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Untitled Article
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Untitled Article
Gar . Am I to walk , talk , think as you direct—Eat , drink , and sneeze in your approved good fashion—Sleep in your attitude , and dream your dream ? I'd rather make my bed upon a wasp ' s nest . Gio . Thou dost already ; and thro * the spleenful day Bear ' st it about , as madmen play with fire . Gar . As elder brothers play !"—p . 8 .
The depths of heart-thrilling pathos are searched in the after development of Garcia . His burst of feeling at the fatal issue of the quarrel in the
chase , has all the anguished fervor of the first bitter grief that comes to blight the freshness of youth : —
" Gar . He is not dead !—he is not surely dead ? Giovanni , speak to me—speak but one word t Make some faint sign—the least—that I may know A thread of life remains !—save me from madness ! ( After a pause . ) Yes—he is surely dead—he must be dead ! No sleep was e ' er like this—no trance—no fainting ! Those white and rigid lips—those dreadful eye-balls , Turning me all to stone ;—all but my soul—Would that were stone too !—God I make me a stone , Or make him animate !—these unnatural limbs—These root-cold fingers—fallen jaw—this hair Steaming the grass—all prove that death is here ; For every vital thing i' the universe Is quite unlike it I —Where—where shall I go ! ( Exit wildly . )"—p . 41 .
The misery of his concealment of Giovanni's death ; a concealment foreign to his nature , but to which he is driven by the consciousness of the towering despotism of his father ' s will and judgment , and the excessive tenderness of his mother's affection ; the maze of deceit in which he becomes involved , inducing a despairing recklessness ; the rapid growth of mind and passion under the bitter lessons of misery , and the final throwing off of the heavy load in the dreadful
closing scene of his life , are points which will be felt as successive and masterly proofs of genius in the mind which conceived them . We cannot take a finer example of the strength which is the grand feature in the character of Cosmo than the scene at the banquet , where , surrounded by the magnificence of his court , he receives the news of the death of Giovanni from the Cavalier Dalmasso , who has found the body in the forest : —
" Cosmo . Who ' s this ? with ' s spear And grey with dust ! See you aright , sir ?
Untitled Article
196 Cosmo de ? Medici .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 1, 1837, page 196, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1835/page/52/
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