In the Carmagnola the pathos is chiefly in the
feeling embodied by the magnificent chorus lamenting the slaughter of
Italians by Italians at the battle of Maclodio; in the Adelchi we are
conscious of no emotion so strong as that we experience when we
hear the wail of the Italian people, to whom the overthrow of their
Longobard oppressors by the Franks is but the signal of a new
enslavement. This chorus is almost as fine as the more famous one in
the Carmagnola; both are incomparably finer than anything else in the
tragedies and are much more dramatic than the dialogue. It is in the
emotion of a spectator belonging to our own time rather than in that
of an actor of those past times that the poet shows his dramatic
strength; and whenever he speaks abstractly for country and humanity
he moves us in a way that permits no doubt of his greatness.
After all, there is but one Shakespeare, and in the drama below him
Manzoni holds a high place. The faults of his tragedies are those
of most plays which are not acting plays, and their merits are much
greater than the great number of such plays can boast. I have not
meant to imply that you want sympathy with the persons of the drama,
but only less sympathy than with the ideas embodied in them. There are
many affecting scenes, and the whole of each tragedy is conceived in
the highest and best ideal.
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