To this long tirade, Love with indignation replies: "Hearest thou the falsehood of this ungrateful man? This is he who in his youth devoted himself to the despicable traffic of words and lies, and now he blushes not to reproach me with having raised him from obscurity, to know the delights of an honourable and virtuous life. I gave him power to attain a height of fame and virtue to which of himself he had never dared to aspire. If he has obtained a name among men, to me he owes it. Let him remember the great heroes and poets of antiquity, whose evil stars condemned them to lavish their love upon unworthy objects, whose mistresses were courtezans and slaves; while for him, I chose from the whole world one lovely woman, so gifted by Heaven with all female excellence, that her likeness is not to be found beneath the moon,--one whose melodious voice and gentle accents had power to banish from his heart every vain, and dark, and vicious thought. These were the wrongs of which he complains: such is my reward for all I have done for him,--ungrateful man! Upon my wings hath he soared upwards, till his name is placed among the greatest of the sons of song, and fair ladies and gentle knights listen with delight to his strains:--had it not been for me, what had he become before now? Perhaps a vain flatterer, seeking preferment in a Court, confounded among the herd of vulgar men! I have so chastened, so purified his heart through the heavenly image impressed upon it, that even in his youth, and in the age of the passions, I preserved him pure in thought and in action;[28] whatever of good or great ever stirred within his breast, he derives from her and from me. From the contemplation of virtue, sweetness, and beauty, in the gracious countenance of her he loved, I led him upwards to the adoration of the first Great Cause, the fountain of all that is beautiful and excellent;--hath he not himself confessed it? And this fair creature, whom I gave him to be the honour, and delight, and prop of his frail life"-- Here the sense is suddenly broken off in the middle of a line. Petrarch utters a cry of horror, and exclaims--"Yes, you gave her to me, but you have also taken her from me!" Love replies with sweet austerity--"Not I--but HE--the eternal One--who hath willed it so!" After this, it will be allowed, I think, that it is to Laura we owe Petrarch; and that if the recompense she bestowed on him was not exactly that which he sought,--yet in fame, in greatness, in virtue, and in happiness, she well and richly repaid the adoration he lavished at her feet, and the glorious wreath of song with which he has circled her brows! FOOTNOTES: [22] See Pursuits of Literature.