sy of that poet's
fame, a similar feeling is known to have existed in Petrarch towards
Dante; and the same reason assigned for it,--that from the living he
had nothing to fear, while before the shade of Dante he might have
reason to feel humbled,--is also not a little applicable[2] in the
case of Lord Byron.

[Footnote 1: Some passages in Foscolo's Essay on Petrarch may be
applied, with equal truth, to Lord Byron.--For instance, "It was
hardly possible with Petrarch to write a sentence without portraying
himself"--"Petrarch, allured by the idea that his celebrity would
magnify into importance all the ordinary occurrences of his life,
satisfied the curiosity of the world," &c. &c.--and again, with still
more striking applicability,--"In Petrarch's letters, as well as in
his Poems and Treatises, we always identify the author with the man,
who felt himself irresistibly impelled to develope his own intense
feelings. Being endowed with almost all the noble, and with some of
the paltry passions of our nature, and having never attempted to
conceal them, he awakens us to reflection upon ourselves while we
contemplate in him a being of our own species, yet different from any
other, and whose originality excites even more sympathy than
admiration."]

[Footnote 2: "II Petrarca poteva credere candidamente ch'ei non
pativa d'invidia solamente, perche fra tutti i viventi non v'era chi
non s'arretrasse per cedergli il passo alla prima gloria, ch'ei non
poteva sentirsi umiliato, fuorche dall' ombra di Dante."]

Between the dispositions and habits of Alfieri and those of the noble
poet of England, no less remarkable coincidences might be traced; and
the sonnet in which the Italian dramatist professes to paint his own
character contains, in one comprehensive line, a portrait of the
versatile author of Don Juan,--

"Or stimandome Achille ed or Tersite."

By the extract just given from his Journal, it will be perceived
that, in Byron's own opinion, a character which, like his, admitted
of so many contradictory comparisons, could not be otherwise than
wholly undefinable itself. It will be found, however, on reflection,
that this very versatility, which renders it so difficult to fix,
"ere it change," the fairy fabric of his character, is, in itself,
the true clue through all that fabric's mazes,--is in itself the
solution of whatever was most dazzling in his might or startling in
his levity, of all that most attracted and repelled,