ess of whose
intelligence rose superior to the hampering limitations of his age.

In its general character and in its biographical revelations the
'Banquet' forms a connecting link between the 'New Life' and the 'Divine
Comedy.' It is not possible to frame a complete reconciliation between
all the statements of the 'Banquet' in respect to Dante's experience
after the death of Beatrice, and the narrative of them in the 'New
Life'; nor is it necessary, if we allow due place to the poetic and
allegoric interpretation of events natural to Dante's genius. In the
last part of the 'New Life' he tells of his infidelity to Beatrice in
yielding himself to the attraction of a compassionate lady, in whose
sight he found consolation. But the infidelity was of short duration,
and, repenting it, he returned with renewed devotion to his only love.
In the 'Convito' he tells us that the compassionate lady was no living
person, but was the image of Philosophy, in whose teaching he had found
comfort; and the poems which he then wrote and which had the form, and
were in the terms of, poems of Love, were properly to be understood as
addressed--not to any earthly lady, but--to the lady of the
understanding, the most noble and beautiful Philosophy, the daughter of
God. And as this image of Philosophy, as the fairest of women, whose
eyes and whose smile reveal the joys of Paradise, gradually took clear
form, it coalesced with the image of Beatrice herself, she who on earth
had been the type to her lover of the beauty of eternal things, and who
had revealed to him the Creator in his creature. But now having become
one of the blessed in heaven, with a spiritual beauty transcending all
earthly charm, she was no longer merely a type of heavenly things, but
herself the guide to the knowledge of them, and the divinely
commissioned revealer of the wisdom of God. She looking on the face of
God reflected its light upon him who loved her. She was one with Divine
Philosophy, and as such she appears, in living form, in the 'Divine
Comedy,' and discloses to her lover the truth which is the native desire
of the soul, and in the attainment of which is beatitude.

It is this conception which forms the bond of union between the 'New
Life,' the 'Banquet,' and the 'Divine Comedy,' and not merely as
literary compositions but as autobiographical records. Dante's life and
his work are not to be regarded apart; they form a single whole, and
they possess a dramatic d