_A Manual of_ _Italian Literature_ BY FRANCIS HENRY CLIFFE LONDON: JOHN MACQUEEN 1896 CONTENTS. I. INTRODUCTION II. DANTE III. PETRARCH IV. BOCCACCIO AND THE PROSE WRITERS OF THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY V. WRITERS OF THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY VI. ARIOSTO VII. POETS CONTEMPORARY WITH ARIOSTO VIII. MACHIAVELLI AND THE PROSE WRITERS OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY IX. BERNARDO AND TORQUATO TASSO X. MARINO, CHIABRERA, FILICAIA, AND OTHER POETS OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY XI. GALILEO AND THE PROSE WRITERS OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY XII. CHARACTERISTICS OF THE WRITERS OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY XIII. METASTASIO XIV. PARIMI XV. ALFIERI XVI. OTHER POETS OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY XVII. PROSE WRITERS OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY XVIII. CHARACTERISTICS OF THE WRITERS OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY XIX. LEOPARDI XX. MANZONI XXI. SILVIO PELLICO XXII. POETS OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY XXIII. PROSE WRITERS OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY XXIV. CONCLUSION INDEX _A Manual of_ _Italian Literature_ CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION. Whoever examines a map of Europe, and sees the position occupied by Italy, must, even without knowledge of history, come to the conclusion that a country situated in so central a position and favoured in so many respects by Nature, cannot have failed to command an exalted rank in the hierarchy of nations. But the most daring conjectures would probably fall short of the brilliant reality. The rise and the dominion of Rome would be regarded in a romance as too improbable for the credulity of the simplest reader, but as a well-established fact in the annals of mankind, it becomes a phenomenon of the most striking importance and interest. That a solitary city should produce brave and distinguished men, and even, aided by wealth and courage, establish settlements in remote countries, is not wonderful; Carthage and Tyre did so at an earlier period, Venice and Genoa did so in times nearer the present; but that a solitary city should play a part reserved apparently only for a great nation, should draw to itself, as in a magic circle, all Italy, should conquer Gaul, Greece, Africa, Spain, Britain, Asia Minor, and even threaten Persia and India, is indeed marvellous. Nor were the conquests of Rome transient conflagrations whose fury was soon exhausted; they were as durable as they were brilliant, and the subjugated races speedily learned the language and the manners of their masters. Only one nation, though politically enslaved, remained intellectually free. Greece had produced poets so sublime, philosophers so profound, historians so brilliant, that even in the darkest hour of degradation, even when Memmius was despoiling Corinth of the works of the greatest of statuaries, even when Sulla was slaughtering the helpless inhabitants of Athens, she had the