Bellarmino's censure of the Pastor Fido strikes a modern reader as inexplicably severe. Yet it is certain that the dissolute seventeenth century recognized this drama as one of the most potent agents of corruption. Not infrequent references in the literature of that age to the ruin of families and reputations by its means, warn us to remember how difficult it is to estimate the ethical sensibilities of society in periods remote from our own.[183] In the course of the analysis which I now propose to make of this play, I shall attempt to show how, coming midway between Tasso's Aminta and Marino's Adone, and appealing to the dominant musical enthusiasms of the epoch, Guarini's Pastor Fido may have merited the condemnation of far-sighted moralists. Not censurable in itself, it was so related to the sentimental sensuality of its period as to form a link in the chain of enervation which weighed on Italy.
The Pastor Fido is a tragi-comedy, as its author points out with some elaboration in the critical essay he composed upon that species of the drama. The scene is laid in Arcadia, where according to Guarini it was customary to sacrifice a maiden each year to Diana, in expiation of an ancient curse brought upon the country by a woman's infidelity. An oracle has declared that when two scions of divine lineage are united in marriage, and a faithful shepherd atones for woman's faithlessness, this inhuman rite shall cease. The only youth and girl who fulfill these conditions of divine descent are the daughter of Titiro named Amarilli, and Silvio, the son of the high priest Montano. They have accordingly been betrothed. But Silvio is indifferent to womankind in general, and Amarilli loves a handsome stranger, Mirtillo, supposed to be the son of Carino. The plot turns upon the unexpected fulfillment of the prophecy, in spite of the human means which have been blindly taken to secure its accomplishment. Amarilli is condemned to death for suspected misconduct with a lover; and Mirtillo, who has substituted himself as victim in her place, is found to be the lost son of Montano. This solution of the intrigue, effected by an anagnorisis like that of the Oedipus Tyrannus, supplies a series of dramatic scenes and thrilling situations in the last act. Meanwhile the passion of Dorinda for Silvio, and the accident whereby he is brought to return her affection at the moment when his dart has wounded her, form a picturesque underplot of considerable interest. Both plot and underplot are so connected in the main action and so interwoven by links of mutual dependency that they form one richly varied fabric. Regarded as a piece of cunning mechanism, the complicated structure of the Pastor Fido leaves nothing to be desired. In its kind, this pastoral drama is a monumental work of art, glittering and faultless like a polished bas-relief of hard Corinthian bronze. Each motive has been carefully prepared, each situation amply and logically developed. The characters are firmly traced, and sustained with consistency. The cold and eager hunter Silvio contrasts with tender and romantic Mirtillo. Corisca's meretricious arts and systematized profligacy enhance the pure affection of Amarilli. Dorinda presents another type of love, so impulsive that it conquers maidenly modesty. The Satyr is a creature of rude lust, foiled in its brutal appetite by the courtesan Corisca's wiliness. Carino brings the corruption of towns into comparison with the innocence of the country.
In Carino the poet painted his own experience; and here his satire upon the Court of Ferrara is none the less biting because it takes the form of well-weighed and gravely-measured censure, instead of vehement invective. The following lines may serve as a specimen of Guarini's style in this species:—
I' mi pensai che ne' reali alberghi
Fossero tanto più le genti umane,
Quant'esse ban più di tutto quel dovizia,
Ond' è l'umanità sì nobil fregio.
Ma mi trovai tutto 'l contrario, Uranio.
Gente di nome e di parlar cortese,
Ma d'opre scarsa, e di pietà nemica:
Gente placida in vista e mansueta,
Ma più del cupo mar tumida e fera:
Gente sol d'apparenza, in cui se miri
Viso di carità, mente d'invidia
Poi trovi, e 'n dritto sguardo animo bieco,
E minor fede allor che pin lusinga.
Quel ch'altrove è virtù, quivi e difetto:
Dir vero, oprar non torto, amar non finto,
Pietà sincera, invïolabil fede,
E di core e di man vita innocente,
Stiman d'animo vil, di basso ingegno,
Sciochezza e vanità degna di riso.
L'ingannare, il mentir, la frode, il furto,
E la rapina di pietà vestita,
Crescer col danno e precipizio altrui,
E far a sè dell'altrui biasimo onore,
Son le virtù di quella gente infida.
Non merto, non valor, non riverenza
Nè d'età nè di grado nè di legge;
Non freno di vergogna, non rispetto
Nè d'amor nè di sangue, non memoria
Di ricevuto ben; nè, finalmente,
Cosa sì venerabile o sì santa
O sì giusta esser può, ch'a quella vasta
Cupidigia d'onori, a quella ingorda
Fama d'avere, invïolabil sia.
The Pastor Fido was written in open emulation of Tasso's Aminta, and many of its most brilliant passages are borrowed from that play. Such, for example, is the Chorus on the Golden Age which closes the fourth act. Such, too, is the long description by Mirtillo of the kiss he stole from Amarilli (act ii. sc. 1). The motive here is taken from Rinaldo (canto v.), and the spirit from Aminta (act i. sc. 2). Guarini's Satyr is a studied picture from the sketch in Tasso's pastoral. The dialogue between Silvio and Linco (act i. sc. 1) with its lyrical refrain:
Lascia, lascia le selve,
Folle garzon, lascia le fere, ed ama:
reproduces the dialogue between Silvia and Dafne (act i. sc. 1) with its similar refrain:
Cangia, cangia consiglio,
Pazzarella che sei.
In all these instances Guarini works up Tasso's motives into more elaborate forms. He expands the simple suggestions of his model; and employs the artifices of rhetoric where Tasso yielded to inspiration. One example will suffice to contrast the methods of the spontaneous and the reflective poet. Tasso with divine impulse had exclaimed:
Odi quell'usignuolo,
Che va di ramo in ramo
Cantando: Io amo, io amo!