He lived tranquilly and content with his moderate means. His niece was married at Venice; his nephew settled happily at Paris. The revolution did not, fortunately, disturb the repose of his last years. The National Convention confirmed his pension to him, and continued it to his widow after his death. Goldoni died in the year 1792, at the age of eighty-five. No man was ever more born for the career which he pursued. His heart was excellent, and his disposition gay. He never allowed himself to be cast down by adversity, and met the attacks of his enemies with good humour, or such replies as caused the laugh to be on his side. He is numbered by his countrymen as among the best of their authors,—an opinion confirmed by all those sufficiently cognisant with the Italian language and manners to enter into the spirit of his compositions.
[ALFIERI]
1749-1803.
The Italian poets of the early ages were eminently distinguished for their patriotism. The haughty spirit of Dante burst forth into indignant denunciations against the oppressors of his country; the gentler, but not less fervent, Petrarch was never weary of adjuring its rulers to bestow upon it the blessings of justice and peace; and the latter years of Boccaccio's life were ennobled by his public services, and his earnest endeavours to implant a love and reverence for literature in the minds of his countrymen. The pages of Roman history and the writings of Roman poets made them proud of the country which had given them birth, and which added to its moral grandeur, of having been once the sovereign and civiliser of the world,—the natural affection inspired by its being, from its fertility, the diversity of its woods, lakes, and mountains, and surrounding sea, the most beautiful country upon earth.
The national spirit died away in after times. The devastating wars carried on in the Peninsula by France and the emperor, the rise of minor principalities, and the struggles of rival states, so excited the passions and absorbed the interests of the Italians, that they became incapable of enlarged views for the good of their country. The depressing influence of courtly servitude checked the free spirit of the writers; Ariosto and Tasso were both conspicuous for personal independence of character; but they did not extend their love of liberty to any exertions for the redemption of Italy. A darker day was at hand. The Peninsula, divided and weakened, became a mere province. A Spanish viceroy reigned over Naples, and the northern portion was controlled by France and Austria. The Italians were taught to take pride in the virtues of slaves; in submission, patience, and repose. The prosperity of the country was gone, its trade destroyed, its armies annihilated. No scope was given to generous ambition; no career offered, by entering on which a man might exercise the peculiar privilege of the free—that of instructing their fellow countrymen: to be inoffensive to the ruling powers was the aim of all. The love of money—not the love of gain, for to gain was impossible, but mere parsimony, arising from the necessity of regarding the domestic expenditure as the only business of life—engrossed the fathers of families; the women were uneducated and degraded, and though they preserved, as is often the case in a depraved state of society, a nature more generous, artless, and kindly than the other sex, yet these virtuous feelings found no scope for their developement, except in the passion of love. While the law of primogeniture interested not only the large class of younger sons, but even the heads of families, who wished to prevent their children from marrying, to establish a system of society, which, beginning by subverting the best principles of morality, ended by destroying all social happiness. While the higher orders were thus occupied by money-saving and intrigue, the lower orders were tamed by hard labour, and rendered submissive by the priests. The writers were the servants of princes: they administered to the pleasures of their countrymen, without uttering one word that could call them from their state of debasement, or inspire a love of the active and disinterested virtues.
Full of talent as the Italians are, and formed by nature for the noblest scenes of action, doubtless "many a village Hampden" was born and died in obscurity and inaction; and yet this expression gives rise to a false notion. The peasants of Italy have no education, and, although infinitely superior in talent, perhaps, to any other peasantry in the world, are incapable of that generalisation of ideas which produces patriotism. But, among the better sort of gentry,—men of simple habits and strong good sense, among the men of science and the professors at the universities,—there were individuals who mourned over the ruin of Italy. These men did not so much dwell on the ancient greatness of Rome, as on the achievements of their countrymen during the middle ages. Literature had been revived by them; the arts had flourished among them: they were proud of the past, but they despaired of the present.
The voice of liberty was silent. The Italians hated and despised their masters, but never dreamed of rebelling against them. Tuscany was slothful under a mild sway, whose tyranny was never felt, except by the few who believed that they were not merely fruges consumere nati, and were bitten with a noble mania for benefiting their race. Piedmont was ruled by a prince, who, by cultivating in his subjects, not a martial, but a military spirit (a very different thing), gave his idle nobles something to do. Lombardy was crushed by foreign bayonets. The voice of liberty was silent, when the French revolution awoke the world, and the hope of freedom spoke audibly in the hearts of all; and, afterwards, when the victories of Napoleon crushed this hope, they could not impose a silence for ever broken. Its language is now felt and understood from one end of the country to the other, and the day must come when the oppressors will be unable to oppose the veto of mere physical force to the overpowering influence of moral courage.
It was while Italy yet reposed submissive and mute, that a poet was born, who dedicated all the powers of his mind to the awakening his countrymen from their lethargy—to strengthening their enervated minds, and spreading such knowledge and such sentiments abroad among them, as would at once reveal their degraded state, and give them energy to aspire to a better.
Vittorio Alfieri was born at Asti, in Piedmont, on the 17th of January, 1749. His parents were noble, wealthy, and respected. To these three circumstances Alfieri attributes many of the prosperous circumstances that attended his literary career. "Since I was born noble," he says, "I could attack the nobility without being accused of envy; since I was rich, I was independent and incorruptible; and the respectability of my parents prevented my ever being ashamed of my rank."
His father was named Antonio Alfieri, and his mother was Monica Maillard de Tournon, whose family, originally from Savoy, had long been established at Turin. His father was a man of blameless life: he had never entered on any public office, and was without a spark of that ambition which might have led him to seek distinction at court. He was fifty, five when he married, and his wife, though very young, was already a widow. Their eldest child was a daughter. Two years after, to the infinite joy of his father, Vittorio was born. He was put out to nurse, at a village called Rovigliasco, two miles from Asti; but such was the tenderness of his father, that he went on foot each day to see the child. This was a strong mark of affection, and testified also his simple and unostentatious disposition: for the Italian nobility usually love repose beyond all things, and their greatest pride is never to go on foot. This solicitude unfortunately cost him his life: he caught cold on occasion of one of his visits, and died after a few days' illness, leaving his wife about to give birth to another son, who, however, died in his infancy. She was an amiable and excellent woman, and still young when her second husband died; so that she was induced to marry a third time. Her husband was a cadet, of another branch of the Alfieri family; but, by the death of his elder brother, he in process of time inherited the wealth of his family, and became very rich. This marriage proved a very fortunate one. The cavaliere Giacinto was handsome and amiable; the couple grew old together in happiness; and the lady, as she advanced in years, gained the love and respect of all by her piety and works of charity and kindness.