Vita Nuova

“ Thus he reached the very flower of his young manhood—not the less a man that he was so absorbed and adoring a lover. But his manhood, his fighting, his studying—all the other side of his life—is outside the 'Vita Nuova.' In this there is nothing but poetry, and the worship of that perfection of all womanhood, that embodiment of sweetness and purity and love. ”

“ No one else, so far as we know, has ever thus accomplished the highest results of art with such a visionary exquisite vagueness, with an outline so veiled in mists of sacred awe and reverence. To every man and woman who has purely and truly loved, loved for love's sake, "all for love and nothing for reward," the 'Vita Nuova,' to the end of time, will be a revelation not only of Dante and the peerless Beatrice, but of themselves and their own hearts. ”

“ Some of them, according to the stories of the time, lofty and refined as they are, were sung about the streets of Florence, by the carters and blacksmiths, in the very hearing of the poet; which wonderful popular appreciation of those finest ethereal voices goes far to make us believe in the stately dream-city of the 'Vita Nuova,' where, when Beatrice lived there, and the young Dante who loved her, angels, and muses, and every lovely imagination seem to have trod the antique pavement, and, with a dazzling of celestial smiles and sunshine, irradiated all the ancient place. ”

“ The perfection and finish of every line, the correspondence of sense and sound, the incomparable command over all the most delicate resources of verse, and the exquisite symmetry of the complete odes which are extant, raise her into the very first rank of technical poetry at once, while her painting of passion, which caused Longinus to quote the ode to Anactoria as an example of the sublime, has never been since surpassed, and only approached by Catullus and in the Vita Nuova. Her fragments also bear witness to a profound feeling for the beauty of nature. ”

“ Boccaccio, in his Life of Dante, tells us that the [15] great poet, in later life, was ashamed of this work of his youth. Such a statement hardly seems reconcilable with the allusions to it made or implied in the Commedia; but it is true that the Vita Nuova is a book which only youth could have produced, and which must chiefly remain sacred to the young; to each of whom the figure of Beatrice, less lifelike than lovelike, will seem the friend of his own heart. ”

“ They met at a great entertainment given by Folco Portinari, the father of the child Beatrice, in his big palace round the corner, over the way from where the Alighieris lived, to which the little Dante accompanied his parents when he was nine years old. The 'Vita Nuova' begins with a description of this meeting:—
"Nine time already, since my birth, had the heaven of light returned to wellnigh the same point in its orbit, when to my eyes was first revealed the glorious lady of my soul, even she who was called Beatrice by many who wist not wherefore she was so called. ”

“ To tax its author with effeminacy on account of the extreme sensitiveness evinced by this narrative of his love, would be manifestly unjust, when we find that, though love alone is the theme of the Vita Nuova, war already ranked among its author’s experiences at the period to which it relates. In the year 1289, the one preceding the death of Beatrice, Dante served with the foremost cavalry in the great battle of Campaldino, on the eleventh of June, when the Florentines defeated the people of Arezzo. ”

“ Hear how much Love did her honouring; for I saw him lamenting in very [12] person over the dead seemly image: and often he gazed towards heaven, wherein was already settled the noble soul who had been a lady of such gladsome semblance.”
It would be out of place to enter here into any detailed observations upon the Vita Nuova, its meaning, and the literature which has grown out of it. I will merely name, as obvious things for the English reader to consult, the translation which was made by Sir Theodore Martin ”

“ Still, the work, as we now have it, is essentially the [7] work of those adolescent years—from time to time reconsidered and improved, but not transmuted.
Some few years after producing his translation of the Vita Nuova, Rossetti was desirous of publishing it, and of illustrating the volume with etchings from various designs, which he had meanwhile done, of incidents in the story. ”

“ Is it so certain, then, that the new generation whereunto you offer your lives will merit the sacrifice; will be more beautiful, happier, will do something you have not done? Your aim is clear to us, clearer far than our own; you desire to live, as long as the world itself, in those that come after; but what can the aim be of this great aim; what the mission of this existence eternally renewed? ”

“ Humanity hath taken on new life. The autumn hath gone by, and the reviving spring is here. All things are now made new. Arts and industries have been reborn, there are new discoveries in science, and there are new inventions; even the details of human affairs, such as dress and personal effects—even weapons—all these have likewise been renewed. The laws and procedures of every government have been revised. Renewal is the order of the day.
And all this newness hath its source in the fresh outpourings of wondrous grace and favour from the Lord of the Kingdom, which have renewed the world. ”

“ I long to live so that I can explore what is no less than a new world to me. Do you want to know what this new world is? I think you can guess what it is. It is the world in which I have been living. Sorrow, then, and all that it teaches one, is my new world.... ”

“ Thus does regeneration become a work of orderly progress and successive growth. Guided by the Lord, it is brought forward under his never ceasing energies. It is begun in chaos and ends in the glorious likeness of Divinity. This, and manifold more, the parable of the Creation sets forth, in its beautiful symbols, concerning the beginnings of the soul, its progress through the stages of its advancing career, the nature of each successive state, and the quality of its celestial outcomes. ”

“ They who dwell in it, and it on which they dwell pass through analogous changes, and as for the individuals, the 'new creation' is the old self purified by the fire of the Divine Spirit into incorruption and righteousness, so the world in which they live shall, in like manner, be 'that new world which is the old,' only having suffered the fiery transformation and been glorified thereby. ”

“ Here was a new generation, shouting the old cries, learning the old creeds, through a revery of long days and nights; destined finally to go out into that dirty gray turmoil to follow love and pride; a new generation dedicated more than the last to the fear of poverty and the worship of success; grown up to find all Gods dead, all wars fought, all faiths in man shaken. ”

“ How is it with man after two hundred years?
"Great cities, vast powers, a collective greatness beyond our dreams. For that we did not work, and that has come. But how is it with the little lives that make up this greater life? How is it with the common lives? As it had ever been—sorrow and labour, lives cramped and unfulfilled, lives tempted by power, tempted by wealth, and gone to waste and folly. The old faiths have faded and changed, the new faith———Is there a new faith?" ”

“ It was the outcome, as it was the sole relief, of the unhappiness of the period which made life so bitter even to the rich, and which, as you may see with your bodily eyes, the great change has swept away. More akin to our way of looking at life was the spirit of the Middle Ages, to whom heaven and the life of the next world was such a reality, that it became to them a part of the life upon the earth ”

“ A new Age is ushered in by the influx of new life and the revelation of new and higher truth. From underneath the cloud of the letter—out from the living soul of Scripture—the Sun of righteousness arises with healing in his wings. And thus, to humble and open minds, the incarnate God comes and reveals Himself anew—comes with new power and glory in the clouds. Agreeable to his own prophetic declaration: "And they shall see the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory." ”

“ As she and I hung over the deck rail side by side we felt ourselves on the edge of wonders. The Old World was in need of us, and we were in need of the New. To us who were New World born, and who were coming back to generous, easy-going welcome after the unspeakable things we had seen, the craving for New World brotherhood and vigor was like that of hunger or thirst. ”

“ For we all feel that we must not measure the new with the old measures our forefathers used, that we must not live through the new with feelings outworn, that we [Pg 6] must discover a new sense of distance, a new sense of time, a new sense of space, that we must find a new music for this nervous, feverish rhythm around us. This new-born human conditionality calls for a new morality; this new union of equals a new beauty; this new topsy-turvydom a new system of ethics. And this new confrontation with another and still newer world, with another Unknown, demands a new religion, a new God. ”

“ The root-failure of the organized Church to-day is its failure to share in the growing life of the world. A growing life is one that is full of new ideas, new experiences, new emotions, a new outlook over life—that works in new ways, and that is full of seething and tumultuous energy, enthusiasm, and hope. If we look out over the colleges, business enterprises, periodicals, agriculture, manufacturing, and shipping of the world, we find everywhere one story—growth, impetus, courage, resources, vigorous and bounding life. ”

“ But there is one certain way, in which we can do something and perhaps much for the amelioration of mankind and the regeneration of the world: and that is, by regenerating that part of the world which lies absolutely in our own power—namely, ourselves. We are each a part of the world and of mankind, and, by regenerating our own minds, we regenerate a portion of the world. ”

“ He carries us and the world forward out of sin and death, by carrying us back to God’s ideal. The new world is the old world repaired, and in its reparation infinitely enhanced—rich in the memories of redemption, in the fruit of penitence and the discipline of suffering, in the lessons of the cross. ”

“ As one gazes with holy admiration at this theophany of truth in renewed manifestation, and watches the changing effects, the action of the Spirit of New Life becomes apparent; the adaptation of the new growth to progress becomes a living experience, the facts become vital in significance to help others to live beautifully and truly. ”

“ But creation is progressive. In this also it is made to typify regeneration. In another parable our Lord has told us how the attainment of the kingdom of heaven, that is, the regeneration of the soul, is a progressive work. It is like a grain of mustard seed, which a man—the Lord—took and sowed in the earth—in the human mind; which at first is the least of all seeds, in that spirituality at the beginning of our regeneration is very small, but growing, becomes a great tree, in that as regeneration progresses, we become great in spiritual perceptions, power and goodness. ”

“ Then you may walk in this old world, new creatures in Christ Jesus, looking for the blessed hope of entire renewal into the perfect likeness of Him, the perfect man, in a perfect world, where all old sorrows and sins have passed away and He has made all things new. Through eternity, new joys, new knowledge, new progress, new likeness, new service will be ours—and not one leaf shall ever wither in the amaranthine crown, nor 'the cup of blessing' ever become empty or flat and stale. Eternity will be but a continual renewal and a progressive increase of ever fresh and ever familiar treasures. ”

“ It was the divine power of Love, tried in sufferings, and sacrificing to high Love itself not only life, but every earthly desire; and from which proceeded the new words of a new life, a new light of moral and divine science, that was to unfold new views of the world, introduce a new organization of society, and give a new form to human existence. ”

“ The banner of the Holy Spirit is uplifted, and men see it, and are assured with the knowledge that this is a new day.
This is a new cycle of human power. All the horizons of the world are luminous, and the world will become indeed as a garden and a paradise. It is the hour of unity of the sons of men and of the drawing together of all races and all classes. You are loosed from ancient superstitions which have kept men ignorant, destroying the foundation of true humanity. ”

“ It is plain that the men of the New Learning looked forward, not to a reform of doctrine but to a reform of life, not to a revolution which should sweep away the older superstitions which they despised but to a regeneration of spiritual feeling before which these superstitions would inevitably fade away. ”

“ Therefore, in the measure in which we draw into ourselves the new life and the Spirit of God shall we be independent of men round us, and be able to say, 'With me it is a very small matter to be judged of you or of man's judgment.' That new life ought to make men original, in the deep and true sense of the word, as drawing their conceptions of duty and their methods of life, not at second hand from other men, but straight from God Himself. ”

“ You would sunder yourself from society, from the spell of institutions, customs, conventionalities, that you may lead a fresh, simple life with God. Instead of breathing a new life into the old forms, you would have a new life without and within. ”