, I began inwardly to deplore my miserable estate. In an agony of sorrow I said to myself, "It cannot but be that gentlest Beatrice must sometime die." This idea, prompted by the tenderness of his affection, throws him into a frenzy, when he sees in the heavens a multitude of angels singing "Hosanna in excelsis;" he afterwards imagines that he beholds Beatrice dead, and that he witnesses the last offices paid to her remains. The illusion under which he was labouring was so intense, that he utters audibly, with profound emotion, "O, fairest spirit, how blessed he who beholds thee!" The exclamation is overheard, but not understood; and a lady who is tending him in his sickness, supposed to be his sister of the whole or half-blood, and by himself described as one united to him in the nearest bond of consanguinity, is induced to leave the room by her companions, who fancy him to be suffering in his sleep from the agony of his malady. They accost him thus :- Awake, and be comforted:" he awakes with the word "Beatrice" on his lips, but his voice so broken by his emotions that nothing is articulated. He then relates to them his dream, suppressing, however, the name of its object. The death of Beatrice occurred on the 9th of June, 1290. She was then in her twenty-fourth year, and it would seem in the third of her marriage. The event is thus detailed in the "Vita Nuova :"-" How doth the city sit solitary that was full of people! How is she become as a widow that was great amongst the nations! I was on the point of commencing this canzone after having completed the sonnet, when the Lord of that Tuttavia era di si nobilissima virtù che nulla volta sofferse che amore mi regesse senza il fedele consiglio della ragione in quelle cose la ove tal consiglio fosse utile a udire."-Vita Nuova, p. 4. + Vita Nuova, p. 39. |