pronounced by the Academy of Della Crusca one of the classical textbooks of the language, no critic of any note has spoken in terms either of praise or censure; nor was it republished until a century afterwards (1726), in the design of completing the collection of the works of celebrated Florentines. If we are to take literally the expressions of one of our author's most intimate friends, all that was published of Michel Angelo was but a very small part of the great quantity of pieces-infiniti sonetti-which he had composed.* Still not even their scanty number has been able to preserve them from forgetfulness; nor was it until after another century (1806), and, as it were, in fulfilment of the duty of a biographer deeply attached to his author, that Mr. Duppa once more republished them in the appendix to his life of Michel Angelo. Recently Mr. Biagioli, to whom we are obliged for the best Italian grammar which has been yet written, has published, at Paris (1821), the same collection, with some additions, which render it more complete, and encumbered with a commentary, which, whether useful or not to the reader, has, at least, enlarged the size of the volume. Such is the brief history of the editions of Michel Angelo's poetry.

The criticisms of Mr. Duppa, without being profound, are judicious and candid-perfectly calculated to prove that some pieces of his author, very far from deserving to continue in that neglect to which the caprice of fortune had condemned them, deserved to be held forth as models of excellence in their kind. "The justice of this opinion appears most clearly from the translations with which Mr. Wordsworth and Mr. Southey have enriched his work; and even still more so from the prose translations of several extracts, by Mr. Duppa himself. The following is one of his devotional sonnets, which we have endeavoured to render in English.

Sonnet CXVI.

Ben sarian dolci le preghiere mie,
Se virtù mi prestassi da pregarte:
Nel mio terreno infertil non è parte
Da produr frutto di virtù natie.
Tu il seme se' dell' opre giuste, e pie,
Che la germoglian dove ne fai parte:
Nessum proprio valor può seguitarte,
Se non gli mostri le tue belle vie.
Tu nella mente mia pensieri infondi,
Che producano in me sì vivi effetti,
Signor, ch' io segua i tuoi vestigi santi.
E dalla lingua mia chiari, e facondi
Sciogli della tua gloria ardenti detti,
Perchè sempre io ti lodi, esalti, e canti.

To the Supreme Being.

Grateful and sweet would be my prayer,
If thou wouldst lend me grace to pray;

My soil unfertile will not bear

Virtue's fair fruit, thine aid away.

* Vasari, Vita di Michel Angelo.

Thou know'st the seed, how it should lie
Within the mind to make it spring,
And bring forth deeds of piety

And works of worthy offering.

If thou show'st not the sacred road,
None of themselves thy paths can see-
Fill all my soul with thoughts that lead
In thy just steps to heaven and thee,-
Give me a fervent tongue that I may praise,
And sing thy glory through eternal days.

Mr. Biagioli's commentary is so minute, so pedantic, and at the same time so effectually enthusiastic, as to excite our fears that he may obtain a result precisely the reverse of that which he has proposed to himself. His purpose is nothing less than to establish a poetical triumvirate, consisting of Dante, Petrarch, and Michel Angelo, to be placed on a triple throne, whilst Ariosto, Tasso, and the other poets of Italy-nay of the whole world, both ancient and modern-are to be seated on the steps below, as their pages. To judge of Michel Angelo's verses as the productions of a professional poet, would be manifestly unjust-as it always must be, when a measure of excellence is exacted, to which the author himself never thought of laying claim. But, on the other hand, whoever is over-anxious to regard as extraordinary all that may proceed from the pen of a distinguished man, pushes his admiration to an extent of superstition, which, while it adds nothing to the glory of the author, greatly diminishes our respect for the judgment of the critic.

If there ever existed a mortal fully confident in his own faculties, it was Michel Angelo; but, likewise, if there ever existed a mortal, who knew the difficulties inherent in every art, and who employed the meditation, the time, and the unremitted exertions which it requires to surmount them, it was Michel Angelo. He was aware that genius consists not only in the power of producing, but also in the energy and perseverance which are necessary to give to its productions the excellence to which alone they owe their durability. Bold, enterprising, and indefatigable as he was-having felt and put to the proof from his earliest youth, his talent for sculpture, he reproached himself to the last day of his life for not having devoted enough of study and time to the chisel and marble. We are told that the Cardinal Farnese one day found him, when an old man, walking alone in the Colosseum, and expressed his surprise at finding him solitary amid the ruins; to which he replied, "I go to school that I may continue to learn something." There is still remaining one of his designs-an old man with a long beard, in a child's go-cart, and an hour-glass, with the scroll over his head ANCHORE IMPARO-still I learn.* But as to the art of writing, he with equal magnanimity confessed "that he had never acquired it."tNever did he foresee that the verses which he composed as a relaxation and outpouring of his feelings, would one day be compared with those to which Dante and Petrarch had consecrated their toil, their life, and all the rare faculties of their intellect. Michel Angelo was evidently endowed with a disposition to poetry; and in his youth his evenings were spent in reading Dante and Petrarch to his friends; and his

Lettere Pittoriche.

Life of Michel Angelo.

attempts to catch their spirit show that he had profited by the study. Yet these same attempts are sufficient to convince us, that had he even devoted to poetry the whole power of his talent, he would nevertheless have remained inferior to his great models; and that, at all events, he would have approached nearer Petrarch than Dante. It is impossible to account for the works of Nature; but it is often useful, and always interesting to observe them. Nature had gifted Michel Angelo, in a supreme degree, with the imitative imagination necessary to form a painter, sculptor, and architect;-but she had sparingly accorded to him the creative imagination of a poet. The poet invents, and the artist copies: the poet breathes a soul into all creation, and the artist embellishes it;-and the fact that all the chefs-d'œuvres of the fine arts have been in all ages, and in all countries, preceded by the chefsd'œuvres of poetry, amply confirms our opinion, that it is the poets who furnish conceptions to the artist. As Phidias acknowledged having found the original of his Jupiter Olympius in the first book of the Iliad, so Michel Angelo professed to have designed his figures, arranged his groups, given the attitude to their limbs, and the expression to their physiognomy, out of the poem of Dante. He translated (if we may use the term) this poem in a series of designs, forming a large volume, which he unfortunately lost by a shipwreck. His admiration for Dante was accompanied with a sympathy which almost amounted to filial respect; and he spoke of him as though he had been the companion of his misfortunes, and had passed with him a portion of his life. The following sonnet is the 73d of Mr. Duppa's collection, and the 23d of the edition of Biagioli.

Sonnet LXXIII.-Dante.

Quanto dirne si dee non si può dire,

Che troppo agli orbi il suo splendor s'accese:
Biasmar si può più il popol che l'offese,
Ch' al minor pregio suo lingua salire.

Questi discese a i regni del fallire

Per noi insegnare, e poscia a Dio n'ascese:
E l' alte porte il ciel non gli contese,
Cui la patria le sue negò d' aprire.
Ingrata patria, e della sua fortuna

A suo danno nutrice; e n'è ben segno
Ch'a i più perfetti abbonda di più guai.
E fra mille ragion vaglia quest' una;

Ch' egual non hebbe il suo esilio indegno,
Com' huom maggior di lui quì non fu mai.

How shall we speak of him, for our blind eyes
Are all unequal to his dazzling rays?

Easier it is to blame his enemies

Than for the tongue to tell his lightest praise..
For us did he explore the realms of wo:

And at his coming did high Heaven expand
Her lofty gates, to whom his native land
Refused to open hers. Yet shalt thou know,
Ungrateful city, in thine own despite,

That thou hast foster'd best thy Dante's fame:
For virtue, when oppress'd, appears more bright,
And brighter therefore, shall his glory be,
Suffering, of all mankind, most wrongfully,
Since in the world there lives no greater name.

But the more successful Michel Angelo was in adopting, and even improving on the conceptions of Dante, as an artist, the less did he succeed-nor, in truth, did he attempt it-in equalling him as a poet. The poetry of Dante consists chiefly in images; that of Michel Angelo, like Petrarch's, is a compound of thought and sentiment, which always excites to meditation, and sometimes touches the heart; but neither describes, nor paints, nor works powerfully on the imagination. The thoughts of Michel Angelo are always just, often profound, and sometimes novel; but although he generally writes with that precision of words, and compression of ideas, which characterize a deep thinker, he does not express himself, at all times, with that perspicuity which can only be attained from the constant habitude of writing, nor with that poetical diction which imparts warmth and brilliancy even to the coldest reasonings. The versification betrays the same want of exercise in composition: there is in it more of ear than of skill. The melody is rarely imperfect in any of his lines; but we scarcely ever meet with a succession of verses in which the sound of the words, and the variety of the numbers and position of the accents, are so combined as to produce a sustained and general harmony. Nevertheless, several of the pieces of Michel Angelo have the merit of conveying thoughts long and deeply meditated, and sentiments really felt; which create an interest not always to be found in the otherwise admirable verses of many professed poets. The double apprehension of quitting this world whilst it is inhabited by the object of our love, or of remaining here after her departure, is expressed in a manner at once elegant and impassioned, in the following stanza.

Occhi miei, siate certi

Che 'l tempo passa, e l' ora s'avvicina

Ch' agli sguardi ed al pianto il passo serra.
Pietà dolce di voi vi tenga aperti,

Mentre la mia divina

Donna si degna d'abitare in terra.
Ma se 'I ciel si disserra

Per le bellezze accorre uniche e sole

Del mio terreno sole,

S'ei torna in ciel fra l' alme dive e liete,
Allor ben, sì, che chiuder vi potete.

O yes, for certain, Time fleets swift away,
And ye the hour are daily fast approaching,
Which, while it makes you tearless, shall forbid
Your admiration of celestial beauty—

Be careful of your vision-be open
While on the earth, a bright inhabitant,

Lingers the form divine of her I love :

But at the moment when she mounts to Heaven,

There to rejoin the pure and blessed souls,

And decorate its region with her beauties

Then, nor till then, close ye mine eyes for ever!

To fall into affectation and coldness is the inevitable penalty of all imitation. Michel Angelo is neither affected nor cold, except when he superstitiously follows the sentiments and phraseology of Petrarch. He had not, however, the same right to be an innovator in literature as he had in the fine arts; and in his age every writer, in proportion

as he deviated from the example of Petrarch, was stigmatised as barbarous. The manners of the time also contributed to this imitationfor although, in every age, men feel love in the same manner, it must be made differently; and in those times it was necessary to profess Platonism. But the Platonism which is derived from the conception of ideal beauty was always real in Michel Angelo. Thus he declares, "that the admiration and love of beauty which made him a sculptor and a painter, led him likewise to aim at being a poet :”—

Ma non potea se non somma bellezza
Accender me, che da lei sola tolgo
A far mie opre eterne lo splendore-

Per fido esempio alla mia vocazione,
Nascendo, mi fu data la bellezza
Che di due arti m' è lucerna e specchio.

Forse ad amendue noi dar lunga vita
Posso, o vuoi ne' colori, o vuoi ne' sassi,
Rassembrando di noi l'affetto e 'l volto;
Sicchè mill' anni dopo la partita

Quanto tu bella fosti ed io t' amassi

Si veggia, e come a amarti io non fui stolto.

We both, perchance, may gain immortal life
From these my labours on the sculptured marble,
Or by my pencil's art. Our countenances,
Nay, the expression of our breathing souls,
Mortals unborn, while we inhabit Heaven,
Ages to come may view, and find how fair,
How beautiful thou wert, and wise I was
To give to thee my love!

Almost all his verses are love-verses, and they do not seem to have been inspired by the same person; which is not very surprising:but it is remarkable, that, often in the same piece, he sometimes laments and sometimes rejoices that the pains and visions of love haunt him even in his old age.

Io son colui che ne' primi anni tuoi
Gli occhi tuoi infermi volsi alla beltade,
Che dalla terra al ciel vivo conduce.

Now I am old, Love tells me in my youth
He made me fondly contemplate that beauty,
Which has a power to elevate the soul
Even in life to Heaven.

The largest and most animated portion of his verses was inspired by Vittoria Colonna, Marchioness of Pescara. This lady, illustrious for her rank, her beauty, and her poetry, numbered as many forlorn lovers as there were men of letters at the court of Leo X. and in the rest of Italy. She was celebrated as the heroine of conjugal love, for though left a widow at an early age, no temptations could induce her to wed again-and to the last she continued to address verses to her husband's shade. The preference which Michel Angelo obtained in her regard was apparently due as much to his genius as to his ad