After the proem, in which the poet’s intention is set forth, the _Vita Nuova_ falls into three divisions. Each contains ten poems set as gems in a golden prose framework, the end of each part being indicated by a reference to new matter, _nuova matera_ (xvii., xxxi.). The whole book is closed by an epilogue containing one sonnet, _una cosa nuova_, “a new thing,” with an introductory episode and a visionary sequel. In the first part Dante mainly depicts the effects in himself of Beatrice’s beauty, the loveliness of the _belle membra_, “the fair members in which I was enclosed” (_Purg._ xxxi. 50); in the second, the miracles wrought by the splendour of her soul; the third contains his worship of her memory, when “the delight of her fairness, departing from our view, became great spiritual beauty that spreads through heaven a light of love, gives bliss to the Angels, and makes their lofty and subtle intellect wonder” (xxxiv.). The first part (ii. to xvii.) contains nine of Dante’s earliest sonnets and one ballata, with the story of his youthful love up to a certain point, where, after having passed through a spiritual crisis, he resolves to write upon a new and nobler matter than the past. We have the wondrous effects of Beatrice’s salutation; the introductory sonnet resulting in the friendship with Guido Cavalcanti, to whom the book is dedicated, and who seems to have induced Dante to write in Italian instead of Latin (_V. N._ xxxi.); his concealment of his love by feigning himself enamoured of two other ladies. Throughout the _Vita Nuova_, while Beatrice on earth or in heaven is, as it were, the one central figure in the picture, there is a lovely background of girlish faces behind her; just as, in the paintings of many early Italian masters, there is shown in the centre the Madonna and her Divine Babe, while around her all the clouds and sky are full of sweetly smiling cherubs’ heads. There have been students of the book who supposed that, while Beatrice represents the ideal of womanhood, these others are the real Florentine women in whom Dante for a while sought this glorious ideal of his mind; others have endeavoured in one or other of the minor characters of the _Vita Nuova_ to recognise the Matelda of the Earthly Paradise. And there are visions and dreams introduced, in which Love himself appears in visible form, now as a lord of terrible aspect within a cloud of fire with Beatrice in his arms, now by a river-side in the garb of a traveller to bid Dante feign love for another lady, now as a youth clad in very white raiment to console him when Beatrice refuses her salutation. It may be that these two latter episodes mean that Dante was for a time enamoured of some girl whom he afterwards represented as the second lady who shielded his real love from discovery, and that he resolved to turn from it to a nobler worship of Beatrice. The most beautiful sonnet of this group is the fifth: Cavalcando l’altr’ier per un cammino,