Ideal Love
He who loves truly, grows in force and might;For beauty and the image of his loveExpand his spirit: whence he burns to proveAdventures high, and holds all perils light.If thus a lady's love dilate the knight,What glories and what joy all joys aboveShall not the heavenly splendour, joined by loveUnto our flesh-imprisoned soul, excite?Once freed, she would become one sphere immenseOf love, power, wisdom, filled with Deity,Elate with wonders of the eternal Sense.But we like sheep and wolves war ceaselessly:That love we never seek, that light intense,Which would exalt us to infinity.
Words in this poem
- shall v. i.
- To owe; to be under obligation for. [OE. shal, schal, imp. sholde, scholde, AS. scal, sceal, I am obliged, imp. scolde, sceolde, inf. sculan; akin to OS. skulan, pres. skal, imp. skolda, D. zullen,]
- splendour n.
- Great brightness; brilliant luster; brilliancy; as, the splendor ot the sun. B. Jonson. [L. fr. splendere to shine: cf. F. splendeur.]
- elate a.
- Lifted up; raised; elevated. [L. elatus elevated, fig., elated, proud (the figure, perh., being borrowed from a prancing horse); e out + latus (used as p. p. of ferre to bear), for tlatus, a]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Ideal Love is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Sonnets of Michael Angelo Buonarroti and Tommaso Campanella, Project Gutenberg ebook #10314, the John Addington Symonds translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Tommaso Campanella, Ideal Love, in Sonnets (1878), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #10314, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/campanella-sonnets/ideal-love.html, id L27823.
Form and metre
Ideal Love is 14 lines in a single stanza. The metre is iambic pentameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 87%).
See other poems in iambic pentameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 ABBAABBAC-C-C- mightA · loveB · proveB · lightA · knightA · aboveB · loveB · exciteA · immenseC · deity · senseC · ceaselessly · intenseC · infinity
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against iambic pentameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| He who loves truly, grows in force and might; | 10 | ···/˘····· |
| For beauty and the image of his love | 10 | ·/˘··/˘··· |
| Expand his spirit: whence he burns to prove | 10 | ˘/·/˘····· |
| Adventures high, and holds all perils light. | 10 | ˘/˘····/˘· |
| If thus a lady's love dilate the knight, | 10 | ···/˘·˘/·· |
| What glories and what joy all joys above | 10 | ·/˘······· |
| Shall not the heavenly splendour, joined by love | 10 | ···/˘/˘··· |
| Unto our flesh-imprisoned soul, excite? | 10 | ··/·˘/˘·˘/ |
| Once freed, she would become one sphere immense | 10 | ····˘/··˘/ |
| Of love, power, wisdom, filled with Deity, | 11 | ··/˘/˘··/˘˘ |
| Elate with wonders of the eternal Sense. | 11 | ˘/·/˘··˘/˘· |
| But we like sheep and wolves war ceaselessly: | 10 | ·······/˘˘ |
| That love we never seek, that light intense, | 10 | ···/˘···˘/ |
| Which would exalt us to infinity. | 10 | ··˘/··˘/˘˘ |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.