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CHAPTER VI.
THE PROSE WORKS.
It is scarcely to be looked for that even the most supreme genius should be able to keep up in prose the lofty level raised in such verse as that of the 'Divine Comedy;' and there is good reason why the lesser productions of Dante, though dear to the student both for their own strange sake and for the minute rays of exposition which they throw upon his chief work, should be unlikely to attract popular sympathy or interest. To ourselves, we cannot deny, even the sometimes sublime strain of the "Paradiso" is impaired by the very large admixture of theology and philosophy to which the denizens of heaven give vent, in their anxiety to remove those "doubts" which so persistently assail the poet. And the three chief prose productions of Dante are all theology and philosophy, full of arguments so minute, so detailed, and so subtle, that the strain of attention required to follow them is beyond the powers of most readers. These works are the 'Convito,' the discourse 'Sul Volgare Eloquio,' and that called 'La Monarchia.' The two later of these seem to have been written for a special purpose: one, to encourage and recommend, as well as to defend
