horror of its excesses, was passing. More temperate ideas
prevailed; the need of a moral and religious restoration was felt.
Foscolo's poem touched these chords ... which vibrated in all
hearts."

The tragedies of Foscolo are little read, and his unfinished but
faithful translation of Homer did not have the success which met
the facile paraphrase of Monti. His other works were chiefly
critical, and are valued for their learning. The Italians claim
that in his studies of Dante he was the first to reveal him to
Europe in his political character, "as the inspired poet, who
availed himself of art for the civil regeneration of the people
speaking the language which he dedicated to supreme song"; and
they count as among their best critical works, Foscolo's
"exquisite essays on Petrarch and Boccaccio". His romance, "The
Last Letters of Jacopo Ortis", is a novel full of patriotism,
suffering, and suicide, which found devoted readers among youth
affected by "The Sorrows of Werther", and which was the first cry
of Italian disillusion with the French. Yet it had no political
effect, De Sanctis says, because it was not in accord with the
popular hopefulness of the time. It was, of course, wildly
romantic, of the romantic sort that came before the school had
got its name, and it was supposed to celebrate one of Foscolo's
first loves. He had a great many loves, first and last, and is
reproached with a dissolute life by the German critic, Gervinius.

He was made Professor of Italian Eloquence at the University of
Pavia in 1809; but, refusing to flatter Napoleon in his inaugural
address, his professorship was abolished. When the Austrians
returned to Milan, in 1815, they offered him the charge of their