CHAPTER II.

DANTE.

The _De Vulgari Eloquio_: Its history and authentication 417 Its importance 418 And the scanty recognition thereof 418 Abstract of its contents: The “Vulgar Tongue” and “Grammar” 419 The nature, &c., of the gift of speech 420 Division of contemporary tongues 421 And of the subdivisions of Romance 422 The _Italian Dialects_: Some rejected at once 423 Others—Sicilian, Apulian, Tuscan, and Genoese 424 Venetian: Some good in Bolognese 424 The “Illustrious” Language none of these, but their common 425 measure Its four characteristics 425 The Second Book—Why Dante deals with poetry only 426 All good poetry should be in the Illustrious 427 The subjects of High Poetry—War, Love, Virtue 427 Its form: Canzoni 427 Definition of Poetry 428 Its styles, and the constituents of the grand style 428 _Superbia Carminum_ 428 _Constructionis elatio_ 429

_Excellentia Verborum_ 429 _Pexa et hirsuta_ 430 The Canzone 430 Importance of the book 431 Independence and novelty of its method 432 Dante’s attention to Form 433 His disregard of Oratory 433 The influence on him of Romance 434 And of comparative criticism 434 The poetical differentia according to him 435 His antidote to the Wordsworthian heresy 436 His handling of metre 436 Of diction 437 His standards of style 438 The “Chapter of the Sieve” 439 The _pexa_ 440 The _hirsuta_ 441 Other critical _loci_ in Dante 441 The Epistle to Can Grande 441 The _Convito_ 442 Dante on Translation 443 On language as shown in prose and verse 443 Final remarks on his criticism 444