In this unfortunate yet illustrious land, ever fresh to travellers, ever to be hallowed in spite of revolutions and assassinations, of popes and priests, of semi-infidel artists and cynical savants, of beggars and tramps, of filthy hotels and dilapidated villas, Madame de Stael lingered more than a year, visiting every city which has a history and every monument which has antiquity; and the result of that journey was “Corinne,”—­one of the few immortal books which the heart of the world cherishes; which is as fresh to-day as it was nearly one hundred years ago,—­a novel, a critique, a painting, a poem, a tragedy; interesting to the philosopher in his study and to the woman in her boudoir, since it is the record of the cravings of a great soul, and a description of what is most beautiful or venerated in nature or art.  It is the most wonderful book ever written of Italy,—­with faults, of course, but a transcript of profound sorrows and lofty aspirations.  To some it may seem exaggerated in its transports; but can transports be too highly colored?  Can any words be as vivid as a sensation?  Enthusiasm, when fully expressed, ceases to be a rapture; and the soul that fancies it has reached the heights of love or beauty or truth, claims to comprehend the immortal and the infinite.

It is the effort of genius to express the raptures and sorrows of a lofty but unsatisfied soul, the glories of the imperishable in art and life, which gives to “Corinne” its peculiar charm.  It is the mirror of a wide and deep experience,—­a sort of “Divine Comedy,” in which a Dante finds a Beatrice, not robed in celestial loveliness, coursing from circle to circle and star to star, explaining the mysteries of heaven, but radiant in the beauty of earth, and glowing with the ardor of a human love.  Every page is masculine in power, every sentence is condensed thought, every line burns with passion; yet every sentiment betrays the woman, seeking to reveal her own boundless capacities of admiration and friendship, to be appreciated, to be loved with that fervor and disinterestedness which she was prepared to lavish on the object of her adoration.  No man could have made such revelations, although it may be given to him to sing a greater song.  While no woman could have composed the “Iliad,” or the “Novum Organum,” or the “Critique of Pure Reason,” or “Othello,” no man could have written “Corinne” or “Adam Bede.”

In painting Corinne, Madame de Stael simply describes herself, as she did in “Delphine,” with all her restless soul-agitations; yet not in too flattering colors, since I doubt if there ever lived a more impassioned soul, with greater desires of knowledge, or a more devouring thirst for fame, or a profounder insight into what is lofty and eternal, than the author of “Corinne.”  Like Heloise, she could love but one; yet, unlike Heloise, she could not renounce, even for love, the passion for admiration or the fascinations of society.  She does not attempt to disguise