Abstract
The metaphysical concept of the «works» in the Persiles is based on discovering and expressing, in the chain to be, the human plenitude through different degrees of moral perfection. Human ascends, as in a chain of links, from its barbarian state to its moral fulfillment, culminated in Rome. This is why the theme of the journey, associated with the pilgrimage as a symbol of human life, is so important and structures the work.
From its start point in the Northern Islands (the mythical Barbara Island), Denmark, Ireland, England, and Portugal to the Mediterranean, passing through France and Italy. The protagonists confirm that concatenated metaphysical structure that goes from the lowest in the order of creation (the barbarians, types like Clodio and Rosamunda) to a higher level of moral perfection in the scale of being (Arnaldo, Periandro and Auristela, Mauricio and Soldino) arriving to Rome, “the heaven of the earth”.
To analyse those “works”, carried out by our protagonists in the pilgrimage of the human being, what Alexander Pope calls “the vast chain of being”, in his Essay on Man (1733), is the proposal of my work.
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