simple and natural form. But the poet in him pushes the man aside, and
bids him, at all events, wait. He does not know that he is failing
through the hopeless disunion of the two. He silences his better
humanity, and retains the worst; for he is more and more determined to
succeed at whatever cost. Yet failure meets him on every side. He is too
large for his public, but he is also too small for it. Every question
raised even in talk carries him into the infinite. Every man of his
audience has a practical answer ready before he has. Naddo plies him
with common sense. "He is to speak to the human heart--he is not to be
so philosophical--he is not to seem so clever." Shallow judges pull him
to pieces. Shallow rivals strive to sing him down.[15] He loses his
grasp of the ideal. He cannot clutch the real. His imagination dries up.

Meanwhile Adelaide has died. Salinguerra, who had joined the Emperor at
Naples, is brought back in hot haste by the news that Eccelino has
retired to a monastery, has disclaimed the policy of his House; and is
sealing his peace with the Guelph princes by the promised marriage of
his sons Eccelino and Alberic with the sisters of Este; and of his
daughter Palma with Count Richard of San Bonifacio himself. He is coming
to Mantua. Sordello must greet him with his best art. But Sordello
shrinks from the trial, and escapes back to Goito, whence Palma has just
departed. What his Mantuan life has taught him is thus expressed (vol.
i. page 130):--

"The Body, the Machine for Acting Will,
Had been at the commencement proved unfit;
That for Demonstrating, Reflecting it,
Mankind--no fitter: was the Will Itself
In fault?"