And
of what can be known," I say that not even to that which I do
understand am I sufficient, because my tongue is not so eloquent that
it could tell that which is discoursed in my thoughts concerning her.
It may be seen, therefore, that, with respect to the Truth, it is very
little that I shall say; and this redounds to her great praise, if
well considered, in that which was the main intention. And it is
possible to say that this form of speech came indeed from the workshop
of Rhetoric, which on every side lays its hand upon the main
intention. Then, when it says, "If my Song fail," I excuse myself for
my fault, which ought not, then, to be blamed when others see that my
words are far below the dignity of this Lady. And I say that, if the
defect is in my rhymes, that is, in my words, which are appointed to
discourse of her, for this are to be blamed the weakness of the
intellect and the abruptness of our speech: "blame wit and words,"
which are overpowered by the thought, so that they cannot follow it
entirely, especially there where the thought is born of love, because
there the Soul searches more deeply than elsewhere. It would be quite
possible for any one to say: Thou dost excuse and accuse thyself all
in one breath, which is a reason for blame, not for escape from blame,
inasmuch as the blame, which is mine, is cast on the intellect and on
the speech; for, if it be good, I ought to be praised for it in so
much as it is so; and if it be defective, I ought to be blamed. To
this it is possible to reply, briefly, that I do not accuse myself,
but that I excuse myself in truth. And therefore it is to be known,
according to the opinion of the Philosopher in the third book of the
Ethics, that man is worthy of praise or of blame only in those things
which it is in his power to do or not to do; but in those things over
which he has no power he deserves neither blame nor praise, since
either the praise or blame is to be attributed to some other, although
the things may be parts of the man himself. Therefore, we ought not to
blame the man because his body, from his birth, may be ugly, since it
was not in his power to make it beautiful; but our blame should fall
on the evil disposition of the matter whereof he is made, whose source
was a defect of Nature. And even so we ought not to praise the man for
the beauty of form which he may have from his birth, for he was not
the maker of it; but we ought to praise the artificer, that