Similar antagonism to the critical doctrines of Aristotle is to be found in passages scattered here and there throughout the works of Giordano Bruno. In the first dialogue of the _Eroici Furori_, published at London in 1585, while Bruno was visiting England, he expresses his contempt for the mere pedants who judge poets by the rules of Aristotle's _Poetics_. His contention is that there are as many sorts of poets as there are human sentiments and ideas, and that poets, so far from being subservient to rules, are themselves really the authors of all critical dogma. Those who attack the great poets whose works do not accord with the rules of Aristotle are called by Bruno stupid pedants and beasts. The gist of his argument may be gathered from the following passage:-- "TANS. Thou dost well conclude that poetry is not born in rules, or only slightly and accidentally so; the rules are derived from the poetry, and there are as many kinds and sorts of true rules as there are kinds and sorts of true poets. CIC. How then are the true poets to be known? TANS. By the singing of their verses; in that singing they give delight, or they edify, or they edify and delight together. CIC. To whom then are the rules of Aristotle useful? TANS. To him who, unlike Homer, Hesiod, Orpheus, and others, could not sing without the rules of Aristotle, and who, having no Muse of his own, would coquette with that of Homer."[308] A similar antagonism to Aristotle and a similar literary individualism are to be found in a much later work by Benedetto Fioretti, who under the pseudonym of Udeno Nisieli published the five volumes of his _Proginnasmi Poetici_ between 1620 and 1639.[309] Just before the close of the sixteenth century, however, the _Poetics_ had obtained an ardent defender against such attacks in the person of Francesco Buonamici, in his _Discorsi Poetici_; and three years later, in 1600, Faustino Summo published a similar defence of Aristotle. The attacks on Aristotle's literary dictatorship were of little avail; it was hardly necessary even to defend him. For two centuries to come he was to reign supreme on the continent of Europe; and in Italy this supremacy was hardly disturbed until the days of Goldoni and Metastasio. FOOT-NOTES: [298] De Sanctis, ii. 193 _sq._ [299] _Cf._ Bosanquet, _Hist. of AEsthetic_, p. 152 _sq._ [300] _Cf._ Foffano, p. 151 _sq._ [301] Symonds, ii. 470. [302] Baillet, iii. 70. [303] Tiraboschi, vii. 1559. [304] Several similar extracts from Italian comic prologues may be found in Symonds, v. 533 _sq._ [305] Foffano, p. 154 _sq._ [306] _Poetica_, p. 32. [307] _Paradossi_, Venetia, 1545, ii. 29. [308] _Opere_, ii. 315 (Williams's translation). [309] _Cf._ the diverse opinions of Tiraboschi, viii. 516, and Hallam, _Lit. of Europe_, pt. iii. ch. 7. PART SECOND _LITERARY CRITICISM IN FRANCE_ LITERARY CRITICISM IN FRANCE CHAPTER I