The reader who peruses the poems of Luis de Leon, which are all odes, in the spirit in which the author wrote them, will fancy himself transported to a better world. No furious zeal disturbs the gentle piety that pervades them; no extravagant metaphor destroys the harmony of the ideas and expression; and no discordant accent breaks the pleasing melody of the rhythm. The idea of the perishableness of all earthly things,[230] is united with smiling pictures of nature.[231] The imitations of Horace are only introduced to aid the poetic light in which the poet views those objects which were peculiarly interesting to his contemporaries.[232] One of Luis de Leon’s most celebrated odes is the Noche Serena, but the concluding stanzas do not correspond with the beauty of the commencement.[233] In the ode to Felipe Ruiz, the ardent aspiration for heavenly truth is very picturesquely expressed.[234] But the exalted inspiration and tender enthusiasm in which Luis de Leon so widely departs from Horace, are most prominently evinced in his ode on Heavenly Life (De la Vida del Cielo). Here his fancy is bold without launching into extravagant metaphors. What an etherial effulgence glows through his lyric picture of “the soft bright region, the meadow of holiness, never blighted by frost, nor withered by the sun’s rays;—where the good shepherd, his head crowned with blossoms of purple and white, without either sling or staff, leads his beloved flock to the sweet pasture covered with everblooming roses;—where the shepherd, reclining in the shade at noon, blows his heavenly pipe, whose feeblest tone, should it descend on the ear of the poet, would transform his whole soul to love.”[235] The ode in which the genius of the Tagus prophecies to King Roderick the misfortunes of Spain, is more in Horace’s style, and possesses a very happy uniformity of character. In some other imitations of a similar kind, the fancy of the pious poet willingly descends from the heavenly regions. The poems contained in the first part of the collection are few in number. Those which Luis de Leon himself inserted, amount only to twenty-seven, and among them is an indifferent elegy, and a cancion in the Italian style of not much greater merit. Several other compositions, which he seems to have rejected, have been recently printed from manuscripts.[236]
The greater portion of the poetic works of Luis de Leon consists of translations; but these translations form an epoch in the department of literature to which they belong. Those in the second book of the collection are the first classical specimens, in modern literature, of the art of renewing the ancient poetry in modern forms. Luis de Leon has himself explained the principles by which he was guided in bringing the ancient poetry within the sphere of the romantic. He endeavoured to make the ancient poets speak, “as they would have expressed themselves, had they been born in his own age in Castile, and had they written in Castilian.”[237] However bold this attempt may appear, and whatever defects a translation of this kind may present to the eye of the connoisseur who wishes for a faithful resemblance of the original, and not a flowery imitation, yet if the validity of the principle be once admitted, Luis de Leon will be found to have fulfilled all that the most rigid critic can desire. Besides, it must be considered that translations of a more literal character would scarcely have found readers in Spain at that period. Luis de Leon translated Virgil’s eclogues, partly in tercets, and partly in coplas;[238] a considerable series of Horace’s odes in the same romantic syllabic measure which he chose for his own odes;[239]—and a portion of Virgil’s georgics in stanzas. But the easy flowing style of his Spanish version of Pindar’s first ode, excels all the rest.[240] To these translations are also added two imitations of Italian sonnets, which prove that he succeeded very well in that species of composition, though among his own original poems there is not a single sonnet. He translated the psalms of David, according to the rule he had prescribed to himself. His translations speedily obtained the rank in Spanish literature to which they were entitled; and they have served as models for all succeeding versions of Greek and Latin poetry in the Spanish language. Luis de Leon may indeed be blamed for having thwarted, by the style of translation which he introduced, all the attempts made to form Spanish poetry on the model of that of the ancients. But on the other hand, to his example the Spaniards are indebted for numerous translations of Greek and Latin poetry, which have all the air of Spanish originals.
If Luis de Leon had not confined his prose writings exclusively to spiritual subjects, he would doubtless have also exercised a very decided influence on the rhetorical cultivation of Spain. His sermons (oraciones) are, however, invariably mentioned in terms of praise by Spanish writers, whenever they allude to the theological literature of their country.[241] Among his other works intended for edification, The Woman as she should be, or The Perfect Wife, (La Perfecta Casada), will perhaps be found the most interesting to the untheological class of readers; though it constantly turns on the positive morality of Catholicism, and therefore, like every mixed treatise of theology and morals, is no legitimate specimen of the developement of ideas in the didactic style.[242]
Luis de Leon terminates the series of distinguished Spanish authors, who during the first half of the sixteenth century, composed after the model of the great poets of Italy, or the ancient classics, and who, by the superiority of their genius, mainly contributed to give a new character to Spanish poetry. There are, however others, whose poetic works ought not to be passed over in silence; but to follow the example of those writers, who have hitherto related the history of Spanish poetry, without separating subordinate from eminent talent, would be to prolong an act of injustice. At the same time to the continuation which must be made of the history of the lyric and pastoral poetry of Spain, during the first half of the sixteenth century, may be very properly added some account of a few unsuccessful efforts in epic composition, and a notice of the further progress of the old national poetry during the same period.
MINOR SPANISH POETS DURING THE PERIOD OF THIS SECTION, VIZ. ACUÑA—CETINA—PADILLA—GIL POLO.
Fernando de Acuña, one of the first of the distinguished men who became the disciples of Boscan and Garcilaso, was of Portuguese extraction, but born in Madrid, probably about the beginning of the sixteenth century.[243] He signalized himself in the campaigns of Charles V. and was also a person of consideration at the court of that monarch. He lived on terms of intimate friendship with Garcilaso de la Vega, whom he survived for a considerable period, for it appears that his death did not take place until the year 1580. He proved his taste for classical literature by translations and imitations. He paraphrased in iambic blank verse, several passages from Ovid’s Metamorphoses, and among the rest, the dispute between Ajax and Ulysses for the arms of Achilles, in very correct and harmonious language. He likewise translated some of the Heroides of the same author in tercets. In his own sonnets, cancions, and elegies, which are replete with sentiment and grace, it is easy to recognise a poet who successfully laboured to attain classical elegance of style.[244] He was also one of the first poets, who, by composing in short strophes, endeavoured to form an intermediate style between the Italian canzone and the Spanish cancion.[245]
Gutierre de Cetina is less known, though there is no doubt of his having lived about the same period, as he is mentioned by Herrera in his Commentary on the Works of Garcilaso. He was, like Herrera, a native of Seville; and having removed to Madrid, was there invested with an ecclesiastical dignity. Few of his poems have been printed;[246] but from those few it is obvious that he had a fair chance of becoming the Anacreon of Spain. That glory, however, was reserved for Villegas. Still Gutierre de Cetina’s imitations of the anacreontic style are not without their share of sweetness and grace; and they are moreover remarkable as being the first productions in the class to which they belong.[247] His madrigals also seem to have had no prototype in Spanish literature.[248] In his canciones, however, the romantic enthusiasm occasionally degenerates into absurdity.[249]
Pedro do Padilla, a knight of the spiritual order of St. Jago, must be ranked in the same class with Gutierre. He vied with Garcilaso in pastoral poetry; and in order to conciliate the partizans of both the old and the new styles, he introduced alternately in the same eclogue the Italian and the ancient Spanish metres.[250] His poetry is still esteemed in Spain. He followed the old national custom by making the events connected with the war in the Netherlands serve as subjects for romances.[251]
But a poet still more celebrated, and in a great degree indebted for his fame to the immoderate encomium bestowed upon him by the pen of Cervantes, is Gaspar Gil Polo, a native of Valencia, who continued and concluded Montemayor’s Diana under the title of La Diana enamorada.[252] A continuation of this pastoral romance had previously been undertaken by a writer named Perez; but without success. Gil Polo in one respect effected more than did Montemayor himself; but in point of invention he is inferior, notwithstanding the faults of the original plan. After Sireno has been cured of his love by the sage Felicia, Gil Polo makes the passion of Diana revive, and renders her more unhappy for Sireno’s sake, than he had previously been for hers. Thus the romantic story is reversed; but the new relations under which it now appears are few. In the sequel the aid of the sage Felicia is again obtained, and she finally unites the long separated lovers. The narrative style in the prose portion of the romance presents a very correct imitation of Montemayor; but neither the merit of this imitation, nor the continuation of the metaphysical reflections on love, with which the romance is interspersed, would have gained for Gil Polo the approbation of the critic. What must have raised him higher than Montemayor in the estimation of such a judge as Cervantes, is the precision and clearness of the ideas, and the perfect polish of style in the poetic part of the romance. Montemayor has often indulged in too subtle or sophistical plays of wit. Gil Polo in painting the feelings has exercised a sounder judgment, without, however, descending to the coldness of prose. His sonnets may be regarded as models; for he has succeeded in combining the unity of ideas, which ought to distinguish that species of composition, with the most elegant rounding and regularity of structure.[253] In his canciones he has occasionally, for the sake of variety, imitated the Provençal rhymes (rimas Provenzales) with such happy dexterity, that the reader might fancy himself perusing some of the best opera songs, though no such thing as an opera then existed.[254] In like manner, he endeavoured to naturalize the metrical structure of French verse (rimas Franceses) in the Spanish language, upon which the burthen of alexandrines had already been inflicted.[255] In compliment to the old Spanish taste, he bedecked his romance with a profusion of versified riddles (preguntas,) which are, for the most part, so exceedingly dull, that it is difficult to conceive how they could be endured by a man of Gil Polo’s talent.[256] In honour of Valencia, his native city, he composed a poem, in which the genius of the little river Turia is made to sing the praises of the celebrated men to whom Valencia had given birth. This song of Turia (Canto de Turia) has found patriotic commentators, without whose laborious explanations it would have been unintelligible to foreign readers.[257]