Mother.But I more fear
Thou wilt forget thy God, me and thyself,
When thou art gone: thy tender years are such,
That thou wilt lose thy faith amidst this race
Of infidels—teachers of lies.
Crier.Silence!
And fear, old wicked woman, that thy head
Pay for thy tongue!"
At the end of the play, Juan is seduced by fine clothes and sweetmeats to become a Mahometan. When we think of the Spanish horror of renegades, and its fierce punishment, we may imagine the effect that such scenes, brought vividly before them, must have had. The play ends with the arrival of a vessel, with a friar on board, charged with money to redeem the captives, and the universal joy the Christians feel; Cervantes had felt such himself, and well could paint it. The whole play, though without plot, and rendered wild and strange by the introduction of allegorical personages, yet is full of the interest of pathetic situations and natural feelings, simply, but vividly represented; such doubtless, roused every sentiment of horror and compassion, and even vengeance in a Spanish audience. In some respects we feel otherwise; and when one of the captives relates the cruel death of a priest burnt by slow fire, by the Moors, in retaliation of a Moor burnt by the inquisition, our indignation is rather levelled against that nefarious institution, which, unprovoked, punished those who adhered to the faith of their fathers, and filled the whole world with abhorrence for its name. Such, Cervantes could not feel; and in reading his works, and those of all his countrymen, nothing jars with our feelings so much as the praise ever given to the most savage cruelties of the Dominicans, and the merciless reprobation expressed towards those who dared revenge their wrongs.
From the publication of these works to "Don Quixote," what a gap! He would seem to have lived as an unlighted candle—suddenly, a spark touches the wick, and it burst into a flame. "Don Quixote" is perfect in all its parts. The first conception is admirable. The idea of the crazed old gentleman who nourished himself in the perusal of romances till he wanted to be the hero of one, is true to the very bare truth of nature, and how has he followed it out? Don Quixote is as courageous, noble, princely, and virtuous as the greatest of the men whom he imitates: had he attempted the career of knight errantry, and afterwards shrunk from the consequent hardships, he had been a crazy man, and no more; but meeting all and bearing all with courage and equanimity, he really becomes the hero he desired to be. Any one suffering from calamities would gladly have recourse to him for help, assured of his resolution and disinterestedness, and thus Cervantes shows the excellence and perfection of his genius. The second part is conceived in a different spirit from the first; and to relish it as it deserves, we must enter into the circumstances connected with it. Cervantes was desirous of not repeating himself. There is less extravagance, less of actual insanity on the part of the hero. He no longer mistakes an inn for a castle, nor a flock of sheep for an army. He sees things as they are, although he is equally expert in giving them a colouring suited to his madness. This, however, renders the second part less entertaining to the general reader, less original, less brilliant; but it is more philosophic, more full of the author himself: it shows the deep sagacity of Cervantes, and his perfect knowledge of the human heart. Its drawback, for the second part is not as perfect as the first, consists in the unworthy tricks of the duchess—very different from the benevolent disguise of the princess Micomicona, the deceptions of this great lady are at once vulgar and cruel.
The greatest men have looked on "Don Quixote" as the best book that ever was written. Godwin said, "At twenty, I thought 'Don Quixote' laughable—at forty, I thought it clever—now, near sixty, I look upon it as the most admirable book in the whole world." In Coleridge's "Literary Remains," there are some admirable remarks on "Don Quixote;" they are too long to be inserted here, but I cannot refrain from quoting the contrast he draws between the Don and Sancho Panza. He says, "Don Quixote grows at length to be a man out of his wits; his understanding is deranged; and hence, without the least deviation from the truth of nature, without losing the least trait of personal individuality, he becomes a substantial living allegory, or personification of the reason and moral sense divested of the judgment and understanding. Sancho is the converse. He is the common sense without reason or imagination; and Cervantes not only shows the excellence and power of reason in Don Quixote, but in both him and Sancho the mischiefs resulting from a severance of the two main constituents of sound intellectual and moral action. Put him and his master together, and they form a perfect intellect; but they are separated and without cement: and hence, each having need of the other for its whole completeness, each has at times a mastery over the other; for the common sense, though it may see the practical inapplicability of the dictates of the imagination of abstract reason, yet cannot help submitting to them. These two characters possess the world—alternately and interchangeably the cheater and the cheated. To impersonate them, and to combine the permanent with the individual, is one of the highest creations of genius, and has been achieved by Cervantes and Shakspeare almost alone."
Of the "Novellas," or tales of Cervantes, I had intended to give a detail, but have no space; they are among the best of his works. They cannot compete with the best of Boccaccio: they have not his energy of passion—his soul-melting tenderness—his tragic power and matchless grace; but the tales of Cervantes are full of interest and amusement: they possess the merit also of being perfectly moral; he calls them himself Novellas Exemplares, and there is not a word that need be slurred over or omitted. It is strange also that as afterwards the intrigue of his comedies was so bad, that of some of his stories is so good, that Beaumont and Fletcher—than whom no dramatists better understood the art of fabricating plays—have adopted two, ("La Señora Cornelia" and "Las Dos Doncellas"), and so adopted them as to follow them line for line, and scene by scene. There is a very beautiful interview in "Las Dos Doncellas," between a cavalier and a lady at night, by the sea-shore; Beaumont and Fletcher have but translated and versified this, and it stands among the most effective of their scenes.[72]
The "Voyage to Parnassus" has the inherent Spanish defect of length, otherwise it has great merit: the ridicule is playful—the machinery poetic—the story well adapted for burlesque. There had been a poem, written on the subject of a voyage to Parnassus, by Cezare Caporali—an Italian of Perugia. Cervantes begins his poem by mentioning the return of the Italian, and how he, who ever desired to deserve the name of poet, resolved to follow his example. In playful derision of his poverty, he describes his departure: a piece of bread and a cheese in his wallet, were all his provision—"light to carry, and useful for the voyage and then he bids adieu to his lowly roof—"Adieu to Madrid—adieu to its fountains, which distil ambrosia and nectar—to its prado—to its society—to the abodes of pleasure and deceit." He arrives at Carthagena, and sees Mercury, who invites him to embark on board a boat, and to come to assist in the defence of Parnassus, which had been attacked by a host of poetasters. The skiff is fancifully described:—
And lo! of verses framed, the bark,[73]
From the maintop to water mark,
Without a word of prose betwixt;
The upper decks were glosses mix'd—
A hodge-podge badly put together,
Ill-married all with one another:—
And of romances form'd, the crew,
A daring people glad to do
The wildest acts, however fierce.
The poop was made of other verse:
'Twas form'd of sonnets, each one rare,
Written all with the nicest care.
Two tercets, bold as muse could write,
The gunnels framed from left to right,
And gave free scope unto the oar.
The gangway's length was measured o'er
By elegies most sad and long,
More apt for tears than gladsome song.
The mast that rose unto the sky
An ode embodied, long and dry,
Tarr'd o'er with songs of dreary length,
So to ensure its weight and strength.
And all the yards that ran across
Were burthens harsh—you're at no loss
Their hard material to find:
The parrel creaking to the wind,
Of redondillas gay and free;
So that more easy it might be.
The ropes and tackle—rigging all—
Of seguidillas light and small,
Each twined with fancies gay and fickle,
The which the soul are apt to tickle;
The thwarts, of stanzas staunch and strong,
Planks to support a world of song;
While the pennants, flying lightly,
Love songs framed so gay and sprightly.
Sestinas grave, and blank verse ready,
Shaped the keel both sharp and steady;
That like a duck the bark might swim,
And o'er the waters lightly skim.
Embarked on board this fanciful galley. Mercury shows him a long catalogue of poets, asking his advice as to their admission. Cervantes takes this occasion to characterise several of his contemporary poets, in a manner that in his day might have been keenly satirical or warmly laudatory: there is no doubt that there is a good deal of irony in his praise, but a portion also is sincere. The whole is obscure and uninteresting to us. In the midst of the examination, a crowd of poets rush into the skiff, in numbers that threaten its safety; and the syrens are obliged to raise a storm to scatter them. After this, he beholds a cloud obscure the day, and from this cloud falls down a shower of poets, and, among them, Lope de Vega, "a renowned poet, whom none excels, or even equals, in prose or verse." The voyage now proceeds prosperously; the vessel glides along impelled by oars formed of verses druccioli, (such as have a dactyl at the end of each line), and the sails, which are stretched to the height of the mast, were
Woven of many a gentle thought,
Upon a woof that love had wrought,
Fill'd by the soft and amorous wind
Which breathed upon us from behind—
Eager to waft us swift along;
While the fair queens of ocean-song—
The syrens three, around us float,
And so impel the dancing boat;
And crested waves are spread around,
Snowy flocks on a verdant ground;
And the crew are at work reciting,
Or sweet love-laden sonnets writing,
Or singing soft the sweetest lays
All in their gentle ladies' praise.