100.
[73] Paradiso, I. 70.
[74] In a letter to Can Grande (XI. of the Epistolae).
[75] Witte, Wegele, and Ruth in German, and Ozanam in French, have
rendered ignorance of Dante inexcusable among men of culture.
[76] Inferno, VII. 75. "Nay, his style," says Miss Rossetti, "is more
than concise: it is elliptical, it is recondite. A first thought
often lies coiled up and hidden under a second; the words which state
the conclusion involve the premises and develop the subject." (p. 3.)
[77] A complete vocabulary of Italian billingsgate might be selected
from Biagioli. Or see the concluding pages of Nannucci's excellent
tract "Intorno alle voci usate da Dante," Corfu, 1840. Even Foscolo
could not always refrain. Dante should have taught them to shun such
vulgarities. See Inferno, XXX. 131-148.
[78] "My Italy, my sweetest Italy, for having loved thee too much I
have lost thee, and, perhaps, ... ah, may God avert the omen! But
more proud than sorrowful, for an evil endured for thee alone, I
continue to consecrate my vigils to thee alone.... An exile full of
anguish, perchance, availed to sublime the more in thy Alighieri that
lofty soul which was a beautiful gift of thy smiling sky; and an
exile equally wearisome and undeserved now avails, perhaps, to
sharpen my small genius so that it may penetrate into what he left
written for thy instruction and for his glory.
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