I was moving on, and following willingly the steps of my Master, and

both now were showing how light we were, when he said to me, “Turn

thine eyes downward; it will be well for thee, in order to solace the

way, to look upon the bed of thy footprints.” As above the buried, so

that there may be memory of them, their tombs in earth bear inscribed

that which they were before,—whence oftentimes is weeping for them

there, through the pricking of remembrance, which only to the pious

gives the spur,—so saw I figured there, but of better semblance in

respect of skill, all that for pathway juts out from the mountain.

I saw him who was created more noble than any other creature,[1] down

from heaven with lightning flash descending, at one side.

[1] Lucifer.

I saw Briareus[1] transfixed by the celestial bolt, lying at the other

side, heavy upon the earth in mortal chill. I saw Thymbraeus,[2] I saw

Pallas and Mars, still armed, around their father, gazing at the

scattered limbs of the giants.

[1] Examples from classic and biblical mythology alternate.

[2] Apollo, so called from his temple at Thymbra, not far from Troy,

where Achilles is said to have slain Paris. Virgil (Georgics, iv. 323)

uses this epithet.

I saw Nimrod at the foot of his great toil, as if bewildered, and

gazing at the people who in Shinar had with him been proud.

O Niobe! with what grieving eyes did I see thee portrayed upon the road

between thy seven and seven children slain!

O Saul! how on thine own sword here didst thou appear dead on Gilboa,

that after felt not rain or dew![1]

[1] I Samuel, xxxi. 4, and 2 Samuel, i. 24.

O mad Arachne,[1] so I saw thee already half spider, wretched on the

shreds of the work that to thy harm by thee was made!

[1] Changed to a spider by Athena, whom she had challenged to a trial

of skill at the loom.

O Rehoboam! here thine image seems not now to threaten, but full of

fear, a chariot bears it away before any one pursues it.[1]

[1] 1 Kings, xii. 13-18.

The hard pavement showed also how Alcmaeon made the ill-fated ornament

seem costly to his mother.[1]

[1] Amphiaraus, the soothsayer, foreseeing his own death if he went to

the Theban war, hid himself to avoid being forced to go. His wife,

Eriphyle, bribed by a golden necklace, betrayed his hiding-place, and

was killed by her son Alcmaeon, for thus bringing about his father’s

death.

It showed how his sons threw themselves upon Sennacherib within the

temple, and how they left him there dead.[1]

[1] 2 Kings, xix. 37.

It showed the ruin and the cruel slaughter that Tomyris wrought, when

she said to Cyrus, “For blood thou hast thirsted, and with blood I fill

thee.”

[1] Herodotus (i. 214) tells how Tomyris, Queen of the Massagetae,

having defeated and slain Cyrus, filled a skin full of human blood, and

plunged his head in it with words such as Dante reports, and which he

derived from Orosius, Histor. ii. 7.

It showed how the Assyrians fled in rout after Holofernes was killed,

and also the remainder of the punishment.[1]

[1] Judith, xv. 1.

I saw Troy in ashes, and in caverns. O Ilion! how cast down and abject

the image which is there discerned showed thee!

What master has there been of pencil or of style that could draw the

shadows and the lines which there would make every subtile genius

wonder? Dead the dead, and the living seemed alive. He who saw the

truth saw not better than I all that I trod on while I went bent

down.—Now be ye proud, and go with haughty look, ye sons of Eve, and

bend not down your face so that ye may see your evil path!

More of the mountain had now been circled by us, and of the sun’s

course far more spent, than my mind, not disengaged, was aware, when

he, who always in advance attent was going on, began, “Lift up thy

head; there is no more time for going thus abstracted. See there an

Angel, who is hastening to come toward us: see how from the service of

the day the sixth hand-maiden returns.[1] With reverence adorn thine

acts and thy face so that he may delight to direct us upward. Think

that this day never dawns again.”

[1] The sixth hour of the day is coming to its end, near noon.

I was well used to his admonition ever to lose no time, so that on that

theme he could not speak to me obscurely.

To us came the beautiful creature, clothed in white, and in his face

such as seems the tremulous morning star. Its arms it opened, and then

it opened its wings; it said, “Come: here at hand are the steps, and

easily henceforth one ascends. To this invitation very few come. O

human race, born to fly upward, why before a little wind dost thou so

fall?”

He led us to where the rock was cut; here he struck his wings across my

forehead,[1] then promised me secure progress.

[1] Removing the first P that the Angel of the Gate had incised on

Dante’s brow.

As on the right hand, in going up the mountain,[1] where sits the

church that dominates her the well-guided[2] city above Rubaconte,[3]

the bold flight of the ascent is broken by the stairs, which were made

in an age when the record and the stave were secure,[4] in like manner,

the bank which falls here very steeply from the next round is

slackened; but on this side and that the high rock grazes.[5] As we

turned our persons thither, voices sang “Beati pauperes spiritu”[6] in

such wise that speech could not tell it. Ah, how different are these

passes from those of Hell! for here through songs one enters, and there

below through fierce lamentings.

[1] The hill of San Miniato, above Florence.

[2] Ironical.

[3] The upper bridge at Florence across the Arno, named after Messer

Rubaconte di Mandella, podesta of Florence, who laid the first stone of

it in 1237; now called the Ponte alle Grazie, after a little chapel

built upon it in 1471, and dedicated to Our Lady of Grace.

[4] In the good old time when men were honest. In 1299 one Messer

Niccola Acciaioli, in order to conceal a fraudulent transaction, had a

leaf torn out from the public notorial record; and about the same time

an officer in charge of the revenue from salt, for the sake of private

gain, measured the salt he received with an honest measure, but that

which he sold with a measure diminished by the removal of a stave.

[5] The stairway is so narrow.

[6] “Blessed are the poor in spirit.” As Dante passes from each round

of Purgatory, an angel removes the P which denotes the special sin

there purged away. And the removal is accompanied with the words of one

of the Beatitudes.

Now we were mounting up over the holy stairs, and it seemed to me I was

far more light than I had seemed on the plain before. Whereon I,

“Master, say, what heavy thing has been lifted from me, so that almost

no weariness is felt by me as I go on?” He answered, “When the P’s that

almost extinct[1] still remain on thy countenance shall be, as one is,

quite erased, thy feet will be so conquered by good will that not only

they will not feel fatigue, but it will be delight to them to be urged

up.” Then I did like those who are going with something on their head,

unknown by them unless the signs of others make them suspect; wherefore

the hand assists to ascertain, and seeks and finds, and performs that

office which cannot be accomplished by the sight; and with the fingers

of my right hand outspread, I found only six those letters which he of

the keys had encised upon my temples: looking at which my Leader

smiled.

[1] Almost extinct, because, as St. Thomas Aquinas says, “Pride by

which we are chiefly turned from God is the first and the origin of all

sins.” He adds, “Pride is said to be the beginning of every sin, not

because every single sin has its source in pride, but because every

kind of sin is born of pride.” Summa Theol., II. 2, quaest. 162, art.

7.

CANTO XIII.

Second Ledge the Envious.—Examples of Love.—The Shades in haircloth,

and with sealed eyes.—Sapia of Siena.

We were at the top of the stairway, where the mountain, ascent of which

frees one from ill, is the second time cut back. There a cornice binds

the hill round about, in like manner as the first, except that its arc

bends more quickly. No shadow is there, nor mark which is apparent[1]

so that the bank appears smooth and so the path, with the livid color

of the stone.

[1] No sculptured or engraved scenes.

“If to enquire one waits here for people,” said the Poet, “I fear that

perhaps our choice will have too much delay.” Then he set his eyes

fixedly upon the sun, made of his right side the centre for his

movement, and turned the left part of himself. “O sweet light, with

confidence in which I enter on the new road, do thou lead us on it,” he

said, “as there is need for leading here within. Thou warmest the

world, thou shinest upon it; if other reason prompt not to the

contrary, thy rays ought ever to be guides.”

As far as here on earth is counted for a mile, so far had we now gone

there, in little time because of ready will; and towards us were heard

to fly, not however seen, spirits uttering courteous invitations to the

table of love. The first voice that passed flying, “Virum non

habent,”[1] loudly said, and went on behind us reiterating it. And

before it had become quite inaudible through distance, another passed

by, crying, “I am Orestes,”[2] and also did not stay. “O Father,” said

I, “what voices are these?” and even as I was asking, lo! the third,

saying, “Love them from whom ye have had wrong.” And the good Master:

“This circle scourges the sin of envy, and therefore from love are

drawn the cords of the scourge. The curb must be of the opposite sound;

I think that thou wilt hear it before thou arrivest at the pass of

pardon.[3] But fix thine eyes very fixedly through the air, and thou

wilt see in front of us people sitting, and each is seated against the

rock.” Then more than before I opened my eyes; I looked in front of me,

and saw shades with cloaks in color not different from the stone. And

when we were a little further forward, I heard them crying, “Mary, pray

for us!” crying, “Michael,” and “Peter,” and all the Saints.

[1] “They have no wine.”—John ii. 3. The words of Mary at the wedding

feast of Cana, symbolic of a kindness that is a rebuke of envy.

[2] The words of Pylades, before Aegisthus, when contending with

Orestes to be put to death in his stead.

[3] At the stair to the third ledge, at the foot of which stands the

angel who cancels the sin of envy.

I do not believe there goes on earth to-day a man so hard that he had

not been pricked by compassion at that which I then saw. For when I had

approached so near to them that their actions came surely to me, tears

were drawn from my eyes by heavy grief. They seemed to me covered with

coarse haircloth, and one supported the other with his shoulders, and

all were supported by the bank. Thus the blind, who lack subsistence,

stand at pardons[1] to beg for what they need, and one bows his head

upon another, so that pity may quickly be moved in others, not only by

the sound of the words, but by the sight which implores no less. And as

to the blind the sun profits not, so to the shades, there where I was

now speaking, the light of Heaven wills not to make largess of itself;

for a wire of iron pierces and sews up the eyelids of all; even as is

done to a wild sparrow-hawk, because it stays not quiet.

[1] On occasion of special indulgences the beggars gather at the door

of churches frequented by those who seek the pardons to be obtained

within.

It seemed to me I was doing outrage as I went on, seeing others, not

myself being seen, wherefore I turned me to my sage Counsel; well did

he know what the dumb wished to say, and therefore waited not my

asking, but said, “Speak, and be brief and to the point.”

Virgil was coming with me on that side of the cornice from which one

may fall, because it is encircled by no rim. On the other side of me

were the devout shades, that through the horrible stitches were

pressing out the tears so that they bathed their cheeks. I turned me to

them, and, “O folk secure,” I began, “of seeing the lofty light which

alone your desire holds in its care, may grace speedily dissolve the

scum of your consciences so that the stream of memory through them may

descend clear,[1] tell me, for it will be gracious and dear to me, if

there be a soul here among you that is Latin, and perhaps it will be

good for him if I learn it.” “O my brother, each is a citizen of one

true city,[2] but thou meanest, who lived in Italy while a pilgrim.”[3]

This it seemed to me to hear for answer somewhat further on than where

I was standing; wherefore I made myself heard still more that way.

Among the others I saw a shade that was expectant in look; and, if any

one should wish to ask, How?—like a blind man it was lifting up its

chin. “Spirit,” said I, “that humblest thyself in order to ascend, if

thou art that one which answered me, make thyself known to me either by

place or by name.” “I was a Sienese,” it answered, “and with these

others I cleanse here my guilty life, weeping to Him that He grant

Himself to us. Sapient I was not, although I was called Sapia, and I

was far more glad of others’ harm than of my own good fortune. And that

thou mayst not believe that I deceive thee, bear if I was foolish as I

tell thee. The arch of my years already descending, my fellow-citizens

were joined in battle near to Colle[4] with their adversaries, and I

prayed God for that which He willed. They were routed there, and turned

into the bitter passes of flight; and I, seeing the pursuit,

experienced a joy unmatched by any other; so much that I turned upward

my audacious face, crying out to God, ‘Now no more I fear thee;’ as the

blackbird doth because of a little fair weather. At the very end of my

life I desired peace with God; and even yet my debt would not be

lessened by penitence,[5] had it not been that Pier Pettinagno,[6] who

out of charity was sorry for me, held me in memory in his holy prayers.

But thou, who art thou that goest asking of our conditions, and bearest

thine eyes loose as I think, and breathing dost speak?” “My eyes,” said

I, “will yet be taken from me here but a little time, for small is the

offence committed through their being turned with envy. Far greater is

the fear, with which my soul is in suspense, of the torment beneath,

and already the load down there weighs upon me. And she to me, “Who

then hath led thee here up among us, if thou thinkest to return below?”

And I, “This one who is with me, and says not a word: and I am alive;

and therefore ask of me, spirit elect, if thou wouldst that I should

yet move for thee on earth my mortal feet.” “Oh, this is so strange a

thing to hear,” she replied, “that it is great sign that God loves

thee; therefore assist me sometimes with thy prayer. And I beseech

thee, by that which thou most desirest, if ever thou tread the earth of

Tuscany, that with my kindred thou restore my fame. Thou wilt see them

among that vain people which hopes in Talamone,[7] and will waste more

hope there, than in finding the Diana[8] but the admirals will stake

the most there.[9]

[1] Being purified from sin they will retain no memory of it.

[2] “Fellow-citizens with the saints, and of the household of

God.”—Ephesians, ii. 19.

[3] “For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to

come.”—Hebrews, xiii. 14.

[4] This was the battle in 1259, in which the Florentines routed die

Sienese Ghibellines, at whose head was Provenzan Salvani. who was

slain. See Canto XI.

[5] I should not yet within Purgatory have diminished my debt of

expiation, but, because I delayed repentance till the hour of Death, I

should still be outside the gate.

[6] A poor comb-dealer, a man of kind heart, honest dealings, and good

deeds, and still remembered for them in Siena. He died in 1289.

[7] A little port on the coast of Tuscany, on which the Sienese wasted

toil and money in the vain hope that by strengthening and enlarging it

they could make themselves rivals at sea of the Pisans and Genoese.

[8] A subterranean stream supposed to flow beneath the city.

[9] Of these last words the meaning is obscure.

CANTO XIV.

Second Ledge: the Envious—Guido del Duca.—Rinieri de’ Calboli.—Examples

of the punishment of Envy.

“Who is this that circles our mountain ere death have given him flight,

and opens and shuts his eyes at his own will?”[1] “I know not who he

is, but I know that he is not alone. Do thou, who art nearer to him,

ask him; and sweetly, so that he may speak, accost him.” Thus two

spirits, leaning one to the other, discoursed of me there on the right

hand, then turned up their faces to speak to me. And one of them said,

“O soul that still fixed in thy body goest on toward heaven, for

charity console us, and tell us whence thou comest, and who thou art;

for thou makest us so marvel at this thy grace, as needs must a thing

that never was before.” And I, “Through mid Tuscany there wanders a

little stream, that has its rise on Falterona,[2] and a hundred miles

of coarse does not suffice it. From thereupon I bring this body. To

tell you who I am would be to speak in vain, for my name as yet makes

no great sound.” “If I grasp aright thy meaning with my understanding,”

then replied to me he who had spoken first, “thou speakest of the

Arno.” And the other said to him, “Why did he conceal the name of that

river, even as one does of horrible things?” And the shade of whom this

was asked, delivered itself thus, “I know not, but truly it is fit that

the name of such a valley perish, for from its source (where the rugged

mountain chain, from which Pelorus[3] is cut off, is so teeming that in

few places it passes beyond that mark), far as there where it gives

back in restoration that which heaven dries up of the sea (wherefrom

the rivers have what flows in them), virtue is driven away as an enemy

by all men, like a snake, either through misfortune of the place, or

through evil habit that incites them. Wherefore the inhabitants of the

wretched valley have so changed their nature that it seems as though

Circe had had them in her feeding. Among foul hogs,[4] more fit for

acorns than for other food made for human use, it first directs its

poor path. Then, coming down, it finds curs more snarling, than their

power warrants,[5] and at them disdainfully it twists its muzzle.[6] It

goes on falling, and the more it swells so much the more the accursed

and ill-fated ditch finds the dogs becoming wolves.[7] Descending then

through many hollow gulfs, it finds foxes[8] so full of fraud, that

they fear not that wit may entrap them. Nor will I leave to speak

though another hear me: and well it will be for this one if hereafter

he mind him of that which a true spirit discloses to me.

[1] These words are spoken by Guido del Duca, who is answered by

Rinieri de’ Calboli; both of them from the Romagna.

[2] One of the highest of the Tuscan Apennines.

[3] The north-eastern promontory of Sicily.

[4] The people of the Casentino, the upper valley of the Arno.

[5] The Aretines.

[6] Turning westward.

[7] The wolves of Florence.

[8] The Pisans.

“I see thy grandson,[1] who becomes hunter of those wolves upon the

bank of the fierce stream, and terrifies them all. He sells their

flesh,[2] it being yet alive; then he slays them, like an old wild

beast; many of life, himself of honor he deprives. Bloody he comes

forth from the dismal wood;[3] he leaves it such, that from now for a

thousand years, in its primal state it is not rewooded.” As at the

announcement of grievous ills, the face of him who listens is

disturbed, from whatsoever side the danger may assail him, so I saw the

other soul, that was turned to hear, become disturbed and sad, when it

had gathered to itself the words.

[1] Fulcieri da Calvoli, so named by Villani (viii. 69), “a fierce and

cruel man,” was made podesta of Florence in 1302. He put to death many

of the White Guelphs, and banished more of them.

[2] Bribed by the opposite party.

[3] Florence, spoiled and undone.

The speech of one and the look of the other made me wishful to know

their names, and I made request for it, mixed with prayers. Wherefore

the spirit which first had spoken to me began again, “Thou wishest that

I abase myself in doing that for thee which thou wilt not do for me;

but since God wills that such great grace of His shine through in thee,

I will not be chary to thee; therefore know that I am Guido del Duca.

My blood was so inflamed with envy, that had I seen a man becoming

joyful, thou wouldst have seen me overspread with livid hue. Of my

sowing I reap this straw. O human race, why dost thou set thy heart

there where is need of exclusion of companionship?

“This one is Rinier; this is the glory and the honor of the house of

Calboli,[1] where no one since has made himself heir of his worth. And

between the Po and the mountain,[2] and the sea[3] and the Reno,[4] not

his blood alone has become stripped of the good required for truth and

for delight; for within these limits the ground is so full of poisonous

stocks, that slowly would they now die out through cultivation. Where

is the good Lizio, and Arrigo Manardi, Pier Traversaro, and Guido di

Carpigna? O men of Romagna turned to bastards! When in Bologna will a

Fabbro take root again? When in Faenza a Bernardin di Fosco, the noble

scion of a mean plant? Marvel not, Tuscan, if I weep, when I remember

with Guido da Prata, Ugolin d’ Azzo who lived with us, Federico Tignoso

and his company, the house of Traversara, and the Anastagi, (both the

one race and the other is without heir), the ladies and the cavaliers,

the toils and the pleasures for which love and courtesy inspired our

will, there where hearts have become so wicked. O Brettinoro! why dost

thou not flee away, since thy family hath gone, and many people, in

order not to be guilty? Well doth Bagnacaval that gets no more sons;

and ill doth Castrocaro, and worse Conio that takes most trouble to

beget such counts. Well will the Pagani do when their Demon shall go

from them;[6] yet not so that a pure report of them can ever remain. O

Ugolin de’ Fantolin! thy name is secure, since one who, degenerating,

can make it dark is no longer awaited. But go thy way, Tuscan, now; for

now it pleases me far more to weep than to speak, so much hath our

discourse wrung my mind.”

[1] A noble Guelph family of Forli.

[2] The Apennines.

[3] The Adriatic.

[4] Near Bologna.

[5] These and the others named afterwards were well-born, honorable,

and courteous men in Romagna in the thirteenth century. What is known

of them may be found in Benvenuto da Imola’s comment, and in that of

Scartazzini.

[6] The Pagani were lords of Faenza and Imola (see Hell, Canto XXVII);

the Demon was Mainardo, who died in 1302.

We knew that those dear souls heard us go; therefore by silence they

made us confident of the road. After we had become alone by going on, a

voice that seemed like lightning when it cleaves the air, came counter

to us, saying, “Everyone that findeth me shall slay me,”[1] and fled

like thunder which rolls away, if suddenly the cloud is rent. Soon as

our hearing had a truce from it, lo! now another with so great a crash

that it resembled thunderings in swift succession: “I am Aglauros who

became a stone.”[2] And then to draw me close to the Poet, I backward

and not forward took a step. Now was the air quiet on every side, and

he said to me, “That was the hard curb[3] which ought to hold man

within his bound; but ye take the bait, so that the hook of the old

adversary draws you to him, and therefore little avails bridle or lure.

Heaven calls you, and around you circles, displaying to you its eternal

beauties, and your eye looks only on the ground; wherefore He who

discerns everything scourges you.

[1] The words of Cain—Genesis, iv. 14.

[2] Daughter of Cecrops, changed to stone because of envy of her

sister.

[3] These examples of the fatal consequences of the sin.

CANTO XV.

Second Ledge: the Envious.—An Angel removes the second P from Dante’s

forehead.—Discourse concerning the Sharing of Good.—Ascent to the Third

Ledge: the Wrathful.—Examples of Forbearance seen in Vision.

As much as appears, between the beginning of the day and the close of

the third hour, of the sphere that ever in manner of a child is

sporting, so much now, toward the evening, appeared to be remaining of

his course for the sun.[1] It was vespers[2] there,[3] and here

midnight; and the rays struck us across the nose,[4] because the

mountain had been so circled by us that we were now going straight

toward the sunset, when I felt my forehead weighed down by the splendor

far more than at first, and the things not known were a wonder to

me.[5] Wherefore I lifted my hands toward the top of my brows, and made

for myself the visor that lessens the excess of what is seen.

[1] The sun was still some three hours from his setting. The sphere

that ever is sportive like a child has been variously interpreted;

perhaps Dante only meant the sphere of the heavens which by its ever

varying aspect suggests the image of a playful spirit.

[2] Dante uses “vespers” as the term for the last of the four canonical

divisions of the day; that is, from three to six P.M. See Convito, iv.

23. Three o’clock in Purgatory corresponds with midnight in Italy.

[3] In Italy.

[4] Full in the face.

[5] The source of this increase of brightness being unknown, it caused

him astonishment.

As when from water, or from the mirror, the ray leaps to the opposite

quarter, and, mounting up in like manner to that in which it descends,

at equal distance departs as much from the falling of the stone,[1] as

experiment and art show; so it seemed to me that I was struck by light

reflected there in front of me, from which my sight was swift to fly.

“What is that, sweet Father, from which I cannot screen my sight so

that it avails me,” said I, “and which seems to be moving toward us?”

“Marvel not if the family of Heaven still dazzle thee,” he replied to

me; “it is a messenger that comes to invite men to ascend. Soon will it

be that to see these things will not be grievous to thee, but will be

delight to thee as great as nature fitted thee to feel.”

[1] I.e., the perpendicular, at the point of incidence.

When we had reached the blessed Angel, with a glad voice he said,

“Enter ye here to a stairway far less steep than the others.”

We were mounting, already departed thence, and “Beati misericordes”[1]

had been sung behind us, and “Rejoice thou that overcomest.”[2] My

Master and I, we two alone, were going on upward, and I was thinking to

win profit as we went from his words; and I addressed me to him, thus

enquiring, “What did the spirit from Romagna mean, mentioning exclusion

and companionship?”[3] Wherefore he to me, “Of his own greatest fault

he knows the harm, and therefore it is not to be wondered at if he

reprove it, in order that there may be less lamenting on account of it.

Because your desires are directed there, where, through companionship,

a share is lessened, envy moves the bellows for your sighs. But if the

love of the highest sphere[4] had turned your desire on high, that fear

would not be in your breast; for the more there are who there say

‘ours,’ so much the more of good doth each possess, and the more of

charity burns in that cloister.”[5] “I am more hungering to be

contented,” said I, “than if I had at first been silent, and more of

doubt I assemble in my mind. How can it be that a good distributed

makes more possessors richer with itself, than if by few it is

possessed?”[6] And he to me, “Because thou fastenest thy mind only on

earthly things, from true light thou gatherest darkness. That infinite

and ineffable Good which is on high, runs to love even as the sunbeam

comes to a lucid body. As much of itself it gives as it finds of ardor;

so that how far soever charity extends, beyond it doth the eternal

bounty increase. And the more the people who are intent on high the

more there are for loving well, and the more love is there, and like a

mirror one reflects to the other. And if my discourse appease not thy

hunger, thou shalt see Beatrice, and she will fully take from thee this

and every other longing. Strive only that soon may be extinct, as two

already are, the five wounds that are closed up by being painful.”[7]

[1] “Blessed are the merciful.”

[2] At the passage from each round, the Angel at the foot of the stairs

repeats words from the Beatitudes adapted to those purified from the

sin punished upon the ledge which is being left.

[3] In the last canto, Guido del Duca had exclaimed, “O human race, why

dost thou set thy heart there where companionship must needs be

excluded!”

[4] The Empyrean.

[5] “Since good, the more Communicated, the more abundant grows.”

Milton, Paradise Lost, v. 73.

[6] “True love in this differs from gold and clay, That to divide is

not to take away.”—Shelley, Epipsychidion.

[7] The pain of contrition.

As I was about to say “Thou satisfiest me,” I saw myself arrived on the

next round,[1] so that my eager eyes made me silent. There it seemed to

me I was of a sudden rapt in an ecstatic vision, and saw many persons

in a temple, and a lady at the entrance, with the sweet action of a

mother, saying, “My son, why hast thou done thus toward us? Lo,

sorrowing, thy father and I were seeking thee;” and when here she was

silent, that which first appeared, disappeared.

[1] Where the sin of anger is expiated.

Then appeared to me another, with those waters down along her cheeks

which grief distils when it springs from great despite toward others,

and she was saying, “If thou art lord of the city about whose name was

such great strife among the gods, and whence every science sparkles

forth, avenge thyself on those audacious arms, that have embraced our

daughter, O Pisistratus.” And the lord appeared to me, benign and mild,

to answer her, with temperate look, “What shall we do to him who

desires ill for us, if he who loves us is by us condemned?”[1]

[1] Dante translated this story from Valerius Maximus, Facta et dicta

mem., vi. 1.

Then I saw people kindled with fire of wrath, killing a youth with

stones, loudly crying to each other only, “Slay, slay.” And I saw him

bowed by death, which now was weighing on him, toward the ground, but

in such great strife he ever made of his eyes gates for heaven, praying

to the high Lord, that He would pardon his persecutors, with that

aspect which unlocks pity.[1]

[1] See Acts, vii. 55-60.

When my mind returned outwardly to the things which outside of it are

true, I recognized my not false errors. My Leader, who could see me do

like a man who looses himself from slumber, said, “What ails thee, that

thou canst not support thyself? but art come more than a half league

veiling thine eyes, and with thy legs staggering like one whom wine or

slumber bends.” “O sweet Father mine, if thou harkenest to me I will

tell thee,” said I, “what appeared to me when my legs were thus taken

from me.” And he, “If thou hadst a hundred masks upon thy face, thy

thoughts howsoever small would not be hidden from me. That which thou

hast seen was in order that thou excuse not thyself from opening thy

heart to the waters of peace which are poured forth from the eternal

fountain. I did not ask, ‘What ails thee?’ for the reason that he does

who looks only with the eye which hath no seeing when the body lies

inanimate; but I asked, in order to give vigor to the foot; thus it

behoves to spur the sluggards, slow to use their wakefulness when it

returns.”

We were going on through the vesper time, forward intent so far as the

eyes could reach against the bright evening rays; when, lo, little by

little, a smoke came toward us, dark as night; iior was there place to

shelter ourselves from it. This took from us our eyes and the pure air.

CANTO XVI.

Third Ledge the Wrathful.—Marco Lombardo.—His discourse on Free Will,

and the Corruption of the World.

Gloom of hell, or of night deprived of every planet, under a barren

sky, obscured by clouds as much as it can be, never made so thick a

veil to my sight nor to my feeling so harsh of tissue as that smoke

which covered us there; so that my eye endured not to stay open[1]

wherefore my sage and trusty Escort drew to my side and offered me his

shoulder. Even as a blind man goes behind his guide, in order not to

stray, and not to butt against anything that may hurt or perhaps kill

him, I went along, through the bitter and foul air, listening to my

Leader, who was ever saying, “Take care that thou be not cut off from

me.”

[1] The gloom and the smoke symbolize the effects of anger on the soul.

I heard voices, and each appeared to be praying for peace and mercy to

the Lamb of God that taketh sins away. Only “Agnus Dei[1] were their

exordiums: one word there was in all, and one measure; so that among

them seemed entire concord. “Are these spirits, Master, that I hear?”

said I. And he to me, “Thou apprehendest truly; and they go loosening

the knot of anger.” “Now who art thou that cleavest our smoke, and yet

dost speak of us even as if thou didst still divide the time by

calends?”[2] Thus by one voice was said: whereon my Master said,

“Reply, and ask if by this way one goeth up.” And I, “O creature, that

cleansest thyself in order to return beautiful unto Him who made thee,

a marvel shalt thou hear if thou accompanyest me.” “I will follow thee,

so far as is permitted me,” it replied, “and if the smoke allows not

seeing, in its stead hearing shall keep us joined.” Then I began, “With

that swathing band which death unbinds I go upward, and I came hither

through the infernal anguish. And if God bath so enclosed me in His

grace that He wills that I should see His court by a mode wholly out of

modern usage, conceal not from me who thou wert before thy death, but

tell it to me, and tell me if I am going rightly to the pass; and let

thy words be our guides.” “Lombard I was, and was called Marco; the

world I knew, and that worth I loved, toward which every one hath now

unbent his bow. For mounting thou art going rightly.” Thus he replied,

and added, “I pray thee that thou pray for me when thou shalt he

above.” And I to him, “I pledge my faith to thee to do that which thou

askest of me; but I am bursting inwardly with a doubt, if I free not

myself of it; at first it was simple, and now it is made double by thy

words which make certain to me, here as elsewhere, that wherewith I

couple it.[3] The world is indeed as utterly deserted by every virtue

as thou declarest to me, and with iniquity is big and covered; but I

pray that thou point out to me the cause, so that I may see it, and

that I may show it to others; for one sets it in the heavens, and one

here below.”

[1] “The Lamb of God.”

[2] By those in the eternal world dine is not reckoned by earth

divisions.

[3] The doubt was occasioned by Guido del Duca’s words (Canto XV.), in

regard to the prevalence of evil in Tuscany, arising either from

misfortune of the place, or through the bad habits of men. The fact of

the iniquity of men was now reaffirmed by Marco Lombardo; Dante accepts

the fact as certain, and his doubt is coupled with it.

A deep sigh that grief wrung into “Ay me!” he first sent forth, and

then began, “Brother, the world is blind, and thou forsooth comest from

it. Ye who are living refer every cause upward to the heavens only, as

if they of necessity moved all things with themselves. If this were so,

free will would be destroyed in you, and there would be no justice in

having joy for good, and grief for evil. The heavens initiate your

movements: I do not say all of them; but, supposing that I said it,

light for good and for evil is given to you; and free will, which, if

it endure fatigue in the first battles with the heavens, afterwards, if

it be well nurtured, conquers everything. To a greater force, and to a

better nature, ye, free, are subjected, and that creates the mind in

you, which the heavens have not in their charge.’ Therefore if the

present world goes astray, in you is the cause, in you let it be

sought; and of this I will now be a true informant for thee.

[1] The soul of man is the direct creation of God, and is in immediate

subjection to His power; it is not in charge of the Heavens, and its

will is free to resist their mingled and imperfect influences.

“Forth from the hand of Him who delights in it ere it exist, like to a

little maid who, weeping and smiling, wantons childishly, issues the

simple little soul, which knows nothing, save that, proceeding from a

glad Maker, it willingly turns to that which allures it. Of trivial

good at first it tastes the savor; by this it is deceived and runs

after it, if guide or bridle bend not its love. Wherefore it was

needful to impose law as a bridle; needful to have a king who could

discern at least the tower of the true city. The laws exist, but who

set hand to them? Not one: because the shepherd who is in advance can

ruminate, but has not his hoofs divided?[1] Wherefore the people, who

see their guide only at that good[2] whereof they are greedy, feed upon

that, and seek no further. Well canst thou see that the evil leading is

the cause that has made the world guilty, and not nature which in you

may be corrupted. Rome, which made the world good, was wont to have two

Suns,[3] which made visible both one road and the other, that of the

world and that of God. One has extinguished the other; and the sword is

joined to the crozier; and the two together must of necessity go ill,

because, being joined, one feareth not the other. If thou believest rue

not, consider the grain,[4] for every herb is known by its seed.

[1] The shepherd who precedes the flock, and should lead it aright, is

the Pope. A mystical interpretation of the injunction upon the children

of Israel (Leviticus, xi.) in regard to clean and unclean beasts was

familiar to the schoolmen. St. Augustine expounds the cloven hoof as

symbolic of right conduct, because it does not easily slip, and the

chewing of the cud as signifying the meditation of wisdom. Dante seems

here to mean that the Pope has the true doctrine, but makes not the

true use of it for his own guidance and the government of the world.

[2] Material good.

[3] Pope and Emperor.

[4] The results that follow this forced union.

“Within the land which the Adige and the Po water, valor and courtesy

were wont to be found before Frederick had his quarrel;[1] now safely

anyone may pass there who out of shame would cease discoursing with the

good, or drawing near them. Truly three old men are still there in whom

the antique age rebukes the new, and it seems late to them ere God

restore them to the better life; Currado da Palazzo, and the good

Gherardo,[2] and Guido da Castel, who is better named, after the manner

of the French, the simple Lombard.[3]

[1] Before the Emperor Frederick II. had his quarrel with the Pope;

that is, before Emperor and Pope had failed in their respective duties

to each other.

[2] Gherardo da Camino, “who was noble in his life, and whose memory

will always be noble,” says Dante in the Convito, iv. 14.

[3] “The French,” says Benvenuto da Linda, “call all Italians Lombards,

and repute them very astute.”

“Say thou henceforth, that the Church of Rome, through confounding in

itself two modes of rule,[1] falls in the mire, and defiles itself and

its burden.”

[1] The spiritual and the temporal.

“O Marco mine,” said I, “thou reasonest well; and now I discern why the

sons of Levi were excluded from the heritage;[1] but what Gherardo is

that, who, thou sayest, remains for sample of the extinct folk, in

reproach of the barbarous age?” “Either thy speech deceives me, or it

is making trial of me,” he replied to me, “in that, speaking Tuscan to

me, it seems that of the good Gherardo thou knowest naught. By other

added name I know him not, unless I should take it from his daughter

Gaia.[2] May God be with you! for further I come not with you. Behold

the brightness which rays already glimmering through the smoke, and it

behoves me to depart—the Angel is there—ere I appear to him.”[3] So he

turned, and would not hear me more.

[1] “The Lord separated the tribe of Levi, to bear the ark of the

covenant of the Lord, to stand before the Lord to minister unto him,

and to bless in his name, unto this day. Wherefore Levi hath no part

nor inheritance with his brethren; the Lord is his

inheritance.”—Deuteronomy, x. 8-9.

[2] Famed for her virtues, says Buti; for her vices, say the Ottimo and

Benvenuto.

[3] His time of purgation is not yet finished; not yet is he ready to

meet the Angel of the Pass.

CANTO XVII.

Third Ledge the Wrathful.—Issue from the Smoke.—Vision of examples of

Anger.—Ascent to the Fourth Ledge, where Sloth is purged.—Second

Nightfall.—Virgil explains how Love is the root of Virtue and of Sin.

Recall to mind, reader, if ever on the alps a cloud closed round thee,

through which thou couldst not see otherwise than the mole through its

skin, how, when the humid and dense vapors begin to dissipate, the ball

of the sun enters feebly through them: and thy imagination will easily

come to see, how at first I saw again the sun, which was already at its

setting. So, matching mine to the trusty steps of my Master, I issued

forth from such a cloud to rays already dead on the low shores.

O power imaginative, that dost sometimes so steal us from outward

things that a man heeds it not, although around him a thousand trumpets

sound, who moveth thee if the sense afford thee naught? A light, that

in the heavens is formed, moveth thee by itself, or by a will that

downward guides it?

[1] If the imagination is not stirred by some object of sense, it is

moved by the influence of the stars, or directly by the Divine will.

In my imagination appeared the impress of the impiety of her[1] who

changed her form into the bird that most delights in singing. And here

was my mind so shut up within itself that from without came nothing

which then might he received by it. Then rained down within my high

fantasy, one crucified,[2] scornful and fierce in his look, and thus

was dying. Around him were the great Ahasuerus, Esther his wife, and

the just Mordecai, who was in speech and action so blameless. And when

this imagination burst of itself, like a bubble for which the water

fails, beneath which it was made, there rose in my vision a maiden,[3]

weeping bitterly, and she was saying, “O queen, wherefore through anger

hast thou willed to be naught? Thou hast killed thyself in order not to

lose Lavinia: now thou hast lost me: I am she who mourns, mother, at

thine, before another’s ruin.

[1] Progne or Philomela, according to one or the other version of the

tragic myth, was changed into the nightingale, after her anger had led

her to take cruel vengeance on Tereus.

[2] Haman, who, according to the English version, was hanged, but

according to the Vulgate, was crucified—Esther, vii.

[3] Lavinia, whose mother, Amata, killed herself in a rage at hearing

premature report of the death of Turnus, to whom she desired that

Lavinia should be married.—Aeneid, xii. 595-607.

As sleep is broken, when of a sudden the new light strikes the closed

eyes, and, broken, quivers ere it wholly dies, so my imagining fell

down, soon as a light, greater by far than that to which we are

accustomed, struck my face. I turned me to see where I was, when a

voice said, “Here is the ascent;” which from every other object of

attention removed me, and made my will so eager to behold who it was

that was, speaking that it never rests till it is face to face. But, as

before the sun which weighs down our sight, and by excess veils its own

shape, so here my power failed. “This is a divine spirit who directs

us, without our asking, on the way to go up, and with his own light

conceals himself. He does for us as a man doth for himself; for he who

sees the need and waits for asking, malignly sets himself already to

denial. Now let us grant our feet to such an invitation; let us hasten

to ascend ere it grows dark, for after, it would not be possible until

the day returns.” Thus said my Guide; and I and he turned our steps to

a stairway. And soon as I was on the first step, near use I felt a

motion as of wings, and a fanning on my face,[1] and I heard said,

“Beati pacifici,’[2] who are without ill anger.”

[1] By which the angel removes the third P from Dante’s brow.

[2] “Blessed are the peacemakers.”

Now were the last sunbeams on which the night follows so lifted above

us, that the stars were appearing on many sides. “O my virtue, why dost

thou so melt away?” to myself I said, for I felt the power of my legs

put in truce. We had come where the stair no farther ascends, and we

were stayed fast even as a ship that arrives at the shore. And I

listened a little, if I might hear anything in the new circle. Then I

turned to my Master, and said, “My sweet Father, say what offence is

purged here in the circle where we are: if the feet are stopped, let

not thy discourse stop.” And he to me, “The love of good, less than it

should have been, is here restored;[1] here is plied again the

ill-slackened oar. But that thou mayst still more clearly understand,

turn thy mind to me, and thou shalt gather some good fruit from our

delay.

[1] It is the round on which the sin of acedie, sloth, is purged away.

“Neither Creator nor creature,” began he, “son, ever was without love,

either natural, or of the mind,[1] and this thou knowest. The natural

is always without error; but the other may err either through an evil

object, or through too much or through too little vigor. While love is

directed on the primal goods, and on the second moderates itself, it

cannot be the cause of ill delight. But when it is bent to evil,[2] or

runs to good with more zeal, or with less, than it ought, against the

Creator works his own creature. Hence thou canst comprehend that love

needs must be the seed in you of every virtue, and of every action that

deserves punishment.

[1] Either native in the soul, as the love of God, or determined by the

choice, through free will, of some object of desire in the mind.

[2] A wrong object of desire.

“Now since love can never bend its sight from the welfare of its

subject,[1] all things are safe from hatred of themselves; and since no

being can be conceived of divided from the First,[2] and standing by

itself, from hating Him[3] every affection is cut off. It follows, if,

distinguishing, I rightly judge, that the evil which is loved is that

of one s neighbor; and in three modes is this love born within your

clay. There is he who hopes to excel through the abasement of his

neighbor, and only longs that from his greatness he may be brought

low.[4] There is he who fears loss of power, favor, honor, fame,

because another rises; whereat he is so saddened that he loves the

opposite.[5] And there is he who seems so outraged by injury that it

makes him gluttonous of vengeance, and such a one must needs coin evil

for others.[6] This triform love is lamented down below.[7]

[1] To however wrong an object love may be directed, the person always

believes it to be for his own good.

[2] The source of being.

[3] God, the First Cause.

[4] This is the nature of Pride.

[5] Envy.

[6] Anger.

[7] In the three lower rounds of Purgatory.

“Now I would that thou hear of the other,—that which runs to the good

in faulty measure. Every one confusedly apprehends a good[1] in which

the mind may be at rest, and which it desires; wherefore every one

strives to attain it. If the love be slack that draws you to see this,

or to acquire it, this cornice, after just repentance, torments you

therefor. Another good there is,[2] which doth not make man happy, is

not happiness, is not the good essence, the root of every good fruit.

The love which abandons itself too much to this[3] is lamented above us

in three circles, but how it is reckoned tripartite, I am silent, in

order that thou seek it for thyself.”

[1] The supreme Good.

[2] Sensual enjoyment.

[2] Resulting in the sins of avarice, gluttony, and lust.

CANTO XVIII.

Fourth Ledge The Slothful.—Discourse of Virgil on Love and Free

Will.—Throng of Spirits running in haste to redeem their Sin.—The Abbot

of San Zone.—Dante falls asleep.

The lofty Teacher had put an end to his discourse, and looked attentive

on my face to see if I appeared content; and I, whom a fresh thirst

already was goading, was silent outwardly, and within was saying,

“Perhaps the too much questioning I make annoys him.” But that true

Father, who perceived the timid wish which did not disclose itself, by

speaking gave me hardihood to speak. Then I, “My sight is so vivified

in thy light that I discern clearly all that thy discourse may imply or

declare: therefore I pray thee, sweet Father dear, that thou

demonstrate to me the love to which thou referrest every good action

and its contrary.” “Direct,” he said, “toward me the keen eyes of the

understanding, and the error of the blind who make themselves leaders

will be manifest to thee. The mind, which is created apt to love, is

mobile unto everything that pleases, soon as by pleasure it is roused

to action. Your faculty of apprehension draws an image from a real

existence, and within you displays it, so that it makes the mind turn

to it; and if, thus turned, the mind incline toward it, that

inclination is love, that inclination is nature which is bound anew in

you by pleasure.[1] Then, as the fire moveth upward by its own form,[2]

which is born to ascend thither where it lasts longest in its material,

so the captive mind enters into longing, which is a spiritual motion,

and never rests until the thing beloved makes it rejoice. Now it may be

apparent to thee, how far the truth is hidden from the people who aver

that every love is in itself a laudable thing; because perchance its

matter appears always to be good;[3] but not every seal is good

although the wax be good.”

[1] In his discourse in the preceding canto, Virgil has declared that

neither the Creator nor his creatures are ever without love, either

native in the soul, or proceeding from the mind. Here he explains how

the mind is disposed to love by inclination to an image within itself

of some object which gives it pleasure. This inclination is natural to

it; or in his phrase, nature is bound anew in man by the pleasure which

arouses the love. All this is a doctrine derived directly from St.

Thomas Aquinas. “It is the property of every nature to have some

inclination, which is a natural appetite, or love.”—Summa Theol., 1,

lxxvi. i.

[2] Form is here used in its scholastic meaning. “ The active power of

anything depends on its form, which is the principle of its action. Fur

the form is either the nature itself of the thing, as in those which

are pure form; or it is a constituent of the nature of the thing, as in

those which are composed of matter and form.”—Summa Theol., 3, xiii. i.

Fire by its form, or nature, seeks the sphere of fire between the ether

and the moon.

[3] The object may seem desirable to the mind, without being a fit

object of desire.

“Thy words, and my understanding which follows,” replied I to him,

“have revealed love to me; but that has made me more full of doubt. For

if love is offered to us from without, and if with other foot the soul

go not, if strait or crooked she go is not her own merit.”[1] And he to

me, “So much as reason seeth here can I tell thee; beyond that await

still for Beatrice; for it is a work of faith. Every substantial form

that is separate from matter, and is united with it,[2] has a specific

virtue residing in itself which without action is not perceived, nor

shows itself save by its effect, as by green leaves the life in a

plant. Yet, whence the intelligence of the first cognitions comes man

doth not know, nor whence the affection for the first objects of

desire, which exist in you even as zeal in the bee for making honey:

and this first will admits not desert of praise or blame. Now in order

that to this every other may be gathered,[3] the virtue that counsels

[4] is innate in you, and ought to keep the threshold of assent. This

is the principle wherefrom is derived the reason of desert in you,

according as it gathers in and winnows good and evil loves. Those who

in reasoning went to the foundation took note of this innate liberty,

wherefore they bequeathed morals[5] to the world. Assuming then that

every love which is kindled within you arises of necessity, the power

exists in you to restrain it. This noble virtue Beatrice calls the free

will, and therefore see that thou have it in mind, if she take to

speaking of it with thee.”

[1] If love be aroused in the soul by an external object, and if it be

natural to the soul to love, how does she deserve praise or blame for

loving?

[2] The substantial form is the soul, which is separate from matter but

united with it.

[3] In order that every other will may conform with the first, that is,

with the affection natural to man for the primal objects of desire.

[4] The faculty of reason, the virtue which counsels and on which free

will depends, is “the specific virtue” of the soul.

[5] The rules of that morality which would have no existence were it

not for freedom of the will.

The moon, belated[1] almost to midnight, shaped[2] like a bucket that

is all ablaze, was making the stars appear fewer to us, and was running

counter to the heavens[3] along those paths which the sun inflames,

when the man of Rome sees it between Sardinia and Corsica at its

setting;[4] and that gentle shade, for whom Pietola[5] is more famed

than the Mantuan city, had laid down the burden of my loading:[6]

wherefore I, who had harvested his open and plain discourse upon my

questions, was standing like a man who, drowsy, rambles. But this

drowsiness was taken from me suddenly by folk, who, behind our backs,

had now come round to us. And such as was the rage and throng, which of

old Ismenus and Asopus saw at night along their banks, in case the

Thebans were in need of Bacchus, so, according to what I saw of them as

they came, those who by good will and right love are ridden curve their

steps along that circle. Soon they were upon us; because, running, all

that great crowd was moving on; and two in front, weeping, were crying

out, “Mary ran with haste unto the mountain[7] and Caesar, to subdue

Ilerda, thrust at Marseilles, and then ran on to Spain.”[8] “Swift,

swift, that time be not lost by little love,” cried the others

following, “for zeal in doing well may refreshen grace.” “O people, in

whom keen fervor now perhaps redeems your negligence and delay, through

lukewarmness, in well-doing, this one who is alive (and surely I lie

not to you) wishes to go up, soon as the sun may shine again for us;

therefore tell us where is the opening near.” These words were of my

Guide; and one of those spirits said: “Come thou behind us, and thou

shalt find the gap. We are so filled with desire to move on that we

cannot stay; therefore pardon, if thou holdest our obligation for

churlishness. I was Abbot[9] of San Zeno at Verona, under the empire of

the good Barbarossa, of whom Milan, still grieving, doth discourse. And

he has one foot already in the grave,[10] who soon will lament on

account of that monastery, and will be sorry for having had power

there; because in place of its true shepherd he has put his son, ill in

his whole body and worse in mind, and who was evil-born.” I know not if

more he said, or if he were silent, so far beyond us he had already run

by; but this I heard, and to retain it pleased me.

[1] In its rising.

[2] Gibbous, like certain buckets still in use in Italy.

[3] “These words describe the daily backing of the moon through the

signs from west to east.”—Moore.

[4] These islands are invisible from Rome, but the line that runs from

Rome between them is a little south of east.

[5] The modern name of Andes, the birthplace of Virgil, and therefore

more famous than Mautua itself.

[6] With which I had laden him.

[7] Luke, i. 36.

[8] Examples of zeal.

[9] Unknown, save for this mention of him.

[10] Alberto della Scala, lord of Verona; he died in 1301. He had

forced upon the monastery for its abbot his deformed and depraved

illegitimate son.

And he who was at every need my succor said: “Turn thee this way; see

two of them coming, giving a bite to sloth.” In rear of all they were

saying: “The people for whom the sea was opened were dead before their

heirs beheld the Jordan;[1] and those who endured not the toil even to

the end with the son of Anchises,[2] offered themselves to life without

glory.”

[1] Numbers, xiv. 28.

[2] But left him, to remain with Acestes in Sicily—Aeneid, v. 751.

Then when those shades were so far parted from us that they could no

more be seen, a new thought set itself within me, from which many

others and diverse were born; and I so strayed from one unto another

that, thus wandering, I closed my eyes, and transmuted my meditation

into dream.

CANTO XIX.

Fourth Ledge: the Slothful—Dante dreams of the Siren.—The Angel of the

Pass.—Ascent to the Fifth Ledge.—Pope Adrian V.

At the hour when the diurnal heat, vanquished by the Earth or sometimes

by Saturn,[1] can warm no more the coldness of the moon,—when the

geomancers see their Greater Fortune[2] in the east, rising before the

dawn along a path which short while stays dark for it,—there came to me

in dream[3] a woman stammering, with eyes asquint, and crooked on her

feet, with hands lopped off, and pallid in her color. I gazed at her;

and as the sun comforts the cold limbs which the night bennmbs, so my

look made her tongue nimble, and then set her wholly straight in little

while, and so colored her wan face as love requires. Then, when she had

her speech thus unloosed, she began to sing, so that with difficulty

should I have turned my attention from her. “I am,” she sang, “I am the

sweet Siren, and the mariners in mid sea I bewitch, so full am I of

pleasantness to hear. I turned Ulysses from his wandering way by my

song; and whoso abides with me seldom departs, so wholly I content

him.”

[1] Toward dawn, when the warmth of the preceding day is exhausted,

Saturn was supposed to exert a frigid influence.

[2] “Geomancy is divination by points in the ground, or pebbles

arranged in certain figures, which have peculiar names. Among these is

the figure called the Fortuna Major, which by an effort of imagination

can also be formed out of some of the last stars of Aquarius and some

of the first of Pisces.” These are the signs that immediately precede

Aries, in which the Sun now was, and the stars forming the figure of

the Greater Fortune would be in the east about two hours before

sunrise.

[3] The hour when this dream comes to Dante is “post mediam noctem …

cum somnia vera,”—the hour in which it was commonly believed that

dreams have a true meaning. The woman seen by Dante is the deceitful

Siren, who symbolizes the temptation to those sins of sense from which

the spirits are purified in the three upper rounds of Purgatory.

Not yet was her mouth closed when at my side a Lady[1] appeared, holy,

and ready to make her confused. “O Virgil, Virgil, who is this?” she

sternly said; and he came with his eyes fixed only on that modest one.

She took hold of the other, and in front she opened her, rending her

garments, and showed me her belly; this waked me with the stench that

issued from it. I turned my eyes, and the good Virgil said, “At least

three calls have I given thee; arise and come; let us find the opening

through which thou mayst enter.”

[1] This lady seems to be the type of the conscience, virtus

intellectualis, that calls reason to rescue the tempted soul.

Up I rose, and now were all the circles of the sacred mountain full of

the high day, and we went on with the new sun at our backs. Following

him, I bore my forehead like one who has it laden with thought, and

makes of himself the half arch of a bridge, when I heard, “Come ye!

here is the passage,” spoken in a mode soft and benign, such as is not

heard in this mortal region. With open wings, which seemed of a swan,

he who thus had spoken to us turned us upward between the two walls of

the hard rock. He moved his feathers then, and fanned us, affirming qui

lugent[1] to be blessed, for they shall have their souls mistresses of

consolation.[2] “What ails thee that ever on the ground thou lookest?”

my Guide began to say to me, both of us having mounted up a little from

the Angel. “With such apprehension a recent vision makes me go, which

bends me to itself so that I cannot from the thought withdraw me.”

“Hast thou seen,” said he, “that ancient sorceress who above us

henceforth is alone lamented? Hast thou seen how from her man is

unbound? Let it suffice thee, and strike thy heels on the ground;[3]

turn thine eyes to the lure that the eternal King whirls with the great

circles.”

[1] “They that mourn.”

[2] The meaning seems to be, “they shall be possessed of comfort.”

Donne (i.e.”mistresses ) is a rhyme-word, and affords an instance of a

straining of the meaning compelled by the rhyme.

[3] Hasten thy steps.

Like the falcon that first looks down, then turns at the cry, and

stretches forward, through desire of the food that draws him thither;

such I became, and such, so far as the rock is cleft to afford a way to

him who goeth up, did I go on as far as where the circling[1] is begun.

When I was come forth on the fifth round, I saw people upon it who were

weeping, lying upon the earth all turned downward. “Adhoesit pavimento

anima mea,”[2] I heard them saying with such deep sighs that the words

were hardly understood. “O elect of God, whose sufferings both justice

and hope make less hard, direct us toward the high ascents.” “If ye

come secure from the lying down, and wish to find the speediest way,

let your right hands always be outside.” So prayed the Poet, and so a

little in front was replied to us by them; wherefore I, in his

speaking, marked the hidden one;[3] and then turned my eyes to my Lord,

whereon he granted me, with cheerful sign, that which the look of my

desire was asking for. Then when I could do with myself according to my

will, I drew me above that creature whose words had first made me note

him, saying, “Spirit in whom weeping matures that without which no one

can turn to God, suspend a little for me thy greater care. Tell me who

thou wast; and why ye have your backs turned upward; and if thou

wishest that I obtain aught for thee there whence I alive set forth.”

And he to me, “Thy heaven turns to itself our hinder parts thou shalt

know; but first, scias quod ego fui successor Petri.[4] Between Sestri

and Chiaveri[5] descends a beautiful stream,[6] and of its name the

title of my race makes its top.[7] One month and little more I proved

how the great mantle weighs on him who guards it from the mire, so that

all other burdens seem a feather. My conversion, ah me! was tardy; but

when I had become the Roman Shepherd, then I found out the lying life.

I saw that there the heart was not at rest; nor was it possible to,

mount higher in that life; wherefore the love of this was kindled in

me. Up to that time a wretched soul and parted from God had I been,

avaricious of everything; now, as thou seest, I am punished for it

here. That which avarice doth is displayed here in the purgation of

these converted souls, and the Mountain has no more bitter penalty.[8]

Even as our eye, fixed upon earthly things, was not lifted on high, so

justice here to earth has depressed it. As avarice, in which labor is

lost, quenched our love for every good, so justice here holds us close,

bound and captive in feet and hands; and, so long as it shall be the

pleasure of the just Lord, so long shall we stay immovable and

outstretched.”

[1] The level of the fifth round.

[2] “My soul cleaveth to the dust.”—Psalm cxix. 25.

[3] The face of the speaker, turned to the ground, was concealed.

[4] “Know that I was a successor of Peter.” This was the Pope Adrian

V., Ottobono de’ Fieschi, who died in 1276, having been Pope for

thirty-eight days.

[5] Little towns on the Genoese sea-coast.

[6] The Lavagna, from which stream the Fieschi derived their title of

Counts of Lavagna.

[7] Its chief boast.

[8] Others may be greater, but none more humiliating.

I had knelt down and wished to speak; but when I began, and he became

aware, only by listening, of my reverence, “What cause,” said he, “hath

bent thee thus downward?” And I to him, “Because of your dignity my

conscience stung me for standing.” “Straighten thy legs, and lift thee

up, brother,” he replied; “err not, fellow servant of one power am I

with thee and with the rest.[1] If ever thou hast understood that holy

gospel sound which says neque nubent,[2] thou mayst well see why I

speak thus. Now go thy way. I will not that thou longer stop; for thy

stay hinders my weeping, with which I ripen that which thou hast said.

A grandchild I have on earth who is named Alagia,[3] good in herself,

if only our house make her not wicked by example; and she alone remains

to me yonder.”[4]

[1] And I fell at His feet to worship him. And He said unto me, See

thou do it not: I am thy fellow servant.”—Revelation xix. 10.

[2] They neither marry.”—Matthew, xxii. 80. The distinctions of earths

do not exist in the spiritual world.

[3] Alagia was the wife of the Marquis Moroello Malaspina. See the

close of Canto VIII. Dante had probably seen her in 1306, when he was a

guest of the house, in the Lunigiana.

[4] Not that she was his only living relative, but the only one whose

prayers, coming from a good heart, would avail him.

CANTO XX.

Fifth Ledge: the Avaricious.—The Spirits celebrate examples of Poverty

and Bounty.—Hugh Capet.—His discourse on his descendants.—Trembling of

the Mountain.

Against a better will the will fights ill: wherefore against my own

pleasure, in order to please him, I drew from the water the sponge not

full.

I moved on, and my Leader moved on through the space vacant only

alongside of the rock, as upon a wall one goes close to the

battlements. For on the other side the people, that through their eyes

are pouring drop by drop the evil that possesses all the world,

approach too near the edge.[1]

[1] Too close to leave a space for walking.

Accursed be thou, old she-wolf, who more than all the other beasts hast

prey, because of thy hunger hollow without end! O Heaven! by whose

revolution it seems that men believe conditions here below are

transmuted, when will he come through whom she shall depart?[1] We were

going on with slow and scanty steps, and I attentive to the shades whom

I heard piteously lamenting and bewailing; and peradventure I heard in

front of us one crying out, “Sweet Mary,” in his lament, even as a

woman does who is in travail; and continuing, “So poor wast thou as may

be seen by that inn where thou didst lay down thy holy burden.” And

following this I heard, “O good Fabricius,[2] thou didst rather wish

for virtue with poverty than to possess great riches with vice.” These

words were so pleasing to me that I drew myself further on to have

acquaintance with that spirit from whom they seemed to come. He was

speaking furthermore of the largess which Nicholas[3] made to the

damsels in order to conduct their youth to honor. “O soul that

discoursest so well,” said I, “tell me who thou wast, and why thou

alone renewest these worthy praises. Not without meed will be thy

words, if I return to complete the short journey of that life which

flies towards its end.” And he, “I will tell thee, not for comfort that

I may expect from yonder,[4] but because such grace shineth on thee ere

thou art dead. I was the root of the evil plant which so overshadows

all the Christian land[5] that good fruit is rarely plucked therefrom.

But if Douai, Lille, Ghent, and Bruges had power, soon would there be

vengeance on it;[6] and I implore it from him who judges everything.

Yonder I was called Hugh Capet: of me are born the Philips and the

Louises, by whom of late times France is ruled. I was the son of a

butcher of Paris.[7] When the ancient kings had all died out, save one,

who had assumed the grey garb,[8] I found me with the bridle of the

government of the realm fast in my hands, and with so much power

recently acquired, and so full of friends, that to the widowed crown

the head of my son was promoted, from whom the consecrated bones[9] of

these began.

[1] The old she-wolf is avarice, the same who at the outset (Hell,

Canto I.) had driven Dante back and made him lose hope of the height.

The likeness of the two passages is striking.

[2] Caius Fabricius, the famous poor and incorruptible Roman consul,

who refused the bribes of Pyrrhus, King of Epirus. Dante extols his

worth also in the Convito, iv. 5.

[3] St. Nicholas, Bishop of Mira, who, according to the legend, knowing

that owing to the poverty of their father, three maidens were exposed

to the risk of leading lives of dishonor, secretly, at night, threw

into the window of their house money enough to provide each with a

dowry.

[4] The earth.

[5] In 1300 the descendants of Hugh Capet were ruling France, Spain,

and Naples.

[6] Phillip the Fair gained possession of Flanders, by force and fraud,

in 1299; but in 1802 the French were driven out of the country, after a

fatal defeat at Courtrai, here dimly prophesied.

[7] Dante here follows the incorrect popular tradition.

[8] Who had become a monk. The historical reference is obscure.

[9] An ironical reference to the ceremony of consecration at the

coronation of the kings.

“So long as the great dowry of Provence[1] took not the sense of shame

from my race, it was little worth, but still it did not ill. Then it

began its rapine with force and with falsehood; and, after, for

amends,[2] Ponthieu and Normandy it took, and Gascony; Charles[3] came

to Italy, and, for amends, made a victim of Conradin,[4] and then

thrust Thomas[5] back to heaven for amends. A time I see, not long

after this day, that draws forth another Charles[6] from France to make

both himself and his the better known. Without arms he goes forth

thence alone, but with the lance with which Judas jousted;[7] and that

he thrusts so that he makes the paunch of Florence burst. Therefrom he

will gain not land,[8] but sin and shame so much the heavier for

himself, as he the lighter reckons such harm. The other,[9] who has

already gone out a prisoner from his ship, I see selling his daughter,

and bargaining over her, as do the corsairs with other female slaves. O

Avarice, what more canst thou do with us, since thou hast so drawn my

race unto thyself that it cares not for its own flesh? In order that

the ill to come and that already done may seem the less, I see the

fleur-de-lis entering Anagna, and in his Vicar Christ made a

captive.[10] I see him being mocked a second time; I see the vinegar

and the gall renewed, and between living thieves him put to death. I

see the new Pilate so cruel that this does not sate him, but, without

decretal, he bears his covetous sails into the Temple.[11] O my Lord,

when shall I be glad in seeing thy vengeance which, concealed, makes

sweet thine anger in thy secrecy?

[1] Through the marriage in 1245 of Charles of Anjou, brother of St.

Louis (Louis IX.), with Beatrice, the heiress of the Count of Provence.

[2] The bitterness of Dante’s irony is explained by the part which

France had played in Italian affairs.

[3] Of Anjou.

[4] The youthful grandson of Frederick II., who, striving to wrest

Naples and Sicily, his hereditary possessions, from the hands of

Charles of Anjou, was defeated and taken prisoner by him in 1267, and

put to deaths by him in 1268. His fate excited great compassion.

[5] Charles was believed to have had St. Thomas Aquinas poisoned.

[6] Charles of Valois, brother of Philip the Fair, sent by Boniface

VIII., in 1301, to Florence as peacemaker. But there he wrought great

harm, and siding with the Black party, the Whites, including Dante,

were driven into exile.

[7] The lance of treachery.

[8] A reference to his nickname of Senza terra, or Lackland.

[9] Charles II., son of Charles of Anjou. In 1283 he was made captive

in a sea fight, by Ruggieri de Loria, the Admiral of Peter II. of

Aragon. In 1300, according to common report, he sold his young daughter

in marriage to the old Marquis of Este.

[10] Spite of his hostility to Boniface VIII., the worst crime of the

house of France was, in Dante’s eyes, the seizure of the Pope at

Anagni, in 1303, by the emissaries of Philip the Fair.

[11] The destruction of the Order of the Temple.

“What I was saying of that only bride of the Holy Spirit, and which

made thee turn toward me for some gloss, is ordained for all our

prayers so long as the day lasts, but when the night comes, we take up

a contrary sound instead. Then we rehearse Pygmalion,[1] whom his

gluttonous longing for gold made a traitor and thief and parricide; and

the wretchedness of the avaricious Midas which followed on his greedy

demand, at which men must always laugh. Then of the foolish Achan each

one recalls how he stole the spoils, so that the anger of Joshua seems

still to sting him, here.[2] Then we accuse Sapphira with her husband;

we praise the kicks that Heliodorus received,[3] and in infamy

Polymnestor who slew Polydorus[4] circles the Whole mountain. Finally

our cry here is, ‘Crassus, tell us, for thou knowest, what is the taste

of gold?’[5] At times one speaks loud, and another low, according to

the affection which spurs us to speak now at a greater, now at a less

pace. Therefore in the good which by day is here discoursed of, of late

I was not alone, but here near by no other person lifted up his voice.”

[1] The brother of Dido, and the murderer of her husband for the sake

of his riches—Aeneid, i. 353-4.

[2] Joshua, vii.

[3] For his attempt to plunder the treasury of the Temple.—2 Maccabees,

iii. 25.

[4] Priam had entrusted Polydorus, his youngest son, to Polymnestor,

King of Thrace, who, when the fortunes of Troy declined, slew

Polydorus, that he might take possession of the treasure sent with him.

[5] Having been slain in battle with the Parthians, their king poured

molten gold down his throat in derision, because of his fame as the

richest of men.

We had already parted from him, and were striving to advance along the

road so far as was permitted to our power, when I felt the Mountain

tremble, like a thing that is falling; whereupon a chill seized me such

as is wont to seize him who goes to death. Surely Delos shook not so

violently, before Latona made her nest therein to give birth to the two

eyes of heaven.[1] Then began on all sides such a cry that the Master

drew towards me, saying: “Distrust not, while I guide thee.” “Gloria in

excelsis Deo,”[2] all were saying, according to what I gathered from

those near at hand whose cry it was possible to understand. We stopped,

motionless and in suspense, like the shepherds who first heard that

song, until the trembling ceased, and it was ended. Then we took up

again our holy journey, looking at the shades that were lying on the

ground, returned already to their wonted plaint. No ignorance ever with

so sharp attack made me desirous of knowing—if my memory err not in

this—as it seemed to me I then experienced in thought. Nor, for our

haste, did I dare to ask, nor of myself could I see aught there. So I

went on timid and thoughtful.

[1] Apollo and Diana, the divinities of Sun and Moon.

[2] “Glory to God in the highest.”

CANTO XXI.

Fifth Ledge: the Avaricious.—Statius.—Cause of the trembling of the

Mountain.—Statius does honor to Virgil.

The natural thirst,[1] which is never satisfied save with the water[2]

whereof the poor woman of Samaria besought the grace, was tormenting

me, and haste was goading me along the encumbered way behind my Leader,

and I was grieving at the just vengeance; and lo,—as Luke writes for us

that Christ, now risen forth from the sepulchral cave, appeared to the

two who were on the way,—a shade appeared to us; and it was coming

behind us looking at the crowd that lay at its feet: nor did we

perceive it, so it spoke first saying, “My Brothers, may God give you

peace!” We turned suddenly, and Virgil gave back to it the greeting

which answers to that;[3] then he began: “In the assembly of the blest

may the true court, which relegates me into eternal exile, place thee

in peace.” “How,” said it,—and meanwhile we went on steadily,—“if ye

are shades that God deigns not on high, who hath guided you so far

along his stairs?” And my Teacher, “If thou regardest the marks which

this one bears, and which the Angel traces, thou wilt clearly see it

behoves that with the good he reign. But, because she who spinneth day

and night[4] had not for him yet drawn the distaff off, which Clotho

loads for each one and compacts, his soul, which is thy sister and

mine, coming upwards could not come alone, because it sees not after

our fashion. Wherefore I was drawn from out the ample throat of Hell to

show him, and I shall show him so far on as my teaching can lead him.

But tell us, if thou knowest, why just now the mountain gave such

shocks, and why all seemed to cry together, even down to its moist

feet.” Thus asking he shot for me through the needle’s eye of my

desire, so that only with the hope my thirst became less craving.

[1] “According to that buoyant and immortal sentence with which

Aristotle begins his Metaphysics, ‘All mankind naturally desire

knowledge.’” Matthew Arnold, God and the Bible, cli. iv. This sentence

of Aristotle is cited by Dante in the first chapter of the Convito.

[2] The living water of truth.

[3] To the salutation, “Peace be with you,” the due answer is, “And

with thy spirit.”

[4] Lachesis.

The shade began: “There is nothing which without order the religion of

the mountain can feel, or which can be outside its wont.[1] Free is

this place from every alteration; of that which heaven receives from

itself within itself there may be effect here, but of naught else;[2]

because nor rain, nor hail, nor snow, nor dew, nor frost, falls higher

up than the little stairway of the three short steps; clouds appear

not, or thick or thin; nor lightning, nor the daughter of Thaumas[3]

who yonder often changes her quarter; dry vapor[4] rises not farther up

than the top of the three steps of which I spoke, where the vicar of

Peter has his feet. It trembles perhaps lower down little or much; but

up here it never trembles because of wind that is hidden, I know not

how, in the earth. It trembles here when some soul feels itself pure,

so that it rises or moves to ascend; and such a cry seconds it. Of the

purity the will alone makes proof, which surprises the soul, wholly

free to change its company, and helps it with the will. The soul wills

at first indeed, but the inclination,—which, contrary to the will,

Divine Justice sets to the torment, as erst to the sin,—allows it

not.[5] And I who have lain in this pain five hundred years and more,

only just now felt a free volition for a better seat. Wherefore thou

didst feel the earthquake, and hear the pious spirits through the

Mountain giving praise to that Lord, who—may He speed them upward

soon!”

[1] The religion, the sacred rule, of the Mountain admits nothing that

is not ordained and customary.

[2] Whatever happens here is occasioned only by the direct influences

of the heavens.

[3] Iris = the rainbow, seen now to the west, now to the east.

[4] Dry vapor, according to Aristotle, was the source of wind and of

earthquake.

[5] Until the soul is wholly purified from its sinful disposition,it

desires the punishment through; which its purification is accomplished,

as it had originally desired the object of its sin. But when it becomes

pure, then the will possesses it to mount to Heaven, and becomes

effective.

Thus he said to us, and since one enjoys drinking in proportion as the

thirst is great, I could not say how much he did me good. And the sage

Leader, “Now I see the net which snares you here, and how it is

unmeshed; wherefore it trembles here; and for what ye rejoice together.

Now who thou wast may it please thee that I know, and that from thy

words I learn why for so many centuries thou hast lain here?” “At the

time when the good Titus, with the aid of the Most High King, avenged

the wounds wherefrom issued the blood sold by Judas, I was fatuous

enough on earth with the name which lasts longest, and honors most,”[1]

replied that spirit, “but not as yet with faith. So sweet was my vocal

spirit, that me of Toulouse Rome drew to itself, where I deserved to

adorn my temples with myrtle. Statius the people still on earth name

me. I sang of Thebes, and then of the great Achilles, but I fell on the

way with my second load.[2] Seed of my ardor were the sparks that

warmed me of the divine flame whereby more than a thousand have been

kindled; I speak of the Aeneid, which was mother to me, and was my

nurse in poesy: without it I balanced not the weight of a drachm; and

to have lived yonder, when Virgil lived, I would agree to one sun more

than I owe for my issue from ban.”[3]

[1] The name of Poet.

[2] Statius died before completing his Achilleid.

[3] A year more in Purgatory than is due for my punishment.

These words turned Virgil to me with a look which, silent, said, “Be

silent:” but the power that wills cannot do everything; for smiles and

tears are such followers on the emotion from which each springs, that

in the most truthful they least follow the will. I merely smiled, like

a man who makes a sign; whereat the shade became silent, and looked at

me in the eyes where the expression is most fixed. And it said, “So

mayst thou in good complete so great a labor, why aid thy face just now

display to me a flash of a smile?” Now am I caught on one side and the

other: one bids me be silent, the other conjures me to speak; wherefore

I sigh and am understood by my Master, and “Have no fear to speak,” he

said to me, “but speak, and tell him what he asks so earnestly.”

Whereon I, “Perhaps thou marvellest, ancient spirit, at the smile I

gave; but I would have more wonder seize thee. This one who guides my

eyes on high is that Virgil from whom thou didst derive the strength to

sing of men and of the gods. If thou didst believe other cause for my

smile, dismiss it as untrue, and believe it to be those words which

thou saidst of him.” Already he was stooping to embrace the feet of my

Leader, but he said to him, “Brother, do it not, for thou art a shade,

and thou seest a shade.” And he rising, “Now canst thou comprehend the

sum of the love that warms me to thee when I forget our vanity,

treating the shades as if a solid thing.”[1]

[1] Sordello and Virgil (Canto VI.) embraced each other. The shades

could thus express their mutual affection. Perhaps it is out of modesty

that Virgil here represses Statius, and possibly there may be the under

meaning that an act of reverence is not becoming from a soul redeemed,

to one banned in eternal exile.

CANTO XXII.

Ascent to the Sixth Ledge.—Discourse of Statius and Virgil.—Entrance to

the Ledge: the Gluttonous.—The Mystic Tree.—Examples of Temperance.

Already was the Angel left behind us,—the Angel who had turned us to

the sixth round,—having erased a stroke[1] from my face; and he had

said to us that those who have their desire set on justice are Beati,

and his words ended with sitiunt, without the rest.[2] And I, more

light than through the other passes, was going on so that without any

labor I was following upward the swift spirits, when Virgil began,

“Love kindled by virtue always kindles another, provided that its flame

appear outwardly; wherefore from the hour when amid us Juvenal

descended into the limbo of Hell, and made known to me thy affection,

my own good will toward thee was such that more never bound one to an

unseen person; so that these stairs will now seem short to me. But tell

me (and as a friend pardon me, if too great confidence let loose my

rein, and as a friend now talk with me) boxy avarice could find a place

within thy breast, amid wisdom so great as that wherewith through thy

diligence thou wast filled?”

[1] The fifth P.

[2] The Angel had not recited all the words of the Beatitude, but only,

“Blessed are they which do thirst after righteousness,” contrasting

this thirst with the thirst for riches.

These words first moved Statius a little to smiling; then he replied,

“Every word of thine is a dear sign to me of love. Truly oftentimes

things have such appearance that they give false material for

suspicion, because the true reasons lie hid. Thy question assures me of

thy belief, perhaps because of that circle where I was, that I was

avaricious in the other life; know then that avarice was too far

removed from me, and this want of measure thousands of courses of the

moon have punished. And had it not been that I set right my care, when

I understood the passage where thou dost exclaim, as if indignant with

human nature, “O cursed hunger of gold, to what dost thou not impel the

appetite of mortals?”[1] I, rolling, should share the dismal jousts.[2]

Then I perceived that the bands could spread their wings too much in

spending; and I repented as well of that as of my other sins. How many

shall rise with cropped hair[3] through ignorance, which during life

and in the last hours prevents repentance for this sin! And know, that

the vice which rebuts any sin with direct opposition,[4] together with

it here dries up its verdure. Wherefore if to purify myself I have been

among the people who lament their avarice, because of its contrary this

has befallen me.” “Now when thou wast singing[5]the cruel strife of the

twofold affliction[6] of Jocasta,” said the Singer of the Bucolic

songs, “it does not appear from that which Clio touches[7] with thee

there,[8] that the faith, without which good works suffice not, had yet

made thee faithful. If this be so, what sun, or what candles dispersed

thy darkness so that thou didst thereafter set thy sails behind the

Fisherman?”[9] And he to him, “Thou first directedst me toward

Parnassus to drink in its grots, and then, on the way to God, thou

enlightenedst me. Thou didst like him, who goes by night, and carries

the light behind him, and helps not himself, but makes the persons

following him wise, when thou saidst, ‘The ages are renewed; Justice

returns, and the primeval time of man, and a new progeny descends from

heaven.’[10] Through thee I became a poet, through thee a Christian.

But in order that thou mayst better see that which I sketch, I will

stretch out my hand to color it. Already was the whole world teeming

with the true belief, sown by the messengers of the eternal realm; and

these words of thine touched upon just now were in harmony with the new

preachers, wherefore I adopted the practice of visiting them. They came

to me then appearing so holy, that, when Domitian persecuted them, not

without my tears were their lamentings. And so long as I remained on

earth I succored them; and their upright customs made me scorn all

other sects. And before I had led the Greeks to the rivers of Thebes in

my verse, I received baptism; but out of fear I was a secret Christian,

for a long while making show of paganism: and this lukewarmness made me

circle round the fourth circle,[11] longer than to the fourth century.

Thou, therefore, that didst lift for me the covering that was hiding

from me such great good as I say, while we have remainder of ascent,

tell me where is our ancient Terence, Caecilius, Plautus, and Varro, if

thou knowest it; tell me if they are damned, and in what region?”

“They, and Persius, and I, and many others,” replied my Leader, “are

with that Greek whom the Muses suckled more than any other ever, in the

first girdle of the blind prison. Oftentimes we discourse of the

mountain[12] that hath our nurses[13] always with itself. Euripides is

there with us, and Antiphon, Simonides, Agathon, and many other Greeks

who of old adorned their brows with laurel. There of thine own

people[14] are seen Antigone, Deiphile, and Argia, and Ismene sad[15]

even as she was. There she is seen who showed Langia;[16] there is the

daughter of Tiresias and Thetis,[17] and Deidamia with her sisters.”

[1] Quid non mortalia peetora yogis,

Auri sacra fames?

Aeneid. iii. 56-57.

[2] I should be in Hell among the prodigals rolling heavy weights and

striking them against those rolled by the avaricious. See Hell, Canto

VII.

[3] A reference to the symbolic short hair of prodigals in Hell.

[4] As, for instance, avarice and prodigality.

[5] In the Thebaid.

[6] Eteocles and Polynices, the two sons of Jocasta. See Hell, Canto

XXVI.

[7] On her lyre.

[8] From the general course of thy poems.

[9] St. Peter.