The Terrestrial Paradise. Compare Milton, Parad. Lost IV. 214:--
"In this pleasant soil
His far more pleasant garden God ordained :
Out of the fertile ground he caused to grow
All trees of noblest kind for sight, smell, taste
And all amid them stood the Tree of Life,
High eminent, blooming ambrosial fruit
Of vegetable gold ; and next to Life,
Our death, the Tree of Knowledge, grew fast by,
Knowledge of good bought dear by knowing ill.
Southward through Eden went a river large,
Nor changed his course, but through the shaggy hill
Passed underneath ingulfed ; for God had thrown
That mountain as his garden mould, high raised
Upon the rapid current, which through veins
Of porous earth with kindly thirst up drawn,
Rose a fresh fountain, and with many a rill
Watered the garden ; thence united fell
Down the steep glade, and met the nether flood,
Which from his darksome passage now appears ;
And now, divided into four main streams,
Runs diverse, wandering many a famous realm
And country, whereof here needs no account ;
But rather to tell how, if art could tell,
How from that sapphire fount the crisped brooks,
Rolling on orient pearl and sands of gold,
With mazy error under pendent shades
Ran nectar, visiting each plant, and fed
Flowers worthy of Paradise ; which riot nice art
In beds and curious knots, but nature boon
Poured forth profuse on hill, and dale, and plain ;
Both where the morning sun first warmly smote
The open field, and where the unpierced shade
Imbrowned the noontide bowers. Thus was this place
A happy rural seat of various view :
Groves whose rich trees wept odorous gums and balm ;
Others, whose fruit, burnished with golden rind,
Hung amiable, Hesperian fables true,
If true, here only, and of delicious taste.
Betwixt them lawns, or level downs, and flocks
Grazing the tender herb, were interposed ;
Or palmy hillock, or the flowery lap
Of some irriguous valley spread her store ;
Flowers of all hue, and without thorn the rose.
Another side, umbrageous grots and caves
Of cool recess, o'er which the mantling vine
Lays forth her purple grape, and gently creeps
Luxuriant : meanwhile murmuring waters fall
Down the slope hills, dispersed, or in a lake,
That to the fringed bank with myrtle crowned
Her crystal mirror holds, unite their streams.
The birds their quire apply ; airs, vernal airs,
Breathing the smell of field and grove, attune
The trembling leaves ; white universal Pan,
Knit with the Graces and the Hours in dance,
Led on the eternal spring."
Ruskin, Mod. Painters, III.219 :
"As Homer gave us an ideal landscape, which even; a god might have been pleased to behold, so Dante gives us, fortunately, an ideal landscape, which is specially intended for the terrestrial paradise. And it will doubtless be with some surprise, after our reflections above on the general tone of Dante's feelings, that we find ourselves here first entering a forest, and that even a thick forest. . . .
"This forest, then, is very like that of Colonos in several respects,--in its peace and sweetness, and number of birds ; it differs from it only in letting a light breeze through it, being therefore somewhat thinner than the Greek wood ; the tender lines which tell of the voices of the birds mingling with the wind, and of the leaves all turning one way before it, have been more or less copied by every poet since Dante's time. They are, so far as I know, the sweetest passage of wood description which exists in literature."
Homer's ideal landscape, here referred to, is in Odyssey V. , where he describes the visit of Mercury to the Island of Calypso. It is thus translated by Buckley :--
"Immediately then he bound his beautiful sandals beneath his feet, ambrosial, golden ; which carried hint both over the moist wave, and over the boundless earth, with the breath of the wind. . . . Then he rushed over the wave like a bird, a sea-gull, which, hunting for fish in the terrible bays of the barren sea, dips frequently its wings in the brine ; like unto this Mercury rode over many waves. But when he came to the distant island, then, going from the blue sea, he went to the continent ; until he came to the great cave in which the fair-haired Nymph dwelt ; and he found her within. A large fire was burning on the hearth, and at a distance the smell of well-cleft cedar, and of frankicense, that were burning, shed odour through the island : but she within was singing with a beautiful voice, and, going over the web, wove with a golden shuttle. But a flourishing wood sprung up around her grot, alder and poplar, sweet-smelling cypress. There also with spreading wings slept, owls and hawks, and wide-tongued crows of ocean, to which maritime employments are a care. There a vine in its prime was spread about the hollow grot, and it flourished with clusters. But four fountains flowed in succession with white water, turned near one another, each in different ways; but around there flourished soft meadows of violets and of parsley. There indeed even an immortal coming would admire it when he beheld, and would be delighted in his mind ; there the messenger, the slayer of Argus, standing, admired."
And again, at the close of the same book, where Ulysses reaches tile shore at Phaecia :
"Then he hastened to the wood ; and found it near the water in a conspicuous place, and he came under two shrubs, which sprang from the same place ; one of wild olive, the other of olive. Neither the strength of the moistly blowing winds breathes through them, nor has the shining sun ever struck them with its beams, nor has the shower penetrated entirely through them : so thick were they grown entangled with one another ; under which Ulysses came."
The wood of Colonos is thus described in one of the Choruses of the Oedipus Coloneus of Sophocles, Oxford Tr., Anon.:--
"Thou hast come, O stranger, to the seats of this land, renowned for the steed ; to seats the fairest on earth, the chalky Colonus ; where the vocal nightingale, chief abounding, trills her plaintive note in the green vales, tenanting the dark-hued ivy and the leafy grove of the god, untrodden [mortal foot], teeming with fruits, impervious to the sun, and unshaken by the winds of every storm ; where Bacchus ever roams in revelry companioning his divine nurses. And ever day by day the narcissus, with its beauteous clusters, burst into bloom by heaven's dew, the ancient coronet of the mighty goddesses, and the saffron with golden ray ; nor do the sleepless founts that feed the channels of Cephissus fail, but ever, each day, it rushes o'er the plains with its stainless wave, fertilizing the bosom of the earth ; nor have the choirs of the Muses spurned this clime ; nor Venus, too, of the golden rein. And there is a tree, such as I hear not to have ever sprung in the land of Asia, nor in the mighty Doric island of Pelops, a tree unplanted by hand, of spontaneous growth, terror of the hostile spear, which flourishes chiefly in this region, the leaf of the azure olive that nourishes our young. This shall neither any one in youth nor in old age, marking for destruction, and having laid it waste with his hand, set its divinity at naught ; for the eye that never closes of Morian Jove regards it, and the blue-eyed Minerva."
We have also Homer's description of the Garden of Alcinous, Odyssey, VII., Buckley's Tr. :--
"But without the hall there is a large garden, near the gates, of four acres ; but around it a hedge was extended on both sides. And there tall, flourishing trees grew, pears, and pomegranates, and apple-trees producing beautiful fruit, and sweet figs, and flourishing olives. Of these the fruit never perishes, nor does it fail in winter or summer, lasting throughout the whole year ; but the west wind ever blowing makes some bud forth, and ripens others. Pear grows old after pear, apple after apple, grape also after grape, and fig after fig. There a fruitful vineyard was planted : one part of this ground, exposed to the sun in a wide place, is dried by the sun ; and some [grapes] they are gathering, and others they are treading, and further on are unripe grapes, having thrown off the flower, and others are slightly changing colour. And there are all kinds of beds laid out in order, to the furthest part of the ground, flourishing throughout the whole year : and in it are two fountains, one is spread through the whole garden, but the other on the other side goes under the threshold of the hall to the lofty house, from whence the citizens are wont to draw water."
Dante's description of the Terrestrial Paradise will hardly fail to recall that on Mount Acidale in Spenser's Faerie Queene VI. x.6:--
"It was an Hill plaste in an open plaine,
That round about was bordered with a wood
Of matchlesse hight, that seemed th' earth
to disdaine ;
In which all trees of honour stately stood,
And did all winter as in sommer bud,
Spredding pavilions for the birds to bowre,
Which in their lower braunches sung aloud ;
And in their tops the soring hauke did towre,
Sitting like king of fowles in maiesty and powre.
And at the foote thereof a gentle flud
His silver waves did softly tumble downe,
Unmard with ragged mosse or filthy mud ;
Ne mote wylde beastes, ne mote the ruder clowne,
Thereto approch ; ne filth mote therein drowne :
But Nymphes and Faeries by the bancks did sit
In the woods shade which did the waters crowne,
Keeping all noysome things away from it,
And to the waters fall tuning their accents fit.
"And on the top thereof a spacious plaine
Did spred itselfe, to serve to all delight,
Either to daunce, when they to daunce would fame,
Or else to course-about their bases light ;
Ne ought there wanted, which for pleasure might
Desired be, or thence to banish bale :
So pleasauntly the Hill with equall hight
Did seeme to overlooke the lowly vale ;
Therefore it rightly cleeped was Mount Acidale."
See also Tasso's Garden of Armida, in the Gerusalemme XVI.
Chiassi is on the sea-shore near Ravenna. "Here grows a spacious pine forest," says Covino, Descr. Geog., p. 39, "which stretches along the sea between Ravenna and Cervia." .
The river Lethe. .
This lady, who represents the Active life to Dante's waking eyes, as Leah had done in his vision, and whom Dante afterwards, Canto XXXIII. 119, calls Matilda, is generally supposed by the commentators to be the celebrated Countess Matilda, daughter of Boniface, Count of Tuscany, and wife of Guelf, of the house of Suabia. Of this marriage Villani, IV. 21, gives a very strange account, which, if true, is a singular picture of the times. Napier, Flor. Hist., I. Ch. 4 and 6, gives these glimpses of the Countess :--
"This heroine died in 1115, after a reign of active exertion for herself and the Church against the Emperors, which generated the infant and as yet nameless factions of Guelf and Ghibelline. Matilda endured this contest with all the enthusiasin and constancy of a woman, combined with a manly courage that must ever render her name respectable, whether proceeding from the bigotry of the age, or to oppose imperial ambition in defence of her own defective title. According to the laws of that time, she could not as a female inherit her father's states, for even male heirs required a royal confirmation. Matilda therefore, having no legal right, feared the Emperor and clung to the Popes, who already claimed, among other prerogatives, the supreme disposal of kingdoms. . . . .
"The Church had ever come forward as the friend of her house, and from childhood she had breathed an atmosphere of blind and devoted submission to its authority ; even when only fifteen she bad appeared in arms against its enemies, and made two successful expeditions to assist Pope Alexander the Second during her mother's lifetime.
"No wonder, then, that in a superstitious age, when monarchs trembled at an angry voice front the Lateran, the habits of early youth should have mingled with every action of Matilda's life, and spread an agreeable mirage over the prospect of her eternal salvation : the power that tamed a Henry's pride, a Barbarossa's fierceness, and afterwards withstood the vast ability of a Frederic, might without shame have been reverenced by a girl whose feelings so harmonized with the sacred strains of ancient tradition and priestly dignity. But from whatever motive, the result was a continual aggrandizement of ecclesiastics; in prosperity and adversity ; during life and after death ; from the lowliest priest to the proudest pontiff.
"The fearless assertion of her own independence by successful struggles with the Emperor was an example not overlooked by the young Italian communities under Matilda's rule, who were already accused by imperial legitimacy of political innovation and visionary notions of government . . . .
"Being then at a place called Monte Baroncione, and in her sixty-ninth year, this celebrated woman breathed her last, after a long and glorious reign of incessant activity, during which she displayed a wisdom, vigour, and determination of character rarely seen even in men. She bequeathed to the Church all those patrimonial estates of which she had previously disposed by an act of gift to Gregory the Seventh, without, however, any immediate royal power over the cities and other possessions thus given, as her will expresses it, 'for the good of her soul, and the souls of her parents.'
"Whatever may now be thought of her chivalrous support, her bold defence, and her deep devotion to the Church, it was in perfect harmony with the spirit of that age, and has formed one of her chief merits with many even in the present. Her unflinching adherence to the cause she had so conscientiously embraced was far more noble than the Emperor Henry's conduct. Swinging between the extremes of unmeasured insolence and abject humiliation, he died a victim to Papal influence over superstitious minds ; an influence which, amongst other debasing lessons, then taught the world that a breach of the most sacred ties and dearest affections of human nature was one means of gaining the approbation of a Being who is all truth and beneficence.
"Matilda's object was to strengthen the chief spiritual against the chief temporal power, but reserving her own independence ; a policy subsequently pursued, at least in spirit, by the Guelphic states of Italy. She therefore protected subordinate members of the Church against feudal chieftains, and its head against the feudal Emperor. True to her religious and warlike character, she died between the sword and the crucifix, and two of her last acts, even when the hand of death was already cold on her brow, were the chastisement of revolted Mantua, and the midnight celebration of Christ's nativity in the depth of a freezing and unusually inclement winter."
Ovid, Met. V. , Maynwaring's Tr. :--
" Here, while young Proserpine, among the
maids,
Diverts herself in these delicious shades ;
While like a child with busy speed and care
She gathers lilies here, and violets there ;
While first to fill her little lap she strives,
Hell's grizzly monarch at the shade arrives ;
Sees her thus sporting on the flowery green,
And loves the blooming maid, as soon as seen.
His urgent flame impatient of delay,
Swift as his thought he seized the beauteous
prey,
And bore her in his sooty car away.
The frighted goddess to her mother cries,
But all in vain, for now far off she flies.
Far she behind her leaves her virgin train ;
To them too cries, and cries to them in vain.
And while with passion she repeats her call,
The violets from her lap, and lilies fall :
She misses them, poor heart and makes new
moan ;
Her lilies, ah ! are lost, her violets gone."
Ovid, Met. X., Eusden's Tr. :--
For Cytherea's lips while Cupid prest,
He with a heedless arrow razed her breast.
The goddess felt it, and, with fury stung,
The wanton mischief from her bosom flung :
Yet thought at first the danger slight, but
found
The dart too faithful, and too deep the wound.
Fired with a mortal beauty, she disdains
To haunt th' Idalian mount, or Phrygian plains.
She seeks not Cnidos, nor her Paphian shrines,
Nor Amathus, that teems with brazen mines :
Even Heaven itself with all its sweets unsought,
Adonis far a sweeter Heaven is thought."
,
He with a heedless arrow razed her breast.
The goddess felt it, and, with fury stung,
The wanton mischief from her bosom flung :
Yet thought at first the danger slight, but
found
The dart too faithful, and too deep the wound.
Fired with a mortal beauty, she disdains
To haunt th' Idalian mount, or Phrygian plains.
She seeks not Cnidos, nor her Paphian shrines,
Nor Amathus, that teems with brazen mines :
Even Heaven itself with all its sweets unsought,
Adonis far a sweeter Heaven is thought."
When Xerxes invaded Greece he crossed the Hellespont on a bridge of boats with an army of five million. So say the historians. On his return he crossed it in in a fishing-boat almost alone, --a warning to all human arrogance."
Leander naturally hated the Hellespont, having to swim it so many times. The last time, according to Thomas Hood, he met with a sea nymph, who, enamoured of his beauty, carried him to the bottom of the sea. See Hero and Leander, stanza 45 :--
His eyes are blinded with the sleety brine,
His ears are deafened with the wildering noise ;
He asks the purpose of her fell design,
But foamy waves choke up his struggling
voice,
Under the ponderous sea his body dips,
And Hero's name dies bubbling on his lips.
"Look how a man is lowered to his grave,
A yearning hollow in the green earth's lap ;
So he is sunk into the yawning wave,
The plunging sea fills up the watery gap ;
Anon he is all gone, and nothing seen,
But likeness of green turf and hillocks green.
And where he swam, the constant sun lies sleeping,
Over the verdant plain that makes his bed ;
And all the noisy waves go freshly leaping,
Like gamesome boys over the churchyard
dead ;
The light in vain keeps looking for his face,
Now screaming sea-fowl settle in his place."
Psalm xcii. 4: "For thou, Lord, hast made me glad through thy work : Iwill triumph in the works of thy hands."
Canto XXI. 46:-
"Because that neither rain, nor hail, nor snow,
Nor dew, nor hoar-frost any higher falls
Than the short, little stairway of three steps."
Only six hours, according to Adam's own account in Par., XXI. 139 :--
"Upon the mount which highest o'er the wave
Rises was I, with life or pure or sinful,
From the first hour to that which is the second,
As the sun changes quadrant, to the sixth."
Above the gate described in Canto IX.
Venus, the morning star , rising with the constellation Pisces, two hours before the sun.
Virgil and Statius smile at this allusion to the dreams of poets.