Another little circumstance, not less affecting, he has beautifully commemorated in two Sonnets which follow the one last mentioned. They are addressed to some kind and gentle creature, who from a window beheld Dante abandon himself, with fearful vehemence, to the agony of his feelings, when he believed no human eye was on him. "She turned pale," he says, "with compassion; her eyes filled with tears, as if she had loved me: then did I remember my noble-hearted Beatrice, for even thus she often looked upon me," &c. And he confesses that the grateful, yet mournful pleasure with which he met the pitying look of this fair being, excited remorse in his heart, that he should be able to derive pleasure from anything. Dante concludes the collection of his _Rime_, (his miscellaneous poems on the subject of his early love) with this remarkable note:-- "I beheld a marvellous vision, which has caused me to cease from writing in praise of my blessed Beatrice, until I can celebrate her more worthily; which that I may do, I devote my whole soul to study, as _she_ knoweth well; in so much, that if it please the Great Disposer of all things to prolong my life for a few years upon this earth, I hope hereafter to sing of my Beatrice what never yet was said or sung of woman.'" And in this transport of enthusiasm, Dante conceived the idea of his great poem, of which Beatrice was destined to be the heroine. It was to no Muse, called by fancy from her fabled heights, and feigned at the poet's will; it was not to ambition of fame, nor literary leisure seeking a vent for overflowing thoughts; nor to the wish to aggrandise himself, or to flatter the pride of a patron;--but to the inspiration of a young, beautiful, and noble-minded woman, we owe one of the grandest efforts of human genius. And never did it enter into the imagination of any lover, before or since, to raise so mighty, so vast, so enduring, so glorious a monument to the worth and charms of a mistress. Other poets were satisfied if they conferred on the object of their love an immortality on earth: Dante was not content till he had placed _his_ on a throne in the Empyreum, above choirs of angels, in presence of the very fountain of glory; her brow wreathed with eternal beams, and clothed with the ineffable splendours of beatitude;--an apotheosis, compared to which, all others are earthly and poor indeed. FOOTNOTES: [38] "Membra formosi et grandi." [39] It borrows even the solemn language of Sacred Writ to express its intensity: Nelle man vostre, o dolce donna mia! Raccomando lo spirito che muore. SON. 34. [40] I refer particularly to that sublime Canzone addressed to the ladies of Florence, and beginning "Donne ch' avete intelletto d' amore." [41] Monna Vanna, for _Madonna Giovanna_; and Monna Bice, _Madonna Beatrice_. This famous sonnet has been translated by Hayley and by Shelley. I subjoin the version of the latter, as truer to the spirit of the original.