As a Jlinorite he was not willing to become a priest, but only a lay-brother. "Very severe against himself he was," says Wa(l<ling, "always full of desire to imitate Christ and suffer for him. In an ecstasy he imagined, at times, that he saw him with his bodily eyes. Very often he was seen sighing, sometimes weeping, some- times singing, sometimes embracing trees, and exclaim- ing, 'O sweet Jesus! O gracious Jesus! O beloved Je- sus!' Often he conversed with his Saviour, who call- ed him dearest Jacob. Once when weeping loudly, on being asked the cause, he answered, ' Because Love is not loved.'" That Jacopone was in deep earnest with his ascetic life is beyond all doubt. For determining the genuineness of love he gives these searching tests : " Al- though I cannot know positively that I love, yet I have some good marks of it. Among others it is a sign of love to God when I ask the Lord for something, and he does it not, and I love him, notwithstanding, more than before. If he does contrary to that which I seek for in my prayer, and I love him twofold more than before, it is a sign of right love. Of love to my neighbor I have this sign, namely, that when he injures me I love him not less than before. Did I love him less, it would prove that I had loved not him previously, but myself." On the subjugation of the senses he allegorizes in this wise : "A very beautiful virgin had five brothers, and all were very poor; and the virgin had a precious jewel of great worth. One of her brethren was a guitar-player, the second a painter, the third a cook, the fourth a spice- dealer, the fifth a pimp; each desired the jewel. The first was willing to play, and so on ; but she said, What shall I do when the music has ceased? In short, she remained firm and kept the jewel. At last a great king came, who was willing to make her his bride and give her eternal life if she would give up to him the jewel. She re()lied : How can I, O my beloved, to such grace refuse the stone ? and so she gave it to him." It is plain that by the five brethren are meant the five senses ; by the virgin, the soul; and by the precious jewel, the will. With such severe principles and severer ascetic life, Ja- copone could not fail to earnestly denounce the corrup- tions of his time in general, and especially the licentious manners, wickedness, and debaucheries of the priesthood, and the deeply sunken condition of the Church. He was especially severe on pope Boniface VIII, who pun- ished him bj' excommunication and hard imprisonment. Boniface, one day passing the cell where Jacopone was, asked mockingly, " When will you come out'?" He an- swered, "When you come in." After the death of this bad pope, in 1308, Jacopone was set free, and closed his earthly jiilgrimage at an advanced age, Dec. 25, 1306, and was buried at Todi. "He died," says Wadding, "like a swan, having composed several hymns just be- fore his death." The inscription on his grave tells the story of his life :
"Ossa B. Jacopoiii de Benedictis Turtertini, Fr. Oidiuis Minorum Qui stultus propter Chiistum Nova Muiuhiiii arte delusit, Et Cceluin riipuit. OI)dJ)riiiivit in Doniiiio Die XXV Decembris, Aiiiio MCCLXXXXVI."
The year 1290 is not correct; hence Wadding calls this date a cnmsus error.
The Mater Dolorosa has furnished the text to some of the noblest musical compositions by Palestriua, I'ergo-
STABAT MATER
9V3 STABAT MATER SPECIOSA
lesi, Astorga, Haj'dn, Bellini, Rossini, Neukomm. That of Palestriua is still annually performed in the Sistine Chapel during the Passion week; that of Pergolesi, the last and most celebrated of his works, has never been surpassed, if equalled, in the estimation of critics of Pergolesi's compositions. Tieck, in his Phaiitasus (ed. 1812, ii, 384 sq.), expresses himself in the following man- ner: "The loveliness of sorrow in the depth of pain, this smiling in pain, this childlikeness which touches the highest heaven, had to me never before risen so bright in the soul; I had to turn away to conceal my tears, especially at the place 'Vidit suum didcem Na- tum.' How signiticant that the Amen, after all is con- cluded, still sounds and plays in itself, and, in tender emotion, can find no end, as if it were afraid to dry up the tears and would still till itself with sobbings! The hymn itself is touching and profoundly penetrating. Surely the poet sang these rhymes, 'Qua3 moerebat et dolebat cum videbat," with a moved mind." It is a tra- dition that the great impression which the Stubat Ma- ter of the young artist (Pergolesi) made on its first per- formance inflamed another musician with such furious envy that he stabbetl the young man as he left the church. This tradition was long ago disproved ; but as Pergolesi died at an early age, it may, as some one re- marks, be permitted to the poet to refer to this story, and allow him to fall as a victim of his art and inspira- tion.
III. Translations. — Like the Dies Irce this hymn has challenged and defied the skill of the best translators and imitators. Thus Lisco mentions about eighty German translations and four Dutch. The earliest German translation is that by Herman of Salzburg (^Maria stuend in swinden smerczen'). Of other transla- tors we mention L. Tieck, De la Motte Fouque, A. L. Follen, Wessenberg, Daniel, Lisco, Konigsfeld, A. Knapp, etc. Of English translations we mention that of E. Cas- wall, in Hymns and Poems, " At the cross her station keeping;" that of lord Lindsay, in The Seven Great Hymns of the Mediceval Church (N. Y. 1866), p. 98 :