Italian Language and Literature

Oft on the dappled turf at ease
I sit, and play with similes,
Loose type of things through all degrees.

Language is a city to the building of which every human being brought a stone.

There is first the literature of knowledge, and secondly, the literature of power. The function of the first is—to teach; the function of the second is—to move, the first is a rudder, the second an oar or a sail. The first speaks to the mere discursive understanding; the second speaks ultimately, it may happen, to the higher understanding or reason, but always through affections of pleasure and sympathy.