History of Spanish and Portuguese Literature (Vol 2 of 2)Bouterwek, Friedrich
History
History of Spanish and Portuguese Literature (Vol 2 of 2)
Bouterwek, Friedrich
Portuguese literature -- History and criticism; Spanish literature -- History and criticism
Christianity gives birth, that some portion of poetic life has been
imparted to the spiritual songs, sonnets, and estancias of Bernardes.
That feeling led him to introduce into his sonnets to the holy virgin,
a mixture of romantic love; for example, when the poet complains to the
virgin that he loves something beside herself;[201] or, when he admires
her beauty in a picture, and reflects how beautiful she herself must
be. The spiritual songs in the popular style, which are included among
the works of Bernardes, are written in Spanish. The temporal songs,
elegies, and sonnets of this poet, have the same soft and infantine
character, and are therefore not inappropriately presented to the
public as an appendix to his pictures of spiritual feeling.[202] A few
elegies which he composed during his captivity among the Moors,[203]
and some _endechas_ in the old national style,[204] belong to this
class. Bernardes has also left behind him eclogues, epistles, and
numerous sonnets. His epistles shew the veneration he entertained for
the critical judgment of Ferreira, whose cold style, however, certainly
could not please him.[205] Many of his sonnets are expressive of the
homage with which he submitted his poetry to the judgment of Ferreira,
as he did his faith to the doctrines of the church. The elegy in which
he laments the death of Ferreira may, therefore, be numbered among his
sincerest effusions of the heart.[206]
CORTEREAL.
In the same school of correct poetry with Andrade Caminha and
Bernardes, arose the ingenious Jeronymo Cortereal, another of those
chivalrous spirits of the sixteenth century, for whom every ordinary
sphere of life was too limited. Ambitious of doing honour to his
country and his distinguished family, he served in the Portuguese army
against the infidels in Asia and Africa. He afterwards settled on his
estate near Evora. In his residence, which was situated on a hill, and
surrounded by rude precipices, and which commanded an extensive view
of the surrounding country, he devoted himself to poetic composition;
and sometimes, for the sake of variety, turned his attention to
music and painting. This romantic abode of the muses charmed even
the cold-hearted Philip II. of Spain, when he visited his kingdom
of Portugal. Cortereal, who on that occasion, rendered homage to the
new sovereign in verse, had previously often been unfaithful to his
native tongue. He is included in the number of those Spanish poets, who
indefatigably but vainly vied with each other to convert historical
art into epic art, and to produce a Spanish national epopee.[207]--He
related in Spanish verse and in a poem of fifteen cantos, the history
of the battle of Lepanto, which has given occasion to so much Spanish
poetry of every description. In the Portuguese language, he wrote two
poems of a similar kind, which, at the time of their production were
very much esteemed. The subject of one is the siege of the Portuguese
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