{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_19817/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_19817","id":"gutenberg_19817","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/19817","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Poetry","Philosophical anthropology","Philosophy, Renaissance"],"text":"Produced by Sjaani, Ted Garvin and the Online Distributed\nProofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE\n\nHEROIC ENTHUSIASTS\n\n(_GLI EROICI FURORI_)\n\nAn Ethical poem\n\nBY GIORDANO BRUNO\n\nPART THE FIRST\n\nTRANSLATED BY\n\nL. WILLIAMS\n\n_WITH AN INTRODUCTION, COMPILED CHIEFLY FROM DAVID LEVI'S\nGIORDANO BRUNO O LA RELIGIONE DEL PENSIERO_\n\n\nLONDON\nGEORGE REDWAY\nYORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN\n1887\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE.\n\n\nWhen this Translation was begun, more than two years ago, for my own\npleasure, in leisure hours, I had no knowledge of the difficulty I\nshould find in the work, nor any thought of ever having it printed; but\nas \"Gli Eroici Furori\" of Giordano Bruno has never appeared in English,\nI decided to publish that portion of it which I have finished.\n\nI wish to thank those friends who have so kindly looked over my work\nfrom time to time, and given me their help in the choice of words and\nphrases. I must, moreover, confess that I am keenly alive to the\nshortcomings and defects of this Translation.\n\nI have used the word \"Enthusiasts\" in the title, rather than\n\"Enthusiasms,\" because it seemed to me more appropriate.\n\nL. W.\n\nFOLKSTONE, _September 1887_.\n\n\n\n\nERRATA\n\nPage 3, line 10, _for_ \"also mother\" _read_ \"also my mother.\"\nPage 47, line 9, _for_ \"poisons\" _read_ \"poison.\"\n\n\n\n\nINTRODUCTION.\n\n\nNola, a city founded by the Chalcidian Greeks, at a short distance from\nNaples and from Vesuvius, was the birth-place of Giordano Bruno. It is\ndescribed by David Levi as a city which from ancient times had always\nbeen consecrated to science and letters. From the time of the Romans to\nthat of the Barbarians and of the Middle Ages, Nola was conspicuous for\nculture and refinement, and its inhabitants were in all times remarkable\nfor their courteous manners, for valour, and for keenness of perception.\nThey were, moreover, distinguished by their love for and study of\nphilosophy; so that this city was ever a favourite dwelling-place for\nthe choice spirits of the Renaissance. It may also be asserted that Nola\nwas the only city of Magna Graecia which, in spite of the persecutions of\nPagan emperors and Christian princes and clergy, always preserved the\nphilosophical traditions of the Pythagoreans, and never was the sacred\nfire on the altar of Vesta suffered to become entirely extinct. Such was\nthe intellectual and moral atmosphere in which Bruno passed his\nchildhood. His paternal home was situated at the foot of Mount Cicada,\ncelebrated for its fruitful soil. From early youth his pleasure was to\npass the night out on the mountain, now watching the stars, now\ncontemplating the arid, desolate sides of Vesuvius. He tells how, in\nrecalling those days--the only peaceful ones of his life--he used to\nthink, as he looked up at the infinite expanse of heaven and the\nconfines of the horizon, with the towering volcano, that this must be\nthe ultimate end of the earth, and it appeared as if neither tree nor\ngrass refreshed the dreary space which stretched out to the foot of the\nbare smoky mountain. When, grown older, he came nearer to it, and saw\nthe mountain so different from what it had appeared, and the intervening\nspace that, seen from afar, had looked so bare and sterile, all covered\nwith fruit-trees and enriched with vineyards, he began to see how\nillusory the judgment of the senses may be; and the first doubt was\nplanted in his young soul as he perceived that, while the mind may grasp\nNature in her grandeur and majesty, the work of the sage must be to\nexamine her in detail, and penetrate to the cause of things. When he\nappeared before the tribunal of the Holy Office at Venice, being asked\nto declare who and what he was, he said: \"My name is Giordano, of the\nfamily of Bruno, of the city of Nola, twelve miles from Naples. There\nwas I born and brought up. My profession has been and is that of\nletters, and of all the sciences. My father's name was Giovanni, and my\nmother was Francesca Savolini; and my father was a soldier. He is dead,\nand also mother. I am forty-four years old, having been born in 1548.\"\nHe always regarded Nola with patriotic pride, and he received his first\ninstruction in his father's house and in the public schools. Of a sad\ndisposition, and gifted with a most lively imagination, he was from his\nearliest years given to meditation and to poetry. The early years of\nBruno's life were times of agitation and misfortune, and not propitious\nto study. The Neapolitan provinces were disturbed by constant\nearthquakes, and devastated by pestilence and famine. The Turks fought,\nand ravaged the country, and made slaves of the inhabitants; the\nneighbouring provinces were still more harassed by hordes of bandits and\noutlaws, who invested Calabria, led by a terrible chief called Marcone.\nThe Inquisition stood prepared to light its fires and slaughter the\nheretic. The Waldensians, who had lately been driven out of Piedmont,\nand had sought a shelter in the Calabrian territory, were hunted down\nand given over to the executioner.\n\nThe convent was the only refuge from violence, and Bruno, either from\nreligious enthusiasm, or in order to be able to devote himself to study,\nbecame a friar at the age of fifteen. There, in the quiet cloister of\nthe convent of St. Dominic at Naples, his mind was nourished and his\nintellect developed; the cloistral and monkish education failed to\nenslave his thought, and he emerged from this tutelage the boldest and\nleast fettered of philosophers. Everything about this church and this\nconvent, famous as having been the abode of Thomas Aquinas, was\ncalculated to fire the enthusiasm of Bruno's soul; the leisure and\nquiet, far from inducing habits of indolence, or the sterile practices\nof asceticism, were stimulants to austere study, and to the fervour of\nmystical speculations. Here he passed nearly thirteen years of early\nmanhood, until his intellect strengthened by study he began to long for\nindependence of thought, and becoming, as he said himself, solicitous\nabout the food of the soul and the culture of the mind, he found it\nirksome to go through automatically the daily vulgar routine of the\nconvent; the pure flame of an elevated religious feeling being kindled\nin his soul, he tried to evade the vain exercises of the monks, the\npuerile gymnastics, and the adoration of so-called relics. His character\nwas frank and open, and he was unable to hide his convictions; he put\nsome of his doubts before his companions, and these hastened to refer\nthem to the superiors; and thus was material found to institute a cause\nagainst him. It became known, that he had praised the methods used by\nthe Arians or Unitarians in expounding their doctrines, adding that they\nrefer all things to the ultimate cause, which is the Father: this, with\nother heretical propositions, being brought to the notice of the Holy\nOffice, Bruno found himself in the position of being first observed and\nthen threatened. He was warned of the danger that hung over him by some\nfriends, and decided to quit Naples. He fled from the convent, and took\nthe road to Rome, and was there received in the monastery of the\nMinerva. A few days after his arrival in Rome he learned that\ninstructions for his arrest had been forwarded from Naples; he tarried\nnot, but got away secretly, throwing aside the monk's habiliments by the\nway. He wandered for some days about the Roman Campagna, his destitute\ncondition proving a safeguard against the bands of brigands that\ninfested those lands, until arriving near Civita Vecchia, he was taken\non board a Genoese vessel, and carried to the Ligurian port, where he\nhoped to find a refuge from his enemies; but the city of Geneva was\ndevastated by pestilence and civil war, and after a sojourn of a few\ndays he pursued once more the road of exile. Seeking for a place wherein\nhe might settle for a short time and hide from his pursuers, he stayed\nhis steps at Noli, situated at a short distance from Savona, on the\nRiviera: this town, nestled in a little bay surrounded by high hills\ncrowned by feudal castles and towers, was only accessible on the shore\nside, and offered a grateful retreat to our philosopher. At Noli, Bruno\nobtained permission of the magistracy to teach grammar to children, and\nthus secured the means of subsistence by the small remuneration he\nreceived; but this modest employment did not occupy him sufficiently,\nand he gathered round him a few gentlemen of the district, to whom he\ntaught the science of the Sphere. Bruno also wrote a book upon the\nSphere, which was lost. He expounded the system of Copernicus, and\ntalked to his pupils with enthusiasm about the movement of the earth and\nof the plurality of worlds.\n\nAs in that same Liguria Columbus first divined another hemisphere\noutside the Pillars of Hercules, so Bruno discovered to those astonished\nminds the myriads of worlds which fill the immensity of space. Columbus\nwas derided and banished by his fellow-citizens, and the fate of our\nphilosopher was similar to his. In the humble schoolmaster who taught\ngrammar to the children, the bishop, the clergy, and the nobles, who\nlistened eagerly to his lectures on the Sphere, began to suspect the\nheretic and the innovator. After five months it behoved him to leave\nNoli; he took the road to Savona, crossed the Apennines, and arrived at\nTurin. In Turin at that time reigned the great Duke Emanuele Filiberto,\na man of strong character--one of those men who know how to found a\ndynasty and to fix the destiny of a people; at that time, when Central\nand Southern Italy were languishing under home and foreign tyranny, he\nlaid the foundations of the future Italy.\n\nHe was warrior, artist, mechanic, and scholar. Intrepid on the field of\nbattle, he would retire from deeds of arms to the silence of his study,\nand cause the works of Aristotle to be read to him; he spoke all the\nEuropean languages; he worked at artillery, at models of fortresses, and\nat the smith's craft; he brought together around him, from all sides of\nItaly, artisans and scientists to promote industry, commerce, and\nscience; he gathered together in Piedmont the most excellent compositors\nof Italy, and sanctioned a printer's company.\n\nBruno, attracted to Turin by the favour that was shown to letters and\nphilosophy, hoped to get occupation as press reader; but it was\nprecisely at that time that the Duke, instigated by France, was\ncombating, with every kind of weapon, the Waldensian and Huguenot\nheresies, and had invited the Jesuits to Turin, offering them a\nsubstantial subsidy; so that on Bruno's arrival he found the place he\nhad hoped for, as teacher in the university, occupied by his enemies,\nand he therefore moved on with little delay, and embarked for Venice.\n\nBerti, in his Life of Bruno, remarks that when the latter sought refuge\nin Turin, Torquato Tasso, also driven by adverse fortune, arrived in the\nsame place, and he notes the affinity between them--both so great, both\nsubject to every species of misfortune and persecution in life, and\ndestined to immortal honours after their death: the light of genius\nburned in them both, the fire of enthusiasm flamed in each alike, and on\nthe forehead of each one was set the sign of sorrow and of pain.\n\nBoth Bruno and Tasso entered the cloister as boys: the one joined the\nDominicans, the other the Jesuits; and in the souls of both might be\ndiscerned the impress of the Order to which they belonged. Both went\nforth from their native place longing to find a broader field of action\nand greater scope for their intellectual powers. The one left Naples\ncarrying in his heart the Pagan and Christian traditions of the noble\nenterprises and the saintly heroism of Olympus and of Calvary, of Homer\nand the Fathers, of Plato and St. Ignatius; the other was filled with\nthe philosophical thought of the primitive Italian and Pythagorean\nepochs, fecundated by his own conceptions and by the new age;\nphilosopher and apostle of an idea, Bruno consecrated his life to the\ndevelopment of it in his writings and to the propagation of his\nprinciples in Europe by the fire of enthusiasm. The one surprised the\nworld with the melody of his songs; being, as Dante says, the \"dolce\nsirena che i marinari in mezzo al mare smaga,\" he lulled the anguish\nthat lacerated Italy, and gilded the chains which bound her; the other\ntried to shake her; to recall her to life with the vigour of thought,\nwith the force of reason, with the sacrifice of himself. The songs of\nTasso were heard and sung from one end of Italy to the other, and the\npoet dwelt in palaces and received the caress and smile of princes;\nwhile Bruno, discoursing in the name of reason and of science, was\nrejected, persecuted, and scourged, and only after three centuries of\ningratitude, of calumny, and of forgetfulness, does his country show\nsigns of appreciating him and of doing justice to his memory. In Tasso\nthe poet predominates over the philosopher, in Bruno the philosopher\npredominates over and eclipses the poet. The first sacrifices thought to\nform; the second is careful only of the idea. Again, both are full of a\nconception of the Divine, but the God that the dying Tasso confessed is\na god that is expected and comes not; while the god that Bruno proclaims\nhe already finds within himself. Tasso dies in his bed in the cloister,\nuneasy as on a bed of thorns; Bruno, amidst the flames, stands out as on\na pedestal, and dies serene and calm. We must now follow our fugitive to\nVenice.\n\nAt the time Giordano Bruno arrived in Venice that city was the most\nimportant typographical centre of Europe; the commerce in books extended\nthrough the Levant, Germany, and France, and the philosopher hoped that\nhere he might find some means of subsistence. The plague at that time\nwas devastating Venice, and in less than one year had claimed forty-two\nthousand victims; but Bruno felt no fear, and he took a lodging in that\npart of Venice called the Frezzeria, and was soon busy preparing for the\npress a work called \"Segni del Tempo,\" hoping that the sale of it would\nbring a little money for daily needs. This work was lost, as were all\nthose which he published in Italy, and which it was to the interest of\nRome to destroy. Disappointed at not finding work to do in Venice, he\nnext went to Padua, which was the intellectual centre of Europe, as\nVenice was the centre of printing and publishing; the most celebrated\nprofessors of that epoch were to be found in the University of Padua,\nbut at the time of Bruno's sojourn there, Padua, like Venice, was\nravaged by the plague; the university was closed, and the printing-house\nwas not in operation. He remained there only a few days, lodging with\nsome monks of the Order of St. Dominic, who, he relates, \"persuaded me\nto wear the dress again, even though I would not profess the religion it\nimplied, because they said it would aid me in my wayfaring to be thus\nattired; and so I got a white cloth robe, and I put on the hood which I\nhad preserved when I left Rome.\" Thus habited he wandered for several\nmonths about the cities of Venetia and Lombardy; and although he\ncontrived for a time to evade his persecutors, he finally decided to\nleave Italy, as it was repugnant to his disposition to live in forced\ndissimulation, and he felt that he could do no good either for himself\nor for his country, which was then overrun with Spaniards and scourged\nby petty tyrants; and with the lower orders sunk in ignorance, and the\nupper classes illiterate, uncultivated, and corrupt, the mission of\nGiordano Bruno was impossible. \"Altiora Peto\" was Bruno's motto, and to\nrealize it he had gone forth with the pilgrim's staff in his hand,\nsometimes covered with the cowl of the monk, at others wearing the\nsimple habit of a schoolmaster, or, again, clothed with the doublet of\nthe mechanic: he had found no resting-place--nowhere to lay his head, no\none who could understand him, but always many ready to denounce him. He\nturned his back at last on his country, crossed the Alps on foot, and\ndirected his steps towards Switzerland. He visited the universities in\ndifferent towns of Switzerland, France, and Germany, and wherever he\nwent he left behind him traces of his visit in some hurried writings.\nThe only work of the Nolan, written in Italy, which has survived is \"Il\nCandelajo,\" which was published in Paris. Levi, in his Life of Bruno,\npasses in review his various works; but it will suffice here to\nreproduce what he says of the \"Eroici Furori,\" the first part of which\nI have translated, and to note his remarks upon the style of Bruno,\nwhich presents many difficulties to the translator on account of its\nformlessness. Goethe says of Bruno's writings: \"Zu allgemeiner\nBetrachtung und Erhebung der Geistes eigneten sich die Schriften des\nJordanus Brunous von Nola; aber freilich das gediegene Gold and Silber\naus der Masse jener zo ungleich begabten Erzgaenge auszuscheiden und\nunter den Hammer zu bringen erfordert fast mehr als menschliche Kraefte\nvermoegen.\"\n\nI believe that no translation of Giordano Bruno's works has ever been\nbrought out in English, or, at any rate, no translation of the \"Eroici\nFurori,\" and therefore I have had no help from previous renderings. I\nhave, for the most part, followed the text as closely as possible,\nespecially in the sonnets, which are frequently rendered line for line.\nForm is lacking in the original, and would, owing to the unusual and\noften fantastic clothing of the ideas, be difficult to apply in the\ntranslation. He seems to have written down his grand ideas hurriedly,\nand, as Levi says, probably intended to retouch the work before\nprinting.\n\nFollowing the order of Levi's Life of Bruno, we next find the fugitive\nat Geneva. He was hardly thirty-one years old when he quitted his\ncountry and crossed the Alps, and his first stopping-place was Chambery,\nwhere he was received in a convent of the Order of Predicatori; he\nproposed going on to Lyons, but being told by an Italian priest, whom he\nmet there, that he was not likely to find countenance or support, either\nin the place he was in or in any other place, however far he might\ntravel, he changed his course and made for Geneva.\n\nThe name of Giordano Bruno was not unknown to the Italian colony who had\nfled from papal persecution to this stronghold of religious reform. He\nwent to lodge at an inn, and soon received visits from the Marchese di\nVico Napoletano, Pietro Martire Vermigli, and other refugees, who\nwelcomed him with affection, inquiring whether he intended to embrace\nthe religion of Calvin, to which Bruno replied that he did not intend to\nmake profession of that religion, as he did not know of what kind it\nwas, and he only desired to live in Geneva in freedom. He was then\nadvised to doff the Dominican habit, which he still wore; this he was\nquite willing to do, only he had no money to buy other clothing, and was\nforced to have some made of the cloth of his monkish robes, and his new\nfriends presented him with a sword and a hat; they also procured some\nwork for him in correcting press errors.\n\nThe term of Bruno's sojourn in Geneva seems doubtful, and the precise\nnature of his employment when there is also uncertain; but his\nindependent spirit brought him into dispute with the rigid Calvinists of\nthat city, who preached and exacted a blind faith, absolute and\ncompulsory. Bruno could not accept any of the existing positive\nreligions; he professed the cult of philosophy and science, nor was his\ncharacter of that mould that would have enabled him to hide his\nprinciples. It was made known to him that he must either adopt Calvinism\nor leave Geneva: he declined the former, and had no choice as to the\nlatter; poor he had entered Geneva, and poor he left it, and now turned\nhis steps towards France.\n\nHe reached Lyons, which was also at that time a city of refuge against\nreligious persecutions, and he addressed himself to his compatriots,\nbegging for work from the publishers, Aldo and Grifi; but not succeeding\nin gaining enough to enable him to subsist, after a few days he left,\nand went on his way to Toulouse, where there was a famous university;\nand having made acquaintance with several men of intellect, Bruno was\ninvited to lecture on the Sphere, which he did, with various other\nsubjects, for six months, when the chair of Philosophy becoming vacant,\nhe took the degree of Doctor, and competed for it; and he continued for\ntwo years in that place, teaching the philosophy of Aristotle and of\nothers. He took for the text of his lectures the treatise of Aristotle,\n\"De Anima,\" and this gave him the opportunity of introducing and\ndiscussing the deepest questions--upon the Origin and Destiny of\nHumanity; The Soul, is it Matter or Spirit? Potentiality or Reality?\nIndividual or Universal? Mortal or Eternal? Is Man alone gifted with\nSoul, or are all beings equally so? Bruno's system was in his mind\ncomplete and mature; he taught that everything in Nature has a soul, one\nuniversal mind, penetrates and moves all things; the world itself is a\n_sacrum animal_. Nothing is lost, but all transmutes and becomes. This\nvast field afforded him scope for teaching his doctrines upon the world,\non the movement of the earth, and on the universal soul. The novelty and\nboldness of his opinions roused the animosity of the clergy against him,\nand after living two years and six months at Toulouse, he felt it wise\nto retire, and leaving the capital of the Languedoc, he set his face\ntowards Paris.\n\nThe two books--the fruit of his lectures--which he published in\nToulouse, \"De Anima\" and \"De Clavis Magis,\" were lost.\n\nThe title of Doctor, or as he said himself, \"Maestro delle Arti,\" which\nBruno had obtained at Toulouse, gave him the faculty of teaching\npublicly in Paris, and he says: \"I went to Paris, where I set myself to\nread a most unusual lecture, in order to make myself known and to\nattract attention.\" He gave thirty lectures on the thirty Divine\nattributes, dividing and distributing them according to the method of\nSt. Thomas Aquinas: these lectures excited much attention amongst the\nscholars of the Sorbonne, who went in crowds to hear him; and he\nintroduced, as usual, his own ideas while apparently teaching the\ndoctrines of St. Thomas. His extraordinary memory and his eloquence\ncaused great astonishment; and the fame of Bruno reached the ears of\nKing Henry III., who sent for him to the Court, and being filled with\nadmiration of his learning, he offered him a substantial subsidy.\n\nDuring his stay at Paris, although he was much at Court, he spent many\nhours in his study, writing the works that he afterwards published.\n\nPhilosophical questions were discussed at the Sorbonne with much\nfreedom: Bruno showed himself no partisan of either the Platonic or the\nPeripatetic school; he was not exclusive either in philosophy or in\nreligion; he did not favour the Huguenot faction more than the Catholic\nleague; and precisely by reason of this independent attitude, which kept\nhim free of the shackles of the sects, did he obtain the faculty of\nlecturing at the Sorbonne. Nor can we ascribe this aloofness to\nreligious indifference, but to the fact that he sought for higher things\nand longed for nobler ones. The humiliating spectacle which the positive\nreligions, both Catholic and Reformed, presented at that time--the\nhatreds, the civil wars, the assassinations which they instigated--had\ndisgusted men of noble mould, and had turned them against these\nso-called religions; so that in Naples, in Tuscany, in Venice, in\nSwitzerland, France, and England, there were to be found societies of\nphilosophers, of free-thinkers, and politicians, who repudiated every\npositive religion and professed a pure Theism.\n\nIn the \"Spaccio della Bestia Trionfante\" he declares that he cannot ally\nhimself either to the Catholic or the Lutheran Church, because he\nprofesses a more pure and complete faith than these--to wit, the love of\nhumanity and the love of wisdom; and Mocenigo, the disciple who\nultimately betrayed and sold him to the Holy Office, declares in his\ndeposition that Bruno sought to make himself the author of a new\nreligion under the name of \"Philosophy.\" He was not a man to conceal his\nideas, and in the fervour of his improvisation he no doubt revealed what\nhe was; some tumult resulted from this free speaking of Bruno's, and he\nwas forced to discontinue his lectures at the Sorbonne.\n\nTowards the end of the year 1583 the King became enthralled by religious\nenthusiasm, and nothing was talked of in Paris but the conversion of\nKing Henry. This fact changed the aspect of affairs as far as Bruno was\nconcerned; he judged it prudent to leave Paris, and he travelled to\nEngland.\n\nThe principal works published by Bruno during his stay in Paris are \"Il\nCandelajo\" and \"Umbrae Idearum.\" The former, says Levi, is a work of\ncriticism and of demolition; in this comedy he sets in groups the\nprincipal types of hypocrisy, stupidity, and rascality, and exhibiting\nthem in their true colours, he lashes them with ridicule. In the \"Umbrae\nIdearum\" he initiates the work of reconstruction, giving colour to his\nthought and sketching his idea. The philosophy of Bruno is based upon\nthat of Pythagoras, whose system penetrates the social and intellectual\nhistory of Italy, both ancient and modern. The method of Pythagoras is\nnot confined, as most philosophies are, to pure metaphysical\nspeculations, but connects these with scientific observations and social\npractice. Bruno having resuscitated these doctrines, stamps them with a\nwider scope, giving them a more positive direction; and he may with\npropriety be called the second Pythagoras. The primal idea of\nPythagoras, which Bruno worked out to a more distinct development is\nthis: numbers are the beginning of things; in other words numbers are\nthe cause of the existence of material things; they are not final, but\nare always changing position and attributes; they are variable and\nrelative. Beyond and above this mutability there must be the Immutable,\nthe All, the One.\n\nThe Infinite must be one, as one is the absolute number; in the original\nOne is contained all the numbers; in the One is contained all the\nelements of the Universe.\n\nThis abstract doctrine required to be elucidated and fixed. From a\nhypothesis to concentrate and reduce it to a reality was the great work\nof Bruno.\n\nOne is the perfect number; it is the primitive monad. As from the One\nproceeds the infinite series of numbers which again withdraw and are\nresolved into the One; so from Substance, which is one, proceed the\nmyriads of worlds; from the worlds proceed myriads of living creatures;\nand from the union of one with the diverse is generated the Universe.\nHence the progression from ascent to descent, from spirit to that which\nwe call matter; from the cause to the origin, and the process of\nmetaphysics, which, from the finite world of sense rises to the\nintelligent, passing through the intermediate numbers of infinite\nsubstance to active being and cosmic reason.\n\nFrom the absolute One, the sun of the sensible and intellectual world,\nmillions of stars and suns are produced or developed. Each sun is the\ncentre of as many worlds which are distributed in as many distinct\nseries in an infinite number of concentric centres and systems. Each\nsystem is attracted, repelled, and moved by an infinite, internal\npassion, or attraction; each turns round its own centre, and moves in a\nspiral towards the centre of the whole, towards which centre they all\ntend with infinite passional ardour. For in this centre resides the sun\nof suns, the unity of unities, the temple, the altar of the universe,\nthe sacred fire of Vesta, the vital principle of the universe.\n\nThat which occurs in the world of stars is reflected in the telluric\nworld; everything has its centre, towards which it is attracted with\nfervour. All is thought, passion, and aspiration.\n\nFrom this unity, which governs variety, from this movement of every\nworld around its sun, of every sun around its centre sun--the sun of\nsuns--which informs all with the rays of the spirit, with the light of\nthought--is generated that perfect harmony of colours, sounds, forms,\nwhich strike the sight and captivate and enthrall the intellect. That\nwhich in the heavens is harmony becomes, in the individual, morality,\nand in companies of human beings, law. That which is light in the\nspheres becomes intelligence and science in the world of the spirit and\nin humanity. We must study this harmony that rules the celestial worlds\nin order to deduce the laws which should govern civil bodies.\n\nIn the science of numbers dwells harmony, and therefore it behoves us to\nidentify ourselves with this harmony, because from it is derived the\nharmonic law which draws men together into companies. Through the\nrevolution of the worlds through space around their suns, from their\norder, their constancy and their measure, the mind comprehends the\nprogress and conditions of men, and their duties towards each other. The\nBible, the sacred book of man, is in the heavens; there does man find\nwritten the word of God.\n\nHuman souls are lights, distinct from the universal soul, which is\ndiffused over all and penetrates everything. A purifying process guides\nthem from one existence to another, from one form to another, from one\nworld to another. The life of man is more than an experience or trial;\nit is an effort, a struggle to reproduce and represent upon earth some\nof that goodness, beauty, and truth which are diffused over the universe\nand constitute its harmony.\n\nLong, slow, and full of opposition is this educational process of the\nsoul. As the terraqueous globe becomes formed, changed, and perfected,\nlittle by little, through the cataclysms and convulsions which, by means\nof fire, flood, earthquake, and irruptions, transform the earth, so it\nis with humanity. Through struggle is man educated, fortified, and\nraised.\n\nIn the midst of social cataclysms and revolutions humanity has one\nguiding star, a beacon which shows its light above the storms and\ntempests, a mystical thread running through the labyrinth of\nhistory--namely, the religion of philosophy and of thought. The vulgar\ncreeds would not, and have not dared to reveal the Truth in its purity\nand essence. They covered it with veils with allegories, with myths and\nmysteries, which they called sacred; they enshrouded thought with a\ndouble veil, and called it Revelation. Humanity, deceived by a\nseductive form, adored the veil, but did not lift itself up to the idea\nbehind it; it saw the shadow, not the light.\n\nBut we must return to our wandering hero.\n\nBruno was about thirty-six years old when he left Paris and went to\nEngland. He was invited to visit the University of Oxford, and opened\nhis lectures there with two subjects which, apparently diverse, are in\nreality intimately connected with each other--namely, on the Quadruple\nSphere and on the Immortality of the Soul. Speaking of the immortality\nof the soul, he maintained that nothing in the universe is lost,\neverything changes and is transformed; therefore, soul and body, spirit\nand matter, are equally immortal. The body dissolves, and is\ntransformed; the soul transmigrates, and, drawing round itself atom to\natom, it reconstructs for itself a new body. The spirit that animates\nand moves all things is one; everything differentiates according to the\ndifferent forms and bodies in which it operates. Hence, of animate\nthings some are inferior by reason of the meanness of the organ in which\nthey operate; others are superior through the richness of the same. Thus\nwe see that Bruno anticipates the doctrine, proclaimed later by Goethe\nand by Darwin, of the transformation of species and of the organic unity\nof the animal world; and this alternation from segregation to\naggregation, which we call death and life, is no other than mutation of\nform.\n\nAfter having criticised and scourged the religions of chimera, of\nignorance, and hypocrisy, in \"Lo Spaccio della Bestia Trionfante\" and in\n\"L'Asino Cillenico,\" the author, in \"Gli Eroici Furori,\" lays down the\nbasis for the religion of thought and of science. In place of the\nso-called Christian perfections (resignation, devotion, and ignorance),\nBruno would put intelligence and the progress of the intellect in the\nworld of physics, metaphysics, and morals; the true aim being\nillumination, the true morality the practice of justice, the true\nredemption the liberation of the soul from error, its elevation and\nunion with God upon the wings of thought. This idea is developed in the\nwork in question, which is dedicated to Sir Philip Sidney. After\ntreating of the infinite universe, and contemplating the innumerable\nworlds in other works, he comes, in \"Gli Eroici Furori,\" to the\nconsideration of virtue in the individual, and demonstrates the potency\nof the human faculties. After the Cosmos, the Microcosm; after the\ninfinitely great, the infinitely small. The body is in the soul, the\nsoul is in the mind, the mind is in God. The life of the soul is the\ntrue life of the man. Of all his various faculties, that which rules\nall, that which exalts our nature, is Thought. By means of it we rise to\nthe contemplation of the universe, and becoming in our turn creators, we\nraise the edifice of science; through the intellect the affections\nbecome purified, the will becomes strengthened. True liberty is\nacquired, and will and action becoming one through thought, we become\nheroes.\n\nThis education of the soul, or rather this elevation and glory of\nthought, which draws with it the will and the affections, not by means\nof blind faith or supernatural grace, not through an irrational and\nmystical impulse, but by the strength of a reformed intellect and by a\npalpable and well-considered enthusiasm, which science and the\ncontemplation of Nature alone can give, this is the keynote of the poem.\nIt is composed of two parts, each of which is divided into five\ndialogues: the first part, which may be called psychological, shows, by\nmeans of various figures and symbols drawn from Nature, how the divine\nlight is always present to us, is inherent in man; it presents itself to\nthe senses and to the comprehension: man constantly rejects and ignores\nit; sometimes the soul strives to rise up to it, and the poet describes\nthe struggle with the opposing affections which are involved in this\neffort, and shows how at last the man of intelligence overcomes these\ncontending powers and fatal impulses which conflict within us, and by\nvirtue of harmony and the fusion of the opposites the intellect becomes\none with the affections, and man realizes the good and rises to the\nknowledge of the true. All conflicting desires being at last united,\nthey become fixed upon one object, one great intent--the love of the\nDivine, which is the highest truth and the highest good. In \"Gli Eroici\nFurori\" we see Bruno as a man, as a philosopher, and as a believer: here\nhe reveals himself as the hero of thought. Even as Christ was the hero\nof faith, and sacrificed himself for it, so Bruno declares himself ready\nto sacrifice himself for science. It is also a literary, a\nphilosophical, and a religious work; form, however, is sacrificed to the\nidea--so absorbed is the author in the idea that he often ignores form\naltogether. An exile wandering from place to place, he wrote hurriedly\nand seldom or ever had he the opportunity of revising what he had\nwritten down. His mind in the impulsiveness of its improvisation was\nlike the volcano of his native soil, which, rent by subterranean\nflames, sends forth from its vortices of fire, at the same time smoke,\nashes, turbid floods, stones, and lava. He contemplates the soul, and\nseeks to understand its language; he is a physiologist and a naturalist,\nmerged in the mystic and the enlightened devotee.\n\nBruno might have made a fixed home for himself in England, as so many of\nhis compatriots had done, and have continued to enjoy the society of\nsuch men as Sir Philip Sydney, Fulke Greville, and, perchance, also of\nShakespeare himself, who was in London about that time; but his\nself-imposed mission allowed him no rest; he must go forth, and carry\nhis doctrines to the world, and forget the pleasures of friendship and\nthe ties of comfort in the larger love of humanity; his work was to\nawaken souls out of their lethargy, to inspire them with the love of the\nhighest good and of truth; to teach that God is to be found in the study\nof Nature, that the laws of the visible world will explain those of the\ninvisible, the union of science and humanity with Nature and with God.\n\nBruno returned to Paris in 1585, being at that time tutor in the family\nof Mauvissier, who had been recalled from England by his Sovereign.\nDuring Bruno's second sojourn in Paris efforts were made by Mendoza,\nthe Spanish ambassador, and others, to induce him to return to his\nallegiance to the Church, and to be reconciled to the Pope; but Bruno\ndeclined these overtures, and soon after left Paris for Germany, where\nhe arrived on foot, his only burden being a few books.\n\nHe visited Marburg and Wurtemburg, remaining in the latter place two\nyears, earning his bread by teaching.\n\nPrague and Frankfort were next visited; ever the same courage and\nboldness characterised his teaching, and ever the same scanty welcome\nwas accorded to it, although in every city and university crowds of the\nintelligent listened to his lectures; but the Church never lost sight of\nBruno, he was always under surveillance, and few dared to show\nthemselves openly his friends. Absorbed in his studies and intent upon\nhis work, writing with feverish haste, he observed nothing of the\ninvisible net which his enemies kept spread about him, and while his\nslanderers were busy in doing him injury he was occupied in teaching the\nmnemonic art, and explaining his system of philosophy to the young\nLutherans who attended his lectures; in settling the basis of a new and\nrational religion, and in writing Latin verses; using ever greater\ndiligence with his work, almost as if he felt that the time was drawing\nnear in which he would be no longer at liberty to work and teach.\n\nIt was during the early part of the pontificate of Gregory XIV. that\nBruno received letters from Mocenigo in Venice, urging him to return to\nItaly, and to go and stay with him in Venice, and instruct him in the\nsecrets of science. Bruno was beginning to tire of this perpetually\nwandering life, and after several letters from Mocenigo, full of fine\nprofessions of friendship and protection, Bruno, longing to see his\ncountry again, turned his face towards Venice.\n\nIn those days men of superior intellect were often considered to be\nmagicians or sorcerers; Mocenigo, after enticing Bruno to Venice,\ninsisted upon his teaching him \"the secret of memory and other things\nthat he knew.\"\n\nThe philosopher with untiring patience tried to instil into this dull\nhead the principles of logic, the elements of mathematics, and the\nrudiments of the mnemonic art; but the pupil hated study, and had no\nfaculty of thought; yet he insisted that Bruno should make science\nclearly known to him! But this was probably only to initiate a quarrel\nwith Bruno, whom he intended afterwards to betray, and deliver into the\nhands of the Church.\n\nThe Holy Office would have laid hands on Bruno immediately on his\narrival in Italy, but being assured by Mocenigo that he could not\nescape, they left him a certain liberty, so that he might more surely\ncompromise himself, while his enemies were busy collecting evidence\nagainst him. When at last his eyes became opened to what was going on\nabout him, and he could no longer ignore the peril of his position, it\nwas too late; Bruno could not get away, and was told by Mocenigo that if\nhe stayed not by his own will and pleasure, he would be compelled to\nremain where he was. Bruno, however, made his preparations for\ndeparture, and sent his things on to Frankfort, intending to leave the\nnext day himself; but in the morning, while he was still in bed,\nMocenigo entered the chamber, pretending that he wished to speak with\nhim; then calling his servant Bartolo and five or six gondoliers, who\nwaited without, they forced Bruno to rise, and conducted him to a\ngarret, and locked him in. There he passed the first day of that\nimprisonment which was to last for eight years. The next day he went\nover the lagoon in a gondola, in the company of his jailors, who took\nhim to the prison of the Holy Office, and left him there. Levi devotes\nmany pages to the accusations brought against Giordano Bruno by the\nInquisitors, and the depositions and denunciations made against him by\nhis enemies. The Court was opened without delay, and most of the\nprovinces of Italy were represented by their delegates in the early part\nof the trial; Bruno himself, being interrogated, gave an account in\ndetail of his life, of his wanderings, of his occupations and works:\nserene and dignified before this terrible tribunal, he expounded his\ndoctrine, its principles, and logical consequences. He spoke of the\nuniverse, of the infinite worlds in infinite space, of the divinity in\nall things, of the unity of all things, the dependence and\ninter-dependence of all things, and of the existence of God in all.\nAfter nine months' imprisonment in Venice, towards the end of January\n1593, Bruno, in chains, was conveyed from the Bridge of Sighs through\nthe lagoons to Ancona, where he remained incarcerated until the prison\nof the Roman Inquisition received him. If we look upon \"Gli Eroici\nFurori\" as a prophetical poem, we see that his sufferings in the\nloneliness of his prison and in the torture-chamber of the Inquisition\npassed by anticipation before his mind in the book written when he was\nfree and a wanderer in strange lands.\n\n    \"By what condition, nature, or fell chance,\n    In living death, dead life I live?\"\n\nhe writes eight years and more before he ever breathed the stifling air\nof a dungeon; and again:\n\n    \"The soul nor yields nor bends to these rough blows,\n    But bears, exulting, this long martyrdom,\n    And makes a harmony of these sharp pangs.\"\n\nFurther details of the trial of Giordano Bruno are to be found in Levi's\nbook. It is well known how he received the sentence of death passed upon\nhim, saying: \"You, O judges! feel perchance more terror in pronouncing\nthis judgment than I do in hearing it.\" The day fixed for the burning,\nwhich was to take place in the Campo dei Fiori, was the 17th February in\nthe year 1600. Rome was full of pilgrims from all parts, come to\ncelebrate the jubilee of Pope Clement VIII. Bruno was hardly fifty years\nold at this time; his face was thin and pale, with dark, fiery eyes; the\nforehead luminous with thought, his body frail and bearing the signs of\ntorture; his hands in chains, his feet bare, he walked with slow steps\nin the early morning towards the funeral pile. Brightly shone the sun,\nand the flames leapt upwards and mingled with his ardent rays; Bruno\nstood in the midst with his arms crossed, his head raised, his eyes\nopen; when all was consumed, a monk took a handful of the ashes and\nscattered them in the wind. A month later, the Bishop of Sidonia\npresented himself at the Treasury of the Pope, and demanded two scudi in\npayment for having degraded Fra Giordano the heretic.\n\n    \"L'incendio e tal, ch'io m'ardo e non mi sfaccio.\"\n\n    EROICI FURORI.\n\n\n\n\nTHE\n\nHEROIC ENTHUSIASTS.\n\n\n\n\n=First Dialogue.=\n\nTANSILLO, CICADA.\n\n\nTANS. The enthusiasms most suitable to be first brought forward and\nconsidered are those that I now place before you in the order that seems\nto me most fitting.\n\nCIC. Begin, then, to read.\n\nTANSILLO.\n\n1.\n\n    Ye Muses, that so oft I have repulsed,\n    That, now importuned, haste to cure my pain,\n    And to console me in my woes\n    With verses, rhymes, and exaltation\n    Such as to others ye did never show,\n    Who yet do vaunt themselves of laurel and of myrtle\n    Be near me now, my anchor and my port,\n    Lest I for sport should towards some others turn.\n\n    O Mount! O Goddesses! O Fountain!\n    Where and with whom I dwell, converse and nourish me,\n    Where peacefully I ponder and grow fair;\n    I rise, I live: heart, spirit, brows adorn;\n    Death, cypresses, and hells\n    You change to life, to laurels, and eternal stars!\n\nIt is to be supposed that he oftimes and for divers reasons had repulsed\nthe Muses; first, because he could not be idle as a priest of the Muses\nshould be, for idleness cannot exist there, where the ministers and\nservants of envy, ignorance, and malignity are to be combated. Moreover,\nhe could not force himself to the study of philosophies, which though\nthey be not the most mature, yet ought, as kindred of the Muses, to\nprecede them. Besides which, being drawn on one side by the tragic\nMelpomene, with more matter than spirit, and on the other side by the\ncomic Thalia, with more spirit than matter, it came to pass that,\noscillating between the two, he remained neutral and inactive, rather\nthan operative. Finally, the dictum of the censors, who, restraining him\nfrom that which was high and worthy, and towards which he was naturally\ninclined, sought to enslave his genius, and from being free in virtue\nthey would have rendered him contemptible under a most vile and stupid\nhypocrisy. At last, in the great whirl of annoyances by which he was\nsurrounded, it happened that, not having wherewith to console him, he\nlistened to those who are said to intoxicate him with such exaltation,\nverses, and rhymes, as they had never demonstrated to others; because\nthis work shines more by its originality than by its conventionality.\n\nCIC. Say, what do you mean by those who vaunt themselves of myrtle and\nlaurel?\n\nTANS. Those may and do boast of the myrtle who sing of love: if they\nbear themselves nobly, they may wear a crown of that plant consecrated\nto Venus, of which they know the potency. Those may boast of the laurel\nwho sing worthily of things pertaining to heroes, substituting heroic\nsouls for speculative and moral philosophy, and praising them and\nsetting as mirrors and exemplars for political and civil actions.\n\nCIC. There are then many species of poets and crowns?\n\nTANS. Not only as many as there are Muses, but a great many more; for\nalthough genius is to be met with, yet certain modes and species of\nhuman ingenuity cannot be thus classified.\n\nCIC. There are certain schoolmen who barely allow Homer to be a poet,\nand set down Virgil, Ovid, Martial, Hesiod, Lucretius, and many others\nas versifiers, judging them by the rules of poetry of Aristotle.\n\nTANS. Know for certain, my brother, that such as these are beasts. They\ndo not consider that those rules serve principally as a frame for the\nHomeric poetry, and for other similar to it, and they set up one as a\ngreat poet, high as Homer, and disallow those of other vein, and art,\nand enthusiasm, who in their various kinds are equal, similar, or\ngreater.\n\nCIC. So that Homer was not a poet who depended upon rules, but was the\ncause of the rules which serve for those who are more apt at imitation\nthan invention, and they have been used by him who, being no poet, yet\nknew how to take the rules of Homeric poetry into service, so as to\nbecome, not a poet or a Homer, but one who apes the Muse of others?\n\nTANS. Thou dost well conclude that poetry is not born in rules, or only\nslightly and accidentally so; the rules are derived from the poetry, and\nthere are as many kinds and sorts of true rules as there are kinds and\nsorts of true poets.\n\nCIC. How then are the true poets to be known?\n\nTANS. By the singing of their verses; in that singing they give delight,\nor they edify, or they edify and delight together.\n\nCIC. To whom then are the rules of Aristotle useful?\n\nTANS. To him who, unlike Homer, Hesiod, Orpheus, and others, could not\nsing without the rules of Aristotle, and who, having no Muse of his own,\nwould coquette with that of Homer.\n\nCIC. Then they are wrong, those stupid pedants of our days, who exclude\nfrom the number of poets those who do not use words and metaphors\nconformable to, or whose principles are not in union with, those of\nHomer and Virgil; or because they do not observe the custom of\ninvocation, or because they weave one history or tale with another, or\nbecause they finish the song with an epilogue on what has been said and\na prelude on what is to be said, and many other kinds of criticism and\ncensure, from whence it seems they would imply that they themselves, if\nthe fancy took them, could be the true poets; and yet in fact they are\nno other than worms, that know not how to do anything well, but are born\nonly to gnaw and befoul the studies and labours of others; and not being\nable to attain celebrity by their own virtue and ingenuity, seek to put\nthemselves in the front, by hook or by crook, through the defects and\nerrors of others.\n\nTANS. Now, to return from this long digression, I say that there are as\nmany sorts of poets as there are human sentiments and ideas; and to\nthese it is possible to adapt garlands, not only of every species of\nplant, but also of other kinds of material. So the crowns of poets are\nmade not only of myrtle and of laurel, but of vine leaves for the\nwhite-wine verses, and of ivy for the bacchanals; of olive for sacrifice\nand laws; of poplar, of elm, and of corn for agriculture; of cypress for\nfunerals, and innumerable others for other occasions; and, if it please\nyou, also of that material signified by a good fellow when he exclaimed:\n\n    O Friar Leek! O Poetaster!\n    That in Milan didst buckle on thy wreath\n    Composed of salad, sausage, and the pepper-caster.\n\nCIC. Now surely he of divers moods, which he exhibits in various ways,\nmay cover himself with the branches of different plants, and may hold\ndiscourse worthily with the Muses, for they are his aura or comforter,\nhis anchor or support, and his harbour, to which he retires in times of\nlabour, of agitation, and storm. Hence he cries: \"O mountain of\nParnassus, where I abide! Muses, with whom I converse! Fountain of\nHelicon, where I am nourished. Mountain, that affordest me a quiet\ndwelling-place! Muses, that inspire me with profound doctrines.\nFountain, that cleanses me! Mountain, on whose ascent my heart uprises!\nMuses, that in discourse revive my spirit. Well, whose arbours cool my\nbrows! Change my death into life, my cypress to laurels, and my hells\ninto heavens: that is, give me immortality, make me poet, render me\nillustrious!\"\n\nTANS. Well; because to those whom Heaven favours the greatest evils turn\nto greatest good, for needs or necessities bring forth labours and\nstudies, and these most often bring the glory of immortal splendour.\n\nCIC. For to die in one age makes us live in all the rest. Go on.\n\nTANS. Then follows:\n\n2.\n\n    In form and place like to Parnassus is my heart,\n    And up unto this mount for safety I ascend;\n    My Muses are my thoughts, and they present to me\n    At every hour new beauties counted out.\n    The frequent tears that from my eyes do pour,\n    These make my fount of Helicon.\n    By such a mount, such nymphs, such floods,\n    As Heaven did please, was I a poet born.\n    No king of any kingdom,\n    No favouring hand of emperor,\n    No highest priest nor great pastor,\n    Has given to me such graces, honours, privileges,\n    As are those laurel leaves with which\n    O'ershadowed are my heart, my thoughts, my tears.\n\nHere he declares his mountain to be the exalted affection of his heart,\nhis Muses he calls the beauties and attributes of the object of his\naffections, and the fountain is his tears. In that mountain affection is\nkindled; through those beauties enthusiasm is conceived, and by those\ntears the enthusiastic affection is demonstrated; and he esteems himself\nnot less grandly crowned by his heart, his thoughts, and his tears than\nothers are by the hand of kings, emperors, and popes.\n\nCIC. Explain to me what he means by his heart being in form like\nParnassus.\n\nTANS. Because the human heart has two summits, which terminate in one\nbase or root; and, spiritually, from one affection of the heart proceed\ntwo opposites, love and hate; and the mountain of Parnassus has two\nsummits and one base.\n\nCIC. On to the next!\n\n3.\n\n    The captain calls his warriors to arms,\n    And at the trumpet's sound they all\n    Under one sign and standard come.\n    But yet for some in vain the call is heard,\n    Heedless and unprepared, they mind it not.\n    One foe he kills, and the insane unborn,\n    He banishes from out the camp in scorn.\n    And thus the soul, when foiled her high designs,\n    Would have all those opponents dead or gone;\n    One object only I regard,\n    One face alone my mind does fill,\n    One beauty keeps me fixed and still;\n    One arrow pierced my heart, and one\n    The fire with which alone I burn,\n    And towards one paradise I turn.\n\nThis captain is the human will, which dwells in the depths of the soul\nwith the small helm of reason to govern and guide the interior powers\nagainst the wave of natural impulses. He, with the sound of the\ntrumpet--that is, by fixed resolve--calls all the warriors or invokes\nall the powers; called warriors because they are in continual strife and\nopposition; and their affections, which are all contrary thoughts, some\ntowards one and some towards the other side inclining, and he tries to\nbring them all under one flag--one settled end and aim. Some are called\nin vain to put in a ready appearance, and are chiefly those which\nproceed from the lower instincts, and which obey the reason either not\nat all, or very little; and forcing himself to prevent their actions and\ncondemn those which cannot be prevented, he shows himself as one who\nwould kill those and banish these, now by the scourge of scorn, now by\nthe sword of anger. One only is the object of his regards, and on this\nhe is intently fixed; one prospect delights and fills his imagination,\none beauty pleases, and he rests in that, because the operation of the\nintelligence is not a work of movement but of quiet; from thence alone\nhe derives that barb which, killing him, constitutes the consummation of\nperfection. He burns with one fire alone; that is, one affection\nconsumes him.\n\nCIC. Why is love symbolized by fire?\n\nTANS. For many reasons, but at present let this one suffice thee: that\nas love converts the thing loved into the lover, so amongst the elements\nfire is active and potent to convert all the others, simple and\ncomposite, into itself.\n\nCIC. Go on.\n\nTANS. He knows one paradise--that is, one consummation, because paradise\ncommonly signifies the end; which is again distinguished from that which\nis absolute in truth and essence from that which is so in appearance and\nshadow or form. Of the first there can only be one, as there can be only\none ultimate and one primal good. Of the second the modes are infinite.\n\n4.\n\n    Love, Fate, Love's object, and cold Jealousy,\n    Delight me, and torment, content me, and afflict.\n    The insensate boy, the blind and sinister,\n    The loftiest beauty, and my death alone\n    Show to me paradise, and take away,\n    Present me with all good, and steal it from me,\n    So that the heart, the mind, the spirit, and the soul,\n    Have joy, pain, cold, and weight in their control.\n    Who will deliver me from war?\n    Who give to me the fruit of love in peace?\n    And that which vexes that which pleases me\n    (Opening the gates of heaven and closing them)\n    Who will set far apart\n    To make acceptable my fires and tears?\n\nHe shows the reason and origin of passion; and whence it is conceived;\nand how enthusiasm is born, by ploughing the field of the Muses and\nscattering the seed of his thoughts and waiting for the fruitful\nharvest, discovering in himself the fervour of the affections instead of\nin the sun, and in place of the rain is the moisture of his eyes. He\nbrings forward four things: Love, Fate, the Object, and Jealousy. Here\nlove is not a low, ignoble, and unworthy motor, but a noble lord and\nchief. Fate is none other than the pre-ordained disposition and order of\ncasualties to which he is subject by his destiny. The object is the\nthing loved and the correlative of the lover. Jealousy, it is clear,\nmust be the ardour of the lover about the thing loved, of which it boots\nnot to speak to him who knows what love is, and which it is vain to try\nto explain to others. Love delights, because to him who loves it is a\npleasure to love; and he who really loves would not cease from loving.\nThis is referred to in the following sonnet:\n\n5.\n\n    Beloved, sweet, and honourable wound,\n    From fairest dart that love did choose,\n    Lofty, most beauteous and potential zeal,\n    That makes the soul in its own flames find weal!\n    What power or spell of herb or magic art\n    Can tear thee from the centre of my heart,\n    Since he, who with an ever-growing zest,\n    Tormenting most, yet most does make me blest?\n    How can I of this weight unburdened be,\n    If pain the cure, and joy the sore give me?\n    Sweet is my pain: to this world new and rare.\n    Eyes! ye are the bow and torches of my lord!\n    Double the flames and arrows in my breast,\n    For languishing is sweet and burning best.\n\nFate vexes and grieves by undesirable and unfortunate events, or because\nit makes the subject feel unworthy of the object, and out of proportion\nwith the dignity of the latter, or because a perfect sympathy does not\nexist, or for other reasons and obstacles that arise. The object\nsatisfies the subject, which is nourished by no other, seeks no other,\nis occupied by no other, and banishes every other thought. Jealousy\ntorments, because although she is the daughter of Love, and is derived\nfrom him, and is his companion who always goes with him, and is a sign\nof the same, being understood as a necessary consequence wherever love\nis found (as may be observed of whole generations who, from the coldness\nof the region and lateness of development, learn little, love less, and\nof jealousy know nothing), yet, notwithstanding its kinship,\nassociation, and signification, jealousy comes to trouble and poisons\nall that it finds of beautiful and of good in Love. Therefore I said in\nanother sonnet:\n\n6.\n\n    Oh, wicked child of Envy and of Love!\n    That turnest into pain thy father's joys,\n    To evil Argus-eyed, but blind as mole to good.\n    Minister of torment! Jealousy!\n    Fetid harpy! Tisiphone infernal!\n    Who steals and poisons others' good,\n    Under thy cruel breath does languish\n    The sweetest flower of all my hopes.\n    Proud of thyself, unlovely one,\n    Bird of sorrow and harbinger of ill,\n    The heart thou visitest by thousand doors;\n    If entrance unto thee could be denied,\n    The reign of Love would so much fairer be,\n    As would this world were death and hate away.\n\nTo the above is added, that Jealousy not only is sometimes the ruin and\ndeath of the lover, but often kills Love itself, because Love comes to\nbe so much under its influence that it is impelled to despise the\nobject, and in fact becomes alienated from it, especially when it\nengenders disdain.\n\nCIC. Explain now the ideas which follow. Why is Love called the\n\"insensate boy\"?\n\nTANS. I will tell you. Love is called the insensate boy, not because he\nis so of himself, but because he brings certain ones into subjection,\nand dwells in such subjects, since the more intellectual and speculative\none is, the more Love raises the genius and purifies the intellect,\nrendering it alert, studious, and circumspect, promoting a condition of\nvalorous animosity and an emulation of virtues and dignities by the\ndesire to please and to make itself worthy of the thing loved; others,\nand they are the largest number, call him mad and foolish, because he\ndrives them distracted, and hurries them into excesses, by which the\nspirit, soul, and body become sickly, and inept to consider and\ndistinguish that which is seemly from that which is distorted; thus\nrendering them subject to scorn, derision, and reproach.\n\nCIC. It is commonly said that love makes fools of the old and makes the\nyoung wise.\n\nTANS. That drawback does not happen to all the aged, nor that advantage\nto all the young; the one is true of the weak, and the other of the\nrobust. One thing is certain, that he who loves wisely in youth will in\nage not go astray. But derision is for those of mature age, into whose\nhands Love puts the alphabet.\n\nCIC. Tell me now why Fate is called blind and bad.\n\nTANS. Again, blind and bad is not said of Destiny itself, because it is\nof the same order and number and measure as the universe; but as to the\nsubjects it is said to be blind, for they are blind to fate, she being\nso uncertain. So also is Fate said to be evil, because every living\nmortal who laments and complains, blames her. As the Apulian poet says:\n\n    How is it, or what means it, Maecenas,\n    That none on earth contented with that fate appear,\n    Which Reason or Heaven has assigned to them?\n\nIn the same way he calls the object the highest beauty, as it is that\nalone which has power of attracting him to itself; and thus he holds it\nmore worthy, more noble, and feels it predominant and superior as he\nbecomes subject and captive to it. \"My death itself,\" he says of\nJealousy, because as Love has no more close companion than she, so also\nhe feels he has no greater enemy; as nothing is more hurtful to iron\nthan rust, which is produced by it.\n\nCIC. Now, since you have begun so, continue to show bit by bit that\nwhich remains.\n\nTANS. So will I. He says next of Love: he shows me Paradise, in order to\nprove that Love himself is not blind, and does not himself render any\nlovers blind, except through the ignoble characteristics of the subject;\neven as the birds of night become blind in the sunshine. As for himself,\nLove brightens, clears, and opens the intellect, permeating all and\nproducing miraculous effects.\n\nCIC. Much of this, it seems to me, the Nolano demonstrates in another\nsonnet:\n\n7.\n\n    Love, through whom high truth I do discern,\n    Thou openest the black diamond doors;\n    Through the eyes enters my deity, and through seeing\n    Is born, lives, is nourished, and has eternal reign;\n    Shows forth what heaven holds, earth and hell:\n    Makes present true images of the absent;\n    Gains strength: and drawing with straight aim,\n    Wounds, lays bare and frets the inmost heart.\n    Attend now, thou base hind unto the truth,\n    Bend down the ear to my unerring word;\n    Open, open, if thou canst the eyes, foolish perverted one!\n    Thou understanding little, call'st him child,\n    Because thou swiftly changest, fugitive he seems,\n    Thyself not seeing, call'st him blind.\n\nLove shows Paradise in order that the highest things may be heard,\nunderstood, and accomplished; or it makes the things loved, grand--at\nleast in appearance. He says, Fate takes love away; because, often in\nspite of the lover, it does not concede, and that which he sees and\ndesires is distant and adverse to him. Every good he sets before me, he\nsays of the object, because that which is indicated by the finger of\nLove seems to him the only thing, the principal, and the whole. \"Steals\nit from me,\" he says of Jealousy, not simply in order that it may not be\npresent to me; removing it from my eyesight, but in order that good may\nnot be good, but an acute evil; sweet, not sweet, but an agonized\nlonging; while the heart--that is, the will, has joy by the great force\nof love, whatever may be the result; the mind--that is, the intellectual\npart, has pain through the Fear of Fate, which fate does not favour the\nlover; the spirit--that is, the natural affections, are cold because\nthey are snatched from the object which gives joy to the heart, and\nwhich might give pleasure to the mind; the soul--that is, the suffering\nand sensitive soul, is heavy--that is, finds itself oppressed with the\nheavy burden of jealousy which torments it. To this consideration of his\nstate he adds a tearful lament, and says: \"Who will deliver me from\nwar, and give me peace? or who will separate that which pains and\ninjures me from that which I so love, and which opens to me the gates of\nheaven, so that the fervid flames in my heart may be acceptable, and\nfortunate the fountains of my tears?\" Continuing this proposition, he\nadds:\n\n8.\n\n    Ah me! oppress some other, spiteful Fate!\n    Jealousy, get thee hence--begone! away!\n    These may suffice to show me all the grace\n    Of changeful Love, and of that noble face.\n    He takes my life, she gives me death,\n    She wings, he burns my heart,\n    He murders it, and she revives the soul:\n    My succour she, my grievous burden he!\n    But what say I of Love?\n    If he and she one subject be, or form,\n    If with one empire and one rule they stamp\n    One sole impression in my heart of hearts,\n    Then are they two, yet one, on which do wait\n    The mirth and melancholy of my state!\n\nFour beginnings and extremes of two opposites he would reduce to two\nbeginnings and one opposite: he says, then, oppress others--that is, let\nit suffice thee, O my Fate! that thou hast so much oppressed me; and\nsince thou canst not exist without exercise of thyself, turn elsewhere\nthy anger. Get thee hence out of the world, thou Jealousy, because one\nof those two others which remain can supply your functions and offices;\nyet, O Fate! thou art none other than my love; and thou, Jealousy, art\nnot external to the substance of the same. He alone, then, remains to\ndeprive me of life, to burn me, to give me death, and to be to me the\nburden of my bones; for he delivers me from death--wings, enlivens, and\nsustains. Then two beginnings and one opposite he reduces to one\nbeginning and one result, exclaiming: But what do I say of Love? If this\npresence, this object, is his empire, and appears none other than the\nempire of Love, the rule of Love and its own rule; the impression of\nLove which appears in the substance of my heart, is then no other\nimpression than its own, and therefore after having said \"Noble face,\"\nreplies \"Inconstant Love.\"[A]\n\n[A] Vago amore.\n\n\n\n\n=Second Dialogue.=\n\nTANSILLO.\n\n\nNow begins the enthusiast to display the affections and uncover the\nwounds which are for a sign in his body, and in substance or essence in\nhis soul, and he says thus:\n\n9.\n\n    Of Love the standard-bearer I;\n    My hopes are ice, and glowing my desires.\n    At once I tremble, sparkle, freeze, and burn;\n    Am mute, and fill the air with clamorous plaints.\n    Water my eyes distil, sparks from my heart.\n    I live, I die, make merry and lament.\n    Living the waters, the burning never dies,\n    For in my eyes is Thetys, and Vulcan in my heart.\n    Others I love; myself I hate.\n    If I be winged, others are changed to stone;\n    They high as heaven, if I be lowly set.\n    I cease not to pursue, they ever flee away;\n    If I do call, yet none will answer me.\n    The more I search, the more is hid from me.\n\nIn accordance with this, I will continue with that which just before I\nsaid to thee, that one should not strive so hard to prove that which is\nso very evident--namely, that there is nothing pure and unalloyed; and\nsome have said that no mixed thing is a real entity, as alloyed gold is\nnot real gold, manufactured wine is not real simple wine. Almost all\nthings are made up of opposites, whence it comes that the success of our\naffections, through the mixture that is in things, can afford no\npleasure without some bitterness; and more than this, I will say, that\nwere it not for the bitter, there would be no sweet; seeing that it is\nthrough fatigue that we find pleasure in repose; separation is the cause\nof our pleasure in union; and, examining generally, we shall ever find\nthat one opposite is the reason that the other opposite pleases and is\ndesired.\n\nCIC. Then there is no delight without the contrary?\n\nTANS. Certainly not; as without the opposite there is no pain; as is\nshown by that golden Pythagorean poet when he says:\n\n    Hinc metuunt cupiuntque, dolent gaudentque, nec\n    Respiciunt, clausae tenebris, e carcere caeco.\n\nThis, then, is what the mixture of things causes, and hence it is that\nno one is pleased with his own state, except some senseless blockhead,\nwho is so all the more the deeper is the degree of obscure folly in\nwhich he is sunk; then he has little or no apprehension of pain; he\nenjoys the actual present without fearing the future; he enjoys that\nwhich is and that in which he finds himself, and has neither care nor\nsorrow for what may be; and, in short, has no sense of that opposition\nwhich is symbolized by the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.\n\nCIC. From this we see that ignorance is the mother of sensual felicity\nand beatitude, and this same is the garden of paradise of the animals;\nas is made clear in the dialogues of the Kabala of the horse Pegasus;\nand as says the wise Solomon, \"Whoso increases knowledge increases\nsorrow.\"\n\nTANS. Hence it appears that heroic love is a torment, because it does\nnot enjoy the present, as does animal love, but is of the future and the\nabsent; and, on the contrary, it feels ambition, emulation, suspicion\nand dread. One evening, after supper, a certain neighbour of ours said:\n\"Never was I more jolly than I am now.\" John Bruno, father of the\nNolano, answered him: \"Never wert thou more foolish than now.\"\n\nCIC. You would imply, then, that he who is sad is wise, and that other\nwho is more sad is wiser?\n\nTANS. On the contrary, I mean that there is in these another species of\nfoolishness and a worse.\n\nCIC. Who, then, is wise, if foolish is he who is content, and foolish he\nwho is sad?\n\nTANS. He who is neither merry nor sad.\n\nCIC. Who? He who sleeps? He who is without feeling--who is dead?\n\nTANS. No; but he who is quick, both seeing and hearing, and who,\nconsidering evil and good, estimating the one and the other as variable,\nand consistent in motion, mutation, and vicissitude, in such wise that\nthe end of one opposite is the commencement of another, and the extreme\nof the one is the beginning of the other; whose spirit is neither\ndepressed nor elated, but is moderate in inclinations and temperate in\ndesires; to him pleasure is not pleasure, having ever present the end of\nit; equally, pain to him is not pain, because by the force of reasoning\nhe has present the end of that too. So the sage holds all mutable things\nas things that are not, and affirms that they are no other than vanity\nand nothingness, because time has to eternity the proportion of the\npoint to the line.\n\nCIC. So that we can never hold the proposition of being contented or\ndiscontented, without holding the proposition of our own foolishness,\nwhich we thereby confess; therefore no one who reasons, and\nconsequently no one who participates, can be wise; in short, all men are\nfools.\n\nTANS. I do not intend to infer that; for I will hold of highest wisdom\nhim who could really say at one time the opposite of what he says at\nanother--never was I less gay than now; or, never was I less sad than at\npresent.\n\nCIC. How? Do you not make two contrary qualities where there are two\nopposite affections? Why, I say, do you take as two virtues, and not as\none vice and one virtue, the being less gay and the being less sad?\n\nTANS. Because both the contraries in excess--that is, in so far as they\nexceed--are vices, because they pass the line; and the same, in so far\nas they diminish, come to be virtues, because they are contained within\nlimits.\n\nCIC. How? The being less merry and the being less sad are not one virtue\nand one vice, but are two virtues?\n\nTANS. On the contrary, I say they are one and the same virtue; because\nthe vice is there where the opposite is; the opposite is chiefly there\nwhere the extreme is; the greatest opposite is the nearest to the\nextreme; the least or nothing is in the middle, where the opposites\nmeet, and are one and identical; as between the coldest and hottest and\nthe hotter and colder, in the middle point is that which you may call\nhot and cold, or neither hot nor cold, without contradiction. In that\nway whoso is least content and least joyful is in the degree of\nindifference, and finds himself in the habitation of temperance, where\nthe virtue and condition of a strong soul exist, which bends not to the\nsouth wind nor to the north. This, then, to return to the point, is how\nthis enthusiastic hero, who explains himself in the present part, is\ndifferent from the other baser ones--not as virtue from vice, but as a\nvice which exists in a subject more divine or divinely, from a vice\nwhich exists in a subject more savage or savagely; so that the\ndifference is according to the different subjects and modes, and not\naccording to the form of vice.\n\nCIC. I can very well conceive, from what you have said, the condition of\nthat heroic enthusiast, who says, \"My hopes are ice and my desires are\nglowing,\" because he is not in the temperance of mediocrity, but, in the\nexcess of contradictions, his soul is discordant, he shivers in his\nfrozen hopes and burns in his glowing desires; in his eagerness he is\nclamorous, and he is mute from fear; his heart burns in its affection\nfor others, and for compassion of himself he sheds tears from his eyes;\ndying in the laughter of others, he is alive in his own lamentations;\nand like him who no longer belongs to himself, he loves others and hates\nhimself; because matter, as say the physicists, with that measure with\nwhich it loves the absent form, hates the present one. And so in the\noctave finishes the war which the soul has within itself; and when he\nsays in the sistina, but if I be winged, others change to stone and that\nwhich follows; he shows his passion for the warfare which he wages with\nexternal contradictions. I remember having read in Jamblichus, where he\ntreats of the Egyptian mysteries, this sentence: \"Impius animam\ndissidentem habet: unde nec secum ipse convenire potest, neque cum\naliis.\"\n\nTANS. Now listen to another sonnet, as sequel to what has been said:\n\n10.\n\n    By what condition, nature, or fell chance,\n    In living death, dead life I live?\n    Love has me dead, alack! and such a death,\n    That death and life together I must lose.\n    Devoid of hope, I reach the gates of hell,\n    And laden with desire arrive at heaven:\n    Thus am I subject to eternal opposites,\n    And, banished both from heaven and from hell,\n    No pause nor rest my torments know,\n    Because between two running wheels I go,\n    Of which one here, the other there compels,\n    And like Ixion I pursue and flee;\n    For to the double discourse do I fit\n    The crosswise lesson of the spur and bit.\n\nHe shows how much he suffers from this dislocation and distraction in\nhimself; while the affections, leaving the mean and middle way of\ntemperance, tend towards the one and the other extreme, and so are\nwafted on high or towards the right, and are also transported downwards\nto the left.\n\nCIC. How is it that, not being really of one or the other extreme, it\ndoes not come to be in the conditions or terms of virtue?\n\nTANS. It is then in a state of virtue when it keeps to the middle,\ndeclining from one to the other opposite; but when it leads towards the\nextremes, inclining to one or the other of those, it fails so entirely\nfrom being virtue, that it is a double vice, which consists in this,\nthat the thing recedes from its nature, the perfection of which consists\nin unity, and there where the opposites meet, its composition and virtue\nexist. This, then, is how he is dead alive, or living dying; whence he\nsays, \"In a living death a dead life I live.\" He is not dead, because\nhe lives in the object; not alive, because he is dead in himself;\ndeprived of death, because he gives birth to thoughts; deprived of life,\nbecause he does not grow or feel in himself. He is now most dejected\nthrough meditating on the high intelligence, and the perceived\nfeebleness of power; and most elated by the aspiration of heroic\nlonging, which passes far beyond his limits, and is most exalted by the\nintellectual appetite; which has not for its fashion or aim to add\nnumber to number, is most dejected by the violence done to him by the\nsensual opposite which drags him down towards hell. So that, finding\nhimself thus ascending and descending, he feels within his soul the\ngreatest dissension that is possible to be felt, and he remains in a\nstate of confusion through this rebellion of the senses, which urge him\nthither where reason restrains, and _vice versa_. This same is\nthoroughly demonstrated in the following sentences, where the Reason,\nunder the name of \"Filenio\" asks, and the enthusiast replies under the\nname of \"Shepherd,\" who labours in the care of the flocks and herds of\nhis thoughts, which he nourishes in the submission to and service of his\nnymph, which is the affection of that object to which he is captive.\n\n11.\n\nFILENIO. Shepherd!\n\nSHEPHERD. What wilt thou?\n\nF. What doest thou?\n\nS. I suffer.\n\nF. Wherefore?\n\nS. Because neither life has me for his own, nor death.\n\nF. Who's to blame?\n\nS. Love.\n\nF. That rascal?\n\nS. That rascal.\n\nF. Where is he?\n\nS. He holds me tight in my heart's core.\n\nF. What does he?\n\nS. Wounds me.\n\nF. Who?\n\nS. Me.\n\nF. Thee?\n\nS. Yes.\n\nF. With what?\n\nS. With the eyes, the gates of heaven and of hell.\n\nF. Dost hope?\n\nS. I hope.\n\nF. For pity?\n\nS. For pity.\n\nF. From whom?\n\nS. From him who racks me night and day.\n\nF. Has he any?\n\nS. I know not.\n\nF. Thou art a fool.\n\nS. How if such folly be pleasing to my soul?\n\nF. Does he promise?\n\nS. No.\n\nF. Does he deny?\n\nS. Not at all.\n\nF. Is he silent?\n\nS. Yes, for so much purity (_onesta_) robs me of my boldness.\n\nF. Thou ravest.\n\nS. How so?\n\nF. In vain efforts.\n\nS. His scorn more than my torments do I fear.\n\nHere he says that he craves for love, and he complains of it, yet not\nbecause he loves--seeing that to no true lover can love be displeasing;\nbut because he loves unhappily, whilst those beams which are the rays of\nthose lights, and which themselves, according as they are perverse and\nantagonistic, or really kind and gracious, become the gates which lead\ntowards heaven or towards hell. In this way he is kept in hope of future\nand uncertain mercy, but actually in a state of present and certain\ntorment, and although he sees his folly quite clearly, nevertheless he\ndoes not care to correct himself in it, or even to feel displeased with\nit, but rather does he feel satisfied with it, as he shows when he says:\n\n    Never let me of Love complain,\n    For Love alone can ease my pain.\n\nHere is shown another species of enthusiasm born from the light of\nreason, which excites fear and suppresses the aforesaid reason in order\nnot to commit any action which might vex or irritate the thing loved.\nHe says, then, that hope rests in the future, without anything being\npromised or denied; therefore, he is silent and asks nothing, for fear\nof offending purity (_l'onestade_). He does not venture to explain\nhimself and make a proposition, lest he be rejected with repugnance or\naccepted with reserve; for he thinks the evil that there might be in the\none would be over-balanced by the good in the other. He shows himself,\nthen, ready to suffer for ever his own torment, rather than to open the\ndoor to an opportunity through which the thing loved might be perturbed\nand saddened.\n\nCIC. Herein he proves that his love is truly heroic; because he proposes\nto himself as the chief aim, not corporeal beauty, but rather the grace\nof the spirit, and the inclination of the affections in which, rather\nthan in the beauty of the body, that love that has in it the divine, is\neternal.\n\nTANS. Thou knowest that, as the Platonic ideas are divided into three\nspecies, of which one tends to the contemplative or speculative life,\none to active morality, and the third to the idle and voluptuous, so are\nthere three species of love, of which one raises itself from the\ncontemplation of bodily form to the consideration of the spiritual and\ndivine; the other only continues in the delight of seeing and\nconversing; the third from seeing proceeds to precipitate into the\nconcupiscence of touch. Of these three modes others are composed,\naccording as the first may be coupled with the second or the third, or\nas all the three modes may combine together, of which one and all may be\ndivided into others, according to the affections of the enthusiast, as\nthese tend more towards the spiritual object, or more towards the\ncorporeal, or equally towards the one and the other. Hence it comes,\nthat of those who find themselves in this warfare, and are entangled in\nthe meshes of love, some aim at enjoying, and they are incited to pluck\nthe apple from the tree of corporeal beauty, without which acquisition,\nor at least the hope of it, they hold vain and worthy only of derision\nevery amorous care; and in such-wise run all those who are of a\nbarbarous nature, who neither do nor can seek to exalt themselves by\nloving worthy things, and aspiring to illustrious things, and higher\nstill to things divine, by suitable studies and exercises, to which\nnothing can more richly and easily supply the wings than heroic love;\nothers put before themselves the fruit of delight, which they take in\nthe aspect of the beauty and grace of the spirit, which glitters and\nshines in the beauty of the body, and certain of these, although they\nlove the body and greatly desire to be united to it, bewailing its\nabsence and being afflicted by separation, at the same time fear, lest\npresuming in this they may be deprived of that affability, conversation,\nfriendship, and sympathy which are most precious to them; because to\nattempt this there cannot be more guarantee of success than there is\nrisk of forfeiting that favour, which appears before the eyes of thought\nas a thing so glorious and worthy.\n\nCIC. It is a worthy thing, oh Tansillo! for its many virtues and\nperfections, and it behoves human genius to seek, accept, nourish, and\npreserve a love like that; but one should take great care not to bow\ndown or become enslaved to an object unworthy and base, lest we become\nsharers of the baseness and unworthiness of the same: appositely the\nFerrarese poet says\n\n    Who sets his foot upon the amorous snare,\n    Lest he besmear his wings, let him beware.\n\nTANS. To say the truth, that object, which beyond the beauty of the body\nhas no other splendour, is not worthy of being loved otherwise than to\nmake the race; and it seems to me the work of a pig or a horse to\ntorment one's self about it, and as to myself, never was I more\nfascinated by such things than I am now fascinated by some statue or\npicture to which I am indifferent. It would then be a great dishonour to\na generous soul, if, of a foul, vile, loose, and ignoble nature,\nalthough hid under an excellent symbol, it should be said: \"I fear his\nscorn more than my torment.\"\n\n\n\n\n=Third Dialogue.=\n\nTANSILLO.\n\n\nThere are several varieties of enthusiasts, which may all be reduced to\ntwo kinds. While some only display blindness, stupidity, and irrational\nimpetuosity, which tend towards savage madness, others by divine\nabstraction become in reality superior to ordinary men. And these again\nare of two kinds, for some having become the habitation of gods or\ndivine spirits, speak and perform wonderful things, without themselves\nunderstanding the reason. Many such have been uncultured and ignorant\npersons, into whom, being void of spirit and sense of their own, as into\nan empty chamber, the divine spirit and sense intrude, as it would have\nless power to show itself in those who are full of their own reason and\nsense. This divine spirit often desires that the world should know for\ncertain, that those do not speak from their own knowledge and\nexperience, but speak and act through some superior intelligence; for\nsuch, the mass of men vouchsafe more admiration and faith, while others,\nbeing skilful in contemplation and possessing innately a clear\nintellectual spirit, have an internal stimulus and natural fervour,\nexcited by the love of the divine, of justice, of truth, of glory, and\nby the fire of desire and the breath of intention, sharpen their senses,\nand in the sulphur of the cogitative faculty, these kindle the rational\nlight, with which they see more than ordinarily; and they come in the\nend to speak and act, not as vessels and instruments, but as chief\nartificers and experts.\n\nCIC. Of these two which dost thou esteem higher?\n\nTANS. The first have more dignity, power, and efficacy within\nthemselves, because they have the divinity; the second _are_ themselves\nworthy, potential, and efficacious, and _are_ divine. The first are\nworthy, as is the ass which carries the sacraments; the second are as a\nsacred thing. In the first is contemplated and seen in effect the\ndivinity, and that is beheld, adored, and obeyed; in the second is\ncontemplated and seen the excellency of humanity itself. But now to the\nquestion. These enthusiasms of which we speak, and which we see\nexemplified in these sentences, are not oblivion, but a memory; they\nare not neglect of one's self, but love and desire of the beautiful and\ngood, by means of which we are able to make ourselves perfect, by\ntransforming and assimilating ourselves to it. It is not a\nprecipitation, under the laws of a tyrannous fate, into the noose of\nanimal affections, but a rational impetus, which follows the\nintellectual apprehension of the beautiful and the good, which knows\nwhom it wishes to obey and to please, so that, by its nobility and\nlight, it kindles and invests itself with qualities and conditions\nthrough which it appears illustrious and worthy. He (the enthusiast)\nbecomes a god by intellectual contact with the divine object, and he has\nno thought for other than divine things, and shows himself insensible\nand impassive towards those things which are commonly felt, and about\nwhich others are mostly tormented; he fears nothing, and for love of the\ndivine he despises other pleasures and gives no thought to this life. It\nis not a fury of black bile which sends him drifting outside of\njudgment, reason, and acts of prudence, and tossed by the discordant\ntempest, like those who, having violated certain laws of the divine\nAdrastia, are condemned to be scourged by the Furies, in order that they\nmay be excited by a dissonance as corporeal through seditions,\ndestructions, and plagues, as it is spiritual, through the forfeiture of\nharmony between the perceptive and enjoying powers; but it is aglow\nkindled by the intellectual sun in the soul, and a divine impetus which\nlends it wings, with which, drawing nearer and nearer to the\nintellectual sun, and ridding itself of the rust of human cares, it\nbecomes a gold tried and pure, has the perception of divine and internal\nharmony, and its thoughts and acts accord with the symmetry of the law,\ninnate in all things. Not, as drunk from the cups of Circe, does he go\ndashing and stumbling, now in this and then in that ditch, now against\nthis or that rock, or like a shifting Proteus, changing now to this, now\nto the other aspect, never finding place, fashion, or ground to stay and\nsettle in; but, without spoiling the harmony, conquers and overcomes the\nhorrid monsters, and however much he may swerve, he easily returns to\nhimself[B] by means of those inward instincts that, like the nine Muses,\ndance and sing round the splendours of the universal Apollo, and under\ntangible images and material things, he comes to comprehend divine laws\nand counsels. It is true that sometimes, having love for his trusty\nescort, who is double, and because sometimes through occasional\nimpediments he finds himself defrauded of his strength, then, as one\ninsane and furious, he squanders away the love of that which he cannot\ncomprehend; whence, confused by the obscurity of the divinity, he\nsometimes abandons the work, and then again returns, to force himself\nwith his will thither, where he cannot arrive with the intellect. It is\ntrue also that he commonly wanders, and transports himself, now into\none, now into another form of the double Eros; therefore, the principal\nlesson that Love gives to him is, that he contemplate the divine beauty\nin shadow, when he cannot do so in the mirror, and, like the suitors of\nPenelope, he entertain himself with the maids when he is not permitted\nto converse with the mistress. Now, in conclusion, you can comprehend,\nfrom what has been said, what is this enthusiast whose picture is put\nforth, when it is said:\n\n12.\n\n    If towards the shining light the butterfly,\n    Winging his way knows not the burning flame,\n    And if the thirsty stag, unmindful of the dart,\n    Runs fainting to the brook,\n    Or unicorn, unto the chaste breast running,\n    Ignores the snare that is for him prepared,\n    I, in the light, the fount, the bosom of my love\n    Behold the flames, the arrows, and the chains.\n    If it be sweet in plaintiveness to droop,\n    Why does that lofty splendour dazzle me?\n    Wherefore the sacred arrow sweetly wound?\n    Why in this knot is my desire involved?\n    And why to me eternal irksomeness\n    Flames to my heart, darts to my breast and snares unto my soul?\n\n[B] Facilmente ritorna al sesso.\n\nHere he shows his love not to be like that of the butterfly, of the\nstag, and of the unicorn, who would flee away if they had knowledge of\nthe fire, of the arrow, and of the snares, and who have no other sense\nthan that of pleasure; but he is moved by a most sensible and only too\nevident passion, which forces him to love that fire more than any\ncoolness; more that wound than any wholeness; more those fetters than\nany liberty. For this evil is not absolutely evil, but, through\ncomparison with good (according to opinion), it is deceptive, like the\nsauce that old Saturn gets when he devours his own sons; for this evil\nabsolutely in the eye of the Eternal, is comprehended either for good,\nor for guide which conduces to it, since this fire is the ardent desire\nof divine things, this arrow is the impression of the ray of the beauty\nof supernal light, these snares are the species of truth which unite our\nmind to the primal verity, and the species of good which unite and join\nto the primal and highest good. To that meaning I approached when I\nsaid:\n\n13.\n\n    With such a fire and such a noble noose,\n    Beauty enkindles me, and pureness binds,\n    So that in flames and servitude I take delight,\n    Liberty takes flight and dreads the ice.\n    Such is the heat, that though I burn yet am I not destroyed,\n    The tie is such, the world with me gives praise.\n    Fear cannot freeze, nor pain unshackle me;\n    For soothing is the ardour, sweet the smart.\n    So high the light that burns me I discern,\n    And of so rich a thread the noose contrived\n    That, thought being born, the longing dies.\n    And since, within my heart shines such pure flames,\n    And so supreme a tie compels my will,\n    Let my shade serve, and let my ashes burn.\n\nAll the loves, if they be heroic and not purely animal, or what is\ncalled natural, and slaves to generation, as instruments of nature in a\ncertain way, have for object the divinity, tend towards divine beauty,\nwhich first is communicated to souls and shines in them, and from them,\nor rather through them, it is communicated to bodies; whence it is that\nwell-ordered affection loves the body or corporeal beauty, insomuch as\nit is an indication of beauty of spirit. Thus that which causes the\nattraction of love to the body is a certain spirituality which we see in\nit, and which is called beauty, and which does not consist in major or\nminor dimensions, nor in determined colours or forms, but in harmony and\nconsonance of members and colours. This shows an affinity between the\nspirit and the most acute and penetrative senses; whence it follows that\nsuch become more easily and intensely enamoured, and also more easily\nand intensely disgusted, which might be through a change of the deformed\nspirit, which in some gesture and expressed intention reveals itself in\nsuch wise that this deformity extends from the soul to the body, and\nmakes it appear no longer beautiful as before. The beauty, then, of the\nbody has power to kindle, but not to bind, and the lover, unless aided\nby the graces of the spirit, such as purity, gratitude, courtesy,\ncircumspection, is unable to escape. Therefore, said I, beautiful is\nthat fire which burns me, and noble that tie which binds.\n\nCIC. I do not believe it is always like that, Tansillo; because,\nsometimes, notwithstanding that we discover the spirit to be vicious, we\nremain heated and entangled; so that, although reason perceives the evil\nand unworthiness of such a love, it yet has not power to alienate the\ndisordered appetite. In this disposition, I believe, was the Nolano when\nhe said:\n\n14.\n\n    Woe's me! my fury forces me\n    To union with the bad within,\n    And makes it seem a love supreme and good.\n    Wearied, my soul cares nought\n    That I opposing counsels entertain,\n    And with the savage tyrant\n    Nourished with want,\n    And made to put myself in exile,\n    More than with liberty contented am.\n    I spread my sails to the wind,\n    To draw me forth from this detested bliss,\n    And to reclaim me from the cloying hurt.\n\nTANS. This occurs when spirits are vicious and tinged as with the same\nhue; since, through conformity, love is excited, enkindled, and\nconfirmed. Thus the vicious easily concur in acts of the same vice; and\nI will not refrain from repeating that which I know by experience, for\nalthough I may have discovered in a soul vices very much abominated by\nme--as, for instance, filthy avarice, base greediness for money,\ningratitude for favours and courtesies received, or a love of quite vile\npersons, of which this last most displeases, because it takes away the\nhope from the lover, that by becoming or making himself more worthy he\nmay become more acceptable--in spite of all this, it is true that I did\nburn for corporeal beauty. But how? I loved against my will; for, were\nit not so, I should have been more saddened than cheered by troubles and\nmisfortunes.\n\nCIC. It is a very proper and nice distinction that is made between\nloving and liking.\n\nTANS. Truly; because we like many--that is, we desire that they be wise\nand just; but we love them not because they are unjust and ignorant;\nmany we love because they are beautiful, but we do not like them,\nbecause they do not deserve it; and amongst other things of which the\nlover deems the loved one undeserving, the first is, being loved; and\nyet, although he cannot abstain from loving, nevertheless he regrets it,\nand shows his regret like him who said, \"Woe is me! who am compelled by\npassion to coalesce with evil.\" In the opposite mood was he, either\nthrough some corporeal object in similitude or through a divine subject\nin reality, when he said:\n\n15.\n\n    Although to many pains thou dost subject me,\n    Yet do I thank thee, love, and owe thee much,\n    That thou my breast dost cleave with noble wound,\n    And then dost take my heart and master it.\n    Thus true it is, that I, on earth, adore\n    A living object, image most beautiful of God.\n    Let him who will think that my fate is bad\n    That kills in hope and quickens in desire.\n    My pasture is the high emprise,\n    And though the end desired be not attained,\n    And though my soul in many thoughts is spent,\n    Enough that she enkindle noble fire,\n    Enough that she has lifted me on high,\n    And from the ignoble crowd has severed me.\n\nHere his love is entirely heroic and divine, and as such, I wish it to\nbe understood; although he says that through it he is subject to many\npangs, every lover who is separated from the thing loved (to which being\njoined by affection he would also wish to be actually), being in anguish\nand pain, he torments himself, not forsooth because he loves, since he\nfeels his love is engaged most worthily and most nobly, but because he\nfeels deprived of that fruition which he would obtain if he arrived at\nthat end to which he tends. He suffers, not from the desire which\nanimates him, but from the difficulty in the cultivation of it which so\ntortures him. Others esteem him unhappy through this appearance of an\nevil destiny, as being condemned to these pangs, for he will never cease\nfrom acknowledging the obligation he is under to love, nor cease from\nrendering thanks to him because he has presented before the eyes of his\nmind such an intelligible conception through which, in this earthly\nlife, shut in this prison of the flesh, wrapped in these nerves and\nsupported by these bones, it is permitted to him to contemplate the\ndivinity in a more suitable manner than if other conceptions and\nsimilitudes than these had offered themselves.\n\nCIC. The divine and living object, then, of which he speaks, is the\nhighest intelligible conception that he has been able to form to himself\nof the divinity, and is not some corporeal beauty which might overshadow\nhis thought and appear superficially to the senses.\n\nTANS. Even so; because no tangible thing nor conception of such can\nraise itself to so much dignity.\n\nCIC. Why, then, does he mention that conception as the object, if, as\nappears to me, the true object is the divinity itself?\n\nTANS. The divinity is the final object, the ultimate and most perfect,\nbut not in this state, where we cannot see God except as in a shadow or\na mirror, and therefore He cannot be the object except in some\nsimilitude, but not in such as may be extracted or acquired from\ncorporeal beauty and excellence, by virtue of the senses, but such as\nmay be formed in the mind, by virtue of the intellect. In which state,\nfinding himself, he comes to lose the love and affection for every other\nthing senseful as well as intellectual, because this, conjoined to that\nlight, itself also becomes light, and in consequence becomes a god:\nbecause it contracts the divinity into itself, it being in God through\nthe intention with which it penetrates into the divinity so far as it\ncan, and God being in it, so that after penetrating, it comes to\nconceive, and so far as it can, receive and comprehend the divinity in\nits conception. Now in such conceptions and similitudes the human\nintellect of this lower world nourishes itself, till such time as it\nwill be lawful to behold with purer eye the beauty of the divinity. As\nhappens to him, who, absorbed in the contemplation of some elaborate\narchitectural work, goes on examining one thing after another in it,\nenchanted and feeding in a wonder of delight; but if it should happen\nthat he sees the lord of all those pictures, who is of a beauty\nincomparably greater, leaving all care and thought of them, he is turned\nintently to the examination of him. Here, then, is the difference\nbetween that state where we see divine beauty in intelligible\nconceptions apart from the effects, labours, works, shadows, and\nsimilitudes of it, and that other state in which it is lawful to behold\nit in real presence. He says: \"My pasture is the high emprise,\" because\nas the Pythagoreans remark, \"The soul moves and turns round God, as the\nbody round the soul.\"\n\nCIC. Then the body is not the habitation of the soul?\n\nTANS. No; because the soul is not in the body locally, but as intrinsic\nform and extrinsic framer, as that which forms the limbs indicates the\ninternal and external composition. The body, then, is in the soul, the\nsoul in the mind, the mind either is God or is in God, as Plotinus said.\nAs in its essence it is in God who is its life, similarly through the\nintellectual operation, and the will consequent upon such operation, it\nagrees with its bright and beatific object. Fitly, therefore, this\nrapture of heroic enthusiasm feeds on such \"high emprise.\" For the\nobject is infinite, and in action most simple, and our intellectual\npower cannot apprehend the infinite except in speech or in a certain\nmanner of speech, so to say in a certain potential or relative\ninference, as one who proposes to himself the infinity, so that he may\nconstitute for himself a finality where no finality is.\n\nCIC. Fitly so, because the ultimate ought not to have an end seeing\nthat it is ultimate. For it is infinite in intention, in perfection, in\nessence, and in any other manner whatsoever of being final.\n\nTANS. Thou sayest truly. Now in this life, that food is such that\nexcites more than it can appease, as that divine poet shows when he\nsays: \"My soul is wearied, longing for the living God,\" and in another\nplace; \"Attenuati sunt oculi mei suspicientes in excelsa.\" Therefore he\nsays, \"And though the end desired be not attained, And that my soul in\nmany thoughts is spent, Enough that she enkindle noble fire:\" meaning to\nsay that the soul comforts itself, and receives all the glory which it\nis able in that state to receive, and that it is a participator in that\nultimate enthusiasm of man, in so far as he is a man in this present\ncondition, as we see him.\n\nCIC. It appears to me that the Peripatetics, as explained by Averroes,\nmean this, when they say that the highest felicity of man consists in\nperfection through the speculative sciences.\n\nTANS. It is true, and they say well; because we, in this state, cannot\ndesire nor obtain greater perfection than that in which we are, when our\nintellect, by means of some noble and intelligible conception, unites\nitself either to the substance of things hoped for, as those say, or to\nthe divine mind, as it is the fashion to say of the Platonists. For the\npresent, I will leave reasoning about the soul, or man in another state\nor mode of being than he can find himself or believe himself to be in.\n\nCIC. But what perfection or satisfaction can man find in that knowledge\nwhich is not perfect?\n\nTANS. It will never be perfect, so far as understanding the highest\nobject is concerned; but in so far as our intellect can understand it.\nLet it suffice that in this and other states there be present to him the\ndivine beauty so far as the horizon of his vision extends.\n\nCIC. But all men cannot arrive at that, which one or two may reach.\n\nTANS. Let it suffice that all \"run well,\" and that each does his utmost,\nfor the heroic nature is content and shows its dignity rather in\nfalling, or in failing worthily in the high undertaking, in which it\nshows the dignity of its spirit, than in succeeding to perfection in\nlower and less noble things.\n\nCIC. Truly a dignified and heroic death is better than a mean, low\ntriumph.\n\nTANS. On that theme I made this sonnet:\n\n16.\n\n    Since I have spread my wings to my desire,\n    The more I feel the air beneath my feet,\n    So much the more towards the wind I bend\n    My swiftest pinions,\n    And spurn the world and up towards heaven I go.\n    Not the sad fate of Daedalus's son\n    Does warn me to turn downwards,\n    But ever higher will I rise.\n    Well do I see, I shall fall dead to earth;\n    But what life is there can compare with this my death?\n    Out on the air my heart's voice do I hear:\n    \"Whither dost thou carry me, thou fearless one?\n    Turn back. Such over-boldness rarely grief escapes.\"\n    \"Fear not the utmost ruin then,\" I said,\n    \"Cleave confident the clouds and die content,\n    That heaven has destined thee to such illustrious death.\"\n\nCIC. I understand when you say: \"Enough that thou hast lifted me on\nhigh;\" but not: \"And from the ignoble crowd hast severed me;\" unless it\nmeans his having come out from the Platonic groove on account of the\nstupid and low condition of the crowd; for those that find profit in\nthis contemplation cannot be numerous.\n\nTANS. Thou understandest well; but thou mayst also understand, by the\n\"ignoble crowd,\" the body, and sensual cognition, from which he must\narise and free himself who would unite with a nature of a contrary\nkind.\n\nCIC. The Platonists say there are two kinds of knots which link the soul\nto the body. One is a certain vivifying action which from the soul\ndescends into the body, like a ray; the other is a certain vital\nquality, which is produced from that action in the body. Now this active\nand most noble number, which is the soul, in what way do you understand\nthat it may be severed from the ignoble number, which is the body?\n\nTANS. Certainly it was not understood according to any of these modes,\nbut according to that mode whereby those powers which are not\ncomprehended and imprisoned in the womb of matter, sometimes as if\ninebriated and stupefied, find that they also are occupied in the\nformation of matter and in the vivification of the body; then, as if\nawakened and brought to themselves, recognizing its principle and\ngenius, they turn towards superior things and force themselves on the\nintelligible world as to their native abode, and from thence, through\ntheir conversion to inferior things, they are thrust into the fate and\nconditions of generation. These two impulses are symbolized in the two\nkinds of metamorphosis expressed in the following:\n\n17.\n\n    That god who shakes the sounding thunder,\n    Asteria as a furtive eagle saw;\n    Mnemosyne as shepherd; Danae gold;\n    Alcmene as a fish; Antiope a goat;\n    Cadmus and his sister a white bull;\n    Leda as swan, and Dolida as dragon;\n    And through the lofty object I become,\n    From subject viler still, a god.\n    A horse was Saturn;\n    And in a calf and dolphin Neptune dwelt;\n    Ibis and shepherd Mercury became;\n    Bacchus a grape; Apollo was a crow;\n    And I by help of love,\n    From an inferior thing, do change me to a god.\n\nIn Nature is one revolution and one circle, by means of which, for the\nperfection and help of others, superior things lower themselves to\nthings inferior, and, by their own excellence and felicity, inferior\nthings raise themselves to superior ones. Therefore the Pythagoreans and\nPlatonists say it is given to the soul that at certain times, not only\nby spontaneous will, which turns it towards the comprehension of Nature,\nbut also by the necessity of an internal law, written and registered by\nthe destined decree, they seek their own justly determined fate; and\nthey also say that souls, not so much by determination of their own will\nas through a certain order, by which they become inclined towards\nmatter, decline as rebels from divinity; wherefore, not by free\nintention, but by a certain occult consequence, they fall. And this is\nthe inclination that they have to generation, as towards a minor good.\nMinor, I say, in so far as it appertains to that particular nature; not\nin so far as it appertains to the universal nature, where nothing\nhappens without the highest aim, and which disposes of all things\naccording to justice. In which generation finding themselves once more\nthrough the changes which permutably succeed, they return again to the\nsuperior forms.\n\nCIC. So that they mean, that souls are impelled by the necessity of\nfate, and have no proper counsel which guides them at all.\n\nTANS. Necessity, fate, nature, counsel, will, those things, justly and\nrightfully ordained, all agree in one. Besides which, as Plotinus\nrelates, some believe that certain souls can escape from their own evil,\nif knowing the danger, they seek refuge in the mind before the corporeal\nhabit is confirmed; because the mind raises to things sublime, as the\nimagination lowers to inferior things. The mind always understands one,\nas the imagination is one in movement and in diversity; the mind always\nunderstands one, as the imagination is always inventing for itself\nvarious images. In the midst is the rational faculty, which is a\nmixture of all, like that in which the one agrees with the many,\nsameness with variety, movement with fixedness, the inferior with the\nsuperior. Now these transmutations and conversions are symbolized in the\nwheel of metamorphosis, where man sits on the upper part, a beast lies\nat the bottom, a half-man, half-beast descends from the left, and a\nhalf-beast, half-man ascends from the right. This transmutation is shown\nwhere Jove, according to the diversity of the affections and the\nbehaviour of those towards inferior things, invests himself with divers\nfigures, entering into the form of beasts; and so also the other gods\ntransmigrate into base and alien forms. And, on the contrary, through\nthe knowledge of their own nobility, they re-take their own divine form;\nas the passionate hero, raising himself through conceived kinds of\ndivine beauty and goodness, with the wings of the intellect and rational\nwill, rises to the divinity, leaving the form of the lower subject. And\ntherefore he said, \"I become from subject viler still, a god. From an\ninferior thing do change me to a god.\"\n\n\n\n\n=Fourth Dialogue.=\n\nTANSILLO.\n\n\nThus is described the discourse of heroic love, in all which tends to\nits own object, which is the highest good; and heroic intellect, which\ndevotes itself to the study of its own object, which is the primal\nverity, or absolute truth. Now the first discourse holds the sum of this\nand the intention, the order of which is described in five others\nfollowing:\n\n18.\n\n    To the woods, the mastiffs and the greyhounds young Actaeon leads,\n    When destiny directs him into the doubtful and neglected way,\n    Upon the track of savage beasts in forests wild.\n    And here, between the waters, he sees a bust and face more beautiful\n          than e'er was seen\n    By mortal or divine, of scarlet, alabaster, and fine gold;\n    He sees, and the great hunter straight becomes that which he hunts.\n    The stag, that towards still thicker shades now goes with lighter\n          steps,\n    His own great dogs swiftly devour.\n    So I extend my thoughts to higher prey, and these\n    Now turning on me give me death with cruel savage bite.\n\nActaeon signifies the intellect, intent on the pursuit of divine wisdom\nand the comprehension of divine beauty. He lets loose the mastiffs and\nthe greyhounds, of whom the latter are more swift and the former more\nstrong, because the operation of the intellect precedes that of the\nwill; but this is more vigorous and effectual than that; seeing that, to\nthe human intellect, divine goodness and beauty are more loveable than\ncomprehensible, and love it is that moves and urges the intellect, and\nprecedes it as a lantern. The woods, uncultivated and solitary places,\nvisited and penetrated by few, and where there are few traces of men.\nThe youth of little skill and practice, as of one of short life and of\nwavering enthusiasm. In the doubtful road of uncertain and distorted\nreason--a disposition assigned to the character of Pythagoras--where you\nsee the most thorny, uncultivated, and deserted to be the right and\ndifficult path, where he lets loose the greyhounds and the mastiffs upon\nthe track of savage beasts, that is, the intelligible kinds of ideal\nconceptions, which are occult, followed by few, visited but rarely, and\nwhich do not disclose themselves to all those who seek them. Here,\namongst the waters,--that is, in the mirror of similitude, in those\nworks where shines the brightness of divine goodness and splendour,\nwhich works are symbolized by the waters superior and inferior, which\nare above and below the firmament, he sees the most beautiful bust and\nface--that is, external power and operation, which it is possible to\nsee, by the habit and act of contemplation and the application of mortal\nor divine mind, of man or any god.\n\nCIC. I do not believe that he makes a comparison, nor puts as the same\nkind the divine and the human mode of comprehending, which are very\ndiverse, but as to the subject they are the same.\n\nTANS. So it is. He says \"of red and alabaster and gold,\" because that\nwhich in bodily beauty is red, white, and fair, in divinity signifies\nthe scarlet of divine vigorous power, the gold of divine wisdom, the\nalabaster of divine beauty, through the contemplation of which the\nPythagoreans, Chaldeans, Platonists, and others, strive in the best way\nthat they can to elevate themselves. \"The great hunter saw,\" he\nunderstood as much as was possible, and became the hunted. He went out\nfor prey, and this hunter became himself the prey, by the operation of\nthe intellect converting the things learned into itself.\n\nCIC. I understand. He forms intelligible conceptions in his own way and\nproportions them to his capacity, so that they are received according to\nthe manner of the recipient.\n\nTANS. And does he hunt through the operation of the will, by the act of\nwhich he converts himself into the object?\n\nCIC. As I understand: because love transforms and converts into the\nthing loved.\n\nTANS. Well dost thou know that the intellect learns things\nintelligibly--_i.e._, in its own way, and the will pursues things\nnaturally, that is, according to the reason that is in themselves. So\nActaeon with those thoughts--those dogs--which hunted outside themselves\nfor goodness, wisdom, and beauty, thus came into the presence of the\nsame, and ravished out of himself by so much splendour, he became the\nprey, saw himself converted into that for which he was seeking, and\nperceived, that of his dogs or thoughts, he himself came to be the\nlonged-for prey; for having absorbed the divinity into himself it was\nnot necessary to search outside himself for it.\n\nCIC. For this reason it is said \"the kingdom of Heaven is in us;\"\ndivinity dwells within through the reformed intellect and will.\n\nTANS. It is so. See then, Actaeon hunted by his own dogs--pursued by his\nown thoughts--runs and directs these novel paces, invigorated so as to\nproceed divinely and \"more easily,\" that is, with greater facility and\nwith refreshed vigour \"towards the denser places,\" to the deserts and\nthe region of things incomprehensible. From being such as he first was,\na common ordinary man, he becomes rare and heroic, his habits and ideas\nare strange, and he leads an unusual life. Here his great dogs \"give him\ndeath,\" and thus ends his life according to the mad, sensual, blind, and\nfantastic world, and he begins to live intellectually; he lives the life\nof the gods, fed on ambrosia and drunk with nectar.\n\nNext we see under the form of another similitude the manner in which he\narms himself to obtain the object. He says:\n\n19.\n\n    My solitary bird! away unto that region\n    Which overshadows and which occupies my thought,\n    Go swiftly, and there nestle; there every\n    Need of thine be strengthened,\n    There all thy industry and art be spent!\n    There be thou born again, and there on high,\n    Gather and train up thy wandering fledglings\n    Since adverse fate has drawn away the bars\n    With which she ever sought to block thy way.\n    Go! I desire for thee a nobler dwelling-place,\n    And thou shalt have for guide a god,\n    Who is called blind by him who nothing sees.\n    Go! and ever be by thee revered,\n    Each deity of that wide sphere,\n    And come not back to me till thou art mine.\n\nThe progress symbolized above by the hunter who excites his dogs, is\nhere illustrated by a winged heart, which is sent out of the cage, in\nwhich it lived idle and quiet, to make its nest on high and bring up its\nfledglings, its thoughts, the time being come in which those impediments\nare removed, which were caused, externally, in a thousand different\nways, and internally by natural feebleness. He dismisses his heart then\nto make more magnificent surroundings, urging him to the highest\npropositions and intentions, now that those powers of the soul are more\nfully fledged, which Plato signifies by the two wings, and he commits\nhim to the guidance of that god, who, by the unseeing crowd, is\nconsidered insane and blind, that is Love, who, by the mercy and favour\nof heaven, has power to transform him into that nature towards which he\naspires, or into that state from which, a pilgrim, he is banished.\nWhence he says, \"Come not back to me till thou art mine,\" and not\nunworthily may I say with that other--\n\n    Thou has left me, oh, my heart,\n    And thou, light of my eyes, art no more with me.\n\nHere he describes the death of the soul, which by the Kabbalists is\ncalled the death by kisses, symbolized in the Song of Solomon, where the\nfriend says:\n\n    Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth,\n    For, when he wounds me,\n    I suffer with a cruel love.\n\nBy others it is called sleep; the Psalmist says:\n\n    It shall be, that I give sleep unto mine eyes,\n    And mine eyelids shall slumber,\n    And I shall have in him peaceful repose.\n\nThe soul then is said to be faint, because it is dead in itself, and\nalive in the object:\n\n20.\n\n    Give heed, enthusiasts, unto the heart!\n    For mine condemns me to a life apart,\n    Bound by unmerciful and cruel ties,\n    He dwells with joy, there where he faints and dies.\n    At every hour I call him back by thoughts:\n    A rebel he, like gerfalcon insane,\n    He feels no more the hand that did restrain,\n    And is gone forth not to return again.\n    Thou beauteous beast that dost in punishment\n    Knit up the soul, spirit and heart content'st\n    With pricks, with lightnings, and with chains!\n    From looks, from accents, and from usages,\n    Which faint and burn and keep thee bound,\n    Where shall he that heals, that cools, and loosens thee be found?\n\nHere the soul, sorrowful, not from real discontent, but on account of\npains which she suffers, directs the discourse to those who are affected\nby passions similar to her own: as if she had not of her own free will\nand of her own desire dismissed her heart, which goes running whither it\ncannot arrive, stretches out to that which it cannot reach, and tries to\nenfold that which it cannot comprehend, and with this, because he vainly\nseparates from her, ever more and more goes on aspiring towards the\ninfinite.\n\nCIC. Whence comes it, oh Tansillo, that the soul in such progression\ndelights in its own torments? Whence comes that spur which urges it ever\nbeyond that which it possesses?\n\nTANS. From this, which I will tell thee now. The intellect being\ndeveloped to the comprehension of a certain definite and specific form,\nand the will to a love commensurate with such comprehension; the\nintellect does not stop there, but by its own light it is prompted to\nthink of this: that it contains within itself the germ of everything\nintelligible and desirable, until it comes to comprehend with the\nintellect the depth of the fountain of ideas, the ocean of every truth\nand goodness. So that it happens, that whatever conception is presented\nto the mind, and becomes understood by it, from that which is so\npresented and comprehended it judges, that above it, is other greater\nand greater, and finds itself ever in a certain way discoursing and\nmoving with it. Because it sees that all which it possesses is only a\nlimited thing, and therefore cannot be sufficient of itself, nor good of\nitself, nor beautiful of itself; because it is not the universal nor the\nabsolute entity; but contracted into being this nature, this species,\nthis form, represented to the intellect and present to the soul. Then\nfrom the beautiful that is understood, and consequently limited, and\ntherefore beautiful through participation, it progresses towards that\nwhich is really beautiful, which has no margin, nor any boundaries.\n\nCIC. This progression appears to me useless.\n\nTANS. Not so. For it is not natural nor suitable that the infinite be\nrestricted, nor give itself definitely, for it would not then be\ninfinite. To be infinite, it must be infinitely pursued with that form\nof pursuit which is not incited physically, but metaphysically, and is\nnot from imperfect to perfect, but goes circulating through the grades\nof perfection to arrive at that infinite centre which is not form, and\nis not formed.\n\nCIC. I should like to know how, by circumambulating, one is to arrive at\nthe centre?\n\nTANS. I cannot know that.\n\nCIC. Why do you say it?\n\nTANS. I can say it, and leave it to you to consider.\n\nCIC. If you do not mean that he who pursues the infinite is like him who\ntalks about the circumference when he is seeking for the centre, I do\nnot know what you mean.\n\nTANS. Quite the contrary.\n\nCIC. Now if you will not explain yourself, I cannot understand you; but\ntell me, prythee, what he means by saying the heart is bound by cruel,\nspiteful bonds.\n\nTANS. He speaks in similitude or metaphor; as you would say, cruel was\none who did not allow a full enjoyment, and who lives more in the desire\nthan in possession, and who, partially possessing, is not content, but\ndesires, faints, and dies.\n\nCIC. What are those thoughts that call him back from the noble\nenterprise?\n\nTANS. The sensual and natural affections, which regard the government of\nthe body.\n\nCIC. What have they to do with it, that in no way can either help or\nfavour it?\n\nTANS. They have not to do with it, but with the soul, which, being so\nabsorbed in one work or study, becomes remiss and careless in others.\n\nCIC. Why does he call him insane?\n\nTANS. Because he surpasses in knowledge.\n\nCIC. It is usual to call insane those who know nothing.\n\nTANS. On the contrary. Those are called insane who know not in the\nordinary way, or who rise above the ordinary from having more intellect.\n\nCIC. I perceive that thou sayest truly. Now tell me what are the pricks,\nthe lightnings, and the chains?\n\nTANS. Pricks are those experiences that stimulate and awaken the\naffection, to make it on the alert; lightnings are the rays of the\npresent beauty, which enlighten those who watch and wait for them;\nchains are those effects and circumstances which keep fixed the eyes of\nattention and unite together the object and the powers.\n\nCIC. What are the looks, the accents, and the customs?\n\nTANS. Looks are the means by which the object is made present to us;\naccents are the means through which we are inspired and informed;\ncustoms are the circumstances which are most pleasant and agreeable to\nus. So that the heart that gently suffers, patiently burns and\nconstantly perseveres in the work, fears that its hurt will heal, its\nfire be extinguished, and its bands be loosened.\n\nCIC. Now relate that which follows.\n\nTANS.:\n\n21.\n\n    Lofty, profound, and stirring thoughts of mine,\n    Ye long to sever the maternal ties\n    Of the afflicted soul, and like to proud\n    And able bowmen, draw at the mark,\n    Which is the germ of all your high conceits.\n    In those steep paths where cruel beasts may be,\n    Let not heaven leave ye!\n    Remember to return, and summon back\n    The heart that tarries with the wild wood nymph;\n    Arm ye with love,\n    Warm with the flame of domesticity,\n    And with strong repression guard thy sight,\n    That strangers keep thee not companioned with my heart;\n    At least bring news of that,\n    Which unto him is such delight and joy.\n\nHere he describes the natural solicitude of the attentive soul on the\nsubject, of its inclination towards generation, which it has contracted\nwith matter. She dispatches the armed thoughts, which, solicited and\nurged by disagreement with the inferior nature, are sent to recall the\nheart. The soul instructs them how they should conduct themselves, so\nthat, being allured and attracted by the object, they do not become\ninduced to remain, they also, captive and companions of the heart. She\nsays, then, they are to arm themselves with love, with that love that is\nfired by the domestic flame; that is, the friend of generation, to whom\nthey are bound, and in whose jurisdiction, ministry, and warfare they\nfind themselves. Anon she orders them to repress their eyesight and to\nclose their eyes, so that they may not behold other beauty or goodness\nthan that which is present, friend and mother; and concludes at last\nwith this, that if no other reason will cause them to return, they\nshould at least do so, to give account of the discourse and of the state\nof the heart.\n\nCIC. Before you proceed further, I would understand from you what is\nthat which the soul means when she tells the thoughts to repress the\nsight vigorously.\n\nTANS. I will tell thee. All love proceeds from seeing: intelligent love,\nfrom seeing intelligently; sensuous love, from seeing sensuously. Now\nthis seeing has two meanings: either it means the visual power, that is\nthe sight, which is the intellect, or truly the sense; or it means the\nact of that power, that is, that application which the eye or the\nintellect makes to the material or intellectual object. When the\nthoughts are counselled to repress the sight, it is not the first, but\nthe second, mode that is meant, because that is the father of the\nsubsequent affection of the sensuous or intellectual desire.\n\nCIC. This is what I wished to hear from you. Now, if the act of the\nvisual power is the cause of the evil or good which proceed from seeing,\nwhence comes it that in things divine we have more love than knowledge?\n\nTANS. We desire to see, because in some way we perceive the value of\nseeing. We are aware that, through the act of seeing, beautiful things\noffer themselves to us; and therefore we desire beautiful things.\n\nCIC. We desire the beautiful and the good; but seeing is not beautiful\nnor good; rather is it the touchstone or light by which we see, not only\nthe beautiful and good, but also the evil and bad. Therefore it seems to\nme that seeing may be equally beautiful or good, as the thing seen may\nbe white or black. If, then, the sight, which is an act, is not\nbeautiful nor good, how can it fall into desire?\n\nTANS. If not for itself, yet certainly for some other reason, it is\ndesired, seeing that there can be no apprehension of that other without\nit.\n\nCIC. What wilt thou say, if that other is not within the knowledge of\nthe senses nor of the intellect? How, I say, can that be desired which\nis not seen, if there is no knowledge whatever of it--if towards it\nneither the intellect nor the sense has exercised any act whatever; but,\non the contrary, it is even dubious whether it be intellectual or\nsensuous, whether a thing corporeal or incorporeal, whether it be one or\ntwo or more, or of one fashion or of another?\n\nTANS. I answer, that in the sense and the intellect there is one desire\nand one impulse to the sensuous in general; because the intellect will\nhear the whole truth, so that it may learn all that is beautiful or good\nintelligently; the power of the senses will inform itself of all that is\nsensuous, so that it may know all that is good and beautiful in the\nworld of the senses. Hence it follows that not less do we desire to see\nthings unknown and unseen than those known and seen. And from this it\ndoes not follow that the desire does not proceed from cognition, and\nthat we desire something that is not known; but I say that it is certain\nand sure that we do not desire unknown things. Because, if they be\noccult as to particulars, they are not occult as to generals; as in the\nentire visual power is found the whole of the visible appositely, and in\nthe intellect all the intelligible. Therefore, as the inclination to the\nact lies in its appropriateness, the result is that both these powers\nincline towards the universal action, as to a thing naturally\ncomprehended as good. The soul, then, did not speak to the deaf or the\nblind when she counselled her thoughts to repress the sight, which,\nalthough it may not be the immediate cause of the will, is yet the\nprimal and principal cause.\n\nCIC. What do you mean by this last saying?\n\nTANS. I mean that it is not the figure or the conception, sensibly or\nintelligently represented, which of itself moves us; because while one\nstands beholding the figure manifested to the eyes, he does not yet\narrive at loving; but from that instant that the soul conceives within\nitself that figure, not visible, but thinkable; no longer dividual, but\nindividual; no longer classed among things in general, but among things\ngood and beautiful; then immediately love is born. Now this is the\nseeing, from which the soul desires to divert the eyes of her thoughts.\nHere the sight usually moves the affection to a greater love than the\nlove of that which is seen; for, as I have just said, it always\nconsiders, through the universal knowledge that it holds of the\nbeautiful and the good, that, besides the degrees of known conceptions\nof goodness and beauty, there are others and yet others _ad infinitum_.\n\nCIC. How is it that after we become informed of that conception of the\nbeautiful which is begotten in the soul, we yet desire to satisfy the\nexterior vision?\n\nTANS. From this, that the soul would ever love that which it loves, and\never see that which it sees. Therefore she wills that, the conception\nwhich has been produced in her through seeing, should not become\nweakened, enervated and lost; but would ever see more and more, and that\nwhich becomes obscure in the interior affection, should be frequently\nbrightened by the exterior aspect, which as it is the principle of\nbeing, must also be the principle of conservation. This results\nproportionately in the act of understanding and of considering, for as\nthe sight has reference to visible things, so has the intellect to\nintelligible things. I believe now that you understand to what end and\nin what manner the soul tends, when she says \"repress the sight.\"\n\nCIC. I understand very well. Now continue to unfold what happens to\nthese thoughts.\n\nTANS. Now follows the disagreement between the mother and the aforesaid\nchildren, who having, contrary to her orders, opened their eyes, and,\nhaving fixed them on the splendour of the object, they remained in\ncompany with the heart.\n\n22.\n\n    Cruel sons are ye to me, me whom ye left\n    Still farther to exasperate my pain;\n    And ever without cease ye weary me,\n    Taking away from me my every hope!\n    Why should the sense remain? oh, grasping heavens!\n    Wherefore these broken ruined powers, if not\n    To make me subject and exemplar\n    Of such heavy martyrdom, such lengthened pain?\n    Leave, dear sons, my winged fire enchained,\n    And let me, some of you once more behold,\n    Come back to me from those retaining claws!\n    Oh, weariness! not one returns\n    To bring a late refreshment to my pains.\n\nBehold me, miserable one, deprived of heart, abandoned of thoughts, left\nby hope, I, who had fixed my all in them. Nothing is left to me but the\nsense of my poverty, my unhappiness and misery; why does not this too\nleave me? Why does not death succour me, now that I am deprived of life?\nTo what use do I possess these natural powers if I be deprived of the\nuse of them? How can I alone nourish myself with intelligible\nconceptions as with intellectual bread, if the substance of this bread\nbe composed of this contingency. How can I linger in the intimacy of\nthese friendly and dear members which I have woven round me, adjusting\nthem with the symmetry of the elementary conditions, if my thoughts and\nall my affections abandon me, intent upon the care of the bread that is\nimmaterial and divine? Up, up; oh my flying thoughts; up, oh my rebel\nheart; let live the sense of things that are felt, and the understanding\nof things intelligible, come to the succour of the body with matter and\ncorporeal subject, and let the understanding delight in its own objects,\nto the end that this composition of the body may be realized, that this\nmachine dissolve not, in which, by means of the spirit, the soul is\nunited to the body. Why, unhappy as I am (more through domestic\ncircumstances than through external violence), am I doomed to see this\nhorrible divorce between my parts and members? Why does the intellect\ntrouble itself to give laws to the sense and yet deprive it of its food?\nand this, on the other hand, resists; desiring to live according to its\nown decrees, and not according to the decree of others; for these and\nnot those are able to maintain and bless it, therefore it ought to\nattend to its own comfort and life, and not to that of others. There is\nno harmony and concord where there is only one, where one individual\nabsorbs the whole being, but where there is order and analogy in things\ndiverse; where each thing serves its own nature. Therefore let the sense\nfeed according to the law of things that can be felt, the flesh be\nobedient to the law of the spirit, the reason to its own law. Let them\nnot be confounded nor mixed. Enough that one neither mar nor prejudice\nthe law of the other, since it is not just that the sense outrage the\nlaw of reason. And verily it is a shameful thing that one should\ntyrannize over the other, particularly where the intellect is a pilgrim\nand strange, and the sense is more domesticated and at home. I am forced\nby you, my thoughts, to remain at home in charge of the house, while\nothers may wander wherever they will. This is a law of Nature, and\ntherefore a law of the author and originator of Nature. Sin on then, now\nthat all of you, seduced by the charm of the intellect, leave the other\npart of me to the peril of death. How have you gotten this melancholy\nand perverse humour, which breaks the certain and natural laws of the\ntrue life, and which is in your own hands, for one, uncertain, and which\nhas no existence except in shadow, beyond the limits of fantastic\nthought? Seems it to you a natural thing that they should live divinely\nand not as animals and humanly, they being not gods, but men and\nanimals? It is a law of fate and Nature that everything should adapt\nitself to the condition of its own being, wherefore then, while you\nfollow after the niggard nectar of the gods, do you lose that which is\npresent and is your own, and trouble yourself about the vain hopes of\nothers? Ought not Nature to refuse to give you the other good, if that\nwhich she at present offers to you, you stupidly despise?\n\n    Heaven the second gift denies,\n    To him who does the first despise.\n\nWith these and similar reasons the soul, taking part with the weakest,\nseeks to recall the thoughts to the care of the body. And these,\nalthough late, come and show themselves, but not in that form in which\nthey departed, but only to declare their rebellion, and force her to\nfollow. And the sorrowing one thus laments:\n\n23.\n\n    Ah, dogs of Actaeon, ah, proud ingrates!\n    Whom to the abode of my divinity I sent;\n    Without hope do ye return to me;\n    And, coming to the mother's side, ye bring\n    Back unto me a too unhappy boon;\n    Ye mangle me, and will that I live not.\n    Leave me, life, that I may mount up to my sun,\n    A double streamlet, mad, without my fount!\n    When shall this ponderous mass of me dissolve?\n    When shall it be, that, taking myself hence,\n    And swiftly rising to the heights above,\n    Together with my heart I may abide,\n    And with my thoughts I may be deified?\n\nThe Platonists say that the soul, as to its superior part, always\nconsists in the intellect, in which it has more of understanding than of\nsoul, seeing that it is called soul only in so far as it vivifies the\nbody and sustains it. So here, the same essence which nourishes and\nmaintains the thoughts on high, together with the exalted heart, is\ninduced by the inferior part to afflict itself, and recall them as\nrebels.\n\nCIC. So that they are not two contrary existences, but one, subject to\ntwo contradictory terms?\n\nTANS. So it is, precisely. As the ray of the sun which touches the\nearth, and is joined to obscure and to inferior things, which it\nbrightens, vivifies, and kindles, and is then joined to the element of\nfire--that is, to the star, whence it proceeds, and has its beginning,\nand is diffused, and in which it has its own and original\nsubsistence--so the soul, which is in the horizon of Nature, is\ncorporeal and incorporeal, and contains that with which it rises to\nsuperior things and declines to things inferior. And this, you may\nperceive, does not happen by reason and order of local motion, but\nsolely through the impulse of one and of another power or faculty. As\nwhen the sense rises to the imagination, the imagination to the reason,\nthe reason to the intellect, the intellect to the mind, then the whole\nsoul is converted into God, and inhabits the intelligible world; whence,\non the other hand, she descends in an inverse manner to the world of\nfeeling, through the intellect, reason, imagination, sense, vegetation.\n\nCIC. It is true that I have heard that the soul, in order to put itself\nin the ultimate degree of divine things, descends into the mortal body,\nand from this goes up again to the divine degrees, which are three\ndegrees of intelligence. For there are others in which the intellectual\nsurpasses the animal, which are said to be the celestial intelligences;\nand others in which the animal surpasses the intellectual, which are the\nhuman intelligences; others there are, of which those things are equal,\nas those of demons or heroes.\n\nTANS. The mind then cannot desire except that which is near, close,\nknown, and familiar. The pig cannot desire to be a man, nor wish for\nthose things that are suitable to the human appetite. He likes better\nto turn about in mud than in a bed of linen, he would prefer a sow to\nthe most beautiful of women, because the affection follows the reason of\nthe species. And amongst men the same thing is seen, according as some\nresemble one species of brute beast and some another: these having\nsomething of the quadruped, and those of birds, and, may be, some\naffinity, which I will not explain, but through which those have been\nknown who are affected by certain sorts of beasts. Now, it is lawful for\nthe mind which finds itself oppressed by the material conjunction of the\nsoul, to raise itself to the contemplation of another state, to which\nthe soul may arrive, comparing the two, and so through the future\ndespise the present. If a beast had a sense of the difference which\nexists between his own condition and that of man, and the meanness of\nhis own state with the nobility of the human state, which he would deem\nit not impossible to be able to reach, he would love death, which would\nopen to him that road, more than that life which keeps him in the\npresent state of being. When the soul complains, saying, \"Ah! dogs of\nActaeon!\" she is represented as a thing which appears only in the\ninferior powers, and against which the mind rebels for having taken away\nthe heart with it; that is to say, the entire affections, with all the\narmy of the thoughts. So that, having a knowledge of the present state,\nand being ignorant of every other, and not believing that others exist\nabout which she can have any knowledge, she complains of her thoughts,\nwhich, tardily turning towards her, come rather to draw her up than to\nmake themselves accepted by her. And through the distraction which she\nendures on account of the ordinary love of the material and of things\nintelligible, she feels herself lacerated and mangled, so that at last\nshe is forced to yield to the more vigorous impulse. And if, by virtue\nof contemplation, she rises or is caught up above the horizon of the\nnatural affections, whence with purer eye she learns the difference\nbetween the one life and the other, then, vanquished by the lofty\nthoughts, and, as if dead to the body, she aspires to that which is\nelevated, and, although alive in the body, she vegetates there as if\ndead, being present as an animating principle and absent in operative\nactivity; not because she does not act while the body is alive, but that\nthe actions of this mass are intermittent, weak, and, as it were,\npurposeless.\n\nCIC. Thus a certain theologian, who was said to be transported to the\nthird heaven and enchanted with the view of it, said that what he\ndesired was the dissolution of his body.\n\nTANS. So; first complaining of the heart and quarrelling with the\nthoughts, she now desires to rise on high with them, and exhibits her\nregret for the connection and familiarity contracted with corporeal\nmatter, and says: \"Leave me life (corporeal), and do not impede my\nprogress upwards to my native home, to my sun. Leave me now, for no\nlonger do my eyes weep tears; neither because I cannot succour them (the\nthoughts), nor because I cannot remain divided from my happiness. Leave\nme, for it is not fit nor possible that these two streams should run\nwithout their source, that is, without the heart. I will not, I say,\nmake two rivers of tears here below, while my heart, which is the source\nof such rivers, is flown away on high with its nymphs, which are my\nthoughts.\" Thus, little by little, from dislike and regret, she proceeds\nto the hatred of inferior things, which she partly shows, saying, \"When\nshall this ponderous mass of me dissolve?\" and that which follows.\n\nCIC. This I understand right well, and also that which you would infer\nabout the principal intention; that is to say, that these are the\ndegrees of the loves, of the affections, and of the enthusiasms,\naccording to the degrees of greater and lesser light, of cognition, and\nof intelligence.\n\nTANS. Thou understandest rightly. From this thou oughtest to learn that\ndoctrine taken from the Pythagoreans and Platonists, which is, that the\nsoul makes the two progressions of ascent and descent, by the care that\nit has of itself and of matter; being moved by its own proper love of\ngood, and being urged by the providence of fate.\n\nCIC. But, prythee, tell me briefly what you mean about the soul of the\nworld, if she can neither ascend nor descend?\n\nTANS. If you ask of the world, according to the common\nsignification--that is, in so far as it signifies what is called the\nuniverse--I say that, being infinite, it has no dimension or measure, is\nimmobile, inanimate, and without form, notwithstanding it is the place\nof infinite moving worlds and is infinite space, in which are so many\nlarge animals that are called stars. If you ask according to the\nsignification held by the true philosophers--that is, in so far as it\nsignifies every globe, every star, such as this earth, the body of the\nsun, moon, and others--I say that such soul does not ascend nor descend,\nbut turns in a circle. Thus, being compounded of superior and inferior\npowers, with the superior it turns round the divinity, and with the\ninferior, towards the mass of the worlds, which is by it vivified and\nmaintained between the tropics of generation and the corruption of\nliving things in those worlds, serving its own life eternally; because\nthe act of the divine providence, always preserves it with divine heat\nand light, with the same order and measure, in the ordinary and\nself-same being.\n\nCIC. I have now heard enough upon this subject.\n\nTANS. It happens then that individual souls come to be influenced\ndifferently as to their habits and inclinations, according to the\ndiverse degrees of ascension and descension, and come to display various\nkinds and orders of enthusiasms, of loves, and of senses, not only in\nthe scale of Nature according to the orders of diverse lives which the\nsoul takes up in different bodies, as is expressly declared by the\nPythagoreans, Saduchimi and others, and by implication, Plato, and those\nwho dive more profoundly into it, but still more in the scale of human\naffections, which has as many degrees as the scale of Nature; for man,\nin all his powers, displays every species of being.\n\nCIC. Therefore from the affections one may know souls, whether they are\ngoing up or down, or whether they are from above or from below, whether\nthey are going on towards becoming beasts or towards divine beings,\naccording to the specific being as the Pythagoreans understood it; or\naccording to the similitude of the affections only, as is commonly\nbelieved, the human soul not being able, (so long as it is truly human)\nto become soul of a brute, as Plotinus and other Platonists well said,\non account of the quality of its beginning.\n\nTANS. Now to come to the proposition: From animal enthusiasm, this soul,\nas described, is promoted to heroic enthusiasm, saying, \"When shall it\nbe that I rise up to the height of the object, there to dwell in company\nwith my heart and with my fledglings[C] and his?\" This same proposition\nhe continues when he says:\n\n24.\n\n    Destiny, when, shall I that mountain mount,\n    Which, blissful to the high gates bringing, bring,\n    Where those rare beauties I shall counting, count,\n    When _he_ my pain with comfort comforting,\n    Who my disjointed members joined,\n    And leaves my dying powers not dead?\n    My spirit's rival more than rivalled is\n    If, far from sin, it unassailed may sail,\n    If thither tending, it may waiting, wait,\n    And up with that high object rising, rise,\n    And if my good alone, alone I take,\n    For which I sure remove of each defect effect,\n    And so at last may come to enjoy with joy,\n    As he who all foretells can tell.\n\n[C] Pulcini.\n\nO Destiny! O Fate! O divine immutable Providence! when shall it be that\nI shall climb that mount--that is, that I may arrive at such altitude of\nmind, as transporting me shall bring me into those outer and inner\ncourts where I may behold and count those rare beauties? When shall it\nbe, that he will effectually comfort my pain, loosening me from the\ntightened bonds of those cares in which I find myself, he, who formed\nand united my members, which before were disunited and disjoined: that\nis Love; he who has joined together these corporeal parts, which were as\nfar divided as one opposite is divided from another; so that these\nintellectual powers which, through his action he has extinguished,\nshould not be left quite dead, but be again re-animated and made to\naspire on high? When, I say, will he fully comfort me, and give my\npowers free and speedy flight, by which means my substance may go and\nnestle there, where, by my efforts, I may make amends and correct my\ndefects, and where (if I arrive) my spirit will be made effectual or\nprevail over my rival, because there, no excess will oppose, no\nopposition overcome, no error assail? Oh! if by force he may arrive\nthere, at that height which he is waiting to reach, he will remain on\nhigh, at the elevation of his object, and he will take that good that\ncannot be comprehended by any other than one, that is, by himself,\nseeing that every other has it in the measure of his own capacity, and\nthis one alone has it in all its fulness. Then will happiness come to me\nin that manner which he says, \"who all foretells\"; that is, at that\nelevation in which the saying all and the doing all is the same thing;\nin that manner that he says and does who all foretells, that is, who is\nsufficient for all things and primary, and whose word and pre-ordaining\nis the true doing and beginning. This is how, in the scale of things\nsuperior and inferior, the affection of Love proceeds, as the intellect\nor sentiment proceeds from these intelligible or knowable objects, to\nthose, or from those to these.\n\nCIC. Thus the greater number of sages believe that Nature delights in\nthis changeful circulation which is seen in the whirling of her wheel.\n\n\n\n\n=Fifth Dialogue.=\n\n\nI.\n\nCIC. Now show me how I may be able for myself to consider the conditions\nof these enthusiasts, through that which appears in the order of the\nwarfare here described.\n\nTANS. Behold how they carry the ensign of their affections or fortunes.\nLet us leave the consideration of their names and habits; enough that we\nstand upon the meaning of the undertaking and the intelligibility of the\nwriting, alike that which is put for the form of the body of the figure,\nas well as that which is mostly put as an elucidation of the\nundertaking.\n\nCIC. Thus will we do. Here then is the first, who carries a shield\ndivided into four colours, and in the crest is depicted a flame under\nthe head of bronze, from the holes in which, issue in great force a\nsmoky wind, and about it is written: \"At regna senserunt tria.\"\n\nTANS. For the explanation of this I would say: that the fire there is\nthat which heats the globe, inside of it is the water, and it happens\nthat this humid element, being rarefied and attenuated by virtue of the\nheat, and thus resolved into vapour, it requires much greater space to\ncontain it, therefore if it does not find easy exit, it goes on with\nextreme force, noise, and destruction to break the vessel; but if it\nfinds space and easy exit, so that it can evaporate, it goes out with\nless violence, little by little, and, according as the water is resolved\ninto vapour, it is dissipated in puffs into the air. Here is signified\nthe heart of the enthusiast where, by a cleverly planned allurement\nbeing caught by the amorous flame, it happens that some of the vital\nsubstance sparkles with fire, while some in the form of tearful cries\nrends the bosom, and some other by the expulsion of gusty sighs agitates\nthe air. Therefore he says: \"At regna senserunt tria.\" Now this \"at\"\nsupposes a difference, or diversity, or opposite; as one might almost\nsay there exists something which might have the same sense, but has it\nnot, which is very well explained in the following rhymes:\n\n25.\n\n    From these twin lights of me--a little earth--\n    My wonted tears stream freely to the sea.\n    The greedy air receives from out my breast\n    No niggard part of all that breast contains;\n    And from my heart the lightnings are unlocked\n    That rise to heaven, and yet diminish not.\n    Thus pay I to the air, the sea, the fire,\n    The tribute of my sighs, my tears, my zeal.\n    The sea, the air, the fire, accept a part of me,\n    But my divinity no favour shows.\n    Unkind she turns away. Near her\n    My tears find no response;\n    My voice she will not hear,\n    Nor pitifully will she turn to note my zeal.\n\nHere the subject matter signified by \"earth\" is the substance of the\nenthusiast, which is poured from the twin lights--that is, from the\neyes--in copious tears that flow to the sea; he sends forth from his\nbreast into the wide air sighs in a great multitude, and the lightnings\nfrom his heart, not like a little spark or a weak flame, which, cooling\nitself in the air, smokes, and transmigrates into other beings; but,\npotent and vigorous--rather acquiring from others than losing of its\nown--it joins its congenial sphere.\n\nCIC. I understand it all. To the next.\n\n\nII.\n\nTANS. Close by is portrayed one who has on his shield a crest, also\ndivided into four colours. There is a sun whose rays extend to the back\nof the earth, and there is a legend which says: \"Idem semper ubique\ntotum.\"\n\nCIC. I perceive that the interpretation of it will be difficult.\n\nTANS. The more excellent the meaning the less obvious is it, and you\nwill see that it is unequalled, unique, and not strained. You are to\nconsider that the sun, although with regard to the various regions of\nthe earth he is for each one different as to time, place, and degree,\nyet in respect of the whole globe as such, he always and in every place\naccomplishes everything, for in whatever part of the ecliptic he is to\nbe found, he makes winter, summer, autumn, and spring, and makes the\nwhole globe of the earth to receive within itself the aforesaid four\nseasons; for never is it hot at one side unless it is cold on the other;\nwhen it is to us very hot in the tropic of Cancer it is very cold in the\ntropic of Capricorn; so that for the same reason it is winter in that\npart when it is summer in this, and to those who are in the middle, it\nis temperate according to the aspect, vernal or autumnal. So the earth\nalways feels the rains, the winds, the heat, the cold; nor would it be\ndamp here if it were not dry in another part, and the sun would not warm\nit on this side if it had not already left off warming it on the other.\n\nCIC. Even before you have finished, I understand what you would say. You\nmean that as the sun gives all the impressions to the earth, and this\nreceives them whole and entire, so the Object of the enthusiast, with\nits active splendour, makes him the passive subject of tears, which are\nthe waters, of ardours, which are the fires, and of sighs, which are\ncertain vapours, which partake of both, which leave the fire, and go to\nthe waters, or leave the waters and go to the fire.\n\nTANS. This is well explained below.\n\n26.\n\n    When as the sun towards Capricorn declines,\n    Then do the rains enrich the streams,\n    As towards the line he goes, or thence returns,\n    More felt is each AEolian messenger,\n    Warming the more with every lengthening day\n    What time towards burning Cancer he remounts.\n    And equal to this heat, this cold, this zeal\n    Are these my tears, my sighs, the ardour that I feel.\n    My constant sighs, my never waning flames\n    Are only equal to my tears.\n    My floods and flames howe'er intense they be,\n    Are never more so than my sighs;\n    I burn with fervid heat,\n    And, firmly fixed, I ever sigh and weep.\n\nCIC. This does not so much declare the meaning of the coat of arms, as\nthe preceding discourse did, but it rather supplements or accompanies\nthat discourse.\n\nTANS. Say, rather, that the figure is latent in the first part, and the\nlegend is well explained in the second; as both the one and the other\nare very properly signified in the type of the sun and of the earth.\n\nCIC. Pass on to the third.\n\n\nIII.\n\nTANS. The third bears on his shield a naked child, stretched upon the\ngreen turf, who rests his head upon his arm, with his eyes turned\ntowards the sky to certain edifices, towers, gardens, and orchards,\nwhich are above the clouds, and there is a castle of which the material\nis fire, and in the middle is the sign inscribed: \"Mutuo fulcimur.\"\n\nCIC. What does that mean?\n\nTANS. It means that enthusiast, signified by the naked child as simple,\npure, and exposed to all the accidents of Nature and of fortune, who at\nthe same time by the force of thought, constructs castles in the air,\nand amongst other things a tower, of which the architect is Love, the\nmaterial is the amorous fire, and the builder is himself, who says:\n\"Mutuo fulcimur\"--that is, I build and uphold you there with my\nthought, and you uphold me here with hope; you would not be in existence\nwere it not for the imagination and the thought with which I form and\nuphold you, and I should not be alive were it not for the refreshment\nand comfort that I receive through your means.\n\nCIC. It is true that there is no fancy so vain and so chimerical that\nmay not be a more real and true medicine for an enthusiastic heart than\nany herb, mineral, oil, or other sort of thing that Nature produces.\n\nTANS. Magicians can do more by means of faith than physicians by the\ntruth; and in the worst diseases the patients benefit more by believing\nthis or that which the former say, than in understanding that which the\nlatter do. Now let the rhymes be read.\n\n27.\n\n    Above the clouds in that high place,\n    When oft with dreaming I am fired,\n    For comfort and refreshment of my soul\n    An airy castle from my fires I build,\n    And if my adverse fate incline awhile,\n    And without scorn or ire will understand\n    This lofty grace for which I die,\n    Oh happy then my pains, happy my death.\n    The ardour of those flames she does not feel,\n    Nor is she hindered by those snares\n    With which, oh boy! thou'rt wont to enslave\n    And lead into captivity both men and gods;\n    By pity's hand alone, oh Love,\n    By showing all my woe, thou shalt prevail.\n\nCIC. He shows that which feeds his fancy and bathes his spirit; yet,\ninasmuch as he is without courage to explain himself and make known his\nsufferings, although he is so deeply subjected to that anguish, if it\nshould happen that his hard, uncompromising fate should bend a little\n(as, in the end, fate must soothe him, by showing itself without scorn\nor anger for the high object), he would consider no happiness so great,\nno life so blessed, as in such a case would be his happiness in his\nwoes, and his blessedness in his death.\n\nTANS. And with this he comes to declare to Love that the means by which\nhe will gain access to that breast, is not in the ordinary way by the\narms with which he usually captivates men and gods, but only by causing\nthe fiery heart and his troubled spirit, to be laid bare, to obtain\nsight of which it is necessary that compassion open the way, and\nintroduce him to that secret chamber.\n\n\nIV.\n\nCIC. What is the meaning of that butterfly which flutters round the\nflame, and almost burns itself? and what means that legend, \"Hostis non\nhostis?\"\n\nTANS. The meaning of the butterfly is not difficult, which, seduced by\nthe fascinations of splendour, goes innocently and amicably to meet its\ndeath in the devouring flames. Thus, \"hostis\" stands written for the\neffect of the fire; \"non hostis\" for the inclination of the fly.\n\"Hostis,\" the fly passively; \"non hostis,\" actively. \"Hostis,\" the\nflame, through its ardour; \"non hostis,\" through its splendour.\n\nCIC. Now what is that which is written on the tablet?\n\nTANS.:\n\n28.\n\n    Be it far from me to make complaint of love,\n    Love, without whom I will not happy be,\n    And though through him these weary toils I bear.\n    Yet what is given my will shall not reject.\n    Be clear the sky or dark, burning or cold,\n    To that one phoenix e'er the same I'll be,\n    No fate nor destiny can e'er untie\n    That knot which death unable is to loose;\n    To heart, to spirit, and to soul,\n    No pleasure is, no liberty, no life,\n    No smile, no rapture, no delight,\n    So sweet, so grateful, so divine,\n    As these hard bonds, this death of mine,\n    To which by fate, by will, by nature I incline.\n\nHere, in the figure, he shows the resemblance between the enthusiast\nand the butterfly attracted towards the light; in the sonnet, however,\nhe demonstrates rather difference and dissimilarity; as it is commonly\nbelieved, that if the butterfly foresaw its destruction, it would fly\nfrom the light more eagerly than it now pursues it, and would consider\nit an evil to lose its life through being absorbed into that hostile\nfire. But to him (the enthusiast) it is no less pleasing to perish in\nthe flames of amorous ardour than to be drawn to the contemplation of\nthe beauty of that rare splendour, under which, by natural inclination,\nby voluntary election, and by disposition of fate, he labours, serves,\nand dies more gaily, more resolutely, and more courageously than under\nwhatsoever other pleasure which may offer itself to the heart, liberty\nwhich may be conceded to the spirit, and life which may be discovered in\nthe soul.\n\nCIC. Tell me why he says, \"ever the same I'll be?\"\n\nTANS. Because it seems suitable to bring forward a reason for his\nconstancy, seeing that the sage does not change with the moon, although\nthe fool does so. Thus he is unique, as the phoenix is unique.\n\n\nV.\n\nCIC. But what signifies that branch of palm, around which is the legend,\n\"Caesar adest?\"\n\nTANS. Without further talk, all may be understood by that which is\nwritten on the tablet:\n\n29.\n\n    Unconquered victor of Pharsalia,\n    Though all thy warriors be well-nigh spent,\n    At sight of thee they rise once more;\n    Their strength returns, they conquer their proud foes;\n    So does my love--that equals love of heaven--\n    Become a living presence through my thoughts;\n    Thoughts that my haughty soul had killed with scorn,\n    Love brings again stronger than love himself;\n    Thy presence is enough, oh memory!\n    These to reanimate in all their strength,\n    And with imperious sov'reignty they rule\n    And govern each opposing force.\n    May I be happy in this governance\n    And with these bonds, and may that light ne'er cease.\n\nThere are times when the inferior powers of the soul--like a vigorous\nand hostile army, which finds itself in its own country practised,\nexpert, and ready--revolt against the foreign adversary, who comes down\nfrom the height of the intelligence to curb the people of the valley and\nof the boggy plains, where, through the baneful presence of the enemies\nand of such obstacles as deep ditches, advancing they lose themselves,\nand would be entirely lost, if there were not a certain conversion\ntowards the splendour of intellectual things through the act of\ncontemplation, by means of which they are converted from inferior\ndegrees to superior ones.\n\nCIC. What degrees are these?\n\nTANS. The degrees of contemplation are like the degrees of light, which\nexist not at all in the darkness, slightly in shade, more in colours,\naccording to their orders, from one opposite which is black to the other\nwhich is white; but more fully do they exist in the splendour diffused\nover pure transparent bodies, as in a looking-glass and in the moon, and\nstill more brightly in the rays diffused by the sun, but principally and\nmost brilliantly in the sun itself. Now the perceptive and the\naffectional powers are ordered in this way; the next following always\nhas affinity for the next preceding, and by means of conversion to that\nwhich elevates it, it becomes fortified against the inferior, which\nlowers it; as the reason, through its conversion to the intellect, is\nnot seduced or vanquished by knowledge or comprehension or by passionate\naffection, but rather, according to the law of the intellect, it is\nbrought to govern and correct the same. It comes to this, therefore,\nthat when the rational appetite strives against sensual concupiscence,\nif, by the act of conversion, the intellectual light is presented to\nthe eyes, it causes the above appetite to take up again the lost virtue,\nand giving fresh strength to the nerves, it alarms and puts to rout the\nenemy.\n\nCIC. In what manner do you mean that such a conversion takes place?\n\nTANS. With three preparatives, which are noted by the contemplative\nPlotinus in the book of \"Intellectual Beauty;\" and, of these, the first\nis by proposing to conform himself to a divine pattern, diverting the\nsight from things which stand between him and his own perfection, and\nwhich are common to those things which are equal and inferior. The\nsecond is by applying himself, with full intention and attention, to\nsuperior things. The third is by bringing into captivity to God the\nwhole will and affection: for from this it comes to pass that, without\ndoubt, the divinity will influence him; who is everywhere present, and\nready to come to the aid of whosoever turns to Him through the act of\nthe intelligence, and who unreservedly presents himself with the\naffection of the will.\n\nCIC. It is not then corporeal beauty which can allure such an one?\n\nTANS. No, certes; because in that there is no true nor constant beauty,\nand for this reason it cannot evoke true nor constant love. That beauty,\nwhich is seen in bodies is accidental and transitory, and is like those\nwhich are absorbed, changed, and spoiled by the changing of the subject,\nwhich very often, from being beautiful, becomes ugly, without any change\ntaking place in the soul. The reason then comprehends the truest beauty,\nthrough conversion, to that which makes the beauty of the body, and\nforms it in loveliness--it is the soul which has thus built and designed\nit. Now does the intellect rise still higher, and learns that the soul\nis incomparably more beautiful than any beauty that may be in bodies;\nbut yet it cannot persuade itself that it is beautiful of itself and\nprimarily, for if it be so, what is the cause of that difference which\nexists in the quality of souls, by which some are wise, amiable, and\nbeautiful, others stupid, odious, and ugly. We must then raise ourselves\nto that superior intellect which is beautiful in itself and good in\nitself. This is that sole supreme captain who alone, placed before the\neyes of the militant thoughts, enlivens, encourages, strengthens them,\nand renders them victorious above the scorn of every other beauty and\nthe repudiation of every other good whatsoever. This is the presence\nwhich causes every difficulty to be overcome and all opposition to be\nsubdued.\n\nCIC. I understand it all; but what is the meaning of, \"May I be happy in\nthis governance and with these bonds, and may that light not cease?\"\n\nTANS. He means, and he proves, that every sort of love, the greater its\ndominion and the surer its hold, the more tight are the bonds, and the\nmore firm the yoke, and the more ardent the flames that are felt, as\ncompared with the ordinary princes and tyrants, who adopt a greater\nrigour wherever they see they have less hold.\n\nCIC. Go on.\n\n\nVI.\n\nTANS. Here we see described the idea of a flying phoenix, towards which\nis turned a boy who is burning in the midst of flames; and there is the\nlegend, \"Fata obstant.\" But in order better to understand it, let us\nread the tablet:\n\n30.\n\n    Sole bird of the sun, thou wandering phoenix!\n    That measurest thy days as does the world\n    With lofty summits of Arabia Felix.\n    Thou art the same thou wast, but I what I was not:\n    I through the fire of love, unhappy die;\n    But thee the sun with his warm rays revives;\n    Thou burn'st in one, and I, in every place;\n    Eros my fire, while thine Apollo gives.\n    Predestined is the term of thy long life;\n    Short span is mine,\n    And menaced by a thousand ills.\n    Nor do I know how I have lived, nor how shall live,\n    Me does blind fate conduct;\n    But thou wilt come again, again behold thy light.\n\nFrom the meaning of these lines, you will see that in the figure is\ndrawn the comparison between the fate of the phoenix and that of the\nenthusiast; and the legend, \"Fata obstant,\" does not signify that the\nfates are adverse either to the boy, or to the phoenix, or to both; but\nthat the fatal decrees for each are not the same, but are diverse and\nopposite. The phoenix is that which it was, because the same matter, by\nmeans of the fire, renews itself, and becomes again the body of the\nphoenix, and the same spirit and soul come to inhabit it. The enthusiast\nis that which he was not, because the subject, which is a man, was first\nof some other species, according to innumerable differentiations. So\nthat what the phoenix was, is known, and what it will be, is known; but\nthis subject cannot return, except through many and uncertain means, to\ninvest the same or a similar natural form. Then the phoenix, through the\nsun's presence, changes death into life, and that other, by the\npresence of love, transmutes life into death. The one kindles his fire\non the aromatic altar, the other finds it ever present with him and\ncarries it wherever he goes. The one again, has certain conditions of a\nlong life; but the other, through the infinite differences of time and\ninnumerable circumstances, has the mutable conditions of a short life.\nThe one kindles with certainty, the other with doubt as to whether he\nwill see the sun again.\n\nCIC. What do you think that this means?\n\nTANS. It means the difference that exists between the lower intellect\ncalled the intellect of power, either possible or passive, which is\nuncertain, multifarious, and multiform, and the higher intellect, which,\nperhaps, is like that which is said by the Peripatetics to be the lowest\nof the intelligences, and which exerts an immediate influence over all\nthe individuals of the human species, and is called the active and\nacting intellect. This special human intelligence which influences all\nindividuals is like the moon, which partakes of no other species but\nthat one alone which always renews itself by the transmutation caused in\nit by the sun, which is the primal and universal intelligence; but the\nhuman intellect, both individual and collective, turns as do the eyes\ntowards innumerable and most diverse objects; whence, according to the\ninfinite degrees which exist, it takes on all the natural forms. Hence\nit is that this particular intellect may be as enthusiastic, vague, and\nuncertain, as that universal one is quiet, fixed, and certain, whether\nas regards the desire or the comprehension. Now therefore, as you may\nvery well perceive for yourself, it means that the nature of the\ncomprehension of sense and its varied appetite, is vague, inconstant,\nand uncertain, and the conception and definite appetite of the\nintelligence is firm and stable. This is the difference between sensual\nlove, which has no stability nor discretion as to its object, and\nintellectual love, which aims only at one, sure and fixed, towards which\nit turns, through which it is illuminated in its conception, by which,\nbeing kindled in its affections, it becomes inflamed and brightened, and\nis maintained in unity and identity of condition.\n\n\nVII.\n\nCIC. But what is the meaning of that figure of the sun, with a circle\ninside and another outside, with the legend \"Circuit.\"\n\nTANS. The meaning of this I am certain I should never have understood if\nI had not heard it from the designer of it himself. Now you must know\nthat \"Circuit\" has reference to the movement the sun makes round the\ncircle which is drawn inside and outside, in order to signify that the\nmovement both makes and is made; and hence, as a consequence, the sun is\nto be found in every part of those circles; so that, if he moves and is\nmoved, and is over the whole circumference of the circle equally, then\nyou find in him both movement and rest.\n\nCIC. This I understood in the dialogues on the infinite universe and the\ninnumerable worlds, where it is declared that the divine wisdom is\nextremely mobile, as Solomon said, and also that the same is most\nstable, as all those declare who know. Now go on and make me understand\nthe proposition.\n\nTANS. It means that [D]his sun is not like this one, which is commonly\nbelieved to go round the earth with the daily movement in twenty-four\nhours, and with the planetary movement in twelve months, and by which he\ncauses the four seasons of the year to be felt, according as he is found\nto be in the four cardinal points of the zodiac; but he is such an one,\nthat, being the ethereal eternity itself, and consequently an entire and\ncomplete totality, he contains the winter, the spring, the summer, the\nautumn, together with the day and the night, for he is all and for all,\nin all points and places.\n\n[D] Il suo sole.\n\nCIC. Now apply that which you have said to the figure.\n\nTANS. It being impossible here to design the entire sun in every point\nof the circle, two circles are delineated; one which contains the sun to\nsignify that the movement is made through him, the other which is\ncontained by the sun to show that he is moved by it.\n\nCIC. But this explanation is not very clear and appropriate.\n\nTANS. Suffice it that it is the clearest and most appropriate that he\nwas able to make. If you can make a better one, you shall have\npermission to remove this one and put it in its place, for this has only\nbeen put in, so that the soul should not be without a body.\n\nCIC. What do you say about that \"Circuit?\"\n\nTANS. That legend contains all the meaning of the thing in so far as it\ncan be explained, for it means that he turns and is turned, that is to\nsay movement present and accomplished.\n\nCIC. Excellent! And therefore those circles which so ill explain the\ncircumstance of movement and rest, we can say are placed there to\nsignify the circulation only. Thus am I satisfied with the subject and\nwith the form of the heroic device. Now read the lines.\n\nTANS.:\n\n31.\n\n    Mild are thy rays, oh, Sol! from Taurus sent,\n    And from the Lion thy beams mature and burn,\n    And when thy light from pungent Scorpion darts\n    Transcendent is the ardour of thy flames.\n    From fierce Deucalion all is struck with cold,\n    Stiffened the lakes and locked the running streams.\n    With spring, with summer, autumn, and with winter,\n    I warm, I kindle, burn and blaze for ever.\n    So ardent my desire,\n    The object so supreme for which I burn;\n    Glowing and unencumbered I behold,\n    And make my lightnings flash unto the stars.\n    No moment can I count in all the year\n    To change the[E] inexorable cross I bear.\n\nHere observe that the four seasons of the year are signified, not by\nfour movable signs, which are Aries, Cancer, Libra, and Capricorn, but\nby the four which are called fixed--namely, Taurus, Leo, Scorpio, and\nAquarius, to signify the condition, fervour, and perfection of those\nseasons. Note further, that in virtue of those apostrophes, which are in\nthe eighth line, you can read: I warm, kindle, burn, blaze; or, be thou\nwarmed, kindled, burning, blazing; or, let him warm, kindle, burn,\nblaze.\n\n[E] Sordi affanni.\n\nYou have farther to consider that these are not four synonyms, but four\ndifferent terms, which signify so many degrees of the effects of the\nfire, which first warms, secondly kindles, thirdly burns, and fourthly\nblazes or inflames that which it has warmed, kindled, and burnt. And\nthus are denoted in the enthusiast, desire, attention, study, affection,\nin which he never for a moment feels any change.\n\nCIC. Why does he put them under the title of a cross?\n\nTANS. Because the object, which is the divine light, is, in this life,\nmore felt as a painful longing than in quiet fruition, because our mind\nis towards that, as the eyes of night birds to the sun.\n\nCIC. Proceed; for from what you have said I understand all.\n\n\nVIII.\n\nTANS. On the next crest there is painted a full moon and the legend:\n\"Talis mihi semper ut astro,\" which means that to the star--that is, to\nthe sun--she is ever such as she here shows herself, full and clear in\nthe entire circumference of the circle, which, in order that you may\nbetter understand, I will let you hear that which is written on the\ntablet.\n\n32.\n\n    Oh, changeful moon, inconstant moon!\n    With horns now full, now void, thou wanderest.\n    Mounting, thy sphere now white now dark appears.\n    The mountains and the valleys of the north thou brightenest,\n    And turning by thy dust-encumbered steps,\n    Thou lightest in the south the Lybian heights.\n    My moon for my continual pain.\n    Is constant ever, ever full.\n    So is my star,\n    Which ever from me takes and nothing gives,\n    For ever burns and ever shines,\n    Cruel always yet always beautiful.\n    This noble light of mine\n    Torments me still and still delights me.\n\nIt seems to me, that it means that his particular intelligence is to the\nuniversal intelligence ever the same--that is to say, the one is ever\nilluminated by the other, over the whole hemisphere; notwithstanding\nthat to the inferior powers, and according to the influence of his\nactions, it appears now dark, and now more and less clear. Or perhaps it\nmeans that his speculative intellect, which is ever invariable in its\naction, is always turned and affected towards the human intelligence\nsignified by the moon. Because, as this is said to be the lowest of all\nthe stars, and is nearest to us, so the illuminating intelligence of all\nof us in this state is the last in order of the other intelligences, as\nAverroes and the more subtle Peripatetics say. That intelligence, in so\nfar as it is not in any act, goes down before, or sets to the potential\nintellect, or as if so to say, it emerged from the bottom of the occult\nhemisphere, and showed itself now void, now full, according as it gives\nmore or less light of intelligence. Now its sphere is dark, now light,\nbecause sometimes it shows itself as a shadow, a semblance, and a\nvestige, and sometimes more and more openly: now it declines towards the\nsouth, now it mounts towards the north--that is, now it removes farther\nand farther away, and now it approaches nearer and nearer. But the\nintellect, active with its continual grief--seeing that it is not\nthrough its human condition and nature that it finds itself so wretched,\nso opposed, courted, solicited, distracted, and, as it were, torn by the\ninferior powers--sees its object stable, fixed and constant, and ever\nfull, and in the same splendour of beauty. Thus it ever takes away, in\nso far as it does not concede, and ever gives, in so far as it concedes.\nIt ever burns in the affection in so far as it shines in thoughts, and\nis always cruel in withdrawing itself through that which withdraws\nitself; as it is always beautiful in communication with, that to which\nit presents itself. Always does it torment when it is divided from him\nby difference of locality, as always it delights him being joined to it\nby affection.\n\nCIC. Now apply your intelligence to the legend.\n\nTANS. He says then, \"talis mihi semper;\" that is, because of the\ncontinual application of my intellect, my memory, and my will, because I\nwill remember, understand and desire no other; she is ever the same to\nme, and in so far as I can understand her, she is entirely present, and\nis not separated from me by any distraction of my thoughts, nor does she\nbecome darkened to me through any want of attention, for there is no\nthought that can divert me from that light nor any necessity of nature\nwhich forces me to a less constant attention; \"talis mihi semper\" on her\nside, because she is invariable in substance, in virtue, in beauty, and\nin effect, towards those things that are constant and invariable towards\nher. She says further, \"ut astro,\" because in respect of the sun, the\nilluminator of her, she is ever equally luminous, seeing that she is\never turned equally towards him, and he at the same time diffuses his\nrays equally. As, physically, this moon that we see with the eyes,\nalthough towards the earth she appears now dark, now shining, now more,\nnow less illuminated and illuminating, yet is she ever equally\nirradiated by the sun, because she always reflects his rays over at\nleast the whole of her hemisphere. So also is the hemisphere of this\nearth ever equally irradiated, although from the watery surfaces she\nfrom time to time sends her splendours unequally to the moon,--which\nlike innumerable other stars we consider as another earth--in the same\nmanner, she also sends hers to the earth, on account of the periodical\nchanges which both experience in finding themselves now the one, now the\nother, nearer to the sun.\n\nCIC. How can this intelligence be signified by the moon which lights up\nthe hemisphere?\n\nTANS. All the intelligences are signified by the moon, in so far as they\nare sharers in act and in power, in so far as they have the light\nmaterially and by participation, receiving it from another; I say that,\nas not being lights of themselves, nor by their own nature, but by\nreflection from the sun, which is the first intelligence, which is pure\nand absolute light, as it is also pure and absolute action.\n\nCIC. All those things, then, that are dependent, and are not the first\nact and cause, are they composed of light and shade, of matter and\nform, of power and action?\n\nTANS. It is so. Furthermore this soul of ours, in all its substance, is\nsignified by the moon which shines through the hemisphere of the\nsuperior powers, by which it is turned towards the light of the\nintelligible world, and is dark through the inferior powers, by which it\nis occupied with material things.\n\n\nIX.\n\nCIC. It seems to me that what has just been said has some connection and\nanalogy with the impression that I see on the next shield, where stands\na gnarled and rugged oak, against which the wind is raging, and it is\ncircumscribed by the legend, \"ut robori robur,\" and here is the tablet,\nwhich says:\n\n33.\n\n    Old oak, that spread'st thy branches to the air,\n    And firmly in the earth dost fix thy roots;\n    No shifting of the land, no mighty elements,\n    Which Heaven from the stormy north unlocks;\n    Nor whatso'er the gruesome winter sends,\n    Can tear thee from the spot where thou art chained.\n    Thou art the veritable portrait of my faith,\n    Which, fixed, remains 'gainst every casual chance.\n    Ever the self-same ground dost thou\n    Grasp, cultivate and comprehend; and stretch\n    Thy grateful roots unto the generous breast.\n    Upon one only object I\n    Have fixed my spirit, sense, and intellect.\n\nTANS. The legend is clear, by which the enthusiast boasts of having the\nstrength and vigour of the oak, and as before said of being ever the\nsame in respect to the one only phoenix, and in the next preceding one,\nconforming himself to that moon which ever shines so brightly and is so\nbeautiful, and also in that he does not resemble this antichthon between\nour earth and the sun in so far as it changes to our eyes, but in that\nit ever receives within itself an equal amount of the solar splendour,\nand through this remains constant and firm against the rough winds and\ntempests of winter, through the stability that he has in his star, in\nwhich he is planted by affection and intention, as the roots of the oak\ntwist and weave themselves into the veins of the earth.\n\nCIC. I hold it better worth living in quiet and without vexation than to\nbe forced to endure so much.\n\nTANS. That is a maxim of the Epicureans which, being well understood,\nwould not be considered so unworthy as the ignorant hold it to be,\nseeing that it does not detract from what I have called virtue, nor\ndoes it impair the perfection of firmness, but it rather adds to that\nperfection as it is understood by the vulgar, for Epicurus does not hold\nthat, a true and complete strength and firmness which feels and bears\ninconveniences, but that which bears them and feels them not. He does\nnot consider him perfect in divine heroic love, who feels the spur, the\ncheck, or remorse or trouble about other love; but him who has no\nfeeling of other affections; so that being fixed in one pleasure, there\nis no displeasure that has any power to jostle him or dislodge him from\nhis place. And this it is to touch the highest blessedness of this\nstate, to have rapture and no sense of pain.\n\nCIC. The ignorant do not believe in this meaning of Epicurus.\n\nTANS. Because they neither read his own books, nor those that report his\nmaxims without invidiousness, but there are those who read the course of\nhis life and the conditions of his death, where with these words he\ndictated the beginning of his testament: \"Being in the last, and at the\nsame time, the happiest day of our life, we have ordained this with a\nhealthy, tranquil mind at rest; for whatever acute sorrow may torment us\nfrom one side, that torment is entirely annulled by the pleasure of our\nown inventions and the consideration of our end.\" And it is manifest\nthat he no longer felt more pleasure than sorrow in eating, drinking,\nrepose, and in generating, but in not feeling hunger, nor thirst, nor\nfatigue, nor sensuality. From this may be understood what is according\nto us the perfection of firmness; not in this, that the tree neither\nbends nor breaks, nor is rent, but in that it does not so much as stir,\nand its prototype keeps spirit, sense, and intellect, fixed there, where\nthe shock of the tempest is not felt.\n\nCIC. Do you then think it is a thing to be desired, to bear shocks in\norder to prove that you are strong?\n\nTANS. You say \"to bear;\" and this is a part of firmness, but it is not\nthe whole of that virtue, which consists in bearing strongly, as I say,\nor in not feeling, as Epicurus said. Now this loss of feeling is caused\nby being entirely absorbed in the cultivation of virtue, or of real good\nand felicity, in such wise that Regulus did not feel the chest, Lucretia\nthe dagger, Socrates the poison, Anaxagoras the mortar, Scaevola the\nfire, Cocles the abyss, and other worthies felt not those things which\nwould torment and fill with terror the vulgar crowd.\n\nCIC. Now pass on.\n\n\nX.\n\nTANS. Look at this other who bears the device of an anvil and a hammer,\nround which is the legend \"ab Aetna!\" But here Vulcan is introduced:\n\n34.\n\n    Not now to my Sicilian mount I turn,\n    Where thou dost forge the thunderbolts of Jove,\n    Here, rugged Vulcan will I stay;\n    Here, where a prouder giant moves,\n    Who burns and rages against Heaven in vain,\n    Soliciting new cares and divers trials.\n    Here is a better smith and Mongibello[F]\n    A better anvil, better forge and hammer;\n    For here behold a bosom full of sighs,\n    Which blows the furnace and the fire revives.\n    The soul nor yields nor bends to these rough blows,\n    But bears exulting this long martyrdom,\n    And makes a harmony from these sharp pangs.\n\n[F] Mount Etna.\n\nHere are shown the pains and troubles which beset love, principally love\nof a low kind, which is no other than the forge of Vulcan, that smith\nwho makes the bolts of Jove which torment offending souls. For\nill-ordered love has in itself the beginning of its own pain, seeing\nthat there is a God near us, in us, and with us. There is in us a\ncertain sacred mind and intelligence, which supplies an affection of its\nown, which has its own avenger, which, through remorse for certain\nshortcomings, flagellates the transgressing spirit as with a hammer. It\nnotes our actions and our affections, and as it is treated by us, so are\nwe treated by it. In every lover I say there is this smith Vulcan, and\nas there is no man that has not a god within him, so there is no lover\nthat has not a god within him, and no lover within whom this god is not.\nMost certainly there is a god in every man, but what god it is in each\none is not so easy to know. And even though we should examine and\ndistinguish, yet do I believe that none other than Love could declare\nit, he being the one who pulls the oars, and fills the sails, and\nmodifies this compound, so that it comes to be well or ill affected. I\nsay well or ill affected as to that which it puts in execution through\nthe moral actions and through contemplation; for the rest, all lovers\nare apt to experience some difficulties, things being as they are, so\nentangled; there being no good whatever, either of conception or of the\naffections, which is not joined to or stands in opposition to evil, as\nthere is no truth which is not joined or opposed to what is false, so\nthere is no love without fear, ardour, jealousy, rancour, and other\npassions, which proceed from their opposites, and which disturb us, as\nthe other opposite causes satisfaction. Thus the soul striving to\nrecover its natural beauty seeks to purify itself, to heal itself, and\nto reform itself, and to this end it uses fire, because, being like\ngold, mixed with earth and crude, with a certain rigour it tries to\nliberate itself from defilement, and this result is obtained when the\nintellect, the real smith of Jove, puts itself to the work and causes an\nactive exercise of the intellectual powers.\n\nCIC. It seems to me that this is referred to in the \"Banquet\" of Plato,\nwhere it says that Love has inherited from his mother, Poverty, that\ndried-up, thin, pale, bare-footed, and submissive condition without a\nhome, without anything, and through these is signified the torture of\nthe soul that is torn with contrary affections.\n\nTANS. So it is; because the spirit, full of this enthusiasm, becomes\nabsorbed in profound thoughts, stricken with urgent cares, kindled with\nfervent desires, excited by frequent crises: whence the soul, finding\nitself in suspense, becomes less diligent and active in the government\nof the body through the acts of the vegetative power; thus the body\nbecomes lean, ill-nourished, attenuated, poor in blood, and rich in\nmelancholy humours, and these, if they do not administer to the\ndisciplined soul, or to a clear and lucid spirit, may lead to insanity,\nfolly, and brutal fury, or at least to a certain disregard of self, and\na contempt of its own being, which is symbolized by Plato in the bare\nfeet. Love becomes subjected and flies suddenly down to earth when it is\nattached to low things, but flies high when it is fixed upon more worthy\nenterprises. In conclusion, whatever love it may be, it is ever\nafflicted and tormented in such a way that it cannot fail to supply\nmaterial for the forge of Vulcan; because the soul, being a divine\nthing, and by nature, not a servant but the mistress of corporeal\nmatter, she becomes troubled in that she voluntarily serves the body\nwherein she finds nothing to satisfy her, and albeit, fixed in the thing\nloved, yet now and then she becomes agitated, and fluctuates amidst the\nwaves of hope, fear, doubt, ardour, conscience, remorse, determination,\nrepentance, and other scourges, which are the bellows, the coals, the\nforge, the hammer, the pincers, and other instruments which are found in\nthe workshop of the sordid grimy consort of Venus.\n\nCIC. Enough has been said upon this subject. Let us see what follows.\n\n\nXI.\n\nTANS. Here is a golden apple, rich with various kinds of precious\nenamel, and there is a legend about it which says, \"Pulchriori detur.\"\n\nCIC. The allusion to the fact of the three goddesses who submitted\nthemselves to the judgment of Paris is very common. But read the lines\nwhich more specifically disclose the meaning of the present enthusiast.\n\nTANS.:\n\n35.\n\n    Venus, the goddess of the third heaven\n    (Mother of the archer blind, who conquers all),\n    She whose father is the head of Zeus,\n    And Juno, most majestic wife of Jove,\n    These call the Trojan shepherd to be judge,\n    And to the fairest give the ruddy sphere.\n    Compared with Venus, Pallas, and the Queen of Heaven,\n    My perfect goddess bears away the palm.\n    The Cyprian queen may boast her royal limbs,\n    Minerva charm with her transcendent wit,\n    And Juno with a majesty supreme;\n    But she who holds my heart all these excels\n    In wisdom, majesty, and loveliness.\n\nHere he makes a comparison between his object (or ideal) which comprises\nall circumstances, all conditions, and all kinds of beauty, in one\nsubject, and others which exhibit each only one, and that through\nvarious hypotheses, as with corporeal beauty, all the conditions of\nwhich Apelles could not find in one, but in many virgins. Now here,\nwhere there are three kinds of the beautiful, although it seems that all\nof these exist in each of the three goddesses--Venus not being found\nwanting in wisdom and majesty, Juno not lacking loveliness and wisdom,\nand Pallas being full of majesty and beauty, in each case it is a fact\nthat one quality exceeds the others, so that it comes to be held as\ndistinctive of the one, and the other as incidental to all, seeing that\nof those three gifts, one predominates in each and proclaims her\nsovereign over the others. And the cause of this difference lies in the\nfact of possessing these qualities, not primarily and in their essence,\nbut by participation and derivation; as in all things which are\ndependent, their perfection depends upon the degrees of major and minor\nand more and less. But in the simplicity of the divine essence, all\nexists in totality, and not according to any measure, and therefore\nwisdom is not greater than beauty and majesty, and goodness is not\ngreater than strength: not only are till the attributes equal, they are\none and the same thing. As in the sphere all the dimensions are not only\nequal, the length being equal to the depth and breadth, but are also\nidentical, seeing that what in a sphere is called deep, may also be\ncalled long and wide. Likewise is it, as to height in divine wisdom,\nwhich is the same as the depth of power and the breadth of goodness. All\nthese perfections are equal, because they are infinite. Of necessity,\none is according to the sum of the other, seeing that where things are\nfinite it may result in this, that it is more wise than beautiful or\ngood, more good and beautiful than wise, more wise and good than\npowerful, and more powerful than good or wise. But where there is\ninfinite wisdom there cannot be other than infinite power, otherwise\nthere would be no infinite knowledge. Where there is infinite goodness\nthere must be infinite wisdom, otherwise there would be no infinite\ngoodness. Where there is infinite power there must be infinite goodness\nand wisdom, because there is the being able to know and the knowing to\nbe able. Now, observe how the object of this enthusiast, who is, as it\nwere, inebriated with the drink of the gods, is incomparably higher\nthan others which are different. I mean to say that the divine essence\ncomprehends in the very highest degree perfection of all kinds, so that\naccording to the degree in which this particular form may have\nparticipated, he can understand all, do all, and be such an attached\nfriend to one that he may come to feel contempt and indifference towards\nevery other beauty. Therefore to her should be consecrated the spherical\napple as to her who seems to be all in all; not to Venus, who is\nbeautiful but is surpassed in wisdom by Minerva, and by Juno in majesty;\nnot to Pallas than whom Venus is more beautiful, and the other more\nmagnificent; not to Juno, who is not the goddess of intelligence or of\nlove.\n\nCIC. Truly, as are the degrees of Nature and of the essences, so in\nproportion are the degrees of the intelligible orders and the glories of\nthe amorous affections and enthusiasms.\n\n\nXII.\n\nCIC. The following bears a head with four faces, which blow towards the\nfour corners of the heavens, and are four winds in one subject; above\nthese stand two stars, and in the centre the legend \"Novae ortae\naeoliae.\" I would like to know what that signifies.\n\nTANS. I think that the meaning of this device is consequent upon that\nwhich precedes it, for, as there the object is declared to be infinite\nbeauty, so here is proposed what may be called a similar aspiration,\nstudy, affection, and desire. I believe that these winds are set to\nsignify sighs; but this we shall see when we come to read the lines:\n\n36.\n\n    Sons of the Titan Astraeus and Aurora,\n    Who trouble heaven, earth, and the wide sea,\n    Leave now this stormy war of elements,\n    And fight anon with the high gods.\n    No more in my AEolian caves ye dwell,\n    No more does my restraining power compel;\n    But caught are ye and closed within that breast,\n    With moans and sobs and bitter sighs opprest.\n    Turbulent brothers of the stars,\n    Companions of the tempests of the seas,\n    Those lights are all that may avail\n    Peace to restore; murderous yet innocent;\n    Which, open or concealed,\n    Will bless with calm, or curse with pride.\n\nEvidently, here, AEolus is introduced as speaking to the winds, which he\ndeclares are no longer tempered by him in the AEolian caverns, but by two\nstars in the breast of this enthusiast. Here, the two stars do not mean\nthe two eyes which are in the forehead, but the two appreciable kinds of\ndivine beauty and goodness, of that infinite splendour, which so\ninfluences intellectual and rational desire, that it brings him to a\ncondition of infinite aspiration, according to the way and the degree\nwith which he comes to comprehend that glorious light. For love, while\nit is finite, contented, and fixed in a certain measure, is not in the\nform of the species of divine beauty, but as it goes on with ever higher\naspirations, it may be said to verge towards the infinite.\n\nCIC.. How is breathing made to mean aspiring? What relation has desire\nwith the winds?\n\nTANS. Whosoever in this present condition aspires, also sighs, and the\nsame breathes; and therefore the vehemence of the aspiration is noted by\nthe hieroglyph of strong breathing.\n\nCIC. But there is a difference between sighing and breathing.\n\nTANS. Therefore it is not put as if one stood for the other, or as being\nidentical, but as being similar.\n\nCIC. Go on then with our proposition.\n\nTANS. The infinite aspiration then, indicated by the sighs and\nsymbolized by the winds, is not under the dominion of AEolus in the AEolic\ncaverns, but of the aforementioned two lights, which are not only\nblameless, but benevolent in killing the enthusiast, inasmuch as they\ncause him to die to every other thing, except the absorbing affection;\nat the same time, they, being closed and concealed, render him unquiet,\nand being open, they will tranquillize him, because at this time, when\nthe eyes of the human mind in this body are covered with a nebulous\nveil, the soul, through such studies, becomes troubled and harassed, and\nhe being thus torn and goaded, will attain only that amount of quiet as\nwill satisfy the condition of his nature.\n\nCIC.. How can our finite intellect follow after the infinite ideal?\n\nTANS. Through the infinite potency it possesses.\n\nCIC. This would be useless, if ever it came into effect.\n\nTANS. It would be useless, if it had to do with a finite action, where\ninfinite potency would be wanting, but not with the infinite action\nwhere infinite potency is positive perfection.\n\nCIC. If the human intellect is finite in nature and in act, how can it\nhave an infinite potency?\n\nTANS. Because it is eternal, and in this ever has delight, so that it\nenjoys happiness without end or measure; and because, as it is finite\nin itself, so it may be infinite in the object.\n\nCIC. What difference is there between the infinity of the object and the\ninfinity of the potentiality?\n\nTANS. This is finitely infinite, and that infinitely infinite. But to\nreturn to ourselves. The legend there says: \"Novae Liparaeae aeoliae,\"\nbecause it seems as if we are to believe that all the winds which are in\nthe abysmal caverns of AEolus were converted into sighs, if we include\nthose which proceed from the affection, which aspires continually to the\nhighest good and to the infinite beauty.\n\n\nXIII.\n\nCIC. Here we see the signification of that burning light around which is\nwritten: \"Ad vitam, non ad horam.\"\n\nTANS. Persistence in such a love and ardent desire of true goodness, by\nwhich in this temporal state the enthusiast is consumed. This, I think,\nis shown in the following tablet:\n\n37.[Transcribers Note: Original source said 34]\n\n    [G]What time the day removes the orient vault,\n    The rustic peasant leaves his humble home,\n    And when the sun with fiercer tangent strikes,\n    Fatigued and parched, he sits him in the shade;\n    Then plods again with hard, laborious toil,\n    Until black night the hemisphere enshrouds.\n    And then he rests. But I must ever chafe\n    At morning, noon-day, evening, and at night.\n    These fiery rays\n    Which stream from those two arches of my sun,\n    Ne'er fade from the horizon of my soul.\n    So wills my fate;\n    But blazing every hour\n    From their meridian they burn the afflicted heart.\n\n[G] Quando il sen d'oriente il giorno sgombra.\n\nCIC. This tablet expresses with greater truth than perspicacity the\nsense of the figure.\n\nTANS.. It is not necessary for me to make any effort to point out to you\nthe appropriateness, as it only requires a little attentive\nconsideration. The rays of the sun are the ways in which the divine\nbeauty and goodness manifest themselves to us; and they are fiery\nbecause they cannot be comprehended by the intellect without at the same\ntime kindling the affections. The two arches of the sun are the two\nkinds of revelation, that scholastic theologians call early and late,\nwhence our illuminating intelligence, as an airy medium, deduces that\nspecies, either in virtue, which it contemplates in itself, or in\nefficacy, which it beholds in its effects. The horizon of the soul, in\nthis place, is that part of the superior potentialities where the\nvigorous impulse of the affection comes to aid the lively comprehension\nof the intellect, being signified by the heart, which, burning at all\nhours, torments itself; because all those fruits of love that we can\ngather in this state are not so sweet that they have not united with\nthem a certain affliction, which proceeds from the fear of imperfect\nfruition: as especially occurs in the fruits of natural affection, the\ncondition of which I cannot do better than explain in the words of the\nEpicurean poet:\n\n    Ex hominis vera facie, pulchroque colore\n    Nil datur in corpus praeter simulacra fruendum\n    Tenuia, quae vento spes captat saepe misella.\n    Ut bibere in somnis sitiens cum quaerit, et humor\n    Non datur, ardorem in membris qui stinguere possit,\n    Sed laticum simulacra petit, frustraque laborat,\n    In medioque sitit torrenti flumine potans:\n    Sic in amore Venus simulacris ludit amantis,\n    Nec satiare queunt spectando corpora coram,\n    Nec manibus quicquam teneris abradere membris\n    Possunt, errantes incerti corpore toto.\n    Denique cum membris conlatis flore fruuntur\n    AEtatis, dum jam praesagit gaudia corpus,\n    Atque in eo est Venus, ut muliebria conserat arva,\n    Adfigunt avide corpus, iunguntque salivas\n    Oris, et inspirant pressantes dentibus ora,\n    Necquiquam, quoniam nihil inde abradere possunt,\n    Nec penetrare, et abire in corpus corpore toto.\n\nIn the same way, he judges as to the kind of taste that we can have of\ndivine things, which, while we force ourselves to penetrate, and unite\nwith them, we find that we have more pain in the desire than pleasure\nin the realization. And this may have been the reason why that wise\nHebrew said that he who increases knowledge increases pain; because\nfrom, the greater comprehension grows the greater desire. And this is\nfollowed by greater vexation and grief for the deprivation of the thing\ndesired. So the Epicurean, who led a most tranquil life, said\nopportunely:\n\n    Sed fugitare decet simulacra, et pabula amoris\n    Abstergere sibi, atque alio convertere mentem,\n    Nec servare sibi curam certumque dolorem:\n    Ulcus enim virescit, et inveterascit alendo,\n    Inque dies gliscit furor, atque aerumna gravescit.\n    Nec Veneris fructu caret is, qui vitat amorem,\n    Sed potius, quae sunt, sine poena, commoda sumit.\n\nCIC. What is meant by the meridian of the heart?\n\nTANS. That part or region of the will which is highest and most exalted,\nand where it becomes most strongly, clearly, and effectually kindled. He\nmeans that such affection is not as in its beginning, where it stirs,\nnor as at the end, where it reposes, but as in the middle, where it\nbecomes fervid.\n\n\nXIV.\n\nCIC. But what means that glowing arrow, which has flames in place of a\nhard point, around which is encircled a noose with the legend: \"Amor\ninstat ut instans\"? Say, what does it mean?\n\nTANS. It seems to me to mean that love never leaves him, and at the same\ntime eternally afflicts him.\n\nCIC. I see the noose, the arrow, and the fire. I understand that which\nis written: \"Amor instat\"; but that which follows I cannot\nunderstand--that is, that love as an instant, or persisting, persists;\nwhich has the same poverty of idea as if one said: \"This undertaking he\nhas feigned as a feint; he bears it as he bears it, understands it as he\nunderstands it, values it as he values it, and esteems it as he who\nesteems it.\"\n\nTANS. It is easy for him to decide and condemn who does not even\nconsider. That \"instans\" is not an adjective from the verb \"instare,\"\nbut it is a noun substantive used for the instant of time.\n\nCIC. Now, what is the meaning of the phrase \"love endures as an\ninstant?\"\n\nTANS.. What does Aristotle mean in his book on Time, when he says that\neternity is an instant, and that all time is no more than an instant?\n\nCIC. How can this be, seeing that there is no time so short that it\ncannot be divided into seconds? Perhaps he would say that in one instant\nthere is the Flood, the Trojan war, and we who exist now; I should like\nto know how this instant is divided into so many centuries and years,\nand whether, by the same rule, we might not say that the line is a\npoint?\n\nTANS. If time be one, but in different temporal subjects, so the instant\nis one in different and all parts of time. As I am the same I was, am,\nand shall be; so I myself am always the same in the house, in the\ntemple, in the field, and wheresoever I am.\n\nCIC. Why do you wish to make out that the instant is the whole of time?\n\nTANS. Because if it were not an instant, it would not be time; therefore\ntime in essence and substance is no other than an instant, and let this\nsuffice, if you understand it, because I do not intend to perorate upon\nthe entire physics; so that you must understand that he means to say\nthat the whole of love is no less present than the whole of time;\nbecause this \"instans\" does not mean a moment of time.\n\nCIC. This meaning must be specified in some way, if we do not wish to\nsee the motto invalidated by equivocation, by which we are free to\nsuppose that he meant to say that his love was but for an instant--that\nis, for an atom of time, and of nothing more, or that he means that it\nis as you interpret it, everlasting.\n\nTANS. Surely, if these two contrary meanings were implied, the legend\nwould be nonsense. But it is not so, if you consider well, for it cannot\nbe that in one instant, which is an atom or point, love persists or\nendures; therefore one must of necessity understand the instant in\nanother signification. And for the sake of getting out of the mesh, read\nthe stanza:\n\n38.\n\n    One time scatters and one gathers;\n    One builds, one breaks; one weeps, one laughs;\n    One time to sadness, one to gaiety inclines;\n    One labours and one rests; one stands, one sits;\n    One proffers and one takes away;\n    One stays and one removes; one animates, one kills.\n    In all the years, the months, the days, the hours,\n    Love waits on me, strikes, binds, and burns.\n    To me continual dissolution,\n    Continual weeping holds me and destroys.\n    All times to me are full of woe;\n    All things time takes from me,\n    And gives me naught, not even death.\n\nCIC. I understand the meaning quite perfectly, and confess that all\nthings agree very well. It is time to proceed to the next.\n\nXV.\n\nTANS. Here behold a serpent languishing in the snow, where a labourer\nhas thrown it, and a naked child burning in the midst of the fire, with\ncertain other details and circumstances, with the legend which says:\n\"Idem, itidem non idem.\" This seems more like an enigma than anything\nelse, and I do not feel sure that I can explain it at all; yet I do\nbelieve that it means that the same fate vexes, and the same torments\nboth the one and the other--that is, immeasurably, without mercy and\nunto death, by means of various instruments or contrary principles,\nshowing itself the same whether cold or hot. But this, it seems to me,\nrequires longer and special consideration.\n\nCIC. Some other time. Read the lines:\n\n39.\n\n    Limp snake, that writhest in the snow,\n    Twisting and turning here and there\n    To find some ease from the tormenting cold,\n    If the congealing ice could know thy pain,\n    Or had the sense to feel thy smart,\n    And thou couldst find a voice for thy complaint,\n    I do believe thy argument would make it pitiful.\n    I with eternal fire am scourged, am burnt, and bitten,\n    And in the iciness of my divinity find no deliverance,\n    No pity does she feel, nor can she know, alas!\n    The rigorous ardour of my flames.\n\n40.\n\n    Serpent, thou fain wouldst flee, but canst not;\n    Try for thy hiding-place, it is no more;\n    Recall thy strength, 'tis spent;\n    Wait for the sun, behind thick fog he hides;\n    Cry mercy of the hind, he fears thy tooth.\n    Fortune invoke, she hears thee not, the jade!\n    Nor flight, nor place, nor star, nor man, nor fate\n    Can bring to thee deliverance from death.\n    Thou dost become congealed. Melting am I.\n    I like thy rigours, thee my ardour pleases;\n    Help have I none for thee, and thou hast none for me.\n    Clear is our evil fate--all hope resign.\n\nCIC. Let us go, and by the way we will seek to untie this knot--if\npossible.\n\nTANS. So be it.\n\n\nPRINTED BY BALLANTYNE, HANSON AND CO. LONDON AND EDINBURGH THE APOLOGY\nOF THE NOLAN\n\n\nTO THE MOST VIRTUOUS AND LOVELY LADIES.\n\n    O lovely, graceful nymphs of England!\n    Not in repugnance nor in scorn\n    Our spirit holds you,\n    Nor would our pen abase you\n    More than it must--to call you feminine!\n    Exemption I am sure you would not claim,\n    Being subject to the common influence;\n    Shining on earth as do the stars in heaven.\n    Your sov'reign beauty, ladies, our austerity\n    Cannot depreciate, nor would do so,\n    For we have not in view a superhuman kind,\n    Such poison,[H] therefore, far from you be set,\n    For here we see the one, the great Diana,\n    Who is to you as sun amongst the stars.\n    Wit, words, learning and art,\n    And whatsoe'er is mine of scribbling faculty,\n    I humbly place before you.\n\n[H] Arsenico.","title":"The Heroic Enthusiasts (Gli Eroici Furori) Part the First: An Ethical Poem","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":36308}