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poem, but in almost all the writings of Boccaccio; for it is not the Decameron alone, which dwells on the licentious habits of his native town. "There'says he 'the ladies, unable to conceal the inextinguishable fire of their voluptuousness, seek by every artifice to increase that of the men. Lascivious in their gaze and half naked in their persons, they scatter vice and death itself through the town, and make it one reservoir of nastiness (1): while, on the other hand, they are more than rivaled in pro. fligacy by our debauched youth of the male sex, who, less civilized than the Ethiopians, Indians, or any of the new-discovered savages, will pro. bably soon be seen without any clothing whatever; and in that will imitate the brute beasts, whom in want of shame and reason they have long since surpassed'. But voluptuousness is not the only characteristic of the Panther, but also beauty and cruelty. This latter is proved to have belonged to Florence by her treatment of Dante himself; and as to the former, it still exists within her walls to speak for itself. If to an Oltremontano, a cool, casual visitor, she appears even now the loveliest town in Europe, what must she not have been in the days of her liberty to her own favoured child? On the beauty of the Panther he consequently dilates: and I know of no creature, that could have answered his purposes as well as

(1) Ostel di lordura. Com. Vol. 1. p. 330.

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this, who furnished mantles both to Paris and Venus (1); and of whom it is recounted, that she hath the craft to conceal her head, so that the most timid animals, when no longer repelled by a certain fierceness that is in her eyes, approach that charming wild beast, the fairness of whose dap pled hide is so alluring: and she, wheeling round, tears them in pieces without compassion (2). It may be even supposed that he used her in a good sense, as in his Volgare Eloquenza, or grammar, and so personified the beautiful Florence, without any reference either to cruelty or voluptuousness: for, meaning to affirm that the pure literary Italian is not to be found in any of the dialects of Italy, his words are 'having beat all the groves and pastures of Italy without finding the desired Panther' (3).

Although learned men have disputed whether the world was created in autumn or in spring, yet we know this latter to have been Dante's opinion and he here inculcates it with an astrono mical reference, to understand which, his readers must have acquired some principles of astronomy. Two things are to be kept in mind: the low state

(1) Iliad. Lib. 3. 18.

(2) Plin. Ap. Land. Com.

(3) Postquam venati saltus et pascua sumus Italiæ nec Panteram quam sequimur invenimus p. 39.

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of science in Dante's age, and his passionate wish to be useful. As to the former, it is certain that he had amassed a store of information physical and moral far surpassing that of his contemporaries; as will be apparent to any one who glances over the books of his preceptor, Brunetto Latini: and as to the latter, sufficient proofs of it will be found in his conduct by those who consider it attentively; and that it was the great scope of his writings, we have not only weighty internal evidence, as shall be fully demonstrated, but even his own unqualified assertion in the Monarchia — « ut utiliter mundo provigilem » (1). Hence to gain the reputation of a poet was with him a secondary object his primary one being to benefit his countrymen by the continual repetition of lessons of philosophy and virtue, in poetry and prose, in his life both political and private. It is impossible to do him, or his compositions, justice without viewing them in this light. If he wrote his sweet rhymes of love and the Vita Nuova, he followed them with a comment full of lofty speculations and showing how united was that noble love with the most refined philosophical doctrines; so that the reader was told to consider the being they celebrate to be no earthly dame, however fair, but one that is eternally fair and wise, philosophy herself. That indeed was not the case; a real

(1) p. 2.

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lady had been his theme, a lovely lady of youth and innocence, of rank and beauty, who, from his ninth year to the day of his death, occupied an altar in his memory; and whose influence, after her decease, is more or less to be traced throughout all his productions, as if he thought that cherishing it sanctified his pen. But such was the sublime purity of his tenderness, that what it had addressed to a mortal was not unworthy of being transferred to an immortal power; what the conscious poet had written to woo a girl of Florence was to be considered by others as in praise of celestial wisdom; and no party was loser by the change. Thus what would have been a mere amorous trifle, chiefly commendable as a speci men of language, became highly dignified; as if the notion of his mistress were so angelical, so delicately sensitive, that it shrunk from permitting her to be esteemed human; or as if he were too deeply impressed with a reverence for his own talents and the important ends for which alone they were given him, to allow any individual feeling to divert them from the public service: and, thus explained, even those works treat of many abstruse, scientific problems and continually refer to the various ethical systems ancient and modern. Of three females whom he had particulary admired, two has he handed down as representing charity and grace; and the third, as I have said, every where introduced as the personification

is

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of divine, all-comprehending wisdom: which, after having purified and strengthened his soul, was to guide him to that ineffable city, that « hath no need of the sun, neither of the moon to shine in it: for the glory of God doth lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof » (1). When even his amours were thus rendered instrumental to his design of enlightening his fellow-men, it is no wonder that he embraced also every other opportunity of doing so. On this scale should we estimate those astronomical paraphrases, which we shall find continually; and should such modes of designating so simple a thing as the hour or the season appear cumbersome now, and as incurring exposure to the Attic repartee potueras hoc igitur a prin cipio citharista dicere (2) — yet be it recollected, that they are acknowledged to have been eminently beneficial once; for they decked with the irresistible attractions of a popular poem many allusions, in learning to understand which, no class of auditors could fail to gather a large stock of instruction. To have formed its language then is but a trivial part of the advantages for which Italy should be grateful to Dante. She has had scarcely a man of science, since the fourteenth Century, who reaped not some profit to his peculiar avocations from a diligent perusal of the Divine Come

(1) Rev. 21, 23.

(2) De divin. 1. 2. p. 59.