New-York tribune., 1893-12-24
DANTE LITERATURE.
TRANSLATION AND EXPOSITION.

THE COMEDY OF DANTE AI1GHlERI F,en Rem
saF asrea PART Pare l. f'Hn Hei Pp ix 10 Elliot Stock
A COMPANION TO DANTE. From the German ieiro1aI
Pp XIV, 503. Macmillan co.
The first thought of those who are not experts
IN Dantean studies and who occasionally miss
a publication devoted to the subject may De
that Mr. Butler has performed needless task
in transating handbook from the pen OF or'
scartazzini For they will remember that
Thomas Davidson had already turned into Eng
fish the "Manuale Dantesco." But they will find
to their qualification that this is different WORK
Scartazzini as ready with the one language
as with the other. was repeatedly urged to give
a German version of his Italian "Proegomenl
della Divina CCmmedia." But he found so much
to write which was new that he ended with
"Dante Handbuch' to which Mr. Butler has now
given an English form. AS between the manu-
ale" and the "Handbuch" the difference Is
marked Not only is the treatment OF the SUD-
ject far more complete in the latter. but the
author has fully perfected himself in that scep-
ticism Of which there was little trace IN the
! earlier book. He has whole bundle of argu-
rnents to prove that Dantes Beatrice could not
have been Beatrice Portinari For Beatrice Por-
tinari lived to be married. and Dante's Beatrice
that this sort Of disbelief affects not Dante but
his early bIographers. It is Boccaccio who must
be blamed if the world has all along been pay
ing homage to the wrong woman. Scartazzini
suspects that Dantes own son. Peter, may have
been the first TO err in respect TO this incident
of his fathers life. He calls attention to the
fact that though 1t is less than ten years since
he demanded another Beatrice in place Of the
lady who SO long held the place Of honor in
Dante literature he Is now sustained by nearly
all the italian scholars whose opinion should
carry weight Mr.. Butler is not at all friendly
to Scartazznis opinion. But If the latter turned
out to be right, the effect would be a complete
overthrow for the theory that Beatrice was
merely an allegorical fancy. For Dante could
then be shown to have meant literally, as we'll
as figuratively, all that he wrote The death. the
funeral Of his beloved. and his grief for her
would then be historical and not pure romance.
While the reader may we'll feel like following
Scartazzini on this point he may be prejudiced
against the exclusion Of practically all those
letters which have been attributed to the poet.
1t is hard to give up that explanatory letter to
Can Grande. Scartazzini knows this and he
comedies certain authority to It, though ques-
tioning its genuneness. AS to the remaining
apccryphal works. few will care how soon scep-
ticism sweeps them all away. They worth
less.
But Mr. Butler. In introducing his translation.
makes a point which will have to be considered
more and more Danean study widens its
scope. He calls attention to the fact that IT
Is almost impossible 10 read more than page
or two Of any work Of the twelfth or thirteenth
century without coming upon some passage
which one feels certain that Dante must have
seen. Now ordinary commentary. however use
full 1t may have been in the past, has become
q mere vexation. All medieval literature must
be studied anew, and, 1t may be added all folk
lore, II the future is to add anything TO the
study Of Dante The contempt which modern
Incidence has cast upon the Middle Ages will
have to be replaced by spirit Of jealous, II
not reverent. investigation. 1t may be dis
covered that forgotten tones Of theology have
something useful in them. despite Hallams
sweeping condemnation. For example, who
would have suspected that the nearest counter
part to Dante's contrvance for the punishment Of
. the Popes guilty Of slmony is 10 be found in the
sermon Of man who himself became Pope?
In the simple and straightforward verse Of the
gentle and lamented poet Parsons the Pope
whose heels CULVER in flame. says:
Headlong beneath my head buried more.
Crammed In this rocks ineXOrabe chink.
Who practised smony like me before;
SO !. In my turn farther down shall sink;
Ay, soon he approached whom my tongue
Hastily greeted as l thought in thee.
The feature to be observed in this savage
picture Of hell-pain is that each newcomer
pushes all his predecessors deeper into the fiery
cleft to make room for himself. That Is exactly
the feature made prominent in a discourse
preached by the fiery Hdebrand at Arezzo
while he was still monk. OF course, the Pope
that was to be did not take the victims Of his
hlIrnt ha
Mantle" On the contrary, he pitched upon
family of the German nobility. He told how
certain German count, a rich yet upright man.
after his death was seen in vision by monk.
He was standing on the topmost rung OF
ladder that descended into fiery abyss Be-
low him were his ancestors in regular, though
inverted. succession. 1t seems that ten genera
tions before the count was born one of his
cestors had sequestrated the revenues Of
church. and now every new descendant pushed
his predecessors down the ladder into the
flames. In each Of these cases the crime
a misuse Of resources held to be sacred. and the
punishment was what Villemain graphically de-
scribed as a progressive novitiate in internal
suffering Again it might be supposed at first
glimpse that nobody except Dante would have
the audacity to put any soul in hell before death
Says Alberto. the monk:
Even now perchance the body of this one
Who winters here behind me walks the world
II thou but newly art descended here,
His outward sembance haply thou mayest
know:
That's Master Branca Doria; many year
Hath gded by since he was chained below
But even SO utterly prosaic writer as Caesar
fus OF Heisterbach has such a story 20 tell Of a
certain Landgrave Hermann, whose soul was IN
torment a whole year before anybody discovered
that his body animated by a demon. IT
might be thought that Dante's originality would
be shown in some description Of an angel like
the following from the "Purgatory":
with sparkling face as glows at rosy prime
The tremuous morning star. and robed In
white
But the crazy monk who composed the fright