n the eager spirit of the times, sharing
all the ardor of the pursuit of knowledge, and with a spiritual insight
which led him into regions of mystery where no others ventured,
naturally connected the knowledge which opened the way for him with the
poetic imagination which cast light upon it. To him science was but
another name for poetry.

Much learning has been expended in the attempt to show that even the
doctrine of Love, which is displayed in "The New Life," is derived,
more or less directly, from the philosophy of Plato. It has been
supposed that this little autobiographic story, full of the most
intimate personal revelations, and glowing with a sincere passion, was
written on a preconceived basis of theory. A certain Platonic form of
expression, often covering ideas very far removed from those of Plato,
was common to the earlier, colder, and less truthful poets. Some
strains of such Platonism, derived from the poems of his predecessors,
are perhaps to be found in this first book of Dante's. But there is
nothing to show that he had deliberately adopted the teachings of the
ancient philosopher. It may well, indeed, be doubted if at the time of
its composition he had read any of Plato's works. Such Platonism as
exists in "The New Life" was of that unconscious kind which is shared
by every youth of thoughtful nature and sensitive temperament, who
makes of his beloved a type and image of divine beauty, and who by the
loveliness of the creature is led up to the perfection of the Creator.

The essential qualities of the "Vita Nuova," those which afford direct
illustration of Dante's character, as distinguished from those which
may be called youthful, or merely literary, or biographical, correspond
in striking measure with those of the "Divina Commedia." The earthly
Beatrice is exalted to the heavenly in the later poem; but the same
perfect purity and intensity of feeling with which she is reverently
regarded in the "Divina Commedia" is visible in scarcely less degree in
the earlier work. The imagination which makes the unseen seen, and the
unreal real, belongs alike to the one and to the other. The "Vita
Nuova" is chiefly occupied with a series of visions; the "Divina
Commedia" is one long vision. The sympathy with the spirit and impulses
of the time, which in the first reveals the youthful impressibility of
the poet, in the last discloses itself in maturer forms, in more
personal expressions. In the "Vita Nuova" it is