ill many lessons to learn, though
we no longer think as it thought or feel as it felt. The eighteenth
century, as represented by the characteristic passage from Voltaire,
cited by Mr. Longfellow, failed utterly to understand Dante. To the
minds of Voltaire and his contemporaries the great mediaeval poet was
little else than a Titanic monstrosity,--a maniac, whose ravings found
rhythmical expression; his poem a grotesque medley, wherein a few
beautiful verses were buried under the weight of whole cantos of
nonsensical scholastic quibbling. This view, somewhat softened, we
find also in Leigh Hunt, whose whole account of Dante is an excellent
specimen of this sort of criticism. Mr. Hunt's fine moral nature was
shocked and horrified by the terrible punishments described in the
"Inferno." He did not duly consider that in Dante's time these fearful
things were an indispensable part of every man's theory of the world;
and, blinded by his kindly prejudices, he does not seem to have
perceived that Dante, in accepting eternal torments as part and parcel
of the system of nature, was nevertheless, in describing them, inspired
with that ineffable tenderness of pity which, in the episodes of
Francesca and of Brunetto Latini, has melted the hearts of men in past
times, and will continue to do so in times to come. "Infinite pity,
yet infinite rigour of law! It is so Nature is made: it is so Dante
discerned that she was made." [57] This remark of the great seer of our
time is what the eighteenth century could in no wise comprehend. The men
of that day failed to appreciate Dante, just as they were oppressed or
disgusted at the sight of Gothic architecture; just as they pronounced
the scholastic philosophy an unmeaning jargon; just as they considered
mediaeval Christianity a gigantic system of charlatanry, and were wont
unreservedly to characterize the Papacy as a blighting despotism. In
our time cultivated men think differently. We have learned that the
interminable hair-splitting of Aquinas and Abelard has added precision
to modern thinking. [58] We do not curse Gregory VII. and Innocent III.
as enemies of the human race, but revere them as benefactors. We can
spare a morsel of hearty admiration for Becket, however strongly we may
sympathize with the stalwart king who did penance for his foul murder;
and we can appreciate Dante's poor opinion of Philip the Fair no less
than his denunciation of Boniface VIII. The contemplation of Gothic
a