LOPEZ DE CASTANHEDA—DAMIAÕ DE GÓES—AFFONSO D’ALBOQUERQUE.
In order to form a correct estimate of the rhetorical merit of Barros, with reference to the age in which he lived, it is necessary to compare his historical works with others which were written in Portugal at the same period and on the same subjects. In this comparison Barros will be found to shine forth as a light of superior lustre. With equal patriotism and industry, and with a greater sacrifice of his own interest, Fernaõ Lopez de Castanheda composed his history of the discovery and conquest of India by the Portuguese: a narrative of events, which, though compendious in form, exhibits the most laborious accuracy in the investigation of facts.[248] But whatever may be the historical merit of this work, it is, as to rhetorical character, merely a common chronicle. The diffuse chronicle of King Emanuel, which was about this period edited by Damiaõ de Góes, is also interesting only to the historian.
The life of the great Affonso d’Alboquerque, composed by his son, Affonso d’Alboquerque, the younger, is a biographical chronicle, which may be placed on a parallel with the works entitled, Histories, which have just been noticed.[249] No historical work enjoys greater esteem in Portuguese literature: and that a father so celebrated, should have found so worthy a narrator of his atchievements in his son, certainly was not a thing easily to be anticipated. But in the scale of rhetorical merit, these Commentaries, as the work is usually denominated, weigh but lightly. The language may be said to be pure, but the style is monotonous; and upon the whole it is merely a repetition of the old chronicle style.[250]
BERNARDO DE BRITO.
Bernardo de Brito, a Portuguese historian, who lived in the latter end of the sixteenth and beginning of the seventeenth centuries, possessed a far higher degree of historical cultivation. He was educated at Rome, and was master of several modern languages. He devoted himself to the ecclesiastical profession, but in the cloister he followed his predilection for Portuguese history; and as authorized Cronista of his convent, he undertook the arduous task of writing a complete history of the Portuguese monarchy. He died in the year 1617, in the forty-seventh year of his age, without having attained the object to which he honourably aspired. But, notwithstanding his early death, he might have succeeded in completing the history of his native country, had not the plan on which he proceeded placed that object beyond his reach. The idea of a history of the Portuguese monarchy, would have been properly fulfilled by commencing with the foundation of that monarchy, and in an introduction only, referring back somewhat beyond the eleventh century. But Bernardo de Brito contemplated the execution of a work of much greater magnitude. His Monarchia Lusitana was intended to be a complete history of the country, now called Portugal, from the most remote antiquity down to the latest period.[251] The ancient history of Portugal was with him a favourite part of his subject. It is probable that he wished his history to rank as a companion to the Spanish work of Florian de Ocampo, who in the reign of Charles V. commenced on a similar plan, a history of the Spanish monarchy from the time of the flood.[252] Brito, however, did not think that period sufficiently remote, but chose to start from the creation of the world. Whatever particulars are furnished by ancient authors, concerning Lusitania and the Lusitanians of the earliest ages, he has collected, examined, and arranged in historical connection. But a thick folio volume, which includes the four first books, brings the history no further than the birth of Christ; and towards the end of the second volume, where the history of modern Portugal commences, the work breaks off. Had it been completed, still it would not have been an easy matter to have brought the numerous notices respecting Portuguese antiquities, which Brito has introduced, under a point of view whereby they might have formed an appropriate union with the heterogeneous events of modern history. But the work is eminently distinguished for style and descriptive talent. The ingenious author seems like many other eminent persons of his age to have derived particular advantage from his residence in Italy. Without deteriorating by laborious polish, the vigorous style which is indispensable to historical composition, he gives even dry narratives of facts in a manner totally different from the compilers of the old chronicles; and where the internal interest of the subject animates the description, Brito’s historical pictures possess an impressive effect, which marks the pupil of the ancient classic writers.[253]
Brito’s preface, in which he gives an account of the spirit and plan of his history of the Portuguese monarchy, merits attention. He observes that even his own countrymen advised him to write his work, if not in Latin or Italian, at least in Spanish, in order to afford it an opportunity of being read beyond the confines of Portugal, and also for the sake of avoiding the vulgarity into which his native tongue might betray him.[254] Thus, even in Portugal, during the sixteenth century, notwithstanding the progress made by Portuguese literature, the detractors of the Portuguese language must have been exceedingly numerous, since their conduct is so frequently a subject of complaint with patriotic writers. Brito was one of the patriots who most loudly expressed his indignation against that anti-national party. The Portuguese language, he says, has fallen into disrepute only because Portugal cherishes “ungrateful sons, like poisonous vipers.”[255] He expresses his regret, that though possessing a little better knowledge of his native language, he could not write in the most brilliant style, which is only to be done when the author bestows greater attention on elegance of expression than on the veracity of facts, which is unworthy of a true historian.[256]
A smaller historical work by Bernardo de Brito, from its title of Elogios dos reys de Portugal, (Eulogies on the Kings of Portugal) seems to promise to the historian of eloquence a kind of rhetorical memoires, from which not a little might be expected. But these eulogies are brief and dull notices, and scarcely afford groundwork for biographical sketches. They are merely intended to illustrate the copper-plate portraits of the kings of Portugal, which are included in the work.[257]
The travels of Fernaõ Mendez Pinto,[258] may also be numbered among the works written in cultivated Portuguese prose, which appeared during the sixteenth century. It seems to have been the first book of travels, the author of which bestowed labour on narrative and descriptive style.
The cultivation of the other departments of prosaic composition appears to have been at this period very much neglected in Portugal. Some moral treatises, written by the historian Barros, in the dialogue form, perhaps merit to be again brought into notice.[259] A Panegyrico by the same author on an Infanta Maria, has also the reputation of being eloquently written.
An art of poetry and rhetoric composed on practical principles, and calculated to convey useful instruction, was not to be expected while writers had still sufficient difficulty in the preliminary study of the grammatical rules and purity of diction. To facilitate the acquisition of both, Nunez de Liaõ wrote his book on the origin of the Portuguese language, and his introduction to Portuguese orthography.[260]