New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1883-01-28

where art might be free, and to md Tor the
hearts language utterance direct and limpid"-ffee
and mpid. at least il not quito direct. 1t is true
also that he had objective faculty, and failed to
depict things as he saw them; in which he differed
most widely and Enthusiastically from Dante.
who is the most vivid and ncisve of all disorders
surprising in this respect even Homer. Mr..
Symonds says we'll of Petrarch that instead OF
scenes he delneated the moods suggested by them"
Petrarch's manhood conceded with the boyhood
of the next great italian writer. tBOccacclo. de
was the ilegitimate son of rustic who went to
Florence and there obtained citizenship. His
mother was Frenchwomau with whom his father
became acquainted during business residence at
Paris. He was therefore irregular" in every way.
lie was not genuine Florentlne nor even true
Italian In these conditions of his life Mr.. Symouds
finds with reason, the causes of his mental charac-
terlstics, and, measurably, of the quality Of his
work. Nevertheless he regards Boccacco as the
typical Italian bourgeois, the representative OF the
class who fualy determined the renaissance
hose who do not Understandable there are many
who do not understand-wben they read Boccaccos
NorelH the high position to which he is assigned
in literature, finding him gross. sensual, soothing
and without penetration beneath the surface of life
in all which judgments they are right-mny profit
by Mr. Symonds's critical summing up Of his quail
the people for the literature of the learned classes
and the aristocracy lie freed the natural instincts
from ascetic interdctons and the mysticism Of tho
transcendental school. lie exposed the shams OF
chivalrous romance and the hypocrises of monkery
with ridlcule more deadly than satire or invecive.
He brought realism in art and letters back to honor
by delineatDg the world as he found it--sensnal,
base comic, ludicrous, pathetic tender, c1nel-in
ali its crudities and contradictions He replaced the
distractions Of aegory by concrete fact. lie VIM
dicted the claims of appetite and sonsuout enjoy
ment against ideal aspirations and the scrupes OF
faith .tormeDted conscience" This presents
strongly and favorably but not more than justly.
Boccaccio's actual achievement. But the bastard
French Italian Florentine bourgeois had no such
purpose He sought only to entertain his fellow
citizens in way pleasant and profitable 10 himself
His writings express the spirit and tone OF his time
and of his own nature "a love of beauty, delight
IN natural scnsuous enjoyment, satirical vein of
humor an enjoyment of coarse jokes, Of sucli trcks
as faithless women play upon dull, coniid'ng hus-
bands 1t was in the free daring way In which he
did this and particularly by his disregard of all the
conventional and religious restraints which were
then felt. but which people were ready to break
away from and to laugh al, that he became one OF
the literary pioneers of free thought and free ac-
ton He was entirely without moral purpose, and
even without moral tone and dignity; but lie was
true literary artist; and he first developed model
narrative style III what was then called the vulgar
tongue in contradisinction TO Latin, in which all
professed literary men before his time had written,
even upon coarse and familiar subjects. The num-
her of broad indecent anecdotes, moro indecent
even than any of his norelH, which are lightly con-
ceaed in the obscdrity OF learned language" IS
legion We cannot give 10 Mr.. Symondss ample
and dscriminative discussion of Boccacco the alton
tion we shodd like to give. but must pass rapidly
over the Northumberland that is The buik-oi his
work. touching here and there only the most i'm
pressive passages. We only remark further, and
with perfect accord. upon the opinion which he sets
forth impresslvely and repeats that one OF Boecac-
clos chief traits and functions was he introduction
OF q popular tone-Mr. SvmoDds calls II bluntly
plebeian tone-into literature setting thus fash
ion which was followed ty nearly all the writer's OF
norelH. Another was the use OF irontca narrative
Bocca:cio aud his followers delighted IN telling n
story which IN itself was good-humored satire of
chlvalry OF Of the priesthood or OF court life They
must have been regarded by the high-socicty OF
their day merely a set OF very clever and amusing
blackguards. And from certain point OF view,
high society-coarse and ruian-hke as II was itself
beneath the surface-was not much in the wrong In
passing such a Judgment The amazing fact to us
",
Church and State--fenale as well as maIe-enioyed
these gross and blasphemous norei (which were not
at oil like, and did not pretend to be like, our nov
els our tales and sketches Of the present dayl
and even that churchmen who became bishops
wrote some of the most outrageous specimens OF
this sort of literature. II is perhaps hardly less
strange hardly less in violation OF consistency or OF
seeming possibility that all this literary freedom
and all the coarseness and hcenticusness which
was thus freely portrayed and 10 Reenly enjoyed,
coexsted with appreciation of moral duty OF
family affection and OF social decOrum which are
not surpassed il they equalled by the tone and
the fashions of our own day. Albertrs book upon
the Family, upon which Mr. Symonds remarks In
this part of his work. and winch he has before crit
jclsed and appreciated presents picture of Flor
entine family Of condition which as to moral tone
and good manners Is in most respects admirable.
Boecacco and his immediate followers do not be-
long strictly to the of the literature of
which they were rntner the ushers. OF that liter
allure two of the most important men were lorenzo
dI Medicl and Poliziauo, who here reapDear upon
Mr.. Symondss ample canvas,-a canvas rather
panoramic in it's design than truly pictorial and
tistic He gives much attention to Lorenzo as a
poet and finds his power to please his contempOra-
ries and mould Italian literature. In his thorough
sympathy with the Italian people; in his love Tor
his vernacular tongue, although he was an elegant
# not profound scholar. lie uses language like
a man who has habitually spoken the words which
he commits to paper His brain was vigorous and
his critical faculty acute. He lived. moreover. IN
close sympathy with his age never rising above It,
but accurately representing its main tendencies
Al the same time he was sufficiently q poet to de-
light generation that had seen no great writer OF
verse since Boccaocio. Though his work was In no
sense absolutely first rae, he wrote nothing that
man of ability might not be pleased to own" We
should agree with this judgment except in Its use OF
the phrase frstrate" which 1t seems to us should
not be applied to Lorenzo di Medic even a stand
ard of depreciatory comparison. He wrote nothing
that as even absolutely second-rate He is a very
interesting man to the student of Italian literal ure
and society but the reader Of poetry for its own
aba ~ e,end hIs tIme-as lifo IL short-mOre TO