St Francis Xavier Academy - Xavier Yearbook (Providence, RI)

Page 31 text:

THE XAVIER 31 DANTE, THE ARTIST |ANTE, the master-genius of the 1300’s, shows himself to | us myriadsided. He is philosopher, epic, poet, “one of the supreme triad,” theologian, patriot, profound scholar, and founder of that soft, sweet southern tongue, the modern Italian. While in each of these he occupies a niche peculiarly his own, there is one place in the world’s gallery of fame where as we gaze at hitn, all others of the type are lost in the distance and Dante, the artist, stands out pre-eminent. We apply the term to one skilled in the practice of the fine arts. He who has the power of depicting nature or man in any mood on canvas or other surface, is the painter; he who can make the marble or bronze seem to live and breathe for us is the sculptor ; but he, who deals with the beautiful in language who shows us nature or man in any mood, not on canvas, not in the plastic clay, but in words, clear, glowing, so that the mind can conceive as readily as the eye can see, he is the true artist, and such a one was Dante by excellence. It is in the “Divine Comedy” that he shows this magical art of his, painting for us, pictures, virile, illuminating; limning portraits with all the “admirable force of a Velasquez and the coloring of a Tintoretto.” In these magnificent delineations, he appeals to the emotions, he charms the senses, he enlightens the intellect, and speaks to the soul of the true and the good, leading her on to the very footstool of the Author of the true and the good. He appeals to the emotions ;—Can we stand with him and Virgil before the awful entrance to the Inferno, read the dread inscription upon that arch,— “Through me you pass into the city of woe : Through me you pass into eternal pain : Through me among the people lost for aye. Justice, the founder of my fabric moved : To rear me was the task of power divine, Supremest wisdom, and primeval love. Before me things create were none, save things Eternal, and eternal I endure. All hope abandon ye, who enter here.”

Page 30 text:

30 THE XAVIER Ausserhalb auf beiden Seiten der Thure standen zwei Soldaten. Sie begrussten und als wir vorbeigingen und in das Zimmer traten. Dies war selir gross versehen mit glassernen Tischen die in langen Reihen standen. Auf den Tischen waren Kastchen inwendig gestickt mit Gold und in jedem war ein wundersckones Kleinod. ,,Dies ist IhrTisch, Anna,” sagte die Fee. ,,Mein Tisch,” erwiderte Anna. .,Wie kann ich ein Tiscli hier haben, da ich niemand kenne.” ,,Desungeachtet ist dies dein Tisch,” sagte ihre Pate. Auf den Tischen waren vier-und-zwanzig Kastchen aber das letzt liatte kein Kleinod. ,, Wo ist das schone Kleinod fur dieses Kastchen ?” fragte Anna. ,,Jenes Kleinod ist verloren und darum muss das Kastchen leer bleiben,” sagte die Fee. ,,Aber, waruin muss es leer bleiben?” entgegnete Anna. ,,Ich werde es dir erzahlen,” sagte ihre Pate. ,,Dies vicr-und zwanzig Kleinodien bedeuten vier-und-zwanzig Stunden im Tage.” ,,Aber ein Kastchen ist leer,” bemerkte Anna,—,,wo ist das Kleinod ?” ,, Vier-und-zwanzig Kleinodien waren dir im Anfange gegeben, aber seitdem du die Stunde in Traumereien verloren hast, war dein Kleinod auch verloren und gleich der Stunde kann es niemals gefunden werden.” Plotzlich richtete Anna sich auf erwachend, und die Fee. Kleinodien, Kastchen und alles war verschwunden. Anna sah ein dass ihre Traumerei ein wirkliches Traum war. Dieselbe Nacht, jedoch, ehe sie sich zur Ruhe begab, machte sie den Vorsatz niemals mehr eine Minute zu verlieren, Oder zu verschwenden, und dadurch ein Kleinod zu verlieren. Frances Doran.

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32 THE XAVIER follow him, cross the threshold and perceive through the murky darkness ‘pierced by no star,” a vast multitude, who wailing with terror, cast themselves like the leaves in Autumn down on the shore of that great Acheron, where Charon, the ferryman, sliaggy-clieeked, with eyes of burning coal, beckons, collects, strikes the lingering, and thus, ‘‘They go over the umbered wave, and ever on the opposing bank are landed while on this side another throng still gathers,”—can we look at this, I say, and not be moved to the very centre of our being, not feel the anguish, the agony of each unfortunate spirit ? He charms the senses ;—No one can deny this after reading his description of dawn upon the waters in the first canto of the Purgatorio, the coming on of evening in the 8th and 15th cantos of the same book, and again, in the 20th of the Paradiso, the upward flight of the lark on a spring morning. We see those delightful things just as he saw them. We are aroused to keenest sympathy and experieEce the very feelings that stirred his great and noble nature. He illumines the intellect;— In canto ninth of the Purgatorio, our artist prepares a palette of rich, harmonious color and with quick strokes, paints in a series of the most vivid imagery, where each detail tells. ‘‘Thither we came : and the first mighty stair Was marble white—so polished and so smooth That I stood mirrored there as I appear. The second, darker than the darkest blue, Was formed of a rough stone, rugged and dry, Cracked lengthwise and across through all its mass. The third, whose bulk completes the topmost stair, Seemed to my gaze, of porphyry, that flamed Like blood forth bursting from a smitten vein. Thereon God’s angel planting both his feet. Sat firmly stationed on the threshold floor, Which, as I thought, was solid diamond.” But Dante is the Catholic teacher, and so in this grand conception he creates the picture and at the same time, points to the symbols, emphasizes the lessons to be learned. The first stair, ‘‘polished, smooth, marble white, ” is our soul when in the state of grace, pure and sincere ; the second, the dark slab, rugged, dry, cracked crosswise, our soul broken and contrite after sin ; the blood-red porphyry of the third stair, our soul