Basil experiences of Paracelsus. Like the poet of _Pauline_, after his
immersion in worldliness, Sordello again seeks solitude, and recovers a
portion of his higher self; but solitude cannot content one who is
unable to obtain the self-manifestation which his nature demands
without the aid of others who may furnish an external body for the
forces that lie suppressed within him. Suddenly and unexpectedly the
prospect of a political career opens before him. May it not be that he
will thus obtain what he needs, and find in the people the instrument of
his own thoughts, his passions, his aspirations, his imaginings, his
will? May not the people become the body in which his spirit, with all
its forces, shall incarnate itself? Coming into actual acquaintance with
the people for the first time, the sight of their multiform miseries,
their sorrows, even their baseness lays hold of Sordello; it seems as if
it were they who were about to make _him_ their instrument, the voice
through which their inarticulate griefs should find expression; he is
captured by those whom he thought to capture. By all his personal
connections he is of the Imperial party--a Ghibellin; but, studying the
position of affairs, he becomes convinced that the cause of the Pope is
one with the cause of the people. At this moment vast possibilities of
political power suddenly widen upon his view; Sordello, the minstrel, a
poor archer's son, is discovered to be in truth the only son of the
great Ghibellin chieftain, Salinguerra; he is loved by Palma, who, with
her youth and beauty, brings him eminent station, authority, and a
passion of devoted ambition on his behalf; his father flings upon
Sordello's neck the baldric which constitutes him the Emperor's
representative in Northern Italy. The heart and brain of Sordello become
the field of conflict between fierce, contending forces. All that is
egoistic in his nature cries out for a life of pride and power and joy.
At best it is but little that he could ever do to serve the suffering
multitude. And yet should he falter because he cannot gain for them the