Romaunt of the Rose

“ But they, beyond all question, contain also the first complete presentation of a scheme, a mode, an atmosphere, which for centuries enchained, because they expressed, the poetical thought of the time, and which, for those who can reach the right point of view, can develop the right organs of appreciation, possess an extraordinary, indeed a unique charm. I should rank this first part of the Roman de la Rose high among the books which if a man does not appreciate he cannot even distantly understand the Middle Ages ”

“ The modern Romans have not only lost many of the good qualities of their early ancestors, but they have also escaped much of the effeminate softness which characterized the Romans under some of the later emperors; and, as belonging to this state of luxury, the cultivation of the Rose has, in modern times, been much neglected. The homage of the Romans is now reserved for art, and the beautiful products of nature are, in their opinion, worthy only of secondary consideration. ”

“ For if it has the sweetness of the rose, it has its freshness too; if it has the languor of the nightingale’s song, it has also its giddy transport; if it has the softness of a southern spring, it is as glowing and as bright. There is nothing of a sickly and sentimental cast. Romeo and Juliet are in love, but they are not love-sick. Everything speaks the very soul of pleasure, the high and healthy pulse of the passions: the heart beats, the blood circulates and mantles throughout. ”

“ The probability, moreover, of there being a double allegory in the 'Romance of the Rose,' as planned originally by Guillaume de Lorris, appears to us to be strengthened by a further consideration of the Provençal literature and the line of its development.
Love, in a time when life had few pleasures and distractions to offer—when these were generally only to be snatched in the intervals of fighting—became not only the symbol of all life's joy, but grew into a kind of religion. It had its own ritual, its ceremonies, its sacraments, its lessons, and its hymns. ”

“ But when Romeo revealed his new passion for Juliet, and requested the assistance of the friar to marry them that day, the holy man lifted up his eyes and hands in a sort of wonder at the sudden change in Romeo's affections, for he had been privy to all Romeo's love for Rosaline, and his many complaints of her disdain: and he said, that young men's love lay not truly in their hearts, but in their eyes. ”

“ Slowly she replies:—“The terrible altar never lacks a victim!”
Suddenly rose loud cries of anger; and through the thick throng of worshippers there ran several armed Gauls, bearing in their midst a man dressed in Roman garments.
“A Roman found in the sacred temple.”
Who was this man—this Roman? She, Norma, trembled as she saw him; and she whispered the word “Pollione!”
There was a suppressed cry of joy amongst the Druids—their gods had sent this sacrifice—this Roman, their enemy, who had dared to enter the sacred forest.
“Take thou the sacred sword and slay him.” ”

“ We have indeed one beautiful picture of Honorius, when still but a youth he entered Rome again, and again heard the Roman shouts as he passed on to the Palatine, standing in his gilded chariot, the sun resting on his dark head and playing radiantly on the great necklaces of emeralds that rose and fell in response to the joyful beatings of a heart still very young, still responsive at times to noble impulses, the people cheering him madly, and the women weeping for joy at the sight of his beauty. ”

“ When darkness fell, Romeo made his way once more to the Capulet's garden, and, scaling the balcony, bade a long and passionate farewell to the weeping Juliet. With the first signs of dawn, he was compelled to depart, with a last fond embrace, and then, with a heavy heart, and reluctant steps, he made his way to Mantua, from whence his messengers and friends could keep him acquainted with all news concerning the fair young bride from whom he had been thus so cruelly parted. ”

“ And they fell to dancing, and Romeo was suddenly struck with the exceeding beauty of a lady who danced there, who seemed to him to teach the torches to burn bright, and her beauty to show by night like a rich jewel worn by a blackamoor: beauty too rich for use, too dear for earth! like a snowy dove trooping with crows (he said) , so richly did her beauty and perfections shine above the ladies her companions. While he uttered these praises, he was overheard by Tybalt, a nephew of lord Capulet, who knew him by his voice to be Romeo. ”

“ The cost of roses thus delivered in Rome must have been immense, but we do not find a single passage in any of the ancient authors which can give any light on this point; they only tell us that nothing for the gratification of luxury was considered too costly by the wealthy Roman citizens. Nor do they afford more positive information as to the species of Rose cultivated on the borders of the Nile, to gratify this taste of the Romans. ”

“ That night Romeo passed with his dear wife, gaining secret admission to her chamber, from the orchard in which he had heard her confession of love the night before. That had been a night of unmixed joy and rapture; but the pleasures of this night, and the delight which these lovers took in each other's society, were sadly allayed with the prospect of parting, and the fatal adventures of the past day. ”

“ Romayne and the one absorbing passion of her life had fallen that solemn shadow before which all earthly passions pale and fade away; that solemn shadow before whose creeping touch not strength of will, not love itself, can stand. As she fell to the ground before her son she had loosed her hold perforce on all the struggle and burning resolution which was life to her ”

“ Red Rose, proud Rose, sad Rose of all my days!
Come near me, while I sing the ancient ways:
Cuchulain battling with the bitter tide;
The Druid, grey, wood-nurtured, quiet-eyed,
Who cast round Fergus dreams, and ruin untold; ”

“ Thus knowing nothing of the old monk's plan, and believing his beloved one to be dead, Romeo was distracted with grief; but, determined to at least look once more upon the sweet face of Juliet, even though in death, he instantly mounted a horse, and galloped at a furious pace to Verona. ”

“ At this same ancient feast of Capulet’s
Sups the fair Rosaline whom thou so lov’st;
With all the admired beauties of Verona.
Go thither and with unattainted eye,
Compare her face with some that I shall show,
And I will make thee think thy swan a crow.
ROMEO.
When the devout religion of mine eye
Maintains such falsehood, then turn tears to fire;
And these who, often drown’d, could never die,
Transparent heretics, be burnt for liars.
One fairer than my love? The all-seeing sun
Ne’er saw her match since first the world begun. ”

“ MERCUTIO.
If love be blind, love cannot hit the mark.
Now will he sit under a medlar tree,
And wish his mistress were that kind of fruit
As maids call medlars when they laugh alone.
O Romeo, that she were, O that she were
An open-arse and thou a poperin pear!
Romeo, good night. I’ll to my truckle-bed.
This field-bed is too cold for me to sleep.
Come, shall we go?
BENVOLIO.
Go then; for ’tis in vain
To seek him here that means not to be found.
[Exeunt.]
SCENE II. Capulet’s Garden. Enter Romeo.
ROMEO.
He jests at scars that never felt a wound. ”

“ Romeo, then, is introduced to us with perfect truth of costume, as the thrall of a dreaming, fanciful passion for the scornful Rosaline, who had forsworn to love; and on her charms and coldness, and on the power of love generally, he descants to his companions in pretty phrases, quite in the style and taste of the day. [24]
Why then, O brawling love, O loving hate,
O any thing, of nothing first create!
O heavy lightness, serious vanity,
Mis-shapen chaos of well-seeming forms!
Love is a smoke raised with the fume of sighs;
Being purg'd, a fire sparkling in lover's eyes ”

“ "Why, what a wonderful piece of luck!" he cried; "here is a red rose! I have never seen any rose like it in all my life. It is so beautiful that I am sure it has a long Latin name;" ”

“ Last night we owned, with looks forlorn,
“Too well the scholar knows
There is no rose without a thorn”—
But peace is made! We sing, this morn,
“No thorn without a rose!”
Our Latin lesson is complete:
We’ve learned that Love is Bitter-Sweet! ”

“ In Syria and Persia it has been cultivated from a very early period, and the ancient name of the former, Suristan, is said to signify the land of roses. Damascus, Cashmere, Barbary, and Fayoum in Egypt, all cultivated the Rose extensively for its distilled oil or essence. Very little is extant respecting the culture of the Rose in the middle ages, but that it was cultivated and valued is known by its having been worn by knights at the tournament, as an emblem of their devotion to grace and beauty. ”

“ Ere I again behold my Romeo!
Rom. Farewell!
I will omit no opportunity
That may convey my greetings, love, to thee.
Jul. O, think'st thou we shall ever meet again?
Rom. I doubt it not; and all these woes shall serve
For sweet discourses in our time to come.
Jul. O God, I have an ill-divining soul!
Methinks I see thee, now thou art below,
As one dead in the bottom of a tomb.
Either my eyesight fails, or thou look'st pale.
Rom. And trust me, love, in my eye so do you.
Dry sorrow drinks our blood. Adieu, adieu!
Exit.
Jul. O Fortune, Fortune! all men call thee fickle. ”

“ When he played his fiddle to the Austrian princess, did she not give him a key to the garden where she walked of an evening? And this was a Romany lass, daughter of his Chieftain, as he was son of a great Romany chief; and what marvel could there be that she who had been made his child wife, should be conquered as others had been!
"'Mi Duvel', but I see!" he repeated in a husky fierceness. "I am your husband, but you would have killed me if I had taken a kiss from your lips, sealed to me by all our tribes and by your father and mine." ”

“ Romeo and Juliet are pictured lovely in death as in life; the sympathy they inspire does not oppress us with that suffocating sense of horror, which in the altered tragedy makes the fall of the curtain a relief; but all pain is lost in the tenderness and poetic beauty of the picture. Romeo's last speech over his bride is not like the raving of a disappointed boy: in its deep pathos, its rapturous despair, its glowing imagery, there is the very luxury of life and love. ”

“ Romeo took his leave of his dear wife with a heavy heart, promising to write to her from Mantua every hour in the day; and when he had descended from her chamber window, as he stood below her on the ground, in that sad foreboding state of mind in which she was, he appeared to her eyes as one dead in the bottom of a tomb. Romeo’s mind misgave him in like manner. But now he was forced hastily to depart, for it was death for him to be found within the walls of Verona after daybreak. ”

“ Our impression of Juliet's loveliness and sensibility is enhanced when we find it overcoming in the bosom of Romeo a previous love for another. His visionary passion for the cold, inaccessible Rosaline forms but the prologue, the threshold, to the true, the real sentiment which succeeds to it. ”

“ A romance must be a love story, and of all the love stories of time, that of Rome is the most marvellous. Certain girl children, we are told, were born so beautiful that, like Helen of Troy, Lucrezia Borgia—and she whose soul was of equal loveliness with what the chronicler calls “the supreme and royal beauty” of her body, Saint Radegonde, Queen of France, they were passionately loved, passionately defended, passionately sung, from the hour of their birth. ”

“ The world had still a long march to make from the Rose of Queen Blanche to the guillotine of Madame du Barry; but the "Roman de la Rose" made epoch. For the first time since Constantine proclaimed the reign of Christ, a thousand years, or so, before Philip the Fair dethroned Him, the deepest expression of social feeling ended with the word: Despair. ”

“ Being held a foe, he may not have access
To breathe such vows as lovers use to swear,
And she as much in love, her means much less
To meet her new beloved anywhere;
But passion lends them power, time means, to meet,
Temp'ring extremities with extreme sweet.
Exit.
ACT II. Scene I. A lane by the wall of Capulet's orchard. Enter Romeo alone.
Rom. Can I go forward when my heart is here?
Turn back, dull earth, and find thy centre out.
[Climbs the wall and leaps down within it.]
Enter Benvolio with Mercutio.
Ben. Romeo! my cousin Romeo! Romeo! ”

“ But the count in scorn refused his warning, and laid hands on him as a felon, which Romeo resisting, they fought, and Paris fell. When Romeo, by the help of a light, came to see who it was that he had slain, that it was Paris, who (he learned in his way from Mantua) should have married Juliet, he took the dead youth by the hand, as one whom misfortune had made a companion, and said that he would bury him in a triumphal grave, meaning in Juliet's grave, which he now opened: and there lay his lady, as one whom death had no power upon to change a feature or complexion, in her matchless beauty ”

“ Romeus does not yet know his doom. The Friar goes forth, learns the sentence, and returns. He tells the Nurse that Romeus shall come at night to Juliet to devise of their affairs. He informs Romeus that the sentence is good, not death but banishment. Romeus is frantic, tears his hair, throws himself on the ground, and prays for death; he blames nature, his time and place of birth, the stars, and Fortune. ”