Some certain women's faces hurried by,

And shrieked to me, 'Thou too shalt die, shalt die!'

“Then saw I many broken hinted sights

In the uncertain state I stepped into.

Meseemed to be I know not in what place,

Where ladies through the streets, like mournful lights,
Ran with loose hair, and eyes that frightened you,
By their own terror, and a pale amaze :

The while, little by little, as I thought,

The sun ceased, and the stars began to gather,
And each wept at the other;

And birds dropped in mid-flight out of the sky
And earth shook suddenly;

And I was 'ware of one, hoarse and tired out,
Who asked of me: 'Hast thou not heard it said?
Thy lady, she that was so fair, is dead.’

"Then lifting up mine eyes, as the tears came,
I saw the Angels, like a rain of manna,
In a long flight flying back Heavenward;
Having a little cloud in front of them,

After the which they went and said, 'Hosanna';

And if they had said more, you should have heard.
Then Love said, 'Now shall all things be made clear:

Come and behold our lady where she lies.'

These 'wildering phantasies

Then carried me to see my lady dead.
Even as I there was led,

Her ladies with a veil were covering her;
And with her was such very humbleness
That she appeared to say, 'I am at peace.'

"And I became so humble in my grief, Seeing in her such deep humility,

That I said: 'Death, I hold thee passing good
Henceforth, and a most gentle sweet relief,

Since my dear love has chosen to dwell with thee:
Pity, not hate, is thine, well understood.

Lo! I do so desire to see thy face

That I am like as one who nears the tomb;
My soul entreats thee, Come.'

Then I departed, having made my moan;
And when I was alone

I said, and cast my eyes to the High Place: 'Blessed is he, fair soul, who meets thy glance!'

Just then you woke me, of your complaisaùnce."

t

This poem has two parts. In the first, speaking to a person undefined, I tell how I was aroused from a vain phantasy by certain ladies, and how I promised them to tell what it was. In the second, I say how I told them. The second part begins here, "I was a-thinking." The first part divides into two. In the first, I tell that which certain ladies, and which one singly, did and said because of my phantasy, before I had returned into my right senses. In the second, I tell what these ladies said to me after I had left off this wandering: and it begins here, "But uttered in a voice." Then, when I say, "I was a-thinking," I say how I told them this my imagination; and concerning this I have two parts. In the first, I tell, in order, this imagination. In the second, saying at what time they called me, I covertly thank them: and this part begins here, "Just then you woke me." XXIV. After this empty imagining, it happened on a day, as I sat thoughtful, that I was taken with such a strong trembling at the heart, that it could not have been otherwise in the presence of my lady. Whereupon I perceived that there was an appearance of Love beside me, and I seemed to see him coming from my lady; and he said, not aloud but within my heart: "Now take heed that thou bless the day when I entered into thee; for it is fitting that thou shouldst do so." And with that my heart was so full of gladness, that I could hardly believe it to be of very truth mine own heart and not another.

A short while after these words which my heart spoke to me with the tongue of Love, I saw coming towards me a certain lady who was very famous for her beauty, and of whom that friend whom I have already called the first among my friends had long been enamoured. This lady's right name was Joan; but because of her comeliness (or at least it was so imagined) she was called of many Primavera (Spring), and went by that name among them. Then looking again, I perceived that the most noble Beatrice followed after her. And when both these ladies had passed by me, it seemed to me that Love, spake again in my heart, saying: “She that came first was called Spring, only because of that which was to happen on this day. And it was I myself who caused that name to be given her; seeing that as the Spring cometh first in the year, so should she come first on this day,1 when Beatrice was to show herself after the vision of her servant. And even if thou go about to consider her right name, it is also as one should say, 'She shall come first': inasmuch as her name, Joan, is taken from that John who went before the True Light, saying: Ego vox clamatis in deserto: Parate viam Domini." And also it seemed to me that he added other words, to wit: "He who should inquire delicately touching this matter, could not but call Beatrice by mine own name, which is to say, Love; beholding her so like unto me."

Then I, having thought of this, imagined to write it with rhymes and send it unto my chief friend; but setting aside certain words3 which

1 There is a play in the original upon the words Primavera (Spring) and prima verrà (she shall come first), to which I have given as near an equivalent as I could.

2 "I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare ye the way of the Lord.""

3 That is (as I understand it), suppressing, from delicacy towards his friend, the words in which Love describes Joan as merely the forerunner of Beatrice. And perhaps in the latter part of this sentence a reproach is gently conveyed to the fickle Guido Cavalcanti, who may

seemed proper to be set aside, because I believed that his heart still regarded the beauty of her that was called Spring. And I wrote this

sonnet:

I FELT a spirit of love begin to stir

Within my heart, long time unfelt till then;
And saw Love coming towards me fair and fain,
(That I scarce knew him for his joyful cheer,)
Saying, "Be now indeed my worshipper!

יי

And in his speech he laughed and laughed again.
Then, while it was his pleasure to remain,
I chanced to look the way he had drawn near,
And saw the Ladies Joan and Beatrice
Approach me, this the other following,
One and a second marvel instantly.

And even as now my memory speaketh this,

Love spake it then: "The first is christened Spring;
The second Love, she is so like to me."

This sonnet has many parts: whereof the first tells how I felt awakened within my heart the accustomed tremor, and how it seemed that Love appeared to me joyful from afar. The second says how it appeared to me that Love spake within my heart, and what was his aspect. The third tells how, after he had in such wise been with me a space, I saw and heard certain things. The second part begins here, "Saying, 'Be now""; the third here, "Then, while it was his pleasure." The third part divides into two. In the first, I say what I saw. In the second, I say what I heard; and it begins here, "Love spake it then."

XXV. It might be here objected unto me, (and even by one worthy of controversy,) that I have spoken of Love as though it were a thing outward and visible: not only a spiritual essence, but as a bodily substance also. The which thing, in absolute truth, is a fallacy; Love not being of itself a substance, but an accident of substance. Yet that I speak of Love as though it were a thing tangible and even human, appears by three things which I say thereof. And firstly, I say that I perceived Love coming towards me; whereby, seeing that to come bespeaks locomotion, and seeing also how philosophy teacheth us that none but a corporeal substance hath locomotion, it seemeth that I speak of Love as of a corporeal substance. And secondly, I say that Love smiled: and thirdly, that Love spake; faculties (and especially the risible faculty) which appear proper unto man: whereby it further seemeth that I speak of Love as of a man. Now that this matter may be explained, (as is fitting,) it must first be remembered that anciently they who wrote poems of Love wrote not in the vulgar tongue, but rather certain poets in the Latin tongue. I mean, among us, although perchance the same may have been among others, and although likewise, as among the Greeks, they were not writers of spoken language, but men of letters treated of these things.1 And indeed it is

already have transferred his homage (though Dante had not then learned it) from Joan to Mandetta.

1 On reading Dante's treatise De Vulgari Eloquio, it will be found that the distinction which he intends here is not between one lan

not a great number of years since poetry began to be made in the vulgar tongue; the writing of rhymes in spoken language corresponding to the writing in metre of Latin verse, by a certain analogy. And I say that it is but a little while, because if we examine the language of oco and the language of sì,1 we shall not find in those tongues any written thing of an earlier date than the last hundred and fifty years. Also the reason why certain of a very mean sort obtained at the first some fame as poets is, that before them no man has written verses in the language of sì: and of these, the first was moved to the writing of such verses by the wish to make himself understood of a certain lady, unto whom Latin poetry was difficult. This thing is against such as rhyme concerning other matters than love; that mode of speech having been first used for the expression of love alone. Wherefore, seeing that poets have à license allowed them that is not allowed unto the writers of prose, and seeing also that they who write in rhyme are simply poets in the vulgar tongue, it becomes fitting and reasonable that a larger license should be given to these than to other modern writers; and that any metaphor or rhetorical similitude which is permitted unto poets, should also be counted not unseemly in the rhymers of the vulgar tongue. Thus, if we perceive that the former have caused inani- ́ mate things to speak as though they had sense and reason, and to discourse one with another; yea, and not only actual things, but such also as have no real existence (seeing that they have made things which are not, to speak; and oftentimes written of those which are merely accidents as though they were substances and things human); it should therefore be permitted to the latter to do the like; which is to say, not inconsiderately, but with such sufficient motive as may afterwards be set forth in prose.

That the Latin poets have done thus, appears through Virgil, where he saith that Juno (to wit, a goddess hostile to the Trojans) spake unto Æolus, master of the Winds; as it is written in the first book of the Æneid, Æole, namque tibi, etc; and that this master of the Winds made reply: Tuus, o regina, quid optes - Explorare labor, mihi jussa capessere fas est. And through the same poet, the inanimate thing speaketh unto the animate, in the third book of the Æneid, where it is written: Dardanidæ duri, etc.5 With Lucan, the animate thing speaketh to the inanimate; as thus: Multum, Roma, tamen debes civilibus armis. In Horace, man

guage, or dialect, and another; but between vulgar speech" (that is, the language handed down from mother to son without any conscious use of grammar or syntax), and language as regulated by grammarians and the laws of literary composition, and which Dante calls simply "Grammar."

1 I.e., the languages of Provence and Tuscany. 2 It strikes me that this curious passage furnishes a reason, hitherto (I believe) overlooked, why Dante put such of his lyrical poems as relate to philosophy into the form of love-poems. He liked writing in Italian rhyme rather than Latin metre; he thought Italian rhyme ought to be confined to love-poems: therefore what

ever he wrote (at this age) had to take the form of a love-poem. Thus any poem by Dante not concerning love is later than his twentyseventh year (1291-2), when he wrote the prose of the Vita Nuova; the poetry having been written earlier, at the time of the events referred

to.

3" For to thee, O Eolus," etc.-K.

4""Tis thy task, O Queen, to consider what thou desirest; mine it is to fulfill thy commands." - K.

5"Ye hardy sons of Dardanus," etc.-K. 6"Still, much dost thou owe, O Rome, to the arms of thy citizens."— K.

is made to speak to his own intelligence as unto 'another person; (and not only hath Horace done this, but herein he followeth the excellent Homer,) as thus in his Poetics: Dic mihi, Musa, virum, etc.1 Through Ovid, Love speaketh as a human creature, in the beginning of his discourse De Remediis Amoris: as thus: Bella mihi, video, bella parantur, ait.2 By which ensamples this thing shall be made manifest unto such as may be offended at any part of this my book. And lest some of the common sort should be moved to jeering hereat, I will here add, that neither did these ancient poets speak thus without consideration, nor should they who are makers of rhyme in our day write after the same fashion, having no reason in what they write; for it were a shameful thing if one should rhyme under the semblance of metaphor or rhetorical similitude, and afterwards, being questioned thereof, should be unable to rid his words of such semblance, unto their right understanding. Of whom, (to wit, of such as rhyme thus foolishly,) myself and the first among my friends3 do know

many.

XXVI. But returning to the matter of my discourse. This excellent lady of whom I spake in what hath gone before, came at last into such favor with all men, that when she passed anywhere folk ran to behold her; which thing was a deep joy to me: and when she drew near unto any, so much truth and simpleness entered into his heart, that he dared neither to lift his eyes nor to return her salutation: and unto this, many who have felt it can bear witness. She went along crowned and clothed with humility, showing no whit of pride in all that she heard and saw : and when she had gone by, it was said of many, "This is not a woman, but one of the beautiful angels of Heaven": and there were some that said: "This is surely a miracle; blessed be the Lord, who hath power to work thus marvellously." I say, of very sooth, that she showed herself so gentle and so full of all perfection, that she bred in those who looked upon her a soothing quiet beyond any speech; neither could any look upon her without sighing immediately. These things, and things yet more wonderful, were brought to pass through her miraculous virtue. Wherefore I, considering thereof and wishing to resume the endless tale of her praises, resolved to write somewhat wherein I might dwell on her surpassing influence; to the end that not only they who had beheld her, but others also, might know as much concerning her as words could give to the understanding. And it was then that I wrote this sonnet:

My lady looks so gentle and so pure
When yielding salutation by the way,

That the tongue trembles and has naught to say,
And the eyes, which fain would see, may not endure.
And still, amid the praise she hears secure,

. She walks with humbleness for her array;
Seeming a creature sent from Heaven to stay
On earth, and show a miracle made sure.

1 "Tell me, O Muse, of the man," etc.-K. 3 Guido Cavalcanti.-K. 2" Wars, he says, I see are preparing

against me."— K.