Dante, as hath already been intimated, is the hero of his own poem; and the "Divina Commedia" is the only example of an attempt triumphantly achieved, and placed beyond the reach of scorn or neglect, wherein, from beginning to end, the author discourses concerning himself individually. Had this been done in any other way than the consummately simple, delicate, and unobtrusive one which he has adopted, the whole would have been insufferable egotism, disgusting coxcombry, or oppressive dulness,--whereas this personal identity is the charm, the strength, the soul of the book: he lives, he breathes, he moves through it; his pulse beats or stands still, his eye kindles or fades, his cheek grows pale with horror, colours with shame, or burns with indignation; we hear his voice, his step, in every page; we see his shape by the flames of hell, his shadow in the land where there is no _other_ shadow ("Purgatorio"), and his countenance gaining angelic elevation from "colloquy sublime" with glorified intelligences in the paradise above. Nor does he ever go out of his actual character;--he is, indeed, the lover from infancy of Beatrice, the aristocratic magistrate of a fierce democracy, the valiant soldier in the field of Campaldino, the fervent patriot in the feuds of Guelfs and Ghibellines, the eloquent and subtle disputant in the schools of theology; the melancholy exile, wandering from court to court, depending for bread and shelter on petty princes who knew not his worth, except as a splendid captive in their train; and, above all (though not obtrusively so), he is the poet anticipating his own assured renown, and dispensing at his will honour or infamy to others, whom he need but to name, and the sound must be heard to the end of time, and echoed from all regions of the globe. Dante, in his vision, is Dante as he lived, as he died, and as he expected to live in both worlds beyond death,--an immortal spirit in the one, an unforgotten poet in the other. Pride of birth, consciousness of genius, religious feeling almost to fanaticism, and the sense of wrongs, under which he is alternately inflamed with rage, withered with disappointment, or saddened with despair,--these are continually reminding the reader of the man as he was; stimulating his jaded hope with the bitter sweet of revenge, which he could wreak at will upon his enemies; and solacing a wounded spirit with the thought of fame in possession, which his fellow-citizens could not confiscate, and fame in _reversion_, of which contemporaries could not cut off the entail.