u. There is no enthusiasm,
no energy, no condensation, nothing which springs from strong
feeling, nothing which tends to excite it. Many fine thoughts and fine
expressions reward the toil of reading. Still it is a toil. The Secchia
Rapita, in some points the best poem of its kind, is painfully diffuse
and languid. The Animali Parlanti of Casti is perfectly intolerable. I
admire the dexterity of the plot, and the liberality of the opinions.
I admit that it is impossible to turn to a page which does not contain
something that deserves to be remembered; but it is at least six times
as long as it ought to be. And the garrulous feebleness of the style is
a still greater fault than the length of the work.

It may be thought that I have gone too far in attributing these evils to
the influence of the works and the fame of Petrarch. It cannot, however,
be doubted that they have arisen, in a great measure, from a neglect of
the style of Dante. This is not more proved by the decline of Italian
poetry than by its resuscitation. After the lapse of four hundred and
fifty years, there appeared a man capable of appreciating and imitating
the father of Tuscan literature--Vittorio Alfieri. Like the prince in
the nursery tale, he sought and found the sleeping beauty within the
recesses which had so long concealed her from mankind. The portal
was indeed rusted by time;--the dust of ages had accumulated on the
hangings;--the furniture was of antique fashion;--and the gorgeous
colour of the embroidery had faded. But the living charms which were
well worth all the rest remained in the bloom of eternal youth, and well
rewarded the bold adventurer who roused them from their long slumber. In
every line of the Philip and the Saul, the greatest poems, I think, of
the eighteenth century, we may trace the influence of that mighty
genius which has immortalised the ill-starred love of Francesca, and
the paternal agonies of Ugolino. Alfieri bequeathed the sovereignty of
Italian literature to the author of the Aristodemus--a man of genius
scarcely inferior to his own, and a still more devoted disciple of the
great Florentine. It must be acknowledged that this eminent writer has
sometimes pushed too far his idolatry of Dante. To borrow a sprightly
illustration from Sir John Denham, he has not only imitated his garb,
but borrowed his clothes. He often quotes his phrases; and he has,
not very judiciously as it appears to me, imitated his versification.
Nev