Dante: The Central Man of All the World | Page 7

Here the object of loving hospitality, he
remained finding means and opportunity for profound study. Before he
departed he drew from his bosom a part of the precious manuscript of

Divina Commedia and trustingly giving it into the hands of the Prior
said, "Here, Brother, is a portion of my work which you may not have
seen: this remembrance I leave with you: forget me not."
That he himself was not unforgetful of the sympathy of the simple and
warm-hearted followers of St. Francis is evident from the fact that he
gloried in his membership of the Third Order, wearing about his body
the Franciscan cincture for chastity and it is not unlikely that at
Ravenna before he finally closed his eyes upon the turmoil of the world
full of vicissitudes, he modestly requested that he be buried in the
simple habit of the order and be laid to rest in a tomb attached to their
monastery. In any event such was his burial.
For our sympathetic understanding of the supremacy of religion in
Dante's day, may I again quote Ralph Adams Cram, whose words on
the eleventh century are equally applicable to the era of our Florentine
and to his country? Dr. Cram writes: "It is hard for us to think back into
such an alien spirit and time as this and so understand how with
one-tenth of its present population England could support so vast and
varied a religious establishment, used as we are to an age where
religion is only a detail for many and for most a negligible factor. We
are only too familiar with the community that could barely support one
parish church, boasting its one-half dozen religious organizations, all
together claiming the adherence of only a minority of the population,
but in the Middle Ages, religion was not only the most important and
pervasive thing, it was a moral obligation on every man, woman and
child, and rejection or even indifference was unthinkable. If once we
grasp this fact," continues Cram, "we can understand how in the
eleventh century, the whole world should cover itself with 'its white
robe of churches.'"
The second great fact observable in the times of Dante is that it was an
age of inquiry and of efficient craftsmanship. Many of our generation
think that Dante's day being so far removed from the age of printing
and the spirit of positivism, and being given to the upholding of
authority almost as an unexhaustible source of knowledge, was wholly
unacquainted with scientific research. Furthermore they declare that

education then was almost at its minimum stage. A little study will
show that the people of that era were not unacquainted with the
scientific spirit and it will also prove that if education did not prevail, in
the sense that everybody had an opportunity to read and write--a
consummation hardly to be expected--education in the sense of
efficiency--education in the etymological sense, i.e. the training of the
faculties so that the individual might develop creative self-expression
and especially that he might bring out what was best in him, all which
meant knowledge highly useful to himself and others--that kind of
education was not uncommon.
To give an idea of the scientific inquiry and sharp observation of mind
in those days, I might cite Dante as a master exponent of nature study,
and adept of science. Passing over his experiment in optics given in
Paradiso, given so naturally as to justify the inference that investigation
in physics was then not an uncommon mode of gaining knowledge, I
call your attention to an observation made by Alexander Von Humboldt,
the distinguished scientist, to prove that nothing escaped the eyes of
Dante, intent equally upon natural phenomena and the things of the
soul. Von Humboldt suggests that the rhetorical figure employed by
Dante in his description of the River of Light with its banks of
wonderful flowers (Par. XXX, 61) is an application of our poet's
knowledge of the phosphorescence of the ocean. If you have ever
looked down the side of a steamship at night as it ploughed its way
forward, and if you have ever observed in the sea the thousand darting
lights just below the water line your enjoyable experience will enable
you to appreciate the beauty of this passage. I now quote:
"I saw a glory like a stream flow by In brightness rushing and on either
side Were banks that with spring's wondrous hues might vie And from
that river living sparks did soar And sank on all sides in the flow'rets
bloom Like precious rubies set in golden ore Then as if drunk with all
the rich perfume Back to the wondrous torrent did they roll And as one
sank another filled its room."
Commenting on this passage, Von Humboldt says "It