pm? Sm Ae ened > 
 
 = 
 
 = ~ : : See = aememet = = : = : Ritgeesese 
 ogee === 2 3 = = = 3 ae > meatewere aes 
 ik okt 
 
 =. Sescatepintes 
 32 : g Spaaien 
 pees ae = Se eee : : ei ens 
 sy = teat estas eee Seer eens == eanange ‘= mts, = ; : means = : Wee ae 
 feasts nS ee Se ete ze ; peers 
 
 Sates 
 
 *. 
 Bonen 
 a 
 Sores 
 = yee Shree 
 Pega emcee 
 
 as iS 5 ¥ 
 : SSS: = - TAs oes Soe > ay me Pee 
 Ses 3 . : = 7 = = = 
 tS Faint = : Ss = Se Seas : y ‘s tee 
 gs eprapaer nes : Be ~ = 2 eS, . : f STi 
 
 Fas meee 
 
 Se 
 
| AF ae , 
 he eee 
 
 a4 
 / er OC / . 4 
 
 THE LIBRARY OF THE 
 UNIVERSITY OF 
 “NORTH CAROLINA 
 AT CHAPEL HILL 
 
 ENDOWED BY THE 
 DIALECTIC AND PHILANTHROPIC 
 SOCIETIES 
 
 DEMCO 
 
UNIVERSITY OF N 
 
 | ll TN 
 
 01517930 
 
 This book is due at the WALTER R. DAVIS LIBRARY on 
 the last date stamped under ‘‘Date Due.” If not on hold it 
 may be renewed by bringing it to the library. 
 
 DATE 
 DUE 
 
 ‘AUG=C 
 
 be 
 
 are 
 A OK face aR 10s 
 analy ae 
 iam 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2023 with funding from 
 University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill 
 
 https://archive.org/details/divinecomedyOOdant_ 3 
 
Che World's Greatest Literature 
 
 HE Masterpieces of the World’s Greatest 
 Authors in History, Biography, Philosophy, 
 Economics, Politics; Epic and Dramatic 
 
 Literature, History of English Literature, Oriental 
 Literature (Sacred and Profane), Orations, Essays. 
 Sixty-one Crown Octavo Volumes 2 
 
 ILLUSTRATED WITH FRONTISPIECES, EACH A MASTER 
 WORK OF ART IN PORTRAITURE OR HISTORIC PAINTING 
 
 Cditors 
 
 LIBRARY COMMITTEE 
 JUSTIN McCARTHY, M.P. 
 Flistorian and Journalist 
 TIMOTHY DWIGHT, D.D., LL.D. 
 Eix-President Yale Untversity 
 
 RICHARD HENRY STODDARD 
 Author and Critic 
 
 PAUL VAN DYKE, D.D. 
 
 Princeton Untversity 
 
 ALBERT ELLERY BERGH 
 Managing Editor 
 
 ADVISORY COMMITTEE 
 
 JOHN T. MORGAN 
 United States Senate 
 
 FREDERIC R. COUDERT, LL.D. 
 New York Bar 
 
 EDWARD EVERETT HALE 
 Author and Editor 
 
 MAURICE FRANCIS EGAN, LL.D. 
 Catholic University of America 
 
 JULIAN HAWTHORNE 
 Literary Editor 
 
THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 BY K Gf Y3K 
 
 DANTE ALIGHIERI ¢¥ 
 
 TRANSLATED BY 
 
 Pen ikY ORRANCIS- CARY 
 
 WITH INTRODUCTION AND EXPLANATORY NOTES 
 BY THE TRANSLATOR 
 
 REVISED EDITION 
 
 NEW YORK AND LONDON 
 THE CO-OPERATIVE PUBLICATION SOCIETY 
 
a 
 
 ‘CopyRIGHT, 1901 
 
 By THE COLONIAL PRESS 
 
 th 
 
 — 
 
 oe 
 
 Pk os 
 
 _3 
 
 =. 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 T is not to be wondered at that while Petrarch, Ariosto, and 
 Tasso found English translators and imitators during the 
 Elizabethan period, the “ Divine Comedy ” was compara- 
 
 tively neglected and remained untranslated. The spirit of the 
 Italian Renaissance which, spreading westward, had quickened 
 the intellectual life of France and England, was of a different 
 order from that with which Dante had been inspired.  Dante’s 
 poem was largely the product and expression of the medizeval 
 conceptions of the universe embodied in the dogma of the 
 Roman Church. In form and substance it was strange to the 
 new era. Hence, though Chaucer had translated delightfully 
 some brief passages of it, though it was read and admired by a 
 few scholars and poets of succeeding generations, though Mil- 
 ton recognized Dante’s greatness well enough to speak of his 
 “ giving leave to Fame,” the “ Divine Comedy ” remained prac- 
 tically unknown to English readers down to the end of the eigh- 
 teenth century. Thomas Warton, a scholar of genial apprecia- 
 tions and wide reading, could say of it as late as 1780 in his 
 “History of English Poetry”: “ We are surprised that a poet 
 should write one hundred cantos on hell, purgatory, and para- 
 dise. But this prolixity is partly owing to the want of art and 
 method.” And this of a poem unsurpassed in the whole field of 
 literature precisely in these very qualities of art and method. 
 Warton cites a witty and vivacious paraphrase and per- 
 version by Voltaire of a passage from the poem, praises Vol- 
 taire’s “ inimitable lines,” and adds, with seemingly unconscious 
 humor, “ Dante thus translated would have had many more 
 readers than at present.” Speaking of the Italian poets of the 
 thirteenth century, among whom Dante was included, he says 
 with true Anglican provincialism: ‘“ Their unnatural and ec- 
 centric habits of mind and manners, . . . their scholastic 
 theology, superstition, ideal love, and, above all, their chivalry, 
 
 Classics. Vol. 34—A iii O37! 
 
 tan i 4 
 
 ts OR aw . 
 
iv INTRODUCTION 
 
 had corrupted every true principle of life and literature, and 
 consequently prevented the progress of taste and propriety.” 
 But Warton himself, in spite of his false judgments, was doing 
 much by his generally excellent History to promote that change 
 of taste and sentiment which the course of time was rapidly 
 bringing about, and which was to result in a juster appreciation 
 of the poet whose “art and method” had been obscured by 
 prepossessions engendered by the false doctrine which had long 
 been prevalent in regard to the nature and scope of the pocket 
 imagination and-to the laws of poetic expression. 
 
 It was just after the publication of Warton’s History that 
 the first English version of the “ Inferno” was published. It 
 was the work of Mr. Charles Rogers, F.R.S., a man of culti- 
 vated taste, whose two folio volumes of “ Prints in Imitation 
 of Drawings by the Great Masters ” are still valued by lovers 
 of the fine arts. His translation appeared anonymously in a 
 quarto volume in 1782. I know it only by extracts from it, 
 and, so far as one may judge from these specimens, it is a very 
 respectable performance, in its general fidelity to the original 
 and in the well-sustained measure of its blank verse. It is at 
 least to be held as a superior work to the version of the “ In- 
 ferno” by the Rev. Henry Boyd, an Irish clergyman, which 
 appeared in 1785, and which was republished, seventeen 
 years later, in 1802, with the addition of the other portions of 
 the poem, forming thus the first complete English translation 
 of the “ Divine Comedy.” 
 
 Mr. Boyd’s notes and preliminary essays show that he had 
 prepared himself for his task by some study of Italian history, 
 but he was not a profound nor a very accurate scholar, and his 
 notions of translation were of the most liberal character. His 
 work is in iambic verse in stanzas of six lines, of which the 
 first two, the third and sixth, the fourth and fifth rhyme. He 
 makes no attempt to reproduce the qualities of the style and 
 diction of the original, but is content with a free and fluent 
 paraphrase of its meaning, often remoulding Dante’s sentiment 
 no less than his words, and adding to his thought or subtracting 
 from it, not merely according to the need of the verse, but at 
 times apparently according to the moral sense of the translator, 
 or his wish to supply what he esteemed defective in the original. 
 The very opening stanza affords a good example of his method. 
 
INTRODUCTION Vv 
 
 The words of Dante, as every reader of the “ Divine Comedy ” 
 remembers, are literally: “ Midway upon the journey of our 
 life | found myself in a dark wood where the right way was 
 perplexed.” In Mr. Boyd’s numbers this is transformed as 
 follows: 
 
 ‘* When life had labour’d up her midmost stage, 
 And weary with her mortal pilgrimage, | 
 Stood in suspense upon the point of Prime ; 
 Far in a pathless grove I chanc’d to stray, 
 Where scarce imagination dares display 
 The gloomy scen’ry of the savage clime.” 
 
 It is plain that Mr. Boyd’s work has almost as much claim to 
 be called an original poem as a translation, and that its reader 
 will hardly find in it a closer resemblance to the “ Divine 
 Comedy ” than the image in the bowl of a spoon presents of 
 the countenance reflected in it. 
 
 Twelve years after the publication of Boyd’s version of the 
 “Inferno,” the Rev. Henry Francis Cary set himself to the 
 translation of the poem. He was the son of an Irishman, cap- 
 tain in the British army, of good family, with a tradition of 
 breeding and culture, his grandfather having been the Archdea- 
 con and his great-grandfather the Bishop of Killala. Cary was 
 born in 1772. While yet a boy he displayed a love of literature, a 
 fondness for poetry, and a readiness at versifying. His early let- 
 ters, published in the memoir of him by his son, give evidence of 
 refinement of taste and unusual maturity of judgment. He was 
 sent to Oxford, where he made good use of his time, and com- 
 pleted his course with the degree of Master of Arts in 1796. 
 In the same year he was presented to the Vicarage of Abbots 
 Bromley in Staffordshire, and shortly afterward was happily 
 married. His literary journal shows a wide range of miscel- 
 laneous but well-selected reading in the Greek and Latin 
 classics and in English, French, and Italian authors, and in 
 1797 he began the translation of the “ Purgatorio ”—“ the com- 
 mencement,” says his son, “of the great undertaking which 
 was to establish his reputation as a poet and a scholar.” 
 
 The first volume of Cary’s version of the “ Inferno ” was pub- 
 lished in 1805, and this was followed by the second volume in 
 the next year. It attracted little attention, and few copies of it 
 
vi INTRODUCTION 
 
 were sold. Cary was not, however, disheartened ; he went on 
 with the work, but eight years elapsed before the translation 
 was finished, and it was not till 1814 that the poem appeared 
 complete, in a cheap form, ‘published at the author’s expense. 
 It was scarcely noticed by the press, and it did not gain many 
 readers. But in the autumn of 1817 an incident occurred— 
 his son says, “I might almost call it an event ’—which deter- 
 mined the better fortunes of the book. This incident was the 
 forming by Cary of acquaintance with Coleridge. The story 
 is a pleasant one and is well told by ‘Cary’s son. Cary and his. 
 family were residing for the time at Littlehampton, on the 
 southern coast, where Coleridge happened to be staying. 
 
 “Several hours of each day were spent ‘by Mr. Cary in read- 
 ing the classics with the writer of this memoir, who was then 
 only thirteen years of age. After ‘a morning of toil over Greek 
 and Latin composition, it was our custom ‘to walk on the ‘sands 
 and read Homer aloud. . . .. For several days Coleridge 
 crossed us in our walk. The sound of the Greek, and especially 
 the expressive countenance of the tutor, attracted his notice; 
 so one day, as we met, he placed himself directly in my father’s 
 way and thus accosted him: ‘Sir, yours is a face I should 
 know: I am Samuel Taylor Coleridge.’ His person was not 
 unknown to my father, who had already pointed him out to me 
 as the great genius of our age and country. Our volume of 
 Homer was shut up; but as it was ever Coleridge’s custom to 
 speak (it could not be called talking or conversing) on the 
 subject that first offered itself, whatever it might be, the deep 
 mysteries of the blind bard engaged our attention during the 
 remainder of a long walk. . . . The close of our walk 
 found Coleridge at our family dinner-table. Among other 
 topics of conversation Dante’s “ divine’ poem was mentioned: 
 Coleridge -had never heard of my father’s translation, but took 
 2 copy home with him that night. 
 
 “On the following day when the two friends (for so they 
 may from the first day of their meeting be called) met for the 
 purpose of taking their daily stroll, Coleridge was able to re- 
 cite whole pages of the version of Dante, and, though he had 
 not the original with him, repeated passages of that also, and 
 commented on the translation. Before leaving Littlehampton 
 he expressed his determination to bring the version of Dante 
 
INTRODUCTION vii 
 
 into public notice; and this, more than any other single person, 
 he had the means of doing in his course of lectures delivered 
 in London during the winter months.” 
 
 “In the course of the next winter Coleridge fulfilled his 
 promise of speaking, in one of his lectures, of Mr. Cary’s trans- 
 lation. The effect of his commendation seems to have been 
 great and immediate. The work, which had been published 
 four years, but had remained in utter obscurity, was at once 
 eagerly sought after. About 1,000 copies of the first edition, 
 that remained on hand, were immediately disposed of; in less 
 than three months a new edition was called for. The Edin- 
 burgh and Quarterly Reviews re-echoed the praises that had 
 been sounded by Coleridge, and henceforth the claims of the 
 translator of Dante to literary distinction were universally 
 admitted.” 
 
 For a long time Cary’s translation held the field without a 
 rival. An intelligent and spirited version of the “ Inferno,” 
 in a modification of Dante’s terza rima, by Mr. I. C. Wright, 
 was published in 1833, followed by the “ Purgatorio ” in 1836, 
 and by the “ Paradiso” in 1840. Since then no less than 
 twenty versions of the complete “ Divina Commedia,” or of one 
 or more of its three divisions, have been published in England 
 and America. Few of these have had more than one edition, 
 but up to 1900 there are no less than twenty-seven editions of 
 Cary’s translation recorded in Mr. Koch’s invaluable catalogue 
 of the Dante Collection in the library of Cornell University. 
 “Tt has remained,” says Dr. Garnett, in his brief memoir of 
 Cary in the Dictionary of National Biography, “ the transla- 
 tion which on Dante’s name being mentioned occurs first to 
 the mind.” But he adds: “ Cary’s standard is lower and his 
 achievement less remarkable than those of many of his succes- 
 sors, but he, at least, has made Dante an Englishman, and they 
 have left him half an Italian.” 
 
 The quality and the defect of Cary’s work are indicated in 
 these words. If the object of the translator is to turn Dante’s 
 poem into an English one, keeping as close to the original as 
 may be compatible with this end, but with a changed method of 
 versification, with frequent alteration of forms of expression, 
 and with constant maintenance of a manner and tone likely to 
 seem less strange to the modern reader than that of the original, 
 
Vili INTRODUCTION 
 
 then Cary’s version deserves the position it has achieved. It 
 is always sustained at a high level; it is often felicitous in its 
 rendering of the meaning of the original ; it is the work of a good 
 scholar, with a cultivated taste in poetry and a sufficient com- 
 mand of his native tongue. But if the reader desire to know 
 exactly what Dante said, neither more nor less, and, so far as 
 possible, the manner in which he said it; if he desire to study 
 Dante’s poem as a monument of its own time, and to gain ac- 
 quaintance with the precise nature of Dante’s genius, he must 
 turn to some other one of the translations. No one of them 
 will be as easy reading as Cary’s, no one will seem so English; 
 but the best of them will give to him a more intimate and trust- 
 worthy acquaintance with the original. 
 
 The great qualities of Dante’s diction are its simplicity and 
 its straightforwardness. There is no more striking proof of 
 his poetic power than the fact that his narration is generally 
 little less direct than if it were in prose, and the order of the 
 words has the natural sequence, without inversions or apparent 
 elaboration. Mr. Cary was, perhaps, too much under the in- 
 fluence of the taste of the century in which he was born to value _ 
 at their worth those qualities of diction which go so far to de- 
 termine style, and which are, indeed, difficult to preserve in an- 
 other language. Too often where Dante uses simply a proper 
 name, Mr. Cary prefers an epithet or paraphrase. Thus Virgil 
 is rendered remote by the designation of “the Mantuan ”; 
 Hippocrates is obscured under the title of “the great Coan”; 
 Juvenal becomes “ Aquinum’s bard,” and Euripides “ the bard 
 of Tella”; Thetis, “the bride sea-born of Peleus” ; the cock of 
 Gallura, “ shrill Gallura’s bird.”” Where Dante says, speaking 
 of the help from heaven given to him for his poem, “ Minerva 
 breathes and Apollo guides me, and nine Muses point out to me 
 the Bears,’ Mr. Cary translates, 
 
 ‘< Minerva breathes the gale, 
 Apollo guides me; and another Nine 
 To my rapt sight the arctic beams reveal.” 
 
 ‘Where Dante says, “ We rejoiced,” Mr. Cary gives us, “Joy 
 seized us straight.” Dante says, “ The sea closed over us”; 
 
 Mr. Cary, “ And over us the booming billows closed.” 
 
INTRODUCTION ix 
 
 Such illustrations as these of infidelity to the simple direct- 
 ness of Dante’s diction may be drawn from every canto. Each 
 in itself is, perhaps, of little consequence, but their cumulative 
 result is to deprive the poem in large measure of its most strik- 
 ing characteristic, that of being the narrative of an actual ex- 
 perience. The reader of Dante is reading a true story, told, 
 in all its narrative parts, with straightforward and convinc- 
 ing simplicity and with unrivalled charm of measure and 
 thyme. The reader of Mr. Cary’s Dante is reading a fiction, 
 told in excellent verse, by which he is entertained, but seldom 
 so moved as to lose the sense of its unreality. 
 
 But in spite of its defects as a translation, Mr. Cary’s work 
 is likely to retain its popularity as an English poem, and on the 
 whole deserves to do so. The notes with which it is provided 
 are excellent, and show the wide reading of an accomplished 
 man of letters. The scholar who wishes to acquire an exact 
 conception of the form and contents of the “ Divine Comedy ” 
 will seek other aid, but for the general reader Cary’s translation 
 
 will suffice. 
 ety Lei Jlrrktn ES 
 
 CAMBRIDGE, MASS., Igol. 
 
Pee 
 a , 
 
Canto 
 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 Canto 
 
 Canto 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PELL 
 
 PAGE 
 Breck aly toile tins we beat a 6s roe ee oe Ae I 
 EMEP YEOH aS ral os nts Siete oad ck Kolule wae oles ed wa aed 5 
 RT er cate es ta Ctra ela heh ikl s cilkivin d o-wluate Sob or Ce Own 9 
 Es rials Liu Pes fe ae scuba eh odie stash ee ce ied Pare yWERP os 13 
 eS) Pek foesittie', Ciara \ lee nluRicg Wie one Fie Saas poe aye) 0 Bhd Pelle 17 
 rete hate oN ed Oh SF INL oie Ag Mie Olga elelpValla ale me hes 21 
 PE Cire ela Uo iat oes ered als sic armless ee Gate e oie 25 
 OER Es Poce te enter e'e 8h bev ain nly al tceleoe wate be we Sap oe Oe 29 
 EM 5. oar, Cid wipe SA eS Ab, |, sess: Aivig Se y Giese soiwin(s aiehd elec Se 35 
 MRE Te et HS eC Ds hche y NOcies, ASG ote hab sae hele etal iceONW adae 37 
 RMR Io SPN Saha ga ea ies ed Gay elke cele ola ate vtal¥ wrote a ake 42 
 MEME she 8 YIM, yr cb eigen sin lel e es ake a ee ER MER 46 
 eNO ar Sg aie 5c Ws goals xe Odile Sie me wee wale eo eee 50 
 TNE tN oo 9 Se ok aeve' i) ye thie Slolale ¢ ie oo edn OB ey 55 
 CNMI reese Sansa ei SSL, eg 2 Sa Wik y Sie te etre 8 ROO HE ein 59 
 SME ar PA ey a etl Ss a Bars ciarq ab Wie Noe « Cobalt Re Whoa 63 
 EES. G is. bs Lece one Goes eudeeses <> BES PROG RAR Cs) et pee 67 
 MP IEE AES caters Gao 2 ie $ 6 ao CA ea & Roly ad UR op 71 
 DMEM ry eh he a ee eh ee ol wit tals Gis Se Sek ae 
 EIS A Date Gis ctl dies eleto d's: A ohee e vie oe eos AOR DESO N S 76 
 SMI et Gee ng 3) eit & lao. ces x olen o kc» aldhgn «Od OU SEE Se 83 
 ERNIE ee ee are eG alee coy Glee tae « Rade LEMUR DEA ois 87 
 REED Ta ce eS ien) oS sora eecee Shela Mase boakd 6 aclayhid bee Ot Ola tbs QI 
 EME MAW ER aba T Aa eyd Gel, ea ihe die'e Widig blade wis Gab cob ge Wrercieree 96 
 AMR Lane tale bige iain hts BAR SED viele kid om bo Sidelela’ ei ork wea eels a 100 
 rea er Cnt eee ee tat etek oS peat h lS igre, be ois calnty Bealinle “po Dateie lee Wt at eas 104 
 Peas EER torneo coe ad ath ty ots Wie Wve k a ote’ a loco 4 Bi otae’ Ale Sbaatea i o's 108 
 OAL ML SOS) SC CS NOU NE AE oe a ED ER ioe APO ec rar LOL? ae 112 
 We in irre aa ee Ue roe hic leca ly a deh b Bare aT Aenea Re Le LL 
 PE serrate Pach ait VE sas Wut arl ae o Steeles aie ae Pe Ro RM ee 121 
 as GY SM od SS UPAR RS SR Re AAAES I OR UP bre ACL eae 125 
 EE Ler renee Wren a el iene cea Dielg tg ws! da eae tiara wa en ek Rees 129 
 ea NOME MDa etek ete OLN yal uit setae chelate PEERS oe 133 
 DOO. VAR GEU AG Uy re ale gs ais Aga ge Ps REESE AAS Balle, MAb 138 
 
vei Bee CONTENTS 
 
 PURGATORY 
 
 PAGE 
 CIATED GE ers ae oR a Se ee NOE One HOE eee cee en toate 143 
 CERIO Loess x eee CE a ie SO Une ted tee cade a ee 147 
 Cobah CouD © & Rapep alana ante eranc. Ori WAN -aak Spe. (ln irs AO ape a 151 
 Canto sly ee he Ee Cee ne Tt © cae eeee 155 
 GSATILO VS Ss we are Seles ae han Pas ie 5 RIES aE es ae 159 
 Cantor Vibe Pak oe a ks B Winsoe Us os cia we ba Caine Le SL ae es ee 163 
 ATO ONT oe ain ein 4 win ole OW eottiete Biaela haw ace ee Meas at a tee 168 
 Cantor Vil ie ecco ee aces oe cn e Daia oe Ce wikia re ee 173 
 Canto cE Re ee Se Care hee 0d ane ee tee ane ea TEN oo 177 
 GATOS A os ke cies Sela soa ocale on shee EIU Seta eee ae ee eae eee 181 
 RFANTO ONT O Siie sie Cit dere hep Uk awe os Coe eo DERE Ate een een te 185 
 Canto TEA eee See ee Sc ae oheis as CU AUR UR Le Rea Ree 189 
 CANTO POC Ld octet g ote ee ees aie oe nce ah eese ces eee oe Bee er 193 
 Canto XPV Cer ee Re LR vies te oats eke a atete nen ni ce tal oe ee 197 
 Canto vA Vas Geel & ate tate e Sede hoe here wien ee Soetok b ent re eee ima ate en as Oe 202 
 CaNtOr: Vea o Se oe CESSES Rehan bate Aen Ee eee Aree aia 206 
 Canto 2X VAT Scot wes oii be ate Oa ee ate tate es Ue 210 
 GATE VD. VA ULE Sea ileia o:aln a os oe Cee nO Wel Sei ee eee nee eee 214 
 RSA TE GN LOE Grate ste cll bE pie otaroe a lalate nee a Salk we vated Grete Ok ea eee 218 
 Be Vil ca 3G, CG Ae SAN Anan Sener ee See ERE bial nh tak baey aes Ls Ba 223 
 CO ree). G CCU ERAS EO, URE SM cag ae baton cr egret TEs 228 
 Ge Ter cagee. OG & Mle: Seo a ihe AE EAL nt e AiG Res RR Ay Lo OT os 232 
 CANO U RR TET orn ee ae 2 a Hee Wk wa ee eee ce ee 236 
 (TATED EXIT VSG SS ote Sos lace Stanats oe radiate Pete aes etch Fon oun an te 240 
 Ganto Oe REV Os eh BN Ta tetas rola gies tg tetas atetale se ee 244 
 CAnitO OAV Lise Dev oaton mie REE EA ES SOM Vis SS lan eG wien Cee es 248 
 CantovoO RV TIAA eee er eee ee cue ee cuht al ae oe eee 252 
 Cantos SV LE ee ae ete te atacu aie oe aloe elateoten Os Wane eae ee 256 
 Canto: OX a eee ig ne Soe Oo 8 tae ee 260 
 Canto 2X RR ee a Ee URE a hin, SIL eee ee eee 265 
 Canto SRT a ci ch Siatitahs a ler A ian tat tene lal Gels teeta ae Fem eee 269 
 CAE A CLIP coo ceteiacahe wie eta iare alatatg oh amis eee nll ein eh ee 273 
 CANEO ERS OULD 5 Deeatetere wen pele acetate aatista's ahs lakra'e he iote lel ele creer ree 278 
 
 PARADISE 
 
 CSATIEG SEO CE BOG estou vis lates Wins sc ae CA ee ae ee 283 
 MEATIECY PED fossa plans atathea's osc w/the otal atehdve eiatate clans Meshes te he’s bc ere 287 
 (GeV a) fetty OB LAA eae Ae ARCO bet Mia a RS ee 201 
 Costu 4 DS A AMADOR RPAH TAMA MAAR RISTO ss 205 
 CATER Bek ia bie w aba y wnccea slcete d alans 5 OUR aoe ee ee 209 
 RGOTIEO GV Aisles go 0's Vo we watele decal alprele ovslp esta Nie w cial aaa ala once eee 303 
 RTADLO DV A Bay's eis vo. e sins a eee dee Mare ea Se 308 
 GATOR eos ga wy! vial ain! Seed anit en Mae ace clita thie ne eat 312 
 CONEG ERP SE oie doe kig eM E ON ta te ae 317, 
 
CONTENTS xii 
 
 PAGE 
 Canto XI .+...... Peres Uae «ik eka AUER PRR CAS ae ead Kararais 7) 
 en ge ila dco wlecls dak undgnc oi pus a'ee sole a de teed 6 331 
 Se N NEN yc ovis ig 25 bg cro le B's a ici. # bic wield soua bea oa8 cesrale Glo 336 
 Ee aie. Wie'e ws are oe REM ECE ERR’ doe bee 341 
 oe yes ahaa vie. a afe'gin's pS pe Vuln ge Wulong eivicletie been er 344 
 ME PERO) Plea a SIS Soc in'e fois Gad © 0's, joie Bios eae eee Meise 349 
 DEMME Ee A ro CO Gg oie. bbe. 5 x dy acovnte aC aus ween Gu eteues 354 
 NE Pest ccksy LS dsteteo a vicshh ot a eels e peas se els wede 358 
 ee ck Yay cca owes aIMigiaiulace 4 6 bb bd «A wile ie gh aoe Re Oh 362 
 EE er nr a Pls oie creek gules s ba sine boo oe OO LOS 367 
 ER ee ee aia fisteiale: a esau reels cleat bv Gane a at 371 
 RMN ERO Sc Lae te ad Cache b Gowie eos ga Guam Bios wee ateveee 375 
 Reet rarer SS ciate sh lowiela bore bles & ob co ibieee! vil obatelorye 6 380 
 NS Ne eS Sci ee eg ck his itis o weledcce cuwies o's aaeaws 384 
 PIN SO ele en ce Sse tcigia siain'sy ob cna i b's vine Severs 388 
 RR RD hte tte ik, ac tacin gia’ welvin bins wid es va cleeibiate 392 
 RE eR. duets wes oe oh 6 vids ie Cano cases eldeeres 306 
 08 RS a bb rate heart nt aeaes 400 
 ENE EON ek are Bic laig eat sie e cits ct bas twice au wos ueee tna 404 
 I fire ei yo gale oa 6 sv cleat ss p.sfacc O2 vinieh be cvaepens 408 
 TE el oie a's views 6 a Woe Wale Maw ele algble pele bun aeets 412 
 MN Re TPNeeOL Ia. ge aie 'etg (ial vieic k's on eiele Shine bots ae oe ole 416 
 
 Cento XXXIII Coc ecccccccccccscccccceneccevceesceeseecescocees GOW 
 
pes . 
 
THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 HELL 
 
 CANTO I 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The writer, having lost his way in a gloomy forest, and 
 being hindered by certain wild beasts from ascending a mountain, 
 is met by Virgil, who promises to show him the punishments of 
 Hell, and aftérward of Purgatory; and that he shall then be con- 
 ducted by Beatrice into Paradise. He follows the Roman poet. 
 
 Naren eeeeee 
 
 N the midway? of this our mortal life, 
 I found me in a gloomy wood, astray 
 Gone from the path direct: and e’en to tell, 
 It were no easy task, how savage wild 
 That forest, how robust and rough its growth, 
 Which to remember only, my dismay 
 Renews, in bitterness not far from death. 
 Yet, to discourse of what there good befel, 
 All else will I relate discover’d there. 
 How first I enter’d it I scarce can say, 
 Such sleepy dulness in that _instant_weigh’d 
 eee toga ohen the rue cath T ieth, 
 But when a mountain’s foot I reach’d, where closed 
 The valley that had pierced my heart with dread, 
 I look’d aloft, and saw his shoulders broad 
 Already vested with that plane éam, 
 Who leads all wanderers safe through every way. 
 
 *“In the midway.” The era of the bow, the highest point of which is 
 eo is intended by these words to be those well framed by nature, at chee 
 to the thirty-fifth year of the thirty- -fifth del 
 t’s age, A.D. 1300. In his Convito, * That planet’s beam.”’ The sua, 
 uman life is compared to an arch or 
 
 - &£ 
 
, THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Then was a little respite to the fear, 
 That in my heart’s recesses deep had lain 
 All of that night, so pitifully past: 
 And as a man, with difficult short breath, 
 Forespent with toiling, ’scaped from sea to shore, 
 Turns to the perilous wide waste, and stands 
 At gaze; e’en so my spirit, that yet fail’d, 
 Struggling with terror, turn’d to view the straits 
 That none hath passed and lived. My weary frame 
 After short pause recomforted, again 
 I journey’d on over that lonely steep, 
 The hinder foot still firmer.* Scarce the ascent 
 Began, when, lo! a,panther,* nimble, light, 
 And cover’d with a speckled skin, appear’d; 
 Nor, when it saw me, vanish’d; rather strove 
 To check my onward going; that oft-times, 
 With purpose to retrace my steps, I turn’d. 
 
 The hour was morning’s prime, and on his way 
 Aloft the sun ascended with those stars,°® 
 That with him rose when Love divine first moved 
 Those its fair works: so that with joyous hope 
 All things conspired to fill me, the gay skin 
 Of that swift animal, the matin dawn, - 
 And the sweet season. Soon that joy was chased. 
 And by new dread succeeded, when in view 
 A lion came, ’gainst me as it appear’d, 
 With his heat field aloft and hunger-mad, 
 That e’en the air was fear-struck. A she-wolf 
 Was at his hegls, who in her leanness seem'd 
 
 ull of all wants, and many a land hath made 
 Disconsolate ere now. She with such fear 
 O’erwhelm’d me, at the sight of her appall’d, 
 That of the height all hope I lost. As one, 
 Who, with his gain elated, sees the time 
 When all unawares is gone, he inwardly 
 Mourns with heart-griping anguish; such was I, 
 Haunted by that fell beast, never at peace, 
 
 3“ The hinder foot.” In ascending 5** With those stars.” The sun was 
 
 a hill the weight of the body rests on in Aries, in which sign he supposes it 
 the hinder foot. to have begun its course at the crea- 
 
 #**A panther.”” Pleasure or luxury. tion. 
 
HELL : 3 
 
 Who coming o’er against me, by degrees 
 Impell’d me where the sun in silence rests. 
 
 While to the lower space with backward step 
 I fell, my ken*discern’d the form of one 
 
 ose voice seem’d faint through long disuse of speech. 
 
 When him in that great desert I espied, 
 “Have mercy on me,” cried I out aloud, 
 “Spirit! or living man! whate’er thou be.” 
 
 Ue answered: “ Now not man, man once I was, 
 And born of Lombard parents, Mantuans both 
 By country, when the power of Julius yet 
 Was scarcely firm. At Rome my life was past, 
 Beneath the mild Augustus, in the time 
 Of fabled deities and false. A bard 
 Was I, and made Anchises’ upright son 
 The subject of my song, who came from Troy, 
 When the flames prey’d on Ilium’s haughty towers. 
 But thou, say wherefore to such perils past 
 Return’st thou? wherefore not this pleasant mount 
 Ascendest, cause and source of all delight?” 
 “ And art thou then that Virgil, that well-spring, 
 From which such copious floods of eloquence 
 Have issued?” I with front abash’d replied. 
 “Glory and light of all the tuneful train! 
 May it avail me, that I long with zeal 
 Have sought thy volume, and with love immense 
 Have conn’d it o’ef. My master thou, and guide! 
 Thou he from whom alone [ha Ive 
 That style, which for its beauty into fame 
 Exalts me. See the beast, from whom I fled. 
 O save me from her, thou illustrious sage! 
 For every vein and pulse throughout my frame 
 She hath made tremble.” He, soon as he saw 
 That I was weeping, answer’d, “ Thou must needs 
 Another way pursue, if thou wouldst ’scape 
 From out that savage wilderness. ‘This beast, 
 At whom thou criest, her way will suffer none 
 To pass, and no less hinderance makes than death: 
 So bad and so accursed in her kind, 
 That never sated is her ravenous will, 
 
THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Still after food more craving than before. 
 
 To many an animal in wedlock vile 
 
 She fastens, and shall yet to many more, 
 
 Until that greyhound® come, who shall destroy 
 
 Her with sharp pain. 
 
 He will not life support 
 
 By earth nor its base metals, but by love, 
 Wisdom, and virtue; and his land shall be 
 
 The land ’twixt either Feltro.’ 
 
 In his might 
 
 Shall safety to Italia’s plains arise, 
 
 For whose fair realm, Camilla, virgin pure, 
 Nisus, Euryalus, and Turnus fell. 
 
 He, with incessant chase, through every town 
 Shall worry, until he to hell at length 
 
 Restore her, thence by envy first let loose. 
 
 I, for thy profit pondering, now devise 
 
 That thou mayst follow me; and I, thy guide, 
 Will lead thee hence through an eternal space, 
 Where thou shalt hear despairing shrieks, and see 
 Spirits of old tormented, who invoke 
 
 A second death;* and those next view, who dwell 
 Content in fire,® for that they hope to come, 
 Whene’er the time may be, among the blest, 
 Into whose regions if thou then desire 
 
 To ascend, a spirit worthier?® than I 
 
 Must lead thee, in whose charge, when I depart, 
 Thou shalt be left: for that Almighty King, 
 Who reigns above, a rebel to his law 
 
 Adjudges me; and therefore hath decreed 
 
 That, to his city, none through me should come. 
 He in all parts hath sway; there rules, there holds 
 
 His citadel and throne. 
 Whom there he chuses! ” 
 
 O happy those, 
 
 I to him in few: — 
 
 “ Bard! by that God, whom thou didst not adore, 
 I do beseech thee (that this ill and worse 
 
 6“ That greyhound.” This passage 
 has been commonly understood as a 
 eulogium on the liberal spirit of his 
 eeronses patron, Can Grande della 
 
 cala. 
 
 7“ ?Twixt either Feltro.”” Verona, 
 the country of Can della Scala, is situ- 
 ated between Feltro, a city in the Marca 
 Trivigiana, and Monte Feltro, a city in 
 the territory of Urbino. 
 
 8“ A second death.” ‘* And in these 
 days men shall seek death, and shall 
 not find it; and shall desire to die, and 
 death shall flee from them.” Rey. ix. 6. 
 
 ©“ Content in fire.” The spirits in 
 Purgatory. 
 
 10 “ A spirit worthier.” Beatrice, who 
 conducts the Poet through Paradise. 
 
HELL 5 
 
 I may escape) to lead me where thou said’st, 
 
 That I Saint Peter’s gate*? may view, and those 
 
 Who, as thou tell’st, are in such dismal plight.” 
 Onward he moved, I close his steps pursued. 
 
 CANTO II 
 
 ArcuMENT.—After the invocation, which poets are used to prefix to 
 their works, he shows that, on a consideration of his own strength, 
 he doubted whether it sufficed for the journey proposed to him, 
 
 but that, being comforted by Virgil, he at last took courage, and 
 followed hign as his guide and master. 
 ed 
 
 OW was the day departing, and the air, 
 
 N Imbrown’d with shadows, from their toils released 
 All animals on earth; and I alone 
 Prepared myself the conflict to sustain, 
 Both of sad pity, and that perilous road, 
 Which my unerring memory shall retrace. 
 O Muses! O high genius! now vouchsafe 
 Your aid. O mind! that all I saw hast kept 
 Safe in a written record, here thy worth 
 And eminent endowments come to proof, 
 I thus began: “ Bard! thou who art my guide, 
 
 Consider well, if virtue be in me 
 Sufficient, ere to this high enterprise 
 Thou trust me. Thou hast told that Silvius’ sire,* 
 Yet clothed in corruptible flesh, among 
 The immortal tribes had entrance, and was there 
 Sensibly present. Yet if heaven’s great Lord, 
 Almighty foe to ill, such favor show’d 
 In contemplation of the high effect, 
 Both what and who from him should issue forth, 
 It seems in reason’s judgment well deserved; 
 Sith he of Rome and of Rome’s empire wide, 
 In heaven’s empyreal height was chosen sire: 
 Both which, if truth be spoken, were ordain’d 
 1 ** Saint Peter’s gate.” The gate of guarded by an angel placed om that 
 
 Purgatory, which the Poet feigns to be station by St. Peter. 
 1 ** Silvius’ sire.”” 7Eneas. 
 
THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 And stablish’d for the holy place, where sits 
 Who to great Peter’s sacred chair succeeds. 
 
 He from this journey, in thy song renown’d, 
 Learn’d things, that to his victory gave rise 
 And to the papal robe. In after-times 
 
 The chosen vessel? also travel’d there, 
 
 To bring us back assurance in that faith 
 Which is the entrance to salvation’s way. 
 
 But I, why should I there presume? or who 
 Permits it? not Atneas I, nor Paul. 
 
 Myself I deem not worthy, and none else 
 
 Will deem me. I, if on this voyage then 
 
 I venture, fear it will in folly end. 
 
 Thou, who art wise, better my meaning know’st, 
 Than I can speak.” As one, who unresolves 
 What he hath late resolved, and with new thoughts 
 Changes his purpose, from his first intent 
 Removed; e’en such was I on that dun coast, 
 Wasting in thought my enterprise, at first 
 
 So eagerly embraced. “If right thy words 
 
 I scan,” replied that shade magnanimous, 
 “Thy soul is by vile fear assail’d, which oft 
 
 So overcasts a man, that he recoils 
 
 From noblest resolution, like a beast 
 
 At some false semblance in the twilight gloom. 
 That from this terror thou mayst free thyself, 
 
 I will instruct thee why I came, and what 
 
 I heard in that same instant, when for thee 
 Grief touch’d me first. I was among the tribe, 
 Who rest suspended,? when a dame, so blest 
 And lovely I besought her to command, 
 
 Call’d me; her eyes were brighter than the star 
 Of day; and she, with gentle voice and soft, 
 Angelically tuned, her speech address’d: 
 
 ‘O courteous shade of Mantua! thou whose fame 
 Yet lives, and shall live long as nature lasts! 
 
 A friend, not of my fortune but myself, 
 
 On the wide desert in his road has met 
 
 8“* The chosen vessel.” St. Paul. in Limbo, neither admitted to a state 
 8“ Who rest suspended.” te spirits of glory nor doomed to punishment. 
 
HELL 7 
 
 Hindrance so greaf, that he through fear has turn’d. 
 Now much I dread lest he past help have stray’d, 
 And I be risen too late for his relief, 
 From what in heaven of him I heard. Speed now, 
 And by thy eloquent persuasive tongue, 
 And by all means for his deliverance meet, 
 Assist him. So to me will comfort spring. 
 I, who now bid thee on this errand forth, 
 Am Beatrice;* from a place I come 
 Revisited with joy. Love brought me thence, 
 Who prompts my speech. When in my Master’s sight 
 I stand, thy praise to him I oft will tell.’ 
 
 “She then was silent, and I thus began: 
 ‘O Lady! by whose influence alone 
 Mankind excels whatever is contain’d 
 Within that heaven which hath the smallest orb, 
 So thy command delights me, that to obey, 
 If it were done already, would seem late. 
 No need hast thou further to speak thy will: 
 Yet tell the reason, why thou art not loth 
 To-leave that ample space, where to return 
 Thou burnest, for this centre here beneath.’ 
 
 “She then: ‘Since thou so deeply wouldst inquire, 
 I will instruct thee briefly why no dread 
 Hinders my entrance here. Those things alone 
 Are to be fear’d whence evil may proceed; 
 None else, for none are terrible beside. 
 I am so framed by God, thanks to his grace! 
 That any sufferance of your misery 
 Touches me not, nor flame of that fierce fire 
 Assails me. In high heaven a blessed dame® 
 Resides, who mourns with such effectual grief 
 That hinderance, which I send thee to remove, 
 That God’s stern judgment to her will inclines.’ 
 To Lucia,® calling, her she thus bespake: 
 ‘Now doth thy faithful servant need thy aid, 
 And I commend him to thee.’ At her word 
 
 ¢* Beatrice.” The daughter of Folco 5‘*A blessed dame.” The Divine 
 Portinari, who is here invested with the Mercy. |. ; : 
 character of celestial wisdom or the- 8“ Lucia.” The enlightening Grace 
 
 ology. of Heaven; as it is commonly explained. 
 
THE DIVINE COMEDY, 
 
 Sped Lucia, of all cruelty the foe, 
 And coming to the place, where I abode 
 Seated with Rachel, her of ancient days, 
 She thus address’d me: “ Thou true praise of God! 
 Beatrice! why is not thy succor lent 
 To him, who so much loved thee, as to leave 
 For thy sake all the multitude admires? 
 _ Dost thou not hear how pitiful his wail, 
 Nor mark the death, which in the torrent flood, 
 Swol’n mightier than a sea, him struggling holds?” 
 Ne’er among men did any with such speed 
 Haste to their profit, flee from their annoy, 
 As, when these words were spoken, I came here, 
 Down from my blessed seat, trusting the force 
 Of thy pure eloquence, which thee, and all 
 Who well have mark’d it, into honor bring.’ 
 “When she had ended, her bright beaming eyes 
 Tearful she turn’d aside; whereat I felt 
 Redoubled zeal to serve thee. As she will’d, 
 Thus am I come: I saved thee from the beast, 
 Who thy near way across the goodly mount 
 Prevented. What is this comes o’er thee then? 
 Why, why dost thou hang back? why in thy breast 
 Harbor vile fear? why hast not courage there, 
 And noble daring; since three maids,’ so blest, 
 Thy safety plan, e’en in the court of heaven; 
 And so much certain good my words forebode? ” 
 As florets, by the frosty air of night 
 Bent down suet closed, when day has blanch’ d their leaves, 
 Rise all unfolded on their spiry stems; 
 So was my fainting vigor new restored, 
 And to my heart such kindly courage ran, 
 That I as one undaunted soon replied: 
 “O full of pity she, who undertook 
 My succor! and thou kind, who didst perform 
 So soon her true behest! With such desire 
 Thou hast disposed me to renew my voyage, 
 That my first purpose fully is resumed. 
 
 t“ Three maids.”” The Divine Mercy, Lucia and Beatrice. 
 
HELL | 9 
 
 Lead on: one only will is in us both. 
 Th guide, my master thou, and lord.” 
 So spake I; and when he had onward moved, 
 
 I enter’d on the deep and woody way. 
 
 CANTO III 
 
 ArcuMENT.—Dante, following Virgi], cames to the gate of Hell; where, 
 after having read the dreadful words that are written thereon, they 
 
 both enter. Here, as he understands from Virgil, those were pun- 
 ished who had passed their time (for living it could not be called) 
 in a state of apathy and indifference both to good and evil. Then 
 pursuing their way, they arrive at the river Acheron; and there find 
 the old ferryman Charon, who fakes thefSpirits) over to the opposite 
 
 shoré; which, as soon as Dante reaches, hej i ith terror, 
 and falls into a trance. 
 
 HROUGH me you pass into the city of woe: 
 Through me you pass into eternal pain: 
 Through me among the people lost for aye. 
 
 Justice the founder of my fabric moved: 
 To rear me was the task of power divine, 
 Supremest wisdom, and primeval love.t 
 Before me things create were none, save things 
 Eternal, and eternal I endure. | 
 All hope abandon, ye who enter here.” 
 
 Such characters, in color dim, I mark’d 
 Over a portal’s lofty arch inscribed. 
 Whereat I thus: “ Master, these words import 
 Hard meaning.” He as one prepared replied: 
 “Here thou must all distrust behind thee leave; 
 Here be vile fear extinguish’d. We are come 
 Where I have told thee we shall see the souls 
 To misery doom’d, who intellectr ood 
 Have lost.”” And when his hand he had stretch’d forth 
 TO mine, with pleasant looks, whence I was cheer’d, 
 Into that secret place he led me on. 
 
 Here sighs, with lamentations and loud moans, 
 
 ower divine, The three Persons “of the Blessed 
 mein Sane Aine primeval love.” Trinity. 
 
Celestine order, and printed at Milan 
 in 1701, in which an attempt is made 
 
 passage. Lombardi would apply it to Pope Celestine as 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Resounded through the air pierced by no star, 
 That e’en I wept at entering. Various tongues, 
 Horrible languages, outcries of woe, 
 Accents of anger, voices deep and hoarse, 
 With hands together smote that swell’d the sounds, 
 Made up a tumult, that forever whirls 
 Round through that air with solid darkness stain’d, 
 Like to the sand that in the whirlwind flies. 
 
 I then, with error yet encompast, cried: 
 “O master! what is this I hear? what race 
 Are these, who seem so overcome with woe?” 
 
 He thus to me: “ This miserable fate 
 Suffer the wretched souls of those, who lived 
 Without or praise or blame, with that ill band 
 Of angels mix’d, who nor rebellious proved, 
 
 Nor yet were true to God, but for themselves 
 
 Were only. From his bounds Heaven drove them forth 
 Not to impair his lustre; nor the depth 
 
 Of Hell receives them, lest the accursed tribe 
 
 Should glory thence with exultation vain.” 
 
 I then: “ Master! what doth aggrieve them thus, 
 That they lament so loud?” He straight replied: 
 “That will I tell thee briefly. j[hese of death 
 No hope may entertain: and their blind life 
 So meanly passes, that all other lots 
 They envy. Fame of them the world hath none, 
 Nor suffers; mercy and justice scorn them both. 
 Speak not of them, but look, and pass them by.” 
 
 And I, who straightway look’d, beheld a flag, 
 Which whirling ran around so rapidly, 
 
 That it no pause obtain’d: and following came 
 Such a long train of spirits, I should ne’er 
 Have thought that death so many had despoil’d. 
 
 When some of these I recognized, I saw _ 
 
 And knew the shade of him, who to base fear ? 
 
 ee Who to base fear some one of Dante’s fellow-citizens, 
 
 3 
 Yielding, abjured his high estate.-——”’ who, refusing, through avarice or want 
 
 This is commonly understood of Celes- of spirit, to support the party of the 
 tine V, who abdicated the papal power 
 in 1294. Venturi mentions a work writ- occasion of the miseries that_befel them. 
 ten by Innocenzio Barcellini, of the But the testimony of Fazio degli 
 Uberti, who lived so near the time of 
 our author, seems almost decisive on 
 
 to put a different interpretation on this this point. He i eae s iy of the 
 eing in Hell. 
 
 Bianchi at Florence, had been the main 
 
HELL - 
 
 Yielding, abjured his high estate. Forthwith 
 I understood, for certain, this the tribe 
 Of those ill spirits both to God displeasing 
 And to his foes. These wretches, who ne’er lived, 
 Went on in nakedness, and sorely stung 
 By wasps and hornets, which bedew’d their cheeks 
 With blood, that, mix’d with tears, dropp’d to their feet, 
 And by disgustful worms was gather’d there. 
 
 Then looking further onward, I beheld | 
 A throng upon the shore of a great stream: 
 Whereat [ thus: “Sir! grant me now to know 
 Whom here we view, and whence impell’d they seem 
 So eager to pass o’er, as I discern | 
 Through the blear light?” He thus to me in few: 
 “This shalt thou know, soon as our steps arrive 
 Beside the woful tide of Acheron.” 
 - Then with eyes downward cast, and fill’d with shame, 
 Fearing my words offensive to his ear, 
 
 Till we had reactrd the tiver-t-from- speech 
 Abstain’ds And lo! toward us in a bark 
 Comes on an old man, hoary white with eld, 
 
 Crying, “ Woe to you, wicked spirits! hope not 
 Ever to see the sky again. I come 
 
 To take you to the o 
 to eternal darkness, there to dwell 
 In fierce fIr~t thou, who there 
 
 Standest;-tive-spiritT get thee hence, and leave 
 
 These who are dead.” But soon as he beheld 
 
 I left them not, “‘ By other way,” said he, 
 
 “By other haven shalt thou come to shore, 
 
 Not by this passage; thee a nimbler boat 
 
 Must carry.” Then to him thus spake my guide: 
 
 “Charon! thyself torment not: so ’tis will’d, 
 
 Where will and power are one: ask thou no more.” 
 Straightway in silence fell the shaggy cheeks 
 
 Of him, the boatman o’er the livid lake, , 
 
 Around whose eyes glared wheeling flames. Meanwhile 
 
 Those spirits, faint and naked, color changed, | 
 
 And gnash’d their teeth, soon as the cruel words - 
 
 - They heard. God and their parents they blasphemed, 
 
 @ 
 
12 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 The human kind, the place, the time, and seed, 
 That did engender them and give them birth. 
 Then all together sorely wailing drew 
 To the curst strand, that every man must pas: 
 Who fears not God. Charop, demoniac form, 
 With eyes of burning coal, collects them all, 
 Beckoning, and each, that lingers, with his oar 
 Strikes. As fall off the light autumnal leaves. 
 One still another following, till the bough 
 Strews all its honors on the earth beneath; 
 E’en in like manner Adam’s evil brood 
 Cast themselves, one by one, down from the shore, 
 Each at a beck, as falcon at his call.® 
 Thus go they over through the umber’d wave; 
 And ever they on the opposing bank 
 Be landed, on this side another throng 
 Still gathers. ‘ Son,” thus spake the courteous guide, 
 “ Those who die subject to the wrath of God 
 All here together come from every clime 
 And to o’erpass the river are not loth: 
 For so Heaven’s justice goads them on, that fear 
 Is turn’d into desire. Hence ne’er hath past 
 Good spirit. If of thee Charon complain, 
 Now mayst thou know the import of his words.” 
 This said, the gloomy region trembling shook 
 So terribly, that yet with clammy dews 
 Fear chills my brow. The sad earth gave a blast, 
 That, lightening, shot forth a vermilion flame, 
 Which all my senses conquer’d quite, and_I 
 
 own dropp’ ith sudden slumber seized. 
 
 3“ As falcon at his call.” This is Vel- a bird that is enticed to the cage by the 
 lutello’s eviasaes and seems pref- call of another.” 
 erable to that commonly given: ‘as 
 
HELL 13 
 
 CANTO IV 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The Poet, being ro , and follow- 
 ing his guide onward, descends into Limbo, which is the first circle 
 
 of Hell, where he finds the souls of those, who, although they have 
 lived virtuously and have not to suffer for great sins, nevertheless, 
 
 through SR ar PO Sang epee PEE VRIIR Hence he 
 is led on by Virgil to descend into the second circle. 
 ROKE the deep slumber in my brain a crash 
 Of heavy thunder, that I shook myselt, 
 
 As one by main force roused. Risen upright, 
 My rested eyes I moved around, and search’d 
 With fixed ken, to know what place it was 
 Wherein I stood. For certain, on the brink 
 I found me of the lamentable vale, 
 The dread abyss, that joins a thundrous sound 
 Of plaints innumerable. Dark and deep, 
 And thick with clouds o’erspread, mine eye in vain 
 Explored its bottom, nor could aught discern. 
 
 “ Now let us to the blind world there beneath 
 Descend,” the bard began, all pale of look: 
 
 “I go the first, and thou shalt follow next.” 
 
 Then I, his alter’d hue perceiving, thus: 
 “How may I speed, if thou yieldest to dread, 
 Who still art wont to comfort me in doubt? ” 
 
 He then: “ The anguish of that race below 
 With pity stains my cheek, which thou for fear 
 Mistakest. Let us on. Our length of way 
 Urges to haste.”” Onward, this said, he moved; 
 
 And entering led me with him, on the bounds 
 Of the first circle that surrounds the abyss. He 
 
 Here, as mine ear could note, no plaint was heard 
 Except of sighs, that made the eternal air 
 Tremble, not caused by tortures, but from grief 
 Felt by those multitudes, many and vast, 
 
 Of men, women, and infants. Then to me 
 
 The gentle guide: “ Inquirest thou not what spirits 
 Are these which thou beholdest? Ere thou pass 
 Farther, I would thou know, that these of sin 
 
 Were blameless; and if aught they merited, 
 Classics. Vol. 34—B 
 
14 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 It profits not, since baptism was not theirs, 
 The portal 1 fo thy faith. If they before 
 
 The Gospel lived, they served not God aright; 
 And among such am I. For these defects, 
 And for no other evil, we are lost; 
 
 Only so far afflicted, that we live 
 
 Desiring without hope.” Sore grief assail’d 
 My heart at hearing this, for well I knew 
 Suspended in that Limbo many a soul 
 
 Of mighty worth. 
 
 “O tell me, sire revered! 
 
 Tell me, my master!” I began, through wish 
 Of full assurance in that holy faith 
 
 Which vanquishes all error; ‘ 
 
 “say, did e’er 
 
 Any, or through his own or other’s merit, 
 
 Come forth from thence, who afterward was blest? 
 
 39 
 
 Piercing the secret purport ? of my speech, 
 He answer’d: “I was new to that estate 
 When I beheld a puissant one ® arrive 
 Amongst us, with victorious trophy crown’d. 
 He forth the shade of our first parent drew, 
 
 Abel his child, and 
 
 oah righteous man, 
 
 Of Moses lawgiver for“faith approved, 
 Of patriarch Abraham, and David king, 
 Israel with his sire and with his sons, 
 Nor without Rachel whom so hard he won, 
 And others many more, whom he to bliss 
 Exalted. Before these, be thou assured, 
 No spirit of human kind was ever saved.” 
 We, while he spake, ceased not our onward road, 
 Still passing through the wood; for so I name 
 
 Those spirits thick beset. 
 
 We were not far 
 
 On this side from the summit, when I kenn’d 
 A flame, that o’er the darken’d hemisphere 
 Prevailing shined. Yet we a little space 
 Were distant, not so far but I in part 
 
 1** Portal.”’ ‘ Porta della fede.’? This 
 was an alteration made in the text by 
 the Academicians della Crusca, on the 
 authority, as it would appear, of only 
 two manuscripts. The other reading is, 
 ** parte della fede,” “‘ part of the faith.” 
 
 2“ Secret purport.” Lombardi well 
 observes that’ Dante seems to have been 
 
 restrained by awe and reverence from 
 uttering the name of Christ in this 
 place of torment; and that for the 
 same cause, probably, it does not occur 
 once thronghout the whole of this first 
 part of the poem. 
 
 8“ A p.issant one.” Our Saviour. 
 
HELL 
 
 Discover’d that a tribe in honor high 
 
 That place possess’d. ‘O thou, who every art 
 And science valuest! who are these, that boast 
 Such honor, separate from all the rest? ” 
 
 He answer’d: “ The renown of their great names, 
 That echoes through your world above, acquires 
 Favor in Heaven, which holds them thus advanced.” 
 Meantime a voice I heard: ‘“ Honor the bard 
 Sublime! his shade returns, that left us late!” 
 
 No sooner ceased the sound, than I beheld 
 Four mighty spirits toward us bend their steps, 
 Of semblance neither sorrowful nor glad. 
 
 When thus my master kind began: “ Mark him, 
 Who in his right hand bears that falchion keen, 
 The other three preceding, as their lord. 
 
 This is that Homer, of all bards supreme: 
 
 Flaccus the next, in satire’s vain excelling; 
 
 The third is Naso; Lucan is the last. 
 
 Because they all that appellation own, 
 
 With which the voice singly accosted me, 
 
 Honoring they greet me thus, and well they judge.” 
 
 So I beheld united the bright school 
 Of him the monarch of sublimest song,* 
 
 That o’er the others like an eagle soars. 
 
 When they together short discourse had held, 
 They turn’d to me, with salutation kind 
 Beckoning me; at the which my master smiled: 
 Nor was this all; but greater honor still 
 They gave me, for they made me of their tribe; 
 And I was sixth amid so learn’d a band. 
 
 Far as the luminous beacon on we pass’d, 
 Speaking of matters, then befitting well 
 To speak, now fitter left untold. At foot 
 Of a magnificent castle we arrived, 
 
 Seven times with lofty walls begirt, and round 
 Defended by a pleasant stream. O’er this 
 
 As o’er dry land we pass’d. Next, through seven eatce 
 I with those sages enter’d, and we came 
 
 Into a mead with lively verdure fresh. 
 
 “The monarch of sublimest song.’”?’ Homer, 
 
16 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 There dwelt a race, who slow their eyes around 
 Majestically moved, and in their port 
 Bore eminent authority: they spake 
 Seldom, but all their words were tuneful sweet. 
 We to one side retired, into a place 
 Open and bright and lofty, whence each one. 
 Stood manifest to view. Incontinent, 
 There on the green enamel of the plain 
 Were shown me the great spirits, by whose sight 
 I am exalted in my own esteem. 
 Electra > there I saw accompanied 
 By many, among whom Hector I knew, 
 Anchises’ pious son, and with hawk’s eye 
 _ Cesar all arm’d, and by Camilla there 
 Penthesilea. On the other side, 
 Old king Latinus seated by his child 
 Lavinia, and that Brutus I beheld 
 Who Tarquin chased, Lucretia, Cato’s wife 
 Marcia, with Julia * and Cornelia there; 
 And sole apart retired, the Soldan fierce 7. 
 Then when a little more I raised my brow, 
 I spied the master of the sapient throng,® 
 Seated amid the philosophic train. 
 Him all admire, all pay him reverence due. 
 There Socrates and_Plato both I mark’d 
 Nearest to him in rank, Democritus, 
 Who sets the world at chance,® Diogenes, 
 With Heraclitus, and Empedocles, 
 And Anaxagoras, and Thales sage, 
 Zeno, and Dioscorides well read 
 In nature’s secret lore. Orpheus I mark’d 
 And Linus, Tully and moral Seneca, 
 Euclid and Ptolemy, Hippocrates, 
 Galenus, Avicen, and him who made 
 The commentary vast, Averroes.?® 
 68“ Electra.””’ The daughter of Atla ® "«: Democritus, 
 and mother of Dardanus the founder o Who sets the world at chance.” 
 
 i) 2A a Democritus, who maintained the world 
 6 “ Julia. The daughter of Julius to have been formed by the fortuitous 
 
 Cesar, and wife of Pompey. concourse of atoms. 
 7“ The Soldan fierce.’ Saladin, or 10 er Him who made 
 vA Salaheddin, the rival of Richa? Cceur That commentary vast, Averroes.”’ 
 de Lion. Averroes, called by the Arabians 
 
 8“ The master of the sapient throng.” Ibn Roschd, translated and commented 
 R pHighel di color che sanno.” _Argis-, on the works of Aristotle. 
 otle. 
 
 Serena? 
 
HELL 17 
 
 Of all to speak at full were vain attempt; 
 For my wide theme so urges, that oft-times 
 My words fall short of what bechanced. In two 
 The six associates part. Another way 
 My sage guide leads me, from that air serene, 
 Into a climate ever vex’d with storms: 
 
 And to a part I come, where no light shines. : 
 
 CANTO V 
 
 ArRGUMENT.—Coming into the second circle of Hell, Dante at the en- 
 trance beholds Minos the Infernal Judge, by whom he is admon- 
 ished to beware how he enters those regions. Here he witnesses 
 the punishment of carnal sinners, who are tossed about ceaselessly 
 
 in the dark air by the most furious winds. Among these, he meets 
 with Francesca of Rimini, through pity at whose sad tale he falls 
 
 fainting to the ground. 
 
 ROM the first circle I descended thus 
 
 Down to the second, which, a lesser space 
 
 Embracing, so much more of grief contains, 
 Provoking bitter moans. There Minos stands, 
 Grinning with ghastly feature: he, of all 
 Who enter, strict examining the crimes, 
 Gives sentence, and dismisses them beneath, 
 According as he foldeth him around: 
 For when before him comes the ill-fated soul, 
 It, all confesses; and that judge severe 
 Of sins, considering what place in Hell 
 Suits the transgression, with his tail so oft 
 Himself encircles, as degrees beneath 
 He dooms it to descend. Before him stand 
 Always a numerous throng; and in his turn 
 Each one to judgment passing, speaks, and hears 
 His fate, thence downward to his dwelling hurl’d. 
 “O thou! who to this residence of woe 
 Approachest! ”’ when he saw me coming, cried 
 Minos, relinquishing his dread employ, 
 “Look how thou enter here; beware in whom 
 Thou place thy trust; let not the entrance broad 
 
18 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Deceive thee to thy harm.” To him my guide: 
 “Wherefore exclaimest? Hinder not his way 
 By destiny appointed; so ’tis will’d, 
 Where will and power are one. Ask thou no more.” 
 Now ’gin the rueful wailings to be heard. 
 Now am I come where many a plaining voice 
 Smites on mine ear. Into a place I came 
 be FWhere light was silent all. Bellowing there groan’d 
 A Noise, as of a sea in tempest torn 
 By warring winds. The stormy blast of Hell 
 With restless fury drives the spirits on, 
 ght Whirl’d round and dash’d amain with sore annoy. 
 When they arrive before the ruinous sweep, 
 There shrieks are heard, there lamentations, moans, 
 And blasphemies ’gainst the good Power in Heaven. 
 I understood, that to this torment sad 
 The carnal sinners are condemn’d, in whom 
 Reason by_lust is sway’d. As, in large troops 
 And multitudinous, when winter reigns, 
 The starlings on their wings are borne abroad; 
 So bears the tyrannous gust those evil souls. 
 On this side and on that, above, below, 
 -— It drives them: hope of rest to solace them 
 Is none, nor e’en of milder pang. As cranes, 
 Chanting their dolorous notes, traverse the sky, 
 Stretch’d out in long array; so I beheld 
 Spirits, who came loud wailing, htrried on 
 By their dire doom. Then I: “ Instructor! who 
 Are these, by the black air so scourged?”’ “ The first 
 *Mong those, of whom thou question’st,” he replied, 
 “O’er many tongues was empress. She in vice 
 Of luxury was so shameless, that she made 
 Liking be lawful by promulged decree, 
 To clear the blame she had herself incurr’d. 
 This is Semiramis, of whom ’tis writ, 
 That she succeeded Ninus her espoused ; 
 And held the land, which now the Soldan rules, 
 The next in amorous fury slew herself, 
 And to Sichzus’ ashes broke her faith: 
 Then follows Cleopatra, lustful queen.” 
 
HELL 
 
 There mark’d I Helen, for whose sake so long 
 The time was fraught with evil; there the great 
 Achilles, who with love fought to the end. 
 Paris I saw, and Tristan; and beside, 
 A thousand more he show’d me, and by name 
 Pointed them out, whom love bereaved of life. 
 
 When I had heard my sage instructor name 
 Those dames and knights of antique days, o’erpower’d 
 
 By pity, well-nigh in amaze my mind 
 
 MWaslosty and Thegar—“BaraT willingly 
 I would address those two together coming, 
 Which seem so light before the wind.” He thus: 
 “ Note thou, when nearer they to us approach. 
 Then by that love which carries them along, 
 Entreat; and they will come.” Soon as the wind 
 Sway’d them toward us, I thus framed my speech: 
 “O wearied spirits! come, and hold discourse 
 With us, if by none else restrain’d.”” As doves 
 By fond desire invited, on wide wings 
 And firm, to their sweet nest returning home, 
 Cleave the air, wafted by their will along ; 
 Thus issued, from that troop where[Didolranks, 
 They, through the ill air speeding: with such force 
 My cry prevail’d, by strong affection urged. 
 
 “O gracious creature and benign! who go’st 
 Visiting, through this element obscure, 
 Us, who the world with bloody stain imbrued ; 
 If, for a friend, the King of all, we own’d, 
 Our prayer to him should for thy peace arise, 
 Since thou hast pity on our evil plight. 
 Of whatsoe’er to hear or to discourse 
 It pleases thee, that will we hear, of that 
 Freely with thee discourse, while e’er the wind, 
 As now, is mute. The land,! that gave me birth, 
 Is situate on the coast, where Po descends 
 To rest in ocean with his sequent streams. | 
 
 “Love, that in gentle heart is quickly learnt, 
 Entangled him by that fair form, from me 
 Ta’en in such cruel sort, as grieves me still: 
 
 1“ The land.” Ravenna. 
 patience | 
 
20 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Love, that denial takes from none beloved, 
 
 Caught me with pleasing him so passing well, 
 
 That, as thou seest, he yet deserts me not. 
 
 Love brought us to one death: Caina? waits 
 
 The soul, who spilt our life.’”’ Such were their words; 
 At hearing which, downward I bent my looks, 
 
 And held them there so long, that the bard cried: 
 
 “ What art thou pondering?” 
 
 I in answer thus: 
 
 “ Alas! by what sweet thoughts, what fond desire 
 Must they at length to that ill pass have reach’d!” 
 Then turning, I to them my speech address’d, 
 
 And thus began: “ Erancesca!* your sad fate 
 
 Even to tears my grief and pity moves. 
 
 But tell me; in the time of your sweet sighs, 
 
 By what, and how Love granted, that ye knew 
 
 Your yet uncertain wishes?” She replied: 
 —— “No greater grief than to remember days 
 
 Of joy, when misery is at hand. That kens 
 
 Thy learn’d instructor. Yet so eagerly 
 
 If thou art bent to know the primal root, 
 
 From whence our love gat being, I will do 
 
 As one, who weeps and tells his tale. One day, 
 
 For our delight we read of Lancelot,* 
 
 How him love thrall’d. Alone we were, and no 
 
 Suspicion near us. Ofttimes by that reading 
 
 Our eyes were drawn together, and the hue 
 
 Fled from our alter’d cheek. But at one point 
 
 Alone we fell. When of that smile we read, 
 
 The wished smile so rapturously kiss’d 
 
 By one so deep in love, then he, who ne’er 
 
 From me shall separate, at once my lips 
 
 All trembling kiss’d. The book and writer both 
 
 Were love’s purveyors. In its leaves that day 
 
 2“ Caina.”” The place to which mur- 
 derers are doomed. 
 
 8“ Francesca.” Francesca, the daugh- 
 ter of Guido da Polenta, Lord of Ra- 
 venna, was given by her father in mar- 
 riage to Lanciotto, son of Malatesta, 
 Lord of Rimini, a man of extraordinary 
 courage, but deformed in his person. 
 His brother Paolo, who unhappily pos- 
 sessed those graces which the husband 
 of Francesca wanted, engaged her af- 
 
 fections; and-being taken in adultery, 
 they were both put to death by the 
 
 _ enraged Lanciotto. 
 
 4“ Lancelot.” One of the Knights 
 of the Round Table, and the lover of 
 Ginevra, or Guinever, celebrated in ro- 
 mance. The incident alluded to seems 
 to have made a strong impression on 
 the imagination of Dante, who intro- 
 duces it again, in the Paradise, Canto 
 XVi. 
 
HELL aI 
 
 We read no more.” While thus one spirit spake, 
 The other wail’d so sorely, that heart-struck 
 
 I, through compassion fainting, seem’ 
 
 From death, and like a corse fell to the ground. 
 
 CANTO VI 
 
 ARGUMENT.—On his recovery, the Poet finds himself in the third circle, 
 where the gluttonous are punished. Their torment is, to lie in the 
 mire, under a continual and heavy storm of hail, snow, and dis- 
 colored water; Cerberus meanwhile barking over them with his 
 threefold throat, and rending them piecemeal. One of these, who 
 on earth was named Ciacco, foretells the divisions with which Flor- 
 ence is about to be distracted. Dante proposes a question to his 
 guide, who solves it; and they proceed toward the fourth circle. 
 
 Y sense reviving, that erewhile had droop’d 
 With pity for the kindred shades, whence grief 
 O’ercame me wholly, straight around I see 
 New torments, new tormented souls, which way © 
 Soe’er I move, or turn, or bend my sight. 
 In the third circle I arrive, of showers 
 Ceaseless, accursed, heavy and cold, unchanged 
 For ever, both in kind and in degree. 
 Large hail; discolor’d water, sleety flaw 
 Through the dun midnight air stream’d down amain: 
 Stank all the land whereon that tempest fell. 
 Cerberus, cruel monster, fierce and strange, 
 Through his wide threefold throat, barks as a dog 
 Over the multitude immersed beneath. 
 His eyes glare crimson, black his unctuous beard, 
 His belly large, and claw’d the hands, with which 
 -He tears the spirits, flays them, and their limbs 
 Piecemeal disparts. Howling there spread, as curs, 
 Under the rainy deluge, with one side 
 The other screening, oft they roll them round, 
 A wretched, godless crew. When that great worm * 
 Descried us, savage Cerberus, he oped 
 
 _ &* That great worm.” In Canto xxxiv. Lucifer is called 
 - “The abhorred worm, that boreth through the world. ” 
 
ae THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 His jaws, and the fangs show’d us; not a limb 
 
 Of him but trembled. Then my guide, his palms 
 
 Expanding on the ground, thence fill’d with earth 
 
 Raised them, and cast it in his ravenous maw. 
 
 E’en as a dog, that yelling bays for food 
 
 His keeper, when the morsel comes, lets fall 
 
 His fury, bent alone with eager haste 
 
 To swallow it; so dropp’d the loathsome cheeks 
 
 Of demon Cerberus, who thundering stuns 
 
 The spirits, that they for deafness wish in vain. 
 We, o’er the shades thrown prostrate by the brunt 
 
 Of the heavy tempest passing, set our feet 
 
 Upon their emptiness, that substance seem’d. 
 They all along the earth extended lay, 
 
 Save one, that sudden raised himself to sit, 
 
 Soon as that way he saw us pass. “O thou!” 
 
 He cried, “ who through the infernal shades art led, 
 
 Own, if again thou know’st me. Thou wast framed 
 
 Or ere my frame was broken.” I replied: 
 
 “The anguish thou endurest perchance so takes 
 
 Thy form from my remembrance, that it seems — 
 
 As if I saw thee never. But inform 
 
 Me who thou art, that in a place so sad 
 
 Art set, and in such torment, that although 
 
 Other be greater, none disgusteth more.” 
 
 He thus in answer-to my words rejoin’d: 
 
 | Thy city, heap’d with envy to the brim, 
 
 Aye, that the measure overflows its bounds, 
 
 Held me in brighter days. *Ye citizens | 
 
 Were wont to name me eee For the sin 
 
 Of gluttony, damned vice, berfeath this rain, 
 
 E’en as thou seest, I with fatigue am worn: 
 
 Nor I sole spirit in this woe: all these 
 
 Have by like crime incurr’d like punishment.” 
 No more he said, and I my speech resumed: 
 
 “Ciacco! thy dire affliction grieves me much, 
 
 Even to tears. But tell me, if thou know’st, 
 
 What shall at length befall the citizens 
 
 9** Ciacco.” So called from his in- signifying a pig. The real name of this 
 ordinate appetite; ‘‘ ciacco,” in Italian, glutton has not been transmitted to us. 
 
HELL 
 
 Of the divided city ;* whether any 
 
 Just one inhabit there: and tell the cause, 
 
 Whence jarring Discord hath assail’d it thus.” 
 He then: “ After long striving they will come 
 
 To blood; and the wild party from the woods * 
 
 Will chase the other ® with much injury forth. 
 
 Then it behooves that this must fall,® within 
 
 Three solar circles;* and the other rise 
 
 By borrow’d force of one, who under shore 
 
 Now rests.® 
 
 It shall a long space hold aloof 
 
 Its forehead, keeping under heavy weight 
 The other opprest, indignant at the load, 
 
 And grieving sore. 
 
 The just are two in number.® 
 
 But they neglected. Avarice, envy, pride, 
 Three fatal sparks, have set the hearts of all 
 
 On fire.” 
 And I continued thus: 
 
 Here ceased the lamentable sound; 
 “ Still would I learn 
 
 More from thee, further parley still entreat. 
 
 Of Farinata and Tegghiaio *° say, 
 
 They who so well deserved; of Giacopo,” 
 
 Arrigo, Mosca,’* and the rest, who bent _ - 
 Their minds on working good. Oh! tell me where 
 They bide, and to their knowledge let me come. 
 For I am prest with keen desire to hear 
 
 Ii heaven’s sweet cup, or poisonous drug of Hell, 
 
 Be to their lip assign’d.” 
 
 He answer’d straight: 
 “These are yet blacker spirits. 
 
 Various crimes 
 
 Have sunk them deeper in the dark abyss. 
 If thou so far descendest, thou mayst see them. 
 But to the pleasant world, when thou return’st, 
 
 8‘*The divided city.” The city of 
 Florence, divided into the Bianchi and 
 Neri factions. : 
 
 4“ The wild party from the woods.” 
 So called, because it was headed by 
 Veri de’ Cerchi, whose family had 
 lately come into the city from Acona, 
 and the woody country of the Val di 
 Nievole. 
 
 5‘* The other.”” The opposite party 
 of the Neri, at the head of which was 
 Corso Donati. 
 
 8“ This must fall.”” The Bianchi. 
 
 7** Three solar circles.”” Three years. 
 
 8“ ____§__ Of one, who under shore 
 
 Now rests.” 
 Charles of Valois, by whose means the 
 Neri were replaced. 
 
 ® The just are two in number.” Who 
 these two were, the commentators are 
 not agreed. Some understand them to 
 be Dante himself and his friend Guido 
 Cavalcanti. : 
 
 10 ** Of Farinata and Tegghiaio.” See 
 Canto x. and notes, and Canto xvi. and 
 notes. 
 
 11 “* Giacopo.”” Giacopo Rusticucci. 
 See Canto xvi. and notes. 
 
 12“* Arrigo, Mosca.” Of Arrigo, who 
 is said by the commentators to have 
 been of the noble family of the Fifanti, 
 no mention afterward occurs. Mosca 
 degli Uberti, or de’ Lamberti, is intro- 
 duced in Canto xxviii. 
 
 - 
 
24 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Of me make mention, I entreat thee, there. 
 No more I tell thee, answer thee no more.” 
 
 This said, his fixed eyes he turn’d askance, 
 A little eyed me, then bent down his head, 
 And ’midst his blind companions with it fell. 
 
 When thus my guide: “No more his bed he leaves, 
 Ere the: last angel-trumpet blow. The Power 
 Adverse to these shall then in glory come, 
 
 Each one forthwith to his sad tomb repair, 
 
 Resume his fleshly vesture and his form, 
 
 And hear the eternal doom re-echoing rend 
 
 The vault.” So pass’d we through that mixture foul 
 Of spirits and rain, with tardy steps; meanwhile 
 Touching, though slightly, on the life to come. 
 
 For thus I question’d: ‘ Shall these tortures, Sir! 
 When the great sentence passes, be increased, 
 
 Or mitigated, or as now severe?” 
 
 He then: “ Consult thy knowledge; that decides, 
 That, as each thing to more perfection grows, 
 
 It feels more sensibly both good and pain. 
 Though ne’er to true perfection may arrive 
 This race accurst, yet nearer then, than now, 
 They shall approach it.” Compassing that path, 
 Circuitous we journey’d; and discourse, 
 Much more than [ relate, between us pass’d: 
 Till at the point, whence the steps led below, 
 Arrived, there Plutus, the great foe, we found. 
 
HELL 25 
 
 CANTO VII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—In the present Canto, Dante describes his descentainto the 
 
 fourth.circle, at the beginning of which he sees Plutus stationed. 
 Here one like doom awaits the prodigal and the avaricious; which 
 is, to meet in direful conflict, rolling great weights against each 
 other with mutual upbraidings. From hence Virgil takes occasion 
 to show how vain the goods that are committed into the charge of 
 Fortune; and this moves our author to inquire what being that 
 Fortune is, of whom he speaks: which question being resolved, they 
 go down into the fifth circle, where they find the wrathful and 
 gloomy tormented in the Stygian lake. Having made a compass 
 round great part of this lake, they come at last to the base of a lofty 
 
 tower. 
 
 “s H me! O Satan! Satan!” ? loud exclaim’d 
 
 A Plutus, in accent hoarse of wild alarm: 
 And the kind sage, whom no event surprised, 
 
 To comfort me thus spake: “ Let not thy fear 
 Harm thee, for power in him, be sure, is none 
 To hinder down this rock thy safe descent.” 
 Then to that swoln lip turning, “ Peace!” he cried, 
 “Curst wolf! thy fury inward on thyself 
 
 Prey, and consume thee! Through the dark profound, 
 
 Not without cause, he passes. So ’tis will’d 
 
 On high, there where the great Archangel pour’d 
 
 Heaven’s vengeance on the first adulterer proud.” 
 As sails, full spread and bellying with the wind, 
 
 Drop suddenly collapsed, if the mast split; 
 
 So to.the ground down dropp’d the cruel fiend. 
 
 _ Thus we, descending to the fourth steep ledge, 
 
 Gain’d on the dismal shore, that all the woe 
 
 Hems in of all the universe. Ah me! 
 
 Almighty Justice! in what store thou heap’st 
 
 New pains, new troubles, as I here beheld. 
 
 Wherefore doth fault of ours bring us to this? 
 E’en as a billow, on Charybdis rising, 
 
 Against encounter’d billow dashing breaks; 
 
 Such is the dance this wretched race must lead, 
 
 Whom more than elsewhere numerous here I found. 
 
 1‘* Ah me! O Satan! Satan! ” “‘ Pape Satan, Pape Satan, aleppe; ”’ words with- 
 
 out meaning. 
 
THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 From one side and the other, with loud ‘voice, 
 Both roll’d on weights, by main force of their breasts, 
 Then smote together, and each one forthwith 
 Roll’d them back voluble, turning again; 
 
 Exclaiming these, “ Why holdest thou so fast? ” 
 Those answering, “ And why castest thou away?” 
 So, still repeating their despiteful song, » 
 They to the opposite point, on either hand, | 
 Traversed the horrid circle; then arrived, a 
 Both turn’d them round, and through the middle space 
 Conflicting met again. At sight whereof 
 I, stung with grief, thus spake: “O say, my guide! 
 What race is this. Were these, whose heads are shorn, 
 On our left hand, all separate to the church? ” 
 
 He straight replied: “In their first life, these all - 
 In mind were so distorted, that they made, 
 According to due measure, of their wealth 
 No use. This clearly from their words collect, 
 Which they howl forth, at each extremity 
 Arriving of the circle, where their crime 
 Contrary in kind disparts them. To the church 
 Were separate those, that with no hairy cowls 
 Are crown’d, both popes and cardinals, o’er whom 
 Avarice dominion absolute maintains.” 
 
 I then: “’Mid such as these some needs must be, 
 Whom I shall recognize, that with the blot 
 Of these foul sins were stain’d.” He answering thus: 
 “ Vain thought conceivest thou. That ignoble life, 
 Which made them vile before, now makes them dark, 
 And to all knowledge indiscernible. 
 For ever they shall meet in this rude shock: 
 ‘ These from the tomb with clenched grasp shall rise, 
 Those with close-shaven locks. That ill they gave, 
 And ill they kept, hath of the beauteous world 
 Deprived, and set them at this strife, which needs 
 No labor’d phrase of mine to set it off. 
 Now mayst thou see, my son! how brief, how vain, 
 The goods committed into Fortune’s hands, 
 For which the human race keep such a coil! 
 Not all the gold that is beneath the moon, 
 
HELL 27 
 
 Or ever hath been, of these toil-worn souls 
 
 Might purchase rest for one.” I thus rejoin’d: 
 
 “ My guide! of these this also would I learn; 
 
 This Fortune, that thou speak’st of, what it is, 
 
 Whose talons grasp the blessings of the world.” 
 He thus: “O beings blind! what ignorance 
 
 Besets you! Now my judgment hear and mark. 
 
 He, whose transcendent wisdom passes all, 
 
 The heavens creating, gave them ruling powers 
 
 To guide them; so that each part shines to each, 
 
 Their light in equal distribution pour’d. 
 
 By similar appointment he ordain’d, 
 
 Over the world’s bright images to rule, 
 
 Superintendence of a guiding hand 
 
 And general minister, which, at due time, 
 
 May change the empty vantages of life 
 
 From race to race, from one to other’s blood, 
 
 Beyond prevention of man’s wisest care: 
 
 Wherefore one nation rises into sway, 
 
 Another languishes, e’en as her will 
 
 Decrees, from us conceal’d, as in the grass 
 
 The serpent train. Against her nought avails 
 
 Your utmost wisdom. She with foresight plans, 
 
 Judges, and carries on her reign, as theirs 
 
 The other powers divine. Her changes know 
 
 None intermission: by necessity 
 
 She is made swift, so frequent come who claim 
 
 Succession in her favors. This is she, 
 
 So execrated e’en by those whose debt 
 
 To her is rather praise: they wrongfully 
 
 With blame requite her, and with evil word; 
 
 But she is blessed, and for that recks not: 
 
 Amidst the other primal beings glad 
 
 Rolls on her sphere, and in her bliss exults. 
 
 Now on our way pass we, to heavier woe 
 
 Descending: for each star is falling now, 
 
 That mounted at our entrance, and forbids 
 
 Too long our tarrying.” We the circle cross’d 
 
 To the next steep, arriving at a well, 
 
 That boiling pours itself down to a foss- 
 
THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Sluiced from its source. Far murkier was the wave 
 Than sablest grain: and we in company 
 Of the inky waters, journeying by their side, 
 Enter’d, though by a different track, beneath. 
 Into a lake, the Stygian named, expands 
 The dismal stream, when it hath reach’d the foot 
 Of the gray wither’d cliffs. Intent I stood 
 To gaze, and in the marish sunk descried 
 A miry tribe, all naked, and with looks 
 Betokening rage. They with their hands alone 
 Struck not, but with the head, the breast, the feet, 
 Cutting each other piecemeal with their fangs. 
 
 The good instructor spake: ‘“ Now seest thou, son! 
 The souls of those, whom anger overcame. 
 This too for certain know, that underneath 
 The water dwells a multitude, whose sighs 
 Into these bubbles make the surface heave, 
 As thine eye tells thee wheresoe’er it turn. 
 Fix’d in the slime, they say: “Sad once were we, 
 ‘In the sweet air made gladsome by the sun, 
 ‘Carrying a foul and lazy mist within: 
 ‘ Now in these murky settlings are we sad.’ 
 Such dolorous strain they gurgle in their throats, 
 But word distinct can utter none.” Our route 
 Thus compass’d we, a segment widely stretch’d 
 Between the dry embankment, and the core 
 Of the loath’d pool, turning meanwhile our eyes 
 Downward on those who gulp’d its muddy lees; 
 Nor stopp’d, till to a tower’s low base we came. 
 
HELL 29 
 
 CANTO VIII 
 
 ArcuMENT.—A signal having been made from the tower, Phlegyas, the 
 ferryman of the lake, speedily crosses it, and conveys Virgil and 
 Dante to the other side. On their passage, they meet with Filippo 
 Argenti, whose fury and torment are described. They then arrive 
 
 at the city of Dis, the entrance whereto is denied, and the portals 
 closed against them by many Demons. 
 
 Y theme pursuing, I relate, that ere 
 We reach’d the lofty turret’s base, our eyes 
 Its height ascended, where we mark’d uphung 
 
 Two cressets, and another saw from far 
 Return the signal, so remote, that scarce 
 The eye could catch its beam. I, turning round 
 To the deep source of knowledge, thus inquired: 
 “ Say what this means; and what, that other light 
 In answer set: what agency doth this? ” 
 
 “There on the filthy waters,” he replied, 
 * E’en now what next awaits us mayst thou see, 
 If the marsh-gendered fog conceal it not.” 
 
 Never was arrow from the cord dismiss’d, 
 That ran its way so nimbly through the air, 
 As a small bark, that through the waves I spied 
 Toward us coming, under the sole sway 
 Of one that ferried it, who cried aloud: 
 “ Art thou arrived, fell spirit? ’—‘ Phlegyas, Phlegyas,? 
 This time thou criest in vain,” my lord replied; 
 “ No longer shalt thou have us, but while o’er 
 The slimy pool we pass.” As one who hears 
 Of some great wrong he hath sustain’d, whereat 
 Inly he pines: so Phlegyas inly pined 
 In his fierce ire. My guide, descending, stepp’d 
 Into the skiff, and bade me enter next, 
 Close at his side; nor, till my entrance, seem’d 
 The vessel freighted. Soon as both embark’d, 
 Cutting the waves, goes on the ancient prow, 
 More deeply than with others it is wont. 
 1“ Phlegyas.” Phlegyas, who was so fire to the temple of that deity, by 
 
 incensed against Apollo, for having vio- whose vengeance he was cast into Tar- 
 lated his daughter Coronis, that he set tarus. See Virg. ‘* 7En.” 1. vi. 618, 
 
? 
 
 Vy, 
 
 go THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 While we our course o’er the dead channel held, 
 
 One drench’d in mire before me came, and said: 
 
 answer d: “ Though Icome, I tarry not: 
 But who art thou, that art become so foul?” 
 
 “ One, as thou-seest, who mourn:” he straight replied. 
 owhich Ithus: “ In mourning and in woe, 
 iit! tarry thou. I know thee well, 
 
 E’en thus in filth disguised.”’ Then stretch’d he forth 
 Hands to the bark; whereof my teacher sage 
 Aware, thrusting him back: “ Away! down there 
 To the-ettrer-degs!” then, with his arms my neck 
 Encircling, kiss’d my cheek, and spake: “O soul, 
 Justly disdainful! blest was she in whom 
 Thou wast conceived. He in the world was one 
 For arrogance noted: to his memory 
 No virtue lends its lustre; even so 
 Here is his shadow furious. ‘There above, 
 How many now hold themselves mighty kings, 
 Who here like swine shall wallow in the mire, 
 Leaving behird them horrible dispraise.” 
 
 I then: “ Master! him fain would I behold 
 Whelm’d in these dregs, before we quit the lake.” 
 
 He thus: “ Or ever to thy view the shore 
 Be offer’d, satisfied shall be that wish, 
 
 Which well deserves completion.” Scarce his words 
 Were ended, when I saw the miry tribes 
 
 Set on him with such violence, that yet 
 
 For that render I thanks to God, and praise. 
 
 “To Filippo Argenti! ” * cried they all: 
 
 And on himself the moody Florentine 
 
 Turn’d his avenging fangs. Him here we left, 
 
 Nor speak I of him more. But on mine ear 
 
 Sudden a sound of lamentation smote, 
 
 Whereat mine eye unbarr’d I sent abroad. 
 
 And thus the good instructor: “ Now, my son 
 Draws the city, that of Dis is named, 
 With its grave denizens, a mighty throng.” 
 
 2* Filippo Argenti.”” Boccaccio tells vigor of his bodily fram@, and thie 
 
 us, “he was a man remarkable for the | extreme waywardness and irascibility of 
 large proportions and extraordinary his temper.’’—“‘ Decam.” G, ix. N. 8. 
 
HELL 3t 
 
 I thus: “ The minarets already, Sir! 
 There, certes, in the valley I descry, 
 Gleaming vermilion, as if they from fire 
 Had issued.” He replied: ‘“ Eternal fire, 
 That inward burns, shows them with ruddy flame 
 Illumed; as in this nether Hell thou seest.” 
 We came within the fosses deep, that moat 
 This region comfortless. The walls appear’d 
 As they were framed of iron. We had made 
 Wide circuit, ere a place we reach’d, where loud 
 The mariner cried vehement: “Go forth: . 
 The entrance is here.’’ Upon the gates I spied 
 More than a thousand, who of old from heaven 
 Were shower’d. With ireful gestures, “ Who is this,” 
 They cried, “that, without death first felt, goes through 
 The regions of the dead?”’ My sapient guide 
 Matte-sign that he for secret parley wish’d; 
 Whereat their angry scorn abating, thus 
 They spake: ‘“‘ Come thou alone; and let him go, 
 epee oa dly eed tiie veal. 
 Alone return he by his witless way ; 
 If well he knew it, let him prove. For thee, 
 Here shalt thou tarry, who through clime so dark 
 Hast been his escort.”” Now bethink thee, reader! 
 What cheer was mine at sound of those curst words. 
 I did believe I never should return. 
 -_“O my loved guide! who more than seven times® 
 Security hast render’d me, and drawn 
 From peril deep, whereto I stood exposed, 
 Desert me not,” I cried, “in this extreme. 
 And, if our onward going be denied, 
 Together trace we back our steps with speed.” 
 My liege, who thither had conducted me, 
 Replied: “ Fear not: for of our passage none 
 Hath power to disappoint us, by such high 
 Authority permitted. But do thou 
 8“ Seven times.”” The commentators, berus, Plutus, Phlegyas, and iat 
 gays Venturi, perplex themselves with Argenti, as so many others, we shall 
 the inquiry what seven perils these have the number; and if this be not 
 were from which Dante had been de- satisfactory, we may suppose a determi- 
 Ihvered by Virgil. Reckoning the nate to have been put for an indeter- 
 
 beasts in the first, Canto_as one_of minate number. 
 them, and adding Charon, Minos, Cer- 
 
32 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Expect me here; meanwhile, thy wearied spirit 
 
 Comfort, and feed with kindly hope, assured 
 
 I 
 
 id:? 
 
 This said, departs the sire benevolent, 
 
 And quits me. 
 
 Hesitating I remain 
 
 At war, ’twixt will and will not, in my thoughts. 
 I could not hear what terms he offer’d them, 
 But they conferr’d not long, for all at once 
 Pellmell rush’d back within. Closed-were the gates, 
 By those our adversaries, on the breast a 
 Of my liege lord: excluded, he return’d 
 To me with tardy steps. Upon the ground 
 His eyes were bent, and from his brow erased 
 All confidence, while thus in sighs he spake: 
 - “ Who hath denied me these abodes of woe?” 
 Then thus tome: “ That I am anger’d, think 
 No ground of terror: in this trial I 
 Shall vanquish, use what arts they may within 
 
 For hindrance. 
 
 This their insolence, not new,* 
 
 Erewhile at gate less secret they display’d, 
 Which still is without bolt; upon its arch 
 
 Thou saw’st the deadly scroll: and even now, 
 On this side of its entrance, down the steep, 
 Passing the circles, unescorted, comes 
 
 One whose strong might can open us this land.” 
 
 « “This their insolence, not new.” 
 Virgil assures our poet that these evil 
 spirits had formerly shown the same in- 
 solence when our Saviour descended 
 into hell. They attempted to prevent 
 him from entering at the gate, over 
 
 which Dante had read the fatal inscrip- 
 tion. ‘‘ That gate which,” says the Ro- 
 man poet, “‘an angel had just passed, 
 by whose aid we shall overcome this 
 opposition, and gain admittance into 
 the city.” 
 
HELL 33 
 
 CANTO IX 
 
 ARGUMENT.—After some hinderances, and having seen the hellish furies 
 and other monsters, the Poet, by the help of an angel, enters the 
 city of Dis, wherein he discovers that the heretics are punished in 
 tombs burning with intense fire; and he, together with Virgil, passes 
 onward between the sepulchres and the walls of the city. 
 
 HE hue,? which coward dread on my pale cheeks 
 Imprinted when I saw my guide turn back, 
 Chased that from his which newly they had worn, 
 And inwardly restrain’d it. He,as one 
 Who listens, stood attentive: for his eye 
 Not far could lead him through the sable air, 
 And the thick-gathering cloud. “It yet behoves 
 We win this fight;” thus he began: “ if not, 
 Such aid to us is offer’'d—Oh! how long 
 Me seems it, ere the promised help arrive.” 
 T noted, how the sequel of his words 
 Cloked their beginning; for the last he spake 
 Agreed not with the first. But not the less 
 My fear was at his saying; sith I drew 
 To import worse, perchance, than that he held, 
 His mutilated speech. “ Doth ever any 
 Into this rueful concave’s extreme depth 
 Descend, out of the first degree, whose pain 
 Is deprivation merely of sweet hope?” 
 Thus I inquiring. “ Rarely,” he replied, 
 “Tt ‘chances, that among us any makes 
 This journey, which I wend. Erewhile, ’tis true, 
 Once came I here beneath, conjured by fell 
 Erictho,? sorceress, who compell’d the shades 
 Back to their bodies. No long space my flesh 
 Was naked of me, when within these walls 
 She made me enter, to draw forth a spirit 
 From out of Judas’ circle. Lowest place 
 Is that of all, obscurest, and removed 
 1“ The hue.” Virgil, perceiving that sorceress, according to Lucan, ** Phar- 
 Dante was pale with fear, restrained sal.” 1. vi., was employed by Sextus, son 
 those outward tokens of displeasure of Pompey the Great, to conjure up a 
 which his own countenance fad be- spirit, who should inform him of the 
 trayed. issue of the civil wars between his 
 8“ Erictho.” Erictho, a Thessalian father and Cesar. 
 
34 
 
 8 “ The lore.”” The Poet probably in- perance, reason, which is figured under 
 the person of Virgil, with the ordinary 
 the allegorical and mystic sense of the grace of God, may be a sufficient safe- 
 present Canto, and not, as Venturi sup- 
 poses, to that of the whole work. Lan- ; 
 dino supposes this hidden meaning to hereafter see punished, a special grace, 
 
 represented by the angel, is requisite 
 
 tends to call the reader’s attention to 
 
 be that in the case of those vices which 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Furthest from heaven’s ail-circling orb. The road 
 Full well I know: thou therefore rest secure. 
 That lake, the noisome stench exhaling, round 
 The city of grief encompasses, which now 
 We may not enter without rage.’’ Yet more 
 He added: but I hold it not in mind, 
 For that mine eye toward the lofty tower 
 Had drawn me wholly, to its burning top; 
 Where, in an instant, I beheld uprisen 
 At once three hellish furies stain’d with blood. 
 In limb and motion feminine they seem’d ; 
 Around them greenest hydras twisting roll’d 
 Their volumes; adders and cerastes crept 
 Instead of hair, and their fierce temples bound. 
 He, knowing well the miserable hags 
 Who tend the queen of endless woe, thus spake: 
 “ Mark thou each dire Erynnis. To the left, 
 This is Megzera; on the right hand, she 
 Who wails, Alecto; and Tisiphone 
 I’ th’ midst.” This said, in silence he remain’d. 
 Their breast they each one clawing tore; themselves 
 Smote with their palms, and such thrill clamor raised, 
 That to the bard I clung, suspicion-bound. 
 “Hasten Medusa: so to adamant . 
 Him shall we change;” all looking down exclaim’d: 
 “F’en when by Theseus’ might assail’d, we took 
 No ill revenge.” “ Turn thyself round and keep 
 Thy countenance hid; for if the Gorgon dire 
 Be shown, and thou shouldst view it, thy return 
 Upwards would be for ever lost.” This said, 
 Himself, my gentle master, turn’d me round; 
 Nor trusted he my hands, but with his own 
 He also hid me. Ye of intellect 
 Sound and entire, mark well the lore * conceal’d 
 Under close texture of the mystic strain. 
 
 proceed from incontinence and intem- for our defence. 
 
 uard; but that in the instance of more 
 einous crimes, such as those we shall 
 
HELL 35 
 
 And now there came o’er the perturbed waves 
 Loud-crashing, terrible, a sound that made 
 Either shore tremble, as if of a wind 
 Impetuous, from conflicting vapors sprung, 
 That ’gainst some forest driving all his might, 
 Plucks off the branches, beats them down, and hurls 
 Afar; then, onward passing, proudly sweeps 
 His whirlwind rage, while beasts and shepherds fly. 
 Mine eyes he loosed, and spake: ‘‘ And now direct 
 Thy visual nerve along that ancient foam, 
 
 There, thickest where the smoke ascends.” 
 
 As frogs 
 
 Before their foe the serpent, through the wave 
 Ply swiftly all, till at the ground each one 
 
 Lies on a heap; more than a thousand spirits 
 Destroy’d, so saw I fleeing before one 
 
 Who pass’d with unwet feet the Stygian sound. 
 He, from his face removing the gross air, 
 
 Oft his left hand forth stretch’d, and seem’d alone 
 By that annoyance wearied. I perceived 
 
 That he was sent from heaven; and to my guide 
 Turn’d me, who signal made, that I should stand 
 Quiet, and bend to him. Ah me! how full 
 
 Of noble anger seem’d he. To the gate 
 
 He came, and with his wand touch’d it, whereat 
 Open without impediment it flew. 
 
 “ Outcasts of heaven! O abject race, and scorn’d!” 
 Began he, on the horrid grunsel standing, 
 “Whence doth this wild excess of insolence 
 Lodge in you? wherefore kick you ’gainst that will 
 Ne’er frustrate of its end, and which so oft 
 Hath laid on you enforcement of your pangs? 
 What profits, at the fates to butt the horn? 
 
 Your Cerberus,* if ye remember, hence 
 Bears still, peel’d of their hair, his throat and maw.” 
 This said, he turn’d back o’er the filthy way, 
 
 eeerour Cerberus.” Cerberus. is 
 feigned to have been dragged by Her- 
 cules, bound with a threefold chain, of 
 which, says the angel, he still bears the 
 marks. ombardi blames the other in- 
 terpreters for having supposed that the 
 angel attributes this exploit to Her- 
 
 cules, a fabulous hero, rather than to 
 our Saviour. It would seem as if the 
 good father had forgotten that Cerberus 
 is himself no less a creature of the 
 imagination than the hero who en- 
 countered him. 
 
36 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 And syllable to us spake none; but wore 
 The semblance of a man by other care 
 Beset, and keenly prest, than thought of him 
 Who in his presence stands. Then we our steps 
 Toward that territory moved, secure 
 After the hallow’d words. We, unopposed, 
 There enter’d; and, my mind eager to learn 
 What state a fortress like to that might hold, 
 I, soon as enter’d, throw mine eye around, 
 And see, on every part, wide-stretching space, 
 Replete with bitter pain and torment ill. 
 As where Rhone stagnates on the plains of Arles,§ 
 Or as at Pola,® near Quarnaro’s gulf, 
 That closes Italy and laves her bounds, 
 The place is all thick spread with sepulchres ; 
 So was it here, save what in horror here 
 Excell’d: for ’midst the graves were scattered flames, 
 Wherewith intensely all throughout they burn’d, 
 That iron for no craft there hotter needs. 
 Their lids all hung suspended; and beneath, 
 From them forth issued lamentable moans, 
 Such as the sad and tortured well might raise. 
 Ithus: ‘“‘ Master! say who are these, interr’d 
 Within these vaults, of whom distinct we hear 
 The dolorous sighs.” He answer thus return’d: 
 “ The arch-heretics are here, accompanied 
 By every sect their followers; and much more, 
 Than thou believest, the tombs are freighted: like 
 With like is buried; and the monuments 
 Are different in degrees of heat.” This said, 
 He to the right hand turning, on we pass’d 
 Betwixt the afflicted and the ramparts high. 
 6“ The plains of Arles.’”’ In Pro- cap. 28. .and 30. and by Fazio degli 
 vence. These sepulchres are mentioned Uberti, Dittamondo, L. iv. cap. xxi. 
 in the Life of Charlemagne, which goes 6“ At Pola.” A city of Istria, sit- 
 
 under the name of Archbishop Turpin, uated near the gulf of Quarnaro, in the 
 Adriatic Sea. 
 
HELL 37 
 
 CANTO X 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Dant 
 
 up till afte 
 
 from Florence; and shows him 
 
 tha 
 
 his. guide, holds 
 
 Pe 
 
 t the condemned have knowledge 
 
 of future things, but are ignorant of what is at present passing, un- 
 less it be revealed by some newcomer from earth. 
 
 OW by a secret pathway we proceed, 
 Between the walls, that hem the region round, 
 And the tormented souls: my master first, 
 I close behind his steps. “ Virtue supreme!” 
 
 I thus began: 
 
 “Who through these ample orbs 
 
 In circuit lead’st me, even as thou will’st; 
 
 Speak thou, and satisfy my wish. May those, 
 Who lie within these sepulchres, be seen? 
 Already all the lids are raised, and none 
 
 O’er them keeps watch.” He thus in answer spake: 
 “They shall be closed all, what-time they here 
 From Josaphat ? return’d shall come, and bring 
 Their bodies, which above they now have left. 
 The cemetery on this part obtain, 
 
 With Epicurus, all his followers, 
 
 Who with the body make the spirit die. 
 
 Here therefore satisfaction shall be soon, 
 
 Both to the question ask’d, and to the wish ? 
 Which thou conceal’st in silence.” I replied: 
 
 “T keep not, guide beloved! from thee my heart 
 Secreted, but to shun vain length of words; 
 
 A lesson erewhile taught me by thyself.” 
 
 “O Tuscan! thou, who through the city of fire 
 Alive art passing, so discreet of speech: 
 Here, please thee, stay awhile. Thy utterance 
 Declares the place of thy nativity 
 
 1 Josaphat.” It seems to have been 
 @ common opinion among the Jews, as 
 well as among many Christians, that 
 the general judgment will be held in 
 the valley of Josaphat, or Jehoshaphat: 
 “I will also gather all nations, and will 
 bring them down into the valley of 
 Jehoshaphat, and will plead with them 
 there for my people, and for my heri- 
 
 Classics. Vol. 34—C 
 
 tage Israel, whom they have scattered 
 among the nations, and parted my 
 land.”’—Joel, iii. 2, 
 
 2“* The wish.” The wish that Dante 
 had not expressed was to see_and con- 
 verse with the followers of Epicurus; 
 among whom, we shall see, were Fari- 
 nata degli Uberti and Cavalcante Caval- 
 canti. 
 
38 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 To be that noble land, with which perchance 
 
 I too severely dealt.” Sudden that sound 
 
 Forth issued from a vault, whereat, in fear, 
 
 I somewhat closer to my leader’s side 
 
 Approaching, he thus spake: ‘“ What dost thou? Turn: 
 Lo! Farinata* there, who hath himself 
 
 Uplifted: from his girdle upwards, all 
 
 Exposed, behold him.” On his face was mine 
 
 Already fix’d: his breast and forehead there 
 
 Erecting, seem’d as in high scorn he held 
 
 E’en Hell. 
 
 Between the sepulchres, to him 
 
 My guide thrust me, with fearless hands and prompt; 
 This warning added: “ See thy words be clear.” 
 
 He, soon as there I stood at the tomb’s foot, 
 Eyed me a space; then in disdainful mood 
 Address’d me: “ Say what ancestors were thine.” 
 
 I, willing to obey him, straight reveal’d 
 The whole, nor kept back aught: whence he, his brow 
 Somewhat uplifting, cried: “ Fiercely were they 
 Adverse to me, my party, and the blood 
 From whence I sprang: twice,* therefore, I abroad 
 
 Scatter’d them.” 
 
 “Though driven out, yet they each time 
 
 From all parts,” answer’d I, “return’d; an art | 
 
 Which yours have shown they are not skill’d to learn.” 
 Then, peering forth from the unclosed jaw, _ 
 
 Rose from his side a shade,® high as the chin, 
 
 Leaning, methought, upon its knees upraised. 
 
 It look’d around, as eager to explore 
 
 If there were other with me; but perceiving 
 
 That fond imagination quench’d, with tears 
 
 Thus spake: “If thou through this blind prison go’st, 
 
 Led by thy lofty genius and profound, 
 
 Where is my son? * and wherefore not with thee?” 
 
 3“ Fari , Farinata degli Uberti, 
 a noble-Picrentine was the leader of 
 the Ghibelline faction, when they ob- 
 tained a signal victory over the Guelfi 
 at Montaperto, near the river Arbia. 
 Macchiavelli calls him ‘‘a man of ex- 
 alted soul, and great military talents.” 
 —‘* Hist. of Flor.’’ b. ii. His grandson, 
 
 Bonifacio, or, as he is commonly called, - 
 
 Fazio degli Uberti, wrote a poem, en- 
 titled the ‘“‘ Dittamonodo,” in imitation 
 of Dante. 
 
 4“ Twice.” The first time in 1248, 
 when they_were driven out by Fred- 
 erick the Second. See G. Villani, lib. 
 vi. c. xxxiv.; and the second time in 
 1260. See note to v. 83. 
 
 5“ A shade.” The spirit of Caval- 
 cante Cavalcanti, a noble Florentine, of 
 the Guelf party. 
 
 6“ My son.” Guido, the son of Ca- 
 valcante Cavalcanti; * he whom I call 
 the first of my friends,” says Dante in 
 his “Vita Nuova” where the come 
 
HELL 39 
 
 I straight replied: ‘ Not of myself I come; 
 
 By him, who there expects me, through this clime 
 Conducted, whom perchance Guido thy son 
 
 Had in contempt.” * Already had his words 
 
 And mode of punishment read me his name, 
 Whence I so fully answer’d. He at once 
 
 Exclaim’d, up starting, “ How! said’st thou, he had? 
 
 No longer lives he? 
 é blessed dayli 
 
 Strikes not on his eye 
 t?” Then, of some delay 
 
 I made ere my reply, aware, down fell 
 
 ore. 
 
 Meanwhile the other, great of soul, near whom 
 I yet was station’d, changed not countenance stern, 
 Nor moved the neck, nor bent his ribbed side. 
 * And if,” continuing the first discourse, 
 “ They in this art,” he cried, ‘ small skill have shown; 
 That doth torment me more e’en than this bed. 
 But not yet fifty times ® shall be relumed 
 Her aspect, who reigns here queen of this realm,® 
 Ere thou shalt know the full weight of that art. 
 So to the pleasant world mayst thou return, 
 As thou shalt tell me why, in all their laws, 
 Against my kin this people is so fell.” 
 
 “ The slaughter *° and great havoc,” I replied, 
 “* That color’d Arbia’s flood with crimson stain— 
 To these impute, that in our hallow’d dome 
 
 Such orisons ™ ascend.” 
 
 Sighing he shook 
 
 The head, then thus resumed: “In that affray 
 
 mencement of their friendship is re- 
 lated. From the character given of him 
 by contemporary writers, his temper 
 was well formed to assimilate with that 
 of our Poet. He was,”’ according to 
 ORC Ts SOS e+ tie aii 4 § Con 
 hilosophical and elegant mind, if he 
 ad not been too delicate and fastid- 
 ious.” 
 ep We i Guido thy son 
 Had in contempt.”’ 
 Guido Cavalcanti, being more given to 
 philosophy than poetry, was perhaps no 
 great admirer of Virgil. 
 8“ Not yet fifty times.” ‘‘ Not fifty 
 months shall be passed, before thou 
 shalt learn, by woful experience, the 
 difficulty of returning from banishment 
 to thy native city.”’ 
 ®“* Queen of this realm.”” The moon, 
 one of whose titles in heathen mythol- 
 
 ogy was Proserpine, queen of the 
 shades below. 
 
 10‘* The slaughter.” ‘‘ By means of 
 Farinata degli Uberti, the Guelfi were 
 conquered by the army of King Man- 
 fredi, near the river Arbia, with so 
 great a slaughter, that those who es- 
 caped from that defeat took refuge, not. 
 in Florence, which city they considered 
 as lost to them, but. in Lucca.’’—Mac- 
 chiavelli, ‘* Hist. of Flor.”’ b. ii. and G. 
 Villani, lib. vi. c. Ixxx. and Ixxxi. 
 
 11 ** Such orisons.”” This appears to 
 allude to certain prayers which were 
 offered up in the ahenelies of Florence, 
 for deliverance from the hostile at- 
 tempts of the Uberti: or, it Be be 
 that the public councils being held in 
 churches, the speeches delivered in 
 them against the Uberti are termed 
 “‘ orisons,” or prayers. 
 
40 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 I stood not singly, nor, without just cause, 
 Assuredly, should with ithe rest have -stirr’d; 
 But singly there 1 stood,** when, by consent 
 Of all, Florence had to the:ground been razed, 
 The one who openly forbade the deed.” 
 “‘ So may thy lineage find at last repose,” 
 I thus adjured him, “as thou solve this knot, 
 Which now involves my mind. If right I hear, 
 Ye seem to view beforehand that which time 
 Leads with him, of the present uninform’d.” 
 “We view, as one who hath an evil sight,” 
 He answer’d, “ plainly, objects far remote; 
 So much of his large splendor yet imparts 
 The Almighty Ruler: but when they approach, 
 
 Or actually exist, our intellect 
 
 Then wholly fails; nor of your human state, 
 Except what others bring us, know we aught. 
 Hence therefore mayst thou understand, that all 
 Our knowledge in that instant shall expire, 
 When on futurity the portals close.” 
 
 Then conscious of my fault,?? and by remorse 
 Smitten, I added thus: “ Now shalt thou say 
 To him there fallen, that his offspring still 
 Is to the living join’d; and bid him know, 
 That if from answer, silent, I abstain’d, 
 
 ’Twas that my thought was-occupied, intent 
 Upon that error, which thy ‘help hath solved.” 
 
 But now my master summoning me back 
 I heard, and with more eager haste besought 
 The spirit to inform me, who with him 
 
 Partook his lot. 
 
 He answer thus return’d: 
 
 “ More than a thousand with me here are laid. 
 
 123‘*Singly there I stood.”? Guido 
 Novello assembled a council of the 
 Ghibellini at Empoli; where it was 
 agreed by all, that, in order to main- 
 tain the ascendancy of the Ghibelline 
 party in Tuscany, it was necessary to 
 destroy Florence, which .could serve 
 only (the people of that city being 
 Guelfi) to enable the party attached to 
 tke church to recover its strength. This 
 cruel sentence, passed upon so noble a 
 city, met with no opposition from any 
 of its citizens or friends, except Fa- 
 
 rinata degli Uberti, who openly and 
 without reserve forbade the measure; 
 affirming, that he had endured so many 
 hardships, and encountered ‘so many 
 dangers, with no other view than that 
 of being able to pass his days in his 
 own country. Macchiavelli, “ Hist. of 
 Flor.” b. :ii. 
 
 18“ My fault.”” ‘Dante felt remorse 
 for not having returned an immediate 
 answer to the inquiry of Cavalcante, 
 from which delay he was led to believe 
 thas his son Guido was no longer living. 
 
HELL 41 
 
 Within is Frederick,1* second of that name, 
 And the Lord Cardinal, and of the rest 
 
 I speak not.” 
 
 He, this said, from sight withdrew. 
 
 But I my steps toward the ancient bard 
 Reverting, ruminated on the words 
 
 Betokening me such ill. 
 
 Onward he moved, 
 And thus, in going, question’d: 
 That holds thy senses wrapt? ” 
 
 * Whence the amaze 
 I satisfied 
 
 The inquiry, and the sage enjoin’d me straight: 
 “Let thy safe memory store what thou hast heard 
 To thee importing harm; and note thou this,” 
 With his raised finger bidding me take heed, 
 “When thou shalt stand before her gracious beam,*® 
 Whose bright eye all surveys, she of thy life 
 
 The future tenor will to thee unfold.” 
 
 Forthwith he to the left hand turn’d his feet: 
 We left the wall, and toward the middle space 
 Went by a path that to a valley strikes, 
 
 Which e’en thus high exhaled its noisome steam. 
 
 14“ Frederick.” The Emperor Fred- 
 erick II, who died in 1250. See notes 
 to Canto xiii. 
 
 % The Lord Cardinal.” Ottaviano 
 Ubaldini, a Florentine, made cardinal 
 in 1245, and deceased about 1273. On 
 account of his great influence, he was 
 
 generally known by the appellation of 
 “the Cardinal.’”? It is repovted of him 
 that he declared if there were any such 
 thing as a human soul he had lost his 
 for, the Ghibellini. 
 6 ‘Her gracious beam.”’ Beatrice. 
 
42 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 CANTO XI 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Dante arrives at the verge of a rocky-precipice which en< 
 coses the sexenth cree ere he sees the sepulchre of Anastasius 
 the Heretic; behind thetid of which pausing a little, to make him- 
 self capable by degrees of enduring the fetid smell that steamed 
 upward from the abyss, he is instructed by Virgil concerning the 
 manner in which the three following circles are disposed, and what 
 description of sinners is punished in each. He then inquires the 
 reason why the carnal, the gluttonous, the avaricious and prodigal, 
 the wrathful and gloomy, suffer not their punishments within the 
 city of Dis. He next asks how the crime of usury is an offence 
 against God; and at length the two Poets go toward the place from 
 whence a passage leads down to the seventh circle. 
 
 PON the utmost verge of a high bank, 
 U By craggy rocks environ’d round, we came, 
 Where woes beneath, more cruel yet, were stow'd3 
 
 And here, to shun the horrible excess 
 Of fetid exhalation upward cast 
 From the profound abyss, behind the lid 
 Of a great monument we stood retired, 
 Whereon this scroll I mark’d: “TI have in charge 
 Pope Anastastius,t whom Photinus drew 
 From the right path.” “ Ere our descent, behoves 
 We make delay, that somewhat first the sense, 
 To the dire breath accustom’d, afterward 
 Regard it not.” My master thus; to whom 
 Answering I spake: ‘‘ Some compensation find, 
 That the time pass not wholly lost.” He then: 
 “Lo! how my thoughts e’en to thy wishes tend. 
 My son! within these rocks,” he thus began, 
 “ Are three close circles in gradation placed, 
 As these which now thou leavest. Each one is full 
 Of spirits accurst; but that the sight alone 
 Hereafter may suffice thee, listen how 
 And for what cause in durance they abide. 
 
 “ Of all malicious act abhorr’d in heaven, 
 The end is injury; and all such end 
 
 1** Pope Anastasius.”” The commen- some he_ is supposed to have been An- 
 tators are not agreed concerning the astasius II; by others, the fourth of that 
 erson who is here mentioned as a fol- mame. 
 
 ower of the heretical Photinus. By 
 
HELL | ' 43 
 
 Either by force or fraud works other’s woe. 
 
 But fraud, because of man’s peculiar evil, 
 
 To God is more displeasing ; and beneath, 
 
 The fraudulent are therefore doom’d to endure 
 
 Severer pang. The violent occupy 
 
 All the first circle; and because, to force, 
 
 Three persons are obnoxious, in three rounds, 
 
 Each within other separate, is it framed. 
 
 To God, his neighbor, and himself, by man 
 
 Force may be offer’d; to himself I say, 
 
 And his possessions, as thou soon shalt hear 
 
 At full. Death, violent death, and painful wounds 
 
 Upon his neighbor he inflicts; and wastes, 
 
 By devastation, pillage, and the flames, 
 
 His substance. Slayers, and each one that smites 
 
 In malice, plunderers, and all robbers, hence 
 
 The torment undergo of the first round, 
 
 In different herds. Man can do violence 
 
 To himself and his own blessings: and for this, 
 
 He, in the second round must aye deplore 
 
 With unavailing penitence his crime, 
 
 Whoe’er deprives himself of life and light, 
 
 In reckless lavishment his talent wastes, 
 
 And sorrows there where he should dwell in joy. 
 
 To God may force be offer’d, in the heart 
 
 Denying and blaspheming his high power, 
 
 And Nature with her kindly law contemning. 
 
 And thence the inmost round marks with its seal 
 
 Sodom, and Cahors, and all such as speak 
 
 Contemptuously of the Godhead in their hearts. 
 “Fraud, that in every conscience leaves a sting, 
 
 May be by man employ’d on one, whose trust 
 
 He wins, or on another who withholds 
 
 Strict confidence. Seems as the latter way 
 
 Broke but the bond of love which Nature makes. 
 
 Whence in the second circle have their nest, 
 
 Dissimulation, witchcraft, flatteries, 
 
 Theft, falsehood, simony, all who seduce 
 
 To lust, or set their honesty at pawn, 
 
 With such vile scum as these. The other way 
 
44 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Forgets both Nature’s general love, and that 
 Which thereto added afterward gives birth 
 To special faith. Whence in the lesser circle, 
 Point of the universe, dread seat of Dis, 
 The traitor is eternally consumed.” 
 
 I thus: “Instructor, clearly thy discourse 
 Proceeds, distinguishing the hideous chasm 
 And its inhabitants with skill exact. 
 But tell me this: they of the dull, fat pool, 
 Whom the rain beats, or whom the tempest drives, 
 Or who with tongues so fierce conflicting meet, 
 Wherefore within the city fire-illumed 
 Are not these punish’d, if God’s wrath be on them? 
 And if it be not, wherefore in such guise 
 Are they condemn’d?”’ He answer thus return’d: 
 “ Wherefore in dotage wanders thus thy mind, 
 .Not so accustom’d? or what other thoughts 
 Possess it? Dwell not in thy memory 
 The words, wherein thy ethic page? describes 
 Three dispositions adverse to Heaven’s will, 
 Incontinence, malice, and mad brutishness, 
 And how incontinence the least offends 
 God, and least guilt incurs? If well thou note 
 This judgment, and remember who they are, 
 Without these walls to vain repentance doom’d, 
 Thou shalt discern why they apart are placed 
 From these fell spirits, and less wreakful pours 
 Justice divine on them its vengeance down.” 
 
 “O sun! who healest all imperfect sight, 
 Thou so content’st me, when thou solvest my doubt, 
 That ignorance not less than knowledge charms. 
 Yet somewhat turn thee back,” I in these words 
 Continued, “ where thou said’st, that usury 
 Offends celestial Goodness; and this knot 
 Perplex’d unravel.” He thus made reply: 
 “Philosophy, to an attentive ear, 
 Clearly points out, not in one part alone, 
 
 dniste Thy ethic page.” He refers to that respecting morals there are three 
 
 Aristotle’s “‘ Ethics,” lib. vii. c. 1: “In sorts of things to be avoided, malice, 
 the next place, eee on another di- incontinence, and brutishness.”’ 
 vision of the subject, le 
 
 t it be defined 
 
HELL 45 
 
 How imitative Nature takes her course 
 From the celestial mind, and from its art: 
 And where her laws® the Stagirite unfolds, 
 Not many leaves scann’d o’er, observing well 
 Thou shalt discover, that your art on her 
 Obsequious follows, as the learner treads 
 
 Tn his instructor’s step; so that your art 
 Deserves the name of second in descent 
 From God. These two, if thou recall to mind 
 Creation’s holy book,* from the beginning 
 Were the right source of life and excellence 
 To human-kind. But in another path 
 
 The usurer walks; and Nature in herself 
 And in her follower thus he sets at naught, 
 
 Placing elsewhere his hope.® 
 
 But follow now 
 
 My steps on forward journey bent; for now 
 The Pisces play with undulating glance 
 Along the horizon, and the Wain® lies all 
 O’er the northwest; and onward there a space 
 Is our steep passage down the rocky height.” 
 
 8 Her laws.” Aristotle’s ‘ Physics,” 
 ib. ii. c. 2: ‘‘ Art imitates mature.” 
 ,,*. Creation’s holy book.’”’ Genesis, c. 
 ii. v. 15: “ And the Lord God-took the 
 man, and put him into the Garden of 
 Eden, to dress it, and to om sh it.” And 
 Genesis, c. iii. v. 19: ‘‘ In the sweat of 
 thy face shalt thou eat bread.” 
 
 ““ Placing elsewhere his hope.” The 
 wsurer, trusting in the produce of his 
 
 wealth lent out on usury, despite nat- 
 ure ieee because he does not avail 
 himself of her means for maintaining or 
 enriching himself; and indirectly, be- 
 cause he does not avail himself of the 
 means which art, the follower and imi- 
 tator of nature, would afford him for 
 the same purposes. i 
 
 6“ The ain.” The constellation 
 Bodtes, or Charles’s Wain. 
 
46 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 CANTO XII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Descending by a very rugged way into the seventh circle, 
 where the violent are punished, Dante and his leader find it guarded 
 by the Minotaur; whose fury being pacified by Virgil, they step 
 downward from crag to crag; till, drawing near the bottom, they 
 descry a river of blood, wherein are tormented such as have com- 
 mitted violence against their neighbor. At these, when they strive 
 to emerge from the blood, a troop of Centaurs, running along the 
 side of the river, aim their arrows; and three of their band opposing 
 our travellers at the foot of the steep, Virgil prevails so far that one 
 consents to carry them both across the stream; and on their passage, 
 Dante is informed by him of the course of the river, and of those 
 that are punished therein. 
 
 HE place, where to descend the precipice 
 We came, was rough as Alp; and on its verge 
 Such object lay, as every eye would shun. 
 As is that ruin, which Adice’s stream? 
 On this side Trento struck, shouldering the wave, 
 Or loosed by earthquake or for lack of prop; 
 For from the mountain’s summit, whence it moved 
 To the low level, so the headlong rock 
 Is shiver’d, that some passage it might give 
 To him who from above would pass; e’en such 
 Into the chasm was that descent: and there 
 At point of the disparted ridge lay stretch’d 
 The infamy of Crete,” detested brood 
 Of the feign’d heifer:* and at sight of us 
 It gnaw’d itself, as one with rage distract. 
 To him my guide exclaim’d: “ Perchance thou deem’st 
 The King of Athens* here, who, in the world 
 Above, thy death contrived. Monster! avaunt! 
 He comes not tutor’d by thy sister’s art,° 
 But to behold your torments is he come.” 
 Like to a bull, that with impetuous spring 
 Darts, at the moment when the fatal blow 
 
 -~ 
 
 a“ Adice’s stream.”” After a_ great 8 “* The feign’d heifer.”? Pasiphaé. 
 deal having been said on the subject, it 4“ The King of Athens.” Theseus 
 still appears very uncertain at what part who was enabled by the instruction of 
 
 of the river this fall of the mountain Ariadne, the sister of the Minotaur, to 
 happened. e destroy that monster. ‘ - 
 
 ‘ 2“ The infamy of Crete.”” The Mino- &“* Thy sister’s art.”’ Ariadne. 
 
 aur. 
 
HELL 47 
 
 Hath struck him, but unable to proceed 
 
 Plunges on either side; so saw I plunge 
 
 The Minotaur; whereat the sage exclaim’d: 
 
 “Run to the passage! while he storms, ’tis well 
 That thou descend.” Thus down our road we took 
 Through those dilapidated crags, that oft 
 
 Moved underneath my feet, to weight like theirs 
 Unused. I pondering went, and thus he spake: 
 “Perhaps thy thoughts are of this ruin’d steep, 
 Guarded by the brute violence, which I 
 
 Have vanquish’d now. Know then, that when I erst 
 Hither descended to the nether Hell, 
 
 This rock was not yet fallen. But past doubt, 
 
 (If well I mark) not long ere He arrived,® 
 
 Who carried off from Dis the mighty spoil 
 
 Of the highest circle, then through all its bounds 
 Such trembling seized the deep concave and foul, 
 
 I thought the universe was thrill’d with love, 
 Whereby, there are who deem, the world hath oft 
 Been into chaos turn’d: and in that point, 
 
 Here, and elsewhere, that old rock toppled down. 
 But fix thine eyes beneath: the river of blood 
 Approaches, in the which all those are steep’d, 
 Who have by violence injured.” O blind lust! 
 
 O foolish wrath! who so dost goad us on 
 
 In the brief life, and in the eternal then 
 
 Thus miserably o’erwhelm us. I beheld 
 
 An ample foss, that in a bow was bent, 
 
 As circling all the plain; for so my guide 
 
 Had told. Between it and the rampart’s base, 
 
 On trail ran Centaurs, with keen arrows arm’d, 
 
 As to the chase they on the earth were wont. 
 
 At seeing us descend they each one stood; 
 
 And issuing from the troop, three sped with bows 
 And missile weapons chosen first; of whom 
 
 One cried from far: “Say, to what pain ye come 
 Condemn’d, who down this steep have journey’d. Speak 
 From whence ye stand, or else the bow I draw.” 
 @“ He arrived.” Our Saviour, who, of the Patriarchs, and of other just men, 
 
 according to Dante, when he ascended out of the first circle. See Canto iv, 
 from Hell, carried with him the souls 
 
48 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 To whom my guide: “Our answer shall be. made 
 To Chiron, there, when nearer him we come. 
 Ill was thy mind, thus ever quick and rash.” 
 Then me he touch’d and spake: ‘“ Nessus is this, 
 Who for the fair Deianira died, 
 And wrought himself revenge’ for his own fate. 
 He in the midst, that on his breast looks down, 
 Is the great Chiron who Achilles nursed; 
 That other, Pholus, prone to wrath.” Around 
 The foss these go by thousands, aiming shafts 
 At whatsoever spirit dares emerge 
 From out the blood, more than his guilt allows. 
 We to those beasts, that rapid strode along, 
 Drew near; when Chiron took an arrow forth, 
 And with the notch push’d back his shaggy beard 
 To the cheek-bone, then, his great mouth to view 
 Exposing, to his fellows thus exclaim’d: 
 “ Are ye aware, that he who comes behind 
 
 Moves what he touches? 
 
 The feet of the dead 
 
 Are not so wont.” My trusty guide, who now 
 Stood near his breast, where the two natures join, 
 Thus made reply: “ He is indeed alive, 
 And solitary so must needs by me 
 Be shown the gloomy vale, thereto induced 
 By strict necessity, not by delight. 
 She left her joyful harpings in the sky, 
 Who this new office to my care consign’d. 
 He is no robber, no dark spirit I. 
 But by that virtue, which empowers my step 
 To tread so wild a path, grant us, I pray, 
 One of thy band, whom we may trust secure, 
 Who to the ford may lead us, and convey 
 Across, him mounted on his back; for he 
 Is not a spirit that may walk the air.” 
 Then on his right breast turning, Chiron thus 
 To Nessus spake: “ Return, and be their guide. 
 And if ye chance to cross another troop, | 
 
 ™*And wrought himself revenge.” 
 Nessus, when dying by the hand of Her- 
 cules, charged Deianira to preserve the 
 gore from his wound; for that if the 
 affections of Hercules should at any 
 time be estranged from her, it would 
 
 act as a charm, and recall them. Deian- 
 ira had occasion to try the experiment; 
 and the venom acting, as Nessus had 
 intended, caused Hercules to expire in 
 torments. 
 
HELL ; 49 
 
 Command them keep aloof.” 
 
 Onward we moved, 
 
 The faithful escort by our side, along 
 
 The border of the crimson-seething flood, 
 
 Whence, from those steep’d within, loud shrieks arose. 
 Some there I mark’d, as high as to their brow 
 
 Immersed, of whom the mighty Centaur thus: 
 
 “These are the souls of tyrants, who were given 
 
 To blood and rapine. 
 Their merciless wrongs. 
 
 Here they wail aloud 
 Here Alexander dwells, 
 
 And Dionysius fell, who many a year 
 
 Of woe wrought for fair Sicily. That brow, 
 Whereon the hair so jetty clustering hangs, 
 Is Azzolino;® that with flaxen locks 
 
 Obizzo® of Este, in the world destroy’d 
 
 By his foul step-son.” 
 
 I turn’d me round, and thus he spake: 
 
 To the bard revered 
 
 “Let him 
 
 Be to thee now first leader, me but next 
 
 To him in rank.” 
 
 Then further on a space 
 
 The Centaur paused, near some, who at the throat 
 Were extant from the wave; and, showing us 
 A spirit by itself apart retired, 
 
 Exclaim’d: 
 
 “He?® in God’s bosom smote the heart, 
 
 Which yet is honored on the bank of Thames.” 
 A race I next espied who held the head, 
 
 And even all the bust, above the stream. 
 
 *Midst these I many a face remember’d well. 
 
 Thus shallow more and more the blood became, 
 
 So that at last it but imbrued the feet; 
 
 And there our passage lay athwart the foss. 
 
 8“ Azzolino.” Azzolino, or Ezzolino 
 di Romano, a most_cruel tyrant in the 
 Marca Trivigiana, Lord of Padua, Vi- 
 cenza, Verona, and Brescia, who died 
 in 1260. His atrocities form the subject 
 of a Latin tragedy, called ‘‘ Eccerinis,” 
 by Albertino Mussato, of Padua, the 
 contemporary of Dante, and the most 
 elegant writer of Latin verse of that 
 
 age. 
 
 9“ Obizzo of Este.’”? Marquis of Fer- 
 rara and of the Marca d’ Ancona, was 
 murdered by his own son (whom, for 
 that most unnatural act, Dante calls 
 his step-son) for the sake of the treas- 
 ures which his rapacity had amassed. 
 
 10 ** He.”’ “‘ Henrie, the brother of this 
 Edmund, and_son to the foresaid King 
 of Almaine (Richard, brother of Henry 
 
 Til of England), as he returned from 
 Affrike, where he had been with Prince 
 Edward, was slain at Viterbo in Italy 
 (whither he was come about _ business 
 which he had to do with the Pope) by 
 the hand of Guy de Montfort, the son 
 of Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leices- 
 ter, in revenge of the same Simon’s 
 death. The murther was committed 
 afore the high altar, as the same Henrie 
 kneeled there to hear divine service.” 
 A.D. 1272.—“* Holinshed’s Chron.,”’ p. 275. 
 See also Giov. Villani, ‘* Hist.” lib. vil. 
 c. xl., where it is said “‘ that the heart 
 of Henry was put into a golden cup, 
 and placed on a pillar at London Bridge 
 over the river Thames, for a memorial 
 to the English of the said outrage.” 
 
50 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 “As ever on this side the boiling wave 
 Thou seest diminishing,” the Centaur said, 
 “So on the other, be thou well assured, 
 
 It lower still and lower sinks its bed, 
 
 Till in that part it reuniting join, 
 
 Where ’tis the lot of tyranny to mourn. 
 
 There Heaven’s stern justice lays chastising hand 
 On Attila, who was the scourge of earth, 
 
 On Sextus and on Pyrrhus,™ and extracts 
 Tears ever by the seething flood unlock’d 
 From the Rinieri, of Corneto this, 
 
 Pazzo the other named,” who fill’d the ways 
 With violence and war.” This said, he turn’d, 
 And quitting us, alone repass’d the ford. 
 
 CANTO XIII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Still in the seventh circle, Dante enters its second com- 
 partment, which contains, both those who have done violence on 
 their own pé and those who have violently consumed their 
 goodsythe-first tHanged into rough and knotted trees whereon the 
 Harpies build their nests, the latter chased and torn by black female 
 mastiffs. Among the former, Piero delle Vigne is one who tells 
 him the cause of his having committed suicide, and moreover in 
 what manner the souls are transformed into those trunks. Of the 
 latter crew, he recognizes Lano, a Siennese, and Giacomo, a Paduan; 
 and lastly, a Florentine, who had hung himself from his own roof, 
 speaks to him of the calamities of his countrymen. 
 
 RE Nessus yet had reach’d the other bank, 
 We enter’d on a forest, where no track 
 Of steps had worn a way. Not verdant there 
 The foliage, but of dusky hue; not light 
 The boughs and tapering, but with knares deform’d 
 And matted thick: fruits there were none, but thorns 
 Instead, with venom fill’d. Less sharp than these, 
 Less intricate the brakes, wherein abide 
 11“ On Sextus and on Pyrrhus.”’ Sex- Two noted marauders, by, whose depre- 
 tus, either the son of Tarquin the Proud dations the public ways in Italy were 
 or of Pompey the Great; and Pyrrhus, infested. The latter was of the noble 
 King of Epirus. family of Pazzi in Florence. 
 
 ——— The Rinieri, of Corneto this, 
 Pazzo the other named.” 
 
HELL oie 
 
 Those animals, that hate the cultured fields, 
 Betwixt Corneto and Cecina’s stream. 
 
 ee the same 
 Who from the Strophades the Trojan band 
 
 Drove with dire boding of their future woe. 
 Broad are their pennons, of the human form 
 Their neck and countenance, arm’d with talons keen 
 The feet, and the huge belly fledge with wings. 
 These sit and wail on the drear mystic wood. 
 The kind instructor in these words began: 
 “Ere further thou proceed, know thou art now 
 I’ th’ second round, and shalt be, till thou come 
 Upon the horrid sand: look therefore well | 
 Around thee, and such things thou shalt behold, 
 As would my speech discredit.” On all sides 
 I heard sad plainings breathe, and none could see 
 From whom they might have issued. In amaze 
 Fast bound I stood. He, as it seem’d, believed 
 That I had thought so many voices came 
 From some amid those thickets close conceal’d, 
 And thus his speech resum’d: “If thou lop off 
 A single twig from one of those ill plants, 
 The thought thou hast conceived shall vanish quite.” 
 Thereat a little stretching forth my hand, 
 From a great wilding gather’d I a branch, 
 And straight the trunk exclaim’d: “Why pluck’st thou me?” 
 en, as own its side, 
 These words it added: “ Wherefore tear’st me thus? 
 Is there no touch of mercy in thy breast? 
 
 y hand might e spared us, had we been 
 
 The souls of serpents.” As a brand yet green, 
 
 That burning at one end from the other sends 
 
 A groaning sound, and hisses with the wind 
 
 That forces out its way, so burst at once 
 
 Forth from the broken splinter words and blood. 
 
 I, letting fall the bough, remain’d as one 
 
 1“ Betwixt Corneto and  Cecina’s to the south of Leghorn; Corneto, a 
 
 stream.’”’ A wild and woody tract of small city on the same coast, in the 
 
 country, abounding in deer, goats, and patrimony of the church, 
 wild boars. Cecina is a river not far 
 
52 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Assail’d by terror; and the sage replied: 
 
 “Tf he, O injured spirit! could have believed 
 What he hath seen but in my verse described, 
 He never against thee had stretch’d his hand. 
 But I, because the thing surpass’d belief, 
 Prompted him to this deed, which even now 
 
 Myself I rue. 
 
 But tell me, who thou wast; 
 
 That, for this wrong to do thee some amends, 
 
 In the upper world (for thither to return 
 
 Is granted him) thy fame he may revive.” 
 “That pleasant word of thine,’ the trunk replied, 
 “Hath so inveigled me, that I from speech 
 Cannot refrain, wherein if I indulge 
 
 A little longer, in the snare detain’d, 
 
 Count it not grievous. 
 
 I it was,? who held 
 
 Both keys to Frederick’s heart, and turn’d the wards, 
 Opening and shutting, with a skill so sweet, 
 That besides me, into his inmost breast 
 
 Scarce any other could admittance find. 
 
 The faith I bore to my high charge was such, 
 It cost me the life-blood that warm’d my veins. 
 The harlot, who ne’er turn’d her gloating eyes 
 From Czsar’s household, common vice and pest 
 Of courts, ’gainst me inflamed the minds of all; 
 And to Augustus they so spread the flame, 
 That my glad honors changed to bitter woes. 
 My soul, disdainful and disgusted, sought 
 Refuge in death from scorn, and I became, 
 Just as I was, unjust toward myself. 
 
 By the new roots, which fix this stem, I swear, 
 That never faith I broke to my liege lord, 
 
 Who merited such honor; and of you, 
 
 If any to the world indeed return, 
 
 2“T it was.’? Piero delle Vigne, a 
 mative of Capua, who from a low condi- 
 tion raised himself, by his eloquence 
 and legal knowledge, to the office of 
 Chancellor to the Emperor Frederick 
 II; whose confidence in him was such 
 that his influence in the empire became 
 unbounded. The courtiers, envious of 
 his exalted situation, contrived, by 
 means of forged letters, to make Fred- 
 erick believe that he held a secret and 
 
 traitorous intercourse with the Pope, 
 who was then at enmity with the Em- 
 peror. In consequence of this supposed 
 crime, he was cruelly condemned, by 
 his too credulous sovereign, to lose his 
 eyes; and being driven to despair by 
 his unmerited calamity and disgrace, he 
 put an end to his life or dashing out 
 his brains against the walls of a church, 
 in the year 1245. 
 
HELL 53 
 
 Clear he from wrong my memory, that lies 
 Yet prostrate under envy’s cruel blow.” 
 First somewhat pausing, till the mournful words 
 Were ended, then to me the bard began: 
 “Lose not the time; but speak, and of him ask, 
 If more thou wish to learn.” Whence I replied: 
 “ Question thou him again of whatsoe’er 
 Will, as thou think’st, content me; for no power 
 Have I to ask, such pity is at my heart.” 
 He thus resumed: “So may he do for thee 
 Freely what thou entreatest, as thou yet 
 Be pleased, imprison’d spirit! to declare, 
 How in these gnarled joints the soul is tied: 
 And whether any ever from such frame 
 Be loosen’d, if thou canst, that also tell.” 
 Thereat the trunk breathed hard, and the wind soon 
 Changed into sounds articulate like these: 
 “ Briefly ye shall be answer’d. When departs 
 The fierce soul from the body, by itself 
 Thence torn asunder, to the seventh gulf 
 By Minos doom’d, into the wood it falls, 
 No place assign’d, but wheresoever chance 
 Hurls it; there sprouting, as a grain of spelt, 
 It rises to a sapling, growing thence 
 A savage plant. The harpies, on its leaves 
 Then feeding, cause both pain, and for the pain 
 A vent to grief. We, as the rest, shall come 
 For our own spoils, yet not so that with them 
 We may again be clad; for what a man 
 Takes from himself it is not just he have. 
 Here we perforce shall drag them; and throughout 
 The dismal glade our bodies shall be hung, 
 Fach on the wild thorn of his wretched shade.” 
 Attentive yet to listen to the trunk 
 We stood, expecting further speech, when us 
 A noise surprised; as when a man perceives 
 - The wild boar and the hunt approach his place 
 Of station’d watch, who of the beasts and boughs 
 Loud rustling round him hears. And lo! there came 
 Two naked, torn with briers, in headlong flight, 
 
54 . THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 That they before them broke each fan o’ th’ wood. 
 
 “ Haste now,” the foremost cried, “ now haste thee, death! * 
 
 The other, as seem’d, impatient of delay, 
 Exclaiming, ‘“ Lano!* not so bent for speed 
 Thy sinews, in the lists of Toppo’s field.” 
 And then, for that perchance no longer breath 
 Sufficed him, of himself and of a bush 
 
 One group he made. 
 
 Behind them was the wood 
 
 Full of black female mastiffs, gaunt and fleet, 
 
 As greyhounds that have newly slipt the leash. 
 
 On him, who squatted down, they stuck their fangs, 
 And having rent him piecemeal bore away 
 
 The tortured limbs. 
 
 My guide then seized my hand, 
 
 And led me to the thicket, which in vain 
 
 Mourn’d through its bleeding wounds: 
 
 ““O Giacomo 
 
 Of Sant’ Andrea!* what avails it thee,” 
 
 It cried, “that of me thou hast made thy screen? 
 
 For thy ill life, what blame on me recoils?” 
 When o’er it he had paused, my master spake: 
 
 “Say who wast thou, that at so many points 
 
 Breathest out with blood thy lamentable speech?” 
 
 He answer’d: 
 
 “O ye spirits! arrived in time 
 
 To spy the shameful havoc that from me 
 My leaves hath sever’d thus, gather them up, 
 And at the foot of their sad parent-tree 
 
 Carefully lay them. 
 
 In that city® I dwelt, 
 
 Who for the Baptist her first patron changed, 
 Whence he for this shall cease not with his art 
 To work her woe: and if there still remain’d not 
 On Arno’s passage some faint glimpse of him, 
 Those citizens, who rear’d once more her walls 
 
 8“* Lano,” Lano, a Siennese, who be- 
 ing reduced by prodigality to a state of 
 extreme want, found his existence no 
 longer supportable; and having been 
 sent by his countrymen on a military 
 expedition to assist the Florentines 
 against the Aretini, took that opportuni- 
 ty of exposing himself to certain death, 
 in the engagement which took place at 
 Toppo near Arezzo. See G. Villani, 
 “ Hist.” lib. vii. c. cxix. 
 
 4 ide O Giacomo 
 
 Of Sant’ Andrea!” 
 Jacopo da Sant’ Andrea, a Paduan, who, 
 having wasted his property in the most 
 
 wanton acts of profusion, killed him- 
 self in despair. 
 
 _ 5“ In that city.” “I was an inhab- 
 itant of Florence, that city which 
 changed her first patron Mars for St. 
 John the Baptist; for which reason the 
 vengeance of the deity thus slighted 
 will never be appeased; and if some re- 
 mains of his statue were not still visible 
 on the bridge over the Arno, she would 
 have been already leveled to the ground; 
 and thus the citizens, who raised her 
 again from the ashes to which Attila 
 had reduced her, would have labored in 
 
 ¢ ? 
 
 vain.’ 
 
HELL 55 
 
 Upon the ashes left by Attila, 
 Had labor’d without profit of their toil. 
 I slung the fatal noose* from my own roof.” 
 
 CANTO XIV 
 
 AARGUMENT.—They arrive at the beginning of the third of those com- 
 partments into which this seventh circle is divided. It is a plain 
 
 of dry and hot sand, where three kinds of violence are punished ; 
 namely, against God, against nature, and against art; and those 
 who have thus sinned, are tormented by flakes of fire, which are 
 
 eternally showering down upon them. Among the violent against 
 God is found Capaneus, whose blasphemies they hear. Next, turn- 
 ing to the left along the forest of self-slayers, and hawing journeyed 
 a little onward, they meet with a streamlet of blood that issues from 
 the forest and traverses the sandy plain. Here Virgil speaks to our 
 
 1 Poet of a huge ancient statue that stands within Mount Ida in Crete, 
 from a fissure in which statue there is a dripping of tears, from 
 which the said streamlet, together with the three other infernal 
 rivers, are formed. 
 
 OON as the charity of native land 
 Wrought in my bosom, I the scatter’d leaves 
 Collected, and to him restored, who now 
 Was hoarse with utterance. To the limit thence 
 We came, which from the third the second round 
 Divides, and where of justice is display’d 
 Contrivance horrible. Things then first seen 
 Clearlier to manifest, I tell how next 
 A plain we reach’d, that from its sterile bed 
 Each plant repell’d. The mournful wood waves round 
 Its garland on all sides, as round the wood 3 
 Spreads the sad foss. There, on the very edge, 
 Our steps we stay’d. It was an area wide 
 Of arid sand and thick, resembling most 
 The soil that erst by Cato’ s foot was trod. 
 Vengeance of heaven! Oh! how shouldst thou be fear’d 
 By all, who read what here mine eyes beheld. 
 Of naked spirits many a flock I saw, 
 All weeping piteously, to different laws 
 
 ®“T slung the fatal noose.” We are — some calling him Rocco de’ Mozzi, and 
 mot informed who this suicide was; others Lotto degli Agli. 
 
THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Subjected; for on the earth some lay supine, 
 Some crouching close were seated, others paced 
 Incessantly around; the latter tribe 
 More numerous, those fewer who beneath 
 The torment lay, but louder in their grief. 
 O’er all the sand fell slowly wafting down 
 Dilated flakes of fire, as flakes of snow 
 On Alpine summit, when the wind is hush’d. 
 As, in the torrid Indian clime, the son 
 Of Ammon saw, upon his warrior band 
 Descending, solid flames, that to the ground 
 Came down; whence he bethought him with his troop 
 To trample on the soil; for easier thus 
 The vapor was extinguish’d, while alone: 
 So fell the eternal fiery flood, wherewith 
 The marle glow’d underneath, as under stove 
 The viands, doubly to augment the pain. 
 Unceasing was the play of wretched hands, 
 Now this, now that way glancing, to shake off 
 The heat, still falling fresh. I thus began: 
 “Instructor! thou who all things overcomest, 
 Except the hardy demons that rush’d forth 
 To stop our entrance at the gate, say who 
 Is yon huge spirit, that, as seems, heeds not 
 The burning, but lies writhen in proud scorn, 
 As by the sultry tempest immatured ?” 
 Straight he himself, who was aware I ask’d 
 My guide of him, exclaim’d: “ Such as I was 
 When living, dead such now Iam. If Jove 
 Weary his workman out, from whom in ire 
 He snatch’d the lightnings, that at my last day 
 Transfix’d me; if the rest he weary out, 
 At their black smithy laboring by turns, 
 In Mongibello, while he cries aloud, 
 ‘Help, help, good Mulciber!’ as erst he cried 
 In the Phlegrzean warfare; and the bolts 
 Launch he, full aim’d at me, with all his might; 
 He never should enjoy a sweet revenge.” 
 Then thus my guide, in accent higher raised 
 Than I before had heard him: “ Capaneus! 
 
HELL ue 59 
 
 Thou art more punish’d, in that this thy pride 
 Lives yet unquench’d: no torment, save thy rage, 
 Were to thy fury pain proportion’d full.” 
 
 Next turning round to me, ‘with milder lip 
 He spake: “ This of the seven kings was one, 
 Who girt the Theban walls with siege, and held, 
 As still he seems to hold, God in disdain, 
 
 And sets his high omnipotence at naught. 
 
 But, as I told him, his despiteful mood 
 
 Is ornament well suits the breast that wears it. 
 Follow me now; and look thou set not yet 
 Thy foot in the hot sand, but to the wood 
 Keep ever close.” Silently on we pass’d 
 
 To where there gushes from the forest’s bound 
 A little brook, whose crimson’d wave yet lifts 
 My hair with horror. As the rill, that runs 
 From Bulicame,’ to be portion’d out 
 
 Among the sinful women, so ran this 
 
 Down through the sand; its bottom and each bank 
 Stone-built, and either margin at its side, 
 Whereon I straight perceived our passage lay. 
 
 “ Of all that I have shown thee, since that gate 
 We enter’d first, whose threshold is to none 
 Denied, naught else so worthy of regard, 
 
 As is this river, has thine eye discern’d, 
 O’er which the flaming volley all is quench’d.” 
 
 So spake my guide; and I him thence besought, 
 That having given me appetite to know, 
 
 The food he too would give, that hunger craved. 
 
 “In midst of ocean,” forthwith he began, 
 
 “A desolate country lies, which Crete is named; 
 Under whose monarch, in old times, the world 
 Lived pure and chaste. A mountain rises there, 
 Call’d Ida, joyous once with leaves and streams, 
 Deserted now like a forbidden thing. 
 
 It was the spot which Rhea, Saturn’s spouse, 
 Chose for the secret cradle of her son; 
 
 1“ Bulicame.”” A warm medicinal turi, with less ct Roe ta conjectures 
 spring near Viterbo; the waters of that Dante would imply that it was the 
 which, as Landino and Vellutelli_af- scene of much licentious merriment 
 
 firm, passed by a place of ill-fame. Ven- among those who frequented its baths. 
 
58 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 And better to conceal him, drown’d in shouts 
 His infant cries. Within the mount, upright 
 An ancient form there stands, and huge, that turns | 
 His shoulders toward Damiata; and at Rome, 
 As in his mirror, looks. Of finest gold 
 
 His head is shaped, pure silver are the breast 
 And arms, thence to the middle is of brass, 
 And downward all beneath well-temper’d steel, 
 Save the right foot of potter’s clay, on which 
 Than on the other more erect he stands. 
 
 Each part, except the gold, is rent throughout; 
 And from the fissure tears distil, which join’d 
 Penetrate to that cave. They in their course, 
 Thus far precipitated down the rock, 
 
 Form Acheron, and Styx, and Phlegethon; 
 Then by this straiten’d channel passing hence 
 Beneath e’en to the lowest depth of all, 
 
 Form there Cocytus, of whose lake (thyself 
 Shalt see it) I here give thee no account.” 
 
 Then I to him: “ If from our world this sluice 
 Be thus derived; wherefore to us but now 
 Appears it at this edge?” He straight replied: 
 
 “ The place, thou know’st, is round: and though great part 
 Thou have already past, still to the left 
 
 Descending to the nethermost, not yet 
 
 Hast thou the circuit made of the whole orb. 
 
 Wherefore, if aught of new to us appear, 
 
 It needs not bring up wonder in thy looks.” 
 
 Then I again inquired: “ Where flow the streams 
 Of Phlegethon and Lethe? for of one 
 Thou tell’st not; and the other, of that shower, 
 Thou say’st, is form’d.” He answer thus return’d: 
 “ Doubtless thy questions all well pleased I hear. 
 Yet the red seething wave ? might have resolved 
 One thou proposest. Lethe thou shalt see, 
 
 But not within this hollow, in the place 
 Whither,* to lave themselves, the spirits go, 
 Whose blame hath been by penitence removed.” 
 
 “ The red seething wave.’”’ This he 3“ Whither.” On the other side of 
 
 might have known was Phlegethon. Purgatory. 
 
HELL 59 
 
 He added: ‘ Time is now we quit the wood. 
 Look thou my steps pursue: the margins give 
 . safe passage, unimpeded by the flames ; : 
 
 For over them all vapor is extinct.” 
 
 CANTO XV 
 
 ARGUMENT—Taking their way upon one of the mounds by which the 
 streamlet, spoken of in the last Canto, was embanked, and having 
 gone so far that they could no longer have discerned the forest if 
 they had turned round to look for it, they meet a troop of spirits 
 that come along the sand by the side of the pier. These are they 
 
 ho_ have done violen ; and among them Dante dis- 
 
 tinguishes Brunetto Latini, who had been formerly his master; with 
 whom, turning a little backward, he holds a discourse which occu- 
 pies the remainder of this Canto. 
 NE of the solid margins bears us now 
 () Envelop’d in the mist, that, from the stream 
 Arising, hovers o’er, and saves from fire 
 Both piers and water. As the Flemings rear 
 Their mound, ’twixt Ghent and Bruges, to chase back ~ 
 The ocean, fearing his tumultuous tide 
 That drives toward them; or the Paduans theirs 
 Along the Brenta, to defend their towns 
 And castles, ere the genial warmth be felt 
 On Chiarentana’s * top; such were the mounds, 
 So framed, though not in height or bulk to these 
 Made equal, by the master, whosoe’er © 
 He was, that raised them here. We from the wood 
 Were now so far removed, that turning round 
 I might not have discern’d it, when—we-met 
 A troop of spirits, who came beside the pier. 
 They each one eyed us, as at eventide 
 One eyes another under a new moon; 
 And toward us sharpen’d their sight, as keen 
 As an old tailor at his needle’s eye. 
 Thus narrowly explored by all the tribe, 
 
 I was agnized of one, who by the skirt 
 Caught me, and cried, “ What wonder have we ee : 
 i“Chiarentana.” A part of the Alps much swollen as soon as the snow be 
 where the Brenta rises; which river is gins to dissolve on the mountains. 
 
60 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 And I, when he to me outstretch’d his arm, 
 Intently fix’d my ken on his parch’d looks, 
 That, although smirch’d with fire, they hinder’d not 
 But I remember’d him; and toward his face 
 My hand inclining, answer’d: “ Ser Brunetto! ? 
 And are ye here?” Hethus tome: “ My son! 
 Oh let it not displease thee, if Brunetto 
 Latini but a little space with thee 
 Turn back, and leave his. fellows to proceed.” 
 
 I thus to him replied: ‘‘ Much as I can, 
 
 I thereto pray thee; and if thou be willing 
 That I here seat me with thee, I consent; 
 His leave, with whom I journey, first obtain’d.” 
 
 “O son!” said he, “ whoever of this throng 
 One instant stops, lies then a hundred years, 
 No fan to ventilate him, when the fire 
 
 Smitest sorest. 
 
 Pass thou therefore on. I close 
 
 * Will at thy garments walk, and then rejoin 
 
 dared not from the path descend to tread 
 
 My troop, who go mourning their endless doom.” 
 f I 
 
 n equal ground with him, but held my head 
 Bent down, as oné who walks in reverent gu 
 “ What chance or destiny,” thus he began, 
 
 “Ere the last day, conducts thee here below? 
 And who is this that shows to thee the way?” 
 “ There up aloft,” I answer’d, “in the life 
 Serene, I wander’d in a valley lost, 
 Before mine age had to its fulness reach’d. 
 But yester-morn I left it: then once more 
 Into that vale returning, him I met; 
 And by this path homeward he leads me back.” 
 “ Tf thou,” he answer’d, “ follow but thy star, 
 Thou canst not miss at last a glorious haven; 
 Unless in fairer days my judgment err’d. 
 And if my fate so early had not chanced, 
 
 Seeing the heavens thus bounteous to thee, I 
 
 3“ Brunetto.”’ “ Ser Brunetto, a Flor- 
 entine, the secretary or chancellor of 
 the city, and Dante’s preceptor, hath 
 left us a work so little read, that both 
 the subject of it and the language of it 
 have been mistaken. It is in the 
 French spoken in the reign of St. Louis, 
 
 / 
 
 under the title of ‘Tresor’ ; and con- 
 tains a species of philosophical course 
 of lectures divided into theory and prac- 
 tice, or, as he expresses it, ‘um en- 
 chaussement des choses divines. et hu- 
 maines. ”” 
 
HELL 6r 
 
 Had gladly given thee comfort in thy work. 
 But that ungrateful and malignant race, 
 Who in old times came down from Fesole, 
 Ay and still smack of their rough mountain-flint, 
 Will for thy good deeds show thee enmity. 
 Nor wonder; for amongst ill-savor’d crabs 
 It suits not the sweet fig-tree lay her fruit. 
 Old fame reports them in the world for blind, 
 Covetous, envious, proud. Look to it well: 
 Take heed thou cleanse thee of their ways. For thee, 
 Thy fortune hath such honor in reserve, 
 That thou by either party shalt be craved 
 With hunger keen: but be the fresh herb far 
 From the goat’s tooth. The herd of Fesole 
 May of themselves make litter, not touch the plant, 
 If any such yet spring on their rank bed, 
 In which the holy seed revives, transmitted 
 From those true Romans, who still there remain’d, 
 When it was made the nest of so much ill.” 
 
 “ Were all my wish fulfill’d,” I straight replied, 
 “ Thou from the confines of man’s nature yet 
 Hadst not been driven forth; for in my mind 
 Is fix’d, and now strikes full upon my heart, 
 The dear, benign, paternal image, such 
 As thine was, when so lately thou didst teach me 
 The way for man to win eternity: 
 And how I prized the lesson, it behoves, 
 That, long as life endures, my tongue should speak, — 
 What of my fate thou tell’st, that write I down; 
 And, with another text * to comment on, 
 For her I keep it, the celestial dame, 
 Who will know all, if I to her arrive. 
 This only would I have thee clearly note: 
 That, so my conscience have no plea against me, 
 Do Fortune as she list, I stand prepared. 
 Not new or strange such earnest to mine ear. 
 Speed Fortune then her wheel, as likes her best; 
 The clown his mattock; all things have their course.” 
 
 Thereat my sapient guide upon his right 
 
 8** With another text.” He refers to the prediction of Farinata, in Canto x. 
 Classics. Vol. 34—D 
 
62 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Turn’d himself back, then looked at me, and spakes 
 “ He listens to good purpose who takes note.” 
 I not the less still on my way proceed, 
 Discoursing with Brunetto, and inquire 
 Who are most known and chief among his tribe. 
 “To know of some is well ;” he thus replied, 
 
 “ But of the rest silence may best beseem. 
 Time would not serve us for report so long. 
 
 _In brief I tell thee, that all these were clerks, 
 Men of great learning and no less renown, 
 By one same sin polluted in the world. 
 With them is Priscian; and Accorso’s son, 
 Francesco,* herds among the wretched throng: 
 And, if the wish of so impure a blotch 
 Possess’d thee, him ° thou also mightst have seen, 
 Who by the servants’ servant was transferr’d 
 From Arno’s seat to Bacchiglione, where 
 His ill-strain’d nerves he left. I more would add, 
 But must from further speech and onward way 
 Alike desist ; for yonder I behold 
 A mist new-arisen on the sandy plain. 
 A company, with whom I may not sort, 
 
 Approaches. 
 
 I commend my Treasure to thee, 
 
 Wherein I yet survive; my sole request.” 
 
 This said, he turn’d, and seem’d as one of those 
 Who o’er Verona’s champaign try their speed 
 For the green mantle; and of them he seem’d, 
 Not he who loses but who gains the prize. 
 
 4‘ Francesco.” Accorso, a Floren- 
 tine, interpreted the Roman law at Bo- 
 logna, and died in 1229, at the age of 
 78. His authority was so great as to ex- 
 ceed that of all the other interpreters, 
 so that Cino da Pistoia termed him the 
 Idol of Advocates. His sepulchre, and 
 that. of his son Francesco here spoken 
 of, is at Bologna, with this short epi- 
 
 taph: ‘ Sepulcrum Accursit Glossatoris 
 et Francisci eus Fili.” 
 
 5“ Him.” Andrea de’ Mozzi, who, 
 that his scandalous life might be less 
 exposed to observation, was translated 
 either by Nicholas III or Boniface VIIT 
 from the see of Florence to that of. Vi- 
 cenza, through which passes the river 
 Bacchiglione. At the latter of these 
 places he died. 
 
HELL 63 
 
 CANTO XVI 
 
 'ARGUMENT.—Journeying along the pier, which crosses the sand, they 
 are now so near the end of it as to hear the noise of the stream 
 falling into the eighth circle, when they meet the spirits of three 
 military men; who judging Dante, from his dress, to be a country- 
 man of theirs, entreat him to stop. He complies and speaks with 
 them. The two Poets then reach the place where the water descends, | 
 being the termination of this third compartment in the seventh 
 circle; and here Virgil, having thrown down into the hollow a cord, 
 wherewith Dante was girt, they behold at that signal a monstrous 
 and horrible figure come swimming up to them. 
 
 OW came I where the water’s din was heard 
 As down it fell into the other round, 
 Resounding like the hum of swarming bees: 
 When forth together issued from a troop, 
 That pass’d beneath the fierce tormenting storm, 
 Three spirits, running swift. They toward us came, 
 And each one cried aloud, “Oh! do thou stay, 
 Whom, by the fashion of thy garb, we deem 
 To be some inmate of our evil land.” 
 _ Ah me! what wounds I mark’d upon their limbs, 
 Recent and old, inflicted by the flames. 
 E’en the remembrance of them grieves me yet. 
 Attentive to their cry, my teacher paused, 
 And turned to me his visage, and then spake: 
 “Wait now: our courtesy these merit well: 
 And were’t not for the nature of the place, 
 Whence glide the fiery darts, I should have said, 
 That haste had better suited thee than them.” 
 They, when we stopp’d, resumed their ancient wail, 
 And, soon as they had reach’d us, all the three 
 Whirl’d round together in one restless wheel. 
 As naked champions, smear’d with slippery oil 
 Are wont, intent, to watch their place of hold 
 And vantage, ere in closer strife they meet ; 
 Thus each one, as he wheel’d, his countenance 
 At me directed, so that opposite 
 The neck moved ever to the twinkling feet. 
 “Tf woe of this unsound and dreary waste,” 
 Thus one began, “ added to our sad cheer. 
 
64 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Thus peel’d with flame, do call forth scorn on us 
 And our entreaties, let our great renown 
 Incline thee to inform us who thou art, 
 
 That dost imprint, with living feet unharm’d, 
 The soil of Hell. He, in whose track thou seest 
 My steps pursuing, naked though he be 
 
 And reft of all, was of more high estate 
 
 Than thou believest ; grandchild of the chaste 
 Gualdrada,’ him they Guidoguerra call’d, 
 Who in his lifetime many a noble act 
 Achieved, both by his wisdom and his sword, | 
 The other, next to me that beats the sand, 
 
 Is Aldobrandi,? name deserving well, 
 
 In the upper world, of honor; and myself, 
 Who in this torment do partake with them, 
 Am Rusticucci,? whom, past doubt, my wife, 
 Of savage temper, more than aught beside 
 
 Hath to this evil brought.” 
 
 If from the fire 
 
 I had been shelter’d, down amidst them straight 
 I then had cast me; nor my guide, I deem, 
 Would have restrain’d my going: but that fear 
 Of the dire burning vanquish’d the desire, 
 Which made me eager of their wish’d embrace. 
 I then began: “ Not scorn, but grief much more, 
 Such as long time alone can cure, your doom 
 
 2“ Gualdrada.” Gualdrada was the 
 daughter of Bellincione Berti, of whom 
 mention is made in the Paradise, Can- 
 tos xv. and xvi. He was of the family 
 of Ravignani, a_ branch of the Adimari. 
 The Emperor Otho IV being at a fes- 
 tival in Florence, where Gualdrada was 
 present, was struck with her beauty; 
 and inquiring who she was, was an- 
 swered by Bellincione, that she was the 
 daughter of one who, if it was his 
 Majesty’s pleasure, would make her ad- 
 mit the honor of his salute. On over- 
 hearing this, she arose from her seat, 
 and blushing, in an animated tone of 
 voice desired her father that he would 
 not be so liberal in his offers, for that no 
 man should ever be allowed that free- 
 dom except him who should be her law- 
 ful husband. The Emperor was not less 
 delighted by her resolute modesty than 
 he had before been by the loveliness of 
 her person; and calling to him Guido, 
 one of his barons, gave her to him in 
 marriage; at the same time raising him 
 to the rank of a count, and bestowing 
 on her the whole of CaSentino, and a 
 part of the territory of Romagna, as 
 
 her portion. Two sons were the offspring 
 of this union, Guglielmo and Ruggieri; 
 the latter of whom was father of Guido- 
 guerra, a man of great military skill and 
 prowess; who, at the head of four hun- 
 dred Florentines of the Guelf party, was 
 signally instrumental to the victory ob- 
 tained at Benevento by Charles of An- 
 jou, over Manfredi, King of Naples, in 
 1265. One of the consequences of this 
 victory was the expulsion of the Ghibel- 
 lini, and the re-establishment of the 
 Guelfi at Florence. 
 
 2“ Aldobrandi.” Tegghiaio Aldobran- 
 di was of the noble family of Adimari, 
 and much esteemed for his military tal- 
 ents. He endeavored to dissuade the 
 Florentines from the attack which they 
 meditated against the Siennese; and the 
 rejection of his counsel occasioned the 
 memorable defeat which the former sus- 
 tained at Montaperto, and the _conse- 
 
 . quent banishment of the Guelfi from 
 
 Florence. 
 
 8 ** Rusticucci.”? Giacopo Rustictcci, a 
 Florentine, remarkable for his opulence 
 and the generosity of his spirit. 
 
HELL 6s 
 
 Fix’d deep within me, soon as this my lord 
 
 Spake words, whose tenor taught me to expect 
 That such a race, as ye are, was at hand. 
 
 I am a countryman of yours, who still 
 Affectionate have utter’d, and have heard 
 
 Your deeds and names renown’d. Leaving the gall, 
 For the sweet fruit I go, that a sure guide 
 
 Hath promised to me. But behoves, that far 
 
 As to the centre first I downward tend.” 
 
 “So may long space thy spirit guide thy limbs,” 
 He answer straight return’d; “and so thy fame 
 Shine bright when thou art gone, as thou shalt tell, 
 If courtesy and valor, as they wont, 
 
 Dwell in our city, or have vanish’d clean: 
 For one amidst us late condemn’d to wail, 
 Borsiere,* yonder walking with his peers, 
 Grieves us no little by the news he brings.” 
 
 “An upstart multitude and sudden gains, 
 
 Pride and excess, O Florence! have in thee 
 Engender’d, so that now in tears thou mourn’st!” 
 Thus cried I, with my face upraised, and they 
 
 All three, who for an answer took my words, 
 Look’d at each other, as men look when truth 
 Comes to their ear. “If at so little cost,” 
 
 They all at once rejoin’d, “ thou satisfy 
 
 Others who question thee, O happy thou! 
 Gifted with words so apt to speak thy thought. 
 Wherefore, if thou escape this darksome clime, 
 Returning to behold the radiant stars, 
 
 When thou with pleasure shalt retrace the past,’ 
 See that of us thou speak among mankind.” 
 
 This said, they broke the circle, and so swift 
 Fled, that as pinions seem’d their nimble feet. 
 
 Not in so short a time might one have said 
 *“ Amen,” as they had vanish’d. Straight my guide 
 Pursued his track. I follow’d: and small space 
 
 é* Borsiere.”” Guglielmo Borsiere, an- 5 “* When thou with aaa shalt ree 
 Sine: Florentine, whom Boccaccio, in a trace the pas 
 story which he relates of him, terms ‘“‘a * Quando ti giovera Hie io fut.” 
 man of courteous and elegant manners, So Tasso, “ G. L.” c. xv. st. 38: 
 
 ene eet  Breat peetiness in conversation.’ Quando mi gioverd narrar altrut 
 ip e novita vedute, e dire; io fui.” 
 
66 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Had we past onward, when the water’s sound 
 Was now so near at hand, that we had scarce 
 Heard one another’s speech for the loud din. 
 E’en as the river,® that first holds its course 
 Unmingled from the Mount of Vesulo, 
 On the left side of Apennine, toward 
 The east, which Acquacheta higher up 
 They call, ere it descend into the vale, 
 At Forli,’ by that name no longer known, 
 Rebellows o’er Saint Benedict, roll’d on 
 From the Alpine summit down a precipice, 
 Where space ® enough to lodge a thousand spreads; 
 Thus downward from a craggy steep we found 
 That this dark wave resounded, roaring loud, 
 So that the ear its clamor soon had stunn’d. 
 I had a cord ® that braced my girdle round, 
 Wherewith I erst had thought fast bound to take 
 The painted leopard. This when I had all 
 Unloosen’d from me (so my master bade) 
 I gather’d up, and stretch’d it forth to him. 
 Then to the right he turn’d, and from the brink 
 Standing few paces distant, cast it down 
 Into the deep abyss. ‘“ And somewhat strange,” 
 Thus to myself I spake, “ signal so strange 
 Betokens, which my guide with earnest eye 
 
 Thus follows.” 
 
 Ah! what caution must men use 
 
 With those who look not at the deed alone, 
 
 But spy into the thoughts with subtle skill. 
 “Quickly shall come,” he said, “ what I expect; 
 
 Thine eye discover quickly that, whereof 
 
 Thy thought is dreaming.” 
 
 6“ Ben as the river.”” He compares 
 the fall of Phlegethon to that of the 
 Montone (a river in Romagna) from the 
 Apennines above the Abbey of St. Bene- 
 dict. All the other streams that rise be- 
 tween the sources of the Po and the 
 Montone, and fall from the left side of 
 the Apennines join the Po and accom- 
 pany it to the sea. 
 
 7“ At Forli.”” Because there it loses 
 the name of Acquacheta, and takes that 
 of Montone. 
 
 8 “ Where space.’’ Either because the 
 abbey was capable of containing more 
 than those who occupied it, or because 
 (says Landino) the lords of that terri- 
 
 Ever to that truth, 
 
 tory, as Boccaccio related on the author. 
 ity of the abbot, had intended to build 
 a castle near the water-fall, and to col- 
 lect within its walls the population of 
 the neighboring villages. | 
 
 ®“ A cord.” It is believed that our 
 poet, in the earlier part of his life, had 
 entered into the order of St. Francis. 
 By Mesias the rules of that profes- 
 sion he had designed to mortify his car- 
 nal appetites, or, as he expresses it, “ to 
 take the painted leopard ” (that animal, 
 which, as we have seen in a note to the 
 first Canto, represented Pleasure) ‘‘ with 
 this cord.” 
 
HELL 67 
 
 Which but the semblance of a falsehood wears, 
 A man, if possible, should bar his lip; 
 
 Since, although blameless, he incurs reproach. 
 But silence here were vain; and by these notes, 
 Which now I sing, reader, I swear to thee, 
 
 So may they favor find to latest times! 
 
 That through the gross and murky air I spied 
 
 A shape come ‘swimming up, that might have quell’d 
 The stoutest heart with wonder; in such guise 
 As one returns, who hath been down to loose 
 
 An anchor grappled fast against some rock, 
 
 Or to aught else that in the salt wave lies, 
 
 Who, upward springing, close draws in his feet. 
 
 CANTO XVII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The monster Geryon is described; to whom while Virgil 
 is speaking in order that he may carry them both down to the next 
 circle, Dante, by permission, goes a little further along the edge 
 of the void, to descry the third species of sinners contained in this 
 compartment, namely, those who have done violence to art; and 
 then returning to his master, they both descend, seated on the back 
 of Geryon. 
 
 ws O! the fell monster ?. with the deadly sting, 
 Who passes mountains, breaks through fenced walls 
 And firm embattled spears, and with his filth 
 Taints all the world.” Thus me my guide address’d, 
 And beckon’d him, that he should come to shore, 
 Near to the stony causeway’s utmost edge. 
 Forthwith that image vile of Fraud appear’d, 
 His head and upper part exposed on land, 
 But laid not on the shore his bestial train. 
 His face the semblance of a just man’s wore, 
 So kind and gracious was its outward cheer; 
 The rest was serpent all: two shaggy claws 
 Reach’d to the arm-pits; and the back and breast, 
 And either side, were painted o’er with nodes 
 And orbits. Colors variegated more 
 
 2“ The fell monster.”’ Fraud. 
 
68 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Nor Turks nor Tartars e’er on cloth of state 
 With interchangeable embroidery wove, 
 
 Nor spread Arachne o’er her curious loom. 
 As ofttimes a light skiff, moor’d to the shore, 
 Stands part in water, part upon the land; 
 
 Or, as where dwells the greedy German boor, 
 The beaver settles, watching for his prey; 
 So on the rim, that fenced the sand with rock, 
 
 Sat perch’d the fiend of evil. 
 
 In the void 
 
 Glancing, his tail upturn’d its venomous fork, 
 
 With sting like scorpion’s arm’d. Then thus my guide, 
 
 “Now need our way must turn few steps apart, 
 
 Far as to that ill beast, who couches there.” 
 Thereat, toward the right our downward course 
 
 We shaped, and, better to escape the flame 
 
 And burning marle, ten paces on the verge 
 
 Proceeded. Soon as we to him arrive, 
 
 A little further on mine eye beholds 
 
 A tribe of spirits, seated on the sand 
 
 Near to the void. Forthwith my master spake: 
 
 “ That to the full thy knowledge may extend 
 
 Of all this round contains, go now, and mark 
 
 The mien these wear: but hold not long discourse. 
 
 Till thou returnest, I with him meantime 
 
 Will parley, that to us he may vouchsafe 
 
 The aid of his strong shoulders.” 
 
 Thus alone, 
 
 Yet forward on the extremity I paced 
 
 Of that seventh circle, where the mournful tribe 
 
 Were seated. At the eyes forth gush’d their pangs, 
 
 Against the vapors and the torrid soil 
 
 Alternately their shifting hands they plied. 
 
 Thus use the dogs in summer still to ply 
 
 Their jaws and feet by turns, when bitten sore 
 
 By gnats, or flies, or gadflies swarming round. 
 Noting the visages of some, who lay 
 
 Beneath the pelting of that dolorous fire, 
 
 One of them all I knew not; but perceived, 
 
 That pendent from his neck each bore a pouch ? 
 
 ouch.” A 
 bearings o 
 zoned. According to Landino, our Poet 
 implies that the usurer can pretend to 
 no other honor than such as he derives 
 
 (2A 
 
 armoria 
 
 urse, whereon the 
 each were embla- 
 
 from his purse and his family. The de. 
 scription of persons by their heraldic 
 insignia is remarkable both on the 
 present and several other occasions in 
 this poem. 
 
HELL 69 
 
 With colors and with emblems various mark’d, 
 On which it seem’d as if their eye did feed. 
 And when, amongst them, looking round I came, 
 A yellow purse *® I saw with azure wrought, 
 That wore a lion’s countenance and port. 
 Then, still my sight pursuing its career, 
 Another * I beheld, than blood more red, 
 A goose display of whiter wing than curd. 
 And one, who bore a fat and azure swine © 
 Pictured on his white scrip, address’d me thus: 
 “What dost thou in this deep? Go now and know, 
 Since yet thou livest, that my neighbor here 
 Vitaliano ® on my left shall sit. 
 A Paduan with these Florentines am I. 
 Ofttimes they thunder in mine ears, exclaiming, 
 ‘Oh! haste that noble knight,’? he who the pouch 
 ‘ With the three goats will bring.’” This said, he writhed 
 The mouth, and loll’d the tongue out, like an ox 
 That licks his nostrils. I, lest longer stay 
 He ill might brook, who bade me stay not long, 
 Backward my steps from those sad spirits turn’d. 
 My guide already seated on the haunch 
 Of the fierce animal I found; and thus 
 He me encouraged. “ Be thou stout: be bold. 
 Down such a steep flight must we now descend. 
 Mount thou before: for, that no power the tail 
 May have to harm thee, I will be i’ th’ midst.” 
 As one, who hath an ague fit so near, 
 His nails already are turn’d blue, and he 
 Quivers all o’er, if he but eye the shade; 
 Such was my cheer at hearing of his words. 
 But shame soon interposed her threat, who makes 
 The servant bold in presence of his lord. 
 I settled me upon those shoulders huge, 
 And would have said, but that the words to aid 
 My purpose came not, “ Look thou clasp me firm.” 
 
 8** A yellow purse.”? The arms of the of the Scrovigni, a noble family of 
 
 Gianfigliazzi of Florence. : adua. nest 
 
 4“ Another.” Those of the Ubbri- 6“ Vitaliano.”’ Vitaliano del Dente, 
 achi, another Florentine family of high a Paduan. : Sy kd , 
 distinction. 7“ That noble knight.” Giovanni Bu- 
 
 5 “* A fat and azure swine.” The arms jamonti, a Florentine usurer, the most 
 infamous of his time. 
 
7O 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 But he whose succor then not first I proved, 
 Soon as I mounted, in his arms aloft, 
 Embracing, held me up; and thus he spake: 
 “Geryon! now move thee: be thy wheeling gyres 
 Of ample circuit, easy thy descent. 
 
 Think on the unusual burden thou sustain’st.” 
 As a small vessel, backening out from land, 
 Her station quits; so thence the monster loosed, 
 And, when he felt himself at large, turn’d round 
 
 There, where the breast had been, his forked tail. 
 Thus, like an eel, outstretch’d at length he steer’d, 
 Gathering the air up with retractile claws. 
 
 Not greater was the dread, when Phaeton 
 The reins let drop at random, whence high heaven, 
 Whereof signs yet appear, was wrapt in flames; 
 Nor when ill-fated Icarus perceived, 
 
 - By liquefaction of the scalded wax, 
 
 The trusted pennons loosen’d from his loins, 
 
 His sire exclaiming loud, “ Ill way thou keep’st,” 
 Than was my dread, when round me on each part 
 The air I view’d, and other object none 
 
 Save the fell beast. He, slowly sailing, wheels 
 His downward motion, unobserved of me, 
 
 But that the wind, arising to my face, 
 
 Breathes on me from below. Now on our right 
 
 I heard the cataract beneath us leap | 
 With hideous crash; whence bending down to explore, 
 New terror I conceived at the steep plunge; 
 
 For flames I saw, and wailings smote mine ear: 
 
 So that, all trembling, close I crouch’d my limbs, 
 
 And then distinguish’d, unperceived before, 
 
 By the dread torments that on every side 
 
 Drew nearer, how our downward course we wound. 
 As falcon, that hath long been on the wing, 
 
 But lure nor bird hath seen, while in despair 
 
 The falconer cries, ““ Ah me! thou stoop’st to earth,” 
 
 Wearied descends, whence nimbly he arose 
 
 In many an airy wheel, and lighting sits 
 
 At distance from his lord in angry mood; 
 
 So Geryon lighting places us on foot 
 
HELL 
 
 Low down at base of the deep-furrow’d rock, 
 And, of his burden there discharged, forthwith 
 Sprang forward, like an arrow from the string. 
 
 CANTO XVIII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The Poet describes the situation and form 
 
 73 
 
 circle, divided into ten Ss, which contaim as many different de- 
 
 scriptions of traudulent sinners; but in the present Canto 
 
 he treats 
 
 only of two sorts: the first is of those who, either for their own - 
 
 pleasure, or for that of another, have seduced any woman from-her- 
 nes and these are scourged of demons in the first gulf: 
 
 the other 
 
 ft is of flatterers, who in the second gulf are condemned to re- 
 
 main immersed in filth. 
 ee ES cs eT ae 
 
 HERE is a place within the depths of Hell 
 
 Call’d Malebolge, all of rock dark-stain’d 
 
 With hue ferruginous, e’en as the steep 
 That round it circling winds. Right in the midst 
 Of that abominable region yawns 
 A spacious gulf profound, whereof the frame 
 Due time shall tell. The circle, that remains, 
 Throughout its round, between the gulf and base 
 Of the high craggy banks, successive forms 
 Ten bastions, in its hollow bottom raised. __ 
 
 As where, to guard the walls, full many a foss 
 Begirds some stately castle, sure defence 
 Affording to the space within; so here 
 Were model’d these: and as like fortresses, 
 E’en from their threshold to the brink without, 
 Are flank’d with bridges; from the rock’s low base 
 Thus flinty paths advanced, that ’cross the moles 
 And dykes struck onward far as to the gulf, 
 That in one bound collected cuts them off. 
 Such was the place, wherein we found ourselves 
 From Geryon’s back dislodged. The bard to left 
 Held on his way, and I behind him moved. 
 
 On our right hand new misery I saw, 
 New pains, new executioners of wrath, 
 That swarming peopled the first chasm. Below 
 
72 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Were naked sinners. Hitherward they came, 
 
 “Meeting our faces; from the middle point; 
 
 With us beyond, but with a larger stride. 
 
 F’en thus the Romans,’ when the year returns 
 
 Of Jubilee, with better speed to rid 
 
 The thronging multitudes, their means devise 
 
 For such as pass the bridge; that on one side 
 
 All front toward the castle, and approach 
 
 Saint Peter’s fane, on the other toward the mount. 
 Each diverse way, along the grisly rock, 
 
 Horn’d demons I beheld, with lashes huge, 
 
 ‘That on their back unmercifully smote. 
 
 Ah! how they made them bound at the first stripe! 
 
 None for the second waited, nor the third. 
 Meantime, as on I pass’d, one met my sight, 
 
 Whom soon as view’d, “ Of him,” cried I, “ not yet 
 
 Mine eye hath had his fill.” I therefore stay’d 
 
 My feet to scan him, and the teacher kind 
 
 Paused with me, and consented I should walk 
 
 Backward a space; and the tormented spirit, 
 
 Who thought to hide him, bent his visage down. 
 
 But it avail’d him naught; for I exclaim’d: 
 
 “Thou who dost cast thine eye upon the ground, 
 
 Unless thy features do belie thee much, 
 
 Venedico? art thou. But what brings thee 
 
 Into this bitter seasoning? ” 
 
 He replied: 
 
 “ Unwillingly I answer to thy words. . 
 
 But thy clear speech, that to my mind recalls 
 The warld I once inhabited, constrains me. 
 Know then ’t was I who led fair Ghisola 
 
 To do the Marquis’ will, however fame 
 
 The shameful tale have bruited. Nor alone 
 Bologna hither sendeth me to mourn. 
 
 Rather with us the place is so o’erthrong’d, 
 
 2“ F’en thus the Romans.” In the 
 year 1300, Pope Boniface VIII, to rem- 
 edy the inconvenience occasioned by the 
 press of people who were passing over 
 the bridge of St. Angelo during the time 
 of the Jubilee, caused it to be divided 
 lengthwise by a partition; and ordered, 
 that all those who were going to St. 
 Peter’s should keep one side, and those 
 returning the other. G. Villani, who 
 was present, describes the order that 
 
 was preserved, lib. viii. c. xxxvi. It 
 was at this time, and on this occasion, 
 as the honest historian tells us, that he 
 first conceived the design of *‘ compil- 
 ing his book.’’ 
 
 2“ Venedico.’”? WVenedico Caccianimi- 
 co, a Bolognese, who prevailed on his 
 sister Ghisola to prostitute herself to 
 Obizzo da Este, arquis of Ferrara, 
 whom we have seen among the tyrants, 
 Canto xii. 
 
HELL 73 
 
 That not so many tongues this day are taught, 
 Betwixt the Reno and Savena’s stream, 
 To answer Sipa* in their country’s phrase. 
 And if of that securer proof thou need, 
 Remember but our craving thirst for gold.” 
 Him speaking thus, a demon with his thong 
 Struck and exclaim’d, “ Away, corrupter! here 
 Women are none for sale.” Forthwith I join’d 
 My escort, and few paces thence we came 
 To where a rock forth issued from the bank. 
 That easily ascended, to the right 
 Upon its splinter turning, we depart 
 From those eternal barriers. When arrived 
 Where, underneath, the gaping arch lets pass 
 The scourged souls: “ Pause here,” the teacher said, 
 “ And let these others miserable now 
 Strike on thy ken; faces not yet beheld, 
 For that together they with us have walk’d.” 
 From the old bridge we eyed the pack, who came 
 
 From the other side toward us, like the rest, 
 Excoriate from the lash. My gentle guide, 
 By me unquestion’d, thus his speech resumed: 
 “ Behold that lofty shade, who this way tends, 
 And seems too woe-begone to drop a tear. 
 How yet the regal aspect he retains! 
 
 ason is he, whose skill and prowess won 
 . The ram from Colchos. To the Lemnian isle 
 His passage thither led him, when those bold 
 And pitiless women had slain all their males, 
 There he with tokens and fair witching words 
 
 Hypsipyle * beguiled, a, virgin young, 
 Who first had all the rest herself beguiled. 
 Such is the guilt condemns him to this pain, 
 Here too Medea’s injuries are avenged. 
 All bear him company, who like deceit 
 
 8“*To answer, Sipa.’? He denotes tive “ sipa”’ instead either of “si” of, 
 Bologna by its situation between the as Monti will have it, of “ sia.” : 
 rivers Savena to the east, and Reno to 4‘ Hypsipyle.” Hypsipyle deceived 
 the west of that city; and by a pecul- the other women, by concealing her 
 iarity of dialect, the use of the affirma- father Thoas, when they had agreed to 
 
 put all their males to death. 
 
74 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 To his have practised. And thus much to know 
 Of the first vale suffice thee, and of those 
 Whom its keen torments urge.” Now had we come 
 Where, crossing the next pier, the straiten’d path 
 Bestrides its shoulders to another arch. 
 Hence, in the second chasm we heard the ghosts, 
 Who gibber in low melancholy sounds, 
 With wide-stretch’d nostrils snort, and on themselves 
 Smite with their palms. Upon the banks a scurf, 
 From the foul steam condensed, encrusting hung, 
 That held sharp combat with the sight and smell. 
 So hollow is the depth, that from no part, 
 Save on the summit of the rocky span, 
 Could I distinguish aught. Thus far we came; 
 And thence I saw, within the foss below, 
 A crowd immersed in ordure, that appear’d 
 Draff of the human body. There beneath 
 Searching with eye inquisitive, I mark’d 
 One with his head so grimed, ’t were hard to deem 
 If he were clerk or layman. Loud he cried: 
 “Why greedily thus bendest more on me, 
 Than on these other filthy ones, thy ken?” 
 “ Because, if true my memory,” I replied, 
 “T heretofore have seen thee with dry locks; 
 And thou Alessio ° art, of Lucca sprung. 
 Therefore than all the rest I scan thee more.” 
 Then beating on his brain, these words he spake: 
 “ Me thus low down my flatteries have sunk, 
 Wherewith I ne’er enough could glut my tongue.” 
 My leader thus: “A little further stretch — 
 Thy face, that thou the visage well mayst note 
 Of that besotted, sluttish courtesan, 
 Who there doth rend her with defiled nails, 
 Now crouching down, now risen on her feet. 
 Thais ® is this, the harlot, whose false lip 
 Answer’d her doting paramour that ask’d, 
 ‘Thankest me much! ’—‘ Say rather, wondrously,’ 
 And, seeing this, here satiate be our view.” 
 5‘ Alessio.” Alessio, of am ancient where Thraso asks if Thais was obliged 
 and considerable family in Lucca, called to him for the present he had sent her; 
 the Intermingei. and Gnatho replies that she had_ exe 
 
 6“ Thais.” He alludes to that pas- Piece her obligation in the most forcie 
 sage in the ‘‘ Eunuchus” of Terence, le terms. 
 
HELL 95 
 
 CANTO XIX 
 
 ARGUMENT.—They come to the third gulf, wherein are punished those 
 
 who have been guilty of simony. These are fixed with the head 
 downward in certain apertures, so that no more of them than the 
 legs appears without, and on the soles of their feet are seen burning 
 flames. Dante is taken down by his guide into the bottom of the 
 gulf; and there finds Pope Nicholas V, whose evil deeds, together 
 with those of other pontiffs, are bitterly reprehended. Virgil then 
 carries him up again to the arch, which affords them a passage over 
 the following gulf. : 
 
 OE to thee, Simon Magus! woe to you, 
 His wreched followers! who the things of God, 
 Which should be wedded unto goodness, them, 
 
 Rapacious as ye are, do prostitute 
 For gold and silver in adultery. 
 Now must the trumpet sound for you, since yours 
 Is the third chasm. Upon the following vault 
 We now had mounted, where the rock impends 
 Directly o’er the centre of the foss. 
 
 Wisdom Supreme! how wonderful the art, 
 Which thou dost manifest in heaven, in earth, 
 And in the evil world, how just a meed 
 Allotting by thy virtue unto all. 
 
 I saw the livid stone, throughout the sides 
 And in its bottom full of apertures, 
 All equal in their width, and circular each. 
 Nor ample less nor larger they appear’d 
 Than, in Saint John’s fair dome? of me beloved, 
 Those framed to hold the pure baptismal streams, 
 One of the which I brake, some few years past, 
 To save a whelming infant: and be this 
 A seal to undeceive whoever doubts 
 The motive of my deed. From out the mouth 
 Of every one emerged a sinner’s feet, 
 And of the legs high upward as the calf. 
 The rest beneath was hid. On either foot 
 
 1“ Saint John’s fair dome.” The 
 apertures in the rock were of the same 
 dimensions as the fonts of St. John the 
 Baptist at Florence, one of which, 
 Dante says, he had broken, to rescue a 
 
 child that was playing near and fell in. 
 He intimates that the motive, of his 
 breaking the font had been maliciously 
 represented by his enemies. 
 
96 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 The soles were burning; whence the flexile joints 
 Glanced with such violent motion, as had snapt 
 Asunder cords or twisted withes. As flame, 
 Feeding on unctuous matter, glides along 
 The surface, scarcely touching where it moves; 
 So here, from heel to point, glided the flames. 
 “Master! say who is he, than all the rest 
 Glancing in fiercer agony, on whom 
 
 _ A ruddier flame doth prey?” I thus inquired. 
 
 “Tf thou be willing,” he replied, “ that I 
 Carry thee down, where least the slope bank falls, 
 He of himself shall tell thee, and his wrongs.” 
 
 Ithen: “ As pleases thee, to me is best. 
 
 Thou art my lord; and know’st that ne’er I quit 
 Thy will: what silence hides, that knowest thou.” 
 Thereat on the fourth pier we came, we turn’d 
 
 And on our left descended to the depth, 
 
 A narrow strait, and perforated close. 
 
 Nor from his side my leader set me down, 
 
 Till to his orifice he brought, whose limb 
 
 Quivering express’d his pang. “ Whoe’er thou art, 
 Sad spirit! thus reversed, and as a stake 
 
 Driven in the soil,” I in these words began; 
 
 “ Tf thou be able, utter forth thy voice.” 
 
 There stood I like the friar, that doth shrive 
 A wretch for murder doom’d, who, e’en when fix’d, 
 Calleth him back, whence death awhile delays. 
 
 He shouted: “ Ha! already standest there? 
 Already standest there, O Boniface! ? 
 
 By many a year the writing play’d me false. 
 So early dost thou surfeit with the wealth, 
 For which thou fearedst not in guile to take 
 The lovely lady, and then mangle her? ” 
 
 I felt as those who, piercing not the drift 
 Of answer made them, stand as if exposed 
 In mockery, nor know what to reply; 
 
 When Virgil thus admonish’d: “ Tell him quick, 
 
 2**Q Boniface!’ The spirit mistakes as it should seem, of a prophecy, which 
 
 Dante for Boniface VIII, who was then 
 
 redicted the death of that Pope at a 
 
 alive; and who he did not expect would later period. Boniface died in 1303. 
 have arrived so soon, in consequence, . 
 
HELL 
 
 77 
 
 ‘I am not he, not he whom thou believest.’ ” 
 And I, as was enjoin’d me, straight replied. 
 That heard, the spirit all did wrench his feet, 
 
 And, sighing, next in woful accent spake: 
 
 “ What then of me requirest? If to know 
 
 So much imports thee, who I am, that thou 
 
 Hast therefore down the bank descended, learn 
 
 That in the mighty mantle I was robed,® 
 
 And of a she-bear was indeed the son, 
 
 So eager to advance my whelps, that there 
 
 My having in my purse above I stow’d, 
 
 And here myself. Under my head are drage’d 
 
 The rest, my predecessors in the guilt 
 
 Of simony. Stretch’d at their length, they lie 
 
 Along an opening in the rock. ’Midst them 
 
 I also low shall fall, soon as he comes, 
 
 For whom I took thee, when so hastily 
 
 I question’d. But already longer time 
 
 Hath past, since my soles kindled, and I thus 
 
 Upturn’d have stood, than is his doom to stand 
 
 Planted with fiery feet. For after him, : 
 
 - One yet of deeds more ugly shall arrive, 
 
 From forth the west, a shepherd without law,* 
 
 Fated to cover both his form and mine. 
 
 He a new Jason ® shall be call’d, of whom 
 
 In Maccabees we read; and favor such 
 
 As to that priest his King indulgent show’d, 
 
 Shall be of France’s monarch * shown to him.” 
 I know not if I here too far presumed, 
 
 But in this strain I answer’d: 
 
 “Tell me now 
 
 What treasures from Saint Peter at the first 
 Our Lord demanded, when he put the keys 
 Into his charge? Surely he ask’d no more 
 
 8 “ Tn the mighty mantle I was robed.” 
 Nicholas III of the rsini family, 
 whom the Poet therefore calls “ figliuol 
 dell’ orsa,’”’ “son of the she-bear.”? He 
 died in 1281. 
 
 4* From forth the west, a_ shepherd 
 without law.” Bertrand de Got, Arch- 
 bishop of Bordeaux, who succeeded to 
 the pontificate in 1305, and assumed the 
 title of Clement V. He transferred the 
 Holy See to Avignon, in 1308 (where it 
 remained till 1376), and died in 1314. 
 
 5‘*A new Jason.” ‘ But after the 
 death of Seleucus, when Antiochus, 
 called Epiphanes, took the kingdom, Ja- 
 son, the brother of Onias, labored ua- 
 derhand to be high-priest, promising 
 unto the King, by intercession, three 
 hundred and threescore talents of sil- 
 ver, and of another revenue eighty tal- 
 ents.”’—Maccab, b. ii. ch. iv. 7, 8. 
 
 6“ Of France’s monarch.” Philip IV 
 fs France. See G. Villani, lib. viii. c. 
 XXX, 
 
78 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 But ‘ Follow me!” Nor Peter,’ nor the rest, 
 Or gold or silver of Matthias took, 
 When lots were cast upon the forfeit place 
 Of the condemned soul.® Abide thou then; 
 Thy punishment of right is merited: 
 And look thou well to that ill-gotten coin, 
 Which against Charles ® thy hardihood inspired. 
 If reverence of the keys restrain’d me not, 
 Which thou in happier time didst hold, I yet 
 Severer speech might use. Your avarice 
 O’ercasts the world with mourning, under foot 
 Treading the good, and raising bad men up. 
 Of shepherds like to you, the Evangelist 
 Was ware, when her, who sits upon the waves, 
 With kings in filthy whoredom he beheld; 
 She who with seven heads tower’d at her birth, 
 And from ten horns her proof of glory drew, 
 Long as her spouse in virtue took delight. 
 Of gold and silver ye have made your god, 
 Differing wherein from the idolater, 
 * But that he worships one, a hundred ye? 
 Ah, Constantine! *° to how much ill gave birth, 
 Not thy conversion, but that plenteous dower, 
 Which the first wealthy Father gain’d from thee.” 
 Meanwhile, as thus I sung, he, whether wrath 
 Or conscience smote him, violent upsprang 
 Spinning on either sole. I do believe 
 My teacher well was pleased, with so composed 
 A lip he listen’d ever to the sound 
 Of the true words I utter’d. In both arms 
 He caught, and, to his bosom lifting me, 
 Upward retraced the way of his descent. 
 Nor weary of his weight, he press’d me close, 
 Till to the summit of the rock we came, 
 Our passage from the fourth to the fifth pier. 
 His cherish’d burden there gently he placed 
 
 af Cokes Peter.” Acts of the Apostles, alliance between their families. See G, 
 ch. Villani, “ Hist.” lib. vii. c. liv. 
 ge The condemned soul,” Judas Ah, Constantine! ” He alludes to 
 
 ®“** Against Charles.’ iggy Sut ie pretended gift of the Lateran b 
 was enraged against Charles I, King of Constantine to Sylvester, of whic 
 Sicily, because he rejected with scorn a Dante himself seems to imply a doubt, 
 proposition made by that Pope for an in his treatise “‘ De Monarchia.”’ 
 
HELL 79 
 
 Upon the rugged rock and steep, a path 
 Not easy for the clambering goat to mount. 
 Thence to my view another vale appear’d. 
 
 CANTO XX 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The Poet relates the punishment of such as presumed, 
 while living, to predict future events. It is to have their faces re- 
 versed and set the contrary way on their limbs, so that, being de- 
 prived of the power to see before them, they are constrained ever to 
 walk backward. Among these Virgil points out to him Amphiarats, 
 Tiresias, Aruns, and Manto (from the mention of whom he takes 
 occasion to speak of the origin of Mantua), together with several 
 others, who had practised the arts of divination and astrology. 
 
 ND now the verse proceeds to torments new, 
 
 A Fit argument of this the twentieth strain 
 Of the first song, whose awful theme records 
 
 The spirits whelm’d in woe. Earnest I look’d 
 Into the depth, that open’d to my view, 
 Moisten’d with tears of anguish, and beheld 
 A tribe, that came along the hollow vale, 
 In silence weeping: such their step as walk 
 Quires, chanting solemn litanies, on earth. 
 
 As on them more direct mine eye descends, 
 Each wondrously seem’d to be reversed 
 At the neck-bone, so that the countenance 
 Was from the reins averted; and because 
 None might before him look, they were compell’d 
 To advance with backward gait. Thus one perhaps 
 Hath been by force of palsy clean transposed, 
 
 But I ne’er saw it nor believe it so. 
 
 Now,*reader! think within thyself, so God 
 Fruit of thy reading give thee! how I long 
 Could keep my visage dry, when I beheld 
 Near me our form distorted in such guise, 
 
 That on the hinder parts fallen from the face 
 
 The tears down-streaming roll’d. Against a rock 
 t , so that my guide exclaim’d: 
 
 ‘“‘ What, and art thou, too, witless as the rest ? 
 
80 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Here pity most doth show. herself alive, 
 When she is dead. What guilt exceedeth his, 
 Who with Heaven’s judgment in his passion strives? 
 Raise up thy head, raise up, and see the man 
 Before whose eyes ' earth gaped in Thebes, when all 
 Cried out ‘ Amphiarats, whither rushest? 
 ‘Why leavest thou the war?’ He not the less 
 Fell ruining far as to Minos down, 
 Whose grapple none eludes. Lo! how he makes 
 The breast his shoulders; and who once too far 
 Before him wish’d to see, now backward looks, 
 And treads reverse his path. ‘Tiresias note, 
 Who semblance changed, when woman he became 
 Of male, through every limb transform’d; and then 
 Once more behoved him with his rod to strike 
 The two entwining serpents, ere the plumes, 
 That mark’d the better sex, might shoot again. 
 “ Aruns,? with rere his belly facing, comes. 
 On Luni’s mountains ’midst the marbles white, 
 Where delves Carrara’s hind, who wons beneath, 
 A cavern was his dwelling, whence the stars 
 And main-sea wide in boundless view he held. 
 “The next, whose loosen’d tresses overspread 
 Her bosom, which thou seest not (for each hair 
 On that side grows) was Manto, she who search’d 
 Through many regions, and at length her seat 
 Fix’d in my native land: whence a short space 
 My words detain thy audience. When her sire 
 From life departed, and in servitude 
 The city dedicate to Bacchus mourn’d, 
 Long time she went a wanderer through the world. 
 Aloft in Italy’s delightful land 
 A lake there lies, at foot of that proud Alp 
 That o’er the Tyrol locks Germania in, 
 Its name Benacus, from whose ample breast 
 A thousand springs, methinks, and more, between 
 Camonica and Garda, issuing forth, 
 
 1** Before whose eyes.”” Amphiaraiis dwelt in the mountains of Luni (from 
 one of the seven kings who besieged whence that territory is still called Lu- 
 Thebes. He is said to have been swal- nigiana), above Carrara, celebrated for 
 
 lowed up by an opening of the earth. its marble. 
 2“ Aruns.” Aruns is said to have 
 
HELL 8x 
 
 Water the Apennine. There is a spot ® 
 
 At midway of that lake, where he who bears 
 
 Of Trento’s flock the pastoral staff, with him 
 Of Brescia, and the Veronese, might each 
 Passing that way his benediction give. 
 
 A garrison of goodly site and strong 
 
 Peschiera * stands, to awe with front opposed 
 The Bergamese and Brescian, whence the shore 
 More slope each way descends. There, whatsoe’er 
 Benacus’ bosom holds not, tumbling o’er 
 Down falls, and winds a river flood beneath 
 
 Through the green pastures. 
 
 Soon as in his course 
 
 The stream makes head, Benacus then no more 
 They call the name, but Mincius, till at last 
 Reaching Governo, into Po he falls. 
 
 Not far his course hath run, when a wide flat 
 It finds, which overstretching as a marsh 
 
 It covers, pestilent in summer oft. 
 
 Hence journeying, the savage maiden saw 
 Midst of the fen a territory waste 
 
 And naked of inhabitants. 
 
 To shun 
 
 All human converse, here she with her slaves, 
 Plying her arts, remain’d, and liv’d, and left 
 Her body tenantless. Thenceforth the tribes, 
 Who round were scatter’d, gathering to that place, 
 Assembled; for its strength was great, enclosed 
 On all parts by the fen. On those dead bones 
 They rear’d themselves a city, for her sake 
 Calling it Mantua, who first chose the spot, 
 
 Nor ask’d another omen for the name; 
 
 Wherein more numerous the people dwelt, 
 
 Ere Casalodi’s madness ® by deceit 
 
 Was wronged of Pinamonte. If thou hear 
 Henceforth another origin assign’d 
 
 8“ There is a spot.”” Prato di Fame, 
 where the dioceses of Trento, Verona, 
 and Brescia meet. 
 
 4“ Peschiera.” A Bere situated 
 to the south of the lake, where it emp- 
 ties itself and forms the Mincius. 
 
 5“ Casalodi’s madness.” Alberto da 
 Casalodi, who had got possession of 
 Mantua, was persuaded, by Pinamonte 
 
 Buonacossi, that he might ingratiate 
 himself with the people, by banishing 
 to their own castles the nobles, who 
 were obnoxious to them. No sooner 
 was this done than Pinamonte put him- 
 self at the head of the populace, drove 
 out Casalodi and his adherents, and 
 obtained the sovereignty for himself. 
 
82 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Of that my country, I forewarn thee now, 
 
 That falsehood none beguile thee of the truth.” 
 I answer’d, “ Teacher, I conclude thy words 
 
 So certain, that all else shall be to me 
 
 As embers lacking life. But now of these, 
 
 Who here proceed, instruct me, if thou see 
 
 Any that merit more especial note. 
 
 For thereon is my mind alone intent.” 
 
 He straight replied: 
 
 “That spirit, from whose cheek 
 
 The beard sweeps o’er his shoulders brown, what time 
 Grecia was emptied of her males, that scarce 
 The cradles were supplied, the seer was he 
 In Aulis, who with Calchas gave the sign 
 When first to cut the cable. Him they named 
 Eurypilus: so sings my tragic strain, 
 In which majestic measure well thou know’st, 
 Who know’st it all. That other, round the loins 
 So slender of his shape, was Michael Scot,® 
 Practised in every slight of magic wile. 
 
 “‘ Guido Bonatti* see: Asdente mark, 
 Who now were willing he had tended still 
 The thread and cordwain, and too late repents. 
 
 ““ See next the wretches, who the needle left, 
 The shuttle and the spindle, and became 
 Diviners: baneful witcheries they wrought 
 With images and herbs. But onward now: 
 For now doth Cain with fork of thorns ® confine 
 On either hemisphere, touching the wave 
 Beneath the towers of Seville. Yesternight 
 The moon was round. Thou mayst remember well: 
 For she good service did thee in the gloom 
 Of the deep wood.” ‘This said, both onward moved. 
 
 6 ‘* Michael Scot.”’ Boccaccio, ‘* Dec.” 
 G. viii. N. 9. ‘‘ It is not long since 
 there was in this city (Florence) a great 
 master in necromancy, who was called 
 Michele Scotto, because he was from 
 Scotland.”’ 
 
 7 Guido Bonatti.” An astrologer of 
 Forli, on whose skill Guido da Monte- 
 feltro, lord of that place, so much re- 
 lied, that he is reported never to have 
 gone into battle, except in the hour 
 recommended to him as fortunate by 
 Bonatti. Landino and Vellutello speak 
 of a book which he composed on the 
 subject of his art. Macchiavelli men- 
 
 ~ 
 
 tions him in the “ History _of Flore 
 ence,” 1, i. p. 24. ed. 1550. “ He flour- 
 ished about 1230 and 1260. Though a 
 learned astronomer he was seduced by 
 astrology, through which he was greatly 
 in favor with many princes of that time. 
 His many works are miserably spoiled 
 it 
 
 3° Cain with fork of thorns.”’ By Cain 
 and the thorns, or what is still vulgarly 
 called the Man in the Moon, the Poet 
 denotes that luminary. The same super- 
 stition is alluded to in the Paradise, 
 Canto ii. 52. 
 
HELL ; 83 
 
 CANTO XxXI 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Still in the eighth circle, which bears the-nameof Male- 
 
 ein age look down from the bridge that passes over its fifth gulf, 
 
 pon the barterers or public peculators. These are plunged in a 
 
 lake of boiling pitch, and guarded by Demons, to whom Virgil, 
 
 leaving Dante apart, presents himself; and license being obtained to 
 pass onward, both pursue their way. 
 
 HUS we from bridge to bridge, with other talk, 
 The which my drama cares not to rehearse, 
 Pass’d on; and to the summit reaching, stood 
 
 To view another gap, within the round 
 Of Malebolge, other bootless pangs. 
 
 Marvellous darkness shadow’d o’er the place. 
 
 In the Venetians’ arsenal as boils 
 Through wintry months tenacious pitch, to smear 
 Their unsound vessels; for the inclement time 
 Seafaring men restrains, and in that while 
 His bark one builds anew, another stops 
 The ribs of his that hath made many a voyage, 
 One hammers at the prow, one at the poop, 
 This shapeth oars, that other cables twirls, 
 The mizzen one repairs, and main-sail rent; 
 So, not by force of fire but art divine, 
 Boil’d here a glutinous thick mass, that round 
 Limed all the shore beneath. I that beheld, 
 But herein naught distinguish’d, save the bubbles 
 Raised by the boiling, and one mighty swell 
 Heave, and by turns subsiding fall. While there 
 I fix’d my ken below, “ Mark! mark!” my guide 
 Exclaiming, drew me toward him from the place 
 Wherein I stood. I turn’d myself, as one 
 Impatient to behold that which beheld 
 He needs must shun, whom sudden fear unmans, 
 That he his flight delays not for the view. 
 Behind me I discern’d a devil black, 
 That running up advanced along the rock. 
 Ah! what fierce cruelty his look bespake. 
 In act how bitter did he seem, with wings 
 
THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Buoyant outstretch’d and feet of nimblest tread. 
 His shoulder, proudly eminent and sharp, 
 Was with a sinner charged; by either haunch 
 He held him, the foot’s sinew griping fast. 
 “Ye of our bridge!” he cried, “ keen-talon’d fiends! 
 Lo! one of Santa Zita’s elders. Him 
 Whelm ye beneath, while I return for more. 
 That land hath store of such. All men are there, 
 Except Bonturo, barterers: of ‘no’ 
 For lucre there an ‘ay’ is quickly made.” 
 Him dashing down, o’er the rough rock he turn’d; 
 Nor ever after thief a mastiff loosed 
 Sped with like eager haste. That other sank, 
 And forthwith writhing to the surface rose. 
 But those dark demons, shrouded by the bridge, 
 Cried, ‘“‘ Here the hallow’d visage saves not: here 
 Is other swimming than in Serchio’s wave, 
 Wherefore, if thou desire we rend thee not, 
 Take heed thou mount not o’er the pitch.” This said, 
 They grappled him with more than hundred hooks, 
 And shouted: “Cover’d thou must sport thee here; 
 So, if thou canst, in sécret mayst thou filch.” 
 E’en thus the cook bestirs him, with his grooms, 
 To thrust the flesh into the caldron down 
 With flesh-hooks, that it float not on the top So. 
 Me then my guide bespake: ‘Lest they descry “=~ 
 That thou art here, behind a craggy rock 
 Bend low and screen thee: and whate’er o 
 Be offer’d me, or insult, fear thou not; 
 For I am well advised, who have been erst 
 In the like fray.” Beyond the bridge’s head 
 Therewith he pass’d; and reaching the sixth pier, 
 Behoved him then a forehead terror-proof. 
 With storm and fury, as when dogs rush forth 
 Upon the poor man’s back, who suddenly 
 From whence he standeth makes his suit; so rush’d 
 Those from beneath the arch, and against him 
 Their weapons all they pointed. He, aloud: 
 “ Be none of you outrageous: ere your time 
 Dare seize me, come forth from amongst you one, 
 
HELL 85 
 
 Who have heard my words, decide he then 
 
 If he shall tear these limbs.”’ They shouted loud, 
 “Go, Malacoda!” Whereat one advanced, 
 
 The others standing firm, and as he came, 
 “What may this turn avail him?” he exclaim’d. 
 
 “ Believest thou, Malacoda! I had come 
 
 Thus far from all your skirmishing secure,” 
 My teacher answer’d, “ without will divine 
 And destiny propitious? Pass we then; 
 
 For so Heaven’s pleasure is, that I should lead 
 Another through this savage wilderness.” 
 
 Forthwith so fell his pride, that he let drop 
 
 The instrument of torture at his feet, 
 
 And to the rest exclaim’d: ‘“ We have no power 
 
 To strike him.” Then to me my guide: “O thou! 
 Who on the_bridge among the crags dost sit 
 
 Low crouching, safely now to me return.” 
 
 I rose, and toward him moved with speed; the fiends 
 Meantime all forward drew: me terror seized, 
 
 Lest they should break the compact they had made. 
 Thus issuing from Caprona,’ once I saw 
 
 The infantry, dreading lest his covenant 
 
 The foe should break; so close he hemm’d them round. 
 
 I to my leader’s side adhered, mine eyes 
 With fixt and motionless observance bent 
 On their unkindly visage. They their hooks 
 Protruding, one the other thus bespake: 
 
 “Wilt thou I touch him on the hip?” To whom 
 Was answer’d: “Even so; nor miss thy aim.” 
 
 But he, who was in conference with my guide, 
 Turn’d rapid round; and thus the demon spake: 
 “Stay, stay thee, Scarmiglione!” Then to us 
 He added: “Further footing to your step 
 This rock affords not, shiver’d to the base 
 Of the sixth arch. But would ye still proceed, 
 
 Up by this cavern go: not distant far, 
 
 Another rock will yield you passage safe. 
 
 1“ From Caprona.’”’ The surrender of in safety, to which event Dante was a 
 the castle of Caprona to the combined wna Lee place in 1290. See G, Vil- 
 
 forces of Florence and Lucca, on condi- _lani, “ Hist.”’ lib. vil. c. cxxxvi. 
 tion that the garrison should march out 
 
 Classics. Vol. 34—E. 
 
THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Yesterday,’ later by five hours than now, 
 Twelve hundred threescore years and six had fill’d . 
 The circuit of their course, since here the way 
 Was broken. Thitherward I straight despatch 
 Certain of these my scouts, who shall espy 
 If any on the surface bask. With them 
 Go ye: for ye shall find them nothing fell. 
 Come, Alichino, forth,” with that he cried, 
 “ And Calcabrina, and Cagnazzo thou! 
 The troop of ten let Barbariccia lead. 
 With Libicocco, Draghinazzo haste, 
 Fang’d Ciratta, Graffhiacane fierce, 
 And Farfarello, and mad Rubicant. 
 Search ye around the bubbling tar. For these, 
 In safety lead them, where the other crag 
 Uninterrupted traverses the dens.” 
 I then: ‘“O master! what a sight is there. 
 Ah! without escort, journey we alone, 
 Which, if thou know the way, I covet not. 
 Unless thy prudence fail thee, dost not mark 
 How they do gnarl upon us, and their scowl 
 Threatens us present tortures?” He replied: 
 “T charge thee, fear not: let them, as they will, 
 Gnarl on: ’tis but in token of their spite 
 Against the souls who mourn in torment steep’d.” 
 To leftward o’er the pier they turn’d; but each 
 Had first between his teeth prest close the tongue, 
 Toward their leader for a signal looking, 
 Which he with sound obscene triumphant gave. 
 
 a“ Yesterday.” This passage fixes the Evangelists inform us, happened “ at the 
 
 era of Dante’s descent at Good Friday, ninth hour,” that is, our sixth, when 
 in the year 1300 (thirty-four years from “ the rocks were rent, ”? and the convul- 
 our blessed Lord’s incarnation being sion, according to Dante, was felt even 
 
 added to 1266), and at the thirty- “Aith is the depths of Hell. See Canto xii. v. 
 
 year of our Poet’s age. See Canto i. v. 3 
 
 The awful event alluded to, the 
 
HELL | 87 
 
 CANTO XXII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Virgil and Dante proceed, accompanied by the Demons, 
 and see other sinners of the same description in the same gulf. The 
 
 evice of Ci one of these, to escape from the Demons “ 
 
 had laid hold on him. 
 a een 
 
 T hath been heretofore my chance to see 
 Horsemen with martial order shifting camp, 
 To onset sallying, or in muster ranged, 
 Or in retreat sometimes outstretch’d for flight: 
 Light-armed squadrons and fleet foragers 
 Scouring thy plains, Arezzo! have I seen, 
 And clashing tournaments, and tilting jousts, 
 Now with the sound of trumpets, now of bells, 
 Tabors,* or signals made from castled heights, 
 And with inventions multiform, our own, 
 Or introduced from foreign land; but ne’er 
 To such a strange recorder I beheld, 
 In evolution moving, horse nor foot, 
 Nor ship, that tack’d by sign from land or star. 
 With the ten Demons on our way we went; 
 Ah, fearful -ompany! but in the Church 
 With saints, with gluttons at the tavern’s mess. 
 Still earnest on the pitch I gazed, to mark 
 All things whate’er the chasm contain’d, and those 
 Who burn’d within. As dolphins that, in sign 
 To mariners, heave high their arched backs, 
 That thence forewarn’d they may advise to save 
 Their threaten’d vessel; so, at intervals, 
 To ease the pain, his back some sinner show’d, 
 Then hid more nimbly than the lightning-glance. 
 E’en as the frogs, that of a watery moat 
 Stand at the brink, with the jaws only out, 
 Their feet and of the trunk all else conceal’d, 
 Thus on each part the sinners stood; but soon 
 
 1“*Tabors.”” ‘‘ Tabour, a drum, a holy war. yotsnlle describes a superb 
 common accompaniment of war, is men- bark or galley belonging to a saracen 
 tioned as one ahine instruments of mar- chief which, he says, was filled with 
 tial music in this battle (in Richard Seals. tabours, ees Saracen horns.— 
 Ceeur-de-Lion) with characteristical pro- *‘ Hist. de S. Sipe 30.” Warton’s 
 priety. It was imported into the Euro- * Hist. of Bnglig Poetry,” v. i, § 4, p 
 
 pean armies from the Saracens in the 167. 
 
88 © THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 As Barbariccia was at hand, so they 
 
 Drew back under the wave. 
 
 I saw, and yet 
 
 My heart doth stagger, one, that waited thus, 
 As it befalls that oft one frog remains, 
 
 While the next springs away: and Graffacan, 
 Who of the fiends was nearest, grappling seized 
 His clotted locks, and dragg’d him sprawling up, 
 
 That he appear’d to me an otter. 
 
 Each 
 
 Already by their names I knew, so well 
 When they were chosen I observed, and mark’d 
 
 ‘How one the other call’d. 
 
 “© Rubicant! 
 
 See that his hide thou thy talons flay,” 
 Shouted together all the cursed crew. 
 
 Then I: 
 
 “Inform thee, Master! if thou may, 
 
 What wretched soul is this, on whom their hands 
 
 His foes have laid.” 
 
 My leader to his side 
 
 Approach’d, and whence he came inquired; to whom 
 
 Was answer’d thus: 
 
 “Born.in Navarre’s domain,? 
 
 My mother placed me in a lord’s retinue; 
 For she had borne to me a losel vile, 
 A spendthrift of his substance and himself. 
 The good King Thibault® after that I served: 
 To peculating here my thoughts were turn’d, 
 Whereof I give account in this dire heat.” 
 Straight Ciratto, from whose mouth a tusk 
 Issued on either side, as from a boar, 
 
 Ripp’d him with one of these. 
 
 *Twixt evil claws 
 
 The mouse had fallen: but Barbariccia cried, 
 
 Seizing him with both arms: 
 
 “Stand thou apart 
 
 While I do fix him on my prong transpierced.” 
 Then added, turning to my guide his face, 
 “Inquire of him, if more thou wish to learn, 
 
 Ere he again be rent.” 
 
 My leader thus: 
 
 “Then tell us of the partners in thy guilt; 
 
 2“ Born in Navarre’s domain.” The 
 name of this peculator is said to have 
 been Ciampolo. 
 
 8“ The good King Thibault.” ‘‘ Thi- 
 bault I, King of Navarre, died on June 
 8, 1233s as much to be commended for 
 the desire he showed of aiding the war 
 in the Holy Land, as reprehensible and 
 faulty for hig design of oppressing the 
 rights and privileges of the Church; on 
 which account it is said that the whole 
 
 kingdom was under an interdict for the 
 space of three entire years. Thibault 
 undoubtedly merits praise, as for his 
 other endowments, so especially for his 
 cultivation of the liberal arts, his exer 
 cise and knowledge of music and poetry, 
 in which he so much excelled, that he 
 was accustomed to compose verses and 
 sing them to the viol, and to exhibit .his 
 poetical compositions publicly in his pal- 
 ace, that they might be criticised by. all.” 
 
HELL 89. 
 
 Knowest thou any sprung of Latin land 
 
 Under the tar?” “I parted,” he replied, 
 
 “ But now from one, who sojourn’d not far thence; 
 
 So were I under shelter now with him, 
 
 Nor hook nor talon then should scare me more.” 
 “Too long we suffer,” Libicocco cried; 
 
 Then, darting forth a prong, seized on his arm, 
 
 And mangled bore away the sinewy part. 
 
 Him Draghinazzo by his thighs beneath 
 
 Would next have caught; whence angrily their chief, 
 
 Turning on all sides round, with threatening brow 
 
 Restrain’d them. When their strife a little ceased, 
 
 Of him, who yet was gazing on his wound, 
 
 My teacher thus without delay inquired: 
 
 “Who was the spirit, from whom by evil hap 
 
 Parting, as thou hast told, thou camest to shore?” 
 “Tt was the friar Gomita,’* he rejoin’d, 
 
 “He of Gallura, vessel of all guile, 
 
 Who had his master’s enemies in hand, 
 
 And used them so that they commend him well. 
 
 Money he took, and them at large dismiss’d; 
 
 So he reports; and in each other charge 
 
 Committed to his keeping play’d the part 
 
 Of barterer to the height. With him doth herd 
 
 The chief of Logodoro, Michel Zanche.® 
 
 Sardinia is a theme whereof their tongue 
 
 Is never weary. Out! alas! behold 
 
 That other, how he grins. More would I say, 
 
 But tremble lest he mean to maul me sore.” 
 Their captain then to Farfarello turning, 
 
 Who roll’d his moony eyes in act to strike, 
 
 Rebuked him thus: “ Off, cursed bird! avaunt!” 
 “If ye desire to see or hear,” he thus 
 
 Quaking with dread resumed, “or Tuscan spirits 
 
 Or Lombard, I will cause them to appear. 
 
 Meantime let these ill talons bate their fury, 
 
 4“ The friar Gomita.’”?’ He was in- of Nino will recur in the notes to Canto 
 trusted by Nino de’ Visconti with the Xxxlii, and in the Purgatory, Canto viii, 
 government of Gallura, one of the four 5 “ Michel Zanche.”? The President of 
 Jurisdictions into which Sardinia was di- | Logodoro, another of the four Sardinian 
 vided. Having his master’s enemies in jurisdictions. See Canto xxxiii. Note 
 his power he took a bribe from them, to v. 136. 
 
 and allowed them to escape. Mention 
 
go THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 So that no vengeance they may fear from them, 
 
 And I, remaining in this self-same piace. 
 Wh : S torveo 
 Our custom_is to call ea : 
 Cagnazzo at that word deriding grinn’d, 
 Then wageg’d the head and spake: “ Hear his device, 
 ischi ge him down.” 
 Whereto he thus, who fail’d not in rich store 
 Of nice-wove toils: “ Mischief, forsooth, extreme! 
 Meant only to procure myself more woe.” 
 No longer Alichino then refrain’d, 
 But thus, the rest gainsaying, him bespake: 
 “If thou do cast thee down, I not on foot 
 Will chase thee, but above the pitch will beat 
 My plumes. Quit we the vantage ground, and let 
 The bank be as a shield; that we may see, 
 If singly thou prevail against us all.” 
 - Now, reader, of new sport expect to hear. 
 ‘They each one turn’d his eyes to the other shore, 
 He first, who was the hardest to persuade. 
 The spirit of Navarre chose well his > time, 
 
 ta ges 
 Escaping, disappointed their resolve 
 
 Them quick Feseremrent stung, put him the most 
 Who was the cause Of fatltre: in pursuit 
 
 He therefore sped, exclaiming, “Thou art caught.” 
 But little it avail’d; terror outstripp’d 
 
 His following flight; the other plunged beneath, 
 
 And he with upward pinion raised his breast: 
 
 FE’en thus the water-fowl, when she perceives 
 
 The falcon near, dives instant down, while he 
 
 Enraged and spent retires. That mockery 
 
 In Calcabrina fury stirr’d, who flew 
 
 After him, with desire of strife inflamed; 
 
 And, for the barterer had ’scaped, so turn’d 
 
 His talons on his comrade. O’er the dyke 
 
 In grapple close they join’d; but the other proved 
 
 A goshawk able to rend well his foe; 
 
 And in the boiling lake both fell. The heat 
 
 33 
 
HELL 91 
 
 Was umpire soon between them; but in vain 
 
 To lift themselves they strove, so fast were glued 
 Their pennons. Barbariccia, as the rest, 
 
 That chance lamenting, four in flight despatch’d 
 From the other coast, with all their weapons atm’d. 
 They, to their post on each side speedily 
 Descending, stretch’d their hooks toward the fiends, 
 Who flounder’d, inly burning from their scars: 
 And we departing left them to that broil. 
 
 CANTO XXIII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The enraged Demons pursue Dante, but he is preserved 
 from them by Virgil. On reaching the sixth gulf, he beholds the 
 punishment of the hypocrites; which is, to pace continually round 
 the gulf under the pressure of caps and hoods, that are gilt on the 
 outside, but leaden within. He is addressed by two of these, Cata- 
 lano and Loderingo, Knights of St. Mary, otherwise called Joyous 
 Friars of Bologna. Caiaphas is seen fixed to a cross on the ground, 
 and lies so stretched along the way, that all tread on him in passing. 
 
 N silence and in solitude we went, 
 One first, the other following his steps, 
 As minor friars journeying on their road. 
 The present fray had turn’d my thoughts to muse 
 Upon old Asop’s fable, where he told 
 What fate unto the mouse and frog befell; 
 For language hath not sounds more like in sense, 
 Than are these chances, if the origin 
 And end of each be heedfully compared. 
 And as one thought bursts from another forth, 
 So afterward from that another sprang, 
 Which added doubly to my former fear. 
 For thus I reason’'d: “ These through us have been 
 So foil’d, with loss and mockery so complete, 
 As needs must sting them sore. If anger then 
 Be to their evil will conjoin’d, more fell 
 1“ 7sop’s fable.”” The fable of the off by a kite. It is not among those 
 frog, who offered to carry the mouse Greek fables which go under the name 
 
 across a ditch, with the intention of of AZsop. 
 drowning him, "when both were carried 
 
THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 They shall pursue us, than the savage hound 
 Snatches the leveret panting ’twixt his jaws.” 
 
 Already I perceived my hair stand all 
 On end with terror, and look’d eager back. 
 
 “Teacher,” I thus began, “if speedily 
 Thyself and me thou hide not, much I dread 
 Those evil talons. Even now behind 
 They urge us: quick imagination works 
 So forcibly, that I already feel them.” 
 
 He answer’d: “ Were I form’d of leaded glass, 
 I should not sooner draw unto myself 
 Thy outward image, than I now imprint 
 That from within. This moment came thy thoughts 
 Presented before mine, with similar act 
 And countenance similar, so that from both— 
 
 I one design have framed. If the right coast 
 Incline so much, that we may thence descend 
 Into the other chasm, we shall escape 
 
 Secure from this imagined pursuit.” 
 
 He had not spoke his purpose to the end, 
 When I from far beheld them with spread wings 
 Approach to take us. Suddenly my guide 
 Caught me, even as a mother that from sleep 
 Is by the noise aroused, and near her sees 
 The climbing fires, who snatches up her babe 
 And flies ne’er pausing, careful more of him 
 Than of herself, that but a single vest 
 Clings round her limbs. Down from the jutting beach 
 Supine he cast him to that pendent rock, 
 
 Which closes on one part the other chasm. 
 
 Never ran water with such hurrying pace 
 Adown the tube to turn a land-mill’s wheel, 
 When nearest it approaches to the spokes, 
 
 As then along that edge my master ran, 
 Carrying me in his bosom, as a child, 
 
 Not a companion. Scarcely had his feet 
 Reach’d to the lowest of the bed beneath, 1 
 When over us the steep they reach’d: but fear 
 In him was none; for that high Providence, 
 Which placed them ministers of the fifth foss, 
 
 % 
 
HELL 93 
 
 Power of departing thence took from them all. 
 There in the depth we saw a painted tribe, 
 Who paced with tardy steps around, and wept, 
 Faint in appearance and o’ercome with toil. 
 Caps had they on, with hoods, that fell low down 
 Before their eyes, in fashion like to those 
 Worn by the monks in Cologne. Their outside 
 Was overlaid with gold, dazzling to view, 
 But leaden all within, and of such weight, 
 That Frederick’s* compared to these were straw. 
 Oh, everlasting wearisome attire! 
 We yet once more with them together turn’d 
 To leftward, on their dismal moan intent. 
 But by the weight opprest, so slowly came 
 The fainting people, that our company 
 Was changed, at every movement of the step. 
 Whence I my guide address’d: “ See that thou find 
 Some spirit, whose name may by his deeds be known; 
 And to that end look round thee as thou go’st.” 
 Then one, who understood the Tuscan voice, 
 Cried after us aloud: “Hold in your feet, 
 Ye who so swiftly speed through the dusk air. 
 Perchance from me thou shalt obtain thy wish.” 
 Whereat my leader, turning, me bespake: 
 “Pause, and then onward at their pace proceed.” 
 I staid, and saw two spirits in whose look 
 Impatient eagerness of mind was mark’d 
 To overtake me; but the load they bare 
 And narrow path retarded their approach. 
 - Soon as arrived, they with an eye askance 
 Perused me, but spake not: then turning, each 
 To other thus conferring said: “This one 
 Seems, by the action of his throat, alive; 
 And, be they dead, what privilege allows 
 They walk unmantled by the cumbrous stole?” 
 Then thus to me: “ Tuscan, who visitest 
 The college of the mourning hypocrites, 
 2“ Monks in Cologne.” They wore who were guilty of high treason by 
 their cowls ee Ne TS ap Oey. wrapping them up in lead and casting 
 
 8“ Prederick’s.” them into a furnace 
 erick II is said to have nanisted those 
 
THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Disdain not to instruct us who thou art.” 
 “ By Arno’s pleasant stream,” I thus replied, 
 “In the great city I was bred and grew, 
 And wear the body I have ever worn. 
 But who are ye, from whom such mighty grief, 
 As now I witness, courseth down your cheeks? 
 What torment breaks forth in this bitter woe?” 
 “Our bonnets gleaming bright with orange hue” 
 One of them answer’d, ‘“‘ are so leaden gross, 
 That with their weight they make the balances 
 To crack beneath them. Joyous friars* we were, 
 Bologna’s natives; Catalano I, 
 He Loderingo named; and by thy land 
 Together taken, as men use to take 
 A single and indifferent arbiter, 
 To reconcile their strifes. How there we sped, 
 Gardingo’s vicinage® can best declare.” 
 “© friars!” I began, “ your miseries—” 
 But there brake off, for one had caught mine eye, 
 Fix’d to.a cross with three stakes on the ground: 
 He, when he saw me, writhed himself, throughout 
 
 Distorted, ruffling with deep sighs his beard. 
 And Catalano, who thereof was ’ware, 
 
 Thus spake: “ That pierced -spirit,® whom intent 
 Thou view’st, was he who gave the Pharisees 
 Counsel, that it Were fitting for one man 
 
 4“ Joyous friars.’? ‘‘ Those who ruled 
 the city of Florence on the part of the 
 Ghibelfines perceiving this discontent 
 and murmuring, which they were fearful 
 might produce a rebellion against them- 
 selves, in order to satisfy the people, 
 made choice of two knights, Frati Go- 
 denti (joyous friars) of Bologna, on 
 whom they conferred the chief power in 
 Florence; one named M. Catalano de’ 
 Malavolti, the other M. Loderingo di 
 Liandolo; one an adherent of the Guelf, 
 the other of the Ghibelline party. It 
 is to be remarked, that the eb Friars 
 were called Knights of St. Mary, and be- 
 came knights on taking that habit: their 
 robes were white, the mantle sable, and 
 the arms a white field and red- cross 
 with two stars: their office was to de- 
 fend widows and orphans: they were to 
 act as mediators; they had internal reg- 
 ulations, like other religious bodies, The 
 above-mentioned M.. Loderingo was the 
 founder of that order. But it was not 
 long before they too well deserved the 
 
 appellation given them, and were found 
 to be more bent on enjoying themselves 
 than on any other object. These two 
 friars were called in by the Florentines, 
 and had a residence assigned them in 
 the palace belonging to the people, over 
 against the Abbey. Such was the de- 
 pendence placed on the character of 
 their order, that it was expected they 
 would be impartial, and would save the 
 commonwealth any unnecessary ex- 
 pense; instead of which, though inclined 
 to opposite parties, they secretly and 
 hypocritically concurred in promoting 
 their own advantage rather than the 
 
 ublic good.”—G. Villani, b. vii. c. xiii. 
 
 his happened in 1266. 
 
 5“ Gardingo’s vicinage.” The name 
 of that pay of the city which was in- 
 habited by the powerful Ghibelline fam- 
 ily of the Uberti, and destroyed under 
 the partial and iniquitous administra- 
 tion of Catalano and Loderingo. 
 
 ¢** That pierced spirit.” Caiaphas, 
 
HELL 95 
 
 To suffer for the people. He doth lie 
 Transverse; nor any passes, but him first 
 Behoves make feeling trial how each weighs, 
 In straits like this along the foss are placed 
 The father of his consort,’ and the rest 
 Partakers in that council, seed of ill 
 And sorrow to the Jews.”’ I noted then, 
 How Virgil gazed with wonder upon him, 
 Thus abjectly extended on the cross 
 In banishment eternal. To the friar 
 He next his words address’d: ‘“ We pray ye tell, 
 If so be lawful, whether on our right 
 Lies any opening in the rock, whereby 
 We both may issue hence, without constraint 
 On the dark angels, that compell’d they come 
 To lead us from this depth.” He thus replied: 
 “Nearer than thou dost hope, there is a rock 
 From the great circle moving, which o’ersteps 
 Fach vale of horror, save that here his cope 
 Is shatter’d. By the ruin ye may mount: 
 For on the side it slants, and most the height 
 Rises below.” With head bent down awhile 
 My leader stood; then spake: “ He warn’d us ill, 
 Who yonder hangs the sinners on his hook.” 
 To whom the friar: _“ At Bologna erst 
 I many voices of the devil heard; 
 Among the rest was said, ‘ He is a liar, 
 ‘And the father of lies!’” When he had spoke, 
 My leader with large strides proceeded on, 
 Somewhat disturb’d with anger in his look. 
 I therefore left the spirits heavy laden, 
 And, following, his beloved footsteps mark’d. 
 
 7“ The father of his consort.’? Annas, father-in-law to Caiaphas. 
 
96 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 CANTO XXIV 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Under the escort of his faithful master, Dante not with- 
 out difficulty makes his way out of the sixth gulf; and in the 
 seventh, sees the robbers tormented by venomous and pestilent 
 serpents. The soul of Vanni Fucci, who had pillaged the sacristy 
 of St. James in Pistoia, predicts some calamities that impended 
 over that city, and over the Florentines. 
 
 N the year’s early nonage,’ when the sun 
 
 ] Tempers his tresses in Aquarius’ urn, 
 And now toward equal day the nights recede; 
 When as the rime upon the earth puts on 
 Her dazzling sister’s image, but not long 
 Her milder sway endures; then riseth up 
 The village hind, whom fails his wintry store, 
 And looking out beholds the plain around 
 All whiten’d; whence impatiently he smites 
 His thighs, and to his hut returning in, 
 There paces to and fro, wailing his lot, 
 As a discomfited and helpless man; 
 Then comes he forth again, and feels new hope 
 Spring in his bosom, finding e’en thus soon 
 The world hath changed its countenance, grasps his crook, 
 And forth to pasture drives his little flock: 
 So me my guide dishearten’d, when I saw 
 His troubled forehead; and so speedily 
 That ill was cured; for at the fallen bridge 
 Arriving, toward me with a look as sweet, 
 He turn’d him back, as that I first beheld 
 At the steep mountain’s foot. Regarding well 
 The ruin, and some counsel first maintain’d 
 With his own thought, he open’d wide his arm 
 And took me up. As one, who, while he works, 
 Computes his labor’s issue, that he seems 
 Still to foresee the effect; so lifting me 
 Up to the summit of one peak, he fix’d 
 His eye upon another. “Grapple that,” 
 tie latte Gata antares orhee the aun | oO enoue, bitters Eislted toy aie rising 
 
 enters into Aquarius, and the equinox ~ sun. 
 is drawing near, when the hoar-frosts in 
 
' HELL 
 
 Said he, “ but first make proof, if it be such 
 As will sustain thee.” For one capt with lead 
 This were no journey. Scarcely he, though light, 
 And I, though onward push’d from crag to crag, 
 Could mount. And if the precinct of this coast 
 Were not less ample than the last, for him 
 
 I know not, but my strength had surely fail’d. 
 But Malebolge all toward the mouth 
 
 Inclining of the nethermost abyss, 
 
 The site of every valley hence requires, 
 
 That one side upward slope, the other fall. 
 
 At length the point from whence the utmost stone 
 Juts down, we reach’d; soon as to that arrived, 
 
 So was the breath exhausted from my lungs 
 I could no further, but did seat me there. 
 
 “Now needs thy best of man;” so spake my guide: 
 “For not on downy plumes, nor under shade 
 Of canopy reposing, fame is won; 
 
 Without which whosoe’er consumes his days, 
 Leaveth such vestige of himself on earth, 
 As smoke in air or foam upon the wave. 
 Thou therefore rise: vanquish thy weariness 
 By the mind’s effort, in each struggle form’d 
 To vanquish, if she suffer not the weight 
 Of her corporeal frame to crush her down. | 
 A longer ladder yet remains to scale. | 
 From these to have escaped sufficeth not, 
 
 If well thou note me, profit by my words,” 
 
 I straightway rose, and show’d myself less spent 
 Than I in truth did feel me. “On,” I cried, 
 “For I am stout and fearless.” Up the rock 
 Our way we held, more rugged than before, 
 Narrower, and steeper far to climb. From talk 
 I ceased not, as we journey’d, so to seem | 
 Least faint; whereat a voice from the other foss 
 Did issue forth, for utterance suited ill. 
 
 Though on the arch that crosses there I stood, 
 
 What were the words I knew not, but who spake 
 
 Seem’d moved in anger. Down I stoop’d to look; 
 | But my quick eye might reach not to the depth 
 
THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 For shrouding darkness; wherefore thus I spake: 
 “To the next circle, teacher, bend thy steps, 
 
 And from the wall dismount we; for as hence 
 
 I hear and understand not, so I see 
 
 Beneath, and naught discern.” “I answer not,” 
 Said he, “ but by the deed. To fair request 
 Silent performance maketh best return.” 
 
 We from the bridge’s head descended, where 
 To the eighth mound it joins; and then, the chasm 
 Opening to view, I saw a crowd within 
 Of serpents terrible, so strange of shape 
 And hideous, that remembrance in my veins 
 Yet shrinks the vital current. Of her sands 
 Let Libya vaunt no more: if Jaculus, 
 
 Pareas and Chelyder be her brood, 
 
 Cenchris and Amphisbzena, plagues so dire 
 
 Or in such numbers swarming ne’er she show’d, 
 Not with all Ethiopia, and whate’er 
 
 Above the Erythrzan sea is spawn’d. 
 
 Amid this dread exuberance of woe 
 
 Ran naked spirits wing’d with horrid fear, 
 
 Nor hope had they of crevice where to hide, 
 
 Or heliotrope to charm them out of view. 
 
 With serpents were their hands behind them bound, 
 Which through their reins infix’d the tail and head, 
 Twisted in folds before. And lo! on one 
 
 Near to our side, darted an adder up, 
 
 And, where the neck is on the shoulders tied, 
 Transpierced him. Far more quickly than e’er pen 
 Wrote O or I, he kindled, burn’d, and changed 
 
 To ashes all, pour’d out upon the earth. 
 
 When there dissolved he lay, the dust again 
 Uproll’d spontaneous, and the self-same form 
 Instant resumed. So mighty sages tell, 
 
 The Arabian Phoenix, when five hundred years 
 Have well-nigh circled, dies, and springs forthwith 
 Renascent: blade nor herb throughout his life 
 
 He tastes, but tears of frankincense alone 
 
 And odorous amomum: swaths of. nard 
 
 ‘And myrrh his funeral shroud. As one that falls, 
 
HELL 99 
 
 He knows not how, by force demoniac dragg’d 
 To earth, or through obstruction fettering up 
 In chains invisible the powers of man, 
 
 Who, risen from his trance, gazeth around, 
 Bewilder’d with the monstrous agony 
 
 He hath endured, and wildly staring sighs; 
 So stood aghast the sinner when he rose. 
 
 Oh! how severe God’s judgment, that deals out 
 Such blows in stormy vengeance. Who he was, 
 My teacher next inquired; and thus in few 
 He answer’d: ‘ Vanni Fucci? am I call’d, 
 
 Not long since rained down from Tuscany 
 To this dire gullet. Me the bestial life 
 
 And not the human pleased, mule that I was, 
 Who in Pistoia found my worthy den.” 
 
 I then to Virgil: “ Bid him stir not hence; 
 And ask what crime did thrust him thither: once 
 A man I knew him, choleric and bloody.” 
 
 The sinner heard and feign’d not, but toward me 
 His mind directing and his face, wherein 
 Was dismal shame depictured, thus he spake: 
 
 “It grieves me more to have been caught by. thee 
 In this sad plight, which thou beholdest, than 
 When I was taken from the other life. 
 
 I have no power permitted to deny 
 
 What thou inquirest. I am doom’d thus low 
 To dwell, for that the sacristy by me 
 
 Was rifled of its goodly ornaments, 
 
 And with the guilt another falsely charged. 
 But that thou mayst not joy to see me thus, 
 
 So as thou e’er shalt ’scape this darksome realm, 
 Open thine ears and hear what I forebode. 
 ‘Reft of the Neri first Pistoia*® pines; 
 
 Then Florence* changeth citizens and laws; 
 
 2 Vanni Fucci.’”’ He is said to have chi party of Pistoia, with the assistance 
 been an illegitimate offspring of the and favor of the Bianchi, who ruled 
 family of Lazari in Pistoia, and, having Florence, drove out the party of the 
 robbed the sacristy of the church of St. Neri from the former place, destroying 
 ames in that city, and to have charged their houses, palaces, and farms. 
 
 anni della Nona with the sacrilege; in 4“ Then Florence.”’ “Soon after the 
 consequence of which accusation the lat- Bianchi will be expelled from Florence 
 ter suffered death. the Neri will prevail, and the laws an 
 
 “ Pistoia.” In May, 1301, the Bian- people will be changed.’ 
 
100 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 From Valdimagra,®> drawn by wrathful Mars, 
 A vapor rises, wrapt in turbid mists, 
 
 And sharp and eager driveth on the storm 
 
 With arrowy hurtling o’er Piceno’s field, 
 Whence suddenly the cloud shall burst, and strike 
 Each helpless Bianco prostrate to the ground. 
 This have I told, that grief may rend thy heart.” 
 
 CANTO XXV 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The sacrilegious Fucci vents his fury in blasphemy, is 
 seized by serpents, and flying is pursued by Cacus in the form of a 
 Centaur, who is described with a swarm of serpents on his haunch, 
 and a dragon on his shoulders breathing forth fire. Our Poet then 
 meets with the spirits of three of his countrymen, two of whom 
 
 undergo a marvellous transformation in his presence. 
 
 HEN he had spoke, the sinner raised his hands 4 
 Pointed in mockery and cried: “ Take them, God! 
 
 I level them at thee.” 
 
 From that day forth 
 
 The serpents were my friends; for round his neck 
 One of them rolling twisted, as it said, 
 
 “Be silent, tongue!” 
 
 Another, to his arms 
 
 Upgliding, tied them, riveting itself 
 
 So close, it took from them the power to move. 
 Pistoia! ah, Pistoia! why dost doubt 
 
 To turn thee into ashes, cumbering earth 
 
 No longer, since in evil act so far 
 
 Thou hast outdone thy seed? I did not mark, 
 
 Through all the gloomy circles of the abyss, 
 
 Spirit, that swell’d so proudly ’gainst his God; 
 
 8“* From Valdimagra.”” The commen- 
 tators explain this prophetical threat to 
 allude to the ae obtained by the 
 Marquis Morello Malaspina of Valdi- 
 magra (a tract of country now called the 
 Lunigiana), who put himself at the head 
 of the Neri, and defeated their op- 
 ponents, the Bianchi, in the Campo Pi- 
 
 ceno near Pistoia, soon after the occure ‘ 
 
 rence related in the preceding note on 
 Vv. 142. f this engagement I find no 
 mention in Villani. Balbo (“ Vita di 
 Dante,” v. ii. p. 143) refers to Gerini, 
 ‘“Memorie Storiche di Lunigiana,” tom. 
 ii. p. 123, for the whole history of this 
 Morello or Morollo. Currado Malaspina 
 is introduced in the eighth Canto of the 
 
 Purgatory; where it appears, that al- 
 though on the present occasion they 
 espoused contrary sides, most impor- 
 tant favors were nevertheless conferred 
 by that family on our Poet, at a subse 
 quent period of his exile, in 1307. 
 
 1“ His hands.” The practice of 
 thrusting out the thumb between the 
 first and second fingers, to express the 
 feelings of insult and contempt, has 
 prevailed very generally among the na- 
 tions of Europe, and for many ages had 
 been denominated ‘ making the fig,’ or 
 described at least by some equivalent 
 expression.’’—Douce’s “ Illustrations of 
 Shakespeare,” vol. i. p. 492, ed. 1807. 
 
HELE. " 10% 
 
 Not him,? who headlong fell from Thebes. He fled, 
 Nor utter’d more; and after him there came 
 A centaur full of fury, shouting, “ Where, 
 Where is the caitiff?” On Maremma’s marsh? 
 Swarm not the serpent tribe, as on his haunch 
 They swarm’d, to where the human face begins, 
 Behind his head, upon the shoulders, lay 
 With open wings a dragon, breathing fire 
 On whomsoe’er he met. To me my guide: 
 *Cacus is this, who underneath the rock 
 Of Aventine spread oft a lake of blood. 
 He, from his brethren parted, here must tread 
 A different journey, for his fraudful theft 
 Of the great herd that near him stall’d; whence found 
 His felon deeds their end, beneath the mace 
 Of stout Alcides, that perchance laid on 
 A hundred blows, and not the tenth was felt.” 
 
 While yet he spake, the centaur sped away: 
 And under us three spirits came, of whom 
 Nor I nor he was ware, till they exclaim’d, 
 “Say who are ye!” We then brake off discourse, 
 Intent on these alone. I knew them not: 
 But, as it chanceth oft, befell, that one 
 Had need to name another. ‘“ Where,” said he, 
 “Doth Cianfa* lurk?” I, for a sign my guide 
 Should stand attentive, placed against my lips 
 The finger lifted. If, O reader! now 
 Thou be not apt to credit what I tell, 
 No marvel; for myself do scarce allow 
 The witness of mine eyes. But as I look’d 
 Toward them, lo! a serpent with six feet 
 Springs forth on one, and fastens full upon him: 
 His midmost grasp’d the belly, a forefoot 
 Seized on each arm (while deep in either cheek 
 He flesh’d his fangs); the hinder on the thighs 
 Were spread, *twixt which the tail inserted curl’d 
 Upon the reins behind. Ivy ne’er clasp’d 
 A dodder’d oak, as round the other’s limbs 
 ®** Not him.’”? Capaneus. Canto xiv. 4‘ Cianfa.”” He is said to have been 
 
 .2“ On Maremma’s marsh.” Anexten- of the family of Donati at Florence. 
 Sive tract near the seashore of Tuscany. 
 
102 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 The hideous monster intertwined his own. 
 Then, as they both had been of burning wax, 
 Each melted into other, mingling hues, 
 That which was either now was seen no more. 
 Thus up the shrinking paper, ere it burns, 
 A brown tint glides, not turning yet to black, 
 And the clean white expires. The other two 
 Look’d on exclaiming, “ Ah! how dost thou change, 
 Agnello!® See! Thou art nor double now, 
 Nor only one.” The two heads now became 
 One, and two figures blended in one form 
 Appear’d, where both were lost. Of the four lengths 
 Two arms were made: the belly and the chest, 
 The thighs and legs, into such members changed 
 As never eye hath seen. Of former shape 
 All trace was vanish’d. Two, yet neither, seem’d 
 That image miscreate, and so pass’d on 
 With tardy steps. As underneath the scourge 
 Of the fierce dog-star that.lays bare the fields, 
 Shifting from brake to brake the lizard seems 
 A flash of lightning, if he thwart the road; 
 So toward the entrails of the other two 
 Approaching seem’d an adder all on fire, 
 As the dark pepper-grain livid and swart. 
 In that part, whence our life is nourish’d first, 
 Once he transpierced; then down before him fell 
 Stretch’d out. The pierced spirit look’d on him, 
 But spake not; yea, stood motionless and yawn’d, 
 As if by sleep or feverous fit assail’d. 
 He eyed the serpent, and the serpent him. 
 One from the wound, the other from the mouth 
 Breathed a thick smoke, whose vapory columns join’d, 
 Lucan in mute attention now may hear, 
 
 Nor thy disastrous fate, Sabellus, tell, 
 Nor thine, Nasidius. Ovid now be mute. 
 What if in warbling fiction he record 
 Cadmus and Arethusa, to a snake 
 Him changed, and her into a fountain clear, 
 = envy not; for never face to face 
 
 5“ Apnello.”” Agnello Brunelleschi. 
 
= 
 L/ pe 3 
 Nats 
 
 ee 
 ouch 
 Two natures thus transmuted did he sing, 14% 
 Wherein both shapes were ready to assume a 
 The other’s substance. They in mutual guise BP 
 So answer’d that the serpent split his train 
 Divided to a fork, and the pierced spirit 
 Drew close his steps together, legs and thighs 
 Compacted, that no sign of juncture soon. 
 Was visible: the tail, disparted, took | 
 The figure which the spirit lost; its skin | 
 
 Softening, his indurated to a rind. 
 
 The shoulders next I mark’d, that entering join’d 
 
 The monster’s arm-pits, whose two shorter feet 
 
 So lengthen’d, as the others dwindling shrunk. 
 
 The feet behind then twisting up became 
 
 That part that man conceals, which in the wretch 
 
 Was cleft in twain. While both the shadowy smoke 
 With a new color veils, and generates 
 
 The excrescent pile on one, peeling it off 
 
 From the other body, lo! upon his feet 
 
 One upright rose, and prone the other fell. 
 
 Nor yet their glaring and malignant lamps 
 
 Were shifted, though each feature changed beneath. 
 
 Of him who stood erect, the mounting face 
 
 Retreated toward the temples, and what there 
 Superfluous matter came, shot out in ears 
 
 From the smooth cheeks; the rest, not backward drage’d, 
 Of its excess did shape the nose; and swell’d 
 
 Into due \size protuberant the lips. 
 
 He, on the earth who lay, meanwhile extends 
 
 His sharpen’d visage, and draws down the ears 
 
 Into the head, as doth the slug his horns. 
 
 His tongue, continuous before and apt 
 
 For utterance, severs; and the other’s fork 
 
 Closing unites. That done, the smoke was laid. 
 
 The soul, transform’d into the brute, glides off, 
 Hissing along the vale, and after him 
 
 The other talking sputters; but soon turn’d 
 
 His new-grown shoulders on him, and in few 
 
 Thus to another spake: “ Along this path 
 Crawling, as 1 have done, speed Buoso now 
 
 HELL 103 
 
 ras 
 
 { 7? 
 
104 ‘THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 So saw I fluctuate in successive change 
 The unsteady ballast of the seventh hold: 
 And here if aught my pen have swerved, events 
 So strange may be its warrant. O’er mine eyes 
 Confusion hung, and on my thoughts amaze. 
 Yet ’scaped they not so covertly, but well 
 I mark’d Sciancato: he alone it was 
 Of the three first that came, who changed not: tho’ 
 The other’s fate, Gaville! still dost rue. 
 
 CANTO XXVI 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Remounting by the steps, down which they have descended 
 to the seventh gulf, they go forward to the arch that stretches over 
 the eighth, and from thence behold numberless flames wherein are 
 punished the evil counsellors, each flame containing a sinner, save 
 one, in which were Diomede and Ulysses, the latter of whom relates 
 the manner of his death. 
 
 LORENCE, exult! for thou so mightily 
 Hast thriven, that o’er land and sea thy wings 
 Thou beatest, and thy name spreads over Hell. 
 Among the plunderers, such the three I found 
 Thy citizens; whence shame to me thy son, 
 And no proud honor to thyself redounds. 
 But if our minds, when dreaming near the dawn, 
 Are of the truth presageful, thou ere long 
 Shalt feel what Prato? (not to say the rest) 
 Would fain might come upon thee; and that chance 
 Were in good time, if it befell thee now. 
 Would so it were, since it must needs befall ! 
 For as time wears me, I shall grieve the more. 
 We from the depth departed; and my guide 
 Remounting scaled the flinty steps, which late 
 We downward traced, and drew me up the steep. 
 
 1“ Shalt feel what Prato.”” The Poet 
 
 I utc 4 resentation of hell and the infernal tor- 
 prognosticates the calamities which were i 
 
 ments, in consequence of which accident 
 
 soon to befall his native city, and which, 
 he says, even her nearest neighbor, Pra- 
 to, would wish her. The _ calamities 
 more particularly pointed at are said to 
 be the fall of a wooden bridge over the 
 Arno, in May, 1304, where a large multi- 
 tude were assembled to witness a rep- 
 
 many lives were lost; and a conflagra- 
 tion, that in the following month de. 
 stroyed more than 1,700 houses, many 
 of them sumptuous buildings. See G, 
 Nana, ** Hist.” lib. viii. ¢. Ixx. and 
 Xxi. 
 
HELL ; 105. 
 
 Pursuing thus our solitary way 
 Among the crags and splinters of the rock, 
 Sped not our feet without the help of hands. 
 
 Then sorrow seized me, which e’en now revives, 
 As my thought turns again to what I saw, 
 And, more than I am wont, I rein and curb 
 The powers of nature in me, lest they run 
 Where Virtue guides not; that, if aught of good 
 My gentle star or something better gave me, 
 I envy not myself the precious boon. 
 
 As in that season, when the sun least veils 
 His face that lightens all, what time the fly 
 Gives way to the shrill gnat, the peasant then, 
 Upon some cliff reclined, beneath him sees 
 Fire-flies innumerous spangling o’er the vale, 
 Vineyard or tilth, where his day-labor lies; 
 With flames so numberless throughout its space 
 Shone the eighth chasm, apparent, when the depth 
 Was to my view exposed. As he, whose wrongs 
 The bears avenged, as its departure saw 
 Elijah’s chariot, when the steeds erect 
 Raised their steep flight for heaven; his eyes meanwhile, 
 Straining pursued them, till the flame alone, 
 Upsoaring like a misty speck, he kenn’d: 
 E’en thus along the gulf moves every flame, 
 A sinner so enfolded close in each, 
 That none exhibits token of the theft. 
 
 Upon the bridge I forward bent to look, 
 And grasp’d a flinty mass, or else had fallen, 
 Though push’d not from the height. The guide, who mark’d 
 How I did gaze attentive, thus began: 
 “Within these ardors are the spirits, each 
 Swathed in confining fire.” “ Master! thy word,” 
 I answer’d, “hath assured me; yet I deem’d 
 Already of the truth, already wish’d 
 To ask thee who is in yon fire, that comes 
 So parted at the summit, as it seem’d 
 Ascending from that funeral pile? where lay 
 2“ Ascending from that funeral pile.” of Eteocles and Polynices, as if cone 
 
 The flame is said to have divided on the _ scious of the enmity that actuated them 
 funeral p#le which consumed the bodies while living. , 
 
106 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 The Theban brothers.” He replied: “ Within, 
 Ulysses there and Diomede endure 
 Their penal tortures, thus to vengeance now 
 Together hasting, as erewhile to wrath 
 These in the flame with ceaseless groans deplore 
 The ambush of the horse,’ that open’d wide 
 A portal for the goodly seed to pass, 
 Which sow’d imperial Rome; nor less the guile 
 Lament they, whence, of her Achilles ’reft, 
 Deidamia yet in death complains. 
 And there is rued the stratagem that Troy 
 Of her Palladium spoil’d.”—‘ If they have power 
 Of utterance from within these sparks,” said I, 
 “O master! think my prayer a thousand-fold 
 In repetition urged, that thou vouchsafe 
 To pause till here the horned flame arrive. 
 See, how toward it with desires I bend.” 
 He thus: “ Thy prayer is worthy of much praise, 
 And I accept it therefore; but do thou 
 Thy tongue refrain: to question them be mine; 
 For I divine thy wish; and they perchance, 
 For they were Greeks,* might shun discourse with thee.” 
 When there the flame had come, where time and place 
 Seem’d fitting to my guide, he thus began: 
 “O ye, who dwell two spirits in one fire! 
 If, living, I of you did merit aught, 
 Whate’er the measure were of that desert, 
 When in the world my lofty strain I pour’d, 
 Move ye not on, till one of you unfold 
 In what clime death o’ertook him self-destroy’d.” 
 Of the old flame forthwith the greater horn 
 Began to roll, murmuring, as a fire 
 That labors with the wind, then to and fro 
 Wagging the top, as a tongue uttering sounds, 
 Threw out its voice, and spake: “ When I escaped 
 From Circe, who beyond a circling year’ 
 Had held me near Caieta by her charms, 
 
 at 
 
 8“* The ambush of the horse.”’ ‘‘ The descendants founded the Roman Em- 
 
 ambush of the wooden horse that pire.” . 
 
 caused Aineas to quit the city of Troy 4“ For they were Greeks.’”? By this it 
 
 and seek his fortune in Italy, where his is perhaps implied that they were haughe 
 ty and arrogant. 
 
HELL 107 
 
 Ere thus A®neas yet had named the shore; 
 
 Nor fondness for my son, nor reverence 
 
 Of my old father, nor return of love, 
 
 That should have crown’d Penelope with joy, 
 
 Could overcome in me the zeal I had 
 
 To explore the world, and search the ways of life, 
 
 Man’s evil and his virtue. Forth I sail’d 
 
 Into the deep illimitable main, 
 
 With but one bark, and the small faithful band 
 
 That yet cleaved to me. As Iberia far, 
 
 Far as Marocco, either shore I saw, 
 
 And the Sardinian and each isle beside 
 
 Which round that ocean bathes. Tardy with age 
 
 Were I and my companions, when we came 
 
 To the strait pass,> where Hercules ordain’d . 
 
 The boundaries not to be o’erstepp’d by man. 
 
 The walls of Seville to my right I left, 
 
 On the other hand already Ceuta past. 
 
 ‘O brothers!’ I began, ‘ who to the west 
 
 Through perils without number now have reach’d; 
 
 To this the short remaining watch, that yet 
 
 Our senses have to wake, refuse not proof 
 
 Of the unpeopled world, following the track 
 
 Of Pheebus. Call to mind from whence ye sprang: 
 
 Ye were not form’d to live the life of brutes, 
 
 But virtue to pursue and knowledge high.’ 
 
 With these few words I sharpen’d for the voyage 
 
 The mind of my associates, that I then 
 
 Could scarcely have withheld them. To the dawn 
 
 Our poop we turn’d, and for the witless flight 
 
 Made our oars wings, still gaining on the left. 
 
 Each star of the other pole night now beheld, 
 
 And ours so low, that from the ocean floor 
 
 It rose not. Five times reillumed, as oft 
 
 Vanish’d the light from underneath the moon, 
 
 Since the deep way we enter’d, when from far 
 
 Appear’d a mountain dim,® loftiest methought 
 ro ee ion tee ceecerrial porate; eiene 
 
 6“ A mountain dim.” The mountain Lombardo relates that “‘ it was separated 
 of Purgatory.—Among the various opin- by a long space, either of sea or land, 
 
108 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Of all I e’er beheld. Joy seized us straight; 
 But soon to mourning changed. From the new land 
 A whirlwind sprung, and at her foremost side 
 
 Did strike the vessel. 
 
 Thrice it whirl’d her round 
 
 With all the waves; the fourth time lifted up 
 The poop, and sank the prow:so fate decreed: 
 And over us the booming billow closed.” * 
 
 CANTO XXVII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The Poet, treating of the same punishment as in the last 
 Canto, relates that he turned toward a flame in which was the 
 fount Guido da Montefeltro, whose inquiries respecting the state 
 
 of Romagna he answers; an 
 
 uido is thereby induced to declare 
 
 who he is, and why condemned to that torment. 
 
 OW upward rose the flame, and still’d its light 
 N To speak no more, and now pass’d on with leave 
 From the mild poet gain’d; when following came 
 
 Another, from whose top a sound confused, 
 Forth issuing, drew our eyes that way to look. 
 
 As the Sicilian bull,* that rightfully 
 His cries first echoed who had shaped its mould, 
 Did so rebellow, with the voice of him 
 Torment’d, that the brazen monster seem’d 
 Pierced through with pain; thus, while no way they found, 
 Nor avenue immediate through the flame, 
 Into its language turn’d the dismal words: 
 But soon as they had won their passage forth, 
 Up from the point, which vibrating obey’d 
 Their motion at the tongue, these sounds were heard: 
 “© thou! to whom I now direct my voice, 
 That lately didst exclaim in Lombard phrasep 
 
 from the regions inhabited by men, and 
 placed in the ocean, reaching as far as 
 to the lunar circle, so that the waters of 
 the deluge did not reach it.’’—‘ Sent.” 
 lib. ii. dist. 17. Thus Lombardi. 
 
 7“ Closed.”’ Venturi refers to Pliny 
 and Solinus for the opinion that Ulysses 
 was the founder of Lisbon, from whence 
 he thinks it was easy for the fancy of a 
 poet to send him on yet further enter- 
 prises. Perhaps the story (which it is 
 not unlikely that our author will be 
 
 found to have borrowed from some lfe- 
 gend of the Middle Ages) may have 
 taken its rise partly from the obscure 
 oracle returned by the ghost of Tiresias 
 to Ulysses (see the eleventh book of 
 the ‘‘ Odyssey ”), and partly from the 
 fate which there was reason to suppose 
 had befallen some adventurous explor- 
 ers of the Atlantic Ocean. 
 
 1“ The Sicilian bull.”” The engine 
 of torture invented by Perillus, for the 
 tyrant Phalaris. 
 
HELL 
 
 109 
 
 ‘Depart thou; I solicit thee no more;’ 
 Though somewhat tardy I perchance arrive, 
 Let it not irk thee here to pause awhile, 
 
 And with me parley: lo! it irks not me, 
 
 And yet I burn. 
 
 lf but e’en now thou fall 
 
 Into this blind world, from that pleasant land ° 
 Of Latium, whence I draw my sum of guilt, 
 Tell me if those who in Romagna dwell 
 
 Have peace or war. 
 
 For of the mountains there? | 
 
 Was I, betwixt Urbino and the height 
 
 Whence Tiber first unlocks his mighty flood.” 
 Leaning I listen’d yet with heedful ear, 
 
 When, as he touch’d my side, the leader thus: 
 
 “ Speak thou: he is a Latian.” 
 
 My reply 
 
 Was ready, and I spake without delay: 
 “© spirit! who art hidden here below, 
 Never was thy Romagna without war 
 
 In her proud tyrants’ bosoms, nor is now: 
 
 But open war there left I none. 
 
 The state, 
 
 Ravenna hath maintain’d this many a year, 
 
 Is steadfast. 
 
 There Polenta’s eagle ® broods; 
 
 And in his broad circumference of plume 
 
 O’ershadows Cervia. 
 
 The green talons grasp 
 
 The land,* that stood erewhile the proof so long 
 And piled in bloody heap the host of France. 
 “The old mastiff of Verruchio and the young,® 
 That tore Montagna ® in their wrath, still make, 
 Where they are wont, an auger of their fangs. 
 
 %‘* Of the mountains there.” Monte- 
 feltro. 
 
 8 ** Polenta’s eagle.”? Guido Novello da 
 Polenta, who bore an eagle for his coat- 
 of-arms. The name of Polenta was de- 
 rived from a castle so called in the 
 neighborhood of Brittonoro. Cervia is 
 a small maritime city, about fifteen miles 
 tu the south of Ravenna. Guido was the 
 son of Ostasio da Polenta, and made 
 himself master of Ravenna in 1265. In 
 1322 he was deprived of his sovereignty, 
 and died at Bologna in the year follow- 
 ing. This last and most munificent pa- 
 tron of Dante is himself enumerated, by 
 the historian of Italian literature, among 
 the poets of his time. 
 
 «The land.” The territory of Forli, 
 the inhabitants of which, in 1282, were 
 enabled, by the stratagem of Guido da 
 Montefeltro, who then governed it, to 
 
 Classics. Vol. 34—F 
 
 defeat with great slaughter the French 
 army by which it had been besieged. 
 See G. Villani, lib. vii. c. Ixxxi. he 
 Poet informs Guido, its former ruler, 
 that it is now in the possession of Sini- 
 baldo Ordolaffi, or Ardelaffi, whom he 
 designates by his coat-of-arms, a lion 
 
 vert. 
 
 5“ The old mastiff of Verruchio and 
 the young.” Malatesta and Malatestino 
 his son, lords of Rimini, called, from 
 their ferocity, the mastiffs of Verruchio, 
 which was the name of their castle. 
 Malatestino was, perhaps, the husband 
 of Francesca, daughter of Guido da Po- 
 lenta. See notes to Canto v. 113. , 
 
 6 ‘* Montagna.’”’ Montagna de’ Parct- 
 tati, a noble knight and leader of the 
 Ghibelline party at Rimini, murdered by 
 Malatestino. 
 
1106 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Lamone’s city, and Santerno’s,’ range 
 Under the lion of the snowy lair,® 
 Inconstant partisan, that changeth sides, 
 Or ever summer yields to winter’s frost. 
 And she, whose flank is wash’d of Savio’s wave,® 
 
 As ’twixt the level and the steep she lies, 
 Lives so ’twixt tyrant power and liberty. 
 
 “ Now tell us, I entreat thee, who art thou: 
 
 Be not more hard than others. 
 
 In the world, 
 
 So may thy name still rear its forehead high.” 
 Then roar’d awhile the fire, its sharpen’d point 
 
 On either side waved, and thus breathed at last: 
 
 “Tf I did think my answer were to one 
 
 Who ever could return unto the world, 
 
 This flame should rest unshaken. 
 
 But since ne’er, 
 
 If true be told me, any from this depth 
 Has found his upward way, I answer thee, 
 Nor fear lest infamy record the words. 
 
 “ A man of arms ’*® at first, I clothed me, then 
 In good Saint Francis’ girdle, hoping so 
 
 To have made amends. 
 
 And certainly my hope 
 
 Had fail’d not, but that he, whom curses light on, 
 The high priest, again seduced me into sin. 
 And how, and wherefore, listen while I tell. 
 Long as this spirit moved the bones and pulp 
 
 My mother gave me, less my deeds bespake 
 The nature of the lion than the fox. 
 
 All ways of winding subtlety I knew, 
 
 And with such art conducted, that the sound 
 
 Reach’d the world’s limit. 
 
 Soon as to that part 
 
 Of life I found me come, and when each behoves 
 To lower sails and gather in the lines; 
 
 That, which before had pleased me, then I rued, 
 And to repentance and confession turn’d, 
 Wretch that I was; and well it had bested me. 
 
 7“ QLamone’s city and Santerno’s.” 
 Lamone is the river at Faenza, and San- 
 terno at Imola. 
 
 8“ The lion of the snowy lair.”” Ma- 
 chinardo Pagano, whose arms were a 
 lion azure on a field argent; mentioned 
 again in the ‘‘ Purgatory,” Canto xiv. 
 122. See G. Villani passim, where he is 
 called Machinardo da Susinanae _ 
 
 ® “Whose flank is wash’d of Savio’s 
 wave.”’ Cesena, situated at the foot of a 
 mountain, and washed by tke river Sa- 
 vio, that often descends with a swollen 
 and rapid stream from the Apennines. 
 
 10 “ A man of arms.” Guido da Mon- 
 tefeltro. i. ; 
 
 11“ The high-priest.”” Boniface VIII. 
 
HELL ce 
 
 The chief of the new Pharisees ?? meantime, 
 Waging his warfare near the Lateran, 
 Not with the Saracens or Jews (his foes 
 All Christians were, nor against Acre one 
 Had fought,’ nor traffick’d in the Soldan’s land), 
 He, his great charge nor sacred ministry, 
 In himself reverenced, nor in me that cord 
 Which used to mark with leanness whom it girded. 
 As in Soracte, Constantine besought, 
 To cure his leprosy, Sylvester’s aid; 
 So me, to cure the fever of his pride, 
 This man besought: my counsel to that end 
 He ask’d; and I was silent; for his words 
 Seem’d drunken: but forthwith he thus resumed: 
 “From thy heart banish fear: of all offence 
 I hitherto absolve thee. In return, 
 Teach me my purpose so to execute, 
 That Penestrino cumber earth no more. 
 Heaven, as thou knowest, I have power to shut 
 And open: and the keys are therefore twain, 
 The which my predecessor ** meanly prized.’ 
 
 “Then, yielding to the forceful arguments, 
 Of silence as more perilous I deem’d, 
 And answer’d: ‘Father! since thou washest me 
 Clear of that guilt wherein I now must fall, 
 Large promise with performance scant, be sure, 
 Shall make thee triumph in thy lofty seat.’ 
 
 “ When I was number’d with the dead, then came 
 Saint Francis for me; but a cherub dark 
 He met, who cried, ‘ Wrong me not; he is mine, 
 And must below to join the wretched crew, 
 For the deceitful counsel which he gave. 
 E’er since I watch’d him, hovering at his hair. 
 
 12“ The chief of the new Pharisees.” 
 Boniface VIII, whose enmity to the 
 family of Colonna prompted him to de- 
 Stroy their houses near the Lateran. 
 Wishing to obtain possession of their 
 other seat, Penestrino, he consulted with 
 Guido da Montefeltro how he might ac- 
 complish his purpose, offering Bae at 
 the same time absolution for his past 
 sins, as well as for that whieh he was 
 then tempting him to commit. Guido’s 
 advice was that kind words and fair 
 promises would put his enemies into his 
 
 power; and they accordingly soon after- 
 ward fell into the snare laid for them, 
 A.D. 1298. 
 
 66 
 
 Nor against Acre one 
 Had fought.”’ cen 
 
 He alludes to the renegade Christians, 
 by whom the Saracens, in April, aie 
 were assisted to recover St. John 
 d’Acre, the last possession of the Chris- 
 tians in the Holy Land. : 
 
 14 My predecessor.” Celestine V. 
 See notes to Canto iii. 
 
Ii2 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 No power can the impenitent absolve; 
 
 Nor to repent, and will, at once consist, 
 
 By contradiction absolute forbid.’ 
 
 Oh misery! how I shook myself, when he 
 Seized me, and cried, ‘Thou haply thought’st me not 
 A disputant in logic so exact!’ 
 
 To Minos down he bore me; and the judge 
 Twined eight times round his callous back the tail, 
 Which biting with excess of rage, he spake: 
 ‘This is a guilty soul, that in the fire 
 
 Must vanish.” Hence, perdition-doom’d, I rove 
 A prey to rankling sorrow, in this garb.” 
 
 When he had thus fulfil’d his words, the flame 
 
 In dolor parted, beating to and fro, 
 
 And writhing its sharp horn. We onward went, | 
 I and my leader, up along the rock, F 
 Far as another arch, that overhangs 
 
 The foss, wherein the penalty is paid 
 
 Of those who load them with committed sin. . 
 
 CANTO XXVIII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—They arrive in the ninth gulf, where the sowers of scandal, 
 
 schismatics, and heretics, are seen with their limbs miserably 
 maimed or divided in different ways. Among these the Poet finds 
 Mohammed, Piero da Medicina, Curia, Mosca, and Bertrand de 
 Born. 
 
 HO, e’en in words unfetter’d, might at full 
 Tell of the wounds and blood that now I saw, 
 Though he repeated oft the tale? No tongue 
 
 So vast a theme could equal, speech and thought 
 Both impotent alike. If in one band 
 
 Collected, stood the people all, who e’er 
 
 Pour’d on Apulia’s happy soil their blood, 
 Slain by the Trojans, and in that long war, 
 When of the rings the measured booty made 
 
 A pile so high, as Rome’s historian writes 
 
 Who errs not; with the multitude, that felt 
 
 The grinding force of Guiscard’s Norman steel,* 
 
 1“ Guiscard’s Norman steel.” Robert of Naples, and died in 1110. He is imtro- 
 Guiscard, who conquered the kingdom duced in the Paradise, Canto xviii. 
 
HELL 113 
 
 And those the rest,? whose bones are gather’d yet 
 
 At Ceperano, there where treachery 
 
 Branded the Apulian name, or where beyond 
 
 Thy walls, O Tagliacozzo,? without arms 
 
 The old Alardo conquer’d; and his limbs 
 
 One were to show transpierced, another his 
 
 Clean lopt away; a spectacle like this 
 
 Were but a thing of naught, to the hideous sight 
 
 Of the ninth chasm. A rundlet, that hath lost 
 
 Its middle or side stave, gapes not so wide 
 
 As one I mark’d, torn from the chin throughout 
 
 Down to the hinder passage: ’twixt the legs 
 
 Dangling his entrails hung, the midriff lay 
 
 Open to view, and wretched ventricle, 
 
 That turns the englutted aliment to dross. 
 
 Whilst eagerly I fix on him my gaze, 
 
 He eyed me, with his hands laid his breast bare, 
 
 And cried, “Now mark how I do rip me: lo! 
 
 How is Mohammed mangled: before me 
 
 Walks Ali* weeping, from the chin his face 
 
 Cleft to the forelock; and the others all, 
 
 Whom here thou seest, while they lived, did sow 
 
 Scandal and schism, and therefore thus are rent. 
 
 A fiend is here behind, who with his sword 
 
 Hacks us thus cruelly, slivering again 
 
 Each of this ream, when we have compast round 
 
 The dismal way; for first our gashes close 
 
 Ere we repass before him. But, say who 
 
 Art thou, that standest musing on the rock, 
 
 Haply so lingering to delay the pain 
 
 Sentenced upon thy crimes.” “‘ Him death not yet,” 
 
 My guide rejoin’d, “hath overta’en, nor sin 
 
 Conducts to torment; but, that he may make 
 
 Full trial of your state, I who am dead 
 
 Must through the depths of Hell, from orb to orb, 
 
 Conduct him. Trust my words; for they are true.” 
 
 2“ And those the rest.”” The army of 3“ © Tagliacozzo.” He alludes to_the 
 Manfredi, which, through the treachery victory which Charles gained over Con- 
 of the Apulian troops, was overcome by radino, by the sage advice of the Sieur 
 Charles of Anjou in 1265, and fell in de Valeri, in_ 1268. | 
 such numbers that the bones of the slain 4* Ali,” The disciple of Mohammed. 
 
 were still gathered near Ceperano. See 
 the Purgatory, Canto iii. 
 
114 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 More than a hundred spirits, when that they heard, 
 Stood in the foss to mark me through amaze 
 
 Forgetful of their pangs. 
 
 “Thou, who perchance 
 
 Shalt shortly view the sun, this warning thou 
 Bear to Dolcino:® bid him, if he wish not 
 Here soon to follow me, that with good store 
 
 Of food he arm him, lest imprisoning snows 
 Yield him a victim to Novara’s power; 
 
 No easy conquest else: with foot upraised 
 For stepping, spake Mohammed, on the ground 
 Then fix’d it to depart. Another shade, 
 Pierced in the throat, his nostrils mutilate 
 E’en from beneath the eyebrows, and one ear — 
 Lopt off, who, with the rest, through wonder stood 
 Gazing, before the rest advanced, and bared 
 His wind-pipe, that without was all o’ersmear’d 
 
 With crimson stain. 
 
 “O thou!” said he, “ whom sin 
 
 Condemns not, and whom erst (unless too near 
 Resemblance to deceive me) I aloft 
 Have seen on Latian ground, call thou to mind 
 
 Piero of Medicina,® if again 
 
 Returning, thou behold’st the pleasant land * 
 That from Vercelli slopes to Mercabo; 
 
 And there instruct the twain,? whom Fano boasts 
 Her worthiest sons, Guido and Angelo, 
 
 That if ’tis given us here to scan aright 
 
 The future, they out of life’s tenement 
 
 Shall be cast forth, and whelm’d under the waves 
 
 5“ Dolcino.” In 1305, a friar, called 
 Dolcino, who belonged to no regular 
 order, contrived to raise in Novara, in 
 Lombardy, a_ large si feel ahd of the 
 meaner sort of people, declaring himself 
 to be a true apostle of Christ, and 
 promulgating a community of property 
 and of wives, with many other such her- 
 etical doctrines. He blamed the Pope, 
 cardinals, and other prelates of the holy 
 church, for not observing their duty, nor 
 leading the angelic life, and afhrmed 
 that he ought to be pope. He was fol- 
 lowed by more than three thousand men 
 and women, who lived promiscuously 
 on the mountains together, like beasts, 
 and, when they wanted provisions, sup- 
 plied themselves by depredation and 
 rapine. This lasted for two years, till 
 many, being struck with compunction 
 at the dissolute life they led, his sect 
 was much diminished; and, through fail- 
 
 ure of food and the severity of the 
 snows, he was taken by the people of 
 Novara, and burnt, with Margarita, his 
 companion, and many other men and 
 women whom his errors had seduced. 
 8“ Medicina.” A place in the terri- 
 tory. of Bologna. Piero fomented dis- 
 sensions among the inhabitants of that 
 city, and among the leaders of the neigh- 
 boring States. 
 7“ The pleasant land.”? Lombardy. 
 8“ The twain.” Guido del Cassero 
 and Angiolello da Cagnano, two of the 
 worthiest and most distinguished citi- 
 zens of Fano, were invited by Malates- 
 tino da Rimini to an entertainment, on 
 daa ae that he had some important 
 usiness to transact with them; and, 
 according to instructions given by him, 
 they were drowned in their passage near 
 Cattolica, between Rimini and Fano. 
 
HELL 
 
 115 
 
 Near to Cattolica, through perfidy 
 
 Of a fell tyrant. 
 
 *Twixt the Cyprian isle 
 
 And Balearic, ne’er hath Neptune seen 
 
 An injury so foul, by pirates done, 
 
 Or Argive crew of old. That one-eyed traitor 
 (Whose realm there is a spirit here were fain 
 His eye had still lack’d sight of) them shall bring 
 To conference with him, then so shape his end, 
 That they shall need not ’gainst Focara’s wind ° 
 
 Offer up vow nor prayer.” 
 
 I answering thus: 
 
 “ Declare, as thou dost wish that I above 
 
 May carry tidings of thee, who is he, 
 
 In whom that sight doth wake such sad remembrance.” 
 Forthwith he laid his hand on the cheek-bone 
 
 Of one, his fellow-spirit, and his jaws 
 
 Expanding, cried: “Lo! 
 
 this is he I wot of: 
 
 He speaks not for himself: the outcast this, 
 Who overwhelm’d the doubt in Czsar’s mind,?° 
 Affirming that delay to men prepared 
 
 Oh! 
 
 Was ever harmful.” 
 
 how terrified 
 
 Methought was Curio, from whose throat was cut 
 The tongue, which spake that hardy word. Then one, 
 Maim’d of each hand, uplifted in the gloom 
 
 The bleeding stumps, that they with gory spots 
 
 Sullied his face, and cried: 
 
 “Remember thee 
 
 Of Mosca ™ too; I who, alas! exclaim’d, 
 ‘The deed once done, there is an end’ that proved 
 A seed of sorrow to the Tuscan race.” 
 
 I added: 
 
 “Ay, and death to thine own tribe.” 
 
 Whence, heaping woe on woe, he hurried off, 
 
 As one grief-stung to madness. 
 
 ®“ Focara’s wind.” Focara is a moun- 
 tain, from which a wind blows that is 
 peculiarly dangerous to the navigators 
 of that coast. 
 
 10 The doubt in Cesar’s mind.” Cu- 
 rio, whose speech (according to Lucan) 
 determined Julius Czsar to proceed 
 when he had arrived at Rimini (the an- 
 cient Ariminum), and doubted whether 
 he should prosecute the civil war. 
 
 11 “* Mosca.” Buondelmonte was en- 
 gaged to marry a lady of the Amidei 
 amily, but broke his promise, and 
 united himself to one of the Donati. 
 This was so much resented by the for- 
 mer, that a meeting of themselves and 
 
 But I there 
 
 their kinsmen was held, to consider of 
 the best means of revenging the insult. 
 Mosca degli Uberti, or de’ Lamberti, 
 persuaded them to resolve on the ase 
 sassination of Buondelmonte, exclaime 
 ing to them, “the thing once done, 
 there is an end.” This counsel and its 
 effects were the source of many terri 
 ble calamities to the State of Florence. 
 “This murder,” says G. Villani, lib. v. 
 cap. xxxviii., “yas the cause and be- 
 ginnirg of the accursed Guelf and 
 Ghibelline parties in Florence.” It 
 happened in 1215. See the “ Paradise,” 
 Canto xvi. 139. 
 
116 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Still linger’d to behold the troop, and saw 
 
 Thing, such as I may fear without more proof 
 
 To tell of, but that conscience makes me firm, 
 
 The boon companion, who her strong breastplate 
 
 Buckles on him, that feels no guilt within, 
 
 And bids him on and fear not. Without doubt 
 
 I saw, and yet it seems to pass before me, 
 
 A headless trunk, that even as the rest 
 
 Of the sad flock paced onward. By the hair 
 
 It bore the sever’d member, lantern-wise 
 
 Pendent in hand, which look’d at us, and said, 
 
 “Woe’s me!” The spirit lighted thus himself; 
 
 And two there were in one, and one in two. 
 
 How that may be, he knows who ordereth so. 
 When at the bridge’s foot direct he stood, 
 
 His arm aloft he rear’d, thrusting the head 
 
 Full in our view, that nearer we might hear 
 
 The words, which thus it utter’d: ‘“ Now behold 
 
 This grievous torment, thou, who breathing go’st 
 
 To spy the dead: behold, if any else 
 
 Be terrible as this. And, that on earth 
 
 Thou mayst bear tidings of me, know that I 
 
 Am Bertrand,}* he of Born, who gave King John 
 
 The counsel mischievous. Father and son 
 
 I set at mutual war. For Absalom 
 
 And David more did not Ahitophel, 
 
 Spurring them on maliciously to strife. 
 
 For parting those so closely knit, my brain 
 
 Parted, alas! I carry from its source. 
 
 That in this trunk inhabits. Thus the law 
 
 Of retribution fiercely works in me.” 
 
 12 ** Bertrand.” Bertrand de Born, against his father, Henry II of Eng: 
 
 Vicomte de Hautefort, near Perigueux land. Bertrand holds a distinguished 
 in Guienne, who incited John to rebel place among the Provengal poets. 
 
HELL Ily 
 
 CANTO XXIX 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Dante, at the desire of Virgil, proceeds onward to the 
 bridge that crosses the tenth gulf, from whence he hears the cries 
 of the alchemists and forgers, who are tormented therein; but not 
 being able to discern anything on account of the darkness, they 
 descend the rock, that bounds this, the last of the compartments in 
 which the eighth circle is divided, and then behold the spirits who 
 are afflicted by divers plagues and diseases. Two of them, namely, 
 Grifolino of Arezzo, and Capocchio of Sienna, are introduced 
 speaking. 
 
 O were mine eyes inebriate with the view 
 Of the vast multitude, whom various wounds 
 Disfigured, that they long’d to stay and weep. 
 
 But Virgil roused me: “ What yet gazest on? 
 Wherefore doth fasten yet thy sight below 
 Among the maim’d and miserable shades? 
 Thou hast not shown in any chasm beside 
 This weakness. Know, if thou wouldst number them, 
 That two and twenty miles the valley winds 
 Its circuit, and already is the moon 
 Beneath our feet: the time permitted now 
 Is short; and more, not seen, remains to see.” 
 
 “Tf thou,” I straight replied, “ hadst weigh’d the cause, 
 For which I look’d, thou hadst perchance excused 
 The tarrying still.” My leader part pursued 
 His way, the while I follow’d, answering him, 
 And adding thus: “ Within that cave I deem, 
 Whereon so fixedly I held my ken, 
 There is a spirit dwells, one of my blood, 
 Wailing the crime that costs him now so dear.” 
 
 Then spake my master: “ Let thy soul no more 
 Afflict itself for him. Direct elsewhere 
 Its thought, and leave him. At the bridge’s foot 
 I mark’d how he did point with menacing look 
 At thee, and heard him by the others named 
 Geri of Bello.1. Thou so wholly then 
 
 1 “* Geri of Bello.” A kinsman of the ment of his punishments than has gene 
 Poet’s, who was murdered by one of seally been supposed. He was the son 
 the Sacchetti family. His being placed of Bello, who was brother to Bellin- 
 here, may be considered as a proof that cione, our Poet’s grandfather. 
 
 Dante was more impartial in the allot- 
 
118 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Wert busied with his spirit, who once ruled 
 
 The towers of Hautefort, that thou lookedst not 
 That way, ere he was gone.” “QO guide beloved! 
 His violent death yet unavenged,” said I, 
 
 “By any, who are partners in his shame, 
 
 Made him contemptuous; therefore, as I think, 
 He pass’d me speechless by; and, doing so, 
 
 Hath made me more compassionate his fate.” 
 
 So we discoursed to where the rock first show’d 
 The other valley, had more light been there, 
 E’en to the lowest depth. Soon as we came 
 O’er the last cloister in the dismal rounds 
 Of Malebolge, and the brotherhood 
 Were to our view exposed, then many a dart 
 Of sore lament assail’d me, headed all 
 With points of thrilling pity, that I closed 
 Both ears against the volley with mine hands, 
 
 As were the torment, if each lazar-house 
 Of Valdichiana,? in the sultry time 
 *Twixt July and September, with the isle 
 Sardinia and Maremma’s pestilent fen,® 
 Had heap’d their maladies all in one foss 
 Together; such was here the torment: dire 
 The stench, as issuing streams from fester’d limbs. 
 
 We on the utmost shore of the long rock 
 Descended still to leftward. Then my sight 
 Was livelier to explore the depth, wherein 
 The minister of the most mighty Lord, 
 All-searching Justice, dooms to punishment 
 The forgers noted on her dread record. 
 
 More rueful was it not methinks to see 
 The nation in A°gina* droop, what time 
 Each living thing, e’en to the little worm, 
 
 All fell, so full of malice was the air, 
 (And afterward, as bards of yore have told, 
 
 2“ Of Valdichiana.” The valley is mentioned as a remarkably sluggish 
 
 through which passes the river Chiana, stream, in the Paradise, Canto xiii. 21. 
 bounded by Arezzo, Cortona, Monte- 8** Maremma’s pestilent fen.”” See 
 pulciano, and Chiusi. In the heat of note to Canto xxv. v, 18. 
 
 autumn it was formerly rendered un- “In /Egina.” He alludes to the 
 
 wholesome by the stagnation of the fable of the ants changed into Myrmi- 
 water, but has since been drained by dons.—Ovid, “ Met.” 1b. Vii. 
 the Emperor Leopold II. The Chiana 
 
HELL 119 
 
 The ancient people were restored anew 
 
 From seed of emmets), than was here to see 
 
 The spirits, that languish’d through the murky vale, 
 Up-piled on many a stack. Confused they lay, 
 One o’er the belly, o’er the shoulders one 
 
 Roll’d of another; sideling crawl’d a third 
 
 Along the dismal pathway. Step by step 
 
 We journey’d on, in silence looking round, 
 
 And listening those diseased, who strove im vain 
 To lift their forms. Then two I mark’d, that sat 
 Propt ’gainst each other, as two: brazen pans 
 
 Set to retain the heat. From head to foot, 
 
 A tetter bark’d them round. Nor saw I e’er 
 Groom currying so fast, for whom his lord 
 Impatient waited, or himself perchance 
 
 Tired with long watching, as of these each one 
 Plied quickly his keen nails, through furiousness 
 Of ne’er abated pruriency. The crust 
 
 Came drawn from underneath, in flakes, like scales 
 Scraped from the bream, or fish of broader: mail. 
 
 “O thou! who with thy fingers: rendest off 
 Thy coat of proof,” thus spake my guide to one, 
 “And sometimes makest tearing pincers of them, 
 Tell me if any born of Latian land 
 Be among these within: so may thy nails 
 Serve thee for everlasting to this toil.” 
 
 “Both are of Latium,” weeping he replied, 
 “Whom ‘tortured thus thou seest: but who art thou 
 That hast inquired of us?” To whom my guide: 
 “One that descend with this man, who yet lives, 
 From rock to rock, and show him Hell’s abyss.” 
 
 Then started they asunder, and each turn’d 
 Trembling toward us, with the rest, whose ear 
 Those words redounding struck. To me my liege 
 Address’d him: “ Speak to them whate’er thou list.” 
 
 And I therewith began: “So may no. time 
 Filch your remembrance from the thoughts: of men 
 In the upper world, but after many suns 
 ‘Survive it, as ye tell me, who ye are, 
 
 And of what race ye come. Your punishment, 
 
120 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Unseemly and disgustful in its kind, 
 Deter you not from opening thus much to me.” 
 “ Arezzo was my dwelling,” > answer’d one, 
 “ And me Albero of Sienna brought 
 To die by fire: but that, for which I died, 
 Leads me not here. True is, in sport I told him, 
 That I had learn’d to wing my flight in air; 
 And he, admiring much, as he was void 
 Of wisdom, will’d me to declare to him 
 The secret of mine art: and only hence, 
 Because I made him not a Deedalus, 
 Prevail’d on one supposed his sire to burn me. 
 But Minos to this chasm, last of the ten, 
 For that I practised alchemy on earth, 
 Has doom’d me. Him no subterfuge eludes.” 
 Then to the bard I spake: “ Was ever race 
 Light as Sienna’s?® Sure not France herself 
 Can show a tribe so frivolous and vain.” 
 The other leprous spirit heard my words, 
 And thus return’d: “Be Stricca’™ from this charge 
 Exempted, he who knew so temperately 
 To lay out fortune’s gifts; and Niccolo, 
 Who first the spice’s costly luxury 
 Discover’d in that garden,® where such seed 
 Roots deepest in the soil: and be that troop 
 Exempted, with whom Caccia of Asciano 
 Lavish’d his vineyards and wide-spreading woods, 
 And his rare wisdom Abbagliato show’d 
 A spectacle for all. That thou mayst know 
 Who seconds thee against the Siennese 
 Thus gladly, bend this way thy sharpen’d sight, 
 That well my face may answer to thy ken; 
 So shalt thou see I am Capocchio’s ghost, 
 
 6 ** Arezzo was my dwelling.” Grifo- Stricca, Niccolo Salimbeni, Caccia of 
 
 lino of Arezzo, who Prana Albero, Asciano, and Abbagliato or 
 son of the Bishop of Sienna, that he Folcacchieri belonged to a company 
 would teach him the art of flying; and, of prodigal and luxurious young men in 
 because he did not keep his promise, Sienna, called the ‘‘ Brigata Goderec- 
 Albero prevailed on his father to have cia.”” Niccolo was the inventor of a 
 him burnt for a necromancer. mew manner of using cloves in cook- 
 6 BS Was ever race ery, not very well understood by the 
 Light as Sienna’s? ” commentators, and which was termed 
 
 The same imputation is again cast on the ‘‘ costuma ricca.”’ : 
 the Siennese, Purg. Canto xiii. 141. 8“ In that garden.” Sienna. 
 %** Stricca.’”?’ This is said ironically, 
 
a) HEEL 121 
 
 Who forged transmuted metals by the power 
 Of alchemy; and if I scan thee right, 
 
 Thou needs must well remember how I aped 
 Creative nature by my subtle art.” 
 
 CANTO XXX 
 
 ARGUMENT.—In the same gulf, other kinds of impostors, as those who 
 have counterfeited the persons of others, or debased the current 
 coin, or deceived by speech under false pretences, are described as 
 suffering various diseases. Sinon of Troy and Adamo of Brescia 
 mutually reproach each other with their several impostures, 
 
 HAT time resentment burn’d in Juno’s breast 
 
 For Semele against the Theban blood, 
 
 As more than once in dire mischance was rued; 
 Such fatal frenzy seized on Athamas, . 
 That he his spouse beholding with a babe 
 Laden on either arm, “Spread out,” he cried, 
 “The meshes, that I take the lioness 
 And the young lions at the pass:” then forth 
 Stretch’d he his merciless talons, grasping one, 
 One helpless innocent, Learchus named, 
 Whom swinging down he dash’d upon a rock; 
 And with her other burden, self-destroy’d, 
 The hapless mother plunged. And when the pride 
 Of all presuming Troy fell from its height, 
 By fortune overwhelm’d, and the old king 
 With his realm perish’d; then did Hecuba, 
 A wretch forlorn and captive, when she saw 
 Polyxena first slaughter’d, and her son, 
 Her Polydorus, on the wild sea-beach 
 Next met the mourner’s view, then reft of sense 
 Did she run barking even as a dog; 
 Such mighty power had grief to wrench her soul, 
 But ne’er the Furies, or of Thebes, or Troy, 
 With such fell cruelty were seen, their goads 
 Infixing in the limbs of man or beast, 
 As now two pale and naked ghosts I saw, 
 That gnarling wildly scamper’d, like the swine 
 
122 
 
 Excluded from his stye. 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 One reach’d Capocchio, 
 
 And in the neck-joint sticking deep his fangs, 
 Dragg’d him, that, o’er the solid pavement rubb’d 
 
 His belly stretch’d out prone. 
 
 The other shape, 
 
 He of Arezzo, there left trembling, spake: 
 “That sprite of air is Schicchi,’ in like mood 
 Of random mischief vents he still his spite.” 
 
 To whom I answering: 
 
 “Oh! as thou dost hope 
 
 The other may not flesh its jaws on thee, 
 
 Be patient to inform us, who it is, 
 
 Ere it speed hence.” —“ That is the ancient soul 
 
 Of wretched Myrrha,” he replied, “ who burn’d 
 
 With most unholy flame for her own sire, 
 
 And a false shape assuming, so perform’d 
 
 The deed of sin; e’en as the other there, 
 
 That onward passes, dared to counterfeit 
 
 Donati’s features, to feign’d testament 
 
 The seal affixing, that himself might gain, 
 
 For his own share, the lady of the herd.” 
 When vanish’d the two furious shades, on whom 
 
 Mine eye was held, I turn’d it back to view 
 
 The other cursed spirits. One I saw 
 
 In fashion like a lute, had but the groin 
 
 Been sever’d where it meets the forked part. 
 
 Swoln dropsy, disproportioning the limbs 
 
 With ill-converted moisture, that the paunch 
 
 Suits not the visage, open’d wide his lips, 
 
 Gasping as in the hectic man for drought, 
 
 One toward the chin, the other upward curl’d. 
 “© ye! who in this world of misery, 
 
 Wherefore I know not, are exempt from pain,” 
 
 Thus he began, “ attentively regard 
 
 Adamo’s woe.? 
 
 When living, full supply 
 
 Ne’er lack’d me of what most I coveted; 
 
 4** Schicchi.”” Gianni Schicchi, who 
 was of the family of —avalcanti, pose 
 sessed such a faculty of moulding his 
 features to the resemblance of others, 
 that he was employed by Simon Dona- 
 ti to personate Buoso Donati, then re- 
 cently deceased, and to make a will, 
 Jeaving Simon his heir; for which ser- 
 vice he was remunerated with a mare 
 of extraordinary value, here called “ the 
 lady of the herd.” 
 
 2“ Adamo’s woe.” Adamo of Bres- 
 cia, at the instigation of Guido, Alese 
 sandro, and their brother Aghinulfo, 
 Lords of Romena, counterfeited the 
 coin of Florence; for which crime he 
 was burnt. Landino says that in his 
 time the peasants still pointed out a 
 pile of stones near Romena, as the 
 place of his execution. See Troya, 
 *Veltro Allegorico,” p. 25. 
 
HELL | 123 
 
 One drop of water now, alas! I crave. 
 The rills, that glitter down the grassy slopes 
 Of Casentino,? making fresh and soft 
 The banks whereby they glide to Arno’s stream, 
 Stand ever in my view; and not in vain; 
 For more the pictured semblance dries me up, 
 Much more than the disease, which makes the flesh 
 Desert these shrivel’d cheeks. So from the place, 
 Where I transgress’d, stern justice urging me, 
 Takes means to quicken more my laboring sighs. 
 There is Romena, where I falsified 
 The metal with the Baptist’s form imprest, 
 For which on earth I left my body burnt. 
 But if I here might see the sorrowing soul 
 Of Guido, Alessandro, or their brother, 
 For Branda’s limpid spring * I would not change 
 The welcome sight. One is e’en now within, 
 If truly the mad spirits tell, that round 
 Are wandering. But wherein besteads me that? 
 My limbs are fetter’d. Were I but so light, 
 That I each hundred years might move one inch, 
 I had set forth already on this path, 
 Seeking him out amidst the shapeless crew, 
 Although eleven miles it wind, not less 
 Than half of one across. They brought me down 
 Among this tribe; induced by them, I stamp’d 
 The florens with three carats of alloy.” ® 
 
 “ Who are that abject pair,” I next inquired, 
 “That closely bounding thee upon thy right 
 Lie smoking, like a hand in winter steep’d 
 In the chill stream?” ‘‘ When to this gulf I dropp’d,” 
 He answer’d, “ here I found them; since that hour 
 They have not turn’d, nor ever shall, I ween, 
 Till time hath run his course. One is that dame, 
 The false accuser *® of the Hebrew youth; 
 Sinon the other, that false Greek from Troy. 
 
 *“Casentino.” Romena is a_ part of pure gold. Villani relates that it 
 
 of Casentino. was first used at Florence in 1252, an 
 4** Branda’s limpid spring.” A foun- era of great prosperity in the annals of 
 
 tain in Sienna. the republic; before which time their 
 &’* The florens with three carats of most valuable coinage was of silver, 
 
 alloy.” The floren was a coin that 6“ The false accuser.”  Potiphar’s 
 
 ought to have had twenty-four carats wife. 
 
124 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Sharp fever drains the reeky moistness out, _ 
 In such a cloud upsteam’d.” When that he heard, 
 One, gall’d perchance to be so darkly named, 
 
 With clench’d hand smote him on the braced paunch, 
 That like a drum resounded: but forthwith 
 
 Adamo smote him on the face, the blow 
 
 Returning with his arm, that seem’d as hard. 
 
 “Though my o’erweighty limbs have ta’en from me 
 The power to move,” said he, “I have an arm 
 At liberty for such employ.” To whom 
 Was answer’d: “ When thou wentest to the fire, 
 Thou hadst it not so ready at command, 
 
 Then readier when it coin’d the impostor gold.” 
 
 And thus the dropsied: “ Ay, now speak’st thou trues 
 But there thou gavest not such true testimony, 
 When thou wast question’d of the truth, at Troy.” 
 
 “Tf I spake false, thou falsely stamp’dst the coin,” 
 Said Sinon; “I am here for but one fault, 
 
 And thou for more than any imp beside.” 
 
 “Remember,” he replied, “O perjured one! 
 
 The horse remember, that did teem with death; 
 And all the world be witness to thy guilt.” 
 
 “To thine,” return’d the Greek, “ witness the thirst 
 Whence thy tongue cracks, witness the fluid mound 
 Rear’d by the belly up before thine eyes, 
 
 A mass corrupt.” To whom the coiner thus: 
 “Thy mouth gapes wide as ever to let pass 
 
 Its evil saying. Me if thirst assails, 
 
 Yet I am stuft with moisture. Thou art parch’d: 
 Pains rack thy head: no urging wouldst thou need 
 To make thee lap Narcissus’ mirror up.” 
 
 I was all fix’d to listen, when my guide 
 
 Admonish’d: “ Now beware. A little more, 
 And I do quarrel with thee.” I perceived 
 How angrily he spake, and toward him turn’d 
 With shame so poignant, as remember’d yet 
 Confounds me. As a man that dreams of harm 
 Befallen him, dreaming wishes it a dream, 
 
 And that which is, desires as if it were not; . 
 Such then was I, who, wanting power to speak, 
 
HELL 125 
 
 Wish’d to excuse myself, and all the while 
 Excused me, though unweeting that I did. 
 “ More grievous fault than thine has been, less shame,” 
 My master cried, “might expiate. Therefore cast 
 All sorrow from thy soul; and if again 
 Chance bring thee where like conference is held, 
 Think I am ever at thy side. To hear 
 Such wrangling is a joy for vulgar minds.” 
 
 CANTO XXXI 
 
 ArcuMENT.—The Poets, following the sound of a loud horn, are led by 
 it to the ninth circle, in which there are four rounds, one enclosed 
 within the other, and containing as many sorts of traitors; but the 
 present Canto shows only that the circle is encompassed with giants, 
 one of whom, Anteus, takes them both in his arms and places 
 them at the bottom of the circle. 
 
 “HE very tongue, whose keen reproof before 
 Had wounded me, that either cheek was stain’d, 
 Now minister’d my cure. So have I heard, 
 Achilles’ and his father’s javelin caused 
 Pain first, and then the boon of health restored. 
 Turning our back upon the vale of woe, 
 We cross’d the encircled mound in silence. There 
 Was less than day and less than night, that far 
 Mine eye advanced not: but I heard a horn 
 Sounded, so loud, the peal it rang had made 
 The thunder feeble. Following its course 
 The adverse way, my strained eyes were bent 
 On that one spot. So terrible a blast 
 Orlando’ blew not, when that dismal rout 
 O’erthrew the host of Charlemain, and quench’d 
 His saintly warfare. Thitherward not long 
 My head was raised, when many a lofty tower 
 Methought I spied. “ Master,” said I, “ what land 
 
 Beecitiando,”? i? 5. ‘ horn which Orlando won from the 
 ** When Charlemain with all his peerage giant Jatmund, and which, as Turpin 
 fell and the Islandic bards report, was en- 
 _At Fontarabia.” dued with magical power, and might 
 Milton, ‘‘ Paradise Lost,” b. i. 586. be heard at the distance of twenty 
 See Warton’s “ Hist. of Eng. Poetry,” miles.” Charlemain and Orlando are 
 
 vol. i. sect. iii. p. 132. ‘“‘This is the introduced in the Paradise, Canto xviii. 
 
it is remarked by W rans 
 Arabian vein of tabling. to the place where it now is, in the 
 
 126 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Is this?” He answer’d straight: “Too long a space 
 Of intervening darkness has thine eye 
 To traverse: thou hast therefore widely err’d 
 In thy imagining. Thither arrived 
 Thou well shalt see, how distance can delude 
 The sense. A little therefore urge thee on.” 
 Then tenderly he caught me by the hand; 
 “Yet know,” said he, “ere further we advance, 
 That it less strange may seem, these are not towers, 
 But giants. In the pit they stand immersed, 
 Each from his navel downward, round the bank.” 
 As when a fog disperseth gradually, 
 Our vision traces what the mist involves 
 Condensed in air; so piercing through the gross 
 And gloomy atmosphere, as more and more 
 We near’d toward the brink, mine error fled 
 And fear came o’er me. As with circling round 
 Of turrets, Montereggion? crowns his walls; 
 E’en thus the shore, encompassing the abyss, 
 Was turreted with giants,® half their length 
 Uprearing, horrible, whom Jove from heaven 
 Yet threatens, when his muttering thunder rolls. 
 Of one already I descried the face, 
 Shoulders, and breast, and of the belly huge 
 Great part, and both arms down along his ribs. 
 All-teeming Nature, when her plastic hand 
 Left framing of these monsters, did display 
 Past doubt her wisdom, taking from mad War 
 Such slaves to do his bidding; and if she 
 Repent her not of the elephant and whale, 
 Who ponders well confesses her therein 
 Wiser and more discreet; for when brute force 
 And evil will are back’d with subtlety, 
 Resistance none avails. His visage seem’d 
 In length and bulk, as doth the pine * that tops 
 3‘* Montereggion.” A castle near Si- belfry of St. Peter; and having (accord- 
 enna. ing to Buti) been thrown down by 
 8“ Giants.” The id round the pit, lightning, it was, after lying some time 
 arton, are in the on the steps of this palace, transferred 
 
 “The pine.” The large pine of Pope’s garden, by the side of the great 
 
 bronze, which once ornamented the top corridor of Belvedere. In the time of 
 of the mole of Adrian, was afterward our poet, the pine was then either on 
 employed to decorate the top of the the belfry or on the steps of St. Peter’s. 
 
 a 
 
HELL | 127 
 
 Saint Peter’s Roman fane; and the other bones 
 Of like proportion, so that from above 
 The bank, which girdled him below, such height 
 
 Arose his stature, that three 
 
 Friezelanders 
 
 Had striven in vain to reach but to his hair. 
 Full thirty ample palms was he exposed 
 
 Downward from whence a 
 
 man his: garment loops. 
 
 * Raphel® bai ameth, sabi almi:” 
 
 So shouted his fierce lips, which sweeter hymns 
 Became not; and my guide address’d him thus: 
 “O senseless spirit! let thy horn for thee 
 Interpret: therewith vent thy rage, if rage 
 
 Or other passion wring thee. 
 
 Search thy neck. 
 
 There shalt thou find the belt that binds it on. 
 Spirit confused! lo, on thy mighty breast 
 
 Where hangs the baldrick!” 
 “He doth accuse himself. 
 
 Then to me he spake: 
 Nimrod is this, 
 
 Through whose ill counsel in the world no more 
 One tongue prevails. But pass we on, nor waste 
 Our words; for so each language is to him, 
 
 As his to others, understood 
 
 by none.” 
 
 Then to the leftward turning sped we forth, 
 And at a sling’s throw found another shade 
 
 Far fiercer and more huge. 
 What master hand had girt 
 
 I cannot say 
 him; but he held 
 
 Behind the right arm fetter’d, and before, 
 
 The other, with a chain, that fasten’d him 
 
 From the neck down; and five times round his form 
 Apparent met the wreathed links. ‘ This proud one 
 Would of his strength against almighty Jove 
 
 Make trial,” said my guide: 
 
 “whence he is thus 
 
 Requited: Ephialtes him they call. 
 
 Great was his prowess, when the giants brought 
 Fear on the gods: those arms, which then he plied, 
 Now moves he never.” Forthwith I return’d: 
 “Fain would I, if ’t were possible, mine eyes, 
 
 Of Briareus immeasurable, gain’d 
 
 Experience next.” He answered: “ Thou shalt see 
 
 6“ Raphel, ete.” These unmeaning 
 sounds, it is supposed, are meant to 
 
 express the confusion of languages at 
 the building of the tower of Babel. 
 
128 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Not far from hence Antzus, who both speaks 
 
 And is unfetter’d, who shall place us there 
 
 Where guilt is at its depth. Far onward stands 
 Whom thou wouldst fain behold, in chains, and made 
 Like to this spirit, save that in his looks 
 
 More fell he seems.” By violent earthquake rock’d 
 Ne’er shook a tower, so reeling to its base, 
 
 As Ephialtes. More than ever then 
 
 I dreaded death; nor than the terror more 
 
 Had needed, if I had not seen the cords 
 
 That held him fast. We, straightway journeying on, 
 Came to Antzus, who, five ells complete 
 
 Without the head, forth issued from the cave. 
 
 “O thou, who in the fortunate vale,® that made 
 Great Scipio heir of glory, when his sword | 
 Drove back the troop of Hannibal in flight, 
 
 Who thence of old didst carry for thy spoil 
 
 An hundred lions; and if thou hadst fought 
 
 In the high conflict on thy brethren’s side, 
 
 Seems as men yet believed, that through thine arm 
 The sons of earth had conquer’d; now vouchsafe 
 To place us down beneath, where numbing cold 
 Locks up Cocytus. Force not that we crave 
 
 Or Tityus’ help or Typhon’s. Here is one 
 
 Can give what in this realm ye covet. Stoop 
 Therefore, nor scornfully distort thy lip. 
 
 He in the upper world can yet bestow 
 
 Renown on thee; for he doth live, and looks 
 
 For life yet longer, if before the time 
 
 Grace call him not unto herself.” Thus spake 
 The teacher. He in haste forth stretch’d his hands 
 And caught my guide. Alcides? whilom felt 
 That grapple, straiten’d sore. Soon as my guide 
 Had felt it, he bespake me thus: “ This way, 
 That I may clasp thee;”’ then so caught me up, 
 That we were both one burden. As appears 
 The tower of Carisenda,® from beneath 
 
 6 “* The fortunate vale.’”’ The country lib. ii. as a (phe of the judgment of 
 near Carthage. God displayed in the duel, according to 
 7“ Alcides.”” The combat between the singular superstition of those times. 
 
 Hercules and Antzus is adduced by the 8“ The tower of Carisenda.” The 
 
 poet in his treatise ‘‘ De Monarchia, leaning tower at Bologna, 
 
HELL 129 
 
 Where it doth lean, if chance a passing cloud 
 So sail across, that opposite it hangs; 
 
 Such then Antzus seem’d, as at mine ease 
 
 I mark’d him stooping. I were fain at times 
 To have passed another way. Yet in the abyss, 
 That Lucifer with Judas low ingulfs, 
 
 Lightly he placed us; nor, there leaning, stay’d; 
 But rose, as in a bark the stately mast. 
 
 CANTO XXXII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—This Canto treats of the first, and, in part, of the second 
 of those rounds, into which the ninth and last, or frozen circle, is 
 divided. In the former, called_Caina, Dante finds Camiccione de’ 
 Pazzi, who gives him an account of other sinners who are there 
 punished; and in the next, named Antenora, he hears in like man- 
 ner from Bocca degli Abbati who his fellow-sufferers are. 
 
 OULD I command rough rhymes and hoarse, to suit 
 That hole of sorrow o’er which every rock 
 His firm abutment rears, then might the vein 
 Of fancy rise full springing: but not mine 
 Such measures, and with faltering awe I touch 
 The mighty theme; for to describe the depth 
 Of all the universe, is no emprise 
 To jest with, and demands a tongue not used 
 To infant babbling. But let them assist 
 My song, the tuneful maidens, by whose aid 
 Amphion wall’d in Thebes; so with the truth 
 My speech shall best accord.’ Oh ill-starr’d folk, 
 Beyond all others wretched! who abide 
 In such a mansion, as scarce thought finds words 
 To speak of, better had ye here on earth 
 Been flocks, or mountain goats. As down we stood 
 In the dark pit beneath the giants’ feet, 
 But lower far than they, and I did gaze 
 Still on the lofty battlement, a voice 
 Bespake me thus: “Look how thou walkest. Take 
 Good heed, thy soles do tread not on the heads 
 Of thy poor brethren.” Thereupon I turn’d, 
 
130 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 And saw before and underneath my feet 
 
 A lake,.whose—frozen surface liker seem’d 
 
 To glass than water. 
 
 Not so thick a veil 
 
 In winter e’er hath Austrian Danube spread 
 O’er his still course, nor Tanais far remote 
 Under the chilling sky. MRoll’d o’er that mass 
 Had Tabernich or Pietrapana? fallen, 
 Not e’en its rim had creak’d. As peeps the frog 
 Croaking above the wave, what time in dreams 
 The village gleaner oft pursues her toil, 
 So, to where modest shame appears, thus low 
 Blue pinch’d and shrined in ice the spirits stood, 
 Moving their teeth in shrill note like the stork. 
 His face each downward held; their mouth the cold, 
 Their eyes express’d the dolor of their heart. 
 
 A space I look’d around, then at my feet 
 Saw two so strictly join’d, that of their head 
 
 The very hairs were mingled. 
 
 oh vel mesyve; 
 
 ~ 
 
 Whose bosoms thus together press,” said I, 
 
 “Who are ye?” 
 
 At that sound their necks they bent; 
 
 And when their looks were lifted up to me, — 
 Straightway their eyes, before all moist within, 
 Distill’d upon their lips, and the frost bound 
 
 The tears betwixt those orbs, and held them there. 
 Plank unto plank hath never cramp closed up 
 
 So stoutly. 
 
 Whence, like two enraged goats, 
 
 uke two enraged g¢ 
 They clash’d together: them such fury seized. 
 nd one, from whom the cold both ears had reft, 
 
 Exclaim’d, still looking downward: 
 If thou wouldst know 
 
 Dost speculate so long? 
 
 “Why on us 
 
 Who are these two,” the valley, whence his wave 
 
 Bisenzio slopes, did for its master own 
 
 Their sire Alberto, and next him themselves. 
 
 They from one body issued: and throughout 
 aina thou mayst search, nor find a shade 
 
 More worthy in congealment to be fix’d; 
 
 1**Tabernich or Pietrapana.”” The one 
 a mountain in Sclavonia, the other in 
 that tract of country called the Gar- 
 fagnana, not far from Lucca. 
 ‘‘Who are these two.’”’ Alessandro 
 and Napoleone, sons of Alberto Albe” 
 
 ti, who murdered ch oth The 
 we re) e ey of Fal. 
 terona, where the Bisenzio has its 
 source, a river that falls into the Arno 
 about six miles from Florence. 
 
HELL 
 
 131 
 
 Not him,? whose breast and shadow Arthur’s hand 
 At that one blow dissever’d; not Focaccia ;* 
 
 No, not this spirit, whose o’erjutting head 
 Obstructs my onward view: he bore the name 
 
 Of Mascheroni:° Tuscan if thou be, 
 
 Well knowest who he was. 
 
 And to cut short 
 
 All further question, in my form behold 
 
 What once was: Camiccione.® 
 
 I await 
 
 Carlino? here my kinsman, whose deep guilt 
 
 Shall wash out mine.” 
 
 A thousand visages 
 
 Then mark’d I, which the keen and eager cold 
 Had shaped into a doggish grin; whence creeps 
 A shivering horror o’er me, at the thought 
 
 Of those frore shallows. 
 
 While we journey’d on 
 
 Toward the middle, at whose point unites 
 
 All heavy substance, and I trembling went 
 
 Through that eternal chillness, I know not 
 
 If will it were, or destiny, or chance, 
 
 But, passing ’midst the heads, my foot did strike 
 
 With violent blow against the face of one. 
 “Wherefore dost bruise me?” weeping he exclaim’d 
 
 “Unless thy errand be some fresh revenge 
 
 For Montaperto,* wherefore troublest me?” 
 
 I: thus: 
 
 “Instructor, now await me here, 
 
 That I through him may rid me of my doubt: 
 
 Thenceforth what haste thou wilt.” 
 
 The teacher paused 
 
 And to that shade I spake, who bitterly 
 
 Still cursed me in his wrath. 
 That railest thus on others?” 
 
 “What art thou, speak, 
 He replied: 
 
 “Now who art thou, that smiting others’ cheeks, 
 
 8‘“* Not him.” Mordrec, son of King 
 Arthur. In the romance of ‘ Lance- 
 lot of the Lake,” Arthur having discov- 
 ered the traitorous intentions of his son 
 agai him through with the stroke of 
 
 is lance, so that the sunbeam passes 
 through the body of Mordrec; and this 
 disruption of the shadow is no doubt 
 what our Poet alludes to in the text. . 
 
 4 “Focaccia.” Focaccia of Cancellieri, 
 (the Pistoian family), whose atrocious 
 act of revenge against his uncle is said 
 to have given rise to the parties of the 
 Bianchi and Neri, in the year 1300. 
 
 8“ Mascheroni.”’” Sassol Mascheroni, 
 a Florentine, who also murdered his 
 uncle. 
 
 6“ Camiccione.”” Camiccione de’ Paz- 
 
 zi of Valdarno, by whom his kinsman 
 Ubertino was treacherously put to 
 death. 
 
 7* Carlino.” One of the same family. 
 He betrayed the Castel di Piano Tra- 
 vigne, in Valdarno, to the Florentines 
 after the refugees of the Bianca an 
 Ghibelline party had defended it 
 against a siege for twenty-nine days, in 
 
 the summer of 1302. 
 
 8“ Montaperto.” The defeat of the 
 Gueilfi at ontaperto, occasioned by 
 the treachery of Bocca degli Abbati, 
 who, during the engagement, cut_off 
 the hand of Giacopo del Vacca de’ Paz- 
 zi, bearer of the Florentine standard. 
 This event happened in 1260. 
 
2 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Through Antenora roamest, with such force 
 As were past sufferance, wert thou living still?” 
 “ And I am living, to thy joy perchance,” — 
 Was my reply, “if fame be dear to thee, 
 That with the rest I may thy name enroll.” 
 “The contrary of what I covet most,” 
 Said he, “ thou tender’st: hence! nor vex me more. 
 Ill knowest thou to flatter in this vale.” 
 Then seizing on his hinder scalp I cried: 
 “Name thee, or not a hair shall tarry here.” 
 “Rend all away,” he answer’d, “ yet for that 
 I will not tell, nor show thee, who I am, 
 Though at my head thou pluck a thousand times.” 
 Now I had grasp’d his tresses, and stript off 
 More than one tuft, he barking, with his eyes 
 Drawn in and downward, when another cried, 
 “What ails thee, Bocca? Sound not loud enough 
 Thy chattering teeth, but thou must bark outright? 
 
 What devil wrings thee? ”—‘‘ Now,” said I, “ be dumb, 
 
 Accursed traitor! To thy shame, of thee 
 
 True tidings will I bear.”—‘ Off!” he replied; 
 “Tell what thou list: but, as thou ’scape from hence, 
 To speak of him whose tongue hath been so glib, 
 Forget not: here he wails the Frenchman’s gold. 
 
 ‘Him of Duera,’® thou canst say, “I mark’d, 
 
 Where the starved sinners pine.’ 
 
 If thou be ask’d 
 
 What other shade was with them, at thy side 
 Is Beccaria,’® whose red gorge distain’d 
 
 The biting axe of Florence. 
 
 Further on, 
 
 If I misdeem not, Soldanieri™ bides, 
 With Ganellon,!? and Tribaldello,? him 
 
 9“ Him of Duera.” Buoso of Cre- 
 mona, of the family of Duera, who was 
 bribed by Guy de Montfort, to leave a 
 pass between Piedmont and Parma, 
 with the defence of which he had been 
 intrusted by the Ghibellines, open to 
 the army of Charles of Anjou, A.p. 
 1265, at which the people of Cremona 
 were so enraged that they extirpated 
 the whole family. G. Villani, lib. vii. 
 
 c. iv. 
 
 10 “* Beccaria.”” Abbot of Vailombrosa, 
 who was the Pope’s legate at Florence, 
 where his intrigues in favor of the Ghib- 
 ellines being discovered, he was _ be- 
 headed. BS ss De 
 
 11 “ Soldanieri.”” “Gianni Soldanieri,”’ 
 
 says Villani, ‘‘ Hist.” lib. vii. c. xiv., 
 ** put himself at the head of the people, 
 in the hopes of rising into power, not 
 aware that the result would be mischief 
 to the Ghibelline party, and his own 
 ruin; an event which seems ever to 
 have befallen him who has headed the 
 populace in Florence.”—a.p. 1266. 
 Ganellon.” The betrayer of Charle- 
 magne, mentioned by Archbishop Tur- 
 pin. He is a common instance of 
 treachery with the poets of the Middle 
 
 ges. 
 
 18 “* Tribaldello.” Tribaldello de’ Man- 
 fredi, who was Beibes to betray the 
 city of Faenza, A. D. 1282. 
 
HELL 133 
 
 Who oped Faenza when the people slept.” 
 
 We now had left him, passing on our way, 
 When I beheld two spirits by the ice 
 Pent in one hollow, that the head of one 
 Was cowl unto the other; and as bread 
 Is raven’d up through hunger, the uppermost 
 Did so apply his fangs to the other’s brain, 
 Where the spine joins it. Not more furiously 
 On Menalippus’ temples Tydeus gnawed, 
 
 Than on that skull and on its garbage he. 
 
 ““O thou! who show’st so beastly sign of hate 
 ’Gainst him thou prey’st on, let me hear,’ said I, 
 “The cause, on such condition, that if right 
 Warrant thy grievance, knowing who ye are, 
 And what the color of his sinning was, 
 
 I may repay thee in the world above, 
 If that, wherewith I speak, be moist so long.” 
 
 CANTO XXXIII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The Poet is told by Count Ugolino de’ Gherardeschi of the 
 cruel manner in which he and his children were famished in the 
 tower at Pisa, by command of the Archbishop Ruggieri. He next 
 discourses of the third round, called Ptolomea, wherein those are 
 punished who have betrayed others under the semblance of kind- 
 ness; and among these he finds the Friar Alberigo de’ Manfredi, 
 who tells him of one whose soul was already tormented in that 
 place, though his body appeared still to be alive upon the earth, - 
 being yielded up to the governance of a fiend. 
 
 IS jaws uplifting from their fell repast, 
 That sinner wiped them on the hairs o’ the head, 
 Which he behind had mangled, then began: 
 “Thy will obeying, I call up afresh 
 Sorrow past cure; which, but to think of, wrings 
 My heart, or ere I tell on ’t. But if words, 
 That I may utter, shall prove seed to bear 
 Fruit of eternal infamy to him, 
 The traitor whom I gnaw at, thou at once 
 Shalt see me speak and weep. Who thou mayst be 
 
 I know not, nor how here below art come: 
 Classics. Vol. 34—G 
 
134 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 But Florentine thou seemest of a truth, 
 
 When I do hear thee. 
 
 Know, I was on earth 
 
 Count Ugolino,’ and the Archbishop he 
 
 Ruggieri. 
 Now list. 
 
 Why I neighbor him so close, 
 That through effect of his ill-thoughts 
 
 In him my trust reposing, I was ta’en 
 
 And after murder’d, need is not I tell. 
 
 What therefore thou canst not have heard, that is, 
 How cruel was the murder, shalt thou hear, 
 
 And know if he have wrong’d me. 
 
 A small grate 
 
 Within that mew, which for my sake the name 
 
 Of Famine bears, where others yet must pine, 
 Already through its opening several moons 
 
 Had shown me, when I slept the evil sleep 
 
 That from the future tore the curtain off. 
 
 This one, methought, as master of the sport, 
 
 Rode forth to chase the gaunt wolf, and his whelps, 
 Unto the mountain? which forbids the sight 
 
 Of Lucca to the Pisan. 
 
 With lean brachs 
 
 Inquisitive and keen, before him ranged 
 
 1** Count Ugoling.” In the year 1288, 
 in the mont uly, Pisa was much 
 divided by competitors for the sover- 
 eignty; one party, composed of certain 
 of the Guelfi, being headed by the Judge 
 Nino di Gallura de’ Visconti; another, 
 consisting of others of the same faction, 
 by the Count Ugolino de’ Gherardeschi; 
 and a third by the Archbishop Rwg- 
 gieri degli Ubaldini, with the Lanfran- 
 chi, Sismondi, Gualandi, and _ other 
 Ghibelline houses. The Count Ugolino, 
 to effect his purpose, united with the 
 archbishop and his party, and having be- 
 trayed Nino, his sister’s son, they con- 
 trived that he and his followers should 
 either be driven out of Pisa, or their 
 persons seized. Nino hearing this, and 
 not seeing any means of defending him- 
 self, retired to Calci, his castle, and 
 formed an alliance with the Florentines 
 the people of Lucca, against the Pisans. 
 The count, before Nino was gone, in 
 order to cover his treachery, when 
 everything was settled for his expul- 
 sion, quitted Pisa, and repaired to a 
 manor of his called Settimo; whence, 
 as soon as he was informed of Nino’s 
 departure, he returned to Pisa with 
 great rejoicing and festivity, and was 
 elevated to the supreme power with 
 every demonstration of triumph and 
 honor. But his greatness was not of 
 long continuance. It pleased the Al- 
 mighty that a total reverse of fortune 
 should ensue, as a punishment for his 
 acts of treachery and guilt; for he was 
 said to have poisoned the Count Anselmo 
 
 Lucca. 
 
 da Capraia, his sister’s son, on account 
 of the envy and fear excited in his mind 
 by the high esteem in which the gra- 
 cious manners of Anselmo were held by 
 the Pisans.—The power of the Guelfi be- 
 ing so much diminished, the archbishop 
 devised means to betray the Count Ugo- 
 lino, and caused him to be suddenly 
 attacked in his er by the fury of the 
 people, whom he_had exasperated, by 
 telling them that Ugolino had betrayed 
 Pisa, and given up their castles to the 
 citizers of Florence and of Lucca. He 
 was immediately compelled to surren- 
 der; his bastard son and his grandson 
 fell in the assault; and two of his sons, 
 with their two sons also, were conveyed 
 to prison. In the following March, the 
 Pisans, who had imprisoned the Count 
 Ugolino, with two of his sons and two 
 of his grandchildren, the offspring of 
 his son the Count Guelfo, in a tower on 
 the Piazza of the Anziani, caused the 
 tower to be locked, the key thrown into 
 the Arno, and all food to be withheld 
 
 from them. In a few days they died of . 
 
 hunger; but the count first with loud 
 cries declared his penitence, and yet 
 neither priest nor friar was allowed to 
 shrive him. All the five, when dead, 
 were dragged out of the prison and 
 meanly interred; and from thencefor- 
 ward the tower was called the Tower of 
 Famine, and so shall ever be. 
 
 2“ Unto_the mountain.” The moun- 
 tain S. Giuliano, between Pisa and 
 
 oe ee ee 
 
HELL 135 
 
 Lanfranchi with Sismondi and Gualandi. 
 
 After short course the father and the sons 
 Seem’d tired and lagging, and methought I saw 
 The sharp tusks gore their sides. When I awoke, 
 Before the dawn, amid their sleep I heard 
 
 My sons (for they were with me) weep and ask 
 For bread. Right cruel art thou, if no pang 
 Thou feel at thinking what my heart foretold; 
 And if not now, why use thy tears to flow? 
 Now had they waken’d; and the hour drew near 
 When they were wont to bring us food; the mind 
 Of each misgave him through his dream, and I 
 Heard, at its outlet underneath lock’d up 
 
 The horrible tower: whence, uttering not a word, 
 I look’d upon the visage of my sons. 
 
 I wept not: so all stone I felt within. 
 
 They wept: and one, my little Anselm, cried, 
 ‘Thou lookest so! Father, what ails thee?’ Yet 
 I shed no tear, nor answer’d all that day 
 
 Nor the next night, until another sun 
 
 Came out upon the world. When a faint beam 
 Had to our doleful prison made its way, 
 
 And in four countenances I descried 
 
 The image of my own, on either hand 
 
 Through agony I bit; and they, who thought 
 
 I did it through desire of feeding, rose 
 
 O’ the sudden, and cried, ‘ Father, we should grieve 
 Far less, if thou wouldst eat of us: thou gavest 
 These weeds of miserable flesh we wear; 
 
 And do thou strip them off from us again.’ 
 
 Then, not to make them sadder, I kept down 
 
 My spirit in stillness. That day and the next 
 We all were silent. Ah, obdurate earth! 
 
 Why open’dst not upon us? When we came 
 
 To the fourth day, then Gaddo at my feet 
 Outstretch’d did fling him, crying, ‘ Hast no help 
 For me, my father!’ There he died; and e’en 
 Plainly as thou seest me, saw I the three 
 
 Fall one by one ’twixt the fifth day and sixth: 
 Whence I betook me, now grown blind, to grope 
 
136 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Over them all, and for three days aloud 
 
 Call’d on them who were dead. Then, fasting got 
 The mastery of grief.’”’ Thus having spoke, 
 Once more upon ‘the wretched skull his teeth 
 He fasten’d like a mastiff’s ’gainst the bone, 
 Firm and unyielding. O thou Pisa! shame 
 
 Of all the people, who their dwelling make 
 
 In that fair region, where the Italian voice 
 
 Is heard; since that thy neighbors are so slack 
 To punish, from their deep foundations rise 
 Capraia and Gorgona,*? and dam up 
 
 The mouth of Arno; that each soul in thee 
 May perish in the waters. What if fame 
 Reported that thy castles were betray’d 
 
 By Ugolino, yet no right hadst thou 
 
 To stretch his children on the rack. For them, 
 Brigata, Uguccione, and the pair | 
 
 Of gentle ones, of whom my song hath told, 
 Their tender years, thou modern Thebes, did make 
 Uncapable of guilt. Onward we )pass’d, 
 
 Where others, skarf’d in rugged folds of ice, 
 Not on their feet were turn’d, but each reversed. 
 
 There, very weeping suffers not to weep; 
 
 For, at their eyes, grief, seeking passage, finds 
 Impediment, and rolling inward turns 
 
 For increase of sharp anguish: the first tears 
 Hang cluster’d, and like crystal vizors show, 
 Under the socket brimming all the cup. 
 
 Now though the cold had from my face dislodged 
 Each feeling, as ’t were callous, yet me seem’d 
 Some breath of wind I felt. “ Whence cometh this,” 
 Said I, “my Master? Is not here below 
 All vapor quench’d?’’ “Thou shalt be speedily,” 
 He answer’d, “ where thine eyes shall tell thee whence, 
 The cause descrying of this airy shower.” 
 
 Then cried out one, in the chill crust who mourn’d: 
 “O souls! so cruel, that the farthest post 
 Hath been assign’d you, from this face remove 
 The harden’d veil; that I may vent the grief 
 
 8“ Capraia and ‘Gorgona.” Small islands near the mouth of the Arno. 
 
HELL 
 
 137 
 
 Impregnate at my heart, some little space, 
 
 Ere it congeal again.’ 
 
 I thus replied: 
 
 “Say who thou wast, if thou wouldst have mine aid; 
 And if I extricate thee not, far down 
 As to the lowest ice may I descend.” 
 “The friar Alberigo,’* answer’d he, 
 “Am I, who from the evil garden pluck’d 
 Its fruitage, and am here repaid, the date 
 
 More luscious for my fig.” 
 
 “ Hah!” I exclaim’d, 
 
 “ Art thou, too, dead?” “ How in the world aloft 
 It fareth with my body,” answer’d he, 
 
 “T am right ignorant. 
 
 Such privilege 
 
 Hath Ptolomea,® that ofttimes the soul 
 
 Drops hither, ere by Atropos divorced. 
 
 And that thou mayst wipe out more willingly 
 The glazed tear-drops that o’erlay mine eyes, 
 Know that the soul, that moment she betrays, 
 As I did, yields her body to a fiend 
 
 Who after moves and governs it at will, 
 
 Till all its time be rounded: headlong she 
 
 Falls to this cistern. 
 
 And perchance above 
 
 Doth yet appear the body of a ghost, 
 
 Who here behind me winters. 
 
 Him thou know’st, 
 
 If thou but newly art arrived below. 
 
 The years are many that have passed away, 
 
 Since to this fastness Branca Doria® came.” 
 “Now,” answer’d I, “methinks thou mockest me; 
 
 For Branca Doria never yet hath died, 
 
 But doth all natural functions of a man, 
 
 Eats, drinks, and sleeps, and putteth raiment on.” 
 
 He thus: 
 
 “Not yet unto that upper foss 
 
 By th’ evil talons guarded, where the pitch 
 
 4“ The friar Alberigo.”? Alberigo de’ 
 Manfredi, of Faenza, one of the Frati 
 Godenti (Joyous Friars), who having 
 quarrelled with some of his brotherhood, 
 under pretence of wishing to be recon- 
 ciled, invited them to a banquet, at the 
 conclusion of which he called for the 
 fruit, a signal for the assassins to rush 
 in and despatch those whom he had 
 marked for destruction. Hence, adds 
 Landino, it is said proverbially of one 
 who has been stabbed, that he had had 
 some of the friar Alberigo’s fruit. 
 
 5 ** Ptolomea.” This circle is named 
 Ptolomea from Ptolemy the son of Abu- 
 bus, by whom Simon and his sons were 
 murdered, at a great banquet he had 
 made for them. See 1 Maccabees, ch. 
 xvi. Or from Ptolemy, Kin 
 the betrayer of Pompey the Great. 
 
 ** Branca Doria.” The family of Do- 
 ria was possessed of great influence in 
 Genoa. Branca is said to have mur- 
 dered his father-in-law, Michel Zanche, 
 introduced in Canto xxii. 
 
 of Egypt, 
 
138 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Tenacious boils, had Michel Zanche reach’d, 
 
 When this one left a demon in his stead 
 
 In his own body, and of one his kin, 
 
 Who with him treachery bidet now ‘put forth 
 
 Thy hand, and ope mine eyes.’ sl emma 
 
 Ill manners were best courtesy to see : 
 Ah Genoese! men perverse in eveTy way, 
 
 With every foulness stain’d, why from the earth 
 
 Are ye not cancel’d? Such an one of yours 
 
 I with Romagna’s darkest spirit’ found, 
 
 As, for his doings, even now in-soul 
 
 Is in Cocytus plunged, and yet doth ‘seem 
 
 In body still alive upon the earth. 
 
 CANTO XXXIV 
 
 ArcuMENT.—In the fourth and last-round of the ninth: circle, those who 
 
 have betrayed their benefactors are wholl ice. And 
 e , at whose back Dante and Virgil ascend, till 
 
 by a secret path they reach the surface of the outer hemisphere of 
 
 the earth, and once more obtain-si ars. 
 
 HE banners of Hell’s Monarch do come forth 
 Toward us; therefore look,” so spake my guide, 
 “ Tf thou discern him.” As, when breathes a cloud 
 Heavy and dense, or when the ‘shades .of night 
 Fall on our hemisphere, seems view’d from far 
 A windmill, which the blast stirs briskly round; 
 Such was the fabric then methought I saw. 
 To shield me from the wind, fort Ww 
 in ide: no covert else was there. 
 Now came I (and with fear I bid my strain 
 Record the marvel) where the souls were all 
 Whelm’d underneath, ‘transparent, as through glass 
 Pellucid the frail stem. ‘Some prone were laid; 
 Others stood upright, this upon the -soles, 
 That on his head, a third with face to feet 
 Arch’d like a bow. When to the point we came, 
 
 7 Romagna’s darkest spirit.” The friar Alberigo. 
 
 es ee ee 
 
 Re i omic 
 
HELL . 139 
 
 Whereat my guide was pleased that I should see 
 The creature eminent in beauty once, 
 He from before me:stepp’d and made me pause. 
 “Lo!” he exclaim’d, “lo! Dis; and lo! the place, 
 Where thou hast need to arm ‘thy heart with strength.” 
 How frozen and how faint I then became, 
 Ask me not, reader! for I write it not; 
 Since words would fail to tell thee of my state. 
 Raita Think thyself, 
 If quick conception workin thee at all, 
 How I did feel. That emperor, who sways 
 The realm of sorrow, at mid breast from. the ice 
 Stood forth; and I in stature am more like 
 A giant, than the giants .are ‘this arms. 
 Mark now how great that whole must be, which suits 
 With such a part. rege at nllifip 
 As he is hideous now, and yet did da 
 o scowl upon his Maker, well from him 
 May all our misery flow. Oh what a sight! 
 How passing strange it seem’d, wherrt Git spy 
 Upon his head three faces: one in front 
 he other two with this 
 shoulder join’d and at the crest; - 
 The right *twixt wan and yello: em’d; the left potiaca 
 To look on, such as come from Whence oe ftoe§) 
 Stoops to the lowlands. Under each-sket—fert Stwiese, 
 Two mighty wings, ‘enormous ‘as became 
 A bird so vast. Sails never such I saw 
 Outstretch’d on the wide sea. No plumes had they, 
 But were in texture like a ‘bat; ‘and these 
 He flapp’d i’ th’ air, that from him issued still 
 Three winds, wherewith Cocytus to its depth 
 Was frozen. At six eyes he wept: the tears 
 Adown three chins ditttt-wittt bloody foam. 
 every mouth his ft a sinnér-ctamp d, 
 Bruised as with ponderous engine; so that three 
 Were in this guise tormented. But far more 
 Than from that gnawing, was the foremost pang’d 
 By the fierce rending, whence ofttimes the back — 
 Was stript of all its skin. “ That upper spirit, 
 
140 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Who hath worst punishment,” so spake my guide, 
 
 “Ts Judas, 
 And plies the feet without. 
 
 ithin 
 
 Of th’.other two, 
 
 Whose heads are under, from the murky jaw 
 Abiipemearapecry er lo! how he doth writhe 
 And speaks not. he other, Cassius, that appears 
 So large of limb. But night now reascends; 
 And it is time for parting. All is seen.” 
 
 I clipp’d him round the neck; for so he bade: 
 And noting time and place, he, when the wings 
 Enough were oped, caught fast the shaggy sides, 
 And down from pile to pile descending stepp’d 
 Between the thick fell and jagged ice. 
 
 Soon as he reach’d the point, whereat the thigh 
 Upon the swelling of the haunches turns, | 
 My leader there, with pain and struggling hard, 
 Turn’d round his head where his feet stood before, 
 And grappled at the fell as one who mounts; 
 
 That into hell methought we turn’d again. 
 
 “Expect that by such stairs as these,” thus spake 
 The teacher, panting like a man forespent, 
 
 “We must depart from evil so extreme:” 
 Then at a rocky opening issued forth, 
 And placed me on the brink to sit, next join’d 
 
 With wary step my side. 
 
 I raised mine eyes, 
 
 Believing that I Lucifer should see 
 Where he was lately left, but saw him now 
 With legs held upward. Let the grosser sort, 
 Who see not what the point was I had past, 
 Bethink them if sore toil oppress’d me then. 
 “ Arise,” my master cried, “ upon thy feet. 
 The way is long, and much uncouth the road; 
 And now within one hour and half of noon 
 
 The sun returns.” 
 
 It was no palace-hall 
 
 Lofty and luminous wherein we stood, 
 
 1 Brutus.” Landino struggles, but I 
 fear in vain, to extricate Brutus from 
 the unworthy lot which is here assigned 
 him. He maintains, that by Brutus and 
 Cassius are not meant the individuals 
 known by those names, but any who 
 
 ut a lawful monarch to death. Yet if 
 
 sar was such, the conspirators might 
 
 be regarded as deserving of their doom. 
 If Dante, however, believed Brutus to 
 have been actuated by evil motives in 
 puttin 3 , the excellence 
 of thé patriot’s character in other re 
 spects would only have aggravated his 
 guilt in that particular. 
 
HELL 141 
 
 But natural dungeon where ill-footing was 
 
 And scant supply of light. “Ere from the abyss 
 
 I separate,” thus when risen I began: 
 
 “My guide! vouchsafe few words to set me free 
 From error’s thraldom. Where is now the ice? 
 How standeth he in posture thus reversed? 
 
 And how from eve to morn in space so brief 
 Hath the sun made his transit?” He in few 
 Thus answering spake: “ Thou deemest thou art still 
 On the other side the centre, where I grasp’d 
 
 The abhorred worm that boreth through the world. 
 Thou wast on the other side, so long as I 
 Descended; when I turn’d, thou didst o’erpass 
 That point, to which from every part is drage’d 
 All heavy substance. Thou art now arrived 
 
 Under the hemisphere opposed to that, 
 
 Which the great continent doth overspread, 
 
 And underneath whose canopy expired 
 
 The Man, that was born sinless and so lived. 
 
 Thy feet are planted on the smallest sphere, 
 
 Whose other aspect is Judecca. Morn 
 
 Here rises, when there evening sets: and he, 
 Whose shaggy pile we scaled, yet standeth fix’d, 
 
 As at the first. On this part he fell down 
 
 From heaven; and th’ earth, here prominent before, 
 Through fear of him did veil her with the sea, 
 
 And to our hemisphere retired. Perchance, 
 
 To shun him, was the vacant space left here, 
 
 By what of firm land on this side appears,? 
 
 That sprang aloof.” There is a place beneath, 
 From Belzebub as distant, as extends 
 
 The vaulted tomb ;* discover’d not by sight, 
 
 But by the sound of brooklet, that descends 
 
 This way along the hollow of a rock, 
 
 Which, as it winds with no precipitous course, 
 
 The wave hath eaten. By that hidden way 
 
 My guide and I did enter, to return 
 2'* By what of firm land on this side tomba’”’). This word is used to exe 
 
 eppears.”” The mountain of Purgatory. press the whole depth of the infernal 
 “The vaulted tomb” (* La region. 
 
142 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 To the fair world: and heedless of repose 
 
 We climb’d, he first, I following his steps, 
 Till on our yiew the beautiful lights of heaven 
 Dawn’d through a circular opening in the cave: 
 
 — Theace-issuing-we again beheld the stars. stars. 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 CANTO I 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The Poet describes the delight he experienced at issuing a 
 little before dawn from the infernal regions, into the pure air that 
 surrounds the isle of Purgatory; and then relates how, turning to 
 the right, he beheld four_stars never seen before, but by our first 
 parents, and met on his left the shade of Cato of Utica, who, having 
 warned him and Virgil what is needful to be done before they pro- 
 ceed on their way through Purgatory, disappears; and the two poets 
 go toward the shore, where Virgil cleanses Dante’s face with the 
 dew, and girds him with a reed, as Cato had commanded. 
 
 "ER better waves to speed her rapid course 
 () The light bark of my genius lifts the sail, 
 Well pleased to leave so cruel sea behind; 
 And of‘that-sererd region will I sing, | 
 In which the human spirit from sinful blot 
 Is purged, and for ascent to Heaven prepares. 
 Here, O ye hallow’d Nine! for in your train 
 I follow, here the deaden’d strain revive; 
 Nor let Calliope refuse to sound 
 A somewhat higher song, of that loud tone 
 Which when the wretched birds of chattering note? 
 Had heard, they of forgiveness lost all hope. 
 _ Sweet hue of eastern sapphire, that was spread 
 O’er the serene aspect of the pure air, 
 High up as the first circle,? to mine eyes 
 Unwonted joy renew’d, soon as I ’scaped 
 Forth from the atmosphere of deadly gloom, 
 That had mine eyes and bosom fill’d with grief. 
 
 i‘ Birds of chattering note.” For the §“‘ The first circle.’ Either, as some 
 fable of the daughters of Pierus who suppose, the moon; or, as Lombardi 
 challenged the muses to sing, and were (who likes to be as far off the rest of 
 by them changed into magpies, see the commentators as nossible) will have 
 Ovid, ‘* Met.” lib. v. fab. 5. it, the highest circle of the stars, 
 
 _ 143 
 
144 
 
 3 Planet.” us. 6‘ Our first parents.” In the terres: 
 4“ The Bisco tiene.” The constel- trial paradise, placed, as we shall see, 
 by our Poet, on the summit of Purga- 
 
 tory. 
 7“ The wain.” Charles’s Wain, or 
 
 lation of the Fish veiled by the more 
 luminous body of Venus, then a morn- 
 
 Te 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 The radiant planet,® that to love invites, 
 Wade allthe-Grient laugh, and veil’d beneath 
 The Pisces’ light,* that in his escort came. 
 
 To the right hand I turn’d, and fix’d my mind 
 On the other pole attentive, where I saw 
 
 Four Sas * ne'er seen before save by the ken 
 
 Of our first parents.© Heaven of their rays 
 Seem’d joyous. O thou northern site! bereft 
 Indeed, and widow’d, since of these deprived. 
 
 As from this view I had desisted, straight 
 Turning a little toward the other pole, | 
 There from whence now the wain? had disappear’d, 
 I saw an old man ® standing by my side 
 Alone, so worthy of reverence in his look, 
 
 That ne’er from son to father more was owed. 
 Low down his beard, and mix’d with hoary white, 
 Descended, like his locks, which, parting, fell 
 Upon his breast in double fold. The beams 
 
 Of those four luminaries on his face 
 
 So brightly shone, and with such radiance clear 
 Deck’d it, that I beheld him as the sun. 
 
 “ Say who are ye, that stemming the blind stream, 
 Forth from the eternal prison-house have fled?” 
 He spoke and moved those venerable plumes. 
 
 “ Who hath conducted, or with lantern sure 
 Lights you emerging from the depth of night, 
 That makes the infernal valley ever black? 
 Are the firm statutes of the dread abyss 
 
 Broken, or in high heaven new laws ordain’d, 
 That thus, condemn’d, ye to my caves approach?” 
 
 My guide, then laying hold on me, by words 
 And intimations given with hand and head, 
 Made my bent knees and eye submissive pay 
 Due reverence; then thus to him replied: 
 
 “Not of myself I come; a Dame from heaven ® 
 
 ing star. he 
 “Four stars.” The four stars are Bodtes. 
 
 here symbolical of the four cardinal vir- 8 “* An old man.” 
 
 tues, Prudence Justice, Fortitude, and °“ A Dame from ven.” 
 
 See “ Hell,” ii. 54. 
 
PURGATORY 145 
 
 Descending, him besought me in my charge 
 
 To bring. But since thy will implies, that more 
 Our true condition I unfold at large, 
 
 Mine is not to deny thee thy request. 
 
 This mortal ne’er hath seen the furthest gloom; 
 But erring by his folly had approach’d 
 
 So near, that little space was left to turn. 
 
 Then, as before I told, I was despatch’d 
 
 To work his rescue; and no way remain’d 
 
 Save this which I have ta’en. I have display’d 
 Before him all the regions of the bad; 
 
 And purpose now those spirits to display, 
 
 That under thy command are purged from sin. 
 How I have brought him would be long to say. 
 From high descends the virtue, by whose aid 
 
 I to thy sight and hearing him have led. 
 
 Now may our coming please thee. In the search 
 Of liberty he journeys: that how dear, 
 
 They know who for her sake have life refused. 
 Thou knowest, to whom death for her was sweet 
 In Utica, where thou didst leave those weeds, 
 That in the last great day will shine so bright. 
 He breathes, and I of Minos am not bound, 
 For us the eternal edicts are unmoved’ 
 
 Abiding in that circle, where the eyes 
 
 Of thy chaste Marcia beam, who still in look 
 Prays thee, O hallow’d spirit! to own her thine 
 Then by her love we implore thee, let us pass 
 Through thy seven regions ;?° for which, best thanks 
 I for thy favor will to her return, 
 
 If mention there below thou not disdain.” 
 
 “ Marcia so pleasing in my sight was found,” 
 He then to him rejoin’d, “ while I was there, 
 That all she ask’d me I was fain to grant. 
 
 Now that beyond the accursed stream she dwells, 
 She may no longer move me, by that law," 
 Which was ordain’d me, when I issued thence. 
 7%“ Through thy seven regions.” The livered by Christ from Limbo, 3 
 seven rounds of Purgatory, in which change of affections accompanied his 
 
 .the seven capital sins are punished. change of place. 
 u* By that law.”” When he was de- _ : 
 
146 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Not so, if Dame from heaven, as thou sayst, 
 Moves and directs thee; then no flattery needs. 
 Enough for me that in her name thou ask. 
 Go therefore now: and with a slender reed ** 
 See that thou duly gird him, and his face 
 Lave, till all sordid stain thou wipe from thence. 
 For not with eye, by any cloud obscured, 
 Would it be seemly before him to come, 
 
 _ Who stands the foremost minister in Heaven. 
 This islet all around, there far beneath, 
 Where the wave beats it, on the oozy bed 
 Produces store of reeds. No other plant, 
 Cover’d with leaves, or harden’d in its stalk, 
 There lives, not bending to the water’s sway. 
 After, this way return not; but the sun 
 Will show you, that now rises, where to take 
 The mountain in its easiest ascent.” 
 
 He disappear’d; and I myself upraised 
 Speechless, and to my guide retiring close, 
 Toward him turn’d mine eyes. He thus began: 
 “My son! observant thou my steps pursue. 
 We must retreat to rereward; for that way 
 The champain to its low extreme declines.” 
 
 The dawn had chased the matin hour of prime, 
 Which fled before it, so that from afar 
 I spied the trembling of the ocean stream. 
 
 We traversed the deserted plain, as one 
 Who, wander’d from his track, thinks every step 
 Trodden in vain till he regain the path. 
 
 When we had come, where yet the tender dew 
 Strove with the sun, and in a place where fresh 
 The wind breathed o’er it, while it slowly dried; 
 Both hands extended on the watery grass 
 My master placed, in graceful act and kind. 
 Whence I of his intent before apprised, 
 
 _Stretch’d out to him my cheeks suffused with tears. 
 -- There to my visage he anew restored ! 
 That hue which the dun shades of hell conceal’d.. 
 
 =. EY 
 Sip} 
 
 13 « A’ slendet ieee The reed is bility, ‘to’-be -meant fas: a type of sim- 
 here supposed, with sufficient proba-  plicity and patience. 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 147 
 
 Then on the solitary shore arrived, 
 That never sailing on its waters saw 
 Man that could after measure back his course, 
 He girt me in such manner as had pleased 
 Him who instructed; and, oh strange to tell! 
 As he selected every humble plant, 
 Wherever one was pluck’d another there 
 Resembling, straightway in its place arose. 
 
 CANTO II 
 
 ARGUMENT.—They behold a vessel under conduct of an angel, coming 
 over the waves with spirits to Purgatory, among whom, when the 
 passengers have landed, janie recognizes his triend Case'la; but, 
 while they are entertained by him with a song, they hear Cato ex- 
 claiming against their negligent loitering, and at that rebuke hasten 
 
 forward to the mountain. 
 
 That covers, with the most exalted point 
 
 N OW had the sun? to that horizon reach’d, 
 
 Of its meridian circle, Salem’s walls; 
 
 nd ni 
 
 that opposite to him her orb 
 
 Rounds, from the stream of Ganges issued forth, 
 Holding the scales,? that from her hands are dropt 
 When she reigns highest :* so that where I was, 
 Aurora’s white and vermeil-tinctured cheek 
 To orange turn’d as she in age increased. 
 Meanwhile we linger’d by the water’s brink, 
 
 Like men, who, musing on their road, in thought 
 Journey, while motionless the body rests. 
 
 ~ When lo! as near upon the hour of dawn, 
 Through the thick vapors Mars with fiery beam 
 Glares down in the West, over the ocean floor; 
 So seem’d, what once again I hope to view, 
 A light, so swiftly coming through the sea, 
 No winged course might equal its career. 
 
 1" Now had the sun.” Dante was 
 now antipodal to Jerusalem; so that 
 while the sun was setting with respect 
 to that place, which he supposes to be 
 the middle of the inhabited earth, to 
 him it was rising. A . 
 ap The scales.” The constellation Li- 
 
 $“ When she reigns highest” 
 (‘‘ Quando soverchia ’’) is (according to 
 Venturi, whom I ave __ followed 
 ‘‘ when the autumnal equinox is passed.” 
 Lombardi supposes it to mean ‘ when 
 the nights begin to increase, that is, 
 after the summer solstice.” 
 
oe 
 
 148 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 From which when for a space I had withdrawn 
 Mine eyes, to make inquiry of my guide, 
 
 Again I look’d, and saw it grown in size 
 
 And brightness: then on either side appear’d 
 Something, but that I knew not, of bright hue, 
 
 And by degrees from underneath it came 
 
 Another. My preceptor silent yet ~“ 
 
 Stood, while the brightness, that we first discern’d, 
 Open’d the form of wings: then when he knew 
 The pilot, cried aloud, “Down! Down! Bend low 
 Thy knees! Behold God’s angel! Fold thy hands! 
 Now shalt thou see true ministers indeed! 
 
 Lo! how all human means he sets at naught; 
 
 So that nor oar he needs, nor other sail 
 
 Except his wings, between such distant shores. 
 
 Lo! how straight up to heaven he holds them rear’d, 
 Winnowing the air with those eternal plumes, 
 That not like mortal hairs fall off or change.” 
 
 As more and more toward us came, more bright 
 Appear’d the bird of God, nor could the eye 
 Endure his splendor near: I mine bent down. 
 
 He drove ashore in a small bark so swift 
 
 And _light, that in its course no wave it drank. 
 The heavenly steersman at the prow was seen, 
 Visibly written “ Blessed ” in his looks. 
 Within, a hundred spirits and more there sat. 
 
 “In Exitu* Israel de Egypto,” 
 
 All with one voice together sang, with what 
 
 In the remainder of that hymn is writ. 
 
 Then soon as with the sign of Holy Cross 
 
 He bless’d them, they at once leap’d out on land: 
 He, swiftly as he came, return’d. The crew, 
 There left, appear’d astounded with the place, 
 Gazing around, as one who sees new sights. 
 
 From every side the sun darted his beams, 
 
 And with his arrowy radiance from mid heaven_ 
 Had chased the Capricorn, when that strange tribe, 
 Lifting their eyes toward us: “If ye know, 
 Declare what path will lead us to the mount.” — 
 
 4“In Exitu.” ‘When Israel came out of Egypt.” Ps. cxiv, 
 
PURGATORY Sean 
 
 Them Virgil answer’d: “ Ye suppose, perchance, 
 Us well acquainted with this place: but here, 
 We, as yourselves, are strangers. Not long erst 
 We came, before you but a little space, 
 
 By other road so rough and hard, that now 
 
 The ascent will seem to us as play.” The spirits, 
 Who from my breathing had perceived I lived, 
 Grew pale with wonder. As the multitude 
 Flock round a herald sent with olive branch, 
 
 To hear what news he bring's, and in their haste 
 Tread one another down; e’en so at sight 
 
 Of me those happy spirits were fix’d, each one 
 Forgetful of its errand to depart | 
 
 Where, cleansed from sin, it might be made all fair. 
 
 Then one I saw darting before the rest 
 With such fond ardor to embrace me, I 
 To do the like was moved. O shadows vain! 
 Except in outward semblance: thrice my hands 
 I clasp’d behind it, they as oft return’d 
 Empty into my breast again. Surprise 
 I need must think was painted in my looks, 
 
 For that the shadow smiled and backward drew. 
 To follow it I hasten’d, but with voice 
 
 Of sweetness it enjoin’d me to desist. 
 
 Then who it was I knew, and pray’d of it, 
 
 To talk with me it would a little pause. 
 
 It answer’d: “ Thee as in my mortal frame 
 
 I loved, so loosed from it I love thee still, 
 
 And therefore pause: but why walkest thou here? ” 
 
 “Not without purpose once more to return, 
 Thou find’st me, my Casella,> where I am, 
 Journeying this way” I said: “‘ but how of thee 
 Hath so much time been lost?” He answer’d straight: 
 
 “No outrage hath been done to me, if he,® 
 Who when and whom he chooses takes, hath oft 
 
 &* My Casella.”” A Florentine, cele- ‘** Dante shall give fame leave to set thee 
 
 brated for his skill in music, “ in whose igher 
 
 company,” says Landino, “ Dante often Than his Casella, whom he wooed to 
 recreated his spirits, wearied by severer sing, - 
 
 studies.”” See Dr. Burney’s “ History Met in the milder shades of Purga- 
 of Music,” vol. ii. cap. iv. p. 322. Mil- ory.” 
 
 ton has a fine allusion to this meeting in ®** He.”” The conducting angel. 
 
 his sonnet to Henry Lawes: 
 
150 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Denied me passage here; since of just will 
 His will he makes. These three months past? indeed, 
 He, who so chose to‘enter, ‘with free leave 
 Hath taken; whence I wandering by ‘the shore ® 
 Where Tiber’s wave grows salt, of him gain’d kind 
 Admittance, at that river’s mouth, toward which 
 His wings are pointed; for there always throng 
 All such as not 'to Acheron descend.” 
 Then I: “If new law ‘taketh not from ‘thee 
 Memory or custom of love-tuned song, 
 That whilom all‘my cares had power to ’swage; 
 Please thee therewith a ‘little ‘to console 
 My spirit, that encumber’d with its frame, 
 Travelling so far, of :pain4s:overcome.” 
 “Love, that discourses in my ‘thoughts,” he then 
 Began in such soft accents,‘that within 
 The sweetness ‘thrills‘me*yet. My gentle guide, 
 And all who came with ‘him, ‘so well were pleased, 
 That seem’d naught ‘élse might in ‘their ‘thoughts have room. 
 Fast fix’d in mute ‘attention to ‘his notes 
 We stood, when lo! that old ‘man venerable 
 Exclaiming, “ How is this, ye tardy spirits? 
 What negligence detains ‘you ‘loitering here? 
 Run to the mountain ‘to cast off ‘those ‘scales, 
 That from your eyes ‘the sight of »God «conceal.” 
 As a wild flock of pigeons, ‘to’their food 
 Collected, blade or tares, without ‘their :pride 
 Accustom’d, and in still and quiet ‘sort, 
 If aught alarm ‘them, ‘suddenly desert 
 Their meal, assail’d by more important care; 
 So I that new-come troop beheld, ‘the ‘song 
 Deserting, hasten to the mountain’s side, 
 As one who goes, yet, where he tends, ‘knows not. 
 Nor with less hurried step did we depart. 
 7“* These three months past.”” Since punishment were supposed to pass overt 
 
 the time of the Jubilee, during which to Purgatory as soon as they pleased. 
 all spirits not condemned ‘to ‘eternal 8“ The sshore.”? Ostia. 
 
 OE a RS Say sgl 
 
 apne eet | 
 
PURGATORY: “ISI 
 
 CANTO TI 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Our Poet, perceiving .n ow except that .cast by his 
 own body, is fear fu sat Ning has coserted him; but he is iteed 
 from that error, and both arri gether at the foot of the moun- 
 tain; on finding it too steep to climb, they inquire the way from a 
 troop of spirits that are.coming toward them, and are by them shown 
 which is the easiest ascent. Manfredi, King of Naples, who is one 
 
 of these spirits, bids Dante inform his daughter Costanza, Queen of 
 Arragon, of the manner in which he had died. 
 
 HEM sudden flight ‘had scatter’d-o’er the plain, 
 Turn’d toward the mountain, whither reason’s voice 
 Drives us: I, tomy faithful company 
 
 Adhering, left it‘not. ‘For how, of ‘him 
 Deprived, might I‘have sped? or who, beside, 
 Would o’er the mountainous tract have led my steps? 
 He, with the bitter pang of self-remorse, 
 Seem’d smitten. O clear conscience, and upright! 
 How doth a little failing wound thee sore. 
 Soon as his feet desisted (slackening pace) 
 From haste, that mars all decency of:act, 
 My mind, that in itself before was wrapt, 
 Its thought expanded, as with joy restored; 
 And full against the steep ascent I set 
 My face, where ‘highest ‘to heaven its top o’erflows. 
 The sun, that flared behind, with ruddy beam 
 Before my form was ‘broken; for in-me 
 His rays resistance:met. I 'turn’d aside 
 With fear of being left, when I beheld 
 Only before myself the ground obscured. 
 When thus my solace, turning him around, 
 Bespake me kindly: “ Why distrustest thou? 
 Believest not I'am ‘with ‘thee, thy sure guide? 
 [t now is evening there, where ‘buried lies 
 The body in which I cast a shade, removed 
 To Naples! from Brundusium’s ‘wall. ‘Nor thou 
 Marvel, if before-me-no shadow fall, 
 More than that in the skyey element 
 
 21" To Naples.” Virgil died:at Brundusium, from whence his body is said 
 ' to have been removed to Naples. 
 
152 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 One ray obstructs not other. To endure 
 Torments of heat and cold extreme, like frames 
 That virtue hath disposed, which, how it works, 
 Wills not to us should be reveal’d. Insane, 
 Who hopes our reason may that space explore, 
 Which holds three persons in one substance knit. 
 Seek not the wherefore, race of human-kind; 
 Could ye have seen the whole, no need had been 
 For Mary to bring forth. Moreover, ye 
 Have seen such men desiring fruitlessly ; 
 To whose desires, repose would have been given, 
 That now but serve them for eternal grief. 
 _I speak of Plato, and the Stagirite, 
 And others many more.” And then he bent 
 Downward his forehead, and in troubled mood 
 Broke off his speech. Meanwhile we had arrived 
 Far as the mountain’s foot, and there the rock 
 Found of so steep ascent, that nimblest steps 
 To climb it had been vain. The most remote, 
 Most wild, untrodden path, in all the tract 
 *Twixt Lerice and Turbia,? were to this 
 A ladder easy and open of access. _ 
 
 ‘Who knows on which hand now the steep declines,” 
 My master said, and paused; “so that he may 
 Ascend, who journeys without aid of wing?” 
 
 And while, with looks directed to the ground, 
 The meaning of the pathway he explored, 
 
 And I gazed upward round the stony height; 
 On the left hand appear’d to us a troop 
 
 Of spirits, that toward us moved their steps; 
 Yet moving seem’d not, they so slow approach’d. 
 
 I thus my guide address’d: “ Upraise thine eyes: 
 Lo! that way some, of whom thou mayst obtain 
 Counsel, if of thyself thou find’st it not.” 
 
 Straightway he look’d, and with free speech replied: 
 “Let us tend thither: they but softly come. 
 
 And thou be firm in hope, my son beloved.” 
 
 Now was that crowd from us distant as far, 
 
 2“ Twixt Lerice and Turbia.” At Genoese republic; the former on the 
 that time the two extremities of tha east, the latter on the west. 
 
PURGATORY 153 
 
 (When we some thousand steps, I say, had past) 
 As at a throw the nervous arm could fling; 
 When all drew backward on the massy crags 
 Of the steep bank, and firmly stood unmoved, 
 As one, who walks in doubt, might stand to look. 
 “O spirits perfect! O already chosen!” 
 Virgil to them began: “ by that blest peace, 
 Which, as I deem, is for you all prepared, 
 Instruct us where the mountain low declines, 
 So that attempt to mount it be not vain. 
 For who knows most, him loss of time most grieves.” 
 
 As sheep, that step from forth their fold, by one, 
 Or pairs, or three at once; meanwhile the rest 
 Stand fearfully, bending the eye and nose 
 To ground, and what the foremost does, that do 
 ‘The others, gathering round her if she stops, 
 Simple and quiet, nor the cause discern ; 
 
 So saw I moving to advance the first, 
 
 Who of that fortunate crew were at the head, 
 
 Of modest mien, and graceful in their gait. 
 
 When they before me had beheld the light 
 
 From my right side fall broken on the ground, 
 
 So that the shadow reach’d the cave; they stopp’d, 
 
 And somewhat back retired: the same did all 
 
 Who follow’d, though unweeting of the cause. 
 “Unask’d of you, yet freely I confess, 
 
 This is a human body which ye see. 
 
 That the sun’s light is broken on the ground, 
 
 Marvel not: but believe, that not without 
 
 Virtue derived from Heaven, we to climb 
 
 Over this wall aspire.” So them bespake 
 
 My master; and that virtuous tribe rejoin’d: 
 
 “Turn, and before you there the entrance lies ;” 
 
 Making a signal to us with bent hands. 
 
 Then of them one began. “ Whoe’er thou art, | 
 Who journey’st thus this way, thy visage turn, 
 Think if me elsewhere thou hast ever seen.” 
 
 I toward him turn’d, and with fix’d eye beheld. 
 Comely and fair, and penile of aspect 
 He seem’d, but on oné brow a gash was mark’d. 
 
154 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 When humbly I disclaim’d to have beheld 
 
 Him ever: 
 
 “Now behold!” he said, and show’d 
 
 High on his breast a wound: then smiling spake. 
 “Tam Manfredi,* grandson to the Queen 
 Costanza :* whence I pray thee, when return’d, 
 
 er > go, the parent glad 
 Of Aragonia and Sicilia’s pride; 
 Aad of the truth inform Bo if of me 
 Aught else be told. When by two mortal blows 
 My frame was shatter’d, I betook myself 
 Weeping to him, who of free will forgives. 
 My sins were horrible: but so wide arms 
 Hath goodness infinite, that it receives 
 
 All who turn to it. 
 
 Had this text divine 
 
 Been of Cosenza’s shepherd better scann’d, 
 
 Who then by Clement * on my hunt was set, 
 
 Yet at the bridge’s head my bones had lain, 
 
 Near Benevento, by the heavy mole 
 
 Protected; but the rain now drenches them, 
 And the wind drives, out of the kingdom’s bounds, 
 Far as the stream of Verde,’ where, with lights 
 Extinguish’d, he removed them from their bed. 
 Yet by their curse we are not so destroy’d, 
 
 But that the eternal love may turn, while hope 
 
 Retains her verdant blossom. 
 
 True it is, 
 
 That such one as in contumacy dies 
 Against the holy Church, though he repent, 
 
 8 “ Manfredi.”” King of Naples and 
 Sicily, and the natural son of Frederick 
 I e was lively and agreeable in his 
 manners, and delighted in poetry, musi 
 and dancing. But he was luxurious an 
 ambitious, void of religion, and in his 
 philosophy an Epicurean. He fell in 
 the battle with Charles of Anjou in 1265, 
 alluded to in Canto xxviii. of “ Hell, 
 ver. 13, or rather in that which ensued in 
 
 the course of a few days at Benevento. 
 
 But the successes of Charles were so 
 rapidly followed up that our author, ex- 
 act as he generally is, might not have 
 thought it necessary to distinguish them 
 in point of time; for this seems the best 
 method of seco iag some little ap- 
 parent inconsistency between him and 
 the annalist. ‘‘ Dying excommunicated, 
 King Charles did not allow of his being 
 buried in sacred ground, but he was in- 
 terred near the bridge of Benevento; 
 and on his grave there was cast a stone 
 
 by every one of the army, whence there 
 was formed a great mound of stones, 
 But some have said, that afterward, by 
 command of the Pope, the Bishop of 
 Cosenza took up his body and sent it 
 out of the kingdom, because it was the 
 land of the hurch; and that it was 
 buried oe the river Verde, on the bor- 
 ders of the kingdom and of Campagna. 
 4 “* Costanza.”’ See “ Paradise,”, Canto 
 iii. 121. 
 
 5“ My fair daughter.” Costanza, the 
 daughter of Manfredi, and wife of Peter 
 III, King of Arragon, oy whom she 
 was mother to Frederick, King oi Sicily, 
 and James, King of Arragon. With the 
 latter of these she was at Rome, 1296, 
 
 ©“ Clement.” Pope Clement IV. 
 
 ™*The stream of Verde.” A river 
 near Ascoli, that falls into the Tronto. 
 The “ extinguished lights ” formed part 
 of the ceremony at the interment of 
 one excommunicated. 
 
PURGATORY 155 
 
 Must wander thirty-fold for all the time 
 
 In his presumption past: if such decree 
 
 Be not by prayers of good men shorter made. 
 Look therefore if thou canst advance my bliss; 
 Revealing to my good Costanza, how 
 
 Thou hast beheld me, and beside the terms 
 Laid on me of that interdict; for here 
 
 By means of those below much profit comes.” 
 
 CANTO IV. 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Dante and Virgil ascend the mountain of Purgatory, by a 
 steep and narrow path pent in on each side by rock, till they reach 
 a part of it that opens into a ledge or cornice. There seating them- 
 selves, and turning to the east, Dante wonders at seeing the sun on 
 their left, the cause of which is explained to him by Virgil; and 
 while they continue their discourse, a voice addresses them, at which 
 they turn, and find several spirits behind the rock, and among the 
 rest one named Belacqua, who had been known to our Poet on 
 earth, and who tells that he is doomed to linger there on account of 
 his having delayed his repentance to the last. 
 
 HEN by sensations of delight or pain, 
 That any of our faculties hath seized, 
 Entire the soul collects herself, it seems 
 She is intent upon that power alone; 
 And thus the error is disproved, which holds 
 The soul not singly lighted in the breast. 
 . And therefore when as aught is heard or seen, 
 That firmly keeps the soul toward it turn’d, 
 
 Time passes. and 2 tman_perceives it not. 
 at, whereby we hearken, 1s one power; 
 Another that, which the whole spirit hath: 
 This is as it were bound, while that is free. 
 
 This found I true by proof, hearing that spirit, . 
 And wondering; for full fifty steps? aloft 7" 
 The sun had measured, unobserved of me, 
 
 we arrived where all with one accord | 
 The spirits shouted, * ‘Here is what ye ask,” if 
 
 aa ae Full ‘fitt steps.” Three hours and twenty minutes, fifteen’ degrees being 
 reckoned to an hour. : i 
 
156 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 A larger aperture ofttimes is stopt, 
 With forked stake of thorn by villager, 
 When the ripe grape imbrowns, than was the path, 
 By which my guide, and I behind him close, 
 Ascended solitary, when that troop 
 Departing left us. On Sanleo’s? road 
 Who journeys, or to Noli* low descends, 
 Or mounts Bismantua’s * height, must use his feet; 
 But here a man had need to fly, I mean 
 With the swift wing and plumes of high desire, 
 Conducted by his aid, who gave me hope, 
 And with light furnish’d to direct my way. 
 
 We through the broken rock ascended, close 
 Pent on each side, while underneath the ground 
 Ask’d help of hands and feet. When we arrived 
 Near on the highest ridge of the steep bank, 
 Where the plain level open’d, I exclaim’d, 
 
 “O Master! say, which way can we proceed.” 
 
 He answer’d, “ Let no step of thine recede. 
 Behind me gain the mountain, till to us 
 Some practised guide appear.” That eminence 
 Was lofty, that no eye might reach its point; 
 And the side proudly rising, more than line 
 From the mid quadrant to the centre drawn. 
 I, wearied, thus began: “ Parent beloved! 
 Turn and behold how I remain alone, 
 If thou stay not.” ‘ My son!” he straight replied, 
 “Thus far put forth thy strength;” and to a track 
 Pointed, that, on this side projecting, round 
 Circles the hill. His words so spurr’d me on, 
 That I, behind him, clambering, forced myself, 
 Till my feet press’d the circuit plain beneath. 
 There both together seated, turn’d we round 
 To eastward, whence was our ascent: and oft 
 Many beside have with delight look’d back. 
 
 First on the nether shores I turn’d mine eyes, 
 
 3“ Sanleo.” A fortress on the sum- 3“ Noli.” In the Genoese territory, 
 mit of Montefeltro. The situation is between Finale and Savona. 
 described by Troya, “ Veltro Allegor- ‘“ Bismantua.” A steep mountain in 
 
 ico,” p. 11%. It is a conspicuous object the territory of Reggio. 
 to travellers along the cornice on the 
 
 Riviera di Genoa. 
 
 Fog 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 157 
 
 Then raised them to the sun, and wondering mark’d _ 
 Lhat trom the lett it smote us. oon perceived 
 That poet sage, how at the car of light 
 Amazed ° I stood, where ’twixt us and the north 
 Its course it enter’d. Whence he thus to me: 
 “Were Leda’s offspring ® now in company 
 Of that broad mirror, that high up and low 
 Imparts his light beneath, thou mightst behold 
 The ruddy Zodiac nearer to the Bears 
 Wheel, if its ancient course it not forsook. 
 How that may be, if thou wouldst think; within 
 Pondering, imagine Sion with this mount 
 Placed on the earth, so that to both be one 
 Horizon, geoato Restispherss apart | 
 Where lies the pa at Phaéton ill knew 
 To guide his erring chariot: thou wilt see ° 
 How of necessity by this, on one, 
 He passes, while by that on the other side; 
 If with that clear view thine intellect attend.” 
 
 “ Of truth, kind teacher!” I exclaim’d, “ so clear 
 Aught saw I never, as I now discern, 
 Where seem’d my ken to fail, that the mid orb ® 
 Of the supernal motion (which in terms 
 Of art is call’d the Equator, and remains 
 Still ’twixt the sun and winter, for the cause 
 Thou hast assign’d, from hence toward the north 
 Departs, when those, who in the Hebrew land 
 Were dwellers, saw it toward the warmer part. 
 But if it please thee, I would gladly know, 
 
 5 ** Amazed.” He wonders that being 
 turned to the east he should see the sun 
 on his left, since in all the regions on 
 this side of the tropic of Cancer it is 
 seen on the right of one who turns his 
 face toward the east; not recollecting 
 that he was now antipodal to Europe, 
 . from whence he had seen the sun tak- 
 ing an opposite course. 
 
 6 “* Were Leda’s offspring.”’ ‘* As the 
 constellation of the Gemini is nearer 
 the Bears than Aries is, it is certain that 
 if the sun, instead of being in Aries, 
 had been in Gemini, both the sun and 
 that et of the Zodiac made ‘ ruddy’ 
 by the sun, would have been seen to 
 * wheel nearer to the Bears.’ By the 
 ‘ruddy Zodiac’ must necessarily be un- 
 derstood that portion of the Zodiac 
 affected or made red by the sun; for 
 
 Classics. Vol. 34—H 
 
 the whole of the Zodiac never changes, 
 nor appears to change, with respect to 
 the remainder of the heavens.”—Lom- 
 
 ardi. 
 
 7“ The path.” The ecliptic. 
 
 8“ Thou wilt see.” ‘“‘ If you consider 
 that this mountain of Purgatory, and 
 that of Sion, are antipodal to each other, 
 you will perceive that the sun must rise 
 on opposite sides of the respective em- 
 inences.”’ 
 
 ®°“ That the mid orb.” “That the 
 equator (which is always situated be- 
 tween that part where, when the sun 
 is, he causes summer, and the other 
 where his absence produces winter) re- 
 cedes from this mountain toward the 
 north, at the time when the Jews in- 
 habiting Mount Sion saw it depart to- 
 ward the south.”—Lombardi. 
 
158 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 far we have to jo 
 
 Mounts higher, than this sight of mine can mount.” 
 
 He thus tome: “ Such is this steep ascent, 
 That it is ever difficult at first, 
 But_more a man proceeds, less evil grows.” 
 When pleasant it shall seem to thee, so much 
 That upward going shall be easy to thee 
 As in a vessel to go down the tide, 
 Then of this path thou wilt have reach’d the end. 
 There hope to rest thee from thy toil. No more 
 I answer, and thus far for certain know.” 
 As he his words had spoken, near to us 
 A voice there sounded: “ Yet ye first perchance 
 May to repose you by constraint be led.” 
 At sound thereof each turn’d; and on the left 
 A huge stone we beheld, of which nor I 
 Nor he before was ware. Thither we drew; 
 And there were some, who in the shady place 
 Behind the rock were standing, as a man 
 Through idleness might stand. Among them one, 
 Who seem’d to be much wearied, sat him down, 
 And with his arms did fold his knees about, 
 Holding his face between them downward bent. 
 
 “Sweet Sir!” I cried, “ behold that man who shows 
 
 Himself more idle than if_laziness Teciseean 
 Ware Sister to him?” Straight he turn’d to us, 
 And, o’er the thigh lifting his face, observed, 
 Then in these accents spake: ‘“ Up then, proceed, 
 Thou valiant one.” Straight who it was I knew; 
 Nor could the pain I felt (for want of breath 
 Still somewhat urged me) hinder my approach. 
 And when I came to him, he scarce his head 
 Uplifted, saying, “ Well hast thou discern’d, 
 How from the left the sun his chariot leads.” 
 His lazy acts and broken words my lips 
 To laughter somewhat moved; when I began: 
 “ Belacqua,* now for thee I grieve no more. 
 
 10 “* But more a man proceeds, less there is found this brief notice: ‘* This 
 evil grows.’ nding he Belacqua was an excellent master of the 
 j is sin Ls harp and lute, but very negligent in his 
 
 11 “Belacqua.” Concerni is man, affairs both spiritual and tempora al.”” 
 in the margin of the Monte Casino MS. 
 
PURGATORY 159 
 
 But tell, why thou art seated upright there. 
 
 Waitest thou escort to conduct thee hence? 
 
 Or blame I only thine accustom’d ways?” 
 
 Then he: “ My brother! of what use to mount, 
 
 When, to my suffering, would not let me pass 
 
 The bird of God, who at the portal sits? 
 
 Behoves so long that heaven first bear me round 
 
 Without its limits, as in life it bore; 
 
 Because I, to the end, repentant sighs 
 
 Delay’d; if prayer do not aid me first, 
 
 That riseth up from heart which lives in grace. 
 
 What other kind avails, not heard in heaven? ” 
 Before me now the poet, up the mount 
 
 Ascending, cried: “ Haste thee: for see the sun 
 
 Has touch’d the point meridian; and the night 
 
 Now covers with her foot Marocco’s shore.” 
 
 CANTO V 
 
 ARGUMENT.—They meet with others, who had deferred their repentance 
 
 till they were overtaken by a violent death, when sufficient space 
 being allowed them, they were then saved; and among these, Giac- 
 opo del Cassero, Buonconte da Montefeltro, and Pia, a lady of 
 Sienna. 
 
 OW had I left those spirits, and pursued 
 
 The steps of my conductor; when behind, 
 
 Pointing the finger at me, one exclaim’d: 
 “ See, how it seems as if the light not shone 
 From the left hand 1 of him beneath,” and he, 
 As living, seems to be led on.” Mine eyes, 
 I at that sound reverting, saw them gaze, 
 Through wonder, first at me; and then at me 
 And the light broken underneath, by turns. } 
 “Why are thy thoughts thus riveted,” my guide 
 Exclaim’d, “ that thou hast slack’d thy pace? or how 
 
 i“_ it seems as if the light not on their left; so now that they have 
 shone risen and are again going forward, it 
 
 From the left hand.” must be on the opposite side of them. 
 
 The sun was, therefore, on the right of 2‘* Of him beneath.” Of Dante, who 
 
 our travellers. For, as before, when was following Virgil up the mountain, 
 seated and looking to the east from and therefore was the lower of the two. 
 whence they had ascended, the sun was 
 
360 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Imports it thee, what thing is whisper’d here? 
 
 Come after me, and to their babblings leave 
 
 The crowd. Beas a tower, that, firmly set, 
 
 Shakes not its top for any blast that blows. 
 
 He, in whose bosom thought on thought shoots out, 
 
 Still of his aim is wide, in that the one 
 
 Sicklies and wastes to naught the other’s strength.” 
 What other could I answer, save “ I come’? 
 
 I said it, somewhat with that color tinged, 
 
 Which ofttimes pardon meriteth for man. 
 Meanwhile traverse along the hill there came, 
 
 A little way before us, some who sang 
 
 The “ Miserere ” in responsive strains. 
 
 When they perceived that through my body I 
 
 Gave way not for the rays to pass, their song 
 
 Straight to a long and hoarse exclaim they changed; 
 
 And two of them, in guise of messengers, 
 
 Ran on to meet us, and inquiring ask’d: 
 
 “Of your condition we would gladly learn.” 
 To them my guide: “ Ye may return, and bear 
 
 Tidings to them who sent you, that his frame 
 
 Is real flesh. If, as I deem, to view 
 
 His shade they paused, enough is answer’d them: 
 
 Him let them honor: they may prize him well.” 
 Ne’er saw I fiery vapors with such speed 
 
 Cut through the serene air at fall of night, 
 
 Nor August’s clouds athwart the setting sun 
 
 That upward these did not m shorter space 
 
 Return; and, there arriving, with the rest 
 
 Wheel back on us, as with loose rein a troop. 
 “Many,” exclaim’d the bard, “are*these, who throng 
 
 Around us: to petition thee, they come. 
 
 Go therefore on, and listen as thou go’st.” 
 “O spirit! who go’st on to blessedness, 
 
 With the same limbs that clad thee at thy birth,” 
 
 Shouting they came: “a little rest thy step. 
 
 Look if thou any one amongst our tribe 
 
 Hast e’er beheld, that tidings of him there * 
 
 Thou mayst report. Ah! wherefore go’st thou on? 
 
 3 “ There.”” Upon the earth. 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 Ah! wherefore tarriest thou not ? 
 
 16% 
 
 Weaill 
 
 By violence died, and to our latest hour 
 Were sinners, but then warn’d by light from heaven; 
 So that, repenting and forgiving, we 
 Did issue out of life at peace with God, 
 Who, with desire to see him, fills our heart.” 
 Then I:  “ The visages of all I scan, 
 
 Yet none of ye remember. 
 
 But if aught 
 
 That I can do may please you, gentle spirits! 
 Speak, and I will perform it; by that peace, 
 Which, on the steps of guide so excellent 
 Following, from world to world, intent I seek.” 
 
 In answer he began: 
 
 “None here distrusts 
 
 Thy kindness, though not promised with an oath; 
 So as the will fail not for want of power. 
 Whence I, who sole before the other speak, 
 Entreat thee, if thou ever see that land * 
 Which lies between Romagna and the realm 
 
 Of Charles, that of thy courtesy thou pray 
 Those who inhabit Fano, that for me 
 
 Their adorations duly be put up, 
 
 By which I may purge off my grievous sins. 
 
 From thence I came.® 
 
 But the deep passages, 
 
 Whence issued out the blood ® wherein I dwelt, 
 Upon my bosom in Antenor’s land? 
 
 Were made, where to be more secure I thought. 
 The author of the deed was Este’s prince, 
 
 Who, more than right could warrant, with his wrath 
 
 Pursued me. 
 
 Had I toward Mira fled, 
 
 When overta’en at Oriaco, still 
 
 Might I have breathed. But to the marsh I sped; 
 And in the mire and rushes tangled there 
 
 Fell, and beheld my life-blood float the plain.” 
 
 Then said another: 
 
 4“ That land.” The Marca d’ An- 
 cona, between Romagna and Apulia, the 
 kingdom of Charles of Anjou. 
 
 5“ From thence I came.”’ Giacopo del 
 Cassero, a citizen of Fano, who having 
 spoken ill of Azzo da Este, Marquis of 
 
 errara, was by his orders put to death. 
 Giacopo was overtaken by the assassins 
 at Oriaco, a place near the Brenta, from 
 whence if he had fled toward Mira, 
 
 “Ah! so may the wish, 
 
 higher up on that river, instead of mak- 
 ing for the marsh on the sea-shore, he 
 might have escaped. 
 
 8“ The blood.” Supposed to be the 
 seat of life. 
 
 7** Antenor’s land.”? The city of Pad- 
 ua, said to be founded by Antenor. 
 This implies a reflection on the Paduans, 
 See “ Hell,” xxxii. 89. 
 
162 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 That takes thee o’er the mountain, be fulfill’d, 
 As thou shalt graciously give aid to mine. 
 
 Of Montefeltro I; * Buonconte I: 
 
 Giovanna ® nor none else have care for me; 
 
 Sorrowing with these I therefore go.” 
 
 I thus: 
 
 “ From Campaldino’s field what force or chance 
 Drew thee, that ne’er thy sepulture was known? ” 
 
 “ Oh! ” answer’d he, “ at Casentino’s foot 
 A stream there courseth, named Archiano, sprung 
 In Apennine above the hermit’s seat,” 
 E’en where its name is cancel’d,™ there came I, 
 Pierced in the throat, fleeing away on foot, 
 
 And bloodying the plain. 
 
 Here sight and speech 
 
 Fail’d me; and, finishing with Mary’s name, 
 IT fell, and tenantless my flesh remain’d. 
 
 I will report the truth; which thou again 
 Tell to the living. Me God’s angel took, 
 
 Whilst he of hell exclaim’d: 
 ’ Say wherefore hast thou robb’d me? 
 
 ‘O thou from heaven: 
 Thou of him 
 
 The eternal portion bear’st with thee away, 
 For one poor tear that he deprives me of. 
 But of the other, other rule I make.’ 
 “Thou know’st how in the atmosphere collects 
 That vapor dank, returning into water 
 Soon as it mounts where cold condenses it. 
 That evil will,!? which in his intellect 
 Still follows evil, came; and raised the wind 
 And smoky mist, by virtue of the power 
 Given by his nature. Thence the valley, soon 
 As day was spent, he cover’d o’er with cloud, 
 From Pratomagno to the mountain range ;** 
 And stretch’d the sky above; so that the air 
 
 Impregnate changed to water. 
 
 8° Of Montefeltro I.” Buonconte 
 (son of Guido da Montefeltro, whom we 
 have had in the 27th Canto of ‘ Hell,” 
 fell in the battle of Campaldino (1289) 
 fighting on the side of. the Aretini. In 
 this engagement our Poet took. a dis- 
 tinguished part, as we have seen related 
 in his Life. 
 
 ®** Giovanna.” Either the wife, or a 
 kinswoman of Buonconte. 
 
 10 ** The hermit’s seat.”” The hermit- 
 age of Camaldoli. ; 
 
 11 “* Where its name is cancel’d.” That 
 
 Fell the rain; 
 
 is, between Bibbiena and Poppi, where 
 the Archiano falls into the Arno, 
 
 12° That evil will.’’ The devil. This 
 notion of. the Evil. Spirit having power 
 over the elements, appears to have 
 arisen from his. being termed_ the 
 “ prince of the air,” in. the New Testa- 
 ment. 
 
 18“° From Pratomagno to the moun- 
 tain range.” From Pratomagno, now 
 called Prato Vecchio (which divides the 
 Valdarno from Casentino), as far as to 
 the Apennines. 
 
PURGATORY 163" 
 
 And to the fosses came:all that the land 
 Contain’d not; and, as: mightiest streams are wont, 
 To the great river, with such headlong sweep, 
 Rush’d, that naught stay’d its course. My stiffen’d frame 
 Laid at his mouth, the fell Archiano found, 
 And dashed it into Arno; from my breast 
 Loosening the cross, that of myself I made 
 When overcome with pain. He hurl’d me on, 
 Along the banks and bottom of his: course ; 
 Then in his muddy spoils encircling wrapt:” 
 
 “ Ah! when thou to the world shalt be return’d, 
 And rested after thy long road,” so spake 
 Next the third spirit ; “then remember me. 
 I once was Pia.* Sienna gave me life; 
 Maremma took it fronr me. That he knows, 
 Who me with jewel’d ring had first espoused.” 
 
 CANTO VI 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Many besides; who are in like case with: those spoken: of 
 in the last Canto, beseech our Poet to obtain. for them the prayers 
 of their friends, when he shall be returned to this world. This 
 moves him to express a doubt to his guide, how the dead can be 
 profited by the prayers. of the living; for the solution of which 
 doubt he is referred'to Beatrice. Afterward he meets with Sordello 
 the Mantuan, whose: affection, shown. to. Virgil his countryman, 
 leads Dante to break forth into an invective: against the unnatural 
 divisions with which Italy, and more: especially Florence, was dis- 
 tracted. 
 
 HEN from their game of dice men separate, 
 He who hath lost remains in sadness fix’d, 
 Revolving in his mind what luckless throws 
 He cast: but, meanwhile, all the company 
 Go with the other; one before him runs, 
 And one behind his mantle twitches; one. 
 Fast by his side bids him remember: him. 
 He stops not; and each one, to whom his hand 
 Ts stretch’d, well knows he bids him stand aside; 
 14“ Pia.” She is: said to have been: a husband, Nello della Pietra, of the same 
 
 Siennese lady, of the family of Tolom- city, in Maremma, where he had some 
 mei, secretly made away with by her possessions. 
 
164 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 And thus? he from the press defends himself. 
 
 E’en such was I in that close-crowding throng; 
 
 And turning so my face around to all, 
 
 And promising, I ’scaped from it with pains. 
 Here of Arezzo him ? I saw, who fell 
 
 By Ghino’s cruel arm; and him beside,’ 
 
 Who in his chase was swallow’d by the stream. 
 
 Here Frederic Novello * with his hand 
 
 Stretch’d forth, entreated; and of Pisa he,® 
 
 Who put the good Marzuco to such proof 
 
 Of constancy. Count Orso ® I beheld; 
 
 And from its frame a soul dismiss’d for spite 
 
 And envy, as it said, but for no crime; 
 
 I speak of Peter de la Brosse:’ and here, 
 
 While she yet lives, that Lady of Brabant, 
 
 Let her beware; lest for so false a deed 
 
 She herd with worse than these. 
 
 When I was freed 
 
 From all those spirits, who pray’d for other’s prayers 
 To hasten on their state of blessedness ; 
 
 Straight I began: 
 
 “O thou, my luminary! 
 
 It seems expressly in thy text denied, 
 That heaven’s supreme decree can ever bend 
 To supplication; yet with this design 
 
 1“ And thus.” It was usual for money 
 to be given to bystanders at play by 
 winners; and as is well remarked: 
 ** Dante is therefore describing, with his 
 usual power of observation, what he 
 had often seen, the shuffling, boon- 
 denying exit of the successful games- 
 
 2“ Of Arezzo him.’ Benincasa of 
 Arezzo, eminent for his skill in juris- 
 prudence, who having condemned to 
 death Turrino da Turrita, brother of 
 Ghino di Tacco, for his robberies in 
 Maremma, was murdered by Ghino, in 
 an apartment of his own house, in the 
 presence of many witnesses. Ghino was 
 not only suffered to escape in safety, 
 but (as the commentators inform wus) 
 obtained so high a reputation by the 
 liberality with which he was accustomed 
 to dispense the fruits of his plunder, 
 and treated those who fell into his hands 
 with so much courtesy, that he was after- 
 ward invited to Rome, and knighted by 
 Boniface VIII. } ; 
 
 8 “* Him beside.’’ Cione, or Ciacco de’ 
 Tarlatti of Arezzo. He is said to have 
 been carried by his horse into the Arno, 
 and there drowned, while he was in 
 pursuit of certain of his enemies. 
 
 4 Frederic Novello.” Son of the 
 
 Conte Guido da Battifolle, and slain by 
 one of the family of Bostoli. 
 
 5“ Of Pisa he.” Farinata de’ Scorni- 
 Sanh of Pisa. His father Marzuco, who 
 
 ad entered the order of the Frati Mi- 
 nori, so entirely overcame the feelings 
 of resentment, that he even kissed the 
 hands of the slayer of his son, and, as 
 he was following the funeral, exhorted 
 his kinsmen to reconciliation. 
 
 6“ Count Orso.” Son of Napoleone 
 da Cerbaia, slain by Alberto da Man- 
 gona, his uncle. 
 
 7 ** Peter de la Brosse.” Secretary of 
 Philip III of France. The courtiers, en- 
 while Biline high place which he held in 
 the King’s favor, prevailed on Mary of 
 Brabant to charge him falsely with an 
 attempt upon her person; for which sup- 
 posed crime he suffered death. So say 
 the Italian commentators. Henault rep- 
 resents the matter very differently: 
 ** Pierre de la Brosse, formerly barber 
 to St. Louis, afterward the favorite of 
 Philip, fearing the too great attachment 
 of the King for his wife Mary, accuses 
 this princess of having poisoned Louis, 
 eldest son of Philip, by his first mar- 
 riage. This calumny is discovered by 
 a nun of Nivelle, in Flanders. ‘La 
 Brosse is hanged.’ 
 
PURGATORY 165 
 
 Do these entreat. Can then their hope be vain? 
 Or is thy saying not to me reveal’d?” 
 
 He thus tome: “ Both what I write is plain, 
 And these deceived not in their hope; if well 
 Thy mind consider, that the sacred height 
 Of judgment doth not stoop, because love’s flame 
 In a short moment all fulfils, which he, 
 
 Who sojourns here, in right should satisfy. 
 Besides, when I this point concluded thus, 
 
 By praying no defect could be supplied; 
 Because the prayer had none access to God. 
 Yet in this deep suspicion rest thou not 
 Contented, unless she assure thee so, 
 
 Who betwixt truth and mind infuses light: 
 
 I know not if thou take me right; I mean 
 Beatrice. Her thou shalt behold above, 
 Upon this mountain’s crown, fair seat of joy.” 
 
 Then I: switi_let us mend our speed; for now 
 i : and lo! the hill * 
 
 Stretches its shadow far.” He answer’d thus: 
 “ Our progress with this day shall be as much 
 As we may now despatch; but otherwise 
 Than thou supposest is the truth. For there 
 Thou canst not be, ere thou once more behold 
 Him back retutntig,; who behind the steep 
 
 Is now so hidden, that, as erst, his beam 
 
 Thou dost not break. But lo! a spirit there 
 Stands solitary, and toward us looks: 
 
 It will instruct us in the speediest way.” 
 
 We soon approach’d it. O thou Lombard spirit! 
 How didst thou stand, in high abstracted mood, 
 Scarce moving with slow dignity thine eyes. 
 It spoke not aught, but let us onward pass, 
 Eying us as a lion on his watch. 
 
 But Virgil, with entreaty mild, advanced, 
 Requesting it to show the best ascent. 
 
 It answer to his question none return’d; 
 
 But of our country and our kind of life 
 Demanded. When my courteous guide began, 
 
 8“ The hill.” It was now past the noon. 
 
166 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 “ Mantua,” the shadow, in itself absorb’d, 
 Rose toward us from the place in which it stood, 
 And cried, ‘“ Mantuan! I am thy countryman, 
 
 Sordello.” ® 
 
 Each the other then embraced. 
 
 ; slavish Italy! thou inn of grief! 
 
 Vessel without a pilot in loud storm! 
 Lady no longer of fair provinces, 
 But brothel-house impure! this gentle spirit, 
 Even from the pleasant sound of his dear land 
 Was prompt to greet a fellow-citizen 
 With such glad cheer: while now thy living ones 
 In thee abide not without war; and one 
 Malicious gnaws another; ay, of those 
 Whom the same wall and the same moat contains. 
 Seek, wretched one! around the sea-coasts wide; 
 Then homeward to thy bosom turn; and mark, 
 If any part of thee sweet peace enjoy. 
 What boots it, that thy reins Justinian’s hand 
 Refitted, if thy saddle be unprest ? 
 Naught doth he now but aggravate thy shame. 
 Ah, people! thou obedient still should’st live, 
 And in the saddle let thy Cesar sit, 
 If well thou marked’st that which God commands. 
 
 Look how that beast to fellness hath relapsed, 
 From having lost correction of the spur, 
 Since to the bridle thou hast set thine hand, 
 O German Albert !?° who abandon’st her 
 That is grown savage and unmanageable, 
 When thou shouldst clasp her flanks with forked heels, 
 Just judgment from the stars fall on thy blood; 
 And be it strange and manifest to all; 
 Such as may strike thy successor ™ with dread; 
 For that thy sire ** and thou have suffer’d thus, 
 Through greediness of yonder realms detain’d, 
 
 9“ Sordello.” The history of Sordel- 
 lo’s life is wrapt in the obscurity of ro- 
 mance. That he distinguished himself 
 by his skill in Provencal poetry is cer- 
 tain; and many feats of military prow- 
 ess have been attributed to him. It is 
 probable that he was born toward the 
 end of the twelfth, and died about the 
 middle of the succeeding, century. 
 
 10*°Q German Albert!” The Em- 
 peror Albert I succeeded Adolphus in 
 
 1298, and was murdered in 1308 See 
 ** Paradise,” Canto xix. 114. P 
 
 11“ Thy successor.’’ The successor of 
 Albert was Henry of Luxemburg, by 
 whose interposition in the affairs of Italy 
 our Poet hoped to have been reinstated 
 in his native city. 
 
 12“ Thy sire.” The Emperor Rodolph, 
 too intent on increasing his power in 
 Germany to give much of his thoughts 
 to Italy, ‘“‘ the garden of the empire.” 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 167 
 
 The garden of the empire to run waste. 
 
 Come, see the Capulets and Montagues.* 
 
 The Filippeschi and Monaldi,™* ‘man 
 
 Who carest for naught! those sunk in grief, and these 
 
 With dire suspicion rack’d. 
 
 Come, cruel one! 
 
 Come, and behold the oppression of the nobles, 
 And mark their injuries; and thou mayst see 
 What safety Santafiore can supply.’® 
 
 Come and behold thy Rome, who calls on thee, 
 Desolate widow, day and night with moans, 
 “My Cesar, why dost thou desert my side?” 
 Come, and behold what love among thy people: 
 And if no pity touches thee for us, 
 
 Come, and blush for thine own report. 
 
 For me, 
 
 If it be lawful, O Almighty Power! 
 
 Who wast in earth for our sakes crucified, 
 Are thy just eyes turn’d elsewhere? or is this 
 A preparation, in the wondrous depth 
 
 Of thy sage counsel made, for some good end, 
 Entirely from our reach of thought cut off? 
 So are the Italian cities all o’erthrong’d 
 
 With tyrants, and a great Marcellus made 
 
 Of every petty factious villager. 
 
 My Florence! thou mayst well remain unmoved 
 At this digression, which affects not thee: 
 Thanks to thy people, who so wisely speed. 
 Many have justice in their heart, that long 
 Waiteth, for counsel to direct the bow, 
 
 Or ere it dart unto its aim: but thine 
 
 Have it on their lips’ edge. 
 
 Many refuse 
 
 To bear the common burdens: readier thine 
 Answer uncall’d, and cry, “ Behold I stoop!” 
 
 Make thyself glad, for thou hast reason now, 
 Thou wealthy! thou at peace! thou wisdom-fraught! 
 Facts best will witness if I speak the truth. 
 
 Athens and Lacedemon, who of old 
 
 18“* Capulets and Montagues.” Our 
 ears are so familiarized to the names of 
 these rival houses in the language of 
 Shakespeare, that I have used them in- 
 stead of the ‘‘ Montecchi” and “ Cap- 
 
 pe They were two powerful 
 hibelline families of Verona. 
 
 14“ Filippeschi_ and Monaldi.” Two 
 other rival families in Orvieto. 
 
 15 ‘* What safety Santafiore can sup- 
 ply.” <A place between Pisa and Sienna. 
 
168 THE DIVINE COMEDY, 
 
 Enacted laws, for civil arts renown’d, 
 
 Made little progress in improving life 
 
 Toward thee, who usest such nice subtlety, 
 
 That to the middle of November scarce 
 
 Reaches the thread thou in October weavest. 
 
 How many times within thy memory, 
 
 Customs, and laws, and coins, and offices 
 
 Have been by thee renew’d, and people changed. 
 If thou remember’st well and canst see clear, 
 
 Thou wilt perceive thyself like a sick wretch, 
 
 Who finds no rest upon her down, but oft 
 
 Shifting her side, short respite seeks from pain. 
 
 CANTO VII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The approach of night hindering further ascent, Sordello 
 conducts our Poet apart to an eminence, from whence they behold 
 a pleasant recess, in form of a flowery valley, scooped out of the 
 mountain; where are many famous spirits, and among them the 
 Emperor Rodolph, Ottocar, King of Bohemia, Philip III of France, 
 Henry of Navarre, Peter III of Arragon, Charles I of Naples, 
 Henry III. of England, and William, Marquis of Montferrat. 
 
 FTER their courteous greetings joyfully 
 Seven times exchanged, Sordello backward drew 
 Exclaiming, “Who are ye?” “ Before this mount 
 By spirits worthy of ascent to God 
 Was sought, my bones had by Octavius’ care 
 Been buried. I am Virgil; for no sin 
 Deprived of heaven, except for lack of faith.” 
 So answer’d him in few my gentle guide. 
 As one, who aught before him suddenly 
 Beholding, whence his wonder riseth, cries, 
 “Tt is, yet is not,” wavering in belief; 
 Such he appear’d; then downward bent his eyes, 
 And, drawing near with reverential step, 
 Caught him, where one of mean estate might clasp 
 His lord. “Glory of Latium!” he exclaim’d, 
 “In whom our tongue its utmost power display’d; 
 Boast of my honor’d birth-place! what desert 
 
RURGATORY 169 
 
 Of mine, what favor, rather, undeserved, 
 Shows thee to me? If I to hear that voice 
 Am worthy, say if from below thou comest, 
 And from what cloister’s pale.” “ Through every orb 
 Of that sad region,” he replied, “thus far 
 Am I arrived, by heavenly influence led: 
 And with such aid I come. Not for my doing, 
 - But for not doing, have I lost the sight 
 Of that high Sun, whom thou desirest, and who 
 By me too late was known. There is a place? 
 There underneath, not made by torments sad, 
 But by dun shades alone; where mourning’s voice 
 Sounds not of anguish sharp, but breathes in sighs. 
 There I with little innocents abide, 
 Who by death’s fangs were bitten, ere exempt 
 From human taint. There I with those abide, 
 Who the three holy virtues? put not on, 
 But understood the rest,? and without blame 
 Follow’d them all. But, if thou know’st, and canst, 
 _ Direct us how we soonest may arrive, 
 Where Purgatory its true beginning takes.” 
 He answer’d thus: ‘“ We have no certain place 
 - Assign’d us: upward I may go, or round. 
 Far as I can, I join thee for thy guide. 
 But thou beholdest now how day declines; 
 And upward to proceed by night, our power 
 Excels: therefore it may be well to choose 
 A place of pleasant sojourn. ‘To the right 
 Some spirits sit apart retired. If thou 
 Consentest, I to these will lead thy steps: 
 And thou wilt know them, not without delight.” 
 “How chances this?’ was answer’d: “ whoso wish’d 
 To ascend by night, would he be thence debarr’d 
 By other, or through his own weakness fail?” 
 The good Sordello then, along the ground 
 Trailing his finger, spoke: ‘ Only this line 
 Thou shalt not overpass, soon as the sun 
 1“*There is a place.’”?’ Limbo. See 3“ The rest.”” Prudence, Justice, For: 
 ** Hell,”? Canto iv. titude, and Temperance. 
 
 24. 
 3“ The three holy virtues.” Faith, 
 Hope, and Charity. 
 
170 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Hath disappear’d; not that aught else impedes 
 Thy going upward, save the shades of night. 
 These, with the want of power, perplex the will. 
 With them thou haply mightst return beneath, 
 
 Or to and fro around the mountain’s side 
 Wander, while day is in the horizon shut.” 
 
 My master straight, as wondering at his speech, 
 Exclaim’d: “ Then lead us quickly, where thou sayst 
 That, while we stay, we may enjoy delight.” 
 
 A little space we were removed from thence, 
 When I perceived the mountain hollow’d out, 
 Even as large valleys hollow’d out on earth. 
 
 “That way,” the escorting spirit cried, “ we go, 
 Where in a bosom the high bank recedes: 
 
 And thou await renewal of the day.” 
 
 Betwixt the steep and plain, a crooked path 
 Led us traverse into the ridge’s side, 
 
 Where more than half the sloping edge expires. 
 Refulgent gold, and silver thrice refined, 
 
 And scarlet grain and ceruse, Indian wood 
 Of lucid dye serene, fresh emeralds 
 
 But newly broken, by the herbs and flowers 
 Placed in that fair recess, in color all 
 
 Had been surpass’d, as great surpasses less. 
 Nor nature only there lavish’d her hues, 
 
 But of the sweetness of a thousand smells 
 
 A rare and undistinguish’d fragrance made. 
 
 “Salve Regina,”’* on the grass and flowers, 
 Here chanting, I beheld those spirits sit, 
 
 Who not beyond the valley could be seen. 
 
 “ Before the westering sun sink to his bed,” 
 Began the Mantuan, who our steps had turn’d, 
 “°’Mid those, desire not that I lead ye on. 
 
 For from this eminence ye shall discern 
 Better the acts and visages of all, 
 
 Than, in the nether vale, among them mix’d. 
 He, who sits high above the rest, and seems 
 To have neglected that he should have done, 
 And to the others’ song moves not his lip, 
 
 4“ Salve Regina.” The beginning of a prayer to the Virgin. 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 171 
 
 The Emperor Rodolph call, who might have heal’d 
 
 The wounds whereof fair Italy hath died, 
 
 So that by others she revives but slowly. 
 
 He, who with kindly visage comforts him, 
 
 Sway’d in that country,® where the water springs, 
 
 That Moldaw’s river to the Elbe, and Elbe 
 
 Rolls to the ocean: Ottocar® his name: 
 
 Who in his swaddling-clothes was of more worth 
 
 Than Wenceslaus his son, a bearded man, 
 
 Pamper’d with rank luxuriousness and ease, 
 
 And that one with the nose deprest,’ who close 
 
 In counsel seems with him of gentle look,® 
 
 Flying, expired, withering the lily’s flower. 
 
 Look there, how he doth knock against his breast. 
 
 The other ye behold, who for his cheek 
 
 Makes of one hand a couch, with frequent signs. 
 
 They are the father and the father-in-law 
 
 Of Gallia’s bane:® his vicious life they know 
 
 And foul; thence comes the grief that rends them thus. 
 “ He, so robust of limb,?® who measure keeps 
 
 In song with him of feature prominent,” 
 
 With every virtue bore his girdle braced. 
 
 And if that stripling,’* who behind him sits, 
 
 8“ That country.” Bohemia. 
 
 §** Ottocar’’ King of Bohemia, who 
 was killed in the battle of Marchfield, 
 fought with Rodolph, August 26, 1278, 
 Wencesliaus II, his son, who succeeded 
 him in the Kingdom of Bohemia, died 
 in 1305. The latter is again taxed with 
 luxury in the ‘* Paradise,’’ xix. 123. 
 
 7*“That one with the nose deprest,’”’ 
 Philip III, of France, father of Philip 
 IV. He died in 1285, at Perpignan, in 
 his retreat from Arragon. 
 
 8“ Him of gentle look.” Henry of 
 Navarre, father’ of Jane married to 
 Philip IV, of France, whom Dante calls 
 **mal di Francia.’’—‘“‘ Gallia’s bane.” 
 
 ® “ Gallia’s bane.” G. Villani, lib. vii. 
 cap. cxlvi. ce with equal resentment 
 of Philip IV. ‘ In 1291, on the night of 
 the calends of May, Philip le Bel, King 
 of France, by advice of Biccio and Mus- 
 ciatto Franzesi, ordered all the Italians, 
 who were in his country and realm, to 
 be seized, under pretence of seizing the 
 money-lenders, but thus he caused the 
 good merchants also to be seized and 
 ransomed; for which he was much 
 blamed and held in great abhorrence. 
 And from thenceforth the realm of 
 France fell evermore into degradation 
 and decline. And it is observable that 
 
 between the taking of Acre and this 
 seizure in France, the merchants of 
 Florence received great damage and 
 ruin of their property.” 
 
 10 * He, so robust of limb.” Peter 
 III, called the Great, King of Arragon, 
 who died in 1285, leaving four sons, 
 Alonzo, James, Frederick, and Peter. 
 The two former succeeded him in the 
 Kingdom of Arragon, and Frederick in 
 that of Sicily. 
 
 11 “* Him of feature prominent.’’ ‘* Dal 
 maschio naso’”’—‘ with the masculine 
 nose.” Charles I, King of Naples, 
 Count of Anjou, and brother of St. 
 
 ouis. He died in 1284. The annalist 
 of Florence remarks that “there had 
 been no sovereign of the house of 
 France, since the time of Charlemagne, 
 by whom Charles was surpassed either 
 in military renown and prowess, or in 
 the loftiness of his understanding.” 
 
 12 ** That stripling.’’ Either (as the 
 old commentators suppose) Alonzo III, 
 King of Arragon, the eldest son of Peter 
 III, who died in 12091, at the age of 27; 
 or, according to Venturi, Peter the 
 youngest son. The former was a youn 
 prince of virtue sufficient to have justi- 
 fied the eulogium and the hopes of 
 Dante. 
 
172 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 King after him had lived, his virtue then 
 
 From vessel to like vessel had been pour’d; 
 Which may not of the other heirs be said. 
 
 By James and Frederick his realms are held; 
 Neither the better heritage obtains. 
 
 Rarely into the branches of the tree 
 
 Doth human worth mount up: and so ordains 
 He who bestows it, that as his free gift 
 
 It may be call’d. To Charles*® my words apply 
 No less than to his brother in the song; 
 
 Which Pouille and Provenge now with grief confess. 
 So much that plant degenerates from its seed, 
 As, more than Beatrix and Margaret, 
 Costanza** still boasts of her valorous spouse. 
 
 “ Behold the King of simple life and plain, 
 
 Harry of England,’ sitting there alone: 
 
 He through his branches better issue*® spreads. 
 
 “That one, who, on the ground, beneath the rest, 
 
 Sits lowest, yet his gaze directs aloft, 
 
 Is William, that brave Marquis,” for whose cause, 
 The deed of Alexandria and his war 
 
 Makes Montferrat and Canavese weep.” 
 
 18 “To Charles.” ‘Al Nausto’’— 
 * Charles II, King of Naples, is no less 
 inferior to his father, Charles I, than 
 
 aus and Frederick to theirs, Peter 
 
 14 “* Costanza.”? Widow of Peter ITI. 
 She has been already mentioned in the 
 third Canto, v. 112. By Beatrix and 
 Margaret are tebe meant two of the 
 daughters of Raymond Berenger, Count 
 of Provence; the latter married to St. 
 Louis of France, the former to his 
 brother Charles of Anjou, King of 
 Naples. See “ Paradise,’’ Canto vi. 135. 
 Dante therefore considers Peter as the 
 most illustrious of the three monarchs. 
 
 15 “* Harry of England.” Henry III. 
 The contemporary annalist speaks of 
 this King in similar terms. G. Villani, 
 lib. v. cap. iv. ‘‘ From Richard was born 
 
 Henry, who reigned after him, who was 
 a plain man and of good faith, but of 
 little courage.” 
 
 16 “* Better issue.”” Edward I, of 
 whose glory our Poet was perhaps a wit- 
 ness, in his visit to England. ‘‘ From 
 the said Henry was born the good King 
 Edward, who reigns in our times, who 
 has done great things, whereof we shall 
 make mention in due place.”—G. Villani, 
 
 ibid. 
 
 17 “ William, that brave Marquis.” 
 William, Marquis of Montferrat, was 
 treacherously seized re his own sub- 
 jects, at Alessandria in Lombardy, A. D. 
 1290, and ended his life in prison. 
 war ensued between the people of Ales- 
 sandria and those of Montferrat and the 
 Canavese, now part of Piedmont. 
 
PURGATORY 173. 
 
 CANTO VIII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—T wo angels, with flaming swords broken at the points, 
 descend to keep watch over the valley, into which Virgil and Dante 
 entering by desire of Sordello, our Poet meets with joy the spirit 
 of Nino, the judge of Gallura. one who was well known to him. 
 Meantime three exceedingly bright stars appear near the pole, and 
 a serpent creeps subtly into the valley, but flees at hearing the ap- 
 proach of those angelic guards. Lastly, Conrad Malaspina predicts 
 to our Poet his future banishment. 
 
 OW was the hour that wakens fond desire 
 N In men at sea, and melts their thoughtful heart 
 Who in the morn have bid sweet friends farewell, 
 And pilgrim newly on his road with love 
 Thrills, if he hear the vesper bell from far, 
 That seems to mourn for the expiring day: 
 When I, no longer taking heed to hear, 
 Began, with wonder, from those spirits to mark 
 One risen from its seat, which with its hand 
 Audience implored. Both palms it join’d and raised, 
 Fixing its steadfast gaze toward the east, 
 As telling God, “I care for naught beside.” 
 “Te Lucis Ante,”’? so devoutly then 
 Came from its lip, and in so soft a strain, 
 That all my sense in ravishment was lost. 
 And the rest after, softly and devout, 
 Follow’d through all the hymn, with upward gaze 
 Directed to the bright supernal wheels. 
 Here, reader! for the truth make thine eyes keen: 
 For of so subtle texture is this veil, 
 That thou with ease mayst pass it through unmark’d, 
 IT saw that gentle band silently next 
 Look up, as if in expectation held, 
 Pale and in lowly guise; and, from on high, 
 I saw, forth issuing descend beneath, 
 Two angels, with two flame-illumined swords, 
 Broken and mutilated of their points. 
 Green as the tender leaves but newly born, 
 
 1 “Te Lucis Ante.” “Te lucis ante in the last part of the sacred office 
 terminum,”’ says Lombardi, is the first termed ‘‘ compieta,” a. service which our 
 verse of the hymn sung by the Church Chaucer calls ‘“‘complin. 
 
«74 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Their vesture was, the which, by wings as green 
 Beaten, they drew behind them, fann’d in air. 
 A little over us one took his stand; 
 The other lighted on the opposing hill; 
 So that the troop were in the midst contain’d. 
 Well I descried the whiteness on their heads; 
 But in their visages the dazzled eye 
 Was lost, as faculty that by too much 
 Is overpower’d. “ From Mary’s bosom both 
 Are come,” exclaim’d Sordello, “as a guard 
 Over the vale, ’gainst him, who hither tends, 
 The serpent.” Whence, not knowing by which path 
 He came, I turn’d me round; and closely press’d, 
 All frozen, to my leader’s trusted side. 
 Sordello paused not: “To the valley now 
 (For it is time) let us descend; and hold 
 Converse with those great shadows: haply much 
 Their sight may please ye.” Only three steps down 
 Methinks I measured, ere I was beneath, 
 And noted one who look’d as with desire 
 To know me. Time was now that air grew dim; 
 Yet not so dim, that, ’twixt his eyes and mine, 
 It clear’d not up what was conceal’d before. 
 Mutually toward each other we advanced. 
 Nino, thou courteous judge! ? what joy I felt, 
 When I perceived thou wert not with the bad. 
 No salutation kind on either part 
 Was left unsaid. He then inquired: “ How long, 
 Since thou arrived’st at the mountain’s foot, 
 Over the distant waves?” “Oh!” answer’d I, 
 “ Through the sad seats of woe this morn I came; 
 And still in my first life, thus journeying on, 
 The other strive to gain.’ Soon as they heard 
 My words, he and Sordello backward drew, 
 As suddenly amazed. To Virgil one, 
 The other to a spirit’ turn’d, who near 
 Was seated, crying: “ Conrad!* up with speed: 
 Come, see what of his grace high God hath will’d.” 
 
 2 Nino, thou courteous judge.” 3“ Conrad.’? Conrado, father to Mare 
 Nino di Gallura de’ Visconti, nephew. to cello Malaspina. 
 Count Ugolino de’ Gherardeschi, and 
 betrayed by him. 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 Then turning round to me: 
 
 L7G. 
 
 “ By that rare mark 
 
 Of honor, which thou owest to him, who hides 
 So deeply his first cause it hath no ford; 
 When thou shalt be beyond the vast of waves, 
 Tell my Giovanna,* that for me she call 
 There, where reply to innocence is made. 
 Her mother,® I believe, loves me no more; 
 Since she has changed the white and wimpled folds,® 
 Which she is doom’d once more with grief to wish. 
 By her it easily may be perceived, 
 How long in woman lasts the flame of love, 
 If sight and touch do not relume it oft. 
 For her so fair a burial will not make 
 The viper,’ which calls Milan to the field, 
 As had been made by shrill Gallura’s bird.’’® 
 
 He spoke, and in his visage took the stamp 
 Of that right zeal, which with due ternperature 
 Glows in the bosom. My insatiate eyes 
 Meanwhile to heaven had travel’d, even there 
 Where the bright stars are slowest, as a wheel 
 Nearest the axle; when my guide inquired: 
 “What there aloft, my son, has caught thy gaze?”’ 
 
 I answer’d: 
 The pole is all on fire.” 
 
 “The three torches,? with which here 
 He then to me: 
 
 “The four resplendent stars, thou saw’st this morn, 
 Are there beneath; and these, risen in their stead.” 
 While yet’ he spoke, Sordello to himself 
 
 Drew him, and cried: 
 
 “Lo there our enemy! ” 
 
 And with his hand pointed that way to look. 
 Along the side, where barrier none arose 
 Around the little vale, a serpent lay, 
 
 #“My Giovanna.” The daughter of 
 Nino, and wife of Riccardo da Camino, 
 of Trevigi. 
 
 5“ Her mother.” Beatrice, Marchion- 
 ess of Este, wife of Nino, and after his 
 death married to Galeazzo de’ Visconti 
 of Milan. : 
 
 8“ The white and wimpled folds.’’ 
 The weeds of widowhood. 
 
 1“ The viper.” The arms of Galeazzo 
 and the ensign of the Milanese. 
 
 8“ Shrill Gallura’s bird.’”’ The cock 
 was the ensign of Gallura, Nino’s prov- 
 ince in Sardinia. It is not known 
 whether Beatrice had any further cause 
 to regret her nuptials with Galeazzo, 
 
 than a certain shame which appears, 
 however unreasonably, to have attached 
 to a second marriage. 
 
 ®“ The three torches.” The three 
 evangelical virtues, Faith, Hope, and 
 Charity. These are supposed to rise in 
 the evening, in order to denote their_be- 
 longing to the contemplative; as the four 
 others, which are made to rise in the 
 morning, were probably intended to sig- 
 nify that the cardinal virtues belong 
 to the active life: or perhaps it may 
 mark the succession, in order of time 
 of the Gospel to the heathen system of 
 morality. 
 
_.176 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Such haply as gave Eve the bitter food. 
 Between the grass and flowers, the evil snake 
 Came on, reverting oft his lifted head; 
 And, as a beast that smooths its polish’d coat, 
 
 Licking his back. 
 
 I saw not, nor can tell, 
 
 How those celestial falcons from their seat 
 Moved, but in motion each one well descried. 
 Hearing the air cut by their verdant plumes, 
 The serpent fled; and, to their stations, back 
 The angels up return’d with equal flight. 
 
 The spirit (who to Nino, when he call’d, 
 Had come), from viewing me with fixed ken, 
 Through all that conflict, loosen’d not his sight. 
 
 “So may the lamp, which leads thee up on high, 
 Find, in thy free resolve, of wax so much, 
 
 As may suffice thee to the enamel’d height,” 
 
 It thus began: 
 
 “If any certain news 
 
 Of Valdimagra and the neighbor part 
 
 Thou know’st, tell me, who once was mighty there, 
 They call’d me Conrad Malaspina; not 
 
 That old one;?° but from him I sprang. The love 
 I bore my people is now here refined.” 
 
 “Tn your domains,’ I answer’d, “ne’er was I. 
 But, through all Europe, where do those men dwell, 
 To whom their glory is not manifest? 
 
 The fame, that honors your illustrious house, 
 Proclaims the nobles, and proclaims the land; 
 So that he knows it, who was never there. 
 
 I swear to you, so may my upward route 
 Prosper, your honored nation not impairs 
 
 The value of her coffer and her sword. 
 
 Nature and use give her such privilege, 
 
 That while the world is twisted from his course 
 By a bad head, she only walks aright, 
 
 And has the evil way in scorn.” 
 
 He then: 
 
 “ Now pass thee on: seven times the tired sun 12 
 
 10“* That old one.’? An ancestor of 
 Conrado Malaspina, who was also of that 
 name. 
 
 11 “ Seven times the tired sun.”’ “‘ The 
 sun shall not enter into the constellation 
 of Aries seven times more, before thou 
 shalt have still better cause for the good 
 
 opinion thou expressest of Valdimagra, 
 in the kind reception thou shalt there 
 meet with.’”’ Dante was hospitably re- 
 ceived by the Marchese Marcello, or 
 Morello Malaspina, during his banish- 
 ment, A. D. 1307. 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 177 
 
 Revisits not the couch, which with four feet 
 
 The forked Aries covers, ere that kind 
 
 Opinion shall be nail’d into thy brain 
 
 With stronger nails than other’s speech can drive; 
 If the sure course of judgment be not stay’d.” 
 
 CANTO IX 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Dante is carried up the mountain, asleep and dreamin 
 dy Lucia; and, on wakening, finds himself, two hours after sun- 
 rise, with Virgil, near the gate of Purgatory, through which they, 
 
 are admitted by the angel deputed by St. Peter to keep it. 
 
 OW the fair consort of Tithonus old, 
 
 Arisen from her mate’s beloved arms, 
 
 Look’d palely o’er the eastern cliff; her brow, 
 Lucent with jewels, glitter’d, set in sign 
 Of that chill animal,’ who with his train 
 Smites fearful nations: and where then we were, 
 Two steps of her ascent the night had past; 
 And now the third was closing up its wing,? 
 When I, who had so much of Adam with me, 
 Sank down upon the grass, o’ercome with sleep, 
 
 There where all five*® were seated. 
 
 In that hour, 
 
 When near the dawn the swallow her sad lay, 
 Remembering haply ancient grief,* renews; 
 
 And when our minds, more wanderers from the flesh, 
 And less\by thought restrain’d, are, as ’t were, full 
 Of holy divination in their dreams; 
 
 Then, in a vision, did I seem to view 
 
 A golden-feather’d eagle in the sky, 
 
 With open wings, and hovering for descent; 
 
 And I was in that place, methought, from whence 
 Young Ganymede, from his associates ’reft, 
 
 Was snatch’d aloft to the high consistory. 
 
 1“ Of that chill animal.” The scor- 
 pion. : 
 
 2‘ The third was closing up its wing.” 
 The night being divided into four 
 watches, I think he may mean that the 
 third was past, and the fourth and last 
 was begun, so that there might be some 
 faint glimmering of morning twilight ; 
 and not merely, as Lombardi supposes, 
 
 that the third watch was drawing toward 
 its close, which would still leave an in- 
 surmountable difficulty in the first verse. 
 3¢ All five.” Virgil, Dante, Sordello, 
 Nino, and Conrado Malaspina. ; 
 
 4“ Remembering haply ancient grief.” 
 Progne having been changed into a 
 swallow after the outrage done her by 
 Tereus. 
 
178 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 “Perhaps,” thought I within me, “here alone 
 He strikes his quarry, and elsewhere disdains 
 To pounce upon the prey.” Therewith, it seem’d, 
 A little wheeling in his aery tour, 
 
 Terrible as the lightning, rush’d he down, 
 
 And snatch’d me upward, even to the fire. 
 
 There both, I thought, the eagle and myself 
 
 Did burn; and so intense the imagined flames, 
 “That needs my sleep was broken off. As efst 
 “Achilles shook himself, and round~him roll’d 
 His waken’d eyeballs, wondering where he was, 
 Whenas his mother had from Chiron fled 
 
 To Scyros, with him sleeping in her arms; 
 
 (There whence the Greeks did after sunder him); 
 E’en thus I shook me, soon as from my face 
 The slumber parted, turning deadly pale, 
 
 Like one ice-struck with dread. Sole at my side 
 My comfort stood: and the bright sun was now 
 More than two hours aloft: and to the sea 
 
 My looks were turn’d. “ Fear not,’ my master cried, 
 “ Assured we are at happy point. Thy strength 
 Shrink not, but rise dilated. Thou art come 
 To Purgatory now. Lo! there the cliff 
 
 That circling bounds it. Lo! the entrance there, 
 Where it doth seem disparted. Ere the dawn 
 Usher’d the day-light, when thy wearied soul 
 Slept in thee, o’er the flowery vale beneath 
 
 A_lady came, and thus bespake me: ‘I 
 
 Am er_ me to take this man, 
 
 Who slumbers. Easier _s ay~shall speed.’ 
 ‘Sordello-and the other gentle shapes 
 
 Tarrying, she bare thee up: and, as day shone, 
 
 This summit reach’d: and I pursued her steps. 
 
 Here did she place thee. First, her lovely eyes 
 
 That open entrance show’d me; then at once 
 
 She vanish’d with thy sleep.” Like one, whose doubts 
 Are chased by certainty, and terror turn’d 
 
 To comfort on discovery of the truth, 
 
 Such was the change in me: and as my guide 
 
 Beheld me fearless, up along the cliff 
 
PURGATORY 4199 
 
 He moved, and I behind him, toward the height. 
 Reader! thou markest how my theme doth rise; 
 Nor wonder therefore, if more artfully 
 I prop the structure. Nearer now we drew, 
 Arrived whence, in that part, where first a breach 
 As of a wall appear’d, I could descry 
 A portal, and three steps beneath, that led 
 For inlet there, of different color each; 
 And one who watch’d, but spake not yet a word. 
 As more and more mine eye did stretch its view, 
 I mark’d him seated on the highest step, 
 Tn visage such, as past my power to bear. 
 Grasp’d in his hand, a naked sword glanced back 
 The rays so toward me, that I oft in vain 
 My sight directed. “Speak, from whence ye stand; ” 
 He cried: “ What would ye? Where is your escort? 
 Take heed your coming upward harm ye not.” 
 “A heavenly dame, not skilless of these things,” 
 Replied the instructor, “told us, even now. 
 ‘Pass that way: here the gate is.’” *‘* And may she, 
 Befriending, prosper your ascent,’ resumed 
 The courteous keeper of the gate: ‘‘ Come then 
 Before our steps.” We straightway thither came. 
 The lowest stair® was marble white, so smooth 
 And polish’d, that therein my mirror’d form 
 Distinct I saw. The next of hue more dark 
 Than sablest grain, a rough and singed block, 
 Crack’d lengthwise and across. The third, that lay 
 Massy above, seem’d porphyry, that flamed 
 Red as the life-blood spouting from a vein. 
 On this God’s angel either foot sustain’d, 
 Upon the threshold seated, which appear’d 
 A rock of diamond. Up the trinal steps 
 “ With humble > that he unbar the bolt.” 
 Pious T eet devolved 
 I cast me, praying him for pity’s sake 
 5 ** The lowest stair.”” By the white one, his contrition on their account; and 
 step is meant the distinctness with which by that of porphyry, the fervor with 
 
 the conscience of the penitent reflects | which he resolves on the future pursuit 
 his offences; by the burnt and cracked of piety and virtue. 
 
180 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 That he would open to me; but first. fell : 
 
 Thrice on my bosom prostrate. Se 
 
 times® 
 
 The letter, that denotes the inward stain,/P) 
 
 Of his drawn sword, inscribed. And ‘“ Look,” he cried, 
 
 “When enter’d, that thou wash these scars away.” 
 Ashes, or earth ta’en dry out of the ground, 
 
 Were of one color with the robe he wore. 
 
 From underneath that vestment forth he drew 
 
 Two keys,’ of metal twain: the one was gold, 
 
 Its fellow silver. 
 
 e blunted point 
 
 With the pallid first, 
 
 And next the burnish’d, he so ply’d the gate, 
 
 As to content me well. 
 
 “‘ Whenever one 
 
 Faileth of these, that in the key-hole straight 
 It turn not, to this alley then expect 
 
 Access in vain.” 
 
 Such were the words he spake. 
 
 “One is more precious:® but the other needs, 
 Skill and sagacity, large share of each, 
 
 Ere its good task to disengage the knot 
 
 Be worthily perform’d. From Peter these 
 
 I hold, of him instructed that I err 
 
 Rather in opening, than in keeping fast; 
 
 So but the suppliant at my feet implore.” 
 
 Then of that hallow’d gate he thrust the door, 
 Exclaiming, “Enter, but this warning hear: 
 He forth again departs who looks behind.” 
 
 As in the hinges of that sacred ward 
 The swivels turn’d, sonorous metal strong, 
 Harsh was the grating; nor so surlily 
 Roar’d the Tarpeian, when by force bereft 
 Of good Metellus, thenceforth from his loss 
 To leanness doom’d. Attentively I turn’d, 
 Listening the thunder that first issued forth; 
 And “ We praise thee, O God,’’ methought I heard, 
 
 © “ Semen tl Mes.” AUC. AS to de- 
 the seven sins (Peccata) 6 
 he was tO™be-elearset int” hi 
 
 Ss passage 
 through Purgatory. 
 
 7™“ Two keys.” Lombardi remarks 
 that painters have usually drawn 
 St. Peter with two keys, the one of 
 gold and the other of silver; but that 
 Niccolo Alemanni, in his ‘‘ Dissertation 
 de Parietinis Lateranensibus,”’ produces 
 
 instances of his being represented with 
 one key, and with three. e have here, 
 however, not St. Peter, but an angel 
 deputed by him. 
 
 8 “One is more precious.” The gold- 
 en key denotes the divine authority by - 
 which the priest absolves the sinners; 
 the silver expresses the learning and 
 judgment requisite for the due discharge 
 of that office. 
 
PURGATORY 181 
 
 In accents blended with sweet melody. 
 
 The strains came o’er mine ear, e’en as the sound 
 Of choral voices, that in solemn chant 
 
 With organ® mingle, and, now high and clear 
 Come swelling, now float indistinct away. 
 
 CANTO X 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Being admitted at the gate of Purgatory, our Poets ascend 
 a winding path up the rock, till they reach an open and level space 
 that extends each way round the mountain. On the side that rises, 
 and which is of white marble, are seen artfully engraven many 
 stories of humility, which whilst they are contemplating, there ap- 
 approach the souls of those who expiate the sin of pride, and who 
 are bent down beneath the weight of heavy stones. 
 
 HEN we had passed the threshold of the gate 
 (Which the soul’s ill affection doth disuse, 
 Making the crooked seem the straighter path), 
 
 I heard its closing sound. Had mine eyes turn’d, 
 For that offence what plea might have avail’d? 
 
 We mounted up the riven rock, that wound 
 On either side alternate, as the wave 
 Flies and advances. ‘“ Here some little art 
 Behoves us,” said my leader, “that our steps 
 Observe the varying flexure of the path.” 
 
 Thus we so slowly sped, that with cleft orb 
 The moon once more o’erhangs her watery couch, 
 Ere we that strait have threaded. But when free, 
 We came, and open, where the mount above 
 One solid mass retires; I spent with toil, 
 And both uncertain of the way, we stood, 
 Upon a plain more lonesome than the roads 
 That traverse desert wilds. From whence the brink 
 Borders upon vacuity, to foot 
 Of the steep bank that rises still, the space 
 Had measured thrice the stature of a man: 
 And, distant as mine eye could wing its flight, 
 ®“ Organ.” Organs were used in in the Emperor Julian’s writings, which 
 
 Italy as early as in the sixth century. shows that the organ was not unknown 
 If I remember rightly there is a passage in his time. 
 
 Classies. Vol. 34—I 
 
182 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 To leftward now and now to right despatch’d, 
 That cornice equal in extent appear’d. 
 
 Not yet our feet had on that summit moved, 
 When I discover’d that the bank, around, 
 
 Whose proud uprising all ascent denied, 
 
 Was marble white, aud so exactly wrought 
 With quaintest sculpture, that not there alone 
 Had Polycletus, but e’en nature’s self 
 
 Been shamed. The angel (who came down to earth 
 With tidings of the peace so many years 
 
 Wept for in vain, that oped the heavenly gates 
 From their long interdict) before us seem’d, 
 
 In a sweet act, so sculptured to the life, 
 
 He look’d no silent image. One had sworn 
 
 He had said “ Hail!” for she was imaged there, 
 By whom the key did open to God’s love; 
 
 And in her act as sensibly imprest 
 
 That word, “ Behold the handmaid of the Lord,” 
 As figure seal’d on wax. “ Fix not thy mind 
 
 On one place only,” said the guide beloved, 
 Who had me near him on that part where lies 
 The heart of man. My sight forthwith I turn’d, 
 And mark’d, behind the virgin mother’s form, 
 Upon that side where he that moved me stood, 
 Another story graven on the rock. 
 
 I pass’d athwart the bard, and drew me near, 
 That it might stand more aptly for my view. 
 There, in the self-same marble, were engraved 
 The cart and kine, drawing the sacred ark, 
 
 That from unbidden office awes mankind. 
 Before it came much people; and the whole 
 Parted in seven quires. One sense cried “ Nay,” 
 Another, ‘“ Yes, they sing.” Like doubt arose 
 Betwixt the eye and smell, from the curl’d fume 
 Of incense breathing up the well-wrought toil. 
 Preceding the blest vessel, onward came, 
 
 With light dance leaping, girt in humble guise, 
 Israel’s sweet harper: in that hap he seem’d 
 Less, and yet more, than kingly. Opposite, 
 
 At a great palace, from the lattice forth 
 
PURGATORY 183 
 
 Look’d Michol, like a lady full of scorn 
 _ And sorrow. To behold the tablet next, 
 Which, at the back of Michol, whitely shone, 
 I moved me. There, was storied on the rock 
 The exalted glory of the Roman prince, 
 Whose mighty worth moved Gregory? to earn 
 His mighty conquest, Trajan the Emperor. 
 A widow at his bridle stood, attired 
 In tears and mourning. Round about them troop’d 
 Full throng of knights; and overhead in gold 
 The eagles floated, struggling with the wind. 
 The wretch appear’d amid all these to say: 
 “Grant vengeance, Sire! for, woe beshrew this heart, 
 My son is murder’d.” He replying seem’d: 
 “Wait now till I return.” And she, as one 
 Made hasty by her grief: “O Sire! if thou 
 Dost not return?” “‘ Where I am, who then is, 
 May right thee.” ‘ What to thee is other’s gooa, 
 If thou neglect thy own?” “ Now comfort thee; ” 
 At length he answers. “It beseemeth well 
 My duty be perform’d, ere I move hence: 
 So justice wills; and pity bids me stay.” 
 He, whose ken nothing new surveys, produced 
 That visible speaking, new to us and strange, 
 The like not found on earth. Fondly I gazed 
 . Upon those patterns of meek humbleness, 
 Shapes yet more precious for their artist’s sake; 
 When “Lo!” the poet whisper’d, “where this way 
 (But slack their pace) a multitude advance. 
 These to the lofty steps shall guide us on.” 
 Mine eyes, though bent on view of novel sights, 
 Their loved allurement, were not slow to turn. 
 Reader! I would not that amazed thou miss 
 Of thy good purpose, hearing how just God 
 Decrees our debts be cancel’d. Ponder not 
 ~The form of suffering. Think on what succeeds: 
 Think that, at worst, beyond the mighty doom 
 It cannot pass. “Instructor!” I began, 
 
 1“ Gregory.” St. Gregory’s prayers are said to have delivered Trajan from 
 hell. See “ Paradise, Canto xx. 40. 
 
184 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 “ What I see hither tending, bears no trace 
 Of human semblance, nor of aught beside 
 That my foil’d sight can guess.” He answering thus: 
 “So curb’d to earth, beneath their heavy terms 
 Of torment stoop they, that mine eye at first 
 Struggled as thine. But look intently thither; 
 And disentangle with thy laboring view, 
 What, underneath those stones, approacheth: now, 
 E’en now, mayst thou discern the pangs of each.” 
 Christians and proud! O poor and wretched ones! 
 That, feeble in the mind’s eye, lean your trust 
 Upon unstaid perverseness: know ye not 
 That we are worms, yet made at last to form 
 The winged insect,? imp’d with angel plumes, 
 That to heaven’s justice unobstructed soars? 
 Why buoy ye up aloft your unfledged souls? 
 Abortive then and shapeless ye remain, 
 Like the untimely embryon of a worm. 
 As, to support incumbent floor or roof, 
 For corbel, is a figure sometimes seen, 
 That crumples up its knees unto its breast; 
 With the feign’d posture, stirring ruth unfeign’d 
 In the beholder’s fancy; so I saw 
 These fashion’d, when I noted well their guise. 
 Each, as his back was laden, came indeed 
 Or more or less contracted; and it seem’d 
 As he, who show’d most patience in his look, 
 Wailing exclaim’d: “I can endure no more.” 
 
 2“ The winged insect.” The butterfly was an ancient and well-known symbol 
 of the human soul. 
 
PURGATORY 188 
 
 CANTO XI 
 
 ArcuMENT.—After a prayer uttered by the spirits, who were spoken- 
 of in the last Canto, Virgil inquires the way upward, and is answered 
 by one, who declares himself to have been Omberto, son of the 
 Count of Santafiore. Next our Poet distinguishes Oderigi, the il- 
 luminator, who discourses on the vanity of worldly fame, and points 
 out to him the soul of Provenzano Salvani. 
 
 a THOU Almighty Father! who dost make 
 The heavens thy dwelling, not in bounds confined, 
 But that, with love intenser, there thou -view’st 
 Thy primal effluence; hallow’d be thy name: 
 Join, each created being, to extol 
 Thy might; for worthy humblest thanks and praise 
 Is thy blest Spirit. May thy kingdom’s peace 
 Come unto us; for we, unless it come, 
 With all our striving, thither tend in vain. 
 As, of their will, the angels unto thee 
 Tender meet sacrifice, circling thy throne 
 With loud hosannas; so of theirs be done 
 By saintly men on earth. Grant us, this day, 
 Our daily manna, without which he roams 
 Through this rough desert retrograde, who most 
 Toils to advance his steps. As we to each 
 Pardon the evil done us, pardon thou 
 . Benign, and of our merit take no count. 
 *Gainst the old adversary, prove thou not 
 Our virtue, easily subdued; but free 
 From his incitements, and defeat his wiles. 
 This last petition, dearest Lord! is made 
 Not for ourselves; since that were needless now; 
 But for their sakes who after us remain.” 
 Thus for themselves and us good speed imploring, 
 Those spirits went beneath a weight like that 
 We sometimes feel in dreams; all, sore beset, 
 But with unequal anguish; wearied all; 
 Round the first circuit; purging as they go 
 The world’s gross darkness off. In our behoof 
 If their vows still be offer’d, what can here 
 For them be vow’d and done by such, whose wills 
 
- 186 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Have root of goodness in them? Well beseems 
 
 That we should help them wash away the stains 
 
 They carried hence; that so, made pure and light, 
 
 They may spring upward to the starry spheres. 
 “Ah! so may mercy-temper’d justice rid 
 
 Your burdens speedily; that ye have power 
 
 To stretch your wing, which e’en to your desire 
 
 Shall lift you; as ye show us on which hand 
 
 Toward the ladder leads the shortest way. 
 
 And if there be more passages than one, 
 
 Instruct us of that easiest to ascend: 
 
 For this man, who comes with me, and bears yet 
 
 The charge of fleshly raiment Adam left him, 
 
 Despite his better will, but slowly mounts.” 
 
 From whom the answer came unto these words, 
 
 Which my guide spake, appear’d not; but ’twas said: 
 
 “ Along the bank to rightward come with us; 
 
 And ye shall find a pass that mocks not toil 
 
 Of living man to climb: and were it not 
 
 That I am hinder’d by the rock, wherewith 
 
 This arrogant neck is tamed, whence needs I stoop 
 
 My visage to the ground; him, who yet lives, 
 
 Whose name thou speak’st not, him I fain would view; 
 
 To mark if e’er I knew him, and to crave 
 
 His pity for the fardel that I bear. 
 
 I was of Latium;! of a Tuscan born, 
 
 A mighty one: Aldobrandesco’s name 
 
 My sire’s, I know not if ye e’er have heard. 
 
 My old blood and forefathers’ gallant deeds 
 
 Made me so haughty, that I clean forgot 
 
 The common mother; and to such excess 
 
 Wax’d in my scorn of all men, that I fell, 
 
 Fell therefore; by what fate, Sienna’s sons, 
 
 Each child in Campagnatico, can tell. 
 
 Iam Omberto: not me, only, pride 
 
 Hath injured, but my kindred all involved 
 
 In mischief with her. Here my lot ordains 
 
 1] was of Latium.’? Omberto, the to such a pitch of fury against him 
 son of Guglielmo Aldobrandesco, Count that he was murdered by them at Campa- 
 
 of Santafiore, in the territory of Sienna. gnatico, 
 His arrogance provoked his countrymen 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 187 
 
 Under this weight to groan, till I appease 
 
 God’s angry justice, since I did it not 
 
 Amongst the living, here amongst the dead.” 
 Listening I bent my visage down: and one 
 
 (Not he who spake) twisted beneath the weight 
 
 That urged him, saw me, knew me straight, and call’d; 
 
 Holding his eyes with difficulty fix’d 
 
 Intent upon me, stooping as I went 
 
 Companion of their way. 
 
 “Ol” T exclaim’d, 
 
 “ Art thou not Oderigi?? art not thou 
 
 Agobbio’s glory, glory of that art 
 
 Which they of Paris call the limner’s skill?” 
 “Brother!” said he, “ with tints, that gayer smile, 
 
 Bolognian Franco’s* pencil lines the leaves. 
 
 His all the honor now; my light obscured. 
 
 In truth, I had not been thus courteous to him 
 
 The whilst I lived, through eagerness of zeal 
 
 For that pre-eminence my heart was bent on. 
 
 Here, of such pride, the forfeiture is paid. 
 
 Nor were I even here, if, able still 
 
 To sin, I had not turn’d me unto God. 
 
 O powers of man! how vain your glory, nipt 
 
 E’en in its height of verdure, if an age 
 
 Less bright succeed not. 
 
 Cimabue thought . 
 
 To lord it over painting’s field; and now 
 
 The cry is Giotto’s,* and his name eclipsed. 
 Thus hath one Guido from the other® snatch’d 
 The letter’d prize: and he, perhaps, is born, 
 
 Who shall drive either from their nest. 
 
 The noise 
 
 Of worldly fame is but a blast of wind, 
 
 That blows from diverse points, and shifts its name, 
 Shifting the point it blows from. Shalt thou more 
 Live in the mouths of mankind, if thy flesh 
 
 8“ Oderigi.” The illuminator, or 
 miniature painter, a friend of Giotto and 
 Dante. 
 
 8“ Bolognian Franco.” Franco of 
 Bologna, who is said to have been a 
 pupil of Oderigi’s. 
 
 * “ The cry is Giotto’s.”? In Giotto we 
 have a proof at how early a period the 
 fine arts were encouraged in Italy. His 
 talents were discovered by Cimabue, 
 while he was aelstbed sheep for his father 
 in the neighborhood of Florence, and he 
 
 was afterward patronized by Pope Bene- 
 dict XI and Robert, King of Naples; 
 and enjoyed the society and friendship 
 of Dante, whose likeness he has trans- 
 mitted to posterity. He died in 1336, at 
 the age of 60. F 
 
 5 “ One Guido from the other.”” Guido 
 Cavalcanti, the friend of our Poet, had 
 eclipsed the literary fame, of Guido 
 Guinicelli, of a noble family in Bologna, 
 whom we shall meet with in the twenty- 
 sixth Canto. 
 
188 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Part shrivel’d from thee, than if thou hadst died 
 Before the coral and the pap were leit; 
 
 Or e’er some thousand years have pass’d? and that 
 Is, to eternity compared, a space 
 
 Briefer than is the twinkling of an eye 
 
 To the heaven’s slowest orb. He there, who treads 
 So leisurely before me, far and wide 
 
 Through Tuscany resounded once; and now 
 
 Is in Sienna scarce with whispers named: 
 
 There was he sovereign, when destruction caught 
 The maddening rage of Florence, in that day 
 
 Proud as she tiow is loathsome. 
 
 Your renown 
 
 Is as the herb, whose hue doth come and go; 
 
 And his might withers it, by whom it sprang 
 Crude from the lap of earth.” 
 
 I thus to him: 
 
 “True are thy sayings: to my heart they breathe 
 The kindly spirit of meekness, and allay 
 
 What tumors rankle there. 
 
 Of whom thou speakest but now?” 
 He is here, because 
 
 “Is Provenzano. 
 
 But who is he, 
 
 “This,” he replied, 
 
 He reach’d, with a grasp presumptuous, at the sway 
 
 Of all Sienna. 
 
 Thus he still hath gone, 
 
 Thus goeth never-resting, since he died. 
 Such is the acquittance render’d back of him, 
 Who, in the mortal life, too much hath dared.” 
 
 I then: 
 
 “Tf soul, that to life’s verge delays 
 
 Repentance, linger in that lower space, 
 
 Nor hither mount (unless good prayers befriend), 
 
 Or ever time, long as it lived, be past; 
 
 How chanced admittance was vouchsafed to him?” 
 “When at his glory’s topmost height,” said he, 
 
 “Respect of dignity all cast aside, 
 
 Freely he fix’d him on Sienna’s plain, 
 
 A suitor® to redeem his suffering friend, 
 
 Who languish’d in the prison-house of Charles; 
 
 Nor, for his sake, refused through every vein 
 
 6‘* A  suitor.”’ Provenzano Salvani 
 humbled himself so far for the sake of 
 one of his friends, who was detained in 
 captivity by Charles I of Sicily, as per- 
 
 sonally to supplicate the people of Sien- 
 
 na to contribute the sum required by 
 
 the King for his ransom: and this act of 
 self-abasement aton for his general 
 ambition and pride. He fell in the bat- 
 tle of Vald’ Elsa,. wherein the Florene 
 inks discomfited the Siennese in June, 
 126a. 
 
PURGATORY 189 
 
 To tremble. More I will not say; and dark, 
 
 I know, my words are; but thy neighbors soon 
 Shall help thee to a comment on the text. 
 
 This is the work, that from these limits freed him.” 
 
 CANTO XII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Dante being desired by Virgil to look down on the ground 
 which they are treading, observes that it is wrought over with 
 imagery exhibiting various instances of pride recorded in history 
 and fable. They leave the first cornice, and are ushered to the next 
 by an angel who points out the way. 
 
 ITH equal pace, as oxen in the yoke, 
 I, with that laden spirit, journey’d on, 
 Long as the mild instructor suffer’d me; 
 But, when he bade me quit him, and proceed, 
 (For “ Here,” said he, “ behoves with sail and oars 
 Each man, as best he may, push on his bark,”) 
 Upright, as one disposed for speed, I raised 
 My body, still in thought submissive bow’d. 
 I now my leader’s track not loth pursued ; 
 And each had shown how light we fared along, 
 When thus he warned me: “ Bend thine eyesight down: 
 For thou, to ease the way, shalt find it good 
 To ruminate the bed beneath thy feet.” 
 As, in memorial of the buried, drawn 
 Upon earth-level tombs, the sculptured form 
 Of what was once, appears (at sight whereof 
 Tears often stream forth, by remembrance waked, 
 Whose sacred stings the piteous often feel), 
 So saw I there, but with more curious skill 
 Of portraiture o’erwrought, whate’er of space 
 From forth the mountain stretches. On one part 
 Him I beheld, above all creatures erst 
 Created noblest, lightening fall from heaven: 
 On the other side, with bolt celestial pierced, 
 Briareus; cumbering earth he lay, through dint 
 Of mortal ice-stroke. The Thymbrzan god,* 
 _ 3° The Thymbrzan god.” Apollo. 
 
190 | THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 With Mars, I saw, and Pallas, round their sire, 
 Arm’d still, and gazing on the giants’ limbs 
 Strewn o’er the ethereal field. Nimrod I saw: 
 At foot of the stupendous work he stood, 
 _As if bewilder’d, looking on the crowd 
 Leagued in his proud attempt on Sennaar’s plain. 
 O Niobe! in what a trance of woe 
 Thee I beheld, upon that highway drawn, 
 Seven sons on either side thee slain. O Saul! 
 How ghastly didst thou look, on thine own sword 
 Expiring, in Gilboa, from that hour 
 Ne’er visited with rain from heaven, or dew. 
 O fond Arachne! thee I also saw, 
 Half spider now, in anguish, crawling up 
 The unfinish’d web thou weaved’st to thy bane. 
 O Rehoboam! here thy shape doth seem 
 Louring no more defiance; but fear-smote, 
 With none to chase him, in his chariot whirl’d. 
 Was shown beside upon the solid floor, 
 How dear Alcmzon forced his mother rate 
 That ornament, in evil hour received: 
 How, in the temple, on Sennacherib fell 
 His sons, and how a corpse they left him there. 
 Was shown the scath, and cruel mangling made 
 By Tomyris on Cyrus, when she cried, 
 “ Blood thou didst thirst for: take thy fill of blood.” 
 Was shown how routed in the battle fled 
 The Assyrians, Holofernes slain, and e’en 
 The relics of the carnage. Troy I mark’d, 
 In ashes and in caverns. Oh! how fallen, 
 How abject, Ilion, was thy semblance there. 
 What master of the pencil or the style 
 Had traced the shades and lines, that might have made 
 The subtlest workman wonder? Dead, the dead; 
 The living seem’d alive: with clearer view, 
 His eye beheld not, who beheld the truth, 
 Than mine what I did tread on, while I went 
 Low bending. Now swell out, and with stiff necks 
 Pass on, ye sons of Eve! vale not your looks, 
 Lest they descry the evil of your path. 
 
PURGATORY 191 
 
 I noted not (so busied was my thought) 
 
 How much we now had circled of the mount; 
 And of his course yet more the sun had spent; 
 When he, who with still wakeful caution went, 
 Admonish’d: ‘“ Raise thou up thy head: for know 
 Time is not for slow suspense. Behold, 
 
 That way, an angel hasting toward us. Lo! 
 When duly the sixth handmaid doth return 
 From service on the day. Wear thou, in look 
 And gesture, seemly grace of reverent awe; 
 That gladly he may forward us aloft. 
 
 Consider that this day ne’er dawns again.” 
 
 Time’s loss he had so often warn’d me ’gainst, 
 I could not miss the scope at which he aim’d. 
 
 The goodly shape approach’d us, snowy white 
 In vesture, and with visage casting streams 
 Of tremulous lustre like the matin star. 
 
 His arms he open’d, then his wings; and spake: 
 “Onward! the steps, behold, are near; and now 
 The ascent is without difficulty gain’d.” 
 
 A scanty few are they, who, when they hear 
 Such tidings, hasten. O, ye race of men! 
 Though born to soar, why suffer ye a wind 
 So slight to baffle ye? He led us on 
 Where the rock parted; here, against my front, 
 Did beat his wings; then promised I should fare 
 In safety on my way. As to ascend 
 That steep, upon whose brow the chapel stands,? 
 (O’er Rubaconte, looking lordly down 
 On the well-guided city,?) up the right 
 The impetuous rise is broken by the steps 
 Carved in that old and simple age, when still 
 The registry * and label rested safe; 
 
 Thus is the acclivity relieved, which here, 
 Precipitous, from the other circuit falls: 
 But, on each hand, the tall cliff presses close. 
 
 2“ The chapel stands.” The church 3“*The well-guided city.” This is 
 of San Miniato in Florence, situated on said ironically of Florence. 
 a height that overlooks the ‘Arno, where “The registry.””. In allusion to 
 it is crossed by the bridge Rubaconte, oes instances of fraud committed in 
 
 so called from Messer Rubaconte da Dante’s time with respect to the publi¢ 
 Mandella, of Milan, chief magistrate of accounts and measures. 
 
 Florence, by whom the bridge was 
 
 founded in 1237. 
 
 ¢ 
 
192 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 As, entering, there we turn’d, voices, in strain 
 
 Ineffable, sang: 
 In spirit.” 
 
 “ Blessed ® are the poor 
 Ah! how far unlike to these 
 
 The straits of hell: here songs to usher us, 
 
 There shrieks of woe. 
 
 We climb the holy stairs: 
 
 And lighter to myself by far I seem’d 
 
 Than on the plain before; whence thus I spake: 
 
 “ Say, master, of what heavy thing have I 
 
 Been lighten’d; that scarce aught the sense of toil 
 
 Affects me journeying? ” 
 
 He in few replied: 
 
 “ When sin’s broad characters,® that yet remain 
 
 Upon thy temples, though well nigh effaced, 
 
 Shall be, as one is, all clean razed out: ~ 
 
 Then shall thy feet by heartiness of will. 
 
 Be so o’ercome, they not alone shall feel 
 
 No sense of labor, but delight much more 
 
 Shall wait them, urged along their upward way.” 
 Then like to one, upon whose head is placed 
 
 Somewhat he deems not of, but from the becks 
 
 Of others, as they pass him by; his hand 
 
 Lends therefore help to assure him, searches, finds, 
 
 And well performs such office as the eye 
 
 Wants power to execute; so stretching forth 
 
 The fingers of my right hand, did I find 
 
 Six only of the letters, which his sword, 
 
 Who bare the keys, had traced upon my brow. 
 
 The leader, as he mark’d mine action, smiled. 
 
 5** Blessed.”” ‘‘ Blessed are the poor in 
 spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of 
 heaven.” Matth. v. 3. 
 
 §“* Sin’s broad characters.”’ Of the 
 seven P’s, that denoted the same num- 
 ber of sins (Peccata) whereof he was 
 
 to be cleansed (see Canto ix. 100), the 
 first had now vanished in consequence 
 of his having passed the place where 
 the sin of pride, the chief of them, was 
 expiated. 
 
PURGATO RY 193 
 
 CANTO XIII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—They gain the second cornice, where the sin of envy is 
 purged; and having proceeded a little to the right, they hear voices 
 uttered by invisible spirits recounting famous examples of charity, 
 and next behold the shades, or souls, of the envious clad in sack- 
 cloth, and having their eyes sewed up with an iron thread. Among 
 these Dante finds Sapia, a Siennese lady, from whom he learns the 
 cause of her being there. 
 
 E reach’d the summit of the scale, and stood 
 Upon the second buttress of that mount 
 ~ Which healeth him who climbs. A cornice there, 
 Like to the former, girdles round the hill; 
 Save that its arch, with sweep less ample, bends. 
 Shadow, nor image there, is seen: all smooth 
 The rampart and the path, reflecting naught 
 But the rock’s sullen hue. “If here we wait, 
 For some to question,” said the bard, “I fear 
 Our choice may haply meet too long delay.” 
 Then fixedly upon the sun his eyes 
 He fasten’d; made his right the central point 
 From whence to move; and turn’d the left aside. 
 “O pleasant light, my confidence and hope! 
 Conduct us thou,” he cried, “on this new way, 
 Where now I venture; leading to the bourn 
 We seek. The universal world to thee 
 Owes warmth and lustre. If no other cause 
 Forbid, thy beams should ever be our guide.” 
 Far, as is measured for a mile on earth, 
 In brief space had we journey’d; such prompt will 
 Impell’d; and toward us flying, now were heard 
 Spirits invisible, who courteously 
 Unto love’s table bade the welcome guest. 
 The voice, that first flew by, call’d forth aloud, 
 “They have no wine,” so on behind us past, 
 Those sounds reiterating, nor yet lost 
 In the faint distance, when another came 
 Crying, “I am Orestes,” + and alike 
 
 2“ Orestes.” Alluding to his friendship with Pylades. 
 
194 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Wing’d its fleet away. ‘“‘O father!” I exclaim’d, 
 “What tongues are these?” and as I question’d, lo! 
 A third exclaiming, ‘‘ Love ye those have wrong’d you.” 
 “This circuit,” said my teacher, “ knots the scourge 
 For envy; and the cords are therefore drawn 
 By charity’s correcting hand. The curb 
 Is of a harsher sound; as thou shalt hear 
 (If I deem rightly) ere thou reach the pass, 
 Where pardon sets them free. But fix thine eyes 
 Intently through the air; and thou shalt see 
 A multitude before thee seated, each 
 Along the shelving grot.’”’ Then more than erst 
 I oped mine eyes; before me view’d; and saw 
 Shadows with garments dark as was the rock; 
 And when we pass’d a little forth, I heard 
 A crying, “ Blessed Mary! pray for us, 
 Michael and Peter! all ye saintly host!” 
 I do not think there walks on earth this day 
 Man so remorseless, that he had not yearn’d 
 With pity at the sight that next I saw. 
 Mine eyes a load of sorrow teem’d, when now 
 I stood so near them, that their semblances 
 Came clearly to my view. Of sackcloth vile 
 Their covering seem’d; and, on his shoulder, one 
 Did stay another, leaning; and all lean’d 
 Against the cliff. E’en thus the blind and poor, 
 Near the confessionals, to crave an alms, 
 Stand, each his head upon his fellow’s sunk; 
 So most to stir compassion, not by sound 
 Of words alone, but that which moves not less, 
 The sight of misery. And as never beam 
 Of noon-day visiteth the eyeless man, 
 E’en so was heaven a niggard unto these 
 Of this fair light: for, through the orbs of all, 
 A thread of wire, impiercing, knits them up, 
 As for the taming of a haggard hawk. 
 It were a wrong, methought, to pass and look 
 On others, yet myself the while unseen. 
 To my sage counsel therefore did I turn. 
 He knew the meaning of the mute appeal, 
 
PURGATORY 195 
 
 Nor waited for my questioning, but said: 
 “ Speak; and be brief, be subtile in thy words.” 
 On that part of the cornice, whence no rim 
 Engarlands its steep fall, did Virgil come; 
 On the other side me were the spirits, their cheeks 
 Bathing devout with penitential tears, 
 That through the dread impalement forced a way. 
 I turn’d me to them, and “ O shades!” said I, 
 “ Assured that to your eyes unveil’d shall shine 
 The lofty light, sole object of your wish, 
 So may heaven’s grace clear whatsoe’er of foam 
 Floats turbid on the conscience, that thenceforth 
 The stream of mind roll limpid from its source; 
 As ye declare (for so shall ye impart 
 A boon I dearly prize) if any soul 
 Of Latium dwell among ye: and perchance 
 That soul may profit, if I learn so much.” 
 “My brother! we are, each one, citizens 
 Of one true city.2 Any, thou wouldst say, 
 Who lived a stranger in Italia’s land.” 
 So heard I answering, as appear’d, a voice 
 That onward came some space from whence I stood. 
 A spirit I noted, in whose look was mark’d 
 Expectance. Ask ye how? The chin was raised 
 As in one reft of sight. “ Spirit,” said I, 
 “ Who for thy rise art tutoring, (if thou be - 
 That which didst answer to me,) or by place, 
 Or name, disclose thyself, that I may know thee.” 
 “T was,” it answer’d, “of Sienna: here 
 I cleanse away with these the evil life, 
 Soliciting with tears that He, who is, 
 Vouchsafe him to us. Though Sapia* named, 
 In sapience I excell’d not; gladder far. 
 Of other’s hurt, than of the good befell me. 
 That thou mayst own I now deceive thee not, 
 Hear, if my folly were not as I speak it. 
 
 3 ** _____ Citizens ing in exile at Colle, was so overjoyed 
 Of one true city! ”’ at a defeat which her countrymen sus- 
 
 ** For here we have no continuing city, tained near that place, that she declared 
 but we seek one to come,’”’—Heb. xiii. nothing more was wanting to make her 
 
 14. die contented. 
 8“ Sapia.”” A lady of Sienna, who, liv- 
 
196 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 When now my tears sloped waning down the arch, 
 It so bechanced, my fellow-citizens 
 
 Near Colle met their enemies in the field; 
 
 And I pray’d God to grant what He had will’d.* 
 There were they vanquish’d, and betook themselves 
 Unto the bitter passages of flight. 
 
 I mark’d the hunt; and waxing out of bounds 
 
 In gladness, lifted up my shameless brow, 
 
 And, like the merlin ® cheated by a gleam, 
 
 Cried, ‘It is over. 
 
 Heaven! I fear thee not.’ 
 
 Upon my verge of life I wish’d for peace 
 With God; nor yet repentance had supplied 
 What I did lack of duty, were it not 
 
 The hermit Piero,® touch’d with charity, 
 
 In his devout orisons thought on me. 
 
 But who art thou that question’st of our state, 
 Who go’st, as I believe, with lids unclosed, 
 
 And breathest in thy talk?” 
 
 “ Mine eyes,” said I, 
 
 “May yet be here ta’en from me; but not long; 
 For they have not offended grievously 
 
 With envious glances. 
 
 But the woe beneath 7 
 
 Urges my soul with more exceeding dread. 
 That nether load already weighs me down.” 
 
 She thus: 
 
 “Who then, among us here aloft, 
 
 Hath brought thee, if thou weenest to return? ” 
 
 “He,” answered I, “ who standeth mute beside me. 
 T live: of me ask therefore, chosen spirit! | 
 If thou desire I yonder yet should move 
 
 For thee my mortal feet.” 
 
 “Oh!” she replied, 
 
 “ This is so strange a thing, it is a great sign 
 
 That God doth love thee. 
 
 Therefore with thy prayer 
 
 Sometime assist me: and, by that I crave, 
 Which most thou covetest, that if thy feet 
 F’er tread on Tuscan soil, thou save my fame 
 Among my kindred. Them shalt thou behold 
 
 4“ And I pray’d God to grant what 
 
 He had will’d.”” That her countrymen 
 
 should be defeated in battle. 
 
 5“ The merlin.” The story of the 
 merlin is, that having been induced by 
 a gleam of fine weather in the winter to 
 escape from his master, he was soon 
 eppressed by the rigor of the season. 
 
 6°“ The hermit Piero.” Piero Pettin- 
 agno, a holy hermit of Florence. 
 
 7“ The woe beneath.”? Dante felt that 
 he was much more subject to the sin 
 of pride, than to that of envy; and this 
 is Just what we should have concluded 
 of a mind such as his. 
 
 Ror 
 Fe 
 
PURGATORY 197 
 
 With that vain multitude,’ who set their hope 
 
 On Telamone’s haven; there to fail 
 
 Confounded, more than when the fancied stream 
 They sought, of Dian call’d: but they, who lead 
 Their navies, more than ruin’d hopes shall mourn.” 
 
 CANTO XIV 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Our Poet on this second cornice finds also the souls of 
 
 Guido del Duca of Brettinoro, and_Rinieri da Calboli of Romagna ; 
 Teche ct chon hearing that he comes from the banks of the 
 Arno, inveighs against the degeneracy of all those who dwell in the 
 cities visited by that stream; and the former, in like manner, against 
 
 the inhabitants of Romagna. On leaving these, our Poets hear 
 voices recording noted instances of envy. 
 
 h AY,! who is he around our mountain winds, 
 Or ever death has pruned his wing for flight; 
 That opes his eyes, and covers them at will?” 
 “TIT know not who he is, but know thus much; 
 He comes not singly. . Do thou ask of him, 
 For thou art nearer to him; and take heed, 
 Accost him gently, so that he may speak.” 
 Thus on the right two spirits, bending each 
 Toward the other, talk’d of me; then both 
 Addressing me, their faces backward lean’d, 
 And thus the one? began: “O soul, who yet 
 Pent in the body, tendest toward the sky! 
 For charity, we pray thee, comfort us; 
 Recounting whence thou comest, and who thou art: 
 For thou dost make us, at the favor shown thee, 
 (Marvel, as at a thing that ne’er hath been.” 
 “There stretches through the midst of Tuscany, 
 I straight began, “a brooklet,? whose well-head 
 Springs up in Falterona; with his race 
 Not satisfied, when he some hundred miles 
 Hath measured. From his banks bring I this frame. 
 8“ That vain multitude.” The Sien- a3"* The one.” Guido del Duca. 
 ese. 8“ A brooklet.”” The Arno, that rises 
 1“ Say.’”’ The two spirits who thus in Falterona, a mountain in the Apen- 
 speak to each other are Guido del Duca, nines, Its course is 120 miles, 
 
 of Brettinoro, and Rinieri da Calboli, of 
 Romagna. 
 
198 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 To tell you who I am were words mis-spent: 
 For yet my name scarce sounds on rumor’s lip.” 
 
 “Tf well I do incorporate with my thought 
 The meaning of thy speech,” said he, who first 
 Address’d me, “‘ thou dost speak of Arno’s wave.” 
 
 To whom the other:* “ Why hath he conceal’d 
 The title of that river, as a man 
 Doth of some horrible thing?” The spirit, who 
 Thereof was question’d, did acquit him thus: 
 “T know not: but ’tis fitting well the name 
 Should perish of that vale; for from the source,® 
 Where teems so plenteously the Alpine steep 
 Maim’d of Pelorus (that doth scarcely pass 
 Beyond that limit), even to the point 
 Where unto ocean is restored what heaven 
 Drains from the exhaustless store for all earth’s streams, 
 Throughout the space is virtue worried down, 
 As ’t were a snake by all, for mortal foe; 
 Or through disastrous influence on the place, 
 Or else distortion of misguided wills 
 That custom goads to evil: whence in those, 
 The dwellers in that miserable vale, 
 Nature is so transform’d, it seems as they 
 Had shared of Circe’s feeding. ’Midst brute swine,® 
 Worthier of acorns than of other food 
 Created for man’s use, he shapeth first 
 His obscure way; then, sloping onward, finds 
 Curs,’ snarlers more in spite than power, from whom 
 He turns with scorn aside: still journeying down, 
 By how much more the curst and luckless foss ® 
 Swells out to largeness, e’en so much it finds 
 Dogs turning into wolves.? Descending still 
 Through yet more hollow eddies, next he meets 
 A race of foxes,’® so replete with craft, 
 They do not fear that skill can master it. 
 
 4“ The other.” Rinieri da Calboli. 6‘*’Midst brute swine.’”? The people 
 8 ‘* From the source.’ From the rise of Casentino. 
 of the Arno in that ** Alpine steep,” the 7** Curs.”” The Arno leaves Arezzo 
 Apennines, from whence Pelorus in Sic- about four miles to the left. 
 ily was torn by a convulsion of the 8“ Foss.” So in his anger he terms 
 earth, even to the point where the same the Arno. ‘ 
 river unites its waters to the ocean, Vir- 9“ Wolves.” The Florentines, 
 
 tue is persecuted by all. 10 “* Foxes.’”? The Pisans, 
 
PURGATORY 199 
 
 Nor will I cease because my words are heard 
 By other ears than thine. It shall be well 
 For this man,’? if he keep in memory 
 
 What from no erring spirit I reveal. 
 
 Lo! I behold thy grandson, that becomes 
 
 A hunter of those wolves, upon the shore 
 
 Of the fierce stream; and cows them all with dread. 
 Their flesh, yet living, sets he up to sale, 
 Then, like an aged beast, to slaughter dooms. 
 Many of life he ’reaves, himself of worth 
 
 And goodly estimation. Smear’d with gore, 
 Mark how he issues from the rueful wood; 
 Leaving such havoc, that in thousand years 
 It spreads not to prime lustihood again.” 
 
 As one, who tidings hears of woe to come, 
 Changes his looks perturb’d, from whate’er part 
 The peril grasp him; so beheld I change 
 That spirit, who had turn’d to listen; struck 
 With sadness, sdon as he had caught the word. 
 
 His visage, and the other’s speech, did raise 
 Desire in me to know the names of both; 
 Whereof, with meek entreaty, I inquired. 
 
 The shade, who late address’d me, thus resumed: 
 “Thy wish imports, that I vouchsafe to do 
 For thy sake what thou wilt not do for mine. 
 But, since God’s will is that so largely shine 
 His grace in thee, I will be liberal too. 
 
 Guido of Duca know then that I am. 
 
 Envy so parch’d my blood, that had I seen 
 
 A fellow man made joyous, thou hadst mark’d 
 
 A livid paleness overspread my cheek. 
 
 Such harvest reap I of the seed I sow’d. 
 
 O man! why place thy heart where there doth need 
 Exclusion of participants in good? 
 
 This is Rinieri’s spirit; this, the boast 
 
 And honor of the house of Calboli; 
 
 31‘* My words are heard.” It should has told us that he comes from the 
 be teéailecrod that Guido still addresses banks of Arno. 
 himself to Rinieri. 18‘* Thy grandson.” eg da Cal- 
 12 “ For this man.” For Dante, who boli, grandson of Rinieri da Calboli, 
 who is here spoken to. 
 
200 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Where of his worth no heritage remains. 
 
 Nor his the only blood, that hath been stript 
 
 ('Twixt Po, the mount, the Reno, and the shore '*) 
 Of all that truth or fancy asks for bliss: 
 
 But, in those limits, such a growth has sprung 
 
 Of rank and venom’d roots, as long would mock - 
 
 Slow culture’s toil. 
 
 Where is good Lizio? * where 
 
 Manardi, Traversaro, and Carpigna? ?¢ 
 
 O bastard slips of old Romagna’s line! 
 
 When in Bologna the low artisan,” 
 
 And in Faenza yon Bernardin ** sprouts, 
 
 A gentle cyon from ignoble stem. 
 
 Wonder not, Tuscan, if thou see me weep, 
 When I recall to mind those once loved names, 
 Guido of Prata,?® and of Azzo him ?° 
 
 That dwelt with us; Tignoso ?! and his troop, 
 With Traversaro’s house and Anastagio’s ?? 
 (Each race disherited) ; and beside these, 
 
 The ladies and the knights, the toils and ease, 
 That witch’d us into love and courtesy; 
 
 Where now such malice reigns in recreant hearts. 
 O Brettinoro! 2? wherefore tarriest still, 
 
 Since forth of thee thy family hath gone, | 
 And many, hating evil, join’d their steps? 
 
 Well doeth he, that bids his lineage cease, 
 Bagnacavallo ; ** Castracaro ill, 
 
 And Conio worse,”*> who care to propagate 
 
 14 °Twixt Po, the mount, the Reno, 
 and the shore.”? The boundaries of Ro- 
 magna. 
 
 15 “* Lizio.” Lizio da Valbona intro- 
 duced into Boccaccio’s ‘*‘ Decameron,” 
 
 TIN ae 
 
 16 “* Manardi, Traversaro, and Carpig- 
 na.”’ Arrigo Manardi, of Faenza, or, as 
 some say, of Brettinoro; Pier_Traver- 
 saro, Lord of Ravenna; and Guido di 
 Carpigna, of Montefeltro. 
 
 17“ Tn Bologna the low artisan.” One 
 who had been a mechanic, named Lam- 
 bertaccio, arrived at almost supreme 
 power in Bologna. 
 
 18‘ Yon Bernardin.’”’ Bernardin di 
 Fosco, a man of low origin, but great 
 talents, who governed at Faenza. 
 
 19 * Prata.”” A place between Faenza 
 and Ravenna. ; 
 
 2‘ Of Azzo him.” Ugolino, of the 
 Ubaldini family in Tuscany. 
 
 21 Tignoso.” Federigo Tignoso of 
 Rimini. 
 
 22“ Traversaro’s house and_Anasta- 
 gio’s.”” Two noble families of Ravenna. 
 
 23“ QO Brettinoro.” <A beautifully sit- 
 uated castle in Romagna, the hospitable 
 residence of Guido del Duca, who is here 
 speaking. Landino relates that there 
 were several of this family who, when 
 a stranger arrived among them, con- 
 tended with one another by whom he 
 should be entertained; and that in order 
 to end this dispute, they set up a pillar 
 with as many rings as there were fa- 
 thers of families among them, a rin 
 being assigned to each, and that accord- 
 ingly as a stranger on his arrival hun 
 his horse’s bridle on one or other o 
 these, he became his guest to whom the 
 
 Ting belonged. 
 
 24 ** Bagnacavallo.”” A castle between 
 Imola and Ravenna. 
 25 ‘“¢ —— Castracaro ill, 
 
 : And Conio worse. 
 Both in Romagna. 
 
PURGATORY _ (cee Nia ale 
 
 A race of Counties 7° from such blood as theirs. 
 
 Well shall ye also do, Pagani,?* then 
 
 When from among you hies your demon child; 
 
 Not so, howe’er, that thenceforth there remain 
 
 True proof of what ye were. O Hugolin,?8 
 
 Thou sprung of Fantolini’s line! thy name 
 
 Is safe; since none is look’d for after thee 
 
 To cloud its lustre, warping from thy stock. 
 
 But, Tuscan! go thy ways; for now I take 
 
 Far more delight in weeping, than in words. 
 
 Such pity for your sakes hath wrung my heart.” 
 We knew those gentle spirits, at parting, heard 
 
 Our steps. Their silence therefore, of our way, 
 
 Assured us. Soon as we had quitted them, 
 
 Advancing onward, lo! a voice, that seem’d 
 
 Like volley’d lightning, when it rives the air, 
 
 Met us, and shouted, “ Whosoever finds 
 
 Will slay me;” and then fled from us, as the bolt 
 
 Lanced sudden from a downward-rushing cloud. 
 
 When it had given short truce unto our hearing, 
 
 Behold the other with a crash as loud 
 
 As the qitick-following thunder: “ Mark in me 
 
 Aglauros, turn’d to rock.” I, at the sound 
 
 Retreating, drew more closely to my guide. 
 Now in mute stillness rested all the air; 
 
 And thus he spake: “ There was the galling bit 
 
 Which should keep man within his boundary. 
 
 But your old enemy so baits the hook, 
 
 He drags you eager to him. Hence nor curb 
 
 Avails you, nor reclaiming all. Heaven calls, 
 
 And, round about you wheeling, courts your gaze 
 
 With everlasting beauties. Yet your eye 
 
 Turns with fond doting still upon the earth. 
 
 Therefore He smites you who discerneth all.” 
 
 26 “ Counties.” 1s shave used this word from his teacher. See “‘ Hell,”” Canto 
 here for “‘ counts,’’ as it is in Shake- XXVil. i and note 
 
 speare. antes olin.” Ugolino Ubaldini, a 
 
 27“ Pagani.” The Pagani were lords eons and virtuous re in Faenza, 
 of Faenza and Imola. One of them, who, on account of his age probably, 
 Machinardo, was named “‘the Demon,” was not likely to leave any offspring 
 
 behind him. 
 
202 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 CANTO XV 
 
 ARGUMENT.—An angel invites them to ascend the next steep. On their 
 way Dante suggests certain doubts, which are resolved by Virgil; 
 and, when they reach the third cornice, where the sin of anger is 
 purged, our Poet, in a kind of waking dream, beholds remarkable 
 instances of patience; and soon after they are enveloped in a dense 
 fog. 
 
 S much as ’twixt the third hour’s close and dawn, 
 A Appeareth of heaven’s sphere, that ever whirls 
 As restless as an infant in his play; 
 
 So much appear’d remaining to the 
 Of his slope journey toward the western goal. 
 
 Evening was there, and here the noon of night; 
 And full upon our forehead smote the beams. 
 For round the mountain, circling, so our path 
 Has led us, that toward the sunsset now 
 Direct we journey’d; when I felt a weight 
 ‘Of more exceeding splendor, than before, 
 Press on my front. The cause unknown, amaze 
 Possess’d me! and both hands against my brows 
 Lifting, I interposed them,.as a screen, 
 That of its gorgeous superflux of light 
 Clips the diminish’d orb. As when the ray, 
 Striking on water or the surface clear 
 Of mirror, leaps unto the opposite part, 
 Ascending at a glance, e’en as it fell, 
 And as much differs from the stone, that falls 
 Through equal space (so practic skill hath shown) ; 
 Thus with refracted light, before me seem’d 
 The ground there smitten; whence, in sudden haste, 
 My sight recoil’d. “ What is this, sire beloved! 
 ’Gainst which I strive to shield the sight in vain?” 
 Cried I, “and which toward us moving seems?” 
 
 “ Marvel not, if the family of heaven,” 
 He answer’d, “ yet with dazzling radiance dim 
 Thy sense. It is a messenger who comes, 
 Inviting man’s ascent. Such sights ere long, 
 Not grievous, shall impart to thee delight, 
 As thy perception is by nature wrought 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 Up to their pitch.” The blessed angel, soon 
 As we had reach’d him, hailed us with glad voice: 
 ** Here enter on a ladder far less steep 
 Than ye have yet encounter’d.” We forthwith 
 Ascending, heard behind us chanted sweet, 
 “ Blessed the merciful,’ ? and “ Happy thou, 
 That conquer’st.” Lonely each, my guide and I, 
 Pursued our upward way; and as we went, 
 Some profit from his words I hoped to win, 
 And thus of him inquiring, framed my speech: 
 “What meant Romagna’s spirit,? when he spake 
 Of bliss exclusive, with no partner shared?” 
 
 He straight replied: ‘ No wonder, since he knows 
 What sorrow waits on his own worst defect, 
 If he chide others, that they less may mourn. 
 Because ye point your wishes at a mark, 
 Where, by communion of possessors, part 
 Is lessen’d, envy bloweth up men’s sighs. 
 No fear of that might touch ye, if the love 
 Of higher sphere exalted your desire. 
 For there, by how much more they call it ours, 
 So much propriety of each in good 
 Increases more, and heighten’d charity 
 Wraps that éair cloister in a brighter flame.” 
 
 “ Now lack I satisfaction more,” said I, 
 Than if thou hadst been silent at the first ; 
 And doubt more gathers on my laboring thought. 
 How can it chance, that good distributed, 
 The many, that possess it, makes more rich, 
 Than if ’t were shared by few?” He answering thus: 
 “ Thy mind reverting still to things of earth, 
 Strikes darkness from true light. The highest good 
 Unlimited, ineffable, doth so speed 
 To love, as beam to lucid body darts, 
 Giving as much of ardor as it finds. 
 The sempiternal effluence streams abroad, 
 Spreading, wherever charity extends. 
 So that the more aspirants to that bliss 
 
 1** Blessed the merciful.” Matt. v 
 8° Romagna’s _ spirit.’’ Bante, fa Duca, of Brettinoro. 
 
 203 
 
204 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Are multiplied, more good is there to love, 
 
 And more is loved; as mirrors, that reflect, 
 
 Each unto other, propagated light. 
 
 If these my words avail not to allay 
 
 Thy thirsting, Beatrice thou shalt see, 
 
 Who of this want, and of all else thou hast, 
 
 Shall rid thee to the full. Provide but thou, 
 
 That from thy temples may be soon erased, 
 
 E’en as the two already, those five scars, 
 
 That, when they pain thee worst, then kindliest heal.” 
 “ Thou,” I had said, “ content’st me;” when I saw 
 
 The other round was gain’d, and wondering eyes 
 
 Did keep me mute. 
 
 There suddenly I seem’d 
 
 By an ecstatic vision wrapt away ; 
 
 And in a temple saw, methought, a crowd 
 
 Of many persons; and at the entrance stood 
 
 A dame, whose sweet demeanor did express 
 
 A mother’s love, who said, “ Child! why hast thou 
 
 Dealt with us thus? 
 
 Behold thy sire and I 
 
 Sorrowing have sought thee;” and so held her peace; 
 And straight the vision fled. A female next 
 Appear’d before me, down whose visage coursed 
 Those waters, that grief forces out from one 
 
 By deep resentment stung who seem’d to say: 
 
 “Tf thou, Pisistratus, be lord indeed 
 
 Over this city,? named with such debate 
 
 Of adverse gods, and whence each science sparkles, 
 Avenge thee of those arms, whose bold embrace 
 
 Hath clasp’d our daughter ; 
 
 99 
 
 and to her, meseem’d, 
 
 Benign and meek, with visage undisturb’d, 
 Her sovereign spake: ‘“ How shall we those requite * 
 Who wish us evil, if we thus condemn 
 
 The man that loves us?” 
 
 After that I saw 
 
 A multitude, in fury burning, slay 
 With stones a stripling youth,® and shout amain 
 “ Destroy, destroy ;” and him I saw, who bow’d 
 
 8“ Over this city.”’ Athens, named after 
 AOjvy, Minerva, in consequence of her 
 having produced a more valuable gift 
 for it in the olive, than Neptune had 
 done in the horse. 
 
 + “* How shall we those requite.” The 
 answer of Pisistratus the tyrant to his 
 
 wife, when she urged him to inflict the 
 punishment of death on a young man, 
 who, inflamed with love for his daugh- 
 ter, had snatched a kiss from her in 
 public. ; 
 
 5* A stripling youth.” The protomar- 
 tyr Stephen. 
 
_ PURGATORY 205 
 
 Heavy with death unto the ground, yet made 
 His eyes, unfolded upward, gates to heaven, 
 Praying forgiveness of the Almighty Sire, 
 Amidst that cruel conflict, on his foes, 
 With looks that win compassion to their aim. 
 
 Soon as my spirit, from her airy flight 
 Returning, sought again the things whose truth 
 Depends not on her shaping, I observed 
 She had not roved to falsehood in her dreams. 
 
 Meanwhile the leader, who might see I moved 
 As one who struggles to shake off his sleep, 
 Exclaim’d: ‘“ What ails thee, that thou canst not hold 
 Thy footing firm; but more than half a league 
 Hast travell’d with closed eyes and tottering gait, 
 Like to a man by wine or sleep o’ercharged?”’ 
 
 “ Beloved father! so thou deign,” said I, 
 
 “ To listen, I will tell thee what appear’d 
 Before me, when so fail’d my sinking steps.” 
 
 He thus: “ Not if thy countenance were mask’d 
 With hundred visors could a thought of thine, 
 How small soe’er, elude me. What thou saw’st 
 Was shown, that freely thou mightst ope thy heart 
 To the waters of peace, that flow diffused 
 From their eternal fountain. I not ask’d, 
 
 What ails thee? for such cause as he doth, who 
 Looks only with that eye, which sees no more, 
 When spiritless the body lies; but ask’d, 
 
 To give fresh vigor to thy foot. Such goads, 
 
 The slow and loitering need; that they be found 
 Not wanting when their hour of watch returns.” 
 So on we journey’d, through the evening sky 
 
 Gazing intent, far onward as our eyes, 
 
 With level view, could stretch against the bright 
 
 Vespertine ray: and lo! by slow degrees 
 
 Pauenag. a tog mace foward us, dark as night. 
 no room for ‘scaping’; and that mist 
 
 Bereft us, bor or seht and th pure air. 
 
 Classics. Vol. 34—J 
 
200 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 CANTO XVI 
 
 ArRGUMENT.—As they proceed through the mist, they hear the voices of 
 
 spirits praying. rco Lombardo, one of these, pomts-out-te~Dante 
 the error of such as impufé OF actions to necessity ; explains to him 
 that man is endued with free will; and shows that much of human 
 
 depravity results from the undue mixture of spiritual and temporal 
 authority in rulers. 
 
 ELL’S dunnest gloom, or night unlustrous, dark, 
 H Of every planet ’reft, and pall’d in clouds, 
 Did never spread before the sight a veil 
 
 In thickness like that fog, nor to the sense 
 So palpable and gross. Entering its shade, 
 Mine eye endured not with unclosed lids ; 
 Which marking, near me drew the faithful guide, 
 Offering me his shoulder for a stay. 
 
 As the blind man behind his leader walks, 
 Lest he should err, or stumble unawares 
 On what might harm him or perhaps destroy; 
 I journey’d through that bitter air and foul, 
 Still listening to my escort’s warning voice, 
 “Look that from me thou part not.” Straight I heard 
 Voices, and each one seem’d to pray for peace, 
 And for compassion, to the Lamb of God 
 That taketh sins away. Their prelude still 
 Was “ Agnus Dei”’; and through all the quire, 
 One voice, one measure ran, that perfect seem’d 
 The concord of their song. ‘‘ Are these I hear 
 Spirits, O master? ’”’ I exclaim’d; and he, 
 “Thou aim’st aright: these loose the bonds of wrath.” 
 
 “Now who art thou, that through our smoke dost cleave, 
 And sp¢k’st of us, as thou thyself e’en yet 
 Dividest time by calends?” So one voice 
 Bespake me; whence my master said, “ Reply; 
 And ask, if upward hence the passage lead.” 
 
 “O being! who dost make thee pure, to stand 
 Beautiful once more in thy Maker’s sight; 
 Along with me: and thou shalt hear and wonder.” 
 Thus I, whereto the spirit answering spake: 
 “Long as ’tis lawful for me, shall my steps 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 207 
 
 Follow on thine; and since the cloudy smoke 
 Forbids the seeing, hearing in its stead 
 
 Shall keep us join’d.” 
 
 I then forthwith began: 
 
 “Yet in my mortal swathing, I ascend 
 To higher regions ; and am hither come 
 Through the fearful agony of Hell. 
 And, if so largely God hath doled his grace, 
 That, clean beside all modern precedent, 
 He wills me to behold his kingly state; 
 From me conceal not who thou wast, ere death 
 Had loosed thee; but instruct me: and instruct 
 If rightly to the pass I tend; thy words 
 The way directing, as a safe escort.” 
 
 “I was of Lombardy, and Marco call’d : 
 Not inexperienced of the world, that worth 
 I still affected, from which all have turn’d 
 
 The nerveless bow aside. 
 
 Thy course tends right 
 
 Unto the summit:” and, replying thus, 
 He added, “I beseech thee pray for me, 
 
 When thou shalt come aloft.” 
 
 And I to him: 
 
 “Accept my faith for pledge I will perform 
 
 What thou requirest. 
 
 Yet one doubt remains, 
 
 That wrings me sorely, if I solve it not. 
 
 Singly before it urged me, doubled now 
 
 By thine opinion, when I couple that 
 
 With one elsewhere declared; each strengthening other. 
 The world indeed is even so forlorn 
 
 Of all good, as thou speak’st it, and so swarms 
 
 With every evil. 
 
 Yet, beseech thee, point 
 
 The cause out to me, that myself may see, 
 And unto others show it: for in heaven 
 One places it, and one on earth below.” 
 
 Then heaving forth a deep and audible sigh, 
 
 “ Brother!” he thus began, “ the world is blind; 
 
 1**T was of Lombardy, and Marco 
 call’d.” A Venetian gentleman. ‘‘ Lom- 
 bardo,’”’ both was his surname and de- 
 moted the country to which he belonged. 
 G. Villani, lib. vii. cap. cxx. terms him 
 *“a wise and worthy courtier.’”’ Ben- 
 venuto da Imola, says Landino, relates 
 of him, that being imprisoned and not 
 able to pay the price of his ransom, he 
 applied by letter to his friend Riccardo 
 
 da Camino, lord of Trevigi, for relief, 
 Riccardo set on foot a_ contribution 
 among several nobles of Lombardy for 
 the purpose; of which when Marco was 
 informed, he wrote back with much in- 
 dignation to Riccardo, that he had 
 rather die than remain under obligations 
 to so many benefactors, It is added 
 that Riccardo then paid the whole out 
 of his own purse. 
 
208 
 
 And thouin truth comest from it. 
 Do so each cause reter to 
 
 éaven above, 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 e, V iV 
 
 E’en as its motion, of necessity, 
 
 Drew with it all that moves. 
 
 If this were so, 
 
 Free choice in you were none; nor justice would 
 There should be joy for virttfe, woe for ill. 
 
 Your movements have their primal bent from heaven; 
 Not all: yet said I all: what then ensues? 
 
 Light have ye still to follow evil or good, 
 
 And of the will free power, which, if it stand 
 
 Firm and unwearied in Heaven’s first assay, 
 Conquers at last, so it be cherish’d well, 
 
 Triumphant over all. 
 
 To mightier force, 
 
 To better nature subject, ye abide 
 Free, not constrain’d by that which forms in you 
 The reasoning mind uninfluenced of the stars. 
 ‘If then the present race of mankind err, 
 Seek in yourselves the cause, and find it there. 
 Herein thou shalt confess me no false spy. 
 
 “ Forth from his plastic hand, who charm’d beholds 
 Her image ere she yet exist, the soul 
 Comes like a babe, that wantons sportively, 
 Weeping and laughing in its wayward moods; 
 As artless, and as ignorant of aught, 
 Save that her Maker being one who dwells 
 With gladness ever, willingly she turns 
 
 To whate’er yields her joy. 
 
 Of some slight good 
 
 The flavor soon she tastes; and, snared by that, 
 With fondness she pursues it; if no guide 
 
 Recall, no rein direct her wandering course. 
 
 Hence it behoved, the law should be a curb; 
 
 A sovereign hence behooved, whose piercing view 
 Might mark at least the fortress *? and main tower 
 Of the true city. Laws indeed there are: 
 
 But who is he who observes them? None ;, not he, 
 
 8“ The fortress.” Justice, the most 
 mecessary virtue in the chief magistrate, 
 as the commentators for the most part 
 explain it: and it appears manifest from 
 all our Poet says in his first book De 
 Monarchia, ae a the authority of 
 the temporal Monarch and concerning 
 Justice, that they are right. Yet Lom- 
 
 bardi understands the law ‘here spoken 
 of to be the law of God; ‘“‘ the sover- 
 eign,” a spiritual ruler, and ‘the true 
 city,’’ the society of true believers; so 
 that “the fortress,” according to him, 
 denotes the principal parts of Chris- 
 tian duty. 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 Who goes before, the shepherd of the flock, 
 
 Who ® chews the cud but doth not cleave the hoof. 
 Therefore the multitude, who see their guide 
 Strike at the very good they covet most, 
 
 Feed there and look no further. Thus the cause 
 Is not corrupted nature in yourselves, 
 
 But ill-conducting, that hath turn’d the world 
 
 To evil. Rome, that turn’d it unto good, 
 
 Was wont to boast suns,* whose several beams 
 Cast light on either way, the world’s and God’s. 
 One since hath quench’d the other; and the sword 
 Is grafted on the crook; and, so conjoin’d, 
 
 Each must perforce decline to worse, unawed 
 
 By fear of other. If thou doubt me, mark 
 
 The blade: each herb is judged of by its seed. 
 That land,’ through which Adice and the Po 
 Their waters roll, was once the residence 
 
 Of courtesy and valor, ere the day ° 
 
 That frown’d on Frederick; now secure may pass 
 Those limits, whosoe’er hath left, for same, 
 
 To talk with good men, or come near their haunts. 
 Three aged ones are still found there, in whom 
 The old time chides the new: these deem it long 
 
 Ere God restore them to a better world: 
 
 The good Gherardo ;’ of Plazzo he, 
 
 Conrad ;* and Guido of Castello,® named 
 
 In Gallic phrase more fitly the plain Lombard. 
 
 On this at last conclude. 
 
 The church of Rome, 
 
 Mixing two governments that ill assort, 
 Hath miss’d her footing, fallen into the mire, 
 And there herself and burden much defiled.” 
 
 8“ Who.” He compares the Pope, on 
 account of the union of the temporal 
 with the spiritual power in his person, 
 to an unclean beast in the Levitical law. 
 “The camel, because he cheweth the 
 cud, but divideth not the hoof; he is 
 unclean unto you.”’ Levit. xi. 4. 
 
 4** Two suns.” The Emperor and the 
 Bishop of Rome. 
 
 5“ That land.’?. Lombardy. 
 
 6“ Ere the day.”’ Before the Emperor 
 Frederick II was defeated before Par- 
 ma, in 1248. 
 
 7** The good Gherardo.” Gherardo da 
 Camino, of Trevigi. He is honorably 
 mentioned in our Poet’s ‘* Convito,” p. 
 
 173. ‘* Let us suppose that Gherardo da 
 Camino had been the grandson of the 
 meanest hind that ever drank of the 
 Sile or the Cagnano, and that his grand- 
 father was not yet forgotten; who will 
 dare to say that Gherardo da Camino 
 Was a mean man, and who will not agree 
 with me in calling him noble? Certainly 
 no one, however presumptuous, will 
 deny this; for such he was, and as such. 
 let him ever be remembered.” 
 8 ‘* Conrad.”” Conrado da Palazzo, a 
 gentleman of Brescia. . 
 9 ** Guido of Castello.”’ 
 the Italians were called Lombar 
 French, | 
 
 Of Reggio. All 
 ce by the 
 
210 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 “© Marco!” I replied, “ thine arguments 
 Convince me: and the cause I now discern, 
 Why of the heritage no portion came 
 To Levi's offspring. But resolve me this: 
 Who that Gherardo is, that as thou say’st 
 Is left a sample of the perish’d race, 
 And for rebuke to this untoward age?” 
 “Either thy words,” said he, “ deceive, or else 
 Are meant to try me; that thou, speaking Tuscan, 
 Appear’st not to have heard of good Gherardo; 
 The sole addition that, by which I know him; 
 Unless I borrow’d from his daughter Gaia 1° 
 Another name to grace him. God be with you. 
 I bear you company no more. Behold 
 The dawn with white ray glimmering through the mist. 
 I must away—the angel comes—ere he 
 Appear.” He said, and would not hear me more. 
 
 CANTO XVII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The Poet issues from that thick vapor; and soon after his 
 fancy represents to him in lively portraiture some noted examples 
 of anger. This imagination is dissipated by the appearance of an 
 angel, who marshals them onward to the fourth cornice, on which 
 the sin of gloominess or indifference is purged; and here Virgil 
 shows him that this vice proceeds from a defect of love, and that 
 all love can be only of two sorts, either natural, or of the soul; of 
 which sorts the former is always right, but the latter may err either 
 in respect of object or of degree. 
 
 ALL to remembrance, reader, if thou e’er 
 Hast on an Alpine height been ta’en by cloud, 
 Through which thou saw’st no better than the mole 
 Doth through opacous membrane; then, whene’er 
 The watery vapors dense began to melt 
 Into thin air, how faintly the sun’s sphere 
 Seem’d wading through them: so thy nimble thought 
 
 — ee oo 
 
 10 “* His daughter Gaia.”’ A lady equal- the praise of having been the first among 
 ly admired for her modesty, the beauty the Italian ladies, by whom the ver: 
 of her person, and the excellency of her nacular poetry was cultivated. 
 talents. Gaia may perhaps lay claim to 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 211r 
 
 May image, how at first I rebeheld 
 The sun, that bedward now his couch o’erhung. 
 Thus, with my leader’s feet still equalling pace, 
 From forth that cloud I came, when now expired 
 The parting beams from off the nether shores. 
 O quick and forgetive power! that sometimes dost 
 So rob us of ourselves, we take no mark 
 Though round about us thousand trumpets clang; 
 
 What moves thee, if the senses stir not? 
 
 Light 
 
 Moves thee from heaven, spontaneous, self-inform’d ; 
 Or, likelier, gliding down with swift illapse 
 
 By will divine. 
 
 Portray’d before me came 
 
 The traces of her dire impiety, 
 
 Whose form was changed into the bird, that most 
 Delights itself in song:+ and here my mind 
 Was inwardly so wrapt, it gave no place 
 
 To aught that ask’d admittance from without. 
 Next shower’d into my fantasy a shape 
 
 As of one crucified, whose visage spake 
 
 Fell rancor, malice deep, wherein he died; 
 
 And round in Ahasuerus the great king; 
 
 Esther his bride; and Mordecai the just, 
 Blameless in word and deed. As of itself 
 
 That unsubstantial coinage of the brain 
 
 Burst, like a bubble, when the water fails 
 
 That fed it; in my vision straight uprose 
 
 A damsel? weeping loud, and cried, “O queen! 
 O mother! wherefore has intemperate ire 
 
 Driven thee to loathe thy being? 
 
 Not to lose 
 
 Lavinia, desperate thou hast slain thyself. 
 
 Now hast thou lost me. 
 
 Iam she, whose tears 
 
 Mourn, ere I fall, a mother’s timeless end.” 
 F’en as a sleep breaks off, if suddenly 
 New radiance strike upon the closed lids, 
 
 a 6“ —— The bird, that most 
 
 Delights itself in song.” 
 I cannot think with Vellutello, that the 
 swallow is here meant. Dante probably 
 alludes to the story of Philomela, as it 
 is found in Homer’s “‘ Odyssey,” b. xix. 
 §18, rather than as later poets have told 
 it. ‘‘ She intended to slay the son of 
 her husband’s brother Amphion, incited 
 to it by the envy of his wife, who had 
 
 six children, while herself had only two, 
 but through mistake slew her own son 
 Itylus, and for her punishment was 
 transformed by Jupiter into a nightin- 
 gale.”’ 
 
 2“ A damsel.” Lavinia, mourning for 
 her mother Amata, who, impelled by 
 grief and indignation for the supposed 
 death of Turnus, destroyed herself. 
 
212 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 The broken slumber quivering ere it dies; 
 
 Thus, from before me, sunk the imagery, 
 
 Vanishing, soon as on my face there struck 
 
 The light, outshining far our earthly beam. 
 
 As round I turn’d me to survey what place 
 
 I had arrived at, “ Here ye mount ”: exclaim’d 
 
 A voice, that other purpose left me none 
 
 Save will so eager to behold who spake, 
 
 I could not choose but gaze. As ’fore the sun, 
 
 That weighs our vision down, and veils his form 
 
 In light transcendent, thus my virtue fail’d 
 
 Unequal. “This is Spirit from above, . 
 
 Who marshals us our upward way, unsought; 
 
 And in his own light shrouds him. As a man 
 
 Doth for himself, so now is done for us. 
 
 For whoso waits imploring, yet sees need 
 
 Of his prompt aidance, sets himself prepared 
 
 For blunt denial, ere the suit be made. 
 
 Refuse we not to lend a ready foot 
 
 At such inviting: haste we to ascend, 
 
 Before it darken: for we may not then, 
 
 Till morn again return.” So spake my guide; 
 
 And to one ladder both address’d our steps; 
 
 And the first stair approaching, I perceived 
 
 Near me as ’t were the waving of a wing, 
 
 That fann’d my face, and whisper’d: “ Blessed they, 
 
 The peace-makers: they know not evil wrath.” 
 Now to such height above our heads were raised 
 
 The last beams, follow’d close by hooded night, 
 
 That many a star on all sides through the gloom 
 
 Shone out. “ Why partest from me, O my strength?” 
 
 So with myself I communed; for I felt © 
 
 My o’ertoil’d sinews slacken. We had reach’d 
 
 The summit, and were fix’d like to a bark 
 
 Arrived at land.. And waiting a short space, 
 
 If aught should meet mine ear in that new round, 
 
 Then to my guide I turn’d, and said: “ Loved sire! 
 
 Declare what guilt is on this circle purged. 
 
 If our feet rest, no need thy speech should pause.” 
 He thus tome: “ The love of good, whate’er 
 
PURGATORY ; 213 
 
 Wanted of just proportion, here fulfils. 
 
 Here plies afresh the oar, that loiter’d ill. 
 
 But that thou mayst yet clearlier understand, 
 
 Give ear unto my words; and thou shalt cull 
 
 Some fruit may please thee well, from this delay. 
 “ Creator, nor created being, e’er, 
 
 My son,” he thus began, “ was without love, 
 
 Or natural, or the free spirit’s growth, 
 
 Thou hast not that to learn. The natural still 
 
 Is without error: but the other swerves, 
 
 If on ill object bent, or thought excess 
 
 Of vigor, or defect. While e’er it seeks 
 
 The primal blessings,® or with measure due 
 
 The inferior,* no delight, that flows from it, 
 
 Partakes of ill. But let it warp to evil, 
 
 Or with more ardor than behoves, or less, 
 
 Pursue the good; the thing created then 
 
 Works ’gainst its Maker. Hence thou must infer 
 
 That love is germin of each virtue_in_ ye, 
 
 And of SHeIract G6 Tess, that merits pain. $ 
 
 Now ® since it may not be, but love intend 
 
 The welfare mainly of the thing it loves, 
 
 All from self-hatred are secure: and sinc 
 
 No being can be thought to exist apart, 
 
 And independent of the first, a bar 
 
 Of equal force restrains from hating that. 
 “Grant the distinction just; and it remains 
 
 The evil must be another’s, which is loved. 
 
 Three ways such love is gender’d in your clay. 
 
 There is ° who hopes (his neighbor’s worth deprest) 
 
 Pre-eminence himself; and covets hence, 
 
 For his own greatness, that another fall. 
 
 There is’? who so much fears the loss of power, 
 
 Fame, favor, glory (should his fellow mount 
 
 Above him), and so sickens at the thought, 
 
 He loves their opposite: and there is he,® 
 
 ®“ The primal blessings.” Spiritual ists. We can therefore only rejoice ip 
 
 good. | the evil which befalls others. 
 
 4“ The inferior.”” Temporal good. 6‘ There is.” The proud. 
 
 5“ Now.” “It is impossible for any 17“ There is.” The envious. 
 being, either to hate itself, or to hate 8 There is he.” The resentful, 
 
 _the First Cause of all, by which it ex- 
 
214 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Whom wrong or insult seems to gall and shame, 
 That he doth thirst for vengeance; and such needs 
 Must dote on other’s evil. Here beneath, 
 This threefold love is mourn’d. Of the other sort 
 Be now instructed; that which follows good, 
 But with disorder’d and irregular course. 
 “All indistinctly apprehend a bliss, 
 On which the soul may rest; the hearts of al! 
 Yearn after it; and to that wished bourn 
 All therefore strive to tend. If ye behold, 
 Or seek it, with a love remiss and lax; 
 This cornice, after just repenting, lays 
 Its penal torment on ye. Other good 
 There is, where man finds not his happiness: 
 It is not true fruition; not that blest 
 Essence, of every good the branch and root. 
 The love too lavishly bestow’d on this, 
 Along three circles over us, is mourn’d. 
 Account of that division tripartite 
 Expect not, fitter for thine own research.” 
 
 CANTO XVIII 
 ARGUMENT.—Virgil discourses further concernin : 
 
 Veta ey emnern a eRe | UREPE two of whom in van of the 
 rest, record instances of zeal an rvent affection, and another, 
 who was Abbot of San Zeno in Verona, declares himself to Virgi 
 and Dante; and lastly follow other spirits, shouting forth memorable 
 
 examples of the sin for which they suffer: The Poet,pursuing his 
 
 meditations, falls into a dreamy slumber. 
 A CA genre eet et ptt erence tne te 
 
 HE teacher ended, and his high discourse 
 Concluding, earnest in my looks inquired 
 If I appear’d content; and I, whom still 
 Unsated thirst to hear him urged, was mute, 
 Mute outwardly, yet inwardly I said: 
 “ Perchance my too much questioning offends.” 
 But he, true father, mark’d the secret wish 
 By diffidence restrain’d; and, speaking, gave 
 Me boldness thus to speak: “ Master! my sight 
 
 ee ee Oe ee ee 
 
PURGATORY 215 
 
 Gathers so lively virtue from thy beams, 
 That all, thy words convey, distinct is seen. 
 Wherefore I pray thee, father, whom this heart 
 Holds dearest, thou wouldst deign by proof t’ unfold 
 That love, from which, as from their source, thou bring’st 
 All good deeds and their opposite.” He then: 
 “To what I now disclose be thy clear ken 
 Directed; and thou plainly shalt behold 
 How much those blind have err’d, who make themselves 
 The guides of men. The soul, created apt 
 To love, moves versatile which way soe’er 
 ught pleasing prompts her, soon as she is waked 
 y pleasure into act. Of substance true 
 Your apprehension forms its counterfeit; 
 And, in you the ideal shape presenting, 
 Attracts the soul’s regard. If she, thus drawn, 
 Incline toward it; love is that inclining, 
 And a new nature knit by pleasure in ye. 
 Then, as the fire points up, and mounting seeks 
 His birth-place and his lasting seat, e’en thus 
 Enters the captive soul into desire, 
 Which is a spiritual motion, that ne’er rests 
 Before enjoyment of the thing it loves. 
 Enough to show thee, how the truth from those 
 Is hidden, who aver all love a thing 
 Praiseworthy in itself; although perhaps 
 Its matter seem still good. Yet if the wax 
 Be good, it follows not the impression must.” 
 “What love_is,” I return’d, “thy words, O guide! 
 Ant-myown dowile mind, reveal. Yet thence 
 New doubts have sprung. For, from without, if love 
 Be offer’d to us, and the spirit knows 
 No other footing; tend she right or wrong, 
 Is no desert of hers.” He answering thus: 
 “What reason here discovers, I have power 
 
 To show thee: that which yond, expect 
 From Beatrice, faith not-reason's_task. 
 Spirit, substantial form, with matter join’d, 
 
 Not in confusion mix’d, hath in itself 
 Specific virtue of that union born, 
 
216 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Which is not felt except it work, nor proved 
 But through effect, as vegetable life 
 
 By the green leaf. 
 
 From whence his intellect 
 
 Deduced its primal notices of things, 
 
 Man therefore knows not, or his appetites 
 Their first affections; such in you, as zeal 
 
 In bees to gather honey; at the first, 
 
 Volition, meriting nor blame nor praise. 
 
 But o’er each lower faculty supreme, 
 
 That, as she list, are summon’d to her bar, 
 
 Ye have that virtue’ in you, whose just voice 
 Uttereth counsel, and whose word should keep 
 
 The threshold of assent. 
 
 Here is the source, 
 
 Whence cause of merit in you is derived ; 
 
 F’en as the affections, good or ill, she takes, 
 
 Or severs, winnow’d as the chaff. Those men,? 
 Who, reasoning, went to depth profoundest, mark’d 
 That innate freedom; and were thence induced 
 To leave their moral teaching to the world. 
 
 Grant then, that from necessity arise 
 
 All lows within you; to dismiss 
 r harbor it, the power_is_ in yourselves. 
 
 _Remember,—Beatrice, in her style, 
 
 ominates free choice b 
 
 eminence 
 
 See noble are if in talk with thee 
 
 e touch upon that theme.” The mggn, well nigh 
 To midnight hour belated, made the stars 
 Appear to wink and fade; and her broad disk 
 Seem’d like a crag on fire, as up the vault® 
 That course she journey’d, which the sun then warms; 
 When they of Rome behold him at his set 
 Betwixt Sardinia and the Corsic isle. 
 And now the weight, that hung upon my thought, 
 Was lighten’d by the aid of that clear spirit, 
 Who raiseth Andes* above Mantua’s name. 
 I therefore, when my questions had obtain’d 
 
 1“ That virtue.”? Reason. 
 
 2** Those men.” The great moral phil- 
 osophers among the heathen. 
 
 3“ Up the vault.” The moon passed 
 with a motion opposite to that of the 
 heavens, through the constellation of 
 the Scorpion, in which the sun is, when 
 
 to those who are in Rome he appears to 
 = between the isles of Corsica and Sar- 
 
 Inia, ; 
 
 4“ Andes.” Andes, now Pietola, made 
 more famous than Mantua, near which it 
 is situated, Dy, having been the Lirthe 
 place of Virgil. 
 
 — 
 
PURGATORY a1] 
 
 Solution plain and ample, stood as one 
 Musing in dreamy slumber; but not long 
 Slumber’d ; poe succor a mate, 
 
 The steep already turning from behind, 
 Rush’d on. With fury and like random rout, 
 As echoing on their shores at midnight heard 
 Ismenus and Asopus,® for his Thebes 
 
 If Bacchus’ help were needed; so came these 
 Tumultuous, curving each his rapid step, 
 
 By eagerness impell’d of holy love. 
 
 Soon they o’ertook us; with such swiftness moved 
 The mighty crowd. Two spirits at their head 
 Cried, weeping, “ Blessed Mary® sought with haste 
 The hilly region. Cesar,’ to subdue 
 Ilerda, darted in Marseilles his sting, 
 
 And flew to Spain.” ‘Oh, tarry not: away!” 
 The others shouted; “let not time be lost 
 Through slackness of affection. Hearty zeal 
 To serve reanimates celestial grace.” 
 
 “O ye! in whom intenser fervency 
 Haply supplies, where lukewarm erst ye fail’d, 
 Slow or neglectful, to absolve your part 
 Of good and virtuous; this man, who yet lives 
 (Credit my tale, though strange), desires to ascend, 
 So morning rise to light us. Therefore say 
 Which hand leads nearest to the rifted rock.” 
 
 So spake my guide; to whom a shade return’d: 
 “Come after us, and thou shalt find the cleft. 
 We may not linger: such resistless. will 
 Speeds our unwearied course. Vouchsafe us then 
 Thy pardon, if our duty seem to thee 
 Discourteous rudeness. In Verona I 
 Was Abbot® of San Zeno, when the hand 
 Of Barbarossa grasp’d imperial sway, 
 
 That name e’er utter’d without tears in Milan 
 
 6 ** Tsmenus and Asopus.” Rivers near plete the siege of Marseilles, and has- 
 
 Thebes tened on to the attack of Afranius and 
 Aes Mary. »”» “ And Mary arose in those Petreius, the generals of Pompey, at 
 
 days, and went into the hill country Tlerda (Lerida) in Spain 
 
 with haste, into a city of Judah; and & Abbot,” Aifierto, TABBOE of San 
 
 entered into the house of Zacharias, and Zeno in Verona, when Frederick I was 
 
 saluted Elisabeth.”—Luke, i. Emperor, by whom Milan was besieged 
 
 39, 
 ‘* Cesar.” Czesar left Brutus ti cont and reduced to ashes, in 1162. 
 
218 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 And there is he,® hath one foot in his grave, 
 Who for that monastery ere long shall weep, 
 Ruing his power misused: for that his son, 
 Of body ill compact, and worse in mind, 
 
 And born in evil, he hath set in place 
 
 Of its true pastor.” Whether more he spake, 
 Or here was mute, I know not: he had sped 
 E’en now so far beyond us. Yet thus much 
 
 I heard, and in remembrance treasured it. 
 
 He then, who never fail’d me at my need, 
 Cried, “ Hither turn. Lo! two with sharp remorse 
 Chiding their sin.” In rear of all the troop 
 These shouted: ‘“ First they died,’° to whom the sea 
 Open’d, or ever Jordan saw his heirs: 
 
 And they,? who with A*neas to the end 
 Endured not suffering, for their portion chose 
 Life without glory.” Soon as they had fled 
 Past reach of sight, new thought within me rose 
 By others follow’d fast, and each unlike 
 
 Its fellow: till led on from thought to thought, 
 And pleasured with the fleeting train, mine eye 
 Was closed, and meditation changed to dream. 
 
 CANTO XIX 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The Poet, after describing his dream, relates how, at the 
 summoning of an angel, he ascends with Virgil to the fifth cornice, 
 where the sin of avarice is cleansed, and where he finds Pope 
 Adrian V. 
 
 T was the hour, when of diurnal heat 
 No reliques chafe the cold beams of the moon, 
 O’erpower’d by earth, or planetary sway 
 Of Saturn; and the geomancer? sees 
 His Greater Fortune up the east ascend, 
 
 9“ There is he.”” Alberto della Scala, 1‘ The hour.” Near the dawn. 
 
 Lord of Verona, who had made his natu- 
 ral son Abbot of San Zeno. 
 
 10“ First they died.” The Israelites, 
 who on account of their disobedience 
 died before Vsaimere Sid promised land. 
 
 1“ And they.” ose Trojans, who, 
 wearied with their voyage, chose rather 
 to remain in Sicily with Acestes, than 
 accompany Aineas to Italy. 
 
 2“* The geomancer.”” The geomancers, 
 when they divined, drew a figure con- 
 sisting of sixteen marks, named from so 
 many stars which constitute the end of 
 Aquarius and the beginning of Pisces. 
 One of these they called “the greater 
 fortune.” 
 
PURGATORY 219 
 Where gray dawn checkers first the shadowy cone; 
 When, ’fore me in my dream, a woman’s shape? 
 There came, with lips that stammer’d, eyes aslant, 
 Distorted feet, hands maim’d, and color pale. 
 
 I look’d upon her: and, as sunshine cheers 
 Limbs numb’d by nightly cold, e’en thus my look 
 Unloosed her tongue; next, in brief space, her form 
 Decrepit raised erect, and faded face 
 With love’s own hue illumed. Recovering speech, 
 She forthwith, warbling, such a strain began, 
 That I, how loath soe’er, could scarce have held 
 Attention from the song. “I,” thus she sang, 
 “T am the Siren, she, whom mariners 
 On the wide sea are wilder’d when they hear: 
 Such fulness of delight the listener feels. 
 I, from his course, Ulysses* by my lay 
 Enchanted drew. Whoe’er frequents me once, 
 Parts seldom: so J charm him, and his heart 
 Contented knows no void.” Or ere her mouth 
 Was closed, to shame her, at my side appear’d 
 A dame® of semblance holy. With stern voice 
 She utter’'d: “Say, O Virgil! who is this?” 
 Which hearing, he approach’d, with eyes still bent 
 Toward that goodly presence: the other seized her, 
 And, her robes tearing, open’d her before, 
 And show’d the belly to me, whence a smell, 
 Exhaling loathsome, waked me. Round I turn’d 
 Mine eyes: and thus the teacher: “ At the least 
 Three times my voice hath call’d thee. Rise, begone. 
 Let us the opening find where thou mayst pass.” 
 
 I straightway rose. Now day, pour’d down from high, 
 Fill’d all the circuits of the sacred mount; 
 And, as we journey’d, on our shoulder smote 
 The early ray. I follow’d, stooping low 
 My forehead, as a man, o’ercharged with thought, 
 
 8 «A woman’s shape.” Worldly hap- 
 iness. This allegory reminds us of the 
 
 suppose that she is here represented as 
 purposely deviating from the truth. Or 
 
 ‘Choice of Hercules.”’ 
 
 #“ Ulysses.” It is not easy to deter- 
 miine a Ulysses, contrary to the au- 
 thority of Homer, is said to have been 
 drawn aside from his course by the song 
 of the Siren. No improbable way of ac- 
 counting for the contradiction is, to 
 
 Dante may have followed some legend 
 of the Middle Ages, in which the wan- 
 derings of Ulysses were represented 
 otherwise than in Homer. 
 
 6“ A dame.”’ Philosophy, or perhaps 
 Truth. 
 
220 | THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Who bends him to the likeness of an arch 
 
 That midway spans the flood; when thus I heard, 
 “Come, enter here,” in tone so soft and mild, 
 As never met the ear on mortal strand. 
 
 With swan-like wings dispred and pointing up, 
 
 Who thus had spoken marshal’d us along, 
 
 Where, each side of the solid masonry, 
 
 The sloping walls retired; then moved his plumes, 
 And fanning us, affirm’d that those, who mourn,® 
 Are blessed, for that comfort shall be theirs. 
 
 “What aileth thee, that still thou look’st to earth?” 
 Began my leader; while the angelic shape 
 A little over us his station took. 
 
 “ New vision,’ I replied, “hath raised in me 
 Surmisings strange and anxious doubts, whereon 
 My soul intent allows no other thought 
 Or room, or entrance.” “ Hast thou seen,” said he, 
 “That old enchantress, her, whose wiles alone 
 The spirits o’er us weep for? Hast thou seen 
 How man may free him of her bonds? Enough. 
 Let thy heels spurn the earth; and thy raised ken 
 Fix on the lure, which heaven’s eternal King 
 Whirls in the rolling spheres.” As on his feet 
 The falcon first looks down, then to the sky 
 Turns, and forth stretches eager for the food, 
 
 That woos him thither; so the call I heard: 
 So onward, far as the dividing rock 
 Gave way, I journey’d, till the plain was reach’d. 
 On the fifth circle when I stood at large, 
 A race appear’d before me, on the ground 
 All downward lying prone and weeping sore. 
 “My soul hath cleaved to the dust,” I heard 
 With sighs so deep, they well nigh choked the words. 
 
 ““O ye elect of God! whose penal woes 
 Both hope and justice mitigate, direct 
 Toward the steep rising our uncertain way.” 
 
 “Tf ye approach secure from this our doom, 
 Prostration, and would urge your course with speed, 
 See that ye still to rightward keep the brink.” . 
 
 6‘* Who mourn.” ‘ Blessed are they that mourn; for they shall be com 
 forted.”’—Matt. v. 4. 
 
PURGATORY 221 
 
 So them the bard besought; and such the words, 
 Beyond us some short space, in answer came. 
 
 I noted what remain’d yet hidden from them:7 
 Thence to my liege’s eyes mine eyes I bent, 
 And he, forthwith interpreting their suit, 
 Beckon’d his glad assent. Free then to act 
 As pleased me, I drew near, and took my stand 
 Over that shade whose words I late had mark’d. 
 And, “ Spirit!’’ I said, “in whom repentant tears 
 Mature that blessed hour when thou with God 
 Shalt find acceptance, for a while suspend 
 For me that mightier care. Say who thou wast; 
 Why thus ye grovel on your bellies prone; 
 
 And if, in naught, ye wish my service there, 
 Whence living I am come.’ He answering spake: 
 “The cause why Heaven our back toward his cope 
 Reverses, shalt thou know: but me know first, 
 The successor of Peter,® and the name 
 
 And title of my lineage, from that stream® 
 
 That ’twixt Chiaveri and Siestri draws 
 
 His limpid waters through the lowly glen. 
 
 A month and little more by proof I learnt, 
 
 With what a weight that robe of sovereignty 
 Upon his shoulder rests, who from the mire 
 Would guard it; that each other fardel seems 
 
 But feathers in the balance. Late, alas! 
 
 Was my conversion: but, when I became 
 
 Rome’s pastor, I discerned at once the dream 
 And cozenage of life; saw that the heart 
 
 Rested -not there, and yet no prouder height 
 Lured on the climber: wherefore, of that life 
 
 No more enamor’d, in my bosom love 
 
 Of purer being kindled. For till then 
 
 ‘I was a soul in misery, alienate 
 
 From God, and covetous of all earthly things; 
 Now, as thou seest, here punish’d for my doting. 
 
 7™**T noted what remain’d yet hidden 
 from them.’”’ They were ignorant, it ap- 
 peared, whether Dante was come there 
 to reed of his sins. 
 
 8“ The successor of Peter.’? Ottobu- 
 ono, of the family of Fieschi, Counts of 
 Lavagno, died thirty-nine days after he 
 
 became Pope, with the title of Adrian V, 
 in 1276. a 
 
 9** That stream.” The river Lavagno, 
 in the Genoese territory; to the east of 
 which territory are situated Siestri and 
 Chiaveri. 
 
222 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Such cleansing from the taint of avarice, 
 Do spirits, converted, need. This mount inflicts 
 No direr penalty. E’en as our eyes 
 Fasten’d below, nor e’er to loftier clime 
 Were lifted; thus hath justice level’d us, 
 Here on the earth. As avarice quench’d our love 
 Of good, without which is no working; thus 
 Here justice holds us prison’d, hand and foot 
 Chain’d down and bound, while heaven’s just Lord shall please, 
 So long to tarry, motionless, outstretch’d.”’ 
 My knees I stoop’d and would have spoke; but he, 
 Ere my beginning, by his ear perceived 
 I did him reverence; and “‘ What cause,” said he, 
 “Hath bow’d thee thus?” “ Compunction,” I rejoin’d, 
 “ And inward awe of your high dignity.” 
 “Up,” he exclaim’d, “brother! upon thy feet 
 Arise; err not: thy fellow-servant I, 
 (Thine and all others’) of one Sovereign Power, 
 If thou hast ever mark’d those holy sounds 
 Of gospel truth, ‘nor shall be given in marriage,’ 
 Thou mayst discern the reasons of my speech. 
 Go thy ways now; and linger here no more. 
 Thy tarrying is a let unto the tears, 
 With which I hasten that whereof thou speakest. 
 I have on earth a kinswoman;?° her name 
 Alagia, worthy in herself, so ill. 
 Example of our house corrupt her not: 
 And she is all remaineth of me there.” 
 10 A kinswoman.” Alagia is said to tectors during his exile. See Canto viii. 
 
 have been the wife of the Marchese Mar- 133. 
 cello Malaspina, one of the Poet’s pro- 
 
PURGATORY 223 
 
 CANTO XX 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Among those on the fifth cornice, Hugh Capet records 
 illustrious examples of voluntary poverty and of bounty; then tells 
 who himself is, and speaks of his descendants on the French throne; 
 and, lastly, adds some noted instances of avarice. When he has 
 ended, the mountain shakes, and all the spirits sing “‘ Glory to God.” 
 
 LL strives the will, ’gainst will more wise that strives: 
 His pleasure therefore to mine own preferr’d, 
 I drew the sponge yet thirsty from the wave. 
 
 Onward I moved: he also onward moved, 
 
 Who led me, coasting still, wherever place 
 
 Along the rock was vacant; as a man 
 
 Walks near the battlements on narrow wall. 
 
 For those on the other part, who drop by drop 
 
 Wring out their all-infecting malady, 
 
 Too closely press the verge. Accurst be thou, 
 
 Inveterate wolf!* whose gorge ingluts more prey, 
 
 Than every beast beside, yet is not fill’d; 
 
 So bottomless thy maw.—Ye spheres of heaven! 
 
 To whom there are, as seems, who attribute 
 
 All change in mortal state, when is the day 
 
 Of his appearing,” for whom fate reserves 
 
 To chase her hence?—With wary steps and slow 
 
 We pass’d; and I attentive to the shades, 
 
 Whom piteously I heard lament and wail; 
 
 And, ’midst the wailing, one before us heard 
 
 Cry out “O blessed Virgin!” as a dame 
 
 In the sharp pangs of childbed; and “ How poor 
 
 Thou wast,” it added, ‘“ witness that low roof 
 
 Where thou didst lay thy sacred burden down. 
 
 © good Fabricius! thou didst virtue choose 
 
 With poverty, before great wealth with vice.” 
 The words so pleased me, that desire to know 
 
 The spirit, from whose lip they seem’d to come, 
 
 Did draw me onward. Yet it spake the gift 
 
 Of Nicholas,? which on the maidens he 
 
 1“ Wolf.” Avarice. 8“ Nicholas.”” The story of Nicholas 
 2“ Of his appearing.”” He is thought is, that an angel having revealed to him 
 to allude to Can Grande della Scala. that the father of a family was so im- 
 See “ Hell,”’ Canto i. 98. poverished as to resolve on exposing the 
 
224 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Bounteous bestow’d, to save their youthful prime 
 
 Unblemish’d. 
 
 “Spirit! who dost speak of deeds 
 
 So worthy, tell me who thou wast,” I said, 
 “ And why thou dost with single voice renew 
 
 Memorial of such praise. 
 
 That boon vouchsafed 
 
 Haply shall meet reward; if I return 
 To finish the short pilgrimage of life, 
 Still speeding to its close on restless wing.” 
 
 “T,” answer’d he, “ will tell thee; not for help, 
 Which thence I look for; but that in thyself 
 Grace so exceeding shines, before thy time 
 
 Of mortal dissolution. 
 
 I was root* 
 
 Of that ill plant whose shade such poison sheds 
 
 O’er all the Christian land, that seldom thence 
 
 Good fruit is gather’d. Vengeance soon should come, 
 Had Ghent and Douay, Lille and Bruges power ;° 
 And vengeance I of heaven’s great Judge implore. 
 Hugh Capet was I hight: from me descend 
 
 The Philips and the Louis, of whom France 
 
 Newly is govern’d: born of one, who plied 
 
 The slaughterer’s trade® at Paris. 
 
 When the race 
 
 Of ancient kings had vanish’d (all save one* 
 Wrapt up in sable weeds) within my gripe 
 
 I found the reins of empire, and such powers 
 Of new acquirement, with full store of friends, 
 That soon the widow’d circlet of the crown 
 Was girt upon the temples of my son,°® 
 
 He, from whose bones the anointed race begins. 
 
 chastity of his three daughters to sale, 
 he threw in at the window of their house 
 three bags of money, containing a suffh- 
 cient portion for each of them. 
 
 4* Root.”” Hugh Capet, ancestor of 
 Philip IV. 
 
 5“ Had Ghent and Douay, Lille and 
 Bruges power.” These cities had lately 
 been seized by Philip IV. The spirit 
 is made to intimate the approaching de- 
 feat of the French army by the Flem- 
 ings, in the battle of Courtrai, which 
 happened in 1302. 
 
 6“ The slaughterer’s trade.’”? This 
 reflection on the birth of his ancestor, 
 induced Francis I to forbid the reading 
 of Dante in his dominions. Hugh Ca- 
 pet, who came to the throne of France 
 in 0987, was, however, the grandson of 
 Robert, who was the brother of Eudes, 
 King of France in 888; and it may, 
 
 therefore, well be questioned whether 
 by Beccaio di Parigi is meant literally 
 one who carried on the trade of 3 
 butcher, at Paris, and whether the 
 sanguinary disposition of Hugh Capet’s 
 father is not stigmatized by this oppro- 
 brious appellation. 
 
 7** All save one.” The posterity of 
 Charlemagne, the second race of French 
 monarchs, had failed, with the excep- 
 
 tion of Charles of Lorraine, who is said, ~ 
 
 on account of the melancholy temper of 
 his mind, to have always clothed him- 
 self in black. Venturi suggests that 
 Dante may have confounded him with 
 Childeric ITI, the last of the Merovin- 
 gian, or first race, who was deposed and 
 made a monk in 7s1. 
 
 8“ My son.” Hugh Capet caused his 
 son Robert to be crowned at Orleans. 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 225 
 
 Till the great dower of Provence® had removed 
 The stains, that yet obscured our lowly blood, 
 Its sway indeed was narrow; but howe’er 
 
 It wrought no evil: there, with force and lies, 
 Began its rapine: after, for amends, 
 
 Poitou it seized, Navarre and Gascony. 
 
 To Italy came Charles; and for amends, 
 
 Young Conradine,” an innocent victim, slew; 
 And sent the angelic teacher™ back to heaven, 
 
 Still for amends. 
 
 I see the time at hand, 
 
 That forth from France invites another Charles* 
 To make himself and kindred better known. 
 Unarm’d he issues, saving with that lance, 
 
 Which the arch-traitor tilted with,“ and that 
 
 He carries with so home a thrust, as rives 
 
 The bowels of poor Florence. 
 
 No increase 
 
 Of territory hence, but sin and shame 
 
 Shall be his guerdon; and so much the more 
 As he more lightly deems of such foul wrong. 
 I see the other** (who a prisoner late 
 
 Had stepped on shore) exposing to the mart 
 
 His daughter, whom he bargains for, as do 
 
 The Corsairs for their slaves. 
 
 O avarice! 
 
 What canst thou more, who hast subdued our blood 
 So wholly to thyself, they feel no care 
 
 9“ The great dower of Provence.” 
 Louis IX and his brother Charles of 
 Anjou, married two of the four daugh- 
 ters of Raymond Berenger, Count of 
 Provence. See ‘ Paradise,” c. vi. 135. 
 
 10“* Young Conradine.” Charles of 
 Anjou put Conradino to death in 1268, 
 and became King of Naples. 
 
 11“ The angelic teacher.”” Thomas 
 Aquinas. He was reported to have been 
 
 isoned by a physician, who wished to 
 ingratiate himself with Charles of An- 
 ou. “In the year 1323, at the end of 
 uly, by the said Pope John and by his 
 cardinals, was canonized at Avignon 
 Thomas Aquinas, of the order of Saint 
 Dominic, a master in avi and phil: 
 osophy, a man most excellent in all 
 science, and who expounded the sense 
 of pid ag oid better than anyone since the 
 time o eae: He lived in the time 
 of Charles I, King of Sicily; and going 
 to the Council at Lyons, it is said that 
 he was killed by a physician of the said 
 King, who put poison for him into some 
 sweetmeats, thinking to ingratiate him- 
 self with King Charles, because he was 
 of the lineage of the Lords of Aquino, 
 
 who had rebelled against the King, and 
 doubting lest he should be made car- 
 dinal; whence the Church of God re- 
 ceived great damage. He died at the 
 abbey of Fossanova, in Campagna.” 
 
 12 “ Another Charles.” Charles of Va- 
 lois, brother of Philip IV, was sent by 
 Pope Boniface VIII to settle the dis- 
 turbed state of Florence. In conse- 
 
 uence of the measures he adopted for 
 that purpose, our Poet and his friends 
 were condemned to exile and death. 
 
 18 “ —___ with that lance, 
 
 Which the arch-traitor tilted with.” 
 
 If I remember right, in one of the old 
 romances, Judas is represented tilting 
 with our Saviour. 
 
 14“ The other.” Charles, King of Na- 
 pes the eldest son of Charles of Anjou, 
 
 aving, contrary to the directions of his 
 father, engaged with Ruggieri de Lauria, 
 the admiral of Peter of Arragon, was 
 made prisoner, and carried into Sicily, 
 June, 1284. He afterward, in considera- 
 tion of a large sum of money, married 
 his daughter to Azzo VIII, Marquis of 
 Ferrara. 
 
226 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Of their own flesh? 
 
 To hide with direr guilt 
 
 Past ill and future, lo! the flower-de-luce*® 
 Enters Alagna; in his Vicar Christ 
 Himself a captive, and his mockery 
 
 Acted again. 
 
 Lo! to his holy lip 
 
 The vinegar and gall once more applied; 
 And he ’twixt living robbers doom’d to bleed. 
 Lo! the new Pilate, of whose cruelty 
 
 Such violence cannot fill the measure up, 
 With no decree to sanction, pushes on 
 
 Into the temple*® his yet eager sails. 
 
 “© sovereign Master! when shall I rejoice 
 To see the vengeance, which thy wrath, well-pleased, 
 In secret silence broods?—While daylight lasts, 
 So long what thou didst hear of her, sole spouse 
 Of the Great Spirit, and on which thou turn’dst 
 To me for comment, is the general theme 
 Of all our prayers: but, when it darkens, then 
 A different strain we utter; then record 
 Pygmalion, whom his gluttonous thirst of gold 
 Made traitor, robber, parricide: the woes 
 Of Midas, which his greedy wish ensued, 
 Mark’d for derision to all future times: 
 
 And the fond Achan,’* how he stole the prey, 
 That yet he seems by Joshua’s ire pursued. 
 Sapphira with her husband next we blame; 
 And praise the fore feet, that with furious ramp 
 
 Spurn’d Heliodorus.*® 
 
 All the mountain round 
 
 Rings with the infamy of Thracia’s king,’® 
 Who slew his Phrygian charge: and last a shout 
 
 15“° The flower-de-luce.”’ Boniface VIII 
 was seized at Alagna in Campagna, by 
 the order of Philip IV, in the year 1303, 
 and soon after died of grief. G. Villani, 
 lib. viii. cap. Ixiii: ‘‘As it pleased God, 
 the heart of Boniface being petrified 
 with grief, through the injury he had 
 sustained, when he came to Rome, he 
 fell into a strange malady, for he gnawed 
 himself as one frantic, and in this state 
 expired.” His character is strongly 
 drawn by the annalist in the next chap- 
 ter. Thus, says Landino, was verified 
 the prophecy of Celestine respecting 
 him, that he should enter on the pope- 
 dom like a fox, reign like a lion, and 
 die like a dog. 
 
 16“ Into the temple.” It is uncertain 
 whether our Poet alludes still to the 
 event mentioned in the preceding note, 
 or to the destruction of the order of the 
 Templars in 1310, but the latter appears 
 more probable. 
 
 17“* Achan.” Joshua vii. 
 
 18 “* Heliodorus.” “ For there appeared 
 unto them an horse, with a terrible rider 
 upon him, and adorned with a very fair 
 covering, and he ran fiercely and smote 
 at Heliodorus with his fore feet.” 2 
 Macc. iii. 25. 
 
 19 “ Thracia’s king.”’ Polymnestor, the 
 murderer of Polydorus. “ Hell,’’ Canto 
 XXX. 19. 
 
 : 
 ; 
 ; 
 : 
 
PURGATORY 227 
 
 Ascends: ‘ Declare, O Crassus!?° for thou know’st, 
 The flavor of thy gold. The voice of each 
 Now high, now low, as each his impulse prompts, 
 Is led through many a pitch, acute or grave. 
 Therefore, not singly, I erewhile rehearsed 
 That blessedness we tell of in the day: 
 But near me, none, beside, his accent raised.” 
 From him we now had parted, and essay’d 
 With utmost efforts to surmount the way; 
 When I did feel, as nodding to its fall, 
 The mountain tremble; whence an icy chill 
 Seized on me, as on one to death convey’d. 
 So shook not Delos, when Latona there 
 Couch’d to bring forth the twin-born eyes of heaven. 
 Forthwith from every side a shout arose 
 So vehement, that suddenly my guide 
 Drew near, and cried: “ Doubt not, while I conduct thee.” 
 “Glory!” all shouted (such the sounds mine ear 
 Gather’d from those, who near me swell’d the sounds) 
 “Glory in the highest be to God.” We stood 
 Immovably suspended, like to those, 
 The shepherds, who first heard in Bethlehem’s field 
 That song: till ceased the trembling, and the song 
 Was ended: then our hallow’d path resumed, 
 Eying the prostrate shadows, who renew’d 
 Their custom’d mourning. Never in my breast 
 Did ignorance so struggle with desire 
 Of knowledge, if my memory do not err, 
 As in that moment; nor through haste dared I 
 To question, nor myself could aught discern. 
 So on I fared, in thoughtfulness and dread. 
 
 2 ** Crassus.”” Marcus Crassus, who fell miserably in the Parthian was. 
 
228 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 CANTO XXI 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The two Poets are overtaken by the spirit of Statius, who, 
 being cleansed, is on his way to Paradise, and who explains the 
 cause of the mountain shaking, and of the hymn; his joy at behold- 
 
 ing Wigs a 
 
 but_from the well? 
 Wherot the woman isan raed 
 Excite aste, along the cumber’d path, 
 After my guide, impeil’d; and pity moved 
 My bosom for the *vengeful doom though just. 
 When lo! even as Luke? relates, that Chris 
 Appear’d unto the two upon their way, 
 New-risen from his vaulted grave; to us 
 A shade appear’d, and after us approach’d, 
 Contemplating the crowd beneath its feet. 
 We were not ware of it; so first it spake, 
 Saying, “ God give you peace, my brethren! ” then 
 Sudden we turn’d: and Virgil such salute, 
 As fitted that kind greeting, gave; and cried: 
 “ Peace in the blessed council be thy lot, 
 Awarded by that righteous court which me 
 To everlasting banishment exiles.” 
 
 “ How!” he exclaim’d, nor from his speed meanwhile 
 Desisting; “If that ye be spirits whom God 
 Vouchsafes not room above; who up the height 
 Has been thus far your guide?” To whom the bard: 
 “If thou observe the tokens,? which this man, 
 
 Traced by the finger of the angel, bears; 
 
 ’Tis plain that in the kingdom of the just 
 
 He needs must share. But sithence she,* whose wheel 
 Spins day and night, for him not yet had drawn 
 
 That yarn, which on the fatal distaff piled, 
 
 Clotho apportions to each wight that breathes; 
 
 His soul, that sister is to mine and thine, 
 
 Not of herself could mount; for not like ours 
 
 1“ The well.” “The woman saith by the Angel, in order to his being 
 unto him, Sir, give me this water, that cleared of them in his passage through 
 I thirst not. alobpei ts Purgatory to Paradise. 
 
 .T ake.” AChapter ok “She.” Lachesis, one of the three 
 
 a « The tokens. oP The fetter *p for Pec- fates. 
 cata, sins, inscribed upon his forehead 
 
PURGATORY 229 
 
 Her ken: whence I, from forth the ample gulf 
 
 Of Hell, was ta’en, to lead him, and will lead 
 
 Far as my lore avails. But, if thou know, 
 
 Instruct us for what cause, the mount erewhile 
 
 Thus shook, and trembled: wherefore all at once 
 
 Seem’d shouting, even from his wave-wash’d foot.” 
 That questioning so tallied with my wish, 
 
 The thirst did feel abatement of its edge 
 
 E’en from expectance. He forthwith replied: 
 
 “Tn its devotion, naught irregular | 
 
 This mount can witness, or by punctual rule 
 
 Unsanction’d; here from every change exempt, 
 
 Other than that, which heaven in itself 
 
 Doth of itself receive, no influence 
 
 Can reach us. Tempest none, shower, hail, or snow, 
 
 Hoar frost, or dewy moistness, higher falls 
 
 Than that brief scale of threefold steps: thick clouds, 
 
 Nor scudding rack, are ever seen: swift glance 
 
 Ne’er lightens; nor Thaumantian Iris gleams, 
 
 That yonder often shifts on each side Heaven. 
 
 Vapor adust doth never mount above 
 
 The highest of the trinal stairs, whereon 
 
 Peter’s vicegerent stands. Lower perchance, 
 
 With various motion rock’d, trembles the soil: 
 
 But here, through wind in earth’s deep hollow pent, 
 
 I know not how, yet never trembled: then 
 
 Trembles, when any spirit feels itself 
 
 So purified, that it may rise, or move 
 
 For rising; and such loud acclaim ensues, 
 
 Purification, by the will alone, 
 
 Is proved, that free to change society 
 
 Seizes the soul rejoicing in her will. 
 
 Desire of bliss is present from the first; 
 
 But strong propension hinders, to that wish 
 
 By the just ordinance of heaven opposed; 
 
 Propension now as eager to fulfil 
 
 The allotted torment, as erewhile to sin. 
 
 And I, who in this punishment had lain 
 
 Five hundred years and more, but now have felt 
 
 Free wish for happier clime. Therefore thou felt’st 
 Classics. Vol. 34—K 
 
230 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 The mountain tremble; and the spirits devout 
 Heard’st, over all his limits, utter praise 
 
 To that liege Lord, whom I entreat their joy 
 
 To hasten.” Thus he spake: and, since the draught 
 Is grateful ever as the thirst is keen, 
 
 No words may speak my fulness of content. 
 
 “ Now,” said the instructor sage, “I see the net 
 That takes ye here; and how the toils are loosed; 
 Why rocks the mountain, and why ye rejoice. 
 
 y Vouchsafe, that from thy lips I mext may learn 
 
 i Who on the earth thou wast ; and wherefore here, 
 So many an age, were prostrate.” ‘In that time, 
 When the good Titus,° with heaven’s King to help, 
 Avenged those piteous gashes, whence the blood 
 By Judas sold did issue; with the mame® 
 Most lasting and most honor’d, there, was I 
 Abundantly renown’d,” the shade replied, 
 “Not yet with faith endued. So passing sweet 
 My vocal spirit; from Tolosa, Rome 
 To herself drew me, where I merited 
 A myrtle garland to inwreathe my brow. 
 Statius they name me still. Of Thebes I sang, 
 And next of great Achilles; but 7 the way 
 Fell with the second burden. O my flame 
 Those sparkles were the seeds, which I derived 
 From the bright fountatn of celestial fire 
 That feeds unnumber’d lamps; the song I mean 
 Which sounds A£neas’ wanderings: that the breast 
 I hung at; that the nurse, from whom my veins 
 Drank inspiration: whose authority 
 Was ever sacred with me. To have lived 
 Coeval with the Mantuan, I would bide 
 The revolution of another sun 
 Beyond my stated years in banishment.” 
 
 The Mantuan, when he heard him, turn’d to me3 
 And holding silence, by his countenance 
 Enjoin’d me silence: but the power, which wills, 
 Bears not supreme control: laughter and tears 
 
 6“ When the good Titus.” When it lem, should avenge the death of ows 
 was so ordered by the divine Providence Saviour on the Jews. 
 that Titus, by the destruction of Jerusa- 6“ The name.” The name of Poet. 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 Follow so closely on the passion prompts them, 
 They wait not for the motions of the will 
 
 In nature most sincere. I did but smile, 
 
 As one who winks; and thereupon the shade 
 Broke off, and peer’d into mine eyes, where best 
 Our looks interpret. “So to good event 
 
 Mayst thou conduct such great emprise,” he cried, 
 “Say, why across thy visage beam’d, but now, 
 The lightning of a smile.” On either part 
 
 Now am I straiten’d; one conjures me speak, 
 
 The other to silence binds me: whence a sigh 
 
 I utter, and the sigh is heard. “ Speak on,” 
 
 The teacher cried: “and do not fear to speak; 
 But tell him what so earnestly he asks.” 
 Whereon I thus: “ Perchance, O ancient spirit! 
 Thou marvel’st at my smiling. There is room 
 For yet more wonder. He, who guides my ken 
 On high, he is that Mantuan, led by whom 
 Thou didst presume of men and gods to sing. 
 
 If other cause thou deem’dst for which I smiled, 
 Leave it as not the true one: and believe 
 
 Those words, thou spakest of him, indeed the cause.” 
 Now down he bent to embrace my teacher’s feet; 
 
 But he forbade him: “ Brother! do it not: 
 Thou art a shadow, and behold’st a shade.” 
 
 He, rising, answer’d thus: “ Now hast thou proved 
 
 The force and ardor of the love I bear thee, 
 When I forget we are but things of air, 
 _ And, as a substance, treat an empty shade.” 
 
 231 
 
232 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 CANTO XXII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Dante, Virgil, and Statius mount to the sixth cornice, 
 where the sin of gluttony is cleansed, the two Latin Poets discours- 
 ing by the way. Turning to the right, they find a tree hung with 
 sweet-smelling fruit, and watered by a shower that issues from the 
 rock. Voices are heard to proceed from among the leaves, record- 
 ing examples of temperance. 
 
 OW we had left the angel, who had turn’d 
 To the sixth circle our ascending step; 
 One gash from off my forehead razed; while they, 
 Whose wishes tend to justice, shouted forth, 
 “ Blessed!” + and ended with “I thirst” : and I, 
 More nimble than along the other straits, 
 So journey’d, that, without the sense of toil, 
 I follow’d upward the swift-footed shades; 
 When Virgil thus began: “Let its pure flame 
 From virtue flow, and love can never fail 
 To warm another’s bosom, so the light 
 Shine manifestly forth. Hence, from that hour, 
 When, ’mongst us in the purlieus of the deep, 
 Came down the spirit of Aquinum’s bard, 
 Who told of thine affection, my good will 
 Hath been for thee of quality as strong 
 As ever link’d itself to one not seen. 
 Therefore these stairs will now seem short to me. 
 But tell me: and, if too secure, I loose 
 The rein with a friend’s license, as a friend 
 Forgive me, and speak now as with a friend: 
 How chanced it covetous desire could find 
 Place in that bosom, ’midst such ample store 
 Of wisdom, as thy zeal had treasured there? ” 
 First somewhat moved to laughter by his words, 
 
 Statius replied: “Each syllable of thine 
 Is a dear pledge of love. Things oft appear, 
 That minister false matter to our doubts, 
 When their true causes are removed from sight. 
 Thy question doth assure me, thou believest 
 
 1“ Blessed.” “* Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness, 
 for they shall be filled.”—Matt. v. 6. 
 
PURGATORY 233 
 
 was on earth a covetous man; perhaps 
 Because thou found’st me in that circle placed. 
 Know then I was too wide of avarice: 
 And e’en for that excess, thousands of moons 
 Have wax’d and waned upon my sufferings. 
 And were it not that I with heedful care 
 Noted, where thou exclaim’st as if in ire 
 With human nature, ‘ Why, thou cursed thirst 
 Of gold! dost not with juster measure guide 
 The appetite of mortals?’ I had met 
 The fierce encounter of the voluble rock. 
 Then was I ware that, with too ample wing, 
 The hands may haste to lavishment; and turn’d, 
 As from my other evil, so from this, 
 In penitence. How many from their grave 
 Shall with shorn locks ? arise, who living, ay, 
 And at life’s last extreme, of this offence, 
 Through ignorance, did not repent! And know, 
 The fault, which lies direct from any sin 
 In level opposition, here, with that, 
 Wastes its green rankness on one common heap. 
 Therefore, if I have been with those, who wail 
 Their avarice, to cleanse me; through reverse 
 Of their transgression, such hath been my lot.” 
 To whom the sov’reign of the pastoral song: 
 “While thou didst sing that cruel warfare waged 
 By the twin sorrow of Jocasta’s womb,? 
 From thy discourse with Clio there, it seems 
 As faith had not been thine; without the which, 
 Good deeds suffice not. And if so, what sun 
 Rose on thee, or what candle pierced the dark, 
 That thou didst after see to hoist the sail, 
 And follow where the fisherman had led? ” 
 He answering thus: ‘“ By thee conducted first, 
 I enter’d the Parnassian grots, and quaft’d 
 Of the clear spring: illumined first by thee, 
 Open’d mine eyes to God. Thou didst, as one, 
 Who, journeying through the darkness, bears a light 
 
 2“ With shorn locks.” See “ Hell,” 8“ The twin sorrow of  Jocasta’s 
 Canto vii, 58. womb.”” Eteocles and Polynices. 
 
234 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Behind, that profits not himself, but makes 
 
 His followers wise, when thou exclaimed’st, ‘ Lo! 
 
 A renovated world, Justice return’d, 
 
 Times of primeval innocence restored, 
 
 And a new race descended from above.’ 
 
 Poet and Christian both to thee I owed. 
 
 That thou mayst mark more clearly what I trace, 
 
 My hand shall stretch forth to inform the lines 
 
 With livelier coloring. Soon o’er all the world, 
 
 By messengers from Heaven, the true belief 
 
 Teem’d now prolific; and that word of thine, 
 
 Accordant, to the new instructors chimed. 
 
 Induced by which agreement, I was wont 
 
 Resort to them; and soon their sanctity 
 
 So won upon me, that, Domitian’s rage 
 
 Pursuing them, I mix’d my tears with theirs; 
 
 And, while on earth I stay’d, still succor’d them; 
 
 And their most righteous customs made me scorn 
 
 All sects besides. Before I led the Greeks, 
 
 In tuneful fiction, to the streams of Thebes, 
 
 I was baptized: but secretly, through fear, 
 
 Remain’d a Christian, and conform’d long time 
 
 To Pagan rites. Four centuries and more 
 
 I, for that lukewarmness, was fain to pace 
 
 Round the fourth circle. Thou then, who hast raised 
 
 The covering which did hide such blessing from me, 
 
 Whilst much of this ascent is yet to climb, 
 
 Say, if thou know, where our old Terence bides, 
 
 Cecilius, Plautus, Varro: if condemn’d 
 
 They dwell, and in what province of the deep.” 
 
 “ These,” said my guide, “ with Persius and myself, 
 
 And others many more, are with that Greek,* 
 
 Of mortals, the most cherish’d by the nine, 
 
 In the first ward ® of darkness. There, ofttimes, 
 
 We of that mount hold converse, on whose top 
 
 For aye our nurses live. We have the bard 
 
 Of Pella ® and the Teian,? Agatho, 
 
 Simonides, and many a Grecian else | 
 4“ That Greek.” Hom 6 “ ——. The bard 
 
 8“ In the first ward.”’ eh Limbo. Of Pella.”? Euripides. 
 7“ The Teian.”? Anacreon. 
 
PURGATORY 235 
 
 Ingarlanded with laurel. Of thy train, 
 
 Antigone is there, Deiphile, 
 
 Argia, and as sorrowful as erst 
 
 Ismene, and who show’d Langia’s wave :® 
 
 Deidamia with her sisters there, 
 
 And blind Tiresias’ daughter,® and the bride 
 
 Sea-born of Peleus.” 1° Either poet now 
 
 Was silent; and no longer by the ascent 
 
 Or the steep walls obstructed, round them cast 
 
 Inquiring eyes. Four handmaids of the day 
 
 Had finish’d now their office, and the fifth 
 
 Was at the chariot-beam, directing still 
 
 Its flamy point aloof; when thus my guide: 
 
 “ Methinks, it well behoves us to the brink 
 
 Bend the right shoulder, circuiting the mount, 
 
 As we have ever used.” So custom there 
 
 Was usher to the road; the which we chose 
 
 Less doubtful, as that worthy shade ** complied. 
 They on before me went: I sole pursued, 
 
 Listening their speech, that to my thoughts convey’d 
 
 Mysterious lessons of sweet poesy. 
 
 But soon they ceased; for midway of the road 
 
 A tree we found, with goodly fruitage hung, 
 
 And pleasant to the smell: and as a fir, 
 
 Upward from bough to bough, less ample spreads; 
 
 So downward this less ample spread; that none, 
 
 Methinks, aloft may climb. Upon the side, 
 
 That closed our path, a liquid crystal fell 
 
 From the steep rock, and through the sprays above 
 
 Stream’d showering. With associate step the bards 
 
 Drew near the plant; and, from amidst the leaves, 
 
 A voice was heard: “ Ye shall be chary of me;” 
 
 And after added: ‘“‘ Mary took more thought 
 
 For joy and honor of the nuptial feast, 
 
 Than for herself, who answers now for you. 
 
 @“ Who show’d Langia’s wave.” parent inconsistency, by observing, 
 Hypsipile. that although she was placed there as 
 8“ Tiresias’ daughter.’’ Dante, as a sinner, yet, as one of famous memory, 
 
 some have thought, had forgotten that she had also a place among the wor- 
 he had placed Manto, the daughter_of — thies in Limbo. ‘ 
 
 Tiresias, among the sorcerers. See 10 ““___ The bride ‘ 
 
 ** Hell,” Canto xx. Vellutello endeavors, Sea-born of Peleus.” Thetis. 
 father awkwardly, to reconcile the ap- il‘* That worthy shade.” Statius. 
 
236 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 The women of old Rome were satisfied 
 
 With water for their beverage. Daniel ** fed 
 On pulse, and wisdom gain’d. The primai age 
 Was beautiful as gold: and hunger then 
 
 Made acorns tasteful; thirst, each rivulet 
 
 Run nectar. Honey and locusts were the food, 
 Whereon the Baptist in the wilderness 
 
 Fed, and that eminence of glory reach’d 
 
 And greatness, which the Evangelist records.” 
 
 ARGUMENT.—They are overtaken by the spirit of Forese, who had been | 
 a friend of our Poet’s on earth, and who now inveighs bitterly 
 
 against the immodest dress of their countrywomen at Florence. 
 
 N the green leaf mine eyes were fix’d, like his 
 Who throws away his days in idle chase 
 
 Of the diminutive birds, when thus I heard 
 The more than father warn me: ‘Son! our time 
 
 Asks thriftier using. Linger not: away!” 
 
 Thereat my face and steps at once I turn’d 
 Toward the sages, by whose converse cheer’d 
 I journey’d on, and felt no toil: and lo! 
 
 A sound of weeping, and a song: “ My lips, 
 O Lord!” and these so mingled, it gave birth 
 To pleasure and to pain. “O Sire beloved! 
 Say what is this I hear.”” Thus I inquired. 
 
 “ Spirits,” said he, “ who, as they go, perchance, 
 Their debt of duty pay.” As on their road 
 The thoughtful pilgrims, overtaking some 
 Not known unto them, turn to them, and look, 
 But stay not; thus, approaching from behind 
 With speedier motion, eyed us, as they pass’d, 
 
 12“ Daniel.” “‘ Then said Daniel to 
 
 and gave them pulse. As for these four 
 
 Melzar, whom the prince of the eunuchs 
 had set over Daniel, Hananiah, Mi- 
 chael,and Azariah, ‘ Prove thy servants, 
 I beseech thee, ten days; and let them 
 give us pulse to eat, and water to 
 drink,’ ’’—Dan. i. 11, 12. *“‘ Thus Melzar 
 took away the portion of their meat, 
 and the wine that they should drink: 
 
 children, God gave them knowledge and 
 skill in all learning and wisdom: and 
 Daniel had understanding in all visions 
 and dreams.’’—Ibid. 16, 17. 
 
 1“ My lips.” “O Lord, open thou 
 my lips; and my mouth shall show 
 forth thy praise.”—Psalm li. 15. 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 237 
 
 A crowd of spirits, silent and devout. 
 The eyes of each were dark and hollow; pale 
 Their visage, and so lean withal, the bones 
 
 Stood staring through the skin. 
 
 I do not think 
 
 Thus dry and meagre Erisichthon show’d, 
 
 When pinch’d by sharp-set famine to the quick. 
 “Lo!” to myself I mused, “the race, who lost 
 
 Jerusalem, when Mary with dire beak 
 
 Prey’d on her child.” 
 
 From which the gems were dropt. 
 
 The sockets seem’d as rings, 
 
 Who reads the name ? 
 
 Of man upon his forehead, there the M 
 
 Had traced most plainly. Who would deem, that scent 
 Of water and an apple could have proved 
 
 Powerful to generate such pining want, 
 
 Not knowing how it wrought? 
 
 While now I stood, 
 
 Wondering what thus could waste them (for the cause 
 Of their gaunt hollowness and scaly rind 
 
 Appear’d not), lo! a spirit turn’d his eyes 
 
 In their deep-sunken cells, and fasten’d them 
 
 On me, then cried with vehemence aloud: 
 
 “ What grace is this vouchsafed me? ”’ 
 
 By his looks 
 
 I ne’er had recognized him: but the voice 
 
 Brought to my knowledge what his cheer conceal’d. 
 Remembrance of his altered lineaments 
 
 Was kindled from that spark; and I agnized 
 
 The visage of Forese.® 
 
 “Ah! respect 
 
 This wan and leprous-wither’d skin,” thus he 
 Suppliant implored, “ this macerated flesh. 
 
 Speak to me truly of thyself. 
 
 And who 
 
 Are those twain spirits, that escort thee there? 
 Be it not said thou scorn’st to talk with me.” 
 “ That face of thine,” I answer’d him, “ which dead 
 I once bewail’d, disposes me not less 
 For weeping, when I see it thus transform’d. 
 
 Say then, by Heaven, what blasts ye thus? 
 
 2“ Who reads the name.” ‘“‘ He who 
 pretends to distinguish the letters which 
 form OMO in the features of the hu- 
 man face, might easily have traced out 
 the M on their emaciated counte- 
 nances.”’ The temples, nose, and fore- 
 head are supposed to represent this 
 letter; and the eyes the two O’s placed 
 ~ithin each side of it- 
 
 The whilst 
 
 8 ** Forese.”? One of the brothers of 
 Piccarda; he who is again spoken of 
 in the next Canto, and introduced in 
 the ‘‘ Paradise,”’ Canto iii; Cionacci, in 
 his “‘ Storia della Beata Umiliana,” Parte 
 iv. cap. i., is referred to by Lombardi, 
 in order to show that Forese was also 
 the brother of Corso Donati, our au- 
 thor’s political enemy. 
 
238 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 I wonder, ask not speech from me: unapt 
 Is he to speak, whom other will employs.” 
 
 He thus: “ The water and the plant, we pass’d, 
 With power are gifted, by the eternal will 
 Infused; the which so pines me. Every spirit, 
 Whose song bewails his gluttony indulged 
 Too grossly, here in hunger and in thirst 
 Is purified. The odor, which the fruit 
 And spray that showers upon the verdure, breathe, 
 Inflames us with desire to feed and drink. 
 
 Nor once alone, encompassing our route, 
 
 We come to add fresh fuel to the pain: 
 
 Pain, said I? solace rather: for that will, 
 
 To the tree, leads us, by which Christ was led 
 
 To call on Eli, joyful, when he paid 
 
 Our ransom from his vein.” I answering thus: 
 “Forese! from that day, in which the world 
 
 For better life thou changedst, not five years 
 Have circled. If the power of sinning more 
 
 Were first concluded in thee, ere thou knew’st 
 That kindly grief which re-espouses us 
 
 To God, how hither art thou come so soon? 
 
 I thought to find thee lower,* there, where time 
 
 Is recompense for time.” He straight replied: 
 “To drink up the sweet wormwood of affliction 
 
 I have been brought thus early, by the tears 
 Stream’d down my Nella’s® cheeks. Her prayers devout, 
 Fler sighs have drawn me from the coast, where oft 
 Expectance lingers ; and have set me free 
 
 From the other circles. In the sight of God 
 
 So much the dearer is my widow prized. 
 
 She whom I loved so fondly, as she ranks 
 
 More singly eminent for virtuous deeds. 
 
 The tract, most barbarous of Sardinia’s isle,® 
 Hath dames more chaste, and modester by far, 
 Than that wherein I left her. O sweet brother! 
 What wouldst thou have me say? <A time to come 
 Stands full within my view, to which this hour 
 
 #* Lower.” In the Ante-Purgatory. Sardinia, to which that name was given, 
 
 See Canto ii. \ on account of the uncivilized state of 
 5“* My Nella.” The wife of Forese. its inhabitants, who are said to have . 
 $** The tract, most barbarous of Sar- gone nearly naked. 
 
 dinia’s isle.’”’ The Barbagia is a part of 
 
PURGATORY 239 
 
 Shall not be counted of an ancient date, 
 
 When from the pulpit shall be loudly warn’d 
 
 The unblushing dames of Florence, lest they bare 
 Unkerchief’d bosoms to the common gaze. 
 
 What savage women hath the world e’er seen, 
 What Saracens,’ for whom there needed scourge 
 Of spiritual or other discipline, 
 
 To force them walk with covering on their limbs? 
 But did they see, the shameless ones, what Heaven 
 Wafts on swift wing toward them while I speak, 
 Their mouths were oped for howling: they shall taste 
 Of sorrow (unless foresight cheat me here) 
 
 Or e’er cheek of him be clothed with down, 
 
 Who is now rock’d with lullaby asleep. 
 
 Ah! now, my brother, hide thyself no more; 
 
 Thou seest how not I alone, but all, 
 
 Gaze, where thou veil’st the intercepted sun.” 
 
 Whence I replied: “If thou recall to mind 
 
 What we were once together, even yet 
 Remembrance of those days may grieve thee sore. 
 That I forsook that life, was due to him 
 
 Who there precedes me, some few evenings past. 
 When she was round, who shines with sister lamp 
 To his great glisters yonder,’ and I show’d 
 
 The sun. “’Tis he, who through profoundest night 
 Of the true dead has brought me, with this flesh 
 As true, that follows. From that gloom the aid 
 Of his sure comfort drew me on to climb, 
 
 And, climbing, wind along this mountain-steep, 
 Which rectifies in you whate’er the world 
 
 Made crooked and depraved. I have his word, 
 That he will bear me company as far 
 
 As till I come where Beatrice dwells: 
 
 But there must leave me. Virgil is that spirit, 
 Who thus hath promised,” and I pointed to him: 
 
 “ The other is that shade, for whom so late 
 
 Your realm, as he arose, exulting, shook 
 
 Through every pendent cliff and rocky bound.” 
 7“ Saracens.”? This word, during the short, to all nations (except the Jews) 
 
 Middle Ages, was indiscriminately ap- who did not profess Christianity. 
 plied to Pagans and Mohammedans; in . 
 
240 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 CANTO XXIV 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Forese points out several others by name who are here, 
 like himself, purifying themselves from the vice of gluttony; and 
 among the rest, Buonaggiunta of Lucca, with whom our Poet con- 
 verses. Forese then predicts the violent end of Dante’s political 
 enemy, Corso Donati; and, when he has quitted them, the Poet, in 
 company with Statius and Virgil, arrives at another tree, from 
 whence issue voices that record ancient examples of gluttony; and 
 proceeding forward, they are directed by an angel which way to 
 ascend to the next cornice of the mountain. 
 
 UR journey was not slacken’d by our talk, 
 Nor yet our talk by journeying. Still we spake, 
 And urged our travel stoutly, like a ship 
 When the wind sits astern. The shadowy forms, 
 That seem’d things dead and dead again, drew in 
 At their deep-delved orbs rare wonder of me, 
 Perceiving I had life; and I my words 
 Continued, and thus spake: “ He journeys up 
 Perhaps more tardily than else he would, 
 For others’ sake. But tell me, if thou know’st, 
 Where is Piccarda? Tell me, if I see 
 Any of mark, among this multitude 
 Who eye me thus.” “ My sister (she for whom, 
 *Twixt beautiful and good, I cannot say 
 Which name was fitter) wears e’en now her crown, 
 And triumphs in Olympus.” Saying this, 
 He added: “ Since spare diet hath so worn 
 Our semblance out, ’tis lawful here to name 
 Each one. This,” and his finger then he raised, 
 “Ts Buonaggiunta ‘—Buonaggiunta, he 
 Of Lucca: and that face beyond him, pierced 
 Unto a leaner fineness than the rest, 
 Had keeping of the church; he was of Tours,? 
 And purges by wan abstinence away 
 Bolsena’s eels and cups of muscadel.”’ 
 He show’d me many others, one by one: 
 
 And all, as they were named, seem’d well content ; 
 
 / 
 1“ Buonaggiunta.” Buonaggiunta Ur- Tours became Pope with the title of 
 
 biciani, of Tacce ; Martin IV in 1281, and died in 128s. 
 2“ He was of Tours.” Simon of 
 
rr pep ee 
 
 PURGATORY 243 
 
 For no dark gesture I discern’d in any. 
 I saw, through hunger, Ubaldino,’ grind 
 Fis teeth on emptiness; and Boniface,* 
 That waved the crozier o’er a numerous flock: 
 I saw the Marquis, who had time erewhile 
 To swill at Forli with less drought; yet so, 
 Was one ne’er sated. I howe’er, like him 
 That, gazing midst a crowd, singles out one, 
 So singled him of Lucca; for methought 
 Was none among them took such note of me. 
 Somewhat I heard him whisper of Gentucca: 
 The sound was indistinct, and murmur’d there, 
 Where justice, that so strips them, fix’d her sting. 
 “ Spirit!” said I, “it seems as thou wouldst fain 
 Speak with me. Let me hear thee. Mutual wish 
 To converse prompts, which let us both indulge.” 
 He, answering, straight began: ‘“ Woman is born, 
 Whose brow no wimple shades yet, that shall make 
 My city please thee, blame it as they may. 
 Go then with this forewarning. If aught false 
 My whisper too implied, the event shall tell. 
 But say, if of a truth I see the man 
 Of that new lay the inventor, which begins 
 With ‘ Ladies, ye that con the lore of love.’ ”’ 
 To whom I thus: “ Count of me but as one, 
 Who am the scribe of love; that, when he breathes, 
 Take up my pen, and, as he dictates, write.” 
 “ Brother!” said he, “ the hind’rance, which once held 
 The notary, with Guittone and myself, 
 Short of that new and sweeter style I hear, 
 Is now disclosed: I see how ye your plumes 
 Stretch, as the inditer guides them; which, no question, 
 Ours did not. He that seeks a grace beyond, 
 Sees not the distance parts one style from other.” 
 And, as contented, here he held his peace. 
 Like as the birds, that winter near the Nile, 
 In squared regiment direct their course, 
 $* Ubaldino.” Ubaldino degli Ubal- de’ Fieschi, a Genoese; by Vellutello, 
 dini, of Pila, in the Florentine terri- the son of the above-mentioned Ubal- 
 dini; and by Landino, Francioso, a 
 
 tory. 
 «** Boniface.” Archbishop of Raven- Frenchman. 
 ma. By Venturi he is called Bonifazio 
 
242 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Then stretch themselves in file for speedier flight ; 
 Thus all the tribe of spirits, as they turn’d 
 Their visage, faster fled, nimble alike 
 
 Through leanness and desire. 
 
 And as a man, 
 
 Tired with the motion of a trotting steed, 
 Slacks pace, and stays behind his company, 
 
 Till his o’erbreathed lungs keep temperate time; 
 E’en so Forese let that holy crew 
 
 Proceed, behind them lingering at my side, 
 
 And saying: 
 
 “ When shall I again behold thee? ” 
 
 “ How long my life may last,” said I, “I know not. 
 This know, how soon soever I return, 
 My wishes will before me have arrived: 
 Sithence the place,® where I am set to live, 
 Is, day by day, more scoop’d of all its good; 
 And dismal ruin seems to threaten it.” 
 
 “Go now,” he cried: ‘lo! he,* whose guilt is most 
 Passes before my vision, dragg’d at heels 
 
 Of an infuriate beast. 
 
 Toward the vale, 
 
 Where guilt hath no redemption, on it speeds, 
 
 Each step increasing swiftness on the last; 
 
 Until a blow it strikes, that leaveth him 
 
 A corse most vilely shatter’d. No long space 
 
 Those wheels have yet to roll” (therewith his eyes 
 
 Look’d up to heaven), “ere thou shalt plainly see 
 
 That which my words may not more plainly tell. 
 
 I quit thee: time is precious here: I lose 
 
 Too much, thus measuring my pace with thine.” 
 As from a troop of well-rank’d chivalry, 
 
 One knight, more enterprising than the rest, 
 
 Pricks forth at gallop, eager to display 
 
 His prowess in the first encounter proved; 
 
 So parted he from us, with lengthen’d strides; 
 
 And left me on the way with those twain spirits, 
 
 Who were such mighty marshals of the world. 
 
 &** The place.” Florence. 
 
 6 ** He.”? Corso Donati was suspected 
 of aiming at the sovereignty of Flor- 
 ence. To escape the fury of his fellow- 
 citizens, he fled away on horseback, but 
 falling, was overtaken and slain, a.p. 
 1308. The contemporary annalist, after 
 relating at length the circumstances of 
 his fate, adds, “‘ that he was one of the 
 wisest and most valorous knights, the 
 
 best speaker, the most expert states- 
 man, the most renowned and enterpris- 
 ing man of his age in Italy, a comely 
 Knight and of graceful carriage, but 
 very worldly, and in tis time had 
 formed many conspiracies in Florence, 
 and entered into many scandalous prac- 
 tices for the sake of attaining state and 
 lordship.” 
 
PURGATORY 243 
 
 When he beyond us had so fled, mine eyes 
 No nearer reach’d him, than my thought his words; 
 The branches of another fruit, thick hung, 
 And blooming fresh, appear’d. E’en as our steps 
 Turn’d thither; not far off, it rose to view. 
 Beneath it were a multitude, that raised 
 Their hands, and shouted forth I know not what 
 Unto the boughs; like greedy and fond brats, 
 That beg, and answer none obtain from him, 
 Of whom they beg; but more to draw them on, 
 He, at arm’s length, the object of their wish 
 Above them holds aloft, and hides it not. 
 At length, as undeceived, they went their way: 
 And we approach the tree, whom vows and tears 
 Sue to in vain; the mighty tree. “ Pass on, 
 And come not near. Stands higher up the wood, 
 Whereof Eve tasted: and from it was ta’en 
 This plant.” Such sounds from midst the thickets came 
 Whence I, with either bard, close to the side 
 That rose, pass’d forth beyond. ‘“ Remember,” next 
 We heard, “ those unblest creatures of the clouds,’ 
 How they their twifold bosoms, overgorged, 
 Opposed in fight to Theseus: call to mind 
 The Hebrews,® how, effeminate, they stoop’d 
 To ease their thirst; whence Gideon’s ranks were thinn’d, 
 As he to Madian ® march’d adown the hills.” 
 Thus near one border coasting, still we heard 
 The sins of gluttony, with woe erewhile 
 Reguerdon’d. Then along the lonely path, 
 Once more at large, full thousand paces on - 
 We travel’d, each contemplative and mute. 
 “Why pensive journey so ye three alone?” 
 Thus suddenly a voice exclaim’d: whereat 
 I shook, as doth a scared and paltry beast ; 
 Then raised my head, to look from whence it came. 
 Was ne’er, in furnace, glass, or metal, seen 
 So bright and glowing red, as was the shape 
 6m oo isectnoen: Keke “The wierebicee Gideon in pursuit 
 
 8“ The Hebrews.” Judges, vii. of Madian and her vanquisht kings.” 
 —Milton, ‘‘ Samson Agonistes.” 
 
ae THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 I now beheld. “If ye desire to mount,” 
 He cried; “here must ye turn. This way he goes, 
 Who goes in quest of peace.” His countenance 
 Had dazzled me; and to my guides I faced 
 Backward, like one who walks as sound directs. 
 
 As when, to harbinger the dawn, springs up 
 On freshen’d wing the air of May, and breathes 
 Of fragrance, all impregn’d with herb and ete 
 E’en such a wind I felt upon my front 
 Blow gently, and the moving of a wing 
 Perceived, that, moving, shed ambrosial smell ; 
 And then a voice: “ Blessed are they, whom grace 
 Doth so illume, that appetite in them 
 Exhaleth no inordinate desire, 
 Still hungering as the rule of temperance wills.” 
 
 CANTO XXV. 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Virgil and Statius resolve some doubts that have arisen 
 in the mind of Dante from*what he had just seen. They all arrive 
 on the seventh and last cornice, where the sin of incontinence is 
 purged in fire; and the spirits of those suffering therein are heard 
 to record illustrious instances of chastity. 
 
 T was an hour, when he who climbs, had need 
 To walk uncrippled; for the sun! had now 
 To Taurus the meridian circle left, 
 And to the Scorpion left the night. As one, 
 That makes no pause, but presses on his road, 
 Whate’er betide him, if some urgent need 
 Impel; so enter’d we upon our way, 
 One before other; for, but singly, none 
 That steep and narrow scale admits to climb. 
 F’en as the young stork lifteth up his wing 
 Through wish to fly, yet ventures not to quit 
 The nest, and drops it; so in me desire . 
 Of Nay my guide arose, and fell, 
 
 1 The sun.” The sun had passed pion is opposite, the latter constellation 
 the meridian two hours, and that merid- was consequently at the meridian o 
 ian was now occupied by the constel- night. 
 lation of Taurus, to which as the Scor- 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 245 
 
 Arriving even to the act that marks 
 
 A man prepared for speech. Him all our haste 
 Restrain’d not; but thus spake the sire beloved: 
 “Fear not to speed the shaft, that on thy lip 
 
 Stands trembling for its flight.” 
 
 I straight began: 
 
 Encouraged thus, 
 
 ““ How there can leanness come, 
 
 Where is no want of nourishment to feed? ” 
 “ Tf thou,” he answer’d, “ hadst remember’d thee, 
 How Meleager ? with the wasting brand 
 Wasted alike, by equal fires consumed; 
 This would not trouble thee: and hadst thou thought, 
 How in the mirror ® your reflected form 
 With mimic motion vibrates; what now seems 
 Hard, and appear’d no harder than the pulp 
 
 Of summer-fruit mature. 
 
 But that thy will 
 
 In certainty may find its full repose, 
 
 Lo Statius here! on him I call, and pray 
 
 That he would now be healer of thy wound.” 
 “Tf, in thy presence, I unfold to him | 
 
 The secrets of heaven’s vengeance, let me plead 
 
 Thine own injunction to exculpate me.” 
 
 So Statius answer’d, and forthwith began: 
 
 “* Attend my words, O son, and in thy mind 
 
 Receive them; so shall they be light to clear 
 
 The doubt thou offer’st. 
 
 Blood, concocted well, 
 
 Which by the thirsty veins is ne’er imbibed, 
 And rests as food superfluous, to be ta’en 
 
 From the replenish’d table, in the heart 
 
 Derives effectual virtue, that informs 
 
 The several human limbs, as being that 
 
 Which passes through the veins itself to make them. 
 Yet more concocted it descends, where shame 
 -Forbids to mention: and from thence distils 
 
 In natural vessels on another’s blood. 
 
 There each unite together; one disposed 
 
 To endure, to act the other, through that power 
 
 3“ Meleager.” Virgil reminds Dante 
 that, as Meleager was wasted away b 
 the decree of the fates, and not throug 
 want of blood; so by the divine ap- 
 pointment, there may be leanness where 
 Bie no need of nourishment. 
 
 ‘In the mirror.”’ As the reflection 
 
 of a form in a mirror is modified in 
 agreement with the modification of the 
 form itself; so the soul, separated from 
 the earthly body, impresses the image 
 or ghost of that body with its own 
 affections. 
 
246 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Derived from whence it came; and being met, 
 It ’gins to work, coagulating first ; 
 
 Then vivifies what its own substance made 
 Consist. With animation now endued, 
 
 The active virtue (differing from a plant 
 
 No further, than that this is on the way, 
 
 And at its limit that) continues yet 
 
 To operate, that now it moves, and feels, 
 
 As sea-sponge clinging to the rock: and ther® 
 Assumes the organic powers its seed convey’d. 
 This is the moment, son! at which the virtue, 
 That from the generating heart proceeds, 
 
 Is pliant and expansive; for each limb 
 
 Is in the heart by forgeful nature plann’d. 
 
 How babe of animal becomes, remains 
 
 For thy considering. At this point, more wise, 
 Than thou, has err’d, making the soul disjoin’d 
 From passive intellect, because he saw 
 
 No organ for the latter’s use assign’d. 
 
 “Open thy bosom to the truth that comes. 
 Know, soon as in the embryo, to the brain 
 Articulation is complete, then turns 
 The primal Mover with a smile of joy 
 On such great work of nature; and imbreathes 
 New spirit replete with virtue, that what here 
 Active it finds, to its own substance draws; 
 And forms an individual soul, that lives, 
 
 And feels, and bends reflective on itself. 
 
 And that thou less may’st marvel at the word, 
 
 Mark the sun’s heat; how that to wine doth change, 
 Mix’d with the moisture filter’d through the vine. 
 
 “When Lachesis hath spun the thread,* the soul 
 Takes with her both the human and divine, 
 Memory, intelligence, and will, in act 
 Far keener than before; the other powers 
 Inactive all and mute. No pause allow’d, 
 
 In wondrous sort self-moving, to one strand 
 Of those, where the departed roam, she falls: 
 
 “When Lachesis hath spun the thread.”” When a man’s life on earth is 
 
 at an end. 
 
PURGATORY 249 
 
 Here learns her destined path. Soon as the place 
 Receives her, round the plastic virtue beams, 
 Distinct as in the living limbs before: - 
 And as the air, when saturate with showers, , 
 The casual beam refracting, decks itself 
 With many a hue; so here the ambient air 
 Weareth that form, which influence of the soul 
 Imprints on it: and like the flame, that where 
 The fire moves, thither follows; so, henceforth, 
 The new form on the spirit follows still: 
 Hence hath it semblance, and is shadow call’d, 
 With each sense, even to the sight, endued: 
 Hence speech is ours, hence laughter, tears and sighs, 
 Which thou mayst oft have witness’d on the mount. 
 The obedient shadow fails not to present 
 Whatever varying passion moves within us. 
 And this the cause of what thou marvel’st at.” 
 Now the last flexure of our way we reach’d; 
 And to the right hand turning other care 
 Awaits us. Here the rocky precipice 
 Hurls forth redundant flames; and from the rim 
 A blast up-blown, with forcible rebuff 
 Driveth them back, sequester’d from its bound. 
 Behoved us, one by one, along the side, 
 That border’d on the void, to pass; and I 
 Fear’d on one hand the fire, on the other fear’d 
 Headlong to fall: when thus the instructor warn’d; 
 “ Strict rein must in this place direct the eyes. 
 A little swerving and the way is lost.” 
 Then from the bosom of the burning mass, 
 “O God of mercy!” 5 heard I sung, and felt 
 No less desire to turn. And when I saw 
 Spirits along the flame proceeding, I 
 Between their footsteps and mine own was fain 
 To share by turns my view. At the hymn’s close 
 They shouted loud, “I do not know a man;” ° 
 Then in low voice again took up the strain ; 
 6“ Q God of merey,? (“Summe ries; for in the modern it is “ summz 
 Deus clementiz ”’). The beginning of — parens clementiz.” 
 
 the hymn sung on the Sabbath at ma- @“T do not know a man.”—Luke, i, 
 tins, as it stands in the ancient brevia- 34. 
 
248 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Which once more ended, “ To the wood,” they cried, 
 “ Ran Dian, and drave forth Callisto stung 
 
 With Cytherea’s poison ”: then return’d 
 
 Unto their song; then many a pair extoll’d, 
 
 Who lived in virtue chastely and the bands 
 
 Of wedded love. Nor from that task, I ween, 
 Surcease they; whilesoe’er the scorching fire 
 Enclasps them. Of such skill appliance needs, 
 
 To medicine the wound that healeth last. 
 
 CANTO XXVI 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The spirits wonder at seeing the shadow cast by the body 
 
 of Dante on the flame as he passes it. This moves one of them to 
 address him. It proves to be Guido Guinicelli, the Italian poet, who 
 points out to him the spirit of Arnault Daniel, the Provencal, with 
 whom he also speaks. 
 
 HILE singly thus along the rim we walk’d, 
 Oft the good master warn’d me, “ Look thou well. 
 Avail it that I caution thee.” The sun 
 
 Now all the western clime irradiate changed 
 From azure tinct to white; and, as I pass’d, 
 My passing shadow made the umber’d flame 
 Burn ruddier. At so strange a sight I mark’d 
 That many a spirit marvel’d on his way. 
 
 66 
 
 This bred occasion first to speak of me. 
 He seems,” said they, ‘‘ no insubstantial frame; ” 
 
 Then, to obtain what certainty they might, 
 Stretch’d toward me, careful not to overpass 
 The burning pale. “O thou! who followest 
 The others, haply not more slow than they, 
 
 But moved by reverence; answer me, who burn 
 In thirst and fire: nor I alone, but these 
 
 All for thine answer do more thirst, than doth 
 Indian or A‘thiop for the cooling stream. 
 
 Tell us, how is it that thou makest thyself 
 
 A wall against the sun, as thou not yet. 
 
 Into the inextricable toils of death 
 
 Hadst enter’d?” Thus spake one: and I had straight 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 Declared me, if attention had not turn’d 
 
 To new appearance. Meeting these, there came, 
 
 Midway the burning path, a crowd, on whom 
 
 Earnestly gazing, from each part I view 
 
 The shadows all press forward, severally. 
 
 Each snatch a hasty kiss, and then away. 
 
 E’en so the emmets, ’mid their dusky troops, 
 
 Peer closely one at other, to spy out 
 
 Their mutual road perchance, and how they thrive. 
 That friendly greeting parted, ere despatch 
 
 Of the first onward step, from either tribe 
 
 Loud clamor rises: those, who newly come, 
 
 Shout “ Sodom and Gomorrah!” these, “ The cow 
 
 Pasiphaé enter’d, that the beast she woo’d 
 
 Might rush unto her luxury.” Then as cranes, 
 
 That part toward the Riphzen mountains fly, 
 
 Part toward the Lybic sands, these to avoid 
 
 The ice, and those the sun; so hasteth off 
 
 _ One crowd, advances the other; and resume 
 
 _ Their first song, weeping, and their several shout. 
 Again drew near my side the very same, 
 
 Who had erewhile besought me; and their looks 
 
 Mark’d eagerness to listen. I, who twice 
 
 Their will had noted, spake: ‘“O spirits! secure, 
 
 Whene’er the time may be, of peaceful end; 
 My limbs, nor crude, nor in mature old age, 
 
 - Have I left yonder: here they bear me, fed 
 
 With blood, and sinew-strung. That I no more 
 
 May live in blindness, hence I tend aloft. 
 
 There is a dame on high, who wins for us 
 
 This grace, by which my mortal through your realm 
 
 Ibear. But may your utmost wish soon meet 
 Such full fruition, that the orb of heaven, 
 Fullest of love, and of most ample space, 
 Receive you; as ye tell (upon my page 
 Henceforth to stand recorded) who ye are; 
 And what this multitude, that at your backs 
 
 Have pass’d behind us.” As one, mountain-bred, | 
 
 Rugged and clownish, if some city’s walls 
 He chance to enter, round him stares agape, 
 
 249 
 
250 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Confounded and struck dumb; e’en such appear’d 
 
 Each spirit. 
 
 But when rid of that amaze 
 
 (Not long the inmate of a noble heart), 
 
 He, who before had question’d, thus resumed: 
 “O blessed! who, for death preparing takest 
 Experience of our limits, in thy bark; 
 
 Their crime, who not with us proceed, was that 
 For which, as he did triumph, Cesar heard 
 
 The shout of ‘Queen!’ to taunt him. 
 
 Hence their cry 
 
 Of ‘Sodom!’ as they parted ; to rebuke 
 Themselves, and aid the burning by their shame. 
 Our sinning was Hermaphrodite: but we, 
 Because the law of human kind we broke, 
 Following like beasts our vile concupiscence, 
 Hence parting from them, to our own disgrace 
 Record the name of her, by whom the beast 
 
 In bestial tire was acted. Now our deeds 
 
 Thou know’st, and how we sinn’d. 
 
 If thou by name 
 
 Wouldst haply know us, time permits not now 
 
 To tell so much, nor can I. 
 Learn what thou wishest. 
 
 Of myself 
 Guinicelli I; 
 
 Who having truly sorrow’d ere my last, 
 
 Already cleanse me.” 
 
 With such pious joy, 
 
 As the two sons upon their mother gazed 
 
 From sad Lycurgus* rescued; such my joy 
 (Save that I more repress’d it) when IJ heard 
 From his own lips the name of him pronounced, 
 Who was a father to me, and to those 
 
 My betters, who have ever used the sweet 
 
 And pleasant rhymes of love. 
 
 So naught I heard, 
 
 Nor spake; but long time thoughtfully I went 
 Gazing on him; and, only for the fire, 
 
 Approach’d not nearer. 
 
 When my eyes were fed 
 
 By looking on him; with such solemn pledge, 
 As forces credence, I devoted me 
 
 Unto his service wholly. 
 He thus bespake me: 
 
 1“ Lycurgus.”’ Hypsipile had left her 
 infant charge, the son of Lycurgus, on 
 a bank, where it was destroyed by a 
 serpent, when she went to show the 
 Argive army the river of Langia: and, 
 
 In reply 
 “What from thee I hear 
 
 on her escaping the effects of “ycur. 
 gus’s resentment, the joy her own chil- 
 dren felt at the sight of her was such as 
 our Poet felt on beholding his prede- 
 cessor Guinicelli. 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 Is graved so deeply on my mind, the waves 
 Of Lethe shall not wash it off, nor make 
 A whit less lively. But as now thy oath 
 Has seal’d the truth, declare what cause impels 
 That love, which both thy looks and speech bewray.” 
 “ Those dulcet lays,’ I answer’d; “ which, as long 
 As of our tongue the beauty does not fade, 
 Shall make us love the very ink that traced them.” 
 “Brother!” he cried, and pointed at the shade 
 Before him, “ there is one, whose mother speech 
 Doth owe to him a fairer ornament. 
 He? in love ditties, and the tales of prose, 
 Without a rival stands; and let the fools 
 Talk on, who think the songster of Limoges ® 
 O’ertops him. Rumor and the popular voice 
 They look to, more than truth; and so confirm 
 Opinion, ere by art or reason taught. 
 Thus many of the elder time cried up 
 Guittone, giving him the prize, till truth 
 By strength of numbers vanquish’d. If thouown 
 So ample privilege, as to have gain’d 
 Free entrance to the cloister, whereof Christ 
 Is Abbot of the college; ‘say to him 
 One paternoster for me, far as needs 
 For dwellers in this world, where power to sin 
 No longer tempts us.” Haply to make way 
 For one that follow’d next, when that was said, 
 He vanish’d through the fire, as through the wave 
 A fish, that glances diving to the deep. 
 I, to the spirit he had shown me, drew 
 A little onward, and besought his name, 
 For which my heart, I said, kept gracious room. 
 He frankly thus began: “ Thy courtesy * 
 So wins on me, I have nor power nor will 
 To hide me. Iam Arnault; and with songs, 
 
 2“He.” The united testimony of de Borneil, of Sideuil, a castle in Limo- 
 Dante, and of Feteatehs places Arnault ges. He was a Troubadour, much ad- 
 
 Daniel at the head o 
 
 the Provencal mired and caressed in his day, and ap- 
 
 poets. That he was born of poor but pears to have been in favor with the 
 noble parents, at the castle of Ribeyrac Monarchs of Castile, Leon, Navarre, 
 
 in Périgord, and that he was at the Eng- and Arragon. 
 
 lish court, is the amount of informa- “Thy courtesy.” Arnault is here 
 
 tion we have concerning him. 
 8“ The songster of Limoges.” Giraud Provengal. 
 
 made to speak in his own tongue, the 
 
252 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Sorely lamenting for my folly past, 
 
 Through this ford of fire I wade, and see 
 
 The day, I hope for, smiling in my view. 
 
 I pray ye by the worth that guides ye up 
 
 Unto the summit of the scale, in time 
 Remember ye my sufferings.” With such words 
 He disappear’d in the refining flame. 
 
 CANTO XXVII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—An angel sends them forward through the fire to the last 
 ascent, which leads to the terrestrial Paradise, situated on the sum- 
 mit of the mountain. They have not proceeded many steps on their 
 way upward, when the fall of night hinders them from going ~ 
 further; and our Poet, who has lain down with Virgil and Statius 
 to rest, beholds in a dream two females, figuring the active and con- 
 templative life. With the return of morning, they reach the height; 
 and here Virgil gives Dante full liberty to use his own pleasure and 
 
 judgment in the choice of his way, till he shall meet with Beatrice. 
 4 . 
 
 OW was the sun? so station’d, as when first 
 His early radiance quivers on the heights, 
 Where stream’d his Maker’s blood ; while Libra hangs 
 
 Above Hesperian Ebro; and new fires, 
 
 Meridian, flash on Ganges’ yellow tide. 
 
 So day was sinking, when the angel of God 
 
 Appear’d before us. Joy was in his mien. 
 
 Forth of the flame he stood upon the brink; 
 
 And with a voice, whose lively clearness far 
 
 Surpass’d our human, “ Blessed ? are the pure 
 
 In heart,” he sang: then near him as we came, 
 
 “Go ye not further, holy spirits!” he cried, 
 
 “Ere the fire pierce you: enter in; and list 
 
 Attentive to the song ye hear from thence.” 
 
 I, when I heard his saying, was as one 
 
 Laid in the grave. My hands together clasp’d, 
 
 And upward stretching, on the fire I look’d; 
 
 And busy fancy conjured up the forms 
 
 Erewhile beheld alive consumed in flames. 
 1“ The sun.” At Jerusalem it was noonday, while it was sunset in Purgae 
 
 dawn, in Spain midnight, and in India tory. 
 2** Blessed.””—Matt. v. 8. 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 The escorting spirits turn’d with gentle looks 
 Toward me; and the Mantuan spake: ‘“ My son, 
 Here torment thou mayst feel, but canst not death. 
 Remember thee, remember thee, if I 
 Safe e’en on Geryon brought thee; now I come 
 More near to God, wilt thou not trust me now? 
 Of this be sure; though in its womb that flame 
 A thousand years contain’d thee, from thy head 
 No hair should perish. If thou doubt my truth, 
 Approach ; and with thy hands thy vesture’s hem 
 Stretch forth, and for thyself confirm belief. 
 Lay now all fear, oh! lay all fear aside. 
 Turn hither, and come onward undismay’d.” 
 I still, though conscience urged, no step advanced: 
 When still he saw me fix’d and obstinate, 
 Somewhat disturb’d he cried: ‘“ Mark now, my son, 
 From Beatrice thou art by this wall 
 Divided.” As at Thisbe’s name the eye 
 Of Pyramus was open’d (when life ebb’d 
 Fast from his veins), and took one parting glance, 
 While vermeil dyed the mulberry; thus I turn’d 
 To my sage guide, relenting, when I heard 
 The name that springs for ever in my breast. 
 He shook his forehead ; and, “ How long,’ he said, 
 “ Linger we now?” then smiled, as one would smile 
 Upon a child that eyes the fruit and yields. 
 Into the fire before me then he walk’d; 
 And Statius, who erewhile no little space 
 Had parted us, he pray’d to come behind. 
 I would have cast me into molten glass 
 To cool me, when [ enter’d; so intense 
 Raged the conflagrant mass. The sire beloved, 
 To comfort me, as he proceeded, still 
 Of Beatrice talk’d. “ Her eyes,” saith he, 
 “ F’en now I seem to view.” From the other side 
 A voice, that sang, did guide us; and the voice 
 Following, with heedful ear, we issued forth, 
 There where the path led upward. ‘ Come,” ? we heard 
 “Come, blessed of my Father.” Such the sounds, 
 
 Classics. Vol. 34—], °) Come’ Matt. xxv. 34 
 
 253 
 
 > 
 
254 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 That hail’d us from within a light, which shone 
 So radiant, I could not endure the view. 
 “ The sun,” it added, “ hastes: and evening comes. 
 Delay not: ere the western sky is hung 
 With blackness, strive ye for the pass.” Our way; 
 Upright within the rock arose, and faced 
 Such part of heaven, that from before my steps 
 The beams were shrouded of the sinking sun. 
 Nor many stairs were overpast, when now 
 By fading of the shadow we perceived 
 The sun behind us couch’d; and ere one face 
 Of darkness o’er its measureless expanse 
 Involved the horizon, and the night her lot 
 Held individual, each of us had made 
 A stair his pallet; not that will, but power, 
 Had fail’d us, by the nature of that mount 
 Forbidden further travel. As the goats, 
 That late have skipt and wanton’d rapidly 
 Upon the craggy cliffs, ere they had ta’en 
 Their suf der on the herb, now silent lie 
 And ruminate beneath the umbrage brown, 
 While noon-day rages; and the goatherd leans 
 Upon his staff, and leaning watches them: 
 And as the swain, that lodges out all night 
 In quiet by his flock, lest beast of prey 
 Disperse them: even so all three abode, 
 I as a goat, and as the shepherds they, 
 Close pent on either side by shelving rock. 
 A little glimpse of sky was seen above; 
 Yet by that little I] beheld the stars, 
 In magnitude and lustre shining forth 
 With more than wonted glory. As I lay, 
 Gazing on them, and in that fit of musing 
 Sleep overcame me, sleep, that bringeth oft 
 Tidings of future hap. About the hour, 
 As I believe, when Venus from the east 
 First lighten’d on the mountain, she whose orb 
 Seems always glowing with the fire of love, 
 A lady young and beautiful, I dream’d, 
 Was passing o’er a lea; and, as she came, 
 
PURGATORY 355 
 
 Methought I saw her ever and anon 
 
 Bending to cull the flowers; and thus she sang: 
 
 “ Know ye, whoever of my name would ask, 
 
 That I am Leah :* for my brow to weave 
 
 A garland, these fair hands unwearied ply. 
 
 To please me at the crystal mirror, here 
 
 I deck me. But my sister Rachel, she 
 
 Before her glass abides the livelong day, 
 
 Her radiant eyes beholding, charm’d no less, 
 
 Than I with this delightful task. Her joy 
 
 In contemplation, as in labor mine.” 
 
 And now as glimmering dawn appear’d, that breaks 
 
 More welcome to the pilgrim still, as he 
 
 Sojourns less distant on his homeward way, 
 
 Darkness from all sides fled, and with it fled 
 
 My slumber; whence I rose, and saw my guide 
 Already risen. “ That delicious fruit, 
 
 Which through so many a branch the zealous care 
 
 Of mortals roams in quest of, shall this day 
 
 Appease thy hunger.” Such the words I heard 
 
 From Virgil’s lip; and never greeting heard, 
 
 So pleasant as the sounds. Within me straight 
 
 Desire so grew upon desire to mount, 
 
 Thenceforward at each step I felt the wings 
 Increasing for my flight. When we had run 
 
 O’er all the ladder to its topmost round, 
 
 As there we stood, on me the Mantuan fix’d 
 
 His eyes, and thus he spake: “ Both fires my son, 
 
 The temporal and eternal, thou hast seen ; 
 
 And art arrived, where of itself my ken 
 
 Yo further reaches. I, with skill and art, 
 
 Thus far have drawn thee. Now thy pleasure take 
 For guide. Thou hast o’ercome the steeper way, 
 ‘O’ercome the straiter. Lo! the sun, that darts 
 
 His beam upon my forehead: lo! the herb, 
 
 The arborets and flowers, which of itself 
 
 This land pours forth profuse. Till those bright eyes ® 
 
 Pe lie ac tech a Wun, Se 
 the contemplative. Michel Angelo has 5 Those bright eyes.” The eyes of 
 
 made these allegorical personages the _ Beatrice. 
 subject of two statues on the monument 
 
256 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 With gladness come, which, weeping, made me haste 
 To succor thee, thou mayst or seat thee down, 
 Or wander where thou wilt. Expect no more 
 Sanction of warning voice or sign from me, 
 Free of thy own arbitrament to choose, 
 Discreet, judicious. To distrust thy sense 
 Were henceforth error. I invest thee then 
 With crown and mitre, sovereign o’er thyself.” 
 
 CANTO XXVIII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Dante wanders through the forest of the terrestrial Para- 
 dise, till he is stopped by a stream, on the other side of which he 
 beholds a fair lady, culling flowers. He speaks to her; ani she, in 
 reply, explains to him certain things touching the nature of that 
 place, and tells that the water, which flows between them, is here 
 called Lethe, and in another place has the name of Eunoé. 
 
 HROUGH that celestial forest, whose thick shade 
 With lively greenness the new-springing day 
 Attemper’d, eager now to roam, and search 
 Its limits round, forthwith I left the bank; 
 Along the champain leisurely my way 
 Pursuing, o’er the ground, that on all sides 
 Delicious odor breathed. A pleasant air, 
 That intermitted never, never veer’d, 
 Smote on my temples, gently, as a wind 
 Of softest influence: at which the sprays, 
 Obedient all, lean’d trembling to that part? 
 Where first the holy mountain casts his shade; 
 Yet were not so disorder’d, but that still 
 Upon their top the feather’d choristers 
 Applied their wonted art, and with full joy 
 Welcomed those hours of prime, and warbled shrill 
 Amid the leaves, that to their jocund lays 
 Kept tenor; even as from branch to branch, 
 Along the piny forests on the shore 
 Of Chiassi, rolls the gathering melody, 
 When Eolus hath from his cavern loosed 
 
 1“ To that part.” The west. 
 
PURGATORY 257 
 
 The dripping south. Already had my steps, 
 
 Though slow, so far into that ancient wood 
 
 Transported me, I could not ken the place 
 
 Where I had enter’d; when, behold! my path 
 
 Was bounded by a rill, which, to the left, 
 
 With little rippling waters bent the grass 
 
 That issued from its brink. On earth no wave, 
 
 How clean soe’er, that would not seem to have 
 
 Some mixture in itself, compared with this, 
 
 Transpicuous clear; yet darkly on it roll’d, 
 
 Darkly beneath perpetual gloom, which ne’er 
 
 Admits or sun or moonlight there to shine. 
 
 My feet advanced not; but my wondering eyes 
 
 Pass’d onward, o’er the streamlet, to survey 
 
 The tender may-bloom, flush’d through many a hue, 
 
 In prodigal variety: and there, 
 
 As object, rising suddenly to view, 
 
 That from our bosom every thought beside 
 
 With the rare marvel chases, I beheld 
 
 A lady ? all alone, who, singing, went, 
 
 And culling flower from flower, wherewith her way 
 
 Was all o’er painted. “ Lady beautiful! 
 
 Thou, who (if looks, that use to speak the heart, 
 
 Are worthy of our trust,) with love’s own beam ~ 
 
 Dost warm thee,” thus to her my speech I framed; 
 
 “Ah! please thee hither toward the streamlet bend 
 
 Thy steps so near, that I may list thy song. 
 
 Beholding thee and this fair place, methinks, 
 
 I call to mind where wander’d and how look’d 
 
 Proserpine, in that season, when her child 
 
 The mother lost, and she the bloomy spring.” 
 
 As when a lady, turning in the dance, 
 
 Doth foot it featly, and advances scarce 
 
 One step before the other to the ground; 
 
 Over the yellow and vermilion flowers, 
 
 Thus turn’d she at my suit, most maiden-like 
 
 Vailing her sober eyes; and came so near, 
 2“ A lady.’’ Most of the commenta- tates called the Patrimony of St. Peter 
 tors suppose that by this lady, who in and died in 1115. But it seems more 
 the last Canto is called Matilda, is to probable that she should be intended 
 
 be understood the Countess Matilda, who for some contemporary of Dante, as was 
 endowed the Holy See with the es- Beatrice. 
 
258 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 That I distinctly caught the dulcet sound. 
 Arriving where the limpid waters now 
 Laved the greensward, her eyes she deign’d to raise, 
 That shot such splendor on me, as I ween 
 Ne’er glanced from Cytherea’s, when her son 
 Had sped his keenest weapon to her heart. 
 Upon the opposite bank she stood and smiled; 
 As through her graceful fingers shifted still 
 The intermingling dyes, which without seed 
 That lofty land unbosoms. By the stream 
 Three paces only were we sunder’d: yet, 
 The Hellespont, where Xerxes pass’d it o’er 
 (A curb forever to the pride of man *), 
 Was by Leander not more hateful held 
 For floating, with inhospitable wave, 
 *Twixt Sestus and Abydos, than by me 
 That flood, because it gave no passage thence. 
 
 “ Strangers ye come; and haply in this place, 
 That cradled human nature in her birth, 
 Wondering, ye not without suspicion view 
 My smiles: but that sweet strain of psalmody, 
 “Thou, Lord! hast made me glad,’ * will give ye light, 
 Which may uncloud your minds. And thou, who stand’st 
 The foremost, and didst make thy suit to me, 
 Say if aught else thou wish to hear: for I 
 Came prompt to answer every doubt of thine.” 
 
 She spake; and I replied: “I know not how 
 To reconcile this wave, and rustling sound 
 Of forest leaves, with what I late have heard 
 Of opposite report.” She answering thus: 
 “T will unfold the cause, whence that proceeds, 
 Which makes thee wonder; and so purge the cloud 
 That hath enwrapt thee. The First Good, whose joy 
 Is only in himself, created man, 
 For happiness; and gave this goodly place, 
 His pledge and earnest of eternal peace. 
 Favor’d thus highly, through his own defect 
 
 8“ A curb forever to the pride of a prodigious army, in the hopes of sub- 
 
 man.” Because Xerxes had been so  duing Greece. 
 humbled, when he was compelled to re- 4“ Thou, Lord! hast made me glad.” 
 pass the Hellespont in one small bark, —Psalm xcii. 4. 
 
 after having a little before crossed with 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 259 
 
 He fell; and here made short sojourn; he fell, 
 And, for the bitterness of sorrow changed 
 Laughter unblamed and ever-new delight. 
 
 That vapors none, exhaled from earth beneath, 
 Or from the waters (which, wherever heat 
 Attracts them, follow), might ascend thus far 
 
 To vex man’s peaceful state, this mountain rose 
 So high toward the heaven, nor fears the rage 
 
 Of elements contending; from that part 
 Exempted, where the gate his limit bars. 
 
 Because the circumambient air, throughout, 
 With its first impulse circles still, unless 
 
 Aught interpose to check or thwart its course; 
 Upon the summit, which on every side 
 
 To visitation of the impassive air 
 Is open, doth that motion strike, and makes ' 
 Beneath its sway the umbrageous wood resound: 
 And in the shaken plant such power resides, 
 That it impregnates with its efficacy 
 The voyaging breeze, upon whose subtle plume 
 That, wafted, flies abroad; and the other land,® 
 Receiving (as ‘tis worthy in itself, 
 
 Or in the clime, that warms it), doth conceive; 
 And from its womb produces many a tree | 
 
 Of various virtue. 
 
 This when thou hast heard, 
 
 The marvel ceases, if in yonder earth 
 
 Some plant, without apparent seed, be found 
 To fix its fibrous stem. And further learn, 
 That with prolific foison of all seeds 
 
 This holy plain is fill’d, and in itself 
 
 Bears fruit that ne’er was pluck’d on other soil. 
 
 = 
 
 “The water, thou behold’st, springs not from vein, ° 
 Restored by vapor, that the cold converts; 
 As stream that intermittently repairs 
 And spends his pulse of life; but issues forth / 
 From fountain, solid, undecaying, sure: 
 
 _ 5“ The other land.’”? The continent 
 inhabited by the living, and separated 
 from Purgatory by the ocean, is affected 
 (and that diversely, according to the 
 nature of the soil, or the climate) by a 
 virtue, or efficacy, conveyed to it by 
 
 the winds from plants growing in the 
 terrestrial Paradise, which is situated 
 on the summit of Purgatory; and this 
 is the cause why some plants are found 
 on earth without any apparent seed to 
 produce them. 
 
260 THE DIVINE COMEDY. ~ 
 
 And, by the will omnific, full supply 
 
 Feeds whatsoe’er on either side it pours; 
 
 On this, devolved with power to take away 
 Remembrance of offence; on that, to bring 
 Remembrance back of every good deed done. 
 From whence its name of Lethe on this part; 
 On the other, Eunoé: both of which must first 
 Be tasted, ere it work; the last exceeding 
 
 All flavors else. Albeit thy thirst may now 
 
 Be well contented, if I here break off, — 
 
 No more revealing; yet a corollary 
 
 I freely give beside: nor deem my words 
 
 Less grateful to thee, if they somewhat pass 
 The stretch of promise. They, whose verse of yore 
 The golden age recorded and its bliss, 
 
 On the Parnassian mountain, of this place 
 Perhaps had dream’d. Here was man guiltless; here 
 Perpetual spring, and every fruit; and this 
 
 The far-famed nectar.” ‘Turning to the bards, 
 When she had ceased, I noted in their looks 
 
 A smile at her conclusion; then my face 
 
 Again directed to the lovely dame. 
 
 CANTO XXIX 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The lady, who in a following Canto is called Matilda, | 
 moves along the side of the stream in a contrary direction to the 
 current, and Dante keeps equal pace with her on the opposite bank. 
 A marvellous sight, preceded by music, appears in view. 
 
 INGING, as if enamor’d, she resumed 
 And closed the song, with “ Blessed they ? whose sins 
 Are cover’d.” Like the wood-nymphs then, that tripp’d 
 Singly across the sylvan shadows; one 
 Eager to view, and one to escape the sun; 
 So moved she on, against the current, up 
 The verdant rivage. I, her mincing step 
 Observing, with as tardy step pursued. 
 Between us not an hundred paces trod, 
 
 2“ Blessed they.”—Psalm xxxii. # * 
 
PURGATORY 46: 
 
 The bank, on each side bending equally, 
 Gave me to face the orient. Nor our way 
 Far onward brought us, when to me at once | 
 She turn’d, and cried: ‘“ My brother! look, and hearken.” 
 And lo! a sudden lustre ran across 
 Through the great forest on all parts, so bright, | 
 I doubted whether lightning were abroad; 
 But that, expiring ever in the spleen 
 That doth unfold it, and this during still, 
 And waxing still in splendor, made me question 
 What it might be: and a sweet melody 
 Ran through the luminous air. Then did I chide, 
 With warrantable zeal, the hardihood 
 Of our first parent; for that there, where earth 
 Stood in obedience to the heavens, she only, 
 Woman, the creature of an hour, endured not 
 Restraint of any veil, which had she borne . 
 Devoutly, joys, ineffable as these, 
 Had from the first, and long time since, been mine. 
 While, through that wilderness of primy sweets 
 That never fade, suspense I walk’d, and yet 
 Expectant of beatitude more high; 
 Before us, like a blazing fire, the air 
 Under the green boughs glow’d; and, for a song, 
 Distinct the sound of melody was heard. 
 O ye thrice holy virgins! for your sakes 
 If e’er I suffer’d hunger, cold, and watching, 
 Occasion calls on me to crave your bounty. 
 Now through my breast let Helicon his. stream 
 Pour copious, and Urania? with her choir 
 Arise to aid me; while the verse unfolds | 
 Things, that do almost mock the grasp of thought. 
 Onward a space, what seem’d seven trees of gold 
 The intervening distance to mine eye 
 Falsely presented; but, when I was come 
 So near them, that no lineament was lost 
 Of those, with which a doubtful object, seen 
 
 2“ Urania.” Landino observes, that ** Descend Sots fica vens Urania, by 
 intending to sing of heavenly things, he that na ae: 
 rightly invokes Urania. Thus Milton: li rightly , thou art call’d. 
 
 Paradise Lost,” b. vii. 1. 
 
262 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Remotely, plays on the misdeeming sense; La 
 Then did the faculty, that ministers a 
 Discourse to reason, these for tapers of gold? 
 Distinguish; and i’ the singing trace the sound 
 “ Hosanna!” Above, their beauteous garniture 
 Flamed with more ample lustre, than the moon 7 
 Through cloudless sky at midnight, in her noon. “f . 
 I turn’d me, full of wonder, to my guide; 
 And he did answer with a countenance 
 Charged with no less amazement: whence my view 
 Reverted to those lofty things, which came 
 So slowly moving toward us, that the bride Fd 
 Would have outstript them on her bridal day. 
 The lady call’d aloud: “ Why thus yet burns 
 Affection in thee for these living lights, 
 And dost not look on that which follows them?” 
 I straightway mark’d a tribe behind them walk, 
 As if attendant on their leaders, clothed 
 With raiment of such whiteness, as on earth 
 Was never. On my left, the watery gleam 
 Borrow’d, and gave me back, when there I look’d, 
 As in a mirror, my left side portray’d. 
 When I had chosen on the river’s edge 
 Such station, that the distance of the stream 
 Alone did separate me; there I stay’d 
 My steps for clearer prospect, and beheld 
 The flames go onward, leaving, as they went, 
 The air behind them painted as with trail 
 Of liveliest pencils; so distinct were mark’d 
 All those seven listed colors, whence the sun 
 Maketh his bow, and Cynthia her zone. 
 These streaming gonfalons did flow beyond 
 My vision ; and ten paces, as I guess, 
 Parted the outermost. Beneath a sky 
 So beautiful, came four and twenty elders,‘ 
 By two and two, with flower-de-luces crown’d. 
 All sang one song: “ Blessed be thou® among 
 ti Bevers of gold” See Rev, iu 8" Bleed be thou", “Blessed art 
 
 the seats I saw four and twenty elders fruit of thy womb.”—Luke, 1. 42, 
 sitting.’’—Rev. iv 4. 
 
 ra 
 
| PURGATORY | 263 
 The daughters of Adam! and thy loveliness 
 Blessed forever!” After that the flowers, 
 And the fresh herblets, on the opposite brink, 
 Were free from that elected race; as light 
 In heaven doth second light, came after them 
 Four ® animals, each crown’d with verdurous leaf. 
 With six wings each was plumed; the plumage full 
 Of eyes; and the eyes of Argus would be such, 
 Were they endued with life. Reader! more rhymes 
 I will not waste in shadowing forth their form: 
 For other need so straitens, that in this 
 I may not give my bounty room. But read 
 Ezekiel ;7 for he paints them, from the north 
 How he beheld them come by Chebar’s flood, 
 In whirlwind, cloud, and fire; and even such 
 As thou shalt find them character’d by him, 
 Here were they; save as to the pennons: there, 
 From him departing, John* accords with me. 
 The space, surrounded by the four, enclosed 
 A car triumphal :° on two wheels it came, 
 Drawn at a Gryphon’s® neck; and he above 
 Stretch’d either wing uplifted, *tween the midst 
 And the three listed hues, on each side, three; 
 So that the wings did cleave or injure none; 
 And out of sight they rose: The members, far 
 As he was bird, were golden; white the rest, 
 With vermeil intervein’d. So beautiful 
 A car, in Rome, ne’er graced Augustus’ pomp, 
 Or Africanus’: e’en the sun’s itself 
 Were poor to this; that chariot of the sun, 
 Erroneous, which in blazing ruin fell 
 At Tellus’ prayer devout, by the just doom 
 
 6“ Four.” The four evangelists. 8“ John.” ‘ And the four beasts had 
 7 “ Ezekiel.’”’ ‘‘ And I looked, and be- each of them six wings about him.’”— 
 
 hold, a whirlwind came out of the Rev. iv. 8 
 9“ A car triumphal.” Either the 
 
 north, a great cloud, and a fire it athcat a 
 itself, gd a brightness was about it, an 
 
 out of the midst thereof as the color of 
 amber, out of the midst of fire. Also 
 out of the midst thereof came the like- 
 
 Christian Church or perhaps the papal 
 
 chair. 
 _ “Gryphon.” Under the griffin, an 
 imaginary creature, the fore-part of 
 
 ness of four living creatures. And this 
 was their appearance; they had the like- 
 -ness of a man. ‘And every one had four 
 faces, and every one had four wings.”— 
 Ezekiel, i. 4, 5, 6. 
 
 which is an eagle, and the hinder a lion, 
 is shadowed forth the union of the di- 
 vine and the human nature. in Jesus 
 Christ. 
 
264 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Mysterious of all-seeing Jove. Three nymphs,' 
 At the right wheel, came circling in smooth dance: 
 
 The one so ruddy, that her form had scarce 
 
 Been known within a furnace of clear flame; 
 The next did look, as if the flesh and bones 
 
 Were emerald; snow new-fallen seem’d the third, 
 Now seem’d the white to lead, the ruddy now; 
 And from her song who led, the others took 
 
 Their measure, swift or slow. 
 
 At the other wheel, 
 
 A band quaternion,’? each in purple clad, 
 Advanced with festal step, as, of them, one 
 The rest conducted ;** one, upon whose front 
 
 Three eyes were seen. 
 
 In rear of all this group, 
 
 Two old men?‘ I beheld, dissimilar 
 
 In raiment, but in port and gesture like, 
 
 Solid and mainly grave; of whom, the one 
 
 Did show himself some favor’d counsellor 
 
 Of the great Coan,’ him, whom nature made 
 
 To serve the costliest creature of her tribe: 
 
 His fellow mark’d an opposite intent; 
 
 Bearing a sword, whose glitterance and keen edge, 
 E’en as I viewed it with the flood between, 
 
 Appall’d me. 
 
 Next, four others?* I beheld 
 
 Of humble seeming; and, behind them all, 
 One single old man,’ sleeping as he came, 
 
 With a shrewd visage. 
 
 And these seven, each 
 
 Like the first troop were habited; but wore 
 No braid of lilies on their temples wreathed. 
 Rather, with roses and each vermeil flower, 
 A sight, but little distant, might have sworn, 
 
 11 Three nymphs.” The three evan- 
 gelical virtues: the first Charity, the 
 next Hope, and the third Faith. Faith 
 may be produced by charity, or charity 
 by faith, but the inducements to hope 
 must arise either from one or other of 
 these. 
 
 12** A band quaternion.” The four 
 moral or cardinal virtues, of whom 
 Prudence directs the others, 
 
 18 ‘ _——- one 
 
 The rest conducted.” 
 Prudence, described with three eyes, 
 because she regards the past, the pres- 
 ent, and the future. 
 
 144°°Two old men.” St. Luke, the 
 physician, characterized as the writer of 
 the Acts of the Apostles, and St. Paul, 
 
 represented with a sword, on account, 
 as it should seem, of the power of his 
 
 yle. 
 
 15 “* Of the great Coan.”” Hippocrates 
 “whom nature made for the benefit of 
 her favorite creature, man.” 
 
 16 “* Four others.” ‘“* The commenta- 
 tors,” says Venturi, ‘“‘ suppose these 
 four to be the four evangelists; but I 
 should rather take them to be four prin- 
 cipal doctors of the Church.” Yet both 
 Landino and Vellutello expressly call 
 them the authors of the epistles, James, 
 Peter, John, and Jude. 
 
 17** One single old man.” As some 
 say, St. John, under the character of 
 the author of the Apocalypse. 
 
PURGATORY 
 
 265 
 
 That they were all on fire above their brow. 
 
 When as the car was o’er against me, straight 
 Was heard a thundering, at whose voice it seem’d 
 The chosen multitude were stay’d; for there, 
 
 With the first ensigns, made they solemn halt. 
 
 CANTO XXX 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Beatrice descends from Heave r : 
 
 OON as that polar light,? fair ornament 
 Of the first heaven, which hath never known 
 Setting nor rising, nor the shadowy veil 
 Of other cloud than sin, to duty there 
 Each one convoying, as that lower doth 
 _The steersman to his port, stood firmly fix’d; 
 Forthwith the saintly tribe, who in the van 
 Between the Gryphon and its radiance came, 
 Did turn them to the car, as to their rest: 
 And one, as if commission’d from above, 
 In holy chant thrice shouted forth aloud; 
 
 “ Come,” spouse! from Libanus ” 
 
 : and all the rest 
 
 Took up the song.—At the last audit, so 
 
 The blest shall rise, from forth his cavern each 
 Uplifting lightly his new-vested flesh; 
 
 As, on the sacred litter, at the voice 
 Authoritative of that elder, sprang 
 
 A hundred ministers and messengers 
 
 Of life eternal. 
 
 “ Blessed® thou, who comest! ” 
 
 And, “Oh!” they cried, “ from full hands scatter ye 
 
 Unwithering lilies 
 
 ”: and, so saying, cast 
 
 Flowers over head and round them on all sides, 
 I have beheld, ere now, at break of day, 
 
 The eastern clime all roseate; and the sky 
 
 Opposed, one deep and beautiful serene; 
 
 And the sun’s face so shaded, and with mists 
 
 1“ That polar light.” The seven can- 
 dlesticks o pela, which he calls the po- 
 lar light of Heaven itself, because they 
 perform the same office "for Christians 
 that the polar star does for mariners, in 
 guiding them to their port. 
 
 3“ Come.” “Come with me from 
 Tyson my spouse, with me, from 
 Lebanon.”—Song of Solomon, ie 8. 
 
 8“ Blessed. 4 © Blessed is that 
 cometh in the name of the Pad 
 Matt. xxi. 9. 
 
266 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Attemper’d, at his rising, that the eye 
 
 Long while endured the sight: thus, in a cloud 
 
 Of flowers, that from those hands angelic rose, 
 
 And down within and outside of the_car 
 
 Fell showering, in white veil with olive wreathed, 
 
 A virgin in my view appéar’d, beneath 
 
 Green mantle, robed in hue of living flame: 
 
 And o’er my spirit, that so long a time 
 
 Had from her presence felt no shuddering dread, 
 
 Albeit mine eyes discern’d her not, there moved 
 
 A hidden virtue from her, at whose touch 
 
 The power of ancient love was strong within me. 
 No sooner on my vision streaming, smote 
 
 The heavenly influence, which, years past, and e’en 
 
 In childhood, thrill’d me, than toward Virgil I 
 
 Turn’d me to leftward; panting, like a babe, 
 
 "harneestor reluse to his mother’s breast, 
 
 If aught have terrified or work’d him woe: 
 
 And would have cried, “ There is no dram of blood, 
 
 hat doth nor amet sane. The old flame 
 
 Throws out clear tokens of reviving fire.” 
 
 But-Viegil_had bereaved us of himself; 
 
 Virgil, my best-beloved father; Virgil, he 
 
 To whom I gave me up for safety: nor 
 
 All, our prime mother lost, avail’d to save 
 
 undeux. eeks from blur of soil S. 
 “Dante! wee irgil leaves thee; nay, 
 
 eep thou not yet: behoves thee feel the edge 
 Of other sword; and thou shalt weep for that.” 
 As to the prow or stern, some admiral 
 Paces the deck, inspiriting his crew, 
 When ’mid the sail-yards all hands ply aloof; 
 Thus, on the left side of the car, I saw 
 
 urning me at the sound of mine own name, 
 Whic ompe oO register 
 
 The virgin station’d, who before appear’d 
 Veil’d in that festive shower angelical. 
 Toward me, across the stream, she bent her eyes? 
 
 _ Though from her brow the veil descending, bound ~ 
 
 With foliage of Minerva, suffer’d not 
 
PURGATORY 267 
 
 That I beheld her clearly: then with act 
 
 Full royal, still insulting o’er her thrall, 
 
 Added, as one who, speaking, keepeth back 
 
 The bitterest saying, to conclude the speech: 
 “Observe me well. I am, in sooth, I am 
 
 Beatrice. , What! and hast thou deign’d at last 
 ‘Approach the mountain? Knewest not, O man! 
 Thy happiness is here?’’ Down fell mine eyes 
 On the clear fount; but there, myself espying, 
 Recoil’d, and sought the greensward; such a weight 
 Of shame was on my forehead. With a mien 
 
 Of that stern majesty, which doth surround 
 
 A mother’s presence to her awe-struck child, 
 
 She look’d; a flavor of such bitterness 
 
 Was mingled in her pity. There her words 
 
 Brake off; and suddenly the angels sang, 
 
 “Tn thee, O gracious Lord! my hope hath been”: 
 But* went no further than, “ Thou, Lord! hast set 
 My feet in ample room.” As snow, that lies, 
 Amidst the living rafters on the back 
 _Of Italy, congeal’d, when drifted high 
 
 And closely piled by rough Sclavonian blasts; 
 Breathe but the land whereon no shadow falls, 
 And straightway melting it distils away, 
 
 Like a fire-wasted taper: thus was I, 
 
 Without a sigh or tear, or ever these 
 
 Did sing, that, with the chiming of heaven’s sphere, 
 Still in their warbling chime: but when the strain 
 Of dulcet symphony express’d for me 
 
 Their soft compassion, more than could the words, 
 “Virgin! why so consumest him?” then, the ice 
 Congeal’d about my bosom, turn’d itself 
 
 To spirit and water; and with anguish forth 
 Gush’d, through the lips and eyelids, from the heart. 
 
 Upon the chariot’s same edge still she stood, 
 
 Immovable; and thus address’d her words 
 
 To those bright semblances with pity touch’d: 
 “Ye in the eternal day your vigils keep; 
 
 4“ But.” They sang the thirty-first What follows in that Psalm would not 
 Psalm, to the end of the eighth verse. have suited the place or the occasion. 
 
268 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 So that nor night nor slumber, with close stealth, 
 Conveys from you a single step, in all 
 
 The goings on of time: thence, with more heed 
 I shape mine answer, for his ear intended, 
 
 Who there stands weeping; that the sorrow now 
 May equal the transgression. Not alone 
 Through operation of the mighty orbs, 
 
 That mark each seed to some predestined aim, 
 As with aspect or fortunate or ill 
 
 The constellations meet; but through benign 
 Largess of heavenly graces, which rain down 
 From such a height as mocks our vision, this man 
 Was, in the freshness of his being, such, 
 
 So gifted virtually, that in him 
 
 All better habits wonderously had thrived. 
 
 The -more of kindly strength is in the soil, 
 
 So much doth evil seed and lack of culture 
 
 Mar it the more, and make it run to wildness. 
 These looks sometime upheld him; for I show’d 
 My youthful eyes, and led him by their light 
 
 In upright walking. Soon as I had reach’d 
 The threshold of my second age, and changed 
 My mortal for immortal; then he left me, 
 
 And gave himself to others. When from flesh 
 To spirit I had risen, and increase 
 
 Of beauty and of virtue circled me, 
 
 I was less dear to him, and valued less. 
 
 His steps were turn’d into deceitful ways, 
 Following false images of good, that make 
 
 No promise perfect. Nor avail’d me aught 
 To sue for inspirations, with the which, 
 
 I, both in dreams of night, and otherwise, 
 
 Did call him back; of them, so little reck’d him. 
 Such depth he fell, that all device was short 
 Of his preserving, save that he should view 
 The children of perdition. To this end 
 
 I visited the purlieus of the dead: 
 
 And one, who hath conducted him thus high, 
 Received my supplications urged with weeping. 
 It were a breaking of God’s high decree, 
 
PURGATORY | 269. 
 
 If Lethe should be pass’d, and such food © tasted, 
 Without the cost of some repentant tear.” 
 
 CANTO XXXI 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Beatrice continues her reprehension of Dante, who con- 
 fesses his error, and falls to the ground; coming to himself again, 
 he is by Matilda,drawn through the waters of Lethe, and presented 
 “first to the four virgins who figure the cardinal virtues; these in 
 their turn lead him to the Gryphon, a symbol of our Saviour; and 
 
 the three virgins, representing the evangelical virtues, intercede for 
 him with Beatrice, that she would display to him her second beauty. 
 
 a6 THOU!” her words she thus without delay 
 Resuming, turn’d their point on me, to whom 
 They, with but lateral edge,’ seem’d harsh before: 
 *“‘ Say thou, who stand’st beyond the holy stream, 
 If this be true. A charge, so grievous, needs 
 Thine own avowal.” On my faculty 
 Such strange amazement hung, the voice expired 
 Imperfect, ere its organs gave it birth. 
 A little space refraining, then she spake: 
 “What dost thou muse on? Answer me. The wave 
 On thy remembrances of evil yet 
 Hath done no injury.” A mingled sense 
 Of fear and of confusion, from my lips 
 Did such a “ Yea” produce, as needed help 
 Of vision to interpret. As when breaks, 
 In act to be discharged, a cross-bow bent 
 Beyond its pitch, both nerve and bow o’erstretch’d ; 
 The flagging weapon feebly hits the mark: 
 Thus, tears and sighs forth gushing, did I burst, 
 Beneath the heavy load: and thus my voice 
 Was slacken’d on its way. She straight began: 
 “When my desire invited thee to love 
 The good, which sets a bound to our aspirings ; 
 What bar of thwarting foss or linked chain 
 Did meet thee, that thou so shouldst quit the hope - 
 
 5 “* Such food.’”? The oblivion of sins. directly to himself, but spoken of him 
 1“ With but JIateral edge.’? The to the angel. Dante had thought suffi- 
 words of Beatrice, when not addressed ciently harsh. 
 
270 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Of further progress? or what a bait of ease, 
 
 Or promise of allurement, led thee on 
 
 Elsewhere, that thou elsewhere shouldst rather wait?” 
 A bitter sigh I drew, then scarce found voice 
 
 To answer; hardly to these sounds my lips 
 
 Gave utterance, wailing: “Thy fair looks withdrawn, 
 
 Things present, with deceitful pleasures, turn’d 
 
 My steps aside.” She answering spake: “ Hadst thou 
 
 Been silent, or denied what thou avow’st, 
 
 Thou hadst not hid thy sin the more; such eye 
 
 Observes it. But whene’er the sinner’s cheek 
 
 Breaks forth into the precious-streaming tears 
 
 Of self-accusing, in our court the wheel 
 
 Of justice doth run counter to the edge.? 
 
 Howe’er, that thou mayst profit by thy shame 
 
 For errors past, and that henceforth more strength 
 
 May arm thee, when thou hear’st the Siren-voice ; 
 
 Lay thou aside the motive to this grief, 
 
 And lend attentive ear, while I unfold 
 
 How opposite a way my buried flesh 
 
 Should have impell’d thee. Never didst thou spy, 
 
 In art or nature, aught so passing sweet, 
 
 As were the limbs that in their beauteous frame 
 
 Enclosed me, and are scatter’d now in dust. 
 
 If sweetest thing thus fail’d thee with my death, 
 
 What, afterward, of mortal, should thy wish 
 
 Have tempted? When thou first hadst felt the dart 
 
 Of perishable things, in my departing 
 
 For better realms, thy wing thou shouldst have pruned 
 
 To follow me; and never stoop’d again, 
 
 To ’bide a second blow, for a slight girl,® 
 
 Or other gaud as transient and as vain. 
 
 The new and inexperienced bird* awaits, 
 
 Twice it may be, or thrice, the fowler’s aim; 
 
 But in the sight of one whose plumes are full, 
 
 In vain the net is spread, the arrow wing’d.” 
 
 2“ Counter to the edge.” “The  tucca of Lucca, mentioned in the 
 weapons of divine justice are blunted twenty-fourth Canto. | ; 
 by the confession and sorrow of the | 4“ Bird.” “ ue in vain the net 
 offender.” is spread in the sight of any bird.”— 
 
 3“ For a nae girl.” “Daniello and Prov. i. 17. 
 Venturi say that this alludes to Gen- | 
 
PURGATORY amr 
 
 I stood, as children silent and ashamed 
 Stand, listening, with their eyes upon the earth, 
 Acknowledging their fault, and self-condemn’d. 
 And she resumed: “If, but to hear, thus pains thee; 
 Raise thou thy beard. and lo! what sight shall do.” 
 With less reluctance yields a sturdy holm, 
 Rent from its fibres by a blast, that blows 
 From off the pole, or from Iarbas’ land,® 
 Than I at her behest my visage raised: 
 And thus the face denoting by the beard, 
 I mark’d the secret sting her words convey’d. 
 No sooner lifted I mine aspect up, 
 Than I perceived those primal creatures cease 
 Their flowery sprinkling; and mine eyes beheld 
 (Yet unassured and wavering in their view) 
 Beatrice; she, who toward the mystic shape, 
 That joins two natures in one form, had turn’d: 
 And, even under shadow of her veil, 
 And parted by the verdant rill that flow’d 
 Between, in loveliness she seem’d as much 
 Her former self surpassing, as on earth 
 All others she surpass’d. Remorseful goads 
 Shot sudden through me. Each thing else, the more 
 Its love had late beguiled me, now the more 
 Was loathsome. On my heart so keenly smote 
 _ The bitter consciousness, that on the ground 
 O’erpower’d I fell: and what my state was then, 
 She knows, who was the cause. When now my strength 
 Flow’d back, returning outward from the heart, 
 The lady,® whom alone I first had seen, 
 I found above me. “ Loose me not,” she cried: 
 “ Loose not thy hold”: and lo! had dragg’d me high 
 As to my neck into the stream; while she, 
 Still as she drew me after, swept along, 
 Swift as a shuttle, bounding o’er the wave. 
 The blessed shore approaching, then was heard 
 So sweetly, “ Tu asperges me,” that I 
 May not remember, much less tell the sound. 
 The beauteous dame, her arms expanding, clasp’d 
 
 6 From Iarbas’ land.” The south. 6 “ The lady.” Matilda, 
 
272 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 My temples, and immerged me where ’twas fit 
 The wave should drench me: and, thence raising up, 
 Within the fourfold dance of lovely nymphs 
 Presented me so laved; and with their arm 
 They each did cover me. “ Here are we nymphs, 
 And in the heaven are stars. Or ever earth 
 Was visited of Beatrice, we, 
 Appointed for her handmaids, tended on her. 
 We to her eyes will lead thee: but the light 
 Of gladness, that is in them, well to scan, 
 Those yonder three, of deeper ken than ours, 
 Thy sight shall quicken.” Thus began their song: 
 And then they led me to the Gryphon’s breast, 
 Where, turn’d toward us, Beatrice stood. 
 “ Spare not thy vision. We have station’d thee 
 Before the emeralds, whence love, erewhile, 
 Hath drawn his weapons on thee.” As they spake, 
 A thousand fervent wishes riveted 
 Mine eyes upon her beaming eyes, that stood, 
 Still fix’d toward the Gryphon, motionless. 
 As the sun strikes a mirror, even thus 
 Within those orbs the twifold being shone; 
 Forever varying, in one figure now 
 Reflected, now in other. Reader! muse 
 How wondrous in my sight it seem’d, to mark 
 A thing, albeit steadfast in itself, 
 Yet in its imaged semblance mutable. 
 
 Full of amaze, and joyous, while my soul 
 Fed on the viand, whereof still desire 
 Grows with satiety; the other three, 
 With gesture that declared a loftier line, 
 Advanced: to their own carol, on they came 
 Dancing, in festive ring angelical. 
 
 “Turn, Beatrice!” was their song: “Oh! turn 
 Thy saintly sight on this thy faithful one, 
 Who, to behold thee, many a wearisome pace 
 Hath measured. Gracious at our prayer, vouchsafe 
 Unveiled to him thy cheeks; that he may mark 
 Thy second beauty, now conceal’d.” O splendor! 
 O sacred light eternal! who is he, 
 
PURGATORY 273 
 
 So pale with musing in Pierian shades, 
 
 Or with that fount so lavishly imbued, 
 
 Whose spirit should not fail him in the essay 
 To represent thee such as thou didst seem, 
 When under cope of the still-chiming heaven 
 ‘Thou gavest to open air thy charms reveal’d? 
 
 CANTO XXXII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Dante is warned not to gaze t ice. The 
 procession moves on, accompanied by Matilda, Statius, and Dante, 
 till they reach an exceeding lofty tree, where divers strange chances 
 befall. 
 
 INE eyes with such an eager coveting 
 Were bent to rid them of their ten years’ thirst,? 
 No other sense was waking: and e’en they 
 Were fenced on either side from heed of aught; 
 So tangled, in its custom’d toils, that smile 
 Of saintly brightness drew me to itself: 
 When forcibly, toward the left, my sight 
 The sacred virgins turn’d; for from their lips 
 I heard the warning sounds: “ Too fix’d a gaze!” 
 Awhile my vision labor’d; as when late 
 
 Upon the o’erstrained eyes the sun hath smote: 
 But soon, to lesser object, as the view 
 Was now recover’d (lesser in respect 
 To that excess of sensible, whence late 
 I had perforce been sunder’d), on their right 
 I mark’d that glorious army wheel, and turn, 
 Against the sun and sevenfold lights, their front. 
 As when, their bucklers for protection raised, 
 A well-ranged troop, with portly banners curl’d, 
 Wheel circling, ere the whole can change their ground, 
 E’en thus the goodly regiment of heaven, 
 Proceeding, all did pass us ere the car 
 Had sloped his beam. Attendant at the wheels 
 The damsels turn’d; and on the Gryphon moved 
 
 1‘ Their ten years’ thirst.” Beatrice had been dead ten years, 
 rer 
 
274 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 The sacred burden, with a pace so smooth, 
 
 No feather on him trembled. The fair dame, 
 Who through the wave had drawn me, companied 
 By. Statius and myself, pursued the wheel, 
 
 Whose orbit, rolling, mark’d a lesser arch. 
 
 Through the high wood, now void (the more her blame, 
 Who by the serpent was beguiled) I pass’d, 
 
 With step in cadence to the harmony | 
 Angelic. Onward had we moved, as far, 
 Perchance, as arrow at three several flights 
 
 Full wing’d had sped, when from her station down 
 Descended Beatrice. With one voice 
 
 All murmur’d “ Adam ”’; circling next a plant 
 Despoil’d of flowers and leaf, on every bough. 
 
 Its tresses, spreading more as more they rose, 
 Were such, as ’midst their forest wilds, for height, 
 The Indians might have gazed at. “ Blessed thou, 
 Gryphon! ? whose beak hath never pluck’d that tree 
 Pleasant to taste: for hence the appetite 
 
 Was warp’d to evil.”’ Round the stately trunk 
 Thus shouted forth the rest, to whom return’d 
 The animal twice-gender’d: ‘“ Yea! for so 
 
 The generation of the just are saved.” 
 
 And turning to the chariot-pole, to foot 
 
 He drew it of the widow’d branch, and bound 
 There, left unto the stock whereon it grew. 
 
 As when large floods of radiance from above 
 Stream, with that radiance mingled, which ascends 
 Next after setting of the scaly sign, 
 
 Our plants then bourgeon, and each wears anew 
 His wonted colors, ere the sun have yoked 
 Beneath another star his flamy steeds; 
 
 Thus putting forth a hue more faint than rose, 
 And deeper than the violet, was renew’d 
 
 The plant, erewhile in all its branches bare. 
 Unearthly was the hymn, which then arose. 
 
 I understood it not, nor to the end 
 
 Endured the harmony. Had I the skill 
 
 2‘ Gryphon.” Our Saviour’s sub- junction, to “render unto Caesar the 
 mission to the Roman Empire appears _ things that are Cesar’s.” 
 to be intended, and particularly his in- 
 
PURGATORY 276 
 
 To pencil forth how closed the unpitying eyes 
 Slumbering, when Syrinx warbled (eyes that paid 
 So dearly for their watching), then, like painter, 
 That with a model paints, I might design 
 
 The manner of my falling into sleep. 
 
 But feign who will the slumber cunningly, 
 
 I pass it by to when I waked; and tell, 
 
 How suddenly a flash of splendor rent 
 
 The curtain of my sleep, and one cries out, 
 
 “ Arise: what dost thou?” As the chosen three, 
 On Tabor’s mount, admitted to behold 
 
 The blossoming of that fair tree,? whose fruit 
 
 Is coveted of angels, and doth make 
 
 Perpetual feast in Heaven; to themselves 
 Returning, at the word whence deeper sleeps* 
 Were broken, they their tribe diminish’d saw; 
 Both Moses and Elias gone, and changed 
 
 The stole their master wore; thus to myself 
 Returning, over me beheld I stand 
 
 The piteous one,® who, cross the stream, had brought 
 My steps. “And where,” all doubting, I exclaim’d, 
 “Is Beatrice?” “See her,” she replied, 
 “Beneath the fresh leaf, seated on its root. 
 Behold the associate quire that circles her. 
 
 The others, with a melody more sweet 
 
 And more profound, journeying to higher realms, 
 Upon the Gryphon tend.” If there her words 
 Were closed, I know not; but mine eyes had now 
 Ta’en view of her, by whom all other thoughts 
 Were barr’d admittance. On the very ground 
 Alone she sat, as she had there been left 
 
 A guard upon the wain, which I beheld 
 
 Bound the twiform beast. The seven nymphs 
 Did make themselves a cloister round about her; 
 And, in their hands, upheld those lights® secure 
 From blast septentrion and the gusty south. 
 
 8 “* The blossoming of that fair tat death, in the instance of the ruler of the 
 
 Our Saviour’s transfiguration. ‘‘ As synagogue’s daughter and of Lazarus. 
 the apple-tree among the trees of the 5“ The piteous one.” Matilda. 
 wood, “4 7 my pavale among the ©“ Those lights.” The tapers of 
 sons.”—Solomon’s Son 
 
 g 11, 3- gold. 
 4 ** Deeper sleeps.” "The sleep of 
 
¥ 
 
 276 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 “ A little while thou shalt be forester here; 
 And citizen shalt be, forever with me, 
 Of that true Rome,’ wherein Christ dwells a Roman. 
 To profit the misguided world, keep now 
 Thine eyes upon the car; and what thou seest, 
 Take heed thou write, returning to that place.’’® 
 Thus Beatrice: at whose feet inclined 
 Devout, at her behest, my thought and eyes 
 I, as she bade, directed. Never fire, 
 With so swift motion, forth a stormy cloud 
 Leap’d downward from the welkin’s furthest bound, 
 As I beheld the bird of Jove® descend 
 Down through the tree; and, as he rush’d, the rind 
 Disparting crush beneath him; buds much more, 
 And leaflets. On the car, with all his might 
 He struck; whence, staggering, like a ship it reel’d, 
 At random driven, to starboard now, o’ercome, 
 And now to larboard, by the vaulting waves. 
 Next, springing up into the chariot’s womb, 
 A fox? I saw, with hunger seeming pined 
 Of all good food. But, for his ugly sins 
 The saintly maid rebuking him, away 
 Scampering he turn’d, fast as his hide-bound corpse 
 Would bear him. Next, from whence before he came, 
 I saw the eagle dart into the hull 
 O’ the car, and leave it with his feathers lined :*4 
 And then a voice, like that which issues forth 
 From heart with sorrow rived, did issue forth 
 From heaven, and, “O poor bark of mine!” it cried, 
 “ How badly art thou freighted.” Then it seem’d 
 That the earth open’d between either wheel; 
 And I beheld a dragon’ issue thence, 
 That through the chariot fix’d his forked train; 
 And like a wasp, that draggeth back the sting, 
 So drawing forth his baleful train, he dragg’d 
 7 “ Of that true Rome.” Of Heaven. represented the treachery of the here- 
 8 “To that place.”” To the earth. tics. 
 °“The bird of Jove.” This, which With his feathers lined.” In 
 is imitated from Ezekiel, xvii. 3, 4, is allusion to the donations made by Con- 
 typical of the persecutions which the stantine to the Church. 
 hurch sustained from the Roman em- 12 A dragon.”’ Probably Mohammed; 
 
 perors. . for what Lombardi offers to the con- 
 10 “* A fox.”? By the fox probably is trary is far from satisfactory. 
 
PURGATORY 277 
 
 Part of the bottom forth; and went his way, 
 Exulting. What remain’d, as lively turf 
 
 With green herb, so did clothe itself with plumes,"* 
 Which haply had, with purpose chaste and kind, 
 Been offer’d; and therewith were clothed the wheels, 
 Both one and other, and the beam, so quickly, 
 
 A sigh were not breathed sooner. Thus transform’d, 
 The holy structure, through its several parts, 
 
 Did put forth heads ;** three on the beam, and one 
 On every side: the first like oxen horn’d; 
 
 But with a single horn upon their front, 
 
 The four. Like monster, sight hath never seen. 
 O’er it?® methought there sat, secure as rock 
 
 On mountain’s lofty top, a shameless whore, 
 Whose ken roved loosely round her. At her side, 
 As ’t were that none might bear her off, I saw 
 
 A giant stand; and ever and anon 
 
 They mingled kisses. But, her lustful eyes 
 Chancing on me to wander, that fell minion 
 Scourged her from head to foot all o’er; then full 
 Of jealousy, and fierce with rage, unloosed 
 
 The monster, and drageg’d on,*® so far across 
 
 The forest, that from me its shades alone 
 
 Shielded the harlot and the new-form’d brute. 
 
 13“ With plumes.” The increase of | cupiscence, and envy, hurtful, at least 
 wealth and temporal dominion, which in their primary effects, chiefly to him 
 followed the supposed gift of Constan- who is guilty of them. 
 
 ne. ‘ 15 O’er it.” The harlot is thought 
 _ 4“ Heads.” By the seven heads, it to represent the state of the Church 
 is supposed with sufficient probability, under Boniface VIII, and the giant to 
 are meant the seven capital sins: by the figure Philip IV of France. 
 three with two horns, pride, anger, and 6“ Drageg’d on.” The removal of 
 avarice, injurious both to man himself the Pope’s residence from Rome to 
 and to his neighbor: by the four with Avignon is pointed at. 
 one horn, gluttony, gloominess, con- 
 
 Classics. Vol. 34—M 
 
278 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 CANTO XXXIII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—After a hymn sung, Beatrice leaves the tree, and takes 
 with her the seven virgins, Matilda, Statius, and Dante. She then 
 darkly predicts to our Poets some future events. Lastly, the whole 
 band arrive at the fountain, from whence the two streams, Lethe 
 and Eunoé, separating, flow different ways; and Matilda, at the de- 
 sire of Beatrice, causes our Poet to drink of the latter stream. 
 
 HE heathen, Lord! are come”: responsive thus, 
 The trinal now, and now the virgin band 
 Quaternion, their sweet psalmody began, 
 
 Weeping; and Beatrice listen’d, sad 
 And sighing, to the song, in such a mood, 
 That Mary, as she stood beside the cross, 
 Was scarce more changed. But when they gave her place 
 To speak, then, risen upright on her feet, 
 She, with a color glowing bright as fire, 
 Did answer: “ Yet a little while,® and ye 
 Shall see me not; and, my beloved sisters! 
 Again a little while, and ye shall see me.” 
 
 Before her then she marshal’d all the seven; 
 And, beckoning only, motion’d me, the dame, 
 And that remaining sage,* to follow her. 
 
 So on she pass’d; and had not set, I ween, 
 Her tenth step to the ground, when, with mine eyes, 
 Her eyes encountered; and, with visage mild, 
 “So mend thy pace,” she cried, “that if my words 
 Address thee, thou mayst still be aptly placed 
 To hear them.” Soon as duly to her side 
 I now had hasten’d: ‘“ Brother!” she began, 
 “Why makest thou no attempt at questioning, 
 As thus we walk together?” Like to those 
 Who, speaking with too reverent an awe 
 Before their betters, draw not forth the voice 
 Alive unto their lips, befell me then 
 That 1 in sounds imperfect thus began: 
 “Lady! what I have need of, that thou know’st; 
 And what will suit my need.” She answering thus: 
 
 _1“The heathen.” ‘O God, the while, and ye shall not see me; and 
 heathen are come ag thine inheri- again a a pene and ye shall see 
 tance, ’—-Psalm 1Ixxix. me.’’—John, xvi. 16 
 
 2“ Yet a little while.” ye CK little 8 That remaining sage.” Statius. 
 
PURGATORY ~~ 279 
 
 “Of fearfulness and shame, I will that thou 
 Henceforth do rid thee; that thou speak no more, 
 As one who dreams. Thus far be taught of me: 
 The vessel which thou saw’st the serpent break, 
 Was, and is not:* let him, who hath the blame, 
 Hope not to scare God’s vengeance with a sop.° 
 Without an heir forever shall not be 
 
 That eagle,® he, who left the chariot plumed, 
 Which-monster made it first and next a prey. 
 Plainly I view, and therefore speak, the stars 
 F’en now approaching, whose conjunction, free 
 From all impediment and bar, brings on 
 
 A season, in the which, one sent from God 
 
 (Five hundred, five, and ten, do mark him out), 
 That foul one, and the accomplice of her guilt, © 
 The giant, both, shall slay. And if perchance 
 My saying, dark as Themis or as Sphinx, 
 
 Fail to persuade thee (since like them it foils 
 
 The intellect with blindness), yet erelong 
 Events shall be the Naiads, that will solve 
 
 This knotty riddle; and no damage light 
 
 On flock or field. Take heed; and as these words 
 By me are utter’d, teach them even so 
 
 To those who live that life, which is a race 
 
 To death: and when thou writest them, keep in mind 
 Not to conceal how thou hast seen the plant, 
 That twice? hath now been spoil’d. This whoso robs, 
 This whoso plucks, with blasphemy of deed 
 
 Sins against God, who for his use alone 
 Creating hallow’d it. For taste of this, 
 
 In pain and in desire, five thousand years 
 
 And upward, the first soul did yearn for him 
 Who punish’d in himself the fatal gust. 
 
 4“ Was, and is not.” “ The beast murdered, within the space of nine 
 that was, and is not.”—Rev. xvii. 11. Bid t 
 
 5 “* Hope not to scare God’s_ ven- 6“ That eagle.” He prognosticates 
 geance with a sop.” ‘‘ Let not him that the Emperor of Germany will not 
 
 who hath occasioned the destruction of always continue to submit to the 
 the Church, that vessel which the ser- usurpations of the Pope, and _foretells 
 pent brake, hope to appease the anger the coming of Henry VII, Duke of 
 of the Deity by any outward acts of Luxemburg, signified by the numer- 
 religious, or rather superstitious, cere- ical figures DVX; or, as Lombardi 
 mony; such as was that, in our Poet’s supposes, of Can Grande della Scala, 
 time, performed by a murderer at Flor- ° appointed the leader of the Ghibelline 
 ence, who imagined himself secure from forces. __ ; 
 
 vengeance, if he ate a sop of bread in 7** Twice.” First by the eagle and 
 wine upon the grave of the person next by the giant. 
 
280 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 ‘““Thy reason slumbers, if it deem this height, 
 
 And summit thus inverted, of the plant, 
 
 Without due cause: and were not vainer thoughts, 
 
 As Elsa’s numbing waters,® to thy soul. 
 
 And their fond pleasures had not dyed it dark 
 
 As Pyramus the mulberry ; thou hadst seen, 
 
 In such momentous circumstance alone, 
 
 God’s equal justice morally implied 
 
 In the forbidden tree. But since I mark thee, 
 
 In understanding, harden’d into stone, 
 
 And, to that hardness, spotted too and stain’d, 
 
 So that thine eye is dazzled at my word; 
 
 I will, that, if not written, yet at least: 
 
 Painted thou take it in thee, for the cause, 
 
 That one brings home his staff inwreathed with palm.” 
 I thus: “As wax by seal, that changeth not 
 
 Its impress, now is stamp’d my brain by thee. 
 
 But wherefore soars thy wish’d-for speech so high 
 
 Beyond my sight, that loses it the more, 
 
 The more it strains to reach it?” “To the end 
 
 That thou mayst know,” she answer’d straight, “the school, 
 
 That thou hast follow’d; and how far behind, 
 
 When following my discourse, its learning halts: 
 
 And mayst behold your art, from the divine 
 
 As distant, as the disagreement is 
 
 *Twixt earth and heaven’s most high and rapturous orb.” 
 “T not remember,” I replied, “that e’er 
 
 I was estranged from thee; nor for such fault 
 
 Doth conscience chide me.” Smiling she return’d: 
 
 “Tf thou canst not remember, call to mind 
 
 How lately thou hast drunk of Lethe’s wave; 
 
 And, sure as smoke doth indicate a flame, 
 
 In that forgetfulness itself conclude 
 
 Blame from thy alienated will incurr’d. 
 
 From henceforth, verily, my words shall be 
 
 As naked, as will suit them to appear 
 
 In thy unpractised view.” More sparkling now, 
 
 And with retarded course, the sun possess’d 
 
 The circle of mid-day, that varies still 
 8“ Elsa’s numbing . waters.” ‘The Florence, is ‘said to possess a petrifying 
 
 E]sa, a little stream, which flows into quality. 
 the Arno about twenty miles below 
 
-PURGATORY 
 
 As the aspect varies of each several clime; 
 When, as one, sent in vaward of a troop 
 For escort, pauses, if perchance he spy 
 Vestige of somewhat strange and rare; so paused 
 The sevenfold band, arriving at the verge 
 Of a dun umbrage hoar, such as is seen, 
 Beneath green leaves and gloomy branches, oft 
 To overbrow a bleak and alpine cliff. 
 And, where they stood, before them, as it seem’d, 
 I, Tigris and Euphrates both, beheld 
 Forth from one fountain issue; and, like friends, 
 Linger at parting. “O enlightening beam! 
 O glory of our kind! beseech thee say 
 What water this, which, from one source derived, 
 Itself removes to distance from itself? ” 
 To such entreaty answer thus was made: 
 *Entreat Matilda, that she teach thee this.” 
 And here, as one who clears himself of blame 
 Imputed, the fair dame return’d: “Of me 
 He this and more hath learnt; and I am safe 
 That Lethe’s water hath not hid it from him.” 
 And Beatrice: ‘“ Some more pressing care, 
 That oft the memory ’reaves, perchance hath made 
 His mind’s eye dark. But lo, where Eunoé flows! 
 Lead thither; and, as thou art wont, revive 
 His fainting virtue.” As a courteous spirit, 
 That proffers no excuses, but as soon 
 As he hath token of another’s will, 
 Makes it his own; when she had ta’en me, thus 
 The lovely maiden moved her on, and call’d 
 To Statius, with an air most lady-like: 
 “Come thou with him.” Were further space allow’d, 
 Then, Reader! might I sing, though but in part, 
 That beverage, with whose sweetness I had ne’er 
 Been sated. But, since all the leaves are full, 
 Appointed for this second strain, mine art 
 With warning bridle checks me. I return’d 
 From the most holy wave, regenerate, 
 E’en as new plants renew’d with foliage new, 
 Pure and made apt for mounting to the stars. 
 
 — 
 
 28% 
 
5 ‘he 
 seeds 
 
PARADISE 
 
 aD 
 
 CANTO I 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The Poet ascends with Beatrice toward the first heaven; 
 and is, by her, resolved of certain doubts which arise in his mind. 
 
 IS glory, by whose might all things are moved, 
 Pierces the universe, and in one part 
 sheds more resplendence, elsewhere less. In Heaven, 
 That largeliest of his light partakes, was I, 
 Witness of things, which, to relate again, 
 Surpasseth power of him who comes from thence; 
 - or that, so near approaching its desire, 
 - Our intellect is to such depth absorb’d, 
 That memory cannot follow. Nathless all, 
 That in my thoughts I of that sacred realm 
 Could store, shall now be matter of my song. 
 Benign Apollo! this last labor aid ; 
 And make me such a vessel of thy worth, 
 As thy own laurel claims, of me beloved. 
 Thus far? hath one of steep Parnassus’ brows 
 Sufficed me; henceforth, there is need of both 
 For my remaining enterprise. Do thou? 
 Enter into my bosom, and there breathe 
 So, as when Marsyas by thy hand was drageg’d 
 Forth from his limbs, unsheathed. O power divine! 
 If thou to me of thine impart so much, 
 That of that happy realm the shadow’d form 
 Traced in my thoughts I may set forth to view; 
 Thou shalt behold me of thy favor’d tree, 
 
 1“Thus far.”” He appears to mean 2“Do thou.” Make me thine in- 
 nothing more than that this part of his strument; and, through me, utter such 
 rae will require a greater exertion of | sound as when thou didst contend with 
 is powers than the former. Marsyas. 
 
 283 
 
284 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Come to the foot, and crown myself with leaves: 
 For to that honor thou, and my high theme 
 Will fit me. If but seldom, mighty Sire! 
 
 To grace his triumph, gathers thence a wreath 
 Cesar, or bard (more shame for human wills 
 Depraved), joy to the Delphic god must spring 
 From the Peneian foliage, -when one breast 
 
 Is with such thirst inspired. From a small spark 
 Great flame hath risen: after me, perchance, 
 Others with better voice may pray, and gain, 
 From the Cyrrhzan city, answer kind. 
 
 Through divers passages, the world’s bright lamp 
 Rises to mortals ; but through that * which joins 
 Four circles with the threefold cross, in best 
 Course, and in happiest constellation * set, 
 He comes; and, to the worldly wax, best gives 
 Its temper and impression. Morning there,® 
 Here Eve was well-nigh by such passage made; 
 And whiteness had o’erspread that hemisphere, 
 Blackness the other part; when to the leit ® 
 I saw Beatrice turn’d, and on the sun 
 Gazing, as never eagle fix’d his ken. 
 As from the first a second beam is wont 
 To issue, and reflected upward rise, 
 Even as a pilgrim bent on his return; 
 So of her act, that through the eyesight pass’d 
 Into my fancy, mine was form’d: and straight, 
 Beyond our mortal wont, I fix’d mine eyes 
 Upon the sun. Much is allow’d us there, 
 That here exceeds our power; thanks to the place. 
 Made for the dwelling of the human kind. 
 
 I suffer’d it not long; and yet so long, 
 That I beheld it bickering sparks around, 
 As iron that comes boiling from the fire. 
 And suddenly upon the day appear’d 
 
 8“ Through that.’”’ ‘ Where the four 5“* Morning there.” It was morning 
 
 circles, the horizon, the Zodiac, the 
 Equator, and the equinoctial colure on the earth. 
 
 where he then was, and about eventide 
 
 join; the last three intersecting each 8“ To the left.” Being in the o 
 
 other so as to form three crosses, as 
 may be seen in the armillary s 
 4**TIn happiest constellation.” Aries. herself to the left. 
 Some understand the planet Venus by 
 
 the ‘‘ migliore stella.” 
 
 site hemisphere to ours, Beatrice, 
 phere.” she may behold the rising sun, turns 
 
PARADISE 28s 
 
 A day new-risen; as he, who hath the power, 
 Had with another sun bedeck’d the sky. 
 Her eyes fast fix’d on the eternal wheels, 
 Beatrice stood unmoved; and I with ken 
 Fix’d upon her, from upward gaze removed, 
 At her aspect, such inwardly became 
 As Glaucus, when he tasted of the herb 
 That made him peer among the ocean gods: 
 Words may not tell of that, trans-human change; 
 And therefore let the SPR oer OE weak, 
 For those whom grace hath better proof in store. 
 If I were only what thou didst create, 
 Then newly, Love! by whom the heaven is ruled; 
 Thou know’st, who by thy light didst bear me up. 
 Whenas the wheel which thou dost ever guide, 
 Desired Spirit! with its harmony, 
 Temper’d of thee and measured, charm’d mine ear 
 Then seem’d to me so much of heaven to blaze 
 With the sun’s flame, that rain or flood ne’er made 
 A lake so broad. The newness of the sound, 
 And that great light, inflamed me with desire, 
 Keener than e’er was felt, to know their cause. 
 Whence she, who saw me, clearly as myself, 
 To calm my troubled mind, before I ask’d, 
 Open’d her lips, and gracious thus. began: 
 “With false imagination thou thyself 
 Makest dull; so that thou seest not the thing, 
 Which thou hadst seen, had that been shaken off. 
 Thou art not on the earth as thou believest ; 
 For lightning, scaped from its own proper place, 
 Ne’er ran, as thou hast hither now return’d.” 
 Although divested of my first-raised doubt 
 By those brief words accompanied with smiles, 
 Yet in new doubt was I entangled more, 
 And said: “ Already satisfied, I rest 
 From admiration deep; but now admire 
 How I above those lighter bodies rise.” 
 Whence, after utterance of a piteous sigh, 
 She toward me bent her eyes, with such a look, 
 As on her frenzied child a mother casts; 
 
286 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Then thus began: ‘“ Among themselves all things 
 Have order; and. from hence the form,’ which makes 
 The universe resemble God. In this 
 
 The higher creatures see the printed steps 
 
 Of that eternal worth, which is the end 
 Whither the line is drawn.’ All natures lean, 
 In this their order, diversly ; some more, 
 
 Some less approaching to their primal source. 
 Thus they to different havens are moved on 
 Through the vast sea of being, and each one 
 With instinct given, that bears it in its course: 
 This to the lunar sphere directs the fire; 
 
 This moves the hearts of mortal animals; 
 
 This the brute earth together knits, and binds. 
 Nor only creatures, void of intellect, 
 
 Are aim’d at by this vow; but even those, 
 
 That have intelligence and love, are pierced. 
 
 That Providence, who so well orders all, 
 
 With her own light makes ever calm the heaven,°® 
 In which the substance, that hath greatest speed,?® 
 Is turn’d: and thither now, as to our seat 
 Predestined, we are carried by the force 
 
 Of that strong cord, that never looses dart 
 
 But at fair aim and glad. Yet it is true, 
 
 That as, ofttimes, but ill accords the form 
 
 To the design of art, through sluggishness 
 
 Or unreplying matter; so this course 
 
 Is sometimes quitted by the creature, who 
 
 Hath power, directed thus, to bend elsewhere ; 
 
 As from a cloud the fire is seen to fall, 
 
 From its original impulse warp’d to earth, 
 
 By vicious fondness. Thou no more admire 
 
 Thy soaring (if I rightly deem), than lapse 
 
 Of torrent downward from a mountain’s height. 
 There would in thee for wonder be more cause, 
 If, free of hindrance, thou hadst stay’d below, 
 
 7“ From hence the form.” This order the Supreme Being, so are they referre¢ 
 it is, that gives to the universe the form to Him again. 
 
 of unity, and therefore resemblance to 9“ The heaven.’’ The empyrean, whict 
 God. is always motionless. 
 
 8“ Whither the line is drawn.” All ‘The substance, that hath greates 
 things. as they have their beginning from sheat! " The primum mobtle. 
 
PARADISE 287 
 
 As living fire unmoved upon the earth.” | 
 So said, she turn’d toward the heaven her face. 
 
 CANTO II 
 ‘ARGUMENT.—Dante and his celestial guide enter the moon. The cause 
 s, which appear in that i jained_ to 
 
 _hin- 
 LL ye, who in small bark have following sail’d, 
 A Eager to listen, on the adventurous track 
 Of my proud keel, that singing cuts her way, 
 
 Backward return with speed, and your own shores 
 Revisit; nor put out to open sea, 
 
 Where losing me, perchance ye may remain 
 Bewilder’d in deep maze. ‘The way I pass, 
 
 Ne’er yet was run: Minerva breathes the gale; 
 Apollo guides me; and another Nine, 
 
 To my rapt sight, the arctic beams reveal. 
 
 Ye other few who have outstretch’d the neck 
 Timely for food of angels, on which here 
 
 They live, yet never know satiety ; 
 
 Through the deep brine ye fearless may put out 
 Your vessel; marking well the furrow broad 
 
 Before you in the wave, that on both sides 
 
 Equal returns. Those, glorious, who pass’d o’er 
 
 To Colchos, wonder’d not as ye will do, 
 
 When they saw Jason following the plough. 
 
 The increate perpetual thirst, that draws 
 Toward the realm of God’s own form, bore us 
 Swift almost as the heaven ye behold. 
 Beatrice upward gazed, and I on her; 
 
 And in such space as on the notch a dart 
 
 Is placed, then loosen’d flies, I saw myself 
 
 Arrived, where wonderous thing engaged my sight. 
 Whence she, to whom no care of mine was hid, 
 Turning to me, with aspect glad as fair, 
 
 Bespake me: “ Gratefully direct thy mind 
 
 To God, through whom to this first star* we come.” — 
 
 1‘ This ‘first star.’’: The moon, 
 
288 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Meseem’d as if a cloud had cover’d us, 
 Translucent, solid, firm, and polish’d bright, 
 Like adamant, which the sun’s beam had smit. 
 Within itself the ever-during pearl 
 Received us; as the wave a ray of light 
 Receives, and rests unbroken. If I then 
 Was of corporeal frame, and it transcend 
 Our weaker thought, how one dimension thus 
 Another could endure, which needs must be 
 If body enter body; how much more 
 Must the desire inflame us to behold 
 That essence, which discovers by what means 
 God and our nature join’d! There will be seen 
 That, which we hold through faith; not shown by proof, 
 But in itself intelligibly plain, 
 E’en as the truth that man at first believes. 
 I answer’d: “ Lady! I with thoughts devout, 
 Such as I best can frame, give thanks to him, 
 Who hath removed me from the mortal world. 
 But tell, I pray thee, whence the gloomy spots 
 Upon this body, which below on earth 
 Give rise to talk of Cain in fabling quaint?” 
 She somewhat smiled, then spake: “If mortals err 
 In their opinion, when the key of sense 
 Unlocks not, surely wonder’s weapon keen . 
 Ought not to pierce thee: since thou find’st, the wings 
 Of reason to pursue the senses’ flight 
 Are short. But what thy own thought is, declare.” 
 Then I: ‘ What various here above appears, 
 Is caused, I deem, by bodies dense or rare.” 
 She then resumed: “ Thou certainly wilt see 
 In falsehood thy belief o’erwhelm’d, if well 
 Thou listen to the arguments which I 
 Shall bring to face it. The eighth sphere displays 
 Numberless lights, the which, in kind and size, 
 May be remark’d of different aspects: 
 If rare or dense of that were cause alone, 
 One single virtue then would be in all; 
 Alike distributed, or more, or less. 
 Different virtues needs must be the fruits 
 
PARADISE 289 
 
 Of formal principles; and these, save one, 
 
 Will by thy reasoning be destroy’d. Beside, 
 
 If rarity were of that dusk the cause, 
 
 Which thou inquirest, either in some part 
 
 That planet must throughout be void, nor fed 
 With its own matter; or, as bodies share 
 
 Their fat and leanness, in like manner this 
 
 Must in its volume change the leaves.?__ The first, 
 If it were true, had through the sun’s eclipse 
 Been manifested, by transparency 
 
 Of light, as through aught rare beside effused. 
 But this is not. Therefore remains to see 
 
 The other cause: and, if the other fall, 
 
 Erroneous so must prove what seem’d to thee. 
 
 If not from side to side this rarity 
 
 Pass through, there needs must be a limit, whence 
 Its contrary no further lets it pass. 
 
 And hence the beam, that from without proceeds, 
 Must be pour’d back; as color comes, through glass 
 Reflected, which behind it lead conceals. 
 
 Now wilt thou say, that there of murkier hue, 
 Than, in the other part, the ray is shown, 
 
 By being thence refracted further back. 
 
 From this perplexity will free thee soon 
 Experience, if thereof thou trial make, 
 
 The fountain whence your arts derive their streams. 
 Three mirrors shalt thou take, and two remove 
 From thee alike; and more remote the third, 
 Betwixt the former pair, shall meet thine eyes: 
 Then turn’d toward them, cause behind thy back 
 A light to stand, that on the three shall shine, 
 And thus reflected come to thee from all. 
 Though that, beheld most distant, do not stretch 
 A space so ample, yet in brightness thou 
 
 Wilt own it equalling the rest. But now, 
 
 As under snow the ground, if the warm ray 
 Smites it, remains dismantled of the hue 
 
 And cold, that cover’d it before; so thee, 
 
 2 Change the leaves.”? Would, like leaves of parchment, be darker in some 
 art than in others. 
 
290 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Dismantled in thy mind, I will inform 
 With light so lively, that the tremulous beam 
 
 Shall quiver where it falls. 
 
 Within the heaven,® 
 
 Where peace divine inhabits, circles round 
 A body, in whose virtue lies the being 
 
 Of all that it contains. 
 
 The following heaven, 
 
 That hath so many lights, this being divides, 
 Through different essences, from it distinct, 
 
 And yet contain’d within it. 
 
 The other orbs 
 
 Their separate distinctions variously 
 Dispose, for their own seed and produce apt. 
 Thus do these organs of the world proceed, 
 As thou beholdest now, from step to step; 
 Their influences from above deriving, 
 And thence transmitting downward. Mark me well; 
 How through this passage to the truth I ford, 
 The truth thou lovest ; that thou henceforth, alone, 
 Mayst know to keep the shallows, safe, untold. 
 “ The virtue and motion of the sacred orbs, 
 As mallet by the workman’s hand, must needs 
 By blessed movers * be inspired. This heaven,® 
 Made beauteous by so many luminaries, 
 From the deep spirit,® that moves its circling sphere, 
 Its image takes and impress as a seal: 
 And as the soul, that dwells within your dust, 
 Through members different, yet together form’d, 
 In different powers resolves itself; e’en so 
 The intellectual efficacy unfolds 
 Its goodness multiplied throughout the stars; 
 On its own unity revolving still. 
 Different virtue’ compact different 
 Makes with the precious body it enlivens, 
 
 8“ Within the: heaven.” According 
 to our Poet’s system, there are ten 
 heavens. The heaven, ‘“‘ where peace 
 divine inhabits,” is the empyrean; the 
 body within it, that ‘‘ circles round,’’ is 
 the primum mobile; “the following 
 heaven,” that of the fixed stars; and 
 “‘the other orbs,” the seven lower 
 heavens, are Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, the 
 Sun, Venus, Mercury, and the Moon. 
 Thus Milton, “ Paradise Lost” b. iii. 
 
 , 4 ; eat iy he i ee , 
 “They pass the planets seven, and pass 
 the fix’d, 
 
 And that crystalline sphere whose 
 balance weighs 
 The trepidation talk’d, and that first 
 moved.” 
 4“ By blessed movers.”’ 
 5“ This heaven.” 
 stars. 
 6“ The deep 
 angel. . 
 7 Different virtue.” ‘There is one 
 glory of the sun, and another glory of 
 the moon, and another glory of the 
 
 By angels. 
 The heaven of fixed 
 
 spirit.” The moving 
 
 other star in glory.”—1 Cor, xv. 41. 
 
 stars; for one star differeth from ane 
 1 
 
PARADISE 292 
 
 With which it knits, as life in you is knit. 
 
 From its original nature full of joy, 
 
 The virtue mingled through the body shines, 
 
 As joy through pupil of the living eye. 
 
 From hence proceeds that which from light to light 
 Seems different, and not from dense or rare. 
 
 This is the formal cause, that generates, 
 Proportion’d to its power, the dusk or clear.” 
 
 CANTO III 
 
 ARGUMENT.—In the moon Dante meets with Piccarda, the sister of 
 Forese, who tells him that this planet is allotted to those, who, after 
 having made profession of chastity and a religious life, had been 
 compelled to violate their vows; and she then points out to him the 
 spirit of the Empress Costanza. 
 
 HAT sun,’ which erst with love my bosom warm/’d, 
 Had of fair truth unveil’d the sweet aspect, 
 By proof of right, and of the false reproof; 
 
 And I, to own myself convinced and free 
 
 Of doubt, as much as needed, raised my head 
 
 Erect for speech. But soon a sight appear’d, 
 
 Which, so intent to mark it, held me fix’d, 
 
 That of confession I no longer thought. 
 
 As through translucent_and smooth glass, or wave 
 
 Clear and unmoved, and flowing not so deep 
 
 As that its bed is dark, the shape returns 
 
 So faint of our impictured lineaments, 
 
 That, on white forehead set, a pearl as strong 
 
 Comes to the eye; such saw I many a face, 
 
 All stretch’d to speak; from whence I straight conceived, 
 Delusion ? opposite to that, which raised, 
 
 Between the man and fountain, amorous flame. 
 
 Sudden, as I perceived them, deeming these 
 
 Reflected semblances, to see of whom 
 1 That sun.” Beatrice. mistook a shadow for a Haase! I, 
 
 2“ Delusion.” ‘An error the con- a substance for a shadow 
 trary to that of Narcissus; because he 
 
292 : THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 They were, I turn’d mine eyes, and nothing saw; 
 
 Then turn’d them back, directed on the light 
 
 Of my sweet guide, who, smiling, shot forth beams 
 
 From her celestial eyes. “ Wonder not thou,” 
 
 She cried, “at this my smiling, when I see 
 
 Thy childish judgment; since not yet on truth 
 
 It rests the foot, but, as it still is wont, 
 
 Makes thee fall back in unsound vacancy. 
 
 True substances are these, which thou behold’st, 
 
 Hither through failure of their vow exiled. 
 
 But speak thou with them; listen, and believe, 
 
 That the true light, which fills them with desire, 
 
 Permits not from its beams their feet to stray.” 
 
 Straight to the shadow, which for converse seem’d 
 
 Most earnest, I address’d me: and began 
 
 As one by over-eagerness perplex’d: 
 
 “O spirit, born for joy! who in the rays 
 
 Of life eternal, of that sweetness know’st 
 
 The flavor, which, not tasted, passes far 
 
 All apprehension; me it well would please, 
 
 If thou wouldst tell me of thy name, and this 
 
 Your station here.” Whence she with kindness prompt, 
 
 And eyes glistering with smiles: ‘“ Our charity, 
 
 To any wish by justice introduced, | 
 
 Bars not the door; no more than she above, 
 
 Who would have all her court be like herself. 
 
 I was a virgin sister in the earth: 
 
 And if thy mind observe me well, this form, 
 
 With such addition graced of loveliness, 
 
 Will not conceal me long; but thou wilt know 
 
 Piccarda,® in the tardiest sphere thus placed, 
 
 Here ’mid these other blessed also blest. 
 
 Our hearts, whose high affections burn alone 
 
 With pleasure from the Holy Spirit conceived, 
 
 Admitted to his order, dwell in joy. 
 
 And this condition, which appears so low, 
 
 Is for this cause assign’d us, that our vows 
 
 Were, in some part, neglected and made void.” 
 4 Piccardal”’ The sister of Corso Petrarch has been supposed to allude 
 
 _ Donati, and..of Forese, whom we have to this lady in his “Triumph of 
 seen in the “Purgatory,” Canto xxiii. Chastity,” v. 160, &c. . 
 
PARADISE 293 
 
 Whence I to her replied: “ Something divine 
 Beams in your countenances wonderous fair; 
 From former knowledge quite transmuting you. 
 Therefore to recollect was I so slow. 
 
 But what thou say’st hath to my memory 
 Given now such aid, that to retrace your forms 
 Is easier. Yet inform me, ye, who here 
 
 Are happy; long ye for a higher place, 
 
 More to behold, and more in love to dwell?” 
 
 She with those other spirits gently smiled; 
 Then answer’d with such gladness, that she seem’d 
 With love’s first flame to glow: “ Brother! our will 
 Is, in composure, settled by the power 
 Of charity, who makes us will alone 
 What we possess, and naught beyond desire: 
 
 If we should wish to be exalted more, 
 
 Then must our wishes jar with the high will 
 Of him, who sets us here; which in these orbs 
 Thou wilt confess not possible, if here 
 
 To be in charity must needs befall, 
 
 And if her nature well thou contemplate. 
 Rather it is inherent in this state 
 
 Of blessedness, to keep ourselves within 
 
 The divine will, by which our wills with his 
 Are one. So that as we, from step to step, 
 Are placed throughout this kingdom, pleases all, 
 Even as our King, who in us plants his will; 
 And in his will is our tranquillity: 
 
 It is the mighty ocean, whither tends 
 Whatever creates and Nature makes.” 
 
 Then saw I clearly how each spot in heaven 
 Is Paradise, though with like gracious dew 
 The supreme virtue shower not over all. 
 
 But as it chances, if one sort of food 
 Hath satiated, and of another still 
 The appetite remains, that this is ask’d, 
 
 And thanks for that return’d; e’en so did I, 
 In word and motion, bent from her to learn 
 What web it was,* through which she had not drawn 
 
 * “What web it was.” “What vow been hindered from completing, had 
 of religious life it was that she had been compelled to break.’ 
 
294 
 The shuttle to its point. 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 She thus began: 
 
 “ Exalted worth and perfectness of life 
 The Lady ° higher up inshrine in heaven, 
 By whose pure laws upon your nether earth 
 The robe and veil they wear; to that intent, 
 That e’en till death they may keep watch, or sleep, 
 With their great bridegroom, who accepts each vow, 
 Which to his gracious pleasure love conforms. 
 I from the world, to follow her, when young 
 Escaped; and, in her vesture mantling me, 
 
 - Made promise of the way her sect enjoins. 
 Thereafter men, for ill than good more apt, 
 Forth snatch’d me from the pleasant cloister’s pale. 
 God knows ® how, after that, my life was framed. 
 This other splendid shape, which thou behold’st 
 At my right side, burning with all the light 
 Of this our orb, what of myself I tell 
 May to herself apply. From her, like me 
 A sister, with like violence were torn 
 The saintly folds, that shaded her fair brows. 
 E’en when she to the world again was brought 
 In spite of her own will and better wont, 
 Yet not for that the bosom’s inward veil 
 
 Did she renounce. 
 
 This is the luminary 
 
 Of mighty Constance,’ who from that loud blast, 
 
 Which blew the second ® over Suabia’s realm, 
 
 That power produced, which was the third and last.” 
 She ceased from further talk, and then began 
 
 “Ave Maria” singing; and with that song 
 
 5 “The Lady.” St. Clare, the foun- 
 dress of the order called after her. She 
 was born of opulent and noble parents 
 at Assisi, in 1193, and died in 1253. 
 
 6 “God knows.” Piccarda’s brother 
 Corso, inflamed with rage against his 
 virgin sister, having joined with him 
 Farinata, an infamous assassin, and 
 twelve other abandoned -ruffians, en- 
 tered the monastery by a ladder, and 
 carried away his sister forcibly to his 
 own house; and then tearing off her 
 religious habit, compelled her to go in 
 a secular garment to her nuptials. Be- 
 fore the spouse of Christ came together 
 with her new husband, she knelt down 
 before a crucifix and recommended her 
 virginity to Christ. Soon after her 
 whole body was smitten with leprosy, 
 so as to strike grief and horror into the 
 
 beholders; and thus in a few days, ~ 
 through the divine disposal, she passed 
 with a palm of virginity to the Lord. 
 
 7 “ Constance.”” — Daughter of Rug- 
 gieri, King of Sicily, who being taken 
 by force out of a monastery where she 
 had professed, was married to the Em- 
 peror se patel VI and by him was mother 
 to Frederick II. She was fifty years old 
 or more at the time, and because it was 
 not credited that she could have a child 
 at that age, she was delivered in a 
 
 avilion, and it was given out that any 
 ady, who pleased, was at liberty to see 
 her. Many came and saw her; and the 
 suspicion ceased. 
 
 8 “The second.” Henry VI, son of 
 Frederick I, was the second emperor of 
 the house of Suabia; and his son Fred- 
 erick II ‘‘ the third and last.’ 
 
PARADISE 295 
 
 Vanish’d, as heavy substance through deep wave. 
 Mine eye, that, far as it was capable, 
 
 Pursued her, when in dimness she was lost, 
 
 Turn’d to the mark where greater want impell’d, 
 
 And bent on Beatrice all its gaze. 
 
 But she, as lightning, beam’d upon my looks; 
 
 So that the sight sustain’d it not at first. 
 
 Whence I to question her became less prompt. 
 
 CANTO IV 
 
 ARGUMENT.—While they still continue in the moon, Beatrice removes 
 certain doubts which Dante had conceived respecting the place as- 
 signed to the blessed, and respecting the will absolute or conditional. 
 He inquires whether it is possible to make satisfaction for a vow 
 broken. 
 
 ETWEEN two kinds of food, both equally 
 
 B Remote and tempting, first a man might die 
 Of hunger, ere he one could freely chuse. 
 
 E’en so would stand a lamb between the maw 
 Of two fierce wolves, in dread of both alike: 
 E’en so between two deer a dog would stand. 
 Wherefore, if I was silent, fault nor praise 
 I to myself impute; by equal doubts 
 Held in suspense; since of necessity 
 It happen’d. Silent was I, yet desire 
 Was painted in my looks; and thus I spake 
 My wish more earnestly than language could. 
 
 As Daniel,? when the haughty king he freed 
 From ire, that spurr’d him on to deeds unjust 
 And violent; so did Beatrice then. 
 
 “ Well I discern,” she thus her words address’d, 
 “ How thou art drawn by each of these desires ; ? 
 So that thy anxious thought is in itself 
 Bound up and stifled, nor breathes freely forth. 
 Thou arguest: if the good intent remain; 
 
 1“ Daniel.”” See Dan. ii. Beatrice the Chaldeans. This dream is referred 
 did for Dante what Daniel did for Nebu- _to in “ Hell,” Canto xiv. | ; 
 chadnezzar, when he freed the King 2“ By each of these desires. His 
 
 from the uncertainty respecting his desire to have each of the doubts, which 
 dream, which had enraged him against Beatrice mentions, resolved, 
 
296 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 What reason that another’s violence 
 Should stint the measure of my fair desert? 
 
 “ Cause too thou find’st for doubt, in that it seems, 
 That spirits to the stars, as Plato? deem’d, 
 
 Return. 
 
 These are the questions which thy will 
 
 Urge equally; and therefore I, the first, 
 
 Of that * will treat which hath the more of gall.° 
 Of seraphim * he who is most enskied, 
 
 Moses and Samuel, and either John, 
 
 Chuse which thou wilt, nor even Mary’s self, 
 Have not in any other heaven their seats, 
 
 Than have those spirits which so late thou saw’st; 
 Nor more or fewer years exist; but all 
 
 Make the first circle 7 beauteous, diversly 
 Partaking of sweet life, as more or less 
 
 Afflation of eternal bliss pervades them. 
 
 Here were they shown thee, not that fate assigns 
 This for their sphere, but for a sign to thee 
 
 Of that celestial furthest from the height. 
 
 Thus needs, that ye may apprehend, we speak: 
 Since from things sensible alone ye learn 
 
 That, which, digested rightly, after turns 
 
 To intellectual. 
 
 For no other cause 
 
 The Scripture, condescending graciously 
 To your perception, hands and feet to God 
 Attributes, nor so means: and holy church 
 Doth represent with human countenance, 
 Gabriel, and Michel, and him who made 
 
 Tobias whole. 
 
 Unlike what here thou seest. 
 
 The judgment of Timzus, who affirms 
 Each soul restored to its particular star ; 
 Believing it to have been taken thence, 
 
 3“ Plato.”” Plato, Timzus, v. ix. p. 
 326. ‘‘ The Creator, when he had framed 
 the universe, distributed to the stars an 
 equal number of souls, appointing to 
 each soul its several star.’’ 
 
 4“ Of that.” Plato’s opinion. 
 
 5 “Which hath the more of gall.” 
 Which is the more dangerous. 
 
 ¢ “ Of seraphim.” e amongst the 
 seraphim who is most nearly united with 
 God, Moses, Samuel, and both the 
 Johns, the Baptist and the Evangelist, 
 dwell not in any other heaven than do 
 those spirits whom thou hast just be- 
 
 held; nor does even the blessed Virgin 
 herself dwell in any other: nor is their 
 existence either longer or shorter than 
 that of these spirits.” She first resolves 
 his doubt whether souls do not return 
 to their own stars, as he had read in the 
 “ Timeus ”’ of Plato. Angels, then, and 
 beatified spirits, she declares, dwell all 
 and eternally together, only partaking 
 more or less of the divine glory, in the 
 empyrean; although, in condescension 
 to human Saterday they appear to 
 have different spheres a lotted to them. 
 7“ The first circle.” The empyrean, 
 
PARADISE 
 
 297 
 
 When nature gave it to inform her mould: 
 Yet to appearance his intention is 
 
 Not what his words declare: 
 
 and so to shun 
 
 Derision, haply thus he hath disguised 
 
 His true opinion. 
 
 If his meaning be, 
 
 That to the influencing of these orbs revert 
 The honor and the blame in human acts, 
 Perchance he doth not wholly miss the truth. 
 This principle, not understood aright, 
 Erewhile perverted well-nigh all the world; 
 So that it fell to fabled names of Jove, 
 
 And Mercury, and Mars. 
 
 That other doubt, 
 Which moves thee, is less harmful ; 
 
 for it brings 
 
 No peril of removing thee from me. 
 “ That, to the eye of man,® our justice seems 
 Unjust, is argument for faith, and not 
 
 For heretic declension. 
 
 But, to the end 
 
 This truth ®° may stand more clearly in your view, 
 I will content thee even to thy wish. 
 
 “Tf violence be, when that which suffers, naught 
 Consents to that which forceth, not for this 
 
 These spirits stood exculpate. 
 
 For the will, 
 
 That wills not, still survives unquench’d, and doth, 
 As nature doth in fire, though violence 
 
 Wrest it a thousand times; 
 
 for, if it yield 
 
 Or more or less, so far it follows force. 
 And thus did these, when they had power to seek 
 
 The hallow’d place again. 
 
 In them, had will 
 
 Been perfect, such as once upon the bars 
 Held Laurence *° firm, or wrought in Sczvola 
 
 To his own hand remorseless; 
 
 to the path, 
 
 Whence they were drawn, their steps had hasten’d back, 
 ’ When liberty return’d: but ih too few, 
 
 Resolve, so steadfast, dwells. 
 
 8 “ That, to the eye of man.” ‘* That 
 the ways of divine justice are often in- 
 scrutable to man, ought rather to be a 
 motive to faith than an inducement to 
 heresy.” Such appears to me the most 
 satisfactory explanation of the passage. 
 
 °“ This truth.” That it is no im- 
 
 eachment of God’s justice, if merit be 
 essened through compulsion of others, 
 without any failure of good intention on 
 
 And by these words, 
 
 the part of the meritorious. After all, 
 Beatrice ends by admitting that there 
 was a defect in the will, which hindered 
 Constance and the others from seizing 
 the first opportunity, that offered itself 
 if them, o returning to. the monastic 
 ife. 
 
 10“ Laurence.” Who suffered mnatyr- 
 dom in the third century. 
 
298 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 If duly weigh’d, that argument is void, 
 
 Which oft might have perplex’d thee still. But now 
 
 Another question thwarts thee, which, to solve, 
 
 Might try thy patience without better aid. 
 
 I have, no doubt, instill’d into thy mind, 
 
 That blessed spirit may not lie; since near 
 
 The source of primal truth it dwells for aye: 
 
 And thou mightst after of Piccarda learn 
 
 That Constance held affection to the veil; 
 
 So that she seems. to contradict me here. 
 
 Not seldom, brother, it hath chanced for men - 
 
 To do what they had gladly left undone; 
 
 Yet, to shun peril, they have done amiss: 
 
 E’en as Alcmzon, at his father’s 2 suit 
 
 Slew his own mother ;?? so made pitiless, 
 
 Not to lose pity. On this point bethink thee, 
 
 That force and will are blended in such wise 
 
 As not to make the offence excusable. 
 
 Absolute will agrees not to the wrong; 
 
 But inasmuch as there is fear of woe 
 
 From non-compliance, it agrees. Of will *® 
 
 Thus absolute, Piccarda spake, and I 
 
 Of the other; so that both have truly said.” 
 
 Such was the flow of that pure rill, that well’d 
 From forth the fountain of all truth; and such 
 The rest, that to my wandering thoughts I found. 
 “O thou, of primal love the prime delight, 
 
 Goddess!” I straight replied, “whose lively words 
 
 Still shed new heat and vigor through my soul; 
 
 Affection fails me to requite thy grace 
 
 With equal sum of gratitude: be his 
 
 To recompense, who sees and can reward thee. 
 
 Well I discern, that by that truth ** alone 
 
 Enlighten’d, beyond which no truth may roam, 
 
 Our mind can satisfy her thirst to know: 
 
 Therein she resteth, e’en as in his lair 
 11‘ His father’s.”” Amphiaraus. stances; and that, which I affirm, is 
 12 ** His own mother.” Eriphyle. spoken of the will conditionally and re- 
 18 “ Of will.”’” What Piccarda asserts spectively: so that our apparent differ- 
 
 of Constance, that she retained her af- ence is without any disagreem 
 
 ent. 
 fection to the monastic life, is said ab- 14“ That truth.” The light of divine 
 solutely and without relation to circum- truth. 
 
PARADISE 299 
 
 The wild beast, soon as she hath reach’d ‘that bound. 
 And she hath power to reach it; else desire 
 
 Were given to no end. And thence doth doubt 
 Spring, like a shoot, around the stock of truth; 
 
 And it is nature which, from height to height, 
 
 On to the summit prompts us. This invites, 
 
 This doth assure me, Lady! reverently 
 
 To ask thee of another truth, that yet 
 
 Is dark to me. I fain would know, if man 
 
 By other works well done may so supply 
 
 The failure of his vows, that in your scale 
 
 They lack not weight.” I spake; and on me straight 
 Beatrice look’d, with eyes that shot forth sparks 
 
 Of love celestial, in such copious stream, 
 
 That, virtue sinking in me overpower’d, 
 
 I turn’d; and downward bent, confused, my sight. 
 
 CANTO V 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The question proposed in the last Canto is answered. 
 Dante ascends with Beatrice to nN ereury which isthe 
 second Heaven; and here he finds a multitude of spirits, one of 
 whom offers to Eek him of anything he may desire to know from 
 them. 
 
 F beyond earthly wont, the flame of love 
 Illume me, so that I o’ercome thy power 
 Of vision, marvel not: but learn the cause 
 In that perfection of the sight, which, soon 
 As apprehending, hasteneth on to reach 
 The good it apprehends. I well discern, 
 How in thine intellect already shines 
 The light eternal, which to view alone 
 Ne’er fails to kindle love; and if aught else 
 Your love seduces, ’tis but that it shows 
 Some ill-mark’d vestige of that primal. beam. 
 “This wouldst thou know: if failure of the vow “ii 
 1“ Tf beyond earthly wont.’’ Dante end of the last Ganto# sate tells him to 
 
 a been unable to sustain the splen- attribute her increase of Haidipecirin to 
 dor of Beatrice, as we have seen at the the place in which ‘they. were. ° 
 
300 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 By other service may be so supplied, 
 As from self-question to assure the soul.” 
 
 Thus she her words, not heedless of my wish, 
 Began; and thus, as one who breaks not off 
 Discourse, continued in her saintly strain. 
 
 “ Supreme of gifts,? which God, creating, gave 
 
 Of his free bounty, sign most evident 
 
 Of goodness, and in his account most prized 
 
 Was liberty of will; the boon, wherewith 
 
 All intellectual creatures, and them sole, 
 
 He hath endow’d. Hence now thou mayst infer 
 
 Of what high worth the vow, which so is framed 
 
 That when man offers, God well-pleased accepts: 
 _For in the compact between God and him, 
 
 This treasure such as I describe it to thee, 
 
 He makes the victim; and of his own act. 
 
 What compensation therefore may he find? 
 
 If that, whereof thou hast oblation made, 
 
 By using well thou think’st to consecrate, 
 
 Thou wouldst of theft do charitable deed. 
 
 Thus I resolve thee of the greater point. 
 
 “ But forasmuch as holy church, herein 
 Dispensing, seems to contradict the truth 
 I have discover’d to thee, yet behoves 
 Thou rest a little longer at the board, 
 Ere the crude aliment which thou hast ta’en, 
 Digested fitly, to nutrition turn. 
 Open thy mind to what I now unfold; 
 And give it inward keeping. Knowledge comes 
 Of learning well retain’d, unfruitful else. 
 
 “This sacrifice, in essence, of two things ® 
 
 2** Supreme of gifts.”” So in the ‘‘ De 
 Monarchia,” lib. 1. pp. 107 and 108. “ If 
 then the judgment altogether move the 
 appetite, and is in no wise prevented by 
 it, it is free. But if the judgment be 
 moved by the appetite in any way pre- 
 venting it, it cannot be free: because it 
 acts not of itself, but is led captive by 
 another. And hence it is that brutes 
 cannot have free judgment, because 
 their judgments are always prevented 
 by appetite. And hence it may also ap- 
 pear manifest that intellectual sub- 
 stances, whose wills are immutable, and 
 likewise souls separated from the body, 
 
 and departing from it well and holily, 
 lose not the liberty of choice on ac- 
 count of the immutability of the will, 
 but retain it most. perfectly and power- 
 fully. This being discerned, it is again 
 plain that this liberty, or principle of all 
 our liberty, is the greatest good con- 
 ferred on human nature by God; be- 
 cause by this very thing we are here 
 made happy, as men; by this we are 
 elsewhere happy, as divine beings.” 
 3“ Two things.”?” The one, the sub- 
 stance of the vow, as of a single life 
 for instance, or of keeping fast; the 
 other, the compact, or form of it. 
 
PARADISE 305 
 
 Consisteth; one is that, whereof ’tis made; 
 
 The covenant, the other. For the last, 
 
 It ne’er is cancel’d, if not kept: and hence 
 
 I spake, erewhile, so strictly of its force. 
 
 For this it was enjoin’d the Israelites,‘ 
 
 Though leave were given them, as thou know’st, to change 
 
 The offering, still to offer. The other part, 
 
 The matter and the substance of the vow, 
 
 May well be such, as that, without offence, 
 
 It may for other substance be exchanged. 
 
 But, at his own discretion, none may shift 
 
 The burden on his shoulders; unreleased 
 
 By either key,® the yellow and the white. 
 
 Nor deem of any change, as less than vain, 
 
 If the last bond ® be not within the new 
 
 Included, as the quatre in the six. 
 
 No satisfaction therefore can be paid 
 
 For what so precious in the balance weighs, 
 
 That all in counterpoise must kick the beam. 
 
 Take then no vow at random: ta’en, with faith 
 
 Preserve it; yet not bent, as Jephthah once, 
 
 Blindly to execute a rash resolve, 
 
 Whom better it had suited to exclaim, 
 
 ‘I have done ill,’ then to redeem his pledge 
 
 By doing worse: or, not unlike to him 
 
 In folly, that great leader of the Greeks ; 
 
 Whence, on the altar, Iphigenia mourn’d 
 
 Her virgin beauty, and hath since made mourn 
 
 Both wise and simple, even all, who hear 
 
 Of so fell sacrifice. Be ye more staid, 
 
 O Christian! not, like feather, by each wind 
 
 Removable; nor think to cleanse yourselves 
 
 In every water. Either testament, 
 
 The old and new, is yours: and for your guide, 
 
 The shepherd of the church. Let this suffice 
 
 To save you. When by evil lust enticed, 
 
 Remember ye be men, not senseless beasts ; 
 
 “Tt was pind fhe Israelites.”” See’ 6 “ Tf the last bond.” If the thing sub- 
 ev. c. xii. and stituted be not far more precious than 
 
 xx 
 4 ore Peas key.” “ fcstary Canto that which is released. 
 EOladsion, Vol. 34—N 
 
302 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Nor let the Jew, who dwelleth in your streets, 
 Hold you in mockery. Be not, as the lamb, 
 That, fickle wanton, leaves its mother’s milk, 
 To dally with itself in idle play.” 
 
 Such were the words that Beatrice spake: 
 These ended, to that region, where the world 
 Is liveliest, full of fond desire she turn’d. 
 
 Though mainly prompt new question to propose, | 
 Her silence and changed look did keep me dumb. 
 And as the arrow, ere the cord is still, 
 
 Leapeth unto its mark; so on we sped 
 
 Into the second realm. There I beheld 
 
 The dame, so joyous, enter, that the orb 
 
 Grew brighter at her smiles; and,.if the star 
 
 Were moved to gladness, what then was my cheer, 
 Whom nature hath made apt for every change! 
 
 As in a quiet and clear lake the fish, 
 
 If aught approach them from without, do draw 
 Toward it, deeming it their food; so drew 
 
 Full more than thousand splendors toward us; 
 And in each one was heard: “Lo! one arrived 
 To multiply our loves!’ and as each came, 
 
 The shadow, streaming forth effulgence new, 
 Witness’d augmented joy. Here, Reader! think, 
 If thou didst miss the sequel of my tale, 
 
 To know the rest how sorely thou wouldst crave; 
 And thou shalt see what vehement desire 
 Possess’d me, soon as these had met my view, 
 To know their state. “O born in happy hour! 
 Thou, to whom grace vouchsafes, or e’er thy close 
 Of fleshly warfare, to behold the thrones 
 
 Of that eternal triumph; know, to us 
 
 The light communicated, which through heaven 
 Expatiates without bound. Therefore, if aught 
 Thou of our beams wouldst borrow for thine aid, 
 Spare not; and, of our radiance, take thy fill.” 
 
 Thus of those piteous spirits one bespake me; 
 And Beatrice next: “ Say on; and trust 
 As unto gods.” “ How in the light supreme 
 Thou harbor’st, and from thence the virtue bring’st, 
 
PARADISE 303 
 That, sparkling in thine eyes, denotes thy joy, 
 
 I mark; but, who thou art, am still to seek; 
 
 Or wherefore, worthy spirit! for thy lot 
 
 This sphere? assign’d, that oft from mortal ken 
 
 Is veil’d by other’s beams.” I said; and turn’d 
 Toward the lustre, that with greeting kind 
 
 Erewhile had hail’d me. Forthwith, brighter far 
 Than erst, it wax’d: and, as himself the sun 
 
 Hides through excess of light, when his warm gaze ® 
 Hath on the mantle of thick vapors prey’d; 
 
 Within its proper ray the saintly shape 
 
 Was, through increase of gladness, thus conceal’d; 
 And, shrouded so in splendor, answer’d me, 
 
 F’en as the tenor of my song declares. 
 
 CANTO VI 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The spirit, who had offered to satisfy the inquiries of 
 Dante, declares himself to be the EmperorJustinian; and after 
 speaking of his own actions, recounts the victories, before him, 
 obtained under the Roman Eagle. He then informs our Poet that 
 the soul of Romeo the pilgrim is in the same star. 
 
 FTER that Constantine the eagle turn’d 
 
 A Against the motions of the heaven, that roll’d 
 Consenting with its course, when he of yore, 
 
 Lavinia’s spouse, was leader of the flight; 
 
 A hundred years twice told and more,’ his seat 
 
 At Europe’s extreme point,’ the bird of Jove 
 
 Held, rear the mountains, whence he issued first; 
 
 There under shadow of his sacred plumes 
 
 Swaying the world, till through successive hands 
 
 ™* This sphere.” The planet Mer- course, when he passed from Troy to 
 cury, which being nearest to the sun, is Ita 
 
 oftenest hidden by that luminary. 
 
 8‘* When his warm gaze.”?” When the 
 sun has dried up the vapors, that shad- 
 ed his brightness. 
 
 1**After that Constantine the eagle 
 turn’d.” Constantine, in transferring 
 the seat of empire from Rome to By- 
 zantium, carried the eagle, the imperial 
 ensign, from the west to the east. 
 /Eneas, on the contrary, had, with bet- 
 ter augury, moved along with the sun’s 
 
 2°* A hundred years twice told and 
 more.’”” The Emperor Constantine en- 
 tered Byzantium in 324; and’ Justinian 
 began his reign in 527. 
 
 3“ At Europe’s extreme point.”? Con- 
 stantine being situated at the extreme 
 of Europe, and on the borders of Asia, 
 near those mountains in the neighbor- 
 hood of Troy, from whence the first 
 founders of Rome had emigrated. 
 
304 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 To mine he came devolved. Czsar I was; 
 
 And am Justinian; destined by the will 
 
 Of that prime love, whose influence I feel, 
 From vain excess to clear the incumber’d laws.* 
 Or e’er that work engaged me, I did hold 
 
 In Christ one nature only ;° with such faith 
 Contented. But the blessed Agapete,® 
 
 Who was chief shepherd, he with warning voice 
 
 To the true faith recall’d me. 
 
 I believed 
 
 His words: and what he taught, now plainly see, 
 As thou in every contradiction seest 
 
 The true and false opposed. Soon as my feet 
 Were to the church reclaim’d, to my great task, 
 By inspiration of God’s grace impell’d, 
 
 I gave me wholly; and consign’d mine arms 
 To Belisarius, with whom heaven’s right hand 
 Was link’d in such conjointment, ’twas a sign 
 
 That I should rest. 
 
 To thy first question thus 
 
 I shape mine answer, which were ended here, 
 
 But that its tendency doth prompt perforce 
 
 To some addition; that thou well mayst mark, 
 
 What reason on each side they have to plead, 
 
 By whom that holiest banner is withstood, 
 
 Both who pretend its power * and who oppose.® 
 “ Beginning from that hour, when Pallas died 
 
 To give it rule, behold the valorous deeds 
 
 Have made it worthy reverence. 
 
 Not unknown 
 
 To thee, how for three hundred years and more 
 
 It dwelt in Alba, up to those fell lists 
 
 Where, for its sake, were met the rival three; ° 
 
 Nor aught unknown to thee, which it achieved 
 Down ?° from the Sabines’ wrong to Lucrece’ woe; 
 With its seven kings conquering the nations round; 
 Nor all it wrought, by Roman worthies borne 
 
 #**To clear the incumber’d laws.” 
 The code of laws was abridged and re- 
 formed by Justinian. 
 
 5‘ Tn Christ one nature only.” Jus- 
 tinian is said to have been a follower of 
 heretical opinions held by Eutyches, 
 who taught that in Christ there was but 
 one nature, viz. that of the incarnate 
 word. 
 
 6“ Agapete.” Agapetus, Bishop of 
 Rome, whose ‘‘ Scheda Regia,’ ad- 
 
 dressed to the Emperor Justinian, pro- 
 cured him a place among the wisest and 
 most judicious writers of this century, 
 
 7 “Who pretend its power.” The Ghi- 
 
 bellines. 
 8 “* And who oppose.” The Guelfs. 
 The Horatii and 
 
 9“ The rival three.” 
 ‘From the rape of the 
 
 Curiatii. 
 10 ** Down.” 
 
 Sabine women to the violation of Lu- 
 
 cretia. 
 
PARADISE 
 
 395 
 
 ’Gainst Brennus and the Epirot prince,'! and hosts 
 Of single chiefs, or states in league combined 
 
 Of social warfare: hence, Torquatus stern, 
 
 And Quintius ** named of his neglected locks, 
 The Decii, and the Fabii hence acquired 
 
 Their fame, which I with duteous zeal embalm. 
 
 By it the pride of Arab hordes ** was quell’d, 
 When they, led on by Hannibal, o’erpass’d 
 
 The Alpine rocks, whence glide thy currents, Po! 
 Beneath its guidance, in their prime of days 
 Scipio and Pompey triumph’d; and that hill 14 
 Under whose summit *° thou didst see the light, 
 Rued its stern bearing. After, near the hour,'® 
 When heaven was minded that o’er all the world 
 His own deep calm should brood, to Cesar’s hand 
 Did Rome consign it; and what then it wrought?” 
 From Var unto the Rhine, saw Isere’s flood, 
 
 Saw Loire and Seine, and every vale, that fills 
 
 The torrent Rhone. 
 
 What after that it wrought, 
 
 When from Ravenna it came forth, and leap’d 
 The Rubicon, was of so bold a flight, 
 
 That tongue nor pen may follow it. 
 
 Toward Spain 
 
 It wheel’d its bands, then toward Dyrrachium smote, 
 And on Pharsalia, with so fierce a plunge, 
 
 E’en the warm Nile was conscious to the pang; 
 
 Its native shores Antandros, and the streams 
 
 Of Simois) revisited, and there 
 
 Where Hector lies; then ill for Ptolemy 
 
 His pennons shook again; lightening thence fell 
 On Juba, and the next, upon your west, 
 
 At sound of the Pompeian trump, return’d. 
 “What following, and in its next bearer’s gripe,1® 
 It wrought, is now by Cassius and Brutus 
 
 Bark’d of in Hell; and by Perugia’s sons, 
 
 1 The Epirot prince.” King Pyr- 
 rhus. 
 
 12“ Quintius.”” Quintius Cincinnatus. 
 
 18 “* Arab hordes.’ The Arabians seem 
 to be put for the barbarians in general. 
 
 14 That hill.’ The city of Fesule, 
 which was sacked by the Romans after 
 the defeat of Catiline. 
 
 15“ Under whose summit.” At the 
 foot of which is situated Florence, thy 
 birth-place.”’ 
 
 16 “* Near the hour.’”? Near the time of 
 our Saviour’s birth. 
 
 17 ** What then it wrought.” In the 
 following fifteen lines the Poet has com- 
 prised the exploits of Julius Cesar, for 
 which, and for the allusions in the great- 
 er part of this speech of Justinian’s, I 
 must refer my reader to the history of 
 Rome. 
 
 18 ** Tn its next bearer’s gripe.” With 
 Augustus Cesar. 
 
306 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 And Modena’s, was mourn’d. Hence weepeth still 
 Sad Cleopatra, who, pursued by it, 
 
 Took from the adder black and sudden death. 
 
 With him it ran e’en to the Red Sea coast; 
 
 With him composed the world to such a peace, 
 
 That of his temple Janus barr’d the door. 
 
 “ But all the mighty standard yet had wrought 
 And was appointed to perform thereafter, 
 Throughout the mortal kingdom which it sway’d, 
 Falls in appearance dwindled and obscured, 
 
 If one with steady eye and perfect thought 
 
 On the third Cesar ?® look; for to his hands, 
 The living Justice, in whose breath I move, 
 Committed glory, e’en into his hands, 
 
 To execute the vengeance of its wrath. 
 
 “Hear now, and wonder at, what next I tell. 
 After with Titus it was sent to wreak 
 Vengeance for vengeance of the ancient sin. 
 And, when the Lombard tooth, with fang impure, 
 Did gore the bosom of the holy church, 
 
 Under its wings, victorious Charlemain ?° 
 
 Sped to her rescue. 
 
 Judge then for thyself 
 
 Of those, whom I erewhile accused to thee, 
 
 What they are, and how grievous their offending, 
 Who are the cause of all your ills. The one #4 
 Against the universal ensign rears 
 
 The yellow lilies ; 2? and with partial aim, 
 
 That, to himself, the other ** arrogates: 
 
 So that ’tis hard to see who most offends. 
 
 Be yours, ye Ghibellines, to veil your hearts 
 Beneath another standard: ill is this 
 
 Follow’d of him, who severs it and justice: 
 
 And let not with his Guelfs the new-crown’d Charles 24 
 
 19‘* The third Cesar.”” The eagle in 
 the hand of Tiberius, the third of the 
 Cesars, outdid all its achievements, both 
 past and future, by becoming the instru- 
 ment of that mighty and mysterious act 
 of satisfaction made to the divine justice 
 in the crucifixion of our Lord. 
 
 20 “* Charlemain.”” Dante could not be 
 ignorant that the reign of Justinian was 
 long prior to that of Charlemain; but 
 the spirit of the former Emperor is rep- 
 resented, both in this instance and in 
 what follows, as conscious of the events 
 that had taken place after his own time. 
 
 21° The one.” The Guelf party. 
 
 22“*The yellow lilies.” The French 
 ensign. 
 
 23 “The other.””_ The Ghibelline party. 
 
 *4“* Charles.” The commentators ex- 
 pera this to mean Charles II, King of 
 
 aples and Sicily. Is it not more likely 
 to allude to Charles of Valois, son of 
 Philip III of France, who was sent for, 
 about this time, into Italy by Pope Bon- 
 iface, with the promise of being made 
 aed tibte See G, Villani, lib. viii. cap. 
 xlii. 
 
PARADISE 
 
 Assail it; but those talons hold in dread, 
 
 397 
 
 Which from a lion of more lofty port 
 Have rent the casing. Many a time ere now 
 The sons have for the sire’s transgression wail’d: 
 Nor let him trust the fond belief, that heaven 
 Will truck its armor for his lilied shield. 
 
 “This little star is furnish’d with good spirits, 
 Whose mortal lives were busied to that end, 
 That honor and renown might wait on them: 
 And, when desires *° thus err in their intention, 
 True love must needs ascend with slacker beam. 
 But it is part of our delight, to measure 
 Our wages with the merit; and admire 
 
 The close proportion. 
 
 Hence doth heavenly justice 
 
 Temper so evenly affection in us, 
 
 It ne’er can warp to any wrongfulness. 
 
 Of diverse voices is sweet music made: 
 
 So in our life the different degrees 
 
 Render sweet harmony among these wheels. 
 “Within the pearl, that now encloseth us, 
 
 Shines Romeo’s light,?* whose goodly deed and fair 
 
 Met ill acceptance. But the Provengals, 
 
 That were his foes, have little cause for mirth. 
 
 Il] shapes that man his course, who makes his wrong 
 
 Of other’s worth. Four daughters 2” were there born 
 
 To Raymond Berenger;?* and every one 
 
 Became a queen: and this for him did Romeo, 
 
 Though of mean state and from a foreign land. 
 
 Yet envious tongues incited him to ask 
 
 A reckoning of that just one, who return’d 
 
 Twelve-fold to him for ten. Aged and poor 
 
 25 ‘© When desires.”? When honor and 
 fame are the chief motives to action, 
 that love, which has Heaven for its ob- 
 ject, must. necessarily become less fer- 
 
 ent. 
 
 26 ‘* Romeo de Villanova.” After he 
 had long been faithful steward to Ray- 
 mond, Count of Provence, when an ac- 
 count was required from him of the 
 revenues which he had carefully hus- 
 banded, and his master as lavishly dis- 
 bursed, he demanded the little mule, 
 the staff, and the scrip, with which he 
 had first entered into the Count’s ser- 
 vice, a stranger pilgrim from the shrine 
 
 of St. James, in Galicia, and parted as 
 he came; nor was it ever known whence 
 he was, or whither he went. 
 
 27 Wour daughters.” Of the four 
 daughters of Raymond Berenger, Mar- 
 garet, the eldest, was married to Louis 
 
 of France; Eleanor, the next, to 
 Henry III of England; Sancha, the 
 third, to Richard, Henry’s brother, and 
 King of the Romans; and the youngest, 
 Beatrix, to Charles I, King of Naples 
 and Sicily, and brother to Louis. 
 
 28 “ Raymond Berenger.” This prince, 
 the last of the house of Barcelona, who 
 was Count of Provence, died in 1245. 
 
308 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 He parted thence: and if the world did know 
 The heart he had, begging his life by morsels, 
 ’Twould deem the praise, it yields him, scantly dealt.” 
 
 CANTO VII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—In consequence of what had been said by Justinian, who- 
 together with the other spirits has now disappeared, some doubts 
 arise in the mind of Dante respecting the human redemption. These 
 difficulties are fully explained by Beatrice. 
 
 OSANNA!? Sanctus Deus Sabaoth, 
 
 H Superillustrans claritate tua 
 Felices ignes horum malahoth.” 
 Thus chanting saw I turn that substance bright,? 
 With fourfold lustre to its orb again, 
 Revolving; and the rest, unto their dance, 
 With it, moved also; and, like swiftest sparks, 
 In sudden distance from my sight were veil’d. 
 Me doubt possess’d; and “ Speak,” it whisper’d me, 
 
 “ Speak, speak unto thy lady; that she quench 
 Thy thirst with drops of sweetness.” Yet blank awe, 
 Which lords it o’er me, even at the sound 
 Of Beatrice’s name, did bow me down 
 As one in slumber held. Not long that mood 
 Beatrice suffer’d: she, with such a smile, 
 As might have made one blest amid the flames,’ 
 Beaming upon me, thus her words began: 
 “Thou in thy thought art pondering (as I deem, 
 And what I deem is truth,) how just revenge 
 Could be with justice punish’d: from which doubt 
 I soon will free thee; so thou mark my words; 
 For they of weighty matter shall possess thee. 
 Through suffering not a curb upon the power 
 That will’d in him, to his own profiting, 
 That man, who was unborn,* condemn’d himself; 
 
 1‘ Hosanna.” “ Hosanna holy God amid the flames. ”” So Giusto de’ Conti, 
 of Sabaoth, abundantly Sea with ** Bella. Mano ” : 
 thy brightness the blessed fires of these “ Qual salamandra.” 
 kingdoms.”’ Che ,puommi nelle fiamme far beato. 
 
 2“ That substance bright.” Justinian. ‘That man, who was un ” 
 8“ As might have made one blest Adebe born, ; 
 
PARADISE 
 
 399 
 
 And, in himself, all, who since him have lived, 
 His offspring: whence, below, the human kind 
 Lay sick in grievous error many an age; 
 
 Until is pleased the Word of God to come 
 Amongst them down, to his own person joining 
 The nature from its Maker far estranged, 
 
 By the mere act of his eternal love. 
 
 Contemplate here the wonder I unfold. 
 
 The nature with its Maker thus conjoin’d, 
 Created first was blameless, pure and good; 
 
 But, through itself alone, was driven forth 
 
 From Paradise, because it had eschew’d 
 
 The way of truth and life, to evil turn’d. 
 
 Ne’er then was penalty so just as that 
 
 Inflicted by the cross, if thou regard 
 
 The nature in assumption doom’d; ne’er wrong 
 So great, in reference to him, who took 
 
 Such nature on him, and endured the doom. 
 
 So different effects® flow’d from one act: 
 
 For by one death God and the Jews were pleased; 
 And heaven was open’d, though the earth did quake. 
 Count it not hard henceforth, when thou dost hear 
 That a just vengeance® was, by righteous court, 
 Justly revenged. But yet I see thy mind, 
 
 By thought on thought arising, sore perplex’d; 
 And, with how vehement desire, it asks 
 
 Solution of the maze. 
 
 What I have heard, 
 
 Is plain, thou say’st: but wherefore God this way 
 - For our redemption chose, eludes my search. 
 “ Brother! no eye of man not perfected, 
 Nor fully ripen’d in the flame of love, 
 
 May fathom this decree. 
 
 It is a mark, 
 
 In sooth, much aim’d at, and but little kenn’d: 
 And I will therefore show thee why such way 
 
 Was worthiest. 
 
 5 ‘* Different effects.”” The death of 
 Christ was pleasing to God, inasmuch 
 as it satisfied the divine justice; and to 
 the Jews, because it gratified their mal- 
 ignity; and while Heaven opened for 
 joy at the ransom of man, the earth 
 trembled. through compassion for its 
 Maker. 
 
 The celestial love, that spurns 
 
 6“ A just vengeance.”? The punish- 
 ment of Christ by the Jews, although 
 just as far as regarded the human _nat- 
 ure assumed by him, and so a right- 
 eous vengeance of sin, yet being unjust 
 as it regarded the divine nature, was 
 itself justly revenged on the Jews by 
 the destruction of Jerusalem. 
 
310 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 All envying in its bounty, in itself 
 
 With such effulgence blazeth, as sends forth 
 
 All beauteous things eternal. What distils 
 Immediate thence, no end of being knows; 
 Bearing its seal immutably imprest. 
 
 Whatever thence immediate falls, is free, 
 
 Free wholly, uncontrollable by power 
 
 Of each thing new: by such conformity 
 
 More grateful to its author, whose bright beams, 
 Though all partake their shining, yet in those 
 Are liveliest, which resemble him the most. 
 These tokens of pre-eminence? on man 
 
 Largely bestow’d, if any of them fail, 
 
 He needs must forfeit his nobility, 
 
 No longer stainless. Sin alone is that, 
 
 Which doth disfranchise him, and make unlike 
 To the chief good; for that its light in him 
 
 Is darken’d. And to dignity thus lost 
 
 Is no return; unless, where guilt makes void, 
 
 He for ill-pleasure pay with equal pain. 
 
 Your nature, which entirely in its seed 
 Transgress’d, from these distinctions fell, no less 
 Than from its state in Paradise; nor means 
 Found of recovery (search all methods out 
 
 As strictly as thou may) save one of these, 
 
 The only fords were left through which to wade: 
 Either, that God had of his courtesy 
 
 Released him merely; or else, man himself 
 
 For his own folly by himself atoned. 
 
 “Fix now thine eye, intently as thou canst, 
 On the everlasting counsel; and explore, 
 Instructed by my words, the dread abyss. 
 
 “Man in himself had ever lack’d the means 
 Of satisfaction, for he could not stoop 
 Obeying, in humility so low, 
 
 As high, he, disobeying, thought to soar: 
 And, for this reason, he had vainly tried, 
 Out of his own sufficiency, to pay 
 7‘ These tokens of pre-eminence.” secondary causes, and consequent simili- 
 
 The before-mentioned gifts of immedi- tude and agreeableness to the Divine 
 ate creation by God, independence on Being, all at first conferred on man. 
 
PARADISE 
 
 313 
 
 The rigid satisfaction. Then behoved 
 
 That God should by his own ways lead him back 
 Unto the life, from whence he fell, restored: 
 By both his ways, I mean, or one alone.® 
 But since the deed is ever prized the more, 
 The more the doer’s good intent appears; 
 Goodness celestial, whose broad signature 
 Is on the universe, of all its ways 
 
 To raise ye up, was fain to leave out none. 
 Nor aught so vast or so magnificent, 
 
 Hither for him who gave or who received, 
 Between the last night and the primal day, 
 
 Was or can be. 
 
 For God more bounty show’d, 
 
 Giving himself to make man capable 
 
 Of his return to life, than had the terms 
 Been mere and unconditional release. 
 
 And for his justice, every method else 
 Were all too scant, had not the Son of God 
 Humbled himself to put on mortal flesh. 
 
 * Now, to content thee fully, I revert; 
 And further in some part® unfold my speech, 
 That thou mayst see it clearly as myself. 
 
 “TI see, thou sayst, the air, the fire I see, 
 The earth and water, and all things of them 
 Compounded, to corruption turn, and soon 
 
 Dissolve. 
 
 Yet these were also things create 
 
 Because, if what were told me, had been true, 
 
 They from corruption had been therefore free. 
 “The angels, O my brother! and this clime 
 
 Wherein thou art, impassable and pure, 
 
 I call created, even as they are 
 
 In their whole being. But the elements, 
 
 Which thou hast named, and what of them is made, 
 
 Are by created virtue inform’d: create, 
 
 8‘* By both his ways, I mean, or one 
 alone.”” Either by mercy and justice 
 united, or by mercy alone. 
 
 ®‘* Tn some part.’’ She reverts to that 
 part of her discourse where she had 
 said that what proceeds immediatel 
 from God “no end of being knows.” 
 She then proceeds to tell him that the 
 
 elements, which, though he knew them © 
 
 to be created, he yet saw dissolved, re- 
 ceived their form not immediately from 
 
 God, but from a virtue or power created 
 by God; that the soul of brutes and 
 lants is in like manner drawn forth 
 y the stars with a combination of those 
 elements meetly tempered, ‘‘ di comples- 
 sion potenziata”; but that the angels 
 and the heavens may be said to be 
 created in that very manner in which 
 they exist, without any intervention of 
 agency. 
 
312 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Their substance; and create, the informing virtue 
 In these bright stars, that round them circling move. 
 The soul of every brute and of each plant, 
 The ray and motion of the sacred lights, 
 Draw from complexion with meet power endued. 
 But this our life the eternal good inspires 
 Immediate, and enamors of itself; 
 So that our wishes rest forever here. 
 
 “And hence thou mayst by inference conclude 
 Our resurrection certain, if thy mind 
 Consider how the human flesh was framed, 
 When both our parents at the first were made.” 
 
 CANTO VIII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The Poet ascends with Beatrice to the third Heaven, which 
 is the planet Venus; and here finds the soul of Charles Martel, King 
 of Hungary, who had been Dante’s friend on earth, and who now, 
 after speaking of the realms to which he was heir, unfolds the cause 
 why children differ in disposition from their parents. 
 
 HE world? was, in its day of peril dark, 
 Wont to believe the dotage of fond love, 
 From the fair Cyprian deity, who rolls 
 In her third epicycle, shed on men 
 By stream of potent radiance: therefore they 
 Of elder time, in their old error blind, 
 Not her alone with sacrifice adored 
 And invocation, but like honors paid 
 To Cupid and Dione, deem’d of them 
 Her mother, and her son, him whom they feign’d 
 To sit in Dido’s bosom: and from her, 
 Whom I have sung preluding, borrow’d they 
 The appellation of that star, which views 
 Now obvious, and now averse, the sun. 
 I was not ware that I was wafted up 
 1“ The world.” The Poet, on his ar- under the name of Venus, they paid 
 rival at the third Heaven, tells us that divine honors; as they worshipped the 
 the world, in its days of heathen dark- supposed mother and son of Venus, un- 
 
 ness, believed the influence of sensual der the names of Dione and Cupid. 
 love to proceed from the star, to which, 
 
 he tel 
 
PARADISE 313 
 
 Into its orb; but the new loveliness, 
 That graced my lady, gave me ample proof 
 That we had enter’d there. And as in flame 
 A sparkle is distinct, or voice in voice 
 Discern’d, when one its even tenor keeps, 
 The other comes and goes; so in that light 
 I other luminaries saw, that coursed 
 In circling motion, rapid more or less, 
 As their eternal vision each impels. 
 Never was blast from vapor charged with cold, 
 Whether invisible to eye or no, 
 Descended with such speed, it had not seem’d 
 To linger in dull tardiness, compared 
 To those celestial lights, that toward us came, 
 Leaving the circuit of their joyous ring, 
 Conducted by the lofty seraphim. 
 And after them, who in the van appear’d, 
 Such an Hosanna sounded as hath left 
 Desire, ne’er since extinct in me, to hear 
 Renew’d the strain. Then, parting from the rest, 
 One near us drew, and sole began: “ We all 
 Are ready at thy pleasure, well disposed 
 To do thee gentle service. We are they 
 To whom thou in the world erewhile didst sing; 
 ‘O ye! whose intellectual ministry 
 Moves the third heaven:’ and in one orb we roll, 
 One motion, one impulse, with those who rule 
 Princedoms in heaven; yet are of love so full, 
 That to please thee ’twill be as sweet to rest.” 
 After mine eyes had with meek reverence 
 Sought the celestial guide, and were by her 
 Assured, they turn’d again unto the light, 
 Who had so largely promised; and with voice 
 That bare the lively pressure of my zeal, 
 “Tell who ye are,’ I cried. Forthwith it grew 
 In size and splendor, through augmented joy; 
 And thus it answer’d: “ A short date, below, 
 The world possess’d me. Had the time been more,? 
 2‘*Had the time been more.” The Charles II, King of Naples and Sieire 
 
 spirit now speaking is Charles Martel, to which dominions, dying in his fat 
 crowned King of Hungary, and son of _ er’s lifetime, he did not succeed. The 
 
314 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Much evil, that will come, had never chanced. 
 
 My gladness hides thee from me, which doth shine 
 Around, and shroud me, as an animal 
 
 In its own silk enswathed. Thou lovedst me well,’ 
 And hadst good cause; for had my sojourning 
 
 Been longer on the earth, the love I bare thee 
 
 Had put forth more than blossoms. 
 
 The left bank,* 
 
 That Rhone, when he hath mix’d with Sorga, laves, 
 In me its lord expected, and that horn 
 
 Of fair Ausonia,® with its boroughs old, 
 
 Bari, and Croton, and Gaeta piled, 
 
 From where the Trento disembogues his waves, 
 With Verde mingled, to the salt-sea flood. 
 
 Already on my temples beam’d the crown, 
 
 Which gave me sovereignty over the land® 
 
 By Danube wash’d, whenas he strays beyond 
 
 The limits of his German shores. 
 
 The realm, 
 
 Where, on the gulf by stormy Eurus lash’d, 
 
 Betwixt Pelorus and Pachynian heights, 
 
 The beautiful Trinacria’ lies in gloom 
 
 (Not through Typhoéus,® but the vapory cloud 
 
 Bituminous upsteam’d), that too did look 
 
 To have its sceptre wielded by a race 
 
 Of monarchs, sprung through me from Charles and Rodolph,® 
 Had not ill-lording,!° which doth desperate make 
 
 The people ever, in Palermo raised 
 
 evil, that would have been prevented by 
 the longer life of Charles Martel, was 
 that resistance which his brother Rob- 
 ert, King of Sicily, who succeeded him, 
 made to the Emperor Henry VII. 
 
 ’“ Thou lovedst me well.” Charles 
 Martel might have been known to our 
 Poet at Florence, whither he came to 
 meet his father in 1295, the year of his 
 death. The retinue and the habiliments 
 of the young monarch are minutely de- 
 scribed by G. Villani, who adds that 
 ‘‘ he remained more than twenty days in 
 Florence, waiting for his father, King 
 Charles, and his brothers; during which 
 time great honor was done him by the 
 Florentines, and he showed no less love 
 toward them, and he was much in favor 
 with all.”” Lib. vii. cap. xiii. His broth- 
 er Robert, King of Naples, was the 
 friend of Petrarch. 
 
 4“ The left bank.’”? Provence. 
 
 5 “« ___ That. horn 
 
 Of fair Ausonia.” 
 
 The Kingdom of Naples. 
 
 6“ The land.” Hungary. . , 
 
 7**The beautiful Trinacria.” Sicily; 
 so called from its three promontories, 
 of which Pachynus and Pelorus, here 
 mentioned, are two. 
 
 8“ Typhoéus.” The giant, whom Ju- 
 piter is fabled to have overwhelmed un- 
 der the mountain /Etna, from whence 
 he vomited forth smoke and flame. 
 
 ®“ Sprung through me from Charles 
 and Rodolph.” Sicily would be still 
 ruled by a race of monarchs, descended 
 through me from Charles I and Ro- 
 dolph I, the former my grandfather, 
 King of Naples and Sicily; the latter, 
 Emperor of Germany, my father-in-law; 
 both celebrated in the ‘‘ Purgatory,” 
 Canto vii. : 
 
 10‘ Had not ill-lording.” If the ill- 
 conduct of our governors in Sicily had 
 not excited the resentment and hatred 
 of the people, and stimulated them to 
 that dreadful massacre at the Sicilian 
 vespers; in consequence of which the 
 kingdom fell into the hands of Peter IIT 
 of Arragon, in 1282. 
 
 99 
 
PARADISE 
 
 315. 
 
 The shout of ‘death,’ re-echoed loud and long. 
 Had but my brother’s foresight 14 kenn’d as much, 
 He had been warier, that the greedy want 
 Of Catalonia might not work his bale. 
 And truly need there is that he forecast, 
 Or other for him, lest more freight be laid 
 On his already over-laden bark. 
 Nature in him, from bounty fallen to thrift, 
 Would ask the guard of braver arms, than such 
 As only care to have their coffers fill’d.” 
 
 “My liege! it doth enhance the joy thy words 
 Infuse into me, mighty as it is, 
 To think my gladness manifest to thee, 
 As to myself, who own it, when thou look’st 
 Into the source and limit of all good, 
 There, where thou markest that which thou dost speak, 
 
 Thence prized of me the more. 
 
 Glad thou hast made me: 
 
 Now make intelligent, clearing the doubt 
 
 Thy speech hath raised in me; for much I muse, 
 How bitter can spring up,!? when sweet is sown.” 
 
 I thus inquiring; he forthwith replied: 
 
 “If I have power to show one truth, soon that 
 
 Shall face thee, which thy questioning declares 
 Behind thee now conceal’d. The Good, that guides 
 And blessed makes this realm which thou dost mount, 
 Ordains its providence to be the virtue 
 
 In these great bodies: nor the natures only 
 
 The all-perfect mind provides for, but with them 
 
 11** My brother’s foresight.’’ He seems 
 to tax his brother Robert with employ- 
 ing necessitous and greedy Catalonians 
 to administer the affairs of his king- 
 
 om. 
 
 12“ How bitter can spring up.” ‘‘ How 
 a covetous son can spring from a lib- 
 eral father.”” Yet that father has himself 
 been accused of avarice in the ‘‘ Purga- 
 tory,’’ Canto xx. 78; though his general 
 character was that of a _ bounteous 
 prince, 
 
 13° The Good.”? The Supreme Being 
 uses these spheres as the intelligent in- 
 struments of his providence in the con- 
 duct of terrestrial natures; so that these 
 natures cannot but be conducted aright, 
 unless these heavenly bodies ‘should 
 themselves fail from not having been 
 made perfect at first, or the Creator of 
 them should fail. To this Dante re- 
 
 plies that Nature, he is satisfied, thus 
 directed must do her part. Charles Mar- 
 tel then reminds him that he had 
 learned from Aristotle that human so- 
 ciety requires a variety of conditions, 
 and consequently a variety of qualifica- 
 tions in its members. Accordingly, men, 
 he concludes, are born with different 
 owers and capacities, caused by the 
 influence of the heavenly bodies at the 
 time of their nativity; on which influ- 
 ence, and not on their parents, those 
 powers and capacities depend. Having 
 thus resolved the question proposed, 
 Charles Martel adds, by way of cor- 
 rollary, that the want of observing 
 their natural bent in the destination of 
 men to their several offices in life, is 
 the occasion of much of the disorder 
 that prevails in the world. 
 
316 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 That which preserves them too; for naught, that lies 
 Within the range of that unerring bow, 
 
 But is as level with the destined aim, 
 
 As ever mark to arrow’s point opposed. 
 
 Were it not thus, these heavens, thou dost visit, 
 Would their effect so work, it would not be 
 
 Art, but destruction; and this may not chance, 
 
 If the intellectual powers, that move these stars, 
 Fail not, and who, first faulty made them, fail. 
 Wilt thou this truth more clearly evidenced?” 
 
 To whom I thus: 
 
 “Tt is enough: no fear 
 
 I see, lest nature in her part should tire.” 
 
 He straight rejoin’d: 
 
 “Say, were it worse for man, 
 
 If he lived not in fellowship on earth?” 
 
 “Yea,” answerd. £34) 
 
 nor here a reason needs.” 
 
 “And may that be, if different estates 
 Grow not of different duties in your life? 
 Consult your teacher,'* and he tells you ‘ no.’” 
 
 Thus did he come, deducing to this point, 
 
 And then concluded: 
 
 “ For this cause behoves, 
 
 The roots, from whence your operations come, 
 
 Must differ. 
 
 Therefore one is Solon born; 
 
 Another, Xerxes; and Melchisedec 
 A third; and he a fourth, whose airy voyage 
 
 Cost him his son.*5 
 
 In her circuitous course, 
 
 Nature, that is the seal to mortal wax, 
 
 Doth well her art, but no distinction owns 
 *Twixt one or other household. Hence befalls 
 That Esau is so wide of Jacob: hence 
 Quirinus 1° of so base a father springs, 
 
 He dates from Mars his lineage. 
 
 Were it not 
 
 That Providence celestial overruled, 
 Nature, in generation, must the path 
 Traced by the generator still pursue 
 
 14 “6 Consult your teacher.” Aristotle, 
 
 * De, Rep.” lib. iii, cap.. 4: .Sincea 
 State is made up of members differing 
 from one another (for even as an ani- 
 mal, in the first instance, consists of 
 soul and body; and the soul, of reason 
 and desire; and a family, of man and 
 woman; and property, of master and 
 slave; in like manner a state consists 
 both of all these, and besides these of 
 
 other dissimilar kinds); it ndeerarity 
 follows that the excellence of all the 
 members of the State cannot be one 
 and the. same. ‘: 
 ‘—— whose airy voyage 
 Cost him his son.’ 
 
 Dedalus. 
 
 16 ** Ouirinus.”” Romulus, born of so 
 obscure a father that his narentage was 
 attributed to Mars. 
 
PARADISE 317 
 
 Unswervingly. Thus place I in thy sight 
 
 - That, which was late behind thee. But, in sign 
 Of more affection for thee, ’tis my will 
 Thou wear this corollary. Nature ever, 
 Finding discordant fortune, like all seed 
 Out of its proper climate, thrives but ill. 
 And were the world below content to mark 
 And work on the foundation nature lays, 
 I would not lack supply of excellence. 
 But ye perversely to religion strain 
 Him, who was born to gird on him the sword, 
 And of the fluent phraseman make your king: 
 Therefore your steps have wander’d from the path.” 
 
 CANTO Ix 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The next spirit who converses with our Poet in the planet 
 Venus, is the amorous Cunizza. To her succeeds Folco, or Folques, 
 the Provengal bard, who declares that the soul of Rahab the harlot 
 is there also; and then, blaming the Pope for his neglect of the Holy 
 Land, prognosticates some reverse to the papal power. 
 
 FTER solution of my doubt, thy Charles, 
 A O fair Clemenza,* of the treachery? spake, 
 That must befall his seed; but, ‘ Tell it not,’ 
 
 Said he, “and let the destined years come round.” 
 Nor may I tell thee more, save that the meed 
 Of sorrow well-deserved shall quit your wrongs. 
 
 And now the visage of that saintly light 
 Was to the sun, that fills it, turn’d again, 
 As to the good, whose plenitude of bliss 
 Sufficeth all. O ye misguided souls! 
 Infatuate, who from such a good estrange 
 Your hearts, and bend your gaze on vanity, 
 Alas for you!—And lo! toward me, next, 
 Another of those splendent forms approach’d 
 That, by its outward brightening, testified 
 
 2“ Q© fair Clemenza.’’ Daughter of by Robert, in exclusion of his brother’s 
 Charles Martel, and second wife of son Carobert, or Charles Robert, the 
 Louis X of France. rightful heir. 
 
 *“ The treachery.”” He alludes to the *3 That saintly light.” Charles Mare 
 occupation of the Kingdom of Sicily tel. 
 
338 
 
 The will it had to pleasure me. 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 The eyes 
 
 Of Beatrice, resting, as before, 
 Firmly upon me, manifested forth 
 
 Approval of my wish. 
 
 “ And QO,” I cried, 
 
 “ Blest spirit! quickly be my will perform’d; 
 And prove thou to me,* that my inmost thoughts 
 
 I can reflect on thee.” 
 
 Thereat the light, 
 
 That yet was new to me, from the recess, 
 Where it before was singing, thus began, 
 
 As one who joys in kindness: 
 
 “In that part® 
 
 Of the depraved Italian land, which lies 
 Between Rialto and the fountain-springs 
 
 Of Brenta and of Piava, there doth rise, 
 
 But to no lofty eminence, a hill, 
 
 From whence erewhile a firebrand did descend, 
 
 That sorely shent the region. 
 
 From one root 
 
 I and it sprung; my name on earth Cunizza:® 
 And here I glitter, for that by its light 
 
 \This star o’ercame me. 
 
 Yet I naught repine," 
 or grudge myself the cause of this my lot: 
 hich haply vulgar hearts can scarce conceive. 
 “ This® jewel, that is next me in our Heaven, 
 
 Lustrous and costly, great renown hath left, 
 And not to perish, ere these hundred years 
 
 Five times® absolve their round. Consider thou, 
 If to excel be worthy man’s endeavor, 
 
 When such life may attend the first.1° 
 
 4“Prove thou to me.” The thoughts 
 of all created minds being seen by the 
 Deity, and all that is in the Deity being 
 the object of vision to beatified spirits, 
 such spirits must consequently see the 
 thoughts of all created minds. Dante, 
 therefore, requests of the spirit, who 
 now approaches him, a proof of this 
 truth with regard to his own thoughts. 
 See v. 70. 
 
 5“ Tn that part.’”’ Between Rialto in 
 the Venetian territory, and the sources 
 of the rivers Brenta and Piava, is situ- 
 ated a castle called Romano, the birth- 
 place of the famous tyrant Ezzolino or 
 Azzolino, the brother of Cunizza, who 
 is now speaking. The tyrant we have 
 seen in “the river of blood,” “ Hell,” 
 Canto xii. v. 110. 
 
 8 “ Cynizza.”’ The adventures of Cu- 
 nizza, overcome by the influence of her 
 star, are related by the chronicler Ro- 
 landino, of Padua. She eloped from 
 her first husband, Richard of St. Boni- 
 face, in the company of Sordello, with 
 
 ° 
 
 Yet they 
 
 whom she is supposed to have cohabited 
 before her marriage: then lived with a 
 soldier of Trevigi, whose wife was liv- 
 ing at the same time in the same city; 
 and 'on his being murdered by her 
 brother the tyrant, was by her brother 
 married to a nobleman of Braganzo: 
 lastly, when he also had fallen by the 
 same hand, she, after her  brother’s 
 death, was again wedded in Verona. 
 
 7 Yet I nought repine.” am not 
 dissatisfied that I am not allotted a 
 higher place.” 
 
 8“ This.”” Folco of Genoa, a cele- 
 Provencal poet, commonly 
 termed Folques of Marseilles, of which 
 place he was perhaps bishop. 
 
 ®“* Five times.” The 500 years are 
 elapsed. 
 
 10“ When such life may attend the 
 first.” When the mortal life of man 
 may be attended be so lasting and gio- 
 rious a memory, which is a kind of sec- 
 ond life. 
 
PARADISE 
 
 319 
 
 Care not for this, the crowd" that now are girt 
 
 By Adice and Tagliamento, still 
 
 Impenitent, though scourged. The hour is near}? 
 
 When for their stubbornness, at Padua’s marsh 
 
 The water shall be changed, that laves Vicenza. 
 
 And where Cagnano meets with Sile, one 
 
 Lords it, and bears his head aloft, for whom 
 
 The web** is now a-warping. Feltro*® too 
 
 Shall sorrow for its godless shepherd’s fault, 
 
 Of so deep stain, that never, for the like, 
 
 Was Malta’s*?® bar unclosed. ‘Too large should be 
 
 The skillet?” that would hold Ferrara’s blood, 
 
 And wearied he, who ounce by ounce would weigh it, 
 
 The which this priest,?® in show of party-zeal, 
 
 Courteous will give; nor will the gift ill suit 
 
 The country’s custom. We descry above 
 
 Mirrors, ye call them thrones, from which to us 
 
 Reflected shine the judgments of our God: 
 
 Whence these our sayings we avouch for good.” 
 She ended; and appear’d on other thoughts 
 
 Intent, re-entering on the wheel she late 
 
 Had left. 
 
 That other joyance meanwhile wax’d 
 
 A thing to marvel at, in splendor glowing, 
 
 Like choicest ruby stricken by the sun. 
 
 For, in that upper clime, effulgence?® comes 
 
 Of gladness, as here laughter: and below, 
 
 As the mind saddens, murkier grows the shade. 
 
 1“ The crowd.” The people who in- 
 habited the tract of country bounded 
 by the river Tagliamento to the east and 
 Adice to the west. 
 
 12“ The hour is near.”’ Cunizza fore- 
 tells the defeat of Giacopo da Carrara 
 and the Paduans, by Can Grande, at Vi- 
 cenza, on September 18, 1314. 
 
 18 “* One.”’ She predicts also the fate 
 of Riccardo da Camino, who is said to 
 have been murdered at Trevigi (where 
 the rivers Sile and Cagnano meet), while 
 he was engaged in playing at chess. 
 
 14 “ The web.” The net, or snare, in- 
 to which he is destined to fall. 
 
 15“ Feltro.” The Bishop of Feltro 
 having received a number of fugitives 
 from Ferrara, who were in opposition 
 to the Pope, under a promise of pro- 
 tection, afterward gave them up; so that 
 they were reconducted to that city, and 
 the greater part of them there put to 
 
 eath. 
 
 16 “* Matlta’s.”” 
 
 A tower, either in 
 
 the citadel of Padua, which, under the 
 tyranny of Ezzolino, had been “ with 
 many a foul and midnight murder fed”’; 
 or (as some say) near a river of the 
 same name, that falls into the Lake of 
 Bolsena, in which the Pope was accus- 
 tomed to imprison such as had been 
 guilty of an irremissible sin. 
 
 Ww“ The skillet.” The blood shed 
 could not be contained in such a vessel, 
 if it were of the usual size. 
 
 18 “ This priest.’? The bishop, who, 
 to show himself a zealous partisan of 
 the Pope, had committed the above- 
 mentioned act of treachery. The com- 
 mentators are not agreed as to the name 
 of this faithless prelate. Troya calls 
 him Alessandra Novello, and relates the 
 circumstances at full. 
 
 19 “ Effulgence.”? As joy is expressed 
 by laughter on earth, so is it by an in- 
 crease of splendor in Paradise; and, on 
 the contrary, grief is betokened in Hell 
 by augmented darkness. 
 
320 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 “God seeth all: and in him is thy sight,” 
 
 Said [, “ blest spirit! 
 
 Therefore will of his 
 
 Cannot to thee be dark. Why then delays 
 
 Thy voice to satisfy my wish untold; 
 
 That voice, which joins the inexpressive song, 
 
 Pastime of Heaven, the which those ardors sing, 
 
 That cowl them with six shadowing wings*® outspread? 
 I would not wait thy asking, wert thou known 
 
 To me, as thoroughly I to thee am known.” 
 
 He, forthwith answering, thus his words began: 
 “The valley of waters,?4 widest next to that?? 
 Which doth the earth engarland, shapes its course, 
 Between discordant shores,”* against the sun 
 Inward so far, it makes meridian** there, 
 
 Where was before the horizon. 
 
 Of that vale 
 
 Dwelt I upon the shore, ’twixt Ebro’s stream 
 And Macra’s,?® that divides with passage brief 
 
 Genoan bounds from Tuscan. 
 
 East and west 
 
 Are nearly one to Begga”® and my land 
 
 Whose haven?’ erst was with its own blood warm. 
 Who knew my name, were wont to call me Folco; 
 And I did bear impression of this heaven,?® 
 
 That now bears mine: for not with fiercer flame 
 Glow’d Belus’ daughter,?® injuring alike 
 
 Sichzeus and Creusa, than did I, 
 
 Long as it suited the unripen’d down 
 
 That fledged my cheek; nor she of Rhodope,*° 
 That was beguiled of Demophoon ; 
 
 Nor Jove’s son,*4 when the charms of Iole 
 
 Were shrined within his heart. 
 
 And yet: there bides 
 
 No sorrowful repentance here, but mirth, 
 
 ** Above 
 
 20 “* Six shadowing wings.” 
 each one had 
 
 it stood the seraphims: 
 six wings.’’—Isaiah, vi. 2. 
 
 21 ** The valley 
 Mediterranean Sea. 
 
 22 ** That.” The great ocean. 
 
 23 ** Discordant shores.’’ Europe and 
 Africa. 
 
 24‘ Meridian.” Extending to the east, 
 the Mediterranean at last reaches the 
 coast of Palestine, which is on its hor- 
 izon when it enters the Straits of Gib- 
 raltar. 
 
 25 *¢ ___ "twixt Ebro’ s stream 
 
 And Macra’s.’ 
 Ebro, a river to the west, and Macra, 
 
 of waters.” The. 
 
 a river to the east of Genoa where Folco 
 was born; others think that Marseilles, 
 and not Genoa, is here described; and 
 then Ebro must be understood of the 
 river in Spain. 
 
 26 “ Begga.’”? A place in Africa. 
 
 27 ** Whose haven.” Alluding to the 
 terrible slaughter of the Genoese made 
 by the Saracens in 936. 
 
 28 “ This heaven.” The planet Venus, 
 by which Folco declares himself to have 
 been formerly influenced, 
 
 * “ Belus’ aes: ” Dido. 
 
 “She of Rhodope.” Phyllis. 
 si ** Jove’s son.” ercules. 
 
PARADISE 322 
 
 Not for the fault (that doth not come to mind) 
 But for the virtue, whose o’erruling sway 
 And providence have wrought thus quaintly, 
 The skill is look’d into, that fashioneth 
 With such effectual working, and the good 
 Discern’d accruing to the lower world 
 
 From this above. But fully to content 
 
 Thy wishes all that in this sphere have birth, 
 Demands my further parle. Inquire thou wouldst, 
 Who of this light is denizen, that here 
 
 Beside me sparkles, as the sun-beam doth 
 
 On the clear wave. Know then, the soul of Rahab*? 
 Is in that gladsome harbor; to our tribe 
 
 United, and the foremost rank assign’d. 
 
 She to this heaven,®* at which the shadow ends 
 
 Of your sublunar world, was taken up, 
 
 First, in Christ’s triumph, of all souls redeem’d. 
 For well behoved, that, in some part of heaven, 
 She should remain a trophy, to declare | 
 
 The mighty conquest won with either palm; *4 
 
 For that she favor’d first the high exploit 
 
 Of Joshua on the Holy Land, whereof 
 
 The Pope*® recks little now. Thy city, plant 
 
 Of him,** that on his Maker turn’d the back, 
 
 And of whose envying so much woe hath sprung, 
 Engenders and expands the cursed flower," 
 
 That hath made wander both the sheep and lambs, 
 Turning the shepherd to a wolf. For this, 
 
 The gospel and great teachers laid aside, 
 
 The decretals,** as their stuft margins show, 
 
 Are the sole study. Pope and Cardinals, 
 
 Here 
 
 82 ““ Rahab.”? Heb. xi. 31. 88“ The decretals.”” The canon law. 
 88“ This Heaven.” ‘“‘ This planet of So in the “ De Monarchia,” lib. iii. p. 
 Venus, at which the shadow of the earth 137: “‘ There are also a third set, whom 
 ends, as Ptolemy writes in his ‘ Alma- they call Decretalists. These, alike ig- 
 
 gest.’ ”—Vellutello. 
 
 84 “ With either palm.’? By both his 
 hands nailed to the cross. 
 
 3“ The Pope.” ‘“ Who cares not 
 that the Holy Land is in the possession 
 of the Saracens.”’ 
 
 86 “Of him.’’ Of Satan. 
 
 87 “The cursed flower.”? The coin of 
 Florence, called the florin; the covetous 
 
 desire of which has excited the Pope to 
 sO much evil. 
 
 norant of theology and philosophy, re- 
 lying wholly on their decretals (which 
 I indeed esteem not unworthy of rever- 
 ence), in the hope I suppose of obtain- 
 ing for them a paramount influence, 
 derogate from the authority of the em- 
 pire. Nor is this to be wondered_ at, 
 when I have heard one of them saying, 
 and impudently maintaining, that tradi- 
 tions are the foundation of the faith of 
 the Church.” 
 
322 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Intent on these, ne’er journey but in thought 
 To Nazareth, where Gabriel oped his wings. 
 Yet it may chance, ere long, the Vatican,°*® 
 And other most selected parts of Rome, 
 
 That were the grave of Peter’s soldiery, 
 
 Shall be deliver’d from the adulterous bond.” 
 
 CANTO X 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Their next ascent carries them into the sun, which is the 
 
 fourth Heaven. 
 
 Here they are encompassed with a wreath of 
 blessed spirits, twelve in number. 
 
 Thomas Aquinas, who is one of 
 
 these, declares the names and endowments of the rest. 
 
 OOKING into his first-born with the love, 
 Which breathes from both eternal, the first Might 
 Ineffable, wherever eye or mind 
 Can roam, hath in such order all disposed, 
 As none may see and fail to enjoy. Raise, then, 
 O reader! to the lofty wheels, with me, 
 Thy ken directed to the point,’ whereat 
 One motion strikes on the other. There begin 
 Thy wonder of the mighty Architect, 
 Who loves his work so inwardly, his eye 
 
 Doth ever watch it. 
 
 See, how thence oblique? 
 
 Brancheth the circle, where the planets roll 
 
 To pour their wished influence on the world; 
 Whose path not bending thus, in heaven above* 
 Much virtue would be lost, and here on earth 
 All power well-nigh extinct: or, from direct 
 Were its departure distant more or less, 
 
 39 “The Vatican.” He alludes either 
 to the death of Pope Boniface VIII or 
 to the coming of the Emperor Henry 
 VII into Italy; or else to the transfer 
 of the Holy See from Rome to Avignon, 
 which took place in the pontificate of 
 Clement 
 
 1“ The point.” To that part of 
 heaven where the equinoctial circle and 
 the Zodiac intersect each other, where 
 the common motion of the heavens 
 from east to west may be said to strike 
 with greatest force against the motion 
 proper to the planets: and this reper- 
 cussion, as it were, is here the strong- 
 
 est, because the velocity of each is ine 
 creased to the utmost by their respece 
 tive distances from the poles. Such at 
 least is the system of Dante. 
 
 2 “ Oblique.”” The Zodiac. 
 
 3 “Tn heaven above.”’ If the planets 
 did not preserve that order in which 
 they move, they would not receive nor 
 transmit their due influences; and if the 
 Zodiac were not thus oblique; if toward 
 the north it either passed, or went short 
 of the tropic of Cancer, or else toward 
 the south it passed, or went short of 
 the tropic of Capricorn, it would not 
 divide the seasons as it now does. 
 
PARADISE 
 
 323 
 
 1’ the universal order, great defect 
 
 Must, both in Heaven and here beneath, ensue. 
 Now rest thee, reader! on thy bench, and muse 
 
 Anticipative of the feast to come; 
 
 So shall delight make thee not feel thy toil. 
 
 Lo! I have set before thee; for thyself 
 
 Feed now: the matter I indite, henceforth 
 
 Demands entire my thought. 
 
 Join’d with the part,* 
 
 Which late we told of, the great minister ® 
 
 Of nature, that upon the world imprints 
 
 The virtue of the heaven, and doles out 
 
 Time for us with his beam, went circling on 
 
 Along the spires,* where’ each hour sooner comes; 
 
 And I was with him, weetless of ascent, 
 
 But as a man,’ that weets him come, ere thinking. 
 For Beatrice, she who passeth on 
 
 So suddenly from good to better, time 
 
 Counts not the act, oh then how great must needs 
 
 Have been her brightness! 
 
 What there was i’ th’ sun, 
 
 (Where I had enter’d) not through change of hue, 
 But light transparent—did I summon up 
 
 Genius, art, practice—I might not so speak, 
 
 It should be e’er imagined: yet believed 
 
 It may be, and the sight be justly craved. 
 
 And if our fantasy fail of such height, 
 
 What marvel, since no eye above the sun 
 
 Hath ever travel’d? 
 
 Such are they dwell here, 
 
 Fourth family® of the Omnipotent Sire, 
 Who of his spirit and of his offspring? shows; 
 And holds them still enraptured with the view. 
 
 And thus to me Beatrice: 
 
 “ Thank, oh thank 
 
 The Sun of angels, him, who by his grace 
 To this perceptible hath lifted thee.” 
 Never was heart in such devotion bound, 
 
 «The part.”’ The above-mentioned 
 intersection of the equinoctial circle and 
 the Zodiac. 
 
 5 “ Minister.” The su 
 
 @ * Along the spires. a ‘According to 
 our Poet’s system, as the earth is mo- 
 tionless, the sun passes, by a spiral 
 motion, from one tropic to another. 
 
 “Where.” In which the sun rises 
 
 earlier every day after the vernal 
 equinox. 
 8 “ But as a fats * That is, he was 
 quite insensible of i 
 ‘ Fourth family.” The inhabitants 
 of. the sun, the fourth planet. 
 
 “ Of his spirit and of his offspring.” 
 The procession of the third, and the 
 ae ae of the second person in the 
 
 rinity. 
 
324 _ THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 And with complacency so absolute 
 
 Disposed to render up itself to God, 
 
 As mine was at those words: and so entire 
 The love for Him, that held me, it eclipsed 
 Beatrice in oblivion.. Naught displeased 
 Was she, but smiled thereat so joyously, 
 That of her laughing eyes the radiance brake 
 And scatter’d my collected mind abroad. 
 
 Then saw I a bright band, in liveliness 
 Surpassing, who themselves did make the crown, 
 And us their centre: yet more sweet in voice, 
 Than, in their visage, beaming. Cinctured thus, 
 Sometime Latona’s daughter we behold, 
 
 When the impregnate air retains the thread 
 
 That weaves her zone. In the celestial court, 
 Whence I return, are many jewels found, 
 
 So dear and beautiful, they cannot brook 
 Transporting from that realm: and of these lights 
 Such was the song.** Who doth not prune his wing 
 To soar up thither, let him?* look from thence 
 
 For tidings from the dumb. When, singing thus, 
 Those burning suns had circled round us thrice, 
 
 As nearest stars around the fixed pole; 
 
 Then seem’d they like to ladies, from the dance 
 Not ceasing, but suspense, in silent pause, 
 Listening, till they have caught the strain anew: 
 Suspended so they stood: and, from within, 
 
 Thus heard I one, who spake: “ Since with its beam 
 The grace, whence true love lighteth first his flame, 
 That after doth increase by loving, shines 
 
 So multiplied in thee, it leads thee up 
 
 Along this ladder, down whose hallow’d steps 
 None e’er descend, and mount them not again; 
 Who from his phial should refuse thee wine 
 
 To slake thy thirst, no less constrained?® were, 
 Than water flowing not unto the sea. 
 
 11 “ Such was the song.” The song of any intelligence at all of that place, for 
 
 these spirits was ineffable. It was like it surpasses description. 
 
 a jewel so highly prized, that the expor- 18** No less constrained.”” ‘* The rivers 
 tation of it to another country is pro- might as easily cease to flow toward the 
 hibited by law. sea, as we could deny thee thy request.’”* 
 
 13 “ Let him.” Let him not expect 
 
PARADISE 
 
 325 
 
 Thou fain wouldst hear, what plants are these, that bloom 
 In the bright garland, which, admiring, girds 
 
 This fair dame round, who strengthens thee for heaven. 
 J, then,'* was of the lambs, that Dominic 
 
 Leads, for his saintly flock, along the way 
 
 Where well they thrive, not swol’n with vanity. 
 
 He, nearest on my right hand, brother was, 
 
 And master to me: Albert of Cologne?® 
 
 Is this; and, of Aquinum, Thomas?® I. 
 
 If thou of all the rest wouldst be issured, 
 
 Let thine eye, waiting on the words I speak, 
 
 In circuit journey round the blessed wreath. 
 
 That next resplendence issues from the smile 
 
 Of Gratian,!”7 who to either forum?® lent 
 
 Such help, as favor wins in Paradise. 
 
 The other, nearest, who adorns our quire, 
 
 Was Peter,?® he that with the widow gave 
 
 To holy Church his treasure. 
 
 The fifth light,2° 
 
 Goodliest of all, is by such love inspired, 
 
 That all your world craves tidings of his doom :?1 
 Within, there is the lofty light, endow’d 
 
 With sapience so profound, if truth be truth, 
 
 14 “7, then.” ‘* I was of the Domeni- 
 can order.” 
 
 18 “‘Albert of Cologne.” Albertus 
 Magnus was born at Laugingen, in 
 Thuringia, in 1193, and studied at Paris 
 and at Padua; at the latter_of which 
 places he entered into the Domenican 
 order. He then taught theology in va- 
 rious parts of Germany, and particularly 
 at Cologne. Thomas Aquinas was his 
 favorite pupil. In 1260 he reluctantly 
 accepted the bishopric of Ratisbon, and 
 in two years after resigned it, and re- 
 turned to his cel’ in Cologne, where the 
 remainder of his life was passed in su- 
 perintending the school, and in com- 
 posing his voluminous works on divin- 
 ity and natural science. He died in 
 1280. The absurd imputation of his 
 having dealt in the magical art is well 
 known; and his biographers take some 
 pains to clear him. 
 
 16 “ Of Aquinum, Thomas.’’ Thomas 
 Aquinas, of whom Bucer is reported to 
 have said, “ Take but Thomas away, 
 and I will overturn the Church of 
 Rome ”’; and whom Hooker terms “ the 
 greatest among the school divines ”’— 
 (“ Eccl. Pol.” b. iii. § 9), was born of 
 noble parents, who anxiously but vainly 
 endeavored to divert him from a life of 
 celibacy and study. He died in 1274, at 
 the age of forty-seven. : 
 
 17 “* Gratian.” Gratian, a Benedictine 
 
 Classics. Vo. 34—O 
 
 monk belonging to the convent of St. 
 Felix and Nabor, at Bologna, and by 
 birth a Tuscan, composed, about the 
 year 1130, for the use of the schools, an 
 abridgement or epitome of canon law, 
 drawn from the letters of the pontiffs, 
 the decrees of councils and the writings 
 of the ancient doctors. 
 _ 18 “To either forum.” By reconcil- 
 ing the civil with the canon law. 
 
 1® “* Peter.”” Pietro Lombardo was of 
 obscure origi.., nor is the place of his 
 birth in Lombardy ascertained. With 
 a recommendation from the Bishop of 
 Lucca to St. Bernard, he went into - 
 France to continue his studies; and for 
 that purpose remained some time at 
 Rheims, whence he afterward proceeded 
 to Paris. Here his reputation was so 
 great that Philip, brother of Louis VII, 
 being chosen Bishop of Paris, resigned 
 that dignity to Pietro, whose pupil he 
 had been. He held his bishopric only 
 one year, and died 1160. His ‘* Liber 
 Sententiarum ” is highly esteemed. It 
 contains a system of scholastic theology, 
 so much more complete than any which 
 had been yet seen, that it may be 
 deemed an original work. 
 
 20 “* The fifth light.’? Solomon. 
 
 21 “* His doom.” It was a common 
 question, it seems, whether Solomon 
 were saved or no. 
 
326 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 That with a ken of such wide amplitude 
 
 No second hath arisen. Next behold 
 
 That taper’s radiance,?* to whose view was shown, 
 Clearliest, the nature and the ministry 
 
 Angelical, while yet in flesh it dwelt. 
 
 In the other little light serenely smiles 
 
 That pleader 2* for the Christian temples, he, 
 
 Who did provide Augustin of his lore. 
 
 Now, if thy mind’s eye pass from light to light, 
 Upon my praises following, of the eighth?* 
 
 Thy thirst is next. 
 
 The saintly soul, that shows 
 
 The world’s deceitfulness, to all who hear him, 
 Is, with the sight of all the good that is, 
 
 Blest there. 
 
 The limbs, whence it was driven, lie 
 
 Down in Cieldauro;*° and from martyrdom 
 
 And exile came it here. 
 
 Lo! further on, 
 
 Where flames the arduous spirit of Isidore ;** 
 Of Bede;?7 and Richard,?* more than man, erewhile, 
 
 In deep discernment. 
 
 Lastly this, from whom 
 
 Thy look on me reverteth, was the beam 
 
 Of one, whose spirit, on high musings bent, 
 Rebuked the lingering tardiness of death. 
 
 It is the eternal light of Sigebert?® | 
 Who escaped not envy, when of truth he argued, 
 
 22“ That taper’s radiance.’ St. Di- 
 onysius, the Areopagite. The famous 
 Grecian fanatic, who gave himself out 
 for Dionysius the Areopagite, disciple 
 of St. Paul, and who, under the pro- 
 tection of this venerable name, gave 
 laws and instructions to those that were 
 desirous of raising their souls above all 
 human things, in order to unite them 
 to their great source by sublime con- 
 templation, lived most probably in this 
 century (the fourth); though some place 
 him before, others after, the present 
 period. 
 
 23“ That pleader.”’ In the fifth cen- 
 tury, Paulus Orosius acquired a con- 
 siderable degree of reputation by the 
 history he wrote to refute the cavils of 
 the Pagans against Christianity, and by 
 his books against the Pelagians and 
 Priscillianists. 
 
 % “The eighth.” Boétius, whose 
 book ‘‘de Consolatione Philosophiz ” 
 excited so much attention during the 
 Middle Ages, was born about 470. In 
 524 he was cruelly put to death by com- 
 mand of Theodoric, either on real or 
 pretended suspicion of his being en- 
 gaged in a conspiracy. 
 
 *5 “ Cieldauro.”” Boétius was buried 
 at Pavia, in the monastery of St. Pietro 
 in Ciel. d’Oro. 
 
 26“ Isidore.” He was Archbishop of 
 Seville during forty years, and died in 
 
 35+ 
 
 27 “ Bede.” Bede, whose virtues ob- 
 tained him the appellation of the ‘‘ Ven- 
 erable,” was born in 672, at Wearmouth 
 in the bishopric of Durham, and died 
 at Jarrow in. 735. Invited to Rome 
 by Pope Sergius I, he preferred passing 
 almost the whole of his life in the se- 
 clusion of a monastery. 
 
 #8 “ Richard.” Richard of St. Victor, 
 a native either of Scotland or Ireland, 
 was canon and prior of the monastery of 
 that name at Paris; and died in 1173. 
 He was at the head of the Mystics in 
 this century; and his treatise, entitled 
 the “‘ Mystical Ark,’? which contains as 
 it were the marrow of this kind of the- 
 ology, was received with the greatest 
 avidity. 
 
 29 ** Sigebert.”” A monk of the Abbey 
 of Gemblours, who was in high repute 
 at the end of the eleventh and Becanine 
 of the twelfth century. 
 
PARADISE 327 
 
 Reading in the straw-litter’d street.”°° Forthwith, 
 As clock, that calleth up the spouse of God*! 
 
 To win her bridegroom’s love at matin’s hour, 
 
 Each part of other fitly drawn and urged, 
 
 Sends out a tinkling sound, of note so sweet, 
 Affection springs in well-disposed breast ; 
 
 Thus saw I move the glorious wheel; thus heard 
 Voice answering voice, so musical and soft, 
 
 It can be known but where day endless shines. 
 
 CANTO XI 
 
 ArcuMENT.—Thomas Aquinas enters at large into the life and character 
 of St. Francis; and then solves one of two difficulties, which he per- 
 ceive é risen in Dante’s mind from what he had heard in the 
 last Canto. 
 
 FOND anxiety of mortal men! 
 How vain and inconclusive arguments 
 Are those, which make thee beat thy wings below. 
 For statutes one, and one for aphorisms? 
 Was hunting; this the priesthood follow’d; that, 
 By force or sophistry, aspired to rule; 
 To rob, another; and another sought, 
 By civil business, wealth; one, moiling, lay 
 Tangled in net of sensual delight; 
 And one to wistless indolence resign’d; 
 What time from all these empty things escaped, 
 With Beatrice, I thus gloriously 
 Was raised aloft, and made the guest of heaven. 
 They of the circle to that point, each one, 
 ’ Where erst it was, had turn’d; and steady glow’d, 
 As candle in his socket. Then within 
 The lustre,’ that erewhile bespake me, smiling 
 With merer gladness, heard I thus begin: 
 “E’en as his beam illumes me, so I look 
 
 Into the eternal light, and clearly mark 
 
 80“ The straw-litter’d street.” The 1** Aphorisms.” The study of medi- 
 mame of a street in Paris: the “ Rue de cine 
 Fouarre.”’ 2“ The lustre.” The spirit of Thomas 
 31“ The spouse of God.” The Aquinas. 
 
 Church. 
 
328 
 
 Thy thoughts, from whence they rise. 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Thou art in doubt, 
 
 And wouldst that I should bolt my words afresh 
 In such plain open phrase, as may be smooth 
 To thy perception, where I told thee late 
 That ‘ well they thrive’ ;* and that ‘no second such* 
 Hath risen,’ which no small distinction needs: 
 “The Providence, that governeth the world, 
 In depth of counsel by created ken 
 Unfathomable, to the end that she, 
 Who with loud cries was ’spoused in precious blood, 
 Might keep her footing toward her well-beloved,® 
 Safe in herself and constant unto him, 
 Hath two ordain’d, who should on either hand 
 In chief escort her: one,’ seraphic all 
 In fervency; for wisdom upon earth, 
 The other,’ splendor of cherubic light. 
 I but of one will tell: he tells of both, 
 Who one commendeth, which of them soe’er 
 Be taken: for their deeds were to one end. 
 “ Between Tupino,® and the wave that falls 
 From blest Ubaldo’s chosen hill, there hangs 
 Rich slope of mountain high, whence heat and cold?° 
 Are wafted through Perugia’s eastern gate: 
 And Nocera with Gualdo, in its: rear, 
 
 Mourn for their heavy yoke.** 
 
 Upon that side, 
 
 Where it doth break its steepness most, arose 
 
 A sun upon the world, as duly this 
 
 From Ganges doth: therefore let none, who speak 
 Of that place, say Ascesi; for its name 
 
 Were lamely so deliver’d; but the East,?? 
 
 To call things rightly, be it henceforth styled. 
 
 He was not yet much distant from his rising, 
 
 8 “ That ‘ well they thrive.’ ”’ See the 
 
 last Canto, v. 93. 
 4 “*No second such.’” See the last 
 
 - Canto, v. 111. 
 
 5 “ She.”? The Church. 
 
 6 “ Her well beloved.” Jesus. Christ. 
 
 7 “One.” St. Francis. 
 
 8 “The other.”? St. Dominic. 
 
 ®“ Tupino.”” Thomas Aquinas pro- 
 ceeds to describe the birth-place of St. 
 Francis, between Tupino, a_ rivulet 
 near Assisi, or Ascesi, where the saint 
 was born in 1182, and Chiascié, a stream 
 that rises in a mountain near Agobbio, 
 
 chosen by St. Ubaldo for the place 
 of his retirement. 
 
 10 “ Heat and cold.” Cold from the 
 snow, and heat from. the reflection of 
 the sun. 
 
 11° Yoke.”?  Vellutello. understands 
 this of the vicinity of the ‘mountain ” 
 to Nocera and Gualdo;,and Venturi (as 
 I have taken it) of the heavy imposi- 
 tions laid.on those places by. the Peru- 
 gians: 
 
 12%* The east.” ‘This is the East, 
 and Juliet is the sun.’’—Shakespeare. 
 
PARADISE 
 
 329 
 
 When his good influence ’gan to bless the earth. 
 A dame,'* to whom none openeth pleasure’s gate 
 More than to death, was, ’gainst his father’s will,'* 
 His stripling choice: and he did make her his, 
 Before the spiritual court,'® by nuptial bonds, 
 
 And in his father’s sight: from day to day, 
 
 Then loved her more devoutly. She, bereaved 
 Of her first husband,*® slighted and obscure, 
 Thousand and hundred years and more, remain’d 
 Without a single suitor, till he came. 
 
 Nor aught avail’d, that, with Amyclas,** she 
 
 Was found unmoved at rumor of his voice, 
 
 Who shook the world: nor aught her constant boldness 
 Whereby with Christ she mounted on the cross, 
 When Mary stay’d beneath. But not to deal 
 Thus closely with thee longer, take at large 
 
 The lovers’ titles—Poverty and Francis. 
 
 Their concord and glad looks, wonder and love, 
 And sweet regard gave birth to holy thoughts, 
 
 So much, that venerable Bernard?® first 
 
 Did bare his feet, and, in pursuit of peace 
 
 So heavenly, ran, yet deem’d his footing slow. 
 
 O hidden riches! O prolific good! 
 
 Egidius’® bares him next, and next Sylvester,?° 
 And follow, both, the bridegroom: so the bride 
 Can please them. Thenceforth goes he on his way 
 The father and the master, with his spouse, 
 
 And with that family, whom now the cord?} 
 
 Girt humbly: nor did abjectedness of heart 
 
 13 “* A dame.” There is in the under 
 church of St. Francis, Assisi, a pict- 
 ure painted by Giotto from this sub- 
 ject. It is considered one of the artist’s 
 best works. See Kugler’s ‘‘ Hand-book 
 of the History of Painting.”’ 
 
 14 “ *Gainst his father’s will.’’ In op- 
 
 osition to the wishes of his natural 
 ather. 
 
 15 “* Before the spiritual court.” He 
 made a vow of poverty in the presence 
 of the bishop and of his natural father. 
 
 16 “ Her first husband.” Christ. 
 
 17 ** Amyclas.”? Lucan makes Cesar 
 exclaim, on witnessing the secure pov- 
 erty of the fisherman Amyclas:— 
 
 *O happy poverty! thou greatest good 
 
 Bestow’d by Heaven, but seldom un- 
 
 derstood! 
 
 Here nor the cruel spoiler seeks his 
 
 ; prey, . 4 
 Nor ruthless armies take their dread- 
 ful way,’’ etc.—Rowe. 
 
 18 “ Bernard.”” Of Quintavalle; one 
 of the first followers of the saint. 
 
 1° “ Egidius.”” The third of his dis- 
 ciples, who died in 1262. His work, 
 entitled ‘‘ Verba Aurea,’? was published 
 in 1534, at Antwerp. 
 
 20 “ Sylvester.”? Another of his earli- 
 est associates. 
 
 71 “Whom now the cord.”’. St, Fran- 
 cis bound his body with a cord, in sign 
 that he considered it as a beast, and 
 that it required, like a beast, to be led 
 by a halter. 
 
33° 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Weigh down his eyelids, for that he was son 
 Of Pietro Bernardone,?? and by men 
 
 In wonderous sort despised. But royally 
 
 -His hard intention he to Innocent?? 
 
 Set forth; and, from him, first received the seal 
 
 On his religion. 
 
 Then, when numerous flock’d 
 
 The tribe of lowly ones, that traced his steps, 
 Whose marvellous life deservedly were sung 
 
 In heights empyreal; through Honorius’** hand 
 
 A second crown, to deck their Guardian’s virtues, 
 Was by the eternal Spirit inwreathed: and when 
 He had, through thirst of martyrdom, stood up 
 
 In the proud Soldan’s presence,?° and there preach’d 
 Christ and his followers, but found the race 
 Unripen’d for conversion; back once more 
 
 He hasted (not to intermit his toil), 
 
 And reap’d Ausonian lands. 
 
 On the hard rock,?® 
 
 *Twixt Arno and the Tiber, he from Christ 
 Took the last signet,?7 which his limbs two years 
 Did carry. Then, the season come that he, 
 Who to such good had destined him, was pleased 
 To advance him to the meed, which he had earn’d 
 By his self-humbling ; to his brotherhood, 
 As their just heritage, he gave in charge 
 His dearest lady:*% and enjoin’d their love 
 And faith to her; and, from her bosom, will’d 
 His goodly spirit should move forth, returning 
 To its appointed kingdom; nor would have 
 His body?® laid upon another bier. 
 
 “Think now of one, who were a fit colleague 
 To keep the bark of Peter, in deep sea, 
 Helm’d to right point; and such our Patriarch®® was 
 Therefore who follow him as he enjoins, 
 
 22 “* Pietro Bernardone.”’ A man in 
 an humble station of life at Assisi. 
 
 23 “ Tnnocent.”? Pope Innocent IIT. 
 
 24 “* Flonorius.”” His successor Hon- 
 orius III, who granted certain privi- 
 leges to. the Franciscans. 
 
 % “In the proud Soldan’s presence.” 
 The Soldan of Egypt, before whom St. 
 Francis is said to have preached. 
 
 26 “On the hard rock.”. The moun- 
 tain Alverna in the Appenines. 
 
 27 “* The last signet.”” Alluding to the 
 
 stigmata or marks 
 
 the 
 wounds of Christ, said to have been 
 found on the saint’s body. 
 
 28 “* His dearest lady.” Poverty. 
 
 29 “ His body.” He forbade any fu- 
 neral pomp to be observed at his burial; 
 and, as it is said, ordered that his re- 
 mains should be deposited in a place 
 where criminals were executed and in- 
 terred. 
 
 %0 “Our Patriarch.” St. Dominic, to 
 whose order Thomas Aquinas belonged. 
 
 resembling 
 
‘PARADISE 331 
 
 Thou mayst be certain, take good lading in. 
 But hunger of new viands tempts his flock ;*4 
 So that they needs into strange pastures wide 
 Must spread them: and the more remote from him 
 The stragglers wander, so much more they come 
 Home, to the sheep-fold, destitute of milk, 
 There are of them, in truth, who fear their harm, 
 And to the shepherd cleave; but these so few, 
 A little stuff may furnish out their cloaks. 
 
 “ Now, if my words be clear; if thou have ta’en 
 Good heed; if that, which I have told, recall 
 To mind; thy wish may be in part fulfill’d: 
 For thou wilt see the plant from whence they split ;%? 
 And he shall see, who girds him, what that means, 
 * That well they thrive, not swol’n with vanity.’ ” 
 
 CANTO XII. 
 
 ARGUMENT.—A second circle of glorified souls encompasses the first. 
 
 Buonaventura, who is one of them, celebrates the praises of St. 
 Dominic, and informs Dante who the other eleven are, that are in 
 this second circle or garland. 
 
 OON as its final word the blessed flame? 
 Had raised for utterance, straight the holy mill? 
 Began to wheel; nor yet had once revolved, 
 
 Or e’er another, circling, compass’d it, 
 Motion to motion, song to song, conjoining; 
 Song, that as much our muses doth excel, 
 Our Syrens with their tuneful pipes, as ray 
 Of primal splendor doth its faint reflex. 
 
 As when, if Juno bid her handmaid forth, 
 Two arches parallel, and trick’d alike, 
 Span the thin cloud, the outer taking birth 
 From that within (in manner of that voice® 
 
 81 * His flock.”? The Dominicans. 8 “In manner of that voice.” One 
 82*The plant from whence they rainbow giving back the image of the 
 split.” ‘*‘ The rule of their order, which other, as sound is reflected by Echo, that 
 the Dominicans neglect to observe.” nymph, who was melted away by her 
 1“ The blessed flame.” Thomas fondness for Narcissus, as_ vapor is 
 Aquinas. melted by the sun. The reader will ob- 
 
 “The holy: mill.” The circle of serve in the text not only a second and 
 
 Spirits. third simile within the first, but two 
 
332 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Whom love did melt away, as sun the mist) — 
 And they who gaze, presageful call to mind 
 The compact, made with Noah, of the world 
 
 No more to be o’erflow’d; about us thus, 
 
 Of sempiternal roses, bending, wreathed 
 
 Those garlands twain; and to the innermost 
 E’en thus the external answer’d. When the footing, 
 And other great festivity, of song, 
 
 And radiance, light with light accordant, each 
 Jocund and blythe, had at their pleasure still’d, 
 (E’en as the eyes, by quick volition moved, 
 
 Are shut and raised together), from the heart 
 Of one* amongst the new lights® moved a voice, 
 That made me seem® like needle to the star, 
 
 In turning to its whereabouts; and thus 
 
 Began: 
 
 “The love,’ that makes me beautiful, 
 
 Prompts me toAell of the other guide, for whom 
 
 Such good of mine is spoken. 
 
 Where one is, 
 
 The other worthily should also be; 
 
 That as their warfare was alike, alike 
 
 Should be their glory. Slow, and full of doubt, 
 And with thin ranks, after its banner moved 
 
 The army of Christ (which it so dearly cost 
 
 To reappoint), when its imperial Head, 
 
 Who reigneth ever, for the drooping host 
 
 Did make provision, through grace alone, 
 
 And not through its deserving. As thou heard’st,8 
 Two champions to the succor of his spouse 
 
 mythological and one sacred allusion 
 bound up together with the whole. 
 Even after this accumulation of 
 imagery, the two circles of spirits, by 
 whom Beatrice and Dante were en- 
 compassed, are by a bold figure termed 
 two garlands of mnever-fading roses. 
 Indeed there is a fulness of splendor, 
 even to prodigality, throughout the be- 
 ginning of this Canto. 
 
 4“ One.” St. Buonaventura, general 
 of the Franciscan order, in which he 
 effeeted some reformation; and one of 
 the most pr oionnd divines of his age. 
 He refused the archbishopric of York, 
 which was offered him by Clement IV, 
 but afterward was prevailed on to ac- 
 cept the bishopric of Albano and a car- 
 dinal’s hat. e was born at Bagnoregio 
 or Bagnorea, in Tuscany, A.D. 1221, and 
 died in 1274. ‘ 
 
 5 “ Amongst the new lights.” In the 
 circle that had newly surrounded the 
 
 rst. 
 
 6 “That made me seem.” ‘“ That 
 made me turn to it, as the magnetic 
 needle does to the pole.’’ 
 
 7 ** The love.” y an act of mutual 
 courtesy, Buonaventura, a Franciscan, 
 is made to proclaim the praises of St. 
 Dominic, as Thomas Aquinas, a Do- 
 minican, has celebrated those of St. 
 Francis; and in like manner each 
 blames the irregularities, not of the 
 other’s order, but of that to which him- 
 self belonged. Even_Macchiavelli, no 
 great friend to the Church, attributes 
 the revival of Christianity to the in- 
 fluence of these two saints. 
 
 8“ As thou heard’st.” See the last 
 Canto, v. 33. 
 
PARADISE 
 
 333 
 
 He sent, who by their deeds and words might join 
 
 Again his scatter’d people. 
 
 In that clime® 
 
 Where springs the pleasant west-wind to unfold 
 The fresh leaves, with which Europe sees herself 
 New-garmented ; nor from those billows*® far, 
 Beyond whose chiding, after weary course, 
 
 The sun doth sometimes™ hide him; safe abides 
 The happy Callaroga,’? under guard 
 
 Of the great shield, wherein the lion lies 
 
 Subjected and supreme. 
 
 And there was born 
 
 The loving minion of the Christian faith, 
 The hallow’d wrestler, gentle to his own, 
 
 And to his enemies terrible. 
 
 So replete 
 
 His soul with lively virtue, that when first 
 Created, even in the mother’s womb," 
 
 It prophesied. When, at the sacred font, 
 
 The spousals were complete ’twixt faith and him, 
 Where pledge of mutual safety was exchanged, 
 The dame,” who was his surety, in her sleep 
 Beheld the wondrous fruit, that was from him 
 
 And from his heirs to issue. 
 
 And that such 
 
 He might be construed, as indeed he was, 
 
 She was inspired to name him of his owner, 
 Whose he was wholly; and so call’d him Dominic. 
 And I speak of him, as the laborer, 
 
 Whom Christ in his own garden chose to be 
 
 His help-mate. 
 
 Messenger he seetn’d, and friend 
 
 Fast-knit to Christ; and the first love he show’d, 
 Was after the first counsel’® that Christ gave. 
 
 ® “In that clime.” Spat } 
 10 “* Those _ billows.” he Atlantic. 
 11 “* Sometimes.” During the summer 
 
 olstice. 
 
 12 “* Callaroga.’”? Between Osma and 
 Aranda, in Old Castile designated by 
 the royal coat-of-arms. 7 
 
 13 The loving minion of the Chris- 
 tian faith.” Dominic was born April _5, 
 1170, and died August 6, 1221. His 
 birth-place Callaroga; his father and 
 mother’s names, Felix and Joanna; his 
 mother’s dream; his name of Dominic, 
 
 iven him in consequence of a vision 
 fy a noble matron who stood sponsor 
 to him, are all told in an anonymous 
 life of the saint, said to have been writ- 
 ten in the thirteenth century. : 
 
 % “In the mother’s womb.” His 
 
 mother, when pregnant with him, is 
 said to have dreamt that she should 
 bring forth a white and black dog with 
 a lighted torch in his mouth, which 
 were signs of the habit to be worn by 
 his order, and of his fervent zeal. 
 
 1% “The dame.” His godmother’s 
 dream was, that he had one star in his 
 forehead and another in the nape of his 
 neck, from which he communicated 
 light to the east and the west. 
 
 16 ** After the first counsel.” ‘* Jesus 
 said unto him, If thou wilt be perfect, 
 go and sell that thou hast, and give to 
 the poor, and thou shalt have treasure 
 in heaven; and come and follow me.”— 
 Matth. xix. 21. Dominic is said to have 
 followed this advice. 
 
334 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Many a time*’ his nurse, at entering, found 
 That he had risen in silence, and was prostrate, 
 As who should say, ‘ My errand was for this.’ 
 O happy father! Felix*® rightly named. 
 
 O favor’d mother! rightly named Joanna; 
 
 If that do mean, as men interpret it.?® 
 
 Not for the world’s sake, for which now they toil 
 Upon Ostiense?® and Taddeo’s”* lore, 
 
 But for the real manna, soon he grew 
 
 Mighty in learning; and did set himself 
 
 To go about the vineyard, that soon turns 
 
 To wan and wither’d, if not tended well: 
 
 And from the see?? (whose bounty to the just 
 And needy is gone by, not through its fault, 
 But his who fills it basely) he besought, 
 
 No dispensation? for commuted wrong, 
 
 Nor the first vacant fortune,?* nor the tenths 
 That to God’s paupers rightly appertain, 
 
 But, ’gainst an erring and degenerate world, 
 License to fight, in favor of that seed *° 
 
 From which the twice twelve cions gird thee round. 
 Then, with sage doctrine and good-will to help, 
 Forth on his great apostleship he fared, 
 
 Like torrent bursting from a lofty vein; 
 
 And, dashing ’gainst the stocks of heresy, 
 Smote fiercest, where resistance was most stout. 
 Thence many rivulets have since been turn’d, 
 Over the garden catholic to lead 
 
 Their living waters, and have fed its plants. 
 
 71°* Many a time.’’ His nurse, when 
 she returned to him, often found that 
 he had left his bed, and was prostrate, 
 and in prayer. 
 
 78 “* Felix.” Felix Gusman. 
 
 91‘* As men interpret it.’”’ Grace or 
 gift of the Lord. ; 
 
 20 “* Ostiense.” Arrigo, a_ native of 
 Susa, formerly a considerable city in 
 Piedmont, and cardinal of Ostia and 
 Velletri, whence he acquired the name 
 of Ostiense, was celebrated for his lect- 
 ures on the five books of the Decre- 
 tals. He flourished about the year 1250. 
 
 21“ Taddeo.”’ It is uncertain wheth- 
 er he speaks of the physician or the 
 lawyer of that name. The former, Tad- 
 deo d’ Alderotto, a Florentine, called 
 the Hippocratean, translated the ethics 
 of Aristotle into Latin; and died at an 
 advanced age, toward the end of the 
 thirteenth century. The other, who 
 
 was of Bologna and celebrated for his 
 legal knowledge, left no writings behind 
 
 im. 
 
 22The see.” The apostolic see, 
 which no longer continues its wonted 
 liberality toward the indigent and de- 
 serving; not indeed through its own 
 fault, as its doctrines are still the 
 same, but through the fault of the pon- 
 tiff, who is seated in it. 
 
 23°* No dispensation.” Dominic did 
 not ask for license to compound for the 
 use of unjust acquisitions by dedicating 
 a part of them to pious purposes. 
 
 %** Nor the first vacant fortune.’ 
 Not the first benefice that fell vacant. 
 
 25‘* Tn favor of that seed.” ‘ For 
 that seed of the divine Word, from 
 which have sprung up these four-and- 
 twenty plants, these holy spirits that 
 now environ thee.” 
 
 i 
 
PARADISE 
 
 335 
 
 “Tf such, one wheel*® of that two-yoked car, 
 Wherein the holy Church defended her, 
 And rode triumphant through the civil broil; 
 Thou canst not doubt its fellow’s excellence, 
 Which Thomas,?* ere my coming, hath declared 
 
 So courteously unto thee. 
 
 But the track,?§ 
 
 Which its smooth fellies made, is now deserted: 
 That, mouldy mother is, where late were lees. 
 His family, that wont to trace his path, 
 
 Turn backward, and invert their steps; erelong 
 To rue the gathering in of their ill crop, 
 When the rejected tares?® in vain shall ask 
 
 Admittance to the barn. 
 
 I question not*° 
 
 But he, who search’d our volume, leaf by leaf, 
 Might still find page with this inscription on’t, 
 
 ‘I am as I was wont.’ 
 
 Yet such were not 
 
 From Acquasparta nor Casale, whence, 
 
 Of those who come to meddle with the text, 
 One stretches and another cramps its rule. 
 Buonaventura’s life in me behold, 
 
 From Bagnoregio; one, who, in discharge 
 Of my great offices, still laid aside 
 
 All sinister aim. 
 
 Illuminato here, 
 
 And Agostino *! join me: two they were, 
 
 Among the first of those barefooted meek ones, 
 
 We sought God’s friendship in the cord: with them 
 Hugues of Saint Victor ;°* Pietro Mangiadore ;** 
 
 86** One wheel.” Dominic; as the 
 other wheel is Francis. ; 
 
 27 “* Thomas.’’ Thomas Aquinas. 
 _ %“ But the track.”’ ‘‘ But the rule of 
 St. Francis is already deserted; and the 
 lees of the wine are turned into mouldi- 
 ness.”’ 
 
 2% * Tares.”” He adverts to the parable 
 of the tares and the wheat. 
 
 80“ [ question not.’ ‘* Some indeed 
 might be found, who still observe the 
 rule of the order: but such would come 
 neither from Casale nor Acquasparta.” 
 At Casale, in Monferrat, the discipline 
 had been enforced by Uberto with un- 
 necessary rigor; and at Acquasparta, in 
 the territory of Todi, it had been equal- 
 ly relaxed by the Cardinal Matteo, gen- 
 eral of the order. | 
 
 a1 “ ____ TlJuminato here, 
 
 And Agostino.” 
 
 Two among the earliest followers of St. 
 Francis. : 
 
 82 “ Hugues of Saint Victor.’’ He was 
 
 of the monastery of St. Victor at Paris, 
 and died in 114, at the age of forty- 
 four. His ten books, illustrative of the 
 celestial hierarchy of Dionysius the 
 Areopagite, according to the transla- 
 tion of Joannes Scotus, are inscribed 
 to King Louis, son of Louis le Gros, 
 by whom the monastery had _ been 
 founded. ‘* A man distinguished by the 
 fecundity of his Pare who treated, 
 in his writings, of all the branches of 
 sacred and profane erudition that were 
 known in his time, and who composed 
 several dissertations that are not desti- 
 tute of merit.’”’—Mosheim, ‘“‘Eccl. Hist.” 
 Vv. ili. cent. xii. p. it, c. i1.. § 23. 
 83 “* Pietro Mangiadore.” Petrus Com- 
 estor, or the Eater, born at Troyes, was 
 canor and dean of that church, and. af- 
 terward: chancellor of the church of 
 Paris. He relinquished these benefices 
 to become a regular canon of St. Vice 
 tor at Paris, where he died in 1198. 
 
330 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 And he of Spain ** in his twelve volumes shining; 
 Nathan the prophet; Metropolitan 
 
 Chrysostom ; ** and Anselmo; ** and, who deign’d 
 To put his hand to the first art, Donatus. 
 
 Raban *" is here; and at my side there shines 
 Calabria’s abbot, Joachim,®* endow’d 
 
 With soul prophetic. 
 
 The bright courtesy 
 
 Of friar Thomas and his goodly lore, 
 Have moved me to the blazon of a peer *° 
 So worthy ; and with me have moved this throng.” 
 
 CANTO XIII 
 
 ‘ARGUMENT.—Thomas Aquinas resumes his speech. He solves the other 
 of those doubts which he discerned in the mind of Dante, and warns 
 him earnestly against assenting to any proposition without having 
 
 duly examined it. 
 
 Imagine (and retain the image firm 
 
 | ET him,’ who would conceive what now I saw, 
 
 As mountain rock, the whilst he hears me speak), 
 Of stars, fifteen, from midst the ethereal host 
 Selected, that, with lively ray serene, 
 O’ercome the massiest air: thereto imagine 
 The wain, that, in the bosom of our sky, 
 Spins ever on its axle night and day, 
 
 84 “* He of Spain.’”’?. To Pope Adrian 
 V succeeded John XXI, a native of 
 Lisbon; a man of great genius and ex- 
 traordinary acquirements, eae ceed in 
 logic and in medicine, as his books, 
 written in the name of Peter of Spain 
 (by which he was known before he be- 
 came Pope) may testify. His life was 
 not much fed than that of his pred- 
 ecessors, for he was killed at Viterbo, 
 by the falling in of the roof of his 
 chamber, after he had been pontiff only 
 eight months and as many days, A.D. 
 
 1277. 
 
 85 “* Chrysostom.” The eloquent Pa- 
 triarch of Constantinople. 
 
 86 “* Anselmo.”” Anselm, Archbishop 
 of Canterbury, was born at Aosta, about 
 1034, and studied under Lanfranc, at the 
 monastery of Bec in Normandy, where 
 he afterward devoted himself to a relig- 
 ious life, in his twenty-seventh year. 
 In three years he was made prior, and 
 then abbot of that monastery; from 
 whence he was taken, in 1093, to suc- 
 ceed to the archbishopric, vacant by the 
 death of Lanfranc. He enjoyed this 
 
 dignity till his death, in 1109, though 
 it was disturbed by_many dissensions 
 with William II and Henry I respecting 
 immunities and investitures. There is 
 much depth and precision in his theo- 
 logical works. 
 
 37“ Raban.” Rabanus Maurus, Arch- 
 bishop of Mentz, 847, is deservedly 
 placed at the head of the Latin writers 
 of this age. 
 
 88“ Joachim.” Abbot of Flora in Cal- 
 abria; whom the multitude revered as a 
 person divinely inspired, and equal to 
 the most illustrious prophets of ancient 
 times. 
 
 80 “A peer.” St. Dominic. 
 
 1“ Let him.” Whoever would con- 
 ceive the sight that now presented itself 
 to me, must imagine to himself fifteen 
 of the brightest stars in heaven, to- 
 gether with seven stars of Arcturus Ma- 
 jor and two of Arcturus Minor, ranged 
 in two circles, one within the other, 
 each resembling the crown of Ariadne, 
 ane moving round in opposite direc 
 ions. 
 
PARADISE 
 
 337 
 
 With the bright summit of that horn, which swells 
 Due from the pole, round which the first wheel rolls, 
 To have ranged themselves in fashion of two signs 
 In heaven, such as Ariadne made, 
 
 When death’s chill seized her; and that one of them 
 Did compass in the other’s beam; and both 
 
 In such sort whirl around, that each should tend 
 With opposite motion: and, conceiving thus, 
 
 Of that true constellation, and the dance 
 
 Twofold, that circled me, he shall attain 
 
 As ’twere the shadow; for things there as much 
 Surpass our usage, as the swiftest heaven 
 
 Is swifter than the Chiana.? 
 
 There was sung 
 
 No Bacchus, and no Io Pzan, but 
 Three Persons in the Godhead, and in one 
 Person that nature and the human join’d. 
 The song and round were measured: and to us 
 Those saintly lights attended, happier made 
 At each new ministering. Then silence brake 
 Amid the accordant sons of Deity, 
 That luminary,®? in which the wondrous life 
 Of the meek man of God * was told to me; 
 And thus it spake: “ One ear > 0’ the harvest thresh’d, 
 And its grain safely stored, sweet charity 
 Invites me with the other to like toil. 
 “ Thou know’st, that in the bosom,® whence the rib 
 Was ta’en to fashion that fair cheek, whose taste 
 All the world pays for; and in that, which pierced 
 By the keen lance, both after and before 
 Such satisfaction offer’d as outweighs 
 Each evil in the scale; whate’er of light 
 To human nature is allow’d, must all 
 Have by his virtue been infused, who form’d 
 
 2‘ The Chiana.” See ‘ Hell,’’ Canto 
 XIX. 45. : 
 
 8 That luminary.”? Thomas Aquinas. 
 
 4‘* The meek man of God.”’ St. Fran- 
 cis. See Canto xi. 25. 
 
 5“ One ear.’”’ ‘“‘ Having solved one of 
 thy questions, I proceed to answer the 
 other. Thou thinkest then that Adam 
 and Christ were both endued with all 
 the perfection of which the human nat- 
 ure is capable; and therefore, wonder- 
 est at what has been said concerning 
 Solomon.” 
 
 6“*In the bosom.” ‘‘ Thou knowest 
 that in the breast of Adam, whence the 
 rib was taken to make that fair cheek 
 of Eve, which, by tasting the apple, 
 brought death into the world; and also 
 in the breast of Christ, -.which, being 
 ierced by the lance, made satisfaction 
 or the sins of the whole world; as 
 much wisdom resided, as human nature 
 was capable of: and thou dost therefore 
 wonder that I should have spoken of 
 Solomon as the wisest.’’ See Canto x, 
 105. 
 
338 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Both one and other: and thou thence admirest . 
 In that I told thee, of beatitudes, 
 A second there is none to him enclosed 
 
 In the fifth radiance. 
 
 Open now thine eyes 
 
 To what I answer thee; and thou shalt see 
 Thy deeming and my saying meet in truth, 
 As centre in the round. That? which dies not, 
 And that which can die, are but each the beam 
 Of that idea, which our Sovereign Sire 
 Engendereth loving; for that lively light,® 
 Which passeth from his splendor, not disjoin’d 
 From him, nor from his love triune with them,® 
 Doth, through his bounty, congregate itself, 
 Mirror’d, as ’twere, in new existences ; ?° 
 Itself unalterable, and ever one. 
 
 “ Descending hence unto the lowest powers,” 
 Its energy so sinks, at last it makes 
 But brief contingencies; for so I name 
 Things generated, which the heavenly orbs 
 Moving, with seed or without seed, produce. 
 Their wax, and that which moulds it,’* differ much: 
 And thence with lustre, more or less, it shows 
 The ideal stamp imprest: so that one tree, 
 According to his kind, hath better fruit, 
 And worse: and, at your birth, ye, mortal men, 
 
 Are in your talents various. 
 
 Were the wax 
 
 Moulded with nice exactness, and the heaven 18 
 In its disposing influence supreme, 
 
 The brightness of the seal ** should be complete. 
 But nature renders it imperfect ever; 
 Resembling thus the artist, in his work, 
 Whose faltering hand is faithless to his skill. 
 Therefore, if fervent love dispose, and mark 
 
 7“ That.” Things, corruptible and 
 api Saat rea are only emanations from 
 the archetypal idea residing in the Di- 
 vine Mind. 
 
 8“ Light.”” The Word; the Son of 
 
 od. 
 
 ®“ His love triune with them.” The 
 Holy Ghost. 
 
 10 “ New existences.”” Angels and hu- 
 man souls. 
 
 i“ The lowest powers.” 
 life and brute matter. { 
 
 13“ Their wax, and that which moulds 
 
 Irrational 
 
 it.” Matter, and the virtue or energy 
 that acts on it. 
 
 18 ** The heaven.” The influence of the 
 planetary bodies. 
 
 14 “* The brightness of the seal.”” The 
 brightness of the Divine idea before 
 spoken of. : 
 
 15 “* Therefore.” Our Poet intends 
 this for a brief description of the Trin- 
 ity: the primal virtue signifying the 
 Father; the lustrous image, the Son; the 
 fervent love the Holy Ghost. 
 
PARADISE 
 
 339 
 
 The lustrous image of the primal virtue, 
 
 There all perfection is vouchsafed; and such 
 The clay #* was made, accomplish’d with each gift, 
 That life can teem with; such the burden fill’d 
 The virgin’s bosom: so that I commend 
 
 Thy judgment, that the human nature ne’er 
 
 Was, or can be, such as in them it was. 
 
 “ Did I advance no further than this point; 
 
 * How then had he no peer?’ thou might’st reply. 
 But, that what now appears not, may appear 
 Right plainly, ponder, who he was, and what 
 (When he was bidden ‘ Ask’) the motive, sway’d 
 To his requesting. I have spoken thus, 
 
 That thou mayst see, he was a king, who ask’d 1” 
 For wisdom, to the end he might be king 
 Sufficient: not, the number to search out 
 
 Of the celestial movers; or to know, 
 
 If necessary with contingent e’er 
 
 Have made necessity; or whether that 
 
 Be granted, that first motion 7° is; or if, 
 
 Of the mid-circle,’® can by art be made 
 Triangle, with its corner blunt or sharp. 
 
 “ Whence, noting that, which I have said, and this, 
 Thou kingly prudence and that ken mayst learn, 
 At which the dart of my intention aims. 
 
 And, marking clearly, that I told thee, ‘ Risen,’ 
 Thou shalt discern it only hath respect 
 To kings, of whom are many, and the good 
 
 Are rare. 
 
 With this distinction take my words; 
 
 And they may well consist with that which thou 
 Of the first human father dost believe, 
 
 And of our well-beloved. And let this 
 Henceforth be lead unto thy feet, to make 
 
 Thee slow in motion, as a weary man, 
 
 16 ** The clay.’”? Adam. 
 
 17** Who ask’d.” He did not desire 
 to know the number of the celestial 
 intelligences, or to pry into the subtle- 
 ties of logical, metaphysical, or mathe- 
 matical science: but asked for that wis- 
 dom which might fit him for his kingly 
 
 office. 
 
 18“ That first motion.” If we must 
 allow one first motion, which is not 
 caused by other motion: a question re- 
 
 solved affirmatively by metaphysies, ac- 
 cording to that principle, ‘‘ repugnant 
 m causis processus infinitum.” 
 
 19 “* Of the mid-circle.”” If in the half 
 of the circle a rectilinear triangle can 
 be described, one side of which shall be 
 the diameter of the same circle, without 
 its forming a right angle with the other 
 two sides; which geometry shows to be 
 impossible. 
 
340 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Both to the ‘ yea’ and to the ‘ nay’ thou seest not. 
 For he among the fools is down full low, 
 Whose affirmation, or denial, is | 
 Without distinction, in each case alike. 
 Since it befalls, that in most instances 
 Current opinion leans to false: and then 
 Affection bends the judgment to her ply. 
 “Much more than vainly doth he lose from shore, 
 Since he returns not such as he set forth, 
 Who fishes for the truth and wanteth skill. 
 And open proofs of this unto the world 
 Have been afforded in Parmenides, 
 Melissus, Bryso,?° and the crowd beside, 
 Who journey’d on, and knew not whither: so did 
 Sabellius, Arius,?? and the other fools, 
 Who, like to scimitars,?* reflected back 
 The scripture-image by distortion marr’d. 
 “Let not the people be too swift to judge; 
 As one who reckons on the blades in field, 
 
 Or e’er the crop be ripe. 
 
 For I have seen 
 
 The thorn frown rudely all the winter long, 
 
 And after bear the rose upon its top; 
 
 And bark, that all her way across the sea 
 
 Ran straight and speedy, perish at the last 
 
 E’en in the haven’s mouth. Seeing one steal, 
 Another bring his offering to the priest, 
 
 Let not 7? Dame Birtha and Sir Martin ** thence 
 Into heaven’s counsels deem that they can pry: 
 For one of these may rise, the other fall.” 
 
 20 ‘* ____ Parmenides, 
 Melissus, Bryso.” 
 
 For the singular opinions entertained 
 
 by the two former of these heathen 
 
 maoeo bers, see Diogenes Laertius, 
 
 ib. ix. 
 
 21** Sabellius, Arius.” Well-known 
 heretics. 
 
 22 “* Scimitars.”” Bertradon de la 
 Brocquiére, who wrote before Dante, 
 informs us that the wandering Arabs 
 used their scimitars as mirrors. 
 
 23 “‘ Let not.” ‘‘ Let not short-sighted 
 mortals presume to decide on the tard 
 doom of any man, from a consideration 
 of his present character and actions.” 
 This is meant as an answer to the 
 doubts entertained respecting the salva- 
 tion of Solomon. See Canto x. 107. 
 
 2 “*Dame Birtha and Sir Martin.” 
 Names put generally for persons who 
 have more curiosity than discretion, 
 
; PARADISE 341 
 
 CANTO XIV 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Solomon, who is one of the spirits in the inner circle, de- 
 clares what the appearance of the blest will be after the resurrection 
 of the body. Beatrice and Dante are translated into the fifth 
 Heaven, which is that of Mars; and here behold the souls of those, 
 who had died fighting for the true faith, ranged in the sign of the 
 cross, athwart which the spirits move to the sound of a melodious 
 hymn. 
 
 ROM centre to the circle, and so back 
 From circle to the centre, water moves 
 In the round chalice, even as the blow 
 
 Impels it, inwardly, or from without. 
 Such was the image? glanced into my mind, 
 As the great spirit of Aquinum ceased ; 
 And Beatrice, after him, her words 
 Resumed alternate: “ Need there is (though yet 
 He tells it to you not in words, nor e’en 
 In thought) that he should fathom to its depth 
 Another mystery. Tell him, if the light, 
 Wherewith your semblance blooms, shall stay with you 
 Eternally, as now; and, if it doth, 
 How, when ? ye shall regain your visible forms, 
 The sight may without harm endure the change, 
 That also tell.” As those, who in a ring 
 Tread the light measure, in their fitful mirth 
 Raise loud the voice, and spring with gladder bound; 
 Thus, at the hearing of that pious suit, 
 The saintly circles, in their tourneying 
 And wondrous note, attested new delight. 
 
 Whoso laments, that we must doff this garb 
 Of frail mortality, thenceforth to live 
 Immortally above; he hath not seen 
 The sweet refreshing of that heavenly shower.® 
 
 Him, who lives ever, and forever reigns 
 In mystic union of the Three in One, 
 Unbounded, bounding all, each spirit thrice 
 
 1 “Such was the image.’”’ The voice clothed with your bodies at the resur- 
 of Thomas Aquinas proceeding from the rection. 
 circle to the centre; and that of Bea- 8 “That heavenly shower.” That ef- 
 trice, from the centre to the circle. | fusion of beatific light. 
 
 3° When.’”? When ye shall be again 
 
oe THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Sang, with such melody, as, but to hear, 
 
 For highest merit were an ample meed. 
 
 And from the lesser orb the goodliest light,* 
 With gentle voice and mild, such as perhaps 
 
 The angel’s once to Mary, thus replied: 
 
 “Long as the joy of Paradise shall last, 
 
 Our love shall shine around that raiment, bright 
 As fervent; fervent as, in vision, blest; 
 
 And that as far, in blessedness, exceeding, 
 
 As it hath grace, beyond its virtue, great. 
 
 Our shape, regarmented with glorious weeds 
 
 Of saintly flesh, must, being thus entire, 
 
 Show yet more gracious. Therefore shall increase 
 Whate’er, of light, gratuitous imparts 
 
 The Supreme Good; light, ministering aid, 
 
 The better to disclose his glory: whence, 
 
 The vision needs increasing, must increase 
 
 The fervor, which it kindles; and that too 
 
 The ray, that comes from it. But as the gleed 
 Which gives out flame, yet in its whiteness shines 
 More livelily than that, and so preserves 
 
 Its proper semblance; thus this circling sphere 
 Of splendor shall to view less radiant seem, 
 Than shall our fleshly robe, which yonder earth 
 Now covers. Nor will such excess of light 
 O’erpower us, in corporeal organs made 
 
 Firm, and susceptible of all delight.” 
 
 So ready and so cordial an “ Amen” 
 Follow’d from either choir, as plainly spoke 
 Desire of their dead bodies; yet perchance 
 Not for themselves, but for their kindred dear, 
 Mothers and sires, and those whom best they loved, 
 Ere they were made imperishable flame. 
 
 And lo! forthwith there rose up round about 
 A lustre, over that already there; 
 
 Of equal clearness, like the brightening up 
 
 Of the horizon. As at evening hour 
 
 Of twilight, new appearances through heaven 
 Peer with faint glimmer, doubtfully descried; 
 
 4“ The goodliest light.” Solomon. 
 
PARADISE 343 
 
 So, there, new substances, methought, began 
 To rise in view beyond the other twain, 
 And wheeling, sweep their ampler circuit wide. 
 O genuine glitter of eternal Beam! 
 With what a sudden whiteness did it flow, 
 O’erpowering visionin me. But so fair, 
 So passing lovely, Beatrice show’d, 
 Mind cannot follow it, nor words express 
 Her infinite sweetness. Thence mine eyes regain’d 
 Power to look up; and I beheld myself, 
 Sole with my lady, to more lofty bliss ° 
 Translated: for the star, with warmer smile 
 Impurpled, well denoted our ascent. 
 With all the heart, and with that tongue which speaks 
 The same in all, a holocaust I made 
 To God befitting the new grace vouchsafed. 
 And from my bosom had not yet upsteam’d 
 The fuming of that incense, when I knew 
 The rite accepted. With such mighty sheen 
 And mantling crimson, in two listed rays 
 The splendors shot before me, that I cried, 
 “ God of Sabaoth! that dost prank them thus!” 
 As leads the galaxy from pole to pole, 
 Distinguish’d into greater lights and less, 
 Its pathway, which the wisest fail to spell; 
 So thickly studded, in the depth of Mars, 
 Those rays described the venerable sign, 
 That quadrants in the round conjoining frame. 
 Here memory mocks the toil of genius. Christ 
 Beam’d on that cross; and pattern fails me now. 
 But whoso takes his cross, and follows Christ, 
 Will pardon me for that I leave untold, 
 When in the flecker’d dawning he shall spy 
 The glitterance of Christ. From horn to horn, 
 And ’tween the summit and the base, did move 
 Lights, scintillating, as they met and pass’d. 
 Thus oft are seen with ever-changeful glance, 
 Straight or athwart, now rapid and now slow, 
 The atomies of bodies, long or short, 
 _6“To more lofty bliss.’ To the planet Mars, 
 
344 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 To move along the sunbeam, whose slant line 
 
 Checkers the shadow interposed by art 
 
 Against the noontide heat. And as the chime 
 
 Of minstrel music, dulcimer, and harp 
 
 With many strings, a pleasant dinning makes 
 
 To him, who heareth not distinct the note; 
 
 So from the lights, which there appear’d to me, 
 
 Gather’d along the cross a melody, 
 
 That, indistinctly heard, with ravishment 
 
 Possess’d me. Yet I mark’d it was a hymn 
 
 Of lofty praises; for there came to me 
 
 “ Arise,” and “ Conquer,” as to one who hears 
 
 And comprehends not. Me such ecstasy 
 
 O’ercame, that never, till that hour, was thing 
 
 That held me in so sweet imprisonment. 
 Perhaps my saying overbold appears, 
 
 Accounting less the pleasure of those eyes, 
 
 Whereon to look fulfilleth all desire. 
 
 But he, who is aware those living seals 
 
 Of every beauty work with quicker force, 
 
 The higher they are risen; and that there 
 
 I had not turn’d me to them; he may well 
 
 Excuse me that, whereof in my excuse 
 
 I do accuse me, and may own my truth; 
 
 That holy pleasure here not yet reveal’d, 
 
 Which grows in transport as we mount aloft, 
 
 CANTO XV 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The spirit of Cacciaguida, our Poet’s ancestor, glides 
 rapidly to the foot of the cross; tells who he is; and speaks of the 
 simplicity of the Florentines in his days, since then much corrupted. 
 
 RUE love, that ever shows itself as clear 
 In kindness, as loose appetite in wrong, 
 Silenced that lyre harmonious, and still’d 
 The sacred chords, that are by Heaven’s right hand 
 Unwound and tighten’d. How to righteous prayers 
 Should they not hearken, who, to give me will 
 For praying, in accordance thus were mute? 
 
PARADISE 345 
 
 He hath in sooth good cause for endless grief, 
 Who, for the love of thing that lasteth not, — 
 Despoils himself forever of that love. 
 
 As oft along the still and pure serene, 
 At nightfall, glides a sudden trail of fire, 
 Attracting with mvoluntary heed 
 The eye to follow it, erewhile at rest; 
 And seems some star that shifted place in heaven, 
 Only that, whence it kindles, none is lost, 
 And it is soon extinct: thus from the horn, 
 That on the dexter of the cross extends, 
 Down to its foot, one luminary ran 
 From mid the cluster shone there; yet no gem 
 Dropp’d from its foil: and through the beamy list, 
 Like flame in alabaster, glow’d its course. 
 So forward stretch’d him (if of credence aught 
 Our greater muse may claim) the pious ghost 
 Of old Anchises, in the Elysian bower, 
 When he perceived his son. “O thou, my blood! 
 O most exceeding grace divine! to whom, 
 As now to thee, hath twice the heavenly gate 
 Been e’er unclosed?”’ So spake the light: whence I 
 Turn’d me toward him; then unto my dame 
 My sight directed: and on either side 
 Amazement waited me; for in her eyes 
 Was lighted such a smile, I thought that mine 
 Had dived unto the bottom of my grace 
 And of my bliss in Paradise. Forthwith, 
 To hearing and to sight grateful alike, 
 The spirit to his proem added things 
 I understood not, so profound he spake: 
 Yet not of choice, but through necessity, 
 Mysterious; for his high conception soar’d 
 Beyond the mark of mortals. When the flight 
 Of holy transport had so spent its rage, 
 That nearer to the level of our thought 
 The speech descended; the first sounds I heard 
 Were, “ Blest be thou, Triunal Deity! 
 That hast such favor in my seed vouchsafed.”’ 
 Then follow’d: “ No unpleasant thirst, though long, 
 
346 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Which took me reading in the sacred book, 
 Whose leaves or white or dusky never change, 
 Thou hast allay’d, my son! within this light, 
 From whence my voice thou hear’st: more thanks to her 
 Who, for such lofty mounting, has with plumes 
 Begirt thee. Thou dost deem thy thoughts to me 
 From Him transmitted, who is first of all, 
 E’en as all numbers ray from unity ; 
 And therefore dost not ask me who I am, 
 Or why to thee more joyous I appear, 
 Than any other in this gladsome throng. 
 The truth is as thou deem’st; for in this life 
 Both less and greater in that mirror look, 
 In which thy thoughts, or e’er thou think’st, are shown. 
 But, that the love, which keeps me wakeful ever, 
 Urging with sacred thirst of sweet desire, 
 May be contented fully; let thy voice, 
 Fearless, and frank, and jocund, utter forth 
 Thy will distinctly, utter forth the wish, 
 Whereto my ready answer stands decreed.” 
 I turn’d me to Beatrice; and she heard 
 Ere I had spoken, smiling an assent, 
 That to my will gave wings; and I began: 
 “To each among your tribe, what time ye kenn’d 
 The nature, in whom naught unequal dwells, 
 Wisdom and love were in one measure dealt; 
 For that they are so equal in the sun, 
 From whence ye drew your radiance and your heat, 
 As makes all likeness scant. But will and means, 
 In mortals, for the cause ye well discern, 
 With unlike wings are fledge. A mortal, I 
 Experience inequality like this; 
 And therefore give no thanks, but in the heart, 
 For thy paternal greeting. This howe’er 
 I pray thee, living topaz! that ingemm’st 
 This precious jewel; let me hear thy name.” 
 “Tam thy root,’ O leaf! whom to expect 
 Even, hath pleased me.”” Thus the prompt reply 
 
 1“JT am thy root.’ Cacciaguida, father to Alighieri, of whom our Poet 
 avas the great-grandson. . 
 
PARADISE 
 
 Prefacing, next it added: 
 
 347 
 
 “ He, of whom ? 
 
 Thy kindred appellation comes, and who, 
 These hundred years and more, on its first ledge 
 Hath circuited the mountain, was my son, 
 
 And thy great-grandsire. 
 
 Well befits, his long 
 
 Endurance should be shorten’d by thy deeds. 
 
 “ Florence, within her ancient limit-mark, 
 Which calls her still* to matin prayers and noon, 
 Was chaste and sober, and abode in peace. 
 
 She had no armlets and no head-tires then; 
 
 No purfled dames; no zone, that caught the eye 
 More than the person did. Time was not yet, 
 When * at his daughter’s birth the sire grew pale, 
 For fear the age and dowry should exceed, 
 
 On each side, just proportion. 
 
 House was none 
 
 Void® of its family: nor yet had come 
 Sardanapalus,® to exhibit feats 
 
 Of chamber prowess. 
 
 Montemalo? yet 
 
 O’er our suburban turret ® rose; as much 
 To be surpassed in fall, as in its rising. 
 I saw Bellincion Berti ® walk abroad 
 
 2‘ He, of whom.” Thy great-grand- 
 father, Alighieri, has been in the first 
 round of Purgatory more than a hun- 
 dred years; and it is fit that thou by 
 thy good deserts shouldst endeavor to 
 shorten the time of his remaining there. 
 His son Bellincione was living in 1266; 
 and of him was born the father of our 
 Poet, whom Benvenuto da Imola calls 
 a lawyer by profession. t 
 
 in Which calls her still.””, The public 
 clock being still within the circuit of 
 the ancient walls. 
 
 “When.” When the women were 
 not married at too early an age, and did 
 not expect too large a portion. | 
 
 6 “ Void.” Through the civil wars 
 and banishments. r he may mean 
 that houses were not formerly built 
 merely for pomp and show, nor of 
 greater size than was necessary for con- 
 taining the families that inhabited them. 
 
 For it has been understood in both 
 these ways. ; 
 6 ‘“* Sardanapalus.”’ The luxurious 
 
 monarch of Assyria. 
 
 7 ‘* Montemalo.” Either an elevated 
 spot between Rome and Viterbo; or 
 Monte Mario, the site of the villa Mel- 
 lini, commanding a view of Rome. 
 
 8“ Our suburban turret.”’ Uccel- 
 latojo, near Florence, from whence that 
 city was discovered. Florence had not 
 
 et vied with Rome in the grandeur of 
 her public buildings. 
 
 ®“ Bellincion Berti.” ‘ Hell,’ Canto 
 xvi. 38, and notes. There is a curious 
 
 description of the simple manner in 
 which the earlier Florentines dressed 
 themselves, in G. Villani, lib. vi. c. xxi, 
 “‘ And observe that in the time of the 
 said people (A.D. 1259), and before and 
 for a long time after, the citizens of 
 Florence lived soberly, on coarse viands, 
 and at little cost, and in many customs 
 and courtesies of life were rude and 
 unpolished; and dressed themselves and 
 their women in coarse cloths: many 
 wore plain leather, without cloth over 
 it; bonnets on their heads; and all, boots 
 on the feet; and the Florentine women 
 were without ornament; the better sort 
 content with a close gown of scarlet 
 cloth of Ypres or of camlet, bound with 
 a girdle in the ancient mode, and a 
 mantle lined with fur, and a hood to it, 
 which was worn on the head; the com- 
 mon sort of women were clad in a 
 coarse gown of Cambrai in like manner. 
 One hundred pounds (libbre) was the 
 common portion for a wife; and two or 
 three hundred was accounted a mag- 
 nificent one; and the young women 
 were for the most part twenty years old 
 or more before they were given in mar- 
 riage. Such was the dress; and thus 
 coarse were the manners of the Flor- 
 entines; but they were of good faith 
 and loyal both among themselves and 
 to the State; and with their coarse way 
 of living and poverty did greater and 
 more virtuous deeds than have been 
 done in our times with greater refine- 
 ment and wealth.” 
 
348 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 In leathern girdle, and a clasp of bone; 
 And, with no artful coloring on her cheeks, 
 
 His lady leave the glass. 
 
 The sons I saw 
 
 Of Nerli, and of Vecchio,?® well content 
 With unrobed jerkin; and their good dames handling 
 
 The spindle and the flax: 
 
 O happy they! 
 
 Each ** sure of burial in her native land, 
 And none left desolate a-bed for France. 
 One waked to tend the cradle, hushing it 
 With sounds that lull’d the parent’s infancy : 
 Another, with her maidens, drawing off 
 The tresses from the distaff, lectured them 
 Old tales of Troy, and Fesole, and Rome. 
 A Salterello and Cianghella ** we 
 Had held as strange a marvel, as ye would 
 A Cincinnatus or Cornelia now. 
 
 “In such composed and seemly fellowship, 
 Such faithful and such fair equality, 
 In so sweet household, Mary ** at my birth 
 Bestow’d me, call’d on with loud cries; and there, 
 In your old baptistery, I was made 
 Christian at once and Cacciaguida; as were 
 My brethren Eliseo and Moronto. 
 
 “From Valdipado '® came to me my spouse; 
 
 And hence thy surname grew. 
 
 I follow’d then 
 
 The Emperor Conrad:'* and his knighthood he 
 Did gird on me; in such good part he took 
 
 My valiant service. 
 
 After him I went 
 
 To testify against that evil law, 
 
 Whose people,** by the shepherd’s fault, possess 
 Your right usurp’d. There I by that foul crew 
 Was disentangled from the treacherous world 
 
 40 “ Of Nerli and of Vecchio.” Two 
 of the most opulent families in Flor- 
 
 ence. 
 11 “* Fach.” None fearful either of 
 dying in banishment or of being desert- 
 ed by her husband on a scheme of 
 traffic in France. . 
 12 “* A Salterello and Cianghella.” The 
 latter a shameless woman of the family 
 of Tosa, married to Lito degli Alidosi 
 of Imola: the former Lapo Salterello, 
 a lawyer, with whom Dante was at va- 
 riance. ‘‘ We should have held an 
 abandoned character, like these, as a 
 
 great wonder, as ye would the contrary 
 
 _ 18 “Mary.” The Virgin was invoked 
 in the pains of child-birth. “ Purga- 
 tory,” Canto xx. 21. 
 
 18 “ Valdipado.”’ Cacciaguida’s wife, 
 whose family name was Alighieri, came 
 from Ferrara, called Val di Pado, from 
 its bein& watered by the Po. 
 
 16 ** Conrad.”” The Emperor Conrad 
 IT¥, who died in 1152. 
 
 17“* Whose people.” The Mohamme- 
 dans, who were left in the possession of 
 the Holy Land, through the supineness 
 of the Pope. See Canto ix, 123. 
 
PARADISE 
 
 Whose base affection many a spirit soils; 
 And from the martyrdom came to this peace.” 
 
 CANTO XVI 
 
 349 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Cacciaguida relates the time of his birth; and, describing 
 the extent of Florence when he lived there, recounts the names of 
 the chief families who then inhabited it. Its degeneracy, and subse- 
 quent disgrace, he attributes to the introduction of families from 
 the neighboring country and villages, and to their mixture with the 
 
 primitive citizens. 
 
 SLIGHT respect of man’s nobility! 
 I never shall account it marvellous, 
 That our infirm affection here below 
 Thou movest to boasting; when I could not chuse, 
 E’en in that region of unwarp’d desire, 
 In heaven itself, but make my vaunt in thee. 
 Yet cloak thou art soon shorten’d; for that Time, 
 Unless thou be eked out from day to day, 
 Goes round thee with his shears. Resuming then, 
 With greeting 1 such as Rome was first to bear, 
 But since hath disaccustom’d, I began: 
 _ And Beatrice, that a little space 
 Was sevr’d, smiled; reminding me of her, 
 Whose cough embolden’d (as the story holds) 
 To first offence the doubting Guenever.? 
 “ You are my sire,” said I: “ you give me heart 
 Freely to speak my thought: above myself 
 You raise me. Through so many streams with joy 
 My soul is fill’d, that gladness wells from it; 
 So that it bears the mighty tide, and bursts not. 
 Say then, my honor’d stem! what ancestors 
 
 Were those who sprang from, and what years were mark’d 
 
 In your first childhood? Tell me of the fold,’ 
 That hath Saint John for guardian, what was then 
 Its state, and who in it were highest seated! ” 
 
 1“ With greeting.” The Poet, who #"* Guenever.” Beatrice’s smile re- 
 had addressed the spirit, not knowing minded him of the female servant_who, 
 him to be his ancestor, with a plain by her coughing, emboldened Queen 
 ** Thou,” now uses more ceremony, and Guenever to admit the freedoms of 
 calls him ‘* You,” according to a cus- Lancelot. See ‘‘ Hell,”’ Canto v. 124. 
 tom introduced among the Romans in 8 ‘The fold.” Florence, of which 
 
 the latter times of the empire. 
 Classies. Vol. 34—P 
 
 John the Baptist was the patron saint. 
 
35° 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 As embers, at the breathing of the wind, 
 Their flame enliven; so that light 1 saw 
 Shine at my blandishments; and, as it grew 
 More fair to look on, so with voice more sweet, 
 Yet not in this our modern phrase, forthwith 
 
 It answer’d: 
 
 “From the day,* when it was said 
 
 ‘Hail Virgin!’ to the throes by which my mother, 
 Who now is sainted, lighten’d her of me 
 
 Whom she was heavy with, this fire had come 
 Five hundred times and fourscore, to relume 
 
 Its radiance underneath the burning foot 
 
 Of its own lion. 
 
 They, of whom I sprang, 
 
 And I, had there our birth-place, where the last ® 
 Partition of our city first is reach’d 
 
 By him that runs her annual game. 
 
 Thus much 
 
 Suffice of my forefathers: who they were, 
 And whence they hither came, more honorable 
 It is to pass in silence than to tell. 
 
 All those who at that time were there, betwixt 
 Mars and the Baptist, fit to carry arms, 
 
 Were but the fifth, of them this day alive. 
 
 But then the citizen’s blood, that now is mix’d 
 From Campi and Certaldo and Fighine,® 
 
 Ran purely through the last mechanic’s veins. 
 
 O how much better were it, that these people? 
 Were neighbors to you; and that at Galluzzo 
 And at Trespiano ye should have your boundary ; 
 Than to have them within, and bear the stench 
 Of Aguglione’s hind, and Signa’s,® him, 
 
 That hath his eye already keen for bartering. 
 Had not the people,® which of all the world 
 
 4‘ From the day.’”” From the incar- 
 nation of our Lord to the birth of Cac- 
 ciaguida, the planet Mars had returned 
 580 times to the constellation of Leo, 
 with which it is supposed to have a 
 congenial influence. As Mars then 
 completes his revolution in a period of 
 forty-three days short of two years, 
 bree ty was born about 1090. 
 
 5 “* The last.” The city was divided 
 into four compartments. The Elsei, the 
 ancestors of Dante, resided near the 
 entrance of that, named from the Porta 
 
 Piero, which was the last reached by 
 the competitor in the annual race at 
 Florence, 
 
 6 ** Campi and Certaldo and Fighine.” 
 Country places near Florence.  - 
 
 7“ That these people.” That the ine 
 habitants of the above-mentioned places 
 had not been mixed with the citizens; 
 nor the limits of Florence extended be- 
 yond Galluzzo and Trespiano. 
 
 ® “ Aguglione’s hind, and Signa’s.” 
 Baldo of Aguglione, and Bonifazio of 
 
 igna. , 
 ® “Had not the Denoles, If Rome 
 had continued in her allegiance to the 
 Emperor, and the Guelfi-Ghibelline fac- 
 tions had thus been prevented; Florence 
 would not have been polluted by a race 
 of upstarts, nor lost the most respecte 
 able of her ancient families. 
 
PARADISE 35! 
 
 Degenerates most, been stepdame unto Cesar, 
 But, as a mother to her son been kind, 
 
 Such one, as hath become a Florentine, 
 
 And trades and traffics, had been turn’d adrift 
 To Simifonte,?° where his grandsire plied 
 The begar’s craft: the Conti were possessed 
 Of Montemurlo™ still: the Cerchi still 
 
 Were in Acone’s parish: nor had haply 
 From Valdigreve passed the Buondelmonti. 
 The city’s malady hath ever source 
 
 In the confusion of its persons, as 
 
 The body’s, in variety of food: 
 
 And the blind bull falls with a steeper plunge, 
 Than the blind lamb: and oftentimes one sword 
 Doth more and better execution, 
 
 Than five. Mark Luni; Urbisaglia?* mark; 
 How they are gone; and after them how go 
 Chiusi and Sinigaglia: 1° and ’twill seem 
 
 No longer new, or strange to thee, to hear 
 That families fail, when cities have their end. 
 All things that appertain to ye, like yourselves, 
 Are mortal: but mortality in some 
 
 Ye mark not; they endure so long, and you 
 Pass by so suddenly. And as the moon 
 
 Doth, by the rolling of her heavenly sphere, 
 Hide and reveal the strand unceasingly ; 
 
 So fortune deals with Florence. Hence admire not 
 At what of them I tell thee, whose renown 
 Time covers, the first Florentines. I saw 
 The Ughi, Catilini, and Filippi, 
 
 The Alberichi, Greci, and Ormanni, 
 
 Now in their wane, illustrious citizens; 
 
 And great as ancient, of Sannella him, 
 
 With him of Arca saw, and Soldanieri, 
 
 And Ardinghi, and Bostichi. At the poop ** 
 
 10 “* Simifonte.”” A castle dismantled merly of importance, but then fallen to 
 
 by the Florentines. The person here decay. 
 
 alluded to is no longer known. ee 18“ Chiusi and Sinigaglia.” The 
 11 “ Montemurlo.”” The Conti Guidi, same. ; 
 
 not being able to defend their castle 4 ‘* At the poop.” The Cerchi, 
 
 from the Pistoians, sold it to the State Dante’s enemies, had succeeded to the 
 
 of Florence. houses over the gate of St. Peter, for- 
 
 uni; Urbisaglia.’”? Cities for- merly inhabited by the Ravignani and 
 the Count Guido. 
 
352 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 That now is laden with new felony 
 
 So cumbrous it may speedily sink the bark, 
 
 The Ravignani sat, of whom is sprung 
 
 The County Guido, and whoso hath since 
 
 His title from the famed Bellincion ta’en. 
 
 Fair governance was yet an art well prized 
 
 By him of Pressa: Galigaio show’d 
 
 The gilded hilt and pommel, in his house: 
 
 The column, clothed with verrey,** still was seen 
 Unshaken ; the Sachetti still were great, 
 Giouchi, Sifanti, Galli, and Barucci, 
 
 With them *? who blush to hear the bushel named, 
 Of the Calfucci still the branchy trunk 
 
 Was in its strength: and, to the curule chairs, 
 
 Sizii and Arrigucci 1® yet were drawn. 
 
 How mighty them ?® I saw, whom, since, their pride 
 
 Hath undone! 
 
 And in all their goodly deeds 
 
 Florence was, by the bullets of bright gold,° 
 O’erflourish’d. Such the sires of those,” who now, 
 As surely as your church is vacant, flock 
 
 Into her consistory, and at leisure 
 
 There stall them and grow fat. The o’erweening brood,?? 
 That plays the dragon after him that flees, 
 
 But unto such as turn and show the tooth, 
 
 Ay or the purse, is gentle as a lamb, 
 
 Was on its rise, but yet so slight esteem’d, 
 
 That Ubertino of Donati grudged 
 
 His father-in-law should yoke him to its tribe. 
 Already Caponsacco ** had descended 
 
 Into the mart from Fesole: and Giuda 
 
 1%“ The gilded hilt and pommel.” 
 The symbols of knighthood. 
 
 16 ** The column, clothed with verrey.” 
 The arms of the Pigli, or, as some write 
 it, the Billi. 
 
 17“ With them.” Ejither the Chiara- 
 montesi, or the Tosinghi; one of which 
 had committed a fraud in measuring 
 out the wheat from the public granary. 
 See “‘ Purgatory,’’ Canto xii. 99 
 
 18 “‘ Sizii_ and Arrigucci.” ‘“ These 
 families still obtained the magistracies.” 
 
 19 “© Them.”? The Uberti. 
 
 20“ The bullets of bright gold.” The 
 arms of the Abbati, as it is conjectured; 
 or of the Lamberti, according to the 
 authorities referred to in the last note. 
 
 1 “The sires of those.”” Of the Vis- 
 
 domini, the Tosinghi, and the Corti- 
 
 iani, who, being sprung from the 
 ounders of the bishopric of Florence, 
 are the curators of its revenues, which 
 they do not spare, whenever it becomes 
 vacant. 
 
 22 “The o’erweening brood.” The 
 Adimari. This family was so little es- 
 teemed, that Ubertino Donato, who had 
 married a daughter of Bellincion Berti, 
 himself indeed derived from the same 
 stock, was offended with his father-in- 
 law, for giving another of his daughters 
 in marriage to one of them. 
 
 23 “ Caponsacco.”” The family of Ca- 
 ponsacchi, who_had removed from Fe- 
 sole, lived at Florence in the Mercato 
 Vecchio. 
 
PARADISE 
 
 353 
 
 And Infangato 74 were good citizens. 
 
 A thing incredible I tell, though true: 
 
 The gateway, named from those of Pera, led 
 Into the narrow circuit of your walls. 
 
 Each one, who bears the sightly quarterings 
 
 Of the great Baron,?® (he whose name and worth 
 The festival of Thomas still revives), 
 
 His knighthood and his privilege retain’d ; 
 Albeit one,?® who borders them with gold, 
 This day is mingled with the common herd. 
 In Borgo yet the Gualterotti dwelt, 
 
 And Importuni:?7 well for its repose, 
 
 Had it still lack’d of newer neighborhood.”® 
 The house,” from whence your tears have had their spring, 
 Through the just anger, that hath murder’d ye 
 And put a period to your gladsome days, 
 
 Was honor’d; it, and those consorted with it. 
 O Buondelmonti! what ill counselling 
 Prevail’d on thee to break the plighted bond? 
 Many, who now are weeping, would rejoice, 
 Had God to Ema *° given thee, the first time 
 
 Thou near our city camest. 
 
 But so was doom’d: 
 
 Florence! on that maim’d stone ** which guards the bridge, 
 
 The victim, when thy peace departed, fell. 
 
 * 
 
 “With these and others like to them, I saw 
 Florence in such assured tranquillity, 
 
 ia 4 Guida 
 And Infangato.”’ ‘ 
 Giuda Guidi and the family of Infangati. 
 25 “* The great Baron.’? The Marchese 
 Ugo, who resided at Florence as lieu- 
 tenant of the Emperor Otho III, gave 
 many of the chief families license to 
 bear his arms. A vision is related, in 
 consequence of which he sold all his 
 possessions in Germany, and founded 
 seven abbeys, in one whereof his mem- 
 ory was celebrated at Florence on St. 
 Thomas’s day. The marquis, when 
 hunting, strayed away from his people, 
 and wandering through a forest, came 
 to a smithy, where he saw black and 
 deformed men tormenting others with 
 fire and hammers; and, asking the 
 meaning of this, he was told that they 
 were condemned souls, who suffered this 
 pemenment, and that the soul of the 
 arquis Ugo was doomed to suffer the 
 same if he did not repent. Struck with 
 horror, he commended himself to the 
 
 Virgin Mary; and soon after founded 
 the seven religious houses. 
 
 ete OneN. iano della Bella, belong: 
 ing to one of the families thus dis- 
 tinguished, who no longer retained his 
 place among the nobility, and had yet 
 added to his arm a bordure or. 
 
 37 a Gualterotti dwelt, 
 
 And Importuni.”’ 
 Two families in the compartment of 
 the city called Borgo. 5 
 
 28 “* Newer neighborhood.” Some un- 
 derstand this of the Bardi; and others, 
 of the Buondelmonti. 
 
 29** The house.”? Of Amidei. 
 
 30 “To Ema.” It had been well for 
 the city if thy ancestor had been 
 drowned in the Ema, when he crossed 
 that stream on his way from Monte- 
 buono to Florence. 
 
 81 “ On the maim’d stone.” Near the 
 remains of the statue of Mars, Buondel- 
 monti was slain, as if he had been a 
 victim to the god; and Florence had 
 not since known the blessing of peace. 
 
354 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 She had no cause at which to grieve: with these 
 Saw her so glorious and so just, that ne’er 
 
 The lily ** from the lance had hung reverse, 
 
 Or through division been with vermeil dyed.” 
 
 CANTO XVII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Cacciaguida predicts to our Poet his exile and the calami- 
 ties he had to suffer; and, lastly, exhorts him to write the present 
 poem. 
 
 UCH as the youth,’ who came to Clymene, 
 
 S To certify himself of that reproach 
 Which had been fasten’d on him (he whose end 
 Still makes the fathers chary to their sons), 
 FE’en such was I; nor unobserved was such 
 Of Beatrice, and that saintly lamp,? 
 Who had erewhile for me his station moved; 
 When thus my lady: “ Give thy wish free vent, 
 That it may issue, bearing true report 
 Of the mind’s impress: not that aught thy words 
 May to our knowledge add, but to the end 
 That thou mayst use thyself to own thy thirst,® 
 And men may mingle for thee when they hear.” 
 “© plant, from whence I spring! revered and loved! 
 
 Who soar’st so high a pitch, that thou as clear,* 
 As earthly thought determines two obtuse 
 In cae triangle not contain’d, so clear 
 Dost see contingencies, ere in themselves 
 Existent, looking at the point ° whereto 
 All times are present; I, the whilst I scaled 
 With Virgil the soul-purifying mount 
 And visited the nether world of woe, 
 
 832 The lily.” The arms of Florence 8 “To own thy thirst.” ‘* That thou 
 had never hung reversed on the spear mayst obtain from others a solution of 
 of her enemies, in token of her defeat; any doubt that may occur to thee.” 
 nor been changed from argent to gules; 4“ That thou as clear.” ‘* Thou be- 
 as they afterward were, when the Guelfi holdest future events with the same 
 gained the predominance. clearness of evidence that we discern 
 
 1“ The youth.” Phaéton, who came the simplest mathematical demonstra- 
 to his mother Clymene, to inquire of tions.” i aid 
 her if he were indeed the son of Apollo. 5 “ The point.” The divine nature. 
 8“ That saintly lamp.” Cacciaguida. , 
 
PARADISE 
 
 355 
 
 Touching my future destiny have heard 
 Words grievous, though I feel me on all sides 
 
 Well squared to fortune’s blows. 
 
 Therefore my will 
 
 Were satisfied to know the lot awaits me. 
 
 The arrow, seen beforehand, slacks his flight.” 
 So said I to the brightness, which erewhile 
 
 To me had spoken; and my will declared, 
 
 As Beatrice will’d, explicitly. 
 
 Nor with oracular response obscure, 
 
 Such as, or e’er the Lamb of God was slain, 
 Beguiled the credulous nations: but, in terms 
 Precise, and unambiguous lore, replied 
 
 The spirit of paternal love, enshrined, 
 
 Yet in his smile apparent; and thus spake: 
 
 “ Contingency,® whose verge extendeth not 
 Beyond the tablet of your mortal mould, 
 
 Is all depictured in the eternal sight ; 
 
 But hence deriveth not necessity,’ 
 
 More than the tall ship, hurried down the flood, 
 Is driven by the eye that looks on it. 
 
 From thence,? as to the ear sweet harmony 
 From organ comes, so comes before mine eye 
 
 The time prepared for thee. 
 
 Such as driven out 
 
 From Athens, by his cruel step-dame’s ® wiles, 
 Hippolytus departed; such must thou 
 
 Depart from Florence. 
 
 This they wish, and this 
 
 Contrive, and will ere long effectuate, there,’° 
 Where gainful merchandise is made of Christ 
 Throughout the live-long day. The common cry,™ 
 Wiill, as ’tis ever wont, affix the blame 
 
 Unto the party injured: but the truth 
 
 Shall, in the vengeance it dispenseth, find 
 
 A faithful witness. 
 
 Thou shalt leave each thing 
 
 Beloved most dearly: this is the first shaft 
 
 ® ** Contingency.”? Contingency, which 
 has no place beyond the limits of the 
 material world. Y 
 
 7 “ Necessity.”” The evidence with 
 which we see casual events portrayed 
 in the source of all truth, no more ne- 
 cessitates those events, than does the 
 image, reflected in the sight by a ship 
 sailing down a stream, necessitate the 
 motion of the vessel. 
 
 8 “ From thence.” From the eternal 
 
 sight; the view of the Deity himself. 
 ‘His cruel step-dame.” Phedra. 
 
 10 “ There.’?’ At Rome, where the ex- 
 pulsion of Dante’s party from Florence 
 was then plotting, in 1300. 
 
 11 The common cry.” The multi- 
 tude will, as usual, be ready to blame 
 those who are sufferers, whose cause 
 will at last be vindicated by the over- 
 throw of their enemies. 
 
356 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Shot from the bow of exile. 
 
 Thou shalt prove 
 
 How salt the savor is of other’s bread; 
 How hard the passage, to descend and climb 
 
 By other’s stairs. 
 
 But that shall gall thee most, 
 
 Will be the worthless and vile company, 
 
 With whom thou must be thrown into these straits. 
 
 For all ungrateful, impious all, and mad, 
 
 Shall turn ’gainst thee: but in a little while, 
 
 Theirs,?? and not thine, shall be the crimson’d brow, 
 
 Their course shall so evince their brutishness, 
 
 To have ta’en thy stand apart shall well become thee. 
 “First refuge thou must find, first place of rest, 
 
 In the great Lombard’s ** courtesy, who bears, 
 
 Upon the ladder perch’d, the sacred bird. 
 
 He shall behold thee with such kind regard, 
 
 The ’twixt ye two, the contrary to that 
 
 Which ’falls ’twixt other men, the granting shall 
 
 Forerun the asking. With him shalt thou see 
 
 That mortal,4* who was at his birth impressed 
 
 So strongly from this star, that of his deeds 
 
 The nations shall take note. 
 
 His unripe age 
 
 Yet holds him from observance; for these wheels 
 Only nine years have compassed him about. 
 But, ere the Gascon ** practise on great Harry,?® 
 Sparkles of virtue shall shoot forth in him, 
 
 In equal scorn of labors and of gold. 
 
 His bounty shall be spread abroad so widely, 
 
 As not to let the tongues, e’en of his foes, 
 
 Be idle in its praise. 
 
 Look thou to him, 
 
 And his beneficence: for he shall cause 
 Reversal of their lot to many people; 
 
 Rich men and beggars interchanging fortunes. 
 And thou shalt bear this written in thy soul, 
 Of him, but tell it not:” and things he told 
 Incredible to those who witness them; 
 
 12 “ Theirs.’’ They shall be ashamed 
 of the part they have taken against 
 
 thee. 
 
 18 “The great Lombard.” Either 
 Bartolommeo della Scala or Alboino 
 his brother, although our Poet has 
 spoken ambiguously of him in his 
 * Convito,” p. 179. Their coat-of-arms 
 was a ladder and an eagle. 
 
 14 ** That mortal.”? Can Grande della 
 Scala, born under the influence of Mars, 
 but at this time only nine years old. 
 He was, as the other two, a son of 
 Alberto della Scala. 
 
 ¥ hy ae See ed) Peeper er uneat V. 
 
 “* Great arry. e mperor 
 Henry VII. > 
 
his satirical vein. 
 
 PARADISE 
 
 Then added: “So interpret thou, my son, 
 What hath been told thee—Lo! the ambushment 
 That a few circling seasons hide for thee. 
 
 Yet envy not thy neighbors: time extends 
 
 Thy span beyond their treason’s chastisement.” 
 
 Soon as the saintly spirit, by silence, mark’d 
 Completion of that web, which I had stretch’d 
 Before it, warp’d for weaving; I began, 
 
 As one, who in perplexity desires 
 
 Counsel of other, wise, benign, and friendly: 
 
 “My father! well I mark how time spurs on 
 Toward me, ready to inflict the blow, 
 
 Which falls most heavily on him who most 
 Abandoneth himself. Therefore ’tis good 
 
 I should forecast, that, driven from the place 17 
 Most dear to me, I may not lose myself #8 
 
 All other by my song. Down through the world 
 Of infinite mourning; and along the mount, 
 
 From whose fair height my lady’s eyes did lift me; 
 And, after, through this Heaven, from light to light: 
 Have I learnt that, which if I tell again, 
 
 It may with many wofully disrelish: 
 
 And, if I am a timid friend to truth, 
 
 I fear my life may perish among those, 
 
 To whom these days shall be of ancient date.” 
 
 The brightness, where enclosed the treasure 1° smiled, 
 Which I had found there, first shone glisteringly, 
 Like to a golden mirror in the sun; 
 
 Next answer’d: “Conscience, dimm’d or by its own 
 Or other’s shame, will feel thy saying sharp. 
 
 Thou, notwithstanding, all deceit removed, 
 
 See the whole vision be made manifest. 
 
 And let them wince, who have their withers wrung. 
 What though, when tasted first, thy voice shall prove 
 Unwelcome: on digestion, it will turn 
 
 To vital nourishment, The cry thou raisest 
 
 357 
 
 17 “* The place.”? Our Poet here dis- 18 “*T may not lose myself.”” That 
 
 covers both that Florence, much as he being driven out of my country, I 
 inveighs against it, was still the dearest ‘ 
 object of his affections, and that it was by the boldness with which I expose 
 
 may 
 
 not deprive myself of every other place 
 
 not without some scruple he indulge in my writings the vices of mankind. 
 
 The treasure.”? Cacciaguida. 
 
358 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Shall, as the wind doth, smite the proudest summits ; 
 Which is of honor no light argument. 
 
 For this, there only have been shown to thee, 
 Throughout these orbs, the mountain, and the deep, 
 Spirits, whom fame hath note of. For the mind 
 
 Of him who hears, is loth to acquiesce 
 
 And fix its faith, unless the instance brought 
 
 Be palpable, and proof apparent urge.”’ 
 
 CANTO XVIII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Dante sees the souls of many renowned warriors and crt- 
 saders in the planet Mars; and then ascends with Beatrice to Jupiter, 
 the sixth Heaven, in which he finds the souls of those who had ad- 
 ministered justice rightly in the world, so disposed, as to form the 
 figure of an eagle. The Canto concludes with an invective against 
 the avarice of the clergy, and especially of the Pope. 
 
 OW in his word, sole, ruminating, joy’d 
 That blessed spirit: and I fed on mine, 
 Tempering the sweet with bitter. She meanwhile, 
 Who led me unto God, admonish’d: ‘“ Muse 
 On other thoughts: bethink thee, that near Him 
 I dwell, who recompenseth every wrong.” 
 At the sweet sounds of comfort straight I turn’d; 
 And, in the saintly eyes what love was seen, 
 I leave in silence here, nor through distrust 
 Of my words only, but that to such bliss 
 The mind remounts not without aid. Thus much 
 Yet may I speak; that, as I gazed on her, 
 Affection found no room for other wish. 
 While the everlasting pleasure, that did full 
 On Beatrice shine, with second view 
 From her fair countenance my gladden’d soul 
 Contented; vanquishing me with a beam 
 Of her soft smile, she spake: ‘‘ Turn thee, and list. 
 These eyes are not thy only Paradise.” 
 As here, we sometimes in the looks may see 
 The affection mark’d, when that its sway hath ta’en 
 
‘PARADISE 359 
 
 The spirit wholly; thus the hallow’d light,? 
 
 To whom I turn’d, flashing, bewray’d its will 
 
 To talk yet further with me, and began: 
 
 “On this fifth lodgment of the tree,? whose life 
 
 Is from its top, whose fruit is ever fair 
 
 And leaf unwithering, blessed spirits abide, 
 
 That were below, ere they arrived in heaven, 
 
 So mighty in renown, as every muse 
 
 Might grace her triumph with them. On the horns 
 
 Look, therefore, of the cross: he whom I name, 
 
 Shall there enact, as doth in summer cloud 
 
 Its nimble fire.” Along the cross I saw, 
 
 At the repeated name of Joshua, 
 
 A splendor gliding; nor, the word was said, 
 
 Ere it was done: then, at the naming, saw, 
 
 Of the great Maccabee,’? another move 
 
 With whirling speed; and gladness was the scourge 
 
 Unto that top. The next for Charlemain 
 
 And for the peer Orlando, two my gaze 
 
 Pursued, intently, as the eye pursues 
 
 A falcon flying. Last, along the cross, 
 
 William, and Renard,* and Duke Godfrey ° drew 
 
 My ken, and Robert Guiscard.® And the soul 
 
 Who spake with me, among the other lights 
 
 Did move away, and mix; and with the quire 
 
 Of heavenly songsters proved his tuneful skill. 
 To Beatrice on my right I bent, 
 
 Looking for intimation, or by word 
 
 Or act, what next behoved; and did descry 
 
 Such mere effulgence in her eyes, such joy, 
 
 It pass’d all former wont. And, as by sense 
 
 Of new delight, the man, who perseveres 
 
 In good deeds, doth perceive, from day to day, 
 
 His virtue growing; I e’en thus perceived, 
 
 2 “ The hallow’d light.” In which the age of Charlemain. The former, Will- 
 
 spirit of Facciagaide was enclosed. iam I of Orange, supposed to have been 
 3 “On this fifth lodgment of the tree.”’ the founder of the present illustrious 
 Mars, the fifth of the heavens. family of that name, died about 808. 
 8‘* The great Maccabee.”? Judas Mac- The latter is better known by having 
 cabzus. been celebrated by Ariosto, under the 
 
 4“ William, and Renard.” Probably, name of Rinaldo. 
 not William II of Orange, and his 5“ Duke Godfrey.” Godfrey of 
 kinsman Raimbaud, two of the crusaders Bouillon. 
 
 Godfrey of Bouillon, but rather Robert Guiscard.” See ‘ Hell,” 
 
 the two more celebrated heroes in the Canto xxviii. 12. 
 
350 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY. 
 
 Of my ascent, together with the heaven, 
 
 The circuit widen’d; noting the increase 
 
 Of beauty in that wonder. Like the change 
 
 In a brief moment on some maiden’s cheek, 
 Which, from its fairness, doth discharge the weight 
 Of pudency, that stain’d it; such in her, 
 
 And to mine eyes so sudden was the change, 
 Through silvery whiteness of that temperate star 
 Whose sixth orb now enfolded us. I saw, 
 Within that jovial cresset, the clear sparks 
 
 Of love, that reign’d there, fashion to my view 
 Our language. And as birds, from river banks 
 Arisen, now in round, now lengthen’d troop, 
 Array them in their flight, greeting, as seems, 
 Their new-found pastures; so, within the lights, 
 The saintly creatures flying, sang; and made 
 Now D, now I, now L, figured i’ the air. 
 
 First singing to their notes they moved; then, one 
 Becoming of these signs, a little while 
 
 Did rest them, and were mute. O nymph divine 
 Of Pegasean race! who souls; which thou 
 Inspirest, makest glorious and long-lived, as they 
 Cities and realms by thee; thou with thyself 
 Inform me; that I may set forth the shapes, 
 
 As fancy doth present them: be thy power 
 Display’d in this brief song. The characters, 
 Vocal and consonant, were five-fold seven. 
 
 In order, each, as they appear’d, I mark’d 
 
 Diligite Justitiam, the first, . 
 
 Both verb and noun all blazon’d; and the extreme, 
 Qui judicatis terram. In the M 
 
 Of the fifth word they held their station; 
 Making the star seem silver streak’d with gold. 
 And on the summit of the M, I saw 
 Descending other lights, that rested there, 
 Singing, methinks, their bliss and primal good. 
 Then, as at shaking of a lighted brand, : 
 Sparkles innumerable on all sides 
 
 Rise scatter’d, source of augury to the unwise: 
 Thus more than thousand twinkling lustres hence 
 
PARADISE 
 
 361 
 
 Seem’d reascending; and a higher pitch 
 
 Some mounting, and some less, e’en as the sun, 
 
 Which kindleth them, decreed. And when each one 
 Had settled in his place; the head and neck 
 
 Then saw I of an eagle, livelily 
 
 Graved in that streaky fire. 
 
 Who painteth there,’ 
 
 Hath none to guide Him: of Himself he guides: 
 And every line and texture of the nest 
 Doth own from Him the virtue fashions it. 
 The other bright beatitude,® that seem’d 
 Erewhile, with lilied crowning, well content 
 To over-canopy the M, moved forth, 
 Following gently the impress of the bird. 
 
 Sweet star! what glorious and thick-studded gems 
 Declared to me our justice on the earth 
 To be the effluence of that heaven, which thou, 
 Thyself a costly jewel, dost inlay. 
 Therefore I pray the Sovran Mind, from whom 
 Thy motion and thy virtue are begun, 
 That He would look from whence the fog doth rise, 
 To vitiate thy beam; so that once more ® 
 He may put forth his hand ’gainst such, as drive 
 Their traffic in that sanctuary, whose walls 
 With miracles and martyrdoms were built. 
 Ye host of heaven, whose glory I survey! 
 O beg'ye grace for those, that are, on earth, 
 All after ill example gone astray. 
 War once had for his instrument the sword: 
 But now ’tis made, taking the bread away,’ 
 Which the good Father locks from none.—And thou, 
 That writest but to cancel,” think, that they, 
 Who for the vineyard, which thou wastest, died, 
 Peter and Paul, live yet, and mark thy doings. 
 Thou hast good cause to cry, “ My heart so cleaves 
 To him, that lived in solitude remote, 
 
 hit ‘6 Who painteth there.” The Deity 
 imself. 
 8 “ Beatitude.”’ The band of spirits. 
 
 8“ That one more.” That he may 
 again drive out those who buy and sell 
 in the temple. 
 
 10 “ Taking the bread away.” X- 
 communication, or interdiction of the 
 Eucharist, is now employed as a weapon 
 of warfare. 
 
 11 “ That writest but to cancel.”? And 
 thou, Pope Boniface, who writest thy 
 ecclesiastical censures for no other pur- 
 pose than to be paid for revoking them, 
 
 2“ To him.” The coin of Florence 
 was stamped with the impression of 
 John the Baptist; and, for this, the 
 avaricious Pope is made to declare that 
 he felt more devotion, than either for 
 Peter or Paul. 
 
362 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 And for a dance was drage’d to martyrdom, 
 I wist not of the fisherman nor Paul.” 
 
 CANTO XIX. 
 
 ANCU MENTS eee et Dees ece Pavegeeiie nes woot at from a 
 multitude of spirits, that compose it; and declares the cause for 
 which it is exalted to that state of glory. It then solves a doubt, 
 which our Poet had entertained, respecting the possibility of salva- 
 tion without belief in Christ; exposes the inefficacy of a mere pro- 
 
 fession of such belief; and prophesies the evil appearance that many 
 Christian potentates will make at the day of judgment. 
 
 EFORE my sight appear’d, with open wings, 
 B The beauteous image; in fruition sweet, 
 Gladdening the thronged spirits. Each did seem 
 A little ruby, whereon so intense 
 The sun-beam glow’d, that to mine eyes it came 
 In clear refraction. And that, which next 
 Befalls me to portray, voice hath not utter’d, 
 Nor hath ink written, nor in fantasy 
 Was e’er conceived. ¥ For I beheld and heard 
 The beak discourse; and, what intention form’d 
 Of many, singly as of one express, 
 Beginning: “ For that I was just and piteous, 
 I am exalted to this height of glory, 
 The which no wish exceeds: and there on earth 
 Have I my memory left, e’en by the bad 
 Commended, while they leave its course untrod.” 
 Thus is one heat from many embers felt ; 
 As in that image many were the loves, 
 And one the voice, that issued from them all: 
 Whence I address’d them: ‘“ O perennial flowers 
 Of gladness everlasting! that exhale 
 In single breath your odors manifold ; 
 Breathe now: and let the hunger be appeased, 
 That with great craving long hath held my soul, 
 Finding no food on earth. This well I know; 
 That if there be in heaven a realm, that shows 
 In faithful mirror the celestial Justice, 
 
PARADISE 363 
 
 Yours without veil reflects it. Ye discern 
 
 The heed, wherewith I do prepare myself 
 
 To hearken; ye, the doubt, that urges me 
 
 With such inveterate craving.” Straight I saw, 
 Like to a falcon issuing from the hood, 
 
 That rears his head, and claps him with his wings, 
 His beauty and his eagerness bewraying ; 
 
 So saw I move that stately sign, with praise 
 Of grace divine inwoven, and high song 
 
 Of inexpressive joy. “ He,” it began, 
 
 “Who turn’d his compass on the worlds extreme, 
 And in that space so variously hath wrought, 
 Both openly and in secret; in such wise 
 
 Could not, through all the universe, display 
 Impression of his glory, that the Word 
 
 Of his omniscience should not still remain 
 
 In infinite excess. In proof whereof, 
 
 He first through pride supplanted, who was sum 
 Of each created being, waited not 
 
 For light celestial; and abortive fell. 
 
 Whence needs each lesser nature is but scant 
 Receptacle unto that Good, which knows 
 
 No limit measured by itself alone. 
 
 Therefore your sight, of the omnipresent Mind 
 A single beam, its origin must own 
 
 Surpassing far its utmost potency. 
 
 The ken, your world is gifted with, descends 
 
 In the everlasting Justice as low down, 
 
 As eye doth in the sea; which, though it mark 
 The bottom from the shore, in the wide main 
 Discerns it not; and ne’ertheless it is; 
 
 But hidden through its deepness. Light is none, 
 Save that which cometh from the pure serene 
 
 Of ne’er disturbed ether: for the rest, 
 
 ’Tis darkness all; or shadow of the flesh, 
 
 Or else its poison. Here confess reveal’d 
 
 That covert, which hath hidden from thy search 
 The living justice, of the which thou madest 
 Such frequent question; for thou said’st—‘ A man 
 Is born on Indus’ banks, and none is there 
 
364 THE DIVINE COMEDY ~ 
 
 Who speaks of Christ, nor who doth read nor write; 
 And all his inclinations and his acts, 
 As far as human reason sees, are good; 
 And he offendeth not in word or deed: 
 But unbaptized he dies, and void of faith. 
 Where is the justice that condemns him? where 
 His blame, if he believeth not ? —What then, 
 And who art thou, that on the stool wouldst sit 
 To judge at distance of a thousand miles 
 With the short-sighted vision of a span? 
 To him, who subtilizes thus with me, 
 There would assuredly be room for doubt 
 Even to wonder, did not the safe word 
 Of Scripture hold supreme authority. 
 “O animals of clay! O spirits gross! 
 The primal will,* that in itself is good, 
 Hath from itself, the chief Good, ne’er been moved. 
 Justice consists in consonance with it, 
 Derivable by no created good, ) 
 Whose very cause depends upon its beam.” 
 
 As on her nest the stork, that turns about 
 Unto her young, whom lately she hath fed, 
 Whiles they with upward eyes do look on her; 
 So lifted I my gaze; and, bending so, 
 
 The ever-biessed image waved its wings, . 
 
 Laboring with such deep counsel. Wheeling round 
 It warbled, and did say: “As are my notes 
 
 To thee, who understand’st them not; such is 
 
 The eternal judgment unto mortal ken.” 
 
 Then still abiding in that ensign ranged, 
 Wherewith the Romans overawed the world, 
 Those burning splendors of the Holy Spirit 
 Took up the strain; and thus it spake again; 
 
 “ None ever hath ascended to this realm, 
 
 Who hath not a believer been in Christ, 
 
 Either before or after the blessed limbs 
 
 Were nail’d upon the wood. But lo! of those 
 
 Who call “ Christ! Christ !’? there shall be many found, 
 2 “ The primal will.” The divine will. Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of 
 
 8“ Who call ‘ Christ! Christ!’’* ‘Not heaven.’’—Matt. vii. 21. 
 évery one that saith unto me, Lord, 
 
PARADISE 
 
 365 
 
 In judgment, further off from him by far, 
 
 Than such to whom his name was never known. 
 Christians like these the AEthiop? shall condemn: 
 When that the two assemblages shall part; 
 
 One rich eternally, the other poor. 
 
 “What may the Persians say unto your kings, 
 When they shall see that volume,* in the which 
 All their dispraise is written, spread to view? 
 There amidst Albert’s ® works shall that be read, 
 Which will give speedy motion to the pen, 
 
 When Prague ® shall mourn her desolated realm. 
 There shall be read the woe, that he * doth work 
 With his adulterate money on the Seine, 
 
 Who by the tusk will perish: there be read 
 
 The thirsting pride, that maketh fool alike 
 
 The English and Scot,’ impatient of their bound. 
 There shall be seen the Spaniard’s luxury ; ® 
 
 The delicate living there of the Bohemian,?° 
 Who still to worth has been a willing stranger. 
 The halter of Jerusalem ™ shall see 
 
 A unit for his virtue; for his vices, 
 No less a mark than million. He,'* who guards 
 The isle of fire by old Anchises honor’d, 
 
 Shall find his avarice there and cowardice; 
 
 And better to denote his littleness, 
 
 The writing must be letters maim’d, that speak 
 
 Much in a narrow space. 
 
 8“ The Athiop.” The men of Nine- 
 veh shail rise in judgment with this 
 
 eneration, and shall condemn it.”— 
 
 att. xii. 41. 
 
 4“ That volume.” ‘“ And I saw_the 
 dead, smalt and great, stand before God; 
 ‘and the books were opened: and another 
 book was opened, which is the book of 
 life: and the dead were judged out of 
 those things which were written in the 
 books, according to their works.”—Rev. 
 
 ren > 6¢ 2? 2 
 Albert. Purgatory,” Canto vi. 
 
 < 8“ Prague.” The eagle predicts the 
 devastation of Bohemia by Albert, 
 which happened soon after this time, 
 when that Emperor obtained the king- 
 dom for his eldest son Rodolph. 
 
 7“ He.” Philip IV of France, after 
 the battle of Courtrai, 1302, in which the 
 French were defeated by the Flemings, 
 raised the nominal value of the coin. 
 
 All there shall know 
 
 This King died in consequence of his 
 horse being thrown to the ground by 
 a wild boar, in 1314. 
 
 8 “ The English and Scot.” He ad- 
 verts to the disputes between John 
 Baliol and Edward I, the latter of whom 
 is commended in the ‘“ Purgatory,” 
 Canto vii. 130. 
 
 ® “The Spaniard’s luxury.’”? It seems 
 probable that the allusion is to Ferdi- 
 nand IV, who came to the crown in 
 1295, and died in 1312, at the age of 
 twenty-four, in consequence, as it was 
 supposed, of his extreme intemperance. 
 
 10“ The Bohemian.” Wenceslaus II. 
 
 ’ * Purgatory,” Canto vii. 90. 
 
 11“ The halter of Jerusalem.” Charles 
 Ne of Naples and Jerusalem, who was 
 ame. 
 
 12“ He”? Frederick of Sicily, son of 
 Peter III of Arragon. Purgatory,” 
 Canto vii. ais The isle of fire is Sicily, 
 where was the tomb of Anchises. 
 
266 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 His uncle *° and his brother’s ** filthy doings, 
 
 Who so renown’d a nation and two crowns 
 
 Have bastardized. And they, of Portugal +5 
 
 And Norway,’ there shall be exposed, with him 
 Of Ratza,'7 who hath counterfeited ill 
 
 The coin of Venice. O blessed Hungary! %% 
 
 If thou no longer patiently abidest 
 
 Thy ill-entreating: and, O blessed Navarre! ?® 
 If with thy mountainous girdle 2° thou wouldst arm thee. 
 In earnest of that day, e’en now are heard 
 Wailings and groans in Famagosta’s streets 
 
 And Nicosia’s,”* grudging at their beast, 
 
 Who keepeth even footing with the rest.” 
 
 18 “ His uncle.’’ pee King of Ma- 
 jorca and Minorca, brother to Peter III. 
 
 14 “* His brother.” James II of Arra- 
 gon, who died in 1327. See “ Purga- 
 tory,’ Canto vii. 117. 
 
 18“ Of Portugal.” In the time of 
 Dante, Dionysius was King of Portu- 
 gal. He died in 1325, after a reign of 
 nearly forty-six years, and does not 
 seem to have deserved the stigma here 
 fastened on him. Perhaps the _ rebel- 
 lious son of Dionysius may be alluded 
 
 to. 
 
 16 “ Norway.” Haquin, King of Nor- 
 way, is probably meant; who having 
 given refuge to the murderers of Eric 
 
 I, King of Denmark, a.p. 1288, com- 
 menced a war against his successor, 
 Eric VIII, which continued for nine 
 years, almost to the utter ruin and de- 
 struction of both kingdoms. 
 
 him 
 Of Ratza.’’ 
 One of the dynasty of the house of 
 Nemagna, which ruled the Kingdom of 
 Rassia or Ratza, in Sclavonia, from 1161 
 to 1371, and whose history may be found 
 
 in Mauro Orbino. Uladislaus appears 
 to have been the sovereign in Dante’s 
 time; but the disgraceful forgery, ad- 
 verted to in the text, is not recorded 
 by the historian. 
 
 18“ Hungary.” The Kingdom of 
 Hungary was about this time disputed 
 by_ Carobert, son of Charles artel, 
 and Wenceslas, Prince of Bohemia, son 
 of Wenceslas IT. 
 
 19 “* Navarre.”’ Navarre was now un- 
 der the yoke of France. It soon after 
 (in_ 1328) followed the advice of Dante, 
 and had a monarch of its own. 
 
 20 “ Mountainous girdle.” The Pyr- 
 enees. 
 
 Famagosta’s streets 
 And Nicosia’s.” 
 
 Cities in the Kingdom of Cyprus, at 
 that time ruled by Henry VII, a pusil- 
 lanimous prince. The meaning appears 
 to be, that the complaints made by 
 those cities of their weak and worthless 
 Governor may be regarded as an earn- 
 at of his condemnation at the las¢ 
 OOMes 
 
PARADISE 367 
 
 CANTO XX 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The eagle celebrates the praise of certain kings, whose 
 glorified spirits form the eye of the bird. In the pupil is David; 
 and, in the circle round it, Trajan, Hezekiah, Constantine, William 
 II of Sicily, and Ripheus, It explains to our Poet how the souls 
 of those whom he supposed to have had no means of believing in 
 Christ, came to be in Heaven; and concludes with an admonition 
 against presuming to fathom the counsels of God. 
 
 HEN, disappearing from our hemisphere, 
 The world’s enlightener vanishes, and day 
 
 On all sides wasteth; suddenly the sky, 
 Erewhile irradiate only with his beam, 
 Is yet again unfolded, putting forth 
 Innumerable lights wherein one shines. 
 Of such vicissitude in Heaven I thought; 
 As the great sign, that marshalleth the world 
 And the world’s leaders, in the blessed beak 
 Was silent: for that all those living lights, 
 Waxing in splendor, burst forth into songs, 
 Such as from memory glide and fall away. 
 
 Sweet Love, that dost apparel thee in smiles! 
 How lustrous was thy semblance in those sparkles, 
 Which merely are from holy thoughts inspired. 
 
 Aiter ? the precious and bright beaming stones, 
 That did ingem the sixth light, ceased the chiming 
 Of their angelic beils; methought I heard 
 The murmuring of a river, that doth fall 
 From rock to rock transpicuous, making known 
 The rickaess of his spring-head: and as sound 
 Of cittern, at the fret-board, or of pipe, 
 
 Is, at the wind-hoie. modulate and tuned; 
 Thus up the neck, as it were hollow, rose 
 That murmuring of the eagle; and forthwith 
 Voice there assumed; and thence along the beak 
 Issued in form of words, such as my heart 
 Did look for, on whose tables I inscribed them. 
 “The part in me, that sees and bears the sun 
 2“ The area sign.” The eagle, the sixth planet (Jupiter) had ceased their 
 
 imperial e ensig singing. 
 * After.” ria tler the spirits in the 
 
368 
 
 b 
 
 In mortal eagles,’ 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 it began, “ must now 
 
 Be noted steadfastly: for, of the fires, 
 That figure me, those, glittering in mine eye, 
 
 Are chief of all the greatest. 
 
 This, that shines 
 
 Midmost for pupil, was the same who® sang 
 The Holy Spirit’s song, and bare about 
 
 The ark from town to town: now doth he know 
 The merit of his soul-impassion’d strains 
 
 By their well-fitted guerdon. Of the five, 
 That make the circle of the vision, he,* 
 
 Who to the beak is nearest, comforted 
 
 The widow for her son: now doth he know, 
 How dear it costeth not to follow Christ; 
 Both from experience of this pleasant life, 
 
 And of its opposite. 
 
 He next,® who follows 
 
 In the circumference, for the over-arch, 
 
 By true repenting slack’d the pace of death: 
 
 Now knoweth he, that the decrees of heaven ® 
 Alter not, when, through pious prayer below, 
 To-day is made to-morrow’s destiny. 
 
 The other following,’ with the laws and me, 
 
 To yield the shepherd room, pass’d o’er ® to Greece; 
 From good intent, producing evil fruit: 
 
 Now knoweth he, how all the ill, derived 
 
 From his well doing, doth not harm him aught; 
 Though it have brought destruction on the world. 
 That, which thou seest in the under bow, 
 
 Was William,? whom that land bewails, which weeps 
 For Charles and Frederick living: now he knows, 
 How well is loved in heaven the righteous king; 
 Which he betokens by his radiant seeming. 
 
 Who, in the erring world beneath, would deem 
 
 8 “ Who.” David. 
 
 4“ He.” Trajan. See 
 Canto x. 68. 
 
 5“* He next.” Hezekiah. 
 
 6 ‘**The decrees of Heaven.’ The 
 eternal counsels of God are indeed 
 immutable, though they appear to us 
 men to be altered by the prayers of the 
 pious. . 
 
 7 The other following.” Constan- 
 tine. There is no passage in which 
 Dante’s opinion of the evil that had 
 arisen from the mixture of the civil 
 with the ecclesiastical power is more 
 unequivocally declared. 
 
 “* Purgatory,” 
 
 8“ Pass’d o’er.”? Left the Roman 
 State to the Pope, and transferred the 
 seat of the empire to Constantinople. 
 
 % “ William.” William II, King of 
 Sicily, at the latter part of the twelfth 
 century, He was of the Norman line 
 of sovereigns, and optained the appella- 
 tion of “the Good”; and, as the Poet 
 says, his loss was as much the subject 
 of regret_in his dominions, as the pres- 
 ence of Charles II of Anjou, and Fred- 
 erick of Arragon, was of sorrow and 
 complaint. 
 
PARADISE | 36g 
 
 That Trojan Ripheus,’° in this round, was set, 
 
 Fifth of the saintly splendors? now he knows 
 
 Enough of that, which the world cannot see; 
 
 The grace divine: albeit e’en his sight 
 
 Reach not its utmost depth.” Like to the lark, 
 
 That warbling in the air expatiates long, 
 
 Then, trilling out his last sweet melody, 
 
 Drops, satiate with the sweetness; such appear’d 
 
 That image, stamped by the everlasting pleasure, 
 
 Which fashions, as they are, all things that be. 
 I, though my doubting were as manifest, 
 
 As is through glass the hue that mantles it, 
 
 In silence waited not; for to my lips 
 
 “ What things are these?” involuntary rush’d, 
 
 And forced a passage out: whereat I mark’d 
 
 A sudden lightening and new revelry. 
 
 The eye was kindled; and the blessed sign, 
 
 No more to keep me wondering and suspense, 
 
 Replied: “I see that thou believest these things, 
 
 Because I tell them, but discern’st not how; 
 
 So that thy knowledge waits not on thy faith: 
 
 As one, who knows the name of thing by rote, 
 
 But is a stranger to its properties, 
 
 Till other’s tongue reveal them. Fervent love, 
 
 And lively hope, with violence assail 
 
 The kingdom of the heavens, and overcome 
 
 The will of the Most High; not in such sort 
 
 As man prevails o’er man; but conquers it, 
 
 Because ’tis willing to be conquer’d; still, 
 
 Though conquer’d, by its mercy, conquering. 
 
 “ Those, in the eye who live the first and fifth, 
 Cause thee to marvel, in that thou behold’st 
 The region of the angels deck’d with them. 
 They quitted not their bodies, as thou deem’st, 
 Gentiles, but Christians; in firm rooted faith, 
 This,’! of the feet in future to be pierced, 
 That,12 of feet nail’d already to the cross. 
 
 - Then iphces Seth, ae justest far of all 2 “ That” rae 
 
 The sons of Troy. 
 ar thet “ 7AEneid.” lib. ii. 427. 
 
370 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 One from the barrier of the dark abyss, 
 
 Where never any with good-will returns, 
 
 Came back unto his bones. Of lively hope 
 
 Such was the meed; of lively hope, that wing’d 
 The prayers ** sent up to God for his release, 
 
 And put power into them to bend His will. 
 
 The glorious Spirit, of whom I speak to thee, 
 
 A little while returning to the flesh, 
 
 Believed in him, who had the means to help; 
 And, in believing, nourish’d such a flame 
 
 Of holy love, that at the second death 
 
 He was made sharer in our gamesome mirth, 
 The other, through the riches of that grace, 
 Which from so deep a fountain doth distil, 
 
 As never eye created saw its rising, 
 
 Placed all his love below on just and right: 
 Wherefore, of grace, God oped in him the eye 
 
 To the redemption of mankind to come; 
 Wherein believing, he endured no more 
 
 The filth of Paganism, and for their ways 
 Rebuked the stubborn nations. The three nymphs, 
 Whom at the right wheel thou beheld’st advancing, 
 Were sponsors for him, more than thousand years 
 Before baptizing. O how far removed, 
 Predestination! is thy root from such 
 
 As see not the First Cause entire: and ye, 
 
 O mortal men! be wary how ye judge: 
 
 For we, who see our Maker, know not yet 
 
 The number of the chosen; and esteem 
 
 Such scantiness of knowledge our delight: 
 
 For all our good is, in that primal good, 
 Concentrate; and God’s will and ours are one.” 
 So, by that form divine, was given to me 
 Sweet medicine to clear and strengthen sight. 
 
 And, as one handling skilfully the harp, 
 Attendant on some skilful songster’s voice, 
 Bids the chord vibrate; and therein the song 
 Acquires more pleasure: so the whilst it spake, 
 
 ee Lae 
 ” 
 
 18 The prayers.” The prayers of St. ene Charity. “ Purgatory,’’ Canto xxix, 
 116, 
 
 Gregory. ‘ 
 14“ The three nymphs.” Faith, Hope, 
 
PARADISE 371 
 
 It doth remember me, that I beheld 
 
 The pair *® of blessed luminaries move, 
 
 Like the accordant twinkling of two eyes, 
 Their beamy circlets, dancing to the sounds. 
 
 CANTO XXI 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Dante ascends with Beatrice to the seventh Heaven, which 
 is the planet Saturn; wherein is placed a ladder, so lofty, that the 
 top of it is out of his sight. Here are the souls of those who had 
 passed their life in holy retirement and contemplation. Piero 
 Damiano comes near them, and answers questions put to him by 
 Dante; then declares who he was on earth; and ends by declaiming 
 against the luxury of pastors and prelates in those times. 
 
 GAIN mine eyes were fix’d on Beatrice; 
 And, with mine eyes, my soul that in her looks 
 Found all contentment. Yet no smile she wore: 
 
 And, “ Did I smile,” quoth she, “thou wouldst be straight 
 Like Semele when into ashes turn’d: 
 For, mounting these eternal palace-stairs, 
 My beauty, which the loftier it climbs, 
 As thou hast noted, still doth kindle more, 
 So shines, that, were no tempering interposed, 
 Thy mortal puissance would from its rays 
 Shrink, as the leaf doth from the thunderbolt. 
 Into the seventh splendor '* are we waited, 
 That, underneath the burning lion’s breast,1? 
 Beams, in this hour, commingled with his might. 
 Thy mind be with thine eyes; and, in them, mirror’d 18 
 The shape, which in this mirror shall be shown.” 
 
 Whoso can deem, how fondly I had fed 
 My sight upon her blissful countenance, 
 May know, when to new thoughts I changed, what joy 
 To do the bidding of my heavenly guide; 
 In equal balance,’® poising either weight. 
 
 18 ‘‘ The pair.” Ripheus and Trajan, this mirror,” the planet, that is, of 
 16 “ The seventh splendor.”” Theplanet Saturn (soon after, v. 22, called the 
 Saturn crystal), “ be reflected in the mirror of 
 
 47 The burning lion’s breast.’” The thy sig ight. 
 constellation Leo. ®“ In equal balance.” iy her willy 
 ‘In them, mirror’d.” “Let the was as t in Niidag ih ate | with her will, 
 
 form which thou shalt now behold in as in beholding her countenance. 
 
372 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Within the crystal, which records the name 
 (As its remoter circle girds the world) 
 Of that loved monarch,*° in whose happy reign 
 No ill had power to harm, I saw rear’d up, 
 In color like to sun-illumined gold, 
 A ladder, which my ken pursued in vain, 
 So lofty was the summit ; down whose steps 
 I saw the splendors in such multitude 
 Descending, every light in heaven, methought, 
 Was shed thence. As the rooks, at dawn of day, 
 Bestirring them to dry their feathers chill, 
 Some speed their way a-field; and homeward some, 
 Returning, cross their flight; while some abide, 
 And wheel around their airy lodge: so seem’d 
 That glitterance,?* wafted on alternate wing, 
 As upon certain stair it came, and clash’d 
 Its shining. And one, lingering near us, wax’d 
 So bright, that in my thought I said: “ The love, 
 Which this betokens me, admits no doubt.” 
 Unwillingly from question I refrain; 
 To her, by whom my silence and my speech 
 Are order’d, looking for a sign: whence she, 
 Who in the sight of Him, that seeth all, 
 Saw wherefore I was silent, prompted me 
 To indulge the fervent wish; and I began: 
 “T am not worthy, of my own desert, 
 That thou shouldst answer me: but for her sake, 
 Who hath vouchsafed my asking, spirit blessed, 
 That in thy joy are shrouded! say the cause, 
 Which bringeth thee so near: and wherefore, say, 
 Doth the sweet symphony of Paradise 
 Keep silence here, pervading with such sounds 
 Of rapt devotion every lower sphere? ” 
 “ Mortal art thou in hearing, as in sight; ” 
 Was the reply: “and what forbade the smile 2? 
 Of Beatrice interrupts our song. 
 Only to yield thee gladness of my voice, 
 
 2 “* Of that loved monarch.” Saturn. different movements, pion cog has de 
 Compare ** Hell,” Canto Xiv. OI. scribed as made by the b 
 
 21 ** That glitterance.” That multi- “What forbade he pay ” Bee 
 tude of shining spirits, who, coming to ae it would have overcome thee. 
 a certain point of the ladder, made those 
 
PARADISE 373 
 
 And of the light that vests me, I thus far 
 Descend these hallow’d steps; not that more love 
 Invites me; for, lo! there aloft,?* as much 
 Or more of love is witness’d in those flames: 
 But such my lot by charity assign’d, 
 That makes us ready servants, as thou seest, 
 To execute the counsel of the Highest.” 
 
 “That in this court,” said I, “O sacred lamp! 
 Love no compulsion needs, but follows free 
 The eternal Providence, I well discern: 
 This harder find to deem: why, of thy peers, 
 Thou only, to this office wert foredoom’d.” 
 
 I had not ended, when, like rapid mill, 
 Upon its centre whirl’d the light; and then 
 The love that did inhabit there, replied: 
 “Splendor eternal, piercing through these folds, 
 Its virtue to my vision knits; and thus 
 Supported, lifts me so above myself, 
 That on the sovran essence, which it wells from, 
 I have the power to gaze: and hence the joy, 
 Wherewith I sparkle, equalling with my blaze 
 The keenness of my sight. But not the soul,** 
 That is in heaven most lustrous, nor the seraph, 
 That hath his eyes most fix’d on God, shall solve 
 What thou hast ask’d: for in the abyss it lies 
 Of th’ everlasting statute sunk so low, 
 That no created ken may fathom it. 
 And, to the mortal world when thou return’st, 
 Be this reported: that none henceforth dare 
 Direct his footsteps to so dread a bourn. 
 The mind, that here is radiant, on the earth 
 Ts wrapt in mist. Look then if she may do 
 Below, what passeth her ability 
 When she is-ta’en to heaven.” By words like these 
 Admonish’d, I the question urged no more; 
 And of the spirit humbly sued alone 
 To instruct me of its state. “ ’Twixt either shore *° 
 
 23 * There aloft.” Where the other 25 “ Twixt either shore.” Between the 
 souls were. Adriatic Gulf and the Mediterranean 
 % “Not the soul.” The particular Sea. 
 ends of Providence being concealed 
 from the very angels themselves. 
 
 Classics. Vol. 34—Q 
 
374 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Of Italy, nor distant from thy land, 
 
 A stony ridge?® ariseth; in such sort, 
 
 The thunder doth not lift his voice so high. 
 They call it Catria: 77 at whose foot, a cell 
 Is sacred to the lonely Eremite; 
 
 For worship set apart and holy rites.” 
 
 A third time thus it spake; then added: 
 
 “ There 
 
 So firmly to God’s service I adhered, 
 That with no costlier viands than the juice 
 Of olives, easily I pass’d the heats 
 
 Of summer and the winter frosts; content 
 
 In heaven-ward musings. 
 
 Rich were the returns 
 
 And fertile, which that cloister once was used 
 To render to these heavens: now ’tis fallen 
 Into a waste so empty, that ere long 
 
 Detection must lay bare its vanity. 
 
 Pietro Damiano*® there was I yclept: 
 
 Pietro the sinner, when before I dwelt, 
 
 Beside the Adriatic,?® in the house 
 
 Of our blessed Lady. Near upon my close 
 
 Of mortal life, through much importuning 
 
 I was constrained to wear the hat,°° that still 
 From bad to worse is shifted.—Cephas*! came; 
 He came, who was the Holy Spirit’s vessel ; *? 
 Barefoot and lean; eating their bread, as chanced, 
 
 At the first table. 
 
 Modern Shepherds need 
 
 Those who on either hand may prop and lead them, 
 So burly are they grown; and from behind, | 
 
 Others to hotst them. 
 
 26“ A stony ridge.” A part of the 
 Apennines. 
 
 7 “ Catria.”” Now the Abbey of Santa 
 Croce, in the Duchy of, Urbino, about 
 half way between Gubbio and La Per- 
 gola. ere Dante is said to have re- 
 sided for some time. 
 
 28 “* Pietro Damiano.” S. Pietro 
 Damiano obtained a great and well- 
 merited reputation by the pains he 
 took to correct the abuses among the 
 clergy. Ravenna is supposed to have 
 been the place of his birth, about 1007. 
 He was employed in several important 
 missions, and rewarded by Stephen IX 
 with the dignity of cardinal, and the 
 bishopric of Ostia, to which, however, 
 he preferred his former retreat in the 
 monastery of Fonte Avellana, and_pre- 
 
 vailed on Alexander II to permit him to. 
 
 Down the palfrey’s sides 
 
 retire thither. Yet he did not long con- 
 tinue in this seclusion, before he was 
 sent on other embassies. He died at 
 Faenza in 1072. His letters throw much 
 light on the obscure history of these 
 times. Besides them, he has left several 
 treatises on sacred and_ ecclesiastical 
 subjects. His eloquence is worthy of a 
 better age. 
 
 29 “* Beside the Adriatic.”? S. Pietro 
 Damiano is made to distinguish himself 
 from S. Pietro degli Onesti, surnamed 
 ** Tl Peccator,” founder of the monastery 
 of S. Maria del Porto,.on the Adriatic 
 coast, near Ravenna, who died 1119, at 
 about eighty years of age. 
 
 30 “* The hat.” The cardinal’s hat. 
 
 81 “ Cephas.” St. Peter. 
 
 a2 “*The Holy Spirit’s vessel.” . St. 
 Paul. See “‘ Hell,” Canto ii. 30. 
 
PARADISE 376 
 
 Spread their broad mantles, so as both the beasts 
 Are cover’d with one skin. O patience! thou 
 That look’st on this, and dost endure so long.” 
 
 I at those accents saw the splendors down 
 From step to step alight, and wheel, and wax, 
 Fach circuiting, more beautiful. Round this*® 
 
 _ They came, and stay’d them; utter’d then a shout 
 So loud, it hath no likeness here: nor I 
 Wist what it spake, so deafening was the thunder. 
 
 CANTO XXII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—He beholds many other spirits of the devout and contem- 
 plative; and among these is addressed by St. Benedict, who, after 
 disclosing his own name and the names of certain of his companions 
 in bliss, replies to the request made by our Poet that he might look 
 on the form of the saint, without that covering of splendor, which 
 then invested it; and then proceeds, lastly, to inveigh against the 
 corruption of the monks. Next Dante mounts with his heavenly 
 conductress to the eighth Heaven, or that of the fixed stars, which 
 he enters at the constellation of the Twins; and thence. looking 
 back, reviews all the space he has passed between his present station 
 and the earth. 
 
 STOUNDED, to the guardian of my steps 
 A I turn’d me, like the child, who always runs 
 Thither for succor, where he trusteth most: 
 
 ‘And she was like the mother, who her son 
 
 Beholding pale and breathless, with her voice 
 
 Soothes him, and he is cheer’d; for thus she spake, 
 Soothing me: ‘“ Know’st not thou, thou art in heaven? 
 And know’st not thou, whatever is in heaven, 
 
 Is holy; and that nothing there is done, 
 
 But is done zealously and well? Deem now, 
 
 What change in thee the song, and what my smile 
 
 Had wrought, since thus the shout had power to move thee; 
 In which, couldst thou have understood their prayers, 
 
 The vengeance! were already known to thee, 
 83 “ Round this.”? Round the spirit of supposed, intimates the approaching fate 
 
 Pietro Damiano. : ya of Boniface VIII. See “ Purgatory,” 
 “The vengeance.” Beatrice, it 1s Canto xx. 86. 
 
376 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Which thou must witness ere thy mortal hour, 
 The sword of heaven is not in haste to smite, 
 Nor yet doth linger; save unto his seeming, 
 Who, in desire or fear, doth look for it. 
 But elsewhere now I bid thee turn thy view; 
 So shalt thou many a famous spirit behold.” 
 Mine eyes directing, as she will’d, I saw 
 A hundred little spheres, that fairer grew 
 By interchange of splendor. I remain’d, 
 As one, who fearful of o’er-much presuming, 
 Abates in him the keenness of desire, 
 Nor dares to question ; when, amid those pearls, 
 One largest and most lustrous onward drew, 
 That it might yield contentment to my wish; 
 And, from within it, these the sounds I heard. 
 “Tf thou, like me, beheld’st the charity 
 That burns amongst us; what thy mind conceives, 
 Were utter’d. But that, ere the lofy bound 
 Thou reach, expectance may not weary thee; 
 I will make answer even to the thought, 
 Which thou hast such respect of. In old days, 
 That mountain, at whose side Cassino? rests, 
 Was, on its height, frequented by a race 
 Deceived and ill-disposed: and I it was,’ 
 Who thither carried first the name of Him, 
 Who brought the soul-subliming truth to man. 
 And such a speeding grace shone over me, 
 That from their impious worship I reclaim’d 
 The dwellers round about, who with the world 
 Were in delusion lost. These other flames, 
 The spirits of men contemplative, were all 
 Enliven’d by that warmth, whose kindly force 
 Gives birth to flowers and fruits of holiness. 
 Here is Macarius;* Romoaldo® here; 
 
 2 * Cassino.” A castle in the Terra di rank among the practical writers of the 
 
 Lavoro. fourth century, as his works displayed, 
 8“ T it was.” A new order of monks, some few things excepted, the brightest 
 
 which in a manner absorbed all the and most lovely protraiture of sanctity 
 
 others that were established in the west, and virtue. 
 
 was instituted, A.D. 5290, by Benedict of 5 ** Romoaldo.” S. Romoaldo, a na- 
 
 Nursia, a man of 
 for the age he live 
 
 piety and reputation tive of Ravenna, and the founder of 
 in. the order of Camaldoli, died in 1027. 
 
 4“ Macarius.”’ Macarius, an Egyptian He was the author of a commentary on 
 
 monk, undoubtedly deserves the first the Psalms. 
 
‘ 
 
 PARADISE. 377 
 
 And here my brethren, who their steps refrain’d 
 Within the cloisters, and held firm their heart.” 
 I answering thus: “ My gentle words and kind, 
 
 And this the cheerful semblance I behold, 
 
 Not unobservant, beaming in ye all, 
 
 Have raised assurance in me; wakening it 
 Full-blossom’d in my bosom, as a rose 
 
 Before the sun, when the consummate flower 
 
 Has spread to utmost amplitude. Of thee 
 
 Therefore intreat I, father, to declare 
 
 If I may gain such favor, as to gaze 
 
 Upon thine image by no covering veil’d.” 
 
 “ Brother!” he thus rejoin’d, “in the last sphere® 
 
 Expect completion of thy lofty aim: 
 
 For there on each desire completion waits, 
 
 And there on mine; where every aim is found 
 Perfect, entire, and for fulfilment ripe. 
 
 There all things are as they have ever been: 
 
 For space is none to bound; nor pole divides. 
 
 Our ladder reaches even to that clime; 
 
 And so, at giddy distance, mocks thy view. 
 
 Thither the patriarch Jacob® saw it stretch 
 
 Its topmost round; when it appear’d to him 
 
 With angels laden. But to mount it now 
 
 None lifts his foot from earth: and hence my rule 
 
 Is left a profitless stain upon the leaves; 
 
 The walls, for abbey rear’d, turn’d into dens; 
 
 The cowls, to sacks chok’d up with musty meal. 
 
 Foul usury doth not more lift itself 
 
 Against God’s pleasure, than that fruit, which makes 
 The hearts of monks so wanton: for whate’er 
 
 Is in the Church’s keeping, all pertains 
 
 To such, as sue for heaven’s sweet sake; and not 
 
 To those, who in respect of kindred claim, 
 
 Or on more vile allowance. Mortal flesh 
 
 Is grown so dainty, good beginnings last not 
 6“*In the last sphere.”” The Empy- 7“ The patriarch Jacob.” ‘“ And he 
 rean, where he afterward sees St. Bene- dreamed, and behold, a ladder set upon 
 dict, Canto xxxii. 30. Beatified spirits, the earth, and the top of it reached to 
 
 though they have different heavens al- heaven: and behold the angels of God 
 lotted them, have all their seats in that ascending and descending on it.’’—Gen. 
 
 higher sphere. XXVili. 12. 
 
378 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 From the oak’s birth unto the acorn’s setting. 
 His convent Peter founded without gold 
 Or silver; I, with prayers and fasting, mine; 
 And Francis, his in meek humility. 
 And if thou note the point, whence each proceeds, 
 Then look what it hath err’d to; thou shalt find 
 The white grown murky. Jordan was turn’d back. 
 And a less wonder, than the refluent sea, 
 May, at God’s pleasure, work amendment here.” 
 So saying, to his assembly back he drew: 
 And they together cluster’d into one; 
 Then all roll’d upward, like an eddying wind. 
 The sweet dame beckon’d me to follow them: 
 And, by that influence only, so prevail’d 
 Over my nature, that no natural motion, 
 Ascending or descending here below, 
 Had, as I mounted, with my pennon vied. 
 So, reader, as my hope is to return 
 Unto the holy triumph, for the which 
 I- ofttimes wail my sins, and smite my breast; 
 Thou hadst been longer drawing out and thrusting 
 Thy finger in the fire, than I was, ere 
 The sign,’ that followeth Taurus, I beheld, 
 And enter’d its precinct. O glorious stars! 
 O light impregnate with exceeding virtue! 
 To whom whate’er of genius lifteth me 
 Above the vulgar, grateful I refer; 
 With ye the parent ® of all mortal life 
 Arose and set, when I did first inhale 
 The Tuscan air; and afterward, when grace 
 Vouchsafed me entrance to the lofty wheel ?° 
 That in its orb impels ye, fate decreed 
 My passage at your clime. To you my soul 
 Devoutly sighs, for virtue, even now, 
 To meet the hard emprise that draws me on. 
 “Thou art so near the sum of blessedness,” 
 Said Beatrice, ‘‘ that behoves thy ken 
 8 “ The sign.” The constellation of constellation of the Twins at the time 
 Gemini f Dante’s birth. 
 
 ae oO 
 ®‘ The parent.” The sun was in the 10 “The lofty wheel.” The eighth 
 heaven; that, of the fixed stars, 
 
PARADISE | 379 
 
 Be vigilant and clear. And, to this end, 
 
 Or ever thou advance thee further, hence 
 
 Look downward, and contemplate, what a world 
 
 Already stretch’d under our feet there lies: 
 
 So as thy heart may, in its blithest mood, 
 
 _ Present itself to the triumphal throng, 
 
 Which, through the ethereal concave, comes rejoicing.” 
 I straight obey’d; and with mine eye return’d 
 
 Through all the seven spheres; and saw this globe 
 
 So pitiful of semblance, that perforce 
 
 It moved my smiles: and him in truth I hold: 
 
 For wisest, who esteems it least; whose thoughts 
 
 Elsewhere are fix’d, him worthiest call and best. 
 
 I saw the daughter of Latona shine 
 
 Without the shadow, whereof late I deem’d 
 
 That dense and rare were cause. Here I sustain’d 
 
 The visage, Hyperion, of thy son; }* 
 
 And mark’d, how near him with their circles, round 
 
 Move Maia and Dione; ?* here discern’d 
 
 Jove’s tempering ’twixt his sire and son; +4 and hence, 
 
 Their changes and their various aspects, 
 
 Distinctly scann’d. Nor might I not descry 
 
 Of all the seven, how bulky each, how swift; 
 
 Nor, of their several distances, not learn. 
 
 This petty area (o’er the which we stride 
 
 So fiercely), as along the eternal Twins 
 
 I wound my way, appear’d before me all, 
 
 Forth from the havens stretch’d unto the hills. 
 
 Then, to the beauteous eyes, mine eyes return’d. 
 
 _ 1 “ Without the shadow.” See Canto mother of the latter, and Maia of the 
 
 ii. 71: former deity.  —s_ 
 12“ Of thy son.” The sun. 14“ °Twixt his sire and son.” Be- 
 18 “Maia and Dione.’’ The planets. twixt Saturn and Mars. 
 
 Mercury and Venus: Dione being the 
 
380 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 CANTO XXIII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—He sees Christ triumphing with his Church. The Saviour 
 ascends, followed by his virgin Mother. The others remain with 
 St. Peter. 
 
 "EN as the bird, who midst the leafy bower 
 Has, in her nest, sat darkling through the night, 
 With her sweet brood; impatient to descry 
 Their wished looks, and to bring home their food, 
 In the fond quest unconscious of her toil: 
 She, of the time prevenient, on the spray, 
 That overhangs their couch, with wakeful gaze 
 Expects the sun; nor ever, till the dawn, 
 Removeth from the east her eager ken: 
 So stood the dame erect, and bent her glance 
 Wistfully on that region,’ where the sun 
 Abateth most his speed; that, seeing her 
 Suspense and wondering, I became as one, 
 In whom desire is waken’d, and the hope 
 Of somewhat new to come fills with delight. 
 Short space ensued; I was not held, I say, 
 Long in expectance, when I saw the heaven 
 Wax more and more resplendent; and, “‘ Behold,” 
 Cried Beatrice, “the triumphal hosts 
 Of Christ, and all the harvest gather’d in, 
 Made ripe by these revolving spheres.” Meseem’d, 
 That, while she spake, her image all did burn; 
 And in her eyes such fulness was of joy, 
 As I am fain to pass unconstrued by. 
 As in the calm full moon, when Trivia? smiles, 
 In peerless beauty, ’mid the eternal nymphs,? 
 That paint through all its gulfs the blue profound; 
 In bright pre-eminence so saw I there 
 O’er million lamps a sun, from whom all drew 
 Their radiance, as from ours the starry train: 
 And, through the living light, so lustrous glow’d 
 The substance, that my ken endured it not. 
 O Beatrice! sweet and precious guide, 
 1“ That region.”” Toward the south, 2“ Trivia.””, A name of Diana. 
 where the course of the sun appears 8 “The eternal nymphs.”’ The stars. 
 
 less rapid, than when he is in the east 
 or the west. 
 
PARADISE wy, 381 
 
 Who cheer’d me with her comfortable words: 
 *“‘ Against the virtue, that o’erpowereth thee, 
 Avails not to resist. Here is the Might,‘ 
 And here the Wisdom, which did open lay 
 The path, that had been yearned for so long, 
 Betwixt the heaven and earth.” Like to the fire, 
 That, in a cloud imprison’d, doth break out 
 Expansive, so that from its womb enlarged, 
 It falleth against nature to the ground ; 
 Thus, in that heavenly banqueting, my soul 
 Outgrew herself; and, in the transport lost, 
 Holds now remembrance none of what she was. 
 “Ope thou thine eyes, and mark me: thou hast seen 
 Things, that empower thee to sustain my smile.” 
 I was as one, when a forgotten dream 
 Doth come across him, and he strives in vain 
 To shape it in his fantasy again: 
 Whenas that gracious boon was proffer’d me, 
 Which never may be cancel’d from the book 
 Wherein the past is written. Now were all 
 Those tongues to sound, that have, on sweetest milk 
 Of Polyhymnia and her sisters, fed 
 And fatten’d; not with all their help to boot, 
 Unto the thousandth parcel of the truth, 
 My song might shadow forth that saintly smile, 
 How merely, in her saintly looks, it wrought. 
 And, with such figuring of Paradise, 
 The sacred strain must leap, like one that meets 
 A sudden interruption to his road. 
 But he, who thinks how ponderous the theme, 
 And that ’tis laid upon a mortal shoulder, 
 May pardon, if it tremble with the burden. 
 The track, our venturous keel must furrow, brooks 
 No unribb’d pinnace, no self-sparing pilot. 
 “Why doth my face,” said Beatrice, “ thus 
 Enamour thee, as that thou dost not turn 
 Unto the beautiful garden, blossoming 
 Beneath the rays of Christ? Here is the rose,° 
 “The Might.”? Our Saviour. Mystica.” ‘I was exalted like a palm- 
 
 6“ The rose.” The Virgin Mary, tree in Engaddi, and as a rose-plant in 
 who is termed by the Church, ‘* Rosa Jericho.”’—Ecclesiasticus, xxiv. 14. 
 
382 . THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Wherein the Word Divine was made incarnate s 
 
 And here the lilies,* by whose odor known 
 
 The way of life was follow’d.”’ Prompt I heard 
 
 Her bidding, and encounter’d once again 
 
 The strife of aching vision. As, erewhile, 
 
 Through glance of sun-light, stream’d through broken cloud, 
 
 Mine eyes a flower-besprinkled mead have seen; 
 
 Though veil’d themselves in shade: so saw I there 
 
 Legions of splendors, on whom burning rays 
 
 Shed lightnings from above; yet saw I not 
 
 The fountain whence they flow’d. O gracious virtue! 
 
 Thou, whose broad stamp is on them, higher up 
 
 Thou didst exalt thy glory,’ to give room 
 
 To my o’erlabor’d sight; when at the name 
 
 Of that fair flower,? whom duly I invoke 
 
 Both morn and eve, my soul with all her might 
 
 Collected, on the goodliest ardor fix’d. 
 
 And, as the bright dimensions of the star 
 
 In heaven excelling, as once here on earth, 
 
 Were, in my eye-balls livelily portray’d; 
 
 Lo! from within the sky a cresset ® fell, 
 
 Circling in fashion of a diadem; 
 
 And girt the star; and, hovering, round it wheel’d. 
 Whatever melody sounds sweetest here, 
 
 And draws the spirit most unto itself, 
 
 Might seem a rent cloud, when it grates the thunder; 
 
 Compared unto the sounding of that lyre,?° 
 
 Wherewith the goodliest sapphire,'! that inlays 
 
 The floor of heaven, was crown’d. “ Angelic Love 
 
 I am, who thus with hovering flight enwheel 
 
 The lofty rapture from that womb inspired, 
 
 Where our desire did dwell: and round thee so, 
 
 Lady of Heaven! will hover; long as thou 
 
 Thy Son shalt follow, and diviner joy 
 
 Shall from thy presence gild the highest sphere.” 
 
 6 ** The lilies.”” The Apostles. ‘* And 8 “* —— the name 
 
 give ye a sweet savor as frankincense, Of that fair flower.” 
 
 and flourish as a lily.’”—Ecclesiasticus, The name of the Virgin. 
 
 XXxix. 14. ‘A cresset.”” The angel Gabriel. 
 7‘ Thou didst exalt thy glory.” The 30 “That lyre.’”?’ By synecdoche, the. 
 
 divine light retired upward, to render ‘lyre is ut for the angel. 
 
 the eyes of Dante more capable of en- “The goodliest sapphire.” The 
 during the spectacle which now pre- Virgin. 
 
 sented itself. 
 
PARADISE 
 
 Such close was to the circling melody: 
 And, as it ended, all the other lights 
 Took up the strain, and echoed Mary’s name. 
 The robe,’ that with its regal folds enwraps 
 The world, and with the nearer breath of God 
 Doth burn and quiver, held so far retired 
 Its inner hem and skirting over us, 
 That yet no glimmer of its majesty 
 Had stream’d unto me: therefore were mine eyes 
 Unequal to pursue the crowned flame,?* 
 That towering rose, and sought the seed ** it bore. 
 And like to babe, that stretches forth its arms 
 For very eagerness toward the breast, 
 After the milk is taken; so outstretch’d 
 Their wavy summits all the fervent band, 
 Through zealous love to Mary: then, in view, 
 There halted; and “ Regina Coeli” © sang 
 So sweetly, the delight hath left me never. 
 Oh! what o’erflowing plenty is up-piled 
 In those rich-laden coffers,’® which below 
 
 Sow’d the good seed, whose harvest now they keep. 
 
 Here are the treasures tasted, that with tears 
 Were in the Babylonian exile 1” won, 
 
 When gold had fail’d them. Here, in synod high 
 Of ancient council with the new convened, 
 Under the Son of Mary and of God, 
 
 Victorious he'® his mighty triumph holds, 
 
 To whom the keys of glory were assign’d. 
 
 383 
 
 12 “The robe.” The ninth Heaven 16 “ Those rich-laden coffers.”? Those 
 
 the primum mobile, that enfolds and 
 moves the eight lower heavens. 
 
 spirits, who, having sown the seed of 
 ood works on earth, now contain the 
 
 “The crowned flame.” The Vir- ruit, Me their pious endeavors. 
 gin, with the angel hovering over her. In the Babylonian exile.” Dur- 
 14“ The seed.” Our Saviour. ing their abode in this world. 
 
 18 “* Regina Ceeli.’”? The beginning of “He.” St. Peter, with the other 
 
 an anthem, sung by the Church at holy, men of the Old and New Testa 
 
 Easter, in honor of Our Lady. me 
 
384 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 CANTO XXIV 
 
 ARGUMENT.—St. Peter examines Dante touching Faith, and is con- 
 tented with his answers. 
 
 YE! in chosen fellowship advanced 
 () To the great supper of the blessed Lamb, 
 Whereon who feeds hath every wish fulfill’d; 
 If to this man through God’s grace be vouchsafed 
 Foretaste of that, which from your table falls, 
 Or ever death his fated term prescribe; 
 Be ye not heedless of his urgent will: 
 But may some influence of your sacred dews 
 Sprinkle him. Of the fount ye alway drink, 
 ~ Whence flows what most he craves.” Beatrice spake; 
 
 And the rejoicing spirits, like to spheres 
 On firm-set poles revolving, trail’d a blaze 
 Of comet splendor: and as wheels, that wind 
 Their circles in the horologe, so work 
 The stated rounds, that to the observant eye 
 The first seems still, and as it flew, the last; 
 E’en thus their carols weaving variously, 
 They, by the measure paced, or swift or slow, 
 Made me to rate the riches of their joy. 
 
 From that, which I did note in beauty most - 
 Excelling, saw I issue forth a flame 
 So bright, as none was left more goodly there. 
 Round Beatrice thrice it wheel’d about, 
 With so divine a song, that fancy’s ear_-- 
 Records it not; and the pen passeth on, 
 And leaves a blank: for that our mortal speech, 
 Nor e’en the inward shaping of the brain, 
 Hath colors fine enough to trace such folds. 
 
 “O saintly sister mine! thy prayer devout 
 Is with so vehement affection urged, 
 Thou dost unbind me from that beauteous sphere.” 
 
 Such were the accents toward my lady breathed 
 From that blest ardor, soon as it was stay’d; 
 To whom she thus: “O everlasting light 
 
PARADISE 
 
 Of him, within whose mighty grasp our Lord 
 
 Did leave the keys, which of this wondrous bliss 
 
 He bare below! tent this man as thou wilt, 
 
 With lighter probe or deep, touching the faith, 
 
 By the which thou didst on the billows walk. 
 
 If he in love, in hope, and in belief, 
 
 Be steadfast, is not hid from thee: for thou 
 
 Hast there thy ken, where all things are beheld 
 
 In liveliest portraiture. But since true faith 
 
 Has peopled this fair realm with citizens; 
 
 Meet is, that to exalt its glory more, | 
 
 Thou, in his audience, shouldst thereof discourse.” 
 Like to the bachelor, who arms himself, 
 
 And speaks not, till the master have proposed 
 
 The question, to approve, and not to end it; 
 
 So I, in silence, arm’d me, while she spake, 
 
 Summoning up each argument to aid; 
 
 As was behoveful for such questioner, 
 
 And such profession: “ As good Christian ought, 
 
 Declare thee, what is faith?” Whereat I raised 
 
 My forehead to the light, whence this had breathed; 
 
 Then turn’d to Beatrice; and in her looks 
 
 Approval met, that from their inmost fount 
 
 I should unlock the waters. ‘“ May the grace, 
 
 That giveth me the captain of the church 
 
 For confessor,” said I, “ vouchsafe to me 
 
 Apt utterance for my thoughts;” then added: “ Sire 
 
 E’en as set down by the unerring style 
 Of thy dear brother, who with thee conspired 
 To bring Rome in unto the way of life, 
 Faith of things hoped is substance, and the proof 
 Of things not seen; and herein doth consist 
 Methinks its essence.” “ Rightly hast thou deem’d,” 
 Was answer’d; “if thou well discern, why first 
 He hath defined it substance, and then proof.” 
 
 “ The deep things,” I replied, “‘ which here I scan 
 Distinctly, are below from mortal eye 
 So hidden, they have in belief alone 
 Their being; on which credence, hope sublime 
 Is built: and, therefore substance, it intends. 
 
 385 
 
386 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 And inasmuch as we must needs infer 
 
 From such belief our reasoning, all respect 
 
 To other view excluded; hence of proof 
 
 The intention is derived.” Forthwith I heard: 
 “Tf thus, whate’er by learning men attain, 
 Were understood; the sophist would want room 
 To exercise his wit.’ So breathed the flame 
 Of love; then added: “Current is the coin 
 Thou utter’st, both in weight and in alloy. 
 
 But tell me, if thou hast it in thy purse.” 
 
 “Even so glittering and so round,” said I, 
 “T not a whit misdoubt of its assay.” 
 
 Next issued from the deep-imbosom’d splendor: 
 “Say, whence the costly jewel, on the which 
 Is founded every virtue, came to thee.” 
 
 “ The flood,” I answer’d, “ from the Spirit of God 
 Rain’d down upon the ancient bond and new,+— 
 Here is the reasoning, that convinceth me 
 So feelingly, each argument beside 
 Seems blunt, and forceless, in comparison.” 
 
 Then heard I: ‘“ Wherefore holdest thou that each, 
 The elder proposition and the new, 
 Which so persuade thee, are the voice of heaven?” 
 
 “The works, that follow’d, evidence their truth; ” 
 IT answer’d: “ Nature did not make for these 
 The iron hot, or on her anvil mould them.” 
 
 “Who voucheth to thee of the works themselves,” 
 Was the reply, “ that they in very deed 
 Are that they purport? None hath sworn so to thee.” 
 
 “ That all the world,” said I, “ should have been turn’d 
 To Christian, and no miracle been wrought, 
 
 Would in itself be such a miracle, 
 
 The rest were not an hundredth part so great. 
 E’en thou went’st forth in poverty and hunger 
 To set the goodly plant, that, from the vine 
 
 It once was, now is grown unsightly bramble.” 
 
 That ended, through the high celestial court 
 Resounded all the spheres, “ Praise we one God!” 
 In song of most unearthly melody. 
 
 16*The ancient bond and new.” The Old and New Testaments, 
 
PARADISE 387 
 
 And when that Worthy? thus, from branch to branch, 
 
 Examining, had led me, that we now 
 
 Approach’d the topmost bough; he straight resumed: 
 
 “The grace, that holds sweet dalliance with thy soul 
 
 So far discreetly hath thy lips unclosed; 
 
 That, whatsoe’er has passed them, I commend. 
 
 Behoves thee to express, what thou believest, 
 
 The next; and, whereon, thy belief hath grown.” 
 “O saintly sire and spirit!” I began, 
 
 “Who seest that, which thou didst so believe, 
 
 As to outstrip feet younger than thine own, 
 
 Toward the sepulchre; thy will is here, 
 
 That I the tenor of my creed unfold; 
 
 And thou, the cause of it, hast likewise ask’d. 
 
 And I reply: I in one God believe; 
 
 One sole eternal Godhead, of whose love 
 
 All Heaven is moved, himself unmoved the while. 
 
 Nor demonstration physical alone, 
 
 Or more intelligential and abstruse. 
 
 Persuades me to this faith: but from that truth 
 
 It cometh to me rather, which is shed 
 
 Through Moses; the rapt Prophets; and the Psalms; 
 
 The Gospel; and what ye yourselves did write, 
 
 When ye were gifted of the Holy Ghost. 
 
 In three eternal Persons I believe; 
 
 Essence threefold and one; mysterious league 
 
 Of union absolute, which, many a time, 
 
 The word of gospel lore upon my mind 
 
 Imprints: and from this germ, this firstling spark 
 
 The lively flame dilates; and, like heaven’s star, 
 
 Doth glitter in me.” As the master hears, 
 
 Well pleased, and then enfoldeth in his arms 
 
 The servant, who hath joyful tidings brought, 
 
 And having told the errand keeps his Peace 
 
 Thus benediction uttering with song, 
 
 Soon as my peace I held, compass’d me thrice 
 
 The apostolic radiance, whose behest 
 
 Had oped my lips: so well their answer pleased. 
 
 2 That Worthy.” “Quel Baron.” 10, we find “Baron Messer Santo 
 
 In the next Canto, St. James is called Antonio.” 
 ** Barone.” So in Boccaccio, G. vi. 
 
ARGUMENT.—St. James questions our Poet concerning Hope. 
 
 i“ The fair sheep-fold.” 
 whence he was banished. 
 
 2 For its sake.” 
 that faith. 
 
 MHE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 CANTO XXV 
 
 Next St, 
 John appears; and, on perceiving that Dante looks intently on him, 
 informs him that he, St. John, had left his body resolved into earth, 
 upon the earth, and that Christ and the Virgin alone had come with 
 their bodies into Heaven. 
 
 Both heaven and earth copartners in its toil, 
 And with lean abstinence, through many a year, 
 Faded my brow, be destined to prevail 
 Over the cruelty, which bars me forth 
 Of the fair sheep-fold,’ where, a sleeping lamb, 
 The wolves set on and fain had worried me; 
 With other voice, and fleece of other grain, 
 I shall forthwith return; and, standing up 
 At my baptismal font, shall claim the wreath 
 Due to the poet’s temples: for I there 
 First enter’d on the faith, which maketh souls 
 Acceptable to God: and, for its sake,? 
 Peter had then circled my forehead thus. 
 
 Next from the squadron, whence had issued forth 
 The first fruit of Christ’s vicars on the earth, 
 Toward us moved a light, at view whereof 
 My Lady, full of gladness, spake to me: 
 
 “Lo! lo! behold the peer of mickle might, 
 That makes Galicia throng’d with visitants.” 3 
 
 As when the ring-dove by his mate alights; 
 In circles, each about the other wheels, 
 
 And, murmuring, coos his fondness: thus saw I 
 One, of the other * great and glorious prince, 
 With kindly greeting, hail’d; extolling, both, 
 Their heavenly banqueting: but when an end 
 
 ] F e’er the sacred poem, that hath made 
 
 Florence, difficulty of the journey, by the rough- 
 ness and barrenness of those parts, and 
 by the incursions of the Moors, who 
 
 made captives many of the pilgrims.— 
 
 For the sake of 
 
 8 “ Galicia throng’d with visitants.” 
 At the time_that the sepulchre of the 
 apostle St. James was discovered, the 
 devotion for that place extended itself 
 not only over all Spain, but even round 
 about to foreign nations. Multitudes 
 from all parts of the world came to vist 
 it. Many others were deterred by the 
 
 The canons of St. Eloy, afterward (the 
 precise time is not known), with a de- 
 sire of remedying these evils, built, in 
 many places along the whole road, 
 which reached as far as to France, hos- 
 pitals for the reception of the pilgrims. 
 
 * “One, of the other.” St. Peter and 
 St. James. 
 
PARADISE 
 
 Was to their gratulation, silent, each, 
 Before me sat they down, so burning bright, 
 I could not look upon them. Smiling then, 
 Beatrice spake: ‘O life in glory shrined! 
 Who? didst the largess of our kingly court 
 Set down with faithful pen; let now thy voice, 
 Of hope the praises, in this height resound. 
 For well thou know’st, who figurest it as oft, 
 As Jesus, to ye three, more brightly shone.’: 
 “Lift up thy head; and be thou strong in trust: 
 For that, which hither from the mortal world 
 Arriveth, must be ripen’d in our beam.” 
 Such cheering accents from the second flame® 
 Assured me; and mine eyes I lifted up’ 
 Unto the mountains, that had bow’d them late 
 With over-heavy burden. “ Sith our Liege 
 Wills of his grace, that thou, or e’er thy death, 
 In the most secret council with his lords 
 Shouldst be confronted, so that having view’d 
 The glories of our court, thou mayst therewith 
 Thyself, and all who hear, invigorate 
 With hope, that leads to blissful end; declare, 
 What is that hope? how it doth flourish in thee? 
 
 And whence thou hadst it?” Thus, proceeding still, 
 
 The second light: and she, whose gentle love 
 My soaring pennons in that lofty flight 
 Escorted, thus preventing me, rejoin’d: 
 
 “ Among her sons, not one more full of hope, 
 Hath the church militant: so ’tis of him 
 Recorded in the sun, whose liberal orb 
 Enlighteneth all our tribe: and ere his term 
 Of warfare, hence permitted he is come, 
 From Egypt to Jerusalem,® to see. 
 
 The other points, both which ® thou hast inquired. 
 Not for more knowledge, but that he may tell 
 
 389 
 
 8 ** Who.’ The Epistle of St. James the hills, from whence cometh my 
 
 is here attributed to the elder apostle help.”,—Psalm cxxi. 1. 
 
 From 
 
 of that name, whose shrine was at Com- 8 “ From Egypt ae erusalem. 
 postella, in Galicia. the lower world to Heaven. | é 
 ®* The second flame.” St. James. » “ Both which.”? One point Beatrice 
 
 7™“T lifted up.” I looked up to the has herself answered: ‘‘ how that 
 
 hope 
 
 € 
 apostles. “ I will lift up mine eyes unto flourishes in him.’”’ The other two re- 
 
 main for Dante to resolve. 
 
39° 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 How dear thou hold’st the virtue; these to him 
 Leave I: for he may answer thee with ease, 
 And without boasting, so God give him grace.” 
 Like to the scholar, practised in his task, 
 Who, willing to give proof of diligence, 
 Seconds his teacher gladly; “ Hope,” said I, 
 “Ts of the joy to come a sure expectance, 
 The effect of grace divine and merit preceding. 
 This light from many a star, visits my heart; 
 
 But flow’d to me, the first, from him who sang 
 
 The songs of the Supreme; himself supreme 
 
 Among his tuneful brethren. ‘Let all hope 
 
 In thee,’ so spake his anthem, ‘ who have known 
 
 Thy name;’ and, with my faith, who know not that? 
 
 From thee, the next, distilling from his spring, 
 
 In thine epistle, fell on me the drops 
 
 So plenteously, that I on others shower 
 
 The influence of their dew.” While as I spake, 
 
 A lamping, as of quick and volley’d lightning, 
 
 Within the bosom of that mighty sheen? 
 
 Play’d tremulous; then forth these accents breathed: 
 
 “Love for the virtue, which attended me 
 
 E’en to the palm, and issuing from the field, 
 
 Glows vigorous yet within me; and inspires 
 
 To ask of thee, whom also it delights, 
 
 What promise thou from hope, in chief, dost win.” 
 “Both scriptures, new and ancient,’ I replied, 
 
 “Propose the mark (which even now I view) 
 
 For souls beloved of God. Isaias™ saith, 
 
 ‘ That, in their own land, each one must be clad 
 
 In twofold vesture;’ and their proper land 
 
 Is this delicious life. In terms more full, 
 
 And clearer far, thy brother’? hath set forth 
 
 This revelation to us, where he tells 
 
 Of the white raiment destined to the saints.” 
 
 And, as the words were ending, from above, 
 
 “ They hope in thee! ”’ first heard we cried: whereto 
 
 ; ee Gein be ite sheen.” The spirit covered me ithe ae tobe of righteous- 
 oF St 
 
 WD << 
 
 ness.’’—Chap. 
 saie? “He hath clothed me at Thy. Sting ” St. John in the 
 
 with the peayllleedly of salvation, he hath Rev. vii. 9. 
 
PARADISE 
 
 ‘Answer’d the carols all. 
 
 39t 
 
 Amidst them next, 
 
 A light of so clear amplitude emerged, 
 That winter’s month were but a single day, 
 Were such a crystal in the Cancer’s sign. 
 
 _ Like as a virgin riseth up, and goes, 
 And enters on the mazes of the dance; 
 Though gay, yet innocent of worse intent, 
 Than to do fitting. honor to the bride: 
 
 So I beheld the new effulgence come 
 
 Unto the other two, who in a ring 
 
 Wheel’d, as became their rapture. 
 
 In the dance, 
 
 And in the song, it mingled. And the dame 
 Held on them fix’d her looks; e’en as the spouse, 
 
 Silent, and moveless. 
 
 “ This'® is he, who lay 
 
 Upon the bosom of our pelican: 
 This he, into whose keeping, from the cross, 
 
 ‘The mighty charge was given.” 
 
 Thus she spake; 
 
 Yet therefore naught the more removed her sight 
 From marking them: or e’er her words began, 
 Or when they closed. As he, who looks intent, 
 And strives with searching ken, how he may see 
 The sun in his eclipse, and, through desire 
 
 Of seeing, loseth power of sight; so I ** 
 
 Peer’d on that last resplendence, while I heard: 
 “Why dazzlest thou thine eyes in seeking that, 
 
 Which here abides not? 
 
 Earth my body is, 
 
 In earth; and shall be, with the rest, so long, 
 
 As till our number equal the decree 
 
 Of the Most High. The two’ that have ascended, 
 In this our blessed cloister, shine alone 
 
 - With the two garments. 
 
 So report below.” 
 
 As when, for ease of labor, or to shun 
 Suspected peril, at a whistle’s breath, 
 The oars, erewhile dash’d frequent in the wave, 
 All rest: the flamy circle at that voice 
 So rested; and the mingling sound was still, 
 
 18 “ This.” St. John, who reclined on 
 the bosom of our Saviour, and to whose 
 charge Jesus recommended his mother. 
 
 14“ So I.”’ He looked so earnestly, 
 to descry whether St. John were pres- 
 ent there in body, or in spirit only; 
 having had his doubts raised by that 
 
 saying of our Saviour’s: “ If I will, that 
 he tarry till I come, what is that to 
 
 1% “*The two.” Christ and Mary, 
 whom he has described in the last Canto 
 but one, as rising above his sight. 
 
39% THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Which from the trinal band, soft-breathing, rose. 
 I turn’d, but ah! how trembled in my thought, 
 When, looking’ at my side again to see 
 
 Beatrice, I descried her not; although, 
 
 Not distant, on the happy coast she stood. 
 
 CANTO XXVI 
 
 ARGUMENT.—St. John examines our Poet touching Charity. Afterward 
 Adam tells when he was created, and placed in the terrestrial para- 
 dise ; how long he remained in that state; what was the occasion of 
 his fall; when he was admitted into Heaven; and what language he 
 spake. 
 
 ITH dazzled eyes, whilst wondering I remain’d; 
 Forth of the beamy flame,t which dazzled me, 
 Issued a breath, that in attention mute 
 Detain’d me; and these words it spake: “’Twere well, 
 That, long as till thy vision, on my form 
 O’erspent, regain its virtue, with discourse 
 Thou compensate the brief delay. Say then, 
 Beginning, to what point thy soul aspires: 
 And meanwhile rest assured, that sight in thee 
 Is but o’erpower’d a space, not wholly quench’d; 
 Since thy fair guide and lovely, in her look 
 Hath potency, the like to that, which dwelt 
 In Ananias’ hand.” ? I answering thus: 
 “Be to mine eyes the remedy, or late 
 Or early, at her pleasure; for they were 
 The gates, at which she enter’d, and did light 
 Her never-dying fire. My wishes here 
 Are centred: in this palace is the weal, 
 That Alpha and Omega are, to all 
 The lessons love can read me.” Yet again 
 The voice, which had dispersed my fear when dazed 
 With that excess, to converse urged, and spake: 
 “ Behoves thee sift more narrowly thy terms; 
 ‘And say, who level’d at this scope thy bow.” 
 
 1 The beamy flame.” St. Joh his hand on St. Paul, restored his sigh 
 2“ Ananias’ hand.” Who, by pido Acts, ix. 17. ght, 
 
PARADISE 393 
 
 “ Philosophy,” said I, “ hath arguments, 
 And this place hath authority enough, 
 To imprint in me such love: for, of constraint, 
 Good, inasmuch as we perceive the good, 
 Kindles our love; and in degree the more, 
 As it comprises more of goodness in ’t. 
 The essence then, where such advantage is, 
 That each good, found without it, is naught else 
 But of his light the beam, must needs attract 
 The soul of each one, loving, who the truth 
 Discerns, on which this proof is built. Such truth 
 Learn I from him, who shows me the first love 
 Of all intelligential substances 
 Eternal: from his voice I learn, whose word 
 Is truth; that of himself to Moses saith, 
 ‘I will make all my good before thee pass: ’ 
 Lastly, from’thee I learn, who chief proclaim’st 
 E’en at the outset ® of thy heralding, 
 In mortal ears the mystery of heaven.” 
 “Through human wisdom, and the authority 
 Therewith agreeing,’ heard I answer’d, “ keep 
 The choicest of thy love for God. But say, 
 If thou yet other cords within thee feel’st, 
 That draw thee toward him; so that thou report 
 How many are the fangs, with which this love 
 Is grappled to thy soul.” I did not miss, 
 To what intent the eagle of our Lord * 
 Had pointed his demand; yea, noted well 
 The avowal which he led to; and resumed: 
 “ All grappling bonds, that knit the heart to God, 
 Confederate to make fast our charity. 5 
 The being of the world; and mine own being; 
 The death which He endured, that I should live; 
 And that, which all the faithful hope, as I do; 
 To the foremention’d lively knowledge join’d; 
 Have from the sea of ill love saved my bark, 
 And on the coast secured it of the right. 
 As for the leaves,® that in the garden bloom, 
 
 &** At the outset,” John, i. 1, etc. # “ The eagle of our Lord,” St. John, 
 « The’ leaves.” Created beings. 
 
394 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 My love for them is great, as is the good 
 _ Dealt by the eternal hand, that tends them all.” 
 
 I ended: and therewith a song most sweet 
 Rang through the spheres; and “ Holy! Holy! Holy!” 
 Accordant with the rest, my lady sang. 
 
 And as a sleep is broken and dispersed 
 
 Through sharp encounter of the nimble light, 
 With the eye’s spirit running forth to meet 
 
 The ray, from membrane on to membrane urged; 
 And the upstartled wight loathes that he sees; 
 So, at his sudden waking, he misdeems 
 
 Of all around him, till assurance waits 
 
 On better judgment: thus the saintly dame 
 Drove from before my eyes the motes away, 
 With the resplendence of her own, that cast 
 Their brightness downward, thousand miles below. 
 Whence I my vision, clearer than before, 
 Recover’d; and well-nigh astounded, ask’d 
 
 Of a fourth light, that now with us I saw. 
 
 And Beatrice: “ The first living soul,® 
 That ever the first virtue framed, admires 
 Within these rays his Maker.” Like the leaf, 
 That bows its lithe top till the blast is blown; 
 By its own virtue rear’d, then stands aloof: 
 
 So I, the whilst she said, awe-stricken bow’d. 
 Then eagerness to speak embolden’d me; 
 
 And I began: “O fruit! that wast alone 
 Mature, when first engender’d; ancient father! 
 That doubly seest in every wedded bride 
 
 Thy daughter, by affinity and blood; 
 
 Devoutly as I may, I pray thee hold 
 
 Converse with me: my will thou seest: and I, 
 More speedily to hear thee, tell it not.” 
 
 It chanceth oft some animal bewrays, 
 Through the sleek covering of his furry coat, 
 The fondness, that stirs in him, and conforms 
 His outside seeming to the cheer within: 
 
 And in like guise was Adam’s spirit moved 
 _ 'To joyous mood, that through the covering shone, 
 6 “ The first living soul.’”’ Adam. 
 
PARADISE 305 
 
 Transparent, when to pleasure me it spake: 
 
 “ No need thy will be told, which I untold 
 
 Better discern, than thou whatever thing 
 
 Thou hold’st most certain: for that will I see 
 
 In Him, who is truth’s mirror; and Himself, 
 Parhelion unto all things, and naught else, 
 
 To Him. This wouldst thou hear: how long since, God 
 Placed me in that high garden, from whose bounds 
 She led me up this ladder, steep and long; 
 
 What space endured my season of delight; 
 Whence truly sprang the wrath that banish’d me; 
 And what the language, which I spake and framed. 
 Not that I tasted of the tree, my son, 
 
 Was in itself the cause of that exile, 
 
 But only my transgressing of the mark 
 Assign’d me. There, whence’ at thy lady’s hest 
 The Mantuan moved him, still was I debarr’d 
 This council, till the sun had made complete, 
 
 Four thousand and three hundred rounds and twice, 
 His annual journey; and, through every light 
 
 In his broad pathway, saw I him return, : 
 Thousand save seventy times, the whilst I dwelt _ 
 Upon the earth. The languageI diduse 
 
 Was worn away, or ever Nimrod’s race 
 
 Their unaccomplishable work began. 
 
 For naught, that man inclines to, e’er was lasting; 
 Left by his reason free, and variable 
 
 As is the sky that sways him. That he speaks, 
 
 Is nature’s prompting: whether thus, or thus, 
 
 She leaves to you, as ye do most affect it. 
 
 Ere I descended into hell’s abyss, 
 
 El was the name on earth of the Chief Good, 
 Whose joy enfolds me: Eli then ’twas call’d. 
 
 And so beseemeth: for, in mortals, use 
 
 Is as the leaf upon the bough: that goes, 
 
 And other comes instead. Upon the mount 
 
 Most high above the waters, all my life, 
 
 Both innocent and guilty, did but reach 
 ™“ Whence.” That is, from L-mbo. tion to the time of his deliverance, 
 
 See “Hell,” Canto ii. 53. Adam says which followed the death of Christ. 
 that 5,232 years elapsed from his crea- 
 
396 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 From the first hour, to that which cometh next 
 (As the sun changes quarter) to the sixth.” 
 
 CANTO XXVII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—St. Peter bitterly rebukes the covetousness of his suc- 
 cessors in the Apostolic See, while all the heavenly host sympathize 
 in his indignation; they then vanish upward. Beatrice bids Dante 
 again cast his view below. Afterward they are borne into the ninth 
 Heaven, of which she shows him the nature and properties; blaming 
 the perverseness of man, who places his will on low and perishable 
 things. 
 
 TT HEN “Glory to the Father, to the Son, 
 And to the Holy Spirit,” rang aloud 
 Throughout all Paradise; that with the song 
 My spirit reel’d, so passing sweet the strain. 
 And what I saw was equal ecstasy: 
 One universal smile it seem’d of all things; 
 Joy past compare; gladness unutterable ; 
 Imperishable life of peace and love; 
 Exhaustless riches, and unmeasured bliss. 
 Before mine eyes stood the four torches? lit: 
 And that,? which first had come, began to wax 
 In brightness, and, in semblance, such became, 
 As Jove might be, if he and Mars were birds, 
 And interchanged their plumes. Silence ensued, 
 Through the blessed quire; by Him, who here appoints 
 Vicissitude of ministry, enjoin’d; 
 When thus I heard: “ Wonder not, if my hue 
 Be changed; for, while I speak, these shalt thou see 
 All in like manner change with me. My place 
 He® who usurps on earth (my place, ay, mine, 
 Which in the presence of the Son of God 
 Is void), the same hath made my cemetery 
 A common sewer of puddle and of blood: 
 The more below his triumph, who from hence 
 Malignant fell.” Such color, as the sun, 
 
 21“ Four torches.” eh Peter, St. the planet Jupiter would, if it assumed 
 James poe John, and Ada the sanguine appearance of Mars. 
 as St. Peter, whe looked as 8 “ He.” Boniface VIII. 
 
PARADISE 307 
 
 At eve or morning, paints an adverse cloud, 
 Then saw I sprinkled over all the sky 
 
 And as the unblemish’d dame, who, in herself 
 Secure of censure, yet at bare report 
 
 Of other’s failing, shrinks with maiden fear ; 
 
 So Beatrice, in her semblance, changed: 
 
 And such eclipse in heaven, methinks, was seen, 
 When the Most Holy suffer’d. Then the words 
 Proceeded, with voice, alter’d from itself 
 
 So clean, the semblance did not alter more. 
 “Not to this end was Christ’s spouse with my blood 
 With that of Linus, and of Cletus,* fed; 
 
 That she might serve for purchase of base gold: 
 But for the purchase of this happy life, 
 
 Did Sextus, Pius, and Calixtus bleed, 
 
 And Urban;° they, whose doom was not without 
 Much weeping seal’d. No purpose was of ours,® 
 That on the right hand of our successors, _ 
 
 Part of the Christian people should be set, 
 
 And part upon their left; nor that the keys, 
 Which were vouchsafed me, should for ensign serve 
 Unto the banners, that do levy war 
 
 On the baptized: nor I, for sigil-mark, 
 
 Set upon sold and lying privileges: 
 
 Which makes me oft to bicker and turn red. 
 
 In shepherd’s clothing, greedy wolves” below 
 Range wide o’er all the pastures. Arm of God! 
 Why longer sleep’st thou? Cahorsines and Gascons® 
 Prepare to quaff our blood. O good beginning! 
 To what a vile conclusion must thou stoop. 
 
 But the high providence, which did defend, 
 Through Scipio, the world’s empery for Rome, 
 Will not delay its succor: and thou, son, 
 
 . see, in the second; an 
 
 ¢ “ Of Linus, and of Cletus.”? Bishops 
 of Rome in the first_century. j 
 6**Did Sextus, Pius, and Calixtus 
 bleed, 
 And Urban ———” 
 The former two, bishops of the same 
 
 the others, in 
 
 the fourth century. ‘ 
 6 “* No purpose was of ours.” We did 
 not intend that our successors should 
 take any part in the political divisions 
 among Christians; or that my figure 
 (the seal of St. Peter) should serve as 
 
 Classics. Vol. 34—R 
 
 a mark to authorize iniquitous grants 
 and privileges. 
 
 7 “ Wolves.” 
 
 “Wolves shall succeed to_ teachers, 
 iene wolves.”—Milton, ‘‘ Paradise 
 
 ost,” b. xii. 508. 
 
 8 “ Cahorsines and Gascons.” He al- 
 ludes to Jacques d’Ossa, a_ native of 
 Cahors, who filled the papal chair in 
 1316, after it had been two years vacant, 
 and assumed the name of John XXII, 
 and to Clement V, a Gascon. 
 
398 
 
 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Who through thy mortal weight shalt yet again 
 Return below, open thy lips, nor hide 
 
 What is by me not hidden.” 
 
 As a flood 
 
 Of frozen vapors streams adown the air, 
 
 What time the she-goat® with her skyey horn 
 Touches the sun; so saw I there stream wide 
 The vapors, who with us had linger’d late, 
 And with glad triumph deck the ethereal cope. 
 Onward my sight their semblances pursued ; 
 So far pursued, as till the space between 
 
 From its reach sever’d them: whereat the guide 
 Celestial, marking me no more intent 
 
 On upward gazing, said, “ Look down .and see 
 
 What circuit thou hast compassed.” 
 When I before had cast my view beneath, 
 
 From the hour?® 
 
 All the first region overpast I saw, 
 Which from the midmost to the boundary winds, 
 That onward, thence, from Gades," I beheld 
 The unwise passage of Laértes’ son ; 
 And hitherward the shore,?* where thou, Europa, 
 Madest thee a joyful burden; and yet more 
 Of this dim spot had seen, but that the sun,1* 
 A constellation off and more, had ta’en 
 His progress in the zodiac underneath. 
 Then by the spirit, that doth never leave 
 Its amorous dalliance with my lady’s looks, 
 Back with redoubled ardor were mine eyes 
 Led unto her: and from her radiant smiles, 
 Whenas I turn’d me, pleasure so divine 
 Did lighten on me, that whatever bait 
 Or art or nature in the human flesh, 
 Or in its limn’d resemblance, can combine 
 Through greedy eyes to take the soul withal, 
 
 Were, to her beauty, nothing. 
 
 ® “The she-goat.”” When the sun is 
 in Capricorn. ‘ 
 
 10“ From the hour.” Since he had 
 Jast looked (see Canto xxii.) ‘he per- 
 ceived that he thad passed from the 
 meridian .circle to the ‘eastern horizon; 
 the half of our hemisphere, anda quar- 
 ter of the heaven. 
 
 11“ From Gades.” See “‘ Hell,’’ Can- 
 to xxvi. 106. 
 
 Its boon influence 
 
 12 The shore.” Phoenicia, where 
 Europa, the daughter of genor, 
 mounted on the back .of Jupiter, in his 
 shape of a bull. , 
 
 18 “ The sun.” Dante was in the con- 
 
 stellation of Gemini, and the sun in 
 
 Aries. There was, therefore, part of 
 those two constellations, and the whole 
 of Taurus, between -them. 
 
From the fair nest of Leda* rapt me forth, 
 And wafted on into the swiftest heaven. 
 
 What place for entrance Beatrice chose, 
 I may not say; so uniform was all, 
 Liveliest and loftiest. She my secret wish 
 Divined; and, with such gladness, that God’s love 
 Seem’d from her visage shining, thus began: 
 “ Here is the goal, whence motion on his race 
 Starts: motionless the centre, and the rest 
 All moved around. Except the soul divine, 
 Place in this heaven is none; the soul divine, 
 Wherein the love, which ruleth o’er its orb, 
 Is kindled, and the virtue, that it sheds: 
 One circle, light and love, enclasping it, 
 As this doth clasp the others; and to Him, 
 Who draws the bound, its limit only known. 
 Measured itself by none, it doth divide 
 Motion to all, counted unto them forth, 
 As by the fifth or half ye count forth ten. 
 The vase, wherein time’s roots are plunged, thou seest 
 Look elsewhere for the leaves. O mortal lust! 
 That canst not lift thy head above the waves 
 Which whelm and sink thee down. The will in man 
 Bears goodly blossoms; but its ruddy promise 
 Is, by the dripping of perpetual rain, 
 Made mere abortion: faith and innocence 
 Are met with but in babes; each taking leave, 
 Ere cheeks with down are sprinkled: he, that fasts 
 While yet a stammerer, with his tongue let loose 
 Gluts every food alike in every moon: 
 One, yet a babbler, loves and listens to 
 His mother; but no sooner hath free use 
 Of speech, that he doth wish her in her grave. 
 So suddenly doth the fair child of him, 
 Whose welcome is the morn and eve his parting, 
 To negro blackness change her virgin white. 
 
 “ Thou, to abate thy wonder, note, that none 
 Bears rule in earth; and its frail family 
 
 14“ The fair nest of Leda.’”? From was the mother of the twins, Castor 
 the Gemini; thus called, because Leda and Pollux. 
 
400 ~ THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Are therefore wanderers. Yet before the date, 
 
 When through the hundredth in his reckoning dropped, 
 Pale January must be shoved aside 
 
 From Winter’s calendar, these heavenly spheres 
 
 Shall roar so loud, that fortune shall be fain *® 
 
 To turn the poop, where she hath now the prow; 
 
 So that the fleet run onward: and true fruit, 
 
 Expected long, shall crown at last the bloom.” 
 
 CANTO XXVIII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Still in the ninth Heaven, our Poetis permitted to beh 
 the divine essence; and then sees,“in three hierarchies, the nine 
 . Beatrice clears some difficulties which occur to 
 him on this occasion. 
 
 O she, who doth imparadise my soul, 
 
 Had drawn the veil from off our present life, 
 
 And bared the truth of poor mortality: 
 When lo! as one who, in a mirror, spies 
 The shining of a flambeau at his back, 
 Lit sudden ere he deem of its approach, 
 And turneth to resolve him, if the glass 
 Have told him true, and sees the record faithful 
 As note is to its metre; even thus, 
 I well remember, did befall to me, 
 Looking upon the beauteous eyes, whence love 
 Had made the leash to take me. As I turn’d: 
 And that which none, who in that volume looks, 
 Can miss of, in itself apparent, struck 
 My view; a point I saw, that darted light 
 So sharp, no lid, unclosing, may bear up 
 Against its keenness. The least star we ken 
 From hence, had seem’d a moon; set by its side, 
 As star by side of star. And so far off, 
 Perchance, as is the halo from the light 
 Which paints it, when most dense the vapor spreads; 
 There wheel’d about the point a circle of fire, 
 
 1% “Fortune shall be fain.” The which he vainly hoped would _ follow on 
 
 commentators in general suppose that the arrival of the Emperor Henry VII 
 our Poet here augurs that great reform in Italy. 
 
PARADISE ' 404 
 
 More rapid than the motion which surrounds, 
 Speediest, the world. Another this enring’d; 
 And that a third; the third a fourth, and that 
 A fifth encompass’d; which a sixth next bound; 
 And over this, a seventh, following, reach’d 
 Circumference so ample, that its bow, 
 
 Within the span of Juno’s messenger, 
 Had scarce been held entire. Beyond the seventh, 
 Ensued yet other two. And every one, 
 As more in number distant from the first, 
 Was tardier in motion: and that glow’d 
 With flame most pure, that to the sparkle of truth, 
 Was nearest; as partaking most, methinks, 
 Of its reality. The guide beloved 
 Saw me in anxious thought suspense, and spake: 
 “ Heaven and all nature hangs upon that point 
 The circle thereto most conjoin’d observe; 
 And know, that by intenser love its course 
 Is, to this swiftness, wing’d.” To whom I thus: 
 “Tt were enough; nor should I further seek, 
 Had I but witness’d order, in the world 
 Appointed, such as in these wheels is seen. 
 But in the sensible world such difference is, 
 That in each round shows more divinity, 
 As each is wider from the centre. Hence, 
 If in this wondrous and angelic temple, 
 That hath, for confine, only light and love, 
 My wish may have completion, I must know, 
 Wherefore such disagreement is between 
 The exemplar and its copy: for myself, 
 Contemplating, I fail to pierce the cause.” 
 
 “Tt is no marvel, if thy fingers foil’d 
 Do leave the knot untied: so hard ’tis grown 
 For want of tenting.” Thus she said: “ But take,” 
 She added, “if thou wish thy cure, my words, 
 And entertain them subtly. Every orb, 
 Corporeal, doth proportion its extent 
 Unto the virtue through its parts diffused. 
 The greater blessedness preserves the more, 
 The greater is the body (if all parts 
 
402 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Share equally) the more is to preserve. 
 
 Therefore the circle, whose swift course enwheels 
 The universal frame, answers to that 
 
 Which is supreme in knowledge and in love. 
 
 Thus by the virtue, not the seeming breadth 
 
 Of substance, measuring, thou shalt see the heavens, 
 Each to the intelligence that ruleth it, 
 
 Greater to more, and smaller unto less, 
 
 Suited in strict and wondrous harmony.” 
 
 As when the north blows from his milder cheek 
 A blast, that scours the sky, forthwith our air, 
 Clear’d of the rack that hung on it before, 
 Glitters; and, with his beauties all unveil’d, 
 
 The firmament looks forth serene, and smiles: 
 Such was my cheer, when Beatrice drove 
 With clear reply the shadows back, and truth 
 Was manifested, as a star in heaven. 
 
 And when the words were ended, not unlike 
 To iron in the furnace, every cirque, 
 Ebullient, shot forth scintillating fires: 
 
 And every sparkle shivering to new blaze, 
 
 In number? did outmillion the account 
 Reduplicate upon the checker’d board. 
 Then heard I echoing on, from choir to choir, 
 “ Hosanna,” to the fixed point, that holds, 
 And shall forever hold them to their place, 
 From everlasting, irremovable. 
 
 Musing awhile I stood: and she, who saw 
 
 My inward meditations, thus began: 
 
 “Tn the first circles, they, whom thou beheld’st 
 
 Are seraphim and cherubim. Thus swift 
 
 Follow their hoops, in likeness to the point, 
 
 Near as they can, approaching; and they can 
 
 The more, the loftier their vision. Those 
 
 That round them fleet, gazing the Godhead next, 
 
 Are thrones; in whom the first trine ends. And all 
 
 Are blessed, even as their sight descends 
 
 2“ In number.” The sparkles ex- oned one; for the —, te for the 
 
 ceeded the number which would be third, four; and so went on doubling 
 
 produced by the sixty-four squares of to the end of the account. 
 a chess-board, if fex the first we reck- 
 
PARADISE 403 
 Deeper into the truth, wherein rest is 
 
 For every mind.. Thus happiness hath root 
 
 In seeing, not in loving, which of sight 
 
 Is aftergrowth. And of the seeing such 
 
 The meed, as unto each, in due degree, 
 
 Grace and good-will their measure have assign’d. 
 The other trine, that with still opening buds 
 
 In this eternal springtide blossom fair, 
 
 Fearless of bruising from the nightly ram,? 
 Breathe up in warbled melodies threefold 
 Hosannas, blending ever; from the three, 
 Transmitted, hierarchy of gods, for aye 
 Rejoicing ; dominations first; next them, 
 Virtues; and powers the third; the next to whom 
 Are princedoms and archangels, with glad round 
 To tread their festal ring; and last, the band 
 Angelical, disporting in their sphere. 
 
 All, as they circle in their orders, look 
 
 Aloft; and, downward, with such sway prevail, 
 That all with mutual impulse tend to God. 
 These once a mortal view beheld. Desire, 
 
 In Dionysius,’ so intensely wrought, 
 
 That he, as I have done, ranged them; and named 
 Their orders, marshal’d in his thought. From him, 
 Dissentient, one refused his sacred reed. 
 
 But soon as in this heaven his doubting eyes 
 Were open’d, Gregory* at his error smiled. 
 
 Nor marvel, that a denizen of earth 
 
 Should scan such secret truth; for he had learnt © 
 Both this and much beside of these our orbs, 
 From an eye-witness to heaven’s mysteries.” 
 
 3“ Fearless of bruising from the 
 nightly ram.” Not injured, like the 
 roductions of our spring, by the in- 
 eance of autumn, when the constella- 
 tion Aries rises at sunset. Me eee 
 
 8 “ Dionysius.” The Areopagite, in 
 his book ‘‘ De Ccelesti Hierarchia.”’ 
 
 « “ Gregory.” Gregory the Great. 
 
 6 “He had learnt.” Dionysius, he 
 says, had learnt from St. Paul. It is 
 almost unnecessary to add that the 
 book above referred to, which goes 
 under his name, was the production of 
 a later age. In Bishop Bull’s seventh 
 sermon, which treats of the different 
 
 degrees of beatitude in Heaven, there 
 is much that resembles what _is said_on 
 the same subject by our Poet. The 
 learned prelate, however, appears a 
 little inconsistent, when, after having 
 blamed Dionysius the Areopagite, ‘‘ for 
 reckoning up exactly the several orders 
 of the angelical hierarchy, as if he had 
 seen a muster of the Saemeees t | host be- 
 fore his eyes ” (v. i. p. 313), he himself 
 then speaks rather more particularly 
 of the several orders in the celestial 
 hierarchy than he is warranted in doing 
 
 by Holy Scripture. 
 
404 THE DIVINE COMEDY. 
 
 CANTO XXIX 
 
 ARGUMENT.—Beatrice beholds, in the mirror of divine truth, some doubts 
 which had entered the mind of Dante. These she resolves; and 
 then digresses into a vehement reprehension of certain theologians 
 and preachers in those days, whose ignorance or avarice induced 
 them to substitute their own inventions for the pure word of the 
 Gospel. 
 
 O longer, than what time Latona’s twins 
 Cover’d of Libra and the fleecy star, 
 Together both, girding the horizon hang; 
 
 In even balance, from the zenith poised; 
 
 Till from that verge, each, changing hemisphere, 
 Part the nice level; e’en so brief a space 
 
 Did Beatrice’s silence hold. A smile 
 
 Sat painted on her cheek; and her fix’d gaze 
 
 Bent on the point, at which my vision fail’d: 
 When thus, her words resuming, she began: 
 
 “T speak, nor what thou wouldst inquire demand; 
 For I have mark’d it, where all time and place 
 Are present. Not for increase to himself 
 
 Of good, which may not be increased, but forth 
 To manifest his glory by its beams; 
 
 Inhabiting his own eternity, 
 
 Beyond time’s limit or what bound soe’er 
 
 To circumscribe his being; as he will’d, 
 
 Into new natures, like unto himself, 
 
 Eternal love unfolded: nor before, 
 
 As 1f in dull inaction, torpid, lay, 
 
 For, not in process of before or aft, 
 
 Upon these waters moved the Spirit of God. 
 Simple and mix’d, both form and substance, forth 
 To perfect being started, like three darts 
 
 Shot from a bow three-corded. And as ray 
 
 In crystal, glass, and amber, shines entire, 
 
 F’en at the moment of its issuing; thus 
 
 Did, from the eternal Sovran, beam entire 
 
 His threefold operation, at one act 
 
 Produced coeval. Yet, in order, each 
 
 Created his due station knew: those highest, 
 
PARADISE ~ 
 
 405 
 
 Who pure intelligence were made; mere power, - 
 The lowest; in the midst, bound with strict league, 
 Intelligence and power, unsever’d bond. 
 
 Long tract of ages by the angels past, 
 
 Ere the creating of another world, 
 
 Described on Jerome’s pages,’ thou hast seen. 
 
 But that what I disclose to thee is true, 
 
 Those penmen,? whom the Holy Spirit moved 
 
 In many a passage of their sacred book, 
 
 Attest; as thou by diligent search shalt find: 
 
 And reason,’ in some’ sort, discerns the same, 
 Who scarce would grant the heavenly ministers, 
 Of their perfection void, so long a space. 
 
 Thus when and where these spirits of love were made, 
 Thou know’st, and how: and, knowing, hast allay’d 
 Thy thirst, which from the tripie question‘ rose. 
 Ere one had reckon’d twenty, e’en so soon, 
 
 Part of the angels fell: and in their fall, 
 Confusion to your elements ensued. 
 
 The others kept their station: and this task, 
 Whereon thou look’st, began, with such delight, 
 That they surcease not ever, day nor night, 
 
 Their circling. Of that fatal lapse the cause 
 
 Was the curst pride of him, whom thou hast seen 
 Pent with the world’s incumbrance. Those, whom here 
 Thou seest, were lowly to confess themselves 
 
 Of his free bounty, who had made them apt 
 
 For ministries so high: therefore their views 
 
 Were, by enlightening grace and their own merit, 
 Exalted; so that in their will confirm’d 
 
 They stand, nor fear to fall. For do not doubt, 
 But to receive the grace, which Heaven vouchsafes, 
 Is meritorious, even as the soul 
 
 With prompt affection welcometh the guest. 
 
 Now, without further help, if with good heed 
 
 Set see Jerome’s pages.”” St. Jerome 
 had described the angels as created 
 long before the rest of the universe: an 
 opinion which Thomas Aquinas contro- 
 verted; and the latter, as Dante thinks, 
 had Scripture on his side. ; 
 
 2 ‘Those penmen.’’ As in Gen. i. 1, 
 and Ecclesiasticus, xviii. 1. a 
 _ 8“ Reason.” The heavenly ministers 
 
 (“‘ motort”’) would have existed to no 
 purpose if they had been created before 
 the corporeal world, which they were to 
 govern. é 
 
 “The triple question.” He had 
 wished to know where, when, and how 
 the angels had been created, and these 
 three questions had been resolved. 
 
gob THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 My words thy mind have treasured, thou henceforth 
 This consistory round about mayst scan, / 
 And gaze thy fill. But, since thou hast on earth 
 Heard vain disputers, reasoners in the schools, 
 Canvass the angelic nature, and dispute 
 
 Its powers of apprehension, memory, choice; 
 Therefore, ’tis well thou take from me the truth, 
 Pure and without disguise; which they below, 
 Equivocating, darken and perplex. 
 
 “ Know thou, that, from the first, these substances, 
 
 Rejoicing in the countenance of God, 
 
 Have held unceasingly their view, intent 
 
 Upon the glorious vision, from the which 
 Naught absent is nor hid: where then no change 
 Of newness, with succession, interrupts, 
 Remembrance, there, needs none to gather up 
 Divided thought and images remote. 
 
 “ So that men, thus at variance with the truth, 
 Dream, though their eyes be open; reckless some 
 Of error; others well aware they err, 
 
 To whom more guilt and shame are justly due. 
 
 Each the known track of sage philosophy 
 
 Deserts, and has a by-way of his own: 
 
 So much the restless eagerness to shine. 
 
 And love of singularity, prevail. 
 
 Yet this, offensive as it is, provokes 
 
 Heaven’s anger less, than when the book of God 
 
 Is forced to yield to man’s authority, 
 
 Or from its straightness warp’d: no reckoning made | 
 What blood the sowing of it in the world 
 
 Has cost; what favor for himself he wins, 
 
 Who meekly clings to it. The aim of all 
 
 Is how to shine: e’en they, whose office is 
 
 To preach the gospel, let the gospel sleep, 
 
 And pass their own inventions off instead. 
 
 One tells, how at Christ’s suffering the wan moon 
 ‘Bent back her steps, and shadow’d o’er the sun 
 With intervenient disc, as she withdrew: 
 Another, how the light shrouded itself 
 
 Within its tabernacle, and left dark 
 
PARADISE 
 
 The Spaniard, and the Indian, with the Jew. 
 Such fables Florence in her pulpit hears, 
 Bandied about more frequent, than the names 
 Of Bindi and of Lapi® in her streets. 
 
 The sheep, meanwhile, poor witless ones, return 
 From pasture, fed with wind: and what avails 
 For their excuse, they do not see their harm? 
 Christ said not to his first conventicle, 
 
 ‘Go forth and preach impostures to the world,’ 
 
 But gave them truth to build on; and the sound 
 
 Was mighty on their lips: nor needed they, 
 Beside the Gospel, other spear or shield, 
 
 To aid them in their warfare for the faith. 
 
 The preacher now provides himself with store 
 Of jests and gibes; and, so there be no lack 
 
 Of laughter, while he vents them, his big cow! 
 Distends, and he has won the meed he sought: 
 Could but the vulgar catch a glimpse the while 
 Of that dark bird which nestles in his hood, 
 
 They scarce would wait to hear the blessing said, 
 
 Which now the dotards hold in such esteem, 
 That every counterfeit, who spreads abroad 
 The hands of holy promise, finds a throng 
 Of credulous fools beneath. Saint Anthony 
 Fattens with this his swine,® and others worse 
 Than swine, who diet at his lazy board, 
 Paying with unstamped metal? for their fare, 
 
 “ But (for we far have wander’d) let us seek 
 The forward path again; so as the way 
 Be shorten’d with the time. No mortal tongue, 
 Nor thought of man, hath ever reach’d so far, 
 That of these naturesshe might count the tribes. 
 What Daniel § of their thousands hath reveal’d, 
 With finite number, infinite conceals. 
 
 407 
 
 The fountain, at whose source these drink their beams, 
 
 §** Of Bindi and of Lapi.”” Common 1297, they obtained the dignity and 
 
 mames of men at Florence. 
 @ ‘‘ Fattens with this his swine.” On 
 
 peuilanrs of an independent congrega- 
 on 
 
 see sale of these blessings, the Souther ™“ With unstamped metal.” With 
 Anthony supported themselves false indulgences. 
 
 end their paramours. From behind the “ Daniel.” “Thousand thousands 
 
 swine of gr A Anthony, our Poet levels thet Siete unto him, and ten Maer rs~ 4 
 
 a blow at the obj 
 
 enmity, Boniface VIII, from whom, in —Dan. vii. 10, 
 
 oa of his inveterate times ten thousand stood before him.” 
 
A408 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 With light supplies them in as many modes, 
 As there are splendors that it shines on: each 
 According to the virtue it conceives, 
 
 Differing in love and sweet affection. 
 
 Look then how lofty and how huge in breadth 
 The eternal might, which, broken and dispersed 
 Over such countless mirrors, yet remains 
 Whole in itself and one, as at the first.” 
 
 CANTO XXX 
 
 '(ARGUMENT.—Dante is taken up with Beatrice into the Empyrean; and 
 there having his sight strengthened by her aid, and by the virtue 
 derived from looking on the River of Light, he sees the triumph 
 of the angels and of the souls of the blessed. 
 
 OON’S fervid hour perchance six thousand miles ? 
 e From hence is distant; and the shadowy cone 
 Almost to level on our earth declines; 
 When, from the midmost of this blue abyss, 
 By turns some star is to our vision lost. 
 And straightway as the handmaid of the sun 
 Puts forth her radiant brow, all, light by light, 
 Fade; and the spangled firmament shuts in, 
 F’en to the loveliest of the glittering throng. 
 Thus vanish’d gradually from my sight 
 The triumph, which plays ever round the point, 
 That overcame me, seeming (for it did) 
 Engirt ? by that it girdeth. Wherefore love, 
 With loss of other object, forced me bend 
 Mine eyes on Beatrice once again. 
 If all, that hitherto is told of her, 
 Were in one praise concluded, ’twere too weak 
 To furnish out this turn. Mine eyes did look 
 On beauty, such, as I believe in sooth, 
 Not merely to exceed our human; but, 
 
 2“ Six thousand miles.” He com- part of it inhabited by the Poet, is 
 ares the vanishing of the vision to the about to disappear. 
 
 ading away of the stars at dawn, when 2“ Engirt.” Appearing to be encom. 
 it is noon-day 6,000 miles off, and the passed by these angelic bands, which 
 shadow, formed by the earth over the are in reality encompassed by it. 
 
PARADISE 409 
 
 That save its Maker, none can to the full 
 Enjoy it. At this point o’erpower’d I fail; 
 Unequal to my theme; as never bard 
 
 Of buskin or of sock hath fail’d before. 
 
 For as the sun doth to the feeblest sight, 
 K’en so remembrance of that witching smile 
 Hath dispossessed my spirit of itself. 
 
 Not from that day, when on this earth I first 
 -Beheld her charms, up to that view of them, 
 Have I with song applausive ever ceased 
 
 To follow; but now follow them no more; 
 My course here bounded, as each artist’s is, 
 When it doth touch the limit of his skill. 
 
 She (such as I bequeath her to the bruit 
 Of louder trump than mine, which hasteneth on 
 Urging its arduous matter to the close) 
 
 Her words resumed, in gesture and in voice 
 Resembling one accustom’d to command: 
 
 “ Forth * from the last corporeal are we come 
 Into the heaven, that is unbodied light; 
 Light intellectual, replete with love; 
 
 Love of true happiness, replete with joy; 
 
 Joy, that transcends all sweetness of delight. 
 Here shalt thou look on either mighty host * 
 Of Paradise; and one in that array, 
 
 Which in the final judgment that shalt see.” 
 As when the lightning, in a sudden spleen 
 Unfolded, dashes from the blinding eyes 
 
 The visive spirits, dazzled and bedimm’d; 
 
 So, round about me, fulminating streams 
 
 Of living radiance play’d, and left me swathed 
 And veil’d in dense impenetrable blaze. 
 
 Such weal is in the love, that stills this heaven; 
 For its own flame® the torch thus fitting ever, 
 So sooner to my listening ear had come 
 The brief assurance, than I understood 
 New virtue into me infused, and sight 
 
 ® “Forth.” From the ninth sphere souls; the latter in that form which 
 to the Empyrean, which is mere light, they will have at the last, . ‘ 
 4“ Kither mighty host.” Of angels, | 5 “ For its own flame.” Thus dispos- 
 that remained faithful, and of beatified ts 8 the spirits to receive its own beatific 
 ight. 
 
410 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Kindled afresh, with vigor to sustain 
 Excess of light however pure. I look’d; 
 And, in the likeness of a river, saw 
 _. +s, +@Light flowing, from whose amber-seeming waves 
 Flash’d up effulgence, as they glided on 
 *Twixt banks, on either side, painted with spring, 
 Incredible how fair: and, from the tide, 
 There ever and anon, outstarting, flew 
 Sparkles instinct with life; and in the flowers 
 Did set them, like to rubies chased in gold: 
 Then, as if drunk with odors, plunged again 
 Into the wondrous flood; from which, as one 
 Re-enter’d, still another rose. ‘“ The thirst 
 Of knowledge high, whereby thou art inflamed, 
 To search the meaning of what here thou seest, 
 The more it warms thee, pleases me the more, 
 But first behoves thee of this water drink, 
 Or e’er that longing be allay’d.” So spake 
 The day-star of mine eyes: then thus subjoin’d: 
 “This stream; and these, forth issuing from its gulf, 
 And dividing back, a living topaz each; 
 With all this laughter on its bloomy shores; 
 Are but a preface, shadowy of the truth 
 They emblem: not that, in themselves, the things 
 Are crude; but on thy part is the defect, 
 For that thy views not yet aspire so high.” 
 
 Never did babe that had outslept his wont, 
 Rush, with such eager straining, to the milk, 
 As I toward the water; bending me, 
 To make the better mirrors of mine eyes 
 In the refining wave: and as the eaves 
 Of mine eyelids did drink of it, forthwith 
 Seem’d it unto me turn’d from length to round. 
 Then as a troop of maskers, when they put 
 Their vizors off, look other than before ; 
 The counterfeited semblance thrown aside: 
 So into greater jubilee were changed 
 Those flowers and sparkles; and distinct I saw, 
 Before me, either court of heaven display’d. _ 
 
 O prime enlightener! thou who gavest me strength 
 
PARADISE 411 
 
 On the high triumph of thy realm to gaze; 
 Grant virtue now to utter what I kenn’d. 
 
 There is in heaven a light, whose goodly shine 
 Makes the Creator visible to all 
 Created, that in seeing him alone 
 Have peace; and in a circle spreads so far, 
 That the circumference were too loose a zone 
 To girdle in the sun. All is one beam, 
 Reflected from the summit of the first, 
 That moves, which being hence and vigor takes. 
 And as some cliff, that from the bottom eyes 
 His image mirror’d in the crystal flood, 
 As if to admire his brave apparelling 
 Of verdure and of flowers; so, round about, 
 Eying the light, on more than million thrones, 
 Stood, eminent, whatever from our earth 
 Has to the skies return’d. How wide the leaves, 
 Extended to their utmost, of this rose, 
 Whose lowest step embosoms such a space 
 Of ample radiance! Yet, nor amplitude 
 Nor height impeded, but my view with ease 
 Took in the full dimensions of that joy. 
 Near or remote, what there avails, where God 
 Immediate rules, and Nature, awed, suspends 
 Her sway? Into the yellow of the rose 
 Perennial, which, in bright expansiveness, 
 Lays forth its gradual blooming, redolent 
 Of praises to the never-wintering sun, 
 As one, who fain would speak yet holds his peace, 
 Beatrice led me; and, ‘‘ Behold,” she said, 
 “This fair assemblage; stoles of snowy white, 
 How numberless. The city, where we dwell, 
 Behold how vast; and these our seats so throng’d, 
 Few now are wanting here. In that proud stall, 
 On which, the crown, already o’er its state 
 Suspended, holds thine eyes—or e’er thyself 
 Mayst at the wedding sup—shall rest the soul 
 Of the great Harry,® he who, by the world 
 
 ' @“ Of the great Harry.” The Em- imperial ower three years seven 
 
 eror Henry VII, who died in 1313. months and eighteen days from his first 
 Freary, Count of Luxemburg, held the coronation to his death. He was a man 
 
4qi2 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Augustus hail’d, to Italy must come, 
 
 Before her day be ripe. But ye are sick, 
 And in your tetchy wantonness as blind, 
 
 As is the bantling, that of hunger dies, 
 
 And drives away the nurse. Nor may it be, 
 That he,” who in the sacred forum sways, 
 Openly or in secret, shall with him 
 
 Accordant walk: whom God will not endure 
 I’ the holy office long; but thrust him down 
 To Simon Magus, where Alagna’s priest ° 
 Will sink beneath him: such will be his meed.” 
 
 CANTO XXXI 
 
 ARGUMENT.—The Poet expatiates further on the aia vision a 
 scribed in the last Canto. : 
 that she has left him, and_that an_old mani 
 
 proves to be St. Bernard ows him that hes has re- 
 tfirped to he one € blessedness of 
 the-Virgin Motker— 
 
 N fashion, as a snow white rose, lay then 
 Before my view the saintly multitude,* 
 Which in his own blood Christ espoused. Meanwhile, 
 
 That other host,? that soar aloft to gaze 
 And celebrate his glory, whom they love, 
 Hover’d around; and, like a troop of bees, 
 Amid the vernal sweets alighting now, 
 Now, clustering, where their fragrant labor glows, 
 Flew downward to the mighty flower, or rose 
 From the redundant petals, streaming back 
 Unto the steadfast dwelling of their joy, 
 Faces had they of flame, and wings of gold: 
 The rest was whiter than the driven snow; 
 And, as they flitted down into the flower, 
 
 wise and just and gracious; brave and 7“He.” Pope Clement V. See 
 intrepid in arms; a man of honor and Canto XXVii. 53. 
 
 a good Catholic; and although by his “ Alagna’s priest.” Pope Boniface 
 lineage he was of no great condition, yet VIL ‘‘ Hell,” Canto xix. 79. 
 
 he was of a magnanimous heart, much 1“ The saintly multitude. Human 
 
 ‘feared and héld in awe; and if he had souls advanced to this state of glory 
 lived longer, would have done the through the meditation of Christ 
 greatest things. au Phat other host.””? The angels, 
 
PARADISE 413 
 
 From range to range, fanning their plumy loins, 
 Whisper’d the peace and ardor, which they won 
 From that soft winnowing. Shadow none, the vast 
 Interposition of such numerous flight 
 Cast, from above, upon the flower, or view 
 Obstructed aught. For, through the universe, 
 Wherever merited, celestial light 
 Glides freely, and no obstacle prevents. 
 All there, who reign in safety and in bliss, 
 Ages long past or new, on one sole mark 
 Their love and vision fix’d. O trinal beam 
 Of individual star, that charm’st them thus! 
 Vouchsafe one glance to gild our storm below.’ 
 If the grim brood,* from Arctic shores that roam’d, 
 (Where Helice ® forever, as she wheels, 
 Sparkles a mother’s fondness on her son), 
 Stood in mute wonder ’mid the works of Rome, 
 When to their view the Lateran arose 
 In greatness more than earthly; I, who then 
 From human to divine had passed, from time 
 Unto eternity, and out of Florence 
 To justice and to truth, how might I choose 
 But marvel too? ’*Twixt gladness and amaze, 
 In sooth no will had I to utter aught, 
 Or hear. And, as a pilgrim, when he rests 
 Within the temple of his vow, looks round 
 In breathless awe, and hopes some time to tell 
 Of all its goodly state; e’en so mine eyes 
 Coursed up and down along the living light, 
 Now low, and now aloft, and now around, 
 Visiting every step. Looks I beheld, 
 Where charity in soft persuasion sat ; 
 Smiles from within, and radiance from above; 
 And, in each gesture, grace and honor high. 
 So roved my ken, and in its general form 
 All Paradise survey’d: when round I turn’d 
 With purpose of my lady to inquire 
 
 8“ To gild our storm below.” To 5 Ffelice.” Callistro, and her son 
 guide us through the dangers to which Arcas, changed into the constellation of 
 we are exposed in this tempestuous life. the Greater Bear and Arctophylax, or 
 
 « “Tf the grim brood.” The northern _ Bodtes. 
 
 hordes who invaded Rome. 
 
414 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 Once more of things, that held my thought suspense, 
 
 But answer found from other than I ween’ds 
 
 For, Beatrice, when I thought to see, 
 
 I saw instead a senior, at my side, 
 
 Robed, as the rest, in glory. Joy benign 
 
 Glow’d in his eye, and o’er his cheek diffused, - 
 
 With gestures such as spake a father’s love. 
 
 And, “ Whither is she vanish’d?” straight I ask’d. 
 “By Beatrice summon’d,” he replied, 
 
 “T come to aid thy wish. Looking aloft 
 
 To the third circle from the highest, there 
 
 Behold her on the throne, wherein her merit 
 
 Hath placed her.” Answering not, mine eyes I raised, 
 
 And saw her, where aloof she sat, her brow 
 
 A wreath reflecting of eternal beams. 
 
 Not from the centre of the sea so far 
 
 Unto the region of the highest thunder, 
 
 As was my ken from hers; and yet the form 
 
 Came through that medium down, unmix’d and pure. 
 “O lady! thou in whom my hopes have rest; 
 
 ‘Who, for my safety, hast not scorn’d, in hell 
 
 To leave the traces of thy footsteps mark’d; 
 
 For all mine eyes have seen, I to thy power 
 
 And goodness, virtue owe and grace. Of slave 
 
 Thou hast to freedom brought me: and no means, 
 
 For my deliverance apt, hast left untried. 
 
 Thy liberal bounty still toward me keep: 
 
 That, when my spirit, which thou madest whole, 
 
 Is loosen’d from this body, it may find 
 
 Favor with thee.” So I my suit preferr’d: 
 
 And she, so distant, as appear’d, look’d down, 
 
 And smiled; then toward the eternal fountain turn’d. 
 And thus the senior, holy and revered: 
 
 “ That thou at length mayst happily conclude 
 
 Thy voyage (to which end I was despatch’d, 
 
 By supplication moved and holy love), 
 
 Let thy upsoaring vision range, at large, 
 
 This garden through: for so, by ray divine 
 
 Kindled, thy ken a higher flight shall mount; 
 
 And from heaven’s queen, whom fervent I adore, 
 
PARADISE 
 
 415 
 
 All gracious aid befriend us; for that I 
 
 Am her own faithful Bernard.” ® 
 
 Like a wight, 
 
 Who haply from Croatia wends to see 
 Our Veronica; and the while ’tis shown, 
 Hangs over it with never-sated gaze, 
 
 And, all that he hath heard revolving, saith 
 
 Unto himself in thought: 
 
 “ And didst thou look 
 
 F’en thus, O Jesus, my true Lord and God? 
 
 And was this semblance thine? ” 
 
 So gazed I then 
 
 Adoring; for the charity of him,° 
 
 Who musing, in this world that peace enjoy’d, 
 Stood lively before me. “ Child of grace!” 
 Thus he began: “thou shalt not knowledge gain 
 Of this glad being, if thine eyes are held 
 
 Still in this depth below. But search around 
 The circles, to the furthest, till thou spy 
 
 Seated in state, the queen,® that of this realm 
 
 Is sovran.”’ 
 
 Straight mine eyes I raised; and bright, 
 
 As, at the birth of morn, the eastern clime 
 Above the horizon, where the sun declines; 
 
 So to mine eyes, that upward, as from vale 
 To mountain sped, at the extreme bound, a part 
 Excell’d in lustre all the front opposed. 
 
 And as the glow burns ruddiest o’er the wave, 
 That waits the ascending team, which Phaéton 
 Ill knew to guide, and on each part the light 
 Diminish’d fades, intensest in the midst; 
 
 So burn’d the peaceful oriflamb, and slack’d 
 On every side the living flame decay’d. 
 
 And in that midst their sportive pennons waved 
 Thousands of angels; in resplendence each 
 
 Distinct, and quaint adornment. 
 
 6 * Bernard.” St. Bernard, the ven- 
 erable Abbot of Clairvaux, and the 
 great promoter of the Second Crusade 
 who died A.D. 1153, in his sixty-third 
 ear. His sermons have even been pre- 
 erred to all the productions of the 
 ancients, and the author has been 
 termed the last of the fathers of the 
 Church. It is uncertain whether they 
 were not delivered originally in the 
 French tongue. That the part he acts 
 in the present poem should be assigned 
 to him, appears somewhat remarkable, 
 when we consider that he severely cen- 
 
 At their glee 
 
 sured the new festival established in 
 honor of the Immaculate Conception of 
 the Virgin, and opposed the doctrine it- 
 self with the greatest vigor, as it sup- 
 posed her being honored with a_priv- 
 ilege which belonged to Christ alone. 
 
 7“ Our Veronica.” A copy in minia- 
 ture of the picture of Christ, which is 
 supposed to have been miraculously 
 imprinted upon 4 handkerchief pre- 
 served in the church of St. Peter at 
 
 ome. 
 8“ Him.” St. Bernard. | 
 ®“*The queen.” The Virgin Mary. 
 
416 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 And carol, smiled the Lovely One of Heaven, 
 
 That joy was in the eyes of all the blessed. 
 Had I a tongue in eloquence as rich, 
 
 As is the coloring in fancy’s loom, 
 
 ’Twere all too poor to utter the least part 
 
 Of that enchantment. When he saw mine eyes 
 
 Intent on her, that charm’d him; Bernard gazed 
 
 With so exceeding fondness, as infused 
 
 Ardor into my breast, unfelt before. 
 
 CANTO XXXII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—St. Bernard shows hi ir_several throne her 
 blessed sou S$; explains to him 
 that their places are assigned them by grace, and not according to 
 
 merit; and, lastly, tells him that if he would obtain power to descry 
 what remained of the heavenly vision, he must unite with him in 
 supplication to Mary. 
 
 REELY the sage, though wrapt in musings high, 
 HK Assumed the teacher’s part, and mild began: 
 “The wound, that Mary closed, she’ open’d first, 
 Who sits so beautiful at Mary’s feet. 
 The third in order, underneath her, lo! 
 Rachel with Beatrice: Sarah next; 
 Judith; Rebecca; and the gleaner-maid, 
 Meek ancestress ? of him, who sang the songs 
 Of sore repentance in his sorrowful mood. 
 All, as I name them, down from leaf to leaf, 
 Are, in gradation, throned on the rose. 
 And from the seventh step, successively, 
 Adown the breathing tresses of the flower, 
 Still doth the file of Hebrew dames proceed. 
 For these are a partition wall, whereby 
 The sacred stairs are sever’d, as the faith 
 In Christ divides them. On this part, where bloom 
 Each leaf in full maturity, are set 
 Such as in Christ, or e’er he came, believed. 
 On the other, where an intersected space 
 
 1“ She.” Eve. *“ Ancestress.”? Ruth, the ancestress of David. 
 
PARADISE 4x7 
 
 Yet shows the semicircle void, abide 
 
 All they, who look’d to Christ already come 
 
 And as our Lady on her glorious stool, 
 
 And they who on their stools beneath her sit, 
 
 This way distinction make; e’en so on his, 
 
 The mighty Baptist that way marks the line 
 
 (He who endured the desert, and the pains 
 
 Of martyrdom, and, for two years,? of hell, 
 
 Yet still continued holy), and beneath, 
 
 Augustin;* Francis;® Benedict;* and the rest, 
 
 Thus far from round to round. So Heaven’s decree 
 
 Forecasts, this garden equally to fill, 
 
 With faith in either view, past or to come. 
 
 Learn too, that downward from the step, which cleaves, 
 
 Midway, the twain compartments, none there are 
 
 Who place obtain for merit of their own, 
 
 But have through others’ merit been advanced, 
 
 On set conditions; spirits all released, 
 
 Ere for themselves they had the power to chuse. 
 
 And, if thou mark and listen to them well, 
 
 Their childish looks and voice declare as much. 
 “ Here, silent as thou art, I know thy doubt; 
 
 And gladly will I loose the knot, wherein 
 
 Thy subtile thoughts have bound thee. From this realm 
 
 Excluded, chance no entrance here may find; 
 
 No more than hunger, thirst, or sorrow can. 
 
 A law immutable hath stablish’d all; 
 
 Nor is there aught thou seest, that doth not fit, — 
 
 Exactly, as the finger to the ring. 
 
 It is not, therefore, without cause, that these 
 
 O’erspeedy comers to immortal life, 
 
 Are different in their shares of excellence. 
 
 Our Sovran Lord, that settleth this estate 
 
 In love and in delight so absolute, 
 
 That wish can dare no further, every soul, 
 
 Created in his joyous sight to dwell, 
 
 With grace, at pleasure, variously endows. 
 
 3**Two years.” The time that elapsed § writer who has been mentioned before, 
 between the death of the Baptist and Canto x. 117 
 
 his redemption by_the death of Christ. aie Francis.” See Canto xi. 
 4“ Augustin.” Bishop of Lo in 6 ** Benedict.” See Canto xxii, 
 the fourth century; the celebrated 
 
418 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 And for a proof the effect may well suffice. 
 And ’tis moreover most expressly mark’d 
 In holy Scripture, where the twins are said 
 To have struggled in the womb. Therefore, as grace 
 Inweaves the coronet, so every brow 
 Weareth its proper hue of orient light. 
 And merely in respect to his prime gift, 
 Not in reward of meritorious deed, 
 Hath each his several degree assign’d. 
 In early times with their own innocence 
 More was not wanting, than the parents’ faith, 
 To save them: those first ages past, behoved 
 That circumcision in the males should imp 
 The flight of innocent wings: but since the day 
 Of grace hath come, without baptismal rites 
 In Christ accomplish’d, innocence herself 
 Must linger yet below. Now raise thy view 
 Unto the visage most resembling Christ: 
 For, in her splendor only, shalt thou win 
 The power to look on him.” Forthwith I saw 
 Such floods of gladness on her visage shower’d, 
 From holy spirits, winging that profound; 
 That, whatsoever I had yet beheld, 
 Had not so much suspended me with wonder, 
 Or shown me such similitude of God. 
 And he, who had to her descended, once, 
 On earth, now hail’d in heaven; and on poised wing, 
 “ Ave, Maria! Gratia Plena!” sang: 
 To whose sweet anthem all the blissful court, 
 From all parts answering, rang: that holier joy 
 Brooded the deep serene. “ Father revered! 
 Who deign’st, for me, to quit the pleasant place 
 Wherein thou sittest, by eternal lot; 
 Say, who that angel is, that with such glee 
 Beholds our queen, and so enamour’d glows 
 Of her high beauty, that all fire he seems.” 
 
 So I again resorted to the lore 
 Of my wise teacher, he, whom Mary’s charms 
 Embellish’d, as the sun the morning star; 
 Who thus in answer spake: “In him are summ’d, 
 
PARADISE * 419 
 
 Whate’er of buxomness and free delight 
 
 May be in spirit, or in angel, met: 
 
 And so beseems: for that he bare the palm 
 Down unto Mary, when the Son of God 
 Vouchsafed to clothe him in terrestrial weeds. 
 Now let thine eyes wait heedful on my words; 
 And note thou of this just and pious realm 
 The chiefest nobles. Those, highest in bliss, 
 The twain, on each hand next our empress throned, 
 Are as it were two roots unto this rose: 
 
 He to the left, the parent, whose rash taste 
 Proves bitter to this seed; and, on the right, 
 That ancient father of the holy church, 
 
 Into whose keeping Christ did give the keys 
 Of this sweet flower; near whom behold the seer,’ 
 That, ere he died, saw all the grievous times 
 Of the fair bride, who with the lance and nails 
 Was won. And, near unto the other, rests 
 The leader, under whom, on manna, fed 
 
 The ungrateful nation, fickle and perverse. 
 
 On the other part, facing to Peter, lo! 
 
 Where Anna sits, so well content to look 
 
 On her loved daughter, that with moveless eye 
 She chants the loud hosanna: while, opposed 
 To the first father of your mortal kind, 
 
 Is Lucia,® at whose hest thy lady sped, 
 
 When on the edge of ruin closed thine eye. 
 
 “ But (for the vision hasteneth to an end) 
 Here break we off, as the good workman doth, 
 That shapes the cloak according to the cloth; 
 And to the primal love our ken shall rise; 
 
 That thou mayst penetrate the brightness, far 
 
 As sight can bear thee. Yet, alas! in sooth 
 
 Beating thy pennons, thinking to advance, 
 
 Thou backward fall’st. Grace then must first be gain’d, 
 Her grace, whose might can help thee. Thou in prayer 
 Seek her: and, with affection, whilst I sue, 
 
 Attend, and yield me all thy heart.” He said; 
 
 And thus the saintly orison began. 
 
 ¥“ The seer.” St. John. 8“ Tucia.”? See “Hell,” Canto ii, 97, 
 and “ Purgatory,” Canto ix. 50, 
 
420 THE DIVINE COMEDY. 
 
 CANTO XXXIII 
 
 ARGUMENT.—St. Bernard supplicates the Virgin Mary that Dante may 
 have grace given him to contemplate the brightness of the Divine 
 Majesty, which is accordingly granted; and Dante then himself 
 prays to God for ability to show forth some part of the celestial 
 
 glory in his writings. Lastly, he is admitted to a glimpse of the. 
 
 reat mystery; the Trinity, and the Union of Man with God. 
 
 VIRGIN mother, daughter of thy Son! 
 
 () Created beings all in lowliness 
 Surpassing, as in height above them all; 
 
 Term by the eternal counsel preordain’d ; 
 
 Ennobler of thy nature, so advanced 
 
 In thee, that its great Maker did not scorn, 
 
 To make himself his own creation; 
 
 For in thy womb rekindling shone the love 
 
 Reveal’d, whose genial influence makes now 
 
 ‘This flower to germin in eternal peace: 
 
 Here thou to us, of charity and love, 
 
 Art, as the noon-day torch; and art, beneath, 
 
 To mortal men, of hope a living spring. 
 
 So mighty art thou, lady, and so great, 
 
 That he, who grace desireth, and comes not 
 
 To thee for aidance, fain would have desire 
 
 Fly without wings. Not only him, who asks, 
 
 Thy bounty succors; but doth freely oft 
 
 Forerun the asking. Whatsoe’er may be 
 
 Of excellence in creature, pity. mild, 
 
 Relenting mercy, large munificence, 
 
 Are all combined in thee. Here kneeleth one, 
 
 Who of all spirits hath review’d the state, 
 
 From the world’s lowest gap unto this height. 
 
 Suppliant to thee he kneels, imploring grace 
 
 For virtue yet more high, to lift his ken 
 
 Toward the bliss supreme. And I, who ne’er 
 
 Coveted sight, more fondly, for myself, 
 
 Than now for him, my prayers to thee prefer. 
 
 (And pray they be not scant), that thou wouldst drive 
 
 Each cloud of his mortality away, 
 
 Through thine own prayers, that on the sovran joy 
 
PARADISE. 421 
 
 Unveil’d he gaze. This yet, I pray thee, Queen, 
 
 Who canst do what thou wilt; that in him thou 
 Wouldst, after all he hath beheld, preserve 
 
 Affection sound, and human passions quell. 
 
 Lo! where, with Beatrice, many a saint 
 
 Stretch their clasp’d hands, in furtherance of my suit. 
 
 The eyes, that heaven with love and awe regards, 
 
 Fix’d on the suitor, witness’d, how benign 
 
 _ She looks on pious prayers: then fasten’d they 
 On the everlasting light, wherein no eye 
 Of creature, as may well be thought, so far 
 Can travel inward. I, meanwhile, who drew 
 Near to the limit, where all wishes end, 
 The ardor of my wish (for so behoved), 
 Ended within me. Beckoning smiled the sage, 
 That I should look aloft: but, ere he bade, 
 Already of myself aloft I look’d; 
 For visual strength, refining more and more, 
 Bare me into the ray authentical 
 Of sovran light. Thenceforward, what I saw, 
 Was not for words to speak, nor memory’s self 
 To stand against such outrage on her skill. 
 
 As one, who from a dream awaken’d, straight, 
 All he hath seen forgets; yet still retains 
 Impression of the feeling in his dream; 
 
 E’en such am I: for all the vision dies, 
 
 As ’twere, away; and yet the sense of sweet, 
 That sprang from it, still trickles in my heart. 
 Thus in the sun-thaw is the snow unseal’d; 
 Thus in the winds on flitting leaves was lost 
 The Sibyl’s sentence. O eternal beam! 
 (Whose height what reach of mortal thought may soar?) 
 Yield me again some little particle 
 
 Of what thou then appearedst; give my tongue 
 Power, but to leave one sparkle of thy glory, 
 Unto the race to come, that shall not lose 
 
 Thy triumph wholly, if thou waken aught 
 
 Of memory in me, and endure to hear 
 
 The record sound in this unequal strain. 
 
 __ Such keenness from the living ray I met, 
 Classics. Vol. 34—S' 4 
 
422 THE DIVINE COMEDY 
 
 That, if mine eyes had turn’d away, methinks, 
 I had been lost; but, so embolden’d, on 
 I pass’d, as I remember, till my view 
 Hover’d the brink of dread infinitude. 
 O grace, unenvying of thy boon! that gavest 
 Boldness to fix so earnestly my ken 
 On the everlasting splendor, that I look’d, 
 While sight was unconsumed; and, in that depth, 
 Saw in one volume clasp’d of love, whate’er 
 The universe unfolds; all properties 
 Of substance and of accident, beheld, 
 Compounded, yet one individual light 
 The whole. And of such bond methinks I saw 
 The universal form; for that whene’er 
 I do but speak of it, my soul dilates 
 Beyond her proper self; and, till I speak, 
 One moment seems a longer lethargy, 
 Than five-and-twenty ages had appear’d 
 To that emprise, that first made Neptune wonder 
 At Argo’s shadow darkening on his flood. 
 With fixed heed, suspense and motionless, 
 Wondering I gazed; and admiration still 
 Was kindled as I gazed. It may not be, 
 That one, who looks upon that light, can turn 
 To other object, willingly, his view. 
 For all the good, that will may covet, there 
 Is summ’d; and all, elsewhere defective found, 
 Complete. My tongue shall utter now, no more 
 E’en what remembrance keeps, than could the babe’s 
 That yet is moisten’d at his mother’s breast. 
 Not that the semblance of the living light 
 ‘Was changed (that ever as at first remain’d), 
 But that my vision quickening, in that sole 
 Appearance, still new miracles descried, 
 And toil’d me with the change. In that abyss 
 Of radiance, clear and lofty, seem’d, methought, 
 Three orbs of triple hue, clipped in one bound:1 
 1“ Three orbs of triple hue, clipped in of the impossibility that the human soul 
 one bound.’ The Trinity. This pas- should attain to what it desires to know 
 sage may be compared to what Plato, of them, by means of anything akin to 
 
 in his second pistle, enigmatically itself. 
 says of a first, second, and third, and 
 
PARADISE 423 
 
 And, from another, one reflected seem’d, 
 As rainbow is from rainbow: and the third 
 Seem’d fire, breathed equally from both. O speech! 
 How feeble and how faint art thou, to give 
 Conception birth. Yet this to what I saw 
 Is less than little. O eternal light! 
 Sole in thyself that dwell’st ; and of thyself 
 Sole understood, past, present, or to come; 
 Thou smiledst, on that circling,? which in thee 
 Seem’d as reflected splendor, while I mused 
 For I therein, methought, in its own hue 
 Beheld our image painted: steadfastly 
 I therefore pored upon the view. As one, 
 Who versed in geometric lore, would fain 
 Measure the circle; and, though pondering long 
 And deeply, that beginning, which he needs, 
 Finds not: e’en such was I, intent to scan 
 The novel wonder, and trace out the form, 
 How to the circle fitted, and therein 
 How placed: but the flight was not for my wing; 
 Had not a flash darted athwart my mind, 
 And, in the spleen, unfolded what it sought. 
 (Here vigor fail’d the towering fantasy: 
 
 ut yet the will roll’d onward, like a wheel 
 In even motion, by the love impell’d, 
 That moves the sun in heaven and all the stars. 
 
 2 “‘ That circling.” The second of the dimly beheld the mystery of the Incar: 
 circles, ‘ Light of Light,” in which he nation. 
 
~ 
 
PED Olen! 
 ey oD J igh 
 A « 
 
- i re 
 - | ; & ‘ 
 Pos : 
 r - x i A d 1h gto 
 iy i 4 “| 
 <<, ~ sigh - 
 j : 
 Fe Ara ay | ba wh 
 1 ; 
 | ray f } ; , 
 ; ‘ bh i arr ta? 
 ¥ y i i ew 
 ‘ é 7 
 . ‘ 
 ‘ . 
 i vi 
 } 
 } 
 ‘| Ga) 
 i st Poe q 
 Waka w é 
 a a 
 ' pls 
 j Tey 
 i 
 1 * 
 ae i) 
 ; ‘ Fi Pt 
 1 ean. 
 * (hy 
 Ti i 
 i 
 | 
 oa ot 
 < ' tg 
 A “4 
 ti 
 ‘ a" PTbay 
 Pie 42 ‘ 
 
 xy 
 
 “ 
 al 
 age 
 
 7 
 4 
 i . 
 at 
 “ 
 Pore] ? L 
 +; 
 a 
 ay ji 
 ” fie 
 _ _ =] 
 7 4 
 2 ' { 
 ~4 4 4 
 4 a 
 Veta 
 + } 4204 e 
 ha 7 wy 4 4 : r 7h § 
 a del AA a a hae 
 ny 7 ij a 
 ry ‘i i ah ak 
 Le! sate ten 
 
 i: 
 
St 
 
 = care = 
 Sipe trees