FOOTNOTE:
[21] Mr Roscoe, author of the History of the Medici, has recently published an History of Leo X., which is truly a masterpiece in its kind, in which he relates all those marks of esteem and admiration, which the princes and the people of Italy have conferred on distinguished men of letters; he also shows, with impartiality, that the conduct of many of the Popes has been, in this respect, very liberal.
Chapter iv.
Corinne's letter made Oswald a second time repent the idea he had formed of detaching himself from her. The intellectual dignity, the attractive tenderness with which she repelled the harsh allegations he had made against her country, affected him deeply, and penetrated him with admiration. A superiority, so grand, so simple, and so true, appeared to him above all ordinary rules. He felt that Corinne was not the weak, timid woman, without an opinion on any subject beyond the sphere of her private duties and sentiments, which he had chosen in his imagination as a partner for life. The remembrance of Lucilia, such as he had beheld her at the age of twelve years, agreed much better with this idea;—but could any woman be compared with Corinne? Could ordinary laws and rules be applied to one, who united in herself so many different qualities, cemented by genius and sensibility? Corinne was a miracle of nature, and was it not a miracle worked in favour of Oswald, when he could flatter himself with interesting such a woman? But her real name and condition were unknown to him. What would be her future projects were he to avow his intention of uniting himself to her? All was yet in obscurity; and although the enthusiasm with which Corinne had inspired Oswald made him desirous of espousing her, yet the idea that her life had not been wholly irreproachable, and that such an union would certainly have been condemned by his father, threw his soul into confusion, and racked him with the most painful anxiety.
He was not now so sunk in grief, as before his acquaintance with Corinne; but he no longer felt that sort of calm, which may even accompany repentance, when our whole life is devoted to the expiation of a crime. Formerly, he was not afraid to abandon himself to his recollections, bitter as they were; but now he dreaded those long and profound reveries, which would have revealed to him what was passing at the bottom of his soul. In the meantime he prepared to visit Corinne, in order to thank her for her letter, and obtain pardon for what he had written to her, when Mr Edgermond, a relation of young Lucilia, entered the room.
He was a worthy English gentleman, who had almost constantly resided in Wales, where he possessed an estate. He cherished those principles and prejudices which, in every country, serve to maintain things as they are, and which have a most beneficial tendency, when things are as well as human reason will permit. When that is the case, such men as Mr Edgermond, that is to say, the partizans of established order, though strongly and even obstinately attached to their customs and to their manner of thinking, ought to be considered as men of rational and enlightened minds.
Lord Nelville was startled when he heard Mr Edgermond announced; every recollection of the past rushed upon him at once; but as it immediately occurred to his mind that Lady Edgermond, the mother of Lucilia, had sent her relation to reproach him, and thus restrain his independence, this thought restored his firmness, and he received Mr Edgermond with great coldness. However, he wronged his visitor by his suspicions, for he had not the least design in his head that regarded Nelville. He visited Italy for the sake of his health alone; and ever since he had been in the country, he was constantly employed in hunting, and drinking to King George and Old England. He was the most open-hearted of men, and possessed a much better informed mind than his habits would induce many to believe. He was a downright Englishman, not only as he ought to be, but also as one might wish he were not: following in every country the customs of his own, living only with Englishmen, and never discoursing with foreigners; not out of contempt to them, but from a sort of repugnance to foreign languages, and a timidity, which even at the age of fifty, rendered him very diffident in forming new acquaintances.
"I am happy to see you," said he to Nelville, "I am going to Naples in a fortnight and should be glad to see you there, for I have not long to stay in Italy; my regiment will soon embark." "Your regiment!" repeated Lord Nelville, and blushed as if he had forgotten that he had a year's leave of absence because his regiment was not to be employed before the expiration of that period. He blushed at the thought that Corinne could make him forget even his duty. "Your regiment," continued Mr Edgermond, "will not go upon service so soon; so stay here quietly, and regain your health. I saw my young cousin before I set out—she is more charming than ever. I am sure by the time you return she will be the finest woman in England." Lord Nelville said nothing—and Mr Edgermond was also silent. Some other words passed between them, very laconic, though extremely friendly, and Mr Edgermond was going, when suddenly turning back, he said, "Apropos, my lord, you can do me a kindness—they tell me you are acquainted with the celebrated Corinne: I don't much like forming new acquaintances, but I am quite curious to see this lady." "Since you desire it, I will ask Corinne's permission to introduce you," replied Oswald. "Do so, I beseech you," said Mr Edgermond; "and contrive to let me see her some day when she improvises, or dances and sings to the company." "Corinne does not thus display her talents to strangers," said Nelville; "she is your equal and mine in every respect." "Pardon my mistake," said Mr Edgermond, "as she is not known by another name than that of Corinne, and lives by herself at the age of twenty-six years unaccompanied by any part of her family, I thought she derived support from her talents." "Her fortune is entirely independent," answered his lordship warmly, "and her mind is still more so." Mr Edgermond immediately dropped this subject, and repented at having introduced it, seeing that it interested Oswald. No men in the world have so much discretion and delicate precaution in what concerns the affections, as the English.
Mr Edgermond went away. Lord Nelville, when alone, could not help exclaiming with emotion, "I must espouse Corinne. I must become her protector, in order to preserve her from obloquy. She shall have the little it is in my power to bestow—a rank and a name; whilst she on her part will confer on me every earthly felicity." It was in this disposition that he hastened to visit Corinne, and never did he enter her doors with sweeter sentiments of hope and love; but, swayed by his natural timidity, and in order to recover confidence, he began the conversation with insignificant topics, and of this number was his request for permission to introduce Mr Edgermond. At this name Corinne was visibly agitated, and with a faltering voice refused what Oswald solicited. All astonishment, he said to her, "I thought that in this house, to which so many are allowed access, the title of my friend would not afford a motive of exclusion." "Do not be offended, my lord," replied Corinne: "Believe that I must have very powerful reasons not to consent to your desire." "Ands will you acquaint me with those reasons?" replied Oswald. "Impossible!" cried Corinne; "Impossible!" "So then—" said Nelville, and his emotion rendered him unable to proceed. He was about to depart, when Corinne, all in tears, exclaimed in English, "For God's sake do not leave me unless you wish to break my heart!"
These words, and the tone of voice in which they were uttered, deeply affected the soul of Oswald. He sat down again at some distance from Corinne, supporting his head against a vase of alabaster which embellished her apartment; then, suddenly, he said to her, "Cruel woman! you see that I love you—you see that, twenty times a day, I am ready to offer you my hand and my heart; yet you will not inform me who you are! Tell me, Corinne, tell me the story of your past life," repeated he, stretching his hand to her with the most moving expression of sensibility. "Oswald!" cried Corinne; "Oswald! you do not know the pain you give me. If I were mad enough to tell you all you would no longer love me." "Great God!" replied he; "what have you then to reveal?" "Nothing that renders me unworthy of you," said she; "but fortuitous circumstances, and differences between our tastes and opinions, which existed formerly and which no longer exist. Do not oblige me to confess who I am. Some day, perhaps—some day, should you love me sufficiently—Ah! I know not what I say," continued Corinne; "you shall know all; but do not forsake me before you have heard it. Promise me that you will not, in the name of your father who is now in heaven!" "Pronounce not that name," cried Lord Nelville; "can you fathom his will respecting us? Think you that he would consent to our union? If you do, declare it, and I shall no longer be racked with doubts and fears. Some time or other, I will unfold to you my sad story; but behold the condition you have now reduced me to." In truth, his forehead was covered with a cold sweat, his face was pale, and his trembling lips with difficulty articulated these last words. Corinne, seated by the side of Nelville, holding his hands in hers, gently recalled him to himself. "My dear Oswald," said she to him; "ask Mr Edgermond if he has ever been in Northumberland; or at least if he has only been there within these past five years. Should he answer in the affirmative he may then accompany you hither." At these words Oswald looked steadfastly at Corinne, who cast down her eyes and was silent. "I shall do as you desire me," said Lord Nelville, and went away.
On his return home, he exhausted conjecture upon the secrets of Corinne. It appeared evident that she had passed a considerable time in England, and that her name and family must be known there. But what could be her motive for concealing them; and if she had been settled in England, why had she left it? These questions greatly disturbed the heart of Oswald. He was convinced that no stain would be found in her life; but he feared a combination of circumstances might have rendered her guilty in the eyes of others. What he most dreaded, was her being an object of English disapprobation. He felt sufficiently fortified against that of every other country; but the memory of his father was so intimately connected with the love of his native country, that these two sentiments strengthened each other.
Oswald, having learnt of Mr Edgermond that he had been in Northumberland for the first time the preceding year, promised to introduce him to Corinne that evening. Oswald arrived at her house before him, and made her acquainted with the ideas that Mr Edgermond had conceived respecting her, suggesting the propriety of convincing him how much he was in error, by assuming the most cold and reserved manners.
"If you permit me," replied Corinne, "I will be the same to him as to everybody else; if he desire to hear me, I will improvise before him; in fact, I will appear to him as I am, not doubting that he will perceive as much dignity of soul in this simple and natural behaviour, as if I were to put on an air of restraint which would only be affected." "Yes, Corinne," replied Oswald, "you are right. Ah! how much in the wrong is he, who would in the least alter your admirable disposition."
At this moment Mr Edgermond arrived with the rest of the company. At the commencement of the evening, Lord Nelville placed himself by the side of Corinne, and with an interest which at once became the lover and the protector, he said every thing that could enhance her worth. The respect he testified for her seemed to have for its object rather to win the attention of others, than to satisfy himself; but it was with the most lively joy that he soon felt the folly of all his anxiety. Corinne entirely captivated Mr Edgermond—she not only captivated him by her genius and her charms, but by inspiring him with that sentiment of esteem which true characters always obtain of honest ones; and when he presumed to express a wish to hear her upon a subject of his choice, he aspired to this favour with as much respect as eagerness. She consented without for a moment waiting to be pressed, and thus manifested that this favour had a value independent of the difficulty of obtaining it. But she felt so lively a desire to please a countryman of Oswald's, a man who by the consideration which he merited might influence his opinion in speaking of her, that this sentiment suddenly filled her with a timidity which was quite new to her: she wished to begin, but her tongue was suspended by the emotion she felt. Oswald was pained that she did not dazzle his English friend with all her superiority; his eyes were cast down, and his embarrassment was so visible, that Corinne, solely engrossed by the effect that she produced upon him, lost more and more the presence of mind necessary for improvisation. At length, sensible of her hesitation, feeling that her words were the offspring of memory and not of sentiment, and that thus she was neither able to paint what she thought nor what she really felt, she suddenly stopped and said to Mr Edgermond, "Pardon me Sir, if upon this occasion timidity has deprived me of my usual facility; it is the first time, as my friends can testify, that I have been below myself; but perhaps," added she, sighing, "it will not be the last."
Oswald was deeply affected by the touching failure of Corinne. Till then he had always been accustomed to see imagination and genius triumph over her affections and reanimate her soul at the moment when she was most cast down; but at this time her mind was entirely fettered by feeling, yet Oswald had so identified himself with her fame on this occasion, that he partook of the mortification of her failure, instead of rejoicing at it. But as it appeared certain, that she would one day shine with her natural lustre, he yielded to the tender reflections that arose in his mind, and the image of his mistress was enthroned more than ever in his heart.
Book vii.
ITALIAN LITERATURE.
Chapter i.
Lord Nelville felt a lively desire that Mr Edgermond should enjoy the conversation of Corinne, which was more than equivalent to her improvised verses. The following day the same company assembled at her house; and to elicit her sentiments, he turned the conversation upon Italian literature, and provoked her natural vivacity, by affirming that the English poets were much superior in energy and sensibility to those of which Italy could boast.
"In the first place," said Corinne, "strangers are for the most part acquainted only with our poets of the first rank—Dante, Petrarch, Ariosto, Guarini, Tasso, and Metastasio; whilst we have several others, such as Chiabrera, Guidi, Filicaja, Parini, without reckoning Sannazarius, Politian, &c., who have written in Latin, with as much taste as genius; and all unite in their verses the utmost beauty of colouring and harmony; all, with more or less talent, adorn the wonders of nature and art with the imagery of speech. Without doubt our poets cannot pretend to that profound melancholy, that knowledge of the human heart which characterise yours; but does not this kind of superiority belong more properly to philosophical writers than to poets? The brilliant melody of Italian is more suitable to the splendour of external objects than to meditation; our language is better adapted to paint fury than sadness, because sentiments which arise from deep reflection demand more metaphysical expressions, whilst the desire of vengeance animates the imagination to the exclusion of grief. Cesarotti has produced the best and most elegant translation of Ossian extant; but it seems in reading it that the words possess in themselves an air of festivity that forms a contrast with the sombre ideas of the poem. We cannot help being charmed with our sweet expressions,—the limpid stream, the smiling plain, the cooling shade, the same as with the murmur of the waves, and variety of colours. What more do you expect from poetry? Why would you ask of the nightingale, the meaning of her song? She can only answer you by resuming the strain, and you cannot comprehend it without yielding to the impression which it produces. The measure of verse, harmonious rhymes, and those rapid terminations composed of two short syllables whose sounds glide in the manner that their name (Sdruccioli) indicates, sometimes imitate the light steps of a dance; at others, more sombre tones recall the fury of the tempest and the clangour of arms. In fact, our poetry is a wonder of the imagination—we must only seek it in the various pleasures which it affords."
"It must be allowed," replied Lord Nelville, "that you explain very clearly the beauties and defects of your poetry; but how will you defend your prose, in which those defects are to be found unaccompanied by the beauties? That which is only loose and indefinite in poetry will become emptiness in prose; and the crowd of common ideas which your poets embellish with their melody and their images, are in prose, cold and dry, while their vivacity of style renders them more fatiguing. The language of the greater part of the prose-writers of the present day is so declamatory, so diffuse, and so abundant in superlatives, that their work seems written to order, in hackneyed phraseology, and for conventional natures; it does not once enter into their heads that to write well is to express one's thoughts and character. Their style is an artificial web, a kind of literary mosaic, every thing in fact that is foreign to their soul, and is made with the pen as any other mechanical work is with the fingers. They possess in the highest degree the secret of developing, commenting, inflating an idea, and, if I may use the expression, of working a sentiment into a ferment. So much do they excel in this, that one would be tempted to ask these writers, what the African woman asked a French lady, who wore a large pannier under a long dress:—'Madam, is all that a part of yourself?' In short, what real existence is there in all this pomp of words which one true expression would dissipate like a vain prestige."
"You forget," interrupted Corinne sharply; "first, Macchiavelli and Boccacio; next Gravina, Filangieri, and in our days, Cesarotti, Verri, Bettinelli, and so many others, in short, who know how to write and to think[22]. But I agree with you that in the latter ages, unfortunate circumstances having deprived Italy of its independence, its people have lost all interest in truth and often even the possibility of speaking it: from this has resulted the habit of sporting with words without daring to approach a single idea. As they were certain of not being able to obtain any influence over things by their writings, they were only employed to display their wit, which is a sure way to end in having no wit at all; for it is only in directing the mind towards some noble object that ideas are acquired. When prose writers can no longer in any way influence the happiness of a nation—when they only write to dazzle—when, in fact, the road itself is the object of their journey, they indulge in a thousand windings without advancing a step. The Italians, it is true, fear new thoughts; but that is an effect of indolence, and not of literary baseness. In their character, their gaiety, and their imagination, there is much originality; and nevertheless, as they take no pains to reflect, their general ideas do not soar above mediocrity; their eloquence even, so animated when they speak, has no character when they write; one would say that labour of any kind freezes their faculties; it may also be added, that the nations of the South are fettered by prose, and that poetry alone can express their real sentiments. It is not thus in French literature," said Corinne, addressing herself to the Count d'Erfeuil—"your prose writers are often more eloquent, and even more poetic, than your poets."—"It is true," answered the Count, "your assertion can be verified by truly classical authorities:—Bossuet, La Bruyère, Montesquieu, and Buffon, cannot be excelled; more particularly the first two, who are of the age of Louis the Fourteenth, in whose praise too much cannot be said, for they are perfect models for imitation. They are models that foreigners ought to be as eager to imitate as the French themselves."—"I can hardly think it desirable," answered Corinne, "for the whole world entirely to lose their national colouring, as well as all originality of sentiment and genius; and I am bold enough to tell you Count, that even in your country, this literary orthodoxy, if I may so express myself, which is opposed to every innovation, will in time render your literature extremely barren. Genius is essentially creative; it bears the character of the individual that possesses it. Nature, who has not formed two leaves alike, has infused a still greater variety into the human soul; imitation is therefore a species of death, since it robs each one of his natural existence."
"You would not wish, fair stranger," replied the Count, "that we should admit Teutonic barbarism amongst us—that we should copy Young's Night Thoughts, and the Concetti of the Italians and Spaniards. What would become of the taste and elegance of our French style after such a mixture?" Prince Castel-Forte, who had not yet spoken, said—"It seems to me that we all stand in need of each other: the literature of every country discovers to him who is acquainted with it a new sphere of ideas. It was Charles the Fifth himself who said—that a man who knows four languages, is worth four men. If that great political genius judged thus, in regard to the conduct of affairs, how much more true is it with respect to literature? Foreigners all study French; thus they command a more extended horizon than you, who do not study foreign languages. Why do you not more often take the trouble of learning them?—You would thus preserve your own peculiar excellence, and sometimes discover your deficiencies."