Note 42 — Chapter VII · THE MINOR WORKS

It is, perhaps, worth noting that as the tendency to concetti increased in Italian literature, Dante was more and more neglected. Only three editions appeared from 1596 to 1716. Curiously enough, there are two treatises extant which just correspond with the beginning and end of this period of eclipse. One of them is called A Brief and Ingenious Discourse against the Work of Dante. It was written by Monsignor Alessandro Cariero, and published at Padua in 1582. The arguments are of the feeblest and most pedantic kind; but it marks a stage in taste. The recovery is indicated by a Defence of Dante Alighieri, a lecture given by Dr. Giuseppe Bianchini to the Florentine Academy in 1715, and published three years later.