heretics, under the names of Paterini and Cathari, the Puritans and Dissenters of their age, had become, in the cities of northern Italy, an almost daily ceremony.

That the stern genius of Dante was imbued with something of this gross and stern asceticism, cannot be doubted. At all events, it must be obvious to every one, that he employs its more striking forms and expressions, to reveal the daring thoughts of his deep and gloomy genius. But all the while we can see his better nature struggling through the fire and smoke, and finally breaking away from the whole, and ascending, like a creature of heaven, winged with sunbeams, to the fountain of eternal day.

But the acute Villemain, in his "Cours de Litterateur Française," gives a better account of the origin of Dante's Inferno than the one suggested by Sismondi. "One day," says he, "long before the epoch of Dante, in the little city of Arezzo, the Pope, Nicholas Second, being present, a cardinal ascended the pulpit and preached." This cardinal was then fifty years of age; he was small of stature; his eyes were sparkling and animated by an ardent and sombre fire, which made sinners tremble; his hair, still black, gave to his countenance, already aged, something more manly and harsh. His words were revered by the people. He was deemed a holy man, and all the bishops of Italy trembled before his power. This was Gregory Seventh, yet now only the Archdeacon Hildebrand.

But why go back so far for the inspiration of Dante? Because a man of genius having preached such a thing as the Inferno, it must have entered the popular mind, and repeated, amplified, exaggerated, gone down to posterity, a vast legend, which another man of genius afterwards transformed into the highest poetry. Gregory indeed cared nothing for the poetry, but he wished to subdue incorrigible offenders, and fix an indelible stigma upon the Germans, whom he hated. Listen to him:

"died about ten years

"A certain German count," said he, ago. After his death, a holy man descended in spirit into the infernal regions, and there saw the above-mentioned count, placed upon the highest step of a ladder. He affirmed that this ladder seemed to rise uninjured among the roaring and eddying flames of the avenging fire, and to have been placed there to receive all the descendants of that race of counts. Beyond, a black chaos, a frightful abyss, extended infinitely, and plunged into the infernal depths, whence issued this immense ladder. This was the order established then among those who succeeded each other; the last comer took the highest step of the ladder, and he who before occupied it, and all the others, descended, each, one step towards the abyss. The men of this family coming after him, were successively arranged upon the ladder, and, by an inevitable law, went, one after another, to the bottom of the abyss.

"The holy man who witnessed these things, inquired the cause of this damnation, and why the Count, his contemporary, reputed to be an upright and worthy man, a rare circumstance among persons of that class, was thus severely punished. A voice replied: On account of a domain of the Church of Metz, which one of his ancestors, of whom he is the tenth heir, had wrested from the blessed Stephen; all these have been devoted to the same punishment, and as the same sin of avarice had united them in the same crime, so the same punishment has united them in the fires of hell.''

Here we have the idea of the ten degrees, or circles of the Inferno, which, issuing from that terrible mouth which made kings tremble, might have floated about in the terrified versions of the multitude, until arrested by the glowing mind of Dante, was finally set in the framework of his immortal verse.

But speculations of this sort are more curious than profitable, except as illustrating the spirit of the age, and the methods of

genius; for, while Dante derived his materials from all sources, he alone possessed the power to construct them into that temple of adamant, which is yet invested with all the gloom and glory of the middle ages, or, to quote his own words:

"The sacred song which heaven and earth

Have lent a hand to frame-which

Many a year hath kept me lean with thought."

In a word, the Divina Commedia is one of those old Gothic edifices of the dark ages, with its many-chambered cells, and even dungeons, its dim aisles and massive towers, fretted ornaments, old tombs and blazing altars, illumined by the rays of the setting sun, and echoing the soft tones of the vesper bells; a thing at once of dread and beauty, of stern bigotry and celestial devotion. In that old temple, "that great supernatural world cathedral," a modern, and a Protestant even, may linger in hallowed worship. There, his spirit subdued by solemn thought, may rise to the home of glory in the skies, where the good of all creeds finally mingle; and if, by the blessing of God he should himself at last reach "the highest heaven of uncreated light," he will not be much surprised, if, notwithstanding all his errors and imperfections, he should meet there the glorified Dante. Would to heaven that in these days of scepticism and pride, when we scarce believe in heaven, to say nothing of hell, we had one half of the clear vision, steady faith, and all-conquering love of the immortal Florentine. With our better views and softer piety, we might then set our foot upon the world, mount into the clear empyrean, and bathe our spirits in the very fount of eternal day!

CHAPTER XIII.

Petrarch and Boccaccio-Their Character and Genius-Influence upon literature.

WHEN Dante was banished from Florence, Petracco dell'Ancisci, a noble Florentine, and notary of the republic, was involved in the same calamity. He was the father of the celebrated Petrarch, who was born in Arezzo on the 19th of July, 1304, on the very night when Dante, Petracco, and other Ghibellines, made their last ineffectual attempt on Florence. A striking incident in the life of Petrarch, connected with that event, is thus versified by Rogers. Referring to the Arno, which glides in many beautiful windings through the Val de Pisa

he adds,

"Reflecting convents, castles, villages,
And those great rivals, in an elder day,
Florence and Pisa :"-

"Once indeed 'twas thine,

When many a winter flood, thy tributary,
Was through its rocky glen rushing, resounding,
And thou wert in thy might, to save, restore
A charge most precious. To the nearest ford
Hastening, a horseman from Arezzo came,
Careless, impatient of delay, a babe
Slung in a basket to the knotty staff
That lay athwart his saddle-bow. He spurs,
He enters; and his horse alarmed, perplexed,

Halts in the midst. Great is the stir, the strife;
And lo! an atom on that dangerous sea,

The babe is floating! Fast and far he flies;

Now tempest-rocked, now whirling round and round,
But not to perish. By thy willing waves
Borne to the shore among the bulrushes,
The ark has rested; and unhurt, secure,
As on his mother's breast, he sleeps within,
All peace! or never had the nations heard

That voice so sweet which still enchants, inspires;
That voice which sung of love, of liberty.

PETRARCH lay there!"*

Notwithstanding this early misfortune, the life of Petrarch was only too prosperous and happy-no, not happy, except in the narrow, worldly sense of the term; for alas! his bright career of honor and pleasure grew dim before his eyes, and left him unsatisfied and melancholy. His entire life was a perfect contrast to that of Dante. Honored and caressed by popes and princes, the favorite of the muses and the idol of all, there was no distinction which he could not reach, no pleasure which he could not taste. Learned, generous and polished, a man of genius and station, with no great faults, he had no great virtues. He inveighed against the vices of his patrons, but ever retained their patronage. The friend of Rienzi, the last of the Tribunes, and the advocate of freedom, he consorted, all his life long, with the most consummate despots, and derived his highest honors from hands that reeked with blood.

Petrarch was designed for the law, and studied at Bologna and other places. He made great progress in learning; but felt so strong an attraction to poetry, that he abandoned the legal profession, sorely to the disappointment of his father, and gave himself up to the muses.

* Italy, a poom.