[25] The “Triunfos Morales de Francisco de Guzman” (Sevilla, 1581, 12mo) are imitations of Petrarca’s “Trionfi,” but are much more didactic, giving, for instance, under the head of “The Triumph of Wisdom,” the opinions of the wise men of antiquity; and under the head of “The Triumph of Prudence,” the general rules for prudent conduct. Neither should a call made by Aldana, in the name of military glory, to Philip himself, urging him to defend the suffering Church, be overlooked. It breathes the very spirit of its subject, and may well be put in direct contrast with the earnest and sad persuasions to peace by Virues, who was yet a soldier by profession, and with Cantorál’s winning invitation to the quietness of a country life. Some of the religious poetry of Diego de Morillo and Pedro de Salas, in the next reigns, with several of the wise epistles of the Argensolas, Artieda, and Mesa, should be added; but they are all comparatively short poems, except those by Morillo on the Words of Christ upon the Cross, which extend to several hundred lines on each word, and which, though disfigured by antithesis and exaggeration, are strongly marked specimens of the Catholic didactic spirit. In the mean time, and in the midst of this group,--partly because the way had been already prepared for it by the publication, in 1591, of a good translation of Horace’s “Art of Poetry” by Espinel, and partly from other causes,[26]--we have, at last, a proper didactic poem, or rather an attempt at one. It is by Juan de la Cueva, who in 1605 wrote in _terza rima_ three epistles, which he entitled “Egemplar Poético,” and which constitute the oldest formal and original effort of the kind in the Spanish language. Regarded as a whole, they are, indeed, far from being a complete Art of Poetry, and in some parts they are injudicious and inconsequent; but they not unfrequently contain passages of acute criticism in flowing verse, and they have, besides, the merit of nationality in their tone. In all respects, they are better than an absurd didactic poem, by the same author, on “The Inventors of Things,” which he wrote three years later, and which shows, as he showed elsewhere, that he adventured in too many departments.[27] [26] The “Arte Poética” of Espinel is the first thing published in the “Parnaso Español” of Sedano, 1768, and was vehemently attacked by Yriarte, when, in 1777, he printed his own translation of the same work. (Obras de Yriarte, Madrid, 1805, 12mo, Tom. IV.) To this Sedano replied in the ninth volume of his “Parnaso,” 1778. Yriarte rejoined in a satirical dialogue, “Donde las dan las toman” (Obras, Tom. VI.); and Sedano closed the controversy with the “Coloquios de Espina,” Malaga, 1785, 2 tom. 12mo, under the name of Juan María Chavero y Eslava. It is a very pretty literary quarrel, quite in the Spanish manner.